After taking a quick trip to the Hospital Wing so Madam Pomfrey could check James for injuries, the three of them returned to their dorm. They arrived to an empty room—Sirus had yet to return from his date with Marlene.

The moment they entered, James hurried over to his trunk and began rooting through it, muttering to himself under his breath. 'Need to find out how it's done first. How long it takes…'

'James?' Remus said. 'You alright, mate?'

James straightened, spinning around to face him. His eyes glinted with excitement and his hair was even wilder than usual after his time inside the branches of the Whomping Willow. He looked manic.

'This is it!' he said, grabbing Remus' arms a little too tightly and shaking him ever so slightly. 'This is how we can help you!'

'Huh?' was Remus' ever so eloquent response.

'We'll become animagi! Moony doesn't attack animals. We'd be able to be with him and keep him company.'

Visions of waking up after the full moon to a room splattered with the blood of his friends swam before his eyes, their bodies torn and shredded, faces forever frozen in an expression of horror. James really was insane, Remus decided at that moment. 'You're mad,' he said. 'Stark raving mad.'

'Give me one good reason we shouldn't do this.' James crossed his arms and set his jaw stubbornly.

Remus blinked at him, feeling his face heat with frustration. Had he really just asked that? 'Because it's an insane idea, James. Not only is it ridiculously difficult magic, but we don't even know if the wolf would be fooled!'

The sound of the door closing drew his attention. Sirius had returned at some point during the argument and was standing just inside the door looking perplexed. Remus hadn't even noticed him come in.

'So, we'll find out. I can't be the first person to ever think of it. And it's transfiguration, we can make it easier by honing our focus.'

'What are we talking about?' Sirius asked, stepping into the room properly.

James turned to him with a grin so wide it was in danger of spitting his face in half. 'We're going to become animagi.'

Remus growled. 'No, you're not!'

'Hush, Remus,' Sirius said before turning back to James. 'What's an animagi?'

'A witch or wizard that can become their inner animal.'

Sirius blinked at James as he processed that information. 'So, we'd be able to turn into an animal?'

'And werewolves don't attack animals,' James said, nodding.

Sirius' mouth stretched into a grin to match James'. Great, now he had two of them to fight.

'But, we don't know if the wolf will be able to tell the difference.' Remus' hands pulled at his hair in frustration. 'Not to mention that what you're proposing is extremely illegal. You could be sent to Azkaban!'

Sirius reached out and tugged Remus' hands away from his head. 'Why's it illegal?'

'You're supposed to have ministry supervision while you complete the process, and you're supposed to register so they have a record of what your animal form looks like,' James told him. 'You know, in case of crime or whatever. And we obviously wouldn't be doing either of those things.'

'Like I said. Very, very illegal.'

Sirius frowned. 'Would they let us do it if we asked?'

'Not until we have a NEWT in Transfiguration,' James said. 'Higher than an E.'

'So why not wait until then?' Remus asked. His voice came out in a much higher pitch than usual.

'Because we don't have that much time,' James yelled, finally losing his temper and stomping his foot. 'I'm not going to let you die, Remus. And this plan is better than letting you bite me!'

It was like being drenched in a bucket of ice-cold water. Remus' knees went weak, and he stumbled back, dropping heavily onto the end of his bed, which was thankfully right behind him. 'What?'

Sirius winced.

'Shit. I shouldn't have said that. We weren't going to tell you that plan unless it became necessary.'

'We?' Remus looked to Sirius in time to see him swallow.

'James and me. We discussed it last week and decided if it came to a point that Moony was so unhappy he seemed suicidal, we'd let him bite us so we could keep him company.'

'You're insane.'

Sirius smirked. 'Quite possibly. But I don't think not wanting you to die is proof of it.'

'Not wanting me to die is one thing,' Remus said through gritted teeth. 'Willingly becoming a werewolf is something else entirely. Do you have any idea how shit this is?'

