Beyond Hogwarts -Chapter Sixteen

-=Beyond Hogwarts; Chapter Sixteen=-

The next evening, after finishing up a pile of work at the Ministry, Lily was walking down Diagon Alley, picking up Cyrano de Bergerac in French at Flourish and Blotts before stepping into the Leaky Cauldron, as the bookstore closed earlier on weekdays. James had been called into Alastor Moody’s office around four-thirty, and had left a note on Lily’s desk to go home without him; he’d meet her back at the house, so Lily was meeting the director by herself. She had read the play when it had been published a few years ago in the magical world—it hadn’t been brought to the Muggle public yet.
   Stepping into the Leaky Cauldron, Lily glanced around quickly, then leaned onto the bar counter.
   “Tom?”
   The bartender turned around swiftly. “Mrs. Potter!—what may I do for you? Butterbeer—or a hot cocoa laced with rum? We’ve got both very cheap today, ma’am.”
   “Cocoa without the rum,” Lily said absently but firmly, her fingers searching deftly for several coins in her pocket.
   Within minutes, Tom had set down a tankard painted silver and filled with cocoa in front of her, saying automatically “Two Sickles.”
   “Tom,” Lily asked, handing him the coins, “a theatre director named Bertram Nufflepeck wrote me—he told me he had taken a room here. Do you know where he’s staying?”
   “He’s sitting at the end table, near the hag with the pint of butterbeer.” He handed her a receipt, smiling toothily through several strands of quickly graying hair. “Anything else, ma’am?”
   She flashed a quick smile and a short shake of the head, moving abruptly towards the man wrapped closely in a furry cloak and wearing a long, drooping brown moustache drooping to the rounded point of his chin and accented with a cigarette.
   Without an introduction, Lily pulled out a chair at the man’s table, sitting down abruptly. “Mr. Nufflepeck?”
   “I much prefer Bertram,” the man nodded. “And I have the pleasure of speaking with--?”
   “Lily Evans—well, Lily Potter, now.” She flashed the letter at him. “You wrote me about a role in a musical, and Tom pointed you out to me.”
   The director scrutinized the young woman in front of him carefully. Frank eyes met his own, and a no-nonsense manner pushed formalities out of the way. She was a pretty girl, with auburn hair tied in a long braid pulled over one shoulder and a black standard ballroom dancing skirt underneath unfastened green robes.
   “Exactly.” He stubbed out the cigarette on the table, dusting his hands off. “I want you in the musical. It’s the second time it’s been done; it’s got to match the first, and it had better excel it. We need you for it.”
   “I’ve got a job at the Ministry,” Lily answered, taking a mouthful of the cocoa. “I’m almost sure it’ll interfere with rehearsals.”
   “It most probably will,” Mr. Nufflepeck nodded. “Your headmaster refused to give me any information about you; he told me he’d send the letters to your house, so I was completely without knowledge of your scheduling. It’ll take at least a month to rehearse; most probably longer. Two, maybe—and then the play’ll run for about a month and a half.”
   Lily glanced down at the table, then stood up, pushing her chair back.
   “I’ll let you know in two days. Which room are you taking?”
   “Room fourteen; on the second floor. I—“
   Lily had Disapparated in the middle of his sentence, knowing she was being more than rude but not especially caring. She was thinking furiously. All the Minstry was letting her do was paperwork, and besides the Durmstrang adventure, all she’d been doing was digging her way out from underneath a pile of parchment with a quill and inkpot. But it was no use; she’d have to talk to James before anything.
   She met him at the door when he came home at nine-thirty with a pot of Turkish coffee and a plate of truffles. Pushing the hood of his cloak off his face, a grin lit up his features as he wrapped the cold arms of his robes around her, kissing his wife hello.
   “This is a surprise! What’s this for?”
   Lily took his hand, leading him into the large sitting room. “I’ve got to talk to you.”
   “They’re a bribe?” he asked, though half-laughing.
   “Sort of. And I was in the mood for chocolate. No; it’s about the play. The Minstry wouldn’t give me about four months off, would they?”
