Heading the School

Chapter Ten

"So he said no?" Lily sighed, as her and Sirius huddled in a corner of Transfiguration. Remus, who was currently not speaking to Sirius or Lily when they had left him and Emmeline in the library the other day, was sitting on the other side with James, who was blissfully ignorant of the entire project.

"He said that if I ever mentioned the words ‘Emmeline,' ‘Friday night,' and ‘date' in the same sentence again, he'd hex me into next week," Sirius frowned. "He's being awfully moody, and it's not even close to his time."

"Perhaps we should back off a bit, then," Lily said. "Because every time I even mention Remus to Em, she gets so withdrawn-"

Sirius stared at her.

"Withdrawn for her," Lily clarified. "And I think that it might be hurting her more and more if we continue to press it."

"I don't wanna give up, though," Sirius put his head in his arms and peered out.

"How about we just put it on hold for now?" Lily suggested. "I mean, we could just let nature run its course-"

"Then Moony'll be an old man before he ever makes a move," Sirius snorted as McGonagall came into the classroom.

"You four! Come join the rest of the class today," McGonagall said to the Auror trainees during the second week of November. "Today we will be discussing something that concerns you as well."

Lily and Sirius reluctantly joined the other two (Remus keeping a distance) and sat closer to the rest of their classmates. All thoughts of Remus and Emmeline put on hold, they looked towards McGonagall.

She waited until they were settled before continuing on. "For the next 6 weeks, you will be spending your free periods shadowing a person in your chosen profession. This is your final chance to see if your choice in a job is the one that you want to pursue. Here is a list of people that have offered their time to have you come and spend time with them, and I expect for you all to be on your best behavior."

She stared long and hard at James and Sirius. They smiled back innocently and took the list from her, as the rest of the class crowded around them. Each person was chattering animatedly as they looked down the list for their profession.

"Professor, what about me?" Peter asked, not even looking at the list. McGonagall rounded on him tersely.

"What about you?"

"D'ya think that I should....maybe try again with the Auror thing?" he asked, quietly.

"I think that you...." she sighed. "I think you should try to shadow someone out of the action. Perhaps a bank manager would be more your style."

"Moody wants to take three kids." James said, back over at the list. "C'mon guys, let's get him."

"Who's Moody?" Lily asks, looking over. Sirius was signing his, James', and Remus' names next to the name Alastor Moody, Auror.

"He's one of the best Aurors there are," James said. "My dad works with him."

Lily looked over his shoulder and saw that Emmeline had signed up with a woman named Marlene McKinnon, Auror and signed her name next to it. Down the list, the Prewitt twins were also signed up with another Auror, one that she'd never heard of before.

"Wonder who Snivellus is shadowing?" Sirius scanned the list. His finger stopped in front of the name Lucius Malfoy, Private Business. Sirius narrowed his eyes.

"Married to my cousin, this one is," he murmured. "No wonder Snivellus signed up with him. They're both going to be Death Eaters."

He passed the list to another girl who then passed it to their remaining classmates. Peter ended up signing up next to someone who was a bank manager at Gringotts, a man named ‘Rosier' and looked very downcast about it, however, he was the only one. All the 7th years could talk about was getting to leave school for two or three hours at a time and be, for the most part, unsupervised.

The seven who already were given permission to go to Hogsmeade every other day and Apparate away from the school were very nonchalant about the whole process. Though, that didn't stop them from asking for advice from former students who also were in their classes. They had a few minutes to relive the old times before the class started.

"Yeah, I shadowed Alastor Moody," Sturgis was telling them. "I remember that field work that he took me on. Battles, you know? ‘Course, he told me to stay in the back, and not get in the way, but still, it was exciting."

"Did you see him kill any Death Eaters?" One of the twins asked.

Sturgis shook his head. "One thing that Moody hated more than anything else was when the Prime Minister allowed for Aurors to use the Unforgivable Curses to bring in Death Eaters. He said that it wasn't right sinking down to their level."

"But you saw Death Eaters?" James asked. "What do they look like?"

"They have hoods covering their faces with only two slits for eyes," Sturgis remembered. "They moved in one straight line, shooting hexes and curses as they went."

"Did you see anyone die?" Lily asked, nervous.

"Nope. They didn't kill anyone when they were having these big street fights. These were scare tactics to terrify the population of a town. They thought it was fun. When they really wanted to kill someone, they'd come to their house. The lucky ones get out before there is any real damage done, or they're tipped off. Everyone else..."

"So it's all action?" James grinned to Sirius. "Excellent."

"Well, I wouldn't be so sure about that-" Sturgis corrected, but the two boys were already off dreaming about killing themselves some Death Eaters.

James, Sirius, and Remus walked out of one of the elevators into the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and, first, made a beeline to James' father's office, which was down the hall from Moody's. Mr. Potter was looking through a book intently and James could see it was most certainly not on any sort of ‘law enforcement,' as it had Chaser strategies outline on the front page.

"Working hard there, Dad?" James grinned. Mr. Potter looked up and grinned.

"Skipping school again James?" he laughed.

"Nah, we're shadowing with Moody for the next couple of weeks."

