FFN: AWellWish

House: Hufflepuff

Class: astronomy

Category: Standard

Prompts: [Animal] Fox

[Word] Mysterious

Prompt challenge:

[Sound] The ticking of a clock

[Sound] Raindrops on the glass.

[Speech] "Is 'No' a foreign word to you?"

Word count: 2694

Prongs could hear Moony and Padfoot some way off. Moony was howling and Padfoot was echoing him. The stag kept an ear out for Padfoot's warning signal that they had come up with should he need any assistance at keeping the larger wolf from causing any harm. For now though they were happy enough running through The Forbidden Forest in circles.

Prongs took a minute away from the energetic pair. Wormtail made his way down from the top of his head, unwrapping his tail from the base of his antlers to his back where he could be comfier now that they weren't running to keep up with the wolf. Prongs found a small clearing with a gap in the trees above and gazed up at the dark sky. The moon was full and beautiful and he once again marvelled at how it was the same moon people had looked up at for centuries. Godric Gryffindor, Merlin and the Peverell Brothers had all looked up to it in wonder. Thinking about The Tale of The Three Brothers made him remember other stories his parents had told him when he was young. He always loved the ones about the ancient witches and wizards who had tried to summon the moon and stars closer or apparate to the moon. He felt guilty now for being so enamoured with the sight of the full moon. He knew his best friend had to go through a painful transformation each month but from an admittedly selfish standpoint he associated the full moon with mostly positive memories. For the last couple of years he got to run around The Forbidden Forest with his best friends having monthly adventures, exploring and escaping from exam stress or homework or more recently the reality of fighting in the war as his last day at school drew ever nearer.

A twig snapping startled him out of his thoughts. Wormtail scarpered from his shoulder to climb up a nearby tree. Prongs turned to see a fox standing at the edge of the clearing but there was something different about this fox. It was a fair bit bigger than an average fox, though still not big enough to worry him. It wasn't the way the fox looked like it had been caught, even if it had been trying to avoid being noticed, that was normal. Even a fox this size wouldn't be brazen enough to attack a stag of his stature. It was the foxes eyes. The deep forest green shade of them against the reddish-orange fur was startling enough but its eyes seemed focussed on him too. It sat, its bushy tail swishing and moving like water. There was something rhythmic and familiar to it. The fox pried its eyes from Prongs and gazed up at the moon too. That was strange behaviour for an animal too? Or maybe it wasn't, being in this form allowed them an insight into the forest creatures and their way of thinking that they never would have seen before. He was so focussed on the fox that he let his guard down and it was the foxes sudden movement that alerted him to his friends returning. The fox gave him a quick look, which he again found strange and then it bounded to the edge of the clearing. When it reached the edge, it glanced back.

He had never seen another fox in the forest, they were clever enough to stay away, but Moony and therefore the rest of them had chased unicorns and Moony had caught a few unfortunate rabbits and one poor badger. He couldn't look Professor sprout in the eye for a week after that. Remembering these encounters, Prongs gave a nod-like bow of his head to encourage the fox to leave. Even more strangely the mysterious fox nodded back in farewell and fled. When his friends found him, he was no longer fixed on the moon, but the spot in the trees where the mysterious fox had disappeared.

James more or less forgot about the fox until a few weeks later at lunch, when Sirius was remembering the previous full moon with excitement, telling them about the fairy nest that they had found and how they snapped playfully at the creatures. Peter, feeling somewhat left out, recounted his own tale of adventure from the last moon and insisted that a very large fox had tried to attack him and he had to escape. James was surprised at hearing mention of the fox and for some reason was mad at himself for not giving it more attention so he took his frustrations out on Peter.

"It didn't try to attack you, Pete," James said with a roll of his eye.

"Well…it was going to!" Peter went a little bit red in the face, "Why else did it sneak up on us and stare for so long?" James just shrugged and Sirius was decidedly very uninterested in Peter's so-called brush with death. Peter was noticeably deflated so James tried to cheer him up a bit.

"It was the biggest fox I've ever seen," James agreed thoughtfully.

