It didn't take long for Sirius to return Harry's Nimbus 2000. Sirius told him that his contact said there was a bit of an issue with one of the safety enchantments on the broom, common for first-model brooms, and that he took care of it. No sign of a jinx. Harry still wasn't sure though, so Sirius had to assure him he did a check himself after he got it back from Bode, and he found nothing as well. This calmed Harry down a bit, but the Nicholas Flamel mystery was still dancing in his mind.
The four looked endlessly for anything they could find on the mysterious wizard, but by the time the Christmas holidays rolled around, they were no closer to what they were looking for than they were when they started. Ron and Ginny were the first to burn out when they couldn't find anything in their chocolate frog collection. They even declared they were taking a break from chocolate frogs altogether after a particularly jittery morning of searching and getting very sick in the afternoon. Hermione was almost never seen in the common room, and when she was, her nose was in a book on important wizards of the last 100-150 years. Flamel couldn't have been much older than Dumbledore, who, as far as Hermione knew, is the oldest wizard around.
Harry read a few books too, but mostly went to his family for answers, not that it did him much good. Sirius never heard the name, and Remus was warned by Hagrid that he and his friends were snooping.
When the four sat down at dinner on the last day of the term, Hermione's hair was more frizzy than the typical bushy, black circles under her eyes from sleepless nights of reading. "Nothing." she said horsely. "Absolutely nothing on this person."
"Blimey Hermione," Ron pointed out. "You look awful." Ginny elbowed her twin in the ribs for that comment.
"Thanks Ron. That's exactly what a girl wants to hear." Hermione said, not even looking at Ron but her voice dripping in sarcasm.
"Sorry Hermione, but Ron's right," Harry defended his mate. "Have you been sleeping alright?"
"No she hasn't," Ginny answered for her. "Every night i see a light behind her curtains until I fall asleep."
"Well I'll be going to get plenty of rest when i go home for the holidays." Ron and Ginny groaned. "What's wrong?"
"Mum and Dad are going to Romania for the holidays to visit Charlie." Ron muttered.
"We're stuck here." Ginny finished.
"I'm stuck here too," Harry moaned. "Sirius wanted me to experience one Christmas in the castle. Like he did."
"Well it might be best that you stay here. You could do some more research on Flamel." Hermione pointed out.
"What more can we do?" Harry asked. "You looked through every book in the library."
Hermione raised her eyebrows. A rare occurrence. This was a sign of one of her more harebrained ideas. "Not in the restricted section."
Harry's eyes grew wide. The restricted section was named so for a reason. No student was allowed there without explicit permission from a professor, and even then it was mostly reserved for those post OWLs. "And how exactly do you expect me to get in there?"
Hermione smirked. "You're the heir of the Mauraders. I'm sure you can think of something." With that she stood up and headed to the common room to pack. "Happy Christmas you three."
Ron shook his head in disbelief. "You know she can be scary sometimes. Brilliant, but scary."
Harry paced around his dormitory in thought. Heir of the Marauders. Hah! I'm eleven! Like Dad, Sirius, Remus, or Pettigrew did anything that ambitious at eleven... Well maybe a little, but they had Dad's cloak which has been gone since he died. Maybe a spell. I know Sirius mentioned a disillusionment charm, but he said he didn't learn that until fifth year. "Aaaaargh!" Harry screamed out loud, kicking his nightstand. Unfortunately, this woke up Seamus.
"Oi! Ye mind if you take out yer anger in the morn?" He said sleepily.
"Sorry. Snape's essay got me on edge," Harry lied. Well, half lied now that Harry thought about it, remembering that he did indeed have an essay to work on. Seamus grunted and went back to sleep, unleashing a small sigh of relief from Harry. I should probably just go to bed, work this out with Ron and Ginny in the morning. Harry jumped into bed and quickly fell into a deep slumber.
Deep enough that he slept through Ginny not-so-carefully opening the door and waking up Ron a bit louder than desired a couple of hours later. "Huh! What! Gin, what're yo-mmmphmm..."
