February 1973
James and Sirius, sometimes with the help of Remus and Peter, would hex unsuspecting students and laugh it off. They targeted them for little to no reason. Sometimes it was due to some encounter from before or sometimes they would «feel like it».
But their usual target would be Severus. While in first year, their spats were verbal and it wouldn't really escalate but nowadays, it was common for them to be surrounded by other people who would watch them cast spells and hexes towards each other. It was especially common for those Gryffindor boys, especially James and Sirius, to be found in detention, but Severus sometimes managed to get away with it.
While Adelaide wanted to believe, as much as Lily, that Severus was a victim and never initiated attacks against them, but she held him accountable for some of his actions. As much as Severus would disappear into the shadows after som public spat, everyone knew of his vendetta against James, and Sirius never stopped from supporting the latter. Sometimes even, the Slytherin would unbeknownst to them, send some hex towards them and start the fight first. Yes, as much as Lily wanted to lie to herself, Severus could be the perpetrator as well.
Adelaide knew these situations would get worse since he was already friends with Mulciber. William was also friends with them and they were becoming a questionable trio, a fact that both Adelaide and Lily disliked. Mulciber was trouble and a bad influence, and it seemed that he already managed to somehow land his marks on them. Severus hated being near the girl's Gryffindor friends and was always uncomfortable, and William never acknowledged that Adelaide had Dorcas, Mary, Marlene and Lily as friends. Lily didn't like William that much, though the hatred wasn't as much as the one against Mulciber, but it was something that both girls failed to acknowledge, leaving many conversations unsaid.
The Slytherins were becoming increasingly horrid in their ideas of supremacy and many were more or less naming the muggle borns with «mud blood» instead of their actual name. There was rarely any hexes being exchanged between the prejudiced students and their victims but their spats were still provocative and hurtful. Next year, Adelaide vowed that she would bring a shield just so she could protect herself from incoming hexes that would be intended for the muggle borns.
Adelaide was in Potions class, with the Slytherins, and had finished her potion. She was writing down notes from the board.
"Hey, Mulciber! Why did you do that?" Jack, a Ravenclaw, shouted looking at his fallen cauldron, all his hard work destroyed.
"Well, that's easy. You were being such a proud mud blood, that you needed to be put in your place." Mulciber said giving them an easy smile.
"Well, that was not bloody nice." Alice said glaring at the boy.
"Shut up Fortescue and stay out of it, if you know what is good for you."
"Oh, really? Why don't you stop being a bully and return to your sorry excuse of a potion?" Alice replied now fuming.
"Al-" Sarah warned her, pulling her sleeve.
"Mr Mulciber! What have you done?! I am absolutely against this type of behaviour. You will a get a detention and 20 points from Slytherin. As for you, mr Peters, i will put your assignment score for next week as you score, don't worry."
Mulciber looked away, glaring at Alice. He lowered his voice and said:"If you kept your mouth shut, i would have gotten away with it." He turned away and left.
At the end of the class, when they were packing their supplies, Adelaide said: "Alice, i don't think he will let this go so easily."
"I don't care. If he tries to sabotage my school work, then i wish him good luck, since i am quite a good student and he needs to try more than pushing my potion vials and stealing my papers to bring me down."
"I know. That's why i think whatever he does, won't be related to school. He might hex you, or something. He is quite unhinged you know."
"Dela's right, he definitely will have something else planned." Sarah shuddered. "Last week, Mary said that she heard, he shoved a first year Hufflepuff's head down a toilet."
"Oh, so his bullying tactics are the same as an insecure muggle, the same people he thinks he is much better than."
"And he cursed some girl's teeth to grow very big." Sarah added nervously.
"Well, now that's something." Alice said dryly putting her bag on her shoulder going out of the class, with Adelaide and Sarah trailing after her.
"I'm serious Ali." Sarah said shaking her head.
"And i am not afraid of him."
"Well yes, and you shouldn't be, since he is a prickly crazy second year Slytherin boy with an ego to feed, but what Sarah and i are saying is that if you're going against him, and he is retaliating, always be on guard. Since he has... disgusting ways to retaliate, to put it mildly." Adelaide continued putting a hand on Alice's arm.
"Yes, well i'll be on guard. Don't worry about me." She smiled at them and they all left for their common room.
...................
All was forgotten three day later when they were leaving the great hall after dinner.
The seven girls were standing in one of the corridors leading to the stairs, talking.
"Well, my older sisters don't leave privacy for somethings. I absolutely dread the day that i grow up and they tease me about dating and stuff. Since they will already be graduated and I can't really retaliate."
Adelaide said shuddering.
"Ah, that will be terrible. But i suppose it's worse for you Marlene, since you have two older brothers. But they will graduate this year, so they will be relieved from embarrassing you further, isn't it?" Lily said glancing at the blonde girl beside her.
"Yep, last week, they told Mary and Dorcas some crazy made up stories, well not wholly made up ones,
to embarrass me." Marlene sighed.
"They were eavesdropping when Marls was recounting some of her childhood adventures." Mary explained.
"Ah, the joys of having brothers; they tend to eavesdrop on personal and private conversations that you have with your friends." Marlene said dramatically.
"Oh, so should i worry about the day that my brother gets older and becomes a menace?" Sarah said gulping down.
"Absolutely. Expect some lines to be blurred."
"Well, Edmund is already a handful sometimes, i don't like to see what he'll become later." Adelaide looked at Sarah. "We are doomed, Sarah."
"My brother already has started giving me stupid nicknames. He is calling me Sammie, for god's sake!"
