ViloletsxArexBlue, greenday and hp, futurePOTUS, And So The Wolf Howls, and Rylie D... for leaving reviews. Thanks so much!

Chapter Ten "That Settles That."

Ally was running, she didn't know where to, but she was running.

There were dozens of doors on either side of them as she flew down the hall; Sirius was in front of her. There were noises and sounds of things detonating. They were running too fast for here to really comprehend anything. Some blasts went off next to them, and Ally could here someone screaming before she was pulled to her feet again by Sirius and compelled to run.

Her legs were screaming for oxygen when they started to slow down. The noises were fading away as they ran out of the halls connected to Bonham.

Soon they were running through the halls of the University that Bonham hall was connected to. It was the school healers went to, to get certified, after they left their wizarding school. She knew they were in the University; she had been there before, with her uncle. He had shown it to her in hopes that she would become a healer on day.

The walls weren't nearly as ornate as the Bonham walls; they were an off white color, very hospital-esque, with numerous painting and plaques hung up. The plaques were mainly awards students or teacher's had won. No one was there though; it was too late at night for anyone to be there.

The paintings stared down at them as they entered a large circular room, probably a lecture room. There was a large table that ran from wall to wall. Neither of the two students said anything as they jumped over the table and ducked. They heard a shuffling near the door and Sirius pulled Ally down to the floor. They crouched as low to the ground as possible before the door flung open.

Breathing suddenly became very important to Ally. She focused solely on not passing out as whoever it was stepped into the room. Whoever they were they seemed to be walking very fast. Sirius nudged her shoulder and she looked over at him. He held up two fingers for her to see. Then he held up one finger and pointed to her. I get one, got it. He held up another finger and pointed to himself. You get the other.

She nodded in understanding and pulled her wand from the bun in her hair. I always knew it was a good idea to use your wand as fake Chinese chopsticks. She looked over at Sirius and he nodded. She held up three fingers. Three... two... one.

"Exspelliarmus!"

"Confundo!"

Their spells shot out of their wands and intertwined. As soon as they reached the attacker the spells split apart again and hit them both. Ally looked down to where they were standing, wandless and disoriented, in the middle of the room.

It was the Malfoys. It was unclear which one was which; they were wearing a dumb expression on their faces that would have been humorous if they weren't in their situation. She looked at Sirius who motioned for her to follow. She cautiously and slowly went after him, her legs still hurting from their previous run. He stood in front of the taller Malfoy and pointed his wand at his chest. The Malfoy looked down at the wand, still confounded from Ally's charm.

"Stupefy." Sirius said calmly. A red light left his wand and hit Malfoy, who fell to the ground, stunned. She looked at the other, presumed, younger Malfoy and did the same; he also fell to the floor with a 'thunk'.

They would have returned to their hiding spot, but heard noise beyond the door they came from. Sirius and her ran to the other side of the room and entered another room identical to the last one.

She shut the door behind her carefully, having seen way too many muggle horror movies where the attacker followed open doors. They ran out of that room and into another larger room. She shut the door behind her again. This room looked like a small library; on one end was a large aquarium, filled with bizarre fish and other weird sea creatures. Sirius led her to a shelf and they hid from whoever was following them.

One minute passed... then five... then ten. They were still waiting tensely for someone to open the door. Fifteen minutes in, Sirius spoke.

"I think they're gone..."

A huge weight that was on her shoulders suddenly lifted and she slumped to the floor in exhaustion. Breathing a sigh of relief she pulled Sirius down next to her.

"We should stay here," she said softly, "There are millions of rooms in the University. The chances that anyone will search this one are slim to none."

He relaxed and turned to look at her.

"This is a university?"

"Bonham is connected to the University that certifies healers..." she said, "My Uncle showed me once..."

"He's nice."

"I know..." she sighed. "My legs hurt... I should've played Quidditch."

"Yeah..." he replied. "You should've. We could use you on the team."

