Notes: Now we get to chapter that I've been imagining since I first came up with the story's title. And it's a good idea to keep in mind that the title can be interpreted in more than one way.

Harry Potter and the Inferi Complex
A Fantastic Beasts/Harry Potter Crossover by
Nate Grey (xman0123-at-aol-dot-com)
Chapter 5: Fruit of Life

THEN

In the background, he could hear two men talking. A part of him that he would have rather not acknowledged heard their voices, even knew their names.

Rubeus Hagrid.

Sirius Black.

He didn't care, not just then.

All he cared about was the ruined house, and the two lives that had been lost within.

"It's not right," he whispered, a phrase that would become his mantra for the next several years. No, nothing would be right, not in his life or little Harry's. But he would protect Harry as best he could, and they would live on together.

They were not going to die. They were not going to lose. They would live.

For their parents.

He felt the unmistakable pull that meant Harry was moving away from him, and glanced over his shoulder. Black was already gone, and Hagrid was mounting a large motorcycle. It was time to go.

He looked at the house one last time.

"I won't forget you. Not ever. You should be here with us. If I had any say in it, you would still be here." He paused, then turned away. "Goodbye... Mother, Father. I'll look after Harry for you." With that, the mysterious figure who would one day be named Bones went to meet his fate.

NOW

The old man that appeared abruptly in the graveyard behind St. Jerome's Church was in a hurry. Even hindered by his rather noticable limp and wooden leg as he was, he moved faster than most would have expected. The long staff he carried helped considerably, but still, he moved with the energy and urgency of a much younger, far less scarred man.

Fortunately, he didn't have to go very far to find what he was looking for.

Unfortunately, what he found could mean nothing good.

He drew a small, black orb from his robes and pressed his thumb hard against the smooth surface. After a few seconds, the orb turned dark blue, and a voice floated from it.

"Go ahead, Alastor."

Alastor Moody coughed once before speaking. "Responded to a disturbance in the wards at Godric's Hollow. Standing over the graves of the Potters, Albus. It's not good."

"Tell me what you've found."

"They're empty."

After a very long pause, Albus responded calmly, "Please explain."

"Dirt's missing. Caskets are exposed, but still in the ground where they should be. Look to have been blown open from the inside." Moody paused to lower himself to a squat, peering into the nearest grave. "Wait. Got something."

"Yes?"

Moody slowly dragged his fingers along the edge of the open grave. "Trouble, Albus. Big trouble. This grave was dug out with an Irrigation Charm. And not just anybody's. In all my years, I never saw one as crisp as Lily's. That girl could punch a perfect hole through a spinning Galleon from the other side of a room."

"You are suggesting that Lily Potter climbed out of her own grave, Alastor?"

"Yeah," Moody growled. "And I'm betting that once I examine the other grave, it'll be a Tunneling Charm worthy of only James." He paused. "You know what this must mean, Albus. Even if you don't want to say it, I will. Somebody has turned the Potters into Inferi. That alone would be bad enough. But somehow, these Inferi are capable of using the same spells the Potters were known for, in exactly the same way they were known for them. That makes these specialized Inferi, because I never met one that needed anything other than speed and brute strength to be deadly."

"I am not prepared to make that assumption yet, Alastor," Albus said, though he sounded nowhere near as calm now.

"Oh? And why not?"

"Because we both know that Inferi lack one of the major components required for performing magic at all: life. It's why they only use their physical strength. Because they no longer possess the mental or spiritual capacity to cast spells."

"Call it what you want, Albus. But I'd bet anything that the Potters cast these spells. And when I find the soulless piece of filth that did this to them, he will beg for death."

"Alastor," Albus said slowly. "There is something you need to know. Please finish investigating there, and then come immediately to Hogwarts. After I have shared... certain relevant details, I will ask you to continue looking into this matter."

"Sure." Moody stowed the orb back inside his robes. He wasn't one for prayers, but if he had been, he would have said one now. Muttering his pardon to the soul of Lily Potter, he dropped down into her grave to get a closer look.

The exact combination of various magical wards protecting Number Four, Privet Drive was known only to Albus Dumbledore. They were the collective work of several wizards and witches, all who had contributed with the understanding that their ignorance of the other measures provided an extra layer of security.

But even the brilliance of Dumbledore had been presented with an obstacle when setting up the protection. To put it simply, there was no way to protect Harry from both the magical forces that meant him harm, and the harm that the Dursleys would surely inflict upon him.

