The fifth part of the story begins here. You will find the first four, "The Third Time Lucky", "The Discovery of Friendship", "The Ripening of the Fruit" and "The Outbreak" on my page.

. . . . . . . . .

News

Dumbledore did not appear that morning for breakfast in the Great Hall. Sev thought, Poor man, he must be dealing with the Daily Prophet. Good news, that means they didn't come last night. Better, that way I'll take the opportunity to communicate with Lily. "Good morning my love."

"Oh... I've missed you," Lily replied.

"And I you. Lauren is fine, I saw her yesterday in the Room of Requirement by chance."

"Oh... did you go to the Room?"

"Yes, for one of the books for Albus, and I passed in front of your house, because then I also went to the Haven and I remembered you a lot, I got very sad thinking about when we can be together there again," he said.

"Come on, Sev, don't suffer, cheer up. And why did you go to the Haven?"

"For the alarm clock, because now I'm going to have to use the Time Turner a lot and I'm going to need it, and the sleep potions, to give Restorative to the night owls so they could train today."

"How was the party?" she asked.

"Ugh… a total revelry. Fourth year and up, everyone drunk like vats. I only drank Butterbeer."

"You did well, Sev, because you are not used to it."

"Yes, luckily Jack warned me. I have many things to tell you, I don't know where to start."

"Well, start by telling me if Lauren is going to be safe regarding the Map."

"Oh, sure. No problem," he replied. "I convinced Albus not to control her movements, that I was in charge of her. He's not going to include her bedroom on the map either, only the camouflaged's ones. And in my room he set up a space for Anthony and me to sleep in if the malefics didn't leave, and since we're not going to need it, I haven't said anything to him, but I have told Jack, who has moved into our bedroom, so that they can use it alone. I'll also be able to meet her there when she's not with Jack, Albus is going to show me how to open it on Tuesday."

"Wow, Sev, that's good news. But, wouldn't it hurt you if one night you see them go in or out together, or even when you go in there, to know that the two of them have been there?"

"I'll have to bear it, the important thing is that Lauren is not alone. I have even offered him the Time-Turner to be used for that."

"What a mess, Sev. I hope Jack is able to pay you back one day for what you're doing for him."

"That doesn't matter to me, Lily, I care that Lauren is well. She's going to be left all alone except for the three of us."

"You'll see what you do. What else did you do with Albus?"

"I fought against him," he answered.

"Oh really?"

"Yes, because we had plenty of time. And he beat me."

"What are you saying?" Lily asked.

"Of course, Albus is an exceptional duelist. He beat Grindelwald, he was already sixty years old at the time, and I was fifty percent because of my arm."

"Sure, poor. How about your arm?"

"I don't have any pain, and I don't have it inflamed anymore, but today I'm not going to fight. Poppy told me to rest," Sev replied.

"Sure, listen to her. Did he teach you the talking Patronus?"

"He did."

"It's great, isn't it?" she asked.

"Yes, it's wonderful. We were also watching the training from the window. When I cried in front of the other twenty-eight."

"Oh… I cried too. And Cecile, Remus and Lauren."

"Yeah, and many of those who were with me, all of the Guard, it was very nice," Sev said. "I cried again when I saw it with Albus, when they all came up to me. I had thanked them for pulling me out of the hole."

"Oh…"

"Ah! He is going to take me to perform a ritual in a cave, in which you acquire the power to remember everything that has happened to you in your life in detail, so that I can remember the names of all the new people I'm meeting."

"Wow… that's wonderful. It will also help you remember everything you study and learn," Lily said.

"Well, yes, I hadn't thought about it. Wow… the panacea. I'll ask him to do it with you too, and otherwise, that Jack or Mum take us somewhere this summer Apparating."

"Or we'll go with my parents. And won't the Ministry detect that magic?"

"I'll ask Albus, but I don't think so," he said. "I'm going to do it outside the school and they didn't detect the one on the beach either. There everything we meditated on was instantly fulfilled."

"Yeah, you're right."

