Disclaimer: Still don't own Harry Potter. Still wish I did.

Lily felt in her pocket as she entered Defense Against the Dark Arts, feeling a small round lump. Good. It meant the Skiving Snackbox, a Nosebleed Nougat, was still there. Originally, she had planned to involve the whole class on her first prank of the year, and get fifteen or so students to start showing various symptoms in Charms, but this had changed. She needed to talk to Professor Goldstein about which curse was used on Sara Creevey's broom, and this would be difficult to do if there was a cluster of other students also serving detention.

She waited until the lesson was about midway through before sticking the sweet in her mouth. It was very subtle- put hand in pocket, take out candy, rest chin on hand, swallow the candy- a method that she had learned from her Uncle George, who seemed thrilled that someone was carrying on the tradition of practical jokes that he and his dead twin had been infamous for during their time at Hogwarts.

She instantly felt a small trickle of blood start dripping from her nose, and waited a few seconds before raising her hand. "Professor Goldstein? I have a nosebleed."

"Stick the other end of the candy in your mouth, then, Miss Potter, and it should resolve itself. Detention."

She feigned disappointment as she swallowed the other half and wiped her face with the sleeve of her robe. It wasn't much of a prank, especially since she didn't even make it out of class, but it served its purpose of making her receive detention. Teddy Lupin, the assistant who was currently writing some of the major points of the professor's speech on the board, gave her a sympathetic look. She had grown up with him around, but around the same time that she went to Hogwarts, he got his own apartment and stopped coming to the various Weasley gatherings. It was nice to see him again, even though they had barely exchanged two words so far.

The rest of the class left right after their dismissal, but Lily remained in her desk, waiting for her detention instructions. She liked Professor Goldstein- he was fair, first of all, and never graded badly or favored any particular house, and his detentions were usually simple, something a person like her, constantly in detention, certainly appreciated. "Sir? What am I doing?" she asked after a few minutes of watching him sort through the piles of paper on his desk. Teddy was now erasing those same notations he had made.

"Oh, yes, of course." He looked up. "Nearly forgot you were there. Get a piece of parchment and a quill, just write out 'I will not make trouble in class' until it's filled. I don't have anything that I need you to do- the classroom is quite clean."

She followed his instructions, cheering inwardly at the easiness of this one. It didn't take long for her to finish- she could sense he was in a rather absentminded mood, and therefore had used one of her smaller pieces of parchment. She slid it onto his desk. "Can I ask you something?"

He stopped looking through the papers. "Of course. What is it?"

"I was wondering what happened to Sara's broom. I mean, everyone's saying it was cursed, but…I heard you checked it out, and I was curious about what actually happened." She put on her best innocent look, another thing she had perfected over the years.

"It was indeed cursed," he replied. "A very advanced curse, Urna Serius, that caused the broom to malfunction and try to throw its rider off once it had been up in the air for a set amount of time- fifteen minutes, maybe, or a half hour. This meant that whoever cursed the broom could have done so at anytime before the game, and wouldn't have needed to be present." The sound of something dropping caused him to stop talking. Teddy had dropped his wand. He had inherited his mother's clumsiness, something Lily's parents said numerous times. "Well, I suppose that's all that I know. That poor girl…"

"Thank you," Lily said politely. "Now I can set my roommate straight- she swears that a bludger hit Sara and that's what made her fall." She knew that Professor Goldstein would never check something like this, and it also made her I'm-just-curious story seem more accurate.

Thankfully, Rose and Scorpius were waiting outside the classroom for her, per the groups-of-three-or-more rule, and they set off for the library, their main discussion place. They found their special table in the back (they had carved their initials, LLP, RW, and SM, into it, but the teachers did not know this) and sat at the chairs. "It's Urna Serius," Lily said glumly. "Meaning it could be anyone whatsoever."

"This isn't going to work," Scorpius said. "We need more information- more proof, but how are we supposed to find something like that? We figure that it's a teacher, or at the least, a seventh-year, but there's no way to find out who did it without sneaking into every teacher's office and looking around, and we all know that's impossible."

Both Rose and Lily seemed to get the same idea, but it was Rose who spoke first. "It's not impossible to sneak into every teacher's office. We have the Marauder's Map and the Invisibility Cloak, what more would you need? We'll spread it out over a few nights…I might not be able to come, it would be difficult to meet up with you two somewhere, and risky."

"Alright," Lily said. "Scorpius and I will go. We can fit under the Cloak, and since we share a common room, we can sneak out together. It's doubtful that we'll find anything, anyway. Whoever it was would have covered his or her tracks extremely well, to do something like this. Look, even the teachers can't figure out who it is."

"Partially because one of the teachers is, most likely, the culprit," Scorpius replied. "That person is probably trying to throw the others off his or her tail. It's not like the wannabe killer would lead them in the right direction."

"When should you go?" Rose asked.

The sounds of a commotion reached their ears. From the noise level, Lily guessed it was taking place right outside the library. "I'm guessing tonight. From the sound of it, somebody else has been hurt."

The three rushed out to the hall in front of the library, where there was a crowd of people surrounding another. On second glance, they all were Weasleys- James, Molly, Albus, Hugo, Louis, and Lucy. Everyone was surrounding Molly, who was sobbing hysterically into her sister's shoulder. Scorpius hung back, feeling rather awkward, Lily and Rose, however, entered the fray. "What happened?" Rose shouted.

