The Marauders: Year Six #Wattys2017

Two Names Are in the Stars

Two Names Are In The Stars

ARRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

ARR-ARR-ARRR-ARRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

The howls echoed through the woods - the werewolf's so much louder and more chilling than the dogs's. They crashed through the woods, the stag rushing to keep up, having a much harder go of it with his thick antlers catching on branches as he ducked along through the brush. It was the first good moon in some time, where Padfoot had managed to get control over the werewolf fairly quickly and they'd gone out into the woods to run freely among the bracken.

James had missed this. He'd missed the feeling of the air and the smell of the forest and the crunch of leaves and twigs beneath his hooves. He missed the running and the leaping over logs and low brush, missed the sound of the canines fading in and out around him as they ran, so much faster and more agile than he was, dark in the shadows, nearly impossible to see in the pale moon until they got into clearings. He paused now and then to rest, his heart throbbing in his chest, and nibbled on bark from trees or grass from the ground and listened to the dogs barking playfully about him in the forest.

Sirius always said how much better it felt to be in the animagus form when he was feeling blue - you could always tell when Sirius was feeling sad, he'd be popping in and out of Snuffles form all over the place back in the dorm room, and shedding his stupid black fur on every surface. Sometimes, James forgot how right Sirius was about it, how jealous he was that Sirius's animagus was something he could easily transform into anywhere without getting his antlers caught up in stuff. James felt better now, in the trees, as a stag, than he'd felt for some time. Since the start of term, really.

Prongs paused in running to catch his breath, and walked slow through a clearing, listening as the sounds of the dogs rushing through the trees faded off. They'd come back for him, he wasn't worried about it. He paused and nosed about slowly.

There was a sound then, through the trees and he looked up, raising his head to peer through the dark, ears twitching.

Probably one of the dogs, he thought.

But then he heard it again and turned toward it.

Suddenly there was a spear pressed to his neck.

"Reveal yourself."

The spear was long and it disappeared into the dark behind the trees, but even covered in shadow and branches he could see with his stag eyes that it was a centaur that had spoken. He swallowed his nerves and he closed his eyes and transformed, standing up once it was completed and instinctively raising his hands, palms-up, to show he didn't have his wand in his hand.

Actually, he didn't have his wand at all, he realized.

It was back in the Shrieking Shack in his robes pocket.

"My name is James Potter, I'm a wizard... a student... from Hogwarts," he said quickly.

"I know who you are, Boy," answered a low voice.

James stayed still.

"All of our kind know who you are." The spear was lowered and James slowly lowered his hands.

"You do?" he asked.

"Yes," said the voice, even lower than before. "Your name has been known by the centaurs for years."

James felt uneasy. "Why?"

"It is written in the stars."

"What's written in the stars?" James asked.