That night, Lily got to sleep in the castle again. Remus offered to sleep on the couch, but they were all tired after the trip to the deadland, Remus especially so. She could see the dark circles under his eyes more prominent than when she first arrived, so she told him that the guards at her door will suffice.

James is harder to convince.

Though perhaps because she doesn't really want to convince him to leave.

He has taken up residence on an armchair near the fireplace, not having mentioned why he is still in her room even though sunset was hours ago. And Lily has not suggested that he might want to get to bed, nor has she told him how tired she is, and how the back of her eyelids seem to be calling to her.

James also seems to be calling to her, and at the moment, he was drowning out the call for sleep.

"My heart stopped in my chest, Lily," He said. "When I saw you running through the flames, my heart stopped." They had been talking about the day, but this is the first time he brought up the confrontation with Riddle.

Lily, who was sitting in the middle of her bed with her legs crossed, nodded. "I didn't mean to scare anyone, but please don't try and lock me in a room anymore. I'm not really good at just sitting back and letting other people handle things."

James chuckled, "So I have gathered."

"And you can't blame Remus or Peter for me getting out either. I think I was supposed to be out there. I told Peter to move and he just did."

James nodded. "Peter told me already. Have you tried to see if you can still-"

"No," Lily interrupted him. "I have not. But I don't think it was my magic. I think I just needed to get out there and see Riddle."

James looked at her for a moment and then nodded, reaching up and running his hand through his hair, stopping just short of the antlers protruding out the top. "You know, magic is neither good nor bad. It is exactly as it is intended."

Lily pressed her lips together. "I know." At least she'd gathered as much while she listened to him and Remus give her explanations about different things these last couple of days. "But it doesn't seem like something I should do unless I have to."

James nodded, "Which is why no magic you ever do will be bad." He shifted in the chair, pulling one of his legs up so his ankle was resting on his other knee. He looked too casual to be a prince. They were quiet for a moment, neither one of them wanting to talk about Riddle any longer.

"Remus told me that you do not like going back to the mortal world."

Lily sighed. "I tried to tell you too. It must have something to do with the wish I made. I can't remember if I felt that way before I made the wish or not."

"Well, I have already told you that you do not have to go back if you do not want to."

Lily smiled at him. "I know." It was strange to think that she was honestly considering dropping everything in the mortal world to stay here. She'd need to go back for a few sentimental items, so she could try and explain things to her mother, talk to Remus' mother, but maybe it wouldn't feel so disarming if she knew that she was going to come right back.

"Is there," James cleared his throat and held onto his propped leg. "Is there someone back in the mortal world that you would miss?"

"You mean, apart from my mother?" She asked, tilting her head to the side.

He nodded quickly and looked over at the fire. "James," He raised his brows and glanced back at her. "Are you asking me if I'm single?" She was smiling at him, but his ears still turned red.

"Perhaps," He said quietly, shifting in the chair again.

She smiled at him and remembered how Remus tried to keep her in the room by promising her secrets about James, secrets that she said she didn't want unless she heard them from James. This felt kind of like he was telling her a secret.

"I've got no one back in the mortal world." She said, which made it easier for him to hold her gaze. But then she felt uncomfortable with her wording and started rambling, "I mean, I have friends of course, I wasn't walking around only conversing with my mum while I mourned not being able to come here, but- I'm single, yeah." He was smirking now, and she felt her own cheeks heat up.

"You draw people in like a magnet, I did not think that you meant that you had no friends."

Lily wasn't so sure about that, but this bloke did seem to fancy her, so maybe it was affecting his perception of her. "Well, thank you for saying that."

They looked at one another for a moment before Lily let out, quite possibly, the largest yawn of her life. She covered her mouth with her arm and then started laughing.

"I know that you are tired." James grinned. "I should leave you to rest," It didn't sound as though that was all he wanted to say, so Lily didn't say anything. "Are you going to be alright?" He asked as he stood up. Lily was only slightly disappointed. "I can stay if you'd like." He looked around the room. "I can sleep on the couch," He nodded toward the couch that Remus had pointed out earlier.

"Remus already offered," She admitted. "And while I do like having you close, I can't pretend that I don't feel safe here, when you'll definitely end up with a crick in your neck."

He smiled at her again and walked up to the end of the bed. She wished she had seated herself at the end, instead of the middle. He held out his hand to her and she took it, maybe a bit too eagerly. "I will see in the morning then."

She nodded and he squeezed her hand. "See you in the morning."

The dreamless sleep from the night before was gone.

