Disclaimer: See chapter 1.

A/N: Thanks for all the reviews, alerts, favorites and putting me in your communities! I have no excuse really for how long I've been gone from this story...I can only hope that the next chapter doesn't take another three and half years to come out... :-/

Chapter 2

Madam Pomfrey stood still outside the closed door before she took a deep breath to compose herself before leaning against the door to the room slightly in exhaustion.

"Are they asleep?" asked McGonagall quietly from beside her. Madam Pomfrey gave a little start, jumping away from the door, but she should have guessed that Minerva wouldn't have left after she finished setting the wards. Of course Minerva would have been waiting outside the door for her to come out to talk about what they had learned or more importantly, what they hadn't learned, about their mysterious guests.

"Yes," she standing up straight and motioning for McGonagall to follow her to her office. They walked to her office in silence, not chancing waking up the three sleeping patients this early into taking the Dreamless Sleep Potion as that could be dangerous and lead to some serious side effects.

They walked into her office, shut the door and McGonagall sat down in the chair in front of Pomfrey's desk while Pomfrey made some tea.

"What an evening this turned out to be," said Pomfrey, as she waited for the water for the tea to boil. She was just going to use teabags tonight. She was in no mood to be fussing with the other stuff.

"Yes and here I was hoping for a quiet one," said McGonagall, shaking her head.

"What a naïve thought for you to have, Minerva, in a school," said Pomfrey with a tired, teasing smile on her face.

"Oh, be quiet you," said McGonagall with a slight, tired smile on her face. Those spells she performed multiple times really took it out of her.

The teapot started to whistle and Pomfrey poured two cups, put a teabag in one and gave it to McGonagall so she could make it to her preferred strength and then she made her own. Then she handed McGonagall the sugar, the only thing McGonagall liked with her tea, and poured some honey in hers. When they were done making their tea, they sat and sipped it for a moment, mulling over what to do before Pomfrey spoke.

"What are we going to do?" asked Pomfrey in a quiet voice. They didn't need to worry about having to ward anything here, there were no portraits in Pomfrey's office, per Pomfrey's wish to respect her patient's privacy.

McGonagall took a sip of her tea to give herself a minute to think some more before she responded, "I think, Poppy, we should do what we have always done and err on the side of caution. We don't know enough about the situation as of yet. We don't know exactly who those three young people are. The only things we know for sure is their first names and that they escaped from a terrible situation. Probably from that lunatic, Voldemort."

"Shhh!" said Pomfrey, hiding a flinch. "You've heard what he's done and that he's got a taboo on his name! If they really have escaped from him you don't want to draw his attention to here! Not to mention this is a school!"

"Sorry," said McGonagall, sounding sheepish. "I just can't see being afraid of a name! No matter what the person has done! It's ridiculous!"

"I can't either," agreed Pomfrey, "but we can't act like foolish Gryffindors when those young people need our help, that much I'm also certain of. They are out of their depth here. They weren't excepting the year to be 1977 although why, I'm not sure."

"I agree," said McGonagall, nodding her agreement as well as a plan started to form. "We should talk to them more tomorrow to find out why. Agreed?"

"Agreed," said Pomfrey, nodding her head.

"That one boy looks an awfully like James Potter though, don't you think?" asked McGonagall.

Pomfrey nodded her head in agreement, she had thought that as well when she was examining him, and added, "The other boy looks like a Weasley."

"And obviously Hermione is a Muggle-born," McGonagall said and added with distaste, "You-know-who seems to have a fondness for torturing and killing them."

Pomfrey nodded her head. It made sense though she wondered as well if anyone else had gotten a close enough glimpse in the Hall to make the same assessment as Minerva.

"I wonder if Charlus Potter would be any help in this matter," ponder McGonagall out loud after a few moments of silence.

"Not Albus?" asked Pomfrey, curiously, raising her eyebrows, knowing that Albus and Minerva were close, with Minerva joining the organization Albus had just formed to fight Voldemort although she, herself, had not.

