Chapter Five: Draco the Lewd

Light filtered through a window, shining gently and making its own warm little patch of floor. Butterflies of the same ethereal substance floated idly around the room. Every so often, a butterfly would land on something and expire, leaving a sprinkle of gold dust in its wake. The light filled the room Lily and Harry slept in, warming it and making a show of the glitter and more common variety of dust in the air as it floated through the luminescent shafts. On a bed against the wall housing the window was an old comforter, soft and luxurious in green silk. The top of the comforter shifted as the redhead beneath it unhurriedly came to.

Lily's eyes slowly opened to the sight of one of her butterflies lazily fluttering down from the ceiling to land on her nose. She sneezed violently and rolled over to meet a pair of drowsy green eyes. The redhead smiled slightly and pulled the young wizard closer to her. Harry curled up like a sleepy cat, pillowing his head on her shoulder. He sighed. His eyebrows furrowed, and some of the sluggishness left him. Lily knew that he would be wanting an explanation sooner or later, and it appeared that it would be the former.

"Why Malfoy?" he asked. Lily was relieved to have a relatively easy question first. Her brain still wasn't quite up to speed, as she was most definitely not a morning person.

"Because he was lonely, like you. Maybe even more than you... he didn't have great friends like the Weasleys and Hermione," she replied. "He didn't have anyone to confide in or just talk to." Harry's brow creased, and she knew that he'd be really thinking about what she said, instead of just reacting. 'Good', she thought. 'He's trying.'

"Why didn't you ever tell me about him?" Harry looked up into her eyes as he asked the question, and Lily was ashamed to see that he was really feeling betrayed by her secretiveness. She sighed deeply and gently pressed a kiss to his forehead. They lay in silence for a few moments as Lily tried to find the words to express the way she felt. She really didn't want to make anything worse. 'Tact, Lily. You can do this.'

"I was afraid you'd hate me for being friends with your rival. You two seem to fight a lot, and if you wanted me to take sides... I don't think I'd be able to handle it for long," she said deliberately. "You don't know Dray like I do... he has a different sense of humor. He likes to rile people up, just to get some kind of reaction. He knows just what buttons to push; I wouldn't want him saying something to you about me, or vice versa, just for the sake of a moment's amusement. He's... malicious sometimes, when he doesn't mean to be. Even to me." She paused for a moment to gather her thoughts.

"I guess what it boils down to is that I didn't want you to get hurt, and I was selfish because I didn't want to have to choose just one of you. Like it or not, I love the both of you."

Harry didn't reply, so Lily left him to his thoughts. A few minutes later, a butterfly burst in Harry's mussed hair. He began to laugh, and Lily knew that everything would work out.


It was a Friday, the sixteenth of August. The teachers at Hogwarts were due back the following Monday to prepare for the students' arrival, and to settle in to the old castle once again. Lily and Severus were in a room that the tenacious redhead had cornered him in after an Order meeting. Dust motes floated about, gilded as they were suspended in shafts of sunlight coming in the small, round window. Lily looked her uncle directly in the eye, and tried to mentally tell him how serious she was.

"I want to come to Hogwarts with you next week."

Severus stared blankly at his niece. She stood before him with a resolved look on her face, as if she was daring him to contradict her. She held his gaze unblinkingly.

"I want to go to Hogwarts, and I want to help with this war against Voldemort. I'm apparently supremely powerful, and so you can't really do much to stop me, but I would like your support and approval." She managed the carefully prepared speech without a hitch, and steeled herself for his arguments. She would not give in.

"Fine," he replied. He smirked in satisfaction when she started in surprise, losing her carefully blank façade. "I trust your judgment; you are, after all, of age." Lily's face broke into a smile, and he was soon confronted with an armful of one exuberantly grateful family member.

"Yes, yes, yes. You're welcome," he said dryly.


Lily just could not keep the foolish grin off of her face. September first found the exited girl aboard the stationary Hogwarts Express, waiting anxiously for the students to arrive. She sat in a compartment in the middle of the train, chosen so that she could see the entirety of Platform Nine and Three Quarters from her window. Her leg wouldn't stop bouncing, and she found herself fidgeting constantly. Said ball of excitement thought back over her two week stay at the castle.

