Hey everyone! I'm sorry I know the last two chappies have been pretty short
but there's been a lot happening at school! Thanks to my reviewers:
Agloechen(did you get my email about the Pirates of the Caribbean thing?),
shortnsassy, JCtigerwolf4e, Mequel, pan weasley kent, James-Padfoot and
Biddett da Pigeon Stalker (it was ment to say shaking not shaky sorry!)
~*~mysticaldreams
Chapter seven: Anonymous Animagi.
Lily and Miria rushed to the hospital wing after a quick breakfast that morning, eager to see how their friend was.
After harassing Madam Pomfrey enough to let them see her, the nurse lead them down the rows of beds to Andromeda's.
Andromeda was sitting up in bed, propped against many pillows smiling her usual cheerful smile, though slumped at the bottom, near her feet was a tall lanky boy with gorgeous limp hair, his head was rested on the bed while his body was falling off the chair he had been sitting on.
Lily and Miria took seats next to Andromeda and she beamed at them radiantly. At first it seamed that all thoughts from last nights events had been erased from her features, but as the morning suns beams reflected off the windows and onto her face the golden light outlined the dark shadows under her eyes and the exhausted wrinkles in her brow.
"How are you feeling?" Lily asked Andromeda as she gazed out the window at the sunlit grounds.
"I'm fine!" she said brightly, "I should be getting to lessons today"
"Miss Black do not even think about it!" Madam Pomfrey said as she shuffled around, collecting the various vials and glasses on the bedside tables, "you need rest"
Andromeda sighed, "I'm fine" she mumbled.
A silence followed, Lily took the opportunity to think of how she was going to say what she wanted to ask.
"So.What happened last night? I mean is everything ok?"
Another uncomfortable silence followed until Andromeda finally talked.
"Yeah, I just had a nightmare, that's all" She half whispered in a haunted voice.
She then suddenly snapped back to reality.
"God! Look at the time! You two better head off otherwise you'll be late for class" She exclaimed.
Lily and Miria both jumped up out of their seats.
"Thanks Annie, we'll drop in after lunch to see you" Miria said as she slid on her bag.
As they both went to walk out Lily caught a side ways glance at Sirius.
"Oh and you might want to wake him up, he's going to miss the first lesson"
"I'll let him sleep a little longer, he was up later than me but can you tell James so he doesn't think he's in the astronomy tower" Andromeda said with a grin.
Lily smiled back at her and nodded.
They both walked out to leave Andromeda to ponder over what she had said and what she was hoping no one would find out.
~*~
"She's not telling us something Lil" Miria said worriedly as they both walked quickly towards the transfiguration room.
"I know, she's not telling the whole truth anyway, Sure, everyone gets scared from nightmares but that couldn't have just been a nightmare and Annie doesn't get scared easily" Lily said furrowing her brow in thought. "I think I'll go look in the library after lunch, maybe it'll have something"
"That or we could ask Sirius"
"Over my dead body! You know I never ask those boys for help unless it's a dire need"
"Yes but Sirius is the only one who knows other than Annie"
"Sirius would do anything Annie asked him to, do you really think he'd tell us something she obviously wants no one to know?"
"Good point, come on, let's talk about this later and just get to transfiguration" Miria said cursing as she looked at her watch.
~*~
Sirius joined the class later on that day, looking both exhausted and worried. Lily couldn't help but notice that when he met up with the marauders at their usual desks he shook them off and gave them a knowing look as in 'I'll explain later'. She was curious as to what he was going to tell them, and wondered if she could somehow eves drop on them.
~*~
"So Annie has nightmares, but doesn't everyone" Remus stated as the four boys sat in Gryffindor common room, in a tight nit circle around the fire.
"I do and for some reason in all of them Sirius is chasing me around with a club" Peter said.
"That's not a dream Wormtail, Sirius did that yesterday"
"Oh" Peter said giving Sirius a dodgy look; however, Sirius wasn't taking any notice of his friend's antics.
"Padfoot? You there?" James said waving his hand in front of Sirius' face.
"What? Oh yeah, what did you say?"
