— CHAPTER FIVE —

Gobstones Club

The rest of the day passed without much excitement. Sirius and James went off somewhere while Remus and Peter ate their breakfast. By the time the two came back, Remus was quite sure they had made up and were back to being best mates.

They had Defence Against the Dark Arts again today; Professor Jewel brought in more pixies that danced around the classroom, and their homework task was to draw a diagram of the anatomy of pixies.

Afterwards they had Potions, which Remus loathed because of how difficult it was. Professor Slughorn was still the Potions Master. He was a large, bumbling old man, who very much liked Lily because she was so skilled at Potions. He often complimented Lily heartily in front of the entire class, much to James's annoyance.

Charms was taught by a short, elf-like wizard named Professor Flitwick, who often cast fun charms on objects to make them dance, sing, or on one memorable occasion, shout curse words. Transfiguration was less fun but just as interesting, with Professor McGonagall's stern words about transformation instilled in everybody's minds. History of Magic and its teacher, Professor Binns, were both terribly boring—not even Lily, star swot, could focus properly in that subject.

Remus was feeling quite all right about the level of difficulty of the classes. It didn't seem much too different from last year, thank Godric. Peter, however, was already stressed from the workload.

When the day's classes had finished, and dinner had begun, Remus nervously turned to the Marauders. His plate of Yorkshire pudding was untouched. His second-hand Gobstones set was heavy in his robe pocket. (He'd snuck up to the Common Room earlier that day, giving Ruby as much food as he could carry, then leaving quickly before anybody saw him and questioned his suspicious activities.)

"Er, I'm going to go study with Lily tonight," Remus lied to his friends.

James almost spat out whatever he was chewing on. "Mate, what? It's been, like, four days since term has started!"

Peter marvelled at Remus. "You really are a swot."

Sirius was giving Remus a curious look, but when they'd made eye contact, Sirius smirked. "Going on a little date with Evans, hmm?"

"Careful," added James, grinning. "You'll have to compete with Snivellus for her love."

The three boys hooted with laughter, and Remus could still hear them tittering as they left the Gryffindor table. He exhaled with relief as soon as they were out of sight. He looked back at the table and saw that typical Sirius had forgotten to throw away his rubbish, a bundle of tissues. Remus rolled his eyes. Of course.

Getting up from his seat, he began to walk almost apprehensively out from the Great Hall. As he left he remembered to chuck Sirius's rubbish away for him in a waste basket. Then Remus made his way out slowly, scared that his friends might spot him. His hand on a staircase's railing twitched as he tiptoed up the stairs. Some knights on a tapestry challenged Remus to a duel, pointing embroidered javelins as he passed.

Gobstones Club first meeting Thursday after dinner. Be there or be a Globstone!

He was beginning to have second thoughts. What if his friends found out? What if they found out, or worse, didn't want to associate themselves with him anymore? These invasive thoughts gnawed at him, from the inside out.

He finally stopped at the classroom detailed on the Gobstones Club poster. The door was shut. Remus's hand slowly curled around the doorknob.

"You should do the things you want to do," Sirius had said this morning.

Reach out, something in his head whispered to him.

"All right, fine," he told the voices and turned the doorknob.

He didn't know what he had been expecting to lie on the other side of the door, but it wasn't this. The classroom had been magically refashioned; the floor was now a soft, grass-looking carpet, with a couple of holes in the ground, as well as circles drawn in chalk. People kneeled around these holes, and around these circles, their faces focused and their hands at the ready to flick their gobstones.

There were about fifteen people inside, all from different houses and years. Marlene McKinnon kneeled opposite a Hufflepuff third-year girl and they were determinedly trying to hit each other's gobstones outside a chalk-drawn circle. To Remus's utter surprise, Regulus Black was also here, sitting beside another Slytherin first year that Remus did not recognise.

Not many people looked up when Remus awkwardly shuffled inside, and only one person stood. Remus recognised him immediately as the smiley Gryffindor prefect Frank Longbottom.

"Hiya!" Frank made his way and gave Remus a firm handshake. His hands were very warm. "Remus, right?"

"Yes. Frank, yeah?"

"Uh huh! Here to join Gobstones Club?" Frank grinned. "Didn't bring any of your friends, did you? I remember all the trouble they caused last year."

