Sorry for the delay, but another chapters here now. This one's quite deep - I was in a weird mood when I thought of it but I figured as the characters near the end of Hogwarts, they're going to be sucked into the war too right and this story ought to pay homage to that. Let me know what you think:)

John Di Angelo

"Lily! Have you seen my charms- oh! Sorry, hang on I'll just..." I trailed off and stood helplessly in the doorway to my bedroom where Lily was hastily pulling on her jumper and James was desperately trying to locate his glasses then turned tail and fled.

The cottage was in chaos. Despite the fact that we had only been there for two weeks, our possessions had spread themselves out on all three rickety floors, secreting themselves behind sofas and chairs or down the back of cupboards. My sketchbook somehow had reappeared inside the piano and Lily had discovered her favourite lipstick tucked away in the lightshade in my room along with one of James shoes (I didn't ask).

Because of this, the evening before we were due to apparate back to the disused safe house just outside King's Cross to catch the Hogwart's Express back to school for our final term was hectic to say the least and I did not need Lily and James making out in the guest bedroom that had been shared by Peter, Remus, Sirius and James for the duration of their stay. Mind you, I'd had a hard time staying away from Sirius that morning when Lily had been packing up all of her stuff. Ever the practical one she had advised everyone to pack early so we wouldn't need to rush the next morning.

I had been too busy 'swimming' with Sirius in the sea to take much notice of her advise which was probably foolish of me but I felt I deserved a little me time after the wedding. The six of us would be the only ones heading up to London tomorrow as the newlyweds had taken a Portkey to the South of France for their honeymoon on the evening of their marriage and young Tonks had been picked up by her mother, a pretty women with tired eyes, the previous afternoon.

Remus had looked slightly relieved to see her go, something we all delighted in teasing him about. Tonks had been his shadow and Remus, once he had gotten over the shock of being her favourite person, had been happy enough to look after her now and then. She was good for him, with her wacky hair and ear to ear grin. I knew that Remus still felt the loss of his sister deeply but he'd loosened up with her happy-go-please attitude to life.

I went into my room and sat down on my bed, trying to mentally catalogue everything I would need for the final term. Blimey, that was scary - I could still remember with surprising clarity things that had happened to me, everything from scraping my knee that first time on the platform to our O.W.L.s and the panic of revision to that wonderful, terrifying night that Sirius and I had first kissed. It made me feel so old.

I had never really thought of myself as particularly childlike, growing up, but now looking back I could see that I was a child really. Not even when I'd come of age had I felt any inclination to actually do anything with my life. It was as though Hogwarts had stretched out forever and now that it was drawing to a close my life was catching up with me.

You-Know-Who was out there somewhere. Waiting, biding his time. Growing more powerful. My foolish claim about wanting to join the Order of the Phoenix seemed so silly now - I'd had no idea what it would be like, really being out there, fighting him. I still didn't really. The Order had been a romantic adventure, not really dangerous. He Who Must Not Be Named had been a shadow, a cartoon villain.

My mother had taken me aside just before she was to catch her portkey and led me into the quiet sitting room and asked me to sit down. I was still wearing my beautiful blue dress, though I'd let my hair down. My mother was in her going away dress and was glowing with happiness though her smile now was more serious, not quite reaching her eyes.

"Arty," She said, "I need to tell you something."

I joked, "I hope it's nothing too serious."

The smile had slipped completely at that.

"I need to tell you what happened to your father."

I froze.

My mother continued, not quite looking at me, her eyes instead flittering around the room.

"Your father, he-" She paused, collecting her thoughts then tried again. "We-"

"Mum, you don't have to," I interrupted, "This isn't the time, you're about to go on your honeymoon and I don't care, it's all in the past-"

She cut me off this time. "No, I have to tell you. You deserve to know the truth." She reached out and wrapped her hands around my suddenly cold ones. Half of men wanted to stuff my fingers into my ears and run around singing 'La la la la, I can't hear you', like I would have done as a five year old, but the other half, the more prominent half, was betraying me - wanting to know.

"Artemis." My mother's voice was so serious. Low too, and for some reason that scared me more than anything else ever had. More than when I found out what Remus was, or being pushed around by those Muggles at primary school as a small child, or even the threat of You Know Who.

So she told me. Told me how my father had been in Albania all those years ago, chasing for a story about some rare creature for his magazine and been killed by Lord Voldemort just for getting in the way.

"I was pregnant with you, so I didn't go with him as I normally would, oh Arty I'm so, so sorry." She gathered me into her arms and I wrapped mine around her numbly. Tears were streaming down her face but my mind was strangely blank.

So now, seated in my room, I stared off into the near distance, I thought more seriously than I had ever done before. Despite my light-hearted ways, despite the fact that I had never truly hated anyone in my life, I could feel something bubbling up from the pit of my stomach.

Anger.

Directly or not, You Know Who had cost me not only my father but my childhood friend Ben too. He had ruined Lily's friendship with Severus Snape, had torn Sirius away from his family and taken poor Remus' sister.

Now, I felt older, for the first time in my life - like a little of the laughter had gone out of me but now I knew what I had to do. I was going to join the Order of the Phoenix and I was not going to rest until I had done everything in my power to make them pay for all the suffering and pain caused, for all the innocents murder and all the families torn apart.

It didn't matter what I wanted anymore because in war you have to make sacrifices, you have to give things up for the greater good and now I didn't care what it would cost - I would make Lord Voldemort pay for what he had cost me and my family and friends.