Chapter 13:
After what seemed like a preternaturally long winter, the sun was finally coming out at Hogwarts. It made the newly blossomed flowers look prettier than ever. On one mid-April day, Lily was walking on the grounds alone. She and Emmie still hadn't made up after that day of fighting over what Remus was.
She almost wished that she hadn't stuck up for Remus, because she wasn't feeling well-rewarded for aiding him. Remus had been closer than ever to James and Sirius ever since the werewolf incident and Emmie didn't seem to be feeling to shabby either. Ever since hers and Lily's fight, she had been hanging out with Palliva Patil and Kerry Mabel. She didn't seem to miss Lily at all—she never even looked at her.
Lily decided to sit and read a book that she had recently picked up from the Library. It was a biography on Dumbledore and she was eager to read about what her headmaster had achieved. How much reading she would acomplish, however, she didn't know, because, at the precise moment she opened her book, as if on cue, James, Sirius and Remus came storming out of the castle.
"So, Moony, what do you think?" Sirius asked, in his usually loud voice. "Do you think I should ask her out?"
Ever since, Sirius and James had found out what Remus was they had began to call him Moony. Lily thought that it would only advertise his disease, but Remus didn't seem to mind, so she left the matter alone.
"I think that you were just dumped by two girls, on the same day and that you won't be having much luck with Theresa right now." Remus advised.
"Yeah, but that wasn't my fault. Somebody must have told Kaitlyn about Elizabeth—she couldn't have figured it out by herself." He said.
Lily wondered who would do that. 'Oh yeah,' she thought. 'That was me wasn't it?' If it was anyone other than Sirius, or perhaps James, she would have felt bad about breaking them up. But given the fact that Sirius and James hadn't left her alone ever since the Bubotuber puss incident, she didn't feel the least bit sorry for him.
"Oh well, she deserved to find out." Remus said.
"What…no she didn't…James…back me up" Sirius stuttered.
"Sorry, mate but I'm gonna have to stick with Remus on this one." James said, simply. "You didn't seriously think that you could get away dating two girls all throughout our schooling—they were bound to find out at some point."
Sirius just shrugged for an answer. He was about to say something, but stopped as Theresa Winterson and Alice Carlton came out through the oak front doors.
"Oy, Theresa!" Sirius called.
"Yeah Black?"
"You wanna go out with me?" Sirius asked hopefully.
"Can you get me to Hogsmeade this weekend?" Theresa asked.
"Sure!" Sirius said, without thinking.
"Alright then," Theresa said, clearly surprised. "I'll meet you on Saturday. Does six o'clock sound alright?"
"Yeah sure," Sirius shrugged. "See?" he said, turning to James and Remus. "Piece of cake."
"One problem," Remus pointed.
"What?" Sirius asked
"How are you going to get her to Hogsmeade?" Remus asked. "It's not Hogsmeade weekend, AND you're a first year."
"Oh shit…"
Lily got up, laughed a little, and headed back up to the castle. She couldn't imagine how Sirius was going to get himself out of this one.
"Although we must mourn the loss of the all-muggle Thomas family, I am happy to announce that I have found yet another clue in what used to be their house. It is a checklist of the family's that they are planning to kill in the future, some of them muggle. Most of them are muggle families, but some of them are homes of witches and wizards." Dumbledore announced at the weekly meeting.
Dumbledore then passed the note around and James was able to catch a glimpse of it. It read:
Rudder: No. 1 Rudder Way
Thomas: No. 5 Tutter Lane
Mayne: No. 14 Utick Road
Parnell: No. 3 Kacker Street
Evans: No. 5 Privit Drive
Anderson: No. 10 Gilbert Lane
Hall: No. 8 Addison Avenue
James winced—both Lily's family and Taylor's family were on that list. Not only were they both in his year, but they were both in his house. And although he disliked Lily, he'd still feel bad if she died. 'Oh well,' he thought. 'Dumbledore's found the list now—everything will be alright.'
Once everybody had seen the list, Dumbledore spoke up again. "We must protect these families as best we can. I am not sure as to whether this list is for one particular man or the whole lot of them. But this is all the information we have, and it is therefore all we can deal with. Alastor and Thomas, can you put together a plan for the protection of these family's?"