   James shook his head. “They’re funny like that. You could ask them to reschedule rehearsals during evenings, couldn’t you?”
   Lily didn’t answer. She stirred her own coffee meditatively as she replied.
   “If they need me on a raid, ever, they can call me in, can’t they?”
   James frowned. “What’re you trying to say?”
   “I mean,” Lily responded, tucking a foot underneath her, “that I most probably will be resigning from the Ministry.
   There was a splash and a clatter as James dropped his cup onto his saucer, which split cleanly down the middle. “What?”
   “They’re not letting me do anything because I’m a girl. I firmly resent that. Besides, this is a chance for me I’d love to take.” She met his eyes. “You were urging me to just yesterday.”
   James groaned. “And what about your being so anxious to have a job—what about that whole showdown at Durmstrang?”
   “That was mainly to put you in your place. I don’t do well behind a desk.”
   Shoving the two halves of the saucer onto the floor, James stood up, hands clasped behind his back, pacing the floor.
   “Lily, I dunno—if you quit, I don’t think they’ll let you back on full-time—they’ll most likely have found someone else and won’t have a place for you.”
   She shrugged, slipping the robes off of her shoulders and taking hold of his arm as he passed. “I’m only asking you if you mind, really. If you do very much, I won’t do it.”
   He spun around, lifting her to her feet and pushing her braid out of the way.
   “Lil, I’m not telling you ‘no’ any more. Mr. Merriwether won’t like this much—he’s been trying to overcome Sikora’s old-fashioned views about women ever since you got there, but he likes you, and I think he’ll let you work part-time—that is, whenever they really need you. But you’re a wonderful actress, and if you’d like to do this, go ahead. Go ahead full force; I’m behind you, no matter what.”
   Her eyes lit up with a seldom glimmer, and she flung her arms around him, almost knocking him off of his feet.
   Lily turned in her resignation to Mr. Merriwether the next morning, before anyone else in their department had arrived yet. She caught him just before he closed the door behind someone she knew as Cornelius Fudge, the Junior Minister in the Department of Magical Catastrophes. Slipping the envelope onto his desk, she whisked back out of the door and to her desk. She would still be working the rest of the day, as well as packing up the things in her office.
   Around lunchtime, the door to the office opened, and Mr. Merriwether, face sombre, stepped inside, his cloak hanging from his shoulders like a pack of timber.
   “I read your letter,” he said slowly. “Are you sure about this?”
   Lily nodded shortly. “Very sure. All I’ve done of value since I came to work here was the Durmstrang assignment. I’ve been here a good year, and that’s all I’ve done.”
   Mr. Merriwether clasped his hands together. “My dear, you’re one of our newest Aurors!—you can’t expect anything but simple work for now.”
   “My husband has been working for as long as I have,” Lily snapped, “and he’s one of your most renowned Aurors already. He wouldn’t have brought that Durmstrang job to anything if I hadn’t been sent on it with him.”
   Her employer sighed. Standing up, he moved slowly over to the fireplace across from her desk, fiddling absently with his fingernails.
   “My dear, I’ve tried to do all I can to make the Minister let you go. I know what you’re capable of, and I’d have sent you with Moody to finish that Professor Mink off if Sikora hadn’t hemmed and hawed about it.” He looked straight at her. “And if I could make him understand anything, this would be my first pick…”
   Lily had been burrowing in her desk, and finally came up with a bowl of wrapped chocolates. Holding them out to Mr. Merriwether, she invited, “Have some. From Honeydukes.”
   Tired, the grey-haired man waved the sweets away. “You’re not listening.” Grasping her hand, he pinned it to the desk. “I want you to stay.”
   “Yes, to have Sikora assume he can trample all over me just because I’m a woman. I’d rather not. I’ll come on raids if you need me, and I needn’t be paid for it, but that’s all I’ll do.”
   Mr. Merriwether sighed as he stood and walked to the door. Just before he reached for the doorknob, he turned to Lily who was standing defiantly next to her desk, meeting a flash of forest green with beaten black eyes.
