"Whose table is that?" Scorpius asked Albus. Albus never got the chance to answer.

"Good morning to the sleepyheads who have just arrived!" James called. His voice rang loudly throughout the Great Hall. Scorpius looked up in confusion and turned towards his voice. James and Evvie were sitting side-by-side at the empty staff table, and despite the fact that both looked excruciatingly exhausted, James was smiling. "As I'm sure your Prefects have informed you, there are no classes today. All professors are currently having a quick kip. The dementors are gone and good riddance! As an extra safety precaution, Aurors are still roaming the Forbidden Forest and the grounds. Be kind if you come across them and they seem a bit short—they've been working all night."

It looked as if James and Evvie had been working all night, too. Evvie politely pressed her palm over her mouth as she gave a huge yawn. James yawned after she did (less politely).

Evvie added: "I'm sure you're all wondering about the table." Scorpius spotted a few more heads bob in agreement from those who presumably came in right before or after he and Albus did – "It's been set up as a place where members of all Houses may eat together. James and I, as well as a few of our classmates, have been working on implementing this addition all year, and we hope that some of you might consider using it. We disagree with the current level of House segregation, and those who agree with us are welcome to join our next party held on Halloween night."

"I also have an announcement from my mum," James began. "I mean—our new Quidditch referee and coach, Mrs. Potter. Those of you still waiting to complete try-outs are welcome to come down to the Pitch today to book your time. Slots are available from eleven until eight tonight. On a similar note, our first match will be Gryffindor versus Slytherin, two weeks from today. So you might want to get on those try-outs, Jacques."

James smiled good-naturedly at Jacques, who looked mildly alarmed at this new schedule. He crammed nearly five sausages into his mouth and then jumped up and all but raced from the Great Hall.

"We'll shut up now, but a word of warning: James and I are in charge until the professors wake, and if you're considering taking us on: don't. We're incredibly exhausted, we've already broken up a violent fight in the second floor toilets, and we're not in the mood to deal with it. Have a nice breakfast." Evvie lifted her mug and took a sip of her coffee or tea, her eyes fluttering shut for a brief moment.

"Brilliant," Albus said. "A table for anybody. Let's go see if Rose made any progress on coming to terms with the fact that she fancies Iset."

"I doubt it, it's only been a few hours," Scorpius pointed out.

"So? Look at all we've managed to do in a few hours. Quite impressive, really."

Scorpius grinned at Albus. He tightened his hold on his arm, tugged him closer, and heard his own voice tuck down to that Naughty Scorpius tone, the one that was so much smoother and more confident than Scorpius himself ever was. "It's because you're all Albus-y. I can't help it. You give me your intense eyes and then my desire to touch you is rhapsodic."

"...Thanks, I think? Is that...a good thing? I don't know whether to feel turned on or insulted."

"It's a good thing," reassured Scorpius.

"Oh, then my desire to touch you is also...whatever you just said?"

"Rhapsodic."

"Okay. If I didn't know it the first time, I probably still don't know it the second."

Scorpius sighed. He really needed to find a way to get Albus to read more. "I can't keep my hands off you."

"Oh," Albus said. He nudged Scorpius's ribs. He winked, so quickly that Scorpius almost missed it. "Good. Don't keep them off me."

After a shared mischievous grin, Scorpius helped Albus over to the end of the table that Rose and Iset were at. They exchanged greetings and waves with everybody else at the table as they passed, and then they sat down beside Hugo and across from Rose and Iset.

"Good morning," Scorpius greeted. He cheerfully piled eggs onto his plate, his heart bursting with excitement for his after-breakfast plans with Albus. "How's the dementor-less morning treating you, Iset?"

"Oh," she said. "Hello. Er, good." It took her a moment to adjust to their sudden appearance, as it always did, but she seemed to recover much quicker than she usually did—something Scorpius attributed to Rose's presence. He and Albus had noticed that effect more than ever last night. "It's nice to have them gone. How are you both doing?"

"Good, yeah—" Albus leaned over Iset without thinking about it, reaching for the far plate of sausages. He caught himself a second later and quickly lowered back down onto his bottom. He looked at Iset, and Scorpius did too, the both of them expecting her to cringe away. But she managed with only the slightest shift towards Rose. Albus grabbed Scorpius's thigh from beneath the table. Scorpius reached down and grabbed his, too, as if to say: I know!!

