Animagi
The inhabitants of Gryffindor Tower had been sitting in the same positions for the past hour and a half. It was now half past eight at night and they all had some homework assignment they should have been working on, but what was going on at the present was far more interesting than Transfiguration or Potions. The day had been going smoothly, nothing unusual occurring. Then, halfway during dinner, Severus Snape’s ears turned violently bright shades of purple and pink. Loud snorts of laughter came from all corners of the hall, but mostly four boys sitting at the Gryffindor table. It was painfully obvious who those four boys were. However, it was only one of those four boys who was currently being chewed out by an irate Lily Evans. It was James Potter. He had jumped up to take the blame, though not all of the credit, for the prank against Snape and Lily was not happy about this.
The Gryffindors were sitting on the couch, the armchairs, the floor, all watching in silent hilarity as Lily and James shouted back and forth at each other in front of the fireplace. Some of the sixth years were placing bets on how much longer the arguement would ensue. Three fourth years sitting at one of the tables were watching avidly, munching lazily on Chocolate Frogs. Some of the fifth years were debating in hushed voices about how much longer Lily was going to yell. Sirius, Remus and Peter had taken front row seats and were now discussing whether or not they should tell Lily it hadn’t been all James’s fault. They wanted their work to be noticed, after all. Yet Lily and James remained oblivious to all of this. Their shouting overshadowed many of the bets and debates going on.
“Do you think we should tell Lily?” Remus was saying, watching the red head and the mass of untidy black hair go back and forth.
Sirius laughed. “Why? James willingly took the blame.”
“I feel kind of bad watching her yell at him.”
“You would rather have her yell at you?” Peter asked him doubtfully.
“Well… no… but James didn’t do it all by himself, did he?”
“Yeah, but we’ll take our credit silently,” Sirius said, shifting in his seat.
“He didn’t even do anything to you, Potter!” Lily shouted for about the thirty seventh time in the past hour and a half.
James was stumped for a moment, unsure that he actually had a retort that would suffice. “You know, it’s more that he was just there.”
“What kind of excuse is that?”
“Hey, chuck me that pack of Drooble’s, Remus?” Sirius asked, holding out his hand.
“You’re enjoying this too much,” Remus said as he tossed Sirius their last pack of gum. Sirius grinned impishly and nodded. Remus’s eyes followed Lily as she moved to the other side of James. “You know, I think Lily was supposed to be tutoring me an hour ago.”
“And you didn’t point this out?” Peter asked in amazement as he ripped open a box of Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans.
“Potter!”
“She seemed busy.”
The fight continued for another fifteen minutes, and resulted in a loud bang and a puff of smoke engulfing the two bickerers. When the smoke cleared away, the Gryffindors could see Lily’s wand raised and James’s face planted on the carpet. A few students stood up to get a better look, but they didn’t have to once James raised his head. It looked as though Lily had given him a makeover in the split second that they were invisible. James’s face had been coated with the most ostentatious colours of rouge, lipstick, anything imaginable. James should have known better than to cross one of the best Charms students Hogwarts had ever seen.
The room was quiet, the occupants staring in wonder at James, and then the silence was broken by three howls of violent laughter. Sirius, Remus and Peter were cackling uncontrollably at their friend’s face.
“You’re so pretty, James!” Sirius managed through his bouts of laughter. “Those are really your colours.”
James glared at Sirius, as if being hexed by a girl in front of the entire house wasn’t bad enough… Lily, satisfied with her work, stalked off to join Alice and Frank on the dormitory steps. James, who appeared to want to vanish into thin air, hurried past the group of sixth years that had been betting (two of them miserably handing over a few sickles to the winner) and out of the common room. The three boys glanced at each other; James clearly wasn’t in his right mind if he just went out into the main castle, especially when curfew was about to fall. Abandoning their positions on the couch, they followed James.
“I can’t believe Lily did that,” Peter said, amazed.
“I can,” Sirius said, picking up his pace.
“We should’ve taken the Invisibility Cloak,” Remus panted. “Filch has been dying to catch us for something ever since we left those Dungbombs in his mopping bucket.”
