A/N: I can't believe we're at chapter 4 already, this story is flying by! We're now at the point (unfortunately) where the schedule is going to get a bit dicey. When I first started writing this, I let myself skip around a lot based on what I felt inspired by, but that means that we've now hit a stretch of chapters that are either in the very beginning stages or not started yet in favor of writing chapters further down the line. I'm going to try my best to stick to the schedule, but I won't make any promises. Now, this chapter is another long one, and for the most part it's pretty light and breezy (pun very much intended - you'll see)... I hope you enjoy some classic Marauders' mischief and I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
"Merlin, I'm so bored," Sirius moaned, putting down his Transfiguration textbook and sinking back into his chair. "I hate being stuck in the common room."
"You should try out for the quidditch team," James suggested. "They get special permission to be out after curfew."
"Only for practice," Sirius answered, scoffing. "And besides, I can't do that until next year."
"Well, what do you want, Siri?" Remus huffed impatiently, looking up from his homework.
"I just want to do something," he said, putting his feet up on the table.
"You know the rules," Remus said, trying to focus on his parchment as he scribbled out his essay.
"Sod the rules," Sirius mumbled darkly. "Let's sneak out tonight after bed."
"You know we can't do that," Peter answered, looking up from his homework. "What if we got caught? They could expel us!"
"Oh please, they're not going to kick us out for sneaking out after bed one time," Sirius argued.
"Well, it hasn't exactly been just one time..." James admitted.
"Remus, you know the rules backwards and forwards, surely there must be something we can do," Sirius whined.
Remus stopped doing his homework and considered everything he knew. He supposed that there must be some kind of loophole they could exploit for their entertainment. The past few weeks had been a little dull, he had to admit. The weather had been getting them all down, and every professor seemed to come back from the Christmas holiday determined to make them all miserable with unmanageable amounts of work each day. They'd barely left the library, except to sit at their favourite study table in the common room.
"Well," he whispered, leaning in as his friends did the same, "the rules only specify that we can't be out of bed. But what if our beds didn't stay in the dormitory..."
"What?" James asked, his forehead wrinkling in confusion.
"What if we were in our beds still, but our beds weren't in Gryffindor Tower," Remus tried to explain, still fleshing the idea out in his head. "What if we... if we..."
"We levitate them!" Sirius finished, eyes widening with glee.
"That's brilliant, Remus!" James added, clapping his friend on the back. "It's the perfect loophole!"
"I doubt Filch will see it that way," Peter mumbled, sour-faced.
"Don't be such a flobberworm," Sirius said, rolling his eyes.
"Peter, the whole point of a loophole is that it isn't against the rules, so we can't get in trouble," James said reassuringly. "And even if we do, we'll all be in it together!"
"We'll have to wait until everyone else goes to bed," Remus considered. "And then I think we should have two people to a bed. One person to focus on levitating, and one person to steer."
"Excellent!" James and Sirius replied in unison.
"Peter?" Remus asked, flashing his friend a little bit of puppy dog eyes.
"Fine, fine," Peter grumbled in response, but the corners of his mouth twitched up slightly. "But I want to be with Remus, he's better at talking his way out of this stuff than either of you."
James gasped and Sirius held a hand to his chest in mock offense. But Remus only smiled and gave Peter a look that seemed to say 'fair enough'.
They continued to do their work quietly as Gryffindors slowly filtered out of the common room and up to their dormitories. The fifth and seventh years stayed the longest, stressed about the exams that would determine their futures, but eventually they left as well. With a grin of excitement, the four second year boys packed up their things and went up the boys' dormitory. They tried to stay as quiet as possible so they didn't wake Lance and Firmin. It wouldn't do wake everyone up before they even got out of Gryffindor Tower.
Slowly and quietly, they stripped James' and Sirius' beds of all the sheets and blankets, and set the mattresses on the floor. Remus and Peter climbed on one, while James and Sirius sat down on the other.
"Okay, I'll levitate us, and you steer, alright?" Remus asked Peter, screwing up his eyes in concentration.
"I'm steering," Sirius declared, and James nodded. He was better at Charms anyway.
