Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters belong to J.K. Rowling. I am merely borrowing them.

Author's Note: I appreciate reviews, and I especially appreciate criticism, but if you aren't going to be nice about it, please don't say anything. Even if I have a lot of problems with a story, I try to be encouraging and polite, and I would encourage everyone to extend the same courtesy, not only to me but to all the people they review.

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MUGGLE

Chapter Three: Squabbles and Surprises

Time is the fire in which we burn.

-Gene Roddenberry

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"Stupid—dratted—thing—why—won't—you—WORK!!!!"

Petunia flipped a page in her magazine and sighed.

BANG. BANG. BANG sounded from the other room, suspiciously reminding her of someone hitting their head repeatedly against the wall.

Petunia flipped another page.

"ARGH!!! WHY DID I TAKE THIS STUPID SUBJECT ANYWAY!"

And another page turned—even though she hadn't actually taken in anything written on it.

Another bang, and Petunia heaved a great sigh. Carefully putting her magazine down, she rolled off the bed and padded over to the next room. She waited until the repeated bangs quit once more, and then softly knocked.

"What!" growled Lily, throwing the door wide open.

"Just checking to see if you're trying to break the house down," said Petunia, raising an eyebrow. "I thought you weren't supposed to do magic outside of school."

"I'm not," said Lily and made to shut the door, but Petunia stuck an arm in it before she could close it.

"What are you doing that's making such a racket, then?" she asked quickly, forcing her way into the room.

"I'm beating my brains out on the wall," Lily grumbled. "Go away."

Petunia rolled her eyes and looked around at her sister's room, which bore little resemblance to any other part of the house. Posters waved at her, their brightly colored robes and long, wooden wands flashing and blinking. A broomstick stood in the corner, with the words Cleansweep Two emblazoned on the handle; a pile of thick, heavy books weighed down several unrolled parchments, all covered with Lily's curly, looping handwriting.

In the center of the room, balanced haphazardly on the seat of a chair, was a shimmering round ball, totally smooth and clear. Petunia peered at it, pushing Lily off as her sister tried to physically force her out of the room.

"Go AWAY, Petunia, I don't come in YOUR room," screeched Lily, tugging at her older sister's arm.

"I just want to look," said Petunia, unable to take her eyes from the crystal, and wrested her arm from Lily's grasp. She reached out to touch the surface of the crystal ball. An odd fog seemed to have wrapped itself around her brain, dulling all the rest of the world into mere background noise.

Her own face shone back at her in the shining surface, the long neck and nose and big front teeth mocking her as they always did, magnified even more by the curving crystal. She dropped to her knees and took the ball into her hands, gasping as it seemed to float away from the chair when she had been expecting something much heavier.

She looked at her face, something nagging at the corner of her brain, but she could not figure out what it was—there was another face, green eyes—a flash of green light—the crystal ball was ripped from her grasp—and she was lying on her back on the floor, Lily peering down at her from a very white face. "What did you do?" whispered her little sister, looking very frightened.

Her mouth was dry, and she couldn't speak for a long moment. The crystal ball was tucked under Lily's arms, and Petunia supposed it must have been her who had snatched it away. She wanted to look again. The compulsion was almost unbearable, but her limbs felt as if they weighed a hundred kilos each, and so she stayed on Lily's floor.

"I don't feel so well," she whispered.

"You don't look so well," said Lily, still white-faced. "I don't think you'd better touch any of my magic things. I didn't know they were dangerous to Muggles like that."

"I think it was because you pulled it away," said Petunia. Her head had stopped spinning and she found she could sit up, though she still felt desperately as if she wanted to sleep for a week.

"Why would that make a difference?" Lily said, green eyes wide.

"Aren't people supposed to see things in crystal balls?" Petunia said. "The future, and things like that?"

Lily's eyes narrowed, and she tightened her grip slightly on the crystal ball. "Yes," she said slowly. "Not everyone can, though. Just Seers, really. And those are really rare."

A deep chill went down Petunia's shoulders and settled in the pit of her stomach as her mind raced through the images it had seen in the ball once more. "I saw something, Lily. I saw myself—"

"That was your reflection," said Lily.

"No!" Petunia cried. "I was old! I had wrinkles and, and I looked like myself but not like myself! And I saw someone else, someone that had your eyes..."

She fell silent and sucked in a deep breath. Something had left her with a tremor of dread running through her veins, and nothing in the short, cut-off vision could explain what it was. The silence in the room was deafening for a long moment.

Then Lily snorted.

"Sure, Petunia, that's right. Make fun of me because I can't see anything in this crystal ball. I'm going to drop Divination anyway, I don't care." Her cheeks blazing red, Lily wrapped the crystal ball in a blanket and threw it vehemently into her trunk before Petunia's mind quite registered what was happening. With a scowl she pulled Petunia from her bemused seat on the carpet and shoved her into the hall; the door slammed shut, leaving a very confused Petunia standing in the hallway.

The icy trickle of fear still coursed through her limbs; something terrible was going to happen to her little sister, she was sure of it. She had never been so sure of anything in her entire life. The green light flashed before her eyes again.

"Lily!" she shouted. "I'm not lying, Lil!"

Nothing but silence came from Lily's room. Petunia gritted her teeth, her dread beginning to be replaced by a trickle of anger and doubt, and went down the stairs to the kitchen. She poured herself a glass of water and sank onto the floor, leaning against the white-painted cupboards.

