Slytherin Study Group #2.5: Ramifications

rabbit: "It's really too hot to do anything but curl up in a shady room and torment the Slytherin Study Group.... "

Jinx: "Oh, say, look here... chocolate chips come in ice cream, too.... "

rabbit: "And the cookies make excellent garnishes.... " (upends bag over bowls)

Jinx: "Well, yeah, but what could be more appropriate than MORE chocolate chips, as garnishes?" (upends larger bag over bowls)

rabbit: "Oh, how true! And relentlessly thematic, as well!"

Both: "munch munch munch mmmMMMmmm munch munch MWAHahahahahaaa... "

Ramifications Chapter 5

It was a beautiful day. The sky was an irreproachable blue. The birds were singing madrigals. The sun was shining incandescently. The Gryffindor Quidditch team, under the supervision of Caretaker Filch, was engaged in some kind of heavy lifting... and the lawn looked like a misdirected rummage sale. Shirts, socks, unmentionables, chairs, cushions, tables, nightstands, lamps... and off in the distance, a bed... were scattered across the grass. The Gryffindors were collecting these items, none too carefully.

"Hey!" Pettigrew shouted. "That's mine!"

"Not sure I'd admit that," said Robin Bonhomme, casting a dismissive look at the damp and grass-stained footstool he held before throwing it in a neat arc to his fellow Chaser, Atalanta Finch. She caught it one-handed and popped it atop a mound of bedding from which emanated two legs and the unfortunately bright voice of staunch Gryffindor supporter and inexorable team mascot, Martin Weasley: "Hey, don't leave that footstool on top! They attract dragons, you know! Someone pass me something else, quick, before I'm devoured where I stand!"

"If only," muttered Pettigrew.

"He never stops," noted Black, with a kind of grudging respect.

Lucius sniffed dismissively. There was no need to comment, really, on the kind of person who'd paint his face red and gold to sit in the stands and bellow instructions at Quidditch players too high aloft to hear him.

Darius Thompson and Justin Chandler, the team's Beaters, came trudging along with a mattress slung between them. "Here, Martin, set it on this and give us a hand, will you?" huffed Thompson.

"This one was almost to the lake!" Chandler said with a weary grin. "Some of them really ran for the hills once they hit the ground!" he observed, looking about at the far-flung lawn ornaments. "Maybe you should've conjured a fence, first!" he suggested to the Marauders, who scowled up at him.

Weasley dumped his collection onto the mattress. He had tied a red and gold kerchief round his head; against his coppery hair and flushed face, the rag gave him the look of a diseased strawberry possessed of an irrepressible grin. "I can't believe you levitated everything out the window!" he marvelled. "I mean, look, this wasn't even transfigured!" He held up a lamp, waggling it for attention.

"You break it, you fix it," warned Potter.

"Oh, there's plenty to fix... you are four stories up, after all!" chirruped Finch, adding several throw pillows to the pile.

"I still think we should have let them down the stairs," grumbled Black, "to trample everyone who was camped on the steps, giggling."

"Oh, that's right -- " Chandler cast a bright-eyed, secret-keeping glance round his ring of accomplices. "They never did try the door -- "

"No, right, McGonagall came through the other way, and then they were in Cooper's room -- "

The quintet looked up towards one of Gryffindor Tower's windows. "Wonder if Tabitha's remembered about that?"

"Haven't heard her scream, yet... "

"Put it back," ordered Potter tiredly. "Whatever you did, undo it. We've suffered. We've been called. We've gained a healthy respect for sheep. We've learned our lesson."

"Not by half!" offered Finch. "I saw those sandglasses plummeting as we passed by! You four lost about five hundred points!"

"And they're only Fourth Years," intoned Weasley proudly.

"Yes, well, the lot of you must have been good for at least a hundred and fifty," theorized Lupin. "Changing everything into great bumbling, incontinent sheep -- "

"Oh, now, we never made them incontinent -- " remarked Bonhomme.

Potter glared at him as if he were a complete dunderhead, and said as if explaining to a three-year-old, "Sheep don't like surprises. And when one sheep gets surprised, they all get surprised. When sheep are surprised, they panic... in the most disgusting manner possible." He set his jaw and glared up at his teammate. "You will be scrubbing the floor," he directed, "twice."

"Especially you, Weasley," added Lupin, standing at Potter's elbow, "seeing as you were so thoughtful as to witch my lamp to cast dragon shadows all 'round the walls." He showed his teeth. "Which reminds me, you will be scrubbing the walls, as well -- "

"And the ceiling," growled Caretaker Filch, stumping up behind the Quidditch players. He caught Weasley by the collar, and over the boy's protests announced rustily, "But you'll be washing those blankets, first." Filch jerked a thumb towards a row of wooden washtubs filled with steaming soapy water. "Be about it!" he snapped, badgering his charges on their way.

