The Girl in the Mirror
The rest of February passed without a word from Mundungus, and James tried to quell his restlessness by focusing on his studies. Arithmancy was as complex as always, and he often had trouble understanding what Professor Vector was talking about during her lectures. Fortunately, he had always had a good mind for Transfiguration, which relied heavily on Arithmancy, and James was able to keep afloat in Vector's class without having to work too hard on the homework, which suited him just fine.
As March drew on, James began to grow more and more agitated with Mundungus' silence. He even sent Hardwin out to find the wizard a couple of different times, asking for a report on his progress, but his Screech owl returned each instance with a concise note urging James to be patient. His restlessness was becoming quite evident to Sirius and Peter, and even Remus sensed something amiss with James' continual distraction. During his class periods, James would often blank out when asked a question by a professor, and his wandering mind finally caused him the loss of a few House points when Professor Merryweather could take it no longer.
"Shame on you, Potter! You should at least try to engage with the class!" she chastised him, rapping him lightly on the head with her wand. Turning to the rest of the students, she announced, "As for the rest of you, who can name the most common household pets for Muggles?"
Leaning over from the neighboring desk, Sirius whispered to James, "Are you all right there, mate?"
"I'm fine," James sighed, putting his head in his hands. "Just tired."
"Well, I hope you're not too tired for our outing tomorrow," he answered, leaning back to put his feet on the desk.
"What outing?" James asked.
"Your birthday outing, of course," Sirius explained, and James sat up. He had almost forgotten that his birthday was the next day.
"But we have classes tomorrow," James pointed out.
"And why would that stop us from celebrating?" Sirius questioned, throwing him a grin. "But don't worry. We're going out after dark."
Although still full of questions, James did not ask him anything else as Professor Merryweather turned back around to pace the other way, and Peter shot a quick, searching glance between James and Sirius before returning to his textbook. Sirius did not mention James' birthday surprise again, and James knew better than to bring it up in front of their other roommates, knowing that it would cause objections and pleas for inclusion in what appeared to be an unlawful, risky endeavor. Remus, however, left their dormitory before the evening, having prepared to disappear for a couple of days. At his melancholy expression when he gave James an early bag of Chocolate Frogs, James wished even more urgently that Mundungus would contact them, but he was grateful to have a reason to forget about the wizard's silence the following day.
When he woke up the next morning, Sirius and Peter joined him on his four-poster and presented him with a few different treats, which were shared amongst the group as an early-morning snack. Later that afternoon, Frank and Dill wished James well on the way out of Gryffindor Tower, and Diggle waved at him from across the common room.
"Happy birthday, James!" he called out as he passed. Snorting at the tiny first-year, Sirius shook his head.
"How would he even know about your birthday?" he questioned aloud, interrupting the others as they perused their textbooks in the neighboring armchairs.
Smirking, James reached onto his lap and rubbed Mussmug's ashy head. "When you're a Quidditch sensation, word gets around! I reckon that nearly everyone in our House knows."
"I suppose," Sirius agreed distractedly, and he did not see James' glance towards the opposite end of the room. Seemingly oblivious to his presence, Lily was sitting on a velvety armchair with Alice next to her, her back to James; unlike the whole of Gryffindor, she had not bothered to congratulate him, if she even knew about the importance of the day.
"Hey Peter," James suddenly said, "could you get rid of Newshod for me?"
Jumping, Peter tilted his head. "Why?"
"I just need you to distract her for a few minutes," James replied, and Sirius turned and narrowed his eyes at him.
"But how?" Peter objected. "I don't know what to do!"
"Just get her to think that you lost your pet or something," James said.
"But I don't have a—"
"Come on, Peter, I don't have all day!" James commanded, picking Mussmug up by the scruff of her neck and flinging her over to Peter.
Instantly wide awake, the cat hissed in midair before landing on all fours, glaring at Peter as if he was a small lunch. Gulping, Peter stared back at her yellow eyes until Mussmug sped off down the common room, nearly tripping Kaitlyn Fulbright as she danced aside to dodge the speeding gray blur. Getting up, Peter bounced over to Lily and Alice, where he began to engage the latter in conversation with frequent gestures towards Mussmug's hiding place under the carpet.
"She'll see right through it, you know," Sirius spoke up, not meeting James' eyes as he sent a jet of red sparks shooting from the end of his wand.
"Not until I get to her!" James countered, rubbing a hand through his hair before getting up. Across the room, Peter and Alice started for the back wall as Lily watched them from her seat.
"I'll return in a bit!" James announced, marching off. Leaving Sirius behind, he did not stop until he stood a few paces in front of Lily, who glanced up at him only to drop her eyes to her book a moment later as if she had not seen him.
