The first Gryffindor Quidditch game of the was brilliant; a decisive win in the first fifteen minutes it didn’t give James much scope to show off for the crowd of girls who had turned up to support him but he still managed to score four spectacular goals before the Snitch was caught. The rest of the supporters were thankful for the short match though because no sooner had the whistle blown than it began to rain and the Snitch being caught heralded their return to Gryffindor Tower where they could change out of their wet clothes and warm up.
Returning to the common room they found James still giving a group of admirers who were fawning over him and his every word a blow by blow account of the match, despite all of them having seen it and the goals which he recounted numerous times.
Lily wrinkled her nose and frowned disapprovingly saying, “Look at him, he thinks he’s such a big star now that he’s on the team. We’ll never hear the end of this,” she said ominously as she walked past the place they usually sat.
“Where are you going Lils?” asked Cassie.
“I told Sev I’d go and see him; I haven’t seen him in a while and I should because he’s my best friend.” She was rewarded by a hurt look from Cassie and quickly amended her sentence. “Best boy friend Cassie,” she said, “of course you’re my best girl friend, and my best friend in Gryffindor, but I did know Sev before I came to Hogwarts. He’s my old best friend,” she said as she climbed out of the portrait hole.
“Best boy friend,” Cassie muttered darkly as she started a game of Exploding Snap with Mary and Alice.
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Lily’s prediction proved scarily correct; not only did they never hear the end of James’ success from the boy himself, but also from various teachers. Overnight his popularity rocketed from sky high to almost celestial and even McGonagall’s opinion of him improved; although she had always liked him and knew that he was bright, his love of troublemaking and ambivalent attitude towards his work had made her disapprove of him; now, making it more than likely that Gryffindor would win the Cup by a long way, as opposed to snatching it from the jaws of defeat by Slytherin as had happened last year, she bestowed James with a rare smile and only threatened him with a week’s worth of detention when he accidentally on purpose blew something up and turned a certain Slytherin boy’s hair pink.
People turned to look at the Marauders as they passed them in the corridors, groups of girls squealed whenever they saw them and everybody’s eyes were fixed on them as they entered the Great Hall for every meal; although they had been widely liked before, now the small group of four had become some of the coolest people in school and everybody wanted to be friends with them.
“I didn’t think that that boy’s ego could get any larger!” ranted Lily as she collapsed on her bed, “But I was wrong! I just overheard the most arrogant conversation ever! He thinks he’s so perfect just because he’s on the Quidditch team! Ah he’s going to drive me crazy! AND I just saw him attack Sev – again! – totally unprovoked! Well of course Sev was going to fight back but they’re just as bad as each other! And then a bunch of Slytherins joined in, well that was obviously going to turn out nastily so I ran over to them and tried to drag Sev away when he hexed them! And it didn’t look like a nice hex either, and then some of the Slytherins started using what I think were the Dark Arts!”
“What happened after that?” asked Alice eagerly.
“I just ran for it and dragged Sev along behind me – I don’t know nearly enough to take on the Dark Arts, if I did I would have done but some of them were fifth years! Sev didn’t seem very grateful but I suppose that’s because he was dragged away by a girl in front of loads of Slytherins…”
“Maybe he wanted to fight back,” suggested Mary as she drew the curtains surrounding her bed.
“No, Sev would never do that. Anyway afterwards he smiled and said he missed me; I saw him a couple of days ago but I’ve been really busy with homework, plus my mum keeps asking me where I want to go on holiday over Christmas and Professor McGonagall keeps insisting that I enter this Transfiguration competition.”
“What a mystery,” said Cassie as she yawned and buried herself under duvet.
“Cassie?” Lily called after a minute. “Is she already asleep?” she asked Alice incredulously.
“That girl sleeps like the dead,” she replied sagely as she lit the fire in their room with a spell that they had just learnt in Charms, the dormitory becoming comfortingly warm in a matter of minutes.
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“Remus Lupin looks really ill at the moment,” said Cassie absentmindedly as she flicked through the book she had taken out to help with her Herbology homework.
“Yeah he does,” agreed Lily as Madam Pince glared at her. “I wonder whether I can get Slughorn to let me into the Restricted Section,” she said thoughtfully.
“Silence in the library!” Madam Pince hissed as Cassie shrugged apologetically. “Why do you need to go to the Restricted Section?” she asked as Madam Pince stalked off to terrorize one of the fourth years.
“Research for my Transfiguration essay.”
“What Transfiguration essay?” said Cassie as she panicked, receiving a steely glare from the librarian.
“Don’t worry Cassie, it’s extra work. It’s for that competition I was telling you about.”
Cassie sighed with relief. “So it’s not homework?”
“No.”
“Thank Merlin; you had me scared for a minute there. Why don’t you just ask McGonagall anyway? It’s her work you’re doing.”
Lily grabbed the huge pile of books and walked over to the desk to sign them out. “You’re so dense Cassie! McGonagall hasn’t been here for the past two days!” she answered as they left the library, Lily’s arms overflowing with books.
“Wait what?”
“You wouldn’t have noticed because you’re too busy stuffing your face at mealtimes and we didn’t have Transfiguration today but she left on Friday evening.”
“I take a great amount of offense at your insinuation that I’m fat.”
“Well you are.”
“That hurt. Where’d she go?”
“No one knows but I think it’s probably related to the rumours of disappearances that the Daily Prophet’s been talking about.”
“What disappearances?”
“You’re so dim,” Lily said with a long-suffering sigh. “Do you ever read the Daily Prophet?”
“No because by the time you’ve finished hogging it it’s time for lessons.”
“Maybe you should buy your own then.”
Cassie paused. “Can’t be bothered,” she admitted finally.
“Exactly. Anyway, some people have been disappearing without a trace – there doesn’t seem to be any connection between them but people are beginning to get a bit worried; there’s no concrete evidence but people are beginning to tell stories of some Dark Wizard who’s behind them.”
Cassie’s eyes widened and she stopped in her tracks. “A Dark Wizard?” she whispered. “Here? Merlin. Tell me you’re joking Lily?” she begged as the look in Lily’s eyes confirmed it.
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Dwelling on Dreams (A Marauders Fan Fic)
Fanfiction(Companion story to The Next Great Adventure) Cassie Jones is a typical witch; she joins Hogwarts at the age of eleven after looking forward to it her entire life and quickly makes a number of friends, the closest one being Lily Evans. Her loyalty t...
