Disclaimer: Harry Potter and his world belong to J. K. Rowling. This is for fun, no copyright infringement is intended.
Time frame: Marauder era, middle of their seventh year.
- Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Skele-Gro in itself wasn't a difficult potion. What made it difficult was that one of its ingredients was a second potion which - in turn - based on a third that again contained two others ... not to mention that each required a special grade of maturity at the exact moment of application. So all in all you needed to brew a complete set of five potions, following a horribly strict timetable through them all, for one batch of the bone regenerator. Definitely not your usual project for a seventh-year pair exercise.
Lily Evans smiled to herself as she slipped silently through the door of the charms classroom and closed it carefully on Professor Flitwick's voice, still lecturing the rest of his students. A smile that was quite a bit self-satisfied.
She'd really love to know how Slughorn had managed to persuade the rest of the teachers to go along with this. He himself had been most reluctant at first but for some odd reason he had never been able to resist her cheek when she really wanted something from him ... even if her tongue ran away with her on more than one occasion. Of course, Severus's soft remark about how "one's students' success" gave "a fine display of a teacher's abilities" had helped immensely too. Sly Slytherin indeed.
Smile deepening Lily hurried through the empty corridor and down the main staircase. It was nice to be working with her secret friend so openly for a change. Just trust the old Slug to team up the two brightest students he had ever taught - his words, not hers - whenever coursework required it. Oh, not that the Room of Requirement wasn't fine but from time to time it felt good to interact without having to follow those stupid house rivalries Severus was so overly considerate of. Lily sighed inwardly as she reached the wide Entrance Hall and glanced towards the four great hourglasses. Maybe it was just as well their houses never had had Potions together in the past. Her best friend could be so UNREASONABLE at times.
The air grew colder as she headed down the dimly lit flight of stairs to the dungeons and on through a gloomy corridor. Checking the time she hurried her steps. Only three minutes to go. Lily started jogging as the heavy wooden door to the Potions classroom finally came into view and, knowing it unoccupied at the moment, barged right in so that she was already halfway down the aisle between the tables until she noticed that it wasn't as empty as she had expected.
"Severus?"
Lily stopped abruptly and frowned confused at the black-clad figure standing by the back wall then involuntarily checked the time again.
"I- Did I make a mistake? I thought it was my turn to add the next ingredient?"
The hook-nosed Slytherin glanced briefly over his shoulder, his dark eyes expressionless like tinted glass, then turned back to staring at the big cauldron in front of him. The very silent big cauldron in front of him. A sinking feeling settled in Lily's stomach.
"Oh, no."
Dreading the worst she moved slowly down the rest of the room and winced inwardly when she was close enough to see that the fire under the cauldron was extinguished. Breathing a frustrated sigh she took the last steps and looked with dismay at what should have been a happily bubbling thin yellow broth but now resembled nearly dry reddish cement. Lily closed her eyes.
"You were too late with the salamander tongue."
Swallowing her disappointment quickly for her friend's sake - and her own, to be honest, Severus could be snappish like a hippogriff if annoyed about his own mistakes - she forced a half-hearted smile and tried to sound more encouraging.
"Ah, well, that could have happened to any of us. We knew it would be difficult and you had all the way from the greenhouses..."
"Oh, I was on time."
"... so it is not... What?"
Severus's softly spoken words had needed a moment to register but now Lily slowly turned her head until she was looking directly at his impassive profile.
"What did you just say?" There was a dangerous quiet in her voice.
The fathomless black eyes never left the cold cauldron. "I said that I was here right on time."
A second or two Lily's lips moved soundlessly while her gaze darted down at the cauldron, back to his calm, almost serene face, back to the cauldron and up again. Then anger burned a searing path up her chest.
"Are you telling me that you simply stood here and watched almost two weeks worth of work turn purple pulp?" Her enraged voice rose with every word until she was fairly screaming. "Severus, that set of potions was supposed to be ONE-THIRD of our final school grade not to mention the extra credit it would have given us with the N.E.W.T. examiners!"
"You are going out with Potter this Hogsmeade weekend."
No cold shower could have chilled Lily more thoroughly than this flat statement. A moment she could not think, could not breath, could not imagine what to say or do. And while she still struggled to gather her wits Severus finally looked up and met her eyes. She almost shrank back from the thinly veiled anger directed at her.
"Severus... I... Let me explain."
He spun on his heel and stalked purposefully towards the door. Cold panic gripped her heart, made her cry out.
