Lily Evans and the Marauder's Secrets

Chapter 23: Damage Control

"Umm, so something happened!" I shout as I crash back into the seventh-year girl's dormitory.

Alice's and Marlene's heads both pop up in surprise.

"Something like... what?" Alice asks.

"Okay, so I was just in the library and..." I trail off, suddenly noticing that the third girl in the room is not who I was expecting. "Uh, hi Mary."

"Hi," she says curiously.

"Um, where's Emmeline?" I say to the room at large, but Mary answers for me.

"She left when I came in, I don't know where she was going."

I dart my eyes to my mates, widening them and raising my eyebrows. Alice shrugs, but Marlene, bless her, catches on right away.

"Is it dinnertime already?" she says loudly, slapping a hand to her forehead as she looks down at her watch. "Shall we go down to the Great Hall with Lily, Alice?"

Although she could really do without all the dramatics. For Merlin's sake, what is in the air today that is making everyone act so nutty? Must be the full moon. Who'd have known batty old Professor Criswell would be right about these types of things?

"Oh -- right!" Alice says, finally catching on. She gets up off her bed. "Yes, I'm starving. Let's go now. And we can find Em on our way!"

Really, I have the best of mates.

They scurry out the door, but right before I follow them, I remember Mary and look back. She's still on her bed, watching with a tipped head. "Umm, see you later Mary," I mumble before following the others down the stairs.

"Lily, what is going on?" Alice demands when we reach the common room.

"Not here!" I shush; there are far too many ears in here, and I need to figure out how we're going to rein in the rumors before they spread to Gryffindor Tower, not fan the flames. "I'll tell you in the corridor."

We clamber through the portrait hole and I'm surprised that when I straighten up, there's Emma.

"Em!" I exclaim. "Perfect. I could use your sensibility right now." I'm too preoccupied by the Carol drama to press her for information about where she's been, or why she looks so guilty to see us. Probably just feeling awkward she turned me down to walk to the library earlier only to leave the dormitory on her own. "Let's go!" I grab her arm and set off down the corridor, Alice and Marlene trailing after us.

I'm relieved to find the hallways just as empty as they'd been when I left earlier. Despite Marlene's dinner excuse when we left the dormitory, dinner is actually still half an hour away, so no one but us is heading in that direction now.

"Alright, Lily, spill!" Marlene demands.

"Right, right," I say, hurrying down the corridor; the panic makes me walk faster than I normally would. "So, like I said, I was in the library, and Carol was in there, and you'll never guess who she was getting chatty with."

"James?" Emmeline asks.

"What? No," I say. We sprint down the stairs to the sixth floor. "Not even close. Although funny you should mention Potter..." I shake my head. I'll get to that in a minute. "No, it was Regulus Black."

"What?!" Marlene and Alice say together.

"RIGHT? Anyway, I'm just trying to get my textbook and of course they're sitting right by the Potions section so I walk by their table but then Carol gets in my face and she's all 'what do you want with Potter?' and I'm like 'Carol, you are crazy, get out of my way!' And she's like 'Stop messing with my man and keep your filthy Mudblood hands off him' --"