"Good for you, kiddo. How's your girl?" he asked. "Is she shadowing anyone?" James looked as if he forgot for a moment.

"McKinnon," Remus prompted, and James nodded.

"Marlene? She's a peach, that one. Her whole family's devoted to the cause in some way or another."

James was about to respond again when a scratchy and loud voice shot by them. "POTTER!" Both James and his father jumped and Mr. Potter's book fell on the ground.

"Merlin's beard Moody!" Mr. Potter ran his hand over his face and through his hair. "What do you want?"

"I thought I saw my little miscreants in here,' Moody walked in, and the three parted like the Red Sea. "This your son, Potter?"

James gulped and nodded. Moody seemed to be sizing him up and then sniffed. He then whirled on Sirius who had an identical look of nervousness on his face.

"And you would be the Black son who moved in with him?" Sirius nodded. "Good for you son. I'd hate to have to throw you in Azkaban someday." He chuckled. Then he whirled on Remus and just looked him up and down and said nothing. Remus breathed a sigh of relief.

"All right boys, I've got to get back to work, so you three go with Alastor and I'll talk to you later."

They filed out of the room one by one and followed Moody down to his office. It was filled with all sorts of Dark Magic detecting devices that went off when they walked into the room. Moody turned to glare at them.

"Planning something devious, boys?" he questioned.

"N-No sir," James smiled innocently.

"I don't like your smile, son. You look like you're hiding something." James stopped smiling and Sirius stifled a laugh. Moody turned on him as well. "And you've already got a bad look about you, if you're from the Black family." Sirius stopped laughing. "The only one of you that looks the most innocent is this one," he stuck a thumb at Remus. He managed a half-smile.

James spoke up next. "Erm, Mr. Moody-"

"Call me Moody, everyone else does."

"Yes, sir, Moody-"

"Just Moody," he barked.

"Yes, Moody. Erm, when are we going to go into the field-"

"Field?!" he barked, laughing. "Potter you need to learn how to run before you can crawl." With that, he took a giant stack of papers on his desk and divided them into three stacks (coincidentally, Remus' was remarkably smaller than either James' or Sirius') and handed them a self-inking quill.

"Now boys, this is quite easy. All your doing it copying these attack reports twice." He glared at them. "Make sure you don't screw up!" he barked, causing all three of them to jump.

"M-Moody?" James asked, looking at his giant pile that, while sitting in his lap, was almost taller than he was. "Are the blank ones inside here?"

Moody gave a menacing chuckle. "No boys, the blank ones are in here." He tapped a file cabinet. James looked at Sirius who was looking a bit green. He continued to chuckle. "And you boys won't need to use magic on these."

"But-why not?" Sirius whined. Moody came within an inch of his face in three seconds flat.

"Because I want to see you squirm."

"Y-Yes sir," Sirius choked out.

"And I can tell if you've used a Copying Charm, so don't try it," he smirked and walked out of his office, still chuckling happily.

"Well, let's get to work," Remus said, putting his mediocre-sized stack on the desk and going to the blank file cabinet. James and Sirius glared at him and gave him an equal share of the papers.

"What the bloody hell he thinking, making us do paperwork?" Sirius growled, starting on his first copy of the paper. "I mean, what Auror does paperwork?"

James shrugged. "And why can't we use Copying Charms?"

"When are we going to be seeing action?" Sirius whined, beginning on his first paper.

"I have a nasty feeling that Moody's not going to let us see any action," Remus frowned.

"Oh shut up, brown-noser," Sirius glared at him.

"Marlene was positively brilliant!" Lily bragged as her and James did their midnight rounds. "She showed us all around the headquarters and introduced us to all of the other Aurors. I met Moody and asked for you, but he said that you were busy."

James snorted and rubbed his hand. "Busy is right. Stupid blighter had us copy attack sheets for the past year and a half because he was too lazy to do them himself."

"What are attack sheets?" Lily asked.

"Long ass reports on Auror/Dark Wizard fights. Moody's been in one every day, it seems like."

"How long are they?"

"Like ten pages long front and back. First, you have to explain in detail what happened. And, just in case you forgot something, you have to explain what country it happened in and check a box, then you have to explain what city it happened in and explain where in that city. Then you have to explain how many people were involved, and explain how long they were involved. Then you have to explain how many muggles were involved and you have to describe them. Then you have to say exactly what spells were used and how many times. Then, Merlin forbid, any property was damaged because you have to write in detail what it was, what it looked like, how old it was, how much it cost, what spell was used to repair it, who owned it-I don't remember anymore about that one, and then, as if all that didn't give you a cramp in the hand, you have to do it again."

Lily was fighting down a laugh, obviously, and took James red and swollen hand and kissed it, rubbing it gently.

"And why didn't you use a Copying Charm?"

"Because Moody's a sadistic bastard?" James said.

"I see, well I'm sorry," she kissed his hand again. James shrugged.

"‘S not so bad when you kiss it," he smiled. Lily felt a smile growing on her face and slid her other hand around his waist, leaning her head on his shoulder as they walked.

