Lily Black and the Twin Souls

Chapter Eighteen: Something Stupid

Lily and Teddy thoroughly enjoyed their exams. Lily, in particular, found it highly amusing to watch everyone scramble around with panicked looks on their faces. Lily spent most of her time with her head in Teddy's lap while he read, playing catch with herself and thinking about her dad. She missed him terribly and resolved to ask her parents if she could visit him in Azkaban over the summer. She and Teddy had both learned how to do the Patronus charm. Her Patronus was a fox, like her animagus, and Teddy's was, unsurprisingly, a wolf, meaning that they could visit without having to worry about the dementors.

During the exams, they were given quills enchanted with anti-cheating spells, not that it really helped with Lily and Teddy's mind connection. Teddy only really needed help with a few of the more difficult questions. Lily always finished her tests extremely early and would tip her chair backward and play catch with herself. Everyone else was extremely annoyed by her antics but didn't dare say anything about it for fear of getting pranked. Harry seemed extremely stressed all the time, just not about the exams, sure he was stressed about those too, but he was mostly worried about the stone, Moldy-Voldy (as Lily and Teddy now called him), and Snape. Lily was only really worried about Moldy-Voldy, and barely that too. She was much more focused on thinking about her dad. 

When the exams were finally over, Lily and Teddy decided to spend the rest of the day hanging out with Cerberus. They grabbed as much food as they could carry as well as plenty of books and journals for planning pranks, and other things. They quickly reached the third-floor corridor and greeted Cerberus who wagged his gigantic tail as soon as he saw them. Cerberus curled up in an almost donut-like shape, and Lily and Teddy made a sort of den in the center of where he was laying. They bunched up the blankets and pillows and scattered the food and books across them, before curling up against Cerberus' side and spending a while reading and talking and laughing and planning pranks.

Suddenly they heard a commotion from outside the door Minnie was shouting at what sounded like Harry and Ron,

"I suppose you think your harder to get by than a pack of enchantments! Enough of this nonsense! If I hear you come by here ever again, I'll take fifty points from Gryffindor! Yes Weasley, from my own house!" Lily stifled her snicker at that. Minnie was truly the best. She heard them walk away and laughed to herself. 

*-*-*

That night, Lily and Teddy were still wrapped in the blankets in the third-floor corridor when the door banged open, making Cerberus start growling, and the two first years quickly ducked behind his towering form. LIly peeked out from behind him and saw Quirrel standing there. She shot Teddy an I-told-you-so look, making him roll his eyes and pull her back behind Cerberus. Quirrel enchanted a harp to play music, and Lily watched in horror as Cerberus drifted off into a deep sleep. She watched, wide-eyed as he opened the trapdoor and dropped out of sight. 

Lily and Teddy stared at each other, both thinking the same thing

What the heck?

Lily bent down and tried to wake Cerberus up. She tried that for like an hour, nothing worked and she was growing worried. Suddenly she heard footsteps and shushing. Lily leapt back behind Cerberus and dragged Teddy with her. She watched in horrfied amusement as Harry, Ron, and Hermione pulled Harry's invisibility cloak off themselves. They hurried to the trapdoor, when suddenly the harp stopped playing, and Cerberus woke up. Lily sighed in relief, he was okay! The three Gryffindors were a whole lot less pleased, they screamed and jumped through the trapdoor. 

Lily squealed and threw her arms around one of Cerberus' heads as soon as they were out of sight. She spent ten minutes fussing over him before deciding he was okay. Then she turned to Teddy and said,

"I called it Shadow! I said they would do something stupid, you remember that?" Teddy laughed and replied,

"I remember Flame, let's go make sure they don't die or anything." Lily nodded and turned back to Cerberus.

"Cerbie, we've got to go and make sure they don't die now. See you soon!" Cerberus licked her outstretched arm and Lily beamed at him, before grabbing Teddy's arms and lobbing them both into the open trapdoor. 

She landed on a plant and waved her hands making a ball of fire appear to be nestled in her hands. She realized who that plant was at once, and held the fire closer to it's vines that had wrapped themselves around her and Teddy. They both made their way over to the wall, using the crackling light of Lily's fire. 

Lily pushed open the door and looked around in awe, this next room was beautiful. It was huge and there were glimmering keys flying around. Lily looked down and noticed and old-fashioned silver one on the ground with bent wings. She picked it up and fitted it into the lock. It worked and she opened the door with Teddy by her side. She walked into the room and found Hermione kneeling over an injured Ron, while the remains of a giant chessboard lay around them. Hermione looked up in surprise when she heard the door open, and stared at them in confusion. 

"Hi Hermione," Lily said, knocking the other girl back into her senses.

"Oh! What are you two doing here?" Lily rolled her eyes,

"We're here to help, we'll go on to help Harry. You should really go owl Dumbleduck, maybe even get Sniv-erm-Snape." Hermione looked confused.

"But Snapes down there! And how did you even know we were down here?" Lily shook her head patiently,

"Nope, it's Quirrel, not Snape. And I told you guys that you aren't observant. Shadow and I have been with Cerberus all day, we say you guys and Quirrel go down the trapdoor." Hermion nodded and waved goodbye. 

Lily linked arms with Teddy and they set off to find Harry. When they pushed open the next door, they both wrinkled their noses. There was a huge troll knocked out in the chamber. They crossed the room and entered the next one. In that one they found a bunch of potions and a riddle, along with fire blocking the door. Lily just rolled her eyes and waved her hand, making the fire disappear. Then they strolled through to the final chamber.