Sirius's Top Ten
Sorry it took so long for the new chapter!! I'm just finishing off school, and then I'll be a lot better about new chapters. Another apology – Valentines Day will be in the next chapter, it didn't fit in this one.
Thanks to everyone for their fabulous reviews: Angul-gurl, TeenTypist, James-Padfoot, sweet-baby-angel182, Jen Riddle, bBy x jUjUbee, tayto08 – you rock my world! Keep reviewing!!!
Chapter 18: Hate to Leave You Hanging
"STUPEFY!"
Lily's eyes widened as Oliver screamed, his wand pointed at Sirius. Immediately Sirius's limbs went rigid, and he fell to the floor. Belinda was clutching Lily's arm in terror, and Lily was fumbling for her wand, which she had put back in her pocket.
"Oliver! What the hell – " Belinda began, looking at her boyfriend in a mixture of surprise, disbelief, and disgust.
"CRUCIO!" A Death Eater screamed, silencing Belinda, who doubled over in pain. Lily sat in shock for only a few seconds, before gently pulling Belinda's crippled form behind Professor Binns' desk, not that it would give much protection. In order that she didn't touch Belinda and cause her more pain, Lily had dragged her by gripping onto her shoes, and now that they were behind the desk, Lily was able to straighten her out slightly and stole a peek from behind the desk.
Dumbledore and the five or so Aurors were duelling with the Death Eaters, Dumbledore with a cold look in his eyes that caused shivers to run down Lily's spine. Duelling tactics were amazing – both the Aurors and Death Eaters were firing and blocking spells at a rapid pace, almost like a dance. Two Death Eaters lay on the floor, knocked out or in a body bind curse, Sirius was still lying flat on the floor, and Oliver had been hit by some spell, and was unconscious.
The window of the classroom was then shattered by one of the remaining Death Eaters throwing a history text through the window, and the remaining five Death Eaters abandoned their duels to fling themselves out the window. It reminded Lily very much of the action films muggles made, where the hero would fling him or herself out the window right before something exploded.
"Accio, broom!" each of the Death Eaters called as they plummeted toward the ground. Five brooms appeared from somewhere in the Forbidden Forest, and the Death Eaters grasped them, before flying off into the distance, far enough away from Hogwarts so that they could apparate.
"Damn!" One of the Aurors swore, nursing a deep cut across his forehead as he did so.
"At least we got two." Another reasoned, gesturing to the two crippled forms that lay on the floor. "Even if they're Malfoys, they'll have problems getting out of this one."
"Ms. Evans?" Dumbledore asked in a cheerful tone, startling Lily, who had been watching the scene unfold intently. He was standing over her now, looking somewhat amused at how she, and Belinda were hiding beneath the desk.
"Professor Dumbledore! I…" Lily stuttered, unable to complete her sentence, or even begin an explanation as it dawned on her. I disobeyed direct orders not to leave the tower. He's going to expel me!
"Would you mind accompanying me to Professor Binns's office? I have a few questions concerning tonight's events." Dumbledore offered a friendly, reassuring smile. "I will have Alastor Moody accompany both Mr. Black and Ms. Trafo to the hospital wing."
"Will she be okay?" Lily asked timidly.
"Ms. Trafo? Oh yes, the curse was lifted after Alastor took care of the Death Eater that performed the Cruciatus Curse." Dumbledore replied kindly.
"And Oliver?"
Dumbledore frowned softly at this. "I'm afraid his actions tonight are somewhat suspicious, so he will be questioned by the Aurors when he regains consciousness. He, too, will be fine. Now, Ms. Evans, could you?"
Dumbledore offered a hand to Lily, who took it, and pulled the dishevelled girl up from the floor. He led her into Professor Binns's office silently, before taking a seat behind the desk, and watching Lily quietly take a seat. The office was small, and bookshelves lined all the walls, making Lily feel somewhat claustrophobic.
"Why were you out of the Tower, Ms. Evans?"
"Well, I was in the Tower, and we were all just sitting there… I wanted to find Belinda and thank her for the card she sent me while I was in the hospital wing… She wasn't in the common room, so I checked her dormitory. Oliver was there, he couldn't find her either, so we left to look for her." Lily answered quietly, pausing for thought several times.
"Did Mr. Field seem very intent on leaving the Tower to find Ms. Trafo?" Dumbledore asked, offering another supportive smile.
"Not on leaving the Tower… I thought of that… He was really concerned for Belinda though." Lily replied, realizing it was probably her fault Oliver and Sirius were hurt.
A knock on the door interfered with Dumbledore asking any more questions, and before a 'come in' could be muttered, one of the Aurors, Alastor Moody strode into the room, leading a revived Sirius and Oliver behind him. Sirius looked excited, and had that mischievous glint in his eyes, whereas Oliver looked totally confused and disorientated.
"Sit down." Moody grumbled, shoving Sirius and Oliver into two chairs beside Lily that he had just conjured. He then offered a piece of parchment to Dumbledore, before retreating from the room.
"I'm sure all three of you are rather befuddled by now." Dumbledore commented as he read the parchment quickly.