James sighed, "Mate I haven't seen you like this since you left from Grimmauld Place, and even then you were more angry then worried"
"I know, I'm just concerned about her, that's all"
James suddenly got that sneaking feeling that someone was watching him, he sometimes got that feeling when he was playing a prank and most of the time when it happened, he was usually right, his animal instincts had certain after affects, some which were good, others not so good, such as Sirius' dog-like manner of eating, but he pushed that to the back of his mind. He turned around to scan the few people who were left in the common room and his eyes fell on the unmistakable chestnut hair of Lily Evans, who was sitting on the lounge closest to them, reading a book upside down. He grinned, and the other marauders, noticing where he was looking, stared at Lily as well. The moment she saw James turn his head she had gone back to supposedly reading her book and only just noticed that it was upside down.
"Oh shit!" she cursed under her breath.
"Yes Evans, shit is right, how long have you been listening to our convocation? I mean, I don't mind if you take interest in what I say but it is a bit rude to listen in when you're not asked" James asked in his usual arrogant tone.
Lily's face reddened, out of fury or embarrassment no one could tell but she spoke calmly.
"All wanted to know was what is wrong with Annie"
"She told you this morning" Sirius said.
"How did you know that, I thought you were asleep?"
Sirius just grinned at her, the first true grin that had appeared on his face all day.
Lily was feeling extremely stupid at that moment and wasn't under any circumstances going to stick around any longer to get even further humiliated, so she just turned around started towards the girls dormitories.
"Hey Evans wait two!" Sirius shouted after her.
"What?"
Sirius stared at the girls dormitory staircase that Lily was currently a quarter of the way up.
"How exactly did I get up there last night?"
"Why should I tell you?"
"Because I'm handsome, popular, cute, sexy, sweet, cunning..."
"You make me sick!" She spat.
"Come on Lily just tell me!"
"Tell me what's really wrong with Annie then"
Sirius went a little pale at this request and looked slightly baffled.
"You just heard us, she has nightmares" Sirius justified.
"You don't honestly think I'm that stupid?"
"Do I have to answer that?"
"Come on now Padfoot your taking over my roll, I'm supposed to be the one that gets on her nerves the most!"
"You're both the most annoying people around here anyway!" She said raising her voice.
"You know she does have a point Padfoot" Remus said calmly.
"What that we're annoying? Whose side are you on man?!"
"Not that your annoying, though it is true, that's not what I was getting at, from what I've heard no one reacts like how Annie did last night to that 'nightmare' and Annie is known for being hard to scare"
"So maybe Annie is a bit sensitive in this situation!" Sirius said, starting to get defensive and dropping the annoying act.
"Sirius just tell us" Lily sighed, obviously getting sick of this continuous ranting.
"I can't" he mumbled "I promised her I wouldn't"
"But why?! What could be so bad that she wouldn't tell us?"
At this point in time Remus shuffled his feet on the carpet and suddenly became very aware of how interesting his hands were.
"Maybe she's a werewo"-
"Well would you look at the time! We better get some sleep, potions test tomorrow and I have a lot of studying to do!" James said clamping his hand over Peter's mouth.
James dragged Peter up the stairs, Remus and Sirius following quickly behind, before Lily new it the four sixteen year olds were out of sight, not even giving her a chance to yell that James never did study anyway. So she ran up to her dorm to inform Miria on the little information she had found out.
~*~
"YOU STUPID BLOODY DOLT!" James yelled as soon as soon as the door was closed to their dormitory. "You could have gotten Moony found out!"
Peter cowered under James' tall form and managed to whimper out "I'm s- sorry, you kn-know I have a big mouth"
"Damn right you bloody well do, so we'll just have to fix that, won't we?"
Without giving Peter a chance to comment James took out his wand, muttered "renarpio" and Peters lips automatically sealed together.
"There, much better!"
Peter slumped down in defeat and lay on his bed to sulk.
James then looked over at his other two friends, Remus, who surprisingly had no trace of anger on his face, rather a thoughtful frown and Sirius, who was rummaging around under his bed.
"Padfoot?" Remus said rather loudly, making everyone jump, including Sirius who banged his head on the bottom of his four poster, he then continued with a various trail of swear words while he brang his head out from underneath the mess.
"What?" He asked, rather annoyed.
"Is Annie a werewolf?" Remus asked and everyone could note the uncomfortable tone he had asked it in, they all understood what he must have been thinking about.
"No!" Sirius said, suddenly becoming very alert.
