Here we are! The third chapter :D

As an explanation - Griffin: In ancient art, the griffin is often shown as the protector of gold. In Native American folklore, it stands for the rise to power, seeing and knowing the truth of both light and dark, as well as showing people their true purpose. (Taken from worldbirds' website)

Chapter 3 - History Repeats Itself

They walked past families and couples mingling on Diagon Alley, in front of shops, and on their late afternoon stroll. The sun had started to descend and only a few rays peeked over the high roofs of the buildings surrounding the alley. It was such a peaceful afternoon, that Lily felt oddly detached from anything that happened outside this little refuge.

She took a deep breath and allowed James to pull her further away from their friends. She didn't know what he had planned, but she couldn't say that she overly cared about it, either. It was just nice to feel the slight wind blow softly in her face, the air still warm from the cloudless summer day.

"So, what have you been up to since the beginning of the holidays?"

James' question pulled Lily back to the present and it was as if her soul jumped back into her body. She blinked, smiled, and turned to answer him, but her eyes caught a movement and she looked down at their still clasped hands.

And froze.

"Umm," she hesitated, not knowing what to do until James looked at her, eyebrows raised and clearly confused, only to follow her eyes' path and flinch so hard that Lily thought he had been struck by lightning.

"Oh Merlin, umm. I didn't— I mean, I— You—"

She had never seen James Potter that flustered in her life, and she honestly lived for it. A very, very small part of who she used to be, whispered to let him suffer, but she suffocated that part of her brain as soon as it got vocal.

"It's alright, James," she said softly whilst trying to ignore her blush and being confident all at the same time. It wasn't an easy feat, not with how flustered she was herself. "Nobody got hurt."

Smooth, Evans. Real smooth.

A sound that sounded like a mixture between a laugh and a scream escaped James' throat and the hand that had just held onto hers jumped up to his hair.

"Well," he started and ruffled his hair hesitantly, "not the way I wanted to start the conversation if I'm being honest."

Now, it was Lily's turn to laugh awkwardly and not know what to do with her hands. "You wanted to start a conversation?"

"Well, yeah. I always want to talk with you."

The redhead smiled at him, not knowing what to say, so she didn't say anything.

A few silent seconds went by, and Lily silently cursed herself to have reacted in such a way to him holding her hand. It had felt nice, hell, she hadn't even noticed it at first, it had felt that natural, but now things were awkward between them, and she didn't like that feeling at all. Being uncomfortable with James wasn't something that she was neither used to nor wanted to get used to. They'd always been rather vocal people – for her that had meant yelling at him and for him it had meant flirting and teasing her – so this was wrong.

She thanked Merlin himself when James cleared his throat, took a deep breath, and acted as if nothing of the weird energy had ever surrounded them.

"How has your summer been so far?" He'd already asked her that, but instead of ruining their mood – again – she allowed herself to get comfortable, walking side by side with a boy she had grown to like and respect.

"It was alright." She shrugged; eyes focused on the cobblestones of the road. "Nothing too exciting happened."

James paused and looked at her for a few silent seconds before asking, "Are you alright?"

Lily blinked. "What?"

"Are you alright? You seem… off."

A breathy laugh escaped her lips, a clear sign of discomfort. "I'm fine," but for some reason, I can't look you in the eye. She was feeling off, had been for a couple of weeks now, and she knew the exact reason why. Petunia and her parents really didn't help with making her feel safe but walking through Diagon Alley, seeing all of the happy and carefree people just showed her at what extremes the wizarding world was existing.

It unsettled her, to say the least.

And then, James said something that both irritated her and warmed her heart to an extent that made her look him in the eye and see that he meant it. "I don't believe you."

"Excuse me?"

"I don't believe you when you say you're fine when you clearly aren't." He looked at her, his features set in a serious expression. "You're not alright and I want to know why so that I can help you fix it."

Gobsmacked at hearing his words, so direct and heartfelt, she answered without thinking about what her words would mean and set into motion. "I'm scared."

