Trickster
His dorm mates had been extremely distant for the next few weeks, and Remus often caught them just staring at him. Most of the time, they would turn away in a panic, but if it was Sirius who was caught, he would raise an eyebrow and wink seductively. As a response, Remus would scoff and flip him off.
One day, he returned to his dorm to find it empty, which was odd because he had just seen the three of his dorm mates walk upstairs. Weird. He took a seat on his bed, and pulled out a map which everybody was given on the first day, and placed it inside a worn out satchel. Remus could've sworn he heard whispers, but when he looked around, nobody was there. He shrugged it off, swung the satchel over his shoulder and left.
He wondered around the castle, jotting down secret passages which he had cleverly located for a while, before he reached the fifth floor. Something had seem alluring there, and with his newly altered map clutched in hand, he searched. He would turn over tapestries, looking for anymore secret passages, but after an hour of no luck, he sighed and folded his map up. This act reminded him of a rumour which he had heard, that the room of requirement was on this floor, hidden. Remus glanced around to make sure nobody was nearby, before sighing and whispering to himself, "I wish I had a friend."
After nothing changed, except a slight shift in the air, he scoffed and turned to leave, before a loud, mechanical noise made him jolt. He searched for the source of the noise, and almost fell over at the sight before him. A large, oak door which wasn't there before towered over him, casting an ominous shadow which darkened the once peaceful corridor.
With a grunt, he shoved the door open, and Remus could've sworn he had heard someone speak from behind him. "Is somebody there?" He called out. No reply. Just to be safe, he slammed the door behind him, and the air felt somewhat less dense. Remus glanced around at the seemingly pitch black room, taking careful steps forwards. "What is this place?" He mumbled to himself, before he tripped over something on the floor, causing his nose to bleed. "Shit." He wiped the gooey redness onto his sleeve, and bit his lip.
Remus pulled himself up, and was surprised to see that the room had been litten up now. He wasn't sure how, but it sure helped a lot. The room had dusty bookshelves, filled with what looked like spell books, a few tables and chairs, the room resembled the library in a miniature form. It also had a massive, wooden box in the middle. It wasn't locked, but based off of he banging which was coming from the inside, something was trapped. Hurriedly, Remus rushed over towards the centre of the room, and quickly opened the lid of the oak container.
Inside, a small, curious creature was waiting for him. It had massive wings, two horns on it's forehead, sharp teeth which peaked over it's bottom lip, beady eyes and was clearly tired and worn out. A baby dragon. Remus gaped in awe, this curious creature was beaming up at him, smiling. Remus had asked for friends, and the room of requirement had provided him with one, he was overjoyed. He scooped the baby into his arms, and tickled it's chin. The dragon sneezed out a puff of blazing fire, but Remus just shook it off. "Can I tell you a secret?" He asked, and the dragon didn't react. Obviously.
"Well, I'm a werewolf," the dragon didn't even flinch, of course, "So I'll recover super quickly from stuff like that." The dragon dug its talons into Remus' delicate skin, overlapping on his already visible scars. "Hey, don't do that!" He snapped, and the dragon stuck its tongue out at him. Remus picked it up by it's sides, and beamed at the baby creature. "You're quite mischievous, should I name you Trickster?"
The dragon obviously didn't understand, so Remus decided on that name. "Alright Trickster," He placed the baby dragon on the floor and heaved himself to the ground, glancing around the room. "I have to get back to my dorm, dinner is really soon, but I'll be back, okay?" The dragon frowned slightly, and Remus felt awfully guilty for just leaving him there. "Don't be upset, I'll bring you up some stuff, alright?" Trickster dragon wagged his tail, and Remus giggled, saying his goodbyes.
When Remus made his way down to the great hall, he wasn't surprised to see his dorm mates sat in their usual seats. Remus just sat next to Lily, silently. They chatted about homework, and when the hall started to clear out, Remus decided to smuggle some food in that moment. The satchel with his map in was now absolutely smothered in a mix of meat and mashed potatoes. Not very healthy.