"No," said McGonagall shaking her head, "If those young people are who I think they are, then Albus will be of no help to them. He has to think, after all, of the many, not the few."

"Then perhaps," said Pomfrey after a few moments of silence on her part as she thought about what McGonagall said, "you should send Charlus a letter before you retire for the night?"

McGonagall nodded once and they both finished their tea in silence.

Meanwhile in the Great Hall, at the Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin tables, several students were still frozen by the sudden arrival of the three teens and house-elf. Other students were in shock, silently wondering to themselves how this happened since they thought they knew you could not get into Hogwarts through magical transportation like that. Others were frightened, wondering if those students meant them harm, after all the elf had a knife in him so that had to mean something, didn't it? Yet, there were still others yet hoping that the little elf was going to make it and wondering who the teens were.

However, there were several seventh year Gryffindor students who were not frozen or wondering to themselves about the events that just happened.

"Bloody hell!" said Sirius and James together and Remus and Peter nodding their heads in agreement.

"I mean, just what the – bloody hell!" said Sirius. He was speechless and if his friends weren't as speechless as him they would tease him for being speechless in the first place for the first time since they had known him.

"I know," agreed, surprisingly, Lily Evans who was sitting on the other side of James.

"Since when do things like this happen?" asked Remus.

"It doesn't," said James. He was starting to come out of his shock. "We need to go back to our dorm."

"All right," agreed everyone, except Lily, nodding their heads.

"Coming?" asked James, noticing her lack of head movement.

Lily shook her head. Her friend had caught her eye and she could tell she wanted to talk about this and well Lily needed to talk about it with her own female friends and gossip and guys just didn't gossip the right way. James nodded his head in semi-understanding and gave her a hug and stood up with his friends which seemed to be a signal to everyone in the Hall because everyone else started to leave as well. Whoever said the Marauders weren't trendsetters?

The four of them walked in silence along the familiar pathway to the Gryffindor Common Room, the first time anyone in Hogwarts had seen them do that in their years here whether they be ghost, portrait, student or staff member, and again, if everyone wasn't preoccupied with their own thoughts and conversations, they would have marked this day on the calendar to remember it. They walked slowly and many other Gryffindors, who were talking to each other, passed them, mostly unnoticed by the Marauders.

The four of them took their time to get to the common room to give themselves time to think past 'bloody hell' and actually come up with a logical reason as to why suddenly three teens and a house-elf, with what looked like a fatal knife wound to them, would show up in the Great Hall. So far, all four of them were stuck on 'bloody hell' and didn't seem to be getting past it any time soon, which was a first for Remus. He didn't think much could shock him anymore.

They arrived at the picture of the Fat Lady, which all of them thought was a rather rude thing to be calling someone – three of them having been taught manners and the fourth following his peers – regardless of the fact that she was a painting, but she refused to give her real name out, said she didn't mind being called the Fat Lady, and Peter gave the password and she let them in. They walked in and saw that it looked like they were the last ones to get there despite the four of them being the first ones to leave the Hall. If everyone else, again, hadn't been preoccupied, they would have questioned how that had happened but alas, it seemed that that mystery was the furthest from everyone's mind.

However, it did seem like all the Gryffindors were waiting for the four of them to arrive because as soon as one of the seventh year girls saw them enter, she nodded to Lily who stood up and everyone fell silent.

James, Sirius, Remus and Peter all turned to looked at her, unsure of exactly what was going to happen, a little thrown on how the rest of the Gryffindors got to the Tower before they had and had time to talk.

"It's been decided," started to Lily, "that we would call a quick House meeting to discuss the extremely unusual occurrence that happened at dinner tonight."

After that strangely proper pronouncement from Lily, murmurs started to break out among everyone and Sirius let out another, "Bloody hell is what happened."

"Isn't that the truth," said a fourth year boy standing in front of him, nodding his head in agreement as did several others in the room.

"Besides that, Black," said Lily's friend with a slight scowl on her face.

"Calm down, Mary," said Lily touching her arm to calm her down. Mary took a deep breath and tried to calm her nerves. She always acted this way when something unexpected happened to her or around her.