James' expression didn't change as he simply looked at her, waiting for her to elaborate. Which she did.

"Have you read today's Prophet?"

A small crease appeared between his dark eyebrows, but he nodded, nonetheless. "The family that disappeared."

Lily nodded and her eyes went back to watching the stones underneath her feet. "It's just… It's happening more often now, isn't it? People – Muggle-borns – going missing, whole families just vanishing from their homes…"

The sigh he let out after her muttered observation sounded as if he held the weight of the world on his shoulders, and as she looked up, now slightly worried, he looked older, more tired, and hesitant.

"What?" she asked, reached for his hand, and pulled him to the side. Laughing people walked past them, chatting loudly, but for Lily, they felt oddly far away. "What?"

It took him a few seconds to answer, but this time, Lily didn't remove her hand from his. Instead, she tightened her hold on it, hoping to convey some sort of support.

"It happened before," he said quietly, his eyes trained on hers in a stare so intense that Lily felt a shiver run down her spine. And not a pleasant one.

"Come again?"

She could see his jaw muscles working as he repeatedly clenched his teeth. "The disappearances. It's not the first time that something like that has happened."

Lily looked at him. She couldn't hear the background chatter anymore; it felt as if that was part of another dimension and that she and James were in their own little bubble, separated from everything and everyone around them. Trapped in their own minds.

"When?" she asked fearfully. Her body had gone cold, and she had trouble breathing.

"Decades ago," he said solemnly, never breaking eye contact with her. "Have you ever heard about a dark wizard named Gellert Grindelwald?"

Lily frowned but nodded slowly. "Yes, that name rings a bell."

James hummed. "They should really add that part of our history to Binns' class. It would make much more sense than wasting four years learning about what goblin decapitated another goblin."

She didn't even feel the need to reprimand him for his degrading way of talking about their professor's class because, secretly, she agreed with all of the criticism he had about History of Magic. That class would make more sense if someone more connected to the world would teach it, and not someone who had died decades ago and who would only focus on what he would've taught back then.

"So, what happened to this Gellert Grindelwald?" she asked, intrigued, and watched as James looked up and down the alley and pulled her further away from other people.

"Grindelwald was a very powerful wizard. People say that he wanted to bring the wizarding world back to glory, but not by killing those who endangered it. They say that he wanted to make Muggles see that magic wasn't to be feared but something to be embraced." He grimaced. "You can imagine that he only said that to gain followers and supporters, as the first thing he did when he opened up the magical world to the Muggles was murder those who were openly skeptical of us. It wasn't declared as murder, of course, but Muggle villages and powerful Muggle politicians were being targeted by him. The villages caught fire in the middle of the night, without any witnesses surviving to tell the truth. Influential politicians go on spontaneous holidays, only to reappear weeks later, not being themselves at all. Nobody really cared at the time, and the Prophet didn't think it was anything related to us, so they didn't write about it. Until the first Muggle-born disappeared.

"It was a woman working at the Ministry. A secretary of someone important, I think, so people noticed when she just didn't come to work one day and none of her friends and family knew where she went. A week later, she came back to work as if nothing had ever happened. She seemed happy enough, so nobody thought it was anything serious. Then, the next Muggle-born vanished, shortly followed by the third. The distance between those disappearances shortened, and that was enough to make important people worried.

"The weird thing was that all of them reappeared weeks, or even days, later and none of them ever said anything about being kidnapped. They just went about their days as if nothing had happened in the first place. The one thing all of them had in common, apart from being Muggle-born, was that they had all been vocal about what was happening to the Muggle community. They didn't agree with what Grindelwald was doing and they were very open about it. That was until they came back from wherever they'd been held, because after that, none of them had an opinion on it anymore, some even openly supported what was happening."

He shook his head, and it was clear to Lily that, even though all of that had happened in the past, he was still bothered by it.