"Good day, Evans!" James spoke, raising a hand. Closing her eyes, Lily slowly looked up again as he adjusted his glasses.
"Wonderful to see you, Potter," she answered evenly. "I almost missed you there between your prancing walk and Pettigrew's mysterious vanishment."
"Do you know what today is?" James questioned her, rocking on his heels, and she tilted her head.
"Oh, isn't today when we were supposed to turn in our Astronomy essays? I nearly forgot—the coinciding of Halley's and Neptune's orbits almost did me in."
"Er . . . that's not exactly what I meant," James corrected, but he did a double-take when a small smile crossed Lily's face. "Evans, you nearly had me there!" he exclaimed, and Lily's smirk promptly vanished. "You must know that it's my birthday today!"
"Oh, is it?" Lily inquired, her blank expression betraying her disinterest.
"Yep!" James responded, grinning as he stopped rotating on his heels. "Fifteen years old today!"
"Aren't we all blessed."
His face falling, James pursed his lips. "Well, aren't you going to wish me a happy birthday, Evans? It's traditional, you know."
"Oh, is that what you want?" she asked. "I don't really see why you need it, seeing as the day's already half-over."
"But it wouldn't be complete without a birthday wish from you!" James insisted. "Come on, Evans, don't be stubborn! Humor me for a moment!"
"All right, if it'll make you leave me alone," Lily sighed, turning away. "Have a happy birthday, Potter."
"Thanks, Evans!" James told her, and he turned around to flash a thumbs-up at Sirius, who promptly faced away. Looking back at Lily, James asked, "Now what do you say if I take you down by the lake?"
"Sit on it, Potter!" Before James could reply, Lily glanced to the side and raised an eyebrow. "And you might want to save Lupin's cat before it leaps out of the window."
Spinning around, James caught sight of Mussmug standing on the edge of a windowsill, yowling as Peter and Alice tried to coax her down. Deciding to intervene before the animal could take a terrible fall, James left Lily in a rush and jumped in to help Peter, finally managing to snatch Mussmug from harm's way with a Summoning Spell.
A few hours later, the sun had fallen low over the horizon, and Sirius pulled James away from Peter under the pretense of finding a book from the library at the last minute. As they left Gryffindor Tower through the Fat Lady's portrait, Sirius turned to James with a smirk.
"Peter will know that we lied soon, but it'll be too late to stop us by then," he said as he led the way down the winding stairs.
"So what are we doing?" James prodded.
"I've been itching to take a ride on the motorbike ever since Mundungus brought it here, so I'm treating you to a midnight flight over the Forbidden Forest," he answered. When James grinned, he added, "Who knows? We might even find a place to practice our Self-Transfiguration."
"You're a wonder, Sirius!" James praised, but he frowned a moment later. "We can remove the sidecar, right?"
Giving a bark-like laugh, Sirius answered, "Don't worry, you won't have to use it."
Relaxing, James joined his friend on the winding journey to the third floor, being careful to avoid detection as they went. Thankfully, no one appeared to be in their direction of travel, and the boys walked without fear through the weaving corridors. However, when passing a line of marble busts on the second level, James spotted a flashy blur of bright orange dash from one stone head to the next out of the corner of his eye, and he whipped his line of sight to the side just as a blood-curdling scream ripped through the air.
"LOOK OUT BELOW!"
Yelling out, James and Sirius covered their heads as Peeves the Poltergeist suddenly flew upwards from behind a nearby bust and pelted them with spitballs. Throwing the leering poltergeist a dirty glance when he had finally run out of arsenal, Sirius raised his wand above his head and waved it to catch Peeves' attention.
"Get lost, Peeves!"
"I'm never lost," Peeves giggled back, twirling on his toes in midair. "But you are about to be very lost! Yes, yes, very lost indeed!"
"What do you mean by—" James began, but his words were soon cut off by the slamming of several doors along the hall.
"I hope you know your way around the castle!" Peeves cackled, pointing to a single open door behind the boys. Highlighted in heart-stopping detail against the pale light on the other side, a hunched silhouette of a man stepped into view of the corridor.
"The chase begins now!" Peeves cried as James' heart quickened, and the poltergeist swooped off towards the distant figure, who broke into the familiar, awkward gallop of Filch at the sight of the students.
"WATCH OUT!" Peeves yelled.
Not waiting to watch as Peeves attacked the caretaker with a bent-up spitball shooter, James and Sirius turned tail and sped as fast as they could towards the other end of the hall. Ramming against the farthest door, James jiggled the knob fruitlessly before drawing his wand.