“Forgot about that… We’ll just be quiet, then.”
They couldn’t imagine where James was headed. Where would a boy go if he had just been hexed into makeup? Their first instinct was that he had gone to the Hospital Wing to have Madam Pomfrey take care of it, but they thought against it. James didn’t want the nurse to see him like that. He must have been headed for the nearest bathroom. However, when they came upon the lavatory, it was empty. They couldn’t think of where else he would have gone. There were only so many boys’ bathrooms in the school, unless he went into a girls’ bathroom.
“I remember hearing Mary Porter saying something about there being a girls’ bathroom that’s always out of order on the second floor,” Peter said as they came out of the last bathroom for boys. “Nobody ever goes in there.”
“You don’t think James went in there, do you?” Remus said. They were already on the second floor; it couldn’t hurt to travel down it a bit further. When they approached the unused bathroom, they hesitated for a long time before Sirius got the guts to push the door open and march determinedly inside. They were instantly met with the high-pitched laughter of someone that was clearly not James. It was the pearly white figure of a girl with horn-rimmed glasses and pigtails. She was hovering over one of the sinks, above James, whose head was bent forward over the taps.
“Will you shut up?” James snapped at the ghost.
The ghost did nothing of the sort. If anything, her laughter increased. James’s face was sopping wet as he furiously tried scrubbing off the makeup Lily had forced onto him. So far, he had only succeeded in removing the minimum amount and had a long way to go before he looked like a proper boy again.
“You know, James, you look so pretty I reckon Snape would ask you out,” Sirius snickered.
“Sod off,” James muttered, cupping his hands under the river of water in the sink and splashing it onto his face.
Sirius continued laughing, only to stop when he noticed that the ghost was staring at him with a rather dreamy expression. “Um… hullo,” he greeted uncertainly. “Who are you?”
“Myrtle,” the ghost answered, her voice much resembling her expression. Sirius took a step backwards and turned away from the ghost.
“Moaning Myrtle?” Remus said without thinking. He had heard Lily mention how difficult it was to go to the bathroom in this particular lavatory because the ghost that haunted it was always wailing about something. He did not realise he was about to start another of her tantrums.
The dreamy look she had been wearing moments before vanished as she shrieked, “Tactless!”
Remus stepped back, sensing danger. “Excuse me?”
“You should know I don’t like being called Moaning Myrtle! How would you like it?” In a cry of anger, she swept up into the air and came down through one of the toilets. The boys jumped back as water came spilling out.
“She has a point, Remus,” Peter pointed out.
“I’m not the one who came up with the name!”
Myrtle’s wailing reached an unbearable pitch and, rather than wait for James (who seemed to be oddly immune to the noise) to finish cleaning himself up, Sirius, Remus and Peter dashed out of the bathroom, deciding to wait in the hallway. Even out in the corridor, they could still hear the ghost and apparently Filch did as well. They could hear the distinct disgruntled growl of the caretaker as he prowled closer and closer. The three boys could see a faint light coming from further down the path and ran back inside the bathroom.
“Back for another go at me?” Myrtle cried.
“Filch is coming,” Sirius said to James, ignoring Myrtle.
James looked up, his face free of makeup, and his eyes darted to the door. “Didn’t you bring the cloak?”
“No… We came to look for you!”
“Well you should’ve gotten the cloak!”
“Will you two shut up?” Remus and Peter snapped. They were pointing to the door. The light from Filch’s lantern was spilled through the crack at the bottom as he crooned to Mrs. Norris.
“That’s right, my sweet, we’ll catch those troublemakers.”
The door was open before the boys had a chance to hide and, before they knew it, they were cleaning the floors of the dungeons with toothbrushes.
February brought with it a few more feet of snow, and bouts of the flu infecting many students throughout the castle. Madam Pomfrey was spending almost all of her time handing out Pepperup Potions to the students who came in, coughing with runny noses and aching stomachs. Among these students were Remus and Peter, who had managed to catch a fever when they were ambushed by a group of Slytherin fourth years out on the grounds. They had been down at Hagrid’s hut, helping him tend to some Nifflers and, as they were walking back to the castle, they felt cold streams of water falling on top of their heads and soaking them to the skin.