So very sure she had been only a few moments ago, and now she could not really say what it was she had seen, or why it should have scared her—why it still did scare her—so much. The glass of water trembled in her hand, and she set it down on the floor and buried her head in her arms. Lily shouldn't have snatched the crystal ball out of her hands so quickly. Maybe then she could have seen more... maybe she would have seen something that could explain the sick dread in the pit of her stomach.

She didn't move until the front door banged open and her parents came in, talking loudly to each other, and then she slipped upstairs to her room and did not come out for the rest of the night.

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Two days remained before each sister would pack up and return to school on their separate trains. Petunia was determined to look into the crystal ball once more. The green eyes that were Lily's and yet not haunted her dreams; she was quite sure that something important revolved around their owner, but she could not say what that might be.

Lily guarded her room like a greedy dragon standing sentry over a hoard of treasure, and when she was not in it the door was always locked. Petunia took to haunting the hallway, waiting for Lily to emerge and hopefully leave the door open. All she needed was a few minutes to find the ball and duck back out again.

She had been hanging around the stairway and the upstairs hall for nearly an hour when Lily came out and rolled her eyes. "What is the matter with you, Petunia? Honestly," she said, and went down the stairs without looking back.

Petunia darted across the hall and got a finger into the frame before the door swung shut. Carefully she closed it behind her and tiptoed into the room, looking for a round bundle or a box or something that could be the coveted crystal ball.

To her great surprise it was not hard to find—there it sat, in plain view atop Lily's desk with a shirt cradling the bottom so it could not roll away. For a moment Petunia simply stared and then, quickly, before she could lose her nerve, she snatched it from the desk, shirt and all. With it wrapped snugly in her arms she fled back to her own room just as Lily's footsteps echoed at the bottom of the stairs.

Lily would almost certainly notice its absence, especially because it had been sitting out in the open, so Petunia grabbed a sweater and then opened her window. The old chestnut tree had provided an easy route out many times before, and she could slither down it without needing to use both hands.

It was wet outside, and chilly, but she took no notice. The crystal, wrapped tightly in Lily's shirt and tucked beneath her arm, seemed warm to the touch. Petunia wandered down the road for a few minutes, trying to look unsuspicious, thinking of a place to go where people would not disturb her.

As she walked past the library a thought struck her; though she herself rarely took books out, Lily was in there all the time. And every time her sister had dragged her in, back when they'd still done everything together, the place had been nearly deserted. Petunia went up the steps and slipped through the door, her wet shoes squeaking on the tile. An elderly librarian looked up from his desk and shushed at her.

Walking a little more carefully, she went past him and down the steps into the basement, where Lily's favorite fantasy and science fiction section lurked. There was no one at all there, but Petunia went back to farthest corner and settled down, leaning against the Z's.

She couldn't see the door from where she sat, and she highly doubted anyone would be able to see her, if indeed anyone came down. Hoping desperately that no one would, she pulled the cloth away from the smooth crystal and stared into it, at once nervous and excited.

But nothing happened.

Petunia squinted one way, then the other, tilted her head from side to side, and brought her face closer and farther away.

The crystal remained obstinately blank.

Petunia slumped down with a sigh, deeply disappointed. Maybe it had just been a fluke, some strange Muggle-ness interacting wrongly with wizard magic. She looked at her reflection in the ball, hating the long thin face and the way her nose looked ten times larger, and tried not to cry. How long had she waited outside Lily's door for her chance, and now it was all for nothing?

She did not notice the surface of the ball beginning to swirl below her fingers... Her reflection shimmered and changed as a tear dripped down her nose and splattered on the smooth surface.

Cold gray light bathed Petunia's face, and she blinked, startled... there! Her own face, aged who knew how many years into the future, stared back at her from the crystal, and her mind tumbled into the vision without any control whatsoever.

Images rushed past her eyes—there, the green eyes that were not quite Lily's—the curious green light—terror! A cruel, mocking laugh met her ears, and there...

Her sister, older too, knelt on the floor amidst a sea of broken plaster and furniture, bleeding from a cut on her forehead and clutching something in her arms.

A green light—a blinding flash—and Lily lay still on the floor, her eyes wide and blank, staring dully into oblivion. Green eyes again—the baby! The bundle was a child, a child that now lay wailing at his mother's side.

Petunia had one long moment, stretching out into timelessness, to gaze at her nephew—black hair, as black as night, and pale skin, and those green eyes that mirrored the dead ones of his mother.

And one dark figure came out of nowhere and scooped the child into his arms, and Petunia's senses all exploded with fear. Never had she seen someone who so instantly made her want to run and run and never stop, who smelt of cold death and despair.

He spoke tenderly to the baby, his gentle smile revolting on his evil

face.

"And here you are, Harry," he said. "So tiny. So innocent."

With one long-fingered hand he brushed away the tears from the child's face, gently clucking at the little boy until he quieted.

"You'll see your mother soon," he whispered. His eyes blazed and two more words shot from his mouth, and the green light flared once more, and Harry's eyes—Lily's eyes—widened until they seemed to swallow her up and spit her out, back once more into the depths of the library and the concerned face of the elderly librarian asking her if she was quite all right.

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