She had arrived in Hogsmeade with her uncle, and had made the long trek to the castle with the same stupid grin her face was sporting now. It had been late, as Lily had spent all day imagining her clothing, back in her apartment in upstate New York, and wishing it into her newly conjured (red and silver, for both of her boy's) trunk. Spook had received the same treatment, and had not been happy about it. At all.She had also enlisted the help of Ron, Hermione, and Ginny to get Harry away from his room for long enough to poof away Dudley's old clothes and replace them with some new, less hideous clothing. It wasn't until later that she had realized that she could have just wished that they change, instead of going through his trunk and physically touching everything to do it. She had felt rather silly about that.

As she had come around the bend of the path and Hogwarts finally came in sight, her bag had fallen out of limp fingers. Magnificent stone towers reached up into the sky, as tall as if they were trying to touch the stars. Windows lit by the flickering light of candles from within gave the impression that the castle was encrusted with thousands of gems. The Forbidden Forest loomed over the grounds ominously, but the giant squid waving his tentacles at Severus and herself had ruined the dark atmosphere with its absurdity.

After they had mounted the huge stone steps and entered the building proper, they were swarmed over by House Elves. Dozens of the things came rushing over to escort them to their quarters. On the way, they offered to change anything about her rooms that she didn't like, 'anything at all, Miss Lily-ma'am'.

The rooms were wonderful, and she had told the adorable things that her rooms were perfect the way they were. They were hidden behind a tapestry depicting a field of flowers. The largest, center most flower (which just happened to be a lily) opened up to reveal a little fairy that politely, albeit a bit squeakily, asked her to choose a password. Lily chose Fairyflowers, a silly little thing just to get the cute fairy to blush.

Lily's attention snapped back to the present as she realized that many students were now on the platform. Her giddy smile morphed into a mischievous one as she looked around for Harry's mop of untidy black hair or Draco's platinum blonde locks. She had visited Draco the previous night, and knew that the students (and teachers!) of Hogwarts were in for a big surprise when it came to the Draco who wasn't ruled by Lucius the Satanic Tyrant.

On that note, the rebellious blonde was in for a surprise too - she hadn't told him she would be at Hogwarts this year, or of her familial relationship to his Head of House.

'This is bound to be fun...' A mischievous smile spread across her mouth.


The Hogwarts Express hurtled down the track, past trees, ponds, and tall grass. It all passed the window in an unnoticed blue and green blur.

Harry, along with Hermione, Ron, and Ginny, had found Lily and Spook in their compartment and were now listening to her talk about her gorgeous rooms at Hogwarts. Hermione was looking envious, as Lily had a large bookcase of books deemed too torn up to be in the Library, but which were still perfectly legible. Lily assured her that she was welcome to use them whenever she liked. Hermione beamed.

The lady with the food trolley had been by already, and the four youngest in the compartment had introduced Lily to all the different kinds of Wizarding candy available on the train. Harry playfully threw a Chocolate Frog wrapper at Ginny when the door to the compartment was opened by none other than Neville Longbottom. He was panting as if he had been running.

"Have you seen Malfoy!" he exclaimed. "He's..." They found out exactly what he was moments later, as the door slid open again and the slim figure of Draco Malfoy began to walk inside the crowded space.

He stopped abruptly in the doorway. His jaw dropped as his silver eyes met Lily's, and she was terribly amused to see a tongue piercing glinting at her from within his mouth. Harry and the others were apparently struck speechless as well, for a good reason.

Spoiled, petty Draco Malfoy... looked like a gothic muggle.

A hot gothic muggle.

He had on baggy black pants that half-covered a pair of scuffed black boots with green laces, and a form-fitting green t-shirt. There were various chains connected to his pants, and he had on a black choker with silver spikes. His hair had been cut over the summer, and his hair was left un-gelled. His platinum blonde bangs hung into his eyes, which would give a sexy look to his brooding expression, were he not in the middle of gaping. Black eyeliner topped the look off, bringing attention to the extraordinary color of his eyes - a gray that looked somehow metallic, so that his eyes were like molten silver.

Draco recovered first. He controlled his expression, and looked as calm as if he had not just been looking as if someone hit him in the back of the head with a board.

"Who's the new Potter fan?" he asked coolly.

"Dray, they already know about us," Lily chirped. A huge grin spread across her face as she saw the hit-by-a-board face make a reappearance momentarily. He grinned back at her evilly, smoothly stealing Spook's spot on the seat next to her and depositing the kitten in Ginny's lap.Lily knew that look. He slipped an arm around her shoulders and leered at her.

"In that case... do you want a quickie in the lavatory now or later?"