"Wish we had our wands," muttered Potter to Black. "Be a great time to transfigure all those things into sheep."

Goyle scratched his head. "But didn't we cheat on the test? I mean, that's why we're here, isn't it? Because we couldn't figure out how to turn things into sheep?"

Black sniggered, and was rounded on by Filch, who shot him a scouring look. "Think all of this is funny, do you, boy?" demanded the Caretaker, coming near as if he would be happy to box Black's ears. "If the lot of you had stayed in bed where you belonged at night, all of this mess wouldn't have to be cleaned up!" He shot a glance up at Hagrid, who had thus far been enjoying the morning's festivities, and his grimace deepened. "Don't know what you have to look happy about," Filch grumbled. "They tore up that paddock somethin' awful... and they'll probably turn the barn into a pile of splinters, by nightfall.... "

"Oh, Snape's going to do transfigurations?" inquired Black.

" 'Tis no laughing matter, boy," Filch warned. "You're a pack of destructive bandits, is what you are!" He shook a finger at the collected criminal scum.

"Ah, now, they're jus' learnin', is all -- " began Hagrid supportively.

"They'd learn faster with a bit of torture to encourage 'em," opined Filch, a nearly happy gleam entering his watchful eyes as he surveyed the potential candidates.

There was a moment's apprehensive silence. Dumbledore's prohibitions against torture were fairly recent innovations. Filch was living on memories, now... but his fond recountings could generate nightmares that would steal a fortnight's sleep.

Hagrid was trying hard not to laugh at the miscreants' expressions. He coughed into his hand. "Well, now..." he began.

Filch transferred his Medusan glare to the Groundskeeper. "Thought they were going to do some cleaning, not stand around in the sunshine. They're not out here on holiday, man!"

Goyle turned an enlightened look upon Pettigrew and asked, "They turned all your stuff into sheep?"

"This wrack and ruin is all your fault!" Filch rasped, stepping so close that Goyle and Crabbe had to back up, instinctively shielding Lucius. "If I had my way, the eight of you would be hanging in the dungeons upside down for the next week!"

"How do you like your new office, Filch?" Lucius inquired sharply, trying to ignore the pain in his foot, which was mashed beneath Crabbe's boot.

The Caretaker snorted. "With the 'Gift of Aurelius Malfoy' plaque on the door I have to polish? It's drafty and there's no mice for my dear old Mrs. Beasley. I'm movin' back down to the dungeons."

Lucius paled and wisely refrained from swearing. So much for convincing Filch to go easier on him when he had detention.

"Bumbershoots," said Snape, companionably throwing an arm round Lucius. "And green," he added consolingly.

Filch glowered at Snape, eyes narrowing. "Not again," he growled in disgust. "I swear, boy, next time I find you wandering around the dungeons with no idea where or who you are, I'll leave you to it!"

Hagrid, perhaps sensing old tension, gathered his charges together. "Well, we'd best be gettin' on our way...."

"Muck-meddling maniac!" Filch continued to grumble as they moved away. "I saw him! Eying my sweet cat like she was a... an ingredient!"

"Well done," Lucius murmured. "I'll help you hold her under."

"Tadpoles," Snape said, agreeably resting his head on Malfoy's shoulder.

"Eeugh!" Lucius shoved Snape back to Crabbe and Goyle, who held him at arm's length between them, where he marched along amiably. He glanced at the grease spot now marring his cloak and wished for his wand, or anything of a strong cleaning charm. Good job this wasn't his good cloak.

Hagrid led them to the fence enclosing the horse pasture, and unlocked the gate to usher his charges through so they could follow a winding dirt path. Excited whinnies shrilled through the air as the gate clopped shut, and soon from all directions came galloping several very large equines, all eager for petting and lint-encrusted sugarcubes from the depths of the Groundskeeper's coat pockets.

At least, some of them got sugarcubes. Lucius backed away from a massive roan that was happily crunching down a strip of bacon. "But... I thought... Father told Mother they'd been destroyed!" he stammered, getting a glimpse of the larger horses' dagger-sharp teeth and retreating to the center of the rapidly-coagulating defensive knot of boys.

"Isn't that the one that nearly took your arm off when we were seven?" Crabbe asked nervously, peering over Black's shoulder at a wintry palomino.

