Work Text
AUGUST 6, 1971
“Monsieur Auclair?” Regulus asked, his eyes wide and curious. “What will Hogwarts be like?”Sirius Black looked up from his book—Infamous Tales of European Wizarding Families—and eyed his tutor, curious as to how he’d choose to respond. Regulus, of course, had asked their parents this question nearly a dozen times before Walburga had hexed his mouth shut. Neither Orion nor Walburga were particular forthcoming with answers to this particular question, other than furious mutterings of “Mudbloods and blood traitors, roaming the halls like they have the right to be there.” Alphonse Auclair, the gruff and most recent tutor for the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, let out a grunt. “Haven’t the foggiest,” he grit out. “Went to Durmstrang, didn’t I? That’s where all the great pure-blood houses go, I expect.”Sirius rolled his eyes. “You’re not from a great house, Auclair. You’re one step up from a blood traitor,” he said with a sneer. He didn’t particularly like to point it out, but it was true. He’d heard his mother say it nearly a hundred times. The Auclairs, though great in numbers now, were scattered all around France and Western Europe. That being said, they were a relatively young line of pure-bloods. Nothing compared to the awe-inspiring lineage of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. “Besides,” Sirius said, ignoring Auclair’s glower and turning to Regulus, “Durmstrang’s full of nothing but dark wizards. Hogwarts is way more fun. ‘Dromeda told me so.”“Hogwarts,” Auclair said, baring his yellowing teeth, “has had no shortage of their own bits of riffraff over the years.”“Are the ceilings really enchanted to look like the stars?” Regulus asked, ignoring the tension between Sirius and Auclair.Sirius tried to hide his smile. He’d told Regulus about the ceiling in the dining hall after reading about it in Hogwarts: A History. Regulus always loved the stars. “‘Course not,” Auclair said before Sirius could reply. “I expect Hogwarts’s ceilings are perfectly normal.”“And you would know this how, exactly?” Sirius shot back. “Seeing as you have no imagination to speak of and went to Durmstrang, how would you know what Hogwarts’s ceilings look like?”“Wonder and awe are mere parlor tricks to make Muggles and Mudbloods remember their place,” Auclair growled. “No respectable wizarding institution would waste the time and resources on such audacious and tedious spellwork, when there’s practical magical instruction to be done.”Annoyed, Sirius reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out a folded bit of parchment. It bore his name and a broken wax seal. “Even so,” he said, waiving the letter in Auclair’s face, “Mother and Father seem to have decided Hogwarts is best. Got my letter a few days ago.”“Yes, of course you did,” Alphonse said, his nose wrinkling at the parchment. “’Suppose a brat like you will be sorted into Hufflepuff. No spine to you whatsoever. No stomach for the, ah… More demanding magic.” Hufflepuff? Sirius nearly cringed at the thought.“That so?” Sirius replied, instead, throwing a wink at Regulus. Sirius flexed the fingers of his right hand, reaching for the tingle of magic that seemed to dwell just beneath the surface of his skin. A bolt of red light shot from Sirius’s pointer finger and hit Auclair square in the chest. The tutor’s long, wiry hair stood straight up, as if he’d been electrocuted, and instantly turned from a stunning white to a bright, flamingo pink.Regulus rolled off his chair onto the floor, clutching his stomach, as he collapsed in a fit of laughter. Sirius smirked and snapped his book closed. He wiggled his fingers playfully, the magic still dancing between them. “How’s that for audacious and tedious?” he said.Regulus just laughed harder.“Why, you little—” Auclair reached into the pocket of his robe for his wand, pointed it, and muttered a curse.Sirius was ready. He leaped out of his chair, throwing the book in the general direction of Auclair, and dived behind the coffee table. Auclair’s curse, having missed Sirius by quite a significant margin, hit the high-backed armchair in which he’d been sitting instead. The arm chair let out a shriek and contorted in what Sirius guessed was the chair-equivalent of constipation. “Ah, Auclair,” Sirius chided. “You aren’t supposed to curse us. What would Mother say, if you deprived he of the immense pleasure of doing it herself?”Auclair roared in fury, drowning out the shrieking chair.Regulus howled, tears streaming down his face, grin wild and unable to cease his fit of laughter. Auclair readjusted, aiming again for Sirius, but before he could mutter a spell, Sirius stood up, meeting his tutor in a well-practiced dueling pose. Except instead of a wand, Sirius Black had only his fingers and the magic coursing through his veins. Another red bolt shot from Sirius’s fingertips, once more hitting Auclair directly in the chest. This time, his once-expensive, dark green robes changed into a shade of neon orange that greatly clashed with his bright pink hair.Regulus cackled and roared, clapping his hands when he had to stop laughing to catch his breath. A string of French curse words flew from Auclair’s mouth as he looked down at himself. Then, turning from Sirius, Auclair grabbed Regulus by the back of his neck, his wand trained on Regulus’s forehead. Instantly, the triumphant smile disappeared from Sirius’s face. Regulus let out a small whimper.“Don’t you fucking dare,” Sirius growled, trying to ignore the fact that his voice cracked when he spoke. A wicked, twisted grin spread across Auclair’s face. “Ah, there’s that Slytherin fury. I knew it was there somewhere.”“Sirius—” Regulus choked out, but Auclair silenced him with a flick of his wand.Sirius grit his teeth together. “Let him go. He didn’t do anything. You want to punish me, so do it. Not him.”“And still with that brazen stupidity,” Auclair sneered. “So unbecoming of the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.”“ALPHONSE!” roared a voice from the doorway.All three of them turned to see the looming, well-to-do shape of Walburga Black watching the scene unfold with something akin to hellfire blazing in her soulless, grey eyes. “Release my son, Alphonse,” she snapped, and instantly, Auclair obeyed. Even a cretin like Auclair knew better than to test the patience of Walburga Black. Regulus tumbled to the floor. He scrambled to his feet, brushing off his robes and hovering close to Sirius’s side. Sirius didn’t miss the tremor that went through his younger brother’s body. “Sirius!” Walburga said, her voice a little too loud, a little too grating on his already-frayed nerves for Sirius to entirely hide his flinch. His mother gestured at his tutor. “Fix him. Now.”Knowing better than to talk back to his mother, Sirius suppressed an eye-roll and flicked his wrist at Auclair. His robes instantly reverted to their original color, as did his hair, save for a bright pink streak, right down the center of his scalp.Walburga gave him a harsh glare, her lips pressed in a thin line.“Sorry,” Sirius muttered, though he was not even remotely so. He gestured to the sparks of magic flickering between his fingers. “Best I can do. It’s still a bit unpredictable.”This was, of course, not even the least bit true. Sirius Black had considered himself the resident expert in wandless magic since he turned eight years old. Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, naturally, was warded against all sorts of magic, both protecting from the outside and concealing the secrets within. With no enforceable restriction on underage magic, Sirius had perfected a series of simple hexes and jinx, all easily accessible with varying flicks of his wrist. Regulus, though a year younger, was not nearly as skilled or practiced as his older brother in wandless magic. The magic he displayed was predominantly accidental, as was standard of a wizard his age. Sirius, on the other hand, had something of a knack for charms and enchantments, despite never having owned a proper wand. Walburga, of course, knew all of this, and had bragged to Druella about his knack for wandless magic whenever the occasion to lord Sirius over his cousins arose. However, now, looking at the pink streak in Auclair’s hair, Walburga said nothing to contradict Sirius’s excuse. Instead, she said, “We’re going to Diagon Alley.”Sirius blinked, unable to hide his surprise. “You, apparently, are in need of a proper wand,” Walburga said. “Kreacher and your father shall meet us there. Come, now, Sirius.” She held out her hand. With a wide-eyed glance at his brother, Sirius went to his mother’s side, though he did not take her hand. Instead, she grabbed his bicep, his arm clutched tightly between her well-manicured fingers. Sirius tried and failed to suppress a grimace. He did not particularly like to be touched, even if it were his mother and it didn’t inherently hurt to be touched. Not unless she was also in the process of cursing him. The Blacks, themselves, were not a particularly physical family. Personal space was valued above all else and physical contact, if ever utilized, was usually accompanied by a certain degree of punishment. Regulus, of course, was his one exception. Touching Regulus neither came with the burning pain of physical contact with someone of a lesser bloodline, nor did Sirius ever view it as a punishment to have Regulus’s hand clasped in his, or his hand resting on his younger brother’s shoulder. It was merely comfort, plain and simple, between two young, yet long-suffering souls. Sirius tried to pry his arm out of his mother’s grasp, only to earn himself a harsh yank that nearly ripped his shoulder from its socket. “Regulus, back to your studies,” Walburga commanded. Regulus immediately obeyed, picking up the book that Sirius had hurled at Auclair and opening it up to a random page, pretending to pick up right where he left off. Walburga turned her hellfire-gaze to Auclair. “Alphonse, I leave you in charge.” He nodded, obediently. Walburga lowered her voice. “I feel it necessary to remind you that the discipline of my sons is mine and mine alone. You will not raise a hand against either of them again, no matter what this one might do.” She shook Sirius, to emphasize her point. “Am I understood?”“Of course, my lady,” Auclair said with a slight bow, a lock of his pink-streaked hair falling in his face. Sirius didn’t bother hiding his smirk. Regulus watched them, and Sirius didn’t miss the flicker of fear at the thought of being left alone with their recently slighted tutor. He strained to catch Regulus’s eye. “I’ll bring you back something, yeah?” Sirius said.Regulus gave him a weak smile and nodded. Without another word, Walburga yanked Sirius down the portrait-lined hallway, all the way to the entrance hall. “We will discuss your punishment later,” she hissed in his ear. Sirius swallowed the bile rising in his throat and tried, instead, to think of the wonders that awaited him in Diagon Alley. Orion Black and Kreacher were waiting outside the Leaky Cauldron when Walburga Apparated across the street, Sirius plastered closely to her side. As soon as the woozy feeling settled in his stomach, Sirius took a good step away from his mother, extracting himself from her and going to stand opposite his father.“Sirius,” Orion greeted him, before planting an obligatory kiss on Walburga’s cheek. “Father. Kreacher,” Sirius said in return, as Orion ushered them all through the doors to the Leaky Cauldron. Sirius had been here before, most recently with his cousin, Andromeda, the year before to celebrate her graduation from Hogwarts. She’d escorted him and Regulus to Florean Fortescue’s Ice-cream Parlour and the Black brothers finally met Andromeda’s secret boyfriend, but only after they’d been sworn to secrecy. Ted Tonks was a Muggle-born wizard, the first one Sirius had ever properly met. Pain had shot up his arm when Ted shook his hand, culminating in a all-consuming burning caused by the tattoo on Sirius’s chest. He’d managed, however, to keep a straight face and hide his sigh of relief, when finally Ted released his hand and the burning stopped. Andromeda had shot him a grateful look and Sirius had felt rather brave, for having endured the pain of touching a Muggle-born. Regulus, on the other hand, had let out a whimper of pain and yanked his hand away from Ted, only after a second, before fumbling an excuse about too much roughhousing. Sirius wasn’t entirely certain as to how Andromeda had been able to so casually touch Ted throughout their excursion. He knew for certain, despite the many rows she’d had with her parents, that Andromeda had the same tattoo that he and Regulus did. Every member of the Black family shared the brand: Toujours Pur, in black ink, right above the heart, given to each new branch of the family tree on their eighth birthday, as a sign of eternal fidelity to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. The tattoo, of course, was enchanted. It burned, when in skin-to-skin contact with anyone of a lesser bloodline. Even with pure-blooded blood traitors, the tattoo sent spasms of pain throughout his body. Touching a Muggle-born—even just to shake his hand—was something akin to the Cruciatus curse. Sirius should know. After meeting Ted Tonks, he was familiar with both.The Leaky Cauldron was relatively empty, compared to the last time Sirius had been there. Now, it was early August, and as most families tended to wait until closer to the start of the school year, most of the patrons were well beyond their Hogwarts years. Walburga and Orion ushered him and Kreacher through the Cauldron without much dallying. Once in Diagon Alley, proper, Walburga pulled her family to a stop. She looked from Orion to Sirius, then finally to Kreacher. “Kreacher, go fetch Sirius’s cauldrons, books, and quills,” she said. “The three of us are going to Madam Malkin’s. Orion, you need new robes as well.”“Yes, Mistress,” Kreacher said, bowing his head, before slinking off. Sirius tried to hide his cringe. The last time he’d been fitted for robes was right before his grandmother’s funeral, nearly two years ago. It had been a rather dreadful experience, considering Madam Malkin was a half-blood and he’d tried to jerk away nearly every time she touched him. He ended up with more pins in his arm than one of his poor dead grandmother’s pin cushions. “Don’t you whine,” Walburga snapped, catching the look on his face. “I owled her both of your measurements last week. Try them on—ensure that the likes of her didn’t muck up something so plainly simple—then we’ll be gone. I have other business to tend to today. I do not have time to dawdle in a half-blood’s shop.”“Indeed,” huffed Orion.When Sirius was finally done changing into his own robes—after more than a few minor adjustments to his new robes and decidedly more than a few mutterings of, “Incompetent, half-blood. Really, Orion, when is someone respectable going to open up a tailoring shop in Diagon Alley?”—he strolled to the front of the shop to see his parents standing over a small table filled with memorabilia from each of the four Hogwarts houses. They hadn’t noticed him just yet, so Sirius stopped short of getting their attention, listening instead to their hushed voices. “We should get him a few Slytherin ties and scarves,” Orion said, testing the material of one of the ties. “That way we won’t need to send it to him once he’s already at school.”“He hasn’t been properly sorted yet,” Walburga replied, her nose turned up a little.“He’ll be Slytherin,” Orion said, incredulous. “Of course, he’ll be Slytherin. Every Black that’s gone to Hogwarts has been Slytherin.”Walburga’s lips formed a thin line.Orion inched closer to his wife and lowered his voice. “You think he won’t be?” he hissed, the threat evident in his tone.Walburga grabbed up a scarf. “Of course. Sirius will be Slytherin,” she snapped. She grabbed a few more Slytherin scarves, then turned to see Sirius standing there, trying his best to not look as though he’d been eavesdropping. She snatched the tie out of Orion’s hand and, with the scarves she’d picked, she shoved them into Sirius’s arms. “Here,” she said forcibly. “Slytherin ties and scarves, so you’re prepared. I grabbed an extra scarf for Regulus. You did say you’d get him something, didn’t you?”Sirius took a moment to get his bearings. “Yes, I did.” He hadn’t exactly had a scarf in mind when he’d been thinking of what to get Regulus, but he didn’t dare contradict his mother. He’d rather been thinking about getting Regulus something from the joke shop Andromeda had mentioned in her last letter—Gambol and Japes, or something—though he didn’t dare bring this up with his parents. The Blacks had no time for such trivial things. Sirius figured that, sooner or later, both his parents would be engaged in other things, affording him the perfect opportunity to sneak away to find the joke shop. It’d happened before. Orion and Walburga, though overwhelmingly strict, were not exactly the most attentive parents.Looks like he wouldn’t have to wait long. Walburga looked him up and down and said, “Good. A scarf will do fine. Orion, pay the half-blood—though I hardly think she deserves it, with all those adjustments she made to Sirius’s robes. Honestly, I might not even have bothered sending measurements ahead, for as long as it took!” She shooed her husband towards the counter and a red-faced Madam Malkin. “I have a meeting at Gringotts and you best make your way to Knockturn Alley.”Ducking his head and stumbling slightly under the mass of the box that held his new robes and scarves, Sirius tumbled out the door, only to run smack into someone. Naturally, the box went flying, and Sirius himself landed on his arse. Rolling his eyes, Sirius flicked his wrist and the box of robes and scarves righted itself, shaking off dust as the robes folded neatly back into their box. He carefully tucked the box under his arm, so as not to drop it again.“Merlin, sorry! You alright, mate? Wait—woah. You can do wandless magic?”A hand grabbed his arm and yanked him up. Sirius winced. The touch burned—enough to make him want to yank away just to avoid the pain—but it was nothing like touching Ted Tonks or Madam Malkin. Pure-blood, blood traitor, then, if he’d have to guess. Sirius hastily shook off the helping hand and finally got a good look at the other boy. He was tall—nearly a head taller than Sirius, much to his chagrin—with brown skin and black eyes. His hair stood up in every direction and, unlike Auclair, Sirius didn’t think it was the result of a curse. His hair just seemed to naturally… do that. A pair of glasses sat slightly askew on his nose.“Yeah, uh,” Sirius began. “Wandless magic isn’t so tough once you’ve got the hang of it.”Sirius flicked his wrist again and the boy’s glasses straightened on his face.The boy grinned, all toothy and white. “That’s so cool!” he exclaimed. “I’ve only been able to do some accidental stuff so far. Made dinner burn once, when I sneezed too hard, but nothing like what you just did. You’ll have to teach me!”Sirius smiled. Blood traitor or no, Sirius decided he liked this boy. “You’re on, mate.”A man came stumbling towards them, the near-spitting image of the boy in front of him, just about fifty-some years his senior. The man wore a relatively nice set of robes—nothing like the finery that graced the Blacks’ wardrobes, mind you—and had the same outlandishly untamable hair as the boy, just streaked with significantly more grey. “James?” the man said, looking around. “Where’d you get off to, then? Oh, Merlin, there you—” The man pulled up short, once he caught sight of Sirius.The boy—James—looked from the man to Sirius, before thrusting out his hand under Sirius’ nose. “James Potter,” he said.
Potter?
Sirius eyed the hand for a second, wary, before he drew a breath and shook it once, twice, then released, managing to hide the glimmer of pain that shot through his arm. (Mostly. James kind of gave him a weird look.) “Sirius Black,” he said, matter-of-factly.James’s face fell, as Sirius knew it would. He’d heard of the Potters—from his mother’s furious ramblings about, “All the sodding blood traitors allowed to walk free these days.” Sirius was rather certain that James Potter had heard just as many stories about the Blacks. Gossip was like currency amongst pure-blood families, even blood traitor pure-blood families.“SIRIUS!” came his mother’s voice.Oh, ruddy brilliant, Sirius thought. She’ll think he’s consorting with blood traitors, then. He’d be dead for sure if he let on that he actually liked the Potter boy. Orion came out of the shop behind his wife, then pulled up short when he caught sight of the Potters. “Fleamont,” Orion said, not bothering to keep the disdain out of his voice. “I see that hair potion of yours is as useless as ever.”Sirius would have blushed if he had any sense of shame left in him, after years and years of his parents being unspeakably rude to anyone they deemed as less than themselves. James Potter, on the other hand, flushed red in anger. He looked between Orion and Sirius, clearly ready to explode and defend his family’s honor. As subtly as he could manage, Sirius shook his head, warning James off. He didn’t particularly care to see James fall victim to one of his father’s more subtle and, well, legal curses. Sirius had no doubt that Orion would curse James, despite being in the middle of Diagon Alley, especially if James questioned Orion’s authority. James gave Sirius a look, opened his mouth all the same, but only stopped when Fleamont Potter rested a hand on his son’s shoulder. “James here will be starting his first year at Hogwarts in September,” Mr. Potter said, not bothering to hide the glint of pride in his eye as he spoke. “Your Sirius is too, if I remember correctly.”Walburga grabbed Sirius by the back of his neck and maneuvered him in front of her. She placed her hands on both his shoulders and kept him there with an iron grip. “Yes,” she said. “He is. Sure to be top of his class, too.”Mr. Potter smiled, and if Sirius didn’t know better, he’d almost say there was pity in his eyes. “I’m sure,” he replied. Then, to Sirius, he said, “That was an impressive bit of magic you did there, son. And without a wand, at that.”James beamed at him. Sirius managed a small smile and a muttered, “Thanks.” He tried not to notice how his mother’s grip tightened. “And Regulus?” Mr. Potter asked, politely.At this, Sirius smirked. Sirius loved bragging about his younger brother. “He’ll start next year. He’s quite good at flying, too. He wants to try out for Quidditch as soon as he can.”“Sirius,” Orion hissed.James’s smile widened and he ignored Orion Black. Sirius liked James more, just for that. Not many people have the gal and the daring to so blatantly disregard Sirius’s father. “Really?” said James. “I love Quidditch! Dad got me a Nimbus for my birthday last spring, but I can’t bring it just yet. First years aren’t allowed to try out. Reckon I’ll make a decent Chaser, though, next year.”Sirius grinned. Regulus was the one who loved Quidditch most amongst them, but after years of listening to his little brother go on about it, Sirius had become quite the fan himself. “What’s your team, then?” Sirius asked. “Holyhead Harpies,” James said. “Mostly ‘cos of my mum. She has a friend on the team. Who’s your favorite?”Sirius opened his mouth to reply, but Orion cleared his throat, rather obnoxiously. Sirius bowed his head to hide his annoyance, and did not answer James. “We really must be going, Fleamont,” Orion said. “Nice seeing you, then. Come along, Walburga.”“Yes, goodbye, then,” Mr. Potter said, with a small, polite wave.Pleasantries fulfilled, Orion stalked off towards Knockturn Alley. With her hand still latched onto Sirius’s shoulder, Walburga followed her husband. Sirius managed a small smile in James’s direction before he was dragged after his mother. “You are not to associate with that boy, Sirius Black,” Walburga hissed, though they were not quite out of earshot. Glancing back, Sirius could tell that James had heard. His dark features—so obviously almost always graced with a smile—fell into a scowl at Walburga’s words. “Always associating with Muggles and Mudbloods, those Potters. Blood traitors, the lot of them.”Sirius didn’t say anything. He merely tailed after his parents, box tucked under his arm, and tried to figure out how he was going to get to Gambol and Japes without Orion or Walburga noticing. His parents parted ways, as Orion ducked into Knockturn Alley. Walburga and Sirius soon found Kreacher, laden with so many boxes already that Sirius didn’t even feel guilty about handing the house-elf one more from Madam Malkin’s. His mother sent the house-elf off again, this time to go wait for Orion at the Leaky Cauldron, before finally dragging Sirius into Gringotts. A well-dressed, but otherwise grubby goblin greeted with a slight bow, and a reverently muttered, “Mrs. Black. Mr. Black. So good of you to come.”Walburga smoothed out her green, silk dress and turned to face her son. “Sirius, stay here. I shall return shortly.” Sirius, of course, highly doubted this was the case. His mother’s visits with the Gringotts’s money keepers hardly ever qualified as short. A plan already taking flight in his mind, Sirius said, “Of course, Mother.”She pointed a manicured finger at a bench in the corner, by the entrance. “Stay right there, Sirius, and do not leave this place,” she warned. She gave him a hard look, before following the grubby goblin into the vaults.Sirius strolled over to the bench and sat. He waited all of four minutes—just long enough to ensure that his mother’s meeting was not going to be an unpredictably short one—before he strolled up to the goblin waiting behind the counter. Reaching into his pocket, Sirius pulled out the bag of money he’d been saving for Regulus’s gift. The goblin at the counter glanced up at him, eyes narrowed. Sirius flashed him a smile. “Ten Galleons, to not tell her I’m gone,” he told the goblin, sliding the coins across the counter. The goblin eyed the money, but did not take it. “Ten more,” said Sirius, “if I return and she still doesn’t know I was ever gone.”The goblin smirked, and took the coins, pocketing it in his tiny suit. “Pleasure doing business, Mr. Black.”“Ta,” Sirius said, before hurrying back out to Diagon Alley. It didn’t take long at all for Sirius to locate Gambol and Japes, as the storefront was a painted obnoxious, alternating shades of yellow and blue. Inside, it was just as Andromeda described: wizarding candies and treats lining one wall, jokes and items of mischief lining the other three. Sirius went directly to the back wall—he’d be caught dead with candy in Grimmauld Place—and began pouring over the shelves. There was a one-eyed parrot, wearing an eye-patch, resting on a perch in the middle of the store. Underneath its perch, there was a handwritten card that read, Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot. Sirius suppressed a laugh, and weaved his way through the shelves. Though there were quite a few other patrons currently perusing the shelves of Gambol and Japes, Silas’s one eye followed Sirius as he made his way around the shop. “Hello, Darkness, my old friend,” the bird sang, in an atrociously off-key screech.Sirius gave it an incredulous look, but turned his attention back to the wonders before him. Dungbombs, Whatz-itz, Exploding Quills… Sirius couldn’t take his eyes off them, the possibilities utterly overwhelming. Though not, he thought, upon further consideration, the type of thing Regulus would like. “Tell me something,” a voice said behind him. Sirius froze. “When we’re at Hogwarts, are you ever going to speak to me?”Sirius turned to stare into the bright, black eyes of James Potter. “And why wouldn’t I?” he asked.James shrugged, hands stuffed in the pockets of his robes. “I expect you’ll be in Slytherin, then, seeing how you’re a Black and all.”“And you’ll be Gryffindor. What’s your point?”James scoffed. “Slytherins and Gryffindors don’t exactly get along.”Sirius considered this. “You and I get on fine.”“Do we?” James challenged, almost as if he were looking for a fight.“Thought so,” Sirius said, casually. He’d been surrounded his whole life by people looking to pick fights; he knew how to avoid escalating the situation. “What about what your mum said, about me being a blood traitor?” James asked, with a huff. “Do you agree with that?”Sirius shrugged. “Don’t know if that’s something for me to agree or disagree with,” he said, absently rubbing the tattoo on the left side of his chest, under his robes. “What the hell does that—” James snapped.Sirius cut him off. “Think I know better than anyone that you don’t get to choose your family, Potter.” He paused, reveling a bit in James’s curious expression. “You don’t get to choose your fate and you don’t get to trade in the lot your given for something better.”James stared at him, unblinking, as if Sirius had suddenly sprouted horns. Sirius let out a sigh. “I’ve got to believe, despite all that, that I do still get to choose some things for myself. So…” Sirius stuck out his hand. “Hi. My name’s Sirius Black.”James eyed his hand, like he didn’t quite believe him, but took it all the same. “James Potter,” he said. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Black.”Sirius smiled and held onto his hand for as long as the pain permitted, which, given their first handshake, was a vast improvement. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Potter,” Sirius said, finally drawing his hand away and suppressing a sigh of relief. From the center of the room, the one-eyed parrot squawked loudly. “Black and Potter, Black and Potter. Don’t they make good cannon fodder?” Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot chanted.Both boys froze, looked first at the bird, then each other, then burst out laughing. “What’s it mean, cannon fodder?” snorted James, between laughs. “If you or I were ever to fight a war, we’d have whole armies to fight in our names, now, wouldn’t we?”“Of course,” Sirius said, with a smirk. “People would volunteer to die in our names, Mr. Potter. There’ll be no ‘cannon fodder’ for the likes of us.”“Stupid bloody bird.” Wiping a tear from his eye, James stuffed his hands back in his pockets. “What brings you to Gambol and Japes, Mr. Black?”“Well,” said Sirius, looking around. “I had hoped I’d find something for Regulus—my brother. Have any suggestions?”“Loads,” said James. “What’s he into?”Sirius considered this. Regulus loved Quidditch, of course, but already had his own broom as well as memorabilia from all his favorite teams. He had a copy of nearly every book he could possibly want—thanks to Number Twelve Grimmauld Place’s extensive and slightly illegal library—and their parents had given the both of them the finest wizarding chess set that money could buy last Christmas. Sirius wanted to give Regulus something special, something that’ll keep Sirius close while he’s at school.Then, remembering Regulus’s reaction to learning about Hogwarts’s Great Hall, Sirius said, “He loves the stars. We’re all named after them, obviously, but Regulus has always loved learning about them and mapping them.”“I know just the thing,” James said, with a wide smirk. James stepped towards him and, without a second thought, swung an arm across Sirius’s shoulder. Rather shocked by this development, Sirius didn’t have time to suppress the yelp of pain that shot through him, but he didn’t shrink away. The pain, though not as intense as Sirius knew it could be, was hard not to notice, and after a few seconds, he ducked away from the friendly arm. “Sorry,” he muttered, rubbing again at the tattoo as the burning faded back to nothing. “Not used to it, ’s all. It’s nothing you did.”James gave him a weird look, then slapped his arm. “Don’t worry about it.” He turned back to the shelves before he could see Sirius flinch.“For ye be warned, young Sirius Black. You’ll lose your soul and won’t get it back,” Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot sang. Sirius froze. He turned towards the bird. “What did you say?”The bird repeated the line, over and over.Now, Sirius wasn’t one to unquestioningly believe prophecy—too unpredictable, far too vague for his taste—but he couldn’t help feeling overexposed at the parrot’s words. Something cold, with long, icy fingers settled into his bones and began to tug at his heart, clawing it open, exposing the black nothingness to the rest of the world.Suppressing a shudder, Sirius schooled his face back to neutral. He met James’s eyes, and shrugged it off as best he could. “Sodding chicken.”Together they turned slowly towards the bird, who was now whistling a rather well known children’s tune. One of the owners, standing next to the parrot—Grigori Gambol, from the name pinned to his robes—shot James and Sirius a sheepish grin. “Sorry, lads,” he said. “Ol’ Silas here gets a bit worked up. He don’t mean nothin’ by it.”Sirius ignored the nothingness that seemed to burrow its way into the very core of his being. He turned back to James. “So,” he said, forcing his voice to sound normal. “What’ve you got?”James reached for an ornately decorated tea-cup on the top shelf. “Cosmos-in-a-Cup,” he said, rather proud of himself. “Fill it with water, then splash it wherever, and all you’ll see is stars. If your smart enough, you might even be able to charm the stars to stay put, like in the Great Hall at Hogwarts.” Sirius smirked. Oh, he was definitely smart enough. “Brilliant. Thanks, mate,” he said, sincerely. “Now, what about you? What are you in the market for, Mr. Potter?”James shrugged. “Nothing, really. I loaded up on most of this stuff last week. My dad comes down to Diagon Alley quite a bit for work.” James rubs the back of his neck. “I just came in here to see if you’d talk to me. You seemed decent enough, when you met, you know.”“Decent?” Sirius wrinkled his nose. “I’m wounded, Mr. Potter. Never say such a thing about me again.”James laughed. “You have my word, Mr. Black.”Sirius glanced out the window. Seeing as there was no shrieking woman tearing out of Gringotts and shouting his name followed by numerous obscenities, Sirius figured he was still in the clear. “Let’s pay for this, then,” he said. “I’ve got to get back to my mother before she notices I’m not where she left me.”Sirius walked up to Grigori Gambol and handed him the money for the Cosmos-in-a-Cup, expertly avoiding any actual physical contact with Gambol. Sirius wasn’t too keen on finding out Gambol’s blood status right now. Then, together with James, the two boys turned to exit the shop.Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot, of course, chose that moment to screech out: “Sirius Black, how tragically flawed
Thought he might be the man to kill God
Now Nothing’s dictating
And that dark kiss is waiting
For the murder of the man who killed God.”
This time, Sirius felt his face flash red. Who the hell was this bird, that it thinks it knows enough about him to be saying such things for all the sodding world to hear?James comes to a stop next to him, at the entrance of the shop, both their backs to the bird and proprietor. Sensing his reaction, James said, “Sirius, it’s a stupid bird. It doesn’t mean anything. Besides, it’s only slightly psychic. There’s a good chance he just likes writing limericks.”Sirius ignored him entirely. “Do you want to see a nasty little parlor trick?”James hesitated, but only slightly. “Hell, yes.”“Thought so,” Sirius said. “Do you have a wand yet?”James gave him a look. “What? No. Dad’s got me an appointment with Ollivander next week.”Sirius smirked. “Excellent,” he said, and flicked his wrist. James turned just in time to see all the feathers on Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot disappear into thin air. The bird—now looking rather like a plucked chicken with an abnormally large beak—tried to let out an indignant squawk, only to find that its vocal cords were no longer functioning properly. The sound that came out of the bird’s beak instead sounded rather like a foghorn. “Salazar’s balls, Sirius!” James laughed. “How did you—”“SILAS!” wailed Grigori Gambol. Silas let out another long honk.“We should get out of here,” James said, making a grab for Sirius’s arm. Sirius dodged him, narrowly avoiding James’s hand, and waved him off. “It’ll be fine. Trust me?”After a second, James nodded. Gambol turned his attention to Sirius and James, a look of pure rage making the vein in his forehead pop. “YOU TWO!” he roared. Sirius tried to look as innocent as possible. He was quite good at it, really, having perfected his who, me? face at a young age, whilst tormenting Bellatrix and Narcissa at any given Black family function. James, on the other hand, looked as guilty as a sinner in church. “What?” Sirius said, with just the right amount of practiced aristocratic arrogance. “Oh, my. James, look what’s happened to Silas!”James, with his eyes wide, looked back and forth from Sirius to the bird. “What—oh. Poor sodding parrot,” he managed.“It was you two,” growled Gambol, pointing a finger at them. “Ol’ Silas was singin’ about you, Black. That’s why you’ve done him in.”“Couldn’t have been us,” Sirius replied, shaking his head. “How’s that then?” snapped Gambol. James gave him a look that asked the same question.“First of all,” Sirius said, “we’re both going to be first years, which means we can’t use magic outside of Hogwarts without getting the Ministry on our tails. Do you see any owls from the Ministry?”Gambol waited a moment, but no owls appeared. “No,” he muttered.“Second,” Sirius continued. “Neither of us have wands. I’m off to see Ollivander next and James here won’t be around to see him for another week. How could we have done that to Silas without wands?”Gambol glanced suspiciously between the two of them. “Turn out your pockets, then,” he said. “Prove you’ve got no wands.”Sirius and James obeyed and there were indeed no wands to be found. Gambol leaned against the nearest shelf, both confused and upset. Sirius flashed Gambol a smile, feeling a little bad about what he’d done to Silas. “Cheer up, mate,” he said. “Could’ve been any number of the things in this shop that backfired.” Gambol nodded along in absent agreement. Sirius turned towards the door and winked at James. “I reckon the foghorn thing should only last an hour or so. Then ol’ Silas will be back to spewing out uncomfortable and unwarranted prophecies. The feathers, ah… The feather’s will have to grow back on their own, I’m afraid. Shame, that.”James and Sirius fled the shop before they were able to witness Gambol’s reaction. “That was bloody brilliant!” James said, once they’d rounded a corner, well out of sight of Gambol and Japes. “You’ve got to teach me how to do wandless magic! It’s a bloody lifesaver.”“It’s all in the wrist,” Sirius said with a smirk.James laughed. “But—wait. Why aren’t we—or you, rather. This was all you—getting owls from the Ministry. Technically, we—well, you—did use magic outside of school.”Sirius waved him off. “Wandless magic tends to register in the same category as accidental magic, meaning the Ministry isn’t exactly in a hurry to enforce the legislation. Otherwise, they’d have to arrest every poor sod that sets their mother’s cooking on fire when they sneeze.”James shoved him and Sirius winced once more. Merlin, James Potter was a physical guy. Sirius had never met someone so inclined towards physical contact with virtual strangers. “Hey, I didn’t set her cooking on fire, I turned it straight into charcoals. There were no actual flames involved.”“Whatever you say, mate,” Sirius said. He glanced down the alley towards Gringotts. “I should probably be off, then, or I’d be pushing my luck well beyond its worth. It’s never good to be caught disobeying Walburga Black.” James gave him a look that so plainly said, You call your mum by her first name? After a second, he shook it off and beamed at Sirius. Once more, James Potter held out his hand. “Right then. Nice meeting you, Sirius Black. I’ll see you at Hogwarts, where though we shall be in rival houses, we will fall madly in love with each other, start a minor war between our two houses, get married in secret, and off ourselves before the end of the final act.”Sirius was rather taken aback by this and, for once, didn’t exactly have anything to say.James laughed at the blank look on Sirius’s face. “It’s a play,” he prompted. Sirius’s face remained blank. “Romeo and Juliet. By William Shakespeare? It’s famous.”“He’s a Muggle, then, this Shake-sparrow fellow?” Sirius asked. “Yes.”“Haven’t read many Muggle books.”James shook his head and laughed again. “I can tell. No matter. I’ll see you at Hogwarts, Sirius.”With a slight eye roll and a silenced groan, Sirius—for the third time today, mind you—shook James’s hand. “See you at Hogwarts, James.”The two boys parted ways, undoubtably friends.Sirius made it back to Gringotts without a hitch. He slipped the goblin behind the desk his last ten Galleons before once more taking his seat on the bench next to the door. He waited a whole ten minutes before Walburga Black emerged from the vaults, a shiny, new pair of ruby earrings dangling from her ears.She gestured for Sirius to follow her and he obeyed without a word, the Cosmos-in-a-Cup tucked safely in the inside pockets of his robes. Sirius mouth dropped open when he walked through the doors of Ollivander’s shop. The shop was packed with shelves, stuffed floor to ceiling with intricately decorated wand boxes of every shape and size. Sirius could feel the magic floating in the air, coursing around him, infusing each wand with a unique flavor, a unique… well, if he didn’t know better, he’d almost say personality.“Do not gawk, Sirius,” Walburga chided. “It’s unbecoming.”Sirius snapped his mouth shut.Walburga looked around the shop. “Ollivander is the best in the world at his craft,” his mother said, searching the shelves for said proprietor. “He is not, however, the most prompt.”As if on cue, Garrick Ollivander emerged from a back room. His robes, though probably once expensive, were now rather shabby and covered in a good amount of flakes and fine powder—sawdust, if Sirius had to guess—but his eyes twinkled as he saw Walburga and Sirius. “Ah, Mrs. Black,” Ollivander said, nodding to her, rather than shaking her hand. Sirius raised an eyebrow at this. He wondered if he knew not to touch her because of his bloodline, or was merely intimidated by the presence of Walburga Black. “Ebony wood, with a thestral hair, core, if I’m not mistaken. A family heirloom, yes? Made by my grandfather.”“Yes, of course,” Walburga said, as politely as she could manage. “May I see it?” Ollivander asked.Walburga gave a slight nod. She pulled out her wand and offered it to him. Ollivander very deliberately avoided her fingers as he took the wand, holding it reverently in his hand. Sirius narrowed his eyes. Clearly, Ollivander was avoiding physical contact with his mother, yet he had to have some magic in his blood if his grandfather had made Walburga’s wand. That meant he was either a blood traitor—unlikely, given how highly his mother had spoken of him, and really, she tended to put blood traitors on the same level as Mudbloods—or a half-blood. After being poked and prodded by Madam Malkin all morning—plus the three separate handshakes and slew of casual touches from James Potter—Sirius wasn’t too keen on feeling like his blood had been set on fire again.“Ah, yes, such a rare wand, this,” Ollivander said, entranced. “Such remarkable beauty, laced with such darkness and potential for danger.”Sirius almost scoffed. He was quite familiar with the types of curses that came out of that wand. Darkness was a bit of an understatement.Ollivander carefully handed the wand back to Walburga, again avoiding her fingers. He then proceeded to look Sirius up and down. “Something a bit different for this one, I think,” he said, and Sirius sucked in a breath. Different usually meant punishment in the Black house. “Tell me, Master Sirius, have you yet performed any accidental magic?”Sirius nodded, opening his mouth to reply, but his mother beat him to it. “He’s quite adept at wandless magic, actually,” Walburga said, matter-of-factly. “Really?” Ollivander said, surprised. “Quite unusual for a wizard of your age. Would you, perhaps, be able to demonstrate?”“Sure,” Sirius said, looking around the shop for something to charm. He caught sight of a vase filled with four dead tulips on the front desk. He pointed the tulips out to his mother and Ollivander, reached for his magic, and flicked his wrist. The tulips sprang to life, no longer wilting, but bright yellow and in full bloom. Sirius smirked at Ollivander’s expression and flicked his wrist once more. This time, the four tulip bulbs began singing an Italian opera, in perfect, four part harmony.“Remarkable,” Ollivander said, applauding quietly. Sirius flicked his wrist one last time and the bulbs stopped singing.“Such control of wandless magic is highly unusual, my dear boy, for someone of your age,” Ollivander said. “Best find you a wand to compliment your talent. Cypress is quite good with non-verbal magic, as is ash. Willow too, if it suits you.”Ollivander flicked his own wand and boxes came flying off the shelves. Walburga cleared her throat. “Dragon heartstring, I should think for Sirius, Mr. Ollivander,” she said.Ollivander bit his lip, looked almost like he wanted to argue, but said instead, “Of course, Mrs. Black.”A few of the boxes he’d pulled flew back onto the shelves.“Try this one, Master Sirius,” Ollivander said, holding out a dusty, grey wand. “Thirteen inches, ash, with a dragon heartstring.” Sirius took the wand. It felt heavy and wrong in his hand, but he held it up anyway. He glanced at Ollivander for further instruction.“Try levitating the tulips,” Ollivander said. “Non-verbally, of course. Can’t have the Ministry thinking I allowed you to utter real spells in my shop.”Sirius nodded and, concentrating, flicked the wand at the flower pot. A bolt of red light shot out and shattered the vase. “Don’t think this is the one,” he said to Ollivander handing the wand back. Then, he flicked his wrist, and the vase knit itself back together.“Right, then,” Ollivander said. “Try this. Willow, this time.”It went on like this for nearly an hour. Ollivander would hand Sirius a wand—varying the length and the wood type, but never the core—and each time, Sirius would try to levitate the tulip vase, it would either explode, shatter, or, with one particular wand (ebony, like his mother’s), disintegrate entirely. Each time, Sirius would sigh and hand the wand back, then use his wandless magic to repair the vase. Ollivander, naturally, became increasingly flustered as each progressive wand failed. He seemed to know what disappointing a Black could do to one’s physical safety, let alone their reputation.Walburga’s frown deepened and her foot began to tap impatiently. “How much longer, Mr. Ollivander? I would like to take my son home before the start of the term.”“O-of course, Mrs. Black. Of course,” Ollivander stammered. Then, he gestured at Sirius. “If I could just—” Ollivander suddenly stopped talking, as if reconsidering what he’d been about to ask.“If you could what?” Walburga snapped. “Out with it, Mr. Ollivander.”Ollivander hesitated. “Sometimes, in rather difficult cases…” he started, then trailed off. “If I could just take his hand, I might be able to discern which type of wand best suits him. With your permission, of course.”Sirius frowned. Thus far, taking the cues from his mother, Sirius had avoided any physical contact with Ollivander, for fear of the pain. He shook his head. “No,” he said firmly, before his mother could speak. “Absolutely not.”A half-second later, Walburga said. “Fine. Do it.”“No!” Sirius snapped.“He’s a half-breed, not a Mudblood, Sirius,” Walburga said, hellfire blazing in her eyes, clearly not pleased that her son and hair had talked back to her in public. “Do it so we can go home. I’m sure you’ll be wanting to give Regulus your little trinket.”Sirius froze. Ah, so this was punishment, then. She knew he’d snuck away while she was conducting her business at Gringotts. Bloody, backstabbing goblin, Sirius thought, viciously. Vaguely, he wondered if Walburga knew he’d met up again with James Potter. Deciding it best to not push his luck, Sirius extended his hand to Ollivander, with a muttered, “Yes, Mother.”With an apologetic glint in his eye, Ollivander took Sirius’s hand. Pain shot up his arm, fire in his blood, and Sirius fought every instinct to yank his hand back. Instead, he grit his teeth together, to keep from crying out, as Ollivander turned his hand over, examining the lines on his palm and the movements of his wrist.After nearly two minutes, Ollivander released him. Sirius sprang back, knocking into a shelf and clutching his arm to his chest. He let out a whimper, barely suppressed a sob, and let out a long breath, as the pain slowly evaporated back to nothing. He hated showing weakness in front of his mother—in front of a stranger—but it fucking hurt and there was not much he could do about it.“Well, then,” Ollivander said, looking guiltily between Sirius and his mother. “I think I have just the thing.”Ollivander scampered off to the back room. Sirius could hear shuffling, then a crash, then a curse, then some more shuffling. Walburga continued to tap her foot impatiently. Finally, Ollivander reappeared, holding a single, straight wand. He held it out to Sirius.“I’ve been working on this one,” he said. “Bit of a special project, really. Try it out, then, Master Sirius.”Sirius glanced suspiciously at the wand, but took it all the same. He spun it around in his grip, tested its weight and strength. This wand felt different—felt good—like maybe it’d been made specifically for him.“Go on, then,” Ollivander said, with a knowing smile. He gestured at the tulip vase. Sirius flicked the wand at the vase and, instantly, the flowers sprang into midair and hovered there. Sirius whooped in triumph. “Think you’ve done it!” he exclaimed, throwing a broad smile at Ollivander. Sirius flicked his wrist again, and the vase did a flip, dumping the flowers and water out at the top of the loop and catching them once more at the bottom. Ollivander clapped his hands together. “Ah, perfect fit, then?”“Perfect,” Sirius agreed. “I’ll take it.”Walburga crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes at the wand in Sirius’s hand. “What’s it made out of, then?” she demanded.Ollivander hesitated. “Willow,” he said.“You tried a dozen willow wands before. How come this one works?” Walburga snapped.“Well, you see,” Ollivander said, looking reverently at Sirius’s wand, “this wand is from a special willow tree. A young tree, enchanted at that, just planted at Hogwarts. Willow wands are excellent with non-verbal spells—probably the best, mind you—and are suited for those with the greatest potential. This willow tree, more specifically, was enchanted to protect and defend, a resolute guardian of a closely-held secret. It has a special quality to it that no other wood possesses; that is, the weirder of this wand is destined to fight fiercely for the secrets he holds, for the protection of the ones he loves.”Sirius’s eyes widened. That a wand like that had chosen the likes of him… Sirius couldn’t fathom it. That sounded almost like he was brave or something, and Sirius Black knew in his heart of hearts that he was very much not brave. He’d learned to fear a great many things. Walburga’s brow furrowed and her frown deepened. “What’s the core, then, of this special wand?”“Ah,” Ollivander said, clearly stalling. “I’ve had a rough go of it, trying to find a core that would compliment such a unique wood. Phoenix feather, of course, would not do. Too unpredictable, that. I’m not entirely satisfied with the end result of this core—it fits, sure, but I’m not entirely certain it’s complementary to the special qualities of this willow wood—but Master Sirius seems to be suited just fine for this wand, so there you have it.”“Out with it, Ollivander,” Walburga growled, but Sirius already knew what the wand master was going to say. There was only one thing it could be, if Ollivander feared Walburga Black’s reaction.“Unicorn hair,” Ollivander said quietly. “Enchanted willow wood, with a unicorn hair core, twelve inches long, exactly.”“Excuse me?!” Walburga growled.Sirius looked down at his wand in awe. No one in his family had ever had a unicorn hair core. “The most faithful of all the wand cores,” Ollivander continued, the hesitation and fear in his voice evident. “But, ah, yes. Unicorn hair does tend to wither away into nothing if it’s forced to perform Dark Magic.”Sirius swallowed the lump in his throat. He refused to look at his mother, terrified of her rage at this new development.“But, ah, the bright side,” Ollivander said, holding up a finger. “The first spell uttered with a unicorn hair core will, of course, determine the—ah—the character of the wand itself, as well as that of its wielder.” He threw a half-joking wink at Sirius. “Best wait until Hogwarts before you attempt any verbal spells, I reckon.”“Right. That’s enough,” Walburga snapped. “How much, then? We must be going. No use in staying here all night trying to find a better match.”Ollivander gave Walburga a significantly discounted price, from what Sirius understood was the average cost of specialty wands. Sirius highly doubted Ollivander would give such an offer to anyone other than a highly displeased Walburga Black, but the alternative seemed to be incurring her wrath, which, from experience, Sirius knew to be a far worse fate. Walburga didn’t speak to him the whole way home, but Sirius couldn’t be bothered to care. He finally had a wand. A wand that had chosen him, specifically, and one laced with contradictions, down to its very making, much like Sirius Black himself. Apparating right outside the Muggle-repelling wards that surround Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Sirius immediately sensed something was… off. His mother, calm and collected as ever, shoved Sirius away from her side and opened the front door. House-elf skulls and ancient family members in ornate portraits adorned the entrance hall. “Orion and Kreacher shall be around shortly,” Walburga said. “We shall discuss your punishment for disobeying my direct order and consorting with that Potter boy then.”Sirius bowed his head and winced, almost anticipating the punishment. Whatever his parents cooked up, it was bound to leave him aching for days. “Yes, Mother,” he said, before slinking off.Temporarily off the hook, Sirius wove his way through the halls, twirling his new wand between his fingers. “Regulus?” he called. “Reg, where’re you at?”He paused, waiting for the reply. The house remained silent. Then, he heard the front door open once more, and the booming voice of his father carry throughout the halls as Orion asked Walburga how their trip to Ollivander’s had gone. His parents’ voices defended into hushed, angry whispers as Sirius turned another corner. Still no sign of his brother.Sirius frowned. “Regulus?” he called again.Still no reply.Sirius turned on his heel, heading back towards their study, where he’d left Regulus with Auclair earlier. “Regulus?” he said, hesitantly, as he pushed open the door.Sirius registered the muffled cry before his brain fully wrapped himself around the sight. Auclair, still with that brilliantly pink streak in his hair, had Regulus pinned against the opposite wall, both hands clasped around his throat. Regulus’s feet skimmed the ground—he wasn’t tall enough to touch—and Auclair supported Regulus’s entire weight by the hands around his throat. Sirius gaped in horror, dazed for a second, as he watched Regulus’s lips turn blue.“You’re a filthy, entitled little bastard, you are,” Auclair hissed, his face contorted in fury.“What the fuck are you doing?!” Sirius shouted, pointing his wand at Auclair. “Let him go!”Auclair whirled his head around, but did not release Regulus. Regulus clawed at the tutor’s hands and mouthed Sirius’s name, over and over, his eyes wild with panic.“LET HIM GO! LET HIM GO! LET HIM GO!” Sirius roared.“He’ll get what he deserves, right bastard,” Auclair growled. “Only need one heir, after all.”Before Sirius even had time to properly think about it, he raised his and shouted, “CRUCIO!”A bolt of green light shot out from his brand new, enchanted-willow-with-unicorn-hair-core wand. Auclair went rigid for a split second, the fell to the ground, wailing out in pain. He contorted on the ground, trying to wiggle out of the curse, but to no avail. Sirius held him there, writhing in unspeakable pain. Regulus dropped to the ground, clutching his throat and coughing.“SIRIUS!” yelled his mother, from somewhere behind him. Then, out of the corner of his eye, Sirius saw his father come to stand next to him. Orion drew his wand and pointed it at Auclair. “Release him, Sirius,” Orion said, remarkably calm, given the situation. After three more seconds, Sirius obeyed and lowered his wand. Auclair let out a long, drawn out moan of relief. Sirius glanced at his father, suddenly terrified of incurring punishment for torturing their tutor. “He—” Sirius started, pointing an accusing finger at Auclair. “He was… And Regulus—”Sirius cut off, when suddenly, Regulus ran across the room and threw his arms around Sirius’s neck, sobbing. Ignoring both their parents, Sirius held his brother tight against him, carding fingers through Regulus’s thick, black hair, trying to soothe him. Eventually, he forced Regulus to step back, so Sirius could get a good look at his neck. Dark purple bruises were already forming on Regulus’s skin, in the perfect shape of Auclair’s hands. Sirius growled in anger and gently pulled Regulus back against his chest. Only then, does Sirius dare to look up at his father.Orion’s expression had hardened. “Auclair, what happened?”From his place on the floor, Auclair let out a broken, bitter laugh. “Little bastard—” he coughed, loudly, and Sirius was sure he saw blood come up. “Fucking bastard said my family were nothing but blood traitors, the whores of Europe, that—”“Crucio!” Orion yelled, flicking his wand. Auclair collapsed again, letting loose another wail of pain. “You will not speak of my son in that manner, Auclair,” he spat. Orion turned back to Sirius and Regulus. “In your own words, Regulus. What happened?”Regulus kept his face buried in Sirius’s chest, but risked a glance up at their father. “What he said,” Regulus muttered. “Then he grabbed me by the throat and started choking me.”Orion nodded, then turned his focus back to the writhing tutor. “You were given the terms of discipline upon your employment, Auclair. No one of lesser blood was to lay hands on either of my sons. If you had problems, you were to take it up with Walburga, who would then handle their punishment. Only a Black is fit to punish a Black.” Auclair had now been reduced to mere moans and whimpers, as Orion continued to hold the curse. Then, catching Sirius’s eye once more, Orion said, “I’m proud of you, Sirius. Cruciatus as your first curse. Not many can claim that honor, even amongst the Blacks. Perhaps that new wand of yours is not as useless as your mother seems to think.”I’m proud of you, Sirius. In his nearly eleven years of life, Sirius Black had never heard his father utter those words. He managed a small nod, in response, not quite knowing what to say. “Since it was you that cast the first curse, I find it only fair for you to deliver the final punishment, Sirius,” Orion continued. He nodded to Sirius’s new wand. “Finish it.”Sirius was well aware that that was supposed to mean something, but his brain seemed to be having immense difficulty in computing his father’s words. “F-finish it?” he asked, rather stupidly.“Avada Kedavra, Sirius,” Walburga said, impatiently. “He deserves to die, for what he’s done. Now, on with it!”Sirius’s jaw dropped and he clutched Regulus closer to him. “No,” he choked out. “I’m not going to kill him.”His mother’s eyes flashed. “You dare disobey me again, after what you pulled in—”Orion raised a hand. “Enough, Walburga,” he said. He turned to Sirius and gave him a long, hard glare. “I’ll do it this time, Sirius, but just this once and only because you had the gall to perform the first curse. Next time, if you refuse to finish it, you’ll take his place.”Sirius felt his blood turn to ice at the threat. Regulus let out a sob.The Blacks all turned their attention to their sniveling tutor, still huddled on his knees. “No! Please, Master—” He never got to finish.“Avada Kedavra!” A green bolt shot from Orion’s wand and Alphonse Auclair dropped dead. Sirius stared down at those empty eyes and felt cold sneaking up his spine. Auclair didn’t look dead, at least nothing like his grandmother had, lying pale and lifeless in her coffin. Auclair looked as though he were merely staring off into space, ready to be roused by him or Regulus, in time for their next lesson and bout of bickering. Orion tucked his wand back into his robes, as if it were nothing at all that he’d just killed a man in front of his two, young sons. Turning to his wife, he said, “Have Kreacher clean this up. Sirius, we’ll discuss your punishment for your actions in Diagon Alley tomorrow.”Sirius found himself nodding along.“Good,” Orion huffed. “Now, off with you. No use standing around gaping, staring at a dead blood traitor. I’ll be in my study.” Sirius didn’t go down to dinner that night. Though, he doubted if he did show up, that he’d actually be given anything to eat. He was well aware that whatever pride his parents had felt at him performing the Cruciatus curse was short-lived, especially given his afternoon spent with James Potter and the fact that Sirius apparently didn’t have the backbone to perform the killing curse.He lay flat on his back, on his four poster bed, the dark green duvet tucked right up to his chin. He’s not entirely certain how long he’s been laying there, staring straight up at the ceiling, but he’d guess a few hours, at least. He’d performed the Cruciatus curse, willingly and without hesitation. Andromeda had told him a few years ago that, in order to perform any one of the Unforgivable Curses, you had to mean it, had to feel the rage welling up in your very soul. Sirius had felt it, alright. He’d meant it and, to what he thinks should be his great dismay, he’s unwaveringly certain that he’d do it again.Sirius Black was eleven years old and, were it not for the wards on Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, the Ministry of Magic would throw him in Azkaban for the rest of his life. Maybe he deserved it.Maybe he’d been fated for Azkaban from the moment he’d been born.Eventually, after what was probably another hour or so, Sirius pulled out his wand. It felt heavier than it had in Ollivander’s and the smooth, willow wood appeared half a shade darker. Maybe it was his imagination, but he doubted it. His wand had a unicorn hair core. Ollivander had said the core would wither into nothing if it were forced to perform Dark Magic, and that the first spell would determine the wand’s fate. It seemed, then, no matter what he chose, Sirius Black was fated for darkness. He’d wither into nothing, just like his wand.Sirius sat up when he heard his door creak open. Soft feet padded across the wood floor, until there was a rustle of covers and Sirius felt Regulus wiggle close to him on the bed. Regulus lay on his side, facing his older brother, black eyes wide, even in the darkness. “Siri?” Regulus whispered.“Yeah, Reg?” “Thank you.”Sirius turned on his own side, facing Regulus. They were pressed close together, their feet tangling and fingers brushing underneath the duvet. Sirius reached up, his fingers skimming the dark bruises on Regulus’s neck. “I can heal that for you,” Sirius said, suddenly. Regulus’s eyes went wide. “I know a spell. Or, well, I read about one. Can’t really fix that sort of thing without a wand, but I could give it a go. Do you trust me?”Regulus nodded and bared his neck. Sirius wasn’t entirely certain he trusted himself, especially with his recently-cursed wand now pointed at his little brother’s throat. He drew in a sharp breath, sent a prayer to whoever or whatever might be listening, and muttered, “Episkey.”Sirius watched in relative amazement as the bruises faded into pale, smooth, untarnished skin. Regulus’s hand flew to his neck and he poked the skin, his face breaking out in a grin once he realized it no longer hurt. “Thanks,” he said, earnestly. He gestured to Sirius’s hand. “That your new wand? Can I see it?”Sirius hesitated only a second before handing his wand off to his brother. “Wow,” Regulus said, running a finger across the smooth, straight wood. “What’s it made of?”“Enchanted willow wood,” Sirius said, with a burst of pride that frankly surprised him. “Ollivander said it’s from an special tree, at Hogwarts. He said it guarded a secret.”Regulus’s eyes went wide. “What kind of secret?”Sirius huffed a laugh and poked Regulus in the side. His little brother let out an indignant squeak. “If he told me what it was, it wouldn’t be a secret, now would it?”Regulus giggled. “I’ll try to find out, yeah?” Sirius said. “Once I’m at Hogwarts. Kind of want to know myself, after what Ollivander said. He seemed to think this wand was real special.” Sirius again thought about the dying unicorn hair core of his wand and felt an unbelievable twinge of guilt.Regulus, of course, didn’t know that the wand was slowly dying. “You’ll write me and tell me the secret, once you find out, right?” he asked.“‘Course I will,” Sirius said, with a huff.Regulus grinned and handed the wand back to Sirius. “Do you think I’ll get a special wand next year, too?”“I don’t doubt it.” Sirius poked him again, this time tickling him a bit more. Regulus giggled relentlessly and retaliated. After they’d both regained their breath (and Sirius had taken a good kick to a most undesirable location), the brothers lay on their backs, shoulder to shoulder, and stared up at the ceiling.“Sirius?”“Yeah?”“Did you get me anything?”“Merlin, I almost forgot.” Sirius sat back up, a wicked grin on his face. He pointed his wand towards his dresser and said, “Accio Cosmos.”The little tea-cup fluttered over to them. Regulus snatched it out of the air, running his fingers over the intricate patterns. “What is it?”“Cosmos-in-a-Cup,” Sirius said, with a smirk. Tossing his wand aside, Sirius flicked his wrist and the tea cup filled with water. The two brothers stared into the cup, millions of millions of stars swirling in the tiny space. “Splash the water on the ceiling or something, to see all the stars.”“Really?” Regulus asked, his eyes wide, reflecting the tiny stars twinkling in the cup.“Try it.”Without another word, Regulus held the teacup up and splashed the water towards the ceiling. Instead of liquid, the splash rained down stars around them, engulfing them, swirling everywhere, unto infinity. The Milky Way streaked across the ceiling of Sirius’s bedroom, all purple and blue and astoundingly white light.“’S beautiful, Siri,” Regulus whispered, and yeah, it was. Regulus nudged Sirius. “So where are we at, then?”Sirius smiled, studying the cosmos above him. “There’s Orion’s belt,” he said, pointing, and neither of them bothered to hide a grimace. “Which means… Ah, there. Right south of Orion, that’s Sirius. The heart of Canis Major and the brightest star in the night sky.”Regulus reached up, tracing the outline of Canis Major with his finger. “Good dog,” he giggled. Sirius poked him. “Fucking sap, you are,” he muttered. He pointed back at the swirling stars. “Regulus is there, brightest one in the Leo constellation.”“Leo?” Regulus said. “The lion?”“Yep,” Sirius replied. “Probably means you’ll be in Gryffindor.”Regulus grabbed the pillow under his head and swatted Sirius. “No! Take it back!”Sirius laughed and shoved him away. “Nah, you’ll be Slytherin, like the rest of us,” he said, after a moment. “Besides, it’d be a shame if all those Slytherin scarves Mother got went to waste.”“Suppose so,” Regulus said. He looked back at the Cosmos-in-a-Cup, still clutched reverently between his fingers, even as the galaxy swirled above them. “Sirius?” he asked. Sirius hummed in response. Regulus gestured to the tea cup. “Is this why you’re in trouble?”Sirius let out a sigh. “Nah,” he said. Then, he reconsidered. “Well, not specifically.”“Specifically,” Regulus said, slowly, “what did you do?”“I snuck away from Mother while she was at Gringotts, went to a joke shop, exchanged friendly banter with the infamous son-of-blood-traitors, James Potter, blew all the feathers off a rather annoying psychic pigeon, bought you a cup of stars, then paid a traitorous goblin twenty Galleons to shut up about all of it. He then betrayed me to Walburga Black, and here we are.”Regulus seemed to run that all through his head again. “You’re friends with James Potter?”Sirius shrugged. “S’pose so. What of it?”“Mother and Father won’t like it.”“Didn’t think they would.”“Then why bother?”“He’s funny,” Sirius said, considering it. “His hair sticks up in every direction and he likes Quidditch. He wants me to teach him wandless magic.”Regulus nodded. “Doesn’t it…” he trailed off, reconsidering his question. “Doesn’t it hurt?”“Yeah,” Sirius replied, letting out a sigh. He thought of the three separate times James shook his hand, of James throwing his arm over Sirius’s shoulder, of the casual touches, of the easy, friendly intimacy James Potter constantly initiated. Sirius shuddered, as the memory of the pain nearly overwhelmed him. “Course it does,” he said, his voice quieter now. “But I figure if we’re going to be friends, I’ll just have to avoid touching him, is all.”Sirius, of course, had no idea how he was going to deter James Potter, but it felt good to say, at least. “Was it like ‘Dromeda’s boyfriend?”“Nah,” Sirius replied. “It still hurt. Merlin, it hurt, but not like Ted. James is still a pure-blood, even if he’s from a family of blood traitors.”Regulus hummed in response. “Lot of those today. Blood traitors.”Sirius felt that darkness creeping back up his spine. Despite the cosmos above him, despite the comfort of his brother next to him, Sirius felt the weight on his chest, overwhelming and all-consuming. He was sure he was about to drown, lost in the darkness forever.“Orion-fucking-Black said he was proud of me,” Sirius said, rather surprising himself. He didn’t want to talk about this, didn’t want Regulus to see any more of the darkness and the nothing than necessary. If Regulus knew... Merlin, if Regulus knew what that Unforgivable Curse might have cost Sirius, he’d go running for the hills, leaving Sirius alone, once and for all, with a suddenly empty cosmos shining above his head.“You don’t sound happy about it,” Regulus muttered, reaching for Sirius’s hand. Sirius wove their fingers together and held on tight.“I’m not,” he said, his voice harsher than he meant. “Not even a little bit.”Regulus gave him a strange look. “Why not?”Sirius scoffed at his brother’s indignant tone. “Because to get Father to say that again, I’d have to do that again, and probably worse. And… And I don’t think I can.” In fact, Sirius Black is quite certain that he’d rather die, in any one of the myriad of painful ways his parents might devise.Regulus frowned and squeezed his hand. “But… Siri, you saved me. You’d do that again, wouldn’t you?”Sirius swatted him. “Of course, but… Reg, did you really say all that to him? Call him a blood traitor and all?”“Only after you did!” Regulus protested.Sirius closed his eyes, swallowing his regret. “I know,” he muttered. “I know, okay?”“Then what—”“I tortured him to make up for my own loud mouth, which, in essence, means I tortured him because he was a blood traitor.”Regulus was genuinely confused. “So?”Sirius opened his eyes and stared at his brother. Regulus’s black eyes—so unlike his own—reflected the galaxy above them, around them, inside them. They were beautiful, his brother’s eyes, and so undeserving of the darkness that surrounded them.“He didn’t get to choose his family, Reg. He couldn’t help what he was,” Sirius said, his voice quiet. “Neither can we.”“He chose to attack me, Sirius.” Sirius shook his head. “He’s a pure-blood wizard, called inferior and a blood traitor his whole life—whether it’s true or not—because his lineage will never measure up against the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.” Sirius couldn’t keep the sarcastic edge out of his voice at the mention of his own bloodline. “Years later, some snot-nosed punk—or rather, a snot-nosed punk and his dashing big brother—remind him of what he is, of the type of blood runs through his veins, so he snaps. He attacks said snot-nosed punk, forcing his dashing big brother to step up and throw down the Cruciatus curse. This pure-blood wizard falls dead a blood traitor, because he stood against the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, thereby fulfilling every taunt and jeer that’s been thrown at him over the years. He never had a choice, Reg. He was born to become a blood traitor. He was born to die as one.”They’re silent a long moment, the stars blazing bright and beautiful just out of reach.Finally, Regulus said, “If that’s true, then what are we born to be?”Sirius swallowed the lump in his throat. He’d give anything not to be the one to share this particular tragedy with his younger brother.“There’s darkness in our veins,” Sirius said, eventually, gazing into the infinite mysteries of the cosmos spread out above them. “This God, this hand of fate, or whatever it is—the very monster that wrote the destinies of pure-bloods and blood traitors, who wrote the darkness into our very souls… That’s something I can never forgive. You and me, Regulus? Well, we were born to kill God.”Regulus looked at him for a long moment, then sighed. He curled up next to Sirius, his head on Sirius’s chest, right below the tattoo that caused so much pain. Regulus clutched the Cosmos-in-a-Cup carefully between them. “Thanks for the stars, Siri.”Sirius carded his fingers through his brother’s hair and planted a kiss on the top of his head. “You’re welcome, Reg.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Dear Andromeda,
How’s Ted?
Reg and I got a new tutor, Mrs. Blanche Withers, and she’s forcing us to keep up correspondence with our relatives, even though I’m off to Hogwarts (finally!) early next week. And, seeing as you’re the only relative I can stand (other than Reg, of course), it’s your lucky day. Let me dazzle you with my masterful prose and incendiary wit. (Incendiary—that’s the right word, right? I think it is.)
How are Bella and Cissa?
(Ignore that. I don’t really care. Mrs. Blanche Withers just made me write it because it’s polite or some bullshit like that.)
How’s the Ministry, these days? (Please do answer that one. I want to know.) What have they got you doing? Are you still in Public Relations?
Like I said, I’m off to Hogwarts next week. I’ve got my wand and my books and loads of Slytherin scarves and ties Mother insisted upon buying when were in Diagon Alley. I’m excited, truly, and not just because I’ll finally be away from this house for a good portion of the year. Well, who am I kidding? It’s mostly that.
I do have a question—(Sorry if the writing gets small or smeared. I’m trying to hide this bit from Mrs. Blanche Withers. She’s quite a snoop, that one.)—at Hogwarts… How did you manage it with, well, the Black family brand, and all? One day in Diagon Alley almost did me in, and, if Mother’s ramblings about the complete lack of blood purity at Hogwarts, then I imagine it’s quite a task navigating the halls. Then, say, hypothetically—very, very hypothetically, mind you—I were to hypothetically befriend someone of a rather less-than-pure lineage—a blood traitor, for instance—how might I hypothetically embark on such a friendship, when I, as I am, can hardly stand to touch said hypothetical friend?
Anyway, I hope you’re well and I hope this letter reaches you and doesn’t get thrown into the fire. Regulus tried to write Uncle Alphard and ask him how long he thought it would take before the Ministry to arrest Rodolphus Lestrange and throw him in Azkaban for using Dark Magic. Apparently, since Bella’s engagement was announced, Alphard’s been taking bets. Mrs. Blanche Withers, ever the spoil-sport, tore Reg’s letter to shreds and ordered him to go help Kreacher with the dishes. Frightful woman, that Mrs. Blanche Withers, and that’s coming from someone raised by Walburga Black.
Love,
Sirius
Dear Sirius,
I’m so glad to hear from you!
In reference to your first question, I must now implore you to speak in a rather coded manner, as my nightmare of a younger sister has taken to reading my letters when I am not present to receive them. Henceforth, the subject of your question shall be referred to only as my new, adorable owl, Feathers. In answer to your question, Feathers is doing perfectly fine. He’s enjoying his new employment at an apothecary shop in Hogsmeade—such a smart owl, that Feathers! We are also madly in love and I shall never love another owl as much as Feathers, no matter the arrangements my parents make.
I am doing well. Yes, I’m still in Public Relations, slowly working my way up, though it’s a bit tedious. Feathers thinks my talents are being wasted and I should begin Auror training. Imagine that, huh? A Black, as an Auror! Mother and Father would have a fit. Perhaps I’ll do it, then, eh?
I’m so sorry to hear of the passing of your old tutor—Auclair, was it? I know you weren’t particularly fond of him either, but this Mrs. Blanche Withers sounds like a real nightmare. Poor Reg. He’ll have to learn to tolerate her while you’re off at Hogwarts. You better write your poor, dear brother often, Sirius Black, or I shall never invite you out for ice-cream with me and Feathers again.
You should be excited for Hogwarts, Sirius! I’m excited for you. There’s so much more to the wizarding world than even the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black can ever prepare you for. I expect you’ll love Charms, given how you seemed to have mastered that whole wandless magic thing. Everything at Hogwarts is utterly brilliant, Sirius. Be sure to stop by the gamekeeper’s hut and tell Hagrid I said hello. Hagrid was a good friend of Feathers’s and actually had quite a hand in putting us in contact. You should have him tell you the story.
I do feel it’s fair to warn you—Not because you asked. I did ignore that question, as instructed.—that Narcissa will be starting her sixth year. Mother’s told her that she’s to look out for you, seeing as how you’re the Black heir and all. Narcissa wasn’t too keen, but she’ll listen, for as long as she knows she’s being watched. Wily little snake, that one, but the perfect little Slytherin. She’s dating a fifth year, Lucius Malfoy. Mother and Father have entered into marriage negotiations with the Malfoys, for after Narcissa graduates Hogwarts. It would seem that they’re to be a rather permanent fixture, Lucius and Narcissa, though I dare say he’s a bit of a monster. You’d think the Blacks were horrid purists, Sirius, but you’ve never seen the likes of fanatical blood-allegiance until you’ve met with Lucius Malfoy. I say this only in warning: He’s made prefect, it would seem. Cissa’s been bragging about it all month. You won’t get away with much, with Malfoy looming over you, but you’re still the Black heir, so he’s got to respect that, at least a little.
As for the Black family brand, yes. That does take some getting used to. It’s a lot of dodging people in the hallways and learning to slip past other students without brushing against them. You’ll figure it out. Every Black that’s attended Hogwarts has so far. It might mean some random bouts of excruciating pain, but you’re brave, Sirius. You’ll figure it out. For making friends, everyone in the Slytherin house is relatively safe. A few half-bloods get in every year, but you’ll learn who they are just by how they’re ostracized. Everyone else in the house should be safe and shouldn’t cause you any pain.
That being said, I want you to know that I couldn’t care less who you choose to be friends with, hypothetical blood-traitor or no. Just look at me and Feathers, for Merlin’s sake! If this hypothetical friend of yours really wants to be your hypothetical friend, then just tell him about the tattoo. If he’s a good hypothetical friend, then he’ll respect your boundaries without question, even if he does, hypothetically, seem to be particularly inclined towards physical affection. It took me forever to tell Feathers and it caused a lot of heartache. I don’t particularly care to watch you go through the same thing.
On a completely unrelated side note, please tell James Potter he owes me ten Galleons. He’ll know what it’s in reference to. I met him when I was with Feathers in Diagon Alley last week (Feathers is a huge fan of Mr. Potter’s Sleekeazy Hair Potion and now sells it in his shop) and James mentioned that he’d met you. We then entered into a little wager and it would seem that I’ve won.
Speaking of bets, please also tell Uncle Alphard to put me down for seven years, before Rodolphus is in Azkaban, and eight for Bella. The two of them are squirrelly, feisty little cretins. It’s bound to take the Ministry at least that long to actually pin a crime on them, much to my great annoyance. I do hope they allow me to testify against them at their trial.
Love,
Andromeda
P.S. - I didn’t tell James about your tattoo. That is your secret to tell, Sirius, if James is to, hypothetically, be your friend.
SEPTEMBER 1, 1971
Much to his dismay, Sirius found himself shrinking against his mother’s side, as they stood in the middle of platform nine and three quarters. She gave him a nudge and a scowl, then a glare that so clearly said, Act like the Black heir, you ungrateful ingrate. Sirius straightened up and put a few feet between himself and his mother. He was coming to the rather rapid realization that he did not care, at all, for crowds. There were too many people, too many trollies full of luggage taking up too much space on the platform. The young wizards and their parents resolutely avoided bumping into the imposing and sophisticated figures of Orion and Walburga Black, which, in essence, meant that they inevitably ran into Sirius. Try as he might, he kept brushing up against people, then jerking away at the burn, only to bump into someone else and send yet another lightening bolt of pain up his spine. Sirius was already injured, for Merlin’s sake. There were purple bruises up and down his sides. Last week, already anxious to get out of Grimmauld Place, Sirius had accidentally set Kreacher’s potato-sack smock on fire. Sirius had actually been attempting to light a lamp with his wand, but the damned thing had backfired and hit Kreacher with the fire spell instead. His mother, naturally, had not believed him in the slightest. She’d ordered Kreacher to punish Sirius as if he were punishing himself for disobedience. Kreacher had taken great pleasure in that privilege, so much so that Sirius was fairly certain the stupid house-elf had cracked one of his ribs. A muttered healing spell fixed the break a day later, after he’d regained consciousness, but he didn’t dare fixing the bruises, lest his mother or Kreacher think it necessary to renew them.Someone bumped against him once more—this one Muggle-born, judging by the ferocity of the pain—and Sirius barely held back a scream.Andromeda was wrong. She had to be. There was no way that Sirius could get used to this.Part of him—that dark part that he’d spent the better part of the month desperately trying not to even acknowledge—wanted to curse these people for just touching him, and for the pain it caused him. Who were they to—But he couldn’t think like that. Couldn’t think like his parents.Still, Sirius felt the weight of his wand in the pocket of his robes, tucked against Andromeda’s letter. He was itching to do something—anything, for Merlin’s sake—just to take his mind off the near constant pain of constantly being shoved around in this crowd.He gritted his teeth together, heaved a few breaths, then opened his eyes once more, only to see none other than James Potter strolling onto the platform. James wore a long, Gryffindor scarf and his hair was no more tamed than it had been that day in Diagon Alley. He was followed by his father and a beautiful, elegant older woman that Sirius assumed was James’s mother. When James looked up and caught Sirius’s eye, he gave Sirius a wide smile and a small wave. Glancing nervously back at his parents to ensure they hadn’t noticed the Potters—they hadn’t, thank Merlin—Sirius looked back at James, gave a slight shake of his head, then nodded towards the arriving train. Sirius prayed James got the message. Not now. We’ll talk on the train. James gave him a small smile and nodded. He walked away, in the other direction, followed by his parents. Sirius let out a breath in relief and surveyed the platform. There was a tall boy—probably a first year, given his lack of any discernible house memorabilia—with curly, sandy-brown hair and amber eyes, standing next to a man who was undoubtedly his father. The boy looked between the train and his father, then all but flung his arms around his father’s neck, yanking him into a tight hug. Sirius winced, unable to keep from imagining receiving a hug from his own father. It was a terrifying thought, really, and one, Sirius had no doubt, that would be accompanied by a certain degree of pain, even if it weren’t from his damned tattoo.When the boy pulled away, the light on the platform caught just right on his face that Sirius was able to make out three pale scars that sliced parallel to each other across his face. Sirius gasped and was unable to hide the sound. His own parents, he understood well. If Sirius or Regulus stepped out of line, there was bound to be punishment. Whether that punishment was physical, in the form of Cruciatus or some equally painful curse entirely depended on the day. What Sirius couldn’t understand, however, was the sight before him. How could a father, with a son that so willingly hugged him like that, punish the boy in such a manner that would warrant such obvious scars?More importantly, what, in Merlin’s name, had that boy done to deserve such a severe and visible punishment?“Sirius. Sirius!”Sirius was suddenly very aware that his mother had been calling his name for the past thirty seconds. He turned, looking as innocent as possible, and said, “Yes, Mother?”Walburga’s lips formed a thin line and she scowled down at her son. “You’re cousin is here.”Sirius looked around to see Narcissa Black stalking up to them, trailed by her mother, Aunt Druella. Much to his chagrin, Narcissa stood a great deal taller than Sirius. Her long, blonde hair—a trait she shared only with her mother—fanned out behind her and her sharp, blue eyes glared down at Sirius. Sirius was fairly certain that he’d give his left arm for Andromeda to be here, greeting him, instead of her beast of a younger sister. “Walburga, Orion,” Aunt Druella said, greeting both his parents with kisses on the cheek. She looked Sirius up and down, a small, malicious smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “With the way things are going, it’s about time for the Black heir to be counted amongst the Slytherins, don’t you think?”Sirius narrowed his eyes. The way things were going? What does that—“Indeed,” Orion said. “Sirius will do us all proud, I’m sure.”Sirius could hear the threat behind his father’s words. “Of course,” he said, meeting Aunt Druella’s stare dead on.“Glad to hear it,” Aunt Druella said. She gestured towards her daughter. “Now, Narcissa will look out for you, Sirius, make sure you get settled all right. If you need anything, if any half-breed or Mudblood tries to give you trouble, let Narcissa know. Her boyfriend, Lucius Malfoy, is the Slytherin prefect. Oh, where’d that boy get off to? Lucius? Lucius!” she called. A wiry boy with white-blonde hair turned and started towards them. He had what seemed to be a permanent sneer etched into his features. Sirius decided in an instant that he hated Lucius Malfoy.“Yes, Mrs. Black,” Lucius Malfoy said, with an air of arrogance about him. He stuck out his hand to Sirius. “Pleasure to meet you, Sirius.”“Same,” Sirius said, suppressing an eye-roll. There was no pain when he shook Malfoy’s hand. Malfoy was pure-blood, to his very core.“You three should get on the train,” Aunt Druella said. “The house-elves will handle your trunks.”“Yes, Mother,” Narcissa said, then kissed Aunt Druella’s cheek. She took Malfoy’s hand.Walburga held out her arms to Sirius. Obediently, not seeing any other option, Sirius stepped closer to his mother and she kissed him on both cheeks. Unlike the exchange between the boy with the scars and his father, Walburga’s touch was cold, thin icing over a veiled threat. “You live up to your name and station, Sirius Black,” she hissed in his ear. “Do you understand me?”Sirius gave a slight nod and stepped away. The train gave one last, long whistle.“Come, Sirius,” Narcissa said, her nose up in the air.Begrudgingly, Sirius followed his cousin and her boyfriend onto the crowded train. The corridor of the train was frustratingly narrow and, though Malfoy led the way through the throngs of students, neither Sirius nor Narcissa could entirely avoid contact with these strangers. Sirius found himself flinching every few seconds, which greatly cut into his concentration on how he was going to hex Lucius Malfoy. Narcissa and Malfoy stopped, about halfway down the train, when a greasy-haired boy with sallow skin stumbled and fell right in front of them. Sirius pulled up short, to avoid running smack into Malfoy’s back. “Watch where you’re going, firstie!” sneered Narcissa. “Merlin, there’s so much grease in that hair, it’s no wonder he fell,” Malfoy said, wrinkling his nose and giving the boy a sharp kick. “Half-blood, that one,” Narcissa said with a hiss, as the greasy first year brushed against her. She stepped a good distance out of reach. “Not fit for Slytherin, then, is he?” Malfoy taunted, giving the boy another kick.Sirius disagreed. Half-blood or no, the slimy boy was exactly what he’d imagined a Slytherin would look like. Not particularly wanting to watch his cousin and her disgusting boyfriend torment another first year Sirius with whom could very well end sharing a dormitory, he took another step back, and occupied himself by looking intently at his cuticles, trying to appear as though he were not a part of the altercation in front of him.A sharp pain shot up his spine as someone leaned close to him. Sirius almost flinched away, but then James Potter whispered in his ear, “What do you say we hex Malfoy while his back is turned?”Sirius took half a step away from James, but grinned madly. “What exactly did you have in mind, Mr. Potter?” Sirius asked, reaching for his magic and twirling his fingers. “I think, perhaps, that it’s my turn to do the honors, Mr. Black,” James said. He reached into the pocket of his robes. “Besides. This time I have a wand.”Sirius laughed and took a look at the wand. It was shorter than his own, maybe by an inch, but made of dark mahogany. The wand had intricate patterns and swirls etched into the handle. When he thought about it later, James’s wand was undoubtably beautiful, but Sirius greatly preferred the simplicity of his own enchanted willow wand. Sirius gestured at Malfoy. “All yours, then. Just don’t hit my cousin, or I’ll never hear the end of it.”James bit his lip, pointed his wand, muttered a spell that Sirius didn’t quite catch, and then, suddenly, all of Lucius Malfoy’s clothes disappeared. Or, rather, turned invisible, it would seem, as there was still a rush of fabric as Malfoy sputtered and felt his chest, dazed and confused.Narcissa screamed.Sirius howled in laughter, nearly collapsing in on himself. James, with a wicked smirk plastered on his face, gave Malfoy a long, lingering glance, up and down his body. “My, my, Malfoy. White all over, aren’t we?”Malfoy’s eyes flashed, and he flushed red, right down to his—“Why, Narcissa,” Sirius said, barely holding back another cackle. “Even with a horrid personalty like yours, I’d think you could do better than that.” He gestured at Malfoy’s junk. “How is a wormy thing like that s’posed to produce a child?”James snorted a laugh and slapped Sirius on the shoulder. He winced, but mostly ignored it. “No, you see, Sirius,” James said, quite reasonably, “given that blood-curdling scream she let out upon seeing his naughty bits, I’m not sure she wants that limp noodle anywhere near her. Looks like Malfoy’s line will die with this pasty fellow we see before us.”Sirius laughed and leered at Malfoy. “Why, you—” Malfoy fumbled with his invisible robes, searching desperately for his pocket and his wand.Narcissa, however, beat him to it. She pointed her wand at them, and yelled, “Stupefy!”James launched himself in front of Sirius, his wand raised, and deflected the curse. It backfired and hit the sniveling first year square in the chest. The boy’s greasy head plopped to the floor as he lost consciousness. For a second, all four of them froze. “Oops,” muttered James.Narcissa raised her wand again, but this time, Sirius was faster. He flicked his wrist, and the corridor beneath Malfoy and Narcissa turned to ice. When she stepped forward to cast the spell, her foot slipped and she fell backwards, on top of the greasy-haired first year. Malfoy turned a deeper shade of red, clearly stuck between helping his now-sobbing girlfriend and cursing James and Sirius into oblivion. Sirius wasn’t going to wait to find out. He turned, threw a wink at James, and said, “Run.”Sirius and James took off in the opposite direction, tearing through the corridor, Malfoy hot on their heels. They kept shoving past loads of protesting students, and Sirius felt it every single time, but he was far more focused on escaping the wrath of Lucius Malfoy. He ignored the shouts and screams, the gasps of horror at the two first years pursued by a seemingly naked prefect. When they were nearing the last car and desperately running out of places to hide, Sirius spun on his heel, then flicked his wrist once more. The corridor, again, was spontaneously covered in ice, this time lacing up the wall and sealing a few of the compartments shut. Three or four students fell flat on their faces, directly in Malfoy’s path. He tried to jump over them, but ended up coming down on one boy’s groin area, and was sent sprawling, as both Malfoy and the poor sod wailed in agony. James grabbed the front of Sirius’s robe and yanked him into the very last compartment on the train, and slammed the door behind him.Sirius shoved James off him, with a strangled gasp, the second they were inside the compartment. “Think he saw where we went?” James asked, brushing off his robes. “Don’t know,” Sirius replied, glancing uneasily at the door. “Best not risk it, though.” He flicked his wand and said, “Colloportus!”With a soft click, the door sealed itself shut. Then, with his free hand, Sirius twirled his fingers at the lock, adding a wandless charm. “There,” he said. “It won’t open for anyone but me, unless they have a battering ram. Though, to be on the safe side, we should probably just wait until Hogwarts before we risk it.”“Agreed,” James said. “Ruddy brilliant, that wandless magic you’ve got.”“What about the food trolly?” came a squeaky voice behind them.Sirius and James exchanged a look, and together, they turned, only to find that the compartment was already occupied by two boys, sitting across from each other on the benches. The boy who’d spoken, a short, plump, mousy little thing, stared up at James and Sirius with beady eyes. Stringy blonde hair hung down almost to his eyes, and he twirled his fingers together nervously. The other boy, Sirius recognized immediately. He’d seen him on the platform, hugging his father goodbye. Up close, the boy’s amber eyes were utterly brilliant, bright and intelligent. His face, though marred by those three, silvery scars, was covered in freckles. His curly hair flopped around a bit, as he inclined his head to get a better look at Sirius and James. On his lap, there was a satchel, with an embroidered buckle that read, R.J. Lupin.The boy with the scars and the beautiful eyes looked between them, then met Sirius’s gaze, dead on. “He’s right. What about the trolley, then? You expect us to go hungry just because you lot are running from trouble?”Sirius shrugged. “I don’t like chocolate much, anyway,” he said.All three of them stared at Sirius like he’d just proclaimed the Queen of England was, in fact, a singing kangaroo. “You don’t…” James started, “like chocolate?”“Who the bloody hell doesn’t like chocolate?” asked the boy with the scars, so indignant that it took Sirius a bit by surprise. “I’ll have you know, R.J. Lupin,” Sirius said, strolling over and plopping down next to the boy with the scars, careful to keep a good amount of space between them, “that actually, I think I’m allergic.”“Allergic?” said R.J. Lupin, twisting a bit in his seat to look properly at Sirius. “To chocolate?”Sirius nodded. He pulled one knee up to his chest, his foot resting on the bench between him and the Lupin boy, and leaned back against the window. “That’s right,” he said. “Makes me sick, every time.”“Well,” said the mousy boy, budging over so James could sit directly across from Sirius. “What are the rest of us supposed to do? Starve to death?”Sirius smirked and pointed his wand at the compartment door. “If any one of you blokes can open that door, I will march right up to Malfoy, surrender, and await expulsion.” “Oi! If you get expelled, so do I, Black!” James said, attempting to kick Sirius, who narrowly dodged the foot by smashing himself further against the window. Sirius rolled his eyes. “Challenge stands, boys.” The mousy boy let out a whine, but gave up. Lupin, however, seemed to consider it. He drew out his own wand. Sirius hadn’t really expected any of them to try it, but was delighted that this boy sitting next to him was up for a challenge. “Go on, then,” he said to Lupin. “So you know, Alohomora won’t do you any good. I added a special sticking charm. My own invention.” He waved his fingers, showing them all the magic dancing between them in little sparks and flecks of color. Lupin considered this, then conceded. “Alright, you win. We’re all starve together. Can’t have you expelled on the first day.”The mousy boy let out a long, distraught groan.Lupin kicked him. “Cheer up, mate. There’ll be a feast, once we’re sorted.” He turned back to Sirius. “What exactly did you do, to warrant an expulsion?”Sirius ran his tongue over his teeth and threw a wink at Lupin, then counted off on his fingers. “We stopped a mad prefect from bullying a first year half-blood, made said prefect’s clothes invisible, questioned his ability to procreate with his tiny little prick, whilst his betrothed looked on in horror, then Jamie here engaged in a minor duel, which, unfortunately left the sniveling greasy-haired first year fellow unconscious—”“Oi!” James said. He gave Sirius a funny look and mouthed, Jamie?Sirius just shrugged. “Then, I made the hallways turn to ice, and we ran for our lives, pursued by a rather vengeful, naked prefect. Which, incidentally, is about when we ran into you lot.”Lupin and the mousy boy blinked at him. Then, after a minute of what Sirius chose to call basking in his brilliance, the mousy boy said, “So what house are you two in, then?”James and Sirius exchange a glance, ready to reply, but Lupin beat them to it. “They’re first years, Pete. Just like us.”James and Sirius nodded. “But…” the mousy boy—Pete—began. He pointed a shaky finger at Sirius. “He knows spells. He’s invented spells, didn’t you hear him? And you!” The finger moved to James. “You said he—” Back to Sirius. “—did wandless magic!”A wicked grin spread across Sirius’s face. “I’ve had loads of practice.”“P-practice?” Pete squeaked.This time Sirius shrugged. “Orion and Walburga weren’t going to send their oldest son to Hogwarts without knowing a fair bit of magic, now were they? They do so like to brag. Perks of coming from a pure-blood family, I guess.”Lupin narrowed his eyes. “How’d you get around the underage magic laws?”He winked again. “The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black hardly ever plays by the rules, mate.”“I’m pure-blood and I had to obey the rules,” Pete whined. “Me too,” James said, cocking an eyebrow at Sirius that clearly said, Explain, Black. Sirius turned his attention to Lupin and waited.“Don’t look at me,” Lupin said. “My mum is a Muggle. No special underage magic privileges here. Now out with it.”As subtly as he could manage, Sirius pressed himself back against the window just a bit more, now very keen in avoiding contact with Lupin. Lupin, however, seemed to notice and shot Sirius an appraising look. “There are wards around Grimmauld Place—where I grew up,” Sirius said, rather than allowing Lupin to formulate a question regarding why Sirius was trying to put more distance between them. “The wards keep even the Ministry in the dark, to the spells performed on the grounds of the house. Which means, while I’m there, I can use magic.”It also means, Sirius thought, rather savagely, that Dark Magic is undetectable and the Unforgivables go unnoticed.“That is so bloody unfair!” James whined.“That it is, mate,” Sirius said. Sirius caught Lupin watching him, his amber eyes taking in all of Sirius’s little quirks and mannerisms. Sirius watched Lupin right back. His jumper was a bit rumpled and Sirius could see another long, silvery scar poking out from beneath his collar. Biting his lip and meeting Lupin’s eye, Sirius said, “How’d you get your scars?”James sputtered a bit. “Salazar’s balls, Sirius!” he hissed. “You can’t just ask a bloke that!”Lupin, on the other hand, seemed to find it amusing. “It’s alright,” he said, absently tracing the marks on his face with his long fingers. He turned to Sirius. “I fell out of a tree, when I was young. Climbed right up to the very top, then the branch gave way. Scratched my face and arms up pretty bad on the way down, then felt like I broke every bone in my body when I landed. My dad was away on business, so my mum rushed me to the emergency room—”“Emergency room?” Sirius interrupted. “Muggles have whole rooms for emergencies?”James made a face, equally confused. “No, it’s…” Lupin laughed. “It’s at the Muggle hospital—like St. Mungo’s—but for the worst Muggle injuries.”“Oh,” Sirius and James said together.“Anyway,” Lupin continued, “the Muggles fixed me up fine, but seeing as they had no magic, it ended up scarring pretty bad.” Lupin looked down at his hands, fiddling with the hem of his jumper.Sirius narrowed his eyes. He didn’t believe Lupin’s story for one sodding second. He recognized a nervous gesture when he saw one and he knew when someone was lying. Merlin knows, Sirius had done it enough himself: make polite excuses for the bruises—like the ones still currently gracing his ribs—or for the split lips or baggy eyes. He knew how to make excuses that were just plausible enough that people will accept it as the truth because they’re too uncomfortable to press farther.Sirius also knew that, no matter how desperately he wanted to know the truth, he wasn’t going to force Lupin to give himself up, to reveal his secret—whatever that may be—to three strangers in this compartment on the Hogwarts Express.Sirius Black knew how to pick his battlesHe turned, instead, to Lupin and the mousy boy. “What are your proper names, then?” He quirked an eyebrow at Lupin. “Unless you actually go by R.J. Lupin?”The mousy boy nearly jumped out of his seat in the process of extending his hand across the aisle to Sirius. “I’m Peter Pettigrew.”Sirius, a bit startled by the interruption and forwardness of Peter Pettigrew, managed a smile. “Sirius Black,” he said, and he took the grubby hand. It neither hurt nor didn’t hurt, shaking Peter’s hand. It was an odd sensation, almost the precipice of pain, but Sirius was grateful for it. Peter had said he was pure-blood, which had to be true, he supposed, though not from a blood traitor family, like James. Sirius didn’t know if that was good or bad, or if he particularly wanted to associate with another pure-blood in good standing with other pure-bloods. It would make his mother—well, proud was the wrong word, but perhaps not in a rage—if he were to associate with other boys his age from a decently respectable lineage.That thought alone made Sirius drop Peter’s hand long before it was strictly polite, though the handshake itself caused Sirius almost no pain.Sirius turned towards the scarred boy sitting next to him and looked him up and down. Lupin had a Muggle mother and, judging from the exchange on the platform, a wizard father. Sirius already had a sneaking suspicion that Lupin was onto him about the burning-pain-from-physical-contact-with-anyone-strictly-less-than-pure-blood thing, so, bracing himself for the agony of touching a half-blood, extended his hand. “Sirius Black,” he said again.Lupin raised an eyebrow at the offered hand. “Remus Lupin,” he said, after a second, shook Sirius’s hand.Now, Sirius Black would say that he’s quite accustomed to pain. Growing up in Grimmauld Place would do that to anyone. But, the moment Remus Lupin touched his hand, Sirius Black very nearly bit off the tip of his tongue to keep from screaming. He yanked his hand away, barely a second later, clutching it close to his chest, and tasting blood in his mouth. Shaking hands with Ted Tonks had hurt, nearly as bad as the Cruciatus curse. But this…This…This was worse.“Bloody hell, Lupin, you sure you’re not Muggle-born?” Sirius blurted, before he could stop himself. All three boys stopped and stared at him.Sirius froze in horror, realizing what he said and what it implied. “I mean, just…” he stammered, inching closer to the window and farther away from Remus Lupin. “Merlin, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I swear I’m not a pure-blood fanatic. Ask James!”Peter and Remus looked to James, who nodded and shrugged. “If he was, he’d never talk to me, either. The Potters—that’s my family—are considered blood traitors to the Blacks.”“You had a firm handshake, is all,” Sirius said, waving a dismissive hand between him and Remus. “It startled me. I don’t shake hands very much, and I know Muggles do, so… Sorry.”Remus held his gaze for a long moment, then turned back to Peter and James, a soft smile on his face. Sirius let out a breath of relief. “So. Since we’re all first years, how do you figure you’ll all be sorted?”James leaned back in his seat, propping his feet up across the aisle, resting them between Remus and Sirius. Sirius, for his part, scrunched himself up as far as he could go against the window, desperate to avoid any more contact after that handshake with Remus. Remus gave him an odd look, but after a second, grabbed James’s ankles and rested them on his lap instead of the bench, giving Sirius a little more room. Sirius avoided his eyes as he managed to relax a little. James, on the other hand, noticed absolutely nothing of this exchange. “I’ll be in Gryffindor, for sure,” he said, twirling his wand. After a second, he pointed it at Sirius. “He’ll be Slytherin. We’re destined to have an ongoing prank war between our two houses, him and me, the likes of which Hogwarts has never seen before and shall never see again.”Sirius snorted. Remus, however, gave Sirius a critical look, his brows pinching in such a way that the scars on his face crinkled a bit. “Slytherin?” he said to Sirius. “You don’t seem like a Slytherin to me.”Sirius didn’t know how to respond to that. “I’m a Black,” he said, rather stupidly.James swatted Remus with his foot. “‘Course he’s a Slytherin.” He pulled his feet back, sitting up straight and rubbing his hands together. “Picture this, lads. Two houses, both alike in dignity, in fair—oh, Merlin. Where the bloody hell are we?”“Scotland,” Remus said.James didn’t miss a beat. “In fair Scotland, where we lay our scene.”Remus scoffed. “No one, in the history of English literature has ever called Scotland fair.”“Ol’ Will Shakespeare is rolling in his grave,” James conceded. Sirius, rather feeling like he was missing something, squirmed a little in his seat. After a second, he became increasingly aware of Remus’s gaze on him, reading every secret Sirius kept trying to hide. “Do you want to be in Slytherin?” Remus asked, like it was the most obvious question in the world.Sirius was fairly certain that his jaw dropped. No one had ever asked him that before. No one. Not Regulus, or Andromeda, or James Potter. Everyone had just assumed—hell, even Sirius had assumed—that he’d just end up in Slytherin. It was the way things were done, it was fucking natural for a Black to be in Slytherin. For all he knew, it was written in the goddamned stars.He proved it, the day he got his wand, from the moment he performed the Cruciatus curse and every bit of hope he had that he’d be something different—something better—than the monsters that filled his family tree slowly began to die.“Well?” Remus prompted. “Do you want to be in Slytherin, Sirius?”More than anything, no. “I’m a Black,” Sirius said, again, furious at how unfair it all was. “I’m afraid I don’t have much choice. The Hat will put me in Slytherin and that’ll be that. Bet it won’t even be on my head for more than a second or two.”Remus reached out a comforting hand, but pulled it back in midair when he caught the flash of fear in Sirius’s eyes. With his head bowed, and praying the two across the aisle didn’t see, Sirius shot Remus a grateful look. “What about you, then?” James said, placing his feet in Remus’s lap once more.Remus shrugged. “My dad was in Ravenclaw, when he was in school. He went on to work at the Ministry for a while before I…” He trailed off, and he opened and closed his mouth, almost as if he were trying to pull back some of his words. “Well, we moved around a lot. Dad got mostly Muggle jobs after that.”Oh, there was something else to that story, Sirius thought, his eyes narrowed.“So it’s Ravenclaw for you, then?” Sirius asked. Remus smirked at him. “S’pose so. It’s in my blood, after all. I’m not sure I have much of a choice.”Sirius frowned. “What about you, Pete?” Remus asked, that smirk still tugging at his lips. “Is there some great family tradition dictating your fate as well?”Sirius gaped at Remus Lupin, ninety percent sure that the other boy was making fun of him. It was a new experience, really. Few people ever tended to taunt the Black heir and, if they did, usually ended up facing the wrath of either Sirius or his parents. Sirius, however, found that he didn’t mind so much, when Remus teased him, especially about his Sorting. He found, instead, that it stirred up something that felt dangerously close to hope.Remus Lupin didn’t believe he was going to be in Slytherin. It didn’t matter much, but it was a nice thought, he supposed.“Well,” Peter said, shifting a little in his seat. “Mum was in Slytherin. Dad was in Gryffindor, but he left when I was a baby, so I don’t expect I take after him much. Mum doesn’t think I’ll be Slytherin. She says I’m not clever enough. She thinks I’ll be Hufflepuff.”Sirius wanted to laugh, but then thought the better of it. His parents had a lot to say about pure-bloods that were sorted into Hufflepuff, but he didn’t think any of his companions would take kindly to anyone voicing these ideas. “Look at that,” James said, clapping his hands together, a smirk dancing on his face. “All four houses represented in one compartment. What are the odds of that?”They carried on like that for a good long while, as the train sped across the Scottish landscape. James and Remus bonded over this William Shakespeare fellow, a conversation to which Sirius took no interest whatsoever, and instead, mostly spent staring out the window, ever-cautious that the boy next to him didn’t get too close. At one point during their rather exuberant conversation, James heaved a full body laugh, nearly kicking Remus in the groin. Remus let out an indignant whine followed by a string of very rude French curses. Sirius, who had been feeling a bit left out in his brooding, brightened up immediately, then proceeded to scold Remus for his fowl language in his own near-perfect French. After many similar reprimands from his string of French tutors over the years, Sirius was rather well-versed in the language. Remus, though at first stunned that he’d been understood, became rather animated as he replied. As it turns out, Remus’s mother had been born in France, and both of his maternal grandparents still lived in the French countryside. Eventually, James grew tired of the two blokes carrying on in French across from him. He gave Remus another light kick, this time deliberately aiming for less sensitive bits. James and Sirius struck up a conversation about Quidditch, as the Holyhead Harpies had made it to the World Cup again this year. Sirius’s team—or rather, Regulus’s—the Chudley Cannons had also done fairly well for themselves, though not, much to Sirius’s dismay, as well as the Harpies. Sirius and James both tried and failed to suppress bouts of laughter when Peter voiced his support for the Caerphilly Catapults. Peter pouted and insisted that though the Catapults hadn’t even been decent in nearly twenty years, they were due for a winning streak, despite their tremendous losses this past season.Remus wasn’t too familiar with Quidditch at all—he’d only heard vague mentions of it from his dad—so, upon discovering this, the three pure-bloods spent the rest of the train ride explaining the rules and strategies to Remus, so he wouldn’t make a fool of himself during Ravenclaw’s first match. For the love of Merlin, Sirius found himself wishing he could sit next to Remus during that match. Remus would undoubtedly make a fool of himself as he pretended to know what was going on in the sky above him.But, Sirius would be sitting with the Slytherins, under the watchful eye of his cousin and Lucius Malfoy. It was a shame, really. Sirius, much to his own annoyance, found that he rather liked these boys. He knew, once he was sorted, he’d see very little of them. Peter, well, Sirius wasn’t sure how he felt about Peter. He supposed Peter was decent enough, though a bit whiny. Sooner rather than later, though, he’d be sorted into Hufflepuff, branded useless and a blood traitor and Sirius would never see him again. Sirius supposed if he could keep the fact that Remus was a half-blood from getting back to his parents, he might get away with an acquaintanceship, if Remus was in Ravenclaw. At the very least, Remus wouldn’t be Gryffindor and a fated rival, like James. He’d still see James, of course, which was a slight consolation. Sirius rather liked James Potter and not even the rather explicit threats from Walburga Black could keep him from James indefinitely. The fact of the matter, as James so helpfully pointed out twice now, they’re destined to be rivals in opposite houses, apparent enemies to everyone in the school. Outside, the world whizzed by and Sirius sank further into his seat against the window. The closer they got to Hogwarts, the more their inevitable fates made Sirius’s skin crawl and his stomach twist into knots. He didn’t want this—whatever was beginning in the compartment of the train—to be over. He didn’t want to be forced to ignore Peter’s very existence, to merely pass Remus in the halls with a nod and a small smile, nor maintain a cold distance from James Potter.Sirius Black very much didn’t want to be alone.When the train finally rolled to a stop, Sirius tried to swallow the lump in his throat. He went to stand, wand out, ready to undo the charm and locking spell on the door, ready to face the Sorting Hat and his inevitable fate. However, much to his surprise, Remus beat him to it. Remus muttered a spell that Sirius didn’t quite catch, flicked his wand, and the compartment door popped right open.Remus turned back to face them, swinging his satchel over his shoulder, a smirk plastered on his scarred face. “Why didn’t you do that earlier, when the trolley was coming around?” Peter whined.Sirius just gaped at Remus, opening and closing his mouth a few times in shock. No one—not his mother, not Kreacher, nor his father—undid his locking charms. Sirius prided himself on being quite good at them. “How did you—?” Sirius began, but Remus just winked at him and walked out.James, also rather flabbergasted at this development, pointed a threatening finger at Sirius. “We are not turning ourselves in to Malfoy. I did not agree to that nor will I be in trouble before I’m even properly sorted.”He then stood and followed Remus into the throng of students. As it turned out, there was no need for Sirius and James to surrender themselves to Malfoy.After the boat ride up to the castle—during which Peter vomited into the lake, despite insisting his stomach was decidedly empty before boarding —the four boys hardly had time to marvel at the great might that was Rubeus Hagrid (This was Andromeda’s friend?! thought Sirius), before an angry, fat professor was storming out of the castle, mumbling, “Honestly, they get worse every year!”James saw the professor too, as the fat man paused at the steps of the castle to take a few huge gulps of air. “That’ll be Slughorn, then,” James said. “My dad told me about him. They were in the same year.”Sirius briefly recalled Andromeda mentioning the Head of Slytherin once or twice, but given how infrequently he’d heard her mention ol’ Slughorn, Sirius couldn’t imagine Andromeda had taken a particular liking to him.Sirius froze when Slughorn descended the steps, storming down to the incoming first years, tailed by none other than Lucius Malfoy—who, though now properly clothed, his robes were still somewhat transparent when he walked—the greasy-haired first year, and a short girl with unbelievable red hair.“Oh, Merlin,” Sirius muttered.“JAMES POTTER!” roared Slughorn, his face turning beat red, as he wheezed a little bit when he finally reached the crowd of first years. “Which one of you is James Potter?”“Uh,” James said, intelligently, coming to a stop next to Sirius. Remus and Peter pulled up short behind them, Remus very carefully avoiding running smack into Sirius.Lucius Malfoy pointed. “There, Professor.”“James Potter?” Slughorn asked, coming to a stop in front of the four of them.“Uh,” James said, again. “Yeah.”“Did you or did you not hex Severus Snape unconscious on the Hogwarts Express?” Slughorn demanded, gesturing to the greasy-haired first year. Severus Snape kept his long nose to the ground, but the girl behind him glared at Sirius and James with a fury that ran as red as her hair.“What? No, I—” James began.“Did you or did you not cause Mr. Snape to fall unconscious, then run traipsing through the corridor, causing all sorts of disorder and mayhem, as Mr. Malfoy tried to bring you to justice?”James flushed red in anger, then gestured wildly at Sirius. “Oi! I wasn’t alone!” James snapped. “Sirius was with me! Sirius, tell him!” Sirius, for his part, mimicked Severus Snape and kept eyes focused on the ground. He had a rather sickening feeling that he knew exactly how this was going to play out. And, right now, he couldn’t afford for this to get back to his parents.Slughorn’s eyes flicked to Sirius, just for a second, before he turned all his rage and fury back to James. “Yes or no, Mr. Potter,” Slughorn growled. “Did you cause Mr. Snape to fall unconscious?”“Well, yes, but—”“That’s enough, Mr. Potter!” Slughorn shouted and James snapped his mouth shut. “This type of bullying will not be tolerated at Hogwarts. I’ll be writing your parents tonight.” Then, mostly to himself, he muttered. “Detention before the Sorting ceremony. That’s certainly a new one.”“What?!” James cried. “But I—”“Detention, Mr. Potter,” Slughorn snapped. “One week, starting tomorrow after class. You’ll be with me, in the dungeons, scrubbing something unspeakable, I’d imagine. And twenty points from whatever bloody house you’re sorted into.”“But, Professor—”“Not another word, or I make it two weeks of detention.” Slughorn paused, glaring at James and daring him to say something. James, with a furious look in his eye that rather reminded Sirius of his mother’s murderous rage, kept his mouth shut. After a tense moment, Slughorn huffed, “Good,” then marched back up to the castle, heaving as he chanced the stairs. Snape and the red headed girl followed him, but only after the red head shoved two fingers in the air and stuck her tongue out at James.“Learn your place, blood traitor,” Malfoy snarled, before following Slughorn back towards the castle. The second they were gone, James whirled on Sirius and shoved him backwards, right into Remus. Sirius, though stunned, bit his tongue to keep from crying out, once more tasting blood, but managed to maintain most his composure. He straightened quickly, stepping well out of Remus’s space, should James shove him again. “Why the bloody fuck am I in trouble and you’re not?!” James growled. “You’re the one who iced the corridors and caused a scene!”Sirius looked down at his feet. “Ah,” he said, sheepishly. “The Black heir is awarded certain privileges, I imagine, by the Head of Slytherin.”James did shove him again, but this time, Sirius kept his own footing. “You’re just like them, then, aren’t you, Black? Pure-blood fanatic that sets himself up on a pedestal to look down at the rest of us blood traitors and half-bloods.”That hurt far more than Sirius was expecting. James was his friend, for Merlin’s sake. “James, no, I’m not like them, I swear!”“Then go tell Slughorn that you were in on it too!”That was the one thing Sirius couldn’t do. If his parents got wind of what he’d done to Malfoy, there’d be hell to pay, and Sirius highly doubted the distance would be much of a deterrent. “I-I can’t, James, I’m sorry,” Sirius stammered. “Then stay the fuck away from me.” James went to shove him once more, but this Sirius flinched back. James stopped, mid-motioned, and sneered at him. “You can’t even stand to touch me, can you? I’m just a goddamned filthy blood traitor after all, aren’t I?”“No, James, I—”James tried to reach out for Sirius, just to touch him, but once more, Sirius flinched back on instinct. James huffed, having proved his point, then grabbed Peter’s arm instead. “Come on, Pete. Let’s go find us some better company.”Sirius felt rather like he’d had his heart pulled from his chest as he watched James strut towards the castle, with Peter in tow. James was his friend, goddamnit, the only one he’d be allowed to properly keep once he’s sorted, even if it would be under the guise of mortal enemies. Now, though, well. Now, James was his enemy.Remus stepped up next to Sirius, who stood there in a sort of daze. Remus, rather than nudging Sirius to get his attention, cleared his throat. Sirius looked at him and saw something dangerously close to sympathy in those freaky amber eyes, but that couldn’t be right. Blacks were hardly ever the recipients of something so menial as sympathy. “You should go after them,” Sirius said.“Why?” Remus asked, innocently.Sirius gave him a look. “I’m a Slytherin. A pure-blood fanatic, just like my family. Didn’t you hear?”Remus shrugged. “I don’t think you’re meant to be Slytherin.”Sirius could have laughed. Remus, it seemed, was in something of a state of adamant denial. “Yeah? And how do you figure that? You don’t know me, Lupin.”“You’re not like other Slytherins.” Sirius opened his mouth to argue, but Remus cut him off. “If you were, you wouldn’t have pulled that prank in the first place, nor would you have spoken with me once you figured out my mum is a Muggle. James is just upset that he got caught. He’ll get over it.”Given what he knew about James Potter, Sirius rather doubted it, but he was grateful to Remus all the same, even if he was dead wrong. He knew Remus would feel different once Sirius was sorted into Slytherin and Sirius would be forced to pretend they’d never met.Remus, however, seemed to know exactly what he’s thinking. “Let’s go on up to the castle, then,” he said, “so you can tell that old hat that it can go fuck itself.”Sirius blinked. “And why would I do that?”“Because you don’t want to be in Slytherin either.” James Potter hexed his robes, the second they entered the Great Hall, to make them far longer than they had been when Madam Malkin stitched them. Sirius fell flat on his face, right in front of everyone, and the Great Hall erupted in laughter. Sirius felt his face flush red, but he didn’t retaliate. He may have deserved that.Remus stopped next to him, though he didn’t bend to help Sirius up, for which Sirius was quite grateful. “You alright?”“Yes.” Sirius stood, his face contorting a bit as the movement jostled the bruises on his ribcage. He brushed off his robes, then flicked his wrist so that his robes returned to their normal lengths. From the other end of the crowd of first years, James Potter wore a wicked smirk. Peter looked quite amused, as well.Sirius turned back to Remus. He gestured at James and Peter. “You sure you wouldn’t rather be over there, then?”Remus shrugged. “I’m sure.”Sirius didn’t understand Remus Lupin. What kind of person—let alone a half-blood, for Merlin’s sake—deliberately associated with a pure-blood, especially a pure-blood from a family like the Blacks? Next to him, Remus stopped. “Christ,” he said. “Sirius, look up!”Already knowing what he was going to see, Sirius looked up. The ceiling sparkled, the galaxy streaked across the beams and supports. A comet shot past, overhead, and the half-moon hovered over the professors’ table at the end of the hall. Glancing at Remus, Sirius felt himself smiling, despite everything, at the look of sheer wonder plastered on Remus’s scarred face. Sirius remembered Auclair’s taunt, that the stars of Hogwarts castle were nothing more than parlor tricks to impress those of lesser breeding. Maybe it’s true, maybe it wasn’t. Sirius didn’t particularly care, so long as that wonder never left Remus’s eyes.“First years, form a line. Come now!” said an older witch, in flowing, burgundy robes. McGonagall, Sirius guessed. The first years hurried to comply, and formed a line in front of the four tables, all of them facing the professors. Remus and Sirius stayed towards the far end of the line, closest to the Slytherin table. James and Peter stood at the other end, nearest Gryffindor.Sirius felt Narcissa’s eyes on the back of his neck, but he didn’t turn around. He didn’t want to give her the satisfaction. “Welcome, students!” boomed Albus Dumbledore, from the pedestal at the front of the Great Hall. “It is my immense pleasure to bid you all a fair welcome to another year at Hogwarts.”Sirius frowned. Dumbledore was nothing like he was expecting, nothing like the idea of this great and powerful wizard he’d formed after years of listening to his parents’ angry mutterings. Dumbledore, to Sirius, seemed perfectly ordinary. Long, white beard, standard robes… There was about him that suggested he was the formidable wizard his parents claimed him to be. The Headmaster’s eyes, beneath their half-moon glasses, sparkled just as much as the stars overhead. “I’d like to welcome Professor Amelia Rattleburn as our new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher,” Dumbledore said, gesturing to a young professor, with blond, curly hair. She gave a short wave, but did not change her vacant expression otherwise. “Now, some ground rules, before the Sorting.”There was a chorus of annoyed groans, coming mostly from the Gryffindor end of the hall.“I feel it necessary to remind all of you,” Dumbledore said, eying the Gryffindors, “that the Forbidden Forest is off limits to all students, and with good reason. Second, for those of you eligible to go to Hogsmeade, it would seem that the shack at the edge of town has become rather haunted over the summer, by a string of malevolent spirits. Madam Rosmerta tells me they’re now calling it the Shrieking Shack. For the safety of all students, no one is allowed anywhere near it.”Next to him, Remus visibly stiffened at the mention of the Shrieking Shack. Sirius gave him an odd look, and filed the reaction away for later.“Finally,” Dumbledore said, “there’s a small matter of groundskeeping that needs to be addressed. It would seem that our dear groundskeeper, Hagrid, has acquired a rather special willow tree and has planted it on the edge of the grounds.”Sirius blinked at the Headmaster. Ollivander had told him that the tree from which Sirius’s wand was made had been planted at Hogwarts. This had to be the tree.“Hagrid tells me he’s taken to calling this tree the Whomping Willow, as, thus far, it has taken swipes at everyone who draws near to it,” Dumbledore said. “Hagrid’s already had his fair share of nasty bruises, so I advise all of you to stay well out of range of this Whomping Willow.”Sirius frowned. That can’t be right. Ollivander had also said that the enchanted willow was a guardian of a secret, not enchanted with a spell that left bruises on passerbys.“Professor McGonagall, the Sorting Hat, if you please,” Dumbledore said. McGonagall stepped forward, holding a dusty old hat, and set it on the stool in front of Dumbledore’s pedestal.The Sorting Hat opened at the brim and belted out a song about the founders of Hogwarts and the houses. Sirius didn’t pay much attention to it, and instead, had taken to fidgeting with the corners of his robes. “You’ll be fine,” Remus whispered, when the song was over. He’d noticed Sirius’s fidgeting. “I promise.”Sirius had no clue how Remus could promise such a thing, not when he had to know, even if he was in denial about it, that very soon, Sirius would be sitting next to Narcissa and Malfoy and that would be the end of their very brief friendship.McGonagall began calling names from a parchment, in alphabetical order. There was a Ravenclaw, a few Hufflepuffs, but Sirius hardly paid attention, before McGonagall called out, “Black, Sirius!”Maybe it was his imagination, but Sirius felt a chill pass over the crowd as he sat down on the stool. McGonagall lowered the Hat onto his head.“SLYTHER—hmph.”The Hat cut off, mid-Sorting.The crowd fell silent.What?! Sirius thought, alarmed.I don’t think you belong in Slytherin, Mr. Black, said the disembodied voice of the Sorting Hat.Why does everyone keep saying that? Sirius thought, in a bit of a huff. He wanted this over with. He wanted to get on with his fate, on with his destiny as the Black heir, and leave behind the memories of the pseudo-friends he’d made on the Hogwarts Express.Out in the crowd, Sirius caught Remus’s eye. There was a knowing smirk that danced between the scars on Remus’s face. I don’t think you belong in Slytherin, the Hat repeated. Hm. I don’t think you want to be in Slytherin.
I’m a Black.
Yes, and it appears one that would be best suited elsewhere.
No. Can’t be right, Sirius thought, bitterly. And why’s that? The Hat, if Sirius didn’t know better, sounded rather smug.Because I’m a Black, Sirius repeated. Blacks belong in Slytherin.
Why else?
Sirius didn’t dare reply to that. Do you want to be in Slytherin, Mr. Black? the Sorting Hat asked. Again, Sirius said nothing, though the Hat waited for a response.Then, aloud, the Sorting Hat said, “Well, seeing as you have no opinion on the matter, whatsoever, I find it best in these circumstances to follow the family’s tradition. Therefore, it would seem, that you, Sirius Black, are best suited for… SLYTH—”Please, no.Again, the Hat swallowed its words.
What was that, Mr. Black?
Sirius squeezed his eyes closed. He couldn’t stand to look out over the crowd who were clearly not expecting a Black to take so long. Please, no, Sirius thought, now desperate. He didn’t want his family’s predestined life for him. He didn’t want to sit between Narcissa and Malfoy, sneering at people like Remus Lupin from across the Great Hall. He didn’t want the Dark Magic, nor the mind games, nor the subversive quests for power. He found, much to his surprise, that he didn’t care what it cost him. I don’t want to be in fucking Slytherin, Sirius said, with all the conviction he possessed. The Hat chuckled a bit. I thought not. Now, now. Where to place the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, if not in Slytherin? Hm. Gryffindor would do quite nicely, yes. It was, apparently Sirius’s turn to laugh. What? I can’t be in Gryffindor.
And why not?
Because I’m not brave.
I beg to differ, Mr. Black.
Really? scoffed Sirius. Fine. Then I can’t be in Gryffindor because I’ve used the Cruciatus curse. Ah, yes, said the Hat, its voice suddenly grim. Your first spell with your unicorn hair wand, yes? Best be careful with that wand, now. It’s dying, you know.I know. He had known, at least in theory, but this confirmed it. Sirius felt his heart shatter. No Gryffindor would have used that curse. No Gryffindor would have killed their own wand.
What was the second spell?
What?
Answer, please, the Sorting Hat said. I do have other destinies to write, you know. After the Unforgivable curse, Mr. Black, what was the second spell you cast with that beautiful wand of yours?Sirius cast his memories back to that night, after his father killed Auclair, after Regulus crawled into his bed. Oh, Sirius thought. A healing spell. I cast a healing spell on Regulus.
Hmm, yes. Ah, young lionheart, you cast a healing spell, with a cursed wand, on someone so fiercely loved.
Sirius couldn’t come up with anything he could possibly say to that.Ah, but for that first spell. Hmm. An act of heroism, brought about by desperation, it seems, the Sorting Hat concluded
No, that’s not—
It’s not an excuse, Mr. Black, nor is it a defense for your actions. But you, Sirius Black, have a streak of bravery in you that rivals very few, even a good many that I’ve placed in Gryffindor over the years. I expect you’ll have to find a new core for that wand of yours, though.
Sirius didn’t say anything. He hadn’t even been aware that was an option.
Is this truly something you want, to be made into a pariah by your family, to be tormented by your peers, to be judged by your name, until you prove the true intentions of your heart by your actions?
Sirius opened his eyes, bracing himself for the fallout. Yes.“GRYFFINDOR!” roared the Hat.Unlike the few students who’d been sorted before him, there was no applause when McGonagall lifted the Hat off Sirius’s head. The crowd just stared, unblinking and silent, up at him. Even Dumbledore seemed rather astounded by this development.Remus caught Sirius’s eye and winked, an I-told-you-so written on his face. Sirius took three steps towards the Gryffindor table, before he stopped and almost went back to beg the Hat to put him into Slytherin. James Potter looked positively murderous. Nonetheless, Sirius slipped past James and sat at the end of the Gryffindor table. Everyone in Gryffindor stared at him, almost as though Sirius were a wild animal that had somehow found its way into their village. After a tense moment, when nobody in the entire Hall dared to breathe a word, the Gryffindor prefect stood, walked to the end of the table, and offered his hand to Sirius. “Frank Longbottom,” the prefect said.Longbottom. Pure-blood, Sirius thought, and took the proffered hand without hesitating. It didn’t hurt in the slightest. “Sirius Bla—” Sirius started.“Yeah. I know who you are,” Frank said, a rather shaky smile dancing on his lips.“Welcome to Gryffindor, mate.”Frank was nervous, wary of the new addition, clearly aware of the major breech in tradition that had occurred moments ago. A Black in Gryffindor. Frank stared at him, oddity that he was, and Sirius saw the distrust that lingered just below the welcoming prefect exterior. Whether it was all for show or not, the rest of Gryffindor took their cues from Frank and began a slow chorus of applause.A part of Sirius breathed a huge sigh of relief. He had a place he belonged, a home, now, in Gryffindor. Another part of him—the part more concerned with survival and self-preservation—didn’t dare turn around to look at the Slytherin table. With a wave of his hand, Dumbledore gestured at McGonagall to continue with the Sorting. Sirius only caught a few, between him and Remus. The red-headed girl—Lily Evans, it turned out—was immediately sorted into Gryffindor, though she didn’t look particularly pleased about it. She stormed over to the table, pointedly ignored Sirius, and sat closest to the second years. “Lupin, Remus,” McGonagall called. Despite himself, Sirius held his breath. At least, now that he was in Gryffindor, he’d be able to be proper friends with Remus in Ravenclaw. Sirius, admittedly, felt a little giddy at the thought. Whatever James’s or his mother’s fury might bring, Sirius felt confident that, for once in his life, he had a friend in Remus Lupin: one who’d stay by him, no matter what.Well, maybe not no matter what. Remus knew nothing of Sirius’s tattoo or his dying wand or the fact that he’d performed the Cruciatus curse, but those secrets would hold for the moment. Right now, Sirius was just fucking glad he had a friend, especially considering the number of enemies he seemed to have acquired in the last hour alone.As Remus sat down on the stool, McGonagall hovering the Hat over his shaggy-blonde hair, Remus caught Sirius’s eye and winked.The Hat hmmm’d loudly, then said, “Why, yes of course… GRYFFINDOR!”Around him, the Gryffindor table erupted into loud, raucous applause. Sirius was fairly certain his jaw dropped.Remus sauntered over and plopped down right across from Sirius. He smirked, then, loud enough for James and Peter to hear from where they still stood in the line of first years, Remus said, “See? I knew you didn’t belong in Slytherin.”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. Leaning forward, he pointed a finger at Remus and narrowed his eyes. “But… You… You’re in—”“Gryffindor?” Remus supplied. “Looks like it. Guess you’re stuck with me.”Finally, Sirius’s brain seemed to comprehend what’d just happened. “Thank Merlin,” Sirius breathed, before he could stop himself. Then, realizing what he said, he fidgeted a bit in his seat. “Er, I mean—”Remus smiled at him. “It’s okay, Sirius.”And, for a moment, Sirius believed him. There was still that darkness, that tiny inkling of terror creeping up his spine, waiting to make itself known. It was the kind of terror that was familiar with the consequences of crossing Walburga and Orion Black: the kind of white hot fear that dug its hands into the Sirius’s insides, constricting until he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t stand. It was the very worst kind of terror, that knew his mother would tear all of Gryffindor to shreds if she thought it would get back at her son for the shame he’d caused her.It was a damn, waiting to burst, but for now, Sirius shoved it aside and smiled back at Remus Lupin.The sorting continued. A Marlene McKinnon and, right after her, a Dorcas Meadows, both of whom ignored Remus and Sirius, were sorted into Gryffindor and took their seats next to and across from Lily Evans. When it came to Peter’s turn, the Hat let out a long hmmmmm as it was placed on his head. The Hall waited for the verdict. Minutes ticked by.“Merlin,” muttered Remus, leaning across the table so only Sirius could hear him. “Pete’s is taking nearly as long as yours did.”Sirius frowned. Despite his conversation and debate with the Sorting Hat, he hadn’t exactly realized that it had taken that long.Finally, the Hat said, “Fine, fine. Have it your way. GRYFFINDOR!”Sirius and Remus exchanged rather shocked looks, but then joined in the chorus of Gryffindor applause. Peter, with a wide, giddy smile plastered on his face, took a seat right next to Sirius. “Howdy, lads,” he said. “Took a bit of doing, but looks like I’ll be joining you lot.”Sirius was in shock, it seemed. Still doubting his own placement, there was no way in hell that Petter Pettigrew belonged in Gryffindor. Remus, on the other hand, seemed to recover. He shot a smile at Peter and said, “Good to have you, Pete.”All three of them turned when McGonagall called out, “Potter, James!”In total, Sirius guessed the Sorting Hat was on James Potter’s head for all of two seconds, before it shouted out, “GRYFFINDOR!”Though he knew James’s Sorting was pretty much a guarantee, Sirius couldn’t bring himself to join in the applause.James strutted over, his chest poofed out, and shook hands with Frank Longbottom. Then, he turned, eyeing the first year side of the table. The only spot left was between Remus and Dorcas Meadows. Seeing as the first year girls were highly engrossed in some conversation or other, Sirius highly doubted James would get them to scoot down. With a huff, James sat down next to Remus. He crossed his arms across his chest and continued to glare at Sirius for the rest of the Sorting.When Dumbledore announced the Sorting complete, the feast began. Food swirled into existence all around them: shepherd’s pie and spare ribs and any kind of potato he could possibly imagine. Sirius, who was no stranger to lavish meals, found that he was rather impressed. Salivating a little, Sirius reached to the middle of the table, for a bowl of potatoes. Immediately, James Potter grabbed his hand. Sirius jerked back, with a surprised yelp, then knocked his elbow on the edge of the table. It fucking hurt, but he refused to give James the satisfaction of seeing him in pain, so instead he lowered his injured arm to his lap. “What the fuck, Potter,” he hissed.James leaned across the table, keeping his voice low and threatening. “I don’t know how you tricked that goddamned Hat into putting you in Gryffindor, but I’m onto you, Black. You’re a Slytherin, down to the bone. You don’t fucking belong here and I’m never going to let you forget it.”Sirius swallowed a lump in his throat. He knew he didn’t belong. The Hat had tried to place him in Slytherin. Twice. “Fuck off, James,” he muttered, that darkness inside him suddenly threatening to consume him. This time, reaching for a bowl of mashed peas, Sirius brought it close to his own plate, to dish it out. Sirius didn’t quite see James reach for his wand, but he heard the muttered spell, and before he could properly react, Sirius Black had mashed peas running down the front of his robes. Hearing the noise—or perhaps Sirius’s colorful curses—the entire Gryffindor table turned to gawk at Sirius. After a second of taking in the misplaced first year now covered in green mush, nearly every Gryffindor burst out laughing.Sirius felt himself turn bright red, ducking his head a little and hiding behind a curtain of black hair. Sirius sent a silent prayer out into the void that all this noise didn’t attract the attention of the Slytherins or his cousin.James Potter, for one, looked rather smug.“James!” Remus hissed, elbowing James sharply in the side. Remus reached for his own wand, ready, apparently, to defend Sirius’s honor—and boy, wasn’t that a new feeling?Sirius placed the now-empty bowl of mashed peas back on the table. “It’s alright, Remus,” he muttered, not daring to look at James. Instead, Sirius flicked his wrist and the mess disappeared from his robes.Remus shot Sirius a look that said it was very much not alright, what James had done.“Everything okay down there, lads?” Frank Longbottom called, from about halfway down the table, amidst the ebbing snickers.“Everything’s fine,” Sirius called back, despite the fact that James still had his wand pointed at him. Sirius threw a meaningful glance at Remus, begging him to back down.With a sigh, Remus set about preparing a plate. When it was full, he handed it across the table to Sirius. Though a bit shocked, and throwing a cautious look at James, Sirius accepted the plate and handed his own empty one back to Remus.With a huff, Remus nudged James, this time prompting him to eat. “There we go,” Remus said, once James’s, Peter’s, and his own plates were full. “Guess we’re one for four, then, aren’t we?”Three blank faces stared at Remus.“One for four, in guessing which house we’d all be Sorted into,” Remus explained. “Looks like we were only right about James. I hope none of us had particularly high hopes for earning decent marks in Divination.”Sirius gave him a weak smile. He was grateful for Remus’s attempt at breaking the tension, but with James still glaring at him like that, Sirius couldn’t allow himself to relax. Remus tried a different tactic. “Peter, you said your dad was Gryffindor, right? Guess you do take after him, then, eh?”This time, it seemed to work. Peter went off on a tirade about his family, one that Sirius didn’t care to follow. James, aside from a few more withering glares, ignored him.Despite a few meaningful looks at his still-full plate and what could only be constituted as a growl from Remus, Sirius didn’t dare pick up his fork until James Potter was almost done with his meal. “First years, after me!” Frank Longbottom shouted over the roaring crowd as soon as the feast was over. Obediently, everyone stood and crowded around Frank. “Blimey,” Frank said, looking them all over. “Only seven of you this year? Makes my job easier, I guess.”Sirius glanced around. He and Remus stood at the back of the group, separated from James and Peter by Lily and her friends, but Frank was right. There were only the seven of them. “Right, then,” Frank said, clapping his hands together. “This way to the dormitories.”Remus stayed close to Sirius as they walked, James and Peter, a few steps ahead, just behind the girls. As they navigated the hallways of the castle, Frank pointed out classrooms and gave general directions, and helpful tips to make it to class on time.“Where do you think the Gryffindor common room is?” Peter whispered to James.“North tower,” James said, without hesitating, because, of course he knew.James Potter was Gryffindor down to his very core.Sirius’s stomach turned over and Frank’s monologue faded to background noise. Once again, that familiar terror clawed its way up the length of his spine. He was in fucking Gryffindor. He’d asked to be in fucking Gryffindor. His mother would know about it. Salazar’s balls, with the connections Walburga Black has, she probably already knew about it. His mother was going to fucking kill him.Sirius’s breath came out in short, frantic gasps. His vision swirled a bit and there was a loud drum pounding away in his ears.Next to him, he’s fairly certain Remus said something, but whatever it was, it didn’t register. Nor did he register that the rest of the group had come to a stop outside the portrait of a Fat Lady.Suddenly, Remus grabbed his elbow, to keep Sirius from running smack into James.Sirius let out a sharp, startled cry, and jumped away from Remus. Tears pricked the corners of his vision and Sirius willed them away, because fuck that hurt, but he’d be damned if he cried in front of James Potter.Frank stopped talking and all of Gryffindor turned to stare at Sirius.Sirius forced himself to focus on Remus, who stood a few feet away, both his hands visible in a placating gesture. Sirius let out a breath. “Sorry,” he muttered. “Stubbed my toe.”It was clearly a lie, but Frank let it slide and continued with his lecture about the Gryffindor rules: curfew, girls and boys dormitories, that kind of stuff. Once again, Sirius wasn’t paying attention. He needed help.Andromeda, his brain supplied, and, Merlin, why didn’t I think of this earlier?Remus took a step towards him, close enough to whisper to him, but hands still out in a silent promise not to touch Sirius again. “You alright, mate?”Sirius nodded, even though, no, he fucking wasn’t, thanks. “Do you have a quill and parchment on you by chance?”“What? Why?” Remus asked, keeping his voice low.“You look like the sort of bloke that would carry a quill and parchment around,” Sirius said.“No, that’s not what I meant.” Remus laughed a little. “Why do you need them?”“Need to write a letter.”“Now?”“Sort of a family emergency. I need to send it tonight.” The sooner, the better, Sirius thought. His mother would already know. She would have sorted out a way to torture him from afar. He needed a plan, needed someone on his side, after tonight, who knew of the horrors the Blacks can inflict when someone’s stupid enough to cross them.Andromeda would help. Andromeda would understand. Andromeda would have a plan.Remus gave him a long, searching look. “It can’t wait for the morning?”Sirius bit his lip and shook his head, trying to keep a lid on his desperation. Remus didn’t need to see that. Sirius had a sneaking suspicion that Remus saw it anyway. Remus reached into the pocket of his robe. “I have a napkin from King’s Cross and a ballpoint. Will that work?”The napkin was a little crumpled, but otherwise clean enough. Sirius, however, had never seen a ballpoint before and had no clue what to do with one. He snatched both out of Remus’s hand, expertly avoiding contact, then held the ballpoint up to his face to examine it.“What am I supposed to do with this?” Sirius asked, eyeing Remus around the ballpoint.Remus snorted a bit. “You write with it.”“Oh,” Sirius said, considering it. “You haven’t got any ink, then, do you?”“There’s ink in pen already, Sirius.”“Really?”“Try writing on your hand if you don’t believe me.”Sirius eyed him, but took the cap off the ballpoint and scribbled all over his left hand. He grinned, then held up his work for Remus to see. “Wicked,” he said, eyes wide. “Now which way was the owlery again?” Then, mostly to himself, he muttered, “Someone needs to make a bloody map of this place.”“What? Sirius, you can’t just wander off.”“Why not?”“You’ll get lost.” “No, I won’t.” Well, he didn’t think he would. Remus, however, gave him a look. Sirius rolled his eyes and conceded. “Fine. I’ll ask one of the portraits if I get lost.”“You’ll miss curfew,” Remus said. “Besides, Frank hasn’t given us the password yet.”Sirius winked at him. “Then wait up for me.” Remus opened his mouth to protest, but Sirius beat him to it. “Please, Remus. This is really important.”“Fine,” Remus said, after a long moment. “Frank said the owlery was in the west tower.”“Thanks. Cover for me?”Remus rolled his eyes. “I will.”Without another word, Sirius slipped away. He jogged through the hallways, got turned around once, but the portrait of Flannigan O’Henry pointed him in the right direction again. The hallways were dark, so Sirius reached into his pocket for his wand, and muttered, “Lumos.”His wand gave a burst of light and quickly flickered out. He tried again—and again—but wasn’t able to sustain the pale, blue light for more than a few seconds. Eventually, he gave up, put his wand back in his pocket. He waved his left hand and a flame danced above his palm. He kept his palm up, holding the flame in place as he climbed the stairs to the owlery. Right outside the door, there was a torch, to which he quickly transferred the flame.Sirius took out the crumpled napkin—cleaned and flattened it with a flick of his wrist—and the ballpoint Remus had given him. He quickly scrawled a note.
Andromeda,
Gryffindor, not Slytherin.
What the bloody hell am I supposed to do now?
Sirius
He pocketed Remus’s ballpoint. Then, he found an owl that looked decently clever and fast, gave it a treat to further encourage it, and sent it on its way. Sirius prayed Andromeda would get the owl tonight. He needed to hear from her. He needed to know he still had an ally who shared his blood.When he returned to the north tower, Frank Longbottom was waiting for him. Sirius frowned. He still had ten minutes until curfew and Remus, not Frank, had promised to wait for him. “Where’s—” Sirius started.“You’re friend?” Frank said, raising a rather condescending eyebrow. “I sent him inside. He listened, though under protest, if it makes you feel better.”Sirius shrugged. It did, actually, make him feel better, that Remus had at least valiantly tried to keep his word.Frank Longbottom didn’t look too happy. Sure, he’d been the first one to welcome Sirius to Gryffindor, but as Frank’s scowl deepened, Sirius got the distinct impression that the welcome he’d received had just been an act to impress the professors. “What are you doing, Sirius?” Frank said, crossing his arms.Sirius didn’t particularly want to tell a prefect that he was writing to family on his first night away from home—especially with Frank now looking at him like that, like James Potter had earlier, after Slughorn gave him detention. It was the kind of look that said, You’re a Black and you’ll stab me in the back the second I give you the chance.Sirius fucking hated it when people looked at him like that. “Exploring,” Sirius bit out, trying to keep his blood from boiling. He couldn’t afford to lose his temper, or even let slip that Frank’s attitude was getting to him. He had enough enemies inside Gryffindor already.“Exploring,” Frank repeated, with a frown. “It’s almost curfew.”“Almost, being the operative word in that sentence,” Sirius shot back. “I made it back. What’s the problem?”“You don’t know the password, for one,” Frank said. “How were you planning on getting in?”Sirius glanced behind Frank at the portrait of the Fat Lady. She was in the process of examining her cuticles, seemingly bored, but Sirius knew she was keeping an eye on their exchange.Sirius flashed a smirk at Frank. “I figured I’d flirt my way in.”The Fat Lady giggled.Frank’s frown deepened. “Listen to me, Sirius,” he said, his voice hard. “This is Gryffindor. Not Slytherin.”“Gathered that, thanks,” Sirius muttered.“That means,” Frank said, glaring at him, “that you don’t get to get away with shit because of your name. The Black heir won’t get any privileges here.”“Didn’t think I would,” Sirius said, indignant. Who the hell was Frank Longbottom to judge Sirius by his name and his family? It wasn’t fucking fair. “Look, did I break any rules, or not? I didn’t exactly stay for the end of the speech.”“You didn’t, but—”“Then let’s go inside, shall we?” Sirius said, glaring right back at Frank. “We’ve got classes tomorrow and I’ve had a long day. What’s the password, then?”Frank looked like he had half a mind not to give the password to Sirius, but, after a minute, he muttered, “Dragon bones.”The Fat Lady’s portrait swung open and Frank and Sirius stepped inside.Really, Sirius should have braced himself for the ostentatious red-and-gold-strewn common room, but, as it was, it came as something of a shock. The Gryffindor common room was nothing like how his cousins described Slytherin’s. Instead of gray, cold, and dreary, Gryffindor’s common room was warm and inviting, and not just because of the hearth at the center of the room. Students lurked around the room, chatting with friends and telling stories of pleasant summer holidays. “You best get to bed, then, if you’re so tired,” Frank said, and Sirius took it as You’re not welcome here, Black. “Up the stairs, to your left.”Sirius climbed the stairs. A pillow smacked him in the face the second he opened the door to the first year dormitory. All the laughter in the room stopped. James and Peter, who seem to be responsible for the pillow fight, froze and stared at Sirius. Remus was on his bed, pretending to read a book, but Sirius saw him throw a glance in his direction when the door opened. “Where were you, then?” James demanded. “Off to get your good night kisses from your friends in Slytherin?”“I don’t have any friends in Slytherin.”“Seems like you do, seeing as I got detention and you didn’t,” James shot back. “Bet you gave them the password and everything. Should we expect everything in here to be green in the morning?”“I didn’t—”“Bet they love it that they have a man on the inside, now, huh?”Something inside his brain snapped. “I’m not a fucking spy, James!” Sirius shouted. “I hate Narcissa and Malfoy just as much as you do, except you have the great fucking privilege of not being related to them. They’re so fucking full of it and they were torturing that little tattling shit for no other reason than the fact he was in their way! I’m not like them! I was going to hex them, long before you showed up, except my curse wouldn’t have backfired!”“Fine!” James shouted, right back at him. “Then why didn’t you get detention right along with me?!”“Because I’m the fucking Black heir!”James stalked towards him, and Sirius raised the pillow that had smacked him in the face between them, in an effort to keep James from either shoving or punching him. “That’s right,” James hissed. “You got away with it because of your name. You’re beautiful, fucking pure-blood name, that has even Slughorn running after you, just fucking begging to kiss the ground you walk on. You’re better than us, isn’t that right? Better than a fucking blood traitor and a half-blood like Remus?”Sirius cast a frantic glance at Remus. He didn’t think that way, he didn’t want Remus to think he did.“No, James, I—”James yanked the pillow away from Sirius and shoved him up against the door, pinning him there. Sirius cried out in pain. Every point of contact, every inch of his skin burned where James was touching him. Razor blades seemed to carve their way across his skin, right down to the bone, and James kept knocking against the bruises on his ribs.Goddamnit, Sirius couldn’t help the tears that suddenly filled his vision.“You don’t fucking belong here, Black. A Gryffindor would never be so cowardly that he hides behind his goddamned name!”“James, enough, already,” Sirius heard Remus say, from his bed.James Potter did not back down.“ENOUGH!”Suddenly, James was pulled off him and more or less thrown across the room. James landed on his arse and looked up at Remus Lupin in amazement.Sirius slumped to the ground, unable to suppress a sob. He buried his face in his hands. His whole fucking body hurt and now James was going to see him cry.“Can’t you see he’s had enough?” Remus asked James, his voice quieter now, more threatening. Remus half-turned back to Sirius. “Can you stand up on your own?”Remus looked like all he wanted to do was reach out a hand and pull Sirius to his feet.Sirius scrubbed a hand over his face, praying it hid the tears, and managed to nod. He pressed his back against the door—oh, fuck, his ribs—and somehow clawed his way to his feet, his breaths coming out in short, aborted gasps. Without looking at any of them, Sirius crossed the room to the bed with his trunk underneath it, directly on the other side of Remus’s. He flopped down on the mattress, then flicked his wrist to close the hangings. He pulled out his wand and whispered, “Silencio.” The spell didn’t completely work—he could still hear James and Remus, now arguing in hushed voices—but Sirius didn’t particularly care. He let out a full-body sob, clutched his ribs, and curled in on himself.Sirius allowed himself to cry until the voices outside his curtains faded to nothing.Rolling onto his back, Sirius felt the tears track down his face. In his gut, Sirius knew he was well and truly fucked. There’d be a Howler waiting for him, tomorrow morning, one laced with some sort of nasty curse, if his mother had anything to say about it. She was sure to employ the help of Malfoy and Narcissa in order to make Sirius’s life in Gryffindor a living hell and he knew she kept at least a few of the Hogwarts professors well within her spheres of influence. He’d have his work cut out for him, just trying to stay afloat, and that’s only considering what his mother could do to him from afar.Sirius felt his stomach turn over and thought for a second that he might throw up. There was no telling what sort of punishments Walburga Black would devise for him for when he returned to Grimmauld Place at Christmas. She could be rather creative in her punishments and there was no doubt in Sirius’s mind that his mother would be keeping a detailed and comprehensive list of all his sins against the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. He’d pulled a prank with a known blood-traitor—one his mother specifically forbade him to associate with—against his cousin and her betrothed. The prank itself, though harmless, was far beneath the status for the Black heir and, more importantly, thoroughly embarrassed both Narcissa and Malfoy. To make matters worse, he accidentally befriended a half-blood boy and, at least in the eyes of his mother, furthered his association with one James Potter.Then, worst of all, Sirius Black had gone and got himself sorted into Gryffindor. The house made for blood traitors and Mudbloods. He’d disgraced both his name and his station and brought shame to anyone who calls themselves a Black. Not only was he destined to be hated by his own kind, but James Potter seemed rather determined to make Sirius’s life in Gryffindor as miserable as possible. He’d thought anything was better than Slytherin. He’d wanted so desperately to believe the Hat when it had told him he was brave. That he could be brave. That he was one of the bravest people ever placed in Gryffindor.Lionheart, the Hat had called him.Sirius knew it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. His wand was dying and there was darkness in his every crevice of his soul. Maybe it’d taken Slughorn’s detention for James to see it, but James was fucking right. Sirius Black didn’t belong in Gryffindor.Sirius clamped a hand over his mouth to muffle another sob. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t pretend to be something he’s not, he couldn’t prove everyone wrong, he couldn’t win back James Potter’s friendship. He wasn’t brave enough to do this alone.“Sirius?”Sirius sat up, furiously wiping the tears from his face, thinking, for a second, that it was James coming to taunt him some more, but no. That was Remus’s voice.“Yeah?” he whispered.“Can I…” Remus hesitated a bit. “Can I come in?”Sirius considered this for a moment. What, in Merlin’s name, could Remus possibly have to say to him? James had laid it all out: Sirius was a pure-blood. He wasn’t meant to associate with half-bloods, no matter how much he suddenly wanted to.“Sirius?” Sirius surprised himself by tugging the hangings aside. Remus gave him a small smile. His scars were even more pronounced in the pale lighting. “Scoot over,” he demanded. “All the way.”Not knowing what else to do, Sirius obeyed, leaving a fair amount of room for Remus to lay down on his side, facing Sirius, without any risk of touching him.“Are you alright?” Remus asked, settling his head on Sirius’s spare pillow.Sirius wasn’t sure how to answer that. “No,” he said, eventually.Remus looked him over, but he made no mention of the tear tracks on Sirius’s face. “Is it your family? Do you miss them?”Sirius laughed, genuinely surprised at the question. “I don’t think it’s ever occurred to me that I should miss them. Regulus, sure, but not the rest of them.”“Is Regulus your brother?”“Yeah,” Sirius said, his voice soft. “He’ll start here next year. We’re only a year apart.”“You’re close, then?”Sirius gave him a wry smile. “We had to be. There’s no surviving that place on your own.”Remus’s eyes widened and Sirius watched the comprehension wash over his face. “That’s just the way it is with my family,” Sirius said, softly. He looked over at Remus. His eyes glowed amber in the darkness, his scars cast silver shadows across his face. It was mesmerizing, really, Remus Lupin’s face in the darkness. Sirius suddenly felt that he had absolutely no right to be looking at it. “You don’t have to do this, you know,” Sirius said, his voice hardly more than a whisper.Remus raised an eyebrow. “Do what?”Sirius turned on his back, staring at the ceiling instead of Remus’s eyes. “Defend me,” he whispered. “Be my friend. You don’t have to.”Sirius could feel Remus staring at him. “I know,” Remus said, eventually, but he didn’t get up to leave.Sirius tried to smile, tried to believe that he was allowed to have this, just this one thing: friendship with Remus Lupin. “But, so you know, even if we’re not friends, I’m keeping that ballpoint you gave me. It’s bloody wicked, that thing.”Remus laughed, then flopped on his back, mirroring Sirius’s position and still keeping a distance between them. “You can keep it. I made sure to bring a whole pack of them. I’m not particularly fond of quills.” He paused for a second, then smirked. “Muggles make ballpoints in a whole bunch of different colors. I’ll get you some colorful ones for Christmas.”Remus said it so casually, like it’ll all be okay, like they’ll still be talking come Christmas. Sirius shot him a look. “What should I get you, then?”Remus shrugged. “I like chocolate. A lot, actually. Still can’t believe you don’t.”“Can’t help it, mate. I’m allergic. But I guess I’ll buy you a shit-ton of chocolates, then.”“Thanks.”They were quiet for awhile, just lying awake, taking comfort in each other’s presence. Sirius, despite that darkness currently gnawing away at his insides, found he was enjoying himself, even if nothing was said, because—Merlin knows why—Remus chose to spend time with him. Remus chose to check on him, to make sure he was okay. No one but Regulus had ever bothered to ask after Sirius Black.“Sirius?” “Yeah?”Remus turned his head a little to look at him. “Can I tell you something?”“Sure.”Remus smirked. “I asked the Hat to put me in Gryffindor. It wanted to put me in Ravenclaw.”Sirius’s eyes went wide and he sat up. “What? Why?”“Well, actually, it said I could be suited for either Ravenclaw or Gryffindor. Given the choice, I asked the Hat to put me in Gryffindor.”“But why would you—”Remus gave him a look that said, Shut up, you moron. “I didn’t particularly want to leave you alone with James, mad as he is. I thought you might need a friend.”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. He was having a bit of trouble wrapping his mind around this new development. “You chose Gryffindor… for me?”Remus shrugged. “I suppose so. If the hat put you in Slytherin, I probably just would have gone with Ravenclaw. We wouldn’t have been outright rivals that way, at least.”Sirius stared at him. He’d thought the same thing, before the Sorting. The only way him and Remus could even remain cordial if Sirius had been sorted into Slytherin was if Remus was likewise sorted into Ravenclaw. Sirius, of course, had thought that far ahead. He hadn’t dared hope that Remus would too.Remus winked at him. “Plus, I think I’m the only one who’s figured out your secret.”Sirius felt his stomach do a backflip. Secret? He had a lot of secrets, none of which he particularly cared for Remus Lupin to know. If Remus knew, well. If Remus knew, he wouldn’t have asked the Hat for Gryffindor. “Secret?” Sirius sputtered. “What—”“You don’t like to be touched.”On instinct, Sirius scooted a little farther away, should Remus decide he wanted to test his theory. “I, um, that’s not—”“More specifically,” Remus continued, making no move to touch Sirius whatsoever, “it hurts you when someone else touches you.”“Er, I—”“Did I get all that right?”Sirius froze for a second, then whispered, “Yes.”Remus shifted a little, to face him better. “Am I allowed to ask why it hurts when someone touches you?”Sirius considered it. He’d have to explain the tattoo, which would mean he’d have to explain his family’s pure-blood fanaticism, which Remus could take the wrong way, especially considering he’s a half-blood. Sirius wasn’t prepared to give away that secret. Not yet, no matter what Andromeda had said in her letter. An idea struck him and Sirius smirked. “Am I allowed to ask you where you really got your scars?”Remus appeared rather startled by the question. “I fell out of a tree,” he said, a bit too quickly. Sirius flopped back down, onto his back. “No, you didn’t.”“Yes, I did.”“No,” Sirius repeated. He waved a finger at Remus’s face, tracing the scars without touching them. “If you fell out of a tree, there’d be scratches everywhere. These… There’s almost a pattern to them. They’re too straight, too deep to possibly be from tree branches. So, no. You didn’t fall out of a tree. Or, well, maybe you did, but that isn’t how you got the scars on your face. So what…”He trailed off, when he saw the terror flash across Remus’s eyes. Remus bowed his head. He suddenly looked like he was on the verge of tears. “Remus, I’m sorry,” Sirius said, wanting to comfort him, but not knowing how. He couldn’t touch him, goddamnit, not even to comfort him. “I didn’t mean to—”Bright amber eyes snapped up to meet his own. “I can’t tell you, Sirius.”Sirius leaned in, as close as he dared. “Why not?” he whispered.Remus squeezed his eyes shut. “Because it’s a horrible secret, the very worst kind there is. Because if I tell you, then you won’t ever look at me again.”“Remus, look at me,” Sirius said, deliberately. After a moment, Remus opened his eyes. “I know a thing or two about secrets, okay? Even dark and horrible ones. I expect we understand each other, then, about why we keep those kinds of secrets.”Remus held his gaze for a long moment. “Yes, I suppose we do.”They were silent for a moment, acknowledging the weight of each other’s nightmares. Then, Sirius grinned, wide and mischievous. “I have an idea.”Remus laughed a little. “Sounds dangerous. Tell me.”“When we get out of Hogwarts,” Sirius said, a smile dancing on his lips, “we’ll tell each other all our secrets, no matter how horrible they are. We’ll be brave by then, both of us proper Gryffindors. Secrets won’t matter anymore.”Remus looked away. “If we’re still friends, that is.”A jolt of insecurity shot through Sirius and he stiffened. Did Remus not want to be friends? He’d never properly asked, didn’t think he had to, but still. “What do you mean?” Sirius asked, not caring if his voice was a bit higher than normal. “Why wouldn’t we still be friends?”Remus shrugged. “Dunno. People change. You might change your mind about me.”Sirius gaped at him, because no fucking way. “I’m not going to get bored of you, Remus,” he said, because there was no way in hell he ever would. “We’re mates. That’s that.”Letting out a breath, Remus said, “Okay, then. When we get out of Hogwarts, and if we’re still friends, we’ll get pissed and tell each other all of our horrible secrets because we’ll be brave and it won’t matter. But, until such time, we leave the secrets alone.”Sirius, who had been nodding along rather enthusiastically, stopped.“Sirius?”“Hypothetically,” Sirius started, taking his time with pronouncing the word, “if in the mean time, say I were to find out a secret of yours—how you got your scars, for instance—it’d be fair game, right? I’d have discovered it all on my own. It wouldn’t be a secret anymore. It’d only be fair, them, for you to tell me if I guessed it right.”Remus paused, and took a long moment to consider this. “Alright,” he said. “But same goes for you. If I find out about your no touching thing, then, horrible secret or no, you tell me if I’m correct.”“Fair enough,” Sirius said, fairly certain that even if that secret slipped, he’d be able to keep the rest under lock and key. He looked Remus over, suddenly wanting to trace the pale lines on his face. “I’m never going to stop trying to figure you out, Remus Lupin.”Remus smiled. “Same to you, Sirius Black.”“Will you stay here tonight?” Sirius whispered. “I mean, if you want to. You don’t have to.”“What about your—?” Remus gestured to the space between them. “I don’t want to roll over on you in the middle of the night.”Sirius reached behind him and grabbed an extra pillow. He maneuvered it between them. There was just enough room on the bed for them to fit comfortably, even with the pillow separating them. “That okay?” Sirius asked.“Works for me,” Remus replied. Sirius was still in his robes, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want to move right now and he didn’t think it was worth getting up from this bed. “Goodnight, Remus,” he whispered. “And thanks. For everything.”Remus gave him a sleepy smile and closed his eyes. “Night, Sirius.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
SEPTEMBER 2, 1971
Sirius woke early, before sunrise from the looks of it, but that was hardly unusual. He’d always been an early riser. If he actually thought about it, he’d probably say it had something to do with finding sanctuary in the early hours of the morning. Before sunrise, all the responsibilities that rested on the shoulders of the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black seemed to fade into nothing.Next to him, separated by a pillow, Remus Lupin snored softly. His lips parted, the top lip nicked by a tiny scar, and his eyes fluttered in a dream. The scars that lined his face seemed paler, too, silvery amongst the splattering of Remus’s constellation of freckles. It was mesmerizing, really, Remus’s face. More so than anything Sirius had yet seen at Hogwarts.Despite himself, despite knowing the pain it would cause him, Sirius suddenly found himself wanting to touch, to trace the scars with his fingers, and perhaps once more beg Remus to tell him where they came from.Shaking his head, mostly to clear it, Sirius stretched and stood, praying Remus wouldn’t wake up. Remus didn’t stir, so Sirius grabbed fresh clothes and made his way to the showers.There were seven shower stalls flanking one wall, paralleled by seven toilet stalls on the opposite wall. Against the back wall, seven sinks and mirrors, as well as a closet full of towels. Sirius walked straight to the back of the room and pulled off his robes from yesterday. They were creased and wrinkled from sleeping in them, but they ironed out with a simple flick of his wrist. He unbuttoned his shirt and then stopped, staring at his reflection in the mirror. Absently, Sirius traced the Toujours Pur, in his mother’s handwriting, right above his heart. He’d cried, when his mother carved the tattoo into his chest with her wand and the blood spell. It hadn’t even hurt, but he’d cried anyway. Eight years old, and he’d been marked for House Black forever.Even back then, a part of him raged against the fate his parents had already written for him.Sirius couldn’t allow anyone in Gryffindor to see the tattoo. James Potter would know what it meant immediately. Remus, too, on a basic level. Remus spoke French, so although he probably wouldn’t understand all the magical implications, a child branded with “Always pure” wasn't exactly inspiring. If he saw the tattoo, Remus would understand, once and for all, that Sirius was cursed and will remain cursed, no matter how much Remus might not want to believe it.Sirius almost sobbed, but this time, he didn’t allow himself to cry. He’d cried enough.He was Gryffindor. Now, he had to face the consequences, cursed or not.When Sirius came back into the dormitory, fully dressed, he stubbed his toe on the poster of his bed. “Salazar’s—fuck!”On his bed, Remus jolted upright. Bleary and confused amber eyes looked about the room, almost on the verge of panic, until they landed on Sirius. His curly hair stuck out in all directions and there was an imprint of Sirius’s pillow on Remus’s cheek, right between his scars. Remus blinked a few times. Then, seeming to realize where he was, Remus let out a moan. “Wha’ time is it?”Sirius cast a look at the other beds, praying James and Peter were sleeping in a bit more. Peter, for his part, was curled in the fetal position, snoring loudly, while the hangings on James’s bed remained resolutely shut. “It’s about six thirty,” Sirius said, glancing at the window. The sky was a pale grey and sun was just starting to think about rising. He’d been up for almost an hour already. “Breakfast won’t start until seven.”“Merlin, Sirius, why are you up so early?” Remus moaned into his pillow.Sirius just shrugged and opened his trunk. “Figured I’d get a head-start on the day. Nip down to breakfast to see if there’s any letters waiting.”Plus, the fewer people heard the Howler his mother would undoubtedly send, the better. He didn’t need to be the talk of the school on his first day. If he was going to be the subject of gossip at Hogwarts, he was damn well going to do it on his own terms. Remus let out another long moan and swung his feet over the edge of the bed. He tried to stretch, but was interrupted by an enormous yawn.Sirius gave him a look. “You can go back to bed, if you want.”“No,” Remus said, stifling the tail-end of his yawn. “I’m up. Lemme get dressed and I’ll come with you.”“You don’t have to—”Remus glared at him. There was still crust in the corners of his eyes, but his gaze was as sharp as ever. “I’m coming, Sirius.”Damn, Sirius thought. He had hoped to keep the wrath of Walburga Black under wraps for more than a day. He could only hope that Remus would keep it to himself and not tell James and Peter. “Alright,” Sirius said, with a wave of his hand. He reached into his trunk and pulled out the Slytherin scarf and tie his mother had selected at Madam Malkin’s. He set both of them on the bed next to Remus.Remus glanced between the scarf and tie and Sirius. “Bold fashion choice,” he said. “Though, I’m not sure the color suits you.”Sirius smirked. “My thoughts exactly.”He waved his hands, his magic once again dancing between his fingers, and suddenly, the silver and green melted into gold and crimson. “Impressive,” Remus said, stifling another yawn. “How long will that last?”“Not sure,” Sirius said. “Transfiguring one color to another is pretty simple, really, but I’ve always been forced to reverse the spell before it wears off.”Remus’s eyes began to droop a bit as Sirius talked, but scrubbed a hand over his face and stood. He stumbled a bit, but righted himself. “Right, then.” He gave another look at Sirius’s scarf and tie. “Best not let them turn back to green. Green doesn’t seem to be a popular color around here.”Sirius huffed. “Understatement.”He wrapped the long, gold and crimson scarf around his neck all the same. The Great Hall was almost empty when Remus and Sirius walked in, save for a few older Ravenclaws, who all had their noses buried in books. Breakfast still didn’t start for another ten minutes and the charmed ceiling still showed the early moments of sunrise. Next to him, Remus yawned, his scars crinkling all across his face as he did so. Remus stretched his arms above his head and cracked his neck, following Sirius to the end of the Gryffindor table. Remus plopped down across from him and immediately laid his head on the table. Two seconds later, Sirius swore he heard a snore.“You’re really not a morning person, are you?” he asked.Remus blinked up at him and lifted his head to rest on his folded arms. “No,” he said, rather grumpily. “I’d prefer it if six o’clock in the morning would remain a theoretical concept to me. But you—” He gave Sirius a stern look. “—You’re quite… chipper.”Sirius laughed. “Most nights, sleep is a theoretical concept to me,” he said, hiding a grimace. He was used to nightmares and insomnia. “Mornings are a welcome interruption.”Remus frowned. “You slept fine last night.”Sirius shrugged. Honestly, he was rather confused by that fact, too, given everything that had happened the day before. “Some nights are better, I guess.” He risked a glance directly into Remus’s eyes. “Thanks for staying, by the way.”“You’d do the same if I were hurting,” Remus said, through a yawn, then stopped, his brain seeming to register what he’d said. “I mean—Christ.”Sirius was rather taken aback. How could Remus have sounded so sure about that? How could he assume that Sirius was good enough, decent enough, to stop and—“I would,” he said, before he could think too much more. “Of course I would, Remus. I mean, you don’t know me from Adam, but I’m your friend, so yes. I’d stay with you if you’re hurt.”He meant it. Every goddamned word, he meant it, though he prayed he’d never have to see Remus hurt. A boy like Remus didn’t deserve to be hurt. Clearly, from the scars on his face, he’d suffered enough as is. Remus gave him a sad smile, and if Sirius looked closely, he’d swear he saw tears glistening in those amber eyes. “Thanks,” he said, his voice quiet. He sat up a little straighter. “Looks like you’re Gryffindor after all.”Merlin, that terrified him.As the clocks struck seven, more students trickled in, but, much to Sirius’s relief, James and Peter were not yet among them. Lily Evans, however, with her hair messy and eyes a bit bloodshot, stormed in and sat down, right next to Remus, keeping her back to the rest of the Hall.“Morning,” Remus muttered.Lily ignored him and, instead, glared at Sirius.Sirius, for his part, was a bit thrown by the intensity of those green eyes. “Um, hi,” he said, while Lily continued to attempt to bore a hole through his skull. “Can I… help you?” he asked, figuring it was best to shoot for decorum.“I know you were there, too,” Lily snapped. “Severus told me.”“I—what?”“On the train,” she clarified. A lock of red hair fell in her face and Lily quickly blew it out of the way. “Severus said you were with James Potter, tormenting the Slytherins, but Malfoy said you weren’t involved in the slightest. But you were. Severus said you were. You and James hurt him and—”“Hey!” Sirius snapped, shifting in his seat and leaning over the table a bit. “Malfoy and Cissa were tormenting this… this Snivellus—”“Severus.”Sirius huffed. “Fine. Severus. Malfoy and my horrid cousin shoved him to the floor and Malfoy kicked him, just because he was in their way. James hexed Malfoy for it—made his clothes disappear, quite brilliantly, if I may say so, never seen such a pale twat—”“Sirius,” Remus hissed. “Make your point.”“Right,” Sirius said. “Then Cissa tried to stun James, he tried to block it, and it backfired a bit and hit Severus.”Lily’s face scrunched up. “But—”“Look,” Sirius cut her off. “Whatever happened, it wasn’t James Potter’s fault. It was those damn Slytherins. They started it, not us.”“That’s not what Severus told me,” Lily said.“Then he lied!” Sirius shot back. “Or he told you exactly what Malfoy told him to say. Either way, it wasn’t our fault!”“Severus is my friend!” Lily snapped. “He wouldn’t lie to me. Besides, even in your own story, James Potter threw the first hex. You started it.”“Yes, fine. We started it because Malfoy was torturing Snivellus!”“Severus!” “We were trying to help.”“Potter knocked him unconscious!”“By accident!”“Then you turned half the train to ice!”“Okay, well, that wasn’t so much of an accident as it was a poorly conceived escape plan, I’ll cop to that, but the rest wasn’t our fault.”Lily was quiet for a moment, then leaned forward, a scowl on her face. “If you admit to turning the train to ice, then you were involved. So why is James Potter in trouble and you’re not?”Sirius looked away. “That’s the question, isn’t it?” he muttered. Lily, however, seemed to already have an answer. “I don’t care what the reason is or what Malfoy says, you don’t get to get away with it just because of your name, Black. Whatever you do, just make it right, you arrogant prat.” With that, Lily stood and marched off to the other end of the table.As she stood, food materialized in ornate serving dishes between Sirius and Remus. Remus, not hesitating for a second, reached for the tea and poured himself a cup, before pouring a coup for Sirius.Sirius huffed and accepted the tea, taking a sip of it without bothering with cream or sugar. “Make it right, she says,” he muttered. “Merlin’s beard, she says it like it’s that easy.”Remus was quiet for a moment, before he said, “Maybe it is easy” Sirius looked him over. “It really wasn’t our fault, Remus. We didn’t mean to take out her friend.”“I believe you,” Remus said. “I do, Sirius. Whatever you decide, I’ll still believe you.”Just then, a swarm of owls flew in and Sirius’s felt his stomach sink. It was barely seven in the morning and Sirius was already emotionally exhausted. He wasn’t particularly looking forward to his mother’s Howler. In fact, he was half tempted to leave the hall, march back to the dormitories, draw the hangings on his bed, and not come out until next Christmas.But he was Gryffindor. He was supposed to be brave.The same brown owl he’d used last night swooped down and perched on Sirius’s shoulder, dropping three letters on the table in front of him. Much to his surprise, there were no red envelopes amongst them. Perhaps his mother hadn’t heard the news, after all? Sirius could only dare hope.“What’s wrong?” Remus asked, seeing his expression.“I was—um.” Sirius paused, feeling himself flush a bit. “I was sort of expecting a Howler.”“A Howler?”“Yeah,” Sirius said. “Big, red envelope that screams at you and explodes if you don’t open it. My mother’s quite fond of them.”Remus looked a little confused. “And you thought she’d send you one for—oh.”“Being sorted into Gryffindor? Yeah.”Remus didn’t have anything else to say to that. He reached for a plate and scooped himself a large serving of bacon.Sirius grabbed the first letter—Andromeda’s, by the handwriting, and thank Merlin for that—and opened it.
Siri,
Merlin! I thought I was the rebellious one in the family, what with my involvement with Feathers and all, but Gryffindor?! I do believe a proper congratulations is in order. Never much pegged you for a snake, anyway. You’ll do brilliant, Sirius.
I know you must be terrified, given the circumstances, so if you want to meet me, I’d be happy to help you come with a strategy for coping with… everything. I’m staying a few days in Hogsmeade with Feathers, and will be up at Hagrid’s hut tomorrow around noon, for lunch. I’d be happy to meet with you, then, if you would like to discuss things further.
I’ve got your back, Sirius. I always have. I’m ruddy proud of you, for sticking it to the Black family traditions like that.
Hope to see you tomorrow,
Andromeda
He read the letter through twice, rather surprised. Never much pegged you for a snake, anyway. Andromeda hadn’t thought he belonged in Slytherin, after all. It was just an accepted fact in his family and she’d gone along with it. Sirius felt an odd sense of relief wash over him. Andromeda was the person who probably knew him best, after Regulus. If she was proud of him, thought he belonged—if Remus thought he belonged—well. Whatever his mother may or may not have to say about how he was sorted suddenly seemed to matter a lot less than it had immediately after his Sorting.Remus continued to munch on his bacon. Sirius took another swig of his tea before tearing into the second letter. This time, he didn’t recognize the handwriting.
Mr. Black,
I’m afraid I seem to have missed the opportunity to introduce myself last night after the Sorting, a slight for which I would like to offer my most sincere apology.
I’ve known your parents for many, many years, as well as your aunt and uncle, and consider all four of them dear friends and close confidants. Your cousins, Bellatrix and Andromeda, were some of my finest students and, I’m sure, mentioned the mentorship I offered them on many occasions. I’m so glad to hear of Bellatrix’s engagement to Lestrange—another one of my favorites, dear lad—and could not be prouder of her accomplishments.
It would be a great honor to get to know you as well, my boy, and I would like to cordially invite you to a small dinner gathering I’m having this Friday night, in my office. Your cousin, Narcissa, Lucius Malfoy, as well as another first year by the name of Michealo Avery will also be in attendance. I do hope to see you there as well.
Best regards,
Professor Horace Slughorn
Sirius grimaced. Immediately, after reading that, he knew why Andromeda hadn’t ever mentioned Slughorn, despite what Slughorn apparently chose to believe. Slughorn, it seemed, was quite interested in the connections offered by certain families. Sirius didn’t particularly care to be collected on the basis of his name alone. Everyone, save for Remus, seemed to see him only as a Black, only as an heir to a long, pure-blood line: one with traditions and ideals, the least of which involved branding children at the age of eight.The Hat had warned him about this, of course, and Sirius had known it even before he’d gone and gotten himself sorted into Gryffindor. Wizards both feared and revered the Black name. For some, like Slughorn, that reverence morphed into an opportunity for social advancement. For others, like James Potter, the Black name was synonymous with everything wrong with pure-blood families.For Sirius, his goddamned name was the same as the fate already written for him. A fate he was certain he didn’t want.The last letter, naturally, was unmarked. It didn’t even bear his name. He wondered, momentarily, if it had actually been intended for someone else, so he picked it up and—Searing pain shot across his abdomen. He thought for a second that his ribs had snapped once more, but no. This felt different, more itching, oozing, burning—Sirius let out a moan and bent over. Remus’s eyes snapped away from his breakfast. “Sirius? What’s wrong?”Remus reached for the letter.“NO!” Sirius snatched it away, before Remus could be cursed as well. Remus pulled his hand back. “What?”“It’s—” He gestured to the letter in his hand. “It’s, ah. From my mother.” Sirius grit his teeth, holding back another moan of pain.“Are you okay? I smell…” Remus snapped his mouth shut.Had he been about to say blood?“I’m fine,” Sirius managed. Remus leaned forward and lowered his voice. “The letter’s cursed.”It wasn’t a question. For a second, Sirius considered lying. There were certain… consequences for letting his mother’s cruelty be widely known, but it would seem Remus had already deduced the truth. Slowly, Sirius nodded. “Boils, I think. On my stomach.”Remus’s nostrils flared. “We should get you to the hospital wing. We’ll say it was one of the Slytherins who cursed you. Madam Pomfrey will help and—”“No, Remus.”“What? Why not?”“It’ll wear off.” Really, he couldn’t risk this getting out. He was still half relieved that his mother hadn’t sent a Howler. He wasn’t about to go to the hospital wing when, underneath the boils, there were still purple bruises from his mother’s last punishment, let alone the tattoo that would forever brand him a fanatic. Sirius didn’t need that kind of scrutiny, not when he was supposed to be doing everything in his power to distance himself from every assumption other wizards had about people bearing his name. The boils, at least, he could deal with on his own. The pain was a solitary experience, and if Remus hadn’t been here, then no one else would have had to know about it. It was the best possible scenario, though he wasn’t about to explain to Remus why he greatly preferred boils to a Howler. Remus opened his mouth, ready to protest, but Sirius beat him to it. “I’m fine, Remus. I swear. Curses like this won’t last long after the source is destroyed. I’ll burn the letter, and I’ll be fine.”Remus held his gaze, then nodded. “Are you going to read it first?”Honestly, he hadn’t intended to, but with Remus looking at him like that, he supposed he’d better. Sirius broke the seal. Two words stared back at him.
BLOOD TRAITOR.
Sirius felt himself go pale. Blood traitor. Sirius remembered what Regulus had said to Auclair—how he’d tormented Auclair first. The Blacks couldn’t even stand to be touched by blood traitors.Merlin, Regulus was going to hate him.Blood traitor was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Even if his mother didn’t burn him off the tapestry for this offense, she would eventually, down the road, for some other slight, for some other betrayal. He knew exactly what his mother meant.Sirius Black was no longer the heir. He was the subject of a fate yet to be fulfilled.Regulus was going to fucking hate him.He squeezed his eyes shut. His breath came out in short, rapid bursts and invisible fingers tightened around his heart.“Sirius?” Remus prompted quietly. Sirius opened his eyes and held his breath, staring right back into Remus’s amber eyes. He set the letter down on the table between them and watched Remus read the words.“What’s it mean?” Remus asked, his voice hardly more than a whisper. “I mean, I have a pretty good idea—James said his whole family were blood traitors to yours—but…” He trailed off, not quite sure how to finish his question.“A blood traitor is a pure-blood,” he said, his voice far more calm than he felt. Sirius took a deep breath and started again. “A blood traitor is a pure-blooded wizard, who’s either got some Muggle blood somewhere in his family tree, like the Potters, or one who willingly associates with Muggle-borns and half-bloods. Anyone who’s not strictly pure-blood, really. A blood traitor is someone who betrayed his name and his station.”“Oh,” Remus said, looking down into his empty cup of tea. “It doesn’t matter,” Sirius said, even though it did. (Of course it did. Regulus was going to hate him, of course it fucking mattered.) “It doesn’t matter, Remus,” he said again, forcibly this time, as if the dichotomy of it all wasn’t eating him alive already. “They’re wrong. There’re ignorant and stupid for thinking that bloodlines matter like that. It should be about your choices, not your parents.”That, at least, he wanted to believe, more so, perhaps, than he’d ever wanted to believe anything.Remus just nodded, slowly looking up again to meet Sirius’s eyes. Sirius flicked his wrist and his mother’s letter burned up between them. The boils on his chest eased up, stopped oozing at least, though they didn’t disappear completely. He guessed he’d probably have to deal with them the rest of the day. “So,” Remus said, snagging another slice of bacon. Sirius was grateful for the subject change. “Looks like we’ve got Transfiguration first, with McGonagall. Reckon you’ll be quite good at that.”Sirius scoffed. “Just the wandless stuff. I need to practice more spells while using my wand.” His wand, as it was, was dying. It was a bit finicky, to say the least, and Sirius wasn’t entirely sure he trusted it not to backfire after every spell he cast. They carried on a casual conversation, for the better part of an hour. Both Sirius and Remus were excited about Defense Against the Dark Arts (a subject to which Sirius’s parents were vehemently opposed) and both had opted to take an extra hour of Ancient Runes, on top of their five other classes. Neither had opted for Divination. James and Peter strolled into the dining hall about fifteen minutes before the end of breakfast. James pointedly ignored Sirius and went instead to sit by Lily and the other first year girls. However, from what Sirius could tell, Lily snapped something at James and he and Peter retreated, once more forced to sit by Sirius and Remus.Sirius promptly shut up and took great interest in his tea cup, not bothering to say anything to James or Peter for the remainder of breakfast. McGonagall was not in the room when the first year Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs trickled into the Transfiguration classroom. Sirius sat on the bench seat next to Remus. James and Peter sat behind them. “Slytherins have Transfiguration tomorrow, Black,” James hissed.Sirius flushed red and turned, but Remus reached out a hand. Seeing it, Sirius quickly jerked out of reach. Remus sent him an apologetic look. “Sorry. I forgot,” he whispered. “But just ignore him. He’s just upset. He probably doesn’t mean it.”Sirius wasn’t so sure about that, but took his seat and kept his back to James all the same.A silver and black tabby cat jumped onto McGonagall’s desk and began licking its front paw.Remus tilted his head, looked at the cat, curious, then leaned forward a bit. “No way,” he said, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.Sirius didn’t get a chance to ask Remus what he was on about, before the cat on the desk began to grow and shift, its fur retracting and bones reshaping in one fluid movement, until Professor McGonagall stood before them.Sirius felt his jaw drop. There’s not a whole lot of magic out there with which Sirius Black was unfamiliar—including varying degrees of Dark Magic—but he’d never seen anyone do that before. Amidst gasps of awe and reverence, the class applauded. McGonagall smiled graciously and gave a slight bow. “Welcome to Transfiguration,” she said. “Here, you will learn to change things from one form to another, not just in shape, but in essence, from the most basic—” She tapped an inkwell on her desk and it transformed into a hummingbird. “—to, should you desire and should you posses a great deal of skill, the most complicated transfiguration a witch or wizard can manage: that of an Animagus form.”Sirius’s hand shot up.McGonagall seemed rather surprised, as if she was not used to first years interrupting her opening lectures. “Yes, what is it, Mr. Black?” she said curtly.“How do you become an Animagus, Professor?” he asked.“Well,” McGonagall said. “That is magic far beyond a first year, I’m sure. A majority of adult witches and wizards are not capable of performing the tasks required for Animagus transformation, and those that pursue the change spend many years in rigorous study before they earn their license. You need not worry about this for many years, Mr. Black.” She turned her attention back to the entire class. “Now, this year in Transfiguration—”“Yes, but—” Sirius said, before he could stop himself.McGonagall glared at him. “Do you have something you’d like to contribute, Mr. Black?”“How do you actually become an Animagus?”“As I said,” McGonagall began, her patience clearly reaching its limit. “It takes many years of study for—”“Yes, but how do you do it?”McGonagall glared at him.“Surely you’d know, Professor,” Sirius said. “Seeing as you are an Animagus, after all.”McGonagall’s lips formed a thin line. “Mr. Black,” she said, her voice calm and measured, “if you would like to teach this class, by all means, continue with your interruption.”Sirius’s face scrunched up, offended. “But I was just—”“Otherwise,” McGonagall snapped, “I, for one, will not tolerate this kind of disrespect in my classroom.”“It was a question,” Sirius huffed. “Ten points from Gryffindor,” McGonagall said. “Between you and Mr. Potter, I think this is the first time in recent memory Gryffindor has started the term with negative points. Another word out of you before you leave this classroom, save for the spell we shall be learning today, Mr. Black, and it’ll be detention.”Sirius glared at her, but swallowed his protests. He knew better than to contradict an authority figure, especially in front of a group of people. If she forbade him from speaking, then fine. It’s not like he expected her lesson to be particularly difficult anyway. He could shut up for an hour.Remus gave him a sympathetic shrug, but that was about it. Sirius folded his hands on his desk and put his head down, his eyes fixed on McGonagall, and the tails of his scarf laying across his back.“Now,” McGonagall said, righting herself. “Transfiguration is a dangerous, complex form of magic, and I will not tolerate misuse of magic or—” She glanced at Sirius. “—insubordination in my classroom. Am I understood?”The class nodded. A few students voiced their assent. Sirius scowled.“I believe in a practical approach when teaching magic, so today you’ll be transfiguring a thistle into a rose. It is a relatively simple transfiguration, given that the original form and the intended form are both plants, but it does require a certain amount of finesse. You will be graded on both your technique and the final result. You’ll find the spell and the wand motion on page nineteen of your textbooks. Begin,” McGonagall said. She flicked her wand at a vase full of ugly, purple thistles, and they floated out and landed on the desks, one per student.Sirius and Remus both fished their transfiguration textbooks out of their bags. Remus’s copy was clearly second-hand and was very nearly falling apart. When Remus thumbed to page nineteen, it appeared to have been ripped out. Without really thinking about it, Sirius shoved his brand new book towards Remus, already opened to the page. Remus flushed red. “No, you don’t have to—”Sirius glared at him. Then, without looking from Remus’s eyes, he flicked his wrist at his thistle and it levitated off his desk, immediately transforming into a beautiful red rose. Remus’s eyes went wide. McGonagall, on the other hand, was not amused. “With your wand, Mr. Black!” she shouted. She then flicked her wand and his rose turned right back into a thistle and landed with a plop on his desk. “I will not have you showing off in my classroom!”Sirius sneered at her, but took out his wand. It was so bloody unfair, the way she was treating him. He hadn’t done anything, save for ask a question to which he genuinely wanted to know the answer.Andromeda always said that the teachers played favorites, even though, strictly speaking, they weren’t supposed to, and she’d repeatedly told him that, as Head of Gryffindor House, McGonagall was no exception. Clearly, however, she did not favor him. Sirius would put Galleons on the fact that McGonagall thought the Hat had made a mistake, that like James Potter, she clearly thought that all Blacks belonged in Slytherin.He couldn’t help but hate her a little bit for it.Sirius glared at the thistle in front of him, then looked at his wand. He knew that no matter how closely he mimicked the movement described in the textbook, whatever he managed to conjure with his wand wouldn’t look nearly as flawless as the rose he’d made without it. His wand had a mind of its own, after all, and had never strictly obeyed him since he’d cast the Cruciatus curse. He leaned a little closer to Remus to glance at the textbook, then pretended to practice the wand movement. He kept an eye on McGonagall, waiting for her to turn her back so he could cast the spell without a wand once more, but she seemed to be onto him and always kept one eye on him in return. At this rate, there was almost no way to cast the wandless spell without her noticing.Next to him, Remus sat up straight and practiced the wand movement. When he kept getting it wrong, Sirius tapped the desk to get his attention, then demonstrated proper form. A few more tries, Remus had it down, and muttered the spell, pointing his wand at the thistle. The thistle grew petals, faded to red, and morphed into a perfect rose. “Well done, Mr. Lupin!” McGonagall exclaimed. “Ten points to Gryffindor, for being the first to successfully complete the transfiguration.”McGonagall seemed proud, as she scrutinized Remus’s rose and held it out for the rest of the class to see. Remus, on the other hand, seemed quite embarrassed. He sent an apologetic look at Sirius and slouched a little in his seat. Ten minutes to the end of the lesson, most of the other students had managed to transform their thistles into roses, with the exception of Peter, who had accidentally set his thistle on fire, thus earning a stern lecture from McGonagall and zero points. Sirius, though, had yet to even attempt the spell with his wand. He knew he could do it, at least in theory, perfectly, but the unpredictable temperament of his wand was another matter entirely. He waited until he was the only student left, then, with McGonagall’s full attention on him, Sirius flicked his wand at his thistle and muttered the spell.The thistle turned into a rose alright, but it was black and shriveled and dead.Sirius flushed bright red, whether in embarrassment or anger at the whole situation, he wasn’t quite sure.McGonagall strolled over and picked up the dead rose. She frowned. “Full marks for technique, Mr. Black. Zero for the end result.”He rolled his eyes. Honestly, it was the best he could have hoped for. McGonagall turned her attention back to the class. “For next class, I want a two foot essay on the varying techniques of transfiguring the essences of objects that have similar forms to begin with. Good day.” The bell rang and she disappeared into her office at the back of the classroom.Sirius sighed. They had History of Magic next, followed by lunch. In all honesty, he was a bit relieved. He needed a bit of reprieve from everyone and everything right now. He pulled his textbook back from Remus’s side of the desk and tucked it into his bag.Next to him, Remus stood and drew in a sharp breath. “Christ, Sirius, your scarf!” he hissed.Sirius glanced down. Half of the scarf had faded back into green and silver, while the other half remained gold and crimson. He flicked his wrist and it flushed back to Gryffindor colors, but not, unfortunately, before James Potter saw it.“Ha!” James said, coming to stand in front of Sirius’s desk. Peter stood behind him, looking sheepish and a little bit bored. “Knew it. You’re bloody Slytherin, Black!”“James, just leave it,” Remus said, sounding tired. James turned to Remus. “Give him a week, Lupin. He won’t even be speaking to you. He can’t stand to look at any of us.”Sirius just glared at James, but refused to say anything. “Speaking of,” James said, drawing his wand, “Slytherins don’t have Transfiguration until tomorrow. I expect you can wait here for your housemates to rescue you.” James muttered a spell and flicked his wand at Sirius. “Come on, Pete,” James said, and the two of them left. Sirius tried to stand, but found he rather couldn’t. His eyes went wide, in sudden panic. Fucking James Potter.Remus, seeing Sirius’s expression, slid back into the seat next to him. “Are you stuck?”Sirius scowled and nodded. He waved his hand over his lap, praying it would undo the charm, but nothing happened. “Merlin, let me try,” Remus said, and drew his wand.Sirius glared at him and took out Remus’s ballpoint from his pocket. He scribbled on his hand, then showed it to Remus.
LEAVE. YOU HAVE CLASS.