The fact that the full moon was approaching did not make matters much better, but Remus made it through his transformation no worse than he normally did. The only setback was a slightly longer recovery than he would have liked. Madam Pomfrey refused to let him leave the Hospital Wing and also refused to let the boys in to see him. He was let out two days later on Tuesday and had some news to share with his friends. Remus found them at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall, trying to figure out two words that were synonymous with the worst Quidditch team ever.
“Chudley Cannons,” Remus supplied when he sat down beside James.
“Thanks mate,” Sirius said, scribbling it in the empty spaces. He folded up the Daily Prophet and tucked it in his robes pocket. “How’re you feeling?”
“Better. You know who I saw in the Hospital Wing?”
“Who?” Peter asked as he searched the plate of potatoes for a suitable one.
“Professor Jones.”
“He was ill?” James asked interestedly. They had had Defence Against the Dark Arts that day and the professor appeared to be well. Granted, he was more distracted than usual, but he seemed in good health.
“He looked like he was.”
“He probably just has the flu,” Sirius said, shrugging.
“I dunno… The way Madam Pomfrey was talking, it sounded worse than the flu.
James looked intrigued. “Did she say exactly what was the matter with him?”
“No… but she sounded mad that he hadn’t gone to her sooner.”
“I hope it’s nothing serious,” Peter said anxiously. Jones was one of their favourite teachers; they didn’t want anything bad to happen to him. “Did he look really bad?”
“He didn’t look good. Madam Pomfrey shooed me out before I could get a better look.”
The condition of Professor Jones was left at that “ a mystery to all students except for the boys, and they didn’t even know much. They resolved to watch the man closely and see if his illness, whatever it was, grew worse. They noticed that his pallor was almost as bad as Remus’s and for the quickest of moments James, Sirius and Peter suspected that he may have been bitten by a werewolf. Remus put an end to that theory at once, stating how when a person has just been bitten, they are more green than white. Jones appeared to be losing weight and he seemed weary. Still, they could not figure out what was plaguing him and decided it was best if they just ignored it for the time being.
February turned to March and James, Sirius and Peter could be found sitting in the common room on the first, conversing quietly while Remus was at a tutoring session with Lily. Remus was showing quite an improvement in his potion-making abilities, he had not made a potion explode for weeks. They were talking about the upcoming full moon, on the seventeenth, and how they wished they could do something to help their friend. Sirius had told James and Peter a long time ago what it had been like to listen to him transform. This strengthened their desire to aid Remus. As they were sitting in front of the fire, two third years came into the common room, talking loudly about how Professor McGonagall was an Animagus.
“There’re only a few,” one third year was saying.
“Her name was on the register and she showed us it,” the other added.
“It’d be great to be one, wouldn’t it?”
“Yeah, but it’s hard. A lot of things can go wrong.”
The two continued up to the third year boys’ dormitory and disappeared out of sight. They had all known the Professor McGonagall was an Animagus; she had the ability to transform into a tabby cat. They hadn’t thought much of it initially; it didn’t matter to them if she could turn into an animal. If anything, it just made her all the more intimidating. Now, something about this fact struck them as oddly helpful.
Sirius, his eyes alight with mischief, turned to the others. “That’s it.”
“What is?” Peter asked, bemused.
“Animagi.”
James got it before Peter did and he grinned widely. “That’s brilliant, Sirius.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Why didn’t we think of it before?”
“Think of what?”
“I dunno, but now that we have it, what are we going to do?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Becoming Animagi, Peter!”
“And why would we do that?”
“Listen.” Sirius leaned forward on the table and dropped his voice carefully, making sure that they had no unwelcome listeners. “Werewolves are only dangerous to humans.”
“Yeah?” Peter still had no idea where Sirius was going with this.
“Then we become animals. Remus won’t be able to turn us into werewolves if he bites us then.”
