The trio returned to Hogwarts with many laughs, stories and tears from Maggie. As they were about to apperate back to Hogsmeade, Mark Potter pulled his son aside, and they conversed in hushed tones, watching the others warily to make sure that they weren't listening to what they were saying.

"I know that Dumbledore's been talking to you, and I know how much you lot are going to want to help him-"

"How did you…"

"I talk to Dumbledore. We keep in touch. Listen to me James, I know what you lot are like with stuff like this. Especially you and Padfoot. But I am asking you now, please, please, don't get involved with it all until after you have left Hogwarts. I know that I cant stop you after that, and even though it's dangerous I don't know if I would even want to, but for now, enjoy being seventeen…"

"Does mum know?"

"No. I haven't had the guts to tell her. But there's no need to, is there James." He added at the end, with a stern look. James knew what this meant. He was promising, promising that he would be a good boy and stay in the castle until he left, and for that, he was slightly happy, even though it seemed his father was treating him as though he were inferior.

"I promise."

"Good. Thankyou. And take care of Lily too. I like that girl, and I can see that she's not one who needs taking care of, but she's not like the other ones that you and Padfoot talk about, she's…"

"She's Lily Evans." Said James simply, with a smile, and Mark took that as all the reassurance that his son was a good bloke that he needed.

They went back over to where the girls and Sirius were saying their goodbyes, and Tracy was wrapping Sirius up in a rib-crunching hug.

"Now sweetie, you know that you're to come back here any time that you like, even after you boys leave the school. And don't be shy to bring around this Dani girl any time that you like either, ok? Don't be a stranger." She wiped her eyes, and Sirius smiled at her.

"Thanks for everything. Both of you." He added, turning to Mark. Lily felt awkward for a moment, like she was intruding on something private, seeing Sirius get emotional like this, but she was sort of glad that she was.

In three quick pops, the three friends were gone, and standing out the front of the three broomsticks.

They looked from the school to the pub, and back again. James shrugged, and the others knew what he meant straight away. There would be time for walking to Hogwarts later. They turned and entered the three broomsticks.

The wizarding pub had the definite drowsiness that comes as sinister trait of Boxing Day. Rosmerta lazed around the bar, slowly cleaning the table, making drinks groggily for any one who approached the counter. The Christmas tree stood in the corner slightly more wilted than it had the last time James and Lily had been in there, and it was as though it was a reminder of the cleaning up and work that was to be done now that they jolly Yule time was over. The songs that played from the wizarding wireless in the corner was no longer the festive carols that adorned their ears a few days beforehand, but was emitting a slow ballad about a young witch who lost her pet owl, with whom she had fallen in love with.

James, Lily and Sirius found a small table, and sat around it, butterbeers in their hands.

"Thanks for that James." Lily said.

"Thanks for what?"

"For inviting me for Christmas. That was the best Christmas that I've ever had." She replied. Sirius nodded in agreement, staring into the depths of his bottle.

"You know what, I think it might have been mine as well." He said. James grinned.

"Well I'm glad. I think it was probably mine too, although the time that dad and I shrunk you Padfoot, and stuck you on the top of the tree…"

Lily burst out laughing, and Sirius went red.

"That was not funny." He said, though there was a small smile playing around his lips.

Back at Hogwarts, the rest of the castle had the same post-season gloom that came when something good was over. The drowsy atmosphere was broken somewhat, however, by the arrival of Dani, as she burst through the portrait hole into the Griffindore common room. Sirius jumped to his feet, and she ran right up to him and threw her arms around him. Sirius grinned bashfully, then kissed her.

Dani cast a quick look around the common room to see if anyone had seen them. Only James and Lily were laughing at them without shame, James rolling on the floor at what had previously been a very secret relationship.

"Um, Lily, er, guess what?" Dani said brightly.

"Don't fret Dan, you like I could spend the whole holidays and not get the gossip out of that idiot?" Lily laughed, and Dani relaxed.

She and Sirius sat down, hand in hand.

"Well, I'm glad you missed me Doyle." Sirius said, smiling. Dani looked embarrassed, and feigned deafness.

Ella wasn't due back until late that night, but Remus came sauntering back through the portrait hole around nine o'clock, unusually cheery and greeting them all with a happy merry Christmas.

"What's got you so happy Remus? Have too much eggnog?" James laughed, as his friend sat down by the fire.

"Nothing, I just had a good break, that's all." He said, smiling.

Peter came back shortly after, and he seemed to pop up out of nowhere, and sat down with them at the fireplace without saying anything at all.

"Peter! When did you get in?" James exclaimed, a couple of moments later. Peter smiled.

"A few seconds ago. You guys were talking; I didn't want to disturb you." He said.

"How was your Christmas Peter?" Lily asked, a little more enthusiastically than she would have ordinarily. The group so often left out the poor boy, and she hadn't ever really taken the chance to get to know him before. In fact, he wasn't so much one to take part in the marauders jokes, and the majority of the time he was at the receiving end of them. The fact that his animagus form was a rat was the cause of many a snide remark, and the fact that he was shorter and rounder than his three best friends didn't help him either.

