Chapter 12

The next few days passed like a dream for Lily. Between her evenings spent in front of the fireplace in the library with James and daydreaming about him during the day, her feelings for him grew stronger and faster than she ever thought was possible for her. She waited impatiently for the warm smile he would send her at breakfast when he would come in late, for the hasty kisses that would share in the empty rooms during the day when they knew they were alone, their long conversations that went on into the night, the way he drummed his fingers on her shoulder as they listened to music together. These things made her so happy that she didn't even mind that Black made vomiting imitations when they were together, and that they were still hiding their relationship from the rest of the household staff.

On Sunday she could barely concentrate on the sermon. She scolded herself for not listening as she left the cool church and arrived into the sunlit morning, but immediately forgot all about it when she saw James waiting for her outside the church, leaning against the red car.

"What are you doing here?" She asked with a trace of suspicion, while unable to hide her smile.

"It's your day off, so I thought we could go to the beach," he replied, giving her a fluttering kiss.

"I don't have a bathing suit..."

"You don't need one."

He laughed as she tried to hit him on the shoulder. Her face became very hot at the inappropriate suggestion.

"I meant we didn't have to go swimming, but if you have other ideas – "

She stuck out her tongue, knowing she couldn't escape the embarrassment in any other way. He hugged her and kissed the frown off her lips, dissolving all her resistance immediately.

"So, what do you say?"

Lily decided to give up. "Only if I'm driving. No magic."

James agreed without hesitation, and they drove down the country roads toward the ocean. The memories of her driving lessons with her father came back to Lily as soon as she sat behind the wheel, and she remembered why she used to love driving so much; The sense of speed and control was unique. It helped her understand why James liked flying so much.

They had spent the whole morning walking on the beach, letting the cool water lick their bare feet. When they got tired they lay down on the warm sand, and for some reason Lily didn't care that her dress was getting dirty and her hair getting filled with sand.

James hung his glasses on the collar of his shirt and closed his eyes calmly against the sun. Lily took the opportunity to look at him without him knowing, without him smiling at her or trying to make her laugh. His eyelashes fluttered against his cheek, and she was transfixed by the almost hidden movement of the muscles in his face as he breathed and moved slightly. A white butterfly fluttered across his face. At this point she must have exposed herself, because he opened one eye to look at her.

"Are you staring at me?" He said in a hoarse voice that made something vibrate deep inside her.

"And if I am?" She answered, holding hif gaze with determination.

"Then I'm obliged to stare back at you," he replied, and after a moment of stubborn eye contact he rolled over and kissed her passionately.

For a very short moment she felt uncomfortable, and then she gave herself to the new, sweeping feeling, allowing her head to rest against the sand. She put her arms around his chest, feeling the heat radiating from his skin through the shirt, and the next moment they were pressed together against the sand. A small voice in the back of her head told her to pull back, that she shouldn't behave like that, that she has to guard herself, but the feelings he aroused in her were as loud as the sound of the ocean in her ears, drowning every other sound.

After a long time lying in the sun they both agreed that they were particularly thirsty. James suggested they have lunch at an inn in Godric's Hollow, and Lily surprised herself immensely when she agreed. He sent a stag shaped Patronus to his friends to cover their absence to Mrs. Chambers, and for some reason Lily didn't feel as bad about lying as she would have expected.

The inn in Godric's Hollow was a classic English bar, full of groups of chatting friends and several families. Everyone seemed to know each other there, and Lily felt like she was wrapped in a mantle of kindness and warmth as she sat at a corner table opposite to James. People that passed by their table smiled at them for no apparent reason, and when James kissed her hand as she spoke she felt like the most beautiful girl in the room.

The way back home was long because James insisted that she teach him to drive like a Muggle, and by the time they left the village the engine had been turned off every few minutes. But James continued to try doggedly, and finally managed to get them home without colliding with anything.

