AN: Not much Sirius/Kate interaction, but it does cover the dynamics of the foursome friendship of the girls. If I did my job correctly, then you'll all see everyone has a little role to play: Lily is the reasonable one, Alice is the glue who tries to keep everyone together, Merle is the tension breaker, and Kate really adds a wry sense of humor and likes to keep everyone in check. If anyone currently hates Kate for being a humorless bitch, that's how its supposed to start. No girl would heartily dislike Sirius unless she was really uptight herself, but I'm hoping she grows into a more likable character over time. Cheers!

Chapter 4

Kate stared precariously over Hogsmeade village, with its snowy streets bustling with Hogwarts students as well as villagers eager to shop. With a shiver, Kate then felt the icy grip of Merle's hand tighten over her arm, tugging her along into one of the streets

"Will you hurry up?" snapped Merle while her teeth chattered in the cold air, and Kate saw a circle of smoke emerge around Merle's mouth as she spoke. "I'm freezing my arse off!"

Kate forcibly tugged her arm out of Merle's grip to establish that she wasn't taking orders. She followed Merle to one particularly icy road, making it rather difficult to cross the street without tripping. While Merle ventured to cross said road, occasionally slipping on the ice with her boots, Kate rolled her eyes at how clueless Merle could be then pulled out her wand. With a simple melting spell, the ice from the road suddenly vanished, and Merle looked up at Kate.

"I would've thought of that," whined Merle to save face. "I, er... just forgot my wand in the dormitory."

"You're wand is right between your ear, Merle," said Kate spitefully. "Are you a compulsive liar or what?"

"Or what," answered Merle, frowning and grabbing Kate again so that they could move on. "I don't understand why Lily had to leave early without us, doesn't she know that we obviously can't be trusted to be left alone?"

"Oh thanks. That obviously restores my faith in our ability to be friends," Kate bit back, a little more harsher than she intended.

Merle was of course stung by these words, but unlike most often of times, Kate actually felt sorry.

"Oh, I see," said Merle. "So we aren't friends anymore, is that it?"

Kate disheartened at the idea, and then grabbed at Merle's hand to stop her from walking. She sighed, readying herself for an apology.

"You know I didn't mean it like that, Merle. I was just being a pain in the arse, like always."

Merle smiled at Kate in what felt like the first time in a long while.

"I know," she replied. "I know we're friends."

"Good," said Kate with relief. "I mean, I know we don't always act like we're friends, but we... Merle?" But Merle had already turned away in disinterest, walking toward a window shop and ruining the apology that Kate had been working up to. "Erm, hullo, this was our touching reconciliation moment?"

"There's Lily and Alice," explained Merle, waving at them through the shop window of Gladrags Wizardwear. "Looks like they got here earlier than us. Lets go."

They were thankful to enter the warm confines of the shop rather than having to face the blistering winds outside of Hogsmeade. They stared around at the shop, looking up at the different choices of Halloween costumes. Lily and Alice approached them with happy greetings.

"Bad news, Merle," said Alice. "I asked the shop boy, and he said that they had only one mermaid costume, but it was already purchased by someone else."

"Someone who?!" demanded Merle loudly, casting her glare around the shop as if the culprit would be found there.

"Do you really think they'd tell us?" reasoned Lily. "Just forget it, Merle. Look, there are so many other cool costumes in the shop. Want to see mine?"

Lily reached into a bag, apparently already haven purchased her costume, and yanked out an elegant white gown which had a large set of fake wings attached to it. Lily undoubtedly chose the prettiest outfit she could find.

"An angel, really?" asked Kate with raised eyebrows. "Lily, it's Halloween. As in the holiday with the purpose of dressing up to scare its young."

"Oh, only children do that. I want to be an angel, dammit!" Lily said with a rather cunning conviction that would suggest Lily was anything but an angel.

Alice then stepped up to the plate, holding out her own choice of costume. "As for me, I'm going as Raggedy Anne. And get this, Edgar is my date--he's going as Raggedy Andy, isn't that cute?"

"The cutest!" said Kate mockingly enthusiastic. "Now if you'll excuse, I have to go barf."

Kate began to turn for the exit, when Lily grabbed her to prevent her from doing so.

"I'm really doubting whether I should have come in the first place, not if you two are going to pick out the wrongest costumes imaginable."

"I know!" agreed Merle, also disapproving of Lily and Alice's choices. "Why would you do something so boring when you can go as a cat woman!"

Merle had suddenly snatched a nearby outfight designed with black fur and fake cat ears. Kate, Alice and Lily groaned all at once.

"For the love of Circe, Merle, put that atrocious thing down!" begged Lily. "If you show up to Slughorn's party in that, everyone will know you only chose it to receive attention from the opposite sex!"

"Exactly!" said Merle, undeterred. "A cat getting catcalls, get it?" She made a hissing noise to emphasize her point, baring her nails at them in the way a cat would.

"Right," said Lily. "Alice, try talking her out of it. I'm going to help Kate look for a costume. I have something to show her."

"What did you want to show me?" asked Kate curiously, as Lily guided her into the back of the shop.

