DISCLAIMER: I do not own Harry Potter, any of the characters used. THIS STORY IS IN NO WAY AFFILIATED WITH THE HARRY POTTER SERIES BY JK ROWLING, IT IS A PURE FORM OF FANFICTION!!!!

Alexei Noire xXx :D

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Chapter Five: The Instructions~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hey Padfoot, mate," Remus voice rang through Sirius ears, waking him up from his momentary daydream, "You're meant to be Transfiguring the pumpkin into a raven, not a rook."

Sirius pointed his wand at the rook and muttered, "Alitum Corvus," and the rook's beak changed colour to jet black, and its wings became bluish black. The raven now began cawing noisily, fitting in with the others cawing around it.

"You okay?" Remus asked, looking at Sirius' troubled face.

"Yeah, I just..." Sirius began but then twirling his wand between his fingers.

Remus stared at him; James was banned from Transfiguration for the rest of the week and sat at the back of class writing essays. Meanwhile, Professor McGonagall was recovering from her faint in the Hospital Wing, thus a temporary teacher, Professor Hermes, a very large, round faced Wizard with curly grey hair, had been covering her classes since.

"Okay class," Professor Hermes announced, "when your pumpkin is satisfactorily a cawing raven, I want you to test how well you have Transfigured it by holding the silver thimbles I gave you at the start of class in front of it. If it feels the urge to continuously peck at the thimble, it is clear that you have changed the pumpkin's thoughts well."

Remus held the thimble in front of his raven, which still had a stalk growing out of its head, and began staring at it, confused as to what it was.

"You looking forward to tomorrow night?" Remus asked Sirius, who'd been looking thoroughly depressed since morning.

Sirius turned his head abruptly to Remus and widened his gaze.

"What?" Remus asked, noticing the shocked look upon his face, "You DID remember?"

"Yeah, of course," Sirius frowned in concentration, "Hey, can we wrestle tomorrow? As animals, I mean."

Remus raised his eyebrows so high, they would have disappeared into his brown hair if they went any further.

"Why?" he asked with a puzzled frown now on his face.

"Well, it'll be fun you know," Sirius said casually, "I mean we could have some sort of like tournament or something, right?"

Remus sighed worriedly, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah course I am, just please, promise me you'll wrestle me tomorrow."

"Ouch!" Remus' raven had finally taken heed of the thimble and began pecking it profusely, "Okay then, but remember what I'm like when I'm... you know, transformed, I might just try to kill you."

"I'll be careful, mate," Sirius said, the first smile for days forming upon his handsome face, "Thanks!"

Remus smiled and simply replied, "No probs - OW! Damn this bird!"

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With the coming prospect of receiving instructions on how to obtain a new ability by wrestling his friend as a werewolf, Sirius began to envisage what kind of fantastical power he could attain.

Perhaps flying would be a good power or maybe being able to turn into a dragon - well he could already turn into a dog so that would not be too novel. Sirius did like the idea of frightening people simply by staring at them like his ancestor, Winchester Amadeus Black. At this point in time, Sirius was very proud to be a Black, and dreamed about scaring Rodolphus Lestrange to death all throughout dinner that night.

"Oi, Padfoot!" Peter nudged Sirius in the arm from beside him, "Wake up would ya?"

Sirius shook his head and looked round the table, surprised to see all his friends' faces upon him.

"What?" he asked innocently.

"Padfoot, you've been acting weird this whole week," James said, eyeing Sirius worriedly.

Sirius simply tilted his head sideways disbelievingly.

"You have!" Remus cried from beside Peter, "You've been staring into space a lot - today particularly, and this wrestling tournament was a bit of a bizarre concept..."

"What's wrong with a bit of wrestling?" Sirius asked jovially, beaming round at them, "we're boys aren't we? We're MEANT to fight!"

And he gave James a sharp punch in the arm, still smiling.

"Ow!" James yelled, "That hurt, you know!"

"Sorry there, mate," Sirius said edgily, "when you grow up with Andromeda coming to your house every other Sunday and play fighting with you, you begin to stop feeling pain. I mean look what she's done to poor Dominique, he's terrified of her!"

