Chapter Text
“Lily! Take Harry and go! Go! Run! I’ll hold him off!”
There wasn’t a chance for James Potter. He had no wand and stood only with his courage and his willingness to buy his wife and son some time. Any time. A few extra seconds.
There was a chance for Lily. There were anti apparition wards over the house, and Lily could barely think to keep a hold of her wand while she clutched onto her baby with both arms, running through the nursery. She flicked her wand as best she could while she held Harry, and sent the furniture crashing up against the door, easily her clumsiest spellwork in years but it hardly seemed to matter now.
A few extra seconds. What to do with them?
No way to apparate, no portkey, James’ broom was in the shed, and flying with a baby was practically impossible. No magic transport. But there was a window, and Lily could have flicked her wand, but she couldn’t even think to move her wand arm away from Harry. But she was wearing her boots, and with her ratty old muggle doc martens, she smashed the window pane with her foot.
The cottage wasn’t tall, but Harrys nursery was still on the second floor, and by now Lily’s furniture blockade had been blasted to pieces. No time left. No choices left to make, she fell backwards out of the window, clutching her baby to her chest and hoping desperately the time she had spent gardening left her with enough of a flowerbed to cushion her fall.
She didn’t even have time to think about the pain as she scrambled to her feet, and ran. Just ran. Jets of green light flew at her from the broken window, and Harry’s screams filled her ears, but Lily couldn’t spare a thought for any of it as she ran, vaulting over the small garden wall as best she could.
Now, you’re not supposed to apparate with a baby, but truly, Lily had no choice. She ran past the apparition wards and closed her eyes and thought of home. Cokeworth. And suddenly there she was. In the alley by her parents old house, Tuney was the one who sorted out the paperwork, but she knew it stood empty, up for sale since her parents had passed.
She stood stone still for a moment, her heart thudding in her chest, and she registered mutely as Harry’s cries stopped only for the poor boy to be sick down Lily’s front. The least of her worries right now. She rubbed Harry’s back to calm him, barely registering doing it as she tried to catch her breath in the growing darkness of the alley around her. She couldn’t apparate again, not with her baby. She had managed not to splinch him once, and Lily was sure that was fueled entirely by terror.
Peter. Of course it had been Peter. He had been sewing seeds about Remus for months, even getting Sirius to pick a fight over it. Lily cursed as she rocked Harry softly, adjusting him in her arms enough to pull her wand out and use a few cleaning charms to get rid of his sick. It had been Peter. Or had it been Sirius too? Wanting to blame Remus, and he had been most vocal about that. Her boys… what on earth had happened to her boys. James…
Lily shook her head, she had no time to go down that road right now. All she had was her wand, and her baby, and she was in the middle of muggle nowhere, with an empty home in which she had grown up. Now with bare floors and naked walls, it was the shell of a house, wiped clean for someone else to move their lives into. But it was all she had.
Lily took a breath and set off down the road, bouncing harry in her arms as she approached the old Evans’ home, the garden had become overgrown, and the for sale sign was slightly wonky from a recent storm, but it was safe enough for the moment.
She crept up to the back gate, and let herself in with her wand. Slipping through the kitchen, Lily went straight upstairs, Tuneys old room. Her window had a view of the whole street, and a plush carpet on the floor.
Still numb, Lily placed Harry on the floor gently, knowing the carpet was the best she could provide right now. Someone in the order had blabbed. Definitely Peter, but who knows who else? Lily didn’t know who to trust or who to turn to, so she set up her own wards, enough to keep them safe for this moment.
Lily sat down on the floor next to where she had placed Harry, leaning against the wall and still clutching to her wand. Harry was still whimpering, and reached his arms out for her.
“Oh Harry… what are we gonna do?” She murmured as she picked him up, holding him tight to her chest and letting herself have a breather, as the pain started to wash over her.
Lily had lost almost everything in the last ten minutes, her husband, her house, her friends, her safety. But she did have her baby, and she did have a chance.
“Lets get a game plan together, shall we?” She said out loud, looking down at Harry. “We can’t go to uncle Remus, he’s still on a mission… uncle Sirius… well, we don’t know what he’s doing, do we? But he might not be safe right now, so we can’t go to him.”
She had turned to Petunia’s old room in desperation, and the situation wasn’t about to get any better. If she couldn’t trust in magic right now, perhaps going to her sisters was the safest bet. She hadn’t spoke to her since Petunias wedding. It hadn’t gone well. But surely she would help, Lily had nothing left but her life and her son, and her sister still stood.