Ginny covered his mouth and shushed him. She pulled out her wand and pointed to Harry's bed. She motioned with her fingers that they were going to levitate Harry downstairs, and pull off their annual Christmas prank on him. Ron grinned widely and quickly got out of bed with his wand ready. They carefully opened the curtains of Harry's bed. They both aimed their wands at Harry, and swished and flicked. 'Wingardium Leviosa' they murmured as Harry gently rose in the air. Down the stairs they went with a floating Harry.
When they reached the Common Room, they encountered Percy, causing them to panic a little. Percy's tired gaze went from the younger pair of twins to Harry, before sighing. "Just leave me out of this," He whispered returning to his studies. He knew it was pointless to stop their annual tradition. Plus it was always harmless fun.
They gently lowered Harry to the ground, and begin to cover him in his presents from the neck down (and there were quite a few of them). The finishing touch was a chocolate frog strategically placed on Harry's face so it would be the first thing they would see when he wakes. Proud of their handiwork, Ginny turned to Ron. "Alright, brother dear. Do your thing."
Ron cleared his throat, and, in his best impersonation of the Bloody Barron, said loudly, "Harry Potter! I have come for thee!"
Harry woke with a start, oblivious of what is going on. Then he noticed something on his face. "Bloody Hell!" Harry jumped, causing his presents to fly everywhere and him crashing into the Gryffindor Christmas Tree, causing a few of the needle-like leaves to fall on his face. As he tried to spit out the leaves, the twins were rolling with laughter. "Oh sure! Laugh it up!"
Ron was the first to get up. "Oh trust us. We are," Ron said wiping away his tears.
"Happy Christmas, Harry," Ginny said still on the floor.
Harry stood up dusting off the remaining leaves while mumbling something that sounded like, "Bah humbug." he turned to Percy who was concealing a smile with his book. "You couldn't have stopped them?"
"Sorry, I was distracted. You three might as well open your presents now." And with that, Percy took his remaining presents and went up to his dormitory. The three grinned at each other without saying a word, and began tearing the wrapping paper off of all of their presents, as you do at 11 years of age.
All three of them received their annual Weasley sweaters from Molly and Arthur along with some homemade sweets. Gifts exclusively to Ron and Ginny were very similar: Books on famous Gryffindors from Percy, various prank items from Fred and George, copies of Quidditch Throughout the Ages from Hermione, and some muggle comic books from Harry (Harry got the idea after seeing their collection of Muggleman comics). Harry also got the various prank items from the twins, but got the rest of Ron and Ginny's Chocolate Frog stash, a copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them from Hermione, a sneakosnope from Remus, and a book of minor jinxes and hexes from Sirius, in case "the snakes cause you any more trouble." Normally that would be the end, but Ginny was the first to point out another parcel under the tree. "Harry, i think you forgot one."
Harry picked up the parcel and looked for a name. There was none. Just a message.
Your father left this in my possession before he died. It is time it was returned to you. Use it well.
While there was no signature, it was clearly Dumbledore's handwriting. He took notice of how soft the present was. He shook his head. "It can't be." Ron and Ginny stared in confusion as Harry carefully opened his mystery gift. A dark glimmering cloak covered Harry's hands. "It's dad's cloak." He surrounded himself with the cloak and his body completely disappeared. Ron and Ginny's jaws dropped.
"An invisibility cloak!" Ron whispered in awe.
"Wicked!" Ginny finished the thought. "Think of everything you'd be able to get away with."
With that thought, Harry grinned somewhat maliciously. He had an idea... An awful idea. Harry Potter had a wonderful, awful idea.
A/N: Back from a very long hiatus. I never forgot about this story, but i became very busy with school. Now that i graduated, i have some more free time to work on this story. I may have gone a bit overboard with the A Christmas Carol and The Grinch references, but i don't care. It adds to the charm of the chapter. I hope you enjoy. Don't forget to review!