Remus rolled his eyes. “So do you,” he said. “And I’m sure they can do without me for one class. I’ve already read the textbook anyway and, from what my dad told me, History of Magic isn’t exactly a thrilling experience. Let me help, Sirius.”Sirius held his gaze for a moment, then rolled his eyes and nodded. Just then, McGonagall walked back into the otherwise empty classroom. Both Sirius and Remus straightened up and Remus immediately tucked his wand away. McGonagall froze when she caught sight of them.“Mr. Black!” she snapped, ignoring Remus entirely. “What on earth are you still doing here?!”Sirius glared at her, but didn’t reply. McGonagall scowled at him. “Mr. Black! Answer me!”Still, Sirius didn’t reply. He threw a glance at Remus, wondering if he’d caught onto Sirius’s strict obedience to McGonagall’s earlier order. He assumed he had, given how he’d taken the fact that Sirius wrote a message on his hand in stride.“Of all the spoiled, insolent children, how is it that you, Mr. Black, found your way into Gryffindor? I will not tolerate—”“Professor?” Remus said, cutting her off.McGonagall seemed to acknowledge him for the first time. “Yes, what is it, Lupin?”“You told him he couldn’t speak until he left the classroom, or he’d get detention,” Remus said, his voice remarkably calm and reasonable. McGonagall huffed. “You may speak, Mr. Black. Why are you still in my classroom?”Sirius sat up a bit straighter. Then, as politely as he could manage, he said, “Well, you see, Professor, it seems that I’m rather stuck.”McGonagall blinked. “Stuck?”“Yes,” Sirius said, keeping his voice neutral. “My arse is glued to this bench.”It was clear that whatever she’d been expecting him to say, it wasn’t that. McGonagall turned to Remus. “And you, Mr. Lupin? Are you… stuck as well?”“No,” Remus said, glancing between Sirius and McGonagall. “I’m mostly here for moral support.”McGonagall sighed. “Mr. Black,” she said, her voice far more measured. “Do you know who it was that performed this sticking charm?”Sirius didn’t hesitate. “No, I don’t, Professor.”She narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure?”“Quite sure,” Sirius said. “My back was turned. And even if it wasn’t, I’m not a snitch.”McGonagall frowned. “Mr. Lupin, did you happen to see who cast the charm on Mr. Black while his back was turned?”Remus gave Sirius a look, but said, “No, I didn’t. It seems my back was turned as well.”Sirius smiled. “Well,” McGonagall said. “Mr. Black, seeing as how you somehow managed to get yourself into this predicament in the first place, it’s only fitting for you to sit for the duration of the charm. I shall notify Professor Binns of your absence. Mr. Lupin, off to class with you.”“Professor, I—” Remus started, then stopped at McGonagall’s glare.“Yes, what now?”Remus glanced at Sirius. “I-I’m going to stay,” he managed. “Sirius, well. He really is quite stuck and seems to be in need of…”McGonagall pinched the bridge of her nose. “Moral support?” she prompted.“Yes, exactly,” Remus said.“Very well, Mr. Lupin. I shall inform Professor Binns of your absence as well.” She turned her attention back to Sirius. “One more finger out of line, Mr. Black, and I shall be writing to your parents and you’ll be serving at least a month’s detention. Am I understood?”Sirius swallowed. He couldn’t afford for any of this to get back to his parents. He was in enough trouble as is. “Yes, ma’am.”McGonagall nodded, and, with a swish of her robes, strolled from the classroom, leaving the two boys alone.Remus waved his wand and tried a spell. Sirius tried to wiggle, but he wouldn’t budge. He groaned and once more buried his face in his arms, folded on the desk. “Merlin, why’d I do this?” he mumbled.“Do what?” Remus asked, trying another spell. Still no luck.Sirius gestured to his lap. “This,” he said. At Remus’s confused look, he clarified. “I asked—no, well, I begged the Hat to not put me in Slytherin. It told me I’d be hated for my name, if it put me in Gryffindor and I asked for it anyway. Why the fuck did I do that?”Remus just shrugged. “Because, for a second there, I think you were trying to be brave.”Sirius rolled his eyes. “I’m a Black, Remus. I’m not brave and I don’t belong in Gryffindor. James can see it, so can Frank Longbottom and Professor McGonagall. Hell, even Lily Evans gets it. So why the hell don’t you?”Remus’s lip twitched up a little. He muttered another spell and this one felt a bit like a bee sting. Sirius yelped. Remus, on the other hand, looked momentarily gratified and perhaps just a little bit smug. “I was raised mostly Muggle,” he said, by way of explanation. “Well, I knew about magic, obviously, from my dad, but we lived like Muggles. I don’t know anything about Black family traditions or these seemingly unreasonable expectations resting on the shoulders of pure-blood heirs. I don’t believe in fate, Sirius. I can’t. If I did, I surely wouldn’t be here.”Sirius’s face scrunched up and he turned to look at Remus. “What the hell do you mean by—”“Besides,” Remus said, ignoring him entirely, though Sirius noticed Remus’s ears turn pink. “It sounds rather like the Hat laid out your options. You chose Gryffindor. That’s all that matters.”Sirius didn’t know what to say to that.Remus gave him a smile. “Whatever happens, I think James will come around.”This time, Sirius snorted. “He hates me, Remus.”“No,” Remus said. “I think he hates the idea of you.”“Thanks for that,” Sirius scoffed.“So prove him wrong.”“What?”“Prove to him you belong in Gryffindor,” Remus said, as if it were that simple. “Do the one thing a Slytherin would never do.”Sirius flashed back to James’s words from last night, at the entrance to Hogwarts castle. He narrowed his eyes. “Are you suggesting,” he said, his voice measured, “I go to Slughorn and tell him I was in on it with James?”Remus shrugged. “At the very least, it couldn’t hurt.”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. “There’s a reason I didn’t just do that last night, Remus. I can’t just—”“Why not?” Remus said. “Is it because you’re scared of Malfoy? Or—” He lowered his voice a bit. “—your mother?”Sirius looked away. “Mother. She’d kill me if she knew I’d cursed and humiliated Narcissa and Malfoy. They’re family,” he muttered, spiting out the last word as if it were poison.“Well,” Remus said, with a smirk, “it looks like you’ve already pissed her off, getting sorted into Gryffindor and all. She called you a blood traitor for that, so how much worse could it possibly get?”Sirius very nearly laughed aloud at the pure innocence of that statement. Whether or not Remus understood it, there was almost an infinite repository of vengeance when it came to Walburga Black. She could beat Sirius senseless, not feed him for a week, use the Unforgivables on him, or all of the above. No one in his house or outside it would lift a goddamned finger to help him. No one in their right mind would risk raining down that kind of fury on themselves, not even a well-meaning, ignorant, half-blood Gryffindor.His mother could burn him off the tapestry. Then he’d never see Regulus again.It could get so much fucking worse than blood traitor, but he couldn’t explain that to Remus Lupin.Remus, however, seemed to have an uncanny knack for reading Sirius’s mind. “Even if it did get worse, Sirius,” he said, his voice unreasonably kind, “isn’t it better to bear that burden with friends? James Potter was your friend on the train and he could just as easily be again, if he pulled his head from his arse and maybe you groveled a bit. It’s your choice, Sirius.”His choice. His fucking choice. Sirius Black was not used to so many goddamned choices. He wasn’t much used to friends either.“I’ll think about it,” he muttered. Then, he gestured down to his lap. “Now, have you got anything better than that stinger one you did? That fucking hurt.”Remus laughed, then muttered, “Reglutino.”Hesitating a second, Sirius stood up. “HA!” he exclaimed, shoving the bench back and nearly toppling Remus off of it. “Oh, to be free at last!”Remus rolled his eyes and gathered his books. “Come on, you,” he said, nodding towards the door. “We’re already excused from class. What do you say to an early lunch?” The rest of the day was predominantly uneventful. In their afternoon Charms class, Remus kept himself between Sirius and James at all times. It was subtle; Sirius didn’t even think James noticed, as James continued to glare at Sirius straight through Remus, but something in Sirius twisted a little bit. Remus was protecting him. It was a weird feeling. For all his life, he’d been in danger, at least to some degree. Sirius Black walked around with a target on his back, the unquestionable culprit for whatever slight, imagined or otherwise, that might piss off his father or mother, Kreacher, or tutor. Curses, hexes, and jinxes flew free and unhindered at Grimmauld Place, and Sirius had been the recipient of a great many of them.No one ever tried to protect him before.Sirius had defended Regulus, of course, more times than he truly cared to count. He always figured it was best if he bore the punishment, rather than his younger brother, even if Regulus was the one who’d actually been in the wrong. Regulus didn’t deserve that kind of punishment. (Sirius deserved it. He’d always deserve punishment, no matter how much he feared it, for as long as he lived. He’d done terrible things. Unspeakable things. Things that could earn him a sentence in Azkaban.)At first, Sirius couldn’t decide if it was kindness or stupidity or an stubborn refusal to acknowledge the apparent darkness inside Sirius that made Remus defend him from James Potter’s wrath. Ultimately, he concluded that it was an odd combination of all three.Perhaps, that’s what made Remus Lupin Gryffindor.By the time dinner rolled around, James Potter had taken to ignoring Sirius completely and went so far as speaking as if he weren’t there at all. Remus, naturally, kept trying to bring Sirius into the conversation, despite numerous dirty looks from James, but Sirius mostly spaced out.He couldn’t stop thinking about what Remus said in Transfiguration. His mother was going to kill him—or at least respectably maim him—for being sorted into Gryffindor. That much Sirius knew beyond a shadow of a doubt. On some level, he knew that should terrify him—and it did—but it was more of a disembodied dread than a cower-under-the-covers sort of fear. Whatever actual punishment awaited him, aside from whatever curses she could deliver via owl or Malfoy, it was four months away. There was a chance, however minuscule it was, that the severity of the punishment would lessen slightly if he just kept his nose in the dirt and didn’t do anything else to provoke his parents for the rest of the term. Then again, the reasonable part of him argued, Walburga Black had a long memory and a burning desire to seek vengeance for even the smallest offense. There’s no way he comes back to Hogwarts in January unscathed, no matter what he does. Even if Sirius made nice with Narcissa and Malfoy, he was still Gryffindor. He still shared a dormitory with a blood traitor, an idiot, and a half-blood. There was no possible universe in which Walburga would let that go.Which begged the question: Was the cumulated wrath of Walburga Black, and all the pain and anguish that would undoubtedly entail, worth the effort of worming his way back into James Potter’s good graces?Was it worth being branded a blood traitor?Was it worth the possibility that his mother might burn him off the tapestry before the year was up?Or maybe it wasn’t about cost-benefit analysis or fear of punishment at all.Maybe it was about what was right and fair and just.Sirius had been there, he’d been involved, just as much as James. The punishment, of course, was wildly unfair and was certainly brokered by Malfoy, but that wasn’t something either Sirius or James could change. The fact remained: if James was to be punished for the incident on the train, it’s reasonable to conclude that Sirius Black should be as well. Sirius knew this. Objectively, he knew it. He also knew that the he’d only avoided punishment for the incident because of his name. Perhaps, then, Remus was right after all. If he wanted anyone to look at him and see more than his name and family history, he had to prove he was nothing like a Black. Maybe this was about doing what was right, and damning the consequences, however severe they may be.Maybe that would make him brave.After dinner, James Potter stood and left for detention.Sirius waited five minutes, threw a half-smile at Remus, and followed James to the dungeons. When Sirius pushed open the heavy door to Slughorn’s office, James Potter was the only one in the room. It smelled a bit like mildew and potion fumes. Sirius tried not to breathe too deep. Instead, he strolled in, his head held high, and plopped into the seat right next to James. Sirius leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the desk.“What the actual fuck are you doing here?” James hissed.Sirius shrugged and looked at his cuticles, aiming for nonchalance, even though his heart was threatening to hammer out of his chest. “Serving detention, same as you.”Just then, Slughorn walked in, balancing two cauldrons in his arms. Sirius put his feet down and all four legs of the chair returned to the floor. “Now, Potter,” Slughorn said, teetering the cauldrons a bit. “I want these scrubbed and polished. They’re full of chimera dung, which can be quite pungent, so I do hope you’ve brought gloves. If not, I’m afraid you’ll have to use your hands.” James looked affronted and wrinkled his nose at the idea.Slughorn set the cauldrons down and turned to look at James. His face brightened when he saw Sirius. “Ah, Mr. Black. What a pleasant surprise. How can I help you this evening?”Sirius swallowed his nerves and but all the bravado he could into his voice. “I’m here to serve detention, sir.”“My word, whatever for? I don’t believe I received a detention slip from another professor,” he said, sorting through the mess of parchments on his desk. “No, sir,” Sirius said. “I’m here for the same reason as James. I was with him on the train. Strictly speaking, I’m the one who turned the corridors to ice.”Slughorn held his gaze for a minute, clearly surprised, then turned to James. “You put him up to this, didn’t you, Potter?” he snapped, his voice rising. “I’ll have you know, bribing other students into admitting guilt will not lessen, your punishment. That’ll be another—”James opened his mouth, clearly ready to protest, but Sirius beat him to it. “He didn’t bribe me, Professor,” Sirius said, a little insulted that Slughorn thought he was stupid enough to accept an offer like that. “I’m here because it’s only fair. I was with James on the train when Snivellus or whatever-his-name-is was hexed and I helped him escape. If James is to be punished for it, so should I.”Slughorn sighed. “Mr. Black, are you sure that’s what happened?”“Yes, Professor.”“You understand, then,” Slughorn continued, “that if you are to share in Potter’s punishment, I will have to write your parents and inform them of your involvement in this prank. Are you absolutely sure you are remembering the events exactly as they transpired?”Slughorn was offering him an out. Sirius could walk away, no questions asked, and his mother would never hear of it. He shoved down the part of him that was roaring for him to take escape route, the part of him that so rightfully terrified of the pound of flesh this would cost him.With ever ounce of courage he possessed, Sirius met Slughorn’s eyes. “I’m sure, Professor.”“Right, then. Twenty more points from Gryffindor, I suppose,” Slughorn said. “It seems I have another letter to write. Both of you, take a cauldron. You’re not to use your wands at all. When you’re finished, you may leave, and I’ll see you both tomorrow night.”Sirius and James both nodded, after a quick glance between them. To Sirius’s satisfaction, James looked rather bewildered, if not a little cautious. Together, they walked up to Slughorn’s desk and grabbed a cauldron each. Sirius very nearly gagged at the smell, as they brought the cauldrons back to their desks. “I’ll leave you to it, then,” Slughorn said. He gathered a stack of papers and a few quills. Then, he paused, mid-shuffle. “Oh, and Mr. Black? That dinner I mentioned on Friday night…? Well, I’m afraid I’ll have to reschedule. It appears something has come up.”Sirius could have laughed. He was uninvited to a dinner party he hadn’t particularly wanted to attend in the first place. He hid his smile and said, “Alright, Professor.”Slughorn left the room. After a tense moment, Sirius risked a glance at James over the brim of his reeking cauldron. James stared right back at him, his expression decidedly blank. “Why’d you do that?” “It was only fair,” Sirius mumbled.“Not good enough, Black.”Sirius shrugged. “I thought it might prove you wrong.”“What?”“I’m not like them, James,” Sirius said, looking away. “Or, at least I don’t want to be. When the Hat told me it thought I might be suited for Gryffindor, I fucking begged it to place me there because I didn’t want to be in Slytherin. My family is shit, James, and I don’t want any favors or privileges just because I’m related to them. So, yes. It’s shitty and unfair that you were punished last night and I wasn’t. I’m just trying to make it right.”James stared at him, but didn’t say anything.“I, uh,” Sirius mumbled. “I wanted to do the right thing. I thought maybe this might be the Gryffindor thing to do.”The corners of James’s lips tugged upward and he snorted a genuine laugh. “You thought,” he said, “turning yourself in for a prank that was neither your idea nor entirely your fault to begin with was the Gryffindor thing to do?”Sirius fidgeted for a moment, before he realized James was teasing him. Actually, properly teasing him, as if they were friends. Elated at the thought, Sirius smirked. “Well, no. Strictly speaking, I think a true Gryffindor would have gotten away with it, but I figured that’s problem for next time.”James shot him a wolfish grin. “Next time?”“You really think I’m going to let Malfoy get away with all that? He should be the one scrubbing shit from cauldrons, not us. He’s the one that hexed Snivellus in the first place,” Sirius said.“Snivellus?”“The greasy bloke.”“Ah, yes.”Sirius grinned. “Regardless,” he said. “Malfoy ought to be knocked down a few more pegs and I’m certainly open to suggestions. He’s an arse.”“That he is,” James replied. Then, he shot Sirius an appraising look. “So. You think you belong in Gryffindor then?”Sirius shrugged. It was a fair question, after all. “I have rather dichotomous views on the subject, but yes,” he said. James mouthed the word dichotomous back at him, clearly trying to work out its meaning from context. “I’d sure as hell like to belong in Gryffindor, especially if the alternative is Slytherin.”James considered this, then nodded. “Then I’m sorry for being an arse to you and for gluing you to a bench.” He grimaced a bit, and Merlin, was that actually remorse on his face? “And for spilling peas on you. And shoving you against the door. Merlin, you’re alright, aren’t you? You sounded like you were in pain.”Sirius blinked at him, honestly rather taken aback. “Yes, James, I’m fine. I’ve had worse.”“That’s not the point,” James said, quickly. “And I’m sorry anyway.”Sirius didn’t know what to do with that. He looked away. “Thanks,” he mumbled.“What, in Merlin’s name, are you thanking me for?”Sirius flushed red. He preferred not to answer that one.“Sirius?” James prompted.Sirius bit back a groan. “No one’s ever, ah,” he began. He took a breath. “No one’s ever apologized. For hurting me, I mean.”James blinked at him. “Well, that’s just bloody awful.”“What?” Sirius said, his face scrunching up in confusion.“You felt guilty about something, you marched down here and made it right,” James said, simply. “I was an arse to you, I feel guilty about it, so I’m apologizing. That’s how these things work. In fact, this is all such a mess, so let’s start over.” James stuck out his hand, over the filthy cauldrons. “Hi. My name is James Potter.”Despite everything, despite the confusion and the underlying sense of terror for the punishment that would no doubt result from all of this, Sirius couldn’t keep the smile off his face at the sight of James’s proffered hand. He remembered doing the same thing to James in Diagon Alley.Ignoring the pain, Sirius shook his hand. “Sirius Black,” he said. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Potter.”James shot him an award-winning smile. “What do you say we scrub these clean and get the hell out of here? I’m not sure how much longer I can stand the smell.”“Ah,” Sirius said, with a genuine smile of his own. “I might be able to do something about that.”He raised his hand, twirling his fingers and allowing his magic to spark between them. Then, deciding it best to test the spell on himself first, he pointed at his nose. It tickled a bit and Sirius almost sneezed, but when he inhaled, he couldn’t smell a thing. Without hesitating, he pointed his finger at James’s nose. James, of course, did sneeze, but then barked out a laugh. “Fucking brilliant, you are,” he said. Sirius smirked. “See, I keep saying that, but no one ever believes me.”James rolled his eyes and went to Slughorn’s desk to grab a cleaning brush. He tossed one to Sirius, who caught it.“Hey, Sirius?” James said.“Yeah?”“Welcome to Gryffindor.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
SEPTEMBER 3, 1971
“First years, up and at ‘em! Common room, hurry up!”Sirius jolted awake and nearly flew out of his bed. The edges of his nightmare receded a little, the tendrils still tight around his throat, but when he blinked, he was in the Gryffindor dormitory, not Grimmauld Place. He collapsed back on his pillow and let out a long breath of relief.James and Sirius had gotten back late from detention, despite their best intentions of finishing early. Both boys had been so exhausted they’d just collapsed on their beds, not bothering with any homework. Sirius had tossed and turned all night, but he’d finally managed to properly sleep.That is, until, Frank Longbottom barged into their dorms and started screaming like a mad idiot. “Get your arses out of bed! First year common room meeting, now!”Morning person or no, Sirius Black did not appreciate waking up at—he waved his hand and cast a time charm—Merlin, half-six-bloody-A.M. to shouting. Sirius let out a long breath. It’d been ages since he slept in that long. He rolled over and yanked back his hangings. Frank Longbottom stood in the doorway, clearly quite prepared to begin another round of yelling. Sirius threw his legs over the side of the bed and pushed his hair out of his face. “What’s going on, Longbottom?” he asked.Frank scowled at him. “First years need a lecture on discipline. Common room. Now, the lot of you.” James and Peter stared at Frank, bleary-eyed and confused. James’s hair stood up in every fathomable direction and he squinted at the scene in front of him, not seeming to remember that he needed his glasses to see it properly. Peter smacked his lips a few times and raised his eyebrows halfway up his forehead to compensate for his droopy eyes, but he stood and stretched and shook the sleep away. Remus, on the other hand, was still sleeping soundly on his bed next to Sirius’s. The hangings were open and Remus let out a soft snore, completely oblivious to the commotion around him.When none of them moved, Frank flicked his wand and a loud screech came from it. Sirius covered his ears. James and Peter both jumped to their feet. Remus kept on snoring.“I won’t say it again!” Frank shouted.“Alright, alright, we’re coming!” James screamed back, over the noise.Frank eyed Remus’s sleeping form. “Everyone downstairs now.”“We’ll handle it,” Sirius growled.Frank glared at him for a second, then flicked his wand. The shrieking stopped. Frank turned on his heel, leaving the three boys to wake their friend.James, Peter, and Sirius surrounded Remus’s bed. Remus was on his back, his mouth open, with one arm slung over his eyes, completely dead to the world. Peter scrubbed the sand from his eyes and leaned over the bed a bit. “Is he… Is he dead?”“Yes, Pete,” Sirius said, rolling his eyes. “That’s why he’s snoring so loudly.”“How do we wake him up?” James asked.“Do we pour water on him?” Peter suggested. Sirius shrugged. “Sure, go ahead. And when he wakes up and craves vengeance, I’ll be sure to point him in your direction.”Peter gulped and promptly shut up.“Do you have any suggestions, Sirius?” James asked, flicking his wand at his nightstand. His glasses levitated over to him and James situated them on his face. “You could try poking him,” Sirius said with a shrug.“Why do I have to try poking him?” James whined. “Peter’s too scared and I’m too beautiful to be strangled this early in the morning.”James rolled his eyes. “Are you serious?”“I’m always Sirius,” he deadpanned. At that, James yanked Remus’s pillow out from under his head and flung it at Sirius.“Oi!” Remus said, eyes wide and plopping back onto the mattress.Sirius threw the pillow right back at James.Remus snatched the pillow out of the air. “If you two are still fighting, then don’t get my goddamn pillow involved in your petty squabble.”James and Sirius exchanged a look, then laughed. “Nah, we’re fine,” James said, ruffling Remus’s curly bedhead. “Sirius just has a horrible sense of humor.”Sirius stuck his tongue out. “You love it.” He turned to Remus. “Frank wants us in the common room. Apparently, we have a discipline problem.”Ten minutes later, James, Peter, and Sirius were fully dressed and ready for the day. Remus, on the other hand, was still in his pinstriped pajamas, his hair was untamed, and there was a look in his eyes that spelled death and destruction for anyone who tested his patience. One glance at Remus, and Sirius couldn’t hold back a snort. “Really, really not a morning person, are you?” he whispered, following Remus down the stairs.“No,” Remus deadpanned. “You’re hair’s amazing, by the way. Almost as crazy as James’s. You should wear it like that more often.”Remus growled at him.Frank stood in the middle of the common room. The three first year Gryffindor girls stood close to the staircase that led up to their dormitory, looking just as grumpy and disheveled as Remus. Lily Evans had her arms crossed over her chest and a pout on her face. Her red hair was tied back in a messy braid that had clearly been slept on.Even from across the room, her fury was almost palpable. Next to Sirius, James Potter stared at Lily like she had descended from the heavens right in front of him. “Jamie, you’re drooling,” Sirius said, out of the corner of his mouth.James’s attention snapped to Sirius, shooting him the same, confused look he’d had on the train when Sirius first used the nickname. Before James could ask about it, Frank clapped his hands. On Sirius’s other side, Remus flinched at the noise.Frank surveyed the room, ensuring he had everyone’s attention. “Right, then. See that?” He pointed on the mantle above the fireplace, where a large, golden trophy sat. “That’s the House Cup. As I’m sure it’s been explained to you, Gryffindor earned the cup by having the most points at the end of last term.” Frank paused to look around at the seven first years. Nobody seemed surprised by this. “Gryffindor has held the House Cup for the past three years running—” Frank continued.“But not the Quidditch Cup,” James said.“Which is arguably more prestigious,” Sirius added.“Prospects don’t look good this year, either,” said James.“Yeah, not if Gryffindor plays the same Keeper as last year,” said Sirius.James shook his head, clearly pained. “Shame, really. We haven’t had a good Keeper since Lewis left to play for the Harpies.”Sirius raised his eyebrow. “I thought Lewis played for Ravenclaw.”“Are you kidding?” James said. “Ravenclaw hasn’t had a decent Keeper in centuries. Lewis was Gryffindor.”“She graduated in ’68 and she was definitely Gryffindor,” Marlene McKinnon shouted from the girls’ side of the common room. “She was friends with my older brother.”James’s face lit up. “How good of friends? Think your brother could score us tickets to a Harpies game?”“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Frank shouted. The first years shut up. Frank pinched the bridge of his nose. He wasn’t riled, nor red-faced and furious like Evans, but he was clearly peeved, to say the least.“Now,” Frank said, forcing his voice to calm, “Gryffindor has held the House Cup for the past three years running. As some of you may know—” He threw a pointed glare at James. “—Gryffindor hasn’t come in dead last in house points since 1734.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. He had a feeling he knew where this was going.“However,” Frank continued, his voice slowly losing whatever control he’d had over it a moment ago, “it is only the second day of the term and we’re somehow sitting on minus fifty points! Not only that, but three of you have earned detention—”“Three?” Sirius asked, scrunching his face up in confusion. He exchanged a look with James, then at Remus and Peter. “Wasn’t us,” Remus muttered, equally confused. Slowly, the four boys turned to stare at the girls.Lily Evans flushed a deeper shade of red.Sirius smirked. “No way.”James’s jaw dropped. “Sirius,” he hissed. “I think I’m in love.”“What did you do, Evans?” Sirius asked. “What did you do, Black?” she shot back.Sirius threw up his hands in surrender and winked at her. “I made it right.”Lily blinked at him. Though surprised, she clearly understood what he meant. Sirius smirked. Bet she didn’t see that coming.“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Frank groaned. “The point is, three of you lot are in detention—two of you for an infraction that occurred on the bloody Hogwarts Express—and Gryffindor is not only leagues behind the other houses, but is currently sitting at minus fifty points.”The first years all looked at their feet, the very pictures of remorse and we-promise-to-try-better. All, except Sirius, that is. Sirius Black was of the belief that he already had enough about which he could choose to feel guilt. If guilt and shame were to be thrust upon him by any authority figure, let alone Frank Longbottom, Sirius was damn well going to do his part in earning it.“Hang on, Longbottom,” Sirius said. “You said we’re minus fifty points?”“Yes.”Sirius smirked. “Remus, you earned points in Transfiguration, right?”Remus narrowed his eyes. “Yes.”“How many?”“Ten.”“Evans, how many points did you lose for your mystery infraction?” Sirius asked. She scowled at him. “Twenty.”Sirius could taste victory. “And James and I both lost twenty. That makes a grand total of minus fifty.”“What’s your point, Black?” Frank snapped.The four boys looked at each other, all of them hiding wicked grins, all of them on the same page.“Just to be clear, Remus was the only one in this entire hose to earn points yesterday?” Sirius didn’t wait for Frank’s reply. “Seems to me the rest of you need to step it up.”“Definitely,” James said, mirroring Sirius’s smirk.“But instead,” Remus growled, stifling a yawn, “you chose to wake seven first years at the crack of dawn just to inform them that the burden of earning house points lies solely on our shoulders.”“Seems unfair,” Peter said. Frank opened and closed his mouth. His ears turned a bit pink.“But we’re Gryffindors, right lads?” Sirius said.“Right,” James said, echoed by Remus and Peter. “Right ladies?” Sirius said, catching Lily’s eye and throwing her a wink. Lily valiantly tried to hide a smirk of her own. “Right,” she said.“I’m no expert,” Sirius said, with a pointed look at Frank, “but I’m told that Gryffindors are brave.”Frank fumed. “I don’t—”“Which is why,” Sirius snapped, cutting him off again, “we’re willing to bear the burden of being the sole earners of Gryffindor house points, since the rest of you are, for some reason, incapable of earning points on your own.”“That’s not—” Frank started.“Although,” Remus said, now fully awake, with a smile tugging at the edges of his scars. “Sirius, we might be brave, but we’re not entirely daft. If the seven of us are the only ones earning points, it’s rather unreasonable to assume we’ll win the House Cup again.”“That’s right.” Sirius beamed, proudly. He walked right up to Frank, only slightly miffed that the prefect stood a good head taller than him. “So, Longbottom. Would you settle for not dead last? More specifically, second to dead last? There are only seven of us and, well, let’s be honest. James and I have a bit of a grudge against Malfoy that will probably cost us a few points. But, overall, I think we’re clever enough to still knock Hufflepuff to the bottom slot.”Frank scowled. “For the love of Merlin, Black—”“Hey, Frank?” James said. “If we win the Quidditch Cup, would you settle for dead last in house points? Because I can talk to the Captain about—”“No, Potter!”“Second to last it is!” Sirius shouted. “Hear, hear!” James said. Remus and Peter echoed the cheer. Marlene and Dorcas snickered, but clapped along.Frank buried his head in his hands in defeat. “Fine!” He trained his eyes on Sirius. “You know the goddamned rules. Whatever you do to Malfoy, I don’t want to hear about it. And make sure we don’t have negative points, Black.”Prefect duties fulfilled, Frank stormed out the portrait hole. All of the first years took an early breakfast. The girls sectioned themselves off a ways down the table—still basking in Sirius’s cleverness, or so he told himself—while the four boys sat closest to the head table. James elbowed Sirius as he sat down and Sirius gasped. Remus shot him a concerned look, clearly ready to say something to James, but Sirius waved him off. He took his place next to James, very carefully out of elbowing distance. Despite the fact that James and Sirius were now on excellent terms and Sirius no longer feared eating in front of James, Remus still made Sirius’s plate and handed it across the table. Disregarding the odd look from Peter, Sirius accepted the plate and poured tea for himself and Remus. “What do you reckon Care of Magical Creatures will be like?” Peter asked. All Gryffindor first years had a double block of the class after breakfast. “Do you think there’ll be dragons?”Sirius scoffed. “No, there won’t be dragons.”“Not until next year,” Remus said with a smirk.Peter gulped.“Want to have lunch at the lake, afterwards?” James asked. “Might be nice, before winter’s here.”“Can’t,” Sirius said. “I’m meeting my cousin at Hagrid’s.”“Your… cousin?” James said, cautiously.“Andromeda,” Sirius clarified. “The only good one out of the lot. She’s staying in Hogsmeade. I’d invite you lot, but—”“Don’t worry about it. We’ll meet up later,” James said, casually waving him off. “Andromeda seems alright.”Sirius smirked, popping a piece of bacon in his mouth. “Yeah, she told me she met you in Diagon Alley. She also said you owed her ten Galleons. What’s that about?”“Merlin, I forgot,” James groaned, fishing the Galleons out of the pockets of his robes and tossing the coins to Sirius. “I sort of bet her that you’d fall in line with the rest of your family once you got to Hogwarts.”“Thanks for the vote of confidence, mate,” Sirius deadpanned. He wasn’t too upset about it. Given who the rest of his family was and the types of beliefs they held, Sirius probably would’ve bet against himself as well. “In my defense, Andromeda threatened to hex me if I didn’t take the bet,” James said. “What about basilisks?” Peter asked, clearly still stuck on the Care of Magical Creatures thing. “Do you think we’ll have to fight them?”Sirius rolled his eyes. “Merlin, Pete, no. It’ll probably be something cute and fluffy. Like McGonagall in cat form.”“McGonagall has claws,” Remus reminded him. “And though she may be fluffy, she’s still very much a predator.”“There you go, Pete,” Sirius said. He reached across the table and snagged some of Remus’s bacon, having eaten all of his own. Remus growled, but allowed it. “Cute and fluffy or no, you’re probably going to get eaten alive.”Peter whimpered a little. James laughed.Overhead, the morning owls swooped in. A great brown-and-gold flecked owl landed in front of James and deposited a letter in his lap. James slipped the owl a bit of his biscuit and the bird flew off. Then, James opened it, smiling as he read. Ten seconds later, another owl swooped in and deposited a letter on Sirius’s empty plate. It was the same, unmarked parchment as yesterday. Sirius exchanged a look with Remus over the table. Rather reluctantly, Sirius reached for the letter.“Sirius, wait!” Remus hissed, his eyes fixed on the letter.Sirius froze, remembering the boils.“What’s going on?” James asked, looking between the two of them.Remus ignored him. “Are you going to open it?”Sirius almost said no, almost flicked his wand and made the stupid fucking letter dissolve into ashes, but then again…Instead, Sirius tapped the letter with his wand. It teetered a bit in midair, almost as if it were about to fall back onto his plate, but once he tapped it again, the letter opened, just out of James’s line of sight. I told you to stay away from James Potter. You will end any association you have with him immediately and will not so much as SPEAK to anyone like him.
We will discuss your Sorting at Christmas.
Sirius felt himself go pale. He looked across the table, seeking out Remus’s amber eyes, desperate for comfort, desperate to know he’s safe, here and now.Come Christmas, he’s fucked. Remus seemed to read his expression. “How bad?” he whispered.Really, really fucking bad.Just as he knew she would, his mother had started a list of grievances. She’d keep track, until Christmas, of every breath he took at Hogwarts castle. Sooner or later, she’d find out about Remus. Merlin, the things his mother could do to Remus.“Sirius?” Remus prompted.“What the hell is going on?” James demanded. “You’re freaking me out, mate. What’s the letter say? Who’s it from?”Sirius didn’t—couldn’t—reply.How long before his mother’s fury turned from him and extended out to his friends?“Oh, for Merlin’s sake…” James made a grab at the letter.Sirius stood, panicked. It was cursed. The letter was fucking cursed. His mother’s curse, which could be fucking lethal, for all he knew. He pointed his wand at the letter. “Incendio!”The letter and half of Gryffindor table caught fire. The four boys jumped up, panicking, until James pointed his wand and shouted, “Restinguo!”The flames died. The four boys stood frozen. The rest of Gryffindor table gaped at them, but luckily, none of the teachers seemed to be privy to the commotion. Clearly, random fires in the dining hall were not uncommon occurrences.Ever so slowly, the four boys sank back into their seats. “What the fuck was that, Sirius?” James hissed. Sirius gulped, his eyes fixed on the pile of ash in front of him. He let out a slow breath, eyes seeking out Remus for support. Remus, ever the picture of undue sympathy and compassion, gave Sirius a small nod. Without looking at James or Peter, Sirius said, “My mother… Er, well. She wasn’t too happy with my Sorting. She has a nasty habit of putting curses on her letters.”James’s jaw went slack. “She what?! Sirius, that’s illegal. She can’t go around cursing her own son, least of all here.”“Strictly speaking, it’s not Dark Magic. Or at least it wasn’t yesterday,” Sirius mumbled.“Yesterday?” Peter squeaked, alarmed.Sirius grimaced, kicking himself for his own stupidity. “Boils,” he admitted reluctantly.Remus leaned in closer. “Have they all gone?”“Most of them,” he replied. There were still a few on his chest, open sores that had popped before he’d been able to burn the letter yesterday. All things considered, though, the boils and Kreacher’s bruises on his ribs were healing. Compared to a few days ago, he was hardly in any pain, so long as no one touched him.“Boils,” James repeated. His dark, tanned skin appeared vaguely greenish. Sirius nodded. “Frowned upon, but not strictly illegal. Walburga’s speciality,” he said, with a bit of a smirk, but his attempt at humor fell flat.James was silent for a minute, before he slammed his flat palm against the slightly charred surface of the table. Sirius jumped. “That’s it,” James snapped. “You still have boils? Good. I’m taking you to Dumbledore.”James reached out, grabbing Sirius’s wrist.Sirius reacted immediately, letting out a faint yelp and nearly flew out of his seat. As he did so, he banged his knees on the underside of the table.Without hesitating, James made to grab Sirius again, but Remus drew his wand and pointed it at James. “James, leave it!” Remus hissed. James turned on him. “You’re okay with this, Remus?!” he demanded. “It’s fucking child abuse!”“Keep your voice down!” Remus stage whispered, glancing around. No one was paying any attention to them, save for Lily Evans, who seemed to have half an ear towards their conversation, all the while nodding along to whatever Dorcas was saying. He lowered his wand.“I won’t fucking stand for this!” James snapped. “He’s hurt. His mother cursed him. If you lot won’t go to Dumbledore, then I bloody hell will!”“No!” Sirius shouted. All three boys turned to him, stunned, as did most of the Gryffindor table. Sirius waited a moment, until everyone else lost interest, then lowered his voice. “No, James. You can’t go to Dumbledore.”“Why the fuck not?!”Sirius met dark brown eyes and struggled to keep his voice steady. “Because I’m her son and heir, and look what she’s already done to me. You’re the son of blood traitors. Remus is a half-blood. Pete, well. Pete’s Gryffindor and that’s enough. You make her your enemy and nothing will fucking stop her.”“I’m not afraid of your mother, Sirius,” James said, puffing his chest a little. Ever the bloody stupid Gryffindor.“You should be,” Sirius said, without missing a beat. “My mother will curse you black and blue, with whatever she can get away with, and then some. And, James? Speaking from experience, she won’t bloody stop at the Unforgivables.”Sirius watched all the anger seep out of James Potter. All that was left was a mask of horror.Peter gulped, then piped up: “But those… Unforgivables, they’re—”“Illegal?” Sirius prompted, with a self-depreciating laugh. “Yes, but my mother is extremely adept at security wards and, technically speaking, the Ministry can’t trace the Unforgivables unless a victim is stupid enough to come forward.” He threw a pointed glance at James. “And, if they did, well. My father owns half the Wizengamot and can easily blackmail the rest of them, if it were ever to come to a trial.”James shook his head. “Sirius, you can’t just expect us to—”
Yes, I damn-well can.
Sirius had to keep them safe. He’d rather march into hell this very instant and kiss the devil’s arse than allow Remus, James, and Peter to go down with him. “Swear to me,” Sirius said.“What?”“Swear on your magic you won’t tell anyone about this,” Sirius said. He looked at Remus and Peter. “All of you.”A little ways down the table, Sirius caught Lily’s eye. She was definitely watching, intrigued by whatever was going on, but decidedly looked away. Sirius shook his head. If he had to, he could deal with Evans later.James gaped at him. “Sirius, you can’t expect us to—”Remus held up his wand. James shut his mouth. “I, Remus John Lupin, solemnly swear upon my magic and my wand, that I will never speak of the secret atrocities committed by the Blacks to anyone, without the express permission of Sirius Black.”Sirius shot him a weak smile and said, “Thank you.”Remus elbowed Peter, who held out his own wand. “I, P-Peter Percival Pettigrew, solemnly swear on my wand and my magic, that I will never speak of the atrocities committed by the Blacks to anyone, without the express permission of Sirius Black.”Three sets of eyes turned to James.“Fine!” James said, exasperated. He raised his wand. “I, James Fleamont Potter, solemnly swear on my magic and my wand, that I will not speak of the secret atrocities of the parents of Sirius Black, without the express permission of Sirius Black.”Sirius noted the change in language, but didn’t comment on it. Instead, he said, “Your middle name is Fleamont?”Remus snickered into his tea.James puffed out his chest a little. “Yes, it is. What’s yours?”“Orion,” Sirius said, pulling a face. “Any chance you want to trade?” Sirius hadn’t known what a Clabbert was until he saw one hanging from Professor Cuckoo’s arm in Care of Magical Creatures. As per McGonagall’s instructions, the first year Ravenclaws and Gryffindors reported to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, where they were greeted by none other than Professor Cuckoo and his recently-acquired pet Clabbert, Hickory Dave.In Sirius’s strict opinion, Professor Artemus Cuckoo bore a striking resemblance to the Clabbert, Hickory Dave. Both had abnormally long, lanky limbs not unlike a chimpanzee, and both had pinched, frog-like noses that were far too broad for their respective facial features. The only discernible differences between the two was the copious amount of hair covering Hickory Dave, as well as the rather obvious, green knob that protruded from the Clabbert’s forehead.That, and the fact that Hickory Dave was most certainly female. Her previous caretaker—an idiotic and eccentric American by the name of Toby Beans—had had an affinity for Kentucky barbecue, but had no practical understanding of any female primate anatomy. He’d only discovered the particular ins and outs of Hickory Dave’s biology when she’d fallen pregnant. Unbeknownst to Beans, Clabberts were rather amorous creatures and tended to breed quite rapidly and, much like more than a few country hicks in the Kentucky wilderness, were not entirely opposed to the concept of incest. Poor Hickory Dave had fourteen pups within a year, before ol’ man Beans even considered getting her and her children fixed. Of course, when he did so, the Magical Congress of the United States of America was promptly alerted to the presence of unsanctioned magical creatures and Hickory Dave and her brood were relocated to better homes. Other than their unreasonably short gestation periods and their affinity for in-breeding, Clabberts, said Professor Cuckoo, were rather docile creatures. They had an extremely heightened sense of smell, especially for primates, a voracious appetite, and were known to be quite cuddly when sleepy, which was why they were often taken from their habitats in Southern America to serve as sort of black market pets for wizarding children. The knobs on their forehead, Cuckoo said, changed color with the Clabbert’s mood. More specifically, green was for content and awake, as it was most of the time, blue was for asleep, and red was for mortal danger. After explaining all this, Professor Cuckoo flicked his wand and small bowls flew into each students’ hands. Next to him, Remus held his bowl at arm’s length, clearly repulsed by the smell and trying not to breathe too deep. Sirius held his up, for closer inspection. He was pretty sure something was wiggling in the brown and yellow mush. A few of the Ravenclaw girls yelped. Peter dropped his bowl entirely.“What in Merlin’s name is this?” James said, holding his up.“That, Mr. Potter,” said Professor Cuckoo, “is Hickory Dave’s favorite lunch. Can anyone tell me what it is?”James, Sirius, and Remus watched in horror as Lily Evans stuck her finger in the mush, scooped up a bit, and popped it in her mouth. Then, pulling a face, she said, “Mac and cheese, topped with live crickets, mayonnaise, and… Is that barbecue sauce?”Remus looked like he was going to be sick. Lily didn’t appear be doing much better.“Very good—Evans, was it?” Cuckoo said. Lily nodded. “Ten points to Gryffindor.”“Frank will be so proud,” Remus deadpanned. Sirius barked a laugh. “Was it worth it, Evans?” “Not at all,” she said. “Next time, one of you eats the crickets.”“Hear that, Pete?” Sirius said, leaning over James to look at the shorter boy. “You get Hickory Dave’s leftovers.”“Unfortunately, I don’t anticipate there being any leftovers. Hickory Dave hasn’t eaten since breakfast. I can assure you, she’s quite hungry. Plus, it seems that eating tends to keep her mind off her sudden inability to mate,” Professor Cuckoo said. “I’d like each of you to come forward and feed her what’s in your bowl. This is the primary way to establish trust with a Clabbert. You will need to feed Hickory Dave your entire bowl to earn full marks.”The first years formed a line. Remus snagged James by the elbow and marched him towards the back of the line, casting a wary glance at Hickory Dave. Sirius shrugged and followed. When it was his turn, he tried to wandlessly levitate the food into Hickory Dave’s mouth, but after a sharp glare from Professor Cuckoo, Sirius used his fingers. After his bow was empty, Sirius tossed it aside and twirled his fingers, vanishing any trace of Hickory Dave’s saliva or her disgusting meal. Sirius took his place next to James. Remus was the last one in line.However, the second Remus stepped within five feet of Hickory Dave, the Clabbert let out a guttural, ear-splitting wail and the knob on her forehead turned bright red. Several of the Ravenclaw girls screamed right along with it.Remus immediately stepped back, dropped his bowl, and raised both hands in surrender.Hickory Dave stopped screaming and the knob turned green again. She kept cautious, beady eyes fixed on Remus. Her nostrils flared.The second it was quiet again, everyone, including James, Sirius, and Peter, burst out laughing. Remus, however, seemed almost… heartbroken.“A-Alright, that’s enough!” cried a flustered and confused Professor Cuckoo. “Pick up your bowl and try again, dear boy.”Reluctantly, Remus obeyed. He looked over at the group of first years, and Merlin, there were tears in his eyes.Sirius stopped laughing immediately and elbowed James, ignoring the zing of pain that shot up his arm at the contact.Remus took a tentative step forward. Once more, Hickory Dave let out a wail and the knob on her forehead flashed red. This time, she tried to climb onto Professor Cuckoo’s back, trying to put distance between herself and Remus. Remus backed off again, his eyes focused on the forest floor. “I-I’m sorry, Professor, but I… I don’t think she’ll let me any closer.”“You sure she’s not just… full?” James asked.“No, no,” Professor Cuckoo said, giving Remus an appraising glance. “Unfortunately, it’s just her… nature, I suppose.” Then, to Remus, he said, “I’m afraid I cannot give you full marks, my boy, but five points to Gryffindor for two valiant attempts.”Remus did not seem to be in any way consoled by earning house points. “That’s enough for today. Read the next chapter in your books for next time. Class dismissed,” Professor Cuckoo said, before starting the trek back to the castle, Hickory Dave still hanging off his arm. One by one, the class followed him. Remus stayed frozen, staring at the ground.With a quick glance at James, Sirius took a step towards Remus, craning his neck a bit, trying to catch Remus’s eye.“Remus?” he said.Watery amber eyes met his. “It thought I was a monster,” Remus whispered. He bit his lip, right over the scar.“What? No, it didn’t,” Sirius said, mildly alarmed. Why on earth would Remus think a thing like that? Sirius cast a look at James and Peter, silently begging for support. The other boys nodded along. “She probably just thought you didn’t shower, or something.”Remus, much to Sirius’s relief, still had the capacity to look mildly insulted. “I did so shower,” he said.“Then perhaps Hickory Dave didn’t like your soap,” Sirius said. “She seems rather fussy. She is American, after all.”That earned him a laugh.“We’ve got the rest of the period free,” James said. “Everyone still up for that picnic?”Remus and Peter nodded.“I’ll head to Hagrid’s now, then,” Sirius said. “See if I can’t catch Andromeda early. I’ll meet up with you lot as soon as I can.” Sirius nearly swallowed his tongue when Hagrid opened the door to his hut. Hagrid was fucking huge. He consumed nearly the entire doorframe and his beard hung down to his gut. His eyes were soft and kind, though the left one was rather purple and swollen shut. There was a golfball-sized lump on his forehead to complement the black eye.“Um, hi,” Sirius said, shifting awkwardly, trying not to stare. “Is Andromeda here? She told me to meet her—”“Sirius Black, is it?” Hagrid said.“Yes.” Hesitantly, Sirius stuck out his hand.Hagrid looked him up and down. “Ah, I wouldn’t do that, ‘f I were you. ‘Dromeda always seems to have a bit of pain whenever it comes to touchin’ me. I expect it’ll be the same for you.”Sirius yanked his hand back.“I do ‘preciate it, though,” Hagrid continues. “Yer mighty brave to offer yer hand to strangers, without knowin’ their bloodlines and all.” Hagrid shook his head. “Terrible thing fer a parent to do, really, brandin’ a child with that kind o’ magic. Real sorry ‘bout that.”Sirius felt his jaw drop. Hagrid knew about the tattoo on his chest. “Um, thanks,” he managed, not knowing what else to say.“Come on in, then,” Hagrid said, standing aside. “I’ve jus’ put on some tea. Hope you’re okay with rock cakes for lunch. ‘Fraid I don’t have much else lyin’ around.”Sirius squeezed past him, carefully avoiding contact with Hagrid. The hut was large, and clearly built for someone of Hagrid’s size and stature. Sirius sat in a high-backed, stone chair, that made him feel a whole lot younger than he was. From where he sat, his chin was even with the edge of the table. He’d always been a bit short, but this… This was ridiculous.Sirius turned sideways in the chair, pointedly ignoring the table, and instead, opted for watching Hagrid shuffle around the kitchen, occasionally muttering things to his cooking. “I added salt t’ this already, dinnit I? Oh well, bit more never hurt nobody.”Just then, something soft and fluffy crawled into Sirius’s lap and made itself comfortable. Sirius let out a yelp, jumped a little, and held his hands above his head in surprise, but the creature just kneaded his lap and let out a purr. Hagrid turned at the noise and boomed a great laugh. “Oh, that? That there’s Spot. She’s quite friendly. Excellent judge of character. She won’t bite you unless you deserve it.”Spot was covered in long, golden stripes, all the way from the tips of her ears to the extended length of her tail. Her face was a bit squashed and two fangs protruded from her lower lip. Sirius kept his hands in the air and wrinkled his nose a bit. “I’m, uh,” Sirius began, not wanting to offend Hagrid, but not entirely comfortable with the creature in his lap. “I’m not much of a cat person.”“Expect it won’t matter much,” Hagrid said, amicably. “Spot’s not a cat. She’s a kneazle. ’S why her tail’s so long. That’s usually how you can tell. That, and she’s real good at sniffin’ out untrustworthy folk.”Sirius didn’t quite know what to say to that, but he reached out a tentative hand and scratched the kneazle’s ears. Spot arched into his touch and let out a contented purr. “Look-y there,” Hagrid said, with a broad grin. “She likes you.”There was a knock at the door. A second later, Andromeda Black pushed the great thing open and stepped inside the hut. “Hagrid?” she said, peering around the door. “Merlin, what happened to your face?”“‘Dromeda,” Hagrid greeted, fondly. He set a steaming teapot down on the table, along with two, slightly-cracked cups. “Had a bit of a run in wit’ the Whompin’ Willow yesterday. Nasty thing, that tree. I was jus’ tryin’ to make sure it was takin’ root properly—Dumbledore just had me plant it over the holidays, see—and it nearly took my head off.”Sirius sat up straight. “The Whomping Willow?” he said.Andromeda seemed to notice him for the first time. “Sirius!” she exclaimed. She rushed forward, pulled him to his feet, and wrapped her arms around his neck. Spot, apparently anticipating all of this, jumped easily down from Sirius’s lap and twined her long tail with Andromeda’s legs, still purring. Though initially shocked at her reaction, Sirius squeezed his eyes shut and clung to his cousin, relishing in the painless physical contact. She held him for longer than was strictly necessary or comfortable, given Hagrid was still in the room, but Sirius was grateful. When finally she pulled away, she kept her hand on Sirius’s shoulder even when she took the chair next to him. Spot hopped right back onto Sirius’s lap and went to sleep.“Hagrid,” Sirius said, clearing his throat that was suddenly much tighter than it had been before Andromeda walked in. “What were you saying about the Whomping Willow?”“Jus’ that it nearly did me in,” Hagrid said. “Now, I figure I should jus’ let you two talk.” He eyed Sirius. “Expect you’ve got a lot to talk about and Madam Hooch said there’s some gnomes that’ve taken up in the Quidditch pitch. Reckon I’ll head out and handle that.”Hagrid grabbed a large, pink umbrella and opened the door. “Thank you, Hagrid,” Andromeda said, tightening her grip on Sirius’s shoulder. “Thanks,” Sirius echoed. Then, before Hagrid disappeared through the door, Sirius said, “Hagrid? Where’s the Whomping Willow at?”“Wha— oh,” Hagrid said, pausing. He pointed across the ground. “Jus’ there, at the edge of the grounds, towards Hogsmeade.” Sirius made a mental note and ignored Andromeda’s curious look. Hagrid, however, narrowed his eyes. “You ought to stay away from the Whompin’ Willow, Sirius Black. ’S not safe, ’specially for a first year.” Sirius held his gaze, but made no promises. “Right. Best be going, then.”Hagrid left. Andromeda flicked her wand and the tea poured itself into the cracked mugs. She held one out to Sirius, who took it in his hand that wasn’t currently scratching Spot’s ears. “So,” Andromeda said, taking a sip of her tea. “How’re you holding up?”Sirius didn’t reply right away, just stared straight back at Andromeda. She looked nothing like Narcissa. Andromeda wore her hair long, curly, and dark, where Narcissa’s was straight and revoltingly blonde. Andromeda did, however, bear a remarkable resemblance to Bellatrix, though Sirius wasn’t ever going to mention it. Andromeda was still a Slytherin and a Black; hexes came as easily as breathing to her, if she thought you deserved it. Andromeda’s eyes were different than Bella’s, though. They were grey, like Sirius’s, like all the Blacks, for that matter, but Andromeda’s were unreasonably kind. “Sirius?” she said again. “Are you alright?”
Is he alright?
Sirius scoffed. “No,” he said. “Not really. But I’m… better than I was that first night, I guess.”Andromeda nodded and took another sip of tea. “How’d she take it?”“How’d you expect?” he said. He sat forward a bit, and, with his free hand, lifted his shirt. The bruises from Kreacher were yellowing and greenish, a stark contrast to the raw, open sores from the leftover boils. Andromeda wasn’t phased. She simply nodded and drew her wand. “Want me to heal them?” she asked.“They’re from a curse,” Sirius said, scrunching his face and lowering his shirt again. “Didn’t think you could heal them.”“You can’t heal Dark Magic curses,” Andromeda said. “This isn’t strictly Dark. Or, at least I don’t think so. Repifarigo!”Sirius straightened. The pain in his chest immediately vanished. He lifted his shirt once more, this time revealing only smooth, unmarked skin, save for the tattoo above his heart. “Thanks,” he said, earnestly. “Can you teach me?”Andromeda smiled and repeated the incantation, while demonstrating the wand movement. Sirius mimicked the twirl and flick with his fingers. She narrowed her eyes at him. “Use your wand, you idiot,” she said, fondly. “You’ll hurt yourself otherwise.”“Right,” Sirius said, though, he figured there was a good chance he’d hurt himself anyway, if he tried to use his wand. It hadn’t exactly been cooperating with him lately.“Horrible curses aside,” Andromeda said, “how’s Gryffindor treating you?”“Bit of a rough start,” Sirius admitted. He reached into his pocket and pulled out James’s Galleons. “But James Potter sends his regards.”Andromeda laughed and pocketed the Galleons. “Knew he’d come around. I imagine he was a bit of a prat at first, though.” “Yeah,” Sirius said, with a small laugh. “He was, but we’re fine now. Besides, I had another friend, before James came around.”“Oh?”“His name is Remus,” Sirius said. He hesitated a bit. “He’s a half-blood.”“Ah,” said Andromeda, understanding. “How’d you deal with it, with Ted and everything?” Sirius asked, gesturing to the tattoo on his chest. “I mean, when I shook Ted’s hand, it hurt, but I’ve never felt pain like I do whenever Remus touches me.”Andromeda’s eyes widened a bit. “Really?” she said. “And you’re sure he’s not Muggle-born?”“Yes,” Sirius replied. “His dad was Ravenclaw.”“Huh,” Andromeda said. “Have you told him about the tattoo?”“No,” Sirius said. “But he, ah. He kind of guessed. Not specifically, really. Just that it hurts whenever someone touches me.”“Yeah,” Andromeda said, setting down her cup and giving him a small smile. “Ted guessed that pretty early on, too. It’s harder to hide from someone when you want to scream nearly every time they touch you.”“How’d you handle it?” Sirius asked again. “With Ted. With everyone, really.”“Well,” she hesitated. “With Ted, it was different, wasn’t it? I, well. I liked him, which basically meant I avoided him for nearly five years, even though he damn well followed me everywhere. Then, I told him the truth.”“The whole truth?” Sirius asked, alarmed. Andromeda sighed. “No, not at first. But, eventually, yes. I told him all about it. My parents, the pure-blood fanaticism, the tattoo, and the fact that they have three suitors lined up for me to marry. He took a while, but he accepted it. Accepted that I wasn’t like them, more like.”“You’re not,” Sirius said firmly.She bopped him on the nose. “Neither are you, oh, noble Gryffindor.”Sirius smiled, then twined his fingers with Spot’s long, striped fur. “I asked for it, you know,” he said. “I asked the Hat for Gryffindor.”Andromeda gave him a sad smile. “I asked it for Slytherin. It kept trying to argue with me that I’d be best suited for Hufflepuff.”“What?!”She shrugged. “It has something to do with loyalty. I’m sneaky and cunning enough to get away with Slytherin, sure. Plus, there’s the whole family history. The Hat just argued that I’m also kind or something else I absolutely couldn’t afford to be. Then, well. Guess I wasn’t brave enough to be anything other than the embodiment of the tattoo on my chest when I was eleven.”Sirius gaped at her. “I’m not… ‘Dromeda, I’m not brave.”“But you want to be,” she said, kindly. “More than anything, Siri, you want to be brave.”“Walburga’s going to kill me,” Sirius said, his voice tense and quiet. “I mean, she’s actually going to properly kill me.” “She won’t,” Andromeda replied, with all the conviction she possessed. “You’re the heir, for Merlin’s sake. The family won’t allow it.”“Then she’ll do the next best thing,” Sirius snapped. “She’ll hex and curse and Crucio me until I can’t see straight.”Andromeda was quiet for a minute, before she said, “Siri, if it gets that bad, you have to tell me. I know I don’t pull much weight around the Blacks, but I’ll get you out of there. I swear it.”Sirius shook his head. “I won’t leave Reg.”“Sirius, he’ll be okay. He—”“I won’t leave him, ‘Dromeda. Ever. If I leave him there, then Walburga takes her fury out on him. Then she starts asking where the fuck she went wrong with me and starts shaping him up to be the perfect, Slytherin heir to the Most Noble and Fucked House of Black. If I’m not there, Regulus becomes the same as Lucius Malfoy. Just another entitled fanatic, ready to sign up with the next Dark Wizard who starts singing the right tune. But—” He took a long, labored breath. “If I’m still there, I can save him.”“Why?”“What?”“Why?” Andromeda said again. “Why is it up to you to save him?”Sirius shrugged, like it’s obvious. “He’s my little brother.”Andromeda stared at him. “Am I supposed to save Narcissa, then?”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. Rather than answering that directly, he said, “What’s the alternative then? Run away from home? Even if I left Reg behind, where the fuck would I go?” Andromeda opened her mouth, but Sirius cut her off. “If I go to you, or if you helped me, we’d both be disowned and branded proper blood traitors.”He thought of his mother’s note, of the words BLOOD TRAITOR staring up at him in her neat, perfect handwriting. He thought of the boils that spread across his chest as he read the words, and all the horrible things those two words would mean for him.He’d never be able to touch his brother again.Regulus would be taught to hate him, just like his mother tried to get him to hate James Potter.Except there was the distinct possibility that Regulus would listen to their mother.She scoffed. “I’m starting to think being disowned might not be such a bad thing. You should see some of the gits my mother expects to court me these days.”He gave her a weak smile. “Well, I can’t risk all that. Whatever you’re suggesting, I can’t, ‘Dromeda. Not now. Not with Reg still stuck there.”Andromeda nodded, seeming to understand. “Then hold your head high and remember why you chose to be cursed instead of run away, my brave, sweet Gryffindor,” she whispered. “I’ll be there for you, afterwards, you know. Ted’s got the best healing potions I know of.”He nodded, stiffly. He didn’t want to think about healing potions right now. “Have you written to Regulus?” Andromeda asked, gently.Sirius cringed. He hadn’t exactly known what to say, though he expected his mother filled Regulus in on his Sorting. “No,” he said.“You should,” she replied. “He’d probably scared.”“Scared?” Sirius hadn’t thought of that.“He’s been listening to your mother scream for two days.”“Yeah,” Sirius said, reluctantly. “She wrote me a letter and called me a blood traitor.”Andromeda nodded. “See? Reg’s probably been listening to all the things she thinks are unfit for actual letters and are best said in person. He’s bound to be terrified. He cares about you, Siri.”“I know. I’ll write to him as soon as I can.”“Good,” she said. Then, she clapped her hands together and stood. “Now, I best be off. I told Ted I’d stop by before I head back to the Ministry. Oh, Merlin, we didn’t even eat and I… hm.”Andromeda trailed off and stared at Hagrid’s untouched rock cakes on the table. “Are those even edible?” Sirius asked.“Not particularly,” she said. “Best not hurt Hagrid’s feelings, though. It was kind of him to let us use his hut.”With a flick of her wand, the rock cakes levitated into the hearth. To Sirius’s horror, she had to stoke up the flames quite a bit to get them to burn and, even when they did, they only glowed like coals. Spot jumped down from Sirius’s lap and curled up in front of the fire. Andromeda reached into her robes and pulled out a vial. “Here,” she said, handing it to Sirius. “This is one of Ted’s. All the nutrition and calories of a full meal. Tastes kind of like herring, but it’ll hold you over.”Sirius eyed the vial, but took it and downed it in one go. “Thanks, ‘Dromeda,” he said, trying to hide his grimace. “You’ll be alright?” she asked.“I will be, while I’m here,” he replied, with a shrug. She nodded. “Owl me if anything comes up. I’d love to see you again before the hols. Ted would too. We could meet up here again, until you’re old enough to visit us in Hogsmeade.”“That sounds wonderful,” Sirius said, relieved to not only have her on his side, but to have her close.Andromeda stepped forward and pulled him into another bone-crushing hug. Sirius dug his fingers into her robes and held on. “I love you,” she said. “Be careful, yeah?”“I will.”“The fates never wanted you in Slytherin, Siri,” she said with a sad smile. Andromeda planted a kiss on his forehead. “My braveheart, Gryffindor” Sirius couldn’t help but mull over Andromeda’s words as he trudged away from Hagrid’s hut, a little reluctant to go back to the castle just yet.
My braveheart, Gryffindor.
He wasn’t brave. He hadn’t been brave enough to tell Andromeda about his dying wand.At the thought of his wand, Sirius froze, mid-step. He turned away from the castle, back towards Hogsmeade and the Forbidden Forest.The Whomping Willow wasn’t exactly hard to identify. Even as a sapling, it towered over the surrounding trees and shrubs. Its ash-grey branches flayed wildly at a figure sitting cross-legged, just out of reach of the longest limbs.“Remus?” Sirius said, genuinely surprised.Remus jumped and turned to face him, nearly twisting into the Whomping Willow’s reach, but he easily ducked out of the way of a stray branch. Outside, in the noon sun, his scars were pale, barely perceptible lines across his face. His eyes glowed a brilliant amber and looked just a little panicked at having been caught in the presence of the Whomping Willow.“What are you doing here?” Sirius asked.Remus shrugged, in a clear effort to seem nonchalant. “James and Peter had that picnic,” he said, fiddling with the corners of his jumper. And, really, thought Sirius, it was much to warm to be wearing a jumper. “They decided to go swimming in the lake, and I…”Remus trailed off and gestured helplessly at his face. He refused to meet Sirius’s eyes.It took Sirius a minute to catch on. “Ah,” he said, as gently as he could manage. “Scarred all over, huh?”Remus gaped at him, alarmed. “What?! No, I—”“Don’t worry,” Sirius said, holding up his hands in surrender. “I’m not trying to pry, I swear. I just…” He searched for the right words. “I know the feeling. That’s all.”Remus stared at him for a long, uncomfortable minute. Then, he gestured to the spot next to him. Cautiously, Sirius sat down next to him, just out of the Whomping Willow’s reach. After a few more minutes of silence, Remus mumbled, “At least your marks go away.”No, Sirius thought, absently rubbing his tattoo through his shirt. Not all of them. There was a tattoo on his chest, right above his heart, that read Toujours Pur. He’d rather drop dead of Dragon Pox than let anyone see it.He didn’t dare say any of that out loud.The two boys sat in silence, dwelling in their respective miseries, for longer than either cared to admit. The Whomping Willow continued to swing at them, its branches groaning and creaking with each swipe, but as much as it strained and croaked, Sirius and Remus remained just out of reach. “It never stops, does it?” Sirius said, mostly just to fill the silence.Remus shook his head. “Hasn’t stopped trying to strangle me since I got here.” He turned to look at Sirius. “Why are you here? You never said.”Sirius shrugged. “Hagrid specifically told me to stay away from this tree.”“So, naturally, here you are.”“Exactly,” Sirius replied. He paused for a minute, then reached into the pocket of his robes for his wand. He held it in his lap, twirling it around, tracing the intricate sigils and patterns with his finger. Remus watched him, a curious look on his face. “My wand’s made from this tree, you know.” Sirius’s voice came out even and measured, despite the sinking feeling in his gut. It pained him to think about his wand, this beautiful, once powerful thing in his hand that he’d cursed and damned right along with his own soul. “What?” Remus said, rather sharply. He looked between the wand and the tree a few times, a weird mixture of alarm and shock swimming across his face, in between his scars. “Yep,” Sirius said. “Ollivander said it was made from an enchanted tree, just planted at Hogwarts over the holidays. This one fits the bill, unless you know of any other magical trees around?”Remus was quiet for a moment, before he said, “No, I don’t.”Sirius hummed in reply. “Ollivander said the tree was a guardian of a great secret.” He paused to stare down at his wand. “He said that the keeper of this wand was destined to fight for the secrets he keeps, just like the tree the wand’s made from.”“Oh,” Remus said.“What, in Merlin’s name, could a tree be keeping secret?”Remus turned his eyes back to the Whomping Willow. “Probably something dark and horrible, I’d imagine,” he whispered. Sirius scrunched up his face. “Why’s it got to be dark and horrible?”“Why else would it be guarded by an enchanted tree that tries to take people’s heads off?”Honestly, Sirius hadn’t thought of that. Or, perhaps, he’d been deliberately trying not to think about that. “Can I…” Remus started. “Can I see your wand?”Sirius stared at him for a second, considering. Then, he flipped the wand over in his hand and held the handle out to Remus. Sirius watched as Remus’s amber eyes went wide. “Merlin, Sirius,” Remus said, feeling the wand in his hand. “It’s heavy. And…”“And what?” Sirius asked, mildly alarmed. Could Remus sense that the wand was dying? Could he feel the Dark Magic Sirius had cast to save his little brother?“It’s cold,” Remus said simply.It’s dying, Sirius wanted to say, just to get it off his fucking chest, but he bit his lip. “Ollivander said…” Sirius started, trying to control the tremble in his voice, “that he’d had a hard time finding a wand core that fit with the enchanted wood. That’s why it’s all… wonky, sometimes.”It wasn’t a complete lie. Not really. For all intents and purposes, it was mostly true, except the wand core had fit, had suited him perfectly, before he’d gone and poisoned it.“What kind of core, then?” Remus asked.“Unicorn hair,” Sirius mumbled. Remus gave him a small smile and handed the wand back. “Wand cores can be replaced, you know.”“They can?” Sirius squeaked, unable to fully contain the sudden burst of hope that swelled in his chest.Remus nodded. “I read about it in a book. The History of Western Wand-Crafting, or something like that. Sometimes cores—especially unicorn hair—wear out or are destroyed. The right wand-maker can forge a new core with the same wood. The tricky part is getting it to fit with the same wizard or witch. Most opt to get a new wand instead of replacing the core.”“Yeah, well,” Sirius said, “I won’t have any luck with that. This is the only wand that even remotely obeyed me.”“Then perhaps you should look into switching out the core.”“How?” Sirius asked, genuinely curious. “Do I just walk up to a unicorn, pluck a strand of hair from its tail, and hope I don’t get kicked in the face?”Remus laughed a little. “No,” he said. “Besides, if Ollivander said the wand core doesn’t fit the wood, then maybe you shouldn’t be looking for a unicorn hair at all. Wands can be made using hairs, heartstrings, or teeth from any magical creature. Maybe find one that’s a bit more comparable with the wood from an enchanted tree.”“Huh,” Sirius said, thinking it over. “Think Hickory Dave will be up to donating a hair to the cause?”Remus snorted. “Doubt it. You should owl Ollivander. See if he has any suggestions.”If Sirius owled Ollivander, he’d have to explain why his wand was dying in the first place. Still, he managed a smile and said, “I’ll think about it.”Remus held his gaze for a second, before he stood. “We should get back.”Sirius stood as well, except he stumbled a bit on the edge of his robes and staggered towards the tree. He felt the whoosh as the Whomping Willow’s branches all changed direction, converging on him. He was vaguely aware of Remus shouting his name. On pure instinct, Sirius raised his wand, squeezing his eyes shut, anticipating the impact.Five seconds later, he was still standing. Sirius opened his eyes.The Whomping Willow was calm, almost frozen, save for the gentle sway of its branches.“Holy shit,” Remus said.Sirius lowered his wand a bit. The branches seemed to track and mimic the movement. Then, even as the two boys continued to stare at the tree in amazement, Whomping Willow bowed before Sirius’s wand.He threw a glance at Remus, then lowered his wand completely. The Whomping Willow did not move. Hesitating slightly, Sirius took a step forward, then another, until he was standing right under the low-hanging branches. He reached out a hand, then placed it flat on the trunk.Objectively speaking, Sirius Black had been exposed to a great number of magical artifacts, places, and people from a very young age. He was naturally attuned to the magical lifeblood that tended to course through such people and things. It is not unfair to say that he’s quite competently able to tap into that magical undercurrent from time to time, with a wave of his fingers or a flick of his wrist. That, essentially, was what wandless magic entailed, after all. But this tree… Merlin, it was alive with magic. That wasn’t what surprised him.It was the innocence, the purity, the… latent protective fury he sensed just underneath the surface. Whatever secret the Whomping Willow guarded, it was precious—sacred, almost—and worth any amount of pain and suffering so long as it remained protected.The secret was loved by the Whomping Willow. There was no other plausible way to describe it.Sirius didn’t know how long he stood there, basking in the remarkable magic of the Whomping Willow, before he managed to pull his hand away. Remus stared at him, about a thousand emotions flashing across his eyes. Sirius couldn’t read a single one of them and it annoyed him how much that hurt. “Come on,” Remus repeated. “Let’s go back.” That night, in detention, Slughorn left six cauldrons on his desk and a note on the chalkboard that read, Polish all of these before you leave. No magic. I’ll know if you cheat.“Where’s Slughorn at, then?” James asked, selecting a cauldron and moving it to one of the desks. He wrinkled his nose at the smell.Sirius waved his hand in front of James’s face, once again temporarily numbing his sense of smell. He repeated the spell on himself. “He has a previous engagement,” Sirius said, remembering his now-revoked invitation to dinner. “Just a few of his favorites from prominent families and what not. I was told that Malfoy and Narcissa would be in attendance. Probably guests-of-fucking honor.”James snorted. “And look at you. The heir to House Black, stuck in detention, instead of kissing the arse of some ratty old professor and sipping fancy wine.”“To be quite honest, I’d prefer to be here, cleaning cauldrons filled with… Merlin, what is this stuff?” Sirius cautiously poked the viscous greenish sludge adhered to the rim of his cauldron. “Flobberworm entrails.” Both boys turned to see Lily Evans storm into the room, grab a cauldron off Slughorn’s desk, then slam it down right next to Sirius’s. She grabbed a scrub brush, rolled up the sleeves of her robes, and got to work.James and Sirius gaped at her. “Careful,” Lily said, glancing at the goo on Sirius’s finger. “Get that in your eye, and you’ll go blind.”He followed her gaze, then wiggled his fingers a bit. He didn’t quite know if she was telling the truth or having one over on him, but he wasn’t going to risk it. The flobberworm goo disappeared from his hand. Next to him, James remained frozen, his mouth agape and catching flies. Once again, James couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of Lily. “So,” Sirius began, turning back to Lily. She ignored him. “Not only did you get detention, but you got detention from Slughorn. We haven’t even had him in class yet.”Lily continued to ignore him. She didn’t even seem bothered by the smell. She just kept scrubbing her cauldron.Sirius slid into the seat next to her and leaned in close. “No, really, Evans. What did you do?”Lily huffed, clearly irritated by his pestering. “I broke into the Slytherin dormitories.”“What?!” Whatever Sirius had been expecting, it wasn’t that. James looked rather gobsmacked. “Lily Evans, will you marry me?”“Oi, Potter!” Sirius whirled back to face him, feigning betrayal. “I help you execute a truly brilliant prank that involved Malfoy running naked through a crowd, and all I get is a bunch of peas dumped on me? Where the hell is my marriage proposal?”This, thankfully, seemed to snap James out of his Lily-Evans-induced trance. He glared at Sirius. “If you manage to break into the Slytherin dormitories without being caught, I’ll buy you a ring and snog you right in the middle of the Great Hall.”Sirius smirked. “You’re on, mate.” Lily looked between them. “You two are insane.”“Thank you,” Sirius replied. “Now, Evans, I need details. How’d you do it and why?”“I’m not telling you how,” she said, smoothly. “I know you’re a bit desperate for that kiss, Black, but I can’t make it too easy.”“Fine,” he conceded. “Then why, in Merlin’s name, did you break into the Slytherin dormitories?”“My friend’s in Slytherin. He was being a prat. I wanted to talk to him.”Huh. Just the facts, then, Sirius thought. Lily shrugged, tried to play it off as casual, but Sirius could see the pain and hurt just below the surface. She wore the mask well, though. He’d give her credit for that. If he hadn’t known the act—hadn’t worn that mask a hundred times himself—he wouldn’t have noticed. James certainly didn’t.“You have friends in Slytherin?” James asked, incredulous.“Yes, why?” Lily shot back, defiantly. “Does that mean our brief engagement is off, Potter?”“Yes. No. Maybe. I don’t know,” James stammered, looking incredibly conflicted. “Which friend?” Sirius said, trying to save James from embarrassing himself further.“Severus.”“Snivellus?!” James said.Lily put down her scrub brush and glared at Sirius. “You taught him that?”Sirius shrugged. “Why was your friend being a prat?”“Why the hell should I tell you?” Lily snapped.“You don’t have to,” he said. “You just seemed upset.”Lily Evans seemed rather taken aback by this. “Severus has made friends in Slytherin and… They don’t like me.”“Why don’t they like you?” James asked.At the same time, Sirius said, “Which friends?”Lily looked between them, trying to decide which question was safer to answer. After a second, she met James’s eyes. “I’m Muggle-born. The Slytherins seem to find that offensive.”Sirius nodded and leaned back in his seat. “Ah, Jamie, so not only did Snivellus rat us out to Malfoy and ol’ Sluggie, but he’s actually managed to make friends with the git.”Lily flushed red. “Well, what would you do, Black? He needed friends and—”“He needed protection,” Sirius snapped. “He’s a half-blood, isn’t he?”“How did you—”“I have my sources,” Sirius replied, remembering Narcissa brushing against Snape on the Hogwarts Express and her cringe of pain. “Snape needs protection, because the alternative is having Malfoy treat him just the same as he treats you. It’s all about blood purity to them.”“And it’s not to you?” Lily shot back.“Obviously not. I’m Gryffindor, aren’t I?”“Fine,” Lily said. “Then shake my hand.” How the hell did she possibly know about that? Sirius thought. He eyed her hand, knowing the pain it would cause, knowing what both her and James would think if he refused.He shook her hand. Merlin, the pain coursed through him, like fire in his bones, but Sirius held firm, kept his gaze focused on her remarkably green eyes, and grit his teeth through it.Much to his surprise, Lily pulled away first, with a tiny yelp. Her face scrunched up and she shook her hand.James, suddenly a knight in shining flobberworm goo, drew his wand and pointed it at Sirius. “What’d you do?”“N-nothing!” Sirius protested, just as shocked as James. “I didn’t do anything!”She shouldn’t be in pain. Not from touching him. He couldn’t transfer the curse, could he? No. There was no way. Lily didn’t have a tattoo. She was Muggle-born, for Merlin’s sake. A normal, boring, incorruptible Muggle-born witch. No one held her down and branded her skin when she was eight years old. “Potter, stop! It wasn’t him.”“Then what was it?!” Sirius demanded, trying and mostly failing to keep the rising panic out of his voice.Lily refused to look at them and took to staring at her hand. “A parting gift from Malfoy,” she said, her voice quiet. “He said it was to help me remember what I am, at least for a few days. I didn’t notice it at first—not really—not until…” She took a shaky breath. “Not until Divination, this afternoon. Marlene was supposed to read my palm and...”Sirius’s heart was in his throat. “It hurt when she touched you?”Lily nodded.They’ve weaponized it. Salazar’s balls, Malfoy’s figured out how to use the curse without the tattoo.“I switched partners,” Lily continued. “I was fine when… When Dorcas read my palm.”“She’s Muggle-born,” Sirius said. It wasn’t a question.Again, Lily nodded.“And it hurts when you touch me or probably James or when you brush up against a good number of people in the halls?” Sirius asked.“Yes,” she said. “Touching you… hurt a lot.”Feeling’s mutual, he thought. It hadn’t been nearly as painful as touching Remus, but she was still Muggle-born. If he hadn’t been anticipating the pain, he’d have reacted just the same as she did.James looked between the two of them. “Will one of you please just explain what’s going on?”Sirius glanced at Lily, who nodded. “It’s a blood curse,” he said. “A temporary one, but still a blood curse.”“What’s that mean?” Sirius sighed, praying to the gods that he doesn’t give too much away. “It’s an old pure-blood custom. Some families… Well, they’d tattoo their kids with a mark of some kind, in a blood spell ritual. The intent was to keep their children from being able to touch anyone of a lesser blood than themselves. It’s to stop them from marrying Muggles and tainting the bloodlines, or something.”“That’s barbaric,” Lily said, the disgust plain in her voice.Sirius felt his throat constrict and he struggled to maintain control. “It… It is. Yours, though… Malfoy must have modified the curse, to make you feel the pain if you touch someone of a more pure bloodline.”“So when I touch Dorcas, it doesn’t hurt, because she’s Muggle-born,” Lily said. “Like me.”“Exactly,” Sirius said.“How long will it last?” James asked, looking slightly pale.“For pure-bloods, it’s the tattoo that seals the blood curse,” Sirius said. “She doesn’t have a tattoo, so whatever curse he did can’t hold long. Couple days, at most.” Then, to Lily, he said, “When did he curse you?”“Last night,” she said. “Right after he caught me in Severus’s dorm.”“Is there any way to reverse it?” James asked.“Not that I know of.” Sirius sighed. Merlin, he’d give anything to be able to answer that question differently. “I’ll look into it,” Lily said. She narrowed her eyes at Sirius and for a brief second. Merlin, it was like she’d looked into his soul and seen every dark secret that was there. “In case Malfoy tries to curse me again,” she clarified, almost as an afterthought.“Right,” he said, a little unsure of his voice. “In the mean time, Jamie, we’ve got to find a way to get back at Malfoy.”Without hesitating, Lily said, “I want in.”“No!” James and Sirius shouted, a bit too quickly.“Why the hell not?” Lily snapped, crossing her arms.“You need to stay off Malfoy’s radar,” Sirius said, slowly. “Otherwise, he’ll just renew the curse as soon as it wears off.”“Plus, he’s a prefect,” James said. “Even if we told someone, he’s likely to get away with it.”“I’m not a damsel in distress, you know,” Lily spat. “I’m not yours to protect.”“Didn’t say you were,” Sirius replied, before James could say something stupid. “Look, if you want to get back at Malfoy, I’ll help you plan an elaborate, complicated, and anonymous prank that he’ll never be able to trace back to you. But this?” He gestured to her hands. “This calls for immediate action and public humiliation. James and I can take the fall for whatever happens. All it will cost us is a couple detentions and probably cause Frank to have a small aneurism, but it’ll be worth it.”Lily seemed conflicted, warred with herself for a minute, then threw her hands up in defeat. “Fine,” she said. “But whatever you do, you’ll keep Severus out of it.”James and Sirius exchanged a look. “Alright,” James said. “Good.” Lily picked up her scrub brush again. “And Potter?”James perked up, eager for her attention. “Yes?”“I’m afraid our break-up is still rather fresh for me. I don’t know if I’m quite ready to be friends with you just yet.”James pouted. “What? I—”Sirius cackled. “You’re alright, Evans.”“Oi!” James smacked his shoulder. Sirius winced a little, but otherwise shook it off. “Now, Jamie, about this little bet of ours,” Sirius said. “Is there a consolation snog if I break into the Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff dorms?”
SEPTEMBER 4, 1971
James and Sirius both rose early the next morning, despite the fact that it was Saturday, as James repeatedly told Sirius on their way down to the Great Hall. They spent most of the morning sipping tea—well, coffee for James—and catching up on the homework they’d put off because of their evening detentions. Peter joined them around nine, just as the last of the food was disappearing. Two hours later, a disheveled and disoriented Remus Lupin trudged into the Great Hall, still wearing his pajamas and dressing gown. Like the day before, his unruly curly hair stuck out in almost every direction, except for the left side, which had, until recently, been comfortably pressed into his pillow. Remus took his usual seat at the table, across from Sirius, folded his arms, and went right back to sleep. The three boys stared at him, then at each other. After a second, Sirius summoned a kettle and poured a cup of tea. “Wake him up,” he said to James. As carefully as he could, James nudged Remus. Remus let out a long groan, then sat up, his eyes still closed. Sirius slid the cup of tea across the table. Remus grabbed it and took a long drink. “You alright, mate?” Sirius asked, leaning in a little.Remus was pale today and the scars on his face were pinkish and rather obvious. After taking another drink of his tea, Remus managed to nod and opened his eyes.“Holy shit,” Sirius said.“What?” James asked, alarmed, looking betweens the two of them, trying to figure out what was wrong.“Your eyes,” Sirius said to Remus, leaning in even closer. “They’re gold.”They were, too. Deep, shimmering gold, like freshly polished jewelry left out in the sun. Sirius had never seen anything quite so inherently mesmerizing. Remus flushed bright red and stared pointedly down at the table, even as James and Peter tried to see his eyes for themselves.“They definitely were not gold yesterday,” Sirius said.“Trick of the light and sleep deprivation,” Remus mumbled, still avoiding their gazes. “Sleep deprivation?” James asked. “Mate, it’s almost noon.”“What?” Remus said, mildly alarmed. “Remus, are you alright?” Sirius asked again, a feeling of unease settling over him. Something was wrong, something was about to happen, he was sure of it.“I—” Remus started, then sighed. “I have to go away for a few days. I’m leaving tomorrow afternoon.”“What? Why?” Sirius demanded. “For how long?” Peter asked.“You’ll miss Quidditch tryouts!” James exclaimed, apparently quite offended by this.“I thought first years couldn’t try out,” Peter said.“They can’t,” James pouted. “But I figured it’d be as good of a time as any to acquaint Remus here with the wonderful world of Quidditch, before—”“Remus,” Sirius said, his voice firm and unrelenting. James immediately shut up. “Why do you have to go away for a few days?”Sirius regretted his tone instantly, when Remus finally looked up at him. Tears glistened in his eyes, making the gold irises dance and glitter through whatever secret Remus was keeping. Sirius’s face fell, horrified he’d made Remus look like that: scared, lonely, and helpless to whatever tragedy lurked behind his scars and his golden eyes.“M-my mum,” Remus stammered. He took a deep breath and his voice evened out. “She’s… sick. It’s just me and my dad, and he works quite a bit, so she needs my help when there’s a flare-up. She, uh. I need to go home and… and make sure she’s alright.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. It sounded like a lie, like any one of the thousands he’s told to excuse his own panic, to hide the fact he can’t touch anyone less than pure-blood, or to hide any one of the injuries he’d recently acquired. But that look in Remus’s eye… Whatever waited for Remus at home, it fucking terrified him.Sirius knew the feeling, that one of dread so powerful and overwhelming that you feel it in your bones.His stomach turned over at the mere possibility that Remus Lupin, who was so kind and wonderful and tolerant of Sirius’s secrets… that Remus had to face the same kind of monster Sirius did, every time he set foot in Grimmauld Place.“Don’t go,” Sirius said.James and Peter turned and stared at him.Remus made a strangled noise and ducked his head, but not before Sirius saw a tear fall down his cheek. “Sirius, I…” Remus’s voice sounded coarse and painful. “I have to go. I don’t have a choice.”“What’s wrong with your mum?” Peter blurted. Sirius shot him a glare. Remus, however, didn’t seemed to mind the question. “It’s a Muggle thing, called lupus. There’s no cure, but she’s not dying. It’s… it’s a chronic condition and she has bad days every once in a while. Can hardly feed herself or anything, and when my dad’s not there, well. That’s why I have to go home.” He paused, tried to meet Sirius’s eyes, but quickly looked away again. “My parents, they… They talked to Dumbledore before I came to Hogwarts. He’s aware of the situation and has agreed to let me leave when I need to.”“When will you be back?” James asked.“Don’t know for sure,” Remus muttered. “Probably a couple of days, at least.”“What about your classes?” Peter asked.“Take notes for me?” Remus said, sheepishly. “Look, I’m sorry to have to ask that, but I don’t—”“It’s not a problem,” Sirius said, quickly. Remus looked at him and the two stared at each other for a long moment.Eventually, James slammed his hand on the table. “Right,” he said, hesitantly “Well, Slytherin’s holding their Quidditch tryouts today. Peter and I are going to go stake out the competition. Do you two want to—”“No,” Sirius said. A second later, Remus shook his head as well.“Right,” James said. “Catch you later, then. C’mon, Pete.”James and Peter left. Aside from a few Ravenclaws and the Hufflepuffs just a tad bit too eager for lunch, Sirius and Remus were alone in the Great Hall. Sirius couldn’t shake the feeling that something felt off, like he was staring out over a cliff with jagged rocks at the bottom, with a sudden and inexplicable urge to jump. The air between him and Remus buzzed with danger, with fear, and that horrible, indescribable scent of impending doom. From the look in his bizarrely golden eyes, Remus felt it too. “Why can’t someone else look after her?” Sirius asked, knowing how selfish and horrible his question sounded.“I told you,” Remus said, quietly. “There’s no one else. Has to be me.”“Why?” It was redundant, he knew. He was grasping at straws, trying to find something—bloody anything—that would convince Remus not to go. “You’re in school, for Merlin’s sake. She’s got to understand that—”“She’s my mum, Sirius.”“If my mother were suffering like that, I’d do a dance at her bedside and let her fucking rot.”“My mum doesn’t send me curses via owl post,” Remus snapped.“No?” Sirius shot back, his temper rising. “Did she do that to your face? Or did you really fall out of a tree?”Remus fucking growled at him.Fuck, fuck, fuck. Sirius opened and closed his mouth. “Remus, I— Merlin, I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry. I didn’t—”“I know, Sirius,” Remus snapped, in between heavy breaths. Then, avoiding Sirius’s eyes and still looking rather upset, he stood. “Look, I have some things to take care of, before I leave. I’ll see you around.”“Remus, wait—"He was already gone. Sirius Black did not mope.Or, at least, if you asked him a week ago, he definitely did not mope. The occasional violent rampage, sure. He’d been known to break a few of Walburga’s fine china just to get back at her. And, though he’d loathe to admit it, there’s been a time or two where he’s cowered in the corner and cried his bloody eyes out, but he did not mope.Apparently, Remus Lupin was the exception to nearly every rule Sirius had, because he sure as hell was moping now. He spent most of the day shuffling aimlessly around the castle, trying to focus on an essay or a bit of reading for McGonagall, but it was almost entirely useless. He’s pretty sure that however many coherent sentences he was able to string together ended abruptly with, “I’m so fucking sorry” or, “Please, don’t go.” He made a mental note to rewrite them after he tracked Remus down, groveled a bit, and managed to make an adequate apology whilst still maintaining his stark opposition to Remus’s upcoming trip.The problem was, of course, no matter where he looked, he couldn’t find Remus. James and Peter were no help; they spent the afternoon down on the Quidditch pitch, mostly booing and hissing at the Slytherin team. Sirius made his way into the stands, around three in the afternoon, to ask if they’d seen Remus, but they hadn’t.Sirius distracted himself, mostly, by writing a letter to Regulus. It took him the rest of the afternoon, as he kept scribbling it out, crumpling it up, starting over, only to end the letter to his little brother by crafting some apology to Remus once again. Eventually, he settled on short and to-the-point:
Reg,
I’m sure you heard the news. I’m doing alright, though, I promise. I’ve managed to make a few friends. All things considered, I’m glad this is the way it played out.
The ceiling in the Great Hall is fucking spectacular. I can’t wait for you to see it for yourself.
I hope you’re doing okay there, by yourself.
I love you,
Sirius
P.S. If Mrs. Blanche Withers tries to read this, please tell her I respectfully said she should go fuck herself.
By the time dinner rolled around and Remus still hadn’t turned up anywhere, Sirius was entertaining the possibility that the castle had spontaneously decided to swallow him whole.Remus wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye, would he?James and Peter spoke animatedly about the Slytherin Quidditch team. “Did you see the grip Malfoy had on his broom? You can’t make a single, bloody turn with a grip that tight, let alone dodge a bludger. If he handles his cock like he handles his broom, Merlin, it’s no wonder he’s—”“Please, stop!” Peter squeaked, covering his ears.As much as Sirius would normally love to join in a conversation regarding Malfoy’s inadequate manhood, he couldn’t seem to focus on anything but the cold potatoes on his plate and his need to find Remus. Sirius stood abruptly and headed for the dormitory. If he’s being quite honest, he’s not even sure James and Peter noticed he’d gone.Once inside the boys’ dormitory, Sirius begins pacing. Remus wasn’t anywhere, for Merlin’s sake. Even if he was, he probably didn’t want to talk to Sirius, probably wouldn’t accept an apology. He’d go off to his family, they’d hurt him, maybe take him away forever, then Sirius would never get to apologize. He’d lose his first friend—the first person to believe he could be different than the expectations placed upon him by his family—just like that. Sirius tugged his hair in frustration and sat down on the edge of his bed, suddenly trying to fight back tears. He couldn’t do this—he didn’t want do do this—without Remus. The hangings on his bed billowed around him, and there was a slight chill coming from—
Oh.
Sirius stared at the open window that led to the roof. Of course, that’s where he was. In retrospect, it’s the perfect spot. Obvious, but not intuitive. Safe, but solitary. In a random and rather unexpected bout of inspiration, Sirius went to his trunk and dug out a Honeydukes chocolate bar that he knew Regulus snuck into his trunk, despite Sirius’s insistence that he very much detested chocolate. (“You gave me stars, I give you chocolate,” Regulus had said, with a slight pout. “If you won’t eat it, make a friend.”)
Make a friend.
Taking a breath and going over the thousands of apologies he’d worked out over the course of the afternoon, Sirius crawled out the window and onto the slated, shingled roof. Remus sat there, his knees pulled up to his chest, a thick, wool blanket wrapped around him. He didn’t look at Sirius as he made his way carefully onto the roof. Merlin, they were up high. Gryffindor tower stood tall and proud, and overlooked most of the castle. It was a beautiful sight, really; the sun had set and cast the grounds in a dull, purplish glow. The mostly-full moon sat low on the horizon and a few stars dotted the sky.“Hey,” Sirius said, sitting down next to Remus. Hesitating slightly, Sirius nudged him, when Remus still refused to acknowledge him. The touch didn’t particularly hurt, with that thick blanket wrapped around him, but it still stung a little. Nothing near the pain he knew he’d come to expect from touching Remus. Sirius held out the chocolate bar. “I brought this for you.”Finally, Remus looked at him. Merlin, his eyes gleamed, golden and perfect, in the fading light. It was eerie, really, but absolutely breathtaking. There was a ferocity in Remus’s eyes that Sirius had not anticipated, as well as a brokenness, that he’d seen so clearly earlier. Remus took the chocolate and turned back to the stars.“I…” Sirius started. Merlin, why was this so hard? “I’m sorry for what I said. I didn’t mean it and it was totally uncalled for.”“It’s alright, Sirius,” Remus said, quietly. “No, it’s not. No, it’s fucking not,” he snapped, before he could stop himself. Remus blinked at him. “Merlin, I’m sorry. Again,” he mumbled. “I’m no good at this. I shouldn’t have said that. And… And I didn’t want you to leave without being able to apologize to you, because…”“Because?” Remus prompted.
Because what if you don’t come back? What if they tear you apart, carve out your skin, until there’s nothing left?
“Please don’t go,” Sirius breathed. It just came out, entirely without his permission. He slammed his eyes shut, couldn’t let Remus see the tears. “I have to,” Remus whispered. “I’m sorry, Sirius, but I have to go.”His mind conjured up half a dozen things he wanted to say in a fraction of a second. Dangerous things, that gave away how fucking scared he was. Things like, No you fucking don’t have to go, and, Please, Remus, you can stay here, where you’re safe, where no one can hurt you. Then, worst of all: I won’t let you go.“Then…” He fought for control of his voice. “Then promise me you’ll be alright. That you won’t get hurt.”“I—I can’t promise that.”What the fuck not? he almost said. Why the fuck are you going if you can’t promise me you’ll be safe?But then, suddenly, it all made sense. “Is this the dark and horrible secret?” Sirius asked. “The one you can’t tell me?”Remus was quiet for a long, drawn out moment. “Part of it, yes,” he said, and Sirius started to panic. Remus reached for him, trying to calm him, but pulled back. “Sirius… it’s not… It’s not what you’re thinking.”Sirius thought someone was hurting him, someone Remus knew was carving into his flesh like he was a Sunday roast, no mercy, no hesitation. Someone was etching those horrific scars all across his skin. “If I went to Dumbledore and begged…” Merlin, he couldn’t keep the desperation out of his voice. “Could I come with you? Just to make sure you’re safe. I’ll help with your mum, whatever you need, but could I—”“No!” Remus snapped, his eyes flashing in momentary panic. “No, Sirius you can’t come. Not ever, do you understand?”No, he didn’t fucking understand.“I’ll just follow you,” he said, defiantly.Remus’s voice was low, almost a growl. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you fucking dare. Please, Sirius, it’s too dangerous.”“I’m not scared.” Well, not scared enough to stop me from following you.“You damn-well should be!” Remus shouted. Sirius froze, utterly taken aback. Remus sighed and ran a hand through his messy hair. Then, in a measured voice, he said, “Why are you so convinced I’m going to get hurt?”“Because you’re fucking terrified!” Sirius snapped, his verbal filter suddenly retiring for the evening. “Because you won’t let me follow you because it’s too dangerous. Because you have scars across your face that had to have happened somehow. Because I fucking know what its like to be surrounded by monsters trying to hurt you for no other reason than because you’re fucking there!”Oh, Merlin. He hadn’t meant to say all that. Remus looked… well, heartbroken was the best word for it. “M-monsters?” he repeated.Sirius shimmied a little closer, wanting to hug Remus, wanting to pull him into his arms and hold him so he’d never leave, but he couldn’t. Even with the blanket, it’d hurt too goddamned much. He felt utterly helpless. “You don’t have to go,” Sirius whispered.“Yes, I do.” It sounded like a death sentence, like a white flag flying over a blood-stained field. It made Sirius’s blood boil. “No, you fucking—”Remus glared at him, his golden eyes flashing in the pale moonlight. “Why didn’t you let James take you to Dumbledore yesterday? Why did you make us swear we’d keep that secret?”Shit. Sirius knew where he was going with this. “This is different,” he insisted.“Is it?” Remus asked. “You made us swear to that secret because someone else would’ve gotten hurt otherwise. You chose that burden, that pain, that curse, because you didn’t want us hurt in your place.” He took a breath, and a few tears streaked down his face. “Me? I don’t get that choice. I don’t get to choose to take on that burden. It’s mine to bear, whether I like it or not. But the end result is the same.”Sirius was stunned. He took a minute to mull that over. Remus was… forced into this? And if he didn’t go, then… “You-You’re saying—” Merlin, Sirius’s voice was shaking and he couldn’t bloody stop it. “You’re saying someone will get hurt if you don’t go? Remus, who? Please, just let me help—”“You can’t help, Sirius.” Remus fiddled with the corners of his blanket. “No one can. But I—I still have to go.”“To keep someone safe.”Bright, golden eyes stared straight into his soul. “To keep you safe,” Remus whispered.That doesn’t make any sense, he desperately wanted to scream.Instead, he gazed into Remus’s eyes, silently begging for answers. “Safe from what?”Remus sighed. “That’s the secret, Sirius. That’s the dark and horrible secret that you can’t know. Not until…”“Not until we’re brave enough,” Sirius breathed, echoing the promise they’d made to each other on that first night.“Yes.”Sirius felt his eyes welling again, this time in defeat. He hated feeling helpless, and this? This just fucking sucked. He let out a breath. “Alright. Is…Is there anything I can do?”Remus gave him a small smile and held up the chocolate bar. “Share this with me?”Sirius barked a laugh. “Can’t. I’m allergic.”Remus quirked an eyebrow. “You’re serious about that?”“I’m Sirius about everything.”This time, Remus laughed. “That is a terrible joke.”Sirius nudged him with his shoulder. “You love it.”Initially, Remus froze at the contact, but when Sirius showed no outward sign of pain, he asked, “Why’d you have the chocolate if you can’t eat it?”Sirius smiled. “Because my brother’s a chocolate advocate. He, too, is greatly offended that I won’t eat it. He thinks if he drops enough hints, I’ll just give in.”“Good man, your brother.”“Yeah,” Sirius said. “The very best.”This time, Remus pressed against him, just for a second, the blanket still between them. Sirius closed his eyes, allowing himself to cherish the contact, even if it was only temporary. After a second or two, Remus pulled away. “Does… Does that still hurt?”Sirius shrugged. “A little. But not like it does without the blanket.”“You still feel the… pain through clothes, though?”“Yes. It’s worse with bare skin, but yes. Clothes don’t seem to matter much.”He didn’t know why it was so hard to talk about this with Remus, when he’d basically spelled out the details of the curse to James and Lily in detention. They didn’t know specifics, of course, and definitely not that he bore one of those tattoos, but they knew a hell of a lot more than Remus. Sirius wanted to talk about it, wanted to tell Remus why he couldn’t touch him, but…Remus knew about his mother. Hell, he’d sworn to keep her atrocities secret, but this…?This was too much. He was branded by a pure-blood family, who hated people like Remus. Sirius’s very touch was cursed with an inbred darkness that went back centuries. Remus took a substantial bite out of the chocolate, moaning a little as it melted in his mouth. “So…” He gestured to Sirius with the chocolate bar. “Whatever this is, whatever doesn’t let you touch people… it’s a curse?”Sirius huffed. “Something like that.”“Dark Magic?”“No,” he said. “More like… gray magic.”“Permanent?”“So far.” Which, of course, meant yes. There was no getting rid of the words on his chest. He’d already asked around, searched through every book on blood magic in the Black family library. There was no way around the curse.Andromeda found one, an uncharacteristically optimistic voice in his head chimed in. She can touch Ted, and he’s Muggle-born.He kicked himself for not asking her about that in person.“That’s horrible,” Remus said, snapping him out of his own thoughts.“So is whatever gave you your scars,” Sirius shot back, not knowing what else to say.Remus pulled a face, took another bite of chocolate, and chewed slowly. “I wish…” he started, but then seemed to choke on his words. Sirius nudged him again. “What?”There were tears in his eyes when he looked up. One or two trailed down his scarred cheeks. “I wish the scars weren’t the first thing people see, when they look at me.”“They weren’t,” Sirius said, with every ounce of conviction he possessed. “Not for me, anyways.”“What?” Sirius smiled a bit, at the memory, even though it was only from a few days ago. “I saw you from a distance, on the platform. First thing I noticed was your ridiculous hair and… and your eyes. Your eyes are…” He trailed off, because those eyes—now gold, not amber—were going to tear him to pieces. Sirius managed to shrug. “Couldn’t really make out the scars until I was sitting right next to you.”“Thank you,” Remus whispered. Instead of replying, Sirius leaned against him, content to stay there, close to Remus for as long as he was physically able. It was still early—before curfew, even—when Sirius and Remus climbed back inside. James and Peter weren’t back yet, but they could hear raucous voices coming from the common room. Walking few steps into the room, Remus yawned and stretched, the blanket pooling in a heap at his feet. “I have to—” He stifled another yawn. “—make arrangements early tomorrow morning. I should get to bed.”“Early for the rest of the world or early for you?” Sirius asked, not bothering to hide his smirk.“Ten,” Remus said. “So early for everyone.”“Ten is not even remotely early.”“It is on a Sunday morning,” Remus argued. Sirius went to his trunk and fished out his pajamas. “Mm, it’s still not that early,” he said. He darted into the bathroom, closed the door, and changed as quickly as he could. When he came back out, Remus was already dressed and straightening his button-down, pin-striped top.“I’ll be up, you know,” Sirius said, trying to sound casual. “You’ll say goodbye, won’t you?”Remus nodded. “‘Course I will. It’s only for a few days, Sirius.”
A lot can happen in a few days.
“Remus?” Sirius said, without much conscious thought.“Yeah?”He rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly unsure of himself. “Will, um. Will you stay with me tonight? In my bed? You don’t have to, if it’s weird, but—”Remus was quiet for a second, and Sirius very nearly panicked, but then, Remus smiled and said, “Yes. I’ll stay.”They arranged Sirius’s bed like they had the first night, the covers drawn and a pillow between them. They climbed in, facing each other, and Sirius flicked his wrist to close the hangings and dim the lights.Sirius and Remus stared at each other, far longer than either of them would care to admit. Eventually, Sirius said, “Your eyes… They glow. Did you know that? They glow like stars.”They did. They were ethereally beautiful, and Sirius couldn’t stop staring at them, terrified that if he did, Remus Lupin would disappear entirely and the night would be frightfully dark once more. Remus laughed softly, into his pillow. “Yeah, well. Yours look like the moon.”Sirius reached out, almost unaware he was doing it, and traced the pattern of Remus’s scars in midair, an inch above Remus’s face. “I wish you didn’t have to go,” Sirius whispered. “You don’t deserve to fight the same kind of monsters I do.”Remus closed his eyes tight and Sirius watched one, last tear fall down his face. A second later, miraculous golden eyes found his once more. “Everyone’s got their secrets… Their very own monsters.” Remus took in a shattered breath. “Siri, yours and mine? They tend to leave scars.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Andromeda,
Have you heard from Reg? I’ve sent him two letters in the last three days and he hasn’t replied. Can’t tell if he’s not speaking to me because of my Sorting, or if it’s because Warden Walburga is burning my letters.
I need to hear from him, even if he says he’ll never speak to me again. I left him alone in that goddamned house.
Sirius
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Sirius,
Send me your letter to Regulus. I’ll wrap it up in one of my own and send it to him. The Warden will be none the wiser.
He’ll be okay, Siri. He loves you.
Andromeda
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Andromeda,
I’ve enclosed a letter. It’s not very long, but… Merlin, I just need him to talk to me. I told him to send his reply to you.
Thank you.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
SEPTEMBER 7, 1971
On Tuesday morning, when Remus still hadn’t returned, Sirius was starting to get antsy. He kept scanning the halls, scanning the faces surrounding the Gryffindor table, desperate for a glimpse of ridiculously curly, honey-brown hair. Presently, he was silently fuming at Annalise Morkin, a second year Ravenclaw, who had short, curly hair, just a shade or two lighter than Remus’s. Every time he looked across the Hall, he caught sight of the back of her head and found himself almost calling out for Remus, only to sink back into his seat with a growing sense of dread.Remus should have been back by now. Merlin only knows what he’s going through.Sirius had been trying his best to continue on as if everything were normal. James and Peter certainly didn’t think anything of Remus’s absence, though, to be fair, they hadn’t seen the fear in Remus’s eyes when he’d said goodbye to Sirius on Sunday morning. Sirius was intimately familiar with that look; he saw it in the mirror every time he remembered the punishment Walburga had in store for him when he returned to Grimmauld Place for the Christmas holidays.Still, as long as James and Peter were going to continue to be blissfully ignorant berks about the whole thing, then Sirius vowed to try his damnedest to pretend that everything was just fucking fine. He’d insisted on taking notes for Remus in Transfiguration yesterday, even though he found McGonagall’s lecture on converting objects of a smaller mass into those of a significantly larger mass dolefully boring. But Remus had asked for notes, and Sirius was intent on delivering. Yesterday in class, when McGonagall had come up for air, either to scold someone on improper wand motions or to write something on the chalkboard, Sirius had flicked his wrist. Peter’s quill had instantly morphed into a rather large, brass candlestick. Peter, naturally, had let the thing drop and it had made an obnoxious series of clangs as it fell to the floor. McGonagall hadn’t seen Sirius cast the spell, but she’d kept a rather watchful eye on him for the remainder of the class. At one point, she’d even snatched away Sirius’s meticulous notes for Remus, because, “Taking notes and paying attention are simply out of character for you, Mr. Black,” and, “I had ever reason to believe you were passing notes with Mr. Potter.”He’d wanted to snap back, tell McGonagall that she knew absolutely nothing about his character, but he’d managed to keep his mouth shut. During the lesson’s practical, Sirius hadn’t managed to shake her ever-scrutinising gaze, so, just like the previous week, he’d been forced to transfigure the goose feather into a wooden spoon using his wand. Once again, his spoon came out a bit charred and bent at an odd angle, but McGonagall had deducted significantly fewer points than she had the first time. Sirius took this to mean that she’d been reluctantly impressed by his bit of wandless showmanship with Peter’s quill, though he had no doubt she was still watching his every move, just waiting for some kind of slip up. Even now, he could see McGonagall at the head table, her face turned towards Professor Sprout, seemingly engaged in conversation, but every now and again, McGonagall would glance his way and narrow her eyes.Just then, James sat down across from him, a wicked grin plastered on his face and his glasses slightly off-centre. “Sirius, I’ve got it,” James said.“Got what?” “Merlin, pay attention, mate,” James complained, with an eye roll. “I’ve got a plan to get back at Malfoy.” Before Sirius could say anything, a tall, fit redhead plopped down next to him and gave him a nudge. Instinctively jerking away from the contact, Sirius jumped, only to more or less crash into an identical redhead on his other side.Sirius froze, expecting pain, but not really feeling anything more than a mild irritation at the contact. It took Sirius a full three seconds to realise he was pretty much seated in the lap of the redhead on his right. He surreptitiously shifted away, back into his place wedged between them. The other redhead, on his left, burst out laughing. “Bet you never thought you’d be getting a lap dance from the Black heir, eh, Gid?”“Yeah, you should be so lucky,” Sirius bit out, straightening his robes and absolutely refusing to blush. “Bit rude, wouldn’t you say so, Gid?”“Ah, just what I suspected, Fabian,” said the redhead called Gid.“Another Black,” Fabian said.“Alas,” said Gid. “Not a drop of decency or mischief in him.”“What a waste.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. Ah, so this was a test. James flashed him a brilliant smirk, but said nothing. Sirius looked from one twin to the other. “Decency? Definitely not. I’m rather insulted you would think so little of me. But mischief…?” Sirius flicked his wrist and both twins sprouted long, fuchsia pink beards that clashed violently with their red hair and freckles. The twins exchanged a look, completely unperturbed. “Wandless magic,” Gid said.“Impressive, for a first year,” Fabian said. “But a coloured beard?”“Not entirely original.”“I can do better,” Sirius said.“Prove it,” said Fabian.Sirius glanced across the table to James, who gave him a half-hearted shrug. “They did this to me, too,” James said. “Show them something and then we can talk business.”“All right,” Sirius said, again glancing between the twins. “What do you want me to do?”“Ah, to have such a willing young disciple,” Fabian cooed, slinging an arm around Sirius. A second later, Sirius felt Gid’s arm sneak around his waist. He was, effectively, sandwiched between the twins. Remarkably, their touch didn’t hurt—not really. They must be pureblood, whoever they were. “Ol’ Frankie’s been getting on our nerves lately,” Gid said, nodding down the table, where Frank Longbottom sat across from a pretty, blonde girl. “That’s Alice Fortescue. She’s in our year,” Fabian said, following Sirius’s gaze. “Frankie’s not shut up about her since she earned the points that broke Gryffindor into positive digits, all in one go,” said Gid.“Just, Alice this and Alice that, these days.”“We miss the days where he was breathing down our necks for losing house points.”“We’ve been replaced,” said Fabian, feigning a broken heart. “I’m afraid Frankie’s forgotten all about what a good little mischief tastes like,” said Gid.“We’d like you to remind him. Right, Gideon?” Fabian said. “Right.” Gid—or Gideon, it seemed—leaned in close, then whispered in Sirius’s ear, “But don’t get caught.”Sirius took a moment to consider. Then, he leaned back, reached behind Fabian, and flicked his fingers at Frank. A few green sparks shot across the table, but not enough for anyone to notice if they weren’t already looking.At first, nothing happened. The twins exchanged unimpressed looks. James grimaced a little.Frank picked up his fork. It immediately turned a very specific shade of green. Sirius smirked, though he wasn’t entirely sure the twins noticed the effects of his jinx until Frank picked up his glass of pumpkin juice. The glass, too, turned Slytherin green. Then went his spoon and the tablecloth and his plate and a strip of bacon Frank picked up and popped into his mouth. He brushed his fingers against the sleeve of his robes and those, too, faded to green.One by one, heads began to turn towards Frank and the expanding collection of green items around him. Frank, however, was so enamoured with Alice Fortescue, that he somehow failed to notice anything at all. Alice, too, was completely oblivious, and stared lovingly into Frank’s eyes. On either side of Sirius, the twins snickered.Then, it happened: Frank reached across the table, in what would have been a disgustingly romantic gesture, and took Alice Rowan’s hand.Alice Fortescue turned Slytherin green. For a moment, everyone was silent, waiting for Frank’s reaction. Confused, Frank glanced down at Alice’s hand. He seemed to notice all of the green around him. He glanced helplessly around the table, noting how the people seated on either side of him seemed to back away, clearly afraid of turning green themselves.Alice Fortescue, much to her credit and Sirius’s relief—he hadn’t meant to hurt or embarrass her, after all—held up her hands to inspect them. “Well,” she said, cutting through the silence, “I think I look rather good in green. I bet it brings out my eyes. Wouldn’t you say so, Frank?”Fabian and Gideon roared with laughter, each of them slapping Sirius on the back. Their uproar was echoed by the rest of the Gryffindor table. Frank turned bright red. Looking back and forth down the table, his gaze landed on Fabian and Gideon. “Who... Who did this?” Frank demanded.“Looks like you did, mate,” Gideon said with a smirk. Frank reached to run a hand through his hair, but seemed to decide against it. Instead, he clenched and unclenched his fists right in front of him. “I see that, thanks,” he snapped. “But who—”“Wasn’t me or Gid,” Fabian said, honestly. “Look at the colour, though,” James pointed out, throwing a wink at Sirius. “My money’s on the Slytherins.” “Bloody Slytherins,” Frank growled. He stood, surveying the Slytherin table from a distance, clearly trying to discern a likely culprit. As Frank stormed towards the Slytherin table to enact his vengeance, Sirius took pity on him and flicked his wrist at Frank to reverse the jinx, lest he accidentally turn the entire castle green. Fabian slapped Sirius on the back. “A Midas Jinx!”“A wandless Midas Jinx!” Gideon echoed. “Haven’t seen one of those in ages.” Fabian grabbed Sirius’s hand and shook it. “Seems we’ve underestimated you, Black.”Gideon tore Sirius’s hand away from his brother. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”“Fabian and Gideon Prewett,” Fabian said. “We’re mostly interchangeable, but—”“But if you call either of us Molly—”“They will never find your body.”Sirius glanced between the two, then at James. “Why would I call you Molly?”“Their older sister,” James explained. “Ah,” Sirius said. “How do you feel about Elizabeth? Can I call you that?”Fabian leaned back and stroked his pink beard. “Yeah, s’pose Elizabeth is fine. Though Gid here’s more of a Lizzie.”Gideon laughed. “You’re all right, Black.”“Sirius,” he said. Fabian smirked and leaned over the table. “Right, then, Sirius and Potter. Looks like you’ve got yourselves a bona fide distraction.”Gideon set a potion vial on the table. “And a few doses of Prewett’s Hiccuping Secrets.”“Patent pending, of course,” Fabian said. “Hiccuping Secrets?” Sirius repeated, eyeing the vial. “Merlin, I like the sound of that. What’s the plan?”Gideon smirked and tucked the vial back into his robes. “Meet us in the Astronomy Tower, tomorrow night.”“Don’t be late,” Fabian said, tossing Sirius a wink. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Neither James nor Sirius were particularly looking forward to seeing Slughorn in Double Potions that morning. The night before, Slughorn had had James, Sirius, and Lily slicing grime from severed centaur hooves, supposedly to be used in today’s lesson.“Christ,” Lily had muttered, looking more than a little green. “The centaurs better have been dead when these hooves were cut off.”“Yes,” James had replied. “But then you’d have to wonder how they died.”“Best not to ask questions,” Sirius had said. Now, a small platter full of hoof shavings sat at each table. As the first year Slytherins and Gryffindors walked in, they began to pair off: Marlene with Dorcas, Lily with Snape, and the Slytherin Carrow twins together. James moulded himself to Sirius’s side, but Sirius waved him away. “You should go with Pete,” Sirius said. “He’ll need more help than me.”James raised an eyebrow. “You sure?”“Are you kidding?” Sirius asked, pretending to be insulted. “I’m practically a Slytherin. There’s a Potions Master in my veins, Potter.”“You’re about as humble as a Slytherin,” James muttered, but he gave Sirius a smile. “You’ll be okay?”“I’ll partner with Remus when he gets back.” Sirius glanced over James’s shoulder, at Peter. Peter, oblivious to the two of them, wandered to the far end of the room. He picked up a piece of hoof shaving and sniffed it. “Besides, it looks like Pete’s a bit confused.”James looked over. Peter, as if on cue, stuck the hoof shaving in his mouth and nibbled on it.“Merlin—PETER!” James shouted, rushing over. Peter started coughing. James slapped him on the back until the hoof shaving dislodged from his throat and went flying across the room. The shaving landed in front of Snape, who looked positively revolted.Sirius just laughed and claimed the empty bench next to James and Peter, sitting down and propping his feet up on the second chair. “First rule of Potions, Pete,” he said. “Don’t eat the ingredients.”Peter smacked his lips, clearly trying to get the taste out of his mouth. “What was that?”James grimaced. “Probably best if you don’t know, at this point.”“He’ll find out soon enough,” Sirius mumbled. Just then, Sirius looked up and there was a Slytherin girl smiling down at him. She was blonde, short, and had the same high-cheekbones as any pure-blood family. Her name was Greengrass, or something. He’d seen her at a few of his parents’ gatherings, over the years, and had maybe spoken to her a few times. He’s pretty sure, at one of these gatherings, Regulus had gotten a sugar quill stuck in her hair. “Hi, Sirius,” she said, blinking blue eyes at him beneath long eyelashes. “I still need a partner. Can I sit with you?”Sirius shot a panicked look in James’s direction. James pulled a face, his dark eyes wide and clueless.“My partner’s out for the day,” Sirius said, quickly, after his silent exchange with James amounted to absolutely nothing. “Um, sorry…?” Merlin, for the life of him, he couldn’t remember her first name. He got the distinct impression she would not take kindly to being referred to as Ms. Greengrass. “Kayla,” she said, looking a little hurt. “Kayla Greengrass.”“Right,” he replied, trying to look sheepish. “Sorry.”Kayla Greengrass sulked to the other side of the room and sat in an empty bench, by herself. “Where’s your boyfriend, Black?” Severus Snape sneered, leaning across Lily Evans. Lily Evans cuffed Snape upside the head. It seemed that Malfoy’s curse had mostly worn off, at least.Snape ignored her completely. “Did he get those scars before or after he learned he’d have to spend the next seven years sharing a dorm with you? Because if I were him, I’d want to claw my face off too.”Sirius felt his blood start to boil. He stood and drew his wand, even before he had a conscious thought about doing so. James wasn’t far behind him. They both pointed their wands at Severus Snape. Snape stood up and drew his own wand. Lily grabbed his arm. “Severus, sit down!”Snape shook her off and sent a jinx flying towards James and Sirius. They easily dodged it, but Peter yelped and ducked under the table to avoid further crossfire. Snape didn’t seem too bothered that he missed. “Do your parents know about him yet, Black? That you’re making eyes at a scarred, half-blood fag?”“Hey!” James said, affronted. “Remus isn’t a—”“At least I didn’t bend over for Lucius-fucking-Malfoy the second I was sorted into Slytherin, eh, Snivellus?” Sirius said.“Sirius!” Lily hissed. Sirius ignored her. “Does my cousin know about your sordid arrangement? I should probably tell you that Cissa is definitely the jealous type.”Snape flushed bright red. In an instant, he shoved past Lily Evans and punched Sirius in the face.There was a very distinct crunch of bone and pain erupted from Sirius’s left cheek.Sirius blinked a few times and tenderly felt his cheek. He was dazed, and maybe a little out of it. Everything played out in slow motion, as if everyone in the room seemed to forget how to transition from frozen to animated once again. Half the class was on their feet, Gryffindors and Slytherins pointing their wands and shouting at each other. Lily Evans used all her meagre bulk to keep James from tearing Snape a new one. Sirius felt a vague and disembodied swell of pride for James: his wild hair all over the place, glasses askew and very nearly slipping from his nose, and wand drawn, trying desperately to aim a curse around Lily without hitting her in the process. It was still a rather new feeling, having someone who’d defend him, even though Sirius hardly thought he needed defending in this particular circumstance. He didn’t know if it was stupidity or some form of loyalty that stemmed from their newfound friendship that made James want to defend him without question. Perhaps it was just Gryffindor bravery, plain and simple, or that urge to win the fight first and worry about the consequences later. Or, maybe it was that wild and dangerous instinct to protect, avenge, and destroy any threat. That little zing of unhindered fury that Sirius felt when Snape called Remus a fag, or that fire that boiled in his veins when he’d seen Auclair’s fingers wrapped around Regulus’s throat.Sirius didn’t know what to call it—loyalty, rage, or, perhaps most terrifying, love—but it was dangerous. Powerful. That instinct made him do stupid things, without hesitation. His ears rang, drowning out most of the commotion around him, and images kept flashing before his eyes: Regulus, on his knees, gasping for breath, bruises already forming around his throat; his father’s face, as he told Sirius he was proud; Remus, on the train, brilliant amber eyes smiling at Sirius like he was actually worth the effort; Remus, sitting cross-legged in front of the Whomping Willow, staring up at the tree like it held the answers to the universe; Remus, on the roof, gold eyes shimmering in the moonlight and glistening with tears, absolutely fucking terrified of whatever monsters awaited him. Merlin, Sirius prayed to every deity that might still care that Remus was all right. Vaguely, he became aware of a pair of hands on his face that were definitely not his own. Sirius blinked and, bit by bit, Kayla Greengrass came into focus. “Sirius?” she said, her eyebrows pinched together. “Sirius, are you all right? You’re bleeding.”Her fingers carded through his hair and Sirius jerked out of her reach. Her touch didn’t hurt—Kayla Greengrass was about as pure-blooded as they come—but he didn’t particularly care for the fact that she’d had her hands on him without his permission. It was different with James or even the Prewetts. Those were normal, casual bits of physical contact, nothing out of the ordinary between friends. Despite the pain, Sirius appreciated that he was included in that. It meant that they considered him their friend.With Kayla Greengrass, touching meant something entirely different. She wanted his attention—fucking craved it, judging by the hurt look on her face—and he didn’t want to give it to her. She was pure-blood. She was Slytherin. She was his future on a plate.She was everything Sirius would do anything not to become.Sirius shook his head, to clear it of intrusive thoughts. He waved Kayla away, even as she took another step towards him. A bit of blood trickled down his cheek, until it reached the corner of his lips. He tasted iron and, little by little, Sirius returned to the present.Everyone was shouting.Cautiously, he prodded his cheek. There’d been a definite crack, when Snape had hit him. Sirius was convinced Snape had broken his cheekbone, but no, it didn’t hurt enough for that. He down at his body, trying to figure out where else Snape had hit him and when and how he’d done it without Sirius noticing. It took him a solid few, dazed seconds to realise he wasn’t the one with the broken bone. Sirius laughed.One by one, the crowd fell silent, and all eyes turned to him. From his place behind a furious and rather imposing Lily Evans, Snape was livid. He held his right hand close to his chest.“How’s the hand, Snape?” Sirius smirked. It hurt, what with the bruise forming on his face and all, but it was worth it.“It’s fine,” Snape growled. “Really?” Sirius held up his hand and wiggled his fingers. “Go like this, then.”Snape didn’t move.“See, when you hit someone in the face, you’ve got to angle your hand just right, or you’ll break something,” Sirius said. “I’d be happy to show you, but I’m afraid it wouldn’t be a fair fight, since you’ve already broken your hand.”Lily turned her attention away from James and reached for Snape. “Severus?”“I’m fine,” Snape snapped, shoving her away with his good hand. Lily looked hurt. “Better get to the hospital wing, Snape,” Sirius said. “This isn’t over, Black,” Snape growled, heading for the door.“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Sirius called after him. “Same time next week?” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius didn’t bother healing the dark bruise and small cut on his face. He knew, in theory, that he could perform the spell—even wandlessly—without much of a hiccup. He’d spent the past few days, since Remus left, touching up on his healing spells. He’d always been pretty good at them, having grown up in Grimmauld Place, and all. He hadn’t had an opportunity to actually practice any of the spells recently, but he’d been idly mimicking the wand movements with his fingers and wrist at ever available opportunity. The fact was, Sirius could very easily heal himself without so much as a second thought.If Sirius was being honest, he’d reluctantly cop to the fact that he liked walking around the castle with a black eye. He liked the attention it gave him. He liked that it made him look tough. Gryffindors were supposed to be tough, right?Of course, it had absolutely nothing to do about the fact that Sirius loved telling anyone and everyone that Snivellus had broken his fucking hand trying to rough him up. All Sirius had was a little bruising and swelling. Nothing he wasn’t used to already. Or, maybe he liked the fact that, for once, he didn’t have to lie about where the bruising and swelling came from. Either way, Sirius refused to heal the bruise and wore it like a badge of honor. After lunch, a few first year students gathered outside the Ancient Runes classroom, waiting for Professor Idunn to open the door. Lily Evans stood, clutching her books against her chest, and stared at the door. Sirius smirked, then leaned against the wall next to her. Lily sighed and looked him up and down, her eyes zeroing in on the bruise on his face. “You shouldn’t have provoked him like that,” she admonished, but there was no real fight in her voice. She sounded resigned. “Hey, he started it,” Sirius said. “He called Remus a—”“I know,” Lily snapped. “I heard him. You were an arse, too, Sirius Black, but I heard what he said.”Lily bit her lip and averted her eyes. She was… upset. She looked like she wanted to cry. Sirius shifted, uncomfortably. For all his numerous lessons on etiquette and decorum with the best tutors money could buy, Sirius had no idea how to handle a crying girl. “Would it help if I asked how he was doing? No permanent damage to his hand or anything, is there?”Lily scrubbed a hand over her face and Sirius thanked his lucky stars that no actual tears fell. “Do you care?”He shrugged. “Not particularly.”She nodded, like that was the answer she was expecting. Sirius turned to leave her alone, maybe to go talk to Dorcas, or something, when Lily grabbed his arm.Merlin, it burned. In an instant, he jerked away, nearly throwing her off balance as he did so.“Fuck, sorry.” He reached out, as if to steady her, but definitely did not touch her. “I just…”He prayed she’d chalk it up to concern for Malfoy’s curse on her, not because he was in pain himself, from touching her. Lily gave him a weird look, but waved it off. “Sirius?” “Yeah?” he replied. “You…” She hesitated, clearly not comfortable with whatever it was she had to say, but she pressed on all the same. “You said Severus went to Malfoy for protection.”“Yeah, I did,” he said, remembering that first night in detention with her and James. “Because he’s a half-blood,” she continued. “Yes,” he said.“Because if he didn’t ask for protection, Malfoy would treat him like he treated me.”“Yes.”“And you think that makes Severus a coward?”He wasn’t prepared for that question, but he immediately knew the answer to it. He opened and closed his mouth, then nervously ran a hand through his hair. “I, um. Yes. I do,” he said, eventually, as if he had any authority to speak on cowardice. Lily raised an eyebrow. “I suppose that makes you the hero then?”Sirius laughed, rather like a madman. “Definitely not. And if I ever give you that impression again, you have my full permission to punch me in the face. You look like you could do a better job of it than Snivellus.”This seemed to brighten her spirits considerably. “You bet your arse I could,” she muttered. After a moment, she sobered. “I won’t have you going after him, Sirius. I will not allow it. Severus is my friend. You don’t get to treat him like—”“Malfoy?” Sirius supplied.“Yes, like Malfoy. Severus isn’t like that. I don’t care what you say.”On the one hand, he admired her loyalty. Until a few days ago, Sirius would have killed for a friend like Lily Evans. On the other hand, Sirius knew exactly what kind of person Severus Snape was. He’d been around people like Snape his whole life: wizards just shy of pure-blood, cozying up to the nearest Ancient House to serve as their judge, jury, and executioner, so the pure-bloods could keep up the illusion that their hands were clean. Sooner or later, Snape would realise any association with Muggle-borns merely jeopardised his relationship with the blood-purists. He’d turn on Lily Evans, one way or another.He wanted to tell her. He wanted to hold her hand and tell her she was too good for Severus Snape and that whole Slytherin gang. She didn’t deserve their prejudice. But really, who was Sirius Black, a pure-blood pariah himself, to talk to a Muggle-born about the fates and inevitable destinies of those who align themselves with Ancient Houses?“I won’t start anything, Evans. Even if he comes after me,” Sirius said, eventually. She held his gaze for a long second and he could tell she understood the half-promise for what it was. “You really mean that?” she asked.“Yes.”“And if, hypothetically, he were to go after someone else?”“I won’t allow it,” he said, simply, throwing her words back at her.Slowly, she nodded.A second later, her attention was no longer on him, but on Severus Snape, who had just rounded the corner, a brace on his right arm.“Severus!” Lily cried, running to him and immediately wrapping him in a hug.Reluctantly, and clearly cautious of his surroundings, Snape hugged her back, but really, Sirius couldn’t be expected to pay any attention to the two of them because right behind Snape was Remus.Remus.Remus, who looked like he’d recently been run over by the Hogwarts Express, then left to the carrion birds for a few days.Remus, whose eyes were nearly as purple as Sirius’s shiner, whose hair was rumpled and a little bit greasy, who walked like every step caused him unimaginable agony. For a second, Sirius thought he was going to lose his lunch.Then, he rushed to Remus’s side, his hands flailing about, desperate, yet unable to touch, to soothe, to hug like Lily was so unfairly able to hug Snape. “Hi,” Sirius said, rather stupidly. Then, his hand darted out, entirely without his permission, and grabbed Remus’s.
Holy fucking mother of Merlin—
Remus jerked away at the same time Sirius did, both of them giving small cries of pain. For a second, they just stared at each other, brilliant amber eyes into silver. “Hi, Sirius.” Remus’s voice sounded scratchy, as if it hadn’t been used in several day.“How’s your mum?” Sirius managed, after a few, uncomfortable moments of just staring, because, Merlin, how could he possibly be expected to look away? Remus leaned against the wall, in what Sirius prayed was a casual attempt at nonchalance, instead of a last-ditch effort to keep himself upright. “Fine,” Remus said. He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I mean, she’s good. Really good. It was nice to see her.”“And… How are you?” Sirius didn’t know what else to say. He looked Remus up and down, trying to assess the damage underneath Remus’s long, baggy robes. There was damage, of that Sirius was certain. Remus had both arms folded across his mid-section and he was a bit hunched over. That probably meant a broken rib, or two—perhaps only cracked, if Remus was lucky, but given how short of breath he seemed to be, Sirius wasn’t counting on it. Remus was pale, too, which probably meant he’d lost a lot of blood. Sirius figured it was a safe bet to assume Remus had a few brand new scars to add to his collection. “‘M fine, too.” Remus yawned, nearly collapsing in on himself while doing so. “Been sleeping most of the day actually, but when Snape came in, Madam Pomfrey said I could go back to class.”It took a full minute for Remus’s words to register. Sirius felt himself go pale. Remus seemed to realise what he’d said a second later, and both boys stared at each other.“I didn’t mean—” Remus started.At the same time, Sirius said, “You were in the hospital wing?” “No!” Remus nearly shouted, his eyes flashing a bit. “I mean—fuck. Yes, Sirius, I was. But I’m fine. I promise. Just a bit tired.”Remus was lying. He was lying and he was hurt, and someone had done this to him, goddamnit.Remus told him it was a monster, that had done this to him. But he’d been home, with his mum, for Merlin’s sake. What kind of—Sirius shook his head, his temper flaring. He knew exactly what kind of monster would do this to their child. “You’re not going back there,” Sirius growled, low enough so only he and Remus could hear. Remus made a small, choked noise and his face contorted in pain. “Sirius—”“No, Remus! Someone did this to you. You’re not—”Suddenly, all Sirius could see was Remus’s brilliant, amber eyes, glistening with tears. “Can we do this later, Siri?” Remus whispered, his voice cracking mid-sentence. “I can’t...” He glanced around at the other students. “I can’t do this right now.”Sirius deflated immediately. “Okay. Okay, I’m sorry. Let’s get you inside. Can you, um. Can you walk?”Remus shot him a petulant glare. “I walked all the way here, didn’t I? Down two flights of moving stairs, I might add.”To prove his point, Remus stood up straight. He swayed a bit and Sirius almost reached out for him, but Remus caught himself with a palm flat against the wall. “Come on, Sirius,” Remus managed. “Let’s go to class.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius couldn’t stop fidgeting. He’d thought it would be better, having Remus back, instead of the thousands of horrible scenarios of what Remus might be going through, but it was just the opposite. Now, he’d seen the damage, or enough of it to know that whatever had happened to him, it was far worse than Sirius had imagined. Far worse than what his parents typically put him through. Walburga Black did not leave visible marks, save for one.Remus hadn’t denied it, that day by the Whomping Willow, when Sirius had assumed he was scarred all over. Even knowing that, Sirius hadn’t done a goddamned thing to stop Remus from leaving. Professor Idunn gave a long and exuberant lecture about the origins and basics of ancient Nordic runes. As she talked and flailed her hands about, the chalk behind her traced out each symbol and its meaning. Every student, save for Sirius and Remus, frantically scribbled down notes, just trying to keep up. About ten minutes into class, Remus started to nod off. Sirius poked him with his ballpoint. Remus jerked back awake and hit his knees on the underside of the desk, which made him hunch over and suppress a groan of pain. Sirius shot him an apologetic look. Thankfully, nobody seemed to notice, save perhaps Lily Evans. Professor Idunn didn’t even pause for a breath. Fifteen minutes into class, Remus slumped over his desk, a small moan of pain slipping from his lips. This time, a few more heads turned, including that of Severus Snape. Sirius began to panic. “Remus,” he hissed, leaning as close to him as he could without touching.Remus groaned in reply and cracked one eye open to stare at Sirius. His face was deathly pale and his scars stood out, pink and gnarled, as if they were brand new.“I think you need to go back to the hospital wing,” Sirius whispered.“‘M fine, Sirius,” Remus muttered. “Just need to sleep.”Remus laid his head down and folded his arms over his eyes to block out the light. “We’re in class, Remus,” Sirius said.“Don’t care,” came the muffled reply. “Take notes for me.”Sirius tried. Merlin, he tried to pay attention, but it was nearly impossible, what with Remus moaning in pain every few minutes. As it turned out, his internal radar only had eyes and ears for Remus Lupin, and Remus most certainly was not fine.Five minutes before class was supposed to end, Professor Idunn finished her lecture and dismissed them, demanding, in a final dramatic frenzy, that they memorise the basic structure of the Nordic alphabet for next class. Sirius poked Remus with the ballpoint again. Most of the students had cleared out, by the time Sirius managed to actually get Remus to wake up. If anything, Remus looked even more exhausted than he had before class. His face was eerily pale and the bags under his eyes looked more like black and blue bruises by the second. Remus wheezed a bit with every intake of breath. “C’mon, Remus,” Sirius said, quietly. “Let’s stand up and get you out of here.”Remus stood, hunched over and swaying a bit. He planted both hands on the desk to steady himself and Sirius very nearly had a stroke.There was blood on Remus’s hands. Fresh blood. Remus’s blood.It wasn’t just a little. It was fucking everywhere, dark and red and thick, and from the looks of it, flowing from open wounds hidden by Remus’s sleeves. Sirius couldn’t tear his eyes away from the blood. He’d read about injuries like that before: cuts on the wrists, usually from—“My, my,” Snape said, his eyes tracking over Remus. “Tried to off yourself already, Lupin?”
No. No. No. No.
That couldn’t be it. Merlin, please, no. Remus wouldn’t do that. Remus wouldn’t—
Well, what would you do, to escape that kind of pain? said a dangerous and disturbingly logical voice in Sirius’s head.
No, shut up.
Remus glanced down at his hands and saw the blood. “Fuck you, Snape,” Remus muttered, but there was absolutely no fight in his voice. “I thought you Gryffindors were supposed to be brave,” Snape said. “Nothing brave about taking the easy way out.”
No. No. No. No.
Sirius’s eyes flashed as he whirled on Snape. Sirius raised his hand, his magic dancing in fiery sparks between his fingers. “Keep talking, Snape. I dare you.”“Careful, Black. Don’t let him bleed on you. You don’t want to upset your delicate, pure-blood sensibilities. He might infect you with something,” Snape sneered.If it were possible, Remus paled even more. “That’s it, you piece of shit,” Sirius snarled, ready to aim the first hex that came to mind right at Snape.“Sirius!” Remus hissed, putting up a hand. Blood dripped onto the desk and Remus pulled his hand back.Just then, Lily Evans threw her book at Snape. It hit him in the head and he let out a rather gratifying yelp.“Severus, get out!” Lily yelled. Her face was nearly as red as her hair and she was absolutely fucking furious. Sirius realised he’d never fully appreciated Lily Evans until that moment. Snape’s attention immediately snapped to Lily and his face fell. “Lily, I’m—”“Get out!”Sirius was starting to understand why James had been so quick to propose to her.As soon as Snape was out of the room, Remus collapsed back into his seat. For a moment, Lily and Sirius just stared at him.“Remus?” Lily started, taking a step towards him and crouching next to his chair. “You’re bleeding, love.”Remus scoffed and shot her a wry smile. “You noticed that, huh?”Sirius gathered both his and Remus’s books and shoved them in his bag. “We’re taking you to the hospital wing.”“No, Sirius.”Sirius gestured at his hands. “But—”Remus glared at him. “I said no.”Sirius’s face fell. He couldn’t keep the pleading notes out of his voice.“Remus—”“A bathroom, then,” Lily said, cutting in, glancing between the two of them and effectively shutting Sirius up. “Let’s get you to a bathroom, so we can wipe up the blood, yeah?”“All right,” Remus agreed. Reluctantly, Sirius nodded. He grabbed Remus’s bag and threw it over his shoulder, along with his own.“Can you stand?”“Yes.” Remus did, with one arm curled protectively around his ribcage. Remus almost made it out of the classroom, before stumbling. Lily and Sirius weren’t far behind and both of them lunged to catch Remus, but Sirius pulled back, furiously reminding himself that he could not fucking touch. “Come on,” Lily said, ducking under Remus’s free arm. “I’ll help. It’s okay to lean on me.”Remus gave her a weak smile. “Thanks,” he managed, through a laboured breath. “Mind the ribs, yeah?”Lily nodded and wrapped her arm around him. Together, they began to slowly make their way down the hallway, towards the toilets. Sirius trailed a few steps behind, completely and utterly useless. “Christ, Sirius, get over here and help. He’s tall. And heavy,” Lily groaned, trying to support Remus’s weight without jostling his ribs.“He can’t help,” Remus said, quickly, before giving a small yelp when Lily’s shoulder jabbed uncomfortably into his side.“Why the fuck not?” Lily snapped.Sirius’s eyes widened. He hadn’t expected her to so blatantly swear like that. If the circumstances were even remotely different, he’d be impressed. He jogged forward a few steps.“I, um—”“He has a thing about germs,” Remus wheezed out.Germs?! Sirius mouthed to Remus, over Lily’s head and out of her line of sight“Germs?” Lily said, incredulous. She looked between the two of them, best she could, as she continued to shuffle Remus down the hallway. “Germs,” Remus repeated. He glared pointedly at Sirius.“That’s right,” Sirius managed. “I, er. Don’t like to touch people.”“Can’t you—” She adjusted her grip around Remus’s waist. “Can’t you make an exception?”“Er, no. Sorry.”Merlin, she didn’t know. She didn’t fucking know he’d give anything just to help. Remus was in pain, goddamnit, and he needed someone—he needed Sirius—to help him, to hold him up, to make sure he didn’t bleed to death in the second floor corridor. Sirius didn’t think he’d ever hated his mother or the tattoo on his chest more than right now. “Then learn a goddamned levitating spell, Black,” Lily growled. They’d reached the boys’ toilets. “Open the door, Sirius.”He did. After Lily helped Remus in and propped him against the far wall. Remus folded both his arms across his middle and sat with his legs straight out, drawing in slow, measured breaths. Sirius followed, confirming with a sigh of relief, that the room was empty, save for the three of them. He threw both his and Remus’s bags down by the door.“Right,” Lily said, backing away once she was relatively certain Remus wasn’t going to fall over. “I’d better get back to…” She made a vague hand gesture.“It’s all right, Evans,” Sirius said. “Go find Snape.”Lily nodded, then glanced between the two of them. “You’ll be okay?”“Yes,” Remus said, his voice a bit stronger, now that he was no longer standing. “Thank you, Lily.”“Right,” she said again. She pointed a rather threatening finger at Sirius. “You. Help him, goddamnit.”Then, she left.Remus blinked up at him, his head lolling against the wall, his amber eyes tired and resigned. After a long moment, Remus erupted into a coughing fit. His hands shook, as he calmed down, but the steady stream of blood that Sirius had seen in the classroom seemed to have slowed. What blood remained on Remus’s hands was slowly drying into a burnt-amber crust. Whatever had made Remus’s wrists bleed, he filed away for later. So long as Remus wasn’t in immediate danger of bleeding to death, Sirius would deal with his ribs and his laboured breathing first.Sirius knelt down next to him, as close as he dared without actually touching him. “Show me,” Sirius demanded, gesturing to Remus’s chest.Remus glared at him. “Sirius—”“Don’t you fucking dare tell me you’re fine, Remus.”“I swear, I’m—”“So help me, I will vanish your damn clothes.”Remus scoffed. “You couldn’t do a levitating spell, but you—”“Levitating spells require a functioning wand and a certain degree of focus, neither of which I have in abundance at the moment. Plus, I don’t know if something’s broken or what and if I levitate you without knowing, I could make it worse. Vanishing spells…” Sirius held up his fingers and tossed Remus a half-hearted wink. “That’s just a flick of the wrist.”“No.”“Your ribs are either broken or bruised. I need to see which, before I can fix it.”Remus’s eyebrows knit together. He coughed softly. “You know healing spells?”Sirius legitimately laughed at that. “Are you kidding? Healing spells were the first thing I taught myself.”Remus looked over at him, his eyes wide and compassionate, like Sirius was the one who was hurt, like Sirius deserved pity, like Sirius was the one bleeding on the bathroom floor. “No, shut up. This is about your horrifying injuries, not mine. Let me heal you. Please, Remus. I’m pretty good at the spells, even wandless, I swear. But I need to see what’s wrong, so take off your goddamned shirt.”Remus shook his head, tears welling up in his eyes. “I-I can’t, okay? Sirius, I can’t—”Sirius could have screamed. Instead, he squeezed his eyes closed and leaned imperceptibly closer. “I already know you have scars and I don’t fucking care, okay?” he whispered. “I’m not going to hate you or laugh at you or whatever the hell you think I’m going to do. You know where I come from and you know what my mother does to me. I don’t care about scars, Remus.”Two tears slipped down Remus’s face, tracing over the pink indentations of his scars before dripping onto his robes. “Okay,” he managed.Remus leaned back and sat up a bit straighter. His bloody hands shook as long fingers undid the buttons on first his robes, then his shirt, until they both hung open.For the life of him, Sirius couldn’t tear his eyes away. Remus’s chest was littered with purple and black bruises. His shirt hung open, barely wide enough for Sirius to see a majority of the old scars, though there was jagged scar one that ran the entire length of Remus’s torso, from just below his collarbone to where it disappeared beneath the hem of Remus’s trousers. Zigzagged lines of fresh scrapes and nicks covered the bruises on his ribcage. A few of the cuts still oozed blood, but, for the most part, they were superficial. Nothing in comparison to that old, horrendous scar.Sirius swallowed his building terror and forced himself to focus on the fresh cuts and bruising. “Merlin, Remus, why didn’t Pomfrey heal these?”Remus at least had the decency to look a little guilty. “I didn’t tell her about them.”“Why the fuck not?!”Remus huffed and glared at him. “You know why. Same reason—”Sirius rolled his eyes. “Same reason I wouldn’t let James take me to Dumbledore.”“Yes.”Sirius hovered his hand above Remus’s ribcage, focusing instead on the task at hand. “Have you coughed up any blood? Or mucus? Or, really anything you shouldn’t be coughing up?”Remus, apparently, was not prepared for the rather abrupt subject change. “What?”“I need to know if your ribs are broken.”Remus shook his head. “Um, no. Haven’t coughed anything up.”“Good. Anything sticking out anywhere?”“No.”“Okay. Nothing’s broken.”Remus raised an eyebrow at him. “Is that your expert medical opinion?”“I could take you back to Pomfrey, if you’re so concerned.”“No,” Remus growled.“Then will you let me heal them?”Remus squeezed his eyes shut and sighed. “Sure you won’t fuck it up?”Sirius Black was sure of no such thing. Instead, he asked the more important question: “Do you trust me?”After a long moment, Remus blinked up at him and nodded. “S’pose so, yeah.”Sirius flicked his fingers, calling up his magic to dance between them. Then, pointing his finger at Remus’s chest, he whispered, “Episkey.”Remus drew in a sharp breath, but one by one, the bruises faded to green, then yellow, then disappeared altogether. When they were gone, Remus almost doubled over in relief. Sirius had been trying his damnedest to not think about the state of Remus’s wrists. Arguing with Remus had… helped, but there was only so long the subject could be avoided. Sirius flicked his wrist again and the buttons of Remus’s shirt did themselves up, once more covering Remus’s chest. Sirius’s eyes tracked to Remus’s wrists.Muttering a little under his breath, Remus sat up and shrugged off his outer robes, now that his ribs were no longer bothering him. The black robes pooled on the floor, in a semi-circle around him.“Shit, Remus,” Sirius breathed. Remus’s sleeves were soaked in blood, from just below the crook of his elbow to the cuffs of his wrists. Like the blood on his hands, the stains were crusted over and turning a dull-brown colour, but it was, without a doubt, blood, and a lot of it. Without another word between them, Remus rolled up his sleeves, one at a time. The thin flesh covering both of Remus’s wristbands was torn to shreds. Blood caked and continued to ooze from the wounds, thin trails of it tracking down Remus’s forearm. What’s worse, underneath the fresh blood and torn flesh, Sirius could make out the pale outline of countless scars. “Siri, it’s not what you think,” Remus whispered, his voice cracking a bit. And he’s right, because Sirius didn’t think that. Not anymore. If Remus had done this to himself with that intent, the scars would be on the fleshy part of his arm, not on the bone.This… This looked like someone had gnawed on Remus’s flesh, straight to the bone. “Sirius,” Remus started again, after seeing the hard-set expression on Sirius’s face.“Scourgify.” Sirius flicked his wrist and the caked and dried blood disappeared from Remus’s hands and arms, leaving only the gnarled wounds and fresh blood. A second later, he twirled his fingers and said, “Episkey.”Nothing happened. Sirius risked a glance at Remus, then flicked his wrist and tried the spell again. Still nothing.His hand shaking slightly, Sirius reached into the pocket of his robe for his wand. Remus squeezed his eyes shut. “Sirius, you don’t have to—”“Shut up.” He focused all his magic on Remus’s wrists, praying his defective wand wouldn’t make things worse. “Episkey.” Again, nothing. The magic fizzled out, just above the gaping wounds. A trickle of blood tracked down Remus’s left forearm. Remus started to pull his wrists out of reach. “Honestly, Sirius, I’m fine. Let’s just—”Sirius couldn’t tear his eyes from Remus’s wrists. “It should work. I’m doing the spell right. These are deep, but they should still heal.”“They’ll be perfectly fine in a day or two. Just let it—”“A day or two?” Sirius repeated, incredulously. “Remus, these will take weeks to heal naturally. Now, I know another spell that will—”“I heal fast. I’m fine, Sirius.”“It’s a special spell. Meant for healing curses and, well, persistent wounds, I guess.”Remus’s eyes widened. “No, you can’t—”Sirius ignored him and set down his wand. He practiced the movement Andromeda had shown him with his wrist. When he was sure he’d gotten it right, he pointed his first two fingers at Remus’s wrists and repeated the swishing motion. “Repifarigo.”There was a flash of blue light, but then absolutely nothing. Remus’s wrists were still as raw and bloody as they had been a second ago. Sirius frowned and tried to swallow the panic rising in his throat. He tried the spell again, this time with his wand, but still nothing. Remus bowed his head. His wrists rested limp and bloody in his lap. Sirius bit his lip. Tears welled in his eyes, completely without his permission. He scrubbed a hand over his face to wipe them away. “That’s… That’s Dark Magic, Remus,” he said, his voice barely audible. “No, it’s not.”Sirius laughed, a little broken, a little insane, but he couldn’t help it. “Yes, it is. Dark Magic’s just about the only thing that spell won’t heal.”“Then maybe you did the spell wrong.”“Don’t insult me!” Sirius snapped, because, Merlin, he didn’t do the fucking spell wrong. “That’s Dark Magic. Someone did that to you. Tell me who.”“No one—”“Bullshit! Who did this to you, Remus?”Now, Remus was the one in tears. He shook his head, silently pleading with Sirius just to drop it, to leave him alone, to—Sirius lowered his voice. “Please, just tell me. I want to help. Who did this?”Very softly—so softly that Sirius almost missed it, even though he was sitting right next to Remus—Remus whispered, “A monster.”“Fuck,” Sirius breathed. His hands were shaking, aching to touch, to comfort, to take all Remus’s pain away. Almost subconsciously, Sirius reached out his index finger and brushed it against the unmarred skin of Remus’s palm. Sirius jerked back almost immediately, but it was enough to get Remus to look at him.“I’m sorry,” Sirius said. “I’m so fucking sorry. I let you go and—”“No! No,” Remus very nearly sobbed. “You did not let me go. I had to go. This… It has nothing to do with you, all right? It…”Sirius shifted imperceptibly closer. “It, what?”“The monster’s going to find me, one way or another, no matter what I do. All I can do is try to keep him away from you and from anyone else I might care about, because… Christ, Sirius. I’d rather he tear me to pieces than watch him sink his teeth into you. I wouldn’t be able to stop it. He’d kill you and he’d make me watch.” Remus paused, his eyes boring into Sirius’s soul. “I need you to swear to me that you won’t go looking for this monster, even if you know I might get hurt.”Sirius recoiled and shook his head. “No. No. You can’t ask me to do that,” he whispered, not really caring if his voice broke.“Please, Sirius. I need to know you’re safe.”Sirius swore under his breath. He remembered how quick Remus had been to swear that he’d never say anything about Sirius’s family, like he understood Sirius’s that terrifying martyr complex that demanded Sirius keep his friends away from his family. Sirius needed to keep his friends safe.Remus knew that desperation, then. He knew it intimately. He bore the scars from some unnamed monster that left him bruised and bleeding and he’d give just about anything to make sure his friends never endured the same.Goddamnit.“All right,” Sirius whispered. “I promise.”He hated Remus, just a little, for forcing that promise upon him, and he thought maybe Remus knew that, too. That horrifying protective instinct—that inspired both delusions of grandeur and desperate recklessness—ran deep in both of them. “Thank you,” Remus murmured, one final tear slipping down his cheek.Sirius squeezed his eyes shut, willing away the tears that wanted to well up in his own eyes. He’d cried enough over this. Now was the time to act.“Do you…” Sirius gestured to Remus’s wrists. They’d mostly stopped bleeding, but they still looked horrible. “Do you want me to take you back to the hospital wing? Pomfrey will have dittany, or something. Might not heal them all the way, but it’ll help.”“No,” Remus said, softly. “If I go back, she’ll make me stay the night. I just want to sleep in my own bed again.”“You’re sure?”“Yeah. I heal fast. I just want to sleep.”Remus placed his hand on the wall and managed to drag himself to his feet without making his wrists bleed again. He swayed a little, but kept his balance.Sirius held out a hand, ready to catch him should he suddenly collapse. “Do you need help? I can go get Evans back here, if—”“I’m fine, Sirius. I can walk. It was my ribs that made that rather difficult, so thank you, for that. And for trying, with the…” He held up his wrists. Sirius stared at them, then at the scars lining Remus’s face.
I don’t care what I promised. One day, I’ll tear whoever did this to you to shreds, I swear it.
“Sirius?” Remus’s eyebrows pinched together. “Yeah?”“What the fuck happened to your face?”This time, Sirius managed a genuine laugh. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
SEPTEMBER 8, 1971
At a quarter past two in the morning, Remus cried out in his sleep.Sirius, who was already up—unable to sleep due to a combination of restless thoughts involving scars, monsters, and Remus as well as his general insomnia—sat bolt upright in his bed. From the bed next over, Sirius heard Remus let out a faint whimper. He threw back the covers and his own hangings, grabbed a pillow, and made his way over to Remus’s bed. Pulling aside the hangings, Sirius threw his pillow at Remus.“Mmph—Sirius?” Remus muttered, opening one eye. Sirius gestured at the pillow. “Budge over and put that thing between us. I’m sleeping here.”Remus obeyed. Sirius crawled into bed and lay on his side, facing Remus. Bright amber eyes blinked at him, then carved a path right into his heart. “Are your wrists all right?” he asked, mostly just trying to break whatever tension there was between them. “They’re fine,” Remus replied, without looking at them.“Are… Are you all right?” Sirius tried. “Just a nightmare. They tend to happen after…” Remus looked away. “It’s okay, Remus,” Sirius said. “I get them, too. I’m here, though, okay? In case you have another one.”“You don’t have—”“Your bed’s more comfortable anyway,” Sirius said, quickly. Remus’s face softened a little, before he closed his eyes. “Thank you.”“You never have to thank me, you idiot. I’m your friend,” Sirius muttered, but he didn’t think Remus heard him.“I missed you, Siri,” Remus murmured, delirious and half-asleep already. “Missed you, too,” Sirius whispered back and, Merlin, he didn’t think he’d realised it until just now. Sirius was surprised by how much he meant it. With the notable exception of Regulus, Sirius Black had never missed anyone before. He’d never longed for someone so much that it hurt when they weren’t there beside him. The thought terrified him, really, because Remus made him vulnerable. If anyone took Remus from him, Sirius was pretty sure it might destroy him.For Merlin’s sake, he’d only known Remus for a week.In the morning, James didn’t comment on the fact that Sirius slept in Remus’s bed, when Sirius accidentally woke him on his way to the shower, and, after that, their sleeping arrangement just became normal. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Despite everything Snape had done and said the day before, Sirius was determined to keep his word to Lily and not mess with Snape, unless Snape directly attacked someone other than Sirius.In Defence Against the Dark Arts, on Wednesday morning, Snape called Sirius a blood traitor in front of the entire class. Lily shot Sirius a panicked look, before once again smacking Snape upside the head. Remus and Peter each took an arm as James tried to stand to defend Sirius’s honour. Together, they yanked James back into his seat and slowly calmed him down.Sirius flushed bright red, but did absolutely nothing.Professor Amelia Rattleburn prattled on, as if horrible and derogatory names such as that were nothing out of the ordinary.In History of Magic, that afternoon, Snape and the Carrow twins began to loudly theorise how Walburga and Orion Black were going to punish Sirius for being sorted into Gryffindor. Remus more or less had to toss Peter into James’s lap to keep James from storming over to the Slytherins and gouging their eyes out.Sirius, again, did absolutely nothing, though secretly he prayed his parents weren’t taking suggestions from Snape and the Carrows. They were rather… creative. Professor Binns droned on, completely and utterly oblivious.After their final detention on Wednesday evening, James and Sirius climbed the steps to the Astronomy Tower. Fabian and Gideon Prewett were waiting for them. Both twins still sported their fuchsia beards. Sirius laughed a little. “It still hasn’t worn off?” Sirius asked.“Nah, it did,” Gideon said. “We thought they looked quite nice, so we’ve decided to keep them.”“Yeah,” said Fabian. “The Hogwarts handbook specifically prohibits students from growing natural beards, of course, but these…” He gestured towards his face. “These are most certainly unnatural beards.”“A huge oversight in linguistics, if you ask me,” Gideon said. “But, technically speaking, we’re not breaking any rules.”“McGonagall tried to make us get rid of them, but—”“—We told her these beards were part of our religion, so if she makes us get rid of them, it’s discrimination.”“We figured that’d give us a few more days, until she decides to write Mum and Dad about it,” Fabian said.“Wicked,” James said, cracking a wild grin. “How ‘bout this plan of yours?” Sirius prompted, leaning against the Tower wall. “Right, of course,” Fabian said. “It’s rather simple, really.”“Tomorrow at breakfast, we cause a distraction, lure all the professors out of the Great Hall—”“—Then you and Potter slip ol’ Malfoy some of this.”Once again, Gideon produced a vial of Hiccuping Secrets from his robes. James nodded. “We’ll get Pete and Remus to keep watch, too, just in case. Can’t have the professors interfering.”Sirius looked the twins up and down, then narrowed his eyes. “What’s in it for you lot, especially if your plan actually involves you getting caught?”“Oh, we don’t mind,” Gideon said.“Especially if getting caught means the public humiliation of Lucius Malfoy,” Fabian said. “See, we’ve had our run-ins with Malfoy,” Gideon explained, leaning in close. “One too many, in fact,” Fabian said, morosely. “Malfoy said if we tried anything else, he’d make sure his father had ours thrown out of the Ministry.”“Yeah,” said Gideon. “Dad’s already been demoted once, because of us.”“He can do that?” James asked, genuinely shocked.“Of course he can,” Sirius said, suppressing the urge to roll his eyes. “His dad’s Abraxas Malfoy. He basically runs the Ministry, along with my father and a few more blood-purists.”“That’s a horrifying thought,” James muttered.Sirius couldn’t help but agree. Men like his father—like Abraxas Malfoy—should never have been given power in the first place, let alone power based solely on their lineages. “What exactly does the potion do?” Sirius asked, a little desperate for a subject change.Fabian smirked. “It’s in the name, really. Few drops of this in your morning tea, and you’re forced to cough up all your secrets. The more hidden or embarrassing the secret, the more the potion compels you to spit it out.”“Yeah,” Gideon said. “And if you’re stupid enough to try to keep your mouth shut or try to resist the potion, all your hair falls out.”“All of it,” Fabian echoed, stressing each word. “Everywhere,” Gideon finished. “The hair-loss was more of an unintended side-effect than anything, really,” Fabian said, “but it does serve as rather compelling incentive just to cough up all your secrets.”A wicked grin spread across James’s face. “So,” he said. “Can we see a demonstration? You know, just to make sure it works?”The brothers exchanged a look, both of them stroking their beards in a bizarre mirror image of each other. “Sure, Potter,” Fabian said, with a wink. “Give it a go.”Gideon held out the vial. “Only a drop. Go on. Bottom’s up.”James stared at the vial for a second, then took it. “Sure,” he said. “I’ve got nothing to hide.”James let a drop fall onto his tongue, before handing the vial back.“Black?” Gideon prompted, offering him the vial as well. “How ‘bout it, eh?” “I’ll keep my secrets, thanks,” Sirius bit out, a bit horrified at the thought. Luckily, he didn’t have to bother with any further explanation because, next to him, James hiccuped loudly. “Sirius Black was the first friend I ever had.”Sirius stared at him, his mouth hanging open.The twins exchanged a look, completely unimpressed.“That’s your deepest, darkest secret?” Gideon asked, an eyebrow raised.James, on the other hand, flushed bright red.Merlin, Sirius thought. How was that possible? Surely James had loads of friends, before Hogwarts. He was pure-blood, after all, and pure-bloods always have their circles of friends.James hiccuped again, stopping Sirius’s thought.“Every Christmas, my mum gives the house elf the day off and makes the curry. She’s a terrible cook, but I don’t have the heart to tell her. Last year, I threw her curry in the rosebushes outside, when she wasn’t looking, and I’m pretty sure it killed the neighbour’s cat.”The twins burst out in a fit of laughter. Sirius managed a nervous snicker.Once more, James hiccuped.“My father tested every version of his hair potion on me and none of them ever worked, not even the one on the market.”“Merlin, Potter, you’re as vanilla as they come,” Fabian laughed.“Am not!” James protested. The hiccups fizzled out.“Don’t worry, Potter,” Gideon said. “I have a feeling Black can help sully your reputation a bit.”“Oi!” Sirius pointed a finger at James. “He hexed Malfoy so his bits were flapping around on the train. Jamie can do just fine on his own.”“Oh, we heard about that,” Fabian leered.“Is it really all…” Gideon made a rather obscene hand gesture.“Shrivelled?” James supplied. “Yeah.”“Brilliant,” the twins said together. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Later, after their plans had been hashed out and Gideon handed over the vial of Hiccuping Secrets, James and Sirius made their way back to Gryffindor Tower.“So,” Sirius said, aiming for casual and not quite getting there. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his robes. “I’m your first friend, huh?” James turned beat red. “Ugh,” he groaned. “We’re not going to talk about this, are we?”“Yes, we are,” Sirius said. “How’s that possible, exactly?”James shrugged. “Didn’t have siblings, I guess,” he said. “And my parents are great and all, but they’re still my parents. Plus, they’re older, so none of their friends had kids around my age. I had a few older cousins, I guess, but I was never really close with any of them. Never really had much opportunity to make friends until I met you.”“Right, yeah,” Sirius said, nodding along. “But, aside from that bit with Malfoy on the train, you didn’t really like me in the beginning. Shouldn’t your first friend be Peter or Remus?”“I met you in Diagon Alley,” James said. “I thought we got along just fine, then.”“Sure, but you hardly knew me at all,” Sirius argued. “And after the Sorting, well. I thought you were never going to speak to me at all.”James grimaced. “It wasn’t that.”“Then what was it?”“I thought you were trying to fuck with me. I thought...” James trailed off and looked away.“Spit it out, Jamie.”James eyed him. “You won’t like it.”“Don’t care,” Sirius said, easily. “I’m your friend, you git. Just tell me.”“I thought you were a Slytherin spy, sent by Malfoy or your cousins or your parents to infiltrate Gryffindor.”Sirius barked a laugh. “Merlin, that’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard. Even if I had done it as a Slytherin spy, I’d still be stuck in Gryffindor for the next seven years. Hell of a price to pay, Potter.”“Yes, well, I know that now,” James huffed, indignantly. “But, then… Slughorn let you off the hook and you’re a Black. I came to a reasonable conclusion.”“Reasonable, my arse,” Sirius snickered.“It seemed reasonable at the time,” James said. “I know you’re a right proper Gryffindor now, though. Right down to your bones.”Sirius smirked. “Aw. You’re just saying that because I’m your best friend.”“You’re probably right,” James said, with a shrug. “Do we have to hug now?”“Nah,” Sirius said. “I figure if I’m supposed to be sullying your reputation, it’s best not to get caught hugging it out in the corridors so close to curfew. We can cry about our feelings later, in private, like proper blokes.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
SEPTEMBER 9, 1971
On Thursday morning, on the way to the Great Hall, Severus Snape shoved past an exhausted and barely-upright Remus and Sirius Black very nearly lost his shit.Remus went sprawling. The books he’d been holding fanned out around him, their spines bent and pages ruffled. Remus let out a cry of pain, which was greatly muffled by the crack of his chin hitting the stone floor. Absolutely unable to help Remus in any way that might be considered productive, Sirius whirled on Snape, his hand extended and his magic spurting between his fingers. “Cool it, Black,” Snape sneered, tipping his ridiculously large nose towards the ceiling. “The great oaf just needs to watch where he’s going.”Remus pulled himself to his feet and Sirius risked a glance over. There was blood trickling down Remus’s chin. He’d bitten his tongue, most likely. Snape’s gaze drifted to Remus, then back to Sirius. “What are you going to do about it, Black? Can’t let it get back to Mummy that you’re letting a half-blood bleed all over you.”“Fuck off, Snivellus,” Sirius growled, trying to swallow the fury welling up inside him. “Right now, if you know what’s good for you.”“Sirius,” Remus warned. He wiped the blood from his face and summoned all his books. “I’m fine. Let’s just go.”Reluctantly, Sirius let his magic fizzle out and lowered his hand. With one more withering glare at Snape, he turned and followed Remus into the Great Hall.“Just like a dog on a leash,” Snape called after him. “Follow your master, Black!”At Remus’s glare, Sirius clamped his mouth shut and didn’t turn around.As soon as he sat down, Remus poured himself a cup of tea and downed it in one go.“How much of that potion have we got?” Sirius hissed to James, sitting down next to him.James swallowed, then ducked his head to whisper back. “More than enough. Why?”“We’re getting Snivellus, too.”James smirked. “I like the way you think, Black.”With one more bite of his toast, James stood. He glanced around the Hall, then made his way ever-so-carefully over to the house elf entrance.Remus narrowed his eyes at Sirius and wiped a lingering drop of blood from his lips. “You better not be doing something stupid because of me, Sirius.”“It’s not because of you,” Sirius protested and, well, it was mostly true. “We’re getting back at Malfoy for the whole train thing.”“And you’re going to keep Snape out of it?” Remus asked.Sirius shrugged. “At this point, it’s probably best if you don’t ask questions. Just sit back and enjoy the show.”As if on cue, a series of loud bangs and pops reverberated throughout the castle. A number of students screamed and ducked. A few of the professors did as well, but then McGonagall drew her wand and, muttering under her breath, raced out of the Great Hall. “Remain calm and stay put!” she shouted. Every single one of the other professors followed her.James took his place back at the table. A second later, with a nod from Sirius, Peter stood and went to stand by the ginormous doors to the Great Hall.Remus shook his head. “Merlin, what did you two do?”James feigned hurt and turned to Sirius. “He hears explosions and automatically assumes it’s us.”“I’m flattered, Remus,” Sirius laughed. “But what makes you think we’re responsible for every explosion in this castle?”They were not, in fact, responsible for this particular explosion. This particular explosion was entirely a Prewett operation and a brilliant one, at that. The plan was for the Prewetts to light off a series of fireworks near Ravenclaw tower—hopefully catching some of the tapestries on fire—thereby ensuring more James and Sirius more time as all the professors scrambled to make sure the precious works of art wouldn’t perish in flames. (They wouldn’t. Fabian and Gideon assured James that they spent most of the night before charming the tapestries with preservation charms. They’d still catch fire, but the damage wouldn’t last.) A second round of fireworks, set off in the dungeons, would be the signal for James and Sirius to wrap up their end of the prank. With practically nothing to set on fire in the dungeons, the Prewett twins anticipated their capture, with the consolation that James and Sirius would utterly humiliate Lucius Malfoy.“Have they had their tea, yet?” Sirius whispered to James. “Think so.”“Good. Would you like to do the honours?”James inclined his head. “All you, Mr. Black.”Trying to at least be moderately subtle, Sirius stood and flicked his wrist at Malfoy. “Sonorus!” A second later, he repeated the charm on Snape. Neither of the Slytherins seemed to notice. Remus rolled his eyes. “Christ, Sirius, what are you—”He didn’t have time to finish the thought.Lucius Malfoy hiccuped so loudly that the Great Hall fell silent. One by one, every head turned towards the Slytherin table, just in time to hear Malfoy proclaim, in an obnoxiously loud voice, “I lost my virginity to Bellatrix Black last summer!”Narcissa’s shriek was nearly deafening. “YOU WHAT!?”Sirius burst out laughing. A few more nervous giggles broke out across the Hall. “Merlin,” Sirius wheezed, clutching his stomach. “This is better than I could have hoped for.”“Is that,” Remus began, swallowing nervously, “truth serum?”“Close,” James said, through his own snickers. “Hiccuping Secrets. Makes you spill your deepest, darkest secrets to whoever’s listening.”Remus turned pale, but neither Sirius or James noticed, because, just then, Snape hiccuped.“I have grease stains on my pillow from my hair and I can’t figure out how to get them out!”Snape clamped a hand over his mouth. All eyes at the Slytherin table turned their focus to Snape. Even Malfoy and Narcissa stopped shouting at each other to sneer down at Snape. The entire Hall erupted in laughter. Sirius and James would have doubled over, had there not been a table to support them. Malfoy hiccuped again.“My mother thought I was a Squib until I got my Hogwarts letter!”Sirius could barely contain himself. “Brilliant,” he cackled. “Bloody fucking brilliant.”It was Snape’s turn. “I’m terrified of the giant squid!”More laughter. “Sirius,” Remus whispered. “Don’t you think they’ve had enough?”Sirius winked at him. “Not even close.”The rest of the Slytherins seemed torn between laughing at their prefect and frantically checking their own drinks to ensure they hadn’t been dosed with the potion as well. Narcissa was yelling so loudly that, between the raucous laughter in the Hall and her telling Malfoy off, Sirius didn’t quite catch Malfoy’s next secret, even with the amplifier charm. The Slytherins, however, looked so gratifyingly scandalised that Sirius didn’t care too much that he’d missed it.Snape, on the other hand, they heard loud and clear.“I’m in love with Lily Evans!”“WHAT?!” James Potter and Lily Evans roared at the same time.Shit. Sirius sobered immediately. He hadn’t meant to drag Evans into this.Remus glared at Sirius, the I told you so, you idiot plain on his face. Unfortunately for Snape, James and Lily’s reactions just made him start babbling. “Merlin, her hair! It’s so beautiful. Red, like a rose, even though she’s called Lily. Lily. Merlin, I can’t stop thinking about her, even when...”Snape just kept talking.Lily looked like she was torn between bursting out in tears and murdering the first person that crossed her path. She raised her wand and pointed it at Snape.Sirius realised what she was going to do a second too late. “Wait, Evans, don’t—!”“Silencio!” Snape swallowed his words, then visibly hiccuped again, but still no words came out. A second later, every greasy strand of hair on Snape’s head fell out and onto the Slytherin table. The Slytherins sitting around him leapt out of the way, their faces contorted in disgust. Lily made a strangled noise that sounded suspiciously like a sob and ran over to him. Snape’s pale, sallow skin turned a vibrant shade of pink and he absolutely refused to acknowledge her.“Well,” said Sirius, trying to contain his laughter, “at least his pillow will be safe for a while.”A second round of explosions echoed through the castle.Lucius Malfoy hiccuped. “I’ve seen the Cruciatus curse—”“Silencio!” Narcissa shouted, her voice a wild and reverberating shriek.Malfoy’s hair fell out, but this time, nobody laughed. A deathly silence fell over the Hall and it had nothing to do with Narcissa’s spell.Sirius felt his blood run cold. He’d never been naive enough to think that the Blacks were the only pure-blood family who used the Unforgivables, but to hear it said so plainly—in the middle of the Great Hall, no less…
Shit.
There were consequences to revealing the secrets of any pure-blood family. Narcissa rose to her feet. She stood still, for a moment, heaving deep, measured breaths. Every eye in the Hall focused on her. “SIRIUS!” she bellowed.Sirius stood. “Yes, Cissa?” He didn’t bother keeping the false bravado out of his voice. It was the only thing keeping the rising panic at bay. Merlin, he couldn’t go down for this. His mother would murder him, then use his bones in a graveyard sacrifice to the incarnation of evil itself. “You complete monster!” Narcissa’s normally pale face turned a bright pink. It was not a good colour on her. “Your mother will hear about this!”Fuck. Next to him, Remus stood up. “How do you know it was Sirius?”Narcissa sputtered. Clearly, she wasn’t used to being directly addressed by first year Gryffindors. “Because it was!”“Did you see Sirius hex them? Or put something in their food?” Remus asked, his voice remarkably calm. “Well, no, but I—”“Then you can’t know it was him,” Remus said. Narcissa huffed and placed her hands on her hips. “Who else would have done it?”“It was my understanding that Malfoy has no shortage of enemies,” Remus said. “The truth could have been used as a weapon by any number of them, certainly not excluding yourself.”Narcissa drew her wand and pointed it at the centre of Remus’s chest. “What the hell do you mean by that?!”Sirius raised his hand, ready to defend Remus, his magic sparking and flickering, but Remus waved him off. “Malfoy just admitted to sleeping with your sister,” Remus said, his voice as calm as ever. “Perhaps you had a suspicion before and wanted proof, so you gave him a truth serum. You’d have a greater chance of dosing any one of the Slytherins than Sirius ever would. So, in my opinion, it’s far more logical to assume that you’re the culprit and that Sirius is merely your scapegoat.”Holy mother of Merlin, Sirius loved Remus Lupin. Narcissa, however, clearly didn’t share the sentiment. “How dare you suggest that, you filthy, little—” She was cut off by Peter’s squeak and frantic gestures from the front of the Hall.A second later, the Prewett twins threw open the doors and strolled in, closely trailed by a furious Professor McGonagall. Their faces were smudged with soot and both of their pink beards were covered in ash. Gideon had a small burn on his temple. Both were grinning like mad idiots. McGonagall froze, taking in the scene that greeted her in the Great Hall: Narcissa with her wand drawn, two bald Slytherins, a sobbing Lily Evans, and Sirius and James looking, all together, a bit smug.“Well, well,” Fabian said. “It seems we’ve missed something, Gid.”“Such a shame. We’re off causing general mischief and mayhem and suddenly the Slytherins develop male pattern baldness. I hope it isn’t catching.” Gideon feigned horror and lovingly stroked his beard.“Have to say, Malfoy,” Fabian said, with a wink, “I think it’s a huge improvement.”Malfoy rose to his feet and tried to retort, but Narcissa’s silencing spell had done its job. He choked on whatever he was about to say and the Prewetts burst out laughing.“Enough!” McGonagall shouted. Her eyes scanned the crowd, then zeroed in on Sirius. “Mr. Black, I should like to know the meaning of all this.”“Oi! Why does everyone assume this was my fault?”Technically speaking, it was his fault, but that wasn’t the point.“Professor,” James said. “No one saw Sirius do anything to the Slytherins.”McGonagall pushed her square spectacles up her nose. “Is this true, Miss Black?”Narcissa gave a short nod, then stowed her wand, and sat back down with a huff of frustration.“Right,” Fabian said, clapping his hands together. “Since nobody asked, we’re fine, by the way.”Gideon smiled. “Bit singed around the edges, and—”‘’—And a little hurt that our brilliance has thus far gone unnoticed.”“Your brilliance,” McGonagall snapped, “has cost Gryffindor one hundred points.” (From the other end of the Gryffindor table, Frank Longbottom let out a cry of dismay.) “I expect better of the both of you.”“Hear that, Fabian? Next time, she wants more fireworks.”That earned the twins a few snickers. McGonagall raised her wand and sent down a shower of sparks. “That’s enough! Now, off to class, all of you. That’s quite enough excitement for one day.”One by one, the students gathered their things and trickled out of the Great Hall.“That was fucking brilliant, Remus!” Sirius said, the second they were out of the Slytherins’ earshot. James jogged up and slung an arm across Remus’s shoulders. He had to reach up and stand on his toes a bit to do it, given Remus’s height, but one could never fault James Potter for his effort. “Our hero,” he cooed. “I thought for sure Narcissa was going to have Sirius’s head. Then mine, two, by extension.” He threw a wink at Sirius. “No one should face decapitation alone.”“Thanks, mate,” Sirius deadpanned, but he smiled too. “But no heads shall roll today!” shouted James, jumping up a little so he could ruffle Remus’s hair. “Not with Remus Lupin, true Gryffindor and brilliant teller of tall tales, on our side!”Remus shrugged James off. “Couldn’t let you two get detention again,” he muttered, throwing a glance at Sirius. “If you’re going to make a move against Malfoy, you’ve got to be sure you won’t get caught.”“Hear, hear!” Sirius chanted, pretending to raise a glass. He absolutely refused to let the implications of Remus’s warning drag him down from his high. They had gotten away with it. Sure, Malfoy had said some… unsavoury things, but neither the Slytherins nor the professors could prove that he, Sirius Black, had anything to do with it. They’d gotten back at Malfoy and Snape, embarrassed them both thoroughly, and walked away with virtually unscathed, thanks to Remus. Of all the possible outcomes he’d envisioned—and quite a few of them had involved his mother finding out about their prank—this was the best possible result. “You’re sure your cousin won’t say anything to the professors?” Peter asked, trailing behind them a little.“She won’t,” Sirius said. “Everyone heard what Malfoy confessed. My guess is even Malfoy suspects Cissa at this point. There’s no end to the treachery among the pure-bloods.”“But she’s the one that silenced him,” Peter said. “He’ll know pretty quickly that it wasn’t her.”“Pete’s right,” Remus said, apparently determined to be the voice of reason in all this. “He might not be able to prove anything, but Malfoy’s not an idiot. He’ll come after all of us soon enough.”Ugh. Sirius had no doubt that was true. “All of us?” Peter squeaked. “Why’s he after me? I didn’t do anything!”“Oi!” Sirius glared at him. “Are you kidding me, Pettigrew? You’re just going to leave us to the wolves? Some Gryffindor you are.”“You were the lookout, Pete,” James pointed out. “You were definitely involved.”“Yeah, but—”Remus cut him off. “All I’m saying is that we all need to watch our backs.”“Or, conversely,” James began, raising a finger, “we immediately start planning our next ingenious prank against Malfoy and his gang.”All things considered, Sirius wholeheartedly agreed.“Picture this: Black and Potter. The greatest purveyors of mischief Hogwarts has ever seen!” James said.“Don’t forget Lupin,” Sirius said, giving Remus an award-winning smile. “Our fiendish mastermind and loyal advocate, should we get caught.”“And Pettigrew.” James threw an arm across Peter’s shoulders. “Our faithful lookout.” “Oh, Merlin. We’re all going to be serving detention until we graduate,” Remus grumbled, but Sirius thought he looked rather proud. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ In Transfiguration, McGonagall gave a stern lecture on how pranks were certainly unbecoming of Hogwarts students and would no longer be tolerated. The Prewetts, she said, despite their reputations, were not to be idolised for their misdeeds, even if they were all in the name of fun.James Potter kept throwing conspiratorial glances at Sirius, and even so much as dared to mock McGonagall when she wasn’t looking. Clearly, James took McGonagall’s lecture as a challenge and Sirius loved him for it. McGonagall, for her part, drove every point home with a stern glare at Sirius. Even though he knew he played a role in this particular prank, McGonagall certainly didn’t know that and the Prewetts had officially taken the fall for it. As far as she could prove, he was innocent, yet she still assumed his guilt. Whether it was because of his name alone or the incident last week in the first Transfiguration class, Sirius wasn’t sure. Either way, it was bloody unfair. Sure, he’d been involved in this particular instance, but not everything that went awry in Hogwarts castle was his fault. After class, Remus hung back. “Sirius?” he said. “Can I, um. Can I speak to you?”Sirius paused. “Yeah, sure.”They waited until the classroom cleared out. McGonagall threw one more demeaning look at Sirius before following her students into the corridor. When Remus didn’t immediately say anything and refused to look at him, all the things that could possibly be wrong flashed through Sirius’s head. Were Remus’s wrists still bleeding, or…? Merlin, what if Remus had to go home again? Finally, Remus met his eyes. “That potion you and James used… it was a truth serum?”Sirius barely had time to exchange his relief for general confusion. “Um, yeah, I think so. The Prewetts brewed it. It’s called Hiccuping Secrets. My guess is there’s at least a drop of Veritaserum in it.”Remus nodded. “And it… forces you to tell the truth?”“Yes.”“You shout out your darkest secrets?”“That’s the general idea,” Sirius said, slowly. “Look, Remus, we tested it on James, and well… First of all, it was hilarious, but more importantly, it’s perfectly safe. You don’t even lose all your hair unless you try to fight the potion.”“Were you going to use it on me?”The question floored him. All the air rushed from Sirius’s lungs. “What?! Remus, no. Fuck, no!”Remus fidgeted and looked embarrassed. “It’s just that… You keep asking about my scars and—”“Because I’m worried about you, Remus!” Merlin, he hadn’t meant to say it like that. Sirius took a breath. “I would never force you to give up your secrets. I’ll probably pester you until the sky falls down, but only because I want to help if someone’s hurting you. I’m your friend, goddamnit. I’d never dose you with truth serum.” He paused, pleading with Remus now. “You believe me, don’t you?”Remus sighed and nodded. “Yes, I believe you.”“Because I’d never hurt you,” he rambled on, almost as if Remus hadn’t spoken at all. “I can’t stand it, seeing you—or… or anyone I care about, really—in pain. Hell, the only reason I told James to slip Snape his own dose was because—” Remus held up a hand and Sirius stopped, mid-confession. “You… You put the potion in Snape’s glass because of me?”“He shoved you!”“I’m fine, Sirius.”“I don’t care,” Sirius growled. “He shoved you. You were bleeding. That made Snape fair game.”Remus pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’ve made all of us a target,” he said, but there was no accusation in his voice. It was just a fact.“What?”“Sirius, you made Snape and Malfoy spill their deepest, darkest secrets in front of everyone. Do you really think there won’t be consequences?”“We can handle them,” he insisted. “Or, like James said, we strike first.”“Look,” Remus said, with a heavy sigh. “If you wan’t to go after Malfoy or Snape or anyone in Slytherin, I’ll help you, if only to keep you from doing something stupid, but—”Sirius rolled his eyes. “I appreciate the vote of confidence. I’ve gotten away with pranking my cousin and Malfoy since I was little.”Remus shrugged, unfazed by Sirius’s sarcasm. “Not unscathed.”Sirius swallowed his next comment. No, he’d certainly not made it out unscathed. There was a time, at Bella’s birthday gathering, when Sirius had been nine. It wasn’t long after he’d gotten his tattoo, and—Fuck, he wasn’t going to think about that right now. The tattoo might still be there, but those bruises had healed long ago. Remus watched him carefully. “I can’t afford to have my secrets revealed in the middle of the Great Hall.”Neither can I, Sirius thought bitterly, absently rubbing his tattoo through his robes. “People could get hurt,” Remus continued. “I’d be expelled.”
Expelled?!
Oh, holy mother of Merlin, he needed to find out what Remus was hiding.“If Malfoy gets a hold of the Prewett’s potion—”“He won’t,” Sirius snapped. “But if—”“We’ll go talk to the Prewetts,” Sirius said. “Right fucking now, if you like.” Remus raised an eyebrow. “You’re right,” Sirius said. Remus looked rather smug about this, but honestly, Sirius couldn’t blame him. It’d been stupid, this whole Hiccuping Secrets thing. Hilarious, sure, but definitely stupid. “Secrets need to be off the table. So we convince the Prewetts we have reason to believe Malfoy might retaliate in the same fashion and ask them to not brew any more potion.”“Your plan is to… ask the Prewetts for a favour?”“We could destroy the Potion Lab with Fiendfyre, if that would make you feel better.”Remus snorted a laugh. “It would, actually. But I’m not sure I’d like to spend the rest of my days in Azkaban for arson.”“You’re right,” Sirius said. “If we’re gonna get ourselves thrown in Azkaban, it damn well better be for something awesome.”Remus laughed again, raw and genuine, and, Merlin, it was a relief to see him smile. When they’d both laughed more than perhaps their exchange warranted, Remus said, “So. We’re asking the Prewetts for a favour?”Sirius nodded. “Shouldn’t be too hard. I think Fabian has a crush on me.”This set Remus off laughing again. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ One amicable and mutually beneficial conversation later, and Fabian and Gideon Prewett had agreed to stop the production of hiccuping Secrets while at Hogwarts, on the condition that James, Remus, Peter and Sirius take up the sole mantle as the antagonisers of Slytherins, namely Malfoy. The Prewetts, it seemed, wanted to retire from plots of vengeance and humiliation and instead focus more on general mischief and mayhem. Sirius, if he was honest, didn’t see why the two should be mutually exclusive, but he hadn’t found that necessary to point out to Fabian or Gideon. The rest of the day was more or less uneventful. James and Peter left to go watch the Ravenclaw Quidditch team practice after lunch, while Remus and Sirius headed to the library. Immediately upon entering, Remus cracked open no less than four books and began reading from all of them, simultaneously, one sentence at a time from each. “Have to catch up,” he muttered under his breath, when Sirius told him to take it easy. Without another word, Sirius slid Remus all the notes he’d taken over the past few days, which was enough to distract Remus from the books. Remus set about copying the notes by hand, until Sirius showed him a wandless spell to copy them with magic. After that, Remus began cross-referencing the notes with the books, and Sirius lost all interest and tried not to be too insulted. Sirius prided himself on his note-taking ability; he knew all of the information was already correct. Sirius leaned back in his chair, balancing on the back two legs and propping his feet up on the table. His feet landed on the book Remus was currently reading. Remus glared at him. “Sirius.”“Hm?”“I have to study.”“I can see that.”Remus rolled his eyes. “You’re not helping.”“I gave you my notes!”“I appreciate it,” Remus said. Sirius smirked at him. “You really should. Contrary to popular belief, I really am a brilliant student.”“And humble, too, apparently,” Remus deadpanned.“No need to be humble when you’re a prodigy.”“Good lord,” Remus grumbled. He tried a different approach. “Sirius, I have stack of Muggle novels in my trunk.”Now that was intriguing. Sirius put his feet back on the floor and leaned forward. “Really?”“Really.” Remus put on a charming smile, all scars and freckles and amber eyes. “And you can borrow any one you choose, so long as you let me study and kindly fuck off.”“Deal,” Sirius said immediately, with a gleam in his eye. He grabbed his bag and stood. “Uh, Remus…?”Remus raised an eyebrow. “As brilliant as I am,” Sirius started, hesitating only slightly, “I know next to nothing about Muggle literature, so… Any suggestions? I know James likes this Shakes-a-lot—”“Shakespeare,” Remus said, laughing a little. “And you should probably work your way up to him. Try Frankenstein.”“Franken-what now?”“Frankenstein. Mary Shelley. It’s a well-worn copy, towards the top of the stack. It’s a red book with grey trim.” Sirius nodded. “Shouldn’t be too hard to find.”Remus narrowed his eyes and pointed a threatening finger at him. “If you ruin my book, Sirius Black, I will have to kill you. I’ll feel bad about it, but I will have to kill you.”Sirius gave a mock salute. “Noted.” Then, he marched up to Gryffindor tower.When he crawled through the portrait hole, Sirius thought he was alone, until Lily Evans marched right up to him and punched him in the stomach.
Merlin, fuck—!
“OW!” Sirius said, more from the pain touching her than her punch. Though, if he’s being honest, Lily Evans can throw a damn good punch. She crossed her arms over her chest. “I have a bone to pick with you, Sirius Black.”Ah. Snape.“He shoved Remus!” Sirius protested, rubbing his stomach a little. It would probably bruise, but nothing like the ones he’s used to. “You don’t get to be the executioner of justice!” she yelled, standing on her toes so she was inches from his face.“Why the hell not?” he yelled back, putting distance between them. “None of the professors were going to do anything about it!”“You said you’d leave him out of it!”“I kept my word, Evans! Snape’s been saying shit about me all of yesterday and I didn’t do a damn thing, but this morning, he shoved Remus, and—”“I know,” she snapped. “Fuck, I know! Marlene saw Severus push him.”“Then why am I here?” Sirius asked, lowering his voice. “More importantly, why are you hitting me?”She took half a step forward. Sirius took half a step back, wondering if she was going to take another swing. “I wanted to talk to you about secrets,” Lily said. Sirius laughed. “Yeah, well, save it. I’ve already had that particular conversation with Remus.”He edged around her, careful not to touch, then sank into one of the armchairs, dangling one leg over an armrest. Lily turned on her heel. “And?”“And what?”“What was the outcome of that particular conversation?”Sirius shrugged. “We concluded that, though revealing secrets has a potentially hilarious outcome, secrets are, first and foremost, a liability and one that could just as easily be used against us.” He paused and waved his hand. A tiny flame appeared and he let it dance over his fingers before extinguishing it. “So, in essence, revealing secrets for pranking and/or revenge purposes is now strictly off the table.”Lily nodded once. “Good.”He flicked another flame into being. “Plus, we made the Prewetts swear on their magic that they wouldn’t give that potion to anyone else at Hogwarts.”“Even better.” Her voice changed. Lily looked down at her shoes. For a horrifying second, Sirius thought she was crying, but then she looked up and her eyes were dry. She looked… hurt, though, and he knew why. “I, uh,” he began, not really sure how to do this, but knowing he needed to all the same. “I didn’t mean to get you involved. I’m… sorry I made him say that. In front of everyone.”“But you’re not sorry about giving him whatever it is you gave him or about the other things he said or about how all his hair fell out?”At this point, he didn’t see any point in lying to her. “No. Not sorry for that, really. He hurt Remus.”She nodded, sniffed, and was quiet for a moment. Then, she walked over and sat in the chair across from him. She leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, and fixed him with a hard stare. “Sirius?”“Yeah?”“Are we—” She fidgeted again. He noticed she did that a lot when she didn’t know what to say. “Are we friends?”He hadn’t been expecting that. She didn’t give him a chance to reply. “I’m not asking because you’re sorry for embarrassing me or even because of what happened at breakfast. I just… I want to know where you and I stand.”Sirius put both feet on the ground and mimicked her pose. “Do you want to be friends with me?”“I think so.”He narrowed his eyes. “Why? Because, trust me, Evans, you’re not Snape. You’ve handled yourself just fine so far. You don’t need my protection.”Lily’s face scrunched up. “Your protection?!”Sirius waved her off. “And, let’s be honest here, I painted a huge fucking target on my back the second I asked the Hat for Gryffindor, so even if I was offering protection, it’d be shit.”“Did you offer Potter or Remus your ‘protection’?”Sirius gulped. He considered the possibility that he severely misunderstood her intention in asking for his friendship. “What? No.”“Why not?”“They’re different.”“Because they’re boys or because they’re higher born than me?”Well, he walked right into that one. “I, um. I don’t think I want to answer that.”Lily smirked, triumphant. “Hah. Even Sirius Black has a blood bias.”His stomach lurched. “No—fuck—I don’t—!”“Grow out of it. Right now.”“Yes, ma’am.” Merlin, he meant it too. Anything and everything to separate himself from the horrible philosophies forced down his throat since he was born and named heir.“I do not need your protection,” Lily Evans said. Sirius nodded. “Understood.”“And I would like to be your friend.”He paused. “Okay, honestly? That one I don’t get.”“You’re loyal. Kind, too, I think, when you want to be.” A wicked smirk crept across her face. “Plus, no one in their right mind would expect it.”Sirius barked a laugh. “Ah, you’re here for the danger of defying societal norms. I admire that.”“I’m a Gryffindor, aren’t I?” she said, a wild gleam in her eye.“S’pose you are.” He waved his hand, once more conjuring a flame. “There are drawbacks to this whole arrangement, you know.”Lily nodded, serenely. “You are a bit of an arse.”“Fair enough,” he said, letting the tiny fire dance across his knuckles. “I think I hate Severus Snape.”Lily’s smile fell a little and she heaved a sigh. “I don’t think that’s entirely unwarranted, given your interactions with him.”Sirius raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “But,” she continued, “you should probably know that he’s my best friend and, deep down, he is a good person. I won’t stop being friends with him for you or for anyone.”“I wouldn’t ask you to. But I still hate him.”Lily Evans knew how to match him blow for blow. Merlin, Sirius loved it. “I’m not feeling particularly fond of James Potter at the moment.”The flame in his hand inched up his arm a bit, flickering across the sleeves of his robes, before Sirius closed his fist and snuffed it out. “Why hate James and not me?”“You’re an arse, but at least you show a general sense of compassion for your fellow man. I saw how you helped Remus the other day.”
Compassion, huh?
“You should know,” Sirius said, “that James Potter is my best friend and, deep down, is a good person.”“Then we understand each other. We don’t choose between our friends.” Sirius nodded.They sat in a comfortable silence, both openly sizing each other up.Eventually, Sirius said, “There are other things to consider than James and Snape, Evans.” “You’re quite posh, you know that? I wasn’t aware this was a negotiation.”“I’m trying to help you make an informed decision, and, for that, there are a few things you should probably know.”Say, for instance: My mother would probably kill both of us if she knew we were speaking together. And: There’s a tattoo on my chest that means I can never touch you.Lily rolled her eyes. “Oh, please, do go on.”This was a challenge to her.No sense in beating around the bush, then. “My family would hunt you down for just talking to me.”Lily frowned. “Because I’m—”“Muggle-born. Yes, but they would probably not use that word.”“Huh.” That wild gleam was back in her eyes. “I did mention this secret motivation of mine that involved obliterating everyone’s opinions of what should be considered normal, did I not?”Bravery, even if it was stupid. Like any true Gryffindor. “If Malfoy even suspects you’re my friend, he’ll perform the blood curse again.”At this, Lily Evans almost looked excited. “I’ve been meaning to tell you that I’m looking for a cure to that. Do you want to help?”“There’s no cure. I’ve checked.”(But, Merlin, imagine a world in which there was a cure or a counter-curse for that godforsaken tattoo on his chest. He could—) Sirius shook his head. Now was not the time. “Just to be clear, while we’re on the subject of Slytherins and Malfoy and, well, Snape—”Lily groaned. “Are we still on that?”“—As long as Snape continues to threaten my friends, I’m not going to let him get away with it.”“Nor will I stop putting you in your place if and when you go too far,” she said. “Now, are you done trying to convince me we shouldn’t be friends?”He laughed a little. “Not quite. Contrary to popular belief, I am not the picture of perfection you see before you. I’m allergic to chocolate, I can’t sing for shit—but that doesn’t stop me from trying—and, as Remus said, I have a thing about germs, so I will not be touching you under any circumstances short of actual mortal peril.”Lily considered this. “Okay. Is that it?”
Well, there’s the tattoo, and the crazy mother, and the dying wand—
“Think so, yes,” he said, instead.“Good.” She stood up, then strolled towards the stairs that led to the girls’ dormitory. “Guess you’re stuck with me, Sirius Black.”Sirius smiled, ducking his head a little. Lily Evans, Muggle-born Gryffindor, was a force of nature and, Merlin, he was just stuck in her wake. He loved every minute of it.“Think it’s the other way around, Evans.”Lily paused, halfway up the first few steps, and turned back to face him. “Are you really allergic to chocolate?” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Andromeda,
You’re never going to believe what I got Malfoy to say in front of the entire school! (Hint: You might want to watch out. He seems to have a thing for the Black sisters.) Merlin, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Cissa so mad! He said some other stuff, too, and Narcissa nearly had my head, but my wonderful, amazingly clever friend, Remus Lupin, intervened and I was saved!
Anyway, I’ve included a dramatic retelling of the whole affair that you can peruse at your leisure, before forwarding on to Regulus. I have a feeling he’d love it.