"I'm great!" Scorpius blurted, even though the window to answer Iset's question had probably already closed. He beamed. Albus nodded along in agreement. Scorpius dropped his eyes to Rose, who still had her face resting in her arms. "Is Rose...actually asleep?"

"She's got a headache," Iset explained quietly. She reached up and tapped her own forehead. "Above her eyes and at the back of her head, here," she reached over and gently touched the base of Rose's skull. Rose hardly stirred.

"Oh," Scorpius perked up. "Probably from the stress. Muggles call it a 'tension headache'! Rose, you should go to Madam Pomfrey and get a pain potion."

Rose muttered something into her arms. Scorpius thought he might've heard Bread Head somewhere in there. Yikes.

"I'll go," Iset offered immediately. She seemed eager to help in some way. She rose from the table right as Rose sat straight up. She shot a hand out and grabbed onto Iset's hand, stopping her as she began to walk off. Iset frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Don't go to the Hospital Wing," Rose said.

Albus and Scorpius exchanged a quick look. From the concern saturating Rose's words, this was about to get good.

"Why?" Iset asked. Her voice was still lowered into a soft whisper, even if Rose had spoken rather loudly and harshly.

"Because—because. Because...I feel better. No more headache. I guess I just needed to...rest my head," Rose lied.

Scorpius thought it was fairly obvious that it was a lie (and that the real reason Rose didn't want Iset to go was because she didn't want her going off alone). Iset also seemed to be well aware of those things, but instead of calling Rose out on it, she smiled. She slid back into her place beside Rose. Rose had yet to drop her hand from Iset's.

"Rina's got pain potion in her trunk," Iset said. "We can ask her for some before we start our homework."

Albus deposited buttered toast onto his plate and (to Scorpius's delight) Scorpius's, too. He turned to Rose afterwards.

"You're going into the Hufflepuff basement?" he demanded loudly. Rose winced. Iset winced in response to her wince.

"Soft voices," Iset reminded them, and both Albus and Scorpius were so shocked that she was sort of scolding Albus that they didn't say anything back.

Albus's loud voice had done more than pain Rose and make Iset speak up; it gathered Lily's attention. She moved from her previous seat and sat suddenly at Scorpius's side.

"Hufflepuff Basement? I want to go," she greeted. "I've seen the Ravenclaw Tower and the Slytherin Dungeon but I've never seen—"

"When have you seen the Slytherin Dungeon?!" Albus interrupted, horrified. Lily ignored him.

"Can I come along?" she asked sweetly.

"No," Rose said coldly. "You can't. You know, pretending that we didn't argue doesn't mean it didn't happen. I'm still angry with you."

Lily scowled. "Seriously? You're still angry? But it's been nearly five entire hours, Rose. How long do you plan on being angry?"

"Until I'm not anymore," Rose snapped. "Do you know how embarrassing it was to get locked out because you decided it'd be fun to play around with Dark Magic? People thought it was me who triggered the new safe-guards! The Fat Lady was being purposefully cagey to fuel the rumors!"

"Well honestly, Rose, that shouldn't bother you. Anybody who'd look at the two of us and conclude that you must be the one who did Dark Magic clearly doesn't understand much at all. And their opinion really shouldn't matter."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Rose demanded, affronted. "I look like Miss Prim and Proper, do I?"

Lily nudged Scorpius's arm.

"Scorpius, between Rose and I, who would you rather get into a duel with?" she demanded.

Scorpius balked, horrified. "Neither!"

"If you had to," Lily pressed.

"I wouldn't!"

"Scorpius!" Lily said sharply.

He sighed. "Okay, okay...if I had to choose...well...I would definitely not like to duel you, Lily."

Lily grinned smugly. She gestured his way.

"See? I clearly appear to be the dangerous one, so don't worry, Rose. Your reputation is unharmed."

"Except it's not! Because everybody saw the Fat Lady closing up in front of me!"

Lily groaned. "This is so annoying, Rose! We have Quidditch practice later! I don't want to be ignored during Quidditch practice! Love me again!"

"No! I won't!"

"Rose! That's a horrid, fucked up thing to say to your family!"

