Hey everybody, it's been a while. First year is at it's end and I'm excited for now the real action starts. I hope you enjoy and please leave your reviews for me. It really matters. This is part one of a two part chapter.

Chapter eighteen: Revelations(1)

Of all the dumb ideas James had, James was sure this was the worst of them. Standing in front of a door searching for bumblebees seemed rather pointless to Remus. It wouldn't hurt to look though and Remus would ask James what he meant when he would come out of the classroom.

"Lost something Lupin?" Sirius asked from behind.

Remus jolted and looked at Sirius "Er…no."

Sirius raised an eyebrow and pointed at the door "Cut it out Lupin, I don't imagine you taking interest in doors. Whatever Potter is planning to do I want in!"

"Why do you think James plans to do anything?" Remus shrugged.

"I know when a bloke is wasting time. Potter finished half way through and spent the last part practically eating his quill."

Remus sighed and looked around "Where's Pettigrew?"

"Off eating I think, don't change the subject! What's Potter up to and what does staring at a bloody door got to do with it?"

"James is inside talking to the professor. He told me to watch the door for bumblebees." Remus explained.

As soon as he said the word, the door made a clicking noise and disappeared from sight. Instead, a big closet stood before him.

"Smart Lupin!" Sirius muttered "Remind me to never speak in riddles with you!" He then pulled Remus by his robes and dragged him inside. As they entered, the closet increased in size until it was large enough for both of them to move freely.

"What do you suppose this is?" Remus questioned. Brooms started dusting the place making Remus cough once or twice.

"A listening closet. I heard about these but never thought Hogwarts had them!" he was awed by his surroundings and closed his eyes making a chair appear out of nowhere. "In the war, wizards used these to hide and listen to meetings. The room has a mind of his own and produces anything a spy would need. The objects can't be taken out of here of course but you could spend a lifetime inside one of these and not need anything!"

"Why would James send me here?" Remus asked making a chair of his own.

"Lupin you're really deaf you know that? Potter wants us to watch the defense classroom. Something is going on! Any opinion?"

"Well, James wanted to talk with Dolohov about something…" Remus started.

Sirius cut him off "If he needs this place, he surely put himself in danger. Had to play hero did he?" Sirius groaned "So he suspects Dolohov of foul play. I'm betting everything I have that it isn't about the damn exam. Maybe he thinks Dolohov is in cohorts with McGonagall? No, no, wait a minute!" Sirius screamed having realized "There was something about that ruddy night I didn't understand! If McGonagall had changed sides, why did she and the Death Eater put a show on planning to talk to Dumbledore? She didn't know we were there. The only solution possible is that she didn't know the guy was a Death Eater!"

Remus slapped his forehead "Course! She was calling him professor not because he was her professor but because he was a professor, ours!"

Sirius nodded "So the Death Eater is…" he swore "idiot bloody Potter, only he could have done something as stupid as confronting a Death Eater about his identity!"

At that moment a red light illuminated the door for a second before fading. A crash was heard then it sounded as if something was dragged away.

The door opened to reveal Dolohov sneering and holding his hands in the air. He looked around checking to see is somebody was looking.

"He can't see us!" Sirius explained. "Once those meant to use the room get inside, the false image of a door returns. Nobody can get inside unless the say the password. We're also sound proof." He added.

Once he was sure nobody was looking, Dolohov knelt down and dropped something rather brutally. Nothing was visible though and the two boys shared confused looks.

Dolohov then took out his wand and muttered an incantation nobody heard. James's body appeared instantly hovering up. Dolohov cursed and picked a silvery substance from the floor and covered him making him invisible again.

"That's an invisibility cloak!" Sirius awed delighted looking like a little boy in front of the Christmas tree.

Dismayed, Remus gave him a slap on the head to wake him from his reverie "And he's covering James with it! Stop bloody staring at…nothing!"

"He was an Auror, course he had one of those!" comprehension came to Sirius "He could have been anywhere and we didn't see him!" Sirius paled and shook his head.

"Oi! We have bigger problems now!" Remus said angrily. Dohov finished disguising James and walked around the corner with him.

"Right, you go tell Peter and I'll follow him!" Sirius said taking out his wand.

"Can Peter be trusted?" Remus asked.

Sirius raised an eyebrow "Can I?"

Remus opened his mouth and closed it. He didn't know what to think of Sirius anymore. "Good point!"

"If you knew how I grew up, you'd know that people can't be trusted." Sirius said darkly performing some spells at him.

"What are you doing?" Remus asked seeing Sirius take different colors.

"It's a disillusionment charm. Well, something like that anyway! You see, only my body becomes disillusioned. It's for those who can't perfect real one yet."

"What do…" Remus began to ask before he gave a yelp. Sirius began stripping before his very eyes. "You're crazy!"

