Lily Evans is not sure that's the best idea (misslily) wrote in thosegathered, @ 2010-04-20 20:12:00 |
|
|||
The last week of school was usually Lily's least favourite as a Prefect. The pressure finally off, the student body tended to go a little wild, and at the head of the parade were the seventh years. As a fifth and sixth year Prefect, Lily had wanted to tear out her hair trying to patrol that last week of school. As a general rule she disliked taking points or giving detention, preferring instead to reward good behaviour rather than sew resentment with using a heavy hand with punishment. However in those last weeks she was usually forced to take more points than the entire year combined. This year was different. This year she was a seventh year and that restless urge to be beyond the walls of Hogwarts was settling into her as well. It was what kept her turning a blind eye to the rule breaking of the Dare War, to the snapping arguments that seemed to be in everyone's journal. She didn't want to take points and she didn't want to be the one to ruin this last week. So aside from that incident with Severus - which was completely different, she maintained - Lily was enjoying being blissfully ignorant. Except of course, for Tuesday. Tuesday was the night she and James patrolled the halls, and this last week was no different. Already they'd stumbled across six students out past curfew, four couples snogging, and a pair of students with an empty bottle of Firewhiskey. And the night had barely started. Lily was very quickly remembering why she usually hated this week. Pinching the bridge of her nose, Lily turned down a corridor on the fourth floor. This was officially the longest night of her life. "Do you think anyone would notice if I spent the rest of rounds curled up in Greenhouse two?" she asked James while they walked, reaching behind her head to twist up her hair and pin her wand through it before looking up at him. "It's warm, the plants in there won't eat me, and I think that's the one that smells like sage." What was Lily's least favorite week of school was no doubt James's favorite week of the year. Ever since he'd been a first year and he and Sirius had charmed half the girls in the school's hair pink, he'd looked forward to it from the minute he got on the Hogwarts express. And now it was here, and the prank war was hilarious and he was a seventh year, roaming the halls with permission and even if Evans seemed dead set on pretending they needed to care James wasn't having any of it. "Evans, Evans, Evansevansevans," he scolded, stepping in front of her and turning deliberately so she'd run into him midstride. "Beautiful, beautiful, Lily Evans," he added, a slight smirk brightening his features. "While I wouldn't say no to a warm roll in the hay down in the Greenhouse we'd be wasting a perfectly good opportunity to catch a snog anywhere," he teased. He didn't have even the tiniest hope that she'd actually agree to this plan but well-- seventh year + last week = worth a try! "There are so many places I could show you. Places I guarantee you've never seen. Places that aren't in any book or on any map except one. Let's let Filch have his fun and catch everyone in the whole damn place and you and I will have an adventure. And we don't even have to tell anybody," James said. "Our secret. I'll solemnly swear." His hazel eyes were brimming with mischief and he was having a difficult time not bouncing with excitement as he waited for answer. "Pretty please?" Lily's red eyebrows arched, nearly blending into her hair line. "Right. Let's just contribute to the chaos and anarchy and complete lawlessness that is this week. Because that sounds like such a brilliant id--" trailing off Lily shook her head, squeezing her eyes shut. "No, of course you think that's a brilliant idea, I don't even know what I'm saying," she muttered. Why had she not brought a headache draught with her again? "James we have," pausing, she glanced at the watch on her wrist, "two more hours. And then we will be off duty and can do whatever we like. But if I let you lead me into some completely random room I have never known or wanted to know of then I will be a hypocrite. Do you really want to be dating a hypocrite? Don't answer that." Crossing her arms she glanced around the abandoned corridor. Did they really have two entire hours left to go? Were rounds normally this long? Her shoulders slumped some. No. No she was not giving in. It was fine, really. They could do this. And then she glanced up at James again and he looked as if he had just seen Father Christmas and if she said no it would be like telling him that Father Christmas was really just his dad. She sighed. It wasn't fair, he was cheating by looking that excited. "I love it when you don't let me answer," he said with a grin. "Because I know that I probably argue loads better in your head than I do with my mouth." Without warning James scooped Lily up into his arms, holding her like a bride being carried over the threshold. "You're right though, no girlfriend of mine is going to be a hippogriff," he added. "Which is why you aren't going to be a willing participant. If anyone asks, I kidnapped you," he said, already moving with her down the hall, pretending to duck and dodge toward the