Chapter 4
To become one with the wild
Last year we discovered that Remus had a small furry problem that he'd been hiding from us with poor excuses that his grandma was sick or his mother had fallen ill and that he had to go home and visit her. "Guy's I've been thinking over summer about the Furry problem and I think I've come up with a solution," I said suddenly remembering the book I had. I rummaged around in my robe pocket and pulled out a small shrunken black book, with a flick of my wand the book resized and became a large thick heavy, leather bound book with silvery writing on the front reading -The art of advanced human Transfiguration, by Falco Aesalon. "Where on earth did you find that thing?" asked Sirius eyeing the book up suspiciously. "Stole it from Dads private collection, trust me he won't even notice its missing, I replaced it with a fake," I said proudly flicking through the books dusty pages until I got to the right page. "Professor McGonagall gave me the initial idea after all the solution to our problem has been hiding in plain sight this entire time," I said not yet giving away the solution. "Come on tell us woman," demanded James as he tried to snatched the book from my hands; I smacked his hands away and grinned. "Fine, I'll tell you, we become animagus, illegal ones of course but with it we can help old Remy out, we can't get infected in animal form, I researched into it and Werewolves are less volatile around other animals as long as they aren't the werewolves prey. In animal form we can not only keep Remy Company but we can make sure no one ever gets attacked, it's a win win situation boys," I stated.
"Only one problem Sin, human transformation is incredibly hard, that's why only really advanced Wizards and witches have a chance at becoming animagus. We don't have a chance," said Remy slightly disappointed. I shook my head in disbelief.
"Come on guys were top in our classes, we can't just dismiss the idea we have to give it a shot at least, come on I know we can do it guys, I know we can! This book was written by the first animagus Falco Aesalon, it's got the complete theory and diagrams he's written a first- hand account of the transformation and the magic behind it, with this book we can't go wrong. Now get up we have some practicing to do," I ordered so sure of myself. We will become Animagus we had to for Remy's sake.
Every night for the next three weeks we came up to the room of Requirement to practice and learn, we were so close to finally doing it, I could feel it in my bones. Finally the day came. "One-one more try I-I know I can do it," I panted exhausted from my previous tries. "No enough Sin look at yourself your worn out we have to call it a day and get back, people are starting to notice that we keep disappearing," confronted Remy as I pulled my tiered body off the cold stone floor. "No I'm not giving in, I know I can do this, just-just one more try and then after that we can go back," I panted wiping beads of sweat from my brow. Remus reluctantly agreed and the guys backed off as I closed my eyes and concentrated, a warm sensation flowed through my body and I pictured myself changing from human into something else, I felt a sharp pain and my head started to spin, and then everything went black for a moment. "Look Sirius I-I think she's done it," I heard a loud voice say; I growled in response, wait I-I just growled, full on growled like some sort of animal. "Sin you hear us?" I heard James ask as he stood in front of me towering over me slightly. Sirius grabbed a large mirror from the corner of the room and dragged it over placing it in front of me. What I saw was not what I was expecting, I didn't know what I was expecting but whatever it was it wasn't this. What looked back at me in from the mirror was a large, furry animal with four legs and a large dark coloured body; I had a large snout and face with a wet black nose and grey stormy eyes and a blond crescent moon on my furry forehead. I was a bear, not quite a grizzly not quite a honey, what I saw was a large fluffy moon bear a distant relative of the black bear. Quite ironic since my name Orsina meant she-bear.
I tried to give the guys a smile but it came out as a menacing grin, I growled lightly and then rolled onto my back with my four large paws in the air, Remus laughed and scratched my large furry belly and I wiggled around until I couldn't stand the tickly feeling any longer and playfully rolled over and knocked him to the floor. Remus went down with Oof as I flopped onto him trapping him under my large bear body. "You weigh a ton," he managed to wheeze out as I pinned him down and licked his face with my long pink tongue. The other guys snickered as I suddenly transformed back and dropped down onto Remus who cringed as I slammed into him. "Sorry Remy," I yawned beat from my short transformation. "You did it Sin, you actually did it," that was the last thing I heard Remus say before I passed out from exhaustion.
