A few days passed with no major events occurring until they had class with Professor Moody. They were all waiting outside his classroom really early, except for Hermione who had been in the library doing more work. The group of fourth years all piled into the classroom and sat eagerly awaiting for Moody to appear. As he entered Lilly got another one of those shivers down her spine. She still could not figure out why, but all her instincts were telling her not to trust him. The class began quickly with Moody reviewing what they had learned last year, and him yelling at Lavender. They moved straight into curses, which surprised Lilly extremely. 'Why curses of all things?' Lilly thought to herself.

"Right so, does anybody know the curses most heavily punished by wizarding law?" Moody asked.

Lilly raised her hand shyly along with several other students. But Moody chose Ron.

"Er, my dad told me about one... is it the Imperius curse?" Ron said shyly.

"Yes, well you father would know that one! It gave the Ministry a lot of trouble at one time."

Moody removed a glass jar from his desk with three spiders in it. Lilly noticed as Ron recoiled slightly at the sight of the spiders and made a mental note to find out more about that. Moody then removed one of the spiders and held it in his hand.

Pointing his wand at it Moody said, "Imperio!"

Lilly watched in horror as Moody made the spider dance on the desk. She closed her eyes tightly trying to block out the image, her fellow classmates' laughter, and suppress a memory that was threatening to consumer her. Moody's booming voice from yelling at the class brought her back to reality. She found his magical blue eye staring at her with and odd expression in it, one she had never seen on a human being before.

"Total control. I could make it jump out of the window, drown itself, throw itself down one of your throats!" Moody said in a hushed voice as the spider balled itself up and began to roll all over.

"Years back, there were a lot of witches and wizards being controlled by the Imperius curse. Some job for the Ministry, trying to sort out who was being forced to act, and who was acting of their own free will. But it can be fought, and I'll be teaching you how, but it takes real strength of character, and not everyone's got it. Better avoid being hit with it if you can. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" Moody yelled caused everyone to jump, "Anyone else? What's another illegal curse?"

Hermione's hand shot up along with Lilly's and Neville's.

"Yes?" Moody said pointing his magical on Neville.

"There's one … the Cruciatus curse," Neville said quietly but clearly.

Staring at Neville intently Moody said, "Your name's Longbottom?" checking the register again with his magical eye.

Neville nodded and began to blush. Moody saying nothing more turned to the jar of spiders reached in and grabbed the next spider.

"The Cruciatus curse needs to a bit bigger for you to get the idea," he said pointing his wand at the spider, "Engorgio!"

The spider swelled to the size of a tarantula. Raising his wand, Moody pointed his wand at the spider and said, "Crucio!"

At once the spider's legs bent in upon its body and it rolled over and began to twitch horribly, rocking from side to side. No sound came from it but Lilly knew that it would be screaming if it could have. Moody did not remove his wand, and the spider started to shudder and jerk more violently.

"Stop it!" Hermione said shrilly.

Everyone turned to look at her and seeing she wasn't looking at the spider. Following her gaze Lilly's eyes fell upon Neville; his hands were clenched upon the desk in front of him, his knuckles white, and his eyes wide and horrified.

Moody raised his wand and the spider's legs relaxed but it continued to twitch.

"Reducio!" Moody muttered and the spider shrank back to normal size, "Pain! You don't need thumbscrews or knives to torture someone if you can perform the Cruciatus curse… that one was very popular too. Anyone else know another?"

Hermione raised her hand again for the third time.

"Yes?"

"Avada Kedavra" Hermione whispered.

Several people looked uneasily around at her, including Ron.

"Ah, yes the last and worst. Avada Kedavra… the killing curse." Reaching into the jar Moody pulled out the last spider. Raising his wand Mood roared, "Avada Kedavra!"

There was a flash of green light and a rushing sound, as though a vast; invisible something was soaring through the air, instantly the spider rolled over onto its back, unmarked, but unmistakably dead. Several of the girls stifled cries, and Ron had thrown himself backwards and almost toppled off his seat as the spider skidded towards him. Moody swept the spider off the desk and onto the floor.

"Not nice. Not pleasant. And there's no counter-curse. There's no blocking it. And so far there is only one know person to survive it, and he's sitting right in front of me."

Lilly turned to look at Harry and knew exactly what he must be thinking and going through. The pain of knowing that that was how your parents died is the hardest thing to go through. Tears brimming her eyes at the memory of her own realization of her mother's death, Lilly turned away from Harry and back to Moody.