"Actually I'm disillusioned. It's safe to look, won't get you nightmares or anything!" Sirius retorted. "I'm off, go find Peter and come to me."

"How do I do that?" Remus asked as both of them came out of the closet. As he looked back, the door became solid again.

"Peter will know!" Sirius said then footsteps were heard confirming that Sirius ran off.

As Remus walked towards the Great Hall, he thought long and hard about what he'd been through. It was even stranger that their expeditions haven't gone to the staff yet. He was still surprised that McGonagall hadn't suspended them yet or that Dumbledore hadn't put them in St. Mungo's yet for their idiocy. He was already taking advantage because of his condition. Putting dueling outside of curfew in a girl's bathroom, spying on Death Eater meetings and socializing with a Black on top of it would throw Remus out of Hogwarts in a heartbeat. Surely a small friendship wasn't worth his life. But then again, Remus though darkly, it was one of his few friendships he had had yet.

"Remus?" a voice called to him.

"Yeah?" he turned around finding himself in front of Lily. Remus mentally cursed, he forgot that she was always with them. Going anywhere without her would mean explanations.

"Where were you? Where's James?" she asked a little off put.

"James is…hanging around." Remus tried to put it so he wouldn't lie "I waited for him to finish something but it's taking longer then I thought."

"Oh," Lily said not pushing the subject. "Are you going to the Gryffindor tower? I'm heading there to take a nap. All this stress with the exams has worn me out. Just now I though I saw the shape of Black running after something. He didn't even have a body."

"Did you take a good look of it?" Remus asked amused.

Lily thought "No, but I swear he wasn't wearing anything. He also winked at me." She sounded shaken.

Remus took all his will to stop from laughing "I'm going to the Great Hall, I suggest you sleep and forget about Black." The corners of his lips were twitching hard.

He left Lily planning to have a talk with Sirius later. He ran into a bunch of Gryffindors that told him that the little chubby boy was eating again in the Great Hall.

As Remus entered the Great Hall, he struggled not to laugh. The only two people left eating were Dumbledore and Pettigrew, a couple he would have never imagined. He greeted Dumbledore who sat at the Gryffindor table feeling that he interrupted something. Peter also was looking relived at him, something he never experienced before. It occurred to him that against their better judgment and family traditions, the four boys had bonded.

Peter excused himself from the table and left, leaving Dumbledore alone smiling at their retreating backs. Once outside, Remus quickly told him about everything that had happened, still unsure what the next move was.

Peter began searching inside his robe for something, taking a full minute or two. Finally, he pulled out his wand and put it on the ground and muttered some words. The wand began rotating until it stopped.

"While we were at Sirius' this summer, we practiced elementary spell making. We discovered one where we could jinx a part of our body so we could always find each other with the proper spell using only the wand we used." Peter started explaining.

Remus nodded, surprised at Peter's ingenuity "You did this?"

Peter laughed "No, Sirius has a cousin that helped us. She was amused by the idea of never having privacy. She tried to create the spell and we applied it."

"Don't we have to tell the professors?" Remus asked feeling smaller by the minute.

Peter shook his head "If there was a moment when we could have told them, it's long gone. We broke rules Lupin, nothing we did to compensate matters. Adults usually don't care for "what if"s, only for solid facts and we don't have anything to offer them that can tell our story. Now, we are just some students hiding in the girl's bathroom that attacked some Slytherins out of house rivalry while they were going to the loo. By the time they find the truth, Dolohov will have been long gone."

"Why do you care for James?" Remus inquired.

"We don't!" Peter laughed "but it's a good adventure for me and Sirius, anything else doesn't matter."

"You're fighting with fire!" Remus cautioned.

"So do you" Peter shrugged "Why should you be more special than us?"

"I have a reason to!" Remus said.

"So do we! I'd imagine you'd be more grateful."

"I don't know if I should trust you!" Remus tried.

"No you don't." Peter answered gently picking up his wand "Too late now isn't it? Follow me if you want to help."

Feeling desolated, Remus followed.

James had many surprises when he woke up. For one, he wasn't in the hospital ward, common room or any classroom he had ever seen at Hogwarts. The world around him was dark, the only source of light coming from the moon.

"Where am I?" he whispered to himself.

He knew he wasn't tied but he didn't have his wand. There were many trees around him, towering over everything and making few gapes of space between for people to pass. In short, it was like a fortress.

A river was flowing in the middle of it, illuminated by the night light. The moon was mirrored into it making a distorted image. The water crossing and hitting the stones around it was making an unpleasant sound.

To worsen the mood, a group of birds were glaring at him from the trees; an unpleasant look about them told James he wasn't welcomed there.

"Good, you're awake." Dolohov said coming from the forest. "Do you like this place? I had the pleasure to come across it back in the days I was a student here."

