"Ever. Oi! Ever!"

On top of a sleepless night, it had been an extremely long day. Their first potions lesson—with the teacher from the front table in the Great Hall with the greasey hair, Professor Snape—hadn't exactly gone well, as it was a double class and with the Slytherins. It put most of the Gryffindors on edge, and most of the Slytherins and sneered at her throughout the classroom because someone had whispered, already, that she was muggle-born. She'd done her best to ignore them, but had practically ran from the dungeons on the way to lunch, where she hadn't eaten much. Then there was History Of Magic, and could there be a more boring subject? It was all any of the first-years could do to keep their heads up off of their desks, but Professor Binns didn't seem to notice. Afterwards, the six Gryffindors hauled themselves into the tower for a rundown on Astronomy, ending early with a promise to meet at midnight the next Friday. They trudged back down to dinner and stared at the gloomy sky on the ceiling, and there they had separated; the girls had gone up to the dormitories while the boys had lounged in the common room, waiting for their detention to begin. Ever had quickly washed up and fallen into bed, exhausted...until someone began poking at her and calling her name.

"Come on, Ever, wake up!" She finally groaned and turned over, peeking blearily out from under her covers at the boy—wait. The boy? She sat straight up, keeping the covers up to her shoulders.

"How did you get up here?" she hissed, with a glance at the drawn drapes around Angelina and Alicia's beds. The twin—a quick glance at his hand told her nothing, it was much to dark to make out a scar if it was there—grinned and pointed to the doorway. She sighed and tossed the covers back, resigned to yet another night of disturbed sleep, and shivered when her feet hit the floor. Her bathrobe was at the end of the bed, and she grabbed it, slinging it around her shoulders.

"I promise I'll explain everything as soon as we get to the common room," the red head whispered, and led the way out into the hall. The moment he stepped foot on the staircase, it became a slide again—whatever he'd done the first time, he wasn't bothering with anymore—and the two of them slid down side by side. The common room was deserted except for the other twin and Lee Jordan, who was rubbing his eyes but looking excited nonetheless.

"What if the staircase doesn't change back before I need to go back upstairs?" Ever whispered. She wasn't exactly sure why she was whispering, but in a late-night meeting with three boys she barely knew, it felt appropriate.

"It will, it did the moment I got into your room," said Fred—now that they were in the firelight, she could clearly see there wasn't a scar on his hand—as he took a piece of parchment from his pocket. "You've got to see this, it's brilliant." He handed it to her, and she examined it, confused.

"So what? It's a spare bit of parchment."

"Yeah, but look what happens when you tap it!" said George, and demonstrated with his wand. Immediately, ink seemed to bleed out of the parchment, and formed a couple of words.

You jokingly

"You...jokingly..." Ever read, more confused than ever. "Alright then...so...what does it do?"

"We think it's a riddle," said Lee, "because that's not all it says. But we need four people to get the last bit of it." He tapped the map, and it bled out a few more words.

deny that you're

Fred tapped the parchment.

down to

They were all looking at the first year girl. She sighed and drew her wand out of the pocket of her pajama pants, tapping the parchment.

some evil.

"You jokingly deny that you're down to some evil," she read aloud, sliding her wand behind her ear. "That makes no sense."

"It does if you look at it as a puzzle. There are four different handwritings on the parchment, took four different people to get the whole message," Lee explained, chewing on his thumbnail. "But I don't get it. Those are really random words to string together."

The four of them sat in relative silence for more than half an hour. Every now and again, someone would pipe up with an idea, and they would quickly try it to no avail. Just as the minute hand on the nearst clock—the one over the mantle—clicked past the twelve for the thirty-seventh time, Fred looked up.

"What if it's opposites?"

"What?" George began slowly, blinking down at the parchment. "Like the opposites of the words?"

"Yes!" said Fred, pointing his wand at the map. "You becomes I. Jokingly—"

"Seriously?" Lee asked.

"Solemnly," Ever suggested. Fred nodded to her, his crooked grin breaking out on his face.

"I like that one better, we'll go with solemnly. Deny..."

"It could be confirm...?" It was more a question than a confident answer, and Ever felt a bit dumb even suggesting it. George shook his head, brow furrowed.

"I think it's meant to be like...promise."

"Swear," said Lee. George nodded, and Fred repeated it.

"I solemnly swear...I think 'that' and 'to' are the same. There aren't really any opposites to those." The remaining three Gryffindors agreed with quiet nods. "I solemnly swear that...you're...so I'm..."

"Down is up," said Ever.

"To is the same," George murmured.

"Some...I think that's no," said Lee, pushing his hair back out of his face as he leaned forward to look at the parchment. "And 'evil'..."

"Good," the four of them chorused. They looked at the parchment, but nothing had happened.

"S'alright," said Fred easily, "we've just got to string it all together." He held out his hand to George, and his twin took it, offering his hand to Ever. Ever grabbed hold of Lee's, and Lee closed their little circle, taking Fred's free hand. "On the count of three, yeah?" They nodded solemnly, eyes fixed on the scrap in front of them. "One...two...three!"

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," they whispered. For a moment, nothing happened; the words already on the parchment didn't go away, and nothing new appeared. Ever bit down on her lip, trying to decide whether or not she was disappointed—this was probably some older student's idea of a joke, that was all, and it was still interesting at any rate, even if she had been woken up for it—when the words seemed to be wiped clean. New ones began in their place, each line in a new handwriting, as before.

If you've stumbled onto this, it's been taken away from us.

Or we've forgotten it.

Or we've passed it on to you.

Or we're just gits and something else has happened to us.

In any event, the piece of parchment continued, and it was in the same handwriting—neat, compsed, more careful than the other three—as the first line. If you've gotten this far, then you're worthy to have it, we suppose. May it help you as much as it did us.

And then, at the bottom, in the four distinctive handwritings:

Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs.

The ink exploded outward across the page, and suddenly it was forming corridors, compartments, staircases, all perfectly in line.

"It's a map of the whole school," Fred murmured, his eyes scanning over it quickly.

"It's not just that!" Ever exclaimed, pointing to one corridor. There was a small dot there, and it was moving, and the label beside it clearly stated "Severus Snape". The four of them marvelled over it for a moment, searching for Gryffindor tower and themselves, and finally found their respective dots, crowded into the common room...and, coming down the stairs, the dot of Bill Weasley. George quickly swiped up the map and stuffed it in his pocket, just as their oldest brother walked into the room, blearily rubbing at his eyes.

"Boys...Ever...what are you doing up? It's past two."

"Just talking," said Lee with a shrug.

"Yeah," George piped up. "Ever couldn't sleep and we've just gotten back from detention, so..." He trailed off, and Bill gave the four of them one long look before apparently deciding he was too tired to deal with any of it.

"To bed. Now."

"Alright," the twins chorused easily, while Ever and Lee quickly nodded. Bill seemed satisfied, turning to climb the stairs again.

"Right," whispered Fred, glancing back over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't coming back. "Tomorrow at lunchtime we go figure out what some of these passages are." He pointed out a few of them, and the other first years nodded their agreement quickly, heading toward the stairs.

About halfway up, Ever turned to look back at them.

"Fred!" she hissed. He turned around, heading backwards up the stairs. "Tomorrow you tell me how you got into my dormitory in the first place!" The red head grinned, but turned around and said no more.