Chapter – 3

Lily P.O.V

Lily turned to Severus expectantly.

Severus scowled at her ferociously but shoved his hands into his robe pocket and pulled out a bunch of knuts, cursing spectacularly. Dumping the coins in her hands, he turned back to the chess board and reset the pieces.

The two of them didn't play with bets often, least of all over chess. But Lily was insistent on trying something new this time, so betting over chess it was. And Severus was hating this game, because Lily was a brilliant tactician. Playing chess against Lily was like trying to win a Quidditch match against Potter – it was impossible. Severus was smart enough to admit that.

"Are you done thrashing me at a game you already know you are going to win?" Severus asked, looking bored out of his mind.

Lily simply moved one of the pawns and stared at Severus in expectation. He sighed and leaned back onto his forearms to stare at the board moodily.

Before he moved a piece, Remus sat down in between them, and pulled out his homework. The three of them had spent many afternoons, simply sitting together and never interacting properly. Severus hated the marauders, a group which Remus was a part of. And Remus didn't particularly know Severus well, so didn't care much for the Slytherin.

"Lupin!" Severus exclaimed, as delighted as someone like him could ever sound. "How about you play Lily for 5 knuts."

Without waiting for a reply, Severus got out of the chair and turned the board towards Remus. He then proceeded to move over enough to spread out his books as messily as both boys always did. Remus didn't even look slightly shocked at this turn of events, and the parchment that he pulled out was merely shoved towards Severus' books.

"He got tried of playing against you already, I see." Remus stated, and Lily scowled fiercely at Severus in response.

"We literally only played one game!"

"And I'm assuming you thrashed the poor scatterbrain?" Remus stated, moving pieces to his own mental tune. The supposed brains behind the marauders was the best strategist in the school and as a result, he was the only person who was a challenge for Lily to defeat.

"I wouldn't say that…" Lily said, moving her white knight in response to one of Remus' previous moves. She could only hope that Remus would fall for the dupe.

"You wouldn't say that." Severus muttered, and Lily cursed out loud when Remus counter acted against the dupe that he wasn't supposed to find out about.

Remus laughed at her cursing and Severus managed to look up from his potions work for long enough to share a smug smirk with Remus. Lily was tempted to hex both of them, but that was against the fair play rules they had set. Especially since all three of them had attacked one of the others more than thrice in the first two weeks of their friendship.

"So," Severus started, when Lily had calmed down enough from her hissy fit, well after Remus had won the chess game. He had put his work away, as if in anticipation for a difficult conversation. "What's the status with Potter?"

Lily felt it the second the sound bubble went up around them and glanced at Remus.

"Let's see." Remus pondered sarcastically. The two boys could have gotten along so well if only they tried. Alas, they didn't, and Lily had to spend hours and hours mediating between them because of their choice in friends, which was questionable for both of them!

"Don't be sarcastic now, boys!" Lily grinned sharply at the two. If they started with the sarcasm, they would never stop it.

Remus rolled his eyes in a 'whatever' way, while Severus' sigh was extremely put out, as if someone had taken away his favorite toy. Neither of them was sarcastic after that though.

"James believes us, but we don't exactly have a proper description on anything. And honestly, the letter is slightly useless without the exact descriptions or knowledge as to where we can find any of it." Remus reported, waving his hands in a random gesture that meant nothing to Lily. (It did mean something to the marauders, she knew that.)

"That is the exact problem I am facing," Severus nodded sagely, waving his hand slightly in her direction. The two shared a serious look and Lily contemplated banging both their heads into the table.

"Peter still doesn't understand the problem with soul pieces, if you know what I mean." Remus was speaking again, and Lily tuned in with a long-suffering mental sigh. "The easiest way to get anyone to believe us would be to look through the Black library, which is what Sirius plans to do these vacations."

"Don't tell me," Severus said, grimacing slightly. "He's going to try and steal some of the books from the extensive library of the darkest pureblood family that he belongs to?"

"Well, when you put it like that it sounds so illegal!" Remus grumbled. "Besides he's heir, so it'll be his library one day. He's just borrowing the books."

Lily tuned out again. The two would get into an utterly useless argument and she wouldn't be able to get any thinking done. Thank God they had put up a sound bubble or Madam Pince would have thrown them all out and banned them forever!

"LILY!" Severus voice was unnecessarily loud. She turned and scowled at the boy. "Oh, so you are awake! I thought you decided to take a trip to dreamland and managed to drown yourself in the fluffy clouds of murder."

Lily scowled some more and turned to Remus, pointedly ignoring Severus' scathing remark. Unfortunately, it seemed that Remus found the statement funny, and he didn't seem inclined to stop gasping for breath anytime soon. Wrestling down the urge to slap one, or both, of her friends, Lily closed her eyes. Going and drowning in the 'fluffy clouds of murder' would be such a nice dream.

Either way, there was nothing that could be done about the soul things without more information on them, and since they wouldn't get the information until Sirius stole from his library, they wouldn't be able to do anything until after Christmas at the least.

So, Lily, like the smart girl she was, she opened her charms book and pulled some parchment from the table towards her. If her friends were planning to act like sarcastic chipmunks, she was going to complete her homework instead of talking to them.