Chapter 16 – The Map

“Severus,” Harry hissed at the snake, which was lying on the floor next to his bed, surprised.

“Yes. Do you feel better?”

“A little. Why are you here, and why as a snake?”

“I wanted to show you something, but the dragon is still in her office. I think I have the Potion. Tomorrow we can try it out on a rat, or whenever she lets you out.”

“Wow, that’s cool. You’re just great!”

“I’ll show you tomorrow, I can’t change back now, because she would notice me. Go to sleep, I’ll be back tomorrow morning. Good night Harry. Oops, look at the cat over there.”

“Cat? Oh, is that McGonagall?”

“Yes. I could be in trouble. Oops.”

“Just ignore her and try to leave. Maybe she doesn’t want to be seen either. Good night Severus and thank you.”

-----

When Harry woke up in the morning, Severus was sitting in a chair next to him. As soon as he notice Harry was awake, he handed him a small piece of parchment.

It read:

Floo powder to get back to the future:

fairy dust

essence of whirlwind

powdered unicorn’s horn

fresh basilisk powder (made from the venom to be collected from a living basilisk or within 24 hours of it’s death and preserved immediately)

house elf hair freely given, 1 mm per day (7305 mm 20 years)

“Don’t lose this parchment; nobody except from us should know about it. And don’t get your hopes up yet, you know that we haven’t tested this so far. Maybe it doesn’t work at all.”

“Alright Severus, thank you. When can we test it?” Harry asked eagerly.

“If you want me to do the test alone, I can do it immediately, but when you want to be with me, we have to wait until you are allowed to go. How do you feel? Do you think she will let you go sometime today?”

Harry looked down to his blankets and shook his head. He still didn’t feel much better. “Severus, when you go down to breakfast, could you please ask Remus or Lily or even James to bring me my school books? I really have to study for the tests next week, and as I missed all of the last ones because of my fight with Tom, I have to give my best on these tests.”

“Alright, I will ask them. I have to go down to breakfast now anyway.”

-----

Pomfrey finally released Harry on Monday evening just in time for dinner but not before having a stern talk with Harry.

“Harry, did your relatives who raised you ever take you to a Healer or a doctor when you were ill?”

“No, never. I always had to heal myself, meaning … that broken bones or such external injuries I always healed somehow by wish, internal illnesses just had to go away by themselves. Last summer it was quite bad; I had a cold but couldn’t do anything about it, and by the time Dumbledore finally rescued me to Hogwarts it had turned quite bad and you told me it was Pneumonia.”

“That’s exactly what I thought. With this lack of treatment of illnesses, they have damaged your immune system, and that’s why the two of us meet so often. You have to be very careful when you have any trouble breathing like on Saturday, or when you even get a slight cold, you have to come to me immediately, otherwise it might turn into Pneumonia before you know it. You were very near to it this time. And now go down to dinner. No running, no playing Quidditch for a week!”

As soon as dinner was finished, Harry stormed up to the Slytherin table. “Severus come on, let’s do it.”

They two boys went down to the Potions classroom quickly, Severus caught a rat and stunned it, took a small box filled with yellow powder out of his pocket, threw the rat together with the powder in the fireplace and called, “Hogwarts Potions classroom”. Harry and Severus watched as the rat disappeared.

“Now we can only wait until tomorrow. The problem is… will it arrive exactly at the same time? As it said in the recipe, 1 mm of elf hair means a day. I put about 1.1mm in the Potion to be on the safe side, so the rat should be back about 2 hours later than we have now, so that we are sure we’ll be able to be here.”

“Alright. What are we going to tell Lily, why a rat comes through the floo during our Potions tutoring?”

“Let’s just tell her it’s an experiment, don’t tell any details.”

“Alright. Shall we brew a Potion together? I still have time until my lesson with Dumbledore about wandless magic which starts at 9.”

“Yes, we can do that. Pomfrey has asked me to make a batch of the new pain relieving Potion I invented, so we could do that now, if you don’t mind.”

-----

During their Potions tutoring the next evening, both of them could hardly concentrate on their Potion.

Suddenly Lily giggled and asked curiously, “what’s wrong with the two of you? You are watching the fireplace constantly. Are you waiting for someone coming through the floo?”

Severus and Harry giggled as well and Harry answered sincerely, “Yes, of course, we are waiting for a rat coming to visit us.”

When an hour later the fireplace fared green and a stunned rat appeared, Lily fainted, while the two boys congratulated themselves.

“Have you laughed enough?” Severus asked his friend. “May I wake her up?”

