"I just want a damn normal jellybean, can't you just taste a bit of one before I eat the whole thing?" Rose demanded of Sirius.
The Christmas spirit had begun to spread as early as the first week of December, but by now, a majority of the school had only one day left before break.
The marauders had taken over the common room in their final free afternoon.
"If you do insist, my dear," Sirius responded. "I shall accept the challenge of being the royal taste-tester." He began to inspect a handful of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans in an attempt to pick out the normal ones.
Ellie was in the corner, studying, with Peter and Remus, the latter of whom was constantly playing catchup to learn everything that he missed while he was out sick.
Ellie had noticed his repetitive illness, but hadn't even begun to guess at his real problem, assuming because of his constant, somewhat sickly appearance that he never quite managed to get healthy before he was once again in the infirmary.
James was daringly eating every flavor of the beans, and coming out surprisingly lucky.
Whenever Sirius found a bad one that was not an appetizing flavor, (like earwax for example), he would pitch it a James who had now accumulated a small pile of rejects.
Rose had gotten only slightly nibbled samples of several typical flavors that Sirius had tasted for her; blueberry, coffee, peach, and mango.
Sirius bit into one and made a puzzled face.
"This one's a bit odd," he said, seeming to be analyzing the flavor. "Give it a try. I think that I'm getting a kind of 'candied apple' vibe."
Rose took it eagerly and popped it into her mouth, biting down immediately. She gagged and nearly threw up, standing to spit what was left of the bean into the fire.
"My god, I think that was vomit! I trusted you!" She hollered at Sirius, who along with James was rolling on the floor in laughter. She sat back down and retaliated by throwing a green bean at Sirius who caught it in his mouth.
"Mmmmm," he grinned. "Kiwi."
"Ugh!" She grumbled, still while smiling. She found it hard to hold a grudge on him.
They began tossing beans to James who caught every one, all of them decently flavoured, until he had a record of fourty-three.
They only stopped because they had their last class before holiday, double Defense Against the Dark Arts with the Ravenclaws, and Remus was making them all attend.
Xx
They had been promised a special lesson on the last day before their holiday, and a special lesson was exactly what they got, even if it wasn't quite what they expected.
Professor Clarkson was an average man, who was perhaps in his late thirties, with brown hair that he kept quite short, (although not quite short enough to miss the fact that it was beginning to bald) and a calm way of speaking. He managed to teach the students in what they found to be an exciting way while still managing to get the boring bits learned without too much trouble as well.
It was his third year teaching, but it was rumored that it would be his last, as he planned to take his wife traveling abroad once the year was out. Instead of gathering the class in the usual place today, they were in an old textbook storage room on the third floor.
"All right. I suppose you're all wondering what we're doing down here," he began, leaning against an old cabinet.
The class, even James and Sirius, nodded raptly, paying attention.
"Okay... Let's start with... Does anyone know what a boggart is?"
Several hands from the Ravenclaw house went up, along with Remus, Rose, and Peter's.
"Mr. Lupin?"
"A shape shifter that takes the shape of whatever the person facing it fears the most."
"Excellent. Anything else?"
Rose's was the only hand up now.
"Boggarts thrive in dark places, and no one knows what one looks like when it doesn't take the form of someone's fear. Boggarts are best faced in groups, which the creature finds disorienting, and the charm used against it is 'Riddikulus', which exploits the creature's weakness of laughter," she finished, clearly still trying to scan her brain for anything she missed.
"Perfect. Ten points to Gryffindor. Is there anyone who knows their worst fear and is willing to let the rest of the class in on it?" He asked.
No one raised their hands for quite a while until Ellie sighed boldly and stepped forward.
"Wasps and bees, or anything that stings, really. Swarms of them," Ellie described. There was some snickering from Oliver on the Ravenclaw side of the room, shut up quickly with a muting spell from Sirius.
"Excellent, Ms. Claybourne. When the boggart emerges, it will take the form of a swarm of bees. You should try to picture them as clumping together into shapes or words to make a funny picture. Make them comical. Can you do that?"
Ellie nodded.
"Good. Then say the spell, 'Riddikulus', and the bees should be forced into what you're picturing. Then the next person, from Ravenclaw, will step up and have their go. Everyone got it? Good. If you can't even imagine facing your fear, or don't know what it is and don't want to have to improvise on the spot, move near the door where you won't need to take a turn. Everyone all right?" There was general approval, as the crowd moved into two lines, the professor in the middle, ready to intervene if necessary.
There were a few tense minutes before everyone claimed to be fully prepared.
He pointed his wand at the old cabinet. "Go."
A flood of bees washed into the room, filling the air with a mind-numbing hum. Ellie was able to stop them from getting far at all. Once they were in open air, she pointed her wand and shouted, "Riddikulus!"