corners and alcoves sometimes as if they were being followed. "Struggle all you like Ginger, I've got you now!" he play cackled, sounding like some awful villain from one of the WWN dramas. "You are helpless to my Head Boy persuasions!" Without warning he suddenly ducked through an alcove that was meant to have a solid back wall but that swished aside at the last minute like a curtain, revealing a hallway that students didn't typically have access to. "Well would you look at that," James said. "Weird. A hallway I bet you've never been in before! What a random event!" Instinct caused Lily's body to stiffen as soon as her legs left the ground, and her feet automatically kicked back ineffectively as James whisked her off to whatever secret space he'd discovered after years of scurrying around the castle like an overgrown spider. "James!" she started before realising that her voice was far far too loud for someone who did not want to be caught skiving off duties and being carried through the castle. "James," she tried again, her voice now at an appropriate whisper, "put me down James, I swear to God, this isn't funny!" But it was. And it didn't matter what she said, or the Muggle vernacular she slipped into when she wasn't thinking, her cheeks were pink and her eyes were sparkling and she tried kicking again even harder to make up for it. It didn't work. And then James was walking into a wall, but that wall was moving, and Lily let out a defeated sigh as her legs stopped kicking and she did her best to glare up at him. "Oh James. How clever are you. I thought for sure we would hit that wall. I am so impressed with your skills," she said in a slow monotone, punctuated with a roll of her eyes as she tried very hard not to actually give truth to her words and look around the hallway in amazement. "Oh, you can play unimpressed Evans, but we both know you're grinning on the inside," he insisted, hugging her to his body to thwart her attempts at escape until the were half way down the first hall. Now turning around there were alcoves everywhere and she wouldn't find her way out without him. Not that he'd let her try. If she really wanted to go back he'd take her but a little adventure was good for the soul. He slung his arm around her now, giving her a playful squeeze and even stealing a kiss from her cheek as he led her along. "Guess where we are," he insisted, "And if you get it right in three tries I'll help you with the Dare War for the rest of the week and you can let me be the bad guy anytime you want. Just one ward and I'll swoop in and start shouting and taking point and everything," he promised, stopping so he could look at her because James could never get enough of Lily's face. Ever. Immediately the look of annoyance Lily had been trying to convey evaporated. That was a good deal. That was a very good deal. Suddenly trying to get out and convince herself to return to rounds was the absolute last thing on Lily's mind as she struggled against James' arm around her in order to look at absolutely everything, down to the most minute details. "Well it seems like a tunnel system of sorts," she started, speaking mostly to herself as a means to work out the problem without the benefit of quill and parchment to help make a chart. Verbal charts would have to suffice. "We came in through a hidden alcove and walked down a hall and there are now several alcoves. A first assumption would be that these alcoves also lead to seemingly normal alcoves located in strategic places throughout Hogwarts. If it is a tunnel system and that is the case and Filch is aware of this it would explain how he gets from one place to another so ridiculously fast. So 'back door tunnel system' is my first guess." Pausing, she began to listen, holding a distracted hand up to cover her boyfriend's mouth so he couldn't start talking and distract her while she was trying to listen. Nothing. Crinkling her nose she removed her hand and crossed her arms. "I can't hear anything, but that could just be because most people are in bed. Am I allowed to ask questions? Wait." Ignoring her question about questions, Lily's nose - scrunched as it was - detected an unpleasant scent. Quickly she inhaled again and regretted it, looking up and raising her eyebrows at James. "If you took me to the place Hogwarts stores their garbage so we can snog I'm not going to be thrilled. I don't want to leave smelling like a rubbish bin." "Not a back door tunnel system, no," James said with a grin, though really that was a good guess. "But you're getting warmer. Not that you aren't hot already," he added, giving her another squeeze, about to say something else when he smelled something rotten too. Something he'd never smelled before. "Ugh, no," he said, wrinkling his nose. "No where near the garbage. That's down three levels and on the other side of the school," he added knowledgeably. "Not far from Slytherin to tell you the truth. No... nothing up here should smell like that." He tugged at her hand as they continued walking down the alcove, now with James peeking in each one. He was a few steps ahead of her, completely done with their game and only concentrating on the vaguely familiar stench. He'd never smelled anything just like it but as a deer he'd smelled close. He couldn't