FALLING WITH GRACE
by shiiki
CHAPTER TEN
Calm Before the Storm
August, 1979
'Protego Amore,' said Lily distinctly. This has to work, this has to work … Beside her, Liz's lips were moving in a silent mantra that was probably similar to the one in Lily's mind.
She had cast the Shield Charm, infused with love; steeped in sacrifice: if she and Liz had done it, the charm would absorb the elements of the killing curse, engulfing it and disintegrating it. The final touches to the spell had been clinched by an idea from a Muggle Chemistry textbook: sacrificial protection. According to the book, Muggles used a more reactive metal to protect a less reactive one from corrosion. They'd taken this concept and applied it to their spellcrafting: a shield to absorb the killing curse's energy so that it wouldn't focus on the charm's caster. Theoretically, the charm should be able to hold off the killing curse as long as the caster could keep it in place. Rather like a battle of wills, Lily imagined it: certainly, holding the charm would be difficult, but the murderer would have to hold Avada Kedavra for just as long, and surely that would tire him (or her) out as well!
'Conspicuous!' said Liz, and the powerful lines of light defining their charm materialised, looking exactly like the visual prototype they had created earlier to help them along. Lily felt a sense of pride – this beautiful, potent charm was their work; their effort; its success would be theirs.
Moody surveyed the spell approvingly. 'It looks … it feels … right,' he said. 'Stand back, now.' When Lily and Liz had stepped out of range, he aimed his wand through the visible shield towards a spider crawling slowly across the floor. Lily held her breath.
'Avada Kedavra!'
The beam of green light streaked out of his wand, right at the pure, white light radiating from Lily's. There was a crushing sense of pressure gripping Lily as she waited, anticipating the collision … and then the lights connected with a tiny explosion.
'Oh my God,' breathed Liz, her hand flying to her mouth in wonder.
Lily's arms were tingling, her hair standing on end. This was powerful, powerful magic! She had to focus with all her might, concentrating on that little shield she was holding out to protect the spider, the only barrier between the arachnid and death. It was so much more tiring than she had expected, just holding it there, countering a single curse. Moody wasn't even breaking a sweat; he had lowered his wand, and was watching her with intense interest.
But it was working! She was holding the curse at bay, although it was sapping her strength the longer she tried. Her arms were starting to tremble with the effort; her head throbbed as she forced herself to concentrate. It didn't matter, though. The important thing was that the charm was working!
And then, with a powerful rush of white light, the green vanished. It just seemed to … implode. Lily lowered her wand, breathing hard, as though she had just flown a trans-Atlantic – or maybe a round-the-world – broom race. Her arms were sore and her head pounding, but she felt elated.
The spider scampered across the room, found a knothole, and disappeared.
There was a long moment of silence, during which the three of them simply stared at each other, beaming. And then Liz burst out laughing.
'We did it! Oh my God, Lily, that was spectacular! I thought you were going to let go, actually, but you held on, and then … wow … we're going to have to modify it, and see if we can make it work quicker or less tough to cast, but we're definitely on the right track!'
'Well done, girls,' said Moody approvingly. 'Dinner, then? On me.'
'Oh, yes, please,' said Liz enthusiastically, once they'd got over the shock. It wasn't everyday that Moody treated you to a meal! (If he'd ever even done it before.) She turned to Lily, her excitement over their success radiantly displayed across her face. 'Come on, Lily, you deserve this the most!'
Lily shook her head. 'We did everything together.'
'Yes, but you've done so much last week – I don't believe you've properly rested at all! Come on, a good meal will do you good!'
'I … I think I'd rather have a rest first, if that's all right with you. That charm took a lot out of me …'
'Meaning you need some sustenance first,' said Moody firmly. They wouldn't take no for an answer, and Lily soon relented. She was rather hungry.
After a wonderfully filling meal at the pub Liz had chosen (Liz was right; Lily hadn't eaten so well in weeks), Lily thought her bed sounded incredibly inviting. When she collapsed into it, however, sleep wouldn't come, although she felt exhausted. Sitting up again, she reached for her wand on her bed table.
