A.N.: Guys, sorry for taking so long! I got a bit stuck on this one but will hopefully get back to posting regularly now! I hope you enjoy!

Chapter Six

„Off-key"

Tap. Tap.

"Huh?"

Tap. Tap. Tap.

"Umph." Lily rolled onto her back, shielding her eyes from the sunlight filtering through the thin white curtains. For a second, she didn't know where she was, but then her eyes fell on the familiar dresser, the flowers painted on the yellow walls and her guitar in the corner. She felt sore all over, as though she had been run over by a car or trampled by a herd of hippogriffs. Her hair, which she usually kept braided back at night, was frizzed up and smelled of cigarettes and she was still wearing the too-tight grey dress from last night, like someone had just dumped her in bed and left again. But her mind was blank as to who that might have been, just as it was wiped of any other memories from the night before. She felt her heart give a panicked spasm. What in the - ?

Tap. Tap. Tap-tap. The tapping noises were quicker and louder this time, like whoever was knocking was becoming impatient. A glance at the window told Lily it was owl post: a brown shape bobbing up and down, a sharp beak hacking at the glass pane.

She groaned and pulled her pillow over her head so it was dark and quiet. "Molly," she mumbled into her mattress, hoping the cat would hear. "Could you get that for me?"

When there was no sound except a renewed tapping on the window, Lily looked up again, only to see Molly sprawled next to her. The tabby blinked once, then yawned widely, showing her pink tongue. Her meaning was unmistakable, even to the sleepy redhead: Get up and do that yourself, you lazy drunkard.

Lily scowled at her, then struggled into an upright position. "You're being really unhelpful today."

She opened the window and the messenger, a big barn owl, hopped inside with an envelope attached to her leg. It looked annoyed and, having been relieved of its burden, managed to just hit Lily over the head with one of its wings as it took off into the morning ("Thanks a heap," grumbled Lily). One of the owl's feathers lingered on the covers of her bed, tickling Molly's nose and making the cat sneeze. The coming and going of owls hadn't excited her for years now and she had long since given up trying to catch them. Owls were all right, she had decided, as long as they didn't claim any of her favourite sleeping spots. That would mean war.

"I wonder who's writing to me," said Lily. She had crawled back into her bed and had a start when she saw that the letter was from none other than Minerva McGonagall, Head of Gryffindor House and her Transfiguration teacher. It was heavy, with an official Hogwarts seal.

Lily frowned and opened the letter, pulling out a page covered in Professor McGonagall's familiar, clear script:

Dear Miss Evans,

I am pleased to inform you that after due consideration of all possible candidates, you have been chosen for the post of Head Girl this year. I offer my warmest congratulations to you and wish to remind you of the honour and responsibility this post entails. We, the Heads of Houses at Hogwarts, are sure you will perform the tasks you are set with your usual dedication and reflection and look forward to our work together in the new school year.

Please find enclosed your new Head Girl badge. I shall arrange a meeting with you and the new Head Boy, James Potter, at the beginning of term.

Sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Lily lowered the letter. Her feelings had gone from utter elation to a dull queasiness in about a second. She just couldn't believe it – this was everything she had ever hoped for. "Head Girl," she whispered – and yet. Molly opened one green eye and gave her a quizzical look which Lily returned blankly. Potter. James Potter, she thought. He just destroyed everything, didn't he? Even this, her lifelong dream. What had she done to deserve this? To get what she had hoped for with such a bitter sting? Oh yes, she would be Head Girl, but of course she had to have none other than big-headed, stupid and irresponsible James Potter for Head Boy.

()

Breakfast at the Potters' house was a quiet affair that morning, with its occupants sidling into the kitchen at lengthy intervals, stifling yawns and rubbing puffy eyes. Elfie the house elf treated them all to big helpings of porridge, bacon and scrambled eggs, which Sirius and James, who had trundled down the stairs together, scarfed down as though they had been going hungry for weeks. Mr. Potter, meanwhile, was half-hidden behind his paper und remained silent. He had probably just returned from a night shift.