"Sorry," she said but Sirius just waved her off. Everyone handled stress in different ways and he was just going to keep repeating his catch phrase at the moment until his world straightened out and she could snap as much as she wanted though he hoped her next target was a Slytherin.

"I've never heard of this happening before," said Remus. "It's not mentioned in any of the books that I've read."

"It's not in any of the books that I've read either," said Lily, also nodding her head in agreement with what Remus said.

"I've never read anything like this happening in the Potter library," said James.

"Nor in the Longbottom library," said Frank Longbottom.

"Or in the Black library," said Sirius quietly.

Everyone choose at the moment to ignore the mentioning of the Black name and nod their understanding at what all the pure-bloods were saying. Nothing in any of their family libraries, which go back further than any public library, including Hogwarts' library, and had more exotic - for a lack of a better word - books, had any mentioning of this, so this must be a very big deal indeed.

Several more students voiced their agreement as well that they never read anything like this happening either.

Everyone was quiet after all that.

"What are we going to do?" asked Mary, in the silence that followed everyone's grave pronouncement at lack of information so far but before anyone could worry themselves into a tizzy.

"I think, first we have to wait and find out what is going to happen to the, for lack of a better word, visitors first before we can decide anything else. Agreed?" said James using his Head Boy voice. "If they are dangerous, the professors, who are among the best, wouldn't let them stay nor would the professors be fooled by them. If they stay, then we should probably use caution around them until we know more for ourselves."

After a moment of deliberation, all the students in the Gryffindor Common Room nodded their heads in agreement.

"This means," said Lily, "that after we find out what is happening to the visitors, we will have to have another House meeting so we can decide what to do as a House and present a united front while still being cautious about anything. These are dangerous times."

There were more nods of agreement at that as what Lily had said was true. Many of their classmates and/or housemates had loss family members and friends to You-Know-Who, as he was starting to be called.

"Okay everyone is now dismissed and free to carry on and do your own thing now," said James after he exchanged a look at Lily who had nodded at him and slowly everyone dispersed into smaller groups to talk in depth on their thoughts about their unexpected visitors that night, their homework and earlier plans forgotten.

They went to bed after hours of further speculation, exhausted, nervous and somewhat excited for what tomorrow would bring.

The same exact conversations were happening in the other houses as well. In the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw House Common Rooms, they too came to the same decisions as the Gryffindor House, though there was more worry in the Hufflepuff House and perhaps some slight overthinking in the Ravenclaw House, which they all did not think was a bad thing in this case.

At the same time in the Slytherin Common Room, a different discussion was going on although they too reached the same conclusions as the rest of the school, except for two boys, who were lying in two separate dorms not taking part in the House discussion, lost in their own thoughts.

In the first dorm room, Regulus Black was lying on his back on his bed and having very similar thoughts to his brother's at first, having witnessed them in the Great Hall, though he chose to ignore the fact they had anything in common anymore, figuring any sane person would have very similar thoughts to what was going through his mind at the moment especially since he had never come across anything like this while reading any of the books in the Black Family Library and he spent more time in there than Sirius did, he was sure of that, just as he was sure that he read books that Sirius wanted nothing to do with.

It was unthinkable what had just happened. They were told time and time again that you couldn't Apparate, Disapparate or Portkey into Hogwarts – there were wards preventing that. So how had those three and elf done it?

Were they perhaps more powerful? A new side in this war between the Dark Lord and Dumbledore? Or perhaps someone already loyal to the Dark Lord or Dumbledore?

Being loyal to Dumbledore made more sense thought Regulus as he put his hands behind his head as he let out a sigh. He didn't think any followers of the Dark Lord would care if a house-elf died, except for perhaps himself but then again he wasn't a follower yet.

He stopped that line of thought. He didn't want to think about what would inevitably happen during the Christmas holiday.

He thought back to the arrival of the three visitors and elf. He had gotten a glimpse of the knife that Madam Pomfrey took out of the elf (he wondered what the elf's name was as he didn't hear it spoken and the elf deserved the respect) and if he wasn't mistaken, the knife looked like a Black Family Heirloom.

