A/N: I got it up a tad quicker this time! Nuh, I've had this chapter written for ages, and now I finally get to post it! Yay! I wrote this around the same time that I wrote the ball sequence! Haha. Hope that you all like it!

Disclaimer: None of this is mine.

The seventh years had little time for such leisurely activities after that. The NEWTS were getting closer and closer, as the teachers were quick to remind them, as were Lily and Remus, who were exceedingly edgy, and snapped quickly if someone disturbed the peace that feel on the common room as was the tradition as they neared the end of the year.

Divination orbs, arithmancy charts, and massive books poured over by those studying history were a common sight in the Griffindore common room these days, and the library was constantly haunted by those who were studying for their NEWTs and their OWLs.

"Lily…"said James, in a singsong voice, late one night, as the two of them sat studying in the common room…or rather Lily sat studying and James accompanied her, sitting in the next seat and playing idly with her quill.

Lily ignored him. He had repeated many idiotic musings to her, when he got bored and her attention had not yet waved from the work that she was studying.

"Liiiily…" he repeated, singing it a little higher, and much more whiny this time. She slammed down her book onto the desktop.

"Ok, but this had better be good." She said, knowing that it wouldn't be. James looked guilty for a moment.

"You have puuuurty eyes Liiiiily." He said, still with the same sense of being a daze.

Lily rolled her 'purty eyes," and picked her book back up, refocusing her attention and placing it between her face and James', exasperated.

"James, you can go to bed you know, you don't have to stay here and, well, watch me study. It's kind of annoying."

"I know, but if I go upstairs then I have to watch Remus study, and his eyes aren't as pretty as yours!" James said, perkier this time, and Lily rolled them, once again.

History of Magic had gone back, the next lesson, to the same drab subject that it had been before their memorable lesson, and Lily went back to taking note while the others fell into a sleepy stupor, for which she was not grateful. It meant that James accompanied her even more when she studied, and, as much as she loved him, he was not the greatest person to work with.

James had the composure that he could know any information at a glance, an opinion shared by Sirius, who was scarcely seen studying, and as much as he lacked in common sense, Lily had to admit to herself that they did seem to pass their exams easier than the rest of the grade.

Sirius, meanwhile, was on the edge, not knowing whether to share the revelation that he had experienced by the fire with Dani, though seeing the girl in a whole new light. The thing was that he had sort of said that he loved her before…not that he had known what it meant when he was hanging off a broom at forty feet, and screaming it out in front of the whole school. Now he knew what love was, and it brought up a whole new list of possibilities. They were leaving Hogwarts in less than two months. Would this mean that he and Dani would move in together? Get engaged? He had no idea, but the first step was telling her, and the prospect scared the hell out of him.

"Lets go down to the beech tree!" James announced one Sunday morning, and Remus and Lily gave him dark looks, thinking of the calendar pinned up in the common room, counting down the days until the burdens of exams fell on them.

"No no no!" Sirius said, seeing their expression, and looking to Dani and Ella for support, "No, we can! You two can study down there, we've done it before, it's actually quite nice And it's getting pretty hot nowadays, so I think that it would be good for you two to get out of the castle, and more importantly, get out of the bloody library!"

Ella and Dani nodded slowly in agreement, and Sirius and James gave Remus and Lily puppy dog eyes, which, by the way, Sirius was quite accomplished at…

"Ok! Ok!" Lily exclaimed, after exchanging looks with Remus and relenting to the four anxious faces in front of them.

Gathering up their books, swimmers and towel, the friends all headed down to the beech tree by the lake, where they had spent many an afternoon lying under its tresses.

Lily and Remus immediately opened up their books, and began to pour over them intently. James and Ella exchanged looks, and shook their heads, before following Sirius and Dani into the water.

"Does Ella follow you when you want to study?" Lily asked Remus, when they were gone. He shook his head, and laughed.

"No, but I'm glad that James has you to do that to now. OWLs were horrible with him watching over my shoulder every two seconds, insisting that he knew it all." Remus laughed, and went back to studying…

What was that?" Lily asked, looking up suddenly at Remus. She looked back down at her parchment. There was a great drip mark smudging the writing. Remus looked at it too, and then at the sky.

"It can't be raining, can it?" he said, uncertain, looking around the periwinkle blue sky for signs of clouds. There was nothing but blue sky stretching off into the distance. Lily was confused.

Realising that they had blown their cover, Ella and James dove from the tree, and landed on top of Lily and Remus, dragging them to the water, Ella by grabbing Remus' hand before he had a chance to object, throwing him into the icy water and jumping in after him, and James by throwing Lily over his shoulder and running and jumping into it's refreshing depths.

"Ahhhh! James I am going to kill you!" Lily cried, feeling the water hit her skin and soak her robes through. Remus was yelling similarly at Ella, but neither of them seemed to care. Out further Dani was perched on Sirius shoulders, balancing until he would throw her off.