Thanks,
Sirius
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Merlin, Sirius!!
You should know, Feathers was in a right state after I read him your “dramatic retelling”. First, he laughed (Well, we both did—you should be a novelist, Siri!), then he wanted to storm up to Hogwarts to give Malfoy a piece of his mind. “If you think you can lay your slimy little hands on my ‘Dromeda…etc., etc.” He doesn’t mean it, of course. Neither of us are stupid enough to cross Malfoy. We’ll leave that up to you and Potter, thank you very much. I think Feathers mostly said that because I find it hot. Merlin, I love him. Ugh, sorry.
I, um. Well. Sirius, I haven’t forwarded your “dramatic retelling” to Reg, just yet, but I will if you insist on it. I thought that even if there was the slightest chance that the Warden might be reading the letters we keep sending to Regulus, then it’s best not to risk it. If she knew about the Hiccuping Secrets, she’d only hold it against you and I don’t want to make things worse for you or Reg, come Christmas.
Like I said, I’ll still send it if you want me to, so long as you understand the risks.
Love, always,
Andromeda and Feathers (who requested I convey his gratitude to you)
P.S. I think I would quite like to meet your wonderful, amazingly clever friend, Remus Lupin. You’ll have to bring him next time I see you at Hagrid’s.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Andromeda,
Merlin, I hadn’t thought of that at all. Don’t send it. I definitely can’t risk the Warden hearing about it. I’ll just tell Reg about it over the holidays.
I’m glad you and Feathers enjoyed my dramatic retelling. I shall consider a career as a novelist when the time comes.
Sirius
P.S. I’ll bring Remus around. Just don’t shake his hand. Don’t know why, but it feels like you’ve thrown your entire body into the fucking sun. He’ll understand. He has suspicions on why I can’t touch anyone, but I haven’t told him the full story.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
SEPTEMBER 23, 1971
With the help of Madam Pomfrey’s potions, it had only taken about two days for Snape’s and Malfoy’s hair to grow back, but they were a glorious two days, in which the Prewetts and four Gryffindor first years were heralded as heroes over the vanquished and bald Slytherins.For next the two weeks, James went around the castle giving free, dramatic performances of Snape’s deepest, darkest secrets and subsequent hair-loss. Lily Evans hexed him stupid on no less than five separate occasions. There came a point when James Potter would no longer get annoyed with Lily’s hexes, but instead, he’d get this ridiculous doe-eyed look on his face and then drone on about her greatness until either Sirius or Remus hexed his mouth shut. Sirius and Remus had a working theory that James kept up the impressions of Snape for the sole purpose of falling victim to one of Lily’s hexes. Peter, on the other hand, couldn’t figure out why someone would be that stupid. It was a fair point, Sirius conceded, but neither he nor Remus particularly felt like explaining James’s little crush to Peter. Standing outside the Transfiguration classroom, James was under the influence of what looked to be a Babel Hex. He spouted off a stream of rapid-fire, nonsensical words, and seemed to have absolutely no clue that he was speaking gibberish. They caught bits of English, then French and Latin, and perhaps some Yiddish, along with some…“Merlin, what language is that?” Sirius asked, scrunching his face up at James, who just kept talking. “I think that’s Mermish,” Remus said, equally dumbfounded by James Potter’s newfound linguistic skills. “Mermish,” Sirius repeated. “As in—”“The language of the merpeople, yes,” Remus said. James continued to blubber on, slowly starting to realise that his friends couldn’t understand him. “Well, now I think that’s Cantonese. Or Japanese. Or Korean. I can’t really tell.”“What do you think we sound like to him?” Peter asked. “Hm. Good question,” Sirius said, stroking his chin. “Do you think he’s trying to tell us something?”James let out a frustrated sigh and flicked two fingers up at him.“See, now that I understood,” Sirius said with a smirk.Lily Evans walked in. Remus and Sirius stood and applauded. “Excellent hex work today, Evans,” Sirius said. “You’re truly the best out of all of us,” Remus said. Lily took a bow. James threw his book at Sirius’s head, but Sirius ducked, and it hit Peter square in the face. While Remus dealt with the fallout, Sirius snuck away to stand beside Lily. Together, they watched as Remus crumpled James’s homework and used it to mop the blood coming from Peter’s nose. Lily side-eyed him. “Remus gave me the impression that you were quite handy with healing spells.”“Oh, I am,” he said, waving his hand and conjuring a bit of his magic. “I’ll fix him before McGonagall gets here. This is too funny to cut short.”James tried to hex Remus for destroying his homework, but the spell kept coming out in Russian and fizzling out. James threw a desperate glance at Sirius. His face immediately went slack-jawed and stupid once he caught sight of Lily.“You should really stop, you know,” Sirius said to Lily. She flashed him her best smile. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”“He’s besotted. Totally beside himself. Utterly and completely in love with you.”“Who? Potter?!” Lily wrinkled her nose. “In love with me?!”“Yes,” Sirius said, laughing a little. “You didn’t pick up on that when he proposed to you?”“I just thought he was being a berk.”“Oh, he definitely was,” Sirius said. James walked over to them, his full attention on Lily Evans, as he began reciting an epic love poem in what could only be understood as Pig-Latin. Lily tried not to laugh.“Hm. Guess I’ll find a hex that’ll make him swallow his tongue next.”Without looking away from James, Sirius said, “Careful, Evans, or I’ll fall in love with you.”James turned beat red and glared death at Sirius.“I’m not your type, Black,” she said with a scoff. “Nah, you’re not my type,” he echoed. And that was how it went.James and Sirius, with the help of their brilliant mastermind, Remus Lupin, continued to hex Slytherins left and right. As per Sirius’s agreement with Lily, they stayed away from Snape, though Sirius refused to tell James and Remus exactly why. Malfoy and Snape watched them—Sirius could feel their gazes on the back of his neck at all times, like an evil spirit clinging to the mere taste of his flesh—but neither of them acted. They were planning something, Sirius knew, biding their time like good little Slytherins, but he didn’t let it worry him too much. He was still the Black heir, and Gryffindor though he may be, his name still afforded him some degree of protection, and his friends, by extension. Neither Malfoy nor Snape could afford to alienate themselves from one of the most powerful wizarding houses in Britain.Though Malfoy and Snape were temporarily off the table, their Slytherin compatriots were more than fair game for the Gryffindors’ pranks. One morning, right after breakfast, Remus hit one of the Carrow twins with a sticking hex, not all that dissimilar from the one James used to glue Sirius to the bench in McGonagall’s classroom. It hadn’t done anything at first, and Sirius and James almost lost faith, but then Alecto jumped on her brother’s shoulders in excitement, when the Quidditch schedule was announced, and, well, she was quite stuck there. It’d taken Flitwick and McGonagall to get the two wailing Slytherins unstuck from each other, while the four Gryffindor boys laughed until they couldn’t breathe on the other side of the Hall.Nights, Sirius mostly spent with Remus, on the roof, outside their dormitory after Remus came back from the library. They talked about everything not important, from the actual rules of Quidditch—because somehow Remus still tuned James out every time he tried to talk about Beaters and Snitches—to an in-depth analysis and eventual debate on the philosophical implications of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. (Sirius had great sympathy for the monster, created against his will and forced to do his master’s bidding. Remus, while acknowledging that Frankenstein the man was a monster in his own right for what he’d done, refused to give any dignity to the monster’s tragic story and circumstance itself.) Then, afterwards they’d just stared at the stars for a good long while, occasionally with Sirius pointing out constellations named after his least favourite family members, they’d crawl back inside and usually end up sharing a bed, with a pillow situated between them. Early in the mornings, when Remus was still sleeping and the sun had not quite risen, Sirius would lie awake, staring at the bed hangings or at Remus’s scars. He’d allow himself a few moments to bask in the thrill of his life here, in Gryffindor tower. It was everything his parents would hate. Everything they’d feared he’d become. Sirius Black was home, here, in this magic castle with moving staircases and talking paintings. It was perfect, this life, even in its imperfection. The consequences be damned. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 3, 1971
One Sunday morning, about a month into classes, Remus Lupin stumbled into the Great Hall around nine, just as breakfast was ending, looking bleary and out of it. Remus had still been asleep when Sirius had returned to the dorm after an early morning jog through the castle. It wasn’t entirely unusual, save for the fact that now, even after a few more hours of sleep, Remus looked like he hadn’t slept at all in days. Remus sat down and piled his plate with bacon. He was pale and a bit sallow, which made his scars far more noticeable than they already were. His eyes were sunken in and half-lidded, and, for a moment, Sirius wondered if Remus might be sleep-walking, until Remus glanced up at him and—“Your eyes are gold again,” Sirius blurted. This seemed to wake Remus up a little. He stared directly at his breakfast and his ears turned pink. “Are they?”“Why do they do that?” Sirius asked, trying to catch another glimpse of Remus’s eyes.“Do what?”“Change colour.”“They haven’t changed colour.”“Yes, they have,” Sirius said, a little frustrated. He wasn’t fucking crazy. “Yesterday, they were this brownish colour, like honey. Today, they’re gold.”“Those are two very similar colours, Sirius. I’m sure it’s just your imagination.”“It is not!”“What’s not?” James said, taking his seat beside Remus. Peter sat down next to Sirius and reached for some of Remus’s bacon, but then pulled his hand back when threatened by Remus’s menacing glare.Remus forced his features back to normal. Then, with a very deliberate glare at Peter, he popped another piece of bacon in his mouth and said, “Siri thinks my eyes are changing colour.” James grabbed Remus by the chin and stared intently into his eyes. A second later, he released him. “Maybe they’re a little different, but it’s probably just the lighting.”Sirius rolled his eyes. “You are no use whatsoever, Potter.”“Love you too, Black.”“Peter’s on my side, aren’t you, Pete?” Sirius said, turning to him. Peter swallowed nervously and squinted at Remus. “I’ve never really noticed the colour of his eyes to begin with. I’m not sure I should take a side.”Sirius buried his head in his hands. “Complete and utter betrayal. Why do I even bother to keep you lot around?”“Because we’re nice to look at,” James deadpanned. “Nah, that’s what those magazines are for, mate,” Sirius shot back, with a wink.Remus snickered. It took James a solid thirty seconds before he understood what Sirius meant, then, he promptly choked on his tea. “Gross, Sirius,” James said, wiping dribble from his chin. Sirius just shrugged. “So, Jamie, what’s the plan for tomorrow? It’s been a week or two since we’ve really done anything to Avery, and yesterday, I saw him shoving around some Hufflepuffs and calling them some unsavoury names. I hexed him, of course, but I don’t think he quite got the message.”“Well, now that you mention it,” James said, “I procured some Dungbombs from the Prewetts—”“Merlin, I love those two,” Sirius cut in.“—And I was thinking that you and Remus should distract Avery. You know, taunt him and the like. Then, I’ll hit him with a numbing charm from behind, so he won’t feel anything, and Pete will slip the Dungbomb into his trousers. Avery won’t notice a thing until he starts stinking up the place.”“Why do I have to be the one to touch his arse?” Peter whined. Sirius ignored him and wiggled around excitedly. “Perfect. So, tomorrow after breakfast, Remus and I will—”“I can’t,” Remus said. All three boys turned to look at him.“What?” Sirius said. “Why not?”Remus refused to meet his eyes. A profound sadness seemed to wash over him.“I have to go away again,” Remus said. “My mum…”James’s features softened to something like sympathy. “She’s sick again?”Remus nodded. “She’s always sick, it’s just… more, this time. I’m leaving tomorrow morning.”Sirius clamped his jaw shut and didn’t say anything. He refused to react like he had last time, even though every instinct he had told him to beg Remus to stay. “How long will you be gone?” Peter asked.Remus gave a noncommittal shrug. “Few days, at least.”And he’ll come back with even more scars, that evil, annoyingly logical voice in Sirius’s brain supplied. “’S no big deal,” James said, trying to wave off the air of tension that suddenly surrounded them. “We’ll wait until you’re back to get Avery, Remus.”“Don’t worry about it,” Remus said, forcing a smile. “Avery needs to be put in his place, the sooner the better. I’ll help with the next one.”James and Peter exchanged a glance. Sirius refused to tear his eyes from Remus. “If you’re sure…” James said.“I’m sure,” Remus said. James cast a Tempus spell then immediately jumped to his feet, nearly banging his knees on the table as he did so. “Merlin, we’re supposed to meet McKinnon on the Quidditch pitch. The Prewetts are supposed to give us lessons after practice. Pete, you’re with me. Sirius, are you—” “I’ll catch up,” Sirius said, his attention still completely on Remus. Remus tugged at the edges of his jumper and pretended to eat a little more bacon. “Suit yourself,” James said, then he and Peter left the Hall. Sirius let the silence fester between them a bit, before he said, “You know what I’m going to say.”Remus nodded. “You don’t want me to go.”“Right,” Sirius breathed. “Any use in trying to talk you into staying?”Remus looked down, heartbroken and defeated. “No.”“Will you be… hurt?” Merlin, Sirius nearly choked on the question. “That’s…” Remus hesitated. “That’s always a possibility.”Fuck.But instead of reacting, Sirius swallowed down the fire that was itching to erupt inside of him. “Will you go to Pomfrey this time?” he asked, desperately trying to keep control of his voice.Remus seemed surprised by the question. “Pomfrey? Wha—”“For anything I can’t heal,” Sirius explained, making a vague gesture towards Remus’s wrists. They’d scarred over pretty bad: new, pinkish gouge marks over older, deeper wounds. Remus had shown him a week ago, mostly to stop Sirius from pestering him about it. “You don’t have to show her everything, if you don’t want to, but Pomfrey has dittany for, er, those kinds of wounds. I can fix whatever else there is, so long as it’s not…”
Dark Magic.
Remus narrowed his eyes. “You’re being awfully pragmatic about this.”“Yeah, well,” Sirius muttered. “I have to be. We’ve had this argument before—a few times, actually—so you know where I stand. I just… I guess I want you to know that I’ll be here, when you get back, to pick up the pieces. No matter what.”Unshed tears welled in Remus’s eyes and he looked away. He managed a throaty laugh. “I, uh. I don’t want you to think less of me because I’m going, especially if I know…”He trailed off and held up his wrists. A few of the scars peeked out from beneath the cuffs of his robes. “I don’t!” Sirius said, startled. “Merlin, Remus, I don’t think less of you!” It’d be pretty fucking hypocritical if he did. “You’re brave, you idiot. Gryffindor, down to the bones.” Remus shook his head. “You don’t have to say that, Siri.”“Shut up. I mean it. I wouldn’t lie to you about this. I know what it’s like to—” Merlin, how does one go about phrasing this delicately? “—to expect pain. It’s terrifying. It’s lose-your-mind kind of fear. It eats you alive. I know. I’d give anything to stop it, Remus, but I can’t. So, I’m here, no matter what. Until the end.”Remus stared at him, apparently no longer caring that there were tears spilling down his cheeks, tracing the divots of his scars. “The gods ask too much of you and me, Siri,” Remus said, eventually.Sirius barked a laugh. “Fuck the gods. Didn’t Jamie tell you? Some crazy pigeon in Diagon Alley said I’m destined to kill the gods.”“I look forward to it.”Remus flashed him a smile and, Merlin on high, it was brilliant: golden eyes glistening between the recent memories of tears, his scars proud and unforgettable, a testament to the valour buried in his heart.Gryffindor to the bone, indeed. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 5, 1971
Remus didn’t come back for two days. James, Sirius, and Peter pranked the Slytherins, as planned. They got caught, as predicted by Remus. They served their detentions each night with Filch, scrubbing old trophies without magic, as ordered. None of that, however, could take Sirius’s mind off of Remus Lupin. Just like last time, Sirius spent every waking moment thinking up all the possible things that could be happening to Remus. One of the more terrifying scenarios—fuelled almost entirely by a half-formed, insomnia-induced nightmare—involved Remus locked in a cage with two rabid dogs. They lunged at him, each latching onto a wrist, and began gnawing his flesh away, as Remus screamed. Sirius had no idea where it came from, but apparently, his subconscious couldn’t shake the idea that the scars on Remus’s wrists were teeth marks. They couldn’t be, though. If they were, Sirius would be able to heal them. Those scars were from Dark Magic. Which, naturally, led Sirius down the increasingly short list of suspects who could possibly be performing Dark Magic on Remus. Unfortunately, his list of suspects was entirely reliant on what Sirius knew of Remus’s home life, which was to say, very little.There was Remus’s mum, of course. She was sick. Remus could be lying about that, but given that haunted look he got every time he mentioned it, Sirius doubted it. Sick people inevitably did crazy things—(Hell, anyone did, when they were in pain. It’s the cornered dog response.)—but Remus’s mother was Muggle. She couldn’t have performed Dark Magic on him. There were a few other unlikely suspects Sirius considered, whilst lying awake alone in his bed. Remus had mentioned his grandparents in France on the train, but they were A), in France, and B), his mother’s parents and therefore Muggles. That led Sirius to the most viable known suspect: Remus’s father. He had been in Ravenclaw and the name Lupin was vaguely familiar, but Sirius was having trouble disassociating the name with Remus enough to even begin to wonder where he could have heard it mentioned before. It certainly wasn’t among the Sacred Twenty-Eight, nor did he think that Remus’s father had any sort of blood bias, given that he’d married a Muggle, but pure-blood fanatics were hardly the only ones capable of performing Dark Magic. Something about it didn’t add up. Remus had hugged his father on the platform. Now, Sirius Black was the last person to comment on healthy physical intimacy between family members, but that hug? Remus loved his father. You didn’t cling to someone like that unless you loved them, and Remus’s father had hugged him right back. Maybe it had been an act. Merlin knows Sirius’s own parents had forced physical affection upon him and Regulus, to keep up appearances at family gatherings, but his parents had never hugged him like that. Like they’d actually meant it. Like they were genuinely concerned that the sun wouldn’t rise anymore after they’d said goodbye.So, how could you love someone with that kind of ferocity and still use Dark Magic on them? Sirius’s own parents wouldn’t know love like that if it hit them across the face with a Beater’s bat. Maybe, then, it couldn’t be his father. Maybe it was someone else who Remus knew, but Merlin, that meant this person had been doing this to Remus for years, given the sheer number of scars Remus had. It also meant that, considering hypothetically that Remus’s parents loved and cared about him, they knew someone was hurting their son. There was literally no other way to explain away those scars, especially if they couldn’t be healed with ordinary healing spells. If Remus’s parents—or, more specifically, his wizard father—knew, then he was complacent with the Dark Magic used against his son, which, in Sirius’s mind, was just as damning. There was no way around it, no way to account for this discrepancy. Remus Lupin’s father loved him. Remus was a victim of Dark Magic. The two didn’t add up.Mother of Merlin, Sirius prayed he was missing something big. Being completely fucking wrong was far better than the idea that Remus was being tortured by a father who clearly claimed to love him. That would be far worse than curses at the hand of a mother who constantly told her son that he was a disgrace and a blood traitor. That kind of illusion of love… it’s inhumane. A cruelty even the Blacks could never think up.All in all, this constant speculation did little to improve Sirius’s mood. Lily Evans, however, certainly did. Over the past two days, she’d been keeping Sirius company when he wasn’t with James and Peter. She’d also stepped in for Remus as the resident expert on Muggle literature.“He made you read Frankenstein?” she asked, on Tuesday morning, as she and Sirius walked back to class after lunch.“He didn’t make me,” Sirius insisted. He spun around on his heel and walked backwards, a pace or two in front of Lily. “He recommended it. I had a choice. And, besides, I liked it. It was… romantic, in a horrifically tragic sort of way. Muggles have a fascinating notion of—”“Romantic?” Lily repeated. “Frankenstein is not romantic. There’s no love story. The monster kills Frankenstein’s wife.”“It’s not about the stupid wife!” Sirius insists. “It’s about the monster! He’s in love with humanity, but humanity rejects him because of what he is, and it breaks his heart. He acts out of heartbreak, not because of what he is!”Lily raises an incredulous eyebrow. “It’s a horror story, Sirius. Not a romance.”“Why can’t it be both?” he asked, genuinely confused.“If you like romances so much, you should read one of my books,” Lily said, not quite conceding to his point, but clearly not wanting to argue it further. Sirius claimed it as a victory. “Is it a Muggle book?”“Yes.”“With murder, mayhem, and maybe a thought provoking inquiry as to the state of the human condition?”“Of course,” she said, with a small smile. “And this time with a structured love story.”“Ooh,” Sirius cooed, waggling his eyebrows. “Is it one of those sexy Muggle novels, Evans? I won’t judge.”She whacked him with her textbook, barely missing grazing him with her fingers. “No, you prat. But… it’s French.”“French?”“Yes, it’s—”They stopped at a corner, the sound of angry voices echoing from up ahead. Sirius and Lily leaned against the wall and listened. “Watch where you’re going, arsehole!” That was Snape’s voice. Lily gasped. Sirius made to round the corner, but she placed her hand on his chest and shoved him back against the wall, before releasing him. He winced and glared at her. She glared right back and waved a threatening finger in his face, demanding he stay put. “Look, Snape, I’m not in the mood to start anything right now, so if you could just—”Remus. That was Remus.“Weren’t you listening, half-breed?” Fucking Malfoy. “He said you’re in the way.”“Well, actually, what he said was—”There was a scuffle. Then a slam. Then Remus cried out in pain.Sirius absolutely fucking lost his shit. Lily immediately slapped a hand over his mouth and wrapped her other arm around his middle to keep him from running in half-cocked.Every nerve in his body was on fire. He was burning alive. That was the only explanation.“Fuck, Evans, let go!” he hissed, shaking her hand away from his mouth. She just grabbed his wrist and used her entire weight to pull him backwards.Through gritted teeth, she managed to keep her voice down. “No, Sirius, please, you need to—”“Let go! It hurts!” he whispered, as loud as he dared. Instantly, she sprang back, holding up her hands. She looked him up and down, and he could see the pieces clicking into place in her eyes.She’d figured out his secret.Merlin, he didn’t have time to think about that right now. “I know what you are, you disgusting little freak!” Malfoy sneered, from around the corner. “My father sits on the board of governors. A thing like you shouldn’t even be allowed inside the gates!”Remus whimpered.Sirius rounded the corner just in time to see Malfoy drive his fist into Remus’s ribs. Remus crumpled. “Malfoy!” Sirius shouted.Malfoy whirled and drew his wand. Sirius was faster. He made a slashing movement with his wand. “Sectumsempra!”A gash appeared, vertically down the left side of Malfoy’s face, and Malfoy staggered backwards with a loud cry of pain. Severus Snape drew his wand and started towards Sirius, but Sirius merely flicked his wrist and Snape went flying. Vaguely, he heard Lily shout Snape’s name behind him, but Sirius only had eyes for Malfoy. Blood gushing from the slash on his face, Malfoy managed to stand, furious silver eyes trained on Sirius. “Oh, you stupid cunt!” Malfoy yelled.Sirius dropped his wand and all but launched himself at Malfoy. The force of his weight knocked Malfoy back. Sirius curled his fingers and slammed the palm of his hand into Malfoy’s nose once, twice—until he heard it break. Malfoy elbowed his ribs. It hurt, but Sirius did not fucking care. He dug his fingernails into Malfoy’s cheeks and throat.He wasn’t aware of anyone shouting except Malfoy, not until two unimaginably strong arms wrapped around Sirius’s waist and pulled.
Holy mother of—
Sirius screamed. There was no pain on heaven or on earth that could ever compete with that. He fell backwards, using whatever strength he had left in him to roll away from Remus. His breath came in deep, wheezing rasps and his throat felt raw. His vision swirled a little, until Remus’s face came into focus. There were two new gashes across Remus’s chin and down his neck. The lines ran parallel to each other and looked deep and painful, but Sirius knew, beyond a doubt, that Malfoy hadn’t done those. Remus reached for Sirius, then pulled back, just as fast, but it was enough for Sirius to see the blood dripping down Remus’s fingers. Without warning, Malfoy got to his feet and charged them, his long, white hair a wild and blood-stained curtain around his face. Sirius wasn’t expecting the kick to his ribs, nor the one that followed. He curled in on himself, but Malfoy kept kicking him. “No!” Remus shouted. He shoved his way between Sirius and Malfoy and stood up to his full height. He grabbed hold of the front of Malfoy’s robes, as Malfoy tried to make another go for Sirius. “Christ, Malfoy, STOP IT!” In a flash, Malfoy had his wand pointed directly at Remus’s head. “Let go of me, you fucking animal!” Malfoy said, his voice remarkably steady.Remus did not move. Every bit of magic left in him ignited. Sirius pulled himself to his feet, then stepped around Remus. With a shout, Sirius held out his arm and Malfoy went flying across the hall, until he collided with an armour statue and fell to the ground, unconscious and bleeding. “SIRIUS BLACK, STAND DOWN THIS INSTANT!”Sirius and Remus whirled around.McGonagall and Rattleburn came running down the corridor, both of their wands raised and pointed at him.Oh, fuck. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ He wasn’t sure how long he and Remus sat in McGonagall’s office. They hadn’t spoken to each other, besides the muttered, “Thanks,” when Remus handed Sirius his wand back. He hadn’t even realised Remus had picked the stupid thing up. As far as he could tell, Lily made it out of the corridor with Snape before McGonagall and Rattleburn showed up. That was consolation, at least. McGonagall was one thing, but Sirius was pretty sure Lily Evans would have his head for this.The good news: there was a very slim chance that any of this would actually get back to his mother. Sirius didn’t think Malfoy would go around bragging about how he was beat up by a couple of first years any time soon. Even if he told Narcissa—(He’d have to, eventually. She was bloody persistent.)—it wasn’t likely that Cissa would go about telling anyone else. It didn’t exactly look good that her betrothed was unable to stand against a pariah heir and his half-blood friend. The bad news? Lily was angry and had more than likely worked out Sirius’s secret, McGonagall was furious, and Remus Lupin had yet to actually speak to him. Sirius kept his general sense of panic at bay by sneaking glances at Remus. Along with the deep cuts along Remus’s chin and neck, there was a smaller scratch across the bridge of his nose that already looked like it was healing. Remus kept his hands clasped together on his lap, but Sirius could see blood seeping from beneath each cuff. Whatever happened, Remus’s wrists were in bad shape again. Other than that, he seemed relatively fine. As far as Sirius noticed, Remus hadn’t been walking hunched over or wheezing like last time, so he figured Remus’s ribs were all right.His own ribs… well, not so much. Normally, he’d prefer to look in the mirror before he performed a healing charm on himself—especially a wandless healing charm—but Sirius didn’t particularly want to appear weak in front of McGonagall. He’d need his wits about him. He was in enough trouble, as is.Sirius sat up as straight as he could manage. With one hand, he prodded his ribcage, just to be certain that nothing was broken or would require another spell. Then, calling his magic to his fingertips, Sirius muttered, “Episkey.”He let out a hiss as the magic worked over his bruises. He sat up straighter and wiggled a little, to make sure there was no lingering damage. Remus glanced at him from the corner of his eye. (They were amber again, Sirius noted.) “Are you all right?”Sirius shrugged. “I should be asking you that.”“I’m fine, Siri.”Sirius gave him a weak nod. Merlin, he didn’t know what to say. Thankfully, McGonagall stormed in, a flurry of burgundy robes. “Black, Lupin,” she said, coming to stand behind her desk. “I should like an explanation. Right now.”Remus and Sirius glanced at each other. Then, Remus turned back to McGonagall, the picture of innocence and remorse. “How’s—”“Malfoy will be fine,” she snapped. “He will scar, but he will be fine.”Sirius nearly choked on the air in his lungs. “He’ll scar?!”“You used Dark Magic on him, Black,” McGonagall said. “Of course it will scar.”“No, it wasn’t—” Fuck. “It wasn’t Dark Magic!”“It was a curse.”“Which, strictly speaking, isn’t necessarily Dark Magic,” Sirius argued. “A curse doesn’t have to be Dark. It wasn’t an Unforgivable.”“It doesn’t matter,” McGonagall said, cooly. “Lucius Malfoy will have that scar for the rest of his life because of you, Mr. Back.”“He attacked Remus!” Sirius protested, because Merlin, he had to say something. McGonagall turned to Remus. “Mr. Lupin, is that true?”Slowly, Remus nodded. “Malfoy shoved me against the wall.”“And punched you,” Sirius supplied, crossing his arms over his chest.“And punched me.”“And said you didn’t deserve to be at Hogwarts because you’re a half-blood.”Remus was silent for a moment, before he said, “Yeah.”McGonagall’s expression did not soften. “You’re saying this was self-defence, Black?”“Merlin, yes! I was stopping Malfoy from hurting Remus!”“So you cursed him?”“Yes.”“And broke his nose?”“Yes.”“And threw him against a wall?”Sirius rose to his feet. “He fucking deserved it!”McGonagall just stared him down. “Mr. Black, I have never tolerated that kind of language and I will not make an exception now. You will—”“Malfoy started this. I stopped it. End of story.”“You cursed a fellow student! You could have blinded him!”“None of you lot were going were there to help! And even if you’d seen it, would you have done anything? Malfoy’s a fucking prefect and his father practically runs the Ministry. Malfoy has more power at this school than anyone but Dumbledore!”McGonagall’s lips formed a thin, white line. “I could have you expelled for this, Black.”Sirius barked a laugh, because otherwise, he thought his panic might swallow him whole. “Yeah? And how else did you plan on keeping an eye on the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black? You and Dumbledore seem to think my family’s full of Dark Magic and—who are we kidding?—it is. So I’m sure ol’ Dumbledore would be thrilled to hear you expelled the Black heir and resident fuck-up. You could have turned me into your very own spy. Bet you’ll be needing one, in few years or so.”McGonagall’s face didn’t give anything away. “Was that a threat?”“It’s a fact!”Remus tugged on the edges of Sirius’s robes, careful not to make contact with his flesh. “Sirius, sit down!” Sirius sat down.“Professor,” Remus said, his voice measured, “no matter the outcome, Sirius’s intentions were noble. He just… got a little carried away.” Sirius huffed, but didn’t contradict him. McGonagall regarded them for a long moment. “Lucius Malfoy will be instructed to leave the two of you alone, on the threat of losing his prefect badge and incurring further disciplinary action.”Sirius actually laughed. “Well, that’s bloody brilliant!”“Language, Mr. Black,” McGonagall snapped. “I’m not finished. Black, you shall serve one month’s detention with me, starting tonight. And you will write me a long, well-researched essay on the damaging effects of curses, specifically those that are not, as you say, strictly Dark Magic. I want three full rolls of parchment, to be turned into me at your final detention.”All right. All things considered, that wasn’t too bad.“And I shall be writing your parents immediately.”All of the blood washed out of Sirius’s face. He jumped to his feet, on pure instinct. “What?! No, you can’t just—”Remus rose to his feet as well. “Professor, I really don’t think that’s necessary—”McGonagall did not so much as blink. “Given the severity of Mr. Malfoy’s injuries, I’m afraid you leave me little choice.”“No, please!” Sirius all but shouted.Fuck, no. No. No. No. No. “I-I swear,” Sirius stuttered, and fuck! “Malfoy—He won’t say a word about where he got that scar. He’ll be too bloody embarrassed. It was just a stupid fight! My parents—”“Your parents will be notified about the situation,” McGonagall said, fixing him with a hard stare.Sirius’s hands started to shake. He clenched them into fists, absolutely refusing to allow McGonagall to see the extent of the terror eating him alive from the inside. “Malfoy’s basically my cousin,” Sirius said, forcing his voice to sound calm. “You can’t tell my parents. Please, Professor. They’ll—”Sirius suddenly clamped his mouth shut.
No.
“They’ll what, Mr. Black?”
Hate me. Hurt me, maim me, kill me. Destroy me completely, then throw me away.
Sirius felt the tears welling in his eyes, and he fought them back with everything he had left in him. He did not open his mouth. Remus glanced desperately between him and McGonagall. “Sirius can serve a longer detention, Professor,” Remus suggested.“With Filch, even. Or shovelling out the hippogryph pens with Hagrid. Or—”Sirius would do anything. “I’m afraid the protocol for disciplining such actions is quite clear. Your parents will be notified, Mr. Black. That’ll be the end of it. Am I understood?”Every ounce of hope seeped out of him. Sirius managed weak nod.“Good,” McGonagall said, taking absolutely no notice of the virtual death sentence she’d placed on his head. “Mr. Lupin, you’re excused. Black, your detention may as well start now.”Remus did not move for a long moment. Instead, he just stared at Sirius, trying to catch his eye, but Sirius refused to move. If he did, he’d break down in tears. Or run screaming through the halls and end up jumping off the Astronomy Tower.There was no escaping this. Sirius Black was fucked.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
OCTOBER 5, 1971
Sirius was exhausted by the time McGonagall dismissed him for the night, somewhere around eleven. More accurately, he felt like he’d gone about six rounds with an enraged hippogryph. His limbs felt like lead, his face was a mask of unshed tears and fury, and what was left of his sanity seeped out around round four. All he wanted to do was collapse face first in his bed, have a good cry, and never fucking wake up.Unfortunately, Lily Evans seemed to have other plans. She was waiting for him, in the otherwise-empty common room, when he finally crawled through the portrait hole. Her face was diplomatically neutral as she stood and looked him up and down, but he saw it in her eyes all the same. Merlin, he couldn’t do this right now. “Look, Evans, Snape started it. He’s lucky he doesn’t have a pretty little scar of his own, for saying that kind of shit to Remus. I’m not going to—”She held up a hand and he stopped. “This isn’t about Snape.” Lily drew her wand and muttered, “Muffliato.”They stared at each other for a long moment, neither of them really wanting to make the first move or give anything away. Eventually, Lily rolled her eyes and gestured to the couches. She sat down across from Sirius. Merlin, whatever hope he’d had that she hadn’t seen straight through his very soul evaporated on the spot. She knew.“I’ve been researching—” She made a vague hand gesture at him “—this, you know.”“Oh?” His voice came out weak. Exhausted and noncommittal. “After what you said when Malfoy cursed me, I had to.” Sirius scoffed. “Find anything interesting?”Lily didn’t bat an eye. “Show me your tattoo.”
Fuck.
“Evans,” he started, his voice cracking. “I don’t—”Her expression softened. “Sirius, I didn’t mean to… But, Christ, I need to know. I think I can find a way to help both of us. Yes or no. Do you have a blood curse tattoo?”“Yes.” Sirius scrubbed his face, grateful for the small mercy that no tears had fallen. “Where?”“Above my heart,” he whispered, absently rubbing the spot.“And I’m assuming it’s a family crest of some kind?”“Something like that.”Lily nodded, thankfully not pressing more for specifics. “Does Narcissa have one too?”Sirius grimaced. “Yes. As does every Black born in the past five generations. Even the Squibs. My great-uncle Marius went insane because of the blood curse. The magic was too strong and it was quite literally burning him alive. He had no magic of his own to counterbalance the force of the blood curse. He killed himself not long after he was disowned by his father.”“Jesus Christ,” Lily muttered. “How old were you when they did this to you?”“Eight.”“Shit. I’m sorry, Sirius.”“Why are you sorry?” he grumbled, indignant. “You didn’t do anything, Evans.”Lily Evans gave him a withering glare. “No one should do that to a child. I don’t care who you are or what kind of superiority complex you have. Putting a blood curse on a child is wrong, full stop.”He didn’t disagree in the slightest, but what the hell was he supposed to say, when she was staring at him like that? There was a horrible look of vengeance in her green eyes, like she was about to hunt down every last branch of his family tree and force her wrath upon them for daring to put their brand on him. Merlin, he didn’t deserve that kind of devotion. Not from Lily Evans, of all people. Thankfully, Lily seemed to sense the weight slowly settling on his shoulders. The fire faded from her eyes and she shot him a small, sad smile. “I want to talk to you about this, Sirius,” she said. “But not tonight. It’s been a long day.”He gave a noncommittal nod.“There has to be a cure,” Lily said, almost as if to convince herself. “Or a counter-curse or an antidote or something. I’m going to find it and—”“There’s no cure, Evans.” His voice was hardly more than a whisper. “I’ve looked.”“Yes, there is. There has to be. You haven’t looked in the Hogwarts library, or in the Restricted Section. We’ll find something. We just need to learn more about your tattoo.”He didn’t tell her that the Black family library was far more extensive than anything that could possibly be at Hogwarts, particularly when it came to Dark Magic and blood curses. If there was a way around the blood curse, then it wasn’t in any book that he knew of. As far as Sirius was concerned, looking for a cure was a lost cause, but he wasn’t about to tell Evans that. He couldn’t. Not when she was still looking at him like he might be worth more than his name and the brand above his heart. Instead, he gave a weak nod. “I’d like to meet up with you to show you what I have and maybe work out a plan,” she said.He could have turned her down. In fact, what’s left of the rational part of his brain screamed that he very well should turn her down, then get on with his life, pretending that Lily Evans doesn’t know about the Black family brand. It’d only put her in the line of fire, messing with something like this, and, ultimately, it would amount to nothing because there’s no magic antidote to the blood curse tattoo that wouldn’t involve some seriously Dark Magic. Andromeda found a way, that annoyingly hopeful voice in the back of his head whispered. Merlin, he didn’t have enough capacity for intelligent thought left to deal with all of this tonight, so he said, “Next week. After Defense. I’ll meet you in the library.”Lily smiled at him, her green eyes twinkling with excitement. “I’ll see you then.” She stood to head up to her dorm. “Goodnight, Sirius. And… I’m sorry if I hurt you. You know, earlier.”“It’s not your fault, Evans,” he muttered, rising to his feet. “Goodnight.”Without looking back, he headed for the stairs. There was a moment, there, when Sirius thought he wouldn’t be able to make it up the steps, that he’d just fold in on himself and disappear. The ramifications of attacking and permanently scarring Malfoy slowly began to dawn on him. For one thing, it meant that he’d inadvertently declared war on the Slytherins. James Potter, the reckless fuck, would be thrilled. As would Peter, by default. Sirius had no doubt that Remus would stand by his side no matter what, but it was dangerous to drag his friends into this fight. Slytherins, by nature, fought dirty, and this… This, whatever he’d started, had the distinct undertones of something dark, looming, and soul-shattering. More pressing, of course, than the impending war, was his mother. At this point, Sirius was fairly certain that Walburga Black wouldn’t even hesitate: the second Sirius stepped into Grimmauld Place, she’d use the Killing Curse on him and mount his head on the walls with the house elves. Then again, his mother always did favor torture and such a quick end might rob her of the pleasure of listening to him scream.His vision swirling, Sirius managed to push the door to the dormitory. He didn’t know if he was crying or hyperventilating, or maybe a little of both, but he was having a hell of a hard time seeing straight as he closed the door behind him. Sirius slid down the wood paneled door, then sat with his knees pulled up to his chest, both hands in his hair, and he tried to remember how to breathe. Vaguely, he was aware of his surroundings, but not enough to focus on any one thing. James’s and Peter’s hangings were closed. Peter snored loudly. The window to the roof was open and pale moonlight streamed in the room. Somewhere in the distance, an owl hooted. Someone whispered his name, frantic and scared, but it hardly registered in the midst of the chaos in his own mind. Sirius drew in a shaky breath and forced himself to calm down. It was only then that he realized that Remus Lupin was crouching next to him, his amber eyes wide and concerned. Remus’s hand hovered over him, not touching, but clearly trying to calm him down. After a moment, Remus whispered, “Can you stand?” His voice sounded tired, but almost… relieved. Sirius nodded and, using the door for support, managed to push himself to his feet. He stood there, awkwardly, the remnants of his panic attack not quite out of his system. Remus watched him for a second, then went to his bed and yanked off the duvet. He turned back to Sirius, the blanket clutched in his hands. He raised an eyebrow at Sirius. “Trust me?”Again, Sirius nodded. It took him a second, to realize what Remus was trying to do, and once he did, Sirius didn’t protest. As carefully as he could manage, Remus wrapped the duvet around Sirius, draping the middle over Sirius’s head and letting the blanket fall across his shoulders. Sirius caught the ends of the blanket and pulled it tight against his chest. “You’re messing up my hair,” he mumbled, pouting a little. “You can steal James’s hair potion in the morning. I know where he keeps it,” Remus said, with a small laugh. “Now come here, you.”Remus all but pulled Sirius into an embrace and Sirius was helpless but to fall into it. The duvet largely impeded his movements, but it also shielded him from excruciating pain. The duvet served as a barrier between his face and Remus’s shoulder, between his hands and Remus’s chest, as Remus wrapped his arms tightly around Sirius and held him close. Unable to hug back because of the duvet clutched tightly in his hands, Sirius closed his eyes and pretended the entire world had been swallowed up by this blanket, by the strength of Remus Lupin’s embrace. It still hurt. Of course it did. That stupid fucking tattoo was relentless, but Sirius refused to allow it to rob him of this moment. He relished Remus’s touch, almost, because this pain was his choice. It was a slow torture, sure: a small flame underneath the surface of his skin, building, quaking, ready to erupt at a moment’s notice, at one wrong brush of skin against skin, but this…This moment, wrapped in a duvet and Remus Lupin’s arms, this was his. It was overwhelming and not enough all at the same time, because Sirius Black needed to be touched, even if it killed him. He needed to feel someone else against him, around him, consuming him. He’d needed it for so fucking long, and Merlin alive, here he was, wrapped up in Remus Lupin. He’d give almost anything—fight any deity or being who held the power enough to change his fate, to erase his tattoo—just to stay in Remus’s arms for just another minute. It was safe, here. He knew that with every fiber of his being. Remus would protect him, just as Sirius vowed to do the same for him. Remus wouldn’t let the Slytherins win this war. Remus wouldn’t let his mother mount his head in Grimmauld Place, next to the house elves. Likewise, Sirius would heal Remus’s scars, and one day, Sirius would eviscerate the monster that dared sink its claws into Remus’s skin. That’s what this was, really: an unspoken promise to stand with each other, come whatever, despite whatever pain or torture or monsters or secrets await them. It was perfect, in its blatant imperfection. It was safe. Sirius Black hadn’t felt safe in a very long time.Remus held onto him until Sirius began to tense up, the pain finally reaching a threshold that could no longer be ignored. Remus pulled back. Sirius shuffled his feet and gave Remus a weak smile. He slid the duvet off of his head and held it out to Remus, this time careful not to touch. Remus tossed the blanket back on his bed, before turning back to Sirius. “Roof or bed?” Remus asked, simply, and that was all he needed for Sirius to understand. Roof, and they’ll have a talk about what happened with Malfoy, about McGonagall’s punishment, about Sirius’s virtual death sentence. Bed, and they’ll sleep it off, then pretend to forget about it in the morning. Merlin, Sirius was grateful for the choice. “Roof,” he answered, almost immediately. A smarter man might have insisted on going to sleep and forgetting the whole ordeal as long as conceivably possible, but Sirius was so far beyond acting rationally tonight. He wanted to stay awake with Remus. He wanted to talk to him, have a little bit of a breakdown, maybe learn how to laugh again. He needed someone to criticize his attack on Malfoy, but acknowledge why he’d done it. That desperation—that fire and fury and horrifying terror that had nearly eaten him alive when he’d heard Malfoy punch Remus—well, he needed to make sure that Remus was alright, at the very least. More importantly, Sirius wanted someone to acknowledge the fact that he was so royally fucked and Sirius didn’t have a goddamned clue of what to do about it. It was so much different than talking to Lily. As much as he liked Lily Evans—and honestly, it surprised him how much, given how they’d started out—Sirius would wear himself thin ensuring that she never shared in the burden secret or a nightmare this terrifying. She’d never understand why he’d kept his tattoo a secret in the first place. Remus would; he might hate the secret—as Sirius hated all of Remus’s—but he’d understand the overwhelming need to keep it quiet.They were fundamentally the same, him and Remus. They both had nightmares and secrets and scars and horrible monsters ready and willing to tear them to shreds. These secrets were merely the truths of their existence, mutually acknowledged: an uncompromising burden that neither of them was strong enough to bear alone. The fact was, Remus Lupin understood him, down the very fibers of his being. Who was he kidding? He wasn’t going to get much sleep anyway. Sirius followed Remus out the window and onto the roof. He sat down next to Remus, close but not touching, and waved his hand to cast a warming charm over them. Remus gave him a small smile, then drew his legs up and draped his long arms over his knees, before turning his eyes to the sky. A dense fog hung over the castle, blurring the grounds, but the sky remained remarkably clear. The stars shone bright, a dazzling counterpoint to the waning moon. Sitting in a comfortable silence, Sirius slowly turned his gaze from the night sky to Remus. The moon cast a silver glow over both of them, but it seemed to catch on Remus, illuminating him and immortalizing him in silver. His eyes, though… They were almost gold again. Almost, but not quite, but still as bright as the sun, even in the darkness. Sirius never wanted to look away. Remus shifted imperceptibly closer and finally tore his eyes away from the sky. “Siri?”“Yeah?”“Can I… ask you some questions?”Sirius sighed. He’d known this was coming. “Yes.”Tentatively, Remus reached out a hand and let it hover, just over Sirius’s own where it rested on the shingles. “It hurts when I touch you.” It wasn’t so much a question as it was a statement of a mutually acknowledged fact. “Yes,” he whispered. “More than anything I’ve ever felt.”Remus immediately yanked his hand back. “It hurts when Evans touches you?”“Yes.”“But not Malfoy?”Sirius hung his head in defeat. “No. Not Malfoy.”“Because he’s pure-blood,” Remus said simply.“I can’t...” Sirius choked out. His eyes burned with shame and unshed tears and panic itched at the edges of his consciousness. “I can’t, Remus. I swear to you, I’ll explain, but not right now. I can’t—”It should be easy, to tell Remus this secret. Hell, Lily Evans had had him dead to rights down in the common room not ten minutes ago and he’d confirmed her every suspicion. This was different. This was a confession. This was admitting that he’d been branded by his family, marked heir apparent and was therefore complicit in his parents’ crusade against anyone of lesser blood. As much as he hated his mark now, Sirius knew his resolve would weaken. That was the purpose of the tattoo, wasn’t it? To detach him from any affiliation with his inferiors. He’d shy away from touch and friendship, because who could honestly befriend something as cursed and broken as him? The pain and resentment from every attempt at friendship or love would chip away at any resolve for change he’d once had, until he withered away into the malicious heir his mother had longed for since before Sirius was conceived. The tattoo on his chest was proof: Sirius Black, Gryffindor or not, was an inevitability, in every respect. He was not strong enough to fight his brand or his fate.Sirius was not brave enough to tell Remus.He felt raw and exposed and he wanted that goddamned blanket back just so he could hide underneath it. His skin itched and Merlin, every nerve felt like it was scrubbed bare. He folded his arms against his chest, desperately trying to make himself smaller. He was panicking, again, and he knew it, but he was absolutely fucking powerless to stop it. “Hey!” Remus said, his voice forceful, but kind. “Hey, it’s alright, Siri. Just breathe, okay? You don’t have to talk, just breathe. Siri, please. Just breathe for me, yeah?”His breaths came out raspy, but Sirius did his best. It was easier, he found, not to panic when he stared into Remus’s eyes. Bit by bit, he forced his breathing back to normal. When Remus saw he was no longer at risk of hyperventilating, he backed off and leaned back against the brick wall. Sirius watched him, because, honestly, how could he not?“Did you learn that spell from your mother?” Remus’s question was so quiet that Sirius almost missed it against the ambient noise of the castle and the surrounding moors from this far up.Sirius expected his heart rate to pick up again, the panic to itch underneath his skin, but instead, he just felt… numb. “Yes.”Remus’s expression didn’t change. “Did she use it on you?”Sirius let out a broken, self-depreciating laugh. “Walburga Black doesn’t leave marks. Not on her heir, at least,” he said bitterly. “She uses it on the house elf, mostly.”“The spell… worked, then? When you did it?”Sirius’s face scrunched up in confusion, because, of course, the spell worked. Malfoy was scarred and bleeding, wasn’t he?“Yes, the spell worked. Why the hell wouldn’t—” The question was halfway out of Sirius’s mouth when the answer smacked him in the face. “Oh.”Sirius reached in his pocket and pulled out his wand.Remus grimaced a little and gestured at the wand. “You can’t transfigure a thistle into a rose, without turning it to ash, but you can use a spell like that just fine?”Remus didn’t sneer or cast blame, or even emphasize the full extent of the horrifying fact he’d outlined with his question: that Sirius was darkness incarnate, that it lived and breathed within him, and devoured anything light that came within his grasp. Remus’s voice was gentle, kind even. Far kinder than Sirius deserved, really.Sirius swallowed, his throat impossibly tight. Tears welled in his eyes and he refused to look at Remus. “I’m a Black,” he choked out. “Magic like that is as natural as breathing.”It was true, wasn’t it? He hadn’t thought twice about using the Sectumsempra, and it had done exactly what it was supposed to. He’d meant to maim, to hurt, to carve a mark into Malfoy’s skin in retribution for what he’d done to Remus. Even now, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. Not really. He was terrified of the consequences—of McGonagall, his mother, and that horrible pit of darkness festering within his every nerve—but, Merlin alive, Malfoy had deserved it. And Sirius’s wand had obeyed him. It hadn’t backfired or sputtered out or refused to cooperate.
Magic as natural as breathing.
He traced a finger up and down the length of his wand, as if saying a prayer over the runes etched into the enchanted willow wood could save the wand from its fate. His wand was still the same tangle of heavy coldness it had been since he’d cast the Cruciatus. No more, no less.Ollivander had been right, of course, when he’d said the first spell cast with a wand determined the character of the wand itself and that of the wizard who wielded it. There was a darkness, gnawing at his insides. Sirius felt it, late at night, when there was no one else to distract him from the voices in his head: this all-consuming parasite inside of him, burning away his sanity bit by bit. This… abyss threatened to erupt from him, every damn time he held his wand. It’d consume him, in the end. Of that, he was absolutely certain. He’d been weighed, measured, and condemned, ever since he’d muttered his first spell.The thing was, he wasn’t sorry he’d thrown the Cruciatus curse, for the same damn reason he’d never learn to regret hurting Malfoy. Regulus wouldn’t be alive if he hadn’t intervened. Sirius didn’t regret the Unforgivable, and perhaps that was worse. The Cruciatus had killed his wand and damned his soul and he’d never be fucking forgiven for what he did, but Regulus was still alive, for Merlin’s sake. In the end, no matter how much it fucked up his life, no matter the darkness swelling in the depths of his own soul, no matter how much it terrified him, Regulus was alive because Sirius damned himself.Malfoy would be forced to leave Remus alone because Sirius had cursed him.If that was the price, if that was what it cost to keep the people he loved breathing, then Sirius would hold his head high, march through the gates of hell, then snog the devil himself right on the mouth. “Was it actually Dark Magic?” Remus asked, his voice far too casual for that sort of question. “That Septum— What was it again?”“Sectumsempra. And no. It’s not inherently Dark,” he said, but Sirius wasn’t as convinced of his answer as he had been with McGonagall.Magic, by and large, had everything to do with the intention of the person who cast the spell. Sirius had meant to hurt Malfoy, had fully intended to make him bleed for what he’d done to Remus, and his dying wand had responded without a hitch. The spell itself might not be inherently Dark, but that meant nothing for the ravenous abyss clawing away at Sirius’s soul. Malfoy would bear the scar for the rest of his life. That, alone, was proof enough of Dark Magic. Remus watched him closely. “Are you going to be alright, Sirius? Your mum…”Remus trailed off, unable to make himself finish the thought, and Merlin, Sirius couldn’t fault Remus for it. Sirius didn’t have the words or the willpower to explain the horror he knew he’d have to face when he returned to Grimmauld Place. “I have until Christmas,” he said, and there it was: his fate sealed in four words.Instead of replying, Remus gave him a small nod. He shifted a little bit and the moonlight caught on his new scars: two parallel gouges, etched into his lower jawbone and trailing down the side of his neck. They were still raw and bloody, the edges of the wounds puffy and jagged because of the freshly-torn flesh. They’d scabbed over, since this afternoon, and maybe looked a little better, but Sirius thought it could just be a trick of the light. They’d scar, too. Of that, Sirius was certain. Mother of Merlin, who could have possibly done that to Remus?He’d been so concerned with his own web of secrets and internalised panic that he’d forgotten about the whirlwind of an afternoon Remus had had. Remus had returned from whatever hell he’d been in, acquired two new, very visible scars, and then had been assaulted by Malfoy. Fuck, that’d been the whole reason Sirius had thrown himself head first into this whole mess in the first place: Remus was hurt and he’d almost forgotten about it. Then, something occurred to him. “McGonagall didn’t say anything about those cuts on your face.”“Hmm?” Remus replied, still half-caught in the mesmerising aura of the night sky. “She made such a big deal about Malfoy’s brand new scar, but she didn’t mention yours,” Sirius said, and now Remus was paying attention to him. “Malfoy’s Slytherin. You’re Gryffindor. Even if she’d thought you were causing shit—which, she didn’t. She thought it was all me, which it was, but that’s not the point. If she thought you’d been hurt or scarred, she’d have had Malfoy’s head on a plate, which means—”“Sirius,” Remus warned. “McGonagall knew Malfoy didn’t do that to you.” Sirius gestured wildly at the gouge marks on Remus’s face.“Look, Sirius, I don’t want to fight about this tonight—”“Do you want me to heal them?”Remus shut his mouth and stared unblinking at Sirius. “I mean,” Sirius continued, mistaking Remus’s silence for something else. He tucked his wand back into the pocket of his robes. He reached out a hand, tracing the lines of the scars with his fingers a few inches above Remus’s face. “I won’t use my wand. I can do it wandlessly. You know I can. I swear it won’t hurt.”Remus shook his head. “They won’t heal, Sirius. And Madam Pomfrey already fixed the bruises.”“Oh.” Sirius felt his soul shatter all over again. He couldn’t heal Remus, like he had with Regulus. He couldn’t make it better, or stop the horror from devouring the both of them. He was fucking powerless to stop it. All that remained was pain and scars and—More Dark Magic. They were surrounded by it on all sides, him and Remus. There was no escaping, no running away and forgetting, just darkness and pain and a never-ending saga of fate and inevitability. “How’d you get the scars, Remus?” he choked out.It wasn’t fair for him to ask, not tonight, after everything he’d deliberately not told Remus, but Sirius couldn’t help himself. He had to know. He had to stop it. He wasn’t going to let that old, familiar darkness take Remus too.Remus let out a self-depreciating laugh. “I tried to shave, but… missed a bit.”“Not good enough,” Sirius growled.“I ran with scissors.”“I’m not messing around here.”“My mother’s cat has had it in for me ever since the frying pan incident.”“Remus!”Remus shot him a wicked smirk, half desperate gallows humour, half heartbreak. “I’ve been brainstorming. Are any of these more convincing than I fell out of a tree? I could really use some feedback.”Sirius glared at him, willing himself to be angry, but to no avail. There was not enough left of the shattered pieces of himself to be angry with Remus for long, especially when they were both desperate and broken and in dire need to make light of something that is so unbelievably out of their control. A second later, Sirius had to bow his head to hide his laughter. Remus laughed with him, wild and genuine, and just a little bit dangerous. Merlin, they were crazy, and Sirius thought they both knew it, but that laughter tasted a little bit like rebellion and it was enough to chase the darkness away, just for a few seconds.“That last one’s no good,” Sirius said, keeping the laughter in his voice. “They’re all shit, Sirius,” Remus said. He threw a bit of shingle at Sirius’s head. Sirius stuck his tongue out. “That’s why you’re helping me brainstorm.”“If you say the cat’s had it in for you since the frying pan incident, that implies you tried to kill the cat with a frying pan. Which, kudos to you if you did. Cats are vile creatures.” He scrunched up his face a bit in disgust and it made Remus laugh more. “Anyway, killing a cat loses you major sympathy points, especially with girls. They tend to like cats. And, if you don’t have their pity, then they tend to ask more questions.”“Is that why you never stop pestering me about my scars?” Remus’s smile did not leave his face, but it no longer reached his eyes. There was a sadness, there, buried behind a mask of scars and laughter. It was loneliness and pain and an insurmountable burden and Merlin, Sirius knew it well. “Yep,” Sirius said, and it was true. “I don’t have time to pity you. I’m too busy planning out the many ways I will eviscerate the person who gave you those scars. And, if I am to eviscerate this person, I need to know who they are. Hence the pestering.”“So you’ve skipped over sympathy entirely and gone directly to homicidal rage?”“Exactly.”Remus frowned. “You promised me you wouldn’t go after him.” I lied, he wanted to say. I was under duress and I fucking lied, okay?Remus seemed to take Sirius’s silence for what it was: a confession and an oath of vengeance. Remus’s expression softened into something dangerously close to compassion. “I don’t need you to kill for me, Siri. Nor do I want you to. I’m not worth—”“Yes, you are,” Sirius snapped—or, Merlin, very nearly snarled.“I’m not worth it, if you lose your soul over me.”Sirius bowed his head. His voice came out hoarse and broken. “Not sure there’s much to lose, Re.”Remus leaned forward, as close to Sirius as he could get without actually touching. His eyes were wide and so unfairly kind that it took Sirius’s breath away. “All the more reason to fight to keep it. I don’t need an assassin or an avenger, Sirius, especially if this is what it costs. I kind of just need a friend.”Merlin, he couldn’t fight back the tears, so he scrubbed them away as soon as they fell. No one had any right to care for Sirius the way Remus did. All this… it could only end in disaster. That didn’t stop Sirius from saying: “You have one.”Remus smiled.Sirius sniffed and rubbed his nose. “You should tell them that you didn’t do McGonagall’s homework once, and she didn’t take it well, so she turned into a cat and attacked. They’ll know you’re lying, but they’ll get a laugh out of it. They’ll understand that a story like that means you’re not going to tell them what actually happened. Everybody wins.”Remus laughed. “That’s genius.”“I have my moments.”From inside the dorm room, there was a thud and a quick patter of feet. Remus and Sirius both turned to see James standing in the open window in his pyjamas. His hair was a wild bird’s nest and he wasn’t wearing his glasses. He rubbed his eyes and squinted at them, his face all scrunched up and sleep-weary. “Remus? Sirius? What the bloody fuck are you doing out there? It’s freezing.”“Stargazing,” Remus said.“Scheming,” Sirius said, at the same time. Remus rolled his eyes. “We’re solving all the world’s problems, in one fell swoop.”James raised an eyebrow. It seemed to take a great deal of effort, given how his eyes were drooping. “That so?”“Come join us, Jamie,” Sirius said, leaning over Remus to catch James’s eye. “And bring a blanket.”“Bring two!” Remus called after him, as James ducked back into the room. James yanked the duvets off of both his and Remus’s bed and dragged them to the window, one in each hand. James passed one blanket to Sirius as he climbed through the open window. Sirius wrapped the duvet around himself, much as he had earlier, just as James situated himself between Sirius and Remus. Sirius waved his hand once more, renewing and extending the warming charm to cover the three of them. James flung the second blanket across his and Remus’s laps, before laying his head on Remus’s shoulder. Remus allowed it, shifting a little so he was more comfortable, before ducking his head away from James, away from the faint stream of light coming from the single candle by Remus’s bed inside the dorm room. Sirius understood: Remus didn’t want his scars to be seen, at least for tonight. Tonight, the pain and the secrets were poured into the fog around the castle, witnessed only by the waning moon, and would fade by morning. Come morning, there’d be a reckoning, but tonight they could pretend that the world made sense for just a little longer. “Heard you got detention, Sirius,” James said, conversationally. “Yes, but Remus has convinced me to forget about my problems tonight, so instead, I’ve been trying to make the stars that share a namesake with my least favourite relatives fall out of the sky with just the power of my mind.”It was a blatant lie, of course, but Remus never even seemed to consider contradicting him.James scoffed. “How’s that working out, oh great and powerful wizard?”“Not great. Bellatrix is particularly stubborn,” Sirius said, with a smirk. He glared at the constellation, then raised his hands, wiggling his fingers, trying to pull the stars from the sky.James laughed.As the minutes ticked on in relative silence, the fog surrounding the castle began to lift. One by one, the towers and parapets, decorated with shadowy gargoyles and ancient shingles, emerged from the mist, until the entire castle was visible before them. James sat up straight and leaned forward a bit. He squinted, then rubbed his eyes, clearly trying to make something out in the darkness. A moment later, he turned around and gazed up at the steep, slanting roof behind them. Then, he turned to Sirius, a wild grin plastered on his face. “Ravenclaw tower is taller than ours,” James said. “What?” It was Sirius’s turn to squint. Then, like James, he turned to gaze up at the slanted Gryffindor roof behind them, trying to calculate and compare the height difference. “It’s definitely taller,” Remus said, not bothering to compare the heights himself. “My dad told me. Historically, it’s a bit of a sore spot between Ravenclaws and Gryffindors.”“As it should be!” James nearly shouted. “We’re the bravest and the most daring. Why on earth did they get the highest tower?”“Because bravery and daring should never be determined by a measuring contest,” Remus deadpanned. Sirius barked a laugh, but really, he had to side with James on this one. “It is a travesty,” he said. He twisted a little to look behind him again. “What if we stuck a broom up there? Make up the height difference?”Remus shook his head. “Even if you somehow managed to fuse a broom to the top of Gryffindor tower, it wouldn’t technically change the height.”James scrunched his face up in confusion. “Why the hell not?”Sirius sighed and reconsidered. “No, Remus is right. The castle’s magic. More importantly, it’s slightly alive. It wouldn’t recognise a broom as part of itself.”“You’d have to fuse something to the intrinsic magic of the castle itself,” Remus said. “Well, what sort of thing would the castle allow as an addition?” James asked. “A flag,” Remus said, with a shrug. “With a bit of spellwork. And possibly a miracle.”“A giant flag,” Sirius said, ignoring the rest.“Oh, that’s brilliant,” James said, wiggling a little in excitement. “An enormous Gryffindor flag and we’ll be the tallest tower in the castle!”“Except for the Astronomy tower,” Sirius muttered.“We’ll be taller than the Ravenclaw tower!” James amended, not missing a beat.Remus, once again, shook his head. “No good. The castle won’t favour one house over the other. If you use a Gryffindor flag, there’s a chance it won’t fuse with the castle’s magic.”“Then we’ll make a Hogwarts flag,” Sirius said. Remus shrugged. Sirius took it to mean, Genius plan. Brilliant detection of a loophole. Sirius preened, quite proud of himself. Remus laughed at him, then asked, “How do we get a giant flag to the top of the tower?” James didn’t hesitate. “I’ll nick a broom from Madam Hooch and fly it up.”“Okay,” Remus said, drawing out the word. “Ignoring any potential flaws in that plan for the moment, how do you plan on balancing a flag that large while flying on a broom?”James’s look of triumph faltered a bit. “Why? How big does the flag have to be?”“Big enough to make up the gap in height between the Ravenclaw tower and the Gryffindor tower, and then a bit more for bragging purposes,” Sirius said. “A couple of meters, at least,” Remus said, squinting at the Ravenclaw tower, as if he’d be able to calculate the exact difference from their perch. “I’d have to research it.”“Okay, Sirius will fly with me and help me carry the flag,” James said. “We’ll use a Permanent Sticking Charm and ward the flag itself against weather—”“That won’t work,” Remus said. “Well, not long-term, anyway. The flag can’t just be stuck there, it has to fuse with the castle’s magic. There’s got to be a way to do that. This castle’s over a thousand years old. There have definitely been renovations and additions. We’ve just got to figure out how, which means—”“More research,” Sirius finished, with a sigh. “And a miracle.”James groaned. “We need more man-power on this, lads.”James and Sirius exchanged a look. Then:“PETER!” they yelled, together, at the top of their lungs. A second later, Remus joined in. There was another crash from inside as Peter startled awake and tumbled to the window. His eyes were wild and unfocused, like he wasn’t quite free from the realm of unconsciousness. James and Sirius nearly collapsed in laughter. “I’m awake—what?” Peter managed. He rubbed his eyes, then squinted at the three of them on the roof. Again, Remus ducked his head to avoid the light from the dormitory to fall on his new, open scars.“Merlin, I thought someone had fallen off the roof,” Peter gasped, clutching at his chest.“Mmm, good plan, Pete,” James said. “Do you think we could get Snivellus up here?”Remus swatted him. James hardly noticed. “We’re planning on carving a place for ourselves in the newest edition of Hogwarts: A History, Pete. You want in?” Sirius askedPeter’s eyes lit up and he scrambled out the window. It took him a few tries, and, ultimately, Remus grabbed him by the collar of his pyjamas and hauled him out. Peter huffed and straightened himself out, then sat down on Remus’s other side, pushing himself as far away from the edge of the roof as possible. “Right,” Peter said. “What do you want me to do?”“You and me are on broom duty, Peter,” James said, squishing a little too close to Sirius in order to make room for Peter. Sirius was immediately grateful for the duvet wrapped around his shoulders. He didn’t think he could take any more pain tonight. “Broom duty?” Peter asked, confused. “You want me to… sweep?”Sirius barked a laugh. “No, you idiot.”“You and me are gonna steal a few Quidditch brooms from Madam Hooch,” James explained, with a casual wave of his hand that was probably supposed to be some pantomime of flying on a broom.“Oh,” Peter said, still obviously no less confused by this explanation than he’d been a second ago. “Why?”“Why, he asks,” Sirius muttered, laughing to himself. “Why?” James echoes, much louder. He nudges Sirius in the ribs and there’s so much blanket between them that Sirius thankfully doesn’t feel a thing. “Why, for honour and glory and a restoration of Gryffindor pride, of course!”“And for victory in this ridiculous measuring contest,” Remus said, pretending to raise a glass. James and Sirius echoed his movement and raised their own imaginary glasses. “Hear, hear!”Peter glanced between the three of them and frowned. “I still don’t get it.”James waved him off. “I’ll fill you in. But first, we need to work out how to break into the Quidditch supplies.”“Without getting caught,” Remus added.James pouted. “You’re no fun, Lupin,” he said, but his voice was light.“We should plan on doing this before it gets too cold out and that won’t happen if all of you lot have detentions for the rest of the month,” Remus pointed out. James reluctantly nodded his agreement. “Good,” Remus continued. “Sirius, that means you and I are on research.”Sirius beamed at him. Merlin, he could see the plan unfolding in the near-golden gleam of Remus’s eye: the taste of glory, adventure, and that half-hidden, all-knowing smirk that Remus got whenever he allowed himself to believe that he was the smartest one in the room. It was that same look, that small quirk of his lips, that Remus had given Sirius that very first night: the one that said, You’re Gryffindor, and fuck anyone who says different. It was that wild triumph, that he’d seen lurking in the depths of Remus’s heart, when he’d outsmarted Malfoy in the Great Hall. It was pure, unadulterated rebellion, that look in Remus’s eye, and it left no doubt in Sirius’s mind: Despite all the shit and the pain and monsters all around him, Remus Lupin would find a way to outmanoeuvre fate itself. Sirius Black was in love. Later, when the plan had been thoroughly explained to Peter a few times, the four boys climbed back through the window just as the waning moon dipped below the horizon. James and Peter immediately collapsed on their respective beds, neither of them bothering to pull the hangings. Remus took one look at Sirius and grabbed him by the blanket and hauled him towards his own bed. Sirius fell into a dreamless sleep, in the early hours of the morning, curled up in the safety of Remus Lupin’s bed, a pillow situated between them. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Merlin’s beard, Sirius,
Narcissa wrote me and told me what happened. (She’s in a fit, by the way. Best stay away from her.) She said Malfoy’s got one hell of a scar. She whinged about “Oh, poor Lucius” for about three pages. I stopped reading. Then, yesterday, I received a letter from my mother, stating that, “Given the precarious state of the marriage negations between the Lucius Malfoy and your sister, it is high time, Andromeda, for you to take a far more serious approach to your own future.” Et cetera, et cetera. Enormously long letter short, my mother is in a right state and has set me up with Julius Fawley, and, apparently, has given him the impression that I’ll be wooed and ready to marry by the summer. He’s nearly twice my age! Feathers is not to happy about it, but there’s not much either of us can do about it without risking Feathers’s life and limb. So I guess I’m courting Fawley now.
(Any chance I can persuade you to maim him as well?)
(Sorry. That was a terrible joke.)
Merlin, this wasn’t supposed to be about me.
How are you holding up, Sirius? These past few days can’t have been easy. Whatever happened with Malfoy—remarkably, Narcissa wasn’t quite forthcoming about the exact details—I’m guessing you had good reason. You’re not an idiot, Sirius, and I’m not going to lecture you. I just want you to be more careful. If someone bothered to tell me about this, then I’m just going to go ahead and assume the Warden’s already heard. I know I don’t need to tell you what that means.
Merlin, I’d give just about anything for you to not have all this shit on your shoulders, Siri. I know it isn’t fair.
Halloween is coming up. Do you want to meet at Hagrid’s again, before the feast? I’ll bring Feathers and you can bring your friends. We’ll make a whole go of it. Feathers can entertain your friends while you and I work out a strategy for Christmas. Do you think you could convince a professor to let you stay at Hogwarts?
Until I see you, stay close to your friends, and for the love of Salazar, Siri, please stay safe.
I love you, always.
Andromeda
P.S. I still haven’t had any luck reaching Regulus. I’m sorry, Sirius, but I think it’s safe to assume that the Warden is burning my letters, too.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Andromeda,
Sorry you got dragged into all this. I didn’t mean for that to happen. Well, I definitely meant to do get back at Malfoy. He hurt Remus. That’s the end of the story, really. Malfoy hurt Remus and said he didn’t deserve to be at Hogwarts because he’s a half-blood, so I used one of the Warden’s curses on Malfoy. Now, Malfoy’s got a scar. Can’t say I’m particularly sorry about that.
I’m okay, mostly. Terrified, if I’m being honest, but it’s okay when I’m with James and Remus and just going to classes and stuff. (And hexing the Slytherins, but shhhh! McGonagall hasn’t caught on just yet to the hilarious pranks we’ve pulled. It seems I accidentally started something of a war by cursing Malfoy, between us and the Slytherins. We’re going to win. Remus will make sure we’re not caught.) I’m lucky, I think. Terrified and fucked beyond belief, but I’m lucky to have James and Remus. And Peter too, but don’t tell him I said that. It’ll get to his head. I don’t know what I’d have done if that stupid Hat put me in Slytherin.
I’m trying not to think about the Warden at all, really, but you’re right. Some kind of strategy is probably in order. I don’t know if it’s as simple as asking a professor to stay. Plus, with the exception of Professor Idunn because of my immeasurable talent in Ancient Runes, I’ve not gained the favour of too many professors. I’m pretty sure McGonagall is out for my head and she’s the head of Gryffindor. I’d have to go through her.
Speaking of McGonagall, I don’t think I’ll be able to meet you. I’ve got detention for the Malfoy Incident for a whole month. She expects me to write this huge essay on curses and Dark Magic as well, so I’ll more than likely be stuck in the library. Sorry.
Thanks for checking in with Reg. Honestly, I didn’t expect much. I’m more worried what the Warden’s been telling him about me. I think I’ll actually die if Reg hates me when I go back to Grimmauld Place.
Thanks for your letter. It’s good hearing from someone who’s at least partially sane. Love you too.
Sirius
P.S. I’ll be sure to hex Fawley into oblivion, if I ever see him. No one gets between you and Feathers.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 12, 1971
The next week flew by relatively quickly. As per his punishment with McGonagall, Malfoy avoided the first year Gryffindors like the plague, though Sirius still couldn’t shake Malfoy’s ever-watchful gaze. It made him fidget and twitch and, more often than not, Sirius had to suppress the urge to send hex after hex in Malfoy’s direction. It would only be reported back to his mother and, at this point, Sirius couldn’t afford to tack on more grievances for Walburga Black to carve out of his flesh. Although Malfoy couldn’t interfere himself, Sirius was convinced that Malfoy had simply taken to sending the Carrows or Avery to do his bidding. There’d been more than a few scuffles, one of which left James with a broken nose and Remus with a hex that gave him large, vampire-like fangs. Remus, although back to normal within in an hour thanks to Madam Pomfrey, had spent the rest of the day with his mouth firmly clamped shut. He’d resolutely refused to speak to anyone, until that evening, when Sirius had handed him the last of Regulus’s chocolate out on the roof. After that, Sirius could not, on a clean conscience, let the Slytherins’ transgressions go unpunished. With Sirius’s near-constant pestering, he’d convinced James to vanish Avery’s tongue completely, and, rather miraculously, really, Madam Pomfrey had said the only thing to do was regrow it from scratch, which meant that Avery had spent the better part of the past three days unable to talk and had been taking all of his meals in the form of grey mush. The Carrows had been a bit trickier, given their proclivity of hanging around one Severus Snape, who, much to Sirius’s chagrin, had not done anything recently that would further jeopardise his still-rather-precarious relationship with Lily Evans. He’d had to be a bit more creative, so yesterday, after yet another disastrous Care of Magical Creatures lesson—it’d been doxies this time, and immediately upon catching sight of Remus, they’d swarmed him and started pulling at his hair until Professor Cuckoo had charmed them to sleep—Sirius had followed a sulking Remus to the library. After a bit of research and more than a bit of nagging Remus to get him to help, Sirius and Remus had made their way down to the dungeons. They’d hidden behind a statue for what had seemed like well over an hour—they’d argued about Frankenstein again, because Remus could not get behind the idea that the monster was not, in fact, a true monster, nor that he was capable of love—before the Carrow twins finally emerged from behind a tapestry. Sirius had conjured his magic, let it twirl between his fingers just for show, before he’d shot Remus a smirk, stepped out in the open, and muttered, “Sanguinem Ligare!”Alecto and Amycus Carrow had both levitated, then were suddenly thrown together as if drawn to each other by magnets. They’d stood there, shoulder to shoulder, cursing and completely unable to separate themselves from each other. Remus had sighed, though Sirius hadn’t missed that wonderfully dangerous gleam in his eye, and had cast an extension charm, so that the blood-binding hex wouldn’t wear off in just an hour, as A Hundred and Forty Seven Ways to Mildly Inconvenience Your Mortal Enemy had said it would. That morning at breakfast, the Carrows had still literally been glued together at the hip. According to the whispers coming from the Slytherin table that James had conveniently amplified for their entertainment, the Carrows had been forced go to Quidditch practice the day before, and they’d had a slight tumble off their broom, seeing as neither of them could fly particularly well whilst carrying the “useless deadweight of the other sibling”. The Carrows had also, apparently, refused to shower after their Quidditch practice, given their inability to separate themselves. As Marlene and Dorcas had reported after passing the temporarily conjoined twins in the halls, the Carrows reeked of mud and sweat and something that, according to Remus, was almost certainly urine. All in all, Sirius Black felt rather vindicated. After Defense Against the Dark Arts on Tuesday, Sirius waved a quick goodbye to James and Peter—they were off to stake out the Quidditch Pitch for the fifth time that week, in what James had repeatedly called, “strategic reconnoissance”—Sirius accompanied Lily Evans to the library. They walked side by side, in silence, then just stared at each other, from across the table, when they’d finally found a relatively private table towards the back and well out of Madam Pince’s general vicinity. Without breaking eye contact, Lily reached into her bag and produced a large, leather-bound novel. She tossed it on the table between them and, for whatever reason, Sirius hadn’t been expecting her to do so. He jumped at the noise, then flushed a little in embarrassment. Lily smirked. Forcing his heart rate to return to normal, Sirius let out a long breath and reached for the book, not bothering to look at the title, as he pilfered through the pages. There were no spells or references to magical tattoos or curse breaking whatsoever, as he’d been expecting. Sirius frowned and narrowed his eyes at Lily. “What’s this, then?”“Les Miserables,” Lily said, crossing her arms across her chest. “It’s that novel I told you about. The one with revolution and romance.”“The French one?”“Yup.”Sirius looked between the open book and Lily Evans, confused. “This is in English.”“It’s a translation.”“How will I get the full scope of a French story if I don’t read it in French?”Lily raised an eyebrow. “You speak French?”“‘Course I do. English, French, bits of Latin, and a whole string of German curse words, curtesy of the best magical tutors that money can buy.”“Christ, you’re so posh,” she muttered, but the corners of her lips tugged up in a smile. “All those tutors and you never once touched Muggle literature until you read Frankenstein?”“Nope. Muggle literature is far beneath us pure-bloods,” Sirius said, as he thumbed to the beginning of the book and started reading. For a solid ten minutes, Lily allowed Sirius to get lost in the dismal world of nineteenth century France. The tale began with a bishop, a weary traveller, and a cruel, unforgiving world.Lily reached into her bag and produced another book, this one nearly twice the size, and slams it on the table. He didn’t jump this time. He’d been waiting for it, in fact. Sirius glanced up at the book between them. There was a loud hiss and Sirius felt his guts twist into knots. He knew what that book was. It was leather-bound, old and molding around the edges. The pages had long since gone yellow and they were wavy from age and water damage. Etched into the cover, there was a skull, with a dagger through it, and smoke billowing from its open mouth. A serpent twisted around the hilt of the dagger, its long tail twisting as if it really were still alive. It bared its fangs and hissed in the direction of Lily, writhing against the dagger and snapping its jaw at her, trying to bite and tear into flesh. Sirius would recognise the book anywhere. This one certainly showed more wear and tear, but it was utterly unmistakeable. His mother had a copy prominently displayed in the library at Grimmauld Place. It’d been in the Black family since it had been published, long ago, when magic was at its darkest. To his knowledge, no one knew who’d written it, but given his mother’s pride in the book and the fact that there were only twelve known copies left in existence after the mass burning of books about Dark Magic in 1689, he’d place good money that the author had been an ancestor of his and, therefore, the book was kept safe and pristine in the Black library. The title was red, long ago written in the author’s blood, though it was still bright and oozing as if the wound had only recently been open: Most Vile Tome of Blood Magicks. “Where, in the name of Salazar, did you get that book?” Sirius whispered, his voice thick and his heart in his throat. Les Miserables closed in on itself on his lap as he leaned forward, his place lost, but Sirius couldn’t bring himself to care.Lily watched his expression closely. “The Restricted Section. Where else?”“Who—” His voice cracked a little. He cleared his throat. “Who the hell gave a first year permission to check this out?!”“Professor Rattleburn, technically.”“Technically?”“Well, I actually checked out a book on hexes and their counters for the essay she assigned, but while I was in the Restricted Section, I thought I might as well research blood curses. This one looked promising, so I grabbed it and stuffed it in my bag. That snake kept hissing at me, so I pretended to have a cough the whole way out of the library.” Sirius blinked at her. “That was… You’d make a damn fine Slytherin, Evans.”“Don’t insult me,” she huffed, but she still looked a little proud. “Now. What do you know about this book?”“I know that you, especially, should not let that snake bite you,” he said, drawing out his words a bit and dancing around the real question.“Why? What would happen?”“I don’t know, exactly, but if I had to guess, it’s hissing at you because you’re Muggle-born. See, watch.” He reached for the book and ran his fingers across the cover. The snake shut its mouth and preened, leaning into Sirius’s touch. Sirius drew his hand back and glowered at the book. “I just know that it was charmed by Dark wizards who hate Muggles as a general rule. It’s probably something nasty.”“Noted.” Lily gestured at the book. “I take it you’ve read this before.”Sirius nodded. “At least three times, all the way through. There’s no cure in there. I can assure you, I’ve looked.”Lily ignored him entirely and carefully opened the enormous book. The snake hissed and lunged at her, but she let the cover fall flat on the table and it fell silent once more. She thumbed through the pages, landing about halfway through the volume. “There’s a whole section on magical tattoos, all of them with their own rituals,” she said. “There are detailed rituals in here, including the one I believe was used on you. The Sanguinem Purificatus. The blood of four family members, usually the eldest living, is spilled in a ritual circle. The initiate—that’d be you—sits in the middle of the circle and is covered in the blood. Then, his own hand is cut and mixed with his family’s blood and ink made from the ashes of the ceremonial fire. While the others in the circle, the matriarch of the family uses her wand to carve the mark on the initiate and—”Sirius’s vision swirled, lost for a moment in Lily’s words, before shook his head. “I’m quite familiar with the rest, thanks, Evans.”“Right. Sorry,” she said, slowly. She shifted in her chair and leaned forward, over the book. “What exactly is your mark?”“My— What?”“You weren’t very specific the other night. The book talks about a whole bunch of different types of Dark Marks and tattoos. Some families just use their family seal, but other runes or symbols can be imbued with more magic. Some marks can be used to summon an initiate, some cause pain, and there was one that—fucking hell—would turn the initiate to ash if they so much as thought of betraying their family.”Thank Merlin his mother hadn’t used that one. Sirius would’ve been ash the second he’d been sorted into Gryffindor. He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying not to think of how much worse it could be, should his mother decide to implement any one of the spells in that book. “My mark,” he said, his voice low, “is my family’s words, above my heart. It… hurts whenever someone of a lesser bloodline touches me, even if it’s a pure-blooded blood traitor. It’s meant to discourage association with anyone with impure blood. No way for an heir to produce a half-blood bastard if he can’t bloody touch a Muggle-born, eh? The mark prevents…contamination.”Lily pulled a face. Sirius couldn’t really blame her.“The pain isn’t just the mark,” he went on. “It… Well, to be quite honest, when I touch you or Remus or James or anyone else, it feels like someone decided to set my bones on fire and then stab me about a hundred thousand times.”“Right.” Lily sat up straighter in her chair, inching backwards. There was a table separating them, but she had this look in her eye that said she was afraid to even get near him. Sirius didn’t know whether to feel grateful or insulted. “What exactly is the mark?”“Does it matter?”“It might.”Merlin, what’s one more horrible family secret he’d give away? Sirius let out a breath. “Toujours Pur. Always Pure.”“Oh.” Lily was quiet for a moment, her face frustratingly blank. Then: “That’s rather on the nose, don’t you think?”That was so far from any one of the possible reactions he’d been expecting that Sirius couldn’t hold back a laugh. It’s a little delirious and more than a bit self-deprecating, but it felt good to just have a laugh at the insanity of it all. “Right,” Lily said, reaching into her bag and pulling out another book. This one, too, Sirius recognised from the Black library. Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. He leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest, tipping his chair to balance on two legs as he did so, waiting for Lily to explain. “Now, it’s my understanding that all you pure-bloods keep tabs on each other. Since we’ve established the ritual used for your mark and we know its effects, I thought you could tell me what other families have similar tattoos and rituals, so we can search through the histories to see if there’s any reference to a cure.”“There’s no cure, Evans.”Merlin, he’d lost count of how many times he’d said that to her. It was true, technically speaking. A mark like that one was too powerful to come with any sort of counter-spell or loophole. The words on his chest could not be burned away, carved off, or covered up by anything. If the skin was damaged, the scar would heal, and the words would appear again on top of it, completely and irreversibly intact. But Lily’s hunch wasn’t entirely unfounded. There had to be… something. Andromeda, after all, had found a way to hold hands with Ted Tonks without any residual pain. Sirius had been giving that a great deal of thought lately. He hand’t exactly worked up the courage to actually ask Andromeda about it. He was terrified of the answer. Andromeda was cunning—she was Slytherin, after all—and was something of a force of nature when she sets her mind on something. The thing was, Sirius already had a hunch as to how she’d done it. A mark like that, imbued with that kind of magic, could only be outmatched by an equally powerful ritual. He wasn’t sure what kind of ritual, exactly, but he was certain that it involved a good deal of blood magic, pain, and probably came with its own set of stipulations, addendums, and dire, world-ending consequences. On the one hand, Sirius figured it meant that Muggle-born, Hufflepuff, apothecary-owner Ted Tonks had one hell of a backbone, if he had been willing to perform this unspecified ritual just so he could hold Andromeda’s hand. It meant that he loved her, unequivocally, and that he was so fiercely loved by Andromeda in return. That kind of love… it was dangerous. Powerful, imbued with its own innate magic, and so tragically beautiful, sure, but it was also wild, and laced with every symptom of insanity. That kind of love consumes you, and mother of Merlin, Sirius knew it well. “Humour me,” Lily said, interrupting his thoughts. “Fine,” Sirius groused. “For the past century or so, most families that traditionally practiced this particular blood ritual have resigned themselves to only branding the eldest male heir. It’s still expected that everyone else in the family still marry into pure-blood, but for these families, only the male heir bears the brand of his house. ”“That’d be you, then.”“Yes, but like I told you, everyone in my family has the mark.”“Why’d the other families change, then?”“Convenience?” Sirius tried. “Suddenly, there were all these Muggle-borns and half-bloods running around. The old families were dying out. All that mattered was keeping the line pure, through the male heir. Everyone else, it didn’t matter so much, as long as the name continued.”“But the Blacks didn’t agree?”“The Blacks tend to believe that even the slightest hint of impurity should be met with excruciating pain,” he said, unable to hide a grimace. “The Shafiqs believe the same, as do the Lestranges.” Sirius pulled Nature’s Nobility towards him and flipped it open. “The Averys, Yaxleys, Notts, Gaunts, and Princes only brand the male heir, but the last of the Gaunts is locked in Azkaban and the Princes have all died out.”Lily, who had been frantically scribbling down the names as he talked, paused, looked up at him, and frowned. “No, they haven’t.”“What?”“Severus’s mother is a Prince. They haven’t all died out.” Sirius raised an eyebrow and filed that bit of information away for later. Lily grabbed the book back from him, spun it around and flipped to the P’s. “Snape won’t be in there, Evans.” “Why the hell not?” she snapped, without looking up. “It’s called A Wizarding Genealogy, not The Pure-Blood Genealogy.”“To most pure-bloods, it’s the same thing,” Sirius said, with a shrug. “Besides, if Snape’s a half-blood, it means his mum married a Muggle, and, if she did that, she was probably disowned. I highly doubt she’s even in there.”Lily finally landed on the right page. Her eyebrows pinched together as her frown deepened. “You’re right. The Prince line ends with Everett Prince, born 1901. But how is that possible. Surely there’s a record that she was born?”“There probably is somewhere, but not in that book,” Sirius replied. “The book’s magic, Evans. It updates for every birth, every death, and every poor sod that goes and gets themselves disowned.”“Alright, then,” Lily said, closing the book once more and taking up her quill. “What are the names of the individual patriarchs that have their own marks?”Sirius paused, wracking his brain. “Mortimer Yaxley, Milton Avery, Pulsifer Nott, and Morfin Gaunt, I think. I always get the two Avery brothers mixed up. They’re both hideous and they’re both fanatics. Not the type you’d like to run into.”Lily nodded and made a note to look up the Averys. “Does every family perform the ritual when the initiate is eight years old?”“Ideally,” Sirius replied. “Eight is a powerful year, historically speaking. It’s usually when accidental magic starts manifesting. It’s understood to be when a pure-blood child comes into their inheritance, but the ritual doesn’t always happen on the eighth birthday. If a male heir dies, his younger brother or cousin would be forced into the ritual, even if they were well into adulthood. The line must continue.”“Right. I’ll see what I can find out about possible variations in the ritual and—”Lily cut off, her eyes wide and fixed on something over Sirius’s shoulder. He didn’t have time to turn or properly react before Remus sat down next to him, armed with his own stack of ancient looking books. “Mind if I sit?” Remus said, even though it was a bit redundant at this point. Lily still hadn’t wiped that halfway-guilty look off her face, so Sirius answered for her. “Not at all. What are you reading?”“Theories on wand magic,” Remus said, not looking away from Lily Evans. Sirius was so caught up in the bizarre tension between Lily and Remus, that he almost didn’t register what Remus said. It hit him like a ton of bricks and he very nearly choked on the air. “W-wand magic?”That couldn’t be right, could it? He’d misheard, or something, because why, in the name of Merlin, would Remus be researching wand magic? Unless—No. Remus had to be lying, because Lily Evans was sitting right there. It was probably something for the Ravenclaw prank, hence the secrecy. “Yes,” Remus said, easily, and Merlin, it didn’t sound like he was lying. Then again, Remus was quite good at lying, wasn’t he? He’d told a thousand lies about his scars, even as recently as last week, when he’d taken Sirius’s advice and told James and Peter that the brand new marks on his face were retaliation for stepping on McGonagall’s tail one night. McGonagall, at least as far as James and Peter were concerned, had quite a temper when she was a cat. Remus raised an eyebrow at Lily, as if daring her to answer. “What about you two?”Lily opened and closed her mouth, then seemed to decide it was best for it to remain closed for the moment. She threw a panicked look at Sirius.He rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically. “Evans was helping me research curses and Dark Magic for McGonagall’s essay.”It wasn’t necessarily untrue, but it wasn’t the full truth either, and he was about eighty percent sure that Remus didn’t quite believe him. Lily wasn’t exactly helping, what with that wide-eyed panic written all across her face, but Sirius couldn’t exactly blame her. She was keeping his secret, after all, and had been caught a bit off guard. It takes practice, to lie as easily as he and Remus did. Lily, snapping out of her daze, snatched both her books from the table and stuffed them in her bag. She stood up fast, her chair scraping against the floor and nearly tipping over as she did so. “Right. Sirius, I’ll…” She hesitated and shifted uncomfortably. “I’ll get back to you about that… curse you asked about.”Then, mumbling a quick goodbye, Lily slung her bag over her shoulder and left, mumbling to herself as she went. Remus turned in his chair to face Sirius. “Please tell me you’re not planning to curse the Slytherins again. You’re in enough trouble, Sirius. There’s a real possibility that McGonagall will actually claw your face off if she catches you again.”Sirius barked a laugh. “No, of course not. You think I convinced Evans to help me curse Slytherins? She’s best friends with Snivellus.”“She’s quite good friends with you as well, in case you hadn’t noticed.”“That’s because I’m amazing.” Remus snorted and kicked the leg of Sirius’s chair for good measure. Sirius smirked and continued, “Besides, if I want to curse the living daylights out of the Slytherins, I’ve got you and James and Pete to help. And I seem to remember that we have a prior commitment, as far as elaborate schemes go, so let’s get to it, shall we?”He reached for one of Remus’s books and pulled it close, then felt his heart leap into his throat when he caught sight of the cover. The Art of Wand-Making Around the World. Sirius grabbed the other three books in Remus’s stack. The Heart and the Matter: Varying Theories on Wand Cores, The Wizard and His Wand, and, strangely enough, a beaten copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Well, shit. Sirius grabbed at the pile, snatching The Wizard and His Wand away from Remus before he could raise a protest. Raising a finger and turning a little bit red, Remus said, “That one actually has very little to do with wand making, but it was in the Restricted Section, so I took it. I got about half-way through before I realized why it was in the Restricted Section. Honestly, I can’t believe Madam Pince let me check that out.”Curiosity won out over the mild swell of panic twisting up his insides. Sirius raised an eyebrow and went to open The Wizard and His Wand, but Remus immediately slapped a hand on the cover. “Don’t,” Remus said, with a small laugh. “It’s, ah. It’s illustrated.” Sirius pushed the book away, then schooled his expression. “You’re…” he started, choking a bit on his words. “You’re actually researching wands?”Remus looked genuinely confused. “Yes? I already told you that.”“Yeah, well, I thought you were researching how to get Hogwarts to recognise a flag as a part of itself and that you lied because Evans was here.”Remus shrugged. “I have been researching that, just not today. Today, I’m researching wands. But, now that you mention it, I do have—”“Why?”“Why, what?”“Why are you researching wand magic?”Remus paused, a small frown tugging at a few of the most recent scars on his face. “You never wrote Ollivander. About your wand.”It wasn’t exactly an accusation, just a… statement of a fact. “I—” Sirius started, then clamped his mouth shut. There was a perfectly good reason he’d never written Ollivander. Writing Ollivander meant confessing that Sirius had killed his own wand. It meant admitting to an Unforgivable. “I mean,” Remus continued, looking a little nervous, “you said the core of your wand didn’t fit the Whomping Willow’s wood. Outside of McGonagall’s class, I’ve seen you use your wand just the once, with Malfoy, and, yes, you’re quite a prodigy at wandless magic—” Remus paused, graciously allowing Sirius an opportunity to look quite smug with himself. “—but you can’t get by on wandless magic forever, Siri. You need a wand. I thought I’d help.”“I, um…” Merlin, Sirius had no idea what to say to that, so, after a moment of hopeless floundering, he settled with a sincere, “Thank you.”“You’re welcome.” A raw, genuine smile spread slowly across Remus’s face. He gestured to his pile of books and, mother of Merlin, Remus had that look in his eye again: the one that said, Fuck the world because I’ve cracked the secrets of the universe a bit too loudly for polite company. “The trick is matching the enchanted willow wood to a magical core. The core has to, in a way, compliment the Whomping Willow specifically, which is difficult because—”“It’s guarding a secret,” Sirius finished. Remus gave a slight nod. “For whatever reason, the magic of the Willow is somehow entwined with this… secret.”“So we need to find out what the secret is?”“Not… necessarily.” Remus let out a nervous cough and looked away. “You need a magical core that’s worthy of the magic and ferocity of the Whomping Willow, as well as one fitting to you.”“You’re saying a bloody unicorn wasn’t worthy?” Sirius deadpanned. “A unicorn is too… pure,” Remus said, grimacing. “Pure?” Sirius felt a sudden, horrible weight in the pit of his stomach. Of course, that was the problem. He’d killed the unicorn hair core with Dark Magic, hadn’t he? A creature that innocent and perfect would never be—“I’m not— Merlin, Siri,” Remus muttered. He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m sorry. All I meant was that a thing that pure doesn’t necessarily compliment the nature of the Whomping Willow, or you, by extension, since this wand chose you. I meant… Look, you told me Ollivander said the Willow loved this… secret it’s protecting, unreservedly. Right?”Sirius nodded, not quite sure where Remus was going with this. “Right.”“Right,” Remus repeated. He sat up a bit straighter, fidgeting wildly as he talked. “Sirius, love like that—all entwined up in magic and purpose and destiny—it’s never pure, or innocent. Not in the same sense that a unicorn is pure. Purity to a unicorn means it’s unsullied. Untouched, even. The Willow… that kind of love burns with all the fury of the heavens. A unicorn can never love like that. This kind of love is instinctual and raw and it’s—”
It’s the kind of love that fires Unforgivable and healing spells, one right after the other.
“Oh.” Sirius and Remus stared at each other for a long moment, before Remus finally broke the tension with a small smile and nudged the leg of Sirius’s chair with his foot. Sirius laughed a little and cleared his throat of the unexpected emotion that welled up. “So. You’re going to fix my wand.”“No,” Remus said, with a patient sigh. “This is complicated magic. I have neither the skill nor the desire to become a wand-maker. You need a functioning wand, so I’m coming up with a possible solution. Ollivander will fix it, if and when I find a compatible core.”“Alright, then.” Sirius reached for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. He flipped to the middle of the book. “So we’re looking for a magical creature that compliments both the magic of the Willow and, well, me. Have you narrowed down the list of candidates? This is quite a long book.”Remus gave a noncommittal shrug. “I have a working theory.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. “Please tell me it’s not Hickory Dave.”Remus laughed. “No. Definitely not Hickory Dave.”“How exactly do you plan on getting this mysterious magical creature to give you a…” Sirius trailed off, not entirely certain of what parts of magical creatures could be used for wand cores. “A tooth,” Remus finished for him.“A tooth?!”“Yep.”Sirius gaped at him, waiting for Remus to elaborate, but clearly, Remus had no plans on doing so. Sirius narrowed his eyes. “That sounds… vaguely ominous. How exactly do you plan on getting a bloody tooth from this creature?”“I have a theory on that too,” Remus answered, as if that were the end of it.“Care to share with the class?”“No.” Remus smirked at him, smug and very clearly triumphant. “I don’t think I will.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 16, 1971
“I’ve had a thought,” Remus said.“Ooh, sounds dangerous. Tell me.”It was a cool, early afternoon on a Saturday, and Remus and Sirius were in the greenhouse. Their mission was twofold: steal a few of the large sheets of canvas Professor Woodward had been using to cover the Peruvian Snarl-Dragons and collect a fair amount of Speckle Grass to be used as paint. Remus, being the taller of the two of them, had been nominated, unanimously, by Sirius to handle the canvas removal. The Peruvian Snarl-Dragons weren’t even up to Remus’s knees—they wouldn’t be fully grown, man-eating nightmares until the spring, or so Professor Woodward assured them—but they still had a nasty bite. The venom of a Peruvian Snap-Dragon left its victim dazed and confused, and, as they’d found out the week before, highly susceptible to suggestion. Peter had taken a good nip in the backside in class, when he’d been laughing at one of Sirius’s jokes, and, well. The whole thing culminated in Peter doing an Irish dance on the Gryffindor table during dinner. It was all good fun, until McGonagall had made Peter and Sirius—who she’d immediately decided was behind the whole stunt, despite his vehement protests—clean up the whole mess of scattered food and pumpkin juice without magic. Remus, for his part, had thus far expertly avoided any contact with the Snap-Dragon fangs and had almost finished gathering the canvases by the time Sirius stood. Remus snorted a laugh, when he caught sight of Sirius. Sirius let out a pitiful groan. He was well aware that he was covered head to toe in Speckle Grass dust. The grass itself was rather ordinary looking, save for the fact that it was white and incredibly soft to the touch. It was, however, covered in a fine dust that could turn any possible colour with just the slightest touch of magic. With a little finesse, a wizard could determine the colour of the dust, and it made for very fine paint, but, of course, Remus had failed to mention the finesse bit, and Sirius had simply gone in and grabbed a handful of Speckle Grass. The dust… well, Sirius’s hair was a purple-ish shade. There were red and blue streaks across his face and hands, and his robes were dotted with patches of silver, and yellow, and a horrible shade of lime green right over his crotch. Remus snickered again when Sirius waved his hand and tried to remove the dust in one fell swoop. Despite the magic twirling between his fingers, all it did was brighten the shades of colour. “Here,” Remus said, setting down the canvas and walking up to Sirius. He drew his wand and tapped it to Sirius’s pouting face. “Scourgify.”The dust cleared and Sirius muttered his thanks. Then, turning back to his pile of Speckle Grass, he flicked his wrist and the grass floated into a whicker basket they’d nicked from Woodward’s office. “So,” Sirius said, brushing out his robes again for good measure. “You had a thought?”“Actually, I’ve had several.” Remus yanked the last canvas free of the Snarl-Dragons. “Relatively speaking, this operation is fairly simple. The books on Hogwarts’s magic are in the library, the spells—although there are a lot of them—aren’t particularly complicated, and the execution won’t be too difficult, if all that’s required are a giant flag and a couple of brooms.”Sirius shrugged, internally disagreeing with one point. The spell were very complicated. They were extending both the sentience and inherent magic of the castle to include a flag they planned to make themselves. The spell required to make a legitimate extension to the castle required the extension to have life within itself before it was integrated into Hogwarts itself. This had stumped Remus and Sirius for a good two days, before, last night, Sirius had woken up Remus around two in the morning with an ingenious solution. The castle requires life, so why not give it? Blood magic, plain and simple, and founded in such wonderful benevolence, Sirius had kicked himself for not thinking of it sooner. After that particular epiphany, it seemed like the easiest thing in the world: Once Sirius gathered all the Speckle Grass dust for the paint, the four Gryffindor boys would add a few drops of their blood, thus imbuing the paint with their life-force, which, according to the ancient, Latin spell-book, would give the flag enough magic to endure as long as Hogwarts itself. It was the purest kind of blood ritual—so far afield from the one used by the Blacks—and the enormity of it all took Sirius’s breath away if he allowed himself to dwell on it.This was good.This was Gryffindor.This would be their legacy.“What’s your point?” Sirius said, tearing himself from his own thoughts.“What’s to stop the Ravenclaws from retaliating? All they’d need is a few spells and a flag. Their flag wouldn’t even have to be all that big, either, since they’re not making up the distance.”“They’re Ravenclaws,” Sirius huffed. “They don’t retaliate.”“They do if it’s a matter of proving who’s more intelligent.”“Ugh, fair enough. What do we do?”“We have to make sure they’ll never be able to get to the top of Ravenclaw tower.”“And you know how to do that?”Remus shrugged, then flicked his wand to fold up the giant pieces of canvas. “More or less. We hex the shit out of their roof. Nothing nasty, of course, but enough layered hexes to deter even the most persistent Ravenclaws.”“That… would be a lot of hexes.”“Yes it would,” Remus said, dismissively, before continuing on with his rant. “So, while you and James fly the flag up on our tower, Pete and I will break into Ravenclaw tower and—”Sirius stopped fiddling with his robes and looked up sharply. “Wait, hold on. You’re breaking into Ravenclaw tower?”Remus paused, blinking at Sirius. “Yes. I thought it best that we lock all their windows on our way out, so at least they can’t get up on the roof that way. They’d have to fly up on a broom, and then, well… Hexes.”“I’m coming with you.”“What?” Remus’s face scrunched up in confusion. “You’re flying with James, Sirius. You’re the one who knows the final incantations.”“Pete can fly with James and I’ll show James the incantations. We can do most of them before they fly the flag up there anyway,” Sirius insisted. “I want to break into Ravenclaw tower.”“Why?”“I’m quite good at hexes, I’ll have you know. Plus, you’ve seen my locking charm, remember? No one but you has ever been able to break it.”Remus raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms, waiting for Sirius to fork over the whole truth.Sirius groaned. “Alright, fine. James promised me a consolation snog.”Remus opened and closed his mouth. “You—You want to snog James Potter?”Sirius gave a noncommittal wave of his hand. “Not particularly. It’s more about the prestige and proving I can break into Ravenclaw.”“If this is a consolation snog…”Sirius nodded and finished the thought. “James has to snog me and profess his undying love to me in the Great Hall if I ever manage to break into Slytherin.”Remus snorted a laugh. “In that case, let’s get you that consolation snog.” He gathered the folded canvases into his arms, then flicked his wand at the basket of Speckle Grass to levitate it. “But first, we need a flag. Let’s go. James said he’d call in reinforcements.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius and Remus made their way up to the Astronomy Tower, occasionally ducking inside alcoves and behind statues to avoid passerbys. Neither of them particularly cared to explain to a professor or fellow student why they were carrying a pile of stolen canvases between them and being followed by a levitating basket that was currently leaking purple dust. James and Peter were waiting with a large cauldron, in the centre of the Astronomy Tower. It was still light out, but the evening twilight was quickly fading into darkness. To the southeast, Sirius could just make out his star, the heart of Canis Major, rising above the Scottish moors. “Are you sure we couldn’t have gone to dinner first?” Peter said to James, just as Remus and Sirius walked in. James gave a half-hearted shrug, as if he’d been thinking the same thing. “We have to do the blood ritual and paint the flag in one go, preferably before curfew, otherwise the spell might not work properly,” Remus said, as he and Sirius set down the canvases next to the cauldron. Remus stood up straight and fished around in the pockets of his robes. “Here. I brought provisions.”He tossed a Chocolate Frog first to Peter, then to James, taking a third one out for himself. Then, digging in his robes a little more, he produced a sugar quill. Remus handed it to Sirius with an apologetic smile, and muttered, “Sorry I don’t have anything more filling.”Sirius, on the other hand, didn’t care in the slightest. He hadn’t been too concerned about missing dinner in the first place. It wasn’t like it was the first time he’d missed a meal. He broke off the tip of the sugar quill and popped it in his mouth, flashing Remus a winning smile.“Ugh, another Helga Hufflepuff?” Peter moaned around a mouthful of chocolate, staring in dismay at his card. James looked at his own card and pulled a face. “I’ll trade you for it later, Pete. Sirius, care to do the honours?”James tossed his card to the floor, face-up, in the middle of the four of them. Sirius would recognise that general scowl of disapproval anywhere. It lived on in both his mother and his father and haunted Sirius’s nightmares. Phineas Nigellus Black. “With pleasure,” he said. Sirius flicked his wrist and the card caught on fire, disintegrating in seconds, but not before a look of abject horror crossed over his great-great grandfather’s face.Peter pouted a little. “That one was rare.”“Yeah, well,” Sirius said, dismissively, “come over to mine and you can listen to him bitch and moan all day long. Filthy Muggles, this, and ungrateful Mudbloods, that. It all gets rather repetitive, really. No original content whatsoever. It’s a wonder anyone listened to him at all. Now, my mother… she’s creative with her insults, you see, but that’s a circle of hell in and of itself.”Peter gulped and wisely shut his mouth.Sirius smirked and bit off another piece of sugar quill, leaning back on his heels, pretending to be triumphant for proving his point. Except, that uncomfortable swirl of dread and terror that settled in his stomach didn’t feel particularly triumphant.Remus cleared the dust away with a swirl of his wand. “Let’s get this started, shall we?”Another flick of Remus’s wand had the basket of Speckle Grass unceremoniously dumping its contents into the cauldron. Now came the blood. “Best I go first,” Sirius muttered under his breath, only loud enough so that Remus could hear. Sirius had no intention whatsoever of risking contact with James or Remus’s blood. If touching them hurt as much as it did, he didn’t even want to imagine what their blood would do to him.Sirius produced a small, silver knife from the pockets of his robes. He dragged the knife across his palm and bit his lip against the pain. He held the open wound over the cauldron and counted until thirteen drops of blood fell in. The ritual called for thirteen. Then, muttering a quick scourgify for the knife and an episkey for his hand, Sirius held out the hilt of the knife to Remus. Remus stared at the gleaming silver hilt for a solid minute, a frown on his face, and—Merlin, Remus was terrified. “Is that… silver?”“Yes,” Sirius said, hesitantly. “Nicked it from my mum before I left for school. It’s probably a family heirloom of some degree, but I just thought it looked… neat.”Remus swallowed loudly and cleared his throat. “Can you, um—” He looked desperately between Sirius and the knife. “Can you do it for me?”A cold dose of realisation washed over Sirius. “You’re—”“Squeamish, yes,” Remus finished.But, no, that wasn’t it at all. Sirius thought of Remus, propped up against the wall in the second floor bathroom, absolutely covered in blood. Remus wasn’t afraid of blood, per se. He was afraid of the knife.Sirius pulled the knife back. “If you want, we can use magic. All we need is blood—”“‘Blood drawn by man’s own blade,’” Remus quoted. “If we use magic, it won’t work.”“Then you don’t have to—”“It works better with four, Siri,” Remus said. “It’s a powerful magical number, like the four points on the compass. The spell-book said so. Just do it.”Sirius took a second to calculate the best way to do this without actually touching Remus. If he held Remus’s hand while he made the cut, there was a chance Sirius would react to the pain and flinch. He’d hurt Remus, if he didn’t make a clean, precise cut. Glancing over at James, who’s face was pinched up in sympathy, Sirius said, “Maybe James should—”Remus shook his head, and it broke his heart, but Sirius understood that too. James might be a good friend and a stand-up guy, but Remus trusted Sirius with this. This, and the burden of his fear. “Alright,” Sirius said, flipping the knife back over. “Hold your wrist for me, yeah? Keep it steady.”Remus understood and did as he was asked, holding his left wrist with his right hand over the cauldron. Sirius stepped forward and, very carefully, dragged the blade across Remus’s upturned left palm.A whimper escaped Remus, before he had a chance to bite his lips, but no one commented on it. The second the cut was deep enough, Sirius yanked the knife back. Tears glistened in the corners of Remus’s eyes, but they did not fall, and Remus maintained his composure.Braveheart Gryffindor, a voice in Sirius’s head whispered, and for once, he agreed. Remus was the best out of all of them.Once more, Sirius cleaned off the knife. Then, with his magic still dancing on the tips of his fingers, he turned back to Remus, ready with a healing spell, but Remus waved him off, instead producing a handkerchief from his pocket. He wrapped his hand and gave Sirius a small, reassuring smile.Slightly confused, Sirius passed the knife to James, hardly able to tear his eyes off Remus and the thousand and one emotions flittering intermittently between his scars. He was pale, probably a little more than he should be after losing only thirteen drops of blood, and it made Sirius’s insides churn. Remus gave him his best, reassuring smile, but there was still pain hidden behind his eyes.James sliced his own palm, then handed it off to Peter, who was doing his best to appear brave, but sobbed a little as he cut his hand. Sirius waved his hand and threw a healing charm at both James and Peter, as Remus began the final words of the incantation. Five minutes later, they had a cauldron full of life-force-imbued paint. Sirius flicked his fingers over the cauldron, adding a few weather-proofing and vibrancy charms just for good measure. “Is it supposed to be that color?” Peter asked, leaning over the simmering black ooze. Remus nodded. “Tap your wand to the paint and it’ll change to whatever color you need.”“Jamie, did you bring paint brushes?” Sirius asked. “‘Course.” James reached into the pocket of his robes and produced a handful of brushes.“Good,” Remus said. He looked a little better, and this time his smile was a bit more convincing. Remus turned his back to the cauldron and flicked his wand at the canvases. The four sheets unfolded themselves and spread out across the floor, to form a giant rectangle. James clapped his hands together, excited. “Now all we need to do is—”“Oi, Potter! What the hell is all this?”The four boys turned to face the stairs. Lily Evans stood with her arms crossed over her chest and an annoyed frown on her face. She was flanked on either side by Dorcas Meadows and Marlene McKinnon. Remus looked between James and the first year girls. “What are they—oh.” James put his hands on his hips and jutted his chin out, looking, all together, far to smug with himself. “Reinforcements,” James said, by way of explanation. “I thought he meant the Prewetts,” Sirius muttered to Remus, though he really wasn’t too upset about it. He liked Lily Evans quite a bit these days.“Me too,” Remus replied. “Answer my question, Potter, or I’m leaving, agreement be damned,” Lily snapped. “Agreement?” Sirius asked, quirking an eyebrow at Lily. Lily pinched the bridge of her nose. “I agreed to help Potter with whatever stupid project this is if he agreed to leave Severus alone for the rest of the year.”James held up a finger. “First of all, Lily, it is not a stupid project. Our names will live in infamy and our grandchildren will remember our legacy—”“Our grandchildren?!” Lily snapped. Sirius couldn’t be reasonably expected to suppress the laughter that bubbled up in his throat. James ignored her entirely. “Secondly—” He spun on his heel to face Sirius, Remus, and Peter. “—as per the terms of my agreement with the love of my life, none of us will be going after Snape for the rest of the year. So, no more hexing Snivellus—or, er, Severus. Especially you, Sirius.”Sirius rolled his eyes, but didn’t bother explaining to James that he already had his own sworn agreement with Lily Evans regarding his conduct towards Severus Snape. “Excuse me?! The love of your—Christ, Potter.” Lily drew her wand and shot a Stinging Hex directly at James Potter’s arse. Again, Sirius barked a laugh, before Lily trained her wand on him.“Sirius, explain what’s going on now, or you’re next.”Sirius raised his hands in surrender. “We’re making a flag. We needed reinforcements.”“A flag?” Dorcas asked, incredulously. All three girls leaned to the side to glance around the Gryffindor boys. All three of them wore nearly identical unimpressed looks at the sight of the blank canvases spread out on the floor. “A giant flag,” James clarified, still rubbing his arse. “Doesn’t exactly look like much, does it?” Dorcas mumbled. “Well,” Sirius said, “first we have to stitch it together—”Marlene McKinnon nudged Lily aside and walked right up to Sirius, stopping only inches from his face. He didn’t blink—didn’t even flinch—but Merlin, he hated that she was taller than him. “We won’t be stitching anything just because we’re girls,” she snapped, her blue eyes flashing dangerously at the perceived injustice.“That’s not what I said.” Sirius took a step back, just to be safe. Marlene was pure-blood, that much he knew, but she was also in Gryffindor, which more than likely meant that she wasn’t pure enough by the extremist Black standards. “I’ll be doing the stitching, thank you very much.”Marlene scoffed. “How’d you end up with that job? Do you even know how to stitch?”“Nope, but neither do they.” Sirius gestured wildly to James, Peter, and Remus. “Out of the four of us, we’ve unanimously agreed that I have the widest range of magic—”“We’ve agreed to no such thing,” James Potter protested, looking affronted. “Technically speaking, I think he’s right, Jamie,” Remus muttered. “Plus, Sirius knows all the permanence charms to make sure the flag doesn’t fall apart at the first gust of wind.”“And he does them without a wand,” Peter added. “That’s only because he had a head start,” James said, pouting a little. Sirius smirked, absolutely revelling in the fact that all eyes were on him. “Anyways, I figured I’d just wave my hand, and—” He did just that, muttered a quick joining spell and another permanence charm to boot. In the middle of the four canvases, a loose thread levitated and magically sharpened itself to a point, then shot downwards and began stitching two of the sheets together. The lines were precise and even, the stitching akin to the work of any professional. Sirius flicked his wrist again, and thread began stitching at every junction point between the canvases, until each end tied itself off, and there was only one, enormous canvas sprawled across the floor of the Astronomy Tower. Marlene inclined her head, in bemused amazement at Sirius’s handiwork. “Impressive.”“Alright,” Lily said, cutting in. “Now that we’ve established Sirius as the honorary girl—”“Hey!” “—Can someone please tell me what we’re actually doing here?”James held up the paintbrushes as if they were Excalibur and he was King-fucking-Arthur. Which, Sirius thought, was probably not too far off from the image James had of himself in his own head. “We asked you lot here to help us paint the Hogwarts seal on the flag,” James Potter proclaimed to his loyal knights.On cue, Remus tapped his wand to his chest, where the Hogwarts insignia was sewn onto his robes, then pointed his wand at the enormous canvas. “Exscribo.”A perfect stencil of the Hogwarts insignia shimmered into existence, in full color, hovering a centimeter above the canvas. Lily gawked at James. “You want us to… paint?”“Yeah,” Sirius answered, because their noble King Arthur seemed to have gotten lost somewhere in the depth of Lily Evans’s eyes. “Remus said we have to paint it by hand, otherwise the charms we’re using to protect the flag won’t work.”Lily turned her attention to Sirius. “Where exactly do you plan on hanging this flag?”“Ah, that’s secret,” Sirius said. “But I promise you, there will be pomp and circumstance and they’ll remember it for generations. You can tell the little Potter grandchildren all about it.”James made a disgustingly lovesick noise.“Watch it, Black,” Lily growled, but there was no real fight in her voice. Lily turned to face Marlene and Dorcas and the three of them conversed in furtive whispers. Marlene looked rather like she wanted to shove past Lily, tackle James and steal a paintbrush, then paint the entire canvas herself. Dorcas, on the other hand, kept tugging on Marlene’s sleeve and gazing longingly towards the door. Eventually, Lily spun on her heel to face the four boys. “Alright, fine. We’ll help, but we’re signing our names on the flag. No use in you lot getting all the credit.”Sirius glanced at his friends. Remus smirked, and nodded, amber eyes flashing with excitement. James was drooling a little bit, lost somewhere in his Lily Evans-induced coma. Peter stared at Remus’s robes, apparently trying to discern whether or not Remus had another Chocolate Frog in his pocket. “Sign our names too, and you have a deal,” Sirius said to Lily. She nodded, then strode forward and snatched a brush from James’s hand. James apparently took this as a cue to lean in for a kiss, so Lily punched him in the stomach. Sirius nearly doubled over in laughter, and was still clutching his own stomach when Remus carefully handed him a jug of Speckle Grass paint. James Potter, however, didn’t seem deterred in the slightest. He followed Lily around, as she surveyed the canvas and the stencil, as if she were the sun and he was merely trapped in orbit. “Merlin, he’s hopeless,” Remus muttered to Sirius, after his third attempt to get James to focus. Sirius hummed in agreement. “It’s a wonder she punched him instead of throwing him off the Tower.”“At this point, he’d probably grow wings and fly right into the sun.”“Bloody idiot.”The seven of them stood around the edges of the canvas, each holding a paintbrush and a small jug of paint, while Remus explained exactly how the paint would change colour. Lily gestured to the shimmering stencil, and the four House insignias woven into the Hogwarts seal. “Who’s going to paint which House symbols?”Sirius’s hand shot up in the air. “I’ve got Slytherin!”“No!” Remus shouted, in counterpoint. He grabbed the edge of Sirius’s robe and tugged him over to the non-Slytherin side of the canvas. “Knowing you, you’d probably manage to paint an obscenity or two into the Slytherin symbol.”“Oh, ye of little faith,” Sirius muttered.Actually, in the three total seconds Sirius had had to come up with a plan, he’d landed on placing a Medusa Hex into his green paint, so that whoever looks directly upon the Slytherin symbol temporarily turns into stone. It would have been brilliant. Reluctantly, he let the idea go. He didn’t know how the hex would affect the blood ritual they’d done either, and, of the two, ensuring that the flag integrated into the magic of Hogwarts itself seemed exponentially more important. “We’ll do Ravenclaw,” Remus said, before immediately sitting down by the navy portion of the stencil. He yanked Sirius down next to him.“I’ll take Slytherin,” Lily said. Then, pointing her paintbrush as she talked, “Potter and Pettigrew have Hufflepuff. Marlene and Dee are on Gryffindor. When you finish with your house, start on the banner.”With that, they got to work. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ It took them until fifteen minutes before curfew to finish painting, mostly because, about an hour in, James had finally snapped out of his Lily Evans-daze in order to have a proper shouting match with Marlene about some Quidditch team or other. It had only ended when Lily had jumped in and—to everyone’s surprise—had taken James’s side. It’d shut James up for all of fourteen seconds, before he’d walked over to Lily, got down on one knee, and proposed to her with a Golden Snitch he’d had in his pocket. Lily had dumped the remainder of her Speckle Grass paint on James’s head and, well, it all devolved from there.As it turned out, Speckle Grass paint was much more difficult to remove than Speckle Grass dust, which Sirius attributed mostly to the utter brilliance of his permanence charms. They signed their names under the banner, all seven of them written in black ink along the edge of the flag: Lily Evans, Marlene McKinnon, Dorcas Meadows, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Sirius Black, and James Potter.Lily Evans requested that her name be as far away from James’s as physically possible. Standing and flicking the last of his paint in Sirius’s face, Remus smirked and waved his wand over the canvas, casting a drying spell. A second later, the flag folded itself back up. After another brief argument between Marlene and James, it was decided via intervention from Lily that both James and Marlene could carry the flag back to Gryffindor tower. Peter trailed after them and, after waving a goodnight to Remus and Sirius, Lily linked arms with Dorcas and followed them. Remus and Sirius followed, walking slowly, and keeping a well out of earshot of the others. Remus kept fidgeting with the handkerchief still wrapped around his left hand, picking at the paint that had dried there, trying to peel it away.Outside the portrait hole, Sirius grabbed Remus’s robes and stopped him from crawling through. Sirius gestured at Remus’s left palm and the handkerchief that was stained with blood and Speckle Grass paint. “Is there a reason you won’t let me heal that?”“It’ll heal on its own.” Remus shrugged, and the light from the common room caught on his face. He had a splotch of paint right across his nose and dripping down one cheek. It’d been blue, earlier, when Sirius had put it there. Now, though, the paint had turned into a deep crimson, and it made the parallel scars on Remus’s face look like they were brand new. “It’ll scar if it heals on his own,” Sirius said, his voice breaking. Merlin, he couldn’t stand the thought of it. Remus had so many scars, from so many horrific nights of pain. Sirius would rather tear out his own entrails than be responsible for another scar on Remus’s body. Remus gave him a sad smile. It wasn’t an absolution, but a heartbroken resignation. Remus muttered something that might have been, “It’ll scar either way,” but Sirius didn’t have a chance to even fully process that before Remus said, “Let’s go out on the roof, yeah?”James and Peter ignored them, as Remus climbed through the window. They were still engrossed in the remnants of whatever meaningless argument James had had with Marlene. Sirius snagged the duvet from his bed and followed Remus. It was cold out, but Remus didn’t seem particularly bothered. The stars shone brightly, only contrasted by the tiny sliver of the moon hanging low in the western sky. Sirius didn’t say anything, as he wrapped himself in the duvet and pressed his shoulder into Remus’s, revealing in the ever-present, yet significantly dulled twinge of pain. The pain was comforting, if he was being honest. It meant that all of this was real, that he was here, on the roof, safe in the presence of a friend. It meant that all other pain, past and future, was irrelevant, because the stars burned specifically for them, and no amount of pain could mar the beauty of Remus Lupin. They sat in silence, well into the night, pressed as close to each other as their respective tragedies would allow. Sirius did his best to not think about the brand new scar on Remus’s left palm. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 30, 1971
“How’s your essay for McGonagall going?”“You’re asking me this now?!”Remus and Sirius were in an alcove in the fourth floor corridor, just down the hall from the door that led to Ravenclaw tower. They were as close together as reasonably possible, and had ducked in here to avoid being seen by some fifth year Ravenclaws until their disguises were properly in place. Sirius flicked his wrist, and both of their ties morphed into that deep, Ravenclaw blue. “I just meant…” Remus started, then sighed. “We’re not going to curse any Ravenclaws, Sirius.”Sirius glared at him. “At what point did I give you the impression that I was secretly planning on cursing the Ravenclaws?”“You didn’t. I just—Christ.”“Despite what McGonagall would have you believe, I think I can tell the difference between some random Ravenclaw and Lucius Malfoy. For one, Malfoy’s blonde and fucking ugly Two, he deserved what he got.”Remus grimaced. “Sirius—”“Shut up,” Sirius snapped. “No one has any right to say those sort of things to you. Or hit you. I don’t care who they are.”Remus ducked his head, embarrassed. A lock of curly hair fell in his face. A second later, he brushed it aside. “The Ravenclaws—”“Don’t deserve to be cursed,” Sirius finished, trying not to roll his eyes. “They just need a gentle reminder that they are capable of being outsmarted. It’s all in good fun.”He shot Remus a wicked smile and, much to his relief, Remus returned it. “Just be careful, okay?”“I will,” Sirius promised, dismissively. “If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t even bring my wand.”He turned out his pockets, just to prove his point. Remus drew in a sharp breath. “What? Your—Christ, Sirius. What if you—”It was Sirius’s turn to grimace. “My wand has a bit of a preference for, er, darker things. I didn’t want to accidentally muck anything up. There’s quite a lot of hexes we have to get through.”“And you’re sure you can…?” Remus made a dramatic hand gesture that was supposedly meant to imitate Sirius’s wandless magic. Sirius rolled his eyes. “We’ve been over the hexes about a thousand times, Remus. I’m sure I’ve got it right.” That, at least, was only a slight exaggeration. They’d been practicing the sequence of the hexes they planned on placing on the Ravenclaw roof for nearly two whole weeks. Twenty-six hexes in total, thirteen done by Remus, thirteen by Sirius, in an alternating pattern, with increased severity and duration of effectiveness as they progressed. They’d found, in a book Sirius had borrowed from McGonagall’s personal library for his essay on curses and Dark Magic, that each witch or wizard had their own magical signature. It was the personal flair that usually gave curse-breakers a hard time, when it came to undoing certain hexes or jinxes, rather than the spell itself. The more personality each spell had, the harder it was to break. They’d figured, then, if they alternated the hexes and performed a sequential locking spell to seal it, no one would really go through the effort of undoing the spells, even a rather determined Ravenclaw. Even if they tried, they’d have to undo each spell in the order that Sirius and Remus performed them, counteract alternating patterns of Remus’s and Sirius’s magical signatures, all the while dealing with effects of each hex, set to go off with even the slightest bit of tampering. All in all, it was all rather clever. Sirius and Remus were quite proud of themselves. Remus leaned around the corner of the alcove, checking to see if the hallway was still clear. He turned back to Sirius. “What time is it?”Sirius waved his hand and cast a Timus. It was ten minutes to three in the afternoon. As far as plans go, this particular one was not without its flaws. For one, they’d all come to the conclusion that it was almost inevitable that they’d get caught. Peter, despite his constant lessons with James whenever the Quidditch pitch was open, was still a bit unsteady on a broom and had absolutely refused to fly the flag up with James at night. When James had complained to Sirius about leaving him for Remus, Sirius had merely handed the parchment containing his half of the twenty-six hexes to Peter. Peter had immediately tried the first one—the Tail-Growing hex. He’d somehow managed to fire the hex directly at the reflective surface of the dorm window, and it’d immediately backfired, and Peter had spent the rest of the day stuffing a long, bushy horse’s tail into the back of his trousers. “Hooch locks the broom cupboard at night anyways,” James had grumbled, in surrender. “Stealing brooms in broad daylight it is.”“If we’re resigned to getting caught,” Remus had said, after Peter eventually stopped whining about his temporary tail, “we just have to make sure that we don’t get caught until after we get the job done.”Which meant, of course, that they had to get the timing just right.At three in the afternoon, precisely, Sirius and Remus would break into Ravenclaw tower by walking through the front door. After much debate between Sirius and Remus—and a brief consultation from one James Potter—it was determined that the front door was both the most effective and the least-suspicious method of breaking into Ravenclaw tower. Once they’d solved the riddle, Sirius and Remus would make their way up to the roof, perform and layer their hexes, lock all the windows, then make their way back through Ravenclaw tower, in order to meet James and Peter in the Great Hall. If luck was on their side, Remus and Sirius wouldn’t be caught at all, but had readily agreed to jump in and take an equal share in the blame when McGonagall ultimately caught James and Peter. While Remus and Sirius secured Ravenclaw tower against any possible retaliation, Peter and James would carry the flag down to the Quidditch pitch and steal a couple of brooms. Then, at a quarter past three, they’d fly the flag up to the top of Gryffindor tower, mount it, and then James would perform the final binding charms to get the flag to integrate with the castle. Sirius and James had been up late the night before, practicing the wand movements and the hybrid Latin over and over and over, until James could finally pronounce Sempiternum without stumbling over the unfamiliar syllables. On a completely unrelated side note, Sirius’s essay for Ancient Runes was now stuck to the ceiling above James’s bed with one hell of a permanence charm. As Sirius figured it, future generations would thank him for his brilliance in Ancient Runes and would build shrines in his honour. Sirius turned to Remus and gave him one last once over. They were only going to have one shot at this, after all. Remus’s Ravenclaw robes were perfect, if he did say so himself, but he was still very much… Remus. Sirius twirled his fingers, running over a few possibilities in his head for a second, before he flicked them at Remus. Remus’s hair turned black.“Oi! What did you—” Remus looked down at himself, trying to figure out what was different. Finding nothing, his hands went to his hair. Remus tugged on a curl, then pulled it down in front of his eyes. Sirius snorted a laugh at Remus’s indignant glare. “You look like Jamie’s Welsh cousin.”In retaliation, Remus drew his wand and flicked it at Sirius. A curtain of blonde hair fell into his face. Sirius yelped. “You look like Marlene,” Remus said, rather proud of himself. Sirius ruffled his hair for good measure. “I’m way prettier than Marlene and you know it.”“I’ll be sure to tell her you said that. She’ll probably punch you in the face.” Sirius grimaced. “Ugh, you’re right. Best not mention it to her.” He gave Remus another once-over. “We are passable Ravenclaws, aren’t we? Well, as much as can be done without Polyjuice, right?”Remus tugged at the edges of his black curls and frowned. “Sirius, do you think you could, er…?”Remus made a vague gesture to his face. Sirius blinked, genuinely confused. “What, your eyes? I suppose I could spell them darker, like James’s, but I’m not sure how it’d affect your vision, and really, best not risk it with all the—”“No, Merlin.” Remus scrubbed a hand over his face and Sirius couldn’t quite tell if he was frustrated or embarrassed. “My scars, Sirius. Can you do anything to hide my scars?”Sirius frowned and slowly shook his head. “Not without a complicated Disillusionment spell. I’d need a wand and… a great deal of practice.” He drew in a breath and forced a smile. “It doesn’t matter anyway. We’ll be in and out of the common room so quick that those poor sods will hardly have time to look up from their books. No one will recognise you.”“I’m rather recognisable,” Remus muttered, darkly. “Yes, but compared to the alluring written word, you’re just another face in the crowd to a Ravenclaw,” Sirius said. “Muss your hair up a bit and you’ll be fine. I promise.”Remus sighed, rolled his eyes to show Sirius that he didn’t believe him, but mussed up his hair all the same. His curls went out in every direction, and he tugged a few down to fall over his face. Once the corridor is clear, Remus and Sirius make their way to the base of the tower. There was a large, ornate door, painted a dark navy. About three-quarters of the way up, there was an ancient, brass knocker, shaped rather like a battle horn. “Do we just… knock?” Sirius asked. “No, there’s a—” Remus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Didn’t you read that book I gave you on Rowena Ravenclaw?”“Ah. Nope. I had to finish Evans’s book. There was a revolution. People were dying, Remus.”The corner of Remus’s lip twitched up in a half-smile, so Sirius knew he wasn’t too bothered by it. “There’s a riddle,” Remus said, nodding to the door. “It changes every day. You answer it correctly and the door opens.”“Well, that seems like a rather ineffective method of security.”“As opposed to a generic password that hasn’t changed since the first day of term?” Remus deadpanned.Sirius chose to ignore that. “Ravenclaws aren’t the only intelligent people in the castle, you know.”“I certainly hope not, or this plan is fucked,” Remus muttered. “We’ve got about four minutes until three. Knock, Sirius.”Sirius knocked. The battle horn yawned, then, in a deep voice, bellowed, “What is greater than God, and more evil than the devil? The poor have it, the rich want for it, and if you drink it, you’ll face judgment yourself.”Sirius coughed, nervously, his heart-rate picking up. “That’s rather… foreboding.”“And rather poetic. If it’s poetic, it’s subjective, and if it’s subjective, it could literally be anything, so, Christ.” Remus bit his thumbnail and stared at the ground.“‘More evil than the devil,’” Sirius quoted. “Is my mother an acceptable answer?”They stared at the door for a moment, but nothing happened. “Apparently not,” Remus said. “Let’s focus on the second bit. What would kill you if you drink it? There’s poison, obviously, but—”“What the hell is greater than God?” Sirius muttered. Sirius didn’t particularly like the whole concept of God to begin with. He never had. Some big, omniscient being in the sky, moving the hands of destiny and fate at his very whim, regardless of the lives of the people he supposedly loves?If Sirius had any say in it whatsoever, God didn’t fucking deserve the universe he created. Sirius felt he had a right to have an opinion on that. Silas, the Slightly Psychic Pirating Parrot told him he’d kill God, after all, right? How’d that go again? Sirius started repeating the limerick in his head, straining to remember the exact wording.
Sirius Black, how tragically flawed
Thought he might be the man to kill God
Now Nothing’s dictating—
Sirius’s eyes went wide. “No way it’s that easy.”Remus was still mumbling, mostly to himself, something about rich and poor and how maybe it’s richer and poorer, or some kind of vow. He ignored Sirius completely. “Nothing,” Sirius said to the brass knocker. “Nothing is greater than God or more evil than the devil.”The door clicked open. Remus’s eyes snapped to him, a fair bit of wonder and confusion swirling in his expression. “How did you—”Sirius had already started up the stairs. “I remembered something a pigeon told me. Now, hush. We can’t disturb the bookworms.”The Ravenclaw common room, as it turned out, was rather similar to the Gryffindor one, except for the fact that there were book cases lining every wall and everything was blue. Everything else was the same: hearth, rug, random bits of armour. The sofas were even in the same position in the centre of the room. It was all a bit… weird. As Sirius predicted, absolutely none of the seven other people in the common room looked up from their books when he and Remus entered. “Think it’s the same staircase?” Remus whispered, nodding to what would be the boys’ staircase in Gryffindor tower.“That’d be my best guess,” Sirius replied. They made their way up the stairs to the left and, thankfully, they neither ran into any Ravenclaws nor went sliding back down to the common room in any sort of dramatic fashion. Sirius shoved open the door to the first years’ dorm room and stopped. Remus nearly ran into him from behind, but pulled up at the last second. “Woah,” Remus whispered, his breath ghosting the back of Sirius’s neck. There were sixteen beds in the room, and it was, understandably, vastly larger than the room that the four Gryffindor first years shared. The dorm was empty, save for one bed in the far corner, where a Ravenclaw first year—Sirius thought his name was Micah, or something—was snoring with a book open across his face. “Fabian told me we were the smallest Gryffindor class in three generations,” Sirius stage whispered. “Guess this is where the rest of the first years were sorted.”“Glad I wasn’t one of them,” Remus muttered. Me too, Sirius thought, emphatically, but he was no where near brave enough to say that out loud. Instead, he gestured towards the window and Remus followed him, careful not to wake Micah-Or-Something. The one thing, in all their weeks of planning, they hadn’t counted on was the wind. In hindsight, given that they were on the Scottish moors and it was almost November, the wind very much should have been a factor. “Christ,” Remus swore, above the roar of the wind. He clutched his robes tight against his chest, making sure they didn’t just fly away. “This might be a problem.”“As long as we keep our balance, we’ll be fine.” Sirius edged up the slanted roof, keeping one hand out for balance as he cast a protection charm on himself and Remus, in order that the hexes they were about to put on the roof don’t affect them. “James and Pete—” “They’ll be fine too,” Sirius said, but he wasn’t too sure if he was trying to convince Remus or himself. James, he knew, would most likely be fine. He was—though Sirius would never tell him—rather exceptional on a broom. Nonetheless, with Peter’s less than adequate flying skills plus the added weight and encumbrance of the flag, the wind may very well cause them some problems. Remus nodded, his wild black hair whipping about in every possible direction. “Alright. Lock all the windows first, except the one we came through. I’ll start with the hexes.”Sirius wiggled his fingers and shot a Colloportus, followed by his own wandless locking spell at the nearest window, then proceeded to the next one. Remus finished up the first hex—they’d agreed that a sliding hex, that made the roof too slick to stand on, would be best as their first line of defence—and motioned for Sirius to start on the next hex, the Forget Me Not, which wipes the victim’s short term memory. And so it went: they alternated the hexes, all the while careful to maintain their balance. When Remus did his portion of the hexes, Sirius moved from one window to the next, making sure they were all soundly locked and shut, and that no Ravenclaw would be able to break the charm. All was going according to plan, until Sirius was in the middle of his ninth hex—a Gravity hex, that makes the victim’s shoes weigh a couple hundred pounds, therefore significantly decreasing the chances of levitation or effectively flying on a broom—when Remus shouted over the roar of the wind, “Fuck, Sirius, look!”Sirius turned, his eyes searching the sky around Gryffindor tower, and, sure enough, there were James and Peter. James flew in front, hefting most of the canvas. Peter was a couple of meters behind and below, holding the long, wooden pole that they’d stolen from Hagrid last week. They were teetering dangerously, caught in the wind, with Peter being thrown about like he was nothing more than a rogue feather. The only reason the two of them and the flag were still airborne was because James Potter was a damn steady flier. But even the best flier in the world couldn’t support the weight of that flag and another deadweight on a broom for long. “Fuck,” Sirius shouted. He turned to Remus, shoving his stupid blonde hair out of his face as he did. “Can you cast a shield charm?”“I know the spell,” Remus replied, looking a little uncertain. “But I don’t think I can from this far away.”“We’ve got to stabilise them, or they’ll both go down,” Sirius forced himself to say, and fucking Salazar, it was true. Sirius was starting to panic. “Just… point your wand at Peter and cast the spell. Try to block the wind. I’ll switch with you in a second.”Remus turned his back to Sirius and did as instructed. The Protego worked, to a degree, and Peter’s flight pattern evened out a little, but he was still wobbling quite a bit. Remus knit his brow in concentration, then snapped over his shoulder, “Get on with it, Sirius! I’m not sure I can hold this for long!”Sirius finished off the Gravity hex, then locked the last two windows, save for their escape window. He went to stand beside Remus, his hands raised and his magic lacing all the way up his arms. He could make out the sweat on Remus’s brow, as Remus looked at him out of the corner of his eye. “Ready?” Remus asked.Sirius squared his shoulders and nodded, his eyes now locked on Peter. “Now!” Remus shouted.A heartbeat later, Sirius shouted, “Protego!”Peter swayed a little bit and they could hear the muffled sounds from James’s shout, but they stayed in the air. Behind him, Sirius heard Remus cast the next hex, as quick as he possibly could without messing up the spell. Then, he was standing by Sirius’s side again. They alternated between stabilising James and Peter and finishing up the hexes once, twice, three times, and—“They’re at the top!” Remus shouted, and, sure enough, James hovered, holding tight to the canvas, as Peter mounted the base of the pole onto the top of the tower. Sirius whooped in triumph, as he finished off his second to last hex. Then, from far, far below: “POTTER GET DOWN HERE AT ONCE!”Sirius and Remus exchanged a look, then carefully peered over the edge of the roof. They could just make out McGonagall, standing in the courtyard with her wand to her throat. A crowd of shouting and clapping students began to gather around her. Behind them, someone pounded on a window. Sirius spun around, only to meet the eyes of a seventh year Ravenclaw, whose face and palm were pressed flat against the glass as he shouted at them. The Ravenclaw turned, and shouted back towards the dorm, only to be joined by two more boys. They each took a turn pointing their wands at the window.Remus glanced over his shoulder. “Christ, Sirius, lock the last window!”“What?! But how will we—”“Just do it!”Right.Sirius made his way down the roof, as carefully and quickly as possible, back to the window that led to the first year boys’ dorm. Each window he passed on the way, he saw Ravenclaws desperately trying to break glass and get onto the roof, all of them either shouting at Sirius or at each other. The last window in sight, Sirius shouted a final, “Colloportus,” just as poor Micah-Or-Something made a break for the window. Micah-Or-Something crashed into the window face-first and crumpled to the ground. Sirius grimaced, but waved his hand for the final lock all the same. “I think James has just about finished the binding charm!” Remus shouted, as Sirius hauled himself back to the top of the roof. The Ravenclaws continued to pound and crash into every available window, but to no avail. Sirius Black was the goddamn master of locking charms.“Stabilise Peter as I finish the last hex,” Remus said, and Sirius obeyed. Less than a minute later, he switched with Sirius for the last time, and Sirius cast a final Blinding hex on the roof. “How the hell do we get down from here?”Remus’s face twisted into something that would otherwise be considered apologetic, but there was still that wonderful gleam of mischief in his eyes that didn’t quite complete the look. “Can you touch Peter?”“What?” Because, what, in the name of Merlin, could that possibly have to do with—Oh.“You want to—” Sirius gestured wildly in the general direction of James and Peter.“Yes or no, Sirius.”Well, that was the question, then, wasn’t it? He could touch Peter. Technically. Far more so than James, certainly, but it still wasn’t entirely comfortable. Peter might be pure-blood, but he was nowhere near pure-blood in the same way or with the same pedigree as the Blacks or the Prewetts or even the McKinnons. Now was not the time to sweat the details. He could handle it for the minute it took to get to the ground. “Yes.”Remus smirked, then pointed his wand at Sirius’s throat. “Sonoros.” Sirius coughed, surprised by the weird tingling sensation, and, Merlin, that was a lot louder than he’d expected. He glared at Remus, but waved his hands, trying to catch their attention. “Oi, Jamie! Come give us a lift, would you?”“POTTER! BLACK!” roared McGonagall.James and Peter, however, ignored her and sailed over to Ravenclaw tower. They were far more steady now that there was not a flag balanced between them, though Peter still dangerously overcompensated whenever there was a burst of wind. “Everything all right?” James said, catching his foot on the edge of the roof. Peter hovered midair, a pace or two behind, clutching the handle of his broom for all he’s worth. “We’re fine,” Sirius said, having to shout a bit to be heard over the roar of the wind and the increasingly loud shouts from the crowd down below. “The Ravenclaws just got a bit antsy and I had to cut off our escape.”He gestured behind him, at the window. At least fifteen students now crowded it, each alternatively trying unlocking spells and pounding on the glass in frustration. “Flag set up all right?” Remus asked. They could see the flag from here: enormous, proud, and its brilliant colours catching in the afternoon sun. “It’ll stand for a thousand years,” James declared, puffing his chest out. “POTTER, THIS IS YOUR LAST WARNING!”“She sounds angry,” Peter said, his voice barely carrying over the wind and the roar of the crowd down below. Peter leaned over to glance at the Ravenclaws through the locked windows. “They look angry.”Sirius waved him off. “I have absolutely no idea why they should be angry,” he said with a smirk. “Come on, lads. Let’s go see what Minnie’s so upset about.”James barked a laugh. “I dare you to call her that to her face.”“Merlin,” grumbled Remus, climbing onto the broom behind James and wrapping his arms around James’s waist. “If he did that, McGonagall would have him in detention for the rest of his life.”Sirius stuck his tongue out. “At least I’d beat the Prewetts’ record.”“You’re on track to do that by the end of the year.”Sirius shrugged. “Fair point.”As carefully as he could, Sirius climbed onto the broom behind Peter, having to grab onto Peter’s shoulders to steady them after a particularly strong gust of wind. Remus shot him an apologetic look, and, if he’s honest, as they took off, Sirius found himself wishing things had gone according to plan and he and Remus were able to escape the way they’d come. He was grateful, of course, that Remus had enough forethought to offer to ride with James for Sirius’s sake, but it certainly wasn’t ideal. Peter really was not that good of a flier, and with the added weight of another person, he kept swaying through the air and randomly plummeting a few feet at a time. Sirius found himself plastered to Peter’s back for fear of his life, and Merlin. It was nowhere near as excruciating as touching Lily or Remus, or even James, for an extended amount of time, but still. It didn’t not hurt, touching Peter. It felt like… an itch buried deep beneath his skin, right on the precipice of pain. It was the horrible feeling that he should be in pain, but the sensation hadn’t quite boiled up to the surface just yet. It was… nauseating.Sirius squeezed his eyes shut and waited for it to be over. Madam Hooch and the Hufflepuff Quidditch Captain met the four boys halfway. They flanked to the left and right of James and Peter, escorting the four of them back to the ground. Peter and Sirius landed hard, and Sirius staggered a bit on the dismount, still unsteady from the jerky flight and the almost-pain coursing through his veins. A second later, when James and Remus landed next to them, Fabian and Gideon Prewett rushed forward, applauding, completely ignoring the stone glare of Professor McGonagall. “A truly remarkable feat,” Fabian said.“Sabotage and glory, all rolled into one,” Gideon echoed. “Brilliant.”Fabian slung his arm across Sirius’s shoulders. Sirius tensed a little, but didn’t shake him off. It didn’t hurt, even a little. Fabian tugged on a string of Sirius’s hair. “Mm. Not quite sure I like this, Black. You look a little too much like your cousin.”Sirius pulled a face, then immediately waved his hand above his head, eradicating the horrific blonde for good. He flicked his fingers at Remus, too, for good measure, just as James began to tease him. “That’s enough!” McGonagall snapped and, Merlin, Sirius had almost forgotten about her. McGonagall’s eyes zeroed in on him. “Mr. Black, I want an explanation right now.”Sirius shoved Fabian aside and took a step forward, glaring up at McGonagall. He opened his mouth, ready to shout the indignity of her prejudice, of her assumption that he was to blame for everything just because of his name—James nudged Sirius to the side and smiled up at McGonagall. “Oi, Professor, I don’t think it’s fair for Sirius to get all the credit. Didn’t you see me and Pete fly that flag up there? And, speaking of— While I have you and Madam Hooch here, I’d like to formally submit my name for candidacy on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. I was thinking maybe as a Chaser, but I wouldn’t be opposed to—”Remus let out an exasperated sigh and yanked James back by the collar of his shirt. “He means that this was all four of us, Professor. We planned it together, and we all worked together to execute the plan.”Fabian put his hands over his eyes, mimicking binoculars pointed up at Gryffindor tower. “And what an ingenious plan it was!” He swivelled over to Ravenclaw tower, then back to Gryffindor. “Merlin, you really did it, didn’t you? I’ve been saying someone should do something about that for years, haven’t I, Gid?”Gideon tossed a wink at Sirius. “He really has.”McGonagall pushed her glasses back up her nose. “You two—” She pointed a long finger at Fabian and Gideon. “You will get this crowd to clear out in the next five minutes, unless you want me to hold you down and forcibly remove those ridiculous beards from your faces.”Gideon smirked. “Kinky, Professor.”“Mm. How delectably tempting,” Fabian echoed, stroking his beard for good measure. “Enough!” McGonagall snapped, raising her wand. Fabian and Gideon simultaneously grabbed their faces to protect their precious pink beards and began dispersing the crowd. McGonagall turned to Madam Hooch. “Rolanda, would you be so kind as to fly up to Gryffindor tower and take down that flag?”“Yeah, good fucking luck with that,” Sirius muttered. James grinned wickedly. Gesturing to the Hufflepuff Quidditch Captain, Madam Hooch and her took off. “As for the four of you,” McGonagall said, her voice laced with just enough contempt that it gave Sirius vivid flashbacks of his mother. McGonagall’s stone-cold glare tracking over James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter. “Report to my office. Now.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “Are we going to get expelled?” Peter whispered as they waited for McGonagall. He wiggled nervously in his seat between James and Remus. There were only three chairs on the students’ side of McGonagall’s great mahogany desk, so Sirius had taken to pacing next to Remus not long after they’d walked in. He’d thought about just walking around the desk and sitting in McGonagall’s chair, just to spite her for her obvious hatred of him, but he didn’t think he could risk pissing her off more. She’d just send another letter home and it’d be another nail in his coffin come Christmas. “No, we’re not going to get expelled,” Remus said, with a sigh. “We’ll probably only get a telling off and a detention. No one got hurt.” Peter slumped further down in his chair. “I don’t see why I should get detention,” he mumbled. “I was hardly involved.”Sirius turned on his heel, his magic flaring to life between his fingers, because there was no fucking way—Remus held up a hand to stop Sirius and glared at Peter. “You spent weeks with James, figuring out Madam Hooch’s schedule, in order to steal a broom. You succeeded in stealing a broom. You flew the flag up to the top of Gryffindor tower. You were just as involved as the rest of us.”“Yes, but I—”“For fuck’s sake, Pete,” James moaned. “We all knew we were going to get caught. You can’t chicken out before McGonagall properly recognises us for our genius.” He leaned forward, to wink at Sirius. “Besides. She’s Gryffindor, when it comes down to it. She’ll be fucking proud.”Sirius had his doubts about that. McGonagall seemed determined to hate him and anything involving him. McGonagall flung open the door and stormed in, a whirl of burgundy robes and annoyance. She walked around the four boys, glaring at Sirius as she did so, then planted both her hands on her desk. “Will one of you please explain to me exactly what happened this afternoon and why it involved stolen brooms and locking every window in Ravenclaw tower?”The four boys exchanged looks: a silent swap of raised eyebrows and jerked nods and vague hand gestures. Then, through what Sirius would like to call collective decision and diplomatic process (though it probably had a great deal more with betting against Sirius’s own temper), it was unanimously decided that James was probably the best spokesperson. Not because he’s the most tactful, certainly—that’d be Remus, hands down—but because James Potter exuded a sort of confidence that could be paralleled by absolutely nobody.“Ravenclaw tower was taller than Gryffindor tower.” James flashed McGonagall his most winning smile. “So we fixed it.”As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Madam Hooch burst through the door, completely out of breath. Her hair was all out of sorts, presumably from the wind, and she was still holding her broom. “Ah, Rolanda,” McGonagall said, her voice softening while addressing another member of the staff. “I trust you were able to remove the flag from—”“Well, actually, Minerva—” Madam Hooch paused, seeming to realise suddenly that the four boys were in the room. She straightened up a little, her gaze flicking from Sirius to James, then back to McGonagall. “It seems that the flag is rather… stuck.”“HA!” James shouted, pumping his fist in the air. “You are on very thin ice, Potter. Do be careful,” McGonagall snapped, but no one in their right mind would ever call James Potter careful. That wicked gleam never left his eye. McGonagall addressed Madam Hooch again: “What about the windows in Ravenclaw tower?”“Also rather stuck,” Madam Hooch said. McGonagall fixed her glare on Sirius. “I suppose that’s your doing, then?”Sirius had a sudden, suicidal urge to stick his tongue out at her. Miraculously, he refrained, and instead gave her a wild smirk, which he figured was answer enough.McGonagall was not amused. “When we are done here, Black, I expect you to march back to Ravenclaw tower and open every single window. Am I understood?”Sirius opened his mouth but—“Actually, Professor,” Remus said, raising his pointer finger. “The locking spell can’t be undone by the person who cast it.”That was utter and complete bullshit, of course, but it made Sirius’s heart fucking soar. “Then you will undo the spell, Lupin,” McGonagall said, her voice harsh, with an almost unnatural subterranean bite to it.Remus put on his most sincere face: eyebrows pinched together, chin tucked in just a bit, to get the full effect of his enormously endearing puppy-eyes. “I’m afraid I don’t know how to undo the locks, Professor.”As far as Sirius was concerned, Remus was the only one who knew how to undo the locks. McGonagall glared at Remus for a long moment, but the puppy-eyes held, and she turned towards the rest of them. After a moment, her pale, blue eyes landed on Sirius. “I will not have a group of…of marauders running around this castle. You will—”“Minerva,” Hooch said, raising a her index finger. “There were names, on the flag. These four and—”Oh, shit. Sirius bit his thumb, nervously, leaning over to exchange a rather panicked look with James. They weren’t supposed to get the girls in trouble. “—Lily Evans, Marlene McKinnon, and Dorcas Meadows,” Hooch finished.McGonagall sighed and pushed her glasses back up her nose. “Very well. Rolanda, please bring the girls into my office and—”James jumped to his feet, startling everyone in the room. Peter nearly leapt out of his skin. “They weren’t involved, Professor,” James said. McGonagall raised an eyebrow, a perfect arch above the rims of her glasses. “Oh?”“Yep,” James said, tossing a pointed look at Sirius. Clearly, bullshitting a professor was not James’s forte. “We forced them to help. Told them the flag was for a special project… for Hagrid. Sirius did most of the spellwork on the flag, anyways. Lily, Marlene, and Dee just painted.”“That’s right,” Sirius said, keeping his voice steady, with just enough dramatic flair mixed in to make it believable. “This was strictly a… a Marauder operation. The flag and the whole Ravenclaw tower thing. Jamie, me, Pete, and Remus. Just us Marauders, Professor.”A second later, Remus and Peter echoed his story, though Peter needed a nudge in the ribs from Remus before doing so. McGonagall looked so very done, it almost made Sirius laugh. Her gaze flicked to Madam Hooch. “Rolanda, would you please see if Professor Flitwick is available? See if he can’t get that flag down and restore Ravenclaw tower to its former state.”Madam Hooch nodded and left the room, tucking her broom under her arm on her way out.Sirius caught Remus’s eye, just as Remus smirked at him and winked. Flitwick could try, but they’d thought of absolutely everything. And, Merlin, there was that gleam again, in Remus’s eyes. McGonagall couldn’t see it, and if she could, she’d be incapable of appreciating it. It was wild and mischievous and so beautifully triumphant and it made Sirius’s insides burst with a pride he’d never known before, because that look on Remus’s face… It meant they’d won. The four of them—the Marauders—were utterly indestructible. McGonagall couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Sirius was pretty sure, if he wanted to, he could grow wings and fucking fly.“As for the four of you,” McGonagall said, placing both her palms flat on her desk and leaning forward. “Detention. Two weeks, with Filch. Black, you will finish your previous detention sentence with me before you begin your time with Filch.”Sirius had resigned himself long before they’d gotten caught that he’d be in detention for the foreseeable future, especially if McGonagall had anything to say about it. All things considered, especially given what had happened the last time he’d been in this office, Sirius wasn’t too bothered by a few weeks’ detention. At least he’d have company, this time. “I’m taking two hundred points from Gryffindor.” None of the four boys so much as blinked at that. McGonagall didn’t seem to appreciate their apathy too much. She narrowed her eyes.“You will not serve detention tomorrow night, but the four of you are also banned from the Halloween Feast. Food will be brought to you in your dormitory and you are not to leave Gryffindor tower for the duration of the night.” James let out a noise of distress, but otherwise, he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. McGonagall went on, unperturbed: “The feast is a reward for students on their performance, halfway through the term. Your recent behaviour and general predisposition towards mayhem—” Here, she paused to glare at Sirius. “—does not warrant an invitation to such a feast. Am I understood?”Sirius just nodded, as James, Peter, and Remus all muttered varying degrees of, “Yes, ma’am.”“Good.” McGonagall sat down, picking up the nearest parchment and pretending to read it. “You may go.”Sirius was almost out the door, when Peter said, “You’re not going to write our parents, Professor?”If James and Remus hadn’t been in the way, Sirius more than likely would have punched Peter in the face. They were almost free. Sirius’s imaginary wings collapsed in on themselves and bile rose in his throat. Remus shot him a look, his eyes almost as terrified as Sirius felt. Remus turned on his heel, his mouth open, ready to protest.McGonagall removed her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose, her eyes falling shut for a long, excruciating moment. Then: “There’ll be no need of that, Pettigrew. Although I expect behaviour of this nature to cease immediately, I do not find it necessary to inform your parents at this point.”Thank fucking Merlin. Sirius let out a long breath, then spun on his heel, absolutely refusing to let the momentary panic ruin his mood. “Well, lads,” James said, as soon as they made their way down the twisting staircases. “The first successful Marauder operation is in the books.”“The first of many!” Sirius proclaimed, pumping his fist in the air. “The first of many!” James echoed. “So, I was thinking…”But Sirius was no longer paying attention. He was staring at Remus again, and holy mother of—Sirius would never get over that look on Remus’s face. His tiny little smirk, and how it tugged at the scar on the corner of Remus’s lip. The amber in his eyes, dancing like rays of sunlight through firewhisky. That look reverberated down to Sirius’s very soul: it was fire and freedom, it was an explosion in the depth of space that spawned life, the universe, and every moment actually worth living.Sirius swore, on anything and everything holy left in the world, that he’d spend the rest of his life trying to put that look on Remus Lupin’s face. Remus winked, when he caught Sirius staring. He leaned in close, his lips mere centimetres from Sirius’s ear. “We fucking did it,” Remus whispered. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
OCTOBER 31, 1971
“What, in Merlin’s name, are we supposed to do, locked up in this tower, when everyone else is at the feast?” James moaned dramatically, throwing his arm over his eyes. He was laying on the couch in the common room, his feet propped up on the arm rest and his tie hanging loose around his neck. “Do you think we’re banned from the feast forever, or just for this year?” Peter asked, a note of fear in his voice. He sat on an ottoman, engaged in a losing battle of Exploding Snap with Remus. Remus and Sirius were carefully situated on the opposite couch: Remus, with his feet squarely on the ground, and Sirius, with his legs securely wrapped up, mermaid style, in a duvet stolen from Peter’s bed, sat with his feet resting in Remus’s lap. Every few minutes, he’d pull them back again, when the creeping pain became too much. He’d hug his knees to his chest for a few minutes, feign a stretch, then put his feet right back in Remus’s lap. It was comforting. Remus seemed to have worked out the pattern and went along with it without question. Sirius scoffed at Peter’s comment, and subtly gestured to the card Remus should play next. Remus tossed the card down on the floor between him and Peter, and a second later, Peter’s cards exploded in his face. “I don’t particularly care if they do ban us,” Sirius said. “I see this as an absolute win. House elves bring us our food and I don’t have to look at Snivellus’s ugly face while I eat my dinner. Plus, the whole school is in awe of us.”This wasn’t quite true, of course, but even most of the Slytherins had looked adequately impressed when Dumbledore announced at breakfast that he’d put in for a footnote to be added to Hogwarts: A History. “Gryffindor tower is the tallest of the dormitory towers, reaching a staggering height of sixty-four-point-seven-three meters, a height only surpassed by the Astronomy Tower,” Dumbledore had read from a large, official-looking parchment. “The previous record, held by Ravenclaw tower since Hogwarts’s completion in 992 A.D., stood at precisely sixty-four-point-six-two meters. This addition to Gryffindor tower was completed by Messrs. Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Sirius Black, and James Potter, on 30 October, 1971, and authenticated by Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, on 31 October, 1971.”The Gryffindor table, naturally, had exploded in exuberant cheers. Even McGonagall had the decency to look moderately pleased, though certainly still perplexed as to how they’d actually pulled it off. A few of the seventh year Ravenclaws hadn’t been particularly thrilled by the announcement, and Sirius could guess why, after whispers of a failed, late-night attempt to rectify the situation had ended up with two seventh year Ravenclaws flying up on stolen brooms and subsequently losing their short term memories. Apparently, they hadn’t even been able to get through the second hex, nor had anyone, including Flitwick, been able to undo the locking charms on the windows. “Speaking of,” Remus said, and Sirius felt his stomach growl even through the duvet, “where are the house elves? The feast must have started at least an hour ago.” As if on cue, a whole spread of food appeared on the common room table. Little tables popped up out of nowhere, shoving aside other furniture, and holding an immense spread of everything from sheppard’s pie, to beef Wellington, to pumpkin juice, and a wide assortment of different puddings, including a lemon poundcake. (It was Sirius’s favourite. He’d moaned excessively, the first time he’d had it, and had immediately proclaimed the lemon poundcake as definitive proof in the existence of a higher power. It was probably only a slight exaggeration.)No one said a word. Four sets of eyes stared at the feast in front of them in amazement. Sirius pulled his legs from Remus’s lap, then stood, tossing the duvet somewhere in Peter’s direction. Sirius walked over to the spread and leaned over it, sticking his finger in a bowl of mashed potatoes. He stuck his finger in his mouth. “That’s… a lot of food,” Sirius said.“I thought we were in trouble,” James muttered.“Maybe the house elves got confused?” Remus offered, already reaching for a slice of chocolate cake. “Doesn’t matter,” Peter managed, over a mouthful of sheppard’s pie. Somehow, in the past minute or so, Peter had filled a plate and was already several forkfuls into his meal. “There’s food.”Just then, there was a crash, followed by a loud bang, and a resounding cheer. Sirius, Remus, and James jumped in surprise. Peter choked on his fork. Fabian and Gideon burst through the portrait hole, arm in arm. Both of them had their ties wrapped around their heads and tiny braids in their fuchsia beards. They were followed by, well… all of Gryffindor. “My, my,” Fabian said, taking in the food and the four boys. “Seems our very own Marauders have started without us. Gideon, if you please.”Gideon smirked and pointed his wand up the stairs leading to the boys’ dormitory. He bit his tongue, in concentration. “Accio butterbeer!”A second later, a large case came flying down the stairs. It landed with a clink at the Prewetts’s feet, then immediately opened. Bottles flew out of the case by the dozen, guided by Gideon’s wand, until each person in the overcrowded common room had one in their hands. “Now,” Gideon said, “we only have enough of these for one each, okay? I’m looking at you, Longbottom!”Frank Longbottom had already drained half his bottle. He paused mid-gulp. The twins burst out laughing. “Our Frankie,” cooed Fabian. “All grown up and guzzling booze.”Frank flipped two fingers up at them. The twins blew kisses back.“To the Marauders!” Fabian shouted, raising his bottle.“The bravest Marauders!” Gideon echoed. “The greatest of their generation!”“The kings of Gryffindor!”“Let their names shine on in infamy!” Gideon clinked his bottle with his brother’s. “To the immortal Marauders, Lupin, Pettigrew, Black, and Potter!”“The Marauders!” the crowd echoed, and followed it with a loud cheer. James looked positively giddy, as the crowd broke apart to dig into the feast. Sirius butted to the front of the line, riding the glory, then grabbed a plate and slipped off to a corner next to a small dessert table with Remus.“How do they know that name? Isn’t that what McGonagall called us?” Remus whispered to Sirius, as he took a cautious sip of his butterbeer. He seemed to like it, and immediately took another sip.Sirius snorted a laugh. “James went around the Dining Hall this morning while you were still sleeping. He’s insisted that everyone call us that from now on. He was quite proud of it. It was adorable.”“So—” Remus cut off, then glanced at his bottle. He downed the rest of it in one go. “Just to be clear, Fabian and Gideon… They’re making fun of us.”“Without a doubt,” Sirius laughed. “But they mean well. We’re still the ones with a footnote in our very own history.”Remus smirked. “I can see the jealousy radiating off of them.”“Mm, no, I think that’s coming from the pink beards.”Remus chuckled, as he carefully reached around Sirius for another piece of chocolate cake. “Have they convinced you to join their cult yet?”“Their what now?!”Remus gestured to Fabian and Gideon with his fork. “They’ve started a religion, to make sure McGonagall can’t make them get rid of those beards.”“Well, yes, I knew that, but—”“They’ve amassed followers.”“They’ve…” Sirius followed Remus’s gaze, and, sure, he’d noticed a few of the Prewetts’s friends had also sprouted colourful beards recently—the orange beard was particularly fetching on Emmeline Vance—but, Merlin, they wouldn’t—Fabian and Gideon stood at the centre of a group of Gryffindors, including none other than Marlene McKinnon, all of their faces sporting brightly coloured—and now braided—beards. A burst of laughter bubbled up in his gut and Sirius leaned on the dessert table for support. “Fuck, how’d I miss that? Marlene—”Remus smiled around his fork. “I have absolutely no idea.”“It’s green!” Sirius said, gesturing to Marlene’s beard. “When did she get that?!”“Last week, I think?” Remus replied. “Fabian’s been trying to get you to notice for ages. I think you’re right, by the way. He definitely has a crush on you.”Sirius smirked. “Mm, ‘course he does. I’m fucking gorgeous.” When Remus opened his mouth to reply, Sirius waved a threatening finger in his face. “But I’m not going to join his cult.”Remus feigned sympathy. “Aw, but it’ll break his heart.”“Shut up, you.” Sirius stuck his tongue out. Remus flicked a bit of chocolate cake at Sirius. “Gah! Gross!”Sirius scooped up a glop of potatoes with his first two fingers. He aimed right for Remus’s face, when—“Oi, Black, get over here!” Lily Evans shouted, her voice echoing over the crowd.Sirius and Remus turned, their impromptu food-fight forgotten. It took Sirius a second to piece together what exactly was happening. James stood on a table, his feet planted firmly between two plates of food, holding what was certainly not his one and only glass of butterbeer. His glasses were askew and sliding down his nose, his hair was a sight to behold, and—Were those fucking antlers?!James swayed on his feet, thrown a bit off-kilter by either the butterbeer or the goddamned antlers. Lily Evans, presumably, as Sirius suspected, the reason behind said antlers, reached out a hand to steady him.“Sirius, Potter seems to have forgotten about your bet,” Lily announced to the entire common room. “Wha—”Oh. That bet. He’d forgotten she knew about that.Lily gestured for them to come over and, well, to be quite honest, Sirius didn’t want to join them in the centre of the crowded room. Too many people, too many happy-friendly-nice people who’ll pat him on the back when James snogged him. Remus, apparently sensing Sirius’s anxiety, pushed his way through the laughing crowd, carving a path for Sirius to follow mostly unscathed. Sirius kept his arms tucked close to his chest, careful not to touch or, worse, be shoved into Remus or Lily. After a moment of hopping around uncomfortably, Sirius climbed up on top of the table with James, and Merlin, it did wonders for his confidence. He plastered a smile on his face.“Technically,” James said, holding up a shaking finger. “Technically you got caught, so you didn’t exactly win.”“That was your fault, mate!” Sirius protested, mostly for the sake of the crowd. “Remus and I had an escape plan!”“Oi!” James slurred. “It was windy!”“I broke into Ravenclaw tower. That was the deal.”“Yes, but—Mmph!”In a moment of true Gryffindor courage, Sirius grabbed James by the antlers and crashed their mouths together. It was sloppy and holy-fucking-Merlin it hurt, but the crowd roared out waves of laughter and raucous cheers and every nerve in Sirius’s body buzzed with life, uninhibited. Five, ten seconds later, Sirius shoved James away so hard, James almost fell, but both of them were laughing so hard it didn’t even matter. Sirius’s lips stung and his hands tingled a bit, but he didn’t care that it’d hurt. He didn’t even particularly care that it’d been James. It could have been anyone in this goddamned room. It meant he’d chosen something, that he’d made it happened just because he fucking wanted to, consequences be damned. It was intoxicating. He’d never known a rush like it before. James wiped a hand over his mouth, and let out his own burst of wild, uninhibited laughter. “You slobbered all over me, you fucking mutt.”Merlin, how the crowd roared. James hopped down from the table, shoved Lily aside, then stood up on his tiptoes to cup Remus’s face. James kissed him square on the mouth. Remus’s eyes went wide in shock and Sirius nearly collapsed in on himself in laughter. Recovering from his initial surprise, Remus wrapped his long arms around James and made a show of it, until James was scrambling to get away, his face beet-red. “I suppose that’s because I also broke into Ravenclaw tower?” Remus said, perfectly composed, and Sirius couldn’t fucking breathe, he was laughing so hard. James nodded, stunned into silence. “Frankly, I’m feeling rather left out,” Fabian said, stroking his beard in what can only be described as an attempt at a parody of seduction. “What do you say, Potter? I’ll meet you in the cupboard.”James’s eyes went wide, and he made a hasty exit, shoving his way back through the crowd. Someone started music, and the crowd pressed close together, dancing, and laughing, and revealing in the joys of life. Suddenly, all feelings of euphoria melted away and Sirius found himself trapped, standing on a table in the centre of a crowded room with absolutely no exit strategy. Sirius wondered if anyone would notice if he stood there the rest of the night, until the crowd cleared up enough for him to make his way through without touching anyone. “Hey,” Lily Evans called up to him, green eyes wide and eyebrows pinched together in concern. “Hey, Sirius, are you okay?”He must have made some kind of face, because the next thing he knew, Remus was standing next to her, and Peter’s duvet had made a miraculous reappearance. His heart racing, Sirius hopped down from the table, as Remus carefully wrapped the duvet around his shoulders. Merlin, there weren’t words for his gratitude, so he muttered a simple, “Thanks,” and met Remus’s eyes, praying he could somehow convey the rest. Remus gave him a small smile, then lowered his voice to a whisper. “Follow Lily to the dorm. I’ll cover for you here.”Sirius’s eyes went wide. He shook his head. “No, I’m fine. I should—”“Sirius,” Lily said, gently placing a hand on his duvet-covered arm. He hardly even felt the pressure of it. “Let’s go.”Sirius managed a weak smile. “Tell Marlene I love her beard,” he said to Remus, before following Lily through the crowd. People laughed, and slapped his shoulder, jostled him around, and Sirius played it off with a wide smile, as best he could, eternally grateful for the duvet, even though it was covered in someone’s spilled dinner by the time they reached the stairs. Lily and Sirius stopped halfway up the staircase and sat, their backs against the curved, stone wall, two steps apart from each other. Sirius tossed the duvet on the step below him and muttered a quick cleaning spell.“So,” Lily said, eventually. Up here, the noise of the crowd hardly mattered. “Not a fan of crowds, I take it?”Sirius scoffed. “That obvious?”“Sorry for doing that to you. I didn’t mean—”“I’m glad you did,” Sirius said, quickly, because fuck, he was glad. He smiled at her, and this time, it was genuine. “You meant well. It was fucking hilarious. James would probably like me to tell you that he’s a fantastic kisser.”Lily raised an eyebrow. “Is he really?”“Not in the slightest. I’ve had better kisses from my mother, whenever she’s forced to pretend she likes me when we have company.”“Please promise me you’ll tell Potter that when he’s sober.” Sirius laughed. “Oh, Merlin. How many has he had?”“Well,” Lily said, letting her head thunk against the stone wall behind her. “He had his own, then Peter’s, then the rest of Frank’s when Frank wasn’t looking. Frank took ten points from Gryffindor for that, by the way. At that point, I found it necessary to donate my own butterbeer to the cause.”Sirius sent her a sly smirk. “The cause to get James Potter drunk enough to snog his two best mates?”“It was a truly noble cause.”“We’ll make a Marauder out of you yet, Evans.”“Ugh, no thanks.” Lily picked at the chipped, green nail polish on her fingers. “Just so you know, that thing with the flag and Ravenclaw tower? Pretty much the stupidest plan ever.”Sirius barked a laugh. “Thanks, Evans. I came up with it myself. Well, Remus helped. Peter brought snacks. And James was… there, though he did do most of the flying.”Lily looked unimpressed. “You think you could have done better?” Sirius challenged. “I know I could have.”“Doesn’t matter, though, does it?” he said, with a teasing note in his voice. “It worked.”“You got caught.”“Yes, and McGonagall accidentally threw us the best part of the year.” Sirius paused, the implications of that particular statement suddenly smacking him in the face. “Merlin, do you think McGonagall did it on purpose, banning us from the feast and all? Do you think she’s trying to reward us for our unquestionable genius, but, like, without actually rewarding us?”Lily giggled. “If she was, she’d never admit to it.”“Mm, you’re right,” Sirius said, relaxing against the wall. The sounds of music, laughter, and the occasional loud shout of jubilation from a very drunk James Potter echoed up the stone walls. Sirius tilted his head, meeting Lily’s green eyes. “Just out of curiosity, what did James do to warrant antlers?”“He announced that our first child would be named either Herbert or Edna, after his dad’s parents.”“Just thank your lucky stars he didn’t go with Fleamont.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
NOVEMBER 2, 1971
“Sirius?”“Out here.” Sirius closed his fist to extinguish the Lumos charm that had been dancing between his fingers. He leaned forward a bit, his eyes locked on the faint silhouette in the dormitory window. Remus yawned as he climbed through the window and took his place next to Sirius. He shivered slightly, and Sirius waved his fingers and muttered a warming charm over Remus. “Are you just getting out of detention?” Sirius asked. It was late, well past midnight at that point. The wonderfully bright, nearly-full moon shone brightly overhead, bathing them in ethereal light. It made Remus’s scars stand out, bright and silver against the relative darkness of the night, etched in intricate patterns across his face and hands. Merlin, Remus’s scars were more mesmerising than the stars. “Yeah,” Remus said, fidgeting a little. He kept his eyes down, looking out across the castle grounds instead of up at the moon. If he felt Sirius’s stare, he didn’t say anything. “How about you? How’s that essay?”“Essay’s done, as of this morning. Three fucking rolls of parchment on the difference between Dark Magic and curses. Lots of citations. Minimal sarcasm. All pretty boring, really.” Sirius gave Remus his most winning smile. “Still three more detentions with McGonagall before I move on to scrubbing trophies with Filch. What’d he have you doing tonight?”“He sent me to clean out McGonagall’s office. After you’d left, apparently.”Sirius raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”“Yes,” Remus said, nodding sagely. “In the middle of cleaning her office, I came to a realisation that I could not, morally speaking, allow such an opportunity go to waste.”“Of course not. Please do continue.”“So I decided that I’d make the ink on all the Slytherins’ Transfiguration essays disappear.”“I love it.”“Naturally, I had to break into her desk.”“You devious little shit.”“It was easy, really. Her locking spells are no where near as complicated as yours.”“That’s because mine are custom made.” Sirius wiggled his fingers for emphasis.“Then I open the desk, and right there on top, there’s this giant folder labeled Sirius Black.”Sirius barked a laugh. “Oh, please tell me she’s been spying on me in cat-form. You know, sometimes I get the feeling I’m being watched, and I could be crazy, but I have found little fur balls—”“No, she’s not spying on you, you dolt,” Remus said, laughing a little under his breath. “But I did find something interesting.”“What?”Remus’s eyes sparkled in the moonlight, and holy mother of Merlin, they were gold again. Perfect reflections of the moon, shining brighter than anyone’s eyes ought to in the dark, and Sirius was utterly and completely lost in the wonders of the universe reflected in Remus’s eyes. He couldn’t look away, even when Remus laughed at his expression, drew his wand, and summoned something from their dorm room. Even when Remus offered it to him. Sirius was gone, millions of miles away, melting into nothing in the molten gold of Remus’s eyes.Remus shoved the package into Sirius’s lap, chuckling softly, and finally, Sirius crashed back to earth. His face scrunched up in confusion at the neatly wrapped present on his lap. “It’s your birthday tomorrow, Siri,” Remus said, his voice soft. Oh. Sirius looked between the package and Remus. “You got me a—”“A present? Yeah.”Sirius tried to swallow around the lump in his throat. ”No one’s ever… Except Reg, one year, but even then it wasn’t...”Remus gave him a sad smile, but it did nothing to extinguish the brilliant gold of his eyes. “I figured that might be why you didn’t mention it was your birthday. Go on. Open it.”Sirius looked down at the present again and shook his head. “No. I should wait until tomorrow, or—”Something in Remus’s eyes flashed, a white hot bolt of pain. “No, no. Please open it tonight. I know it’s early, but—”Fuck. Sirius’s heart sank with understanding. “You’re leaving.”Remus nodded, tears welling in his eyes. “When?”“In a few hours.” His voice was tight, apologetic and almost broken.Sirius reached out a hand, his fingers hovering over Remus’s face, tracing his scars in midair. “Your eyes turn gold, and then you leave,” he whispered. “A few days later, you come back bloody.”A tear fell from Remus’s eye, landing on the corner of his mouth. Remus’s tongue darted out to catch it as he took a in a shaky breath.“Is there any way I can convince you to stay?”Watery, golden eyes snapped up to meet his. “Christ, Sirius, I’d give just about anything, but…”Remus’s hand flew to a mouth as he tried to suppress a sob. Sirius shuffled closer, as close as he dared without actually touching Remus. “How can I help?” Sirius whispered. “Please tell me what I can do, Re.”Remus sniffed, then reached up his hand, his fingers hovering a mere hair’s breadth from Sirius’s. “You can be here when I get back,” Remus said, his voice far more steady than it had been a moment ago. With his free hand, Sirius made a cross over his heart. “I solemnly swear it.”“Thank you,” Remus whispered, then lowered his hand. He smiled, and it was mystifying, really, like his face had been carved from marvel, and the artist had spent eons mapping every one of Remus’s scars. Remus gestured to Sirius’s lap. “Open your present, Siri.”There was more to say—there was always so much more to say—but Sirius nodded and ripped open the paper. A book fell into his lap, tiny and well-worn, with a rose and a fox on the cover. The title read, Le Petit Prince, in elegant, gold cursive. “The Little Prince. Remus, is this yours?” Sirius breathed. “I can’t—”Remus shook his head. “No! I mean, yes, it’s mine, but I want you to have it. You… Christ, Sirius just take it. Read it. It’s…”“Special?” Remus let out a small, breathy laugh. “More than you’ll ever know. It’s in French, so—”“My French is impeccable, thank you very much.”“I’ve charmed it, too,” Remus said. “Tap your wand to it—or, er, your finger, I guess, but use magic—and say, ‘All men have stars’. It’s a concealment charm, in case your mother ever decides to go through your trunk.”Sirius held his gaze for a moment, then obeyed. The book shimmered a little, then faded to brown leather. The gold writing morphed into a new title: Three Thousand and Thirty Six Potions for Young Wizards. Sirius opened the book, but all of the pages were blank.“Say the same thing, and it’ll change back.”Sirius tapped his fingers and said the words once more. He smiled up at Remus. “Thank you.”Remus watched him for a moment, his eyes flickering with something that Sirius couldn’t quite make out, but it was enchanting. The corner of Remus’s lips twitched upwards, in something of a smile, but there was a sadness there, too, buried beneath it all. “This makes it worth it, you know,” Remus said, his voice barely carrying over the ambient noise of the castle and the moon and the whole host of the heavens above them. “Makes what worth it?” Sirius replied, almost too scared to ask. Remus let out a low, self-depreciating laugh. “I wasn’t going to come to Hogwarts. Did you know that?”Sirius frowned. He hadn’t been expecting that. “What? But you’re a wizard.”Remus ignored him, save for a small quirk of his eyebrow. “Dumbledore came to my house. More or less begged my parents until they relented.” Remus tore his eyes from Sirius and gazed over the castle, bathed in moonlight, fog, and and the eerie glow of torch-fire. “I never thought I’d get to see any of this.”“But why wouldn’t you—”“I never thought I’d have a friend who’d wait for me to come back every time I leave, who’d wait up for me, who’d bring me chocolate and steal my pillows. All those years, all that pain, and the scars and the fucking agony every goddamned time…” Tears streamed down Remus’s cheeks, now, glistening silver rivulets cut and dissected by the scars already lining his face. Golden eyes flared brighter, unearthly and almost… inhuman, but so wild and kind and filled with pain no creature should ever know. “I was never meant to have any of this, least of all you.” Sirius clamped his mouth shut, swallowing all his questions. He shook his head, vehemently, because no, that wasn’t true. Remus was good and kind, and fucking Merlin, Remus Lupin deserved every ounce of perfection and happiness this world had to offer. Sirius would give anything—But the pain never left Remus’s eyes. “Merlin, Siri, half the time I convince myself that you’re not even there, that you’re a figment of my imagination, or… or you’re a manifestation of all those years I spent with nothing.” Remus reached out his hand, and it hovered over Sirius’s face. “How are you even real, Siri?”Sirius didn’t think. He grabbed Remus’s hand in his own, clutching it tight as Remus’s face lit up in alarm. Remus tried to pull away, but Sirius held on, gritting his teeth, his eyes watering in unimaginable pain, but he didn’t care. He didn’t fucking care.“I’m real,” Sirius said, his voice cracking. “I’m real, Remus. This… This is real.”Finally, he let go, and Remus tumbled backwards, putting as much distance between himself and Sirius as the roof would allow. “Fuck, Sirius,” he whispered. “You didn’t have to—”“Yes, I did.” Because, of course, he did. Because the insanity of choosing pain—even an indescribable pain such as that—proved they were still alive, still breathing, still caught perpetually in each other’s orbits. The world could capsize, could burst into a hundred million pieces, but this… this one thing between them would still be there: unbreakable, unending, a culmination of all the shattered scars between them. This was the very reason Sirius’s heart was still beating. Remus huffed, laughing a little, because what else can you do when you stare inevitably and insanity right in the face? “Some birthday celebration, huh?”Sirius shrugged. “Best one I’ve ever had.”“This was supposed to be fun.”“You got me a book. That’s definitely fun.” Sirius shot him a wry smirk. “If you come back in one piece, my birthday will be even better.”“I’ll do my damnedest.”Sirius flipped the book open to the first page. “What’s it about?”A look crossed over Remus’s features: something of amazement. Maybe something as astronomically crazy as hope. “A fox, a rose, a prince, and all the wonders of the universe,” he whispered.“Read it to me?” Sirius asked, offering the book out to Remus. “At least for a little?”Remus nodded, taking the book. “Come on. Let’s go inside.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
NOVEMBER 3, 1971
Sirius shivered, clutching his cloak tight against his chest. He’d transfigured it, a little bit longer and a little bit heavier, to combat the cold weather, but it still did little against the wind outside the castle. Snow flurried around him, coating the ground and, much to his annoyance, his hair. His breath came out in little frozen puffs. He’d barely reached up to knock on the enormous door to Hagrid’s hut when Andromeda threw it open and nearly tackled him in a hug. She was laughing, almost manically, and Sirius returned it. He wrapped his arms around her waist and let her warmth surround him. After a minute, Andromeda pulled back, cupping his probably-frostbitten face in her hands. “Happy fucking birthday, kid,” she said, a grin spread wide across her face. Inside, Hagrid crouched over the hearth, stoking the flames, and coaxing a kettle to boil. He stood, when Andromeda and Sirius walked in, and clapped his gigantic hands together. “Sirius!” Hagrid boomed. “So glad you could make it. Spot hasn’t shut up about missin’ you since you left. She’s even saved you a seat.”Hagrid gestured to the table, where two large chairs were pulled out. On the one nearest them, Spot, the orange-striped kneazle, sat, curled around herself, her tail flicking, and her large, green eyes locked on Sirius. She jumped down, as elegantly as a lioness, and pranced right up to Sirius, wrapping her long tail around his leg. She purred.“Oh, she’s quite taken with you, Sirius,” Hagrid said, with a deep, bubbling chuckle. “No surprise, really. Professor Cuckoo says yer the top of his class, did ya know that?”Sirius hadn’t, and shook his head. If he was at the top of his Care of Magical Creatures class, it was only because Remus was the absolute worst when it came to the handling of magical creatures. He’d come within a few feet—or sometimes even just within a thousand meters—and every creature, from Hickory Dave to Professor Cuckoo’s flobberworms, seemed to lose their shit. Sirius spent most lessons first calming down Remus, who took great offence at the creatures’ distaste for him, and then consoling whatever creature had been traumatised for the day. He had a knack for handling the creatures, sure, but he hadn’t really thought it was anything out of the ordinary. Spot hooked her tail around the back of his knee and more or less dragged Sirius to one of the giant chairs. He sat, obediently, and Spot immediately hopped into his lap and went to sleep. “She’s… nice,” Sirius said, and he meant it. Mostly. She hadn’t try to claw him to shreds just yet. For the record, Sirius still hated cats.“That she is,” Hagrid said, with a burst of pride. ”Wanted to wish you happy birthday, Sirius. Woulda baked you a cake if Andy had given me any warning that you’d be comin’ by today.”Andy?! Sirius mouthed to Andromeda, when Hagrid turned his back to grab the kettle. Andromeda ran a finger across her throat, demanding his silence on pain of death. “Er, thanks, Hagrid,” Sirius managed, after another pointed glare for Andromeda. “It was kind of a… last minute thing.”It had been, too. Andromeda had written him that morning: a short note that wished him a happy birthday and then went into vague allusions to a viable plan to keep Sirius at Hogwarts over Christmas. Sirius had scribbled back a hasty reply, then had ducked out of History of Magic the second Professor Binns began his lecture. “Well,” Hagrid said, clapping his hands together once more, after handing off the kettle to Andromeda. “I’ll leave ya to it, then.”“No,” Andromeda said, her voice genuinely kind. She set the kettle down on the table next to Sirius. “No, Hagrid, please stay. It’s not fair for us to kick you out of your home, especially when it’s snowing.”“Aw, it’s all right,” Hagrid said. He grabbed his cloak from a hook above the door. “I’ve gotta tend the hippogriff herd. It’s calving season, y’know. Merlin knows why the daft creatures insist on birthin’ in the middle o’ winter, but I’m not going to question them. Delicate sensibilities, those hippogriffs.” Hagrid turned back to face them. He bent down a little and winked at Andromeda. “Besides, the less I know about the dealings of the Black family, the longer I’ll live, I expect.”Andromeda and Sirius exchanged a look. It wasn’t like Hagrid was wrong about that. “Thank you for lending us your house, Hagrid,” Andromeda said. “I’ll make sure Ted sends some nutrient potions your way for the baby hippogriffs.”Hagrid smiled, and maybe a tear welled in the corner of his eye. Sirius couldn’t quite tell. “Thanks, Andy. Happy birthday, Sirius.”Spot let out a growl as the door opened and let in a blast of cold air, but was back to purring the second it slammed closed again behind Hagrid.“So,” Andromeda said, raising an eyebrow. She flicked her wand at the kettle and it levitated off the table, pouring tea into two separate mugs. “You didn’t bring your friends.”It wasn’t an accusation, per se. Not really. But something about Andromeda’s tone of voice sent Sirius’s insides bubbling. It was almost like she pitied him. He felt his face flush red. “I, er. Um. Well—”“You didn’t tell them it was your birthday.”“I, um. No.”Andromeda’s face softened. “You could have, Siri. From what it sounds like, they would love to celebrate with you.”“I know,” Sirius mumbled. “Party of the century, probably. I don’t know, I just…”“Never really celebrated it before?” she asked. Sirius’s eyes snapped to hers. She waved her hand, dismissively. “I was the same way, when I came to Hogwarts. I didn’t really celebrate my birthday until Ted figured out when it was, in fourth year.”Sirius laughed a little. “Yeah, well. Remus figured mine out, too. He broke into McGonagall’s office during detention and stole a file with my name on it. He gave me a Muggle book last night. We stayed up reading it.”“He… broke into McGonagall’s office?!” Andromeda repeated, barking a laugh. “Merlin, where is this Remus? I want to meet him.”Sirius suddenly felt like the floor had been torn out from under him. “He…”Merlin, Sirius didn’t know what to say. He’s gone to see his family, but he’ll be back later today, hopefully, but he probably won’t be in one piece. They hurt him, you know. He has scars. He has so many fucking scars and I can’t do anything to—No. Even if Sirius thought Andromeda could help Remus, it wasn’t Sirius’s secret to tell.So, Sirius repeated the company line: “His mother’s sick. He had to go visit her.”Andromeda nodded. “I’m sorry he couldn’t be here to celebrate, then.”Sirius put on a brave face and waved her off. “I thought we were coming up with a scheme to keep me away from the Warden.” “Mm, same thing. But, before I forget…” Andromeda reached under the table and shoved a box at Sirius. It wasn’t wrapped, just a wooden box marked ZONKO’S. “Ted and I thought that since you have something of a proclivity for pranks, these might help you out.”Inside was the best assortment of joke products that Sirius had seen outside a store. Dungbombs and Sticky Straws, Frog Spawn Soap, and Nose-Biting Teacups. Sirius grinned up at his cousin. “Thanks, Andy,” he said, snickering a little at the horrible nickname. “Call me that again and I will quite literally shove a Dungbomb down your throat.”Sirius grabbed the box and pushed it well out of her reach, just as a precaution. She was a Slytherin, after all. Spot growled on his lap and peeked one eye open, glaring at Andromeda, before closing her eyes once more. Andromeda sipped her tea. “Ted and I have something of a plan.”“Oh?” Sirius ran a cautious hand along Spot’s back. She preened, arched, then settled down with a contented pur. “Have you heard of the Slug Club?”Sirius pulled a face. “I got an invitation at the start of term, but it was… er, revoked almost immediately. Slughorn didn’t like that I’d fessed up to that whole mess with Malfoy on the Hogwarts Express.”Andromeda hummed sympathetically. “No, he wouldn’t. He’s all about amassing power and talent, collecting the brightest wizards of the age under his fat, little thumb. He wouldn’t like a snitch amongst the ranks, especially one who is more loyal to someone else other than him. Such a person is dangerous to a man like Slughorn.”“Makes sense why I was uninvited, then.” Andromeda shrugged. “Are you decent at potions?”“I’m fucking phenomenal at potions,” Sirius said, puffing up his chest a little. “Or, well, when I’m not always fixing Remus’s mistakes. He says everything smells funny and he can’t concentrate.”“Good,” she said. “That’s good.” Sirius narrowed his eyes, confused. “Why, exactly, is that good?”“Ted and I were both in the Slug Club. Me, well, because I’m a Black, and Ted because he’s a goddamned prodigy in potions. Slughorn even made a donation when Ted announced he was going to open his apothecary. ‘Course, now that means that Ted gives ol’ Sluggy the first choice of all the potions ingredients from his suppliers, but that’s besides the point.” “All right,” Sirius said, slowly, waiting for her to get to the point. “Slughorn has every reason to want you in the Club, even if he thinks you’re a snitch and more loyal to your friends than to him or your family. You’re still a Black. More specifically, you’re the heir. With a little prompting, I’m absolutely positive me and Ted could convince Slughorn to send you another invite.” Sirius frowned. He didn’t particularly want to be part of any club that only wanted him for his name and station, let alone one run by the Head of Slytherin. “Okay, but what would that—”“Slughorn has a Christmas party every year,” Andromeda said, with a conspiratorial smirk on her face. She took another sip of her tea. “It’s exclusive. Prestigious. He only takes the best. Narcissa got her first invite this year, even though she’s been in the Slug Club since her first year.”Sirius’s eyes widened as the pieces started to fall into place. “You’re saying that—”“If Ted and I can convince Slughorn to send you an invite, there’s a chance that the Warden will let you stay at Hogwarts for the holidays. It’ll be an honour. Might earn you some brownie points with your mum and dad.”“Not enough to make them forget I’m a Gryffindor,” Sirius muttered.“But maybe just enough to let you stay,” Andromeda countered. “It might be putting of the inevitable, Siri, but it’ll buy you some time. You can’t go home now. Not while that incident with Malfoy is fresh in their minds. I won’t let—”Her voice took on a desperate edge and she choked a little. She knew what that meant for him just as much as he did. Andromeda swallowed past the apparent lump in her throat. “I think this’ll work, Siri. I’ve got to at least try.”He nodded, slowly, honestly taken aback by the ferocity in her eyes. No one had ever—That is… Merlin. No one had ever been this desperate to save him. He loved her for it. “Alright, ‘Dromeda,” he said. “It’s worth a try.”Something dangerous… something as horrifying as hope began to swirl in the pit of his stomach. It was such an unfamiliar feeling that he almost didn’t recognise it. A wild and wicked smile cracked across Andromeda’s face and her silver eyes twinkled just a little. “Perfect. Ted and I will write a few letters and send them off tonight. Do you think it’s too much I refer to you as ‘the shining star on the Black family tree’?”“Merlin,” Sirius groaned, felling his cheeks flush pink. “I’m not sure Slughorn would appreciate poetry.”She laughed. “No, I suppose not. I’ll be sure to mention the wandless magic, though. A man like Slughorn will salivate at power and skill like that. Has he seen you do any of it yet?”Sirius frowned. He glanced down at his hands, a few sparks of magic jumping between his fingers as he stroked Spot. He rarely thought about his wandless magic, if he was honest. It was just… natural to him, by now. Like breathing. More often than not, he found himself forgetting that wandless magic didn’t come naturally to most wizards. Objectively, of course, he knew it was rare. His mother, with all her bragging, had solidified that fact in his mind years ago. He knew his skill and precision, in particular, were practically unheard of, especially for his age. For the most part, Sirius chalked it up to his bloodline and his years of boredom in Grimmauld Place, with nothing to do to pass the long hours between beatings and lectures but practice twirling that incessant pull of his own magic between his fingers until it did something productive. To him, wandless magic was ordinary.Like fucking breathing.He hardly took his wand anywhere these days, but he couldn’t say anyone had really noticed—outside of his friends and Lily Evans and maybe the Prewetts—other than McGonagall. She watched him like a hawk in Transfiguration, ready to tell him off if he so much as thought about trying a spell without using his wand. Given that the spells he did with his wand always backfired, Sirius was half-convinced that, at this point, McGonagall just liked watching things quite literally blow up in his face. “No,” Sirius said, after a moment. “Slughorn hasn’t seen it. No one has, really. Or no one’s noticed.”Andromeda raised an eyebrow. “I guarantee you that the Slytherins have noticed. Malfoy’s noticed. No one can do the things you can without a wand, Sirius, except maybe Dumbledore, and I doubt even Dumbledore could at your age.”Well. That opened the door to a whole slew of questions Sirius had never even considered about himself. He’d never bothered questioning his magic before. It was just… natural. He was starting to realise that maybe he didn’t want to think about it. If it had anything to do with his bloodline, the answers were probably Dark. “It’ll intrigue Slughorn, at the very least,” Andromeda said, completely oblivious to how fast Sirius’s heart was beating. “You’d make a shiny new addition to his collection.”“Great,” Sirius muttered. But if it kept him from Grimmauld over the holidays… He swallowed the swirling questions and managed a smile. Barely, because—There was another question, burning the back of his tongue, that he’d waited to ask her for months and months, one that he wasn’t certain he actually wanted to hear the answer, but…“Andromeda?” he said, and Merlin, his voice sounded small. “Yeah?”“How long have you and Ted been together?” It was out of his mouth before he could stop it, rephrase it, or broach the subject from another angle, because Merlin. That was not the right question.“Officially? Since sixth year. Friends since about third. Don’t tell my mum, though. Not that you would.” She stopped, then narrowed her eyes. “Why?”“Just… wondering.” Fuck. It really shouldn’t be this difficult, but—Sirius was terrified of the answer. Andromeda gave him an unimpressed look. “Ask the question, Sirius.”Merlin, she was good. Slytherin to the core.“How do you and Ted…” Sirius made a vague hand gesture. “Y’know.”“I’m not explaining the birds and bees to you, Sirius.”Sirius groaned in frustration. “No. Merlin, no. That’s not what I meant.”She smirked. “I know.”His eyes snapped up to meet hers. “You… know?”Of course she did.“You want to know how I can touch Ted Tonks when he’s Muggle-born and I have this handy-dandy magic tattoo right above my heart.”“I… Yes.”“Why?”“Why, what?”“Why—” She smirked at him, something he didn’t quite recognise dancing in her eyes. “—do you want to know?”“I—”
Because I can’t touch any of my friends. Because I can’t shake their hands, or clap them on the back, or hug them when they’re sad or in pain. Because walking through the halls is one of the worst thing I’ve experienced and I can’t let anyone know how much it fucking hurts me.
