A/N: I must be going insane! My dad has to go to work so I am using my HOME COMPUTER to type this chapter up (which I have already handwritten)! I am OBSESSED! This computer is so slow I've had to start up and shut down SIX TIMES! Yeah, anyways, I'm not sure if MWP&P went to the Shrieking Shack or not at full moon, but I'm saying that, this time at least, they did.

Disclaimer: If I were J.K.R. I'd be at Harbor Town. Or possibly Hawaii…

The stag just stared at her. It's brilliant hazel eyes bore into her own until they began to water. Yet she was entranced. She could not turn away.

It looked so… sad. I know that look. I know those eyes. The stag made to move towards her and the dog gave a low growl in its throat. Where had she seen this before?

"Who are you?" she muttered, though she knew the stag was much too far away to hear her. It inclined its magnificent, antlered head slightly.

Something stirred in Lily's memory. "…Sorry, we thought you were talking to him. See you up there, Prongs." Her eyes widened. Prongs!

"James?" murmured Lily, not taking her eyes off of his for a second. It seemed impossible, downright crazy, yet she knew as she said it that it was true.

The dog (or was it a dog?) barked again. James remained frozen where he was as Lily drew closer, watching, waiting.

The dog barked its significant, booming bark once more. This time it jolted James back to earth. With an apologetic glance at the canine, he scrambled towards the still-frozen Whomping Willow and out of sight.

Freed from the spell James had been weaving around her (not that he had required a wand), Lily swayed on the spot, feeling slightly sick. Now, with James gone, her feeling of certainty about him was ebbing away. How was it possible that he was a stag? It was just stupid. But, still - she'd been so sure it was him!

More squeaky noises echoed from underneath her feet. Suddenly, without knowing why, she once again felt doubtless that the stag was the student who had kissed her under the mistletoe just four days ago…

Wait a minute! James! He, James… I was mad at him! He really was… I've got to apologize! And with that, Lily ran towards the tree, forgetting momentarily just which tree it was.

KERTHUMP! A branch as wide as a dustbin hit the ground, right where she'd been standing moments before. THWACK! Another hit her in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her. There was another THUD as a different branch got her from behind the knees, causing her to loose balance and fall into a pile of mud.

Cursing and wiping sludge off her face, Lily ran forwards again, around to the side of the tree that she'd seen the two animals disappear.

Swoosh! A thin, whip-like branch shot past her, just missing her face and flicking her wrist as it went by. A gash appeared across her hand, spattering her cuff in blood. She winced, but bid her bottom lip and moved on.

Yet another thick branch came at her feet. She jumped. A wide, knobbly one came at her face from the right. She ducked. I don't know how much longer I can keep this up! Maybe I should just give up now.

"Aaah!" Lily gasped in pain. She'd lost concentration for too long, and the whip-like branch had struck her on the side of the face. It spit of the situation at had, Lily grinned as she remembered the event almost two years previously at which James had sported a similar cut.

The knobbly branch came at her again from the right side, and this time it's aim was true. There was a sickening crunch as Lily felt her nose break. Warm blood spurted from both her nostrils.

The branch struck again, this time at her back, and she was shoved into the tree trunk. Too scared to move, Lily turned to face the Whomping Willow, letting her foot slide… slide?

She looked down and saw a cleverly disguised hole at the trunk of the tree, sloping steeply underneath the roots of the tree and out of sight – obviously where James and that dog had gone. Without a second thought, Lily crouched down and slid through the hole.

Dust and dirt settled on her, added to the collection of mud, water (from snow AND Peeves' water balloon) and blood all over her clothes. Her nose was still bleeding freely, so she pinched it, partly because of the bleeding and partly because of the horrible, musty smell. She started walking cautiously through the passageway.

It was cold, Lily was shivering and wished she'd thought to bring a jacket. But then again, she hadn't known she would be going outside when she left the Common room, and even if she had, her former rage probably would have distracted her too much to think of jackets, anyway.