Okay... We have just been attacked and we're talking about Quidditch... In a library... hiding from who knows what...

"You need a chaser?"

"Not yet... maybe later in the year..." Suddenly his face hardened. "This is exactly as I thought it would turn out... you know."

"What? Hiding in a library?"

He looked at her, and then turned to face the aquarium.

"I want to be an auror."

The weird, Phillips head shaped fish stared back at them, then swum away to hide behind a bubble machine.

"Why? That's not really a dream profession. Dangerous really... and I heard you have to have top marks in nearly everything." She was looking at the fish tank too now. A little baby grindylow appeared and started to make funny faces at them. At first it had tried to attack them. But when it charged, it rammed into that glass wall and after several failed attempts, it had settled on the funny faces.

Sirius had been silent a while, thinking over his response.

"I already have top marks... School has never been a real problem for me."

"Gee, it's nice to know someone got off easy."

He smiled and then continued.

"Did you know I spent the last summer at the Potter house...?"

"Why? Do they have a pool? Don't be ashamed to say it..."

He smile grew a little and then faded into a frown. The only noise in the room was the bubbles of the fish tank.

"No... After I was sorted into Gryffindor... before that... I started to see my family for what they really were. Horrible people, swept up into pureblood mania. My mother and father were the worst of them. My cousin Andromeda wasn't all that bad; she was one of the few people who could stand me in the house. She was real nice... even after..."

"What?" Ally urged him on. This was possibly the only time she'd get him talking about his family and wanted to take advantage of the situation. Not the situation that they were hiding from attackers, but the situation where they were alone and he was talking.

"Well, I got a letter recently; it seems my mum finally had enough. She blew my name of the family tree. I am no longer an official Black." he spat the words out bitterly, "I'm not even really broken up about it. People thought that I would be, Dumbledore and that lot. I'm angry, not sad, I always hated them, and they were convinced that being a Black made you royal in some way. The only thing that made me feel bad was that I had to leave Andromeda there with them."

"I'm sure she'll be fine."

"I know... my brother's the real problem, maybe you've seen him around school. He's in Slytherin, like the rest of my crazy relatives. Mum loved to tell me about how much better of a son he was. He was brainwashed from day one, just like the rest of them... pulled in by the riches. I hear he's joined this new dark wizard, calls himself Voldemort. He's probably the one who attacked the ball tonight..."

"Really... There's a new dark wizard?"

"Yeah, chances are he'll be just another hack. My whole families behind him, you know, all about purifying the wizard race. Getting rid of the muggleborns, anyone that's anything less than pureblood is in danger. Of course, my saintly brother joined up right away. The people who follow Voldemort are called Death Eaters... their marked with a tattoo. My brother was showing it off this summer, before I left. "

"What does it look like?" she asked.

"It's a skull—"

"I think Pirates already stole that one."

"Let me finish. It's a skull, with a green snake coming out its mouth."

"Creepy. I guess they know how to decorate to a theme."

He barked a laugh.

"You should see my old house. It's all dark and filthy; don't know why we kept that stupid house elf. Can't clean a thing! That house is full of old dark magic and evil curses. Just walking into it can send a shiver down you spine."

"Your family can't be that bad! They must really have worked hard to get that sort of malevolence into a building!"

He smiled and turned to her.

"Your okay, Al"

"Okay? Look at me! I'm gorgeous...! At least that's what I've been told."

She stood up; her dress wasn't nearly as great as it had been at the ball. It was torn at the side from running so much, and some of the diamonds had fallen off. Her hair was completely ruined. She had also lost one of her shoes while running. So she stood, slightly lopsided, with her hands on her hips, and flipped her hair back. He laughed at her little display.

"You look beautiful."

"Aw..." she bent down and ruffled his hair, "Thanks!"

"Not the hair!" he shouted.

"Don't worry," she reassured, "it was already messed up pretty bad."

"Aw well."

She sat back down next to him and transformed her wand into a comb.

"How'd you do that?"

