Disclaimer: Not mine, nothing's mine. You know the drill.
In this first section, the italics are what Sirius is thinking, he's not saying it out loud. Likewise, later on the bold is what they're writing to each other.
Chapter 13- Mysteries
"D'you think I could wear that color?" Morgan pointed to flowing light blue robes in the window of Madam Malkin's. "Usually people with dark hair can't wear light blue, but I've always thought it rather compliments me."
"Uh-" Sirius was remembering why he did not generally go to Diagon Alley with his cousin. She became annoyingly female when shopping, and he had no inclination to be her fashion consultant. He shrugged. "I don't know, you usually look okay."
"Oh stop, I'm blushing."
But he didn't seem to hear her, instead he was squinting against the sun across the street.
"Is that….HEY! JULIET!"
Juliet Mason turned from where she was standing in front of the apothecary, looking for who had shouted her name. She saw him, and smiled.
"Hold on a sec." He said to Morgan, and jogged across the street to talk to her, as he drew even with her, he merely said "Hey."
"Hey yourself." Her voice was neutral, not happy to see him, but not unhappy either.
And he realized he had come sprinting across the street as though on a mission to speak to her, when in actuality he had nothing to say. He racked his brain for the right opening remark that was sure to lead to a lengthy and fascinating conversation on something he knew loads about so he could sound insightful. He was at a loss. Come on, say something witty and clever. Clever… think…. what would be something clever to say? Right, I've been thinking too long… just say something… anything… it doesn't have to be clever. Dear Merlin how long am I going to stand here goggling at her silently? Say something! Something! ANYTHING!
"So nice weather, huh?"
I am a complete and utter idiot.
"Yes, it's gotten a bit cooler." She seemed puzzled by his strange behavior.
"So, um, what are you up to?"
Would someone just hit me with Avada Kedavra and put me out of my misery?
"Oh, just some shopping…" She gestured vaguely to the bags she was holding. "For some things…"
"Oh, right…."
******
Morgan was torn between annoyance and amusement as she watched Sirius gawp wordlessly at Juliet Mason, wondering why he had suddenly turned into a blundering idiot.
"I thought he was supposed to be good with women." Said a voice behind her. She turned to find Evan Marakiv leaning in a doorway. "But this is kind of like watching a broom accident. You want to turn away, and yet you can't."
"It's always been a mystery to me too." She replied.
"He seems quite smitten with her."
She frowned. "Sirius doesn't get smitten. And certainly not with her."
"What's wrong with her? She was in Ravenclaw, she must be halfway intelligent. And she's hot."
"Evan!"
"What? She is. You're not the only pretty girl in the world."
Sirius seemed to be doing a bit better, at least in that he was forming sentences. And Juliet was laughing even, she placed a hand on his chest to push him playfully, but then left it there. Morgan scowled and said something in a foreign language that did not sound at all ladylike.
"Pardon?"
"She is blatantly flirting with him."
Evan clasped his hands together in mock horror. "What? A single woman flirting with a single man? That bitch!"
"She's barely single, she's been widowed for like, a week. She's certainly not in a position to be throwing herself at him in public."
"A week….three months, who's counting? Besides, he doesn't appear to be discouraging her."
She had to admit that he certainly was not, and then turned away from the scene briskly. Who Sirius was lately attempting to get into bed was none of her concern, even if she did think someone so recently widowed was a little tasteless, she was certainly not going to say as much to Evan. Besides, she had been hoping to run into him, even thinking to owl him, she wanted to know if he had heard anything else from whoever it was he talked to, about the supposed spy in Auror headquarters. Morgan had mentally gone through everyone who worked there and there was not one of them she could imagine as a spy.
"I've been meaning to ask you-" He immediately tensed, guessing where she was going. "Have you heard anything more? About what you told me?"
He glanced around, and shook his head. "Keep your voice down. No, I told them I was not going to bring messages anymore anyway."
"Evan, couldn't you-"
"No! I don't know how deeply embroiled in all of this you are McCarrick, but I suspect it's more deeply than you let on. I also don't know how to make it clear to you that I do not wish to be involved. If you want anymore information you'll have to ask Snape yourself." He spat. She blinked at him. He obviously had let that slip without meaning to
"Snape? It was Snape?" She muttered, ignoring that Evan looked furious with himself.
