At breakfast the next day Sirius excitedly recounted last night's story at the table. "Ladies, I know you wouldn't think it, but he destroyed him. Don't let the quidditch uniform fool you but James was crushed by little ol' Remus here."
Remus smiled sheepishly while nibbling on a sausage. The full moon was drawing nearer and even though he was grateful to his friends for dragging him out of bed, he struggled to keep his eyes open.
"I'd believe it," replied Lily, who was fiddling with James's hair while eating an apple. "I'm not dating him for his athletisism. I can carry my own books you know,"
James pecked her on the cheek, "Good because I hate that arithmetic book of yours. I swear it weighs five pounds."
"You disgust me," sniggered Sirius, staring at the affectionate couple.
James starred pointedly back at Sirius, whose arm was wrapped tightly around Marlene's waist. Sirius just shrugged.
"Did anything else happen last night boys?" asked Dorcas. Her eyes were fixed at the Slytherin table, where Wilkes and Rosier- who both had heavy bandages over their noses- were glaring at Remus's back.
James, Sirius, and Remus were all silent. No one wanted to be the one to bring up Severus. Even though Lily hadn't spoken to him in over a year and she had long since stopped yelling at the boys for fighting with him, it was still a sore subject for her. It was Peter who saved them, "Yeah, we ran into some Slytherins going after a firstie near the kitchens. Nasty spell work too. Remus put 'em in their place."
Even though his name wasn't mentioned, everyone knew who those Slytherins were. The type who would attack first years for the fun of it, who weren't pleased until they cried to go back home to their muggle parents. The kids who idolized Voldemort and his regime, who were more interested in the dark arts than the defense against them, and who wore their blood status like a crown. They were the Gryffindors' natural enemies. Severus was one of them.
Lily's eyes narrowed, "Reckon they'll pull anything?"
James pulled her closer to him, "I doubt it, not with a Hogsmeade trip on the line."
Peter snickered, "Yeah, they haven't figured out how to go whenever they please."
"And Hogwarts mail is more regulated than stuff that comes into Hogsmeade," added Sirius darkly. People could only speculate what type of mail made it so that the Hogsmeade post office was always crammed with sixth and seventh year Slytherins, but it put everyone on edge. It was one thing to think that the kids who you had gone to school with for six years had opposite values than yours, but to see them actively join a leader who threatened to destroy the wizarding world as you knew it was another.
"I swear, as soon as we're out of this school we're gonna do something," muttered Dorcas, "we're gonna fight."
Remus spent the next day in the hospital wing sleeping before the iminent transformation. James, Peter, and Sirius were gathered around him quietly doing homework and preparing for the long night ahead. Winter nights were longer and while November certainly wasn't as bad as January it certainly made everyone miss those short August nights when the night was over before anything bad could happen.
At 4 o'clock Madam Pomfrey came to rouse Remus from his sleep and to clear the boys off, "Come on now, you better leave," she said, shooing them away.
"No problem," replied James.
"See you tomorrow, mate," said Sirius with a wink.
Peter grabbed their bags and the three boys all returned to their dormitory without any hassle.
While Madam Pomfrey gathered Remus and began to lead him down to the Whomping Willow, the marauders prepared for a night of werewolf wrangling. The boys went down to the common room, where Lily, Marlene, Dorcas, and Alice were gathered around the fireplace. James walked up to Lily and whispered in her ear, "We're heading out now."
Lily gave him a peck on the cheek, "Send him my love in the morning, will you? And be careful."
The boys left the common room and Peter transformed into a rat and sat on James's shoulder. James and Sirius were just able to fit under the invisibility cloak if they bent their knees. The boys snuck downstairs and slipped outside into the cool air. The sky was becoming darker by the second and the boys began to run. It was crucial that they were already in the house and transformed by the time Moony appeared, or else they were just human snacks. Peter ran ahead and froze the branches of the tree, allowing James and Sirius to slip under. James stuffed the invisibility cloak into his magically enlarged pocket, and the boys began the long walk to the most haunted house in Britain.
Remus could hear his friends before he could see them. The old house creaked and he listened to them climb the flight of stairs before they walked into the room where he usually chose to park himself. He was sitting in a ripped armchair in what had once been a grand parlor, shivering as beads of sweat dripped down his face. His toes felt numb and every breath felt rattled in his chest as if his lungs had been frozen. The dirty floor had collected a layer of dust in the past month, but it couldn't cover the layers of dried blood.
"Hey Remus," said Peter softly as he pushed the door open.
Remus gave a weak smile in response.
James collapsed into another one of the disfigured chairs. "You're okay with going into the forest, right? Maybe Hogsmeade?"
He have a heavy sigh and replied tiredly, "It doesn't matter what I'm okay with, it's all up to it. But maybe not the village." Remus was breathing heavily.
"Mate, you alright? Do you have time?"
Remus shook his head and immediately regretted it. He grabbed at his hair as the world began to spin. " Long night, harder for you guys to control," he gasped out.
Sirius added in, "Don't worry, we've got this-"
Before he could finish his sentence Remus crumpled like paper in his chair and collapsed onto the floor on all fours. He twitched-one, two, three, times- and James, Sirius, and Peter instantly transformed.
Remus's face scrunched with pain and he squeezed his eyes shut as his skeleton began to rattle in his body. His hips popped up and back and he groaned in pain, knowing that worse was yet to him. A guttural cry escaped when his knees inverted themselves. The pain was everywhere, it was all consuming, he couldn't think, couldn't breath, could only scream and scream and scream because it wasn't just pain, it was torture. He felt the white hot pain in his shoulders like someone had taken a thick, white hot needle and was lacing between his shoulder blades. He cried in agony as the invisible string was pulled tight and his shoulders pulled behind him. His shrieks of anguish echoed against the walls, forcing his friends to look away from his solitary torment. White splotches as bright as the moon floated in his vision He could feel his nose and mouth elongate by the way the scent of dried blood came into sharp focus and the rattling in his head told him that his ears had moved to the top of his head as well. He howled in pain till Remus didn't know who he was, what there was besides the pain, or how to make it stop. He yelled until Remus was gone and all that was left was the wolf.
When Remus came to he could feel his brain pounding in his too-small skull. Someone had draped a blanket over him- probably James. He felt like he had been crushed under a boulder and he couldn't move even if he tried. Light and noise filtered through his senses like a kaleidoscope. His shoulders still felt like they had been sewn together and he groaned in pain- even that hurt his throat.
Peter was beside him in an instant "You back Remus?" He sounded distorted and far away and Remus tried to use his voice as an anchor to keep him from drifting off to sleep.
He gave another little groan.
"Pomfrey's gonna be here any minute, we gotta go, but we'll visit later"