Remus and James focused intensely on the mattresses beneath them, each levitating their charges a bit off the floor. It was difficult – the mattresses were quite a bit larger and heavier than the objects they usually levitated, especially with two people sitting on top. They were a bit wobbly at first, but Sirius was eager to press on, bouncing up and down a bit (which did not help James). Cautiously, James flicked his wand, and the mattress began to move forward slowly, a few inches from the ground. Sirius guided it through the doorway and down the stairs, only bumping lightly against the wall. Taking a deep breath, Remus slowed his heart, trying to stay completely attuned to the mattress hovering beneath him. He gave his wand a small twitch, and they started to creep forward, under Peter's guidance. Remus found that it was easier to maintain the spell if he closed his eyes, trusting Peter to steer. Once both mattresses had cleared the portrait hole, they paused, setting the mattresses down in the hallway so James and Remus could rest for a moment.
"Right, which way should we go?" Sirius asked excitedly. "Down to the Entrance Hall?"
"The door will be locked," James reasoned, shaking his head. "But if you want to go outside we could probably get through the Astronomy Tower."
"I don't know about that..." Remus said nervously. "It's going to be really hard to keep these up that high. I'm not sure I can manage it."
"'Course you can, Remus!" Sirius encouraged. "You just have to be confident."
"I trust you," Peter added helpfully.
"Okay, let's do it," Remus agreed, bracing himself.
"Right, here we go then," James said. He closed his eyes, readying himself and casting wingardium leviosa once more. None of the boys noticed the portrait of the Fat Lady behind them, one eye barely open as she watched them.
Remus followed suit, keeping his eyes closed as they drifted. He picked up the pace a bit this time, so they were floating and the same pace as one might jog through the hallway. They climbed higher and higher through the castle until they came to the door of the observation balcony at the very top of the Astronomy Tower. Sirius quickly alohamora'ed the lock, and the door sprang open easily, allowing them passage. Under the cool night air, they rested once more, preparing for the hardest part of the adventure so far. It briefly occurred to Remus that they would, at some point, have to get back up, but that was a problem for later.
"James, you ready?" he asked, after they had taken a moment to compose themselves.
James nodded, though he was looking tired already. Remus felt the same, but he offered to take the lead this time. Carefully, he raised them up until they could pass over the wall, about two meters up. Even more delicately, he moved them forward until they hung over empty space. If he thought about it, they were probably fifteen stories up at least, but Remus most definitely did not want to think about that. He sucked in another deep breath and tried to keep his hand steady, the mattress lilting a tiny bit beneath him. He began letting the spell go bit by bit, dropping his wand down a millimeter, and the mattress began to sink through the air. It was going a touch faster than he would have liked, but he was still in control, so Remus was considering it a win.
"You're doing great," Peter encouraged, leaning over the edge of the mattress to watch their descent. "'Bout a quarter of the way down now."
Remus let out the breath in his lungs slowly, a hissing sound escaping from him like a balloon letting out air. He was beginning to feel dizzy from the effort, and he reached out one hand to feel the mattress beneath him.
"Killing it, Reem!" Sirius shouted from above them, and Remus gathered that James had begun his efforts.
Apprehensively, Remus started trying to push the mattress forward a bit at the same time, wanting to clear out of James' way. It made things harder, so he was more or less just moving sideways as he hung in midair, and then drifting down again.
"Oh bollocks," James swore above them, and Sirius whooped in delight as their mattress dropped several feet switfly.
Remus stomach clenched in anxiety at the sound, and he tried desperately to block his friends out, and worry on his own mattress.
"Nearly there," Peter said, smiling brightly, even though Remus couldn't see it.
He was so tired, he just wanted to let go completely, but Remus struggled to keep them in the air, and descending steadily. At last he felt the mattress bump against the ground, and he let go of every ounce of the spell he was holding, sighing in relief. Remus lay back on the mattress, grinning at his achievement and trying to recoup some of his energy.
He could see James struggling to let the mattress down steadily, but they were at least low enough now that if they did fall, they wouldn't be seriously hurt. Just a few more feet and James would have made it too. He watched the rest of their descent, and laughed as James simply gave up two feet from the ground, letting them crash down. He was so tired, he barely managed a smile while Sirius laughed heartily.
"Gonna need a mo'," James panted, lying back as well, and Remus nodded in agreement.