“No, wait!” Harry pointed his wand at Lily, mouthed “obliviate,” and said, “now you may.”

“Enervate”

Lily blinked. “What happened?”

“Nothing. You just fainted, is everything alright?”

“Yes of course. Let’s get on with our Potion.”

Later the same evening Harry thought, ‘everyone in my time told me the Marauders had always being funny at playing pranks, but since I have arrived here they’ve done nothing interesting. Do I have to help them with that as well?’

On their way to breakfast the next morning, he whispered to James and Sirius. “I think we are much too good, we should play some pranks don’t you think?”

“Yes, of course. We nearly forgot we had to defend the reputation we got in our fifth year. Let’s prank the Slytherins.”

“No, Sirius. Not the Slytherins. Don’t forget, one of the Marauders is a Slytherin. No, let’s prank either the teachers or everyone here. And I’ve already thought of something. But I can’t tell you here; let’s meet beside the lake directly after lunch.”

The six Marauders, James, Sirius, Remus, Harry, Severus and Lily ate their lunch very fast and met outside to hear what Harry had thought of.

“I thought about changing the floor under all entrance doors to the main class rooms into Portkeys that will transport people to different classrooms, for example the floor under the door of the Transfigurations classroom into a Portkey that sends people directly to the Potions classroom, although the door, of course will stay where it is. The door of the Potions classroom for example to the Hospital wing and so on. It should cause a great deal of chaos all over the school. What do you think it?”

“Cooool” Sirius and James shouted at the same time.

Remus asked carefully, “Harry, do you know how to make Portkeys? Even those which don’t move with the victim?”

“Yes, Remus, I know how. In fact, I had that idea while I was stuck in the Hospital Wing, so one night I flashed directly into the library, borrowed a book about Portkeys and studied it. No problem. As I’m the only one capable of making Portkeys I could go alone during the night, but I would prefer to have one of you with me, and we need to plan which door should lead where.”

“When you make the Portkeys, can you fix a time for which the Portkeys are active?”

“Yes, and I think we should just set all times to a fixed date from ten minutes before the start of the first lesson to five minutes after classes start. And afterwards the Portkeys should deactivate.”

“Harry, that sounds great, but are you really sure it will work? Should we meet in the dungeons tonight after dinner and try with some of the unused classrooms?”

“No, we have Quidditch practise tonight. Only Remus and Lily are free, but we need Harry to make the Portkey.”

“I’m not allowed to play Quidditch this week, so I could try with Severus, Lily and Remus. Has someone a free period today? If so, you could make a plan, and when our test works this evening, we could set the whole plan into action tonight and set the Portkeys for tomorrow morning.”

In fact, Remus and Sirius had a free period and developed a plan to transport every one over the greatest possible distances. Unfortunately, the classes for Care Of Magical Creatures couldn’t be considered, but all other classes, even the greenhouse for Herbology was included in the plan.

-----

Harry couldn’t believe that the teachers were unable to detect the excitement that dominated Gryffindor table the next morning. The Marauders couldn’t wait for classes to finally start. All six Marauders had Charms for their first class, and the portkey at the door to the Charms classroom was set to take everyone to the Transfiguration classroom.

“Oh, I can’t wait to see McGonagall’s face,” Sirius whispered to Harry, who just couldn’t stop laughing when he thought of the impending mayhem.

“Be careful Harry, you’re attracting attention. Your Grandparents are watching you,” Lily whispered from his other side.

Harry’s face fell and he said to Lily, “Oh no, if my granny thinks I’m behind this I’ll be grounded for the rest of the year.” With that he managed to put on a very serious expression on this face.

“Alright, let’s go; we don’t want to be late,” Remus said in a normal voice, for everyone to hear.

And it worked! They went to the Charms classroom, waited for Professor Flitwick to open the door, entered and felt a familiar pull behind their navels only to find themselves standing in the Transfiguration classroom together with all their classmates and Professor Flitwick. Professor McGonagall however was there as well; she probably hadn’t entered through the classroom door but through the door between her office and the classroom. The six culprits tried hard to make confused faces, when the first students who had already noticed, that they were in the wrong room, tried to leave the classroom and were pulled to the Potions classroom. There was complete and utter chaos, and it took up to about the end of the first lesson until all students had finally reached the classes they were supposed to be in.

Just after curfew on the same day, Fawkes appeared in Harry’s dormitory and asked, #Do you know anything about the prank this morning?#

“Um… why? Did Grandfather suspect me and sent you to ask?”

