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Chapter Nineteen: Time Ago

The Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw Quidditch teams were in the midst of a very intense Quidditch game, with the Hufflepuffs getting pummeled badly, thanks to the inept captaincy of Zacharias Smith, who seemed to not learn from his past mistakes against the Ravenclaw team. Last year, Hufflepuff only barely scratched out a victory against Ravenclaw barely, due to Hailey grabbing the Snitch when Ravenclaw was up by one hundred and forty points.

This time, Ravenclaw is ahead of Hufflepuff by one hundred points and Hufflepuff hadn’t come close to gaining one goal.

“Swerve over there, spread out as far as possible!” barked Smith to the Chasers who looked disapproving but flew to the side.

“Don’t you know anything about Quidditch!” yelled Hailey angrily as she swooped in. “Can’t you see you’re playing right into the Ravenclaw team’s hands and leaving the team open for more goals?”

“Just go and do your job, Potter!” shouted Smith.

“Oh, I will, because it’s quite obvious that you don’t know how to do yours,” replied Hailey, as she flew to the side to scan for the Snitch and sure enough, the game continued with Ravenclaw scoring three goals in relatively short time and Hailey glanced upwards, spotting the golden snitch.

She flew upwards arm reached forward, as Cho Chang, the Ravenclaw Seeker, spotted her and followed in pursuit.

“Potter’s seen the Snitch, Potter’s flying towards the Snitch, Chang’s seen Potter going towards the Snitch,” droned the commentator as Hailey came within inches but a Bludger was blasted in her pathway, causing her to lose her concentration and the Snitch vanished from sight in a matter of seconds.

Hailey looked around for the Snitch, breathing a sigh of relief when the Hufflepuff Keeper blocked the Quaffle and threw it back into the game but at that exact moment, Smith had ordered the Chasers to move slightly to the left, which allowed another Ravenclaw Chaser to grab onto the Quaffle and push it through, giving Ravenclaw another goal and pushing them ahead of one hundred and forty to nothing.

Hailey looked around, putting her head in her hands in disgust, shaking it from side to side before looking up just in time to see Smith get his hands on the Quaffle and one of the Ravenclaw Beaters exploded forward, before he whacked the Bludger right towards Smith with full intents of disarming him of the Quaffle.

Unfortunately for Smith and rather fortunate for the rest of the Hufflepuff Team, Smith was smashed right in the side of the head with the Bludger, causing him to lose his balance and his broom to spiral to the ground, before landing hard on the ground, knocked in a state of unconsciousness.

“Smith has been knocked out, this is bad,” said the commentator in a monotone voice. “Oh no, they are calling for a timeout, Hufflepuff might need to forfeit the game.”

Hailey swooped down first, with the other members of the Hufflepuff team following her, looking around in confusion.

“Looks like we’re going to forfeit this game, if Smith’s knocked out,” said Hufflepuff Chaser, Elizabeth Martin in a fretful voice.

“Not that he does us much good if he is conscious, but he threatened to replace us if we deviated from his little game plan,” answered Hufflepuff Chaser Brent Vine in a disgusted voice.

Madam Hooch swooped down as Smith was being tended to before being put on a stretcher and put back to the hospital wing.

“Resume play or forfeit?” asked Hooch.

“Resume play!” replied Hailey in a firm voice, causing the other members of the Hufflepuff Team to look at her with surprised looks. “Look, it’s obvious our captain’s knocked out, but that shouldn’t cripple us too much and someone’s got to take charge.”

“Smith’s not going to like this,” said the Hufflepuff Keeper Gregory Quance in a skeptical voice.

“Look we can still win this game, but I need your help to keep the score gap below one hundred and fifty so I can get the Snitch,” said Hailey in a calm voice before muttering. “Lanton and Edwards, do not let the Ravenclaw Chasers score no matter what. Hammer the Bludgers at them if they so much get their possession on the Quaffle.”

The Beaters nodded.

“Work together and only separate when necessary to draw the other team’s fire in the other direction,” continued Hailey. “Work as a team, work as one, and we can do this.”

“Are you certain you want to resume play?” questioned Hooch again.

“Absolutely!” chorused the remaining six members of the Hufflepuff Team in unison as they flew off into the air to resume play against Ravenclaw, despite the noticeable handicap of being down by one player.