"People say that Dumbledore knew Grindelwald, that he'd been friends with him, so those against Grindelwald were starting to wonder why it was taking Dumbledore so long to do something about it. You see, Dumbledore was a very powerful wizard, even back then, even before he'd conquered Grindelwald in the famous, final battle in 1945. I guess the public demand for him to do something got too much because shortly after voices got louder, the Griffin's Order was founded, an Order whose sole job it was to make sure that Muggle-borns and their families would be safe.

"At that point, Grindelwald had already started a war. There were dozens of disappearances a day, and the number of murders grew with each passing hour. People who vanished weren't found until months later. Most of them were dead. Those that survived were so traumatised that they couldn't do much more than cry and scream. If they didn't attempt to end their lives, they'd break their wands, not wanting to be a part of the magical world anymore."

"What?" the redhead breathed.

"Yeah. I don't even want to know what they had to go through."

Lily gulped.

"So, when the first article of a disappearance showed up in the Prophet, it all felt like déjà-vu. I wasn't alive back then, obviously, but my parents were, and they said that it feels like it did back then when it started. And that worries me even more."

Lily was stunned into silence after James stopped talking. She didn't know what to say or think, so she just shook her head slowly, trying to get her brain back in order.

"Yeah, I know," James said, his eyes back on her. "It's a lot."

Lily scoffed. "That is the understatement of the century."

A slightly embarrassed smile tugged at his lips and Lily felt her ability to talk return. "How come you know so much about everything?"

"My parents are part of the Griffin's Order."

"And they think it's all happening again?" Lily asked, feeling more frightened than she did before the conversation, yet the fear felt different – it felt real and not as if she was going insane. It was something she could understand and use to prepare herself for whatever the future had in store for her. "That Grindelwald is back?"

James winced and tilted his head to the left. "No, that's not what they suspect. Grindelwald is locked in Nurmengard Castle, a prison that, ironically enough, he had built back in the day. From what intel they could gather, he's still in his cell, slowly being taken over by insanity. But something is happening. The signs are all there, you've seen them yourself. The Order just doesn't know what that something is just yet."

He paused shortly and looked down at their hands, still intertwined tightly. "It could, of course, all be some kind of plot orchestrated by Grindelwald. Even though he's locked away in the high-security wing of the prison, there're always ways to communicate with the outside world, and if he can communicate with his former followers, I doubt that it would be a big hassle for him to organise attacks like this. My parents say that there are too many parallels for it to not have at least some part of it being planned by him. It could be someone else entirely, of course, but that someone would probably also have some kind of connection to Grindelwald, just by judging the circumstances and the news alone."

They stayed silent for a few tense moments, just looking at each other and trying to stay calm.

"Is there anything we can do to help?" Lily asked almost desperately. "I know we're still young and some of the students in our year aren't even of age yet, but we are. There has to be something that we can do!"

"There isn't. No, really, believe me, there isn't," James added as Lily set about arguing back. "I've talked to my parents, and they said that no one is allowed to join the Order if they're still going to school and to do anything without the support and protection that they offer would simply be suicidal." He sounded like a scolded and very put-off boy who wasn't allowed to drink a beer at the family gathering because he was underage, which, if they had been in a different situation, Lily would have found amusing. "So, no matter how much we don't like it, we'll have to wait until after graduation. My parents won't like it, but I know that I will join the Order as soon as I can."

The redhead nodded, feeling an odd sense of clarity. "I want to help as well. But to actually be of help, we'll have to get better at duelling and healing, and whatnot. I understand that, and it actually makes sense that the Order has that rule."

"I knew you would say that." James smirked and it was as if the serious conversation that they had just shared had never happened. The atmosphere lightened and the sounds of a pleasant summer evening reached her ears again.

"Did you now?" she asked cheekily and turned to continue down the street once again. She didn't know whether there was an Apparition point anywhere near them, but she was enjoying his company, so she didn't mind that much. She didn't even really care that she would most likely get in trouble when she got home because she was supposed to have returned twenty minutes ago.