"Avada Kedavra's a curse that needs a powerful bit of magic behind it… you could all get your wands out now and point them at me and say the words, and I doubt I'd get so much as a nose-bleed. But that doesn't matter. I'm not here to teach you how to do it. Now if there's no counter-curse, why am I showing you? Because you've got to know. You've got to appreciate what the worst is. You don't want to find yourself in a situation where you're facing it. CONSTANT VICILANCE!" Moody roared again as the whole class jumped.

"Now … those three curses… Avada Kedavra, Imperius and Cruciatus… are known as the Unforgivable Curses. The use of any one of them on a fellow human being is enough to earn a life sentence in Azkaban. That's what you're up against. That's what I've got to teach you to fight. You need preparing. You need arming. But most of all, you need to practice constant, never-ceasing vigilance. Get out your quills… copy this down…"

They spent the rest of the lesson taking notes on each of the Unforgivable Curses. No one talked during the class but as soon as they were dismissed everyone began discussing the curses in awed voices.

"Hurry up." Hermione said to the three of them.

"Not the ruddy library again?" Ron said.

"No," Hermione said curtly as she pointed up a side passage, "Neville."

Neville was just standing alone, halfway up the passage, staring at the stonewall opposite him with the same horrified, wide-eyed look he had worn when Moody had demonstrated the Cruciatus curse.

"Neville?" Hermione said sweetly as she gently rested her hand on his shoulder.

"Oh, hello." He said in a voice much higher than normally, "Interesting lesson wasn't it? I wonder what's for dinner, I'm… I'm starving, aren't you?"

"Neville, are you alright?" Hermione asked. Lilly stood out of the way; she knew why he was so upset. She had learned from her father many years ago about the children who had survived Voldemort's wrath and what had happened to their parents.

"Oh yes, I'm fine!" Neville gabbled, "Very interesting dinner… I mean lesson… what's for eating?"

Lilly's eyes began to water from her own pain caused by the past. Suddenly there was an odd clunking sound behind them. They all turned to see Professor Moody limping towards them. All five of them fell silent, watching him approach. When he spoke his voice was much lower and gentler than they had heard. But something about him still bothered Lilly.

"It's all right, sonny." He said to Neville, "Why don't you come up to my office? Come on… we can have a cup of tea…"

Neville looked even more frightened at the idea of having tea with Moody. He neither moved nor spoke.

Moody turned to observe both Harry and Lilly, "You two alright?"

"Yes." Harry said defiantly.

Lilly just nodded.

"You've got to know. It seems harsh, maybe, but you've got to know. No point pretending… well… come on, Longbottom, I've got some books that might interest you."

Neville looked pleadingly towards them as he was steered away by one of Moody's gnarled hands that was on his shoulder.

"What was that about?" Ron asked.

"I don't know…" Hermione said pensively.

"Some lesson, though, eh?" Said Ron, "Fred and George were right, weren't they? He really knows his stuff, Moody, doesn't he? When he did Avada Kedavra, the way the spider just died, just snuffed it right…" Ron said stopping suddenly at the look on Harry's face.

"Lilly why did he ask if you would be alright?" Hermione asked as they continued there way to the Great Hall.

"Don't know…" Lilly lied.

Dinner flew by with Harry and Ron discussing their Divination homework that they hadn't started. Shortly after dinner started Hermione ran off to the library again. Lilly joined the boys on their way back to the dormitories.

"Do you think Moody would get in trouble with the Ministry for showing us those curses?" Harry asked.

"Yeah probably, but Dumbledore's always done things his way, hasn't he, and Moody's been getting in trouble for years, I reckon. Attacks first and asks questions later… look at his dustbins. Balderdash." Ron said to the Fat Lady.

"I have a feeling the Ministry couldn't touch either of them for anything we're going to learn this year." Lilly said smiling as they entered the noise of the Gryffindor common room.

"Shall we get our Divination stuff then?" Harry asked the two of them.

"I s'pose," Ron groaned.

"Haha have fun with it!" Lilly giggled.

"You're already done?" Harry said shocked.

"So then you can help us!" Ron said looking relieved.

"Not a chance! You're doing it yourselves haha!" Lilly giggled as she saved a table for them to do their work on. She sat with them quietly as they struggled through their first attempts to figure it out. And when they decided to make the whole thing up, she laughed at every misfortune that was supposed to befall each of them.

About and hour later Hermione came climbing through the portrait hole. She was carrying a sheaf of parchment in one hand and a box in the other.

"Hello, I've just finished!" She said excitedly.

"So have I!" Ron said as he threw down his quill.

"Great only took you two hours!" Lilly laughed.

Hermione smiled as she sat down at the table with them, laying the things she was carrying in an empty armchair. Then pulled Ron's homework towards her.

"Not going to have a very good month are you?" she said sardonically.

"Ah well, at least I'm forewarned."

"You seem to be drowning twice." Hermione pointed out.