I awoke the next day in a soft warm bed that smelt faintly of chocolate and honey, a smell I didn't associate with my own bed. I groaned and sat up to find myself not in my dorm but the dorm of the other Marauders, who were all asleep around me except Remus. I must have been in his bed because everyone else was sleeping in their own four poster bed. I heard a soft groan and looked down to find Remus asleep curled up on the floor with a thin blanket pulled around him. I quietly slipped form the bed and pulled the heavy duvet with me and gently draped it over Remus's shivering body. He snuggled down subconsciously and wrapped himself up; I chuckled to myself quietly before slipping out of their room and making my way back to my own dorm. What met me back at my dorm was not what I was expecting. There in the door way stood a very pissed off red head, "Where the hell have you been all night, it's almost 5 in the morning and your creeping back here with a stupid grin on your face," scolded Lilly as she glared at me. I gave her a weak smile. "You best not have been with Jason this entire time Sin, I thought you knew better," she berated. I almost laughed, as if I'd been shacked up with Jason this entire time. "Relax Lilly I was with the guys, I fell asleep in their dorm and they didn't want to disturb me plus you know boys can't get up to the girls rooms there's a spell on the staircase remember." Lilly knew all too well about the stairs, her and James had been the ones who had discovered it, James had tried to follow Lilly up to her room when the stairs changed into a slide forcing both Lilly and James to fall and slide to the bottom of the staircase and to land embarrassingly in a small tangled pile. "Fine Sin but don't do it again you had me worried sick," said Lilly still a little angry at me.
Over the next few nights the other guys started to get the hang of the animagus transformation and soon the whole gang had an animalistic side to them and with that came our famous nicknames. There was Prongs which was James; he turned into a large noble stag. Then there was Padfoot, Sirius the dog actually turned into a large shaggy black dog. Wormtail, Peter of course turned into a small rat. Moony, that was Remus because of his small furry problem and then there was me, Earthpaw, the large shaggy playful moon bear. We were the Marauders, we were Prongs, Padfoot, Wormtail, Moony and Earthpaw, remember the names because trust me one day were going to be famous.
Lessons and days quickly slipped by us as we waited for the first full moon of the school year, we couldn't wait to try out our plan and help Moony. Finally it arrived and all of us were nervous, Moony told everyone his usually excuses for his disappearance and Me, Sirius, James and Peter, we just vanished, not a word to anyone we just disappeared.
We all met on the school grounds with the invisibility cloak wrapped around us all concealing us from any prying eyes. "Alright Peter your up first, Moony said that the whomping willow was planted at the entrance to the shrieking shack to stop him from running rampage across Hogwarts grounds, there's a knot at the bottom of the tree you touch to stop and freeze it," informed Sirius. Peter nodded and quickly shifted into his rat form and scampered across the grounds towards the vicious tree and placed his paw on the base of the tree. The tree froze and we all ran towards it under the invisibility cloak. Under the tree was a small passage, we all squeezed through the gap and continued down the underground tunnel. "Lumos," we all whispered, light illuminating the tunnel from the tips of our wands. "It's not much further, just at the end of the tunnel," informed Remus as we got further underground. After a few more minutes we reached the end of the tunnel and found a battered old door falling off its rusted hinges. We folded the cloak up and hid it back in James's bag quickly before we entered the shrieking shack. "Don't judge me on the state of the shack please, I know I'm a monster," said Remus quietly as we entered the smashed shack, there was broken furniture and smashed doors scattered everywhere. Deep claw marks were ripped into the surrounding walls and small bits of furnishing that where left mostly intact.
"Man this place is a dump," mused Sirius, I quickly elbowed him in the side, the insensitive prat. "Watch it twin," I hissed quietly noticing Remy's sad face. I unclasped my robes and stuffed them into the backpack leaving me in some scruffy old Muggle clothes; I didn't want to ruin my uniform if anything was to happen tonight. "We don't have long the moon will be up in ten minutes, I'm-I'm just going to go and wait in the far room, I-I really do think you're being foolish being here with me but thank you, I really do appreciate it guys," said Moony before disappearing upstairs, we heard a door close and lock. I looked at the guys, "Well this is it hopefully our plan will work, everyone ready for this?" asked James giving us a cheesy smile. "Whatever happens tonight remember none of this is Moony's fault and no matter what happens do not turn back into your human form when Moony's still a werewolf, the last thing we need is for one of us to be bitten and Moony to blame himself. Okay I think we should change before the moon hits," I said as I looked through one of the broken windows to find the moon almost at its fullest. A monstrous howl ripped through the shack follow by loud grunts and cries of pain, "I think that's our queue," said Sirius as his body suddenly shifted and he landed on all four paws. The rest of us quickly followed and shifted into our animagus forms, Peter squeaked in protest as one of my heavy paws landed on his small body crushing him slightly, I tried to apologies but communication was very difficult between the four of us in animagus form. My bear senses were far stronger than those of my human form so I flinched when I heard a creak come from the floor boards upstairs, I could also smell the fur of Moony's werewolf form and let out a low growl signaling the guys that Moony was coming our way, no doubt he had smelt us as well.