“With Zacharias Smith knocked unconscious, Hufflepuff is down a player, and they have yet to score a point, but wait, Martin grabs the Quaffle and she flies, flies some more, Beaters on either side protect her from the attacks of the other beaters on the other team and she passes the Quaffle to Vine, no wait she doesn’t, I mean she does and he aims the Quaffle before sending it through the hoop. The Quaffle flies, making it through, it’s going, the Quaffle goes in, Hufflepuff scores, finally getting on the board.”

That goal scored boosted the morale of the Hufflepuff Quidditch Team a great deal and their spirits quickly lifted, scoring five more goals in successive, closing the gap slightly. Hailey spent a great deal of time, looking for the Snitch, rather than yelling complex orders and plays to her other teammates, a strategy that worked well, as the score gap was only by fifty points as Hailey spotted the golden snitch fluttering on the other side of one of the Ravenclaw Beaters.

Adjusting her flight, Hailey zoomed forwards, spotting yet another goal being scored by Hufflepuff out of the corner of her eye. Hailey skillfully dodged the Bludger that was aimed at her and in a flash, a Hufflepuff beater hammered the Bludger in the other direction, to stop Cho Chang from catching up to her. Not that it mattered as Hailey was nearly half of a field ahead of Cho. One of the chasers, in a last ditch effort, attempted to swerve in front of Hailey but she had seen that common cheap tactic coming a mile away and quickly flew to the other side, before spiraling around and she reached forward, clasping the snitch into hand.

“Hufflepuff beats Ravenclaw, winning the game, two hundred and fifty points to one hundred and forty,” said the commentator. “Hufflepuff wins, they’ve beat Ravenclaw and move up second in the standings, just behind Slytherin.”

Hailey flew down and seconds later, the other Hufflepuff team members joined her to celebrate the victory. She watched as Daphne, Theodore, Ginny, and Harry made their way out of the field, in between the crowd of Hufflepuffs as they congratulated Hailey on her quick thinking, which brought the Hufflepuff team up from the depths to defeat Ravenclaw.

“That was brilliant, Hailey, good flying,” cheered Ginny.

“Yeah, pretty good, Ravenclaw is one of the toughest teams to beat, they have players on the team that have been there for four and even five years,” added Theodore.

“It was rather fortunate you thought on your feet and dug yourselves out of the hole that Smith put you in,” concluded Daphne.

Hailey turned to Harry to see what he thought but she was distracted by their mother running down from the stands.

“As a teacher I’m not to teach sides, but that was good Hailey,” muttered Lily to her daughter but Hailey couldn’t notice her mother looked a bit preoccupied for some reason.

“Oh no, they’re going to mob me,” muttered Hailey, as she saw a large group of Hufflepuffs moving their way, all looking happy at Hailey’s victory and ready to congratulate the impromptu captain, who looked a bit overwhelmed at this over the top show of gratitude.

“Quick, grab on, I use the Portus-Amulet to get us to Mum’s office,” said Harry promptly and without another word, everyone gripped onto Harry as he activated his Portus-Amulet and drew them to Lily’s office.

A second later, everyone readjusted their footing, before sitting down in chairs around the office, with Lily taking a seat behind her desk. Hailey looked out the window and saw storm clouds roll in.

“Good thing we wrapped up the game, looks like there’s a brutal storm coming in,” remarked Hailey before turning to her brother. “So what did you think of the game, Harry?”

“You were there, sis, you would know how it went better than anyone else,” answered Harry crisply. “If you must know, you did a pretty decent job on there and your strategy worked well at catching Ravenclaw off guard. It might not work again though.”

“Yes, but the point is it did work well this time,” said Hailey.

“Hailey, it was good, don’t worry about it,” said Lily in an absent minded voice, as she stared out the window with a far off look.

“Lily, is there something wrong?” asked Ginny in a concerned voice.

“No, Ginny, I’m just thinking,” replied Lily.

“About what,” said Harry who also looked concerned and Hailey, Daphne, and Theodore looked at Lily curiously.

“This day is one that I wish I could forget, but I can’t, it ways heavily on my mind, next to Halloween and the day that my parents were killed,” said Lily. “Of course, I don’t think anyone that’s lived to tell the tale would forget the first time they’ve come face to face with him.”

“Voldemort,” suggested Harry darkly.

“Right,” said Lily. “Twenty years ago, to the day, and I was very lucky, very lucky indeed to not have that day end in tragedy.”