“I don’t fancy being bitten by a werewolf, animal or not.”
“Come on, Peter. It’s the perfect idea; maybe it’ll even help Remus keep his attention off himself.”
“Because it’ll be on biting us.”
“You wanted to help him, Pete,” James said reproachfully. “Sirius has a good idea. Animals relate to other animals. Maybe we would be able to keep Remus calm, so he doesn’t hurt himself.”
Peter still looked hesitant but, upon seeing the determined looks on his friends’ faces, he resignedly nodded. They weren’t sure how to bring up the subject to Remus; they were not at all certain he would go for it. Remus would instantly see the dangers of the attempt going wrong. If Remus was conscious of anything, it was safety and oftentimes he placed others’ above his own. It was only natural that he would fear everything would go horribly wrong. They had to try. It was too good of an idea to let go by.
James resolved to write to his mother, asking her to use the money he enclosed in the envelope and go to Flourish and Blotts. He had to be very evasive. He had looked it up, asked around, and discovered the Flourish and Blotts had the best selection of books about Animagi in all of Diagon Alley. He, Sirius and Peter decided that they would give whatever book Mrs. Potter picked out to Remus for his birthday. This was the very excuse that James used when he wrote home. He explained that Remus was extremely interested in the subject and wanted to research it. What better way to do so than by getting a present about it for his thirteenth birthday?
When March tenth dawned, James, Sirius and Peter decided that the best way to wake Remus up was to push him sideways off his bed. Frank thought this was a cruel idea, but pointing this out did nothing to deter the boys. At eight o’ clock James and Sirius were on one side, and Peter on the other, and when the two pushed, Peter pulled and Remus fell sideways off his bed. For a split second they thought that Remus managed to sleep through the fall, but he moaned angrily and kicked the nearest person, which happened to be Peter. To avoid the outburst that would inevitably follow, James threw the colourful package into Remus’s chest.
When he tore open the paper, he was shocked to find a book entitledAnimagi for Beginners. At first he couldn’t quite figure out why his friends would give him this. Then, as he flipped through the pages, realisation dawned and he stared up at the three disbelievingly. Frank was still in the room, so he could not ask them about it at the moment. Instead, he thanked them as wholeheartedly as he could and waited patiently for Frank to vanish down into the common room. Luckily, it only took Frank ten minutes to leave. When the door shut, Remus jumped to his feet and rounded on his friends.
“Are you three mental?” he hissed.
“He took it just like we thought he would!” Sirius observed cheerfully.
“You can get killed.”
“Not if we don’t do it wrong,” James contradicted airily, like it was the easiest thing in the world to explain.
“Do you know how hard it is to do this? That’s why they keep tabs on all of the Animagi! You’d have to register at the Ministry and everything.”
“Who says we do?” Sirius looked completely unfazed by what Remus had said.
“The law says so, Sirius.”
“So?”
“Stop being stupid, James. You know you’d get in trouble. I can’t let you do this. I’m not worth you getting chucked into Azkaban.”
“Yes you are,” the three said automatically.
Even though Remus wanted to get them off this track more than anything, he could not help but feel glad at the thought that they were willing to get thrown in the wizard prison for him. “No one can know you’re doing this.”
James, Sirius and Peter looked triumphantly at each other. They had done it.
“In that case,” Sirius said, stepping forward, “Happy birthday, Remus.”
Remus was returning from watching the Gryffindor team’s Quidditch practise. James was still sitting through Hamilton’s tactics speech, while Sirius and Peter had been roped into helping Hagrid round up his escaped Kneazles. The castle was fairly quiet, even though there was quite some time before curfew. He had a Potions essay to get to, so he had to hurry to the common room. Remus was inclined to admit, his grades in that class had skyrocketed once Lily began tutoring him. It was true that he was still one of the worst potion brewers in the class, but it was impossible to beat the best. His potions didn’t explode anymore, that he was grateful for.