'We've got a fairly clear picture, yeah,' James said. 'And it's nowhere near as shit as it would be if you died and we had to live the rest of our lives knowing we could have saved you but were too cowardly to do it.'

Remus rubbed his hands over his face in despair. He didn't doubt for one second that his idiotic friends would go ahead with their harebrained plan if given the chance. Maybe this animagus thing would keep them occupied, at least for a while. It was unlikely that they'd get very far with it. Something else would come along to distract them, and they'd forget all about it.

'Alright. Fine.' he said. 'It's utterly insane, but you're right, it beats you sneaking into the Shack after I've transformed and forcing me to wake up to your mangled corpses, so fine. Research it. See what you can find out.'

'The books about it are probably in the Restricted Section,' Peter said, finally reappearing from the corner where he'd hidden when the conversation got heated. 'We should find out what's involved as soon as possible.'

Remus gazed at him. 'You too, Pete? I thought at least you would be sensible.'

Peter shrugged. 'I don't want you to die either. It was horrible thinking James might die earlier.'

'WHAT?' Sirius yelled, turning to James. 'How? When? Where? Are you okay?'

James shot him a cocky grin. 'I climbed the Whomping Willow.'

'You did WHAT?'

His smile dropped from his face. 'Yeah, it was really bad actually. You remember when we were trying to get the bark for the potion and we told those kids we made a bet?' Sirius nodded. 'Well, apparently that got passed around and people thought there was some sort of reward on offer if they touched the trunk. This kid, Davey, got pulled up into the tree and I went up to rescue him.'

Sirius' face turned impossibly paler. 'Fuck. Is he okay?'

'Yeah, I got to him in time. Madam Pomfrey says he's going to be fine, but he might lose his left eye.'

'Fuck,' Sirius repeated, clasping his hands at the back of his head. 'Fuck! We could have got him killed.'

James nodded. 'I know. We have to be more careful what we tell people.'

'If it wasn't for me, the tree wouldn't even be on the grounds to hurt people. If anyone's to blame here, it's me,' Remus said, attempting to make Sirius feel less responsible.

'You're all being ridiculous,' Peter said. 'No one forced him to do it. We all make our own choices in life and we have to live with the consequences.' He shrugged. 'That's what my mum says. James, you even warned him it could get him killed, and he did it anyway.'

'Yeah, but still. We put the idea in his head.'

'How did you even climb that thing?' Sirius asked.

'Froze it, and then climbed as far as I could before it unfroze,' James said. 'It's all tangled up inside and it can't move as fast as the outer branches, but I almost got crushed. If Pete hadn't returned with McGonagall when he did, I'd be a goner.'

'Why? What did Minnie do?'

'Turned into a cat and kept the knot pressed until Davey and I were both out.'

Sirius frowned. 'Couldn't Remus have done that with a stick or something?'

'Not without giving away the entrance to the tunnel,' Remus said. 'We had an audience until the teachers arrived and sent them back to the castle.'

'Bloody, fucking hell. I should have been there!' Sirius said, the words exploding out of him. He looked furious with himself. 'I'd have scared the fuckers away and then we could have frozen the tree from the start.' He grabbed the closest thing he could reach, an inkpot from Peter's trunk, and launched it at the wall. 'Fuck!'

'What the hell, mate?' Peter asked, staring aghast at the remains of his ink splattered across the wall, ceiling and floor.

At the expression on Peter's face, Sirius deflated. 'Sorry, Pete. You can have one of mine.'

Remus pulled on his arm until he gave in and sat beside him, and then he wrapped him in a hug. 'You can't change the past,' he said, stroking Sirius' hair. 'You can only learn from it.'

'You're right. I need to break up with Marlene.'

Remus spluttered. 'That's not what I meant. How did you even get that from what I said?'

'You guys needed me, and I was off with Marlene. If I didn't have a girlfriend, I would've been there to help.'

'Right, but I just meant you should be more careful what you tell people in future.'