Remus shook his head. "Nah, only me."

Remus was privately mollified that Frank knew that Remus was friends with the Marauders—this meant people were aware of it. Remus wasn't sure why this mattered to him, but it did.

"Cool," said Frank, and he looked like he meant it. "Well, come sit with me, I'm just watching Davey and Isaac play a Slytherin's pit game."

Davey Gudgeon and Isaac Chelton were both in Remus's year, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw respectively. They were crouching opposite one another, in between them a strange circular hole in the floor. Davey flicked one of his gobstones as lightly as he could—but it was still too hard. He swore as his gobstone rolled into the hole and dropped down.

"Ha, sucker!"

Isaac laughed as the gobstones jumped into the air and squirted a foul-smelling liquid into Davey's eye, causing him to yell out.

Frank grinned as Davey wildly tried to wipe his eye. "Ah, the final globstone at the end of a game! It never gets old."

"Right," said Remus, because he had no idea what was happening.

"Keepsies," taunted Isaac, and a disgruntled Davey shoved a few gobstones into Isaac's outstretched hand.

"Right, it's almost six-thirty," said Frank, checking a clock on the wall. "I should officially start. Attention everyone!"

Everybody playing their games stopped.

"I think this is probably everybody that's going to come, so: Welcome! Gobstones Club is a long-standing club here at Hogwarts, even older than Chess Club and Quidditch. Now, I know that Gobstones might not be very cool—"

Remus heard low mutters and grumbles.

"—but Gobstones Club is where we don't care about that, all right?" Frank grinned once more, showing off pearly white teeth. "We're here to have fun, think critically about our games, training everyone, and discuss upcoming competitions. Normally we have lunchtime meetings, but someone has detention every lunch this week –"

"Not my fault Jewel's a git—" called out a Ravenclaw sixth-year. (Secretly, Remus was offended. Professor Jewel was not a git.)

"—so, our next meeting will be next week Thursday lunch, all right?" Frank continued. "If anyone has any problems with this, come and speak to me sometime soon. Now, everybody can go back to playing their games – and no cheating, Weston, I see you!"

Remus exchanged eye contact with Marlene for a split second, and they waved shyly to each other before looking away.

(Remus didn't think Marlene would tell anyone that he'd joined Gobstones Club; firstly, she was quiet and kept to herself and secondly, she wasn't friends with Remus's friends, so he was probably safe. Also, she seemed to be a little embarrassed herself about being in the club.)

(Remus was also afraid that Regulus might tell Sirius that he was in the Gobstones Club – but then Remus was quite sure the brothers were not on speaking terms. This relieved Remus, until Remus realised that this was a terrible thing to be relieved by. Then he felt quite bad about the whole affair.)

Remus spent the rest of the night next to Frank, watching people play their own matches of Gobstones and engaging in light conversation whenever Frank initiated it. Remus didn't really get the game yet, but the atmosphere in the room was warm and Remus felt relaxed. In fact, when the time came for everybody return to bed, Remus found that he quite regretted it.

"We need to do a prank," said James suddenly during History of Magic. Professor Binns was far too engrossed in his own recounting of goblin warfare to notice. Lily shot them a rude look but said nothing.

"It's been a week," said Remus to James, though he was amused. "You'd think you could go a week without doing a prank."

"Lupin, it hasn't been a week," insisted James, reaching over to grab onto Remus's shoulder. "Did you forget about the holidays? It's been a good three months! I've been deprived, I've been empty inside without the idea of pranking people—"

Remus laughed, shoving him off. "Okay, okay, I get it!"

"Don't you have Quidditch practice or something?" snapped Sirius, but at Remus's quelling look, Sirius's expression softened. "I mean; we wouldn't want you to miss training, that's all."

"We can make it work," said James good-naturedly. "We just need to do a prank."

"I agree!" Peter piped up.

"'Course you do," said Sirius, rolling his eyes, as if he were not commonly guilty of sucking up to James as well.

"I guess we can do something," said Remus, smiling.

James returned the grin. "You're the best, Lupin!"

"But I haven't really been a part of many," admitted Remus.

"We did that shampoo one on Snivellus!" said James, grabbing Remus again. "That was all you, and it was brilliant."

