Lily Potter and the Uppas of Declome
Chapter Four
After Defense Against the Dark Arts was over, Jeremy told the girls about what had happened to him.
"And they didn't leave a note?" Lily asked.
"None I saw."
"How fiendish," Lorna said. "And I don't even know what fiendish means!"
"Guys, I'm afraid to go to sleep again."
"It was just a little paint," said Lily. "Nothing to fret about."
"Simple for you to say. You did not wake up this morning looking like a—"
"A what?"
"A candy cane." Jeremy's eyes became clear with understanding. "Oh, it's so obvious who did this! How very puerile of them."
Lorna looked at Lily. Jeremy was so clueless. "Who did it, then?"
"Well, I don't know exactly. But it must be some of the other Hufflepuff first years. The ones who laughed at Lorna for her candy-cane colored hat."
"As I remember," said Lily, "you were one of the ones who laughed at her hat."
"Only because it was strange and unfamiliar," Jeremy said. "And I wasn't your friend at the time. But now that I am, somebody is plotting against me. To make me look ridiculous for having ridiculous friends."
Lorna stared at him coldly. Lily could tell it was an act. "If we're so ridiculous in your eyes, maybe we shouldn't be friends anymore." Then both girls got up and stormed off in mock anger.
"Wait, guys! I apologize for being insensitive! Come back!"
But they paid no heed. And for once, Jeremy did not follow them.
Jeremy gave Lily and Lorna notes during class, which if they had read them might've caused them to pity him. But they did not read them. Lily chewed them as if they were sticks of gum. Lorna set them on fire using a spell Jeremy had taught her only a couple of days before they painted his skin red and white. After three days, Jeremy gave up. He stopped talking to anybody in the Great Hall, and he was rarely in the common room, spending most of the time in the library since that was his sanctuary against neglect.
Lily was happier now that she had a friend who was an adept exterminator of pests. (Lorna said she had a lot of practice with her older brother.) So Lily decided to try her hand at peering in the Hufflepuff pool again.
She glanced around carefully when she entered the common room. Jeremy might be hiding somewhere. She knew he was usually in the library, but Bethany had whispered to her and Lorna that she had seen Jeremy making blueprints, apparently with the attempt of accosting the girls so that he could force them to be his friend again. Thus she had to be wary.
Perceiving that he was not there, she boldly stepped forward to the pool. She was just about to peer into it when a coughing sound caused her head to turn to a kid in a chintz chair. He was a corpulent fifth year, and he was just staring straight ahead.
"What are you doing?" Lily asked him.
He did not answer. He just sat there. Lily couldn't even tell whether he was blinking, and it unnerved her.
"Hey, you! What are you staring at?"
Another boy came up to Lily. "Leave Stumpster alone," he said.
"Stumpster? Is that his name? But why is he just sitting there?"
"That's his idio-syn-crasy," the boy split the word into syllables, believing that if he said it as one word, Lily would be unable to catch it. "Do you know what that means?"
"No."
"It means he sits on his butt all day and does nothing."
"Oh. But isn't it his O.W.L. year?"
"Yeah, so?"
"I heard that in the fifth year you have a ton of work to do."
"Indeed. We have no time to waste."
"Then why is he wasting his time?" Lily wished to know.
"Because he's Stumpster. Now, are you going to leave him alone or will I have to knock your teeth out?"
"I'll leave him alone," Lily said meekly. She stepped toward the pool and did her best to ignore the staring boy and his glaring friend.
She looked into the pool, and felt a thrill of joy go through her. Then, she saw her parents sitting at the table in Number Twelve Grimmauld Place. Harry and Ginny were talking, but Lily couldn't hear a thing they were saying. Holly Jester, the female prefect who had guided the first years to their dormitories on the first day, had told them later that the use of Extendable Ears would aid in hearing the family members one saw in the pool. Lily pulled a pair out that her Uncle George had given her for her last birthdayy and put them in her ears. Then she let them fall into the water.
"She's a big disappointment," Harry was saying. "A failure in life. We ought to write here out of our will."
"Yes," said Ginny. "That girl's more trouble than she's worth. But I never thought one of our family would go sour."
