Disclaimer: Right. Despite the fact I'd love to, I don't own Harry Potter or anything in this story, apart from the plot, obviously.

Author note: Thank a lot to Aln-Mai, who proofreads the story from now on. No more stupid mistakes:). Also thanks to you guys for all the reviews and comments. I had the impression that the end of last chapter was a little confusing. So, here comes the explanation: Harry was at the edge of the forest when James and Sirius came out and he flew into the forest without seeing them out. They did not recognize him. Now, what was Harry doing, when he flew into forbidden forest? Read and find out:)

Chapter 15

Harry went flying again. He knew it was risky, he knew that someone could see him, but it didn't stop him anyway. Luckily, it was raining, so there was a very small probability of someone going outside.

Harry loved flying the same way that some girls loved dancing—when he was doing it, he felt free and no matter how stupid it sounded, attracted to his surroundings. When he couldn't do it for a long time, all his muscles ached, and no amount of stretching could stop the feeling. So, exactly one week since he was nearly spotted by the Marauders, he was outside again, with a firm intention of coming back in about an hour, which would be before everybody woke up.

But he had not taken into account the fact that when he was flying, he simply did not notice the passing time. So, predictably, he was still up in the air at ten o'clock.

He had just finished a long series of crazy loops (his favorite maneuver) when he noticed a few figures emerging from the castle. He hovered high in he air for a while, hoping that the rain would be enough to hide his identity, and at the same time, tried to figure out a way of returning unnoticed to the castle. Maybe it was Ron again, trying to warn him? Well, it would be stupid to count on that.

He soon knew that he was not so lucky this time. He counted the unknown shadows—one, two, three—there were about six people outside, despite the fact that it was still quite early in the morning, and moreover, it was raining heavily. Harry doubted there were many other students as desperate as he was to get a morning broomstick flight.

Instead of heading towards the castle, he flew up in the sky, hoping that even if the students down on the ground noticed him, they wouldn't be able to figure out who he was. When he was high enough to be safe, he once again searched the around on the grounds to find the figures. At first he couldn't see them, until he finally noticed them already halfway towards the Forbidden Forest.

They had to be running, otherwise they wouldn't move so fast. Part of Harry thought that there was nothing special about it—a couple of students went jogging—maybe they had just lost a bet, or something. But another part of him, some sort of intuition, told him there was something going on.

Finally Harry's curiosity got the better of him. He decided to follow the students and see what they were up to. He stopped at the edge of the forest and observed them, invisible from the group. The mysterious students entered the dangerous forest without hesitation. Harry waited until he was sure that they wouldn't notice him and followed them, staying high in the air.

He didn't notice two more students emerging from the castle, watching him, and then turning back with disappointment as soon he flew out of their sight.

Instead, he followed the jogging group into the forest. Because of the leaves and branches that were hiding him, he was able to get much closer to them, close enough to tell that they were from Slytherin. Snape was among them, as well as some other boys from their year, and a few older students.

Harry tried to fly as quietly as he could, but it was rather difficult. The broom he had, even though it was the best of the school brooms, was rather old and emitted odd sounds from time to time. It was also almost impossible to avoid the branches.

Luckily, the Slytherins didn't go too far into the forest. They stopped in a small clearing, surrounded by bushes, perfect for a hiding spot from someone trying to spy on them. When it came to overhearing their conversation, however, Harry was sorely disappointed. Although they were not very wise about choosing their meeting spot, when it came to protection charms, they certainly knew what to do. Harry supposed that he could try to break the wards, but this would certainly alarm them, and Harry would probably wind up dueling six students—which he didn't want to do, of course.

Even though it was rather pointless to stay, Harry waited until the meeting was over. As it turned out, it was a good thing, because after the wards were down, the Slytherins continued to talk in hushed voices while heading back to the castle. Harry didn't hear much, but a few mentions of "Dark Lord" and "orders" was enough to give him a very strong idea of what the meeting was about.

He felt a shiver running down his spine—was it possible that these boys were already Death Eaters? Even in his wildest dreams, Harry could not imagine someone his age murdering another person without a second thought.


Hermione and Lily woke up simultaneously. Their conversation last evening had turned into a large gossip session later on, and they had talked late into the night, finally falling asleep right where they were, too tired and lazy to go up to their dorm.

Some time later, Ron came downstairs from the boys' dormitories. He seemed rather offended by Hermione's good mood, but apologized anyway.

Lily giggled madly at her friend when she saw her disentangled hair. Hermione smiled back weakly. She'd had a nightmare that night—a terrible nightmare about Voldemort and Harry. She couldn't remember it very well at that moment, only recalling that she had been very, very frightened.

She tried to regain her composure—she was probably as safe from Voldemort as she could get—back in their time she was a target, both for being a Muggle-born and friend of Harry. Here, she was just one of the Hogwarts students—not really standing out from the crowd. The same applied to Harry—for the first time in his life, he was relatively safe.

Lily noticed her thoughtful expression and scowled.

"Don't tell me that you're still upset, Hermione. I thought that we'd sorted things out, didn't we?"

"Oh, yes—it's nothing. Just a bad dream," Hermione answered, shaking her head.