'So, you don't think I should break up with Marlene?'

'Yes,' James said. 'You definitely should.'

Remus rolled his eyes at James. 'No, I don't think it would really be fair to her. She didn't do anything wrong.'

'But is it fair to keep seeing her when she's not right for you?' James asked. 'You could be keeping her from her one true love.'

Remus stared at James and raised his eyebrows. 'Do you really believe everyone has one person who's made for them?'

'Yes.' James crossed his arms defensively.

He seemed ridiculously sure of himself, but Remus hoped he was wrong. Noone deserved a werewolf as a soulmate. If there was someone out there who had been meant for him, then they'd been doomed to a solitary life the moment he was bitten just as much as he had. And that didn't seem fair.

They went to bed early that night, knowing they'd be up again later to set things up for the Niffler Hunt, and James woke them all up at midnight.

'I didn't realise being Chiefs of Entertainment would require quite so many late-night excursions,' Remus grumbled as he climbed out of Sirius' bed. 'If I had, I might have thought twice about agreeing to it.'

'And miss out on all the fun?' Sirius asked with a grin.

Remus shrugged as he pulled a jumper on over his pyjamas. 'What can I say? I prefer when the fun is had during daylight hours.'

'And you call us mad,' James said, already waiting by the door with the bag of supplies. 'Nothing beats the excitement of sneaking around at night in places you're not supposed to be.'

It took them no more than five minutes to reach classroom 12c, and when they arrived, James and Sirius doubled back to the sixth floor to retrieve the armour, leaving Remus and Peter to set up the fireworks and the time-delayed messages announcing the start and end of the hunt. Sirius and James arrived with the suit of armour just as they were finishing up, and they stacked the pieces out of sight at the side of the stage. Lastly, they left the box of scrolls at the back of the room. Not even Remus was strong enough to conjure them at the right moment like the twins had the previous year.

When everything was ready, James glanced around at them all and grinned. 'This is going to be brilliant!'

James woke them all early on Saturday morning. The Hunt was due to start at eight and they still needed to clear the eating hall in the Squib Wing so Sirius would have space to move around. He hurried them through washing and dressing, irritating Sirius in particular when he pulled him away from the bathroom mirror with a, 'Don't worry about your hair, Twinkles, it's only going to get messed up when you put the hood on.'

'Yes, but we have breakfast before that. If you think I'm showing my face in the hall with bad hair, Sunshine, you can think again,' Sirius snapped back, tugging his arm away and returning to the mirror.

James laughed. 'Sunshine?'

'Yep.' Sirius met his eyes in the mirror and nodded firmly. 'Sunshine.'

James hummed and tilted his head to the side, considering. Then he grinned. 'I like it.'

'You like it?' Sirius asked, raising an eyebrow.

'Yeah, for now. Once we're animagi, we can think of nicknames related to our animals to match Moony, but I can live with Sunshine in the meantime.'

Sirius had finished with his hair, so he turned to face James. Lowering his voice, he asked, 'Do you really think we can do it?'

James grimaced. 'I hope so. It seems like our best chance at helping without actually letting ourselves be infected. But I guess we won't know until we find out how it's done.'

'Let's get this done then,' Sirius said. 'Then we can get started on project animagus.'

James laughed. 'We're going to need a subtler name for it than that.'

They arrived in the Great Hall just after seven and were some of the only people there. A few Ravenclaws were already up, a couple of Hufflepuffs and one lone Slytherin, but the room was mostly empty. By the time they had finished eating, though, the place was beginning to fill up. Several groups of students were sitting at each of the four tables, all of them looking wide awake and eager. The four Marauders were just getting up to leave when the post arrived, and James paused to watch the owls swooping down to their recipients. A large, brown, speckled owl carrying a small parcel circled in the air above the four of them before gliding down and landing in front of James.

'Brilliant,' James said, detaching the parcel from the owl. 'I didn't think they were going to come in time.'