He made his way up the tall, spiral staircase, being careful that nobody was following him. Remus made sure to leave after Lily, her friends, his dorm mates and some particularly nosy Hufflepuffs had left. When he reached the room of requirement, he simply repeated what he said to enter in the first place. "I wish I had a friend." And with that, the humongous oak door appeared in the same area as before.
He pushed the door open, huffing. Trickster was curled up on top of a dusty table, snoring softly. Remus smiled happily at the sight, "Hey, Trickster." Immediately, the baby dragon perked up, his ears twitching. His eyes open and he jumped off of the table, landing shakily onto the dusty floor. "I brought you some stuff." Remus said, as he emptied the contents of his pockets onto the floor. He shook some access mashed potatoes off of his customised map, and placed it onto the table which Trickster had been sleeping on with a sigh.
As Trickster noisily gobbled down his food, Remus pulled a dusty book from the shelf, shaking off some cobwebs as he did. The book was thick, and after wiping the cover, it read "Defence against the arts - how to win every duel". Remus raised an eyebrow, this could certainly help him. He took his wand out of his robes, and began practicing simple incantations, with a particularly curious Trickster watching him.
"Is your interest peaked?" Remus joked, that was vocabulary which he had picked up from sharing a dorm with Sirius. "The guy who taught me that, my dorm mate," He started, after all, he could trust Trickster, "He's clearly well-bred. Probably grew up on an estate or some shit. Me, on the other hand, grew up at a fucking orphanage. I'm trying to drop my British slang and accent, but it's too hard. To be honest, if I weren't a werewolf, I'd probably be their friend. It's not like I don't particularly want to be. I just," It felt as if he should continue that sentence, but he didn't exactly know what with.
"Anyways, that's off track." The dragon didn't particularly care about what he talked about, it seemed that Trickster had been alone for a while. Perhaps even his whole life. "So, do you wanna see me do a magic trick?" Remus joked, and Trickster began barking and jumping around like an overly excited puppy. "Alright then, bombarda!" Remus exclaimed, aiming at a pile of used parchment. The pile immediately scattered in all different directions, as if exploding. "Holy fuck," he chuckled, and Trickster was now spitting fire in all directions out of obvious excitement, Remus didn't blame him.
He had picked up that spell from the duelling book, and it was definitely worth learning. Remus glanced at the grandfather clock which was positioned at the end of the small room, "Shit, sorry Trickster," Remus stroked the dragon's scaly head, and began collecting his things in a hurry, "ten minutes past curfew already!" He explained when the dragon was staring at him, and said his final, rushed, goodbyes before dashing out the door. Trickster just remained sat there, in a confused daze.
When Remus was almost at the portrait of his common room, a Slytherin prefect who was patrolling nearby must've heard him coming, because the next thing Remus knew, he was hidden behind a corner, hand covering his mouth whilst he breathed unsteadily. Remus wasn't planning on getting a detention anytime soon, and judging based off of the ones which he had already sat, they weren't very enjoyable.
He pulled the map out of his satchel, and that's when it hit him. The best idea he had ever come up with. The scrunched up piece of parchment only showed classroom locations and hideouts (which Remus had annotated himself). He had planned on locating a spell for tracking the moving staircases, but now he had come up with the idea of tracking people as well.
Whilst he had been preoccupied by his thoughts, the Slytherin prefect had caught him crouched behind the concrete wall, and had assigned him with a nighttime detention and twenty points deducted. The prefect then walked Remus back into his common room with a very satisfied grin on his face. When Remus was back at Gryffindor tower, he immediately darted upstairs into his dormitory. "Finally." He sighed as he opened the door, ignoring his dorm mates which were disrupted by his intrusion.
Remus flopped onto his bed, chuckling at the memory of Trickster watching his magic. Immediately, he pulled out his satchel, and took out the book of spells in which he had learnt the explosion charm from. "What's that?" A very nosy Sirius asked, and Remus scoffed, slamming it shut.