"I thought he was her best friend?" Peter asked, chewing on his steak and kidney pie.

"Oh he is," Sirius laughed, "but that's only because other people are frightened of her too - she has a mean backhand, my Andie."

James sniggered, but Remus stood up suddenly, looking over to the end of the Gryffindor table.

"What's up?" James asked him.

Remus merely pointed to where he was looking and ran over.

Sirius then saw what he had been gazing at - Martyn Mitochondria was standing over Bellatrix and, by the looks of it, had just performed the Knee-Bashing Curse, which resulted in Bellatrix's knees continuously banging into one another. Bellatrix was shrieking so badly that people began looking up to see what all the fuss was.

Sirius sprinted over to where Bellatrix lay on the floor, screaming her head off and yelling, "YOU DIRTY MUDBLOOD! HOW DARE YOU CURSE ME?"

It was quite a sight - Bellatrix Black, Sixth Year bully extraordinaire being cursed by a First Year boy who was barely taller than garden hedge.

"FIFTY POINTS FROM GRYFFINDOR!" she screamed.

A crowd had gather round Martyn and the shrieking Bellatrix, but no one seemed to want to help - it looked as if some even thought she deserved it.

"What's all the fuss?" a silky voice came from behind them, and Sirius was pleased to see that it was the Potions Teacher, Professor Darnley.

Although completely useless at his own subject, Professor Darnley found time to joke around in class, and was most possibly, Sirius' favourite teacher. He was also Head of Ravenclaw, though no one was sure quite why this was so. He stood tall on his sweeping purple robes, and he always had the same wide brimmed, towering top hat on his head, but this changed colour every so often, and at this point it was a nasty tinge of orange.

"PROFESSOR!" Bellatrix yelled up at him.

Professor Darnley got his wand out and performed the counter curse, and immediately Bellatrix's legs stops roving in and out. A few people laughed at how pathetic she looked lying on the floor.

"HE DID IT!" Bellatrix yelled, pointing at Martyn, "Give him a month's detention, Professor! Make him live in a cage for Christmas! I want his life to be hell!"

"Oh is that so?" Professor Darnley asked, his lip twitching, "I'm afraid you must be mistaken, Miss Black."

Bellatrix's eyes widened, and a vein was throbbing in her temple, making her look so horribly unattractive as compared to her usual beauty.

"Of course it was him!" she shrieked, "You saw it, I saw it, we all saw it!"

She was waving her hands about manically now, and people were eyeing her worriedly - it appeared that the curse had made her a bit mad.

"Do calm down, Miss Black," Professor Darnley said in his sly voice, "I do not believe it was young Martyn here at all. That curse that you were under had certainly not been cast by someone as young as he - Martyn is only his First Year, Miss Black."

Martyn was grinning so widely now, that it would have been apparent to any other teacher that it was him who had cursed Bellatrix, but Professor Darnley was no ordinary teacher.

"Of course it was him!" she shouted, "Ask the little midget, he won't deny such a thing!"

"I can't believe you'd blame ME, Bellatrix," Martyn said innocently, "I mean, after all those times you made sure I noticed you in the corridors and between lesson, one would think you didn't like me. Surely that can't be true?"

Sirius felt a grin forming upon his face - he had to hand it to the kid, his wit was great.

"Well there you have it, Miss Black," Professor Darnley said crisply, "Mr Mitochondria is pleading Not Guilty, and I for one, believe him. Now I suggest we all finish our dinners, or else go to sleep and discuss the various methods to wander round school unnoticed after hours."

He gave Martyn a small wink and made his way back to the Staff Table.

"But he's obviously lying!" she screamed after him - but no one seemed to think it was Martyn anymore; even those who had seen him perform the curse with their own eyes. It seemed that they willed themselves to consider the possibility that they had been imagining things.

But Sirius knew it was Martyn who had performed that curse, and was jolly well proud of him too, for now Bellatrix had plainly failed her task of mortally terrifying a Muggle Born. He clapped a hand on Martyn's back and smiled, once they were back in Gryffindor Tower.

