The Rise And Fall Of The Stag And The Doe

a great big world

It was late May. The last Quidditch game of the season was the next day, NEWT's were the next week, finals were a month away and the school year was drawing to a close.

Dorcas, Cas, Marlene, Lily, Esmee, Sirius, Emmeline, Remus, Everett, James and Peter were sitting in a large circle, with a stack of notes and a quaffle. They'd been studying in different sections for the past week. Lily had devised it so two people would go over all the main concepts of their best subjects to everyone else: James and Sirius went over Transfiguration, she and Remus did Charms, Cas and her covered Potions, Marlene and Emmeline did Herbology, Dorcas and Everett did defense and Peter and Dorcas did Muggle studies and Care of Magical Creatures together. It was a great system. Studying in such a huge group helped immensely because there was always one person who would know the answer.

But their brains had grown tired looking at textbooks and notes so James had a brilliant idea. In order to keep their brains sharp and not give up on studying entirely, they created a game. Whoever answered five questions in a row correctly was elected to the middle of the circle where they would turn into the question asker until someone else replaced them.

Before they began they all thought Lily would stay in the middle the longest, but actually Emmeline had been sitting in the middle the longest, much to Dorcas's utter rage.

"What is the name of the duplicate spell and how do you cast one?" Emmeline spoke clearly before throwing the Quaffle at Remus.

Remus caught it and said, "Geminio," then he took out his wand and performed it on one of the random pebbles in the grass.

"Good," Emmeline nodded at him as he threw the Quaffle back to her.

Lily sighed, leaned towards Dorcas and whispered to her in an undertone, "Would you cool it on the glares at Emmeline?...Cas is getting pissed."

"Why?" Dorcas said lazily, leaning back on her arms, "I love Cas...it's her bitchy, evil, devil of a girlfriend I can't stand..."

"I'm well aware...as is everyone else in the circle, but can you just simmer?...She's not as bad as she used to be." Lily attempted, "I haven't heard her gossip or even say anything rude since they started dating-"

"What? So that's an excuse?" Dorcas muttered, "'Oh, you said unthinkably horrible things about everyone four the past seven years, but ahhh that's fine now that you're dating my friend and haven't said anything recently."' Her dark eyes filled with mirth. "Yeah, that's happening."

"What are you two talking about?" James questioned the two as Everett answered a question on the other side of the circle.

Lily said, "Dorcas is bitching about Emmeline again."

James laughed at Dorcas, "Never going to let go of that are you?"

"Nope." Dorcas stated firmly. "When I hate someone it's for life."

Lily didn't bother arguing with her, especially when she didn't particularly like Emmeline either. Instead, she leaned back and felt the sun warm her pale skin. She could practically feel another freckle forming as she did it, but thankfully the burn wouldn't burn her skin. James had thoughtfully smothered sunscreen all over her an hour before and although it ended in her smashing some on the side of his face, she was perfectly protected, unlike the week before when she got a nasty case of sun poisoning and was in bed the entire night.

She began to daydream as Cas turned her brother into a Parrott. Her head had been aching, she was sick of school. Lily loved to learn, she genuinely wanted to know as much about magic and this entire world that she now lived in...but if she had to recite one more thing, she was going to vomit.