The Dangers of Magic

Chapter One: Caffeinated Coffee Isn't Always Cool

It was a bright yet cold day, as crisp as newly ironed laundry, some might say. It was quite cloudy, but the sun shone weakly through the thick and luminous clouds, and the cheery yellow sun hadn't shown up for ages. It seemed like today would be different.

And Christmas was at hand, and Diagon Alley reeked of it. Of course, it was a nice reek, if reeks could be nice. Every shop was busy pushing away old Thanksgiving displays and showing new and expensive yet desirable items that were a Must-Have for the whole family. Elves were paid big money to dress up like the stereotypical fairy tale elves and sing Christmas carols in fake, high, twittering voices. Every candy shop offered new kinds of Candy Canes, Chocolates, and new flavours of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans (the Special Christmas kind) . Peppermint, Mistletoe (Hold over your lover's head and kiss!) Candy Cane, and every other Christmas Flavour. And then there was the drawback, almost every single person decided to come right there and then and do their Christmas shopping, which was quite unfortunate to some. Or maybe it was just their fault they hadn't shown up sooner. Who knew, it was a time to be merry and happy and jolly, and a time to give, and all sorts (even a rather chubby man with a huge white beard) were turning up in the Leaky Cauldron.

Lily Evans was a bright and cheery nineteen year old. Bright and cheery, that was, until the time to shop for Christmas presents came to hand. Then people met (and watched out for) Bittersweet and Sarcastic Lily Evans. At the moment, she gave the impression of being rather merry and joyful, but if you dared to cross her path and upset her, she'd be sure to sprout claws and grow fangs for your benefit, or rather your disadvantage. She could terrify most people when she was in the wrong mood, and people were sure that with Dumbledore and herself, no Death Eater, nor Voldemort, himself, would stand a chance, what with Dumbledore's immense power and Lily's sharp tongue which tended to launch insults like a snake spitting venom. Which would obviously sting very badly. Yes sir, don't cross her path, her flame James Potter and friends Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew would say. After all, who else to ask, but her frequent victims? Lily Evans was the only person who could control James and Sirius, even the slightest if not completely. A sharp tongue was not all she possessed that portrayed her individuality. Her startling green eyes and ample red hair added to her unique personality which equalled a one-of-a-kind Muggleborn witch. At the moment she was counting off the people whom she selectively decided needed presents.

Obviously one for James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter. All the Professors, except maybe Sulton, (The Ravenclaw Herbology teacher that Lily could not stand. It was a back and forth cycle of insults that Lily often lost because of the sulky professor's advantage of deducting points. Needless to say, Lily's fellow Gryffindors weren't necessarily pleased with her that year.) my parents, my friends, that's four and eight and two and two, which is... Damnit. twelve and four... sixteen! All right then, sixteen presents it is.

And while absorbed in her mathematical thoughts (Ah, how nice a calculator would have been!), she didn't notice the rather tall and dark haired man walk up behind her and tap her on the shoulder. After she jumped violently for a moment, she turned to face him.

He was tall, no doubt, with brilliant green-grey eyes. Lily didn't like the look of him, he could have been handsome if it hadn't been for that peculiar aura around him. He was rather, creepy. the only way to describe him. Very dark brown hair, sort of square set face. Reminded her a bit of someone, but she didn't know who.

"I saw you come in," he said, with a pleasantly eerie smile.

Okay, I knew I needed stocking stuffers, some stuffed animals wouldn't do amiss, and neither would socks... But I really don't recall 'Stalker' being on the list...

"Right," she replied dubiously. She didn't know how to handle Stalkers, really. No one had ever stalked her before. At least, not that she couldn't remember.

"Don't you remember me?" he asked, looking somewhat hopeful.

Lily blanched. "Hmm?" she asked nervously. Her brain did not like it when they couldn't place a face.

"It's me! Oh, it's so good to see you again! It's been a while since Hogwarts, hasn't it?" he asked, in an even more excited voice, in which he could hardly contain his sudden excitement at seeing her.

Hogwarts? She thought weakly. Oh shit.

"O-oh." Lily turned on a rather nervous version of her confident smile, which had never been used before. "H-how are you?"

"I'm great! And you?" he asked, giving her a look over.

"I'm, just, great. Absolutely fine!" she added with fake enthusiasm. She figured she might as well match his bouncing demeanour.

"Well, how about a drink?" he asked, smiling.

"Eh," she stuttered, nervous again. She wondered how rude it would have been to ask his name.

"How'd you like to, you know, catch up?" The man gave her another excited look.

"Oh, um, I should, uh," Lily stammered, thinking just what in the world should she do.

"Please? It would be so much fun!" Again, with the bouncy charisma which was rapidly grating on Lily's nerves. Damn all bouncy and vivaciously happy men who claimed they knew you!

