Chapter 7
Lily threw her lost odd sock into her trunk and snapped the lid shut. Finally she was going home. After 3 months, 3 weeks and 2 days in Beauxbatons Lily was ready to go home and see her family. Even seeing Petunia was preferable to another night in this ice castle. It wasn't that she didn't like Beauxbatons; she just felt that nothing was comparable when it came nearly three weeks at home with her family. Recasting the weightless spell all trunks were provided with, simply because she would hate for it to suddenly wear off, even though common sense told her it wouldn't, Lily pulled the trunk out of her dorm and down the corridor where she stopped at Alex's door and knocked.
"Yeah?" Came Alex's muffled voice from within, a voice Lily took to be an invitation to enter.
"Alex!" she admonished. "You're nowhere near packed. Hurry up, we're due to leave in three hours."
"I am," she declared defiantly as she wriggled out from under the bed, a triumphant look on her face as she clutched a pink and blue shirt. At the disapproving look on Lily's face she sighed, "I am. I just have to shove it all in the trunk. I'll be ten minutes."
Lily, though doubtful, nodded and sat on the edge of Alex's bed watching her. Half an hour later Alex seemed no closer to being packed and Lily sat watching her with a rather superior told-you-so look. Alex glared up at her.
"You know, you could help."
"I could," Lily agreed. "But how would that help you learn not to leave things until the last minute?"
"You left it until the last minute too," Alex pointed out.
"I know but I know the spell that makes packing so much easier, you insist on doing it the muggle way."
"Lily!" Alex cried. "You're sat there watching me suffer and you can do it with the wave of a wand?"
"Actually it's five waves, but yes," she leant back further on the bed, making herself comfy.
"Well…" Alex looked at her desperately.
"What?" Lily shrugged casually.
"Do it then."
"Oh! No."
"Please?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Don't want to."
"I'll pay you."
"I don't want your money."
"I'll buy you a really good Christmas present."
"You've already bought my present."
Alex sighed, running out of ideas, time for the old hopeful. "I'll be your best friend forever."
Lily laughed, "I might not want you to be my friend forever."
"Course you do, why wouldn't you?"
Lily just smiled peacefully and closed her eyes, "Wake me when you're done."
Resisting the urge to get up and throttle her 'friend' where she sat, Alex continued to throw things into her trunk.
Lily casually opened one eye, grinning at seeing Alex struggle with her packing. She closed her eye again. Half an hour later progress was visible, as little as it was, and Lily began to take pity on her. Casually she waved her wand and Alex's clothes, parchments, books and things began to sort themselves out and neatly place themselves in her trunk.
"You were taking too long," Lily commented as she got up off the bed. "Can we go now?"
"Wha…Thank you."
Lily just shrugged in response and began to lead the way to the head teacher's office where they would floo to the Leaky Cauldron in London to meet their families.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
Sirius and Peter reached the scene first and stared in horror at the sight before them. White robes and silver masks, a dozen or so men stormed the busy street of Hogsmeade cursing anyone within sight. Peter let out a terrified squeak and ran to the left of Sirius, crouching down behind a bin and out of sight. Sirius, as tempted as he was to join his little friend, stopped dead when he saw James and Tae round the corner, directly in the way of the men in white. Spells flew from his wand faster than he seemed to be shouting them. The three men bringing up the rear fell to the floor under different spells, two more narrowly missed being hit my jelly-legs jinxes. They turned and moved away from the group heading straight for Sirius who squeezed his eyes shut and pointed his wand, firing off as many curses as he could think of.
A female scream and a male shout brought him back to his senses and he opened his eyes to find no one stood before him but half of the group just metres away from James and Tae, both of whom appeared to have been fighting just as hard as him, though perhaps with a bit more precision. Still, as the group got closer, they seemed to be losing their will to fight and before he knew what was happening Sirius could feel himself running towards his friends.
He burst through the group of men in white, punching and kicking whoever got in his way. He didn't care, his focus was on getting to his friends and nothing was going to stop him. He reached them just as a stunning spell was being sent their way. Sirius dived in front of them, the full force of the spell hitting him in the chest. He landed face down with a bit of a slide left over from his dive.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
The stunning spell was heading straight for them and Merlin only knew what would happen to them then. Tae shut her eyes tightly, imagining she were anywhere but here, anywhere but about to get stunned and probably killed by maniacs in disguise. James, at least, was a bit more practical, he saw the spell coming and grabbed Tae's wrist, if this were going to happen, he wasn't going to go through it alone. He was about to duck when a body threw itself in front of them. He watched as the spell hit the body in the chest and it rolled, falling and sliding across the floor. It took him a moment to digest what had happened.