"Hello, Pestilentius," Hagrid greeted the beast, and tugged a dead pheasant out of his pocket; he held it out to the horse, which bit into it with a wet crunch and a satisfied whicker. "Aren't they beautiful?" the Groundskeeper said proudly to Snape, who was the only one still standing at his side. "Takes a bit o' gettin' ter know them, but we all understand each other now," he added, firmly extracting the roan's teeth from the shoulder of his coat. "Easy, there, Incendium!"

Lucius counted Hagrid's fingers. They were all there.

Magic could make things grow back.

Snape's shoulders slumped. "They're still not footstools," he sighed. "That one's moving."

"Handsome, ain't he?" Hagrid beamed down at his small companion. "He likes it that yer not afraid o' him."

"Yes, it's always better when the meal comes willing to you," muttered Lucius, and more loudly said, "We should be moving on, shouldn't we?" Magic couldn't make everything grow back. Heads, for example. And he was supposed to be looking after Snape.

"Yes," piped Lupin decisively. "Yes, we should."

"Get an early start," added Potter with zeal.

"Yes, start scrubbing and sweeping, all of that healthy, rewarding exercise, honestly, Hagrid, we just can't wait!" enthused Black.

"Have to make good, and all," offered Crabbe.

"Yes," said Goyle. "That's right!"

"Soonest begun, soonest done," threw in Pettigrew.

The Groundskeeper shone a wide grin down upon them. "That's the spirit!" he lauded. "Glad ter hear yeh all wantin' ter -- "

"I didn't do it, Mr. Filch!" yelped Snape.

Hagrid glanced back and hastened to wrestle Snape out of the roan's grip on his cloak. The animal snapped at the boy's head and Lucius shut his eyes, knowing Snape was dead and Keele was going to end the Malfoy family line for it.

"Stoppit, cat!" protested Snape.

Lucius peeked. The roan had a mouthful of Snape's hair, which it chewed thoughtfully for a moment and then spat out, doing no apparent harm. With a snort, the creature snapped again at the boy's cloak, and a brief tug-of-war ensued before Hagrid set Snape safely aside while the roan thoughtfully chewed a swatch of wool. "Whups! Really friendly t'day, I see.... Ah... yeh... well, let's move on, shall we?"

Boisterous agreement met this suggestion, and the boys clustered closely around Hagrid as the group made their way across the pasture towards the haven of the barn.

"Hagrid?" Potter asked as they hurried along. "Are all the horses out in the pasture? I mean, they won't be in the stables, while we're cleaning them, right?"

Alarmed looks were directed up at the Groundskeeper.

"Naw, they're all out gettin' some fresh air. Does 'em good." Hagrid watched a fine gray canter by.

Pettigrew shivered, watching the animal's teeth. "I thought horses ate grass," he mumbled, pressing closer against his fellows.

"Most do," Malfoy muttered. "The... imported ones, though... they only eat grass after they've eaten someone who doesn't agree with them."

"I'm surprised they don't eat the other horses," said Lupin, interested enough to stare, but not so interested that he didn't do it through the crook of Goyle's elbow.

"They're carnivores, not cannibals," said Hagrid. "And Professor Dumbledore bespelled the other animals ter look like they'd taste bad if they was still breathin'."

"And ... students?" asked Potter, eyeing Snape's cloak.

"Oh, yeh'll learn how in Seventh Year, I expect." Hagrid waved a quarter of a ham at another massive horse that was coming over in search of a treat.

Goyle wistfully watched the ham vanish. "I hate porridge," he sighed as the other boys condensed defensively and propelled him along toward the looming safety of the stables. Surely stone and wood could keep the horses out.

Hagrid continued dispensing treats from the larder of his coat along the way. By the time the tight-knit band reached the barn doors, a nervous imagination had nearly driven Pettigrew to faint, while extensive knowledge had nearly done the same for Malfoy. The other boys were fairly holding them up, one way or another; when they got to the center of the group, they couldn't fall anyway, and when they were shifted to the edges they got used as shields until the next nervous reconfiguration. Even Snape was getting anxious, although he seemed to believe he was still in the paddock amid frantic sheep.

Gusty sighs of relief saluted Hagrid as the Groundskeeper hauled open the huge double doors of the barn. "In yeh go!" he directed cheerfully, herding them as if they were ducklings.

His effort was unnecessary. In perhaps the first truly coordinated and peaceable, mutual act of their lives, the Marauders and the Slytherin study group bolted into the sanctuary of the barn.

"That's the spirit!" encouraged Hagrid, and with a reassuring thud! he closed and bolted the barn doors, confining the miscreants safely within the warm, hay-scented dimness.