While she slept, she dreamt of all sorts of terrible things. Hands reached up to her from beneath the dead earth, the trees turned to dust in the breeze, ashy, grey and white dust that swirled around and made it hard to see much else.

She had to walk across the dead land, there was something on the other side that she knew she needed, but with all the white ash floating about, and all the hands reaching up to grab her ankles, she couldn't see what it was, she couldn't tell if she was getting any closer to it or not.

And then Riddle was in front of her. His bright blue eyes seemed to be glowing and he was smiling at her. He looked so handsome standing in the middle of all this death and destruction. How could one person do all this, how did he look at what he had done and feel no remorse.

"You could help me, you know." He said, and when he moved toward her, he seemed to float. The hands didn't reach for him. They didn't plea for his help as he moved past them. "Helping me and helping them does not have to conflict. You can do both. You should want to do both."

He reached out for her and Lily, with the hands grabbing at her ankles, she couldn't move away from him. He paused with his fingers just over her skin. "Help me, Lily Evans. Help me create a new world."

"No," She said quietly, her voice raw in her throat. "No, I won't help you."

"We could accomplish so much together. Imagine what we could do if we combined our magic, imagine how much we could change!" His fingers still floated over her cheek, like he was about to caress her. Lily felt fear creep up her spine, fear that hadn't been present when she was actually standing before him. He smiled when he saw it. "There it is," He took a deep breath, "But you need not be afraid of me, Lily Evans. Not if you agree to work with me. Together we could be so much more than we are alone."

Lily kept shaking her head. "I will never join you. I won't do it." She said. "There's too much at stake, you've hurt too many people." She tried to pinch her arm to wake herself up, but it didn't work, this wasn't like a normal nightmare.

He gave her a careful and calculating look. "You understand that I cannot allow you to work against me. And I did offer you another way, you were simply too weak to accept it."

And then his hands were wrapping around her throat. She tried to scream, to call out for help, but she couldn't take in the breath she would need to do so. She reached up to try and knock his hands away from her throat, but then he was screaming out in pain and stepping back.

"What did you do to me!" He shouted, holding up his hands. The pale white that they had been before, was decaying, just like the trees, and before Lily's eyes, his hands turned to dust and blew off in the breeze. "What did you do to me!" He screamed again, as blood started pouring from the ends of his arms.

Lily fell in her haste to get away from him, and then the ash and dust swirled around her, obscuring him from her view.

Closing in on her.

Making her feel like she couldn't breathe again.

And then she bolted upright in bed. Fully awake and absolutely terrified.

She ripped her covers off and her feet hit the stone floor with a smack. She ran over to the mirror, and she felt irrational checking, but she pulled down her nightgown and threw her hair over her chest.

And then she screamed.

His handprints were still on her neck.

She turned around to look around the room, just as two guards burst into the room. There was no one in her room.

"Are you alright?" One of the guards asked her, rushing over to her side. His eyes widened as he saw the marks on her neck. He turned to the other guard, "Go and fetch the captain!"

"I'm fine," She said, but the handprints on her neck felt as though they were burning now, and she turned back toward the mirror and traced her fingertips over the shape lightly, she hissed in pain.

Soon the captain, a large burly man with only one eye and one leg, looking much to Lily like she imagined a pirate would look, came barreling into her room, looking about and berating his guards for not being vigilant enough. She tried to tell him that it was just a dream, that the marks on her neck had to be there through some kind of magic, but he didn't seem to care. He had the female guard escort her down to the mediwitches.

And sitting on a bed in the hospital wing of the castle, is where she met the king.

She didn't recognize him at first. He was leaning against the wall across from her with a quiet and thoughtful look on his face, but there were a flurry of medics rushing about Lily, trying to determine what they could do for her and if the burns on her neck, and the bruising that had appeared since she left her room, were the only injuries they needed to worry about.

No one seemed to pay him much attention, he just leaned against the wall and sipped something out of a teacup. A simple teacup, made of white porcelain. It looked entirely out of place here in fairyland.

He stayed there like that until the medics had slathered her neck in a salve and tucked her into one of the beds to rest. When they started to disperse, they seemed to remember that he was there, but he waved them away as he slowly made his way across the room, stopping at the bed next to her and taking a seat.

And that's when she recognized him as James' father.

"Your highness," Lily tried to bow her head, but the salve was drying and started to crack. "It's an honor to meet you." She'd never met the high king before. She'd seen him from afar a few times when she was a kid, but she'd never met him, never spoken to him.

"And it is an honor to meet you as well," He nodded his head back at her and then took a sip of his tea. "Though you may call me, Monty. According to the prophecy, while I may be the high king, you are the true queen. One could argue that something true is, well, higher than high."