Lily was tired, her dress was wrinkled and her hair was full of sand; So she felt a tremendous relief when James came back out after inspecting the kitchen and the dining room and informed her that the coast was clear. They sneaked in like two naughty children and walked quietly toward their rooms. They would have made it safely if only Black hadn't noticed them as they passed the sitting room.

"You owe us big time, love birds," he said in a particularly loud voice.

James groaned. He pulled the embarrassed Lily into the sitting room and closed the door before Black could keep shouting. He and Pettigrew were in the middle of a chess game and Remus was reading on a nearby armchair.

"You're just dying she'll hear you, aren't you?" James said to his noisy friend.

"Yeah," Black said without a trace of gentleness as Pettigrew's bishop threw one of his soldiers off the board. "It would save us inventing stories to cover up for you. Just tell her already."

"Where did you tell her we were?" Lily asked, not wanting to start up that discussion with Black.

"Moony told her you had to go back and close loose ends at the Ministry," Black said, concentrating on his next move.

Lily smiled at Remus with gratitude. He smiled back at her over his book.

"So I'll see you in the evening?" She said to James, desperate to get to her room and take a shower.

"Sure," he said at once, not noticing that his three friends were looking at him strangely. Black cleared his throat. "What?"

"The Quidditch World Cup. It's tonight." Black spoke as if James had forgotten his own name.

"I'm pretty sure it's next week," James replied, with that starting a heated debate about the final's date. Lily took the opportunity to part with him by touching the shoulder and leaving them to their arguments.

In the end James was the one who made the mistake, and the game did take place that evening. Lily was able to hear the Marauders very well every time their team scored a goal. She spent the evening in the library, planning to look for books to help her finish her homework, but instead found herself being sucked into a series of books about pure- blood families in Britain. She found the Peverell's family, which had grown horribly thin over the years until it reached a wizard named Henry Potter, a member of the Wizengamot, who was James' grandfather. In another book was a family tree that spread over nearly a dozen pages of the descendants of Salazar Slytherin, which included many families whose children had studied with Lily at school, such as the Malfoys and the Blacks. A narrow, very marginal branch was dedicated to the Princes, whom Lily knew were related to Severus from his mother's side.

Lily, who knew nothing about her family's history, was impressed by the meticulous documentation of all the descendants for so many generations. She began to understand why pure bloods were so proud of their origin. Perhaps she would have been proud of her family too if she had known that her ancestors had established important organizations or won fateful battles.

The books were fascinating, but as the evening wore on they made her feel a paralyzing sadness, so she decided at once to put them back and not look at them again. There were wizards for whom the purity and honor of their families were important enough to kill for.

Severus couldn't let go of the fact that his mother gave up the honor and power of a pure- blood family to marry his father, a Muggle, a man who hurt her and abused her. Was the humiliation so bad that he felt that he had to prove himself to superior pure- bloods? Did he think it would make his mother proud?

She turned off the lights in the library and went back to her room, determined to sleep and forget about Severus' tragedies. She had just finished changing when a knock on her window startled her so much that she had to cover her mouth to stop a scream. With her wand in her hand, she peered carefully between the curtains. She felt immediate relief when she saw it was James.

"You almost gave me a heart attack," she scolded him as she opened the window to the cool night.

"Sorry," he said, though his smile made it clear that he wasn't really sorry at all, and that he he enjoyed surprising her. "I didn't want Mrs. Chambers to catch me."

"So you thought it was a good idea to knock on my window in the middle of the night?" Lily said, still a little anxious.

"Be grateful I decided to skip the serenade," he replied, making her laugh and forget her anger with great talent. She leaned out the window and let him kiss her.

"I felt bad for stranding you tonight," he said as they broke apart, revealing a colorful box that he'd been hiding behind his back. "So I brought you these. It was extremely difficult to salvage them from Moony, so you better enjoy them."

"You don't need to feel bad," Lily said, receiving the chocolate box from him. She didn't like chocolate particularly, but the gesture still improved her mood remarkably. "So who won?"