Because every time I touch Remus Lupin, I think the pain’s going to burn me alive.
Sirius swallowed around the lump in his throat and forced his voice to be calm. “Because you found a way around the tattoo. And I want to know how.”This time, a strange wariness flashed across her face. “It’s… It’s not as simple as that, Siri. To fight a curse like that, you’ve got to be willing to do the same kind of magic.”Sirius felt his blood run cold. “You mean… The cure… It’s Dark?”“It’s not a cure,” she said, slowly. “Ted’s the only one I can touch that’s not pure-blood. It’s a blood-binding, a long and complicated ritual and it’s… Sirius, it’s permanent and forever and no, it’s not Dark, but it’s more powerful than you can fucking imagine and I—”She pulled up short.“What?” he prompted, needing to hear her finish the thought.She grimaced. “It’s not anything that can be taken lightly, Sirius. It’s not something you can do just so you can be closer to your friends. It doesn’t work like that.”“But you and Ted did it.” Merlin, his voice sounded small and pleading, like a fucking child.“Because Ted and I are forever,” she said, like it was that simple. “We have been, since the very day I met him.”And Sirius nodded, because he understood. Because that was what he needed to hear, even if it shattered any hope he might have had for a way around the tattoo. A blood-binding. Forever. That was a hell of a lot to ask of anyone. “Thanks, Andromeda. I… Just… Thanks.”“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you more.” She gave him a warm smile. “Happy birthday, Sirius.”“You’ve given me a chance, at Christmas. And… answers,” he said, returning the smile. “That’s more than enough.”On his lap, Spot yawned, and stretched, digging her claws into Sirius’s thigh before hopping down. Silently, he cursed the stupid creature. That fucking hurt. Spot yawned again, then curled up on top of his feet. Andromeda finished her tea and cast a Timus. “Merlin, I’d better get going. I told Ted I’d man the register for the afternoon crowd.”“Ted has an afternoon crowd? At an apothecary? What, in Merlin’s name, is he selling?”Andromeda laughed and shoved his shoulder. “I should hope he has an afternoon crowd, because he was closed all morning.” At Sirius’s tilted head and raised eyebrow, she continued. “Merlin, Siri, we were up half the night last night. Ted’s shop is on the northern edge of Hogsmeade, right? There’s this Shack, just up the hill, and the noises. People are saying it’s haunted, but you’d have thought someone was being disemboweled in there.”“The Shrieking Shack?” Sirius asked.“Yeah, that’s the one. You’ve heard of it?”“Dumbledore mentioned it at the welcome feast. He said some nasty spirits took up residence or something.”“Nasty’s an understatement,” Andromeda muttered, standing and gathering her cloak. She paused, her face scrunched up a bit. “Thing is, ghosts exist everywhere, right? They’re all over Hogwarts, but they’re hardly ever violent, not even the Bloody Baron or Nearly Headless Nick, who both have more than enough cause to be bitter and cruel in the afterlife. But mostly they’re just—I don’t know—bored with the prospect of eternity. Vengeance and violence don’t seem to matter much when you don’t have a body anymore.”“So… You don’t think the Shrieking Shack’s haunted.” Sirius said. It was more of a statement than a question.“I don’t know if it’s a ghost or a monster or a bloody serial killer,” Andromeda said, drawing out her words. “I just think that whatever’s in the Shrieking Shack, it’s in more pain than any creature, living or dead, could possibly imagine. And I think it breaks my heart, just a little, for anyone to be in that much pain.”Sirius couldn’t get her words out of his head for the entire trek back to the castle. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
NOVEMBER 4, 1971
“Sirius? Christ, Sirius wake up!”Someone smacked him in the face with a pillow and Sirius nearly leapt out of his skin. Remus scrambled to the other side of the bed, deftly dodging Sirius’s flaying limbs, using a spare pillow as a shield between them. “Fuck,” Sirius muttered, his heart still in his throat. Whether from the nightmare or the abrupt wakeup call, he couldn’t tell. “What time is it?”“Around three,” Remus said, lowering the pillow and cautiously settling back against the headboard. There was a faint glow, peeking through the hangings on Sirius’s bed from the almost-full moon looming outside the window. Remus wore pyjamas, a pinstriped, button up top and matching pants. He had a nick across the bridge of his nose and gauze bandages around his wrists poked out from beneath both sleeves, causing them to bunch a little at the cuffs. Two of his fingers on his left hand were taped together, from knuckle to nail, the tips just a little bit purple. Merlin, Sirius felt every scrape, every bruise, every damn broken finger as if it were his own, because how could anyone keep sending a kid like Remus—wonderful, perfect, kind-beyond-all-logic Remus—home when he comes back looking like that?Sirius was going to tear whoever did this in half. He swore it on every beautiful freckle on Remus’s face.But maybe not tonight. Sirius scrubbed a hand over his face. “Sorry.” He squinted at Remus in the almost-darkness. In the dull light, Sirius could make out the bags under his eyes. “When did you get back?”Remus didn’t respond for a long moment and Sirius almost believed he’d fallen asleep sitting up or forgotten or maybe Remus had miraculously decided they weren’t going to talk about the fact that Sirius was having one hell of a nightmare until about forty four seconds ago, but then: “You were talking in your sleep.”Fuck. “That…” Sirius rubbed the back of his neck. “That happens sometimes.”Remus’s voice sounded small in the dark. “Is... All that. It’s really going to happen, isn’t it? When you go home.”Sirius, despite his still-thumping heart and the tangy taste of blood in his mouth from where he’d undoubtedly bit his tongue in his sleep—and, well, maybe it wasn’t all just Remus’s pain he felt tonight—because he wracked his brain for the remnants of his nightmare, desperate to figure out what Remus could have heard, but then—It didn’t matter. It was all the same, anyway. His mother and her wand pointed at him and curses and Kreacher and pain pain pain. Sirius squeezed his eyes shut and tried to remind himself that he was awake. Safe. Here, with Remus Lupin.Safe. “If history’s any indication,” he muttered, “if I go home, I’m royally fucked.”He could see it, plain as day, in Remus’s eyes. Remus Lupin, of all people, knew what that meant. Remus settled into the space beside him, nestled as close to Sirius as the pillow between them would allow, a warm and lingering presence that was more comfort than Sirius would care to admit to anyone. “‘If you go home’?” Remus asked, quietly, and maybe there was a note of forbidden hope in his voice.“Andromeda has a plan,” Sirius said, and he quickly reiterated the conversation from Hagrid’s hut.“Do you think it’ll work?”“I don’t know,” Sirius whispered, because, honestly, he hadn’t allowed himself to think about it much outside of his conversation with Andromeda. Hope was a dangerous thing and, Merlin knows, it was so easily extinguished. There were so many factors at play: Andromeda, Ted, Slughorn, his mother. The inevitably cruel hand of fate that seemed to have it in for him. Finding an impossible hope, then having it snuffed out… It was enough to make any sane person dangerous. A thing like that… It would break Sirius Black in two, and he knew it. He felt it in his bones.Sirius knew what it would cost him if he allowed himself to hope. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ That lasted until breakfast. Sirius—who was certainly not accustomed to receiving letters, unless he was expecting something from Andromeda—glanced up from his tea to see a large, grumpy owl deposit a neatly-folded letter right on top of his toast. After a raised eyebrow from a barely-conscious Remus and a somewhat confused frown from James, Sirius shooed the bird away and flicked off the little bits of jam from the corners of the envelope. He broke the seal.
Mr. Black,
It seems, rather, that you and I have gotten off on the wrong foot. Regardless of that business with Lucius Malfoy and the Potter boy, I have found you to be an exceptional student in my classes. I hear from your other professors that you possess an above average intelligence and a strong proclivity towards magic. It doesn’t surprise me, given your family. I’ve never known a Black to shirk in their pursuits, magical or otherwise.
To demonstrate my heartfelt apologies and perhaps to turn over a new leaf between us, I would like to cordially invite you to a little Christmas gathering I’m hosting in my office over the holidays. First years are hardly ever in attendance at my Christmas gatherings, but it would be my honour to see you seated amongst your peers and two of your classmates who’ve also garnered an invitation.
Best regards,
Professor Horace Slughorn
Sirius read the letter through twice, just to make sure he hadn’t made it up.This was a way out.It’d fucking worked.He felt the smile spread across his face. “Sirius?” Remus asked, his eyes flicking to the letter as he sipped his tea. He passed the letter to Remus. James crowded close to read over Remus’s shoulder. Something like triumph danced in Remus’s eyes when he looked up. “Andromeda?” he asked.“Seems like,” Sirius said, and Merlin, hope never tasted so sweet. Who cared if it was dangerous? He’d won!“I can’t believe this!” James said, emphatically, snatching the letter from Remus’s hands to read it more closely. “He’s apologising to you!”“Yeah, well,” Sirius said, casually. “‘Dromeda reminded Slughorn that I’m a Black and that I’m something of a prodigy. Slughorn collects prodigies, you see, so—”“He apologised to you and now is begging you to come to his Christmas dinner. He’s a goddamned kiss-arse!”“You’d be surprised how many people would leap at the chance to kiss my arse, Potter. You’ll have to wait your turn.” James made a face that so clearly said Not in a million years, Black. Sirius barked a laugh. “Besides. It keeps me here.”The annoyance washed out of James’s face at that and he changed tactics. “Yes, well, if I’d known that all we had to do is mention your name or prestige and all the professors will fall at your feet—”“Except McGonagall,” Peter cut in, helpfully.“—Except McGonagall, I’d have been taking advantage of you since the day we met, Black.”Part of Sirius wanted to call bullshit, because James had hated him for his name, just as McGonagall still did, but he wasn’t going to ruin the high he was feeling at not having to return to Grimmauld Place.”I wonder who the other two first years who got an invite are,” Peter said, now leaning over the table to read the letter that was still clasped in James’s hand. “It’s got to be Remus,” James said, slinging his free arm over Remus’s shoulders. “His cauldron only exploded once last week. That’s gotta be a record. Certainly something to get him on Slughorn’s radar.”Remus groaned and buried his head in his hands. “Lily got one,” Marlene McKinnon said, unashamedly butting into their conversation. She shuffled closer, sandwiching Peter against Remus across from Sirius. Marlene eyed him closely, before, after a moment, he forked over the letter. Marlene stroked her green beard as she read, in a way that uncomfortably reminded Sirius of Dumbledore, when he was pontificating. Dorcas Meadows peered over, resting her own purple beard—Merlin, this was getting out of hand—on Marlene’s shoulder. “Yeah, she got it this morning,” Dorcas Meadows said.“Sirius, can you get me an invitation?” James asked, his eyes on Sirius wide and pleading. Ordinarily, this was the point in the conversation where Lily Evans appeared and dumped pumpkin juice on James Potter’s head. Ignoring James completely, Sirius leaned over his place and glanced down the table. “Where is Evans?”Dorcas swallowed and gestured in the vague direction of Gryffindor tower. “She went up to the common room. She got another letter from her—”Marlene elbowed her in the ribs. They exchanged a hard look and something passed between them, an acknowledged truth, a story to stick to. “She’s in the common room, but she wants to be left alone right now,” Marlene said.James’s eyes nearly leapt out of his head. He started to get to his feet, but Remus’s firm grip on his arm yanked him back down. “Why? Is she okay? What happened? Lily, is she all right? What—”Remus clamped a hand over James’s mouth, much to everyone’s relief. Sirius, in a much more calm and reasonable voice, said, “What’s wrong?”Another silent conversation passed between Marlene and Dorcas, this one including vague hand gestures and frustrated glares, culminating in Dorcas shoving her palm in Marlene’s face. Marlene grumbled something about surrender, then, with an eye-roll, Dorcas said to Sirius, “You can go.” Her gaze cut to James and turned icy cold. The effect was only slightly less intimidating with the purple beard. “But only Sirius.”Sirius stood, pushed back the bench, and was out the door before he saw Remus deposit Peter into James’s lap in order to keep James put. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius thought the common room was empty when he crawled through the portrait hole. He turned right, ready to brave the impossible stairs that led to the girls’ dorms, when he heard a faint sob. He spun on his heel.Lily sat cross-legged on the floor, by the hearth. Her shoulders were haunched and shook every time she sobbed. Bright red hair curtained her face, a few strands sticking to her cheeks.Sirius walked over, slowly and silently, and sat down across from her. She sniffed, then hastily wiped her face. “Christ,” she muttered. “Didn’t even hear you come in.”Lily fussed with her hair and wiped her cheeks again with the sleeves of her robe, trying to appear presentable. Sirius ducked his head a bit to catch her eye. “You don’t have to stop crying just because I’m here, Evans. I don’t give a shit if you cry.”He’d known her for a little more than two months, and she’d already seen him have most of a meltdown. Even if he was the shittiest person in the world, he’d never hold a few tears against her. Bright green eyes met his, wide and tear-stained, searching his soul for any hint of duplicity. She sniffed again, but did not cry. “Why are you here, Sirius?”He shrugged. “Didn’t feel like sitting through breakfast.”Lily didn’t buy it. “Dee sent you?”Another shrug. “If it makes you feel any better, Marlene didn’t seem too happy about it.”“It does, actually.”Lily was quiet for a moment, inhaling and exhaling deep breaths, her eyes trained towards her lap instead of at Sirius. There was a crumpled letter resting on her legs. It was paper, instead of parchment, and looked like it had been torn directly out of a larger book of some kind. The ink was blue, the handwriting large and ostentatious, and so slanted that Sirius didn’t even try to make out the words upside down. Sirius shuffled a little, reaching for words of comfort, but he didn’t have any. Merlin, he was shit at this. Why was all this so much easier with Remus? After a long silence, he made a vague gesture at the letter, and forced himself to ask, “Your family?”Her nose scrunched up a little. “Yeah. How’d you—”“Because everyone tries to hide the pain caused by their families,” he said, the words coming out before he has a chance to really think. Lily’s eyes went wide and he knew he’d guessed that much right, at least. He let out a breath, then, while pointedly touching a finger to the spot over his heart and the horrible words hidden beneath his robes, Sirius said, “They’re supposed to love you, take care of you, but… It doesn’t always work out like that, does it?”Lily shook her head, slowly, side to side, her eyes never leaving his. Merlin, he almost hated how she did that, how she looked at him like she’s the goddamned cartographer of his madness and insecurities. His skin prickled, because when Lily Evans looked at him like that, it meant that she’d figured him out, knew every fucking thing about him, every dark secret and silent tragedy.It terrified him and he wanted to hate her for seeing right through him, but—There was a small part of him that was fucking relieved. If she’d figured him out, he’d never have to say his secrets out loud.Then she smiled, her lips quirking up in a wry smile, and it was acknowledgement and understanding and absolution and all the things he was certain he didn’t deserve, because this wasn’t about him, goddamnit. “Yeah,” she said, gesturing to the letter and yanking him right back to the moment. “It’s my sister. Petunia.”Sirius barked a laugh, and it was out of place and ill-fitting, but he couldn’t stop it. “Petunia is a stupid name.”The smile didn’t quite reach her eyes, but it was there, just a twinge of her lip, a tug at the freckles on her cheek, just enough to let him know that she appreciated his attempt to make her feel better. “She’s older than me by four years and she’s always been a bit… much,” Lily said, after a moment. “She’s very proud, always worried about what everyone else thinks about us. She’s so much like my mum, in that. It was just how they were, Petunia especially. Staunch, and uptight, but kind, deep down. That is until…”Lily trailed off as a tear trailed down her cheek. She caught it, just as it reached the tip of her nose, and she looked at her fingers like she was surprised to see them wet. Sirius had an inexplicable urge to reach out and grab her hand, make her forget about the stray tear, or maybe wrap her in a hug and let her cry properly, but he couldn’t. So he didn’t. And he felt horrible about it.“Did you know that Dumbledore hand-delivers Hogwarts letters to Muggle-born first years?” she asked. Sirius shook his head, his eyes wide, because he hand’t. “It makes sense, really,” Lily said, in a voice that oozed practicality. “What a shock, right? Imagine being perfectly ordinary parents, with perfectly ordinary children, until one day, a fucking bird shows up with a letter and promises admittance to a special school of magic.”Sirius almost got lost in the image of it all: a world without magic, growing up without owl post and magical tutors and tomes upon tomes of ancient, magical books. “That had to be so—”“Boring?” Lily supplied, raising an eyebrow in challenge. “Mundane? Monotonous?”“No, Merlin,” Sirius muttered, then searched desperately for the right word, before she could fill in the blank for him again. A world without magic wasn’t something he could properly comprehend.Sirius didn’t rememberer his own first experience with magic. If his mother’s braggart stories were to be believed, he’d summoned more food to his plate before his first birthday. His magic ebbed and flowed from his hands as easily as breathing. He could feel it, too, flowing through his veins, every second of every day. It felt like life itself, wild and phenomenal, all at once. It wasn’t something he could even fathom living without. Or even… not knowing it was there. “Inexplicable,” he decided, because that was the best word for it.And Lily gave him a look like… like she was almost proud of him.“So, Dumbledore shows up and explains it all,” Lily continued. “Asks if I’ve ever done anything special or extraordinary and then starts explaining magic to my perfectly ordinary parents. And Petunia.”“But not to you?” Sirius asked, gently.Lily shook her head. “I knew what I was. Severus—” Sirius pulled a face at the mention of Snape, but at Lily’s glare, forced his features back to neutral. “Severus explained it all to me a few months before Dumbledore came. He said I was magic and would get a wand and go to Hogwarts, just like him. He always said I was special and he told Petunia off for calling me a freak.”And, Merlin, what a thought that was. This, all of this—his entire world—was all so new to her. He tried to imagine the grandiose sense of wonder that she must have felt when she’d found out, when she realised she wasn’t like everything else.He wondered what she thought when she’d first seen the ceiling in the Great Hall. Auclair said it was meant to mesmerise the lower-borns. What had it been like when she’d seen the stars from inside the castle for the first time?What had it been like when she’d first tasted magic? He had a more difficult time trying to imagine Snape explaining it to her. “Oh,” was all he could manage. “My dad was thrilled. Even my mum played nice,” Lily said. A ghost of a smile flashed across her face, before disappearing so fast Sirius wasn’t quite sure it’d really been there in the first place. “You should’ve seen my dad shaking Dumbledore’s hand. You’d have thought he was the Prime Minister or something.”Lily’s fingers tightened around the letter and her eyes filled up with tears. “After Dumbledore left, though, Petunia let loose. She called me a freak and an abomination and kept saying that magic was unnatural and unholy.”“Unholy?!” he asked, because of all the words that could be used to describe magic, unholy seemed… blasphemous. Unholy. Because, really, it didn’t get more fucked up than that. Anyone else—Muggle, or Squib, or fucking vampire—would kill for just the slightest taste of a witch or wizard’s magic. It couldn’t be unholy, this itch that was buried under his skin, under Lily’s skin, under the skin of any and every witch or wizard that had ever held a wand. Magic was like fucking breathing. She nodded, swallowing something of a sob that threatened to bubble over. “Petunia and Mum can be religious, when it suits them. Not enough to go to church every Sunday—or even on Easter or Christmas, really—but just enough to call down the wrath of God in order to prove a point.” She paused, then met Sirius’s eyes, and deadpanned: “Witchcraft invokes the power of the devil.”“Really?” Sirius asked, deciding that was probably the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard. “If I’d’ve known that, I’d have summoned the armies of darkness to torment my mother ages ago. Thanks for the tip.”This earned him the laugh and the eye roll he’d been hoping for. Lily wiped her eyes. “My dad managed to move the conversation away from fire and brimstone, eventually, but Petunia refused to speak to me, even right before I left.”“Merlin,” he said, half under his breath.“What?” Lily prompted, a wary of the expression flickering in the depths of her eyes. “If you’re about to say something nasty about my family, then you have another thing coming, Sirius Black, because—”“No!” He held up his hands in surrender. “No. I just… I never realized that the prejudice went both ways.”Because Salazar’s balls, what a thought that was. Petunia Evans hated Lily for her magic, same as Walburga Black would hate Lily for the exact same reason. They’d both call Lily unclean, unnatural, a freak of nature. Mudblood. One hated out of spite and envy, then called it unholy out of convenience, because Lily Evans had something that her sister could never even dream of possessing. The other’s hatred was more sinister, perhaps, because it was rooted in an ancient repository of superiority complexes, ideals of purity, and centuries of conditioned malice. He’d never thought it would come to this: that someone could be hated in the way that Lily Evans was. By her family, by her world, by his world, attacked and berated on all sides simply because she has magic in her veins same as him. A fire gurgled in his belly, something just a little bit dangerous and ready to ignite in the face of injustice. Lily Evans didn’t deserve this. She watched him closely, cataloging the emotions that flashed in his eyes, that manifest by the clenching and unclenching of his fists. Without saying anything, she handed over the tear-stained paper. Lily,
Mum and Dad asked me to convey their elation and approval that you’ve been invited to attend the magical ball hosted by your school over the coming holidays. They regret that you’ll be unable to come home for Christmas, but understand that you’ve made new friends and would greatly prefer to spend time with your own kind. Dad said to be sure to inform you that they’ve put a gift for you in the post, but we’re not quite sure if it’ll reach you before Christmas, if ever, given that it’s not being delivered by way of one of those ridiculous birds.
Of course, I know that there is no ball over the holidays, but I thought it best if you not come home. Mum’s having guests over and, well, there’s really no need to frighten Gran with your incessant little parlour tricks. It would really put a damper on things here, and we can’t have the neighbours thinking you’re off to a school for troubled children or something. Mum and Dad have a sort of standing in this community and, well, frankly, you put all that in jeopardy with all your talk of magic and unnatural things.
I expect there’ll be some function or other you’ll have to attend over Easter as well. So, we will not be seeing you until the summer holidays. And when you do come home, I expect that you will not bore us to death with excessive talk about your school or unholy practices.
Petunia
The word unholy had been underlined three times. “I’m sorry,” Sirius said, his voice thick with building emotion. “No one should ever have the right to say those things to you. Not Malfoy, or the Slytherins, or your own goddamned sister.”Merlin, because if Regulus said that sort of thing to him, Sirius was fairly certain he’d drop dead on the spot. Lily took the letter back from him, tossed it unceremoniously into the hearth, then flicked her wand at it. The letter disintegrated in a quick burst of flame. “Maybe it’s for the best,” Lily mumbled. “I’ve written my parents every week since I arrived at Hogwarts. Long letters, too, explaining all the things that they’ll never be able to understand or see but—” She sniffed, again, then wiped her cheeks. “This is the first time I’ve heard from any of them.”“Do your mum and dad feel the same way Petunia does about magic?” Sirius asked. Lily shook her head. “My dad doesn’t. He was so excited when Dumbledore came. But, my mum… I think she’s the same as Petunia, except she won’t even risk writing it down or saying it out loud. That would mean acknowledging the fact that I’m a witch.” Her eyes turned to the smouldering remains of Petunia’s letter. “I thought by writing them, they’d come to understand it all better, maybe see how happy and natural this is for me. It’s… Except for Severus, I’ve never met anyone like me before. Hogwarts feels like home to me.” She managed a small smile. “Even if I’m constantly fending off Potter’s marriage proposals.”Sirius barked a laugh. “He was ready to storm Gryffindor tower when he heard you were upset.”“Well, thank you for stopping him. I’m not sure I could tolerate James Potter at the moment.”“Thank Remus,” Sirius said. “He forced Peter to give James a lap dance and provided me with ample opportunity to escape.”She laughed. “Oh, Christ, I think I would’ve paid to see that.”“It was quite the sight,” he said, more for the benefit of her imagination, given that he hadn’t stayed long enough to really see it either. He leaned forward a bit, hands on his knees, a wicked smirk creeping up his face. “Now. We must begin planing for mischief making over Christmas, Evans. It’s the only thing left to do.”A look of surprise flashed across her face. “Wha— We?!”“Didn’t I mention? I’m staying at Hogwarts. Officially. As of half an hour ago.”“Really? Remus said—”“I’m really staying,” Sirius said, elated to be able to say those words aloud. “Slughorn invited me to some dinner thing, so now I’m obligated to—”“Wait,” Lily said, waving a hand in his face. “You’re in the Slug Club?”“Surprised, Evans?” He laughed a little at her expression, because, yes, she was. “Well, with a little nudging from my cousin, plus a lot of emphasis placed on me being the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, Slughorn invited me to his Christmas gathering.”“I thought there we were the only two first years who—”It was Sirius’s turn to be surprised. “We?! Who—Oh, shit.”“Yup.” “Oh, Merlin, no.”“Oh, Merlin, yes.” Lily had a ridiculous smirk plastered on her face. She reached into the pocket of her skirt and handed Sirius a piece of parchment bearing the same seal as the one in his own pocket. “Severus and me. We were invited last week. I wasn’t going to go, but now I suppose I ought to.”Sirius pouted. “Are you telling me that I went through all that to avoid seeing my horrible mother just to be stuck sitting next to Snape on Christmas?”“Seems like.” Lily gave him a hard look. “I know what you think of him, Sirius Black, and it’s… It’s not entirely fair. He’s kind to me, and he’s my friend. He was all I had, until a few months ago, and now…” She paused, a shadow of pain flickering across her face. “He hardly speaks to me outside of class.”Sirius grimaced, remembering Snape’s mortified face when he’d blurted, “I’m in love with Lily Evans!”“That may be partially my fault,” he said, rather quietly, because the truth was, even if Snape was embarrassed by the result of the Hiccuping Secrets, Snape still had whatever agreement he’d made with Malfoy for his own protection to contend with. Malfoy wouldn’t approve of Snape’s friendship or childhood crush on a Muggle-born. But, instead of voicing all this, Sirius said, “But at least his hair grew back.”She gave him a look that said she’d very much like to throw something at him, or maybe punch him in the stomach again. “You should know, part of me is still furious with you for making him tell the whole school he’s in love with me.”“I didn’t mean to get you involved,” he said, earnestly, because it was the only thing he could say. Lily heaved a sigh, like her chest suddenly had a thousand pounds resting on it. “It was only a matter of time, I suppose. I had a bit of a hunch that he felt that way, but I...”She trailed off into nothing. “Do… Do you feel that way?” Sirius asked, absolutely hating the image in his head of Lily Evans being swept off her feet by Severus Snape.This time, she did punch him, right in the knee-cap, because it was the only thing she could reach. “Ow!”“Sorry. Sorry,” she muttered, scooting a bit out of reach, just to assure him that she wouldn’t be touching him again any time soon. “But, ew. No. No fucking way. He’s my friend, Black. That’d be like me having a crush on you.”Sirius’s nose wrinkled up. “Ugh, that’s horrible.”Lily made a noise that Sirius took to mean that she was also equally disgusted by both prospects. After a moment, her face smoothed out again. “So,” she said. “Christmas?”“Christmas,” he agreed. “You, me, and Snape. It’ll be a laugh.”She waved a very threatening finger in his face. “You’ll be civil to him, Sirius Black. Or I swear I’ll—”“All right, all right. I promise.” Sirius crossed his finger over his heart to prove his point. He leaned back a little, grinning. “It’ll be nice, though. You and me. King and Queen of Gryffindor tower. At least for the holidays.”“We’ve established that I’m not going to be your fucking queen. How about I duel you for the title of king?”“You’re on, Evans.” Sirius leapt to his feet, his magic sparking. Lily reached behind her and chucked a throw pillow at him. “Not now, you berk. We have Transfiguration.”“Correction. We’re late for Transfiguration.” He cast a Timus to prove his point. “Let’s skip and settle this right now.”Lily narrowed her eyes. “McGonagall hates you, Sirius. She might literally kill you if you skive off Transfiguration.” “Brave of you to assume she won’t still kill me if I show up late.”Lily groaned and got to her feet, drawing her wand. “Fine. Do your worst, Black.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “Oi! Where the hell have you been?” James shouted as he and Peter exited the Transfiguration classroom amidst a swarm of first year Hufflepuffs. James stopped dead in the middle of the hall when he caught sight of Lily Evans, standing with her chin held high next to Sirius, a crown of yellow lilies woven into her hair. Sirius had stolen them from the greenhouse on the way here and used a little bit of magic to twist them into a crown.Remus, who had his nose buried in a book, rammed into James from behind, and his book clattered to the floor. “Christ, James, you—”Remus’s eyes landed on Sirius and Lily. James, for his part, had started to drool. Lily directed a very pointed look at Sirius’s forehead that probably would have liquified his brain if she suddenly got laser eyes. Sirius cleared his throat, then swept his arm out in a wide gesture at Lily. “I, Sirius Black, appointed herald of Her Majesty, the King, present to you, the Marauders of House Gryffindor, Lily…”He paused. He didn’t know her middle name. “Josephine,” she supplied, with a cut nod.Sirius managed to curtail his reaction, deciding it would be best to unpack that later. “… Lily Josephine Evans, King of Gryffindor.”“King?!” Peter squeaked. James, of course, had the exact opposite response. He fell to his knees, the moron. “Your Majesty,” he said, a beatific expression plastered on his face. “Oh, get up,” Lily snapped. She tilted her chin up once more, reasserting her regal pose and voice. “James Potter, should you ever kneel before me again, I shall have you flogged—”Sirius snorted. “He might enjoy that.”Lily immediately flushed bright red, nearly the colour of her hair, and Merlin, Sirius couldn’t hold back his laughter, even when she thwacked him with her book. James, for his part, looked helplessly confused. “Don’t worry, Jamie,” Sirius teased. “Remus will explain it to you when you’re older.”Remus’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head. “I most certainly will not.”“James Potter,” Lily said again, her voice a pitch or two higher and her face still brilliantly red, “I forbid any sort of ridiculous behaviour from you. And… and you’ll not speak to me for the rest of the day—week! Month? No, week—unless I address you directly.”“Yes, Your Majesty,” James said, solemnly, and honestly, Sirius hadn’t expected him to agree to all that. “Your Majesty?” Remus said, nudging James aside with his shoulder. There was a ghost of a smile dancing on his lips. “How is it you came to hold such a noble title?”“Yeah,” said Peter, petulantly. “I thought we were the kings of Gryffindor.”“You’ve been usurped,” Lily said. “Sirius lost a duel.”Peter’s jaw dropped. He turned to Sirius. “You lost? You? You mean you let her win, right?”“I did not!” Sirius said, indignity. “Come off it,” Peter said, dismissively. “You threw Snape across the hall and nearly sliced Malfoy in half. How could you lose to a—”“Peter! That’s no way to talk about your king,” Remus snapped, smacking him upside the head before Sirius could enact the murder plot he’d been planning in his head ever since Peter threw out Malfoy’s name. That wasn’t a chapter in his life that he was particularly proud of, nor did he appreciate it when it was casually brought up in conversation.“Yes, but how—”“I’m shit at wandless defensive charms,” Sirius growled. “She knocked me on my arse, fair and square.”Lily grinned triumphantly, seemingly choosing to ignore Peter’s line of questioning. “‘Bout time someone knocked you on your arse,” Remus said, but he tossed a wink at Sirius, and his voice was light. “Mr. Lupin, a—”Five heads turned just as McGonagall appeared in the doorway. “Oh, shit,” muttered Sirius. Then, to Lily: “Told you we just should’ve met them in Potions.”“I wanted to inform my subjects of my ascension to the throne,” she muttered back, out of the corner of her mouth.McGonagall just glared at them and Sirius wondered just how much of their conversation she’d overheard. “Evans. Black.” McGonagall said Black like it was some annoying fur ball caught in her throat. “I didn’t see you in class.”Sirius said, “We had a prior commitment,” at the same time, Lily Josephine Evans said, “We’ll see you in detention tonight, Professor.”Sirius turned to gape at Lily, utterly betrayed. McGonagall’s expression gave nothing away. “Very well.” Then, with a pointed glare at Sirius, McGonagall added: “Your Majesty.”Lily Josephine Evans preened like a fucking peacock. All hail the King of Gryffindor. Sirius was torn between lashing out at McGonagall, with cries of injustice and accusations of favouritism, and falling on his knees at Lily’s feet like James fucking Potter and begging her to teach him her maniacal, Minerva McGonagall-charming ways. “I can’t believe you just gave us detention,” Sirius groaned, instead. “We skipped class. Therefore, I enacted a fair and just punishment. You’re welcome.”“Snitch.”“King,” Lily shot back, holding her head high. Then, with a sparing glance at James and Peter, she spun on her heel. “Come along, boys,” she called over her shoulder, as she rounded the corner to the dungeons. “Mr. Lupin,” McGonagall cut in. “I’d like a word.”Remus frowned, and something flashed across his eyes, but Sirius didn’t have long enough to see what it was before it was gone again, erased in that perfectly even face Remus sometimes made when he was trying to hide how much pain he was in. That same something lurched in the pit of Sirius’s stomach. Glancing at James, Sirius jerked his head in the direction Lily had gone. After a moment, James took the hint and dragged Peter along. When they were gone, Sirius took half a step towards Remus, then stopped when McGonagall glared at him.“I need to speak with Mr. Lupin,” she repeated, accentuating every word. “All right,” Sirius said, with a shrug, because Remus wouldn’t meet his eyes. “In private, Mr. Black.”“All right.”McGonagall heaved a great sigh and pinched the bridge of her nose. Sirius noticed that she did that a lot in his presence. It made him proud. “You have class, Mr. Black.”“I’m here for moral support,” Sirius said, because Remus certainly looked like he needed it. Another sigh, but this one sounded a hell of a lot more like reluctant acceptance. “Very well.” She pointed to the spot right outside the classroom door. “Sit right there. Behave.”Deciding it was best to not push his luck, Sirius obeyed without question. Remus shot him a glance, that dangerous, horrifying something lurking somewhere behind his amber eyes. McGonagall shut the heavy wooden door behind Remus, leaving Sirius alone in the hall. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ This was taking far longer than Sirius had anticipated. The sit-and-behave order from McGonagall lasted all of five minutes before Sirius was on his feet, pacing in front of the door. Fifteen minutes in, he glanced up and down the hallway, before pressing his ear against the heavy oak, but he couldn’t hear a damn thing. Figures, McGonagall would put a silencing charm on the door. He tried not to worry or wildly speculate. He really, really did. But that look on Remus’s face combined with the inordinate amount of time he suddenly had on his hands, wild speculation was pretty much his only option. He bit his thumbnail and stopped pacing. Fact: Remus was scared. Or nervous, maybe. Ashamed? All three? Remus was… something.Logical conjecture: Remus knew why McGonagall pulled him aside to speak in private. If Remus knew—or, at the very least, suspected—why McGonagall wanted to speak with him and he was… heartbroken (maybe?), then Sirius felt fairly confident in concluding it had something to do with Remus’s scars and his trips home. If that was the case, it could go either way.Maybe, McGonagall had finally taken notice of Remus’s scars. Or, more specifically, how he tended to have more of them whenever he returned to Hogwarts after visiting his sick mum. If that was the case, Sirius would be fucking ecstatic, because, regardless of Sirius’s personal gripes with McGonagall, there was no way in hell McGonagall would allow that to happen to Remus Lupin. Even if she wasn’t Head of House or a professor at Hogwarts and thereby entrusted with the safety and well-being of her students, McGonagall actually liked Remus. He was her star student. If she suspected someone was hurting him, Sirius was fairly confident that McGonagall would put an end to it immediately. Then again, Sirius distinctly remembered Remus saying something about the possibility that he’d be expelled if anyone ever discovered his secret. That…Well, Sirius didn’t even want to think about that.He started pacing again. An hour later—a whole fucking hour—the latch on the door clicked, and Sirius’s heart jolted. He moved quick, darting to the spot from which McGonagall told him not to move, sitting cross-legged on the floor, and plastering a patently innocent expression on his face. Remus slipped through the narrow crack in the door, his eyes fixed firmly on the floor. He tugged the door shut again behind him. Remus looked very much like he wanted to cry. Sirius jumped to his feet, then edged into Remus’s space, close but not touching, in his orbit, but never colliding. Remus glanced at him, and something like surprise flickered across his face. “You’re still here?”“‘Course I am,” Sirius said, easily. “But you missed Potions.”Sirius shrugged. “Moral support, remember?”Remus blinked, but his mouth twitched up at the memory of Sirius’s arse stuck to the bench after that first Transfiguration class. It didn’t last long, though, before whatever dark cloud remained from his conversation with McGonagall masked his features once more. “Lunch or dorms?” Sirius asked.Remus took a long moment before he replied. “Lunch.” Then, with far more conviction: “Christ, I’m starving.”“Right. Let’s go.”Sirius was three paces away before he realised Remus wasn’t following. He stopped, then turned on his heel. “Remus?”Remus met his eyes, his face remarkably blank, save for the single tear that trailed down the divots of his scars. “I’m staying at Hogwarts for the holidays.”Sirius’s stomach dropped in relief and he broke out in a grin. Before he could stop himself, he blurted, “That’s brilliant! You, me and Evans. We’ll—”He swallowed his words at Remus’s expression. “You… You don’t want to stay?” Sirius tried not to be hurt by that, because it was different than Evans not wanting to stay, wasn’t it? Remus staying at Hogwarts was a good thing. He was safe at Hogwarts, just like Sirius. Remus squeezed his eyes shut. “I don’t have much of a choice.” He turned, slightly, gesturing towards the door. “McGonagall— We, er. We flooed my parents, and they decided it was best if I stay here.” Remus gave a half-hearted shrug and muttered something about his mother’s progressing illness.It was all matter-of-fact, almost detached, like Remus hadn’t been part of the discussion at all. Why the hell wasn’t Remus relieved? And, although Sirius didn’t ask that, the question must have been written all over his face. Remus sighed, caught his eye, and said, “I know what you think of my parents, Sirius, but I swear to you, that’s not it. I love my parents and I—”Remus choked on his words. They hurt you. They scarred you, Remus. You said they were monsters. They—Sirius Black had a hard time picturing anyone with a happy family. Whenever James talked about his parents and how Mr. and Mrs. Potter doted on him constantly, Sirius was overwhelmed with the wistful haze that often accompanied the telling of some romantic fairytale. It didn’t seem real, that anyone could possibly be loved and content and goddamned happy to be around their family.Deep down, he knew that this only spoke to how fucked his own situation was. He knew, logically, that some people, out there in the wide, wild world, had to be happy when surrounded by their family, else the human and wizarding races would’ve died out ages ago. It was undoubtedly a matter of statistical probability, but even then, Sirius’s own experiences muddled his belief that such families could exist. What he absolutely, positively refused to accept, however, was that someone could come from a family like his and still, by some logical inconsistency, defend them. No matter how good the person, no matter how kind, how remarkably brave or heroic in the face of atrocities, how could anyone—even Remus-bloody-Lupin—have it in their heart to love the people that did all that to them?If Remus wasn’t going to hate his family for the scars that crisscrossed his skin, then Sirius was damn-well going to do it for him.However, in a rather dramatic bout of uncharacteristic forethought, Sirius held his tongue. “I’m sorry,” Sirius found himself saying instead. Remus’s eyes snapped to his, all amber waves of utter heartbreak and pain that went down to his bones. “What if—”Remus cut off in something of a choked sob.Sirius edged closer, almost imperceptibly. “What if, what?”“What if I stay here for the holidays and still end up with new scars?”He said it in a rush, so fast and with such force, that it took Sirius nearly a full minute to digest. Because how the fuck was that possible? If Remus stayed at Hogwarts, he was safe. Wasn’t he?“W-what?” Sirius breathed. “I told you, Siri. The scars. They’re not what you think.”Sirius tried to process this, to cross-reference with the conclusion he’d drawn when he’d first seen Remus on the platform—when he first sought after answers for the marks crisscrossing Remus’s face, between his freckles—with the reality that Remus thought he could still be hurt at Hogwarts. His mind flitted through everything Remus had said about his scars: the pain, running with scissors, the absolute terror in his eyes when he left and came back with fresh marks. Dark Magic and wounds that won’t heal and all that fucking blood in the bathroom on the second floor. Monster. Remus had said it was a monster. What else could it be?Once more, Remus seemed to sense the question written all over Sirius’s face. “I swear I’ll… I’ll tell you when I’m brave, Siri,” Remus whispered. “But now, I…”He cut off again with a helpless shrug.Despite every instinct nagging at him to push Remus for answers, Sirius sighed and let it go with a subtle nod. “Now,” Sirius said, finishing his thought with a trade-marked wicked grin, “you and I need to plan how to get away with the most elaborate Christmas prank that Hogwarts has ever seen. I might even be able to persuade Her Majesty, the King to help. We’ll have a proper Marauders’ Christmas, you and me.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
NOVEMBER 5, 1971
When Sirius got back to the dorms that night, it was just past midnight. McGonagall had kept him nearly an hour longer than Lily Evans purely, or so it seemed to Sirius, out of spite. Sirius loosened his tie, tossed it haphazardly on his trunk, before he tugged the hangings aside on his bed. Remus was asleep under his covers, the extra pillow situated in the middle of the bed, and plenty of room for Sirius to crawl in and sleep. He smiled, because, Merlin, Remus always looked so peaceful in his sleep, like all the fears and pain and doldrums of the day melted into the star-patterned freckles of his face. A breeze swept at the hangings and nipped at the exposed skin on the back of Sirius’s neck. Sirius turned to the open window and wondered briefly if Remus had waited for him on the roof before succumbing to the exhaustion from the day and from his recent visit home. Except, no, because when Sirius went to close the window, he found James Potter leaning casually against the roof, swaddled in a heavy winter cloak and a ridiculous dog-eared cap on his head. “Thought you were asleep,” Sirius said, casually, leaning back inside to glance at James’s empty bed. “Thought you’d be back hours ago,” James replied, matching his tone. “Remus tried to wait up, but I sent him inside. It’s slippery enough out here with the frost. Didn’t need him taking an accidental nose dive in case he nodded off.”“Mm, no, we can’t have that.”“You coming out, or what?”Sirius narrowed his eyes. “You’re not having a crisis, are you? Not that I wouldn’t want to help, but it’s been a rather long day and I’m rather beat.”“Not having a crisis, no. Just waiting for the fireworks.” He said it with that mischievous glint in his eye, the one that sparkled there, constantly, no matter what he was doing. It was a wicked gleam that was so distinctly James Potter that Sirius found it impossible to resist. “In or out, Black?”“Out.” Sirius flicked his wrist and summoned the duvet from Remus’s empty bed. Wrapping it tightly around his shoulders, he carefully made his way out on the roof, then waved a quick warming charm over both him and James. “Ta,” James muttered, as colour flooded back into his cheeks. Sirius had a sneaking suspicion that James had been out there in the cold for quite some time. He pressed close, safely wrapped in the duvet, and despite the cold, he felt remarkably content up here on the roof with James Potter. Then, the fireworks started. Sirius had thought James was kidding, playing facetious at the very least, but there they were, one after another. Sparks of red and blue and gold danced across the sky, in a constant stream of hiss and pop and acrid smell of sulphur that settled over the castle. The fireworks came from all four corners of the castle, simultaneous and timed down to the second, one after the other, in a chorus of brilliantly coloured explosions. Sirius leaned forward, a manic grin on his face, nearly close enough to touch the raining sparks. He glanced back at James. “Prewetts?”James nodded, the blasts from the fireworks reflected in the whites of his eyes. “It’s Guy Fawkes Day,” he said, by way of explanation. “That’s a Muggle thing, right?” “Yeah,” James said. “Some guy tried to blow up Parliament. Or declared independence. Or maybe something with a prison?”“No, no. The prison is the French one. Evans had a book about it. Well, not specifically. But it was mentioned.”“Ah.” James paused. “To be quite honest, I’m not sure what we’re celebrating.”The fireworks cascaded across the sky, shifted and morphed into patterns: a regimen of sparkling soldiers, an angular mask, then, finally, an illustrious bout of explosions.“It’s not like the Prewetts would pass up an opportunity to set off explosions,” Sirius said.James laughed as the last of the fireworks died down. “From what Marlene said, they got their whole bearded cult involved.”“Figures,” Sirius snorted. “I knew there was a good reason behind starting a cult. I’m considering starting one of my own. Though, I’m not much one for colourful beards.”Silence fell over the castle, as the leftover plumes of smoke evaporated into the blanket of stars. A chill snuck up Sirius’s spine, despite the warming charm and the duvet, and he edged closer to James. “Are you in love with Evans?”Sirius didn’t quite know how to go about dissecting that question, so he started with, “What the fuck, James?”“It’s just…” James started, helplessly. “You spend a lot of time with her. And she likes you. Since when does she like you?”“She’s my friend, Jamie.”“Do you like her? I mean, I… How could you not? She’s gorgeous. I wouldn’t be mad if you did.”Sirius thought that James’s tone seemed to suggest otherwise. Sirius quirked his eyebrow in a sort of challenge.“Okay, fine,” James relented. “I’d be upset if you were ogling my future wife.”“Mother of Merlin, James, I am not ogling Evans.”“But you spend a lot of time with her.”“She’s my friend! Same as you and Remus and Pete!”“But Lily…” James frowned. “She’s gorgeous. How can you not want to snog her?”“You’re bloody gorgeous too, mate, and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to snog you. You’re rather bad at it.”“Oi!” James shoved him hard, nearly causing Sirius to lose his balance, before he grabbed Sirius’s arm. Sirius thanked his lucky stars for the duvet, otherwise he may have very well flinched away and fallen from the roof. “You think I’m gorgeous?” James asked, once Sirius had once again settled in on the relative safety of the icy roof.“Salazar’s fucking balls,” Sirius muttered, running a hand through his hair. “Yes, James, you’re the prettiest princess in the castle. I’m still not snogging you again.”“Yes, but the question is how do I—or, we, it seems—get Evans to snog me.”“She hates you,” Sirius deadpanned. “It’s not going to happen.”And, honestly, James didn’t seem too offended by that. “Yes, but she doesn’t hate you.”“Because I’m her friend.” He wondered how many times he was going to have to repeat that before James latched onto the idea. “So, you love her?” “I’m her friend,” Sirius answered, slowly and deliberately, and it’s Yes, I love her, because she’s his friend, and No, I don’t love her in the way James meant. It was the best possible answer he could give.“Alright,” James said, clearly understanding none of the subtleties of Sirius’s answer. “You can talk me up, right?”Sirius rolled his eyes. “I’ve already told her you’re a horrible kisser, Potter. What more do you want?”James looked rather offended at that. “I want to marry her and have thirteen children.”“Merlin, thirteen?” Sirius muttered. “What does anyone even do with thirteen children? Open a sweat shop? Good luck getting Evans on board with that.”“Yes, but that’s where you come in.”“I will not be your pimp, Jamie.”“But you can convince her not to hate me.”“While we’re on the subject of miracles, I suppose I’ll just pull a unicorn out of my arse. I’ll earn extra marks in Care of Magical Creatures.”James ignored the biting sarcasm. “Come on, Sirius. Please? I’ll let you be the best man at our wedding.”Sirius barked a laugh. “I’d be the best man at your wedding if you married a toad. I’m your best friend, remember?”Except James seemed to have gotten stuck on this whole idea of his wedding to Lily Evans. “Merlin, can you picture it? Do you think she’d wear a Muggle wedding dress? I bet she would. She’s proud like that. It’ll be long, and beautiful, and white, and Merlin, her hair. She’d look like a white-frosted carrot cake.”“If you ever decide to say that to her face, please make sure I’m there with a camera first,” Sirius said, mostly in an effort to cut James off before he waxed poetic on every detail of the Evans-Potter wedding.Again, James ignored him and blinked wistful dark eyes at Sirius. “You’ll help me, right? Please, Sirius?”“Fine,” Sirius relented, mostly because he knew James wouldn’t stop pestering him about this. “But, for the record, I think you have a better chance with that toad.”James threw his arms around Sirius’s neck and pulled him close in a hug before Sirius could get away. It hurt, mostly where James placed a sloppy on Sirius’s cheek, and Sirius was grateful for the modicum of cushion the duvet offered. He shoved James away, wiping the spit from his cheek.“You can start by buying her chocolate, maybe. Or quills. Evans goes through quite a few quills,” Sirius said. “Also, you should refrain from any future marriage proposals and mentioning the thirteen chidden.”“You’re right,” James said, nodding serenely. “That’s more of second date material.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
NOVEMBER 12, 1971
As the week went on, Sirius finally began to relax. He surrendered fully into the idea that he was safe and for once in his life, having hope had paid off. He was staying at Hogwarts over the holidays. He was, however, beginning to understand that look in Remus’s eye whenever the upcoming Christmas holidays were mentioned: the one that spoke of longing for home and, maybe, of something like abandonment. Despite the brilliant plans that Sirius, Remus, and Lily had concocted—one of which involved a secret tunnel that supposedly led to Honeydukes in Hogsmeade that Lily had heard one of the older Hufflepuffs discussing—Remus still craved to spend the holidays with his family. And, maybe—maybe—Sirius was starting to understand. Because it didn’t matter if he managed to worm his way out of the Black Christmas gathering, did it? Regulus was still there. Regulus was all but locked in Grimmauld Place, not just for the holidays, but for the year, left to face the wrath and anger of their parents without Sirius there as his protector, buffer, and constant advocate. Would his mother turn her wand on Regulus, if Sirius wasn’t there to take his own punishment for being sorted into Gryffindor, for scarring Lucius Malfoy, for being a general disgrace to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black? He wouldn’t put it past her and the thought nauseated him. What kind of monster would leave his little brother to go to judgment in his place?Sometimes, mostly at night, when the elation and hope faded into the darkness, the guilt threatened to devour Sirius whole. He’d mentioned his concern for Regulus in a letter to Andromeda and had included a draft of another letter addressed to his younger brother for her to forward. Though his letter to Regulus was subtle, filled with empty, yet heartfelt platitudes and subtle hints at acts of vengeance should Regulus face any harm on Sirius’s behalf, Andromeda had shot down the idea entirely. We can’t risk provoking the Warden now, Siri. If we do, she’ll find a way to get you back to Grimmauld Place. She’d then gone into a rather lengthy explanation on how her presence had been specifically requested at Grimmauld Place by his mother, no less, only to find out from Bellatrix that it was because Julius Fawley—“the utter fucking, marble-brained, toadstool of a wizard”—planned to propose to her in front of all of the Black family guests, thereby making it nearly impossible for her to refuse. Poor Ted, Sirius had thought, when he read the letter. Andromeda had sworn up and down that she’d check up on Regulus, even amidst the impending proposal and chaos, but Sirius could feel the hollowness in the promise, no matter how well-meaning it was. Andromeda could do no more than check up on him, and they both knew it. She was powerless to help Regulus, to stop anything from happening to him, even if Regulus begged her to. All and all, Sirius found himself praying to unnamed deities that his mother would take out her rage and frustration on Kreacher. Or, even, that she’d let it stew and simmer until the summer, when he could take the brunt of it. Anything to keep Regulus out of her line of fire. Anything, well, except going home for the holidays. He was pretty sure that made him a coward, but he was nowhere near brave enough to go home willingly. Mostly, he tried not to think about it. Like, earlier that week, for instance, when he’d hexed the ever-living shit out of the Carrow twins for teasing Dorcas Meadows about her beard. Marlene had come to his aid, mid-hex, and they’d both taken on a twin, only to end up serving detention with Filch when McGonagall had caught them. Commiserating in detention, both Marlene and Sirius decided they felt better knowing that the Carrow twins would spend the next day or so in the hospital wing regrowing all their teeth. Or, two days ago, when he’d slid into the seat beside Lily Evans in the Great Hall, just before dinner, and said, “You know, James Potter is remarkably majestic on a broom, don’t you think, Evans? I reckon he’ll be a professional Quidditch player. His arse sure would look good in—”Lily had glared at him, stood up, and left. The next morning, she’d grabbed Sirius’s sleeve—always careful not to actually touch him—and had all but dragged him down to the Quidditch Pitch. They’d watched James and Peter fly around for a bit, and every time Sirius had tried to ask Lily what they were doing there, she’d shushed him, then motioned that he watch James. Ten minutes in the air and James had begun to… fidget. Twelve minutes in, he’d begun to swerve in an effort to itch his backside. Thirteen minutes in, he couldn’t stop itching. Thirteen and a half minutes in, he tumbled off his broom from twenty feet up and would’ve landed hard on his arse had Lily not been ready with a Cushioning Charm. “That’s what I think of his arse,” she’d said.Sirius had gaped at her in amazement, as she’d held up a packet of itching powder. Plain, old, non-magic, Muggle itching powder, that she’d somehow managed to slip into James Potter’s Quidditch robes.Sirius found himself strongly reconsidering his insistence that he wasn’t, in fact, in love with Lily Josephine Evans. It had not, however, deterred James Potter in the slightest. He’d insisted on accompanying Remus, Lily, and Sirius to the library after lunch.Now, James sat next to Sirius, his glasses slightly askew and hair as crazy as ever. He leaned back in his chair, his arms dangling limp at his side, staring at the ceiling and groaning in boredom.Lily and Remus had been arguing for quite some time. “How many books have you given him, then?” Lily said. “Two? Three? It’s my turn!” “To be fair, the last time it was your turn, you gave him Les Miserables. You could not have picked a longer book,” Remus replied. “It’s got to count for two.”Lily rolled her eyes. “Just because you picked the shortest possible book for your turn doesn’t mean you get to go again, Lupin. That’s not how this works.”James lolled his head to the side to catch Sirius’s eye. He looked bored. Sirius figured if it wasn’t for the excuse to blatantly stare at Lily Evans, James would’ve left ages ago. “Do they always talk about books?” James asked.Sirius shrugged. He hadn’t realised, until he sat down, that Remus and Lily seemed to have made some kind of arrangement that predominantly involved introducing him to the Greatest Hits of Muggle literature. He’d just thought they were being kind and occasionally lending and/or giving him their books. But this… This was a competition.Sirius kind of liked it. “Since when do you read books?” James asked. “I haven’t seen you touch your Potions or Charms book all year. And I’m pretty sure I saw you toss your Transfiguration book into the fire.”Sirius had done that, actually. He’d been particularly angry with McGonagall for giving him zero marks and taking away house points when he’d used wandless magic in class. “That’s because I already know all the spells in them. This—” Sirius gestured to Remus and Lily. “—This is Muggle stuff. Brave new world.”“Ooh,” Lily said, her attention snapping to Sirius and cutting off mid-sentence with whatever she’d been saying to Remus. She reached for a scrap of parchment. “That’s a brilliant one!” She turned back to Remus and glared. “But I’m saving that for later. He has to read The Three Musketeers first.”“No,” Remus said, with a patient sigh. “Beowulf logically comes next.”“What about Shakespeare?” James threw in.“No,” Remus and Lily snapped. Then, a sympathetic glance from Remus. “He’s got to work his way up to Shakespeare.”Sirius, who had been told this before, just shrugged at James.James held up his hands in mock surrender. To Sirius, he said, “I only know plays. My mum loves them and she takes me to see them. It’s fun, really. We dress in Muggle clothes. Mum wears a sari and Dad spends the whole day swooning. If we go to one of the authentic performances, blokes play the girls’ parts. Even Juliet.”Sirius tried to imagine what that was like, to have a mother who loved Muggle plays and culture so much that she took her son to see cross-dressers in a play. Once again, James Potter’s life seemed to be a fairy tale. “You’re the Marauders,” Lily insisted, which caused James to sit up proudly and preen a little. “He needs to read The Three Musketeers. It should be your bloody anthem!”“Beowulf should be our bloody anthem!” Remus shot back. “He’s a warrior king, a true Gryffindor who defeats monsters!”Sirius leaned forward, intrigued. “Do I get a say in all this?”“No,” Remus and Lily said, once more in unison. “I’m not doubting the merits of Beowulf,” Lily said, diplomatically. “I’m just saying that it’s my—”“Mr. Black?”Four heads snapped around to stare up at the frowning face and clipped voice of Professor Horace Slughorn.Something horrifically similar to dread settled in the pit of Sirius’s stomach. “Hello, Professor,” Sirius said, forcing his voice to come out upbeat and even. “Mr. Black,” Slughorn repeated. “I wasn’t able to catch you after class, but I wanted to speak with you.”Slughorn cast a glance over the table, which Sirius took to mean that Slughorn wanted to speak to him in private. Sirius wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to speak to Slughorn in private. He didn’t think he could handle it, if his intuition was correct. This was not a conversation that would bear glad tidings.Slughorn huffed in a way that reminded Sirius of his mother. He could almost hear Walburga Black’s clipped tone, picture her upturned nose. Pure blood matters are not discussed in the company of our lessers. For all Slughorn claimed to be above blood biases, he still deferred to pure blood traditions when it came to the finer pieces of his collection. And Sirius was meant to be the finest of them all, wasn’t he? The fucking Black heir. In that moment, Sirius hated Slughorn, with every fibre of his being. “Yes, Professor?” Sirius prompted, trying to convey with all the arrogance and authority of the Black heir that he was not moving from his seat. Slughorn gave a halfhearted shrug, as if to say Very well.“I received your mother’s letter yesterday morning, Black,” Slughorn said, conversationally, as all the air was sucked out of Sirius’s lungs. “I understand why your cousin didn’t mention it, seeing as the engagement’s meant to be a surprise for her, but I do wish you’d told me you won’t be able to attend my little Christmas gathering. But you must be with your family, I suppose. Pressures of the heir, and all that.”Slughorn chuckled, a deep, chortling thing that he clearly expected Sirius to reciprocate, but Sirius’s brain had frozen somewhere after the phrase, your mother’s letter.“It’s no problem to reschedule after the holidays,” Slughorn continued, woefully misinterpreting Sirius’s silence. “A private dinner will give us an opportunity to get better acquainted, I’m sure, far more so than an unnecessarily formal dinner gathering. Not that my exclusive Christmas party is too shabby, Miss Evans.”Sirius didn’t catch Lily’s reaction, if she had one at all. Slughorn hardly missed a beat before continuing. “There are quite a few things I’d like to discuss with you, Black. Am I correct in assuming your father still holds his seat on the Wizengamot? There’s one bill in particular that interests me, concerning magical—”“My mother’s letter?” Sirius said, his voice small and nearly broken. He hadn’t heard a word of Slughorn’s ramblings.“Yes, yes,” Slughorn said, pulling up short mid-sentence. He patted his robes, then rummaged through the pockets. “I do believe I still have it on me. Yes, here.”Sirius took the letter and stares down at the broken Black seal. Toujours Pur was printed in a harsh, yet elegant script right underneath, the same slanted pattern as the tattoo on his chest. His mother’s handwriting.
Professor Slughorn,
While I’m sure my son appreciates your invitation to your dinner party over the Christmas holidays, I am afraid that I must decline on his behalf. Sirius is needed at home for a rather important family matter. Andromeda Black, whom I believe was another star pupil of yours, is due to be engaged to Julius Fawley on Christmas Eve. Sirius, as the Black heir, is needed, as per his station in the Black family.
I am sure you understand.
Walburga Black
Matriarch of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black
His first thought was, I didn’t know my mother could sound so diplomatic.His second thought was his mother’s voice, ghostly and disembodied, but still as cruel as ever: Nice fucking try.His third was perhaps the most terrifying of them all: She knows I tried to run.Numbly, Sirius handed the letter back to Slughorn, who was still fucking talking. “I sincerely look forward to meeting with you in the new year, my dear boy, and further cultivating our relationship. It always helps to have a Black in my corner. Do tell Andromeda congratulations, after the surprise, of course. She was one of my best. Shame about that Ted Tonks, really, poor chap, but Andromeda has always had greater things her future.”Sirius wanted to punch Slughorn in his fucking face, if not for himself, then for Ted Tonks.“Until next time, then,” Slughorn said, rocking on his feet a little, still seemingly oblivious to the bomb he’d just placed so casually into Sirius’s hands. “Don’t forget your Potions essays. I expect great things out of both you and Evans, Black.”Then he was gone.The library was quiet. The library was always quiet—thanks, Madam Pince—but this was kind of silence that roared across snow covered fields in the dead of night: haunting and horrifying and carrying every sorrow left in the world. “Right,” said Remus, clapping his hands as loud as humanly possible. Everyone jumped but Sirius. “Marauders meeting—”“And Lily,” Lily demanded.Remus inclined his head. “Marauders meeting, and Lily. Our dormitory. Right fucking now.”Lily flicked her wand at the mess of books on the table and all at once they slammed shut. “Right,” James echoed, letting out a long breath. “I’ll go find Peter.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius didn’t remember exactly how he got from the library to the boys’ dormitory, but he was leaning towards some form of teleportation before he remembered Apparition was impossible within the school grounds. All he knew was that he was currently wrapped in not one, but two duvets, seated on Remus’s bed, with Lily pressed against one side and Remus sitting an inch away at his other. “Right,” James said, biting his lip. He stood next to Peter, with his arms crossed “And I mean this with all the love in the world, but…” He paused, then said in a rush: “ShoudEvansbehere?”Lily flicked two fingers up at him. “Fuck you, Potter.”“While I’m sure that would be lovely, my point is, she might not be aware of certain—”“I’m his friend,” Lily spat, every word laced with venom. “Yes, but does she know about—”“James!” Remus was quick. He hurled a pillow at James’s head with such force that James stumbled back into the door. Then, looking a little guilty, and glancing between a blank-faced Sirius and a rather indignant James, Remus said, “We swore an oath, remember? On our magic. We can’t say anything.”Oh, right. Sirius had nearly forgotten about that. “But she doesn’t know,” James said, with a vague gesture that was probably supposed to mean something. “I know enough,” Lily retorted. And Sirius shrugged, because, that’s right. She did. Probably. He was operating under the assumption that she’d figured him out. Sirius glanced around the room and, Merlin’s saggy tits, when did his secrets get thrown around in little bits and pieces like dirty fucking laundry? James and Peter knew enough about his less than ideal childhood to be bound by an oath of silence. Remus knew about his wand and his general hatred of physical contact, but thankfully, not the specifics of either. Lily knew about the tattoo on his chest and the blood curse and—“My parents—” Sirius started, by way of explanation.“Hurt you,” Lily finished.And, yep, she knew about that too. Lily Evans, cartographer of secrets.A half-crazed voice in the back of his head whispered that if he hadn’t seen her kindness or that little streak of reckless ferocity in her that made her so much more Gryffindor than Slytherin, he’d be absolutely terrified of her. Maybe he was scared of her all the same. Just a little. “Right,” Remus said. He pressed himself into Sirius’s side, just enough that Sirius felt the beginnings of pain, but not enough to actually hurt. “You are absolutely not going back there.”That same annoying voice gnawed at his subconscious, because Wasn’t that what I said to Remus a week ago?No one said anything for a solid minute. “All right,” Lily breathed, her voice steady and remarkably calming, given the circumstances. “I’ll ask the question if no one else will: How do we keep him here?”“What about your cousin?” Remus asked.“Narcissa?” Lily asked, her voice hitting a high note. “Andromeda,” James said.“The good one,” Peter added, helpfully. Sirius just shook his head. “I’ll write her, but… Slughorn was her plan. It’s all we were able to come up with since I was sorted. Plus, well…” Sirius thought back to Andromeda’s latest letter and her nearly three page rant about Julius Fawley. “She’s got her own shit to deal with.”“No offense, mate,” Peter began, his voice barely a squeak, “but what’s the difference in going back now and going back in the summer? You’ll have to go back in the summer. Everybody does. So maybe it would be better if you just went back now and—”“No fucking way,” Remus snarled. It was difficult to see from where he was sitting, but judging by the look of horror that washed over Peter’s face and the venom laced in Remus’s tone, Sirius was pretty sure that Remus had bared his teeth at Peter. Sirius didn’t know whether to be alarmed or flattered by that.“Remus,” Lily said, in a calm, soothing tone, as she gingerly reached around Sirius to put a hand on Remus’s shoulder. She turned her gaze to Peter. “Everything’s fresh on everyone’s mind right now, Peter. It’s a temporary fix, yes, but it’ll give Sirius time to let things calm down.”Sirius wished that were true. He’d give anything for that to be true, but it wasn’t. It couldn’t be, not with the Warden and her list of grievances. Sirius was sitting on a fucking time bomb and it was not so much a matter of if it’ll explode at all, but when and holy mother of Merlin, think of the fallout.Peter fucking Pettigrew was right. Christmas or summer, Sirius was fucked. All he’d wanted was to put it off as long as possible. “Doesn’t matter, does it?” Sirius said, and he was already through the sentence before he actually realised he was speaking out loud. “I’m going back for Christmas. That’s the end of it.”“Okay,” James said, clapping his hands together as he started to pace. “If you’re stuck going back there, then we’ll train you up. Defensive spells. All of them. Any one we can get ahold of. You said you could do magic at Grimmauld Place, yeah? We’ll just make sure you’re ready. You’ve got to work on your shield charms, anyways, mate.”The thought nauseated Sirius, because how much worse would it be if he actually dared to put up a fight?“No.” Sirius’s voice came out so quietly that James almost missed it.James opened and closed his mouth. Then, in a huff, he said, “Well, how do you know what it’ll be like? Maybe it’ll be fine. You’ll see your brother and your family and have a lovely Christmas dinner and maybe it’ll be just fine. You don’t know that—”“I know exactly what it’ll be like!” Sirius roared. The words felt like desperation, deep in his soul, but Merlin, it tasted like rage on his tongue. Sirius took a second to savour it. “I’ve known since I asked that bloody hat for Gryffindor.”Because how could James-fucking-Potter, fairytale prince from a fairytale family, even begin to comprehend the horrors that lurked in the shadows of Grimmauld Place?“Do you want to know, Jamie? Do you want to know what the Blacks will do to their pariah heir?” It came out detached, and maybe a little bit cruel, but Sirius was beyond caring. “They will do anything and everything short of ending my life or leaving a permanent mark. My mother is quite fond of the Cruciatus curse, did you know that? Do you know what that feels like, James? To see your fucking mother pointing her wand at you and--”“Sirius.” Remus’s voice cut through the muddled cloud of rage and terror in his mind. James looked, well, appropriately remorseful. Properly horrified, really. And maybe like he wanted a blanket of his own to hide under. Peter was as pale as a ghost.Oh, look, said that horrible voice in Sirius’s head. I’ve frightened them.Sirius let out a long, laboured breath. “It’ll be worse, now.”“W-worse?” squeaked Peter.“She knows I tried to get away.”Sirius watched as, one by one, realisation slowly washed over their faces. It took longer for James, just as Sirius knew it would, because how could the golden, fairytale prince possibly imagine the horrific monster that lie in wait to devour Sirius’s heart and soul? James Potter looked forward to his own homecoming and his smiling parents—his mum in a sari and his dad with his speckled grey hair sticking out every which way just like his son—would meet him on the platform, embrace him, smother him, then take him home to spoil him, dote on him, fatten him up before they sent him back to Hogwarts with his mother’s lipstick smeared across his cheek. Sirius didn’t envy James. Not really, though the annoyingly logical voice in the back of his head told him that any other sane person should envy James Potter. A kid like James Potter would never know what it’s liked to be unwanted, let alone the abject horror that seeped into your bones at the prospect of being loathed beyond all reason by someone who was supposed to love you.No, Sirius Black didn’t want to be James Potter. But, in that moment, he also very much didn’t want to be himself, either. A wave of emotionless detachment washed over him, the bizarrely unnatural feeling you get when you suddenly find yourself begging gods you don’t believe in to take it all back. Because maybe—maybe—it was better to have never been born at all.And, Merlin, what a comfortingly terrifying thought that was.Not for the first time—and certainly not the last—the voice in his head told him that he was batshit crazy. For once, Sirius agreed with it.“I don’t know what to do,” he found himself saying, because what else was there for him to say?For a long moment, no one said anything. Sirius was pretty sure no one even dared to breathe.Then, almost in unison, Remus and Lily glanced at each other—which wasn’t easy, seeing as Sirius was bundled in a mess of blankets between them—and Sirius was suddenly struck with the realisation that they’d spoken about this before. That they’d strategised ways to keep him at Hogwarts. He wasn’t sure how, exactly, that was possible, given Remus’s oath, but if Lily had approached Remus, then technically…Sirius supposed it didn’t matter. Either way, they’d somehow arrived at the same conclusion. “Right,” Lily sighed.“Pay the ferryman,” Remus said.“What?” James, Peter, and Sirius asked, in perfect, three-part harmony.“Pay the ferryman,” Remus repeated, emphasising every word. “It refers to the fee a dead soul gives to Charon, the ferryman, to cross the River Styx into the underworld.”“Well, isn’t that an optimistic metaphor,” Sirius muttered. Lily swatted him.“In certain versions of the myth,” Remus continued, as if Sirius hadn’t spoken, “the dead soul can bargain with Charon—or, more specifically, bribe him—for a better place in the underworld.”“The point is,” Lily cut in, “if you have the ferryman on your side, you might still be dead and fucked, but at least you have a modicum of control of where you end up.”“Okay,” James said slowly, dragging out the last syllable. He pushed his glasses up his nose. “If Sirius is the dead and fucked guy—”“Thanks, mate,” Sirius deadpanned.“—Then who is our ferryman in this particular scenario?”Once more, Remus and Lily exchanged a look over his head. Sirius glowered. He was not particularly fond being trapped between someone else’s silent conversation.“McGonagall,” Lily said.Peter outright laughed.James raised a finger and said, intelligently, “Uh…”Sirius let out a long, resigned breath. “Yeah, that was ‘Dromeda’s first plan too.”“McGonagall hates Sirius,” Peter said.“Yeah, uh. He’s not wrong,” James said. He tossed a sympathetic frown at Sirius. “Sorry.”Sirius just shrugged because, yeah, McGonagall definitely hated him. “Then we’ve got to get her to not hate him,” Lily said, in a tone that said, Yes, you morons, it really is that simple.“How?” James asked.“No more pranks, for one,” Lily replied. “At all. Not even the little ones you lot have been pulling under her nose. Leave the fucking Slytherins alone. At least until next term.”James looked sort of like he’d like very much to protest that point, but with a pointed glance at Sirius, he gave a curt nod. “Right. No more pranks.”“It wouldn’t hurt,” Remus said, slowly, “if Sirius improved his marks in Transfiguration. She’s been known to favour her best students.”“I am her best student,” Sirius muttered, his voice flat, because really, it was more a statement of fact than any kind of a boast. “She gives me bad marks because I can’t do shit with my wand.”Remus nudged Sirius with his shoulder. “You and I will practice before every Transfiguration class. If you can do everything with wandless magic, there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to do them with your wand. We’ll work on each one until you can.”Sirius had some doubts about the viability of that particular bit of the plan, but Merlin, he was desperate and figured it might just be worth the effort. Plus, if anyone could figure out a way to get his goddamned dying wand to work properly, it’d be Remus Lupin. “The four of us,” Lily said, her finger pointing at herself, Remus, James, and Peter, each in turn, “we do everything we possibly can to help Sirius do everything right. Then, at the end of the term, Sirius asks McGonagall for permission to stay in order to help me and Remus with a special research project.”“Research project?” James asked. “What research project?”“Wands,” Remus said, and Sirius felt his stomach drop. “Wandless magic, actually. Which is why Sirius specifically would be necessary to the project.”“We’ve already got it approved with Rattleburn for credit,” Lily added. “We can convince McGonagall, especially if she’s a little more… amenable towards Sirius. It’d be a much less theoretical project if we had Sirius work with us.”Sirius pushed himself back on the bed, sitting crosslegged in the middle, so he could better look between Remus and Lily. “When the fuck did you plan all this?” Sirius asked It didn’t come out angry, or even surprised, really. To everyone in the room, it sounded a hell of a lot like gratitude.“The second I figured out that Christmas might be a problem,” Lily said.Sirius couldn’t figure out if that just meant since the Malfoy Incident, or if it was a subtle way of saying that Lily Evans had had him figured out since the very beginning. “Oh,” he said, stupidly.“This could really work, Siri,” Remus said, shifting a little so he could nudge Sirius’s duvet-covered knee. “McGonagall’s Head of House. Her permission could override your mother’s demands if it were for a school-sanctioned project.”“Merlin,” James muttered, ruffling his hair so that it stuck out more than it normally did. “They’re right, Sirius. This could work.”Sirius let his eyes track over them. James, valiant fairytale prince with ridiculous hair that obeyed neither peasant nor product, and Peter, his loyal companion. Lily Evans, King, whose friendship and compassion were slowly becoming his lifeline. And Remus… Remus, who knew intimately of the kind of pain that was entirely beyond description, who knew of horror and madness and unfathomable kindness. Remus, braveheart Gryffindor, who looked at Sirius like he was as bright and as infinite as the star that burned in the night sky… Remus Lupin had a plan.“All right,” Sirius said, his voice a little hoarse and choked with emotion. “Let’s do it.”The plan was a long shot. It was insanity and improbability and involved begging Minerva McGonagall to save him, but Merlin, it was a chance. It wasn’t hope that began to simmer in his veins, per se. No, Sirius Black could no longer allow himself to be blindsided and maimed by the consequences of something as dangerous as hope.This… this was something like desperation, but Sirius didn’t care.It was a chance.“Right,” Remus said, smiling like the triumphant idiot that he was, all white teeth and amber eyes and pale, silver scars. “Grab your wand, Siri. We might as well start now.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
DECEMBER 13, 1971
The thing was, by all reasonable counts, it should have worked.He’d done everything right.He’d met with Remus—more often than their usual nights on the roof and afternoons in the library—and they’d practiced every single flick and swish of his wand before Sirius had even been allowed to try muttering the spell. It was clunky, imprecise work, and more often than not, it left one or both of them more than a little singed around the edges. Nonetheless, Sirius had sworn and cursed his way through it, and it’d worked. After many, many long hours (and more than one heartfelt bargain with his wand), Sirius had finally managed to turn a teacup into hummingbird. And the hummingbird hadn’t even puffed up and exploded, like it had in class the first time he’d tried it with his wand. That’d been the first one, less than a week after Slughorn delivered his news. Sirius was pretty sure that McGonagall’s eyes had nearly popped out from behind her square spectacles when Sirius had been the first person in class to produce a living, breathing, flying, non-exploding hummingbird in class. Though he could tell it’d pained her greatly, McGonagall had given him top marks. She had, however, made him stay after class in order to watch him perform the transfiguration not once, but four more times, until she’d been absolutely certain that Sirius had done it on his own, with his wand, without any assistance from one Remus Lupin. After that, it all just sort of fell into place. Sirius spent nearly every waking hour practicing various Transfiguration spells with his tempestuous wand, until he was quite certain that he’d memorised every goddamned page of Remus’s second-hand Transfiguration book, right down to the precise angle of the half-torn out page 236. Remus had been called home again, at the beginning of December, supposedl both because of his mum’s health and because he wouldn’t be home for the holidays. He’d been gone for nearly four days, which, by Sirius’s count, was certainly longer than normal. Lily and James had taken over Sirius’s extracurricular Transfiguration lessons, though Sirius suspected James had mostly been there because Lily was there. James and Lily had spent a majority of the time bickering and, Sirius, well… He’d spent most of the time trying to keep Lily from permanently maiming his best friend in between her adjustments and suggestions for Sirius’s own wand movements. In class that Friday, the remaining Marauders had been exhausted, and Sirius hadn’t been nearly as prepared as he’d been with Remus’s lessons. He’d barely noticed James and Lily’s quick consultation before class and hadn’t thought much of it, really, but then, when one of the Ravenclaws—probably Micah Or-Something—had been about to successfully transfigure his candle into a field mouse, James had sent a bolt of fire at his own candle, melting it instantly. McGonagall, successfully distracted, had proceeded to lecture James about how fire was not to be used in her classroom at all, ever, end of story, and Lily… Well, Lily had hexed the ever-living shit out of Micah Or-Something. Sirius still wasn’t entirely certain what she’d done, but he was more than certain that poor Micah Or-Something wet himself and had to make a hasty exit. The rest of the class had proceeded in a similar fashion: James and Lily had alternated their roles as the distraction and the one who hexed the Ravenclaw who’d almost got the spell right. Micah Or-Something, thankfully, had been the only one to actually leave the class, so McGonagall had been none-the-wiser, though certainly more than a little annoyed. James and Lily had been brilliant, really, because they timed their distractions with their ridiculous and elaborate arguments. “A summer wedding would be so much better, Evans,” James had whined. “Thirteen? Christ, Potter, no sane person would fuck you thirteen times, let alone bear that many children,” Lily had shouted, while James pantsed one of the Ravenclaws. This one had earned Lily Evans detention for two weeks, a stern lecture after class, and had cost Gryffindor twenty points. (So much for waiting until the second date.)Ten minutes before the end of class, and no one had successfully done their transfiguration. Any Ravenclaw that had gotten close had been promptly hexed, until nearly half the class had been sporting sores in uncomfortable places. McGonagall had been so frazzled and put out that she’d actually let out a sigh of relief when Sirius had finally—finally—conjured a field mouse from his candlestick with his wand. She’d awarded him the highest marks in the class and a reluctant five points to Gryffindor, before dismissing the class early in order to sufficiently yell at Lily and James. Sirius had waited outside, ready with both an apology for taking so long and numerous expressions of gratitude, but Lily had just shrugged when she’d walked out, her head held high and proud. “You have to be the best. If this is going to work, McGonagall’s got to know that you’re the best,” she’d said.James had clapped him on the shoulder, with a quick, You’re welcome, mate, and then had proceeded to tell Sirius that it wasn’t that big of a deal, because it meant that James got to serve detention with Lily until the end of the term. Apparently, it hadn’t mattered much that they were going to be scrubbing toilets with Filch.Sirius’s good mood had lasted until that Sunday, when Remus had stumbled up the dormitory stairs some time after dinner. His eyes had been sunken, though still flecked with gold, and dark purple bruises had formed underneath them. Both of his wrists had been bleeding through his rumpled shirt again, which very nearly sent Sirius into full panic mode, but Remus had just waved him off, whispering over and over, “I’m fine, Siri. I’m fine.”Sirius hadn’t believed it for a goddamned second, but he’d allowed Remus to disappear into the bathroom for a long, hot shower. When Remus had slipped into Sirius’s bed that night, his wrists had been wrapped in what looked like the torn and tattered remains of his shirt. Blood had still seeped out, a little watery, still wet from the shower, but neither of them had cared. Sirius had whispered, “I’m so fucking glad you’re not going home for the holidays.”Remus had sobbed into his pillow. Sirius had thrown the duvet over him and pretended the tears and the blood and the scars didn’t matter. The whole staying-out-of-trouble thing had proven to be a bit more complicated than the winning-McGonagall’s-heart thing. The Marauders were, by nature, troublemakers, and Sirius Black most of all. James and Sirius had, for the better part of the month, been fielding more of their time-sensitive ideas off to the Prewetts, which was both satisfying to see the pranks completed and the destruction wrought, but utterly devastating that they would never bear the Marauders’ trademarked name into infamy. The Slytherins were a whole other matter, because despite Sirius’s pledge to leave them alone (and the Marauders’ similar pledge out of sheer solidarity), the Slytherins were bound by no such obligations. The Carrows—who Sirius considered Enemies Numbers Three and Four, immediately after Snape and Malfoy—took particular delight in nagging and tormenting the Marauders, especially after they figured out there seemed to be no retaliation. The Carrows had spelled Peter’s eyes shut, they’d cursed James to yodel everything for nearly two full days, and they’d once again given Remus vampire fangs—and that was just in the first week. They still hadn’t touched the goddamned Black heir. Sirius seethed, swearing up and down he’d curse them into oblivion the second the next term started, but he did nothing. All things considered, it could have been worse. Malfoy could have gotten involved. Sirius could tell—even from across the Great Hall—how much Malfoy wanted to curse the ever-living shit out of him, but McGonagall had threatened Malfoy’s prefect badge and Malfoy was, at his very nature, the least-subtle, unimaginative, cowardly bastard on the fucking planet. Sirius had a sneaking suspicion that Lily Evans had been keeping a tight leash on Severus Snape as well. They were talking again, even after the Malfoy Incident and the Great Snape Confession, and for the most part, they seemed to be friends. He saw them in the library every once in a while, sitting close together and whispering, and when he did, he’d spin on his heel and go to find Remus or James. Sirius both hated and couldn’t even begin to understand how Lily could be friends with Snivellus, but he’d sworn to her that he wouldn’t interfere.Every now and then, when he’d be sitting with Lily in the library or the Great Hall and caught Snape glowering at them, Sirius found himself wondering if Lily was holding Snape to a similar promise. He wondered if Snape loved Lily enough to tolerate her friendship with Sirius.In a bizarre twist of fate, it was Crabbe and Macnair who’d started it. Of all the Slytherins that Sirius knew and loathed, up until this moment, Sirius wouldn’t have even ranked the sixth-year-Crabbe and fourth-year-Macnair in the top twenty on his surprisingly thought-out list of enemies. They were, the both of them, more followers than instigators, and both rather stupid. It was Regulus’s birthday. More specifically, it was Regulus’s eleventh birthday. Sirius was up early, as always, and sat in his bed to scribble down a quick letter to his brother. He’d summoned a proper quill from James’s bag, rather than using Remus’s ballpoint, just on the off chance that his mother had been burning his letters simply because they were written with Muggle ink and not just because they were from Sirius. The letter was quick, simple, full of Happy fucking birthday and Did you get your Hogwarts letter yet?!!!!Sirius’s own Hogwarts letter had come later in the evening on his eleventh birthday. He couldn’t quite decide if it was because the owl post was delayed for the day or if seven in the evening was the actual hour of his birth and therefore his exact eleventh birthday. He hadn’t quite wanted to ask his mother, most especially because neither his mother nor father acknowledged that it actually was his birthday until that damn owl flew threw the window at dinner. He didn’t want it to be like that for Regulus. Regulus deserved to have his birthday acknowledged, even if the acknowledgment wasn’t immediately accompanied by a Hogwarts letter. Remus stirred on the other side of the pillow-barrier when Sirius slipped from underneath the covers. “Siri? What time is it?”Sirius pulled on his boots and a thick Gryffindor robe that had to be James’s. “Half five. Go back to sleep.” “Where’re you going,” Remus muttered into his pillow and, really, it came out more like a whine than a question. “Letter to Regulus. It’s his birthday.”Remus let out a long, mournful groan, then shoved himself upright. He didn’t look to happy to be vertical. Light brown curls stuck out egregiously on one side, while they were pressed flat against his skull on the other. There were bags under his eyes and the scars on his face seemed to glow just a little in the pale, morning light. Remus Lupin was not a morning person. “I’m coming with you,” Remus Lupin said anyway. Sirius froze, halfway through the process of tucking Regulus’s letter in an empty pocket of James’s robe—if he could find an empty pocket, that is. “What? Why?”Remus shrugged, then it immediately turned into a stretch. “Keep an eye on you, I suppose.”Sirius narrowed his eyes, not quite sure how he felt about a babysitter, even if it was Remus. “You should sleep.”“I’ll sleep in History of Magic.” Remus stood and pulled on his own robe: a tattered, brown-ish thing that was probably once soft and comforting. “Model student, you are,” Sirius muttered, but he didn’t protest any more. He enjoyed Remus’s company. Even grumpy, morning Remus. They made their way to the West Tower, and Remus waited at the bottom of the stairs while Sirius climbed up to the owlery. He whistled twice, before the small barn owl that usually carried his letters to Andromeda landed on his arm. Sirius had named the owl Rogelio, because between him and Andromeda, Rogelio was the most ridiculous name for an owl that they could come up with. Rogelio didn’t seem to mind it, and despite belonging to Hogwarts, he was quick and unyieldingly loyal to Sirius, even though, more often than not, Sirius forgot the owl treats. Andromeda said it had something to do with the natural charm and charisma of being the Black heir.Sirius thought that was bullshit. He was naturally charming and charismatic on his own, thanks.Sirius tied the letter to Rogelio’s leg, then fished in the pocket of his robe for some leftover biscuit crumbs—(Gross, James.)—to give the owl before sending him off. Remus was slumped against the wall when Sirius descended the stairs. He thought for a moment Remus was asleep again, but then one amber eye quirked open. “When are you going to ask McGonagall about the holidays?” Remus yawned into the question.“Friday, I think,” Sirius replied. When Remus made no move to stand, Sirius slid down the wall opposite him and mirrored his position exactly. “Evans has this whole week of good deeds planned. I’m tutoring third year Ravenclaws on their Charms homework, then helping Madam Pince sort through library returns—that was Evans’s idea and, please, kill me now—then something with Madam Pomfrey. I think.”“How very altruistic of you,” Remus deadpanned, though the corner of his lip twitched upwards in a small, secret smile. “Seemingly selfless deeds to further my own ends,” Sirius replied, matching his tone to Remus’s. “My mother would be so proud.”“Pay the ferryman,” Remus said, and really, that was the end of it.Sirius smiled, and it was only a little bit forced. “Feel like breakfast?”“Breakfast doesn’t start for another hour,” Remus replied, but his stomach growled loud enough for Sirius to hear. Sirius snorted a laugh, then pulled himself to his feet. “Doesn’t matter. I know where the kitchens are. You up for bribing the house elves into feeding us?”For a second, Sirius thought Remus might protest because bribery and extortion, technically, were probably not ideal behaviour for someone who was supposed to be on his best behaviour, but in the end, Remus’s stomach won out. “Lead the way,” he said.Halfway down the stairs to the basement, Remus stopped so abruptly Sirius very nearly smacked into him. “Re, wha—”“Shh.”Sirius swallowed a pit of dread that suddenly settled in his throat. “What is it?”“Slytherins.”Shit. “Crabbe. And Macnair. I think.”Sirius tried to edge around Remus, to see what might be going on, but Remus stepped in his way, again narrowly avoiding touching him. Remus turned on his heels to face Sirius.“Crabbe has Renada Pines pinned against the wall. She’s a third year Hufflepuff. They’ve hexed her and she’s bleeding from somewhere and the Macnair is saying some horrible things.”Sirius wasn’t entirely sure how Remus could know all that—he wasn’t even sure when Remus had had a chance to look around the corner without Sirius noticing—but that wasn’t important.Macnair’s voice carried through the hall. “Fucking Mudblood slut. Never learns her place, does she?”Sirius called his magic to his fingers, felt it dance, felt it flair up with the anger welling inside him. Next to him, Remus…Well, for a hot second there, Sirius was pretty sure Remus growled.“Right, then,” Sirius said. “This’ll be fun. Let’s go.”Remus grabbed for his sleeve, narrowly missing the bare skin on Sirius’s wrist, and Sirius instantly leaped back to avoid the touch.“Remus, what the hell?” Sirius hissed. For a half a second, Remus had the decency to look mildly apologetic. “You can’t be here.”“What?”“Pay the ferryman,” Remus said, with a shrug. “McGonagall won’t side with you if she catches you hexing Slytherins.”“But they’re—”
Hurting her. Maiming her.
Remus said there was blood.“I know,” Remus snapped. “I know, okay? And they’re not going to get away with it.”Sirius gave him a look that he hoped properly conveyed his great distaste for this whole situation, specifically the part about Remus being right about McGonagall.“You’re going to go find McGonagall,” Remus said. “You’re going to tell her what’s going on and get her to come down here immediately. I’m going to—” Remus waved his hand in the vague direction of where the Slytherins had Renada Pines pinned. “—help.”“You want me to snitch?!” He felt the blood curdling in his veins at the very thought of it. It didn’t seem very Gryffindor to Sirius.“I need you to be safe. I don’t care about the fucking Slytherins. I need to know that you’re safe, no matter what, and if you get in trouble now, you won’t be.”Every instinct Sirius had screamed at him to fight Remus on this. Crabbe and Macnair were dangerous. All Slytherins seemed to already have it in for Remus. Crabbe and Macnair were fucking monsters and Remus was about to throw himself in their path to save a Hufflepuff and—“Please, Sirius,” Remus all but begged. “There are far more terrifying monsters out there than these tow morons. I won’t let you throw away your chance of escape. I need you to be safe.”Goddamnit.Sirius gave a shaky nod, turned on his heel, then headed back up the stairs. It didn’t really occur to him until he was halfway to McGonagall’s office that he wasn’t exactly sure where McGonagall typically was at this hour. If she wasn’t in her classroom, she’d be in her quarters, and for the life of him, Sirius had no idea where the professors stayed.
For the love of Merlin, someone really needs to make a map of this place.
His heart racing, Sirius sent a prayer to every deity he could think of as he knocked on McGonagall’s office door. Once, twice, three times, then nothing. He tried again, two quick raps, then he slapped his palms helplessly against the door.He was torn between spelling the door open, running aimlessly through the halls shouting for McGonagall, or racing back to the kitchens to help Remus and the Hufflepuff, his own fate be damned. “Shit,” Sirius mumbled, but he called his magic to his hands, little red sparks dancing between his fingertips. The door swung open.McGonagall loomed over him, her hair done up perfectly and her robes freshly pressed. She looked like she did during every lesson, not anything like he’d expected her to this early in the morning.She scowled at him, a few wrinkles forming at the corners f er down-turned lips. Absently, Sirius wondered if those wrinkles had been there this whole time, or if he could take personal responsibility for them. He’d be rather proud of himself if it was the latter.“Mr. Black.” McGonagall’s voice was laced with poison. “Is there a reason you’re trying to break into my office this early in the morning?”“I knocked,” Sirius protested, then reined himself in. He didn’t have time to argue with her. “Remus and—”“I will not have you breaking into my office for some prank—”Merlin’s balls, she was impossible.“Crabbe and Macnair have Rendada Pines pinned in the hallway by the kitchens. She’s hurt and Remus said she’s been hexed. He stayed to stop them. I came for help.”McGonagall paused for a whole five seconds, her eyes zeroed in on his. Sirius did not dare look away. “Is this a joke, Black?” McGonagall asked. “Because, rest assured, if it is—”“No! It’s not a joke. She’s hurt, Professor. They hurt her and she needs help.”An eyebrow went up, just over the rim of McGonagall’s square spectacles. “Please, Professor.”Remus put himself in danger to protect Sirius. Sirius was not above begging McGonagall to make sure Remus was safe, too.“Very well,” McGonagall said. She stepped aside and gestured to the empty chair in her office. “You will sit there until such time as I return. You will not move a single inch. If I find out that this is any sort of a trick—”“Detention for the next millennia, a letter home, and writing lines until my hand falls off?” Sirius supplied.McGonagall pursed her lips. “Indeed.”Sirius brushed past her and sat in the chair. By the time he turned around, she’d already left. She was only gone fifteen minutes. Sirius bit his nails and fidgeted the entire time. He ripped a hangnail off his index finger, then flicked his wrist to quickly heal it before the blood welled up.McGonagall walked back into her office in a flurry of now-slightly-rumpled robes, trailed by Remus. Sirius sat up straight, but did not stand, as Remus took a seat next to him. Remus had a bruise under his right eye, but otherwise appeared fine. He gave Sirius a small smile and a nod that was probably meant to convey something, but Sirius couldn’t quite work past the bruise and the gnawing guilt that had settled in his stomach.Remus was hurt and Sirius had been sitting here the entire time.“I’m fine, Sirius,” Remus whispered, seeing the look on his face. Sirius muttered a quick Episkey and pointed his finger at Remus’s cheek. The bruise very quickly faded from purple to green to yellow, then it was gone and Remus was indeed fine.Both boys turned to see McGonagall staring between them. She wore an expression that Sirius couldn’t quite read, but if he had to guess, he’d say she was confused by their exchange. “Professor?” Sirius asked. His voice seemed to bring her back to the present and her expression neutralised. “Ms. Pines is being treated by Madam Pomfrey as we speak. She’s expected to make a full recovery. I’ve entrusted the discipline of the Misters Crabbe and Macnair to Professor Slughorn, with the assurance that they are banned from the Quidditch team for the rest of their time at Hogwarts. Mr. Black, Mr. Lupin…”Both Sirius and Remus sat up a little straighter. “For your actions today, I’m awarding ten points to Gryffindor.”The bitter, cynical voice in Sirius’s head said that if he’d been James Potter, McGonagall would’ve shelled out fifty points. “You did the right thing, Mr. Black, in coming to me.” A crease appeared on McGonagall’s forehead as she said it and Sirius very nearly laughed at the physical pain it seemed to cause her to compliment him.“If that’s all,” McGonagall said, “I expect to see the two of you at breakfast in an hour.”Remus leaned forward in his chair, a hand held out to Sirius to tell him to stay put.“Professor?” Remus asked.McGonagall frowned. “What is it, Mr. Lupin?”Remus turned to Sirius with a look on his face that Sirius understood instantly. This was it. If Sirius planned on asking McGonagall to stay over the holidays, he had to do it now, when he had somehow miraculously ended up in her favour. “I do not have all day, Mr. Lupin.”Sirius took a breath, then put on his most innocent face, and recited the words that he’d been practicing with Lily for weeks. “Professor, as you know, Remus and Lily Evans have been given special permission to conduct research on the nature and workings of wandless magic over the holidays. They’re in need of a test subject and they asked me to be their, ah, lab rat, I suppose. So I was hoping I could get your permission to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays to help them on their… academic endeavours. Please?”Okay, so that wasn’t exactly how they’d rehearsed it, that last sentence came out in a single breath, and the please was more of an afterthought, but there it was. His fate in Minerva McGonagall’s hands. Sirius was pretty sure his heart was going to leap out of his chest. McGonagall held his gaze for a long, painful minute, her expression entirely inscrutable. Neither Remus nor Sirius dared to breathe.Finally, with a deep frown, McGonagall said, “If you want to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays, Mr. Black, then you’ll need written permission from a parent.”Remus took over when Sirius waited too long to respond. “Professor, Sirius’s parents have been somewhat… apathetic towards our project. Lily and I really want Sirius involved. He’s the best either of us have seen at wandless magic and we’d like to test the limits of what he can do. We’d hoped, as Sirius’s Head of House, you could over-rule his parents and—”“No.”Sirius’s entire world came crashing down with one word.That’s what it was. It was just No. Not No, I’m sorry, Black, but I must obey the rules. Not No, but maybe if you’d been a better student or hexed fewer Slytherins. Not even No, your actions today were pretty bloody heroic all the same. Good job, Mr. Black. You may be damned but you’re still a hero.Just fucking No.Remus looked to be on that same razor-edge between sanity and total panic that Sirius was. “Please, Professor, if you’d just consider…” Remus’s voice hitched and he started over. “You’ve seen how Sirius’s magic works. He just healed my face with a wave of his hand, for Merlin’s sake. Have you ever seen anyone who could—”McGonagall’s piercing stare cut to Remus. “Professor Dumbledore has numerous books on the subject of wandless magic, Lupin. If you and Evans write to him, explaining your project, he’s sure to lend them to you. As for a live subject, if you ask nicely, I’m positive Professor Dumbledore will be more than willing to demonstrate the mechanics of wandless magic for you. Without permission from his parents, Black will not be allowed to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays.”“But, Professor, please—”“No.”Her voice was harsh. Cruel, even. The final nail on Sirius’s coffin.Remus looked terrified, like he was debating between going to war with McGonagall or taking Sirius and running as far as he could before they were caught and executed. He kept sneaking glances at Sirius, amber eyes pleading for a response, but Sirius was… shell-shocked. Numb all over. “But… I did everything right.” Sirius’s voice came out broken, scared, as if whispered by someone much younger than twelve to the monster lurking under their bed.He wasn’t even aware he’d said that out loud until McGonagall’s eyes trained on him and they were… Murderous.Even Walburga Black would cower in fear. “Am I to believe, Black—” She spat out his name, like the poison it was. “—that your improved behaviour these past few weeks was motivated under the assumption that I would grant you a favour?”Remus made a small noise. “No, Professor, it wasn’t like that, I—”“Quiet, Lupin!” She never looked away from Sirius.Sirius tried valiantly to melt into his chair. McGonagall placed both hands flat on her desk and leaned forward. “Listen to me very closely, Black. I will not allow you to manipulate me into any favours. You name, your station, your family’s influence means nothing to me and I will not tolerate this idea that you seem to have that you can get away with anything just because of who you are. That is how Slytherins behave, Mr. Black, not Gryffindors and I will not stand for this blatant form of bribery in my house. Am I understood?”“Professor, that’s not—” Remus started.McGonagall’s sharp glare cut Remus off.Sirius just nodded, just threw in the towel and fucking rolled over and surrendered to the inevitable, because what else could he possibly do?“I will let you off just this once, on behalf of Ms. Pines and her continued safety thanks to your actions, but if I ever catch wind of this sort of behaviour again, Black, you and I will have a serious conversation about your continued future at Hogwarts.”Remus frantically glanced between Sirius and McGonagall, not quite willing to give up the fight. “Please, Professor, he can’t go home, it’s—”“Why not?” McGonagall demanded.But Remus couldn’t say, and Sirius wasn’t going to. Remus made a promise and Sirius was too much of a coward to acknowledge the horrors that awaited him out loud. McGonagall’s lips pressed into a thin line. “I will hear no more of this. The two of you are needed at breakfast.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius went to breakfast. He’s pretty sure he went to History of Magic, then lunch, then Potions—(Maybe? Did he have Potions today?)—and dinner, but he spaced it all out. No one really spoke to him or bothered him and everyone seemed to even deliberately avoid brushing past him in the halls, but Sirius didn’t think too much of it. He didn’t think too much of anything, really. Just one thought, over and over, and over.He was fucked.He was vaguely aware of Remus, hovering close all day, frantically whispering to James, then Lily, then Peeves? Did Remus talk much to Peeves?By the time reality settled back around him, it was dark. The stars were shining overhead and Sirius was wrapped in a duvet that smelled like Remus, sitting in his usual spot on the roof. Remus rapped on the window before climbing out, startling Sirius out of whatever fog he’d been in. Remus gave Sirius a weak smile, then sat down next to him, pressing up against the duvet from shoulder to hip.Oh, how Sirius relished the dull pain.“James said you made everyone else leave,” Remus muttered.Sirius nodded, though if he’s honest, he didn’t quite remember doing that.“Do you want me to leave?”“No,” Sirius said. “You’re different.”Remus gave him a look that said he’d very much like to explore that particular statement in depth, but he let it drop. “Lily’s been in McGonagall’s office for over an hour, pleading your case.”Remus didn’t seem particularly optimistic about the outcome, and, quite honestly, neither did Sirius . There was nothing else to do. He didn’t have any hope left to place on the shoulders of Lily Evans, no matter how stubborn she could be. He wasn’t sure he had much of anything left in him. Nothing felt real anymore.He’d chosen Gryffindor, he’d made these friends who seemed to care about him far more than he was worth, and for what?Nothing.Walburga Black was going to carve away any speck of Gryffindor he had left in him, chisel him down until he was once again her perfect heir. “I’m so fucking scared, Remus,” he said, and Merlin, where had the words even come from? Remus draped an arm across Sirius’s shoulders and, gods, it hurt, but it was real and tangible and this chosen pain was so much better than the nothing welling up in his soul. Sirius leaned into the touch for as long as he could stand it, teeth gritted together and eyes squeezed shut. All too soon, Remus pulled away and put some distance between them. “What can I do, Siri? There has to be something I can do.”Sirius shook his head, because there just wasn’t anything else to do. This was it. His last chance, and it’d exploded in his face. He didn’t have any more cards to play. On Saturday, he was going home to Grimmauld Place. To his mother and his father and a brother who might not even want to speak with him. Home, to a prison of torture and terror and whatever corporal and psychological punishments the Warden could concoct. Home, to be tormented for trying to be brave, when everyone knew he was a coward.Home, with a dead wand and a virtual noose around his neck.Home, for nearly three fucking weeks. “What can I do, Sirius?” Remus repeated, a note of pained desperation in his voice.Sirius reached for anything left, that last little spark of courage in his heart and finally managed a smile. “Read to me?” he said. “Until it’s too cold.”Amber eyes glistened with unshed tears and so, so many unspoken words between them, but Remus bit his lip and nodded. He drew his wand and muttered a quick spell. A second later, an old, beat-up paperback came floating through the open window. “Fuck what Evans says,” Remus proclaimed, opening the book after casting a quick Lumos. “Tonight, we’re reading Beowulf. He’s an expert at killing monsters, and, quite frankly, between the two of us, I think we need a monster slayer. Take notes.”Sirius managed a soft laugh, then waved a heating charm over the both of them. He got lost in the stars, in the steady cadence of Remus’s voice, in the epic story of a man who never stopped fighting the monsters that came for him.It wasn’t hope that settled in Sirius’s heart, because hope was long gone and had left him empty of almost anything. Terror still ate away at his insides, itself a raging monster threatening to swallow Sirius Black whole, but this?This was stolen, and wholly undeserved peace, next to Remus Lupin, on the roof of Gryffindor tower. He knew it wouldn’t last, but Sirius revelled in it, for as long as there were still words left on the pages of Remus’s books, no matter the fate that had already been written for him when he returned to Grimmauld Place.Here, now, Sirius was safe. He swore on everything that he believed in—on friendship, on James Potter’s ridiculous hair or Lily Evans’s freckles, on the stars shining infinitely above them, on the miraculous, leyline pattern of scars on Remus’s face—Sirius swore on everything holy left in the world that he’d hold onto this moment for as long as he still drew breath. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
DECEMBER 18, 1971
Sirius was up, dressed, packed, and down in the courtyard on Saturday morning while everyone else was either eating breakfast in the Great Hall or packing in the dormitory. It wasn’t because he was in any way excited about the prospect of going home—the opposite, in every possible way—but because he didn’t know if he had the strength left in him to bear everyone else’s excitement. Though he knew James was as rightfully terrified for him as Remus and Lily were, James couldn’t quite keep the excitement out of his voice whenever he talked about the holidays. Fairy-tale prince.Sirius loved him for it, and decided he’d give almost anything to make sure that James Potter never had to face the kind of monster that lived in Grimmauld Place. It was freezing in the courtyard and Sirius wrapped his scarf tighter around his neck. He’d transfigured it back to its original silver and green, though he doubted, at this point, it would make much of a difference when he got home.His parents already knew he’d chosen Gryffindor over Slytherin. At a quarter to nine, Sirius’s head snapped up when he heard the steady clop of hooves and the rough grinding of wheels against cobblestone. One after another, droves of thestral-drawn carriages pulled into the courtyard. The lead carriage marched right up to Sirius, coming to a halt in front of him. The two thestrals huffed, and one stamped its foot against the ground, its wings flaring a bit and knocking against the wings of the other. Sirius was in awe of the creatures. They were huge, for one, and as horrendously beautiful as the end of a nightmare: heart-pounding, gasping in relief to once more see the waking world. He’d seen them from a distance, of course, both in Care of Magical Creatures and at the beginning of the year when they’d first disembarked from the Hogwarts Express. Sirius reached out a hand and the two thestrals edged closer, the one on the left ducking its enormous head so Sirius could stroke its nose. The thestral nickered its approval of the touch and pressed closer and Sirius wrapped both his hands around the thestrals nose, scratching and stroking. He stared into the thestrals eyes, endless pools of shadows and mist, with no discernible pupils, maybe nothing more than empty sockets, an unfathomable abyss that knew only nothing and death. Oh, how Sirius longed to fall into that abyss.“You can see them, too, huh.”Remus didn’t sound particularly surprised at the fact. Sirius, however, was rather surprised by the fact that Remus could see them.He wasn’t going to ask about it, though. If he asked Remus, then Sirius would have to tell him why he could see the thestrals, and Sirius was nowhere near prepared to explain the whole story of Alphonse Auclair right now. He simply shrugged and let it drop. Remus walked up next to him, his hands in his pockets and his head bowed a bit. Sirius did not release his grip on the thestral, nor did the creature back away from Remus. Cautiously, Remus reached out a hand to Sirius’s thestral. The thestral’s empty, shadowed eyes never left Remus as it slowly extracted itself from Sirius’s hold and pressed its face into Remus’s hand. The thestral’s eyes closed and it pressed closer to Remus. It let out a sound that could only be described as a purr.“It likes you,” Sirius said, and really, that was probably the most surprising thing yet. Every creature they’d encountered, from Hickory Dave to Hagrid’s kneazle, Spot, had shied away from Remus or, on more than one memorable occasion, run screaming in the other direction.The thestral edged closer, until its forehead was pressed against Remus’s.“It has no reason to be afraid of me,” Remus replied, and Sirius wondered if that was supposed to be some sort of explanation. “Christ, Sirius, it’s beautiful.”The thestral backed away as other students began to trickle into the courtyard, bowing to Remus as it did so. Sirius looked around: smiling faces wrapped in hats and scarves and winter robes, thrilled to be going home for the holidays. Merlin, he was going to be sick. His breaths came out in short, aborted gasps, and the edges of his vision went fuzzy. Remus very deliberately grabbed his arm. Sirius gasped and his eyes locked on Remus’s, one, because it burned like divine fucking hellfire, and two, because Remus Lupin never intentionally touched him without a significant barrier between them. “Promise me you’ll come back,” Remus whispered, his voice as broken and shattered as Sirius’s heart. “For the love of God, Sirius, please come back.”Shakily, Sirius nodded, though he wasn’t sure he could promise such a thing, not with where he was going. For all he knew, if his parents didn’t outright kill him, he could be shipped of to Durmstrang at the start of next term. Then, Remus pulled him into a hug, and long, impossibly strong arms wrapped tightly around Sirius’s waist. He wanted to cry or scream or pull away, because every nerve in his body was on the verge of spontaneous combustion, but instead he gritted his teeth and dug his fingers into Remus’s coat, clinging to him for all he’s worth. Sirius pressed his face into Remus’s neck, letting out a sob, because everything fucking hurt, but it didn’t matter.This…. This was real. This was pain he’d only begun to fathom. This was a reason to live, a reason to grit his teeth through the horrors at Grimmauld Place.This was a promise that he’d come back. After a moment, a minute, half of an eternity, Remus pushed him away and took a step back. They were both breathing hard, and Sirius couldn’t stop shaking, whether from pain or fear, he couldn’t say. “I’ll be okay,” Sirius said, but they both knew it was a lie. James and Peter made their way up to them, James’s carefree smile fading to nothing when he saw Sirius. Sirius’s gut clenched. What was left of his pride flared up and roared at the pity in James’s eyes, but outwardly, Sirius kept his face blank. “Right, then,” James said, clapping Remus on the shoulder. “Talk me up to Evans, yeah? Tell her I love her.”“Not a chance in hell,” Remus replied, his voice sounding strained.For once in his life, James didn’t press the issue. Instead, he pulled Remus into a quick hug, then strolled towards the carriage. “See you next term,” James said, with a forced smile. He was trying to be brave for all of them. With one last pat on the thestral’s nose, Sirius made to follow James and Peter into the carriage.Remus’s eyes never left Sirius’s, brilliant amber shining in the morning sun. Merlin, Sirius prayed he could remember that forever. “Yeah,” said Remus. “Next term.”Sirius didn’t smile. He didn’t even react, because he’d already made that promise.Now, he just had to survive.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
DECEMBER 18, 1971
Sirius didn’t stay in the compartment at the end of the train with James and Peter for very long. Not even long enough to stash his bag, really, but he couldn’t stand it. James made three separate, aborted attempts at conversation and Peter just kept looking at him, like maybe it was the last time he’d see Sirius alive. Wasn’t that a comforting thought.Sirius mumbled an excuse—he wasn’t even sure what, really—and stood. James stood with him and pulled Sirius into a bone-crushing hug. “You’ll be fine, Black,” James said into Sirius’s hair, but it was forced and hurt that much more. “Just… be brave, okay?”Sirius wasn’t brave. He was stupid and reckless and he’d somehow conned his way into Gryffindor, just like McGonagall thought. Just like James had thought, those first few days. Nothing about Sirius Black was real, not the power of his name, nor his friends, nor anything that happened the past few months. He was an empty shell, standing on the cusp of hellfire, ready to be forged into whatever his mother wanted. Peter patted his arm and muttered something, but Sirius didn’t quite catch it. He unlatched the compartment door and made his way through the corridor.He felt the nothing-pain of Peter’s hand long after the echoes of James’s hug faded away. Nothing always felt worse. It reminded him of who he was—what he was—and that horrible, damning tattoo on his chest that made sure he could never escape the course mapped out for him. That was real. Fuck.Narcissa made a disgruntled huff when Sirius slipped into their compartment. She crossed her arms, moved to the seat next to Lucius Malfoy. Sirius slipped into Narcissa’s vacant seat and threw his bag down next to him, hopefully to dissuade any other Slytherins from thinking they’re welcome to sit next to him. “I’m missing Slughorn’s Christmas party because of you,” Narcissa spat at him. “Mother wouldn’t have had to push Andromeda’s engagement if she hadn’t tried to help you run away.”Something dark and cannibalistic settled in the pit of Sirius’s stomach. Andromeda’s eminent engagement to Julius Fawley was his fault. No one escaped the Warden’s punishment. Lucius Malfoy traced the line of the pale, pink scar on his left cheek.“You’re fucked, Black,” Malfoy sneered. “What do you think your mother will have to say about your little half-breed boyfriend?”
Remus.
No.
Something wild and vicious flared to life in Sirius’s veins, something that felt eerily similar to the insanity of a man who was already damned. Magic danced between Sirius’s fingertips, sparking and crackling to the surface, ready to be released. His right hand itched to draw his wand—not so much for practical use in a potential duel, but for the sheer intent and intimidation factor of facing one’s enemies with a wand drawn—but the wand was packed away in his trunk, and Sirius was well aware that both Malfoy and Narcissa knew he didn’t need a wand to be a major contender in a duel. “You don’t touch him,” Sirius hissed, baring his teeth. “You don’t fucking look at him. You don’t say his name.”“He’s one, pathetic little half-breed. I will speak to him and treat him as he deserves. You can’t make me do anything, Black.”“I’ll make you a deal, Malfoy,” Sirius said, surprised at the calmness and clarity in his own voice, despite the panicked mantra in his head of Keep Remus safe, god-fucking-damnit. Sirius gestured to Malfoy’s scar. “You get one shot at me. Same spell, aimed at me, one shot. I won’t fight back.”Malfoy waved him off. “I am already owed revenge for that, Black. There’s no point in—”“Then, in addition to your revenge,” Sirius said, swallowing the fear that welled up inside him, “I’ll grant you a favour.”Something flared in Malfoy’s eyes as he leered at Sirius. “A favour?”“Yes.” Fuck.Malfoy quirked an eyebrow. “Anything?”“Anything.”
Shit shit shit.
Malfoy leaned back in his seat and crossed his arm, that wicked smile still plastered on his stupid face. “You really want to make that deal? You don’t even know what Lupin is. Not really. If you did, you’d—”“You really want to talk me out of this, Malfoy?” Sirius snapped back. He didn’t give a damn about whatever Malfoy had on Remus. It didn’t fucking matter. “I’m the Black heir. More than a few people would kill to have me in their debt.”There’s no way that ends well, the horribly logical voice in his head whispered. Sirius agreed with it, wholeheartedly, but this, at least, would keep Remus safe from Malfoy, from his influence and wrath, and keep him well out of reach of the long, malicious claws of Walburga Black. He’d do whatever it took, pay any price. “What guarantee do I have that you will keep your word? Or that won’t fight back when I take my revenge?” There was a wary look in Malfoy’s eyes as they tracked over Sirius’s hands, well aware of the magic that flowed just beneath his fingertips.Sirius almost laughed, because goddamnit, despite everything, Lucius Malfoy was afraid of him. “An Unbreakable Vow,” Sirius said, before his mind could fully catch up with his mouth, but it didn’t matter. Because that was the only thing that would keep Remus safe. Malfoy balked a little at the idea. “You’re serious?”Sirius smirked and held out his hand. “Always and forever.”Malfoy reached across the aisle and grasped Sirius’s hand around the wrist.“Cissa, bind the vow,” Sirius said, gritting his teeth against the nothing he felt when he touched Malfoy.
Nothing was so much fucking worse than pain.
Narcissa glanced between the two of them, her mouth gaping open, catching flies. “Lucius, do you think maybe you should—”“Narcissa, do it,” Malfoy said. Her mouth snapped shut and, hesitantly, Narcissa drew her wand from the inside of her robes. She flicked it over their joined hands. Red tendrils of flame trickled out from her wand, binding Malfoy and Sirius together. “I, Sirius Orion Black, solemnly swear that I will grant Lucius Abraxas Malfoy his unanswered revenge, of equal proportion to the Sectumsempra scar he received by my hand, as well as grant one favour, with no time limit or further stipulations, in exchange for his oath to never betray Remus Lupin under any circumstances.”Malfoy narrowed his eyes, seemed to hesitate over the wording, just as Narcissa drew in a sharp breath. The tendrils of flame twisted around their joined wrists, licking at their skin, but never burning. “Say it, Malfoy,” Sirius gritted out.“I will not betray Remus Lupin.”Sirius dug his fingernails into Malfoy’s wrists, almost hard enough to draw blood. “All of it, you arsehole.”Malfoy’s eyes flared with intention, with hatred and malice and the horrifying promise of revenge. “I will never betray Remus Lupin under any circumstances.”Around them, the flames flickered, solidified, bound them together, then in a rush, evaporated into Sirius’s and Malfoy’s chests.They were both breathing hard as the magic threw them apart, the oath bound in the space between them, written on the gates of eternity.Narcissa put her wand away without any further comment. Malfoy let out a broken laugh. “Your loss, Black. I know things about Lupin that would make you shit yourself. He fucking belongs in Azkaban.”“So do you, Malfoy, but here we are,” Sirius found himself saying.Malfoy scoffed. “You’re still fucked. Even if your mother doesn’t know about Lupin.”The thing was, Sirius didn’t fucking care. Sirius figured he was damned and forgotten anyway.This way, Remus was safe.Of all the devils to whom he could have sold his soul to save Remus Lupin, Lucius Malfoy was, at the very least, petty and predictable. Malfoy, he could deal with. It was everything else at Grimmauld Place that absolutely fucking terrified him. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Regulus was standing between their parents when the Hogwarts Express pulled into King’s Cross. Sirius’s breath caught in his throat, and any sense of momentary triumph he had from his deal with Malfoy evaporated in a single heartbeat. Walburga Black was the picture of stone-cold dissonance: malice and control, destruction and conformity. She wore elegant, embroidered emerald robes that covered every inch of skin from her neck down. Her hair, pinned in a neat bun on top of her head, was as black as her soul, showing no signs of age or decay, just the regality that came with her name and title. Her upturned nose swept over the crowded platform, daring anyone to come close enough to actually touch her. She was a statue: horrifically beautiful, cold, and dead to the world, but underneath the surface, a dangerous cocktail of skill, toil, and artistry. His father was the equal and opposite of his mother. Tall, and far more muscular than Sirius ever hoped to be, Orion Black was king and knight and deadly assassin, all at once. He emanated power and regality and the pure nobility of the Black name. His eyes were like the thestrals—shadows unto themselves—but instead of a tragic sadness, Orion’s eyes told tales of cunning deceit and battlefields soaked in blood. It took every ounce of the Gryffindor courage he may have, at one point, possessed for Sirius not to turn around and run screaming in the other direction. Or over to James Potter, across the platform, surrounded by his beautiful mother and greying father.James kept waving at Sirius, trying to catch his eye. Goddamnit. Sirius bit his lip hard enough that he tasted blood, but he pointedly refused to look over at James. He felt his mother’s gaze, watching him for any sign of weakness, for any tick, for any last minute ammunition she could use against him.Not that she needed it. She already had plenty. He wasn’t going to give her James Potter too. A gloved hand clamped tightly on Regulus’s shoulder, hard enough to bruise, though Regulus’s face mirrored the indifference on their mother’s. Sirius put one foot in front of the other, over towards them, ducking occasionally to avoid contact with other reuniting family units. He squared his jaw, ran his hands down the front of his robes, and stood ramrod straight in front of his brother and parents. “Mother. Father,” Sirius greeted, more surprised than anything that his voice remained even remotely steady. Walburga frowned, but didn’t say anything. Orion drew his wand, and Merlin, Sirius couldn’t help the flinch. His father wouldn’t dare hex him here, would he? Not with so many witnesses. No, he wouldn’t—But Orion just pointed his wand at Sirius’s trunk and shrunk it, then picked up the tiny little thing to put in his pocket. Up close, Regulus looked just as terrified as Sirius, his grey eyes wide and panicked, greedily looking Sirius up and down and up again, just to make sure he was alright. Regulus opened his mouth, ready to say something.Sirius’s eyes flashed and he gave a tiny shake of his head. Now was not the time for words. Sirius felt more than saw Lucius Malfoy slither up behind him, Narcissa not far behind. “Mr. and Mrs. Black, it’s a pleasure.” Malfoy nudged past Sirius and extended his hand to Orion. His father reaches past Regulus and takes Malfoy’s hand. “Mr. Malfoy. I hear you’re the top of your class.”“Yes, sir, I am.” Malfoy threw a narrowed side-eye at Sirius. “I’m doing well, all things considered.”All things considered. In a move that could otherwise be considered normal, Malfoy withdrew his hand and swished his hair back, exposing the long, pale scar down the left side of his face. Sirius knew what Malfoy was doing. That scar, despite any arrangement Sirius and Malfoy may have made in private, was leverage against the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. An unforgivable disgrace, an unplayable debt his father would demand from Sirius, and, Merlin, Malfoy knew it. It didn’t matter that Sirius had settled the debt with Malfoy already; Sirius would still be made to pay for the disgrace against his family and Malfoy would never let Orion Black forget it.Malfoy tilted his head, let the light catch on the pale scar, and locked his gaze with Orion, the message clear: Look what your traitor of an heir did to me.Sirius tried to will himself invisible. Regulus let out an audible gasp, then a small whimper, as Walburga dug her fingers into his shoulders. “Right,” his father said, narrowing his eyes. “I can assure you, Mr. Malfoy, that the situation will be dealt with.”Even now, Orion Black apologises for nothing, least of all, for the deeds of his wayward son. “I have no doubts.” Lucius Malfoy looked so fucking proud of himself and, if Sirius wasn’t on the verge of at least three different panic attacks, he’d be thinking up ways to punch Malfoy in his stupid face and get away with it. “I shall see you both at Christmas. Regulus, it was good to see you as well.”Something dangerous flared to life inside Sirius at the thought of Malfoy trying to befriend his younger brother, but whatever it was, it was quickly quelled by what he was sure was to be the first of many panic attacks. His mother’s eyes very nearly drilled a hole in Sirius’s skull. Nothing more was said, as Malfoy and Narcissa drifted away to find their own parents. Walburga jerked her chin, and Sirius followed blindly, like a half-starved dog.Regulus walked in front of their mother, but kept shooting these looks at Sirius, and Merlin, it was a language they’d spoken for so long, in between so many moments like this, both of them afraid, both of them stuck, and Sirius could hear every single word Regulus meant to say to him in their private, unspoken language.
I missed you.
Are you okay?
And the last one, a desperate, horrified look that Sirius prayed his parents couldn’t decode.
Run, Sirius.
But despite it all, Sirius was Gryffindor. He’d sooner cut off his own arm than leave his brother behind. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Number Twelve Grimmauld Place looked like it had just been pulled out of a madman’s nightmares. In reality, it was merely the stage for every single one of Sirius’s nightmares. It manifested suddenly and all at once, morphing into existence between Numbers Eleven and Thirteen, large and imposing and every bit the haunted house in appearance as it was in reality. Sirius followed his mother and father up the front steps and through the door, Regulus close behind him. Sirius’s breaths felt shallow and ineffective against the invisible and mostly-metaphorical noose around his neck. He clenched his fists, digging his nails into the palms of his hands, hard enough to almost draw blood, but not quite. Merlin, he couldn’t give them the satisfaction of breaking down right now. Sirius squared his jaw and forced his lungs to inflate normally. His father hung his cloak on the claw-footed coat rack just inside the entryway, then stalked off to his office without another word. There was no way his father’s silence could be taken as anything but a slow-moving storm front: the chaos and destruction was still a ways off, but its trajectory was set and the whirlwinds and thunder lurked ominously on the horizon. Walburga slowly spun on her heels to face her two sons, her high cheekbones and silver eyes framed by the house-elf skulls lining the wall behind her. She looked every bit worthy of her role as Queen of the Damned. She peeled her black silk gloves from her hands one at a time, then folded them neatly before tucking them into the pocket of her robes. She held out a bony, perfectly manicured hand, a wickedly horrible smile spreading across her face. “Sirius. Your wand,” she said. She crooked one of her fingers. Sirius gulped. Next to him, he felt more than saw Regulus tense up. So. This was how it was going to be. She knew very well that he was perfectly capable of magic even without his wand. It was a power move, plain and simple, more of a symbolic reassertion of the choke hold his mother already had around his neck. It was meant to break him, to toy with him, to take every last hope of freedom he thought he’d be able to maintain. His broken, beautiful, beloved wand.Helpless to do anything else, Sirius reached into the pocket of his robes and placed his wand in the palm of his mother’s hand.His mother’s eyes gleamed as she turned to leave, but then she paused, seemed to weigh his wand in her hand, then glanced back down at Sirius. A gurgling cackle that would’ve made his mad, incest-bred ancestors proud bubbled in her throat and burst forth between them. Instinctively, Sirius flinched back, making sure Regulus was behind him. “Why, Sirius,” his mother crowed between nauseating shrieks. “You’ve killed your wand, haven’t you?”Shame burned through him, eating away at every last piece of his soul. Sirius ducked his head, lest his mother see the tears in his eyes.Walburga tested the wand, twirled it around in her hand, letting loose the occasional derogatory spat of maddened laughter. “There’s hardly anything magic left to be channeled.” She turned her taunting gaze to Sirius. “Was it the Cruciatus?”His silence seemed to be answer enough.“I tried to tell that old fool,” she taunted. “A thing like you was never meant to wield a unicorn hair wand. Perhaps this—” She pointed Sirius’s wand at him, forced his chin up to meet her gaze. “—this will serve as a reminder of what you’re supposed to be: ruthless, uncompromising. Worthy of your name. Unforgivable.”Unforgivable.Sirius squeezed his eyes shut and prayed that the darkness inside him would somehow swallow him whole. “Dinner is at seven. You will stay in your room until then,” his mother said, but her words hardly registered. She spun on her heels, her dress flaring around her as she did, in a dramatic swirl of black lace and fine fabric. His wand twirled between her fingers as she laughed to herself, heels clicking on the floor as she disappeared down the hallway.The portraits of his ancestors echoed her mania in a chorus of mad, hysterical laughter that would echo in Sirius’s ears for years. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Two minutes before seven o’clock, Kreacher apparated into his room. Sirius hadn’t even noticed the hours pass by. He’d been… numb.“Master Sirius must report to the dining room. Kreacher will escort him,” the house-elf grumbled. When Sirius didn’t even attempt to move from where he was laying on the bed, Kreacher Apparated over and yanked on Sirius’s sleeve. Sirius tumbled to the floor, suddenly jolted back to reality and more than a little bruised for it. House-elves were surprisingly strong.With a glower on his face that shockingly resembled his mother’s, Kreacher reached down and grabbed Sirius by the ear, tugging at it until Sirius stood on his own. Kreacher’s tiny hand clamped around Sirius’s wrist. It didn’t particularly hurt—house-elves were immune to the blood curse of his tattoo, a fact for which Sirius was eternally grateful, given the number of times Kreacher was in charge of his punishments growing up—but Sirius pulled away from his grip all the same. He hated Kreacher, hated everything that the house-elf represented. Most of all, he hated that look in Kreacher’s eyes: that mad, ravenous look that said he knew it was only a matter of time before Walburga handed him a switch and ordered Kreacher to punish her eldest son. “I can walk, you fucking cretin,” Sirius growled.Kreacher didn’t say Not for long, but it was written in every goddamned crevice of his expression.Sirius shoved past the house-elf and down the stairs to the dining room, dread echoing in his every step, but somehow he managed to keep his head held high. His parents and brother were already seated at the long, ancient, mahogany table, an ornate, savoury smelling feast laid out before them. Without looking at any of them, Sirius took his place at the narrow part of the table, directly across from Regulus. Neither of his parents acknowledged him, but after the moments of silence dragged on, Regulus finally looked up and met his eye.It was… an apology.Sirius’s breath caught in his throat, but he forced himself to keep his face neutral. Kreacher apparated in, bearing his mother’s silver china plates. A second later, his father’s house-elf—an ancient, decrepit little beast called Crawley—popped in carrying a beef roast. Crawley produced a carving knife and sliced a piece off, then handed the plate back to Kreacher, who then piled it high with potatoes and vegetables before placing the plate in front of Walburga. The house-elves loaded another plate, then another, placing them before his father and Regulus in turn.Then, they apparated away, taking the rest of the roast with them. Sirius grit his teeth together, but didn’t dare say anything about his lack of a plate. They’d done this before. Often, in fact. It was one of his mother’s favourite punishments: make him sit at the dinner table with absolutely nothing while she and Orion enjoyed a feast fit for kings. It was meant to humiliate him, and it did. Every damn time. “How’s the legislation coming along?” Walburga asked casually, before taking a long, elegant sip of her dark red wine. Sirius felt himself tense. Dinner at Grimmauld Place was usually a solemn affair, unless there were guests. The most conversation that ever seemed to pass between the four of them was a perfunctory Sirius, remember your manners or Where’s that damned elf with the wine?His mother’s question and his father’s looming answer… this was meant for Sirius to hear. The thought nauseated him. Orion chewed his roast, then put down his knife. “It’s certainly progressing. Abraxas Malfoy and the Hogwarts Education Board signed off on the wording of the referendum earlier this morning. There’s no way the Old Man will agree to the application of the law to current students—and according to Lestrange, the Old Man’s made that a bit of a sticking point with his own backers and will probably get his way.”His mother frowned. “Unfortunate.”“Indeed,” Orion said. “We needn’t worry too much. He won’t be able to stop the referendum itself. No matter what he might tell his… constituents, the Ancient Houses have been the financial backbone of Wizarding Britain since long before the Old Man climbed on his high horse and dared to call this foolish endeavour moral integrity.”As if a Black knows anything about moral integrity, Sirius thought, bitterly. His mother seemed to sense that Sirius was holding back a rather biting retort, and her eyes narrowed on him. “And what of our… champion?” Walburga took great care in selecting that particular word, and there was a gleam in her eyes that spoke of a horrible, fanatical future. Goose-pimples erupted across Sirius’s skin. Whatever this was, it meant something beyond a vague means of torturing Sirius. A wicked smile crept across Walburga’s face—and, Merlin, Sirius knew that smile well. Walburga Black was the kind of person who enjoyed seeing others in pain, especially if she’d decided they were deserving of that pain, no matter how arbitrary their supposed crimes were. This smile was meant for inflicting torture, for relishing in screams of agony, for tearing flesh from bone.And it was aimed at Sirius. Vaguely, he wondered if the force of her gaze alone was enough to reduce him to rubble and ash. She swirled her wine and brought her goblet to her lips. “What is Mr. Riddle’s position on the proposed Dark Creature legislation?”
Dark Creatures?!
This—this—was her ammunition, somehow meant to render Sirius bloody and broken, but his mind was so fuzzy with the chaos and confusion and ominous sense that war had just been declared and shots had just been fired, but Sirius had no real sense of where the bullets had punctured his flesh. Sirius sat up a bit straighter. His eyes flicked between his parents, trying to discern the meaning of all of this and, more importantly, how he was somehow caught in the middle of all of it. Across from him, Regulus choked on something, then coughed as silently as he could manage, thanks to years of etiquette training. Their parents ignored him, but Sirius caught Regulus’s eye before his brother resumed staring at his plate and there it was.Regulus knew something. “Mr. Riddle supports the bill, of course,” Orion continued, either oblivious or deliberately ignoring Sirius’s attempts to get Regulus to look at him again. “He has idealistic notions that if this bill passes, it’ll be the tipping point in the effort to turn the Dark Creatures against the Old Man’s endless promises of reform and equality.”His mother scoffed at the very thought, and Sirius knew why. Dark Creatures were beneath even Muggles, in Walburga’s eyes. A disgusting perversion of powerful, ancient magic not even innate to their very being, the vile creatures, he’d heard her say time and again. “After they’ve… turned against the Old Man, does Mr. Riddle expect the Ancient Houses to align themselves with these beasts?” Walburga asked, her voice stone-cold. “No, of course not.” Orion raised his goblet to his lips and tilted his head in brief acknowledgment. “Though, Mr. Riddle has mentioned, on occasion, that these beasts would make excellent cannon fodder.”
Canon fodder.
And there it was: the drums of war. A war to what end or against whom, Sirius didn’t know, but he could hazard a guess. The political agenda of the Blacks was always the same: Toujours Pur, and damned be anyone else. His empty stomach twisted itself into about a thousand knots. He’d be expected to fight, of course, to raise the banner for the Blacks and the Ancient Houses and probably lead the fucking charge. It was the burden of his title, and fuck everything, because Sirius didn’t want it. This war, Mr. Riddle, the Wizengamot, all of it. Sirius would rather fall on his own sword than be a part of this. Then, his eyes drifted across the table again, to Regulus, and Merlin, if that wasn’t a knife to the heart. He was allowed to leave. His mother had told him that a hundred thousand times, trying to bait him into it. Into abdicating his title and forfeiting his inheritance. Sirius knew he could walk away right now, with only a few curses to show for it. He could go find Andromeda and they could run as far from the Blacks as they possibly could. She’d marry Tonks, he’d be a proper Gryffindor, and maybe he’d carve out his very own fairytale life to match James Potter’s.But the Warden would never let him take Regulus. That was the price, and Sirius knew it. If he left, Regulus would be forced to stay. Regulus would be the heir, forged in the fire of their malice and hatred until he was their perfect weapon in this war they’d invented.They’d carve him up, send him into battle until there was nothing left of Sirius’s little brother. This was the choice his mother was giving him. This was the silver bullet lodged in his chest. Walburga’s silver eyes gleamed with a conspiratorial malice as took another careful bite of her roast. She was in his head, reading his mind, watching him figure out that he had absolutely no exit strategy, no other choice but to take up his title and fulfil his role.This was his punishment.This was inevitable. He should have been expecting this the moment he learned he’d have to return to Grimmauld Place. “Eat your asparagus, Regulus,” his mother snapped, but she wasn’t looking at Regulus at all. Silver eyes leered at Sirius’s empty plate, at the horrifying truth written all over his face, at the echo from the bullets that pierced whatever armour he’d found. “I’m told that not everyone has the privilege of a healthy meal.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ The ache in his stomach and the suffocating feeling of impending doom followed Sirius well into the night, long after Walburga had spelled the lock shut on the door to his room. Not that it’d do much, really. All things considered, Sirius was still the unquestioned master of locking charms in Grimmauld Place. It was the unspoken, overtly threatening stay put from the Warden that kept him confined to his room. War had already been declared and the terms of his surrender written in stone. He couldn’t bring himself to push the limits of what little sanity and patience his mother had left.He’d be a dead man.And Regulus…He wasn’t going to think about that. Sirius lay on his bed, flat on his back, his eyes on a focusing on a chandelier that he could hardly make out in the dark. He was in a ratty T-shirt he’d stolen from James, having ripped off his dinner robes and button-up shirt the second he’d been secluded in his room for the night. He’d thrown them somewhere on the floor, just desperate to pull away the constricting, fine fabric from his neck as if he’d be able to pull the noose free along with the clothes. At a quarter to midnight, the loose floorboard outside his door gave an aborted, yet purposeful creak.Sirius sat up ramrod straight in his bed. There was only one thing that could be. Kreacher never came up to Sirius’s room without direct instructions from his mother and his parents were more than confident in their veiled (and not-so-veiled) threats of bodily harm that they would never bother to actually check on him. Still, Sirius sent up a silent prayer that he was wrong.Regulus couldn’t be here.Not now. It wasn’t safe. Apparently, in the time he’d been at Hogwarts, Regulus had become the master of wandless—fucking wandless!—locking charms at Grimmauld Place. The latch on his door gave a valiant shudder and Sirius almost felt the magic dissolve. Regulus poked his head around the massive door. Two glimmers of dull light reflected against black, black eyes searched for Sirius in the dark, and Merlin, Sirius was weak and fucking selfish, because he wasn’t brave enough to send Regulus away. He’d missed him so fucking much.Regulus had lived in this house long enough to know the punishments for going behind locked doors—let alone the greater punishment of fraternising with the disgraced Gryffindor heir—and Sirius tried to convince himself that it’d be okay. He swore to himself that if it came to it, he’t take Regulus’s punishment. No questions asked. Regulus’s feet were silent against the carpet, deftly navigating around every creaky floorboard in the room. They’d spent hours—years, even—meticulously mapping out the entire span of floor between Sirius’s bed and Regulus’s, in the room across the hall, for instances such as these. Sirius could almost feel Regulus getting closer, with all the weight of the past few months sparking in the air between them. When Regulus was a few feet from Sirius’s bed, Regulus’s foot caught on Sirius’s discarded dinner robes. Sirius heard the breath leave his brother’s lungs as Regulus plummeted towards the floor.His heart was in his throat, but goddamnit, Sirius was ready. He flicked his wrist and threw a wandless Silencio at Regulus, just as his knees made contact with the floor.It didn’t make a sound.Sirius and Regulus remained frozen in place, each of them holding their breath for nearly a full minute before Regulus dared to move. Sirius barely had enough time to extend the silencing charm over his bed before Regulus launched himself at him and Sirius suddenly had his arms full of his sobbing little brother. And Merlin, Sirius clung to him, almost hard enough to bruise. This wasn’t like touching Peter or Malfoy or Narcissa or fucking anyone else. Because touching Regulus—holding him and shielding him from the nightmare closing in around the both of them—that was Sirius Black’s sacred mission, and one he accepted with pride. It could never hurt to touch Regulus, and when Sirius held him like this, not even the vague ache from the soul-crushing nothing-pain could reach him. Regulus was too much of something to ever be mistaken for nothing. And, Merlin, tonight that something had the desperate, miraculous magic of a healing spell over a near-fatal wound. “Hey, Reg,” Sirius breathed into Regulus’s hair. His fingers dug into Regulus’s pyjamas, clutching at the only good thing left in this fucking house, as if his brother might be suddenly torn from his arms. Oh, how his mother would love that. It’d certainly add to his torment. But, relatively speaking, they were safe here, under the protection of Sirius’s silencing charm and the cover of night around them. And, even then, if anyone or anything tried to pry Regulus from his arms, Sirius would stop at nothing to keep his brother close. He’d find the nearest wand and throw an Unforgivable. What the hell did it matter? He’d done it before. Regulus sniffed, sobbed a little more, then wiped his nose against his sleeves. He sat up enough so that he could look Sirius in the eye. He was still seated mostly in Sirius’s lap. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, now that they were almost the same size—Sirius being relatively short for his age and Regulus having seemingly come out of rather recent growth spurt—but Sirius wasn’t about to shove Regulus away.“I fucking missed you,” Regulus blurted out. Sirius barked a laugh, surprised, more than anything, by the outburst. It was the first thing his brother had said directly to him in months. “Where the fuck did you learn to swear like that?” Sirius asked.“Mrs. Blanche Withers,” Regulus deadpanned, and honestly, Sirius couldn’t tell if he was joking. Given the general temperament of the tutors his mother tended to hire, it wouldn’t exactly surprise him. Regulus nudged Sirius in the ribs and scooted over so that he was stretched out next to Sirius, rather than on top of him. Regulus pressed close, shoulder to hip, seemingly just as unwilling to give up the physical contact as Sirius. Vaguely, Sirius found himself wondering if anyone had actually touched Regulus—outside of a punishment or his mother’s strategically threatening iron grip—since Sirius went to Hogwarts. At least Sirius had had Remus and James and Lily and the duvet stolen from one of the beds in the boys’ dormitory. He’d had the Prewetts—who were no strangers to affectionate displays of camaraderie, especially after a successful prank—and students pressed up against him in the halls, and Salazar’s fucking balls, nearly every second of it hurt, so much so that there had been times when Sirius thought he’d lose is fucking mind from the pain of it all and—And then, Remus had hugged him. Remus Lupin. Remus Lupin, and every scarred, brilliantly beautiful, fucking devious inch of him. Remus Lupin, who burned brighter than every damned star in the night sky, who gave him books and had believed that Sirius was made for Gryffindor when no one else in the fucking universe could see past his name and all the horrible things it represented. Remus Lupin: half-blood, somehow cursed to be, unequivocally, the source and summit of the worst pain that Sirius Black had ever felt.That Remus Lupin had hugged him, knowing full well what Sirius felt, knowing that the world was crashing down around them. Sirius had a hunch that Remus would try to apologise to Sirius once he got back to Hogwarts. (If he got back to Hogwarts.)Sirius wouldn’t let him.It scared him sometimes, how much he preferred the unimaginable pain to the overwhelming nothing inside him. Next to him, Regulus made a small noise and wiggled a little, fishing for something in his pocket. “I almost forgot,” Regulus said. “I brought this for you.”Regulus pushed something into the palm of Sirius’s hand. Sirius’s eyes were having a difficult time focusing in the dark, but he knew what it was from the smell and that horrible, nasty way his stomach clenched. The half-loaf of French bread was wrapped in a linen cloth. This close, Sirius could smell the expensive cheese spread between the two halves. If Sirius was a weaker person, he’d have ripped into the bread and devoured it in three seconds flat, hungry as he was. But Walburga would not win that easily. She’d still get her pound of flesh, Sirius well knew, but he certainly wasn’t about to give her an excuse to take the first swing right now. He still had two weeks here, and his mother already had a taste of war. She’d be unstoppable, if he surrendered now. “Reg,” Sirius drawled, pushing the bread and cheese back into his brother’s hands. “You know I can’t take this.”Regulus did know. Sirius knew he did. He’d more than likely heard Walburga’s ranting and raving about her plans to punish Sirius for months at this point. Regulus knew Walburga’s answer to disobedience. It was almost completely dark—with almost no moon to offer even a semblance of light from the open window—but Sirius saw the wave of desperation and heartbreak that washed over Regulus’s face. Regulus bit his lip, frowning in the dark, and Merlin, for a moment, he looked so much like their father that Sirius very nearly swallowed his tongue. “You’re hungry,” Regulus said, stubbornly. “You need to eat. You have no idea what’s—”Regulus swallowed whatever he’d been about to say, but Sirius heart the words anyway, in the silence that lingered between them.Regulus did know, then, all the horrible things the Warden had planned for Sirius. “Reg,” Sirius breathed, his voice cracking. “She’ll come for you, too, if she knows you tried to help.”Regulus shook his head and clutched at Sirius’s wrist. “No. No, Siri, she won’t know it was from me. I told Kreacher I was hungry and had him bring it up to my—”Sirius let out a broken laugh, and, for a moment, the madness of his ancestors bled into his voice. “You trust Kreacher?!”“Of course,” Regulus said, like it was fucking abhorrent to think otherwise. “He’s Walburga’s elf, Reg.”“So?”“He hates me!”“Well, he loves me!”At this, Sirius let out a long-suffering sigh. Regulus always did have a soft spot for that monster of a house-elf. “You can’t trust him. Not while I’m here.” Sirius paused to once more press the linen-wrapped loaf of bread into Regulus’s hand. “Call him in here to take this back.”“But if Mother knows I’m in here—”“It’ll be worse if she knows you tried to bring me food,” Sirius replied, soberly. Even if their mother tried to punish Regulus for being in Sirius’s room, Sirius swore to himself that he’d step in and take the blame. Sirius would say that he sought Regulus out, more or less bullied Regulus into his room and bed, and Merlin, Walburga would believe it. Then, the curses would start.An expression crossed over Regulus’s face as he figured out Sirius’s contingency plan. Sirius watched as Regulus weighed the options: either leave now, and potentially not speak to Sirius again for another six months, or stay in Sirius’s bed, risk life and limb in getting caught, then allow Sirius to take on whatever brutality Walburga would come up with. Sirius made the choice for him. Anything, really, to remove the guilt from Regulus.None of this was Regulus’s fault. “It’ll be fine, Reg. I promise.” It probably wouldn’t be fine, but Sirius didn’t fucking care. “Please stay. Please?”Eyes wet and wide with fear, Regulus nodded. “Kreacher!” Regulus hissed in the dark, though the command was still so sharp and sudden enough that Sirius lurched back a little. A second later, the wretched house-elf Apparated in. Sirius internally cringed at the loud pop it made, but the creaky floorboards outside his room that indicated movement in the hallway remained miraculously silent.From his vantage point on the floor at the end of Sirius’s bed, Kreacher let out a low growl as his eyes fell on the linen-wrapped bread still suspended in limbo between Sirius and Regulus. “Master Sirius has stolen Master Regulus’s bread. Bread that Kreacher made special for Master Regulus.” The sneer deepened across Kreacher’s face, the dull light catching on every pale crevice of his face. “Nasty Gryffindor steals from my Master, when nasty Gryffindor was ordered to bed without dinner. My Mistress will not be pleased.”Merlin, how Sirius hated this… creature. His mother’s blunt little instrument, his torturer and quite possibly executioner, if tonight was any indication on how Sirius’s luck would hold up. Sirius wasn’t going down without a fight. Not against the fucking house-elf.He called his magic to his fingertips, readying a nasty hex, but then Regulus grabbed his wrist. “Kreacher,” Regulus said, a note of pleading in his voice. “The bread was for me, but I’m not as hungry as I thought I was. Sirius didn’t have any of it. You can check.”Regulus leaned forward and offered the bread to Kreacher. The house-elf didn’t even look at it, his beady eyes instead narrowing on Sirius. “My Master is not supposed to be seeing the nasty Gryffindor.” A horribly cruel smile crept across Kreacher’s face. It made him look every bit like the dead-eyed house-elf skulls that lined the entryway of Grimmauld Place. “Mistress says he is a blood traitor. Mistress says Kreacher gets to punish the blood traitor. Master Regulus would not be wanting to share in that—”Sirius snapped, “I dragged him in here, you little shit,” at the same time Regulus said, “Kreacher, please don’t tell Mother!”Kreacher’s eyes darted between the Black brothers, just as Sirius swore under his breath. He was supposed to take the blame, goddamnit. Sirius wasn’t about to bargain with Kreacher for Regulus’s safety.But Regulus merely tightened his grip on Sirius’s arm. “Kreacher will not lie to his Mistress,” the house-elf grit out. “It’s not lying,” Regulus said, quickly. “It’s just… omission.”Sirius scoffed. To Walburga Black, it was the same thing.“Mistress will not be pleased,” Kreacher growled. “Please, Kreacher,” Regulus whispered, and Merlin, that almost sounded like a prayer passing through his brother’s lips. Sirius’s gut clenched. Regulus was not meant to be the one bargaining for Sirius’s safety. That wasn’t how this worked, but if Sirius spoke up now, they were both fucked. “Do it for me?” Regulus continued. “You can keep the bread. See?”Regulus pulled the linen away and tossed the scrap of cloth in Sirius’s lap—lest it accidentally be mistaken for an article of clothing—and offered the bread to Kreacher. A long silence stretched between them, and Sirius tried to mentally prepare himself for surrender and his mother’s curses. Finally—finally—Kreacher took the bread. The rickety old elf clutched the loaf close to his chest and took a large, greedy bite with pointed teeth.Despite Sirius’s raging hatred towards the elf, Sirius couldn’t help but wonder how long it had been since Walburga allowed Kreacher to eat.“Kreacher thanks Master Regulus,” Kreacher managed, around the crumbs tumbling from his mouth. “Mistress will not hear of this.”“Thank you, Kreacher.”Regulus let out a long breath as Kreacher Disapparated once more, and Sirius was in genuine awe of the affection lurking behind his brother’s words. Now that they were alone and relatively safe, the silence was enormous, weighted down by the months spent apart and all that had changed.Sirius was Gryffindor.Sirius was a blood traitor.There was a war brewing around them, and the Black brothers were lost somewhere in the eye of the storm. “Why didn’t you write?” Regulus’s broken voice cut through the silence, and it was a dagger straight to Sirius’s already-shattered heart. Because of-fucking-course.Not only had his mother burned Sirius’s letters, but she’d made sure that Regulus never knew that Sirius had sent them in the first place. “She burned them, Reg,” Sirius breathed. “I wrote you loads of things. After the Sorting, about the castle. About that absolute idiot, James Potter. Merlin, you’d love him. We made a flag, stuck it on top of Gryffindor tower, and…” He trailed off at Regulus’s expression: a careful mix of pain buried directly under stoney exterior, a look Regulus had somehow stolen directly from their father. “Never mind. I even had ‘Dromeda try to sneak a letter through, but I think Walburga burned those too.”Sirius felt more than saw the tension break in Regulus. It all came flooding open at once, sudden emotion pouring out with hurricane-force winds. Regulus threw himself at Sirius, and for half a moment, Sirius thought his brother was going to punch him, but instead, skinny arms wrapped around Sirius’s middle as Regulus once again sobbed into Sirius’s neck. “I thought… I thought you didn’t care about me anymore. You left, Siri, and I thought—”Where Sirius had expected the full force of his brother’s anguished abandonment and deliberate accusation—anger and furious outbursts were modus operandi in the Black household—Regulus merely let out a small whine and the strangled sound of a kicked puppy.“Don’t ever think that,” Sirius hissed, fierce enough that he felt Regulus flinch against him. Sirius lowered his voice. “I’m never going to leave you here alone, okay? I fucking promise. I might be away for a while at Hogwarts, but you come first. Always. Got it?”Sirius didn’t know if he was brave enough to keep that promise, but he made it anyway.To Sirius’s dismay, Regulus shook his head vigorously, the fringe of his hair coming loose and scraping against the soft skin on Sirius’s neck. “No. You don’t understand,” Regulus said. “She… She called you a blood traitor. She said you attacked Malfoy. She… Fuck, you’re in bloody Gryffindor, Sirius!”Sirius pulled away slightly, just enough to see his brother’s face. At the look in Regulus’s eyes, Sirius was violently thrown back to the last time the two of them were huddled close together on this bed. The night Auclair died, Sirius had told Regulus that being called a blood traitor, even if it wasn’t strictly true, was a self-fulfilling prophecy.He understood, then, what Regulus meant: His mother would treat his grievances as a challenge, as an excuse to torment him until he broke. She didn’t want him as her heir; he was a stain against the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black and he was a Gryffindor. She was merely waiting for the opportunity to burn him from the tapestry, officially brand him as a blood traitor to House Black, and let the cursed tattoo continue to torment Sirius long after she’d croaked her last breath. He’d never be able to touch Regulus again—or any pureblood, for that matter—if his mother burned him off the tapestry. The intricate, ancient magic laced in the ink of his tattoo would forever turn against him. He wouldn’t be able to touch anyone. This was the choice his mother was offering: submit, or lose absolutely everything.Merlin, he should have seen it coming from the moment the Sorting Hat started whispering notes of rebellion in his ear. “Why’d you have to be sorted into Gryffindor?” Regulus asked, as if that were the true source of all of Sirius’s problems, and not his mother’s generalised hatred of her eldest son for no other reason than because he was fucking born. “You were supposed to be in Slytherin. It’d all be fine if you were in Slytherin.”Sirius had to laugh at the absolute absurdity of that thought. “No, it wouldn’t.”Regulus pouted. “Why not?”Because, Black heir or no, Sirius would’ve been Lucius Malfoy’s bitch, same as Snivellus. Because the cruelty of the Carrows would not only have been expected of Sirius, but probably engineered and orchestrated by him.Because, if Sirius was put in Slytherin, every assumption McGonagall had ever made about him would be true. Because if Sirius was Slytherin, he’d never have known the sheer joy of being friends with James Potter, or the uncompromising force of nature that was Lily Josephine Evans, King of fucking Gryffindor. Or the incomprehensible beauty in the brilliant amber eyes and scarred face of Remus Lupin, who, above anyone Sirius had ever met, knew the harrowing depths of pain, but whose soul still had room for unflinching kindness. If Sirius had been Slytherin, he would have been cruel and cowardly. He’d have surrendered to the pureblood fanaticisms of his parents without question. He’d have become the same monster that he feared in his mother.Sirius let out a long sigh and made sure Regulus was looking at him. “I asked the Sorting Hat for Gryffindor, Regulus. It gave me a choice.”Regulus opened and closed his mouth in utter disbelief. “You… You what?!”Sirius wasn’t going to repeat it. He wasn’t that brave. His brother had tears in his eyes. “Why would you do that, Sirius?”“I… I wanted to be brave. I’m not, but… I think I want to be.” It was the simplest and most complicated answer that Sirius could give. “I can’t be like them, Reg. I’m not like them. You have no idea how wrong they are.”“They’re our family, Sirius,” Regulus snapped. Sirius tugged down the collar of his shirt, just enough so that his tattoo was showing. Even if Regulus couldn’t see it in the dark, they both knew it was there and what it meant. “They fucking branded us, Reg,” Sirius hissed. “They staked a claim on our lives and our blood, nothing more. They aren’t fucking family.”Regulus pushed himself away from Sirius so quickly that he nearly tumbled off the bed. “I’m nothing?”Fuck.“No. That’s not what I meant.”
You’re everything.
Regulus’s expression softened but he didn’t make any move to shift closer to Sirius.“It was my choice, Reg,” Sirius whispered. “I knew what would happen.”Sirius felt the distance between them like a gaping, open wound from a curse he should have seen coming. How was he supposed to explain the choice the Sorting Hat had given him?
Is this truly something you want, to be made into a pariah by your family, to be tormented by your peers, to be judged by your name, until you prove the true intentions of your heart by your actions?
And then, even more inexplicable: Lionheart.Sirius knew then and there that the Sorting Hat would never—could never—place Regulus Arcturus Black anywhere other than Slytherin. His brother would not be offered a choice. Part of him—the very, very Black part of him—wanted to rage against the idea that Regulus had no control over his own fate, but a voice that sounded suspiciously like Remus Lupin told Sirius that that wasn’t it at all. Regulus Black belonged in Slytherin the same as Sirius belonged in Gryffindor. Not because Regulus was a coward like Snape or cruel like the Carrows, or any of the other reasons Sirius himself could never be Slytherin. Slytherin would make a monster out of Sirius Black. For Regulus, it just fit. His brother was as cunning and clever as Sirius, but Regulus was reserved, where as Sirius tended towards impulsivity. Regulus revered structure, order, and the discipline of the pure-blood culture, and he was quick witted enough to not get on anyone’s bad side—a skill that Sirius sorely lacked. Regulus was every bit pristine and practical as Sirius was rough around the edges. And, more than anything else, Regulus Black was fiercely loyal to those whom he loved, even to the point of risking his own physical well being. That wasn’t only a Gryffindor trait. Sirius hadn’t known the depths of Regulus’s loyalty to him until tonight, really. Sure, he knew objectively that Regulus loved him and that he himself would do absolutely-fucking-anything for Regulus, no questions asked, but this… Regulus was choosing a side in the only way a Slytherins knew how: consequences be damned. Even if Regulus never saw punishment. Even if tomorrow morning, Regulus still towed the company line. Tonight, he’d chosen Sirius. If their positions were reversed, and Regulus was faced with potential starvation as a means to coerce him into playing a rather undesirable role in a coming war, Sirius would have stormed the fucking castle. He wouldn’t’ve planned, he wouldn’t’ve taken a second to fucking think. He’d have blown the door from its hinges, grabbed his brother, and cursed any and everyone who dared stand between the two of them and their escape. Instead, Regulus had done the Slytherin thing. He’d had a plan, he’d lied to the appropriate parties, then he’d found a way to sneak into Sirius’s room and offered him the bread. It wasn’t an impulsive prison break, or even a permanent solution to the current problem. Even if Sirius had taken the bread, he’d still be hungry come tomorrow, and it wasn’t like Walburga wasn’t going to let up in her efforts after one night. The bread was merely an offer of reprieve, though one Sirius could never accept on good conscience. Sirius would damn himself to hell ten times over before he ever let his mother catch wind of any of this. That was the difference between them: Sirius would throw himself into the flames, when Regulus would find a way to tame them.Now, Regulus stood, with cautious and deliberate movements as he slipped past the boundary of Sirius’s silencing charm. Sirius allowed the magic around them to dissolve reluctantly, but he knew there was no way Regulus could spend the night here. From the expression on his face, Regulus looked like someone had violently torn his heart in half. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this, Siri,” Regulus whispered, and maybe he was right. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe, they were not supposed to be Gryffindor and Slytherin, blood traitor and loyal second son. Of fucking course this all felt wrong to Sirius, but wrong in the sense that Sirius always imagined sharing a dorm and planning mischief at Hogwarts with Regulus, long before he’d ever met the Marauders. “I know, Reg,” Sirius said, but he didn’t have it in him to apologise to his brother for any of it. Sirius Black had been handed a life and a destiny he would never want the moment he came screaming into this world. Whatever higher power supposedly watched over them had tried, just as their mother had, to forge and hone Sirius into a deadly weapon worthy of his name and title. Changing his own fate was never a possibility that Sirius even allowed himself to consider. Not even once, growing up in Grimmauld Place, or even when listening to that parrot in Diagon Alley squawk out prophecies about killing God. It hadn’t really been until he was confronted with the unbridled conviction etched into every scarred inch of Remus Lupin’s face that Sirius let himself believe that he might one day be brave enough to take his life into his own hands. Then, Sirius had made a choice. A real one, for the first time in his goddamned life. Now, Sirius absently wondered if a single choice alone was enough to kill God. Sirius met his brother’s eyes in the dark, then reached out to grab his hand. “I missed you, too, you know. More than you’ll ever fucking know,” Sirius said, and meant every word. Regulus just frowned at him. “You had your friends. Mother said that you and James Potter—”“They aren’t you, Reg,” Sirius snapped, recoiling at the very thought that the valiant prince, James-fucking-Potter, had somehow made it onto his mother’s radar. But that was a problem for another day. “I know it’s…” Too much, not enough, too late, never soon enough. “Ugh, Merlin, Regulus, please just tell me that you’re okay.”Regulus held his gaze for a long moment, then seemed to decide that it was best to ignore Sirius’s plea entirely. “It’s going to get bad, Sirius. You have no idea.” Sirius had no clue if Regulus meant now, in the next two weeks, or possibly years into the future, but there were tears in his brother’s eyes as he spoke. “I… I won’t be able to do anything else. Whatever happens, you can’t break, Sirius. Please don’t let them break you.”And that was Slytherin, too, wasn’t it? Regulus had to play the game, had to tow the line and be the perfect heir, even if he’d already sworn his allegiance to Sirius in every way that counted. Sirius would never fault him for it, either, because Regulus would bide his time until he saw the opportunity for the killing blow. He knew Regulus wouldn’t hesitate, as Sirius had with Auclair. “I won’t,” Sirius breathed, and those two words felt as though they were imbued with more magic than the Unbreakable Vow he’d made with Malfoy. There was so much lurking in the darkness between them, in every nook and cranny of this wretched house. There was so much that Sirius didn’t know: plans and schemes with terrifying ends that Sirius had no doubt would cause insurmountable pain and destruction. Regulus would be faced with the same choices as Sirius—and, as it happened, perhaps more difficult ones with far greater consequences—and Regulus would make his choices as a Slytherin: cunning and clever, devious and deadly from his place in the shadows, but loyal only to his own heart and those that he kept safe within its chambers. Sirius could see it all, this horror-stricken future laid out in front of him as clearly as the map of stars outside his bedroom window. He didn’t have the key, or even of firm grasp of which way was north—and, Merlin, Regulus was only eleven—but this kind of thing felt… ineffable.Fate may be a cruel and capricious god, but it would be kind to Regulus Black. Sirius would be sure of it.Regulus turned to leave, but Sirius kept his grip tight. He was still flying blind, a thousand and one questions swirled along the edges of his vision, and Merlin, maybe he just needed to be pointed in a random direction, even if he was still left wandering in the dark. “Regulus?” Sirius’s voice was hardly loud enough to be heard over the sounds of their breathing. “Who’s Mr. Riddle?”Something harrowing passed over Regulus’s face, like a dark veil over the brilliant light of the full moon. Then, Regulus tugged his hand free of Sirius’s grasp and was gone without a word. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
DECEMBER 23, 1971
Sirius supposed that for most people, at least in theory, time moved in something of a linear fashion, rather than all at once. He was fairly certain that, objectively, days passed around him, but they passed like air through his fingers, slipping out of his grasp and entirely intangible. Sirius was merely a shade, anything that had once been corporeal about him completely consumed by hunger, loneliness, and pain. Every waking hour was filled with the shrill sounds of his mother’s voice, forbidding him food at every damn meal and talking in vaguely threatening circles that made no sense to Sirius’s addled mind—things about Dark Creatures and ancient magic and Mudbloods and honestly, the rights of the Ancient Houses should never fall victim to fallacies of progressivism, Orion and Mr. Riddle.Always, it came back to Mr. Riddle. Even when the sun set and Sirius listlessly made his way to his bedroom to be locked in for the night, his mother’s voice followed him like a disembodied spirit into his nightmares. She’d curse him, call him a blood traitor—neither of which were particularly rare in the waking world—but then Sirius would watch her burn his own name from the family tapestry, over and over, just before he watched his own fingers crumble into dust and nothing. On one of these nights, delirious from nightmares and hunger, Sirius found himself in the kitchens. He wasn’t entirely sure how he’d gotten there, seeing how both time and reality seemed to have turned against him. He remembered waking from the nightmare, still feeling the claws of whatever dark beast had been chasing him rending the flesh on his chest, tearing past the tattoo until it tasted flesh. He remembered the heart-pounding moments after the nightmare, but not the decision to undo his mother’s locking charm, or the descent down the stairs, or the his grand entrance to the kitchens that must have knocked something over, given the amount of broken china on the floor. Idly, Sirius realised he’d stepped on a shattered piece of paisley teacup. His foot was bleeding, leaving red-streaked prints in his wake. Sirius was beyond caring. He tore open the cupboards, until he found—Fresh bread. Bread, that he’d so naively turned down when Regulus had offered it to him. He couldn’t remember why he’d turned it down. It’d seemed so important at the time.Sirius was familiar with starvation, and he wasn’t about to lose whatever calories he might manage to find by throwing up after eating too fast. Biting back every instinct that roared at him to devour the loaf of bread whole, Sirius broke of a little piece, popped it in his mouth, chewed, swallowed. Again, and again, one minuscule piece at a time, until nearly half the loaf was gone.Behind him, Kreacher let out a chortled laugh. “Blood traitors are not allowed dinner in my Mistress’s house. The nasty Gryffindor steals from my Mistress.”Sirius spun around, rabid, clutching the bread to his chest. With his free hand, he called his magic to his fingertips, and in one graceless move, Sirius fired a stinging hex at Kreacher, immediately followed by a binding hex. Too late, Sirius realised that his magic might be the only thing sustaining his body. Weakened as he was by hunger and nightmares, Sirius actually felt the magic drain from him. His vision swirled, then went dark, and the next thing he knew, he on his hands and knees, eyes zooming in and out of focus on his bloody hands and the blood-stained pieces of broken china around him. “You really ought to have known better,” Walburga Black said, conversationally. She was wearing a night dress and her hair was down, and she ran a finger over the scorch mark on the kitchen wall, apparently from where Sirius’s hexes had missed Kreacher. “Or, perhaps, I should have known better. You never were suited for obedience, Sirius.”Sirius was having a difficult time deciding whether she was real, or merely a product of his broken mind. His mother’s silver eyes flared with an unholy fury that was becoming of nightmares, but Sirius had seen that look on Walburga’s face far too often to rule out the possibility of reality. “I should have cut you from my womb the moment I felt you kick. And Salazar, how you screamed. I should have had the wet nurse suffocate you, claim a tragic accident, and name your brother as my heir. You are unworthy of the magic in your veins, of the nobility of your blood.”Sirius tried to push himself to his feet, gritting his teeth together as the palms of his hands ground down into the fine glass from the china scattered across the floor. A small sound escaped his lips, entirely without his permission, but he managed to climb to his knees before—“Stay down!” his mother roared, just before she drew her wand and fired off a Knockback Jinx.Sirius went sliding back across the floor, broken glass lodging in his skin. He felt the blood trickling down his forehead, from a particularly deep gash by his hairline, the blood stinging his eyes. Every joint and muscle in his body ached from exhaustion, and it felt like wasn’t an ounce of magic left in his bones. Real. She was definitely real. Sirius spat out a mouthful of blood. He’d apparently bitten his tongue. “You will learn to obey me, Sirius, or I will find everything you love and burn it to the ground. There’s a war coming, my son. Not even the Old Man will be able to protect your little Gryffindor friends forever. You will learn your place or you will die with them.”Think I’d rather die.“You really are a Gryffindor.” His mother sounded almost bemused, and Sirius was so taken aback that he didn’t have time to worry that he’d said his intentions out loud. “Stupid. Arrogant. Unworthy. Had I not birthed you myself, I’d have called your legitimacy into question.”Walburga twirled her wand, a forlorn expression washing over her face. “Too late now, I suppose. The House of Black needs its eldest son, now more than ever. You’ll have to do.”Despite everything, Sirius found himself laughing. It came out broken and bloody, and Sirius was half-convinced there was a piece of glass lodged in his throat, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Why? Why the fuck do you need me?”He glanced up at his mother and almost shrunk away from the intensity of the lascivious gleam in the pure silver of her eyes. He was looking into the future, but the future as spelled into creation by the cruel hand Walburga Black. Every second of it spilled out in front of him, and Merlin, his nightmares had nothing on this. This was war and desolation, fire and brimstone, all of it already written out in detail, unchangeable and unrelenting. “You will obey me, Sirius,” Walburga droned, slow and steady, knowing full well what he’d seen, “or Regulus will take your place.”No.
No.
He could never abandon Regulus to that fate. “Your choice, Sirius. Yes or no.”Sirius swallowed what was left of his broken pride, and it lodged in his throat right alongside the piece of shattered glass. “Yes, Mother.”Walburga tipped her chin up in triumph, a wicked smile creeping across her face. She raised her wand. “Crucio.”Sirius curled in on himself, but the force of the curse followed him anyway, tearing through his defences, setting every nerve on fire and boiling him alive. He grit his teeth, but it did not stop the scream from escaping his lips. His mother did not react, merely watching him writhe in pain in a pile of broken glass until she finally let the curse drop. Sirius panted, unable to catch his breath, his throat raw and hoarse, and so much blood that he could barely see straight. Summoning the last of his strength, Sirius raised his head and forced himself to look at Walburga. Her long, black hair was sleek against her back, down, like it so rarely was, but not a hair out of place. Her high cheekbones and aristocratic features reeked of victory and loathing, all at once. Silver eyes—as silver as the moonlight that streamed through the window—glared down at him, as finally, she laughed. She was beautiful, perhaps not in spite of but because of the cruelty etched into her every feature. She was a ravenous creature, locked away and starved for eons, waiting for the moment to reap destruction on the world of men.I look like her, a crazy voice in his head whispered. Which, in retrospect, was an odd thing to think while she was pointing a wand at him whilst he was currently bleeding all over the shattered pieces of her super-fucking-expensive wedding china. Walburga left him there, a broken shell of the brave Gryffindor he’d prayed he’d be able to become, laughing all the way down the hall and back up the stairs. Eventually, Sirius picked himself up and dragged himself up the stairs. He had to stop on the landing to catch his breath because he was panicking, goddamnit. His magic was depleted, his body still shivered with aftershocks from the Cruciatus, there was glass in his throat, and his future had been written for him, entirely without his permission.
You will obey me, Sirius, or Regulus will take your place.