"Oh ok, I was just wondering"... Remus trailed off. He knew he should feel glad that she wasn't, but he felt somehow disappointed. He had never met another werewolf, and he'd always felt that talking to his friends about his own unbearable nightmare every full moon just wasn't enough, though his friends were the most supporting people he had ever met, they didn't know how it felt and it seemed that there was something missing, he needed to talk to someone who new exactly what he was going through, someone who had also experienced it. He knew it was stupid, how could Annie be a werewolf? She doesn't disappear every full moon like he does and she definitely hadn't shown any signs of battle with herself. But the regretful hope had lingered there for a while and he felt ashamed at himself for wishing it even in the slightest.
His friends looked at him worriedly as they saw him gaze out the window at the now three quarter moon. He sighed deeply.
"Well I guess we'd all better get some sleep, it'll be full moon tomorrow night"
None of them questioned any more, they all heard the tone of finality in Remus' voice and to this Sirius was grateful as he didn't want to be badgered about Annie any longer.
~*~
"Sirius hurry up!"
"SHUTUP!"
"Man it must be that time of the month again" James said, taking no precaution whatsoever to keep his voice down as he looked at the curtain drawn bed of Remus'.
"I don't know what he'd do without us" Sirius stated with a grin as he rummaged around under his bed, once again. Though the only reply they got from Remus' bed was a low moan.
"Migraine"
"Do you want me to get Madam Pompfrey for you?" Peter asked happily, trying to snatch up the opportunity to get out of class.
"NO! I want you to get out before I eat you!"
Peter squealed rather girlishly and ran down to the common room as a pair of sox came flying over Remus' bed trying to hit him.
"Tut, tut, we do have PMS today"
There was a moment of silence.
"Permanent Moon Syndrome of course!" Sirius put in.
Remus stuck his hand around the curtain and made a rather rude gesture to them both.
"Ok, we can take a hint, c-ya tonight Moony"
Remus made a low grunt noise that the boys took as a sufficient 'bye' and they closed the door to the dormitory to head off to their classes.
~*~
That night the three boys walked over the moonlit grounds under James' invisibility cloak to the Womping Willow where there friend would be waiting in his killing form.
They all got under the shade of the outskirts of the forbidden forest to transform, Peter into a grey rat, Sirius into a black dog and James into a proud stag.
Peter ran under the thrashing branches of the Womping Willow to push in the knot in the trees trunk so it became motionless. The night went suddenly silent as the three animals made there way down the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack and to their friend.
James stood guard at opening of the tunnel as he was too tall to go the full length of it as it became smaller as it went farther down.
After waiting in boredom for half an hour or so he heard soft footfalls on the hard dirt floor and the quick scampering of a rat running. As a dog, rat and werewolf came into view he put his antlers down to signal for them to stop and then poked his head out of the hole to check if the coast was clear. There was no one in sight on the lonely grounds and only a few windows were still lit in the castle.
The four of them leaped out of the hole and bounded towards the forest, Sirius and James keep close to there werewolf friend and Peter feeling highly important by leading the way.
They had explored many parts of the forbidden forest since they had figured out how to become animagi last year and had indeed found the many different animals that lived there, being able to talk to some, some best to keep away from (they had definitely found out why the Forbidden Forest was forbidden when they ran into a huge spider and had to run for their dear lives), Though Sirius swore he saw a unicorn wink at him once, but the others thought it very unlikely.
Sirius bounded into the long green grass and scratched an S into the tree trunks that they went past with his claws so as they wouldn't lose their way. They often wondered if anyone noticed the scratches though nobody ever went into the forest except for themselves, the animals (if you could call some of them animals) in the forest who never came out and the new grounds keeper, who hadn't been in the forest much since he arrived. So they were pretty much safe from being found out by anyone and enjoyed the night while it lasted.
Peter bounded off in one direction that they had gone many times beforehand, to spy on the centaurs, which explained why they all got full marks in care of magical creatures, James had been seen by them once but they took no notice as they were all bickering about whether Mars or Venus was the brightest, which they all thought was rather amusing.
After finding no centaurs about and realizing that it was starting to get early they doubled back and jogged around the outskirts of the forest, towards the greenhouse where they had planned to pull their prank.
Though as Peter scampered along in front of the others an unusual black owl swooped down towards him. Peter looked up at it and squeaked frantically, trying to make his short legs run faster into the safety of the trees, but the owl was too fast, it was gaining towards him every second. It would have been a funny sight to see though as it was a matter of life or death for Peter, he didn't really think so.
Sirius was the first one to catch on to what was happening and ran to Peter's rescue. Just as the owl was stretching out its claws to grab the rat he leaped onto Peter and casually sat on him.