   “In that assumption,” he said quietly, “the Minister would be wrong. You are not a woman.”
   Lily’s hand whipped up as suddenly as a bolt of lightning, and it was only his next words that kept her temper back.
   “You are a lady.”
   He half bowed to her, but then turned the knob deftly and closed the door behind him. Lily, still a bit taken aback by the somewhat odd compliment, sank into her chair, inexplicably tired.
   Arabella Figg burst inside almost moments later, her graying hair waving wildly and messily around her face and her robes flustered. “You didn’t!”
   Amused, Lily stood up, dropping a bundle of her sketches onto her desk. “Hello.”
   Her former trainer was gasping for breath. “You quit? How—why—“
   Lily pulled out a chair for her, and she dropped into it. Eyes sparkling with repressed laughter, she started sorting deftly through the sketches.
   “Let’s not say I quit. Let’s just state that I’m going on an extended vacation, leaving the Ministry full permission to call me back if they need me badly on a particular assignment.”
   “You quit,” Arabella sighed. “It’s because of that Sikora rat, isn’t it?”
   Lily let out a short laugh. “You know there’s a reason that there’s a ratio of twenty male Aurors to one woman. And the few of us are constantly filling out forms that no one’ll ever need, or decoding messages I’ll bet my house Sikora made up. I’m sick of it. Besides, we don’t need the money.”
   Arabella snorted. “Wish I was that lucky!—I’ve got a relatively all right job, but I can’t afford to quit.” Dreamily, she stared into the bowl of chocolate. “So, what’re you planning to do now?”
   Lily grinned, tossing her braid over her shoulder. “Wait and see. I promise, you’ll be one of the first I’ll tell.”
   Helping herself to a truffle, Arabella scowled. “You’re still deserting us.”
   Popping the chocolate in her mouth, her lips widened to a grin. “However, if you’ll leave these with me, I think I can find forgiveness in my heart for you.”
   Lily smiled back, tossing her the half-full bag. “Why not? It only means I don’t have to carry much else home.”
   Arabella raised her eyebrows. Backing out of the office with the sweets in her hands, she pointed at Lily energetically.
   “I like rich people.”
   Lily raised one eyebrow at the lady, and Arabella laughed.
   “When they’re nice to me, that is. Have fun molding to a ball of lard at home!”
   She slammed the door closed with her elbow as Lily rolled her eyes in the direction of the ceiling light fixture.
   Lily arrived home that evening with her arms full of papers and riffraff that had been allowed to clutter up her office. James was already home; she could smell dinner, and Slenka only started making dinner when one of them had arrived from the Ministry.
   She heard jogging footsteps coming from the direction of the office as she reached the top of the stairs. Before she had a chance to put her things down, James had run into the entrance hall, dashed up the stairs, and had lifted her up around the waist, swinging her around, then setting her down and kissing her with the elegance of a hurricane.
   “Lily!—you’re home! I’ve been waiting for ages!”
   “A few minutes,” she corrected, smiling, loosening her hold on her papers. “What’s for dinner?”
   A mischievous smiled crossed James’ face as he looked down at her bundle, then at the stairs. A half-second too late, she realized what he was thinking about, and, despite her cries of protest, he had swung her into his arms and was sliding down the banister, laughing at the sheaves of paper flying all over the entrance hall.
   Lily had shrieked once, letting go of her parcel, but at the sight of the floor looming up ahead of her, the shout turned into a gleeful laugh, and just before they both slid off of the end, James had jumped off, swinging her around in a circle, both of them laughing.
   Severus had Apparated into the entrance hall quietly, and he witnessed the banister ride. He found himself half-smiling at the horseplay ensuing as James sn atched up one of Lily’s drawings that had fluttered to the floor, and started a game of catch.
   He half didn’t want to interrupt with his news when Lily was in that much of a good mood, but it couldn’t be helped. Severus harrumphed loudly.
