He tried turning her over; she flopped lazily onto her back, eyes wide open, glazed, and staring before she slowly started to sink.  James panicked.

"Lily!  Lily!  Oh, my bloody purple humping monkeys!  Lily!"

No response.  Lily floated a few feet further down.  He decided to dive.  About time, Lily thought.

After a good thirty seconds, he caught up with her and managed to drag her up to the surface.  When they reached it, her arms were folded and her eyes were wide open.

"Now, really, James, that was one pathetic rescue mission."

It was a good thing that he had nerves holding his eyeballs in place, she reflected, because he certainly was setting a new world record as to the amount his eyes were popping out.  He managed to gasp out a few mumbles that were barely recognizable as English.

"Lily!  You're alive!"

"That is quite possibly the stupidest remark I've ever heard.  Why do you have me pinned so close to you?"

He let out a snort.  "I thought you were dead!"

"You also thought you were dying when you were in the process of killing me.  Kindly let me go."

He obeyed, scowling a bit.  "Do you know how scared you had me?"

"As a matter of fact, no.  Didn't think you cared."

"Well, I thought I'd killed you."

"If it weren't for the fact that one can breathe in this liquid, you would have."

James gaped.  "You can breathe in this water?"
Lily sighed.  "Technically, my friend, this isn't water.  Watch."  Quickly, she sank under the surface, not bothering to take a breath.  She stayed there for a good minute and a half, and James could clearly see her chest moving up and down with each breath she took.  When she came back up to the top, she had to resist the crazy urge to try to hit his eyes to see if they'd pop back into their sockets.

They didn't, and she did.  She resisted, that is, contenting herself with simply smacking him on the back of the head. 

"Potter, of all the stupid things to do, you had to try and drown me!"

"I said I was sorry."

"Actually, no, you didn't."

He scowled.  "Fine.  I'm terribly sorry for almost murdering you.  Can we get to dry land now?"

Lily sighed, but gave in.  "All right."  Just then, James gave an odd start.  "What?"

He touched the tips of her ears.  "You is what.  Look at your ears!"

"Mm-hm.  I know.  I also noticed that, while breathing this liquid when I was playing dead, that I'm forming odd sorts of fins on my hands."

James gaped and snatched both of her palms, spreading them out.  It was true; she was forming a small, delicate, silver web between each finger.  It didn't look so bad, come to that, but what was rather frightening were the silver strands forming across her hair, reminding him of zillions of small lightning bolts. 

He took a deep breath.  "Lily?"

"Hm?"

"You ready to go to shore?"

She shrugged.  "Sure, if you say so."  Instantly, she had kicked upwards, hard, and had dived into the water a good five feet in front of him.  From time to time she surfaced, streaking the water with her silver lightning bolts cutting across her hair.  He followed her quickly.

James knew the only reason Lily reached the shore at the same time she did was because she'd purposefully dawdled, but he appreciated it just the same.  He swung himself out of the waves and held a hand out for her.

Lily smiled and accepted, leaping onto the rock he was standing on.  To his surprise, her cloak was hardly wet; well, that is, he could see the water glistening on it, but it billowed in the winds and waved about her feet quite unlike a soaked one would, which would actually stick to her legs and feet.  And her hair was dark and heavy with the liquid, but it still curled around her face, blowing with the wind.  Looking down at himself, James found that his clothing imitated the same actions.  The pearl-gray robes he had donned were soaking wet; he could feel that, but they were no heavier than before, and the sharp north wind that was blowing whipped them every which way the wind felt like.

Lily snapped him out of his trance by taking his wrist rather sharply and yanking him down from the boulder.  Quickly, he followed her, to some place he assumed she knew.

When they reached Tom's cave, however, it was empty, and the door was shut.  Lily saw reason in that.  No sane person would stay right in the blast of this wind.  And Tom was mostly sane.  For the present.  So, whipping around, she whisked straight for Svordsja's stable.  The door opened easily, and she stepped inside.  Beckoning James to follow her, both were glad to get out of the knife-cutting wind.

