The Forest - R.L.

Chapter 34 - The Room

"It's a door!" Peter cried, stepping forward to run a hand over the large wooden doors that had just appeared. He then moved his hand down towards one of the golden handles, engraved with many different animals, and twisted it.

It wasn't locked.

A smile broke across Peter's face as he pushed the wooden door inwards, opening it to reveal a large, mostly empty room, and walked inside. The other four followed.

"What is this place?" Peter asked.

"Some kind of secret room, perhaps," Sirius suggested.

"But there's nothing in here worth keeping hidden," Grace pointed out. The room was completely bare, except for a few arm chairs in the corner.

"Well, regardless of what it is, it's exactly what we've been looking for all night so let's get started before it gets too late," Remus said, before sitting down in one of the arm chairs and opening the book that he had brought to read.

"It is exactly what we were looking for, isn't it?" James questioned. "Do you think that this room can, I don't know, hear us?"

"This is Hogwarts, I wouldn't be surprised," Sirius commented.

"So, whenever a person passes by looking for a large empty room it just reveals itself?" Peter said, scratching his chin. "That's so cool."

"Remus is right, though, we should get started soon. It's nearly ten o'clock," Grace instructed.

They all spread out around the room, finding different spots to stand and close their eyes. It had been over a week since any of them had even thought about becoming an Animagus, so Grace was curious to see how things went.

The first person to transform at all was James, succeeding in changing his left foot into a hoof. Peter was second, producing a tiny scaly tail on his lower back. They all laughed for a solid minute after that.

When they finally regained focus, Sirius was the next to transform. He closed his eyes, and tried to clear his mind and think only of becoming a dog, but it didn't seem to be working. He couldn't even feel the pulling sensation that he was supposed to focus on, causing him to sigh in frustration. Sirius knew the he need to do this – he thought of it as a way to make up to Remus after what he had done.

His skin tingled and the pulling sensation returned, tugging at him from every side. He continued to think about last week, about Remus dragging a werewolf claw across Snape's chest, all because of his stupid actions, and about how guilty that would've made Remus feel.

The bones in his arms and legs creaked and ached as they changed shape, and his skin burned as it stretched. He felt like a blob of clay being moulded by a giant, his face being pulled forward, a tail sprouting from his back, and before he knew it, the process was over.

As the stinging faded, Sirius opened his eyes, only to find himself much closer to the ground.

"Ah!" he yelped, surprising himself when the voice came out much different than he had expected. "Merlins beard! I-"

The other four shrieked as they looked up, noticing a large black dog standing where Sirius had stood only moments ago. They all laughed when it began to bark.

"I'm a dog! I did it!" Sirius tried telling them, only causing them to laugh harder as it came out in a series of loud barks and growls.

"Can you understand us?" Remus asked, getting out of his chair and walking over.

Sirius, realising that talking wasn't going to work, nodded his new furry head. He then ran forward, only to trip and go sliding across the wooden floorboards. Having four legs was obviously going to take some getting used to.

He immediately leapt up again, running over to James and head butting his knee.

"This is so weird," Peter said as he reached a hand down to pat Sirius's head.

"Do you want me to change you back?" Grace asked him, holding out her wand. The dog shook his head in response and ran off again, running a lap of the room before stopping and trying to chase his tail. After a few minutes, he realised he wasn't getting anywhere and went back to Grace, sitting down in front of her.

She took this as her cue to change him back. "Dissuo Transformatus."

Sirius' arms and legs immediately began to grow and his dark dog hair shrink away, and before long he was back in human form, crouched on the ground.

"That was... I don't even know what to say," Sirius exclaimed as he stood up. "I turned into a dog!"

"I can't believe you actually did it! Ah, we're so close to finally getting this right," Grace said.

"Do you think we'll be ready by the next full moon?" James asked, turning to Remus.

"Well, the next one should be in another three weeks or so, yeah?"

"The 20th," Grace told him. "Can we do it in three weeks, though?"

"Three weeks? Definently. Maybe," Sirius said, unconvincingly. "Hopefully?"

"So, what's the secret?" Grace asked. "Did you do anything different this time?"

Sirius sighed. "Not really. I suppose I'm just that good."

James chuckled. "Of course you are. But are you sure?"

"I don't know, I must of just focused extra hard that time, I guess. Although... I did kind of..." Sirius trailed off, thinking of a way to explain it. "I thought about... why I actually want to do it... to transform. I'm not sure, but it certainly felt different."

"Why you wanted to transform? Makes sense, I suppose. C'mon, let's try one more time and-" Grace started, only to be cut off by Remus.

"Nuh-uh. It's nearly one o'clock, we need to go to bed."

"But it's a Saturday night," Grace protested.

"And you don't sleep on Saturdays?"

"Yes but..."

"Tomorrow's Sunday, we have all day to come back here and practise," Remus concluded, causing Grace to nod. "For now, let's sleep."

So the five of them trudged back to the Gryffindor Tower, all well and truly exhausted after the night's excitement of Sirius' transformation, and got into bed.

Grace could feel herself being pulled into a sleep the second her head hit the pillow.

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I honestly don't even know what's going on anymore. Oh well.

- Grace