A/N: Hello! Just to let u know that it was my birthday this week and I am
distressed bcos my party is a disaster, only six ppl are coming *sobs and
cries* therefore to cheer me up, I want lots of reviews!!!!!!! there were
quite a few for the last one, keep up the good work! Lots of new ones...
Choc (can i call u that for short, Chocoliciouz?!) - thanx, yah i thought u
were lita, oh most faithful one! hee hee the best fics hav no plot!
amy88 - I was joking! But i admire ur war tactics...
Megsalette - welcome to my (fairly limited) circle of reviewers and thanx!
Lady Elerrina - hope i spelt that with the right number of 'r's and 'l's...
Yes it is ALWAYS best to review, woteva the time! I took the girl things
from OOTP, with the hair ruffling and crowd of girls... but OK, yes, it is
a bit exaggerated.
First Light of Eos - More Lily comes in a couple of chapters' time. See
Eihwaz's bn in a minute... :S
Nona - Uh... good point... *blushes*. well let's say... it is like... a
WoMD... except less dangerous... they like to hav a spell, but not use it.
(That reference is not meant to cause offence to anyway btw. just an
analogy. :S)
ok! now for Eihwaz's bn, and then on with the story at last!
B/N: Sev is a gorgeous god. WORSHIP HIM!!!! Hello I'm back and alive!
*Lourdaise curses in the background* In response to First Light of Eos...
I am not ordering you to worship him... I am manipulating your
subconscious! Heh heh. In response to Amy88... I love you!!! (but not as
much as Lourdaise!)
Chapter Seventeen
"So," Sirius said the next day, "two weeks with nothing to worry about and both our birthdays. What do you say we organise that party we were talking about? If we get started on organising it today, it could easily be next weekend. The best party of the year... hosted by James Potter and Sirius Black."
I grinned. "Yeah..."
As it was me that had stolen the animal essence, it was Sirius who took the secret passage into Hogsmeade at lunchtime, to ask if we could host a 'seventeenth' birthday party at the Three Broomsticks. Madam Rosmerta, the young witch who owned the pub with her husband, was used to seeing us in there and we had sat at the bar and kept her laughing until we left enough times that she was more than happy to agree, Sirius reported when he returned. She didn't know that we were actually only turning fifteen, but I had a feeling she would've agreed anyway. She was a good sort, but very malleable, as Sirius would say.
"Apparently, if we pay twenty five Galleons, she'll organise the whole food, drinks, music thing. It's cheap because it's good for her business as well. We just need to sort invitations and stuff."
I nodded. "I think what we need really is advertisements, rather than invitations. One large one on each house's noticeboard - that can be arranged - and a few small ones floating around that we can bewitch to go blank if a teacher looks at them. Open to all, do you think?"
"Not Slytherin."
"No, of course not. We can bewitch them to go blank if a Slytherin looks at them, too."
I waved my wand a few times and a suitable poster appeared on the table before me. Swirling writing proclaimed 'James Potter and Sirius Black's 'seventeenth' birthday party! All welcome except Slytherins and teachers... Come to the Three Broomsticks at nine o' clock on Saturday 5th October. Food, drinks and music provided.'
Sirius grinned, gave a flick of his wand and the pile of posters levitated off the ground. One separated to pin itself on the notice board - the rest floated out of the portrait hole.
"Brilliant," I said.
The following Saturday was a Hogsmeade weekend, so it wouldn't look suspicious when many people were absent from the Great Hall at dinner. At nine o' clock, Sirius, Remus, Peter and I were sitting inside the Three Broomsticks, watching as more and more people came in, greeted us, ordered drinks and either sat down or milled around. A banner on the wall with flashing letters, proclaimed 'James and Sirius' seventeenth birthday party' - I had gone over after a while and added large apostrophes round the seventeenth, to a round of laughter. Madam Rosmerta gave me a shrewd look, but just collapsed into giggles when I pulled my innocent face.
It was quite a party. Most of my year, except the Slytherins, was there, and most of Gryffindor from first year through to seventh year was there, as well as many others. The music, in my opinion, was better than that at last year's Yule Ball, and Madam Rosmerta's large draughts of Butterbeer were roundly appreciated. Most people approached either Sirius or me to tell us what a great party it was, which we laughed off, though it was true.
At eleven thirty, however, it came to a rather abrupt end. The music died down and everyone stopped talking. Sensing a mishap, I swung towards the door. Professor McGonagall was standing, glaring in.