High above them, Professor McGonagall had just reached the top of the Astronomy Tower, and she stood on the balcony, looking down at the four boys on the ground. Part of her was impressed by the feat the second year boys had accomplished, but only a small part. Mostly, she was furious that they could be so stupid. Suppose they had fallen to their deaths? It would have been up to her to inform their families of their idiocy.
"Bloody boys," Minerva swore, setting off at a brisk pace for the lower floors, and the main entrance of the castle.
It was times like this that she really hated that apparition was disabled on Hogwarts grounds. Merlin only knew what those boys would get up to in the time it would take her to get there.
"Right, let's go," Sirius urged, and James groaned.
"Fine, but you're going to have to do the forward movement," he replied.
"Okay, here's what we'll do," Remus reasoned, "James and I will keep us up in the air. Peter, you and Sirius will do the forward motion, alright? We'll race to the quidditch pitch and then once we're there we can think of some kind of obstacle course?"
"What spell do we use?" Peter asked Remus, his eyebrows knitting together. "Progredior?
"Yeah, that should be fine," Remus said, nodding slightly. "Ready?"
James gave a grunt of agreement, and he and Remus both adjusted their positions on the mattresses. They knelt, bending as low as possible, wands in hand and pressed their palms against the mattress. Remus curled his fingertips, trying to gain some purchase on the smooth material.
"On your marks," Sirius said, grinning maniacally.
"Get set," Peter added, and Remus and James both took a deep breath, raising them in the air.
"GO!" Remus shouted, and both mattresses took off across the grounds.
They sped through the air, Remus trying to focus on not sending them crashing to the ground instead of the feeling of the wind ruffling his hair and cooling the heat under his skin. It was difficult – the lightness that he felt was intoxicating, and he could understand why James enjoyed whizzing through the air so much. Even so, Remus wasn't as fond of heights, as was sure to keep their mattress low to the ground, even as James and Sirius climbed higher into the air.
"C'mon Peter," Remus encouraged, "can't let them win. Wasting time by going higher too."
Peter screwed his face up in concentration and leaned closer to the mattress, the wind buffeting his face as he tried to stay focused. The goalposts of the quidditch pitch were getting closer, and they were only just ahead of the other two. With a small grunt of energy, Peter but every ounce of energy he had into the spell, and they sailed past the goalposts. He whooped delightedly, and Remus opened his eyes, grinning from ear to ear as he let their mattress drop to the ground.
Sirius pouted as they touched down next to their friends, but James looked too exhausted to do much of anything, including pout. He collapsed onto the mattress, face down, panting and looking for all the world like he wanted to go to sleep right there and then.
"Okay, so what kind of obstacle course should we set up?" Remus asked after a moment.
James merely groaned in response, and Sirius kicked at his hand lightly.
"What if we just played Quidditch?" Sirius suggested, looking pointedly at the goalposts.
"We haven't got any of the balls, and since we've only got one mattress each, we'd hardly have much in the way of teams," Remus answered, shaking his head slightly.
"Unless we just got a snitch and tried to catch it," Peter offered.
"Snitches are really complex magical objects though," Remus objected. "I couldn't just conjure one from nothing."
"But could you summon one?" Peter asked, and Remus opened and closed his mouth several times.
They hadn't officially learned the summoning charm yet, but Remus had been practicing on his own (he liked to get ahead, especially when he thought something might be useful). And since it didn't have to do with living creatures, there wasn't much that could go wrong. Still, he felt a bit apprehensive about attempting a spell that a teacher hadn't signed off on yet.
"I – I suppose I could try," he said at last, with a small shrug. "Accio snitch!"
They waited a few minutes to see if anything would happen, wondering if the spell had even worked at all. Remus had no idea where the snitches were even kept, but there had to be one free somewhere on the castle grounds. He wondered if he could even summon one, since they could fly in their own right, and might conceivably just flit off in a different direction. It took several minutes, but eventually Remus could hear the whoosh of air that meant that something small and fast was headed in their direction. He put his hand out and a few seconds later a little snitch collided hard with his palm. Remus wrapped his fingers around it carefully to make sure that it wouldn't fly away before they were ready.
"Okay, so we'll give the snitch a 30 second head start, and then go after it, and the team that catches it wins..." Remus said, drifting off toward the end of his sentence.
"What do we win?" Sirius asked, cocking an eyebrow.