"Nothing, you nosy bugger." Remus said with a scowl, and Sirius rolled his eyes at this reaction, causing Remus to as well.
"You're gonna have to hang out with us one of these days!" Sirius said, with a smirk. His hair had grown out a bit, and it seemed to be rapidly increasing in length. Remus had heard him say to James one night that he was forced to buzz it every summer, which sounded like a nightmare, in Remus' noble opinion.
Remus pulled the curtains shut, grunting as he did so. However angry he was, his mind was elsewhere preoccupied with something else; his first friend. Remus heard the bathroom door open, and two voices flooded the room, drowning out his thoughts. "The quidditch team has their first match tomorrow, and we're all going!" James said happily, giggling with glee.
"Do we have to? It's freezing," Peter complained, and Remus felt a burning annoyance in his chest, "I mean, go Gryffindor!" Peter said, unenthusiastically. James had probably chastised him for being so under-excited about quidditch, it was practically James' whole personality at this point. From what Remus had inferred, Sirius was the rebellious, lovable rouge, (although he didn't feel very loveable, in Remus' eyes), James was the sporty jock whom most girls fancied, and Peter was...well Peter was there.
Remus shut his book slightly louder than he had intended, he assumed based off of the way Peter stopped talking mid sentence, and turned over in bed, going to sleep. That night, he had a very peculiar dream. It was that Remus soared above Hogwarts, on top of Trickster's back. It was a lovely dream, but to be honest, sounded quite dangerous.
When he awoke, all of his dorm mates had already left. Seeing as it was a Saturday, he wouldn't of been surprised if everybody was at the game already, even though it started after lunch. Remus checked the clock, it was nine in the morning, giving him enough time to play with Trickster before watching the first quidditch game of the season. He practically skipped all the way to the room of requirement, and it seemed that Trickster was equally as excited to see Remus.
He emptied out his satchel, revealing about ten juicy sausages and five crispy pieces of bacon freshly stolen from the great hall. Trickster licked his lips and began devouring them, ecstatically. "So the first quidditch game of the season starts today," Remus said, glancing up from his book of spells, and Trickster cocked an eyebrow at him. "It's kind of like football, we used to play it in my orphanage. Well, other kids did, I just sat propped up in my special tree." Remus giggled lightly, but Trickster was smiling widely at him. Remus rolled up a piece of parchment, and threw it at Trickster, who head-butted it right back. They carried on for a while, until something clicked inside of Remus' brain, like a puzzle piece fitting into place.
"I've only tried this spell a few times myself, but it's pretty simple, and wears off after a few hours," Remus said, and the dragon cocked his head sideways, seemingly intrigued, "Well, it's a shrinking charm. If you want, I can shrink you, put you in my bag, and take you to the quidditch!" Remus gasped, and Trickster began jumping around like a golden retriever. Remus giggled, and cleared his throat.
"Reducio." He spoke clearly, and a whisp of blue light shot out from the end of his wand, connecting onto the maroon dragon's scales. He immediately began decreasing in size, and Remus continued until Trickster was small enough to fit in his satchel. "There we go!" Remus exclaimed, picking up the dragon in his hand. Trickster began scratching him, and gnawing at Remus' skin. "Hey!" He said, his hand bleeding slightly.
Luckily, the wound healed, fast thanks to Remus' lycanthropy. It quickly closed itself up, leaving nothing but a slight nibble on his skin. After placing him in his bag, Remus happily exited the room of requirement, and made his way towards the main pitch. When he arrived, he sat on the edge of the bleachers, closest to the exit, just incase. Unlucky for him, three familiar boys had decided to shuffle up in order to sit with him.
Remus decided to ignore them, and focus on Trickster, who was buzzing with excitement inside of his bag. "Hi, Remus." Sirius said, sitting next to him.
"Do you have to sit here?" Remus asked, clear annoyance in his tone. "It's just," he searched his mind for an excuse, but drew a blank, "I have a headache?" It sounded more of a question, and Sirius raised an eyebrow at this. He obviously wouldn't budge, so Remus had decided to shuffle a bit closer to the staircase.
