Part 2: The Plan
At exactly eleven forty-five all three Ravenclaw girls and Rey were in position. Margot and Rosemary were waiting in the old, dusty ballroom on the fourth floor. Rey was patrolling by the staircase at the end of the corridor. While Nell sat by the portrait of the Four Knights awaiting the arrival of Sirius Black.
"Once again my role is to be the bait…" Nell murmured clicking her shoes together quietly.
The plan was quite simple really. Nell would wait by the meeting place until Black arrived with his gang of dingbats and lead them into the nearby ballroom where Rosemary and Margot were waiting with wands ready and a whole lot of dung bombs and slime pellets. Nothing too bad really, just a little something to show the boys they were indeed barking up with wrong tree.
"What do they care if we took some stupid boomslang, anyways?" Nell said quietly to herself. The whole letter seemed suspicious. And she had never really properly met these boys but everything she had ever heard about the Marauders led her to believe this was a matter of more than just some stolen boomslang.
CLANGITY CLANG!
Nell jumped up from her spot and looked around. The noise had come from the direction of the ballroom.
"Shit!" She exclaimed under her breath and began running towards the ballroom. She continued gaining speed until she turned a corner and found herself in pitch black corridor. She continued to jog in what was hopefully the forward direction until suddenly she crashed into something.
"Aghhh!" She crumpled onto the floor.
"Ooof…" breathed a voice on the ground next to her. Perhaps the something was actually a someone?
Nell sat up and whipped out her wand, "Lumos!"
Sitting in across from her was a familiar boy. A year or two older than her perhaps, with dark brown eyes and shaggy brown hair. She'd definitely seen him before but she couldn't determine where exactly at such a time.
"What are you doing?" She demanded.
"Oh I was just passing through," he raised his eyebrows at her. "What are you doing here? It's quite late, isn't it?"
"Nothing," Nell said nervously. Was he about to bust her and her friends? She had to think fast. "I'm just… just sleepwalking! It's an anxiety thing. Terrible nightmares and all that. I get this recurring dream that I'm being chased by a humongous fire-breathing purple dragon and I have to keep running or else she'll burn me into crisps. And so I really do! So it's more like sleep running actually, I suppose."
"Umm, what-?" the boy laughed as though he wasn't expecting such an intricate response. Nell rolled her eyes- how could she be so daft? Clearly this person carried no authority whatsoever. Who was this boy anyway?
"Who are you?" She demanded.
"Remus," he said extended his hand for her to shake. She looked at him and furrowed her eyebrows together in confusion. He awkwardly dropped his hand back to his side, "A-and who are you?"
"Nell."
They stared at each other for a moment. Nell was confused. But that wasn't too out of the ordinary. Nell was known for having a bit of a cluttered mind. When it came to remembering things like names and faces she was absolute toast. Remus on the other hand just seemed to be holding back a shy smile.
Remus started to fill the awkward silence between them, saying "You know you look quite familiar, I-"
"You!" Nell yelled pointing a finger in Remus's face. It took her a moment to remember why she was here in the first place, but now she finally understood what was going on. "You're one of them!"
"One of who-" Remus began to ask, but Nell was already up and running towards the ballroom once again, this time her path illuminated by the tip of her wand.
She turned and noticed that Remus was only a few steps behind her, "Don't follow me you… you dingbat!"
"Excuse me?!" He laughed, running after her.
Nell ran up to the door of the ballroom. She pulled with all of her strength only to find that it had been locked. Remus appeared next to her.
"Need some help?" he smiled, slightly out of breath.
"No!" Exclaimed Nell, pointing her wand at the lock. "Alohomora!"
A quiet clicking noise came from the lock. She pulled on the door a moment later and it opened with ease. Nell bounded inside the room and Remus followed. Inside was Margot and Rosemary sitting in a circle on the ground alongside Sirius Black and another dark haired boy.
"Oh good, we're all here now!" said Sirius Black, grinning mischievously.
"Huh?" Nell was out of breath and more lost than ever.
"Nell," Margot stood up and walked over to her. "Don't worry, the plan's off. They're cool."
"Yeah, by the time we got here these two were already waiting in the dark with their own bag of slime pellets," Rosemary laughed.
"Merely a backup plan! We figured you'd be interested in what we have to say but you can never be too careful!" Sirius said excitedly.
"I… I-what?" Nell shook her head, begging her friends for an explanation.
"Remus was just coming to find you," said the other boy. He had messy black hair and large circular glasses. He also looked vaguely familiar. "I'm James by the way! James Potter!"
"That quidditch bloke?" Nell asked.
"Oh, sure," said James, seeming as though it was not the first time he'd been be referred to as 'the quidditch bloke'.
"Join us!" Sirius yelled.
Remus walked past Nell, looking back towards her with wide eyes. He took a seat between Rosemary and James.
