Forever and a Day ~ James Potter

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Chapter Three

17:02

The five girls all huddled close together with their robes hung over their heads once again, dashing their way up the old stone steps into the gigantic castle – though they didn't help too much as they were still sopping wet from running around the train station. The moment they got under shelter again, they dropped the heavy fabric to the floor with loud slops of water against the school's floor.

As the girls pulled out their wands to cast a drying spell over their hair scrunched up their robes to get some of the water out, a large creature skidded around the closest corner with a loud whooshing sound and sickly giggle, making every single person on the corridor groan with frustration.

Hogwarts's notorious Poltergeist, Peeves, skidded did a somersault in the air as he scanned the area for a victim of who knew what he was planning. He quickly spotted somebody and smiled eerily widely, zooming in their direction, "Ooh! Lookey here, what do we have? Rotten Rosie and her ickle friends!" he giggled manically as Rosie glared up at him with furrowed eyebrows, knowing all too well not to show any signs of discomfort.

She and Lily had decided to prank him when they were in their second year and had caused his tongue to tie so he couldn't speak for three whole days and he had never forgiven them for it. In Rosie's defence, the two girls had been trying to follow Remus around the castle as part of their very long-winded investigation into why he was often so moody with them and the stupid thing had given her away.

"Peeves, you better get on your way before I have to shut you up again," she pointed a finger at him, raising her eyebrows dramatically and spoke in a tone like one would speak to her naughty toddler. Even during her first interaction with him, she knew that he ought to be treated like he was the most unintelligent being in the building otherwise he wouldn't listen to any threats someone made to him.

A flicker of dread flashed over his grotesque features before Peeves threw his hands over his face and rocketed all the way to the other side of the stretching corridor to go and startle some nervous second years that had just found their way into the place.

"I swear he's got bigger since I last saw him," Mary said once she had stowed her wand back in the pocket of her wands, frowning in concentration at the corner that he had just turned.

"Yeah, thanks to the git boys in our year," Marlene rolled her eyes, bending over and using both hands to ruffle up her shoulder-length hair, scoffing loudly while she spoke.

"What do you mean?" Alice asked, standing up from re-tying her shoelaces. The group all began to walk swiftly in the direction of the Great Hall while continuing their conversation, eager to get ample amounts of food from the feast down them and grab a good seat at their table.

"Well, Poltergeists feast on the sort of 'energy' of troublemaking and therefore they grow bigger the more concentrated that energy is," Marlene shrugged – Defence Against the Dark Arts was by far her best subject and was the only thing she ever actually studied for. "It's no wonder we've got one as bad as Peeves in this school. I mean, first the Prewett twins and now the four Gryffindor marauders? Who's next?"

"Have people honestly begun actually calling them 'The Marauders'?" Rosie scoffed, shaking her head. "What sort of people give their own group of friends a nickname? And a nickname like that, no less."

"They didn't," Mary pointed out as the girls naturally came to a stand still in the corridor as their conversation got more interesting. "So many people began calling them that after their pranks started to get bigger that I suppose the name's just sort of... stuck."