"Oh, am I? I'll change that to getting trampled by a rampaging Hippogriff."

"Don't you think it's a bit obvious you've made these up?" Hermione said.

"Probably not!" Lilly muttered.

"How dare you! We've been working like house-elves here!" Ron said in mock outrage.

"It's just and expression!" He added hastily at the raised eyebrow Hermione gave him.

"What's in the box?" Harry said laying down his quill.

"Funny you should ask!" Hermione said giving Ron a nasty look as she took off the lid to the box to reveal its contents, about fifty badges, all different colors, but bearing the same letters: S.P.E.W.

" 'SPEW'?" said Harry picking up a badge along with Lilly, "What's this about?"

"Not spew! Its S – P – E – W! Stands for the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare!" Hermione said indignantly.

"Never heard of it." Ron said.

"Well of course you haven't! I've only just started it!" Hermione said briskly.

"Yeah? How many members have you got?" Ron asked in mild surprise.

"Well if you all join then four…"

"And you think we want to walk around wearing badges saying spew on them?" Ron said.

"S – P – E – W! I was going to put Stop the Outrageous Abuse of Our Fellow Magical Creatures and Campaign for a Change in Their Legal Status… but it wouldn't fit. So that's the heading of our manifesto!"

She brandished the sheaf of parchment at them, "I've been researching it thoroughly in the library. Elf enslavement goes back centuries. I can't believe no one's done anything about it before now!"

"Not true!" Lilly said giggling, "My mom fired all our house-elves once before I was born but as soon as she had me she realized she needed the help in that big old castle. My Father said she made a mess of everything!"

"I like the sound of your mother already!" Hermione said laughing.

"Hermione… open your ears!" Ron said loudly, "They. Like. It. They like being enslaved!"

"Our short-term aims!" Hermione yelled over top of Ron's voice, "Are to secure house-elves fair wages and working conditions. Our long-term aims include changing the law about non-wand-use, and trying to get and elf into the Department for Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, because they're shockingly under-represented!"

"And how do we do all this?" Harry asked skeptically.

"We start by recruiting members!" Hermione said happily, "I thought two Sickles to join… that buys a badge… and the proceeds can fund our leaflet campaign! Lilly you're in charge of advertisement and media… Ron, you're treasurer… I've got you a collecting tin upstairs… and Harry, you're secretary, so you might want to write down everything that I'm saying now, as a record of out first meeting!"

There was silence as Harry looked between Hermione's egger face and Ron's bewildered expression.

"Count me in!" Lilly said laughing.

Suddenly there was a soft tap, tap on the window. Two owls were fluttering outside.

"Hedwig!"

"Mek!"

Both Harry and Lilly jumped across the empty common room to the window with their owls outside. Harry wrenched open the window and the two owls fluttered inside to their owners.

"About time!" Harry said.

"She's got an answer!" Ron said pointing to the parchment on Hedwig's leg.

"Answer to what?" Lilly asked curiously.

All three of them looked up in surprise that Lilly was even there.

"Um… from a friend… it's private…" Harry began.

"Say no more… so is mine I'll just read mine over by the fire." Lilly said smiling as she had just taken the letter from Mek's leg and knew whom it was from. Standing by the warm fire Lilly ripped open her letter.

Dearest Lilly,

I'm coming home immediately! Isn't that wonderful! I'll be able to spend loads of time with you again. I got your letter from the summer and I'm excited that you are finally going to Hogwarts! Your mother would be so proud of you! Just remember to be careful! I will write to you as soon as I get in. Oh and do me a favor and tell your Pops I'm staying with him for a while so to make up my bed! Ha ha! See you soon love!

Sirius

"HE'S COMING HOME! HE'S FINALLY COMING HOME!" Lilly yelled with excitement overflowing her and forgetting that there were other people there who would definitely not approve of Sirius Black being back in the country or her having contact with a princess.

Harry looking bewildered over at Lilly whispered to Ron and Hermione, "You don't think… that Lilly is in contact with Sirius do you?"

"That's CRAZY!" Ron said.

"Lilly…" Hermione began.

"Hermione what are you doing!" Harry muttered angrily.

"Who's your letter from?" Hermione finished.

Lilly was about to lie when she remembered what Sirius had told her last year when he had first escaped from Azkaban, that Harry was his god-child, "Well I guess it won't hurt you three to know…" Lilly said quietly as she walked towards them, "It's from Sirius Black… he's my uncle."

A/N: What a cliff-hanger eh? Hahaha you prolly didn't see that one coming! Oh well the plott thickens! I hope you enjoyed this chapter! keep reading and reviewing! Oh and tell me if you know any wiccan songs and stuff thanks!