"Alohomora!" he commanded, and the spell took effect just as Filch broke free from Peeves' distraction. With a bellow, the caretaker rushed towards the boys as they slipped through the door and immediately faced a flight of stairs. Without a second thought, they slammed the door behind them and started jumping up the stairs two steps at a time.
About halfway up the steps, James heard the door open again as Filch came barreling through, shouting threats between gasps of air. Wondering how much longer he would be able to run, James leapt over the top and ran down another hallway with Sirius, this one littered with paintings of pompous-looking old men, who all jolted awake as the boys raced past.
"Hey, what's the ruckus for?" one of the portraits called out, and another one answered him from across the room.
"Students out of bed, looks like."
"Well, it serves them right if they get caught!"
"Aw, leave them alone! You remember what it was like when you were young!"
Reaching the end of the corridor, James jerked open the door, but he stopped just in time to stop himself from running straight into a brick wall on the other side.
"Are you kidding me?" Sirius demanded as James put his hand to the wall and tried to push through. "I know that Hogwarts is balmy, but this is just unfair!"
Backing away from the doorway, James and Sirius looked around for another escape, but all they could see were the portraits staring at them from the walls. Heart falling, James realized that there was no way to escape another detention, and he glanced back at Sirius just as a voice broke through the silence.
"Psst!"
Spinning around, James and Sirius stared at one of the frames on the wall with wide eyes, seeing a young girl for the first time. James thought that she looked about his age, and she beckoned at the boys with a welcoming smile. When they each took a step forward, she giggled and twirled away, her blonde hair vanishing from her frame.
"Hey, wait!" James called out, and he and Sirius ran to her portrait only to stop suddenly. Instead of the young girl, they had come face-to-face with themselves, and James realized that he had mistaken the mirror for a painting. Behind them, James heard the pounding feet of Filch come striding closer, and he turned around to glance at the top of the stairs as an old wizard in a nearby portrait puffed on his pipe.
"Well?" the man asked in a raspy voice. "Get going, or you'll be caught!"
Turning away from the other portraits as they all watched, James pulled on the side of the mirror and jumped into an opening on the other side. Following a hand-breadth away, Sirius landed on the solid ground beneath them and yanked the mirror shut with a clatter before Filch could appear.
"Come on!" Sirius urged, pushing past James and lighting his wand. "Filch will be scouring the room after he finds out that it's a dead end! We've got to keep moving!"
Without a word of complaint, James lit his wand as well and pattered after his roommate, who hopped down a slow-moving slope. However, the lights from both of their wands soon became somewhat of a formality, because the passageway was inexplicably well-lit of its own accord. Warm and soft, the faint yellowness of the tunnel guided the boys forward with plenty of room between the two of them. As they went on, the corridor grew even more spacious, and James and Sirius eventually put away their wands completely.
After several minutes, the tunnel finally exploded into an echoey room much like a cave, and James finally spotted a light source in the form of several flickering torches lining the circular cavern. Taking in the sheer magnitude of the space, James guessed that it might be able to hold Hagrid's hut at its highest point, and possibly several more cabins spaced along the empty floor. However, the most surprising aspect of the cavern was the blue flames held by the torches, which gave the room a far chillier feel than the previous passageways.
"Is anybody here?" James asked aloud, even though the cavern offered a flat, unobstructed view from all sides. Wondering how long the torches had been flickering, he stepped forward while Sirius glanced back over his shoulder.
"I reckon that Filch would have found us by now if he knew of the tunnel."
"Do you think that anyone knows?" James responded. "Who was that girl in the mirror?"
"I don't know," Sirius replied, a grin slowly forming as he stared around the room, "but I think we just found it!"
"Found what?"
"Where we become Animagi!"
Spinning around, James shot upright and grabbed his hair with one hand. "Merlin's pants, you're right! We've done it!"
"I've never even been to that portrait hall before," Sirius exclaimed, "but whoever that girl was, we owe her, big-time! Just wait until we tell Peter!"
"This place is almost big enough to hold all of Gryffindor House!" James said. "It'll be perfect for when we actually become Animagi! I've always wondered if I might turn into a rhinoceros."
"You?" Sirius scoffed, walking deeper into the cavern. "I think that a goldfish is more likely." Coming to a halt before James could retort, he bent down on the far end of the room and stared at the floor. "Oi, there's an opening here! I think that the passage continues!"
Standing by his side, James glanced down into the circular hole, narrowing his eyes at the dark vortex. "Where do you suppose it goes?"
"There's only one way to find out," Sirius answered, and he shoved his wand into his robes.
"Wait, shouldn't we drop something down there first?" James questioned. "It might go on forever. I can't see a thing!"