Svordsja was inside; kneeling down behind a large mound of piled sand to keep the wind out of the cracks. Her head was down on her forelegs, but she raised her head as soon as Lily and James entered.
Lily stepped forward quietly, holding out one hand, muttering some words under her breath. The pentacorn let out one snort, then relaxed, the tension leaving all three of them. Lily beckoned James to come over and sit down.
"Sit. She won't hurt you—HOLD IT!" She held out a hand, almost hitting James in the face, as the pentacorn's horns lowered. Lily gulped.
"I forgot she doesn't like most people. Here. Give me your hand."
He was a bit edgy about this, but he held it out, and, crooning under her breath, Lily brought it ever closer to Svordsja's neck, not letting James yank it away when the animal tossed her mane and snorted, but bringing it closer till it rested on the stately creature. When she didn't gore James in the stomach after a full minute, James let out a huge breath.
"Whew!"
Lily agreed. "I'd forgotten. I'm sorry."
"No problem. It's payback for almost getting murdered."
She grinned. "I'd forgotten about that, too! Come, sit down. She likes being used as a sofa cushion." He hesitated.
"I'll sit near her teeth, then, for Pete's sake! Come on, she won't hurt you."
James sighed. "All right." He obeyed and sat down next to her, but not that close. Though he wouldn't admit it, the strange silver mists and threads running through her eyes scared him quite a bit. He couldn't look into them for too long; they'd make him terribly nervous.
Lily noticed. "You're scared of me."
He was indignant. "Me, scared of a girl! I think not! Where ever did you get that utterly idiotic idea—"
She wasn't convinced. "You're scared."
James slumped onto the floor. "Yeah, so what?"
"Nothing. It's interesting. I'm not a different person or anything, am I?"
He shook his head. "You're not. I just—oh well. Never mind." He moved closer. "Overcoming fears is good."
She smiled slightly. "James?"
"Hm?"

"You haven't told anyone, have you?"
He frowned. "What do you take me for?"
Lily shrugged. "I don't know…I just figure that if you see Sirius so upset, you'd break down…" She saw his face. "Never mind."
Taking her arm, he patted Svordsja quietly. "Lily, this is your secret. It isn't mine. I've got no right to tell anyone."
She gulped. Please don't make me cry!
He continued. "And I don't intend to tell anyone, not even my closest friends, unless you want them to know. Otherwise my mouth and my quill are staying dumb."
Lily smiled. "Thanks."
"No problem."
"I would have thought it would be; come on, you're a famous Marauder!"
Grinning, he nudged her. "You mean you want this to be shouted in a Howler from the Great Hall when everyone gets back from the holidays?"
Agape, she stared at him. "You wouldn't!"
Seeing the smirk on his face, she settled back down. "I thought not."
He knew better, but let it go. Instead, he switched the subject to something that had bothered him for quite some time. Lifting a hand, he ran it through her hair, ignoring her flinch. He picked up one of the strands of silver hair.
"What, may I ask, are you doing?"
He ignored her indignation. "Let me see something. Bend your head down."
Instead of obeying, she snatched it back up. "How much harm do you intend to inflict upon my skull?"
He shook his head. "I'm not you,—"
"That would be scary."
"—and I don't intend to hurt you;—"
"But will you?"
"—I just want to see something. Head down. Or, at least, incline it this way."
She sighed before obeying. Quite clearly, she could feel him lift some of her hair up and study it.
"What are you doing? Last time I checked, I wasn't a laboratory specimen."
"I just want to see if this is real silver. Mind if I tear some out?"
"Yes."
"Too bad." He tore some of it off. To his surprise, it broke like a piece of wire.
"Erm—Lil?"
"Yes?"
"I think you've got a silver mine planted on the top of your head."

Lily scowled. "You've got such a nasty way of putting that. I have silver hair. Live with it. Otherwise, I can arrange for your funeral."
"You'd have to kill me first."
"Not necessarily. I could bury you alive."
"Note to self: Never let Lily Evans persuade me to get inside a closed, oblong box."
"Wise."
"Isn't it, though?"
"Definitely."
He sighed, then shivered. "It's cold."
Lily frowned. "It is?"
Pulling his robes more tightly around him, he shivered again. "Don't tell me you didn't notice."
She shrugged, taking off her cloak and passing it to him. "I guess it's the elf-nymph change. Something like I have more resistance to temperatures or something. That'd explain why Litharelen's never cold, by the way."
He nodded. "Right. Thanks for the cloak, by the way."
"No problem."
They sat there for a few more minutes, then Lily clapped a hand over James' mouth. "You humans! Stop the teeth-chattering! I can't think!"
He immediately clenched them. "Sorry!"
"'S okay. I just get too annoyed with things."
"With me, too?"
"Sometimes," she admitted truthfully.
"Why?" He looked rather hurt.
"Well—you do get rather irritating when you're showing off, and once in a while you just are too boring for me."
"Excuse me? I'm on the Quidditch team, I—"
She cut him off. "Well, that isn't going to make any girl going to want to stay with you for life, my friend."
James looked at her quizzically. "You mean you ever considered that?"