Lily's eyes were wide, and she was sure that she looked like a child, looking at him in awe like she was. He didn't look like James, not really. His hair was white, and while unruly like his son's, Lily had a feeling that it was due more to the time of night than its natural state. His eyes were a light brown, with no other colors warring for attention. His skin was pale and sallow. He was sick, that was what Remus had told her. His dark red robes seemed to weigh him down, and he slumped, not bothering to sit tall and proud. He was tired, and it showed.

"I really don't think so, your highness." Lily said, and then shook her head, he had just told her to call him 'Monty.' Disregarding what James said had become easy enough, but it felt fundamentally wrong to disregard what the high king said. "Sorry, Monty." She tried to correct it. "From what I hear about prophecies-"

"They are fulfilled mainly by accident." Monty smiled. "And only when people start to believe in them. I have heard many different accounts, aside from James' of course, about what happened yesterday. You stood against the Dark Lord, and you survived. More than that, you made him flee."

Lily shook her head. "James' magic made him flee,"

Monty shrugged a shoulder, and it looked as though it wore him out to do as much. "My son is impressive. He always has been. But Tom has always known what James was capable of, and he has never been deterred by his presence before. He would not have left without what he came for without a compelling reason."

Lily frowned and reached up to her neck. "Do you know what he did to me?"

Monty frowned as well, and looked at the marks. "I do not. Though I do know that he was not here. We have wards against apparation. No one can apparate in or out of the castle. And if he was walking through the halls, someone would have seen him."

"He wasn't in my room." Lily shook her head. "I woke from the dream and I was alone."

Monty nodded. "He is desperate. Desperate men are dangerous," He slowly stood from the bed. "But just as dangerous to themselves as they are to others. He's already made one mistake tonight." He winked at her and then the hospital wing doors were being thrown open and James was running in, looking both livid and in anguish. He was still wearing what he'd been sleeping in as well. A pair of trousers and no shirt. He had thrown on a robe, but his chest was still on display and Lily felt her cheeks heat up.

"I'm fine!" She said quickly, watching a medic jump out of the way as he continued to storm toward her.

"I should have stayed with you."

"There was nothing you could have done," She tried to reassure him, though she didn't know how that would reassure him.

James' dad patted him on the back when he reached Lily's side.

"I will be off to bed now. I hope the rest of your night is far more peaceful, Lily."

"Thank you," She said quietly, watching as James enveloped her hand in his. "Goodnight, Monty." He offered her a small wave and then started toward the door.

James leaned forward, getting so close that Lily could smell him, count the starburst in his eyes, but his eyes were on her neck. "I promised to keep you safe."

"A stupid promise, really," She offered him a small smile. "Especially given what's going on, yes?"

His eyes flashed up to hers. "What happened?"

"I'm not sure." She looked around, but everyone seemed to have left the room now. "It was a dream, but it wasn't. I was back at the dead land, and I was trying to find something," She shook her head, "Riddle showed up, and then… I think he was trying to glamour me again, or maybe he just thought he could get me to agree to work with him, I don't know. But I refused, and he said something about how he'd offered me a different way and then…" She trailed off and motioned to her neck. "But before I could try and get away, he started screaming."

Her stomach turned as she remembered the look of pain that had overtaken him, the way his hands had decayed until they had turned to ash. The way his blood had pooled on the dead ground.

She shook her head and spoke quietly, "His hands turned to ash."

James squeezed her hand in his and she looked down at them again.

"I want to tell myself that it was just a dream," She said, "But," Her free hand touched just under her neck. "What kind of magic was that?"

James took a shallow breath, "I'm not exactly sure. I've heard of people invading people's dreams before, but not like this. His hands turned to ash?"

She nodded. "I think I have these marks because I burned him." A shiver went down her spine.

James took a deep breath, appearing much calmer. "He cannot touch you."

"Well he can, but his hands will disappear." Lily rested her head back against the pillow, her stomach still turning. "There was so much blood, James." She said quietly.

"I wonder if he was actually affected, as you were," Lily shook her head.

"I hope not, or the next time I see him, I might faint." James almost smiled now.

"He did this to himself." He reminded you.

"I know, but I still feel like I caused it and it's making me feel sick."

He reached up and brushed his fingers over her clammy forehead. "I am sorry that this happened."

"It's a good thing," Lily shook her head. "Things are happening, right? Means we're getting somewhere."

He gave her a small smile, a real one now, "Okay, but let us be done with things happening to you for a spell."

"Sounds good to me." Lily agreed.

AN: Reviews are amazing. I hope you all have a great Sunday!