Hmmm…an insightful little bit from Val. She's hell bent on Snape being good. I think I might agree with her on it too. When Hagrid heard Dumbledore and Snape arguing, he heard Snape saying how he couldn't do it. Do what? Had Snape told Dumbledore about the unbreakable vow? Did Dumbledore in fact tell Snape that he had to kill him? Did Dumbledore know he was going to be killed? Did Dumbledore plead to make it all seem more convincing? Did Dumbledore plead with Snape because he was actually saying 'please Snape, you need to do this'? Is that why Snape had a look of hatred on his face? Was it because he didn't want to kill Dumbledore and he had to? Did he hate Voldemort for forcing Draco to do this task? When will we have our answers! growls in frustration I must know the truth! Anywho….
Chapter 11: Death Eaters and Cursed Jobs
Remus smiled happily as he felt Sirius wrap his arms around him. The two had just opened their Hogwarts letters telling them what they needed and what not.
"So, who do you think the new Defence teacher is?" Sirius asked as the two looked down the list. Remus shrugged and looked down at his watch.
"We need to get going," Remus said. "James and Peter will be there soon." Sirius nodded and quickly went to grab his Gringott's key before they left.
"There're the two lovers!" Remus and Sirius looked around to see James and Peter racing towards them. The group continued to talk as they walked to Florish and Blotts.
"Well look who it is, boys!" Sirius said excitedly, pointing over to the back of the one and only Severus Snape. Remus rolled his eyes, muttering about giving the poor boy a break. Peter's beady eyes swept from James and Sirius, to the unsuspecting Severus. Sirius quickly waved his wand and Severus' pants were down around his ankles, revealing greying boxers. Severus turned around but saw nothing.
"Carrying that invisibility cloak everywhere now are we, James?" Remus asked as they watched Severus look around confused. James smirked happily as the four of them crouched low to the ground.
"Well, it may be harder to conceal all of us, but if we crouch low enough the cloak brushes the bottom of the ground," James said. "And to answer your question Moony," James continued, "I'm carrying it around more on mum's order's. This could come in handy if there were a sudden Death Eater attack." Remus nodded thoughtfully.
"I think it's safe for us to go," Peter squeaked as he looked around. Sirius, James, and Remus looked around for any sign of the Slytherin or any of the people he hung around.
"Yep. Let's go get the rest of our things and go."
The Marauders parted for the day and returned to the Leaky Cauldron where they were staying for the night. Tomorrow they needed to go to King's Cross and board the Hogwarts Express for their last ride to Hogwarts. The thought of leaving excited James and Sirius. James was planning to be an auora, so was Sirius. Remus wasn't sure what he wanted to do. Being a werewolf was a bit restricting on his choice of jobs, the Ministry didn't really help either. Peter wasn't sure what he was doing; probably end up working some low job at the Ministry.
The next day the marauders packed up their things in a taxi and headed over to King's Cross to return to their school.
"Now you boys be careful this year!" Mrs. Potter reminded the boys. James and Sirius chuckled nervously as Remus and Peter shook their heads sadly. "I mean it you two, with these death eater attacks I don't want the two of you messing around and getting hurt. Remus, I'm counting on you to keep them in check." Remus sighed.
"Well, I'm sure I can keep one of the two out of trouble with some persuasion… but James will be a little more difficult. I thinks I'll get Miss Evans to help me with him." Mrs. Potter nodded happily at Remus and soon was going into a huge talk about how much she liked Lily and was happy that her son had found someone who could keep him level headed and out of trouble.
The group smiled happily as they sat in the train compartment. Remus was leaning on Sirius and was almost asleep. James had a far away look in his eyes…probably thinking about a certain Lily… Sirius was stroking Remus' hair, eyes closed and a smile on his face. Peter was looking out the window, bored. If the marauders saw him now instead of being lost in day dreams, they would've seen him looking at Sirius and Remus with disgust written all over him. The compartment door slid open.
"Nope. This one's full of worthless life forms, Bellatrix." Sirius opened one eye lazily to see Severus and Regulus standing in the doorway, Bellatrix sneered at them.