Dumbledore could have placed a ward that prevented entry to anyone or anything with ill intent directed at Harry, but that would mean the Dursleys could not live there. Likewise, if a ward prevented physical violence directed at Harry, that left him vulnerable to magical harm. In the end, Dumbledore decided that magical harm was the greatest threat. After all, it wasn't Muggles who would be seeking Harry's life.

At the same time, Dumbledore was in no way ignorant of what Harry might suffer while living with the Dursleys. It was callous to admit, but if there was any reason he was quite glad that the Potters were dead, it was so he would not have to explain his actions concerning their son to them. And neither would the Dursleys.

All of which presented quite the interesting set of circumstances, on this particular evening.

There was a woman standing on the sidewalk in front of Number Four, Privet Drive.

Or at least a distinctly woman-shaped being.

She was staring at the house, standing as still as a statue. She did not even appear to be breathing.

Her body was not moving, but her mind was certainly not at a standstill. She was carefully considering everything she had learned in the past few hours, and putting it all together in a series of surprisingly accurate assumptions.

She could sense that Harry was in the house.

She knew that the Dursleys lived there. The address hadn't changed.

She could logically conclude that someone had placed Harry there because the Dursleys were, technically, family. But whoever did so had done this, either having no idea how the Dursleys felt about the Potters, or knowingly did it in direct defiance of what the Potters would have wanted for Harry. And even if they hadn't known, assuming they bothered to observe at all, it should have been immediately obvious what a huge mistake they'd made.

She knew the Potters had many friends and comrades who would have gladly taken Harry in, even under the worst circumstances. They had all been bypassed in favor of this solution, if it could even be called that.

She could practically smell Dumbledore's plotting in this, but this would have to be the very first time where she would have seriously questioned his sanity to his face.

She knew there had to be wards. If there weren't, she would no doubt be staring at a blackened crater in the ground instead of a house. But she had no idea exactly what these wards would prevent. And, to be quite honest, she was not entirely sure if they would prevent her, for reasons best left alone for the moment.

Perhaps it is easy to imagine that she might have taken a deep breath before venturing forward. It would certainly have to be imagined, as she ventured forward without breathing in any way. She paused at the edge of the yard, unable to see the wards, but trusting they were there.

She slowly lifted a foot, and put her toes in the yard.

There was no resistance.

Carefully, she put her foot down firmly, and after a long pause, brought the other to join it.

Again, there was no resistance.

She was in.

She smiled. Or tried to. She'd been practicing, but it was still a little tricky.

What she might have guessed, but couldn't have known for sure without being told, was that the center-most ward was based on blood protection. This meant that Harry, and by extension the Dursleys, were protected against magical harm, most especially when they were physically in their home.

So the following examples were certainly applicable.

Example A: If there had been an attack on the home by a Dark wizard controlling an Inferi army, it would have failed. That would have certainly fallen under the heading of magical harm. There had never been a case of an Inferius that wasn't intended to harm something, after all.

Example B: If the woman striding across the yard had been an Inferius, surely she would have been prevented from doing so. Unless:

Instance 1: She was an extremely unique Inferius, the very first that was both not Dark in nature, and not intended chiefly to cause harm.

Instance 2: She was, or had once been, the very person whose sacrifice made the blood protection possible. Even if she certainly no longer had any such blood in her.

Instance 3: She was the product of an even rarer Instance were both Instances 1 and 2 were true.

To put it even more simply: Lily Potter, or at least her reanimated body, was currently standing at the front door of the Dursley home, preparing to knock. She was not in a good mood, already having a very good idea of what would greet her. But some small part of her was thinking: perhaps.

Perhaps Petunia would not have vented her hateful feelings for Lily and James on Harry.

Perhaps Petunia had matured and put her old grudge away.

Perhaps Petunia would realize how lucky she was, to have a second child, one that she hadn't had to go through the pains of childbirth to obtain.

Perhaps Petunia had finally seen that pretending she had no sister, and that sister being tragically murdered, were two very different things. Perhaps that had driven her to make up with their parents.

Perhaps things had changed for the better.

Perhaps they had only gotten worse.

She decided. Expect the worst. That way, anything else would be an improvement.