"Lil taught me, nifty isn't it?"

He took the comb and fixed his hair. Then turned and handed it back to her. She ran it through her hair, untangling the knots that had formed. While she was doing this they were talking.

"So, what's our plan?" She said.

"Get to Hogwarts. That's obvious," he said, "The only thing is there are 'Death Eaters' all over the place, waiting to blast us away, you said you've been here before. Can you tell me anything about this place? Is there a fireplace and floo powder anywhere?"

"I remember in the headmaster's office, there was a really large fireplace." she told him, "I didn't see any floo powder, but I'm sure if we look around, we'll be able to find it."

"Do you know how to get there?"

She paused for a moment.

"Sort of..." she gave him an apologetic look, "I know the general layout of the building, but not all that well."

'Well, at least we have a plan."

They both jumped as Ally's wand turned purple and a note shot out of the tip.

"Lily!" Ally shouted for joy, and was about to reach for the note, when Sirius grabbed her hand.

"Wait! Al we don't know if it's real! Death Eaters could easily persuade her to write you a fake note, lure us in."

She stopped at his warning and eyed the note curiously.

"But we're the only ones who know that we send notes to each other by wand... And why would the Death Eaters be after us? We're just a couple of students."

He sighed.

"They don't care if we're a couple of students; all they care about is your blood. I don't know about you, but to them I'm a blood traitor."

"My great grandmother was a muggle..." she said slowly... "After that my family started to marry half bloods and muggle borns..." he squeezed her hand and picked up the note, reading it out loud it said.

Al,

It's Lil; I found some paper and a quill. James and I are in this weird room, full of clocks. Where are you? We need to get together and find a way out.

Ally got up and searched a desk nearby. She tore of a blank page she found in the back of a book, and stole a quill and ink from a desk. Sitting down next to Sirius again she put her pen to the page... then stopped.

"What should I say...? Should I ask her to verify if it's really her? It's her handwriting..."

"Sure start with that." he replied.

She put her quill to the page and started to write.

Lil,

I'm sorry to have to ask this. But if it's really you, tell me where we hid the ingredients for our potion.

Al

She showed it to Sirius.

"Could anyone else know where it was hidden?"

"Not a chance... No one else knew but me and her." she replied.

He nodded and she held it up to her wand. The note was sucked through the tip and a few seconds later she received another reply. On the back of the note Ally was had written an answer was scribbled.

Al,

The disco ball in our room, and I understand.

Where are you?

Ally sighed in relief.

"Is it the right answer?" Sirius asked reading over her shoulder.

"Yep!" Ally answered happily.

Lil,

Glad it's you! I think I know where you are. I've been to this university before. You're on the fifth floor and we're on the third. Go down the first two sets of stairs you find and look through a bunch of lecture rooms, keep going until you come to a small library, that's where we are. Tear this up or burn it as soon as you get it.

Al

Sirius looked it over and nodded in agreement with the last line.

"Send it,"

She sent the letter through her wand and the settled back against the wall, sitting and waiting for their friends.

"So..." Sirius said after a moment of silence, "you have a disco ball in your room?'

"Oh," she laughed, "Yeah, my idea to decorate."

He grinned and lifted one eyebrow at her.

"And just why were you little angels hiding potions ingredients in it?"

"Er—" she fumbled, "Well, you see... we weren't really hiding it... Per se..."

His grin grew at her awkward answer and he pushed the topic further.

"Why did you need potions ingredients outside of the potions room?"

"To make a potion?"

We really should have come up with an alibi if anyone found out. That was dumb...

"Why were you making a potion outside of class? Nothing scandalous, I hope." he tsked at her, "If you're not careful I may have to report you to McGonagall."

Suddenly an idea formed in her head.

"We were doing it for extra credit!" she said happily.

"Extra credit, eh? Professor Slughorn never gives out extra credit." he said, with the same grin plastered on his face.

"He made an exception for me and Lily!" she said, making it up as she went along. "You know how he likes to play favorites."