"'s so good, Elfie," said James between bites. His hair was even more rumpled than usual and his glasses were askew, though he hadn't noticed this yet. He did, however, notice Sirius grinning at him across the jug of pumpkin juice. He narrowed his eyes. "What?"

"Oh, nothing," said the other boy, scooping up another mouthful of eggs and continuing to grin, though his tone was devilishly casual. "Did you get Evans back to her place all right last night?"

James managed not to choke on his sip of juice. He glanced once to the head of the table at his father, who was completely obscured by his paper, then glared at Sirius and tried to aim a kick at the other Gryffindor's shin. The other wizard deflected this easily, lobbing a bit of bacon back at James. "Rookie."

"Wise-ass."

"Smart-mouth."
"Goblin-su-"

"I say." Mr. Potter folded down his newspaper and gave them a look. This was quite impressive, since he usually wore round glasses to read and they lent his greying hair and angular features a scholarly note, so it was like being giving the look by Professor Dumbledore. "Did you have an interesting night, boys?" he asked.

James's eyes found his plate and he muttered, "Yes, Father" but Sirius just laughed. "Oh, yes, sir. James here, ah, renewed old bonds of friendship, didn't you, Prongs?" He punched James playfully on the arm who shot him a murderous look.

Mrs. Potter poked her head out from the kitchen. She looked ready to go to one of her Witch Club outings – elegant dress, pearl necklace, low heels and her hair carefully charmed into waves. "What was that, dears?" she asked curiously. "Friendships?"

James opened his mouth to prevent a disaster but was saved by the arrival of a post owl. It swooped through an open window, soared impressively once around the room ("Show-off," muttered Sirius) and came to a stop on the backrest of the chair next to James. It fixed him with an intense, yellow-eyed stare and held out a leg. From it dangled an envelope that was oddly dented in one corner, like something was inside. It bore the Hogwarts seal.

Sirius and James swapped a quick glance – no one knew about the charm they had put on the caretaker's cat that would make her paws glow in different colours at night, right?

Shrugging, James opened the letter. He read for a few moments, then the corners of his mouth turned up. He was grinning by the time Peter and Remus entered the dining room. "I think," he said seriously, folding the letter and pulling something else from the envelope, which glittered faintly in the morning sunlight, "this is your best prank yet, guys. Who did her signature? You, Remus?" He pointed at the other boy, still holding the shiny object. "You nifty bugger, Moony. And Peter did the seal?"

The other three Marauders looked quite dumbfounded.

"What have you got there exactly, Prongs?" asked Remus. "Is that a Hogwarts letter?"

"And what are you holding?" added Sirius.

James rolled his eyes. "Nice try," he said, glancing from his friends, who were of course mock-surprised about the content of his little joke-letter, to his parents, who looked both confused (Mrs. Potter) and mildly annoyed (Mr. Potter).

"Here you go, Padfoot," he said, throwing the shiny object across the table in a high arc. "Since it's your handiwork, I guess you should wear it." He grabbed his glass of pumpkin juice, still smirking, and toasted his friends. "To the Marauders."

Remus walked over to where Sirius was holding a golden badge in his hands, embossed with the letters HB. They were quiet for a moment, then Sirius started howling with laughter. "This," he gasped between laughs, "this is just – fantastic!"

The other boy, however, turned to James. "Prongs," he said very seriously, "we're not playing a joke on you. This is for real." Now, the corners of his mouth actually quirked up, too. "James, you're really Head Boy."

()

"I'm really sorry to knock this early, but is Nora awake yet? I've got to talk to her." Ten minutes later, Lily was standing on the Blackburns' front step. Her hair was now brushed and she was wearing a clean blue sweater, but she had never felt quite so flustered in her life. That horrid headache wasn't helping either.

Mr. Blackburn yawned. His hair was disheveled and he was holding a copy of the weekend Daily Prophet, looking dazed. He often worked night shifts at St. Mungo's Hospital, where he helped the Healers as a Caretaker in a special unit for long-term patients. Nora said it was too often hard on him to see people reduced to being only such a small part of their humanity.