Lily opened her mouth to say something cutting, but decided against it.  "I tried once.  The only picture I got was of us tearing each other's hair out."

He nodded.  "You've got a point."

"I know."
"But—Lil—"

"What?"

He put a hand on her knee.  "When did you ever form the notion of us maybe spending forever together?"

Lily shrugged.  "It was after an exam, I was bored, and I was looking around the classroom and trying to see who I definitely wanted to stay rather far away from."

He withdrew his hand.  "Makes sense."

"And you, my friend, were just stuffing a fire-breathing salamander down Vanessa's shirt."

He grinned, then checked himself as he met her glare.  "True.  Hey—what?  It was fun!"

"Yeah, and Vanessa had scorch marks on her back for about three days."

"Er."

"Very good answer."

"I try."

"Good.  Try harder."

"Sorry."

"It's all right…" She sighed and let her head fall back.  "I hate myself for getting so fed up with little things."

"I do, too."

She looked up.  "You get fed up with little stuff, too?"

"Nope."  He grinned.  "I hate you for getting so fed up with little things."

"Gee, thanks!"

"I was joking!"  He lightly punched her in the arm.  "Joking.  Jay-oh-kay-eye-en-gee.  Joking."

"I'm impressed."

"I can spell it backwards, too:  Gee-en-eye—Ouch!"  Lily withdrew her hand.

"Enough is enough, you mammoth."

"Mammoth?  Then you're a saber-tooth—er—a saber-tooth—"

Lily smiled.  "You know I'd take it as a compliment if you called me a tiger, don't you?"

"Unfortunately."  He sighed.  "Say, when do you plan on returning to Hogwarts?  It's rather cold, in case you didn't notice, and wind is one of those factors that do exist in this little la-la-land place."

Smirking wickedly, Lily stood up and gave Svordsja a small pat on the side.  The pentacorn immediately stood, knocking James onto his stomach.  Needless to say, he was rather indignant.

"Hey!  That hurt!"

"I thought someone was complaining about sitting here!  Come on.  I'm teaching you how to ride her."

James shook his head.  "No.  Way.  In.  He—in heck," he amended, seeing the look on her face.  "No way."

"It'll keep you warm. Come on, you wimp!"

She knew he disliked being called a wimp, and he knew she knew, and she knew that he knew that she knew that he disliked being called that, and he knew that she knew that he knew that she knew that he disliked it.  In other words, both of them were aware of the fact that James wasn't too particular to that name.

"Lily Evans."

"If you want to hit me, you'd better catch me.  Come on!"  With that, she had flung herself over Svordsja's back, had steered the pentacorn to the door, and crashed headfirst into the shrieking wind.  James shook his head as he followed her. 

"What do you want me to do, jump onto a running horse?"

"Pentacorn."

"Whatever.  You honestly want me to do that?"

"It's not quite traditional, but it'll warm you up.  I assume you know how to ride a pentacorn?"
"Yeah."  James nodded.  "At least, I've ridden horses."
Lily wrinkled her nose.  "In other words, you can't ride.  Never mind about that.  For now, I'll stand still.  You try to mount her."

"With you on her back?"

"Why not?"

"Okay then."  Taking a deep breath, James took a running start, and, slipping his foot into the loop made by a fold of Lily's cloak, he soon was on the back of the pentacorn.  Lily, however, wasn't.

The sudden jerk of his foot in her cloak had thrown her off of the steed, onto an area relatively free from sharp rocks, as she was thankful for later.  However, she was stunned enough to close her eyes and black out.