Remus was quite pleased by this.

"What should we do this time, James?" asked Peter eagerly.

"Whatever we do," said Sirius darkly, "it should be on the Slytherins."

"What about the Gobstones Club?" snickered James, and Remus felt himself deflating.

"Ooh, I know!" said Peter, "We should make sure the Slytherins get no food at dinnertime."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Right, because the worst thing you could do to a person is stop them from eating Yorkshire pudding. What practical priorities."

"No, that's actually a pretty good idea," said Remus, smiling at Peter.

"It's not funny, though," whined James, tapping his quill against his desk.

"Oh, how about instead of them not getting food," said Remus, "their food turns into something, like canaries. That'd be a riot."

"Hey, that's not half bad!" said James approvingly. "We could totally do it—"

"—'cause of that transfiguration-into-a-bird spell we learnt the other day," finished Sirius, eyes finally alight with glee. "Right, that's a good idea, Remus!"

"And Peter," added Remus.

Thus, that night they visited the kitchens. They made their way down a staircase, James leading the way, walking down a wide corridor. It was well lit, and the colourful paintings on the walls depicted different foods, bowls of fruit, slabs of meat, and flagons of drink.

"Hmm … ah, this one!" James stopped in front of a portrait of a colourful bowl of fruit and reached out to tickle a pear. The pear let out a childish giggle and morphed into a three-dimensional green door handle.

"How do you know about this?" asked Remus, amazed.

"My dad." James was grinning as he turned the handle.

Much like the Fat Lady's portrait in front of the Gryffindor Common Room, the painting served as a door. It led into a high-ceilinged room which, after Remus's eyes adjusted to the flickering orange light of a brick fireplace, he realised was modelled after the Great Hall. Four long tables, one for each of the Hogwarts houses, and a shorter one perpendicular to the others, the staff table, stood in the enormous room. The stone walls were lined with pots and pans, on thick counter-tops and stoves. Remus could smell the delicious meat wafting from frying pans. Clearly, this was for dinnertime.

Remus's eyes also had to adjust to an even more interesting sight. Multiple short creatures tottered around the kitchen, their spindly arms carrying large plates of cooked eggs or chopped up fruit. Their heads were enormous, and they had huge eyes that made them look as if they were perpetually shocked. They were all dressed in a tea-towel with the Hogwarts crest emblazed upon it.

"Mr Potter! It is good to see you, sir," called out one of them in a high, squeaky voice, not unlike Peter's.

"You've been here before?" asked Remus, shocked.

"'Course. What do you think we do when Peter gets hungry late at night? Hello Floggy," James said good-naturedly, leaning down to speak to the creature in question.

"What … what are they?" whispered Remus to Sirius.

"They're house-elves," whispered Sirius back. "I've got one at home—he's a nightmare, really—but these ones are really nice."

Oh! He'd never seen one of these odd creatures in his life, but he'd heard of house-elves before. His father had never gotten a house-elf for the Lupin family, probably because it would weird his mother out.

"Would Mr Potter and his friends like a snack before dinner?" house-elf Floggy asked eagerly. Other house-elves had begun congregating near Floggy and looked just as enthusiastic to serve James.

James smiled. "No, not today, Floggy." The house-elves deflated, as if very upset that James did not want them to make him food. "We're just here because my friend wants to ask you some questions. This is Remus Lupin. Remus, say hello."

"Hello," said Remus carefully. This had been part of the plan, as Remus was surely the most diplomatic out of the four, but he was suddenly feeling quite uncomfortable.

There was a chorus of high-pitched "hello's."

"Er—I just want to know a few things. When you put dishes on these tables, they transport to the Great Hall, right?"

"Oh, yes, Mr Lupin is right," said Floggy, nodding his huge head happily.

"Can I ask, do they go there immediately?" wondered Remus. "Like, if I were to place a dish there right now, would it magically go to the Great Hall?"

"Oh, no, no." Floggy shook his head. "Us house-elves is putting the dishes on the table and waiting until six o'clock for the dishes to go to the Great Hall."

"Right," said Remus, a little crestfallen. If the magical tables were instant, then it would make it a lot easier to send the birds to the Slytherin table. This made their plans a little bit more difficult. "And you're very meticulous about it?"

