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A Way to Explain


“Where have you been?” Lily demanded when the three Marauders showed back up in the Great Hall that evening at dinner. She was glowering right at James as she asked, as though it were his fault that all three of them had been missing. “And why are there leaves stuck up in your hair?” she quickly plucked bits of leaf and twig out of his messy hair.

Across the table, Remus and Peter both reached up to feel for leaves and twigs in their own hair.

James smiled, “Evans, I was off becoming a revolutionary. We had a rendezvous with a very important source and we had to go and find out everything he knew - a leak of information for the Resistance, you see. We’re fixing on becoming members.”

Lily rolled her eyes, “Why can’t you ever just tell me the truth about things when you lot go off disappearing?”

“I do tell you the truth, Evans, it’s not my fault that you don’t believe it,” James said with a shrug.

Lily sighed. “Remus…?”

“Sorry, Lily, he’s right,” Remus replied, shrugging.

“Yeah,” Peter said, “We’re rebels, the lot of us, you can’t expect us to stay about the castle, twiddling our thumbs while there’s adventure and battles to be had and won!”

“Next time, maybe you join us, and you can see yourself what a bunch of bloody heroes we are.” He winked and his lip caught up on his tooth.

“Ugh,” she groaned. “Well McGonagall is right angry with the lot of you. You missed a load of really important topics in all our classes! Seems if you were working for the Resistance that perhaps McGonagall would’ve known about it, yeah?”

“McGonagall is on a need-to-know basis,” answered James, “As are you. And I’m sorry love, but with that attitude and eye-rolling you’re doing, I don’t think that you need to know anything more abot what we were doing. Good day.” He turned back to his dinner, shovelling pot roast into his mouth with a smirking grin.

Lily crossed her arms. “And does Maryrose know you’re calling me love?”

“I’m sure she’d find it quite funny. I can wave her over if you’d like to ask her?” James replied.

“It just doesn’t seem appropriate for somebody with an attachment to be calling another girl Love.”

“It’s just a nickname,” James replied, “Old habits die hard, sorry. I’ll try to refrain myself in the future. Since you’re so concerned for Maryrose.”

Lily rolled her eyes and turned away.

Remus stared after her, and when she was out of ear shot, he said, “Blimey. That -- was sort of harsh.”

James shrugged, “I’m just tired of hanging about waiting for Evans. She’s not interested in me, she made that bleeding clear, and I can’t go on worshipping her as I have for the past four years. I need to pull myself together. I have a wonderful girlfriend, who I fancy very much, and I can’t be fawning over Evans…”

Fawning,” mumbled Peter. “He says he can’t be fawning over Evans.”

Remus snorted so hard that he started choking on a piece of carrot and Peter had to slam his fist into his back to help clear the airwaves as James chewed thoughtfully, not really reacting to the pun, but staring off into space, like he was thinking. “Bloody hell,” whimpered Remus, struggling to regain his breath. “That was funny.”

James suddenly turned to look at them, “What if You Know Who is trying to force another election, too?”

“I thought we decided that wasn’t his style?” Remus asked.

“Yeah but what if he is? What if he’s trying ot take over the ministry slowly so it’s like an infiltration, so that nobody really notices until it’s too late? He does it ickle bit by ickle bit and everyone accepts one policy, then another… and another… and soon the bad pills are easier to swallow, next thing you know the whole ruddy world is under his power…”

Remus and Peter exchanged glances.

“What if he has someone he’s already selected to run against her? What if that’s what this Harold Minchum is all about? What if he’s actually for the Dark Lord and he isn’t saying it?” James’s eyes were wide.

“Moody clearly knew the bloke,” Remus disagreed.

“Yeah? Well we all clearly know Sirius, but that didn’t stop You Know Who from putting the imperius on him, did it? Moody could know him and the imperius could be controlling the guy just the same…”

Remus frowned, then looked around. “Perhaps we should go upstairs to discuss this?”

“Yeah. Good thinking. The walls have ears,” James nodded and he jumped up.

“But what about treacle tart?” Peter whimpered, looking at the nearly empty plates around them that meant dessert would be appearing across the table soon… “Can’t we just whisper? At least long enough to stay for the pudding?”

“If someone overhears us - the wrong person --” James glanced toward the Slytherin table, then back to Peter, “Then we’re all in really big trouble. Let’s go.” He stood up and so did Remus and Peter stared sadly at the table top. “Go knick some from the kitchens if it’s going to bother you so much,” James said, and he turned for the door of the Great Hall.

Peter started after them, but just as he stepped away, the deserts filled the table and everyone oooh’ed in surprise and excitement. Peter quickly dove forward and grabbed three of the tarts and each of the three puddings that had arrived at their places. “Yes!” he whispered, and he bolted after the two others, “Guys! I got all three of our puddings! Look! Guys!!” he called, running up the stairs.