"Why, yes. Top of the class, and all that. Combine your brain with the sense of rightness and the want to help, and you come to the conclusion that practising spells and curses is the best way to start."

Lily laughed loudly. "When you say it like that, it sounds very lame."

"It kind of does, doesn't it?" James grinned widely, and a not-so-quiet part of Lily's brain noticed the dimple on his left cheek. She took a deep breath to not falter in her step. "But I think it's the right conclusion, no matter how lame it sounds."

"I'm glad, then."

They walked in companionable silence for a few seconds before James spoke again. "Did you mean it earlier? When you said you'd buy the Butterbeer at Hogsmeade?"

She was slightly taken aback by the sudden change of subject, and to be completely honest, she had already forgotten that she had dipped her toe into flirting waters. That's how her brain worked – remember the important things, forget the embarrassing ones.

"Yeah, I did." Because she had really been serious, albeit very nervous, when she had more or less asked him out in front of their friends in the middle of the busy Diagon Alley on a Monday afternoon.

The smile that lit up his face sent the butterflies that had been slumbering happily in her belly flying somersaults again. His hazel eyes started to sparkle, and the dimple teased her so mercilessly that she had to force herself to look anywhere but at his cheek. Which was an issue in itself because the rest of his face or even his hair, for that matter, had a similar effect on her.

"Thank you," he said, which was probably the last thing she would have expected him to say. "For giving me a chance, that is. I've been wondering if… Well… Originally, I wanted to ask you in a letter, but that felt a bit too impersonal? Although letters are a pretty personal thing, especially if you're writing it to someone you— I mean…"

He went beet-red, and Lily bit her lip to keep herself from laughing.

"Anyway," he went on, and ruffled his hair with his free hand – they were still holding hands, a fact that Lily very much noticed but refused to change – "I know that this is rather short notice, and I apologise for that, but I couldn't bring myself to ask you before… well… now," he finished lamely, and a breathy and very awkward laugh escaped his lips.

"My parents are holding a summer party. They do it every year, actually, and they invite all sorts of important people from the Ministry and the Order and Merlin knows who else, and I've always been forced to go because, you know, only child and all that, need to represent the next generation of the Potter family, and I've always hated it, but I think it could actually be nice this year if you'd like to… um… to c—come."

Lily pulled him to a stop and an elderly lady nearly walked into them, but she ignored her angry muttering in favour of staring at James next to her. "Are you asking me on a date to your parents' social gathering that you've always despised?"

James had the decency to wince. "It sounds awful when you put it like that."

"I'd love to come," she said before he could start to talk his way out of it.

It took him a few moments to react to what she'd just said, but when the meaning had registered, his grin could have lit up the whole street. "You want to come?"

"Yes, I'd love to save you from the boredom of socialising with important people." Even though that comment was meant to be slightly sarcastic, if a bit daring, she couldn't bring herself to put any spite into her tone as she was honestly overjoyed by the turn of events. Who would have thought that this day would end with James Potter asking her on a date? She certainly wouldn't have, and she didn't even try to keep the giddiness she was feeling at bay, allowing a bright smile to stretch over her face. "When is it?"

"Next Friday," he said hurriedly, and he sounded oddly breathless and very excited. "It starts at noon and usually goes on well into the night. You don't have to stay for the whole thing, obviously, but I'd love to see you that day. It'll be held at Potter Manor, so you'll see my home as well. It's a lot, just for the record. Don't say I didn't warn you!"

Lily laughed lightly before shrugging. "I'm very excited to see where you grew up," she said honestly, and could literally see him relax in front of her eyes. "And most pure-bloods live in old mansions, don't they? I've heard Sev—, I mean, Snape may have mentioned it once."

His eyes darkened at the mention of Severus Snape, but he didn't say anything about it, which Lily was thankful for. She didn't have the energy to fight, and she was scared that she would, herself, find her anger and disappointment overwhelm her again. She wasn't ready for it, especially not now, not when she was feeling truly happy for once during the last couple of weeks of summer break.