"You needed a break from all that…" Ella whispered, before kissing Remus. He smiled, an all reprimanding was forgot, as were the water soaked study notes, sitting under the beech tree, as Remus, Ella, Lily and James swam until sunset.

That night, however, there was no escaping the mountain loads of work that they seventh years had to do, and so Lily was naturally the last left in the library that night, when Madame Pince, the ill-tempered librarian turned off all the lamps and told her to get out, in respectable order, so that Lily found herself shrouded in darkness before being roughly shooed from the library.

Lily walked the familiar path back to Griffindore tower, her books slung over her back, lugging her tired feet along the hard stone floor. She opened the door to the common roo m, and her ears were filled with the sound of her friends laughing…

"Oh do Lily! Do Lily!" called Sirius, excited as Lily came through the portrait hole. Lily was taken aback by the sudden shouting of her name, and sat down apprehensively. All her friends were crowded around Ella who was holing out a little velvety bag.

"What are you all doing now?" Lily asked, exasperated. Ella held the bag out to Lily.

"We got given them in divination yesterday." Dani explained. "Draw out a stone and it says something about your future! Go on! It's only fun. Sirius drew out this one!"

Sirius looked sulky, as the rest of the group roared with laughter. "It's the stone of madness. They think I'm going to go crazy."

"No Sirius, we think that it's proof that you already are crazy!" Dani laughed.

"And I got the paternal stone." James said, winking at Lily. "Means I'm going to make a good father. Go on Lily, cant hurt."

Lily plunged her hand into the tiny little bag, and felt a very smooth, round stone, which she pulled out of the bag. Unclenching her fist, she gasped.

"The bloodstone." She breathed, and James gave a sharp intake of breath. Remus rolled his eyes, and Ella read from the tiny chart that she had in her hands…

"It means that you'll take part in a war, be like something of a hero Lily." Lily wasn't listening to her, and nor was James. Ella continued, " It's the martyrs stone…the heliotrope…"

Sirius, Lily and James all jerked their heads abruptly, and James leapt to his feet.

"WHAT?" he yelled.

Everyone stared at the three, who were now all on their feet, wide-awake, staring at the stone as though they had sent a ghost… Ella's eyes widened in shock as the three of them turned to her.

"The heliotrope...that's the other name for the bloodstone, used mostly for transfiguration…" she tried to explain, but James had turned to lily, begging her silently with his eyes.

"We have to James! We always said that if we found the heliotrope…"

"We don't know if that's where it is…"

"Yes we do! How many times have we been through this! It's there James, it all fits perfectly. We've been there before, we can do it! We can find it!"

"No!" it was Remus who spoke now, standing from his chair. He didn't know what they were talking about, but he figured that it had something to do with the tiny red and green stone resting in Lily's palm, and he knew why they wanted it. He wasn't about to let his friends leave the school at such a crucial part of their education to find that rock…

"No Remus, you don't understand! He wants it too!" Lily said, in an urgent whisper. Remus looked confused, and opened his mouth to speak again, before Sirius silenced him with a look. Remus was taken aback. He didn't know that Sirius had been so deeply involved with the bloodstone…

"It's the same thing…" Lily muttered under her breathe, still amazed at what had been staring them in the face all along, all year like a riddle that had been mocking them, jeering when ever they got close to a new answer before turning away…she couldn't turn away this time.

"It's not just about Moony this time James. I wanted it then, but now it's a race against the clock…There isn't time to wait until we're safe, or finished school. We need to go now, and get to that stone before He does." She said in a whisper, holding James hands tightly and staring deep into his eyes. He had seen this look in her eyes before. The iron clad, determined expression that they wore when she wouldn't take no for an answer.

"We'll go to Dumbledore." He said simply. "We should have gone to Dumbledore right back at the beginning. I don't really care if I get in trouble for being at that meeting anymore. This is much more important than a head boy badge." He said. Remus, Ella and Dani looked on in amazement, as they conversed in low whispers.

"But promise me, that when we get to his office, you wont say that you were there too? I was at the meeting, all alone, all right? Neither of you were there, it was just me." Lily nodded glumly, tears in her eyes, and they stood there for a moment, in silence, before…

"So, are we going to see Dumbledore then?" Sirius asked. Lily and James jumped slightly, taken aback at Sirius' keenness. They hadn't even expected him to come alone, but here he was, grabbing their cloaks off the back of the chair, and already halfway through the portrait hole.

With a quick wave to the other, Lily and James ran after him, James' invisibility cloak stuffed strategically in his pocket, his hand clasped tightly over Lily's in which she held the tiny heliotrope.

"Sirius!" They said, when they were almost at Dumbledore's office and he showed signs of wanting to forward right in.