"Well, there goes our last and happy year," James said as he got up and pulled out his wand. Sirius followed James' lead and pretty soon hexes and curses were being thrown back and forth as the marauders tried to get the Slytherins out of their compartment. By the end of the 'battle' Sirius ended up with a black eye from Regulus, Severus' hair was bright pink with lime highlights in it, Bellatrix sang everything that came out of her mouth in a loud, off-key voice, Regulus had a bloody lip and broken nose from Sirius, and James's ears had turned to cacti.
"Well that was fun," Sirius said happily.
"What!" James yelled. Remus chuckled and quickly replaced the cacti with his original ears. "That's better. Thanks Moony." Remus nodded happily and looked over the damage of Sirius.
"Are you going to heal me too?" Sirius asked, giving Remus puppy dog eyes. Remus shook his head.
"Nope. All you need is an ice pack to place over your eye and you should be fine." Sirius pouted and tried ignoring Remus for the rest of the ride to Hogwarts, he failed miserably.
The marauder's felt like skipping the feast as soon as they got off the Hogwarts Express. Instead of eating just then, they decided to sneak into Hogsmeade just once before school officially kicked off.
"I hope Lily doesn't find out about this, she'd kill me," James whispered as they walked along the pathway to Honeydukes' cellar. Sirius let off a small sound that sounded like a growl.
"Well she'll just get over it. This is something we need to do," Sirius said, trying to lift the guilt off of James. James nodded nervously.
Remus felt like his insides were tying themselves into knots. Something wasn't right. Something was off and it freaked him out. One point for werewolf: sixth sense for danger. Whoot. "Guys, maybe we should go back. Something feels off about all of this," Remus said. Sirius looked back at him. They four young men were a few steps away from being in the cellar.
"Honestly Remus, I think we're going to be fine," Sirius said reaching to open the secret floor hatch.
BOOM!
The floor above them shook and caused them to hold onto one another for balance.
"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL WAS THAT?" Sirius yelled. Remus rolled his eyes
"No, nothing is going to happen Remus, 'I think we're going to be fine'," Remus said as the four of them raced back down the steps. Another loud sound erupted, causing the marauders to quicken their pace.
"Let's go tell the Headmaster," Remus said as they waited for Peter to squeeze through the one eye witch hump. He really needed to lose some pounds to get in and out of there quicker. James nodded, his face white with fear. All of them had silently agreed that it must be a death eater attack. Looking down at his watch Remus noticed that there were a few more seconds before the hall would be emptying.
"Let's hurry up before the hall is full of students," James said as he took off in the direction of the headmaster's office.
As luck would have it, they ran into the headmaster who was also on his way there. Literally they did. James tried to skid to a stop but Sirius bumped into him, causing him to fall on the headmaster, who fell to the ground. James ended up falling on the headmaster and Sirius and Remus and Peter soon were scatted in the mess.
"I'm sooo sorry Professor Dumbledore," James said helping him up. Dumbledore straightened out his half moon glasses and smiled at them.
"It's all right my boys, and I promise not the tell Filch that you four were running in the halls," Dumbledore said smiling. Peter smiled weakly at the Headmaster.
"It's a little late for that Professor, we ran into Filch as well on our way here. He should be here in…six seconds," Peter said looking at his watch. Sirius and James nodded. Dumbledore continued smiling and counted down the seconds.
"6…5…4…3…ah, Filch, you're early I see," Dumbledore said spotting Filch running towards them. The Marauders quickly stood up and tried to look as innocent as possible.
"Headmaster," Filch said, taking deep breaths of air, "Those four are in trouble for running in the corridors and endangering the life of Mrs. Norris while they were running." Dumbledore nodded sadly.
"I'm very sorry about Mrs. Norris, Filch, but these four boys were about to tell me something very important or else they wouldn't have been running," Dumbledore said pointing at the boys. "I shall talk to them in my office and then assign them a fitting punishment." Filch's face turned a dark red. He was disappointed to not be able to punish them and left the Headmaster to them, muttering about how the 'fitting punishment' wouldn't be harsh enough.
"Now boys," Dumbledore said, looking at the marauders, "I suggest we go up and talk about what is bothering you." They nodded and quickly followed Dumbledore into his office.
Dumbledore listened carefully to what the boys said. He nodded his head and thought about the situation. "Did you see anyone?" The marauders shook their head.