"You see," he said, grinning down at the tiny boy, "I knew you could do it - Bellatrix is all show most of the time. In fact, I'm quite impressed by the way you handled my poisonous cousin this evening."

"Aren't you upset that I cursed your cousin?" he asked, looking terrified of Sirius even though he was sure that Sirius was on his side.

"No of course not," he laughed, "We've been cursing one another for years, and I'm glad someone else could do it just as well."

Martyn grinned up at Sirius with his gleaming blue eyes. But Sirius thought he saw something glitter in Martyn's eyes momentarily. He looked behind him to see if something had reflected in Martyn's eyes, but to no avail. Martyn was being congratulated by Remus and James now, who were sat by the fire, and Sirius shook his head, thinking it was just tiredness creeping its way into his already fatigued body.

_____________________________________________________________________

"You got the map?" James asked Sirius, while rummaging around in his trunk looking for it.

Sirius began to look in the pockets of his robes and felt a crinkly bit of parchment, and fished it out.

"Yep, it's here," he declared.

James stopped fumbling around and turned round to face Sirius.

"Ah, good," he said, grinning widely, "We'll need it tonight, even if we have the Invisibility Cloak. Now where's Wormtail got to? We can't leave without him."

James strode out of the dormitory and walked down to the Common Room to look for Peter.

This is the night, Sirius thought, biting down on his lip ring, I could be flying around by tomorrow and Bellatrix won't believe her eyes when she sees him soaring above her...

The door opened and Peter walked in looking flushed.

"Where've you been?" Sirius asked, curiously.

"Wha...I - uh..." Peter began looking round the room, and walked over to his bed, "I was in the Owlery, just writing a letter, to my...Mum. Yeah, my Mum."

"Okay then," Sirius said quietly - he wasn't stupid, he could tell when someone was lying, and Peter was about as subtle as Narcissa's make up. But he didn't particularly care what Peter was doing in the Owlery for so long - he had family business to attend to.

Walking under the Invisibility Cloak was never too hard when they made their monthly visit to their transformed friend's temporary abode, as it was only James and Sirius under the Cloak - Peter, being able to transform into a mouse, would change into it before the other two, tottering ahead of them.

"Ouch, that was my foot!" James breathed from beside Sirius, holding the Marauder's Map in his hand - Apollyon Pringle, the Caretaker was on the Sixth Floor, and Peeves the Poltergeist was bouncing happily through the Charms Corridor yet again.

"Sorry, but you have to stop walking into me," Sirius whispered irritably.

"Shhh!"

They somehow managed to stagger their way outside and into the cold night air of the Hogwarts grounds. They stumbled around until they came to the familiar thrashing sounds of the murderous tree that had been planted five years ago - the Whomping Willow.

"Okay, let's do it then," James said, pulling to Cloak off and transforming into a stag in a matter of seconds. Prongs pawed the ground, as Sirius stuffed the Invisibility Cloak into his pocket and transformed into a large black dog.

Padfoot barked at the stag who snorted heatedly at him.

Peter ran through the undergrowth and, evading the Whomping Willow's furious branches, he got to the trunk of the tree and pressed the knot upon it. And in an instant, the tree froze completely, just swaying slightly in the cold night breeze.

Prongs galloped forwards and slid into the crevice beneath the Willow - Peter had already gone through.

Padfoot snarled, pricking his ears up anxiously, then bounded forwards and disappeared into the gap at the trunk of the Whomping Willow.

He crawled through the dark tunnel, thinking about what he would be doing when he met his friend transformed into a man-eating werewolf. And he remembered the possibility of a new power, and growled happily within the tunnel.

When he'd finally emerged, Prongs was already cantering around the Shrieking Shack, and banging his horns into the boarded up windows. Wormtail was stood balanced on the banister, squeaking merrily at Prongs.

Padfoot barked loudly, making Prongs look up and Wormtail to fall off the banister and onto the stairs beside him.

Padfoot, looked around the room, in search of Moony, but to no avail. Then, suddenly there was a crash from above them, making dust fall from the ceiling - Moony was upstairs.

