When James slipped Sirius a dose of Felix Felicis, he didn't expect the next words to come out of Sirius' mouth, immediately after consuming the spiked Pumpkin Juice, to be: "Maybe we should rebel against the crown? That would make our day less boring."

James was hit with the immediate thought to slip the man a large dose of sleeping potion and hope he would only wake next week. He was certainly not bored enough to do that.

"What do you mean? Remus is the crown. He'll be very upset if he knew you were the one starting a rebellion against him," James argued, quickly trying to figure out who he could get some sleeping potion off. Lily was an option, but by the time she chewed him out, Sirius would probably already be halfway through sieging the Gryffindor castle.

"Well, it won't be him exactly, but some of the rules and laws. Don't worry, Prongs, I have a good feeling about this." Sirius's frivolous reply made James wonder if he should accept the assignment to infiltrate Slytherin land for the day. He was surely going to regret this, but then again, it was Felix Felicis that was guiding Sirius for the next 24 hours.

Surely nothing terrible would happen, because that would be bad luck, right?

Nodding to himself, James turned to Sirius, "What's the plan, then?"

"No idea, but it'll all work out in the end. Let's go to Diagon Alley!"

...oOo...

James was dumbfounded when they bumped into Regulus, who didn't immediately curse Sirius, but instead they agreed to 'catch up' over lunch. Regulus had Barty finish whatever business he had come to Diagon Alley for and meet them at the Leaky Cauldron afterwards.

The Leaky Cauldron was bustling. Severus disappeared for a few minutes to ask for a private room while Regulus and Sirius were already deep in their conversation over organising some Slytherins into Gryffindor territory to stage a fake rebellion on the crown, with the hope of a later truce.

Severus and James exchanged the obligatory glares every once in a while as they caught each other's speechless expression at the Black brothers' conversation.

If the Gryffindor-Slytherin feud had been this easy to solve, surely it would have been tried decades ago?

It was barely midday and James wondered if he was somehow in some strange dream. Maybe someone had slipped something into his firewhisky the night before? It seemed far more likely that what he was witnessing.

Regulus finally agreed to meet Sirius at the border at sundown with a reasonable large group of knights. He would warn the Slytherin knights to limit the damage as much as possible, and Sirius and James would help provide the resources to make the attack look large and showy.

"I'm surprised you've agreed to this, James," Regulus commented eventually.

"I'm surprised Sirius hasn't been cursed three ways into next week already," James replied. "It's just been a very surprising day. I'm not entirely sure what's going on any more except that I'm probably going to be in a lot of trouble when all of this is over."

James was tempted to tell them that he had slipped Sirius Felix Felicis, but eventually decided against it. While Felix Felicis wasn't exactly banned but the situation was serious and could be used to the wrong person's advantage. Not that Regulus was exactly the wrong person, but he was the future Slytherin crown.

"Alright, we'll meet you at sundown, then," Sirius exclaimed. "We have to go now. Come on, James."

James was barely able to get a word in before Sirius had dragged him out the door and out of the Leaky Cauldron.

"Where to next?" James asked, not sure he wanted to be shocked before or during whatever happened next.

...oOo...

"Remus," Sirius declared entering the man's study, "we're staging a rebellion."

Remus sighed. "Who is this 'we'? And how much of a mess are you going to leave? We still haven't sorted out the scuffle you had with the Ravenclaws not too long ago. Not to mention the Slytherins haven't been particularly happy with you swearing your loyalty to me."

James looked at Remus' tired face and wondered how long it was going to take for Sirius to realise that not everyone would be this willing to clean up his messes for as long as Remus had. Even he would probably not allow Sirius anywhere near the other territories after the incident with Marlene, the Hufflepuff Matriarch.

"James and I, of course," Sirius replied. "And we're not going to leave any mess. It's going to help you this time."

James wondered how Remus didn't realise how Sirius went out of his way to keep Remus' attention through terrible ideas.

Remus sighed again. "I'd like to sleep some time this week, if you don't mind."

"Of course, but eat first!"

James did not know when Sirius had picked up the food, but he was placing a decent lunch in front of Remus, who looked understandably surprised.

"There are two parts for the agreement: one, a truce with the Slytherins; two: your hand in marriage—" Sirius started.

Remus immediately spat out the pumpkin juice he had just taken a sip of.

"What?"

James wondered if he had somehow missed that part of the discussion in the Leaky Cauldron.

"—Regulus already agreed to convince the current Slytherin Monarch to a truce with Gryffindor, and he'll meet us at the border if we agree, or we'll stage the rebellion if we don't." Sirius continued despite James and Remus' flabbergasted expressions.

"This is not something to joke about, Sirius," Remus interrupted.

Sirius nodded. "I would never joke about something like this. Regulus thought that it would be more convincing if you married someone from Slytherin, and I could technically fill that requirement, even if I had never sworn my loyalty to the Slytherin Crown."

James choked. If this worked...

"So you planned all of this, just to ask me to marry you?" Remus chuckled. "You definitely didn't have to go through all that effort, but the truce would be welcome nevertheless."

... James was definitely going to dose himself with Felix Felicis when he asked someone to marry him.


Written for: [1039 wirds]

Veterinary Sciences: Task #3: Potbelly Pig - write about someone ingesting Felix Felicis and the aftermath/following results.

Would you rather: Write about Mutual Pining or Unrequited Love?

Fantasy February: Dialogue: "Maybe we should rebel against the crown? That would make our day less boring."