"It's happening everywhere," Harry said. "Great wizards turning out bad kids. Look at Euan Abercrombie. Derek Azzos. Daphne Greengrass. All their kids are practicing Dark Arts now. To think that this could happen with a grandchild of Arthur Weasley, too!"
"Helga Hufflepuff will be proud of the fiend she has created. It's such a shame that—"
But Lily never got to hear the end of her mother's sentence. Misery had overcome her. Her parents thought she was a failure. That she could understand, and it hurt terribly. But that they could accuse her of practicing the Dark Arts? That was unforgivable. She hated them! For the eleven years of her existence, her parents had pretended to love her, and now they were accusing her of engaging in the Dark Arts without proof!
She ran to her room and cried. Lorna came to talk to her, but she shooed her away. Susan Azzos also came up, and Lily yelled at her. But Susan would not budge.
"I will not leave until you tell me what's wrong," Susan said. Lily thought she had some nerve.
"Go away!" Lily shrieked.
"No!" Susan stood firm.
"I'm not telling you anything."
"You'd better, dear Lily. Did that Mudblood swine hurt your feelings? Susan is here to make it all better." Susan patted Lily's knee.
"I don't know who you are talking about," Lily said.
"Of course you do. That Lebba or whatever her name is."
"Don't you dare insult Lorna."
"So, she didn't hurt you? Then who did?"
"I already told you that I'm telling you nothing."
"Lily, I have been trying to show you that I'm the only friend you have this school. Now confide in me."
"Never!"
"Lily, I'm warning you. I'm an accomplished Legilimens, and I will use my power on you if I have to."
This caused Lily to scoff. "An accomplished Legilimens, my foot. You're a first year, like me. You just started studying magic, which means you can't possibly be skilled at anything yet."
Susan stared at Lily coldly. "Don't question what I'm capable of. I will give you one hour. If you do not tell me what's upset you by the end of that time, I shall pry it out of you. Make fun of me, if you wish. But I'll do it."
"Is that a threat? What if I told Professor Oglithorpe?" Professor Ogliothorpe was the Head of Hufflepuff. She was the first Head of House to teach Astronomy since 1674. And she wasn't a particularly pleasant lady to be around. She once took ten points away from Hufflepuff because Lily and Lorna playing Gobstones-on-a-Broomstick in an empty classroom, a game that started becoming popular four years before. Professor Oglithorpe had said, "Games are not allowed in empty classrooms," though Lily was certain that rule didn't actually exist. Jeremy might know, since he read everything. But at that time both girls had already wanted to get rid of him, and so they hadn't asked.
"Professor Ogliothorpe does not care about the petty affairs of first years," Susan said, smiling wickedly.
Lily knew this to be true. Susan left her after saying, "One hour." But Lily did not plan to spend that hour being idle. She would seek out a place to hide from Susan. Hogwarts was a big place after all.
She spent twenty minutes looking for a hiding spot before she realized the futility of this endeavor. She'd have to go to sleep sometime, and she shared all of her classes with Susan. It'd be impossible to avoid Susan forever.
Then again, maybe Susan was just lying about the Legilimens thing. It just seemed too improbable that a witch just starting to learn magic would know how to do something so advanced. Auntie Hermione had explained to her all about Legilimens once, and Lily distinctly remembered her saying, "People below the fourth year at Hogwarts would never be able to perform it." And when had her aunt ever been wrong before? But now—
Lily wasn't watching where she was going, and she bumped into a tall kid with dark hair.
"Get away from me, brat!" the boy said.
"Easy, Morfkar, it's just a first year," said the boy's friend, who stood next to him. This boy had green spiky hair. If Lily had been a Muggle-born, she would've thought this character had crawled out of a manga or anime. "Morfkar's not keen on little kids," the boy said. "The name's Ralph. And who might you be?"
"L-Lily. Lily Potter."
"Oh, your James' little sister? He's in our year, that chap. Spends a lot of time with that Kyle bloke, though."
Lily could sense that these boys didn't like her brother's taste in friends. It sounded like Susan's own antipathy to Lorna. Lily started to edge away.
