Coup de Foudre [Fred Weasley] [7]

⚡️ Chapter 38 ⚡️

Lily and Snape were walking across the castle courtyard, evidently arguing. Vega and Harry hurried to catch up with them, to listen in. As they reached them, Vega realised how much taller they both were. A few years seemed to have passed since their Sorting.

"... thought we were supposed to be friends?" Snape was saying. "Best friends?"

"We are, Sev, but I don't like some of the people you're hanging round with!" Lily replied. "I'm sorry, but I detest Avery and Mulciber! Mulciber! What do you see in him, Sev, he's creepy! Do you know what he tried to do to Mary Macdonald the other day?"

Lily had reached a pillar and leaned against it, looking up into the thin, sallow face.

"That was nothing," Snape said. "It was a laugh, that's all –"

"It was Dark Magic," Lily told him. "And if you think that's funny –"

"What about the stuff Potter and his mates get up to?" Snape demanded. His colour rose again as he said it, unable, it seemed, to hold in his resentment.

"What's Potter got to do with anything?" Lily asked.

"They sneak out at night," Snape told her. "There's something weird about that Lupin. Where does he keep going?"

"He's ill," Lily said. "They say he's ill –"

"Every month at the full moon?" Snape said.

"I know your theory," Lily said, and she sounded cold. "Why are you so obsessed with them anyway? Why do you care what they're doing at night?"

"I'm just trying to show you they're not as wonderful as everyone seems to think they are," Snape said. The intensity of his gaze made her blush.

"They don't use Dark Magic, though," Lily said. She dropped her voice. "And you're being really ungrateful. I heard what happened the other night. You went sneaking down that tunnel by the Whomping Willow, and James Potter saved you from whatever's down there –"

Snape's whole face contorted and he spluttered, "Saved? Saved? You think Potter was playing the hero? He was saving his neck and his friends' too! You're not going to – I won't let you –"

"Let me?" Lily asked, her bright green eyes were slits. "Let me?" Snape backtracked at once.

"I didn't mean – I just don't want to see you made a fool of –" Snape stammered. "He fancies you, James Potter fancies you!" The words seemed wrenched from him against his will. "And he's not... everyone thinks... big Quidditch hero –"

Vega could see that Snape's bitterness and dislike were rendering him incoherent, and Lily's eyebrows were traveling farther and farther up her forehead.

"I know James Potter's an arrogant toerag," Lily said, cutting across Snape. "I don't need you to tell me that. But Mulciber's and Avery's idea of humour is just evil. Evil, Sev. I don't understand how you can be friends with them,"

However, Vega doubted that Snape had even heard her strictures on Mulciber and Avery. The moment Lily had insulted James Potter, his whole body had relaxed, and as they walked away there was a new spring in Snape's step...

And the scene dissolved...

This time, Vega watched as Snape left the Great Hall after sitting his O.W.L. in Defence Against the Dark Arts, watched as he wandered away from the castle and strayed inadvertently close to the place beneath the beech tree where James, Sirius, Lupin, and Pettigrew sat together. She realised it was a tree that she herself sat with her friends beneath.

As the scene unfolded, Vega realised that this was what Harry had told them about, the memory he had seen in Snape's head. They kept their distance, because they knew what happened after James had hoisted Severus into the air and taunted him; they knew what had been done and said.