May 27th - Great Hall
It was officially the first day of NEWT exams, and to say that Lily Evans was throwing a temper tantrum, would be an understatement. The redhead had gone completely mental, bossing everyone around and reminding them how important a good night's sleep and a large breakfast were, "James, don't forget the elf revolution of 1078, because you always skipped that part while we were revising. And Marlene, remember it's not Goblin wars, it's Goblin revolutions, Sirius, you are not allowed to sleep your way through this exam, and Winchester-"
Nephera only raised an eyebrow when she heard her name, daring the Gryffindor to try and correct her on something, "Uh, good luck," stammered Lily, looking back down at her breakfast
"Love, you're going to faint," said James, "Relax, you'll do fine,"
"Do not tell me to relax, James Potter! These are out NEWTs!"
"Really, we had no idea,' drawled the Slytherin, "But honestly, Evans, you keep going the way you're going, and you will fail. Just take a fucking breath,"
Alice voiced her agreement to that, mumbling something about how at least Nephera didn't have to share a dorm with the crazed out redhead, "But really, how aren't you in the least bit stressed?" asked the pixie-haired witch
"She's adopting the marauder philosophy," joked Sirius, "Sit back, see where life takes you,"
The brunette rolled her eyes, "I'm really not. I just know that I'll do well, it's History of Magic, anyways, I hardly need a good grade there,"
"It's also because you're Moody's favourite, so you know you'll get the job whatever your grades are," snarked Marlene, but Nephera simply rolled her eyes and ignored the blonde
Nephera, as usual, wasn't eating breakfast and was simply drinking a black coffee, despite James's efforts to push a piece of toast her way. She really was confident she'd be getting a good grade in History of Magic, especially with the memorization charm she had performed on herself a few hours prior.
She didn't count it as cheating, for, in her opinion, one must do everything in their power to achieve a high mark, right? Well, in Nephera's opinion, that meant creating her own spell from scratch and applying it on herself.
Besides, it was History of Magic, probably the most useless class in the school's history. She'd never do that in classes where the knowledge was something that was necessary for her to know, such as DADA or potions.
"We should go," announced the redhead, "Don't want to be late, do we?"
"We still have forty-five minutes!" called out Remus, but to no avail, for the girl was already out the doors before one could say 'History'
The group let out a unanimous breath of relief once the redhead was gone, a silence finally setting around them, "I love her, but my Merlin has she gone mad," muttered Marlene
The others snorted at that, shaking their heads. It was a known fact that the Evans girl was typically a very stressed out person, and especially during exam season, she could become quite insufferable.
Nephera saw Nott walking into the Great Hall, and the two locked eyes briefly before he sat down at the Slytherin table. She had informed Regulus, James, Remus, and Sirius of her plan, and safe to say, they were all impressed and slightly scared of that fact.
The Slytherin had told Peter too, separately from the rest in order to protect Regulus's double nature, and while the mousy boy had been equally as impressed, he was slightly more uncertain about the situation. In his words, 'You shouldn't keep underestimating you-know-who, you might've won against him a couple of times but you can't get overconfident.
Nephera knew the boy was right, while Peter may be a marauder, he was the more cautious out of all of them, the first one to think twice before acting, and was smart than he'd have other people believe, "We really should go too," said Alice after a few beats of silence
"No," whined the Slytherin, leaning her head on Sirius's shoulder, "I'm really not in the mood for History of Magic of all things right now,"
"Well, you're going to have to," announced James, pulling her up by the elbow
The exam was two and a half hours long, and ridiculously boring. At some point, Nephera swore she must've fallen asleep with her eyes open, for one moment, she was putting the final period in her last answer, and the next, the examiner was asking them to pass their papers forward.
Not that she minded much, she was sure she'd gotten a good grade on it, and if she was honest, she was just happy it was over.
Potions was that afternoon, and once again, Nephera was walking into the examination with confidence, knowing full well that she'd once again be getting a top grade in it. If the girl was honest with herself, she hated Snape for more than being an obsessive git with a victim complex and a Dark Mark. He was top of their year at Potions, with Nephera being a close second and Evans a close third, and no matter how hard the brunette tried, she couldn't catch up to the boy.