   Lily’s head snapped up and she whirled around. Registering her friend, she pushed the loose hairs coming out of her braid behind her ears, settled the long, burgundy ballroom skirt, and stepped cleanly over her husband, who was wheezing for breath on the floor, sprawled, in the most undignified way possible, on his back.
   “Severus,” Lily said quickly, before anyone else could get a word in; “is something wrong?”
   “Am I that easy to read?” he asked with a flourish of his cloak. “That needs to be remedied.”
   James sat up at the sight of their visitor. “Snape? Lil, what’s he doing here?”
   “I have a feeling,” Lily said quietly, running her tongue over her bottom lip, which was cracking, “that Slenka will be setting an extra plate for dinner.”
   James’ face fell dramatically, but he picked himself up and vanished into the kitchen.
   Severus opened his mouth to speak, but then closed it, shrugging.
   “Bad news before dinner won’t go down well. What say I accept the somewhat badly phrased invitation?”
   Lily elbowed him playfully. “I do not phrase my invitations badly. I say what I mean to, and unless you don’t want dinner, you’ll accept.”
   With a swish of grey material, Severus removed his cloak, hanging it neatly on a clawed peg before following her into the sunroom on top of the house, where James had set the small Oriental table and several cushions, as well as tableware with the Gryffindor crest on them. Severus didn’t bother to hide a scowl.
   Lily shrugged apologetically. “The Gryffindor team defeated Hufflepuff today, 220 to 60. James wanted to celebrate.”
   Severus raised an eyebrow. “He still keeps track of the current team scores, even though he’s been out of Hogwarts for over a year and a half?”
   “Diehard fanatic,” Lily laughed. “Actually, Peter has a family friend and son over to dinner, the latter of which is on the team. Which is the only reason James knows the scores.” Her smile faded. “I hope.”
   James banged the door open with his shoe, balancing a tureen on his head and a platter in his hands. “Ah, Snape, admiring our china? Second Gryffindor win this year! Just ten points behind the first one, but that’ll be remedied soon! We’re playing Ravenclaw in May.”
   Lily let her head fall into her hands, groaning. “Hope dashed.”
   Severus refused to say anything about the reason he’d come till dessert had been cleared away. Lily had eaten hardly anything; she’d busied herself with pushing her food around on her plate with her fork and watching her friend and husband talk forcedly.
   Finally, Slenka had cleared away the plate of Apfelstrudel, a German dish made with apples, and all three stood up simultaneously.
   “Is there—somewhere…I could talk freely?” Severus asked quietly.
   Lily pulled at James’ sleeve, stepping for the door. “Come on—the library.”
   She drew the curtains in the room filled with bookshelves quickly as James poured three cups of coffee mixed with cocoa. With a swift gesture, he handed Severus one of the cups.
   Eyes flashing from one to the other, Lily seated herself between the two. Taking a cup for herself, she cupped her hands around it, blowing into the liquid.
   “Severus, what happened?”
   He sighed, running a hand through his hair. Setting his cup down on a nearby table, he fixed his gaze on her.
   “They found out that you’ve married—him.” He motioned to James. “Lord—Voldemort was more than a bit surprised by this, but he’s sent me to tell you he wants to talk to you about this.”
   James frowned, ruffling his own hair, and Lily bit her lip, hard. “What—what else has he said?”
   “I’m to tell you when he wants to see you, since I know you.” He hesitated, but knew it was no use. “He doesn’t know where you live—yet—so you’re to meet him in Knockturn Alley, in front of the fountain with the vultures. You know.”
   Lily nodded slowly; she hadn’t been in Knockturn Alley for years, but she remembered vaguely a splattering of water and a bird with large talons. “I think so, yes.”
   “Wait a minute!” James sprang to his feet. “No. Not Knockturn Alley. No way are you going anywhere near there alone. Not when you’re going to meet Voldemort.”
   “You’re speaking his name,” Severus said, amused. “He’s predicting that in several years people’ll be too scared to utter it.”
   James snorted.
   “I am not joking. It’s one of his lesser dreams he wants to come true.”
   “Well,” James scoffed, “looks like we know who the wishing fairy just fell in love with.”