"Now Morgan…"
"No, of course, that makes perfect sense…"
"Don't tell any- Oh Hell…"
He sighed, glaring viciously at something over her shoulder. She turned and saw Sirius had left Juliet and was striding back to them, looking murderous.
"Oh Hell."
******
When Lily came in the room, James was sitting at an antique desk, deeply absorbed in reading. She watched him for a few moments, noting the dark smudges under his eyes, and then he yawned as she snuck up behind him and draped her arms around his neck.
"Whatcha doin?"
"Trying to figure something out….I know it can be done….similar spell to what we did with the map……might need you to do the charm, you're better at them….." He was muttering to himself. Books and papers were spread out on the desk. James rolled his shoulder slightly, as though he was stiff, and she began massaging them, still leaning over him and looking at the mess on the desk.
"Could you be a little more…..specific?"
"Well, I'm trying to figure out a way for us to communicate, besides owls. There's a way you can enchant pieces of parchment so that if you write on them, the people who have the others can see what you're writing. Sort of like a letter, only it's immediate. Sirius and I tried to do it once in school, to use during detentions, but we never quite figured it out. It's a pretty complicated charm." He sighed and leaned his head back, closing his eyes.
"This would be more easily accomplished in bed." She remarked, meaning the massage, not the charm. James opened his eyes and raised an eyebrow suggestively, then grabbed her arm and pulled her around into his lap.
"I can think of some other things that could be more easily accomplished in bed. Shall I suggest a few?"
She smiled. "How about sleeping? That's what you really need."
He frowned. "That's not what I had in mind. Perhaps you missed the innuendo. I was suggesting-"
"I think even the furniture got your meaning James, subtle though it was…but I was serious, you look exhausted."
"Uh-huh." He twisted his fingers through her hair. "You're very pretty."
"James, what about the charm?" She was teasing him now.
"Tomorrow." He said absently, occupied with a very different goal now. "We'll figure it out tomorrow."
******
When Alice sat down at her desk the next day, there was a piece of parchment rolled up on it, tied with a ribbon. Curious, she untied it, and stared, now entirely puzzled, at a piece of blank parchment. Why in the world would someone leave a blank piece of parchment on her desk? As she was about to toss it aside, letters began to appear, as though an invisible hand was writing on it. She choked on her coffee as the blank piece of parchment addressed her.
Hello Alice.
She scooted her chair a little way back, looking around to see if anyone noticed. She looked back at it as more writing appeared.
Don't worry, it's me, James.
She raised a skeptical eyebrow.
No, really, stand up, I'm waving at you.
She stood up, so she could see over the edge of the cubicles. Sure enough, James was standing up as well, waving merrily. She sat back down and picked up her quill hesitantly.
Alice: Can you see this? How does it work?
James: Lily's idea, so we can communicate without anyone knowing. Lily and Frank have one too, after all it's not like we can just shout back and forth about Order-related things, right?
Lily: It was actually James's idea, I just did the charm.
James: I often had a use for such things in school.
Frank: You mean detention. Have we figured anything out about the Department of Mysteries? I'm not sure what goes on down there.
Alice: Well, that's the "mystery" part. Otherwise they'd call it "The Department of Stuff Everyone Already Knows About".
Frank: Funny, you're funny. But I'd imagine it will be hard to get into, I mean that it will likely take more than flashing some cleavage at an eighteen-year-old.
(The story of Lily's undercover job had been circulated quickly among the members of the Order, to great amusement, and Gideon and Fabian were responsible for exaggerating it to such an extent that popular belief was that she had practically done a striptease right there in the hallway. She'd taken endless teasing about it.)
Lily: I'm going to be the adult here and not respond to that. Maybe we should ask Dumbledore before we go charging into the Department of Mysteries.
James: He's got enough going on, we can't go running to him with every problem. I say we just go down there and have a look around. It can't be that hard to get in. If we came back at night nobody would be about.
Frank: I agree with James. We can just take a look and decide where to go from there.
James: Tonight then?
******
Morgan slammed the door of Sirius's apartment to announce her arrival. Nobody was there but she could hear the water running.
"Who's that?" He called out.
"It's me." She called back.
"I'll be out in a few minutes."