The owl hooted its thanks at being relieved of its burden and took a long drink from James' goblet before flying off again.

'What is it?' Sirius asked.

'I'll tell you on the way,' James said. 'We'll need to stop by the classroom again.'

Thankfully, there were no early arrivals when they reached 12c. The room was empty, and James ripped open the package he'd received, before handing the contents to Remus.

'Can you link these to the helmet?'

Remus took the bundle of red wool and grinned, pulling out his wand. 'Good thinking.'

Sirius watched him hurry over to the edge of the stage where the pile of armour was hidden and wave his wand a few times. He still didn't know what had been in the package, but before he could ask again, Remus was back and James was shoving them out of the room and up the stairs. They reached the invisible door on the fourth floor a few minutes later, and James donned the cloak briefly to open it, before leading them down to the ground floor and into the squib's eating hall.

'Right, lets get all this furniture moved to the edge of the room. We only have,' James paused and checked his watch, 'thirty-three minutes until the Hunt is supposed to begin.'

They did the chairs first, stacking them up, ten at a time, against the wall, and once those were out of the way, they paired off to move the tables. Squibs weren't all that different from wizards, Sirius mused, eyeing the graffiti marring the surface of the table he was carrying with James - A. F + S. N Forever, enclosed in a wonky heart shape. They didn't have magic, but apart from that, they were the same, all of them slaves to their emotions.

With only five minutes left until the Hunt would begin, the room was finally cleared, and Sirius scrambled to change into the outfit linked to the suit of armour. It was showtime. As he finished lacing his boots, he glanced up and jerked with surprise. All three of his friends were wearing bright red balaclavas. So that's what had been in the parcel.

'Brilliant, Sunshine. You'll all be able to see what's happening too.'

James grinned. 'That's the idea. Shall we get started?' He pointed his wand at Sirus and activated the magic to bring the suit of armour to life one floor below them.

The light grey film that had been obscuring Sirius' vision since he put on the kelpie-skin hood shifted as the helmet rose off the ground—where it had been lying face down—and positioned itself atop the chest plate, and he could now see the back wall of classroom 12c. The sound of excited chattering filled his ears, and he turned slowly on the spot until the stage came into view, before giving his friends a thumbs-up to let them know everything was working as planned.

Sirius waited impatiently for the fireworks to explode and the welcome message to scrawl itself across the wall, then he took a deep breath and made his entrance.

It was weird being able to see two places at once, but Sirius tried to focus on the view of the classroom so he wouldn't stumble as he made the suit of armour walk out onto the stage and wave at the waiting crowd of students. There were far more participants than there had been the previous year. Some of them were probably just there hoping the new Chiefs would mess up their first event. They were going to be sorely disappointed, though. The Marauders were professionals, dammit.

'Good Morning, Nifflers!' Sirius said, feeling a bit silly, but knowing his words would be booming out of the empty helmet in a metallic voice. James sniggered and Sirius frowned at him. 'Welcome to Hogwarts' Annual Super Secret Niffler Hunt, and the first event hosted by your new Chiefs of Entertainment, The Marauders.' He took a dramatic bow as the sound of applause filled his ears, then waited for it to die down before going over the rules of the game.

'Hey, look to the left again,' James said, suddenly. 'Was that Lily?'

Sirius rolled his eyes but did as asked, and sure enough, Evans was standing near the back of the crowd with her friends McDonald, Meadowes and Sirius' girlfriend. He hadn't known they were planning on taking part in the Hunt.

As he finished up his speech, Sirius turned his head slowly to give the impression the suit of armour was surveying the crowd and spotted someone else he hadn't expected to be there. Reg was standing off to one side with three other Slytherin first-years. One was the girl who'd retrieved him from the common room the day Sirius received the letter from home—Annette, if he remembered rightly. He was glad to see him with someone other than Snivellus, and even happier that he was doing something fun and childish. Maybe there was hope for him yet.

