The Tomb Of Our Forlorn Love

The next morning Ellary woke up in the girl’s sixth year dormitory with a pounding headache. She, Sirius, and James had decided to play a little game that involved seeing who could stay awake the longest. In the end Ellary just had given up and retired to her bed at the insane hour of two o’clock in the morning, James and Sirius on the other hand had still been going strong when she left. Having only five hours of sleep under her belt on the first day of school was definitely not a good thing.

“Ugh…” she moaned when she caught sight of the clock atop her trunk that read seven o’clock.

She threw off her warm covers reluctantly and sat up slowly cursing James under her breath for thinking up such a stupid game. After blinking her eyes a few times she could finally make out the scene in front of her. Lily Evans was sitting on her bed at the opposite side of the room. She was brushing her long, bright red hair while staring in the one of the mirrors. Lily was probably the most beautiful girl in the entire school with her emerald green eyes and fair, flawless skin, but there was something about her that annoyed Ellary to no end.

Candace Flaherty was occupying the other mirror as she tried desperately to get her frizzy, light brown hair to lie flat. Ellary laughed a little to herself, knowing very well that Candace would need about three bottles of hair gel and a miracle to ever accomplish that feat. Beside her was Lily’s most bothersome admirer in Ellary’s opinion, Beatrice Huckle or Bea for short. She had yellow-blonde hair that she wore in a short; chin length bob, light brown eyes that were constantly darting around the room, and a whole mess of dark freckles smattered across her round face.

“Oh Lily, your hair always looks so perfect! How ever do you do it?” Bea squeaked, in her usual high-pitched voice that made Ellary want to vomit. “And it is such a pretty color too,” she swooned.

Ellary snorted, “Oh Huckle, would you stop fawning over carrot top already and find yourself a bloody boyfriend. It is really getting quite pathetic, my dear” she added bluntly.

“Shut your mouth, Snape. You are just jealous,” Lily responded, giving her a stern, unappreciative look.

“Oh yeah, that’s it,” Ellary said sarcastically, rolling her eyes a little as she rolled out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom, like she was drunk, to try to fix herself up a little. “Merlin, do I need some caffeine…” she muttered as she had started to brush her long, raven hair.

Then all of a sudden she heard a girl’s screech that made her jump followed by what sounded like a male’s voice calling her name loudly from the bedroom.

“What the hell is going on out here?” Ellary asked a little annoyed, she was still only dressed in her skimpy white tank top that stopped above her belly button and short, silky pajama shorts when she walked out.

She looked inside the room to see Lily, Bea, and Candace all huddling in the corner on top of Lily’s bed looking very upset. There were sniggers coming from the doorway and then Ellary spotted from whom they were coming from… James and Sirius were standing in the doorway of the room with amused smirks on their faces.

“What in Merlin’s name are you two doing in here?” she inquired, a look of disbelief on her face.

“We flew up on my new broom!” James declared, holding out his shiny, top of the line, Nimbus 900 proudly, “Flies like a dream!” he added, puffing out his chest.

“I didn’t ask you how you got up here Potter, I asked you why dumbass,” she rolled her eyes at him.

“Oh…” he said, looking embarrassed. “Well, we were hungry and Remus won’t leave for breakfast without you, says you’re the only one in his Advanced Potions class,” James shrugged, before turning his head back to Lily with a silly grin.

“Stop staring at me Potter or I swear to Merlin I will hex you!” she snapped, holding out her wand threateningly.

Sirius had yet to speak the entire time, he was just staring at Ellary as if he had never seen her before in his life.

“What are you staring at?” she asked, but he didn’t answer.

She followed his steady gaze curiously and suddenly became conscious of how little clothes she was actually wearing.

Her face blushed scarlet red at the realization; “Oh Sirius Black, you are such a pig!” she exclaimed, grabbing a blanket in an attempt to cover herself up, unfortunately she had grabbed a pillowcase that really didn’t do her much good.

“Wow, Quidditch really does the body well, huh Ella?” Sirius laughed, with a suggestive wink.

At that Ellary responded with a death glare and a rather rude gesture involving one finger, before slamming the bathroom door shut behind her again.