But what in the world was a Black Family Heirloom doing in the elf? No one in his family would waste such a precious thing to kill an elf, they preferred to behead elves when the family hadn't anymore use for them. They would not want to risk losing such a precious heirloom in such a risky fashion, especially since those heirlooms had secrets that were only discovered if you were head of family.

Regulus rolled over on his bed until he was lying on his left side and stopped that train of thought as well when he heard the door to the dorm open, his dorm mates enter and their movements as they got ready for bed. His final thought before he closed his eyes to try to get to sleep was that he would just wait and watch and see what would happen next.

In the other dorm room, at the same time, Severus Snape, lay on his bed with a Potions book in his hand but he couldn't concentrate on it for obvious reasons. His thoughts were preoccupied as he suspected everyone's were in the entire school, except perhaps those bloody Marauders – they were probably thinking up another stupid prank for him.

He put the Potions book back in his trunk, closed it, got in bed and closed the curtains, not wishing to be disturbed for the rest of the night, not that he thought his dorm mates would, but better safe than sorry.

He laid down back on his bed, ankles crossed as he pondered what had happened tonight with one major question on his mind.

Should he tell his new master about what had happened tonight or leave it to someone else? He knew there were other Death Eaters in Hogwarts, not many because they weren't useful except as recruiting agents at school and picking up any information they could on the headmaster, not that the Dark Lord expected much though it didn't stop him from punishing them for failing.

He shook his head to himself. He should probably tell the Dark Lord and if others told as well, all the better because then he wouldn't be punished for keeping important information to himself. He might even get a reward for telling first.

He would inform the Dark Lord tomorrow as Severus suspected everything coming in and out of the castle now would be strictly monitored, not to mention that any student caught out of bed would be severely punished.

Decision made, he relaxed into his bed and closed his eyes as the dorm open and his dorm mates came into the room.

Albus Dumbledore sat behind his desk in his office – having dismissed the staff, just as the students had started to leave the Hall, to make sure that no one was out of bed or out of bounds tonight – thinking about what happened at dinner tonight just like every other student and professor.

Albus knew he should go down to the Hospital Wing to check on the three intruders and the wounded house-elf but he also knew that Madam Pomfrey would let no others in to the Hospital Wing tonight unless they needed her help.

Besides that, Poppy and Minerva were both capable witches and Dumbledore had no doubt that they both could handle themselves, even if they were supposedly outnumbered and in the company of the enemy which Albus doubted. He had seen the look on the young man and woman's faces when they pointed their wands at everyone despite his shock.

They weren't looking for a battle – if anything the four of them were probably looking for safety, which Albus would be happy to grant to them.

No, what bothered Albus was their method of travel and their ability to break through wards while having those very same wards remain intact, – Albus had check after he dismissed his staff and he was the last one left in the Hall – there wasn't even a tiny crack in them, even the wards that were tied to him to alert the headmaster about intruders were functioning to their full potential.

So the questions remained, how and why?

Albus pulled a piece of parchment towards him and picked up his quill, dipping it in his inkwell. He would send Minerva a letter, perhaps she got some information from their intruders. Otherwise he would have to wait until tomorrow to talk to them.

Minerva walked at a steady pace back to her private chambers keeping her eyes peeled for anyone out of bed having just finished her tea with Poppy. She really wanted to go to bed, knowing she would have both an early and long day tomorrow, but as she told Poppy, she really thought Charlus Potter would be helpful in the days ahead.

She said the password to the portrait guarding her chambers and walked in, taking off her outer cloak and releasing her hair from her tight bun. She hung up her cloak on the hook by her door and walked into her room to her desk where she kept all of her parchment and ink.

She sat down at the desk and, ignoring the letter from Albus that was lying there - she would read it tomorrow, started to write her letter to Charlus Potter. Once she was finished, she called her owl over to her, gave the owl the letter and sent the owl out the bedroom window. Satisfied she did all she could for the night, she went to bed already anticipating getting up early in the morning to help Hogwarts' unexpected guests.