Mischief Not Managed Yet

Chapter 15: Bend The Rules

After all the hopes the boys had put into this girl, to say that Sirius was disappointed, was a massive understatement.
Hermione had said that Luna might be able to help, and here she was, smiling like a lunatic, stating the obvious and not helping a bit.

Sirius could've screamed. In his frustration, he resisted the urge to stomp his feet and turned to Remus and James instead. James bit his lip, looking even more frustrated than Sirius felt. Remus merely furrowed his eyebrows, thinking.

"I can't say I'm surprised," Fred deadpanned, sighed dissapointedly and dropped his back onto the bed.

To James' surprise, Luna now stopped smiling, rolling her eyes instead.

At this, Remus tilted his head.
"Is it possible that you meant something specific, Luna?"

"No, not at all," she replied immediately, giving Sirius another disapproving look. "I meant exactly as I said it, simple as that."

Remus was thrown off guard by this grumpy side of the Ravenclaw. He opened his mouth to ask more, when she beat him to it, as if she'd known that noone knew what she was saying.

"You have magic. You conjured parchment and ink to write a list. Have you ever seen another ghost use magic?"

One could've heard a needle dropping down on the floor, as Fred sat back up abruptly, and all the boys stared at Luna.

"Didn't think so," she smirked, a little triumphant yet dreamily at the same time. "Well, if other ghosts can do that, too, at least I haven't seen it. But that doesn't matter: You can use it."

The marauders hadn't paid much attention to their use of magic before. It had always been a part of them, and they simply hadn't changed that after dying. Naturally, they hadn't thought of it as a big deal. But now that Luna had mentioned it...

It was a good point, James admitted. But he still couldn't see the great effect it could have, how it solved all of their problems. How did Luna think that they had solved their own problems already?

"Magic knows little boundaries," Remus almost whispered, finally realising.

Luna nodded, smiling happily. "Exactly, now you understand. If you can use magic to conjure parchment, you should be able to do much more with it. My suggestion is transfiguration. You can't have some things; there are rules. But you can use your wands to turn these things into stuff you can have."

It was quiet as it dawned on the marauders. A smile krept onto Sirius' lips.
"This is brilliant!"

"And we're good at transfiguration!" James exclaimed, much happier, now that he could see hope. For the first time in a little less than a month.
"It might not be a problem that the spells we need don't exist! 'Magic knows little boundaries' - we can create those ourselves!!"

"Precisely. Now you see what I mean?" Luna smiled. "I think that you can bend the rules a little: Human stuff you can't touch can be transformed into ghostly things you can touch, and the other way around. That should solve a lot of problems, shan't it?"

Fred was beaming. "If we really find a way to do that, then yes, it would certainly make everything much easier!"

"It even solves the food problem!" Remus almost laughed, turning to Sirius excitedly. "Magic may not be able to create food and drinks, but we might be able to transform the food of the living into food for us! Oh, this is great!"

Sirius allowed himself a joyous laugh and hugged Remus.
Fred looked away from the both of them and turned to Luna instead.
"Thank you!"

She nodded, the dreamy smile growing a little. "It is nothing. We will think of something to cross the other points off the list, too."

James nodded excitedly. "Thank you! But now I think we might be busy with this, first. Where do we start, trying out spells and stuff? Or if something like this already exists?"

"I'd say, you ask the other ghosts."

"Simple, but effective, yes Luna." Fred wanted to clap Luna's shoulder, but went right through it instead. "Urgh, we'll have to think of something for that."

Luna was a little shaken up by the cold sensation and put a hand on her shoulder. "Alright. You can return to me whenever you have more questions."

"Will do," Sirius had let go of Remus some time earlier and smiled at the girl. "You've been a great help already. Thank you."

The girl only nodded before standing up, letting go of her shoulder. "Now, I have to sell a few more copies of the Quibbler. But I wish you all good luck."
With a last smile at the ghosts, Luna floated out of the room.

"That girl is weird," James said after a few seconds of privacy. "But brilliant."

Sirius nodded frantically, sending his curls bouncing up and down around his handsome face. "We've got to start right now!"

"Way ahead of you," Fred shouted, jumped up and left the room before any of the others could. He practically ran down the stairs. When he reached the end of the staircase, he could hear the other boys follow him.
But Fred hadn't been paying attention to what was in front of him, listening to the boys behind him.
Normally, that wouldn't have been a problem, seeing as Fred would simply walk through students or any other obstacles - but this time he crashed into something solid and got sent sprawling on the floor.

Fred needed a few seconds to collect himself, but then looked up, only to see the young Ravenclaw ghost getting back to her feet. Fred could see a blush forming behind the dark cheeks of the ghost. The girl hid her face behind her dark curls, though, and gave an embarrassed chuckle as she reached out to help Fred back to his feet.
"I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

"No, I'm sorry," Fred replied, letting go of the girl to dust off his trousers - not that he could've collected any dust, even if he'd wanted to. "I didn't watch my step."

The Weasley ghost whipped around abruptly when he heard a whistle sound coming from the staircase.
Sirius stood there, winking, which got him elbowed in the ribs by Remus, while James laughed at Sirius' muffled groan.

"What were you four doing?" The ghost girl asked suspiciously. "Scheming?"

"You could say that," Fred replied without taking his glaring eyes off his immortal-yet-dead friends. Then, out of nowhere, his posture relaxed. He turned around to face the girl again.
"You know what, you could actually help us. How much do you know about a ghost's ability to do magic?"

The girl wrinkled her forehead in confused, dragging out her answer. "Not much. You should ask Helena. She knows more than anyone, she was the one who knew how to invocate you four, too."

"Sounds good,... Erm. What's your name again?"

"Victoria Mallom, but everyone calls me Vicky."

Fred gave her a dazzling smile. "Alright, thank you, Vicky." Then he turned to his friends. "C'mon, we haven't got all day, let's go!"

And as though he'd waken them up, the three marauders regained their postures, walked toward him and joined Fred on his way out of the Ravenclaw Common room, on the search for Helena Ravenclaw.

Sorry for the long wait, but I finally caught covid and was pretty sick, so I couldn't write despite having the time.
Now I'm better though, so here's the update! I hope you like it!!

Stay happy!
Xoxo, your fangirl