About five minutes later Ellary emerged from the bathroom fully dressed in her schoolgirl uniform with her hair tied up in a loose ponytail with a silk red ribbon as usual, it never took her very long to get ready like it did most girls.

“Alright let’s get out of here, you guys are starting to scare them,” she chuckled, glancing back at her fellow Gryffindor girls who were still hiding in the corner.

“Yes, please get your mental friends out of here. Potter is starting to make me nauseous,” Lily sneered.

“Oh you love it, Evans. I bet you’ve been dreaming about me being in this dormitory for a long time,” James replied, with a smirk, subconsciously messing up his hair as he always did around her.

“No mate, that would be in your dreams,” Ellary responded, patting him on the shoulder and Sirius let out one of his bark-like laughs.

“Thanks, Ell,” James said scathingly when you left the room, “You embarrassed me in there in front of Lily!” he exclaimed. “I am going extra hard on you at Quidditch practice tonight just for that,” he chuckled maniacally.

“What? We have Quidditch practice tonight?” Ellary sighed, “I am too bloody tired, because you dunderheads kept me up until two o’clock,” she muttered, “How the hell are you two so awake anyways?”

Sirius smirked, “We’re are endless balls of energy, of course,” he smiled, “I won by the way, I didn’t go to bed until 4:00am! James wimped out about ten minutes after you left. I swear you’re worse than a girl sometimes,” he teased.

“What is this? Attack James day?” James said exasperatedly. “Well, you know what I’m not flying you down, Padfoot,” he said, hopping on his Nimbus 900 and flying down the stairs.

“So, who cares?” Sirius said unfazed, “We’ll slide down!” he said excitedly, grabbing Ellary’s wrist and running toward the staircase that led down to the Common Room.

If a boy was to step on the staircase it would automatically turn into a slide as a mechanism to keep the boys out of the girls’ dormitories, however, it proved to be quite a fun ride if the boy was already in the dormitory.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Ready,” Ellary replied and they both hopped on the first step in unison.

The hard, flat surface instantaneously smoothed out and the two friends went flying down the incline at such a quick speed that Ellary’s hair fell out of her ponytail. With a loud crash they both landed on the wooden floor at the bottom, causing every single person in the Common Room to turn in stare. The boys started laughing and yelling calls of congratulations to Sirius, the girls, however, all glared enviously at Ellary.

“Oh great… now they’re all going to think we’re sleeping together,” she muttered.

“Hell, it could be worse,” he smirked, putting him arm around her and waving to the crowd.

“I am too tired for Potions right now Moony! And I am certainly not ready to listen to Slughorn this early in the morning, especially after that whole incident with Sirius. Why does everything happen to me? I didn’t even get my caffeine,” Ellary whined, as she walked down the dungeon hallway with Remus by her side.

“Well, you should think about that next time you decide to stay up until the wee hours of the night with James and Sirius,” Remus replied a little unsympathetically. “You don’t have anything to worry about anyways, Professor Slughorn is madly in love with you, remember?” he pointed out.

“Don’t remind me!” she sighed loudly. “I don’t know why he insists that I be in that stupid Slug Club of his. Believe me mate, spending two hours a week with Lily Evans and a bunch of stuck up Slytherins is not exactly what I call a good time. Plus the man always expects me to do everything perfect.”

“But you always do do everything perfect, you’re a bloody genius when it comes to Potions,” Remus said.

“Well, yeah…” Ellary said slowly not denying it and Remus laughed, as they walked into the cold, dark classroom that dimly lit on by the torches that lined the walls.

Potions had always been Ellary’s best class, though it was probably one of her least favorite ones. It’s not that she didn’t like the actual potion making; she just despised the professor who taught it. His name was Professor Slughorn. He was a very large, square shaped man with dark brown hair that was starting to bald and beady black eyes. He had a loud booming voice that made it almost impossible not to pay attention during class and he had a strange, self-important attitude about him. He was the head of an unofficial club that the students of Hogwarts had dubbed the “Slug Club”.

The Slug Club was made up of all Slughorn’s favorite and, in his opinion, most promising students. It was rumored that if you were part of the Slug Club that he would make sure you were set for life with almost any occupation that you could imagine; he was a very influential man. Plus members always got invited to all of Slughorn’s party, which people would do almost anything to get an invite to. But none of that really mattered to Ellary, she would rather have not been chosen for it. No matter what she did though, Slughorn still insisted that she was one of the most brilliant and spirited wizards he had ever come across in his entire life.