"He wanted us to leave the castle on some brooms to Apparate from Hogsmeade, and since I don't know how to ride, we must go through a passage."

"Oh, what a shame," she commented.

"He has told me that I am also going to have to learn to ride a broom to teach how to fight flying, as Death Eaters do. And that that would have been what they would have trained me in this summer."

"Sure, because you still can't use your wand."

"That is, and I hadn't even realized it," Sev said. "Albus finds out about everything. Aberforth, the owner of Hog's Head, is his brother, and spies for him when Death Eaters come to Hogsmeade."

"Wow!"

"Of course, they look a lot alike. You have never been there and you don't know him, but I have seen him many times. He is also going to Bond the five Slys that we occluded as a Clanship, everything that he did with you yesterday. We are going to do that tomorrow."

"Wow, Sev. How much work."

"Indeed. And one month until the OWLS. And I also asked him or Minerva to teach us how to become Animagi, they are going to do it."

"Brilliant! To accompany Remus."

"He says that it is easier to do it in the animal of our Patronuses and that they are very appropriate to control him in his crises," he explained.

"Indeed. Far better than the deer, the dog, and the rat. Well, we will be lionesses."

(Better a lion and a lioness,) Sev thought. "Of course, and not only that. I already told him that we have the power of the Forest. He didn't push me at all about the books. But anyway, the three of us are going to go one day to the fir tree so that he can transmit his talent for Transfiguration to us."

"Great! And we can also see each other."

"Sure. He says that he has never done a joint ritual."

"Oh, poor man," Lily said.

"Yes, he has had a very hard life. He was telling me things, he confided in me."

"Very well, Sev. The first day."

"Yes, he needed it a lot, he is very lonely," he said. "I also told him that we know how to project, that we learned by chance, as Lauren's parents did, and it slipped in, so it's a job that we took off. I made fun of him a bit, he was desperate, because he had counted on time to teach me how to do it and it was no longer necessary, so we were able to fight."

"How mean you are, poor man. He already told us to change places in the Great Hall to catch up with him."

"Then you can also teach Remus and Cecile if you want, tell them the same. That way we are all in communication and you can tell them all the news that I give you."

"Brilliant. How much work, Sev."

(And she doesn't know anything about the Horcruxes.) "That's nothing, Lily. I also asked him that Occlumency and Ancestral Magic must be taught to all warriors so that they are protected, we talked about it for a long time."

"Booah, Sev. What a mess. You are more than seventy."

"It is very important, Lily, to save lives, and it will be progressive. We are already four olders who know how to occlude. We will divide the work, as the others learn, they will also teach. We're going to need a fleet of Pensieves. Last night I was inviting the seventh-years of my House to continue coming next year to instruct them as well, and I will do the same with the rest of the Houses."

"Do you train today?"

"Yes, I have told you before. Albus already had a room for a hundred people set up in the hallway to the left after the Library. Didn't the Longbottoms tell you?"

"Ugh… Yesterday we had an early dinner at home and we went to bed before the people came up from the Great Hall," she replied. "Our day was also five hours longer."

"Sure. I endured because I took a nap and took Stimulant to take away the sleep that the painkiller gives me. I lost count of the potions I drank yesterday."

"And all because of the damn trio. I'm sick of them."

(Ugh… not that topic, I get cardiac,) Sev thought. "Jack is hungover. It seems to me that the Slys are not going to perform much today."

"Tell me about the party."

(That topic yes. As soon as possible, but in parts.) "Booah… I talked to everyone. I met Ariel's friends."

"Really?" Lily asked.

"Yes, they are great, everyone was delighted to finally meet me, Ariel has spent three years talking to them about me. And the one I got along with the best was the girl who faced me in the morning. She's a great warrior, she trains against her two friends and can beat them both. She is smug and wants to learn curses from now on. I laughed a lot with her, we are going to get along great."

"I can't wait to train with you again."

"Bah… don't worry, I'm sure Albus will give you permission," Sev reassured her. "It would also be suspicious if your whole House is doing it and you are not."