"Hey, where you going little whippersnapper?" Ralph asked. "We're not going to hurt you. What choo running from, anyhow?"
"Um…a crazy ghost who haunts a toilet on the fourth floor," Lily hastily invented.
The boys laughed. "Like we'd buy that!" said Ralph. "C'mon, give us a real explanation. Did you tick Brodd off?"
"No." Lily had not seen the gamekeeper since the first day, when he had the first years travel to the castle in little boats.
"Is Peeves chasing you?"
"No."
"What about Isanor?"
"Of course not!"
Isanor was a new poltergeist who had moved into the castle since Lily's father's day. She and Peeves were supposedly in love, though this was uncharacteristic of Peeves. But Isanor only came out when Peeves needed some real chaos to prevent himself from getting extremely bored by doing the same things over and over, like dropping water balloons or the heads of armor on the heads of unwary first and second years. When Peeves summoned Isanor, usually chairs and knives and other real hazards were dropped from a great height.
"Well, then, what's the trouble?"
Lily had no idea what made her spill her guts. Maybe something in Ralph's eyes. But she started rambling, "I am running from a first year girl in my House who says that she can use Legilimens and she will use it on me to find out what is troubling me because she wants to force me to be her friend. Then if I tell her, I don't know what she'll do but probably something unpleasant. And the thing she wants me to tell her is that my parents hate me because I'm in Hufflepuff and they suspect that I practice the Dark Arts, which would be incredibly silly since my dad is the most famous Auror alive. And Susan wants to take my friend Lorna away from me, probably because she wants me all to herself! That selfish prig!" She said all this in one breath and had to breathe hard at the end to get back her homeostasis.
"Whoa, Lila, did you say your name was?"
"Lily?"
"Okay, Lily. A first year can't use Legilimens. That's like somebody creating all the rules for Quidditich after seeing one ball. Impossible," said Ralph.
"I figured that, but suppose she dapples in the Dark Arts and—"
"Lily, hold it. You say your parents are accusing you of practicing the Dark Arts without any proof, and here you are doing the same thing to this girl. Please be consistent."
"I guess you're right." But Ralph and Morfkar had not seen Susan's evil smile. If she wasn't evil, who was?
"There's another thing. Only members of Slytherin have gone bad. Susan is in Hufflepuff. Maybe she's just threatening you because she wants a little of your attention."
"She doesn't want a little of my attention. She wants all of my attention."
"Well, Morfkar," Ralph said to his friend, "it sounds like we got a case on our hands."
"Case?" Lily asked.
"Me and Morfkar want to be detectives," Ralph explained. "His parents are Muggles, and he showed me some books about a man named Sherlock Holmes. They were all so fascinating that I asked my father about wizarding detectives, and he said that they are in nearly as much demand as in the Muggle world!" He seemed so elated. "Anyhow, for you, I think we can seek out information about this girl, to see if she really can use Legilimens or not. Just tell us her name and we'll get back to you as soon as we can."
Morfkar pulled out a piece of parchment and a quill. Lily told the boys Susan's first and last name. It wasn't until they disappeared around the corridor that she remembered that there'd be no time for them to find out whether Susan could do Legilimency or not before Susan used it on Lily…unless Lily gave her the information she wished to know willingly.
She went to the library. At least she could hide out there until Ralph and Morfkar reported back. Susan never entered the library.
She sat down at a table not far from Jeremy. She smiled at him, for she had temporarily forgotten that she wasn't supposed to like him. He took her grin as an invitation to come over.
"Lily, I'm really sorry about what I did."
"What?"
"I said I'm sorry."
"For what?"
He looked at her, puzzled. "For insulting Lorna, and you for hanging out with her."
"Oh, that." Lily had no idea what to say. But she needed a friend now, with Susan's threat hanging over her head. So she said, "All is forgiven."
"Really? You have no idea what a relief this is." Jeremy's eyes were shining.
"Yes, well…"
"Well, what?"
"What do you know about Legilimency?"
"That it's a very difficult thing to do. Why?"
"How long does it take to learn to counter it?"