'The lists of items you need to collect are in the box at the back of the room. Take one scroll per team and remember, don't get caught, but if you do, don't tell! Let the Hunt begin!'

As the crowd converged on the box of scrolls, Sirius turned and marched the armour back off of the stage. They waited for everyone to leave before James deactivated the magic, and they all removed their hoods.

'That couldn't have gone better,' James said, slapping Sirius on the back. 'Great job, Twinkles.'

Sirius grinned. 'Shall we hang out here until four, or go watch the chaos?'

'Watch the chaos, of course.'

So they returned to the main building and spent an enjoyable day wandering around under the invisibility cloak watching people try (and mostly fail) to retrieve the high-value items from the Heads of Houses and try (and often succeed) to borrow the mid-value items from various locations around the school. Shortly after lunch, they caught sight of Lily's team outside Professor Sprout's quarters and watched as they knocked on the door and were invited inside.

'They must be trying to get one of her tools,' James said. 'Let's cause a diversion.'

'We can't help them,' Sirius said. 'That's cheating.'

James shrugged and pushed over a suit of armour next to him. 'Too late now,' he said, smirking, as it fell to the floor with a crash.

'Fuck's sake, James!' Remus said, laughing as they sprinted away down the corridor, slipping into a nearby secret passage to avoid capture.

At a quarter to four, they returned to the squib wing and reactivated the magic on Sirius' clothes, ready for the count. The teams filtered into classroom 12c over the next fifteen minutes and by the time the second set of fireworks exploded and the Time's up! message appeared the room was once again crowded with students talking excitedly.

Sirius manoeuvred the armour out onto the stage again and waved. 'Congratulations Nifflers! We've been watching you all day, and you all did an amazing job. So let's begin the count! Who wants to go first?'

Sirius listed each of the items out loud as they were revealed, and Remus counted up the points each team had earned so Sirius could announce their score. Everything went smoothly with the first and second teams, but when the third team revealed their haul he got confused, They had an item he'd never seen the like of before, and he had no idea what it was. Fortunately, Remus caught onto his confusion quickly, and held up a copy of the item list, pointing at the correct one, scissors.

'One skiss-orrs,' Sirius said. 'Five points.'

Remus and Peter both snorted—along with several people in classroom 12c—and Sirius had to use a lot of self-control not to turn his head and glare at his friends. Remus grabbed his pen and scrawled a note onto the parchment, holding it up for Sirius to see.

'My mistake,' Sirius said, scowling but keeping his head still so the armour would continue looking at the leader of the team he was currently scoring. 'One pair of sizzers.'

When the count was finally over, and the winner announced—a team of sixth-year Hufflepuffs—Sirius ripped the hood off and stuffed it into his bag.

'Why are muggle words so hard to pronounce?' he asked. 'Fucking sizzers. Why not spell it how it sounds?'

James, Remus and Peter all pulled their balaclavas off and laughed.

'Come on,' James said. 'We need to check everything for transfiguration to make sure no one cheated.'

It didn't take them long to cast reparifarge on everything (no one had cheated), but it took much longer to return everything to where it belonged. The teachers' items that had been pilfered—including the diamond-encrusted hand-fork Lily's team had taken, unknowingly with James' assistance—they took to Professor Dumbledore, and the single point items were placed in a box and left in lost property for people to collect. The mid-point items all needed to be returned by hand, though, and that took them a while. By curfew, they'd returned the trophies to the trophy room, the saucepans to the kitchen, the teapots to the Divination classroom, and the broomsticks to the broom shed. All that remained were the books from the restricted section of the library.

'We'll have to take these back tomorrow,' James said, idly flicking through the pages of Blood Rituals.

'I don't see why we can't do it tonight,' Sirius said. 'We need to have a look in the restricted section, anyway, don't we?'

James closed the book and frowned at Sirius. 'I've been thinking about that. We're going to need the book for a while, and if we "borrow" it, they might notice it's missing.'

