She thought her life was over – but fate gave her another chance, in a world of magic. Now, running around Hogwarts with James Potter and his friends, she's about to make choices that will change the future in ways she never thought possible…

Marauder's Phase

CHAPTER NINETY-SEVEN

Umbridge

I had a nightmare on Saturday night/Sunday morning. In it, Sirius' had dumped me, because he didn't believe that I hadn't put my name in the Goblet.

"I didn't!" I had yelled to him. "I don't want to do it!"

But he didn't believe me.

And, in this order, the other things that happened in the dream were that:

Regulus drowned in a lake.

Bellatrix was named Supreme Ruler Of Everything.

And I got eaten by a dragon.

I woke up in a cold sweat, and sat up quickly, to avoid the scary feeling I feel if I don't sit up after a nightmare.

I glanced out the window, at the early morning light, and then checked my pocket watch. Five o'clock in the morning.

I groaned, and lay back against my pillow. Dreams are weird. I decided.

Suddenly, there was a sharp tapping at my window, and I sat up quickly, to see Haphazard tapping at the window, with a huge (well, huge compared to him) parcel tied to him.

I hurried to let him in before he could wake the others.

I shut the window a tad too loudly.

"Where's the cannon?" Serilda asked in her sleep.

"At your command, Milady." I told her.

"Good..." She nodded, and lay back down again.

Rolling my eyes, but smiling, I sat down on my bed and opened the parcel.

There was no note attached but, inside the parcel, I found a pair of white ice-skates, the lace-up kind. They looked like they would fit me perfectly.

"Oh!" I gasped. "Ice-skates! I love ice-skating, my gymnastics teacher got me into it, but..." I looked suspciously at them. "In this world..." I continued to stare at them. "Hmm..." I said, glancing at my bedside table. On it, curled up around a hot water bottle, was Septimus, and I found myself wishing that I could talk to owls as well as snakes, but...

Haphazard hooted, in a way that suggested that there was nothing wrong with the skates, but still...what if there were jinxes placed upon them?

"I wish you could talk to me," I told him, stroking his feathers, which are a silvery-grey kind of colour. "Then you could tell me who sent these..." The skates were beautiful, and I would have loved to have tested them out. But...

Haphazard hooted softly, and held out his left leg, where was loosely tied a piece of twine.

I looked at it. "Hang on...maybe there was a letter...but it got lost along the way! Is that it, Happy?" I asked him, and he hooted again, louder this time. At the foot of Lily's bed, Valencia meowed in her sleep. "Okay, shh..." I told my owl, and looked at the skates again. Then I glanced out the window. "I can't wait to test these out...hey, it's snowing!" And it was too, the earliest snow ever, at the start of November. I remembered a line from the movie, basically saying that the weather had changed when Voldemort had last (now) been in power. Maybe...

I sighed.

Haphazard tilted his head to one side.

"The war is far from over, Happy." I partially quoted a song, before I stood up and went to get dressed.

***

Fifteen minutes later, I was sitting at the edge of the Black Lake, which was frozen completely solid, a miracle of nature. I was wearing jeans, a t-shirt, two jumpers, my Gryffindor scarf, two pairs of socks and boots, which I swapped for my skates.

Unsteadily, I made my way over to the ice.

"One, two, three..." I told myself, before stepping out onto the ice and gliding away over the frozen pond. "Whoa..." I said, steadying myself. "Careful..." I got my balance, and then stood in the middle of the pond, wondering where the giant squid had gone, and asking myself why the lake had been frozen over in the books but not in the movie. Humming to myself (I was humming my favourite song) I skated across the ice, becoming bolder as the morning progressed. My gymnastics teacher had just loved me, because of my bold (and sometimes reckless) determination to try everything, which was why I'd been able to master ice-skating skills such as jumping and all those things you see in the movie Ice Princess. I did a few of those things now, jumps and triple-twists and whatnot, enjoying the feeling of being free, and worrying about breaking my leg instead of Death Eaters and being a Champion. For now, I was just skating. I was certainly not a novice, but I wasn't gold medal worthy either. But I was happy that I knew what I was doing. Plus, it was a nice distraction.

Presently, however, I became aware of someone's presence, and looked over to the shore to see Regulus standing there, watching me. I glanced down quickly, and then skated over to see him. He was dressed in jeans, a black jumper and his Slytherin scarf, and came over to meet me as I stepped off the ice.

"You are a really good skater, Ems." He told me earnestly, handing me my boots.

"Thanks," I replied, sitting down in the snow to change out of my ice-skates. "My gymnastics teacher got me into ice-skating. She said it was like gymnastics - on ice." My fingers were frozen, however, and I had trouble getting the skates off and the boots on. Regulus, who was wearing gloves, helped me.

"Ems," He said to me, as we made our way back up to the castle. "I'm really sorry...about what Bella did..." He didn't look at me when he said this. "I mean...really..."

"It's okay," I lied, as we climbed the stone steps toward the castle. "I mean, well, no it's not...but I'll just face whatever comes. I mean, your people pose a much more real threat! Oh, I'm sorry!" I cringed, as Regulus flinched. "You seem different from them..." I mused suddenly. We were walking toward the Great Hall by then, me with my ice-skates slung around my neck. "I mean...you don't want me dead..."

"I would never..." Regulus began but, suddenly, we were in the Great Hall, and everyone was looking at me and Regulus broke off abruptly.

Then, people at the Gryffindor table began to cheer, followed by Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and a couple of Slytherins.

Nymphadora Tonks was suddenly at my side, her hair bright pink today.

"Emma," She said, her eyes shining. "Lily Evans was saying you didn't put your name in! Is it true?"

"Yes," Regulus answered for me, glancing across the hall. I followed his gaze. He was looking at Bellatrix. "That's correct."