“Ellary Amarantha Snape!” the portly professor exclaimed when he saw her enter the room, making her involuntarily twitch at the mention of her middle name. She immediately jumped to try and hide behind Remus, but it was too late… he had already spotted her. “My dear Miss Snape, how are you doing?” he asked, shaking her hand so enthusiastically that he almost knocked her on her butt.

“Well, I was doing great until now,” Ellary replied bluntly, as she attempted to wrestle her hand away from his.

“Oh! You were always a funny one!” he laughed heartily, thinking she was kidding. “I have great things planned for you Miss Snape, great things indeed! I was just talking to one of my friends at the Ministry and I was telling him all about you my dear! He is very interested in you,” he continued, before his eyes spotted someone else in the room. “Oh Miss Evans, my other favorite student! So wonderful to see you again!” he exclaimed, finally bounding away from Ellary, to her great relief.

“Merlin, I really don’t like that man!” Ellary mumbled, plopping down into a seat near the back of the room.

Remus took the seat beside, “Yes, heaven forbid some try to be nice to you Ella,” he chuckled, running his fingers through his light brown hair.

She turned to respond, but paused suddenly. All she could do at that moment was stare into his golden brown eyes that were reflecting the flames of the potions classroom beautifully, but for some reason they looked detached. And for the first time Ellary noticed the dark shadows underneath his eyes and the new scars that ran across his cheeks. Then she looked down at his arms resting on the table, they were covered with deep gashes and long white scars. An overwhelming feeling of pity for her friend rushed inside of her, to the point where tears almost came to her eyes.

“Oh Remus…” she sighed, feeling terrible about herself. “I didn’t even notice,” she admitted sadly running her finger over the slash that ran across his right cheek.

His skin tingled where fingers touched and he felt his body stiffen up again nervously. Her face was close to his as she inspected the wounds he had given himself over the summer during his monthly transformations into a werewolf. He stared straight into her eyes as they traveled over his face; they were such a beautiful, captivating dark brown color that he couldn’t get himself to look away no matter how hard he tried. He could have sat there and stared into her eyes forever.

“You must have had a rough summer,” she spoke again, “I am so sorry I wasn’t there for you,” she whispered pulling him into a tight hug. “I’ve been so preoccupied with myself lately,” she said contritely, sounding thoroughly disappointed with herself.

“Ella, it’s not your fault,” Remus whispered, as they continued to hug. “This is something I have to live with, there is nothing that you could have done,” he assured her.

This was thing that he believed he loved most about Ellary. Though she put on a tough outer exterior most of the time, inside she was one of the most gentle and caring people he had ever met. She would do anything for those whom she cared about and when it came down to it she had a heart of gold.

“No, there is something that I can do,” she responded firmly, letting him go.

Remus grudgingly removed his arms from around her waist.

“There must be something I can do, some kind of potion I can concoct…” she thought out loud more to herself than Remus. “I am a brilliant potion maker right? I’ll figure out a cure for you someday Remus Lupin, even if it is the last thing I do,” she promised, with a bright smile that made Remus’ heart melt every single time he saw it.

“I would never doubt you, Ella,” he replied, even though inside he knew a cure was next to impossible, but he was not about to let her down.

“All eyes on me class!” Slughorn shouted, interrupting Remus and Ellary’s conversation. “Welcome to Advanced Potions! You, my dear students, are the best and the brightest of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!” he said to the miniscule class in front of him. There were only six students in the entire room, leaving about twenty desks unoccupied. The six pupils included Ellary Snape and Remus Lupin who sat together in the back, Lily Evans who was sitting alone toward the front; Severus Snape who was lurking in one of the darker corners, and two Ravenclaws named Brian Trilby and Helena Cairn. The class was so small because only people who had received O’s on the Potions portion of their O.W.L’s were permitted to join the intense class. It was so demanding, lasting two hours practically every day, that even some students who did get an O still opted not to take it, such as James and Sirius. “I am positively thrilled to have such an gifted class with me this year. We will be making some of the hardest and most dangerous potions known in the wizarding world this year and possibly even inventing a few of our own,” he winked and smiled jovially. “But first off, I would like to split you all up into pairs,” he announced, and at once everyone nervously glanced around at each other.