The owl was amazed, it just stared, its chocolate brown eyes boring into Sirius' and Sirius stared back at it, equally surprised.
The owl rose up into the air, practically invisible in the dark night sky and glanced at the other two animals, a stag and a strange looking wolf, who were both cantering over to the others. It swooped down once more to land on the dogs head gracefully.
Now all were thoroughly confused, that except Sirius, whose large dog eyes held a pool of guilt.
The owl made eye contact with the dog again and flew into the trees, Sirius following after it. The other three marauders stood in confusion, watching as the two animals disappeared into the outskirts of the forest. They followed slowly behind, the werewolf growling and the still shaking Peter scampering under James' tall form for protection.
As Sirius and the owl moved into a small clearing, Sirius barked madly as he saw what the owl was about to do, however the owl took no notice and immediately transformed. And there, standing right in front of the dog, was no other then Andromeda Black, sporting a very confused look at that.
The werewolf's nose hit the icy air and his eyes went searching madly, he started to run at full speed, the stag cantering wildly after him. He could smell human flesh and he couldn't resist but long for the taste of blood in his jaws and the bite of skin in his razor sharp teeth. Remus didn't have any control over this monster anymore; it had fully taken over him.
As the werewolf made its way into the clearing Andromeda gave out an ear piercing scream as she met eyes with the ferocious monster. It lunged towards her, but the stag and the dog leaped in front of her, blocking the werewolf's way just in time for her to transform back into her animagi form. The werewolf thrashed its teeth at them, and clawed as the stag lowered his head to show his antlers and the dog snarled at it menacingly. They formed a guard on either side of it until it finally stopped its attack, leaving both of them with large gashes in their sides and itself with even worse wounds.
Sirius looked up to the slightly dawning sky but there was no trace of Andromeda to be found.
~*~
OoOoOoO! Dun dun dunnn! Well I hope this chapter was satisfying as I know I haven't updated for AGES! But now it's the holidays so I will have heaps more time! Ok well for all you L/J peeps hanging on the line for something to happen, It'll be posted within the next couple of chapters but I promise that the next chapters will be interesting and it will include quidditch! I just thought that I would also let you know that I might be changing my pen name to Mystical Dreams instead of mysticaldreams and that I have a new story up called Emotive which is a fic full of little fics that are humorous, romantic depressing etc. Well I hope to update soon!
~*~Mystical Dreams
~*~mysticaldreams
Chapter seven: Anonymous Animagi.
Lily and Miria rushed to the hospital wing after a quick breakfast that morning, eager to see how their friend was.
After harassing Madam Pomfrey enough to let them see her, the nurse lead them down the rows of beds to Andromeda's.
Andromeda was sitting up in bed, propped against many pillows smiling her usual cheerful smile, though slumped at the bottom, near her feet was a tall lanky boy with gorgeous limp hair, his head was rested on the bed while his body was falling off the chair he had been sitting on.
Lily and Miria took seats next to Andromeda and she beamed at them radiantly. At first it seamed that all thoughts from last nights events had been erased from her features, but as the morning suns beams reflected off the windows and onto her face the golden light outlined the dark shadows under her eyes and the exhausted wrinkles in her brow.
"How are you feeling?" Lily asked Andromeda as she gazed out the window at the sunlit grounds.
"I'm fine!" she said brightly, "I should be getting to lessons today"
"Miss Black do not even think about it!" Madam Pomfrey said as she shuffled around, collecting the various vials and glasses on the bedside tables, "you need rest"
Andromeda sighed, "I'm fine" she mumbled.
A silence followed, Lily took the opportunity to think of how she was going to say what she wanted to ask.
"So.What happened last night? I mean is everything ok?"
Another uncomfortable silence followed until Andromeda finally talked.
"Yeah, I just had a nightmare, that's all" She half whispered in a haunted voice.
She then suddenly snapped back to reality.
"God! Look at the time! You two better head off otherwise you'll be late for class" She exclaimed.
Lily and Miria both jumped up out of their seats.
"Thanks Annie, we'll drop in after lunch to see you" Miria said as she slid on her bag.
As they both went to walk out Lily caught a side ways glance at Sirius.
"Oh and you might want to wake him up, he's going to miss the first lesson"
"I'll let him sleep a little longer, he was up later than me but can you tell James so he doesn't think he's in the astronomy tower" Andromeda said with a grin.