With a crack that echoed in their ears, the cloud immediately shifted into a very large set of words: "OH, SHIT!"
This prompted a few giggles from onlookers. Ellie blushed and glanced at the professor apologetically stepping back, and a girl from Ravenclaw, Geneva Marks, stepped up.
Suddenly, there was a sinister- looking man in a lab coat standing in front of her, menacingly pointing a huge needle towards the class.
"Riddikulus!" She called, calmly. CRACK! The doctor's lab coat turned bright pink, causing him to drop his syringe into his own foot. Before he could even scream, Tori, a Gryffindor, had stepped up.
The boggart was now a trio of dogs with golden eyes, coming for her.
"Riddikulus!" CRACK! The dogs' legs went out from under them as it looked like they were sliding on ice.
A Ravenclaw that Rose thought might be named Sara stepped up. The shifter morphed painfully into what was most definitely a werewolf, all the signs that they had learned in class showing. Rose felt a twinge of sympathy for it.
"Riddikulus," Sara trembled as the beast snarled and leapt forward.
CRACK. The werewolf was suddenly looking quite put-out, and was wearing a clown suit.
Next up was James, who set his jaw, as suddenly, the rest of the marauders were all standing in front of him, including Rose and Ellie, all of them smirking in a way that was very wrong for their faces, all of them with fully black eyes, speaking in the same raspy voice, all in unison. "The devil waits patiently, James. Join us, or-" They didn't speak for long enough to finish their sentence however, because with a shout of "Riddikulus!", all of them were suddenly in tutus and performing a ballet.
Another Ravenclaw stepped up, this time facing a large metal robot. CRACK. Rusted so it couldn't so much as move.
Next was Alina, from Gryffindor. A tall, handsome man appeared who controlled the shadows of the room, making it suddenly very dark. CRACK! The man was suddenly a small boy, wearing too-large clothes.
Now was Oliver himself, facing... his father? The man looked quite a bit like him.
"Someday, the darkness will claim you Oliver, as it has claimed me. You will be just like me in the end." CRACK! The man's ear was pulled into a vice-like grip by an elderly woman. "No dessert for a month, Alfie!"
Ruby stepped up, and a group of government soldiers ran into formation. CRACK! They turned into monkeys wearing bullet-proof vests.
Next came Ravenclaw, with the Bloody Baron, one of the castle's many ghosts. CRACK! He was suddenly bobbing on the ceiling, stuck like a balloon.
A Gryffindor with a massive T-rex. CRACK! It was trying to do a pushup and had gotten stuck on its nose.
Now a Ravenclaw and a massive orangutan with a large circular face. CRACK! The beast was now made entirely out of fruit.
Remus was next, and the room froze. They were all looking at a very large silvery orb.
"Riddikulus!" He shouted, his wand hand shaking. CRACK! The orb deflated like a ball with a hole in it.
A Ravenclaw with a massive lion. CRACK. Now a small, yellow balloon animal.
Now Sirius, palms sweating, looking particularly defiant.
A woman appeared in front of him, shrieking about all sorts of things, mudbloods, and traitors and filth, about Regulus, and the ungrateful slime that was her other son. CRACK! The woman now had a large mustache and spoke with a heavy Indian accent, making her curses almost indistinguishable. The class giggled at her.
Then a Ravenclaw, who saw a drooling and babbling elderly person, strapped into a wheelchair. CRACK! The old woman was made of marshmallow.
There were a few that Rose didn't pay attention to.
Then the only two left in line were Peter, and another Gryffindor, Frank Longbottom, neither wanting to go last. They both lunged forward, confusing the boggart into attempting to morph into two things at once; Frank's headless corpse, and Peter's giant slug. The result was unprecedented, but also hilarious. A giant, headless slug.
As almost everyone in the class laughed, the boggart made a popping noise, and disappeared with a finality.
"Well! Excellent job, all of you! Have a good break, and remember that we only have about five months left until exams! Stay safe, and make good choices!"
The class broke off into groups, and Rose made the mistake of taking a few moments extra to search her bag for a book that she wanted to read as they walked back to the common room.
"Rose, are you alright? I noticed that you didn't have a go at the boggart," Professor Clarkson asked, packing his bag too.
"Oh, yes, quite. I just didn't exactly know what form it would take. I didn't want to risk it being something bizarre, I suppose."
"All right, then. If you ever figure it out for sure and want a go with one of the things, let me know. There's plenty of places in the world that could use a laugh. Have a good break."
"Thank you. You too, professor," she replied.
But she was most definitely not okay. She of course had known exactly what her fear was, and how it would most likely present itself, and she did not want to have to face it in front of the rest of the school.
Also, Sirius' worst fear had worried her. She hadn't known that things had been that bad in his home, with his mother...