"Yes sir!" came the voice of James' father, while Moody just grunted.
"Thank you. I had nothing else to discuss with you today. Does anyone have any other points of discussion?" Dumbledore asked the crowd.
"Yeah," Dung said.
James was surprised; this was the first time he had seen Dung stay awake during a meeting, let alone speak voluntarily.
"I've heard a word on the streets that might interest you, Dumbledore. Rumor has it that these people are called 'Death Eaters.' They are lead by one who they either call 'master' or 'the Dark Lord.' His true name is not spoken." Dung recited in a lazy way which made the interesting news sound boring.
"Hmm…Death Eaters…Dark Lord…interesting…" Dumbledore thought aloud while scribbling something on his piece of parchment.
Just then, when the entire order was silent, James tripped and fell backwards. Sirius and Remus caught him before he hit the stone floor, but he still made a lot of noise.
"What was that?" Elizabeth Potter asked, sitting up suddenly.
The three boys heard footsteps heading toward the door.
"Damn it…" James muttered.
"Quick, get under the invisibility cloak!" Remus ordered—being the first person to come to his senses, as usual. James threw the invisibility cloak over the three boys and they hid under it as the closet door swung open it.
When he saw no one in sight, Thomas Potter had a growing suspicion in his mind, and he decided to cover for his son before Moody blasted the closet apart. "Look!" he said, pointing to the floor of the closet. "That box must've fallen from the shelf."
"Oh, okay." Benjy Fenwick said, shrugging.
"Is that all, Dumbledore?" Dung asked, "Because I have some business to attend to."
"I never knew that stealing cauldrons was business." Caradoc Dearborn muttered.
"Yeah, I have some work to do at the ministry." Elphias Dodge added.
"Very well, you may all go." Dumbledore said, still staring suspiciously at the closet. Thomas, however, ushered him off before he had time to investigate further.
The boys went up to the common room and began talking about the recent events during the order's meeting.
"That was lucky." Remus stated. "If your dad hadn't been there, I don't know where we'd be right now."
"My dad?" James asked, confused. "What did he do?"
"Are you blind?" Remus asked rhetorically. "He basically saved us from detention, or worse…"
"But did you hear what Dung said about the Death Eaters?" Sirius asked, clearly thinking that this was more important.
"Yeah, and I thought he'd never be of any use to the order." James said.
"Yeah, I wonder why they call themselves 'Death Eaters' and I wonder who their master is. I'm glad we listened in on this one." Sirius concluded.
"I thought you discouraged eavesdropping." Lily said, coming up behind him.
"I don't think you should be talking." James retorted.
"Try keeping your voices down then." Lily scoffed.
"Come off it Evans, we weren't that loud." Sirius said, in his abnormally loud voice.
"Weren't that loud?" Lily asked, annoyed. "I was trying to read and the volume of your voices broke my concentration.
"Well I'm sorry we distracted you, Evans." James said sarcastically. "Now go back to your petty book."
"I would Potter, but your girlfriend's coming and she giggles so loudly when she's around you that I wouldn't be able to concentrate in the library." Lily said, gesturing towards Rachel, who was coming downstairs.
Lily then walked past a smirking Rachel and up to the girl's dormitory to get some sleep.
A/N: There's chapter number 13. Sorry it was kind of short, well, okay, really short. But the last one was really long and the next one will be longer. I promise. Even though it was kind of short and not much happened, I would really enjoy it if you reviewed. I love hearing what you guys think of my story.
Jewels5: The Order plays a big role in the plot line and is therefore going to come up a lot in the future. Since the Daily Profit isn't telling very much, and they aren't getting their information on what's happening from anywhere else. The people in the Order are going to act like characters in the books. Some of them you've met before, some of them you've heard mention of in the books, and some of them I made up:-) As an author, I try to tell the reader the important parts of the story, and since the order's meetings are often important to the plot line, I tend to include them. The Order of the Phoenix is as much of my story as anything else is. Thanks for your review:-)