"Sure," Lily nodded. She stretched a little bit and yawned.

Exactly at that moment, James and Sirius entered the common room. Lily and Hermione froze when they saw the strange looks both boys gave them. It was awkward—two boys and two girls who did not normally talk to each other alone in the common room.

After a moment Hermione quietly said "hi." It was even more awkward then the silence before. James gave a small nod and continued to the stairs. Sirius gaped at her for a moment before following his friend without a word.

When they were gone, both girls looked at each other uncomfortably. That had been just a little bit too weird.


By the time Harry got back to the castle, it was already late in the morning. He didn't have time for a warm, steamy shower that he would love to take—after all, he had just spent almost three hours in the chilling rain, half of it sitting behind a bush. Not the sort of thing he enjoyed, certainly.

Instead of a shower, he performed cleaning and drying spells on himself and went straight to the Great Hall.

Most people had already finished their breakfast. Harry sat beside Ron; Hermione and Lily were nowhere to be seen.

"Hey, Ron," he said, putting a huge amount of toast and fried eggs on his plate.

Ron looked at him with a strange expression.

"You know what Harry? If you really can't stop yourself from going outside and flying, then OK, do it. But don't stay there until you're bound to be seen!" Ron whispered, even though it was clear he was quite irritated.

"When I woke up," he continued, "James and Sirius were already outside, checking who the mysterious flier was. They're really scared that you're the new Slytherin Seeker or something."

Harry snorted. Ron only shook his head.

"They're looking at you right now. I'll bet they saw you!"

Harry turned and saw Marauders discussing something, and throwing occasional glances at him.

Harry looked back at Ron.

"I don't think they could have seen me—something happened when I was outside—something I need to talk with you and Hermione about. Not here, though."

Ron noticed serious note in his friend's voice and nodded.

"We'll go to the Room after breakfast, OK?"

"Yeah—we should go and get Hermione. It might be hard to separate her from Lily, though. Have they woken up?"

Ron chuckled.

"Nice show they made of themselves, sleeping in common room like that. Why didn't you wake them up when you were going outside, anyway?"

"Well—I didn't want to. They were probably very tired after a whole night of gossiping. It's good that Hermione is finally making friends, don't you think?"

"She made friends with Ginny," Ron pointed out.

"Did she? I mean, they liked each other, but were they friends? Like you and me are? I don't think so, Ron. Anyway, I think we should go and get her. And maybe let's take her something to eat. And something for Lily, as well."

Ron nodded in agreement, so they grabbed some toast with marmalade and took two cups of steaming hot tea. They were halfway to Gryffindor Tower when they heard someone calling their names.

They turned around and saw the Marauders hurrying to catch up with them. Ron threw Harry a meaningful look, as if saying, 'Didn't I tell you so?'

It was Sirius who spoke first.

"Hmm, Bradley," he started lazily, in the very same manner he used when he was talking about Snape. "I was wondering. You woke up first, you were gone when we got up, and yet still you were late for breakfast. I was wondering—what were you doing?"

Harry shrugged and replied calmly, "I can't see that it's any of your business."

"Well, it is. Of course it is—you see, it worries us when we see a fellow Gryffindor going alone to such a dangerous place as the Forbidden Forest."

Harry paled at that. They had seen him? But how? Ron threw him an incredulous look.

"Yeah, and it made us wonder, you know," James added with pure hatred in his voice, "What can a coward like you need there?"

"Now there's another question. How is it connected with everything that's going on?" It was Remus who spoke this time, with a very thoughtful expression on his face. "It makes people think whether there is a connection between the new students and the tragic events that started to occur in Hogsmeade right after they came..."

Up until that moment, Harry's mind had been racing to come up with a proper excuse, but when he heard Remus' accusations, his temper simply got better of him.

"What do you know?" he shouted with fury. "What do you know about anything? You think I had something to do with the killings? So, just to let you know: I would never do anything connected with Voldemort! Never! Bloody hell! He killed my parents!" Harry would have continued, but he made some abrupt gesture to emphasize his words and he spilled the tea he was carrying all over Peter.

"Harry!" Ron shouted with surprise, while Peter shrieked and other Marauders gasped. The scene would have been funny, if the people taking part didn't dislike each other so much.

James glared at Harry and drew his wand out. Harry also took his wand out, and he cast a drying spell on Peter, without even looking at the boy who would betray his parents in future. He didn't apologize.

With his eyes on the other Marauders he spoke much more calmly, "It was not me flying out there. And you should never accuse me of anything like that."

He turned and left, beckoning Ron to follow.


James and Sirius watched the retreating backs of the two boys for a while. Finally, James turned to Sirius with a vicious smile.

"You know what? It was stupid in the first place to assume he was the flier. Anyway, I'm glad. I would not want to have to put up with him during Quidditch practice."

Sirius smirked. Peter nodded and smiled in a way, which said 'I whole-heartedly agree with you'. Only Remus shook his head, and looked at James with an unreadable expression. He opened his mouth to say something, closed it, than opened it again and finally spoke.

"You know what, James? You are really thick sometimes. It's obvious they were lying."