* * * * *

"Right, let's get yeh started," said Hagrid, clumping through the dim room to throw open the upper half of another door, which let a stunning amount of light into the chamber and set something to squealing. Lucius assumed it was Pettigrew until vision returned and he could see pigs in a low-walled enclosure near the door.

Eyes streaming, the sheep-thieves blinkingly inspected the illuminated portion of the building.

It wasn't worth the looking at.

The stables were horrible. And they stank. And there was hay absolutely everywhere, not just on the floor the way it was shown in rustic paintings, but actually drifting like sweet-scented dust through the air, settling onto clothes and getting under collars, making everyone itch and setting Lupin to sneezing frantically.

"Tch. I was afraid o' that." Hagrid frowned sympathetically and caught hold of the suffering boy as a tempestuous sneeze nearly took Lupin off his feet. "Let's have yer kerchief, Remus," he requested, rummaging in his pockets. He pulled out another deceased sparrow, shrugged, and fished in another pocket to produce a small green bottle. "Here we are, jus' the stuff!" He plucked Lupin's crumpled handkerchief from the gasping Gryffindor's hand and sprinkled some of the bottle's contents onto the fabric, wadding it into a ball and working the liquid into the cloth. "There," Hagrid said after a few moments, "that oughtta do it. Remus, you tie this 'round yer head... cover yer nose and mouth," he directed.

Eyes streaming, Lupin did so.

Malfoy snickered. "That's one gagged, any rate. The day's improving."

"It'll never be enough to shut him up," sighed Crabbe.

Lupin drew a shaky breath, looked alarmed, and commenced a flurry of sneezes that sent him reeling into Potter and Black, who caught him and turned concerned looks up to Hagrid. "What is that stuff, Hagrid?" asked Potter.

"Hahh-ahh-ahh-annnh- " gasped Lupin.

The Groundskeeper shrugged easily, but his eyes held a light of concern. "Well, it's hayfever remedy, o'course... made up of all the stuff that sets folk ter sneezin' an' coughin'... it's really good," Hagrid promised, reaching out a hand to stop Lupin from losing his balance to another typhoon sneeze. "Gets it all over with at once, like.... "

Lucius laughed gleefully, and stood back to watch the miserable Marauder suffer. Crabbe and Goyle joined him, instinctively flanking him as they enjoyed the show.

"Cinnamon sticks?" queried Snape, looking puzzled as he stared at Lupin's spasms of sniffling sneezes.

"How long does this last, Hagrid?" asked Potter, clinging onto his convulsing comrade.

" 'Til he stops breathing altogether?" growled Black, grimly hanging onto Lupin's other arm.

"No, no, it won't be like that," Hagrid reassured them hastily.

"Pity," breathed Lucius.

Crabbe blinked at him, and after a few moments observing Lupin's distress, he murmured, "But, Luke, if he's dead, how would we make him do our share of the work?"

Lucius stared at him.

Clearly, the natural order of things was collapsing. Crabbe was thinking. Snape was not. He, Lucius, was expected to do servants' work. Things fell apart. The center could not hold. On the up side, Hagrid apparently fancied himself a Potion Master and, hopefully, would be sent off to Azkaban for murdering a student.

Malfoy was composing the distraught and revelatory letter to his father when Lupin folded over with one cataclysmic sneeze, which took him to the floor and his allies with him.

It was quiet.

"That's it, he's dead -- " started Black, scrambling around to his knees to listen at Lupin's chest.

"Remus, talk to me -- " began Potter, pleadingly, waving a hand in front of Lupin's fixed stare.

Lupin slowly blinked his swollen eyes and said weakly, "Help me up, fellows. The ride's over and I'd like to throw up, now."

His comrades looked relieved and, with encouragements, helped him to his feet; looking damp and ragged, the smallest Gryffindor let himself be escorted towards the half-door.

"Wait -- the horses -- " said Pettigrew nervously.

"They'll bite his head clean off," realized Black, hesitating.

"Naw, that door goes ter the pigyard," Hagrid said reassuringly. "The horses can't get in it."

Lupin merped. Then he made a singularly sick sound, the kind that comes from deep in the belly and means a mess all over the carpet.

Hagrid stepped towards him, but Snape was closer and quicker, moving fluidly, grabbing Lupin, whipping the kerchief off the smaller boy's face and neatly bending Lupin over a pile of hay in the nearest corner. He supported the Gryffindor while Lupin retched, then propped him against the wall and shook his head. "You mustn't drink it when it's teal," Snape cautioned, frowning intensely. "You have to wait 'til it's quite blue and clear."