Sirius snorted at Remus's word choice, but Floggy nodded vigorously, eyes wide open. "Oh, yes, Mr Lupin, we is the most meticulous! We is very focused house-elves, and we only is distracted by terrible things, like our masters in danger, or finding rats in the kitchens!"

Remus nodded. "That's very commendable, Floggy."

He beamed with pride. "The best house-elves is focused and efficient!"

"Er—you said the plates magically go to the Great Hall, right? How do you collect the plates after dinner's over?"

"The magical plates, they is disappearing from wherever they are right as soon as the clock strikes seven," said Floggy, nodding approvingly. "They come back to the kitchen for us to wash them. However, when we is throwing away the rubbish," Floggy added darkly, and the other house-elves tittered anxiously, "the bins, oh, Floggy thinks they is faulty but nobody, nobody, is fixing it. Oh — oh, no — Floggy shouldn't be speaking ill of his masters—"

Floggy began to wail and curl up into a ball, the other house-elves gathering around him to give him comforting pats on his skinny back.

"All right," said Remus hastily, feeling very disturbed and not caring too much about faulty bins. "Thank you so much, Floggy."

"It is our pleasure, Mr Lupin!" Floggy said, choking back his tears.

They left very soon after that, Remus half wanting to make sure Floggy was all right, but also half wanting to leave that very strange situation as soon as possible. As soon as they were out of the kitchens and in that corridor, Sirius spoke.

"This makes our prank harder," he whined.

Remus sighed. It was true.

"We'll think of something," James said deviously, and Remus believed him.

The first full moon of the month fell on the second week of class. Ruby really wanted to come with him—"Pwease," she'd said—but Remus refused her. The thought of bringing the harmless, young rabbit into that shack he transformed in—it was quite awful.

Madam Pomfrey kindly escorted him down to the Whomping Willow that evening and left him inside that shack he would transform into. Remus sat there for minutes on a sturdy chair, staring at the wooden floorboards nailed to the walls, which looks so weak, but managed to keep a werewolf in every full moon.

"The creatures we will be dealing with are not inherently dark," Professor Jewel had said. Was he right?

The full moon had arrived. Remus could feel it in his bones, in his skin—he'd felt it all day, of course, but especially now. He itched badly and his bones cracked and suddenly there was a fire running down in his back and then everything went dark.

The first thing Remus realised after waking up was that he had torn that sturdy chair apart. It wasn't even recognisable as bits of a chair anymore, just shredded up pieces of wood flying in explosions of chips on the floor. Remus gulped, staring at it.

Imagine what Remus would have done if he hadn't been given the protection of the shack. He shuddered horribly thinking about it.

Professor Jewel, Remus thought bitterly, would retract his words after looking at this mess. Maybe hags and trolls weren't dark creatures, but werewolves definitely were.

Later that day after Madam Pomfrey had seen fit to Remus's injuries and made sure he was all right to go back to his dorm, Remus bumped into Frank on the way to dinner.

"Oh, hiya Remus," said Frank cheerfully. "How'd you enjoy the first Gobstones Club meeting?"

"Er, it was pretty fun," said Remus, trying to match Frank's grin. Man, how did he smile so widely like that all the time?

Frank gave Remus a light punch on the shoulder, grinning. "Don't lie to me, you didn't even play yesterday!"

Remus scratched the back of his neck. "Well … I actually don't really know how to play Gobstones."

"Oh," said Frank. "Well, there's no point in joining Gobstones Club if you don't know how to play."

"Right," said Remus, his heart sinking.

"I'll have to teach you!" said Frank, his face splitting into a grin. "Right now."

"Oh! Er—oh, okay!"

Frank led him to an empty classroom and excitedly sat Remus down. "I always keep my set in my pocket. I know, I know, pretty nerdy, but it's super convenient for any unexpected matches."

He took out his Gobstone set and opened it up carefully. Inside were thirty gobstones of different sizes, but they were all circular and sparkled in the light.

"This," said Frank, lifting up a large stone, which had swirling royal blue and indigo colours all over its surface, "is a type of gobstone, a Kingstone. Kingstones are the largest, and most important. You use it to knock out these Serfstones, another type of gobstone," he continued, pulling out a smaller, shinier gobstone, "out from the playing circle."