"Russia, two hundred and ten to ninety. It was pretty obvious if you ask me, but Sirius was sure France was going to win and he made a bet with Peter. Now he has to do his Potions homework."

"Good, it's healthy for him to lose from time to time," Lily said, and they both laughed. To herself she thought that Peter deserved to win sometimes, too.

A cold breeze made her shudder and tighten her robe around her. When she looked up she found out that James was looking at her again with that look of his, as if she were a unique and beautiful phenomenon. The worst thing was that he didn't even blink when she caught him looking.

"Aren't you cold?" She asked, trying to get him to stop. He was wearing only a thin shirt, it's collar fluttering in the breeze.

"It depends," he replied with a cheeky smile, "If I say I am you'll let come inside?"

She tried hard to keep a straight face even though she felt she was blushing.

"No," she replied decisively, crossing her arms.

"You're sure? I'm not going to be home tomorrow, you're going to miss me," he said contentedly, leaning forward on the windowsill.

"You sound quite confident," she replied in the manner of their old bickering, trying to hide the fact that he was charming her.

"I just know I'm going to miss you," he said with sudden modesty, subduing her stiffness once and for all. She cupped his face and kissed him with devotion.

"Where are you going tomorrow?" She asked softly as the kiss ended.

"I have a mission from the Order," James replied, the dreamy look in his eyes slowly fading into something more serious. "I can't really talk about it..."

"It's all right," Lily replied sympathetically, still cupping his face. "I understand. You can't let the information fall into the wrong hands."

"Really? Sirius said I'm a pretentious git because I wouldn't tell him,"

"Good thing he's not your girlfriend."

"Yeah, I told him it wouldn't be a good idea." They both laughed at the notion. Then James looked into her eyes and said in a much softer voice, "And besides, I'm in love with someone else..."

She looked down in embarrassment, resting her head against his forehead. James didn't urge her to say anything in reply, he just took her cool hands and cupped them between his warm ones.

They stood there for a few moments, bathing in pleasant silence, until something stirred in the trees and startled them. James lit the end of his wand and scaned the roots of the apple trees. Lily thought she saw the tip of a hairy tail, but it disappeared before she could be sure.

"Probably a rabbit or a genome," James said at last, putting his wand back in his pocket. "I tell Maxwell to take care of it tomorrow."

Then they wished each other a good night, shared a last kiss, and he disappeared into between thin trees.

Smiling to herself, Lily closed the window and the drapes, turned off the light and got into bed. She just closed her eyes, trying to stop smiling and relax a little, when there was another tap on the window. Convinced that it was James who had returned, she didn't bother to turn on the light when she drew the curtains again. This time she really cried out when she spotted the man outside her window. It wasn't James, but Black.

"I'll thank you if you would refrain from shouting," he said when she opened the window for the second time that night.

"What are you doing here? Where's James?" She demanded to know, not trying to speak quietly.

Black hushed her urgently. "Prongs doesn't know I'm here – "

"I'll call Mrs. Chambers," Lily threatened him angrily.

"No, wait!" He stopped her in genuine panic. "Listen to me first. I heard him telling you about his mission tomorrow – "

"You were spying us?"

"I wasn't looking," he replied defiantly, as if he thought she was accusing him for something he didn't do. "And I tried not to listen... You're a really sticky couple, you know that?"

Lily snatched her wand from her nightstand.

"Sorry, alright?" He called, backing away from her raged expression. "I wouldn't have done it if it wasn't so important that we talked. I really didn't enjoy it, if you had any doubt."

Lily lowered her wand. Her suspicion that perhaps Black was trying to prank her dissolved in the sight of his serious expression.

"What happened?" She asked uneasily.

"We need your help," he said. "Moony didn't want to get you involved, and believe me that I would rather do it myself, but he'll suspect right away – "

"You're not making any sense."

Black shook his head, as if he could make the words line up in a logical order in his head.