"Yeah, what a triumph among the Gryffs."

"Well, don't sing victory yet. Yesterday I had to convince everyone at home not to take revenge on the trio, because the rumor has spread about what happened to me on Thursday, and they really, really want it. So tell Remus not to hang around with them anymore, because if the four of them get caught they're going to beat him too."

"Booah, Sev, what a rest for everyone," she answered. "And don't worry about the Gryffs, yesterday in the Common Room there was no talk of anything else. The people are delighted and eager to continue training, and everyone is amazed at you. They said you should have been Gryff because of the courage you showed threatening the vipers before you knew everything was going to work out, and how you're taking a risk before Voldemort."

(Wow… sure, I hadn't realized. I have spies in the Gryff House, and now I'm admired there, too,) he thought.

"In fact, not only did the trio not go down to dinner nor have they come down to breakfast because of the Slys, but they didn't leave their bedroom all afternoon," Lily continued. "They're even afraid of the ones at home, because of how they harassed you for years."

"Take that! My revenge has begun! Then don't hang out with them at all, don't let them associate Remus with the other three. Talk to the Longbottoms and team up with them. Yesterday I sent them a hint about you, they got it and they're going to be discreet. Tomorrow go down early for breakfast and the five of you get a new place at the table."

"Wow, Sev! What a rest! Five years enduring them!"

"What are you going to tell me?" he asked.

"Yeah, but me at all hours."

"Not me, but they hurt me many times, you know. It's over, my love, we are free at last. Poor Remus is going to have to put up with them in his bedroom, and maybe next month's moon and September until Cecile is seventeen."

"Yeah."

"As soon as he can, I'll help him conjure a Fidelius in an empty classroom on the seventh floor, so that he can escape there whenever he feels like it," Sev said. "And so he has it to be with Cecile too, because if I do it in the fifth floor, Lauren and I could be caught, because I plan to conjure another one there for her."

"Sure, Sev."

"I should have done it before all the mess, so that she would have somewhere to be calm. She must have asked me, she did expect what was going to happen, she told me in the letter."

"Well, yes."

(We've been beating around the bush, I haven't told her what I wanted about the party and I want to take that weight off my soul now,) he thought. "I have to tell you something else about the party. It's committed, Lily, and I want to do it as soon as possible, because I feel bad."

"I can imagine what."

(Intuitive.) "Really? What?"

"You were with a girl," Lily replied.

"You are right. But I didn't do anything that I hadn't already done with you."

"It's okay, Sev, I can understand it. You could avoid telling me and you didn't. That makes me trust you more, not less."

(Oof… what a relief.) "Don't worry, I haven't fallen in love with her and I'm not going to. Maybe I will be with her again sometime. Does it seem bad to you?"

"You can do whatever you want, it seems normal to me, you can't have Lauren or me. It is enough of an unsatisfied lover."

(Wow, I don't deserve her. How generous she is,) Sev thought. "You can't have me either and you don't do it."

"But I don't do it because I don't want to, Sev, not because you have forbidden it. I don't want to be with anyone but you. I've never told you, but I already consider myself lucky enough to have been the only one for you for so many years, even though I didn't appreciate it, and that you still consider me first for everything."

"Never doubt that, my love, you will always be. Without you I would have fallen into the abyss. Thank you very much for understanding. As soon as you can come to train, I'll make you get to know each other, even if I don't introduce you directly. She's a lovely four-year girl, we spent about two hours talking, she already liked me since before, she was the one who started banging the Sly table in the Great Hall."

Lily thought, Of course, he wouldn't have gotten carried away without knowing her personally before, nor if she had simply taken notice of him because of the fame he's acquired. Sev doesn't want what everyone does, he has to like the whole person. "Wow... what's her name?"

"Audrey. You're going to like her great."

"Excellent. A new friend."

"I already told her that we are together, of course, so that she doesn't expect much from me. I told her before we started," he explained.