"Bragging rights?" Remus suggested, but Sirius scoffed.
"No, we need some kind of prize," he argued, shaking his head.
"Can we just figure it out later?" James asked, positively exhausted and wondering how he was ever going to keep the spell going long enough. He felt like he could collapse then and there and sleep for five years.
"Yeah, let's go," Peter agreed, rubbing sleepily at his eyes. It was past two in the morning, the moon was high in the sky, and they had a mere five hours until they would have to be up for breakfast.
With a nod, Remus let go of the snitch in his fingers, and watched with fascination as it unfurled its wings. The small ball fluttered in front of his eyes for a few seconds, darting this way and that in tiny movements. It seemed to be reading him, ruffling through his mind to find out what he wanted, and then it zoomed away into the night sky. Only then did he realize that Peter had been counting down the seconds until they could chase after it, and he began readying himself for takeoff once more.
When the countdown reached zero, James and Remus vaulted their mattresses into the sky, and Sirius and Peter sent them flying in different directions, searching for any glint or glimmer of the snitch. The adrenaline of their little game flooded through Remus' veins, keeping him going as Peter flew them this way and that. They circled as high as Remus could take them, well above the goalposts, scanning the field for their prize. He saw the moonlight reflecting brightly to his left, and realized it wasn't the goalpost.
"Peter, look!" Remus tugged at Peter's sleeve, pointing in the direction that he had seen the snitch.
As fast as he could, Peter sent them hurtling in the direction of the light, and Remus let the levitation spell out bit by bit, dropping them through the air until they were level with where he'd seen the snitch. He could see it, just a few feet away from them, and somehow he knew that James and Sirius would be diving after them, closing in as quickly as possible. Peter was reaching out from the front of the mattress, trying to grab the snitch, wiggling his fingers for it as it darted away.
"JAMES POTTER!"
Remus looked toward the ground where Professor McGonagall's voice boomed toward them, just as Peter's hand closed around the little snitch. He saw James let go of the spell in shock, their mattress dropping to the ground faster than it ought to have, and the two boys bounced violently on it, struggling not to go flying.
"REMUS LUPIN!"
He was already lowering them to the ground as quickly as he safely could when his name pierced the air. He closed his eyes, trying to push back the deep embarrassment and shame that rose inside him instinctively. Technically, they had done nothing wrong. He had to hold onto that.
"SIRIUS BLACK! PETER PETTIGREW!"
Remus knew they were in trouble. Professor McGonagall would not care how clever they were in finding this loophole. They were going to be chewed out, punished, regardless of whether it was technically not against the rules. Remus hated himself for even looking for this loophole at all. He was so lucky they were even letting him be at the school, why would he ever risk that by doing something so stupid? It was so unlike him. This had James and Sirius written all over it, and in that moment, he felt a fleeting dislike for his friends for convincing him to do something so impetuous. But deep down he knew it wasn't really their fault. He had known what he was doing all along.
Peter and Remus touched down lightly on the ground in front of Professor McGonagall, and they could see from her face that she was absolutely fuming. James was staying awake by sheer force of will it would seem, his eyes drooping and his posture sagged on the mattress, not at all his usual swaggering self.
"WHAT ON EARTH DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?" Professor McGonagall bellowed, her face so white with anger that she looked positively ghostly. "DO YOU HAVE A DEATH WISH?"
Sirius and James both blanched as they remembered their incident in the Great Hall the previous year, and how close things had come to being a great deal worse.
"Professor, we were careful, we were safe," James protested weakly, while Sirius looked like he might cry at her words.
"SAFE?" she screeched in reply. "SAFE? You levitated a mattress off the Astronomy Tower! Do you have any idea what might have happened to any of you if your charms had given out, or if, Merlin forbid, you fell off the mattress?"
"But we didn't," Peter answered more boldly than any of them felt.
"And how did you plan on getting back up to Gryffindor Tower? Presumably levitating the mattress up the Astronomy Tower again? All while Mr. Potter looks like he is about to collapse from exhaustion?"
The other three boys all looked at James, who did indeed look a bit peaky.
"I – I would have done the spells," Sirius offered, trying to mollify Professor McGonagall somewhat.
"And flying around on the pitch like that!" Professor McGonagall ploughed on, ignoring Sirius' objection. "What if you had fallen, and with know teachers there to assist!"