#No. But Albus was as amused as Minnie was upset. He thought it was funny and even said he was impressed with the abilities of the student who made the Portkeys. You know he would rather award a medal to someone for playing a good prank. In fact, both of them suspect you and your friends I think, but of course I won’t say anything.#

“All right Fawkes, it was us. You may tell Albus but not his wife.”

#She can’t understand me anyway, Icicle. I’ll be on my way, come to visit me anytime.#

As soon as the phoenix had flashed away, the four others rushed to Harry’s bed. “What did he say?”

“Do they suspect us?”

“Wait mates, everything is okay. Yes they suspect us, and McGonagall is quite upset, but Dumbledore thinks it was funny and was even impressed by our abilities of making Portkeys.”

Fortunately, their Head of House couldn’t see the four inhabitants of the Gryffindor sixth year’s dormitory rolling on the floor with laughter holding their stomachs.

-----

“When are we going to resume our work on the Marauders’ Map?” James asked two days later.

“Sorry, James, but as I missed the last tests completely, I really have to study this time. As soon as the tests are over, I’ll help with the map,” Harry promised.

“Maybe we can do a lot during the Easter holidays, or are you all going home?” he added.

“Normally we all go home for the holidays, but we could stay here I suppose.” James said.

For the next ten days, Harry spent every free minute studying and the tests went off really well; thanks to Severus’ Potions tutoring he and Lily even managed to get an O in their Potion tests.

“Cool” Harry said to Severus smirking. ”Thanks to your tutoring, I got an O in Potions. You have never given me anything better than an A.”

Severus laughed. “Maybe you have really become better in Potions than you were?!”

“Yes of course, but you also have become better at teaching,” Harry said teasingly. “By the way, Severus, are you going to stay here for the holidays?”

“Of course Harry, I won’t leave you here alone, I told you before.”

“That’s great, thank you. The other Marauders are going to stay as well, and we thought we could work on the Marauders’ Map. Are a lot of the Slytherins staying?”

“As far as I know there are only two first years staying, nobody else.”

“Should we ask Dumbledore or McGonagall if you might stay in our dormitory over the holidays? There is a free bed in our room anyway.”

“I would like that very much, but do you think they will allow it?”

“You mean, although there are three others to baby-sit me? Let’s go to the Headmaster’s Office and ask Granddad. It’s easier to ask McGonagall after getting his approval.”

“But wouldn’t your room-mates mind?”

“No, of course not. You belong to the Marauders, don’t you?”

Fortunately, Dumbledore and McGonagall agreed immediately.

-----

After the carriages with the other students had left Hogwarts, the six Marauders gathered immediately in the dormitory and made plans for efficient use of their holiday time. They paired in three groups – Harry and Severus, Remus and Sirius, Lily and James – and divided the castle into three large parts for their initial exploration. During the second week, they would go all together to suss out parts of the castle which were difficult to access and where their different special abilities would be needed.

They spent all their days exploring the castle, and Severus and Harry, who had taken the part of Hogwarts that was very far from Gryffindor because of Harry’s ability to flash them around, managed to miss lunch or dinner every second day. Harry couldn’t care less; they were so busy, and as long as they were not hungry, he didn’t want to interrupt their ‘studies’. Every evening, five minutes before curfew, they flashed to the Hospital Wing, where he downed his nutrient Potion, just to change back and flash Severus and himself straight to the dormitory. On the fifth day, McGonagall and Pomfrey were both waiting for him, very angry and threatening to keep him there if it happened just once again, so that Harry decided to be more careful during the second week.

After the first week, they were able to draw the main points of the map and only had the fine tuning and the charms left for the second week. During the second week, Lily and Remus spent a lot of time in the library looking for useful charms for the map, while the four others were busy with the fine measurement of places difficult to access, where the Animagus abilities of Harry or Severus were needed. They were very busy, but due to Harry’s ability to flash them all around the castle, they managed to finish everything during the holidays.

When school started again, each of them regretted not having much time any more to invest in the map, but they made a detailed plan of their free periods and whenever at least two of them were free of classes, they would meet and work on the map.

-----

Quidditch practise was resumed as well, and James made them train very hard in order to win the Quidditch cup. The final game against Ravenclaw was in two weeks time, and they had Quidditch practise not only three nights a week until directly before curfew, but also on Saturday and Sunday mornings. Harry groaned; he liked flying, but Quidditch practise on five days a week, especially mostly in the rain, was just too much.

One day after their Potions lesson, Professor Slughorn called, “Mr. Snape and Mr. Pane, please stay after class.” The two friends looked astonished at each other and shrugged. What could that be about?