"Oh, er, well, um, what's your-" she attempted to ask.

The man didn't give her a chance to answer. He probably took her previous stutterings as a "Yes, I'd abso-bloodly-lutely love to have a drink with a man I know bloody nothing about!" To which he said, "Oh, I know a great place down the street! They sell Orange Mocha Frappuccinos!" He winked at her.

Lily was beginning to dislike this man even more. She wrinkled her nose in disgust. Who the hell would drink something like Orange Mocha Frappuccinos? Not her. And definitely no one she was friends with. Except for maybe Sirius... But then again, he was delusional and he'd drink just about anything. Or eat anything for that matter. And do... oh, that brought back memories of him stripping when Gryffindor won the Quidditch cup in their last year. That was not pretty. Actually, that was a lie, he did have- she shook her head. Enough with the mental pictures.

"Uh, great. When do you want to go?" Lily was dreading this little meeting. She would have to ask James just what kind of a bleedin' nut would go to Hogwarts and be so chummy with her. She'd rush in to the place, take a quick glance around and suddenly remember she had an important engagement, which she had previously forgotten.

"How about now?" he asked, flashing her a great debonair smile.

"Sure..." she trailed off as he grabbed her arm and began towing her away to the place where they sold Orange Mocha Frappuccinos.

Turned out that she didn't have a chance to escape. This strange, perky, man had got her wrist in a steel-tight bind and led her to the counter to order with him. He babbled nonstop, talking over Lily, deaf to her pleas and whatnot.

She had ordered something that was a seemingly innocent cup of coffee. Very innocent looking that just screamed, "DRINK ME!". Literally. Some of the cups were enchanted to sing at the top of their voice, and unluckily, the strange but supposedly familiar, man in front of her had one, and yet he didn't seem to mind at all. This was one of those hip coffee bars Lily had heard her friends rave about. New fangled cups and coffees to delight the young and young at heart. Lily snorted at such things, and now she looked at herself, almost disgusted. Lily was tempted to order what ever murky orange-brown gunk he'd ordered, since it seemed to calm him down from his active mood. Instead, she stuck with good old, run-of-the mill, highly caffeinated coffee. Ah, sweet coffee, come to thee. The coffee was exceptionally bitter, seeing it had no milk. She took the first sip happily.

That may not have been the wisest thing to do. Suddenly caffeinated coffee didn't seem to agree with her as much as it did before. She felt quite woozy after the first sip. And whatever part of her she knew wasn't feeling drunk was very upset with giving in to this strange man's offer since it happened to bring her off her high horse, and scolded herself about the extra calories coffee was sure to give her. It didn't have any calcium either. Of course, it didn't do any good to have her subconscious screaming at her when she felt like she was drunk, because she did absolutely nothing to obey it. All she did was feel tipsy and drink her coffee which tasted strangely like beer and champagne mixed. And it was not a very nice taste, yet she couldn't put it down.

"So, you come here often?" he asked, with another charming smile.

"Er, no," she managed to say in a seemingly normal voice. Her brain was starting to go fuzzy. And the noise level had increased several decibels.

"Really? But then you must come to Diagon Alley often?" The man asked.

"Yeah," she slurred. And in the midst of saying something, she fumbled, faltered, and then she felt her eyes becoming unfocused. And it didn't feel cool. The man grabbed her arm and led her firmly to the back entrance. There, he leaned her up against the wall and rummaged in his pocket for a small red ball. He placed it into her hands and watched her unconscious hands magically fold over the ball. Thereupon, he pulled out his wand and placed it over the tip of the ball and murmured, "Indivina Portsi Keyour." It was amazing how this man could suddenly look like a mad scientist (among other things) named Lestrange. She subconsciously cursed herself for even considering having something to do with man who's first name she didn't even know. Then it hummed, and Lily, subconsciously, felt that annoying feeling of a hook around her navel.

* * *

"Where the heck is Lily?" James asked, looking at the clock. "It's been over three hours since she said she was going to come back. This isn't like her."

Sirius shrugged. "Probably picked up a better looking bloke and went to go have dinner with him or something," he said, with a mischievous gleam in his bright blue eyes.

James swatted him with a spatula. "That's not funny!" he said.

"I think it is," he told James very honestly. It wasn't like James to be so worried, he never worried about anything practically his whole entire life. And only now he had been worrying about Lily constantly, as if she were a scatter brained two year old instead of his mature nineteen year old girlfriend.

"James, would you relax, please? Lily is probably running late, goodness knows how many people choose to do their Christmas shopping now," Remus called from James's living room.