"A little." Oliver admitted, feeling very awkward as Lily and Sirius glared at him.
"Well, hopefully I will be able to clear up some things. Mr. Field has been in a broom closet just outside this classroom for the past six hours, under a powerful sleeping draught. A Death Eaters, Roldolphus Lestrange, pretended to be you, Oliver, with the assistance of a Polyjuice Potion."
"So… they set it all up to get Lily?" Sirius asked incredulously.
"I am not sure. They definitely knew where Mr. Lestrange and Lily were going. Ms. Trafo has attested that Mr. Field, who evidently was actually Mr. Lestrange, locked her in the classroom, preventing her from leaving."
Oliver was silent in shock and his face pale.
"I'm so sorry, Oliver! I thought it was actually you!" Lily apologized profusely, ignoring the fact that Death Eaters had been after her, and her alone.
"It's alright…" Oliver mumbled quietly.
"Mr. Black, may I ask why you were out of bed?" Dumbledore inquired, looking at Sirius attentively. "Or how you got out of Gryffindor Tower in the first place."
Bugger. Sirius flashed an innocent smile. He would have to tell them that he and James knew. "Well, a few seconds after Lily and Oliver left, and the portrait hole was sealed, me an' James realized that Lillers was gone."
"Lillers?" Dumbledore interjected. "By that, you mean Ms. Evans?"
"Yeah. So, James panicked and searched the Tower completely, before saying he was going out looking for her. I said I was coming. We split up outside the dormitory, and he checked the upper floors while I checked the lower ones, so of course, I found Lily." Sirius explained. Maybe he won't notice I didn't explain –
"And your escape from the magically sealed Tower?"
Bugger again. "Well, back in fourth year, James and I discovered a chute that the house elves use to toss down dirty sheets and such – "
"This chute also has a spell on it to prevent non-clothing objects sliding down it." Dumbledore interjected once more, keeping his polite tone.
"Yeah, well, after we learned human transfiguration in fifth year, James just transforms us into boxer shorts and we can slide down." Sirius explained, lying through his teeth. The human transfiguration they did in fifth year was extremely basic, and he and James had only been able to accomplish this feat with the knowledge they gained when becoming Animagi.
"I see." Dumbledore replied, looking somewhat apprehensive.
"Is Belinda alright, Professor?" Lily asked, saving Sirius from a situation that she knew would probably get him into quite a bit of trouble.
"She will be fine, yes. But I now must ask that you return to your dormitories. The castle has been checked and the only remaining Death Eaters are those who've been captured. Do not speak of this event to anyone."
The three Gryffindors nodded mutely, and left the office, walking down the corridors quietly. Lily was gripping Sirius's arm nervously; it has just dawned on her that the Death Eaters were after her and even Dumbledore had no reason why.
"What do we do about James?" Lily asked quietly, not wanting to sound snobby by adding 'he's probably still looking for me.'
"I dunno, I guess – " Sirius trailed off as he caught sight of Argus Filch, the caretaker of the school, leading a tall, messy-haired boy by the collar towards the Gryffindor common room. The distance between the two groups made it impossible to hear the entirety of Filch's conversation, but Lily could distinctly pick up snippets pertaining to James's 'blatant disregard for rules' as well as several comments about James being an 'arrogant little snot' and a rhetorical question: 'think you're king a the world, Potter? You're not!'
"Sounds like you, Lillers." Sirius joked.
Lily playfully shoved Sirius, who bumped into Oliver. Oliver glared at them.
"How can you be so cheery?" Oliver asked coldly. "You just survived a Death Eater attack, you should be thankful for your lives, and you're just goofing off?"
Both Sirius and Lily were silent for a moment, before Lily managed to speak. "We're both very thankful, Oliver. But now its time to go back to our lives. We can't walk around thinking we're going to die any second… You wouldn't be living, and there would be no point to surviving in the first place."
The group was silent for a moment, but continued walking, having lost sight of Filch and James up ahead. Not liking the silence, Sirius whistled.
"Whoa, that was deep. Too deep for two in the morning, Lillers."
Lily smiled weakly, but was glad when they finally reached the portrait hole where Professor McGonagall was waiting impatiently, in her hair net and tartan dress robes, tapping her slipper-clad foot against the cold stone.
"Good morning, Professor!" Sirius chirped happily. McGonagall grunted in response and muttered an incantation quickly, allowing the portrait hole to swing open. Lily, Sirius, and Oliver quickly climbed in, and the portrait shut behind them.
The common room was empty, save for James, Remus, Cass, and Abby, who lay on the couches by the fireplace, all dishevelled and asleep. Sirius grinned, retrieving his wand and muttering 'Wingardium Leviosa' and levitating James and Remus's sleeping forms off the couch. Lily followed suit, and both were soon navigating their friends up the stairwells.
"Lillers?" Sirius called softly from the landing of the fifth year boys' dormitory.
"Yeah?" Lily called back, peeking her head out the door and inadvertently knocking Cass's head on the doorframe.
Sirius winced. "Be careful with the cargo there."
"What do you want?"
"Happy Valentines Day!"