He wondered what it meant, swearing fealty to the House of Black.He didn’t think he wanted to know the answer. Sirius collapsed in his bed, a thousand shallow cuts bleeding into his sheets. He didn’t dare try a healing spell, not in the least because he didn’t currently posses enough magic to pull one off without further complicating his injuries. A healing spell would mean disobedience. His mother wanted to suffer. If he healed his wounds, then Regulus would take his place. That was how this worked.Sirius sobbed into his pillow and tried to will himself into his grave.In the morning, Kreacher Apparated into his room bearing three potion vials. He drank them all down without even looking at the labels. One, he figured, was a healing potion, because as he drank the other two, he watched the skin on his knuckles knit itself back together. The second and third were harder to decipher, but he figured one was a nutrition potion—not food, by any means, but enough to keep him alive and cognisant for at least a few more days.After a few minutes later, after Kreacher had popped out again, Sirius figured out what the third potion did. It started slowly, then came in a rush, a flood of sensation that was almost euphoric.His magic had returned.He muttered a Scourgify and the blood disappeared first from his sheets, then from his skin and pyjamas. He sat on his bed, feeling all at once better and worse than he had in days.Sirius didn’t think for a second that the potions meant that he was forgiven. The Cruciatus the night before had been for the bread he’d stolen. He still had one hell of a reckoning coming, and he knew it.Still, something had changed. His mother had shown her cards. The House of Black needed its heir. If he were Slytherin, or even a braver Gryffindor, he would be able to use that as leverage. He’d be able to negotiate for even a modicum of control over his own fate.But Regulus came first, always, and Walburga knew it. And that was the end of it, wasn’t it? He’d give anything, tear himself down to nothing, destroy himself completely to make sure his little brother was never touched by the cruel hands of fate or the ravenous claws of their mother. You really are a Gryffindor. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
DECEMBER 25, 1971
Traditionally, Christmas at Grimmauld Place was a small, somber affair that usually involved Walburga and Orion at either ends of the long, ornate dining table, and Sirius and Regulus across from each other in the middle. Kreacher would cook something nice, Orion would present Walburga with an expensive gift, probably imported illegally from some far off country, and that would be it. Orion would retire to his study, Walburga to her rooms, and Sirius and Regulus would entertain themselves in the library. Traditionally, Christmas at Grimmauld Place was like any other given evening on the calendar. This year, however, Andromeda Black was to be engaged. That, of course, was entirely Sirius’s fault. “It’s not your fault,” Andromeda hissed, but Sirius just glared at her. It was only four in the afternoon, and already Grimmauld Place was far too crowded with far too many mostly-hated relatives for Sirius’s comfort. Not that Grimmauld Place could, by any definition, ever be considered comfortable.Aunt Druella and Uncle Cygnus had been the first to arrive, accompanied by Bellatrix, Narcissa, and a very grumpy Andromeda. Bellatrix and Narcissa wore elegant green and crimson dresses befitting of the holiday. They were led into the parlour on the arms of Rodolphus Lestrange and Lucius Malfoy, respectively, before both Malfoy and Lestrange broke off to pay respects to Walburga, Orion, and finally, to Sirius, the heir to House Black. Sirius took great, arcane pleasure in watching Malfoy bow to him, even if the feeling was short lived once he caught the gleam in Malfoy’s eye. He knew what that meant. It wouldn’t be long now. Malfoy would claim his revenge for the scar on his face. Mostly, Sirius tried not to think about it.Andromeda, for her part, wore black, befitting only of her name and her mood. When finally managed to break free from her own precursory greetings and salutations, she plopped down on the settee next to Sirius with an angry huff. Her long, curly hair—just as elegant and sleek as Bellatrix’s was wild and unruly—pulled back, and Sirius caught a glimpse of dangling yellow-gold earrings. Yellow and black.Andromeda was wearing Hufflepuff colours—Ted’s colours—in a sign of defiance so subtle that it could have only been designed by a Slytherin. Sirius didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “I’m only going to say this one more time,” Andromeda practically growled in his ear, and Sirius frowned as he felt everyone else’s eyes on them. It wasn’t unusual for him and Andromeda to be sequestered away at Black family gatherings, but he still felt the palpable waves of his mother’s disapproval from across the room. “This is not your fault.”Across the room, Walburga chatted amicably with Lucius Malfoy. That certainly didn’t bode well for him. Sirius turned the force of his own glare back on Andromeda. “You helped me. Now we’re here. It is most definitely my fault.”Andromeda rolled her eyes with all the dramatic flair innate to those bearing the Black name. “It was only a matter of time. I’m older than Narcissa, and she’s been more or less unofficially betrothed to that pasty, little git over there for almost a year. For Christ’s sake, she’s still at Hogwarts! It was only a question of how long I could continue fielding my mother’s attempts at setting me up with some rich, pure-blood fuck. You had absolutely nothing to do with this, Sirius.”It was his fault, but Sirius knew he wasn’t going to win the argument with her. She was Slytherin and he was exhausted. Instead, he changed the subject. “How is… Feathers taking all this?”A carefully neutral mask crept across Andromeda’s face. She scanned the room. “Cast a silencing charm. If I draw my wand, they’ll notice.”Sirius had a hunch that his mother would notice the distinct silence coming from their corner of the room anyway, but he called his magic forward and cast the spell over them all the same. He felt more than saw the tension drain from Andromeda’s body as she pressed her shoulder against his. “He’s taking it about as well as can be expected.” She looked down at her hands. “I love him, Sirius. More than I could ever dream of putting into words. And I’m going to marry him.” Then, with more conviction: “I’m going to marry Ted-fucking-Tonks.”Sirius frowned. “My mother will burn you off the tapestry, ‘Dromeda. You’ll be disinherited.”She let out a broken sort of laugh. “I’m not sure I care. I mean it, Sirius. I’m going to marry him. I just… need time to plan.”“What about Fawley?” Fawley, who had yet to arrive. Fawley, who Sirius had yet to see in person. Fawley, who was meant to wed his favourite cousin. Fawley, who Sirius would like to tear to pieces, just on principle.Something flashed across Andromeda’s eyes. She smirked. “That much, at least, I’ve figured out.”Sirius couldn’t hold back a smile, even here and starved as he was. He loved conspiring with Andromeda. “Oh?”Andromeda waved a teasing finger in his face and tsked. “It’s a surprise. I can’t wait to see your face, Siri. It’ll leave him no choice. He’ll have to refuse my hand. Lines will be drawn, hexes will be thrown, and I shall remain a free woman. It will be glorious.”Sirius smirked. “Never let it be said that a Black dinner ended without bloodshed.”Instead of the laugh he’d been hoping for, Sirius’s words instantly sobered Andromeda. “How are you doing, Sirius?” Her voice was hardly more than a whisper, even with the silencing charm. He wasn’t sure how to answer that. If he lied, she would see right through it and only worry more. If he told the truth…Well.Andromeda sensed his hesitation and took one of his hands into both of hers, gripping so hard his fingers turned white. “Any marks?”Sirius shook his head and sighed. She wasn’t going to let this one drops. “I haven’t eaten,” he finally managed.“How long?”Since Hogwarts. He bit his lip to stop the words. She seemed to hear them anyway. “Jesus Christ, Sirius.”He wondered if Andromeda knew that she swore like a Muggle and when exactly, in her very clandestine courtship of Ted Tonks, that had happened. To him, it seemed like a rather obvious tell.“How’s Regulus?” she asked, when he said nothing. Sirius scanned the room stuffed full of his various relatives. Kreacher led in a newly-arrived Uncle Alphard, his mother’s middle brother who Sirius hadn’t seen in person in quite some time. Uncle Alphard walked up to Walburga and Malfoy, accepted a glass of wine, and promptly downed the whole thing, seeming to need it in order to endure the ensuing evening. Sirius had always liked Uncle Alphard. Bellatrix and Lestrange huddled together with Narcissa on the opposite side of the room, talking in bawdy tones with the occasional meaningful glare at Andromeda and Sirius. Cygnus and Orion stood close to the door, both of them swirling crystal glasses of his father’s best scotch. Regulus was not in the room.“He’s probably hiding from Bella,” Sirius said. “He’s terrified of her.”“He should be,” Andromeda muttered. Then: “But that’s not what I meant, Siri.”Sirius knew that, of course. He just didn’t particularly want to answer her. He felt an involuntary shudder ripple through his body as his mother’s words from the other night echoed in his skull. “He’s safe,” Sirius said. “I’ll keep him safe. No matter what.”Andromeda gave him a look, and he almost cursed the pity in her eyes. She opened her mouth to reply, but just then, Crawley trailed into the room, followed closely by a visibly nervous Regulus and—Andromeda made a choked noise in the back of her throat. Sirius sat up straighter and dropped the silencing charm. Julius Fawley was tall—taller than both Orion and Cygnus. All things considered, he was rather plain, especially for a pure-blood family named in the Sacred Twenty-Eight. His features were soft, rather than sharp and angular, and vaguely Eastern European. He was probably about Alphard’s age—somewhere in his early forties—with boring, flat brown hair tied back by a silk ribbon that matched his tie. Fawley shook hands with Orion, then Cygnus, kissed Walburga on the cheek, then ruffled Regulus’s hair. Sirius could see the murder in his brother’s eyes from across the room. When Fawley’s eyes landed on Andromeda, the soft, mild-mannered expression on his boring face melted into the ravenous hunger of a feral wolf. Andromeda dug her fingernails into the palm of Sirius’s hand as Fawley walked over. As she stood, she pulled Sirius to his feet as well, then skilfully diverted her eyes: the perfect posture of a subservient bride-to-be. The look didn’t suit Andromeda at all, and Sirius wanted to make a rather snide comment, but her grip on his hand tightened. Sirius couldn’t tell if Andromeda was as truly scared of Fawley as she seemed, or if she was merely playing the part expected of her. Bloody Slytherins.All the same, Sirius swallowed his words. As was proper, Fawley greeted Sirius first by bowing slightly and offering his hand. Sirius internally cursed the sharp angle to which he had to crane his neck in order to properly look Fawley in the eye. He might be twelve and fucking short, but he was the Black heir, goddamnit, and if he was going to be tortured for it, it was only fair that he at least looked the part. Julius Fawley smiled indulgently at him, as though—Black heir or no—Sirius was no more than five. Sirius hated Julius Fawley. “Sirius, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” Fawley said. “Your father has told me a lot about you. I hear you have quite the talent for wandless magic.”It wasn’t particularly creative, as far as greetings went, and Sirius had heard an infinite number of variations of it. Hello, Sirius—an acknowledgement by name, to demonstrate that the party doing the greeting knows exactly who Sirius was. Your father said—Yes, yes, of course his father said. His father took any and every opportunity to make sure that all the other Ancient Houses knew that he had an heir, even a deviant one at that. Wouldn’t want anyone challenging the power and… longevity of House Black. And, of course, a talent for wandless magic. This, Sirius knew, was exclusively his mother’s doing. She spread the rumours of his magic far and wide, often accompanied by little embellishments and white lies. Dumbledore himself never showed such an aptitude at his age. Honestly, Sirius had heard it so often and from so many different people that he’d never really bothered to check if it was true. It was all part of his mother’s game. A message passed in hushed whispers the world over that said: He might be a deviant and a Gryffindor, but he is powerful. You have every right to fear him. Sirius supposed that, in some circles, he really was quite famous. No wonder McGonagall hated him. McGonagall, like everyone else, believed that Sirius used his wandless magic just as his mother intended: to assert his power over others and make them remember their place.He was half tempted to assert his power now. Sirius bit back a nasty retort to Fawley and, more importantly, a hex aimed at an unmentionable place just to prove how powerful his wandless magic could be. Instead, Sirius finally accepted Fawley’s hand that had been left hanging in the empty space between them for almost an indecent amount of time. “Pleasure’s all mine, Mr. Fawley.” Sirius released Fawley’s hand and resisted the urge to wipe his own on the front of his Christmas robes, just to try to shake away the nothing that sparked across his skin. Instead, he tilted up his chin and opted for the type of idle conversation his father had tried to drill into him the moment Sirius said his first words. “Forgive my memory. What is it that you do, again?”Sirius, of course, knew the answer, just as he knew the particular field claimed by each family named in the Sacred Twenty-Eight. Each Ancient House occupied a single seat on the Wizengamot, traditionally held by the eldest male. Together, the Ancient Houses made up fifty percent of the voting body, as the remaining twenty-eight seats were given to elected officials from wizarding districts around Britain. Beyond the permanent seat on the Wizengamot, the Ancient Houses expected their sons to master a particular craft or trade, mostly in the interest of maintaining and expanding both their wealth and political influence. The Averys and Carrows, for instance, ran the British division of the International Potions Guild. The Malfoys held elected positions in the Ministry and government, such as Abraxas Malfoy’s seat on the Hogwarts School Board. The Notts and the Prewetts, having never been particularly amicable towards each other, had long-since been rivals on the professional Quidditch pitch, as well as in their own separate broom-making businesses. The Lestranges…Well, these days, the Lestranges were mostly assassins for hire. The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black were, traditionally, scholars and academics, with the occasional curse-breaker—like Cygnus—thrown in the ranks. (Though, from his uncle’s stories, the curse-breaking done by Black curse-breakers was not so much as Ministry-sanctioned, traditional curse-breaking, as it was making sure that the curse in question only affected the intended party.)More so than any of the other Ancient Houses, House Black was the unquestioned keeper of ancient and predominantly forbidden magic. The library at Grimmauld Place was renowned the world over, and despite the ever-present stench of Dark Magic that lingered in the air, it was Sirius’s favourite room in the house. “I work as a solicitor at my father’s firm,” Fawley said, with no small amount of pride. “My goal, of course, is to take up my father’s seat on the Wizengamot. He’s getting on in years, and, well. Let’s just say that he’s sided with the Old Man one too many times to be entirely comfortable. My father doesn’t always… appreciate the interests of the Ancient Houses.”Fawley said it casually, but Sirius saw the anger lurking behind the whites of his eyes. It was the same expression his father wore across the room, just within earshot: unbridled ambition mixed with one hell of a superiority complex. It was a dangerous combination, certainly, but one his father would readily forge into a deadly weapon, given the right set of circumstances. “Of course,” Fawley continued, as if Sirius’s attention was on him, rather than the political dealings of his own family, “I would have taken over his seat years ago—perhaps prevented one or two of the Old Man’s more… liberal reforms—” Here, he nudged Sirius, as though they were old friends commiserating about a sudden string of foul weather. “—but House Fawley has an ancient binding spell that stipulates that the eldest son must be married and produce an heir before he is able to claim his full inheritance. Unfortunately, my full inheritance includes the seat on the Wizengamot. I would have married ages ago, but my career was taking off and I hadn’t the time or the temperament for such things. Now, though—” His gaze cut to Orion. “—things have gotten a bit more… dire.”Sirius gulped. That’s why his father had agreed to match Andromeda with Fawley, then. Out with the old, in with the fanatic. Maybe Andromeda was right. Maybe this engagement wasn’t strictly his fault.It was just… politics.Fawley’s smile turned lecherous. He turned to Andromeda. “That, I am afraid, is why I have you, my darling.”Sirius had a sudden, horrifying suspicion that he and Andromeda—but Andromeda especially—had severely underestimated Julius Fawley. He wasn’t so sure that Andromeda could outwit him on this, not if he was as dead-set on warmongering as Orion Black was. Fawley offered his elbow to Andromeda. Andromeda looked… bored, now, more than anything. Sirius felt his heart lurch. This was so much bigger than an engagement and… Andromeda had no idea. “Mind if we take a walk in the gardens before dinner?” Fawley asked her.Andromeda nodded and clearly forced a smile. Every set of eyes in the room followed them as they made their way to the back. Then they were gone and the hushed tones of conversation picked up again.Sirius was alone. Normally, at these kinds of things, Regulus glued himself to Sirius’s side, so neither of them were ever left alone and defenceless on the battleground of mindnumbingly dull conversations, but today, Regulus seemed to be holding his own. He stood by their mother’s side, smiling up at her as she seemed to compliment him, then—Sirius cringed—amicably shaking hands with Lucius Malfoy.Sirius’s eyes drifted over the room, trying to stomp out the swell of panic in his stomach. He was the heir. He was expected to socialise. But he wasn’t brave enough to go over to his father and Uncle Cygnus—though this was clearly the option that he was meant to take. They would talk politics and legislation, but in the same veiled, vaguely threatening manner that Orion and Walburga had his first night at Grimmauld Place. Sirius was only meant to bear witness to the war they started, until such time as they needed foot soldiers. Frankly, he didn’t have the stomach for it.With Andromeda and Regulus gone, Sirius was utterly lost at sea. Narcissa was glaring at him and occasionally harrumphing in his general direction, and Bellatrix and Lestrange were furtively whispering with each other in the corner opposite of Orion and Cygnus, occasionally gesturing at Malfoy, then at Sirius, then back to Malfoy. If he was being honest, Sirius was as terrified of Bellatrix Black as Regulus. He’d sooner cut off his own foot than—Beside him, Uncle Alphard plopped down on the couch with a heavy sigh. Sirius turned at the sound. His eyes widened in shock. Mostly, because not only was Alphard slouching on the couch, with one arm draped over the back and the other swirling a glass of expensive wine, but he also had his fucking muddy boots up on Walburga Black’s antique coffee table.“Um,” said Sirius, intelligently. “You’re not going to tattle on me, are you, my dear boy?” Alphard asked, his tone far too casual for a man who was literally asking to be murdered by Sirius’s mother.“Uh.” Sirius threw a nervous glance over his shoulder. Knowing his mother, she’d find a way to blame Sirius for his uncle’s behaviour.Alphard rolled his eyes dramatically and snorted a laugh, but Sirius didn’t miss the bitterness behind it. “She can’t see us, Sirius,” Alphard said, drumming his fingers against the back of the couch. “Little spell I mastered a long time ago. Concealment charm mixed with a healthy bit of illusion magic. She can see us, theoretically, but she’ll instantly be compelled to look away and think that we’re just two proper blokes having a chat.” He took a sip of wine and winked. “I know a thing or two about wandless magic myself.”A smile crept across Sirius’s face as he took the offered seat next to Alphard, though he was not quite brave enough to put his own feet up on the coffee table.“Can you show me?” Sirius tried to hide the blunt force of his eagerness behind a carefully constructed mask of intellectual curiosity. All things considered, he was pretty sure Alphard saw right through it.“Someday,” Alphard said, with a far-off twinkle in his eye. He leaned in close. “As handy as this little parlour trick is, the spell won’t last forever and Walburga has been onto me for years. I’ll have to be brief, so I hope you can forgive my forwardness. How’ve you been, Sirius?”Frankly, Sirius was getting sick and tired of evading that particular question. This time, he opted for a simple, completely bullshit, “Fine.”Alphard, instead of calling Sirius on the obvious lie like everyone else had, Alphard simply asked, “Do you know what it is that I do?”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. For all its stops and starts, he was, quite frankly, having a difficult time following this particular conversation. Alphard smirked. “Unlike that Fawley prat, my occupation might actually be of use to you.”“No,” Sirius said, then amended. “I mean, yes. Vaguely.”Vaguely, in this context, meant not at all. Sirius hadn’t seen Alphard in years—probably since his grandmother’s funeral—and whenever his uncle’s name was brought up, his mother tended to follow it with a string of curse words that was, objectively speaking, rather impressive. Aside from the occasional letter—usually filled with scathing commentary about the lifestyle choices made by Druella, Bellatrix, and Narcissa—Sirius wouldn’t’ve known he had an eccentric uncle to begin with. Eccentric was the absolute nicest thing Walburga said about her younger brother. Coming from her, it was almost a compliment. “Didn’t think so. It’s not exactly a traditional career for a Black,” Alphard said. Then, with a dramatic wave of his hand and a rather fond look in his eye, he continued: “I run a non-profit charity that cares for and rehabilitates magical creatures from all around the world. Your father—” Alphard pauses to throw a patented Black sneer in Orion’s general direction. “—tolerates my choice in career because having a charity, no matter the… persuasion, on the books greatly improves the public perception of the Blacks. Plus, I’m told there are tax benefits.”Alphard handed Sirius a small card. On the front, there was the Black coat of arms: a snarling black dog with a screeching raven perched on its shoulder, wings spread wide. On the back, in perfect script, where Toujours Pur would normally be printed as a fair warning to all who came in contact with the Blacks, it read:
Black Sanctuary for Research & Rehabilitation of Magical Creatures
42 Constellation’s Keep
Inverness, Scotland
44 0473 874 2832
“You’re a magizoologist?” Sirius asked, dumbfounded.“Ah, not quite. I’m a… field researcher and glorified veterinarian. My sanctuary provides potion ingredients and natural remedies to both magical and non-magical afflictions all over the world. Did you know that kelpie venom is not actually venom at all? It’s more of a salve. They use it to heal themselves if they’re injured. Wizards commonly use it in dittany. It can also be mixed into a paste with griffin feathers to tend even healed scars.” He gave Sirius a look that was almost certainly meant to convey something. “Even scars from Dark Magic.”Sirius’s mind immediately flashed to Remus, but he forced it back to the present. He’d ask Alphard about this salve later, when he wasn’t surrounded by a whole bunch of people who hated every part of someone like Remus Lupin. Instead, Sirius said, “So you—”“I help find creatures born in darkness and pain. The creatures I save are… Well, most of them come from the most horrific places and most have dealt with torture of one form or another all their life.” Alphard let out a long, sad breath. “I can… relate. But instead of dwelling in their misery, I treat them with a kindness they’ve never known, and together, we try to find ways to help other… lost causes.”“Oh.”The silence was nearly suffocating, but so was being in a room with this many relatives. Sirius looked back down at the card in his hands. “What’re the numbers for?”Alphard’s lip twitched up in a half-smile. “It’s a Muggle phone number. My… partner insisted that we get one, given the surprising number of creatures that end up in Muggle zoos or homes. But, if your mother asks, it’s the sanctuary’s Ministry-issued registration number.”“Noted.”“Walburga,” Alphard said, with a back-breaking sigh that spoke of the same existential weight of anguish and fear from years spent under Walburga’s thumb that Sirius knew so well. “Well, she’d push me off the face of the earth if she thought she could get away with it.” He nudged Sirius and put on a wry smile. “The secret, my dear boy, is that you must make yourself indispensable. You, of course, have a slight advantage. You’re the heir. But—”“Regulus,” Sirius whispered on an exhale. Then, echoing his mother’s threat: “If I’m not here, Regulus takes my place.”Alphard nodded. “Heir and a spare, as it goes. It just so happens that, in this case, our loving matriarch adores the spare and would greatly prefer it if—”Sirius grit his teeth together. “I won’t let that happen.”“Then you, my boy, must make sure that you are not dispensed of.”Like that was supposed to be easy.Sirius was a Gryffindor, for Merlin’s sake. He had a neon-fucking-target on his back. Alphard ignored the apparent look of distress on Sirius’s face. “I may be able to offer assistance in keeping you… breathing.”And wasn’t that just a remarkable vote of confidence?“How?” “Your mother—if Druella’s incessant gossiping is to be believed—has every intention of sending you to the Lestrange estate in southern France over the summer holidays to… dissuade you from your deviant ways. I needn’t tel you what such a trip would entail.”Sirius very nearly heaved up the nothing stuff in his stomach. If there was one place on earth that could possibly rival the nightmares leaking from the walls of Grimmauld Place, it’d be the ancestral home of the Lestrange family, Wych-Elm Manor. That, or Azkaban. Sirius had only been to Wych-Elm Manor once, two years ago, when Falco Lestrange announced officially that his eldest son and heir had entered into an official courtship with Bellatrix Black. There’d been a party, not at all dissimilar from tonight, except with far more distant European relatives than even Sirius had known he’d had. Wych-Elm Manor had never been wired for electricity or even modern plumbing. Candles floated around, following guests, not unlike the halls of Hogwarts, except these candles occasionally illuminated the literal blood pouring down the walls, as though from a fresh wound. The Lestranges were, as far back as anyone could remember, notorious for their particular… interest Dark Creatures. Instead of house elves, Wych-Elm Manor was staffed by a variety of enslaved Dark Creatures, all of them magically bound to the house, chained in silver, and starved. The Lestranges often organised Dark Creature hunts, in order to keep their house properly staffed and satiate the inbred hunger for the torment of intelligent beings. A vampire footman offered drinks and took the coats of guests. He was so gaunt and pale that, if it had not been for the ravenous creature flashing its teeth, Sirius would have mistaken him for a ghost. They kept werewolves and hags chained to the floor and, even more disturbingly, mounted to the wall once they were no longer of use. Banshee screams could be heard well into the night, haunting and nearly deafening, echoing through bleeding hallways.On top of the tortured Dark Creatures, Wych-Elm Manor was home to no less than seven ghosts. But, instead of the stubborn, dead relatives that refused to move on, each ghost wandering the halls of the Manor was a victim of the psychotic madness of one Lestrange or another. All of the ghosts were violent, attempting to reap some tangible revenge on the family that claimed their lives. Two of them—Blair Vonfeldt and Ichabod Fletcher—were certifiable poltergeists: once human, but long, long ago. In death, their souls became so twisted in rage and hatred that the essence of their beings itself began to decay. In order to manifest themselves, they terrorised the living and feed on their fear. They could only exist, then, in such a place as Wych-Elm Manor, because without the constant terror and bleeding walls to keep what’s left of their souls intact, the poltergeists would fade into nothing. Well, almost nothing. In the thome of ancient legends that Sirius found in the library of Grimmauld Place, it was said to be believed that all poltergeists eventually faded into dementors. “No,” Sirius said after a long pause. “You don’t need to tell me what would happen.”He’d be forged into a weapon, just like each of the Lestranges: carved out of stars and hewn in the fire of ancient hatred, to seek out and destroy blood traitors and Mudbloods. Whatever fragile moral compass Sirius claimed to have now would be ground to dust before his very eyes. He’d become a faceless soldier, waiting for his master to pull his string, waiting to execute the order to curse James Potter or Lily Evans or Albus-fucking-Dumbledore into oblivion.“Hm,” Alphard said, clearly tracking the frightening inevitability of it all as it danced across Sirius’s face. “I’d much prefer it if you came to stay at my sanctuary instead.”Sirius blinked. He hadn’t been expecting that.“There would be… conditions, of course,” Alphard said, tilting his head a little. “What conditions?” Sirius demanded, ready to agree to just about anything that kept him in the United Kingdom.“Your father,” Alphard continued, as if Sirius hadn’t spoken at all, “won’t take too much convincing. He’s always seen my work as an asset to Black politics. Plus, there’s a good chance I’ll have you mucking hippogriff pens, so he knows, at the very least, that you will be suffering. He’ll take comfort in that.”Sirius pulled a face, but all things considered, hippogriff shit was better than Wych-Elm Manor. “He’s not the one you’ll have to convince.”Alphard just nodded.“Your mother,” Alphard said, without a hint of irony, “is the bane of my existence.”Mine too, Sirius thought.It took five full seconds and Alphard’s surprised laugh for Sirius to realise he’d said that out loud. “I’ve had a lifetime to figure out how to get what I want from Walburga Black. She wants you out of the way, surrounded by pure-bloods, and to slowly torment you until you forget any Gryffindor notions that you may have acquired at Hogwarts.” Alphard winked at him. “I can deliver on one… and a half of those, if you count mucking shit as torture.”Sirius managed to smile at the joke, but that was about it. His mind was elsewhere. “What about Regulus?”Alphard’s expression immediately sobered. “You need to know one thing about me, Sirius, before you even consider my offer. I am neither Gryffindor nor a hero, in any sense of the word. You also, objectively, need to understand that Regulus is not the one in immediate danger. As I said, he is the favoured son. You, on the other hand—”“She wants me dead,” Sirius said, bluntly. “To put it mildly. Perhaps, in this circumstance, the right course of action is the Slytherin one. You cannot hope to protect your brother at any point in the future if you allow yourself to be removed from the game board now. The best thing you can do for Regulus is to make sure you’re still breathing long enough to stand between him and Walburga when it all goes to shit.”Sirius’s eyes snapped up to Alphard’s. “You think it will? Go to shit?”It was one thing for Sirius to speculate that his father was planning something. It was one thing for Regulus to whisper about wars and political manoeuvring in the dead of night. It was another thing to hear it from an adult. That made it real. “Take a look around the room, Sirius,” Alphard said, and Sirius did. “Take a look at the men to whom your father sold your cousins. Sons of pure-blood psychopaths, politicians, and sycophants. Your father is merely solidifying his allies and biding his time.”“To do what?” Sirius asked, though he already knew the answer.“To declare war,” Alphard said, “on an unprecedented scale.”Sirius bit his lip and tried to quell the overwhelming sense of dread that welled up inside of him. “Then… I can’t just leave Regulus to face that alone. You don’t know—”Alphard cut him off with a sharp glare, and Sirius recoiled a little bit because, yeah. Alphard knew exactly what would happen if Sirius left Regulus alone at Grimmauld Place.“It’s your decision to make, my boy.” Alphard reached over and squeezed Sirius’s shoulder. “Take some time. You have enough to worry about right now, and both of us need to get through the next few hours, preferably unscathed. My offer stands for as long as you should need it.”As if on cue, Kreacher popped into the room and bowed reverently in front of Walburga. “Dinner is waiting in the Hall, Mistress,” Kreacher croaked.Alphard waved his hand and dropped the concealment charm before anyone had a chance to look too closely at it. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius tried his best not to salivate at the smell as he took his place next to his father at the table. Candles lit the hall, and thirteen places were set at the table with the traditional silver cutlery.Sirius swallowed around a ball of nervous energy and tried his best not to fidget. He hadn’t realised there were exactly thirteen of them about to take their places at the Christmas table. It was a stupid, old superstition, but nothing planned by one Walburga Black was ever left up to chance or coincidence. Thirteen places at the table. The first to rise would be the first to die. In almost all circumstances, Sirius Black was not one to blindly follow ancient superstitions. The hands of Fate already seemed to have it in for Sirius and he was already worn to the bone fighting that particular battle. Despite whatever vendetta Sirius had against any and all higher powers, things like this, well, they tended to be hauntingly self-fulfilling. His mother wouldn’t outright act on it, of course. She was a Slytherin. But she’d set the table for thirteen guests with a clear and menacing purpose: she meant to suss out the weakest link. She meant to frighten and intimidate everyone at this table into submission, to play her hand against Fate and carve a new universe in which she, Walburga Black was lord and master of life and death. This… would be a contest of wills. One Sirius could not allow himself to lose. He didn’t need another death omen following him into his nightmares. More importantly, if the ridiculously superstitious Ancient Houses were to learn that the Black heir had a death omen on his head—even one as arbitrarily common as this one—Sirius’s longevity and viability to produce an heir of his own would be thrown into question. There’d be legal precedent to name Regulus as the Black heir in Sirius’s stead.Julius Fawley could probably arrange something like that.There was a dangerous gleam in his mother’s eyes, as she watched the silent recognition of the thinly veiled threat flit over the twelve other faces in the room. Everyone knew what this was. At the other end of the table from him, Andromeda gulped and he could just make out the thin line of sweat that had begun to bead on her forehead. Regulus took his traditional seat next to Sirius and across from their mother, and Merlin, Sirius watched as his brother tugged nervously at his tie, intermittently flitting terrified eyes up from the table to catch Sirius’s. Vaguely, Sirius wondered if this was what Regulus tried to warn him about. It hadn’t mattered that he’d agreed to his mother’s terms, that he’d bowed to her will already and the torture she’s wrought in the past week. Regulus was still the favourite son, and Walburga Black would stop at nothing to oust the Gryffindor tainting her sacred bloodline.Sirius set his jaw. He would not lose. Everyone took their place and sat. No one dared to make any motion so as to indicate that they might be the first to stand. The second the kitchen doors opened, Sirius nearly doubled over at the sudden, intense smell that drifted in. Gravy and meat, roasted vegetables and bread. All other thoughts flew out of his mind.Salazar’s fucking balls, he was so fucking hungry. Plates floated in from the kitchen, followed by goblets and wine. Sirius watched with rabid, starving eyes as ham and gravy and all sorts of food covered the silver plate in front of him. “A toast,” Orion said, holding up his silver goblet, and Sirius forced himself back to the moment. Twelve identical goblets were raised in salutation. “To the honour of the Ancient Houses.”“To the nobility of our bloodlines,” Rodolphus Lestrange said.“To alliances, new and old,” Julius Fawley added.Lucius Malfoy grinned wide and leered at Sirius. “To the debts we’ve yet to pay.”All eyes fell on Sirius, waiting for the final toast from the Black heir. Sirius glanced across the table and stared directly into his brother’s eyes. “To the family we’d die to protect.”Regulus gulped, his eyes wet and terrified. Sirius felt the weight of his words reverberate around the room. Andromeda broke the tension with a rather non-traditional and halfway irreverent, “Cheers!”The salute echoed in half-hearted little bursts. Moments later, the hall was filled with the scrape of silver and the clinking of glasses as everyone tucked into the feast. Sirius hesitated. Any wrong move, anything seen as deliberate disobedience against his mother who’d starved him for over a week could be his downfall. He clenched his fists and valiantly tried to block out the smells of the tantalising feast in front of him, just out of reach.He’d already given into temptation once, and it’d cost him dearly. He would not lose.“Sirius, darling,” his mother trilled in an unnaturally light tone. He felt himself cringe. Darling was not so much as an endearment—pfft, as if his mother were capable of such a thing—but more as a necessary prerequisite to a threat made in polite company. “Aren’t you hungry?”There was an audible pause, as a palpable tension settled over the room. She’d spent a week starving him to the brink of insanity and now she wanted him to… eat?Honestly, he hadn’t seen that coming. His mother was playing a dangerous game, one in which she was five steps ahead of Sirius and he had no feasible way to catch up.It was his own life on the line and he was flying blind.Sirius’s eyes drifted from his mother’s forced smile to his brother. Regulus bit his lip, pointedly glanced at Sirius’s plate of food, then almost imperceptibly shook his head. Sirius had neither the desire nor the strength of will to resist any longer. If this was part of her game, then he willingly surrendered, if only it meant he’d have food in his belly again. Fighting every instinct to forgo manners and decorum and simply dig into his food with ravenous fingers, Sirius picked up his knife and fork and sawed off a tiny piece of ham, barely larger than the pad of his thumb. He raised the meat to his mouth, then forced himself to chew, pushing aside the animal instinct to growl and inhale his plate whole, before his food could once more be ripped from beneath his nose. Sirius swallowed, and conversation resumed around him, but to him, it was muted and dull. He couldn’t bring himself to tear his attention away from the food in front of him, his mother’s scheming and politics be damned. He ate slowly, deliberately, and even then, his stomach ached after only a few bites of the rich food. With a flick of his wrist he prayed escaped his mother’s attention, Sirius transfigured the ridiculously expensive wine in his goblet into water. He began adding long sips of water in between each bite, and thanked his lucky stars that no one was in a particular hurry to leave the table. Merlin only knew when he’d get food again , if at all, before he returned to Hogwarts in another week. Sirius wasn’t about to waste this opportunity by eating too fast, only to upset his stomach and lose his dinner. An hour in, Sirius’s plate had long since gone cold, even though only a mere half of his food had successfully made it into his stomach. He continued to take deliberate, measured bites, focusing entirely on the mechanical movement of his hands as he cut the meat, the slow grind of his jaw as he chewed, the constriction of his throat as he swallowed, then, the gradual swell of the comforting warmth in his stomach. He could hardly be expected, then, heir of no, to follow even one of the conversations around him, consumed as we was by the inconceivable miracle that was his full belly. That was, of course, until Andromeda slammed her fist down on the table so hard that she almost upended her empty plate. Regulus nearly jumped out of his seat. Sirius nearly choked on his tiny piece of carrot. No one else bothered with such a visceral reaction to Andromeda’s outburst, other than to give her their clear and undivided attention. Andromeda Black was livid.With her non-clenched fist, Andromeda grabbed Julius Fawley’s wrist and dragged his hand—that had, apparently, been resting on her upper thigh, the git—onto the table and in plain view of everyone. “All right,” Andromeda practically growled. “Let’s just get this over with, shall we?” “Aw,” crooned Bellatrix, lasciviously leaning across Lestrange to get a proper look at her sister. “Ickle Andy is nearly gagging for it.”Narcissa snickered.Andromeda glared daggers at her sisters.Sirius frowned, because it was so unfair. If he ever made a comment like that within earshot of his mother, he’d be hexed into an early grave. Of course, he’d never even consider teasing Andromeda about Julius Fawley. That would also end with Sirius buried under six feet of earth.“You will wait until we retire to the parlour, Andromeda,” Cygnus said, his voice a remarkably calm counterpoint to the general demeanour of his daughters. “As is proper.”“We haven’t even had dessert yet,” Narcissa added, a smirk dancing on her lips.“I do not care,” Andromeda said, punctuating every word. “We all know we’re likely to be stuck at this table for a few more hours, at least, and, frankly, I’m not sure I have the patience for it. So—” She turned fully in her seat to face Fawley next to her. “—Just get on with it, would you?”Fawley’s gaze drifted from Andromeda to Walburga, waiting for permission. Sirius narrowed his eyes, then put down his knife and fork. This, too, was part of his of his mother’s insidious game, and Sirius sent up a silent prayer that whatever Andromeda had up her sleeve, it would be enough to win. Otherwise…Sirius didn’t even want to consider otherwise. Walburga inclined her head, a malicious smile creeping across her face. “Proceed, Mr. Fawley. Dessert will hold for another few minutes.”Fawley smiled and pulled Andromeda’s hand to his lips to kiss it. Andromeda rolled her eyes and sighed dramatically.“Andromeda Black,” Fawley began, his voice taking on a rather salacious tone that wasn’t entirely appropriate for polite company. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever laid eyes on—”Narcissa snorted a laugh, but covered her mouth at Druella’s glare.Andromeda merely tilted her chin up so that she could sneer at Fawley properly. “I know that. Do better.”“Andromeda!” Druella hissed.Fawley, to his credit, was not deterred in the slightest. “You are a remarkable witch who—”“You know absolutely nothing about me except for my last name,” Andromeda snapped. “Do not presume that your conclusion to that sentence will even be remotely adequate.”This time, Fawley’s composure wavered. Sirius watched as something akin to rage flashed across his eyes. “Andromeda, I am not a violent man,” Fawley said, with all the false pretence of a man who kicked puppies to pass the time on lazy Saturday afternoons. “But I would easily fight an army for the right to call you my wife.”Yeah. The army was called Ted Tonks and Sirius had money on the Hufflepuff.Then again, Andromeda was quite the force to be reckoned with on her own.“I will marry you,” Andromeda said, through gritted teeth, “on one condition.”Druella slammed her goblet down hard on the table. “Oh, come now, Andromeda, you’re being unreasonable. He’s—”“Let her speak, Druella,” Walburga Black cut in. There was a gleam in her eyes as she calmly glanced between Fawley and Andromeda.Sirius felt a chill creep up his spine. “I will marry you,” Andromeda said, this time drawing out every word, “if and only if you agree to take the name Black.”Silence.Druella let out a mournful sigh and buried her face in her hands. “Andromeda, that’s ridiculous. You have to—”“It’s happened before,” Andromeda snapped, with a harsh glare at her mother. “Charis Lysandra Black only agreed to marry Caspar Crouch if he took her name.”“Charis Black’s line died out,” Cygnus said.“Not entirely,” Alphard muttered into his goblet.Sirius wracked his brain, trying to recall the obscure branch of the Black family tapestry. He knew the name, of course. Charis, daughter of Arcturus. Older than both of his parents, perhaps by half a generation, but for the life of him, he didn’t remember the names of any of her children or what had happened to them. He made a mental note to look into it later. It seemed… important, especially if what Andromeda said was true.“Arcturus Black had no sons, no one to carry on his legacy,” Andromeda explained, evenly. “Arcturus appealed to his brother, Sirius Black II, the patriarch at the time, and begged him to allow Charis to carry the Black name into her marriage, and whatever children they bore to take up the Black brand, rather than that of the Crouches.” “You are not the eldest daughter. That would be me,” Bellatrix sneered. “Why should you carry on Father’s name?”“You’re as good as a Lestrange already.” Andromeda inclined her head at Narcissa, her tone every bit as derisive as Bellatrix’s. “And Cissa’s a bloody Malfoy. She even looks like one. Charis wasn’t the eldest, Bella. She was the youngest. Callidora was already married and Cedrella was disowned for marrying a Weasley. Charis was the only eligible child. As am I.”Andromeda took a moment to compose herself—or psych herself up, Sirius wasn’t sure—before she levelled her gaze on Orion and Cygnus, then Fawley, in turn. “I am the last eligible daughter of Cygnus Nigellus Black,” she said, with all the nobility in her blood. “Uncle, Father, Mr. Fawley. I ask you to not allow my father’s line to die with him. Allow me instead to carry the name my father gave me into my marriage. Allow my children to bear the immortal words of House Black upon their skin. Let me do this, in order that the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black may take up new roots, that our tapestry remain strong and proud for generations to come.”No one spoke. Merlin, Andromeda could talk a good game. Although Sirius couldn’t quite hide a flinch at the mention of the brand to be placed on Andromeda’s hypothetical children, he had to admire the genius of her plan. He was a little hazy on the details surrounding Charis and Caspar Black and their descendants, but he could tell from the faces that the table that Andromeda’s brief accounting had, at the very least, been factually accurate. And, holy fuck, it was brilliant, wasn’t it?The way she’d phrased it, stressing her commitment both to future generations of pure-blood Black heirs as well as preempting the impending endow her own father’s line and legacy with his daughters’ marriages. There was no way Orion could outright deny her, not without risking irreparably offending his brother-in-law.Civil war, within pure-blood houses, was nothing to be trifled with. Orion frowned, deep furrows appearing on his forehead. “The choice is yours, Mr. Fawley,” Orion said, and really, as much as it was a surrender to Andromeda, it was his most diplomatic option. Andromeda preened, and sent Sirius a wink from across the table. This would all be over in minutes. Fawley would storm out, the curse of thirteen be damned, and Andromeda would remain single until such a time as her father found a man willing to give up his own family name in order to take that of the Blacks: a nearly impossible task given the current state lack of eligible bachelors and heirs amongst the Ancient Houses. It’d give Andromeda time, anyway, to run away and marry Ted Tonks.For the first time in what felt like forever, Sirius wanted to shout for joy and to revel in Andromeda’s victory.She was minutes away from freedom.Then, under the table, Regulus snatched Sirius’s hand and squeezed tight. Slowly, his heart suddenly in his throat, Sirius turned to face his brother. Regulus was pale and stared unblinking at the table in front of them. The only sign of life was the vice grip he kept on Sirius’s fingers.Something was wrong.Julius Fawley cleared his throat. “Mrs. Black,” he said, his voice cool and collected, “I assume our agreement is still valid?”All eyes darted from Fawley to Andromeda to the remarkably impassible face of Walburga Black. Even Orion looked at his wife, his expression giving away just a hint of surprise. Only Regulus remained still, his gaze focused straight ahead. Sirius was sure his fingers would be bruised tomorrow. “Of course, Julius,” Walburga said, calmly. “House Black never breaks its word.”Alphard reacted first, before Fawley could say another word. “What agreement?” he demanded. Walburga didn’t so much as blink in acknowledgment. “Walburga, what agreement?!”Fawley took Andromeda’s hand, once more bringing her fingers to his lips. She turned slowly to look at him, her eyes betraying just a hint of rising panic. “I accept your condition, Andromeda,” Fawley said. “I would be my honour to take the name of Black.”Andromeda’s face went deathly pale. Her mask slipped. “W-what?”Because, fuck, somehow Walburga Black had still won. “Congratulations, Andromeda,” Walburga said, a faint smile on her lips. “Your marriage shall bring great honour to your father and to House Black.”Andromeda opened and closed her mouth, searching for words that would no longer come. Alphard slammed his fist onto the table. “Merlin’s fucking tits, Walburga, what did you do?!”Orion cleared his throat. “I would like to know that as well.”Walburga shrugged and planted a placating kiss on her husband’s cheek that was entirely for the benefit of everyone present, rather than out of any sort of affection. She swirled her wine and took a sip, her gaze levelling on first Andromeda, then Cygnus and Druella. “I believe,” Walburga said, “I just saved your house from ruin, Cygnus. Ordinarily, such a favour is accompanied by gratitude.”Cygnus frowned. “What?”“Your daughter—” Walburga spat out the word, her lip curling as she glared at Andromeda. “—has disgraced both your name and this house with her relationship with the Mudblood, Edward Tonks.”Sirius’s blood ran cold. He didn’t think it was possible for Andromeda to pale any further. There were tears in her eyes.“They’ve been… intimate for quite some time, I believe,” Walburga continued, ignoring the stunned expressions from everyone around the table. “Years, if I’m correct.”Druella was nearly as pale as her daughter. “Andromeda. Is… Is this true?”Still, Andromeda did not say anything. Alphard regarded his niece with an inscrutable expression. He turned again to Walburga. “That is not… a light accusation to make, Walburga. How can you—”“My source is reliable, Alphard,” Walburga said, cooly. “And I followed up on the information myself.”Impossibly, Regulus’s grip tightened, and all the air flew from Sirius’s lungs, as though he’d been punched. Andromeda made the connection a heartbeat after Sirius.Regulus.Regulus had betrayed Ted Tonks to the wrath of Walburga Black. “Reg?” Sirius breathed.His brother was close to tears, but he made no move to look at either Sirius or Andromeda. “How could you?” Andromeda whispered, desperately, and that was an admission of guilt itself, wasn’t it?Still, Regulus said nothing and stared blankly ahead.Alphard scrubbed a hand over his face. “Fuck.”“Mr. Fawley,” Walburga explained, ignoring the breaking hearts of those around her, “agreed to marry Andromeda, despite the fact that she’s been… tainted, because, as he said, he needs a wife to assume the entirety of the Fawley estate, including his father’s seat on the Wizengamot. Should either his brothers or his father’s challenge this agreement, their case will be dealt with swiftly and they will lose. There is no clause in the laws of House Fawley that prevent the male heir from assuming the name of another Ancient House.”“That’s because it’s unprecedented!” Alphard shouted. “Caspar Crouch was the fourth son of a fourth son, not the bloody heir!”Walburga ignored him completely. “Mr. Fawley has been well compensated for his willingness to take Andromeda Black as his wife and the Black name as his own. One fourth of Sirius’s inheritance will be transferred to his Gringotts vault upon the completion of the marriage ceremony.”“One fourth?” Orion asked, raising an eyebrow at his wife. Walburga waved him off. “Hardly even a dent in our fortune, dear, and one hundred times that gold already in the Fawley’s vaults.”Neither Julius Fawley nor Orion contradicted her on this. Walburga trained her piercing, black eyes on Andromeda. “The only reason, Andromeda, you are allowed to remain a member of this family is because you have not yet sullied yourself to the point of bearing a half-blood bastard. And, as it happens, you are… useful to my husband’s political alliances. I hereby formally recognise your engagement to Julius Fawley. You will have no further contact with Edward Tonks for the remainder of your days, nor will you have any sort of correspondence with either of my sons until such time as you have borne a son of your own.”That, finally, seemed to stoke the fire in Andromeda’s veins. Color returned to her face and she flushed red, her face hardening into a scowl. “You can’t possibly—”At the same time, Alphard cut in, “Walburga, this is not—”Walburga’s eyes flashed dangerously as the brunt of her fury was trained on Alphard. “Plot and scheme all you want, brother, but never forget that I am Matriarch of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. I will do whatever I feel is necessary to ensure the survival and purity of my bloodline for generations to come. You, of all people, have no room to question my actions.”Alphard snapped his jaw shut with an audible click.Cygnus cleared his throat. “What of this Mudblood—Tonks—that defiled my daughter, Walburga?”Walburga gave him a reassuring smile. “He is being dealt with as we speak.”At that, Sirius yanked his hand away from Regulus. This was his fault.Regulus let out a small sob, and covered his mouth with both of his hands. Andromeda said, “No. No! You can’t do that. He hasn’t done anything wrong. I won’t fucking let you touch him!”She made to stand up.Druella was quicker. One minute she was sitting in passive shock, and the next, she was firing a sticking jinx at her daughter, effectively gluing Andromeda to her chair. “Andromeda Black, don’t you dare leave this table,” Druella snapped. Andromeda squirmed against the curse, her eyes wild and desperate. “Let me go, Mother! Please!”Druella did not so much as blink. Sirius sat frozen, unable to do anything.Andromeda stopped squirming, then, in one movement, drew her wand and shouted, “Expetcto Patronum!”A silver winged horse, tinged in starlight, sprung forth from Andromeda’s wand and galloped around the table. Both Lestrange and Bellatrix flinched away in surprise and horror. Druella let out a yelp.Andromeda didn’t wait for anyone else to react. “Find Teddy! Save him, goddamnit!” she shouted at her Patronus. The next moment, the horse nickered and disappeared in a shimmery, silver mist. Andromeda let out a breath.Walburga drew her wand, leaned forward, and pointed it at Andromeda’s throat. “Try another trick, girl,” Walburga Black hissed, her voice low and dangerous. “I dare you.”Andromeda said nothing, just fixed Walburga with a steely glare as she lowered her wand. “I will not let you hurt him.”“You will do as you’re told. Otherwise…” A gleam appeared in Walburga’s eye, as the point of her wand tracked from Andromeda to Regulus. “Otherwise, whatever punishment I see fit for you shall also be given to my son for withholding the name of your Mudblood for as long as he did.”Regulus let out a small whimper. Sirius felt his heart leap. “No. No, Mother, please. He didn’t—”
He did. He betrayed Tonks and Andromeda, but it didn’t fucking matter.
Sirius wouldn’t let anything happen to Regulus. He’d made a promise. “Learn your place, Sirius,” his mother snapped, not taking her eyes off Andromeda. “I am Matriarch of House Black. I shall punish my son as I see fit.”Sirius’s eyes tracked to Andromeda, and he let her see every bit of his desperation to protect Regulus. It wasn’t fair to ask this of her. He knew that. This was her freedom, her chance of happiness, of escaping everything they both loathed. She’d have to sacrifice everything, if she agreed to this.It wasn’t a fair thing to ask.He asked—begged—anyway. He’d give anything, burn any bridge, if only it meant Regulus was safe, no matter what his brother had done.He prayed that maybe—just maybe—Andromeda might understand that. Sirius saw her surrender a second before his mother did. “I… I will obey, Matriarch,” Andromeda breathed, a little more life draining from her face with each word. “Don’t… Don’t hurt Reg.”Regulus had tears tracking down his face.“Say it,” Walburga sneered. “Accept his proposal.”“Julius Fawley,” Andromeda said, her voice flat. “I will accept your hand in marriage and welcome you into the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.”Fawley put his hand over his heart, in an illusion of genuine happiness. “I am honoured.”“A toast,” Orion said, once more raising his goblet. “To the formal engagement of Andromeda Black and Julius Fawley, and the generations of Blacks to come from their line.”“To Andromeda and Julius,” several voices muttered.Neither Sirius, Regulus, nor Alphard raised their glasses. Sirius just felt… numb. “Kreacher!” Walburga called, not more than second after Orion finished the toast. The elf popped into the dining room next to his mother’s chair. “Yes, Mistress?”“Bring out the dessert. We shall be retiring to the parlour shortly.”Not likely, Sirius thought. There was still the death omen and contest of wills to contend with.Five minutes later, Sirius’s half-full plate was whisked away and replaced by a large slice of chocolate lava cake. He sighed, resigned, relieved that, at the very least, he’d had half a Christmas dinner to sustain him for the foreseeable future. It wasn’t much, in the long run, but it was more than he’d had since he’d come home.Silence echoed against the scrapes of forks and dessert plates as twelve people ate their desserts. As subtilely as he could manage, Sirius pushed his lava cake away from his body, trying not to wrinkle his nose at the smell. He really fucking hated chocolate. “Sirius.”His spine straightened and his eyes snapped up to his mother’s in alarm at the sound of his name. She smiled sweetly at him, and Merlin, it was almost putrid. “Aren’t you going to eat your dessert?”Panic and dread clawed their way once more into the pit of his stomach. He shook his head.“I had it made especially for you.”Fuck. This was part of her game.Because, of course, she wouldn’t allow him to even have this. She merely salivated at the opportunity to tear him down bit by bit, allow him the slightest of reprieves, only to rip the air right from his lungs once again. If he ate that cake, he’d have only minutes before he’d have to rush to the toilet and lose what little dinner he’d had to begin with. He’d be the first of thirteen to stand. She’d torture and damn his soul in one fell swoop. In hindsight, he should have known.Still, he couldn’t stop himself from saying, “But… I’m allergic to chocolate.”Slowly, his mother’s eyes tracked to Regulus. She raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow and the implication was clear.
Obey, or Regulus takes your place.
Swallowing his pride and instinctual will to survive, Sirius mustered whatever courage he had left, then picked up his fork and shoved a huge chunk of chocolate cake into his mouth. He chewed, then swallowed. Another bite, then another, all without breaking eye contact with his mother. His stomach turned, his insides tied themselves in knots, rioting against Sirius’s own stubbornness not to give any more ground in this final battle of the evening. He tasted bile and cocoa and his eyes burned with unshed tears, then—Then, Regulus stood up.
No.
No, no, no.
Not him. Please, not him.Twelve sets of eyes stared at Regulus in shock.Regulus, with tear-stained cheeks, rumpled robes, and a proud tilt to his chin that could only be pulled off by a Black. His eyes were wet, exhausted. Beautiful.Damned. Fuck.Sirius felt his stomach turn over for a whole different reason. “Enough,” Regulus said, bowing his head. “That’s enough. Please.”Then, he turned on his heel, and stalked out of the dining room. His stomach rolling and heaving, Sirius waited only a heartbeat before he ran out of the room after his brother. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius spat into the toilet, as his stomach convulsing for the final time. He flushed the meagre remains of his dinner, then cast a half-arsed Scourgify at his mouth, but couldn’t quite get rid of the horrible taste of bile and chocolate. Merlin, how his bones ached. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He had all but tasted victory, even in the wake of Andromeda’s defeat. His belly had been almost full, for the first time in days, and he was going to outlast his mother in her bid to curse him into an early grave.How had she managed to destroy everything with a fucking chocolate cake?He closed his eyes, then leaned back against the bathroom wall, a boneless heap on the floor. Regulus sat on the sink, kicking his legs out occasionally and biting his nails. Every once in a while, Regulus’s eyes would dart to the bathroom door. Sirius used the last dregs of his magic and his strength to cast a silencing charm and lock the door.They were in the first floor half-bath, and with the rather dramatic exit they’d made, Sirius didn’t expect them to be disturbed any time soon. His mother would be too busy trying to save face. She’d set her heir up to die, but instead, Regulus had taken his place. Even Sirius hadn’t expected that.Sirius scrubbed a hand over his face, utterly exhausted. He opened his mouth, still searching for words, but for the second time that evening, Regulus was quicker on the draw. “You need to realise, Sirius,” Regulus said, “that you can’t always save me. I have to make my own choices.”Sirius squeezed his eyes shut. He didn’t know if he had the strength left in him for this conversation. “Like you chose to give up Ted Tonks?”A pained expression flickered across Regulus’s face, but he nodded. “Yes, like how I gave up Ted Tonks.”“He could be dead, Regulus. And Andromeda—”“Mother gave me a choice, Siri,” Regulus snapped, as he jutted out his jaw in defiance. “She knows about your friends, okay? About the half-blood and James Potter. She needed something on Andromeda, to force her into complying with the marriage, so she gave me a choice. Your friends, or the name of Andromeda’s Mudblood.”Sirius’s breath caught in his throat.
No.
“I gave up Ted Tonks,” Regulus continued, forcing conviction into his voice, “because if I gave up your friends, I’d lose you forever.”“Regulus—”“Your actions have consequences, Sirius. You chose Gryffindor. You chose them over your family.”“No that’s not—”Except, it was true, wasn’t it?Sirius steeled himself, but changed tactics. “Fine. You’re right. You’re right because I don’t fucking regret it. But, Reg, you can’t think for one bloody second that anything comes before you. You’re everything, Regulus.”“You made a choice, Sirius. And I made mine. Right or wrong, it doesn’t fucking matter. Either way, people are going to get hurt.” Regulus’s eyes sparkled with an unnatural wisdom far beyond his eleven years. “We’re soldiers, you and I. We always have been. And this? This is what it means to be born into a war.”And, really, what could Sirius possibly say to that?“Actions have consequences,” Regulus said again. “And no matter the price, I will always choose you, Sirius, until the very fucking end. Even if I damn myself in the process. Even if I break your fucking heart.”Sirius pushed himself to his feet, stumbled a bit, but managed to scramble over to his brother, enough to pull Regulus into a suffocating hug against his chest. Regulus clawed at the fabric of Sirius’s dress robes, pulling him impossibly closer, and burying his face in Sirius’s neck. “I can’t lose you, Reg,” Sirius breathed into his brother’s hair. “I’d burn the stars from the bloody sky if I lost you. I need you to—”“Stars fall just fine on their own, Sirius,” Regulus said, pulling back. “You and I know that better than anyone.”“Fuck, Reg, I—”Outside the door, Sirius heard the sound of footsteps and Uncle Alphard’s clipped tone. Both Sirius and Regulus went rigid. “Orion, you can’t be fucking serious. He’s been through enough. That pasty little prat has no right to—”“This is not your house, Alphard!” came Orion’s snarled reply. “Nor do you have any say on how I make sure my heir pays his debts.”
Fuck.
Sirius heart nearly leapt out of his chest as his father’s fist pounded on the door.“Sirius! Get out here. Now,” Orion boomed, still banging on the door.Resigned and too exhausted to fight the hands of fate any longer, Sirius waved away the locking charm and reached for the handle. He knew what this was. Of course he knew. How could he not? Lucius Malfoy had been leering at him all evening, nearly drooling at the thought of having his revenge for the scar that Sirius had etched onto his face. Regulus grabbed his free hand and yanked Sirius back, his nails digging into the tender skin above Sirius’s wrist hard enough to leave marks. Regulus’s expression was inscrutable, a perfect mask that made him look far older than he was.“You could still run, Sirius.” His brother’s voice was hardly louder than a whisper.“What?” Sirius choked out.Regulus nodded slowly, then looked away from Sirius, straight at their joined hands. “You could run. Get to the back door, head down the alley, then catch the Knight Bus somewhere. Head to the Potters, maybe. If James is as good as you say he is, I’d be willing to bet he’d take you in, even on Christmas. You’d be free, Sirius. You’d be safe.”And, Merlin help him, for three full heartbeats, Sirius actually considered it. He imagined James’s face when he knocked on the door, a little surprised and a lot relieved. His glasses would be all crooked and his hair all wonky, but he’d laugh and pull Sirius into a hug. Sirius would cling to him, no matter how much it hurt, because, fuck, he’d be safe and loved and it would all be okay. James would introduce him to his parents. Sirius pictured Fleamont smoking a pipe and smiling so that his eyes crinkled in the corners, and James’s mother—Merlin, why couldn’t Sirius remember her name?—would be wearing a sari, just like James said. She’d be beautiful and kind and would probably share James’s caramel eyes. She’d give him a hug too, because despite the cruelty of his own mother, on some level, Sirius recognised that mothers were supposed to hug their children—well, their children and lost scions of Ancient Houses that appeared on their doorstep on Christmas Day. James would drag him by the sleeve into the dining room. It’d be smaller, but cosier and a thousand times more inviting from the ornate dining hall at Grimmauld Place. It’d smell of food and family and whatever the fuck curry was. Even if James insisted his mother’s cooking was terrible, Sirius knew he’d devour it like a starved man—hell, he was a starved man—and savour every bite, and every little labour of love that Mrs. Potter had put into the dish. They’d make polite conversation, smile and laugh, then retire to the parlour for cocoa and ghost stories that lingered well into the night.Then, well past midnight, he’d crawl into bed with James, a pillow between them, and beg him to let him stay, maybe forever. He could be the brother James always wanted and Sirius could finally have a family who loved him. Except…Sirius already had a brother.A brother who loved him, irreconcilably and infinitely. A brother for whom he’d sworn he’d burn down the heavens.And as much as he loved James Potter—as much as he craved his own safety and peace of mind—Sirius Black could never leave Regulus behind.Not even if it meant weeks of starvation and futile hope. Not even if it meant opening the door and facing Orion Black and Lucius Malfoy. “I’m sorry, Reg,” Sirius whispered, as he watched Regulus’s eyes fill up with tears. Sirius reached for him, pulled his brother close, then planted a kiss on his forehead. “It has to be this way. I can’t run. Not now.”Because if he ran, Regulus would take his place. Regulus sobbed something that sounded like Stupid, bloody Gryffindor, but it was mostly drowned out another round of his father’s incessant pounding on the door.
“Sirius!”
Sirius schooled his expression. Took a breath.It was time to face the gallows.Sirius opened the door. “Hello, Father,” Sirius said, frankly amazed at the neutrality of his own voice. Orion scowled down at him, his eyes darting to where Regulus was astutely gazing at his feet behind Sirius. “Alphard,” Orion barked, “take Regulus into the parlour. I need to have a word with my son.”Alphard looked like maybe he wanted to put up a fight, but Regulus, ever obedient, walked around Sirius and took their uncle’s hand, practically dragging him away and effectively leaving Sirius alone with their father. Orion was silent for a minute, just long enough to hear the heavy doors of the parlour shut behind Alphard and Regulus. Then, he said, “You know what’s about to happen?”Malfoy. Malfoy was about to have his revenge.“Yes, sir,” Sirius said.Orion gave a curt nod. “You are not to make a sound. You are not to fight back. You are not to further disgrace your name or this house or, so help me, Sirius, I will have Kreacher rub salt into your scars.”And, Merlin, part of Sirius—the dark and angry part that had, up til now, laid dormant in his very bones—wanted to sneer and tell his father how Malfoy had screamed when Sirius turned the Sectumsempra on him. How it’d almost felt good, seeing Malfoy suffer for daring to lay a finger on Remus Lupin. Sirius thought, in his own way, Orion Black might respect that.That terrified him more than anything else in this house.Sirius had never wanted to earn his father’s respect. His father was a monster.Even as the silence stretched between them, Orion narrowed his eyes and growled, “A Black always pays his debts, Sirius. Am I understood?”Sirius thought of the debts he owed Malfoy: one for the Sectumsempra scar and another for vowing to never betray Remus Lupin. He’d pay his debts, even without his father’s threats and warmongering, because the ransoms on his flesh and name meant that he’d saved Remus from pain. It’d be worth it in the end. Sirius glared up at his father. “Yes, sir.”Orion grunted in response, then grabbed the back of Sirius’s neck and yanked him forward. He corralled Sirius towards the parlour, and the great doors flew open at a flick of Orion’s wrist. Sirius stopped abruptly, then shook his father off and took two steps forward. He stood in the centre of the dinner guests. Andromeda was off to his right, her face streaked with tears—whether from her recent engagement or what was about to happen, Sirius didn’t have the presence of mind to say. Bellatrix and Narcissa each had a hold of one of Andromeda’s arms, seemingly in an attempt to hold her back should she try something drastic. Lestrange stood on Bellatrix’s other side, ever the imposing shadow, absently chewing on his fingernails and looking excessively bored. Fawley, too, looked bored, but carried himself with far less flamboyance than Lestrange; he was still a guest in this house, no matter the overwhelming success he’d had at dinner. Walburga stood next to her two brothers and Druella, as still and as imposing as a portrait. Alphard had both of his hands clamped tightly on Regulus’s shoulders, who stood in front of their uncle and had eyes only for Sirius. Lucius Malfoy, his robes open and strangely billowing in the draughty breeze from the open door, stood opposite Sirius in the centre of the room. His wand was drawn and pointed at Sirius’s chest, and he stood in a duel pose.“Father, please,” came Regulus’s strangled voice. “You don’t have to—”But at Orion’s glare, Alphard clamped a hand over Regulus’s mouth. Part of Sirius wanted to lash out at Alphard, to decry him for daring to silence Regulus, but then he saw the wash of anguish flitter across Alphard’s face. He watched as Alphard ducked his head, his eyes squeezed shut, and he refused to open them again. It was the same look reflected in Andromeda’s eyes, and in Regulus’s tears. And, Merlin, Sirius understood.There was nothing any of them could do, save for keep themselves out of the line of fire. Sirius swallowed, prayed to whomever or whatever might be listening that he’d somehow be able to tap into some of that Gryffindor courage that seemed to make him more stupid than brave, then glared over at Malfoy. Sirius Black fucking smiled. “Do your fucking worst, Malfoy.”Malfoy didn’t hesitate. “Sectumsempra!”He sliced his wand through the air, once, twice and—Sirius flew back, hitting the wall so hard behind him that he hardly registered the pain from the curse. His vision swirled, his lungs protested the sharp intake of air, his ears rang and could no longer discern any sound other than the pounding of his own heart, then—He looked down.His robes were torn, revealing his formerly white undershirt, and all he saw was—
Blood. Blood. Blood.
Blood and fucking pain.
He tried to cover the wound, to put pressure on it to stop the flow of red, except—Merlin, fuck, his hands weren’t big enough. His flesh was torn from his collar bone to his opposite hip bone.Remus has a scar like this, the utterly insane voice in his head supplied.Vaguely, he registered that Regulus was screaming. Andromeda was sobbing. He thought maybe his mother and Malfoy were laughing, but really, he couldn’t be expected to focus on anything, except—
Blood.
A manic laugh bubbled up in his own throat, all gurgly and unnatural sounding. He was going to stain his mother’s rug. He wheezed in a few more rapid, half-crazed breaths, and then his world went dark.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
The thing was, Sirius Black didn’t ever remember having good dreams.
He remembered the nightmares, of course. Rather vividly, in fact. But he couldn’t recall a single moment in his life that his subconscious had ever ventured into “good dream” territory. It’d always been Grimmauld Place and his mother’s laughter and various curses and dark fates.
Which was why Sirius Black was immensely confused when he found himself standing in a well-lit, yet unfamiliar atrium, in front of a mirror.
He knew it was a dream because the edges were sort of… fuzzy and everything felt just a bit surreal. His reflection, too, was… different.
He was taller than he remembered being and older, too. Maybe eighteen or nineteen. His hair was longer and synched in a neat knot at the base of his skull. His right ear was pierced twice, once in the cartilage and one hoop on the lobe, and both pieces of silver jewellery caught in the warm light, matching his silver eyes perfectly. His features looked sharper, a bit more sophisticated, and in all honesty, the only reason Sirius recognised himself was because he was a perfect male clone of his mother, from her younger portraits.
Maybe this was a nightmare after all.
“There you are!”
Sirius turned, because he recognised the voice.
It was a little deeper, a little rougher, a little thicker on the Welsh accent, and perhaps happier than Sirius had ever heard it, but he knew deep in his bones he’d recognise that voice anywhere.
Remus Lupin leaned in the doorway, his robes open and hands shoved in the pockets of his Muggle suit pants. He, too, was older—about the same age as the Sirius whose reflection occupied the mirror—and, frustratingly, about a head taller. His hair was still a curly mess, with perhaps a tinge of silver around his temples, but Sirius figured that could be the lighting. More scars than Sirius had ever seen lined Remus’s face; the ones Sirius was used to seeing were pale in comparison to the deepest gouge across the bridge of Remus’s nose. His eyes…
Merlin, his eyes.
Brilliant amber, like morning sunshine through a glass of whiskey, flecked with a wild and impossible ring of gold.
Fuck.
Remus Lupin was the most gorgeous man he’d ever seen.
A smile tugged at the corners of Remus’s lips. His eyes darted to the floor as he caught Sirius staring and Sirius thought that maybe Remus blushed a little.
Frankly, it was adorable.
And, Merlin’s saggy tits, what kind of thought was that?
“What’re you doing in here?” Remus said, and Sirius thought that maybe there was something tacked on to the end of that sentence. It was short, but wasn’t his name—maybe a nickname—but, for whatever reason, his brain refused to interpret the syllables and it sounded mostly like gibberish. “You know they can’t have a proper party without you.”
Sirius had no clue who they were nor were there any indications as to what sort of party this was, other than, perhaps, his and Remus’s robes, which were fancy, but nothing like the kind of robes expected at any sort of pure-blood function. He didn’t know how he was supposed to answer that, so he just gave a half-hearted shrug and said, “I was just thinking.”Remus took a step closer. Then another. So close that Sirius took a step back to avoid any sort of physical contact. This might be a dream, but his subconscious was never exactly kind to him. He had every reason to believe that the tattoo’s curse would follow him into the netherworld.
Remus stood close, but didn’t quite touch. Sirius got lost in him: the twitch of his lips, the intricate leyline pattern of his scars, the infinity of his eyes. Remus smelled like the forest after a rainstorm, just a little bit wild and maybe a bit like what Sirius imagined good dreams were supposed to smell like. It was intoxicating, maddening, and Merlin, Sirius was drowning in Remus Lupin.
Then, Remus Lupin reached out and took Sirius’s hand.
And…
And…
There was no pain.
How was that possible?
Sirius stared down at their joined hands, and, after a moment’s hesitation, laced their fingers together. Remus’s hands were big, his fingers nearly long enough to curve around the tips of Sirius’s own, and callused. His fingers were as scarred as the rest of him, little nicks and scrapes that Sirius would swear looked like fucking bite marks, and a few of them were swollen and crooked from frequent breaks.
A longer scar, thick and smooth and obscenely deep, cut diagonally across the palm of Remus’s left hand. Sirius traced a finger over the ridged scar. It took a moment for him to recognise the scar, but when he did, Sirius very nearly swallowed his own beating heart.
He had given Remus this scar, when he’d dragged his mother’s silver knife over Remus’s hand to draw blood for the paint that now covered the flag that was peached on top of Gryffindor tower.
Because it didn’t hurt—well, mostly just because he could and it felt so right—Sirius drew Remus’s left hand to his mouth and kissed along the line of the scar.
A far-away look crossed Remus’s face, accompanied by a small, familiar smile. “You need to let that go, Siri. I told you a long time ago that I’d never hold that scar against you. It’s okay.” His smile quirked upwards and he tilted his head, a little bit of mischief sparkling in his eyes. “Besides, what does it matter anyway? I’m scarred all over.”
Sirius frowned. “Yes, but only once by me.”
Remus just smirked at him, the infuriating bastard. “Twice.”
Sirius’s eyes snapped up, alarmed. “Twice?! When did I—”
Remus laughed lightly, but instead of answering, he did the most ridiculous fucking thing possible.
He grabbed Sirius’s tie, reeling him in close, one hand on Sirius’s hip and the other tracing the line of Sirius’s jaw with his thumb. “You’ll see,” Remus whispered, his breath ghosting over Sirius’s lips.
Then, Remus Lupin kissed him.
A whimper escaped Sirius’s lips before he could stop it, and he felt Remus chuckling softly against him. He felt Remus’s smile, the scar on his bottom lip, and Merlin, the entirety of Remus’s body pressed close against him. Sirius simply melted into Remus, because he couldn’t do anything else. He’d never been kissed before, not like this, and certainly not by Remus Lupin.It wasn’t the sweet, gentle kiss that came at the end of every fairytale. No, this kiss had an edge of desperation to it, a soul-shattering longing of two long-lost lovers separated by time and circumstances. Remus bit at his bottom lip and Sirius gasped, his mouth sliding open against Remus’s, and Merlin, fuck. Remus tasted as wild as he smelled, and he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he was already addicted to this. He’d never give it up. He’d burrow inside his own head, retreat inside his dreams, if it meant that he could keep kissing Remus for one minute more.
Fuck his mother, fuck her plans and her schemes. Fuck his uncle and his father and the whole bloody lot of them.
None of that mattered.
Nothing mattered, save for Remus Lupin.
As if a fire had been lit in his very blood, Sirius kissed him back for all he was worth. His hands went up, one hooking around Remus’s neck to anchor himself, and the other tangling in Remus’s stupid, wonderful hair. He traced scars under his fingertips, trailed them down Remus’s neck, just as Remus’s lips moved from Sirius’s to trace across his jaw and to the curve behind his ear.
Nearly growling a laugh, Remus nipped at Sirius’s hoop earring. “Can’t wait until you get that fucking tongue piercing.”
Merlin’s tits, Sirius felt his knees buckle.Remus caught him, a strong arm around his waist, holding him impossibly close. Remus broke the kiss and leaned his forehead against Sirius’s. The gold in his eyes was fierce, nearly drowning out the amber, and Merlin, Sirius had to look away from the intensity of Remus Lupin’s eyes.
He felt Remus’s half laugh, just before he planted a kiss on Sirius’s forehead. “Gods, I fucking love you.”
Sirius figured if he died now, he’d die happy.
His reply was on the tip of his tongue, because of fucking course, he loved Remus Lupin. Even in the deepest recesses of his soul, where nothing remained but the gnarled darkness he’d inherited from his family and incarnated with his own choices, Sirius Black knew that he’d only ever be content here in Remus Lupin’s arms.
It was where he fucking belonged.
But then, Remus pulled back slightly, and yanked on Sirius’s hand. Remus was still smiling, and his hair was wonderfully tussled from Sirius’s fingers. “Come on,” Remus said, something akin to mischief in his eyes. “You owe me a dance, Black.”
Remus tugged him into the main hall. Sirius followed, his hand never leaving Remus’s, but he pulled up short when Remus pushed the doors open.
The hall was huge, ornately decorated, but had the same fuzz around the edges that the atrium had had, which Sirius mostly attributed to the fact that he was dreaming. Hundreds of people filled the hall, all of them dressed to the nines, and…
All of their faces were blurred.
Sirius couldn’t make out a single feature, other than the stunningly perfect face of Remus Lupin.
Voices echoed around him, but they sounded distant, and none of the words made any sense to him. Laughter and applause and the joyous cries of a feast were all drowned out by his own heartbeat.
In the centre of the crowd, a man and a woman held each other close, slowly moving in a circle, their arms draped around each other in a familiar embrace. Though he could see neither of their faces, Sirius felt a pull towards them, a swell of love and devotion that came from somewhere deep inside him. The man was tall, lean, and held the woman as though she were his entire world. The woman wore a white dress, and Sirius wished he could see her face, because besides Remus, she was the most beautiful thing in the room.
“This is a wedding,” Sirius said, stupidly.
Remus smiled at him, nodded, then pulled him into the crowd.
Remus’s arm wrapped around him again, holding him close, and his right hand interlaced with Sirius’s left. Remus led the dance, sweeping Sirius across the floor, sometimes passing through other couples as if they were nothing more than ghosts. Sirius stumbled at first, unaccustomed to following instead of leading, and it took him a few tries to get the backwards steps right. All the while, Remus smiled at him, laughing softly whenever Sirius stepped on his foot.
Remus moved them in a set rhythm, though Sirius could hear neither music nor the echo of their footsteps against the floor. It felt like they were floating, gliding through a faceless, nameless crowd, lost entirely in their own world, somewhere between reality and a dream.
Remus kissed him again, this time softly, almost tender, just a press of lips against his own, and, Merlin, Sirius felt the remnants of his soul shatter. He stared up at Remus, his fingers moving to trace the scars across his face that Sirius had wanted to touch for so, so long.
“How are you even real?” Sirius whispered, and the words were out of his mouth before he could even fully process them.
Remus smiled down at him, his eyes almost sad. “I’m not,” he said, then inclined his head. “At least, not yet.”
That seemed to snap Sirius out of whatever Remus-induced daze he’d been in. “What?”
“You’re dreaming, Sirius.”
Sirius rolled his eyes. “I gathered that, thanks. Mister and Missus over there don’t have faces.”
That seemed to throw Remus, just a little. He glanced over at the newlyweds, then back at Sirius. Then, composing himself, Remus said, “They will one day.”
Sirius was quiet for a moment, mulling that over, before he decided on the question he most wanted to ask. “Is this the future?”
Remus shrugged, a half shoulder tilt that merely ended up pulling Sirius closer against him. And, honestly, Sirius wasn’t about to complain about it. “Yes and no,” Remus said.
Sirius swatted his chest. “What’s that supposed to mean, arsehole?”
Remus laughed and planted a quick kiss on his forehead. Sirius’s face softened immediately. “No, in the sense that no future is written in stone, most especially yours. Fate has it in for you, Sirius, and you’re playing a dangerous game against her.”
“I—” But Remus didn’t give him a chance to continue.
“And, yes, in the sense that this is a possible future. A common future, even, in almost every version of reality.”
Sirius’s face scrunched up in confusion. “Someone else’s wedding is a common occurrence in my future?”
Remus took a breath, then leaned in close. “Of all the things that happen to you, of all the tragedies and horrible choices you’ll be asked to make, this is where you’re happiest, Sirius.”
Sirius felt it, too, in the air, all around them. He was happy, and Merlin, the feeling was so foreign to him that he hadn’t recognised it for what it was until Remus had mentioned it.He was beginning to realise, with sobering clarity, that there was an infinite gap between content and happy.
Sirius shoved the feelings down, vowing to deal with them later. Right now, he had questions. “So… I’m dreaming of the future. Does that make me a Seer?”
“Ah, no.” Remus spun them around, bringing them closer to the newly-wed couple. “In any dream, Sirius, time is not only relative, but a fluid thing. The future is yesterday and the past is right now. In your dreams, you exist at every moment of choice you’ve ever had, at every point of possibility and inevitability. In your dreams, you are the god of your own universe, and not even the claws of Fate can reach you.” He leaned in close, and whispered in Sirius’s ear. “You’re safe here, Sirius.”
And, Merlin, Sirius believed him.
He made a vague gesture towards the door, towards the atrium, towards the edges of his dream. “But out there…?”
Remus’s face sobered instantly. “What year did you come from, Sirius?”
“1971,” he answered immediately. “Christmas. Shit, it was horrible and—”
Something in Remus’s eyes flashed, a dark and dangerous thing that would terrify Sirius if he didn’t already know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he was safe here, in Remus’s arms. “Malfoy,” Remus growled. “Sectumsempra.”
Remus trailed a hand down to Sirius’s chest, tracing a line from his collar bone to just above his navel, then back up to the opposite side of his chest to trace the bisecting scar. Sirius shivered, and though, in this dream-world, the scars from Malfoy’s wand had healed ages ago, they still felt fresh and raw under Remus’s touch.
Or, maybe, it was because, in the waking world, Sirius was still bleeding from these very wounds.
“Yeah,” Sirius breathed.
Remus pulled him impossibly closer. “Everything’s about to change, Sirius. Fate is cruel to you, and you wage a dangerous war against her. You need to know that you are not fighting this war alone. You have people that love you, more than you’ll ever know. The choices you face seem impossible, I know, but you’re the only one brave enough to make them. You are the wild card in the great plan of creation, Sirius. You’re the only one who can change anything.”
Sirius swallowed the lump in his throat. “If I make the wrong choices… All this might not happen, will it?”
Remus closed his eyes and sighed. “That is a possibility, yes.”
Sirius only hesitated a moment before asking, “And you and me? Do… we…?”
This time, Remus leaned in close and kissed him lightly, cupping Sirius’s face in his hands. “You and I are inevitable, Sirius Black. In every version of reality, fate be damned.”
“Oh.”
Sirius allowed himself to be held tightly, as Remus twined his arms around Sirius’s neck and hugged him against his chest. Sirius dug his fingers into Remus’s robes and squeezed his eyes shut, entirely unwilling to let this moment pass. It was a miracle, of sorts, wasn’t it? That he could touch Remus Lupin without excruciating pain, that his subconscious took him to this place where he could have a moment to just fucking breathe after a week of suffocating at Grimmauld Place. This was…
This was every wish upon a star that Sirius had ever made.
“Remus?” Sirius whispered, against his shoulder, still unwilling to pull away even slightly.
“Yeah?”
“Am I able to touch you in the future?”
It seemed a stupid question, given that Sirius was currently wrapped up entirely in Remus Lupin, but he couldn’t dismiss the possibility that this was just a figment of his imagination, just his brain trying to make up for torturing him with years and years of nightmares with one, really perfect dream.
“Yes,” Remus said. “But you have to figure it out on your own.”
Of-fucking-course he did.
Remus pulled back, a small smirk dancing on his lips. “And, if, for instance, I try to talk you out of it… Don’t let me, alright? I very much enjoy kissing you and it’d be a sad reality for both of us if I couldn’t.”
Sirius wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but he smiled all the same.
Somewhere in the distance, a door slammed, followed by a shrill, yet familiar voice.
His mother.
Merlin, how did she get here?
Sirius felt himself tense up, a sudden, icy-cold panic constricting around his heart. Remus, too, turned in the direction of the noise, his face set in a scowl, as he gripped Sirius just a little tighter against him.
After a moment, a hand reached up to cup Sirius’s face. “You need to wake up, Sirius. You’re in a nest full of vipers. You’ll get bit while you sleep if you hide here much longer, and I’m not sure you’ll survive the venom this time.”
Immediately, Sirius felt tears well up in his eyes. “I don’t want to wake up.”
Remus pressed his forehead against Sirius’s. “I know, love. I know. But the vipers are whispering around you, plotting and scheming, and you need to be awake to hear it. You need to know of the choice that waits for you.”
Sirius shook his head, furiously. “No, Remus, I can’t... I can’t go back there. Please, don’t make me go back.”
“I will always be here, in whatever reality you choose to create for the both of us, no matter how long it takes you to find your way back here.” Remus placed one, last, lingering kiss against his forehead, before whispering. “A lion’s heart beats inside your chest, Sirius Black. Don’t let them poison it. Wake up.”
“No, Remus, please, don’t—”
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius woke with a strangled gasp, held back only by the hand he immediately clamped over his own mouth. He bit down on his fingers, as a wave of pain washed over him.Merlin, he felt like he’d been carved in two.Vaguely, as awareness and reality settled around him, he felt the dream slip from his memory even as he shook off the last vestiges of sleep. His foggy mind reached for it, desperate to cling to something good, even in this horrible place, but all he could grasp was the echoes of Remus Lupin’s last words.
You need to wake up, Sirius. You’re in a nest full of vipers.
He was staring up at the ceiling of his own room, recognisable only by the familiar bedposts and horrible, green wallpaper, visible even in the dark. He tried to sit up, but had to bite back a moan of pain as the recently-closed slashes on his chest tugged and threatened to bleed once more. He flopped back down, carefully, and lay motionless and shirtless on his bed. After a moment of working up the courage, he traced a careful finger down his own chest, still sticky with recently-dried blood, tracing out the pattern of scars Malfoy had left him. There were two of them, both long and deep, forming a crooked X across his breastplate. The edges of the longer scar nearly reached his hipbone and the shorter one had narrowly missed making contact with his tattoo. He was truly marked, then, as he had marked Malfoy. Scarred and disfigured and never again the paragon of beauty. Just another scarred and battered bit of steel, destined for the forges, to be hammered into a gleaming, silver sword. If he had strength left in him, Sirius thought he might cry. But it wasn’t the pain or the harsh reality of his own disfigurement that had torn him from his dream of Remus Lupin. He wasn’t alone in his room. Neither his mother nor Uncle Alphard had yet realised that Sirius was awake. Sirius could tell from their vague, flickering shadows in the candlelight that they stood near the door to his room, but he didn’t dare raise his head, lest they realise that he’d woken up. This may be the only strategic advantage he’d have, beaten and scarred as he was. Sirius was Slytherin enough not to let it pass through his fingers. He’d been raised by vipers, after all.“You forget your place, Alphard,” his mother hissed, and even though Sirius could not see her face, he could feel the severity of her sneer. “And you forget your debt to me.”Alphard’s voice came out in a derisive laugh. “I owe you nothing, Walburga. Do not try to pretend that you have anything to hold over me. I am not Andromeda, nor am I sloppy with the secrets I keep.”“I know the true nature of the sanctuary that you keep, brother,” Walburga said, the threat clear in her voice. Where a weaker man might have shrivelled up in fear or balked at his discovery, Alphard merely scoffed. “As does half of Britain. And as would your idiot husband if he could see past the revenue my sanctuary brings to the Black vaults.”Sirius’s eyes widened in wonderment. He’d never heard anyone talk about his father like that. Orion commanded authority and radiated danger, even when he was not standing in the room. No one Sirius had ever known had dared insult him, let alone to his wife.His mother was silent for a minute, and Sirius was half convinced she was about to throw a hex at Alphard, but then she said, “How was Andromeda able to touch the Mudblood, Alphard?”Alphard simply laughed, softly to himself, and made no effort to deny the blatant implication that Walburga left hanging in the air between them. Alphard was the one who helped Andromeda break the blood curse. There was a way around the magic of the tattoo, and, impossibly his mother did not know what it was.Sirius felt something like hope swell inside him.“Tell me what you told her,” Walburga demanded, “and maybe I will allow you to walk away from this house unscathed.”Sirius could practically hear Alphard’s eye roll. “And what is it that you plan to do to me, Walburga? Shall I be scarred and starved like your son, or will you simply whisper the true nature of my sanctuary to your little band of warmongering fascists?”Sirius completely ignored the mention of his own predicament in favour of zeroing in on the frigid tone of his uncle’s voice. He’d known it in theory, of course, but Sirius was finally beginning to understand the entire scope of this war between Walburga and Alphard. It was one of subterfuge and mutual assured annihilation. Whatever the true nature of Alphard’s sanctuary, it was invaluable to the Blacks in both reputation and financial status. Walburga would never risk its destruction. “I could force you to marry.”Sirius could feel the thinly veiled, yet palpable threat in his mother’s voice, even from across the room, but again, Alphard merely barked out a laugh. “Please. I fucking dare you to ask that of me.”Walburga’s tone was clipped. “As Matriarch of the House of Black—”Alphard interrupted her. “Who, exactly, do you expect me to marry, Walburga? You’ve sold off Andromeda, so there’s no hope of keeping the line as pure as you’d like. And none of the Sacred Twenty Eight have daughters even close to marrying age, except perhaps Molly Prewett, and I’m sure you’d just love that.”His mother made a disgusted noise. “The Shafiqs have their eldest. She’s nearly seventeen.”Sirius felt his stomach roll in disgust. Alphard was over twice her age. “And she’s as stubborn as her father,” Alphard shot back. “You need a bitch who will roll over and submit.”His mother paused, then tried a different approach. “All it will take is a few owls to the families across Europe. Any girl with blood pure enough to touch you will beg to be taken into House Black.”Alphard let out a long sigh that, to Sirius, sounded almost like a growl. “Fine, Walburga. Fine. Let’s say I marry. Then what? I produce an heir?”It was Walburga’s turn to scoff. “If you can keep it up long enough to consummate the marriage.”Alphard ignored her jab entirely. “I am the eldest son of the previous heir to House Black. The only reason I am not the current scion of this fucking house is because Father married you off to our fucking cousin because you couldn’t inherit on your own. I could have challenged Orion’s claim as patriarch after Father died, but I didn’t, because I don’t fucking care.” His voice dropped nearly an octave. “But I swear on the bones of Salazar-fucking-Slytherin that if you threaten me again, I’ll be married by the end of the bloody week. Because you can bet that if I had a blood heir, no arbitrator in Britain would deny my claim on the inheritance of House Black. Blood is thicker than any marriage, even one born of incest.”For the first time in his life, Sirius thought he detected a slight wavering in the cadence of his mother’s voice, but it could have been anything. A trick of the shadows, a fever settling on his half-delirious mind. But no… it was there. “You wouldn’t,” Walburga said, as though she believed he would.“I would burn your whole fucking empire to the ground, if it meant keeping my interests safe. You can might get away with your war against the Wizarding world, but you’d be a fool to declare war against me, Walburga.”Whatever hesitation or fear there’d been in her voice, it evaporated in a second. “And now your interests include my son?”Sirius held his breath. Alphard did not miss a beat. “I will offer you this olive branch exactly once, Walburga. If he agrees, you will allow Sirius to spend the summer holidays with me in Scotland until he graduates from Hogwarts. I will provide him with a magical tutorage that even your money cannot buy. He will be educated by a Slytherin, in the ways of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, and will be well entranced with a socio-political standing in society equal to or greater than my own by the time he graduates from Hogwarts. No more scandals, no more threat of civil war amongst the Ancient Houses, and no more blood debts owed to the Malfoys.”To Sirius’s utter disbelief, his mother seemed to actually be considering the offer. “And in exchange?” Walburga prompted.“We end all talks of my marriage, hypothetical or otherwise. You vow to protect my interests as if they were your own. And—” Alphard paused here, for what Sirius suspected was dramatic effect. “—in exchange, I will name Sirius as my heir. He will inherit Constellation’s Keep when I pass, and all the financial benefits that accompany it.”His mother merely hummed in response. “Sirius will need to be present at Grimmauld Place at times for certain… functions, pertaining to his duties as the Black heir.”“We can arrange for those as they come up,” Alphard replied. Walburga paused, then her voice turned cold again. “What of my other son? Do you have plans for him as well?”Alphard let out a low, rumbling laugh. “I am not the scion of House Black. I only need one heir, Walburga.”Part of Sirius wanted to give up his position and shout at Alphard, beg him to save Regulus too, because, fuck, if Alphard had this kind of sway, surely he could—“If I agree to this, you are to have no further contact with Regulus until he comes of age,” Walburga said. “And you are to ensure that Sirius’s interaction with his brother will be limited to Hogwarts and mandatory family functions.”This time, Sirius couldn’t quite hold back a whimper.Both his uncle and his mother abruptly stopped their conversation. He heard his mother’s footsteps creak across the floorboards to his bedside. He forced his expression to neutral and tried to even out his breathing as much as possible, despite his thundering heartbeat. He prayed that his mother wrote off his whimper as a symptom of his mangled chest.Which, all things considered, was almost certainly a contributing factor. After a moment, Walburga seemed to decide that Sirius was, indeed, asleep. “We will continue this discussion later.”Alphard, too, had taken up a position at Sirius’s bedside, opposite of his mother. “I have one more condition, Walburga. While he is under your care, neither you nor Orion nor your damned house elf is to lay so much as a stinging hex on him. He is not to be harmed. Am I understood?”Sirius heard his mother brush past Alphard on her way to the door. “I have not yet agreed to anything, brother. And, until I do, I have every right to do with my son as I please.”Then, with that, she was gone, nearly slamming the door behind her. Sirius kept his eyes closed, his breaths painfully even and slow. Then:“Exactly how much of that did you hear?” Alphard’s voice was calm, with maybe just a hint of genuine… amusement.Sirius popped one eye open and admitted defeat, thanking his lucky stars that at least it hadn’t been his mother who had caught him. “All of it.”Alphard sighed. “Of course you did.”“I won’t leave Regulus behind.”Alphard scrubbed a hand over his face. “You need to understand something, Sirius. Fate is a cruel and capricious god, but she is also a liar. She may weave her web and spin her tales, but her futures are never guaranteed. Your future, Sirius, is written only by the choices you’re given. You need to be brave enough to decide your own future.”Sirius swallowed, unable to say anything to that.Alphard let out another sigh, cast a quick Lumos, then said, “Merlin’s tits, look at you.”Sirius couldn’t exactly imagine that it was a pretty picture. Alphard half-turned, and gestured towards a small, ornate box on his desk. “I told your father that I’d brought you a present. A case of inkwells. Happy Christmas.”Sirius furrowed his brow. “Thank you?”“Of course,” Alphard continued, “what I didn’t tell your father is that they’re not inkwells at all. Just cleverly disguised as inkwells.”“What are they?” Sirius said, because Alphard seemed to be waiting for him to ask.“Potions. The red one’s dittany. Hard to come by, that, but I happen to have an abundant supply of kelpie venom. Not much, but a little. The blue is a nutrition potion, so you won’t completely starve, and the black is a sleeping draught. It’s not much, but it should last you until you return to Hogwarts if you use them sparingly.”Sirius opened and closed his mouth a few times, shocked. “T-thank you.”“Don’t let your father catch you drinking from what he believes to be inkwells. He’ll think you’ve gone mad.” Alphard paused. “They won’t let up on you, Sirius. Not even if you look like this.”“I know,” he muttered.“Right now you need to endure. I know it’s horrible, and there are vipers nipping at your heels, but Sirius, if you want to want to learn how to kill a god, you will have to make the choice to do so yourself.”And, Merlin, what an impossible choice it was.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
JANUARY 1, 1972
Remus blinked his eyes open and bit back a moan of pain. The early morning light was too-fucking-bright, so he squeezed his eyes shut almost immediately. He was still not used to waking up to the sunrise through the windows of the relatively-comfortable hospital wing the morning after the full moon. Until he came to Hogwarts, it had always been about trying to remember how just be human again despite the inexplicable ache in his bones, both from the aftershocks of the shift and from waking up in the cold, damp cellar on the edge of his parents’ property, with a chain around his wrists and ankles. Flopping an arm over his face, he tried to force his foggy mind to assess the damage from last night. His left knee twinged painfully, even as he lie on the hospital bed. From the cool draft he felt against his chest, Remus gathered that he was shirtless, which ordinarily only happened when Madam Pomfrey had to bandaged a chest wound. Vague flashes of memories floated through his mind, slowly taking shape as he reluctantly surrendered to full wakefulness. The wolf had been furious last night. Full moons were never exactly easy, and blue moons tended to be worse—hell, he’d been out of commission for nearly four days after December’s first full moon—but this… this felt different, somehow, as though something had triggered the wolf’s rage. His heart still pumped with the adrenaline that severely contradicted the deep ache he felt in his bones. His throat felt raw from howling, and he still tasted the bitter iron of his own blood on his tongue. Remus had never told any of them the truth. Not his parents, or Dumbledore, or Madam Pomfrey. He loathed the depth of pity he saw in their eyes, when they thought he wasn’t looking, and he couldn’t stand the thought of their heartbreak if he told them he remembered every moment of his time as the wolf. Because… he did. From the moment the moon broke over the horizon, to the horrific breaking of every bone in his body, the tearing of his skin from his bones, his teeth—Christ, his teeth. He’d tried to grab them, hadn’t he? Pried them from the wolf’s maw, because—No. The because wasn’t important right now. Just… the teeth. Remus’s brain was a bit fuzzy, though the dull cloud of pain, but he distinctly recalled the sharp nick of the wolf’s teeth against the palm of his hand.He hadn’t let go of them. They were probably around here somewhere, if Remus ever decided to actually open his eyes.Later, maybe. Or, next week. He groaned. At some point in the early morning, not long after Madam Pomfrey had escorted him from the Shrieking Shack to his usual hospital bed, she’d more or less forced a pain potion down his throat, but it hardly seemed to be helping at all now. Madam Pomfrey tried her best, but there was only so much she could do for the cursed wounds of a feral Dark Creature. The wolf was ravenous most nights, taking out its fury at being held captive on Remus’s own flesh, but last night, every one of its heightened senses had been on alert, and it had cried out to the moon, as if rending Remus’s vocal chords would catch the attention of some lonely god lurking beneath a blanket of stars.It wasn’t the same, though, as it normally was. The wolf raged at its captivity, sure, but something was fundamentally wrong. The wolf had been afraid, not for itself, but because it tasted the wrongness in the air just as Remus now felt it in his bones. Unlike the lies he told his father whenever he’d asked, Remus retained a majority of the wolf’s senses as a man, and right now, every single instinct he head rested on the knife’s edge of full on panic. Something was wrong, and Remus had no clue what it was. Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Remus moved his free hand to his chest, to feel out the new scar the wolf had left him, but stopped when he realised that his index and middle finger were taped together, with a cool, metal splint in between them. His broken fingers twitched in a nervous tick he’d probably picked up from Sirius, and it sent a zing of pain up his left arm. Forcing his hand to still, he rested it on his chest. “Fuck,” he groaned into the crook of the arm he still had draped over his face. Remus moaned pitifully when he felt the bed dip next to his hip. Expecting Madam Pomfrey, here to reapply the dose of dittany to his chest, every muscle in Remus’s body tensed up when someone else entirely let out a dramatic sigh. Then:“I can’t believe you kept this from me for so long.”Lily. Fuck. His mind had been so twisted up in the pain and the wrongness in the air that he’d entirely missed the fact that Lily’s scent had lingered in the hospital room since he’d tried to open his eyes the first time. She smelled like sunflowers in the dead of winter, which was entirely impossible, but so perfectly suited to Lily Evans that Remus had never really noticed the impossibility of it all until just now. She wasn’t supposed to be here. She wasn’t supposed to know. He’d be expelled.Remus forced himself to swallow around his own heartbeat as he lifted his arm just enough to peak out with one eye, to confirm what his nose had already told him. Lily Evans sat on the edge of his bed, her long, red hair in a neat plait that hung over her shoulder. Her forest-green eyes shined bright in the early dawn light, and if not for the rather dire circumstances, Remus might have been willing to believe that Lily Evans was a goddess, waiting at his bedside to heal him from his tragic condition. It was no real wonder to him that James Potter was in love with her. She was beautiful.Lily, apparently ignorant to his impending doom, continued to talk. “I mean, I know we’ve only known each other for a few months, but this kind of secret should never be your burden to bear alone. It’s too much for one person to endure.”Her tone was entirely too light for this topic of conversation. And, Christ on a fucking cracker, he was shirtless. She’d see every scar that lined his chest, every gnarled and mangled bit of flesh on him. She’d see—Fuck, she was sitting next to the brutal bite mark, just above his left hip. The one he’d just managed to keep hidden from Sirius that first week when Sirius had patched him up in the bathroom. The bite mark he’d gotten from Fenrir Greyback. Fucking hell, he felt like he was about to cry. Or scream. Or maybe howl at that bastard moon, even though he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was now well below the horizon. “Lily, you don’t understand.” His voice came out hoarse, and broken, both from his rising panic and from having spent a good portion of the night howling out the wolf’s malcontent with this world. “I’ll be expelled. You can’t know. It was part of my deal with Dumbledore. No one is supposed to find out.”Lily Evans smiled at him. “Why would Dumbledore expel you, Remus? Don’t be ridiculous. You have nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, there are some of us that might even consider this remarkable—”Remus let out a bitter, broken laugh. “Remarkable?! Evans, I’m a fucking—”Before he could finish, Lily reached into her bag, pulled out a book, and dropped it right on the centre of Remus’s chest, with no care whatsoever that his chest was covered in bandages. He let out a strangled cry. “I mean, this book is beautiful, Remus,” she said, glaring at him pointedly. “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It’s a first edition, right?” It was. It had belonged to his mother. “I had to snoop around a bit to find it. And I kind of dug through your trunk. Sorry.” She didn’t sound sorry in the slightest. “And, look, Remus, I get it. Well, maybe, not all of it—it’s your book, after all—but I’m Muggle-born, remember? I understand that there are some arseholes in the Wizarding World and at Hogwarts that would not hesitate to destroy such a… fine piece of literature just because it portrays beauty that is far afield from what their small, racist minds can properly comprehend.”Remus was fairly certain she was not referring to the book at all. “Um…” he said, intelligently.Lily plucked the book right off his chest and carefully flipped it open to the middle, gently caressing the pages. “I’m familiar with the concept, but I’ve never actually encountered this story before. It’s about a brilliant and kind man, who, through no choice of his own, transforms into a monster that he can no longer control. Is that right?”Now he knew they were not talking about the book. “That’s about the gist of it, yes,” he breathed, resigned to his fate, because she still fucking knew. He’d be sent home, with his not-so-proverbial tail tucked between his legs, to face his mother’s broken heart and his father’s disappointment. Remus didn’t think he could bear it.Apparently picking up on his expression, Lily’s features softened, and she reached out to take his unbroken hand. “I want you to know, Remus, that you can trust me with this… book. I understand I wasn’t necessarily supposed to find out about it, but if you choose to share it with me, I want you to know that I’d guard it with my fucking life.”Remus was silent for a moment, unable to compose himself and desperately trying to control the panic that threatened to manifest in the broken, hysterical sort of sobs of a madman. Or, even worse, a mad werewolf.“How long have you known?” he croaked out, and if Lily hadn’t been sitting right next to him—way too close to him, really, given his current state of undress—he was certain she wouldn’t have heard him. “About the book?” Lily asked, far too conspicuously for his comfort. “I suspected since the beginning. You have that look—”Remus recoiled in horror, yanking his hand away from her and nearly flinging her off the bed in the process. He looked like a—Lily’s hand latched onto his bare shoulder, her nails digging into his skin, both to steady herself and make sure that she had his full attention. “I didn’t mean that, Remus. I mean… I knew what to look for. I’ve heard a lot… about this book and I’ve always wanted to meet someone with—”Remus laughed derisively and leaned away from her touch. “That book is cursed, Lily. It’s the worst thing in the fucking world.”“Don’t say that.” Her voice was soft, but commanding, and brokered no argument, no matter how valid said argument may be. “I understand that wizards like Lucius Malfoy would throw this book into the fire without a second thought. But this…” She held up the book. “It’s only a cover, Remus. It doesn’t change the man. Because the man is brave and kind and clever and beautiful. The man is my friend. Fuck what anyone else says.”Despite the protests lodged in his throat, Remus felt tears well up in his eyes. “Lily—”“Do not argue with me, Remus Lupin.” Her no-nonsense tone hit him in the face like a gale-force wind. “I’m your fucking king.”Against his better judgement, his lip twitched upwards, and he said, “Yes, Your Majesty.”She beamed at him. Then, a second later, the smile was gone, replaced by a critical gaze that travelled up and down his scarred and battered chest. “How are you feeling?”He rolled his eyes and gestured to the bandages on his chest with his broken fingers. “Like Mr. Hyde took a carving knife to my skin.”Lily had the decency to wince. “Sorry. I guess I walked right into that one.”Remus just shrugged. “Mr. Hyde leaves the scars, but Dr. Jekyll tends to heal pretty fast. Generally speaking. Even without Madam Pomfrey’s help.” He prayed he followed that metaphor correctly. It’d been a while since he’d actually read that book. He wasn’t a huge fan of it, to be honest. If it hadn’t been his mother and smelled distinctly of a distant memory he had of her reading him the book in her garden of summer flowers, Remus wouldn’t have brought it to Hogwarts at all. At this, Lily tilted her head, the curiosity evident on her face. Clearly, his metaphor had been sound. “Really? Is that… feature in every… edition of this book, or just yours?”It took him a minute to discern her meaning, and once more, he cursed the damn metaphor, but he had neither the freedom nor the courage to speak plainly about the wolf—not here, anyway—so he resigned himself to Lily’s vague literary analogies.“I don’t know,” he said. “This edition is the only one I’ve ever read.”Lily nodded, accepting that answer, but then seemed to shift uncomfortably. “I don’t meant to pry, but… Was it given to you when you were born, or did you just… happen upon it?”Remus wanted to laugh, because the answer was just so fucking obvious. All she had to do was look at him. So, in a moment of either utter foolishness that would end with his expulsion or what constituted as true Gryffindor bravery, Remus took Lily’s hand and brought it to rest over the mangled bite mark just above his left hip. Her eyes grew wide with understanding.“It was given to me, by a monster of a man,” Remus said.Lily swallowed, but did not pull her hand away. “How old were you?”“Four.”“Oh.”“I told you,” Remus said, a heartbroken smile tugging at the open scars on his face. “That book is cursed. As is the man who owns it.”“I absolutely refuse to believe that.” Lily straightened her back, squared her shoulders, and stuck out her chin. She squared off against him for a full minute, before her eyes drifted to the nightstand. “All right. I have one-hundred and thirty-four questions numbered and prioritised in a secret journal no one can open but me, but none of them are more pressing than this: Why are there teeth on your nightstand?”Remus followed her gaze to the nightstand and the three, bloody teeth he’d so painstakingly stolen from the wolf in the haze of the early morning. Ah. There they were.Memories of that morning played back with slightly less fuzz around the edges, now. He’d manage to yank out both of the wolf’s front incisors and a canine, all deadly ivory, covered in his own blood. Remus had been half-delirious, half-transformed, when he’d all but yanked the teeth free from the wolf’s maw. He was pretty sure that was how the wolf had broken his fingers, as well as thoroughly gouged his right forearm: uneven and jagged, because of the wolf’s missing teeth, but Madam Pomfrey had had to bandage them all the way to his elbow. The wolf had wanted its teeth back. But Remus had held onto them, so tightly, it seemed, that there were marks from the points of the teeth on the palm of his right hand. He vaguely recalled holding onto the teeth, despite Madam Pomfrey’s insistence that she examine his injured hand and wrist. In the fog of his memory, he recalled the angry bough of Madam Pomfrey’s Irish accent as she scolded him for hanging on to the teeth; she’d wanted to throw them aside.She’d said it was best not to anger the wolf.Remus was pretty sure he’d laughed through a mouthful of blood.The wolf would heal—it did every month, no matter the injuries the wolf inflicted on Remus—and its teeth would be gleaming in the moonlight, as sharp and deadly as ever, at the rise of the next full moon.There was something to be said about the magic inherent to the blood of a werewolf, no matter how Dark that magic may be. Remus prayed the magic he’d stolen from the wolf would be enough, because he needed the teeth. No, that’s not right. Because…The because was the most important thing in the fucking world.“Remus,” Lily prompted. He’d nearly forgotten she was there. “Why do you have Mr. Hyde’s teeth?”
Because, because, because…
“I’ve been working on a certain hypothesis,” he began.“Would this hypothesis have something to do with the inordinate amount of research you’ve been doing on wand-making?”He blinked at her, because how could she possibly know about that too? “Don’t play stupid, Remus,” Lily said, with a dramatic eye roll. “I’ve been with you basically the entire holiday. I’ve seen the books in your bag. And I went through your trunk.”“It was for our project with Rattleburn,” he tried, but he was certain that it wasn’t even remotely convincing. “No. That’s about wandless magic. You’ve been reading about wand craft. They’re drastically different subjects.”“Lily—”“Is it for Sirius? Say, specifically, for the same reason he refused to use his wand in class—at both the detriment of his grade, Gryffindor house points, and his relationship with McGonagall—yet he’s easily the best in our class, if not our generation, at wandless magic? Is his wand broken? Or cursed? Or—”Remus levelled her with his most deadly glare, which he secretly hoped was enhanced by the recent scarring across his face. “It’s not my secret to tell.”Nor did Remus know the full secret. Sirius had clammed up really fast that day at the Whomping Willow.Merlin, but Lily Evans had an unnerving habit of uncovering secrets.Lily nodded once. “All right. You’ll let me know if I can help with anything?”“I will,” he said, not entirely sure whether or not he was lying to appease her.Lily clapped her hands together. “All right, then. That’s quite enough time spent in the hospital wing. It’s New Year’s and I have plans. Get up, Remus.”He gaped at her, completely thrown by her change of tone. He glanced down at his own bare chest, covered in bandages, then raised an eyebrow at her.“There’s a good chance I might bleed out,” he deadpanned.She rolled her eyes. “Madam Pomfrey probably has a potion to help with that. Get up, you arse. I have something I want to show you.”“What, in Christ’s name, do you need to show me that requires me to leave my very comfortable hospital bed at this ungodly hour of the morning?” he demanded.She smirked at him. “You’ll thank me later. Come on!”“Lily, I—”She cut him off by giving his arm a sharp tug, jarring his broken fingers.“Fuck!” He yanked his arm back. “Christ, Evans, what has gotten into—”“Sorry,” she said, only looking moderately apologetic. Remus glowered at her. “Hurry up, or we’ll get caught!”“Jesus fuck, you’re worse than Sirius,” he muttered. “We’ll get caught anyway. Madam Pomfrey usually checks my bandages around—”Lily sighed dramatically and gave him an unimpressed glare. “Are you or are you not Remus Lupin, Marauder of House Gryffindor?”He had a feeling he knew where this was going, and it was probably not going to end with him in this hospital bed, having a nice New Year’s Day lie in. “I… am.” It sounded more like a question, even to Remus.“Are you not the same Remus Lupin who hexed the ever-living shit out of Ravenclaw tower, locked all the doors, and aided in a maniacal plot to plant an indelible flag on the top of Gryffindor tower, immortalising not only yourself, but your fellow Marauders in the history books forever?”He heaved a dramatic sigh. “I am.”“Then let’s go!” She rose to her feet and forcefully tugged at his arm, this time avoiding his broken fingers.Right then, something rather important occurred to Remus and he found himself fighting against Lily’s grip. His face flamed red and he prayed it wasn’t the sort of flush that travelled all the way down his chest. “Erm, Lily? I’m rather… well… starkers under this sheet. And I—”“I know,” Lily said, with a heart-stopping, coma-inducing wink. “I already had a peek.”“I—what?”For the life of him, he could not tell if she was being serious or completely fucking with him.She did absolutely nothing to ease confusion and generalised embarrassment. “I brought you some clothes while I was fishing through your trunk for an excuse to come see you. I figured with Mr. Hyde and all, you would need proper attire for my plan to work.”She pointed to a neat stack of his Muggle clothes on the nightstand, and he smiled at her. He’d had his own set, of course, from last night, but he’d stripped out of them a half hour before the moon rose. He’d hidden them under a loose floorboard in the Shrieking Shack, lest the wolf—Mr. Hyde, he supposed—tear them to ribbons. Usually, Madam Pomfrey collected his clothes when she came for Remus the morning after, but she had a thoughtfully inconvenient habit of holding his clothes hostage until such time as she determined he was fit enough to leave the hospital wing. After the stunt he pulled with the teeth, he figured he wouldn’t be seeing that particular set of clothes at least until dinner time. “What exactly is your plan?” he asked. “And should I be afraid?”She just smiled, sweet and charming and as bright as the fucking sun. “Your wand is there, too.”Raising an eyebrow, Remus leaned over and found his wand under the shirt Lily brought him. He twirled it in his fingers, revelling in the feeling of warmth that it brought him, and how easily his magic seemed to settle back into human skin. He always left his wand behind, ever since he got it from Ollivander that last week of August. He never wanted to risk his wand’s safety against the wrath of the wolf. Remus figured out quickly how much the wolf detested magic. Even tasting it fresh from Remus’s own blood seemed to enrage it. Remus knew the wolf itself had magic native in its veins—Remus felt the wolf’s power every time he whispered even the tiniest spell—but for whatever reason, the wolf had an instinctual distrust for the wizarding magic that coursed through Remus’s very being. It was as if the two halves of his magic were constantly at war with each other, and it was only when he was in control of himself that Remus was even able to have a modicum of a hold over the enormity of the magic buried beneath his skin. He often found himself wondering if Sirius had a similar problem, controlling the wildness of his own wandless magic with his wand. But, for that to be the case, Sirius would have to be some sort of Dark Creature, and Remus would have most certainly been able to smell it if he were.So many things about Sirius Black both confounded and amazed Remus. If Remus had any choice in the matter, he’d spend the rest of his days stitching together all the broken pieces of Sirius Black. “Remus?” Lily shook him a little, which led him to believe this wasn’t the first time she’d tried to get his attention. “Are you okay?”“Yeah,” he said. “Sorry. Let’s go.”Five minutes later, Remus was dressed and following Lily down the third floor corridor. His left knee was giving him occasional fits—especially when it came to the moving staircases—but Lily was gracious enough both to slow down and to not mention the pain he was so valiantly trying to ignore. She did, however, look immensely guilty—presumably from forcing him out of his hospital bed this soon after a transformation—once when he met her at the top of the stairs. She stopped at the end of the hallway, then ducked into an alcove predominantly occupied by a large statue of a rather hideous one-eyed witch. “Lily, what are we—”She turned to face him, so close that she nearly bumped her nose against his shoulder. “I am sharing this with you with the full knowledge that you will, more than likely, immediately share this with James Potter and Sirius and the little Pettigrew fellow, upon their return to Hogwarts.”Remus furrowed his brow, mildly offended that she thought him so indiscrete. He was a bloody werewolf, for Christ’s sake. He breathed discretion. “If this is some kind of secret—”“And I’m okay with that,” she said, cutting him off. “On two conditions.”He opened and closed his mouth. “All right.”Lily held up a finger. “Number one. Knowledge of what I am about to show you will not be used in any pranks—whether they incendiary or benevolent—shenanigans, and/or escaping from any figures of authority who might be chasing you as a consequence of an aforementioned prank.”Remus shrugged. “Sounds fair.”A second finger went up. “Number two. When you inevitably ignore Rule Number One, you are not to mention that I am the one who told you about this, even under the pain of death. Am I understood?”“Perfectly.”Lily turned fully to face the statue, drew her wand, then, with a flick of her wrist, said, “Dissendium.”The statue rumbled, then, with almost a groan more than likely only audible to Remus, the witch’s hump shifted to reveal a—“Is that a secret tunnel?” Remus asked.Lily smirked, triumphantly. “Yep. Apparently, Hogwarts has loads of them. They’re supposed to be hidden all over the castle and the grounds. If you believe the legends, that is.”Remus was familiar with the concept. There was a tunnel beneath the Whomping Willow. He used it every month.“How’d you find this one? I can’t imagine it’s written in any book. The professors would have thrown it out.”“Prewetts,” Lily said, by way of explanation, and really, that was explanation enough. “This is the only one they’ve managed to find, though. They said it’s come in handy.”“Where’s it go?”“Hogsmeade,” she said. “It’s how they smuggled in the butterbeer on Halloween.”A slow, cautious smile spread across Remus’s face. “I’ve never been to a wizarding village.”“Nor have I,” Lily said. “Are you up for the walk?”Remus looked down at himself. There was a bandage across his chest, a fresh set of scars currently healing beneath the bandages on his wrist, his left knee was just a bit wonky, and, imperially speaking, he was rather exhausted.“Fuck yes.” He climbed up to the witch’s hump. “Let’s go.”The tunnel was dark, but Remus kept his wand raised and a Lumos charm active as he led the way. The walls were cold and damp, and smelled deeply of earth and forest, despite the stone that lined all sides of the tunnel. Ordinarily, Remus tried to avoid being surrounded on all sides by stone—it brought back frighteningly haunting memories of waking up in his parents’ cellar—but he found that he didn’t mind the tunnel. It felt… different, in a way that had absolutely everything to do with the fact that it was buried beneath a magic castle.After about five minutes, Lily sidled up close to Remus and looped an arm through his, slowing their pace. She seemed to study his face for a moment. “Remus,” she hedged, sounding nervous enough that he slowed to a stop. “I… I really do have a million questions about… Mr. Hyde. If it’s not to much, can I ask you some?”Christ, he’d really hoped they were past all this werewolf business, but he supposed he couldn’t fault her curiosity. He figured he’d have just as many questions if he were in her position.He sighed. “I cannot guarantee I’ll answer.”“That’s perfectly fine. Can I—” She let go of his arm to rummage in her bag for a minute before pulling out a beautiful, leather-bound book. It had a gold clasp that seemed sealed shut and, on the cover, in gold filigree, was an embossed lily. “Can I write down what you say? For research. There’s not a lot known about… Mr. Hydes. And most of what we do know is ancient superstition that has done nothing except perpetuate stereotypes. Even Newt Scamander himself never spoke to an actual were—fuck, a Mr. Hyde—before he classified the entire species as one of the most deadly magical creatures.”“Dark Creatures,” Remus mumbled. “Werewolves are Dark Creatures.”Lily groaned and fixed him with a menacing glare. “You have a magic inherent to your soul, just like any witch or wizard. Whether or not you choose to use that magic for Dark things is up to you. No one is born evil, Remus.”“I wasn’t born a werewolf.”“Nor did becoming one make you evil, you idiot.” She paused, then gripped his arm again. “You wouldn’t have kept Mr. Hyde’s teeth if you were truly evil. You want to use them to help your friend. That’s not evil. That’s kind, Remus.”There was nothing kind about the wolf. It was a monster that haunted his every waking moment, his every nightmare. It tore him to pieces every month only to demand the same blood sacrifice from him at the rise of the next moon. The wolf was born in darkness, raised in agony and torment, and it stalked the night, hungering for a taste of flesh.That was, by Remus’s count, every possible definition of evil.“The wolf has to be a secret, Lily,” Remus said, subtly shifting over to an argument he was sure he could win. “You can’t write it down. Someone could find it.”Thankfully, Lily dropped the debate and instead, shoved the leather bound book into his hands. “They won’t be able to read it. Here. Try to open it.”Skeptically, he tried fiddling with the clasp. It didn’t budge. Then, with a quirked eyebrow, Remus pointed his wand at the clasp and whispered, “Colloportus.” Then, he added the extra little flick-and-twist of his wrist that typically undid Sirius’s locking charms. Still nothing. Giving up entirely, Remus put his wand in his mouth and tried to forcibly pry the book open.“All right,” he said, handing it back to Lily. “But just because I can’t break into it doesn’t mean that someone else couldn’t. Sirius might be able to—”Lily ignored him entirely, looking instead down at the book and reverently tracing the embossed lily. Her voice grew soft and distant, and so suddenly sad that Remus shut his mouth and just listened.“My dad gave this to me right before I came to Hogwarts. He said it was a little expensive, and told me not to tell my sister or my mum. He was so proud that I was a witch and he said I needed to make my very own book of spells.” She blinked, then seemed to come out of the haze of bittersweet memory. “Anyway, I got to Hogwarts, found a book on locking spells in the Restricted Section, and spelled it shut. I am the only one that can open this book.”Remus was silent for a moment. He leaned back against the stone wall. “Exactly how often do you visit the Restricted Section? Because Sirius and I have noticed that you bring it up quite a lot for a first year, especially considering that—”“The point is,” Lily continued, glaring at him, “The spell required a pass-phrase. The phrase can be spoken in any known language and must be both objectively and subjectively true to the person who is saying it.”“How can something be both objectively and subjectively true?”“Easily,” Lily said, with a wave of her hand. “I can say that the sky is blue. That is objectively true. It’s a scientific fact. Doesn’t change. I also personally believe that the sky is blue, therefore that statement is also subjectively true. If I truly believed, in my heart of hearts, that the sky was green, then the phrase ‘the sky is blue’ would not work, because I did not believe the sky to blue. You can believe a thing to be true both because it’s a fact—an objective truth—and because you have faith. Faith is inherently subjective. It can be objective, but not always.”Remus took a second to make sure he followed that, then nodded. “So what’s the phrase you’ve chosen?”Even in the dim light of the tunnel, Remus could clearly see the flush that suddenly appeared on her cheeks. “I’m not telling you,” she muttered.Then, Lily said something in a language he did not understand. Possibly in Russian. The clasp on the book popped open. “I memorised the phrase I chose in about ten languages, just to be safe,” Lily explained, opening the book and thumbing to a blank page. “Even if you repeated exactly what I just said, with the proper pronunciations and inflections, it still wouldn’t open because you wouldn’t know what you’re saying, therefore it couldn’t be subjectively true to you.”“That’s… impressive.” He gestured to the book. “So, is it a diary, or just—”“Christ, no,” Lily said. “It’s incredibly dangerous to give pieces of one’s heart and soul to a magical book. My diary looks different. Marlene and Dee read it about once a week, but I don’t care. This is more important. This is… Well, it’s like my dad said. It’s my book of spells and secrets.”She thumbed back through the book, then held out the page to Remus. On it, a list of questions, numbered one through one-hundred thirty four. “You weren’t kidding about that list, huh?” he muttered. Before he could get a proper look at the questions, she turned the book back towards her. “I was not. So, what’s the verdict? Can I write down your answers in my book of secrets?”Remus considered for a moment, then reluctantly, he said, “Yes. So long as no one else sees it. I can’t be expelled, Lily.”“You won’t be. I swear, Remus. This secret will die with me, if that’s what you want.”He’d very much like the wolf to die, but that was entirely out of his control. “Now,” she said, whipping out a ballpoint pen from seemingly nowhere. “We’re going to walk and talk, because, really, we don’t have all day and I’m supposed to meet Severus later. I will only ask you the first three questions on my list. The rest will be for later. Does that sound fair?”Once more, Remus raised his wand to illuminate the tunnel, stuffing his other hand in his pocket as he started again towards Hogsmeade. “Fair enough.”“Right.” Lily glanced furtively at her list. “First one’s easy. I’ve seen conflicting reports on this, and really, I must know. One book said it’s bullshit, but another—The Fading Moon—talks about it in detail. That book is ancient, and it’s author wrote it anonymously, but he was rumoured to actually be a werewolf, as it’s almost autobiographical. Unlike most of the other books on the subject, which are, like I said, more superstitious than—”“Lily,” Remus said. “Just ask your question.”As much as he appreciated her… enthusiasm on the subject of werewolves, it was pretty much his least favourite subject of all time, and he preferred just to get it over with. “Sorry.” She glanced up at him with wide eyes, then said in one breath, “Do the wolf’s senses carry over when you’re human?”Remus blinked, then opened and closed his mouth. It wasn’t necessarily a difficult question to answer. It’s just… No one had ever bothered to ask that particular question, not even his father, who at one point, had made a career in hunting werewolves. To him, it seemed like a rather important question to ask. “Yeah,” Remus said, genuinely surprised at himself for volunteering the information. “I have a rather strong sense of smell and hearing. I don’t really remember it any other way, but it’s definitely more accurate than most everyone else. Plus, I tend to heal quickly.”Lily’s eyes flicked to the scars on his face, but were back on her book a heartbeat later. “Thank fuck for that,” she muttered. “Can you distinguish individual scents of people?”Remus paused. “Is this your second question?”“Follow-up. It doesn’t count.”“Fine. Yes, I can.”“What do I smell like?”“Sunflowers.”“And Potter?”“Cinnamon and… brooms, I guess? It’s a woodsy smell.”“Peter?”“Sticky.”Lily frowned. “Sticky is not a scent.”“Yes, it is,” Remus said, because saying someone smelled distinctly like rotten fruit was just rude. “Next question.”“What does Sirius smell like?”“Magic.”He said it without thinking, really, but it was true. Both objectively and subjectively. Sirius Black smelled like magic, wild and unconquered, every bit as reckless and brazen as Sirius himself. “Huh. Interesting,” Lily said, but she didn’t press any further. “Now, question two is a bit… much. So… sorry? I guess.”“You’re forgiven. Ask the question.”“What do you remember about the night you were bitten? Do you remember—” Lily swallowed around a lump in her throat. “—who bit you?”Remus felt his jaw lock up, tighter than the clasp on Lily’s book of spells. He’d never spoken to anyone about that night. Not his mum, or his dad, nor the seeming-thousands of Ministry officials that had shown up the morning after his first shift. His father had acted quickly. He’d bandaged Remus’s wounds—especially the gaping bite mark on Remus’s left hip—wiped his tears, and made him presentable. None of the Ministry officials had ever even suspected that Remus had been bitten. They’d believed the lie his father had told: Fenrir Greyback broke into their house through the window in Remus’s room, but Remus hadn’t been in there. He’d had a nightmare and had been in bed with his mum and dad. When his dad had heard the window break, he’d managed to draw his wand and fight Greyback off. Remus hadn’t been able to say a word to confirm or deny his father’s story to the Ministry officials, so they accepted it without question. He hadn’t been able to say a word, period. He’d been in astronomical pain and his throat had been raw from screaming.After that night, Remus had decided that, like his father, he wasn’t going to speak about it, and that maybe it would just go away. Maybe he wouldn’t turn into a wolf. But, a month later, the moon had risen and his wolf had torn free, and that was that. His mum and dad had packed up and moved them from London to his mum’s native Wales.Over the years, Remus’s parent’s simply stopped asking about that night. He figured it was either because they didn’t want to relive the trauma of having their only son turned into a monster, or because they figured he’d suppressed and forgotten the entire night and was merely doing his best to cope with the consequences. Except Remus remembered every goddamned second of that night, from Greyback’s glowing golden eyes outside his bedroom window, to the glass shattering and his flesh tearing, to his bones breaking and reforming, and Christ, all the fucking blood.Every. Goddamned. Second. Remus shook his head, forcing himself to return to the present. “No. No, Evans, I’m not talking about that.”She didn’t even blink. Remus let out what he hoped was a relatively quiet sigh of relief. “Last question. Have you told Sirius about… Mr. Hyde?”Well. He hadn’t been expecting that one either. Vaguely, Remus found himself wondering as to how, exactly, Lily had prioritised this list of questions.“No,” he said. “I haven’t told him. He… he thinks I’m going home every month and my parents are doing this to me.” Remus gestured helplessly at the scars marring his face. “Well, there’s a chance he’s… projecting.”Remus didn’t want to think about that. He’d been desperately trying to keep Sirius off his mind for the past two weeks. It was nearly impossible—given that, in the four months Remus had known him, Sirius had somehow managed to take up significant real estate in both Remus’s conscious and unconscious mind—but he’d been afraid that if he thought of Sirius at home with his horrible family, he’d find himself breaking into McGonagall’s office again and this time flooing over and rescuing Sirius. Storming the castle, so to speak. He may or may not have worked out the logistics of that plan, in detail, and with intricate battle strategies. “He’s seen the scars, so it’s understandable that he’d have questions. And he’s noticed that my eyes turn a bit gold to match the wolf’s about a day or so before the moon is full. But he hasn’t put it all together.”Lily was silent for a long minute. So long, in fact, that Remus could make out a faint light at the end of the tunnel. “I know it’s none of my business, Remus, and it’s your decision to make, but I really think that if there were one other person in this castle who would understand and sympathise with you, it’d be Sirius Black.”“He’s a pureblood, Lily,” Remus said. “And I’m a monster.”“Neither of you should ever be reduced to either of those things,” Lily snapped. “You’re both so much more, even if you can’t see it. To the world and to each other. You are also both, unfortunately, mad fucking idiots.” She threw him a smirk and promptly closed her book of secrets. Remus took the out for what it was: an end to the uncomfortable questions. “You’re not wrong.”As they walked the tunnel grew narrower and the ceiling curved down low enough that Remus had to duck his head. A few paces later, and the tunnel abruptly ended, with a wooden trap door on the ceiling.“Good thing you’re as monstrously tall as you are,” Lily muttered, and Remus tried not to visibly cringe at the ironic use of the word monstrously. He knew Lily didn’t mean anything by it. “Give me a boost?”Together, they drew their wands and used a levitation spell to open the trap door. Then, Remus hoisted Lily up before crawling up after her. The smell assaulted Remus the second he popped his head through the front door. He covered his mouth and nose with his elbow, trying to suppress his gag reflex. “Christ, Evans, where the hell are we? It reeks.”They were in a basement, of some kind. Oak barrels lined one wall, wooden crates another, then, scattered throughout were half-opened boxes of sugar, spices, and what Remus sincerely hoped weren’t actually millions of deceased cockroaches. The dirt floor shifted as they moved, kicking up dust and coating his lungs, making him cough and inhale the sticky-sweet stench of mildew, yeast, and every kind of sugary confection imaginable.Including, it seemed, after a closer inspection on the label on one of the boxes, chocolate-covered cockroaches.What a horrifyingly criminal use of chocolate. Remus was deeply offended. “We’re in the basement of Honeydukes. Wizarding candy shop.” Lily inhaled deeply and let out a dreamy sigh. “I think it smells wonderful.”Remus pulled a face. It smelled like everything at once, and it was giving him a headache. “Yes, well. If we could get upstairs as soon as possible. These fumes are putting the potion lab to shame.”Lily laughed and started up the stairs. “Is that why you’re doing so bad at potions? You can’t stand the smell? I thought it was because you were trying to give Sirius a chance to feel smarter than you.”“He’s plenty smart on his own already, I’ll have you know, and he certainly doesn’t need anyone inflating his ego. He’ll be top of our class.”“Not if I have anything to say about it.” Lily paused at the top, carefully shouldered the hinge of the door, and pushed it open. When no one seemed to notice either the noise or the fact that two first years were coming up from the basement during early business hours, Remus followed her out into the brightly lit shop. Honeydukes was moderately busy, considering it couldn’t be much past nine in the morning on New Years Day. A few women with grubby-handed children lingered and argued with the shop-keeper at the checkout. A few teenagers perused the shelf of chocolate frogs, and a young couple leaned against one another near the discounted shelf of boxed Christmas truffles. Thankfully, the shop was spacious; high-ceilings and the open door letting in the cool, January breeze did wonders for the state of Remus’s headache. Up here, out of the mildew-y basement, it really did smell heavenly.Lily let out what could only be construed as a squeal of delight. She grabbed Remus’s hand and together, they weaved through the shelves, until they found a small bin near the front of the shop with a crisp, gold label:
Free Samples. Please take only one.
Happy Holidays, M. Honeydukes.
Lily selected a firewhisky flavoured hard candy, while Remus went straight for the chocolate. About three seconds later, Lily’s face turned bright red and she scrunched up her nose. “My God, is that what firewhisky tastes like?” Remus laughed. “I take it you’re not a fan.”“Not even a little bit.” But, to her credit, she did not spit the candy out. Just then, a breeze came from the open door at Remus’s back. Snow from the stoop swept into the store, as well as the cool, crisp scents of winter and pine and—Remus froze.He turned towards the window, the chocolate in his mouth reduced to ash, because there was absolutely no mistaking that scent. He’d smelled it on Sirius, the first day they’d met. He’d smelled it again when Sirius had opened the letter from his mother, and…And, the day Sirius had cursed Malfoy. Remus would know that smell anywhere. It was fire and entrails and sweeter than ambrosia, but there was only poison underneath.Across the street, and in stark contrast to the pure, white snow on the ground, stood the charred remains of what Remus assumed was once a shop. Now, it was nothing more than a husk with a roof, a shattered and splintered door, and shards of glass strewn about outside. Remus was outside, and halfway across the street before he realised what he was doing. He stopped walking, just outside the perimeter of broken glass that surrounded the ruined shop.“Remus!” Lily called, running after him. She slid up close to him, eyeing the shop. Her voice grew quiet as she moulded herself to his side. “Remus, I-I don’t like this. Let’s just go, all right? There’s something wrong here.”Yes, there was. “It smells like Dark Magic,” he whispered, barely aware of his own voice. He felt Lily’s gaze boring a hole in the side of his face. She tugged on his arm. “All the more reason to get the fuck out of here.”Dark Magic hung heavy in the air, blanketing them, coating his insides with its sticky-sweet poison, but Remus made no move to walk away. There was… something. Something he didn’t want to explain. An itch, a feeling, an instinct from the wolf, he couldn’t say, but he found himself moving forward, his feet crunching on snow and broken glass, and Lily’s fingernails digging into this bicep. It was that same, creeping feeling of wrongness that seeped into his bones. He’d felt it when he’d woken up, and he felt it again now: wrongness so thick in the air that Remus could almost sift through it with his fingers.Something horrible had happened, while the wolf had taken over his mind. Or, maybe it had happened days ago, and of the two of them, the wolf was the only one clever enough to recognise the wrongness for what it was: a veiled threat, an act of war, a taste of vengeance.An omen of the darkness to come.He crossed the threshold of the shop. “Remus!” Lily hissed, but she did not let go of his arm. Inside the shop, the sticky-sweet poison smell was even stronger. No part of the shop was untouched by whatever horror had happened here. The ceiling beams were half collapsed, the back wall was blown out entirely, and charred debris lined every inch of the floor. Remus’s senses were on overdrive: the creak of the burnt wood, the howl from the wind whistling against the broken shards of glass in what remained of the front windows, and of course, that smell. It nearly blinded him.Which was probably why he didn’t notice they weren’t alone until someone had their wand at his throat. Next to him, Lily screamed, tore her arm free, and stumbled backwards a few steps, fumbling for her own wand. The wand against Remus’s jugular glowed hot.“One more move from either of you and I liquify his brain,” hissed the voice, presumably attached to the wand at his throat. Remus stayed frozen, staring straight ahead. In hindsight, he should have seen this coming, but the wolf’s senses had been drowning in the wrongness and the tang of Dark Magic. Not for the first time that morning, Remus cursed the wolf for the mess he found himself in: bloody, injured, and precariously balancing on his one good knee. Except now with a wand at his throat.“Oh, love, he’s a kid. He doesn’t mean any harm,” came another voice, from deeper in the shop.“You don’t know that! She has spies everywhere! Look what she did already! I’d be just like her to use fucking brats from Hogwarts!”Behind him, Lily Josephine Evans fired a stinging hex at his attacker.“Fucking—Jesus!” the woman shouted, jumping backwards, but she did not lose her grip on her wand.Remus stumbled back to stand in front of Lily, and he was finally able to catch a glimpse at the odd couple in the shop. The woman reeled for a moment, shaking off the stinging hex, then raised her wand again. “Why you fucking—”Except the short, portly man stepped forward and snatched the wand right out of her hand. “Love, please don’t. They’re children.”“They broke in!”The man let out a hallow laugh. “There’s not much to break into. The door’s been blown off.” He stepped forward and placed a gentle hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Why don’t you play nice and ask them who they are?”With a huff and a dramatic eye-roll that struck Remus as uncomfortably familiar, the woman turned back to face them. She stepped forward—wandless now, but no less intimidating—and crossed her arms. She was only a few inches taller than Remus, and pale. Her dark, curly brown hair was wild and out of sorts, disheveled like the rest of her appearance. Her eerily familiar silver eyes were red-rimmed, and lined with dark circles that looked almost like bruises.“Fine,” the woman said. “Who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want?”“Clearly those years of etiquette lessons payed off,” the man grumbled. “We’re no one,” Lily said, jutting out her chin and trying to appear taller. “Just some fucking brats from Hogwarts.”Remus smirked up at the woman. “Pleased to meet you.”He stuck out his hand for her to shake. She recoiled instantly, wrinkling her nose at his offered hand. “Oh, for God’s sake,” the man muttered, stepping forward. He didn’t shake Remus’s hand, but he gave him a warm, reassuring smile. “I’m Edward Tonks, owner—well, former owner—of this little shop. And this is—”Tonks. He knew that name.Remus’s eyes widened and everything clicked into place. The woman’s familiarity... From her pale skin and high cheekbones, to her silver eyes, and that weird and inexplicable aversion to physical contact.He knew who she was.“You’re Andromeda Black,” he said.Andromeda froze. Her expression hardened and she raised a hand. Little sparks danced between her fingertips—not as many or as in control as the magic that Sirius could so easily summon—but Remus was not fool enough to think Andromeda’s threat of wandless magic was inconsequential. “And how the fuck do you know my name?”Lily kept her wand raised and trained on Andromeda. “We’re friends of Sirius. He said you were the good cousin.”And just like that, Andromeda’s face softened. As though her strings had been cut, she slumped against a fallen beam, seemingly exhausted. “You’re—” She looked Remus up and down. “Are you the Lupin boy? The one who broke into McGonagall’s office?”Remus had to pause to think, because, Christ, that seemed like forever ago. “How did you—”But then he stopped himself. He probably had one of the most recognisable faces in all of Wizarding Britain, what with his scars and all. His heart sank. The scars made him unforgettable.Andromeda gave him a soft smile, and Merlin, she was beautiful when she smiled. Like some dark statue that suddenly had life breathed into it. “Your eyes,” Andromeda said. “Sirius said you had the most brilliant eyes that he’d ever seen.”And, well. Remus had no clue what to say to that, but he allowed his heart to soar. Just for a second. “And you must be the Muggle-born,” Andromeda continued, her eyes shifting to Lily. “The one James Potter plans on marrying.”Lily flushed bright red and Remus had to stifle a laugh. “Sirius better not have introduced me like that,” Lily growled.“I assure you, Miss Evans, that he did not.” Andromeda’s eyes twinkled in a way that was so eerily similar to Sirius that it was a wonder that Remus didn’t recognise her for who she was right away. “I’ve taught him better than that, thank you very much.”“Good.” Lily put away her wand, then cast her gaze around the shop. “What exactly happened here?”Andromeda’s face darkened and she appeared to age about fifty years in an instant. Her eyes met Tonks’s, and the short man stepped forward to pull Andromeda into his arms. He was only an inch or so taller than her, but she made herself small enough to tuck her face against his neck.“Walburga Black happened. That’s what,” Andromeda said, her voice cold and emotionless.Remus felt the cold fingers of dread creeping up his spine, clawing at his heart, tearing him to pieces in ways that even the wolf couldn’t.Lily placed her hand on his arm, apparently sensing his panic. “What does that mean?”Andromeda straightened, her features suddenly entirely devoid of emotion. “I’m sorry, Ms. Evans, but the less you know about the affairs of the Blacks, the better.”Lily’s face flushed red, her eyebrows furrowing. She opened her mouth, no doubt ready to tear Andromeda a new one, but Edward Tonks beat her to it.“Andromeda—“ Tonks began.“No, Teddy! You said it yourself. They’re just kids! There’s no need to get them involved.”“We’re already involved!” Remus snapped. “I’ve seen what Sirius’s mother has done to him. And we both saw how terrified he was to go home. We know, Andromeda. And Sirius— Christ.”Suddenly there were tears in his eyes and his throat closed up.Because Sirius was everything and Remus didn’t have the words.“Sirius is our friend,” Lily finished for him. Andromeda sighed. “This…” She gestured to the shop. “This is nothing compared to what the Blacks are capable of. I am telling you now, the less you know, the longer your life will be.”Lily exchanged a look with Remus.“Yeah,” Lily said. “We don’t care.”“Longevity is overrated,” Remus added, still trying to settle his racing heart.Andromeda muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, “Bloody fucking Gryffindors,” but then nodded to Tonks.“Andromeda was meant to be engaged on Christmas,” Tonks began.“To a pureblood sycophant twice my age,” Andromeda added.“Yes, well. We’d concocted half a plan to make her something of an unattainable bride, but apparently Walburga Black was already leagues ahead.”“And now, in the eyes of Wizarding law and of pureblood society, I am engaged to Julius Fawley. I will bear him sons and play the part of the pureblood wife, and in return, he will get a significant portion of the Black fortune.” Andromeda reached into her pocket and held out a large, ostentatious ring. It had three bands, each curled like a snake, and made of the purest silver in the realm, given that Remus could almost smell the bite from the silver it from where he stood. The diamond was obnoxiously large and horrifyingly black. “See?” Andromeda said, scoffing at their expressions. “I’m betrothed.”Tonks leaned over and kissed her forehead. “And I love you anyway.”She melted, and tucked the ring away to lean against him once more. “All right,” Lily said. “But how did this happen to your shop?”Andromeda pulled a face. “Walburga had a spy.”Remus nearly swallowed his tongue. “Sirius?”“No,” Andromeda said. “Never Sirius. Sirius is unwaveringly loyal in all respects and wouldn’t betray anyone he loved, even at his own expense. That’s why he’s in bloody Gryffindor.”All things considered, Remus knew that. He’d staked everything on Sirius’s loyalty and bravery, from the very moment they’d met.“Then, who?”“His brother.”“Regulus?”“He knew about Teddy. He knew about our relationship and he knew about this shop,” Andromeda said. “And he just turned on you?” Lily said. “That doesn’t make sense. Sirius loves his brother and he wouldn’t—““Unless Walburga threatened Sirius,” Remus said, because if Regulus was anything like Sirius, that would be the only thing that would force him to turn traitor. It’d been why Sirius had cursed Malfoy in the first place. Apparently, the love and loyalty of the Black brothers came at one hell of a price.Andromeda’s silver eyes met his and the icy claws of dread tore into Remus’s very soul. “She threatened Sirius, so Regulus gave you up.”Slowly, painfully, Andromeda nodded. “Regulus did what he had to do.”
But was it enough?
There were tears in his eyes, daggers in his heart, and in his very soul, the wolf inside him howled in agony. “Is Sirius all right?” The question hung heavy in the air, heavy as the ash and stench of Dark Magic surrounding them inside and out. “I don’t know,” Andromeda croaked. “I left as soon as I could. I… I couldn’t help him, and I had to find Teddy.” She reached for Tonk’s hand and clutched it tight. “We Blacks are monstrous creatures, but we all have our priorities and impossible choices to make. I made mine and got out of there as soon as I could.”Remus felt as though his lungs had been ripped from his chest. It felt so much different now, when it was simply words rending his flesh from his bones, rather than the usual claws of the wolf. Fucking Christ, this was worse.Remus couldn’t breathe. “He’s alive, Remus,” Andromeda whispered, or maybe shouted. Remus was having trouble concentrating. “His mother needs him alive. But short of that, I don’t know what state he’s in.”The wolf howled its rage from somewhere deep inside of him.
If he’s hurt, I’ll tear her heart from her chest and devour it whole.
From their expressions, Remus gathered that he might have said that out loud. That should horrify him—he never allowed the wolf to get so close to the surface that it managed to gain control of his tongue—but Remus found he didn’t care. He meant every damn word. Still, he took deep breaths and fought to win back control. Andromeda gave a slight tug on Tonks’s hand and pulled him closer to her. “Teddy and I are leaving. For good,” she said. “I can’t tell you where—Walburga has spies everywhere—but we’re going to elope. We don’t have much tucked away, but I’ll sell Fawley’s goddamned ring the second we land somewhere safe.”Lily and Remus exchanged a glance.“But,” Lily began, “Sirius needs you.”“Sirius needs his army of crazy, fucking Gryffindors ready and willing to go to war to keep him safe.” Her silver glare landed on Remus. “He’ll always have me. I promise you, I will write to him once it’s safe, but for now, I need to be gone. The more distance between me and Sirius, the safer he’ll be.”“Plus,” Tonks added, helpfully, “I really don’t want you to marry Fawley.”“God, me neither.” She focused back on Remus. “The Hogwarts Express comes in tomorrow. Sirius needs his friends.”“He’ll have them,” Lily said, and Remus managed to nod. “Until the very end.”Tonks pulled out his pocket watch. “We best be off, love. Our portkey leaves in less than half an hour.”“Right,” Andromeda said, nodding and brushing off her dress. “And, Remus?”“Yes?”“Tell him I love him,” Andromeda said. “And tell him… Tell him he should really trust Uncle Alphard. He’s on our side.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
January 2, 1972
Remus hadn’t slept.Normally, Remus could barely keep his eyes open on the day following the full moon. The transformation was never easy, and this one in particular had been brutal, both because of the blue moon and because of Remus’s effort to steal the wolf’s teeth. Normally, he was fraught with exhaustion the morning after. Normally, he allowed Madam Pomfrey to force him to sleep most of the day and stay the night. Normal wasn’t a word Remus understood anymore. He’d gotten maybe three hours of sleep in the past seventy-two hours. Sirius haunted his every waking moment.Whenever he closed his eyes, Remus saw the wolf pacing inside him, back and forth, baring its teeth, kneading the earth with its claws, hungry for a fight. Thirsty for vengeance. The wolf was furious at even the slightest hint that Sirius was in trouble. Remus had no clue as to when or how the wolf had formed any sort of connection with Sirius Black, but it had, and now it howled for Remus to do something.Except, there wasn’t anything Remus could do, save for lie here all night staring at the canopy of the bed he’d been sharing with Sirius since the night after Sirius had found him in the bathroom.So, he’d done nothing but wallow in silent agony and pray the old French prayers his mother had taught him as a child, hoping they’d be enough to keep Sirius safe until he was back at Hogwarts, where Remus could protect him. At a quarter after ten in the morning, Remus hauled himself out of bed and into the shower. Every muscle in his body loudly protested the movement, and his knee almost gave out, but Remus grit his teeth and forced the movement anyway. He showered, brushed his teeth, and tried to do something with his hair, but it was mostly a lost cause, even with some of James’s pilfered hair potion. The new scars on his face had closed and faded to pink, but even so, he looked like he’d just gone about twelve rounds too many with a hippogryph.Honestly, Remus couldn’t find it in himself to care too much. He just wanted to see Sirius. Once he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sirius was all right, Remus could sleep.Lily was waiting for him in the common room. Her hair was up, and her arms were crossed, but she smiled at Remus as he came down the stairs.“How was your night?” he asked, conversationally, mostly in an effort to dissuade her from mentioning how horrible he looked. After they’d left Hogsmeade, Lily had hurried off to meet Snape, leaving Remus alone. He’d wandered about the castle, aimlessly, for about an hour before the pain in his left knee forced him to Gryffindor tower. He’d tried to read, tried to get ahead in Ancient Runes, but he’d been unable to focus on on anything other than Sirius Black.“All right,” Lily said, as they crawled through the portrait hole and made their way down to the Great Hall. There was supposed to be a Welcome Brunch served in the Hall as soon as the Hogwarts Express arrived at eleven. “Severus and I had a bit of a tiff.”“Another one?”Lily rolled her eyes. “He has certain… opinions about some legislation that will be up for a final vote of approval later this month. He’s wrong.”Remus hadn’t been aware that Lily followed the legislative process of the Wizengamot. Personally, he knew next to nothing about it and made a mental note to start reading up on it. “Wrong?” he asked, because as with most conversations regarding Snape they’d had over the holidays, Remus had frightfully little to say. He knew Lily was close to Snape, and he had no desire to risk her vengeance and retaliation should he say the wrong thing.“Yes, very, very wrong,” Lily insisted, eying Remus like her response was supposed to mean something to him, though his exhausted mind was not cooperating enough to catch the subtleties. The way he saw it, Severus Snape was wrong about most things, outside the Potions classroom. Lily sighed. “Severus didn’t used to be like this. He was… kind.”Kind was never going to be a word that Remus used to describe Severus Snape.“He’s been writing to Malfoy,” Lily said. “He won’t let me read the letters. I don’t understand why Severus just can’t…”Remus raised an eyebrow at her. “Can’t, what?”“Be better.”“I think,” Remus began, then took a breath. He almost reconsidered—almost—but frankly, it had to be said, and he was too damn tired to hold his tongue. “I think that maybe Snape is incapable of being better than he is.”Lily turned on him. “Remus Lupin, how dare you—““And maybe it’s your responsibility as his friend to show him the kindness he is not capable of expressing, in the hopes that one day, perhaps, he might learn to be better in order to be worthy of your friendship.”“Hm.” Lily was silent for a moment. When they reached the enormous doors of the Great Hall, Lily crossed her arms and smirked up at him. “You know, I was about to hex you there for a minute.”“I know.”Down a ways, around a corner and through the doors of the entrance hall, Remus could hear the excited voices of returning students on the thestral-drawn carriages. An icy breeze swept through the castle, bringing with it the scent of hundreds of students returning to Hogwarts. A few students who’d stayed over the holidays rushed past Remus and Lily to the entrance hall, in order to greet their friends as soon as the carriages came to a halt.“Do you want to wait outside?” Lily asked, sliding close to him and hooking her arm through his.“No,” he said, because this was something he’d actually thought through in the early hours of the morning, staring up at his canopy. Remus figured it was best to wait by the Great Hall, rather than brave searching for Sirius in the crowd outside. Sure, he’d probably be able to find Sirius by scent alone, but they would not, in any way, shape or form, be in a private enough setting that Remus could assess the damages. If he waited here, the students would file in methodically, and if he smelled so much as the slightest hint of Dark Magic or blood on Sirius, he could easily whisk him away to the empty charms classroom just across the hall. So, despite every instinct he had just to run out the front doors and tear through the crowd just to find Sirius, Remus forced himself to remain where he was.“It’s too cold outside,” he told Lily.She stared at him for a long moment, as though she’d followed his every thought. Students began to pour into the hallway, and, behind them, some distant magic compelled the doors to the Great Hall to open. Exuberant voices surrounded them, as Lily Evans stared into his soul. “He’ll be all right, Remus,” she whispered, then leaned her head on his shoulder. “He has to be.”Remus didn’t have any words left to formulate a reply. Five seconds later, Remus caught a whiff of cinnamon.“Oi! Lupin!”James Potter more or less hurled himself at Remus in what amounted to a quite literal bone-crushing hug. Remus laughed, then grunted, as James squeezed his bruised ribcage.James pulled back slightly, but kept an arm slung around Remus’s neck. Peter sidled up close to James and gave Remus a small wave in greeting. “James and I have been planning pranks on the Slytherins the whole way here,” Peter said, with a proud smile. “James claims he has a secret weapon for not getting caught, but he won’t tell me what is just yet.”“Nope. It’s a Marauders Only type of secret,” James said. “Those gits won’t know what hit them.”“Speaking of...” Remus strained his neck, trying to see over everyone in the crowd, searching for the mop of raven-black hair and eyes as silver as the moon. “Where’s—“But James’s attention was already elsewhere. “Remus,” James interrupted. “I need to know. How is my beloved? Have you told her of my grand deeds?”“He hasn’t mentioned you once in the past two weeks,” Lily said, turning to face them from where she’d been conversing with Dorcas and Marlene. “It’s been a glorious holiday.”“Traitor,” James muttered, half-heartedly, to Remus.“Remus did you a favour, Potter,” Marlene said, hooking her arm through Dorcas’s. “Yes, you know what they say,” Dorcas added. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”James broke out in a ridiculous grin. With his glasses askew and his hair an absolute rat’s nest, he extracted himself from Remus’s side and strolled up to Lily. “Well, in that case—““Where’s Sirius?” Lily said, her voice clipped and her eyes finding Remus’s.He shrugged and gave a slight shake of his head. The nauseating dread that had haunted Remus all night welled up inside him, and he did his very best not to panic outright. Christ, he couldn’t even smell Sirius. Had he come back to Hogwarts at all?James sobered instantly, fast enough to give anyone whiplash. “He, uh.” James exchanged a look with Peter. “He said he was tired. He went up to the tower to sleep. Said he’d catch up with us later.”“What?” Remus said. “How’d we miss him, then? We’ve been here the whole time. He would have had to walk past us to get to the staircase—“Peter shook his head. “He cut across the courtyard to the greenhouse. Used the back staircase. The one that doesn’t move around as much. He said he didn’t want to cause a fuss.”Remus tried to swallow around his heart heart that was trying to claw its way out of his chest. “James,” Remus breathed. “Was he all right?”James let out a pained whimper, and cast a furtive look at Peter. “He…”“He said he was tired,” Peter said, eyeing Dorcas and Marlene. Dorcas’s face scrunched up in a frown. “Why… Why wouldn’t Sirius be all right? He was talking with us on the train. He asked about my nan.”“Oh, darling,” Marlene tutted. “There’s a great deal you don’t know about purebloods and their secrets. Best not to ask questions.”“But…” Dorcas said, with far less certainty than before. “He seemed fine.”“Mm, yes,” Marlene replied. “The first thing you need to know about us purebloods is that we’re remarkably good liars.”Absently, Remus found himself wondering just how much Marlene McKinnon knew about the Blacks. Marlene took a step towards the Great Hall and grabbed Lily’s arm. “Come on, Evans,” she said. “This seems like a Marauder matter.”Lily walked backwards two steps, then locked eyes with Remus. “Go check on him. Now, Remus.”Remus wasn’t going to argue with her.“Remus, wait.” James made a grab for his arm, but missed. “We’ll all go together—“But Remus didn’t wait.He ran. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ The smell assaulted him the moment he threw open the door to the dormitory: acrid and sweet, laced with hatred and infection. Dark Magic and blood. God, there was blood.Remus very nearly doubled over. “Sirius?”All four beds were empty, as was the rooftop where he and Sirius spent most nights. Frantic for a moment, thinking that maybe Sirius hadn’t made it all the way up the stairs in the first place, Remus almost ran back out the door, but—He heard a sob.The bathroom door was closed. Remus ran to the door, then pounded his fist against it when he realised it was locked. “Sirius? Siri, are you in there?”Nothing, except the faint sound of laboured breathing that no one would be able to make out through the heavy oak door. Unless that someone happened to be a werewolf. “Sirius, it’s just me. Please, let me in.”More nothing.“Goddamnit, Sirius, I don’t give a shit about anything, okay? I just… Fuck, I just want to see you.” Remus took a deep breath. “You told me that my scars didn’t matter. You said you didn’t give a fuck about them, even though they’re all that most everyone else can see. It goes both ways, Siri. I don’t give a shit what she did to you. I’ve been driving myself crazy not knowing, okay? Just let me help. Please.”He wiggled the door latch again and wondered if it would be over-dramatic to just bust the door down. Even with his injured knee and hand and distinct lack of sleep in the past few days, Remus knew he was more than strong enough to do so, especially with the adrenaline and fear currently coursing through his veins. The wolf was thirsty for violence and destruction, even if it were simply aimed at a door. “Sirius, I’m going to unlock this fucking door.” Remus let his forehead fall against the door with a thunk. “Please, just say something.”He waited. Tried to remember to breathe. Tried not to think about the last time he’d seen Sirius, how he’d pulled Sirius into his arms and cursed the stars when he’d had to let go. Nothing.Remus drew his wand and unlocked the door. Sirius’s back was to him, and he was hunched over a sink. He was shirtless, unreasonably pale and significantly skinnier than he had been two weeks ago. There was a burn mark on his back, marring the flesh along his spine and towards the hem of his trousers. Remus could see him trembling, head to toe. Sirius’s hair was uncharacteristically unkempt and… And…Remus met Sirius’s eyes in the mirror, and nearly choked. In the mirror, Remus could see the scars: two of them, in a criss-cross pattern across Sirius’s chest, from his collarbone to his hip, both of them raw and open and infected.And, right above Sirius’s heart…Remus knew what those words meant. Sirius let out something of a manic laugh. It came out as a cough, partially garbled from the blood dripping from the corner of his mouth.“R-Remus?” Sirius croaked. “Are you real?”“Yeah, Siri. I’m real.” Remus wished he wasn’t, wished this was some nightmare from which they’d both wake up.“Been dreaming about you, I think. Every night. Don’t wanna wake up, but you make me. Vipers. There’s vipers and chocolate cake and riddles. Riddle? Can’t remember the riddle. Cannon fodder and killing god. Something like that.”“Sirius.” Remus took half a step forward. “Sirius, you’re bleeding.”“It hurts, Re. It—“Sirius’s eyes rolled to the back of his head, and before Remus could cast so much as a cushioning charm, he collapsed in a heap on the bathroom floor. Remus made a garbled noise in the back of his throat and found himself kneeling at Sirius’s side in a second flat. His knee twinged painfully, but it hardly even registered in Remus’s mind. Blood trickled from Sirius’s lips to the tile floor. A mixture of pus and blood oozed from the open wounds on his chest. “Christ, no,” Remus muttered, and reached out to roll Sirius onto his back.Sirius flopped over and let out a horrifying moan of pain before Remus jerked back, breathing hard.Remus drew his wand, prayed he was remembered the wand movement correctly, and muttered, “Episkey.”It did absolutely nothing to the open, festering scars on Sirius’s chest, but Remus tried it seven more times anyway, his voice growing hoarse and more frantic with each spell.Numbly, his hand hovered over the fucking tattoo right above Sirius’s heart and Remus cursed the fucking world.Sirius was hurt and bleeding and he was so fucking useless. He couldn’t touch, he couldn’t do anything. The wolf clawed at Remus’s throat, ready and willing to scream for help, when—“Remus!” James, in the other room. Remus heard his footsteps, pounding up the stairs. “Bathroom!” Remus called, unable to keep the high note of desperation out of his voice. “Holy shit.” That was Peter. “What—“ James. “Mother of Merlin, Remus, what happened?!”“Is… Is that a tattoo?!” Peter, again.James knelt on Sirius’s other eyes, panic written all over his face. James reached out a hand, and, well, Remus just reacted.He drew his wand and hit James with a Knockback Jinx, sending James flying across the bathroom floor.“What the fuck, Lupin?!” James yelled, jumping to his feet. “He’s fucking bleeding! We need to—““Don’t touch him,” Remus bit out, with just enough presence of mind not to actually growl and bare his teeth at James. “Don’t fucking touch him.”Remus did not lower his wand.James glared at him, but gave him a slight nod. Then, in a measured voice, he said, “All right. What happened?”“His fucking mother happened,” Remus snarled.James scrubbed a hand over his face. “We need to get him to the hospital wing. Now. Stand back, Remus, I’ll levitate him—“Remus didn’t move, just shook his head furiously. He remembered what Sirius had said to him, when Remus had been the one bleeding on the floor of a different bathroom. “He’s spitting up blood. He could have a broken rib, and if we levitate him, we could make it worse. Puncture something inside.”James gave a curt nod. “Pete, go find McGonagall.”That wouldn’t work either. “No!” “Remus, he needs help!”Remus took a breath, tried to slow his heart enough to explain. “The three of us—“ He gestured between them. “—We swore that we wouldn’t speak of the crimes of the Blacks with anyone without Sirius’s permission. If we tell McGonagall, it’ll fuck with our magic forever.”Remus silently cursed Sirius for weaselling that oath out of him. He understood it—Christ, did he understand the desire to protect a secret—but he fucking loathed it. Especially now.“Then what the fuck do we do?!” James’s voice hit a high note of panic. “Lily.” The answer was so simple. She knew about Sirius’s family and she was cunning enough to not allow herself to be roped into any sort of ridiculous oath of silence. “Right. She said she would distract Marlene and Dee. Pete, go get Evans.”Peter stood frozen, looking back and forth between James and Remus and Sirius, unconscious on the floor. “Now, Peter!” Remus roared. “Run!”Peter jumped, clearly terrified, but hurried out of the dormitory. Remus didn’t have the capacity to feel bad about yelling at his friend right now. He’d apologise later, when Sirius was safe. Remus took a breath, then reached for a lock of Sirius’s tangled, black hair. He twirled it between his fingers, careful not to touch skin. James slowly sank to his knees on Sirius’s other side, his hands raised in a gesture of appeasement. Between them, Sirius let out a soft moan, but his eyes stayed close. His chest rose and fell, the trickle of blood slowing slightly. “That’s a real and proper tattoo,” James said, breathless, as though the tattoo itself was the most frightful and shocking thing about their friend passed out and bleeding on the bathroom floor.Remus just nodded.“Toujours Pur?” James’s French pronunciation was truly atrocious and would be the peak of comedy in any other circumstance. “What the hell does that even mean?”“Always pure,” Remus said, cold and detached. “It means he’s marked. He can’t ever touch either of us.”James’s face scrunched up in confusion. “What do you mean, he can’t touch us?”“I… I think it’s a curse. A blood curse, like the kind Malfoy used on Lily the first week. Just… permanent.”“Salazar’s fucking tits.” James ran fidgety hands through his hair. “And you think his mother did that over the holidays?”“No.” Remus forced out the words. “The scars might be new, but I think his mother branded him a long time ago.”“Fuck.”Fuck, indeed. Remus twined his fingers through Sirius’s hair, because, Christ, if he didn’t touch some part of Sirius, he might as well take a nose dive off the fucking roof. He wasn’t quite sure how long he and James sat there, keeping silent vigil over Sirius, before he heard the dormitory door burst open once again. “In here, Professor.” That was Lily. Thank God. A second later, Lily was crouched by his side, her hand on his shoulder and tears in her eyes. McGonagall stood in the doorway of the bathroom, a cowering Peter right behind her. “Sweet Merlin,” McGonagall whispered, taking in the scene. Her eyes tracked over Sirius, then landed on Remus, and fuck, he knew what that look meant. He’d seen that look in his father’s eyes, every month since he was four years old, when his father opened the cellar door to take in whatever atrocities the wolf had committed during the night.For three solid seconds, McGonagall thought Remus had done this to Sirius.Once more, Remus bit back a growl. “Potter, what happened here?” McGonagall demanded.But James couldn’t answer, not without risking permanent damage to his magic. Instead, he let out a strangled noise in the back of his throat.“Potter—““Oh, for Christ-sakes,” Lily cried. “They didn’t do this. This didn’t happen at Hogwarts.”Something like comprehension washed over McGonagall’s expression. Her lips tightened and there was just a hint of a tremor in her voice. “Right,” McGonagall said. “Speckles!”James fell backwards and gave a squawk of surprise at the sudden crack of apparition. Remus had never seen a house-elf up close, but he was momentarily taken aback by the fondness with which Speckles looked up at McGonagall. “Yes, Mistress?” said the house-elf.“Please Apparate Mr. Black directly to the hospital wing and inform Poppy that I will be there shortly.” Speckles nodded and crouched by Sirius’s head, her big eyes staring up at Remus. “Master needs to let go of Mr. Black’s hair,” Speckles said. “Speckles promises not to hurt Mr. Black.”Remus didn’t want to let go. He almost begged the house-elf to Apparate him to the hospital wing too, but then he felt Lily’s hands on his, silently tugging him away. Another crack, and Speckles and Sirius disappeared, along with all the air in Remus’s lungs. Without another word, McGonagall spun on her heel. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ The door to the hospital wing was locked, and no matter how many unlocking spells Remus tried, it wouldn’t fucking budge.Remus pounded his fist against the solid mahogany for the thousandth time in the last three hours, since McGonagall had promptly slammed the door in his face. He’d broken the splint on his broken fingers in the first hour. Now, his left hand was bleeding and the pain registered somewhere in the back of his mind, but Remus didn’t care.“Remus, love, please come sit,” Lily said. Her voice was strained and exhausted, and he was pretty sure that wasn’t the first time she’d asked him to sit. She was slumped against the wall, her knees drawn up to her chest and head buried in her arms. James sat across from her, with Peter drooling and snoring on his shoulder. James hadn’t said anything in the past three hours.“Remus—““No!” He took a breath, tugged at the sleeves of his jumper. He gestured helplessly at the door. “He was—Christ.”For as long as he’d live, Remus would never forget the look in Sirius’s eyes right before he’d passed out.“I know,” Lily whispered. She didn’t offer any more platitudes, any consolation, or sympathy, nor did he want her to. He didn’t think he could take it, given that he was barely hanging onto his sanity as it was. Behind him, the door gave a loud creak before McGonagall slipped out. Remus was there in a second, nose to nose with McGonagall, and trying to shove his way past her before she slammed the door in his face for a second time that day. “Mr. Lupin—“He ignored her, tried to wiggle past her, but—A cold hand clamped down on his shoulder. He met McGonagall’s icy blue glare beneath her square spectacles. He’d never realised he was only a couple of inches shorter than her. He knew without a doubt he could push her aside and be by Sirius’s side before she could so much as hex him. His wolf howled at him to move, and—Her grip tightened, and Remus knew she could see the wolf, lurking in the corners of his eyes. “Mr. Lupin, that’s quite enough.”Behind him, Remus heard James, Peter, and Lily scrambling to their feet. “How is he, Professor?” James asked. Not breaking McGonagall’s glare, Remus forced himself to take a step back. “He’s stable, Potter.” Ever so slowly, McGonagall sighed and her gaze shifted to James. “Madam Pomfrey said he’ll be in the hospital wings for a few days, but he will be all right.”“I want to see him,” Remus demanded. McGonagall frowned at him. “You may visit him tomorrow. After class.”“No, Professor, I need to—““After class, Lupin,” she snapped. “The four of you—“ She glared at each of them in turn. “—are not to speak of this with anyone. Am I understood?”Behind him, there was a chorus of, “Yes, Professor.”Remus managed a sharp nod. He was already bound to silence by a different oath. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to write a letter to Professor Dumbledore. Dinner starts in an a few minutes. You lot are needed in the Great Hall.”With that, McGonagall brushed past Remus and disappeared around the corner. Remus immediately started after her. “Professor—“Except Lily grabbed his arm. He turned to her, then gestured wildly in the direction McGonagall went. “I need to—““Remus.” Her voice was hard and brokered absolutely no argument. Every muscle in his body tensed. Lily shifted her gaze to glare at James and Peter over his shoulder. Nervously, Peter tugged on James’s sleeve, urging him in the direction of the staircase that led to the Great Hall.“Uh… We’ll catch up with you later, Remus,” James said, as Peter tugged him away. James nodded awkwardly at Lily. “Evans… Thanks. For… Sirius. Thanks.”Lily rolled her eyes.Remus waited until they were well out of earshot.“You knew about the tattoo.” “Yes.”“And what it means?”“Yes.”He’d figured as much. He remembered how she’d covered Sirius in the duvet on Halloween and how she’d ushered him from the common room when it’d gotten to be too much for Sirius. He remembered how she’d sat on Sirius’s other side after he’d gotten Slughorn’s letter, how she implicitly knew when and how to comfort, and when to back down. He remembered how Lily Evans seemed to have a knack for working out secrets. “Thank you,” he said.Her face scrunched up in confusion. “For what?”“For protecting him.”Lily was quiet for a long moment. She shuffled her feet around, her fingers still digging into Remus’s forearm. “I thought you’d be mad at me. For keeping his secret.”“Never,” he said, and meant it.“Look, Remus, I’ve been working on a cure, or a counter-curse, or something, and I—“There was an unreasonable and uninhibited flare of hope somewhere deep in his chest. “Have you found anything?”“No. But I’m confident that I will find something.”He nodded. “I’ll help. As much as you need, for as long as you need it, but right now—”“Right now...“ She let go of his arm and gave him a small smile. “Right now, you need to go speak to McGonagall. She knows enough now, I think, about what he’s been through. Your magic won’t be affected.”Remus had almost forgotten about that entirely. He had other things on his mind.“I need to know he’s okay.” He met Lily’s wide, green eyes and almost choked on the words. “He’s been alone for two weeks, Lily. He was so—Christ. He didn’t know if I was real. He thought he was dreaming. I need to—““Go.” Lily nodded in the direction in which McGonagall disappeared. “And Remus?”“Yeah?”She smirked. “Give her hell and don’t hold back.”Remus was halfway down the corridor when he stopped. He couldn’t turn around, couldn’t face her when he voiced his greatest fear.“He told me it hurts to touch me more than anything he’s ever felt. That’s because of… Mr. Hyde, isn’t it?”“Yes.” Lily’s voice was hardly more than a breath of air. “I’m so sorry, Remus.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Remus burst into McGonagall’s office without any pomp, circumstance, or preamble. He marched right up to the chair across from her desk, sat down, and crossed his arms over his chest. He resisted the ridiculous urge to put his feet up on her desk. Barely. To his immense satisfaction, McGonagall appeared at least moderately surprised by his sudden presence in her office. She let out a long-suffering sigh and put down her quill.“Mr. Lupin, I’m afraid my mind is made up. You may see Mr. Black tomorrow, after class.” She gestured towards the exit. “Please close the door on your way out.”Remus didn’t budge. “Do you or do you not have a duty of care for each and every student at Hogwarts, regardless of their House?”McGonagall paused for a moment, seemed to contemplate whether it was wise to play this game with him.It wasn’t.She wasn’t going to win. “I do,” she said.“Do you or do you not, as the Head of House, have a specific responsibility for the health and well-being of each and every student sorted into Gryffindor?”“Of course, I—““Did you or did you not place the Sorting Hat on the head of Sirius Black, on September 1, 1971, and witness the Hat placing him in Gryffindor with your own two eyes?”“Mr. Lupin—““Yes or no, Professor!”“Mr. Lupin, I understand you’ve had a trying few days, but this behaviour is—“He didn’t give a single shit about his behaviour right now. Remus Lupin, at his core, was a predator, always on the cusp of losing control of the ferocious, wild thing that prowled just below his consciousness. He wasn’t about to back down from the kill.“This is your fault!” he roared, rising to his feet. McGonagall gave no visible reaction.“Choose your next words very carefully, Lupin.” She pressed her palms flat against her desk and fixed him with a glare that would have most first years trembling where they stood. “My duty of care begins and ends within the walls of this castle and I uphold my oath that I have always acted in the best interest of every student while they are under my care. Outside these walls, I am as powerless to stop child abuse as any witch, wizard, or Muggle—“That’s shit, and you know it!” Remus snapped. “If you knew, beyond any shadow of doubt, that by leaving this school, a student will be harmed, you’d move heaven and earth to make sure that student remains in your care. That’s why you insisted I stay over the holidays, isn’t it? You said I was safer in Madam Pomfrey’s care than in my dad’s cellar. You called me up to your office so we could floo my parents and explain that the wolf might be violent because of the blue moon. I missed my mum’s chocolate cake and mince pies because you insisted I’d be safer at Hogwarts.” Remus took a breath. “You chose not to help Sirius because he’s a Black, and that’s the end of it.”For a long time, McGonagall said nothing. Then: “I do not answer to you, Lupin.”Remus almost laughed.“No, you don’t. But you’ll have to wake up tomorrow morning and look in the mirror, and you need to know that Sirius is in that goddamned hospital bed because you refused to help.”That got him a reaction. “Excuse me?”“He begged you!” Remus shouted, because now the monster was loose and it wouldn’t leave any scraps for the carrion birds. “He sat in that goddamned chair and begged you to keep him here. Have you ever known a Black to beg for anything, Professor? He did everything possible to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays, and when it all went to shit, he came to you. He begged, Professor. I was there. I asked you to reconsider. And after we left, how long did Lily Evans spend in here trying to convince you to change your mind? But instead of helping him, you sent him straight to the fucking gates of hell!”“There was no way I could have anticipated what would happen to him—“A dark, cruel laugh escaped his throat. “Professor. There is nothing you can possibly say that will ever lead me to believe you didn’t know that the Blacks were capable of this. Everyone’s heard the stories. Even me and Lily, and we were mostly raised Muggle. What the fuck did you think would happen, when Sirius Black went home a Gryffindor?”McGonagall said nothing, her gaze landing on the nothing-space behind Remus’s head. Remus turned to leave.“You don’t need to answer to me, Professor. But I hope one day you’ll muster enough Gryffindor courage to answer to Sirius.”He opened the door and stopped.“You were right, by the way. The wolf was violent. My knee hurts, my wrists need re-bandaged, I think I re-broke my fingers pounding on that fucking door, and I haven’t slept in three goddamned days. I checked myself out of Madam Pomfrey’s care against her advice, and I am now reaping the rewards. I think it’s best if I spend tonight in the hospital wing. I anticipate I won’t be attending classes tomorrow either, and I may need to stay another night.“In reference to my behaviour, for my swearing and general insubordination, I will begin detention in your office on Tuesday night, after dinner, and will continue for the rest of the term, barring the nights of the full moons.”Still, McGonagall said nothing and her expression gave nothing away.“Please inform Madam Pomfrey that I’m on my way and have her unlock the door. I’d hate to break more fingers.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ This time, the hospital wing door opened as soon as Remus touched it. Remus didn’t even break his stride, until he was about ten feet from Sirius’s hospital bed, at the farthest end of the wing. Sirius was propped up against several fluffy pillows roughly the same shade as his pale skin. He was still shirtless, his lower half covered by a heap of blankets and a quilt Remus knew Madam Pomfrey had knitted by hand. She’d wrapped Remus in that same quilt after his first full moon at Hogwarts, when the wolf had nearly torn him in two. Remus could still smell the faint stench of infection in the air around Sirius, but it was nowhere near as potent as it had been in the bathroom a few hours ago. Instead, he smelled dittany and some sort of herbal poultice. Sirius’s chest was wrapped and bandaged in a manner not all that dissimilar from Remus’s own bandages under his robes. And, above his heart…Those words would haunt Remus for the rest of his life.Silver eyes met his, with far more cognisance and recognition than there’d been a few hours ago. Sirius had dark circles under his eyes, and nobody had yet done anything about his hair (which was a travesty, if Remus ever saw one), but the way that Sirius smirked nearly made Remus’s heart stop.“Hey, Re,” Sirius said. “You look like shit.”Despite everything, despite the enormity of pain and suffering that lingered in the air between them, Remus laughed.It tasted like magic. “How’d you get in?” Sirius asked as Remus approached his bed. “Madam Pomfrey said the doors were locked.”“I, er…” Remus didn’t particularly feel like explaining the last few hours just yet. He held up his left hand that was mostly covered by a broken splint and dried blood. “I broke my fingers.”Sirius frowned. “Doing what?”“Er, well… Pounding on the door?”It might not be a lie, but it was nowhere near the full truth either. Remus gave a helpless shrug.“That was you?” Sirius asked. “Merlin, I thought that noise was just my head about to explode.”“It was probably a bit of both, Mr. Black,” Madam Pomfrey cut in, hurrying over to Sirius’s other side, carrying a tray of potions. She set the tray down, reached for a vial, and thrust it into Remus’s hand over the bed. “Lupin, that’s a pain potion with a drop of Skele-Grow, for your hand. Plus a little… extra. For everything else.”Sirius’s eyes widened in alarm and he gave Remus a quick once-over. Remus cringed and tried to play it off by inhaling the potent stench of the potion. Now was not the time for Sirius to be worried about Remus’s injuries.“Everything else,” Sirius said. “What is she—“Thankfully, Madam Pomfrey came to his rescue. “Lupin, if you’re here for the night, you will make yourself useful. Am I understood?”Sirius let out a frustrated huff.Remus downed the potion and nodded.“Right,” Madam Pomfrey said. She waved her wand in a zig-zag pattern over Sirius, in what Remus knew to be a quick diagnostic charm. “He’s got a curse-burn on his back and Sectumsempra scars across his abdomen, both of which necessitate we change their wrappings in about three hours to avoid the most severe scarring. We won’t be able to avoid it entirely, I’m afraid.”“Sectumsempra?” His mind stuck on that word. It took him nearly a full minute to process the rest of what Madam Pomfrey had said.“Yes.” Madam Pomfrey seemed equally horrified. “A curse I’ve seen far too often this year. If I ever see it again, it’ll be far too soon.”Sirius wouldn’t meet his eyes.Madam Pomfrey flicked her wand, and a tray came floating in from seemingly nowhere. Remus wasn’t entirely sure how he hadn’t smelled that earlier, given the heavy, hearty scent of the beef broth, but the scent of food had somehow gotten lost behind the stench of pain and infection. Madam Pomfrey lowered the tray until it rested on Sirius’s lap, and it was only then that Remus caught the look in Sirius’s eye. Remus knew that look. He saw it in the mirror, on the days leading up to the full moon.Sirius was starving.Fuck.Madam Pomfrey holstered her wand and fixed Remus with a hard glare. “It is my understanding that Mr. Black has not had any actual food in at least several days.” Sirius said nothing. He stared at his soup. “From what I can tell, he’s been surviving on nutrition potions and the kindness of fate.”At this, Sirius laughed, and Remus knew why. Kindness and fate could never coexist peacefully within the same sentence.Madam Pomfrey gaze moved to Sirius and softened immediately. “In either case, he’s in grave need of actual food. He’ll have to eat slow, if he doesn’t want to lose his meal. If he can keep the broth down by the time we next change the bandages, I will have the house-elves bring up some bread. We’ll keep him on the nutrition potions as well, for as long as necessary, but a good helping of solid food will do him some good. You, Lupin—“ She waved a rather threatening finger in Remus’s face. “—are to alert me immediately if he cannot keep the broth down.”Remus nodded.Sirius picked up his spoon and shoved it in his mouth.“Merlin, Sirius,” exclaimed Madam Pomfrey. “Slow down. I know you’re hungry, but it’ll hurt a lot more if your dinner makes a sudden reappearance.”Sirius grimaced and obediently sipped his next spoonful. “I’m well aware.”Remus tried not to focus on that statement.A second later, the threatening finger was back in Remus’s face. “You are not to touch him under any circumstances, for any reason short of immediate mortal peril. Am I understood?”It broke his heart, stole the air from his lungs, and his wolf howled in silent agony, but Remus said, “Yes, Ma’am.”“I’ll leave you to it.” Then, she spun on her heel and disappeared into her office on the other side of the hospital wing.Remus closed his eyes and tried to focus. He took a breath, centring himself on the steady, staccato beat of Sirius’s heart… Followed almost immediately by the ridiculous sound of Sirius slurping up the soup.Remus took a breath. It wasn’t enough, wasn’t enough oxygen to his brain to fully comprehend the horror novel of Sirius Black’s life. Behind his eyelids, all he could see was Sirius hunched over that sink in the Gryffindor bathroom.“Sectumsempra,” Remus whispered, his mouth moving on its own accord. He forced his eyes open. “You said your mother didn’t leave scars.”“She didn’t and she doesn’t,” Sirius said, letting his spoon fall into his soup. “Well, she left one.”A small, pale hand reached up and traced the edges of his tattoo, and Remus had a horrible realisation that he’d seen Sirius do that before. A thousand times, whenever Sirius was nervous, or those stolen moments when they were on the roof, discussing all the horrible secrets between them. He’d seen Sirius reach up, rub the spot right over his heart, just as he’d get that haunted look in his eyes that Remus knew so well. Remus had written it off as a nervous tick, a distant sign of trauma from a childhood filled with monsters, the same way Remus bit at his fingernails and paced the room when he was agitated. But this…Christ, how had Remus not caught on?Remus shook his head and forced himself to focus on the problem at hand. “Then who?”Sirius bit his lip. That was all Remus needed.“Malfoy,” Remus breathed. “Did Malfoy do that?”Sirius was silent for so long, Remus didn’t think he’d actually answer. Then: “Yes.”“Christ, Sirius.” Remus started pacing, raking anxious, broken fingers through his hair and revelling in the pain. The wolf roared, its fury and lust for vengeance eating away at Remus’s every nerve. The wolf had a name, now, a face upon which it could carve out its revenge. It had a name, and it had teeth and claws and—For a second, Remus could taste Malfoy’s blood—fresh and oozing and sweeter than the nectar of the gods—until he realised he’d bitten his lip. Remus scrubbed a hand over his face and fought desperately for control. “I’ll fucking kill him.” That wasn’t the wolf. That was him, Remus Lupin, and he meant every word of it. He, Remus Lupin, was the as much as a deadly hunter as the wolf, and he always went for the kill.Sirius threw his spoon at Remus’s head. It bounced off his forehead and clattered to the floor.Remus stopped. Blinked. Turned to Sirius in confusion.“You’ll do no such thing,” Sirius growled, looking ridiculously convicted for a guy covered in bandages, who hadn’t eaten in nearly two weeks. “I fulfilled my debt to Malfoy, Remus. A curse for a curse. It’s done.”“He tortured you!”“No. I owed him a debt and I paid it. Everything else… well. That’s different.” Sirius tried to glare at him, but there were tears in his eyes. “If I can’t hunt your monster, Remus, then you can’t go after mine.”That stopped Remus in his tracks. Taking another deep breath, Remus bent to pick up Sirius’s spoon. He hit it with a quick Scourgify, then handed it back, before carefully perching on the edge of Sirius’s bed.Sirius took another sip of the broth.“What happened, Sirius?” Remus whispered. “Not just over the holidays. But with—“ Instinct demanded Remus reach out and touch the tattoo, but he pulled his hand back at the last minute. “Please, Siri. What happened?”So, Sirius told him. Sirius’s voice was cold and detached, as if recounting the story from someone else’s diary of nightmares. He took a sip every once in a while, just often enough and in between the most important details that each sip of broth nearly gave Remus an aneurism. Remus started pacing again, when Sirius got to the part where his mother forbade him food. He starting biting his fingers until he’d reached the bloody nail-beds when Sirius mentioned the Cruciatus, and the threat his mother had issued: Obey, or Regulus takes your place. Remus didn’t know what Walburga Black looked like. He’d never seen her face or a painting of her, and Sirius certainly never spoke about her appearance. But Remus could see her clearly, now, through the golden eyes of the wolf that shared his mind. He could see her eyes—silver and deadly, just like Sirius’s—and he could taste the iron tang of her blood.In the deepest, most ravenous part of his mind—that primal part of his soul that was irrevocably tethered to the wolf and untethered from the rest of humanity—Remus knew what it would feel like to snap Walburga Black’s neck between his teeth.When Sirius told him about Christmas, Remus almost let go of the mental chains keeping the wolf at bay. Almost, but not quite.“Don’t really remember what happened after that,” Sirius mumbled. “Until I got on that train, I thought it was Boxing Day. Don’t think I’ve eaten since then.”“Jesus Christ, Sirius.”Sirius merely shrugged, and Remus got the distinct impression that this wasn’t the first time his mother had tried to starve him out. His jaw ached and he longed for the wolf’s teeth. Then, Sirius began a different story, one from years ago. One about arcane pureblood traditions, his mother’s wand and hollow laughter, a ritual circle drawn in the blood of his ancestors, and the words that would seal his fate for eternity.
Toujours Pur.
Remus finally sank down on the edge of Sirius’s bed—more for fear of cardiac arrest than anything else—when Sirius began explaining about the radical approach to blood purity taken by the Blacks, the Lestranges, and the Shafiqs. About his great-uncle Marius, driven to madness and suicide because of the uncaring, unconquerable magic branded onto his skin. About purebloods and blood traitors and a thousand incomprehensible, impossible choices.Remus could barely breathe.Half of him waited for the wolf to make a reappearance, for it to claw at his insides, demanding he act and rage and destroy everyone responsible for doing this to someone as inherently fearless as Sirius Black, but somewhere in the convoluted mess of the story with the magic tattoos and blood curses, the wolf had fallen silent. It’s fury had turned to… Well, it was that kind of bone-deep sorrow that rends your heart. shatters every piece of your soul, and leaves you choking on the very air you breathe.The wolf, it seemed, was heartbroken at the prospect of never being able to touch Sirius. Remus himself wasn’t faring much better.“What’s it feel like?” Remus heard himself ask. “When I touch you?”Because it might be more painful than a silver dagger through his eye socket, but both Remus and the wolf needed to hear it.Beautiful, perfect, radiant silver eyes met his, and Remus nearly broke.“Like I’m drowning in flames,” Sirius whispered. “But it’s infinitely better than nothing.”“What— What does that mean, Siri?”Quick as lightning, Sirius reached out and grabbed Remus’s unbroken hand. His fingers constricted around Remus’s, even as Remus valiantly tried to break free of his grasp. Flashes of every other time they’d touched replayed in vivid, rapid-fire colour in Remus’s mind.He remembered Sirius taking his hand on the Hogwarts Express, and stream of curse words that had immediately followed. Remus had known then—hadn’t he?—that something was fundamentally wrong. The wolf had sensed it, in that instinctual part of his mind that Remus tried desperately to ignore. He remembered James shoving Sirius into him after the Sorting Ceremony, all the grimaces and muttered curses whenever he’d brushed against Sirius in the hall. He remembered grabbing Sirius around the waist and using the wolf’s strength to haul him off Malfoy before Sirius could kill him. Sirius’s screams echoed through his nightmares, reverberated through the depths of Remus’s memory, until they manifested in the present.Except Sirius was silent, so the wolf screamed for him. Frantic, barely able to draw breath, Remus tugged at their joined hands. “No, no, no, no, Sirius. Let go. Fuck, you need to— Please!”His voice hit a high note and Remus tried to get away, tried to yank his hand free, because somewhere behind that horrifying mask of indifference he wore, Sirius was in agony. But Sirius held onto him like the world might end if he let go, and short of using the wolf’s strength to break free, Remus was absolutely fucking helpless.The only indication of pain was the clenching muscle in Sirius’s jaw. “It means,” Sirius said, through his teeth, “that when I touch you, I know you’re real.”Finally—fucking finally—Sirius let go.Remus jerked away so fast he nearly fell flat on his arse, but thanks to reflexes that were more the wolf’s than his own, he somehow managed to keep his feet under him. On the bed, a few feet away—definitely out of grabbing range—Sirius squeezed his eyes shut. His breaths came in rapid bursts and he clenched and unclenched his fists. Remus could hear his heartbeat roaring like thunder over the highland moors. “When they touch me, I feel nothing. Nothing, Remus. Do you understand?” Sirius’s eyes flashed open, and there was lightning behind the starlight silver. Or, maybe it was just magic, so close to the surface, just threatening to spill over; as primal and unconquerable as the wolf. “The nothing is… infinitely worse. It eats at my flesh and gnaws on my bones, and if I let it, I’m pretty sure it’ll swallow me whole.”It was the very definition of insanity, but it was the same madness that was buried in the darkest corners of Remus’s own mind. And, oh, how the wolf revelled in that particular seal of darkness. “So fuck it,” Sirius said, with all the reckless abandon of a madman. “Blood curse or no, I’d rather have you.”And that was the end of it, wasn’t it?Slowly, ever so slowly, Remus approached the bed and sat on the edge by Sirius’s hip, just out of reach. “Budge over,” Remus said, quickly summoning a pillow from the bed next over and settling it between them, just to be safe. “And eat your damn soup.”Sirius shot him a wicked smile, and obeyed.A few hours later, when the soup was gone and still in Sirius’s stomach, Madam Pomfrey appeared to change Sirius’s bandages. She took one look at the two of them on the bed and shooed Remus away with her wand at his throat, threatening to hex him into a hospital bed of his own for breaking his promise not to touch her most recent patient. Before she could get too far into her tirade, Sirius’s hand lashed out and once more clamped around Remus’s fingers.As gently as he could manage with only one (broken) hand free and whilst simultaneously trying to escape Madam Pomfrey and her high-pitched protests, Remus whacked Sirius in the head with the pillow that had been between them. He might have missed spectacularly, but it made Sirius laugh hard enough to let go of him. This time, Remus did fall on his arse. With an indignant huff, Madam Pomfrey pulled the privacy curtain shut in Remus’s face, effectively cutting him off from Sirius. Half a second later, the curtain flared open again, only for Remus to see a smug looking Sirius and a rather flustered Madam Pomfrey, who kept looking between Sirius and the curtain. Sirius smirked and wiggled his fingers, the little sparks of magic still dancing across his fingertips. Madam Pomfrey pinched the bridge of her nose. “Fine, then.” She glared at Remus. “Lupin, get over here.”Remus scrambled to his feet and came around to the other side of Sirius’s bed. “How steady is your wand hand, Lupin?”Remus felt himself go white. Under ordinary circumstances, the wolf’s reflexes and instincts granted Remus a remarkably steady hand, which was why he excelled at all the charms and transfigurations that even Lily Evans stumbled over. That being said, if Madam Pomfrey expected him to essentially perform surgery on Sirius Black, his wand hand was not going to be very fucking steady at all. “Good. It’s good. Steady,” he lied, suddenly scared she might throw him out.Madam Pomfrey didn’t seem to notice. “Draw your wand and help me remove his bandages. Then, I need you to help me clean the scars with a steady stream of Aguamenti, before I apply more dittany. After the dittany is on, I will levitate him as you use your wand to rewrap the bandages. He’s on enough pain potion to not pass out, but it won’t exactly be pleasant either.”Remus thought he just might lose what little food he had in his stomach, but he nodded all the same. “Do. Not. Touch. Him.” Madam Pomfrey waved her wand right under Remus’s nose to accentuate every word.Sirius shot Remus a wink and smiled bravely. Bloody fucking Gryffindor. And so, Remus drew his wand and did as Madam Pomfrey instructed. She muttered continuously throughout about the absurdity of allowing a first year to assist with something such as this. Remus agreed wholeheartedly; it was absurd, and if it weren’t for Sirius’s continuous smiles of reassurances in between his pained grunts, Remus might have passed out from the sudden, rampant stench of infection and Dark Magic that consumed his senses the second the bandages were removed.Turns out, dittany went a long way in not only healing cursed scars, but covering up the stench of rotting flesh. He hadn’t been this close before, and though he’d certainly smelled the infection and sour tang of Dark Magic in the bathroom, he hadn’t realised how bad it was. Green and yellow pus lined the perimeter of both scars, and in some cases, oozed and mixed with the blood. In some places, the skin around the scars had faded into blacks and blues, and Remus wasn’t entirely sure if that was from the force with which Malfoy had hit Sirius with the curse, or from the infection that had set in after. Sirius said he didn’t remember any of the days after Christmas. Vaguely, Remus wondered if anyone had bothered to tend to the wounds at all. From the looks of it, Remus sincerely doubted it. It was something of a miracle that Sirius had made it though the entire train ride and up to the Gryffindor dorms before passing out. Remus made it about halfway through before the stench of the infection became too much. Without really thinking, Remus snatched the open bottle of dittany from Madam Pomfrey’s hand and started snorting the stuff, inhaling the cool, clean scent of oceans and wind in desperate gulps. Sirius gave him a strange, mildly alarmed look, but Madam Pomfrey simply rolled her eyes and snatched the vial back. Trying not to be too obvious about holding his breath, Remus sheepishly cast the next Aguamenti where Madam Pomfrey directed.As they finished, Madam Pomfrey took one last look at the crisp, white bandages now covering the horrible scars on Sirius’s chest and began muttering to herself about whether it would be practical just to stitch the wounds closed in the ‘barbaric Muggle fashion’, given how deep they were. The outcome of that particular one-sided argument was lost to the sands of time when Remus once again sat on the edge of Sirius’s bed, this time far more cognisant of Sirius’s fragility. Sirius gave him a weak, exhausted smile, and muttered, “Thanks,” before reaching behind himself and handing Remus a pillow to situate between them. “Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Madam Pomfrey exclaimed. She flicked her wand, and another hospital bed, covered in clean, ivory sheets, whizzed over and stopped just feet away from Remus. Both Remus and Sirius eyed the bed. Sirius’s face was blank for a long second, before it broke out into a polite, appeasing smile that Remus imagined he might have been practicing in the mirror for years. It had all the charm and quintessential grace expected of a pureblood heir. It made Remus’s stomach turn, because that smile was a lie, even if it was a well-told one.“No, thanks,“ Sirius said, sweetly. Remus smiled just as sweetly, just as fake, and he was certain it was far less effective, given the scars across his own face. “We don’t need that.”Madam Pomfrey crossed her arms. “And where exactly do you plan on sleeping, Lupin?”Sirius shifted over a few inches, grimacing as the movement jostled his injuries, but immediately plastering that same deceitful smile on his face just seconds later. “Here is good.”“Yep,” Remus said. Really, though, the bed was much too small, but it wasn’t much of a problem if Remus didn’t lay down. Despite the fact that he was exhausted down to his bones, Remus didn’t exactly know how he was supposed to sleep after a day like today. He figured he’d stand vigil at Sirius’s bedside, or pace the room. The wolf wouldn’t settle anyways, until it was certain Sirius Black would still be breathing when he woke up. What’s one more night without sleep? He could catch a nap when James and Peter visited tomorrow and temporarily relieved him of his vigil. Madam Pomfrey seemed to track every single thought as it tracked slowly across Remus’s mind. “Fine,” she said, again. “Stand up, Lupin.”This time, Madam Pomfrey was quick enough to flick her wand and freeze Sirius’s hand mid-air as it reached out to grab Remus.“Only for a second, Mr. Black.” She sounded extremely put out. Unwilling to test what little remained of her patience and good will, Remus obeyed. “I ought to be constructing Hadrian’s Wall between the two of you. Not doing you favours,” she muttered as she cast an extension charm on the bed, with Sirius still on it. The bed shook, but he remained in place as it expanded until it was larger even than their bed in the dormitory. Another flick of her wand, and she more or less constructed Hadrian’s Wall out of pillows, lined up vertically on Sirius’s left side, right down the middle of the bed. Almost as an afterthought, she shot the wall of pillows with a sticking charm. “Just for tonight, Mr. Lupin,” Madam Pomfrey said, with an exasperated sigh. Remus smiled, triumphant. He’d always known she had a soft spot for him. He hopped up on the bed, careful not to jostle Sirius too much, and settled against the headboard. “Your dinner will be up shortly,” Madam Pomfrey continued. “There’s an extra potion on the table to settle your stomach if the bread is too much, Black. Take it if you need it. The bandages will hold until morning. And Lupin?”“Yes?”“For Merlin’s sake, and for the sake of my continuing sanity, please get some rest. There’s a vial of Dreamless Sleep on the table as well, for both of you, if needed. You know how much to take?”“Yes, Ma’am.” She’d given him strict instructions about the potion after his first full moon at Hogwarts. Three drops, under the tongue. No more, or he’d risk addiction. Sirius raised an eyebrow at him. Remus chose to ignore him.Madam Pomfrey nodded once, muttered a goodnight, and left. Later—so much later, in fact, that Remus thought Sirius might have been asleep—Remus shifted in the dark to the wall of pillows. He could make out Sirius in the fading moonlight, just a silver outline over the steady rise and fall of his chest. It was mesmerising, and utterly reassuring to have Sirius here and breathing, and something wild and manic finally calmed in Remus’s heart. After a moment, silver eyes met his in the moonlight.“Your eyes are still gold, Re,” Sirius whispered.“Trick of the light,” he said, automatically, but he knew it wasn’t. Usually, his eyes went back to their normal, boring brown the morning after the full moon, but Remus had a sneaking suspicion that the wolf had stayed around longer just to make sure Sirius came home. “Liar,” Sirius said, but there was no bite to the accusation, so Remus let it go. Remus shifted a little and tucked his right arm beneath his head. He let his newly-taped and still-sort-of-broken fingers rest on the pillows between them.“Sirius?”“Hm?”“Why didn’t you just tell me about the tattoo?”Silver eyes—his beautiful fucking eyes that shone brighter than any star in the night sky—clouded with tears. “I was—I thought you… Fuck.”Even in the dark, Remus knew what that look on Sirius’s face meant. He’d seen it the first day, after James had punched Sirius for not getting in trouble. He saw the guilt, the terror, the fear of being left behind forever. “You thought I would see you as a blood supremacist.”Sirius gave a miserable nod.“You told Evans.” This was no more of an accusation than Sirius’s muttered Liar. “Evans figured it out. She doesn’t count.”“Ah.” Remus tugged on a loose stitch on the pillow between them. “She does have a rather annoying habit of stumbling upon secrets.”Sirius hid a laugh in his pillow. “She figured yours out too, huh?”“Yep.”“Lily Evans. King of Gryffindor. Cartographer of Secrets. Feared and respected by all.”“Truly a force to be reckoned with.”Sirius turned and quirked an eyebrow up at him. “Any chance you’re gonna tell me that secret of yours, Remus Lupin?”Oh, how he wanted to, but he was not nearly brave enough for that. “Not unless there’s a wand to my throat,” Remus breathed. “Hm.” Sirius didn’t seem all too offended by it. “Maybe tomorrow, then. I’m rather beat.”Remus stared at him for a long moment, desperately trying to commit every feature to memory. Sirius stared back, unabashedly doing the exact same thing. They didn’t say anything—they no didn’t need to—in this silent, sacred sanctuary they’d created for themselves, both of them teetering on the edge of consciousness.Remus tried to fight the exhaustion, fight the overwhelming silence enveloping him, but he was so very tired of fighting. The sleep-deprived part of Remus’s mind voiced a rather frightful thought that the silence might just swallow them whole and whisk them off to Sirius’s nightmare world of darkness and so much nothing. Remus could taste it—this… Nothing Place—all around them, circling them like a ragged vulture, like a starving vampire desperate for the barest whisper of an invitation just to take and consume. For a moment, Remus wasn’t sure he could breathe, until he counted out the steady beats of Sirius’s thundering heart. They were alive. They were here, together, and maybe that was enough to make him brave. Just for a moment.Remus forced his eyes open, then dared himself to ask, silence and nothing be damned: “Do you think we’ll ever outrun them, Sirius? The monsters that live in our nightmares? The… the Nothing Place? The creatures and curses that keep us apart?”The silence stretched between them, each moment gnawing away at what little remained of his conscious mind.With a breath and a grunt and a few muttered curses, Sirius turned on his side to face Remus. Seeing the moon silhouette Sirius from behind, caressing him and outlining his form in the darkness, Remus didn’t have the heart to tell Sirius to stay still, even to avoid the pain it so obviously caused him. Because, then, Sirius reached across the pillows. Because Sirius’s fingers—the same fingers that tamed ancient and wild magic—ghosted over the scars on Remus’s face—always desperate to touch, but not quite doing so, because touching meant pain and horror and heartbreak and the rending of souls.And, Merlin, now was not a time for pain.Or, perhaps…Sirius’s fingers brushed over the edge of the scar on Remus’s nose, just for a second. Neither of them reacted, neither of them dared to breathe. “I dreamed of you, Remus.” Sirius’s words echoed across the silence.This was infinitely more than nothing. This was real.“You did?” His voice sounded strange, and Remus barely registered the question before it escaped his lips. He tried to breathe, tried to instruct his brain to pay attention, but…Remus hadn’t slept in three days. He was so goddamned tired.And… Sirius had dreamed of him.Sirius had said that before, hadn’t he? In the bathroom? Remus had thought Sirius had been delirious—perhaps he, Remus, was delirious now—but that’s what Sirius had said.Sirius had dreamed of him, in that nightmare of a place.“What…” Remus’s voice no longer wanted to work, it seemed. His words drifted, slurred, lingered in the air with infinite bated breaths between them. “What… Was it… Nightmare?”Remus was awake enough to know that most dreams in which he starred in any sort of a leading role were almost certainly nightmares.A finger played with the edge of a one of his curls, twisting it, tugging slightly. “No, Remus,” Sirius breathed. “It wasn’t a nightmare.”“Mm.” His eyes drifted closed. Or, maybe they’d been closed for a long while. “Tell me.”“We were dancing,” Sirius whispered. Or, maybe Remus dreamed it. “We were dancing, you and me, to a song that hasn’t been written yet.”And, oh, how Remus prayed that he could find that song in his dreams.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
JANUARY 3, 1972
Remus looked slightly less green when he helped Madam Pomfrey change Sirius’s bandages the next morning. It was funny, really. Sirius had seen Remus nearly torn to ribbons himself, but Remus seemed incredibly squeamish around Sirius’s injuries; so much so, in fact, that Sirius would have teased him relentlessly for it, had he not been gritting his teeth and cursing his way through the various Aguamenti’s and levitation spells, at Madam Pomfrey’s careful instruction. Merlin, he thought, when Remus finally let out a relieved sigh and Madam Pomfrey finally retreated to her office. Malfoy really did a number on me.Really, it wasn’t the equal-and-opposite sort of retribution that was generally expected of these sort of pure-blood grudge matches. Sirius had aimed his curse at Malfoy’s face. It had been severe enough to scar, yes, but the scar was no longer than the palm of Sirius’s hand. And he’d struck Malfoy on the side of his face, eyebrow to chin, an area that could easily be covered by Malfoy’s stupid white-blonde hair. Malfoy had…Well, Malfoy had nearly carved Sirius in two, hadn’t he? There was an X etched into Sirius’s chest, from collarbone to hip. No one could reasonably say that that had been a proportional response. No one had decried this grave injustice and breach of pureblood traditions, either.Sirius hadn’t been lying, when he’d told Remus he remembered almost nothing after Christmas day. He knew he must have woken up at some point, because when his father had barged into his room yesterday morning—furious at what he’d deigned to perceive as laziness on the part of his eldest son and heir—Sirius had reached for the inkwells Alphard had given him. He’d downed the very last of the nutrition potion, holding the vial over his mouth for as long as he could possibly manage without passing out, in order to get every last drop.At half past eight, a house-elf popped in, bearing two steaming trays of food. Sirius’s mouth watered on sight, and, with a little strategic manoeuvring so as to avoid re-opening his scars, Sirius managed to sit up. Remus muttered a, “Thanks, Speckles,” as the house-elf set the trays on the pillow-wall between them, then disapparated. They ate in relative silence. Sirius studiously sipped on his piping hot broth—this time containing small bits of beef—as Remus devoured his bacon and eggs. As he finished his soup, and sparing a glance to make sure Madam Pomfrey wasn’t watching, Sirius snatched the last piece of bacon from Remus’s fingers and more or less swallowed it whole. Remus glared at him, but then sighed. He stood, slid out of bed, and placed the empty trays on the cabinet, before stretching his arms over his head. His neck and shoulders popped, and Sirius tried not to cringe at the sound.“How are you feeling?” Remus asked, through a mostly-stifled yawn, and really, Remus looked terrible. His curly hair stuck out in every direction imaginable. His eyes were red-rimmed and opened way too wide in an apparent attempt to fight off exhaustion. His uniform was rumpled and untucked, but that wasn’t all surprising given he’d slept in it. The scar across the bridge of his nose was a darker shade of pink, starkly contrasted against Remus’s pale skin and freckles, almost as if—As if…Sirius counted the scars. Then, he counted them again. No. No. There was no way those were new. Remus had stayed at Hogwarts over the holidays. He couldn’t possibly—“Sirius?”“Hm? Yeah, sorry. I’m fine.”Remus frowned and raised a disbelieving eyebrow at him.Sirius huffed. “Fine. I feel like shit, but considerably less shitty than yesterday. Not going to pass out any time soon, anyway. Hopefully. Most likely.”Remus didn’t look particularly convinced. Sirius pushed his luck anyway. “What are the chances of you helping me break out of here before Madam Pomfrey comes to check on me?”“Not fucking likely.”“But—““Sirius, you almost fucking died.”“I did not!” Piercing, half-golden eyes tracked down to Sirius’s chest, over the bandages, then back up to the tattoo, and—“Fine! Fine!” Sirius crossed his arms over his chest, trying to block it from view. Slightly mortified, he felt himself flush red. He wasn’t used to anyone looking at his chest, his fucking tattoo, least of all Remus Lupin. It… It was unnerving. “Can you at least get me a shirt?”He wasn’t exactly sure when he’d taken off his own shirt—the exact events of yesterday were more than a little hazy in his mind—but he was certainly tired of not wearing one. It brought unnecessary attention to things he’d rather keep secret. Remus nodded, then gave him a small reassuring smile. “Yeah, I think I can do that.”Remus made his way to the opposite end of the hospital wing, crouched by a small, bedside cupboard, rooted a round for a minute, then made a vaguely triumphant noise as he pulled out not just a shirt, but a pair of soft, Muggle trousers as well.“Here,” Remus said, handing over the clothes. “These should do.”Sirius eyed the clothes, subconsciously wiggling a little in his own, now-ruined designer trousers. The waistband and front part of his trousers were crusted with quite a bit of dried blood, Dittany, and other unmentionable, yet equally disgusting bodily fluids he’d rather not think too hard about. The trousers were about as far from salvageable as humanly possible. “Thanks.” Sirius took the proffered clothes and ever-so-slowly swung his legs over the side of the bed. He took a long moment just to breathe. “Do… Do you need help?”“No.” Sirius tried not to snap, but he still managed to answer far too quickly and with far too much conviction. Remus clearly didn’t share any of his false bravado, but he turned his back all the same to allow Sirius the dignity of changing on his own. Sirius shucked his trousers in one go—they were so caked with filth that they kept their shape, much to his disgust—but kept his pants. His silk pants were equally ruined, but Sirius Black had just enough pureblood formality beaten into him that he wasn’t about to go pants-less in borrowed trousers.Said borrowed trousers were rather large on him—so much so that Sirius muttered a quick spell to cinch them at his waist. The trousers hung well past his feet, the knees were rather worn, and never had such pedestrian fabric been used to clothe a member of the Noble and Most Pretentious House of Black, but they were incredibly comfortable. Absently, Sirius found himself wondering as to where one might acquire a pair and just what the consequences might be if his mother found out he’d gone to a Muggle tailor. Sirius shook his head and reached for the shirt. It was an equally worn button-up, with a patch on one elbow and ridiculously long sleeves, but it was made of thick, pliable material that smelled of… starlight and piping hot tea. Right beneath the collar—No. That couldn’t be right. Right beneath the collar, stitched ever so carefully, were the initials R.J.L.“Remus, are these yours?” Sirius blurted.Because if Remus had a spare set of clothes in the hospital wing, that might lead one to believe that not only had Remus been a recent resident of said hospital wing, but the injuries he’d hypothetically sustained had also been grave enough to either warrant a change of clothes or an extended stay in the hospital wing that would consequently necessitate a change of clothes, eventually. Which, really, could not be possible because Remus hadn’t gone home for the holidays, so there was no logical reason for Remus to have been in the hospital wing at all.Right?Except the back of Remus’s neck flushed red and Sirius felt his heart stop. Because Remus had a new scar on his face that Sirius was now fairly certain hadn’t been there when Sirius left. Oh, how he’d wanted to believe that it was nothing.Nothing, as it turned out, hardly ever worked in his favour.“Where’d you get that scar on your face, Remus?”“Siri—““No!” Sirius had half a mind to throw the shirt at the back of Remus’s head.Slowly, ever so slowly, Remus turned to face him, and Merlin, how had Sirius missed it? The scar across the bridge of Remus’s nose was a pale pink, not faded silver. New. Raw. Fresh. The fight drained out of Sirius, as though he’d been punched in the throat.“You were supposed to be safe, Re,” Sirius croaked. “So were you.” Remus’s jaw tightened, but this time, he didn’t turn away. “Our monsters will always find us, Sirius.”For a moment, Remus looked as though he wanted to say more, wanted to explain, anything. He opened and closed his mouth, his fingers fidgeting all over the place. Sirius waited.And waited.Then, suddenly, Remus froze. Every muscle in his body went rigid. Sirius watched, confused and mildly alarmed, as Remus tilted his head up and turned towards the—The giant door to the hospital wing was open, just a crack. When and how that had happened without them noticing, Sirius couldn’t be sure. Remus frowned and… sniffed? Whatever he was doing, it was beyond strange. Sirius watched Remus’s eyes dart around the room, seemingly unable to settle on anything in particular, always on the move, always searching for… something.“Remus, what—“Sirius heard the faint shuffle, the soft whisper of fabric, the slightly too-loud breathing. Except there was no one there.Readying himself for a fight with whatever ghost or shadowy figure that may or may not have infiltrated Hogwarts, Sirius tugged on Remus’s shirt as quickly as he dared without risking reopening his wounds. He shoved the ridiculously long sleeves up past his elbows, called his magic to the tips of his fingers, and took a defensive stance next to Remus.Someone—something?—hissed out a faint curse. Then:“Ow!”“That’s my foot!”“Potter, if that’s your fucking hand on my arse, so help me God, I will—“Sirius and Remus exchanged a startled glance.“Evans?” Sirius called, to the otherwise empty hospital wing.“Shit.” That certainly sounded like James.“Weren’t they s’posed to see us eventually?” Peter, maybe?“Yes, but not until after we scared the shit out of them.”“That doesn’t seem very nice.”“It’s supposed to cheer them up. All they need is a good bit of mischief and—““Oh, for Christ’s sake!”With a sudden whoosh of fabric, James, Lily, and Peter materialised out of nowhere, not five feet from them.“What the fuck,” Remus deadpanned, at the exact same moment Sirius gasped, “Is that a fucking invisibility cloak?!”Sirius eyed the now semi-transparent, shimmering fabric caught in Lily Evans’s fist.“Yep!” James beamed and hesitantly snatched the cloak back from Lily. “It was a Christmas gift from my dad. Bit of a family heirloom, really. Turns out my great-great—““Shut up, Potter,” Lily snapped, with a truly dramatic eye roll. She fixed her bright green eyes on Sirius. “How are you feeling?”“Yeah,” James echoed. He fiddled with the ends of the cloak, his nervous fingers blinking in and out of view. “Evans… Um, well, Evans explained about your—“ James gestured vaguely at Sirius’s chest. “—that.”Sirius glanced sown at the tattoo that was barely obscured by Remus’s still-unbuttoned shirt. Suddenly rather self-conscious, Sirius waved his hand and did up the buttons.“Yeah, mate,” Peter said. “Sounds awful.”Well, if that wasn’t the understatement of the century.Sirius didn’t quite know what to say, but, thankfully, Remus came to his rescue.“How exactly did you lot get in here? Last I checked, that door was locked tight.” Remus held up his mostly-healed-but-still-bandaged fingers as a visual aide. “Evans told us not to—“ Peter began, with marked hesitation.“Peeves,” James said, with relative confidence.“For fuck’s sake, Potter, I told you not to say his name!” Lily said, with blinding rage.Somewhere, down the long hall outside the hospital wing, came a loud shriek and raucous laughter.“Peeves?” Sirius asked. “The poltergeist?”Andromeda had told him stories.Lily buried her face in her hands and nodded miserably. “Now you’ve done it, Potter.”She was right—as she tended to be—because a second later, Peeves, the poltergeist, zipped into the room, did a flip mid-air, then began circling a startled Remus.“Little Lupin is a loon,” sang Peeves. “Loony Lupin howls at the moon.”“Shut the fuck up!” Lily roared at Peeves, standing on her tip toes, her hair flailing rather dramatically behind her. “You agreed to help and now you have, so kindly fuck off!”Sirius couldn’t help but notice that Remus had gone ghostly pale.Peeves turned and floated over to Lily. “Little flower is a bore. Damn the King of Gryffindor!”Lily drew her wand. “Why, you little—“Peeves laughed, rather maniacally. “Merlin, Evans, leave it alone. He doesn’t mean anything,” James said.Peeves suddenly manifested in front of James, circled him a few times, then belted out: “Little Potty Potter had a cloak of night
Little Potty Potter did what he thought right
Oh, how he’s been conned
He who dies without a wand
Little Potty Potter, the blindly loyal knight.”
