Yes I am sorry to all of you who expected a longer chapter last time. Especially you Jinger. But I really am not sure where I'm going with this, so I want to take it little by little for a bit. Hopefully this is longer. And Jinger if you want to contact me by email (or any of you for that matter) to help me with ideas for developing my plot (I'll tell you where I want to go- you help me get there) my email address is iluvdraco4eva at yahoo dot com. Simple enough.

And about the Secret Keeper ordeal. Let me explain. Okay, Sirius is James's best friend. So naturally, James would want to pick Sirius for his Secret Keeper, right? But that would be too easy because Voldemort would guess that James would pick his best friend. Voldemort would think that James is going to pick Peter because Sirius is too obvious. So James then picks Sirius because Voldemort thinks he's going to pick Peter. Got it? Let me know if you don't.

So here's the next chapter!

Immediately the next morning at breakfast, Peter got an owl back from Voldemort.

It is very fortunate that I can get my information from you. Now we have to plan how to kill the both of them. Do you have any more information for me?

Yes, scrawled back Peter furtively while his friends talked. They're using the Fidelius Charm to hide. Sirius Black is their Secret Keeper.

He reattached the note and sent the bird back.

"Who was that from, Wormtail?" asked Remus.

"My mum," replied Peter without hesitation.

Remus nodded and returned to his conversation.

Peter sighed and glanced at James and Lily.

What wouldn't he give to not be doing this?

Anything but his life.

(James' POV)

In the week before Christmas, I sought out Sirius to have a little chat with him.

"Padfoot, man," I began. "I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. Lily and I are having this baby. I'm so excited, but I don't want her to regret that she wasn't married. So dude you have to help me get this proposal straight. I want it to be a Christmas present."

Sirius just burst out laughing hysterically.

"What could be so funny about this?" I cried desperately.

"You take this so Jamesly!" he laughed. "It's funny to watch!"

"Whatever," I said. "Then I'll just ask Remus."

"No, no! I'll help!" he objected. "Because the thing is, I want to propose to Kemmy too."

"Then we'll go ring-shopping together!" I said with a lisp, flipping my too-short-for-a-girl hair and pretending to be gay.

"Okay!" joined in Sirius. "Let's go!"

"Now?" I asked.

"Christmas is next week, if you haven't noticed yet," he said. "And what else is there to do on a boring Saturday afternoon?"

"Okay, then let me go tell Lily."

"Go tell her you're buying the ring?" cried Sirius in outrage.

"No, you idiot, just telling her that I'm leaving."

"I'm coming with you."

We found Lily up in Kemmy's space in the Gryffindor girls' dormitory. We eavesdropped on them for a bit before stepping in.

"Oh my god, Lils, I still can't believe that you're having a baby!"

"I know!" Lily squealed. "I love James so much!"

I felt a pleasant squirm in my stomach.

"Too bad Narcissa isn't here for all of this..."

"I miss her so much," sighed Lily. "Do you think she knows?"

"Hun, the whole school knows."

"Lucius is such an ass," Lily announced. "It's just an atrocity. Kem, I think you've painted my whole toe red."

"Boo!" said Sirius and I, jumping in at that moment.

Kemmy dropped the nail polish bottle and screamed.

"Are you trying to kill the poor baby?!" gasped Lily, one hand to her heart and the other to her stomach.

"Of course not," I replied. "Just wanted to tell you that we're going to Hogsmeade for a bit."

"Okay, honey, see you at dinner. Love you!"

"Love you too!" called Sirius and I behind our shoulders.

(General POV)

Narcissa lay trembling on her bed in the Slytherin dorms. Lucius stood over her dangerously in nothing but boxers.

"When I tell you we're going to make love, you do it!" he shouted, gray eyes ablaze. "You do what I want. Do you understand?"

There was no option to that answer. It had to be yes.

She nodded her head obediently and more tears spilled out anew.

"I said do it, godammit! Take off your clothes! Now!"

Slowly she began to take off her shirt.

"Faster!" barked Lucius. He raised his hand and dealt her a back-hand slap. Her cheek immediately turned red and began to swell.

"Lucius, stop!" she cried. "I'll go faster! Anything! I love you!"

Lucius put his hand down, apparently satisfied.

She quickly deposited the rest of her clothing, quite embarrassed at the prospect of being naked in front of Lucius.

He grew hard at the sight of her right away and approached her with lust in his eyes, slipping off his remaining garment.

Lucius reached out to touch Narcissa but she turned her head away.

"Please, Lucius, not now," she sobbed with the last of her strength.

" 'Not now, not now,'" he mocked. "You've been saying that for weeks. Now if I can't have you normally, I'll take you by force."

Narcissa gave a little scream as Lucius plunged deeply into her, thrusting in and out.

"Lucius, stop!" she whimpered repeatedly. "Lucius, please, I don't want to do this! Lucius!"

She gave her last scream as Lucius climaxed and fell to the bed in exhaustion.

Narcissa pulled on her clothes and ran, ran as fast as she could, ran just for running, not knowing where she was going at all.