The other Marauders were staring, while Hagrid collected their queasy comrade and led him towards a washtub. "Did... Snape... just do Remus a favor?" stammered Potter.

"Yeah." Black nodded dazedly.

They thought about this for a few seconds. Then Potter theorized, "Probably just instinctive, really... he and Jenny Goldberg must hold the school record for excruciating self-induced ailments."

Pettigrew laughed. "Probably." The pudgy Gryffindor grinned wickedly and sneaked with the grace of an underinflated dirigible over behind Snape, to tap the smaller boy on one shoulder before hurrying back to his fellows.

Snape began shuffling in compulsive circles, staring apprehensively at his shoulder. "Roquefort's loose again. Fetch me the net, will you?"

"If only we could find one large enough," muttered Lucius to Crabbe with disdain. It wouldn't be long before the idiot boy got dizzy and keeled over.

Keele.

"Come on, Sev," Lucius commanded, gathering Snape in before he did himself a damage.

"Hi, Jenny," Snape said happily. "Have you seen where I put the #3 copper ladle? The one with the ding in?"

"Dingbat," muttered Lucius.

Snape blinked and started looking around overhead.

Hagrid had returned a damp, but calmer Lupin to the Gryffindors and was clumping around again. A row of clerestory shutters suddenly folded back, yawning like a luminous abyss and letting the boys get their first really good look at their prison. Snape, who had been looking intently upwards, yelped and went down in a heap, throwing his cloak over his head against the glare. Lucius left him there while he tried to absorb the dimensions of the stable.

It was huge.

It was actually larger than anything at Malfoy Manor.

He hadn't thought that was possible.

Oh, Hogwarts, of course, but that was a castle, which had been undergoing perpetual creative renovations for centuries.

"How do you think the teachers have managed to hide this from us for four years?" inquired Potter in a speculative tone.

"Yeh haven't needed ter know, have yeh?" said Hagrid with a grin. He seemed to take a proprietary pride in the stables. "Besides, it mostly only gets used when we have visitors, or when the Centaurs need an inside place ter have a meetin'."

"Centaurs, like in th-oof," Black doubled over Lupin's elbow.

Centaurs? The only Centaurs to be seen for leagues lived deep in the Forbidden Forest, and they were distinctly antisocial. Black could know about them only if the Marauders had also been undertaking midnight sylvan excursions...

How were they getting away with it?

They weren't cleverer. They must have something, some kind of magical device.... That, or they were bribing Hagrid. An intriguing idea. Lucius wished Snape were coherent; Snape was really good at discovering things people would rather keep hidden.

Maybe he wouldn't ask Snape to do the Herbology assignments, as well.

"It's going to take us years to clean all this," Goyle groaned, right in Lucius's ear, bringing him back to the current problem.

Dilemma.

Bleak tableau.

Pity Goyle wasn't bright enough to exaggerate.

Lucius bit back a filthy word and resolved to remember this place as he grew into a proper Dark Wizard; he could use it as an abattoir for his errant minions.

What other use could there be for all those stalls, but to contain the condemned?

The nearest stalls would serve for inept House Elves; they were low enough for ponies even a goblin could ride. Receding off into the distance were stalls and box stalls of increasing size, useful for First through Seventh Years as well as uncooperative Faculty members. Along and supporting the far wall was a stall that looked large enough to hold a horse Hagrid could ride... or, much better, an elephant that could flatten Hagrid, perhaps in a large Coliseum-like event.

Lucius was interrupted in his plans by a noisy, dusty hysteria of chickens. Disturbed by the influx of light, the parti-coloured flock scurried out of the nearby stalls to investigate the new arrivals - especially about the bootlaces, which they seemed to think were worms.

He kicked a chicken aside and continued to survey his future domain.

It needed work.

A lot of work.

Suspicious stains darkened the wood of the floor, and the rich scent of animal presence was rising as the sun warmed a pile of dung in one corner. On the walls hung items, which held promise of use as instruments of torture, although they lacked vision and efficiency of design. Overhead, a hayloft lowered like a thundercloud, sifting down a jaundiced miasma of haydust.

Snape sat up, still blinking. "First," he said, "we divert a river..."

Goyle sighed and threw Snape's cape back over the befuddled boy's head. "Go back to sleep, Sev."

A barn owl came swooping in through the opened upper windows, and deposited a white trail down the shoulder of Sirius Black's cloak before disappearing into a hole in the wall.

"Oh, I say, don't tell me there are wild owls in here!" Black protested, while the other boys laughed at his misfortune. "Those things have no manners at all!"

