A/N: Hi again, hope all my fellow Americans had a pleasant Thanksgiving and managed to survive Black Friday. I did some research for this chapter and I learned a lot about all of the different common rooms, I was surprised to learn that Gryffindor is the only one with a portrait door, but there you go. Also, I'm not 100% certain that having Andromeda go to school at the same time as the Marauders is canon, but Narcissa was born in 1955 and since Andromeda is the middle sister, I figured it's not too far-fetched to think that she could be in seventh year during their first year. Let me know what you think though. Expect angst in the next chapter. As always, I hope you enjoy and please read and review!
Chapter 9: The Kitchens
Remus never thought he'd be so happy to receive his first detention. However, it was true that he'd earned it under false pretenses—although he had helped James and Sirius with some of the more intricate spells and with distracting Hagrid while they enchanted the pumpkins, overall he'd had a very small role in the Halloween prank.
The next day during Defense, Remus earned ten house points when he was able to perform the knockback jinx perfectly, which more than made up for the five he'd lost the night before, and detention with Hagrid after Herbology was quite therapeutic. That evening, after dinner, James and Sirius insisted that Remus accompany them on one of their regular castle exploration expeditions—and Remus, still on something of a high from his first detention, was happy to oblige even though he knew he should be studying for their Charms test instead.
Remus suggested that they invite Peter along too, but Sirius quickly pointed out that they might not make it back to the common room before curfew and they would need to be stealthy: something Peter was incapable of. So the three of them set off to find the Hufflepuff common room since it was one of the few truly unexplored places left in the castle. They weren't even sure which direction they needed to head in to find it though, so they tagged along behind some third year Hufflepuff girls returning from the library.
The girls turned a corner and disappeared from sight, when the boys followed, it was to find a hallway that was completely empty except for a stack of barrels. James, Sirius, and Remus all exchanged confused looks.
"Where'd they go?" Sirius asked. Remus shrugged.
"Well come on, let's look around. They can't have gone far. I swear that the Hufflepuff common room is around here somewhere." James said and they split up.
Remus walked further down the corridor, looking for a portrait door like the Fat Lady—one alcove in the wall looked promising and he even heard a girl giggling from within. But when he peered around the corner he felt his face turn bright red and he retreated hastily, praying the couple hiding inside the alcove hadn't spotted him.
He had no such luck though and the girl gave a yelp and the boy shouted, "Hey!" Someone grabbed the back of Remus' robes and he was spun around so that he was facing the two flustered seventh years.
"Sorry!" He squeaked, keeping his eyes on his feet as the canine in him urged him to act submissively. "I didn't know anyone was in there."
"What are you doing down here?" the boy asked in a gentle voice, obviously forgetting the embarrassment and annoyance from just a second ago at the sight of a timid and apologetic first year student.
"I-I was…" He desperately tried to come up with an excuse for why he was poking around that didn't involve chasing a group of third year girls back to their common room, but nothing was coming to mind, "I was just…"
"Andy?" Remus was flooded with relief at the sound of Sirius' voice. "What are you doing down here?" The dark haired boy approached from behind.
"I was just saying goodnight to Ted. What are you doing down here?" The girl asked and Remus, feeling safer in his friend's presence, properly looked at the couple for the first time.
The boy, Ted, was good-looking with a warm, honest face and thick chestnut brown hair. Andromeda, Sirius' cousin, had long dark hair and wide eyes, her features were aristocratic and Remus could see the Black family resemblance.
"We were trying to find the Hufflepuff common room."
"Why?" Ted asked.
"Well, we know where the other three are already," Sirius replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Andromeda rolled her eyes and Ted chuckled.
"Well then, you're going in the wrong direction. The common room is back that way," he said pointing down the hall.
There was a strange wail and a moment later James came running from the direction Ted had been pointing, completely soaked and smelling like vinegar. Remus wrinkled his nose, having caught the scent before the others.
"What happened?" Sirius asked, taking a step back as James approached to avoid getting dripped on.
"Bloody barrels!" James cried, "They must be cursed or something, I barely even touched one and then out of nowhere, all this weird liquid dropped on my head. Ugh, it smells rancid!"
"It's vinegar," Ted laughed, "You must've touched the wrong barrel. One of them opens a hidden door into the Hufflepuff common room, but if you touch any of the others you'll get drenched."