Padfoot gathered up his energy and bounded up the stairs and to the door of the bedroom from whence the sounds came from.

The werewolf was growling and snarling inside, banging into the walls and, by the sounds of it, breaking apart the bed. Padfoot pushed the door open and came face to face with Moony.

Moony looked up and snarled, jumping over to Padfoot on all fours.

This was his chance, he had to wrestle Remus - Padfoot's heart beat like a drum beneath his ribs and black fur. His tail wagged like made behind him, and he could feel the primal instincts rising inside his body.

Padfoot bared his teeth, snarling, and barked loudly at Moony. Prongs and Wormtail came tottering up the stairs, and opened the door to the bedroom in which Moony and Padfoot were.

Padfoot braced himself and suddenly charged at the werewolf, roaring in its face. The werewolf howled back, as Padfoot's paws hit its chest and he staggered backwards.

The werewolf grabbed Padfoot by the middle and using its great big hairy clawed arms, it threw him up against the bed.

Padfoot howled as his hip bashed against the side of the bed. The werewolf seemed raring to go now, and making its way towards Padfoot, picked him up and began slashing at his face with furious swipes.

Padfoot howled even more loudly, and Prongs came from behind and hit the werewolf with his long horns. The horns poked the werewolf in several places, and seemed to have broken one of his ribs too. It ran howling once again throughout the room.

Padfoot got up off the floor, his face bleeding and with a final attempt, ran at Moony, causing him to fall backwards. Then he whipped his paw across the werewolf's face, and suddenly, a white light fell upon Padfoot, and the whole of the Shack and all its activity froze instantaneously.

A large shrouded figure descended from the zenith of the white light, and Padfoot saw that it was Maxilla.

Maxilla's black hair and black robes flew behind him like billowing smoke, and when he came face to face with Padfoot, he began to speak in the same unctuous tone he had used a few days ago in the Black Room:

'On All Hallows Eve, thou must invoke the demonic presence of the Dark being Azazel. Thou hast four hebdomads to prepare for the deed - 'till All Hallows Eve.'

Maxilla closed his eyes and began to rise upwards again, back into the mysterious source of the angelic light.

The light was fading now, and motion seemed to come back into the room slowly, as Prongs began to thrash his head gradually backwards.

And then suddenly, the sounds and movement rushed in, as the werewolf howled yet again, and covered its face with its paws.

Sirius was utterly disgusted with what he had just done, and could feel the deep human feelings coming back - but he couldn't let himself transform yet...

Quick as a flash, Padfoot got up off Moony's chest and ran out the door, bounded down the stair and rushed into the tunnel leading to the outside of the Whomping Willow.

He tottered out of the hole and transformed back into Sirius, on his way back up the steps to the castle.

Sirius sat down on the step and gazed at the Whomping Willow which was once again thrashing its whip-like branches in every direction murderously. He could not believe what he had just done - he had hurt his friend, and Prongs, though helping Sirius, had caused damage to Remus' ribs.

Sirius was feeling utterly guilty now, and just wanted to go up to Remus and hug him, apologising over and over. A cool breeze played across the grounds and Sirius felt its icy touch on his face and he felt something trickling down his face - he was bleeding. Sirius conjured up a mirror, with his wand and saw that his cheek was severely scratched and his lip was bleeding.

He took hold of his lower lip and removed the lip ring. And holding it in his hands, whilst watching the Whomping Willow's branches, Sirius felt a heavy and burdensome amount of guilt build up inside his stomach. He loved his friends, they were like brothers to him - how could he do something so cold and callous?

Sirius finally got up, sighing, not sure where his legs were taking him, and made his way back to Gryffindor Tower, somehow unnoticed.

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Hehehe, that cheeky Sirius, wrestling his friends all for a magical power he doesn't need!

LOL Well, R&R my children for then, thou can be sure that the great writer Alexei Noire will write more for thou.

Alexei Noire xXx :D

p.s. If anyone has any suggestions or questions about Black Magick, then feel free to email me - my address is on my Bio. THANKS!