Chapter Twenty Seven
Early April, Nineteen Hundred Eighty-One
"Shush, Harry," Davie said, bouncing the little boy on her knee - she had been left at home to watch Harry while Lily, James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter all reported to Dumbledore on an urgent Floo message that the Order's assistance was required. It was nearly two in the morning, and they still hadn't returned - while Davie was aware that staying home and watching Harry was important, she also maintained that they very well could have allowed someone else to do it. She lamented with a sort of harrumph that lately, she had been left out, after having been injured with a particularly nasty curse in their last encounter, and even now hadn't completely recovered.
"Alright, there, little man," Davie sighed, reaching over to the nearby table and snatching up Harry's bottle, laying him on the mattress next to her. He was starting to get fussy from missing his mother, and when he started fussing, he was difficult to appease. "Your mum and dad will be home soon, don't --"
Harry let out a loud, elated squeal when the bedroom door burst open and Lily, James, and Sirius stood in the dimly lit doorway. Lily immediately gave an inexplicable sob and rushed over, taking her son into her arms as though she had been afraid of never seeing him again.
"Oh, Harry," Lily said, hugging her son tightly and placing a kiss in his hair; little Harry squealed in elation at having his mother finally get home, unaware of whatever was bothering her. "Harry, I'm so sorry - I'm sorry, you don't deserve any of this! If your father and I had just laid low -- if I'd just stopped when Sirius suggested I leave the Order --"
"Would someone tell me what's happening?" Davie huffed, her voice catching in her throat in apprehension; Lily Potter never reacted this way unless something was indeed very wrong. "I thought you were just --"
"We've just spoken with Dumbledore - you could have come but I didn't want to wake you," Sirius said stiffly, sounding far too adult and authoritative for Davie's liking. This tone from him meant that he was trying to protect her from something. "We need to tell you--"
"We can't stay here anymore, Davie," James said quickly, as prepared as he could be for the shocked expression on her face. "You've been wonderful to us all, but -- something's happened. A woman was applying for the Divination position with Dumbledore last night. She had a vision --"
"A vision!" Davie scoffed, running a hand through her sleep-tousled hair and looking at her friends in disbelief. "That's ridiculous --"
"Voldemort doesn't think it is," Lily said in a choked voice, still holding Harry tightly and cradling him close. "He -- he wants to kill Harry."
"We're going into hiding," James said quietly. "We can't tell anyone where except -- well, Sirius is going to be our Secret Keeper. We have to leave tomorrow."
"I understand," Davie nodded gravely, letting out a deep breath. "Lily -- Lily, please don't panic. Go get some rest. We'll help you get ready in the morning." And when the Potters had cleared from the room, Sirius, sat on the bed next to Davie, holding his head tiredly in his hands. They were all so young yet, and they had already gotten themselves into this.
"Sirius," Davie said quietly, placing her hands gently on his shoulders. "Sirius, what --"
"They shouldn't have chosen me," Sirius said throatily. "Don't you think it's too obvious?"
"Well, then why hasn't anyone asked Remus?"
"Davie -- don't you think it's suspicious that whenever we have an encounter, he's always lagging a convenient distance behind?" Sirius said, looking up at his fiancee with an expression on his face that oozed distrust. "I don't have any faith in him anymore." Davie remained silence, brow furrowing in concern. "Oh, don't look at me like --"
"How did Voldemort know?" Davie asked, her eyes narrowed hesitantly. "Who told him about the prophecy?"
Sirius' face move into a snarl before the words could even leave his lips, and that snarl in and of itself seemed to turn a lightswitch on in Davie's head. "He had a spy. And you won't need more than one guess who it was -- who else wants James dead that badly?"
Davie's breath hitched in her throat, and her face contorted in anger and confusion. It had been Snape who betrayed them - Snape, whom she had always believed had the ability to be a good person, whom she had had defended, whom she had spared from the full extent of her anger because a part of her still believed in giving him a chance.
"He -- no," Davie said, her forehead wrinkling even further as she tried to make sense of the situation. "It doesn't -- how did Dumbledore find out?"
"It appears Snape grew a modicum of a conscience -- not before he found a way of ruining James' life," Sirius snarled, and the darkness of his expression was enough to instill a strange sense of fear even in Davie. "He's supposedly gone turncoat on Voldemort, but I don't trust him --"
"Then who do you trust?" Davie interrupted, crossing her arms at hearing the phrase for the umpteenth time in what was only really a matter of weeks.
"You. James." Sirius said simply, looking straight ahead. "I'm not sure if there's anyone else."
Davie let out a sigh - Sirius was never one to let on that he was affected by what they were going through, but the changes he had undergone even just since they left Hogwarts were more than obvious. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, nestling into the side of his neck.
"It'll all be over one day soon," Davie said, trying to sound assured, though lately it seemed that they were going farther and farther away from the prospect of defeating Voldemort. "And we'll have the rest of our lives ahead of us, Sirius."
"You don't really believe that," Sirius said stiffly - and Davie gave a small sigh at how well he was able to read her after knowing her for so many years. "I don't think any of us do."
Davie couldn't respond - she had always been the hopeful one, the one who thought they could get by on sheer will and hardheadedness, no matter the challenge. Two years ago, she would hardly have been able to understand Sirius' attitude, would have regarded it as sheer cynicism, but now, he was beginning to sound right.