There was just one problem with her plan. She hadn't imagined how far beyond her definition of "worst" that the reality might be. Because a small part of her was still thinking, "Petunia is my sister. She would never..."

Once he was certain that all the Dementors had passed beyond their range to influence him in his cell, Sirius Black became a man once more.

In truth, it probably would have been easier, to simply remain in dog form the entire time. It would have given him some constant protection from the influence of the Dementors, and the rats that occasionally wandered into his cell were slightly more appetizing that way. Unfortunately, the rare wizard or witch who visited would either think Sirius had escaped, or realize that he was an unregistered Animagus.

As for the Dementors, even after years in their care, Sirius could not really say exactly what they thought. What he was certain of was that things that concerned wizardkind, did not concern them. They cared primarily about their food source, and little else. He would never need to worry about a Dementor revealing his handy trick to a wizard. They simply didn't think that way.

If Dementors were capable of human speech, and Cornelius Fudge himself asked why Sirius wasn't impacted by his stay in Azkaban as others were, the honest response would be, "We don't know." Dementors were blind, so they would only know that Sirius was not quite as good a meal as other prisoners were. His Animagus form was harder to feed from. But so long as they had those other prisoners to feed on, it would never occur to them to explain the difficulty with Sirius to Fudge, and he certainly didn't ask for details on how they fed.

So Sirius was safe, or as safe as he could be, surrounded by Dementors and criminals and Death Eaters and madmen. But this only meant he had plenty of time to consider his situation. And more than anything, Sirius was filled with regret.

He had never, would never have betrayed the Potters. James had been like a brother to him. And while Sirius could admit he'd had a bit of a crush on Lily, that was true of most boys, and some girls, who had known her at school. But he could see that she and James were meant for each other. And Sirius could also admit that she never would have been happy with him, not for long. She would have been a conquest for him, and not the only one, and it would have ruined their friendship.

They had danced together, at her wedding, and Lily had kissed his cheek and thanked him, for not treating her that way, and for many other things beside that. He would never have betrayed the happiness he felt in that moment, handing her back to James and blinking away tears.

She had thanked him, the one who'd probably gotten James in almost as much trouble as James got himself in. Thanked him, like he was worthy of her gratitude.

And this was how he repaid her. Failing to avenge her and James. Failing to look after Harry. Failing to be anything but a black mark on their name.

And the worst of it was, he had done all of that by not doing anything. He wasn't even guilty of the worst that everyone thought he was! He wasn't a traitor, or a murderer, or a Death Eater. He was just a failure.

If a Dementor had come by in that moment, Sirius would have proven to be a poor meal. He would always carry his happy memories of his closest friends, but more and more, he found himself focusing on thoughts that were not happy at all. Nor did much that he thought about lead to happiness. Escaping this place, so he could avenge the Potters and bring Peter Pettigrew to justice, possibly even clear his name. Perhaps all of that should have made Sirius happy, but it wouldn't erase his failure to keep his friends safe. It would only make his world slightly less dark. By now, even Remus probably thought he was a traitor. The best Sirius could hope for was being allowed a nice, quiet place to lay down and die. And even assuming that would reunite him with James and Lily, he could not say for certain that the reunion would be a happy one.

But it wasn't a Dementor that came by in that moment at all.

It was a stag. A ghostly white stag, with thick moss on its broken antlers, accompanied by a stench of rotting flesh so powerful that Sirius noticed it before he saw the creature itself.

Sirius gaped at the creature, and it stared back at him, not even breathing.

For several seconds, nothing happened.

It was insane. It made no sense. It was impossible. And yet, Sirius swallowed hard, licked his dry lips, and said the absolute first mad thing that occurred to him.

"Can't be... Prongs?"

The stag blinked. And then it became James Potter.

"You look like death, Padfoot. And I would know."

Sirius shook his head. "James, you... but you're-"

"Dead. I know. Believe me, I noticed right away."

James was upright, but still clearly dead. Though Sirius had not been at the funeral, he was certain that James was still wearing the suit and robes he'd been buried in. They were deeply stained with soil, as was his unusually pale skin. There was, Sirius noticed and was thankful for, no trace of maggots or exposed bone, like he might have expected. But that only made the visual and accompanying thought even stranger: James was not quite as dead as he should have been, but he was certainly not alive.

"We can stare later," James said. "Let's get you out of here."

Sirius was stunned anew. "You... you're going to help me escape?"