"Severus, he only asked me this morning! I know how much you hate each other but believe me that James is different this year! I had to work with him since school started and at first I couldn't believe it either but it is true! Severus, WAIT, damn it! Something must have happened last year, in the summer holidays, whenever, I don't know, but it changed him completely; he's no longer the bully we both despised all these years. He-"
"SHUT UP! SHUT! UP!" Severus screeched as he whirled round, face contorted in almost insane fury. "You know nothing! NOTHING!"
Over six years Lily had watched Severus rant and rave and blast things in fits of temper or even use some truly hideous curses. And while she had more than once feared FOR him or his sanity she had never been afraid OF him. Until now. She stepped back.
The only sound in the room was their ragged breathing as they stared at each other across the rows of tables. Lily's eyes round and wide in shock, Severus's ablaze with something too terrible to consider. Lily slowly shook her head, a tiny, almost imperceptible gesture of denial and the fire in Severus's eyes flickered. For a moment he opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, to throw, spit something into her face but instead he closed it again, pressed his lips tightly together. She could not read the expression in his eyes, could not understand why there should be helpless frustration underneath the obvious anger. The silence was suffocating. And then Severus turned without another word and left the classroom. Lily winced involuntarily as the door fell shut behind him with a painfully final, resounding boom.
Long seconds she just stood there and stared at the aged wood then she slowly tilted her head back to look at the ceiling, inhaled deeply and said a word that would have cost her house thirty points had any teacher heard it.
This was certainly not how she had wanted him to find out.
She didn't even consider running after him. Not that she REALLY believed he would hurt her, not on purpose, not seriously anyway, but she wouldn't put it past him to hex her up to the ceiling as long as he was in this state of mind. After all, this was the boy who had - rather literally - blown up the practical part of his precious Defence Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. just to get back at James, risking to fail the subject completely. His outstanding theory papers had saved him in the end but ... well. Reason and Severus were two very different things when his temper got in the way and this whole mess was bad enough without anyone watching him attacking the Head Girl. No matter how much she might deserve it.
Groaning deeply Lily sat down on the nearest chair and put her head in her hands.
It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair. Why did this happen? Of all boys she could have fallen in love with ... and it had to be James Potter. Darn it, six years she could not stand the sight of him and now... Yet, there was no denying the little flutter in her stomach whenever they met, the way her heart warmed up whenever he gave her this shy little smile, so unlike his former impetuous grin that had repelled her so much... She didn't even know when it started, certainly not right away when they had been forced to cope with each other as Head Boy and Girl. No, at first her dislike had been a strong as ever but then ... somehow this affection, this feeling she still was hesitant to acknowledge as blossoming love had sneaked its way into her heart and turned her whole world upside down. But how on earth was she supposed to explain that to Severus?
Lily sighed and rubbed her temples. Besides, she knew Severus long enough to know that pressing him now would only lead to pushing him more firmly in the other direction. No, to go after him now would only mean to drive him further away and there was no telling what stupid things he might do then. Better to give him space to cool off, to let him work it out in his own time and wait for an opportune moment when he was calmer.
Sighing again Lily slowly got up and eyed the ugly mess of their ruined project down-heartedly. She was NOT looking forward to breaking those news to Professor Slughorn. Or explain why it was better not to pair up her and Severus in the next couple of weeks. She could just imagine the disappointed quiver of the walrus-like moustache. Looking around for tools to get the botched potion out of the cauldron - she already knew that a Vanishing Spell would not take effect here - her gaze fell on a battered copy of Advanced Potion-Making sitting on the edge of the nearest table. Involuntarily she clapped a hand over her mouth and gasped.
"Oh, darn it. Oh, DARN it."
He had left the book. He had left the book, their book, the book no one would notice except her and Severus because of the See-Me-Not he had placed on it after a rather nasty incident with one of his fellow Slytherins in their second year... The book that was them. Them.
Swallowing dryly Lily reached out and touched the worn cover almost reverently.
She didn't know exactly what fascinated her so much about Potions. Maybe she really was a dab hand at brewing like Slughorn so often exclaimed. Maybe it was simply because, had she not been a witch, she would probably have turned her attention to natural sciences like physics or chemistry. As she still did from time to time in her holidays, encouraged by her parents. Maybe it was because she actually considered MAGIC a science and Potions its most demanding branch, seeing how one flick of a wand, one pronunciation of a word, one stir in the right or wrong direction decided over success or disaster. Although Severus was probably the only person who would and did agree with her on that theory. As for her friend... Severus might be obsessed with the Dark Arts but his love for Potions was silent yet even stronger.