"Oh, well now that the cat's out of the bag, i am most eager to call you Sammie." Dorcas said laughing mischievously. Others nodded snickering.
"No don't you dare."
"Well, you mustn't have shared that with us, Sammie." Adelaide added laughing hard at Sarah's anguished face.
Alice opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted when Mulciber's voice was heard :"Entomorphis!"
Adelaide quickly jumped in front of Alice and shouted: "Protego!" A shield surrounded them, diverting the hex.
Adelaide gave Mulciber a glare, as he tried to do it another time, again trying to hit Alice.
"Expelliarmus." Adelaide said calmly, as Mulciber's wand was easily disarmed and fell in her hand. She gave him a cold look.
"If you're so desperate to land a hit and take revenge on someone, at least do it right. You are a pathetic person. If you try to hurt my friend again, i will land a hex or do something so bad that you can't even go to the infirmary as well, do you understand?"
Mulciber nodded, his eyes wide, Adelaide tossed him his wand. He caught it and stumbled away, as he was leaving did Adelaide catch Severus and William going after him. They were here with him as well.
Adelaide looked at Lily, who was staring at Severus. Her beautiful green eyes had a sad and pained look in them.
The others were shocked with Alice still standing behind Adelaide. She was pale and was shaking a bit.
Then Mary broke the silence: "That was brilliant!"
"You saved me. T-thank you." Alice said hugging her.
"Of course, you are one of my best friends. I would do anything for you."
"You looked so bad-arse too. He peed himself, i swear." Marlene said clapping Adelaide's back.
"Was your threat real? The one about you know, «do something so bad» and all." Dorcas quoted.
"Well, i know a handful of jinxes and hexes. And my..." Adelaide glanced at her gloves feeling some sort of power in her body. Her finger tips felt cold a bit but got back to normal. If I didn't have these gloves, i suppose i would have committed murder.
"Wow. You must one day teach us all you know. That was pretty impressive. A flawless disarming charm. A shielding charm when you're only 12!" Lily exclaimed, finally out of her trance.
"What was the hex he wanted to cast?" Mary asked her brows furrowed.
"The insect hex. Apparently, it is so in nowadays, with Slytherin students."Sarah said quietly.
"What shall we do now?" Dorcas asked.
"Well, he won't be back, i suppose." Adelaide said.
"But Ali, you should do something. I mean Mulciber needs to taught a lesson." Marlene advised.
"I am against it. He might retaliate again." Lily argued.
"Well, it can be something that is less confrontational. Like pulling a prank. I see those idiotic Gryffindor boys doing it all the time. We can get away with it and he won't have to really know that it was really Alice doing it." Sarah said, as all of them nodded.
"Well, that is all right i suppose. But it shouldn't be anything too serious." Lily said looking to Alice who was into deep thoughts.
"That's a brilliant idea, actually, Sammie. I am on it. But i will do it, since i was the victim. Let's set the plan in a few days shall we?"
All of them agreed and made a plan for a week from now.
"Thank you again, Sammie for the plan." Alice said as they were in their dorms.
"You're welcome. But don't call me Sammie."
"Oh, but we are your friends, so we need to have the honour of calling you that lovely nickname, am i not right, Dela?"
"Absolutely." Adelaide nodded. "We can also take it a step further and call you Sam-Sam if you wish." Alice cackled at Adelaide's words.
"Oi, shut up you too." Sarah said as she laid on her bed, bringing her quilt to her face.
"Of course, Sammie darling." Alice cooed. Adelaide giggled.
"Ugh!"
................
More than a week later, it was reported in school that Mulciber had suddenly obtained some mysterious «ailment» that caused him to have painful boils. The girls were gathering at the Gryffindor table at breakfast talking when the news was brought.
"Did you know that Mulciber has gotten some painful boils? He is at the infirmary." Frank said, putting marmalade on his toast.
"Oh really? How come?" Marlene said lazily a hint of a smile on her face.
"Well, that's nice.The classes with the Slytherins this week won't be that bad." Remus said cheering up his friends. His three best friends cheered and went back to their breakfast.
"What kind of an illness could it be? So sudden you know?" Somerset said, drinking his tea and surveying the girls who were beyond calm and somewhat glowing with...glee?
"I don't know. That little prick can go and die somewhere quietly and I would not care. Cheers mate." Sirius said bumping their teacups together and drinking his tea happily.
"Oh, I would not absolutely know what type of illness that is." Alice said as her eyes twinkled.
Alice made the potion with Dorcas' help that caused painful boils with some huge amount of puss on the body.
"Or what sort of thing that could have caused him to get that." Mary replied.
Yet Mary was the one who, while Lily was distracting Slughorn, stole the materials for the potion.
"But i think know that there might be many boils on some very sensitive parts." Marlene said that a tad bit too sweetly.
Marlene told us about making some potion and Sarah found what potion could be easily made by Alice. (As she wanted to do the honours of making the pillar of the plan.)
Adelaide choked on her tea, at the end of Marlene's sentence and had to be patted down at her back to stop choking. Somerset was looking very weirdly at them and then he was staring at her.
I, went into the Slytherin common room when William invited me to play chess with him there and contaminated his bed with it.
Somerset then went back to his breakfast, the girls' comments falling on deaf ears.
But as soon as they left the hall, Adelaide felt a hand holding her wrist lightly. Adelaide turned and looked right into some beautiful brown eyes. What?...
Somerset was too close for her liking, but as soon as she wanted to open her mouth he quietly said:
"I know."
Then he smiled lightly with a small smirk, then let go of her hand and turned away and went to the other direction.