   Lily scowled, elbowing him in the stomach. “Stop.”
   “This,” Severus said, clearing his throat loudly, “is an entirely useless conversation. If I might suggest we go on with the issue at hand?”
   Sighing, Lily nodded. “Yes; you’re right.” She elbowed James again.
   Grudgingly, he gave in. “Okay, fine. But Lily’s not going by herself to Knockturn Alley. There I put my foot down. Not unless she’s got a Ministry squad with her.”
   He glared at Severus, and was surprised to find him mouthing something.
   “You can talk, you know; it’s not like we’re being overheard.”
   Lily lifted a finger to her mouth quickly, then grasped a piece of parchment and set it in front of Severus, along with a small graphite pencil.
   “Severus—draw me a map of the area, will you? I don’t think I can find my way around so easily, and I don’t suppose Tom wants me to take an escort.”
   Her friend nodded, bending his head over the paper. “You’re perfectly right. An escort’s absolutely forbidden.” He scrawled a few signs on the sheet, then handed it over to her. “The circle in the middle is the fountain; Diagon Alley is down three streets to the left, and Fraeden Square branches out to the north.”
   Lily glanced at it. It wasn’t a map, but she hadn’t expected one. Severus had merely written a few vital lines.

Two of them can hear us. I’ve got some charm on the Mark that’ll let them know. Make your husband shut up, please. He’s only lucky they haven’t developed a locating charm yet.

   She slid the paper to James, fiddling with a bit of her hair. “Does that look quite correct to you?”
   James sent a glare that would have capsized a pirate ship at Severus, but nodded. “The fountain has no gargoyles, and he hasn’t labeled shops, but as an extremely rough map, it’s all right.”
   “You’d better let her go, you know,” Severus warned. “Lord Voldemort doesn’t take kindly to resistance.”
   “I didn’t notice,” James growled. “All right, all right. But if she’s not home in an hour and a half I’m sending a search squad out.”
   “You will do nothing of the kind,” Lily ordered. “He wants me to meet him tomorrow—what time?”
   “Tomorrow; at ten,” Severus confirmed He stood up, bowing to both of them. “Thank you for the dinner. I envy you your house-elf.”
   He left the library for the entrance hall, took his cloak down from the hook, threw it around his shoulders, and fastened it. With a quick “Goodbye,” he Disapparated, leaving Lily sitting on the stairs, head in her hands, and James leaning resentfully on the banister.
   The next morning, Lily saw James off to the Ministry before dressing. Slenka had brought her a full tray of breakfast into her bedroom, but she only ate a few bites while searching through her wardrobe. She had promised her husband she wouldn’t wear anything that might draw too much attention to herself, and he had left her a warm, black cloak. She wouldn’t need robes underneath that; it wasn’t even cold enough for snow, though it was December.
   Her fingers grasped one of the long, flowing black skirts and a black blouse, and, within minutes, she was dressed and throwing the cloak around her shoulders while taking up a steaming roll from the breakfast tray.
   Lily Apparated into Knockturn Alley a half-hour ahead of time, but just timely enough for a cold blast of wind and scent to hit her in the face, blowing her hood off. She resettled the cloak, pulling the hood far down into her eyes, out of the corner of which she saw the sign on a store, one with several glass eyes mounted on glittering blue cloth and murky liquids inside jars; she could see a hand inside a glass case with a candle inserted into its palm.
   “Borgin and Burkes,” she murmured. “It can’t do any harm.”
   With a small ding of a bell, she entered the store, her eyes flickering around. Several wine glasses stood on a tabletop, with a large ruby set in the top of the stem. A card was propped up next to them, reading: Poisonous. Any liquid drunk out of this will render the drinker lifeless.
   Her hand reached out to touch the ruby, but a firm hand grasped hers quickly.
   “Don’t touch that!—you could poison yourself.”
   She spun around, smiling. “Lucius!”
   The white-blond man smiled at her, pulling a lock of her hair, which was hanging down in front of her shoulders. “If you do want to walk about unknown, don’t let people see that red.”