"Sure you do," Sirius clearly wasn't convinced, but he didn't pester Remus anymore, and allowed him to shuffle away. Remus took this opportunity to make a small gap in between the opening of the satchel and the buckle of it, and a shrunken down Trickster poked his head out of the small crevice. Suddenly, two teams began souring into the sky on their brooms, and everybody around Remus began roaring with cheers. Remus winced at the sudden, loud noise. He hated loud noises. Although, he wasn't focused on the game at all. His attention was on the adorable, miniature dragon which was staring at the players as well.
"Do you like the game?" Remus whispered, and the dragon chirped in response, spitting a bit of fire onto Remus' finger as he did so. Remus, of course, just shook this off, unbothered. The commentator rambled on about the game, which Remus had no interest in whatsoever. "This is so boring, can we go?" Remus had to raise his voice slightly for the dragon to hear over everybody screaming. Trickster shook his head aggressively, and Remus scoffed. "Such a prince." He said with a chuckle.
Remus looked to his side, and was surprised to see Sirius looking at him instead of the match. Sirius had a softened gaze, and looked as if he were daydreaming as he stared at Remus. He had a faraway look in his eyes, and they twinkled with curiosity. Once he realised that Remus had spotted him, he shook himself back to reality, and turned around in embarrassment. Remus could've sworn that he was blushing.
Suddenly, he was very aware of the adorable dragon barking in his lap. "Trickster! Hey back in the bag," he tried to pick up the small reptile, but the animal dug his sharp, vampire-like teeth into Remus' skin. "Son of a bitch!" He exclaimed, and Trickster fell to the ground. "No!" Remus managed to squeak out, and he was very aware that Sirius was probably staring at him again. He dropped to the ground, and began searching for the shrunken down dragon. "Trickster, please." Remus begged, and to his surprise, he caught sight of the little bugger. He leapt forward, still on all fours, and grabbed the dragon, whom was just within his grasp. He shoved Trickster into his pocket, and immediately stormed down the stairs.
Remus was giving trickster an extremely quiet but stern telling off. The dragon was shuffling inside of his satchel, he definitely needed to get out more. Suddenly, Remus felt a hand clutch onto his shoulder, almost pulling him backwards. To his dismay, Sirius was stood there, his face extremely pale. "Remus, can we talk?" He asked, and Remus nodded hesitantly, subconsciously holding onto his bag, protectively, "What did you bring to the match? I know you hate quidditch, and I saw you talking to something, and not to mention launching your whole body after it. Only, I didn't see what it was." He sounded extremely innocent, and Remus felt obliged to answer him.
"Um, a shrunken down cat." He answered, feeling very uncomfortable and insecure of his response. Sirius cocked an eyebrow, and Remus cringed. "I have to go, don't be such a nosy sod!" He scoffed, and darted upstairs, heading straight for the room of requirement. Trickster would definitely be going outside with him again, but probably not in busy social situations where his pestering dorm mates would certainly be making an appearance. Once they went inside the room, he sized Trickster up again, giggling at the memory of him being so excited for quidditch.
"If you liked it that much, I can probably take you to practices, maybe not games, though." Remus said, not expecting Trickster to understand. The dragon was still very giddy though, and was jumping frantically around the room, spitting deadly balls of fire everywhere. Remus collapsed into a chair, and must've fallen asleep, because he woke up to parchment stuck to his face, his hair ruffled, a book dangling off of the table and sweat all over him.
"Shit," he said, whilst his stomach grumbled. He hadn't eaten a thing all day, at breakfast he was too busy trying to smuggle Trickster some meat, and during lunch he was searching for passageways. "I have to get dinner, I'll bring you up some, though!" He said, waving goodbye to the big-eyed dragon. It smiled innocently at him, before sneezing fire puffs onto the wood, which Remus could tell would leave a mark.
He did love this dragon, no matter how much trouble he could've possibly gotten Remus in.