Lily smiled back at her and nodded.
They both walked out to leave Andromeda to ponder over what she had said and what she was hoping no one would find out.
~*~
"She's not telling us something Lil" Miria said worriedly as they both walked quickly towards the transfiguration room.
"I know, she's not telling the whole truth anyway, Sure, everyone gets scared from nightmares but that couldn't have just been a nightmare and Annie doesn't get scared easily" Lily said furrowing her brow in thought. "I think I'll go look in the library after lunch, maybe it'll have something"
"That or we could ask Sirius"
"Over my dead body! You know I never ask those boys for help unless it's a dire need"
"Yes but Sirius is the only one who knows other than Annie"
"Sirius would do anything Annie asked him to, do you really think he'd tell us something she obviously wants no one to know?"
"Good point, come on, let's talk about this later and just get to transfiguration" Miria said cursing as she looked at her watch.
~*~
Sirius joined the class later on that day, looking both exhausted and worried. Lily couldn't help but notice that when he met up with the marauders at their usual desks he shook them off and gave them a knowing look as in 'I'll explain later'. She was curious as to what he was going to tell them, and wondered if she could somehow eves drop on them.
~*~
"So Annie has nightmares, but doesn't everyone" Remus stated as the four boys sat in Gryffindor common room, in a tight nit circle around the fire.
"I do and for some reason in all of them Sirius is chasing me around with a club" Peter said.
"That's not a dream Wormtail, Sirius did that yesterday"
"Oh" Peter said giving Sirius a dodgy look; however, Sirius wasn't taking any notice of his friend's antics.
"Padfoot? You there?" James said waving his hand in front of Sirius' face.
"What? Oh yeah, what did you say?"
James sighed, "Mate I haven't seen you like this since you left from Grimmauld Place, and even then you were more angry then worried"
"I know, I'm just concerned about her, that's all"
James suddenly got that sneaking feeling that someone was watching him, he sometimes got that feeling when he was playing a prank and most of the time when it happened, he was usually right, his animal instincts had certain after affects, some which were good, others not so good, such as Sirius' dog-like manner of eating, but he pushed that to the back of his mind. He turned around to scan the few people who were left in the common room and his eyes fell on the unmistakable chestnut hair of Lily Evans, who was sitting on the lounge closest to them, reading a book upside down. He grinned, and the other marauders, noticing where he was looking, stared at Lily as well. The moment she saw James turn his head she had gone back to supposedly reading her book and only just noticed that it was upside down.
"Oh shit!" she cursed under her breath.
"Yes Evans, shit is right, how long have you been listening to our convocation? I mean, I don't mind if you take interest in what I say but it is a bit rude to listen in when you're not asked" James asked in his usual arrogant tone.
Lily's face reddened, out of fury or embarrassment no one could tell but she spoke calmly.
"All wanted to know was what is wrong with Annie"
"She told you this morning" Sirius said.
"How did you know that, I thought you were asleep?"
Sirius just grinned at her, the first true grin that had appeared on his face all day.
Lily was feeling extremely stupid at that moment and wasn't under any circumstances going to stick around any longer to get even further humiliated, so she just turned around started towards the girls dormitories.
"Hey Evans wait two!" Sirius shouted after her.
"What?"
Sirius stared at the girls dormitory staircase that Lily was currently a quarter of the way up.
"How exactly did I get up there last night?"
"Why should I tell you?"
"Because I'm handsome, popular, cute, sexy, sweet, cunning..."
"You make me sick!" She spat.
"Come on Lily just tell me!"
"Tell me what's really wrong with Annie then"
Sirius went a little pale at this request and looked slightly baffled.
"You just heard us, she has nightmares" Sirius justified.
"You don't honestly think I'm that stupid?"
"Do I have to answer that?"
"Come on now Padfoot your taking over my roll, I'm supposed to be the one that gets on her nerves the most!"
"You're both the most annoying people around here anyway!" She said raising her voice.
"You know she does have a point Padfoot" Remus said calmly.
"What that we're annoying? Whose side are you on man?!"
"Not that your annoying, though it is true, that's not what I was getting at, from what I've heard no one reacts like how Annie did last night to that 'nightmare' and Annie is known for being hard to scare"
"So maybe Annie is a bit sensitive in this situation!" Sirius said, starting to get defensive and dropping the annoying act.
"Sirius just tell us" Lily sighed, obviously getting sick of this continuous ranting.