"With all due respect, Professor," Remus said, speaking up for the first time, "none of those things happened, nor did they seem likely to. We were on something far more sturdy than a broomstick and –"
"Enough, Mr. Lupin," she cut in sternly, and he stopped talking immediately. "Whether you were injured in your follies or not, it was an unnecessary risk. I would think you of all people would appreciate your place here at this school too much to engage in such behavior. I must ask, are the four of you on a mission to break every school rule in as little time as possible?"
The boys were quiet for a moment, each waiting for the other to speak first, until Peter took a deep breath.
"Actually, we weren't breaking any rules," he said bravely, trying to force courage to flow through his veins.
"Not breaking any rules?" Professor McGonagall repeated shrilly. "Am I to suppose sneaking out of bed in the middle of the night is no longer against the rules?"
"Well that's just it, Professor," Remus continued, giving Peter a small nod, "we didn't sneak out of bed. We only snuck out of the dormitory, and onto castle grounds, but we stayed firmly in our beds the entire time. The rules only say that students are not permitted out of bed, so it wasn't against the rules at all."
She was silent for a moment, seething in the quiet, and for a moment Remus thought he could actually see steam coming from her ears. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, she waved her wand at the four boys, and both mattresses disappeared with a pop from beneath them.
"Upstairs, all of you, now," she said, and for a moment Remus thought that they had gotten away with no punishment. He exchanged incredulous looks with the others as they all pushed themselves to their feet, but once they were all standing, the other shoe dropped. "You'll find that technically, you no longer have beds, but I suggest you get as much sleep as you can anyway. You'll start your detentions tomorrow, and you'll want to be well-rested."
She turned on her heel, and they didn't dare not follow, trudging along behind her. The walk back to Gryffindor Tower seemed impossibly long, and Professor McGonagall saw them silently all the way to the portrait hole. After climbing the stairs to their dormitory, they found that their beds had been replaced with armchairs, stiff and uncomfortable looking, but it was still better than what they had expected. To their immense relief, they discovered that Professor McGonagall had taken some pity on them, and at least made the chairs recliners, so that they could curl up to some degree.
Sighing, they each climbed into their chair, grabbing a pillow from the floor and adjusting themselves until they were as comfortable as possible. James and Remus were so exhausted by their spellcasting that they fell asleep rather quickly, snoring deeply, from their places. Peter drifted off not long after, turning fitfully from side to side. Sirius couldn't seem to find a comfortable position, until he at last nodded off with his feet draped over the top of the chair.
When the sunlight streamed through the windows, the second-year Gryffindor boys all began to stretch and yawn, rubbing their eyes to wake up. Lance and Firmin gave them curious looks when they awoke that morning, but both were so used to the boys' antics that they hadn't even bothered to ask what had happened. None of them felt at all rested the next day, carrying on through their classes sluggishly and waiting to see what their punishment would be.
When dinner was over, Professor McGonagall summoned them, and escorted them down through a maze of hallways, until they reached an exedra that housed a suit of armor. Professor McGonagall winked at it, and it saluted her, and then she simply passed right through it, disappearing into the air. Aghast, the four boys followed suit, and were astonished to find a large chamber hidden on the other side. Vats of steaming water sat at intervals throughout the room, and little house elves scurried around them.
"You will be helping with the laundry each morning, during breakfast, as well as during lunch," Professor McGonagall explained, motioning towards the activities of the room. "You will arrive here at 6:30am promptly, where you will have twenty minutes to eat the provided breakfast before beginning your tasks for the day. You will return during your lunch break, and be given lunch as you leave to eat during the subsequent class. This will continue for two weeks. For every minute that you are late on any given morning, you will receive an extra day of laundry duty. Is this clear?"
"Yes, Professor," all four boys echoed sullenly.
"Excellent, you are dismissed for the evening," she said, waving them away.
They exited the laundry room and made their way to Gryffindor Tower, where they immediately began working on their homework. None of them dared to admit how bored they were, or how much they would love to be out in the open air once more.
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A/N: P.S. I keep meaning to say this but it feels so strange. I've made a Ko-Fi account so if you're enjoying this story, please feel free to shoot me some caffeine - it might even get me writing more!
ko-fi/owlwaysandforever