James blinked. "D'you honestly think I believe those stupid things they're saying about you? That Lily would?" He grinned, in the old way that was painful to Sirius. "Come off it, mate. Be Sirius."

Sirius laughed, unable to help himself. It had been so long since he'd heard that. From someone he welcomed it from, anyway.

James grabbed the bars of the cell, and with no real effort that Sirius could see, pulled them apart, until there was just enough space for a large dog to slip through. Which it immediately did.

The dog became Sirius at once. "James. I hate to ask, but after that display of strength... you're an Inferius, aren't you?"

"I'm not entirely sure. Lily and I were discussing it, and she-"

"Lils is back, too?" Sirius whispered in shock.

James grinned. "Yeah, it's great. Well, not this part," he added, gesturing to himself, "but us being together, I mean. Anyway, she's got this theory on what we are now, but she wants to research it first. If nothing else, we've definitely got increased strength, and some other handy things. But we need to get out of here first. Better change, here's a Dementor."

At once, they became a dog and a stag, and each moved to opposite sides of the corridor. The approaching Dementor paused between them, and the dog shuddered as it felt the familiar hopeless sensation blanket it. The feeling passed quickly, however, and the Dementor moved on.

James changed back first. "Right, better get moving."

"Not that I don't appreciate this, but do you even have a plan, or are you just making it up as you go again?" Sirius asked with a grin.

"Sure, I have a plan. When we reach the shore, I'll become a stag, you hop on my back, and I'll swim for it."

Sirius stared. "Are you mad? You can't swim that distance with me on your back!"

James coughed. "No, you can't. I'm dead, so I don't get tired. I know for a fact that I can swim that distance, how d'you think I got here in the first place?"

"Stags can swim? That far?"

James shrugged. "No idea. Mine can, though. Magic and all, I suppose."

Sirius shook his head. "Can it really be that simple?"

"If I'm being honest? I don't think there's anything simple at all about how I got this way." James frowned. "Lily won't say why, but she's got a very bad feeling about Harry. Sent me to get you while she looked for him. If things go badly, thought it might be a good idea to have at least one clearly living relative around."

"Yes, his clearly living, criminal, traitor, murderous godfather will be a real comfort," Sirius snorted.

James raised his eyebrows. "Compared to his clearly unliving, absent parents, I wouldn't sell yourself short just yet."

The door opened.

"Hi, Petunia."

There was a strangled squawk, and then: "Lily."

It would have been polite, to ask permission to come in, or wait for it to be extended. But Lily had known Petunia for a long time. If there were only two things that could be depended on about the current situation, it was these things.

First, Petunia Dursley would never invite a dead person into her home.

Second, Petunia Dursley would never invite a dripping wet dead person into her home. And Lily was still dripping wet from her journey. Actually, even before it.

So Lily had to be forgiven for simply pushing her way into the Dursley home. Especially considering that, had she used every bit of her Inferi strength to do so, she would have seriously harmed or killed Petunia in the process. As it was, Petunia only stumbled a bit, and Lily made no move to help her, knowing it would be rejected and not feeling particularly helpful at the moment.

"I've come for Harry," Lily said, in case Petunia was wondering. "Where is he?"

Petunia said nothing, though whether she was still in shock or being deliberately unhelpful, Lily had neither time nor inclination to discover. She started for the stairs, intending to search the house from top to bottom, but the padlock on the cupboard door caught her eye, and the presence just beyond it was practically screaming at her in that moment.

No. Surely not.

Faster than Petunia's eyes could follow, Lily launched herself at the cupboard, and with a single, powerful swipe, tore the padlock off the door entirely.

Petunia screamed.

Lily dropped the padlock, slowly pulled the cupboard door open, and found herself staring into a pair of eyes that had once been so like her own, but had now been forever altered in a way she hadn't expected. And yet, the similarities between the boy and his father were obvious. And even if they hadn't been, Lily would have known her son anywhere. His very existence called to her.

And now, so did his magic.

"Harry," she whispered.

Since his only meeting with Bones, Harry had been constantly thinking about that fallen, red-haired figure who must have been his mother. That he had never seen her in any pose other than frozen in death had become a constant ache that there was no treatment for.

Until now.

Harry knew at once who the woman standing before him was.

She had red hair. She was in the Dursley home. And Petunia clearly didn't want her there, if the scream was anything to go by. She could be no one else.

