A Difficult Summer "Mother, it'll be fine. I promise I revised like you said." The summer was finally drawing to close but Lillian's frustration didn't come from the exams but rather as a result of the woman in front of her. She knew her mother wanted her to become an auror to join the fight against dark magic, but it just didn't appeal and this was going to just be another reflection of that. A cynical part of her wondered if it wasn't guilt for not being able to stop her sisters joining the death eaters and now she was going to fix her mistakes by having her daughter's put an end to their reign of terror. But in the same way that she disliked history of magic, Lillian didn't feel inclined to constantly fix the past and make up for things that happened decades ago. She wanted her own life. Yet recent events seemed to be bringing out the worst in everyone, even herself. For the first time she wasn't looking forward to going back to Hogwarts; she had no doubt everyone would be taking sides and was worried about Ellis, who never spoke much about his home life. But she certainly didn't want to stay here, where everyone could feel her relationship with her mother getting taunter by the day. On a couple of storm addled nights she'd had flashes of packing her bags, emptying her half of the vault and running off into the wilderness with nothing but their wands in their pockets and each other to see the world, but then reality snapped back into place and she remembered she couldn't so much as talk to her neighbour without her mother freaking out. Also, she doubted Ellis had ever gone a day in his life without access to dry cleaning and probably wouldn't appreciate living on a moss covered rock in some swamp. Her thoughts were somewhat at odds with the sunny and spacious conservatory they were currently sitting in, watching the owl get closer. Her father didn't seem remotely bothered; he'd merely greeted her for breakfast and then sat down to read the paper like always. Then again, he'd always had quite a hands off approach, happier to to sit back and deal with the practical issues rather than anything personal. "You shouldn't take such a casual attitude about things like this Lillian. Especially with everything going on." Worry strained her mother's otherwise pretty face as she looked fully at her daughter. Her lack of interest in fighting the death eaters worried her that she might be sympathetic to their cause, but she seemed infuriatingly neutral about the whole situation. This was exasperated by her friendship with that Slytherin boy - Ellis - whom she seemed to like more than any of her other, safer friends. Despite Lillian's protests that he wasn't a "stuck up princeling" like Draco, Snape had mentioned how the boy liked to dabble in the dark arts and was generally quite secretive, a trait she did not want Lillian picking up. She also noticed how she'd stopped mentioning him by name in her presence and was careful to always shrug the conversation off if she bought up a different boy. "Mother, I haven't been let out of the house in two months. Or even spoke to anyone on the outside." Lillian repeated with more than a hint of exasperation, becoming ever more frustrated with this situation. Now she was going to be seventeen her mother had scarcely given her a break from mentioning how she was going to be an adult and had to take certain precautions to keep the family safe. Which apparently meant pretending not to exist for two months. Her mother opened her mouth to speak but the owl soaring through the window clearly broke her chain of thought, and Lillian grabbed the letter before her mother could get her hands on it. Feeling a pang of apprehension, she flicked it open and chucked the other stuff aside, focusing on her results. Astrology: A Arithmancy: A Charms: E Care of magical creatures: E Defense against the dark arts: A Potions: A Herbology: E History of magic: P Transfiguration: A "See mother, they aren't so bad." Lillian said as she passed it to her, and although she gave her daughter a small smile, she couldn't quite hide the disappointment in her eyes. She knew why; they'd managed to convince Snape to let Tonks in with an 'E' to pursue becoming an auror, but he'd never accept an 'A' and with good reason - NEWTS were a lot harder than OWLS. "You could retake potions, transfiguration and defense, you know. A little more work and you could definitely be up there; McGonagall says you're talented you just don't apply yourself-" "I want to work with animals. Abroad." Lillian said decisively, reading the other pieces of paper. One was a list saying what classes she was now eligible to take, Charms, Care of magical creatures and Herbology, all of which she was happy to do, along with a list of careers that met those criteria. Sprout certainly had a bias; at least six of them were some kind of botanist, but she was glad to see that a Newt in care of magical creatures and charms would allow her to go into magical veterinary care. "Well I'll slip Sprout a note to talk to you about it, you don't want to limit your options too much." Her mother sighed as she turned away from her daughter's grade sheet to find she'd already left, probably to hide in the loft and pine after her friends. One week later Andromeda, Ted, Nymphadora and Lillian all appeared in Diagon alley, although the atmosphere was far tenser than usual. Faces of death eaters leered down at them from wanted posters and Lillian looked at the one for Bellatrix closely, seeing how similar or not she looked to her mother, although she quickly glanced away when she felt the others looking at her. They'd arrived early in the morning to avoid most of the crowds but with the letters all arriving later than usual it was already busy with teens and their families getting ready for the school year. Hurrying them through from one shop to the other, even Ted seemed a little nervous and kept glancing sideways at Lillian, as if they expected someone to leap out at her at any moment. Sighing through her nose, she was almost relieved when they spotted Hagrid and they decided it was safe to remain still for more than a few seconds at a time. "Hey professor." Lillian said casually, his presence reminding her that she had actually achieved something of note, as her mother had been muttering ' we'll it's not like she'll need that' under her breath for the last forty minutes. The rest greeted him by name and he asked if they'd made it out alright then. "Oh yes, not too bad. Just trying to keep it short really." Her mother replied, sounding slightly short of breath as her eyes swept the street, her hand ever close to her wand. "They'll be alright." Hagrid whispered, although being a half giant it wasn't the most subtle thing in the world. "Let 'em go and look at the new brooms or something." Andromeda looked horrified by this proposal but when Ted glanced at her and then at their two daughters she flurriedly gave them permission to leave but only if they stayed on the street and agreed to meet at the robe store in exactly fifteen minutes. "Minerva told me about your note." He said, not in an accusatory tone but it wasn't approving all the same. "She said you're going too hard on the girl and to drop the order stuff. It's good enough to keep her out of their grasp." As Andromedas expression changed from worried to cold anger, he raised his hand up and said he was just passing on the message. "Well pass on this." She hissed "I spent seventeen years watching my sister's get swept up in this rhetoric and I will not see it happen again." Hagrid held her with a piercing stare as she grabbed her husband's arm and tried to leave. "Andromeda" He said, his voice dropping so low they had to get closer to hear him, "I went to school with Dolohov and you-know-who. I was groundskeeper when you were at school. And now I've taught Draco. She's one of my favourite students to work with. Don't spoil that." A muscle in the side of her jaw twitched aggressively as she stormed off with her husband, furiously looking around for her two daughters, who were currently busy having some of the only fun they'd had all summer. -- Having finally escaped their mothers grasp for five minutes, Lillian breathed a sigh of relief and set about looking for her friends, chatting to her sister along the way. Her Hufflepuff ones were almost certainly going to be in the new joke shop, but as it was Ellis she had missed the most, she headed straight for the stationary store, knowing that was the most likely place for him to be. Admittedly, the chances were fairly slim; it was only half ten, they could've already come or be planning to do it later in the week, or he might not even be returning. But as she spotted that oh-so-familiar dark head of hair on top of a concentrating face reflected in the shop window, she grinned and hurried down, her sister keeping a respectable few metre distance as she watched them. "Ellis!" She yelled happily as she crashed into him, the hill giving her more momentum than she anticipated but they both managed to stay on their feet. Hoping he wasn't carrying one of his usual coffee's, she winced slightly as they pulled apart, a few onlookers giggling as she turned a deep red. "How's your summer been?"