James, for his part, looked thoroughly unimpressed.“See?” James said, gesturing at Peeves. “It’s just a stupid limerick. And he’s just a half-mad poltergeist. Nothing more than a little mischief and chaos. He’s perfectly harmless.”“No, he’s not,” Sirius said, because Andromeda had told him stories.Peeves had been a seer, once, an age ago. He’d had a proper name, a respected position, and a good, long life. But, like so many, he died without having completed his life’s goal, and in death, went utterly mad. The eons of rage and regret ate away at his once-bright soul, until nothing remained but a creature enslaved to chaos. Peeves may not be the cruel and ravenous kind of poltergeist found in Wych Elm Manor, but he was far from the friendly, benevolent spirits that often wandered the halls of Hogwarts.Eventually—years from now, or perhaps tomorrow—Peeves would fade into a dementor, just like the rest of his kind.“He is anything but harmless,” Sirius said.The cackling laughter stopped as Peeves froze mid-air. Slowly, eerily, he turned to Sirius. The mischievous glint in his eyes turned horrifyingly manic. His smile of sharp, pointed teeth stretched wide and unnatural across his face. Peeves floated over and stopped right in front of Sirius, so still he could have been a statue.Sirius Black was not brave—far from it, in fact—and it took ever ounce of courage his mother had so desperately tried to beat out of him to face the utter cruelty in Peeves’s dead, soulless eyes.Then: “For ye be warned, young Sirius Black. You’ll lose your soul and won’t get it back.”It was a crescendo, a cacophony, each word louder and more deranged than the last, until at last, Peeves was screaming the words in Sirius’s face.Words he’d heard before. In Diagon Alley.“What did you say?” Sirius breathed, because those words should be impossible. He’d locked them away in the deepest recesses of his soul. Peeves repeated the verse, over and over, giggling like a schoolgirl. Merlin, it’d been a long time coming, a festering volcano prime for eruption after tremors and earthquakes and trauma and heartbreak, and…Well, something inside Sirius just… snapped.“Stop it! Just stop it!” Sirius tugged at his hair, tried to block his ears, but Peeves turned the verse into a song. “Shut the fuck up!”All at once, the volcano erupted. Sirius’s magic flared to life, cackling and furious and burning beneath the surface of his skin. It exploded out from him, deafening and ravenous for blood and pain and all the darkness that Sirius tried so desperately to hide. He had just enough forethought to raise his hands and direct the cataclysm at Peeves. Peter screamed. James swore. Remus… growled?Lily Evans cast a Protego over all of them.Peeves, of course, was utterly unharmed, seeing as there was absolutely nothing corporeal about him. There was, however, a brand new scorch mark on the ceiling of the hospital wing. In any other circumstance, Sirius might have been proud of that.Sirius sank down on the bed behind him, utterly depleted and trying to starve off a full-blown panic attack, because how could—Peeves whistled, folded his hands under his arms, and flapped his arms in a poor imitation of a bird. He fluttered around the room, and holy-fucking-Merlin, it wasn’t fucking possible. “Sirius Black, how tragically flawed
Thought he might be the boy to kill God
Now Nothing’s dictating
And that dark kiss is waiting
For the murder of the boy who killed God.”
And, with that, Peeves vanished into thin air.A deafening silence roared throughout the hospital wing. James Potter opened and closed his mouth, spun a full three hundred sixty degrees, raised a finger in the air, pointed at nothing, then asked, “Was that the same—““Yep,” Sirius replied, because what the fuck else could he say?“From Diagon Alley?”“Yep.”“The same one that Silas, the-fucked-in-the-head-pigeon—““Yes, James.”“Huh.” James’s finger fell limply at his side.More silence. Then:“I’m sorry, but what the actual fuck?!” Remus blurted. Sirius gave a hapless shrug. “A prophecy,” Lily Evans answered for him, clearly just as unsettled as the rest of them. “That was a prophecy.”Sirius tried for a sardonic smile, but he was pretty sure he only barely managed an exhausted grimace. “I told you about Silas, didn’t I, Remus?”“You said a psychic finch or something told you that you’d kill God, but that—“ There was something like terror dancing in Remus’s amber eyes. “—That was not a prophecy, Sirius. That’s a fucking death omen.”Sirius conceded the point. “Same difference, really.”Lily shook her head and took aim at practicality. “This is all assuming we believe in prophecy, which we shouldn’t, really. It’s hardly an exact science, after all.”As much as he’d love to take solace in Lily’s words, this felt… real. Substantially more like inevitable fact than hyperbolic fairytale. Fate or God or the hands of chaos incarnate… Whatever it was, it had a price on his head. Sirius felt the noose around his neck the same as he felt the cold, cruel nothing eating away at his soul. It could hardly be considered a hypothetical prophecy if it’d already begun. The truth was, the clock started ticking the moment he’d asked the Sorting Hat for Gryffindor. Or, perhaps, before, when he’d killed his wand and healed his brother. Either way, the conclusion was the same and there was only one way this story was going to end. He looked around at his friends. Lily had a hard set to her jaw, her chin tilted up in stubborn defiance. James looked, well… disturbed, to say the least, and remained uncharacteristically quiet. Peter appeared to be more confused than anything, really. Remus… There was a frantic desperation in his eyes, silently begging Sirius to agree with Lily, to denounce his fate, or to fun screaming in the opposite direction of all this chaos. “Siri—“ Remus began, but he choked on his next words. Sirius met his beautiful, amber eyes. Merlin, they were the brilliance of the dawn through a glass of firewhisky. “I told you my secrets were dark and my monsters were very real.”Remus swallowed. “That you did.”They didn’t get a chance to say anything else—or even remotely recover from the fallout of the atom bomb Peeves set off—because, just then, the enormous, mahogany doors to the hospital wing burst open.Professor McGonagall, prim and proper as ever, came in, seemed to take in the sight of five more-than-a-little-rattled first-year Gryffindors—three of whom were definitely not supposed to be in the hospital wing—and pulled up short. Behind McGonagall came a genuine, yet slightly aborted laugh. Then:“Mum?!” James Potter’s voice cracked a bit on the high note. The woman—James’s mum, apparently—was tall, thin, and as poised as any pureblood matriarch that Sirius had ever met. Except… There was a glimmer of mischief in her dark eyes that left no doubt as to her immediate relation to one James Potter. She wore what Sirius assumed to be a gold and red sari underneath an open black robe, not at all dissimilar to that worn by Sirius’s father when he attends to Ministry or Wizengamot business. Her skin was perhaps a shade or two darker than James, and her once-black hair was streaked with grey, but she was—objectively speaking—phenomenally beautiful. “Don’t be rude, James,” she said, with just the faintest clip of a foreign accent. “Introduce me to your friends.”“Um.” James seemed to be having a rather difficult time processing the fact that his mother was at Hogwarts. To be fair, Sirius figured that if it were his own mother making surprise appearances, he’d find himself in an early grave. That being said, Mrs. Potter seemed to be the furthest thing possible from Walburga Black. For one, Mrs. Potter looked at her son as though he were the most precious thing in the world, even though, technically speaking, James Potter was currently breaking the rules just by virtue of being in the hospital wing.“Well,” James managed, before casually looping an arm around Peter’s shoulders. “This is Peter Pettigrew, Marauder, and this—“ He turned to Lily, but she ignored him entirely.Instead, Lily marched right up to Mrs. Potter, stuck out her hand, and said, “Lily Evans. King—“ Here, she directed an icy glare at James. “—of Gryffindor.”Mrs. Potter gasped, curtseyed, shook Lily’s hand, then directed her own, slightly less murderous glare at her son. “James Fleamont Potter,” Mrs. Potter said, and no one missed Lily’s snicker at the use of his middle name. “You should have told me I’d be in the presence of royalty. I would have worn my formal robes.”“I didn’t know you were coming,” James cried, exasperated, then thought about it for a second. “Why are you—“Mrs. Potter ignored him, and instead, addressed Lily. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Your Highness. I must apologise on behalf of my son. He is a bit of an idiot.”It wasn’t said with even a hint of malice, and Sirius might have even laughed at James’s indignant response or Lily’s excessive preening, had he not possessed an inherent mistrust of any-if-not-all maternal figures.Mrs. Potter then turned fully to face Remus and Sirius. Her eyes twinkled as she said, indulgently, “Seeing as James can’t be bothered to do this properly—“ James threw his hands up in the air in a show of dramatic resignation. “—would you be so kind as to introduce yourselves?”“Remus Lupin, ma’am,” Remus said, respectfully. “Also a Marauder, I guess.”Remus turned to Sirius and quirked an eyebrow up at him.Sirius got the distinct impression that Mrs. Potter knew exactly who he was and precisely why he was in the hospital wing, but still he said, “Sirius Black. Marauder,” with all the pride and dignity he had tucked away in the secret crevices of his heart. “Great. That’s done then,” James cut in. “Mum, can you please explain why you’re at Hogwarts ruining my life?”“Such a drama queen,” Mrs. Potter said, with a wink in Lily’s direction, before turning her attention back to her son. “That’s a bit of a long story, I’m afraid, but the short version is that Minerva asked me here.”Four Marauders and one King of Gryffindor directed varying degrees of befuddled looks at Professor McGonagall, who was doing her best impression of one of the stone-faced gargoyles that lined the parapets of the castle. Though, if Sirius didn’t know any better, he’d almost say McGonagall’s cheeks turned just the slightest bit pink.It was probably the lighting. Right?“Um,” James said, on behalf of everyone. “Why exactly is that? Are we in trouble?”“You probably should be,” Lily muttered.“Oi! This was your idea!”“Peeves was my idea! You’re the one who suggested breaking and entering!”“No, Evans, I believe what you said was, ‘Fuck the rules, we need to get to Sirius.’”That last part James did in a high, falsetto voice.Lily huffed. “No reasonable person would ever believe that, Potter.”Either way, something warm leaked into Sirius’s heart and he felt himself smiling, if only for a moment. “Perhaps the long version, then,” Mrs. Potter cut in. “If only to keep my son from further incriminating himself.”All eyes focused once more on Mrs. Potter, but Mrs. Potter, horrifyingly, zeroed her gaze in on Sirius.He had a sudden and desperate desire to hide behind Remus. Mrs. Potter seemed to instinctively sense his discomfort and she kept her tone soft and kind. “Sirius, my name is Euphemia Potter. Before I married James’s father, however, I was Euphemia Shafiq.”Shafiq. He should know her name. Generally speaking, Sirius considered himself something of an expert on pureblood genealogies, particularly those amongst the Sacred Twenty-Eight. Particularly those amongst the Sacred Twenty-Eight that adhered to certain… traditions and rituals regarding blood curses and magical tattoos. He had not, to his knowledge, ever heard that particular name. “My father,” Mrs. Potter continued, “was Devansh Shafiq.”That name he knew, just as surely as he remembered Marius Black.Sirius always made special note of the exiled, even the second sons of second sons. “My father was disinherited by the Shafiqs around the turn of the century,” Mrs. Potter explained. “He never really gave a reason why—not like families such as ours ever need due cause, after all—but penniless and without anywhere else to go, my father took a portkey to India to stay with distant relatives. It was there that he met my mother.” Mrs. Potter paused, seemingly for no other reason than dramatic effect. “Io Lysandra Black.”It was dead silent for a second. Sirius tried to count his breaths and still his heart. Then:“Wait. Wait,” said a very confused James Potter. “Gran was a Black?!”Mrs. Potter gave her son a patient smile. “You knew this, James.”“I most certainly did not,” James muttered.“Why don’t I know that name?” Sirius interrupted. “Your mum’s, that is. Io Black is not on the tapestry.”“Or in any of the pureblood genealogies,” Lily added, frowning.“No, I don’t suppose she would be,” Mrs. Potter said with a heavy sigh. “My mother was disowned and disinherited by her own mother, days before she would have been woven into that damned tapestry at Grimmauld Place.”Sirius froze. He thought back to the day his mother had woven his own name into the tapestry. She’d been laughing, slightly drunk, silver eyes sparkling with mirth and victory as she waved her wand to spell out his name, one letter at a time. He’d been…Well, he’d been crying, sobbing softly in the corner, picking at the bandage that covered his brand new tattoo.“But that means—“ he started.“She was eight years old when her mother, Charis Black, exiled her,” Mrs. Potter finished.Charis Black.Andromeda’s ace up her sleeve that had backfired so spectacularly. Charis Black, who had married a Crouch, but kept her own name. Alphard had said her line wasn’t gone. Not completely.Next to him, Remus visibly stiffened. “Why would anyone disinherit an eight year old?”“They’re the Blacks,” Lily all but spat. “Why else?”Because, in the end, it all came down to loyalty and blood.“Days before her… blood rite—“ Mrs. Potter paused here to shudder, and honestly, Sirius couldn’t blame her. “—Charis found out that Io had befriended a Muggle girl that lived down the way. When Charis found out, well… She killed the Muggle girl in front of her family and punished Io by performing the blood rite on her own.”Sirius nearly choked. “But—““Ordinarily, the blood rite requires the house matriarch, which Charis was not, and a gathering of the family. Charis… improvised.” Mrs. Potter gestured vaguely at Sirius. “She carved that blood cursed tattoo into her screaming daughter’s flesh and then left her on the street to die.”Because, of course, there was no end to the cruelty of the Blacks.“Why the hell wasn’t Charis sent to Azkaban?” James asked, seemingly just as entrenched in the story of his own relatives as the rest of them. “She killed a Muggle, for Merlin’s sake.”“And broke the statute of secrecy, if she did so in front of the girl’s parents,” Lily added.Sirius knew that answer. It was the same reason most of his relatives were not currently in Azkaban. Politics.“At the time,” Mrs. Potter explained, “both of Sirius’s grandfathers were engaged in something of a cold war, both vying for the right to be the Head of House Black. Charis was cunning, as Slytherin as the rest of them, and vowed to back Pollux, the younger, in his little coup. In exchange, when he ultimately defeated Arcturus Black II in a duel, he kept her out of Azkaban, even when some of the other Ancient Houses voted to prosecute.”“Both grandfathers?” Peter gaped and turned to Sirius. “Your grandfathers were—““First cousins,” Sirius muttered, miserably. “What happened to her?” Remus asked. “Your mum?”“She went to the only people she knew. The Muggle family, whose daughter she’d once befriended. The Khatris.” Sirius quirked an eyebrow. That was… unexpected. “They couldn’t touch her, but they’d loved her before, and they loved her still, even in the midst of tragedy. They’d seen the cruelty of the Blacks and they did the only thing they could. In the dead of night, Io and the Khatris left England for India. There, they claimed she was their daughter, to hide her from the wrath of the Blacks, even though Io was as pale as the moon. The Khatris raised her, and when it came time for school, they found another wizarding family to teach Io magic.”“She never went to Hogwarts?” Lily asked.“Neither did I,” Mrs. Potter said, with a bit of a smile.Lily shrugged and sat down on the bed, on the other side of Remus. She whipped out a leather-bound book, seemingly from nowhere, whispered something in… German? Then, she began frantically scribbling down notes. Remus tried to surreptitiously peer over her shoulder, but Lily didn’t even look up as she smacked him with her left hand. She just continued her notes.“My mother and father met when they were both seventeen. Both of them disowned from ancient houses and both almost completely alone in the world. They married after only two months.”Sirius sat up a little straighter. “They could touch each other? The Shafiqs… They have their own blood ritual, same as us. Even if they’d both been branded blood traitors they shouldn’t have been able to touch. I can’t touch James! Is there a way to—“Mrs. Potter sighed, and whatever hope he’d suddenly had vanished in an instant. “Sirius, my mother’s blood ritual was botched, at best. She had the tattoo, but it didn’t affect her in the same way, as the ritual was not performed correctly. I never asked the specifics, of how my father got around his own tattoo. I’m sorry I can’t offer you an answer or even a shred of hope. All I know is that my mother’s tattoo affected her ability to have children.”Sirius didn’t give a shit about his ability to have children. If he had any say whatsoever—which, generally speaking, he didn’t—Sirius was fairly certain he didn’t actually want children. He wanted to know how he could touch Remus Lupin without wanting to cut his fucking hand off. “Gran died,” James said, gravelly. “In childbirth. I remember that part.”Oh. Shit.Mrs. Potter nodded, solemnly. “My father raised me on his own, with the help of the Khatris. I grew up in India. I only met James’s father during the war.”Sirius perked up at that. “You fought against Grindelwald?”“I did. By the time the Muggle war broke out in Europe, Grindelwald was making moves internationally. Monty had been put in charge of the resistance movement in India. We worked with all sorts of people, from every walk of life, to build a better future and work for equality amongst not just wizards, but all magical creatures. We were the antithesis of everything Grindelwald represented. I’d like to think we still are.”Sirius’s parents had both been too young to fight in the war, but there wasn’t a single iota of doubt in his mind as to whose side they would have been on. “The war ended and we decided we hadn’t done enough. There was still prejudice and injustice in the Wizarding World. The echoes of Grindelwald’s cries for blood purity can be heard even today.”Sirius knew that better than anyone. There was a war coming.“Is that why you’re here, then? To see if I’m joining those—“ And really, he couldn’t come up with a better description, especially under pressure. “—racist fucks?”James whirled on him in alarm. “You’re not, are you?”Sirius pinched the bridge of his nose in a frighteningly McGonagall-esque gesture. “No, Jamie.”Mrs. Potter snorted a laugh. “Don’t be daft, Jamie.”James turned bright red. “I am here, Sirius,” Mrs. Potter said, “because I am a barrister for the Ministry of Magic and I argue cases before the Wizengamot every day. Pureblood politics be damned. The abuse you’ve suffered is cruel and unusual in every sense. I am here because Minerva reached out, as did your Uncle Alphard. I am here to make sure that the events of this past holiday are never repeated.”Remus stood. Lily snapped her leather-bound journal closed.“Can you prosecute his parents?” Remus asked, eagerly.“Or send them to Azkaban?” Lily added.“Or just set them on fire?” James muttered. Nobody, including Mrs. Potter or McGonagall, disagreed with him.“If there is a statement from Sirius and formal documentation of the injuries from a Healer—““Like Madam Pomfrey?” Remus prompted.“Yes, Mr. Lupin,” Mrs. Potter said, patiently. “If we were to prosecute, Sirius could feasibly be removed from his parents’ custody, even before the legal battle began. Alphard Black has offered Constellation’s Keep, of course, as an alternative, but you are always, always welcome at Potter Manor, Sirius.”James pumped an excited fist in the air. “You could live with us, Sirius! You could be my actual fucking brother! This will be epic. Marauders and brothers-in-arms, not just at Hogwarts, but—“But.Sirius had a brother, and no matter how much it killed him, he could not trade one brother for another.“No,” Sirius said, his voice remarkably steady. “You can’t prosecute.”It was so silent, they could hear Peeves’s manic laughter from just outside the mahogany door, just as he began chanting Silas’s limerick once again.Lily threw her book down on the bed, making Sirius flinch back, just a fraction. “And why the fuck not?”Numb, he looked at them, one by one. James’s jaw was on the floor, Peter looked profusely uncomfortable. McGonagall, rigid against the far wall, wouldn’t meet Sirius’s gaze, but she subtly shook her head. Mrs. Potter’s eyes were soft, but heartbroken. Lily was pacing, red hair flying about her face. Remus…Sirius stared into bright, golden-amber eyes that were glistening with unshed tears. He could see the pain warring with rage and devastation, carved brutally into every crevice of Remus’s beautiful face. It almost made him choke, almost made him swallow his words, snatch them right out of the air before they could escape his mouth, but…“I can’t leave Regulus,” Sirius said directly to Remus, because Remus was the only one in this fucking room that needed to understand. Even if Sirius was crazy and rash and out of his fucking mind, he needed Remus to understand the same way he needed air to fill his lungs enough to force the words out. “If I’m not there, Regulus takes my place, Re.”Because even if he took Mrs. Potter up on her offer, even if he fought tooth and nail for his own freedom and won, against all the odds, it wouldn’t change the fact that Regulus was not safe there alone. His mother, Sirius knew, would burn the world to ash and ruin before she pried her talons from Regulus’s flesh. At the very least, even though she was as clearly disappointed as the rest of them, Mrs. Potter seemed to understand, and, more importantly, move on. “All right, Sirius,” she said. “The choice is yours and the option is available for as long as I am still breathing.”Which, all things considered, probably wouldn’t be very long if she continued to challenge the authority of the Blacks. Sirius chose not to voice that particular thought out loud. “I believe,” Mrs. Potter said, her voice taking on a lighter tone, “your Uncle Alphard spoke with you over the holiday?”Honestly, Sirius had been under the impression that that particular conversation had been something of a pain-and-starvation induced hallucination, but that wasn’t what bothered him.“How do you know Alphard?” It hadn’t escaped his notice that she’d mentioned his uncle once before, and apparently his uncle was willing to take up permanent custody of the disgraced heir. As far as he knew, though, even outliers such as Alphard tended to stay away from… blood traitors. It was particularly dangerous to associate with people like the Potters, especially if one were directly related to Walburga Black.Mrs. Potter smiled wide. “Alphard is an old, dear friend with a kind, ferocious heart.” In all his life, Sirius had never heard his uncle described like that. Usually, Alphard’s name was accompanied by a rather impressive string of profanities. “Given his… work, Alphard requires a certain number of legal protections against those who may wish to see him fail.” Most notably, Sirius’s mother. “At our last conference, Alphard mentioned an offer he planned to make you.”Something wild and desperate flashed in Remus’s eyes. “What offer?”So, Sirius explained. “My uncle wants me to live with him, in Scotland, while I’m not at Hogwarts. With the exception of a few family gatherings, I wouldn’t go back to Grimmauld for the summer holidays.”James nodded, wisely. “Good. Excellent. Solid plan. Do that.”“I can’t,” Sirius replied.At James and Peter’s vacant stares, Lily supplied, “Regulus. Honestly, Potter, pay attention.”“I will never leave him behind, James.” Even if it kills me.“As Alphard’s legal representative,” Mrs. Potter said, clearing her throat, “I have drafted something of a magically-binding contract. As per the terms, Regulus Black is not to be physically harmed in any way, by any Black or relation thereof, including any servants, employees, or… creatures under the legal jurisdiction of House Black.”There was no fucking way his mother would—“Your mother and her representative, Mr. Fawley—“ Because of-fucking-course it was Fawley. “—have already agreed to the terms. Signed on the dotted line, so to speak. All that’s left is your choice, Sirius.”What? That couldn’t be. There had to be a—“What’s the catch?” Remus asked.But, deep down, Sirius already knew. He might still be the fucking heir, for all intents and purposes, but he was also a Gryffindor and a virtual blood traitor, as far as his mother was concerned. It was one thing to have a pariah for an heir, but he knew Walburga Black would be damned before she allowed Sirius to corrupt her precious spare.“I can’t see Regulus,” Sirius said, once more forcing the words out. “That’s the catch.”“What?” James said. “Like… ever?”“I’m afraid your mother was rather stringent on that point,” Mrs. Potter said, slowly. “You’re to have no contact with your brother outside of Hogwarts, when Regulus is old enough, and the mandatory Black family functions stipulated in the contract. Not even owls, Sirius.”Merlin.That was the ransom price, for his own life and liberty.Either abandon Regulus to a pit of vipers or take the poisoned bite himself.Lily stood, looked at each Marauder in turn, before landing bright, green eyes on Sirius. “I think I speak for all of us,” she said. “Take the damned deal, Black.”Both James and Peter nodded in enthusiastic agreement. Remus…Remus reached for Sirius’s hand and stopped short. After a second, Sirius moved just enough that their pinkies touched. It sent a lightening bolt of red-hot agony up his spine, but Sirius didn’t care. It was far less than he deserved for even considering the offer. “I need you safe, Siri,” Remus whispered, or maybe shouted. It was so loud and so infinitely quiet that Sirius wasn’t entirely convinced that Remus had actually spoken for nearly a full minute. “You can’t go back there. Please.”Honest-to-whatever-god-wasn’t-currently-trying-to-fuck-with-him, it was the please that broke him and more than likely damned him all at once. He turned to Mrs. Potter. “Swear to me that she can’t fucking touch him.”Mrs. Potter nodded, solemnly. “In magicae mea, in nomine meo, et in vita mea.”
On my magic, on my name, and on my life.
It was a pureblood oath, as ancient and resolute as the Noble Houses themselves. No one could take back an oath like the, no more than they could reach up and pull the stars from the sky. “All right,” Sirius said, his throat as tight as the noose around his neck. “Tell Uncle Alphard I accept.”All at once, Sirius was engulfed—drowning, really—in all things Remus Lupin. He was nearly knocked off his feet as long, lanky arms wrapped around him. He felt his bandages scrape against the open wounds on his chest. Pain and liquid fire shot through him and he could hardly breathe, but he didn’t care because it was relief and victory and Remus.Oh, how he’d missed this glorious pain.Sirius clung to Remus, fingers digging into his shirt, his hair, holding on for dear life, because if he let go, Sirius feared he’d drown in his own guilt. The fire in his blood tasted so much better.“Thank you,” Remus breathed into his ear.Sirius thought maybe he could feel tears running down his own cheeks.Vaguely, his brain registered shouting, but really, it was hard to focus on anything other than Remus and safe and pain, pain, pain—Remus released him—or, rather, Remus was dragged off him by James and Peter—just as Sirius began to hyperventilate. Sirius flopped back on the bed, shuddering, trying to ignore the spots that suddenly danced in the corners of his vision, and attempting to force his lungs to take in oxygen normally. It was rather difficult, because he was fairly certain he was laughing.He managed to sit up, just as Lily marched over and thwacked Remus upside the head with her leather-bound book, which, really, was quite a feat given their height difference.Remus sheepishly rubbed the back of his head, shook James off him, and muttered a vague apology to Sirius.Sirius… didn’t care.That kind of pain didn’t matter. It tasted like victory, like survival, like that inexplicable and primal need to shout at the heavens and demand retribution from the cruel, uncaring gods.“I’m fine.” Sirius managed to sit up without aggravating the bandages on his chest, though he was pretty sure he might be bleeding again. Maybe a little. He still didn’t care. “He’s fine. Leave him alone.”Reluctantly, Peter and James backed away from Remus. Lily waved a threatening finger in his face, her face set in a stern scowl.“I’ll owl your uncle immediately, Sirius,” Mrs. Potter said. “I expect he’ll write you once everything is finalised to sort out the arrangements for the summer holidays.” She turned to her son. “James?”James straightened and put on what Sirius assumed to be his best attempt at an innocent face.“I hope you remember that whatever family heirlooms you may or may not have been bequeathed are to be used responsibly and not for general rule-breaking and mischief.”“Of course,” James said.Sirius hoped Mrs. Potter didn’t have much confidence in the sincerity of that particular statement. Mrs. Potter turned to McGonagall.The very same McGonagall who hadn’t said a damned word since she’d walked through the door.Nor had she, until this very moment, taken her eyes off Sirius.“I expect I’ll be hearing from you shortly, Minerva,” Mrs. Potter said, shaking her head. “Just like his father, this one. Always in trouble.”Mrs. Potter smiled warmly at each of them, before landing her gaze on Sirius. “It was a genuine pleasure to meet each and every one of you. Sirius… I cannot define right and wrong for you, nor can I force you to choose in any matter, but I want you to know that you are so very loved by your friends and everyone in this room desperately desires your safety. You are brave, Sirius Black, in every way that is worth a damn in this world.”Sirius had absolutely no idea what to say to that, so, choked with unexpected emotion, he nodded. Rather pathetically.“I’ll be off, then. Love you—“ Here, Mrs. Potter paused to throw a wink at Sirius. “—Jamie.”James groaned.Mrs. Potter blew a kiss and headed out the door.Not a single Marauder or King of Gryffindor said another word, just stared blankly at an equally silent Professor McGonagall. For the life of him, Sirius could not figure out why McGonagall was still here. Or, why she’d apparently reached out to Mrs. Potter in the first place. McGonagall cleared her throat, tilted her head up, and nodded, once. “Off to class, you four. Mr. Black will still be here this afternoon.”With marked reluctance on each of their faces, James, Peter, and Lily shuffled towards the door. Remus stayed put, glaring daggers at McGonagall from his place at Sirius’s side. McGonagall tightened her lips and looked away. Sirius blinked. He was missing something.“Mr. Lupin,” McGonagall said to the ceiling.“Yes, Professor?” Remus… growled.“There will be no need for you to serve any detention. I will see you in class on Thursday.”Remus nodded, once, but did not give any ground. “Yes, Professor.”The words—the very important questions as to why Remus would possibly be serving detention when classes hadn’t even started yet—were halfway from Sirius’s brain to the tip of his tongue, when McGonagall turned on her heel to leave.She paused, leaning against the door frame. “And, Lupin?” Her voice hit a high note, so far from the prim and proper and mildly condescending tone Sirius was used to. “You were… That is to say… Fifty points to Gryffindor.”Sirius was pretty sure his jaw hit the floor. What the fuck had Remus done?“Now, please go to class,” McGonagall bit out. “Mr. Black will probably need your notes.”With that, she left. “Um,” James managed, but they all heard the unspoken question.Sirius was still reeling from the fact that McGonagall had somehow managed to award Remus fifty points and insult Sirius’s intelligence in under thirty words.Remus still hadn’t moved. Nor had any of the others.“Remus—“ Lily began.“I don’t want to talk about it,” Remus said, and as far as Sirius was concerned, that was the end of that mystery. For now. “Siri—““Go on, then,” Sirius said, nodding towards the door. “I’ll be fine.”“You don’t need my notes,” Remus pointed out. “Pfft. Not in Charms. And James will fill me in on whatever magical creature you manage to piss off in Cuckoo’s class. I’m fine, Remus.”James gave Sirius a thumbs up. Lily rolled her eyes. Remus tried and failed to hide his grimace. “You’ll still be breathing and not bleeding when I come back this afternoon, right?”Sirius smirked, and crossed his heart. “In magicae mea, in nomine meo, et in vita mea.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Technically speaking, Sirius did not break his promise. He was both breathing and not bleeding by that afternoon. Or, at least, not bleeding through his bandages, which he prayed was still a big enough loophole that he stayed in the general vicinity of keeping his promise. He just wasn’t in the hospital wing. Where he was supposed to be.Technically.After rather miraculously keeping down both his lunch and the horrendous concoction of Madam Pomfrey’s nutrition potions, Sirius had decided he’d had just about enough of the hospital wing. He’d never been particularly resilient in the face of boredom and monotony and he didn’t see why that should change simply because he’d almost died.So, he snuck out. Which would have been considerably easier if he’d nicked James’s invisibility cloak first. Hindsight, and all that. His wandless attempt at a disillusionment charm that he’d spent the entire morning practicing had been shoddy at best. He’d been less invisible than he would have liked, and his skin had taken on that pasty whiteish-blue hue of a ghost. And, it’d given him one hell of a headache. All in all, it clearly hadn’t been his most successful complex spell he’d attempted as of late, but he’d still managed to sneak past the ever-watchful eyes of Madam Pomfrey when she’d been distracted by two sixth year Hufflepuffs who were rather charred around the edges after an apparent potions accident.He’d even managed to stuff a few pain potions into the pockets of Remus’s trousers. Just in case. He’d been rather relieved that everyone else had been in class as he’d made his way up the stairs to Gryffindor tower. He hadn’t remembered the trek as being so… exhausting. Granted, that’d been before he’d lost ten pounds and been cursed and starved for the better part of two weeks.He’d had to stop twice to catch his breath, each time ducking into an alcove, so as not to be seen by even the ghosts and portraits. He did have at least a semblance of remaining pride, after all. In the boys dorm, Sirius had made a beeline for his trunk. He hadn’t actually seen his wand since his mother had taken it when he’d first arrived at Grimmauld Place. He’d been half-convinced she might not have returned it at all, until he’d opened his trunk and saw his beautiful, perfect, cursed wand lying on top of all his things. He’d felt an immense weight lifted off his chest. Even if the stupid thing was more or less useless, he was immensely grateful that it was still his. Now, Sirius lay flat on his back, sprawled across Remus’s bed, at least moderately comfortable in his own trousers and one of James’s soft, Muggle shirts that he’d somehow managed to wrangle over his head without disturbing his bandages. He held his ice-cold wand against his heart, idly tracing the runes on the grip with his thumb. Surrounded by Remus’s woodsy scent, Sirius allowed himself to feel comfort for the first time in… eons.For a moment, that is. Until the guilt set in. And… the guilt for not feeling nearly as guilty about accepting Alphard’s offer as he probably should. He’d abandoned Regulus. There’d be no saving him, no hope of redemption for his little brother if Sirius wasn’t there to shoulder the wrath of any and all disobedience.Regulus would be forged into a weapon in Sirius’s place, set on fire and sharpened into submission, until he was as deadly as venom-laced goblin steel. Regulus wouldn’t…Sirius didn’t think Regulus had a rebellious bone in his body. He was far too clever for that.Far too Slytherin, in fact. “Thought I might find you up here.”Sirius nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of James’s voice. Then, he was equally startled by the darkness leaking in from the windows and the pale flicker of candlelight against the walls. He’d apparently been staring at the ceiling for quite some time.“The four of us looked for you in the hospital wing after class,” James said.“I escaped,” Sirius supplied, with a smirk.“Yeah, we deduced that as well.” James stuffed his hands in his pockets and leaned against the nearest bedpost. “I thought Madam Pomfrey was going to have Remus’s head for allegedly aiding and abetting your daring escape.”Sirius sat up, wincing a little as the movement tugged on his bandages. “We are talking about the same Remus Lupin, right? The same Remus that ties his shoelaces every time and colour-codes his Muggle books by genre and preference?”“You didn’t see him yesterday, mate.” James’s voice rasped and caught a little on the last word. Sirius frowned. “What… What does that mean, Jamie?”James shook his head, gave Sirius a look that told him that he very much did not want to respond, but James was a Gryffindor, down to his blood, and he was brave. “You scared all of us,” James bit out, “but especially Remus. I’ve never seen him so close to absolutely losing his shit. Evans said… Evans said he went off on McGonagall. A bit.”“He did what now?”“Yelled at her, I suppose.” James gestured at Sirius’s chest. “Said that was her fault.”It wasn’t—not really—but that was so far beyond the point. “Why— Why would he do that?”“Because he cares about you, you fucking moron. We all do, of course, but Remus is… Remus is different. He’d go to war for you.”James’s voice brokered absolutely no argument. It said as a fact, an absolute truth, impervious to contradiction or appeal.He’d go to war for you.There was a very distinct possibility that war might be in their immediate near future.He couldn’t allow himself to think about that right now. “He… yelled at McGonagall and she still gave him fifty points?”James shrugged. “Mum said McGonagall isn’t particularly great at displaying emotions.”“Or remorse, apparently.”“She didn’t give him detention, at least. That means we’re back to business as usual as soon as you’re up for it.” Sirius grinned wickedly at him, ready to jump back into any sort of ordinary chaos and mischief James Potter might have already planned. “You know, all things considered, it’s not so bad, really. Someone else might have been expelled for talking to a professor like that.”That dampened his mood, but only slightly. “I certainly would have been.”James opened and closed his mouth, whether to agree or disagree, Sirius honestly wasn’t sure. James seemed to lose his train of thought. Instead, his dark eyes caught on Sirius’s thin frame drowning in James’s shirt. It certainly wasn’t as big as Remus’s button-down, but Sirius had unfortunately resigned himself to being the second smallest Marauder.Sirius tilted his head as James continued to stare. “Jamie…?”James’s face was tight and frighteningly sober. “Don’t you ever fucking do that to me again, Sirius. I thought you were… The blood…”James Potter was horrifyingly close to tears, and honestly, it wasn’t like Sirius could reliably promise something similar would ever happen again. Not with his family. Not even if he went to live with Alphard. His mother had a unique talent for finding new and inventive ways of torturing him. He didn’t even remotely believe that an oath on her magic would stop her. The Blacks were nothing if not infinitely creative when it came to pain and vengeance.So, Sirius did the one thing he could think of.He stood, paused for a second to collect himself—though not quite long enough for James to figure out what he was about to do and run—then launched himself at James, clinging tightly to him. It burned, it nearly reopened the scars on his chest once again, but Sirius was so, so far beyond giving a single damn about something as insignificant as pain.Not after the day he’d had. James, on the other hand, squawked, flailed his arms about, but eventually caught onto the fact that Sirius wasn’t going to release him until he damned well felt like it. Sirius more or less flopped back on the bed the very instant he let James go, hands shaking and breathing hard. He smiled, as wide and as manic as Peeves.“Will you fucking stop doing that?!” James snapped, clearly attempting to be far more stern than what actually came across.“Absolutely not.”“You’re a fucking idiot.”“Arsehole.”“And I love you.”Sirius sat up, eyes wide and wild. “W-what?”James just shrugged, a far too casual of a gesture given the enormity of his words. “I love you, Sirius. You’re my brother, in every way that actually counts.”No one… He’d never…He’d only ever heard those words from Regulus and Andromeda. Even then, and although he’d never for a second doubted their sincerity, they were his family. His blood. And that came with a certain amount of familial obligation. This… This was entirely James’s choice. His uninhibited, fearless, and utterly incomprehensible choice.No one had a wand to his head, nor had he been threatened by an irreversible blood curse.The fairytale prince chose him, all on his own. Merlin, Sirius loved him, with every shattered piece of his heart.Brothers, James had said.Sirius Black would do anything, fight any deity, or cull any star from the blanket of the night sky for either one of his brothers. James, who suddenly looked rather wary, took half a step back and drew his wand. “Sirius, I fucking love you. I’d fucking die for you. But, Merlin help me, if you try to hug me again, I will Stupify you. Which might end up actually killing you, given that I’m shit at it and you’re already hurt. In which case, I would be morally obligated to jump from this tower in both a show of solidarity in death and because of my overwhelming grief at your death by my incompetence.”Sirius barked out a genuine laugh, and Merlin, it tasted like a drug. So much better than that shit Madam Pomfrey had given him.“You’re not going to hug me, are you?” James asked, eyes narrowed.Sirius shook his head. “I’ve had enough for one day.” “Good. Now stand up and fix your hair. At least try to look presentable.”Brave fucking words coming from James Potter. “Um, why?”“Because.” James tucked his wand back in his pocket and gestured in the general direction of the stairs leading down to the common room. “Once we realised you’d evaded capture, Lily and Remus began… plotting. Peter and I helped, naturally, with the organising and shit, but I’ve been informed by the love of my life that I am contractually obligated to specify that it was their idea. It’s all downstairs, waiting for you. I was, of course, sent to fetch you, but then you got me all confused with the hugging and the professions of undying love, so I almost forgot, and—““James. What’s going on?” Sirius cut in, suddenly rather nervous. It had been a long day, at the end of a very long holiday, and he was nowhere near one hundred percent. Sirius wasn’t sure if he had the emotional capacity to—“Oh, just come on.” James tugged so hard on the edge of the duvet that Sirius nearly toppled from the bed. “Let me show you.”And so, Sirius followed James down the stairs. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ What waited for him in the common room was entirely unexpected.Fabian and Gideon Prewett sat on the back of the largest sofa, on either end. Both of their bright, fuchsia beards had been—to Sirius’s surprised—sheared. Instead, both of them sported rainbow freckles and bright yellow hair. They still looked utterly ridiculous. Honestly, Sirius was impressed. Marlene, Dorcas, and Peter sat squished together in the middle of the sofa and appeared to be acting as a sort of counterweight to keep it from tipping over from the twins’ constant fidgeting. Frank Longbottom leaned heavily against the mantle, a deep frown seemingly carved into his face. Leaning against Frank was an equally placating Alice Fortescue. Remus and Lily stood in the middle of the room, engaged in something of a hushed, conspiratorial conversation.From the looks of things, everyone had gathered… for him.Sirius stopped so suddenly that James tripped over himself and entirely missed the last stair in a valiant attempt to avoid colliding with Sirius. James ended up sprawled out on the thankfully-plush carpet. Conversation stopped. Heads turned. “Ow,” James moaned. Moving in near-telepathic unison, Fabian and Gideon marched over and hauled James to his feet, each twin grabbing one arm. They then mimed brushing him off. Fabian ruffled his hair, until James swatted him away. Sirius remained frozen, until Lily marched over, until she was just a few inches from him.“Say the word,” she said, so quietly he was fairly certain no one else heard, “and this stops here.”“Um.” Sirius gulped and took one more look around the room. “What exactly is this?”“I’d like to know that as well, Evans,” Frank Longbottom said, gently moving Alice aside to properly grouse at them. “Oi! Frankie!” Fabian said, slinging a long arm over James’s shoulders. “You normally talk to your king like that?”“Show some respect,” Gideon chided.Frank rolled his eyes. “I’d also like to know when that happened and why I wasn’t consulted. You don’t just get to go about appointing monarchs—““Treason!” cried Fabian.“Blasphemy!” yelled Gideon.“Off with his head!” roared Alice Fortescue, waving a rebellious fist in the air. Frank’s jaw dropped at the betrayal. Lily looked rather smug. Nobody had answered his question.“Evans?” Sirius prompted.Lily shrugged and nodded at Remus. “This was his idea. Ask him.”Remus ducked his head, his curly hair falling in his face as he offered Sirius the first real smile he’d seen since waking up in the hospital wing. “This… these people,” Remus began, opening his arms and gesturing around the room, “are the collective beating heart of Gryffindor. They are everything that makes anyone want to be brave, be kind. Heroic. They are the best of any of us, and together, in one way or another, they’ve shown that they’re not afraid of monsters. They’re your family, Sirius Black. They will fight for you and beside you, come whatever.”Sirius’s eyes tracked over Marlene and Dorcas, who nodded along. Marlene winked at him.“This,” Lily said, “is your honour guard, Sirius.”“When one of us falls, we all fall. When there’s a monster to face, we do so together,” James added. “No one gets to go off and kill a god all on their own, mate.”Gideon crossed his arms over his broad chest and nodded once, definitively. “He’s right. You’re one of us. And you have been, from the moment that hat sent you up here instead of to the snakes.”Fabian tilted his head up and shot Sirius a triumphant smirk. “And until the very fucking end.”“You’re ours,” Marlene agreed.“Gryffindor to the bone.” Dorcas, now. Peter squeaked out something similar.Sirius… didn’t have words. Instead, he turned his attention to Frank, who was still brooding against the mantle.With a smile dancing on her lips, Alice jabbed her elbow into Frank’s ribs. Hard. He grunted.“Yes, fine,” Frank groused. “Welcome to Gryffindor. Hurrah. Now, will someone please tell me the it sounds like we’re about to go to war?”Sirius almost laughed. Because, the thing was, war had been declared ages ago, long before anyone in this room was even an idea. For as long as there had been wizards and Muggles on this planet, for as long as one side feared the other, for as long as one side dared to love the other, there had been war. They were bystanders, casualties, collateral damage in an epic, impossible, battle.In the end, they were cannon fodder. At best. But… They also might be all that stood between hope and the infinite abyss of insanity and chaos.Family, Remus had said.Maybe that was what family was supposed to be: a line in the sand between everything and nothing.On your side, come whatever.“If we’re going to war...” Remus said, reaching a hand towards Sirius. They didn’t touch—not quite—but Sirius could taste it all the same. It felt like everything and rebellion. “…then you should be the one to declare it. They deserve to know the kind of monsters they’ll face if they’re on your side.”Against his better judgement, against every sane thought left in his brain, Sirius found himself nodding. Remus grinned, nearly manic in his victory. Merlin, Sirius loved him. “First.” Lily stepped between them, holding up her hands. “Sirius, release the Marauders from their oath.”Right. He’d forgotten about that.“Yeah, mate,” James said, trying and failing to suppress a shudder. “Bloody inconvenient, that.”Sirius didn’t remember a whole lot about the day before, just waking up in the hospital wing. Everything else was fuzzy at best, but… He remembered seeing the shock and terror in Remus’s bright golden eyes in the bathroom mirror. He remembered Remus saying his name and… shouting. Merlin. How they’d managed to get him to the hospital wing without breaking their oath was something of a miracle. More than likely a miracle orchestrated by Lily Evans. “All right. I’ll release you. But…” Sirius turned to Remus, searching for words he’d never thought he’d say. “You have to let me tell them. I need…”
I need to pretend I’m as brave as you think I am. Just for a few moments.
“It’s my secret to tell, Remus,” he said, instead.“Always,” Remus confirmed. Before he could talk himself out of it, before whatever courage he’d conjured from nothing abandoned him entirely, Sirius raised his wand and prayed to every deity he knew that it worked, just this once.Miraculously, the tip of his wand shone silver. “I, Sirius Orion Black, release you, Remus John Lupin, James Fleamont Potter, and Peter Percival Pettigrew from your oath to me. I thank you for your loyalty, your friendship and your honour. May your magic be free of the words that bound it.”As he spoke, tendrils of silver starlight snaked out from his wand, nearly invisible ghost-like fingers reaching, clawing, for James, Peter, and Remus. When he finished speaking, the magic tying them all together crackled, ignited, then silently erupted in a whisper of air.“Did… Did it work?” Peter asked, after a rather uncomfortable silence.Sirius honestly wasn’t sure. His wand was unreliable at best and nothing more than a damned and cursed twig at worst. James, officially solidifying himself as both the bravest and the stupidest amongst the four of them, blurted, “Sirius’s parents are pureblood fascists who hate children!”Lily buried her face in her hands. Sirius, despite himself, barked out a laugh.“Well, we all knew that,” Marlene said, sardonically. Then, catching a glimpse at Dorcas’s mildly startled face, she added, “Well, most of us.”Frank and the twins nodded uncomfortably. “Why don’t you tell us why we’re here, Sirius,” Alice said, her voice gentle and melodic. So, Sirius told them.“When I was eight, my mother performed a blood curse on me, binding me to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.” After only a moment’s hesitation, he tugged on the collar of Jame’s T-shirt to reveal the tattoo. Toujours Pur.Merlin, he’d never deliberately shown anyone those words carved into his skin before, let alone a room full of Gryffindors. Taking a breath, he continued. “It means—““Always pure.” Frank’s voice was clipped, his expression more sour than usual. The twins—the goddamned flamboyant and animated Prewett twins—were pale. Fabian looked like he either wanted to start throwing curses or just throw up.“There were always rumours,” Gideon began, gritting his teeth together and nearly snarling out the last word. “Stories Gramps told on Halloween about before the war, when the Ancient Houses had more power.”“Yeah, but those were just ghost stories meant to send the kids running for the safety of their blankets so the adults could stay up and drink. That—“ Fabian pointed a finger at Sirius’s chest. “That is very, very real.”“Then let’s find the cure,” Marlene said.Sirius said, “There isn’t one,” at the same time Lily muttered, “I’m working on it.”Green eyes immediately turned to glare at him.“‘Course there’s a cure,” Fabian said, flippantly. “Every curse has a cure. Them’s the rules.”“Not the killing curse,” Sirius muttered, darkly. “No one’s ever cured that.”Fabian clicked his tongue and winked at Sirius. “Not yet.”Dorcas Meadows looked incredibly lost, her dark brown eyes wide as she mouthed the words ghost story and killing curse to herself a few times before asking, “Yes, but… But what does the tattoo do?”Sirius closed his eyes. “It’s a blood curse, Dee. It’s meant to keep the bloodlines pure, make sure that no tainted blood ever graces the family tree. It… hurts… when…”How could he admit that he could never even touch someone who wasn’t at least ten generations wizard on both sides of their family?How could he possibly explain that although he’d had no choice, although he hated the tattoo and every damn thing it represented, he was still marked? He was branded for darkness and nothing and the eternal abyss and there wasn’t a fucking thing he could do about it.Fate was the cruelest puppet-master.He would enjoy watching her bleed.His eyes found Remus Lupin, who’s mouth ticked up in just the slightest smile, as if he could see the thoughts of blood and murder and ancient, dead gods. “I can’t touch anyone of a lesser bloodline,” Sirius said, not once looking away from Remus. “Blood traitors, half-bloods, Muggle-born, you name it. If I touch anyone not born to someone noble and ancient, it feels like my blood is on fire.”“But…” Dorcas’s finger waved over the Marauders and Lily. “You touch them all the time.”Behind him, James coughed and sheepishly scratched the back of his hair. “Yeah. In light of recent events, the Marauders have recently adopted a no-touching-Sirius policy.”Sirius frowned. He was fairly certain he hadn’t agreed to that. All the fires of hell were better than nothing at all. So, he said: “No, we haven’t. Or if we have, I veto it, effective immediately.” He cut off James’s high-pitched protest with a glare. “I’m not made of glass, James.”“But you said—“ Peter squeaked out.“I’ll decide what I can handle,” Sirius said, with as much conviction as he could muster. “And if one day I wake up and decide I want to snog you and your stupid antlers again, I will damn well do as I please. Fuck the pain.”From the mantle, Frank scoffed. “Not self-destructive at all, are you, Black?”Before it was even really out of his mouth, before Alice could smack him, Fabian drew his wand and muttered a hex. Frank’s wavy, blonde hair braided itself into two, short plaits that stuck out in opposite directions from the top of his head, both tied off with a pink ribbon.Fabian stuck out his tongue. “Stuff it, Longbottom.”No one did anything to help the very indignant Frank, who tugged on his hair, trying to undo the braids.“It’s not self-destruction,” Sirius said, because someone had to. “It’s…”“Rebellion,” Remus finished for him. “Revolution.”Slowly, Sirius nodded.“You wanted war, Frank? This is hardly even the start. My family and the Ancient Houses will do much worse to anyone who stands against them.” Summoning all the courage in his heart and the mania in his blood, Sirius tilted his head and smirked. “Are you Gryffindor enough to fight?”Frank Longbottom stared down at Sirius, expressionless, braids entirely forgotten.“That’s why you’re all here,” Lily said. “Sirius might be the only one of us marked and branded by the purebloods, but it won’t stay that way forever. We’ve all seen the writing on the wall, heard it from the Slytherins, or read about it in the papers.”“You want us to start a war?” Dorcas asked, incredulous. “We’re first years.”“We’re not starting anything,” Remus replied. “Whatever dark things wait for us… they’ll find us all the same. We’re closing rank and defending what’s ours.”“And that starts with Sirius.”
It does?
He opened his mouth, but Lily cut him off.She nodded to each and every one of them, even Frank. “You were chosen because of your loyalty to your house and the fire in your hearts. You are Gryffindor’s honour guard. As your king, I am asking for your help in protecting one of our own.”Sirius didn’t really know whether he should fall down at Lily’s feet in gratitude or go hide in a corner in mortification, his pureblood sensibilities and pride warring with his innate sense of practicality. “What do you need us to do, boss?” Gideon asked. This time, Lily nodded to Remus, who stepped forward, hovering to Sirius’s left. “Make sure he’s safe,” Remus said. “No one touches him, unless—““Unless I initiate contact,” Sirius cut in, nudging Remus’s elbow, just for a heartbeat, before pulling away. For once in his life, didn’t bother to hide the shudder of pain.Remus gave him a small smile. “If circumstances arise, if there’s an emergency, you are to ensure that only purebloods come in direct contact with Sirius.”Marlene raised her hand. “How pure are we talking, Sirius?”Sirius flushed a little, mildly disgusted that he knew the blood status of every single person in this room. Well, pretty much everyone in the castle, for that matter. “You’re fine, Marls,” he muttered. “Frank, Alice, and the Prewetts, too.”From behind him, Peter piped in. “What about me?”Sirius tried and failed to hide a grimace. Technically speaking, he could touch Peter. The Pettigrews, although neither noble nor ancient, were a large enough pureblood family that went back a few hundred years. It should be no different than touching Marlene, or even Frank, but…He felt the same infinite nothing pain when he touched Peter Pettigrew as he did when he touched Lucius Malfoy. He’d do just about anything to avoid that kind of… soul-eating nothingness.Merlin, Sirius wasn’t about to explain that to his friend, either. It’d crush him.“Sorry, Pete,” Sirius said. “Not pure enough.”Peter, predictably, was rather crushed. “The rest of us,” Lily went on, gesturing to three Marauders and Dorcas, “will act as buffers and smoke screens. No one touches him. Not in the halls, in the Quidditch stands, or in classes.”“And,” Remus finished. “No one knows about this outside this room, with the notable exception of McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey.”“Are we all in agreement?” Lily asked.A chorus of enthusiastic answers flooded the room. Fabian and Gideon high-fived, Marlene and Dorcas stood and each grabbed one of Lily’s hands, nodding and smiling the whole time. James and Peter walked over to Remus and clapped him on the shoulder, and Merlin, all the air left Sirius’s lungs when he caught a glimpse of the triumph in Remus’s eyes. As the noise died down, all eyes turned to Frank Longbottom, who had yet to say a damned word. Slowly, he pushed himself away from the mantle and sauntered right up to Sirius, until he more or less towered over him. Sirius held his ground.Then, Frank held out his hand. “You’re one of ours. All of Gryffindor stands with you, whether they know it or not.”Sirius clasped Frank’s hand at the elbow, unsure of what else to do, and nodded once. Much to his surprise, Frank smirked. “Knew you’d bring chaos right to our door, Black. Called it the moment you were sorted.”Sirius barked out a laugh. “Oh, chaos is just the beginning, Longbottom. Just you wait. But… thank you.” He surveyed the room, landing, inevitably, on Remus. “All of you.” Merlin, the sun and stars could never compare to the fire in Remus’s eyes.James cleared his throat. “I think the most important thing we all learned today is that Sirius really wants to snog me.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 4, 1972
Remus talked in his sleep. Sirius wasn’t entirely certain it was something he’d missed entirely, despite having slept next to Remus for a majority of the first term, or if it was a more recent development.Though he’d been awaken hours earlier by the sound of his own name on Remus’s lips, Remus hadn’t really muttered anything coherent since. More importantly, he didn’t seem to be lost to the same realm of nightmares Sirius himself frequently visited. Instead, Remus alternated between bits of incoherent English, half-formed French swear words, and what Sirius assumed to be Welsh, but, in all fairness, it could be pure gibberish. Occasionally, Remus’s face would scrunch up, or his hand would suddenly reach out and grasp the pillow between them, as though Remus meant to throw it across the room. Then, his lips would tick up in a smile, he’d calm, and edge just a bit closer to Sirius.Despite the fact that, by the time he actually got up, he was mere millimetres from falling off the bed entirely, Sirius found the clearly-exhausted Remus Lupin incredibly endearing, and did his best to sneak down to the Great Hall without disturbing him. Although it was barely half-six, there were far more students in the Great Hall than he’d expected. Well, they were mostly Ravenclaws, which wasn’t really a surprise, but there was a rather large and concerning gathering of Slytherins at the edge of their table, all hunched over… something. Sirius paused in the enormous double doors—debating whether or not it was wise to start shit now, especially given his injuries—before Malfoy’s head popped up and an evil grin spread across his pale face. Sirius scowled. They were up to something, and whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. He felt his magic crackling beneath the surface of his skin, was one, two steps on his way over to confront Malfoy, when James Potter called out, “Oi! Sirius!”Sirius froze, mid-step, and turned back to the Gryffindor table. James waved at him, as though absolutely nothing was out of the ordinary. Reluctantly, Sirius turned on his heel and took his seat across from James. “Didn’t realise you were up yet,” Sirius said.“Didn’t realise you were a complete idiot,” James shot back, lowering his voice and casting a surreptitious glance over Sirius’s shoulder at the Slytherins. “I’ve been keeping an eye on them, too, you know. They haven’t done anything yet. Not even when the Hufflepuff Muggle-borns walked by.”“Yes, but they’re plotting,” Sirius groused. “It’s what they do.”“Of course it is. But seeing as we can’t do anything to stop it, I figured we might as well enjoy a healthy breakfast. Eggs?”After just a moment’s hesitation, Sirius took the serving spoon James offered him and piled a heaping serving on his own plate. He’d been able to keep down all the food he’d had yesterday, as well as the last of Madam Pomfrey’s nutrition potions, so he figured he’d be okay with the solid foods.“Besides,” James said, through a mouthful of toast. “I wanted to talk to you. I’ve had a thought.”Sirius smirked into his glass of pumpkin juice. “Spying and thinking before breakfast, Jamie? Don’t use up all your brain power. We still have class today.”James flicked a few beans at him with his fork, but Sirius vanished them mid-air with a smirk and flick of his wrist.“Arsehole,” James muttered. “It’s Evans’s birthday. On the thirtieth.”“Is it?” He hadn’t known that.“Yes. Before the holiday, and after much pestering, Remus finally caved and admitted he broke into McGonagall’s office and discovered all of our birthdays.” He paused, his glasses slipping down his nose, just a little bit. “I’m going to throttle both of you later, by the way, for not telling me about your birthday.”Sirius remembered the roof, the distant scent of snow, the warmth of the duvet wrapped around him, falling asleep as Remus read him The Little Prince. “Oops,” he said, noncommittally. James rolled his eyes, in the most dramatic way imaginable. “Anyways, Evans’s is the thirtieth. I thought we might throw her a Marauders-level party, truly worthy of the King of Gryffindor.”Sirius blinked. “That… That’s actually brilliant.”“You sound unreasonably surprised,” James deadpanned. “Are the Prewetts in?” “Hope so,” James replied. “We’ll need butterbeer.”“And music,” Sirius said. “That’ll be Marlene and Dee. Hopefully.”James nodded, thoughtfully, tapping two fingers against his chin. “Yes. Then all that’s left is for you and I to come up with ha genius plot that will help Evans fall madly in love with me.”Sirius groaned and very nearly gave in to the sudden and inexplicable urge to face-plant in his breakfast. “How, in Merlin’s name, do you plan on accomplishing that?”“No clue. That’s why you’re my wingman,” James said, cavalier as ever, before downing his own glass of pumpkin juice just as Marlene and Dorcas took their seats at the table, just a short ways down.James’s eyes caught on something behind Sirius, and, for a few harrowing heartbeats, Sirius flashed back to the moment before Malfoy’s curse hit him. He imagined Malfoy and that wicked smirk—not the least bit disrupted by the vertical scar Sirius had carved on his face—aiming his wand at some unlucky half-blood Hufflepuff with the same malicious intent he’d had right before he’d nearly cleaved Sirius in two. Again, he felt his magic bubbling just under the surface of his skin, rising and falling with each breath he took in a herculean effort to calm his thundering heart, before—Sirius turned to see Lily Evans arm and arm with a still-rather-sleep-deprived Remus Lupin.He swallowed his panic and let out a breath.James leaned across the table, oblivious to Sirius’s near-meltdown. “You… You don’t think Remus is in love with Evans, do you? I mean, she’s gorgeous and perfect and he can’t be blind to that. And he’s brilliant and bloody clever and my best mate—or one of them—and they spent the holiday together. Merlin, what do you think they talked about? What if—““James,” Sirius cut in. “Shut up.”Though something twisted and nasty and decidedly unfamiliar curled around his heart at the idea. Peter came jogging in—well, it was more of a wobbly speed-walk, really—and shouldered right past Remus and Lily in his beeline for the food. He plopped himself down at James’s side, immediately reaching for the pastries. Lily patted Remus’s arm twice before releasing him to take her seat besides Marlene, while Remus sat next to Sirius, a piece of bacon somehow already in his mouth.“Morning,” Remus muttered, with an only slightly forced smile, just as a screech echoed through the Hall, indicating the arrival of the morning owls. Sirius had grown accustomed to ignoring them. Unless he’d written Andromeda, he never really expected mail. In fact, the only one of them that ever received anything with any degree of regularity was James, and then, only from his parents, and he’d just seen his mother yesterday. So, when a giant, ghost-white eagle owl landed on the table between the Marauders, then presented its taloned foot to Remus, all four of them stopped eating. The owl was holding a rolled up copy of The Daily Prophet.Remus blinked at the bird. “I don’t… I don’t subscribe to—“The owl screeched in disagreement. “It’s a biased, unfair representation of the news,” Remus argued, glaring at the owl. “Its editors sensationalise the truth, marginalise minorities, all to win favour with their subscribers, who are predominantly—“The owl screeched again, this time garnering the attention of the rest of the table.“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Remus roughly grabbed the owl’s leg and yanked the paper free. “I’m not bloody paying you.”The owl flared its wings a few times, then took off.Remus unrolled the paper, only to have a note fall into his lap.All of a sudden, Remus went deathly pale.Alarmed, Sirius turned to face him. “Remus?”“Well,” James said, clearly oblivious to whatever panic Remus felt. “What’s it say?”A trembling, scarred hand held out the attached note to Sirius.
RL,
Enjoy.
-M James snatched the note out of Sirius’s hand. “Who the fuck is M?”For a moment, he turned a narrow-eyed glare at Marlene. She stuck two fingers up at him.But honestly, who else would it be?“Remus,” Sirius asked, his voice low. “Why is Malfoy sending you a copy of The Daily Prophet?”A threat. It had to be a threat. Whatever Malfoy lacked in general intelligence and looks, he made up for by his uncanny ability to follow through on his threats.A threat didn’t technically break Malfoy’s oath to Sirius. He’d sworn not to betray Remus. It was just a subtle enough difference for a snake like Malfoy to use to his own advantage. Remus didn’t seem to hear him, his eyes glued on the front page of the paper. He swallowed once, twice, but it seemed to lodge in his throat. Eventually, he gave up and passed The Daily Prophet to Sirius. Amidst several Ministry officials, Orion Black’s deep obsidian eyes glared back at him and Sirius felt sick. “Read it, Sirius,” Lily demanded, reaching across the table to grasp Remus’s hand. He didn’t seem to notice. “Or hand it off to someone else.”With a breath and a muttered curse, Sirius started to read.
Wizengamot Moves Forward on Anti-Dark Creature Legislation
Kara Kennedy-Kirkwood, reporting.
The controversial Anti-Dark Creature bill, commonly known as the Lestrange Doctrine, was approved by the lower courts yesterday. As litigators on both sides will continue to argue their case, a final Wizengamot vote will likely take place later this month.
The Lestrange Doctrine—named after its author and most outspoken advocate, Falco Lestrange—seeks to make the admittance of Dark Creatures to Hogwarts illegal and punishable by a three-month sentence to Azkaban for both the admitted “student” and the member of the faculty who signed off on it.
“Our goal is to keep our students safe,” said Orion Black on Monday. “A Hogwarts acceptance letter is a privilege, not a right, and a privilege that should only belong to the worthy. It’s a fantastical, ridiculous notion to think a Dark Creature could ever be found worthy. They’re nothing more than mindless beasts, reliant on instinct and bloodlust. There’s no reason to endanger our students as we have in the past.”
Black is, of course, referring to Valerie Valvadova, the last publicly-known Dark Creature to be admitted to Hogwarts. Valvadova, a born vampire, transferred to Hogwarts during her third year, after her family immigrated from Siberia. Through known to be rather adept at magic, given her pureblood mother’s bloodline, Valvadova took after her father, the head of a prominent vampire coven, in more than just looks and bloodlust.
In 1812, during Valvadova’s sixth year, she attacked and drained three Hogwarts students, including Onyx Lestrange, the third son of Barnabas Rodolphus Lestrange, the then-patriarch of the Ancient House. Barnabas appealed to the Wizengamot and secured a blood debt against the Valvadova coven. In exchange for his son’s life, and the lives of those other students killed, Lestrange oversaw the execution of Valerie and both of her parents.
Albus Dumbledore, current Headmaster of Hogwarts, Senior Warlock of the Wizengamot, and most notable wizard to speak out against the Lestrange Doctrine declined to comment on whether Dark Creatures had been admitted to Hogwarts since the Valvadovas’ execution.
“It’s a simple matter, really,” Orion Black said. “If the beasts cannot be reliably controlled or brought to heel, they have no place in the most renowned school in the Wizarding world.”
“The lines have been drawn, the declaration has been made, and our wands are at the ready,” said Mr. Tom Riddle, a rising socialite and respected orator in Wizarding Britain. “All that’s left to do is sign the damned thing, for our children, for our future, and for the sanctity of our magic.”
Despite Mr. Riddle’s confidence, those who oppose the Lestrange Doctrine will have the opportunity to present their case in the coming weeks. Early polls suggest an overwhelmingly favourable public reception of the bill. The Wizengamot will cast their final votes towards the end of the month.
Sirius felt the paper fall through his fingers onto his half-finished plate. Mr. Tom Riddle.“Well,” Peter said, munching far-too-casually on his toast. “I don’t see what all the fuss is about.”Lily’s eyes were emerald fire, merciless and all-consuming. “What.”It wasn’t even in the same vicinity of a question. It tasted like a threat, palpable in the air.Peter shrugged. “It’s not like they’re wrong. Dark Creatures are monsters.”As deadly as a viper coiling to strike, Lily drew her wand, her other hand still clenched tight around Remus’s. “Take. It. Back.”Peter seemed oblivious to the rather immediate danger he was in. “It’s in their name, isn’t it? They’re Dark Creatures. They don’t belong at Hogwarts. It’s too dangerous for the rest of us.”Eyes wide, mouth hanging open, James slowly edged away from Peter, out of the blast-zone. “Pete, mate, you really have to consider—““They let pureblood supremacists into Hogwarts every damn day and no one cries fowl,” Lily snapped. “I’m sure half of those Slytherins would rather I not be here and wouldn’t hesitate in using violence to either intimidate or make it impossible for me to be here.”“Well,” Peter said, apparently more than willing to die on this hill. “That’s a rather broad assumption, don’t you think, Evans? Not all purebloods are violent. Sirius isn’t.”Sirius would beg to differ. He’d killed his own wand.Lily smirked, rather… evilly. “Then not all Dark Creatures are violent.”“Maybe not intentionally,” Peter conceded. “But they can’t help it, can they? They’re monsters, out of control. They can’t safely be around—“Lily rose to her feet, shouted a hex, and Peter’s mouth snapped shut and didn’t reopen. The entire Gryffindor table stared at her, their breakfasts and inane chatter forgotten. “You heard what that arsehole in the paper said, Pettigrew.” She spat out his name. “Wands at the ready, declaration made. You sure as shit better be on the right side when the curses start flying, or so help me God, I will deal with you myself.” Her eyes skimmed over the rest of the table. “Anyone else who is in favour of this bullshit bill can talk to me directly.”Her eyes landed on James, hard and unforgiving, as if daring him to cross her. James didn’t hesitate. “Anyone with magic has a place has a place at Hogwarts. Fuck Lestrange, fuck that Riddle what’s-his-name, and fuck your dad, Sirius. No offence.”“Absolutely none taken.”Lily actually looked… almost impressed, but it was gone in an instant, her face schooled back to neutral. “Good.” She nodded once. Then, to Peter: “Grow the fuck up, Pettigrew.”Then, she stormed out, every eye in Gryffindor following her. After a few moments, most everyone went back to their breakfasts. Sirius reached out and carefully folded the paper and Malfoy’s note and tucked them both into the inner pocket of his robe. “It won’t pass,” James said, definitively. “Not with Dumbledore against it.”Sirius wasn’t so sure. Not after what his father had implied over the holiday. Orion Black had all but declared victory. His father wasn’t one to lose. “Now,” James continued. “The real question is why Malfoy would be sending this to—Merlin, mate, are you all right?”Alarmed, Sirius turned to face Remus, next to him. Remus, who hadn’t made a sound since he’d handed Sirius the paper. Remus, who was about as deathly pale as the Grey Lady.Remus, who, without a word, stood and left. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius found Remus pacing back and forth in front of the Transfiguration classroom, his books clutched tightly to his chest. When he caught sight of Sirius, he froze. Remus raked nervous, twitching fingers through the mess of curly hair hanging in his face. “Look, Sirius, I can explain.”“Explain? Explain what?” Sirius was confused. He pointed in the vague direction of the Great Hall. “You know that thing from Malfoy was meant for me, right?”“What?” Remus stared at him like he’d suddenly sprouted a second head. Sirius swallowed, suddenly nervous. It wasn’t like he was used to talking about the mind games and veiled threats his family tended to dish out. “Yes, well. Malfoy likes his threats.”Remus gaped at him. “Sirius, the letter was addressed to me.”“Yeah. There’s a reason for that.” Sirius scratched the back of his neck. Remus raised an eyebrow, daring him to explain. What the hell. Remus knew about the tattoo. He might as well know about this too. “I made Malfoy swear to never betray you, under any circumstances. He was making threats and accusations, saying you didn’t belong at Hogwarts. Just general, pureblood bullshit, really. And, I don’t know. I was angry and scared and I panicked. Narcissa bound the Unbreakable Vow—““What?!”Sirius didn’t stop. “Yes, look. I made him swear an Unbreakable Vow to keep you safe, and I might owe him a debt, but it doesn’t matter. He can’t touch you. Ever. If he tries, he drops dead.” Sirius pulled out The Daily Prophet. “This… This is just Malfoy’s way of telling me that he doesn’t need to be the one to threaten my friends. My parents will do it all on their own. There’s a war coming, and anyone less than pureblood will be caught in the crossfire.”Remus’s eyes were wide, shimmering amber in the dark corridor. “You… You made an Unbreakable Vow?”“Yes.”“For me?”“Yes.”“What do you owe Malfoy in return?”“A debt. Like I said. Unspecified and in any matter of his choosing.”“Jesus-fucking-Christ, Sirius.” Remus looked like he was about to collapse in on himself. Reaching for him, so close to touching, Sirius took a step towards him. “What if he asks you to hurt someone? Use an Unforgivable? Or… kill someone?”Sirius Black did not so much as blink. “I’d do it.”His wand might even let him.“Why the fuck would you make a deal like that?”“Same reason you went off on McGonagall. Same reason you asked me to take Mrs. Potter’s offer. Same reason you gathered half of Gryffindor to stand by my side.”Because I’d go to war for you.Remus shook his head. “I’m not worth—““Shut up,” Sirius snapped. “You’re everything, Remus.”Merlin, the chaos and devastation in Remus’s eyes.“I might have asked that hat for Gryffindor. I might be a Marauder, and a proud one at that, but I was raised by Slytherins. I know the games they play, the bargains they make, and despite evidence to the contrary—“ He gestured wildly at his own chest. “—I do know how to win. I will throw any curse, cut any throat, if it means keeping my family safe. Fuck the consequences.”“Sirius—““I don’t regret it. Not one bit. But, if you tell me you would have done anything different if Malfoy had threatened me, I’ll at least try.”Remus couldn’t. Wouldn’t. And Sirius knew it.“The fuck do you mean, if,” Remus whispered. “I wanted to claw Malfoy’s eyes out and leave them for the carrion birds when I saw what he’d done to you. Probably would have, if you hadn’t been bleeding so much.”It was so goddamned feral and said with such honesty that Sirius couldn’t help the insane laugh that bubbled up in his throat. Remus smiled, just a little, but it was enough. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Transfiguration was… interesting. Despite the fact that Sirius was technically still supposed to be in the hospital wing, under Madam Pomfrey’s proverbial lock and key; despite the fact that Sirius had not once drawn his wand—instead opting to wandlessly change not one, but twenty-three feathers into varyingly bizarre and phallic-shaped candlesticks—McGonagall did not look his way once. Sirius was rather peeved about it. Lily kept vanishing his candlesticks, as soon as he could make them. Sirius wasn’t so much as annoyed about that as he was… up for the challenge, so to speak. He flicked his wrist and James’s quill turned into a three-pronged penis sculpture. James let out a delightful and dignified squawk of surprise, but it still didn’t garner McGonagall’s attention. She was currently lecturing a Hufflepuff on the other side of the room. Remus vanished James’s former quill with a flick of his wand. “You could at least try the assignment,” Remus urged. “It’s precision work. Should be a bit more difficult than a candlestick. Even uniquely crafted candlesticks. A pea into a thimble, Sirius. Surely, you—“Sirius twirled his pointer and middle finger and the pea turned into a rather phallic-shaped thimble. Remus rolled his eyes, but at the very least, didn’t vanish it. Technically, it fulfilled all the parameters of the the assignment. “Sirius, what are you—““She’s ignoring me.”“Yes,” Remus agreed. “And that’s probably a good thing.”“Why, though? There’s no reason.”“Do you want her to yell at you?”Sirius thought about it. “Yes. Just because she say me cleaved in two doesn’t mean we still can’t be mortal enemies. Some normalcy would be nice.”“I don’t think any sane person ever wanted to be mortal enemies with Professor McGonagall.”Sirius smirked at him. “Except you, apparently.”Remus flushed. “That was a one time occurrence.”“Really? Because I’d pay good money to—“The bell sounded. Then, and only then, did McGonagall turn her attention to him. “Mr. Black, I’d like you to stay after class.”Remus froze.“Do you think it was the penises?” Sirius whispered.“No, I don’t,” Remus said, eyes locked on McGonagall.James glanced between Sirius and a stone-faced Remus, before muttering, “We’ll catch up with you in History of Magic.”James, Peter, and the rest of Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs filed out of the room. Next to him, Remus didn’t move.Professor McGonagall rounded her desk, then leaned against it, a few paces from Sirius and Remus. She crossed her hands in front of her, and tilted her head. Sirius was fairly certain he’d never seen her lean on anything. He swallowed around the lump in his throat.Despite trying to catch her attention for the entirety of the past hour, he suddenly realised he really, really didn’t want to speak to her.He had nothing to say.“Mr. Lupin, although your loyalty is appreciated, I wish to speak to Mr. Black alone,” McGonagall said.Remus narrowed his eyes, glanced at Sirius, then glared back at McGonagall. “I’m staying.”McGonagall’s expression cracked. Just a little. She was nervous.Sirius wasn’t quite sure what to do with that information.“I assure you, Mr. Lupin, that Mr. Black will be safe. I do, after all, have a duty of care for all my students.” That, apparently, meant something to Remus. Sirius watched as Remus’s amber eyes widened in surprise. “There are things I must discuss with Mr. Black, privately. Though, I have no doubt he will tell you later.”Remus scowled at her.“You may wait right outside the door, Lupin.” It was a dismissal, but still, Remus didn’t move.That is, until Sirius gave him the most subtle of nods. He’d be okay. Probably. What more could she possibly do to him that his family hadn’t done already?Still glaring at McGonagall, Remus rose from his seat, nodded once to Sirius, then left. The second Remus was gone, McGonagall let out a long breath. It made her look younger, frightened even. Her glasses were almost imperceptibly crooked and her pointed hat was at a slightly sharper angle than normal. “I find myself, Mr. Black, faced with a certain number of regrets.”That wasn’t at all what he’d expected her to say. “Um…”“I harbour no illusion that any amount of explanation or pontificating on my part will offer any sort of vindication or justification for my actions, but I believe, at the very least, that you are owed the answer as to why I acted in the manner I did.”Sirius had no clue what was going on. McGonagall closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose, and it was so frighteningly normal that all it only served to demonstrate how visibly uncomfortable she was. “Walburga Black was—is—four years my senior. We attended Hogwarts together, though in rival houses.”“You… what?” Sirius sat up just a bit straighter. He’d never heard much about his mother at Hogwarts, and he had an incredibly difficult time picturing her as an eleven-year-old attending classes, squirming as someone placed the Sorting Hat on her head.Already betrothed to his father. “We were not, as you can imagine, friends.”“Pretty sure she doesn’t have any of those,” Sirius muttered.And, to his utter shock, McGonagall let out a small laugh. It seemed to take some effort to school her face back to neutral. “The war against Grindelwald and his followers never officially came to Hogwarts, but the spirit of it was there, in every corridor, every class, and in the hearts of many professors and students. “Before he defeated Grindelwald, Albus Dumbledore was little more than a brilliant, young idealist amongst the professors. Despite the fame of his name and his house, he had very little sway with the other professors, who tended to be sympathetic towards Grindelwald’s cause. Even after Grindelwald fell, the sentiments remained strong. The professors never did anything, so I and a few friends, well… We may have earned a detention or two for our beliefs, but that’s a story for another time, perhaps.”And one Sirius would very much like to hear.“I saw students expelled, their wands broken, and lives destroyed for no other reason than their impure bloodline. Your mother—though she hardly ever worked alone—was directly responsible for a number of these expulsions. She was cruel and unimaginably inventive when it came to waging her own war against her inferiors. Even against rival purebloods who were not as amenable towards Grindelwald’s ideologies. She had a Weasley legally declared a squib simply because he had a stutter, despite the fact that had obviously received a letter deeming him worthy of Hogwarts already. “I watched Walburga Black and her band of loyal followers commit atrocity after atrocity, while the Headmaster and a majority of the professors stood by and did nothing. Everyone feared the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black as much, if not more than they feared the Dark Wizard himself. Grindelwald could only claim one’s life. Your mother could burn your name, your family, and everything you hold dear to ash.”Merlin. He was well aware of that.McGonagall took in a long breath. “I have never hated anyone more than Walburga Black in my entire life, Dark Wizards be damned.”Me neither. And she gave birth to me, Sirius thought, and barely bit down on his tongue in time to keep from saying it out loud. “All this is to say, Mr. Black, that I have failed you, in every cosmic and cataclysmic way possible.”Sirius was fairly certain that his jaw dropped open. “I knew exactly what kind of monster she was, yet I sent you back there anyway. Even when you asked for my help. And… And it almost cost you your life.”And wasn’t that an alarming way to put it?“Though I know I shall fall woefully short of the debt I owe to you for my error in judgement, I should like to do everything in my power to make amends. I’d like to offer my personal tutelage, in any and all subjects pertaining to Transfiguration and whatever I may know about Defence Against the Dark Arts.”Sirius sat up straight and narrowed his eyes. “You want to keep an eye on me.”McGonagall sighed. “I know you’ve been told this before, Mr. Black, but you are an exceptionally talented young wizard. Even if you use your skills to make… inappropriate sculptures.” Sirius smirked. She had noticed. “Refining and honing such talents can only add to one’s prowess as a wizard. Especially if one were to learn how to use his wand properly.”His dead wand. McGonagall continued, “The fact that additional lessons and time spent contemplating the intricacies of magic may keep you from general mischief and mayhem barely crossed my mind.”Was she… teasing him?Sirius wasn’t sure. “How long will these lessons be?”“One hour, twice a week before curfew,” she replied. She paused for a moment, then added: “Which should still leave you additional time for… marauding.”She was definitely teasing him.Sirius didn’t know how to feel about that. “Until when?”“For as long as you like. Until you graduate from Hogwarts. After, if you wish.” She was babbling, just a bit, but eventually, she settled on, “Until I have nothing more to teach you.”Sirius leaned forward, then dared to ask, “You’ll teach me to become an animagus?”McGonagall hesitated for just a second. “Perhaps. When you’re of age.”And, Merlin, wasn’t that brilliant?Which really only left one thing. “Why me?” he asked, because he had to. Because experience had taught him to recognise when things were too good to be true, when intentions were hidden behind veiled motivations and secret histories. “Guilt can’t account for everything.”McGonagall said simply, “You’re Gryffindor, Mr. Black. You deserve a chance to fight back.”That wasn’t an answer, but it was… something.Ever so slowly, McGonagall rounded her desk. She pushed her glasses up her nose and straightened her hat with a flick of her wrist. Wandless magic. Huh.“I don’t expect a decision now, of course,” McGonagall said. “Talk it over with your friends—with… Lupin—and consider every angle. I’ll be here when you’ve arrived at a conclusion, Mr. Black.”Sirius nodded, then shoved his quill and parchments in his bag. When he’d almost reached the door, McGonagall cleared her throat. He turned. She held his thimble between her two fingers. “It’s a shame about the shape, Black. You almost earned full marks.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Despite Remus’s near-constant pestering and sad puppy-eyes, Sirius refused to tell him what McGonagall had said to him on their hasty walk to History of Magic. Grudgingly, Remus seemed to accept Sirius’s promise of later, on the roof just before Professor Binns materialised form behind the chalkboard. Less than three minutes into class, Remus fell asleep.Reasonably, Sirius knew he should be paying attention to the thrilling tales of the Goblin Wars, but he couldn’t be the least bit bothered today, even for the sake of Remus Lupin. Instead, he spent the hour planning.He needed answers.The second Professor Binns faded once more into the walls, Sirius snagged James Potter by the end of his long scarf and frogmarched him out of the classroom, before promptly shoving him into a broom cupboard down the hall. “Sirius, what the—“Sirius flicked his wrist and locked the door. After a second, James held up his wand and whispered a quick Lumos. “You know,” James said, his face entirely neutral. “I was mostly kidding about your obsession with snogging me. But, if you insist on dragging me into a cupboard—“James puckered his lips and leaned forward.Sirius flicked his wrist, called up a gust of wind, and James promptly landed on his arse. In a bucket. “I don’t want to snog you, arsehole,” Sirius wheezed, laughing so hard he almost doubled over. “Salazar’s tits, Sirius, I was kidding!” James yelped, managing to wiggle his arse free. He stood and brushed off his robes. “Ugh, it feels like I wet myself.”Sirius raised a hand again, but this time James’s eyes went big and he held out his wand at Sirius. “Uh-huh,” James said, eyes wide and glued to Sirius’s fingers. “What do you think you’re doing?”“Drying spell.”“No way. Not that close to my bits. You’ll end up vanishing them.”“Aw, Jamie, you’ll hurt my feelings. I’ll be gentle.”“No.”Sirius shrugged. “Suit yourself.”James wiggled a little, clearly uncomfortable. “Why, exactly, did you drag me in here?”“Oh,” Sirius said. “Because I have a plan.”“And it couldn’t wait until we’re in the common room? Or for Peter and Remus?”“Nope. This is exclusively a Black and Potter operation.”“I’m listening.”Sirius smirked. “We’re gonna break into the Slytherin dorms.”“I’m listening intently.” A maniacal grin spread across James’s face. In the half-light, it looked rather hilarious, really: all shadows and lines and dark features. “Are we getting back at Malfoy? For—“ He gestured at Sirius’s chest.“What? No,” Sirius said. “We won’t be getting back at Malfoy for that. It’s done.”“But—““Done, James.” Because, in war, you have to pick your battles, and Sirius refused to pick one that might end the terms of his Unbreakable Vow. He would not risk Remus.James rolled his eyes. “Okay. Care to tell me why we’re breaking into Slytherin, then?”“Because you need a gift for Evans,” Sirius replied. “And I need detention.”“Um. What?” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “You know,” James said, “as much as I am generally a fan of your particular brand of madness, Black, I have to admit that this is probably the stupidest plan I’ve ever heard.”“Shhh.”“I still don’t understand how you expect us to get in there.”“Same way Evans did.”“And how did Evans get in there, exactly?”Sirius had a hunch, but still hadn’t figured that out for sure, but he wasn’t about to tell James that. It’d taken quite some time and no small amounts of pandering and bribery to get James here in the first place.
“You want to invite Snape?!” James sounded more like a banshee than anything human. “To Gryffindor tower?!”
“We’ll blindfold him and… strike a deal with him. Slytherins like making deals. It’ll be fine.”
James leaned close, peering deep into Sirius’s eyes in the near darkness. “Have you gone mad? Look, I know the holidays were shit, but I’m fairly certain you’ve completely lost—“
Sirius cut him off. “Evans is friends with Snape. Snape—and believe me, only Merlin fucking knows why—means something to her. Invite Snape and Evans will be happy. If Evans is even slightly less inclined towards throttling you, she might actually figure out you’re a decent bloke.”
James’s eyes were a little bit wild. “Snape’s in love with her, Sirius! He announced it to the whole bloody school!”
“Yes, but Evans isn’t in love with him.”
“How do you know that?”
“She’s my friend, James,” Sirius said, because it really was that obvious.
James rolled his eyes in the most over-dramatic way possible. “How do you know she won’t fall in love with him if he’s there?”Because I know how his story will end, Sirius didn’t say.
Because it was always the same for people like Snape.
They could never taste the bitter-sweet rot of power and superiority until it had already leeched into every crevice of their soul.
“Because Evans is too smart to fall for a Slytherin, James,” Sirius said, instead. “But she might be dumb enough to at least like you if you’d just pull your head out of your arse. Green is wrong colour for your complexion, Potter.”
Even in the darkness of the broom cupboard, Sirius watched with bated amusement as James flushed a glorious, Gryffindor red.
“She wants to save him, James,” Sirius said. Even though she can’t. “Show her you’re brave enough to let her try.”
Reluctantly, James nodded. “Fine. Let’s go talk to Snape, then. And get you your detention. For some fucking reason.”
James took half a step back as a group of fourth year Slytherins walked past them, nearly right into Sirius, who almost stumbled out from under the invisibility cloak in his effort to avoid James’s flailing limbs. “Oi!” Sirius snapped. “We can’t get caught until we’re inside!”“And why exactly is that?”“I need detention from Slughorn, not Filch.”“Why—““Shut up, Potter, they’re saying the password.”As subtly as he could manage whilst still avoiding contact with James under the invisibility cloak, Sirius waved a silent amplifying spell at the Slytherins. One after another, the whispered words echoed back to Sirius and James.
Magica virtus.
The enormous carving of a snake slithered aside to reveal a door and hissed as, one by one, the Slytherins entered their common room. “What’s that mean?” James whispered.A chill shot up Sirius’s spine. “Magic is might. It was Grindelwald’s anthem to his followers.”“Well, that’s encouraging.” The stone snake once more coiled around the door until it faded back into the walls of the dungeon. “Let’s go.”Together, nearly in sync to keep the invisibility cloak in place, they crept forward until they were standing under the giant, stone snake. Its gleaming emerald eyes glared down at them, all-seeing, all-knowing, invisibility cloak be damned. James and Sirius stood in front of it, shoulder to shoulder, for nearly two whole minutes. “Go on then, Black. Say it.”Sirius turned on him, sharply. “Why do I have to say it?”“I don’t want to.” James shrugged. “It’s Grindelwald’s anthem. Bad luck.”“But you’re okay with me saying it?”“Better chance of it working, if you say it. You’re more Slytherin than I am.”“Rude.” But true.Sirius said the words. Just like with the Slytherins, the snake slithered aside to reveal the stone door. “Merlin,” James huffed. “I was kind of hoping that wouldn’t work.”“Looks like you’ll get your snog after all, Potter.”“Lovely.”Instead of a staircase or a brightly-lit common room, the stone door opened to reveal a long, winding corridor. Mildew and drips of pungent lake-water oozed out of every crack and crevice of the wall not draped in green and silver tapestries. “This is nauseating,” James muttered. “How do they live like this? It’s freezing.”Sirius had no answer to that. “Woah.” James stopped suddenly at the mouth of the corridor that suddenly opened to a wide, spacious common room nearly three times the size of Gryffindor’s. “That’s a giant fucking squid.”The entire far wall seemed to be made of glass and looked out to what could only be the bottom of the Black Lake. The squid lurked in the murky shadows, half out of sight, but several of its tentacles stretched across the glass, leaving smears of slime and… fish guts. Stalactites interspersed with floating lanterns hung from the high ceiling, nearly twenty meters above their heads. Couches, cushions, and lounge chairs circled a raging bonfire in the middle of the common room that, although lit, did little to nothing to warm the chill in Sirius’s bones. Several students lounged about reading or playing together on one of the many Wizarding Chess sets scattered around the atrium. The Carrows, both of them slouching low on opposite couches, seemed to be engaged in throwing small, silver daggers at a picture of Dumbledore apparently cut out of The Daily Prophet.How close had this been to being his second home, his sanctuary from the world? Was it even possible for a cold and dank dungeon with its very own giant squid to be safe? Or, would it have simply become another realm in his nightmares, if he had been sorted into Slytherin?Would it be that for Regulus?Sirius shuddered and tried to focus. He had a job to do. He scanned the room once, twice, then once more just to be sure. No Malfoy. Or Narcissa.Apparently, the universe, too, agreed it’d been rather harsh with Sirius Black as of late. He certainly deserved a reprieve.“Snape’s not here,” James whispered, startling Sirius more than he’d like to admit. “Where do you figure—““Left,” Sirius said, figuring if the the boys’ dorm was to the left in both Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, it’d more than likely be the same in Slytherin. Sirius veered to the left, forcing James to follow close behind to stay hidden under the invisibility cloak. Once out of sight from the common room, however, James stopped abruptly and yanked the cloak off of them. “Oi! My hair!” Sirius yelped, his hands flying to his head, trying to pat down the static mess. James’s hair looked frighteningly no different than it ever did. Apparently, that hair potion was good for something after all. “Can’t let Snivellus know about the cloak,” James said, tucking it away in his bag. Sirius shrugged. It would make future pranks rather difficult. Particularly if Snape snitched to a professor and had the cloak confiscated. The hallway was lined on one side with every assortment of Slytherin memorabilia one could think of: from posters of Quidditch stars, to ancient parchments depicting famous potion makers. Sirius kept his nose to the ground as they passed a seventy-odd-year-old article on Phineas Nigellus Black that showed Sirius’s great-great grandfather shaking hands with the then-Minister of Magic as he accepted his role as headmaster of Hogwarts. The same article hung in a silver frame over the mantle in the library at Grimmauld Place. Sirius had spent many afternoons debating the consequences of just throwing it in the fire. It’d surely be worth it, just to see one of his vile ancestors burn. James stopped in front of Phineas Nigellus. “Is that—““Yes,” Sirius grumbled, but kept moving. James hurried to catch up. “Am I related to him?”Huh. Sirius paused. “Some distant grandfather, I think. Arcturus Black, Charis’s father, was his youngest son.”“Weird,” said James, and, yeah, it was. It was almost impossible for Sirius to imagine that James Potter, fairy-tale prince, could possibly come from the same line of inbred pureblood tyrants that he did. They rounded a corner, only to be met with a line of doors, each one inlayed with silver trim and a serpent door knocker. They were numbered, one to seven, all the way to the end of the hallway that appeared to be another window to the bottom of the Black Lake. James nodded to the closest door, marked with a number one. “Figure he’s in there?”“Here’s to hoping.” Sirius reached for the door handle. The inside of the Slytherin first year boys’ dorm was the exact opposite of its counterpart in Gryffindor in almost every way. For one, there were posh, green curtains hanging over each of the twenty-some beds around the room. Each bed was partitioned off with mahogany folding screens for apparent added privacy. A great, skin rug—probably made out of some magical creature too precious and rare to mention—was spread across the floor in the middle of the room. Next to the bathroom at the back, there seemed to be an entire potions station, complete with an active burner. “Merlin,” James whispered. “I didn’t realise there were so many first year Slytherins.”“You should have seen Ravenclaw,” Sirius said, remembering the bunkbeds. “Which one is his?” James said, peering around the first partition at an empty bed. From the back of the room, there was a rustle of fabric, then: “Rookwood? Is that you?”Severus Snape stepped out from behind his own partition, wearing—surprisingly—a black set of pyjamas that were only slightly worn around the edges. “I found him,” Sirius deadpanned.“What the fuck.” Snape turned a brilliant shade of scarlet, his eyes flashing almost black as he drew his wand.Sirius disarmed him with a flick of his wrist a heartbeat later. It wasn’t so much an Expelliarmus as it was a sudden and unexpected gust of wind.With all the dexterity of any decent Quidditch player, James caught Snape’s wand mid-air, before quickly scanning the rest of the dorm.Snape looked rather incensed, but it only lasted a second. A cruel sneer spread across his face. “You know, there’s a rumour going around about you, Black,” Snape said, his eyes tracking down to Sirius’s chest as he stalked closer. “I didn’t put much stock in it. Lucius does like to brag. But, perhaps—“Snape reached out a hand.Quick as lightening, James stepped between them, his wand pointed at Snape’s throat. “Touch him, Snivellus, and I swear to Merlin, baldness will be the least of your worries.”Sirius hid a smile. He loved the chaotic, violent streak in his fairy-tale prince. But, right now, it was counterproductive. “Wand down, James,” Sirius said evenly. “And give Snape his back. We come in peace.”Both James and Snape stared dubiously at Sirius, until Sirius snatched Snape’s wand out of James’s hand and held it out. Cautiously, Snape took it. “Now,” Sirius continued, eyes fixed on Snape. “You know I can disarm you with a flick of my wrist. You know I have a valiant knight here ready to hex you into next month. And we all know you can’t throw a decent punch. So, let’s all just stand down and pretend to be civilised.”Words he’d never thought he’d say.“What do you want?” Snape sneered.James smirked, his tone suddenly light and affable. “What are you doing on the thirtieth, Severus?”Sirius raised an eyebrow. James didn’t even hesitate, going straight from Snivellus to Severus, as though they were the oldest of friends. It was almost… haunting. Snape stiffened. “The… thirtieth?”“Fancy a party?” James asked.“With you?” Snape sounded as though he’d rather die. “For Evans?”It was at this point that Severus Snape turned a violent shade of red and Sirius had to cough to hide the laughter that suddenly burst from his throat. “Yes, Snape,” Sirius said, with just a hint of a teasing note in his voice. “We’re throwing a party—““—And we thought you’d want to come,” James finished.“To a Gryffindor party?”“Well, Evans is a Gryffindor,” James said. “So, yes.”“In Gryffindor tower?”“Where else?” James huffed.“A party for Lily in Gryffindor tower on the thirtieth?”James and Sirius exchanged a glance. It was quite possible that Snape was just an idiot. “What exactly about any of that is confusing to you?” Sirius asked, keeping his voice as neutral as possible in these trying times. Snape seemingly ignored him. “And you want me there?”“Merlin, Jamie, I think we broke him.”Snape narrowed his eyes. “That’s Lily’s birthday. This is a birthday party.”Sirius pinched the bridge of his nose, in what he was beginning to realise was a habit of exasperation he seemed to have picked up from McGonagall. What a nightmare-inducing thought that was.“Yes,” James said, his voice somehow infinitely more patient than Sirius felt. “We’d like to formally invite you, Severus Snape, to Lily Evans’s birthday party on January 30 in the Gryffindor common room. Any more questions?”Snape crossed his arm, a frown cutting across his face. “What gave you the impression that I’d ever trust you?”“One—” Sirius stepped forward, mirroring Snape’s stance. “—Evans is my friend, Snape. I wouldn’t do anything to break her trust. Ever.”Snape scoffed. Sirius bit back the retort on the tip of his tongue. “Two, she’s your friend. She’d want you there.”Something like hope flashed across Snape’s black eyes for just a second, before it choked and died back into his usual sour expression. “And three—“ Sirius paused. He hadn’t discussed the specifics with James. “We’ll swear on our magic that we won’t break into Slytherin again for pranking purposes.”“What?” James said.Snape scowled. “That’s blackmail.”Sirius smirked. He was so glad Snape picked up on that. Slytherins—occasionally—were good for something. Poor James Potter looked hopelessly confused. “If I don’t go—““And agree to our conditions of a truce,” Sirius added.Snape’s eyes flashed. It’d be terrifying if he posed even a fraction of a threat. “If I don’t attend your party and agree to your conditions, you and your ilk will have free rein of the Slytherin common room for general… mischief and mayhem.”“Oh, that’s brilliant,” James whispered, and Sirius winked at him. It was brilliant, because there was so much Sirius could do to make the Slytherins miserable without directly crossing Snape or Malfoy. His fingers twitched at the thought. “What exactly are your conditions, Black,” Snape said through gritted teeth. Easy. He ticked them off on his fingers. “January 30 every year will be a day of truce between us, for Evans’s sake. We’ll swear on our magic, every Marauder and you, that there will be no foul play between us on that day. In addition, from henceforth, the Gryffindor and Slytherin common rooms are neutral territory. No inter-house rivalries or general mischief and mayhem may be performed by the visiting party.”James nodded along. “Sounds fair.”Snape rolled his eyes. “I’m assuming I won’t be allowed into Gryffindor tower whenever I choose?”James blanched.Sirius didn’t blink. “We change our password about once a week, Snape. It’s rather tedious, really.”He was almost one hundred percent certain that the same could not be said of Slytherin. Not with a password like that. Somebody might have to do something about that.Snape glowered and looked as though he’d rather like to pull out his greasy hair, one clump at a time. “Fine,” he groused. “I’ll go. But I won’t enjoy it.”Probably not, but Sirius had a hunch he’d fake it for Evans’s sake. “Not to worry,” James said. “There’ll be butterbeer.”Sirius raised his right hand, allowing the magic to dance between his fingers in little bursts of red sparks. “Up for swearing your oath now, Snape?” he asked. “Or are you scared?”Not to be outdone, Snape drew his wand once more. “Raise your damn wands.”James was momentarily elated to learn that Snape’s middle name was Tobias, only to realise that he had to subsequently admit to his own middle name was Fleamont in order to fulfil his part of the oath. It took all of five minutes.“Great. Perfect. Thanks, Snape—“ James started.“I’m doing this for Lily, not for you.” Both Sirius and James forced themselves to ignore the blood traitor that Snape tacked on to the end of that. They still had business, after all. “Now, Snivellus,” Sirius said, his tone far too light. “If you could please inform Professor Slughorn of our presence in the Slytherin dorms, that’d be lovely.”Snape’s expression was worth the price of any stupid oath. “What?” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Slughorn placed both hands on his desk and very nearly careened forward; if not for his rather large midsection, Sirius was fairly confident that he might have face-planted on his own desk. All in all, Slughorn did look rather peeved. Or, as though he was trying to be peeved, but it seemed to be quite a bit of effort. His face was red and splotchy and he kept wheezing between every few words.To his credit, he had apparently run all the way through the winding tunnels of the Slytherin dungeons to catch Black and Potter in the act. Sirius had thought Slughorn was going to faint when he’d burst into the first year boys’ dormitory only to find Sirius and James sitting casually on the unnamed-magical-creature-skin rug, pretending to play a game of Exploding Snap that they’d nicked from one of the trunks. Now, James and Sirius sat next to each other on a bench in the Potions classroom, feigning guilt. “How is it, exactly, that not one, but three Gryffindor first years managed to sneak into the dungeons in the span of a few months?” Slughorn wheezed. James and Sirius shared an unimpressed glance. Then, almost as if they’d rehearsed this, James said, “Probably because of that super-secret password of yours.”Sirius couldn’t have been prouder of his conniving, slightly evil prince. Step One, after earning his desired detention: Get rid of Slughorn. “Yes,” Sirius added. “Your not-at-all-problematic-super-secret password.”He lets the sarcasm drip into his words. Slughorn loosened his tie and gulped. “Yes. Well, you see, the prefects choose the password. I have nothing—““Makes sense,” Sirius said.“Does sound like Malfoy.” James nodded serenely. Then, to Sirius: “Reckon Dumbledore knows?”“Hm. I highly doubt it. Doesn’t seem to the type to be exceptionally pleased if a certain house were using the motto of his arch-enemy as a password to their common room.”“Sounds like insubordination.”Sirius shot Slughorn a winning smile. “And I assume that any professor with any knowledge of such a password might find themselves in a spot of trouble, should the headmaster find out.”Slughorn’s red face turned a sallow, sickly colour. He rounded his desk, tightened his tie, and made for the door. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, there’s somewhere I need to be.” He spun in a full circle, surveying the pristine classroom. There hadn’t exactly been that many classes since the holidays for potions accidents to accumulate the usual gunk around the room. “Scrub… something. Twenty points from Gryffindor, and the like. Leave when you’re done. Report back at the same time tomorrow.”With that, Slughorn left, slamming the door behind him. Sirius waited all of three seconds before clapping his hands together and rushing for the door to Slughorn’s office. “Right. Let’s get to it, Potter. He won’t be gone forever.”Step Two: Break into Slughorn’s office.Sirius flicked his wrist and the office door swung open. Not even locked. Sirius barked out a shout of victory before immediately diving into the mismatched pile of school records on the dusty shelves.James followed, slowly, his hands in his pockets and eyes on the door to the classroom. After assuring himself that it was going to remain closed for the foreseeable future, he took a spot next to Sirius and grabbed the nearest tome, not really glancing at it at all.“How’d you know that would work?” James asked.Frankly, Sirius could have asked James the same question. James had gone along with it, after all. Sirius waved his hand to clear away some of the dust surrounding them in a cloud. “Because I happen to know that Slughorn is the worst breed of Slytherin.”“Fat and incompetent?”“Ruthlessly selfish.”James hummed in response, cracking the spine of his tome, which seemed to be nothing more than an ancient potions book written in… hieroglyphics. James traced a few of the pictures with his finger. “Think Malfoy will get his badge taken when Slughorn tells Dumbledore about the password?”Sirius rifled through a loose stack of parchments. Seventh year potions essays, apparently. “He’s not going to speak to Dumbledore.”James’s head jerked up to look at him. “What do you mean? ‘Course he is.”Another stack. Merlin. More potions essays. “He’s going to speak to Malfoy. To get Malfoy change the password before anyone else notices.”“Why, exactly?”The next stack of essays belonged to fifth year Slytherins. Though it was far amiss from what he was actually searching for, Sirius searched through them meticulously. “Because we’re Gryffindors. Expendable. Malfoy’s not. Slughorn won’t burn his relationship with Malfoy if he can avoid it.”“I don’t follow.”With another shout of victory, Sirius held up Malfoy’s essay, with his annoyingly perfect handwriting. Thorough and well researched, it was sure to earn an Outstanding. With a wild smirk and a twirl of his fingers, Sirius set the essay on fire. Vanishing the pile of ash, he continued, “Pretend we’re good, rule-following Gryffindors for just a moment. Or, at the very least, Gryffindors with a bit of an ego and a strong sense of justice.”“Sounds like us. Carry on.”Sirius shuffled over to the next bookshelf. Enrolment records. Getting warmer. He gestured mindlessly as he continued. “We notice an injustice—say a particular password to a certain house’s common room is more like an oath of fealty to a fallen, fascist regime—and we tell a professor. That professor chooses to do nothing about it. We, being noble and righteous Gryffindors, decide to take the matter to the Headmaster.”James was still idly flipping through his book of Egyptian potions. “Okay.”Sirius’s eyes flew over the leather bindings. Financial records, donation records, potion inventories…“Except said professor has already erased all evidence of whatever crime or misdemeanour we have accused him of, having already addressed the crime with the offending prefect. Now, we’re in a tricky spot, because we’re making wild and unfounded accusations about a supposedly-respected professor to the headmaster as well as admitting we violated the school rules by breaking into another house’s common room. Meanwhile, said professor walks away unscathed.”James slammed his book shut.“Huh. I take it we’re not going to Dumbledore, then.”Employment records, Ministry reports, O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. scores spanning several generations… “Definitely not.”“You’re bloody terrifying when you think like a Slytherin,” James said.That made Sirius pause.“Believe me, I know.”James stood and brushed the dirt from his robes, before drawing his wand and muttering a cleaning spell over the both of them. “You do realise this will mean we won’t be able to break into Slytherin again, if the password’s changed.”“It’s not like it was super hard to find out the first time, Potter,” Sirius muttered, though there was no bite to his words. House-elf contracts, medical reports—“Merlin, finally!” Sirius exclaimed. “Here it is.”Sirius dragged the large tome free of the shelf and held it over his head in triumph. His arms wobbled, just a little. It was slightly heavier than he expected, and Sirius was still slightly more injured than he’d like to admit.“Hogwarts Detention Records, 1800-1950.” James glowered. “That’s why we had to get detention?! Sirius, we’re not even in there!”Sirius rolled his eyes, then lugged the book over to Slughorn’s desk and cracked it open, flipping quickly towards the end. “I know that. Slughorn keeps recent detention records on cards until the end of each term when he selects and unlucky student to transcribe them into the current tome. That’s how it’s always done. Andromeda said Ted had to do it several times before Slughorn finally decided he liked him.”“Okay, fine.” James crossed his arms. “I still don’t understand what we’re looking for.”“1947. Ish.” Sirius flipped, scanned, then flipped again. James, though emanating waves of exasperation, crowded close enough to peer over Sirius’s shoulder.He turned the page, and his heart skipped. In neat, formal writing, at the top of the page: Minerva McGonagall, 2nd Year, Gryffindor. Step Three: Revel in manic victory.Below it, listed in increasingly erratic handwriting, dates and descriptions.Sirius laughed, elated and half-crazed, as he scanned the page, and the next, and the next. He couldn’t possibly be expected to choose a favourite.
Sept 3, M. McGonagall set booby trap outside Slytherin dungeon. Small explosion. No injuries.
Oct 5, M. McGonagall hijacked Sonoros spell for inappropriate Quidditch commentary. Many expletives.
Nov 7, M. McGonagall and co. staged protest outside headmaster’s office over expelled student. Mildly inconvenienced everyone.
Scratch that. On the third page, Sirius found his favourite.Mar 10, M. McGonagall punched W. Black in face. No apparent reason. “Holy fucking shit,” James breathed, annunciating each word. “Is this… McGonagall?! Our Minnie?! How could she never tell us?!”Sirius couldn’t force the wild grin from his face if he had a wand to his throat.Then, at the very bottom of McGonagall’s last page of offences, scrawled hastily and with such force it’d left a noticeable indent on the page:
M. McGonagall, having amassed a total of 63 detentions in a single calendar year, hereby sets the record for the most detentions from a single student ever recorded in the history of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. May her record never be broken.
James jabbed his finger at the last sentence. “That sounds like a bloody challenge. What do you say, Black? Think we can break her record?”“Fuck, yes. I’d say we’re off to a pretty good start.” Sirius couldn’t stop the laughter that bubbled from his throat. “Now, go find some parchment. I need to make a copy of this so I can frame it and hang it in the dorms.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 5, 1972
It was well after midnight by the time James and Sirius finally made their way back to the Gryffindor dorms. Though Sirius was bone-weary, in pain, and thoroughly exhausted, it’d been worth it to sort through McGonagall’s detention records. She’d never quite matched her second year record, but she was by no means a saint in her later years at Hogwarts, after Sirius’s mother had long-since graduated. James had even managed to hastily scrub a brand-new cauldron, so as not to arouse suspicion, before Slughorn had returned. With as much reverence as they deserved, Sirius carefully placed the parchment copies of McGonagall’s detention records in his trunk, vowing to transfigure frames for them in the morning. They deserved a place of honour, where everyone could bask in the glory of the mere thought of a young, rebellious Minerva McGonagall. Noticing that both his and Remus’s beds were empty, Sirius snagged his duvet and made his way to the cracked window, his exhaustion notwithstanding. He felt as though he’d hardly seen Remus all day. Sirius missed him, the ache in his bones be damned.Mindful of the new scars on his chest and the ice on the roof, Sirius carefully took his place next to Remus and leaned against him, for just a second, before waving a heating charm over the both of them. Remus’s breath glistened in the air, crystallising and vanishing with each exhale. Moonlight danced across the scars on his face and his eyes nearly outshone the stars above them. Merlin, Sirius couldn’t look away.Remus reached into the pocket of his robe, beneath his own thick blanket, and pulled out a letter. Sirius froze in the dim light, when he recognised the Black seal. “This came for you while you were out,” Remus explained.“Got detention,” Sirius managed, eyes glued on the letter. Any elation he’d felt at McGonagall’s detention record vanished in a heartbeat.“I figured.” Remus nudged him, eyes flicking to the letter, hanging in the nether-space between them. “Anyway, I intercepted this owl before anyone else could see, in case it’s bad news. It’s not hexed or cursed or anything. I checked. Several times.”“Thank you,” Sirius breathed, before reaching out with a shaky hand to take the letter. He broke the seal as Remus cast a Lumos.
S—
Mother told me about her bargain with Alphard.
You did the right thing, Sirius, and you need not beg forgiveness for your choices.
I hope this reaches you, because I have an inkling it might be the last time I’m able to write you without Mother noticing. That particular term of the agreement is rather… inconvenient.
Please write to Andromeda and Ted on my behalf, to make sure they’re okay. I do not regret the choices I made, Sirius, and I pray to whatever god hasn’t yet abandoned you and me that you don’t regret yours, even for a second.
The stars will fall where they may, brother, and all we can do is destroy the riddles they leave in their wake.
I love you, to the very end. I swear to you that we will see each other soon. Until then, be brave, Sirius.
R.A.B.
A single tear fell, unbidden, from Sirius’s eye, soaking into the parchment, right next to his brother’s signature. He scrubbed a hand over his face, drew in a shaky breath, and folded the letter back up. “Regulus?” Remus asked, softly.Sirius could only manage a nod. “Is he all right?” “No,” Sirius breathed, because how could Regulus possibly be all right, bound as he was by their mother’s chains? “There’s a war coming, Remus.”Gravely, Remus said, “I’ve heard.”“My parents, Malfoy, Tom-fucking-Riddle. They’re all part of it.” He pulled the duvet tighter around himself. “We’re fucked.”Remus was silent for a long, nearly infinite moment. “What of the Dark Creatures?”Sirius froze, Malfoy’s threat echoing back to the forefront of his waking nightmares. “What of them?” he asked, carefully.Remus fiddled with the frayed edge of his robes. “What happens to them, when the Lestrange Doctrine passes?”“It won’t pass.“ The lie tasted bittersweet on his tongue.“It will. And you know it.” Merlin, did he ever. He’d known his father and Mr. Tom Riddle would win this particular battle long before Malfoy sent him that damned article. The Blacks never threw their lots in with the losing side. Remus hangs his head, defeated. “What happens to them, Siri, when they are forbidden an education and forced to register with a government who wants their blood and hearts for potions experiments? What happens with the next bill, or the next, that prevents them from marrying or owning land? Where do the monsters turn when their home and hearts are stolen from them?”“They’ll have a choice,” Sirius said, his voice as cold and as distant as the stars above their heads. “Either submit to the whims and wiles of the Ministry, or face their own extinction.”There were tears tracking down Remus’s face, ethereal waterlines that mapped out his scars. “It is cruelest hand fate can cast, to be left with a choice like that,” Sirius whispered.Remus bowed his head, an unbidden, unnatural fury leeching into his voice. “Maybe not. Maybe they deserve it. They’re still monsters.”“No. No, Remus, they’re not.” He’d never said something like that before, so reckless and contrary to everything he was raised to believe. It was liberating, a gasp of fresh air after eons of drowning. “Some are born. Some are made. Very few have a choice in who or what they are. And none of them deserve the hand they were dealt.”Sirius reached out his hand, oblivious to the cold, and hooked his pinky with Remus’s. “Every monster needs a hand to hold, fate be damned. You and I should know that better than anyone.”Agony coursed through him, like a living, breathing ocean of fire, but still, Sirius held on. Remus was the one to pull away, and when he did, Sirius gave a full body shudder, gasping for breath. For a moment, he thought he’d dive into that oblivion—raging, burning, on the fall from the cosmos, to the Nothing Place, where stars go to die—if only to taste the agonising fire of Remus’s touch for one second more.Perhaps Sirius had lost his mind entirely. It wasn’t entirely outside the realm of possibility.Minutes later, when Sirius had once again caught his breath, Remus whispered, “Thank you.”“For what?”“For saying that.”Sirius paused, unsure at what Remus was getting at. “Why?”“Because you’re right. Maybe things would have been different if someone had told Frankenstein’s monster that he was loved. Maybe they’d all have earned a happy ending.”And Merlin, Remus’s words followed him into oblivion.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
JANUARY 5, 1972
He awoke to moon-silver eyes and curtains of raven-black hair—that was just starting to be what one such as Walburga Black might consider of improper length—hanging over his face. He inhaled deeply, taking in the scent of dittany and starlight and…Magic. “You talk in your sleep. You said my name.” Much to Sirius’s apparent delight and amazement, Remus Lupin felt himself turn bright red. It was way too goddamned early for this. “Did you sleep at all?” Remus groaned into his pillow, tucking it under his chest and rolling onto his stomach to block out the light. There wasn’t much of it—far too little streaming in from the open window that led to the roof for it to be even remotely close to breakfast. They’d either forgotten to pull the curtains when they’d made their way inside last night, or Sirius was attempting to systematically drive Remus mad. Dealer’s choice, really, on that one. Sirius wiggled around on the bed, shuffled the pillows between them until he was sitting up and leaning against the headboard. “No,” Sirius said, his tone bright and chipper. “I figured I spent most of the last two weeks unconscious, so I’ve more than hit my quota for sleep. Henceforth, I shan’t be needing to sleep.”It was entirely too early for the use of the word shan’t.Somehow—miraculously—Remus managed to raise his head a little. “Nightmares?” Remus deadpanned.Sirius’s silence was more than telling.Not to be deterred or let darkness settle between them, Sirius waved his hand. “Were you dreaming about me, Remus? Was I wearing clothes?”Remus wanted to die.He had been dreaming about Sirius. In fact, there’d hardly been a night in the last two months—outside the full moon, that is—that he hadn’t dreamed of Sirius. For the most part, there seemed to have been clothes involved. Generally speaking.(There were exceptions to every rule. Remus was only human. Mostly.)“How’re your scars?” Remus shot back, because all’s fair at half-six in the morning.Sirius rolled his eyes and glared at him. “Fine.”“Liar.”With a huff, Sirius raised his shirt. Remus lifted his head off the pillow and squinted a little to get a better look. The green oozing bits had gone and Remus could no longer smell even a trace of infection. Most of the scars had scabbed over, which had to twinge with any sort of movement, but they looked significantly better than even yesterday morning. Still, a pit formed in Remus’s stomach at the sight of them. When the wolf scarred him like that, Remus tended to heal in a few days—faster, if he applied dittany—but with Sirius, it’d take weeks. Longer still, for the scars to fade to silver. Christ, if he ever got his teeth around Malfoy’s throat…“All right, calm down,” Sirius said, before lowering his shirt, and it was only then that Remus realised he’d been growling. He’d been doing that a lot lately. Mr. Hyde needed a tighter leash. “I applied dittany before you woke up,” Sirius continued. “Downed the last of the pain potion, too. Probably need to nick more of that.”Remus hmmm’d, noncommittally. He preferred to only commit high crimes and misdemeanours when the sun was up. Though he could probably be convinced for Sirius’s pain potion. Speaking of high crimes and misdemeanours…“What’d you have detention for? You never said.” Of course, because there’d been far more important tragedies to contend with. But, now, in the early light of dawn, a mad and reckless grin broke across Sirius’s face as he launched into the tale of breaking into Slytherin, meeting with Snape, and—“McGonagall has the record?!” Remus sat up in bed, his exhaustion forgotten. “No fucking way.”Sirius gave him a blank look, flicked his wrist, and three sheets of parchment came zooming in through the hangings, landing on the pillow between them. “Christ,” Remus muttered, perusing the list. “This is amazing.”
Jan 2. M. McGonagall hexed all of Slytherin table to sing in operatic tones when speaking. Infuriated everyone.
After a minute, Remus looked up at Sirius, who leaned back against the headboard, looking smug. “Why, exactly, did you need this? I mean, of course, we’ll hang it in a place of reverence and take copious notes for future endeavours, but why did you go looking for her detention record in the first place?”Sirius’s face sobered, just a hair. “McGonagall offered to tutor me yesterday.”Remus felt his face scrunch up in confusion. “What? Why? You’re not failing. Actually, I think you’re top of our class.”“Don’t tell Evans,” Sirius said with a wink, before his face fell again. He toyed with the edge of his shirt. “McGonagall felt guilty, I think. About…” Sirius gestured at his chest. “I think she apologised to me, Remus. Or, tried to anyway.”Remus nodded once and bit back another growl. “Good. She needed to.”Sirius fidgeted a little, then absently rubbed the spot above his heart. With every iota of hatred he had in his bones, Remus cursed the words carved into Sirius’s skin. “She said she knew my mother. Hated her, even.” Remus looked up sharply, but Sirius refused to meet his eyes. “I’m not exactly in a position in which I can accept things like that at face value. Especially when my mother is involved,” Sirius explained. “Apologies. Confessions of guilt… They’re just words, Remus. Stories and justifications. Whispers in the dark and half-forgotten memories. They don’t mean anything.”Remus gestured at the detention records. “You needed proof.”“It would seem,” Sirius said slowly, “that the stories are true. McGonagall waged war against my mother and the purebloods.”“So what does that mean for you? Will you take her up on her offer?”“I don’t know. I don’t know what she’s planning on teaching me, either. Or why. Guilt doesn’t account for everything. I’m so tired of being a pawn on the chessboard.” Sirius was silent for a moment. “If I did accept, there’d be conditions. She’d have to agree.”Remus nodded. “For what it’s worth, conditions or no, I think you should accept.”The words shocked Remus almost as much as they did Sirius. Sirius’s eyebrows went up.“I didn’t realise you were McGonagall’s fan at the moment.”“I’m not. I hate her for sending you home, especially when she knew what would happen. And despite having recently gained a new respect of her—“ Remus gestured at the detention records. “—I’m not saying you should trust her unconditionally. That being said, she’s a brilliant witch with a world of knowledge. It might be.. fun.”That last word came out sounding more like a question than a statement. “I’ll think about it,” Sirius conceded. Then, “Now. How ‘bout breakfast?”Remus groaned into his pillow. He might be awake—sort of—but he very much dreaded the idea of actually getting out of bed. “Only if there’s coffee.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius was playing with his wand.Which sounded so startlingly like a euphemism in Remus’s head that he very nearly snorted his coffee. All things considered, it probably would have been a highly efficient means in which to get the caffeine directly into his bloodstream. Sirius was simultaneously trying to eat a plate of eggs, unroll a scrap of parchment, tie his hair back with his wand, and write something on the parchment with a brand new quill.“Need a hand?” Remus asked, with both of his hands firmly occupied in holding his mug of coffee as close to his mouth as possible. Sirius shovelled a spoonful of eggs into his mouth and glared at Remus, before tossing his wand in the middle of the table and rifling around in his bag. “Have you got another one of those magic Muggle quills that produce their own ink? I think my dear mother confiscated the one I had.”Remus hummed around his mouthful of coffee, then reached in his bag and handed over a ballpoint pen. Sirius let out a triumphant cry and carelessly tossed his quill over his shoulder, before immediately beginning scrawling on the parchment. Not really thinking too much about it, Remus reached out for Sirius’s wand. It felt heavy in his hand, ice cold to the touch. It was perfectly straight and rigid, and when Remus held it up, he could just catch a trace of the musty, dark scent of the Whomping Willow. Absently, Remus traced a finger up and down the handle of Sirius’s wand.“What do the runes mean?” he asked, tracing over the ornate carvings.“No clue,” Sirius replied, furiously scratching something out. “How does one ask if the love of one’s life is still breathing?”Remus looked up. “Are you writing Andromeda?”Sirius nodded, a frown etched into his features. “Some… things happened at Christmas dinner. Bad shit. And ‘Hey, ‘Dromeda, is your boyfriend alive? Regulus says he’s sorry for almost killing him, by the way,’ really doesn’t sound to great.”“Ted’s alive,” Remus said. “I met him—and Andromeda—a few days ago in Hogsmeade. The shop’s gone, but they’re both fine. They’re going to elope.” Sirius blinked at him several times. “Um. Glad to hear they’re safe. I have several questions—all of them pressing—but none more important than how the fuck did you manage to sneak to Hogsmeade without telling me?”“There’s been a lot going on,” Remus whined, but launched into an explanation of his adventure to Hogsmeade. Luckily, Sirius seemed to be hungry enough for details on his cousin and her fiancé/probably-husband-by-now that he didn’t seem to catch Remus’s vague and purposeful avoidance of the actual means by which he and Lily had arrived in Hogsmeade.That was a secret for later, when whispers of mayhem and mischief were afoot.“She said she’d write you when it was safe,” Remus finished.Sirius nodded and tucked his scratched-out letter back in his bag. “Thank Merlin they’re okay. I was… Shit, Remus, it was bad.”“I know. She… may have mentioned what Regulus did.”Sirius’s face fell. “It wasn’t his fault. He was trying to save me. Save all of you. He was just… so damned Slytherin about it.”Remus didn’t know what else to say about that—whether to condemn or commend Regulus’s choice, both given that Remus was one of the people Regulus had subsequently protected from the wrath of Walburga Black and given the fact that it’d almost cost Ted Tonks his life—so he stayed silent. “Guess I’ll wait ’til I hear from her,” Sirius said. “No use in letting Rogelio get lost somewhere over the Atlantic.” Sirius held out the ballpoint pen.“Keep it,” Remus said, waving it away. “I’ve got loads more in my trunk.”Mirroring Sirius, Remus held out Sirius’s wand. When Sirius reached for it, Remus pulled it back. “Have you written Ollivander?”Sirius’s face paled a little. “What?”“About your wand.”“Why?”Merlin, Remus thought they’d talked about this. “About whether or not it’s possible to switch out the core.”Remus, of course, knew it was possible. He’d read pretty much everything available in the Hogwarts library on wand-lore over the holidays. He just didn’t know for certain if werewolf teeth were a viable replacement for a unicorn hair wand core. Or the logistics how to actually exchange one core for another.Right now, it was just a series of highly complex and dependant hypotheticals. Remus watched, second by second, as Sirius retreated in on himself. Something like anguish and regret washed over his face. “Pretty sure my wand’s beyond fixing. Don’t really need Ollivander to confirm that,” Sirius mumbled. “My wand’s dead, Remus.”Remus frowned, because that couldn’t be true. The wand was heavy as stone and cold as the grave, but it wasn’t dead. Remus could feel the magic of it in the palm of his hand, taste it in the air. It was everything the wolf inside him loved about the night: freedom and darkness, the stars and full moon shining down on him.It wasn’t dead. The wolf could sense the wand’s magic. Gripping the runic handle and twirling Sirius’s wand in the air, Remus whispered a spell, and much to their mutual amazement and wonder, Sirius’s fork turned into a rose. Not a black, dead rose, like Sirius had conjured the first day of transfiguration class, but a vibrant red one, albeit with slightly larger-than-normal thorns. Sirius openly gaped at him. “How did you—“To be honest, Remus was equally surprised that had worked. It’d been a rather arduous process at Ollivander’s when Remus had selected his own wand. Apparently, the wolf had a major influence on Remus’s magic. And was rather picky. But Sirius’s wand had been made from the Whomping Willow, had been crafted for the keeper of the Willow’s secret. For the hundred-thousandth time, the true nature of the Whomping Willow and the secret of the wolf was on the tip of Remus’s tongue. Christ, something inside him howled, yearning to tell Sirius the truth.Sirius Black was worthy of that sort of secret.But, for the hundred-thousandth time, Remus remembered his promise to Dumbledore. To his father. The wolf had to remain a secret. He could be expelled, if the secret got out. And with the Lestrange Doctrine on the horizon, he’d be well and truly fucked. “Your wand’s not dead, Sirius,” Remus said, instead. “It just… needs a new core.”Remus turned the wand over in his hand, until the handle was offered to Sirius, who took it, face awash with awe and reverence.“What kind of core?” Sirius asked. Then, hesitantly, with just enough hope to make Remus’s heart flutter erratically, Sirius added, “You said… You said you might have an idea?” Remus didn’t exactly know how to explain the teeth he’d pulled from the wolf’s maw a few days ago, carefully wrapped in cloth and tucked away at the bottom of his trunk. At the same time, that hope in Sirius’s eyes reverberated in Remus’s soul.The teeth would work. If the Whomping Willow guarded a secret, if the wolf was the secret, Sirius was its keeper, then the teeth would work. Remus knew it in his bones. As long as Ollivander could somehow craft them into a functioning wand.“I do,” Remus said, forcing himself not to elaborate. “I’ll write to Ollivander.”A smile, as bright and as beautiful as the morning sun after a night of terror, broke across Sirius’s face.“Thank you,” Sirius whispered. “I—“They were saved from the weight of that particular conversation from none other than James Fleamont Potter.“Oi, Black!” James shouted from across the Great Hall. Both Remus and Sirius turned as he strutted over, trailed by Peter. Around them, the Great Hall had, at some point, filled with the regular breakfast crowd. Remus hadn’t noticed, but a few heads turned at the sound of James’s proclamation. James came to a stop next to Sirius, his hands stuffed in his pockets. “You ready for this?” James whispered to Sirius, Remus only picking up on the question courtesy of the wolf’s hearing.Sirius’s face scrunched in confusion before a wicked and wild smirk spread across his face. “Fuck, yes,” he all but shouted. Heads turned. “Proclaim away, Potter.”Remus hid a laugh. Right. Their bet.“Right,” James said, nodding once. “On your feet, love of my life.”Absently, Remus found himself wondering just how far James was willing to take this. The answer was, of course, to the fucking moon. With Sirius standing in front of him, James leapt onto the Gryffindor table, right where Sirius’s breakfast had been a moment earlier. “What’s going on, then?” Lily Evans sat down next to Remus, pressing close, and casting calculating glances at James, as though she were secretly plotting on pushing him off the table. “James lost a bet,” Remus informed her. “This ought to be good,” Lily groaned.“Listen up, everyone!” James had, sometime in the last few seconds, cast a Sonoros charm on himself. The Great Hall fell silent. “I must confess something to all of you. I can stay silent no longer. I’m wholly, completely, and irrevocably in love with Sirius Black.”“I take it back,” Lily stage-whispered. “This is the best day of my goddamned life.”James looked down at Sirius, his hand over his heart. “Sirius Anna-Maria Black—”Sirius choked on air. “Anna-Maria?!”“I’m not saying your father’s name in my heartfelt confession of undying love. He’s a dick and it’ll kill the mood,” James shot back. “Right. Yes. Continue.” Sirius waved a hand. “Sirius Patricia Black—““I liked Anna-Maria better.”James glared. “Sirius Eunice Black—““Oi!”“Get on with it, Potter!” Lily Evans called, clearly having the time of her fucking life. She frantically gestured at Marlene, who produced a camera from her bag. “Sirius Esmerelda Black.” James paused, blinked in what he probably thought was a romantic manner. “I have loved you since the moment I first set eyes on you. You are clever and gorgeous and I dream of snogging you often.”“Lame!” Lily shouted. James resolutely ignored her. “You have beautiful eyes and fantastic hair.”“Cliche!” Lily yelled.Cutting a glare at Lily over his shoulder, James added, “And I have a composed a poem that expresses my truest of feelings.”This was met with whoops and hollers from the Gryffindor table, none louder than those of Lily Evans. James cleared his throat—which really didn’t sound to pleasant with the Sonoros charm—and recited from memory:
“Sirius, my love for you is no farce.
Love of mine, you have a nice arse.
Your eyes of silver, hair of black—er.” James paused and turned bright red. “I seem to have forgotten the rest. The gist is I’ll love you till my dying day, et cetera, et cetera.”“Boo!” Lily cried.Sirius, however, looked ecstatic. “Good enough. Get over here, Potter.”James hopped down from the table, an ear-to-ear grin plastered on his face. He stopped right in front of Sirius—paused for a moment, hesitant to touch—before Sirius grabbed him by the hair and snogged him. Thoroughly. Deep in his bones, the wolf growled. Remus shoved it into the furthest corner of his mind, tried desperately not to think about the distinctly green feeling in his gut, and joined in the shouting and raucous applause erupting from the Gryffindor table.Marlene hopped up on the table with her camera. Several flashes went off in quick succession. Remus’s eyes cut to a group of Hufflepuff girls who were noticeably swooning. He gnashed his teeth together a bit, until Lily elbowed him in the ribs, her eyebrow raised in question.Remus didn’t have an answer. Finally, James and Sirius sprang apart. Or, rather, Sirius reached his limit and more or less propelled James backward with his magic.Remus could taste it, sparking in the air. He forced himself to ignore that, too.Sirius was breathing hard, noticeably shuddered once, but otherwise seemed to be functioning. Thoroughly snogged, but functioning.James Potter was dazed and confused, and weird and unexplainable instincts aside, Remus couldn’t hold back a laugh. Neither could the rest of the Great Hall.Then, from the head table, Professor McGonagall stood. Immediately, silence echoed over the hall. Stone-fucking-cold sober, she said, “Ten points to Gryffindor for this morning’s entertainment.”Then, she sat back down. A beat later, the Gryffindor table erupted in another round of applause and chaos. Half the table leapt to their feet, surrounding Sirius and James. Remus and Lily exchanged a proud glance when they caught sight of the Fabian and Gideon Prewett weaselling their way through the crowd and surrounding Sirius on both sides, each slinging an arm around his shoulder, buffering him from the rest of the crowd. Sirius ducked his head a little, under their arms, but with Frank Longbottom taking up a position at Sirius’s back, he seemed to realise he was safe. His honour guard was there to protect him.Across the room, silver eyes met Remus’s, content, peaceful, and triumphant. Just like that, the monster in Remus’s soul settled. While the rest of the hall descended into madness and mayhem, Remus sat back down next to Lily Evans, pulled out a piece of parchment and another ballpoint pen, and began to write a letter. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ If Remus was honest with himself, Care of Magical Creatures had been an absolute fucking nightmare since day one. He had lost track of the number of creatures he’d managed to anger, terrify, or outright piss off and the number of times he’d had to subsequently apologise to Professor Cuckoo. Although Remus was certain Professor Cuckoo had been made aware of his… condition, he hadn’t exactly been as sympathetic towards Remus’s circumstances as Remus would have hoped. Remus was reasonably convinced that he had the lowest grade in this class on record, and despite the constant disasters, Professor Cuckoo continually urged him to attempt interactions with whatever magical creature had struck his fancy that week. The fact of the matter was, every magical creature out there hated him. They could sense the wolf lurking behind Remus’s eyes.It seemed, however, that none hated Remus Lupin more than Hickory Dave.Given that, over the past few months, Hickory Dave had become rather amorously attached to Professor Cuckoo, it’d become the first years’ routine to feed her at the start of every class. Hickory Dave’s meals were increasingly nauseating—and to no one more so than to Remus, who had the unfortunate nose of a werewolf and an abhorrence to all things slimy that seemed to be the preferential meal of a Clabberts. Therefore, not only did he have to keep his own nausea at bay and his wolf in check, but he regularly had to deal with the bright red knob on Hickory Dave’s forehead, her high-pitched wailing, and what always seemed to be a failing grade. Today, in particular, was a bit of a disaster.“She’s got my hair!” Sirius wailed, at nearly the same pitch as Hickory Dave’s terrified caterwauling. Generally speaking, of everyone in the class, Hickory Dave seemed to like Sirius best, and naturally turned to him for protection when the mean and nasty werewolf tried to offer her breakfast. Remus stood, stone-faced, with a spoonful of honey mustard maggots-and-grits held out to the Clabbert. James flailed uselessly around them. Peter covered his ears, screaming right along with Hickory Dave.“Let me just—“ Arms flying in a thousand different directions, James steadied his wand and pointed it at where Hickory Dave had a death-grip on Sirius’s hair.“Wand down, Mr. Potter!” Professor Cuckoo shouted above the noise. “If you even think about hexing my Clabbert, I will speak to Professor Dumbledore about having you removed from my class!”Remus thought about hexing Professor Cuckoo’s Clabbert.“Merlin’s saggy tits, someone get her off! I’m going to have a bald patch!” Sirius’s voice hit an unnatural octave, as he tried to pry Hickory Dave away from his head. Her grip remained strong. Professor Cuckoo raised an eyebrow and began writing notes. Remus glared at the Clabbert, trying to convey his grave displeasure at the situation, in the hopes that Hickory Dave would submit to his werewolf mind powers.Hickory Dave wailed louder and began to pull.“Ow, ow! Fucking Salazar’s ball-sack!”James’s eyes were wide and frantic, hands darting out to grab, to touch, before he seemed to remember Sirius’s tattoo. “Evans, help him!” Lily gestured wildly at Sirius. She couldn’t touch him, either. “What the fuck do you want me to do, Potter?!” James blinked. Remembered the plan. “McKinnon!”Marlene, ever the wonderful embodiment of rainbows and sunshine, had her camera out. The constant flashing seemed to be pushing Hickory Dave to the point of epileptic seizure, which somehow involved even more hair-pulling. “I’m busy, Potter.” Marlene took a picture of the Marauders and Hickory Dave.Sirius screeched and let out a long stream of profanity.James was about to rip his own hair out.Peter was turning in nervous circles and biting his nails.And Remus. Who was currently wishing death and dismemberment upon a harmless woodland creature. Ultimately, it took Lily frog-marching Remus halfway across the courtyard for Hickory Dave to calm down enough to finally release Sirius’s hair. She didn’t stop her caterwauling, however, until Professor Cuckoo handed her off to a Hufflepuff with the instruction to feed Hickory Dave the rest of her breakfast from the safety of his office. It took significantly longer for Sirius to stop messing with his hair. “You’re sure there’s not a bald spot?” Sirius asked James for the thirteenth time. James just shook his head and straightened his glasses. “Not even a little one?”“Sirius!” James hissed. Professor Cuckoo was glaring at the four of them.Well, no. More specifically, he was glaring at Remus. “All right. Everyone have a seat. Take out parchment and a quill. In light of recent events, I would like us to have a discussion,” Professor Cuckoo said. “Please know that everything we cover today will be on the final exam at the end of the term.”“Um.” Peter raised his hand. “We’re outside. There’s snow on the ground. What are we supposed to write on?”“You’re a wizard, aren’t you, Pettigrew?” There was genuine doubt in Professor Cuckoo’s voice. “Figure it out.”Peter stood frozen, unsure of how to proceed. Remus narrowed his eyes. For the most part, Professor Cuckoo was well-liked by students. He was reasonable and fair, and had a natural affinity towards animals, which generally Remus saw as a positive attribute. Sirius, in particular, got on well with Professor Cuckoo, and had, before the holiday, told Remus in no uncertain terms that Care of Magical Creatures was his favourite class. Today, however… Professor Cuckoo was different.Remus didn’t quite know how he knew, but something didn’t taste right. The wolf had its hackles raised. As much as Remus hated the creature inside him, he knew enough to trust its instincts.Professor Cuckoo kept looking at him. The wolf seemed to think it was a challenge. “Here, Peter,” Remus said, still at the edge of the courtyard. He drew his wand and, with Lily’s help, levitated several large rocks to the centre of the courtyard for them to use as makeshift chairs. Other students caught on and did the same. Sirius plopped down on the rock next to Remus, still fiddling with his hair. “Today,” Professor Cuckoo began, “we will be discussing the difference between magical creatures and Dark Creatures.”Remus froze. Alarm bells went off in his head. He was half-convinced his forehead had started to flash red, just like Hickory Dave’s. The wolf in his brain demanded he bare his teeth in defiance. To one side of Remus, Lily sat up ramrod straight, her mouth a thin line and green eyes filled with fire. On his other side, Sirius sat equally frozen, his messy hair entirely forgotten. “Actually,” Professor Cuckoo continued, as if he hadn’t just placed a ticking atom bomb at Remus’s feet, “over the holiday, I had the privilege of attending a, er, lecture on this very subject, presented by someone very knowledgeable on the subject. He’s been in the papers recently, in fact. Mr. Tom Riddle.”“Um, Professor—“ Lily started“What the fuck?!” Sirius shouted, rising to his feet. “I think that’s just about enough profanity out of you today, Mr. Black,” Professor Cuckoo said, casually. Fucking conversationally. “Please have a seat.”Sirius did not sit. Instead, he glared at Professor Cuckoo with all the rage and fury of a wild animal. Remus thought the wolf would be proud. Professor Cuckoo elected to ignore him, which was, ultimately, his first mistake. One should never ignore the likes of Sirius Black. “As you well know,” Professor Cuckoo began, and Remus tasted bile, “Dark Creatures are those classified with a XXXX danger rating or above. All require handling by trained experts and most reasonable people argue that their existence should be more closely monitored by the Ministry.”“Bull—“ Lily started, but Remus snatched her hand and squeezed it tight. He didn’t need her defence. Not now. Not with stakes this high.Remus saw red sparks flickering between Sirius’s fingers. Professor Cuckoo glared at the Gryffindors, and for perhaps the first time since coming to Hogwarts, Remus felt unadulterated hatred emanating off his professor. “Additionally, unlike other magical creatures, Dark Creatures have a penchant for spreading their disease. Usually, this is done through a bite, or through an exchange of blood or saliva. This, in particular, marks these creatures not only as a bane against their usual Muggle prey, but also a direct and viable threat against the very foundations of Wizarding culture. If we allow these creatures to continue unchecked, breeding and festering in dark corners, spreading their disease, then we open ourselves to extinction.”At that, Sirius barked a laugh. It was not a nice laugh. “And what about their extinction? What the fuck do you think will happen when you take away their ability to have an education, a job, a life?!”“In the grand scheme of things, Mr. Black, there are… casualties. Unfortunate, but necessary.”Remus felt his blood run cold. “Casualties,” Sirius repeated, nearly spitting the word. “Casualties are for war, Professor.”As if they weren’t already in the middle of a bloodbath. Professor Cuckoo’s lips pressed together in a thin line. “These creatures are dangerous, Mr. Black. Registering them with the Ministry of Magic is the only way to keep the rest of the population safe. Any other… side-effects are morally justifiable.”“Have you tried fucking talking to them? Negotiating? I thought that’s what all those circle-jerks at the Wizengamot were about.” On Sirius’s other side, James choked on a laugh. “These are not reasonable creatures. Negotiation was not an option.”“Then the way I see it, Professor,” Sirius said, slowly, annunciating each and every words, “these creatures aren’t the dangerous ones. Maybe the real danger to Wizarding society is people like Tom Riddle.”Professor Cuckoo’s voice took on a different note. “Careful, the side you choose, Black. The beast you’re trying to defend would not hesitate to rip your throat out.”Sirius’s throat was not the one the wolf wanted.“Any creature, Dark or otherwise, will scream and fight and rip out throats if they’re threatened and pushed into a corner. I’ve got the bald patch on my head from Hickory Dave to prove it.”Something dark and dangerous—something the wolf intrinsically recognised—flashed across Professor Cuckoo’s eyes. A grin twisted his features. “Well, Mr. Black. I’m sure your father would be eager to hear of the sentiments you’ve—““Sirius, sit down!” The words erupted from Remus’s mouth without thought, without credence. Only instinct and desperation. Feather, meet scale.Heads turned. Eyes widened. Time slowed. Silver eyes read the panic etched into Remus’s face.Because if Orion and Walburga Black got word that their recently-liberated son was expressing anti-pureblood sentiments, they’d rescind their acceptance of Alphard’s offer in a heartbeat. Even tucked away, out of sight and out of mind, if the Black heir became a revolutionary, they wouldn’t hesitate to burn him alive. Christ, Remus could still smell the dittany on Sirius’s wounds, hidden beneath his robes.For perhaps the first time in his life, Remus and the wolf were of the same mind.Sirius Black came first. If he wasn’t safe, nothing else mattered. Even if it meant Remus would be proverbially tar and feathered in front of the class. Sirius sat down, his eyes never leaving Remus. In fact, everyone was staring at him.“Mr. Lupin,” Professor Cuckoo said, a rather cruel smile twisting his face. “Given your disastrous performance earlier, perhaps you’d like to contribute to the discussion.”For a startling moment, Remus wondered if Professor Cuckoo was about to out him in front of everyone. Remus did not cower. Did not so much as blink. If he’d be damned for the wolf, he’d be damned with his head held high. Like a bloody Gryffindor.“Your father, Mr. Lupin—among other things—used to be rather highly regarded in respects to his work campaigning for stricter regulations on Dark Creatures. Did he not?”“What?!” Sirius and James blurted, in perfect unison.Lily’s nails dug into the palm of Remus’s hand. In their cottage, lost somewhere in the unpronounceable villages of northern Wales, Remus’s father had a study. It was no bigger than a shoebox under the stairs, and a man as tall as Remus’s father had to duck his head to even fit through the door. Every time Lyall Lupin had caught his son peering around the corner into his office, he’d gotten this far-off look in his eyes—halfway between terror and heartbreak—before he’d close the door and lock the forgotten past and what-might-have-been’s inside. But the first spell Remus Lupin had mastered was how to unlock doors. One night, when Remus was young, when the house was dark and the moon was new, Remus found himself dying to know why his father looked at him like that. As though, maybe—maybe—Remus was nothing more than a ghost.Remus closed his eyes now, his mind propelling him back to his father’s office, lined with parchment and books and pelts of unknowable creatures. His desk that smelled of silver and spilled ink and a thousand, thousand words and letters that Remus never wanted to read. Words of condemnation, of decimation and destruction. Words that told of a past that would have had Remus’s heart on a plate. He thought of the silver knife pinning Fenrir Greyback’s picture to the wall next to the window.“My father,” Remus said, his voice clipped, “hasn’t worked for the Ministry of Magic since I was very young.”“So I’ve heard.” Professor Cuckoo seemed to be enjoying this. “Mr. Lupin, would you care to explain the specific classification of XXXXX, according to Newt Scamander?”Remus’s jaw tightened. “It means that the creature is an imminent threat to even a trained wizard.”“And how many known creatures have this classification?”“Twenty-three.”“And what is Scamander’s recommendation?”Remus narrowed his eyes. He knew where Professor Cuckoo was going with this. Remus wasn’t going down without a fight. “Bring them tea and toast for breakfast when they’re cranky.”Next to him, Sirius laughed. It was glorious.“Ten points from Gryffindor. Answer the question, Lupin.”“I’m also told they’re rather fond of chocolate.”Snickers erupted from the other Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors. “Another ten points. What does Scamander recommend in regards to Dark Creatures?”“Scamander recommends a good book to read, a knitted blanket, and a crackling fireplace on most nights outside the full moon.”“Detention, Lupin. One week.”Remus smiled at him, humourlessly. Professor Cuckoo cleared his throat loudly and the laughter around them died out. “Scamander recommends classification and containment for all those creatures rated XXXXX. Which means—“ He shot a withering look at Remus. “—there is legal precedent for the Lestrange Doctrine.”“No, there’s not,” Sirius snapped. “Scamander was a magizoologist, not a politician. He never held a seat on the Wizengamot.”“Nonetheless, his work has stood the test of time and is considered the standard for classifying and handling Dark and magical creatures. The Lestrange Doctrine is based on fact and research, and research shows there is only one way to deal with creatures such as these.”“Chain them in silver and brand them?” Remus growled, glaring at Professor Cuckoo. “Use them as canon fodder,” Sirius whispered, bitterly.Professor Cuckoo didn’t reply. “Now, as Lupin told us, there are twenty-three known creatures classified as XXXXX. The Lestrange Doctrine will only apply to these twenty-three creatures. This is a rather liberal concession for most, but it was necessary in the art of compromise.”Sirius scoffed loudly at the word compromise. More like precursor to genocide, Remus thought. Because, at the end of the day, that’s always the direction these things go.“Lupin,” Professor Cuckoo said. “Will you name an example of a creature that is included in the Lestrange Doctrine?”Well, if that wasn’t a set-up, Remus didn’t know what was. He glared at Professor Cuckoo. “I think I’ve said enough today, Professor. Why not give another student a chance? James knows the answer.”“Vampire!” James shouted, helpfully.“Name an example, Lupin, or it’s two weeks’ detention.”Remus crossed his arms. “No.”“A month’s detention, Lupin.”“I’d rather not.”“Banshee!” Sirius yelled. Then, counting off on his fingers: “Incubi, Succubi, Djinn—“Professor Cuckoo’s neutral expression broke immediately. “One more word out of you, Black, and I’ll—““Shadow Men!” Remus growled, loud enough to cut Professor Cuckoo’s words short. This was his battle. Remus refused to allow Sirius Black to become a casualty.“Good.” Professor Cuckoo scowled. “Another.”“Rakshasa.”“Another.”“Wraiths. Wyverns. Wendigos.”Professor Cuckoo’s eyes flared. “Another.”Fucking fine.“Remus—“ Lily started.“Werewolves,” Remus snarled. The whole class was staring at him, in varying degrees of confusion and wonder, but none more so than Sirius Black. Remus felt exposed. Like a live wire, ready to electrocute anyone who dared touch him.And, fucking Christ, Sirius did touch him. Just the slightest brush of his index finger against Remus’s hand, but Remus felt it in his bones—in his teeth—and he knew Sirius did too.How long until Sirius asked about the wolf lurking behind Remus’s eyes?Remus couldn’t bare the question, couldn’t voice the secret.He wasn’t that fucking brave.He stood and left. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ He only waited until he was sure the last fifth year Ravenclaw had not only left, but disappeared down the corridor. He didn’t bother to knock. McGonagall didn’t seem all that surprised to see him. She looked slightly more put together than she had yesterday after their class. Remus smelled only a whisper of magic and something that registered in his brain as a cat, rather than that cloying scent of nervousness that had clung to her robes the day before. “Mr. Lupin,” McGonagall began, barely concealing a sigh. “Have a seat.”Which was a rather polite way of asking what the fuck he was doing in her office. Again.Remus did not sit.“Look,” he began. “Look. I know I’m not exactly in a position to be asking you any favours—and believe me, if I thought I had another option, that’s where I’d be—but there are some things out of my control, so I’m asking for help.”“Help,” McGonagall repeated. Christ, the wolf wanted to tear him to pieces just for asking. “I need your permission to transfer out of Care of Magical Creatures.” Then, as an afterthought, Remus added, “Immediately.”McGonagall blinked at him. “Care of Magical Creatures is a required class until you take your O.W.L.s fifth year.”“Right. I know.” Remus scratched the back of his neck. “It’s just that, well, I was hoping, given my particular circumstances, that there might be grounds for an… exception?”“An exception.” Her reply was far less of a question than Remus’s initial statement.“Yes, er. The creatures have a distaste for the wolf—which is natural, I suppose—but it makes it rather difficult to fully apply myself to the care aspect of the class. My care usually results in wailing and grinding of teeth. Or pulling of hair, as it were.”“I’ll acknowledge your unusual circumstances, Lupin, but—“Except he wasn’t going to give her a chance to turn him down.“Please, Professor.” Remus squeezed his eyes shut, because he really was that fucking desperate. “Please.”McGonagall considered him for a long moment.“Did something… happen, Lupin?” A perfect eyebrow rose slightly. “With Professor Cuckoo, perhaps?”Her tone suggested she already knew the answer to that. Or, suspected, at the very least. Remus forcibly reminded himself that this was the woman who’d taken it upon herself to fight in a war against Grindelwald all on her own. At twelve years old, no less.There was just the slightest possibility that Professor McGonagall was already on his side. Remus swallowed his pride, shoved the wolf into the farthest corner of his mind, and said, “Yes, Professor.”McGonagall nodded once, curt and short. “Do tell, Lupin.”As diplomatically as possible, Remus explained what had happened in Professor Cuckoo’s class. He somehow managed to recount the events without swearing even once, which, if he was being honest with himself, Remus considered something of a minor miracle. When he’d finished his account, McGonagall slowly sat down in her chair behind the desk. Both of her elbows sat on the armrests, her hands folded neatly in front of her face, her features etched with concentration.“Please sit, Mr. Lupin.”Very reluctantly, Remus sat down on the edge of the bench closest to him, leaning forward a bit on his elbows. It was the only concession the wolf would allow, antsy and agitated as it was. McGonagall levelled him with an even stare. “You think Professor Cuckoo was trying to expose you? Deliberately?”“The thought crossed my mind, yes,” Remus replied. “Or make it easier for someone to piece it together.”Which, honestly, was more of an immediate concern.Lily already knew, and although Remus knew she would do nothing to let the secret slip, Professor Cuckoo had done more than his part to ensure that the idea of a werewolf was already on everyone’s minds. Sirius wasn’t an idiot. Neither was James Potter, for that matter.“I can’t let that happen, Professor,” Remus said. “I made a bargain with Dumbledore, that no one would find out. And if they did—““There’s now the concern of the Lestrange Doctrine.”“Yes.” Remus was silent for a moment, the air feeling thicker around him.“Professor, if that passes…” The words stuck in the back of his throat. “If that passes, will I have to leave?”At his question, McGonagall’s neutral expression shattered into one Remus recognised from his own mother, usually the morning after the full moon.Devastation, at destruction already wrought.“It is my understanding,” McGonagall said, drawing out each word, “that Dumbledore has been rather stringent on a clause that makes the bill non-retroactive. That clause will ensure Dark Creatures already admitted and attending Hogwarts will not be affected by the Lestrange Doctrine.”Remus nodded. “But if I were to be discovered…?”“Then there’s a good chance that the Wizengamot could have that clause rescinded.”Right. He’d thought as much. Hearing it out loud still felt like a punch to the gut.“All right, then.” Remus leaned forward. “I’d like to repeat my request to be removed from Care of Magical Creatures. It’s only a matter of time until—““Lupin—““Christ. I have a project I can work on. Been working on it with Professor Rattleburn, really. Just… It can be more specific. Academic. I can—““That’s all well and good—““It’s on wand-crafting. Lily and I did a project on it—well, on wandless magic, really—over the holidays. I’d like to continue the topic. It’ll be—““Merlin, Lupin—““I’ll write to Ollivander. I was planning on doing it anyway. I’ll research wand-lore, wandless magic, anything. Everything. While they’re in Care of Magical Creatures, I’ll—““Remus.”Remus stopped babbling.He didn’t think he’d ever heard McGonagall call any student by their first name. She rolled her r’s.Sharp blue eyes met his. “I was recently reminded that I do possess a duty of care to each and every one of the students under my supervision, but none more so than the Gryffindors.”Remus flushed bright red. “Yes, ma’am.”“As such, I see no reason for you to remain in Care of Magical Creatures. Particularly if it is at all a detriment to your well-being.”Remus’s heart lurched. He honestly hadn’t believed she’d go for it. “You will need to write a proposal for this research project of yours. With your academic strengths, as well as my and Professor Rattleburn’s recommendations, I see no reason the Headmaster will not accept your research project as a viable substitute for Care of Magical Creatures. You will, of course, have to sit the O.W.L. for it during your fifth year, but you should manage at least an Acceptable with only theoretical knowledge of the subject. Which, I believe, you already possess.”“That won’t be a problem.” His wolf could sense more about more about magical creatures on instinct than had ever been written down in one of Newt Scamander’s books.“Now,” McGonagall continued. “You mentioned a detention?”“A month,” Remus muttered miserably. “With Professor Cuckoo.”After today, Remus couldn’t imagine getting through a month alone with the man without further bloodshed. Particularly if the Lestrange Doctrine passed. “Although I cannot hope to dictate the discipline and practices other professors enact in their own classes, as your head of House, I do have rudimentary say over with whom your detentions are served. I’ll write Professor Cuckoo. You’ll serve the whole month, Lupin, but you’ll serve it with me. Am I understood?”She was trying to be stern, but Remus had never heard her sound more flippant.“Yes, Professor.”“Good.” Placing both hands on her desk, McGonagall rose to her feet. “Now, if that’s all, Mr. Lupin, I do have an afternoon class.”Remus nodded and stood. He was halfway to the door when he suddenly remembered and froze.“Professor…” He spun slowly on his heel to face her. “There’s one more thing. Sirius… He…”Under her breath, she muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, Merlin, it’s been one bloody day, but that didn’t make sense. Professor McGonagall didn’t swear.That being said, the wolf had impeccable hearing. Remus almost smirked. “Sirius… may have said some things. In Professor Cuckoo’s class”“What sort of things?”Things a young Minerva McGonagall would have been immensely proud of, Remus thought, sardonically. “A great many anti-Lestrange Doctrine things,” Remus answered, instead. “Professor Cuckoo hinted that he’d be writing Sirius’s parents. Several times.”“I see.” A deep frown cut across McGonagall’s face.“I know you said you couldn’t interfere, but—““I’ll take care of it.”Remus, already preparing and mounting another rapid-fire defence, paused. “You—what?”“I will do everything in my power to make sure those letters, if they exist, will never reach Orion and Walburga Black.”“You will?” Really, it was rather disappointing. He’d constructed a rather brilliant speech in the past minute or so. It would have rivalled the last time he’d been in this office, certainly. “You were right, Lupin.”“I was?” He knew he was. Well, he was usually right in regards to Sirius Black. But it wasn’t like he’d expected Professor McGonagall to acknowledge it.“I failed Sirius Black in every imaginable way. I won’t be doing it again.”Well. It she had been apologising to Sirius the other day.“I will be halting all communication between Hogwarts and Grimmauld Place,” McGonagall continued. “Walburga Black will not hear of anything her son does while under my supervision. Gryffindor secrets, and all that.”Then, Professor McGonagall did the most bizarre thing possible: she winked at him.McGonagall continued on, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world. “If and when Mr. Black does something reckless and ill-advised—which I think we both can acknowledge is rather inevitable—“ Remus took a moment to nod along, sagely. No use in denying it, really. “—I will handle it directly. Anything outside my spheres of influence will automatically be forwarded to both the Potters and Alphard Black. As far as I’m concerned, they are his legal guardians, even if the eyes of the law disagree with me.”Absently, Remus wondered if McGonagall had told Sirius any of this. He felt like Sirius might have mentioned it if she had.“I’ve already set a trace on the owlery. Anything addressed to, or involving the names Walburga or Orion Black or Grimmauld Place will take a detour to my office, where I can further monitor the communications.”Remus was fairly certain that was illegal. He was rather impressed. “All this is to say, Mr. Lupin, is that Sirius Black is safe. I swear it, on my honour as a Gryffindor.”That was one hell of a promise. Remus tilted his head—a gesture the wolf seemed to pull out of him—and acknowledged her acts of subterfuge and bravery, all for Sirius. The wolf was… happy. Relieved.“Thank you,” Remus said, because in the end, all that mattered was that Sirius was safe. McGonagall nodded in return, then fixed him with a stare. Not for the first time, Remus wondered if the animal in her soul could sense the monster in his. “I am going to ask you this question exactly once, Mr. Lupin, and I expect and honest answer. Mr. Black… Sirius. Does he know?”Remus didn’t need to ask what she meant. “No.” “I imagine if he did, we’d have to keep a fairly tight leash on him. Based on his behaviour today, I’d say there’s a very real chance that boy would storm the Wizengamot itself, if he thought for a second it’d help you.”And honestly, Remus Lupin had no fucking clue what to do with that information. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Remus managed to avoid his friends the rest of the day, unable and unwilling to answer their questions about Professor Cuckoo’s class. He’d have to eventually, he knew, but he’d rather do so on his own terms. Spin his own fairy tales, in which he could pretend for a moment that he was anything but the monster that decimated the lonely, mountain village. He’d hidden out in the library, ducking in and out of shelves whenever anyone entered, eventually hiding near the Restricted Section with a roll of parchment. By the time he’d stood and stretched his aching knee, he’d used the entire roll and had very little to show for it other than the scribbled-out ramblings of a half-formed letter. He’d worry about that later. When dinner was due to start in the Great Hall, Madam Pince sniffed him out and threatened to hex him if he didn’t leave the library. Still, Remus didn’t go to the Great Hall, instead opting to camp out in front of McGonagall’s classroom, reading up on wand-lore and waiting for his detention to start. When she arrived after dinner, she opened the door without a word and ushered him inside. Remus deposited himself at a desk in the back of the classroom and once again attempted to write a letter.McGonagall casually passed him by on several occasions, an eyebrow raised, but never did she comment on the slow and steady accumulation of crumpled parchment at Remus’s feet. As the hours ticked on, Remus felt his nose continually scrunching up in concentration, his lips torn to shreds from biting them in frustration, and his fingers… Christ, his fucking broken fingers. He had to keep shaking his hand to keep circulation flowing. Rather miraculously, by the end of the second hour, Remus had composed a semi-coherent letter.He spent the next hour revising and scribbling things out. It looked a mess, but it was, technically speaking, coherent.
Dear Mr. Ollivander,
Recently, I received permission from both Professors Minerva McGonagall and Amelia Rattleburn to conduct an independent study on the nature of wand-crafting. I was hoping that you, as the foremost expert on the subject, might provide some resources or additional reading to help me in my studies.
As of late, I have a particular vested interest in the theories and practices surrounding the core of a wand. I have several pressing questions on this subject. Most specifically:
1. Must the core of a wand always be complimentary to the chosen wood? Or, is the core more closely tied to the magical signature of the wizard?
2. What events or circumstances might lead to a wand core
—
2. If a wand core were to somehow become ineffective, can it be feasibly replaced utilising the original wood?
3. If the core of a wand can be replaced, is it typical to replace the damaged core with the same type of core (that is, from the same creature)? Or, is it possible to use a new type of core and maintain the same integrity and magic of the original wand?
4. If a new core is viable, can that core come from any sort of magical creature? Or must it be a dragon, a unicorn, or a phoenix?
Any insight or information you have would help me in my studies immensely. Thank you for your time and any assistance you may offer.
Remus J. Lupin
After several minutes of structured debate with himself, Remus scribbled down one last question, at the bottom of the letter.
5. Hypothetically, if the core of a wand came from a Dark Creature, would the magic inherent in such a core negatively affect the character and magic of the wizard who wields the wand?
Then, he carefully folded, sealed, and shoved the letter in his bag before his reason caught up with him and he incinerated it entirely. With the letter safely out of sight and… not at all out of mind, Remus folded his hands on the desk, and tried to appear normal. McGonagall was staring at him. From her raised eyebrow and tilted head, Remus got the feeling that she’d been staring at him for quite some time. With a mere flick of her wand, she cast a Timus. Christ. Remus hadn’t realised how late it was.“Better be off, then, Lupin,” McGonagall said, casually gesturing for him to leave. Remus stood. “If you hurry, you can drop that at the owlery before curfew. I would hate to see more parchment go to waste.”He knew what she meant. If he waited until morning to send the letter, there was a good chance he’d chicken out entirely. Some bloody Gryffindor, indeed. Remus felt himself blush, but nodded, and all but flew up the steps to the west tower, his bad knee screaming at him the entire time. Reminding him that he still had another set of stairs to Gryffindor tower to contend with. Remus’s heart lurched as he tied the letter to the leg of Sirius’s favourite owl, Rogelio, his hands shaking. He shouldn’t be this nervous. He knew it wasn’t logical to fear a man like Ollivander, who knew nothing but the kindness inherent to his heart.Ollivander was the kind of man who’d looked at Remus and seen him. Not just the truth and reality of the wolf that lurked behind Remus’s eyes and clawed at his soul, but Remus himself. The eleven-year-old boy who’d somehow been granted a miracle at the eleventh hour. He’d never told Sirius—never told anyone, really—of his own trip to Diagon Alley, the day before he’d boarded the Hogwarts Express. It was… too much, too many secrets too close to the surface, waiting to be discovered and devoured by a set of prying eyes. Remus was sure Ollivander had known what he was the moment he’d walked into the store, trailed by his extremely apprehensive father. Still, Ollivander hadn’t balked at the challenge of finding one such as him a suitable wand—one that appeased the rage inherent in the wolf. One that wouldn’t rend the soul of a creature already cursed and damned with the darkest kind of magic. In the end, it’d been a pliable cypress wand with a unicorn hair core. As brave and as pure as the wolf was dark and murderous. Remus still couldn’t fathom why such a wand would have chosen him and the monster that shared his heart. For as long as he lived, Remus knew he’d never forget the first time he’d held his wand in his hand. It was the only time, since he’d been bitten, that Remus and the wolf had been in perfect synchronicity, body and soul. As if releasing that magic—that very first spell with his unicorn hair wand—had quelled the ravenous appetite of the beast inside. The wolf still hated the taste and scent of magic—still tried to tear Remus to pieces because of it—certainly, but that first spell…The chains had broken.The stars had aligned. The wolf had bowed to the wizard.He knew Ollivander had seen it, the enormity of that single point in time for Remus. For his father, standing in silent awe behind him.Christ, what Remus would give to witness that moment with Sirius Black. To see his magic, as wild and as reckless as a star burning across the sky, tamed by a wand forged for him.It terrified him, how badly wanted the wolf’s teeth to be the answer to everything. Wanted this to work.Because what if it didn’t? ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius was waiting for him on the roof. Remus paused in the windowsill, awestruck, because…Because Sirius was beautiful, like this. Like no words in any language could ever dare to describe. His dark, sable hair blended with the blanket of stars around him, pale skin illuminated by the waning moonlight. Frost sparked on his breath, in his eyes, beneath his hands planted flat on the roof, as Sirius tilted his head up to stare down the silence of the night. He was ethereal. A god amongst men. But… but it was infinitely more than that, Remus realised. No one could ever hope to be as recklessly triumphant as Sirius Black, scarred though he was. Sirius, bathed in the starlight of his ancestors whilst sitting atop Gryffindor tower with a half-blood werewolf, was utterly vanquishing. Far below, in the mortal realm and even farther beneath the earth, Remus imagined he could hear the sound of clattering bones—the only sound, save for the steady cadence of Sirius’s heartbeat, echoing through the night—as those same ancestors screamed their malcontent from their graves.Remus didn’t know how long he stared before Sirius’s frost-flecked silver eyes met his. A smile broke out across Sirius’s face and the wolf in Remus’s heart demanded Remus tilt his head back and howl in homage, in victory, in adoration at the majesty of Sirius Black.Remus didn’t know what that meant—didn’t dare question the truth that dwelled in the heart of the wolf—just smiled back and took his rightful place next to Sirius. Close, but not touching. Never touching.At that thought, Remus shoved the suddenly-discontented wolf aside. Something like silver fire danced in Sirius’s eyes as he flicked his wrist, enveloping them both in a warming charm. “How was detention?” Sirius asked, softly, so as not to disturb the slumber of the stars above them. Under his breath, he mumbled. “It wasn’t fair, you know. That you got detention. Didn’t know Professor Cuckoo was such an arse.”“He wasn’t. Well, I mean, he was in class, but…” Remus struggled to find the words. The secret—the wolf, the damned reason he’d hidden from his friends all day—was a heavy noose around his neck. “I mean that I didn’t serve detention with him. McGonagall commuted my sentence, so to speak. I’m serving the month with her.”Remus kept his eyes fixed on the sprawling castle far below them, but he felt the weight of that silver fire on him. Eventually, after apparently realising that Remus had no plans on elaborating on the particulars of his conversation with McGonagall, Sirius said, “She’s bending the rules. True fucking Gryffindor.”Remus didn’t miss the sharpness in his tone, the venom-laced dagger lying in wait beneath his words. So, Remus said, “I’m transferring out of Care of Magical Creatures.”It wasn’t a defence of McGonagall—Remus Lupin would be the last person to justify her actions, especially to Sirius—but it was… something. A point to consider, in the grand scheme of things. Sirius looked rather intrigued. “We all should, after today. I’ll talk to James—to Evans—and we’ll see about going to the Headmaster and—““No,” Remus cut in. Because if they went looking, they’d find the wolf lurking, waiting to devour them whole.Sirius blinked at him. “Remus, Professor Cuckoo’s an arse, at the very least. If he’s aligning himself with Riddle and my father, then he’s dangerous. He’ll bring war to Hogwarts before—““Then get him fired.”In hindsight, Remus wondered if it was wise to issue such a challenge to Sirius Black.Sirius’s grin went feral and madness sparkled in his eyes, but all he said was, “Okay.” Then, he added, with a shrug of his shoulders, “Won’t be as much fun without you.”“I’ll help you sack the next professor.” Promises, promises. “I’m told those teaching Defence don’t last more than a year.”Sirius pouted. “I like Rattleburn.”“You liked Cuckoo this morning.”“Fair enough.” Sirius paused. “What’ll you do instead? While we’re in class?”“Work with Rattleburn and McGonagall.” The latter he tacked on almost as an afterthought and brushed passed it just as quickly. “Research project on wand-crafting. Similar to what Evans and I did over the holiday, but more in depth. I was… Well, I was sort of hoping to use you as a case study.”Darkness shadowed Sirius’s eyes, quelling the silver fire. “You won’t like the answers to those kind of questions, Remus.”Remus was fairly certain he knew the answer—it was why he hadn’t posed that particular question to Ollivander—but he’d let Sirius keep his secrets. It was only fair, after all. “The past stays where it’s at,” Remus said, easily. “I’m looking for answers for the future. You need a new wand core, Siri.”Sirius stared at him for a long moment. “You really think it’ll work?”He prayed it would. He prayed there was someone—something—out there to hear his prayer.“I think magic is an insurmountable mystery. Intrinsic and essential to our very being, yes, but more infinite a mystery than any man can ever hope to understand.” Remus looked at Sirius, at his eyes of silver frost-fire, and the halo of stars around him. Beautiful. Annihilating. “Yet, the magic obeys you—bows and dances for you—at the mere thought. Christ, Sirius, if ever there were someone born to—““I don’t want to talk about fate tonight, Remus.” Sirius sat the word, venom on his tongue.“All I mean,” Remus amended, just as easily, “is that you are utterly remarkable, Sirius Black. If I can help you in any way, give you a wand that can help you tame the magic in your soul… You deserve a wand as unbreakable as you.”There were tears in Sirius’s eyes by the time Remus finished speaking: silver leylines tracking down his face, shimmering in the moonlight. “All right,” Sirius breathed, scrubbing a hand across his face. He reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out the wand, freely offering it to Remus. “Take it. It’s mostly useless, as it is now Do whatever you need.”Heart in his throat, Remus took it. The wood was ice-cold to the touch. Dead, Sirius had said that morning.Not quite, a silent, hopeful voice whispered to Remus. Absently, he wondered if someone had heard his prayer. He wondered if he believed in such things.“Thank you, Siri.”Sirius’s expression was entirely unreadable. He edged imperceptibly closer to Remus and inclined his head, just a little. “Your father,” Sirius began, and Remus tensed. He’d wondered how long it’d take Sirius to ask. “I know you said on the train that your dad worked for the Ministry, but you never mentioned…” Christ, Cuckoo was a snoop. “What did he do, exactly?”Remus hesitated only for a heartbeat before opting for the truth. Or, as much of the truth he could offer with the secrets that lay between them. “He hunted them. Dark Creatures. Travelled all over the world doing it.” A wry smile twisted across Remus’s face. “That’s how he met my mum, actually. He saved her from a vampire in southern France. He was supposed to Obliviate her after—she was Muggle and she’d seen his magic—but lucky for me, he bent the rules a bit.”“Why’d he stop?”Fenrir Greyback.This time, Remus bent the truth to his will. “Change of heart. Change of circumstances, I suppose.”Circumstances.Remus had grown up in a small neighbourhood just north of London, until he’d been bitten. He’d gone to a Muggle primary school, had friends, and had been well-liked. His mother would sing him French lullabies and he’d known, beyond a shadow of a doubt, he’d been the single greatest point of pride in his father’s life. Then, it’d all been stolen, slipped through his broken fingers, the night Fenrir Greyback had come for him. They’d moved to his father’s cabin in Wales. Remus had withdrawn in on himself, aided and abetted by the trauma etched into his parents’ features, by the scars etched into his own. He’d lost track of the nights he’d lie awake, listening to his mother’s sobs, his father’s angry whisper-shouts, quiet and furious, yet echoing through the walls that separated them. He’d been nothing but a scared and broken young boy growing up in an unpronounceable village, who spoke French more fluently than Welsh, who was so much of something other, but mostly neither. Neither Welsh nor French, neither Muggle nor wizard. Neither wanted nor unwanted. Neither fully human nor the particular breed of monster his father used to hunt. Except, on the full moon.When they’d lock him in the cellar.Sirius narrowed his eyes at the answer, but didn’t press any further. “Do you think he’d side with them? Riddle and my father?”Remus loved his father, and knew he was loved in return. Irrevocably and intrinsically, he knew that, deep in his bones. He’d hug his father, cling tight to him when he’d been frightened as a child, wished to grow up to be just like him, but… But Lyall Lupin was not a perfect man. Remus knew that, too—knew it from that look in his father’s eye, flittering and fading fast, just out of Remus’s eye line most days, but unmistakable thanks to the senses of the wolf. It was fear and terror, mixed with regret and loathing.Christ, there were times, Remus could taste it. His mother’s heart had been broken, the night Remus was bitten, but his father… His father had chosen Remus, his son, over his chance of vengeance and retribution, and there were days Remus knew he regretted it. It’d left Lyall Lupin a broken man. “No,” Remus said, bowing his head. “He won’t go to war over it.” His father wouldn’t risk it. Never, if it meant exposing Remus.Exposing Lyall’s own greatest shame. Sirius nodded once, accepting all the things left unsaid. Remus pulled himself from his own past, once more focusing on Sirius Black. Wondering how he’d ever allowed himself to look away. “Have you given McGonagall an answer yet? About her offer to tutor you?” Remus knew he hadn’t.“I’ve decided to make her wait.” Sirius looked rather proud of himself.“For your benefit? Or her torment?”“Both,” Sirius said. “I’m trying to decide if sorry is enough.”To some, Remus supposed, it would sound cruel, to draw out forgiveness like that, but Remus knew better. Forgiveness was a mighty tempest over the ocean: it came in waves and powerful gulls, ready to rend your heart and break your spirits if you were too careless, too naive or ill-prepared. Sometimes, if you dove in head first, you’d drown in under a minute, suffocated by the cruel, uncaring water around you. Other times, you’d wait on the shore for the storm to pass, and by then it’d be too late. Your courage would fail entirely. The sea would be tranquil, the dust settled, and there’d be nothing worth living for left before you.Sometimes, if you were particularly brave, you’d bide your time, play the odds and count the cards, then dare to chance the storm. Sometimes, Remus wondered if he’d ever be brave enough to forgive his own father. “Oi!” James Potter called from the window. He clambered onto the roof, just a tad bit too clumsy for comfort on the frost-covered tiles, but managed to keep his balance. “Bloody-well knew you’d still be out here.”“Fucking finally,” Sirius muttered, spirits lifting as he nudged Remus, just once, in the ribs to get him to scoot over. “Where’ve you been?” Remus asked James, as he sat on Remus’s other side. “Detention,” James grumbled. He jerked his chin at Sirius. “Slughorn let him go early. Still trying to bloody collect him. It’s revolting.”There was no heat behind James’s words. Hardly any annoyance at all, really. Gone were the days when James would deign to punch Sirius for the undeniable favouritism he was shown because of the Black name. Christ, Remus was relieved. “Yes, well,” Sirius muttered. “I’m not too keen to join his collection. Don’t want to be stuck on a shelf with Malfoy and Snape.”“And Evans,” James said, his suddenly taking on a stupid, dreamy tone. Sirius perked up immediately. "Speaking of, are the Prewetts on board?”James nodded. “Marlene and Dee, too. The Prewetts will distract Frank long enough for us to sneak Snape in.”Remus choked on nothing. “Excuse me, what?!”James gestured to the window. “Should we get Peter out here for this? Make it a full-scale Marauder’s operation.”Sirius shook his head. “Nah, let him sleep. I’ll fill him in tomorrow.”Secretly, Remus was relieved. This time on the roof, beneath the blanket of stars, in the shadow of the full moon, with Sirius—with James—it was sacred. And Peter… Well.If he was being honest, Remus had been avoiding Peter Pettigrew as much as possible these past few days, ever since the article about the Lestrange Doctrine. It was uncomfortable, to say the least, having a friend he knew would turn on him in fucking heartbeat, should Peter discover his secret. If Remus was being completely honest, it broke his heart and terrified him half to death.Trying not to be too obvious about his relief, Remus forced himself back to the matter at hand. “What’s this about Snape?”“We’re sneaking him into Gryffindor tower,” Sirius said, like it was something they did every day.James looked positively giddy. “It’s Evans’s birthday present.”“So instead of an ordinary birthday present, like cake or a nice wool hat or something, you’ve decided to sneak a Slytherin into Gryffindor?”“There’ll be cake too,” Sirius said, flippantly. “Bloody chocolate, if you prefer.”Remus was momentarily distracted by the thought of chocolate cake. He shook his head. “Yes, but Sirius, he’s a Slytherin. A fucking terrible one, at that.”“I know. He’s under an oath, sworn on his magic. It’ll be fine.”Remus sighed, resigned. “All right, but… did it have to be Snape?”“It’s so Evans falls in love with James,” Sirius explained.Remus didn’t follow, and at his blank look, Sirius launched into a detailed and animated argument—mostly with himself—justifying Snape’s presence and somehow, in some convoluted way that Remus didn’t quite follow, determining it to be proof positive of the inevitability of James Potter and Lily Evans falling madly in love. James nodded along and added occasional commentary, but mostly went dewy-eyed and stupid at the mere thought of Lily Evans. It was ridiculous. Remus loved him for it. “All we need now is butterbeer,” Sirius concluded, emphatically. “Um. About that.” James raised a finger. “Fabian said McGonagall threatened to kick them off the Quidditch team if she caught them smuggling any contraband from Hogsmeade. He also mentioned Frank was a bit of a snitch, in that regard.”“He shouldn’t be, from the way he was drinking at the Halloween party,” Remus muttered. “So, we’ll distract Frank,” Sirius said. “Shouldn’t be too hard. Just get Alice to—““No. No way,” James said, shaking his head. “We can’t risk the Prewetts getting thrown off the team. We’re matched against Slytherin, the first Saturday of next month. Gideon’s the best Keeper we’ve had in a decade and Fabian’s been target-practicing with the Bludgers for months. I’ve been going to the practices. He aims for the head. It’s glorious. If they’re off the team, Gryffindor won’t have a shot. We will bring eternal shame upon out house.”Remus had yet to actually attend a Quidditch game—the first had been right after the November moon, and he hadn’t been even remotely up for it—and to his knowledge, Sirius hadn’t gone either. It wasn’t as though he didn’t care, exactly, it was just… Remus wasn’t sure there was a single person alive who could match James Potter’s enthusiasm for Quidditch. “All right,” Sirius said. “Marauders on butterbeer duty, then.”“Sirius, you’re twelve,” Remus said. “No one in their right mind would ever sell you butterbeer, even if you managed to sneak out of Hogwarts.”For the second time that evening, Remus realised he’d inadvertently issued a challenge.“Not a problem. I’ll come up with something before the thirtieth, Remus, you’ll see.”James let out a triumphant cry, echoing across the castle, but Remus…Well. Remus’s heart fucking shattered.The thirtieth was a full moon.The thirtieth was a goddamned lunar eclipse. The wolf hated the nights when it couldn’t feel the light of the full moon on its back, bask in its shadow, taste it in the air. Whether it was a storm or an eclipse, it usually ended in violence for Remus, a slave to the wolf’s vengeance.Remus already knew he’d face retribution for stealing the teeth. He figured he’d need a few days, at best, to be fully functional afterwards, and there was no way he’d risk attending the party, even for a little, if it fell on the same night of the moon. The wolf would be… temperamental. Territorial. And if Snape was going to be there, well… The wolf seemed to think that Slytherins might taste best, if he one day got one between his teeth.He couldn’t lie, couldn’t prematurely say no to James and Sirius’s plan, because the excuse of his mother’s illness was supposed to be spontaneous, a day-of necessity. Anything else—anything other than the white lie of his poor, sick mother—and they’d figure it out.“I’ll help,” Remus managed, when Sirius began to stare at him strangely. He’d been quiet too damn long. “We’ll come up with something brilliant, Siri.”Because they would, even if Remus couldn’t be there to see it.Remus already had an idea. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 7, 1972
On Friday, a panting and wheezing, thoroughly-exhausted Rogelio deposited a stack of four books right on top Remus’s thankfully-empty breakfast plate. Sirius made a screeching noise not at all dissimilar to the owl, and nearly spilled his tea on James’s lap as he surged forward, diving for Rogelio.Remus, in turn, went for the books, saving them from any further tea-spilling calamities. “Merlin’s tits, Remus, you’re going to kill my owl!” Sirius exclaimed, deftly helping Remus unhook the books tethered to Rogelio’s talons, all the while skilfully avoiding Remus’s fingers. Once freed, Sirius scooped Rogelio into his arms, cradling him like a baby. If Sirius cooed a bit at the owl, Remus wasn’t going to mention it. “He’s not your owl,” Marlene said, around a mouthful of toast. “He belongs to Hogwarts.”Sirius, ever the pillar of maturity and well-mannered debate, stuck his tongue out at her. “Yes, but I love him.” Rogelio cooed back, pushing his head into the palm of Sirius’s hand. Remus was fairly certain Marlene said something back, thus sparking something of a heated repartee between her and Sirius, but Remus wasn’t listening. The books the owl brought were huge, and there had to have been some manner of levitation or lightening spell woven into them for Rogelio to manage flight at all. The covers were old—more ancient even than some of the books in the Hogwarts library. One cover—the middle one, Remus noted—was in serious danger of falling off entirely, held together only by a few resilient strings visible through its cracked spine. The title of the largest tome, the one on top, was in French: Baguette et la Magie Inhérente. No one else seemed to notice, save for Sirius, who merely raised an eyebrow. Remus dug out the piece of parchment protruding from beneath the French tome. His name was on the front, in loopy, elegant handwriting. There was a small ink-stain in the bottom cover. Remus tore it open.
Mr. Lupin,
My dear boy, I am so glad you’ve written. Wand-crafting is a subject upon which I shall never tire speaking. I’ll gladly share whatever knowledge I’ve amassed over the years with anyone willing to listen.
In answer to your first question, yes. The core of the wand and the wood it’s made from must be complimentary. Without a compatible core, I’m afraid all you’ll have is a rather ornate stick. But, you are correct in assuming that the witch or wizard’s own magical signature is also something of consequence. After the wood and the core are magically bound, the newly-forged wand takes on a bit of sentience, or alive-ness—no need to get into that now. (Thought, over the centuries, there have been several highly metaphysical texts published on the subject. No definitive conclusions, I’m afraid, though I assume that’s rather common on the matter of philosophy.)
All that is to say that after a wand is forged and has chosen its witch or wizard, it fuses with the magical signature of the wielder at the casting of the first spell. Most hardly remember theirs, but for some… it’s a rather significant moment, as it binds the witch or wizard to the true magic of their soul. The wand always, dear boy, chooses the wizard, based on the magic it senses inside. If one were inclined to believe in such things as fate or destiny, one might deign to look for proof in the art of wand-crafting.
As for your remaining questions, I would, perhaps, like to speak about them in person. Although the questions are incredibly thorough and demonstrate an impressive level of intelligence for one your age, I have a feeling they are far less hypothetical than they appear to be on parchment. I have no qualms discussing such things with you, dear boy, but given the current political climate, I think it best to have such a conversation in person.
Unfortunately, I’m off later this morning to Germany to meet up with an old friend—business at my shop is rather slow this time of year, I’m afraid—and I won’t be back until next month. Until then, I hope these books can assist you in your research. (If I recall from your first visit to my shop, your father mentioned that your Muggle mother taught you French.) I will send you and Professor Rattleburn a letter when I return, so we can set up a time for you to floo to my shop in Diagon Alley.
Until then, keep a list of your questions as they come up. I sincerely look forward to meeting with you.
