The Marauders and the Darkest Talisman
By Gothica Angel
Chapter 1 - Consequences of Danger
Sirius Black grinned as he crept across the green grass, hidden by James Potter's invisibility cloak. He, along with James, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew, moved silently and quickly across the Hogwarts grounds to the Forbidden Forest. The feared Forbidden Forest was home to many a creature, both dark and light, both good and bad. The branches seemed to reach out of the darkness. They ducked under the hanging branches, and removed the cloak folding it neatly, and placing it in a hollow tree stump when they were deep enough into the forest not to be seen.
They started to weave through the trees, dodging thorny Sleeping Roses, which were ugly plants with inch long thorns, but beautiful flowers that lived for a day, and the crushed petals induced a permanent coma. They stopped by the familiar Iter Stone that marked the path that Sirius and James had found last year. The Iter stone was a large white boulder that, if chipped or broken, revealed a solid onyx-colored interior, and they were usually found at junctions. The path was the way the Marauders would reach the home of the Talisman Maker.
"Guys, this isn't such a good idea. We could get attacked and bitten by werewolf!" Peter cried.
"Peter-" James began.
"I mean, honestly, I don't want to spend the rest of my life worrying about when the moon is going to be full, no offense Moony."
"None taken," the young man sighed.
"We could get killed you guys!"
"Peter," James' was growing impatient.
"I don't want to endure all the pain Moony goes through every month, and I really don't want to be an outcast my entire life anymore than I already am!"
"PETER, we're Animagi!" Sirius interrupted Peter with a whack to the back of the smaller boy's head.
James grinned at his friends and continued to walk silently through the Forest on the very small, seldom traveled path. He looked over at Remus, who was still pale from the last 'episode' of a full moon only two days ago. Remus didn't know what had been planned for their adventure in the Forest, but James and Sirius had been planning this all summer. It was only the beginning of their seventh year at Hogwarts, and Sirius already had two or three females in following. 'Poor guy,' James thought, and then grinned as his Voice of Reality said, 'You know he's loving it.'
"What's so funny?" Remus looked at him.
James shook his head and smiled back at his friend. Moony was probably the most realistic of all the Marauders. He had been on the outcast side of life so long, that he saw both sides, and was so grateful to have friends, that James didn't feel he could trust anyone more than Lupin, except for Sirius.
"Are you ok, James? You look, a bit odd, to say the least," Remus stepped closer to peer at James.
"He's just thinkin' 'bout Lily Evans, isn't that right, Mr. Potter," Sirius stopped teasing Peter and gave a stiff formal bow to go with his formal accent.
James blushed and shook his head.
"No? Your not bedazzled by this goddess of, of, uh, goddess of, um, Moony help me."
"Guys, let's stick to the task at hand," James said brightly remembering why they were in the Forbidden Forest to begin with.
The four Marauders grinned mischievously and continued their trek in silence, until they reached the darkest corner of the forest, and Sirius spoke in awe,
"Are we here? Is this, this dark place really where unicorns are born?"
"So it says in that History of Hogwarts book. I thought they were supposed to keep this location under wraps, but-"
"Somebody messed up!" Sirius whispered in joyful delight.
They hesitated before entering the darkness so dark, that it was almost tangible and it engulfed them as they entered. Sirius looked over at Pettigrew. He was pale and shaking, probably one step from wetting his pants. Remus' face was blank as ever, but his eyes shown with mischief and happiness. Sirius grinned back when Remus turned to him and smiled. 'Poor Moony,' Sirius thought to himself as he looked at his pale friend and frowned, 'No one in the world for him.'
"Did a hag tie alligator liver to the corners of your mouth, Padfoot?" Remus joked lightly in a whisper, but he knew that Sirius was thinking about him; Remus always knew when people were thinking about him and his, problem.
"No way! I was just thinking about how this is our seventh year and all," Sirius sighed, and the others stopped and gaped at him.
"Sirius Black, th-th-thinking? Catch me, Moony," and James faked a dramatic faint into Remus' outstretched arms, and Remus promptly dropped him.
James got to his feet, grinning at Sirius, who looked indignant, and said as they reached the entrance to a dark cave from which was wafting great waves of icy cold air,
"Are we going to get those pictures or not? We don't have to go all the way in, Peter," he said upon seeing Pettigrew's face drain of all color when he realized what they were going to do.
Making Severus Snape feel jealous or inferior was the Marauders' favorite thing to do. They intended to accomplish this feat by using an enchantment to place a picture of a unicorn on top of the cave mouth picture they were about to photograph. Snape would be positively GREEN with envy. Snape had always wanted to sneak into the Forbidden Forest and go to the Talisman Maker's lair. The only place in the Forbidden Forest where the purest of all creatures was born.
