A/N: Sorry about taking so long to update. It was winter hols, though, and I went back home to Ireland. I'm back in Manhattan now, so I'll be updating more regularly. Like always, your reviews are very appreciated. Enjoy the 11th chapter!

Chapter 11: A Hunt and a Clue

Sora had been the first one to reach the room. After giving the password to the portrait of the slightly drunk dragon, she rushed up the stairs leading to James's room and tried the handle, only to find it locked. She pounded on the door loudly until she heard a shuffling of feet behind it. Suddenly the door was yanked open and a very irate looking James appeared.

"Do you know what bloody time it is?" he roared. Sora had to admit that he was quite frightening.

"James, Lily's in trouble" Sora said breathlessly. James's face suddenly turned from rage to worry.

"What? How? Where?" he babbled, confused and anxious. Sora shook her head.

"She showed me this letter today in potions, somebody said that there has been a racket in the charms classroom and she should check it out. I think she was being set up" Sora said. From the bottom of the stairs Sirius gasped.

"I met Lily when she and Abe were going to the charms classroom, about a half hour ago" Sirius said suddenly. "She looked nervous and I offered to go with her, but she said she would be fine" she said.

"Obviously, she's not" James said a bit nastily. Sirius narrowed his eyes.

"James, it is not my fault Lily is in trouble, so don't blame me" he said. James frowned.

"Well, if you had gone with her, she probably wouldn't be in this mess" James said.

"Well if you actually did your patrolling duties and stopped making Lily do all of them, she would never have been out there in the first place!" Sirius answered back. Remus groaned.

"Arguing is not going to help Lily!" Remus said, his voice clipped. "Why don't we just go down to the charms room and find her" he said. James and Sirius looked at him dumbfounded.

"Yeah, good idea" James mumbled, running down the stairs. Sora rand after him and soon, all five of them were running down the deserted halls. Looking back on it, Sora thought it was a miracle that they hadn't been caught. Sora, Sirius, and James (all three of whop were on the quidditch team) were the fastest of the five and made it to the charms room first, only to find it deserted.

"Bloody!" James yelled, kicking the wall of the classroom. Sora looked around the room and gasped. There were candles with half-burnt wicks everywhere.

"What went on over here?" she asked.

"By the looks of it, Lily's captor either wanted to make a dramatic effect or did some very ancient magic" Peter said, looking in wonder at the candles. James paled.

"Ancient magic? But…but that's the most powerful kind!" he said, his voice thick with worry. Remus put a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder.

"Don't worry, Prongs" he said "These candles weren't used in any ancient magic ceremony, they aren't set in any specific pattern" he added. James nodded, feeling a bit better. Remus had been taking an ancient magic course for a few years now.

"But where is she?" James said, looking around the room for clues, but not finding any.

"I don't know, but I will find out before the night is over" Sora said, her tone hard. James looked up at her.

"How are you going to do that?" James asked.

"By covering every single square inch of this school" Sora answered. The boys looked at her oddly.

"But Hogwarts is huge" Remus said. Sora nodded.

"So the sooner I start the better" she answered shortly. James nodded.

"I'll come with you" he said. Sirius looked at the both of them and quickly made up his mind as well.

"I'll come, too" he said, stepping up beside James. Sora nodded at the two boys.

"Then you better be fast to keep up with me" she said, changing into her animagus form, a black panther, and running out the door in a flash of midnight fur. Sirius and James quickly changed into their own forms and followed the girl. Peter and Remus were left standing in the room. They both looked at each other.

"I'm pretty sure me changing into my animagus form wouldn't make me faster" Peter said. Remus grinned.

"I'd have to say your right" Remus said "Plus, I don't have an animagus form" he added. Both boys looked at each other.

"I guess we're on foot then" Peter said, heading out the door. Remus nodded his head and followed.

All five met in front of the Gryffindor room the next morning, each one dead tired and completely worn out from running through the castle the whole night.

Did any of you find anything?" James asked the rest of the group, even though he already knew the answer. Everybody shook their heads.

"Where could she be? We searched the whole castle!" Sirius said. Sora gave him a pointed look.

"Obviously whoever kidnapped her took her outside the castle grounds" Sora answered.