She sat down on his couch, picked up a quidditch magazine, glanced at a few pages without seeing them, and tossed it aside. She had been agitated and restless lately, and she knew why. There was a lot on her mind- her Auror training was nearing the end so she actually had to start thinking about the qualification tests. They would be enough to be nervous about, but then she had the Order to think about. And although she was trying to focus on work, always at the back of her mind, pulling at the edges, was what was going on…and she wasn't even sure what that was…with Remus. And when she did think about it, her heart would skip just a half a beat. She never would have imagined, in all the years she had known him, that he could kiss like that. She blushed just remembering it, and maybe if all of their friends didn't have such bloody awful timing they could figure out what was going on between them. But in order to do that she had to figure out what she wanted-
"What are you doing here?" Sirius emerged, his hair was still damp.
"Are you going out?" She asked curiously.
"Why do you ask?"
"Why don't you answer?"
"Why don't you mind your own business?"
"You're going out with Juliet, aren't you?"
His pause, which was just a split second too long, was her answer.
"Morgan, how about I stay out of your personal life and you stay out of mine?"
"See, that might work if you actually did stay out of mine, but you don't. Seriously, are you going out with Juliet?"
"We're having dinner. It's not a "date" kind of thing, I just think she might need friends just now."
It sounded perfectly reasonable, but she frowned. "Evan thinks she's pretty."
"Evan is a jackass."
"So you don't think she's pretty?"
"Of course I think she's pretty. She's beautiful." He saw the trap he had easily walked into.
"Ha! You do like her!"
He shrugged, looking embarrassed. "I'm just trying to be friendly, I'm not putting moves on her. Really."
"I don't like it. I mean, it just seems kind of soon for her to be dating. When you think about her reaction to Rob's death, when everyone thought she was going crazy. She's bounced back and hit the whole dating scene pretty soon, don't you think?"
He shrugged.
"I'm just saying be careful. Who knows what she's thinking?"
"I'm not trying to get into her head. I just like to talk to her."
"And not even much of that." She laughed, thinking of the scene in Diagon Alley.
He groaned. "Don't remind me, it was bad enough living through it once."
******
She read the memo without really seeing it. There was no point to all the paperwork, but she did it without complaining. In fact, the Ministry thought she was one of the best Aurors they had, all of her superiors, even Crouch, had commented on her dedication, her drive, her complete focus on fighting Voldemort. Nobody imagined, even for a second, that she was actually his servant, that she was actually betraying the Ministry to him.
It was not hard, either, with most of the Aurors being as incompetent as they were. Crouch was no manager, and he was terrified. The older Aurors- Barnes, Downing, Paul and Alec Kelly, were beyond his control. The younger ones- the Potters, the Longbottoms, the Prewetts, seemed oddly uninterested. She felt like there was something going on among them that was not attached to the Ministry. Common sense told her it had to do with the meeting at Avalon, but despite having their trust, they were remarkably closed about that. Voldemort was getting frustrated with her inability to find out what had gone on. But she had found a way around that, and it just might turn out to be fun.
She finished the memo, and remembered she meant to get some notes on it from Lily Evans. She walked up behind Lily's desk, and was about to tap the woman's shoulder, when she saw a strange thing. Lily was writing on a piece of parchment, and it seemed to be writing back to her. From where she stood, the words were just visible.
Lily: I'm going to be the adult here and not respond to that. Maybe we should ask Dumbledore before we go charging into the Department of Mysteries.
James: He's got enough going on, we can't go running to him with every problem. I say we just go down there and have a look around. It can't be that hard to get in. If we came back at night nobody would be about.
Frank: I agree with James. We can just take a look and decide where to go from there.
James: Tonight then?
She stared. She could not believe what she was seeing. Slowly and silently, she backed away from Lily's desk. Absorbed in the parchment, Lily had not seen her there. She quickly went back to her desk, her mind racing. She had to go immediately to see the Dark Lord. She must tell him, there was a danger, but also an opportunity…they were going to try to break into the Department of Mysteries that very night.
******
James and Lily stayed late at the Ministry under the guise of working. Slowly, people began to leave. Crouch was the last one to leave, and he complimented them on their dedication and told them not to stay too late. They promptly told Frank and Alice it was safe, and they apparated, along with Morgan, who had long since demanded not to be left out. James had told she could have no part of it because she was not yet an Auror, but she had insisted that she was just as prepared, and that she was a member of the Order after all. In the end, she had simply worn them down. She wanted to see what they did down there in the Department of Mysteries. Another wand was always helpful anyway.
