Harry Potter and the Legend of the Twelve

Potters to the Rescue

The elder members of The Twelve were able to relax a little once the initial shock of the prophecy was now fading into acceptance. Harry, however, was still quite unsettled by the whole thing.

Harry was very happy to see how the younger members of The Twelve and their friends were becoming almost a family unto themselves. Whatever was to come, they knew from experience the importance of having friends.

Hermione, as the best researcher of the group, continued to search for information on the Legend of The Twelve and still found nothing. They were beginning to think they would never understand it, and would just have to wait for something to happen, but as things were going well, they chose not to dwell on what might happen, and to focus on the positive things.

Harry kept a close watch on the goings on around the school, and was quite happy with most of what he observed.

Two weeks had gone by since the young Gryffindors had listened to 'The Tales of Harry Potter and His Friends' as James had started to refer to them. It remained their number one topic of conversation. James had given Lily and Hugo the password to Gryffindor Tower, and the two future Gryffindor hopefuls spent a lot of time hanging out with their older siblings and their friends, really becoming part of the group, much to the approval of their parents. In fact, they all spent so much time together, that some started to refer to them as the 'New Marauders', something James embraced and played up at every opportunity.

It was made more pronounced, as they often got Sirius to tell them tales of the original Marauders, and occasionally a story about the mischief their parents got into. The bond that was developing between the eight New Marauders was as strong as the bond Harry, Ron, and Hermione forged when they were in school.

However, as strong as the bond was becoming, it paled in comparison to the bond between two members of the New Marauders. Albus and Carly had become inseparable. To see them together, you would think they had known each other since birth.

The New Marauders had unfortunately encountered one problem. It was quickly becoming obvious to Harry that Scorpius Malfoy took after his father. He was a troublemaker, and seemed to enjoy being a bully even more than Draco had.

Although Harry hadn't seen Draco Malfoy in many years, until he saw him on Platform Nine and Three Quarters when the children departed for Hogwarts, Harry had heard he had reformed. Harry had a tough time really believing that, though.

The New Marauders seemed to run afoul of Scorpius Malfoy and his gang of thugs quite often. Twin thugs to be exact Xavier Flint and his identical twin brother Zachary Flint. Scorpius liked to give any members of the New Marauders a hard time whenever he could.

What disturbed Harry was that unlike Draco, who at the age of eleven, hated people on the basis of their blood status, Scorpius Malfoy was just plain mean for the sake of being mean, or so it seemed to Harry. Scorpius was particularly fond of trying to convince Carly to go on a date with him. This was not something that sat well with Albus.

There had been several incidents, though nothing serious, of pushing and shoving between members of the New Marauders and Malfoy and his thugs. None of this was unusual among students, but it unsettled Harry. He had a feeling this was going to become more serious in time.

It was September twenty-fifth, and just a week before Professor McGonagall would be leaving the school, and Hermione was finding out how difficult the job of Headmistress really was.

It was just after two o'clock in the afternoon, and Hermione was in her office, which she had taken over officially at the insistence of Professor McGonagall. Hermione was not using the sleeping quarters in the back of the office since it was not big enough for herself, Ron, and Hugo. She had converted it into a personal library, and done some rearranging of the office. Not too much though: certain things belonging to Professor McGonagall and Professor Dumbledore would never be moved. In Hermione's mind, this office would always still belong to them.