"So," she said, "Potter and Black's 'seventeenth' birthday party, hmm?"
"I - we - um," I said helplessly.
"This is clear abuse of the privilege of being allowed to visit Hogsmeade. I am, frankly, very disappointed. I went to the Gryffindor tower quite coincidentally in the hope of wishing you luck for the first Quidditch match of the season, tomorrow, and am greeted by the sight of only about ten Gryffindor students left in a common room with this on the wall." She waved the poster. "I must say, Potter, last time I looked I thought were only fifteen, and that was at a pinch - the way you behave, you could be eleven."
I flinched but said nothing.
"So, anyway, I would like to say that this particular party is over. And if anyone is too tired to play Quidditch tomorrow, they will be very sorry." Her mouth twitched slightly as though she might smile. "On the other hand if you win, all is forgiven. Back to Hogwarts, please, everyone."
I laughed, despite my disappointment. We had planned to party long into the early hours. Still, we were not in as much trouble as we had thought... McGonagall could be a surprisingly good sport.
Until Christmas, we were occupied again with the potion. This, apparently, was the most difficult period - first we had to add a whole sliced unicorn horn, then snake skin and chopped Flobberworm, to our disgust. It was also the time that the charms had to start being used every other night. What with that and another discovery of mine, I seldom spent a full night in bed.
My other discovery was of Hogwarts night life. It had been discovered by pure chance when I was returning one night from charming the potion, and I had seen a Ravenclaw girl with a Hufflepuff boy from my year wandering around. For some absolutely inexplicable reason, I had had an urge to follow them, and had ended up South tower. And there were at least five couples hidden in the shadows kissing, and as I stepped to the balcony, I could see the same thing happening on North tower and West tower as well. It was after that that I began to notice couples disappearing into empty classrooms, store cupboards and just random nooks and crannies where they could get some privacy at night. I only wondered why I had not thought of it for myself. I was still progressing rapidly through girlfriend after girlfriend, and now, apparently, one of the most exciting things for a girl either in my year or younger was the anticipation of being taken up North tower by James Potter or South tower by Sirius Black. It wasn't that we had any preference for which, but we were agreed on one thing - we didn't want to be making out with girls in the same place.
I was caught a couple of times between Christmas and the end of February, once by Professor McGonagall, once by the Head Girl, but it didn't bother me much. Neither did it bother me the little sleep I was getting - up a tower at least once a week and stirring a potion half the rest of the nights - we had soon found that it was impractical for Peter to lose too much sleep, and two people had to go each night. We shared it out, and it was only an hour, tops, a night that we lost. It didn't affect us - nobody would ever know that we didn't get a full ten hours each night.
In February, the threat of Voldemort was brought home to me. We had managed to forget about him, as none of our close friends had been personally affected, but a message to me from Professor Dumbledore gave me a shock. 'Please do not write to your parents for the time being. They are on a mission for me, and owls would draw attention to them. Thank you, Professor Dumbledore.'
Every morning I sat tensely, expecting to hear that at least one of them was dead. Sirius and Remus were equally concerned for me, but to my amazement, I received the all-clear after two weeks. It had been a dreadful time, however. I knew that my parents were working with Dumbledore against Voldemort, but never before had I been hit with such a realisation of the danger they were in. Surely they would not be killed, I had told myself before - but why not? Others had been, many others.
"Just be thankful we're safe here," Remus pointed out.
"Yes," I said, "but in three years' time we won't be." And despite all my willpower, I could not shake what Snape had said about Remus. He was a dark creature - he wasn't at risk. Not really.
"You'll do no good by thinking about it," Peter said surprisingly helpfully. "Nothing did happen to them. Don't stress."
I knew he just wanted me back to normal - 'I was no fun when I was worrying' - but all the same, he was right. Worry didn't help anything - in fact, it was just giving into Voldemort. Or You-Know-Who as he was better known now. I had never noticed, because Sirius, Remus and I had always called him Voldemort, until Peter had said 'You-Know-Who'. Then, observing, I realised that almost everybody else did too. Professor Dumbledore didn't, but he was rare.
"Should we all say 'You-Know-Who' now, then?" I asked him one day when he stopped me for no apparent reason in the corridor.
He shook his head firmly. "Fear of a name breeds fear of a person, James. Keep as you're doing."