How honest he is. One in a million. "Very well done, Sev. You shouldn't lie about those things."

"Of course not. I also told her that I was going to tell only you and she screamed to heaven."

"Oh... you have to teach her Moon Magic."

"Sure. I want to teach her Occlumency and take her to the fir before the summer, because she is doing pretty bad in her studies but she wants to take Defense, and if I don't help her she's not going to make it," Sev said.

Sure, that's why he doesn't fall in love with her. Sev needs to have it all, not just beauty and devotion, but also talent, he's a connoisseur. And he cares about her for more than what he can get. Generous too, of course, always giving more than he receives. "Sure, Sev. Then do it, don't hesitate."

"She also has a boyfriend, she has cheated on him with me. But she's been telling me some things about him and he doesn't deserve her. I have told her to leave him and find another one."

"Very well done, Sev. Because you know a lot about those things."

"That's what she said. She guessed that I was a virgin because I didn't want to shag."

"Sure. Play matchmaker for her, watch the fourth-year boys who train with her and make them fight so they can get to know each other."

"I had already thought about it too," he said. "Yesterday I played bawd for all the couples in the House, serving them Restorative for only three hours before two o'clock, so they could finish the party in their bedrooms. I have to patent the Muffliato too."

"Patent?"

"Oh! It's just that I haven't told you. Do you remember the thing about Poppy's friend researcher mediwizard?"

"I do, of course," Lily replied.

"Well, I got his answer just before leaving the Infirmary. He wants to meet with me as soon as possible to get me a summer scholarship in St. Mungo's to develop the Restorative Potion. I have a job."

"Wooow… Sev. What great news!"

"True? I already told you that I had many things to tell you. I think about yesterday at this time and it seems to me that a week has passed and not a day. Look, the owls are coming in. Do you remember yesterday at this time?"

"Of course, I will never forget it. May fifteenth at nine fifteen, your new date of birth."

"Jack receives The Daily Prophet. I'm going to cut for a while, to see if anything has come out," Sev said goodbye.

"Okay, and tell me."

Sev asked Jack out loud, "What, Jack? How are you dealing with that hangover? Yesterday you lost the horses."

"Don't remind me," answered Jack. "Since Christmas I haven't gotten drunk. My head hurts a lot."

"Stop by the Infirmary before training, so that Poppy gives you something." I already have a new idea for a potion. Anti-hangover. It sure sells great, Sev thought.

"Yes, it seems to me that a few of us from home are going to have to do it."

"Don't worry. As if you don't come, I'll take care of organizing the sixth-years. I'm not going to fight today, otherwise my arm won't heal properly."

"Of course, don't fight, but we do go," said his friend. "We precisely cannot fail, who were the ones who started it all."

"Let's see if there's anything in the newspaper."

"Of course."

Jack opened the package it was wrapped in and unfolded it.

"There's nothing on the front page, at least," Sev said.

"That's because they didn't come last night and they didn't have first-hand information to publish, but maybe it'll come at breaking news, because of some letter they got, which will be even worse, because they'll have invented most of the data."

Jack flipped through the journal until he found the page. "Look, it do come."

They read the article together, without photographs.

REVOLUTION AT HOGWARTS

"Revolution?" Sev asked.

"I don't know why you're surprised, it's the Prophet. Go preparing yourself, tomorrow it will come on the front page. Luckily it'll be Monday, but everyone is going to buy it anyway, they will make a special edition, that's why they have already put it in today, so that people are aware of tomorrow's."

A group of thirty students belonging to the Slytherin and Ravenclaw Houses, commanded by one Severus Snape, took up arms at the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, managing to attract more than twice as many combatants to their ranks.

"How do we take up arms?" Sev broke a nervous laugh.

"The Prophet, Prince. I see you don't read it very often."

"I don't. Only when I catch someone left behind in the Common Room, and only the news about Voldemort."

"Sure. But people are already used to such news, and yesterday was historic," Jack explained. "They are going to exaggerate it as much as they can to sell a lot more tomorrow. Read it all in peace, don't get irritated, and then we'll discuss it."