'Apparecium Protego Amore,' she whispered softly.
The shining map of her charm lit up her dark room. Lily gazed at it fondly, marvelling at its brilliance. It filled her with joy – a happiness that she hadn't felt for so long, not since she and James had quarrelled. She'd hardly seen him in the past two weeks – he'd kept a stony silence since their last argument, and she had felt so miserable that she'd immersed herself in work – besides the Death Shield, there had been security charms to work on for Alice and Frank's wedding. When she was busy, it was easy to forget the trials of her life: James angry at her, Petunia disappearing again – James evidently knew something about that, but refused to tell, which made her angry, too.
It had become customary for her to while away long hours (which got steadily longer) at Liz's place, often staying late into the night to muse over new ideas. Sleep no longer seemed to be an essential commodity; nor did food. She didn't starve herself, but Lily couldn't seem to work up an appetite at the right hours. A little something when she woke, and again before she went to bed saw her through the entire day. On the days when she worked until dawn, she mostly forgot completely about eating.
No wonder Liz had been worried! But it would be all right now. They'd succeeded with their Death Shield – the web of which was flooding her room with a lovely light (The light of love, Lily thought) – and she'd find James and patch things up with him.
Lily reached out to touch her spell web. She'd never done it before – Professor Flitwick had warned her before that it wasn't the safest thing to do – but she knew without a doubt that this spell had no power to harm. It could only heal.
It coursed through her, a magical, almost electrifying, warmth. Lily gave a gasp of delight and lowered her wand in her amazement; the web dissolved.
With a smile, she settled back against her pillow and closed her eyes. Unsurprisingly, her slumber was deep and peaceful that night.
---
James could count the number of times he'd met with Lily since her kidnapping on one hand.
On one finger, actually: he'd sought her out a few days later, once he'd cooled down considerably. They had, however, ended up screaming their lungs out at each other again – James couldn't remember exactly what had set them off, but Petunia and the kidnapping had come into it, and Lily had gone so far as to insinuate that perhaps he shouldn't have come after her since he didn't seem to care about what mattered to her, and he'd actually replied that maybe he shouldn't!
He'd left thinking that he wouldn't go find her again; she could come and apologise for being bloody pigheaded and completely out of order. For heavens sake, couldn't she realise that she'd made a mistake about her sister? They'd avoided each other after that, a surprisingly easy task, as the Order kept them both busy with preparations for Alice and Frank's wedding. A hundred and fifty invitations in total were sent out, all bearing the date of the auspicious event as the twenty-seventh of August. They beseeched the recipients to keep the news to themselves, however, with dire consequences to those who blabbed. James knew, from an Order meeting during which neither of them had even glanced the other's way, Lily was to charm the invitations such that the date would automatically change and the parchment card alert the guest if they hadn't leaked the information beforehand. Liz had suggested a tricky bit of magic to inform the Order if such a leak occurred, and Remus had added a powerful Silencing Hex for good measure – should anyone choose to disclose any information about the wedding, they would be immediately struck dumb. Sirius wanted to put in all sort of more vicious jinxes, but Frank decided that it might be too unforgiving on the few innocent invitees who were careless.
The actual date was set for the thirtieth of August – close enough after the false one for the Death Eaters to have little time to prepare a new offensive and far enough to give the Order a little breathing space.
'And enough time to cancel the whole thing if our little ruse goes awry,' said Elphias Doge, who was predisposed to pessimism.
The invitations were all hand-delivered, to eliminate the possibility of any landing in Death Eater hands.
'What if one of the guests is a Death Eater, just that we don't know it?' Benjy Fenwick pointed out.
'Then we'll be sure to have an attack on the twenty-seventh,' Caradoc Dearborn said.
Since there were a hundred and fifty people to be notified, and only about twenty Order members, it meant a great deal of Apparating all over the country for everyone.