“Really, what happened?” asked Daphne curiously.

“Well, I suppose I should start from the beginning,” stated Lily slowly, before she began to launch into the story.

Sixteen year old Lily Evans yawned as she had exited her dormitory, a bit late in the morning. She had been up way past midnight, putting a few last minute finishing touches on her Potions and Defense essays that were due on Monday. She made her way down the stairs, looking around, the other girls in her dormitory having already obviously woken up and made their way down to breakfast. They were all to used to Lily’s erratic sleep schedule and she had insisted to her friends.

As she exited the common room, Lily spotted the Head Girl, Sophia Robbins, race down the hallway looking rather frantic, before skidding to a stop right by Lily.

“Thank goodness, I’ve found you Lily, I need your help, someone’s been pranked really bad and I don’t know what kind of charm work was used!” exclaimed Sophia without taking a breath.

“Did you ask Professor Flitwick?” asked Lily grumpily.

“No, I can’t find him anywhere, and the third year that was pranked was in very bad shape,” said Sophia hysterically. “Please, Lily, I need your help.”

“Lead the way,” responded Lily in a resigned voice and the two girls moved quickly down the hallway, before reaching a corridor on the third floor, where a third year laid on the floor, with tentacles spouting out of his head and a bottle of shampoo was beating him over the head. Lily sighed before remarking in a sarcastic tone. “Wow, I wonder who did this!”

“Can you fix him?” prompted Sophia.

“Stand back,” said Lily before she swished her wand and the tentacles disappeared as with the bottle of shampoo. The third year staggered to his feet, looking rather pale before vomiting all over the floor.

Lily stepped towards the doorway leading out of the corridor before she waved her wand. The doorway glowed an eerie blue and Lily quickly disabled the spells surrounding the doorway.

“It might be a good idea to take him up to the hospital wing,” said Lily in a tone of forced calmness before she turned her back to walk towards the Great Hall.

Four sixth year Gryffindor boys chatted merrily at their house table. Over the past six years, they have been known infamously for their pranks and troublemaking in Hogwarts. Gryffindors found them rather amusing, Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs also regarded them with amusement, providing that they were not the target of their pranks. Slytherins absolutely despised them with every fiber of their being. Teachers were frustrated with them, as they didn’t seem to be bothered with detentions, they regarded them with mostly honor, especially two certain members. This group was called many names, a few of them not nice, but Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Sirius Black, and James Potter referred to themselves for the most part as the Marauders.

“Nice day today,” replied Sirius. “Think we should let Snivellus have it today. He’s been glaring at us ever since…the incident last month.”

“Sirius, that was completely your fault and you know it,” answered James in an irritated voice. “That was very stupid of you, you could have gotten all of us, especially Remus in trouble. I don’t like Snape as much as anyone, but that was over the line”

“It’s not my fault he’s a nosy, greasy git,” said Sirius in a stubborn voice.

“Well, we’re going to lay off Snape this year,” repeated James in a stubborn voice.

“Yeah, besides, nothing could top Snape showing his greasy underpants to the world,” piped up Peter in an excited voice.

Remus just sat there, quietly, wondering if he had reigned his friends in more closely, that near miss with Snape wouldn’t have happened.

“Wormtail, you have an unhealthy obsession with Snivellus’s underpants,” said Sirius with a mischievous grin. “Sure there isn’t something you’d like to tell us?”

“Padfoot, if anyone has the obsession with Snape, it’s you, you’re always the one talking about wanting to prank him,” replied Peter.

“Okay that’s enough out of both of you,” said James sternly. “Let’s talk about something else.”

“Like the fact that Evans is coming right here and she doesn’t look too happy,” announced Sirius and sure enough, Lily walked towards the Gryffindor table, before standing in front of the Marauders, hands on her hips, with a dangerous glare in her emerald green eyes, but otherwise calm.

“Hello, Lily, my aren’t you looking beautiful today,” said James in an over the top enthusiastic voice but he quickly deflated when he saw Lily’s glare intensify, before she placed a privacy barrier around the five.

“So, let me ask you something, Potter,” prompted Lily. “Perhaps you’d like to tell me about the third floor corridor and about how an innocent third year got attacked by that prank that looked suspiciously like one that was meant for Snape.”

“You tried to prank Snape, way to go, Prongs!” cheered Sirius. “About time you did something.”