The You-Know-Who supporters from the silver-green House were forced to leave the table at breakfast, after which the revolutionary contingent made a show of force by staging a training by the Black Lake. According to our source, 'they looked like a real army', from which it can be deduced that everything was properly calculated and planned.

The Headmaster of the School, Albus Dumbledore, showed his collusion with the revolutionaries by providing them with refreshments during their mid-morning break, and by being present at it without doing anything to interrupt it.

Army project training concluded around lunchtime, at the start of which all the other members of Slytherin House stormed into the Great Hall with their new leader at the helm, to cheers from the entire student body.

The supporters of You-Know-Who did not show up for lunch, from which it can be deduced that they were absent from the School during the morning, with which the number of snakes has been reduced by at least a third of its members.

The whole maneuver is extremely suspicious, because until yesterday Severus Snape, a fifth-year wizard, was considered one of the staunchest supporters of You-Know-Who, who due to his prevalence among the wizards in his House and his well-known penchant of the Dark Arts (it is said of him that 'he knew more curses in his first year than the students in the seventh year'), it was expected that he would obtain a high place in the ranks when he left the school.

(Ugh… this is information from the vipers themselves. They also wrote, of course, to discredit me,) Sev thought.

Let's hope that the Ministry will tackle this rout as soon as possible, since it is not acceptable to allow teenagers, wizards not yet graduated, to take control of the School, which until now has been a refuge of peace and study, a place where young wizards are educated under safe protection, and make it the scene of dangerous dueling practices, let alone under the orders of such a suspicious individual.

"By Merlin!" Sev exclaimed.

"What did you expect?" said Jack calmly, as he passed the newspaper to Deborah and Anthony, who were sitting opposite, and turned to him to speak in confidence.

"They're going to tie Albus hand and foot. He was wrong to send the elves to us, and he should have projected me so that we would not train by the Lake, but in the hidden space that he had already prepared."

"Yes, maybe yes. But he preferred to keep the fact that you were in contact a secret until he was sure the vipers left."

"The information that I was going to have a high position next to Voldemort is from the vipers themselves," Sev said.

"Of course, they also wrote, to discredit you."

"They do not give any importance to the fact that we have expelled the malefics, and they paint it as if we had threatened them so that they would leave."

"Sure. Keep in mind that almost all of them are from wealthy families, with influence, they themselves will go to complain to the Ministry about what happened, because their offspring will not be able to finish their studies because of us," Jack explained. "Miracle will be that they do not return. We will have to continue doing everything covertly."

"Yes, we were wrong to reveal ourselves like that, we should have talked to Albus beforehand."

"Don't be overwhelmed, if it hadn't been like that, the whole school wouldn't have joined as it is now. We have not committed any crime."

"Let's see if this doesn't ruin my scholarship in St. Mungo's, because I can forget about the Chair of Dueling. Raise fame and go to sleep," Sev lamented.

"Don't worry, Albus will fight for you, he also has a lot of influence. He will clear your name from here until it's your turn, that's the least of it. The real danger is that you are facing Voldemort and he is going to find out that you were some kind of infiltrator in his own ranks and you may have too much information about him."

(Of course I have,) Sev thought. "I am exhausted, I am not able to even finish breakfast, and I have lost the desire to train. Who would order me to go into this mess?"

"Lauren…" they both said at the same time.

"If you don't feel safe at home this summer, you know you can come to mine without any problem, and also your mother and Lily whenever she want," said Jack. "There's plenty of room and I'll take you and bring you Apparatinging and that's it."

"Thanks, Jack, I'll check with Albus. Because I just thought of another way they can get my address. I am a scholar and I am registered with the Ministry as such. If they have spies inside they can find out."

"Booah, Prince, how did you not think of that?" Jack was alarmed. "Luckily today is Sunday. Your mother is in danger since tomorrow."

Sev covered his eyes and forehead, shaking. "How unconscious I am. I will never learn."