"Wait," Nell began walking forward. "Rey?"
"Oh he's fine," Margot said.
"But-"
"We have a Rey too!" James smiled. "His name's Peter though."
"Sit!" Margot patted the ground next to her.
Nell sat.
"Alright now that we're all settled, I'll continue," Sirius looked around the circle of faces. "We are the Marauders, as I'm sure you all know. And we've asked you girls to meet us here… because we need your help."
Nell narrowed her eyes. They needed help? What about the boomslang skin?
"We apologize for luring you here under false pretences, but this is a serious matter that could only be spoken of in absolute secrecy," Sirius continued. He spoke as though he was trying to sound serious whilst holding back contagious laughter. He exuded a strange energy that was both fascinating and terrifying to Nell. She could almost feel the excitement radiating off of him as she devoted to him her full attention. "You see we are at war with the Slytherins- this is not news. However, it seems that over the last few days they have stolen some very important items from us."
"Four very important items, to be exact," James chirped.
"Yes four items," continued Sirius. "And they've hidden them at various locations around the castle. And believe me we have searched and searched…"
"And searched," Remus rolled his eyes.
"And we've found nothing!" Sirius yelled. He stood up and began pacing the room. "And then yesterday we received this-" he pulled a small rolled up paper from his pocket and tossed it to Margot.
Margot unrolled the paper and began to read, "'Dearest Marauders, our sources tell us that you've been doing some treasure hunting throughout the past few evenings. What all that is about we truly have no idea, but we thought we might make a small suggestion. Perhaps if the four of you were as girlish as you look you'd have better luck finding what you've lost. Best, S.' S? Like S for Slytherin?"
"Snape," James snapped.
"Yes Severus Snape. Our most beloved enemy," Sirius continued. "It seems that he and his cronies have stolen one item from each myself, James, Remus and Peter and hidden them in one of the girls dormitories. My guess is all of the girls dormitories."
"And we're not just talking small items," James exclaimed, his eyes wide with frustration. "They stole my broom for godsakes!"
"And the extra credit papers I've been working on for Professor McGonagall all year," Remus shook his head morosely.
"And the keys to my motorbike and Peter's yarn!" Sirius shouted. His long, wavy black hair framed a very handsome face that was now as bright and red as a tomato.
"Yarn?" Rosemary asked.
"He's been working on a sweater," James explained. "It's quite nice actually…"
"It does matter what they took!" Sirius yelled. "All that matters is that we get our things back! And so that's where you ladies come in."
Margot stood up to speak to Sirius face to face, "So you want us to help you find your things by breaking into the other girls common rooms?"
"Exactly right, Miss Lusk-Stroud!" Sirius walked over to her and put an arm around her shoulder. "You see the lovely Hogwarts founders designed our school so that it is impossible for male students to enter a female room- trust me I have tried. Therefore, we've decided it's absolutely necessary to enlist some female friends. And our sources tell us that you three are the best and brightest in the school… and that you've got a penchant for a bit of reckless fun…"
Margot scooted out from his arm, "Well you're on the nose about us being bright!" She sat back down on the floor.
"We heard that you managed to convince Professor Slughorn to stop classes for a whole week by convincing him that his chalkboard was cursed," James smiled.
"True!" chirped Rosemary.
"And the case of the mysterious floating turkey legs that we were blamed for last month- that was all of you, was it not?" Remus laughed.
"Guilty," Nell smiled back.
"And we've spoken to our other female friends about this at length and all of them say that if there's any group of gals who could do the job, its you lot," Sirius sat back down.
Nell, Margot and Rosemary all looked at each other silently, trying to read each other's minds- something they often attempted but usually failed.
"Wait!" Nell yelled. "What about Rey?"
Sirius chuckled, "Oh right, sure and the forth."
Nell sighed, she looked over at the other two again who were smiling mischievously- as though they had already decided the moment that Sirius began talking and now they were simply waiting for Nell's approval.
"I-I guess we could help," Nell shrugged, already feeling the tinge of regret in her stomach.
"Excellent!" Sirius jumped up once again. "Then tomorrow we shall meet again, same time, same place. And the plans will commence the day after and -"
"Wait-" Nell stopped him, looking over at the girls again. "What's in this for us?"
Sirius smiled, "Of course! Your repayment, how could I forget!" he looked over at James.
"Let's just say that we have access to a mechanism of pure invisibility," James started. "And we are willing to offer you three uses of this very valuable tool, should you bring us all four items. That's three! Three days of absolute invisibility to use at your disposal."
Invisibility? That could be useful in a place like Hogwarts. Margot had often said she wished she could configure a way to traipse the castle without ever being seen. Nell looked over to Margot and Rosemary who looked like they might burst with excitement.
"We're in!" Margot said happily. And they indeed were in.