Lily pointed out a row of medieval-styled dresses hanging on racks. Kate gaped, impressed at how authentic the dresses looked.

"I know," grinned Lily. "I remember how much you got into that kind of thing, what with your Arthurian phase you had in third year. So I thought you might want to go medieval for the party."

"Brilliant, Lily," said Kate while fingering the material of a silk red gown. "I wouldn't mind dressing up as Morgana, Arthur's sister."

"Wasn't she evil in the legends?"

"Exactly. Now if you were Morgana, which dress would you wear?"

"I dunno. You might want to ask the shop owner. Although, this one is labeled Queen Guinevere."

"I didn't like Guinevere too much. She was a bit of a two-faced dog for cheating on Arthur with Lancelot."

Lily stifled a laugh.

"But it is rather good looking," admitted Kate, staring at the particularly pretty lavender dress that was labeled Queen Guinevere. "I suppose I can go in this one and just tell people it's Morgana, they won't know the difference."

Kate pulled the dress hanger off the rack and looked at the price tag. She inwardly groaned, seeing how expensive it was. Then she placed it back on the rack.

"Then again, I haven't really given the other dresses a fair chance."

Sensing that it was in fact the price that was the problem, Lily picked up the lavender dress again. Lily only glanced at the tag and then approached the front counter.

"Lily, what are you doing?"

"The angel costume came cheap," said Lily, glancing back at Kate. "Consider this your birthday present."

"My birthday isn't until December."

"Can I help you, ma'am?" said the boy behind the counter.

"Yes, I'd like the purchase this dress," said Lily before Kate could put a stop to it.

"You bloody twat, you didn't have to do that!"

"Not the traditional thank you, but you are welcome," said Lily, handing the wrapped dress to Kate. "There's no way you're backing out of Slughorn's party now."

Kate realized that Lily was right. She would be wasting Lily's moment of charity if she just blew of Slughorn's Halloween party. As the girls trotted down the street of Hogsmeade, Kate wistfully glanced into the plastic bag, admiring the seams of the lavender dress. She then popped a kiss on Lily's cheek in appreciation.

The moment of sisterly love was suddenly ruined by a male's voice, who called out, "How cute--I hope you two don't break up any time soon."

Kate instantly recognized the sarcastic voice belonging to Sirius Black. The usual tug of annoyance that accompanied Black's presence returned to Kate, and she glanced over to see all four Marauders near a frozen fountain in the middle of the village. In the background, Kate could see James standing on top of the frozen ice of the water fountain and trying to convince Peter to join him like an ice rink. Remus was sitting down on the fountain ledge, torn between watching James and Peter trying to skate and Sirius, who was now approaching the group of girls.

"As long as it amuses you to see two girls kissing," said Lily, rolling her eyes. Kate could see that just by her voice, Lily had caused James to slightly slip on the ice.

Sirius smirked mischievously at the girls and used a finger to flick off some snowflakes off of Alice's shoulder, causing her to burn crimson. "You girls wouldn't be up to a snowball fight, now, would you?"

His gray eyes momentarily flickered toward Kate, and it suddenly became clear to her that the supposed snowball fight would only have the intention of getting Kate as frost bitten as possible.

"As amusing as that sounds," said Kate with an air of bitterness, "I'm afraid I grew out of snowball-fighting phase as early as ten, like most little children."

"I think you're just afraid of a bit of competition, Nolan," said Sirius.

He bent over and gathered snow together to form a white ball. The anxiousness eating at Kate's stomach didn't feel so assuring. Sirius smirked again, enjoying the nervousness in Kate's face.

"Lets go," said Kate to her friends, and all four began walking away.

That's when she was harshly hit in the back of the head by the snowball. The cold ball collided into her black hair, causing it to throb in pain and ice.

She spun around, her anger reaching a boiling point, and she whipped out her wand and pointed it at Sirius, who was laughing his arse off.

"Vespertilio!" she screeched, causing a flock of menacing bats to come pouring out of her wand.

Just as Sirius became alert and pulled out his own wand, Kate had already shouted, "Oppugno!"

As one, the bats all swooped down and attacked Sirius, causing her to screech in pain.

"Kate, you're a hag!" said Merle, clearly amazed by what Kate had done. "I love it!"

"We should go," said Lily, grabbing Kate and pulling her away from the scene. "Before someone like Filch comes along."

"But come on, though, that was bloody brilliant," said Merle. "You've got to give kudos to Kate for having the nasty temper that she does."

"That little skank deserved it," muttered Kate at the ground, still furious at having a cold bruise where Sirius had hit her with the snowball. "But I should have done something else, I shouldn't have hexed him. I could be reported."

"By who, the Marauders?" asked Alice. "They're the biggest troublemakers in the school, they wouldn't dare turn you in, else they face being accused as the biggest hypocrites the school ever had."

AN: Yay, Kate's first moment of blinding rage! It took me awhile to find a latin translation of "bats" for some reason, but I didn't want to use "Avis" because that's too similar to what Hermione did to Ron (:P). I wanted the friction between Kate and Sirius heat up a bit more before we did the Halloween bash (which I'm frightened of writing next, because a lot of drama ensues there!). Review and tell me if you like it or hate it.