"This is harder than I expected," Remus said with a frown. "I attempted to use a simple Label Charm here," Remus jabbed at the parchment that the marauders were using to experiment, "but it would only label the species. A bunch of humans and some house-elves in the kitchens. I'm also having trouble making the people markers move exactly as the people are moving."

"So, basically you are saying that making moving and labelled people markers isn't working," Sirius summed it up.

"Yes," Remus admitted. "But, oh! I've just had an idea. What if instead of using a simple Label Charm, I used a True-Seeing Charm combined with a Mirror Charm and then added a Nortian Charm? I think that just might work." Remus began to scribble in the margin of his paper, muttering to himself and at times shaking his head. "Let me go to the library, I've got to check up on some of the wand movements for these. I'll be back."

Without another word, Remus snatched the practice parchment and his wand and hurried off. James watched him go for a moment, half-smiling. Although he and Sirius were quite intelligent, they never had the same grasp on things as Moony. James was much better at Transfiguration than Charms, and he was quite satisfied to let Remus work out the necessary details of the map.

"Well, that leaves us to continue drawing the map," Sirius said, rubbing his hands together. "Peter, were you doing the fourth floor? You've missed a room, a classroom. I think I'm going to add in our favorite hidden passageway. Has anyone drawn in the Whomping Willow yet?"

So the work on the Marauder's Map continued, the three companions hunched over, occasionally speaking to one another and pointing out missed places. The map was beginning to take shape, although work was slow. Hogwarts was a rather large castle, and the grounds were extensive. The work was not unpleasant, however, and all of the marauders were enjoying themselves immensely.

"There you are, Potter!"

Guiltily, all three boys jumped, hastily covering what they were working on. For one wild second James though Malia had come to the Gryffindor common room, but in reality it was just Valerie Norman, a muggleborn sixth year who was the Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Why she would be looking for him, he didn't know. There was no Quidditch in the middle of winter, and most of the team would be gone over the holidays anyhow.

"Hello, Valerie," James said pleasantly.

"Look, I don't know if you've heard, but Anders had a bad injury. I'm not sure about the details, I guess it was some serious backfiring magic during Transfiguration. Anyway, he's been sent to St. Mungo's, and now we are short a Chaser."

Larett Anders was the lead point-scorer on any of the four Quidditch teams, and James had not heard about this injury. He was still unsure why Valerie had sought him out. So they were down a Chaser, that wasn't really James's problem. He was the Seeker, and he had no way to improve the situation.

"Merlin's beard, Potter, don't look so bloody confused!" Valerie said, running a hand through her brown hair. She looked very harried and exasperated. "We need a Chaser. There's too much snow to really have any sort of tryout, and we need a well-trained Chaser before our match against Slytherin. It's really early this year, in March, and we'll be lucky if the snow is even half gone."

"Valerie, I still don't know what you want me to do about it." James replied.

"Potter, you're our Seeker. The most important person on the team, and also the least involved." When James opened his mouth to protest, she gave him a glare and pushed on. "So you're able to watch. I know you spend your time looking for the Snitch, but surely you get a good view on the game. I'm a Beater, I don't see anything but Bludgers. We need someone who will be able to work in all our plays that we have, who will get along with everyone. Do you have any suggestions?"

So that was it. All this boiled down to the fact that Valerie needed a new Chaser and she wanted James to choose one. Why she couldn't have just said that in the first place, he didn't know. Now that he understood, however, it wasn't really any better. He didn't have any idea who would make a good replacement Chaser.

"Surely Anders will be back by March," James pointed out. Valerie shook her head.

"That's what I thought. It turns out that he was hit with about three different spells, and none of them were the same, and none of them were done right. Profesor Merika told me that he probably won't be well again until May, and not in Quidditch-playing condition until at least July. So we need someone new."

"What about that one girl, Lucia, who quit the team?" asked James. "Maybe she'll rejoin since we need her."

"Nope, I already asked her. She says she doesn't have the time or the desire," Valerie replied immediately. "Just think about it, okay, Potter?"

"Yeah, sure, Valerie. I'll think about it."

James added finding a new Gryffindor Chaser to his growing list of things to think about. It was going to have to wait, because Remus had just arrived back from the library, looking rather excited. He was carrying a heavy book that had a spiderweb trailing off one corner and was coated in dust. With a thud! he set it down on the table, opening it up and flipping through old, brittle pages.

"Look here!" he exclaimed, pointing at a paragraph halfway down one page. James pulled it nearer to him and squinted.

"'There doth lie a certain uncertainty in our lives that we may perhaps not survive as long as we wouldst desire. Therefore one can produce a charm of the perpetual nature, knownst as the Perpetual Charm, that alloweth ourselves to perpetuate in a certain item.' Remus, what in 'ell does that mean?" James frowned, pushing the old book away from him.

"Exactly what it says!" Remus replied. "We can allow ourselves to perpetuate in our map."

"Perpetuate?" Peter piped up, looking confused.

"Yes," Remus explained patiently. "It means that our personalities, our memories, and a part of ourselves can be a part of the map. People years from now could communicate with the map and be communicating with us, even if we were dead or something."

"This looks really complicated." Sirius said, frowning at the book. He hadn't been listening to Remus but examining the wand movements and words for the charm.

"Not really. As long as you can keep a firm control of your wand, that will get you through this little tricky part. The words aren't too bad, you wouldn't have to memorize them. I think this is great. It'll mean that we can communicate upon request, which would also mean we could explain things about the castle that aren't easily shown in a map."

"It's great, Remus, really great," James replied, yawning. "Now I'm off to bed. Are you guys going on the train tomorrow morning?"

"Yes," Remus and Peter answered. James fixed Sirius with a stern eye. He added reluctantly, "Yes."

"Alright then, I'll see you after the hols. This can wait until then, I don't feel like working on it by myself. Here, you can keep the stuff, Remus. G'night."