So yes, Nephera Winchester was, in fact, slightly jealous of Snape's potion skills.
Needless to say, jealousy was not something the Slytherin was used to feel, "Why do you look ready to kill someone?" asked Remus, "No, I mean it. I remember the pevensvie, that's literally what you looked like before you killed the three Death Eaters,"
"I want a better grade than Snivellus," she replied, taking a seat at her station
Remus scoffed, "You both get O's, you do know that, right?"
"Well, I want a better O than him, then. It's been seven years of me trying to one-up him, and I have one-uped him in everything but this,"
Letting down a low whistle, Remus locked eyes with James who was fighting a smile at how competitive their friend was, "Just try to refrain from throwing it over his head," sighed the werewolf, his head pounding slightly as the full moon was the next night
Nephera noticed this, and she desperately wished she had more wolfsbane to help him, especially since it was exam period, but the boy had run out and there wasn't enough time to write to Ailani so the Hawaiian witch could place an order.
Thankfully, Dumbledore had done one good thing this year because he had somehow managed to free Remus of all exams the day of the full moon and the day after the full moon, and had planned for the boy to take them some other time.
Still, she knew that it wouldn't be a good idea to mention the moon at that moment, seeing as though they were just about to start their Potions exams, "I might throw it over his head," she snorted, "Could act as a substitute for a shower,"
Remus snickered at that, but it was cut short once the examiner walked in.
Potions was much more stressful than History of Magic, that was certain, but the girl relished in the mental challenge as she typically did. The first part of the exam was theory, and the girl had probably never written that much in her entire life, her hand almost cramping by the end of it.
After an hour of grilling her mind about different properties of potions and recipes, the Slytherin finally put her paper down, happy to see that she had finished before Snape. The session was long from over, though, now that there were two more hours of actual potion brewing to focus on.
Halfway through, it became clear to her that nerves truly could be someone's downfall, for Lily Evans looked ready to faint as she was frantically adding the ingredients and stirring the potion. Nephera truly didn't need to be a Potions master to know that the redhead was going to fail. So, despite her mind yelling at her not to, she quickly cast a glance up to the examiner, only to see them immersed in some sort of paperwork, and then stared back towards Lily's cauldron.
Casting a wandless and wordless Evanesco, the contents of the redhead's potion emptied, leaving her surprised and looking around the room to see who the culprit was. It must've dawned on her that there was only one person there skilled with wandless magic, and she shot Nephera a glare, which the Slytherin ignored.
Sending a Confundo towards the examiner, making the woman look under the table, the brunette placed a disillusionment charm on part of her potion to make it invisible, before levitating it into the redhead's cauldron, and taking the disillusionment charm off.
To say Lily was surprised, was an understatement, to say that she was angry, would be a huge understatement. Shooting the Slytherin a glare, Nephera simply mouthed, 'You're welcome,' to her, something that only made her angrier.
What the two girl's hadn't seen, was a random Hufflepuff boy, who had watched the entire thing, "Mrs. Kalerna," he called to the examiner
Nephera, who guessed exactly what he was about to say, did not even need to look at him as she whispered, 'Obliviate,' under her breath.
"Yes, Mr. Olkier?" asked the examiner
The Hufflepuff looked confused for a second, "I uh, sorry, I don't remember what I was about to ask,"
"Well then how about you stop talking, some of us are taking an exam over here," snapped Nephera, concealing a smirk
Soon, Potions were over, and the group of seventh-years was leaving the room, letting a breath of relief escape them as they were now finished with two of their NEWTS.
Well, all but one, for the second they were a decent ways away from the exam room, Lily grabbed Nephera's upper arm roughly and tugged her away from the group.
"We should follow them shouldn't we?" asked James, concerned by the sudden flare of anger in his girlfriend's demeanour
"Yeah," breathed Sirius, the two of them, plus Remus, running after the two girls
They found the two in one of the empty corridors that were branching off of the main one, Lily flailing her arms around and yelling about something the three boys could not comprehend, "You had no right to do that!" exclaimed the redhead, "What is it with you playing God these days? What, you just go ahead and decide what's best for everyone?"