Best,
G. Ollivander
Across the table, Sirius and Marlene seemed to have reconciled. He now appeared to be teaching her how to massage Rogelio’s wing feathers in just the right way to get the owl’s eyes to flutter. James stood on Sirius’s other side, hand-feeding Rogelio bits of bacon. With a stern warning, Sirius passed Rogelio over to Marlene, so the others could preen over the owl without fear of accidentally touching Sirius.Rogelio, for his part, immediately took to Marlene, leaning in close and nuzzling under her chin.“Traitor,” Sirius muttered, abandoning the group and taking up a sentry position behind Remus. Ever so precariously close to touching, Sirius said, just loud enough for Remus to hear, “So. Wands, then?”Remus just nodded, his scarred fingers trailing over the broken spines of the books in front of him. Behind him, he could almost taste the hope that was starting to blossom in Sirius’s heart, and Jesus Christ, the wolf revelled in it. Because no one on earth was more worthy to wield the magic lying dormant in his soul than Sirius Black. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “This is a shortcut,” Sirius insisted. “You said that after the last two wrong turns,” Remus replied. “Oh, ye of little faith,” Sirius huffed, but he mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, This place needs a bloody map!Frankly, Remus was inclined to agree. After lugging Ollivander’s tomes to Herbology and nearly getting the French one devoured by a Snarl-Dragon seedling, Remus made the executive decision that the books needed to make an immediate journey to his trunk in Gryffindor tower. Lily had suggested he simply levitate them, but Remus had taken one look at the four, crumbling, rare tomes and come to the conclusion that he could absolutely never hope to pay Ollivander back for any hypothetical damages, should he fuck up the spell. It was safer to carry them. Whether it was simply his general disposition as a loyal friend or if he’d noticed Remus’s grimace at the mere thought of climbing all those stairs in the fifteen minutes between Herbology and Defence, either way, Sirius had insisted on coming with. Remus had been hesitant to hand over half the tomes—not because he thought Sirius was up to something or harboured any sort of nefarious intent towards the precious, ancient tombs of knowledge, but because the books each weighed probably a quarter of Sirius’s own weight. And, well. Sirius was still injured. Remus could smell the dittany. In the end, they’d compromised. Sort of. Sirius had made a show of lugging three of the tomes out of the greenhouse, before reluctantly relinquishing two of them back to Remus once they’d made it to the back staircase, free from prying eyes. After that, there’d been a series of wrong turns and Remus hadn’t been paying attention to anything other than making sure Sirius was actually all right climbing stairs and hefting the book. By the time they realised they weren’t where they were supposed to be, the staircase they’d been on had moved off to parts unknown. Remus was half convinced the castle was deliberately fucking with them. If magic castles did that sort of thing. From Sirius’s mutterings, Remus assumed Sirius had arrived at a similar conclusion. “Nine hundred fucking years,” Sirius said, “and not once did anyone think, Gee, it would be handy if we knew how to get around this place.” Then, with a cry of dismay, “Merlins swampy pits, we’ve passed that painting three times.”They had. It was hard to forget. A wood nymph and a water sprite were caught in a rather amorous position that was not entirely appropriate for an institution of learning. Though, Remus supposed, the figures in the paintings had to do something to pass the time. The wood nymph adjusted his loin cloth and sent a leer at Sirius that made Remus’s hackles rise. Sirius either didn’t notice or ignored it entirely, as he picked a staircase seemingly at random and started climbing.The best Remus could figure, they were somewhere between the fourth and fifth floors, near the south end of the castle. He could no longer smell the musty paper scent of the library on the third floor, but when he inhaled deeply, he could just catch a whiff of cold and snow and ice, which probably meant they were close to a balcony. Hopefully. If they found a balcony, they’d be able to see out over the rest of the castle. Remus was reasonably certain he’d be able to navigate to Gryffindor tower from there. At the top of the spiral staircase—fifth floor, then?—Sirius paused to… wheeze. Remus frowned. He’d been doing that quite a lot, really, and he was, perhaps, a shade paler than he’d been that morning. “Sirius, give me the book,” Remus said, his voice neutral. He lifted a knee—his good one—to balance the other books and held out his opposite hand to Sirius.Sirius gave him a look that he normally only directed at Snape or Malfoy. All the fury and fire of a dying star, yet it was gone in an instant, replaced by something else when he seemed to realise he was talking to Remus, not someone after a pound of flesh. “I’m not an invalid,” Sirius pouted, though nearly collapsing against a wall a moment later certainly didn’t help his case. “I’m not weak, Remus.”“I know you’re not,” Remus said, because really, it was obscene to think of Sirius Black as anything less than an indestructible, immutable force of nature. “I, of all people, will never think that. I just don’t want you to open your scars.”Or, pass out and go tumbling down five-ish flights of stairs. “So, what? You plan on carrying all of these?” Sirius glanced dubiously at Remus’s knee. Remus opened his mouth, but immediately swallowed his words.Every instinct both Remus and the wolf shared screamed danger and wrong and fight and run.From down the corridor, someone laughed. It was not a nice laugh. No, it was deranged and demented and quite possibly hysterical, almost like—“Peeves.” If it was possible, Sirius paled even more. As if summoned by his name—and Christ, he probably was—Peeves manifested before them, his too-wide grin opened just a hair to reveal yellow, pointed teeth. Had his teeth been pointed in the hospital wing? Remus couldn’t remember.Either way, Peeves was a thing of nightmares.Remus hadn’t asked Sirius about any of that—not about Peeves, or the prophecy, or Sirius’s own reaction to it. He’d wanted to—God, did he ever—but there’d been a lot going on at the time, and bringing up things like that with everything else imploding and erupting around them was a cruelty Remus would never tolerate. Still. The words echoed in his brain, ricocheted in his soul. That look he’d seen in Sirius’s eyes, when Peeves had recited Silas’s prophecy, Remus had seen it before. Usually, under the light of a full moon, when the wolf would stalk a rabbit or a raccoon downwind, waiting for the right moment to attack, to kill, to devour. Right before the killing blow, when the wolf’s maw closed around its throat, Remus would catch the look in its eye. Resignation. Surrender. Prey.And that was wrong. Sirius Black was not weak. He would not just roll over and die. Slowly, carefully, never taking his eyes off Peeves, Sirius crouched to lower the book to the ground before straightening once more, his hands held up in surrender, despite the magic crackling between his fingers, in the air around them. Without a second thought, Remus mirrored him, drawing his wand.Peeves cackled, his eyes darting between them, as though trying to decide which one of them to torment first. Then, to Remus’s surprise, Sirius took a step forward. Towards the poltergeist.Sirius Black was prey no longer.He was on the hunt and Remus’s wolf was right behind him.“I was wondering when you’d show up again,” Sirius said. Peeves looked absolutely giddy. Remus levelled his wand, a spell on the tip of his tongue if Peeves made a move for Sirius. Instead, he just laughed and sang, “Sirius Black, how tragically flawed—““Yeah, shut it,” Sirius snapped. “We’ve all heard that one. Move the fuck on.”Unfortunately, Peeves did, his attention zeroing in on Remus. “Silver fire, moon and stars,” Peeves chanted. “Twisted ire, golden scars.”Remus had no idea what that meant, but he had to force himself not to flinch at the mention of the moon. It would not do, he thought, to have Peeves’s attention focused on him. Not if he could see the wolf behind Remus’s eyes.Luckily, Sirius was going for the throat. “I have questions.” Sirius waved a sparking finger at Peeves. “And you’re going to answer.”Peeves laughter morphed into a lilting whistle as he twirled himself around in an aberration of a waltz. “Pour the wine and see the dancer,” Peeves sang. “Does he know the ask and answer?” “No riddles,” Sirius snapped. “Not today.”“Riddle me this, or riddle me that,” Peeves chanted. “Why the fuck would you trust a rat?”Remus frowned. Sirius sighed and tried a different approach. “I know what you are. What you used to be. You were a Seer.” That was news to Remus. Peeves stopped his eerie dance and looked down at Sirius, his head tilting at an unnatural, unnerving angle.“The future is yesterday and the past is right now.” The poltergeist turned his bent neck to Remus. Christ, he looked like a hanged man. “You said that in a dream once.”Before Remus could open his mouth, mull over all the possible meanings of that statement, he caught the look in Sirius’s eye. He’d never forget that, as long as he lived. Remus knew that in his bones. Years. He saw the years flying by in an instant, a heartbeat, lost in Sirius’s silver eyes, as though Sirius were the Seer and Peeves nothing more than a phantom. Sirius was no longer here, but ten, twenty years from now, living out the destiny Remus had somehow etched into a dream. And Remus… Remus was along for the ride, hurtling through space and time, tethered to Sirius by desperation, by existential happenstance, by fucking willpower alone. It was cosmic and cataclysmic and—It didn’t make sense. There was a very real chance that Remus’s mind was playing tricks on him. But, at the end of it all, the very last page, there was nothing. Or, perhaps there was everything: something and nothing forever in balance, forever at war, tied together for eternity by the same thread of destiny that anchored Remus to Sirius. Remus Lupin had never been so terrified in his life. Greyback, his first moon, the wolf lying in wait to devour his heart… Nothing compared to the story he saw in Sirius’s eyes. It was… harrowing.Remus would rend his soul and tear out his heart, if it’d make any difference. If it’d save them from that ending. Fate would demand one hell of a ransom, for the life of Sirius Black.Then, Sirius blinked, as though he’d been violently yanked back to the present, Remus right along with him. Peeves started to cackle. “Which is better, which is worse? To share a coffin, or share a curse?”“Stop it.” Sirius’s voice was ice-fire. Remus couldn’t breathe. “How do you know about Silas? About my dream?” His dream?! “No more rhymes. No more games. Just answer the question.”“The Veil is thinnest right—“ Peeves tapped his temple with a ghostly finger. Once, twice… “—here. Sometimes there are monsters.” Dead eyes turned to Remus. “And monsters have claws and teeth that tear through shadows and death. And me? I see.”Up until that very moment, Remus hadn’t been entirely certain Peeves was capable of speaking outside of rhymes and couplets. It was… refreshing, if not still a resounding cause for alarm. Remus found himself asking, “See, what, exactly?”“Everything.” Peeves repeated the word, mouthing every syllable. “And Nothing. All at once.” Then, to Sirius: “She wants you dead.”Remus almost choked. “Who wants him dead?”“My mistress.”Sirius pinched the bridge of his nose. “If you say that my mother sent you to torment me, I swear on fucking Merlin’s grave, I’ll—““Not,” Peeves said, “her.”A heartbeat. A millennium. “Oh,” Sirius said. “Her.”Something sharp pierced Remus’s heart. There could be no mistress more cruel than Walburga Black, save one. Fate herself. Sirius squared his shoulders, set his jaw. “How do I kill a god?”Which, at the end of the day, was the only question that mattered.Remus could not fathom how anyone in Sirius’s life could have—even for a bloody second—ever mistaken Sirius as anything but the perfect embodiment of everything it meant to be named a Gryffindor. Weak. Prey. Bullshit.Remus wanted to laugh, as mad and as humourless as Peeves.Sirius Black was the bravest person alive. One way or another—with Peeves’s help or without it—Sirius would find a way to kill God.And maybe mount her head on a pike, on top of Gryffindor tower.Any cognisance, any recognition of reality Peeves might have had mere moments ago vanished, evaporated before Remus’s eyes. Peeves began swaying in a non-existent breeze, oblivious to everything but the rhythm and meter of the universe. “No one knows what lies ahead, when gods and kings and dogs lie dead.”“Answer the question,” Sirius growled. “How do I kill a god?”In his heart of hearts, Remus knew Peeves wasn’t going to answer. Things could never be that easy. “How can he ever face another?” Peeves intoned, his voice rising with every beat. “The death-marked prince has damned his brother!”Remus saw the life drain from Sirius’s eyes. His words were almost stolen on the next breath of air. “What did you say?”Peeves just laughed.Magic—raw and wild and unconquerable—sparked around Sirius, danced on his fingers, and set his eyes ablaze. Remus felt it, prickling the hair on the back of his neck, whispering to his very soul. If ever Remus saw a creature, mortal or otherwise, who was born to withstand the wrath of both gods and men, it’d be Sirius Black. Christ, he was beautiful. “Stop it!” Sirius snarled, a mass of rage and ruin. “Just fucking stop. You’ve had your fun. Now answer the damned question or fuck off! Enough with the fucking riddles—“With that, Peeves struck, equal parts malice and annihilation. “Every Riddle sounds the same
But maybe Riddle is but a name
I know his face, know his plan
Know he seeks to rule this land
Hail, the soldiers damned to war
Riddle, thy name be Vol—“
“Enough!” Sirius roared, and Peeves swallowed that last word before either of them heard it. “Fuck you and your stupid, pointless games! Just… stay away from me. And Remus. And fucking all of us. Keep our names off your bloody lips and out of your bloody rhymes, or so help me, I will find a way to exorcise you and send you to the gates of hell myself.”Peeves just grinned, flashing yellow, pointed teeth. Madness and vengeance crackled across his features. With a flick of his wrist—outstretched so as to assert a little more control and finesse—Sirius summoned his tome from the ground, once more cradling it with both hands to his chest, now seemingly oblivious to its weight.Sirius inclined his head towards a set of stairs Remus was fairly certain hadn’t been there a minute ago. “Come on, Remus.”Remus followed, because, when it came to Sirius Black, he could—forever and always—do nothing else.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
JANUARY 24, 1972
“What’s it mean?” Remus asked. “To kill a god?”He’d thought of nothing else for the better part of three weeks. It’d strike him like a dagger to the heart—the gravity, the tragedy of it all—in the middle of class sometimes, and he’d grind his teeth to keep the panic at bay. He’d found himself spacing off during breakfast or dinner, when James and Sirius were both animatedly plotting some nefarious prank or other. Remus would feel his eyes go hazy. The noise of the Great Hall would simmer down to nothing as suddenly, the only think he’d be able to see was Sirius Black in shimmering, silver armour, sword drawn, ready to slay the dragon. He’d see it with such vivid clarity—taste the venomous metal of Sirius’s armour with each inhale—that he’d wonder if he’d been having some terror-induced fever dream, right there in the middle of the Great Hall. Because no matter now many times Remus blinked, the image never left his mind. Sirius was King Arthur, on a perilous, futile quest for the Holy Grail. He was Beowulf, D’Artagnan, and St. George, off to slay the dragon. He was Adam, standing before the snake, damned to take the fruit. Remus felt as though he hadn’t slept since before the full moon—eons ago, when the world was still a decent place, save for the wolf that tore him to pieces every month. Before he’d found Sirius Black on the bathroom floor bloody, beaten, and broken. From behind her desk, McGonagall stared at him with wide, cat-like green eyes, her spine rigid. Rather intelligently, she said, “What?”Remus forced himself to concentrate enough to repeat the question. A perfectly sarcastic eyebrow went up. Remus was privileged enough to watch in real time as Professor McGonagall schooled her expression back to neutral. “What, in Merlin’s name, are you writing your essay about, Lupin?”Technically, given that he was sitting detention with McGonagall for his behaviour in Care of Magical Creatures, he was supposed to be writing something of a reflection on said behaviour that he’d yet to formally apologise for. He had no plans on doing so. Remus looked down at his parchment and the words he’d written over and over and over and over. He’d traced the words with his pen, scribbled them out and written them again. He’d circled, underlined, and jabbed his pen into the parchment so hard that it’d left indentations.
Sirius Black, how tragically flawed
Thought he might be the boy to kill God
Now Nothing’s dictating
And that dark kiss is waiting
For the murder of the boy who killed God.
After his and Sirius’s confrontation with Peeves, Remus had spent the next several nights after detention searching the dark corridors for the poltergeist. When he’d finally tracked Peeves down, Remus had goaded Peeves into repeating the verse over and over, until Remus had it memorised. Now, it haunted his every heartbeat. Surreptitiously, Remus covered his mad-man scribbles before McGonagall could see what he’d written. He didn’t need her assuming he’d lost his mind. Not when McGonagall may have, possibly—impossibly—become his most vocal advocate among the staff. Though, he’d yet to forgive her for sending Sirius quite literally into the maw of the beast. “Wand-crafting,” Remus lied, in reference to his essay. “Is it a metaphor?”“You have an actual magic wand on your desk, Lupin. I hardly think—““No. Killing God. A god. Either one. Is that a metaphor or is it an actual possibility?”McGonagall looked as though she had a thousand and four questions on the tip of her tongue, but after a moment of consideration, she walked around her desk, crossed one hand over the other, and leaned against the solid mahogany. “I suppose, Lupin,” she said, “that would depend upon which religion or spirituality one subscribes.”“All of them. Any of them,” Remus replied.McGonagall’s lips pressed into a thin line. She took her time before answering. “Are you familiar with Melville’s Moby Dick, Lupin?”Not prepared at all for the question, Remus blinked. “Um.”“He’s a Muggle author,” McGonagall explained, unnecessarily. “I find that, sometimes, on very special occasions, stories and literature are the source and summit of all religion. And those that study these stories, the priests and priestesses of the written word.”Remus’s jaw dropped. “Have you heard the tale of Captain Ahab?”He shook himself a little, tried to focus on McGonagall’s question rather than her startling reverence of Muggle literature. “Um. Yes. Well, I know the story. It’s one of my mum’s favourites. I have her copy in my trunk.”In truth, Remus loathed Moby Dick as much as one could possibly loathe a book whilst still being in ardent opposition of the act of burning a book and erasing it from existence. He’d tried starting it more times than he could possibly count—and mostly at his mother’s insistence—but he’d never managed to stay awake beyond the first five chapters. He found the narration incredibly grating and pretentious, even for a classic. “I imagine,” McGonagall said, “that to endeavour to kill a god of any sort bears a striking similarity to Ahab’s quest for the white whale.”Futile. Perilous. Deadly.Jesus Christ.“Oh.” It was all he could muster. McGonagall frowned. Stress lines creased around unblinking eyes. “Was there a point to this metaphysical exercise, Lupin?”“No, ma’am,” Remus replied, far too quickly. “Just curious.”Remus didn’t have even the smallest of hopes that she actually believed him. “I suppose,” McGonagall said, fixing her deadly gaze on Remus, “that if one were to sail into the open ocean hellbent on the murder of the white whale, one damn-well better have his friends next to him, when the storm breaks loose.”Remus swallowed. “Yes, ma’am.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 27, 1972
Sirius recognised this place.
Well, all the dancing, faceless people were hard to mistake for anything other than fragments of his own shattered mind.
He still had yet to decide if this was a nightmare.
The faceless bride and groom took centerstage as the dance floor cleared for them. A waltz—or what Sirius assumed to be a waltz—began, but Sirius couldn’t hear a single note. The groom took the bride’s hand, kissed it, then bowed deeply before her, his other hand extended behind him in the most dramatic way possible.
Sirius found himself laughing at the groom, then covering it with a snort, and it was strange, because Sirius knew he shouldn’t laugh. He didn’t feel like laughing.
The weight of the world was so goddamned heavy these days.
The groom spun the bride in a circle. Then, with all the mirth and merriment due to him on a night like this, the groom grabbed his bride by the waist and lifted her for all to see.
Sirius didn’t dare look away. Even faceless, she was incomprehensibly beautiful. He could almost see her face, as the groom spun her again, but her exact features were still veiled in shadows. He could see her lips, though, painted a pale pink, as she mouthed the words, “I love you”, to her new husband. If he concentrated, he could just make out a splattering of freckles in between the shadows that danced across her face. And maybe—maybe—just a glimpse of red hair. A pair of arms wrapped around Sirius’s middle as someone pressed close against his back. The touch did nothing to him, save kick his heartbeat up, and Merlin, Sirius revelled in the feeling of safety—of… Love. He closed his eyes, drowning in the scent of rain and starlight, ready and willing to spend the rest of oblivion wrapped in the comfort of these arms.
A scarred hand found its way under Sirius’s jacket. A chin rested on his shoulder.
“That’ll be us someday,” a raspy voice whispered in his ear. Sirius felt the head on his shoulder incline towards the bride and groom. A second later, Sirius felt a soft kiss on the side of his neck.
Remus.
Merlin.
Revelling—bloody-fucking dying—at the feeling of Remus’s hands on him, Sirius reached up and twisted his fingers in Remus’s ridiculously curly hair. Just because he fucking could. It was his fucking dream and no cursed tattoo was going to stop him, god-fucking-damnit.
“Dibs on the dress,” Sirius said, and it came out far breathier than he intended.
Remus laughed into his neck. “White’s not your colour, love.”
The arms around his waist loosened slightly as Sirius turned to face Remus. He found himself gazing up at a slightly older, yet familiar face and haunting, beautiful golden eyes. Sirius reached out a hand to trace the pink and silver scars across Remus’s nose. His fingers danced over the constellations of freckles splattered across Remus’s cheeks, travelling down to follow the line of the scar that split Remus’s upper lip.
“Hi,” Sirius breathed, not moving his fingers from Remus’s lips. He felt the muscles tug at the scar beneath his fingertips as Remus smiled down at him.
“Hi, love.” Remus’s eyes were molten flame. “Dance with me?”
“Won’t we ruin their big moment?” Sirius jerked his head towards the bride and groom.
“Of course,” Remus said, smugly. “Can’t let them have all the fun.”
There, again—just like the last time he’d had this dream—at the end of the sentence was… something. A name, perhaps, but not his own. Or, at least not one Sirius’s mind recognised enough to actually interpret beyond a vague awareness that something was said.
But the way Remus said it, the way the syllables rolled off Remus’s tongue…
It was as melodic and heartfelt as the song that hadn’t yet been written. It could have been part of the love song, as slow and as perfect as the one the bride and groom danced to across the room.
In his heart of hearts, in the very depths of his tattered soul, Sirius knew the name Remus used was meant for him.
Remus said it again—a question this time—and Sirius tried desperately to comprehend the syllables.
Once more, nothing. Just empty air where a melody was meant to be. It was… rather disquieting, to say the least.
“Sirius?” Remus said, a nearly imperceptible frown creasing the spot between his eyes.
Instead of responding, Sirius grabbed Remus’s hand—because he fucking could—and dragged him towards the dance floor. When they were close enough to the newly-weds, he heard Remus let out a laugh—all mirth and mischief and mayhem—before two strong arms once more wrapped around Sirius’s waist.
The next thing Sirius knew, his feet were no longer touching the ground. Remus spun him around, hands on Sirius’s hips, much like the groom had spun the bride.
Sirius may or may not have squealed in terror and delight. Around them, Sirius felt the laughter from the crowd, felt the rhythm, the thrumming of the silent song that he couldn’t begin to comprehend. But it was there, in the beat of his heart, in the taste of the music just out of reach—as real and as solid as the miracle of Remus Lupin holding him in his arms.
Eventually, Remus stopped spinning and his arms folded beneath Sirius’s hips, bearing Sirius’s weight as though it were nothing. Sirius rested his hands on Remus’s shoulders for support. From this angle—held off the ground and towering over everyone—Sirius looked down at Remus and whatever laughter that had bubbled in his throat a moment before died on the tip of his tongue.
There was nothing funny about the way Remus looked at him. Eyes of golden fire and whiskey left in the sun stared up at Sirius as though he was a the only thing in the universe. Remus’s lip twisted upward in a smirk, and then…
Then, he was kissing Sirius.
It was nothing like the few kisses they’d shared the last time Sirius had found this in-between place, this dream-maybe-nightmare. This was…
Devastating.
Remus’s tongue was in his mouth, breathing, tasting, devouring him from the inside out. Merlin, Remus tasted light starlight and words not yet written and Sirius knew he’d claw a hole in the fabric of the universe if he’d somehow be allowed to stay in this moment forever.
One of Remus’s hands snaked up his spine, pulling him closer still, while his other remained firmly on Sirius’s arse, supporting his weight. Sirius had half a mind to wrap his legs around Remus’s waist, but he refrained, just in case he accidentally toppled them over and ruined the moment. Instead, Sirius yanked at Remus’s hair, momentarily surfacing for air, before adjusting the angle and taking control of the kiss, matching Remus’s enthusiasm blow for blow.
In his periphery, he was vaguely aware of the empty, nothing-noise of the crowd. Someone—the groom, maybe—slapped Remus’s shoulders. The gesture was followed by the trill and rhythm of silent laughter that Sirius couldn’t be bothered to care about.
Nothing made sense, in this shadowy dreamland, this in-between place, save for the taste of Remus Lupin on his tongue.
Remus nipped at his lips, their teeth clacking together, and Sirius could feel the growl rumbling though Remus’s chest. Remus bit down on Sirius’s bottom lip, tugging on it as he slowly pulled away.
Sirius couldn’t think. Any attempt at words in any sort of human language vacated his brain and left no notice of return. He clawed at Remus’s hair, pulled at his shoulders, trying to drag him closer once more. Remus, the bastard, was taller and stronger than Sirius and seemed to revel in the desperation that must have been written all over Sirius’s face.
With a chuckle, Remus lowered Sirius to his own two feet.
“Don’t let go, Re.” His voice may have been edged with a note of panic, but Sirius couldn’t bring himself to care. He had absolutely no confidence in his legs to support his own weight. Not after that.
This only seemed to make Remus laugh and really… his laughter could have been proof of a higher power. It made Sirius melt into the floor for a whole different reason.
“Never,” Remus whispered, leaning his forehead against Sirius’s.
One by one, the faceless crowd faded back into the shadows of future memories from whence they came, until even the bride and groom where whisps of nothing on the breeze.
One of Remus’s hands fell to Sirius’s hip, dragging him impossibly close. Merlin, Sirius melted into him. There was nothing else he could do. Resisting the gravitational pull of Remus Lupin was a Herculean task.
Remus’s other hand found Sirius’s, as he led them in a dance.
“What year are you from?” Remus asked, nudging Sirius with his nose, but doing nothing to otherwise break the spell and rhythm of their dance.
“1972,” Sirius breathed into Remus’s neck.
Sirius felt Remus tense up, his heart-rate thundering underneath the palm of Sirius’s hand.
“When in 1972?” There was tension in Remus’s voice that had no business being in a place like this. Unless… Unless this was some twisted nightmare after all.
“January,” Sirius said. “You found me in the bathroom.”
“Christ.” Remus’s eyes squeezed shut. Then, so quiet Sirius knew he probably wasn’t meant to hear, Remus said, “I can still taste the blood.”
Sirius didn’t know what to make of that.
Once more, Remus leaned his forehead against Sirius’s. “Everything’s about to change, Sirius. You’re tearing up the script and burning pages as we speak. The future is waiting for you to rewrite the ending.”
And maybe, if he breathed in deep or was capable of taking his eyes off Remus for more than a heartbeat, he’d see the flames dancing at the edges of the dream.
“That’s what it means, Sirius.” Remus’s voice drowned the flames, stopped the fire from devouring them whole. “To kill a god is to write your own ending. You decide where you go from here.”
Sirius frowned up at him. “What if I don’t want to decide? What if I don’t want to burn it all down?”
Remus smirked. “I don’t believe that for one goddamned second.”
Sirius didn’t budge. “Hypothetically, then.”
Remus’s expression softened. “Then… Then she wins. Then we obey the words and destines already written for us.”
Sirius swallowed, despite the not-so-proverbial noose around his neck. He didn’t even bother wiping away the tears that welled in his eyes. “I can’t lose the possibility of this, Remus. Of us, like this, in this place. If it means letting Fate kill me instead—“
Remus silenced him with another kiss. It tasted like burning embers and the ashes of the aftermath, and Merlin, Sirius knew he’d rather burn with the heavens than never touch Remus like this again.
“I told you, Sirius.” Remus’s breath tickled his lips. “You and I are endgame. In every version of reality.”
“Promise?”
Sirius felt the earthquake of Remus’s laughter beneath his fingers.
“I solemnly swear it.” Remus leaned back just far enough to plant a kiss on Sirius’s forehead. “Time to wake up, Siri.”
“Is it the vipers again?” he asked, but he wasn’t scared. How could he be, when Remus held him so close?
“No, love. No vipers tonight.” He kissed Sirius one last time, and Sirius prayed he could remember the taste for the rest of forever. “Just a friend and a blanket of stars.”
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ He opened his eyes to darkness and an empty bed. Sirius reached over, as he so often did in the middle of the night, searching for Remus’s hand—Merlin, his fingertips—but the other side of the pillow wall was cold. Sirius was fairly sure that the covers hadn’t even been pulled back. Though Sirius couldn’t see more than a few inches in front of him, he could taste the crisp, cold air coming from the open window.
Just a friend and a blanket of stars.
Sirius smiled to himself, crawled out of bed, and yanked the duvet off before making his way out the open window. Remus—his Remus—bathed in starlight, sat crosslegged on the roof, a blanket on his lap. Somehow—impossibly, given the darkness—he held a book in his hands and seemed to be reading by the light of the rising moon. “Hi,” Sirius croaked, taking his place beside Remus and waving a warming charm over the both of them. He didn’t know how Remus could’ve possibly been out here without one. Sirius could taste the frost with every inhale. “How long have you been out here?”Sirius waved his wrist and cast a Timus. It was after three in the morning.“Couple of hours,” Remus replied. “Didn’t want to wake you. You haven’t been sleeping.”“Neither have you.” He’d lost track of the nights he’d felt Remus lying awake beside him, the number of times they’d lain there in silence, letting their own thoughts and waking nightmares devour the darkness between them.“Hm,” Remus acknowledged, closing his book. Sirius couldn’t quite make out the title in the dark. The silence stretched between them, enveloping the castle, the moors, swallowing the world whole. Sirius normally didn’t mind the silence—he’d danced to it, revelled in it, just minutes ago, years from now—but this felt different. There were too many words left unsaid. “Do you ever dream of something you know you’re not meant to remember?” Sirius asked the silence. “Yes. At least once a month,” Remus said, simply. Sirius looked at him. “Though not, I assume, in the way you mean.”Sirius wasn’t entirely certain what he meant. In the waxing moonlight, he couldn’t stop picturing the scars Remus didn’t yet have. “I dreamed about you, Remus,” Sirius said.Remus closed his book and turned fully to look at Sirius. Remus smirked. “Was I wearing clothes?”Sirius snorted at his own question thrown back in his face.“We were dancing,” Sirius replied, because although there were definitely clothes involved, he wasn’t exactly going to fess up to the rest of the dream. Merlin, he didn’t have the capacity to even begin to process that right now. “To a song that hasn’t been written yet.” At Sirius’s startled sputter, Remus elaborated, “You talk in your sleep too, you know.”He had known that, actually. Regulus used to complain about it almost every night, when he used to sneak into Sirius’s room after the last torch went out at Grimmauld Place. Sirius could feel those same, lingering flames flickering away and boring a hole in his heart. A void—a nothing—that used to be something like love and devotion. It ached and stole his breath, because deep in the recesses of his soul—in the fiery pits of brimstone and nightmare and nothing—Sirius came face to face with his greatest sin. He’d abandoned Regulus—his brother—to a pit of vipers.Bargains had been made, oaths sworn, and magical contracts bound in blood and ruin, but at the end of the day, it’d never erase what he’d done. If he were truly any sort of Gryffindor, he would have endured, if in the end it would have spared his brother’s fate. Because… because the writing was on the wall, stitched into that damned tapestry in Grimmauld Place. If abandoned to his own fate, Regulus would be a slave to his destiny, even as Sirius liberated himself from his own damnation. “Sirius?” Remus said, leaning into him. A jolt of… something—fire, maybe—shot though Sirius at the contact. Not pain, exactly—not with the duvet separating them. Just… something. “Where’d you go?”“Hm?” Sirius swallowed and pushed aside thoughts of his brother. He was certain he’d revisit the subject in his nightmares. Remus stared at him, face alight with wonder and scars, his eyes almost golden in the darkness around them. Every fibre of his being craved to reach out and touch, trace the magic leyline scars, taste the—
Salazar’s fucking tits.
No. No. Now was not the time to deal with that. Not while other monsters and unknown gods still lurked in the shadows. “Do you believe in fate, Remus?”He hadn’t actually meant to ask the question, nor did he really know where it came from, but Remus seemed entirely unfazed by it. “I wish every damn day that I didn’t,” Remus replied. “But I’ve seen her hands weaving the chords of life far too often to live in denial.”“How very reasonable of you,” Sirius said, but the sarcasm inherent in the words failed to translate when he spoke them aloud. “Yes, well. Perhaps I’ll go off and join Ravenclaw after all.” Remus toyed with the frayed cover of his book. Sirius snorted, because that was fucking ridiculous. Remus Lupin was the bravest of all of them. Not like James, who bled crimson and gold, nor Lily, their chosen king, but… brave—not fearless—despite the reality of their waking nightmares. Remus and Gryffindor simply belonged in the same sentence. It just made sense. “Apart from your rather extensive horde of Muggle literature,” Sirius said, nodding to the frayed and yellowing book in Remus’s lap, “you’re nothing like those uptight arseholes.” Remus scoffed derisively and Sirius knew he wasn’t going to win an argument against Remus’s own self-deprecating inner monologue, so he changed the subject. “What are you reading, anyway?”Remus sighed heavily and held up the book. Just because he could—and not at all to show off—Sirius flicked his first two fingers together and summoned a bright red flame, which he cradled in the palm of his hand. The fiery light was just enough to illuminate the well-loved cover of the book. Sirius stared at the cover in silence for a solid minute, until the flame in his hand petered out and died, the darkness once more swallowing them whole. “Is that… pornography, Remus?!”Remus’s laugh was so sudden—so genuine—that it seemed to startle both of them. “What?! No, that’s—““Liar. It literally has ‘dick’ in the title.”“Ugh. That’s the—““Gimme your porn book, Remus,” Sirius demanded, already reaching for the book. He pried it from Remus’s hands. Well, not so much pried. Remus let go as soon as Sirius tugged on it, so as to avoid contact. “Are there pictures?”Sirius squinted in the darkness, thumbing through the worn pages. “No, there aren’t—““Then is it one of those romance books Marlene told me about? She said Evans has a secret stash, but Evans won’t share them with me. She said they’re private, which, really, is just rude. Porn belongs to the masses. You’d share your porn books with me, right, Remus?”“What?!” Remus’s voice might have squeaked a little. Sirius thought it was adorable. “Jesus Christ, Sirius, it’s about a whale!”Sirius’s eyes narrowed. “Is that a euphemism for his dick?”Remus groaned and tilted his head back, sharing his grief and lamentations with the waxing moon. “That book—“ Remus said the word book the same way someone might say toe jam or scraggily ear hair. “That book is utter shit. I’d sooner throw it off this tower.”“So… No porn, then?”“No porn, Sirius.”“Hm.” Sirius wasn’t sure if he believed him. “Why are you reading it if you hate it so much?”“I am trying to ascertain the viability of futile quests against whales and/or gods.” The mood change was so abrupt, Sirius very nearly choked on it. “Um… what?”“Nothing.” Remus heaved another sigh. “It’s my mum’s favourite, that book. She always said it was frightfully romantic to go on an adventure on the high seas.”Sirius wasn’t entirely sure he was following the conversation, though he was fairly certain they weren’t talking about a damn whale. Or porn. Unfortunately. Still, he said, “But you disagree.”“I think,” Remus said, voice thick, “that the seas are filled with monsters and the quest to destroy them… It’s heartbreaking, damning, to choose a quest like that. It’s not worth the ransom price.”Sirius grimaced, because, he, more than most, happened to know a thing or two about ransom prices. How can he ever face another? The death-marked prince has killed his brother. “Maybe it’s not about choice,” Sirius heard himself say. When bright, golden eyes flicked to his in shock—in aberration at the desolation in his words—he continued. “Maybe it’s about resignation. Surrender. Inevitability.” “Nothing’s inevitable, Sirius.”“You’re wrong.”Although Remus waited—stared at him, as though starving for answers Sirius knew he’d never have—this time, Sirius refused to elaborate.
You and I are inevitable. In every version of reality.
Sirius wouldn’t risk breathing life—finality—into such a dream, lest he curse it by letting the words leave his tongue. The dream was to fragile, too precious, to take that kind of risk. “Sirius?” Remus’s voice seemed to echo over the castle, despite it being no louder than a breath of air. “Hm?”“Sirius, I—“ Remus opened and closed his mouth, stuttered out a few more incoherent syllables, before cutting himself off with a frustrated growl. He tried again. “I got a letter from my mum.”Sirius’s brows pinched. He didn’t remember any owls coming for anyone recently, besides James. “When?”“This morning?” It was far to much of a question.“Liar.” It was far too much of an answer.“She’s sick.”Sirius wondered if that was true. And, more importantly, what kind of wold-ending nightmare might compel Remus to invent that sort of lie. “I need to leave, to be with her. I don’t know how long this time, but… it’ll be a few days. At least. And I don’t know if… Well, I do, but—Christ, I’m not going to be here for Lily’s party. I need to… go home. Be with my mum.”Remus was babbling and Sirius just… let him.Let Remus lie right to his face.The lie festered between them. Neither of them were brave enough to tear it apart. Not now. It was just allowed to exist out of… necessity, more than anything else. After a long, devastating silence, Sirius said, “Are you ever going to tell me the truth? About your scars, why you leave? Why your damn eyes change colour? Any of it?”Sirius fully expected more excuses, more half-truths and tricks of circumstances. He expected wide eyes and panic: a squealing rat with its tail caught in a trap, desperately wising it’d been its neck instead. He expected a prayer, a plea, a bargain for the end of torment and questions. What he got instead was an acknowledgement of the lie. Not a detailed confession or admission of guilt, but still, it was… something. “The night we graduate. Remember?” Remus said, trying to force levity into his words. “We have a date.”
A… date?
“That’s in six years, Remus,” Sirius deadpanned, rather than allowing himself to fixate on anything else. Remus stared at him for a long moment before he said, “You’ll figure it out long before then. Of that I have no doubt.” There was… cataclysm in Remus’s eyes. Not knowing what else to do, how else to convince Remus that he’d already lived through hell and that whatever it was didn’t fucking matter, Sirius pressed close to Remus’s side, leaning into him from shoulder to hip. It… tingled, twinged a bit, but with the duvet separating them, the vague potential of pain hardly even registered. There were far more devastating things, he’d learned, than soul-shattering pain and cursed tattoos. “Would it be so bad if I knew?” Sirius asked, trying and mostly succeeding in keeping the pout out of his voice. Remus’s eyes squeezed shut. “I don’t know anymore.”“But you’re… afraid?” Sirius guessed. “Petrified,” Remus croaked. And Sirius Black understood that, too, better than anyone. So, instead of pestering Remus, instead of voicing any one of the thousands of questions he’d already asked, Sirius shifted, wiggled around until he freed a corner of the duvet. He managed to drape the loosened corner over his head—his hair be damned—and pulled it tight to form a hood. Satisfied, Sirius leaned his head against Remus’s shoulder. Remus tensed, for just a moment, apparently waiting for Sirius to jerk back from the pain. Except he didn’t—wouldn’t—because he was safe and this… this was worth so much more than pain. After recognising that Sirius wasn’t going anywhere, Remus reached out and wrapped his right arm around Sirius’s shoulders. When Sirius still didn’t pull away, Remus tugged him gently, prompting Sirius to lay back against the roof, with his head pillowed on Remus’s chest, their bodies separated by the duvet. Remus’s other hand tangled in the duvet, pulling Sirius as close as possible. Sirius felt Remus draw in a breath, then shudder with the exhale, his breath faintly whistling in the frosty air. “Are you cold?” Sirius heard himself say, though he wasn’t about to move. They couldn’t stay like this all night—eventually the pain would come back to haunt him, even with the duvet—but if they went back inside, there’d be an infinite chasm of pillows between them and Sirius wasn’t ready for that. He needed to feel—to touch, as much as he possibly could—to measure the steady cadence of Remus’s heartbeat. He needed it more than the air in his lungs. “Not even a little,” Remus breathed, though Sirius was sure then warming charm had worn off a while ago. “You know,” Sirius told the stars above them, because he could see nothing else. “Nothing could ever be so bad. No monster too frightening or secret too terrible. I’m not going anywhere, Remus.” Sirius could feel the tremor in Remus’s words. “You say that now, but—““And I’ll say it forever.” “You don’t know what you’re promising, Sirius.” “I’m promising you, Re. I solemnly swear it. Nothing will change this. Us.”“Sirius—““You’ve seen my nightmares. My horrible, dark secrets, and yet you’re still here. You still… fought for me.”Remus seemed to consider his words carefully. “You haven’t told me everything.”Sirius wasn’t going to deny it. “No, I haven’t. But we have a date for that.” To his immense relief, Remus laughed softly, barely loud enough to hear, but Sirius felt the rumble in Remus’s chest. Sirius inched imperceptibly closer. “Think about my secret. Picture the worst thing—the absolute worst thing you can imagine—““Are we talking about crossdressing or getting thrown in Azkaban here, Sirius?”“Hush, you.” But Sirius laughed, despite the fact that Azkaban wasn’t so far outside of the realm of possibilities, given his sins. “Worst thing possible, would you leave?”The consequences of such a question hadn’t occurred to him before the words left his mouth. Remus could destroy him with his answer. But…“No,” Remus said. “No. Nothing would change.”Sirius could have howled his triumph to the stars. “You’re everything, Remus. They’d have to throw me in Azkaban for you to get rid of me. I’m not going anywhere.”For a brief moment, Sirius wondered if he’d wandered back into his dream, back into the in-between, where nothing bothered to exist except him and Remus Lupin. It was perfect, this moment, and if Sirius had the capacity to will away the ticking clock, the mounting pain, the gnawing weight of fate and tomorrow, he wouldn’t hesitate. Anything, to stay in Remus’s arms, just one moment more. Remus let out another shuddering breath, then pulled Sirius close, fusing them together. Sirius squeezed his eyes shut, fought back tears, because it was almost too much, too close, too—Then, Sirius felt the press of Remus’s lips on his forehead, just between his eyes, and… and it didn’t hurt. Or, maybe it did. Perhaps it burned with the fires of eternity, but Sirius didn’t care. This was a dream, a promise. This was inevitable. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 28, 1972
“Are you absolutely sure we had to miss dinner for this? Can’t we do this after?”Sirius paused, peering around the next corridor. “Shut it, Pettigrew. You’re supposed to be invisible.”“Yes, but, see, they were serving mashed potatoes.”“They always serve mashed potatoes.”“Not these kind. They’re American or something. Lots of butter.”“It’s a potato. They all taste the same.”Peter let out an affronted gasp. “This, coming from the same person who hates chocolate. Chocolate! No appreciation of flavour whatsoever. Either that, or you just enjoy being miserable.” Sirius rolled his eyes. “Throw the damn stone, Pete. I’m pretty sure you ate half of Hickory Dave’s last meal. Fried grits and pickle juice, was it?”Triumphant, Sirius turned down the empty hallway.“Left, Sirius! I said left,” came Remus’s voice. Sirius retraced his steps, this time, turning veering down the opposite corridor. “And, for the record, I agree with Peter. Not about the fried grits. That’s just… wrong.”Sirius spun on his heel, expertly and—dare he say, suavely—walking backwards as he stuck his tongue out at the empty space behind him. They’d agreed, mere moments after Remus had explained the plan (twice, for Peter’s sake), that it’d be best if Sirius remain outside the invisibility cloak. For one, and most practically, with four of them under there, he’d be smashed up against both Remus and James, which would certainly mean excruciating pain and thus put a damper on their adventure. Secondly, they all agreed that although he was exposed and out in the open, Sirius was the most capable of talking his way out of any trouble, should they encounter a professor or Filch. Suave, Sirius concluded, smugly. That was, of course, only half a second before he accidentally walked backwards into the statue of the one-eyed witch.The one-eyed witch’s hand placement was rather… unfortunate. She was stooped over enough and Sirius was just short enough that her scraggily, stoney, cold hand reached right between his legs. Sirius squealed, scrambling away, his magic flaring and sparking, hands raised at the witch in his panic. Behind him, just… hysterical laughter. Remus whipped the invisibility cloak off the three of them. James was bent in two, half-leaning on Peter, laughing his arse off. “You know, Sirius. In some cultures, copping a feel like that means you’re married,” Remus deadpanned.Sirius straightened, smoothed back his hair. Tried to regain what dignity he had. “Yes, well.” Sirius took a step closer to the witch. Stood on his tip-toes to look her in the eye. “I could do worse. She’s far prettier than most of the pureblood girls my mother keeps trying to sell me off to.”At that, Remus grimaced. James, though, didn’t miss a beat. “You mean like Kayla Greengrass?”Sirius tried to conjure a face to fit the name. The name, he knew. He was sure he’d met her, sure his mother had mentioned her. But still, he asked,“Who?”“The Slytherin who’s got a crush on you.”“What?” Sirius wheezed.“What?!” Remus snapped.“She’s blonde,” James supplied. “And pretty,” Peter added.Sirius wrinkled his nose. “Gross.”James narrowed his eyes. Crossed his arms. “Why is that gross?”Sirius wasn’t going to touch that one. Instead, he went with, “Aren’t we supposed to be focusing on your love life, Potter?”“Yeah, I thought there was supposed to be a tunnel,” Peter said, leaning around them to get a better look at the one-eyed witch. “All I see is Sirius’s wife.”Sirius groaned miserably. Remus stepped forward, drawing his wand. “All right, lads. From henceforth, all secret passages in and around Hogwarts—““There’s more of them?” Peter piped up.“At least seven,” Sirius said.“Shut it,” James whispered. “He used the word henceforth. He’s being serious.”“No, I’m Sirius.”“Sirius,” Remus said, voice flat. “I will throw you off the roof.”Sirius grinned, wickedly. He winked, his tongue poking out.Remus visibly swallowed, eyes lingering just long enough to make Sirius preen, before clearing his throat. “As I was saying, all secret passages in and out of Hogwarts are a Marauders-level secret. If word gets out and too many people start using them, Filch will make sure they’re closed off and then no one can use them. Which would significantly hinder any and all future butterbeer acquisition plans. No one knows but us.”“And our king,” Sirius added, mostly because he was pretty sure she already knew. Remus had said both he and Lily went to Hogsmeade over the holidays.“And our king,” Remus confirmed.Both James and Peter nodded in agreement. Without any further ado, Remus raised his wand, pointed at the witch, and said, “Dissendium.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ The smell hit him before anything else. Sirius almost gagged. He tasted bile in the back of his throat, the scent of the room coating the inside of his nose. Mildew mixed with damp, mixed with—“So much damn chocolate,” Sirius moaned in dismay amidst the thousand-some-odd crates in the basement of Honeydukes.“Want to try some, Sirius?” James snarked, prying open the nearest box and promptly tossing a chocolate bar to Remus.“I am so damn allergic.”“Yes, but what a glorious way to go,” Remus said, ripping open the wrapping and breaking off a large piece. “I’d rather eat fried grits and pickle juice.”“Ha!” That was Peter, vindicated.“We’re here for butterbeer,” Sirius groused. “First one to find some gets a prize.” “What kind of prize?” Peter asked.“I’m not snogging you again, Black,” James said, opening another box. “Choose something else.”Sirius twirled his fingers at the box closest to him. It was filled with Chocolate fucking Frogs. “I don’t care, Jamie,” Sirius said, half-gagging. He quickly made his way across the room, blindly fumbling open another box. Little sugar butterflies scattered out of the box, flying in his face, and consequently, all over the basement. “I will literally do anything if it gets us out of here faster.”James and Peter paused in their own searches, shared a look. Remus had yet to open a single box, but something sparked in his golden eyes.“Will you do my homework for a week?” Peter asked.“Sure,” Sirius said, barely containing an eye-roll. Between him and James, they practically always did Peter’s homework anyways.“Will you go to the Gryffindor-Slytherin match next week?” James asked. “You’ve been at Hogwarts for almost six months and haven’t been to a Quidditch game. Sirius, it hurts my soul.”There was a reason for that. Sirius hated crowds. Still, he said. “Yes, fine, whatever.”Sirius opened another box. More fucking chocolate. Fudge this time. Sirius Black was going to die from second-hand chocolate. “Merlin’s fucking tits, where’s the fucking butterbeer?!” Sirius cried in dismay.He turned to Remus. Who still hadn’t moved. “You’re not helping,” Sirius said.“I’m weighing my options.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. “What do you want if you find the butterbeer?”Remus shrugged. “Nothing, really.”“Spit it out, Lupin.”Remus crossed his arms. Nodded at James and Peter. “Both of their things.”“How very nice of you, Remus,” Sirius snarked. “What else?”“I want you to talk to Snape at the party.”Sirius, very eloquently, said, ”Huh?” “Talk to him. He’s going to be awkward and lonely. Lily will be thrilled he’s there, but she’ll be busy with other people too. He’ll be a Slytherin in a room of Gryffindors, so… Talk to him.”Sirius groaned. “I already invited him. Isn’t that enough?”“Not if you want to get out of here before you drown in chocolate.”Sirius crossed his arms. Pouted. “Why?”“Because I want to know if he’s worth saving.” That made Sirius pause. James and Peter looked up from their respective non-butterbeer-containing crates. Remus sighed. “Lily thinks he is. I want to know if she’s right.”She’s wrong. Sirius had never been more fundamentally sure of his ability to read a person than he was of his assessment of Severus Snape. He knew exactly what type of person Snape was. A tragic childhood or sop story wouldn’t change a damn thing.They all had tragic childhoods. It didn’t mean they all chose to be monsters.“Fine,” Sirius said, simply because he wanted nothing more than to march right back up to Gryffindor tower and shove the nozzle of a firehose up his nose to clear out the smell. He fucking hated chocolate. Remus, trying to hide a smirk, tucked his chocolate away and walked to a stack of unmarked crates against the back corner of the cellar. He flicked his wand at the one on top and the lid levitated just enough to reveal forty-eight bottles of butterbeer. “I win,” Remus said. And the thing was, Sirius had known Remus would win. It was inevitable, really. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been stupid enough to bet Sirius for Snape. Remus Lupin was a conniving bastard. Sirius admired that in a person. Still, he was morally obligated to bitch about the outcome of the bet. Just a little. “That’s cheating. You’ve been here before.”“Wasn’t exactly looking for butterbeer last time.”“You must have scouted the premises.”“Nope.” Remus smirked. “I hate you,” Sirius said. It was the closest Sirius was going to come to admitting defeat.“Liar,” Remus said, and yeah, he was right about that too.James stepped forward, his eyes darting back and forth between Sirius and Remus. “This has all been very… enlightening, but I’m going to have to side with Remus on this one. We need to get out of here. Unfortunately, Peter found a dead rat in the corner and has since passed out. I need someone to help me carry him back to Hogwarts.”Sirius took a second to process that. “Peter… what?!”Sure enough, when James stepped aside, a pale and seemingly-lifeless Peter-Pettigrew was passed out cold on the mildew-ridden floor. Next to him, a dead rat, with it’s neck broken in a trap. “Huh,” Sirius said. “Should’ve brought Marlene’s camera.”James tried to smack him. Sirius dodged it, expertly. He’d been expecting it. “Come on, Remus. Help me carry him. Sirius, levitate the butterbeer.”“Yes, Mom,” Sirius said, already calling his magic to the tips of his fingers. Remus went over to Peter. He nudged him with his foot, but Peter did not stir. James started towards them, but stopped, patted his chest, then fished through every pocket in his robes until he finally whipped out a small pouch. He produced a handful of Galleons from the pouch and carefully placed them on the first rung of the ladder that led up to Honeydukes. “Can’t have them going broke on account of our thievery,” James said to Remus’s raised eyebrow. “This place needs to stay open. We need butterbeer.”Remus looked like he wanted to say something, maybe reach into his own pocket and pull out a few meagre sickles, but before he got all altruistic about it—or worse, felt guilty that James alone was funding their endeavours—Sirius said, “Should I bring back the rat too? It seems as though Peter’s made a friend. Perhaps we ought to give it a funeral. Out of respect.”Remus snorted a laugh at the same time James buried his face in his hands. Sirius counted that as a win. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 30, 1972
“I miss Remus.” “That’s the fourth time you’ve said that in the last twenty minutes,” James said, but he sounded more… curious than annoyed. Sirius toyed with the sleeve of his robe as he watched Fabian and Gideon hang the banner that Dorcas had made over the mantle. The robe and scarf Sirius was wearing belonged to James, as James had insisted on Gryffindor colours in light of bringing an enemy (Sirius’s word) into the Gryffindor stronghold. Sirius’s own robes had been transfigured time and again to fit the colours of his house and they’d begun to fray around the edges. Not that Sirius minded. Marlene said it made him look like a rockstar. (He wasn’t entirely sure what she meant, but he liked how it sounded.) But, when he’d donned his own robes earlier, James said it was not appropriate for his best friend to look like a ratty hoodlum if James was going to impress his future bride. Sirius was reasonably sure Lily wouldn’t give a shit, but the sleeves on James’s robes were soft (although substantially too long) and the fabric warm and comfortable, so he hadn’t said anything.Instead, Sirius was thinking about Remus. Sirius sighed, dramatically, but also because he was coming to the conclusion that he was—perhaps—a bit heartbroken. “I can’t help it,” Sirius said. “ It’s not fair that he has to leave all the time. He’s supposed to be here.”“You’ve said that seven times.” James nudged Sirius with his shoulder, just the briefest of touches. “What’s going on with you, mate? You’re being weird.”“Weird? I’m not being weird,” Sirius said, but his voice cracked on several different syllables. James turned on him. “See, that? That was weird.”“I have no idea what you’re on about, Potter,” Sirius said, despite the fact that they both knew Sirius was lying through his teeth. “You miss Remus,” James said, eyebrows waggling just enough to imply weight behind the words. “Yes, I thought we’d established that.”“We did.” James fidgeted, as though he wasn’t quite sure where he was going with this. Sirius wasn’t either. “Okay. I’m going to ask you a series of questions. You don’t have to answer them. In fact, if I cross a line, feel free to hex me. But… be nice about it. Please? I’m still trying to woo my bride here and that’d be rather difficult if I’m bleeding out of my eyes.”“I’d clearly give you green polka dots on your face, Potter.”“Sirius.” James’s tone changed. There was no deflecting this particular conversation. Sirius inwardly cringed, but waved a hand for James to continue. “You and Remus sleep in the same bed.”Merlin. They were really going to talk about this, huh?Sirius nodded, keeping his eyes trained on the party coming together in the common room. “He has nightmares.” That was true, at least. Sirius looked down at his hands and mumbled, “I have nightmares.”That was—surprisingly—less true. Well… It wasn’t not true. He just wasn’t sure if that faceless world was part of his nightmares or his daydreams. Honestly, it could go either way. Because having that only in a dream was enough to rip out his—No. Sirius refused to think about that.James had been quiet for a long time. “Why him? Why Remus?”Sirius felt the corners of his lips rise in a semblance of a smile. It was a teasing smile, albeit a bit cruel. “As in, why not you, Jamie? Why aren’t I spending every night in your bed?”“Merlin, you’re bloody impossible.” James scrubbed a frustrated hand over his face. “Sirius, you’re my brother and I love you. I’d burn the stars for you. You know that, right?”James had been saying that a lot, lately.Sirius still wouldn’t admit—even to himself—how much he needed to hear it. “All I’m saying,” James continued, “is that you can talk to me. About anything. I’ll always be here and I’ll always be on your side. Come whatever.”“I know, James.” It was all he could say, really. They watched Fabian and Gideon try to level the banner, then bicker about the placement and balance and general feng shui of the room for several minutes, before Dorcas cut in and raised the left side of the banner (Fabian’s) about a centimetre up. The twins paused, then nodded sagely, before clapping each other on the back for a job well done. Dorcas looked as though she’d aged several years in the past few minutes. “How’d you know?” James seemed rather taken aback by Sirius’s question. “How’d you know that Evans was… the one?”Sirius said that last bit with a heavy dose of sarcasm, because he wasn’t quite sure he believed in such things. He wanted to—Merlin, did he—but the whole thing tasted rather like fate and destiny and, on principal, Sirius Black was opposed to such things. And yet…
Yet…
James had a dopey look on his face. It was, all things considered, kind of adorable. After a minute, James sobered and nudged Sirius until Sirius looked at him, trying to ignore the zing of pain that shot up his arm. “You can’t tell anyone.” Sirius nodded and crossed his heart for good measure. James seemed satisfied. “My magic kind of… reacts to her? I guess. Like, okay. When I was a kid, I didn’t feel magic at all. Mum said I wasn’t a Squib, but it wasn’t like I was oozing magic out my eyeballs or something. Not like you. And what magic I did have was kind of… all over the place.”“I seem to recall an incident excessive sneezing and burnt dinners.”“Oi. Shut it. But yes, exactly. When I’m around her, though, it’s… settled. Steady. I dunno, mate, it just feels right. Like I’ve peeked at the end of the story and all that’s there is her. Almost like we’re—““Inevitable?”“Exactly.”Sirius tugged at the end of his sleeves. “What if she doesn’t feel the same?”“Then I’ll wait,”James said, and it was pride and love and all the courage that Sirius wished he possessed. “I’ll wait until she reads the ending. If she’s never ready, then all I can do is walk towards the future I see, even if I’m alone, and pray that she’s there to meet me on the last page.”“You’re that sure she will?”“I hope so.” He shrugged. “Given present circumstances, it may take… a minute or two. I don’t care, though. I’ll wait. And also, maybe, along the way, I’ll prove to her that I’m kind of awesome.”“Good luck with that.”“And you’ll talk me up because you love me too.”“I do, you know?” Then under his breath, Sirius muttered, “I don’t think I told you that, but you’re right. I-I love you and we’re—““Brothers.”This made Sirius smile and it felt real. Because real was the look in James’s dark eyes, that spoke of love and fairy-tale endings. Real was the smell of butterbeer, the sound of Marlene’s laughter, Dee’s sweet voice harmonising with the track on the Muggle music box thing that Sirius was still convinced was made of magic. Real was the absence of Remus Lupin and the ache in Sirius’s heart. “Um, Sirius?” James said, and it should have broken the spell, but it didn’t. It was just part of the symphony of real and love and family. “Weren’t you supposed to go get Snape?”“Nope.” Sirius was rather proud of that particular development. “I made Frank do it.”“Frank? Longbottom?” James gave him a look. “Merlin, how’d you swing that?”“Fabian threatened to throw the next Quidditch match against Slytherin if Frank didn’t go along with it.”James’s cry of dismay echoed over the common room. Heads turned. The record scratched. Sirius burst out laughing. “Don’t you fucking dare throw that game, Prewett!” James shouted at Fabian. Fabian put a hand over his heart. Then, to Gideon, he said, “Aw. He sounds just like Frankie.”“Except Potter was about an octave lower,” Gideon added. “Adorable,” Fabian cooed. James stood and brushed his robes off, ready to storm off and make sure that their match against Slytherin was in the bag, when Sirius tugged on his robes. “Jamie,” Sirius said, voice sharp enough to cut through the Quidditch-fog dulling James’s synapses. “Go find Evans. Party’s gonna start.”That dopey smile came back in an instant, and with one last hard glare at the Prewetts, James ducked out of the portrait hole. They’d arranged for Alice and a couple of older Gryffindors to distract Lily in the library until they were ready for her. It was a brilliant plan, really.Sirius closed his eyes, breathing it all in, trying not to pay attention to the ache in his heart. When he opened his eyes, his gaze snagged on the open window next to the mantle. There was a lunar eclipse tonight. They’d learned about it in Defence, when Rattleburn had taken them to the Astronomy Tower earlier that week. Rattleburn said on nights like theses, magic felt closer to the tips of your fingers. Sirius believed her, long before he’d seen the look in Remus’s eyes. The look that reminded him of the sight before him: shadows over the golden moon. Outside, the whisps of darkness dulled the full moon and cast the stars into black. It was beauty and chaos, predictable and deadly, dark when it was supposed to be light. Merlin, he missed Remus. A moment later, Frank Longbottom artfully shoved a blindfolded Severus Snape into the Gryffindor common room. Silence, as Snape removed the blindfold and shot a glare at Frank. “All right,” Frank said, a frown carved into his face. “House rules—“Fabian clapped his hands, gleefully interrupting Frank mid-lecture. “Places, everyone. Potter will be back in a moment. Black, get down here. Snake—““Snape,” he snapped, with just a bite of Slytherin venom.“Right, that’s what I said,” Fabian lied, smoothly. “You… front and centre. You’re the surprise.”Sirius tried to hide his laugh as he carefully made his way through the crowd, gratefully nodding to Marlene when she shoved a fifth-year out of his space. Fabian continued, “Lights out, music off until they get here. Frank, don’t hit the butterbeer until our king arrives. She gets the first drink.”Snape was mouthing the word king with equal parts of disgust and awe. “All right, break,” Gideon ordered, and all around them, Gryffindors ducked behind tapestries and couches. Peter somehow got shoved in the unlit mantle. Sirius picked his way to Snape, carefully dodging his housemates. When Snape saw him, his befuddled look flicked immediately back to venom. Not that Sirius had hoped for better. It was still Snape, after all. Hands in his robe pockets, Sirius forced a smile. “You’re with me, Snape. Behind the coffee table.”Snape scowled, but obeyed, crouching next to Sirius on the plush rug. “I still bloody hate you all,” Snape growled.“I would not expect anything else.”“But thank you.” It was said through gritted teeth and the room erupted into screams and Happy Birthday’s a heartbeat later, Sirius couldn’t be entirely sure that he’d heard Snape right.They sprang up, all of them, shouting and cheering in true Gryffindor fashion. Someone—Sirius had good money on the Prewetts—set off a series of small, colourful fireworks. Marlene and Dorcas led a lovely happy birthday chant and song.Lily Evans had both hands over her mouth and tears in her eyes. Behind her was James Potter, who may as well have been transported to the end of his fairy-tale. When Lily saw the very bashful Severus Snape, she let out a small cry and ran to him, her hands grabbing greasy hair and pulling Snape to her. His arms wrapped around her, clutching her tight. Sirius watched James for a hint of jealousy, and although there was a tick in his jaw, that fairy-tale ending still danced in his eyes. Lily pulled away, then said in a rush, “Oh my God, how are you here? You can’t be here. You’ll get detention!”“He gets a pass tonight,” Frank piped up, after an elbow to his ribs from Alice. “Just tonight.”“But how—“Face red, Snape’s eyes flicked behind Lily to James. Lily turned followed his gaze, and Sirius watched with immense satisfaction as her jaw dropped.“You did this?” she said to James.Suddenly bashful, the fair-tale prince fluffed up his hair until it stood up in every imaginable direction. He looked hopelessly ridiculous. Lily Evans didn’t stand a chance.“It was Sirius’s idea,” James said. “Pete and Remus helped us with the butterbeer. And Snape… showed up.”Clutching Lily’s hand, Snape managed what probably constituted as a small smile, apparently rather proud of himself for doing just that. Squeezing Snape’s hand, Lily nodded to James. “Thank you.”James, if Sirius read him right, was about three heartbeats away from proposing marriage. Again. So, being the amazing friend he was, Sirius cleared his throat loudly. With a flick of his wrist, he summoned a butterbeer—only spilling a little—and held it out to Lily. “Your Majesty, your drink. McKinnon?”“Yeah?” Marlene called.“Make the Muggle thing play the weird space song again.”“Oi, Black! That’s Bowie, mate, and you will show some damn respect,” Marlene snapped, but her tone had no bite to it. She muttered a spell and flicked her wand at the Muggle music box. Fabian snagged Alice from Frank’s arms and started an awkward, robotic dance that made her laugh and Frank scowl, and just like that, the party enveloped the whole room. Sirius managed to snag another butterbeer for himself and a slice of lemon cake, then with a subtle glance and a little help navigating from Gideon, he made his way back to the staircase at the edge of the room. Sirius sat down a few steps up, giving him an eagle-eye view over the whole common room. Marlene and Dee danced carelessly to that Bowie guy, Marlene’s hands on Dee’s hips, as they both giggled and tried to mimic Fabian’s ridiculous moves. Snape sat on the couch, talking with an animated Lily and Peter, and Merlin, Sirius could swear he saw Snape laugh. Some time later, after his cake was gone, Sirius felt more than saw Lily come up and sit next to him. He’d been staring at the moon through the open window. It unsettled him, that moon in shadow from the eclipse. It made him feel like something was… off. The silence before the storm.Merlin, he felt it in his bones.Lily offered him another butterbeer. “Your idea, huh?”“Anything for our king. Even more for our friend,” Sirius replied, clinking his butterbeer against hers in a move that felt way too grown up. He nodded to James Potter who fucking somehow had antlers. Again. “James helped far more than he said.”“I heard. Severus told me.” Severus Snape, who had somehow gotten wrapped up in a discussion with Fabian and Gideon. Sirius didn’t know whether to laugh outright or feel bad for the poor bastard. They were about as far from Slytherin as one could possibly get without being James Fleamont Potter. Lily nudged Sirius’s foot with hers. “Can I trust you with something?”“‘Course.”“Give this to James for me when you get the chance.” With that, she leaned over and kissed Sirius’s cheek. It sent a shock straight through him, and Lily pulled away almost immediately, before flushing fiery red. Without another word, she dove back into her party, snagging another butterbeer and downing it straight from Dorcas’s hand. Sirius hid a smile in his own butterbeer. She’d called him James. Sirius picked at the label of his butterbeer, eyes zeroing in on the bubbles in the bottle, when a pair of scuffed-up shoes and the tails of a green and silver scarf came into his eye line.“I imagine,” Snape said, hands in his pockets, mirroring Sirius’s closed-off position from earlier, “that one such as yourself has something of an aversion to crowds.”“Ah,” Sirius said, and it really, really should bother him, given how hard he’d worked to keep that damn tattoo a secret, but all he felt was resignation. “So you know about that.”“Everyone knows about it, Black,” Snape said, with just a hint of derision. “Well, except maybe the bloody Gryffindors.”“The ones who matter know,” Sirius said, somewhat surprised by his own honesty. “And after all that’s happened, secrets like that aren’t worth keeping.”Snape hummed in response. Then, apparently in no hurry to be rid of Sirius’s company, he asked, “Where’s Lupin tonight?”Sirius had promised Remus he’d talk to Snape, but that didn’t mean Sirius had to give any ground on secrets he himself had yet to uncover. “Family business.”“Is that supposed to be a riddle, Black?”“Not one I will allow you to unravel, Snape.”Much to his surprise, Snape let it drop. “You’re not like the rest of them, you know. Gryffindors.”“I’m aware.”“Can I ask you something?” “Lot of that sort of thing going around tonight,” Sirius muttered into his butterbeer, but he waved at Snape to continue anyway. “Why is she friends with you?”And Merlin, if that wasn’t the question of the hour, but Sirius still couldn’t resist riling Snape up. Just a little. “As in, why me not you?”“No. No.” Snape’s voice was more resolute than he’d ever heard it. “If you’d seen where we— I know why she’s friends with me, Black. Desperation born of loneliness and isolation. But you? She chose you. I saw it happen. It doesn’t matter that I love her, that I’d kill for her. She still chose Gryffindor. She still chose you.”Sirius let out a long sigh, resigning himself to the inevitability of the conversation ahead. “What you feel for her isn’t love, Snape. It’s obsession.”Snape reared back. “It’s not—“But Sirius had two butterbeers and a lifetime of rage inside him and he was not yet ready to let up, promises be damned. “What would it take for someone like Lily Evans to stand by your side, Snape? Let’s think about that for a second. Would Malfoy allow it? She’s Muggle-born. And yes, we all know she’s beautiful and brilliant and the most talented witch of our age, blah, blah, blah. But if that’s all she is to you, Snape, then she’s your bloody trophy. You may as well give her glass eyes and mount her on your shelf.”Snape reached for his wand. “How fucking dare—“Sirius held up his hands, praying Snape remembered their truce. James would have Sirius’s head if he started a fight on Lily’s birthday. Lily would have his balls if he started anything with Snape. “All I’m saying,” Sirius said slowly, “is that if you want to earn her love, her choice, you need to be the one to change. Malfoy wants her dead, the Slytherins want her gone. If she’s going to choose you, she needs to see that that’s not you. You need to be better.”At that, Snape paled, the fight drained right out of him. “I can’t. You don’t understand. Malfoy, he—“Sirius laughed, manic and broken. “I don’t understand? I don’t?! Are you fucking kidding me? Merlin, Snape, I understand better than just about anyone, what it means to make that kind of a choice. I know what it means to love like that. Enough to burn the stars and kill gods.”Snape sneered, and Sirius knew he wouldn’t walk away from this unscathed. In one way or another, this would end in annihilation. “Yeah? And what would a Black know about love? You are a blood traitor. You aren’t Slytherin or Gryffindor. You don’t belong anywhere or to anyone. I don’t think it’s possible to love a creature like you.“Sirius tried desperately to keep his voice calm, deliberately ignoring the daggers Snape had thrown at him. “Yeah. I didn’t think so either. But Lily does.”“You are as unworthy of her as an ant before a giant.”“I know.” Sirius downed the rest of his butterbeer. “But that’s the difference between you and me, Snape. I know I’m not worthy to breathe the same air as her, and I know I never will be. But that doesn’t mean I won’t spend every waking moment trying to be better, to be deserving of her loyalty, her devotion. Her love. You think you’re entitled to everything just because you earned her friendship, but you’re unwilling to fight by her side when the monsters come out, hungry for her blood. Hiding in the shadows and biding your time won’t ever bring you peace, Snape. You’ll lose her and you’ll lose yourself.”“It won’t matter. It won’t be enough.” Snape slumped, defeated. “All you bloody Gryffindors will lose this war.”“Maybe. Probably,” Sirius conceded. “But at least we’re willing to fight.”Snape was silent for a long, long time, then noise of the party drowned out in the prophecies laid out between them. Eventually, he glanced up, greasy hair falling in his face, and said, “My choice, hm?”“That’s the secret, isn’t it? That’s what we’re all fighting for. The right to choose our own destinies.” Sirius gestured to the party. “Maybe start by actually spending time with Lily instead of sitting over here and calling me names. She actually wants to talk to you, arsehole.”After a moment more, Snape nodded once and took a step away, then paused. He scuffed his foot on the ground and once more shoved his hands deep in his pockets. “You know, despite all evidence to the contrary and… this—“ Snape gestured wildly between him and Sirius. “I’ve really enjoyed tonight. Slytherins would never throw a party like this.”Sirius tipped his empty bottle up in something of a toast. “Trust me, I’m aware.”“Black?”“Hm?”“Don’t tell Malfoy,” Snape said, fidgeting. “Not just that I was here, but about Lily, and all of this. He wants war and this…? It’d be a shame to watch it all burn.”Sirius took a second to process the gravity of that statement, but eventually, he nodded, and promised, “I wouldn’t even consider of it.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JANUARY 31, 1972
Remus felt like death.In fact, he was about eighty-five percent sure he was dead.Did death hurt this bad? Probably. It seemed like it would. Everything hurt, always, all the time, and forevermore.But then, he opened his eyes. Mostly. Kind of.Instead of pearly gates—or hellfire, dealer’s choice—Remus found himself looking up at the scorch mark on the ceiling of the hospital wing, from when Sirius had erupted in his attempt to get rid of Peeves.So… Not dead. Jesus fucking Christ, death would be kinder. Mr. Hyde had been out for blood.Remus closed his eyes again against the stabbing pain from the dawn light. Since he’d been bitten, Remus remembered several eclipses. The worst scars that marred his body—the one across his chest, the gouges running from his spine across his ribs—all of them were vivid accounts of the wolf’s rage at the shadows over the moon. The night of the full moon belonged to Mr. Hyde, and when the moon disappeared when it was supposed to cast magic over the earth, the wolf sought vengeance and mayhem. Remus was always the helpless victim. And despite the rising sun and waning moon, the wolf still had its teeth on Remus’s throat, gnawing and scratching for freedom in his mind. He took a breath and forced himself to swallow a coughing fit. Christ, it hurt, which probably meant at least a few ribs were bruised. Remus could feel sticky blood on his hands, beneath his fingernails—remnants from the wolf’s claws—and bandages around his wrists. The wolf liked to sink his teeth into any flesh available, supposedly to dull the pain of shifting from man to beast, and more often than not, Remus’s wrists were the only flesh available. He’d learned from an early age to bandage those right away, to stop the bleeding in any way possible, lest he bleed out. You’d think the layers of scars—from teeth and burn marks from cauterising the wounds—would be tough to break open, but nothing stood a chance against a werewolf’s fangs. Aside from his ribs and his wrists and the general sense of restlessness and foreboding that should ordinarily only be a precursor to death, Remus was… Well, he wasn’t dead yet. He might even be okay in a few hours. His left knee twinged a bit, but that was normal. He’d fucked that up a long time ago—somewhere around his third shift after Greyback bit him—and it’d never quite healed right. It probably didn’t help that he broke it again every month when Mr. Hyde came out to play. All things considered, Remus figured it could be worse. Remus also had a gut feeling that Madam Pomfrey wouldn’t see things the same way. Still, he wasn’t going to be held captive in the hospital wing all day. He’d missed enough as it stood already, and he had to finish reading the tomes Ollivander had sent before their meeting next week. This time, Remus opened his eyes slowly, one at a time, allowing his groggy brain to adjust to the light. Like almost every month, he was naked, wrapped in a heavy blanket to preserve what was left of his modesty. And like the past few months, there were no clothes in sight for him. Madam Pomfrey apparently had plans to keep him here all day, but Remus was used to it. Swallowing a groan at his creaking ribs and wobbly knee, Remus managed to sit up. Ensuring that the coast was clear, he clutched the blanket tight around himself and went to the small cupboard next to his bed. Naturally, Madam Pomfrey had locked the door that held his clothes and wand, but Remus had been practicing. It took him a few times, but the wolf was close enough to the surface to still add a little flair to his magic. He cast a wandless spell on the lock and it popped right open. Dressing carefully, quietly, and quickly—all the while keeping an eye on Madam Pomfrey’s shut office door—Remus tucked his wand in the waistband of his Muggle jeans and snuck to the heavy doors of the hospital wing. As he slowly made his way down the back staircase to the Great Hall—leaning heavily on the walls and railings to compensate for his knee—Remus absently tugged at the sleeves of his shirt. He’d grown since the start of the term in September; the bandages on his wrists stuck out beneath the soft, green cotton. He tried to stretch the sleeves, but they wouldn’t budge much without properly choking him at the collar. His robe—which his father had insisted on buying about two sizes up—was up in the dorms, and Remus didn’t quite know if he’d make it all the way to Gryffindor tower and back to the Great Hall without falling off a moving staircase. Christ, his fucking knee.His knee that suddenly gave out five steps from the bottom. Unable to hold back a sharp cry, Remus collapsed and tumbled down the remaining stairs. His elbow slammed against the stone of the first floor, his forehead colliding with the last stair and everything… echoed. His vision tunnelled. Fuck.He prayed no one saw that.Except when his eyes once again managed to focus, Remus found himself staring into beautiful, panicked, silver eyes.“Remus?! Remus?! What the fuck? What happened? What’s wrong?” Sirius’s voice was pitched high and his words came faster than Remus’s brain could process them. Remus groaned, tried to force his brain and tongue to communicate enough to force out actual, English sentences, but what came out instead was a very articulate, “Ow.”He sat up. Or, maybe Sirius helped him up, judging by the sharp pain shooting up his arm and the fresh splotch of red-on-white that his brain vaguely registered in his field of vision. Hazy, Remus wondered just how hard he’d hit his head. Everything seemed to be moving at warp speed, in slow motion, impossibly at the same time. Green blurred with white and red and pain, and suddenly, pale fingers grabbed ahold of both his wrists and all his stupid, useless brain could focus on was black nail polish on small, stubby fingers. Sirius had painted his fingernails. Instead of howling beasts, instead of pain, pits of fire and catastrophe, Remus Lupin’s entire world was obliterated by the fact that sometime in the past three days, Sirius Black had taken it upon himself to paint his goddamned fingernails. He wasn’t good at it. Not even a little; chipped paint was smeared all around the beds of his nails, rather like he’d dipped his fingers in a jar of paint instead of meticulously taking the time with each individual nail. Remus was mesmerised. Hypnotised. Utterly ruined, inside and out. Sirius’s hands ran up and down his arms, tugging at his sleeves and grazing over the scars and the bandages and the blood, until his fingertips reached skin and…And…And Sirius pressed closer, black-tipped fingers growing desperate, hungry, as they clawed at Remus’s chest, etching a pathway from his clavicle to his bruised ribs, almost as though they could sense the brand new scars underneath. And…Then, a hand cupped his face, traced underneath his eyes, over his split bottom lip, and goddamnit, Remus leaned into the touch. The trembling fingers cupped his jaw, drawing Remus’s gaze from blood and fingernails to—Silver. Silver, that so perfectly mirrored his own pain, his brokenness, the hunger and desperation of the wolf that shared his soul.Silver, stained with starlight, spilling into the eternity between them.Tears.Those were tears.Ice cold terror shot down Remus’s spine, his hands flying up in an attempt to shove Sirius away. “Jesus-fucking-Christ. Hands off, Sirius!”Sirius fought him, batted at his hands to keep fussing with Remus’s bandages, the bruises on his ribs. Teeth gnashing, eyes leaking and unblinking as tears stained his cheeks, Sirius mumbled a string of curses and nonsense as his fingers twirled and summoned useless spells in the little space between them. “Don’t care. Don’t care, don’t care, don’t care. Episkey. EPISKEY! Fucking useless piece of—““Sirius!”Using his good leg, a little leverage, a prayer, and what little he had left of Mr. Hyde’s strength, Remus shoved and propelled Sirius off him. Sirius skidded backwards across the damp, stone floor. As soon as he landed, he immediately scrambled to reach Remus again. This time, Remus was faster. He drew his wand and pointed it at Sirius.His hand was only shaking… a lot. “Don’t touch me, you fucking idiot,” Remus croaked, voice quivering just as much. “You’re hurt,” Sirius said, nearly collapsing in on himself. He slumped against the wall opposite Remus—either drained or defeated, Remus couldn’t be sure. Starlight drained from Sirius, like rivulets down a windowpane after a storm, leaving nothing but the tracks of his tears. “Why are you always hurt?”It came out as a sob. “Tell me you didn’t do that to yourself,” Sirius gasped out, pointing at Remus’s bandaged wrists. “Tell me it didn’t get that bad.”
Christ.
How was he supposed to answer that?The wolf had done it, had gnawed flesh from bone, but the wolf was Remus. Remus was the wolf, the creature that lurked in his own nightmares. As much as he tried to separate himself from that half of his soul, Remus could no more separate himself from Mr. Hyde as he could tear out his own beating heart. Remus and the wolf were one in the same. They shared a mind, a soul, damned though it may be.He’d had no choice—not really. The scars had been done to him, by a beast he had no hope of taming, but Remus could not allow the half-truth to leave his tongue. Because maybe, he deserved the pain. The scars.He was a monster, after all. May as well look the part.And if, one day, the wolf ended up severing an artery in his rage, killing them both…Remus wondered if that would mean salvation. Peace.He wondered if he’d fight it. Or, if he’d just watch the blood drain out.Fresh starlight tracked down Sirius’s face. It looked like the end of the world. “Tell me you won’t leave me alone,” Sirius rasped. “I can’t—“Sirius’s voice caught on a hiccoughing sob.Fuck it. Peace and salvation did not belong to creatures like him.It felt like instinct—whether his or the wolf’s, Remus couldn’t be certain—to go to Sirius. To comfort, to protect. To wipe away the tears and annihilate anyone who’d ever caused him pain. Still wobbling a bit on his bad knee, Remus slumped down hard next to Sirius. As soon as Remus was within arms-reach, black-tipped fingers began fidgeting and itching to touch him once more. Half terrified that Sirius was literally going to crawl into his lap, Remus growled, “Touch me, and I’ll fucking hex you, Black.”Sirius froze, considered, and stuck out his tongue. Then, he lashed out, grabbing Remus’s hand and squeezing tight enough to crush bone and, Christ, it nearly killed them both. “Dare you to try.”“Sirius,” Remus warned, trying to pull away even as the creature that shared his mind begged him to never let go.“I can’t heal you, Remus,” Sirius hissed through his teeth. Black fingernails dug into the palm of his hand.“And I can’t take away your damn tattoo,” Remus said, surprised by the steadiness in his own voice. Sirius released his hand and shifted away. He drew his knees to his chest and draped his arms over them and Remus felt the loss of his touch like the air that immediately fled his lungs. Like the invisible dagger he couldn’t seem to pry from his heart.It wasn’t fucking fair. Both Remus and the wolf would give anything—scorch the earth and rend any soul—to be able to pull Sirius close without any pain. To be able to run fingers through his stupid, stupid hair that Remus was secretly obsessed with. To brush against him in the halls, to wake him from his nightmares and memories.Remus had been having these dreams. They were inane and stupid and if Remus could blame them entirely on the wolf and his stupid time of the month, he would in a heartbeat. But the wolf only knew instinct and nightmare, and these dreams… They were none of that. Not really. Nightmares, only in the sense that he couldn’t hold on tight enough to the dream to manifest it in the waking world. Sometimes, Remus dreamed of starlight and… falling. “What happened?” Sirius asked, staring straight ahead at the otherwise empty hallway. His tone suggested he didn’t expect much of an answer. Remus thunked his head against the ancient stone. “Lions and tigers and bears. Oh, my.”“What?!” Sirius’s back went rigid, eyes flicking up and down Remus’s body, searching for claw marks. Teeth marks.They were there, too, carved into his flesh and bleeding under bandages. Just… His scars were from a different sort of monster. “It’s a line from a movie.” Sirius stared at him, expression blank. Remus explained, “Like a picture, but the people move and talk. It’s a Muggle thing, with actors and costumes and sets. And, in this case, tin men and flying monkeys.”Finally—finally—Sirius’s face split into something that might have been a smile: the beatific light of the morning star after a cold, horrific night. Wiping tears away, Sirius asked, “Does it have space men?”That was… unexpected. “Space men?”“Yeah. Like Bowie.”“Bowie?! Who the hell told you about Bowie?” Remus paused. “Wait. He’s not a wizard, is he?”“Not that I’ve heard. Though, that would be awesome.” Sirius turned fully to face him, excitement etched into every feature. This was the Sirius Black that haunted his dreams. “Marlene had a magic music box. I was sitting by myself at Lily’s party because of—“ (Here, he gestured to his tattoo.) “—and Marlene said I wasn’t allowed to look depressed at a Gryffindor party, so she sat me down in front of the music box and told me about the songs. She had Bowie’s whole lot on this black disk thing. We’d listened to everything about three times by the end of the night. She let me read the disk cover, too. Long story short, there was butterbeer, James grew antlers again, Pete caught on fire, and I had something of a religious experience with David Bowie.” His face went deadly… serious. “I’m in love with him, Remus. I’m leaving you for Bowie. We shall be married by the end of the year.”And that was just so much to process all at once that Remus’s brain gave up on higher cognitive functions altogether. After several failed attempts at articulating his thoughts amidst the sudden maelstrom in his brain, Remus finally managed, “I don’t think that’s allowed.”Sirius—inexplicably—smirked. It was the same one he used when he’d done something particularly devious. “Knew you’d be jealous.”Remus Lupin almost choked on his tongue. “No. No.” (Yes, howled Mr. Hyde, vowing to rend David Bowie’s flesh from his bones.) “I mean it’s illegal. For two blokes to…” Remus trailed off with a very comprehensive and only mildly offensive hand gesture. “In the Muggle world.”“Oh.” Sirius frowned, eyebrows knitting together. “Why?”And Remus wasn’t entirely certain what choices he’d made in his life that led him to explaining the intricacies of historic and pervasive homophobia in Great Britain to a pureblood wizard in a magic castle on the morning after a full moon. “They think it’s immoral,” Remus said, unable and unwilling to come up with a more reasonable explanation.Sirius was quiet for a moment, before he all but erupted with, “Well, that’s stupid. I will marry David Bowie if I damn-well please. He’s got a nice arse. Looks good in those pants.”There were so many follow-up questions dancing on the tip of his tongue that Remus could not possibly be expected to decide which one took priority, so he just said, “So. Good party then?”“Bit lonely, with just me and Bowie after Marlene abandoned me. Would’ve been better if you’d been there.” Sirius shrugged. “But Snape got drunk, so that’s a bonus.”Remus snorted. “Really? Didn’t think he had it in him.”“He didn’t. I may have spiked his drink with firewhisky.” That triumphant smirk was back. “Evans didn’t even notice until the end of the night.”“Was she mad?” Remus asked.“Nah. She had fun. Snape had fun. Evans is now officially on speaking terms with James. It was good.” Sirius looked down at his hand, picked at the edges of the nail polish. “She did make me walk Snape back, though.”“And however did an inebriated Snape fare against the likes of Sirius Black?”Sirius’s smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. “He asked me not to tell Malfoy. Well, begged is more like it. Not that I’d tell Malfoy shit, but..”“Yeah,” Remus grimaced. “Snape’s in too deep.”“You were right, though. Or Evans was.” Sirius said the words like they physically pained him. “There’s part of him that wants out, wants to change. Maybe even be a decent person, but…”“He’s Slytherin,” Remus finished, because even the vipers that lacked venom tended to be deadly to their prey. “Too Slytherin.” With a succinct nod and a sigh, Sirius pulled himself to his feet. He flicked a quick tidying spell over himself, which straightened his robes and made his hair fly back into a semblance of order, before offering a hand out to Remus. “Come on. Today is shit. Let’s go back to bed.”Remus glared pointedly at the offered hand. “Um. Why is today shit?”Sirius rolled his eyes and gestured wildly at the entirety of Remus. Remus stuck two fingers up at him. Then, he stood. All on his own, thank you very much. “I’m fine.”His declaration was only slightly contradicted by the face he made when he put weight on his knee. Sirius, graciously, pretended not to notice. “I want to go back to bed. I’m a bit hungover, I think. Not sure. Never been hungover before. But, I suppose I could be.”Remus sincerely doubted it. “Sometimes I forget you’re a spoiled brat,” he said, not without affection. Sirius still looked offended. “Have a nice nap, then.”Except Sirius grabbed the tail of Remus’s shirt as he tried to move past him. “You’re coming with me,” Sirius insisted. “But… bacon. And coffee. Sirius, I need coffee.”It’d been reason number one for his daring escape from Madam Pomfrey. She said coffee wasn’t good for him and never let him have any, especially after the full moon.It was the one and only time Remus had ever dared to question her medical expertise. “I’ll bring you coffee in bed,” Sirius said, still not releasing Remus’s shirt.“I thought you were hungover.”He got another dramatic eye-roll in response. Remus stopped and crossed his arms over his chest. He didn’t even wince at the movement. With a frustrated huff, Sirius relented. “Fine. Coffee first. But we’re still ditching class.”“Are we now?”“Considering you should still be in the hospital wing, we absolutely are.”With that, Sirius hurried past him towards the Great Hall. Shaking his head and hiding a smile, Remus followed. When he caught up—knee be damned—he brushed up against Sirius’s shoulder for a mere fraction of a second. Enough for lightning to strike, while the rest of the storm was kept at bay. “Just to be clear,” Remus said. “You lied about being hungover to spare my feelings?”“Yes, I did. You’re welcome.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
By the time they arrived, breakfast was in full swing, but the Great Hall was quiet. Muffled whispers and half-hearted attempts at conversation echoed futilely throughout the Hall. The air tasted of sulphur and rain, and the wolf in his head growled in the wake of the oncoming storm. Unlike most mornings, the head table was empty of all staff, which was… disconcerting. Even if Sirius dragged him to breakfast before the sun was up, a member of the staff—usually Rattleburn, as she, like Sirius Black and literally no one else on God’s green earth, was a morning person—was always there in what Remus assumed was a supervisory capacity. Remus and Sirius sat in their normal places, across from each other at the far end of the table, next to James and Peter. James seemed to be neck deep in a very greasy breakfast, his hair ruffled and shooting up in every imaginable direction. Peter, remarkably, was somehow asleep in the presence of a full buffet, head down on the table, next to his own equally greasy breakfast. Like most mornings, Sirius waved over a kettle and poured Remus a cup of coffee. Remus may or may not have downed about half of it almost immediately. A burnt tongue was nothing compared to the rest of his injuries. “Morning,” James muttered around a mouthful of food. If he’d noticed Remus’s limp or his bandaged wrists, he didn’t even so much as blink. He just smirked, cheeks stuffed full of toast. “You missed one hell of a party, mate.”“Shut up, Potter. Something’s happening.”Lily Evans stood at the head of the Gryffindor table, her arms crossed an a deep frown set on her face. Sirius froze, toast halfway to his mouth. Frank joined her, mirrored her posture and expression, and tried to pretend as though she wasn’t the one in charge. “What do you see, Evans?” Frank asked.“It’s quiet.”And the thing is… it was. Remus noticed it earlier, when they walked in, sure, but now… Now, it was haunting. The wolf inside him whispered that they were the key on a kite in the middle of a lightning storm. Sirius stood up on the bench. “Where are the Slytherins?”Remus turned and… The fourth table at the end of the hall was completely empty. That… couldn’t possibly be a good omen. The windows overhead all flew open at once. More owls than Remus had ever seen in one place—more owls than resided in the Hogwarts owlery—burst into the Great Hall, cawing and hooting in a flurry of feathers and talons. The owls swooped in and out, almost rabid, deranged. They dove, empty talons clawing at students, before launching back into the air. Floating candles flickered and went out—magic be damned—at the beat of the owls’ wings. A group of Hufflepuffs screeched just as loudly as the owls themselves as talons began grabbing at hair and robes. Magic crackled to life around Sirius’s black-painted fingertips. James stood and drew his wand. The Prewetts flanked Frank and Lily.Mr. Hyde howled for retreat even as Remus stood to fight. Then, newspapers began falling from the sky. Some of them were on fire, flaky pages caught in the flickering tongues of the ceiling candles, now raining from the sky like falling stars. Chaos and calamity, as students screamed and dove under tables, as centrepieces and scarves and robes caught fire. “Put out the fires! Now!” Lily Evans roared, drawing her wand and casting an Aguamenti at Peter, who was—predictably—the first Gryffindor to catch fire. He woke with a startled shout which morphed into a panicked screech when his brain failed to compute the apocalypse raining down around them.Sirius sprang on the table, kicking aside his plate and toppling Remus’s coffee. He sprinted down the length of the table, towards the head table, dodging panicked students and casting spurts of water as he went. “Remus! Move!” Lily shouted, just as another flaming letter fell from the air. He had just enough time to duck out of the way before his hair caught fire. The paper landed in front of him, the flames sizzling out in the spilled coffee. Around the burnt edges of the paper, Remus caught a snippet of the headline, and cold, cruel eyes staring up at him from a half-charred picture.Eyes he recognised. Eyes that should be laced with starlight, but instead, were devoid of life and laughter. Sirius’s beautiful eyes, cold and cruel and hollow, on his mother’s face.
Orion Black and wife, Walburga, Matriarch of House Black, congratulate T. Rid—
The char and the coffee ate away at the rest of the words on the page. “Sirius!” That was James. His voice cracked. “The banner!”Remus’s head whipped to the enormous Hogwarts banner that hung over the head table. Flames licked up the dangling tassels, inching higher and higher until the whole thing sparked and ignited in less than a second. Sirius’s shouted curse was lost amidst the screams, but in a second, both Prewetts were by his side, their wands and Sirius’s magic aimed at the banner, trying desperately to douse the flame. Remus stood rooted on the spot, just a few feet away from the wrecked and upturned benches of the Gryffindor table. His knee throbbed, lungs burned from the smoke, as his vision blurred grey amidst falling ash and owl feathers. He coughed into his elbow, tried to stagger his way towards Sirius, towards Lily, but there was a large group of Ravenclaws in his way. He shoved, growled, then yelped as they jostled his knee as they pushed past him, going for the door. A first year stumbled in front of him and Remus bent long enough to haul her to her feet. Once on stable footing, she shouldered past him roughly without so much as a muttered thanks. Remus leaned heavily against the Gryffindor table, his knee wobbling dangerously, as he tried to catch his breath, to shove the panic away for just a few more minutes. He looked up and… talons. Remus had just enough time to throw up both his arms to keep the near-rabid owl from gouging out his eyes. He let out an unbidden cry when, still intent on murder, the owl dug its talons into the bandages covering Remus’s left wrist. The bandage split, tore away, and Remus swallowed bile as sharp claws ripped into his already marred flesh. His own blood gushed to the surface, trailing down his arms, splattering his teeth, as the owl raised its wings, screeched, and dove in again for his eyes. Blinded by pain and heart thundering in his throat, Remus’s wand fell uselessly to the ground, clattering and rolling under the upturned table. He saw flashes of feathers and talons and black, black eyes, but he knew nothing but pain.That, and his name on Sirius’s tongue, shouting at him over the roar of agony in his head. Then: “Sectumsempra!”Feathers and talons fell limp in an instant. The owl crashed back down to earth. Its head rolled at Remus’s feet.And there, standing on the Gryffindor table, hair mussed and robes singed, was Sirius Black, his wand pointed at the decapitated owl between them.Remus imagined that, if he ever had the privilege and fortitude to look the wolf in the eye, it’d bear the same expression as Sirius Black did right then.Ferocity and pride.Christ, he was beautiful. “Remus!” Remus realised he may have zoned out. Again. Smoke filled his lungs, coated his teeth, and… and something hurt.“Fuck, Remus, you’re bleeding.”The world narrowed once more to black-tipped fingers reaching for him, but this time, Remus had just enough conscious thought to react faster. He jerked back, out of reach. Sirius froze, but Remus couldn’t think any further because… because… Right. Blood.Remus looked down at his wrists. The bandages were… well, torn to shreds would be a generous description. Fresh blood welled up around patches of dittany, drowning it, and trickling down the tips of Remus’s fingers. Shit.This was going to end badly if he didn’t stop the bleeding soon. In a practiced move, Remus raised both arms above his head to slow the steady trickle of blood. He pulled in deep breaths, forcing oxygen into his lungs and holding it there to keep the panic at bay, the spots out of his vision. Sirius waved his wand, tried casting no less than half a dozen healing spells on him in quick succession, before swearing loudly. “It should fucking work. I don’t under—““Sirius, can you make fire?” Remus snapped through his teeth.Sirius’s jaw clicked shut. Confused, he gestured vaguely around the room.“That won’t work. It’ll get infected.” Remus blinked, shaking his head, trying to clear away some of the fog. “It needs to be hot. As hot as you can make it. And concentrated. Incendio won’t do.”Sirius’s eyes went big when he finally realised what Remus meant. “No. You can’t ask me to—““I’m asking you, Sirius. This… it’s… Deep. Too much blood. I need—“Sirius squeezed his eyes shut, but his voice was steady as he said, “Madam Pomfrey is going to fucking murder me.”“Believe me, I’m at the top of her hit list right now.” Then, with a deep breath in, Remus gnashed his teeth together and lowered his wrists, holding them out to Sirius. “Do it.”Sirius raised his wand—his wand—and Remus didn’t have a moment to consider the consequences of that before Sirius roared, “Infernellium!”And… Remus may have blacked out.A bit.When his vision cleared, Sirius was right in front of him, his wand between his teeth. Nimble fingers wrapped black fabric around Remus’s wrists, perfunctory and precise, only making contact when absolutely necessary. Remus bit back a howl as Sirius pulled the makeshift bandages tight and tied them off, before immediately jumping back. Remus watched a shudder go through Sirius’s body, before he tore off the remnants of his robe and tossed it on the smouldering table. “You…” Remus tried. He coughed around his raw vocal cords. “You used your wand.”Sirius’s face was unreadable. “I told you,” he whispered. “It’s real good with Dark Magic.”“That spell… that fire… That was…”“Yeah,” Sirius sighed. “My mother likes to use it on the house elf.”Remus’s eyes fell on the bloody carcass of the decapitated owl.
Sectumsempra.
That’d been two Dark spells, then. No wonder the air tasted of hellfire.“SIRIUS!” That was Lily. Her voice sounded… strained.At the sound of his name, Sirius leapt back up on the table, magic crackling around him, ready for the next wave of annihilation. Except… Around them, fires dwindled, time slowed, and the remaining owls either retreated back through the skylight windows or were cut down by various stunning spells. The battle, for all intents and purposes, was over. Sounds of the aftermath flooded Remus’s senses. Sobs and whispers and ash, then… overwhelming silence.Across the Hall, flanked by James and Marlene, stood Lily Evans, holding an uncharted copy of The Daily Prophet. Feathers and dying flames swirled around her. Even from a distance, Remus watched in real time as every drop of colour drained from her face. Remus blinked, gasped for air, maybe, and then Lily was running towards them, carelessly shoving aside cowering Ravenclaws and older Gryffindors.The fire in her eyes was unrelenting.“Get him out of here.” She jerked her head at Remus, but her eyes never left Sirius. “Now, Black.”Sirius’s frown deepened. The magic at his fingertips fizzled to nothing. “What? Why? What’s—“But Lily just turned to Remus. “It passed, Remus.. You need to—”He knew, in theory, that she continued speaking, continued barking orders at the Gryffindors waiting on her command, but Remus could no longer understand a word she said.It passed.The Lestrange Doctrine.Remus felt his heart drop to the ground and shatter.There was no salvation for him after this.A firm hand clapped on Remus’s shoulder. He looked up to meet James’s eyes. The wolf nearly howled in dismay at the pity he saw there.“All right, mate?” James asked, softly. It was the only noise that cut through the chaos. James’s eyes flicked down to Remus’s wrists. If James was at all surprised by the extent of Remus’s injuries, he didn’t let it show on his face. “Just breathe, yeah? Can’t have you passing out just yet. I’ll take you to the hospital wing once this is all sorted. I’m sure Sirius will—“Sirius.The beast in Remus’s soul knew that name. Sirius, who paced back and forth on the Gryffindor table, occasionally kicking cups and leftover bowls across the room. On each lap, Sirius’s eyes tracked back to Remus, one fist clenching in fury, the other obsessively twirling his wand. As he paced, Sirius let out of a string of increasingly creative curses in both English and French. Remus caught only snippets amongst the nonsense, but he heard the name Tom-Fucking-Riddle more than once.“Sirius, shut up,” Lily called, frustration evident. Sirius whirled on her, and Christ, how Remus knew that sort of rage. The kind that made gods bow before mortals. “This was all part of the plan! Don’t you see?! This was fucking Malfoy. The Slytherins did all this to prove a fucking point! The fires, the spontaneous-fucking-staff-meeting, the owls. All of it!”James coughed and his fingers tightened on Remus’s shoulder. “The owls?”“They’re cursed.” Sirius stopped pacing. At James’s blank look, Sirius flicked his wrist at the decapitated head still on the floor between them. It shot off the ground and right into James’s fumbling hands. James managed to keep most of his dignity—save for a small yelp—when he caught it. “Look at its eyes.” Sirius sounded utterly drained.And, sure enough, when James carefully turned the head over, a dark green—nearly black—sticky substance oozed from the remnants of the owl’s eye sockets. “Dark Magic always leaves a mark.” Remus’s wolf howled a war cry when met with the abject surrender in Sirius’s voice. “Some curses leave more behind than others.”James dropped the head. It landed with a haunting thunk, the rest of the green-black ick oozing onto the feather-strewn floor. James wiped his hands on his robes a few more times than strictly necessary. He looked up at Sirius. “Was… Was that Imperious? Did someone use an Unforgivable on a bunch of owls?”Peter, crawling out from underneath a Ravenclaw bench, let out a whimper as he came to stand in the crowd of Gryffindors. Sirius sighed, and Remus watched him straighten, once more hefting the weight of the world back on his shoulders. “It’s probably a variation, but essentially, yes. Animals just have weaker minds. Easier to control. Not quite as unforgivable.”“Still worth a sentence in Azkaban,” Lily snapped and Remus absolutely did not miss Sirius flinch.James frowned. “But why would anyone—““Why else, Potter?” Lily spat, kicking the decapitated head. “To declare war.”Ominously on cue, Remus cringed as the monstrous doors to the great Hall creaked open. Before he could turn, before he could even conjure a thought of tearing his eyes away from the pandemonium and devastation warring in starlit eyes, a Knock-Back jinx struck him squarely between the shoulder blades.Remus stumbled forward, his knee giving out and the stone floor rushing up to meet him, but before he could collapse entirely, he felt strong arms wrap around his middle. A heartbeat later, James hauled him upright. Keeping a hand on Remus’s chest, James met his eyes, looked him up and down, then asked once again, “All right, mate?”Before Remus could so much as grunt in response, Lily Evans leapt onto the upturned Gryffindor table and roared, “SEVERUS!”When he finally managed to turn, a paler than usual Severus Snape stood in a duelling pose, his wand arm raised and noticeably trembling. Behind him, a legion of Slytherins, most—save Malfoy—with the hoods of their robes drawn low over their eyes. In a single heartbeat, Sirius Black leapt onto a bench, onto the floor, then planted his feet firmly between Snape and the rest of the Gryffindors. Shoving his wand into his knotted hair, Sirius mirrored Snape’s pose, magic crackling to life between black-tipped fingers. Christ. Sirius might be a fucking prodigy, but duelling without a wand was a veritable death sentence.Pain be damned, Remus’s wolf lurched to the forefront of his mind—fight, protect, pack, blood, mine—and he moved to—Suddenly appearing at his side, Marlene grabbed his arm, before his fucking knee gave out for the thousandth time. Meeting his eyes, she shook her head once. It was a plea, an order, a question, an oath. His wolf wanted to fight her. He felt sharp teeth gnaw at his bottom lip until he tasted blood, but he forced himself to obey.He was no use to Sirius like this.James Potter took Remus’s rightful place as Sirius’s second. He raised his wand, and unlike Snape, there was no hesitation in James’s posture. He would fight until the end, if need be. By Sirius’s side.Mr. Hyde growled in victorious satisfaction, then retreated enough for Remus to actually think.Lucius Malfoy sauntered forward until he stood right behind Snape. He had both his hands in the pockets of his robes and a cruel, devilish smirk on his face. He rocked back on his heels and pretended to survey the room.As though he wasn’t directly responsible for all of this.“My, my, Sirius,” Malfoy crooned. “Your mother was right. You do tend to destroy everything you touch, don’t you?”Sirius didn’t rise to the bait. No, this Sirius was the warrior, the assassin. This Sirius, Remus had only glimpsed on one occasion, when he threatened to murder the beast in Remus’s heart. This Sirius was precision and vengeance, a viper ready to strike, as deadly and devastating as he was raised to be. Starlight eyes darkened to a black void, his magic sparked, but Sirius was in control.“Shut up, Malfoy,” James snapped.Malfoy’s face churned with derision and disgust at the mere thought of James Potter. “Didn’t you see the paper, Black? I sent you so many copies.”Sirius bared his teeth. “It’s about time, really.” The picture of casual superiority, Malfoy dragged his foot across the ash-strewn floor, thoroughly disturbing the aftermath. He gestured wildly to the cluster of Gryffindors standing behind Sirius and James. His eyes lingered to their king, Lily Evans, still standing on the table, then landed on Remus. To Sirius, Malfoy said, “This band of misfits you’ve acquired have no place within these walls, Black. Your father made sure of that.”Remus watched every muscle in Sirius’s body tense up, but still, Sirius did not reply. “What is it that Mr. Riddle said?” Malfoy feigned ignorance and stroked his chin, tracing a finger down the long, pale scar from Sirius’s curse. “Snape, do you recall?”Severus Snape’s face went from bright red to green, then to something devoid of any sort of colour. He swallowed, opened his mouth, tried to conjure words, then—“Severus. What did we talk about?” It was a threat, a noose around his neck, and the ransom price was evident in the cadence of Malfoy’s voice.Snape cleared his throat, then said, “Hogwarts has no place for monsters, half-breeds, or M-Mud—““Severus, if you say that fucking word, I swear to fucking Christ, I will never fucking speak to you again!”Lily’s voice cracked and trembled and Remus could almost taste the salt from the tears streaming down her face.Something that sounded like insane, haunting laughter bubbled to life in Sirius’s chest. To Snape, mad and maniacal, Sirius said, “You chose this? After everything?! What the fuck is wrong with you?!”A shadow crossed over Snape’s face, hiding his expression from all outside scrutiny. He half-turned back, only to duck to avoid Malfoy’s ice-cold glare. Not lowering his wand or flinching in the slightest, Snape said, “I’m not a Gryffindor.”“You’re a coward!” Sirius roared, and it echoed in the broken silence between them.Snape didn’t so much as blink. “Maybe that’s the difference between you and me, Black.”For the briefest moment, Remus wondered if that was meant as a compliment or a death sentence.Then, darkness glazed Snape’s eyes. He raised his wand, and, “Confrin—“
“EXPELLIARMUS!”
Snape let out a sharp cry as his wand flew from his hand. Sirius caught it, and without care or remorse, snapped it in two. The magic whooshed from the wand, sparked and died in front of everyone. Sirius tossed the two halves of the wand at Snape’s feet.Horror and disbelief marred Snape’s face as he bent to touch the shards of his wand.Malfoy stepped forward, his mask of nonchalance evaporating as he drew his own wand. “You should have learned your place when I carved it into your chest, Black!” Malfoy spat.Sirius twirled his fingers, summoning magic to his fingertips, and once more striking a duelling pose. “My place is right here, Malfoy. Between you and them.”“Then you will die with the carrion you claim to defend.”Behind him, all of Slytherin dropped their robes and drew their wands. “Gryffindor,” called their king, from her place atop the upturned table. “Arm yourselves.”All around him, students drew their wands and took up their best, mostly trembling and terrified, duelling positions. Remus looked down just as Marlene pressed his forgotten wand into his hand, before she took up a position between the Prewetts in front of Lily. On his other side, a wide-eyed Peter held out his wand with both hands, and planted himself in front of a group of very singed Hufflepuffs. Frank and Alice, side by side, took up Sirius’s left flank, cutting off the Slytherins from the Ravenclaws. Summoning what little strength he had left and the eternal, ethereal whirlpool of the wolf’s rage, Remus heroically limped over to Sirius’s other side. Sirius looked back at him, for just a moment, ruin and decimation in his eyes. And Remus remembered his words, half whispered, half forgotten—a promise, a dream, an oath, a prophecy from eons ago, it seemed. I’d go to war for you. Christ, it was there in Sirius’s eyes: the battles, both present and future, the casualties, and the lives strewn between them. And, in the midst of it all… silver and falling stars. If Remus didn’t collapse from exhaustion and blood-loss, surely he’d drown in starlight long before Malfoy had a chance to—
Malfoy.
It was just enough.With Sirius momentarily distracted, Malfoy took aim at Lily Evans. “Sanguis Sanguinem!”To his horror, Lily jerked backwards with a sharp cry. She just managed to catch herself from falling entirely, but landed hard on her left wrist, barely keeping hold of her wand as she barrelled into a mess of half-finished breakfast plates. She was slow to get up, and when Fabian took her arm to help, she jerked away from him with another high-pitched cry, blinking back tears. James Potter let out a roar. Remus watched in equal terror and awe as James tucked his wand into his belt, then rushed Malfoy. Somehow, James managed to surprise Malfoy enough to grab onto his stupid, blond ponytail. James yanked Malfoy’s head back, swung his hips around, and hooked both legs around Malfoy’s waist. James clawed at his eyes and bit his ear. Surprised and clearly terrified, Malfoy panicked and dropped his wand. A Slytherin let out a shriek—Narcissa, probably—but it was cut short with a curse from Sirius.The Carrows—Christ, Remus couldn’t tell them apart on a good day—ran for Malfoy, but Remus through a slipping hex at the ground beneath them. They collapsed, sliding into each other and another small group of Slytherin first years. Between him and Frank, they were able to put them in a body-bind, then—Then, fireworks. And a foghorn.In a flutter of robes, cancelling spells, and a few shield charms, the Hogwarts professors entered the Great Hall with the full force of a hurricane. It took mere seconds for the fighting to stop and the remaining fires to be drowned by the professors’ spells. Every professor—even Hagrid—swarmed the Hall, wands (and pink umbrella) raised in defence of a yet-undetermined enemy. Every professor except, of course, Albus Dumbledore.The Headmaster was conspicuously absent. Remus didn’t quite know what to make of that.For a glorious moment, everyone stood frozen in place. That is, until Professor Cuckoo marched right up to Malfoy. James, who still clung to his back and had a fairly decent grip on his hair, jumped back immediately, holding up both hands in surrender. Malfoy’s ear was bleeding from where James bit him.The primal part of Remus’s mind was a little upset Remus hadn’t been the one to dig his fangs into Malfoy’s flesh.“Mr. Malfoy,” Cuckoo began. “Would you care to explain what—“Out of the corner of his eyes, Remus saw Sirius twirl his fingers and mutter a hex.A second later, Lucius Malfoy croaked like a frog. All eyes turned to Sirius Black.Sirius turned a wicked smile up at Professor Cuckoo. “Oops.”Remus might have rolled his eyes or even laughed if he wasn’t in serious danger of passing out.Professor Cuckoo turned his glare to James. “Would you explain, Mr. Potter, what made you attack a Hogwarts prefect without provocation?”“Without prov— Professor, that’s hardly fair!” James shouted.Sirius Black had murder in his eyes. “Who the fuck do you think did all this?!”Professor Cuckoo turned up his nose. “Mr. Black, I do not think it’s appropriate—““I believe you should listen to them, Professor Cuckoo,” snapped Professor Rattleburn. She was crouched next to Lily, her wand out. Lily sat on the ground, crosslegged and fuming, with Dorcas’s arms wrapped around her shoulders. “She’s been cursed.”Professor Cuckoo snorted. “Self-defence, I’m sure of it.”Rattleburn stood, stretched to her full height, which was a few good inches over the top of Cuckoo’s head. “Are you really so naive as to think that this is unrelated to the news of this morning from London?”Her eyes cut to Remus for just a second. “I believe, Amelia,” Cuckoo sneered, “that your personal politics are clouding your objectivity on the matter.”“Oh, please, like you’re one to talk. You and your filthy Death—“Whatever she was about to say was interrupted by another volley of fireworks from McGonagall’s wand.“That’s enough,” McGonagall snapped, glaring between her colleagues. Then, she turned to Sirius. “Mr. Black, if you could—““They attacked us, Professor.” Eyes turned to Severus Snape, who was folded in on himself and trying to make himself look even smaller. “We came in and the Hall was on fire. Black challenged me to a duel. He threw the first spell, then Potter attacked Malfoy.”Narcissa stepped forward. “It seems the Gryffindors and their… kind were upset by the Wizengamot’s decision. They burned copies of The Prophet in protest. They wouldn’t allow anyone to read the article.”“That’s not—“Remus hobbled over and clamped a hand on James’s shoulder, partly because he was about to fall over and partly because Remus could read the fucking room. Nervous Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs cowered around the Hall, but as Narcissa spoke, more and more Ravenclaws shuffled over to stand amongst the Slytherins. Despite the fact that they were attacked just the same as everyone else, they’d chosen a side.Malfoy glared at Sirius. Pointed a crooked finger. He croaked, gagged, then croaked again, but nothing came out.So, Narcissa said, “They want revolution, Professor. My cousin more so than most.”It only took a heartbeat. The Gryffindors shouted curses and obscenities at the Slytherins. Wands were drawn. Marlene all but launched herself at Narcissa. Fabian and Frank, their wands raised, flanked alongside a group of hesitant Ravenclaws who—if Remus wasn’t vividly hallucinating at this point—had literally been fighting alongside them a few minutes ago. Except… No spells were cast, no fists were thrown. The entire Hall held its breath. Lightning poised to strike.“ENOUGH!” McGonagall called. “Enough. Students are to report to their prefects and their Head of House. Everyone is to remain in the dormitories until further notice. Am I understood?”There was a small muttering of affirmatives from the crowd.Frank, ever the prefect, lowered his wand, half an eye still on the hostile Ravenclaws, and said, “Right. Gryffindor, let’s go.”Dorcas helped Lily to her feet, holding her tight under her arm. Fabian and Gideon draped exhausted arms over each other and followed after Frank. James patted Remus’s hand on his shoulder once, twice, and gave him a wan smile. Sirius turned, his righteous fury dissipating in an instant when he caught sight of Remus.“Merlin, Remus,” he whispered fingers clenching on air. “You’re okay. You’re okay, right?”Remus opened his mouth, ready to lie to his face, despite the fact that he was about to collapse, but—Sirius traced the tip of his finger over Remus’s bandaged, burnt, and gouged wrist. He flinched, and edged closer, until mere centimetres separated them. Then, for the briefest of seconds, Sirius stood on his tip-toes and pressed his forehead to Remus’s. “Told you today was shit,” Sirius breathed. Snape coughed loudly. It sounded venomous. “You’re a fucking blood traitor, Black. If you were anything more than the waste of noble blood, you’d know whose side to take while you still have pride and power in your name. When your father hears—“James, fast as a whip, drew his wand and cast a silencing spell over Snape. Snape choked on his words. Then, in the sight of God, the professors, and the entire fucking school, Sirius Black walked up, as slow and calculating as a predator before his prey, and punched Snape in the face. His fist landed with a sickening crack. Blood spurted from Snape’s broken nose, in between his fingers and onto the floor. “Look, Snivellus. Guess you were right. I did attack you.” Sirius snarled at him, shaking out his hand. Magic still sparked between his fingers, in the corners of his eyes. “Except unlike you, I know how to throw a fucking punch.”No one said or did anything for nearly a solid minute. Remus wasn’t entirely sure anyone dared to even breathe.Then, McGonagall: “Mr. Black—“Sirius whirled on her. “I’ll be in your fucking office.” He pointed at Remus. “Someone get him to the goddamned hospital wing. Now.”With that, Sirius Black stormed out of the Great Hall. All eyes of Hogwarts, past, present, and future, followed him. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ It took nearly two hours for McGonagall to show up. An announcement came over a castle-wide Sonorus charm at one point that declared classes had been cancelled for the rest of the day for “unsanctioned but necessary repairs”. Sirius wondered who, at this point, actually benefited from that kind of blatant lie. Everyone had been there. Everyone had seen what he’d seen, heard what the Slytherins had said. Everyone, right or wrong, had taken a side. When McGonagall entered the office, she looked for a moment, as though she’d forgotten he’d be there waiting. “Mr Black, given the morning we’ve all had, I strongly advise you to return to your dorm. Whatever this conversation entails can surely wait until things have—“Well, Sirius was not going to stand for any of that. Especially after that morning. Especially when he was fairly certain McGonagall was contractually obligated to kick his fucking arse from here to London. He’d broken Snape’s wand. Punched him in front of everyone.So, he jutted out his chin and demanded, “How’s Remus?”McGonagall frowned and pursed her lips. “You’re not to see him, I’m afraid.”Honestly, Sirius had expected that. And, if he was being honest anyway, he’d expected worse. Best case scenario would be Madam Pomfrey mounting his head on the castle’s tallest rampart.McGonagall continued, “Pamona seemed rather upset that—for some incomprehensible reason—you decided to take it upon yourself to cauterise Lupin’s wounds with what appears to be an Infernellium curse.”Though McGonagall’s words were meant as a dagger to his heart, Sirius found no reason to deny her accusations. What would be the point?He shrugged.At either his indifference or what she perceived as his stupidity, McGonagall was furious, her composure breaking with each passing second. “Not only are you not even remotely qualified to perform any sort of medical procedure—let alone one as precarious as that—but to use Dark Magic to do is is phenomenally—“No. Of all his sins, of all the reason his soul was twisted and burned and damned, Sirius Black refused to feel even remotely guilty about that.“That goddamned owl cut his vein open. He could have bled out!”McGonagall matched his volume and tone. “Then you should have gone for help!”Sirius snarled at her. “There was blood and fire and none of you were fucking there!”She recoiled slightly, but it was enough. Sirius was poised and ready to strike, and she knew it. Her voice wavered. “We were… indisposed, Mr. Black. Given the news this morning, I’m sure you can—““No, I fucking can’t, Professor!” Sirius started pacing, in an attempt to quell the maelstrom raging inside his head. “The Slytherins planned this. And Remus was… hurt.” He squeezed his eyes shut, forcing the memory of Remus falling down the last few stairs out of his mind. “Remus was hurt and they still attacked him.”“And you retaliated.”Sirius actually laughed at that. “No shit.”“If Mr. Snape is to be believed, you snapped his wand in half after defeating him in a duel.”Again, there was no use denying it. “Yep.”McGonagall scowled. “You of all people, Mr. Black, should understand what a devastating and heartbreaking thing it is to lose one’s wand. It is a physical manifestation of a wizard’s connection to his magic. To snap another’s wand for any other reason than the highest of crimes is inhumane.”You of all people.Like he needed a reminder of the state of his own magic, a tally of all his sins. Sirius bared his teeth. “I’d do it again. Snape might be a puppet on a string, but he threatened all of us. He made his choice.” “And you chose to be the executioner?”“Yes!” Sirius roared. “He had a choice and he chose them!”“The Slytherins?”Sirius was quiet for a moment, glaring up at her. He chose his words carefully, waiting for the bits of poison to leak into his voice. “Snape chose everything that I ran away from, Professor, because he’s too much of a coward to stand up against people like Malfoy.”McGonagall’s face was now infuriatingly neutral. She said nothing.“You’ve figured out what Malfoy did, right?” Sirius laughed, bitter and derisive. “Malfoy cursed Evans! You’ve checked his wand for the curse? Sanguis Sanguinem? If your unfamiliar, it’s a fucking blood curse, Professor. The whole fucking castle saw it. Malfoy couldn’t threaten Remus, so he cursed Evans instead.”She let out a heavy sigh. “I am aware of Mr. Malfoy’s actions.”“Then take his fucking prefect badge! It’s the least you could do!”McGonagall pursed her lips. It added lines to her face that hadn’t been there before. Sirius knew her answer. He stopped pacing.“You can’t, can you?” He narrowed his eyes. Nodded once in complete and utter resignation. “Because Abraxas Malfoy sits on the school board.”A crease appeared between McGonagall’s eyebrows, but she gave no other reaction. “Now is not the time to be carrying out your personal vendettas against the Malfoys, Mr. Black.”“Yes, it fucking is! Don’t you see?! This is all happening because no one bothered to—“Finally—finally—Professor McGonagall broke.“We are at war, Mr Black!” Her voice cracked, diplomatic neutrality shattered into a million, razor sharp edges. Then, for a horrifying second, she looked as though she might cry. When she finally composed herself enough to form sentences once more, her words were quiet, uncertain, as though she were the only one left in the broken universe.“We are at war, and you’re right,” she breathed, and Sirius’s heart nearly stopped at the confession. At what it must cost her to admit such a thing. “I-I prayed this had all ended with Grindelwald. That in the wake of his defeat, we’d come together to build a better society for the next generation. How very naive I was.”She looked at him, a hurricane in her blue eyes, and for the first time since he’d arrived at Hogwarts, Sirius dared to believe—just for a second—that she actually saw him. Not his name, not his family, not even just another Gryffindor under her care.
Him.
Still, she said, “We are at war and you are a child.”Sirius Black had never been a child. He was a soldier, a spy, a victim, and a criminal. He was damned and fated, loved and reviled. He was…Canon fodder.McGonagall went on. “You’re too young to remember or even comprehend how Grindelwald stole the minds and hearts of the young. Of the otherwise innocent. You’re too young to have seen how he twisted their fears, their insecurities, their weaknesses and ambitions, and melted them into a battlecry against the defenceless. You’re too—“That was quite enough of that. Sirius raised his chin and crossed his arms. “I’m no younger than you were when you joined the war, Professor.”Sirius could hear her jaw click shut. Her eyes, filled with regret only a moment ago, grew wide with shock. Then, realisation. “Merlin,” she muttered, pinching the bridge of her nose. “You broke into Slughorn’s office.”Sirius smirked, rather proud of himself. “I did.”“You have the—““Detention records?” he supplied. “Yeah. They’re currently framed and hanging over the mantle in the Gryffindor common room.”“Salazar’s bloody tits,” McGonagall breathed, so quiet Sirius barely heard it. He barked a laugh and she glared at him.“James and I have been taking notes. And, I’ve got to say, I’m rather impressed by—““Those records are of war and extenuating circumstances, Mr. Black. They are not to be used as inspiration for—“Sirius shrugged. “We are at war, Professor. You said so yourself.”Her lips bled into a thin line. “Children should not be called upon to fight.”“You were,” he said simply. Sirius tilted his head to the side in a challenge. “For every incident in that record, I’d bet all the Galleons in my vault that there are three that weren’t recorded.”McGonagall said nothing. It was answer enough.“I’ve heard stories from the war, too, Professor, and I know how Dumbledore fought back. He needed people on his side, so he chose the angry and the broken, same as Grindelwald. He just had better P.R., because at the end of the day, the old man won. After that, no one really bothered to look into how.”McGonagall looked affronted. “Dumbledore never believed in the radical blood purity of Grindelwald—““Maybe not,” Sirius conceded. “But he needed soldiers to fight in his crusade. So, he gave out favours, second chances, and minor miracles. He made sure to accumulate the debts of his soldiers, so that when the time came, they’d be willing to fight for him. To die for him.”McGonagall was half-way between fury and revulsion. “You make him out to be a monster. He’s—““Monsters are the men who declare themselves gods, not the creatures they create.” At her bewildered expression, Sirius muttered, “Remus made me read Frankenstein. I liked it. A lot.”Professor McGonagall was quiet for a long time, simply staring at him like he was the most remarkable and beguiling thing in all of creation. Finally, she said, “There is so much work that even you can’t understand, Mr. Black.”Sirius took a step towards her. “Tell me I’m wrong about Dumbledore. Tell me that’s not exactly how he raised you. As a soldier.”McGonagall waved her hand in protest. “I was young, impetuous, and wholly ignorant of the ways of this world. You cannot possibly—““You don’t get it, Professor. I’m volunteering.”All the colour drained from her face. “What?”“That’s what the old man wants, isn’t it? Soldiers. Cannon fodder. I’ll be his fucking martyr, if that’s what it takes.” Sirius paused, eyes alight with fury. “So long as it means people like my father, like Malfoy, like Tom Riddle burn.”McGonagall slapped her hand down on the desk so suddenly that Sirius flinched. “No.”Sirius snarled. “You said the last war never came to Hogwarts. This one is already here. Are you going to deny it?!”Her expression hardened. She wasn’t.“Then let me—““No!” she shouted, desperation cracking each word. “Don’t you understand, Black? If I allow you to fight, then it’ll be mere moments before Potter and Lupin follow you right into the jaws of death. That little Pettigrew fellow too. He’ll be the first to fall, mark my words. Following his friends, but with no real conviction or even marginal competence of his own. Then, your king, Black. You saw how she fought for all of you today, even as she herself was left cursed and defeated and without her dearest friend. She will try to save every one of you, but she will fall.”Sirius recoiled in horror, backing away from McGonagall as her words dripped poisoned onto what was left of his soul. “Don’t you see? You wish to martyr yourself, to fight a righteous war against tyranny and cruel, maniacal gods and monsters, but you will be the last of any of them. They will die for you, not your war, if you are not careful.”Sirius’s breath caught, escaped his lungs, then absolutely refused to return. He gasped, rasped, panicked as tears welled in his eyes, but he fought them with as much conviction as he’d fought the Slytherins that morning. He wanted to run away from all of it, go up to the hospital wing, grab Remus, and never return. He wanted to escape in the dead of the night with his king and his fairy-tale prince, build a kingdom surrounded by walls that no one—not even his mother—could topple and destroy.But, when he slammed his eyes shut, all he could see was chaos and devastation. James Potter, eyes unblinking, unseeing, wand just out of reach. Lily Evans, close by, hunched in on herself, but equally dead. And Remus—Remus, as bloody and broken as he’d been that morning, his throat slashed by monstrous claws. Sirius forced air into his lungs. Croaked, “What am I supposed to do?”“Survive, goddamn you,” McGonagall rasped. “That’s all there is to it.”It was the most outrageous and incomprehensible command that anyone had ever placed upon his shoulders. Because, at the end of the day, it might very well prove to be impossible.Seeing the devastation on his face, McGonagall nodded. Just once. “My offer of tutelage still stands, Mr. Black,” she said, once more calm and composed. “But hear this: I refuse to raise a martyr. Whether for this war, or for Albus Dumbledore, or bloody Merlin Pendragon himself, I will not raise you as a lamb to be led to the slaughterhouse. That’s my condition, Mr. Black.”His face scrunched up in confusion. “What is?”“I absolutely refuse to outlive any of you.” McGonagall’s face was ice-cold stone, but he could see the cracks in the granite. She bowed her head. “I’ve outlived far to many already.”“But you will train me to fight?” He couldn’t keep the note of desperation out of his voice. Whatever McGonagall believed, war and devastation filled the entire canvas of his future. He’d fight one way or another. He’d seen it, every time he turned his eyes up to the heavens.It was written in the bloody stars.He’d very much like to burn them down before he met his own end.“Yes,” she said, resigned. “And, if you listen very carefully, you might just learn when to walk away.”Not bloody likely.Still, he said, “Then, I accept.”And maybe—just maybe—McGonagall smiled at him. “We start on Tuesday, Mr. Black. After dinner. Don’t be late.”Sirius inclined his head in acknowledgement. “Thank you, Professor.”He made for the door, hands in the pocket of his robes, fingers tracing the frigid, runic lines on his wand hidden there. He’d almost reached the door, when—“Mr. Black?” He paused, turned slowly on his heel to look at her, one hand still on the door. Her eyes softened when she saw the stiffness in his every movement. This time, he was certain she smiled. “You are so very Gryffindor. For as long as I live, I will never stop being ashamed of how long it took me to realise it. And of what it almost cost you in my ignorance.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius decided to take a slight detour on his way back to Gryffindor tower. To… sort out his thoughts. Screw his head on straight. Calm the storm threatening inside his veins. Et cetera. As it turned out, a slight detour translated to a casual stroll to the opposite end of the castle. He figured there was no one better to sort out his head than Remus Lupin and Remus Lupin was currently in the hospital wing. Hence the slightly-more-out-of-the-way-than-originally-anticipated detour.Plus, he knew he wouldn’t be convinced that Remus was actually okay until he saw him with his own eyes. So what if Madam Pomfrey brought in a team of horses to draw and quarter him. As Sirius climbed to the top of the staircase, he caught little snippets of conversation and some muted shuffling.“Oh, will you just give it here!”Sirius felt himself smile as he came to a stop right before the last corner. The sounds of James and Lily’s familiar bickering were a startling comfort after the day he’d had.From his vantage point, Sirius could see James and Lily facing each other outside the doors of the hospital wing. Lily glared ice-daggers up at James, one hand on her hips, the other making sly grabbing motions for—James lurched back, clumsily yanking the invisibility cloak out of her reach and subsequently nearly tripping over its long tails. Pinwheeling his arms, he managed to keep his balance, before collecting himself and draping the cloak haphazardly over his lower half. He looked like a floating torso and head, with one arm wildly gesticulating. “It’s my invisibility cloak!”Lily stuck out her chin. “You said I could borrow it.”James floundered a bit, but said, “Yes, but not without supervision.”“I’m your king, Potter. I don’t need your bloody supervision!”A mischievous, devilish grin spread across James’s face. He held out the invisibility cloak. “Well, you see, Evans, its something of a family heirloom and—““Bullshit! You let Sirius borrow it last week.”James held up a finger. “Ah, but Sirius is both a Marauder and my brother in every way that counts. He more than counts as family.”Although it was impractical, self-indulgent, and more than a little ridiculous given present circumstances, Sirius preened at how readily James Potter claimed him as his own.“But—““But!” James cut in, waving the finger in her face. “If, say, you were to join and/or become a member of my family—in a significant, contractual, and eternal love and devotion sort of way, of course—I could then bequeath upon you the—“Sirius cleared his throat—loud and obnoxious—to save James from what was sure to become another rejected marriage proposal. Their heads swivelled.“Hi,” Sirius said, with a small, pathetic wave as he walked over to them.Lily, as always, wasted no time, gave no quarter. “What did McGonagall say?”Sirius wasn’t exactly ready to talk about that, nor had he even begun to process the magnitude of McGonagall’s warnings. “I don’t have detention, if that’s what you’re asking.”James opened and closed his mouth. “But… you punched Snivellus.”Lily buried her head in her hands and sighed. Exchanging a look with James, Sirius narrowed his eyes, trying to determine exactly how mad she was about that. Apparently, not as mad as he’d thought.It’d been a crazy morning all around. Impossible things at every turn.“Right or wrong,” Lily said, as James immediately chimed in his ardent support for the former, “it doesn’t explain what you’re doing here.”Sirius tilted his head. Wasn’t it obvious? He thought it had been obvious. He pointed at the doors to the hospital wing. “Remus,” he said.Lily’s hands went right back to her hips. “Door’s locked.”“Right.” Sirius twirled his hand, revelling, for a moment, in the exhilarating, intoxicating tingle of his own magic as it was summoned to his fingertips. “I can fix that.”Except Lily wedged herself between Sirius and he door so fast that Sirius took a hearty leap backwards to avoid colliding with her entirely. “Merlin!” he snapped. “What the fuck, Evans?”Maybe she was holding a grudge after all?She waved an accusatory finger in Sirius’s face. “I knew you’d show up here eventually, you bloody idiot!”“Hang on!” Invisibility cloak draped over one invisible arm, James wiggled himself into what was still a dangerously minuscule space between Lily and Sirius. For his own safety, Sirius took another half-step back as James turned on Lily. “You said you were reporting to the hospital wing because of Malfoy’s curse.”Lily stuck her tongue out at him. “Grow up, Potter. It’s a blood curse. It doesn’t have a cure.”James turned wide, desperate eyes to Sirius. The poor, heroic fairy-tale prince seemed to be having a hard time reconciling his perfect world with the idea of blood curses. There was no monster to fight, dragon to slay. Just helpless victims and pain, unimaginable. Though it killed him to break the fantasy, shatter the spell, Sirius just shrugged. Lily was right. “At least hers will wear off,” he said, gesturing hopelessly at his own chest. “I’m here,” Lily interjected, though she did spare Sirius a pitying glance, before she pointed at him once more, “to stop him from breaking into the hospital wing.”Sirius pretended to be affronted. Neither of them bought it. He changed tactics. “Look, Evans, I need to see Remus. He was hurt and I—““And you used Dark Magic on him!” Lily snapped. Sirius jerked back, the accusation in her voice like a physical blow. He drew in a breath. “I— You didn’t see him. Before.” Sirius waved his arms, helpless and broken and so very, very defeated. “He… He fell and... His wrists… They were like that before the damned owl.”Once more, Lily marched right up to him, until Sirius was forced to face the fury in her emerald eyes. “Listen to me, Black, “ Lily said, through her teeth. “You used Dark Magic on your best friend. That is unacceptable.”“He was—““Find another fucking way!” Lily shouted, right in his face. “You’re the fucking expert here, Black. You’re fucking smart enough to figure this out. You don’t get to just panic and resort to—“There was a small explosion behind Sirius’s eyes and he just… erupted. “You’re not fucking listening, Evans!” he roared, tearing at his hair, trying not to pace. “His wrists were already cut and I tried.”Lily froze.James drew in a sharp breath.And that was the last bit of fire that Sirius had inside him. All that remained was embers in the ashes, as the darkness grew colder and colder. He walked backwards until his back hit the opposite wall, but he did not sit. If he allowed himself to relax, stopped fanning the embers with the very last of his strength, he’d freeze from the inside out. “I tried everything.” Sirius’s voice cracked on the last word. “Every healing spell I know. With my wand and without it. Nothing worked. Nothing ever works. He always comes back bloody and I can’t do a fucking thing.”Lily’s fury evaporated instantly. Gently, she said, “Sirius, you’re not a healer.”James nodded along. “You may be a prodigy, but you’re still a first year. No one expects you to know everything, mate. Least of all Remus.”“Don’t you get it? Can’t you— Why can’t you see it?” Sirius face was rapture and devastation, but he forced himself to explain. “Remus leaves and he comes back here hurt. Every. Damn. Time. And sometimes… Sometimes, his wrists are cut. Do you know what that means?”For a moment, James and Lily stared at him. Then, slowly, hauntingly, they exchanged a look.Sirius held his breath.And, just as Sirius knew he would, James shook his head, as adamant and resolute as the last shelter in a raging storm. “Remus wouldn’t—“Sirius could do nothing else but shatter the fairy-tale world that only existed in James Potter’s mind. It was cruel and heartless, but in the wake of battle, with a noose already around his neck, Sirius Black had no other choice.“And what would you know of pain like that, James?” Sirius tilted his head, daring James to answer.Lily’s reprimand was equally cruel. “Sirius.”Sirius’s eyes flicked to her. “They used Dark Magic on him. Did you know that, Evans? That’s why none of the healing spells work. Whoever’s doing this is torturing him.” He gestured helplessly between them. “Neither of you don’t know what that’s like. How could you?” There was venom in his question, but Sirius couldn’t hold it back any longer. He was raised by vipers, after all. Somewhere along the way, he learned to spit poison, too.“So, yes, Evans, I used Dark Magic,” Sirius continued. Then, reaching into his robes, he pulled out his wand. It was as cold and as heavy as ever, as he held it out to her. “My wand is dead. Did I ever tell you that? Remus knows. I think he knows. My wand is dead and it only works when I use Dark Magic. So… fuck it. Cursed or not, if it saves him, I do not give a shit. I will not ever allow Remus to become the first casualty in this war, either by his own hand or Malfoy’s or some fucking feral owls. I will burn the stars before I allow that to happen.” Lily crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. Her voice was quiet. Dangerous. A threat, a prophecy, a condemnation, all in one. “There is more than one way to kill yourself, Sirius.”And Sirius laughed. “I don’t care.”And that, apparently, was the end of the rope for the fairy-tale prince.“Fuck. You.” James marched right up to him. Jabbed his finger into Sirius’s chest. One. Twice, punctuating each word. It burned, just like it was supposed to. Just like Sirius deserved. Ice-fire in his veins. “I care, you fucking arsehole.”And, despite the pain, Sirius didn’t resist when James grabbed him by the back of the neck and pressed their foreheads together. “If you go, I go,” James said. “That’s how this works. Until the very end.”And, bloody fucking Merlin, McGonagall was right and Sirius couldn’t breathe. James let him go, and took half of Sirius’s heart with him, and fuck, if that didn’t hurt more than anything else.“Your rage does nothing for anyone, Sirius,” Lily said. “Not now. Not after today. There’s a time and a place for you to wage your war, but now… We need—“ She swallowed, nodded, then finished: “Remus needs you, and all the impossible things you keep locked up in your heart.”McGonagall’s order echoed in his brain, quiet at first, then loud as a trumpet at the break of dawn.Survive, goddamn you.Sirius had nothing else to say. Nothing to fight for.They were safe, for now: his prince, his king, and the impossible, beautiful boy on the other side of the door. The war could wait for tomorrow. And, of course, Lily Evans saw the surrender in his eyes. She reached out carefully and tugged on the sleeve of his robes. “Come on, love. Let’s go back. Remus is safe. You can rest now.”Merlin, wasn’t that a revolutionary idea?Still, Sirius found himself nodding. With one final look at the doors to the hospital wing and one last, unanswered prayer, Sirius followed Lily and James down the corridor. As they walked, James bumped Sirius’s shoulder. Sirius was so far beyond any concept of pain at this point that he almost didn’t notice. “Tomorrow,” James said, “you and me will plot revenge on the Slytherins. I bet Minerva McGonagall might’ve had some brilliant ideas back in her day.”And, despite everything, Sirius felt himself smile. It didn’t last, because echoing down the long corridor was a haunting, sing-song voice. Sirius froze, his empty, broken heart turning to ice. “Well, then, soldier, how goes the war?” Peeves faded into existence from absolute nothing right before them. He was upside down, floating and grinning madly, smile carved deep and inhuman right across his face. He cawed, “Quoth the raven, ‘Forevermore’.”“Shit,” Lily breathed, stopping shoulder to shoulder with Sirius. “Hi, Peeves,” James said, sounding more annoyed than anything.He should be terrified. Peeves floated down until he hovered right in front of them. He twisted his head a full three-hundred-sixty degrees, then mock-saluted them. “Little filthy Filch-y asked ol’ Peeves-y to help him patrol the corridor. Said their might be trouble about.”“Nope,” James said, hiding the invisibility cloak behind his back. “No trouble here.”Peeves ignored him entirely. “Firsties out of bed, Filch-y says. Peeves is great with trouble, I tells him! It’s yummy with entrails and chops. Chop, chop, chop! Trouble tastes like a king—“ Dark, dead eyes stared right at Lily. Slowly, with a maniacal grin, Peeves’s attention tracks to Sirius. “—and her little doggie.”A long, forked tongue snaked out of Peeves mouth, inches away from Lily’s face. James coughed. On Sirius’s other side, he whispered, “Um. Did he just threaten to eat you?”Sirius was fairly certain it was so much worse than that. “Jamie.” Sirius kept his voice quiet, barely moving, save for the muscles necessary to form the words. “Go find the Bloody Baron. Now.”Because Andromeda had told him stories, and Sirius prayed beyond hope and sanity that this one was true. “What?” James said, affronted. “Why do I have to go?”Because, for some fucking reason, Peeves wasn’t paying any attention to James Potter at all. “Don’t ask questions, Potter,” Lily snapped, her eyes locked on Peeves. “Just do it.”The second she spoke, Peeves lashed out. He spun in a circle, laughing hysterically. It was a sound that Sirius knew would haunt his nightmares. For the rest of his goddamned life.“Though she’s no king of mine,” Peeves sang. “She’ll be dead at twenty-nine.”In less than a heartbeat, Sirius watched all the colour, all the life drain out of James Potter’s face. “Right. Bloody Baron, you said?” Sirius gave a sharp nod. “I’ll be back in a tick.”Peeves didn’t bat an eye as James took off running down the corridor. Now, all Sirius had to do was stall. If he could get Peeves to focus on him, Lily could get away before Peeves carved her name into the same prophecies and destinies and damnations already written for Sirius. “Oi! Peeves!” Sirius shouted, waving his arms. “Remember last time? I told you to leave us the fuck alone! So kindly fuck right off, or I’ll—“Lily ignored him entirely, her eyes fixed on Peeves. “What do you mean?”Sirius choked on his words. “Evans—“Peeves grinned ear to ear, flittering around near the ceiling. “This war you fight is one with Fate. She’ll claim her life ere twenty-eight.”Sirius drew in a sharp breath. No.
No.
Because, once upon a time, Peeves was a Seer, and the Veil was thinnest inside his mind.He knew everything and nothing, all at once. “Evans,” Sirius said, struggling to keep his voice calm. “Back away slowly. When we get to the stairs, we run in opposite directions and—“Again, Lily ignored him.“Well, guess-fucking-what?” she said. “This isn’t my war. I didn’t ask for any of this!”I did, said a voice in Sirius’s head, and it was right.No matter what any of them said—McGonagall, James, or Remus—he’d begged for this, the moment he pleaded with the hat to put him in Gryffindor. Whatever came after, whatever war raged outside these walls—because of him or because of Tom Riddle—Sirius had chosen to fight.
“The king will fight both hell and heaven. But she’ll be dead before twenty-seven.”
Sirius hadn’t understood what it’d mean to kill a god. He hadn’t understood when Silas said it, so, so long ago now. He didn’t fully grasp the concept even when he’d been forced to answer Remus’s questions after Peeves said the verse the first time. Killing God—a god, any god—was impossible to comprehend, even when one held the metaphorical sword in hand to do the deed. Sirius Black hadn’t understood. Not really.Now, he just might.It would cost him everything.“Evans—“ he begged.Peeves floated down from the ceiling, slowly, until he was eye level with Lily Evans. For a long, haunting moment, neither of them moved. Green eyes stared right into nothing, and all Sirius could do was watch.Then, Lily said, “I stumbled upon your world by accident and happenstance.”Peeves replied, “Dead men and kings in the River Styx. She’ll make the crossing ere twenty-six.”Lily said, “If I didn’t open that letter, I’d be at home with my family and everything would be fine. Just fine.” Peeves replied, “While Moon and Stars are left alive, she’ll be dead before twenty-five.”“Stop,” Sirius pleaded, begged, bartered with nothing. No one. Because there was no one out there who would hear his prayer. He was destined to kill god, after all. “Please stop.”Lily said, “My sister wouldn’t hate me. My mother wouldn’t look at me like I’d somehow brought the devil into her home.”Peeves replied, “Weighed measured, wanting more. The king won’t live to twenty-four.”Lily said, “I’d be content and just fine. I’d listen to Severus’s stories of magic and wonder and a world I could only imagine in my wildest dreams when he came home every summer.”Peeves replied, “Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, dead before they’re twenty-three.”“Fate is fucked!” Sirius roared, twirling his fingers, but nothing came to his fingertips. He had nothing left to give. Nothing. He was damned to kill a god, but not before she won. She’d have her vengeance, her pound of flesh, and there was nothing Sirius Black could do about it. Lily said, “I’d live another life. In another world. And I’d be perfectly fine.”Peeves replied, “‘Fate is fucked,’ or so says you. She’ll cross the Veil ere twenty-two.”“No,” Sirius croaked. Prayed, to the god he was damned to kill. “Please, God, no.”Lily Evans bared her teeth and stared right into that Veil. “What a fucking nightmare!”And Peeves replied, “Said the mother to her son, ‘I’ll be dead at twenty-one.’”In the face of death, the King of Gryffindor didn’t so much as blink.Then, from down the hall, came a booming roar. “PEEVES!”Sirius almost sobbed in relief as the Bloody Baron charged down the hall, his sword raised high over his head. Peeves let out a high-pitched yelp, then a full-blown screech, before disappearing into thin air. The Bloody Baron bellowed in fury—the cry echoing and reverberating in Sirius’s soul—before turning and galloping down the opposite hallway, hollering after his enemy. James Potter huffed his ways up the last few stairs. He leaned against a wall for a moment, to catch his breath, then seemed to take in the scene. For half an eternity, no one moved. “So,” James said, drawing out the word. His eyes darted between Lily and Sirius. “What’d he say?”That, apparently, was enough to snap Lily out of whatever apocalypse world she’d been in. She marched up to Sirius and grabbed his wrist. He let out a startled cry and, for a moment, she squeezed her eyes shut. Malfoy’s curse guaranteed that touching Sirius boiled Lily’s blood in her veins, just as much as it did his. Through her teeth, she growled, “You are not to speak about this to anyone. Ever. Do you hear me, Black?!” He nodded, frantic for relief—reprieve—from her touch and prophesied damnation. She let go. She said, “People are superstitious enough as it is.” Without so much as sparing a look at James, Lily shouldered past both of them and up the stairs to Gryffindor tower. James and Sirius watched her go in silence, save for Sirius’s laboured breathing. He rubbed the spot where she’d touched him, wondering if it’d actually burned him. He almost wished it would.It was far less than he deserved. “You’ll tell me later, right?” James asked. “No, James, I won’t.” Sirius shrugged, then slowly followed after Lily, leaving James Potter wide-eyed and confused in the middle of the hall. “King’s orders.” Later, in the middle of the night, Sirius pulled back the curtains to James’s bed and crawled in without a word. Remus was gone and Sirius couldn’t bare to face his nightmares alone. Not tonight.James was awake, lying on his back, staring up at nothing. He didn’t so much as blink as Sirius situated a pillow between them.“Peeves said she was going to die, Sirius,” James told the ceiling. “He’s just a poltergeist, James,” Sirius lied. “It doesn’t mean anything.”James rolled on his side to face him. “Then why do you look so fucking scared?”It wasn’t an accusation. It wasn’t an insult, or a cry of cowardice in midst battle. It was just the fucking truth. And somehow, that was so much worse. Sirius wished he was brave enough to vow vengeance, retribution, annihilation for anyone who threatened their king, but the truth was, he had nothing. Nothing.He was destined to kill god and the ransom price was Lily Evans. “Go to sleep, Jamie,” Sirius whispered. Begged. Eventually, they closed their eyes and prayed for oblivion.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
FEBRUARY 1, 1972
After the previous week—the declarations of war, the battles fought, whether lost or won—normal seemed a foreign, unattainable thing, not suited for anyone left at Hogwarts. But, despite the magic and the ghosts and the cataclysmic ransoms placed upon both gods and kings, normal was what Hogwarts did best.Normal, as the world inside and out erupted into chaos. On Tuesday, the King of Gryffindor and her Marauders—minus the one who’d been torn apart by an unknown monster—went to Care of Magical Creatures. Like normal.Unlike normal, Professor Cuckoo led the class into a dusty, abandoned classroom that had, by generous estimates, last been used in 1797. There’d been a snowstorm the night before that had left nearly a foot of snow on the ground and drifts that towered well-over the heads of most first years. With Hickory Dave munching on what could only be described as mustard-and-chocolate covered bean mush, Professor Cuckoo took his time surveying his class. At the back of the room, Sirius Black mirrored his pose: arms crossed, scowl on his face, fingers itching to draw a wand that only reaped destruction. Instead of a wand, Professor Cuckoo produced a copy of yesterday’s Prophet.Sirius Black bared his teeth.By the end of what constituted as class but was, in reality, more of an hour-long shouting match between a seasoned professor and a twelve-year-old student, Sirius was probably lucky to walk away with only one night of detention.He missed his first lesson with McGonagall, but Merlin, it was worth it to see the fury in Cuckoo’s eyes at the mere notion that a pureblood scion would side against him. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
FEBRUARY 2, 1972
On Wednesday, Sirius found Lily in the library in between classes. James and Peter were off watching Quidditch practice or hexing Slytherins or something. Sirius hadn’t really been listening.“I haven’t heard from Remus, Black.” Lily didn’t look up from her book as Sirius sat down across from her. “So don’t ask.”Sirius hadn’t heard from Remus either, but that wasn’t what he was going to ask. “How’s Snivellus?”Lily didn’t so much as flinch at the nickname. “We’re not speaking.”And, honestly, Sirius hadn’t been expecting that at all. Secretly hoping, yes, obviously, but never did he think Lily would stop speaking to Snape entirely.“I don’t want to hear I told you so’s, Black,” she said, her voice cold. Sirius held up his hands. That hadn’t been what he was going to say in the least. “I get that you might have been right about… certain things, but he’s still my friend. I just kind of want to punch him at the moment.”“Trust me, it’s worth it. Immensely satisfying,” Sirius muttered. Lily shot him a death glare, so he coughed up a semblance of an apology.Accepting it with a roll of her eyes, Lily forced her attention back on her book. “Well, if that’s all, I’ll see you in Charms later. Have a nice—““Evans—“She huffed, but wouldn’t look at him. “Fine. I talked to Madam Pomfrey yesterday. She can’t do anything about Malfoy’s curse, naturally, but she insisted I check in. That’s still going strong, by the way, which is fucking inconvenient. Anyways, she said Remus will be out by the end of the week. It’s just with the extent of his injuries—“Sirius’s heart lurched, but he forced himself to swallow his panic. Remus was safe, for now. “That’s great, Evans. Thank you. But I—““So, that’s all, really. I don’t know why you’re bothering me. Why don’t you go off with Potter and Pettigrew and—““Merlin, Lily.” Without any care or credence, Sirius yanked the book she was reading from her grasp. He slammed it closed, then dropped it between them. It landed with a resolute, thunk.
On Spectres: An Idiot’s Guide to the Preternatural.
Sirius folded his arms and raised an eyebrow. “I saw you grab it from the shelves.”Lily let out a sigh. “We’re not talking about it, Black.”“Yes, we fucking are.”“It didn’t mean anything.” Her words were sharp, resolute. “He’s a just a poltergeist. Give it a few hundred years and he’ll lose what’s left of his soul and have to feed on others. He’ll fade into a dementor, just like the rest of—““He’s not like the rest of them, Evans,” Sirius snapped, a little too loudly, earning angry hushes from the librarian. He lowered his voice to little more than a whisper. “He was a Seer, before he died.”There was a flicker in Lily’s eyes, but otherwise, she gave no quarter. “Prophecy and Divination are nothing more than parlour tricks meant to enthral those without a sure sense of self.”“You’re not listening,” Sirius hissed. He glanced around to ensure no one could hear him. “He’s a Seer and he marked you for death.”Lily, in all her kingly glory, stuck out her tongue at him. “He said you’re going to die too, Sirius. In all sorts of glorious ways. Don’t think I’ve forgotten about that.”Sirius scoffed. He gestured wildly at his own chest. “I’ve been marked for years, Evans. It’s nothing new.”Lily leaned back in her chair, a sardonic smirk dancing at the corner of her lips. “We make quite a pair, then, don’t we? The two of us, the Muggle-born and the pureblood heir. Supposed enemies, but here we are. Blood-tied and damned.”Cold, dead, ethereal fingers clawed their way up his spine.“That’s not funny.”Lily was quiet for a moment. She leaned back in her chair, eyes locked on his.“I meant what I said, Sirius. Any life I might have had outside of Hogwarts would be a fucking nightmare. A taste of magic, even for a moment, even if it ends in my death, is better than none at all. So, I’ll choose this. Every damn time. I need you to understand that.”Sirius thought of talking hats, of bargains and regrets, of prophecies and unknown gods. He thought of the boy with the leyline scars and the touch that brought hellfire to the surface of his skin. He thought of his fairy-tale prince, and his blood brother left behind in a pit of vipers.Most of all, he though of ransom prices. Of everything and everyone he’d ever loved and what that devotion might cost him at the end of all things. And he said, “I do. I understand more than anyone.”Lily nodded. “Knew you would. That’s why we don’t have to talk about it.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
FEBRUARY 3, 1972
On Thursday, after dinner, Sirius walked in to McGonagall’s classroom for his first tutoring session without knocking.She looked up, square spectacles minutely crooked on the bridge of her nose. “Mr. Black—““Right. First thing’s first,” Sirius interrupted, clapping his hands over whatever she’d been about to say. “You’re going to stop calling me Mr. Black right-the-fuck now. My name is Sirius. And… That’s it.”He just wanted to see her reaction. Mostly.It was, unfortunately, anti-climatic. A single, perfectly sculpted eyebrow went up. “I do not think that is entirely proper for a professor to refer to—““When you call me that, you picture my mother in my place.”That rendered much more of a reaction. McGonagall audibly choked on whatever she’d been about to say. “I’m not her, Professor.” Sirius felt rather vindicated at McGonagall’s horrified expression, so he continued. “I know I look like her. Everyone says that. My eyes are hers, but I am not. I don’t know how else to prove to you that I’d rather die than live the life my mother wants for me.”McGonagall was silent for a long, long moment. She simply stared at him, as though he were the most beguiling thing in all of creation.“I do not require proof. I was capricious and cruel to lead you to believe I required proof in the first place. You are Gryffindor. That is enough,” McGonagall managed, with a sharp nod. Then, miraculously, she said, “Take a seat, Sirius.”The grin that spread over his face was involuntary and triumphant. He sat down on the bench in front of her. Sirius immediately propped his feet up on the desk and McGonagall didn’t say a damn thing about it. He twirled his fingers, summoning his magic, as she drew her own wand for a demonstration.Before she could begin, Sirius asked, “Does that mean I get to call you Minnie?”“Merlin.” McGonagall lowered her wand and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I will say this. For all the trouble you seem to go looking for, your mother would be smart to disown you.”Sirius threw his head back and laughed. “Aw, Minnie. I think that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
FEBRUARY 4, 1972
On Friday, Sirius woke up well before dawn in his own bed with the taste of forest and starlight in his mouth, and the echoes of a dream fading into the cold, empty space next to him. Absent fingers traced the unused pillow opposite him, and Sirius felt an ache in his heart that he absolutely refused to think about.A floorboard creaked. A handle turned. Sirius leapt out of bed before his next breath. A heartbeat later, he threw his arms around Remus Lupin’s neck, clawed at his hair, pulled him as close as humanly possible. As close as Remus had held him in the dream Sirius barely remembered. “Shit—Sirius!” Remus exclaimed, but for the briefest of moments, dug his fingers into the fabric of Sirius’s shirt and absolutely refused to let go. The first time Sirius Black felt the pain of the Cruciatus curse, he was nine years old.
It was the morning of Regulus’s eighth birthday, and his younger brother was curled in a ball in Sirius’s lap, crying his damned eyes out. Sirius carded his fingers through Regulus’s short-cropped hair, whispering hollow words, unkept promises, and gold-laced destinies that would never belong to children such as them.
On the other side of the door at the end of the hall, Sirius knew, a circle had been drawn. His father would stand at the southern point, his mother at the north. In her hand, she held a silver knife dipped in black ink mixed with ancient blood. There was a sacrifice to be made, blood to be spilled.
Sirius, just like his namesake in the night sky, would be expected to take up his place to the east of Orion. Another family member—Cygnus, most likely—would hold the point to west, completing the circle. Regulus would be forced to his knees in the middle, while their mother spoke ancient words and carved them into his brother’s flesh.
A floorboard creaked. A handle turned.
Sirius nearly choked on his next breath.
A heartbeat later, his mother’s voice cut through the haze in his mind. “Stop wallowing. It’s time, Sirius.”
His arms around Regulus, Sirius coaxed his brother to his feet. He took a protective stance between his mother and Regulus, carefully nudging Regulus behind him. He swallowed the bile in his throat, the memories of his own eighth birthday, and summoned the words he prayed he was still brave enough to speak.
“Sirius,” his mother snapped. There was poison in the way she said his name.
“Don’t do this to him,” Sirius whispered. Begged. Then, reaching a courage, deep in his bones, that hadn’t been there before this very moment: “I won’t let you.”
It was not, of course, the first time that Sirius had openly defied his mother—if her stories were to be believed, he’d been a disappointment and the bane of her existence since the day he’d been born—but this was different. To his mother, this was subversion and revolution, treason and the highest of crimes.
For a fraction of an eternity, encompassed by a single breath, Walburga Black actually looked shocked at his defiance, but her mask of cruelty and anger was back in place before Sirius could be entirely certain of what he’d seen.
“Sirius.” His mother raised her chin. “Stand aside.”
Sirius mirrored her stance exactly, jutting out his own chin and forcing all the centuries of nobility, purity, and honour into his voice. “I’m the heir. I bear the burden of this family and I wear their mark. Regulus doesn’t need to go through with this.”
A dark, dangerous cloud settled over Walburga’s features. Slowly, methodically, she drew her wand. Thirteen inches of ebony wood—as black as her name, as black as her soul—pointed at Sirius’s throat. “I will not ask again.”
Behind him, Regulus whimpered. They both knew what was coming. “Siri—“
Still, Sirius said, “I won’t let you take him.”
Sirius didn’t hear the curse. Just a flash of red, and—
Agony.
Agony, like he’d never known. Not even on the day when his mother had carved the ancient curse into his skin.
Agony, unrivalled until the day long into the future, when he’d shake hands with a boy with sometimes-golden eyes and mesmerising scars.
Sirius screamed. Or, at least he thought he did.
“No! Stop! Please, stop! I’ll go with you. I swear it. Just stop!”
That was… No—
“Reg—“ But Sirius wasn’t sure what came out of his mouth was even comprehensible. His vocal chords were raw, torn to shreds, just like the rest of him.
Then, it stopped.
Regulus disappeared behind the door.
The air tasted of ozone and magic. Sparks crackled all around him, in between his fingers, and it took Sirius a solid minute to realise it was his own, out-of-control magic. Paintings had flown off the wall, frames bent and broken. A bust of some long-dead relative was on the ground at his mother’s feet, decapitated.
Sirius shuddered against the remnants of agony.
His mother glared at him, as though he were nothing more than an ant beneath her boot.
“You make him weak, when he could be triumphant. He should have been born the heir, not you. You are pathetic,” she spat at him. “Get off the floor and join the circle, or you forfeit your place. You don’t want your brother to go through this alone, do you?”
It was cruel, a dagger to his heart, just like she intended. All the same, Sirius dragged himself to his feet, one agonising move at a time.
Never, in his life, would Sirius Black allow his brother to face the nightmare of their lives alone.
Remus threw him off. Lightening shot up and down Sirius’s spine, but he managed to keep his feet under him. He gave a full-body shudder and his magic sparked involuntarily. Sirius drew in a shaky breath and looked up at Remus, just out of arm’s reach.Remus scrubbed a hand over his face. “Christ, you have to stop doing that.”“Never,” Sirius replied.Because the agony of never laying his hands on Remus Lupin again might just be the worst thing Sirius Black could possibly imagine. “How are you feeling?” Sirius asked, rather than addressing the dangerous, harrowing look in the amber eyes staring into his very soul. “Less shit than the other day,” Remus said with what was probably an attempt at a casual shrug. His words, however, still tasted like a lie.“But still shit,” Sirius concluded.Another shrug.When Sirius reached out a second later, Remus jerked back. “Don’t—“Sirius just rolled his eyes and carefully snagged the loose fabric of Remus’s sleeve.“Can I…?” But Sirius didn’t quite know how to ask that particular question.But, as always, Remus knew what he meant. He unbuttoned the cuffs of his shirt and slowly, methodically, rolled up the sleeves. Sirius, for the life of him, could not look away. Remus’s forearms—as Sirius expected—were covered in scars. Unlike the last few times Remus had allowed him to survey his scars, there were no bandages obscuring Sirius’s view. Just miles and miles of skin, laced with deep, gouging marks that spoke silent languages of torture and nightmare and monsters in the dead of night. Most of the scars were old, long-since faded to silver stripes running perpendicular to Remus’s wrists. On his left arm, there was such stark contrast to the fresh marks from the most recent monsters—from the talons of the owls, from his own curse—that Sirius drew in a sharp breath. Mottled, burnt skin over life-ending slits along the veins. Part of Sirius’s brain wanted to point out that it’d only been three days and there was no feasible way for Remus’s wrists to have healed that much, especially from the burn of Dark Magic, but the much louder voice in his head resolutely ignored the evidence before him, in favour of drowning in insurmountable guilt that he had carved those marks into Remus’s flesh, just like— Remus ducked his head to catch Sirius’s eye. “Stop, Siri. It wasn’t your fault.““I cursed you,” Sirius whispered. He closed his eyes against the threatening tears, and flicked his wrist. From his bedside table, his wand flew into his open hand. Cold. Dead. Devoid of everything that once was sacred. And the thing was, it wasn’t guilt Sirius felt, but nor was it triumph in the face of a battle won. His wand was dead, but somehow—miraculously—it had obeyed his command. His heart oscillated between horror, grief, and the abject wonder at what it all meant. Sirius was death-marked. Damned. Of that he was certain, but… Perhaps not yet. “I cursed you and it worked,” Sirius said, eyes closed, praying that his words came out in a language Remus Lupin could understand. All he could see behind his eyelids were the mottled burn-scars on Remus’s wrists. “Those scars are from me.”Twice, Remus had said once, in a dream.Twice, he’d been marked by Sirius.Remus stepped close to him, crowding his space, inching as physically close as possible without actually touching him. Sirius drew in a sharp breath, as scarred fingers reached out for his face, twirling a loose strand of Sirius’s hair in the same way Sirius twirled magic around his own fingers. Remus’s other hand traced over Sirius’s wand, still outstretched between them.“You are so much more than the executioner’s song that echoes in your heart, Sirius Black,” Remus breathed. Stole air from Sirius’s own lungs. Scarred lips pressed against his forehead. “Thank you.”And the agony was justice. Retribution. Worship.The hope of a man with a noose around his neck.Sirius would choose nothing else. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
FEBRUARY 5, 1972
Saturday was the final Quidditch match between Slytherin and Gryffindor. The winner would proceed to the championship game against Ravenclaw in May, which was, by all accounts, supposed to be an easy win, as Ravenclaw had only won against Hufflepuff by a mid-game forfeit because of too many injured Hufflepuff players.The stakes, if James Fleamont Potter was to be believed, had never been higher. Though they still had nearly an hour before the match started, James Potter had woken all of Gryffindor up at the crack of dawn. They had to prepare, he said, for the upset victory of the century. Which, of course, meant face-paint and costumes, as well as an epic speech from James Potter to the entire Gryffindor Quidditch team before they made a hasty retreat to the locker room nearly three hours early, muttering excuses of last-minute warm-ups. After that, James had sat still just long enough for Dorcas to braid long, yellow ribbons and chords into his hair, meant to mimic a lion’s mane. They’d had to use so many sticking charms and three entire bottles of hair potions that Sirius was certain it’d last until next month. James’s hair was still wild and untameable, but especially when contrasted with his dark skin, the effect on the mane was entirely mesmerising. Right as they finished with James, a still-mostly-asleep Remus had muttered a suggestion to Lily and Dorcas that had nearly made Sirius choke on his tongue, but, naturally, it was brilliant. The girls had spent the next half-hour crowding around Remus as he took a power nap. Dorcas and Lily traced the scars on Remus’s face with a combination of lipstick and eye-shadow, until they appeared fresh and bloody. Remus usually hated to draw attention to his scars, but even after they were done and Remus had seen the result, he’d insisted he was okay with it. It’d take a beast to devour a snake, he’d said. Sirius hadn’t known what to say to that. By the time Lily and Dorcas had finished braiding his stupid, curly hair with the same yellow chords as James, Remus looked…Merlin, he was beautiful. Sirius could absolutely not stop staring. It was very distracting. It was at that point, of course, that Marlene had more or less tackled Sirius and accused him of drooling, which was… probably not true. She’d been momentary appalled at his disastrous attempt to paint his own nails the week before, and had vanished the polish with a flick of her wand. She’d spent the next half hour meticulously painting each nail, alternating between crimson and gold, while Sirius continued to not drool over Remus Lupin. Eventually, Marlene had forced him to close his eyes so she could paint a lion over half of his face. If only his mother could see him now. Sirius imagined she’d drop dead in under a second. It was a comforting thought.“Fuck you, Pete. Whose bloody side are you on anyway?” James roared, mane trailing behind him in a brilliant arc as he rounded on Peter. Peter had insisted on painting his own face red and gold. Which, consequently, meant he’d also painted his own hands and robes as well. He looked very much as though he’d gotten two buckets of contrasting coloured paint dumped over his head. How very festive of him.“Yeah, fuck you, Pete,” Marlene said, nearly jabbing Sirius’s eye out with her makeup brush. “When did you get to be such an expert, anyways?”“I’m just saying,” Peter said, rolling back on his heels. “I’m merely playing the odds. I’ve been watching them all season. The Slytherins have the more experienced team. Augustus Rookwood, their Seeker, is good enough to go pro. He’s never not caught the Snitch in any match he’s played! Rumour has it that there’ll be scouts from at least a few teams at today’s match. And that’s not even considering their—”“Oi!” James snapped, waving a finger in Peter’s direction. “Hawthorne’s an excellent Seeker!”Marlene pulled a face. “Is she, though?”“Well, she tries really, really hard. That’s got to count for something,” James huffed. “Yes, but it’s the Seeker who wins the game,” Peter said.Sirius held up a finger and opened one eye. Marlene swatted his hand out of the way. He glared at her.“If the Chasers outscore the Snitch, it’s still anyone’s game,” Sirius said. James let out a triumphant trill and gesticulated wildly in Sirius’s direction. Sirius smirked and tilted his head. “I do actually listen to most things you say, Jamie.”“I don’t,” Lily said, coming around to the other side of the couch, carrying two mugs of coffee that she seemed to have produced from thin-fucking-air. She nudged Remus—who, at this point, was not awake enough to contribute to the conversation—and forced a mug into his hands. “Continue, Potter. Enlighten us. How are we going to steal a victory from the fucking snakes? And, after the game, where do you plan to hide their bodies?”Most days, Sirius teased and tortured James for his crush on Lily Evans, but sometimes, she was conniving and deadly, and Sirius absolutely loved her for it.“We win with our Chasers. And our Keeper. Frank better be on his game today,” James said, that last bit more to himself than anyone else. “Our Chasers are the best, though. If those scouts had half a brain, they’d be watching Benjy Fenwick, not Rookwood. He’s tied for the top point-earner with Danika Crow. She’s only a third-year, but she’s phenomenal on a broom. She’s got this move where she stands on the broom so she can corner better. It’s brilliant. And she can—““Why don’t you propose to her, Potter?” Lily muttered, and there may have been just the faintest hint of an edge to her voice. Marlene paused mid-brushstroke to raise a perfect, blonde eyebrow at Lily. Next to James, Dorcas stifled a giggle. “Never, my love,” James said, not the least bit phased by the interruption. Almost like an afterthought. “Anyways, together with Sable Appletree, they’re quite the triple-threat. Benjy’s got the arm, Danika has the manoeuvrability and speed, and Sable’s got the strategy. The Slytherin Keeper—Merlin, what’s her name…?”“Cleo Timms,” Peter supplied. James glared at him. “She won’t know what hit her.”Remus clutched a mug of coffee tightly in both hands, hunched over it as if the dark liquid held the secrets to life, the universe, and everything. His mane hung down over his brilliant, wild amber eyes, casting his features in shadows and ethereal wonder.Sirius was not drooling.Remus took three long pulls from his coffee. It had to be hot—had to burn—but it didn’t seem to phase him. The coffee seemed to do its job and bring him back to the realm of the living. “What about the Slytherins?” Remus asked. His voice was raspy. “Are their Chasers any good?”Peter opened his mouth to answer, but at James’s narrow-eyed glare, he clicked his jaw shut once more. James smiled. It was lethal. “Sirius?”Sirius artfully tried to dodge the question by gesturing to Marlene and hastily closing his eyes, but she just smirked at him and patted his head. “You’re done anyway,” she said. Everyone else waited.“Ugh, fine,” Sirius groaned, defeated. “Narcissa’s a Chaser. I’m not even sure if she likes Quidditch, really. She just likes to win. Ruthless would be the kindest thing I have to say about her.”Dorcas folded her arms. “She’s got that tattoo thing, though, right? Same as you? Danika and Morgan Hawthorne are Muggle-born. So is Laurel Sterling, our other Beater, I think, but I haven’t really talked to her. Can’t they use that to their advantage?”“Only if they’re really lucky,” Sirius said. “Cissa’s been playing for years and the tattoo hasn’t caused her problems yet, and I’m pretty sure the entire Hufflepuff team are Muggle-born. I know she’s quick on the broom. Maybe not as skilled as Danika, but she’s fast. If I had to guess, she’ll have the other Chaser’s flank her to make sure no one touches her. That, or she’ll have one of the Beaters watching her six.”“Okay, so that’s out,” Lily said. “Who are their other Chasers?”“Rabastan Lestrange,” Peter blurted. “He’s only a second year. Younger than the rest of the team by at least three years, but he’s amazing. Relentless, even.”“Peter,” James said, rubbing at a stress line on his forehead.“Yes?”“Shut up.”Remus downed the rest of his coffee and tilted his head to Sirius. “Aren’t you related to him?”“I’m related to everyone in Slytherin,” Sirius moaned. “There are not enough branches in any of our family trees.”Remus shrugged. “So. What do you know about him? Is he—“ Here, he paused and smirked at Peter. “—relentless?”“I’ve only met him once,” Sirius said. “His older brother, Rodolphus, is set to marry Bellatrix.”“Oldest cousin,” Marlene whispered, loudly, coming to stand next to Dorcas.Sirius went on, grimacing with every word. “I met Bash at their engagement party. Reg and I found him in the garden, trying to drown a raven in the reflecting pool. Bash said he needed its skull for a potion. Merlin, you should have seen Reg. I thought he was going to scratch Bash’s eyes out, trying to save that bird.”“Did he?” Remus asked. Amber eyes stared up at him. Sirius swallowed around a sudden tightness in his throat. “Save the bird?”Sirius reached up and ruffled his hair. “‘Course he did. Bash started screaming at the first drop of blood. Turns out Reg can be just as ruthless as the rest of us.”Perhaps more so, when someone he loved was threatened. He’d sold out Ted Tonks without batting an eye, after all.“Right,” Lily said. “So not quite hopeless, but it’s sure to be one hell of a brutal match.”Things were always brutal, when snakes and lions went into battle. James Potter, of course, wasn’t phased in the least. “Everyone roots for the underdog, Evans. This way, victory will be that much sweeter.”Just then, Gideon Prewett and Alice Fortescue came down the stairs form the boys’ dorms. Alice’s blonde hair had been split down the middle, one side dyed bright yellow, the other a deep crimson. Her eyeshadow was the same split-colour style, on opposite sides. Gideon, in apparent ignorance of the general festivities presented by literally everyone else they lived with, wore Muggle jeans and a black T-shirt. The only thing remotely, identifiably wizard about him were the rainbow freckles splattered over his cheeks.James put both hands on his hips and scowled at Gideon. “You’re not dressed up. It’s Quidditch and you look normal.”Gideon feigned offence. “I am dressed up. I’m in costume, actually. I look just like one of Gryffindor’s Beaters.”James Potter’s deadpan face was fucking priceless, while a chorus of snickers and muffled laughter filled the Gryffindor common room. Remus stood and clapped James on the shoulder. “Walked right into that one, Jamie. Come on. Match’ll start soon.”That was enough to snap James out of his mood. He immediately started shooing everyone towards the portrait hole. Sirius hung back, if only to hype himself up for the inevitable crowd and noise and unavoidable pain. He was excited, sure, but…But…As the rest of Gryffindor cleared out, Remus Lupin drew his wand and vanish the coffee mugs. He twirled his wand, muttered a spell, and Marlene’s make-up kit tidied itself up with the softest gust of wind. Remus’s mane flared, and when he turned, his eyes caught in the early morning sun, as though the gods themselves had cast him in golden light. With the mane and the painted scars, Merlin it was… Soul-shattering.It took Sirius a solid minute to realise Remus was staring right back at him, his features just a shade paler than they had been a moment before. Remus was fidgeting. He cleared his throat. Took a step towards Sirius. “Do I look all right? I know I don’t normally… I mean, the scars are the first thing people notice, and—““I’m not staring at your scars, Remus,” Sirius blurted, as though in a trance. In a dream. Remus opened and closed his mouth.“I—what?” “Your eyes,” Sirius said, on a single breath. “They change colour in the sun. You look—“Remus closed his eyes. Ducked his head. “Like a monster?”Sirius inched closer. Tugged on a loose strand of Remus’s mane. “Like the pride of Gryffindor.”And…And, Remus smiled. It was providence and salvation. Ferocity and wonder. Sirius was eternally grateful for the lion Marlene painted on his face, otherwise he knew he’d be bright-fucking-red. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “I am not sure I like this plan,” Sirius said, surveying the wooden staircase leading to the Gryffindor section of the Quidditch stands.“It was your plan, Sirius,” James said.“Yes, but that probably just means it’s dubious in the best of circumstances.”Gideon sidled up close to him, his arms clasped behind his back, a devious smile dancing on his lips. “Is that fear I detect, Black?”Sirius glared at him. “You’re going to drop me.”“Oh, ye of little faith.”Overhead and all around them, the crowd thundered, with the force of a hurricane. James did a antsy, fidgety little dance. “Hurry up, Sirius, we’re going to—““Just go, James,” Remus said, hiding a laugh. “I’ll do the spell. We’ll catch up with you in a minute.”James didn’t waste another second. He bolted up the stairs, a war cry on his lips. Remus took a step towards Sirius, wand raised. “Trust me?”Sirius gave a sharp nod. “Always.”Remus pointed at the ground at Sirius’s feet. “On your knees, Prewett.”Gideon let out a startled laugh, but obeyed, slowly dropping to his knees in front of Sirius. He looked up, eyes dancing with mischief.“You know, that line usually only works on the other Prewett.” Sirius swallowed and tried really hard not to think about that too much. He especially tried not to think about the strangled growl that came from somewhere in Remus’s vicinity. Gideon winked at him. “Seems you’re the exception to every rule, Black.”Eyes wide and somewhat breathless at the look on Remus’s face, Sirius walked around Gideon and climbed the first two stairs. Gideon turned his head just enough to smirk at Sirius, before nodding. Using Gideon’s shoulder as a support, Sirius swung one leg over Gideon’s shoulder, then the other. Sirius swayed dangerously back and forth, pinwheeling his arms before—“Ow! Merlin, watch the hair!” Gideon squeaked, his own hands reaching up to loosen Sirius’s death-grip. “Sorry,” he muttered, finally managing to stabilise himself on Gideon’s shoulders.Remus raised his wand. “Ready?”Sirius nodded. With a precise swish and flick of his wand, Remus cast a weightless charm over Sirius. After momentarily drowning in the ethereal cascade of Remus’s magic washing over him, Sirius felt gravity abandon him entirely. His very bones felt hallow. Sirius tapped on Gideon’s head. “Do not let go of me. Pretty sure I’ll float away.”Remus shrugged. “The spell will only last an hour. Then you’ll be just another falling star.”“Oi!” Remus smirked up at him, then walked around them to the stairs. “Come on, then. I’ll clear a path.” Gideon rose effortlessly to his feet. Sirius had to duck his head to avoid hitting it on the underside of the bleachers. When he started to climb the stairs after Remus, a hand wrapped securely around each of Sirius’s legs, Sirius had to swallow the lump in his throat. There were a lot of fucking people. All of Gryffindor, it seemed.But… It was a brilliant plan, really. Remus, with his scars and his mane—and his general tendency to shove people out of the way if they got within even three feet of Sirius and Gideon—did exactly what he said. Gideon climbed to the top row of the bleachers and walked across the bench to the place that had already been cleared for them. Remus filed in, a row below them, that had been conspicuously vacated of anyone and everyone else. James and Peter, as well as Marlene, Dorcas, and Lily were a couple more rows up. Remus had to crane his neck to look up at Sirius on Gideon’s shoulders. He raised his eyebrow, a smile dancing on his lips. It’d worked. No one had touched him.Sirius’s honour guard had pulled through.Sirius grinned, triumphant and almost delirious. He leaned his elbows on the top of Gideon’s head. He caught Remus’s eye. “Is this what you see all the time? Just the top of everyone’s heads?”Remus laughed. Even a row beneath them, he still came up close to Gideon’s shoulders. “Pretty much, yes.”“You’ll let me know the very instant I start to go bald, right?”Remus’s smile made Sirius want to fucking die. “Of course. Your vanity is, in fact, one of the highest priorities in my life.”“As it should be.”Down on the pitch, both the Gryffindor and Slytherin teams were running their final warm-up drills, taking turns showing off to their respective fans. Gideon stood up an inch straighter, and carefully released one of his arms to wave in the air.“Oi! Brother of mine!” Gideon bellowed. “Give us a fly-by!”At the sound of his brother’s voice, Fabian turned and smirked. His own hair was tied back in a knot at the base of his skull. He angled his broom and flew over the Gryffindor stands to thunderous applause. When he neared the top, he hooked both legs around his broom and let go of the handle. Gideon shook his head, laughing at the ridiculous image of Fabian hanging on to his broom with his legs, pretending to swat his admirers away with his Beater’s bat. A few rows below them, Alice jumped up and down, waving him over. “Fabian!”Carefully—and somehow still upside down—Fabian lowered himself into the crowd, right over Alice. The crowed roared and clapped as Alice stood on her tiptoes to whisper in Fabian’s ear. A second later, his face lit up. He righted himself on his broom, blew Alice a kiss, then in a flash, zoomed back onto the pitch.Beneath his fingers, Sirius felt Gideon tense up. It was subtle. No one else would notice.Fabian flew up, right alongside Frank Longbottom. It was, naturally, impossible to hear anything that was said, but Fabian pointed up at the Gryffindor stands. Frank followed his gaze to Alice and, while Frank was distracted, Fabian hooked an arm around Frank’s neck and planted a kiss right on his mouth. A cry of elation rumbled through the Gryffindor crowd. Alice cupped a hand to her lips and hooted up at them. “Oh, fucking Merlin. That fucking moron,” Gideon huffed. He sounded… Angry wasn’t the right word. Concerned, maybe? Whatever it was, Remus caught it too, turning around to cast a questioning look first at Gideon, then up at Sirius when Gideon refused to tear his eyes away from his brother. Sirius, who knew nothing, just shrugged and filed that away for later. Almost immediately, Frank turned the approximate colour as his own, Gryffindor jersey. Fabian pulled away for his victory lap. After a minute or so, Frank blew a kiss back to Alice, then started barking orders at his team, running them through the final drills. Remus half turned, looked Gideon up and down. Finally, Gideon returned to earth, meeting Remus’s eyes with a frighteningly neutral expression.“Why aren’t you out there, Gideon?” Remus asked. It was casual. Nonchalant. A distraction, if Sirius had ever heard one. It served it’s purpose. Sirius felt the tension ease from Gideon’s shoulders. Gideon let out a small laugh. “You know, I am allowed to do things separate from him, right? Besides. Someone’s got to make sure Fabian doesn’t fail his O.W.L.s. I’m the brains. Fabian’s the one who likes to hit things with a stick. It’s a winning combination, in my book.” He dipped his head, halfway bowing, and nearly tipping Sirius forward. “What about you, Lupin? Trying out for Quidditch next year? I hear there’ll be at least two spots open. You planning on being our next Seeker?”Remus gave a sharp jerk of his head and let out a startled laugh. “No. No fucking way. I’ll keep my feet on the ground, thank you very much. One flying lesson was enough. Sirius is going to, though.”Sirius frowned down at Remus. “I am?”He liked Quidditch, sure. Objectively speaking, it was kind of awesome to watch people flying around on brooms and whacking each other with magic cannon balls. And, certainly, there was a definite thrill from rooting for the underdog in any given scenario. But… he’d never really pictured himself actually playing Quidditch.Remus tilted his head. “You really think James isn’t going to drag you to tryouts? Even if you’re kicking and screaming?”“Good point,” Sirius muttered. “Though, if I have to try out, so do you, Lupin.”“I will be kicking and screaming,” Remus said, turning back to face the pitch. His mane billowed in the slight breeze.Sirius wanted to touch. Desperately. Instead, he occupied his hands with something else. Down on the pitch, the players of both teams gathered in their respective huddles. “Are you braiding my hair?” Gideon asked, tilting his chin up just enough to look Sirius in the eye. “Yes,” Sirius muttered, not bothering to stop. “I’m practising. Don’t worry about it.”If Remus hard anything, he didn’t turn around.“Don’t make me look ugly, Black. I have a date later.”Sirius ruffled out the braid he’d been working on and started a new one. “Ooh. With who?”“No one you know.”Sirius tugged on Gideon’s hair, yanking it into two sections. “I think I’m going to give you pigtails.”“I’m still not telling you.”Sirius leaned forward over Gideon’s head. “You should know that I’m very good at sticking charms.”Without turning around, Remus said, “That’s a threat, Gid. Ask the Ravenclaws why they can’t get onto their roof.”Gideon groaned. “Fine. Emmeline Vance.”“The Ravenclaw?” Remus asked. “The Ravenclaw Seeker?!” Sirius specified. He yanked on Gideon’s hair, but Gideon didn’t elaborate. “Don’t tell James. He’ll think you’re betraying state secrets.”Gideon might have mumbled something along the lines of As long as you don’t tell my brother, but the noise of the crowd made it impossible to be certain once Madam Hooch blew her whistle, calling the game to a start. Someone cast a Sonorus. It echoed, spiked. Remus covered his ears with a curse. “Players, at the ready!” a voice echoed over the charm. “Welcome to the final regular-season match of the year, between Gryffindor and Slytherin. Slytherin, with their star Seeker, Augustus Rookwood, hopes to keep up a winning streak nearly six years long. That’s right, everyone. Slytherin has not lost a match since Rookwood joined the team as a second year!”The Slytherin half of the bleachers erupted. Someone cast a misty snake into the air. “As Madam Hooch takes the field, Gryffindor hopes to hold onto what little remains of its dignity in the face of inevitable demise.”Three rows up, several people had to hold James Potter back from launching himself onto the pitch.“Christ, who is that?” Remus muttered.“Antone Locket,” Gideon said, on a groan. “He’s a fifth year Slytherin, and a right arsehole, if I’m being honest. But, Slytherin’s favoured to win, so they got to choose the announcer.”“He is an arsehole. He should be fired.” Then, to Sirius’s utter shock and bewilderment, Remus said, “I want his job.”“Really?” Sirius said, just a bit incredulous. Then again, Remus seemed to be full of surprises today, what with the mane and the bright red paint covering his scars. “I didn’t think you followed Quidditch that much.”“I don’t need to know shit about Quidditch,” Remus said, with the utmost confidence. “That’s not the job.”“And Madam Hooch has released the Golden Snitch! Rookwood’s off to an early pursuit, outpacing Hawthorne by half. He’s really—“Above them, Narcissa caught the Quaffle the second it launched, using the tail end of her broom to make a sharp turn. She tossed the Quaffle to Rabastan Lestrange, flanking him and making a run for Frank Longbottom and the Gryffindor goals. Halfway down the pitch, Fabian swung his bat, but the Bludger missed Lestrange by a mere inch.Pure dumb luck, that one.“Oi! Prewett!” James yelled at the top of his lungs. “Aim for Rookwood!”“And… what is the job, exactly?” Gideon asked.When Remus smirked back at them, the scar on his lip twisted up with the curve of his smile.“Colourful commentary.” “And…” Sirius was once again distracted from the present conversation. He swallowed. “That’s something you’d want to do?”“Of course.” Then, Remus’s features went slack. Absolutely deadpan, he said, “I’m fucking hilarious.”Narcissa spun as she caught the pass-back from Lestrange, right over Fabian’s head. She shot off towards Frank and the Slytherin goals. Faster than anyone could blink, she took aim and—Frank nimbly caught the Quaffle as the Gryffindor section stood and let out a collective breath of relief before erupting in cheers, none louder than Alice. Frank pitched the Quaffle downfield to Benjy Fenwick.
“Rookwood veers left, avoiding the Gryffindor Bludgers. Hawthorne hasn’t yet moved from half-field yet, folks. It appears as though she’s confused about—“
A second later, Rabastan Lestrange appeared from nowhere and slammed his entire weight into Frank. Frank spun, barely managed to avoid hitting his head on the uprights. He slowed to a dead stop, just to come face to face with Lestrange’s snarl, before Lestrange tore himself away, once more in pursuit of the Quaffle.Gryffindor let out a collective war cry, but Madam Hooch’s whistle never sounded. Remus half-turned to face them, a frown set heavy on his face, adding shadows to the painted scars. “Can Lestrange do that? If this were football, he’d be ejected.“Sirius felt the rise and fall of Gideon’s resigned shrug. “Slytherin plays a dirty game. Always have.”Sirius was absolutely convinced that Gideon wasn’t just talking about Quidditch. Overhead, Fabian zipped back to a slightly dazed and confused Frank Longbottom. It was way too loud to hear what they said, but from Fabian’s posture, Sirius guessed that Frank was shaken. Holding on by sheer Gryffindor willpower alone. Under his breath, Gideon muttered, “Pay attention to the bloody match, Fabian, you stupid fucking—“The Slytherin Beater swung his bat. The Bludger whizzed towards Morgan Hawthorne—“Ooh, there goes Hawthorne! Folks, she’s down! Falling from the sky! Madam Hootch rushes to the aide of the Gryffindor Seeker—“The noise of the Sonorus was momentarily drowned by the cackled cheering from the Slytherin stands. Just then, Benjy Fenwick scored. The Slytherin Keeper hadn’t even been paying attention. Gryffindor matched the cries of war and decimation blow for blow. Sirius felt his throat go raw, with the barest hint at possible victory on the tip of his tongue. They’d drawn first blood. Perhaps not literally, but where it counted.
“Hawthorne’s on the ground, making no move to get back on her broom! This could be the match, folks, and—“
“Can we play without a Seeker?” Remus asked over the noise, as James Potter let out a string of curses that would make a sailor blush. “Yes. Technically,” Sirius said. His stomach sank, dread settling into his bones, as they watched Hawthorne try to stand, but immediately collapse on the pitch. “But if we can’t catch the Snitch, we’ll be slaughtered.”“Not necessarily,” Gideon said, as Danika Crow intercepted the Slytherin pass and thrust the Quaffle past the Slytherin Keeper in under thirty seconds.Gryffindor was up, twenty to nothing.“Madam Hooch helps a dazed Hawthorne to her feet. Ooh, wait, folks, she’s back on the ground. And there’s Madam Pomfrey rushing onto the pitch—“James Potter’s swearing rose to near super-sonic levels.Unseen by almost everyone, Rabastan Lestrange once more body-slammed Frank, just as Narcissa took aim. Somehow, Franke managed to dazedly spin at just the right angle that he deflected the Quaffle with the tail-end of of his broom.Narcissa screeched in fury, not at all dissimilar than an angry hippogriff. Lestrange rounded on Frank, ready to strike, but Fabian swung his bat, rage palpable in the might of his arm. Lestrange ducked, dodged, but it was enough to spare Frank a few seconds to right himself. “Fuck, Fabian,” Gideon whispered, on a breath. “Aim for the Seeker, you bloody fucking idiot.”Sable Appletree caught the Quaffle, zipped down the field, and scored. And.That’s how it went. The Slytherins fought dirty. James Potter swore every obscenity known to man. Fabian aimed the Bludger not at Rookwood, but at Rabastan Lestrange, each and every time he tried to unseat Frank. Frank clung to his broom by mere force of will. Madam Hooch saw absolutely none of the battle and the brutality above her head. And Gryffindor scored. Again. And again.And again. “How many points is the Snitch worth?” Remus asked, as the Gryffindor score broke one-hundred. The Slytherins had yet to answer with a single goal, despite an incredibly bruised and battered Frank Longbottom.“One-hundred fifty,” Gideon said, with no inflection or emotion in his voice whatsoever. Sirius could almost feel his frown as Fabian once more took aim at Lestrange.There was something that Gideon knew that Sirius did not. He wasn’t much of a gossip, but this was…It was weird, the tangible tension in the air. Questions for later, at the very least. Lestrange dodged, roared, and barrelled into Frank.“—And Rookwood’s spotted the Snitch! There he goes, folks, straight up left field—“In a bout of what constituted in Sirius’s book as fair-play, Danika slammed herself into the Slytherin Keeper. Cleo Timms spun, and without the skill and experience of Frank Longbottom, hit her head on the upright.She dropped. Her broom made horrifying crack as it broke her fall. She tumbled onto the pitch, the pieces of her broom strewn around her. Madam Hooch and Madam Pomfrey didn’t so much as look over, as they fussed with a barely-conscious Hawthorne. The Slytherin Keeper staggered to her feet, but her broom was…She was grounded. The Slytherin goals were wide open.“Holy shit,” Sirius muttered, an unbelievable tidal wave of something foreign and unfamiliar swelling in his chest. Hope, a voice that had been betrayed one too many times dared to whisper.Hope, that they did not suffer, did not bleed alone or in vain.“Locket hasn’t mentioned the score,” Remus said, casually, curiously. “Not once.”Sirius had noticed that as well. If not for the scorekeeper ticking up the numbers at the base of the stands that held a majority of the professors, Sirius would have lost track a long time ago.In fact, he wasn’t entirely convinced the Slytherin half of the stands had a good view of the scoreboard. The angle was all wrong.“Locket’s got a hard-on for Rookwood,” Gideon said, in the same eerily monotone voice as Remus. “Fabian and I caught them snogging outside the dungeons.”Remus nodded, as though that made perfect sense.Sirius swallowed around the something lodged in his throat.Objectively, Sirius knew that sort of thing went on—snogging and the like—even among purebloods. Even amongst two men. It was known, not exactly taboo, but never mentioned in the open because of the expectation of impermanence. Eventually, such inclinations would have to be put aside, marriage contracts drawn up with more suitable prospects. The propagation of their kind superseded any and all personal preference. “Rookwood’s off, reaches for the Snitch, and— LOOK OUT!!”A Bludger, sent by Fabian, whizzed by Rookwood’s head, missing only by the cruelest of miracles. Rookwood spun, nearly losing hold of his broom, right into Narcissa, who somehow managed to keep them both on their brooms with her fury alone. The Snitch vanished into thin air, zipping somewhere in the other direction. “Fucking finally,” Gideon said, this time loud enough for other people to hear. At the few strange looks, he raised his voice and shouted up at his brother, “Keep aiming for Rookwood!”“Rookwood’s desperate, searching, and— THERE! Off centre-field! Go!”But even as Rookwood dived again for the elusive Snitch, Gryffindor hardly blinked. Because the Slytherin goal was wide open and the Chasers were still—despite Gideon’s shouting—the subject of Fabian Prewett’s wrath. Sable, Benjy, and Danika ran the Quaffle through the goal-posts, barely batting an eye at the Slytherin Beaters.James Potter nearly clambered onto the back of the fifth year in front of him. “Go! Fenwick, the goals! Keep going! You have to—“ “Remus,” Sirius hissed through his teeth. Somehow, even over the deafening maelstrom around them, Remus turned. Sirius met amber eyes and ordered, “Shut him up. Now.”Because Slytherin had yet to fully realise their Keeper was down. They were too enchanted by Rookwood and the drama unfolding on the other side of the pitch. Without a word, Remus squeezed his way though the crowd. From a row up, he wrapped two strong arms around James’s torso, hauling him back. One of Remus’s large, scarred hand clamped around James’s mouth. From Remus’s startled yelp, Sirius gathered James might have bitten his hand, but Remus just turned and pointed up at Sirius.Sirius, who raised a single finger to his lips. One-ten. One-twenty.James’s dark brown eyes went wide, feral, and he visibly went limp in Remus’s arms. After a moment, Remus released him. One by one, Gryffindor fell deathly silent. No one dared to breathe. “Rookwood’s off again, folks. No Beater can touch him. Black bats away another Bludger as—“One-thirty. One-forty.
“There! There it is! Go, Augustus! Go! Lestrange swats the Bludger towards Longbottom as Rookwood reaches out a hand—“
They can hardly hear Locket over the chaos and noise from the Slytherin stands.Sirius’s eyes followed Remus Lupin as he climbed the stands once more. The king of beasts, ascending the throne on the precipice of victory. Remus looks up at him, and it’s all the wonder and majesty that Sirius so desperately longs to taste.
“On the tip of his fingers, Rookwood reaches, stretches—“
Benjy Fenwick sends the Quaffle flying through the goalposts. One-fifty.The Quaffle darted back to midfield. Sable caught it, lobbed it to Danika, who dodged right past the Slytherin Beaters, ducked a Bludger, and—“Oh my fucking Christ.” Remus’s deadpan amazement. One—
“He’s got it! Rookwood’s got the Snitch! Slytherin—“
Fireworks erupted from the tip of McGonagall’s wand. The score was final, magically emblazoned on the placard at mid-field. One-fifty to one-sixty, Gryffindor.For three solid seconds, the entire stadium went as silent as an ancient graveyard, whose ghosts had all found other places to haunt. Then.Victory.Merlin, it tasted like blood on Sirius’s tongue.Gryffindor roared with the ferocity of the lion that lurked in all their hearts. Slytherin called foul. Lestrange rushed for Frank, but Fabian took one last swing of his bat and hit Lestrange squarely in the chest.Despite the chaos, the uproar, annihilation and rapture of victory enveloping them, Gideon kept a tight hold on Sirius’s knees and stuck to the periphery even as Gryffindor stormed the pitch to greet their triumphant champions. Remus stayed close, and Sirius watched, awestruck, as Remus howled right along with everyone else. Remus, majestic and regal, whose attention never lingered long on the insanity on the pitch. Amber eyes, lined with gold and framed by painted scars, stared up at him, and Merlin, wasn’t that the most dangerous, the most incomprehensibly wondrous thing? Not the Slytherins, not their war or their destinies, or even the miracle of victory in battle. No, the danger was the unspeakable spark of hope in the golden shimmer of Remus’s eyes. It spoke of resilience, revolution, of loyalty and something just beyond the grasp of friendship. That look showed a future, a life without expectation, without monsters and curses. It was a cliff, and Merlin, Sirius Black wanted to jump, to fly, regardless of whether or not he remembered to don his wings made of wax. He would fall, he would burn for Remus Lupin. Just like the star that bears his name.It’d be worth it, he thought, to fly into the sun. To trace the scars that criss-crossed Remus’s face, to allow his magic to seep into the leylines, just like the paint. It’d be worth it, even if it’d cost him his wings. Even if he fell from the sky. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
Dear Andromeda,
I’m not entirely sure that this letter will reach you—Merlin, I don’t even know what country you’re in—but I trust Rogelio will find you wherever you’re at. Treat him well. He was possessed recently, but he seems to be doing well now. (That’s a different horror story… No time for it here.) I’ve been sneaking him treats from dinner.