On top of that, as she realized at dinner, the professor had not been the only one to notice that she hadn't wanted to face the boggart. James thought that he was being sly by picking it up.
"So, Miss Bennett. Any reason why you didn't conquer your fears like a true Gryffindor today?" He asked.
"Dunno. Didn't feel like it, I suppose." She responded, sullenly cutting into her roast beef.
"Aw, come off it, what're you so worried about?" He pressed.
She looked up slowly, straight into his eyes.
"I guess it's just hard trying to think of a comedic twist to seeing all of your friends lying dead at your feet," she lied.
James immediately blushed. Two of the others took it as truth. Two didn't.
"Jeez, I'm really sorry," James apologized.
She sighed deeply.
"It's okay. You didn't know. Sometimes it's just better to let it alone," she replied.
Ellie looked at her friend, and knowing what her true fears were, decided to try to comfort her later, when the boys were gone.
The second person who could sense the dishonesty was Sirius. He knew how it was when Rose lied; very artistic. How she brushed away the conversation to get around the truth. How she kept it very detailed and as plausible as possible.
It was not only curiosity, but care that led his resolve to discover what her true fears were. But not here, or now. Rose's mood improved by the time desserts were done, and she was only a little less energetic than usual as she said goodbye to all of the rest of the Gryffindors who were leaving for break that night. Their potion would be done on the day after Christmas. There wasn't much left to do about it.
Xx
That evening, Sirius disappeared for a few minutes, returning only to retrieve Rose, before the pair disembarked again, armed with an invisibility cloak.
Since the two who hadn't wanted to talk about the boggart left, the rest were now able to discuss freely.
"Slugs, Peter! Really? I never knew... It's a bit of a pansy-ass fear in all honesty," James remarked.
"Be nice. At least his made sense. Unlike yours," Ellie responded.
"Possession by the devil is terrifying. You never know, that could actually happen. Man-sized slugs on the other hand..."
"It's reasonable! All you'd have to do is put an engorgement charm on one and then it would be massive. How were you going to get rid of it, Peter?" Remus asked, defending his friend.
"Turning it into gelatin," Peter responded seriously, making the rest of the group crack up.
"What about you Remus? Why do you fear the moon?" Ellie asked.
The rest of the group immediately silenced.
James looked like a deer frozen in front of headlights, but Remus simply turned his head to the side a bit.
"You mean, Rose didn't tell you?" He asked, surprised.
"Tell me what?" Ellie asked.
Remus looked around to find an empty common room and decided it was safe.
"I think she really ought to know why you're doing this, don't you?" He asked.
The other two nodded solemnly. It was only a matter of the fact that everyone had forgotten (or not found it their place) to tell Ellie about Remus. They all knew for certain that they could trust her to know.
"Well, I'm totally against the whole animagus thing, as you know. But Peter and James and Sirius are only doing it for me. See, it's because-you might not take this very well, but I really do trust you, El."
"Are you sick? What is it? Some kind of infection?" Ellie asked. She'd heard of someone who'd gotten an infected doxy bite and had died very young after years of sickness.
"Well, I suppose you could say so. I've got a very serious and specific type of infection, called lycanthropy," he watched her eyes pop open, suddenly alert, her head cock to the side to ask if it was what she thought it was. "Yes, I am a werewolf. They, that is James and Sirius, wanted to keep me company while I'm changed, and being an animagus is the only safe way to do it, really. Peter disagreed entirely and only came along because they did, but all the same..."
Ellie's eyes went wide.
"Oh Merlin. You're kidding!"
She was expecting them to be joking.
"Dead serious, I'm afraid," James answered.
"Well. That does make sense. I wish that you'd told me sooner," she said.
"You're not upset?" Peter asked, curiously. "Or afraid?"
"Well, I'm quite within reason. But I trust you, Remus. If you've kept this quiet for so long, I'd expect you're quite safe," she surmised.
"Well, yes. I'm very careful. And Dumbledore has helped quite a bit. You really can't tell a soul, though," Remus asked, now more than a little worried.
"I won't. I swear." Ellie promised, looking into his eyes to try to show how sincere she was.
"Thank you." Remus smiled. "Anyone up for a game of Gobstones?"
XXXXXXXXxxx
Hello fair readers! How are you on this fine day? I'm doing quite well, thank you!
So I've gotten a few questions as far as format goes, and I'd like to start for apologizing. Because I type this on my phone, it makes the spaces and such weird, and I've literally spent hours trying to figure out how to fix it, but no beans. I think its because my browser is very outdated. Sorry about that :'(. But anyways, thanks for reading and reviewing! I love hearing from you guys! Don't let the muggles get you down!
Post edit: hehe im just now remembering that i left this one to end on a cliffhanger. But dont worry, the next chapter will hopefully be up soon! Thanks again for reading and reviewing!