Nephera, contrary to the Gryffindor's angry demeanour, was simply leaning lazily against the wall, "I saved your grade," she shrugged, "You should be thanking me,"
That made Lily even angrier, "Listen here you bi-"
"No, you listen," snapped the Slytherin, pushing off the wall and walking towards the other girl and making her slowly retreat towards the opposite wall, "I saved your ass back there, putting my grade and my integrity at risk, do you understand that? Your potion was wrong, Evans, wrong. You put in dragon scales when it should've been lizard scales, you stirred it far too many times and you skipped three major steps,"
The way Nephera was looking at her, made Lily shut her mouth and look down at her shoes.
"So, obviously, you don't like me for whatever the reason, because it is becoming very clear to me that whatever I do, you're going to find some reason to yell and whine about it," seethed the brunette, "So, how about you use your big girl words, tell me what the hell is up with you, so you can stop being the bane of my fucking existence!"
Neither of the two was aware of the three boys watching the entire conversation, who were both surprised to hear that Nephera had actually gone out of her way to help Lily, and also that Lily was actually angry at that, "Should we intervene?" asked James
"No," said Remus quickly, "Let them figure it out, but uh, keep your wand out in case it escalates,"
"Lily won't be able to land a hex on Nephera," pointed out Sirius, leaning against the wall
"I know," said the werewolf, "But Nephera will be able to land one if she sees that Lily's trying to hex her,"
The redhead didn't know what to say, blinking rapidly at the intimidating brunette in front of her. After a few beats of silence, she seemed to snap out of her daze, "You want to know what it is? Fine," she seethed, "It's you, Winchester, alright? You're the fucking problem, alright? The all-powerful Nephera Winchester, front cover of the prophet because she did this, and she did the other thing! Because ever since the first year, I've constantly been compared to you, by everyone! Oh, Lily's good at DADA, but Winchester's better. Sure, Lily's a good person, but she's a pushover, Winchester, on the other hand... you don't want to mess with her,"
Of all the things Nephera expected, jealousy was not it.
"And you know what the worst part was? Huh? Do you? I wasn't even a blip on your radar, alright. My entire life, I've been working to surpass you, and you didn't even think of me as competition!"
Reminding herself that Lily was James's girlfriend, the Slytherin channelled a bit of her inner Ellie for her brother's sake, "Well then why didn't you say that?" asked the brunette, "We've never been friends, Evans, but I've never thought less of you, truly,"
Lily paused at the sincerity in the Slytherin's tone, not being used to hearing it in Nephera's words. She coughed, shaking her head, "I suppose I should've," she relented, "And uh, I guess you were right about today, thanks for the help and everything,"
Nephera nodded, taking a step back, "Alright," she sighed, "Remus, James, Snuffles, you can come out from behind that corner, we haven't killed each other," she called out
The Gryffindor turned to look at the end of the corridor, where three sheepish boys were making their way out from behind it, "You knew the entire time, huh?" asked Sirius, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly
"Of course I did," she scoffed, taking his hand and motioning for Remus to follow them, knowing that James would like to speak to Lily alone
The curly-haired boy approached his girlfriend, gently taking her hands in his, "You know I love you, right?" he asked, using a hand to cup her cheek
"I know," she sighed, kissing his palm where it was situated on her face, "And I know how important Nephera is to you, so I'm sorry I-"
"Hey, hey, don't apologize," rushed the boy, "Sure, Nephie's my sister but you mean the world to me, love. I'd kick her ass if I ever thought she did something truly bad to you,"
Lily knew that was a lie, as did James. The boy would never hurt the Slytherin, still, it made her feel better, "You'd kick her ass?" she smiled
James let out a small laugh, "Well, I'd try to, I don't think I'd be very successful," he joked, and this time the girl in front of him truly did laugh
A/N
2.6k words
this came out of nowhere, literally, but oh well. finally the drama between Nephera and Lily is slightly resolved because it was getting rather old if I'm honest
don't forget to comment and vote!
xx