Chapter Three: Trouble Always Comes in Threes...


Harry sat stiffly in his chair at the kitchen table, fuming. Dumbledore was not on his list of favorite people right now. He had skillfully evaded Harry all summer, going so far as to pretend as if Harry was a non-entity during his disciplinary hearing. Then, he simply had to give Lily Veritaserum and strap her into that monstrous chair with metal bands (remarkably similar to the one he had seen in Dumbledore's pensieve used for Azkaban trials).

'He's worse than Umbridge,' Harry thought viciously. His anger faded away to be replaced by confusion. 'Where did that come from?' he wondered. He really had absolutely no reason to hate the woman; he'd only ever been in her presence once. He shook off the odd thought as he heard the sound of Lily's sobbing recede into the house.

Snape, who had been called 'Uncle Sev' by Lily pre-hysterics, had disappeared upstairs with the redhead. She had begun sobbing and clinging to him, making Harry's heart clench. Snape's face had softened, and Harry saw for the first time what the cranky Potions Master looked like when he actually thought someone was worth the air they were breathing. The dark man had put one arm tenderly around Lily's shoulders and gently led her out of the room. Sirius had similarly steered Harry into a chair. Now Harry was just sitting, glaring angrily at the tabletop.

"Mr. Potter-" Dumbledore began.

"No!" he yelled harshly. "Is my word worth something anywhere?" He looked up and locked eyes with the aging Headmaster. "If I'm supposed to be your bloody savior, the Boy-Who-Wouldn't-Bloody-Die, then why don't you listen to me for just a moment?" he asked derisively. "Nobody but Lily would have cared or noticed before Hogwarts is the Dursleys had beat me to death." Harry realized that he had stood up at some point. He met the gaze of everyone in the room, and gave a concise nod as he realized he saw respect in some of their eyes.

"Have you ever thought," he continued quietly, "that I don't want to murder anyone?" Harry's voice broke on the last two words, and he abruptly sat down as his anger rushed out of him. "I've had enough of people dying," he concluded in a whisper, his eyes lowered to the table. He folded his arms on the table and rested his head on them. He sighed deeply, feeling enormously better now that he had gotten everything off his chest. He'd said his piece, and now the ball was in their court.

Except...

'No...' whispered a rebellious voice in the back of his mind. 'Revenge...' it whispered silkily.

'Yes, I should repay them for everything,' Harry thought mechanically.

'NO!' another part of his mind whispered urgently; it was the part of him that rebelled when Harry was under the Imperious Curse. The revenge-seeking part of Harry actually hissed, and alarm bells went off in Harry's head. His head shot up off the table, and he realized everyone was still quiet. Ron was still in the room, and had in fact been followed by Hermione, Ginny, Fred, and George. The occupants of the room focused their attention on him, one and all.

Harry searched for that hissing part of his mind, and seized it with mental hands he could almost see with his outer eyes. It slid through his 'fingers' like a slick and wriggling snake and he decided he would be wiser to just watch in case the snake had fangs. The touch of the serpent made the inside of his head feel slimy and tainted.

So he watched it instead, and experienced a curious sensation as it actually fled before his inquiring mental gaze.

Those surrounding him watched as his eyes, so bright before, began to shine with a brilliant green light. They were a deep, forest green with varying shades of gold swimming and swirling around within. The pupils of his eyes shone a dark and sinister red as dark as freshly shed blood. He green and gold began to contract around the red slowly, so very slowly... as if the red light was resisting.

Harry gasped as he felt the snake separate itself from his mind with a feeling like a dislocated bone being popped back into its socket. He choked on his breath as the entity gave him a short mental whip before its complete departure.

The Order and Ron watched as the red glowed brightly before being consumed by the green and gold. Harry's eyes returned to normal as he blinked.

The black-haired boy wheezed into the stunned silence as Sirius whacked him heartily on the back; Harry could hear Mrs. Weasley trying not to have hysterics in the background. He slowly got his breath back and stared down at his hand, palm down on the tabletop. They had felt unusually warm for a moment, and he noticed with a shock that his hand prints were burned into the tabletop. He rummaged around mentally and found that what he had been fearing was true.

Harry lifted his head and locked eyes with first Sirius, and then his friends before announcing to the entire room, "Voldemort was in my mind."


The scratching of quills on parchment and the sound of pages turning filled the second floor study. Harry, Ron, Ginny, and Lily were sitting quietly at one end of the moderately-sized mahogany table taking up most of the room while Hermione alternated between staring accusingly at her friends, smiling gently at Lily, and reading a massive Advanced Charms book. The boys were diligently (if not a bit sullenly) doing their homework, and Ginny was putting down her quill after finishing her Transfiguration essay. The youngest Weasley looked cautiously over at Lily.