“I did no such thing, I wasn’t even near that corridor,” amended James in a frantic voice. “Lily, please, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Potter, the innocent act might work on every other girl in Hogwarts but it doesn’t work on me,” said Lily in an icily calm voice that made James flinch. “I have half the mind to throw you in detention or better yet, I should turn you into McGonagall.”

“Lily, I haven’t even tried to prank Snape all year, I’ve left him alone, this wasn’t me, someone else did it,” pleaded James.

“Fine, James, lie to me all you want,” responded Lily and here she looked a bit disappointed, but at the same time resigned. “Just to think I was prepared to give you another chance this year.”

Lily dropped the privacy barrier, before she walked off to join her friends at the other end of the table leaving James dumbstruck.

“Guys, seriously, I didn’t do it, in fact, I don’t think any of you did it,” said James and the other three Marauders shook their heads.

“Believe me James, I would have done it, I would have taken full responsibility,” said Sirius.

“That’s not the point, the fact that an innocent person was caught in the crossfire is not good,” replied James. “You know how Lily is; she’s going to hate me.”

“I doubt very much she hates you at all, she’s just very annoyed with you, because she thinks you did it,” said Remus wisely. “And let’s face it; Lily knows your methods all too well.”

“Moony, half of the school knows our methods all too well,” said James before dawning in sudden realization. “Don’t suppose someone could have tried to frame me?”

“Possible,” admitted Remus.

“But why would someone want to do that?” wondered Peter.

“I don’t know,” said James in a frustrated voice, as he looked across the table towards Lily and the other sixth year girls.

“Lily, you look rather out of it,” remarked a girl with long dirty blond hair and blue eyes, “You stormed off after talking with James Potter, did you two have another fight?”

“You could say that, Harmony,” admitted Lily.

“What did he do this time?” asked Alexandra Morgan.

“Tried to prank Severus, failed and accidentally caught a poor third year, had to undo some charm work,” answered Lily in a tired voice.

“It doesn’t make any sense, though, he hasn’t pranked Snape all year, why start now?” asked a round faced girl with dark hair.

“That we know of, Alice,” said Alexandra. “There was that one incident with Snape that…”

“If it’s the one you’re talking about, that was Black’s fault, Potter actually stopped Severus and may have saved his life,” responded Lily.

“A shame really,” muttered Alexandra under her breath.

“Alex, I know you don’t trust Severus, but please lay off of him,” said Lily. “Besides, he wouldn’t have been the only one in danger, Remus would have…”

Lily stopped short, her friends didn’t know about Remus’s “furry little problem” yet and she felt it wasn’t right to bring it up, as Remus had made her swear she wouldn’t. During her second year, Lily had found out about Remus being a werewolf, as quite frankly he was the worst liar in the world. Lily was quite frankly surprised that more people hadn’t caught on but she had covered for Remus several times and indirectly, much to her displeasure, the other three Marauders.

“What, what about Remus?” asked Harmony in a curious voice.

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it,” said Lily quickly before abruptly changing the subject. “Potter frustrates me, as I know he could be better, he’s shown flashes of it before, but just when I think, he’s changed, he does something stupid. I know he’s intelligent but he doesn’t act like it.”

“It seems you care a little bit too much about this, Lily,” suggested Alexandra.

“What are you trying to say, Alex?” challenged Lily as she took a swig of her pumpkin juice.

“Well, one might think that you fancy Potter,” said Alexandra and this little proclamation caused Lily to spit her drink all over the table, causing a couple of fourth year girls to look over in disgust, before muttering.

“No, never, absolutely not,” said Lily quickly before sighing.

“Not even a little bit,” prodded Alice.

“Maybe,” said Lily skeptically. “If he wasn’t such a pompous git he might be actually charming, but his ego is a bit too much for me to swallow.”

“He’s matured a lot this year though,” said Harmony. “Not that I’m trying to make up your mind or anything, that’s up to you, Lily.”

Lily just sat rather silently in thought, before she looked over in her bag which had a slight glow to get her attention.

“Duty calls?” asked Alexandra.

“Yes,” remarked Lily dryly, wondering what they could want on a Saturday morning.

“If anyone asks, I’ll cover for you,” said Alexandra.

“Just use a different excuse this time, please,” pleaded Lily. “The one last time had half of the girls at Hogwarts grilling me about my mysterious and exotic boyfriend. I couldn’t get any homework done.”