"I can't" he mumbled "I promised her I wouldn't"
"But why?! What could be so bad that she wouldn't tell us?"
At this point in time Remus shuffled his feet on the carpet and suddenly became very aware of how interesting his hands were.
"Maybe she's a werewo"-
"Well would you look at the time! We better get some sleep, potions test tomorrow and I have a lot of studying to do!" James said clamping his hand over Peter's mouth.
James dragged Peter up the stairs, Remus and Sirius following quickly behind, before Lily new it the four sixteen year olds were out of sight, not even giving her a chance to yell that James never did study anyway. So she ran up to her dorm to inform Miria on the little information she had found out.
~*~
"YOU STUPID BLOODY DOLT!" James yelled as soon as soon as the door was closed to their dormitory. "You could have gotten Moony found out!"
Peter cowered under James' tall form and managed to whimper out "I'm s- sorry, you kn-know I have a big mouth"
"Damn right you bloody well do, so we'll just have to fix that, won't we?"
Without giving Peter a chance to comment James took out his wand, muttered "renarpio" and Peters lips automatically sealed together.
"There, much better!"
Peter slumped down in defeat and lay on his bed to sulk.
James then looked over at his other two friends, Remus, who surprisingly had no trace of anger on his face, rather a thoughtful frown and Sirius, who was rummaging around under his bed.
"Padfoot?" Remus said rather loudly, making everyone jump, including Sirius who banged his head on the bottom of his four poster, he then continued with a various trail of swear words while he brang his head out from underneath the mess.
"What?" He asked, rather annoyed.
"Is Annie a werewolf?" Remus asked and everyone could note the uncomfortable tone he had asked it in, they all understood what he must have been thinking about.
"No!" Sirius said, suddenly becoming very alert.
"Oh ok, I was just wondering"... Remus trailed off. He knew he should feel glad that she wasn't, but he felt somehow disappointed. He had never met another werewolf, and he'd always felt that talking to his friends about his own unbearable nightmare every full moon just wasn't enough, though his friends were the most supporting people he had ever met, they didn't know how it felt and it seemed that there was something missing, he needed to talk to someone who new exactly what he was going through, someone who had also experienced it. He knew it was stupid, how could Annie be a werewolf? She doesn't disappear every full moon like he does and she definitely hadn't shown any signs of battle with herself. But the regretful hope had lingered there for a while and he felt ashamed at himself for wishing it even in the slightest.
His friends looked at him worriedly as they saw him gaze out the window at the now three quarter moon. He sighed deeply.
"Well I guess we'd all better get some sleep, it'll be full moon tomorrow night"
None of them questioned any more, they all heard the tone of finality in Remus' voice and to this Sirius was grateful as he didn't want to be badgered about Annie any longer.
~*~
"Sirius hurry up!"
"SHUTUP!"
"Man it must be that time of the month again" James said, taking no precaution whatsoever to keep his voice down as he looked at the curtain drawn bed of Remus'.
"I don't know what he'd do without us" Sirius stated with a grin as he rummaged around under his bed, once again. Though the only reply they got from Remus' bed was a low moan.
"Migraine"
"Do you want me to get Madam Pompfrey for you?" Peter asked happily, trying to snatch up the opportunity to get out of class.
"NO! I want you to get out before I eat you!"
Peter squealed rather girlishly and ran down to the common room as a pair of sox came flying over Remus' bed trying to hit him.
"Tut, tut, we do have PMS today"
There was a moment of silence.
"Permanent Moon Syndrome of course!" Sirius put in.
Remus stuck his hand around the curtain and made a rather rude gesture to them both.
"Ok, we can take a hint, c-ya tonight Moony"
Remus made a low grunt noise that the boys took as a sufficient 'bye' and they closed the door to the dormitory to head off to their classes.
~*~
That night the three boys walked over the moonlit grounds under James' invisibility cloak to the Womping Willow where there friend would be waiting in his killing form.
They all got under the shade of the outskirts of the forbidden forest to transform, Peter into a grey rat, Sirius into a black dog and James into a proud stag.
Peter ran under the thrashing branches of the Womping Willow to push in the knot in the trees trunk so it became motionless. The night went suddenly silent as the three animals made there way down the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack and to their friend.
James stood guard at opening of the tunnel as he was too tall to go the full length of it as it became smaller as it went farther down.