Also, distressingly, she was clearly not alive. Harry had no reason to believe the vision Bones had shown him was false, and it explained her total absence in his life thus far. And the woman in front of him simply did not look alive. She was far too pale, and there was a distinctly damp look to all of her that did not seem natural.

And then there was her face. It was pretty enough, even beautiful. But Harry had, for years, dreamed of his parents abruptly showing up to rescue him. They would say that news of their deaths had all been a huge misunderstanding. And in all of those dreams, his mother, faceless as she had been, was smiling. But the woman in front of Harry wasn't smiling.

Although she was clearly trying to, but couldn't, as if she could no longer, because she'd forgotten how to.

Maybe dead people didn't need to smile.

"Mum?" Harry whispered after she said his name.

There it was again, that lip twitch that they both wanted so much to be a smile.

"Harry," she said again, and there was no mistaking the caress in her tone. She wanted to hug him. Harry wanted it, too. Or would have, if she were alive. She wasn't. But he'd never even seen his mother standing upright, and here she was doing that, and it was hardly a time to be picky.

So Harry stepped forward, and slowly put his arms around his dead mother.

It was, he decided later, rather like hugging a wet tree. There was not much give in her body. She was wet, but oddly clean. Or at least gave that impression. But after a moment, it hit him: the odor. Beneath the dampness, the apparent clean, there a powerful odor. He did not want to call it a stench: this was his mother, after all. But it told him, unmistakably, that this woman was dead. This was how dead people would smell, if they got up, started moving around, and perhaps threw on a bit of perfume occasionally. It could only do so much.

When he felt the cold hand on the back of his head, stroking but not pressing, Harry knew. She was aware of the odor, too, and didn't want him to have to smell it. It made him love her even more, and he pressed his face into her, inhaling, odor and all.

It was horrible. But it was better than nothing and the lies of the Dursleys. It was his mother.

"Mum," he whispered, his voice cracking. "You're dead."

"Yes," she agreed.

"But you're here."

"Yes."

"For me?"

"Yes."

After a pause, he asked, "Why?" Not because he didn't know or suspect, but because he needed more than one-word answers.

"You're my baby." She hesitantly trailed her fingers up his cheek, and her lips twitched when, instead of flinching away, he smiled at her. "Or you were. So big, now. But you're my son. I came for you. I came back for you."

"Then we're leaving?" Harry asked, unable to keep the hope out of his voice. "Together?"

"Yes."

He didn't ask where they were going. He didn't care. They could be moving into the dog park down the street, and Harry would have jumped at the chance. He would happily live on the street with his dead mother, rather than stay a minute more with the Dursleys in their house.

She was touching him constantly, her fingers trailing over his clothing and skin. Harry didn't mind. Until her fingers stopped on the spot on his arm where Mauler had bitten him most recently.

"Harry? What's this?"

Harry looked into her face, knowing what she wanted to hear, knowing what she dreaded to hear, but unable to lie to his mother, who he had only known for a few minutes. So he told her the truth.

Her lips weren't twitching anymore. And Harry learned that while dead people apparently didn't need to smile, they did know how to do the opposite. And his mother looked to be an expert. She didn't say anything or move, but he could still easily tell: the terms "anger" or "fury"... they weren't enough to describe the dark, suffocating emotion radiating from her.

He knew, then. She was going to kill the Dursleys. Whether it was because she was that enraged, or because dead people weren't particularly sensitive about increasing their numbers, or because the Dursleys deserved it, Harry wasn't sure. But he also suspected, or at least hoped, that if he had asked his mother to spare them, she would have. For him.

But Harry didn't ask.

After a long moment, perhaps even giving him a chance to stop her, his mother handed him a brown bag, about the size of a standard shopping bag. "Put everything you want to take with you in there. It's bigger on the inside than it looks."

Harry started to tell her that it was probably much too big, then. He changed his mind, nodded, and turned away to start putting the few belongings he wished to take into the bag.

"Harry?" she whispered.

He didn't turn around. "Yes, Mum?"

Her hand was on his head again. "I love you."

He reached up and took her hand in his. Then he brought her hand around to his face, and kissed the back of her hand quickly. "I love you, too."

She squeezed his hand, then slipped away.

Harry heard her footsteps leaving the cupboard. Without really thinking about it, he reached out and closed the door, for what would surely be the last time.