(Lily's POV)

When Kemmy finished painting my nails red, I did hers gold (this was all for the Quidditch game the next day versus Hufflepuff- the game decided who would play Slytherin in the championship in the spring).

"So what are you doing for James for Christmas?" she asked me.

"I'm not quite sure on this yet, but I think I'm going to make-"

At this point, Narcissa DuBois herself ran into our room, crying and looking quite battered with a red welt on her cheek.

"Oh my god!" Kemmy and I gasped, going to Narcissa. "Narcissa, what happened?!"

"Don't you hate me?" she cried.

"No, of course we don't!" I replied. "You can't help but being with Lucius!"

She came over and gave me a big hug. "I miss you guys," she whispered.

"Shhh…" Kemmy comforted, rubbing Narcissa's back.

"Now, tell me," I said. "Did Lucius hit you?"

"I wish that was only it." Narcissa looked down and continued in barely a voice at all, "He raped me too."

"Oh my god, Cissa, we have to get you out of this," I said, starting to cry myself.

Kemmy opened her mouth in horror. "That's awful, Cissa."

"I don't want it to happen again," she wept, still trembling. "It was awful! And what if I get pregnant? He didn't use anything!"

"You can talk to Dumbledore," I suggested.

"No, no, I don't want to get him involved. I'm fine."

"Bullshit!" I replied. "You are not fine!"

"I'm dealing with it!" she yelled.

"Then don't come crying to me!" I answered. "Go and deal with it!"

"Thanks a lot!" she screamed, and she ran out. "For nothing!" she added, slamming the door.

That was the last conversation I'd ever have with her.

(James's POV)

"A Stone's Throw Away," I said. "Fine gem dealer since 1912."

"Never been in there," said Sirius.

"What are we waiting for?" I asked.

A bell tinkled above our heads as we wiped snow off our shoes onto the rug by the door and stepped in.

"Can I help you, gentleman?" asked an older man with white hair and spectacles sliding down his nose.

"Err…" said Sirius, fiddling with his scarf.

"No thanks, we'll just be looking around for a few minutes," I said authoritatively. "Come on, let's look," I whispered then to Sirius.

We browsed through the rings, necklaces, bracelets, bangles, earrings, and all that feminine stuff. My good God, didn't they ever get tired of jewelry?

"Holy shit, it keeps going on and on and on," said Sirius, observing all the gems.

"No joke. How are we supposed to find one?"

"Are you sure you gentlemen don't want help?" inquired the elderly man again.

"Actually, yes, we do need help now," I replied. "We're both looking for engagement rings."

"Aha, you're proposing!" He smiled warmly and gave a little chuckle. "These," he said, gesturing to a beautiful diamond ring row, "are, quite obviously, our diamond rings."

"Cool," said Sirius.

"If you just want to go with the gold, now, we have even a wider assortment." This time he led us to about one hundred gold rings fashioned in different styles. "Which do you gentlemen prefer? Obviously diamond is more expensive."

"I'm not skimping on Lily," I laughed. "Definitely diamond. I do have enough money."

"Yeah," agreed Sirius. "Yeah, diamond."

"Well," the sales clerk continued, "the diamonds start at 65 galleons and go to about 450 galleons."

"How about we find one we like and then see how much it costs?" I said.

"Good idea," said Sirius.

We looked through around thirty rings. The last one just stood out as if the others were only plastic.

"Wow…" I muttered in awe.

"You said it first," whispered Sirius.

The stone glimmered and shone in the light, sending colored rays everywhere. It was set in white and yellow gold twisted around each other to form the band.

"I call it first," I immediately said.

"No I do," argued Sirius.

"No way; I saw it first," I said.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen, no fighting," he said calmly. "This is quite rare, but I do have two of this ring because of such a high demand."

"How much?" I asked.

"325 galleons," replied the man promptly.

"Ha ha, there goes my bank account," said Sirius dryly.

"Oh shut up. Don't you love her?" I asked.

"Yeah, I guess," said Sirius.

"You guess?!" I repeated.

"Just kidding, man."

"We'll both take it, then," I repeated, pulling out my Gringotts charge card.

Ten minutes we walked out of the store, ring boxes in bags in our pockets.

Christmas was approaching, and it was going to the best Christmas ever.

hr

That's all for now! I bet you're so proud because it was longer than usual! Oh yeah! Woo hoo! Well here's a site for you to convert galleons and US dollars just so you can get a feel for how much they really spent. 325 galleons is actually $1566.99. The rings ranged from $350 to $2170. Yeah so you can go look how much your money is in Knuts, Galleons, Sickles, and everything else! Here it is: http:cgi. money. cnn. com/apps/hpcurrconv. Just take all the spaces out and paste it into your address bar! Remember, email me with ideas at iludraco4eva at yahoo dot com. And i realize that the reviewing feature will be temporarily out of order but that DOES NOT excuse you from reviewing! you WILL review after tuesday! Love you all!

iluvdraco4eva (Marina)