"I think we fear him enough," I muttered.
"Not enough for him, James. There is always scope for more." Dumbledore shook himself. "But I'm being morbid. Ignore me."
"Not at all, Professor," I said sadly.
At the start of March, we started the brain-training. It was surprisingly hard, at first, to empty your mind of all human thought and truly concentrate on being an animal. Predictably, all four of us concentrated on being predators - it was hard to believe what the books all said when they said that this had no affect on what animal you would become.
After a fortnight of that sort of brain-training before going to sleep, you had to start muttering an incantation whilst concentrating - this would eventually aid your brain in the concentration, but to begin with it made it harder. I often heard Peter mumbling frantically to himself late at night and given whines of dissatisfaction. He wanted it easy, just like everything else. I wasn't used to working this hard, perhaps, but I didn't mind it. And after a while, it came more easily to me. I could empty my brain of human thought at will, and reverse it. That, the book impressed upon one, was most important - the ability to change back. That was what made the Animagi transformation dangerous, because so many people didn't realise the importance of training themselves to turn back - they thought it was easy, beneath them. I was concerned that that might happen to Peter, so Sirius and I had long conversations in front of him about what we were doing to train ourselves in turning back. We often had the ability to tell him what to do when the book could not. I only hoped he was intelligent enough to prepare himself once he knew he had to.
Whilst the preparation for becoming an Animagus had taken over part of my night life, my days were still comprised of taunting Snape, who was worse than ever after I'd saved his life, and getting together and breaking up with girls. Quidditch, too, of course.
We had beaten Hufflepuff the day after our party, and Slytherin after Christmas. This year, Ravenclaw had a much stronger side - but we weren't playing them until late May. With the loss of Geoff, Arthur Weasley and Crispin, one of our beaters, we had a few new faces. Griff Lemon, our keeper, was the new captain, and in my opinion not so good. It was, in truth, my strength at working with Amanda Prewitt and the new Chaser, a second year called Robin, that kept the team winning points, and we had a reasonable Seeker. The new beater was appalling, but he was Griff's best friend. Still, they would both be leaving at the end of this year, and we still had a strong team.
One morning in early April, when Sirius and I had just arrived back in the dormitory, having been up the towers, Peter came to talk to us.
"James, Sirius... you know how you go up North tower..."
"Well I go up South, but yes?" Sirius shot me an amused look.
"And you know how you've each have thousands of girlfriends."
"Yes..." We could hardly deny it.
"I was wondering... if I wanted to, well, ask a girl out... is there some place you'd recommend asking her to rather than straight up one of the towers?"
"Depends who it is," I laughed. "If it's one of the girls who are up for anything, and believe me we know who they are, then they'll be happiest if you do just take them up, well, you can have West tower."
"But then again if it's not," Sirius said, "then I'd suggest Hogsmeade. Either the Three Broomsticks, or there's a crappy little place that all the girls love that I've forgotten the name of."
I grinned. I didn't like the little tea shop either. "So who is it?"
Chapter Seventeen
"So," Sirius said the next day, "two weeks with nothing to worry about and both our birthdays. What do you say we organise that party we were talking about? If we get started on organising it today, it could easily be next weekend. The best party of the year... hosted by James Potter and Sirius Black."
I grinned. "Yeah..."
As it was me that had stolen the animal essence, it was Sirius who took the secret passage into Hogsmeade at lunchtime, to ask if we could host a 'seventeenth' birthday party at the Three Broomsticks. Madam Rosmerta, the young witch who owned the pub with her husband, was used to seeing us in there and we had sat at the bar and kept her laughing until we left enough times that she was more than happy to agree, Sirius reported when he returned. She didn't know that we were actually only turning fifteen, but I had a feeling she would've agreed anyway. She was a good sort, but very malleable, as Sirius would say.
"Apparently, if we pay twenty five Galleons, she'll organise the whole food, drinks, music thing. It's cheap because it's good for her business as well. We just need to sort invitations and stuff."
I nodded. "I think what we need really is advertisements, rather than invitations. One large one on each house's noticeboard - that can be arranged - and a few small ones floating around that we can bewitch to go blank if a teacher looks at them. Open to all, do you think?"
"Not Slytherin."
"No, of course not. We can bewitch them to go blank if a Slytherin looks at them, too."