After lunch they had silent study for Advanced Transfiguration, with the feline professor McGonagall keeping a watchful eye on them with her bespectacled fur markings. It was silent because they were supposed to be practicing wordless magic but only Lily and Sirius seemed to have perfected it. James normally would have been competing with Them to show off to Lily or compete with Sirius but his mind was still on that fox ever since Peter had mentioned it. Lily of course was concentrating very hard, while Sirius who was annoyingly gifted at transfiguration, seemed to be focusing his energy on silently reverting anything Remus did manage to wordlessly transfigure back to its previous form.

James was doodling a fox on the corner of his parchment when his quill disappeared from his hand. He looked up, expecting Sirius to be the culprit, but saw he was preoccupied with the caterpillars crawling along his collar where his tie used to be and a smug Remus watching him. He glanced around the room and saw the cat at Mcgonagall's desk give him a stern look. He blinked in surprise and blushed, grateful that his professor hadn't instead wordlessly summoned his parchment with 'LE JP' scrawled in the corner opposite the fox. He just couldn't seem to focus enough to transform his pocket watch into a cuckoo bird, he didn't think he'd ever be able to do magic in animagus form like Mcgonagall evidently could. He was too distracted. It was too quiet and too noisy all at once. The noise of the raindrops on the window panels reminding him of all their various hooves and paws across the floorboards of the shrieking shack, running to another adventure under the moonlight. The sound of his watch ticking in his hand, steady as his heart beating in his chest that night in the clearing. Lily Evans effortlessly distracting him with her bushy ponytail swishing two rows in front of him. Remus and Sirius trying and failing to conceal their laughter, reminding him of their howls in the forest. It was all waiting for him, he could feel it! The forest, the fox and the full moon.

Unfortunately the full moon the following week Prongs did not really have a chance to think about the fox. The wolf was hard to keep up with and was pretty set on running towards Hogsmeade, meaning he and Padfoot were tired out from constantly herding Moony back to the depths of the forest with Wormtail holding onto his antlers for dear life. Padfoot managed to lead the wolf on a unicorn chase, somehow conveying through their canine ways of understanding that he had caught a scent. Padfoots sense of smell may not have been better than the wolfs but he could hone it and focus the skill better than the wolf could after being locked away for a month. They followed Padfoot until they came across a unicorn. Prongs wasn't too worried about them catching it, unicorns were faster than his broom sometimes and the chase was good for tiring the wolf out.

As they ran through the trees he felt Wormtail slip from his back with a squeak. He slowed down and turned to retrace his steps and find his friend who would not enjoy being alone and defenceless this deep into the dark forest. Something caught his eye though. A flash of red between the trees to his right and two large emerald green eyes shining. The fox slinked through the denser group of trees with ease, coming towards him. Once again they stood in the forest on a full moon staring at the other. The fox cocked its head in something resembling curiosity before Padfoot came bounding back into the clearing and barked at the fox hoping to scare it off. The fox should have been terrified but instead to the astonishment of both the stag and the large dog, it sat down and narrowed it's eyes, as if challenging Padfoot. Padfoot sniffed the air in its direction for a minute before barking again less aggressively and running around the fox in playful circles. Playtime was soon over though when the wolf emerged from the same direction Padfoot had. The wolf was not in the mood for these games and animal instinct took over, Prongs could sense the shift in the air. So could Padfoot as his fur seemed to stand on end and make him look larger as he growled warningly. This was not Moony, the wolf had taken their playmate and they had to regain control. Prongs was in two minds about stepping in and risking harming the wolf leaving Remus to suffer later or allow him to tear the fox apart. Luckily Padfoot seemed to have made the decision, why Prongs wasn't sure, though he was happy to not have the sole weight of that decision as they both made forward to protect the fox who was finally behaving instinctively and had shrunk back in on itself. The snarling wolf was enough to make bigger creatures tremble, the fox wouldn't stand a chance. Padfoot cut across the path between the wolf and fox but the more powerful of the two slammed him aside into a nearby tree leaving Padfoot to whimper. Prongs leapt forward and the wolf reared back sending him past with only a graze of his antlers to the side of the wolf's neck. Prongs turned just in time to see the wolf lunge for the fox who gave a jump and seemed to stamp it's two front paws to the ground and a gust of powerful energy sent the wolf backwards. The fox took its chance to dart away into the trees leaving something in the air. It was the unmistakable sign of magic.

In the days that followed they were all pretty banged up, even Peter from his fall. They looked so rubbish that Lily even asked if they were feeling okay and suggested that if the who dorm had caught the sick bug that landed Remus in the Hospital Wing, then they should have joined him.

