Disclaimer: Anything you recognize from the HP books and/or movies is not mine.
A/N: Alright, another chapter! Uh, please read the author's note at the bottom for more information, and please read the 'Please read this' thing a bit down the page. It's IMPORTANT! I really don't want to get a bunch of reviews or emails asking me when I'm going to update if I haven't in a while. I mean, I don't mind them, it's just that if I get too many of them, I'll probably get annoyed. But I love you guys! I love getting your reviews, and I hope you guys are understanding. Anyways, on to the other stuff. -- Min
Thanks Ivory Black aka Torri-Chiobie, Angelic Bladez, Evil Cat Hater, larthawyn, wally4ever, The Insane Imortal Dragon, KeLpIeenoch, Black-rose23, quirkgrrl, Aprila, Bluefirestarlily, little mimi, ourlittlesecret7, LunaLovegoss, Alexia321, why do you wanna know?, hp fan!, K.K.Anderson, Katsheswims, rocknrollchck, and terra for the reviews!
PLEASE READ THIS! This story is going on hold for a while! Not for an extremely long time, just about a month or so. The reason: I wanted to work on my other story, Where are the Children. I hope you guys understand, and I know it wont be too bad. I've gone about a month or so without updating this story, and you guys are so wonderful that you wont complain -- too much I hope.
Seasons Change
By: xScenex
a.k.a. Min
Chapter 16
"Emily, it's so nice to see you again! And Harold!"
"Isabel, I'm glad to see you could make it. You look much better, I must say," Mr. Potter said while he moved aside, allowing Mrs. Lupin and her son, Remus, to step into the vast entrance hall of Potter Manor.
"Well, you know, time has passed and all."
"Thank you for allowing Remus to come over," Mrs. Potter smiled and led the other woman to the sitting room.
"No, I should thank you. Remus has been looking forward to coming over ever since I told him he could this morning. When I got home from the market he was practically jumping up and down, waiting for me to get ready."
The two women laughed lightly and the boy trailing her, who was the victim of their speech, blushed slightly, "I was not 'jumping up and down', I was just… moving around and trying to find everything."
"Dear, you just got home yesterday. You shouldn't have to find everything. Most of it was still packed up in your trunk."
Unable to respond to that, Remus shrugged and said, "Mrs. Potter, where can I find James and Sirius?"
"They're up in their rooms, Remus. I hardly know what they've been doing up there all day, and I don't intend to find out. No doubt it's some new prank of theirs. Peter should be over within the next hour."
The werewolf smiled and nodded, excusing himself from the women's presence. He walked through the halls and up a flight of stairs until he reached the landing where James and Sirius' rooms lay. He walked to the door to the left, placing his ear against the wood but didn't hear anything. He did the same to the other and could distantly hear the muffled voices of his friends.
He knocked, causing the occupants in the room to shuffle inside a bit before the door suddenly opened and the guilty face of Sirius popped out of the crack. When he spotted the werewolf, his face lit up with a large, lopsided grin.
"Moony! Come on, we were just planning."
"Right. Planning."
Remus walked through the door, glancing suspiciously around the room. She spotted James laying oddly on the floor over a large lump of blankets with his arms and legs sprawled about over the sides. He greeted his other friend heartily and rolled off of the large mass before standing up.
"We can't take too many chances. Any of our parents could come up here at any moment and then everything would be ruined."
"What are you two planning this time?" Sighed the russet haired boy.
"Oh, just a bit of this and that. You know, the usual."
"You wont tell me?"
"We will, but we have to wait until Wormtail gets here. I don't really feel like explaining it twice -- you know how that is."
"Alright."
All three boys took places on the soft, maroon carpet. They chatted for a while about various things until another knock resounded from the door across from the room.
"Enter!" James called out in a loud, booming voice that caused Sirius to snicker.
Taking command, the person outside of the door turned the knob and it swung open, revealing the smiling face of Peter. He walked in and flopped down next to the other three.
"I can't wait until dinner," he told them matter-of-factly before anyone had spoken, "because dinner smells great."
"With mum cooking, it just doesn't smell good, it taste good," James said proudly.
Sirius smiled from his sprawled out position on the floor, "Emily's cooking is the best. Better than Hogwarts, in my opinion."
"Just don't say that to her, otherwise you'll get whacked upside the head," the messy black haired boy replied.
"Remember the time I tried to flatter her about her apple pie and she chased me out of the kitchen with the oven mitt? Or the other time when I complemented on her hair and she got all fluttered, then tried to shoo me away with the broom? I swear, that woman can't take compliments."
James just laughed and propped his legs up on the large, lumpy mass of whatever it was they were hiding. He fell backwards onto Peters legs, grinning cheekily at the other boy. "Hope you don't mind, Wormtail."
Peter shrugged and leaned against the bed behind him, "So what do you guys have planned for the next few days?"
Sirius waved a hand lazily above him and repeated his words from before, "Oh, a bit of this and that. You know, the usual."
"The usual doesn't involve scaring muggles, does it?" Remus queried.
"What do you take us for?"
"Marauders?" He replied.
"But of course!"