Scorpius felt a shock course through his system at the expletive. It always felt so wrong to hear Lily speaking crudely because her voice was so sweet and the contrast was jarring.

"You're not my family as long as you're doing Unforgivables!" Rose snapped. She snatched her full mug from the table and stood. "I don't claim you! And stop screaming, I've got a headache!"

She stormed off, leaving Lily fuming and Iset biting her lip. An awkward silence settled over their end of the table.

"I thought her headache went away?" Hugo finally asked.

Their plan of after-breakfast snogging (and, if they were lucky, more) was thwarted by Lily. She followed them from the Great Hall and ranted nonstop to Albus about how angry she was with Rose. Albus nodded and agreed and offered some pretty decent advice, but the closer they got to the Slytherin Dungeon, the more annoyed Albus became.

"Lily," he finally said. "Can't you go talk to Aster about this? I know Rose can be cold sometimes, but Scorpius and I have plans."

Lily stopped walking. She observed them both, her eyes drifting from Albus to Scorpius. Scorpius found it extremely difficult to meet her eyes; he looked down guiltily.

"Fine," she said, after a long pause. Her voice sounded smaller than normal. "Have fun with your plans."

She turned on her heel and took off in the opposite direction. Albus groaned. Scorpius sighed.

"Albus..."

"I know, I know. And I'm not happy about it," he hissed. He gave one more sigh and then set off after his sister. "Lily...wait."

"Yeah, wait for us, Lily," Scorpius added gently.

They caught up with Lily easily. She'd stopped at the staircase and sat on the bottom step. Scorpius took one look at her downcast face and knew she was upset. His heart inched down. He frowned. He walked over and sat beside her; Albus did the same.

"What's wrong?" Scorpius asked.

Lily reached up and gathered her hair into her hands. She pulled her fingers through it nervously, her eyes locked on the floor.

"So many people are angry with me. Rose, James, Louis..."

"Er...you sort of...did illegal Dark Magic, Lily," Albus pointed out.

Lily leaned forward and pressed her face into her thighs. She groaned angrily. Her hair spilled over her shoulders and puddled on the steps.

"But I wasn't hurting anybody or anything!" she exclaimed. She sounded so frustrated that she was nearing tears. "I didn't hurt anyone. I neverwanted to hurt anyone. I don't understand why everybody is so angry with me."

"Because it's illegal, Lily!" Albus repeated.

"It's illegal to keep people from abusing and using each other! I wasn't doing that! Caden wanted to; we drafted up rules beforehand and signed them! We knew what we were doing!"

"Yeah, but...but it's still—you just can't do that, Lily. You just can't."

"But why?" she pressed.

Albus struggled to respond to that.

"Because...it's illegal."

"But I didn't use it in an illegal way."

"But...it's still illegal," repeated Albus weakly. He was beginning to doubt himself. Scorpius decided to give it a shot.

"Lily, they're probably angry because they think it was an unnecessary risk. Does that make sense?"

"No," she said, her voice thick with frustrated tears, her face still hidden.

"Doing Dark Magic like that...even if you think it's under control...things can still happen. And it wasn't necessary, you know, it was just for fun—"

"For training!" she interjected.

"But training for what?" Scorpius pointed out. "We're not in a war. It just wasn't necessary. And it probably seems very...insulting to them, that you're playing around with Dark Magic when so many people in your family have been injured by it recently and in the past. Worrying too, I bet. They're probably worried that you're, you know...going to...go Dark."

"I would never," she said fiercely in her legs.

"Then don't do Unforgivables, Lily. It really is that simple," Albus said shortly.

"But I need to know if I can throw the Imperius off!"

"Well, can you?" Albus said.

"...Yeah."

"So you're done. You're finished with your Unforgivable experiment. You wanted to learn to throw it off, and you did. Done. Ended."

"Of course I'm done with it! That's not the problem! The problem is that people are angry with me!" Lily argued.

"Get over it. That's what happens when you do stupid things," Albus snapped. "They'll move on as long as you stop doing Unforgivables."

"I wanted to be prepared! Dad says all the time that people want to hurt us! I just wanted to feel like I could protect myself. The Imperius scares me the most, way more than the Cruciatus, even more than dying. I just wanted to..." she trailed off. "Be less scared."

