For the next day or so Lily was extremely careful what she thought or did. Okney hadn't discovered who the culprit was and had been in a foul mood since, determined to find out who was the cause of all the trouble. Fortunately for her, Lily was one of the last people he would ever suspect of such a thing, and his eye was mostly on the Marauders instead.
For their part the Marauders were also trying to find out who was responsible; partly to congratulate them on infuriating Okney, and partly because they were simply curious as to how someone could do that and completely get away with it. At present all four were sat in the common room talking about it.
"But I just can't see it being any of the Ravenclaws," James said, shaking his head.
"What, not even Jones?" Sirius asked, "he's game for the odd prank now and then."
"Nah, I'm with James," Peter said, "did you see the looks on their faces as they scuttled towards the back of the room?"
"But if it wasn't a Ravenclaw that means it must have been one of us," Remus reasoned, "and if none of us did it, that leaves Alison, Claire, Gemma and Lottie, and can any of you seriously see any of them causing an explosion like that?"
The other three glanced over to where the four girls in their year they had just mentioned were sat on the floor with an astronomy chart in front of them. "Ok then, maybe it was a Ravenclaw," conceded James, quickly deciding that none of his housemates had done it. Alison and Clare were both too mature to perform a prank like that and Lottie would quickly have seen how dangerous it would have been, and as for Gemma, well he just didn't think she had it in her to perform magic like that without getting caught.
"Who then?" Peter mused, "The Ravenclaws were the nearest to the fire to begin with, but then if any of them had pulled out a wand Okney would have seen."
"But it wasn't performed with a wand was it?" Sirius said thoughtfully, "Okney took our wands and tested them remember?"
"What do you think he did?" Peter asked.
"Priori Incantatem," James replied briefly, "it shows the last spell performed by a wand."
"What about Saffron then?" Sirius asked with a grin, "I mean, she's clever enough to be able to figure out a way of not getting caught and she's had her fair share of detentions."
James made a face as Peter laughed, "You just want it to be her because you think this is all a fantastic joke and fancy the pants of her!"
Sirius shrugged and grinned, "what if I do like her? We all know James'll feed me to the most vicious piranhas he could transfigure if I actually tried to hook up with her."
James opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by Remus who had been silent for a while and now said thoughtfully, "You know, I'm not convinced it was intentional-"
"-What do you mean not-"
"Oh shut up Peter and let the man finish," Sirius said good-humouredly.
"All I'm saying is that for a prank it wasn't really very funny was it? People could very easily of gotten serious burns if the explosion had been bigger!"
They fell silent, thinking.
"Well if it was an accident, then I have no idea how that could have happened," Sirius said finally.
****************
The effort of Lily's conscious control over her life was exhausting, but it helped having a friend. Saffron seemed to have decided that Lily was worth spending time with and Lily found it surprising how much she liked having her around. She was smart and fun and a little bit wild at times. But most of all, Saffron accepted her. No questions asked.
And so sooner than she would have believed possible Lily grudgingly placed her trust in Saffron and slowly the answers to questions that Saffron had refrained from asking came out of their own accord. She supposed part of it was that she really was lonely and perhaps more eager that she would admit to herself to have someone to talk to.
A week had gone by since the incident in Potions and Lily and Saffron had hardly spent a minute apart. They were sat on Lily's bed, Saffron sat behind her friend casually braiding her friend's hair. They started to talk about their families.
"Mum and Dad are away a lot of the time so I suppose that's why James and I are so close," Saffron explained, her fingers moving deftly in and out of Lily's hair, "I was gutted in the first year when we were sorted into different houses, I was so miserable being apart from him you see. I'd reckon we're at least as close as twins."
Lily felt a sharp pang of envy and sighed, "I wish I could say the same about me and my sister, Petunia. I doubt we were ever as close as you and James but then she is three years older than me, but we used to be close. When I was little that is, since I got my letter to Hogwarts things have started to change between us…I don't think she loves me anymore."
"I'm sure that's not true!" Saffron protested, dropping the plait midway and crawling round to face her friend, "she can't not love you Lily, she's your sister!"
Lily stretched over to her bedside table and pulled out the letter her family had sent her and passed it to Saffron without comment. Patiently, she watched her friend skim over its contents, her expression darkened as she reached the bottom.
"I can't believe anyone could be so heartless!" Saffron exclaimed.
Lily shrugged.
"Well, if she's going to be so mean then I don't think she deserves your company," Saffron said, slinging an arm round Lily's shoulder, "I'm staying for Christmas, we always do, you should stay too!"
Lily assumed by 'we' Saffron meant James. "I guess," she conceded.
"Great! We'll have an absolute blast! You don't need Petunia anyway, if she's so horrible why would you want to bother making her care about you? I can be your surrogate sister." She giggled, "And if you married James than I really would be!"
