The next morning we all awoke in high spirits; Remus was dancing around the house in green-and-red pajama pants singing “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” James made tree-shaped pancakes for breakfast, and I just watched the two of them, smiling like an idiot.

Remus skipped by and poked me, then ran away.

“Oh, it’s on now!” I laughed, and chased him around the house.

“Children, settle down,” James said, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

Ignoring him, I jumped onto Remus’ back.

“Arrgghhh!” he cried in-between snorts of laughter, then flipped me onto the sofa.

James ran to Remus’ side and I began to shriek as the tickled me.

“Eekk! Stop… or... Or I’ll…!”

“Or you’ll what?” James grinned, not ceasing at all.

I bit my lip then finally managed to squirm off the sofa. “I’ll make you hang the Christmas lights… by hand!”

“Oh yeah? How’ll you do that?”

“A game. If I win this game, you hang the lights, no magic. If you win…”

“Then you have to send a Howler to Professor Slughorn,” Remus inputted, and gave James a high-five.

I turned white. “Not cool… all right, fine. The game is… Wizard’s Chess.”

“You do know James is like the super-expert at chess, don’t you?” Remus groaned.

“Yep,” I replied, and pulled out my set. “I’m black, and I go first.” I moved the pawn in front of the king forward two spaces.

James made his move, and then looked at me. “Were you mad at me?”

“For what?” I asked as I moved my king’s bishop three squares diagonally.

“Showing you off in front of Cathy.”

I placed my queen diagonally two squares. “Oh, it that what that was?”

“I guess,” James replied as he replaced a knight. “Mad?”

“No,” I replied as I took my queen vertically up the line to take the pawn in front of James's king's bishop. “But you better go put on a jacket; it’s cold outside. Checkmate.”

Remus cheered as James looked at me dumbfounded, trying to figure out what I had done.

“Tip number one to chess…” I instructed, standing up. “Don’t talk while you play the game. It’s too distracting.”

I grinned and left the room.