"Then we check all of the secret passageways" James said resolutely. Sora shook her head.

"James, the H6 are the only ones that know about the secret passageways- nobody else could have taken her out of them" she said. James nodded slightly.

"But how else would somebody get Lily out. It's not like you can just walk out of the Hogwarts grounds" Peter said. Remus paled a bit.

"Unless they took her to the Forbidden forest" he said, causing James and Sora to gasp.

"They wouldn't" James said.

"We don't know who we're dealing with, James, they could have taken her anywhere" Sirius answered. James looked as though he was about to faint. Suddenly Sora spoke up.

"This is a very serious problem" she said, stating the obvious "I think in a case like this it's better if we get the help of a professor" she added. The rest of the boys nodded, knowing exactly who they were going to go to.

Professor Dumbledore was sitting in his office as usual. He normally didn't eat breakfast in the Great Hall, but preferred eating in privacy, while he worked on various reports or other headmaster duties. He usually wasn't interrupted early in the morning and was quite surprised indeed to see the H6 walk in the room, all looking bleary and close to dead with fatigue.

"Heavens, what is wrong with you lot?" Dumbledore asked as the group came into his office. He had built a rather solid relationship with the H6. He was the only professor that wasn't afraid of them, and the H6 found him to be the only professor they actually respected. The H6 were more than glad that he was their headmaster and it wasn't unusual to find one of the H6 members in his office, talking to him about this or that. Dumbledore enjoyed the company of the group (he found them to be fascinating, full of life and energy), but today, something seemed off balance about them. Looking at the kids, he realized that one of them was not there.

"Where is Mistress Evans?" he asked.

"She's gone missing!" James said, his voice quavering a bit. Dumbledore looked at the group intently.

"Since when?" he asked.

"Last night" Sora answered, telling him the whole story. Dumbledore listened to her without interrupting.

"I'm glad you came to me" he said after she finished her story "the matter of kidnapping is not something that you kids should try to deal with alone" he added. The five teens nodded.

"Do you know anybody that would have any reason to want to harm Lily?" Dumbledore asked.

"Well there are those three Ravenclaw girls, Emily, Molly, and Grace. They were my first guess" Sirius said. Dumbledore shook his head.

"Those three girls asked for leave yesterday. They said that there was some type of emergency, but really, the Weird Sisters are playing a concert in Kent and I am almost positive that's where they went." Dumbledore said.

"I don't think there would be anybody else who would want to harm Lily" James said.

"Except the creeper" Sora added in. James's eyes flashed.

"Yeah, the creeper, I bet he's the one who did it!" James said.

"Severus could not have kidnapped Lily. He was serving detention with me until very late last night" Dumbledore said.

"So that's why your lights were on" Peter said. "But if it wasn't the creeper, then who could it have been?" he added.

"Why don't you kids go on to class now" Dumbledore said "give me time to think. We'll meet again during lunch and discuss it further then" he said. James look enraged.

"Lunch! But something terrible could have happened to Lily during that time. We need to find her now!" he cried. Dumbledore gave him a sympathetic look.

"I know this is hard on you, James, but there is nothing we can do until we have a solid plan and suspect. Wearing yourself out now will only hurt Lily's chance of escape. We need to conserve our energy" Dumbledore said "So I forbid you to go and search further until lunchtime. That is final. Go on to class now" he said, his voice kind but strict at the same time. The five teens nodded numbly and started to leave.

"Remus, I believe your first class is with professor Slughorn? I'm heading over to him right now, you can come with me " Dumbledore said before they made their way out the door.

"Oh okay" Remus mumbled, going back.

"We'll walk to class together" Dumbledore said, getting up. "Now the rest of you four go on, you don't want to be late" he said.

Sora, Sirius, James, and Peter all made their way out of Dumbledore's office and into the hallway, no intention whatsoever of going to class.

"I'm going back to my room" James said numbly, turning right at the end of the hallway.

"I'll go with you, mate" Peter said. Sora nodded at him thankfully. James needed the support of his friends right now, but Sora was too dejected to offer it. She knew that James fancied Lily and all, but she had been Lily's best mate since first year and her disappearance had had cut Sora the deepest.

Peter and James left, leaving Sora and Sirius to walk back to the Gryffindor common room.