"You are, by far, the worst liar, ever." he said, "What were you really doing?"

She sighed. Just stick to your story, don't falter. Aw, man, he totally knows.

"Extra credit," she said, "Just like I told you..."

He started to laugh and patted her on the head.

"Don't worry Al, I won't tell on you..."

She rolled her eyes and just played dumb; shooting him a grin to show she understood what he was talking about, though.

"I haven't a slightest clue what you're talking about, Black."

"Sirius."

"No, I'm serious. You seem to be playing this game in your head where I'm guilty of smuggling potions ingredients."

"Hey!" he said, "That's my joke!"

"Riiiiiiiight." she laughed.

"You know what's cool about you?"

"Wha..." she said goofily.

"Any other girl in our year would be a blubbering mess right now, but you haven't stepped out of character at all, you kept your cool."

"Hey," she slicked her hair back and faked popping her collar, "I always keep my cool."

(A/N I hate characters that step out of their normal behavior once something bad has happened, it's really annoying. I want my character to be like Mercutio, always the same, steady. Okay... and I can't resist comic relief. XD)

They stopped conversing when they heard a soft knock on the door. Ally and Sirius pulled out their wands. Standing up, she held her wand with two hands and stepped forward.

"Lil? Lily, is that you?"

She rounded the corner. Lily and James stood there, looking horrible. Lily was frightened, Ally could tell, but didn't look too badly beaten up. Once they saw each other, they dropped their wands to their sides and hugged.

"Thank God, are you guys all right?" Lily asked.

"Yeah, how are you doing?" she said and they parted.

"Prongs!" Sirius exclaimed, "What the heck happened to your arm!"

Ally looked over at James. His suit had a large rip in it at the arm. He was clutching it to his chest, and Ally could see blood on him. He looked like he was ill.

"Death Eaters," he hissed painfully, "Barely got away."

Sirius helped his friend to a chair by one of the numerous desks and observed his arm.

"That looks bad, mate."

Ally peered over at James. His arm had a deep cut on it. The cut was turning an unattractive shade of yellow and she saw Lily wince when she looked at it.

"They shot out a spell at us; James took it in the arm."

"Right place to get a magical injury I guess."

"What do you mean right place!" James fumed, "We have no idea where the heck we are! Not to mention if we so much as walk five feet away, a group of pureblood maniacs won't hesitate to blast us apart!"

"I mean..." Ally waved her arms at the shelves of book, "We are in a University of healing. There are tons of book in here that were probably written for the sole purpose of healing that cut on your arm. Come on," she pulled a bunch of books off the shelf, "Let's start looking."

An hour and a half later...

Ally's group was looking feverishly through piles of books, trying to figure out the cure to James' cut. James had lied down on the desk, after clearing it off, and been complaining of pain in his arm since then. It wasn't his usual complaining, it was real genuine distress, and his friends could hear it in his voice. They increased their efforts after a few minutes.

Books on everything were scattered on the floor, thrown after being read through. Disease, black marks, curses, jinxes, exes, bruises...

Lily jumped up abruptly, not bothering to say anything, she walked over to James.

This had happened several times before, either Ally or Lily or Sirius would walk up and just try a spell on him. None of the previous spells had taken any affect on his arm. After a while his yellow skin started to turn a horrid green.

"Ostendo sum aegrotatio" she pronounced quickly.

A blue light emanated from her wand and she put the tip of it on the center of the cut. James winced visibly but kept his mouth shut. Ally gave him a little credit for not yelling. He squirmed a little and Lily pulled away to observe her work.

'Thank goodness..." she sighed.

James lifted his head and looked down at his arm, the mark had gone away, and nothing remained but faint traces of blood on his shirt.

"T-thanks," he stuttered, "I owe you one Lil,"

"No," she said biting down on her lip disapprovingly, "You don't owe me anything, that shot was meant for me and you know it. We're even."