"Oh, it was ok, you know…" he said, in a small voice, a little nervous about the fact that he was talking to Lily Evans, as though he were an equal. James seemed to worship the girls for years and years now, and as Peter worshipped James, any one that James put on a pedestal was practically a god to Wormtail.

"Did you spend it with your family?" she prompted encouragingly, as the rest of the group began to talk amongst themselves. Wormtail nodded.

"Mum mostly. Dad was at work most of the time."

"Are your parents wizards?" she asked, scanning her brain frantically for something to say, Wormtail not providing much help.

He nodded again, and Lily gave up for the moment, though she was determined, from that night on, to make an effort to get to know Peter Petigrew. Who knows, she might even be able to find a girl who would go out with him…

The thought of Peter being set up with any of Lily's friends made her laugh out loud, and she brushed off the weird looks that she received quickly, feeling guilty at her cruel out burst. But the thought was extremely funny. The short little man would barely reach half of her friend's chins.

Brushing aside all thought of Peter, Lily noticed that she had grown tired, the lulling movement of the flames in the fire putting her into a drowsy trance.

"I'm going to go to bed. You coming?" she asked Dani. Dani gave Sirius a quick glance, and then shook her head. Rolling her eyes, Lily gave James a quick kiss on the top of the head, and dragged her feet up the staircase and flopped down on her four poster, completely exhausted.

"Oh Lily it's beautiful!" Ella gushed, when Lily showed her her new necklace before the girls went down to breakfast the next morning. Ella had gotten back to the castle only moments after Lily had gone to bed the previous night, and she and Dani were both yawning consistently throughout the morning.

"What's got the two of you so tired?" Lily asked Ella in a whisper, as the headed out of the common room and passed groggy looking figures in the halls.

"We both wanted the common room to ourselves last night, and before either of us realised it was two in the morning and all four of us had to go to bed!"

"All four of- Oh." Lily laughed, when she realised why each wanted the common room to themselves. "When are you and Remus going to tell everyone that you're, you know, together?"

Ella rolled her eyes, and gave a fleeting glance to Dani, who was walking with Sirius up ahead of them, puffy eyed and unenergetic.

"I don't know. He says that the guys will be absolutely unbearable with 'I told you so's' when they find out, and I know that he's damn well right, but I think that they already sort of worked it out, like we all did with you and James."

"Hey! I told you about James and I! Remember?"

"You told us that he kissed you, you have no idea how long it took before we confirmed that you were actually going out!" Ella laughed, as they neared the Great Hall.

"That's because we never actually confirmed it ourselves." Lily said, giggling. "We just sort of, are."

Ella laughed. "Yeah, well, the heads up would have been nice. We spent a whole while trying to work out weather you were snogging or studying when you went off to the library!"

"Studying!''

Ella gave Lily a sceptical look, a maniacal glint in her eye. Lily seemed to deflate, and mumbled.

"Ok, most of the time we were studying…"

"Anyway, Slughorn's having a dinner tonight, and he want us three to come, even though I've turned him down every time for three years." Ella said, sitting down and rolling her eyes.

"Er, yeah, except James said that you would like to go to the last one, for some reason, so now the three of us are his golden students. Well, except for Snape, but you know what I mean…"

"Why the hell would James sauy that?"

"I don't know, but we didn't go to the last one because Sirius was in the hospital wing. I'm going to this one, please come. We'll have fun, I promise. We'll make it fun." Lily said, very quickly, looking at Ella with her best puppy dog eyes.

"And I wont have to talk to Snape?" Ella bargained, comprehensively. Lily's eyes lit up.

"I promise! If he comes anywhere near us then we'll hide under the table!"

"And Remus will be there?"

"With bells on!"

"Where am I going, and why am I wearing bells?" Remus said, tired, sitting down opposite them.

"Slughorn's party! Remember?" Lily said, kicking him under the table.

"Ella? Ella you're going to that?" he said, confused, "I thought you hated those sort of things."

"I know, but Lily made me promise that I'll go, and I don't have to talk to Snape, and you'll be there, so it can't be that bad." She said, smiling at him. Remus looked as though he had opened his mouth to argue, but when she said the last part of the sentence his confidence fell.

"Oh alright. Lily, you are pure evil." He said, laying his head on the table. "James this is all your fault. I am going to spend a night with Severus Snape, locked in a dungeon."

"Oh don't be so melodramatic." Lily said, hitting him over the head. James looked confused as he sat down, a little behind Remus, and eyed them suspiciously.

"Why are you going to be doing that Moony?" James asked, not understanding Lily. "Got a hot date with Snivellus?"

"Remus shot him a dirty look, and Lily and Ella laughed heartily.

"No! I have just been conned into attending one of Slughorn's dinners tonight, Prongs." Lupin said, through gritted teeth, feeling tired and hard done by.