"You know" Sirius said as they walked. "Lily's disappearance got me thinking. What would I do if…" his voice trailed off. Sora looked up at him.

"If what?" she asked. Sirius stared off blankly.

"What would I do if James was kidnapped" he finished. Sora gaped at him.

"James?" she asked. Sirius nodded.

"Sure, James is my best mate, we've been through everything. I don't know what I would do if he disappeared."

"Yeah" Sora said softly, not showing her disappointment. She had never said it aloud, but she had fancied Sirius since the beginning of their fifth year. She never knew if Sirius liked her back, but she always got the feeling that he didn't.

Sora and Sirius walked back to the common room in silence and as soon as they entered, Sora rushed up to her dormitory and shut the door. Sirius just stared up after her and sighed.

Meanwhile, James and Peter were sitting on a couch in the Head's common room. James was staring into the fire while Peter was trying to think of something to say.

"She'll be okay" Peter said finally. James just continued to stare into the flames, not moving. Peter sighed.

"Mate, you've got to get a hold of yourself. You brooding won't help Lily" he said. James scowled.

"What can I do to help?" James said, his tone cold. "I don't know who took her, I don't know where she could be, I don't know anything!" he spat.

"Listen, Dumbledore said that he would help her. You have got to trust him" Peter said, lamely. James's frown grew deeper.

"But what if he can't come up with anything? Where can he start?" James cried "Lily could be injured or worse by now!"

"Listen, Prongs, you're not the only one who cares about Lily. We're all worried for her" Peter said.

"You wouldn't understand, Wormtail! Think of what you would be like if you precious little Jenny was kidnapped" James said, causing Peter to pale a bit. Peter was the only one of the marauders with a steady girlfriend, having gone out with Jennifer Thomas, a pretty Ravenclaw girl, ever since fifth year.

"She'll be okay" Peter said again to James. "She'll come back" This time James turned his head and looked at Peter.

"You promise?" he said. Peter nodded his head.

"You have my word on it" Peter said.

In the Gryffindor girl's dormitory, Sora was lying on her bed, thinking about what in the world she could do to get Lily back. There were no clues to follow but a room full of candle stumps. Sighing, Sora sat up, her eyes lazily scanning the room. For some reason they fell on Alice's bed, where a certain book lay neatly on the bedside table.

Slowly Sora got up and walked over to the book, noticing that it was the primer yearbook that Alice had so forcefully hidden from her the other day. Even though Sora knew it was an invasion of privacy, she took the book and flipped through it.

Sora noticed that there was one page was more faded than the rest, as though it had been looked at hundreds of times. Sora looked intently at the page. There was only one single picture on it as well as some writing at the bottom in a girlish, loopy script that Sora found vaguely familiar.

Sora studied the picture and gasped. There was a depressed looking girl at the side of the picture, no older than six or seven. She was a very ugly looking girl, but those large, amber eyes were very familiar.

"Alice" Sora breathed softly. Sora was amazed at how such a plain, course, and sad looking girl could grow up to be so pretty and bubbly. Alice, in the picture, was looking very forlornly at a boy, about the same age, who was standing about three feet from her, talking to another little girl.

The boy was taller than Alice and had messy black hair, hazel eyes, and a slightly long nose.

"James!" Sora cried, almost dropping the book in surprise. Alice and James had gone to the same primary school! Sora wondered why in the world Alice had never mentioned it before.

Sora's eyes went from the picture top to the writing at the bottom of the page.

"Someday he'll be mine" she read aloud, wondering what in the world that meant. Suddenly, Sora remembered the loopy handwriting. It was the exact same handwriting that was on the note that was given to Lily.

Cursing under her breath, Sora scooped the book up, held it firmly, and rushed out of the room. She ran down the stairs for the second time in the last 10 hours and hurried through the common room, where Sirius was sitting calmly, reading a book. Upon seeing Sora Sirius immediately got up.

"Sora, what happened?" he asked, worriedly. Sora didn't answer, but instead ran out the portrait hole. Sirius dropped his book and followed after her, wondering what in the world happened.

A/N: Okay, unexpected, wasn't it? Next chapter you'll get to see the extent of Alice's wrath. She's more evil that James used to be, if you can imagine tha