Mischief Managed!

39.

An Auspicious Occasion
5 July 1977

The Hogs Head sign creaked overhead as three cloaked figures cast a furtive look up and down the empty Hogsmeade street, before letting themselves inside. The bar room itself was alive with music and talk, the summer evening drawing not only regulars but also holidaymakers into the small, country tavern.
James clutched Lily's hand tighter as Sirius led them towards the bar.

The barman hovered in a dark doorway that lead from behind the bar to what seemed to be a small back room, but he stepped forward into the light to serve his customers with a suspicious expression.
"And how may I help you young folk tonight?"
James frowned, slipping his hood back slightly to reveal his face. "Aberforth? Well!" he sounded impressed. "I never thought I'd see you working in here!"
The old man squinted, then grinned.
"Why it's the young P- Parkinson lad!" he exclaimed, recalling at the very last minute that yelling Potter out in a bar was not necessarily the most intelligent of ideas. "How are you, son?"
James grinned. "Very well, thank you."
"And what would you like? Anything, on the house, for you and your friends!"
Lily pushed back her hood slightly and leant forward.
"Actually," she began rather nervously. "We were…. We were wondering if you might light the fire for us? Only, it's awfully cold for summer."

Aberforth frowned, his eyes not betraying even a flicker of surprise. He had been expecting them, then. "Nay, lass, that I can not do. I've had a few complaints that t'is too hot in here already! Tell ye what, you lot can sit in my back room, here. I have a fire going with my dinner, and you can be as warm as you please without disturbing these good folk."
Aberforth eyed an old man further down the bar, who was eavesdropping intently.
James pulled his hood further forward once more, and the three of them followed Aberforth into his back room. The older man closed the door, before checking that all the windows were covered and pulling back the hearthrug. Next, he produced his grimy looking wand from his sleeve, and set it to a particular stone in the floor. He tapped the stone.
Nothing happened for a few moments: but then, the stone began to wiggle, and much in the manner of the wall in Diagon Alley, the flagged-stone flooring quickly made way for a trapdoor.

Aberforth's eyes glinted in the flickering light from his fireplace.
"Down you go, young folk, and I hope that nothing too dangerous mars your path tonight."
Sirius led the way, and James sent Lily down next. He paused to shake the old man's hand.
"I was sorry to hear of your parent's passing," Aberforth said quietly.
James smiled grimly, touched. "Thank you."

…

Sirius, Lily and James emerged at the bottom of the stairs and made their way along a short passageway lit by flickering torches.
"Bit like the Honeydukes passage," Sirius murmured reminiscently, his smile ghostly.
James nodded thoughtfully, while Lily looked between the two, confused. "What passage?" she demanded suspiciously.

James said nothing, simply pressing a finger to her lips as they reached yet another doorway. Sirius opened it tentatively to reveal a well-lit chamber. Talk ceased abruptly as the newcomers filed in and waited shyly by the doorway.

Dumbledore's voice emerged from the crowd, and their former headmaster stood, looking pleased.

"Ah, more young people!" he gestured toward Remus and Peter, who sat awkwardly with two red-haired twins, and another young, sandy-haired man, a year or two older than them, that Lily recognized from Hogwarts. Beside him, much to Lily's surprise sat Alice Prewett, her former dorm-mate.

"James Potter, Sirius Black, Lily Evans," Dumbledore introduced them, his eyes twinkling. "Welcome, to the Order of the Phoenix."

Brotherhood
17 March 1978