"Well, she's always the one lecturing people on making an effort to come when they tell us their going to. It just seems weird that Lily wouldn't practice what she has been preaching to us all the damn time." James closed his eyes and leaned against the cupboard, which turned out to be a mistake. The spaghetti James was cooking for a surprise for Lily decided to explode right then and there and all the sauce splattered on James, the sparkling tile, and infested itself on the grout Lily insisted getting.

Sirius and Remus were heard guffawing in the living room, and Peter was chuckling along with them.

"Hey!" James protested. "That wasn't funny!"

"To you maybe!" Remus called, still gasping for air.

"Shut - it- right now!" James growled, flinging the spaghetti sauce covered spatula in the living room which flecked little specs of sauce on Sirius.

"Great," he said, looking over himself. "I know I'm desirable, I know I'm very sexy, but I didn't know I was edible."

"Don't forget those beautiful eyes! And the gorgeous hair that just demands to be played with! Oh, and that whole Pureblooded rich thing that just makes girls go weak at the knees!" Remus added sarcastically.

"Do you want him?" James gestured towards the red spotted dark haired man in the family room.

Remus eyed him critically. "To skinny, not nearly with enough muscle, messy hair is a no no, and those eyes are just creepy! And his-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence!" Sirius said indignantly. " And I am not skinny!"

"Of course you are dear. It's all right, it's not like it's a big secret," Peter said with a grin.

"You," Sirius pointed to Peter. "Shush. And as for the two of you." He turned with a wicked smile to his other two friends.

"FOOD FIGHT!" And he majestically scooped up a handful of sauce that dropped on his knees and slid to the floor in a puddle of goopy and bumpy red stuff.

"Oh no, Lily will kill me," he said, hurrying to get a towel or something to clean it up before it hardened.

James sobered immediately. "I'll clean it up," he said with a doleful, grim look on his face.

"I just can't imagine what's taking her so long," James sighed.

"Listen, James, I'm sure she's fine wherever she is, which is probably in Diagon Alley cursing whatever people get in her way and is probably cursing at you because you are so hard to shop for." Remus gave James a pat on the back. "Don't worry, Lily can definitely take care of herself, or my name's not Remus J. Lupin."

"Then what is it?" Peter asked.

"I don't think you're making it any better, Peter." Sirius said, watching James go from slightly cheery to down in the dumps.

"I hope she's okay." James started cleaning up the spilt spaghetti sauce.

* * *

The man who, at this time, greatly resembled a man named Lestrange watched Lily disappear slowly, and then she faded. Soon there was nothing left except shimmering air. He walked away satisfied. Mission Impossible was suddenly Mission Accomplished. He strolled away innocently whistling a catchy tune.

* * *

Lily slammed into a wall. She shook her head and was accompanied by a horrific hangover and a nasty headache to boot. Rubbing her sore back, she stumbled into the coffee bar, just as a shadow leapt to the front.

She walked into the coffee bar and was given another shock. Not only was there no coffee bar, there were no people who looked even remotely familiar. No screaming coffee cups and no obnoxious elves outside the shop. Lily shook her head fuzzily and climbed on a barstool where she had her head in her hands.

"Had too much?" the bartender asked her with a grin.

"I don't remember," she moaned. Flashing her a sympathetic yet cocky grin, he went ahead to serve man who was waiting by her.

She suddenly felt another bout of wooziness. She blinked rapidly for five minutes and then it passed. So this was the reason she never touched champagne. Well other than the time she was drugged by James, but she didn't like to talk about that. No siree.

"I'm er, going to go," she told the bartender. The bartender just gave her a look that plainly read, "Do I really care?". She hopped off the barstool and nearly collided into a man with a mug of what smelt like eggnog. Which was strange because she didn't think bars sold eggnog, but then again, maybe it was spiked.

"Oh!" she blinked. "I'm so sorry! I didn't see you."

The man laughed. It was a very pleasant laugh, very cheery.

"That's quite all right miss. I suppose I should have been watching where I was going." He gave her a roguish wink. Again, the part of Lily that didn't feel drunk was annoyed. Just how attractive was she, for all those annoying men to keep hitting on her? James had better watch out one of these days, there was sure to be a nice bloke who was better looking than James. Maybe Sirius- And then she was rambling again.

"Say, are you all right? You look a little..." he trailed off, his dark, dark blue eyes searching for the right word.

"Sick?" Lily supplied.

"Yeah," he agreed. "that's it."

"Yeah, I'm not feeling too good." Lily flashed him a champion smile (for someone who was drunk).

"Don't you want to sit down and rest up for a while? I'm almost positive that the bar's open all night." The man smiled.

"No, no that's really alright. I'll manage to get home just fine, trust me," she told the man confidently.

"So you're saying you come here a lot and get drunk?" he asked with his arms folded.

"Well, not really." She managed another laugh. "Just enough to get tipsy."

