Up To No Good

Chapter Twenty-Four

It was a cool, crisp atmosphere and late in the morning when Remus threw open headquarters' door.

"There's an attack," he explained. "Benjy Fenwick just sent word by Patronus. In a Muggle village."

"When?" Frank Longbottom spoke up, hearing the urgency in Remus' tone.

"Right now. Not too far from here. He's just sent it."

Sirius was on his feet at once. "I will go," he volunteered. There was no trace of fear or hesitancy in the young man's voice, James noticed.

Dumbledore stood up as well. "I cannot ask any of you to fight," he concurred. "However, these dark times call for all the assistance that we can have. Where is the Muggle village from here?"

"Not too far north. We can Apparate a few miles away to be discreet," Remus replied. 

"To hell with being discreet," James felt himself becoming angry. "There are people dying by magical hands already, there's no use trying to hide our magic too. We need to help those people before Voldemort himself arrives."

He turned to Lily, who nodded briskly to show that she agreed.

"Let's move," a man perhaps ten years older than him who James hardly knew called Kingsley Shacklebolt agreed. Wands were drawn, and throughout the room there came the loud pop as wizards around the room began to Disapparate out of thin air. James reached for Lily's hand, and as he felt his feet left the ground hoped he wouldn't leave his heart back with them.

Screams.

They were the first thing James heard when his shoes hit the cobblestone walk. He still hated the sensation of Apparation, especially considering it wasn't something he had to do especially often. Adjusting his glasses back on his face he saw people running, and soon Lily was pulling him out of the way.

Masked people stood everywhere, hooded and dark, green jets of light emitting from wands at every angle. It wasn't often that he was taken by surprise, but the sheer violence--the sheer audacity of the attackers--made his breath catch in his throat.

"Where's Fenwick?" someone was calling. That was a woman named Marlene.

"Here," Peter's voice came weakly.

They followed to where they'd heard him. Peter was standing at the head of a motionless body. Marlene approached first, hesitating. "No."

Carefully, she turned the man's face toward her. James hadn't known the man, but his face was battered, bloody, and sightless. He couldn't have died more than a few moments before... and it had been violent, more than just a simple Killing Curse. It was clear he must have sent the Patronus right before his death. James swallowed bile.

"Traitors!" someone shouted. It was a masked figure, a Death Eater, out of the darkness. "You're all blood-traitors!"

"Avada Kedavra!"

The jet of green light narrowly missed Marlene, who spat back a hex in return. The Death Eater doubled over, his mask falling off as his skin began growing enormous, angry boils. James didn't stop to look, heart thumping in his chest.

More members of the Order were Apparating into the fray. The three of them, James, Lily, and Marlene moved toward the square, which was packed full of Death Eaters and Muggles alike. But the former were not aiming for the other wizards--only the Muggles.

James yelled "Stupefy!" at one close by just as the Death Eater was beginning to mutter a curse. Instead, the man dodged it, laughing hysterically.