James didn't notice at first that she wasn't in front of him; he was sitting on Svordsja with a self-conscious grin on his face. When he did realize that no one was in front of him besides a dangerous five-pointed horse's head, his first reaction was to look up. If Lily had been awake, she would have groaned at the density of some people she wouldn't have mentioned because James knew who they were. But Lily wasn't awake, and finally, after checking all of his surroundings, James realized that.
"Lily!"
He gave a sort of strangly gasp, then tried to swing himself down from Svordsja's back. It didn't work too well. He tried to swing his leg over her back and land conveniently on the sand, but somehow he managed to get entangled with his own feet, so he was hanging off of the pentacorn sideways. It surprised everything around that Lily didn't wake up at the world-class screaming concert Mr. Potter presented.
He finally managed to get untangled, and when he did, he almost committed unintentional suicide by falling off. But in the end he was kneeling near Lily's head, shaking her extremely hard, so hard, in fact, that if her neck had been only a bit less firmly attached, she would have had no head.
"Lily! Lil! Oh, come on, wake up…you're only pretending again, aren't you? You'd better be! Oh, wake up, won't you?" He sat back. "This is an extremely sticky situation."
Sitting back on his heels, he stared around the inlet for any moving creature besides Svordsja, who had already tried picking Lily's cloak up and boosting her onto her back. The pentacorn seemed to understand quite well when someone needed help, James reflected, but at that moment he didn't have time to reflect. Several loud bangs came from a spot shielded from his eyes about two hundred yards away. James gulped.
The first thing that came to mind was the story Lily had told him about the day of her first battle, and, though he didn't know what it had looked or sounded like, she had given him a pretty good verbal illustration. And, since there were bright green and gold sparks coming from the place he couldn't exactly see, he was more than convinced that this was exactly what he had thought it was.
"Oh-oh. This isn't good." He was right. It wasn't. "What'm I going to have to do now, with Lily like she is? This was not a good time for this to happen!"
No, it wasn't, but James couldn't very well do anything about that now.
"Oh, dear bouncing quills." He glanced around for a convenient place to hide, and when he did find one, he discovered that it was one of the hardest things in the world to lift someone about your own weight onto a nine-foot high pentacorn. Panting with the effort, he finally gave up and leaned against a suitable piece of rock that was sitting nearby.
"This definitely isn't good."

He finally decided to take her back into Svordsja's stable, the entrance to which was much more concealed than the regular cave Tom used was. Swinging her into a sort of damsel-in-distress-that-is-being-rescued mode (in other words, he was carrying her in front of him, one arm under her neck and back and the other under he knees), he set out for the cave.
It was funny, he thought, how distances lengthen so terribly when one is carrying something heavy. Not that Lily weighed that much, but she was still a human being, and she didn't have hollow bones or anything of that sort, and she didn't starve herself. Just this once, though, he wished she had.
James managed to push the stable door open and set her down on a pile of something hay-like, though it looked like splintered glass and was soft to the touch. It made no sense to him, and he decided to drop it before his head started to hurt from thinking about it. Svordsja curled herself around Lily, and James set himself to brushing the bits of rock and sand away from her face after swinging the door shut.
It took some time to free her skin from all of the debris that her fall had almost permanently embedded into her, but he finally managed it, and by the time someone screamed loudly about one hundred yards away from the stable door, her hair was relatively untangled and placed neatly away from her face.

James and Svordsja gave a large start when something exploded almost outside the door; the only good side to it was that it woke Lily up. She shook herself several times and tried to sit up.
"Lily! You're all right!"
"I would say how childishly obvious that is, but I don't think this is the time. What's going on and what did you blow up this time?"
He frowned. "I didn't do anything—this time. I'm guessing it's another battle."
Lily frowned, too, but hers was more of an 'I'm thinking, so leave me alone' frown, while his was pretty nonplussed. Then she stood up, wincing. James caught her wrist.
"And where do you think you're going?"
"Outside. Let go."
"Lily! Do you have any idea what the words 'highly dangerous' mean?"
"Yes. 'Fun'. Let me go while you still can reproduce."
"Lily."
She swung around slowly to face him. "James Potter, if you wish to be fatally injured, keep this up. If, on the other hand, you would enjoy participating in a battle, feel free. I am going out there whether you like it or not."
"Chances are I don't."
"Then the other chances are you do. Coming or staying?"
He sighed. "Coming. But isn't there anything in the way of armour around here?"
"It's called a Shield Charm. Get used to using it."
"Right. And if it doesn't work?"
"Then, my friend, you are royally screwed." She vanished out of the door, and James followed her, muttering.
"Why did I even bother to ask?"
He looked out of the door, and was met with a surprise. Actually, more of a battle scene than a surprise birthday party, but it was still a surprise. It was also another one to find that Lily wasn't out there, and he stared around stupidly for a good ten seconds before his collar and himself were yanked into a sort of cove.
"Excuse you? That hurt!"
"Sorry. It's just that if you insist on being hit with the Killing Curse, you're going about it the right way. And you haven't told me whether or not you'd mind, so I figured I'd better pull you out of the way."