Then they had to prepare the trap – it wasn't so difficult, they had just to ensure that there were people dressed appropriately at the right place at the right time when the Death Eaters turned up. It was planned that the Order would present themselves as bait, along with as many Aurors as Frank and Moody trusted to include in the scheme.
Besides all this, there were the usual problems of logistics, decoration and catering that accompanied any wedding – not to mention the extra security that would still be needed just in case. Sirius and Moody surveyed the proposed site, a wild Yorkshire moor that was strategically hidden from Muggle eyes as an old Quidditch ground for the villagers ought to be, and pronounced it well-suited for the occasion.
Liz (and Lily, too, no doubt) set to work immediately, designing security charms specific to the site and occasion. The basic Shield Charm had to be amplified to cover the whole area; anti-Apparition warding was essential (Dumbledore promised to rig Portkeys for the event); emergency alarms had to be placed at intervals stretching out radially from the site … and once the girls had planned it all out, the other Order members were to cast the spells. Suffice to say, there was lots to do.
James therefore found it very annoying to be awoken from the rare chance that he could snatch an afternoon nap by a loud bam against the window.
He cursed as he rolled out of bed, his hand instinctively grabbing his wand from the bed table.
BAM.
It was an owl: a minute, fluffy owl who had probably given itself a concussion, slamming against the window. James groaned and let it in, whereby it began to fly about the room, hooting at the top of its tiny lungs.
'Come here, you,' said James irritably. The owl chirpily landed on his outstretched arm and he yanked the letter out of its talons. It was addressed using letters cut out from the headlines of the Daily Prophet, pasted unevenly such that the letters ran up and down: sIriUs BLaCk.
'You got the wrong window,' James told the bird after a quick Revealing Charm unearthed no mail hexes. The owl hooted softly, as if to say, You can deliver it, then. James grimaced at it (hoot!) but went off to find Sirius anyway.
Sirius was fiddling with his motorbike. He was lying on his back, a wrench in one hand and a screwdriver in the other, his wand between his teeth.
'Why don't you just use magic?' James wondered.
Sirius made an indistinct noise. James reached for the wand in his mouth and removed it.
'A bike's like a girl, mate. You've got to spend time with her.'
'Right.' He'd never seen Sirius expend this much effort on any girl.
'What's brought you here, then? Thought you were napping.'
'Bloody owl delivery got the wrong person; woke me up. Here –' James shoved the letter in front of Sirius's face. Sirius peered at it, glanced at his hands, which were full of grease and still gripping his Muggle tools, and then he shrugged.
'Looks like some anonymous shit. Can you read it –? Thanks.'
James slit the envelope with his wand and pulled out the letter inside. It was a simple piece of scrap parchment, torn off, by the look of the edges, and the message was written – or rather, pasted – in the same format as the name on the envelope. It was evidently a rushed job, as the sender had omitted punctuation, the letters were crooked, and some of them had fallen off, leaving holes in the middle of the words.
hE kNO s thE cHArM bEwARe hE w LL c Me
'He?' said Sirius when James had finished deciphering the letter's contents.
'"He" is underlined. I'm betting Voldemort,' said James grimly. It was easy enough to figure out the warning: beware of an attack. But what was the charm the message spoke about?
'Any idea what charm he's talking about?' asked Sirius.
'It's addressed to you,' James pointed out. 'Shouldn't you know?'
'Couldn't be something about the wedding, could it? Why would anyone send this to me? Why not Dumbledore – he's the one with the spies.'
'I s'pose he – if it's a he, that is – trusts you to get it to Dumbledore? I really don't know, Sirius. The best thing to do would be just that: give it to Dumbledore.'
There was a loud metallic clank as Sirius clicked one of his motorcycle parts in place. He put down his tools and inched out from under the bike.
'Well, she's ready to go,' he said, nudging his bike with his shoulder. 'Do a Scouring Charm, will you? Ah, thanks.' Hands Scourgified, Sirius reached for the letter. 'I'll pay a visit to the school, then. Or wherever Dumbledore might be.'
'I'll come with you.' James had a forbidding feeling about the message, but he couldn't quite place his finger on it. What was the charm?