"Right…" said Remus, trying to grasp this. "One Kingstone, and a couple of Serfstones. What's the playing circle?"

Frank took out his wand and waved it in a circular motion. As if drawn by chalk, a circle appeared on the floor out of nowhere. "This is the playing circle." He chucked about half the Serfstones onto the circle until they were dispersed evenly inside it. "Here, have a go."

Frank placed the royal blue Kingstone into Remus's palm. He took it gingerly, not wanting to break it or damage it in anyway.

He folded his fingers into his palm, rolled his pointer finger around the Kingstone, holding it against his thumb knuckle. Then he flicked.

The Kingstone leapt forward and, as if by magic, collided with one of the Serfstones. It let out a little squeal as it rolled away, but not far enough to go out of the circle.

"Great!" Frank beamed at Remus. "You're a natural."

Remus privately knew Frank was just being really nice.

"In a proper game of Gobstones—we call it a Ravenclaw's Round, because Gobstones is truly the thinking wizard's game—you'd be in big trouble here, 'cause you didn't knock out a Serfstone," admitted Frank. "This means your opponent can try knock out your Kingstone—and then it's all over for you. You'll be the victim of a Globstone."

"What's a—what's a Globstone?" asked Remus, a little overwhelmed.

Frank laughed. He had a very nice smile. "Globstone is basically a term for when a round of Gobstones ends. No matter what variation of Gobstones—whether Ravenclaw's Round, Godric's Stone, Slytherin's Pit—whenever a player loses a round, the winning Gobstone will turn on the loser and squirt out foul-smelling globs into their face. Hence, a Globstone."

Remus recalled what had happened when Isaac had beaten Davey earlier that morning.

"Oh, I see," said Remus.

After that, Frank began teaching Remus about the different variations of Gobstones. There were hundreds and hundreds of them but the main ones were Ravenclaw's Round, wherein you have to knock out more Gobstones out of the playing circle than your opponent; Godric's Stone wherein whoever has the closest Kingstone to the 'Godric's Stone' win; Slytherin's Pit, where players must try and hit their Gobstone as close to a hole in the ground without it falling through; and Hufflepuff's Heart, where a target would be drawn into the ground, more points allocated the closer your Serfstones got to the heart of the playing circle.

Frank then challenged Remus to a short Ravenclaw's Round. Remus took out his shoddy second-hat set and played his first ever proper game of Gobstones, if one didn't count the one he'd played against Dumbledore.

The game was relaxing, but fun. One of Remus's Serfstones started acting up and shooting putrid liquid everywhere, but Frank cleaned it all.

Remus could see why people who could hardly sit still like James would find it boring, but Remus personally enjoyed the experience. Even after he'd lost and gotten an eyeful of gunk.

"At least we don't play Gobstones like they do in America," chucked Frank as he magically cleaned Remus's face. "I heard that their Globstones are so bad you have to burn off the boils that grow 'cause of it."

"Thanks for teaching me about the game," he told Frank shyly, who dismissed his gratitude with a friendly wave of his hand.

After that, Remus returned to his dorm, feeling quite pleased with his newfound knowledge. The rest of the Marauders were awake, and perked up at the sight of Remus.

"All right, Remus?" asked James.

"Where were you the whole day?" asked Sirius, incredulous, once Remus had walked into the door.

Ruby leapt into Remus's arms, as she often did whenever he returned to the dorm room, and began mewling about how bored she'd been the entire day. "Thewe's nothing to do," she whined.

Remus didn't want to tell Sirius either of the things he'd done today, that he'd been recovering from a werewolf transformation, or that he'd been learning how to play Gobstones. "Visiting my sick mother," he said quietly, carefully avoiding making eye contact with serious.

James quickly leapt up to give Remus a sympathetic hum and a pat on the shoulder. "S'all right, mate. Hope things get better."

Peter muttered agreement.

"Thanks, guys," said Remus, smiling and he got ready for bed.

But when he'd finished preparing his bed and changed into his pyjamas, he glanced at Sirius, whose face was only illuminated by the flickering light of the lamp. It was pretty dark in the room, but Remus could tell that Sirius was utterly, irrevocably unconvinced.