"Not all of them," James said softly before shooting her a slightly insecure glance. "Just the old families and those who didn't lose their family fortune."

"Ah, I see. Well, I guess it makes sense."

"Yeah…" They walked around the corner and into a smaller alleyway that Lily had never seen before. "I swear my parents aren't the typical pure-bloods. They don't care about anything most of the others do and—"

"You don't have to explain yourself to me, James, I know they aren't like the supremacists. If they're part of an organisation that actively seeks out to protect Muggle-borns, I doubt that there's one mean bone in their bodies. After all, it's not their fault that they're pure-bloods, just as it isn't my fault to be Muggle-born."

James nodded slowly, clearly not sure whether he should try to convince her that there wasn't anything she needed to be sorry or feel at fault for, but he ended up deciding against it as he smiled and motioned for her to enter an even narrower alley. "I know. I just wanted to make sure you did as well, but I should have known that you already know."

"I've met you, after all. Someone who raised you can't be a bad person. There's just no way."

If she had taken two more seconds to look at him, she would have seen his eyes widen and his cheeks darken, but she had already ducked into the dark alley without asking any questions as to where they were, fully trusting him to not lead her anywhere unsafe.

As soon as she entered the narrow alley, she felt as if hundreds of feathers brushed against her skin before she found herself in a relatively small courtyard of sorts with one person standing in the middle of it. She blinked and turned around to see a brick wall where she had just walked through, an opening big enough to fit a toddler.

"James?"

Not a second later, James appeared out of thin air, an easy smile on his slightly red face.

Honestly, no matter how long she was living and experiencing magic, she would never get used to weird stuff like that.

"There you go," James said and motioned for her to follow him to the centre of the small square where the old man was standing. He had very long, wispy hair with a big bald spot right on top of his head, a very long and equally white beard with the moustache part twisted artfully into some sort of sculpture that defied gravity. He was wearing an odd combination of blue Muggle jeans and a light orange tunic.

"What exactly am I looking at?" she whispered, hand hiding her lips from the man so as to not insult him. She nodded at him, trying to overplay her awkwardness and confusion by being friendly, but he merely stared back at her, completely emotionless.

"What? Oh, I didn't tell you, did I?" James snickered before ruffling his hair again. "That's an Apparition point. One from the Order, actually, so it's very safe. It also saves you the hassle of using multiple ones as this one has been charmed to somehow work better. Don't ask me how, I have no clue."

Lily felt her eyes grow bigger with each passing second and her lips parted in a silent, "Oh!" before she whispered, "He's part of the Order, too, then?"

James blinked, looked at the old, motionless man, and turned back to Lily. "I don't know. I've never seen that guy." He shrugged and pointed to the spot next to the man's feet. He was wearing leather sandals. One of them black, the other light brown with a two-centimetre heel. "That's where you can Apparate from."

She shook her head and laughed softly as she walked towards the only piece of the square that was covered in dirt. "I honestly want to meet the person who comes up with all of these disguises of stuff that the Ministry just puts in open and public places. They have to either be insane or brilliant."

"That's difficult to distinguish since insanity and genius are basically twins."

"Ah, you're right. Still. It would be fun."

"That it would be. But you've already met him."

Lily's eyebrows jumped up and she stared at James with a mixture of fascination and humour. "Have I?"

He nodded, a knowing smile on his face, and Lily gasped as the penny dropped. "Dumbledore!"

"Exactly. Though, I'm not sure whether he's insane or brilliant. Maybe a bit of both. So, I'll pick you up on Friday, say, at noon? Would that be okay?"

The butterflies started somersaulting again and Lily smiled. "I'm looking forward to it."

And with a last, rather shy, look at James, she pictured her parents' house and spun on the spot, mentally preparing herself for an annoyed mother, an indifferent father, and a fuming sister.

Until next time - see ya! :D