The Shrieking Shack || The Marauders (Book 1)

JAMES

James was having a great time with Sirius once the holidays started. They spent their days wandering about the castle trying to find secret passages and shortcuts, and to their pleasure, they found a new corridor or a hidden staircase almost every other day. They even made friends with many witches and wizards in the paintings that hung on the corridor walls.

They also had the dormitory to themselves and the common room was much less crowded than usual, so they could get good armchairs by the fire. James had managed to convince a house-elf from the kitchens to bring them food up in the Gryffindor tower and they spent their evenings eating treacle tarts and chocolate éclairs by the fire. Although Sirius wasn't much found of house-elves, even he didn't complain as long as they were bringing tasty snacks up to his bed.

On Christmas Eve, James laid on his bed awake, his stomach too full to sleep, thinking about all the presents he was going to recieve the next day. He guessed his mother would give him another book and he'd probably get some sweets from his father. He wondered whether Peter and Remus had received the dung-bombs he had sent them and hoped they would appreciate all the trouble he had to dodge with Filch to place the Owl-Order.

As the night grew darker and the castle lights reduced, he gradually fell into a deep comfortable sleep and dreamt he was chasing a silver doe through a moonlit meadow.

He woke up early next morning to find a huge pile of gifts at the foot of his bed. Flinging himself off the four poster, he looked at the one beside his which still had its hangings down. Sirius was still asleep.

"Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!" James said, jumping on the balls of his feet and throwing the hangings off Sirius's bed.

"What's wrong?" asked a bleary eyed Sirius, sitting up.

"Merry Christmas!" cried James, diving at his pile of presents after dragging Sirius off his bed.

"Whoa," said Sirius, looking at his stack of presents which was a little smaller than James's.

James picked up the top parcel which was wrapped in silvery-grey paper and opened it hastily. It was a large box of Chocolate Frogs with a note saying-

"Hope you find some good cards in these. Enjoy your Christmas.

Love, Dad."

Another parcel placed right below it was from his mother and as he had guessed, it was a book- Quidditch through the Ages- plus a dozen homemade minced pies.

"Those look nice," said Sirius, throwing a fancy green robe in a corner carelessly.

"You've got one too." James pointed at the base of Sirius's pile where the same silver-grey wrapping paper peeked through the rest of his presents.

"No way," gasped Sirius as he pulled it out and shredded the wrapping paper. Just like James, Sirius had also received a dozen minced pies and a book, though his one was- Mastering the Art of Duelling. Sirius plucked the note off the book and snorted passing it to James.

"Use with caution and try not to hex each other."

Another silver-grey present in Sirius's pile contained a large box of Berti Bott's Every-Flavor Beans from James's father. "Your parents are really cool," he said with a big smile plastered across his face. "Mine gave me green Slytherin robes." He then cleared his throat and said in a high pitched shrill voice which James guessed to be Mrs. Black's- "Family tradition!"

They both laughed and then busied themselves in their presents. Remus had given James and Sirius a big chunk of chocolate each and when Sirius tried breaking a piece off his, it gave a loud BOOM! and the entire dormitory was filled with sweet smelling white smoke. Peter had given James a dozen Fizzing Wizbees and Hagrid had sent about two dozen of his rock cakes (which he immediately repacked and chucked under his bed).

The best gift however came from Sirius. It was a small rattling box wrapped in brown paper which James opened to find a glass box enclosing a tiny golden ball with small fluttering silver wings- the golden snitch. James gasped.

"Where'd you get this from?" he asked, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice.

"At the World Cup," Sirius shrugged. "My brother's really into Quidditch so our father took us during the summers. It's not a real snitch you know- just a copy. Regulus made me promise I'd give him a dozen of those for Christmas, but I guess he'll be fine with the eleven."

"It's amazing," said James. "Now I feel a little bad about giving you dungbombs."

"Are you kidding me?" asked Sirius incredulously "Now I'll have something to give my mother when I return home for the summers. I used all of mine on Filch."

James removed the glass box and watched as the snitch within fluttered around the room though much slowly than an actual snitch would.

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A/N: Sorry for a shorter chapter but I'm so freakin tired these days. My mid-terms are about to start so please forgive me if any of the next updates are a bit late.

Anyway, if you're feeling like it, I would really appreciate your comments and vote. :)