After waiting in boredom for half an hour or so he heard soft footfalls on the hard dirt floor and the quick scampering of a rat running. As a dog, rat and werewolf came into view he put his antlers down to signal for them to stop and then poked his head out of the hole to check if the coast was clear. There was no one in sight on the lonely grounds and only a few windows were still lit in the castle.
The four of them leaped out of the hole and bounded towards the forest, Sirius and James keep close to there werewolf friend and Peter feeling highly important by leading the way.
They had explored many parts of the forbidden forest since they had figured out how to become animagi last year and had indeed found the many different animals that lived there, being able to talk to some, some best to keep away from (they had definitely found out why the Forbidden Forest was forbidden when they ran into a huge spider and had to run for their dear lives), Though Sirius swore he saw a unicorn wink at him once, but the others thought it very unlikely.
Sirius bounded into the long green grass and scratched an S into the tree trunks that they went past with his claws so as they wouldn't lose their way. They often wondered if anyone noticed the scratches though nobody ever went into the forest except for themselves, the animals (if you could call some of them animals) in the forest who never came out and the new grounds keeper, who hadn't been in the forest much since he arrived. So they were pretty much safe from being found out by anyone and enjoyed the night while it lasted.
Peter bounded off in one direction that they had gone many times beforehand, to spy on the centaurs, which explained why they all got full marks in care of magical creatures, James had been seen by them once but they took no notice as they were all bickering about whether Mars or Venus was the brightest, which they all thought was rather amusing.
After finding no centaurs about and realizing that it was starting to get early they doubled back and jogged around the outskirts of the forest, towards the greenhouse where they had planned to pull their prank.
Though as Peter scampered along in front of the others an unusual black owl swooped down towards him. Peter looked up at it and squeaked frantically, trying to make his short legs run faster into the safety of the trees, but the owl was too fast, it was gaining towards him every second. It would have been a funny sight to see though as it was a matter of life or death for Peter, he didn't really think so.
Sirius was the first one to catch on to what was happening and ran to Peter's rescue. Just as the owl was stretching out its claws to grab the rat he leaped onto Peter and casually sat on him.
The owl was amazed, it just stared, its chocolate brown eyes boring into Sirius' and Sirius stared back at it, equally surprised.
The owl rose up into the air, practically invisible in the dark night sky and glanced at the other two animals, a stag and a strange looking wolf, who were both cantering over to the others. It swooped down once more to land on the dogs head gracefully.
Now all were thoroughly confused, that except Sirius, whose large dog eyes held a pool of guilt.
The owl made eye contact with the dog again and flew into the trees, Sirius following after it. The other three marauders stood in confusion, watching as the two animals disappeared into the outskirts of the forest. They followed slowly behind, the werewolf growling and the still shaking Peter scampering under James' tall form for protection.
As Sirius and the owl moved into a small clearing, Sirius barked madly as he saw what the owl was about to do, however the owl took no notice and immediately transformed. And there, standing right in front of the dog, was no other then Andromeda Black, sporting a very confused look at that.
The werewolf's nose hit the icy air and his eyes went searching madly, he started to run at full speed, the stag cantering wildly after him. He could smell human flesh and he couldn't resist but long for the taste of blood in his jaws and the bite of skin in his razor sharp teeth. Remus didn't have any control over this monster anymore; it had fully taken over him.
As the werewolf made its way into the clearing Andromeda gave out an ear piercing scream as she met eyes with the ferocious monster. It lunged towards her, but the stag and the dog leaped in front of her, blocking the werewolf's way just in time for her to transform back into her animagi form. The werewolf thrashed its teeth at them, and clawed as the stag lowered his head to show his antlers and the dog snarled at it menacingly. They formed a guard on either side of it until it finally stopped its attack, leaving both of them with large gashes in their sides and itself with even worse wounds.
Sirius looked up to the slightly dawning sky but there was no trace of Andromeda to be found.
~*~
OoOoOoO! Dun dun dunnn! Well I hope this chapter was satisfying as I know I haven't updated for AGES! But now it's the holidays so I will have heaps more time! Ok well for all you L/J peeps hanging on the line for something to happen, It'll be posted within the next couple of chapters but I promise that the next chapters will be interesting and it will include quidditch! I just thought that I would also let you know that I might be changing my pen name to Mystical Dreams instead of mysticaldreams and that I have a new story up called Emotive which is a fic full of little fics that are humorous, romantic depressing etc. Well I hope to update soon!
~*~Mystical Dreams