"So Snape is your uncle?" she asked hesitantly. Three heads shot up to listen to Lily's answer; she had been uncharacteristically tight-lipped for the past two days.

"That would be why I call him Uncle Sev," she replied dryly. She smiled kindly at Ginny. "You guys are my friends; you don't have to be so hesitant to ask questions." She laughed as all four of them immediately started asking questions. "One at a time!" she giggled.

"I didn't know Snape had family," Hermione said, marking her place in her book and placing it on the table.

"My mother was his sister," Lily replied. "She married a muggle, and was disowned. Then, true to the family's expectations of him, he got her preggers and ran off. Of course, I didn't know any of this about the family until yesterday. I thought Mom's whole family was dead."

"How did you know that Snape was your uncle, then?" asked Harry. Lily smiled grimly.

"He used to visit us, up until I was about eight. One day he came for a visit, and said he'd stay a whole week this time. Usually he'd only stay a day, or two at the most. We had a really little apartment in New York City, and we didn't have any room for him to stay. We were dirt poor, and Mom and I already shared a bed." Her eyes took on a faraway look, and she appeared to be talking more to herself now than the others. "It was great; I thought he was so cool, since I was only eight and he was twenty-four whole years old. He took me to the zoo three days in a row; his favorite was the reptile house with all the snakes. On the fourth day, I waited by the door all day, but he never came. Mom told me the next day that he had to go - no explanation, just that he had to go. He never came back after that, and Mom told me she thought he was dead. Six years later, she died, and I was adopted. I had a new family, and just kind of pushed him to the back of my mind." She shrugged, coming back into the present. "I found out yesterday that he went to Dumbledore that day, to confess about being a Death Eater. Harry had already imploded Moldy-Voldie (Ginny began giggling uncontrollably at the ridiculous nick-name), and he was in hiding 'cause he was a known Death Eater." Lily reached across the table to muss up Harry's hair. "Get back to work, story's over, munchkin."

Harry blushed at the nickname, but did get back to work - for a total of three seconds.

"What's that?" Ginny asked, gesturing at an elaborate sketch on Lily's parchment of doodles. It looked like some kind of insignia: a dragon eating a snake, with the pair wrapped sinuously around an elaborate "M". Lily was a talented artist. The dragon, though in a fierce pose, had an underlying look of gentleness about it. The snake had fear shining from its wide, staring eyes.

"Oh, that's just Drake's crest," Lily replied distractedly, shading the dragon's eyes with the pencil she had borrowed from Hermione. Her hand stopped abruptly, and then resumed jerkily. 'Oh crap,' she thought.

"Who's Drake?" asked Ginny, wondering where she had seen something like the sketch. She knew it was familiar.

"Um... he's, um..." Lily stuttered. Harry looked up from his half- finished Charms essay. Lily was a horrible liar - she always stuttered.

"Lily," Harry said simply, "Don't lie to me." Harry looked at her in that calm way that could pry anything out of her. Lily cringed, and sighed in defeat. Why did she have to have such a big mouth? Before she could come up with an answer, Sirius and Remus walked in, covered in dust and carrying cleaning supplies.

"What's this about lying?" asked Remus curiously. Lily fidgeted nervously.

"Lily's drawn something odd," said Hermione, pointing at the offending piece of parchment. "Ginny asked her what is was." Remus just shrugged, and went over to the window to sit in the window seat.

Sirius, however, walked the few steps to the table to peer over Lily's shoulder at the doodle. His face darkened dangerously at the sight.

"You have some explaining to do, Lily," Sirius said. "This is... some form of the Malfoy family crest."

Hermione put it together first. "Drake? You're on a first name basis with that slimy git?" she exclaimed. Ron and Harry shared an amused look - Hermione never cursed. They sobered as they remembered what she had said prior. Ron's ears turned red, and Ginny gave Lily an odd look. Harry's face closed off, all emotion hidden. Lily knew that look, and winced - it meant he was furious. He turned to her, standing up calmly.

"Draco Malfoy?" he asked, his voice dangerously quiet. "How could you keep a secret like this from me? What is it about me that makes people want to lie to me?" he continued, the volume of his voice rising. "I understand Voldemort sending me false visions, but -" Harry stopped mid-sentence. Lily looked confused.

"False visions?" Lily asked. Understanding dawned on her features. "The fifth book..." she whispered. She hadn't been able to read it yet, having spent all of her pocket money on her shopping spree. She scrutinized the boy's face, and found things she'd never seen before - lines made by sadness and pain. "How old are you, Harry?" she asked quietly.