"Cert'nly they do," corrected Hagrid. "They've got perfect manners... yeh don't know that, 'cause they're owl manners, is all. If yeh learned how ter talk to 'em, Sirius, you'd find they're marvelous conversationalists... though yeh do have ter keep steerin' the topic back from mice."

"Bit like Sev," breathed Lucius, glancing at his dazed associate. Snape had put his grievously tousled head out like a turtle and was staring at a rooster, which was staring back aggressively. "All right there, Sev?"

"Does that owl... look funny to you?" Snape queried.

"Well done, Sev, at least you know it's a bird. Yes, the owl looks funny because it's a chicken."

"Oh." Snape blinked a couple of times. "So why has it got horns?"

"It's a basilisk," grumbled Lucius.

"Aw, now, there's not a basilisk within a hundred miles o' here," Hagrid declared.

"... and Parselmouth, sage, rosemary, and thyme... " recited Snape, sitting back on his heels and looking up again. "The butterflies are pretty, don't you think?"

For a wonder, there actually was a small moth fluttering through the vicinity of Snape's gaze.

"Yes, indeed, Sev," Malfoy said, pleased at this sign of Snape's increasing usefulness.

A barn owl popped its head out of the wall and ate the wanderer.

Snape kept watching the moth. It was apparently travelling the length of the barn.

Lucius sighed. And then started at the sight of Hagrid bearing down on him with a pitchfork.

"Now then," Hagrid announced, shoving the implement into Malfoy's hands. "The first thing ter do today is get the hay outta the loft." As the Groundskeeper moved aside, Lucius noted apprehensively that the Marauders had already been armed. Perhaps fortunately, so had Crabbe and Goyle.

Hagrid was looking down at Snape, a last pitchfork looking like a lobster fork in his huge hand. "Well, maybe not you..." He held out the pitchfork. "Can yeh tell me what it is, then?"

"The number three copper ladle with the ding in!" With a grin, Snape reached for it. "Well done, Jenny!"

"Guess not," Hagrid said, holding the pitchfork over his head.

Snape looked around to see where the ladle had fallen. .

A loud clang drew everyone's attention to Sirius Black, who was sprawled on the floor, a pair of dark iron manacles joining his wrists and weighting him down past all hope of rising. He looked stunned. Gavin Goyle was standing over him and laughing raucously. Crabbe looked amazed, and then joined in the merriment.

"That's the thing about these pitchforks," rumbled Hagrid, over the rising chatter. "They're charmed so's yeh can't use 'em... inappropriately, like." He cast a stern gaze down at Black, then directed it round the assembled sheep-thieves.

Easily he lifted Black to his feet, and drew from his seemingly-bottomless coat a small stone that he touched to the manacles, transforming them back to a pitchfork, which caused Black to overbalance and drop startled to his knees. "Third time yeh misuse one o' these, it'll change past anythin' I can fix, an' yeh'll be scrubbin' the floor in chains fer th' rest o' the' day... with the sure promise o' Sunday detention ter follow."

"So we get two swings. Let's not waste them," murmured Lucius to Crabbe, who nodded seriously.

Black stood up, sulking as he took hold of the pitchfork again. "Catch me wearing those things again..." he growled.

"Right, now, up there is the loft... No wait," Hagrid scratched his bushy hair. "If yeh start droppin' hay down here, yeh'll scare the chickens...."

"And bury Snape," said Goyle.

"Let's get started!" Potter and Black chorused, racing for the ladder.

"No! Wait," Hagrid directed. "Wait. Get the chickens out inter the yard first. There, the door by the pigpen." He looked over the armed group. "Maybe I should have yeh take the pigs out, too."

"Couldn't you have done all that before?" asked Malfoy crossly.

Hagrid stared at him over the chickens' heads. "Then what'd be the point of this detention, hey? Supposed ter be teaching yeh ter care fer animals and their homes, and treat 'em both with respect!"

"Do we have to move the barn owls outside?" asked Crabbe, looking unhappily into the rafters.

"Nah, jus' keep out o' their way," Hagrid advised. "And try not to look like mice."

Crabbe spent far too long considering how not to look like a mouse.

"Well, go on, put those pitchforks inter the corner fer now."

There was a wary disarmament. Lucius picked a different corner than Potter had. He wasn't about to get his pitchfork mixed up with Black's.

"Now then," Hagrid directed, "grab a chicken -- here, see how yeh do it, you scoop 'em up 'round the middle, gently, so's not ter hurt 'em, and out over the half-door -- whoops, shut that, will yeh, Remus? Ta very much." The Groundskeeper gently deposited his chickens outside, and turned expectantly back to his wards. "Well, what are yeh all waitin' fer? Go on!" he encouraged.