Silently in her head Ellary was praying that he put her with Remus. Though Severus was her brother she knew if they had to work on a potion together it most likely end with one of them not being able to walk for a month. Her and Lily working together would also probably have a similar result. It wasn’t as if she would mind being paired up with one of the Ravenclaws, but she would much rather spend the lengthy class with her best friend.

“Now, let’s see,” he tapped his finger to his chin as he thought. “Ellary dear, I’ll pair you with Mr. Lupin. You two seem to get along rather swimmingly,” he smiled and for one of the first times ever, she smiled back it him. “As for you two,” he said looking over at the Ravenclaws, “You seem to be good friends, so I will just leave you together,” he reasoned. “So that just leaves Miss Evans and Mr. Snape! Oh, you two will make a brilliant pair,” he concluded, “I will be expecting some good work out of you.”

Ellary chuckled as she saw the horrified look on her brother’s face as he stood up from his dark corner desk to sit beside Lily, the muggleborn. Though he really had no right to judge her, being a half blood himself, he had always had a prejudice against those who were not pureblood. ‘That’s what being in Slytherin does to you, I guess,’ she thought to yourself. When Severus took his seat, Lily looked like she was about to throw up.

“Professor, must we work in partners?” Severus asked calmly, “I feel I do my best work on my own,” he added.

“Hah, he does everything alone,” Ellary whispered quietly in Remus’ ear at the comment and he nodded.

“Yes Severus, you must. This is my class and you will work in pairs if I say to do so,” he answered sharply.

Though Severus was probably even better at Potions than Ellary, and that was saying something, Slughorn had never liked him very much and refused to admit him as a member of his prestigious club.

“Now, let’s get moving! We are going to be starting a Polyjuice potion for our first assignment. This is an extremely complicated and potentially perilous potion if it is not made correctly. Can anyone tell me what a Polyjuice potion does?” he asked and everyone instantly raised his or her hands. “Well look at that!” he chuckled, “Let’s see, how about you Miss Snape?”

“It allows you to change your appearance into that of another person’s for a certain period of time,” she replied casually.

“Correct!” he remarked, “Fifteen points to Gryffindor!” and at that she heard Severus mutter something angrily under his breath. Slughorn turned and tapped the board twice with his wand and a long list of instructions magically appeared. “Now get started!” he ordered.

“A Polyjuice potion? I thought we were going to be doing advanced potions in this class,” Ellary complained, “I made this is my third year!” she exclaimed, remembering fondly the time she and Sirius had transformed themselves into Lucius and Regulus so they could set off dungbombs in the Slytherin common room. All the Slytherins had smelled horrible for an entire week.

“Yes, but the difference is that now you are making it legally,” Remus countered, with a small smirk on his face.

“Well that just takes all the fun out of it, now doesn’t it?” she retorted, as she chopped up some dragonroot.

He shook his head quietly at his friend, “I’m glad Slughorn made us partners,” he said a little randomly, blushing as he did.

“Me too, mate!” she said clapping him on the back, “I was almost positive he was going to stick me with my brother or Evans,” Ellary laughed. “I would much rather spend my two hours with you though, mate,” she added tossing some rotten frog eggs at him jokingly.

“Aw, gross!” Remus exclaimed, brushing them off his robe. “You are going to pay for that, Patch,” he threatened playfully.

“Oh, I’d like to see you try, Lupin,” she replied, leaning over the table to grab a vile full of some fizzy, green liquid.

As she did though, the bottom of her shirt lifted up just enough so that the bare skin of her back was revealed. Remus looked down and to his shock there was a large, painful-looking welt there.

“How in the hell did you get that?” he asked in shock, not removing his eyes from the voluminous black and blue bruise.

Ellary looked at him confused for a second, before she realized what he was talking about. Her heart nearly stopped in her chest. How could she have been so stupid? She had been successfully hiding her bruises for five years now and in one Potions class her secret had been discovered.

“I well- I…” she began, not knowing the words to say.