"Here, let me." Andromeda pointed her wand at James and said, "Scourgify!" The vinegar siphoned off of the boy and evaporated, and the smell, to Remus' relief, also disappeared. Clearly the girl was much better at the spell than he was; even after the house elves cleaned his shirt it still had a faint blue stain on it from the one time he'd tried to cast it.
"You must be James Potter," she said and James gave her a hesitant look.
"Er… yeah, I am."
Andromeda smiled disarmingly and turned to Sirius, "What did you say to Cissy? She wouldn't stop complaining about the fact that you were going around with a Potter but now she refuses to talk about you at all."
Sirius shifted uncomfortably, looking a little guilty.
"I just told her to back off, that's all."
Andromeda snorted in disbelief, "Alright, well whatever you said to her has obviously worked. You'll need to give me lessons sometime." She turned to Remus, "And who are you?"
"Remus," he replied shyly, still feeling embarrassed that he'd interrupted an intimate moment between the couple.
"You boys better start heading back to the Gryffindor tower; curfew for first years starts in half an hour." Ted interrupted before Andromeda could reply.
"Uhhh…" Sirius said uncertainly, looking around the corridor, "Which way is the way back?"
Ted pointed, "Take a left at the first corner, then another left at the third intersection. Go up the first flight of stairs and you'll be at the Great Hall. I'd walk you there myself but I need to finish saying goodnight to Andromeda." Ted winked, Sirius laughed, and Remus felt his face turning bright red again.
Ten minutes later, the boys still hadn't found the stairs and Remus had the distinct impression that they were walking in circles.
"I swear we've passed that suit of armor three times now," Sirius complained.
"All the suits of armor down here look exactly the same," James retorted, "Come on, this has to be the third intersection." The boys turned left and found a very promising looking staircase; there was a collective sigh of relief.
"Wait!" James shouted and Sirius and Remus jumped. "Wait a minute. Look at that!" He pointed to a large painting of a bowl of fruit next to the staircase.
"Are you feeling alright James?" Sirius asked mildly as they approached the painting, "Because I'm fairly certain that it's just a regular old painting, like the thousands of others in the castle…" But Remus saw what James was excited about.
"That looks like a pretty official pear to me," he laughed. "In fact, I might even call it, 'the pear'."
"Now you've got Remus speaking gibberish too?" Sirius moaned, "Please can we just go? The stairs are right here and I'm getting sick of this basement." The boy's patience was wearing thin.
"No, not gibberish, you dolt. Don't you remember what that portrait told us about tickling a pear to get to the kitchens on the first day of classes?" James asked.
"I thought we all agreed that he was just senile…"
"Well, think about it," Remus said calmly, "The kitchens must be pretty close to the Great Hall and we're right below it now. Besides, there's no harm in trying, right?"
Sirius snorted, "Fine, suit yourself. But I'm not going to tickle that pear."
Remus didn't want to test the limits of Sirius' patience and quickly tickled the pear. It squirmed under his touch and seemed to jump out of the painting, turning into a green door knob in his hand. He turned and grinned at James and Sirius.
"You've got to be kidding me," Sirius looked genuinely shocked.
"Brilliant," James laughed.
The kitchens were massive and noisy. Five large tables were set up in the middle of the room, mimicking the structure of the Great Hall. If it weren't for all the pots and pans and the dozens of house elves running around, Remus might have even mistaken it for the Great Hall for a moment.
The presence of three stunned boys didn't go unnoticed for long: two house elves approached them.
"Good evening sirs!" said one in a squeaky voice, "How can we be of assistance?"
Remus was about to say that they were just looking around when James and Sirius, who had grown up in homes with house elves, spoke first.
"Can we get something to eat?" they asked in near perfect unison. Remus sometimes wondered if James and Sirius were twins in a past life.
"Of course, sirs! What would you like?"
The three boys managed to make it back to the Gryffindor common room just five minutes after their curfew with plenty of pastries in hand. Remus hoped that some of the treats would serve as a peace offering for Peter—who he felt increasingly guilty about leaving behind. Luckily Peter didn't seem to mind being left out in the least, in fact, he was thrilled that the boys had considered him at all. Remus, feeling even guiltier than before, swore that he would make sure Peter could join them next time.
James wrote down how to find the Hufflepuff common room and the kitchens in his notebook along with all the other discoveries they'd made since they came to Hogwarts and Remus was certain that it was the most useful discovery so far.