"And why would I want to do that?" replied Lily, "I don't even know him! Anyway, he's not my type."
"My brother isn't good enough to be in your league is he?" Saffron grinned
"What? No, I don't have a league!"
"Of course you do, everyone does. I do, and Sirius Black is definitely not in it!"
Lily had noticed the extreme antipathy Saffron always seemed to aim at her brother's closest friend and frankly found it rather amusing. She sometimes thought that Saffron acted like that to stop herself from being able to admit that she did like him, I mean, who wouldn't? He was attractive, funny…not that she fancied him of course. No, she preferred a man with brains. And it wasn't that Sirius wasn't clever, he was, it was just that-well she wouldn't be so quick to judge she supposed, it wasn't as if she knew them that well anyway.
A few nights later as they were sat by the common room fire, deep in conversation, Lily brought up the courage to ask Saffron's help with something. Ever since that night, she'd wanted to find out what Ajax had carved onto her back, but even with the aid of mirrors she hadn't been able to make it out. Since then she had been trying to think of a way to ask Saffron what it looked like without revealing anything about being the Huntress.
The idea had come to her earlier in the day when they were looking at one of the muggle magazines that had been left lying around the common room. They had been looking at the fashion pages and some of the models had tattoos. Saffron had laughed at the pictures of models in bikinis and had jokingly suggested that next time Sirius and the others came round to visit she'd wear one of them when they went swimming. The Potters were very rich and had a huge house with an indoor swimming pool. Saffron had promised to invite her back sometime in the summer holidays, but they had planned to stay the other breaks were they were. Less parental control Saffron had said with a glint in her eyes. But Lily knew that although this was probably part of the reason Saffron always stayed at Christmas and Easter, it also had something to do with the fact that her parents were only normally present during the summer holidays.
"Saffron?"
"What?"
"You know those pictures we were looking at earlier?"
"Yeah," she grinned at the memory.
"Well look," with a last glance to check they were alone she pulled her top over her head and turned her back to Saffron, pulling her hair round to reveal her back.
"Wow! When did you get that done?" she gasped.
"Not long ago," replied Lily. Now for the hard bit, "it's really annoying not being able to see it properly though, I haven't really seen it since I got it done." Well that was true enough.
"Oh, well here," Saffron took out her wand and tapped a piece of parchment, muttering a quick charm and pressed it to Lily's back. When she took it away she handed the piece of paper to Lily, who pulled her top back on before turning her attention to the parchment.
It showed her back, as if it had been made of paint and Saffron had just pressed the parchment to it and picked up the imprint. Right in the middle of her shoulder blades' was a silver mark that did in fact look quite like a tattoo. About the size of a galleon, it was a round circle with a five pointed star in the middle, its points touching the outer circle. Lily thought it looked oddly familiar but she couldn't place it.
"I never picked you for the type to get a tattoo done," Saffron was saying, "I like it a lot though!"
"Thanks," replied Lily, relieved that Saffron hadn't suspected anything out of the ordinary.
"Maybe I'll get one done myself," Saffron said grinning madly, "I'd just love to see the look on my mum's face when I turn up in the summer with a tattoo!"
"Well," Lily replied, shaking off her worries and deciding to lighten up, "I think that isn't a bad idea, maybe you could get one done saying 'I love Sirius Black'."
Saffron shrieked at Lily and threw a large pillow sat next to her on the sofa at Lily, "I do not!"
The conversation quickly descended into an all out pillow fight as Saffron tried to beat Lily into submission for daring to insinuate that she fancied Sirius.
*********************************
It was exactly a month since that night and Lily was tiredly making her way down to breakfast with Saffron. They were both only half awake having stayed up late into the night working on an assignment for Transfiguration. Yawning, Lily sat down and poured herself a cup of tea.
Suddenly she gasped and dropped the pot in astonishment. Her eyes wide she ignored the hot liquid spilling over the tablecloth and stared at her hands. Her nails were bright silver. She made a choking sound and continued to stare at them in bewilderment.
"What's wrong?" asked Saffron in concern.
"I-I-I-I…" words completely failed her.
People sat either side of her were busy mopping up the pool of steaming tea.
"When did you paint your nails?" Saffron asked, "I like that colour. You're getting more and more rebellious by the day Miss Evans, first a tattoo and now nail polish."
"I didn't," whispered Lily.
"Sorry?" Saffron asked leaning closer, "what did you say?"
Lily thought quickly, "erm yesterday," she lied, feeling a pang of guilt that she had deceived her best friend.
They sat down at the table Lily continued to stare at her nails, what was going on?
Making up her mind she rose, and followed the motto that every Ravenclaw subscribed to- when in doubt go to the library.
"Look, I'll catch you up," she said to Saffron.
