James clutched Peter's hand, glancing up at the Healer hovering over his hospital bed. "You sure he's going to be all right?"

"Quite sure," the Healer replied, dabbing more of her poultice of powdered silver and dittany onto Peter's wounds. "If he was not injured by the werewolf in his transformed state, he will not become one himself, and he was brought here in time for us to save him from serious hemorrhage. He'll always have the scars, though, I'm afraid."

"I still feel like I'm dying," Peter mumbled woozily. He turned his cheek to peer at Lily, who was crouched beside his pillow and stroking his hair.

"We gave you some potent potions," the Healer explained; "they're going to make you feel tired for a bit." She swept her gaze across James, Lily and Sirius. "He really needs to get some rest now. We'll let you know if anything changes."

"Don't leave," Peter murmured. "Please."

Lily kissed his temple. "Your parents will be here soon," she said softly. "We'll be back to see you in the morning, okay?"

Peter attempted to protest again, but his eyes drew shut before he could say anything comprehensible, and almost immediately he was asleep. James pressed his lips to his hand and laid it gently against his chest.

"I'm think I'll go back to the house," Sirius said as they rose to leave, glancing back at Peter every few seconds until the Healer shut the door to his room. "I need to check in on Remus; he hasn't said a word to me all day." James nodded—Remus hadn't said anything to him either since their rescue of him the night before. He figured he just needed some more time.

"Guess we're on our own here, then," James said to Lily once Sirius had gone. Lily gave a slight shiver. "I mean, you can leave too if you'd like," he said quickly. "But I want to stay here until Peter's parents arrive, at least."

"No, I'll stay with you," Lily said firmly. "I'm just feeling a bit overwhelmed right now. Do you think we could go somewhere a bit quieter?"

"Of course we can." Taking her hand, James led Lily through the wards of St Mungo's until he found an empty waiting room with a giant fish tank in its corner. "This place reminds me of somewhere else, I think," he said.

Lily smirked. "I'm don't know what you're talking about." She lowered herself into a chair with a shaky sigh. "Oh, God, James. I thought we were all going to die last night."

"Hey." James knelt down next to her, rubbing her back as she grabbed at her head. "I was just as scared as you. But we're okay—Peter's the only one who got seriously hurt, and you heard what the Healer said."

"I know." Lily sniffed, turning to meet James's eyes. "But what if we're not so lucky next time? If we go on too many more missions like that one, at some point one of us isn't going to come back."

"Lils—"

"I know this is what we signed up for." She shook her head. "But honestly, I don't know how I'd manage if any of you died. Especially you, James." James took her hand between both of his. "It sounds stupid, but I've built this whole future with you up in my mind. Family, kids, pets…I don't know. Normal life sort of stuff. And every day I'm just…realizing more and more that I can't have any of that."

James rose to his feet, pulling Lily up beside him. His pulse began to quicken. "Well, why not?"

"What?"

"Why can't you have all that with me? I want it with you, too. I want everything with you." He broke out into a crazy, massive grin. "Lily…let's get married."

Lily made a choking noise. "James—Merlin, James, we're eighteen! We're in the middle of a bloody war, and you want us to get married?"

"Yes, I do." As he said it, James realized that he had never wanted anything more in his life. Lily could be his, forever, and he would be hers. It sounded like a dream. "What better time than right now? You're right—we don't know how much longer we've got, but we can make sure we spend it together."

"Oh, James…."

James lowered himself onto one knee. "I—I don't have a ring, but I can get you one as soon as we're out of here." He closed his eyes, took a deep, long breath, then opened them again to look into the face of the woman he loved more than anything else in the world. "Lily Rose Evans, will you do me the extraordinarily immense honor of becoming my wife?"

For a moment Lily stood frozen, blinking blankly like she'd just been Stupefied. Then, slowly, her mouth twitched up into a smile. "This is totally mental," she whispered. "But—yes, James, I will. Yes, yes, one-thousand-percent yes."

James swept her up in his arms and kissed her, twirling her around and holding her so close that he felt for a minute like they were a single person, like their hearts and breaths and everything else in their bodies were working as one, like the two of them were both pieces of something broken and now they finally had become whole. As he held her, James wondered if there was anything in the world that could ever make him feel unhappy again.