The Shrieking Shack

Transformation

"Pads, quick! He'll have changed soon!" said James.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," muttered the other boy. Sirius Black came through the entrance of the Shrieking Shack. He was in jeans and a t-shirt and was holding a red dog collar. He grinned. "Do you like it? Moony bought it for me!"

James sighed, running his hand through his hair. "It's great, Sirius. Now, come on, Moony's freaking out over here."

Sirius, struggling to fit the collar around his neck, looked past James to the interior of the room. Remus was on the floor, naked and huddled over and obviously in a lot of pain. A gray rat was sniffing at him curiously.

"The moon--" choked out Remus. "For Merlin's sake, would you two--"

And within seconds, both James and Sirius had transformed--James into a stag and Sirius into a shaggy black dog with the collar fastened around its neck.

"It's about bloody time," growled Remus. And then the change took over his body--his eyes turned yellow, gray fur spouted all over his thin frame, his nails grew to claws, his jaw lengthened, and his mouth filled with sharp teeth.

"Aaaaaoooo!" howled Remus as the wolf inside him took over. And then he stopped and looked around at his friends. "Arrrooo?" he queried softly. Remus had undergone his transformation with his friends numerous times, but his werewolf form had little memory of previous changes. Each full moon was another night of discovery.

Sirius bounded up to him and licked his clawed hand. James pranced about playfully, quite unaware in his human mind that many of his fun antics would appear threatening to another deer. Peter, meanwhile, scampered up Remus's furry leg, squeaking incessantly.

And then, like always, Remus understood--these animals were his friends, and they wanted to play.

The four of them scampered around the room for several minutes, crashing into furniture, until they finally opted to go out into the woods so they'd have more room. Only Remus, in his semi-human state of mind and humanoid form, was able to unlock the door.

"Aaaaaoooo!" he howled again when he saw the full moon clear in the night sky. The air was cool, with a slight breeze, and the woods smelled of grass and...well, of blood. That was something he could only sense in his werewolf form, and he wished it didn't excite him so.

* * *

"Aaaaaoooo!"

The sound reverberated through the small village of Hogsmeade.

"Oh Merlin, there it is again!" a middle-aged woman in curlers cried, sitting up in bed and clutching at her husband's arm.

"Mmmph, what?" the man muttered.

She shook him desperately. "The monster! It's out again! Did you lock the gates?"

Thomas MacInnie woke up with a snort. "What on earth are you on about?" He looked at his wife's face and knew instantly. It was the full moon, and she looked terrified, and that could only mean one thing: The thing that lived in the Shrieking Shack had awakened.

"It's about bloody time something was done," he muttered. The monster in the Shack had been haunting them for many months now, and it was particularly bad for them as they lived closest to the building of anyone in the village.

"Thomas, you can't! It'll kill you!" she cried.

"It'll kill us, anyway, Martha," he retorted, smoothing down his thick hair where it stood on end.

She glanced out the window. "So far, it hasn't hurt anyone. I don't want you to be the first."

"What about Tucker? Something killed him."

"I think it was his wife," she said softly, a smirk playing around the corners of her lips.

Thomas ignored her. "You know what that thing is, don't you, Martha? It's a bloody werewolf!"

She gasped. "No!"

"That noise? That's a wolf. We've got a werewolf among us. And so far, it's been kept at bay. Maybe it's tied up. But who knows how long that will last." He climbed out of bed, grabbing his battered old wand off the bedstand.

"Don't go!" she said, grabbing for his arm. "If it's a werewolf, it'll kill you! Or even bite you and turn you into one, too. Please! Stay."

He looked at her and then turned to look at the door. Then he looked back at her. "Merlin, woman! It has to be stopped! We can't live like this. This is ridiculous!"

"Well, please, at least go in the daytime! Go in there when it's light out and scope the place out!" she suggested. "Please, come back to bed. I'm scared."

He shrugged. "Very well," he muttered. He reluctantly climbed back into bed but lay awake for the rest of the night, staring at the full moon outside their bedroom window.