As he rounded the corner leading to the portrait of the Fat Lady, he heard an angry conversation taking place between the Fat Lady and Alice Gordon. Curious, Remus came slowly around and saw that the Fat Lady was refusing Alice entry into the common room because she didn’t know the password. The Fat Lady had become notorious, lately, for switching the password two or three times a week. It was no surprise that Alice could not remember the new word.
“Tree bark,” Remus said. The Fat Lady swung open and allowed the two inside. Alice smiled gratefully at Remus and it was then that he realised he had not really spoken to the girl since before her father died.
“Thank you,” she said. “I didn’t think she was ever going to let me in.”
“No problem.” Remus glanced uneasily around the considerably full common room. “So… err… how are you?”
Alice knew at once what he was referring to. “It’s still hard… you know, to realise I’m never going to see my dad again. But it’s getting better.” She offered him a small smile. “Really, it is.”
Remus was quiet for a moment. He could not imagine what Alice was going through. He didn’t know what he would do if his own father died. For the longest time, his father had been his best friend. Not knowing exactly what else to say, he said the first question that appeared in his mind. “Your mum? She’s doing okay as well?”
“Oh yeah. I was surprised at how well she was taking it. But it was probably just a show for me. She doesn’t want me to get upset.”
“That’s nice of her… I suppose.”
“I guess it is, I’d rather she just cry about it in front of me.”
Remus bit his lip. “Really?”
Before Alice could say anything else, the door to the common room open and Sirius’s voice came, reverberating off the walls. “Oi, Remus!”
Remus and Alice spun around to see Sirius and Peter standing by the entryway, waving furiously at him. Remus bid goodbye to Alice, who looked happy to have had someone to talk to, though only briefly, about her father.
They weren’t sure when or how to begin training. Becoming an Animagus was no easy task, but the thought of Remus never having to hurt himself the way he did was their incentive. They would need to find a place to practise in secret, but their knowledge of the castle was still only limited to that of a second year. They did not know about the many secret rooms and passageway that could be used as their hideout. Sirius had suggested using the Shrieking Shack, but Remus refused, saying that it was too far away. Of course, Sirius knew that his friend really didn’t want to spend more time there than he had to.
They couldn’t invest their time into worrying about a place to train at the time. One day during breakfast Professor McGonagall came around and passed out sheets of parchment to the Gryffindor second years. They were a list of the possible courses they could study the following year. The boys knew at once that they wanted to study Care of Magical Creatures with Professor Kettleburn. It didn’t seem like a difficult class and they needed one where they were guaranteed a pass. Their remaining options “ Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, Divination and Muggle Studies “ were giving them trouble. Neither boy could agree on their second course. Sirius wanted to take Muggle Studies (another opportune way to peeve his parents). James was leaning towards Ancient Runes, Remus wanted to take Arithmancy, and Peter was keen on Divination. They had always intended on taking all the same classes, but they would have to draw the line here.
In the end, Sirius wound up taking Muggle Studies, Peter took Divination, while James and Remus requested Ancient Runes and Arithmancy respectively. When they handed in their selections to the Transfiguration professor, James, Sirius and Peter could hear Remus mumble that he wished he could drop Potions. Sirius cheerfully reminded him that they were not allowed to drop classes until they were sixth years. Remus had a few more glorious years of his potions boiling over to look forward to. At these words, Remus sped off to remind Lily that he would not be joining her for Potions tutoring “ it was a full moon. When Remus went with Madam Pomfrey to the Whomping Willow, the boys sat in the dormitory, crowded on Remus’s bed, poring over the Animagi book.
“This is going to take years for us to do,” James muttered, running a finger along the sentence he was reading.
“It’ll be worth it,” Sirius said bracingly, drawing his feet up onto Remus’s bed. He still was not able to forget what he had seen in the Shrieking Shack so many months ago. It was a sight he was not sure he would ever be able to repress. He wanted to do something to prevent that from ever happening again. They had their solution. He had said a long time ago in the Leaky Cauldron, when they had first resolved to discover the nature behind Remus’s monthly disappearances, that when something was hurting one of them, it was up to the rest to find out what it was. Now that they knew the answer, it was up to them to help the other, no matter what it cost them.