The boys looked around the stables. By a fast count, they were outnumbered five to one.

Potter moved towards a couple of hens, which scuttled clucking away from him. Black tried to head them off, and they ran straight for Lupin, only to squawk and wheel in another direction when they got within two feet of him. Pettigrew made a grab at one hen and came up with a few feathers and a pecked hand. "Ouch!"

The watching Slytherins laughed, enjoying their rivals' antics as the four Gryffindors struggled to catch a single chicken, which Black and Potter together heaved -- gently -- over the door into the sunshine.

Potter turned back to the room, panting, hay in his incredibly messy hair. "First point to Gryffindor," he challenged.

Malfoy scowled. "It's not Quidditch, Potter."

"No, but it'll go faster if we make it a game," Potter proposed, grinning. "Come on, lads, let's have another go... that one, in the corner, right... on three.... "

Malfoy rolled his eyes, stopping their orbit as he saw Hagrid looming over him.

"Be about it, Mr. Malfoy," directed Hagrid, picking up Snape.

"Honestly! We weren't even in the forest!" Snape protested as Hagrid deposited him on a bale of hay. The Groundskeeper settled alongside him, pulling out a round of cheddar to munch on as he watched the proceedings.

"Oh, for -- all right, Vic, Gav," summoned Lucius, "we'll back that one into a corner, and you two come at it from either side. Let's make this quick." With a scowl, Malfoy entered the fray.

A terrific amount of dust, hay, feathers, squawks and nipped fingers ensued.

"I've never really liked Quidditch," commented Snape, watching with wide, dark eyes. "Can't see the point in it all." A rooster scrambled to a landing in his lap; Snape stared at it. "Snitch seems a bit bigger this year," he noted.

Hagrid scooped up the bird and sent it back into the scrum. "Look at it this way," he offered to the dazed boy, "at least we've got good seats!"

"I could be studying," sighed Snape.

"No, yeh couldn't, yeh've got detention," Hagrid reminded him.

Snape nodded. "I've got detention at Severus."

Hagrid patted him on the shoulder, provoking another search for Roquefort, and returned his attention to the melee, which indeed had begun to borrow heavily from Quidditch as Potter and Malfoy directed their lieutenants in scooping up and passing the chickens Quaffle-fashion from one boy to another and almost gracefully out the door. "Oh, now, hold on, yer scarin' them!" Hagrid protested.

"Not a bit! Look for yourself, they're fine!" Potter released a rather rumpled hen over the half-door. Relieved clucking drifted up from outside.

Malfoy shouldered past him, dropping a kicking rooster into the sunlight and turning back with a stormy look as he daubed blood from a scratch on his cheek. Teeth bared, Lucius stalked back into the arena for another go.

Potter grinned and shrugged at Hagrid, spreading his hands as if to say, "Well, you know how he gets." A chicken flew at him from Black's direction and Potter seized it expertly, boosting it up and over the half-door; it gave a surprised squawk and fluttered to safety. "That's eleven, lads! We're leading!"

A hen nearly hit Potter in the face as Malfoy hurled it out the door. "Eight for our side," Lucius noted. A moment later a little brown hen came flapping frantically right at his head and wound up tangled in his hair, necessitating rescue while Black laughed with his cronies.

"Yer not ter throw the chickens about!" hollered Hagrid. "And certainly not at each other!"

"Sorry, Hagrid, it slipped loose," apologized Black, grinning.

Hagrid frowned, and lumbered to his feet. The grins faded. "Maybe I should take care o' the pigs meself," the Groundskeeper decided. He went over to the pen, sweet-talked the hogs for a moment, picked up one under each arm and strode outside, leaving the boys unsupervised.

There was the customary moment of silence that generally precedes open hostilities.

The Slytherins and Gryffindors stared with cold, wary eyes at one another, sizing up advantages of terrain, searching for weaknesses.

"Does anyone else see these?" asked Snape, from the corner. The worried tone in his voice made Crabbe and Lupin risk looking over, and they burst into laughter at the sight of Snape keeping quite still beneath the considering gazes of a chicken on his knee, a chicken on his shoulder, and a chicken worrying at his sweater.

"Don't worry, Snape!" called Black, going over to collect his pitchfork. "Give 'em a taste of your hair, they'll leave you well alone!"

"Three for a girl, Sev!" noted Pettigrew.

"That's crows, you fool," snapped Malfoy, heading for his own weapon.