"You're a Death Eater." James stated.

Dolohov frowned "It's rude to interrupt someone when he's speaking Potter. Don't ever do that again." He raised his hand to show he had a wand.

"If you could have killed me you would have done so already." James tried.

"Who said anything about killing?" Dolohov asked acting insulted "There are other ways I could make you beg to die."

"Course you do." James murmured. "What do you want?"

"I see manners cannot be taught to you Potter, shame."

"Why did you let me loose?" James continued.

"I didn't" Dolohov shrugged "You can't escape from here. Even if you somehow managed to kill me, get your wand back and get out, you don't know how to get back to Hogwarts."

"What do you want from me?"

Dolohov raised his wand and shot a spell at James's leg. Pain exploded in James's leg and he could already feel blood.

"That's better. You will pay respect to me from now on. I shot your leg to compensate the pain I felt when you tried to wound me. Madame Pomfrey was most kind to heal me. She didn't ask many questions either."

James sat down, not trusting himself to stand anymore. His vision was already blurring and his left leg was numb.

"To answer your question Potter, when you discovered me, the Dark Lord's plan failed. He will be angry at me for letting you discover. I took you because I wanted something to compensate my failure."

"Sorry to disappoint you but I'm not going anywhere." James spat holding his leg.

"Don't worry Potter; the Dark Lord is too great to show his face to someone like you. I'll get the information from you and take it to him."

"Good luck with that." James countered.

Dolohov stood facing James for a while. His face had a red shade on it, either because of anger or fear, James couldn't tell. He began pacing left and right, waving his arms around and talking to himself it appeared. James tried to crawl to the river to wash his wound but it was too painful.

"I have to do something to get out of here." James thought.

"You've got to be joking." Remus groaned.

The wand was pointing towards the forest. Peter was nudging it towards another direction but the wand persisted in pointing.

"We have no choice" Remus decided walking forward. Peter followed from behind, not looking brave anymore. He was carrying a bag with Sirius's clothes to give them to him when they would meet. Remus would have no objection to it if it hadn't slowed them down for more than an hour.

"Remus can you carry this please?" Peter begged wiping sweat that covered his face.

They had agreed to speak on a first name basis as a result of Remus feeling silly saying Pettigrew over and over again.

"No Peter, and hurry up, it's turning dark already." Remus pointed at the faint line of sun left.

They walked across the grounds as fast as possible, not wanting to be spotted. Remus knew that the Gryffindor tower had perfect view of them and with the help of the bag Peter was carrying; they'd sure understand something was up.

"Can't you shrink the bag?" Remus muttered annoyed when a couple returning from one of the Herbology greenhouses eyed them warily.

"I'm not so good at shrinking charms." Peter answered.

At last, they had gotten to the entrance of the Forbidden Forest. Remus entered first, dragging Peter behind him and looked back. Nobody was following.

"James is going to pay for this." He mumbled as Peter put his wand down asking for directions.

The wand turned and spun until it stopped pointing towards the least clear path into the Forest.

"Wonderful" Remus sighed as Peter caught his breath "Oh give me that!" he pulled the bag from Peter, "You should start loosing weight."

"I can't. All Pettigrews are fat. It's a tradition."

Remus turned his head "You're joking right? The only reason you eat six meals a day is because your family does that?"

Peter looked at him stupidly "Yeah."

"But, it's dumb. If you want to stay slim, you can do it. No damn tradition is worth more than your freedom."

"Lupin, don't talk about things you don't understand" Peter grunted picking up his wand and going forward.

"I remember your uncle well." Dolohov said after a while. "He was cunning like no other Slytherin you see today. If there was a way, he'd do it."

"I don't care." James retorted.

"Grindelwald's first man he was. He escaped Aurors many times. Nobody knew how he did it. I remember one time; me and my men captured him and prepared to take him away. He was bound by ropes, didn't have a wand and the place had anti-Apparation wards all over. You know what he did?" Dolohov laughed "He used his head to kick one of my men in the stomach, grabbed his wand with his teeth and jumped in front of a cutting hex, ripping his skin and rope. In two moves, he killed my men. I was the only one left and he could have killed me. We had a contest going on however, you see, he was toying with me, making me loose my mind in trying to capture him. He tortured me until I told him where his friends were and how to escape. He left me there near death and ran off."

James looked at the ground feeling worse by the minute. His bleeding had stopped a while ago but it still pained him to even move his toe.

"Potter do you hear me? A hundred and twenty year old killed almost half of the Aurors back then. He was even more feared then Grindelwald."

"Make him a bloody statue then!" James spat.

"Potters are famous for being ingenious and extremely lucky. I have no doubt that you'll somehow live after today but there's also a bad side to their luck. Even if they live, they'll have death around them."