When Harry opened the cupboard door ten minutes later, his mother was there. She'd been there for a while.

Her hands were behind her back.

Harry stared up at her. "Show me?"

She hesitated.

"Please, Mum." This was important.

Slowly, she brought her hands into view. There was blood on them both.

"Was it fast?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Did they suffer?"

"No. I wanted them to, but I thought any noise might disturb you."

Harry hadn't actually heard anything through the door, and he'd been listening. There weren't even any telltale heavy thumps. He was tempted to ask exactly how she'd done it, but decided against it. "Where are they?"

"Master bedroom."

"Can we leave now?"

"Yes."

Harry transferred the bag, not even close to being full, to his left hand. Then he held out his right hand. "I want to hold your hand."

She stared at him. "Harry, I'm not-"

"My blood was on their hands. Now theirs is on yours. I'll manage."

Slowly, she took his hand. He gripped hers tightly in return.

"Are you sure this is okay?" she asked.

"Hiding you from me, like you were something dirty, wasn't okay," he said firmly. "Even if I didn't hate them, I never loved them. And if they loved me, they had a funny way of showing it. Only, I never laughed."

"I'm sorry I wasn't here for you, Harry."

"I never blamed you, Mum. And I never will." He smiled at her. "We should go out the back door."

They paused in the kitchen long enough for Harry to take some food. More than the Dursleys had ever given him at once, but surely no more than Dudley had ever eaten in one sitting. At the thought of his cousin, Harry felt a slight pang of regret. Maybe Dudley would have grown out of his meanness, one day. Once he'd lived apart from his parents and experienced enough, who knew? But now? Nothing. It was a shame. But Harry decided that he could live with that regret.

He took one last look around the kitchen, and then followed his mother out of the house. And then he saw it: the innermost dome over the house, still red, was fading. It might last minutes, or hours, but it was definitely breaking down. Harry had no idea what it was for, but he suspected it no longer mattered, for him or the Dursleys.

He was walking away from Number Four, Privet Drive forever, and he was never looking back.

from The New Astute's Handbook, by Opan Dor

Taming the Obscurus

One of the greatest challenges every Astute will face is mastering their Obscurus.

The truth is simple to state, but harder to accept: the Obscurus is part of the Astute, because every Astute was once an Obscurial. They cannot master it until they understand and agree that it will always be a part of them.

Increasing the struggle are the varied forms that the Obscurus takes. They are almost always destructive, and seem especially suited for their violent nature.

I have never seen a record of an Obscurial's Obscurus that was peaceful. Has one ever existed? I cannot say for certain. But the day I finally admitted to myself that I was glad to be an Astute, Obscurus and all, was the day that mine finally bent to my will.

Perhaps it would be simpler, if an Obscurus took a more acceptable form. A friendly smile, a mother's warm touch. But I think it is our destiny, to go to war and save our comrades. And so the Obscurus prepares us, first as an obstacle, and then as an ally.

The road is long and rough, young Astute. There will be much pain. But when you reach the end, you will find yourself with an ally who will always fight for you and never leave you. Your one-time tormentor will become a powerful weapon for your use.

But the greater weapon? The assurance that you will never again suffer the way you once did.

Continued in Chapter 6: Reunions

The Potter family gathers. Sahara goes home.

Endnotes:

I suspect the wards on Privet Drive are more complicated, but for the purposes of the story, I'm going with this setup. Dumbledore flat out states he knew what Harry was in for by bringing him there, so even in canon, the wards don't protect Harry from the Dursleys.

I did not want to reanimate the Potters as standard Inferi, that would have just been... brutal. Instead, I wanted a specialized form that was Inferi-based, so there could be no denying their current state, but still allowed for specific things that are never seen in Inferi. And yes, there actually is a reason for that.

I will be revisiting how the Dursleys died in greater detail next time, in case anyone is interested. Available evidence suggests there are certain ways Inferi usually kill, and this is not a usual case.

I promise this is NOT the reason why my version of Lily can't smile, but in the first film, when Lily smiles at Harry from the Mirror, I always found it to be eerie. Certainly not the type of smile I expected from her. The same is true in the final film, but in that case, I suspect the eeriness was on purpose. So the lesson is, Lily should only smile in films when the representation of her is clearly still alive. Otherwise, it looks creepy. Which is saying something, because Bellatrix has some positively inviting smiles, which... um, best not get into that now.