"I like your logic."
"So do I. Now, I'm going to be watching. Disturb me and you're going to wish you'd never attended Hogwarts."
"Done."
"Good."
"Okay."
"Hush."
"All right."
"I said 'shut up'!"
"No, you said 'hush'."
"Potter!"
"Snap—Evans! I meant Evans! Really, I did!"
"I suggest you shut your mouth."
"You know, that really might be to my advantage."
"Then shut up."
"Yes, sir."

Lily pushed him aside rather roughly and ducked.  James was quite puzzled until he saw a small crack that she was peeking through at the battle.  He poked her on the shoulder.

"What's going on?"
"Tom's fighting…naturally.  I can see Crabbe..and Avery…and Nott—oh, and there's Macnair.  Don't blame Lith for not letting him know about Svordsja—that ax he's swinging looks rather nasty.  Doesn't he know how to use a wand?  Brainless…and someone just hit the floor!  Beach, actually, but who am I to criticize.  Ministry wizard—James, do you know him?  Remus-y hair, kinda short, chubby—I might know him.  I think I've seen him somewhere before.  Tom, the Medusa hair on that poor girl really wasn't necessary!  Ouch—that had to hurt!  What'd he do, give her cobras for hair?"

James interrupted the flowing commentary.  "Looks like he did.  Pleasant, isn't he?  That wizard over there—the one that looks like a cross between Remus, Peter, and a slug—that one's Marvel.  He's one of the clumsiest Auror's I've ever seen."

"He works in your father's department?"

"My father goes to the Ministry once in a while to straighten interesting things out.  He doesn't work there."
"How come?"
"He doesn't need to; we're the richest family besides Malfoy's on this side of Britain.  Well—and the Doylens.  But still—yeah, that is Marvel.  Idiot.  See anyone else you know?"

Lily pushed him aside to squint at the group.  "I don't know.  Don't think so.  I know most of Tom's people—they've all visited him at one point in time—but I don't recognize any of the Ministry."

"Who do you think is winning?"
"I don't know.  Can't exactly tell.  Looks to me like the Ministry's lost more people, but they're driving Tom back.  Depends on what you mean by 'winning'."

"Ah.  Anything interesting happening?"

Lily frowned and didn't answer for quite some time.  James finally got impatient and shoved her less than gently. 

"Anything interesting happening?"

She wore the expression on her face that she hardly ever wore:  the one that said 'There's something wrong and I can't put my finger on it'.  "Depends.  There seem to be less and less of Tom's army—but they're not dead.  They're not anything.  They're just not there."

"You mean they disappeared?"
"Yeah—exactly.  But I don't know if they'd dare without Tom's orders—and why he'd allow them to leave him in the middle of a battle is a mystery to me."

"Oh.  I see."

Suddenly, Lily let out a loud gasp.  "Tom!"

James instantly knelt next to her and stopped looking for more peepholes.  "What?  What?"
"They're all gone!  All except Tom!  Every single one of his army—hang on.  I think it'd be safe to stand up now."
They regained their feet behind the rock, and, peering over it, saw that the entire Ministry army, what was left of it, at least, was closing in on one person:  Tom Riddle, and he was the last of his army, the others obviously having Apparated away.  Just as the Ministry wizards formed a circle around him and he was in the center of a ten-foot ring of enemies, he raised his wand into the air, muttered something, shot a green and glowing figure into the air, and started laughing madly before he Disapparated.

There was nothing left on the field but about three dozen rather unnerved Ministry wizards, destruction and splinters of rock shards and sparks everywhere one looked, and the great, glowing shape Tom had shot into the sky.  Lily drew her breath in so quickly she became dizzy.

It was the same design on the tiara Eva had given her as a birthday present once.  The same design she had copied onto paper for Tom.  The skull with a snake protruding out of its mouth.