'We can't buy it, though,' Peter said. 'You need permission from the ministry.'

'Right,' James said, nodding. 'We're going to have to copy it. Every page. Without a single mistake.'

'Fuck,' Sirius said. 'That's going to take forever.'

'Alohomora,' Remus said, twirling his wand anticlockwise before bringing it back to point at the lock on the library door. It clicked open and James grinned.

'Nice one, Moony.'

Remus rolled his eyes. If he were honest, the name was growing on him. The first time James had called him by the name Sirius had christened the wolf, it had hurt. He felt like James saw him and the Beast inside him as the same being. That he no longer considered him to be human. But that wasn't it at all. While James did seem to view them as two parts of a whole, it wasn't that he saw Remus as the Beast, but that he saw the Beast as Remus.

It was a subtle difference, but an important one.

And he said the name with such affection, Remus found it impossible to hate it.

'Let's go, Sunshine,' Remus said, smirking.

The restricted section was close to the entrance, within sight of the librarian's desk so she could keep an eye out for intruders, so there was nothing but a rope preventing people from entering, and they easily stepped over it. They waited under the cloak, watching the entrance for a few minutes, remembering the last time one of them had broken into the library after curfew. And sure enough, Filch appeared in the doorway, brandishing a lantern. Thankfully, his cat was absent or they probably wouldn't have got away with it.

Remus stiffened, holding his breath, as the caretaker passed their position, feeling the others do the same on either side of him. He peered into the restricted section, but his eyes passed right over them and he continued on into the depths of the library, grumbling under his breath as he went. After waiting another minute to be sure he was out of hearing range, James tossed the cloak off and handed it to Peter.

'Follow him and come tell us when he's on his way back.'

Peter nodded and swung it around his shoulders, vanishing from sight.

'We need to be fast and quiet,' James said. 'Sirius, you start over there.' He pointed to the far corner of the roped-off section. 'Remus, you look here. I'll start in the middle.'

'Don't touch anything unnecessarily,' Remus warned, recalling a few memorable instances while studying there. 'Some of these books make noise when they're opened.'

Sirius nodded and headed into the stacks with James right behind him. Remus turned and started scanning the shelves in front of him for anything that might be related to the process of becoming an animagus. This whole thing was made a lot harder by the fact that they had no idea what the book was called.

Peter returned fifteen minutes into their search, breathless and panicking. 'He's on his way back!'

'Everyone under the cloak,' James hissed. And they all obeyed, huddling together as James covered them, before shuffling towards the roped entrance to watch for Filch.

A minute later, he turned the corner and prowled back to the entrance, giving one more glare to the seemingly empty library before pushing the door open and disappearing through it. The click of the lock turning echoed through the cavernous room before all was once again silent.

James threw the cloak back off and grinned. 'Now we can search in peace.'

It was another half an hour before Sirius found what they were looking for.

'Think I've found it,' he said, placing a thick purple book on the table in the middle of the restricted section.

Remus, James and Peter all joined him, and Remus arched his neck to read the cover.

Connecting with your Inner Beast: A Complete Guide to Human - Animal Auto-transfiguration.

'That definitely sounds like what we're looking for,' he said.

Sirius grinned and opened the book to the contents page.

Chapter 1: Introduction to Auto-transfiguration (transfiguring the self)

Chapter 2: A step-by-step guide

Chapter 3: Potential dangers and how to mitigate them

Chapter 4: Divining your form

Chapter 5: Making a mental connection

Chapter 6: Triggering your transformation

Chapter 7: Spirit animals and their meanings

Appendix 1: Arithmancy tables

Appendix 2: Runic dictionary

'Wow, that's a lot of parts,' Peter said, wide-eyed.

'It is,' Sirius said. 'But look at the page numbers.' He ran his finger down the list of numbers next to the title of each chapter. 'The chapters are pretty short. Most of the book is chapter seven, and the two appendixes.'