"Sixteen," he replied weakly. He was covered in goosebumps and shivering, although the room was warm.

"Oh dear," said Hermione shakily.

"Sirius," moaned Harry, turning to his godfather. Lily hugged her arms to her body as she heard his voice; it was full of utter sadness and pain.

"The Department of Mysteries," murmured Hermione. Lily could do nothing but stare around the room; her body seemed rooted to the spot. She heard a thump and watched confusedly as Ginny actually fainted. Ron rushed over to her even though he was white as a sheet himself. Hermione had her hands over her mouth, with a look of fierce inward concentration on her face. Harry was bent over the edge of the table, wheezing as if someone had punched him in the gut. Sirius and Remus were by far the worst. Remus, eyes closed, had tears running down his cheeks. He had risen to clamp his hand in a death grip on Sirius's shoulder. Sirius had a look of complete, utterly consuming despair written in every line of his being. It seemed that his entire existence was being held together by his old friend's hand.

Call it what you will, but Lily could tell instinctively that in some way, she had cause all of their pain and distress. She ran out of the room, tears making silent trails down her cheeks.


Lily sniffled silently. She was quite hidden, having tripped on a bit of folded rug and fallen through a wall. Unfortunately, after her fall her ankle throbbed and had begun to swell. She had managed to stumble upon a little cubby with a small bench, covered by the illusion of a flat wall. So unless Sirius, the only person likely to know about the secret grotto, knew where it was, wanted to find her, and was in any condition to do so, she was alone.

But apparently not as alone as she had believed; Severus and Dumbledore came down to hall, arguing. They were arguing about her.

"What happened to my niece?" Severus growled. "I am her only family, and as such, I believe I deserve an explanation."

Dumbledore sighed wearily, for once sounding his actual age. "There is a reason there is only one Dream Weaver roughly every 100 years - the Magic they use unconsciously every day takes that long to be replenished when a Weaver dies."

"This Magic," he continued, "is very powerfully attuned to the Weaver. It sometimes acts without the Weaver being aware of it. In Ms. Anderson's case, she believed Sirius to be alive, and so he simply was. The fact that she pulled him into one of her dreams first only made the Magic more powerful, as she was in her element."

Severus stood, shocked. He had grown up on stories of the power of a Weaver - the most famous had been Rowena Ravenclaw. "How did their memories return?" he asked. "Was the child in conscious control of it?" Lily leaned forward on her bench to better hear the answer.

"Ms. Anderson realized that Harry looked older than 15, if Miss Granger's guess is correct. And her guesses usually are," the Headmaster replied.

'Oh god,' Lily thought, remembering the heartbreaking looks on Sirius and Remus's faces. 'I pulled him out of heaven!' She panicked at the thought. 'Please, Magic!' she pleaded silently. 'Come back, and don't change anything else!'

Lily gasped loudly and pitched forward off the couch as she saw a glimmering silver cloud surround her. It called to her, and thrummed in her bones. She breathed it in, taking it back into herself from her position on the ground half inside her hidey-hole. Her head thumped onto the ground as the Magic flooded her, burning its way through her bones and blood. The last thing she saw was Severus rushing toward her before her world faded to black.


Lily woke up all at once. She was being carried through the halls of Grimmauld Place by her scowling uncle. She tried to protest that she could walk, but a moan was all that she could produce. He looked down at her, and she could see the worry in his eyes. He was still scowling, though; Lily had decided earlier that, other than his smirk, it was his favored facial expression. After a time, Lily found herself in th doorway of the dreaded study once again. She got a brief glimpse of the room, and saw that Dumbledore, Molly Weasley, and a tall, bald black man were also in the room in addition to the others, who hadn't left. Her guilt threatened to overwhelm her. It was horrible - and only increased, now that she knew that she really had caused it. She turned her head to hide her face in Severus's robes. The redhead began to sob quietly, and Severus mutely rubbed her back in support. She soon found herself curled up in Sev's lap, safely ensconced in a large chair in the corner of the room. She kept her face buried in the safety of his dark robes.

"Lily?" asked Harry tentatively. All of a sudden, Lily was back in Harry's cupboard under the stairs as a frightened Harry asked for comfort. "L...lily?" Hearing the impending tears in his voice, Lily turned and stood just in time to collapse to the floor with Harry sobbing brokenly into her neck. She sat silently on the floor with him, cradling him as they both wept.


A/N: Holy Doritoes, that was six pages! I hate the ending of this... too much crying. Bleurgh. Let me know what you think.