"All right," Sirius agreed, and James rummaged around in his pocket before finding a leftover Chocolate Frog package from a few days prior. Tossing it into the hole, he listened as it clattered against solid ground after a matter of seconds. Shrugging, he turned to Sirius.
"I guess I'll go first," James offered, and he dangled his legs through the opening before dropping himself.
Prepared to land feet-first, he gave out a short yelp as his heels hit the floor at an angle and slipped out from under him, and he dug his hands into the walls on either side of him as he sped down at an alarming rate. Almost falling steeply enough so that his body remained upright, James twirled in increasingly tighter circles as he clawed at the walls, and he ended up yelling most of the way down due to the shock of the journey and the pain of having his hands grate against the rough stone.
Finally, after a minute of rapid spinning that left his head reeling, James skidded to a stop at the bottom of the tunnel, and he laid with his back against the ground for a moment to catch his breath. His heart was still racing, but he lifted his head and glanced around; he was able to see his surroundings quite clearly from several shining slits in the low ceiling. Frowning, he suspected that he had landed in an underground storage room, judging from the yellow glow coming from the wooden slats overhead and the sparsely placed barrels in front of him.
Eventually, a muffled voice from behind made him turn back towards the hole that he had fallen out of. "James? James! James, are you there? Oof!"
James barely had time to react before Sirius popped out of the cylindrical passageway and plowed into him. Scrambling to a sitting position, Sirius began to push James away only to recognize him a few moments later, and he grinned sheepishly.
"There you are! You didn't answer when I called for you. Quite a ride, wasn't it?"
"Shh!" James demanded as a series of footsteps sounded from overhead, and he slapped his hand over Sirius' mouth while the pacing passed. Yanking James' hand away, Sirius shot him a glare and whispered harshly.
"I can hear too, you know!" he spat, but he soon quieted as the pair of feet crossed back in the other direction, more rapidly this time. Motioning for Sirius to follow, James started to crawl between the barrels with his eyes upturned, searching for a way to climb into the room above.
After a few moments, he stopped underneath a hinged square slab of wood, and he allowed Sirius to join him as he listened for the set of footsteps. Soon, they walked by again, but this time they headed away from the boys along the width of the storage room. Hearing the sound of a door opening, James held his breath as the light coming through the wooden floor flicked off, followed by the door closing and the turn of a key.
"I think it's clear now," Sirius spoke up, and he and James pushed on the trap door, letting a thin shower of dirt cascade onto their faces. Lifting himself up through the exit, James shook his head to knock the dirt off of his glasses and peered around. Less than an arm's length in front of him, a row of Firewhiskey bottles were lined up at the bottom of a cabinet.
"Where are we?" Sirius asked as he pushed his roommate out, and James stood after a cautious pause to get a better look at their surroundings.
"I—I think that we're in the Hog's Head," he replied, making no effort to hide his surprise. Standing up beside him, Sirius stared at the filthy floor.
"We certainly are," he agreed, lifting his eyebrow. "This is the last place I thought we would end up."
Positioned behind the bar's counter, the boys peered at the grimy windows in an attempt to spot the person who had just walked out, but the view from within provided no further clarity than from outside. "Why would there be a passage here from Hogwarts?" James questioned, but he cut himself off with a smirk. "Do you think that Professor Slughorn gets orders of mead delivered from here?"
"The passage seems like it was meant for a one-way trip," Sirius countered, glancing back down at the trap door.
Remembering the steep passageway, James nodded and kicked the trap door closed. "I guess there's no chance of getting back that way, but there's still the tunnel that leads to the Honeydukes cellar."
Hanging back as James marched out from behind the counter, Sirius peered at the bubbling bottles around him with a strange glint in his eye. "Do you think that the bartender will miss any of these?"
"We'd better not," James suggested. "Our footsteps might show in all this grime, and the bartender doesn't seem like the type of fellow to anger."
Deflating, Sirius joined his roommate as James opened the front door with an Unlocking Charm and glanced down the street to make sure that they were alone. As Sirius approached, however, James glanced back into the Hog's head and noticed a portrait hanging near the back corner. Recognizing the young girl who had saved them from Filch, he nodded and smiled, but she did not seem to notice him as she turned her vague smile in the other direction. Catching up to James, Sirius turned back and spotted her as well.
"There she is," Sirius pointed out, and the two boys backed reverently out of the door a moment later.
Guided by the brilliant full moon, they did not have to light their wands to avoid tripping on the cobblestones beneath their feet. As the two stole down to the main street of Hogsmeade, James thought that he could hear the forlorn sound of a howl far within the darkness, but his ears might have just as easily been playing tricks on him in the late hour.