"Miss Evans?" Professor McGonagall called her up to her desk one day after class.

"Yes, Professor?" McGonagall waited until the classroom was empty until she spoke again.

"Miss Evans, there will be a group of people coming tomorrow evening to question you on the happenings between yourself and Bellatrix Black," she looked rather terse when she said that name.

"Who are they?" Lily asked, uncomfortable.

"They are members of the Wizagamot. Bellatrix Black's trial will be at the first of the year, and Professor Dumbledore does not want to bring you out of the school for questioning. He thought it would be much better for you if you were in a familiar surrounding; that it might make you a bit more comfortable."

Lily nodded. "W-What sort of questions are they going to ask me?"

"They're going to probably ask you what your relationship with Miss Black was, and what happened that morning, and things of that nature."

Lily nodded. "And...where has she been? I mean, I hope she hasn't been in Azkaban or anything like that."

McGonagall raised her eyebrow. "Miss Black has been in a holding cell at the Ministry of Magic, heavily guarded. After this trial, if convicted, she probably will go to Azkaban."

"I see," Lily said, looking down. "Isn't there any place less...horrible?"

"Miss Evans..." she sighed. "You should get to your next class."

"Yes, ma'am," Lily said, standing up and walking out of the room, unhappily. She was torn between the fact that Bellatrix tried to kill her and the fact that she was a human being too. She'd heard some horrible things about Azkaban, and the dementors that inhabited it.

And now she had to testify to the fact that Bellatrix was a hardened criminal. Probably her testimony would send her straight to Azkaban. She wasn't sure if she could live with that fact.

The next evening, Lily approached the stone gargoyle with growing anxiety. Professor McGonagall was waiting and provided the password. She looked at Lily and gave her a slight pat on the shoulder.

"Just...do your best," she offered. Lily nodded and ascended the stairs. She'd been up her a few times for Head business with James, but this time, when she walked into the office, there were other people in the office, wearing very snooty-looking robes. They immediately stopped talking when she walked into the room, and all eyes went to her.

"Sit down, Miss Evans," Dumbledore said to her, motioning to a wooden chair in the middle of the room. Lily sat down in it and looked about the room nervously. Dumbledore gave her a kind smile. "No need to look nervous, Miss Evans. We just want to ask you a few questions."

The wizards and witches seemed to see right through her as she nodded at him.

"Could you, first, explain to the Wizagamot what your relationship to Miss Black was?"

Lily cleared her throat. She had thought her voice would sound clear, but it was quiet and mousy. "She was in the same year as I am, and we had a few classes together. That's it."

"Do you have any idea why she attacked you?" Dumbledore asked.

"Well, I figured that since she admitted to the fact that she was a Death Eater-"

"That was not the question!" A very high-and-mighty wizard said. Lily looked down and found that he seemed familiar.

"Calm yourself, Arcturus," Dumbledore said, looking over at a black-haired man who was lurking near a picture of Phineous Black. The more Lily looked at him, the more familiar he seemed. "Lily, please continue," Dumbledore asked.

"I am a member of the early Auror trainee program," Lily explained. "So, I believe that she was acting on orders to try to kill me. That and she had a special aversion to muggle-borns for some reason."

"And you are a muggle born?" A very wizened witch to Lily's left asked.

"Yes, ma'am," Lily nodded.

"Please, tell us what happened on the afternoon in question," Dumbledore said.

Lily cleared her throat and told them, of course, leaving out the parts about James being an Animagus. After the incident had happened, she had locked the memories away in the very back of her mind, so that she could life her life in peace. She had spent the entire day unlocking them and relieving every terrifying moment of her near-death experience. She spoke quietly and clearly, and very evenly, and there wasn't another sound in the room until she was done. She felt a wetness in her eyes and reached up to her cheeks. When she touched them, she realized that she was crying, and had been.

"Does anyone have any more questions?" Dumbledore said, looking quite serious.

"She didn't have to make such a fuss," the man under Phineus Black said. She was sure that she'd seen him before, but she didn't know where. Her eyes drifted to the picture of Phineus... Wait a moment...Black? "Are you...Sirius' father?" she asked the man.

He jumped a bit at being addressed and then sniffed. "Yes, that wastrel is my son. I suspect you know him?"

Lily raised her eyebrow and nodded. "Yes."

"Miss Evans, I don't think that we have any more questions for you," Dumbledore nodded. "We have an appointment with another student in a few minutes, so hurry along back to your Common Room."

Lily nodded and stood up, walking out. Waiting on the other side of the gargoyle were two people; McGonagall and, to her surprise, James.

"What are you doing here?" Lily asked, coming out.

"Got to put Bellatrix in Azkaban," he grinned. "I assume that's why you're in there?"

Lily nodded. "Be careful, Sirius' dad's in there."

James snorted, "Yes, I know. He's unfortunately on the Wizagamot."

"You knew?"

"Yeah, he's probably trying to get Bellatrix off with a reprimand or something like that." He walked past her and into the open door. "See ya back in the Common Room."

Lily watched him go and had a sinking suspicion that maybe the Bellatrix case wasn't as closed as she had previously felt it to be.