5. Immediately upon the appearance of lightning in the sky, proceed directly to the place where your crystal phial is hidden. If you have followed all the preceding steps correctly, you will discover a mouthful of blood-red potion inside it.
• • •
In later years, the only justification James could come up with for the storm that ripped its way through Hogsmeade right before Christmas was that Sirius had willed it to happen. Even the weather, it seemed, was not immune to the unexplainable charm of the Sirius Idea; it didn't matter that they lived in Scotland and storms generally needed a great deal of warm air to develop. Sirius had decided that they needed a storm as soon as possible, and even if it happened more than a month later than he would have preferred, the fact that it happened at all was, in James' opinion, a miracle.
It would have been nice if it hadn't happened in the middle of Transfiguration, though.
James was spending McGonagall's lecture on advanced Summoning Charms vaguely kicking the back of Lily Evans' seat, though he made a conscious effort to be gentle. Right now she was steadfastly ignoring him, but he had a half-formed hope that she would turn around, and then he could give her a winning smile, a soft one, and she would see that he wasn't at all the idiot she thought he was. A stunned look would cross her face, and keep her up at night, and then, tomorrow, she would come seek him out, and—
BANG. An impossibly loud noise split the air, accompanied by a silver-white flash of light that illuminated the snowy landscape outside the window, where dusk had fallen several hours before. A lightning strike. James and Sirius had done some reading on meteorology in recent weeks; James knew that the only real chance they had at a winter thunderstorm was when snow was falling in earnest. The castle's ancient stone foundations vibrated under James' feet.
He took one look at Peter and Sirius, and the three of them leapt from their seats and ran from the room, leaving everything except their wands behind.
"I warned them not to have the banana pudding at lunch," said Remus conversationally. "The house elf who makes it always puts the strangest things in. But they didn't listen to me. Best avoid the Gryffindor toilets for a while."
Lily Evans' mouth dropped open. James ran faster after that.
None of the books said how long after the first bolt of lightning they had to get their potions, but they had agreed they couldn't risk waiting even a second longer than they had to, and so they made it to Gryffindor Tower faster than James thought they had ever made it before. As class was still in session, there was no Gregory Cotton to worry about, and so they proceeded straight to the secret drawer in the trunk, where Sirius almost ripped it out in haste to see what was inside.
The three crystal phials that they had deposited several months before were still there, but they were different. Where before they were full of hair and dew and soggy Mandrake leaves, now they each contained what looked to be a single swallow of dark red potion.
The sight made something inside James' stomach turn over. He took a long breath in. This wasn't the time. They had only minutes, if that.
"It looks like blood," said Peter, voicing James' own thoughts.
"It's supposed to," said Sirius roughly, and James knew that his mind was where it should be, on the next step of the process, which they should already be on their way to completing. "Come on. It's time to change."
• • •
6. It is essential to move, at once, to a large, secure place where your transformation cannot cause alarm or place you in physical danger. Place your wand-tip against your heart, speak the incantation 'Amato Animo Animato Animagus,' and then drink the potion.
• • •
The only possible place was the Room of Requirement. Under cover of James' Invisibility Cloak, the three of them crept through the hallways, once nearly crashing straight into Madam Hooch, who was carrying a large and unwieldy box of Quaffles. But they made it there more or less without incident, and when they'd finished walking past the tapestry of Barnaby the Barmy three times, a wide oaken door appeared in the wall opposite, not altogether different from the entrance to Hagrid's hut.
James and Sirius put their hands to it at the same instant, glancing grimly at each other. After a second's hesitation, Peter did the same. The door opened.
Inside was the Room of Requirement as James had never seen it before. Where, in his experience, it was usually stocked with every joke product imaginable, far beyond the scope of Zonko's, it was now almost entirely empty. All that was inside were two enormous glass walls, stretching from floor to ceiling, standing parallel to each other and perpendicular to the door, creating three long, narrow rooms. Each was accessible by way of three tall glass gates, which stood only a few feet from James, Sirius, and Peter.
"It's so we don't harm each other," said James softly. "If we lose control of the minds."
"They're magically enforced," said Sirius, nodding, squinting at the walls. "I suppose, if something goes wrong with one of us, we could open the gates and try to help… once we've turned back, that is…"
Peter said what James was trying not to think.
"What if something goes wrong with all of us? We made the same potion, after all. What then?"
"Then we'll bear it proudly," said Sirius, straightening up, a wicked gleam in his eye. "Or at least… we will if it turns out that we're bears."
Peter looked horrified, but James forced a laugh, shook off the Cloak, positioned himself in front of the gate in the middle, and uncapped his potion. The cork came off with a thin hiss. James stared into his phial's depths. The potion really did look like blood.
He didn't let himself look away.
"Now?" he said.
"Now," said Sirius.
"See you on the other side," Peter whispered.
James opened the gate and locked himself in.
• • •
7. If all has gone correctly, you will feel a fiery pain and an intense double heartbeat. Into your mind will come the shape of the creature into which you are shortly to transform. You must show no fear. It is too late, now, to escape the change you have willed.
• • •
PAIN.
It was like nothing James had ever felt. It started deep in his chest, behind his ribcage, but soon burrowed into the very depths of his heart, twisting and pulling and wrenching. He doubled over, clutching at his knees; the now-familiar heartbeat from innumerable dusk-and-dawn spells was pounding at hundreds of times its usual force; his stomach jolted backwards; he thought he might be sick; he couldn't breathe; he couldn't—
Silence.
Everything went very bright. The pain stopped. The Room of Requirement glowed, flickered, and then disappeared completely.
James was standing in the Forbidden Forest. It wasn't raining anymore; it was a perfectly clear evening, each star as pale and precise as a pinprick in a black velvet cloth. The weather was just as he liked it: cool and slightly breezy, the birch trees bobbing gently around the clearing where he stood. Unlike the last time he had been in the forest, he had no feeling of unease, no dim idea that he should stay on his guard. He was perfectly relaxed. He felt, in every sense of the word, quiet.
He dropped to the ground, which was soft with moss and fallen leaves, and leaned against a tree, stretching his arms up and outwards. Something moved out of the corner of his eye.
But where James would normally have withdrawn his wand, ready to defend himself against whatever was lurking in the woods, he was sure, somehow, that it would not harm him. He had been brought here to meet it. It was coming to welcome him—as ridiculous as it sounded, and yet he knew it—it was coming to welcome him home.
The breeze sighed around him, and James looked up.
A stag stood before him, long-legged and gentle-eyed, the graceful curve of its antlers the only thing in these woods the wind couldn't sway. It stood before him, and its dark eyes met his, and James found himself giving it a small nod.
So this is who I am, he thought. I wondered.
The stag bowed its own head, as if to agree. James stretched out a slightly shaky hand. It was soft, like his favorite jumper. It nuzzled his wrist; moved to meet his palm. He touched the space right between its eyes—
PAIN.
He wasn't in the Forest anymore. He wasn't sure where he was anymore.