The Shrieking Shack || The Marauders (Book 1)

JAMES

Life had never been better for James Potter. He studied in the most renowned school for wizards and witches in the world, he had three best friends and two great parents who had sent him a brand new broomstick only a month into attending Hogwarts. Life could be worse.

"Don't you think we should be doing this under adult supervision?" Remus said nervously. "You know first years can't fly alone unless we get special permission from Coach Spinnet."

The sun hadn't yet set on the Hogwarts ground and they were all huddled around James and his new Cleansweep Six. A swift breeze rustled their hair as James looked up into the sky, searching for any sign of trouble. Sirius was rubbing his hands absent mindedly for warmth as Remus tried to convince James to drop the fantastic idea that had sprung up inside his mind as soon as he saw his new broomstick. Peter was chewing his lower lips looking from Remus to James, probably trying to calculate who would win this time.

"Rubbish," said James as he prepared to climb his Cleansweep. "Riding a broom isn't all that difficult, as Coach Spinnet would have us believe."

He put his legs across the broom, kicked the ground and zoomed straight up. He stopped around 20 feet above them, looking down smugly.

"Ten knuts, I say he falls flat on his face and breaks his neck," said Sirius, loud enough for James to hear.

"I most certainly will not!" James said indignantly.

"Yeah? For 5 sickels, I say you can't even fly that thing around the castle," Sirius said with a mischievous grin, much to Remus's displeasure.

"There's no need for that. We all know James is the best flyer among us," Remus said, trying to calm the little red face up on the broom.

But James wasn't listening. "I'll bet you 10 sickles I can," he said and flew off.

"He's gonna break his neck at that speed." James heard Peter say horrified. He could still hear them laughing when he closed his eyes.

His stomach was fluttering trying to get out of his body. It had been very easy to say that he was going to circle the entire castle once, but now that he thought about it, the castle was pretty huge. Maybe he should have listened to Remus. "Calm down Potter," he muttered to himself and opened his eyes.

As he soared through the air, the wind rushed through his hair and screamed in his ears. His grip tightened on his broom and he bent down, merging space and time together as he zoomed ahead like a swift eagle flying in a vast blue sky. He opened his mouth and a loud "WHOP!" escaped his tongue. Up on his broom, every distance seemed smaller and the entire world seemed within his reach. As the throbbing in his stomach eased, he looked back at his three friends standing so far below on the ground, looking no bigger than minuscule black ants from his mighty position in the sky, and smirked. He had hoped they would at least cheer him on, but to the contrary, they seemed to be asking him to stop. Sirius was even doing a weird dance- waving his arms widely in a big no and continuously pointing to the right of James. James turned around and his eyes settled on the figure Sirius seemed to be pointing at.

"Bloody hell" he cursed, for he had just spotted Professor McGonagall, thankfully though, she hadn't spotted him yet. He sucked in a huge breath and with his heart beating in his throat, tried to steer his broom away from her. He leaned to the left making a gradual turn when it happened.

"Mr. Potter?!" Professor McGonagall had spotted him and she looked quite mad.

James gulped, already preparing himself mentally for a year worth of detention. He leaned down on his broom ready to land when his hands slipped. For the next few seconds, all his eyes captured was a haze of grey, green and brown. His glasses flew off his eyes in one direction and he in another. The last thing James Potter heard before he passed out was a large awful crack followed by a sharp pain on his head.

*

He woke up that night in the Hospital Wing with bandages on his head and legs and a very angry Professor McGonagall standing by his bed, looking down on him quite severely, her lips pressed in a thin line.

"Mr Potter, were you not made aware through your Hogwarts letter that flying without supervision for first year students is against school rules?"

James turned scarlet. She didn't just sound angry, but her every word shivered with disappointed. He nodded meekly.

"First year flying about- no supervision! I am most disappointed, Mr. Potter- never in my fifteen years of teaching career. And to add to that, the Whomping Willow! You could have died!" She sniffed angrily.

James scrunched up his eyebrows in confusion when she mentioned the monster tree. "The Willow-?"

"After you lost control your broom flew straight into the tree, aggravating the old willow quite a lot. Needless to say, you must face the consequences. You will be serving one month of detention with me, including your weekends or any other holidays. I would have confiscated your broom too, but there's no point in that since the tree destroyed it."

James gasped at that. His broom, his very first broom- destroyed. "Can't it be fixed Professor? How bad is it?" he asked devastated but McGonagall just stared at him sternly until he looked down again, shamefully.

"Fifty points will be taken from Gryffindor for your actions."

"But professor-" James began but stopped quickly when he saw the look on her face.

"You have to understand you broke two rules Mr Potter. I have as much passion for Gryffindor house as you, if not more, but what's fair is fair." And with that she was gone.

*

James marched back into the Gryffindor common room early next morning. He didn't want to face his house mates yet, who he was sure would be mad at him for losing their house fifty points.

However, his plans were foiled by a sleepy Sirius sitting on one of the plushy chairs by the fire, in the common room. He shot up at once as James walked in.

"Are you alright?" asked Sirius worriedly. "We wanted to check on you last night but McGonagall wouldn't let us."

James nodded and sat down on a chair. "Did you get the treacle tart? Peter stole one during dinner and we sent it through a school owl. Did you get it?"

He smiled. "Yes, thank you. Aren't you mad at me though?" he asked.

Sirius's eyebrows scrunched up in confusion. "What? No, I thought you'd be mad at me," he said sheepishly.

"But I lost our house fifty points," James said confused.

"Which you wouldn't have done if I hadn't egged you on in the first place. I didn't think it would lead to this though..." Sirius's voice trailed off. James laughed.

"You know," he said. "For next time, let's get others into trouble instead of ourselves."

Sirius smiled. "Sounds like a good plan."

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A/N: Sorry for the late update, this chapter needed some major editing. =P

Also, yes, I know that first year students couldn't bring brooms to Hogwarts. But there needs to be an incident which ensued this rule. And who else to be at the root of it than James Potter. Well, either him or Nymphadora Tonks. What do you think? 

Anyways, if you still liked this chapter, please don't forget to vote. :)