Chapter 3: Lupis, Rattus, Canis, and Cervidae
Author's Note: Looks like once again I forgot a disclaimer. Oh well, everything having to do with Harry Potter is JK Rowling's work and all the copyright stuff that goes along with it. Elanus Green, Gene Evans, Annie Evans and all other original characters not made up by JK Rowling are mine.
The students at Hogwarts had just began to get settled into their routine and Elanus was no exception. He knew that if he waited a week or two before he started sneaking out at night he'd be less likely to get caught. There was a little excitement in his step, because he decided to sneak out tonight. He had heard several girls talking about how they were going to meet after midnight and he was more then a little curious as to what they were up to. Classes were finished for the day, or at least for him anyway and he walked down the hall to his dormitory. He was stopped by the captain of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team, John Ellington. Ellington was a bit shorter then Elanus with well groomed blonde hair, and an overly friendly demeanor.
"Hey Elanus!" John said, "Just the guy I've been looking for."
Elanus stopped and shook John's hand, "Really? Why?"
"We've got an opening on our team," John said. "I need a new beater, and you've got the build for it. Interested?"
"I'm not much of a flyer, really," Elanus replied.
"Oh, right the Agatha Incident, poor girl," John replied. "Know anyone that might be interested? We've got our first game in two weeks against Gryffindor and I really need that position filled."
"I really don't," Elanus said. "I do have a suggestion on how to improve your brooms though. You guys would have a definite edge on the other teams if your brooms were more maneuverable."
"Yeah, and faster too, we're still using school brooms. Everyone else has either bought their own or are borrowing them from their older siblings.
"Let me show you something here," Elanus said setting his books down and removing a scrap of paper from his pocket, along with a pen. He started drawing on the paper and outlined a few charms.
"Whoa, that looks complicated," John said, "I think we could do that, but we're not allowed to tamper with school brooms."
"I read somewhere that Quidditch players used to tie their house scarves to the brooms for good luck," Elanus said.
"Yeah, too much drag on the broom though," John commented.
"What if you enchanted some scarves to improve the brooms, you wouldn't be tampering with the brooms, and it'd put you on the same level as the other houses as far as maneuverability goes," Elanus said.
"Can you do that?" asked John.
"I sure can," Elanus said confidently.
"I think I can get some scarves," John said. "Can they be the player's scarves?"
"Yeah, it won't hurt people," Elanus said.
"Right, how fast can you do this?" asked John.
"Few days at most, I wouldn't practice with them when people are watching though," Elanus replied.
"Thanks man, if you can pull this off I'll owe you a big one," John said, pointing his fingers at Elanus then walking off.
Elanus shook his head and went on his way. Once he arrived at the entrance to the Hufflepuff common room he stopped and looked up at the painting. The picture portrayed a farm scene, with an old farmer plowing his field.
"Toil," Elanus said. The password had been the same for the last five years, and likely for decades before that. It was a testament to how uninteresting people thought Hufflepuff to be. The painting moved out of the way and Elanus entered the common room. He'd been to the other houses and their common rooms, and none were so nicely decorated or as well taken care of as Hufflepuff's. After quickly putting his books away, he took a large black cloak out from under his bed.
"Two years and I still haven't been able to get it to work right," Elanus said to himself. "Why won't the invisibility charm take, it's worked on everything else I've tried."
He waved his wand at it a few times, and sprinkled some sort of dust on it. The cloak flickered invisible a moment, and then returned to normal. Setting his wand down, Elanus picked up the cloak off his bed and put it on. As he put it on he faced a mirror hanging on the far side of the room. He wasn't completely invisible, as he could still see a bit of refraction as the cloak moved but it was better then all his previous attempts.
"Tonight's as good a night as any to try it out," he said, stuffing it under his bed.
Elanus looked down at his watch and hurried off to the Great Hall for the evening meal. He liked knowing things in advance as much as possible, so a few years prior he'd negotiated a deal with the house elves. In return for keeping a certain abusive student out of the kitchen, they'd give him the week's menu until he graduated. He found little problem keeping the bully out of the kitchen once he found a little dirt on the boy, so every Sunday a house elf delivers a menu with his laundry. Today it was roast beef, tomorrow it would grilled chicken.
The menu was only one of several deals he'd made with the various staff and faculty of the school. Sure he had to go a little bit out of his way, but he'd gained a few conveniences along the way, not to mention friends. One of these conveniences came in handy quite often. The caretaker, Mr. Filch, was privy to an enormous amount of news students weren't allowed to hear and he confiscated quite a few magical "toys" from students every so often. Early on he'd realized that being on Filch's good side would make his life at Hogwarts a whole lot more bearable. In return for helping Filch catch people with the items on his forbidden list, he was allowed not only to go through these items, but Filch would often tell him bits of information students weren't supposed to hear.
When Elanus walked into the hall, John waved to him, "Hey Green! Come sit over here!"
Elanus sat down next to John and was introduced to the Quidditch team, most of whom he'd never really talked to. John motioned for the team to lean in a little. "Elanus here has an idea that might give us an edge over the Gryffindors. Remember the scarf idea, he thinks he can make it happen," John said quietly, "Tell 'em what you need, we can get it."
"Your house scarves and a few things from your potions class," Elanus said pulling a pen out of his robes and writing a few things on a scrap of paper.
"Ok guys, get him the stuff he needs when he needs it," John said.