A tense moment followed. Ally and Sirius looked at each other as if to say. What the heck... We missed something. And then Sirius spoke up.

"So... why don't you tell us what happened while we were here?"

Minutes later...

After Sirius and Lily told them what they had been up to, running, the Malfoy's, letters, and then figuring out that they needed to head to the Headmasters office. Ally had left out what Sirius and she talked about, not wanting to betray his trust.

When they had finished, Lily began her tale. She had been dancing with James when the Death Eaters attacked; so she and James ran out of the hall and through the courtyard. When they had run far enough, they looked back and saw that Bonham was burning. They kept running though, not wanting to get caught up in the fighting. The courtyard was huge, as Lily described it. It was a maze of tall bushes and fountains; there were large gargoyles that decorated the yard.

James and she had run into a few other people while in the courtyard. Ally was happy to hear that they had run into her uncle and aunt in the yard. Ally wasn't too happy to hear, however, that after they ran into each other, a Death Eater showed up.

Ally was in suspense as Lily spoke about the duel between her uncle and the Death Eater. But she wasn't able to listen to the end because her uncle had ordered James and Lily into the building.

Lily continued to tell their story. James and she had run up the stairs to the fifth floor, looking for Ally and Sirius. They had planned to keep going up the stairs to the top floor and work their way down, searching each room of the wing connected to Bonham. But when they had reached the fifth floor they saw someone enter one of the rooms. They followed them carefully, but when they opened the door it was Death Eaters.

"Three of them, they saw me and one of them whispered 'mudblood'," Lily said. "We were outnumbered, I saw a flash of yellow lightning and James yelled out. He had thrust his arm out to protect me."

"Wait," said Ally. "How did they know you were muggle-born?"

"They must have heard her announced at the ball and realized that there weren't and wizard families by the name of Evans," said Sirius.

They had continued running away from the Death Eater's, knowing they didn't stand a chance against three of them at once. They ran through rooms, ending up on in the clock room Lily had described in her letter. She described sending the note and then having to dodge numerous Death Eaters in the halls.

"They're prowling all over the place guys," she said, finishing her tale, "We can't move from this room."

"How will we get to the Headmaster's office if we can't leave?" Ally asked. They were all lying on the couches in the room. James looked thoroughly exhausted from his wound. Sirius had bags under his eyes and had started to nod off while Lily was talking. Ally had to admit, she was pretty tired, and her yawning was becoming ferocious.

Lily sighed and lay back on a pillow.

"I don't know... We'll figure it out later..." she yawned. Let's just rest... close our eyes for a little..."

"Yeah..."Ally yawned and lay back on her end of the couch, 'Just for a little while..."

Her eyelids grew heavy and she was out like a light as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Morning, November 1st.

Ally stretched, her eyes still closed. I don't want to go to Transfiguration..., I feel terrible, and my legs hurt sooooooo badly. Ugh... okay time to get up.

She opened her eyes. When did our ceiling change..? Where am I...? Oh. Memories came flooding back to her. The ball... Death Eaters... Sirius... Lily and James.

She looked around her. Lily was lying down across the couch, her arm draped over the side. Unknowingly her arm fell across James, who fell asleep sitting up at the bottom of the couch. His suit was still torn at the arm, but was looking considerably better than he looked yesterday.

Ally had fallen asleep next to Sirius. He had moved during the night and his head was lying down on her stomach.

Player... she thought and shook him.

"What? I don't have fleas... stop spraying me..."

"Don't be thick Sirius." she said, "Wake up."

He lifted his head drowsily and looked around. Taking in his surroundings, a look of realization appeared on his face. He looked at Lily and smiled when he saw her arm. Then he realized where his head had just been laying and grinned at Ally.

"Gooooood Morning!" he said cheerfully.

She pushed him off and stood up sorely.

"Maybe for you, but I feel like crap.'

He stretched and stood up, as much as he tried to hide it, he winced when his muscles moved.

"Never mind... bad morning..." he groaned.