After debating whether to wait until sun up or not, Lily decided against waiting too long, and scooped up Harry, slipping down the road to the payphone her and Petunia used to pass on their way to the park.
Lily quickly dialled the number, with reverse charges, it rang a few times. To be expected, it was late after all, but thankfully Petunia picked up the phone.
Her tone wasn’t polite, after all, who called this late at night when there was a one year old in the house, and didn’t this person quite know that her husband had to be up early for work the next day?
Once her sisters tone would have gotten on Lily’s nerves, but right now it made her smile weakly. For all that she had lost tonight, her sister hadn’t changed in the slightest.
“Tuney… Tuney it’s me, I’m in trouble.” Lily had finally said down the line.
There was silence. An internal debate clearly raging inside of Petunia, this was her sister after all. And while Petunia Dursley was snobbish and could be cruel, this was her sister.
“Not financial I hope. I’m not here to bail you out because that husband of yours wont work.” She sniffed stiffly, and Lily could hear her sisters arms cross on the other end.
“No… nothing like that. Proper trouble. James… he, he’s gone Tune.” Lily said, bouncing Harry on her hip as she tried not to let her emotions take over.
“Left you has he?” Petunia spit out. “Well, I can’t say I didn’t see it coming-“
“No, no Tune, he’s dead.” Lily interrupted, her words dropping out her mouth like stones. “He’s dead, and I, I managed to get away, and I’ve got Harry, but… well I’ve got nowhere to go that’s safe right now, and, well, I’m at the old house, in Cokeworth. Just holed up for a few hours, didn’t know where else to go, but I’ve got nothing with me, no money, or anything, haven’t even got a coat to keep Harry warm, he’s in his pyjamas.”
Silence. It could have lasted an eternity for all Lily knew, she had said it. She was a widow, in her early twenties, a widow already with a one year old on her hip, and nothing left to take care of him.
“You… you stupid girl.” Petunia sighed after a moment. “I tried to warn you.” She mumbled, but even Petunia Dursley couldn’t make it sound convincing. “I’ll wake Vernon, tell him I’m going to come and pick you up, see if he’s okay waking up for Dudley if he needs it.”
Lily sighed in relief. “Thank you… thank you Tuney. I’m sorry I know it’s late and-“
“Stop that now. I don’t need you blubbering down the phone, I’ve got to get ready for this drive, it’s a good three hours away you know. Just stay inside, and keep warm until I get there. And for gods sake, look after that baby, I don’t want to take him to the hospital tonight too.” She said irritably before hanging up the phone.
Three hours away or not, Petunia made it in two. No traffic, she said, but truthfully it was easier to ignore the speed limits when there was nobody else on the roads.
Things were stiff and awkward, and lets not pretend that Petunia was kind about the ordeal. She simply unlocked the old house with the keys she had forgotten to give to the estate agent yet and called for Lily.
She looked at her sister, silent tears streaming down her face and ugly snot bubbling up at her nose, and for once, Petuina felt like the pretty one. She reached out to take the baby from her sisters shaking arms, and looked sharply down at the boys pyjamas, covered in dragons or some other creature Petunia didn’t care for. She marched down the front path and opened the back door, reaching in and doing up Dudley’s car seat around this other toddler, stiff and clinical, but also taking care not to wake him. A screaming child was the last thing she needed.
“Theres a spare room.” Petunia finally announced, half an hour into their drive as Lily looked out the window trying to hide her crying. “And Dudley’s old Moses basket. It’s obviously going to be small, but better than nothing.”
“Right. Thank you.” Lily replied, pushing tears away from her eyes with the sleeve of her jumper.
“For gods sake Lily, use a tissue.” Petunia snapped, leaning over and opening the glove compartment, handing her sister a packet of tissues.
“Right, yeah, sorry.” Lily mumbled, taking the packet and clearing her face.
“There’ll be time for crying later. After you’ve had some sleep and got a roof over your head.” Petunia told her, craning her neck to watch for traffic at some crossing or other.
“Yeah. Yeah, thanks, again.”
“And stop doing that.”
“Doing what?”
“Not being Lily.”
Lily laughed dryly, but there was no happiness in it. “Tuney, I’ve lost almost everything tonight. I think I’ve got a pass to be a bit out of it, don’t you think?”
“There she is. Bossy as ever.”
“Excuse you, you were the bossy one.”
“Well, I’m older.”
“Alright Tuney.” Lily said softly, a ghost of a smile passing her face. She had lost a lot tonight, but in that moment she had found her sister again.