I waved my wand a few times and a suitable poster appeared on the table before me. Swirling writing proclaimed 'James Potter and Sirius Black's 'seventeenth' birthday party! All welcome except Slytherins and teachers... Come to the Three Broomsticks at nine o' clock on Saturday 5th October. Food, drinks and music provided.'
Sirius grinned, gave a flick of his wand and the pile of posters levitated off the ground. One separated to pin itself on the notice board - the rest floated out of the portrait hole.
"Brilliant," I said.
The following Saturday was a Hogsmeade weekend, so it wouldn't look suspicious when many people were absent from the Great Hall at dinner. At nine o' clock, Sirius, Remus, Peter and I were sitting inside the Three Broomsticks, watching as more and more people came in, greeted us, ordered drinks and either sat down or milled around. A banner on the wall with flashing letters, proclaimed 'James and Sirius' seventeenth birthday party' - I had gone over after a while and added large apostrophes round the seventeenth, to a round of laughter. Madam Rosmerta gave me a shrewd look, but just collapsed into giggles when I pulled my innocent face.
It was quite a party. Most of my year, except the Slytherins, was there, and most of Gryffindor from first year through to seventh year was there, as well as many others. The music, in my opinion, was better than that at last year's Yule Ball, and Madam Rosmerta's large draughts of Butterbeer were roundly appreciated. Most people approached either Sirius or me to tell us what a great party it was, which we laughed off, though it was true.
At eleven thirty, however, it came to a rather abrupt end. The music died down and everyone stopped talking. Sensing a mishap, I swung towards the door. Professor McGonagall was standing, glaring in.
"So," she said, "Potter and Black's 'seventeenth' birthday party, hmm?"
"I - we - um," I said helplessly.
"This is clear abuse of the privilege of being allowed to visit Hogsmeade. I am, frankly, very disappointed. I went to the Gryffindor tower quite coincidentally in the hope of wishing you luck for the first Quidditch match of the season, tomorrow, and am greeted by the sight of only about ten Gryffindor students left in a common room with this on the wall." She waved the poster. "I must say, Potter, last time I looked I thought were only fifteen, and that was at a pinch - the way you behave, you could be eleven."
I flinched but said nothing.
"So, anyway, I would like to say that this particular party is over. And if anyone is too tired to play Quidditch tomorrow, they will be very sorry." Her mouth twitched slightly as though she might smile. "On the other hand if you win, all is forgiven. Back to Hogwarts, please, everyone."
I laughed, despite my disappointment. We had planned to party long into the early hours. Still, we were not in as much trouble as we had thought... McGonagall could be a surprisingly good sport.
Until Christmas, we were occupied again with the potion. This, apparently, was the most difficult period - first we had to add a whole sliced unicorn horn, then snake skin and chopped Flobberworm, to our disgust. It was also the time that the charms had to start being used every other night. What with that and another discovery of mine, I seldom spent a full night in bed.
My other discovery was of Hogwarts night life. It had been discovered by pure chance when I was returning one night from charming the potion, and I had seen a Ravenclaw girl with a Hufflepuff boy from my year wandering around. For some absolutely inexplicable reason, I had had an urge to follow them, and had ended up South tower. And there were at least five couples hidden in the shadows kissing, and as I stepped to the balcony, I could see the same thing happening on North tower and West tower as well. It was after that that I began to notice couples disappearing into empty classrooms, store cupboards and just random nooks and crannies where they could get some privacy at night. I only wondered why I had not thought of it for myself. I was still progressing rapidly through girlfriend after girlfriend, and now, apparently, one of the most exciting things for a girl either in my year or younger was the anticipation of being taken up North tower by James Potter or South tower by Sirius Black. It wasn't that we had any preference for which, but we were agreed on one thing - we didn't want to be making out with girls in the same place.
I was caught a couple of times between Christmas and the end of February, once by Professor McGonagall, once by the Head Girl, but it didn't bother me much. Neither did it bother me the little sleep I was getting - up a tower at least once a week and stirring a potion half the rest of the nights - we had soon found that it was impractical for Peter to lose too much sleep, and two people had to go each night. We shared it out, and it was only an hour, tops, a night that we lost. It didn't affect us - nobody would ever know that we didn't get a full ten hours each night.
In February, the threat of Voldemort was brought home to me. We had managed to forget about him, as none of our close friends had been personally affected, but a message to me from Professor Dumbledore gave me a shock. 'Please do not write to your parents for the time being. They are on a mission for me, and owls would draw attention to them. Thank you, Professor Dumbledore.'