"As long as it takes to learn it. Some learn faster than others, though. It could take you five weeks, or three months, or eight years. Actually, the only person who took eight years had an IQ of about 39.7. So I guess four to five months is the longest."
"I don't have that much time," Lily said in an undertone, though Jeremy still heard it.
"Why would you need to learn Occlumency?"
"Because a girl in our year is planning to use Legilimency on me."
"A girl in our year? You're kidding, right?"
"No. It's no joke."
"Empty threat, Lily. It's impossible for a first year to be a Legilimens."
"So says the dork who reads books all day," came a snotty voice.
Both of them turned around. Susan was there, a gleam in her eye. "Go away, Vince. I have business with Lily."
"First of all, my name is Jeremy, and if you think I'm letting you harm Lily, you're out of your pench."
"Scrawny boy, big words," said Susan. "Girls, take him away."
Three sixth-years lifted Jeremy up and carried him off. If Jeremy had been older, he might've had a crush on them, for they were beautiful. They carried him to the front of the library and one on them struck her foot into his buttocks, hard. "Don't come in again until Susan is finished with your Lily," one of them said.
Susan waited for the three girls to return. The sixth-years used the Muffliato spell on the people at the surrounding tables, so that they wouldn't be able to hear what Susan and Lily were saying.
"Tell me what I wish to know!" Susan shouted. Inside she was thinking how grateful she was for the Muffliato spell, though she herself did not know it, which was one reason she needed the sixth-years. Not to mention that one was her sister, Megara Azzos.
"Never," Lily said, coldly.
"Then you leave me no choice." Susan pulled out her wand, whispered a word that Lily did not catch, and Lily felt her body tumble to the ground. She saw random images from her life…the birthday when she turned three, and Albus sneezed on the cake, causing her to go crying in tears…a time when she was eight and found a seashell on the beach…the previous Christmas, when it was announced that the Minister of Magic had choked himself…and finally, the image of her looking into the pool, and hearing the caustic things her parents had said.
"Ah, I see. Now I know what was troubling you," Susan said. "I will be your mother from now on. Your birth-mother doesn't care for you. She thinks you are an evil witch who practices the Dark Arts. I will be to you what she should've been, if she had cared."
Lily tried to say that what Susan was saying was outrageous, that her mother probably made a mistake. But one of the sixth-year girls had her knee on Lily's chest. "I think you ought to hypnotize her, sis," the girl said.
"Hypnotize? No, Meg. I want her to see me as a mother of her own free will."
"Susan, I've been on this earth longer than you have. Trust me, we must put her under hypnosis.
"Don—" Lily attempted to say, but Megara pressed her knee down harder on Lily's chest. She found it hard to breathe.
"I don't want her to be hypnotized," Susan said. "I just want her to see me as a mother, that is all."
"And for that, you need hypnosis," Megara insisted.
"Someone is looking this way," one of the other sixth-years warned.
Meg lifted Lily and cast a gagging spell so that Lily wouldn't be able to scream. Then she cast another spell which handcuffed Lily and Susan together.
The other girls led the way to an empty classroom, and Lily had to go where Susan went because of the handcuffs. She did try to scream several times. Jeremy stared at her as she swept past him. He did not see the handcuffs, and though Lily tried to contact him with her eyes, he failed to catch the message. What he perceived was that Lily wanted to go with these girls, and he would not have her blissful companionship for some hours.
Once in the classroom, Megara directed Susan on how to perform the hypnosis spell. Susan kept insisting that she didn't want to do it. But Megara wouldn't listen. At last, Susan attempted to do the spell, but she said, "I can't do it," after a few minutes.
"Honestly!" Megara said, throwing up her hands. "If you want something done right, you've got to do it yourself."
Once she had done the Hypnosis Spell, Meg said, "Close your eyes. When I clap my hands three times, you will open your eyes. Now, everything I say you must do, as soon as your eyes open. Treat my sister as a mother. Go everywhere she does. Do the chores she lays out for you. Avoid the people she tells you to avoid. Live to please her. And know that your biological mother has disowned you. This is why Susan must act as a surrogate. You are hers, and she is yours."
Meg clapped her hands three times.