“Yes, but you do have to admit, the look on Potter’s face was priceless when we used the foreign boyfriend excuse,” said Alexandra as the other girls laughed as well and even Lily cracked a smile as she rose to her feet, before searching for an empty classroom.

When she reached one on the second floor, Lily looked from side to side, making sure that no one was watching, before she made her way into the classroom, shutting the door behind her. Without another word, Lily unzipped her bag, before removing a golden scroll wrapped around an old tattered sweater. She placed the scroll in front of her and swirling silvery writing began to appear on the scroll, allowing the sixteen year old witch to read it.

Agent 05.22.01.14.19:

Kindly investigate strange fluctuations of unknown magic in the clearing beyond Hogsmeade Peak. Report back all findings as soon as possible

Sincerely

Super Agent 18.15.23.12.09.14.07.

Lily read over her instructions a couple more times, before she placed the scroll carefully back into her bag. Quickly, she removed a piece of parchment, a quill, and a bottle of ink, before hastily scratching a note, to tell her friends where she went. Tapping her wand to the note, it was sent straight to the Great Hall.

About an hour later, Lily had snuck out of the school and quickly made her way to the area indicated in the message. Right past Hogsmeade peak, Lily felt a sense of foreboding, by the atmosphere, but she pressed on nevertheless, reaching towards a gate. Behind the gate was a dark spiraling tower that seemed to extend past the clouds into the heavens and the air around completely reeked of dark magic.

Lily took a deep breath with having her wand out in front of her as she waved her wand and the gate creaked open, making a bit too much noise for her liking, prompting her to quickly put a muffling charm on the gate, before she made her way towards the front door.

Raising her wand, Lily prepared to open it but black mist blasted right from the door and that’s the last thing she saw before everything went black.

Hours later, Lily began to stir, feeling a splitting headache coming on and her vision rather hazy. It took her moments to gain a sense that her limbs were bound to a wall.

“Excellent, you’re awake,” commented a calm voice from outside the room.

“Where am I?” demanded Lily.

“That’s really none of your concern until the Master gets here, Mudblood,” said the voice from the other end. “As you might have already suspected, this building was allowed to be detected.”

“Yes, I did kind of figure that out when you knocked me unconscious,” replied Lily moodily.

“Quite, this building normally cannot be detected by even the most sophisticated magical tracking, the Dark Lord has made sure of this,” added the voice from outside the room.

Lily looked up, a rather horrified look crossing her face. Lord Voldemort was nearby or already here and to make matters worse, she was chained to a wall and didn’t have her want with her. A large number of scenarios ran through her head, none of them pleasant at the very least.

It was breakfast on Sunday morning and the Marauders were making their way down to Breakfast. James began to deviate from the normal area where the Marauders sat.

“Hey, Prongs, where are you going?” questioned Sirius.

“I’m going to talk to Lily, she should have had time to cool down and listen to reason,” responded James.

“Your funeral, mate,” replied Sirius with an indifferent shrug as James walked off. Sirius turned to Remus and Peter. “Think we can give him some moral support.”

“Depends, do you think you can not stick your foot in your mouth and make things worse,” answered Peter calmly which Sirius just gave a mock glare.

“Yes, I suppose that might be a good idea,” said Remus quickly and they followed James over to the other end of the Gryffindor table where Alice, Alexandra, and Harmony were sitting, looking a bit preoccupied with themselves. Alexandra looked up from her plate, to see James standing there.

“May we help you?” asked Alexandra coolly.

“I need to speak to Lily,” responded James. “Have you seen her?”

“Lily, Lily,” said Alexandra in a mock thoughtful voice.

“Yes, you know, beautiful girl, flowing dark red, auburnish hair, dazzling green eyes, your best friend,” suggested James in an irritated voice.

“Object of James’s undying obsession,” added Sirius which caused James to glare at him.

“She’s out for the weekend, actually I was hoping she would be back by now,” said Alexandra in a fretful voice.

“Why did she leave for the weekend, though?” asked James in a frustrated voice.

“Sorry, can’t say that, classified information,” answered Alexandra.

“I’m sure she’ll be back soon,” said Alice, although there was a little bit of a worried tone in her voice.

A bit of snickering was heard causing the Marauders to spin around, to see Sirius’s younger brother, Regulus standing in the background, the fourth year looking rather pleased with himself.

“I know where she went, but it doesn’t matter, as she’ll never return,” said Regulus in a smug voice which caused Sirius and James to go over to stare down Regulus.