"Yep, Wormtail, we just gotta get close enough to see the evil Talisman Maker, with his rotting corpses strewn in his cave," Sirius slapped Pettigrew's back, "We just get the pictures, and then hightail it outta there and-and-and-and"
"What? Hag caught your tongue, Padfoot? You seem to keep the hags on their toes these days, with the liver and now the -" James voice trailed off upon seeing his friend go pale.
The snap of a twig in the musty black oblivion caught their attention. The sounds of heavy breathing and slow, but steady footsteps reached their ears, and each backed away from the entrance to the cave instinctively, but Sirius was rooted to where he stood. A figure appeared, hood and black cloaks swirling in the icy wind of the cave. Whoever it was walked straight to Sirius and hissed,
"Happy midnight, boy. Have you no respect for those of the Dark? You will regret coming to this place, and you shall fear the consequences." It looped a black amulet around his neck, and cackled.
Sirius lost whatever little amount of color was left in his face and began to stutter nonsense. The cloaked figure withdrew another amulet from its cloak, a fiery red one that glowed sinisterly on a simple chain, and hurled it at the three who had moved a considerable distance from Sirius. It landed face up in front of James, Remus and Peter, and cracked open with a deafening explosion of red smoke and fire. A dragon head emerged from the smoke and roared at them. Sirius broke from his trance and fled, but not before James yelled out, pointing at the black amulet,
"Get rid of that thing!"
Sirius turned and flung the amulet away. It exploded in the cloaked thing's face, and emitted a dark black shadow that engulfed the figure, and swallowed it, while the thing screamed in agony, until the spectre was no more. The boys pounded down the little worn path until they reached the stump, and their exit out of the terrifying forest.
"Know one, tells anyone, of this night. No one is to know what we've done," Remus panted, but with grim solemnity.
"We have to! If a, thing, like that was creeping around the forest, their may be anoth-"
"We committed a crime, Peter, a crime punishable by DEATH. We killed the Talisman Maker. Damn it, if we tell, we're dead, not even in Azkaban, we are dead. As good as fucking dead."
They all leaned forward to relieve the pain in their sides from running through the woods. Sirius finally smiled weakly at them and Remus rolled his eyes, while Peter scowled at Sirius. James grabbed the Invisibility Cloak and sunk to the ground, leaning his back carefully against the rotting tree stump. As his heart calmed and returned to normal pace, he looked at Sirius and said,
"Never again, never ever again."
"Never again what?" Sirius was still a little jumpy, but his humor was returning with his sanity.
"Never again, will I go into the Forbidden Forest on one of your damn bloody pranks. Any other place, but I swear, I never want to see another hooded - thing - again. Damn you Black, you had to try to one-up Snape didn't you?"
Sirius grinned, and that was answer enough, but Sirius had to add, "Is ickle Jamesy ascared! Poor, poor, Jamsey-Wamsey! Maybe Lily Evans can nurse that wounded pride, Prongs!"
James leapt nimbly to his feet, being a Quidditch player after all, and threw an erratic punch at Sirius' face, and only succeeded in hitting his friend's shoulder lightly, just scuffing it. Remus was usually not the one to be scared, after all, he was a werewolf and not much could really hurt him except himself, but he was terrified. He couldn't tell them what he had found. No way, that would be too much. Peter was curled into a little ball on the ground, still shaking. Sirius, after smoothing his robes mussed by James' attack, stretched and grabbed the shimmering cloak from his friend and said,
"Let's go, we never know when they might discover us missing!"
Remus held back from them, and when Peter asked what was wrong, Remus just shook his head. Of course Sirius and James noticed, and began pestering him while they walked up to the castle. Peter hurried ahead, not wanting a detention in the Forest, and left the other three behind. Remus drew a breath, and paused to calm his racing heart, and looked out from beneath the cloak. Filch was nowhere in sight, so he slipped away from the rest. He rummaged around in his robes, and pulled something out, placing it in his palm.
Remus held out his hand, and Sirius hissed behind him,
"It's another amulet, another talisman. This looks like the Amulet of Renewal from the Defense Against the Dark Arts book. Where in bloody hell did you get that, Lupin." Sirius only called his friends by their last names when he was really upset.
"I tripped when we were running, and when I got up this chain thing was in my hand," he answered slowly.
"Get rid of it. Now, Lupin."
Remus closed his hand around the amulet, and warmth spread through his fingers. He heard singing, as though there was a choir of angels in the distance. Hidden behind the beautiful chords of soprano melody, was a hint of darkness, and evil, of murder, and pain. Sirius glared at him, and Remus tightened his grip, shaking his head slowly, not wanting to let go of the music in his head, and the warmth spreading through his body. Colors swam before his eyes, and he felt numb.
Lupin tightened his fingers, and, to his and all the others' surprise, the white stone of the set crumbled in his hands. A voice, a soft female voice, wafted through his head, as though it was brought in on a summer wind.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust...
How did you like it? My character will be coming in during the next chapter, but I won't try to focus on her too much over the main official characters. Please Read and Review, but don't be too harsh, it's my first HP fic!