fatal love

Chapter 48

That week, the four of them all checked out as many books on magical theory as possible from the library. Pince was definitely wary when she stamped the books out, but she couldn't stop them.

"It looks like Snape literally just jammed two spells together, and probably played around with the order and construction until something worked," Remus said on Friday. All of them were in the dorm, and they'd been reading non-stop since the Defence lesson on Monday. "I bet he doesn't even really know what he's doing, just uses trial and error."

Sirius grinned. Of course Remus was more offended by Snape's shoddy work than he was by the actual cursing. "Don't worry, Moony, we'll show him how it's done."

"Okay, I think I'm understanding this," James sighed, shutting the heavy book he was reading with a snap. "His spell wasn't that good because he just combined two spells that already exist, and so he weakened both. But if you go back to the origins of those spells, and build back from there, you'll be more successful."

"Right," Remus said. "And even though most spells are Latin, they all originate from Runes, so we need to write a spell in Ancient Runes, balance it using Arithmancy, and then translate it into Latin or another language so we can cast it verbally."

"We're never going to be able to do all that," Peter moaned. "I mean, adults, at the Ministry, their entire job is inventing spells! It's not like it's a hobby."

"Don't be negative, Pete," James tutted. "We're close to becoming the youngest Animagi in history, we can do this too."

"If we are going to do it, we should figure out exactly what we want to do," Sirius pointed out. "I still think we should come up with a nice, creative curse to get Snivellus back."

"No," James said firmly. "We won't make spells that harm people. Especially with a war on, we don't need anymore."

"You know, this is a perfect pranking opportunity," Remus smiled slyly. "If we do something with a spell we invented, no one will ever be able to figure out how we did it."

"Now that's more like it," James grinned. "Okay, prank ideas, go. Sky's the limit."

"It should use Transfiguration," Peter said reasonably, "we're all already experts of Transfiguration thanks to the Animagus research, so it'll probably be easier."

"Tell you what would be funny," Sirius said thoughtfully, "is if we could set a charm on the plates."

"What do you mean?" Remus asked.

"Like, imagine a mix of a Vanishing Charm and a Conjuring Charm. So when people put food on their plates, it disappears, and reappears, I don't know, like three feet above their heads."

Remus nodded. "So the plate kind of acts as a Portkey!"

"Imagine the chaos," James grinned in excitement. "We'd probably start the biggest food fight Hogwarts has ever seen."

"Okay," Remus said, grabbing some parchment and starting a list. "Let's read up on Portkeys, Transfiguration Theory, Displacement Charms, and the origins and backgrounds of Vanishing and Conjuring Charms. Then we might have a real shot at this."

"Moony, aw" Sirius smiled teasingly, "look at how happy you are at the thought of all that research."

Remus flipped two fingers at him, grinning. "Piss off, Black."

On Monday, when Sirius was leaving Muggle Studies with Marlene, Benjy was waiting there, leaning against the wall.

"What've you got next?" Benjy grinned.

"Herbology," Sirius said.

"Can you skip it?"

Sirius glanced at Marlene.