“Tell us, now,” demanded James as Sirius held his wand close to his brother’s throat.

“She went to Hogsmeade Peak, actually an area a bit behind that,” said Harmony in a calm voice which caused Alice and Alexandra to look at her with incredulous looks.

“Hogsmeade Peak, that’s the highest mountain in Hogsmeade, right,” said Sirius and James nodded slowly, as they didn’t take their eyes off of the younger Black.

“Yes, Hogsmeade Peak, a romantic area,” said Regulus in a mock sweet voice. “What lies beyond is not too romantic though?”

“What lies behind, Regulus?” asked Sirius. “You have three seconds to spill it, you little twerp.”

“Don’t you listen to Mother and Father before they disowned you?” replied Regulus smoothly. “The Dark Lord has been known to operate out of that area. Of course, the Mudblood wouldn’t have been so reckless had she though you did that prank of mine yesterday, Potter and was a bit irritated with you.”

James and Sirius looked absolutely horrified, before motioning for Remus and Peter to follow them, towards an unoccupied corridor on the second floor.

“Lily’s been sent right into Voldemort,” said James.

“We need to tell Dumbledore,” suggested Peter.

“No, Lily will get in trouble, she might have not gotten permission to leave Hogwarts,” said James quickly. “I need to get the cloak and the map, to get to the shortcut that will allow me to easily get to Hogsmeade peak.”

“I’m coming too, James, I’m not letting you fight Voldemort by yourself,” said Sirius.

“No, Sirius, it’s a lot easier for me to get in and get Lily out alone, more people would attract too much attention,” responded James in a firm voice.

“What if she’s…” started Peter but James cut him off.

“No, she has to still be alive,” answered James as he made his way up to Gryffindor dormitories quickly, there wasn’t too much time to waste.

Time dragged by in an unbearabally slow matter as Lily attempted to free herself, but to her despair, the chains were magically reinforced and without her wand, she didn’t have a hope of breaking free.

Footsteps echoed from the corridor outside as Lily made another desperate attempt to pull herself free but alas failed. The door swung open and revealed a tall imposing figure wearing a black hooded robe. Pale hands with long, nearly skeletal, fingers poked out from underneath the sleeves of the robes.

The hooded figure stooped down, giving Lily a good look at the face from beneath the hood. Lily shuddered involuntarily, as she took in the inhumane, waxy looking, face and slit like red eyes that showed no emotion whatsoever. This was a face of a monster, the face of the most feared dark wizard in quite some time, the face of Lord Voldemort.

“Ah, Lily Evans, I must say, I have been looking forward to meeting you for some time,” said Voldemort in a calm, soft-spoken voice that caused the hairs on the back of Lily’s neck to stand up and Voldemort reached down, stroking Lily’s right cheek with one of his skeletal fingers.

“What do you want with me?” asked Lily in what she hoped was a calm, strong voice, but her tone was rather shaky.

“You fear me, child,” hissed Voldemort coldly. “That’s rather smart, showing your intelligence, many Gryffindors foolishly show no fear, unwilling to see what I can do with them, should they defy Lord Voldemort. Rest assured that you are safe, for the moment at least.”

Voldemort stood back, surveying Lily with his slit like eyes, as if determining something.

“I sense great ambition, you work hard towards everything, yet you fell undervalued, your accomplishments fall by the wayside, while those who are less mature get acknowledged, get all the acclaim and the admiration, by making everyone laugh by frivolous pranks,” said Voldemort. “Yes, Lily, I can see it in your eyes, you have a decent amount of power, but if you fall into the right crowd, you can be great, excellent, perhaps nearly as powerful as Lord Voldemort.”

“I had heard your followers didn’t like…my type,” said Lily quickly.

“They can be persuaded to make an exception,” answered Voldemort in a cold voice. “But, enough with the small talk, I am willing to offer you, Lily Evans, a spot in my Inner Circle, and power beyond your wildest imagination.”

Lily closed her eyes, deep in thought. It sounded quite appealing but at the same time, she heard the types of things Death Eaters gotten up to and it sickened her. Yet, again, by joining Voldemort, perhaps she could salvage...

The door creaked open, and Voldemort spun around, but no one appeared to be there, at least visibly. A wave of the wand illuminated the area, revealing the sketchy outline of James Potter from beneath an invisibility cloak.