"Yeh, and it's always only the one that follows Sev about," Crabbe mentioned, collecting his.

"Only I can't find the mail," said Snape, grasping at one hen's leg and earning himself an offended peck. He looked startled and snatched his hand away.

"It really is too easy," murmured Potter.

"But entertaining nonetheless," said Black.

Potter grinned and tossed a bit of wood at the wall near Snape, startling the chickens and causing a regrettable incident.

Snape was not too addled to seek refuge in the nearest corner, shivering and darting his gaze about nervously. "R-really have to add fewer batwings... or at least less fresh.... "

"Watch this!" Pettigrew said, moving like a lacrosse player as he headed towards a chicken, lowering his pitchfork with the clear intent to collect and catapult the bothered bird towards Snape.

Well, anyone could play at that game. And there were still plenty of chickens available to be flung. Even Crabbe and Goyle got the idea.

Hagrid returned for more pigs and found seven chained boys sprawled and swearing amid scolding chickens, while feathers drifted down like new snow.

Snape was perched atop a haybale, clutching his knees to his chest. "Now you've done it, it's boiled over."

Hagrid started laughing.

"It's not my cauldron, Mr. Filch!" Snape called.

"No 'tisn't," Hagrid chortled. "Told yeh not to misuse those things," he said, pulling out his stone and starting the round with Potter. "Maybe I oughtta hold onto 'em until yeh've got all the chickens out." He collected each pitchfork as it transformed.

He grinned at the boys, and shuffled the pitchforks around. "Now, one of these," he intoned jovially, "has been changed twice. Next time it'll take yer Head of House ter change it back."

There was a subdued and thoughtful silence. The animals were removed without further ado.

But when the time came to start pitching down hay from the loft, Lupin turned red, pleading eyes up to Hagrid. "Ca'd I do zubdig eldtze?"

"Ohhh... you need another dose of hayfever potion on that kerchief. Give 'er here a sec," said Hagrid, rummaging in his pocket.

Lupin backed away, eyes wide and bright and wet. "I do'd wadda die," he said pitifully.

"Ah, now, it's not so bad -- "

"I dig by ribs are brogen."

"No, never, not from such a light dose... why, yeh'd hafta use five times as much -- "

"Do dang yu." Lupin shook his head. "I dingk I'b allergik du de pozion. Ca'd I pleadze du zubdig eldze?" He cast his bleary, watery gaze about the barn, looking for an alternative task. "Lug. I cad lug abder Znabe. He'z ztill oud ub hiz bind."

"Well... yeah...." Hagrid allowed, watching Snape, who had settled into a corner with a bit of tarp and seemed annoyed that his chicken feather wouldn't write. "But yer meant ter be cleanin'."

"Zo gib be zubdig du kleed!"

Hagrid pondered this, looking about the barn; suddenly he brightened. "I know jus' the thing! You two can clean the tack! That always takes a while." He waved Lupin toward the door and collected Snape by the shoulder. "Come along."

Lucius stared after them, feeling abandoned and oddly circumvented. Snape might not be much use now, but in principle -- !

Absolutely inhuman, leaving that poor, addled creature defenseless in the hands of a Marauder! A disabled one at the moment, but that would change....

A horrible protracted clang reverberated from outside. Keele. Lucius hurried to the door, almost running into Potter who was doing the same. "He can't have manacled them to the barn!" the Gryffindor exclaimed. "They're not half the trouble we are!"

They went outside to see.

Lupin was sitting in the shade against the barn, still miserable, but breathing a little more easily. He had a snarl of straps and buckles in his hands and was polishing the metal parts with a rag. Nearby, Hagrid was piling more tack into a huge wooden tub which was filling itself with water while Snape stared keenly into it, bouncing gently on his toes.

"You sure you hit the squid hard enough?" he inquired. "I think it's moving."

"Jus' hang the bits yeh've finished with on the fence," Hagrid told Lupin.

"Wo'd de horzez ead deb? Or be?"

"Hey?" Hagrid said. "Oh, no, they're off grazin'. And they don't much care fer the metal bits." He looked up and saw the rest of the boys watching from the doorway. "Now, what're yeh all lookin' at?" he growled. "Yeh've got work ter do! Up inter the loft with yeh! I'll be up in a minute ter show yer what ter do."

Lucius shot a glare at Lupin, trying to convey exactly what the Gryffindor could expect if anything happened to Snape. It would have worked better if Lupin had been in any condition to notice.

Snape was tugging on Hagrid's pocket as the others filed inside. "You'd better hit it again," he said, casting a nervous glance into the tub. "The last one bit me. Twice."