I braced myself as the great werewolf came crashing through the shack snarling and growling, baring its teeth and flexing its long broken claws. Peter squeaked and hid behind one of the broken tables as the werewolf Moony approached. Me, James and Sirius stood our grounds and didn't even flinch as the werewolf snapped its strong jaws at us and growled. James was the first to move and slowly stepped forward and nudged the giant creature with one of his antlers trying to show that we posed no threat to him. We knew in his werewolf form Moony lost his mind to the beast so we knew not to expect this encounter to be that of a friendly kind. Moony raised his great paw ad swiped at James's stag form but I growled at moony and launched myself forward tackling the great wolf. We both crashed to the floor, the werewolf's jaws snapped mere millimeters from my furry face but I managed to muster up enough strength to pin him below me. I felt needle like teeth clamp down on my flesh and I growled in pain releasing the werewolf from below me, it rolled me out of the way and I ended up sprawled in the corner by Sirius's feet. He nudged me with his snout and I rolled back onto my feet, a slight pain and some blood loss in my front leg but otherwise no harm done. This would be so much simpler if Mooney had kept his mind in his transformation.
The werewolf was now ignoring us and sniffing around the shack a look of hunger in its eyes, Mooney clearly wanted to go hunting but was confined for now within the creaky walls of the flimsy shrieking shack. Once he'd sniffed around he turned his attention back to the four of us and slowly padded forwards, Sirius leapt in front of me and growled trying to stop Moony from coming any closer. Moony nudged Sirius with his long snout and let out a playful howl, I think he'd just realized we weren't going to hurt him and in fact posed no threat to him whatsoever. Sirius wagged his fluffy black tail and leapt around the now harmless looking werewolf. Moony also wagged his tail and chased after Sirius; James quickly joined in and trotted after the two boys. I tried to snigger but it came out as a loud bear snort which made Peter squeak with laughter.
After a few hours of us playing around we were all beat, even the Moony werewolf was tiered and we soon collapsed into a large animal pile exhausted and wanting nothing more to do then sleep off the nights events, sun up was in an hour or two so we didn't have long to wait until we could shift back and head back to the comfort and security of the castle walls.
At sun rise we all trudged and limped back up to the castle, Remus was exhausted and had a few nasty cuts from his horrific transformation and I'd been left with some nasty teeth marks in my forearm from where Remus had bitten me but other than that we were in one piece. I hid my arm from Remus not wanting him to know he'd hurt me; the poor boy would be beside himself with guilt if he knew. We left Remus at the hospital wing with the matron so he could recover, Dumbledore and the Hospital wing staff along with a few select teachers knew of Moony's condition so we were safe to leave him up there. We then made our way back to the Gryffindor common room; I decided to crash up in the boy's dorm again and stole Remy's bed since he wouldn't need it. "Sin stop a sec, let me have a look at your arm before you go to bed," said Sirius as he patted the spot next to him on his bed. I wandered over and sat next to him and rolled up my long sleeved t-shirt. He gently poked my arm and I hissed and withdrew it from him. "I thought you said it was a shallow flesh wound Sin," scolded my brother as he rummaged through his trunk and pulled out a bottle of pain salve and a roll of bandages. "It is, Sirius I've had worse and you know it, I didn't want you lot causing a fuss and making this a big deal, it'll heal," I assured him. Sirius frowned and slapped the slave on the wound before wrapping and securing the bandage. "That should do it but tomorrow you're going to the hospital wing for it to be looked at, I don't want you catching rabies or something," he joked before letting me get up. "I'm not going to the hospital wing for a mere scratch, I will be fine all I need is some sleep so if you don't mind I'm going to crash in Moony's bed," and with that said I passed out and fell into a nice deep sleep.