James stood there like a deer in the headlights, as Voldemort quickly summoned the Invisibility Cloak from James, before effortlessly pulling him towards the wall. A swish of his wrist caused chains to fly from the wall, shackling the hands and feet of James.

“Ah, a Potter if I’m not mistaken,” remarked Voldemort. “I daresay you know who I am.”

“Yes,” replied James in a scornful voice.

“Now, I must commend you on making it this far without raising any my traps or meeting any of my followers,” said Voldemort as he picked up James’s wand, which had fallen to the ground. “Dumb luck, maybe, but not anyone could have been this lucky and it shows a great deal of power. You would be well served in joining me, the both of you.”

James was very close to open her mouth and Lily sensed he was about to reply with a comment that would kill them both, so she quickly talked over him.

“We’ll consider it,” said Lily quickly and James looked absolutely appalled and Voldemort waved his wand, to release the chains of both James and Lily, but before he could proceed much further, he felt the sensation of one of his Death Eaters calling him through their dark mark.

“I must attend to some urgent business, I shall return in a short time to receive your decisions,” said Voldemort, taking both James’s wand and cloak, exiting the room, with the door swinging shut, magically blocking entry or exit.

“I can’t believe you would think of joining, Voldemort!” yelled James in an incredulous voice, as he stared in Lily’s face, with a mixture of anger and betrayal. “You of all people, would be the last person I would ever think would join Voldemort, he represents everything that you’re against or I thought you were against, but obviously I was…”

“James, listen to me,” replied Lily in a firm voice. “It was obvious that I told Voldemort that so he would free us.”

James stood there, silent.

“He’s very powerful, he would have killed us in seconds, and that would be if we weren’t chained to the wall,” said Lily. “Not to mention the fact you didn’t have a wand to defend yourself.”

James nodded, as he thought about it, it did make sense, but unless Lily could pull some plan magically out of the air, they were stuck here until Voldemort got back and then the inevitable would happen.

“And another thing, what in the hell possessed you to come looking after me!” screamed Lily. “And how did you find out I was here anyway.”

“Regulus Black, you know Sirius’s brother, he bragged about you not coming back and your friends filled me in on where you went,” said James quickly. “I wanted to talk to you about what happened yesterday…”

“Save it,” answered Lily calmly. “I’m sorry, I overreacted, all right, I really didn’t think it through, are you happy now?”

“Not particularly,” said James. “Even if I didn’t, it put you in danger and not to make you feel any worse, but Regulus pulled the prank in question.”

Lily nodded, not really caring much about that right now. Right now, she concentrated to string together a workable plan to get both of them out of safety.

“We need to get out of here, get the wands and your Invisibility Cloak,” muttered Lily under her breath.

“Great, the door’s shut and we don’t have any wands,” said James.

“We don’t need a wand, we just need to use wandless magic,” said Lily quickly. “Visualizing wanting the door open, concentrating wanting the door open, should open it but I can’t do it alone, I need your help.”

“Okay,” replied James.

“On the count of three, visualize the door springing open, forget that you don’t have a wand, and it should work,” continued Lily before taking a deep breath. “One, Two, Three.”

It took a few seconds of intense concentration on the part of both teenagers, but the door swung open and James staggered forward, grabbing onto the wall.

“Are you okay?” asked Lily, not able to keep a tiny bit of concern from entering her tone.

“Fine, first time I’ve ever tried to do magic without a wand on purpose,” grumbled James.

“Yes, it’s always hard the first time, but let’s go,” said Lily quickly, beckoning James to come forward through the now opened door and into the long, winding corridor where there seemed to be dozens upon dozens of doorways and James looked around.

“This isn’t how it looked when I came through here,” muttered James in a befuddled voice.

“That’s what I was afraid of and our wands could be in any of these rooms, providing of course Voldemort didn’t take them with him,” answered Lily in a worried voice.

James remained silent and Lily screwed her eyes shut, knowing that it would take a great deal of wandless magic to summon their wands, but she had to try, the alternative wasn’t exactly pretty.

Surely enough, just as Lily slumped against the wall, two wands and the Invisibility Cloak soared down the hallway, before stopping at their feet. James quickly bent down and grabbed both their wands, before handing Lily hers and taking his.

“We better get under the cloak,” stated James but an imposing figure appeared down the hallway.

“Too late,” said Lily as Voldemort stood right there, his wand extended.