place it though. Couldn't place it till he spotted a leg. "SHIT, LILS, stop!" James halted and turned to shield her from the sight at least momentarily, backing the both of them up. "It's Professor Frome." When James grabbed her hand, Lily had pulled her wand out from her hair with her free one and kept it ready, just in case. Not that she expected to need it, but it was always a good habit. She stayed behind him, letting him take lead since he knew this place and she didn't, however when he stopped suddenly and backed them away and gave her that exclamation... well, Lily dropped his hand then. "What do you mean it's Professor Frome?" she asked, slipping away from him and looking down where he had just been looking. For a second she froze, the stench strong at the source and the sight of their - now former - professor lying there. But then she felt herself moving, walking over to the clearly dead body and kneeling beside it, placing two fingers on his neck beneath his chin. No pulse. Not that she'd expected one, but it was procedure, wasn't it? Making sure of a death before it was pronounced? Lily withdrew her fingers from his neck, moving them to his eyes and closing his eyelids one by one. It took effort, but Lily swallowed hard and turned her head to the side, looking up at James from where she sat and doing her best to hide the look of terror on her face. "We need a professor, James. Or Dumbledore. I don't know how to get out of here or how to get back so you're going to have to go. I'll stay with Professor Frome." "Hell no, Lily," James said, his nose still wrinkled because oh Godric he was breathing in dead person and Lily now had dead person on her hands. "He's dead he doesn't need a guardian, and whatever killed him knows how to get back here and could still be around. We've got to stick together. Come on. We'll find him again. I know exactly where we are, and a short cut to Dumbledore's office." James already had his wand out and he was aiming it down the hall suspiciously. "He isn't going anywhere and I'm not going to let anything happen to either of us," he said. "Please Lils, don't fight me on this." "He's been here for days by the look and the smell, whoever left him here isn't coming back for him," Lily reasoned, trying to keep her voice calm, but even she could hear it shaking. "It will be much quicker if only one of us goes. You can run much faster than I can, and without waiting for me to follow you you will get there and back in no time." Looking away from James, she turned her eyes back to Professor Frome. He was her third, she couldn't help thinking. Didn't bad things happen in threes? Would people stop dying now? It had only been a couple months ago that she'd seen her mum like this. Not exactly like this, really, there's been a coffin and - Lily shook her head. Her hands in her lap now as she used both of them to clutch her wand while she starred at the body. "We're not leaving him alone. I'm not leaving him alone. So either you go and get help or we're both going to be sitting here until someone finds us," she offered stubbornly, finally tearing her eyes away to look back up at James. "I'll be fine. Promise." James paused for a moment and then took a large, folded piece of paper out of his pocket. "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." The map opened and unfolded as James pulled it apart and then flipped it over several times and handed it to her. "Look here," he said, pointing to the spot where they were, their names staying still on the page. "If any living person is coming you'll see," he said. "I'll explain about the map later. Sit tight and I'll be right back," he added. "Any name at all floating in this direction, go ahead and run out the alcove across the way. You'll end up near the suit of armour with the chicken looking thing on it, near Ravenclaw tower." He looked as if he wanted to say something else, but took one more glance at their professor and then took off down the hall, three alcoves and then he disappeared. The map in her hands, Lily starred at it as James explained about floating names and corridors. Her mouth dropped open into an 'O' shape of wonder as her eyes traveled over the parchment in amazement. There was a dot, and her name was on it, and beside her was another dot with James' name on it. What in the world was this and how the hell had James been the one to get it? Eventually he paused long enough and she glanced up at him and nodded dumbly, holding his eyes for that brief moment before he turned and left. And she was alone. Alone with this map in her hand and her Defense professor at her side. Without really knowing what she was doing, Lily's other hand that wasn't holding the map fell to her side and wrapped around the cold wrist of the professor. Who knew how he had died, or who had done it. Had he suffered? Was it quick? Had he known he was about to die? Wherever he was now, did he know she was here with him? Did it even make a difference? Her hand tightened around the wrist, and she kept her eyes trained to the map, following the miniscular dot that signified James as it sped rapidly down the hallways. James would bring help. He would get Dumbledore, or someone, and he would come back. All she had to do was sit here, and wait, and watch. |