   Lily laughed, shaking herself free of the hood. “It’s nice to see you, too. What’re you doing here?”
   Lucius shrugged, leaning on one of the display counters. “Officially or unofficially?”
   “Whichever you’re willing to tell me.”
   He grinned at her. “I’m supposed to be shopping for curios; actually, I’m making sure you’re here unescorted.”
   “Oh.” The defensive eyebrow flew up. “I’m not trusted, then?”
   “You are, but that dolt of a husband of yours isn’t.”
   Lily glowered at him. “He is not. Take that back.”
   Instead of answering, Lucius threw back his sleeve with a flourish, revealing an elegant and obviously expensive watch.
   “You’re almost late. Better get outside.”
   “Oops.” Pulling the hood back down over her eyes and pushing her hair behind her back, she clasped the cloak tightly around her chest and left the shop with a whisk of her skirt and the ringing of the bell.
   Lily stepped outside to a fierce whip of sleet. It had gotten colder in the moments that she was with Lucius, and if the drop of temperature continued, it would soon begin to snow. Grasping the cloak more firmly, she moved towards the fountain, whose sharp-winged vultures were splashed with the sleet and beginning to freeze.
   Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a wisp of wind curl; instantly, her head whipped around to meet it. Unobtrusively, next to one of the crouching vultures, a dark, cloaked shape started to appear.
   He was a master at the art of Apparating, Lily thought with a faint flush of pride. Most wizards, herself included, were satisfied with simply appearing out of thin air, but Tom understood how to bend things to his will. Slowly, as rushes of the snowy rain fell, they began to hail onto a sturdy black cloak that their own fall had masked from anyone’s view. And yet he had not created the sleet; he had merely shaped it.
   Another whisk of wind revealed the hem of his cloak, and his appearance was complete. No one in the square had noticed the arrival of another being in their midst. They were used to the usual form of Apparition, and their minds registered a change whenever a person appeared within their range of vision. Yet no one paid a glance to the cloaked figure standing languidly next to the unused fountain, one hand clasping a vulture’s beak with long, white fingers, his other ornamented with a magnificent ring. Lily smiled sadly when a glint of lanternlight caught the silver. The ring was a claw; the pads of the paw were on the underside of his hand, and five claws encaptured a dark green orb, its insides slowly revolving with a silver mist.
   Striding noiselessly across the square, Lily slipped a hand through the crook of his arm and took a childish delight in feeling him start.
   Tom looked down at her, lashing a strand of doused, dark hair out of his eyes.
   “You move quietly.”
   Lily smiled to herself, holding her head up. “I still have that gift.”
   “It is no gift,” he said condescendingly, “not among a crowd of this magnitude.”
   “At the least, it is a talent,” she retorted, “to be able to catch the fear of all Southern England off of his guard.”
   He snorted disparagingly, but she caught the glimmer of a smile in the corners of his eyes.
   They walked around the square twice, Tom peering unobtrusively into every shop window and alley they passed. Satisfied, he drew her through a darkened door into a place filled with dirty benches, shouting, and masses of witches, wizards, hags, and other creatures wrangling for food and drink.
   Tom pushed her onto a bench of a smaller table. With the torchlight from the walls shining onto his cloak, it wasn’t black, as she had thought outside, but it glimmered duskily wherever light hit it.
   He caught her gaze. “It’s partly an Invisibility Cloak. I’ve only got to turn it inside out.”
   “Wonderful.” Her tone held no note of sarcasm.
   With a flick of his wrist, Tom hailed a waitress, a woman with greasy brown hair and robes unbuttoned to her chest. “An ale and a white wine.”
   The drinks were there before Lily could count to ten, and a smug voice was demanding, “Four Sickles, two Knuts.”
   Looking a bit peeved at the fact that he was required to pay for anything, Tom threw five Sickles onto the table. “Keep the change.”