"So I take it as a yes? You will be scaring muggles?" The prefect sighed.
"All in good time, Moony."
"I should have known that was what you were planning earlier."
"Hey! What we were planning earlier has nothing to do with scaring muggles. That will come later on." James winked.
"I don't want anything to do with it," Remus huffed. "I don't want to be the one who has to explain everything to our parents and the policemen."
"Those bobbies wont know what hit them!"
"Ugh, leave it to you to be ignorant of the law."
"We are Marauders, Moony. Don't forget it."
"How could I?"
Sirius fake pouted and chucked a chocolate frog wrapper at Remus. The other boy wasn't aware of the flying packaging until it collided with the side of his head. He narrowed his eyes slightly, then picked up a pillow next to him and hurled it at the boy. With a doggish grin, Sirius caught it.
"Too slow, Moony. You couldn't hit me if -- Oomph!"
If Remus couldn't get Sirius, then James could. Sirius sat back up after being brutally attacked by a red-covered pillow. "How dare you!"
"How dare me?"
"I thought I was your best friend!"
"You are, you bampot."
Sirius snorted, "I am not a bampot, you barmy scallywag--"
"You sound like my grandpa, Padfoot."
"Ew…"
Remus laughed along with James and Peter.
"James, Sirius, Remus, Peter -- dinners ready!"
All of them looked at one another, nodded, then at the same time, all four of them jumped up simultaneously and ran for the door. It was going to be their usual race of who could get to the dining room first -- so far, after literally squeezing through the doorframe, Sirius was in lead, Remus and James practically tied behind him, and Peter lagged, but not too much.
Sirius laughed maniacally as he attempted to turn around a corner but misjudged his direction and somehow ended up on the floor after hitting the corner. James and Remus, being close behind him, tripped over his legs and tumbled down on top of him.
"Ow!"
"Bloody Hell, Padfoot, what did you go and fall for?"
"Ow… my legs…"
Remus sat up, rubbing gingerly at the side of his head. He looked up, and saw, to his amusement, that Peter had crept past them and was making his way to the dining room without them. The werewolf turned to James who was helping pull Sirius to his feet and said, "I think Pete beat us for once."
"Bollocks."
Hermione felt as if she had been thrown into a muggle freezer. She shivered, and tried to make herself warmer by pulling her blanket around her but then realized that it wasn't a blanket that was around her.
Groggily, she opened her eyes and the first thing that she noticed was that she wasn't in her own bed. She wasn't even in Gryffindor tower -- no, she was nowhere near it. The girl sat up slowly, her cloak falling off of her and onto her lap. It was dark, cold, and quiet. She was still in the shrieking shack.
She let out a deep sigh, the mist of her breath floating in front of her, then breathed in the chill, damp air, trying to wake herself up more. She had no idea of what time it was. For all she knew, it could have been well past midnight and she would have never known. One thing she did know was that she wanted to be in the warmth of the Gryffindor common room with something warm to eat.
Slowly sliding her way off of the old, ratty bed, Hermione stood up and stretched. The bed hadn't exactly been comfortable and it was by no means good for her back. After a moment, her eyes had become focused on the darkness that enclosed the small and abandoned bedroom. After picking up her cloak and draping it around herself tightly while trying to shut out the cold chill, she noticed something white laying on the bed where she had formerly been sleeping.
Hermione picked the object up and realized that it was the letter Remus had sent her earlier that afternoon. She blinked slowly a few times, then smiled in the dark. It had been sweet of him to post her and apologize for his friends, even though he wasn't the soul cause of it all.
She tucked the letter into her cloak as she decided it was time to make it back to Hogwarts.
Her attempts to find the passage leading back to the Whomping Willow though, proved to be a failure. Slightly panicked, Hermione searched and searched for the passageway but to no avail.
Cursing loudly to herself, she searched out the front room so that she could attempt leaving through the door; she would rather go through Hogsmeade than to have to spend the rest of the night inside of the Shrieking Shack. Dumbledore would probably send out a search party for her if he found out that she was missing.
She had only ever been in the shack one other time and when she had, it wasn't just for her own pleasure. She didn't have any idea of where anything was in the small house. Even so, she eventually found the front door.
It creaked and groaned on its hinges when she was finally able to pry it open, and she was more than happy when the fresh air from outside hit her face.
She slipped through the opening and re-shut the door, not wanting to make it obvious that someone had been in there -- although it wouldn't really matter. No one would care, and if they did, they could easily just follow her footprints through the snow. It wasn't as if she could completely get rid of her tracks.
The walk back to the Hogwarts gates was slow and tiring. It had been a good twenty minutes by the time the girl had made it there. As she passed the dark entry to the grounds of Hogwarts, she heard something to her right coming from the foliage of the Forbidden Forest.
Fearing that it might be a creature from inside of the wooded area, she reached into her cloak and pulled out her wand. She knew what kind of creatures resided in that place and she didn't particularly feel like being ambushed by something, especially in the dark.
She began walking by the area where the noise came from, hoping to remain inconspicuous, but when she realized that it wasn't a creature there, but people, she paused for a moment. Who would be in the Forbidden Forest? Nothing good ever came from that.