“Did you really think you could escape me that easy?” hissed Voldemort calmly, staring down both Lily and James, causing the two teenagers to take a few steps backwards. “Still, I’ll give you one more chance, to join me.”

Lily looked upwards, seeing a heavy chandelier swinging above Voldemort’s head and quickly used a slicing charm to disconnect it from the ceiling and a loud, inhumane shriek echoed throughout the halls.

“The answer’s no,” replied Lily coolly as Voldemort seemed to be momentarily stalled, but magical smoke slowly began to billow from underneath the chandelier.

“You dropped a chandelier on the most feared Dark Lord in a century,” remarked James in a partially awed, partially scared voice before the Chandelier broke into pieces and Voldemort rose up.

“RUN!” yelled Lily, as she grabbed James by the hand before forcing him down the hallway and she saw Voldemort rushing towards them.

“AVADA KEDAVRA!” yelled Voldemort but the Dark Lord was a little slow on the draw as Lily and James had already made their way around the corner into the next corridor.

“Did this part change, too?” inquired Lily.

“Yes, nothing’s the same than when I came through,” confirmed James and Lily quickly swung the door shut, before sealing it shut. “I don’t know how much good that’s going to do, Voldemort’s going to break through that in a minute.”

“A minute’s all we need,” replied Lily, as she reached under the sleeve of her robe, before pulling out her bag, shrunken to microscopic levels. She tapped her wand to it, causing it to grow back to its normal size and Lily reached through, before pulling out the golden scroll and tapping her wand to it.

“I don’t know how that’s going to help us,” responded James, as Voldemort seemed to be breaking through Lily’s charmwork.

“He has Anti-Apparation and Anti-Portkey wards, not to mention Anti-Animagus, around the majority of the building, but there is a way out, a flaw in the wards,” said Lily quickly.

“Better find it quick,” replied James as the door began to crumble and Voldemort’s face appeared on the crumbled doorframe as he ripped through.

“Run towards the wall and imagine yourself arriving safely in Hogsmeade…NOW!” yelled Lily and James seemed to find Lily’s suggestion silly and a bit out there, but did as she requested and sure enough they vanished into thin air, just as Voldemort had made another attempt of offing them with the Killing Curse.

James fell down, they were right outside Honeydukes.

“Congratulations James, you just successfully apparated,” praised Lily and the look on James’s face was absolutely priceless, when he realized what he had just done.

“Without a license, you actually encouraged me to break rules,” responded James in an incredulous voice. “Aren’t prefects supposed to follow the rules to the letter?”

“No, actually we aren’t supposed to get caught,” answered Lily with a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Something that you don’t have the proper grasp of, from the number of detentions that you received. Then again, we all must leave a legacy to Hogwarts”

“Beauty, brains, and a sense of humor, what else do you have up your sleeve, Lily?” demanded James.

“Hey, you’re not too bad yourself, when you’re not being a pompous, conceited, arrogant git and deliberately messing your hair up to the point it looks like you stuck your finger in a light socket,” replied Lily.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” remarked James cheekily.

“You would,” answered Lily shaking her head, but a fond smile appeared on her face, something that James didn’t see. “I suppose we better get back up to Hogwarts, it’s been a long evening.”

“Did you tell anyone about the tower?” wondered Daphne.

“The strange thing I did relay word to my superiors but the next day when they went around to investigate it, it was gone, no doubt Voldemort was able to move it or as I found out, cloak it from all magical detection,” responded Lily.

“You did really come around to the possibility of dating Dad during on that day,” commented Hailey.

“Yes, he did mature a lot during his sixth year, by his seventh year he had rather calmed down his troublemaking ways, and we had to work together as Head Boy and Head Girl a lot, so we forged a friendship that obviously turned into more,” answered Lily with a far off look in her eye and looked up at the clock, it was well into the afternoon and the others seemed to notice the amount of time that had passed.

“Let’s head down to the kitchens for lunch,” suggested Ginny.

“Yeah, I bet Dobby will be able to get us something to eat, he’s always eager to help,” added Harry.

“Yeah sometime’s so eager, it’s scary,” commented Theodore.

“True, but let’s go, I’m starving,” concluded Hailey.

Finally, Finally, I've made it through all the backlogged chapters of the Heart of the Warrior Series and posted them on FicWad. So from now on, this website will receive the updates as they become ready for publication!