Author's Note: I am seriously losing James and Lily in translation here. They've kind of disappeared from the first ten or so chapters. I'm trying my hardest to get them back to being main characters. I'm not going to reduce my Loraina, Delilah, Sirius, and Remus time. I definitely want to keep them there, because they are also main characters. Also, I've made a website for this story! Check out the link my profile. It's still a work in progress that I will update regularly with new quotes, possibly new pictures, and I will add characters as they come into the story. I will also make a story progress page, where I will summarize the chapters.

Orion Black walked the halls of Hogwarts three days after the attack on Hogsmeade. The attack had been his idea, of course. The only witness who knew he was a Death Eater was Delilah, and he knew that she had no tangible evidence beside her word. As far as the rest of the school knew, she was simply a stupid girl with a random grudge against their good-looking, sly student teacher. He smiled as he remembered her tackling him at that last second, as he was about to Crucio her stupid little mudblood friend. The spell had been shot at her instead, and he had reveled in her pain, as he had many times before. It was only a matter of time before he had her again, and matter of time before she betrayed her precious friends. Seeing her reaction to that curse set the wheels turning in Orion's twisted and sadistic mind. A sick grin spread across his lips when he reached his office. He sat at his desk and began to write a letter...

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"When does James get out?" Sirius asked Lily. Classes for the week had been canceled as the teachers reinforced the wards of Hogwarts and helped to rebuild the broken town.

"He should be released in about an hour. I'm going to go meet him when he is," Lily said softly, staring into the fire. Since the attack, she had taken to spacing out and staring into the fire, deep thought etched onto her face.

"You okay?" he asked, concerned. Remus, Loraina, and Delilah were all in the library, researching something or other.

"I'm all right," Lily whispered.

"I don't buy it," Sirius replied. "You ready to tell me what's on your mind?"

"I'm just angry."

"At who?"

"James and Delilah. They took those curses for me. Those curses were meant for me and I should have been the one to receive them. I don't want the people I love to get hurt on my account."

"We're in a war, Lily. People are going to get hurt. To be honest, people are going to die."

"Don't say that, Sirius," Lily said heatedly. "None of us are going to die, Goddamn it. Especially not on my account."

"Okay, I'm sorry."

"You should be. I'm thinking about calling off the ball. I'm the one who planned it, after all, and it just seems like having a party would be inappropriate, given the circumstances."

"No, Lily. A party is just what everyone needs. You can even dedicate it to those students who died in the battle. Canceling it would be letting them win, Lily. Do you want that?"

"No," Lily said, shaking her head. "They're not going to win. They're not going to beat me."

"That's the spirit," Sirius said, ruffling her hair. "Now go get your man from the Hospital."

"Okay," Lily laughed, getting up and walking out. She turned back to her black haired friend. "Sirius?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you."

"Anytime."

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"Yoo-hoo! Fake boyfriend! I'm home!" Delilah called jokingly into Sirius's dorm three hours later.

"If it isn't my lovely girlfriend!" Sirius exclaimed, purposely leaving out the fake. She smiled at him and jumped onto his bed.

"Where did James and Lily go? Weren't they just up here with you?" she asked, blinking in confusion.

"Yeah. They went off to do...couple things," he said, shuddering mockingly at the last two words. Delilah laughed.

"That is to be expected, Sirius. He risked his life to save her. That's gonna get him some major action."

"You did it, too," Sirius said. "Why aren't you getting action from Lily?"

"Because that, my friend, is disturbing."

"Not really," he said, a suggestive smirk on his face. She smacked him.

"You perv," she chuckled. "Now, where might Remus and Loraina be?"

"I believe that Remus is in the library still, and that Loraina went on one of her walks."

"Probably," Delilah said. "I'm bored."

"Well, then, we'll have to change that."

"How?"

"TAG! You're it!"

"Hey, get back here!"

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Lily and James sat underneath a Willow Tree by the lake, cuddling. She breathed in his scent and held onto him tightly.

"Do you have any idea how much you scared me?" she asked him.

"I'm sorry. I would rather have you scared then dead," James said with no remorse. "I would never take it back."

"I know," she sighed. "But how do you think I would feel if you had died?"

"But I didn't."

"But you could have."

"I'm sorry, Lily," James mumbled into her hair. "It was instinct."

"Your mum told me to get used to it. That you'd be doing that a lot."

"You talked to my mum?" James said, pulling back and looking at her in surprise.

"Yeah, right after the battle. She was there with you, and we talked. She told me that you're just like your father, actually."

"I get that a lot," James said with a small smile.

"By the way, your mom seems to think that you were always ranting about me," Lily said, teasing her new boyfriend.

James blushed, and Lily giggled. "I didn't do it that much."

Lily kissed his nose. "It's cute."

"I did it a lot," James said, suddenly changing his tune. She laughed and patted his face.

"Nice try, Romeo."

"It was worth a shot," James shrugged, pulling her back into his arms.

Lily was looking over his shoulder and something on the tree, and a slow, easy grin spread over her pink lips. He looked as well, and found that it said "Lily Evans" in a jagged carving. She had drawn half a heart around it.

"I always planned on finishing that with someone. I did that in second year."

"Well then," James said, pulling out his wand and pushing it against the bark. He finished the heart and etched the words, "James Potter". Lily then took his wand and put a plus sign in between the two names.

"Perfect," she giggled, kissing him lightly.

"Like you," James said cheesily.

"Still not working, Romeo."

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Loraina walked along the edge of the forest with her usual, serene smile on her face. She was looking forward to the ball, which was in two weeks. She was hoping that she and Remus would finally get together. Loraina was positive at this point that she liked him, and she was almost positive he liked her, too. She was also convinced that the ball would be just the thing to finally get them together, as an official couple.

People had always said that Loraina was a dreamer.

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"All you've got to do is walk up to her and say, 'Delilah, I'm sick of fake dating you, because truth is, I want this to be real'. That can't be too hard, can it?" Sirius mumbled to himself as he paced his dorm. He and Delilah had just finished a rousing game of tag when she was called to McGonagall's office for questioning by Aurors.

He looked in the mirror at himself, and couldn't help the cocky smirk that came on his face. He was Sirius Black. Every girl wanted him. Every guy wanted to be him. So why couldn't he just muster up the courage to tell Delilah how he really felt?

He figured it had something to do with his evil, murderous cousin, who was taking over his life after three years of not seeing him. When Orion had graduated, Sirius wrote it off as one more family member he would never have to see again.

Sirius had yet to figure out the extent of the relationship between Orion and Delilah. Apparently, it had been going on since she was fourteen. All of those dates and boyfriends she had must have all been a cover up, to make sure things seemed ordinary.

And she had said that Orion abused her physically, verbally, and even sexually. Just what had his twisted cousin done to Delilah? And what was he after? Sirius was determined to find out.

Author's Note: Wow. These chapters just keep writing themselves! I really hope you all enjoy this story, and I'm starting to get slightly more confident in my writing, which is definitely helping me. Don't forget to check out the website, at There is also a link in my profile. Knowing me, the next chapter will be up soon enough. The site is password protected, and the password is comebackdown.