She pointed to Lily and James.

"There's no chance you have a camera on you, is there?" Ally whispered, careful not to wake up their friends. Sirius grinned back.

"No, but I know how to take one with my wand." he whispered.

"Do it!" she said.

He drew his wand out and waved it in the air. A purple lining in the shape of a square appeared.

"We have five seconds..."

He and Ally hurried into the picture. They put on silly faces and pointed to Lily and James. Sirius had on a look of disgust and Ally looked like she disapproved immensely of their behavior.

The flash from the camera awakened Lily and James, who didn't seem to notice their position. Lily mumbled and turned over on the couch sleepily. James stretched and opened his eyes.

"Where am I?"

"Vegas," Ally said sarcastically, "you, lucky dog, have just won an all expenses paid trip!"

James rolled his eyes and stood up. He stretched and looked around.

"Whoa..." he said in amazement, looking beyond where Sirius and Ally were standing.

They turned to look at whatever he was staring at and they too opened their mouths in shock.

Outside the window was Bonham hall. They could see across the large courtyard, to where the damage was. The ground was smoking and rubble and debris now stood where the left wall of Bonham once was. The dome still stood, half gone. The rest of Bonham stood, remarkably, still intact. Some of the courtyard they looked over was visibly burnt. Lily had woken up and joined them in staring.

"That's horrible..." she said.

Faintly, you could see wizards searching in the rubble, clearing off some, others were walking around.

"Are they Death Eaters?" Lily asked softly

'No..." Ally replied, "They're ministry officials... Look." she pointed over to a group of wizards gathered around something, "They're taking one of the Death Eaters off to Azkaban."

A large group had gathered in one spot. They were dragging a man in chains. Ally couldn't see him clearly from where they were, but he looked like he hadn't given up on escaping.

"Let's get out of here." James said, "I want to get home."

"Me too," Ally agreed, "Follow me to the Headmaster's office."

Ally forced her sore legs into moving and led her friends out of the library.

"Wands ready." Sirius said and they all drew their wands with two hands. Prepared for anything, they continued.

They traveled up many stairs and slopes, climbing higher and higher. Ally was leading them to the tower her Uncle had shown her before. Eventually they reached a large stair; it was in a circular form that led them to the office.

They reached a large door at the top of the stairs. It was made of white stone. She reached for the large doorknob and turned it. Entering the room, she saw nothing in disarray. The room was possibly the only part of the university that was still in perfect shape after last night.

A large ornate desk stood in the middle of the room in front of a large balcony window. The room was very neat, two small tables and a large bookcase were on the left wall. A fireplace sat on the right side of them and two file cabinets were in the corner.

Luckily they didn't have to tear through anything, on the desk sat a large white bowl, filled to the brim with floo powder.

"Good." she said.

Ally walked over to the bowl and picked it up. Her friends stood nearby the fireplace when she turned around, obviously anxious to leave.

Lily was first to go. She stepped into the flames that James had ignited seconds earlier.

"Where am I going?" she asked.

"Dumbledore." James said, "He'll know what to do."

"Right," she said, "Hogwarts, Dumbledore's office!" she threw her floo powder down and vanished into the flames.

James followed suit and Sirius and Ally were the only ones left in the room.

"You can go." Ally said.

"No, you go, I don't mind being last. Besides," he grinned, "Ladies first."

She smiled at him and gave him a hug. Standing on tip toes, she kissed him on the cheek quickly and then disappeared into the flames.

Seconds after, she fell onto the rug of Dumbledore's office, Sirius landed next to her, nearly tripping.

"Well," Dumbledore said, standing in front of the Potters and her uncle who were sitting in the chairs in front of Dumbledore's desk. They were all looking nervous, relieved, and shocked at their children's sudden appearance out of the fire. "That settles that."

(A/N The heat... it burns! It is sooooooo hot out! Nearly 100 degrees and I'm spazzing. Thank goodness for A.C.)