The spark of hope Remus had felt on seeing the size of the book—that they'd be put off by the amount of work involved—sizzled out as he watched Sirius flick through to chapter two.

There was silence for a couple of minutes as they all scanned the two pages the chapter consisted of.

'It's just a potion,' James said. 'And standard transfiguration practice. So what's all that other stuff for? Arithmancy tables and runic dictionaries?'

'Well, since the next chapter is about potential dangers and how to avoid them,' Remus said. 'I'm guessing the rest of the information is about the methods of avoidance.'

'I hope there's advice on how to survive having a leaf in your mouth for a month straight,' Sirius said. 'That is going to suck.'

Peter reached over and turned the page to chapter 3, and they all returned their attention to the book.

Though it is possible to achieve auto-transfiguration with no further preparation, it is inadvisable to attempt it. The consequences of failing to complete the transition are varied, ranging from mild, to severe and life-altering. For this reason, it is highly recommended that the witch or wizard take precautionary measures before attempting the process.

The most common way in which auto-transfiguration fails is in an incomplete transformation, and the consequences of this range from merely changing back and trying again to spending the rest of one's life in a half human-half animal state, unable to fully transform, and unable to revert to normal.

This happens because the witch or wizard is unaware of what form they are attempting to transfigure themselves into. While many may have some idea of what their spirit animal is likely to be, most do not, and, as transfiguration relies strongly on visualisation, not knowing one's intent can cause the magic to go awry.

As stated above, it is possible to complete the transfiguration without knowing one's intent, but to do so requires a significant amount of focus and a deep connection to the self. It is far easier, and safer, to take the time to divine one's spirit animal before attempting auto-transfiguration. See chapter 4: Divining your form for detailed instructions on how to use arithmancy to discover the nature of your inner animal.

The second most common way the transformation can go wrong occurs when the conciousness of your spirit animal overwhelms your human mind, making it impossible to change back. Consequently, the witch or wizard becomes stuck permanently in their animal form. Their human conciousness is still present and aware, and able to control the body, but the animal mind is dominant and the magic necessary to revert to a human state is unable to be performed.

The most effective way to prevent this from happening is through the combination of a potion and a runic ritual used to connect to and dominate the animal conciousness pre-transformation. See chapter 5: Making a mental connection for detailed instructions on choosing the correct runes for the ritual and brewing the mind unlocking potion.

The final way the transfiguration can go wrong is caused by the fear of transforming. As explained in chapter 2, during the final moments before transforming, after the potion has been drunk, the witch or wizard will experience the feeling of a double heartbeat, and this can cause panic. If the witch or wizard attempting auto-transfiguration is unable to control their panic, they may fail to focus their thoughts on their form in the necessary manner, resulting in a partial transformation or no transformation at all. The consequences range from needing to begin again from scratch, to being stuck in a half-transformed state and even death.

The most effective way to prevent this from occurring is through the use of a unique incantation, designed by and tailored to the individual attempting the transformation. It is only possible to complete this preventative step, however, if both of the other preventative measures are taken first. This is because it is necessary to know the form of your spirit animal, and be mentally in touch with them, to create the correct incantation for triggering the auto-transfiguration. See chapter 6: Triggering your transformation for detailed instructions on creating a unique incantation.

'Bloody hell,' James said when he finished reading. 'No wonder most people don't bother learning.'

Sirius shrugged. 'Yeah, but we have an advantage over most people. We can split up the work.'

'I'll brew the potions,' Peter said.

'Obviously,' James said with a laugh. 'What else do we need to learn? Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and incantation creation? They don't do a class on that until seventh-year, though,' he turned to Remus. 'You already know a bit about creating incantations, don't you?'

Remus wrinkled his nose. 'A bit, yeah. But not a lot. I can alter them, but creating them from scratch is harder.'