A man came up behind them, unheard, and spoke in a very low tone, in a sort of accent, that none of them had ever heard of before. The man's face was cast in shadows, and he certainly wasn't a teacher at the school, and much less a student. They stared at him.

"Dumbledore isn't here." He said, in his low husky tones. They just stared at him.

"Who are you." Said James loudly, sounding much braver and bolder than he felt.

"Cardoc Dearborn. I am a…a friend of Dumbledore's. I am just here to watch the school tonight. D not go spreading this around mind you, but he has told us of you three, so I don't mind saying it here. You're the Potter boy, and Miss Lily Evans, and you're Sirius Black, no doubt about it. Yes, yes I have heard great things about the three of you I have." He said, smiling a shadow of a smile as he saw the bewildered looks on the student's faces.

"He's out of the school tonight." Cardoc explained, "I'll tell him that you called in, though I don't know when he'll be back I'm afraid." He said, sighing. The moon shifted in position outside, and cast a long glisten of light on Cardoc's face, so that the lost expression covering it told them that he was no closer to knowing the whereabouts of Albus Dumbledore than they were.

"But for now, I suggest that you get back to your common room. You don't want to be caught out of bed at this hour. I'll be seeing you all soon I expect. Stay safe."

Cardoc said, and the three exchanged scared looks with each other, and then, bidding goodbyes to Cardoc Dearborn, headed back up to the common room, running swiftly through the corridors without further interference.

They reached the common room again, and took a deep breath, anticipating the state that they would find their friends in when they re-entered the room. They were, however, in comparison to what they were expecting, surprisingly calm. Dani was pacing the common room dangerously, taping on things as she went, and twiddling her wand between her fingers. Ella was ling on the floor, looking calmly up at the roof, and Remus was sitting on the lounge, his head in his hands. James made to go over and talk to him, and Dani, upon their arrival, ran over and threw herself on Sirius, letting out her worry at not knowing what was going on.

Lily, however, did none of this. She actually didn't acknowledge that she had entered the common room at all. She walked straight threw the room, past her friends, and started u the stairs to the dormitory. The boys' dormitory.

"Shit." Muttered James, changing direction from his beeline to Remus and running after Lily. Sirius gave Dani a swift kiss on the cheek.

"I love you." He whispered in her ear, before sprinting up the stairs after James and Lily, up the staircase to her dormitory.

The rest of the common room looked confused, but the quiet studiers dropped their heads back down to their books a moment later.

Dani stood there, staring off into the distance, jaw dropped in amazement, her fingers touching the spot on her cheek where Sirius' lips had touched her…

The three friends looked at each other hopelessly. They could try and follow the others, who had run up to the dormitory by now. But they knew that even if they did that they wuld have no way of stopping them.

So did James.

"No Lily! You cant! Give me back the broom!" James cried, standing over the other side of the room, while Lily placed herself near the window, his broomstick clutched firmly in her trembling hand. "You cant Lily!" he said, his voice cracking. Sirius ran into the room, and caught sight of Lily.

"Oh shit. Well, I guess we always knew that we had to, didn't we?" he said, taking his broomstick from its position next to his bed heads and mounting it.
"So where are we going anyway?"

"Nowhere!"

"Chestervalle. Where the heliotrope is."

"No we're not!"

"Chestervalle? Isn't that that place with all the werewolves?"

"That's the one."

"No it isn't!" Sirius and Lily both looked at James. He looked momentarily embarrassed. "Er, sorry, I was getting used to disagreeing with you…" he said, but then turned back to Lily.

"You can't go. I don't want you to get hurt." He said finally, in a defeated voice. She gave him a small smile.

"Jump on."

Quite vexed at being invited to jump onto his own broom, James rolled his eyes, before obliging. Steering the broom from behind her, James managed to manoeuvre it superbly over the school grounds, so that they were ducking in and out of clouds most gracefully, and Lily doubted that anyone had seen them at all.

Sirius, riding behind them, was shocked when James suddenly began to descent, just outside of Hogsmeade.

"We can't be there yet!" He cried, looking down at their black surroundings in shock.

"No! But we can apperate form here!" Lily's voice came from up ahead.

They landed by the side of the road that led to Hogsmeade, and looed at each other firmly, their mouths set into thin white lines, their eyes blazing with fear and determination. Sirius grabbed a hold of James forearm so that he knew where to go.

And with a loud CRACK they were gone. And the sudden smell of decay and eerie silence told them that they had reached Chestervalle.

A/N: I hope that you liked it! Yes, they are the same thing! Good old google, I owe them so much, lol. Thanks to all who have read this far, the next chapter should be posted sometime on Sunday. MY Sunday, so I duno when that is 4 all u non-aussies. Um, not tomorrow, the next day! Yer, that's the one. Anyway, thanks to all the people who have reviewed this fic so loyally! Luv u!

-Ella Evans xXx

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