"Dolohov, shut the fuck up!" James screamed.

Dolohov stared transfixed at James "Shame, I didn't want to do this!" he raised his wand.

Any healing to James's leg in the past hour had been reversed. His wound cut open again and another one appeared. James tried to look and see the damage but he was only seeing black spots.

"Now Potter, I want you to exactly tell me what did your uncle say to you his last moments? What exactly is your secret?" Dolohov roared.

"Like I'm going to tell you." James laughed feeling things couldn't get worse than that.

Dolohov screamed with frustration and took out his wand. "Oh, but you will tell me. Legilimens!"

Any pain James felt went numb at that moment. He felt like an intruder in his mind, like he was seeing his life with the eyes of another. He saw himself as a baby and quickly growing up. In thirty seconds he felt like he had relieved his childhood. Finally, the flow stopped and he saw himself in St. Mungo's laughing in the arms of his father.

His father sat grim rocking James. "Be quiet James, you're making quite a lot of noise.

Of course that only made James laugh even louder.

His mother came into view and took James from his father's hands placing a kiss on his cheek "Behave James." She said and turned to his father "He wants to see James."

Revolted, his father got up on his feet "Why?"

"To say goodbye. He says he's sorry for everything he's done to us."

"You can't believe that!" James's father erupted "He murdered thousands of good people just to fill his greed. Now that everything is over, he wants to suddenly change sides."

"I know, but he's dieing. He doesn't have much left. At least let him talk to his nephew for once. Don't let your anger with him deprive James of his only talk to his uncle." His mother reasoned.

His father slowly nodded "Fine, but I don't want to see him. And make sure you keep an eye on him. I don't know what he plans to do but I'm sure it's something."

"Don't worry, I won't let him do anything to James." She ruffled James's hair to make a point.

Together with his mother, he walked to the end of the hall. His mother opened a door and went inside.

James jumped out of his mother's arms and walked slowly to the only bed. An old frail man sat there, he had no eyeballs and his legs were gone. He had long silvery hair reaching to his shoulders and two golden earrings.

James gaped at the sight and called for his mother to show her something. His mother got next to him and placed a protective hand on James.

"Look at me!" the man started talking "Do you think I'm a threat to James?" he sounded offended.

"Yes." Was his mother's reply.

The old man shook his head "I don't have anything more to gain by hurting James. I want to see him and tell him I'm sorry I wasn't around much for him."

"You were around, making sure we suffer to please your master." His mother replied.

"He's dead now. He was controlling me, what don't you understand?" he gestured to James "come closer James, I want to shake your hand."

"Tell him what you want to say and get over with it." His mother held tight to James.

The man sighed "Fine, I didn't want to do this." He raised his hand and a red light jumped from his ring. It went to James's mother and hit her on the chest. She fell down soundlessly.

"Mommy!" James called.

"Mommy went to sleep James." The man explained. "Come to me so I can say goodbye."

James looked at his mother then approached the man. He smiled ruffling James's hair but more brutally than his mother did before.

"Listen to me Potter!" the man suddenly shouted pulling James to him by the hair.

"I've got to stop this." James thought as the moment came. He imagined a broom and concentrated on flying it. The image began to fade.

Shielding his mind required James to use all the energy he had left. He struggled full five minutes until Dolohov gave up.

"Nice try Dolohov." James gasped as the presence left his mind.

"Dumbledore taught you Occlumency did he?" Dolohov said with frustration "Then I'll have to get the information another way." He readied his wand

"That thing's rigged" Remus said after they had walked for what seemed like hours.

"Maybe." Peter laughed tense.

"What?" Remus roared surprised by the answer.

"We didn't have time to test it properly yet." Peter shrugged embarrassed.

"You mean we walked all this way for nothing?" Remus showed the forest around him to emphasize. "We could be lost!"

"Lupin, keep your voice down." A voice suddenly called.

"Sirius!" Peter exclaimed obviously relieved.

"Why didn't you show yourself before?" Remus demanded.

"I was having fun seeing you fight; besides, I was next to you the whole time." The voice explained.

"Wow, we can't see you at all." Peter said awed.

"That the purpose of the spell Peter." Sirius replied sarcastically.

"We brought your clothes. Where's James?" Remus asked as the bag he was holding opened and clothes lifted up.

"Not far from here, if you had been later, I would have gone myself to save him."

"Is he in trouble?" Remus asked.

"Lupin, your logic amuses me." The bundle of clothes replied.

"How badly is James hurt?" Remus asked again.

The clothes stopped for a moment and waved a wand. Sirius appeared inside the clothes a few moments after "A lot."

"What are we standing here for then? Let's go save him." Remus urged.

"Aye" Sirius agreed grimly.