Scorpius doubted she would've admitted that had her face been visible. He'd felt certain that what Lily had done was wrong, but at those words, his conviction shook a bit. He frowned. Albus also seemed unsure what to say back to that.

"You should tell James and Rose and Louis that," Scorpius finally said. "It might help them understand."

Lily sat up. The bridge of her glasses had left an angry red indention on her nose from the pressure of lying face-down for so long. She pulled her glasses off, dropped them into her lap, and rubbed over the line they'd left.

"They won't care," Lily finally said. She sounded much more wounded than Scorpius had anticipated. She pushed her glasses back on a moment later. "You heard Rose. She doesn't claim me anymore."

"Rose didn't claim me for nearly five years," Albus said sourly. "She got over it. She'll get over it."

Lily huffed. She reached behind her, gathered her hair, and flipped it over the top of her head so it hung in front of her face like a curtain. Bitterly, from behind that curtain of hair: "I don't know how to get people to understand me."

"Welcome to my world, Lulu," Albus snorted. He reached over and began moving sections of hair out of Lily's face, bit by bit, until she was visible again. She was pouting as she came into view.

"And mine," Scorpius agreed. When the tip of her nose gave a tiny twitch, perhaps from withheld tears, he reached over and set his arm around her shoulders. His heart warmed as she immediately leaned her head against him, and he couldn't help but smile. He grinned down at her, overwhelmed by that protective feeling of affection that seemed to overtake him when he was around her. He certainly couldn't see the future like Professor Gantha claimed she could, but he knew that he would probably always want to protect Lily Potter, even if Lily Potter didn't want to be protected. Even if Lily Potter seemed to actively sabotage herself on occasion.

"The Misunderstood Trio," Scorpius teased.

She smiled and scrunched up her nose. Albus laughed along with them.

"I'd drink to that," Albus said.

Their laughter pandered off. All three heaved deep sighs.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'll always be the Black Sheep," Albus finally said.

"That actually does, a bit," Lily said. She reached over and patted Albus's shoulder. "Thanks. That helps."

Scorpius and Albus stepped into the passage leading to the Slytherin Common Room.

"We did a good job," Scorpius said.

"We did. James would give us a solid five if he were rating our lecture."

"A five! Brilliant!" Scorpius celebrated. A quick thought occurred to him—we make a good parenting team—but he was so embarrassed by it that he actually stumbled. Paranoid that Albus would somehow sense what he was thinking and be really turned off by it, Scorpius began reciting lyrics to French songs in his mind.

"What are you humming?" Albus asked curiously.

"What?"

"You're humming."

"Am I? Oh." Scorpius stopped thinking about French song lyrics. "So...an entire day...you and me...the dormitory is almost certainly empty..."

Flirty Albus tightened his hold on Scorpius's arm and grinned up at him.

"This sounds like the beginning to my idea of a perfect afternoon," he murmured.

Scorpius beamed. "Afternoon? We're free well into the evening..."

"The evening?" Albus said. He lifted his eyebrows and gave that cheeky grin again. Scorpius felt the blood migrate away from his rational mind at the sight of it. He slowed, squirmed a bit, and clenched his fists, struggling with the sudden urge to push Albus against the passageway wall. Who was he? Scorpius didn't push people. He would never push anyone—and especially not Albus? So why was the idea of that suddenly so appealing—why couldn't he get it out of his mind—why—

"I can think of loads of ways to spend our afternoon and evening," Albus said, his grin still in place, now paired with smoldering eyes, and Scorpius thought he might explode. "First order of business: getting you out of those clothes—"

Scorpius surprised both Albus and himself as he suddenly pulled Albus to a stop, grasped onto his hips, and swung them both around to push Albus against the passageway wall. His heart was thudding hard in his chest, and he wanted nothing more than to kiss him, but he forced himself to slow down for a moment. He met Albus's green eyes. He studied the depths of them, to make sure he couldn't read any discomfort, but all he saw was churning intensity, the kind that made Scorpius's body quickly gain control over his mind, and he couldn't image going even a moment longer without kissing Albus.

He looped his arms around Albus's waist to help keep him upright, pressed his body gently into Albus's, and moved his lips to his. In less than a second, Albus had one hand at the back of Scorpius's neck, one resting on his stomach, and his lips were already