Lily had no time to think, for the Ministry was searching all around for anyone that was still on the inlet, and James had taken control.  Quickly, he threw the necklace around both of them, dashed it against the rock they had been kneeling behind, and held her tightly as they whirled back to Hogwarts, landing hard on the floor of the dormitory.

They couldn't speak for more than a few minutes, and when they finally managed to get up enough strength to get up from the floor, the first thing Lily did was fall onto her bed, while James, after unhooking the necklace from around his neck, simply stole the blanket that was lying at the foot of her four-poster, using it as a pillow.  When Lily finally sat up, she had to shake her head several thousand times to get rid of whatever was buzzing around in her brain and giving her a large headache.  That landing was the hardest she'd ever had; if it had just been a tiny bit more violent, they'd both have broken several bones. 

"James?"

"What?"
"Why did we land so—erm—painfully?"

"I don't know.  It's not usually like this, is it?"
"No.  I—wait.  James Potter."  She sat up.  "You threw the necklace around both of us, didn't you?"

"Er—yeah."
"Never do that again."
"Why not?"
"Because if the landing has not broken all of your bones, I will personally take care of that."
"Hey!"  He defended himself.  "You didn't know that this would happen, either!"

She was about to respond, but then her shoulders sagged.  "True.  I'm sorry for blowing up."
"Anytime, I guess.  What was that green thing we saw?"
Lily frowned.  "The skull with the snake that Tom shot into the air?"
"Yeah, that."
"I think—well, actually, I know he's using it as his Mark now.  Sort of like a trademark.  I guess he's using it whenever there's a battle or something important happens—I don't know!  I just know that—well, I don't."
"You don't sound to be pretty far off."

"Thanks."
"Sure."

He rubbed the side of his ribs, where a large bruise was forming.  "You up to walking to the hospital wing?"
Lily smiled.  "We could do that."
They did so quickly, avoiding anyone that might ask questions they couldn't answer.  Madam Pomfrey was told that they had fallen off of James' broomstick, seeing that Lily was rather terrified of them.  She asked no questions; simply gave each of them a hot, chicken-like broth to drink and touched the bruises they had a few times with her wand.  By the time they went down to dinner, they were perfectly fine, and if Lily hadn't imposed a strict rule of silence about what happened that afternoon, James would have been singing Madam Pomfrey's praises with his knife, dinner glass, and a terribly warbling baritone that needed to be squashed.

Sirius seemed to be all right again at the dinner table, at which Lily was terrifically relieved.  She had been afraid she'd done something—well, something that had hurt him badly.  But he was in quite a good mood as he asked James if he'd had a good time at Hogsmeade.

"Yeah, I did!  It was neat…but Zonko's needs to hire new inventors.  The stuff they have is rather old.  But other than that, it was wonderful."
Lily smirked.  She didn't want any idiotic rumors about her and James going around, so she was going to prick his little bubble of happiness and hinting as soon as possible.  Which, in other words, was right now.

"I don't know if I'd call it a good time if I were in his place—but everyone to his own, I guess.  I personally wouldn't like having rum spilled all over me and then being attacked by a phoenix on a rampage, but I guess he does."
Sirius snickered.  "You ordered rum?"

"No."  Lily settled into her seat.  "Rosmerta was serving some hag, and James had put his bag in her path.  She tripped.  And I'm not quite sure the seven showers he says he took got the smell of it out of his hair."

James stared at her, rather insulted.  "Hey!"  She glared.  "I mean—I thought you said you wouldn't mention that!"

"I said I wouldn't mention it.  I didn't.  I introduced it as a topic of general conversation and interest."
"I'm really starting to despise you."
"Oops."

"That isn't a question with an 'Oops!' answer!"

"That's what I just made it."

"Oh, honestly!"  James grabbed the hair on each side of his head and pulled.  Yanked, actually.  "You're one of the most difficult people to live with that I've ever seen.  Honestly!"

She shrugged.  "I'm sorry.  By the way, I'm going to need your advice later today."
"You are?"  He was puzzled.  "I thought you were refusing to talk to me!"

"I need your advice."
"On what?"  His evil grin flickered across his face.
"On what to make out of one of my Christmas presents."
His face dropped.  "It's nothing more interesting?  Like, for instance, how to propose to Snape?"
"Well, actually,--" She had to leave off, as the boys were laughing so hard it would have been pointless to continue.  They wouldn't have heard her anyway.