Lily smiled. "It's in a week still, but you too, Sirius."
As soon as Lily had levitated Cass into her bed and Abby into Lily's bed with her, Lily's head dropped to the pillow in exhaustion. Sirius, on the other hand, thought it would be much more fun to return the sleeping forms of James and Remus to the common room, take their wands, and hand them on the chandelier by their boxer shorts. But even Sirius Black eventually gets tired, and so after chuckling to himself for a few moments, he too went to bed.
"LILY! WAKE UP!" A voice called desperately from the common room, waking Lily and sending the common room into a fit of giggles. Lily groaned and glanced at the watch Cass had given her last Christmas. It was only seven twenty, she'd only had about five hours of sleep.
Pulling her messy curls into a ponytail, and putting on a bra under her pyjama top, Lily strode down into the common room to see what the fuss was. Cass and Abby were already down there, their faces bright red with laughter.
"LILY!" the voice, which Lily recognized as James's roared again. Lily frowned and glanced upwards in the direction of the source. She doubled over as she saw James and Remus, looking extremely uncomfortable, hanging by their boxer shorts on the chandelier. It seemed Sirius had been kind enough to put some type of stretching charm to prevent any 'damage', but the boys were definitely trapped.
"Morning James." Lily smiled pleasantly. Sirius joined the girls and swung his arm around Lily, quite pleased she wasn't helping them down right away.
"LILS!" James roared. "HELP US DOWN!!"
"Well, actually, James, I need to get down to breakfast. I'm really tired, it'll take me awhile – "
"LILY! ANYONE! PLEASE!" Remus interrupted her, looking pleadingly at the three girls.
Lily smiled mischievously and looked to her friends. "Breakfast, anyone?"
"Hate to leave you hanging boys, but the food calls!" Sirius added.
The entire common room broke into laughter, and began filing out the portrait hole, leaving behind a very distraught James and Remus. Lily and Sirius led the group, Sirius's arm still swung around Lily's shoulders.
"Sirius, I need your help."
"With what, Lily-love?" Sirius replied, grinning.
"A prank." Lily muttered quickly.
"A prank?" Sirius looked at Lily in mixture of disbelief and excitement.
"On the Slytherins. For what they did at the Quidditch game."
"Oh right! Got any ideas?"
"Actually…" Lily's voice dropped another level and she moved closer to Sirius so he could hear, but even so, Sirius was surprised he could hear her. Finishing her plan, she pulled away from him, and waited expectantly.
"Bloody brilliant, Lillers." Sirius offered with a smile and a look of awe.
"So, you'll help me then?"
"Definitely."
"Perfect."
"What's perfect?" Cass interrupted, leaving a delusional Abby behind her and joining the pair.
"Oh, life in general." Lily offered randomly.
"Well, actually…" Sirius corrected, "It's not. There's the thing that happened last night, Abby and Remus, the fact that James's birthday is in about a month and we haven't planned what to do, Valentines Day is in a week, You-Know-Who…"
"Since when are you such a downer, Sirius?" Lily frowned.
"Yeah?" Cass agreed. "Where's the goofy, idiotic Sirius we all know and love?"
"Just stating the facts!" Sirius defended, before a wicked grin spread across his face. "Does that mean YOU love me too, Cassidy Flemmings?"
"I… err… No! It was just…" Cass faltered, and Sirius skipped ahead of the girls and began to dance and sing. In neither activity did he possess much skill.
"CASSIDY FLEMMINGS LOVES ME!!" He sang, doing a jig down the corridor. "SHE LOVES ME!"
"Shut it, Black!" Cass yelled angrily, but Sirius continued. Instinctively, Cass pulled out her wand, and muttered a levitation spell, hanging Sirius on a chandelier above, and placing a permanence charm on his pants. "Expelliarmus!"
Sirius's wand floated down to Cass, who snatched it and smiled smugly. "Hate to leave you hanging, Black, but 'the food calls!'" Cass called, imitating Sirius almost perfectly.
With a few more laughs from the crowd, the Gryffindors set off for breakfast again, leaving Sirius hanging on the chandelier, in a similar position to his two best mates. Seeing no other way to spend the time until a teacher saved him, Sirius began to sing again.
"CASSIDY FLEMMINGS LOVES ME!" echoed through the corridors, eventually reaching Cass, Lily, and Abby right before they entered the Great Hall. Abby and Lily laughed, and Cass grimaced.
"Stupid prat won't shut up." Cass muttered staring daggers in Sirius's general direction.
"Do you want him to?" Abby asked slyly.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Cass asked incredulously.
Her two friends smiled before also breaking out into song. "CASSIDY FLEMMINGS LOVES SIRIUS BLACK!!"
Cass's face contorted into a frown, before sweeping away from her friends and into the Great Hall. She shook her head as she sat down at the Gryffindor table. Whether Sirius had intended for her to take him seriously or not, his words entered her thoughts. Me, in love with Sirius? The whole school's gone to the nuthouse.
Coming up:
- What will Valentines Day bring?- What sort of prank are Lily and Sirius planning?
- What's up with Abby?
- HAS Hogwarts gone to the nuthouse?