They were sitting about the dormitory that night, talking long into the night about their personal theories on what Voldemort was doing playing cat-and-mouse with the unsuspecting Minister for Magic, who they thought Harold Minchum was and what his intentions might be, where Moody fit in with everything that they knew, and what they should go about doing to tell the Resistance about the stuff Sirius had overheard. “McGonagall’s gonna ask our source,” Remus pointed out.

“We just tell her we can’t tell her,” shrugged James.

“She’ll never let it go at that,” Remus argued.

Peter was eating a chocolate bar. Remus stuck out his hand and Peter snapped a bit of it off for him and offered some to James, but James shook his head.

“Why can’t we just tell her Sirius told us?” Peter asked.

“Then we’d have to tell her we know where Sirius is,” James said, “And she’d ask how we know and where he is and we’d have to find a way to explain how it is that Sirius is living as my father’s pet dog.”

Remus ran a hand over his face.

Peter said, “What if we just told her Sirius told us but that we can’t tell her where he is because he made us swear to it that we wouldn’t.”

“Maybe he made us make an unbreakable vow not to tell,” Remus suggested.

“An unbreakable vow?” asked Peter, “How does one do that?”

“Well you grab onto their hands like this --” James said and he grabbed Peter’s arm and a jolt of familiarity in the grip of James’s hand about his wrist made Peter squirm with the deja’vu, “-- and the person who’s asking for the vow states what you’re vowing and asks you if you swear to it and then this spell binds your souls together so that if the vow is broken, you die.”

Peter stared at his arm as James let go of it. “You die?” he asked, sick to his stomach, “You really die?”

“If the spell’s been cast correctly, you do,” James nodded.

Peter shifted uneasily.

“He’s not really making us take the unbreakable vow, Pete,” Remus said, laughing at how pale Peter Pettigrew’s face had grown, “We’re just making tosh up, you know that, yeah?”

“Yeah, of course,” Peter said, “I know we are.” It wasn’t this hypothetical, made-up vow that he was worried about. It was the very real one that he had been forced to make, quite unknowingly, a month before, in the parlor room of the Lestrange Manor that now had him weighted down… What would he do?

Peter was still trying to figure out what to do when something occurred to him. “Mopsus,” he said suddenly.

“What?” Remus asked, “What about him?” He looked over at Peter with a question in his eyes.

James added, “Guy’s dead, Pete, he can’t have been of any help telling us that information, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“No… it’s just that at the start of term, Mopsus made a whole string of predictions, remember? He said that first someone would leave us and that’s when Remus left because of… of his dad… and then he said that in December two would be together that were then apart and December’s when Rey and Sirius got together. Then he said that February would have things known that were unknown before. Could he have been talking about all this stuff Sirius is telling us? About the Ministry? It was unknown but before the end of February it became known - known to us.”

Remus and James exchanged glances.

“Next is a testing of souls, in May -- four souls tested, two pass, two fail,” Peter recited quietly. “If Mopsus keeps being right, that is...”

James cleared his throat, “If,” he said emphatically.

“Yes, if,” agreed Remus.

Peter said, “Mopsus wasn’t wrong, not even once, you lot.”

“Should’ve seen his own death coming then, shouldn’t he?” Remus demanded.

“Maybe he did and just didn’t tell anybody,” Peter said. “He laughed when it happened… all the way ‘til the moment he was actually dead, he lay there on the floor laughing at You Know Who.”

James shivered. “Creepy old bastard, I don’t miss him.”

“Nor do I,” Remus and Peter said at exactly the same time.

“But it doesn’t mean he wasn’t right,” Peter said darkly. “There’s four souls being tested guys…” he whispered, “There’s four of us. Every other prophecy Mopsus made concerned us four. What if… what if we are the four and -- and we’re tested?”

Remus looked at James.

James snorted, “We’ll be fine Pete, relax!”

“But last time we underestimated Mopsus --”

“Peter, we have loads of time before May. More important right now is figuring out how to tell the Resistance about the stuff going on at the Ministry without giving away that we’re animorphamangi.”

“Animagi,” corrected Remus, rolling his eyes. Some things never changed.

“Whatever it is,” James replied, “That’s way more important than worrying over some test in May. Besides - we’ll be tested in May for sure. Our exams are in May.”

“Don’t mention the exams, I’m so far behind on my revising,” Remus said hurriedly.

“You can’t possibly be revising for the end of year exams already!” Peter exclaimed, “It’s only just turned to March!”

Remus looked about at them, “You mean you lot aren’t revising for the exams yet?”

“Not even a little bit,” James replied.

Remus muttered, “Oh you’re giving me anxiety just thinking of it!”

Peter muttered, “I still haven’t even finished revising for last years exams,” he joked.

James guffawed.

Remus shook his head, “Bloody hell.”