"No sir, Remus had just finished saying he had a bad feeling when we heard the loud noise." Dumbledore nodded and dismissed them. The marauders let out an audible sight and started to leave.
"Oh yes, your punishment. 10 points each from Gryffindor for skipping the feast and an additional 5 for almost harming Mrs. Norris." The Marauders almost died right there. Dumbledore smiled at them, "But 20 points each for informing me of the death eater attack. Good job boys." Sirius and James smirked happily and skipped the rest of the way out of the office happily. Remus and Peter followed, unable to believe that the two even knew how to skip.
The boys ended up skipping down to the kitchens were the house elves served them what was left of the feast. House elves, James said, were the best thing since Lily Evans.
Later that night, while the boys were in bed, they started talking about what happened.
"I wonder if Dumbledore will close off that passageway now," Sirius said sadly.
"Well if he does, then we know it was because he thinks more students know and he doesn't trust us to not go again."
"I wonder why he didn't question how we found out about the place," Peter asked curiously. Remus smiled happily.
"I think it's because of who we are. We are the Marauders of Hogwarts. There have been many occasions were Dumbledore has laughed at the pranks we've pulled and remember the time he gave you two house points for when we dared the two of you to strip during breakfast?" The marauders laughed for a moment at the memory. "He knows that darker times are just around the corner with these Death Eaters and Voldemort running around. He wants it to remain a mystery how we know everything about the school." James and Sirius smiled.
"How thoughtful of you to say that Remus. I hope that's what it is too," James said as he closed his eyes to sleep. Remus and Sirius were the only ones up. Sirius hopped off of his bed and walked over to Remus. Plopping on Remus' bed, he sat there staring at Remus. Remus stared back. The two just stared at each other. Sweat started collecting on Sirius' forehead. Remus just sat there. Sirius wiped away the sweat and then felt his eyes start to twitch. He was going to break soon. Remus smirked as he realized this.
"No!" Sirius cried as he finally blinked. Remus laughed at Sirius and pulled out a sheet of paper.
"Remus: 10. Sirius: 0," Remus said happily. Sirius pouted and crawled closer to Remus. Sirius smirked as he reached to the edge of the bed and slipped out a small box. Remus' eyes went wide. "Sirius, you steal that and it could very well be dangerous to our relationship and your life." Sirius smiled even more and opened it up.
"Oh the variety of chocolate never ends does it?" Inside of the dark, chocolate coloured box was chocolate of almost every kind. The box was enchanted to stay cool inside so that the chocolate would never melt. Remus gritted his teeth together as Sirius pulled out a piece of dark chocolate, inside was a cherry, Remus could almost smell it. Sirius smiled more and began teasing Remus.
"Does Moony want the chocolate?" Sirius teased as he brought the chocolate closer, then farther away from Remus' face. Remus tried to grab for it. How dare he tease him with dark chocolate! It just wasn't right. Sirius looked at the chocolate and started talking to it. "You know my dear chocolate covered cherry, I would eat you my self, but I'm sorry to say that Remus means more to me than you do, so I must hand you over." Now he started imitating the chocolate. "But Sirius, I love you!" Sirius nodded sadly, "And I you, but as I said, Remus is better than you." Sirius began fake sobs and handed the chocolate over to Remus.
"Thank you Sirius, and thank you chocolate for putting up with him."
"Your welcome, Remus," Sirius said, talking for the chocolate again. Remus grabbed his box and set the chocolate back in.
"This Sirius is for special occasions only. You can have one around Halloween…" Sirius smiled happily.
"Yep, been happily together for one whole year!" Remus smiled.
"Surprised you remembered. Usually you never even remember the month when you were with the girls," Remus teased. Sirius stuck out his tongue in revulsion.
"There were all girls. You are Remus. And Remus means a lot more than those girls did," Sirius said leaning in and placing a kiss on Remus' forehead. Remus smiled happily.
"Good. But now we need to sleep Sirius. Sleep is needed because tomorrow we have classes." Sirius nodded and waited for Remus to be comfortable before he got into Remus' bed as well.
"SIRIUS! WHAT IF PROFESSOR MCGONAGALL FINDS OUT!" Remus yelled. Sirius quickly silenced him with another kiss.