   The waitress drifted off after tossing the coins into a pouch that hung at her waist, leaving Lily to peruse the pub. It was by no means the equal of the Leaky Cauldron, which at least was clean. This place had wooden walls with holes where pictures had once been, but now only flashy bits of paper hung here and there. There was a candle on every wobbly table, and no backs to the greasy benches. Five oil lamps lit up the bar in the back of the room, and a pile of clay and glass shards had been swept behind the door, supposedly out of sight.
   “Beautiful den,” Lily commented. “I only hope they host birthday parties.”
   “We can’t be overheard here; or at least it isn’t quite likely. I can hardly hear you.”
   “What?” she grinned, pulling off her hood and cupping her hand around her ear.
   He didn’t smile back. Pushing the tall glass of wine towards her and signaling her to cover her hair, he picked up the mug of ale. “I asked you to meet me for a reason.”
   “Oh, good. I thought you’d forgotten.”
   “You married the kid. The one with his hair all over the place and ‘traitor’ branded into his forehead.”
   Underneath the table, Lily rearranged her skirt so that the folds hid her feet. “I married him. Yes.”
   Tom twisted his hand around to stare at his ring. “You know what I think of that.”
   “And you know what I think of you and your ideas.”
   Crashing the mug onto the tabletop, Tom leapt to his feet. “What?”
   Amused, Lily glanced around the pub. Half of the customers had twisted their chairs around to stare at them. “You’re absolutely right. We most certainly shan’t be overheard in here.”
   She shouldn’t have pushed him that far, Lily knew, but it was one of the hardest things she knew of to keep her tongue in check, especially now, when she’d had more than a year of not having to. James didn’t like it much when her mood was as fiery as her tongue, but he put up with it, which gave her no reason to repress her words. Consequently, she wasn’t in the practice of keeping her mouth shut.
   “Okay; I shouldn’t have said that. Sit down; you’ve still got an attentive audience.”
   “It’s interesting, having someone order me around again. No one’s done that for a good two years.” Whisking his cloak away from the bench, he regained his seat. “But I wanted to talk to you about something else.”
   “About—“ She almost said ‘James’, but then it flashed that Tom hadn’t mentioned his name yet; hopefully, he’d forgotten it. True, he’d only have to question Severus to find out, but still. “—About my husband, yes.”
   “Right.” Tom took a draught from the mug, then pushed it aside, leaning forward. Lily did the same.
   She hadn’t seen his face since she had met him that day, as he’d hidden it with his hood, but now she was close enough to. His eyes were a pronounced, glaring red, and his skin was whiter than usual. His nose was flattened, and he gave off the impression of a dangerously potent and powerful serpent, ready to strike.
   “I promised I wouldn’t kill you unless you got in my way, and to that I hold. But I warn you, that same privilege does not extend to your husband. I will kill him if I find him.”
   Lily narrowed her eyes. “So gracious. I assume it’s a ‘when’ you find him, not ‘if’.”
   Tom smiled. “Such a wise witch.”
   She drew back. “Am I permitted to leave now?”
   “No.” Swiftly, he caught her hand and bent her head back down. “I am not putting him out of the way till he has a son. Or daughter—I don’t care. All I want is for him to lose someone precious to him, knowing he can’t protect her.” An evilly smug grin formed on his lips. “He’s already lost his parents, but that doesn’t mean much. I didn’t know you had married him then—and if you hadn’t, he’d have been at home.”
   Lips white, Lily’s fingers grasped the glass of untasted wine dangerously, the skin around her fingertips pale. “So. You refuse to kill me, yet you want to find pleasure in killing my child?”
   “His child,” Tom corrected. “Mark my word, he won’t be yours. He’ll be the traitor’s.”
   At that, Lily threw the glass at him, its contents spilling all over his robes, face, and cloak. With a sharp intake of breath, both of them shot to their feet, wands out.
   Yet, after only a few seconds, Tom shook his head. “I don’t go back on my word.”
   With the same skill at Apparition he had shown before, he vanished into the thick, dank air, and Lily, trying hard not to look impressed, was left standing in front of her upturned bench, with a hag behind her kicking the seat into her calves in annoyance.