Chapter 7: Marauder Mischief

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The Marauders never forgot what Harry and Severus did to James and the quidditch team the day of the tryouts. Although they were still friendly with Harry, they were secretly plotting a series of pranks aiming to get their own back for the humiliation of the vacuum cleaner incident. Harry had noticed that they were up to something, and knowing what the Marauders were like, he rightly assumed they were coming up with pranks. He spent a good portion of every evening coming up with counter strategies and defences against anything they might try. He had heard a great many stories from Sirius' letters over the summer before the amulet had taken them away about the sorts of pranks he used to get up to at school, so Harry knew more or less what to expect. Every evening, while Sev was trying to perfect his meditation for the animagus viewing spell, he would sit in the corner at his desk and plot. Having experience at detailed planning from the early days of the Order of the Phoenix, he came up with foolproof plans and embarrassing pranks that he couldn't wait to try out. Some evenings, Sev would even stay with him late into the night, giving a truly Slytherin perspective. Although Harry had been in the serpent's House for several weeks, he had still not fully developed his Slytherin cunning.

The first move came in the second week of October, when Harry went down to breakfast and found himself unable to speak. Every time he opened his mouth to speak to Sev, a loud lion's roar would come out. Sev was similarly afflicted, much to the amusement of the rest of the students, even their fellow Slytherins. Neither boy was popular in their own House, especially after Harry's humiliation of Lucius at the quidditch tryouts.

Revenge came the following day when the Marauders sat at the Gryffindor table. As soon at they touched their forks, a torrent of what could only be described as goo fell from the ceiling, covering them from head to toe. Leaping to their feet, they were further abused when hundreds of rotten rose petals rained onto them, sticking to the substance on their skin, which hardened after a few minutes. None of the teachers could remove the stuff, so the petal-covered students had to attend lessons as they were, smelling of rotten roses.

At dinner the following night, the four Marauders and Lily came striding over to the Slytherin table and headed straight for Sev and Harry. The pair stopped mid sentence when they spotted the advancing Gryffindors and turned to watch them as they came to rest opposite the two Slytherins.

" This means war," James stated.

" We are the kings of pranks here, and you are threatening our title," Sirius added.

" We have come to propose a competition, a battle of the pranksters if you will," Remus concluded.

Harry and Sev shared a look, before Harry clearly signaled to leave the talking to him. Turning to the Gryffindors, he prepared to set the conditions.

" What are the rules?"

" The Marauders against you two. A prank war to end all prank wars. A competition of skill, cunning and devilishness," James stated.

" We'll accept on several conditions."

" What are they?" Sirius asked.

" We want to be equally matched. I propose five people in each team, to make it fair. We will announce who those are before we start. No pranks to be played on people individually, for example, you can't corner one person, you have to prank the whole team. Nothing dangerous, or permanent. And we need someone to judge."

" The students can decide, on Hallow'een. We will continue until October 31st, and at the feast the students can decide who wins," Remus suggested.

" Agreed. Who will be in your team?"

" There'll be me," James started, " Sirius, Remus, Peter and Lily. What about you?"

" There'll be me and Sev, obviously. Just a sec."

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