Hermione pulled the hood of her cloak up and readjusted her grip on her wand before she walked to the edge of the forest. A little bit of eavesdropping wouldn't hurt, would it?
"-- didn't like it."
"You think? The Dark Lord isn't pleased about it either."
"Do you think that I already didn't know that? After all, he did hex and curse anyone in the room when he was informed."
"That's nothing new. Anyway, we're here to find out what's going on. One of the students -- I believe it was Lestrange, told the Dark Lord that the Malfoy and Snape brats have been hanging around some mudblood Gryffindor, and if that's true, I don't want to be the one to report it in. Both Malfoy and the Dark Lord will curse us to hell and back."
"Did Lestrange say what the mudblood's name was?"
"Grai.. Grainer… Granger! It was Granger!"
Hermione blinked rapidly. So one of Voldemort's followers had reported her and the others in.
"…"
"So we're just here to find out what's going on?"
"Yes, and no. The Dark Lord said, if possible, to bring him the mudblood."
"And how do you propose we do that? We can't just go into Hogwarts. That's like a death sentence."
"Were you not listening to the Lord's orders earlier? He said to await Christmas Eve!"
"Christmas Eve…?"
"…"
"…"
"…"
"Ohhh, the attack…!"
"Bright one you are."
Hermione had heard enough. She turned around and slowly made her way out of the underbrush as discreetly as she could. She didn't want to get caught now -- not after hearing that, even if the two didn't sound to bright. They were out to kidnap her, and here she was, only a few yards away from them. Bright lot, they were indeed.
She wasn't pleased with what she had just heard. For one, there were Death Eaters that close to the castle, and also, her presence had been found out a lot earlier than she hoped. She hadn't expected someone to actually report her and the others in, but now that she thought about it, she had been pretty dense on that matter. There was bound to be someone who would do it.
She needed to tell Dumbledore. He'd be interested in hearing that Death Eaters dared to get as close to Hogwarts as the Forbidden Forest, and he would also know what to do about her. Even if she had to reveal her plan to him, she would. Just as long as they found a way for her to stay safe and away from Voldemort at the moment.
The reason behind that was -- Hermione simply wasn't ready. She wasn't ready to face Voldemort yet. She had planned on training herself, learning a bit more about the present history, and of course, she had plans on meeting the Order and seeing what they could do to lower Voldemort's defenses. He had too many followers at the moment that even if she tried to duel him, she would be shot down by numerous Death Eaters.
And being killed by Death Eaters before getting her chance at Voldemort didn't bode to well with her. So she wasn't about to let herself get caught.
As the voices faded and she drew closer to the castle, she thought of what she was going to do. If there truly was going to be an attack on Christmas Eve, she would have to plan something out with Dumbledore. There weren't enough professor's in the castle to keep things even, and it was obvious that they would be outnumbered two to one. She figured that it was a good thing that most of the students had gone home, but what about the Slytherin's? What would happen to them if they were caught too?
Hermione sighed as she entered the building. It wouldn't do for her to worry about things. What she needed to do was devise a plan and hope everything went as she hoped.
The castle was quiet. It must have been passed curfew. Hermione looked left and right, fearing that she might run into Filtch or Mrs. Norris. She didn't want to deal with either of them at the moment either.
But luck was on her side and she made it to Gryffindor tower without any incidents or problems. Her luck drew further when she found that the common room was empty.
The girl sat down in one of the large armchairs by the fire and started to arrange her thoughts. She would go see Dumbledore in the morning and tell him about what she had overheard and hopefully he would be able to help her with making a plan -- most likely he would, but she couldn't be too sure. Sometimes, in her original time, she sometimes wondered about his actions.
So that's how she spent the rest of her night, in front of the Gryffindor common room's fire, thinking, planning, and devising. One thing though, that she wouldn't admit to herself, was that she was scared. Scared for her safety, scared for her friends safety, and scared for the future. But that feeling was hidden deeply inside of herself that she didn't even realize it was there yet.
And she would soon realize it. It would be something she hadn't felt since she had left her home in the future. It was something she had thought she had left behind, and it was something that would make her realize just how Harry felt when things were up to him.
A/N: Alright, this chapter was a bit shorter than usual, and I'm sorry for that. It's just that I'm in a small hurry, and I did promise that I'd get a chapter up about this time. I hope it's not confusing, or too jumbled up. Please, please, I beg you, tell me what you think of this chapter. I want to know if I need to fix it up -- even if no one tells me it does, I'll probably go back and fix it anyways. I'm not happy with it. Irk.. NOW! IF YOU DIDN'T READ THIS BEFORE, PLEASE READ THIS! This story is going on hold for a while! Not for an extremely long time, just about a month or so. The reason: I wanted to work on my other story, Where are the Children. I hope you guys understand, and I know it wont be too bad. I've gone about a month or so without updating this story, and you guys are so wonderful that you wont complain -- too much I hope. Uh, anyways, I hope you guys enjoy, or slightly enjoy reading this. I also hope that everyone's had a wonderful New Year's so far. Take care! -- Min