The Ministry was deserted as they took the elevator all the way down. They came off the elevator into a hall that was very different from the noisy and chaotic Auror headquarters where they worked. It was dark, silent, and still. The walls were bare, there were no windows. Lily shivered, and looked to James, who gripped his wand.
"Let's go."
They knew there were security guards who patrolled the Ministry at night, but Lily could not imagine anyone would come down here at night, alone. It was too eerie. They approached the door cautiously, waiting for something to happen, waiting for an alarm to go off or for a guard to surprise them. There was nothing. They all exchanged glances, and then James shrugged and reached for the doorknob. The last thing he expected was for it to merely swing open, but it did.
The room they stepped into was large and circular, and entirely black, with a series of doors along the wall. They paused, looking around, as Frank closed the door softly behind them. And then, the room began to spin. Morgan gave a little shriek, Lily seized James's arm, but then the room slid to a stop.
"We don't know which door to leave by now." Said Frank, unnecessarily, for they all saw that.
"Um, well, let's just pick one, shall we?" More confidently than he felt, James strode to a door and opened it.
They were at the top of stairs that led down some twenty feet into the center of the room. In the center of the room was a dais on which stood a stone archway with a curtain hung from it. It was strangely cold in the room.
"I don't like this place." Said Morgan, stopping in the doorway. "Let's go, we shouldn't go in here."
She looked deadly pale.
"She's right, it's dangerous. Don't James, come back."
He was halfway down the stairs, but Lily gripped his arm and pulled him back. "This isn't what we're looking for, let's get out of here."
He wasn't so sure, he wanted to stay, he wanted to study the curtain that undulated slightly, he felt drawn to it. But Lily and Frank were pulling him away, and Alice closed that door resolutely behind her. She chose another. Pulling open a door to a room that seemed to glitter. There were clocks, clocks everywhere, dazzling their eyes. They spread out around the room, enchanted. At the far end was a bell jar that sent brilliant light around the room. Lily seemed enchanted by this, until Morgan shouted from a corner, where she was leaning over a desk.
"Here! Come here, I've found something that's to do with Claremont! It's got his signature." Morgan called out. Lily joined her. "It's some kind of diagram. It's to do with….time?"
"Yes, it something about manipulating time, isn't this a time turner? I've heard of them, but I've never seen one before.."
"McCarrick, you clever child, do put that down before you see anything you shouldn't."
They all froze at a silky voice.
James slowly turned, as did Lily and Morgan.
Black robed figures, six of them, had entered the room behind them unseen because they had been so intent upon the various wonders there. Death Eaters had trapped them inside the Department of Mysteries.
James knew they should wait until they were sure of where everyone was, but Morgan, for all her training, was not so disciplined, and threw a "Stupefy!" at the one nearest to her. Although it had the desired effect on him, it started hexes flying.
"Reducto!" James knocked down several desks, blocking their way into the room.
"Go, GO!" They scrambled for the nearest door, knocking into desks and clocks. They could not leave the way they had come in but there must be another way out. A Death Eater advanced on Morgan, who was cut off from them by a row of desks, but she was laughing.
"Oh really MacNair, I could curse you when I was fifteen, do you really think…" She was easily blocking his curses, almost lazily, but she did not see that the Death Eater she had stunned was moving again.
Lily saw him first, and started to turn, but not before he cried "Impedimentia!" and Lily collapsed.
"Lily!" James scrambled over a desk, to get to her, calling "Morgan! Behind you!"
She turned, but too late. Ignoring magic altogether, the Death Eater grabbed a clock off the desk nearest them and swung it, clipping Morgan in the back of the head. She slumped to the floor, completely unconscious.
Letting themselves be distracted by this was their fatal mistake.
"EXPELLIARMUS!"
Their wands flew from their hands, and they were left unarmed as Lucius Malfoy's smooth voice came again. "You have been busy, oh yes. The Dark Lord is most interested in hearing what you've been doing. But I'm afraid I cannot have you fighting me all the way, I shall have to keep you under control. Petrificus Totalus!"
_____________________________
This chapter is eh-eh, but it's leading to important stuff, which will be delayed since I am going to London (doing London dance). Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!
And to certain people (coughSusancough) who think James is "too moody to the point if being PMS-y". I've always thought that BOTH James and Lily were probably rather tempermental, passionate, volatile people. Just my take. Don't worry, Lily will have her drama queen moments too…..Just wait until she's pregnant……