"Ohh. Oops." Said James, remembering the reason Remus had been invited in the first place. "You remember though? You can't let anything-"

"Shut up Prongs and have some trust you stupid stag!" Remus groaned, jokingly. James laughed, however, Remus didn't seem to have the energy for that; he laid his head down in the hard wood of the table and dozed off to sleep.

"You know, we could have a lot of fun with this." Sirius said, drawing himself away from the conversation that he had been having with Dani at the sight of Moony's sleeping figure.

"Hand in warm water?"

"Shaving cream moustache?"

"Shave off an eyebrow?"

"For goodness sake!" cried Lily, causing Remus to stir slightly. She lowered her voice to a whisper. "You two are wizards! Can't you think of anything more creative?"

"Turn Moony's face blue?"

"Make him sing in his sleep?"

"Make him declare his undying love for Ella in his sleep!"

"Make him sleepwalk up to McGonagal and dance on the teachers table?"

"Save these for next time Snivellus falls asleep at the table?"

"Ok!"

Sirius and James went back to eating their breakfast politely, in silence. They stoped when they noticed that the girls were staring at them as though they were insane.

"What?" said Sirius, his mouth full of scrambled eggs.

"One, Padfoot, that is gross, and two; why the hell did you bother making up all of that if you weren't even going to use it?" Lily quipped. James stopped eating and looked at her very mater-of-factly.

"Well Lily, we have to keep the creative juices flowing, and for another thing, rule number two of the marauders is never prank a fellow marauder."

"Well what about all those times that you prank Peter?" Lily asked, slightly amused. Peter's head perked up. "Yeah! What about all those times eh?"

"Well…" James and Sirius seemed to ponder on that for a moment. "Peter doesn't count, it's funny when we do something to him. But make Remus dance for the whole school in his sleep is most likely going to come back and hit us smack in the face the next time that James and I want him to skip prefect duties and sneak off to Hogsmeade, isn't it?"

Lily rolled her eyes, and didn't even want to know the answer to when Remus had ever consented to skiving off prefect duties.

That night she and Ella went down to the common room and met a resentful Remus Lupin, who begrudgingly accompanied the girls down to Slughorn's office.

A dull tinkle of music emitting form an old gramophone was seeping through the crack under Slughorn's door and when they were ushered in by a cheery little house elf, Remus, Lily and Ella found themselves presented with about twenty familiar faces, including Slughorn's red one, which was positively beaming at their presence.

"You finally made it! Come in come in!"" he roared merrily, and showed them seats next to each other at the long table that had been conjured to run the length of the warm, cluttered office.

"Lily Evans! What a surprise! I thought you'd forgotten where to find me!" Slughorn said, as Lily lingered behind to talk to her professor.

"Didn't want to be seen with a Slytherin like you Professor, I'm head girl now! What would people think of me?"

Slughorn laughed, and patted her on the back.

"Never give up, do you Evans?" he boomed in a paternal way.

"No sir. No I don't." she laughed and sat down beside Remus. She was horrified to see who was shown the seat next to her.

"Evans." Sneered Severus Snape, his lip curling at the sight of her.

"Severus." She greeted, coldly, not looking side ways at the arrogant Slytherin. Remus groaned. James would kill him if he knew that Remus had allowed this kind of place setting at the table.

"Er, Lily, would you like to swap places? " she gave him a look as though he were a mad convict escaped from Azkaban, as he had expected that she would.

"Er, it's just that it's closer to the turkey Lil, and you know how I like turkey!"

"That's chicken Remus." Lily said dully, looking at him with a raised eyebrow, as though she knew that James somehow had something to do with this.

"Of Course, that's what I meant!" Remus stammered quickly, but Lily was not fooled. Enticed to play the game, she reached over and handed the chicken to Remus, setting it down in front of his plate with a clatter, and a sweet grin.

"There you are. Much easier than moving and all, don't you think?"

Snape looked confused, but tried to cover it up with his characteristic sneering indifference, and Lily looked smug, that she had caught Remus out in the game.

James had put him up to this. He was there to keep an eye on Lily, and make sure that Severus didn't try anything sly. But she knew better. And it was her turn to have some fun and break rule number two; never prank a marauder…

A/N: hope you like that one! My Christmas fluff is over, and I am getting way ahead of myself. Sorry about all my spelling mistakes, I don't really take that much care in things like that; I think everyone's noticed…I will try and get around to fixing some of them up, but for the moment I think I'll just have fun and keep updating! Thankyou so much to my reviewers, you make my day! I am so addicted to reading them, they make me so happy! Just a little cliffy for you there, though I don't think that I will really be, because I'm so excited about writing the next chapter that it should be up tomorrow…all this came to me at work tonight, and I don't care how long I'm up for, I'm writing it all down now, or I'll forget it when I fall asleep! Please Review, whether you liked the story or not…and if you've got a L/J fic that's good please send it to me, because it's the holidays! And I have no life until after Christmas! Love you all!

Luv Ella xXx