"It's James," He said finally,"We think he's going to do something dangerous."

Lily hugged herself, suddenly feeling the night getting colder.

"Are you talking about his mission?" She said calmly, convincing herself that Black was just being dramatic. "I'm sure Dumbledore wouldn't have given him – "

"Dumbledore didn't give him this task," Black said in a hushed voice, confidently. "Think about it. From the very beginning he told him that he wanted him to keep an eye at Hogwarts for him, because it was the most sensible job to give him. So why send him to do something now, when he has a lot of other older and more experienced wizards and witches?"

Lily shook her head. "He must have a good reason .."

She said the words, but she wasn't sure she believed in them. She tought about Dumbledore. What task could he give James? Black was right, there must be much more experienced wizards in his Order... Also, she remembered what he had said that day in Mr. Potter's study, that James was an exaption because he usually wouldn't exept students to his Order. That said, she was sure he would make great efforts to keep James away from danger...

Black looked at her uncompromisingly. A pain began to develop in her stomach.

"James wouldn't lie to us," she said, thinking – he wouldn't lie to me...

Something that looked like pity crossed Black's face, but disappeared before she could get angry, morphing into a businesslike look.

"Look, I know you're at this stage in the relationship were everything looks perfect," he said in a very surprising maturity, "But he's already hidden his plans from us in the past. I don't see why he won;t do it again."

"How can you say that? You're supposed to be his best friend," Lily snapped at him, the frightening situation making her nervous.

"That's exactly how I know when he isn't telling the whole truth," Black replied without flinching. "Prongs is good at pretending that everyhing's alright, but I know when he's only pretending."

When Lily still refused to listen he added with an astonishingly emotional note, "He isn't doing it out of spite, or because he doesn't trust you. Believe me, he does. It's just his way of protecting you."

Lily took a rustling breath. Did her feelings appear so clearly on her face, or did Black have the same talent as James to know exactly what she was thinking and feeling at any given moment?

Finally she nodded. "Alright, I'll talk to him."

"I didn't ask you to talk to him."

Lily was surprised. "So ...?"

A hint of a mischievous smile passed over Black's face, but disappeared almost immediately. "I want you to follow him."

Lily was shocked.

"Don't give me that look," He said at the look in her face, in a tone that made it clear that he understood exactly what was wrong with his request." If we try to talk to him he'll just deny everything, and then he would suspect and do something stupid so we wouldn't be able to help him. Someone needs to follow him and make sure her doesn't get into trouble."

"Why me?" Lily demanded.

"Because if the three of us won't be there when he leaves he'll know what we're up tp," Black explained. "Even Moony agrees. Prongs knows what we're capable of. But you can pretend you have to work – "

"I don't need to pretend, I really have to work," Lily interrupted him angrily.

"We'll take care of Mrs. Chambers," he reassured her, another move to persuade her to take part in his plan. "You just have to worry about being close enough to him to know where he's Apperating to –"

"And how exactly am I supposed to do that without him seeing me?" Lily demanded, and quickly added, "Assuming I'll agree at all."

"We'll take care of everything," Black said with unending confidence, and then, closing his argument with irritating persuasion, he added, "All you have to do is be there for James."

Lily pushed her hair away from her face. It was cruel of him to use her worry and affection for James like that, and he did it so well that she was so worried she couldn't even be angry at him.

"I need to think about it," she said at last.

"Don't think too long," Black said hotly, "He's leaving right after breakfast."

Lily closed the window in his face and pulled the curtains, left alone with the fears and anxieties he had embedded in her.

She was so afraid of losing James. It wasn't fair that something would happen to him now, just when she understood how precious he was to her. But would following him without his knowledge be the right thing to do? Maybe she should ignore his friends' opinions and just talk to him? After all, he would never lie to her...

Right?

She couldn't sleep, thoughts darting in her head in an unbearable noise. So she knelt on the carpet in the darkness and began to pray.