"It's Roxanne," Molly bawled. "She's- she's…"

"No," Lily gasped.

"No, she's not dead," James reassured his sister. Normally, he was arrogant and playful, but his facial expression and attitude now was grave and serious. "She's in the hospital wing. Unconscious. Nobody knows what happened to her, just that she didn't make it to any classes today, and then Madam Bones found her, sprawled across a bed as if somebody threw her down. The odd thing is, she doesn't have any visible injuries."

Lily buried her head in Rose's shoulder. Roxanne was Lily's favorite cousin, apart from Rose. Both girls had been the first to reassure her that, despite making it into Slytherin, she was still awesome to them, still their cousin, and nothing had changed. The others had been more reluctant to accept it (especially James, who hadn't completely, even now) but it had been Roxanne and Rose's doing that caused them to stop ignoring Lily and treat her the same way they had before.

"I have to go see her," Lily murmured in Rose's ear. "Come on, let's slip away."

Quietly, the girls detached themselves from the others. Molly's sobbing, which had increased in pitch seemingly because of something James, ever tactless, had said, provided a sad but useful cover causing nobody to notice when Lily and Rose disappeared down the corridor. Scorpius caught up with them, stuffing his hands in his pockets. It was obvious he didn't know what to do in the case of such a Weasley-centric crisis.

"Come on!" Rose said to Scorpius, who was lagging behind. "At this rate, we're not going to get there until next year. Will you please hurry up?" Normally it was Lily who was impatient, Lily who would make such an exaggeration, but she didn't seem in the state to say anything. She was staring straight ahead, striding along at such a pace that the two sixth-years, despite being taller, had to half-run to keep up.

They reached the hospital wing in what was probably record time coming from the library. Lily burst through, ignoring Madam Bones' call of, 'Wait!' and looked all around for her cousin as the others quickly explained to the woman what was going on. The wing was remarkably empty except for Daisy, and it was easy to locate Roxanne's bed, which hadn't been curtained off, presumably because of the number of Weasleys who would no doubt want to visit at any hours of the day (and, being family, would probably be allowed to).

She looked peaceful. Although James had described her position as sprawled, she had been moved, probably by Madam Bones, so that she rested face-up, her dark hair fanned around her face, a stark contrast against the pure white pillow. Her looks were different than the other Weasleys, courtesy of her mother, and her black hair and dark skin made her look exotic, beautiful. She was so still, not even a flutter of her eyelids or a twitch of her hands. It was worrying, but then, Roxanne had always slept like the dead.

Lily banished that word from her mind. Roxanne's chest was moving up and down steadily. It seemed as though she was just sleeping-was it possible she could be? Nobody knew exactly what had happened to her, just that she was found here. Could she have fallen asleep somewhere, and someone, thinking she was unconscious due to the wannabe killer, had brought her here? It was a logical conclusion, especially since Roxanne had once dozed off in the library, an odd place for a nap, but then, why had she missed all her classes? Roxanne was no well-behaved Head Girl like Molly or top of the class like Rose, but she would never skip a whole day like that.

A whole herd of teachers came rushing in at that point, and could be heard having a hurried meeting with Madam Bones in her office. From the looks and sounds of it, all the teachers were there. Nobody was paying attention to the three students anymore, and, in one movement, Lily grabbed the Invisibility Cloak from her bag, shoved the bag under Roxanne's bed, and threw the cloak over the three.

They sneaked as close as they could to the door. Both Scorpius and Rose were slightly hunched so as to not show their feet-more so in Scorpius' case- but they all were utterly silent, listening with interest to the babble of conversation.

"Well," Professor Goldstein was saying, "I was teaching classes all day, but Teddy was only there for the fourth-years, as I had a bunch of papers that I wanted him to look over. He would have been in his quarters or in the library for much of the day, maybe he saw something?"

Teddy, who Lily hadn't noticed come in, replied, "I wish I had, I would love to get my hands on the person who's doing this. Poor Roxanne-Daisy and Sara, as well, but Roxanne… I've known her since she was a baby." There was a tremor in his voice- was that nervousness, or just sadness, that Lily sensed in his tone.

There was some murmuring that sounded as if somebody was reassuring Teddy, and then Professor Sinistra, Astronomy teacher, said, "I do wonder why the victims are all children of people who fought in the Battle of Hogwarts. For an extremely short time in Miss Zabini's parents' case, but all three children had at least one parent who was there. Odd, really."

There was more whispering that none of the trio could understand, and then Teddy said, "I haven't finished that paperwork I have. I really do have to go." He darted out, rather quickly in Lily's opinion. It was as if he didn't want to be there. Roxanne's incident must have really upset him. He was part of the Weasley family, if not in blood, in heart, and everyone had seen how hysterical Molly was. He probably wanted to go think and be emotional on his own- guys didn't like to show emotion, Lily knew that.

The teachers dispersed barely five minutes after that, without saying anything definite or useful that the trio could use to help uncover the culprit's identity, and Lily, Rose, and Scorpius headed back over to Roxanne, coming out from beneath the Cloak and stuffing it back into Lily's bag, where it had evidently taken up permanent residence. She never was without it, although for a joker like her, it certainly came in handy multiple times. She looked down at Roxanne then up at Scorpius. "Tonight," she whispered, so quietly he could barely hear the word. "We investigate tonight."

A/N: Poor Roxanne! What happened to her? Will she be all right?

Coming up in the next chapter: Lily and Scorpius' midnight wanderings