'Well, it's the last part, so you have plenty of time to learn. Sirius, would you rather take Arithmancy or Ancient Runes for your OWLs?'

'I think my parents would prefer me to take Ancient Runes.'

'So, you'll be doing Arithmancy then?'

Sirius grinned. 'Naturally.'

After deciding they'd only need to copy the contents of chapters four, five and six for now—they could come back in the future for the rest of the information—they broke back out of the library, sniggering at the idea of Filch being alerted to a second intruder that night, and returned to the dorm.

The next morning, after a very late breakfast, James called a Marauder meeting and, to Sirius' relief, it was to be held in the Den. He was worried if Marlene spotted him walking through the common room, he'd be kidnapped by her for the day.

When they arrived, James pulled an enormous sheet of parchment from his bag and used some sticking solution to attach it to the wall. It was a calendar, showing the entire year on one sheet, beginning in September 1972 and ending in August 1973. The boxes for each day were shaded, with the weekdays in pale blue and weekends and holidays in a dusky pink. And every box had a small image of the moon, depicting its phase that day.

'I thought we could use a calendar to keep us organised,' he said, spinning around. 'And I got one with the moon phases, so we don't accidentally schedule something for a night when we'll all be otherwise occupied.' He winked at Remus. 'Now, the Niffler Hunt was a huge success, and we should all be very proud. But we can't sit around basking in the glory because Halloween is right around the corner.'

'It's a month away,' Sirius said.

'Exactly! Just four weeks! We need a plan at the very least.'

Peter squinted at the calendar. 'Halloween's a Tuesday. That's going to limit our options. We won't be able to do anything too long. The teachers won't let us stay up past curfew on a school night.'

'We could make it a Super Secret event, and hold it at midnight,' Sirius suggested.

'We could,' James agreed. 'But the reason the events are always held at the weekend is that fewer people attend if they're held on weeknights. I was thinking we could do it the weekend before Halloween and announce the winner at the Halloween feast on Tuesday. But that's less than a week after the full.' He looked at Remus. 'Will you be up to it?'

Remus looked surprised but nodded. 'Yeah, I only need a couple of days to recover if I don't get hurt.'

'And you won't get hurt with us there to distract Moony,' James said. 'Great, so we'll do it on the 28th,' he wrote Halloween Event on the calendar, 'and announce the winner at the Feast on the 31st. Now we just need to decide what to do.'

'Weren't we going to do an adventure story or something?' Peter asked.

'Yeah, but we needed a way for teams to fight each other safely. Did you find anything, Moony?'

Remus shook his head. 'Completely forgot about it. But I'll get to it tomorrow.'

James nodded. 'Are we going to make it small teams, or the four houses against each other?'

'Oh, I hadn't thought of that,' Sirius said, imagining Snivellus' face when Gryffindor won. 'An inter-house competition sounds fun.'

Remus' brow creased with thought. 'If we have whole houses working together, we could make it an extended event. They'd have to work in shifts to complete it.'

'Interesting,' James said. 'Teamwork and cooperation.'

'Yes, exactly. What if we give each house an item they have to protect, and the other houses have to try to steal them?'

'I like it. But make it so they can't be taken into the common rooms,' Sirius said. 'Each house will have to find a location in the castle, or the grounds, I guess, and set up camp.'

'What will we use as a prize for a whole house, though?' Peter asked. 'A box of sweets isn't going to be enough.'

'We can make a trophy or something,' James said. 'We'll worry about that later. What about rules?'

'No injuring other students. Other than that, anything goes,' Sirius said, grinning. 'We should speak to Dumbles about a prize. I think he'll love this idea. Like you said, it encourages teamwork and cooperation, and everyone gets to use what they've learned in class practically.'

'I don't know,' Remus said. 'He might not approve of everyone being out of bed after curfew, running around the castle.'

'That's true. How are we going to announce it?'

'I have an idea for that,' James said with a mischievous grin. 'What if we send Dumbles a howler?'