"Isn't this cheating?" asked one of the girls on the team.
"No, not according to the rules," Elanus said, "You won't even have to steal the stuff from your potions class; you'll be using all of this stuff in the next three days."
"How do you know?"
"I have my ways," Elanus said.
"Don't question the genius guys," John said, "If he can help us win this game without breaking any rules we're set. Now we're starting to get suspicious looks."
The Hufflepuff Quidditch team sat back up and resumed eating. The roast beef was good, exceptional really and the trimmings were phenomenal. Satiated and a bit sleepy Elanus went to the common room. After a few minutes chatting with his housemates, he bathed and laid down for a nap before he went off for the night.
He slept until eleven o'clock. Listening carefully to make sure all his room mates were asleep he quietly retrieved his map, wand and cloak from under his bed. He also pulled out a more suitable set of clothing then his pajamas and slipped into them as well. Walking out the door quietly as he donned his cloak he crept out of the Hufflepuff dormitory, reflexively keeping near the walls and furniture. He swiftly made his way to his preferred observation spot. It was a stone shelf in one of the outer hallways where the ceilings were much higher. He made sure he never went there during the day time so he wouldn't be tempted to look up at it. Carefully climbing the stones that so conveniently stuck out of the wall in the right places he pulled himself up onto his ledge.
"Full moon," he said quietly as he pulled his map out. "Who do we have sneaking out tonight?"
His map showed an outline of Hogwarts, although nothing was labeled. There were several colored dots on the map. Blue dots represented boys, and pink represented girls. He knew where the most dots were grouped was the house dormitories and he could plainly see where the girls slept, and where the boys slept. There were also several rooms with only one dot on them. These were professors rooms, and other faculty, a few rooms had a pink and blue dot in them where two of the staff were married. Several pink dots began to slowly leave their respective houses.
"There are the girls now," he thought. "I'll give them a few minutes to go wherever they're going before I begin spying."
The pink dots converged on what looked to be an abandoned class room near where he was perched. Three blue dots left their dormitories and met in one of the stairwells. Elanus was intrigued, but he could guess which three dots these were. He looked over his map a few times trying to decide which dots he wanted to pursue. Finally he decided to see what the girls were doing before following the three boys.
He slowly made his way to the classroom in question, and looked in a keyhole. Five girls were sitting inside the classroom, in their pajamas. They were obviously from different houses; probably all related or knew each other outside of school. After a few moments of girl talk one of the girls reached into a small pack sitting near her.
"You are so wicked," one of the girls squealed. Elanus heard glass clink, "Liquor?" he mumbled. He watched as the girl pulled a bottle from the pack and then another and started passing them around.
"Pepsi," he chuckled silently. He'd have to drop by their next meeting. Elanus turned his head as the sound of footsteps echoed quietly down the hall. He glanced at his map, "Filch" he mumbled. Quickly he rapped on the door a few times and ran down the hall quietly. The girls stopped talking and then poked her head out the door and heard the footsteps. They quickly gathered up their things and slipped out of the room and back to their dorms.
"I shouldn't have done that," Elanus thought as he moved towards the three blue dots on his map which had began to move, "But then again, I'm out against the rules too."
Their map was a problem, as they'd see him on the map following them. Fortunately they had it rolled up and weren't paying much attention to it.
He found the three boys moving down a particularly long stretch of hallway. There they were Potter, Pettigrew and Black just as he had suspected. They wrapped a cloak around themselves and disappeared.
"Clever," Elanus mumbled.
The three boys were moving towards the main entrance of the school according to his map. Elanus followed them outside and around a bit until they reached a tree that had been planted six years prior, called a Whomping Willow. The tree thrashed at the boys violently. What Elanus saw next was astonishing. Peter seemed to shrink, and he became a rat, and darted under the thrashing branches up to a knot in the tree. As the rat touched it, the thrashing stopped. The remaining boys began their own transformation, one into a dog, and the other into a large deer like creature. The dots on Elanus map had turned brown to indicate animals. They all disappeared into the roots of the tree, and the willow began thrashing again.
Elanus darted quickly between the limbs and barely made it to the knot unscathed. After a few moments searching he found the opening the other boys had disappeared down into.
Unlike the Marauder's Map, his map worked just fine outside the Hogwarts Campus. He followed the passage for what seemed like hours. Finally he reached the end of the passage, and saw a hole over his head. He listened carefully, and looked at his map. Growling sounds came from above and he saw three brown dots on his map, and one that was half brown and half blue. Elanus puzzled over his map for a few moments, then watched the dots leave. He crawled out of the hole and found himself inside a small house.
He maneuvered outside, and slowly followed the dots as they moved off, trying to get a good look at them. They entered the forest, and stopped in a clearing. Elanus climbed a tree and peered down on them.
In the middle of the clearing stood a large stag, a dog and a rat facing each other. Near them stood an enormous were-wolf. Elanus' eyes widened as they ran off.
Elanus quickly made his way back to the school and into his room. Slipping into his bead he closed his eyes but could not fall asleep. He fought with himself in his head, wondering if he should tell what he saw or keep it to himself. One dilemma he always faced by breaking rules was how often he caught other breaking the same one. There was no way he could tell anyone what he saw, because he himself would be in trouble for being out after curfew. This was one reason he tried to follow the rules as close to the letter as he could manage. Still, there were what appeared to be three illegal Animages in the school, and they seemed to be friends with a werewolf.