The first few weeks of the Potters being in hiding were difficult - she had convinced Sirius to let her know where Lily and James were living, but this turned out to only make it worse, as none of them were permitted to visit, for fear of being caught. It was even harder for Davie to read Lily's letters and the undertone of panic that underlay every single one. Even happy stories of Harry's first steps, his first words - every story was laced with a sort of unsureness whether or not they would live to see the next milestone, and while Davie was obliged to encourage Lily that everything would be okay, every day that passed caused her heart to sink deeper and deeper into hopelessness.
***
October the Twenty-Ninth, Nineteen Hundred Eighty-One
Sixth months, the Potters had been in hiding - to the extent of Davie's knowledge, Sirius was their Secret Keeper, as he had never told her anything to the contrary. Remus and Peter had moved out of the Maddux house as tensions began to rise, and outside of missions for the Order, Sirius could stand to do little else besides write to Lily and James, and spend time with Davie.
Davie, as it turned out ,was taking the extended separation from her best friends hard as well - for a good part of her life before leaving Hogwarts, Davie did little without Lily's accompaniment, Lily's approval. She waited for Lily to go first, because Lily always knew better - even after Auror training, the belief remained in Davie's mind that Lily knew better.
Davie could hardly stand that the only contact she had with Lily now was through letters; there was no constant contact, no Floo Network -- Davie may not have been the one in hiding, but the feeling of isolation settled on her as well. Lily wasn't here, and Sirius was distant despite the fact that they were in the same house.
Dinners, it seemed, were not particularly enjoyable or romantic at all - Sirius seemed to chomp through his food quickly, and dote over Davie as though she would be injured or otherwise harmed throughout the course of any given day.
Today, however, an owl flew through the window to deliver the evening edition of the Daily Prophet, and Sirius snatched it up first, a strange expression crossing his face.
"D'you see?" he asked stiffly, handing it over to Davie, who hesitated before taking it.
"Velingrad - that's where I went to Auror training, it's tiny, what's it doing in the papers?" Davie said, glancing at the headline. "A Death Eater Attack -- but Bulgaria's teeming with Voldemort's sympathizers, why would they--"
Davie turned to where the story continued inside the paper and her jaw dropped unabashedly as her eyes set on a familiar face gracing the page.
"Romnic?" Davie said breathlessly, eyes scanning over the story, and she felt a familiar lump rise in her throat. "He's under the Imperius -"
"This came for you this morning. You were sleeping," Sirius said, opening a drawer and holding out a piece of parchment upon which the seal had already been broken, though Davie could still recognize it as belonging to the Bulgarian ministry. "I couldn't help myself. Sorry."
He clearly was not sorry for opening the letter, but Davie did not have the heart to blame him for letting his curiosity, his suspicion, get the better of him.
Davie slowly took the letter from his hands and read it as well - it was a call for assistance from the Bulgarian ministry, which still took an official stance against Voldemort despite the sentiments of most of the wizards in the area.
"They - they want help from Britain's Aurors. They're a bit short, understandably," Davie said shakily. "They need it, especially if they're dealing with people under the Imperius. And --"
"And Romnic Digby could be one of them," Sirius finished for her, regardless of whether or not it was truly what she was going to say. "You should go." Davie's expression was incredulous. "I'm not trying to trick you, Davie," Sirius said, reaching across the table and touching Davie's hand, though the vein starting to tense in his neck made it evident that this was difficult for him to say. "But if anything happens to you, I swear, I'll go to Azkaban for killing someone --"
"That's not funny," Davie huffed, standing up and walking around the table to stand behind him. "But -- thank you. For letting me do this, I mean." She sighed, starting to move away from the table and towards the stairs. "They need me as soon as possible --"
"They've waited all day," Sirius said, his hand jetting out to take Davie by the wrist; his expression was insistent, and at the same time, pleading. He tugged her insistently back towards him, coaxing her so that she was standing in front of him. He placed his hands on her waist, looking up at her with still the same look on his face. "You say you're going there to help them - but we both know you'd refuse if not for Romnic's picture in the paper."
"Sirius --"
"Just give me tonight," Sirius persisted, and the tips of his fingers tightened their hold into Davie's waist in a gentle gesture of begging. "Just tonight, and tomorrow you can go."
And Davie agreed - agreed to at least this night with Sirius. Wordlessly, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his, and she was met with a sort of desperation and exhilaration that he hadn't given in a long time. Locked in their embrace, it became evident that both were still seeking the sort of thrill and happiness that they had once taken for granted. Sirius wrapped his arms tightly around her waist, and Davie's hands moved to undo the buttons of his shirt - he had asked for tonight to his, to be theirs, a cool autumn night just before Halloween…
***
A/N's
…and I think we all know what happens this Halloween. I'm not going to write a scene of that night, and the next chapter will take place afterwards. It made me really sad that this was the last I'd be able to write of Lily and James. But we still have Sirius and Davie to take care of, and they have a bit of a way to go before the end of their story.
Thank you to Lumihiutale89, Wateranddarkness66, Ithilya (another loyal reader/reviewer) and of course, dancingqueensillystring. I love all of the positive feedback, it encourages me to keep working!
Having another bumpy couple of weeks at school so it might be a bit of a delay before my next update, but for that chapter, expect to see the aftermath of the Potters' death. Sorry to leave everyone on a sad note, but until then, cheers!