It was also dark, and Lily had to squint it order to see. She began to feel around for her wand in her front pocked – she hadn't put her wand in her back pockets since she'd read somewhere that you could accidentally loose buttocks by sticking the wand in the back of your jeans.

"Lumos." Muttered Lily, her wand clenched in her cold, sweaty hand. A narrow beam of light appeared from her wands' tip, onto the soil in front of her. There was nothing to be seen but grimy, earth walls and an unstable looking ceiling with roots coming down every so often.

What's a passage like this doing under the Whomping Willow? And where does it lead? Oh, I'm confused… that seems to be happening a lot tonight. The only possible clue as to what lay at the end of the tunnel was that it seemed, though it was hard to tell underground, to be going in the general direction of Hogsmeade.

Every minute or so, odd noises came from the end of the path. There were yelps, thumps, growls, squeaks (the same noises she had heard earlier), crashes and even a sort of howl.

What is James DOING up there? Thought Lily. They sound like the noises I'm told come from the Shrieking Shack at night! Wait a minute… A sense of dread filled her as she guessed where the passageway she was in ended up.

"Oh, why me?" sighed Lily, still holding her nose in one hand and her wand in the other. However, she trudged on with the thought of apologizing to James in her head.

And, once I've said sorry, it'll be a happy ending to this fiasco, and we'll happily start going out and forget about everything that happened tonight! She kept telling herself. And with that single, positive thought in her head, she turned a corner with the tunnel.

A couple more minutes passed. Lily's cut on her arm itched, she almost got knocked out by a giant root which had been dangling from the ceiling and a drop of water landed on her head – but apart from that, Lily just kept walking forwards through the passageway.

Lily shone her wand forwards once more and was shocked to find that a few paces ahead, the tunnel ended abruptly, without a door. A tear fell from Lily's eyes – she'd come all this way, risked all this, for nothing.

There was another thud from above her. Lily looked up to see a trapdoor. Praying it wouldn't open up to where she thought it was going to, she lifted the door and clambered up through it.

It seemed her prayers had not been answered. She had never been in the Shrieking Shack before (who had?) but she knew just by looking around that she was inside it.

Furniture was strewn everywhere. Large chunks were torn out of different objects around the room. But how could ghosts create such a mess?

There was a yelp and Lily felt a jolt of panic. What was in here? James. Lily reminded herself, but even that did not calm her. It was as though she'd only just truly realized where she was.

"I'm in the Shrieking Shack!" she moaned in despair. "The most severely haunted building in Britain! Oh, help me, God! Please, please help –" Lily screamed as the door on her right smashed open. She turned and saw, to her relief, that it was just James (who was still a stag).

"James!" said Lily, whose mood had changed very fast from fear to relief to happiness. That was more than she could say for him, however. His eyes had glazed over and he was swaying where he stood, looking very ill. But that wasn't the worst of it.

His right shoulder had been slashed by something. Lily guessed it was claws of some sort, as there were three long, separate cuts going in the same direction, towards his neck. He staggered in no direction in particular.

"J-James?" Lily stammered again. "Are… are you alright?" James blinked at her as though he only just realized she was there. He stared his penetrating stare for a few seconds, then looked from her still bleeding nose, to the large cut on her cheek, to her very dirty clothes and jerked his eyes and head towards the trapdoor.

Though he couldn't use words, his meaning couldn't have been plainer. Get back to the castle, Lily. Get back to safety.

"But what about you?" asked Lily, looked at his right shoulder with concern. The stag grimaced but jerked his head towards the trapdoor once more. Wondering why James himself wasn't leaving a place so clearly full of danger, she turned around slowly to the spot she'd come from.

"But-" she turned to face him again. His expression was not one of fear, or bravery. It was one of concern. For her. Sadly, she pulled open the door and jumped down onto the earth with a thud.

A/N: Phew! That's a long chapter for you! 1593 words, that was, WITHOUT the authors notes or disclaimer! Three more chapters to go, stay tuned!