"Come on, don't worry," Jack took him by his shoulders, recovering his calm. "At lunch project to Albus, maybe he'll come up with a solution, otherwise, we'll fix it this afternoon. We'll go to your house by Floo to look for her and from there to mine."

"Albus can't see my mother. I told her about Lauren."

"Oh…"

"How I'm muddling it up, Jack. Increasingly."

"It's okay, just the two of us will go, with the Time Turner, he has enough with the Prophet. Don't go to training, talk to Lily for the rest of the time and then go home to rest."

"That's going to be worse, I'm going to be nervous all the time. I prefer to distract myself."

"Sure, I understand. Come on, give me a hug," his friend asked him.

"Thank you, Jack."

They hugged, and Sev tried to regain some of his calm by taking deep breaths for a long minute.

"Talk to Lily, come on, but don't worry her about your mother yet, you'll tell her when it's resolved," Jack told him.

"It's done, honey," Sev projected to Lily.

"It comes out, right?" she asked, "I've seen the Longbottoms reading it and pass it on to their two year-mates."

"Yes, it do come out. They vilify me, and Albus too, they call me a suspicious individual. I'm not going to tell you in detail, I'm upset."

"Don't worry, I ask them for it when they go to train."

"At least it doesn't say anything about you. For now you are safe," Sev reassured her.

"Yeah. It was lucky that we cut off contact in public from the beginning of the year."

"Ugh… I'm fed up with problems. I barely had a few hours respite last night. Surely now in training everyone talks about it."

"It's sure. But it's going to be to support you, Sev," Lily said. "The students of the school did know what happened. Don't pay attention, you know how the Prophet is, in a week they will have forgotten it."

"Yeah, but not Voldemort. Jack has proposed that I take refuge in his house this summer. He says that he would take us Apparating whenever we want. See, he's already starting to return those favors you say I do for him."

"Okay, Sev, then think about it. Your Mum could also go to work by Apparating from there, and this way you would be with Ariel as well."

"Sure. I think that I won't even be able to take the Express."

"Well, then you'll go wherever you have to go by Floo. Albus will make it easy for you."

"And what will we tell your parents, Lily?"

"Are you worried about my parents, Sev, with the mess you have on you? It's about time they found out the truth."

"Ugh... they're going to scare a lot."

"They also lived through a war, they know what it is."

"Yeah, but I'm in the spotlight, Lily. I have become famous in a bad way. Now they are all enemies to me, both the Death Eaters and the Ministry."

"But you have all of Hogwarts on your side, who are the future warriors who will defeat Voldemort, that's the important thing. Calm down, Sev, you are very nervous."

(How not to be, we are going to live, me and everyone I love, in danger of death for years and years, until we destroy all the damn Horcruxes,) he thought. "Finally the 'has many friends and enemies' part of my horoscope has come true."

"True."

"I am also worried about Mum. I'm sure that since I told her I'm going to participate in the war, she's going to Diagon to buy the Daily Prophet at least on Sunday, which is when she doesn't work. If she reads everything it says about me, she's going to freak out."

"What does it say?" asked Lily.

"That until yesterday I was considered a future high command of Voldemort's army."

"Booah… how do they overdo it."

"No, Lily, it's true, it's information from the vipers. I would have been, it was what was expected of me."

"You didn't tell me that."

"I didn't, because I don't feel proud at all."

"Don't worry, Sev. As soon as I read the article, I'll write to her and tell her that it's all a lie. I'll convince her."

"Ugh… I don't know. If she hasn't read it, you're going to worry her unnecessarily. Better wait to see if she writes to me."

"At Hogwarts we are very isolated."

"Of course. If I get a letter from her tonight or tomorrow, I'll ask Albus to let me floo home first thing tomorrow morning, so I can talk to her in person," Sev said. "We are going to use the Time Turner before school."

"Sure, do it like this."

(Yes, as long as we don't have to frantically go to look for her this afternoon and run to Jack's house,) he thought. "Yeah. It will be the best."