Lifting and opening the book Lily smiled sadly as she ran her eyes over the heavily edited printed text, effortlessly deciphering Severus's cramped handwriting.
Yes, this book was them. Visible evidence of the many stolen hours they had spent secretly in the Room of Requirement, brewing and experimenting and arguing about the best way to achieve the ultimate, the perfect result. In retrospect it was kind of a miracle they had not killed each other or blown up the school with the risks they had taken. Although they had come very close some times.
Lily chuckled softly and flipped through the pages, smiling again fondly as she came across the Draught of Living Death. Ah, yes, she had found out about the Sopophorous Beans. True enough, it had been because she had lost her patience cutting up the shrivelled little things and accidentally crushed them by slamming down her dagger, cutting herself pretty badly in the process. But - as Severus had pointed out after saving the rest of the juice from her blood, taking care of her hand and experimenting a bit with different materials - it had been worth it.
Or rather, it had been more than worth it. In fact, the results of hundreds of little episodes like this filled these pages, whatever she or he or they had discovered alone or together, driven by their hunger for knowledge, delighted by sharing it with someone of the same mind. And then, of course, there were the spells.
Growing serious Lily slowly closed the book and tapped the cover with her fingertips. The spells.
It was strange. She had always been so used to Severus inventing little incantations, had even helped him with some - she had forgotten in how many possible or impossible positions she had hung in the air, cursing at the top of her lungs, while he had worked on Levicorpus - had angrily objected against more - like Sectumsempra ... that it had taken her quite a long time to realize how ... extraordinary that was. Even after a lifetime of learning less than one witch or wizard out of a hundred was able to create new spells and here was this surly, bad-tempered boy who had done it for fun since his second year at Hogwarts. Amazing. And somewhat frightening.
Because sometimes she understood too well what drove him to create some of his nastier little hexes or jinxes. Because sometimes she could almost understand what drove him to actually use them.
You know nothing! Nothing!
A frown crept on Lily's face as she remembered the words Severus had thrown at her just some minutes ago. She suddenly had the nagging feeling that she was missing something, something important but she simply didn't know what. And she didn't like it one bit. Because despite what he had shouted at her earlier the foundation of their friendship had always been KNOWING things.
True, they might snap and snarl at each other at times but nevertheless they always talked. Well, she talked, Severus made cryptic remarks or sarcastic comments and she figured the meaning out. But they were always honest, sometimes shockingly so. For example, they never tried to hide that they didn't have the slightest regard for each other's other friends - in fact Severus normally referred to hers as a flock of brainless geese while she usually called his a bunch of future criminals. He left no opportunity to make fun of her liking being a teacher's favourite and she had no qualms needling him about his tendency to sulk in dark corners if he didn't get the attention he thought his due. They trusted each other in a way that was difficult to describe and impossible to explain ... or at least they once had.
She didn't know what had started it, this - this change in their friendship. Her growing affection for James she had kept a secret? The strangely OFF feeling between her and Severus since she had become Head Girl and didn't have as much time as in the past? But now that she thought about it something else had been wrong before that, considering his foul mood at the end of last year. What was it that HE was not telling her? Why had he left the book? Had he simply forgotten it because he had been so upset? Or...
No. Lily shied away from this train of thought with all her heart and soul. It was impossible. Severus would not give up their friendship no matter how angry he was. He would not give up Potions just to throw her out of his life. He had been upset; he had forgotten he had taken the book out of his bag and that was all. What left her with the question what to do with it now.
She could not leave it here in the open. No one would see it CONSCIOUSLY for the spells protecting it, yet one could still knock it down by accident and discover it that way. But she couldn't take it with her either. She knew too well how he would interpret it as long as he was still so angry, knew he would only see it as an attempt to force him to talk to her again. Something he would never forgive her.
Looking round Lily finally made up her mind and walked over to an old, battered corner cupboard. Opening it she crouched down and carefully placed the book on the lowest shelf under some other spare textbooks then stood and slowly closed the door again, resting her hands against the rough, discoloured wood.
There. There was no way Severus wouldn't find it here, the call of the Here-I-Am spell - sealed by the simple sentence written at the bottom of the back cover claiming it as his possession - would lead him without fail. And here it would be safe until he retrieved it in due time.
Lily slowly stepped back and nodded to herself.
Yes, he would retrieve it; he just needed a little distance to calm down. He would come round, eventually. They would come round. They always did, didn't they?