"Where you going?" she asked.
"Library," she called back.
Saffron turned back to her breakfast, that was a good enough answer for any Ravenclaw.
*******************
In the library she stared around her, she was here but she didn't know where to look. It was all very well knowing what she needed was probably in here, but an entirely different matter to find it.
She wandered along row after row; the familiar smell of musty old books around her, eyes scanning title after title randomly searching for goodness knows what. Near the back of the library she paused and Io's words came back to her, "trust in your heritage, trust in the Moonlit Ones"
Lily walked up to the desk, "Excuse me, can you tell me where I might find information on the Moonlit Ones?" she asked politely.
"Hmm," the librarian mused thoughtfully, "I would think that would be in the myths and legends section." She pointed along several rows, "it's at the end down there after 'true myths'."
"Thanks," Lily turned around and walked in the direction the librarian pointed.
She stood in front of the imposing bookshelf. Rows and rows of leather-bound books reached from the floor to the ceiling. Where on earth was she supposed to start?
'Well,' she thought with a sigh, 'at least it's a Saturday.'
With that, she pulled several books out at random and sat herself at the table nearby.
She spent hour after hour scanning though book after book fruitlessly. The sun set and the lamps around the library flared up sending out a soft glow. Students wandered in and out returning and borrowing books, occasionally sitting at one of the desks to study.
Finally Lily, face flushed with success, traced her fingers along the page. She'd finally found an entry.
Moonlit Ones, the: a mythological set of chosen people believed to combat the powers of darkness that reappear roughly every thousand years. Not much is known about these people, but it is not thought that it has any foundation in truth.
Lily sighed and ran a hand though her hair in frustration, that was it?! Then she noticed a slip of paper in between the pages of the book, one of the notes that the librarian left in old books after more recent discoveries had been made. That read: 'new manuscript discovered in 1964, as yet un-translated, but believed to contain information about the Moonlit Ones. Currently on loan to the Hogesmede Museum.'
Her heart leapt, the Hogesmede Museum?! She could look there-'but wait a second,' she thought, 'it's still un-translated.'
She let her head drop and bang against the table, she clenched her fists. Why did everything have to be so difficult? It was all so frustrating! No one would tell her anything and when she found something that could have been of use it was unreadable.
"Typical, just typical," she said out loud.
"What's typical?"
Lily looked up, "oh, hi Saffron, just some information I wanted that I can't get-again." She frowned and rested her head in her hands, her elbows propping open the page she was at.
Saffron came and sat in the empty chair next to Lily, "the Moonlit Ones," she read out loud. Lily stiffened. "Is this what you're going to do for our History of Magic dissertation?" she asked.
Lily grinned, "yeah, I think I will." Her mood lifted, if she was doing it for her dissertation then maybe she could go and see that manuscript. "Do you think I could combine my History of Magic one with my Ancient Runes?" she said, thinking out loud.
"Probably," Saffron replied, "what are you thinking of doing?"
"Well, there's an un-translated document about the Moonlit Ones in the Hogesmeade Museum. I thought that I could use the translating of the document as my Ancient Runes and then the actual contents for the History of Magic."
Saffron glanced down at the slip of paper, "but that's been there for a while, and I really don't mean this to sound insulting, but what makes you think that you'll be able to translate it when qualified experts have failed?"
Lily shrugged, "hard work, and I'm a Ravenclaw after all." Silently she added, 'And I have something that none of them had.'
She spoke to her teachers' the next day and both approved her topic so she planned to go down to the museum after school on Monday. Then she would see what she was up against.
*****************************************
A/N: Well wasn't that a long chapter?! By normal standards anyhow.
Right questions ppl asked(forgive me if I forget some):
1.Yes, that bow in the museum is hers, but she hasn't connected that bow with everything that's going on with her at the moment. As for when she's going to get it, that would be telling (also I haven't written that bit yet, but the next big bit of action doesn't involve it)
2.About James and the Marauders: well they don't know that it was her they saw that night but they will be developments in that area soon, in 2chapters time I think.
3.The charm seems to be raising a lot of questions so I'll try and make it clear. Firstly it does not make her invisible-just so ordinary that unless she's around then you forget about her. So it does alter her appearance to make her less remarkable, when the Marauders saw her coming back from the forest the strength of magic she'd been exposed to cancelled out the magic of her charm. I'm afraid she isn't going to remove it completely for a while, but the people that matter most in the story will be able to see her more clearly soon.
And Tiger, you really are too astute for your own good! :P I'm not going to answer your questions I'm afraid, because they give a lot away.
Right well you know the drill people, and because exams are finally over I'm able to write more without feeling guilty so I'll post again in about 5-6days or when I get 70 reviews(now that is all that greedy now is it?)
Lots of love to all you people who reviewed!
Melian