"Did the head girl just suggest we cut class?" Sirius asked.

"Suit yourself," she shrugged.

"Hey Evans, is that a new perfume?" He asked suddenly. She stopped.

"No. Why?"

Sirius shook his head and muttered, "Just thought you smelled different…"

"Padfoot, stop smelling people," Peter yawned.

"New shampoo?" Sirius asked.

"No," Lily shook her head, her red hair shaking with it.

"New soap?" Sirius continued his interrogation.

Lily stared at him and cocked her head.

"Is 'No' a foreign word to you?" She asked exasperated.

"Non," he replied smugly in his French accent.

She rolled her eyes but Sirius' eyes just flashed wide and he fought a grin. It was a similar look to when he had an idea for a great prank, but if he did have something in mind for The Marauders next mission he didn't divulge it.

They spent several evenings in the library so that Remus could catch up with the homework he missed while in the hospital wing. James had an alternative addenda though. He had been right! The fox was something else after all, it was magic! He spent the evenings researching every book in the library he could think of. He finally came across something interesting about Japanese spirits that take the shape of a fox. Sirius, who had been doing his own reading, shot his theory down.

"It's not a Kitsune," Sirius smirked.

"How do you know?" James demanded.

"Cause I know!" Sirius replied, sticking his tongue out.

"Why'd you even come? You're not even reading those books, we've already read them and you're barely glancing at the first page!" James accused, which just earned him another funny face from Sirius.

"I don't think it's a Kitsune either, James. Kitsunes aim to cause mischief and from what you told me the fox only acted in self defense," Remus told him calmly while looking at borrowed Astronomy notes.

"Well what do you think it is?" James crossed his arms petulantly.

"I know what it is," Sirius said finally, looking at his last book triumphantly. It was one of the books they had all read years ago that helped them become animagi.

"An animagus?!" James whispered. Sirius nodded.

"Explains why they could do magic!" Remus said.

"We can't do magic while we're in that form," Peter piped in.

"McGonagall can. This person must just be better than all of you!" Remus said.

"Bloody charming," Sirius muttered.

It was true though. Someone else had become an illegal animagus and they had figured out how to do wordless magic while in their fox form.

"So now we just have to figure out who it is!" James said.

"I've got a suspicion about that too," Sirius leaned back and clasped his hands behind his head.

"Who?! How?!" James yelled, earning a warning from Madam Pince.

"It's obvious," Sirius said casually.

"Prongs, the only people who checked out all these books that would help one become an animagus are the three of you and one other person," Remus grinned, handing him the book.

On the library check out page he saw his own name a couple times, Sirius' and Peters, a name he didn't recognise dated twelve years before them and most recently…

"Lily Evans!" He said in astonishment.

"What is it now, Potter?" Lily asked, appearing from behind a bookshelf. "Finished with my notes Remus?"

"It's you!" James accused.

"What's me?" She asked innocently, a small grin appearing on her face.

"Didn't realise you were there, you sly fox, you!" Remus grinned.

"Looking good Foxy Red!" Sirius smirked.

"When?!" James just spluttered.

"Summer," Lily admitted. "I was considering going to McGonagall with it and doing it legit but then I put two and two together when I saw all your names on the checked-out pages."

"Why?" Remus asked.

"Initially to impress McGonagall but then I just wanted to prove to myself that anything you idiots can do I can do too," she winked and tossed her orange-red hair over her shoulder.

"Very impressed, Red," Sirius said.

"Thank you. Sorry about the other night, I didn't mean for anybody to get hurt!"

"You could have gotten hurt!" James reminded her.

"I think she's proven she can take care of herself!" Remus laughed.

"Why did you guys do it?" She asked.

"For Moony," James said. They knew Lily knew about Remus' condition, Snape had told her after Sirius' prank in fifth year.

Lily's eyes widened and she looked at them all with new found respect as understanding dawned on her. "You did it so he wasn't alone. You marauders might not be so bad," she cocked her head again.

"You prefects might not be so bad!" Sirius shot back.

"Thanks for your help the other night," Lily said. "How can I make it up to you?"

"Go on a date with me?" James asked.

She rolled her eyes but her smile didn't fade.

" Are you free on the next full moon?"