"Horrible things in the paper this morning," Mr. Blackburn told her as he held open the door for her. "This group, the Death Eaters, I think, they call themselves, set fire to a children's hospital in London. Can you believe that?"
Lily's heart felt like it had been transfigured into ice. The Death Eaters had long been called a fanatic group of teenage wizards campaigning against Muggleborns to be included in Hogwarts. They had terrorized the students for the past year with graffiti and mean pranks on Muggleborns, though never something as serious as this. Never. "A children's hospital? Are you sure it wasn't an accident?"

Mr. Blackburn shook his head sadly. "They found unmistakable traces of Fiend fire," he explained. "And they left behind their signature on one of the walls." He flipped the paper to show Lily a picture of a tall building. It was blackened and burnt away in places, still flickering eerily in places.

"Luckily, the Muggles and disguised Magical staff could get many of the children safely out," Mr. Blackburn went on, "but they still lost five toddlers and a newborn."

Lily felt her heart constrict. "That's awful," she said very quietly. "Just awful."

He nodded, biting his lip. "And those children were weak, anyway. Leukemia. Pneumonia. Prematurely born kids. They didn't have a chance to save themselves."

They were both quiet for a long moment. Lily felt close to tears and couldn't believe she had been fussing about the Head Girl badge only moments before. She hadn't even known this, though it must have happened last night … while she was partying at the Dragon. It felt horribly wrong. "May I go upstairs and see Nora?" she asked quietly.

Mr. Blackburn nodded. "Do you girls want some breakfast?"

She looked at him, the shadows under his eyes and the sadness in his face for the murdered children. It reminded her very much of another face she had seen that morning. And she realised the hadn't come to talk to Nora and Marlene about the crumpled letter now balled in her hand but something else entirely. "That's all right," she replied, though she was starving. "You just have breakfast yourself, Mr. Blackburn."

The redhead slipped past him and up the stairs, trying to calm herself down, though her head was spinning. How strong were the Death Eaters becoming? It definitely took more than a handful of power-crazed Slytherins to pull off something as big as burning a hospital! She knew this house almost as well as her own, since Nora had lived here since her first year at Hogwarts. The narrow hallway and paling, lime-green carpet was as familiar to her as her own flower-painted walls, as were Nora's drawings that were hung at intervals along the walls. As was her custom, she paused for a moment in front of the painting of a Hippogriff. It was rearing up on its two hind legs, tossing its head and nearly its rider – a girl with red hair that whipped around her head.

Lily felt herself smiling. Usually, Nora drew very detailed and realistic pictures of plants and animals, but this picture had been based on a dream of Lily's: a crazy ride on a Hippogriff across the Hogwarts grounds. The dream felt real to Lily now, with everything in her life blown apart and carried away like she was on a beast's back plummeting through the clouds.

Earlier that morning, on her way out, she had run into Petunia in the kitchen on her way out. The tall brunette had had shadows under her eyes and no make-up on, which was rare. She had been clutching her teacup in one hand and her phone in the other, whispering urgently into it, "I swear, Vernon, I – I'm so sorry." He had replied to her, something harsh that brought tears to her eyes.

Lily, unsure of herself, had hovered in the doorway, torn between rushing forward and squeezing Petunia as tightly as she could or turning on her heel and running just as fast in the other direction and out the door. She never got a chance to decide, however, because at that moment, Petunia had turned around. The look of pure hate and pain in her eyes would have scorched Lily on the spot had she been a witch.

No words had passed between them, but Lily had turned and fled as quickly as she could. She hadn't even known what to say. Grabbing her mum's soft blue sweater from off its hook by the door, she had ripped open the door. Just then, Mr. Evans had come down the stairs, but he only had time to say, "Lily, what –" before the door slammed behind her.

And now here she was on the landing, right in front of Nora's room. Behind there, Marlene and Nora were sleeping deeply. Feeling a little warmth return to her chest, she pushed open the door to the only two people in the world who would forgive her for waking them at 7:30 on a weekend and after partying all night.

"Guys?"