"It's okay Remus, just for tonight." Remus looked at him sceptically. "I'll keep my hands to myself too." Remus laughed and decided that if it were just for one night then it would be okay.
On the way down to breakfast, Sirius, James, Remus, and Peter felt like leaving a small present for Dumbledore as a thank you. On the way to his office, the marauders heard Dumbledore arguing with someone.
"I'm sorry Tom," Dumbledore said to a dark-haired man.
"Hey, he's pretty cute," Sirius, said off hand. Remus growled lowly and Sirius blushed. "But I love you forever Remus, don't worry." The marauders continued spying.
"I'm recognized as-"
"I know Tom, but you'll always be known as Tom to me and every teacher in this school. But I can't give you the Defence Job. There is already another teacher here this year. She is looking forward to it as well." Tom looked at him evilly.
"Well, we'll see if she can even last one year at this school," Tom said before leaving. Dumbledore shook his head and walked back up to his office. The marauders watched the two fascinated.
"What was that about?" James asked as the group hurried down to the Great Hall. The others shrugged and quickly sat down at the table. Lily looked at them, eyes squinted, as she got up and walked over to them, hands on her waist.
"Where were you four last night," She questioned. James looked at Lily nervously. Peter quickly spoke up.
"We were really tired, plotting all the day you understand, and so we just went to bed," Peter said, trying not to sweat under Lily's piercing gaze. She stared him down for about one minute before she believed him.
"Okay, but if you four ever disappear like that again, I'll come looking for you myself," Lily said as she walked back to her seat. Peter let out a long slow breath.
"That was close," James whispered. Sirius shrugged it off and leaned into the kiss Remus when….
"Mr. Black, please refrain from snogging Mr. Lupin at the table," McGonagall said, handing them their class schedules. "Not everyone wants to throw up after watching you two engage in your activities." James and Peter snickered at Remus' blushing face and Sirius' death glare. The group looked down at their schedules, double potions first thing.
"Well, it could be worse. He's not that bad of a professor," Lily said as she joined the group.
"Well, maybe he likes you more Miss Slugclub member," Sirius teased. "I mean," he continued, "Remus isn't in it either and he's just as good of a student, no, a better student then you." Remus blushed and muttered that he and Lily were equally good students.
"Oh please Sirius, you just saying that so you can continue sleeping with Remus," Lily retorted. James and Peter burst out laughing as the five of them entered the potions classroom.
During lunch, The Daily Prophet arrived. Lily looked through hers, scanning for more death eater attacks. Her eyes fell on one article and her mouth dropped. "J-James…." James looked up from his food to see Lily's eyes start to tear.
"Lily, what's wrong?" Lily quickly handed the paper to James. The group quickly looked down to see a picture of the dark mark looming above a large house. The headlines read:
Eight Potters Killed In Death Eater Attack
James looked down and saw two of his aunts and uncles and his grandparents names looking up at him. James quickly got up and started for the door.
"James!" Remus yelled as he also took off after him. Peter, Sirius, and Lily stayed behind to finish the article and gather James' items.
"James," Remus said catching up with him at the Owlery. James turned to Remus with teary eyes. This shocked Remus, he had never seen James cry before. James was the leader of the marauders!
"Remus," James croaked. James sank to his knees and covered his face with his eyes. Remus knelt besides James and wrapped his arms around him.
"James, it's okay, really," Remus tried to say. James leaned into him and cried more. Remus held him close and soon found that he was crying as well.
There. I figured that that was enough pain to put them through for one chapter. I hope you are all happy that I've updated as well. Three chapters is a lot… even though chapter ten was an itty bitty chappie… oh well.
Now, I've got a plan that this whole thing will be in three parts. A trilogy if you will. Them leaving school will be the last chapter. Next story will be them up to the death of James and Lily Potter. Last part will be up to the sixth book. I might end up bringing Sirius back. Need to think of how though. It'll be hard. Very, very hard so I'd love some feed back from you all! If you want me to respond to you though, you'll all have to go to my live journal. Sorry. I'm sure you've all heard about us not being allowed to respond anymore. If not, see me at live journal, 'till then, I'll TRY to update this and 'Heart of Ice'. That is being just evil to me. .