"Sirius," Tae gasped, crouching down and rolling him over. His head, now face up and in her lap, was bloody and scratched, stones and dirt stuck in his wounds, his chest was ripped open, blood pouring from it.
James, angered by the state of his friend, whipped his wand out with a renewed vigour. Spells flew in every direction, the sources of them unidentifiable in the once-busy street. James could feel himself getting pushed further and further back, his back getting closer to the wall with each step. It was one-on-one now and the man in white seemed to be winning.
"Expelliarmus!" A cry came from behind.
The man's wand flew from his hand and he scrambled after it. He turned to find himself face-to-face with a task force of Aurors twice the size of his original group and now, facing twenty four-on-one odds, he was willing to admit defeat. With a quick wave of his wand the man disapparated before their very eyes, in his wake was a street of people either hiding, unconscious or worse and in the air there hovered a rather large and grotesque symbol. A skull with a snake threading through it floated high above them, chilling them all. Tae in particular paled at the sight of the symbol, the same symbol Sirius had spotted in her sketchbook, and the same symbol he'd warned her not to be seen with. She looked down with wonder at the head in her lap, wiping away some of the hair that was matted to his forehead by blood, and couldn't help but wonder just how he knew about the symbol.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
"…Stupid, irresponsible things to do, and you Miss Ruris, a guest to this school, not to mention I thought you had more sense than these three. What made you think you would get away this?"
James looked down guiltily at his scuffed shoes, Peter visibly cowered where he sat but Tae looked boldly at their headmaster. When the Aurors were mostly disapparated and only a few remained to clear up the situation, Peter finally felt comfortable braving the street. He was, of course, immediately spotted and taken to join James, Tae and Sirius, the latter of who was receiving basic treatment for his face and chest. Once his cuts were cleaned up all four students were escorted back to Hogwarts where Dumbledore was already waiting. Sirius was taken to the hospital wing to receive proper treatment from Dr Nedalski while the other three continued on to Professor Dumbledore's office. It was here that they had faced what could only be called the Headteacher's wrath though, James noted with some humour, it was nothing compared to Evans'. Somehow words intended (and working) to make them guilty were nothing compared to the threat of ones life, they were quite shameful though.
Dumbledore had started with the typical round on how irresponsible it was to leave school grounds unattended and without permission, then moved on to the speech about how they shouldn't have been able to get off school premises unnoticed anyway. He then gave them a little bit on how there were bigger things in the world than entertainment for the four of them and how did they think they would get away with it? He then brought it all together for a nice concluding bit. That was where they were up to now.
"With all due respect sir," Tae answered. "You can't possibly think we were stupid enough to think we'd get away with this for one minute. Well, they might have been, I wasn't but that's hardly the point."
"Ruris, shut up," James hissed at her shooting a quick glance at Dumbledore. To his great surprise Dumbledore was smiling in amusement, his eyes twinkling with it.
"Continue, Miss Ruris," Dumbledore said as though James hadn't interrupted.
"Well, sure we snuck out and broke about hundred school rules but it was for a good reason."
"Oh?" Dumbledore linked his long fingers together and leant his chin on them, his elbows on the table. He leant forward, waiting to hear more.
"Yeah," Tae looked around the room, trying to find a good excuse; her eyes fell on a certain messy-haired boy. "James wanted to buy a Christmas present for his mum and I was helping him pick it out, the others just tagged along."
"Is that right?" Dumbledore questioned, looking at the two boys in the room.
"Yes," James answered quickly after a barely long enough pause.
"And he's such a typical guy that he left his Christmas shopping until the last minute," she shot another look at James, this time a more withering glance. "And because we leave tomorrow and I'm back to France we had to go today. I'm sorry we resorted to sneaking out though."
"Yeah, me too," James nodded emphatically.
"And me," Peter piped up after he cottoned on to what the other two were doing.
Dumbledore smiled, "That's a creative story, Miss Ruris but not enough to get you out of punishments. Let me see…I think it'll be fifty points off each of you and two weeks detention after the holidays."
"Oh, but Professor –"
"No buts, Potter, you've flaunted rules often enough to know it warrants punishment."