Every morning I sat tensely, expecting to hear that at least one of them was dead. Sirius and Remus were equally concerned for me, but to my amazement, I received the all-clear after two weeks. It had been a dreadful time, however. I knew that my parents were working with Dumbledore against Voldemort, but never before had I been hit with such a realisation of the danger they were in. Surely they would not be killed, I had told myself before - but why not? Others had been, many others.
"Just be thankful we're safe here," Remus pointed out.
"Yes," I said, "but in three years' time we won't be." And despite all my willpower, I could not shake what Snape had said about Remus. He was a dark creature - he wasn't at risk. Not really.
"You'll do no good by thinking about it," Peter said surprisingly helpfully. "Nothing did happen to them. Don't stress."
I knew he just wanted me back to normal - 'I was no fun when I was worrying' - but all the same, he was right. Worry didn't help anything - in fact, it was just giving into Voldemort. Or You-Know-Who as he was better known now. I had never noticed, because Sirius, Remus and I had always called him Voldemort, until Peter had said 'You-Know-Who'. Then, observing, I realised that almost everybody else did too. Professor Dumbledore didn't, but he was rare.
"Should we all say 'You-Know-Who' now, then?" I asked him one day when he stopped me for no apparent reason in the corridor.
He shook his head firmly. "Fear of a name breeds fear of a person, James. Keep as you're doing."
"I think we fear him enough," I muttered.
"Not enough for him, James. There is always scope for more." Dumbledore shook himself. "But I'm being morbid. Ignore me."
"Not at all, Professor," I said sadly.
At the start of March, we started the brain-training. It was surprisingly hard, at first, to empty your mind of all human thought and truly concentrate on being an animal. Predictably, all four of us concentrated on being predators - it was hard to believe what the books all said when they said that this had no affect on what animal you would become.
After a fortnight of that sort of brain-training before going to sleep, you had to start muttering an incantation whilst concentrating - this would eventually aid your brain in the concentration, but to begin with it made it harder. I often heard Peter mumbling frantically to himself late at night and given whines of dissatisfaction. He wanted it easy, just like everything else. I wasn't used to working this hard, perhaps, but I didn't mind it. And after a while, it came more easily to me. I could empty my brain of human thought at will, and reverse it. That, the book impressed upon one, was most important - the ability to change back. That was what made the Animagi transformation dangerous, because so many people didn't realise the importance of training themselves to turn back - they thought it was easy, beneath them. I was concerned that that might happen to Peter, so Sirius and I had long conversations in front of him about what we were doing to train ourselves in turning back. We often had the ability to tell him what to do when the book could not. I only hoped he was intelligent enough to prepare himself once he knew he had to.
Whilst the preparation for becoming an Animagus had taken over part of my night life, my days were still comprised of taunting Snape, who was worse than ever after I'd saved his life, and getting together and breaking up with girls. Quidditch, too, of course.
We had beaten Hufflepuff the day after our party, and Slytherin after Christmas. This year, Ravenclaw had a much stronger side - but we weren't playing them until late May. With the loss of Geoff, Arthur Weasley and Crispin, one of our beaters, we had a few new faces. Griff Lemon, our keeper, was the new captain, and in my opinion not so good. It was, in truth, my strength at working with Amanda Prewitt and the new Chaser, a second year called Robin, that kept the team winning points, and we had a reasonable Seeker. The new beater was appalling, but he was Griff's best friend. Still, they would both be leaving at the end of this year, and we still had a strong team.
One morning in early April, when Sirius and I had just arrived back in the dormitory, having been up the towers, Peter came to talk to us.
"James, Sirius... you know how you go up North tower..."
"Well I go up South, but yes?" Sirius shot me an amused look.
"And you know how you've each have thousands of girlfriends."
"Yes..." We could hardly deny it.
"I was wondering... if I wanted to, well, ask a girl out... is there some place you'd recommend asking her to rather than straight up one of the towers?"
"Depends who it is," I laughed. "If it's one of the girls who are up for anything, and believe me we know who they are, then they'll be happiest if you do just take them up, well, you can have West tower."
"But then again if it's not," Sirius said, "then I'd suggest Hogsmeade. Either the Three Broomsticks, or there's a crappy little place that all the girls love that I've forgotten the name of."
I grinned. I didn't like the little tea shop either. "So who is it?"