"I'm still cheering for you anyway, Emma!" Tonks told me. "You'll do great!" She added.

"Thanks." I said, before I was swallowed up by a group of Gryffindors.

Well

, I told myself.

At least the Champion isn't a Slytherin...

***

During our break, before our Defense Against The Dark Arts class, my friends confronted me in the hallway. I'd been avoiding them all - even Lily - all day, but now they literally cornered me.

"Was it really Bellatrix who put your name in the Goblet Of Fire?" Sirius asked me. His dark eyes bored holes into my hazel ones. It was as if he needed the reassurance, to let him know that I wasn't unfaithful to him in a strange sense.

I nodded miserably. "Yes, according to Regulus. Bellatrix put my name in the Goblet Of Fire."

"That bitch." Sirius swore, turning away and punching the wall behind him.

I flinched.

"Careful, Padfoot," James said, before glancing at me. "Are you okay?" He asked me. "White Fang?"

"I never wanted to do this," I whispered, as Lily put her arm across my shoulders. "I mean...why does it always happen to me? I don't ask for all of this...why can't I be normal?"

Remus moved his position slightly, so that he was standing directly in front of me. "You're not normal, Ems," He said quietly. "Not in this sense, anyway. things just seem to...happen to you..." He shrugged.

"What's different about me?" I groaned, leaning my head back against the stone wall.

"You're kind." Peter informed me.

"You're beautiful." Sirius added.

"You're smart." Lily told me.

"You're talented." James supplied.

I looked at Remus.

"

There are a thousand things I could say to you right now, but I'm not going to…" He said, staring into my eyes, and I smiled slightly.

"I still didn't want for this to happen," I said. "All those times I avoided death were just luck...guys..." I said, realising that now might be a good time to tell them about my past. They looked at me, interested. "About my past...the amount of magic I've done...I haven't..."

The bell rang suddenly, signalling the beginning of the next class which, for us, was DADA.

We were on the seventh floor, which was nowhere near our DADA classroom.

We ran for it.

***

"Good afternoon, class!" Umbridge said, as she trotted into the classroom a second after the Marauders, Lily and I took our usual seats at the back of the classroom.

I was the only one who had the sense to answer: "Good afternoon Professor Umbridge!"

Umbridge tsked. "That will not do. I would like all of you to answer me 'good afternoon Professor Umbridge'! Shall we try again? Good afternoon class!"

This time, we all answered her, although James and Sirius were staring at her in disbelief, and their expressions read 'is she for real'?

"There now, that wasn't too hard, was it?" She said sweetly.

The Slytherins all rolled their eyes as one.

The Gryffindors exchanged glances.

I glanced down at my pocket watch, praying for the class to end swiftly.

Umbridge went on to explain about the course outline. She fairly dissed the rest of the teachers we'd had (including Professor Repleh) and then she gave us a brief outline of what she'd be teaching us.

"One of the most dangerous things in our world," She said sweetly, standing before us. "Is magical creatures, particuarly half-breeds."

I drew in a breath. Was she going to say what I think she was going to say!?

She was.

"This includes mermen, who are horrible fish creatures," Umbridge said, and the tension in the air grew. I didn't know how many students would take this sitting down, but all I could think of was: Is she training you to kill half-breeds? Sirius would say the words in years to come...could they be true? Umbridge went on: "And Centaurs, vicious horse-men, they really don't understand anything about our customs." Yeah, like you'd know... I thought angrily, aware that my hands were shaking. "And werewolves are horrible, vicious creatures, they must all be destroyed at all..."

"That's not true!" I cried, standing up so quickly that my chair fell over backwards. My hands were shaking violently now, and my gaze was focused on Umbridge. "What kind of first lesson is this anyway!?"

"This is hardly your first lesson, Miss. Pax!" Umbridge said, in her sickly sweet voice that made me cringe. Her smile did not reach her eyes, however. "I have a responsibility to teach my students of the dangers that are currently out there, and this includes dangerous creatures such as werewolves. Do you deny that werewolves are dangerous, Miss. Pax?" She asked me.

"No," I said, through gritted teeth, aware that the entire class was staring at me now. "But you make it seem like they all have a choice. They didn't ask to be bitten! They're not all Fenrir Greybacks! They're only dangerous on a full moon if they're not like him, you have no right to say otherwise!" I fairly yelled, and everyone was staring at me in horrified/awed silence, as Umbridge and I faced off against each other.

I was aware of my friends around me, staring at me transfixed. The look on Remus' face was stunned - but his eyes were alight. I vowed then and there to never rennounce what I had just claimed, and that Remus Lupin was...my thoughts trailed off. They had to remain on the subject, and not stray from being angry at someone. For the time being, at least...

"Now," Umbridge said, her toad-like face looking insincere in its smiling. "Let me make one thing perfectly clear here...werewolves are..."

But, whatever werewolves were, I didn't get to hear it because, at that precise moment, there came a knock at the classroom door, and Nymphadora Tonks poked her head in.

"Hullo!" She said brightly. "I'm supposed to take Emma Pax upstairs, the Champions are all supposed to go, so..."

Umbridge looked at Tonks. "Pax has a full lesson of Defense Against Th..."

"Please Miss," Tonks interrupted her, and I wanted to hug my pink-haired friend. "She's supposed to come now, Mr. Ollivander is here to weigh the wands..."

"Oh, very well then," Umbridge's smile did not suit her at all. "Pax, leave your things here, and we will discuss today's lesson when you return. Understood?"

I glared at her. "Perfectly." I said through gritted teeth, as I followed Tonks out of the classroom.

"I don't like that woman." Tonks said confidingly, once we were out of earwhot.

I nodded. "I agree with you Tonks. She is a horrible person."

That, as it turned out, was an understatement...