The Next Great Adventure (A Marauders Fan Fic)

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Four

On the morning of her birthday Lily was woken by a loud crash as Mary, who had been about to wrench the curtains of the birthday girl’s bed open so that Cassie and Alice could wake her up, tripped over one of the presents lying on the floor. In a desperate attempt to cover this up the other five girls in the dorm (who were all awake) – Mary, Cassie, Alice, Jessica and Imogen – all shouted simultaneously, “Happy birthday!”

“Now open your presents,” Cassie commanded as they jumped on Lily’s bed. Lily groaned and stretched, ruffling her already rumpled hair and yawning. “What time do you all call this?”

“Really too early,” Imogen chuckled, yawning as well, “especially since I have a free period first thing… but I’m up to show my support for you and your newfound ancient-um-ness?” Her uncertainty at creating the final word turned it into a strange kind of question and Lily smiled before having a pile of presents dumped in her arms.

“Now this one is from me, that one’s from Mary, that’s Alice’s… that’s um… I don’t know whose that is.” Jessica listed all of the presents’ respective givers as she shoved them into Lily’s arms and Cassie and Alice squabbled over whose present she should open first.

Each oddly shaped parcel was wrapped in a different type of bright wrapping paper and Lily worked her way through them slowly. Alongside all the presents which her friends had got her there were some from her parents, a mixture of magical and non-magical items, and a small parcel with an even smaller envelope stuck on it with Spellotape. Nobody knew who it came from so Lily left it to last and, because it was so small, it ended up half buried under her duvet and forgotten as the girls rushed down to breakfast. As Lily flung back the duvet and jumped out of bed the parcel, unnoticed by anyone, flew through the air and landed underneath Cassie’s bed.

They all had double Defence Against the Dark Arts before lunch and, as they milled around the entrance to the classroom, Lily overheard Alice whispering to Cassie how quiet the day had been on the Marauders front. “It’s… well it’s not strange really because obviously they don’t cause trouble in every lesson but for some reason it feels quieter than usual.”

“It might be because they’re behaving in lessons for once,” Cassie muttered back. “Normally they flick things at each another and mutter and ask stupid questions that they know the answer to-”

“Or really hard questions that no one else would think to ask and that some of the teachers can’t even answer,” Mary added wryly.

“I don’t think they’ve been given a detention today either… not even in Transfiguration this morning.”

Lily glanced over to where the four boys were standing and watched them for a minute; nothing about them had changed, they were still laughing and chatting with each other and yet something seemed slightly off. Still, she wasn’t about to complain if they’d finally stopped disturbing other people and disrupting lessons; it would certainly make her life as a Prefect much easier. As she wondered about the difference Sirius looked up; it didn’t seem like he had seen her watching them but the boy elbowed James and he too looked up, catching Lily’s eye for a split second before looking back to Remus and turning away again. For some reason this silent almost-rejection hurt Lily and she was glad of Professor Banks' head sticking out of the door and announcing “Come on then! Why are you all hanging around out here? Don't you want to learn about Patronuses?”

The assembled Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs filed into her classroom and took their seats, dumping books, quills and rolls of parchment on the ancient wooden desks. Professor Banks waited for the last few mutters to finish, standing silently in her magenta robes before flourishing her wand and covering the blackboard in an enormous drawing of a wizard casting a spell which caused some kind of ethereal lion to billow out of the tip of his wand. “The Patronus,” she began when she was bored of waiting, her voice resounding through the classroom, “is one of the most advanced pieces of magic in existence. The strange thing about it though is that the theory is unbelievably simple and yet very few witches or wizards are actually able to cast a successful Patronus.” Words began to appear on the board behind her as the drawing disappeared. “Patronuses are a positive projection, capable of repelling Dementors and, in some cases involving corporeal Patronuses, of causing physical harm to people. Patronuses have been said to reflect the innermost traits of the caster as well as their values; as such many people view them as a reflection of the soul and choose not to cast one for fear of giving too much about themselves away. This theory has actually gained a lot of support from wizards who have studied Patronuses and have shown that Patronuses are capable of changing their form, for example when something that has fundamentally changed the soul of the caster has taken place; things which have this kind of effect can range from an extremely strong love to a devastating bereavement. The phenomenon is, however, very rare and Helena Coe suggested in 1932 that many peoples’ Patronuses change form when they are a young child, and consequently without them knowing, since it happens before they have learnt to cast a Patronus. Because Patronuses feed off our inner strength they often take the form of a large, or larger than life, animal; this isn't always the case though; I once knew a girl whose Patronus was a butterfly that managed to hold off three Dementors at once. Household pets are also fairly common despite not being seen as the largest of creatures though no one yet knows why. Considering the use of this spell and the trust which we place in it, it is surprising how much of it is shrouded in mystery.”