Sheepishly, James looked down at his feet and nodded glumly.
"Good behaviour, however, deserves reward and I honestly can think of no better behaviour than heroism."
"Huh?" James looked up from his feet to stare at the eccentric man before him.
"There aren't many who could stand their ground against an attack by Death Eaters, especially not fourteen year olds. You showed courage and ingenuity beyond your years. For that I reward you each seventy-five points." He smiled at the three guilty-looking students before him. "I believe that gives Gryffindor one hundred more points than they started the day with, hmm?"
Peter was beaming at this news. While the idea of more points did please James and Tae, the events of the day and subsequent reality check made their sixty-three points lead trivial. Still, it was good news to hear and the punishment wasn't too severe. At least it was all over now.
"Well, off you go. I'm sure Doctor Nedalski has finished with Mr Black by now."
"Yes, of course, thank you Professor," Tae said as she stood up hurriedly, motioning for the boys to do the same.
"Thank you," James echoed as he followed her.
"Bye," Peter squeaked, bringing up the rear.
The three teenagers made their way down the stairs and out onto the hall outside the entrance to Dumbledore's office. It was then that a thought occurred to Peter, "What's a Death Eater?"
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
"I warned you something bad would happen," Remus scolded Sirius in the Hospital Wing.
Doctor Nedalski took half an hour to treat Sirius. Apparently he'd been hit with a combination of a stunning charm and one intended to inflict serious wounds on the victim. There was no significant damage caused by the spell, according to Nedalski the Aurors on scene had done a good job in healing the gash before reviving him. There wasn't a lot left to do except double-check Sirius was 100 percent healed before letting him go, that meant keeping him in for observation for a few hours. The tingling, apparently, would stay for a while. Sirius was allowed visitors though, his first being Remus, obviously.
Although, by the telling-off he was getting from his friend, Sirius was beginning to wish the spell had been a bit more deadly.
"But you never listen to me, do you?" Remus continued to a very guilty-looking Sirius. "Well, maybe now you will."
"Ah, Remmy-poo, leave the poor boy alone, he's a hero, don't you know."
At hearing the voice Sirius' scowl turned into a bright grin. Remus, on the other hand, rolled his eyes in annoyance.
"Hero or not Jimmy-Pimmy, he's still an idiot and so are you three," Remus turned to face the speaker, James, who was followed by Tae and Peter. "When are you ever going to learn?"
"Do you think he knows he's channelling Dumbledore right now?" Tae asked quietly but loud enough for Remus and Sirius to hear. Sirius began laughing loudly but Remus glared at the girl.
"How did he punish you all?" Remus asked, ignoring Tae's comment.
"Two weeks detention and fifty points each."
"You lost us two-hundred points?" Remus cried in irritation. "I don't believe this."
"Well be grateful you didn't come then," Tae shrugged, hopping over to Sirius' bed where she sat in one of the visitor's chairs.
"Besides," James cut in before Remus could open his mouth. " We got them all back and gained another hundred so quit your whinging."
"I'm not whinging…how did you gain the points back?"
"Heroism in action," James said simply. Remus would probably have asked more but James' attention was already elsewhere.
"So you're not dead then, Black?" Tae asked lightly unaware the rest of the room was watching her.
"You kidding?" Sirius responded in a bored tone. "I'd like to say it'd take a lot more than something like that to kill me off but knowing my luck I'll have some pathetic tragic death. Imagine it, all over the papers: Handsome Man Killed by Pixies."
Tae began laughing, "You're such a freak."
"Ah, you love me really Ruris."
"In your dreams Black." She got up and began to walk away.
"Hey, Ruris?"
Tae stopped and turned to face the attractive patient, still oblivious to the others in the room. "What do you want now?" She asked huffily, her face was light and teasing though.
"What happened to the Big Freeze?"
Tae smiled at him and continued out the Hospital Wing. Just before she left she called over her shoulder. "Our hero gets a truce for the day, I think you've earned it." And then she left, the door swinging behind her.
"What was that?" James asked, stunned at the sight.
Sirius grinned, "One day we might let you in on it if you're lucky."
A.N: It's late, I know, I'm sorry butat least it'a out now :D I know there's been a serious lack of Lily and Alex lately (and Narcissa but she bores me so I don't care) but don't worry, I've got a big storyline coming up for them, it's just a case of fitting it in. Anyway, I best be off so I hope you enjoyed the chapter; review me and let me know.
Rae