The man held out a hand. "Tom's the name. And what would your lovely name be?"

"Lily," she paused and decided she might as well go with the flow. If the man was hitting on her, she'd let James on him. That would wipe the smile of his choirboy face. "Evans."

"Well, Lily, would you like to sit down? I'm sure I'd feel a lot better if you felt better and could walk home without getting hit by a car," Tom gave her a big winning smile and gestured to a seat in the back.

"What time is it? I sort of, er, lost track of the time," Lily replied truthfully.

"I believe it's, ten p.m." Tom squinted at the clock on the mantle piece.

Ten p.m?! Lily thought frantically. Good lord! I was supposed to be back ages ago! I said I'd be back by five, five thirty at the latest! What the hell is James going to say? Oh no... I knew I should have shopped earlier! It happens every damn year!

"Yeah, all right. I'll have a seat." Lily pulled a seat up resignedly and plopped down on it. Ooh, if she ever got home, she'd never do her Christmas shopping late again. Heck, the last day of November she'd go out and buy everything.

"Are you sure nothing's bothering you? You look... depressed." Tom bent his head down and stared at her, those twin blue flames boring holes through her, as if roving through her every thought.

"I'm sure," she said with a heavy sigh. "Well, no, I'm not. But I really don't want to talk about it."

"I wasn't trying to force you too, just incase it would make you feel better." Tom patted her shoulder, but he had to bend to reach it.

"I know, sorry," she flashed him an apologetic smile.

"It's all right." He pulled a chair beside her. "Are you hungry? I don't know why bars never sell anything except alcoholic stuff. Gets rather tiring after a while. If I come here and I want dinner I have to run all over town to try and find a good place to eat. Home cooked meals are nice, but sometimes I have to get out. Have you ever felt like that?" he asked her.

Lily nodded. "Sometimes, yeah. But I usually don't go out to eat. I save my money, like any normal person does. Y'know, so I have something spare to spend." she flashed him a cheeky grin. "I don't believe in splurging money."

"I don't either," he said.

"What, you get all those meals free?" she asked mock disbelief.

"Well, no," he admitted. "I do splurge then."

She rapped him on the head with two fingers. "You're not supposed to give in to an argument. It doesn't give me enough chance to exercise my debating skills," she said severely.

"Well, maybe you convinced me entirely too much," he said fluttering his eyelashes.

Lily wrinkled her nose. "Are you hitting on me?"

Tom grinned, "Do you want me to?"

"You have way to dark hair, eyes look purple, not nearly muscular enough, choirboy face... I'd have to say pass." Lily studied him carefully.

"Hey now!" Tom protested. "I'm not that bad, am I?"

"You don't want to know the answer." Lily turned on her cheeky grin full blast. "You know what? I am hungry. What's the best place to eat around here? Then I'll probably find my way home." Lily was groaning inwardly about the long trek back home, from wherever she was. It would seem kind of stupid to ask where Godric's Hollow was, because she doubted a Muggle would know. Still, he was an awfully nice Muggle.

"Find your way home? It's like you zapped yourself here and you don't know where you are," Tom said with a concerned grin.

Little did he know how close he was to the truth, Lily thought dryly. She still didn't know how she ended up here, but she was going to find Godric's Hollow if it killed her. Not that James or anyone would actually like that. Come to think of it, Lily wouldn't either, but it opened up numerous possibilities for revenge on Petunia.

"That's nonsense." She laughed it off.. What if I'm miles away from Godric's Hollow? I can't be in another continent, Tom's British. What if I'm in Epsom and I didn't know it? James, help me... Lily fretted.

"Well, I mean If you need a place to stay, I could always lend out a spare guest room." Tom looked at her. "For as long as you need it. Because, honestly now, do you have any money for a hotel?"

"Well, no," she admitted, "I don't have money for a hotel."

"What, were you planning on spending the whole night on the streets?" he asked severely.

"No," she admitted again. "I didn't really have a plan."

"Well now you do," he said briskly. "You're staying the night at my place at the very least. Not till you find a way to go back home."

A forceful gentleman. I never thought I would have seen the day... Lily thought as she followed Tom out the door.

It was a brisk, cold, dark night. It had rained some time during the evening. Tom had taken such long strides that she had to almost run to keep up with him. He was also very tall. Around the same height as James, she would say. And that was quite tall. She herself wasn't very short, about a head shorter than James.

"If you do need clothes, my maid will be sent out to get some," he said over his shoulder.

"Oh that's extraordinarily kind of you, Tom. There is no need, I'll just use these." She made a gesture to the rather crumpled clothes she was wearing.

"No, I insist," he laughed.

As they kept walking, Lily glanced at a newspaper flying by,

The London Express

December 1^st, 1946