Remus said he spoke with you. After. He said you’re eloping. (Eloped? I don’t know.) Good. Fuck Fawley and fuck the evil, conniving hag who just so happened to give birth to me. I hope you and Ted are safe, wherever you’re at.
Remus said I owed you a letter. Well, he’s been saying that for the better part of two months, but I’ve been ignoring him. Which, if you knew Remus Lupin, you’d know that’s something of an accomplishment. (But really, all you need is a hot mug of coffee and maybe some of that super expensive chocolate that Kayla-fucking-Greengrass keeps leaving for me. I thought, at this point, everyone in the fucking Wizarding World knows I’m allergic. I’m not entirely convinced that she’s not trying to poison me, given that—
Okay, ignore the stain. I mentioned coffee, right? Remus spilled his coffee (that I gave him… you’re fucking welcome, Lupin) on my letter and I don’t feel like rewriting it.
So. Gryffindor beat Slytherin in the final Quidditch match. It was something of a miracle.
James said I had to include that. As a former Slytherin, I am obliged to tell you that we win and you suck.
Honestly, though, James wouldn’t shut up about it for a month. Remus agreed to throw him off the tower on my behalf. We will make it look like an accident then run away together to live off the Potter fortune in Jamaica or something.
(Remus said writing that down is a confession of sorts, so please burn this letter immediately, so Remus and I can live our our days on a beach, drinking from coconuts and drowning ourselves in David Bowie..)
Remus said I must try to get to the point… eventually. He said it might be wise to tell you that I’m fine. Not fine as in fine, like I normally mean. Fine, like actually-maybe-kind-of good. Possibly. I don’t have a lot of experience in the being-actually-fine department. I mean, I have a gnarly scar now, from Malfoy, but if I’m being completely honest, I kind of think it’s badass. (After it healed, of course. And, let me tell you, healing that was a bitch.)
But I’m okay. Promise. James and Remus and fucking McGonagall all got together and now I’m going to be spending the summer holidays with Uncle Alphard. Mrs. Potter—James’s mum—drew up a magical contract and everything. My dear mother can’t even raise her wand in my direction without reigning down all sorts of magical retribution on herself and her house.
I’ll be safe, at the very least.
If I’m being completely honest—which honestly, I do try to avoid on most occasions—I’m worried about Reg. I know what he did to you and Ted, but he’s my brother, ‘Dromeda. That house is hellfire and damnation on the best days and he’s alone now, and I’m not allowed to write him and—
(Remus said I need to write about good things. At least for now.)
I’m getting a new wand. Mine kind of—
(Remus is yelling at me again. The wand thing’s another sad story. I haven’t told Remus most of it yet.)
Anyway, Remus has been working on my wand since Christmas.
(I just realised why James was laughing at that last line. Fuck off, Potter.)
Well, as I was saying, Remus quit Magical Creatures because the professor is a dick—I’m working on getting him fired, don’t worry—and has been studying wand-lore with our Defense professor. He’s been writing back and forth with Ollivander for a while. They’ve been conspiring, I think. He won’t tell me much. Says it’s a surprise. Guess I’ll find out soon because we’re—Remus and me, that is—making a trip to Diagon Alley next Saturday, when the older students have a Hogsmeade visit. Rattleburn—that’s the Defense professor—is going to supervise us.
I told Remus we’re lucky it wasn’t McGonagall and now he’s glaring at me. It’s all a front. He wants to ditch the adult supervision just as much as I do. He won’t have much choice either, because James gave me a shopping list of absolute must-haves in our ongoing war against the Slytherins. No one likes to see James Potter pout.
Did I mention we were at war? You heard of the Lestrange Doctrine, right? Well, last week—
Andromeda, this is Remus. I will be taking over from here, as it seems your dear cousin is incapable of focusing. He ran off with James to hex some Slytherin or other. I’ve made sure they stay clear of Malfoy, though your sister and Rabastan Lestrange were the unfortunate victims of several jelly-leg jinxes and various other hexes over the past month or so. I’m told this is mostly Quidditch related, and predominantly organised by Fabian Prewett. Revenge for their abuse of our Keeper during the last match.
I feel as though I should tell you that we found out about Sirius’s tattoo. Well, not so much found out as literally found him, bleeding on the floor. You were right. Whatever happened in that house of nightmares must have been… Christ, Andromeda. I can’t imagine, and believe me, I’ve seen my fair share of waking nightmares. He’s okay, by the way. He was half-starved and the scar from Malfoy’s curse was infected—Christ, I don’t think I’ll ever get that smell out of my nose—but Madam Pomfrey saved him. If that’s what that woman does to her own flesh and blood, I cannot fathom—
Christ. Here I am telling Sirius to stay positive, then I go and say shit like that.
He really is okay, though. Sometimes, even better than okay. All of Gryffindor rallied behind him, and those tasked with the burden of the secrets of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black stand as his honour guard. We will fight for him, next to him, until the very end. We’re mad, the lot of us, but you should know more than most that Sirius Black is worth the taste of death.
Sirius is loved here.
He is good. He is brave. And he is loved, by so many and so much.
That’s all, really.
Like Sirius mentioned, I hope that you and Ted are safe somewhere and enjoying married life far beyond the reaches of anyone named Black. I do wish that you and I had met under better circumstances.
Sirius sends his best and loves you dearly.
To a better sunset on the other side of the world,
Remus Lupin
(And Sirius, too. I suppose.)
P.S. - Remus still. Given the present circumstances and the current political climate, I believe it might be advantageous to speak in a sort of code, to verify that you’re you and not writing under duress.
So, if you could, and if you’re truly safe and happy, please include the name of the student that was with me when we met in your next letter to Sirius. Use the noun form of student’s name in an innocuous sentence.
That’s all. Stay safe.
✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
APRIL 1, 1972
“You’re staring again,” Lily said, nudging him. Remus blinked. Straightened. Tightened the strap on his satchel for the third time. He immediately loosened it, when the strap bit into his neck, just above the collar of his shirt. “Am not,” Remus lied, helplessly, even as his eyes tracked right back to Sirius Black. Sirius was laughing, leaning close to James, crowded a bit by Peter, but today, Sirius couldn’t care less. The other three Marauders whispered, conspiring, but the snippets of half-formed plots and essentials from Gambol and Japes couldn’t possibly hold his attention. Not today. Sirius’s nails were painted again. Silver, this time, and maybe it should be a subliminal reminder not to touch. A reminder that touching would be poison for the both of them. The wolf howled in anguish, utterly heartbroken, deep in Remus’s soul as his fingers itched to move, to touch, to hold and never let go, poison be damned. The silver was the cruelest reminder that he was locked in perpetual agony. He was Adam, painted in eternal infamy on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, reaching for the divine, with mere infinite inches separating them. Damned never to touch.Lily tugged one of Remus’s hands into both of hers, but even with the preternatural might of the beast that shared his mind, Remus could not bring himself to look away from Sirius. “He stares at you too, you know. When he thinks you’re not looking.” Lily squeezed his fingers, gnashing bone against flesh. “He sees you, Remus. Probably more than you know.”At that, Remus’s heartbeat caught in his throat. His eyes cut to Lily. She had the fucking nerve to laugh at him. “Not that, love. He’s far too blinded by other things to even catch a glimpse of Mr. Hyde.”Before Remus could properly formulate a question regrading the specifics of these other things, Professor Rattleburn waltzed into McGonagall’s office in a flurry of robin-blue robes. She wore a matching, perfectly pointed hat, just off-centre on her blonde head. Like Remus, Rattleburn wore a satchel that was just on the favourable side of spilling its overflowing contents all over the floor. “Amelia. You’re late,” McGonagall said, without the usual bite of annoyance that tended to accompany a comment on punctuality. Remus took that to mean McGonagall had a certain fondness for Rattleburn. Either that, or she was in a good mood.That seemed to be the case more and more these days, especially when the Marauders were involved in some mischief or other. McGonagall still had the soft crease of stress-lines in the corners of her oft-pursed lips and Mr. Hyde frequently caught the scent of what amounted to stressed cat, but McGonagall was… softer these days. There were times, glimpses, when Remus would swear she actually smiled. Most recently, when one Sirius Black announced in no uncertain terms that he and Remus would be using the floo in her office to go to Diagon Alley to fix his wand. Please and thank you very much.“Apologies, Minerva,” Rattleburn said, just as easily. She patted her satchel. “Had to make sure I had all my research notes. Can’t risk leaving anything behind when I never know what I may find or what flavour inspiration may take today.”Rattleburn threw a wink in Remus’s direction, a gesture of camaraderie, as though he too were studying for a doctoral thesis on the theories and practices of ancient defence magic, rather than some arsehole of a first year who had, in no uncertain terms, all but demanded a field trip to the other side of the country. McGonagall simply nodded, no questions asked. “I’m off to Hogsmeade. The floo is open in my office. The rest of you—“ Her eyes tracked over Lily, James, and Peter, each in turn. “The rest of you, I believe, owe me a Transfiguration essay. Well, perhaps not you, Ms. Evans,” she added, after a moment of consideration.Lily preened for a moment. Then, she stuck her tongue out at James Potter. “But Sirius hasn’t finished yet and I usually—“ Peter started, before James elbowed him in the ribs hard enough to drive most of the remaining air from Peter’s lungs. “We’ll be in the library, Professor,” James lied, unconvincingly. “All afternoon, in fact. Plenty of witnesses.”Somewhere during this exchange, Sirius appeared at Remus’s side. He leaned close to whisper, “This is what happens without my genius and input in planning. Everything goes to shit. Total breakdown of the system.”“To be fair,” Lily said, bone dry, from Remus’s other side, “it does tend to go to shit when you are around just as often.”“Love you too, Evans.” Sirius blew her a kiss. McGonagall, predictably, saw right through James Potter, as though he were made of glass. Still, she shooed them towards the door, then halted. Her hands found her hips. A finger rose.“May I remind you that Hogsmeade is only for third-years and above, and even then, with parental consent. I should not expect to see any indication of marauding enterprises today in Hogsmede, Potter.”“Bet he’ll get caught,” Remus said, to the side.“Not with the cloak, he won’t,” Sirius replied, the picture of innocence.“Sirius, I saw you nick the cloak this morning,” Remus hissed, through his teeth. “It’s in my bag.”Sirius shrugged, entirely unphased. “We need it more. We’re going into the wild.”“He’s going to be mad when he realises it’s gone.”“He’ll forgive me. I’ll bring him dung-bombs.”Remus snorted. “Well, if that’s all it takes.”“I can promise nothing, Professor,” James said to McGonagall, the widest, most impossible grin plastered on his face. He shoved Peter out the door without another word. Lily followed, with one last look at Remus and a dramatic eye-roll thrown in James’s direction.McGonagall pinched the bridge of her nose. Then, with what was probably not actually the last of her patience—again, Remus sensed she was fighting valiantly against the smallest of smiles—she said to Remus and Sirius, “Take care in Diagon Alley. Mind your professor. Don’t let him wander off, Lupin. And—“ Yet again, the shadow of a smile. “—Be good, Sirius.”That, too, was new. Remus knew he’d never forget the way Sirius had puffed up his chest, jutted his chin in brazen defiance of the universe, the first time she’d called him Sirius in class. He’d never forget the near-reverent silence that followed, the stunned expressions on the faces of the Hufflepuffs, or the way that Sirius had twirled his fingers and completed the spell asked of him, as though absolutely nothing had been out of the ordinary. Even Dumbledore had seemed rather shocked one morning, when McGonagall had greeted Sirius by name in the Great Hall. Sirius’s ear-to-ear grin had been nothing short of triumph and victory. All but shoving Remus and Sirius into McGonagall’s office and over to the fireplace, Rattleburn said, “Right. Turns out I am running a bit late for a rather important meeting, so let’s get to it shall we? Have either of you used the floo network before?”And, before he could really think about his answer, Remus did the stupidest thing imaginable and told the damn truth. “Only for calls. I’ve never travelled through.”And Sirius Black slowly turned, a thousand questions in deadly, silver eyes. Each one, a bullet to the lie Remus had so carefully constructed, had told a thousand times over.Because how could he continue to visit his supposedly-ailing mother without frequent use of the floo network?Remus bit his tongue, said nothing more to Sirius, because this was his secret, written in a language Sirius was far too close to deciphering. And, Christ, what then? Cries of revolution and retribution were easy—quick on the tongue and louder than thunder—when they rose against one’s own tyrannical family. Remus couldn’t be certain those same proclamations would sound if Sirius suddenly found himself face to face with the beast his family hunted and mounted on the walls of their sitting rooms. There was, after all, a reason for the pitchforks and torches. Christ, how the monster in his mind revelled in the scent of blood. Professor Rattleburn either didn’t notice the sudden and inexplicable tension, or she was in too much of a hurry to give it a second thought. She waved an errant hand at the fireplace. “Right. It’s simple enough. Little toss of powder, speak clearly, and poof. No fuss, no muss. Off you go.”Sirius shot Remus a forlorn look that swore up and down that they would be discussing this later, and at length. Still, he grabbed a handful of powder, tossed it in the fire, and said, “Diagon Alley.”Minutes later, Remus followed Sirius and Rattleburn through the false wall at the back of the Leaky Cauldron. At ten til nine on a Saturday morning, Diagon Alley was still reasonably asleep; the crowds Remus had seen on his only other trip to Diagon Alley were nowhere to be seen, either off at school or sleeping off a hangover after a long, ordinary week. Most shops were locked up tight, windows dark and unwelcoming, until, Remus anticipated, late morning or early afternoon, when most sane people began to once more join the realm of the living and awake. If he were being honest, part of Remus envied those privileged with their usual Saturday lie-in. But, he’d been planning this for months now, back and forth with Ollivander, dates scratched off the calendar time and again with unexpected conflict. The usual exhaustion he generally felt at all hours before noon had fled his system the moment he’d opened his eyes that morning. Remus wasn’t much one for believing in miracles. He’d been found underserving, unclean, unworthy, of even the chance of divine happenings when he was far too young. He’d been abandoned, locked in a cellar, even as he called upon cruel gods who refused even the cries of a child facing the maw of a beast. Still, he prayed, feigned belief and subservience, for the slightest miracle that this might actually work. That maybe the evil creature that festered in his soul, ate away at his mind, might be used to create something akin to magic. Magic, pure and divine, to be wielded by none other than Sirius Black.Surveying the near empty street, Rattleburn elegantly spun on her heel to face them. “Technically,” she said, adopting what James and Sirius referred to as her professor voice, “you’re not allowed magic outside of Hogwarts. Ollivander’s, of course, is a bit of a loop-hole, but even then, verbalising spells might not work out in your favour. You probably should know, gentlemen, that the Trace can only track wand-casted, verbalised spells.” Her eyes cut to Sirius. She waggled an eyebrow, her professor-guise slipping, just a little, as it so often did. Sirius smiled. It was just a little bit broken, more than a little forced. He hadn’t said a thing since arriving in Diagon Alley. Rattleburn cast a Timus and swallowed what Remus assumed to be a series of swear words. “I’m off to Flourish and Blotts. Should only take a few hours. What do you say we meet up at Fortescue’s after? Say around noon?”Remus looked to Sirius, but his silver eyes were nearly vacant, transparent, as though the life had been torn from him.Christ, something was wrong. Remus understood better than anyone that the most dangerous, most deadly, battlefield Sirius Black would ever face was the one that existed only in his own mind. Either at the look in Sirius’s eye or startling lack of response to the pseudo-bribe of ice-cream, Rattleburn fidgeted. “Now, I know I’m not supposed to—“ In her hand, her wand vibrated and lit up from the handle to the tip, startling her enough that she almost dropped it. “Oh, sod it. I am so late. Lupin, you’re in charge.” She darted forward a few steps, then stopped. “Please don’t tell McGonagall I left you alone.”Not even Rattleburn’s crack about Remus being left in charge could garner even the slightest hint of what would normally have been quite the over-reaction. Without waiting for them to agree, Rattleburn hurried off to the bookshop. Remus edged close enough to brush against Sirius’s shoulder, just barely, because something was wrong. A war was being waged behind silver eyes and Remus could do nothing but stand idly by. Selfishly, he prayed that his secrets wouldn’t be visible in the aftermath.The jolt of pain Sirius felt from Remus’s touch shot through him, a visible, palpable shudder, but nothing more. Sirius stared dazedly, lost somewhere in the middle-distance. As gently as he could, Remus nudged Sirius in the direction of Ollivander’s. They still had an appointment to keep, miracles to barter with unforgiving gods. “It’ll be all right, Sirius. I promise,” Remus said, praying he imbued just enough magic into his voice that they both walked out alive, secrets tucked away, safe once more between them. Blind to seemingly everything else in the world, Sirius trailed after Remus without question. He abruptly stopped right in front of Ollivander’s shop. Staring up at the ancient, gold filigree that bore the wand-maker’s name, Sirius said, “Have you ever wondered what it might feel like to pay the ransom price for your darkest sins?”Sometimes, Sirius Black asked these questions: questions that were infinite, impossibly brazen war cries against the ethereal gods and blood-thirsty monsters that lurked in every shadow of the universe. Each ask, each incomprehensible answer presented itself in incredibly vile visions of a future already written for the boy damned to kill a god.And sometimes, Remus remembered he had long ago tethered himself to a boy he could never touch, never tug back from the brink of eternity, the edge of the Veil. As though Sirius were a comet, instead of a star, and Remus was the fool who’d thought he’d try to catch it with just a spare bit of string.Remus thought of the question, of the rapture and cataclysm etched plainly into Sirius’s beautiful face. He thought of secrets and willow trees, of monsters, planets, foxes, and little princes and the taming thereof. He thought of the little pouch in his right pocket and the teeth hidden inside. The teeth, the ransom Remus had finally had the courage to demand of the wolf, after years of blood and scars and torture. Prayers and gods be damned. This was a battle they could win. This was a ransom Remus would gladly pay. So, he smiled, wickedly—wolfishly—and hooked his pinkie with Sirius’s for the briefest moment. “Yeah, Siri, I do. More than you know,” Remus said, and offered nothing else before opening the door to Ollivander’s shop.Just like the first time Remus found himself in the ancient wand shop, he was immediately gut-punched by the scent of wood and the palpable tingle of magic in the air. The magic itched underneath the surface of his skin, foreign and intoxicating, and every instinct both Remus and the wolf shared told him to open his mouth to taste, to inhale, to devour. Next to him, Remus could tell Sirius felt it too: the magic that seeped from every hidden corner of the shop. Red sparks sprang from nothing, danced across Sirius’s fingers. Fireworks lit up the corner of his eyes, seeping through the chinks in his armour, before Sirius could regain a semblance of control.Voice barely a whisper, barely loud enough for even someone with the wolf’s senses to catch, Sirius breathed, “Re?”“Yeah?”“Don’t hate me after this.”The most feral part of him laughed riotously, maniacally, because no matter the sins Remus suspected lingered behind those words, nothing could be more unfathomable than the act of hating Sirius Black.The most human part of him—the secret part that stubbornly maintained its consciousness for no other reason than to bear witness to sin and depravity, as the wolf decimated Remus’s mind and body—wanted desperately to beg the same promise of Sirius. Remus’s sins—his secrets—were carefully tucked in his pocket, in a tiny, innocuous pouch he’d once stolen from his mother. A ransom for a miracle.Instead, Remus crossed a finger over his own heart: an oath, bound in the silence between them.Not even a second later, Garrick Ollivander emerged from the nowhere-space between the crowded, floor-to-ceiling shelves. A smile broke out across his withered and weathered face that was warm enough to chase away even the most stubborn frost. Ollivander paused, for just a moment, his eyes darting between them, his head tilted to the side. Then, in the brightest voice, he said, “Ah, Masters Lupin and Black. How very nice it is to see you both again.”Expertly, with the finesse of a man half his age, Ollivander manoeuvred between the stacks and shelves to the front of the shop. He leaned against the front desk and turned his warm gaze to Remus. There was the slightest glimmer of mischief in the old man’s eye.“Mr. Lupin, I was under the impression that your inquiries were strictly hypothetical.”Remus made a face and reached up to scratch the back of his neck. “Perhaps slightly less hypothetical than advertised, sir.”“Very well, then,” Ollivander replied easily. “Let’s see the damage, shall we? Ten and a quarter inches, cypress, with a unicorn-tail hair core, wasn’t it? I can see why the unicorn hair might be a bit finicky, what with the—““Er… Um,” Remus interrupted, holding up a finger, before Ollivander had a chance to give too much away. “Not mine, actually.”And Sirius, the dauntless warrior that he was, drew his wand from the inner pocket of his robes. He flipped the wand in the air, catching it by the tip, extending the handle out to Ollivander. If not for the glistening tears that welled in Sirius’s eyes, Remus would think him a knight, kneeling before a king and accepting his sword, his quest, his divinely ordered purpose. To anyone looking on, to anyone who hadn’t had the immense privilege of observing Sirius Black for most hours of most days, he would appear to only be another frightened child. A twelve year old offering the physical manifestation of the magic inherent in his soul, in his bones, back to its creator. It was trust, supplication, of a bruised and battered boy, who had only ever known punishment, retribution, after the crime. “It’s my wand, sir. It’s dead.”Sirius’s words echoed, reverberated, like a death knell in the agonising silence that followed. Cautiously, reverently, Ollivander leaned forward and extended both his hands. He took the wand, held it up like a sacrifice to the gods, the ruins catching on the early morning light. Ollivander ran a bony finger along its length, before lowering Sirius’s wand to rest on the table. “Oh, my dear boy,” Ollivander said, on a single breath. “What have you done?”It was not an accusation, a death sentence, or any sort of judgement Sirius Black probably felt he deserved. Instead, it was a mournful effigy, eulogising a future that might have been possible once—in a long-forgotten dream—but now, could never be.Remus could almost taste the sorrow, the complete annihilation of self, that ravaged Sirius’s soul, even as he stubbornly refused to break on the outside. It was an agony known only to an unfortunate, miserable few—to Remus, certainly—to those, by choice or the cruelty of fate, who bore the responsibility of preserving human life at the ransom of their own soul.A single tear tracked down Sirius’s face. A single sob wrenched free from his throat. “I’m sorry.” Sirius Black bowed his head. Another tear, this one landing on the stone beneath his feet, the nothing-sound echoing around them. “I had to. Regulus, he… I didn’t have a choice.”Ollivander’s face showed none of the vengeance and wrath that was perhaps more fitting of the tragedy laid out before them. Instead, Remus saw…Kindness. Mercy.That, itself, was its own form of magic.“Mr. Black—Sirius.” Ollivander’s words had the air of forgiveness about them. “Please look at me.”Glistening, shimmering silver eyes turned upwards, like starlight on the calmest sea, reaching into the eerie dark for their counterparts in the sky. “Sirius, my dear boy, you are not even half the damnable creature you imagine yourself to be.”Sirius’s jaw dropped. “But I—““There is far greater evil in this world than a frightened child born into a house of horror.”Sirius squeezed his eyes shut. Silver-tipped fingernails dug into the palm of his hand. “I killed my wand, sir.” Matter-of-fact. No room for debate. “I’m cursed.”Christ, Remus felt those words brand themselves in his skin, in every scar and open wound carved into his skin by cruel madness, by ferocious claws and teeth.“You are no more cursed than the rest of us.” Sirius scoffed, and Remus nearly choked on his own obscene laughter. Ollivander cut a dispassionate look to Remus, one that spoke of forgiveness, even in the midst of disbelief. It was the same paradoxical reconciliation he now offered Sirius. Remus, for perhaps the first time in his life, wanted to believe that kind of redemption was indeed possible. Now, for both their sakes.Then, to Sirius, Ollivander said, “You know, I’ve lost track of the number of wands I’ve made. Generations, gentlemen, of magic can be traced back here to this very shop.” The wonder in his eyes melted away into something akin to agony. “Imagine how many Unforgivables have been cast with the wands I’ve made. How many blood curses and dark, ancient spells? How many otherwise innocuous words and movements have been used with malicious intent to brutalise and torture?”Sirius opened and closed his mouth. He looked to Remus for support, but Sirius’s aghast expression was no doubt mirrored on Remus’s own features. Remus cleared his throat. “Sir, you can’t possibly accept that sort of responsibility.”“Yet still, I willing do so. Whether it is illogical or not, someone must bear the weight of these transgressions.” There was a cataclysmic twinkle in Ollivander’s eye, as though all the universe lived and died by his words, his verdict. “We each must live in the prisons we create for ourselves. That’s simply the way of it. So, be kind to yourselves, gentlemen. Be kind, because the chains in your own minds—whether wrought iron or the purest silver—will not be.”Whatever Remus had been about to say died on tip of his tongue. Sirius was no better. He looked… haunted. Smiling just a little, Ollivander turned the full weight of his attention to Remus. The old man’s eyes fell on the wand he still cradled in his hands, as though it were the most magical, most precious thing in all of creation.“This wand,” he said, his eyes shifting between them, “was quite the passion project of mine. I can’t say that I’ve ever created another quite like it. Do you remember what I told you about this wand, Mr. Black?”Sirius swallowed, the guilt—the weight of whatever sins he carried—still heavy in his eyes. “You said that the tree it came from was magic. That it guarded a secret.”Remus’s secret, wrapped in magic and destiny, tethering him to the comet, the falling star, that was Sirius Black.“Indeed. Have you figured out which tree?” Ever so subtly, Ollivander’s eyes tracked to Remus. Remus mustered what little courage he had in his heart. “The Whomping Willow, sir.” He inclined his head to Sirius, a ghost of a smirk trying to make its home on his face. “It bowed to him.”Sirius, remarkably, turned red and began to fidget, but Remus caught the smile that tried to hide at the conjured memory. Sirius Black, darkness be damned, was proud of the magic in his veins. As he should be. Humour danced in Ollivander’s eyes. “Did it now? I’d wondered if it might react to you, Mr. Black. Merlin, the magic that runs through that tree.” Ollivander’s face took on that same look of pure wonder that Remus had seen reflected in Sirius’s silver eyes the day they’d met under the Willow. “It’s ruthless and vindictive when threatened, would willingly sacrifice itself for the secret it protects, but, deep in its roots, it is—““Kind, sir,” Remus cut in, because no one had yet given voice to the secret the Whomping Willow.And who better to breathe life into that secret than Remus himself?Ollivander nodded. “Undoubtedly. Much like the one who wields this wand.”Sirius opened his mouth—to voice protest, to raise ruin, most likely—but this time, Ollivander did not allow it.“You know, I never quite got this wand right. I’ve always wondered about the core. Such ferocity inherent can be understandably incompatible with unicorn tail hair. Unicorns, though pure in heart, are hardly ambiguous creatures.”Ollivander carefully laid the wand in the middle of his desk. He rounded the desk, facing them, and leaned forward, placing both hands flat on either side of the wand. “I tried everything in my arsenal to find a more compatible core. Thestral hair—like your mother’s, Sirius—dragon heartstring, even the tail-feathers of a beautifully remarkable phoenix. None suited the magic inherent in the wood of the Whomping Willow.”Ollivander lowered his voice. “Your wand isn’t dead, Sirius. If it were, you wouldn’t be able to cast any magic whatsoever.”Sirius’s eyes squeezed shut, against a pain so terrible it was worse than any touch. “Dark Magic,” he rasped. “It only works with Dark Magic.”“Aye.” Ollivander gave a solemn nod. “I suspected as much. Unicorns are this worlds most innocent creatures, but they so easily cower to the darkness in fear of corruption.”Sirius made a garbled noise in the back of his throat. Remus took a step closer to him, a pale useless attempt at comfort. He glared at Ollivander, silently demanding the point behind his torturous words.Ollivander sighed. “I should have known the core was incompatible. The secret guarded by the Whomping Willow is not one that should be trusted to a fickle heart, no matter how pure the intention.” Ollivander’s gaze pierced straight past any defences Remus once had. “The core can be replaced. It shouldn’t even prove to be incredibly challenging. The difficulty, of course, is the replacement core. This secret demands ferocity, blood in its sacrifice. Perhaps, the heart of a lion.”Somewhere, deep in his bones, impossible, incomprehensible hope swelled in Remus’s soul: wave of equal parts sorrow and daydream that threatened to swallow him whole before he even had a chance to taste his victory.Perhaps, he’d solved the riddle. Christ, it was his to solve. His secret. His teeth.“Mr. Lupin, your letter suggested—“Instead of replying, instead of muttering words that were damned to catch him in a lie, instead of even allowing Ollivander to even finish his thought, Remus reached into his pocket and tossed his mother’s pouch on the desk.It landed with a deafening silence, right next to Sirius’s wand.A single question—and a thousand more—etched in ancient eyes, Ollivander opened the pouch. The wolf’s teeth—three of them, still bloody from where they’d been ripped from the maw of the beast—tumbled onto the desk. They were small—two incisors, and one jagged canine—and they rattled on the surface of the desk like damnable prophecies yet to be read. Ollivander gasped, audibly. Next to him, Sirius’s expression broke into nothing short of wonder and awe.“Merlin,” Sirius said, glancing between Remus’s impassible face and the desk. “You weren’t kidding about the teeth. Where did you—“At the very same time, Ollivander said, “My dear boy, are these—“Christ, Remus nearly growled as the wolf lurched to the front of his mind. He clenched his jaw, glared at Ollivander with all the ravenous bloodlust of the predator that he was, and nodded. Once. Twice.It was answer enough, to the secret, unvoiced, between them.Ollivander’s jaw clicked shut. Then, he breathed, “You extraordinary, indomitable creature.”Remus winced, but he supposed it was an harmless enough assertion. Sirius glanced between them, frantic to solve the puzzle in front of him, his own sins and tragedies seemingly forgotten, at least for the moment. “Are they what? Re, what are they? Vampire fangs? Thestral? Hippogriff?”Unblinking, Ollivander said, “Hippogriffs don’t have teeth.”Sirius tugged on Remus’s sleeve, but Remus refused to look at him. If he did, he’d break, all his secrets laid bare between them. And that was simply not allowed. “Okay, so not a hippogriff. What else could they be? You didn’t actually steal Hickory Dave’s teeth, did you?” Remus forced himself not to respond, even when Sirius’s finger brushed the edge of his clenched fist. To Ollivander, he said, “Will they work?”“Salazar’s tits, Remus, where did you even get them?” Sirius asked. “They still have blood on them!”Palpable excitement radiated from Ollivander as the old man reached out and picked up the canine. He held it flat, in the palm of one hand, then whispered a silent spell while twirling the fingers of his other hand. Magic enveloped them, so savage and so sudden that Remus felt as though he should bend a knee to the sheer force of it. But…It was his magic—Remus’s and the wolf’s—suddenly manifested in the swirling waves of translucent gold that surrounded the tooth in Ollivander’s hand. It felt familiar and safe, like the worn pages of a treasured and sacred book, but at the same time, it was as vicious and unforgiving as the first taste of moonlight on those dreaded nights.Mesmerised, as though suddenly pulled by the tethers of destiny, Sirius reached out a single finger. His own magic, sparkling silver and red, flared to life on his fingertips, intertwining with the swirling gold around them.Christ.Remus would never be free of the miracle of this boy ensnared in Remus’s own magic.He never wanted to be.Remus could taste the excitement that radiated off of Ollivander. “Yes. Yes.” A laugh bubbled in Ollivander’s throat, and it was hysteria and mirth, all in one. “Merlin, you brilliant creature. This will work.”Ollivander waved a hand and the gold tendrils of magic dissipated in front of them. His trance severed rather abruptly, Sirius blinked, then visibly tamed his own wild magic with a practiced flick of his wrist. “How?”Ollivander set the canine down on the desk. Passive amusement flickered across his features. “Mr. Lupin, I trust you’ve read the books I’ve sent you?”Remus nodded, because he had. For nights on end, when Sirius had lain awake next to him, rereading The Little Prince and Frankenstein for what had to be the hundredth time; for the two nights it took Sirius to read the entirety of Moby Dick, frowning and harrumphing his way through it; for the nights Sirius had slept peacefully next to him, unbothered by Remus’s glowing wand, muttering various nothings about silent songs and faceless ghosts… For every night since Peeves had damned Sirius Black right before Remus’s eyes, Remus toiled over Ollivander’s tomes, searching relentlessly in between sentences and paragraphs, for redemption for them both. The books hadn’t exactly been thrilling—more technical and pragmatic than even most textbooks—and more than one of them tested Remus’s knowledge of medieval French grammar, but he’d gotten through them all. In fact, he’d read them twice.He had to be sure, after all. If he was going to barter for a miracle, of course Remus had to make sure the deck was stacked in his favour.“You need to remove the damaged core,” Remus said. “Without compromising the integrity of the wood.”Ollivander smiled. “Do you know the spell?”“Ligatus Confringetur,” Remus replied. “And then?”“Then,” Remus said, drawing a sharp breath. “You bind the new core to the wand. Preferably with the wizard’s magic.”“Exactly,” Ollivander said. “What do you say, Mr. Black? Are you up for it?”Because for this to work, Sirius would have to say the binding spell. Sirius looked dazed, half out of his mind, standing on the precipice of either salvation or damnation, but still, he nodded. “Yeah. Yes. I-I can do that.”Braveheart, Gryffindor. “Right,” Ollivander said, drawing his own wand from the inner pocket of his robes. “No time like the present, gentlemen. Are you ready?”Remus glanced at Sirius, nearly drowning in silver starlight, and…Christ.Remus tore his eyes away and nodded for the both of them.“Hold your wand, Sirius,” Ollivander instructed.Shaky hand reaching out, Sirius did what he was told. Ollivander readied himself.“Now,” Ollivander said, “you might… feel this, my boy. The wand is tied to your magic and this might—“Through his teeth, Sirius said, “Just do it.”A swish, a flick…
Ligatus Confringetur.
The wolf nearly tore a howl from Remus’s throat at the agonised gasp that slipped free from Sirius’s lips. Sirius almost doubled over, staggered back half a step, but managed to catch himself as the wand in his hands levitated from his fingertips.They watched, in equal parts horror and veneration, as the unicorn tail hair began to glow a faint silver, as it slowly unwound itself from the length of the wand. Second after unbearable second, the hair released the its magic in palpable waves, until, at last, it was free of the wand.Then, before their very eyes, the hair dissolved into dust.The wand—the wood from the Whomping Willow—fell right back into Sirius’s open hands.Sirius choked on a sob. Hand shaking, Remus reached for the wolf’s tooth—the longest one, the canine—and held it in his palm for just a moment. He remembered, the morning after he’d stolen the teeth, how they’d dug into the palm of his hand from where he’d refused to surrender them. He remembered that morning, the pain and terror, the taste of his own blood, his own uninhibited magic. He remembered Lily Evans and her diary of secrets. Christ, he remembered the very next morning, when he’d woken with the wolf still prowling the corners of his waking mind. He remembered tasting wrong and danger and then—Sirius, on the floor of the bathroom, bleeding out before his very eyes.His wolf had screamed in terror and heartbreak, because for a very real moment, he’d believed he’d never again taste the savage flair of Sirius Black’s magic. He remembered, that very night, how he’d maybe walked right into the dream Sirius had whispered to him. The sacrifice—the ransom, the tooth he’d stolen from the monster inside—was worth so much more than something as insignificant as pain.Sirius Black was everything, and his wolf knew it too.Open palm, Remus offered the tooth to Sirius. In Sirius’s eyes, there was something like a story, a future, a destiny, that Remus was more than willing to accept, if it meant he’d still be next to Sirius Black when they reached the last page. Sirius took the tooth. Held it to the base of the rune-carved wood. “Repeat after me, Mr. Black,” Ollivander said, but Remus had nearly forgotten he was still in the room.Because, just then, Sirius began the spell. “Animus tenetur ad core.”Silver starlight erupted from the palms of his hand, and it was—Christ, it was soul-shattering.
“Magicae tenetur ad rune.”
The tears on Sirius’s cheeks tracked leylines across his skin, reflected in the silver light surrounding them, engulfing them, consuming them in magic and something that tasted dangerously like forever and—“Arcanum juramentum.”
Secret bound to oath.
And this time, maybe Remus let the wolf loose, just for a moment, to join his voice to the prayer, the spell, the promise, whispered on Sirius’s lips. It was over in no more than a minute. The magic fled the room like a doused flame. In the palm of Sirius’s hands lay his wand.His wand. Enchanted willow wood, etched in ancient runes, with a core made from a werewolf’s fang.Remus could still taste the magic incarnate between them. “Did—Did it work?” Sirius dared to ask, his voice nearly breaking on the question.Ollivander stared, open-mounted, in awe and wonder at the pair of them. “It’s… Merlin, it’s so much lighter,” Sirius breathed. “It feels like fire.”As though Remus didn’t know that Sirius Black loved playing with fire, in every feasible sense. “Try a spell, Mr. Black.” Ollivander held up a finger. “Non-verbal, if you can manage it.”Sirius hesitated, opened and closed his mouth, then lifted his wand. On Ollivander’s desk, there was a small vial of ink, mostly empty and forgotten. Remus felt the magic summoned to Sirius’s fingertips, to the tip of his wand, as though the magic was stolen from the depths of Remus’s tattered soul.A second later, Sirius Black held a single, red rose in the palm of his hand, cradled as though it were just as sacred as the wand he’d held moments earlier. The wand, now neatly tucked into the mess of hair on the top of Sirius’s head.Sirius held out the rose. Offered it to Remus.In his eyes, there was a story. It was one Remus knew by heart, one he’d read a thousand times on nights after the full moon, in the cold of his father’s dungeons, in the warmth of magic castles, tucked in close next to a boy he could never touch. And, for perhaps the first time in his life, Remus wondered if he was not, in fact, the beast in this story. Perhaps he was the wandering little prince—not royalty, necessarily, but a child who’d been lost and abandoned for longer than he cared to admit—desperately trying to tame the wild creature in front of him, only for the fox to hand him a rose and tell him why it’s the most important rose in all of creation.In his eyes, there was a story, and the story said, “If you love a rose which happens to be on a star, it is sweet at night to gaze at the sky. All the stars are a riot of roses.”And Sirius said, whispered, prayed, “Remus.”And then, Remus pulled Sirius into his arms, the rose cradled carefully in their joined, entwined hands. He pressed his forehead to Sirius’s, sharing breath, stealing moments he knew neither of them were allowed to have, because the universe was still cruel.They had debts yet to pay, curses yet to break. Secrets bound in oaths between them.But for that single, stolen moment—nearly an eternity—Remus held Sirius Black in his arms, and he was tame and safe and so very loved. And this was the story, the ending in sight, and Remus knew what must happen next.He let go. Sirius shuddered, sobbed, then wiped his eyes, but took a full step away from Remus, the rose held tightly against his chest. There was blood on his silver finger-tips, from a thorn. Remus wondered if his own fingers bled from the same thorn. He didn’t dare look.Christ.Ollivander made a small noise, as though to remind them he still stood in their midst. In his hand, Ollivander held his mother’s pouch, the two remaining teeth clacking together inside. He offered the pouch to Remus, but Remus…“Keep it,” Remus croaked. “As payment.”Because Remus Lupin had no means of paying Ollivander for the services rendered.“My dear boy,” Ollivander said, on a gasp, “you could take these to the shop down the way, sell them to a Potions Master for more wages than most make in a year. Do you have any idea what these are worth to—“And what horrific concoction might one make with the teeth of a werewolf? No.“Keep them,” Remus said again, because better in the hands of Garrick Ollivander than with someone who would conjure darkness from the wolf’s magic. “Make a few more wands. I don’t care. They’re yours, sir.”A single penny bartered for nothing short of a miracle. Ollivander looked as though he were weighing the merits of arguing with Remus over this. It wasn’t one he’d win. So, Ollivander just inclined his head. “Thank you. You are the most remarkable creature on this earth, Mr. Lupin. Your kindness, your sacrifice, will not be forgotten.”That wasn’t why he’d done it.“I will send an owl for my books,” Ollivander said. “Or… several. I know carrying them can be quite cumbersome.”He offered the smallest, most tragic smile. “Have a nice day, gentlemen. Stay safe.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Outside, the sky was overcast and there was a bite in the air, promising a storm later in the afternoon, but it had nothing on the festering whirlpool of emotion flittering across Sirius’s features, crashing over him in mighty, world-ending waves.Sirius still held the rose, clutched tightly in trembling, silver-tipped fingers. Carefully, as though coaxing a frightened animal out of its hiding place, Remus tugged Sirius’s sleeve until they were safely tucked out of sight from most of the meagre crowd. It was still early—still hours before Fortescue’s was set to open—but more people trickled out of the woodworks than had been there a mere half-hour ago. Even as they paused, waited, revelled in the enormity of what had just happened in Ollivander’s shop, more and more storefronts began to open their blinds all along the Alley. Neighbours and shop-owners called out jovial morning greetings, and, coming from what was almost certainly the Leaky Cauldron, Remus caught a taste of a hearty, grease-filled breakfast on the breeze. An ordinary day, then, for those bastards who didn’t live in a world of ransoms and miracles. “Here,” Remus said, softly. He reached for his wand, then the rose in Sirius’s hand. “Let me.”The thought never occurred to either of them to get rid of the rose, to vanish it, as they would the various knick-knacks they conjured for their Transfiguration homework. No, this rose was sacred. A miracle made manifest.It took a moment for Remus to focus, to visualise the words of the spell in his mind, then another minute to muster the magic necessary to cast such a spell non-verbally. The preservation spell wasn’t difficult. He’d done it a thousand times, mostly on James Potter’s homework, to set the ink before James inevitably got distracted enough to smudge and ruin all the hours of cajoling it’d taken to get him focused in the first place. When he was confident he had it right and wouldn’t accidentally vaporise the precious rose, Remus waved his wand. The preservation spell washed over Sirius, over the rose, and it shook his very bones. When the taste of magic dissipated from the air, the rose had a new shine to it—something ethereal and enchanting.Remus swung his satchel around to his front and held it open. He ducked a little, tried to catch Sirius’s eye, and said, “It’ll be safe in here until we get back. Promise.”Trust that Remus would never deserve—never, with the beast that shared his heartbeat—glistened in Sirius’s eyes. He placed the rose amongst the books, then pulled away. Sirius dug the palm of one hand into his eye—whether to wipe away tears or prevent new ones from falling, Remus wasn’t sure.“Merlin,” Sirius cursed, on a strangled hiccough. “Fuck, Re. I-I don’t know what to say. I don’t think I’ll ever know what to say.”Words, tumbling out with the sudden madness of an afternoon rainstorm.“Then don’t say anything,” Remus said, and it really was as simple as that. He didn’t think he could bear Sirius’s gratitude for something like this. That wasn’t why Remus had done it. No one in London, in Great Britain, in the fucking world deserved magic more than Sirius Black. It wasn’t because he was born into it, bot because it was inherent in his very blood and the curse etched into his flesh, but because he was good and kind and brave and…Lionheart. It’d be a harrowing, wretched world, should Sirius Black ever be deprived of his magic.“I don’t— Fuck. How do I even—“ Sirius visibly forced himself to stop fidgeting, ever muscle in his body going taught. His fists clenched even as they reached for Remus, but stopped short. “Merlin, Remus, I can never repay you for this.”And, if that wasn’t the single most ridiculous thing Remus had ever heard… It was as though Remus himself didn’t owe Sirius absolutely everything he had, everything he was, for the simple act of undeserved friendship, companionship, despite the monster that lurked in every shadow of Remus’s waking nightmares. A tether to a comet, indeed. So, Remus said, “Don’t say that, Siri. You never have to, okay? I need you to know that.”Sirius wanted to fight him; Remus could see it in his eyes. Instead, he bit his lip, then his fingernail, his eyes flittering from the ground back up to Remus before he gave the slightest of nods. Still, a moment later, out of disbelief more than anything, Sirius shook his head furiously. “Merlin, Remus. How’d you even—“ Sirius paused, a heartbeat, and reconsider the question Remus prayed he’d never have to answer. “Where did you get the—“Then, miracle of miracles, Sirius’s eyes tracked movement from somewhere behind Remus.“Shit, is that Professor Cuckoo?”“What?”Whiplash nearly gut-punching him, Remus turned.Across the alley, there was Professor Cuckoo. He wore a cloak and a hood drawn up over most of his face, but his features were unmistakable from their vantage point. Cuckoo walked at a brisk pace, his head mostly down, save for the surreptitious glances he kept throwing around, as though everyone in the alley were his enemy. “He’s supposed to be in Hogsmeade,” Sirius hissed, pressing as close to Remus as he dared. “Or,” Remus said, humorously, “he needed a plausible alibi.”And, really, that probably wasn’t the sort of nefarious suggestion one should offer to the likes of Sirius Black, but Remus, too, was a Marauder at heart. He craved the taste of chaos and danger just as much as the rest of them.“We’re following him,” Sirius declared, just as Remus knew he would. Sirius hooked a finger through the strap of Remus’s satchel, dragging him imperceptible closer.“What are you—“Sirius reached in and pulled out James’s invisibility cloak.Remus frowned and tried to conjure up that voice of reason that sometimes made its irritating presence known in the back of his mind. But… there was nothing. Instead, Remus gestured vaguely between the both of them.“You want us to…”“Yep.” Sirius popped the syllable on his tongue.“Sirius, I can’t touch you. How are we—“Sirius unfolded the cloak. “It’s long enough to drape over us both. You’re freakishly tall. I’ll just stay close. It’ll be like hiding in a coatrack.”“Thanks.” “I won’t touch you.” After a second, Sirius amended, “Probably.”Then, he threw the cloak over Remus’s head.“Hurry up!” Sirius ducked under the tail end of the shimmery fabric, mirth and excitement gleaming in his eyes. “We’re going to lose him!”They would have, in fact, lost Professor Cuckoo in the twisting cobblestone paths that branched off from Diagon Alley had it not been for Remus’s—Mr. Hyde’s—nose. From their first day of class last September, the cloying, distinctive scent emanating off Professor Cuckoo tended to stick in the air. Musty animal dust and something that was just a little bit sour. They walked at a quick pace, Sirius following dangerously close behind Remus, but he kept just enough distance between them to keep Remus sane and the cloak over both their heads. At the corner, near Madam Malkin’s, Cuckoo veered sharply left and Sirius pulled up short. Remus stopped, nearly tripping, but managed to keep them both invisible. “Knockturn Alley,” Sirius hissed, eyes staring straight ahead, right through Remus.Once upon a time, before a monster climbed through his bedroom window, Remus’s father had whispered bedtime stories to him: words not of comfort, but of the type of creatures that went bump in the night. The kind of creatures his father hunted, vowed to vanquish long before they’d ever harm his only son. Empty words, really, when the monster finally crawled out of the dark. Remus knew of Knockturn Alley from his father’s words. He knew of what lurked behind every shadow: the clandestine transactions, the outcasts and riffraff that had no other place in the Wizarding World, and the brewed stench of death that lingered on the edge of his father’s every whispered warning. Knockturn Alley was everything the Ministry of Magic would rather forget—or better yet, pretend didn’t exist. Remus gazed into silver eyes, trying to decide if Sirius’s tone was meant to convey warning or surrender. Ridiculous. Sirius Black was incapable of walking away from danger.Remus squared his jaw and nodded. A silent acquiescence to whatever waited for them.Whatever storm clouds hung in the sky descended upon them in a thick fog as they entered Knockturn Alley. The grimy scent of mildew and overpowering dark nearly consumed Remus’s senses as they carefully weaved between hooded figures and lingering shadows. Knockturn Alley, unlike its much more genial and trafficked counterpart, was not one wide street surrounded by welcoming shops and cheery shop-owners. Instead, the street was narrow and dark—so narrow, at times, that Sirius had to follow single-file as they each turned sideways to avoid touching. Instead of shops, the alley branched off in every imaginable direction: a tree spreading its poisoned roots through the city, unbeknownst to the rest of Muggle London. After a decent hike away from all that was good and beautiful in the Wizarding World, Remus took a sharp turn, tunnelling them down one of the cobblestone tributaries that fed into Knockturn Alley. Cuckoo’s scent joined a multitude of others, the wind in Remus’s favour, as the narrow passageway suddenly and abruptly opened its maw into a dank courtyard. In the courtyard, there was a crowd. In the crowd, there was a man.A man who—“Is that…?” Remus began, but Sirius was already retreating, backing away, half a step at a time. Remus moved with him, until Sirius was pressed with his back against a wall. “My father,” Sirius said, his words on a single breath.Remus straightened, tasting bile and blood in the back of his throat. He placed himself in front of Sirius, before turning back to the crowd. Orion Black hadn’t been the man who’d captured Remus’s attention, set every one of his instincts—both his and the wolf’s—on high alert. But, sure enough, Sirius’s father stood at the back of a raised dais, cloaked in shadows and his Wizengamot robes. In retrospect, Sirius looked nothing like his father. Orion emanated control and superiority the same way his son radiated passion and a riot of mischief. Orion’s eyes were as dark as the void that Remus suspected had long ago replaced his soul; there was no light in them, no joy or even the barest hint of kindness, let alone ethereal starlight. Orion stood a good head taller than Sirius probably ever would. His black hair was shot through with silver. It made him appear decades older than he probably was. The resemblance was there, though, if one cared enough to look. Father and son mirrored each other in the cut of their cheekbones, the regal, aristocratic slope of their noses. The cursed and damned familial similarity was there in the mathematical calculation, precision, tenacity flittered in waves across each of their faces, as though they were envisioning every possible scenario, ever mired fate, and what they might have to do—what ransom they might have to pay—to emerge victorious.Orion Black, like his son, was an enigma: one Remus greatly wanted to study, just as much as the wolf yearned to rend his flesh from his bones.That man had allowed the torture of his eldest son, if not directly participated in it. Even knowing that, even with the nightmares of Sirius bleeding out on the bathroom floor flashing behind his eyelids, Remus knew, deep in his bones, that Orion Black could never even hope to be the most evil thing standing in that courtyard. Because, at the front of the dais, addressing his closest confidants in silky whispers even Remus couldn’t make out, was Tom Riddle. Remus had seen his picture before, of course, on the cover of The Daily Prophet. Had it been anyone else, Remus would think it cruel just how little that photographer had done him justice. Riddle was violently beautiful, like the crimson break of dawn after a night of bloodshed. His eyes, though they appeared to be the darkest obsidian, shimmered to a bright, venomous green in the dull light. His smile, though is what made him hauntingly unforgettable. Though etched with gods on the purest marble, his smile was as heart-rending and capricious as any mortal who suddenly declared himself worthy of godhead. It was the kind of smile that made grown men—even ones as Noble and Ancient as Orion Black—bend their knees in supplication. His scent, too, was…When Remus opened his mouth, to taste it on his tongue, he felt the hair on the back of his neck rise. Usually, in crowds, the individual scents all bled into one, utterly indistinguishable from the rest. He’d lost Cuckoo’s scent the moment they’d entered the courtyard. But, Tom Riddle was something else: an entirely new form of creature that had slithered into the world.Remus’s wolf howled for retreat, so suddenly and violently that Remus clamped his jaw shut to prevent the sound from gurgling forth from his throat.Because Tom Riddle smelled of ancient, forgotten magic, of hawthorn, maybe, but underneath it—Death.Sirius tugged on his sleeve, begging for the chance of retreat they both knew they should take before it was too late, and then—And then it was.The crowd parted, heads turning as a tall woman glided through the sea of cloaked figures. Her white-blonde hair was cropped short, shorn close to her head, and Remus could just make out a long, pale, brutal scar tracing down the line of her neck. The crowd shoved each other out of her way, keeping a wide, safe berth between themselves and the woman. No one dared touch her. The wind changed.Just one sharp breeze, passing over the courtyard and directly into Remus’s face.She…She was a werewolf.He could smell the monster lurking just behind her eyes, under the pale scars that lined her skin. She wasn’t even bothering to hide it.His heart thundering in his ears, Remus took a step back and forced himself to breathe. Behind him, Sirius let out the faintest whimper, and it was only then that he realised he’d been squeezing Sirius’s hand tightly in his own. He let go, instantly feeling the loss of contact, the angry ache of nothing. He shot Sirius a look that he hoped conveyed both his terror and his apology. Then, the werewolf spoke. “Riddle,” she said, and that was it.Tom Riddle regarded her with every ounce of disdain fitting to a god gazing own on his mangled, corrupted creation. “This meeting was for your Alpha,” he said.“Greyback couldn’t make it.” Remus’s heart nearly gave out. He forced air into his lungs, out again. Focused every ounce of concentration and willpower he had left on the soft tug of Sirius’s fingers as they dug into his robes—not touching, but almost—just to keep the panic at bay. It’d been years, since Remus had heard the name belonging to the face of his nightmares spoken aloud. His father refused to say it, even now. “My name is Lorna Kane,” said the werewolf. “Greyback’s Second. I speak for my Alpha.”His Second. Christ, if the wind changed, if she caught his scent the same as he’d caught hers, they were well and truly fucked. Greyback had never stopped looking for him, even after they’d left London, if the papers and first-hand testimonies left forgotten on his father’s desk were to be believed. Remus was, after all, Greyback’s greatest prize: his first taste of the vengeance the wolf craved. And Remus had slipped right through his claws, in the dead of night.“We do not speak to subordinates.” That was Orion Black. Remus had been so caught up in his own panic that he almost missed the horror of opposites, the raving difference between Orion’s voice and his son’s. Apart from the posh, clipped, aristocratic accent thats had almost a French lilt to it on the elongated vowels, it had never been more clear that Sirius and his father were born to live in entirely different worlds. Riddle clicked his tongue, tutted. Scolded. “Now, now, Orion. That’s hardly polite. She is our guest.”“She,” spat Orion, because he might bend a knee to Riddle, but he was still a Black, “is a savage brute.”The savage brute bared her teeth, ran her tongue over a barely-human fang. Christ. Three days since the full moon, and her wolf still lingered in her eyes.“I hardly intend to waste my day surrounded by the stench of wizards.” Lorna Kane said wizard the same way Orion Black said savage brute. “What do you want, Tom?”It was a power-play, the way she spat out Riddle’s first name, and it worked. Riddle’s smile vanished, and he visibly recoiled. A snake, poised to strike.“That,” he hissed, “is not my name.”Orion squared his shoulders. “You will address him as Lord.”Kane sneered. “I call no man Lord. Not even my Alpha has earned that right.”Something inherently malicious flashed across Riddle’s eyes. That beautiful, ruthless smile returned to his face.“Then call me by the name this world will come to fear.” Riddle’s smile grew feral. He spread his arms wide, a herald of war and rapture. “I am Lord Voldemort.”
But maybe Riddle is but a name.
Peeves’s words, echoing like trumpets across Remus’s memory, playing out in real time.
Hail, the soldiers doomed to war. Riddle thy name be—
Peeves hadn’t said it—Sirius had finally shouted him into submission, into silence—but Remus knew, deep in his bones, the name he’d been read to speak.
Voldemort.
Something like cold, endless nothing clawed its way up Remus’s spine. Or, it was the press and pull of Sirius’s fingers, silently begging for retreat. There, in silver eyes, was the echo of the prophecy of a deranged poltergeist, who’d once been born a Seer. “We can’t be here, Remus,” Sirius said, or maybe didn’t say, because speaking anything aloud would get them caught—would get them killed. Still, Remus heard the words, and, instinctively, Remus knew Sirius was right. This situation called for retreat, but Remus was so close to the blood, the answers the most feral—the most human—part of his mind craved that he wasn’t quite ready to give it up.Retreat was no longer an option. Remus was utterly transfixed, his feet rooted in the earth, by the show of horror and destiny playing out before his eyes. “Voldemort.” The name rolled over Kane’s tongue like acid, like poison dripping from a single fang. “My kind and yours are not friends, yet still you summon me here, to the juicy, bleeding heart of your world. What exactly do you want from my pack, wizard?”Riddle bared his own teeth. “I want an army.”Remus felt sick.Cannon fodder, Sirius had said.“An army.” Kane regarded him cooly. “Yet you hunt us in droves, line your Ancient halls with our pelts, carve jewellery out of our teeth. You’ve passed legislation that requires us to register with your Ministry when we come of age and you’ve claimed it as sacred doctrine. You force us to wear your brand on our flesh, marking us as the slaves we are.”A flash of fang, glistening in the mottled sunlight. “My pack will not bare our throats to you, Voldemort, or any other wizard.”“I do not need your submission,” Riddle said. “I need your strength, your claws and teeth, to help shape this world into something entirely new. Something pure.”“And what might that world look like?”“My kind and yours need not mingle,” Riddle replied. “When I’ve cleansed his world of impurities, from the filth that steal our magic and claim it as their own, I will grant you freedom. Freedom from our laws, from the Ministry’s chains and collars. Everything you’ve ever craved. I need only your loyalty, for when those who will inevitably resist the ides of March make their futile stand. Then, you may sink your teeth into the flesh that once bound you in silver.”Kane stared up at Riddle, as though she were envisioning her teeth in his flesh.“You talk of a future, a fantasy, that has not yet come to pass,” she said. “My kind has very little use of the hypothetical, wizard.”“What do you want, beast?” Orion Black spat the world in her face.Even from where he stood, Remus could see the release as Lorna Kane allowed her wolf to claw its way to the surface. Her features changed, ever so slightly: white hair stood on end, claws edged the tips of her fingers, her eyes blazed golden. “Your children,” she answered, ravenous. Blood-thirsty. Orion looked so aghast, so visibly shaken, that for a moment, Remus dared to believe he actually cared for the health and well-being of his own sons.“Our children are precious to us. Their blood is sacred,” Riddle replied, voice remarkably even. Diplomatic.“And you think ours are nothing more than carrion to us?” Kane took an imposing step towards the dais, as though she might launch herself upon it. “Without children, our race dies. Our children are euthanised by your Aurors, hunted and enslaved by your Noble and Ancient. You’ve brought us to the brink, forced us to act in desperation to avoid extinction. Fenrir Greyback is the last born-werewolf living in Great Britain. Instead, our children are bitten, turned when they are too young to remember another life.”She was right. That life—the one that existed in his memories, before the scars and the dungeons and the wolf—belonged to someone else.“Even now, the Old Man has one of ours in his grasp, out of reach of his Alpha, his family. His home.”Distantly, detached from every version of reality, devoid of everything, Remus thought, She’s talking about me.And: Fenrir Greyback is not my Alpha.And: I have a home. A family.And, he thought of the trembling, terrified boy next to him, and of all the terrible things he’d enjoy doing to Lorna Kane, should she ever deign to give voice to so much as the idea of Sirius Black.Mine, growled the wolf. Mine, and, pack, and, wolf, and—Run. Lorna Kane raised her nose, tilted her head ever so slightly in their direction—Without waiting, without risking their inevitable demise, Remus grabbed Sirius and bodily shoved him back into the alleyway, before entirely remembering the invisibility cloak was meant to be covering the both of them.Sirius gasped, yelped, almost tumbled to the ground, as Remus desperately scrambled to catch him. He did—barely—and yanked Sirius upright. The wizards in the crowd began to whisper, having heard the sound but miraculously unable to see the source of it. It began to rain, as Remus and Sirius ran down the alley and out of the courtyard.Remus wove them through the off-shoots, through the various tributaries linking to Knockturn Alley, until he was well and truly lost. Inconvenient, sure, but bloody-fucking-perfect when they were quite literally running for their lives. They stopped in a small alcove, under the awning of a boarded up shop, both out of breath and suffocating more each minute under the weight of the soaked-through invisibility cloak. “Fuck it,” Sirius huffed, and ripped it off.Ordinarily, Remus would have been quite delighted—enthralled, mesmerised, bewitched—by the ridiculous way the static electricity in the air clung to Sirius’s hair, making it stand up in all directions before the rain plastered it back to his head.As it was, Remus was rasping, bit for desperate for air. The full moon was only three days ago, and, if he was honest, Remus Lupin had never particularly enjoyed running.“Shit,” Sirius said, his face stricken, as he ran his fingers through his soaked hair. He looked like he desperately wanted to start pacing, but also didn’t want to stray too far from their hiding spot. “Shit, shit, shit, shit.”“Shit,” Remus agreed. “They— Merlin’s saggy tits!”“I know.”“And—And my father—““I know.”“That… That man. He said his name was—““I know, Sirius.”It felt like bad luck, to speak Riddle’s chosen name aloud. As if it’d call down the wrath of the gods upon them, in an instant. Sirius made a visible effort to compose himself. “We need to get back to Hogwarts. Now.”Remus nodded, once. “Yes, we do.”“Do you know the way?”“Haven’t got a clue.”“Shit.”
Shit.
Sirius balled up the invisibility cloak, muttering something along the lines of, fuck, fucking, fuck, shit, and we’ll move a hell of a lot faster without it. Sirius waved a quick-drying spell over it, then stuffed it in Remus’s satchel, before looking up at him for some kind of reassurance.Remus wasn’t sure he had any left. But still, he tried to manage a smile, because Sirius Black did, in fact, look utterly ridiculous with half his hair tied up with his wand, and the rest of it sticking to his face.Then, Remus stepped out of the alcove without looking, without scenting the air.It was possibly the worst mistake he could make in a frightfully long list of mistakes he’d already made in the past hour or so. Because there was Professor Cuckoo, as shocked as Remus, to see them both there, but only for a moment. Then, Cuckoo drew his wand and pointed it at Remus’s throat.“Well, well, well,” Cuckoo said, on a wicked laugh. “I should have known it was you two, playing spy the same way normal children play dress-up. Do you think yourselves brave, running around here and reporting back to Dumbledore? Will the puppies get a treat from their master?”Next to him, Remus would swear he heard Sirius snarl at that, but Cuckoo didn’t seem to care.He only had eyes for Remus.“Tell me, Lupin, did you enjoy the little show in the courtyard?” Cuckoo’s sneer was deadly. Then, for a harrowing moment, his eyes tracked to Sirius. “Had I known you’d been there, I would have made proper introductions. I’m sure someone like you, Lupin, would have plenty to contribute to—““Enough,” growled Sirius. Then, to Remus’s horror, Sirius stepped in front of him, right in the line of Cuckoo’s wand. Panicking, Remus tried to yank him back, but Sirius swatted him away and took a step towards Cuckoo. “You’re done, Cuckoo,” Sirius said. “The moment the Old Man learns where your allegiances lie, he’ll have you sacked. Thrown in Azkaban, too, if I can make a compelling argument.”Cuckoo laughed, twirling his wand in a small, precise circle. “And what will your father say, boy, when he finds out you’re Dumbledore’s little pet?”Sirius drew his own wand. What was left of his tied up hair spilled down over the nape of his neck. He struck a duelling pose, wand outstretched in his right hand; his left, tucked close to his side, magic sparking on his fingertips. Christ.He planned to use his non-dominant hand as a backup. Remus could see it in his mind’s eye: Sirius, hair soaked with rain, firing off one spell from his wand, the next a moment—a heartbeat—later, unspoken from his fingertips.It’d be a death sentence, then: duelling Sirius Black. No wizard, short of Albus Dumbledore himself, could hope to fight off that many rapid-fire spells. “I am no such thing,” Sirius spat, as though the idea of belonging to anyone—bowing as his father bowed to Riddle—was the most abhorrent thing in all of creation. “No matter. I’m sure, at the very least, Lorna Kane would love a few bones to pick her teeth with,” Cuckoo sneered. “After, she’s torn your flesh from them, that is. What do you say, Lupin? Does pureblood flesh taste better than—““Go fuck yourself, Cuckoo,” Sirius spat.“Sirius,” Remus warned, because that was not helping. They needed to leave, now, before Cuckoo said anything else. But, Cuckoo raised his wand. “Infindiatum!”In the very same breath, Sirius shouted, “PROTEGO!”The shield charm erupted from his wand, from his spare hand, with such miraculous, indefinable force that Cuckoo’s curse fizzled out harmlessly even as he—Cuckoo—was sent sprawling backwards into the alley wall. “Well,” Sirius said, his voice tainted not by battle, but by sudden, wondrous amazement. He tapped a finger against the blue shield that surrounded them. Christ, it even blocked out the rain. “I’d say my wand works just fine now.”Any other time, Remus would be right there with him, revelling in the taste of Sirius’s magic surrounding them, waiting patiently as the sense of wonder slowly gave way to the inevitability of longing, of desperation for—No.Instead, he only felt rising panic. On a breath, he said, “Christ, Sirius. The Trace.”Sirius turned, his expression suddenly, horrifyingly blank with dawning realisation. What would happen when the Ministry of Magic found two first-years in Knockturn Alley? When they realised Remus held a secret darker than anything carved into Sirius’s skin?Or, worse still, if the wind changed and Lorna Kane caught a taste of Sirius’s infinite, ethereal magic on a breeze?Seconds, and nothing more.It took mere heartbeats for a rescue party to arrive. The next thing Remus knew—before he had time to fully process his own panic and terror—they were surrounded by the sharp cracks of rapid Apparition and a flurry of red robes. Wands drawn, the Auror’s surrounded them, flanked them. Some kept their wands trained on Sirius and Remus, but most faced outward, as though waiting for an attack. Sirius did not drop the shield charm or lower his wand. Instead, he scowled outwards at the Aurors. Remus saw the dangerous glint of recognition flash across some of their faces. The Black heir, found in Knockturn Alley with his werewolf companion, wands drawn against a beloved Hogwarts professor. Remus could see the headlines, feel the silver chains.One last crack, flash from nothing into sudden, jarring existence, and Professor Rattleburn Apparated into the narrow alley that was already far too crowded.Rattleburn brushed off her robes—red now, instead of the pale blue she’d been wearing earlier—and seemed to asses the situation. Her eyes tracked over Remus, over Sirius, the shield charm, and the distrust Sirius was throwing off in waves. Then, she saw Cuckoo, scrambling to his feet.Rattleburn drew her wand and marched forward, tell the tip of her wand was pressed to Cuckoo’s throat. He raised his hands, his own wand clattering to the ground at his feet. Remus certainly didn’t like the glimmer of victory in his eyes. “Come now, Amelia, there’s no need for all this,” Cuckoo said. “We may be on opposite sides, but there’s no need to lose our sense of decorum.”Not lowering her wand, Rattleburn cast a glance over her shoulder at them, a scowl, a look of great displeasure that Remus had never seen before, etched into her features. He swallowed. They’d fucked something up. Something big.Sirius felt it too. He’d gone pale, eyes darting back and forth between Rattleburn and the Aurors still pointing their wands at Remus and Sirius“How long have you known?” Rattleburn said to Cuckoo, but her eyes remained locked with Remus. “Since the beginning, my dear,” Cuckoo said. “You and your Aurors are never subtle. I mean, Defense Against the Dark Arts? Pfft. Probably the only subject in which you scored above average on your N.E.W.T.s. Months, you’ve been at this silly, oh-so-secretive investigation, trying desperately to pin something on me. Are you really going to throw everything away for this? For them?”Rattleburn looked as though she wanted to say something, to snap, to rage back at Cuckoo, but she didn’t. Instead, she leaned back on her heels, lowering her wand. “Arrest him,” Rattleburn ordered, taking a step back. There was a resigned, defeated slump to her shoulders. The Aurors surrounding Remus and Sirius hesitated, but obeyed. One of them waved his wand, synching Cuckoo’s hands behind his back. “On what charges?” Cuckoo was still smiling, as though, even chained and bound, he was the one who’d won the battle. “Sedition. Insubordination. Conspiring against the Ministry of Magic,” Rattleburn replied. Cuckoo laughed. “You have no proof of that, my dear. Certainly not enough to convict.”Rattleburn was silent for a long minute. Remus watched her check in with each of her Aurors, making eye contact one at a time. When the last one—the skinny bloke next to Sirius—bowed his head and refused to meet her eye, Rattleburn let out the tiniest of curses.“Child endangerment, then,” Rattleburn spat, her wet hair whipping as she turned away from him in frustration. She bent to pick up Cuckoo’s wand, which had fallen at his feet. Frustration lacing every move, she waved her own wand over it, recalling the last spell to the tip. The binding spell Cuckoo had cast at Sirius manifested from the wand, in an orange-ish cloud.It was evidence, sure, but the spell told a story that could easily be manipulated, especially when the only two witnesses to the alleged crime were the Black heir and a werewolf.Neither Remus nor Sirius could risk testifying against their professor. If word of their presence in Knockturn Alley got back to Orion Black, to Greyback—Christ. One way or another, it very well might be the end of them both. “Is that all? I’ll be out in time for tea.” Cuckoo laughed again, raucous and damning. “You must be careful with wilfully brandishing these kind of accusations, my dear. Child endangerment, eh? Can’t the same be said of you? Weren’t these two under your charge? But here they are, lost in Knockturn Alley, of all godforsaken places.”Remus’s stomach sank.“No, that’s not—“ Sirius started, but he’d done the math, too. Remus could see the defeat brewing in his eyes even as his protest died on his tongue. “It’s enough to get you sacked,” Rattleburn said, matter-of-factly.Cuckoo grinned, wickedly. “It’ll cost you your precious job, too, Rattleburn. Don’t pretend I don’t know how much you higher-cause types live for shaping the next generation.” He threw his head in Remus’s direction, spitting out the next words. “You bloody Hufflepuffs and your humanitarian spirit. Think of all those students, all those undeserving whelps that you’ve taken under your wing in just a few short months. They’re the future, aren’t they? Isn’t that what your Minister loves to say? What’ll become of them if their most ardent advocate abandons them well before final exams?”Rattleburn swallowed, but said nothing. “Don’t you understand, Amelia?” Cuckoo could see the cracks in her facade just as easily as Remus could. “Even if the Old Man wanted to keep you on, there’s no way the school board will allow a Ministry spy in their midst. Particularly one inclined towards—what was it, you called it? Sedition? Insubordination? Conspiring, against the greater interests of the ruling party of the Wizengamot? Arrest me, sack me, it won’t matter. You’ve failed your truest mission, haven’t you? What of all those children you tried to save from war?”Cuckoo was right.It didn’t matter. War had come for the children, long ago. Remus and Sirius were proof enough.Nothing could mask the resignation and defeat that spread across Rattleburn’s features. Still, she said, “Take him away. I’ll be back to assist the interrogation after I settle things at Hogwarts.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ In any other circumstance, it would have been downright laughable the way McGonagall’s jaw dropped open when Professor Rattleburn followed Remus and Sirius through the floo, still dressed to the nines in her Auror robes.In any other circumstance, an Auror returning two wayward Marauders to Hogwarts after a daring misadventure in Knockturn Alley would be a story for the ages. Instead, they stood in stilted, awkward silence, each wondering how, exactly, they ended up in this precarious situation.Rattleburn cleared her throat loudly and said, “Right, then. I’ll be off, then. Clear out my office. Minerva, please inform Professor Dumbledore that he’ll have my resignation on his desk as early as—“There were certain things Remus knew about Sirius Black, and the one thing he’d learned almost immediately was that Sirius could play the part. He’d never been without fear; his family, his upbringing, the nightmares that haunted him would never allow that. He could be scared—he may even succumb to his fear, cower, retreat, tremble under the covers until the darkness had passed—but that was never the end of the story. One way or another, Sirius would reach his breaking point. Fear would always give way to fury. And when he fought back, even bloody and bruised, Sirius Black bared his teeth.“No,” Sirius snapped. Rain-drenched, with floo-powder sticking to his cheek and his miracle of a wand still clutched tightly in his right hand, Sirius raised his chin in defiance. Remus felt something like pride swell deep in his chest. Deep in his bones, Remus knew Sirius had to have predicted exactly how this would end. These things always end the same, and there was so very little that two first-years could do to stay the ebb and flow of the darkness that surrounded them. Still, Sirius found it in him to raise his voice at the injustice.“You can’t just leave,” Sirius said, punctuating the last word with a swirl of his wand, apparently forgetting that it worked now. A spark of magic shot off. A vase on McGonagall’s bookshelf shattered. Shock momentarily shattered Sirius’s expression, but he shook it off. He didn’t bother apologising. Rattleburn’s face softened into something dangerously close to pity. Regret. “I have very few options left, Mr. Black. When the school board and parents learn that the Minister of Magic placed an Auror at Hogwarts—““Why should they care?!” Sirius interrupted. “The Ministry is up to its tits in Hogwarts business, all the damn time. My father, Lestrange, Malfoy—they’re all responsible for everything that goes on here! Why should it—““It is as simple as that, Mr. Black,” Rattleburn cut in. “Politics, I’m afraid.”“Fuck politics!” Sirius roared. Behind her desk, clearly missing none of the minute details of this exchange, McGonagall let out a snort that might have been agreement. “Any assignment of a Ministry official to Hogwarts requires Wizengamot approval, even if the assignment comes directly from the Minister of Magic,” Rattleburn explained. “Any appointment not meeting the scrutiny of the majority of the Wizengamot is seen as a political attack, a ploy to taint the minds of the children.”Remus almost laughed out loud. As if Rattleburn was responsible for swaying the political opinions of the children in her care. “As the nature of my investigation was deemed Top Secret by the Auror’s office, the Minister agreed to bypass the Wizengamot’s approval in favour of discretion,” Rattleburn continued. “It was the Minister’s decision, at the end of the day, and when her involvement comes to light, I expect she’ll be ousted by her own party, on charges of conspiracy and corruption. I’ll lose my badge, right along with her, I expect.”“What?” Sirius’s mouth opened and closed a few times. “That… That’s not fair.”But it would happen all the same. Sirius knew it, too. He made a visible effort to compose himself, then said, “If you leave, they are just going to put someone in your position. If I have to learn about the practicalities of the goddamned Lestrange Doctrine, I swear to Merlin, I am going to—““The Wizengamot will produce a few convenient truths about me,” Rattleburn said, sardonically. “My Muggle parents, my teaching certification from a Muggle university. Not the type they’d prefer to influence the next generation.”“That’s—““Bullshit?” Rattleburn smirked at the shock on all their faces at her curse. “Believe me, I know. But this is the world we live in, Mr. Black.”Sirius Black would see that world burn. The rapture erupted in his eyes.Christ, it was glorious. Mr. Hyde longed to revel in the devastation.As Sirius began to furiously pace, seemingly caught between wanting to kick something or shatter another one of McGonagall’s vases, Remus edged into Rattleburn’s line of sight. “Professor,” Remus said, the guilt weighing heavy on his soul. None of this would have happened if they’d simply met her at Fortescue’s. Their recklessness had cost Rattleburn her job, her livelihood, her home. She had so very few options left for her in the Wizarding World, should the details of her story find their way into the whispers on the streets. No one could understand the horror of that than Remus. “I… I want to apologise for—““Stop it, Lupin.” Remus nearly recoiled at the finality in her tone. Sirius stopped pacing. Rattleburn sighed. “This was bound to happen. You heard Cuckoo. My cover was not as clandestine as I might have hoped. I knew the risks when I agreed to this assignment. I’m only sorry that you two were roped into it.”Remus said, “Yes, but you could have finished your investigation—landed actual charges—if we hadn’t—““I won’t hear it, Lupin,” Rattleburn said. “The circumstances cannot be changed and I do not want you to bear any guilt. What you did for Black today was nothing short of remarkable. A wizard is nothing but a charlatan without his wand.”Across the room, Sirius bowed his head, his eyes tracking to his wand. “Neither of you has anything to be ashamed of,” Rattleburn said. “What you did, the way you stood your ground—stood together—was incredibly brave. Not many would have, especially given the circumstances. Minerva, if I may?”McGonagall looked as though she had about a thousand questions and one hell of a lecture brewing on the tip of her tongue, but still she nodded, with only the slightest hesitance.“Before I finalise my resignation, it’d be my honour to award one-hundred points to Gryffindor for Lupin’s courageous pursuit of study, of inconceivable solutions, for no other reason than to help a friend.” Her smile was warm and heartfelt. “It’s been a pleasure, Remus, helping you in your study. Though, I have to admit, your tenacity and thirst for knowledge far out-paced what little I had to offer. Gryffindor should be proud to count you among their ranks.”There was a lump in his throat, a crack in his heart.She spoke to him as though he belonged at Hogwarts, as though the creature in his soul was of so little consequence that it might not even matter at all. She was wrong, but she was kind. Perhaps that was even monumentally important.She turned to Sirius. Walked across the room, until she stood right in front of him. “Mr. Black—“ At his visible flinch, Rattleburn started again. “Sirius. That was one hell of a shield charm. I take it the new wand works well?”Sirius nodded, but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. He wouldn’t look at anyone. He seemed very interested in the stone floor of McGonagall’s office. “You had a choice, Sirius,” Rattleburn continued. “You always have a choice, between attack and defence. Sometimes you must fight. I will not deny that. Sometimes, those clever spells that so readily come to you are the only ones you can use to save what you hold sacred. But sometimes, standing your ground and defending those next to you is far more important, even if there seems to be no way out. So, for your unwavering courage when you were outmatched and surrounded by darkness, for successfully defending both yourself and Lupin from harm, I award Gryffindor one-hundred points.”Sirius’s head snapped up, disbelief marring his features. His eyes were wet, jaw hanging open. “But, the Trace. The Ministry will—“Rattleburn shook her head once, definitively. “It doesn’t matter. You did the right thing. Sometimes you must damn the consequences.”That stopped any protest Sirius might have raised. Long before that stupid hat sorted him into Gryffindor, Sirius Black would move heaven and earth, damn his own soul in the process, if it meant protecting those he loved. It was truth, uninhibited, and it was written in Sirius’s very soul, etched into the shadows of his destiny.“You are so very brave, Sirius,” Rattleburn said. “Never let anyone tell you different.”“T-Thank you, Professor,” Sirius managed.“I promise to keep both of your names out of my report. I will make sure Cuckoo is quiet about it too. I’ll slip him a memory-altering potion, if I have to. As far as the Ministry is concerned, there were merely two anonymous wizards involved. Could be absolutely anyone. They disappeared before any Auror was able to take down their names.”Remus swallowed, understanding the grave significance of that. Sirius’s father would never learn that his son had seen him plotting a war. Greyback would have no way of knowing how close his Second had come to sinking her claws into Remus’s flesh. “Minerva,” Rattleburn continued, “I feel it fair to warn you that my Aurors have arrested Professor Cuckoo on charges of child endangerment. He drew his wand against Mr. Black with the intent to harm and we checked his wand.” But still, the ransom weighed heavy and unspoken on all of them: even if it was enough to get him sacked, without witness testimony, Cuckoo would indeed walk free. Still, Rattleburn demanded, “Please ensure that his termination letter is signed by Dumbledore as soon as possible and sent to the Ministry. Let that be the one good thing to come out of these unfortunate circumstances.” With one last glance at both Remus and Sirius, Rattleburn said, “It has been an honour and a privilege to teach you both. Give my regards to those that matter.”Then, she was gone.The great, mahogany door to McGonagall’s office closed behind her, echoing in the dead silence that engulfed the three of them. “What,” McGonagall said, pinching the bridge of her nose, “the hell happened?”Since Sirius still looked very much as though he was caught between committing arson and tearing his hair from his head, Remus began the story. He severely edited the portion of time spent in Ollivander’s—leaving it at the fact that his studies payed off and Sirius now had a functioning wand—and skimmed over the rather significant detail of James’s invisibility cloak, instead leading McGonagall to believe that he and Sirius were a bit more stealthy than they actually were. When he got to the courtyard, he watched all the colour drain from McGonagall’s face. He told her of Tom Riddle, of Sirius’s father, the werewolf. Then, of Cuckoo, the duel, and all the horrible things they suspected of Cuckoo, but like Rattleburn, couldn’t technically prove. It was probably less than five minutes since Rattleburn left, by the time Remus recounted every relevant detail, but it felt like an eternity. McGonagall took a deep breath, looking vaguely sick to her stomach, and leaned forward on her desk. “The two of you need to speak to Professor Dumbledore. Now.”Her accent caught on the last word, elongating it into two, deadly syllables. Just as quick, just as deadly: “No.”Remus turned, utterly shocked, at the cruel vehemence in Sirius’s voice. Silver eyes blazed, just as feral as they’d been mere moments ago. Sirius’s left fist clenched and unclenched at his side, sparks of magic dancing on his fingertips. McGonagall seemed just as wary as Remus, at Sirius’s bizarre reaction. Eyebrows pinched, she said, “Sirius, what you saw was… It is vital that the right people know about it as soon as possible. There are things that you do not yet understand. Things that now involve you and—”Me, Remus finished for her, even though her sentence cut off with a sharp look in his direction.Because things were said, in that courtyard in Knockturn Alley, that would greatly impact the particular circumstances of Remus’s life. The werewolves were gathering, conspiring, and Greyback was on the prowl. Sirius didn’t seem to notice or care about any of that. In his mind, he waged a different war: one Remus didn’t fully understand.“The right people?” Sirius quoted her own words back to her with a derisive scoff. He marched over to her desk and stuck out his chin. “You ask me to survive, but you still have your marching orders, don’t you, Minnie?”It was foreign, nearly unintelligible, these words that came out of Sirius’s mouth, but they hit their mark in one go. McGonagall visibly recoiled, and if Remus had any other way to describe it, he would, but the wolf inside his mind knew what it’d seen. The wolf tasted the ether crackling in the air.There were ghosts in McGonagall’s eyes: haunting and ravenous, called forth suddenly from the Veil by Sirius’s words.Remus felt his mind whirl. He knew he was missing half the conversation, half the battle being waged before his eyes. “Sirius, I think that—““No! No, Remus,” he amended, his voice lowering. He cast his eyes to Remus, just for a moment: a plea, a bargain, an apology, a surrender. Then, with finality, he said, “I have nothing to say to Albus Dumbledore. Dumbledore can fuck right off.”Jaw set, Sirius stormed out, taking the answer to every question Remus ever had with him. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Of all the ridiculous, dangerous, impossible things that had happened to and around him in the past few hours, the most preposterous, outlandish thing had to be the password to Dumbledore’s office.
Fizzy Spangles.
As he followed McGonagall up the spiral staircase, he recalled the sour-sticky-gross taste of the post-War candy he’d pilfered from his grandmother one summer in France, thinking, given the name, that they’d be delicious. How wrong he’d been. Thanks to Mr. Hyde, Remus hadn’t been able to scrub the taste from his sinuses for days. He wondered if it ought to have been an omen. The twisted staircase gave way to an enormous atrium, rivalling the size and scope of the Astronomy Tower. One wall was an enormous bookcase right out of Remus’s daydreams: stuffed floor to ceiling with books, both ancient and brand new. Some of the titles he recognised from his mother, from his own trunk, and he had just enough brainpower left to marvel at the fact that Dumbledore apparently enjoyed his fair share of Muggle literature as well. Dumbledore himself stood with his back to them, arms clasped behind him, apparently consulting another wall: this one crammed full of moving portraits. Varying degrees of shiny gold plaques lined the bottom frame of each portrait, some near the top so old and weathered that it was impossible to make out the names. The subjects of these portraits, too, were mere shades, nothing like the near tangible ghosts within the portraits Dumbledore spoke to in hushed whispers. One of the ghosts—Brutus Scrimgeour, Remus squinted to read—cleared his throat, and Dumbledore turned. A bushy, white eyebrow went up over half-moon glasses, as Dumbledore took in the pinched expression on McGonagall’s face. She stood close to Remus, a hand coming to rest on his shoulder, her mouth turned down in a frown. Albus Dumbledore was exactly as Remus remembered from the mid-August night, when he’d suddenly appeared on the Lupin’s doorstep, a letter in his hand. Remus would never forget the shock, the horror, and reluctance that flittered in waves over his father’s face, as his mother invited Dumbledore in for a cup of tea. He’d never forget the way the old wizard crouched down in front of him, offered him his Hogwarts letter in one hand and a bottle of dittany he’d manifested from seemingly nowhere in the other. This will help with the scratch, Dumbledore had said, a dazzling twinkle in his eye as he winked. The scratch had been the now-barely-visible scar that split Remus’s left eyebrow at the August moon.His mother had screamed, when his father had opened the cellar that morning. She hadn’t done that in awhile; she was used to his injuries, and always willing to help stitch him back together, come the break of dawn. But that morning, with all the blood and the way his face had swollen, she’d been terrified he’d lost his eye. His father had rushed in, wrapped him in a blanket, and wiped the blood away to the sound of his wife’s sobs, something like regret clouding his features, even as Remus’s eye had been revealed, indeed, to be in tact.There had been, of course, still the scars to contend with.They hadn’t been able to afford dittany in years.It’d been the only reason Remus’s mother had been able to convince his father to allow him to go to Hogwarts. Even with the risks, even with the constant threat of exposure, the danger of harming another student, Remus would have uninhibited access to actual medical care and a Healer who, Dumbledore swore, would never reveal the true nature of his injuries.Now, in the early afternoon light, Dumbledore’s blue, gold-lined robes brought out the twinkle in his eye that spoke of the magic incarnate in Dumbledore’s very being. Like Sirius, Dumbledore tasted, smelled, of magic, but it was so unfathomably different than the ethereal, wildness of Sirius Black that Remus was taken aback. Dumbledore’s magic tasted… ancient, powerful, with a hint of shadow Remus hadn’t noticed when he’d first met the headmaster.Perhaps he only noticed the shadow now because he was so used to revelling in the purity and starlight inherent in Sirius’s magic, in his every breath. “Ah, Minerva. Remus,” Dumbledore said. “What can I do for you?”There was a disarming sort of kindness to Albus Dumbledore: one that, despite Remus’s own admiration and gratefulness towards the headmaster, the wolf inside him never quite trusted, even from the start. It was an instinct Remus didn’t understand, could never feasibly comprehend, other than to justify it as a monster’s reaction to powerful magic. Then again, the wolf never reacted like that to Sirius. The wolf was almost ravenous for the barest taste of Sirius’s magic. “Sir. There was a— Well, you see…” Remus had never heard McGonagall stutter like that, even when he’d torn into her for abandoning Sirius. McGonagall cleared her throat and managed some sort of composure. “Well. Best let Lupin explain.”Dumbledore seemed equally intrigued by her reaction. The other bushy eyebrow went up. “Remus?”And so, Remus recounted the same, edited version of events for the second time in under an hour. As he spoke, Dumbledore’s expression grew more and more grim, until he sat heavily at his desk, resting his chin on the triangle point of his fingers in contemplation.When Remus finished speaking, the silence stretched. Then:”That’ll be all, Minerva. Thank you,” Dumbledore said, barely even looking at either of them. His gaze was lost somewhere in the middle distance, between past and present. “Remus, please have a seat.”Eyes wide, Remus sat in the high-backed chair in front of Dumbledore’s desk. “I—“ Glancing behind him, McGonagall looked as though she wanted to protest, wanted to stay, but instead: “Yes, sir.”With a last nod at Remus, she turned and descended the stairs. Marching orders, Sirius had said. The silence stretched, dark and ominous. “I am absolutely thrilled to hear that my great-great-grandson continues to live up to his reputation,” came a posh, vaguely familiar voice from somewhere behind Dumbledore. “I told Walburga that child would bring nothing but trouble, even before he was sorted into bloody Gryffindor. Running around with a goddamned half-blood werewolf mutt, for Salazar’s sake!”Visceral terror shot through Remus, like a bolt of lightening. Several, undeniable facts flashed across his mind: bullets tearing into already-marred flesh. From the very moment he arrived at Hogwarts, Remus had seen how easily the spectre paintings could jump from frame to frame. Sirius said there was a portrait of his great-great-grandfather at Grimmauld Place.Walburga would mount her son’s head on a pike, if she knew her son even spoke to the likes of Remus. God forbid she learn that Remus’s tooth was now the core of Sirius’s wand. He fought to hide a snarl.The portrait of Phineas Nigellus Black was already staring at him like he was feral. Like someone should man up and put him down, like the mutt he was.“Merlin knows that boy will damn us all,” Phineas spat, his nose upturned in a manner that was frightfully similar to Sirius’s father. “Enough, Phineas.” Dumbledore’s voice was remarkably calm. He regarded Remus thoughtfully. “Did you know, Remus, that Hogwarts itself is perhaps the most impenetrable place in Great Britain, if not in the world? The founders made sure of that. For the safety of the students, the children, of course.”Remus had no idea what that had to do with anything.“Not so long ago, in days gone by, this office was not just used to conduct business at Hogwarts. Certain people deemed it a fitting place to host clandestine, often nefarious meetings: ones they would not wish to be privy to eavesdroppers,” Dumbledore continued. “As it turns out, they added extra wards and protections in this office. Binding spells, mostly, on every spirit that resides in this office. The spectres in this room are bound in the magic that allows them to manifest in this world to not repeat a single word spoken in this room, without direct permission from the current headmaster.” There was a mischievous twinkle in Dumbledore’s eye. “This particular binding spell—still in use today—just so happens to be one of Phineas Nigellus Black’s more clever inventions.”The portrait of Phineas Nigellus crossed its arms and sneered down at the both of them. “One I had absolutely no reason to regret until you took up residence here, Albus.”Remus’s eyes darted between the portrait and Dumbledore, his mouth opening into an O. His secret, his wolf, were safe from the ravenous claws of the Blacks.More importantly, Sirius’s mother would never hear of their misadventure in Knockturn Alley. Dumbledore seemed to study him for a long moment, ignoring the continued muttering from Phineas’s portrait. “Remus, do you understand what it is you saw today in Knockturn Alley?”That…That was a surprisingly complicated question. “They—Black and Riddle—said they wanted an army,” Remus tried to answer. He swallowed, recalling the ravenous hunger in Riddle’s eye. “Riddle said he needed Greyback’s pack to devour those that resist the ides of March.”“A peculiar phrase, indeed,” Dumbledore said. “Are you familiar with the idiom?”“Julius Caesar,” Remus supplied, readily. “Referring to the moment of betrayal before the death of the king.”“The death of a king at the hand of a trusted friend,” Dumbledore said. “Foreboding, is it not?”“He’s talking about revolution from within the Ministry, sir,” Remus said, fidgeting on the edge of his seat. “Hm. So it would seem.” And that was it. Acknowledgment, with no offer of a solution.For a terrifying, horrible moment, Remus wondered if that meant Dumbledore wouldn’t fight back. The part of Remus that was so innately Gryffindor nearly rioted at the thought. He wanted to demand retaliation, a counter-attack, a strategy, at the very least, but before he could sound the drums of war, Dumbledore spoke.“Did he give a name?” There was weight to Dumbledore’s words, as though he already knew the answer. As though the answer would cost him everything. “Other than Tom Riddle, that is?”Remus’s jaw clicked shut. He didn’t want to say it. Even the idea of saying that name felt like a drop of liquid silver on his tongue. “Voldemort.” Remus swallowed, choking, gagging on nothing but air. “He called himself Voldemort, sir.”A look of immense sorrow marred Dumbledore’s face. He bowed his head. To no one but himself, on a breath, Dumbledore whispered, “Oh, Tom. What have you done?”What else was there to say about a man who named himself Death?Dumbledore closed his eyes, breathed, tried to compose himself. “What of the werewolf?”“Lorna Kane,” Remus answered, that name coming readily to his tongue. “Greyback’s Second.”“Do you know her?”A ridiculous, almost manic laugh bubbled from Remus’s throat. “Contrary to popular belief, I don’t actually know every werewolf in Great Britain. We don’t have a club.”In fact, besides Greyback, Remus had never actually met another werewolf. His father would probably drop dead at the mere thought of it. “I meant no offence, my dear boy,” Dumbledore said, raising a placating hand. “What do you know of her?”She’s feral, Remus almost said, remembering the way he’d felt her wolf, seen it glistening in her eyes, despite the waning moon. “Nothing,” he replied, instead. “Other than exactly what she said.”Dumbledore’s expression remained frustratingly neutral. “Did she know you were there?”Remus heard the real question underneath. Did she know what you were?“No,” Remus said, both to convince himself as well as Dumbledore. “She would have come after us, if she’d caught my scent. She wouldn’t have let me walk away, even with the Aurors there.”Lorna Kane’s words echoed through his mind: Even now, the Old Man has one of ours in our grasp.Christ, how long had Greyback been searching for Remus, completely mad and ravenous for his final revenge against Remus’s father?“A small consolation, then,” Dumbledore said.Remus choked on a bitter laugh. Dumbledore regarded him carefully. “Earlier this year, when the battle seemed lost and the Lestrange Doctrine appeared more of an inedibility than I had once dared to hope, I took certain measures to ensure that your safety and anonymity were protected.”Remus looked up, sharply. “You… did?”“By nature of you being here, certain people had to be brought in on your secret,” Dumbledore explained, though Remus had suspected as much. “Your professors, of course, as well of the school board know very well about your monthly excursions.”
Monthly excursions.
Christ, it sounded like he regularly took a vacation to the countryside, to wander the moors, and drink tea with the rising sun.“That does, unfortunately, include Abraxas Malfoy,” Dumbledore said, gauging his reaction. Remus forced himself to remain neutral. “I ensured that the Doctrine itself would not affect you, Remus. You are already here and there’s no use throwing away your future in favour of what some, like Malfoy, might wish to call progress.”“I—“ Remus didn’t know what to say, the words lodged in his throat.“That being said, should your condition come to light, there is a very real possibility that those with vested interest would move heaven and earth to see you expelled from this school,” Dumbledore continued. Remus nodded. McGonagall had already told him as much.“Which leads me to my point,” Dumbledore said. “I do have a certain amount of clout with these people—some, I’ll admit, for no other reason than their own political aspirations—and I was able to leverage it in your favour. I was able to bind those on the Hogwarts school board, those professors who may wish you malcontent, to an oath of secrecy. They are not to reveal your secret to anyone, even under duress. On their magic be their betrayal.”Unbidden and entirely without his permission, Remus felt tears well up in his eyes. “T-thank you, sir.”“It should come as no real surprise to you, I’m afraid, that Abraxas Malfoy had already let the cat out of the bag, as it were.” It wasn’t a surprise. Remus vividly recalled how Lucius Malfoy had shoved him against the wall, sneered in his face, called him a half-breed. Sirius had heard half-blood.A reasonable mistake, really, but one for which Remus was infinitely grateful. “He told his son,” Remus said, acknowledging the fact. “He did,” Dumbledore said. “When I learned of this, I, of course, had to ascertain the damage Abraxas had done by telling Lucius. I had to know if the secret dug in its roots and spread further.” Again, the twinkle in Dumbledore’s eye. “Imagine my surprise, then, when I called Lucius in here, under the guise of a prefect meeting, only to discover that, by some manner of happenstance, he was not at all able to divulge to me, or even rudimentarily discuss, the nature of your condition.”That’d been Sirius’s doing.“If I’m not mistaken, it’d seem that Lucius Malfoy was bound to keep your secret by an Unbreakable Vow.” Dumbledore leaned forward, slightly. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”Remus ducked his head, covering a smile. “No, sir.”Remus wasn’t entirely sure why he lied. It wouldn’t be a detriment to Sirius’s health or well-being, if Dumbledore knew he’d forced the vow on Malfoy. Then again, the Black heir had given Malfoy a blank cheque in exchange for the vow. Perhaps Dumbledore would find fault with that. Mostly, though, this secret felt like theirs—his and Sirius’s—even though Sirius knew nothing of what he he’d been protecting. Was it any real wonder, then, that Sirius Black wielded a wand made from the Whomping Willow? The guardian of a secret, ferocious and powerful, and unyielding in battle. If Remus was inclined to give credence to such things, he’d have to acknowledge it tasted awfully similar to fate.Dumbledore regarded him for a long moment, as though watching the truth flitter across every detail of Remus’s scarred face. Instead of pressing further, Dumbledore merely said, “You did well, today, Remus. The things you and Mr. Black saw in Knockturn Alley are disturbing and a cause for concern, so I sincerely thank you for bringing them to me. Rest assured, I will handle them as best as I am able to.” Dumbledore made to rise from his chair. “Now, though, I think it best that you and Mr. Black focus on your studies. It’s never too early to begin cramming for your final exams.”Remus stood, well aware that he was being dismissed. “Have a lovely evening, Remus.”“Sir,” Remus said, before he could lose his courage entirely. It’d been on his mind—constantly, incessantly—for a long damn time now. And Albus Dumbledore might just have the answer. He was known for providing miracles, after all. “Sirius Black has a tattoo. It’s a blood curse, sir. It wasn’t his choice.”This doesn’t seem to surprise Dumbledore at all.How could it, with the ghost of a man like Phineas Nigellus Black lurking behind him?“Ask your question, Remus.” And, really, it was the only question that mattered. “Is there a cure? A counter-curse? Something?”Anything, so that I might touch him.Dumbledore let out a sigh. “That is a mystery, I am afraid, you must figure out on your own.”The wolf very nearly snarled. Remus very nearly allowed it. “Does that mean there isn’t one, or that you don’t know?”“It means,” Dumbledore said, annunciating each word, “if there is a cure, I expect it is only known to those most motivated to find one.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ It took Remus nearly an hour to find Sirius.He found him in the first place he should have probably looked: crosslegged, as though in prayer, sitting under the Whomping Willow. The Whomping Willow was, miraculously, calm. It made no move to lash out at Remus, as it did every month when he cautiously approached the tree with Madam Pomfrey, stick in hand. The Willow was by no means frozen; instead, its branches swayed in the breeze, danced in the light rain, and reached out to caress Remus’s cheeks as he approached. Kindness, instead of ferocity. Sirius’s gaze was fixed on the Willow, wonder and awe painted clearly on his face. At some point, he’d cast an umbrella charm over himself, to keep off the rain, and he sat in a dry circle amidst the Willow’s gnarled roots, as though cradled by the might and power of the tree. Watching the tree carefully, so as not to set it off and disturb the magic of the afternoon, Remus approached, until he stood right behind Sirius. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his robes. He told himself it wasn’t to keep himself from reaching out and running his fingers through the knots in Sirius’s drying hair. “Your great-great grandfather sends his warmest regards.”Sirius barked a startled laugh. “I’m sure he did.” He half-turned to look up at Remus. An eyebrow went up. “Merlin, he didn’t try to hex you, did he? I know he’s dead, but I wouldn’t put it past him to try.”Remus shook his head and sat down, mirroring Sirius’s posture despite the twinge in his left knee. “I believe the exact wording was, ‘That boy will damn us all.’”Deadpan, Sirius said, “Here’s to hoping ol’ Phineas got that one drop of Seer’s blood the Blacks claimed to have acquired back during the Crusades.”“Here’s to hoping,” Remus echoed, even though hope was fickle and not something either of them could afford to trust. Remus edged imperceptibly closer. “How are you doing, Siri?”It was a loaded question: ammunition that could eviscerate the both of them.Sirius made a pathetic, lame gesture to the umbrella charm over their heads, to the dry grass beneath them, then to the Whomping Willow, calm and regal in all its majesty. “My wand works,” Sirius said.Gently, “That’s not what I asked.”Heartbroken wasn’t the right word for the magnitude and devastation left behind from the earthquake that shattered Sirius’s very being, but it was the only word Remus had.“I’m sorry, Remus,” Sirius croaked, sobbed, into the silence of the aftermath.Remus was pretty sure his jaw dropped. He floundered, tried to find the surface just to be able to breathe again. “You never have to apologise to me for breaking down or being scared. I need you to know that, Sirius.”Sirius shook his head. He looked down at his lap. A single, silver-tipped finger traced along the runes of his wand: reverent, as though worshipping a lover. “It’s not that.” Quiet words, barely whispered, laden with guilt.Realisation hit like the break of dawn. “You used Dark Magic to save your brother. It was your first spell and it killed your wand.”Remus tasted the truth in his words, even in its incompleteness. It tasted like truth, but it rolled off his tongue as a lie. Not deliberate—not a complicated deception—but still something that wouldn’t quite venture into the vicinity of objective truth.“Yeah.” A confession, at last. Remus wondered if his secret could ever die with such grace.“You saved me with Dark Magic, too, Sirius.”“Yeah.” Sirius winced. “Personally, I think I’d be a little offended if you regretted it.” Gallows humour, but it hit its mark.Sirius laughed, and it was glorious. “You shouldn’t, you know.” Remus nudged him. Just barely. Just enough to blaze a wild fire in both their souls. “Regret it, I mean. I know I already told you that, but it bears repeating. We all have darkness inside us, Sirius. You and I, perhaps a bit more than most.”Sirius stared at him for a long time before he said a simple, but infinitely important, “Thank you, Remus.”Remus allowed the silence to settle around them: a warm blanket in the storm. Overhead, the Willow performed its silent, mesmerising dance, to the soft, silent music of the falling rain and their beating hearts.It was peaceful, here, beneath the Willow. Remus felt protected—safe—and even the creature in his soul seemed to settle in for the time being, content to surrender his guard to a magic that neither the wolf nor Remus could never hope to fully understand.A magic—primal, yet wild, even in its infancy—now wielded by Sirius Black. There would never be another born more worthy.Vaguely, distantly, Remus wondered if Sirius’s parents knew of the power that itched just below the surface of their son’s skin. Remus could taste it, with every move Sirius made, with each inhalation. It was visceral and as untameable as the fox in the bedtime story Remus had first read so, so long ago. He wondered if perhaps that was why Orion and Walburga tried so hard to leash Sirius and bring him to heel, why they were so threatened by the idea of their heir sympathising with the enemy. He wondered if it meant that Sirius’s parents were afraid of him. Christ, he knew what that was like. Not for the same reason, and not even remotely in the same context, but still. Unlike Sirius’s parents, Lyall Lupin didn’t have the aristocratic upbringing that allowed for the stony exterior under which he hid his deepest fears. Lyall wore his heart on his sleeve, and even without the senses of the wolf, Remus would be able to taste the scent of fear in the air each day before the full moon. Orion… He was a snake. If he was afraid, he’d turn it to poison.Then, unbidden and entirely unprompted, yet unable and unwilling to clamp his jaw against the tide of the question, Remus blurted, “What in Christ’s name do you talk about with your father?”Sirius let loose another bark of startled laughter. He threw a side-eye at Remus, clearly trying to decipher the ebb and flow of his thoughts, as though they were nothing more than an ancient, untranslated tome of magic. “Not much,” Sirius replied. “The perpetuity of the Black line. My duties as the heir.” A sardonic smile. “The superiority of lemon cake over all other desserts.”That was… interesting? “What?”“It’s his one redeeming quality,” Sirius said sagely. “My father hates chocolate. So much so, it seems, that he somehow blessed me with the immense privilege of being allergic.”Remus crinkled his nose. “Mad men, the lot of you.”That one might have hit a little too close to home and Remus wanted to yank the words right out of the air between them. That, or go back in time about thirty seconds and slap himself upside the head. “Yeah, well.” Sirius fidgeted, tapping his wand against the top of his thigh. “Like father, like son.”And Remus wanted to protest, longed to destroy the doubt and self-annihilation that festered in Sirius’s mind from its very foundation, but that wasn’t what Sirius needed right now.A distraction, then. Even one laced with the same poison, in only a slightly more palatable flavour.“Have you met Tom Riddle before?”“No,” Sirius said, staring up at the branches of the Willow overhead. “But… I heard his name. Before. At Christmas.”“Both of them?” Remus had absolutely no intention of saying Riddle’s other name again any time soon. That name tasted foul, like the darkest of curses.There was a very real chance that’s exactly what it was.Sirius’s expression soured, but he shook his head. “Just the one.”Remus swallowed. “They called him Lord. Your father—““My father is a parasite.” Sirius let out a derisive snort. “He’s going to latch onto power, whatever for it’s in and wherever it’s at, until he bleeds it dry. Meanwhile, he’ll be getting fat on the spoils of a war that others will fight for him, in his name.”Remus had more he wanted to say—more he didn’t dare to say—about Tom Riddle, about the werewolf in Knockturn Alley and the war they were plotting between them, but Sirius asked, “What did Dumbledore have to say about the man who named himself the master of death?”The way Sirius said Dumbledore was hauntingly reminiscent of how his father had spat derisive slurs at Greyback’s Second. Perhaps that should have alarmed him, alerted him of some deeper malcontent, but it was the second half of Sirius’s question that stuck in Remus’s brain. Because, of course, Sirius had picked up on the meaning of that name. Sirius had grown up learning and speaking French, same as Remus. His accent was, naturally, a bit more posh, a bit more sophisticated than the rural lilt Remus had long ago picked up from his mother, but the language was the same.As was their understanding of the Latin root words. And that name… There was no mistaking the meaning behind it.
The man who named himself the master of death.
Remus remembered the way Dumbledore bowed his head, the broken, barely whispered, “Oh, Tom, what have you done?”“He was… concerned,” Remus said, eventually. Without hesitation, Sirius said, “You can’t trust him, Remus.”Part of him wanted to laugh, wanted to vomit, at the very idea of believing in a man who not only named himself the master of death but reeked of it. Even if Riddle promised Greyback’s Second a virtual paradise for their kind, it was a lie. A world like that didn’t exist for creatures like them, let alone a world gifted to them by pureblood sycophants. Then… Then, Sirius looked at him.In his eyes, there raged a fury, embers in the ashes left over from the rapture. The embers whispered songs of devastation and ruin, of a long-forgotten world, but—But one spark—one single, fragmented thought—and Remus knew the fiery maelstrom would rage once more, devouring even the ashes that the final execution had left behind.A spark, a thought, a song.Sirius Black wasn’t speaking of Tom Riddle at all. Remus recalled the snarl at Cuckoo, when their former professor merely suggested that their presence in Knockturn Alley was at the behest of Albus Dumbledore. He remembered the teeth bared in fury, the relentless pacing in McGonagall’s office. Remus had chalked it all up to the trauma of the day, in all its varying forms, from Ollivander’s to Knockturn, but…
I have nothing to say to Albus Dumbledore.
And, Dumbledore can fuck right off.And…Honestly, Remus felt lost, blindsided, left wandering alone in the woods after dark with his hands bound behind his back. From the moment they met—the very instant Sirius sat down next to him in that compartment and squashed himself against the window—in all that time, every instinct the wolf had ever had came roaring to life. The wolf howled, clawed, demanded on pain of retribution that Remus do everything in his power to keep the boy who feared the touch of strangers—the boy who tasted of wild magic and starlight—safe.Mine, the wolf growled, not in agreement, but in a definitive, unbreakable oath that Remus would never dare to speak aloud.Disagreeing with Sirius on something as monumental as this felt unnatural.Unholy. The thing was—the tragic truth of the matter—both Remus and the wolf owed Albus Dumbledore their life and that… That was a primal sort of magic neither of them cared to contest. A life debt was a tricky thing, Remus’s father had told him after they’d made the journey on the Knight Bus from Diagon Alley back to Wales.It’d been the day after Dumbledore’s visit.A life debt, Remus’s father had said, relied on temperamental, ever-changing potentialities. On futures not yet written, but likely to come to pass. On alternative timelines—now broken and left to rot—that brought nothing but the reaper’s scythe. It was all very poetic, his father had admitted, but that was, perhaps, why it relied on the most primal of magic. It was the kind of magic that even Muggles understood.A life for a life. The moment Albus Dumbledore showed up on his doorstep, the entire trajectory of Remus’s life changed forever. All the pages of his future that both he and his father desperately tried to forget, every possible future and every bloody end annihilated in the fraction of a moment it took for Dumbledore to raise his hand and knock. It was a touch of magic, this knock. There was no other way to describe it.Suddenly, Remus’s world no longer revolved around running, ad infinitum, from Fenrir Greyback and his ravenous cult of bloodthirsty monsters. He’d never be forced to register his status and accept the Ministry’s brand when he turned seventeen. His magic would never be left suppressed and untamed, damned to war with the wolf until it quite literally carved Remus in two. Remus owed everything to Dumbledore. Before that knock, there was no future written for him that didn’t end in wailing and grinding of teeth.Without Dumbledore, Remus would have never met Sirius Black. Or, if they had met, by some happenstance or trick of fate, they’d be fighting on opposite sides of a never-ending war. So… everything. All that he was, all that he wanted to be, all of it, he owed to Albus Dumbledore. Remus was… grateful wasn’t the right word. It wasn’t strong enough. He was proud of the life debt he owed, because the day after the knock, he woke up and there was no longer a noose around his neck. The debt he owed Dumbledore wasn’t something he was capable of regretting, let alone cursing and bemoaning. Next to him, Sirius seethed in the silence, fury radiating off him in waves and little sparks of magic. It was a fury that threatened to damn Remus to the darkest corner of hell if he even tried to give it a voice. Not knowing what to say—not knowing what could possibly fill the void gnawing its way between them—Remus cleared his throat and whispered the only thing that had ever made sense in his broken universe.A name, a song, an oath. “Sirius?” Except it came out like a heartbreak.Sirius’s jaw ticked. He stared straight ahead, and if Remus didn’t know how much Sirius revered and respected the Whomping Willow, he’d be worried Sirius was aiming in the direction of spontaneously combusting the tree in front of them, even as it danced peacefully in the breeze. “Who’s the monster in Frankenstein?”The question sent a shockwave down Remus’s spine. “What?”Finally—finally—Sirius turned to face him. The mad, red-hot fury was gone, replaced by something soft, something almost kind, but no less deadly. “Who is the monster in Shelley’s Frankenstein, Remus?” Sirius repeated, each word precise and carefully calculated. “Is it Victor, or is it his creation?”The question sounded like an answer Remus never wanted to consider.Sirius slammed his eyes shut, and, for a frightening moment, Remus thought he might be holding back tears. There’d been far too many tears today. “I told you it was a love story, Remus.” There was an unmistakable, incomprehensible sorrow in Sirius’s voice. “You weren’t listening.”It sounded more like a plea than an accusation. “The creature—“ (though Sirius grimaced his way through the cruelty of the term) “—wanted nothing more than to understand his own existence. He was abandoned by his creator, left alone to the wilderness, without so much as the dignity of a name of his own. Then, miracle of miracles, he found a home. When he found the blind man, he fell in love. The creature learned of love for the first time in his existence not from his creator, but through the world-crafters and poets in the pages of the blind man’s books. For the first time, the creature knew what it was—how sacred it was—to be alive, because the natural, uncorrupted privilege of life lends itself to love. The creature understood that in a way that not even the poets who crafted those words ever possibly could.”Remus bit his lip to keep his jaw from dropping.
The natural, uncorrupted privilege of life lends itself to love.
Christ.They’d talked about this before, for hours and at length, but now… It was as if Remus was hearing the arguments for the first time. It felt real, now. As real as the taste of magic on his tongue or the brush of the Willow’s branches against his cheek. Maybe, like the creature in Shelley’s masterpiece, Remus simply wanted to know the secrets of the universe.And Sirius Black was one hell of a poet and crafter of worlds. “Then…” Sirius’s voice seemed to drop an octave, laden with the unimaginable despair known only to Atlas and any other poor soul damned to shoulder the weight of the universe. “Then, the humans he loved so much found themselves at his doorstep and they…” Remus heard ever word of torment Sirius didn’t say. The creature’s fate lurked in the wings, ready to devour Remus, too, if his secret ever got out. “He loved them, wholly and indomitably. Even with their pitchforks and torches, he still risked his own life to pull that little girl from the river.”Sirius nearly choked on his next words. “He still loved them.”But Remus had read the novel too. Maybe not as many times or with as much reverence as Sirius, but he knew the story. It haunted his every waking nightmare, left a bitter taste of iron in his mouth with every rise of the moon. “The people reviled him,” Remus said. “His love for them didn’t matter. They still turned on him. That’s why he became a monster.”“No.”Sirius’s voice was unrelenting, as though that single word was every possible answer to the moral and philosophical debate chaotically strewn between them.Remus, though, knew the truth on a level he prayed Sirius would never come to realise. “The monster killed William, killed the bride, killed Victor. He became the wild beast the whole world knew him to be. That’s the whole point, Sirius. Everyone else could see the monster from the start, even if the creature did his best to pretend to be human.”Again, just, “No.”Remus wasn’t convinced he wanted to win this fight. Still, “Sirius—““All he wanted was to be loved, Remus, as he’d dreamt about since he’d first learned what it meant to be alive. He wanted to love, and when humanity rejected him, he sought solace in his creator’s words, but there was none to be found.”Sirius traced the runes on his wand and would not meet Remus’s gaze. “A man like Victor Frankenstein is not capable as something as fundamentally human as love. Men who declare themselves gods never are.”Remus knew now, of course, that this had never been about Victor Frankenstein.Still, Remus said, “Frankenstein gave life to the creature. A life he never would have had if not for Frankenstein’s kindness.”“Kindness?!” And there, again, was that Black ferocity, the venomous bite that Remus had witnessed first in Orion, then in Phineas Nigellus. Nearly spitting out the words, Sirius went on,“Try cruelty. What sort of man—sort of monster—breathes life into a creature for no other reason than to further his own glory or prove his assumed divinity to those he’s deemed lesser mortals?”Remus opened his mouth. Sirius gave no quarter. “What sort of monster, disgusted by the creation he was—by nature—consigned to love, abandons his broken creature to a world incapable of understanding the truest desires of its heart?”Sometimes, Sirius asked these questions that caused Remus to lose all ability to formulate even a semblance of an answer. “So,” Sirius continued. “Rejected by humanity, the creature seeks out his creator with a single, insignificant ask. Why? Why create something you refuse to love and let live? When his creator dismisses the question, the creature simply asks instead for a mate. Finally, for someone—something—to love him unconditionally, as Frankenstein never could.”Remus’s wolf nearly broke his chains at the cadence and ferocity of the word mate rolling off Sirius’s tongue. Sirius, though, was lost in the story. “But Victor killed the mate, because nothing disgusted him more than the idea of his monster finding love.”“So the monster killed his creator,” Remus finished, because there was no avoiding the final damnation written on the very last page.Sirius looked at him, dead on. Starlight bled from his eyes, in a single, furious tear carving its path down his cheek, until it caught on the curve of his upper lip. Sirius’s tongue lapped out to taste it. Remus swallowed.“I’d have done the same damn thing, “ Sirius said. He looked away. “I still will, if Silas and Peeves have anything to say about it.”The very thought was enough to fuel Remus’s nightmares for the next fifty years or so.“You can’t trust him, Remus,” Sirius said again, in the same deadly cadence as the first time. Except now, Remus had a bit more context.Sirius regarded him for a long moment without offering anything else. He just… stared. Remus wondered if Sirius was any closer to deciphering the myriad of scars and unpaid ransoms etched into Remus’s flesh. What might it mean if Sirius finally asked the right question?Silver and chains, the wolf answered for him.“You heard her, right? The werewolf?” Sirius’s question sent a shock right through him, and for a startling moment, he wondered if he’d given too much slack on reins he kept on the wolf. But… That wasn’t the right question, the one Remus knew was coming. The one he would do anything to prevent. So, Remus recovered as quickly as possible and, forcing himself back into the conversation, he gave Sirius a single, robotic nod. As if he wouldn’t be spending the looming night and subsequent morning reliving and deconstructing Lorna Kane’s every word in vivid detail.“The Old Man has a werewolf in reserve,” Sirius said, and despite the growing numbness to shock and terror Remus seemed to have developed after each, consecutive traumatic event of the day, Sirius’s words still caused his blood to turn to ice. The manic, terrified part of his brain that was half reckless Gryffindor and half untamed werewolf wanted to grab Sirius’s shoulders—cry, beg, shout until his voice was hoarse—because, for Christ’s sake, how could Sirius not see the truth right in front of him?“A werewolf in the wings, ready to answer to the Old Man’s every beck and call,” Sirius continued, and it felt like the final, piercing nail in Remus’s coffin. Mr. Hyde certainly didn’t appreciate that particular sentiment.“What do you think Dumbledore had to do to acquire that kind of debt from a Dark Creature?”Christ, Remus knew the answer. Even if it would confirm Sirius’s every suspicion, was everything Sirius wanted to hear. “I think,” Remus said, drawing it out, “that Dumbledore offered the same bargain that Riddle offered Lorna Kane. A home. A family.” Remus struggled not to choke on the words. “A forest, instead of a cellar.”But the truth was so much more. To a creature like Remus, Hogwarts was only ever meant to be a fairy-tale: a story his father told him before bed, to chase away the very real monsters that lurked in his nightmares. And, Christ, how he’d dreamed of this place.He’d pried every story, every scrap of information from his father, whose descriptions and recounting of Hogwarts became far more bleak and sparse as Remus’s eleventh birthday came and went without a single owl. He’d foolishly allowed himself to believe that he’d have a place here. He was a wizard, after all. Just like his father. He was a wizard long before he became a werewolf, even if his magic didn’t come until later.Remus had been five the first time he’d displayed accidental magic. It’d only been a few months since Greyback’s attack and it’d been the first full moon since his father moved their family to their small cottage in Wales. When Remus woke up in the cellar for the first time, naked and bleeding and so very alone, the magic inherent and owed to him from both his father’s bloodline and the creature that had tried to rend his flesh from his bones, simply erupted from Remus’s fingertips in a single howl of agony. The door to the cellar had shattered from its hinges. The next morning, his father had paid someone to reinforce the cellar door with silver. He’d used all the meagre savings left in his Gringotts vault, with just enough left over to buy the workman’s silence after.Remus Lupin was never meant to go to Hogwarts. And that…That haunted him more than most of his nightmares.Regardless of Dumbledore’s intentions—regardless of the chain and leash Sirius would no doubt see around Remus’s neck, if only he knew the truth—Remus would dwindle to nothing without his bargain with Dumbledore. A life without Sirius… Christ, that thought alone threatened to strangle him.This life was worth its ransom, whatever that might be.Above them, the sky sunk into a deeper, hazier grey as the sun—still hidden behind the dense rain clouds—dipped further along the horizon. Sudden shivers wracked through his body. Remus wasn’t entirely sure it if was because of his still-damp robes or the bite of cold in the breeze. As though reading his mind—Christ, Sirius seemed to be capable of that since the moment they’d met, except, of course, regarding all things about Remus that mattered—Sirius waved his wand in a small circle above his head. A warming charm descended over both of them. If Remus momentarily surrendered control to Mr. Hyde, allowed the creature to open his mouth and taste the stark, shocking reality of Sirius’s magic… Well, no one could blame him.Sirius turned his gaze to the elegant, dancing branches of the Willow and the sky above them. “No stars tonight,” he said.No moon, either. At least not one visible from this earth. But the stars…The stars had long ago been stolen from the heavens. He wasn’t sure when—he wasn’t even sure if it was simply by virtue of his name—but the stars that once reigned in majesty now seemed to only exist in the fantastic whirlpool of silver-lined magic in Sirius’s eyes. He was beautiful and every bit as worthy of exaltation of his name amongst the cosmos. Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky. An anchor of sanity for wandering travellers of countless generations past. Remus would never lose his way—lose himself— in the comforting aura of Sirius’s magic and starlight. Safe. Home, said the wolf. Then, once more, with an air of damnation: Mine.For what was the moon if not tethered to the stars?Remus could not tear his eyes away from Sirius, even if the fates chose that very moment to send the sky crashing down around them.I love you, thought Remus, and it was so simple, so sudden, that it nearly tripped and fell right off the tip of his tongue. And, oh, Christ, that might as well be the dull, silver knife used in his own execution. I love you. Just a whisper in his brain, and maybe it’d been there for a while. Maybe it’d been there since the very beginning. It felt natural, inevitable, like the rise of dawn after an endless night of chaos and destruction.I love you, and I shouldn’t. The voice of reason, the voice of his father, loud and resilient even as the truth of it pierced Remus’s heart. I shouldn’t, but I do, because it was just so simple, loving Sirius Black. Remus was ready to damn himself for just a taste of what that life might be like. He’d march straight into the gates of hell, the maw of destiny, jeered and ridiculed by those who—with an air of both moral and philosophical superiority—spat that a creature like Remus was not old enough—not human enough—to know the magnitude of those words. “Remus?” There was a question in beautiful, silver eyes.It still wasn’t the right question.I love you. Echoing, roaring through his head to the beat of resounding drums. It was—miraculously—Remus’s own voice, not the wolf’s. Not his father’s. Just…
I love you. I love you. I love you.
Indomitable. That was the word for it.“It’s… nothing,” Remus said, because, Christ, he had to. Reality slammed down around him, once more binding him in the silver chains of circumstance and destinies already written.There was no world in which the story of Frankenstein’s monster and the boy damned to kill a god ended in anything but tragedy. Sirius allowed the lie, and maybe that was the best possible outcome. Secrets, after all, kept Remus safe. Kept him here, next to Sirius Black.Sirius raised his wand, directing the swaying branches of the Whomping Willow in a choreographed dance, like a conductor before an orchestra, carefully guiding a mass of symphonies and disjointed rhythms into a beautiful, haunting melody that had, up until that point, only existed in his own head.“My magic feels different.” At the alarmed look Remus was certain spread across his face, Sirius clarified, “Not bad. Just… more, I guess. Like I accidentally ventured beyond the Veil, got lost in the nothing for such a long time, and now… It’s like I’m learning to breathe again. Nothing could be more natural, but I’ve almost forgotten how to do it.”Sometimes, Sirius said these things—asked these questions—and Remus wondered if he’d have been born a poet in another life. Or, perhaps he’d been born a poet in this life. That thought was infinitely more dangerous.“Your eyes went gold, you know,” Sirius said. “When I made that rose.”The rose, now safely tucked away in Remus’s trunk, where he kept all of his other sacred possessions: his mother’s letters (though few and far between), the key to his grandmother’s cottage in the south of France, the copy of Frankenstein Sirius so loved to steal. That damned book smelled like Sirius now. Remus secretly prayed the scent would never fade.To Remus’s silence, Sirius said, “It happened again, I think. Amber to gold, in just a heartbeat. In Knockturn, just before the Auror’s showed up. After I cast that shield charm.”Ah.That’d been Mr. Hyde, asserting his claim, tasting the magic of his sacrifice for the very first time. Revelling at the soul-rending flavour of his and Sirius’s magic tied together, once and for eternity. “Trick of the light,” came Remus’s rote, automatic response.Sirius leaned close. Not touching, but almost. Whispered, “Your eyes look gold now.”Mine, said the wolf.Remus swallowed around the word and the chaotic mantra of his own frantic, repeating drumbeat. He actively refused to allow himself the euphoria of thinking those three words again.Still, Remus didn’t want to—didn’t think he could—muster up another lie to tell Sirius. To write off the wolf’s instincts, his own desires, as nothing. He couldn’t do it. Not with all the lies already strewn in the graveyard before them. So, he let Sirius’s unspoken question fester. It wasn’t the right question.
Close, close, so goddamned close.
And… what then, if Sirius found his way to the right question?What would happen if the blind man suddenly realised what kind of monster he’d allowed into his home?Remus knew the answer, knew how the story ended. “Promise me something, Sirius,” he heard himself say.It was cruel and unfair, but while Sirius remained blind, Remus would never have to worry about Sirius raising a pitchfork against him. For now, he was allowed to believe that his story might end differently, even if he knew it was a lie, knew he was only putting off the inevitable. Sirius’s reply was unconditional. “Anything.”Remus ducked his head, ran a hand through his almost-dry hair, unable to face the world as he handed Sirius Black the silver bullet that would surely destroy every trace of Remus’s existence. “Promise me you’ll never ask me where I got the teeth.”Sirius gave him a look that threatened to shatter what was left of Remus’s beating heart, but he nodded. Crossed his heart with his finger. “Promise.”It wasn’t a magically binding oath—just a single word whispered between friends—and there were days coming when Remus would wish it was more. Wish he’d done more to bind the blind man to his ignorance. For now, though…For now, it was enough, because the roaring drumbeat in his ear—those three, fatal words, over and over and over—lulled to a single, silent rhythm that Remus knew he could trick himself into forgetting, if only he tried hard enough. Mine, said the wolf, stubbornly. Definitively. Catastrophically. “Thank you,” Remus said, slamming his eyes shut, lest they once more turn to gold and utterly betray him.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Frankenstein’s Monster, Part I
MAY 25, 1972
“What does Albus Dumbledore have on Remus?”The question, in its various forms, had been floating around in Sirius’s head for a month now. The first iteration of the question had been simple. It had been the thesis of his entire argument: a long, elegant knife directly to the crux of the issue at hand. It’d come to him in a dream of a better world, immediately before it’d quite literally jolted him awake in the middle of the night, not long after he’d gotten his wand back.
Why did Remus trust Dumbledore
?
He shouldn’t, goddamnit.Sirius thought he’d been pretty clear on that. He’d grown up with people like Dumbledore: people vying for power, playing war-games over Sunday dinner with the same fervour and wrath with which most people stared at the Sunday crossword. And, Merlin, at the end of the day, how many people—how many souls—had sworn their allegiance to Albus Dumbledore, only to be left strewn on the battlefield before the Old Man finally mustered up the goddamned courage to fight that duel against Grindelwald?But Remus did trust him. Sirius knew he did, even after Sirius laid out all of Dumbledore’s sins. Granted, Sirius had veiled everything in a metaphor, but he knew Remus had followed it. He’d seen it in Remus’s eyes. But Remus hadn’t agreed.That… That stung, more than just a dagger to his pride. That kind of trust in a man such as Dumbledore was dangerous. Still, he hadn’t been able to ask Remus that question. It didn’t feel like the right question, and he could already taste Remus’s refusal to answer. He’d known that that question—the wrong one, about misplaced trust in a false god—had been mired in the secret Remus still refused to speak aloud. That thought had sent Sirius spiralling and careening down a rabbit hole of secrets and half truths, and when he’d finally tumbled out into the brave new world without a single answer, he’d been left with nothing but his own insecurities and self-loathing. He hadn’t wanted to speak to anyone for a few days, despite James’s generally dazzling and persuasive personality, Lily’s worn but concerned half-smiles she was no longer trying to hide, and Remus’s—
Merlin.
Remus hadn’t leave his side, hadn’t said a damn word about the self-annihilation on Sirius’s face, written in plain English for the whole damn world to see. He’d stayed at Sirius’s side, gently—briefly—nudging him in the directions he needed to go. He’d made Sirius’s plate at dinner, had poured Sirius’s coffee without a word of complaint or even an attempt to pester an explanation out of him, even as James and Lily had whispered about sending him off to Madam Pomfrey. Remus had just been there, had silently and subtly made his presence known, and that was so much more than enough. On the third night of this deafening silence, Remus had snagged Sirius’s sleeve and tugged him out onto the roof. Once Sirius had settled back into the shingles, duvet wrapped tightly around his shoulders despite the mildness of the night, Remus had pressed his copy of Frankenstein into Sirius’s hand.“Read to me,” he’d said. Then, shattering everything left in Sirius’s heart, “Show me what you see, Sirius.”So, Sirius had forced himself to swallow around the second iteration of the question—still the wrong question, goddamnit—even though it had lodged itself in his throat, threatening to break loose and ruin absolutely everything.Why don’t you trust me, Remus?Instead, Sirius had started reading, and the importance of the question—the words that dug poisoned fingers into his exposed heart—had faded away to nothing. That night, he’d had that goddamned dream again. The nightmare, he’d never be able to properly define. He’d stood, entranced, in a faceless, silent crowd, tracing the scars on Remus’s face, trying to decipher the right question in the rough topography of Remus’s skin. Merlin, how Sirius had begged and bartered with the universe to stay in the warm comfort of the dream-maybe-nightmare.(Nightmare, he decided with an air of finality. But only because the dream had ended with the cruelty of the breaking dawn.)He’d woken against his better judgment with the taste of the future lingering on his tongue and a new resolve thrumming in his heart. He wanted that future: the one where Remus Lupin had held him close, as though the sky was falling around them, and had tugged at Sirius’s lips with his teeth, muttering increasingly frustrated variations of, “That goddamned tongue ring.” He wanted that future desperately, irrevocably. Inconsolably. So, he’d changed his line of questioning entirely, in a frantic, desperate belief that the right question might tether him to that future before it slipped through his fingers, lost in the oblivion of nothing. And this time, instead of mere passive questioning—waiting helplessly for the universe to bend to his will and reveal its secrets—there’d been action.He’d accompanied James on an epic, world-ending mission to flood the Slytherin dorms. (It’d been moderately successful. There’d been a few carefully aimed constipation hexes, an obsessive-compulsive potion unknowingly supplied by the King of Gryffindor in the guise of extra credit in Slughorn’s class, and a “culturally exploratory” dinner of Mexican burritos that Peter had convinced the house elves to serve, and poof. Every toilet in the Slytherin dorms had been clogged due to… excessive flushing. There’d been a foot of standing water in the dungeon for a week, not that Sirius had been gloating.) Beyond the chaos that was in his very nature to reap and sow, Sirius had kept himself busy. He’d sat with Lily in the library, each of them vying for top of their class. He’d attended tutoring with McGonagall, where she’d studied him in turn, as cautious and curious as the cat that lived in her soul, but she’d continued to call him by his first name. And, each night, he’d read to Remus on the roof. Remus, who, by Sirius’s count, had been perfectly damn capable of reading to himself, thank you very much, but Sirius hadn’t minded. Remus said he’d wanted to see the story through Sirius’s eyes, and… That mattered, somehow. More than he knew how to put into words. So, he’d read Frankenstein, and Remus listened, even as he gave no indication of a change of heart. Even as Remus had cringed and fidgeted with a loose string on his sweater at the creature’s every tragic, murderous rampage. A few nights later, Sirius had both laughed and cried his way through The Picture of Dorian Gray, simply because Remus had referred to Oscar Wilde as quintessential. He’d loved it, of course, but not as much as Frankenstein. Dorian Gray made a choice to sell his soul. Frankenstein’s creature was damned to exist without one from the very start. The difference was, well…Quintessential.Then, he’d read Call of the Wild. It’d been a first for the both of them, and one Lily had quite literally thrown in his face on several different occasions. Sirius sobbed through the end, when Buck tore his way through the flesh of those who killed his master. He’d been alone, stranded on a field of corpses, and left to become a ghost in the cool, winter breeze. Remus had been absolutely mortified throughout the entire book, but he hadn’t said a word to stop Sirius from reading the end. If, a few days later, he’d seen Remus shove the book back into Lily’s hands and whisper some choice adjectives, Sirius hadn’t been about to bring it up. Apparently, Remus hadn’t been a fan of American literature.Just like always, heartbreak and distractions had eventually given way to madness and fury, and Merlin, how Sirius loved to play with fire. Unlike all the times before, he’d finally had a wand that not only obeyed his command, but also—much like the boy who wielded it—had seemed to salivate at the prospect of retribution. His hexes had landed with deadly force, his jinxes had stung that much more. He’d slowly been honing his ability to use his left hand as to send a secondary, wandless hex before his opponent had even a second to draw a breath, let alone enough presence of mind to throw up a shield. The first time he’d tried it, in the safety of McGonagall’s office, Sirius was convinced she’d almost fainted. Of course, her shock had very quickly melted into a lecture, mostly at the audacity of a secondary, wandless curse, and I’ve never heard of such a thing, and Sirius, that is horribly irresponsible, and, You can very easily burn out your own magic if you aren’t careful. Except… he never did. Not when he’d been hexed the ever living shit out of Rabastan Lestrange in a spontaneous duel that was meant for Fabian Prewett, but one Sirius had gladly accepted in Fabian’s stead when Gideon had quite literally sat on his brother’s chest and had refused to let him leave the Gryffindor common room. Nor did his magic fail him when he’d duelled against McGonagall, practicing various shield charms held up by his wand whilst firing out hexes with his left hand, from the comfort and safety behind said shield charm. It’d just worked. It’d felt natural, combining the familiar wandless magic with his resurrected, miraculous wand. If, perhaps, he’d gotten a bit reckless after putting Lestrange in the hospital wing for nearly a week, then, well… He’d studiously ignored the ever-deepening frown lines on James Potter’s face with each and ever savage hex Sirius fired. He’d clocked the concern in both Lily’s eyes as he’d spiralled closer and closer to the cusp of insanity. That, too, had been ignored, along with each and every one of McGonagall’s mutterings of deescalation and conflict resolution. Sirius had been well aware that he was suffocating: slowly drowning in a wave of hexes, retribution, and the flames of gold that had sparked in Remus’s eyes whenever he’d thought Sirius wasn’t watching. Sirius was always watching, and each flash of gold—each manifestation of the secrets and questions trapped between them—Mutually assured destruction. This new lease on life had allowed for very few—if any—inhibitions, which had landed both Sirius and his fellow Marauders with weeks’ worth of detentions. In the middle of that particular crusade of chaos and lowered inhibitions, it had been announced at breakfast one morning in mid-April that Hagrid would be taking over Cuckoo’s former classes for the rest of the term. Hagrid’s appointment had taken several weeks, pending Wizengamot emergency approval. Approval, by Sirius’s estimation, that had only been granted because the school year was almost up and there’d been literally no other candidates. Not that Sirius had held anything against Hagrid. Hagrid, in Sirius’s strict opinion, was ten times more qualified than Cuckoo had ever been. Everyone else had seemed to share that sentiment as well, even if Hagrid’s appointment meant they had to give up the extra free period they’d had since Cuckoo left. Remus, having nowhere else to go now that Rattleburn was no longer there to supervise his independent study, had once more been roped into Care of Magical Creatures. (This was, of course, despite numerous protests during Sirius’s tutoring sessions with McGonagall, in which Remus had crashed the session, yelled quite a bit, but hadn’t really said anything. Instead, he’d kept glancing at Sirius, as if one errant word from Remus’s mouth might shatter every secret between them. Sirius had listened, goddamnit, but no secrets had been forthcoming.)There’d been genuine tears in Remus’s eyes when Hagrid’s kneazle, Spot, had marched right up to Remus, wrapped her excessively long tail around his leg, and had stared up at him, purring, as though Remus bore the sole responsibility for the break of dawn each morning.Sirius wasn’t a cat person by any stretch of the imagination, but he’d absolutely melted at the rapture on Remus’s face as he’d offered the back of his hand to Spot in a gesture of friendship. Then, Hagrid’s gruff voice had cut across the clearing: “Ah, Lupin. She likes you. Always picks out the good ones, she does.”Sirius hadn’t said anything about the single tear that tracked down Remus’s face. In fact, he’d hexed Peter’s mouth shut before the moron could open it and ruin absolutely everything.Spot hadn’t left Remus’s lap for the entire class. For perhaps the first time all year, Care of Magical Creatures hadn’t been the problem.The problem had presented itself the next day, in the form of the Wizengamot’s temporary replacement for Defence Against the Dark Arts. It’d been just as Sirius had fucking predicted, pacing ruthlessly back and forth in McGonagall’s office, as Rattleburn had tendered her resignation.“It’s been awhile since I taught this class,” Albus-fucking-Dumbledore had said, standing at the front of Rattleburn’s old classroom. Her Hufflepuff banner had still been hanging above the chalkboard. “You’ll forgive me if I may need to refresh my knowledge on the subject.”Everyone, naturally, had been rather starstruck. Jaws had hit the floor. Any notion of fucking with the replacement had evaporated into nothing. There’d been a nauseating chorus of Yes, sir’s, to which Sirius had absolutely refused to lend his voice. Instead, he’d gnashed his teeth, bit his tongue, and had quite literally shoved a Hufflepuff out of the desk at the back of the room, closest to the door. With a knowing look that spoke so much more of comprehension rather than the acquiescence Sirius so desperately longed for, Remus had taken his place next to Sirius. Then, rather than convalescing in Sirius’s misery, Remus had turned adoring amber eyes up to the Old Man, straining his neck—though he didn’t fucking need to given how damn tall he was—just to get a better view. These people—James, Lily, Peter, Remus and all the goddamned Hufflepuffs—they worshipped Dumbledore. Sirius hadn’t doubted it for a second; not with the frantic waving of hands in the air, trying to race each other to the proper answers, desperate for the approval of a great man. All of them—even Remus and Lily, to some extent—had grown up with stories that painted the Old Man as the hero in every fairy tale, yet mysteriously left out all the gory details and forgotten endings. Sirius had… Well, he’d grown up with the gory details and every ending not encompassed by a lynchpin happily ever after. He’d only ever known the harsh reality of fairy tales: that people like Dumbledore were nothing more than agents of fate. Monsters, like Dumbledore, longed for a taste of the ambrosia of the gods. Once he thought he’d had it, the Old Man would cut down every miserable, broken creature that stood between him and his Elysium. He’d been clever, too. That was what made the Old Man dangerous. Oh, so clever, because the mortals that had still dwelled on his earth were as fickle as his own heart. So as to quell the rebellion in their hearts, the Old Man had worked relentlessly to become a puppet master. There’d come a day, Sirius knew, when the puppy master would begin his search for a hapless, hopeless, fool, who had nowhere else to go, nowhere to turn, except perhaps to sell his soul to a false god. The Old Man would tie the strings to the fool, craft him into a warrior, put him up on a pedestal for all to admire, and make the fool dance, fight his battles, project mesmerising shadows on the wall of the cave to appease the mortals. But… there’d come a time for sacrifice. This was war, after all, and the gods longed for the taste of human blood. It would never be a price Albus Dumbledore himself would pay. It would be a ransom for the fools and knaves, not the men who deigned to declare themselves a god. He would bind the hands of the poor fool, lash his puppet to an alter of stone, then have the fucking nerve to call his fool—this creature he’d created—a hero, even as he called down the gods to devour his sacrifice.Sirius Black wouldn’t fucking stand for it. Not if the Old Man intended to martyr Remus.Remus was his.Slouched in the back of the room, Sirius had let the fire in his heart bring his blood to a boil, until his magic had been chaotically sparking in the corners of his eyes, on the tips of his fingers, in every snarl of his teeth. Perhaps, this was exactly what he was destined to be: a well-placed powder-keg, ready to explode given even the slightest spark. And if he took down the meticulously-crafted facade of Albus Dumbledore in the explosion, Sirius would laugh as the gods escorted the both of them to the gates of hell.For the good of the many be the damnation of the one. Throughout the class, Dumbledore had called on him no less than three times. The first had been under the pretence of camaraderie and academic excellence: given that Sirius was the top of the class, he’d naturally know the particular subjects they’d been discussing prior to Rattleburn’s departure. Sirius had been used to this—expecting it, even: appeasement of the Black heir to gain personal favours from his parents. This had been different, perhaps, because there was every possibility that Albus Dumbledore had been testing his resolve, but it’d felt familiar. So, in that moment, he’d embraced his name, his title, and every drop of regality in his blood as he swore his silent vengeance against the Old Man.Sirius had’t uttered a damned word. He’d simply allowed the truth of his being manifest itself in his eyes. Dumbledore had seen it, too: the future Sirius promised him. For the briefest moment, imperceptible to every other soul in the room still utterly blinded by their own notions of hero-worship, Dumbledore had seemed… scared. Sirius had simply smirked, and it tasted like rage and triumph. Men like Dumbledore would be wise to fear a boy cursed to kill a god.The fire in his blood hadn’t left him after the sudden appearance of the Headmaster in his formerly-favourite class. He’d nearly forced the door to fly off his hinges with a simple flick of his wrist the second the lunch bell rang. He’d refused to talk to anyone, including Remus, as he’d seethed and stared at his dinner, because….Because, he’d seen it, goddamnit. He couldn’t stop seeing it: the strings—the goddamned strings—tethering each of his friends to their puppet-master. James, in his undeniable and unquestioning worship of the Old Man, based on bedtime stories and half truths. Peter, because, well, he was an idiot and would swear allegiance to anyone claiming to be the strongest and bravest. Lily, because she was brave and loyal to a fault, because she had no reason to question what had been told, because she was kind and a better king than Dumbledore could ever hope to be. And Remus…Remus, because…Fuck. That was the fucking question, wasn’t it?Remus was smart, capable. Traumatised, sure, but… Remus, of all people, should be able to see the truth. Or at least acknowledge it when Sirius provided him with highly compelling metaphors.Which meant, of course, that Sirius had still been missing something.All of that had been a long-winded way of explaining exactly how the King of Gryffindor had ended up in detention with her most dangerous and highly unpredictable Marauder.Technically, Lily had been trying to stop him, but, really, it couldn’t be helped. Sirius had been furious, and the Carrow twins had been there.Filch had been there too, apparently, and hadn’t cared in the slightest that Lily had been the one to cast the counter-hex on Carrow #2. He’d marched them straight to detention—no use in arguing—and had left them in the care of Madam Pince, sorting books for the end of term. Lily had cursed him out—probably continued to curse him out—but he’d tuned her out and had gone back to seething. He still needed answers, goddamnit, because answers meant he could prevent Remus from becoming a shadow-puppet in Dumbledore’s quest for immortality. What had Frankenstein done to force his creature into submission? He’d made him into a perversion of humanity. He’d forced him to live apart, told him he was a worthless, pathetic monster, and left him alone to die.In hindsight, the third iteration of the question had been born from rage. He’d known it, even as it flew, unbidden, from his lips. The cloud of wrath and fury had yet to fade from Sirius’s brain, and he’d still very much wanted to pick a fight with anyone in the room.Lily had just so happened to be there.“Do you think Dumbledore is responsible for Remus’s scars?”Lily had frozen in place, her head still bent over her book, hand caught in midair between the pages. She’d frowned, tilted her head, as though trying to decide if she’d heard him right.Sirius had repeated the question. For posterity. It’d been the first iteration of the question he’d dared to ask aloud, and only then, because he’d existed, at the time, in a realm made of vengeance and wrath. He’d known, down to every drop of his still-boiling blood, that the question had not the one he so desperately searched for. Still, he’d revelled in the taste of insanity on his tongue.Her eyes had cut to him, green and infinite, caught somewhere between horror and bemusement.The question had been wrong, but he’d be damned if he couldn’t defend it. It’d felt like justice, at the time: a foreign, pervasive daydream from a realm where mortals dared to put their gods on trial for their sins. So, he’d said, “Think about it, Evans. Remus has to go home, but he’d never used the fucking floo before we went to Diagon. He disappears for a few days, then he ends up in the hospital wing, scarred and bloody. Someone has to be doing that to him. Why not Dumbledore? Who the fuck better than the greatest wizard of our time? Who else could be cruel enough to wilfully cover up and excuse the torture of a child?”All in all, it hadn’t been great reasoning. He’d known that and he’d mentally ticked off the numerous fallacies even as he’d spoken them. But, the fire in his belly had wanted it to be true, desperately, so it’d have something else, besides his own entrails, to burn to cinders. What could possibly be better than the funeral pyre of a false god?So, he’d added, “Did you ever hear the rumour of Dumbledore’s sister, Evans? How she died? How likely it is that he killed her? Maybe he’s just got a taste for it.”Lily had stared at him. Blinked. Once, twice, as though she’d been trying to decide if he’d serious. Face utterly devoid of emotion, she’d closed the book in front of her. Not slammed it shut in a proportionate show of emotion. Nothing deigning to reach the level of dramatics that’d thundered in his every word. She’d just… gently folded the cover over the worn pages, before resting her fingertips on the leather binding.Then, fast as lightening, she’d chucked the book at his head.Sirius had jerked back, stunned, as the book smacked him squarely in the forehead before he could even hope to react, let alone throw up a shield.That’s when the tirade had started. There’d been a lot of shouting, plenty of swearing, a worn path in the floorboards from her pacing, and a few more books hurled in his direction that he’d been able to block now that he’d been expecting it. There’d been a lot of how-dare-you-suggest’s and he’s-the-bloody-Headmaster’s and can’t-see-what’s-goddamned-in-front-of-you’s, all of course interspersed with variations of an exaspirated, exhausted, “Christ Almighty, you’re supposed to be the smart one.”Sirius had been sure that Lily hadn’t even noticed when both Madam Pince and Filch had shooed them out of the library. The King of Gryffindor hadn’t so much as blinked, let alone come up for air, even as Filch had roared at them, threatening to feed their toes to Mrs. Norris, but had eventually settled for an extra week of detention.The whole of it had started in the library with, “Sirius Black, how are you this bloody thick?!” and had mercifully ended in the Gryffindor common room with, “Remus had those scars before he came to Hogwarts, you bloody fucking idiot!”And, yeah. He should have thought of that.So, he’d surrendered. The rage he’d felt simmered down to nothing, as though Lily had siphoned off every last, burning ember to fuel her own inferno. She’d stormed off, eventually, still muttering to herself—something about goddamned stupid boys, who won’t fucking use their goddamned words—and had refused to speak to anyone for the rest of the night.A little lost and more than a little defeated, he’d stopped Lily in the common room the next morning. He’d apologised, profusely and with feeling. She’d squeezed his hand—just once—and had given him a tight smile, her green eyes pensive and sad. She’d pushed up on her toes to give him a quick, agonising kiss on the cheek, and he’d let her, because maybe that kind of pain kept him on the favourable side of sanity. Pulling away, but still close enough to whisper, Lily had said, “Open your eyes, Sirius. The answer’s right in front of you.”And that… well.If he wanted the answer, if he wanted the truth of Remus’s scars, he’d still need the goddamned question. Peeves’s words, trumpeting and taunting from a memory he’d rather forget, had suddenly rattled their way to his waking consciousness:Pour the wine and heed the dancer. Does he know the ask and answer?It was a puzzle, a language of secrets and teeth and half-truths whispered in the dark. Although he’d been pretty sure he was missing all the nouns and verbs that made the puzzle comprehensible, Sirius had known he was clever enough to fill in the missing pieces. He’d just needed to fucking think. So, that morning, he’d thrown his books down in History of Magic, nicked a role of parchment from Peter’s open satchel, and summoned Remus’s ballpoint pen from his own bag, as though it had been carved from the same sort of magic as his wand. He’d unrolled the parchment, had vanished Peter’s poor attempt at the Potions essay—Sirius would probably end up writing it for him anyway—and had started scribbling. The goal, of course, was to stumble upon the right question, somewhere amidst the chaos in his brain. Focusing perhaps more on his notes than was really befitting of anyone sitting in Professor Binns’s classroom, Sirius had scratched down everything he’d known, starting from the very beginning.In the beginning, Remus had hugged his dad. That had been the first time Sirius had seen him: embraced and clinging to Lyall Lupin for all he’d been worth. Remus had spoken to his father not with the ingrained fear and tastefully acquired derision that Sirius spat whenever he’d referred to his own father, but with respect and… love, and all manner of other things Sirius wasn’t sure he’d ever be capable of comprehending.In the beginning, Remus had told him stories: stories of a Muggle mother, whom he loved above all else. She was French and Muggle and… sick? He’d underlined that word three times, because he couldn’t quite see the line separating truth from fiction. Remus had spoken about his mum—who loved books and chocolate, same as her son—as though he missed her, as though her absence in his life was a raw, aching wound. As though he didn’t see her every few weeks. Remus had lied about visiting her—repeatedly—but that didn’t necessarily mean that his mother wasn’t ill.Sirius had paused his mad-man scribbling there, needing a moment to… ruminate in the incomprehensible ache in his chest. It was one he’d known would linger, deep in his bones, long after he’d discovered whatever secrets Remus had, etched in his scars. The thing was, Sirius knew he’d grown up in a nightmare that still consistently bled into his reality. There had never been a time in his life when he’d considered Grimmauld Place anything other than a nightmare, except, perhaps, when he and Regulus had been hiding under the safety of his covers. Nothing else had really mattered—no nightmare had been able to reach them—when they’d been whispering stories of the ancient heroes painted in the stars. The thing was, Sirius knew he’d been traumatised. Objectively, and horrifically. That didn’t mean he had any sort of experience in implementing anything even in the vicinity of a healthy coping mechanism, but it also hadn’t eased the acknowledgement of the fact. And the fact was, Remus had been traumatised, too. Obviously, given his scars, but it was so much more than that. The first time they’d met, Sirius had seen his own pain and nightmares reflected in beautiful, amber eyes. It’d been so plain—so goddamned obvious—that he may as well have been looking in a mirror. It’d been in the flicker of fear, at the unpredictability of meeting a stranger; in the smile that could never quite hide the pain, no matter how beautiful of a mask it made. It’d been in the tilt of Remus’s head, the arch of his nicked eyebrow, when Sirius had very nearly screamed when they’d shaken hands. Acknowledgment of the fact. Nightmares, personified. There’d been two realities from the start, and Sirius held out absolutely no hope that he’d ever be able to reconcile them. One reality, in which Remus Lupin knew of darkness, of monsters of men, of blood and pain, everlasting. It was this reality that Sirius had known intimately, had lived, and shared and understood. But the other…The other reality, the irreconcilable fact of life, was that Remus longed for home, for his family, with a ferocity Sirius would never be capable of comprehending. In this other reality, this land of unknown and unseen things, the trauma didn’t seem to matter, or was superseded by what Sirius could only assume was the hypothetical reconciliation and healing that was, perhaps, due to Remus by those he loved.Either way, there had to me more to the story. More to the language Sirius couldn’t quite understand. Those fucking nouns and verbs. They had to be the key to the question he was so desperately trying to find.Sirius had returned to scratching down everything else he knew, with a mad passion and fervour that had not been witnessed in Professor Binns’s class in countless generations. His parchment and his handwriting had been nearly indecipherable, but he’d still shot a wandless stinging hex at James when he’d caught James trying to read over Sirius’s shoulder. James had yelped, and though it’d done absolutely nothing to impede Binns’s monotone lecture, nearly every head had turned their way. Sirius had glanced up, still mostly hunched over his mad ramblings. He’d caught Remus’s nearly golden eyes a few desks down, then Lily’s knowing smirk she’d tried to hide. Peter had strained his tiny, stumpy neck to catch a glimpse of what Sirius had been writing, but to no avail. He was too short.Sirius had switched to writing in French, just to be safe. Remus could still read French. He hadn’t said anything. Just watched, with those goddamned, super distracting—Sirius had written golden eyes on his parchment about thirty times.Surrendering to the madness, he’d added teeth and floo and Buck and Moby Dick and wrists and Frankenstein and…And Dumbledore.It all came back to Albus-fucking-Dumbledore. There was no way the Old Man hadn’t been involved, from the very start. No way the Old Man didn’t know Remus’s secret. Not with the way Remus had reacted under the Willow. He’d acknowledged the truth of Victor Frankenstein, but he hadn’t agreed. He should have agreed. Sirius knew his logic had been faultless, his metaphor sound and unconquerable, which meant…Albus Dumbledore was the only way to feasibly bridge the two realities of Remus’s existence. It’d been that thought, a glorious epiphany—in which a chorus of angels sang and the heavens parted above him—that had led Sirius to the final iteration of the question.It was close—so goddamned close, but maybe just out of reach. It wasn’t perfect, but it was close. So close to the right question that Sirius prayed the secret might just spill out by accident. If, perhaps, he asked the right person.Naturally, he hadn’t been patient enough to wait more than a few hours. The question simply slipped out the moment he walked into McGonagall’s office that evening—for detention or tutoring, Sirius wasn’t sure anymore.“What does Albus Dumbledore have on Remus?”McGonagall choked on her tea. She sputtered, lost all decorum, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. A single strand of her hair magically freed itself from her bun. Sirius felt a feral smile tear its way across his face. It was dangerous and victorious, because her reaction was everything.He was right.Dumbledore was Frankenstein and Remus, his loyal creation, still lost in his admiration for his creator. Not yet familiar with the wrath and depravity of the man who knew his goddamned secret.It was the only possible explanation.McGonagall straightened her robes. She carefully tucked the stray hair behind her ear. (Not back in her bun. Sirius found that fascinating.) She held his gaze, as disheveled as he’d ever seen her, and studied him as though he were the most beguiling creature in the known universe.“I am aware, Sirius,” she said, carefully, “that we never discussed your… outburst last month, but—“Outburst. Yeah. Because that’s what happened. “But,” McGonagall emphasised, rightly sensing that she was quickly losing ground with him. “Perhaps we need to talk about this. I assume this particular vendetta goes beyond your general distaste for authority figures?”Well, that was… demeaning. He’d kind of hoped they’d progressed beyond this.Sirius crossed his arms and mimicked her tone exactly. “I assume that means you won’t be answering my question?”McGonagall’s lips pressed into a thin line. “Albus Dumbledore is a good man. Not a perfect one, mind, but a—“He let that wicked grin consume his features and the wild animal in McGonagall seemed to realise she’d unknowingly backed herself into a corner.“Does that mean I’m right?” The question hung in the air: a noose, swaying in the morning breeze.“We are at war, Sirius.” And, Merlin, that was answer enough. Because men like Dumbledore were created in war and thrived on sustaining it.He was right, and that was horrifying. Cataclysmic. There was something inside of him—something that the Gryffindors might unknowingly herald as loyalty, as courage. As everything good and honourable that made them worthy of their house. But Sirius knew the truth.This thing inside him was hellfire and rage, born in the nothingness of his shattered heart, called forth by the ancient magic on his tongue. It was arrogance and pride, and every other deadly sin melted down and forged into an obsidian dagger destined to carve out the beating heart of a god.This thing inside him was poison and malice and oh, so bloody Slytherin. Still, Sirius repeated the question. Softer this time, laced with finality. “Minnie. What does the Old Man have on Remus?”Her eye twitched. It’d have been imperceptible to anyone who hadn’t dedicated most of a year studying her mannerisms rather than something as menial as basic, first-year Transfiguration. She let out a breath. “You must know that I’m not going to tell you what you want to know.”Rather than admitting defeat, he issued challenge. “Part of those marching orders?”The same haunting, harrowing shadow that’d crossed her face when he’d first thrown out that accusation now devoured what remained of the neutrality in her expression. But, he’d already thrown down the gauntlet. Surrender was impossible.“How are we meant to survive this war when we are nothing more than pawns on a chessboard?” Sirius demanded. “People like me… I’ve seen the game played out a thousand different times. No one but the king gets a say in which pieces are sacrificed.”He thought of Alphonse Auclair, the self-made traitor to his own name, station, and blood, cursed at the point of Sirius’s wand. Dead, at the hands of his father. He thought of Andromeda and Ted, and their schemes against the crown, and how it had spectacularly backfired right before his eyes. He thought of a hat, whispering words like lionheart, prophecies like pariah, then shouting damnations like Gryffindor. He thought of Malfoy, of Unbreakable Vows and Sectumsempras, and of Regulus. Merlin’s tits, Regulus. Abandoned to a world of nightmares, fated to be forged into the heir Sirius would never be brave enough to become.Most of all, though, he thought of Remus Lupin: the boy, who thought himself a beast, created by a monster of a man—the falsest of gods—who wanted nothing more than to watch his creation burn.All of them—Andromeda, his brother, Remus—they were ransoms paid to the cruelest, most undeserving god. And Merlin, how she sunk her fangs into their flesh, even as she tied her strings around their hands and feet. Even as the puppets answering only to Fate began their shadowed dance.Dumbledore was no better than her. False gods were just as deadly, just as fierce. “I will never bend a knee to Albus-fucking-Dumbledore. He is not my king.” Sirius spat out the word, because the taste of it entangled with the idea of Dumbledore might stain his tongue for the rest of the night. “You want me to survive, Minnie? Fine. Let’s pretend that’s still possible. But I refuse to survive without them. What would be the fucking point?”He saw his words take the very life from McGonagall’s lungs.“I will not let Dumbledore have Remus. Or James and Lily,” Sirius snarled. “I don’t give a damn what Remus owes the Old Man. I will settle his debts if I goddamned have to. I don’t care. Dumbledore cannot have him. Remus is mine.”This thing inside him was divine retribution. Except, where his ancestors used their hellfire to bend the minds and hearts of lesser mortals—to rule over them, as cruel, capricious gods themselves—Sirius would sooner tear the stars from the heavens. Topple each and every false god from their thrones, until he was face to face with her.“I’m fucked either way. You know that right?” he said, casually, definitely. Because it was the truth. But, Merlin, the terror in McGonagall’s eyes. “I’m fighting a war on two fronts, neither of which I can hope to win. The family I was born into—my blood-kin… I am a walking blasphemy to all those who claim purity above all else. Those I love—the family I’ve chosen—are puppets on a string, Minnie. None of us wanted this war. We just want to fucking grow up. Instead, we’re all just cannon fodder for Dumbledore’s war machine.” He took a breath. “I am cursed, death-marked, and damned, all at once, and you want me to survive? You know what? I refuse.”“Sirius—“ And it was a plea, a prayer, but the gods stopped listening so very long ago.“Maybe it’s already written that way. Maybe that’s what Fate wants. But, for now, it’s my fucking choice,” he said, because if he let her speak now, he might very well shatter to pieces right along with her. “And… I think I’m okay with that.”This thing inside him was his birthright. It was a creature, a monster given life from hellfire and vengeance. It was there, lurking, hiding behind his every heartbeat. The shadow of this beast was what made a deranged, half-way psychic bird issue words of damnation to an eleven-year-old child, on a Friday morning, on a day that was supposed to be filled with only magic and new beginnings. “Merlin, Sirius—““As long as they get to walk away.” Because that was the bargain, wasn’t it? That’s what it meant to bear the weight of a life debt. “James, Lily, Peter. Remus. And my brother, too, when the time comes. All of them. They get to live. I’m okay with whatever’s been written for me, whatever terrible ending Fate has planned. So long as they walk away.”Because Fate held the mired chords of the destinies belonging to everyone he loved. She’d written their endings and damned them all.So, that was it: their freedom, or Silas’s words made manifest.There were tears tracking down McGonagall’s face, and Sirius wasn’t entirely sure when that’d happened. When he’d broken her down to her very foundations.“You are a child,” she said, on a sob, but with conviction.It was a lie, though. Because he’d never been that.Sirius popped the button of his shirt, loosened his tie, and tugged his collar down and to the left. McGonagall’s red-rimmed eyes locked on the black ink on his chest, tracing over each letter, perfect and horrifying, etched into his skin in his mother’s handwriting.
Toujours Pur.
“I never had a chance, Minnie. That’s what this means. Damned from the start. But, so help me God—“ And Merlin, how he spat that word. “—if I’m going through the Veil into nothing, I’m taking Tom Riddle and Albus Dumbledore right along with me.”McGonagall didn’t say anything, didn’t so much as blink. “I will be back tomorrow. I appreciate any help you have, so that I can survive these final exams in the mean time.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ “Snape?” Sirius said, only because referring to the greasy git as Snivellus right now did not exactly lend itself to procuring the answers Sirius was seeking.Namely regarding what the actual fuck Severus Snape was doing outside Gryffindor tower, arguing with the Fat Lady, well past curfew on a Thursday night.Snape whirled around, madness and desperation flitting across his expression. His greasy hair hung in sallow locks, framing a hollow face that Sirius would guess hadn’t seen anything resembling sleep in many moons. Snape pointed a wobbly finger at the Fat Lady. “She… She won’t let me in!”“Yeah. No shit,” Sirius deadpanned.“He,” screeched the Fat Lady, with the same childishly indignant tone as Snape, “has been out here harrumphing every night this week. A Slytherin in Gryffindor tower! Honestly, who has ever heard of such nonsense?”Snape glared daggers at him. A single eyebrow went up: a dare. Suddenly vividly reminded of the lengths he’d gone to in order to ensure the Fat Lady’s ignorance the first time around, Sirius swallowed a groan. There’d been a lot of flirting—with both the Fat Lady and the satyr from the portrait outside the Astronomy tower. The satyr had, unfortunately, needed quite a bit of sweet talking before Sirius had finally been able to convince him to take the Fat Lady on a date, just for the evening of Lily’s party. “You need to let me in,” Snape demanded, directing the venom in his words to the Fat Lady. “I told you. I’m not a spy and I mean no harm to any Gryffindor.” Words that were hardly ever true of any Slytherin. “I just… I need to talk to her.”Her.Sirius almost laughed. If that was Snape’s goal, he certainly hadn’t made any actual headway in achieving it. And, honestly, Snape was going about it all wrong. Can’t trust a Slytherin to do the job of a Marauder. Decision made and, at this point, well beyond second guessing, Sirius put his hands in his pants pockets, letting his robe and undone tie hang open. Sirius put on his very best smile—the one that was all perfect teeth and pureblood heir—and sauntered up to the Fat Lady’s portrait. He leaned against the stone wall, crossing one ankle over the other, and lifted his eyes to the Fat Lady. Her eyelashes fluttered—just for a second—and her translucent cheeks tinged just the slightest bit pink.“My dear, beautiful lady,” Sirius began, fluttering his own eyelashes in a way a certain demographic found appealing. “Wouldn’t you rather take the night off instead of arguing with this greasy, snivelling first year?”When Snape opened his mouth to protest, Sirius cut him a deadly look that he hoped conveyed the need to shut the fuck up.“Oh, you see, I couldn’t possibly—“ “But you look so lovely tonight,” Sirius crooned, hating every cajoling word that came out of his mouth. “It’d be a shame to waste such perfection on us. Especially when the satyr—“The Fat Lady let out a shrill giggle. “Oh, has he said anything about me? I did so enjoy our time together.” She leaned in close, nearly falling out of her portrait. “Excellent kissers, those satyrs, believe me. Excellent in other areas, too, though you are perhaps a bit young to understand.”“Oh, I understand plenty.” Unfortunately. “Especially after Niss beguiled me with tales from your time together. He could not recall ever stumbling upon such a glorious, voluptuous woman such as you. He spoke only of how your beauty surpassed even that of the nymphs that used to inhabit his forest. He’s been pestering me for months now, my lady. Demanding the pleasure of your company under the light of the moon.”Strictly speaking… absolutely none of that was true. The satyr had nearly torn Sirius a new one for merely suggesting the possibility of a second date.Was it a bit cruel to lead the Fat Lady on…? Perhaps. But Sirius would feel bad about it later. Now, he needed to find out what Snape needed from his king.It worked, of course. The Fat Lady let out another high-pitched giggle. “Oh, darling, that’s all part of the game. You must make them salivate for you.”And before this could take a nose dive off that particular cliff, Sirius said, “Go to him, my lady! I can hold down the fort here. You must be with your satyr, as he writes poetry of his love for you in the stars above.”The Fat Lady looked for a moment as though she’d simply melt away from her own painting, but then her expression sobered. Her eyes tracked to Snape. “Oh. I would, but the Slytherin. I have an obligation to this tower, you see. I cannot simply—““It’s only Snivellus,” Sirius said, in the most derisive tone in his arsenal. Snape let out an indignant snort. “Not Malfoy. I can handle him. You deserve a night off, lady, if only to spend it with your satyr.”“Oh, all right,” the Fat Lady conceded. “But let the uptight fellow know when you’ve gone inside. Longshanks, or whatever his name is.”“I will,” Sirius lied. What Frank didn’t know wouldn’t kill him. Probably.Blowing Sirius a wet kiss, the Fat Lady slid from her portrait into the one immediately to his right. She forced her way into one portrait after another, only disturbing… absolutely every other portrait ghost from here to the Astronomy tower.Sirius waited until the cries of protest and general harrumphing stopped before turning to face Snape. They stared at each other, either sizing the other up or truly considering the other as a potential equal, it was had to say.“That was… revolting,” Snape said into the silence that stretched between them.Sirius shrugged. Unbothered.“I wouldn’t have thought she was your type, Black.”She wasn’t. “What do you want, Snape?”Any pre-tense of superiority Snape may have momentarily gained vanished in a single breath. Back was the sallow expression and the haunted, haunted eyes. This time, however, his voice remained resolute. “I need to see Lily.” Then, with almost the proper amount of shame and regret: “She won’t speak with me. Hasn’t spoken with me since… Well. Since.”“Yeah, well,” Sirius said, crossing his arms over his chest. “There’s a reason for that, Snivellus.”Snape pressed the palms of his hands into his eyes, his teeth gnashing together. “I know. I know. Shit!”And that—the crack in Snape’s voice on the last word, the ghosts of tears ready to fall—all of it was just a bit too much for Sirius Black to stomach.“Then why’d you fucking do it?” It wasn’t often that Sirius Black held the moral high ground. Right or wrong, while he had it, he’d always choose to wield it as a weapon.A desperate, broken rage erupted from Snape: an animal trapped in a corner with nowhere to go. “I didn’t have a choice!” That was laughable. But still, Snape pressed on, “What would the fucking Black heir know of honour and loyalty? You chose this! This gang of misfits and blood traitors!”Sirius let the insults ricochet off him, fall like shards of broken glass on a marble floor. And yet, there he stood. Somehow, by a rare and beautiful act of some unknown deity, he remained utterly unscathed. “You had everything, Black!” Snape roared. “A family, a title, more gold than most of us mortals can even imagine. You had everything I always—“ Snape swallowed the admission, but Sirius heard it all the same. You had everything I always wanted. “All you had to do was stay in line.”That, of course, was the impossibility. His silence—his obedience to the hand of fate, to his mother’s every scheming whim—meant his damnation. It was, perhaps, the only line he refused to cross.That was something the likes of Severus Snape would never understand.“Think whatever you want. Say whatever you dare.” Sirius crossed his arms over his chest and smirked. “I’m still the only one that knows the password to that door.”Snape sobered instantly. It was time to negotiate. “What do you want, Black?”“Give me a reason.” Sirius didn’t let Snape so much as draw a breath before he clarified, “One damn reason, Snape, that will convince me you’re worthy of her presence. One reason why I shouldn’t hex you into the Void.”Snape opened his mouth. Considered. Then, surrendered. “She’s my friend.”And that was that. “Then she will see you on her own time. When she’s ready.” “Wait! No!”Snape was frantic, pressing in close, reaching for him but never actually touching. “No!” Snape yelled once more, but then, with near-Herculean effort, seemed to reign himself in. He took a step backwards and raised his hands. Rolling his eyes and frighteningly aware of how close they still stood, even with the added distance, Sirius said, “You’re right. It’s not like I can just say the password with you standing there. So—“ Sirius called his magic to his fingertips and hid a smirk. “This is a deafening jinx. It won’t last long, but you’ll probably want to be careful on your way back to the dungeons. You won’t be able to hear whatever creature Hagrid’s probably let into the castle.”“Please, I just need five minutes to—“Snape didn’t finish his sentence before he lashed out and grabbed ahold of Sirius’s wrist.The Knockback Jinx exploded out of Sirius, as instantaneous and unforgiving as the pain that show up his spine. Snape went flying, landing with a thump against the opposite wall. He lay there for a moment, stunned and useless. “Touch me again, Snivellus, and I will break far more than your fucking wand,” Sirius snarled, no longer bothering to keep the casual cruelty out of his voice. Nor did he back down when he heard the faint whimper that very well might have been a sob coming from the lump on the floor. “Get out of here, Snape. You’re clearly not wanted by anyone. Try to break in again, and I’ll make sure either Filch or Longbottom catches you. Honestly, I’m not sure which one would be worse.”Snape struggled to sit up, but Sirius didn’t care. Snape had made his choice, proven just the kind of man he’d grow up to be. Repeatedly, and with feeling. Sirius turned to the portrait. “You want a reason, Black?!” Snape spat at his back. It came out on a gurgled sob. “I ran into Peeves.”And that…That was a damned good reason.Turning on his heel, Sirius forced his features to remain neutral, praying he betrayed nothing of the listening bolt of terror that shot through him at the mere mention of the poltergeist.He simply raised an eyebrow, silently demanding Snape tell him more. “He said… things. About me. About Lily.” Snape seemed to struggle to get the words out. “What sort of things?” As if Sirius didn’t already know.“Cataclysmic things.”
Said the mother to her son, “I’ll be dead at twenty-one.”
Vaguely, Sirius wondered if Peeves had given Snape the same apocalyptic verses as he’d given Lily. “It doesn’t mean anything, Snape,” Sirius lied, aiming in the direction of casual disinterest, but from the look Snape gave him, he more than likely missed by a significant margin. “He’s just a ghost, locked in the past and haunted by half-remembered songs. What could he possibly know of the future?”“He’s a poltergeist!” Snape shouted the truth, the worst possible thing, as though it would set them free.Sirius looked down, as though seeing the invisible chains tethering him to a future he did not want.Then, as if seeing that future with his own eyes, Snape sneered up at him. “You should hear the things he said about you, Black.” Words, whispered in the dark: silent executions when no one else was listening. Words, inked on pages he was trying to burn, even as they were being written.“Daydreams and fairytales,” Sirius breathed. If only.“Liar,” spat Snape. A fitting moniker. With no inflection in his voice, no expression on his face, Sirius said, “Faerie wings.”The portrait hole swung open. Sirius kept himself planted firmly between the open door and the open-mouthed Severus Snape. Something dangerous—something frighteningly like hope—danced behind black, soulless eyes.Hope was not something Sirius could spare to surrender to his enemy. “She’ll see you tomorrow, Snape. You’re not coming in.” “But—““I’ll have Frank change the password in the morning. For now—“ Clever fingers waved a familiar locking spell over the empty portrait. Snape made a noise in the back of his throat that might have been dismay. Sirius tried not to revel in it. “Goodnight, Snivellus.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Lily Evans sat in the middle of the love seat, staring blankly into the hearth. She leaned forward slightly, her chin resting on her clasped hands as though in prayer. Sirius wasn’t entirely sure she’d heard him crawling in through the portrait hole until she said, “He’s been out there all week.”Her voice was raw. Distant. As though she’d been screaming. “So I’ve heard.” Taking the unspoken invitation, Sirius sat down, cross-legged, on the plush rug. He leaned back against Lily’s sofa. “You know I’m going to forgive him.”It was a statement. An indisputable fact. And, yeah. Of course he knew.Lily Evans was good in ways that his corrupted, broken heart could never be. “But not yet. Not tonight,” she finished. He tilted his head up in acknowledgement, and after a moment, he flashed her a conspiratorial smile. His heart swelled as she smiled back, all gentle green eyes and heart made for fixing broken things. She was beautiful, he supposed, and logically he could understand how someone like James Potter would fall madly in love with her mere heartbeats after seeing her for the first time. He understood how someone like Snape, a coward to his very core, would be so desperate to hold onto her forever.How losing someone like her might very well be the death of someone like Snape. Sirius loved her. He knew he did, completely and fiercely. Yet it wasn’t the same way they did, nor could it ever be. Her heart beat to the same thundering rhythm as his, except on every-off beat. He was the echo to her war cry, the raging fire to her spark. The knight—the assassin—to her crown.Blood-tied and damned, she’d said. Lily twined her finger in a loose strand of his hair. It was longer now, almost to his shoulders. Far longer than his mother would have deemed appropriate for her son and heir. He hadn’t allowed anyone to cut it since he’d come to Hogwarts. If he had his way, he’d never cut it again. (Except, perhaps, to shape it a bit more like Bowie’s.)He’d realised, somewhere amidst the chaos and trauma that’d marred so much of his first year, that his hair was just about the only way his friends could touch him without evoking the curse etched into his skin. It was soothing—mind-numbing—whenever Lily loosely braided the ends. When it was Remus, well…When it was Remus, he lost all semblance of thought. “I got a letter from my sister,” Lily said.Sirius tilted his head back to look at her, mindful of her fingers in his hair. “Bad?” he asked.“They’re never good,” Lily replied, gesturing to the embers and all that was left of Petunia’s letter. “She told me she tried to convince Mum and Dad that I needed to be sent to a school for freaks over the summer. For remediation. Never mind that I’m at the top of the class.”“You’re second in the class, but close enough.” It was a play at levity, at a mirth that perhaps no longer existed in either of their souls, but in the moment, it numbed the pain well enough.Lily yanked at his hair, just once. Entirely out of spite. “You had a head start. That’s cheating.”“What lying bastard ever led you to believe I play fair?”“How very Slytherin of you.”Merlin. It was just that kind of night. Sirius asked, “What else did your sister say?”“Same old shit,” Lily replied. “Called me a freak, an abomination. A crime against the natural order of things. Et cetera.”“Merlin,” Sirius said. “My mother would like her, even if she’s a Muggle. They should get together for tea and murder plots.”He laughed suddenly at the image that manifested in his head: a crone and a pimply girl, both glaring each other with upturned noses and eyes that burned with a hatred that would fell ordinary mortals at twenty paces. They were each other’s equal and opposites, his mother and Petunia Evans. Masters of torment, of words that fell just shy of death sentences. Lily’s mind, apparently, went elsewhere. Presented a different version of the same future.“I’m going to need him, you know,” she said, almost as though she believed she ought to feel guilty for voicing such a thing. “I can’t… I don’t think I can survive without him this summer.”Almost like an apology. A weakness. A chink in her armour that had perhaps been there for awhile, finally acknowledged. “You have us, too, you know,” Sirius said, turning to face her, cross-legged on the floor before his king. “You’ll always have us, Evans. You’ll always have me.”“Here. I have you here, Sirius. But out there, in the real world…” She trailed off, and Sirius took a moment to marvel at what she perceived to be the real world. It was as though she thought of his world—magic and Hogwarts and all the damn prophecies that already bore their names—as nothing more than a dream. As though opening one’s eyes and rising from the bed were the cure-all to every nightmare they’d faced together.As though Fate were kind and would obey the boundary of nightmares, forever trapped in the Void at the edge of the real world.Lily fiddled at with the hem of her sleeves. “Remus is in Wales, Siri. Marlene is visiting family in Ireland. Dee’s visiting hers in South Africa.”“You still have me,” he insisted, stubbornly. “And James and Peter. We’ll—““James,” Lily said, leaning into the name, “can barely string a coherent sentence together when he’s around me. Plus, he’s utterly useless around Muggle things. And I’m pretty sure Pettigrew only learned my first name last week.”Sirius wasn’t quite sure how that was possible, but it wasn’t as though it wasn’t entirely plausible. “And you,” Lily said, “are not to ever be left alone with my sister under any circumstances. Ever.”Her words were not unkind. Still, Sirius felt the need to herald a minor revolution. “Oi! That’s not fair! I’ll—““You will set her on fire,” Lily cut in. “Or she’ll have you burned at the stake. Either way, the two of you would end up destroying each other. And then you’ll be in Azkaban and I’ll be an only child without my favourite Marauder.”All pretence of a witty rejoinder vacated his mind entirely. He opened and closed his mouth, uselessly. “All of which leads me to the inevitable conclusion,” Lily said. “I have to forgive Severus. Outside this place, he’s all I have in the world.”That was sobering. Sirius frowned. “Some people don’t deserve to be forgiven, Evans. And even if you decided, sometime in the future, that he did, forgiving him now out of some disjointed sense of obligation would be cruel. It’d be a lie. It could never be real.”Rather than yelling at him—which he both expected and probably deserved—rather than the snide, snappy barb that gave no quarter, took no prisoners, that so often accompanied their arguments regarding Snape, Lily just… stared at him. Then, his king said, “What if it was Regulus?”His blood ran cold. His question barely registered in his mind. “What?”“You know what I mean.”He did. And he rejected it outright. “Regulus would never do what Snape’s done, Evans.”“You have to have considered the possibility, Sirius,” she said, her tone placating. Diplomatic. At the unspeakable terror he was sure was permanently carved into his expression, she went on: “Regulus has been alone in that house all year. With your mother. You said there’s no way your brother isn’t going to be sorted into Slytherin. So, he’ll be around them—Malfoy, the Carrows, Lestrange—when he gets here.”She took a breath and doubled down. “Sirius, if you’re told a lie, over and over and over again; if every ounce of truth within you is beaten, bullied, or carved out of your flesh, suddenly that lie begins to sound a hell of a lot like that truth you once believed in. Either because you’re fool enough to believe the lie, or because they’ve shattered your every whispered desire to rebel. The end result is the same. They’ve broken you. Your lie becomes the only truth you’ve ever known.”“Regulus isn’t like that,” Sirius lied, and he allowed himself to be foolish enough to believe it.Because… Regulus had sold Ted Tonks to his mother, and would never come to regret it. To save me, that relentless, endlessly hopeful voice whispered—shouted—from the very depths of his soul. Louder, it cried out, once more, “Regulus would never do what Snape’s done.”Lily, in her infinite kindness, did not address the hollow lie. Instead, she said, “If it were Regulus—“ Merlin, if, not when. “—you wouldn’t just… stop. Stop loving him. Stop hating him, for the choices he’s made. Stope desperately praying he hasn’t already damned himself right before your eyes. You’d never give up on him, even if he became everything evil in this world. Everything Tom Riddle wants him to be.”Sirius’s gaze snapped to hers. “I would never allow that to happen.”Another sad, heartbroken smile.“I think,” she said, “these things happen on their own, regardless of everything we might do to stop them. Their choices are so far beyond our reach. We’re merely cursed with the agony of the aftermath.”In his heart, objectively, he knew she was right. But he’d be damned if he allowed that story to unfold without fighting tooth and nail to unravel the ending. Merlin, he was damned anyway. Might as well go out in a blaze of glare, as it were. “I have to forgive him,” Lily said, “because if I don’t, I’ll lose him forever. And if I’m not there to stop him…”“He becomes Malfoy’s bitch?” Sirius supplied, half-heartedly. He easily ducked the throw pillow she hurled at him. “Forgiveness out of obligation isn’t right, let alone deserved, even by someone like him, Lily.”“It’s all I have to keep from losing him,” she said. “And it may be my only chance to save him.”“That’s not your job.”“But it’s your job to save Regulus?”“That’s different. He’s my brother.”“And Severus may as well be mine.”It was cruel and ill-timed and spoke to the insanity that lurked in the recesses of his broken mind, but Sirius desperately wanted to laugh at the myriad of ways those words would shatter the heart of Severus Snape. “I will forgive him,” Lily repeated, and it was definitive. A prophecy in its own right. “Though, perhaps not tonight.”He managed to nod, hoping it conveyed his acquiescence rather than his surrender. He would never win this battle, but he loved Lily Evans enough to walk away. “I have to be up early tomorrow to unlock that door,” he said, with a nod towards the portrait hole. “Otherwise, we’ll all have to wait for Remus. We’d miss class and Minnie would never let me hear the end of it.”Lily smiled at him, and it was just a bit heartbreaking. He knew she saw right through his excuse. Everyone in Gryffindor both marvelled and griped at the only goddamned morning person this tower has ever seen. Still, all she said was, “Goodnight, Sirius.”Exhaustion weighed heavy on his bones as he trudged up the stairs. He hadn’t been sleeping well—too many world-ending questions rattling around his brain in the dead of night—but he’d been able to force the exhaustion out of his mind in his relentless quest for answers, but now…Now, the question remained unanswered. Gnawing guilt ate away at his still-beating heart. Guilt for the brother he left behind. Guilt for the scars that kept appearing on a beautiful face. Guilt for all the dragons could not yet slay. A cacophony of snoring assaulted him the moment he opened the door: James and Peter, waging a battle of contrasting, yet equally unpleasant, noises. Remus sat upright on the bed, the curtains still opened. Remus’s legs were steepled, feet flat on the bed, and a book in his lap. He was bathed in the flickering candlelight that danced across his beautiful face in perfect step with the silver shadow-light of the nearly-full moon hovering in the window. Remus didn’t look up as Sirius threw off his school clothes, summoned his pyjamas with a flick of his wand, and crawled into what had officially become his side of the bed. Sirius watched, utterly mesmerised, as long, scarred fingers traced over the words on the open page, as if by a spark of magic, Remus could bring the words to life.“I keep reading the same chapter over and over again,” Remus said, still lost in the magic of the words.“Why?”Merlin, those golden eyes. Sirius was convinced that they held every secret, every answer, every truth in the known universe.Remus said, “Because I can’t bear to face the ending.”Sirius wondered if Remus was rereading Call of the Wild, or even something by that Shakespeare fellow Remus still insisted Sirius was not yet ready for. Lily said Shakespeare was a master of heart-rending tales. But, when confronted with the near-physical entity of Sirius’s unspoken question, Remus held the book up to show a familiar, worn cover. Sirius nearly swallowed his tongue. Frankenstein. Remus was reading Frankenstein. Voluntarily. Perhaps he had understood Sirius’s warning after all. Perhaps tonight would the night they joined together to unravel their cruel destines already written in the stars. To hang false gods from the castle’s parapets. “What chapter?” It was just about all Sirius could manage, drowning as he was in the enormity of the wave of hope that swelled in his chest. “William’s dead,” Remus said. “Frankenstein’s confronting his monster.”“The creature is damning his god,” Sirius corrected, nearly choking on the words. Bur Remus just shook his head. He opened the book to where he’d held his place with his thumb. Voice cracking, Remus read, “‘I was not even the same nature as man… When I looked around, I saw and heard none like me. Was I, then, a monster, a blot upon the earth, from which all men fled and whom all men disowned?’”For the life of him Sirius had no clue why Remus chose to read the creature’s lamentations, when the false god himself stood guilty and accused before them. Remus swallowed, and Sirius could do nothing but stare at the long line of his throat, at the subtle bob of his Adam’s apple. He was helpless, left to drown in an unfamiliar misery, because for some fucking reason, Remus Lupin seemed to think of himself as a monster, reviled by the whole of humanity. And that was wrong, because Remus was good and kind and beautiful. It was wrong, because, of the two of them, Sirius Black was the one with the Unforgivable stain on his soul. It was wrong, because focusing on the creature’s self-revulsion for more than a heartbeat was not the goddamned point. If anything, it was a distraction—a red herring—meant to distract from the obvious cruelty of the story’s true monster. The creature’s pain necessitated acknowledgment, of course, but in the guise of an unrelenting, indisputable testimony against the monster that is its creator, Victor Frankenstein. But Sirius didn’t say any of that, because they’d had this argument before, and each time his testimony went unacknowledged, it broke his heart that much more. Because, Merlin, how different would the ending have been if the creature had been shown the same kindness that still lingered in his own lightning-forged heart, even as he was reviled and damned by the rest of humanity?How different might things be, if Remus were able to see the truth of the creature’s heart?After a moment of near-infinite silence, Remus pulled out a letter that had been tucked inside the cover of the book. “This came for you about an hour ago,” Remus said, handing it over. Sirius was fairly certain his heart stopped beating when their fingers brushed. He was immediately resuscitated and brought back to life by the lightning bolt of apocalyptic pain.He tasted electricity and moonlight. It was a murderous high—one that very well could be the death of him—but oh, how he revelled in it.Turning the letter over, Sirius immediately recognised the handwriting, the messy scrawl of his name right above the seal. He traced the unbroken seal: the imprint of a familiar crest pressed into the wax and poured over fine, lined Muggle paper. The seal weighed down the paper, bled through in places, staining the white. He could make out small scratches and blots of ink from the quill that had dared put down words on such fragile paper.The letter was an amalgamation of both her worlds: Muggle and wizard. It was a demonstrable act of rebellion in and of itself. “I’m glad she’s safe,” Sirius said. “Glad she made it out. After.”After Regulus sold her out. After his mother burned Ted’s shop down to cinders. “Aren’t you going to open it?” Remus asked.Nodding, Sirius broke the seal, which seemed to break whatever compression charm Andromeda had placed on it. Pages spilled out, multiplied. Sirius struggled to keep them in order, momentarily panicking, until a chuckling Remus pointed at the numbers in the upper corners of each page.
S—
I’m sorry I haven’t written you. I cannot express how thrilled I was to receive your/Remus’s letter, and I apologise for not responding sooner. It’s certainly been a difficult few months. It feels as though I haven’t had a single moment to spare.
Where to start, eh? That’s the question.
I got married. January 11. Winter wedding, but we were nowhere in the vicinity of snow. It was simple: in some Muggle church with a preacher who barely spoke any English. It was empty, save for us and our witnesses: our cab driver and his granddaughter, who happened to live nearby. Ted wore a suit. I have no idea where he got it or how he managed to hide it from me, but he said if he were going to marry a Black, he needed to look the part.
Well, joke’s on him, really. I’m a Tonks now! No way was I going to keep my fucking name, after all it’s cost me.
The preacher had to leave immediately after the ceremony—for a funeral, of all things—and we didn’t have a hotel, so Ted took me dancing until the clubs kicked us out at closing. Then, we danced under the stars for the rest of the night. Who the hell needs music, anyway, when someone’s holding you like that?
The next morning, we went to the nearest Ministry office to submit our marriage license, and—
Merlin, Sirius. It took seconds. She must have had a Trace of some kind, or a thousand and one spies.
She burned me off the tapestry. I felt every ember, every tongue of fire licking my skin. I still feel it, sometimes, and it’s the worst pain any one person can ever hope to imagine. For a moment, I was utterly convinced that she’d carved out my still-beating heart with her fingernails, then sliced away tiny bits of flesh, a little at a time, before finally setting the damn thing on fire.
Needless to say, touching anyone—pureblooded or Muggle—is just a reminder and a remnant of that pain. Anyone, Sirius, except for Teddy, and that… Well, it’s a whole different tale of ancient, potentially world-ending rituals and consequences I accepted in exchange for this small miracle. I won’t lie to you. It’s been a hard few months. Even cursed as we were as kids, I never realised how much I relied on those innocent, innocuous touches from those around me—even when I was surrounded by purebloods. I was comfortable with the curse, with those words inked on my skin. I was familiar with how to manage it. We all are, I think. Now, going out of my way to never touch anyone…? It is cruelty of the highest degree. Inhumanity made manifest.
Ted does his best. He’s my foundation—my walking teddy bear, most days—but I think the pain carves deeper than even the magic of a Hufflepuff can heal. And I’m not sure that will ever go away.
On top of that, I’ve been constantly sick this last week or so. Nausea, vomiting, the whole spread. Everything smells funny. I’m hoping it’s the lilies Teddy keeps bringing in from the fields or some of the weird fruits he’s been growing in his little garden. I’m not sure I am properly prepared for anything else, at the moment.
Anyways, that’s not the only reason I’m writing. Sirius, you mentioned a war. Although I’d like to say you’re too young to understand such things, I am also frighteningly aware that things like war have a tendency of ensnaring all who bear our name. (Well, just your name now. I’m a Tonks.) You need to know, Sirius, that this war is very real and it is by no means some ridiculously romantic Gryffindor adventure game. This is by no means the mere propagation of the rhetoric and escalation of tensions between those who share our blood and their lessers. This is the deliberate orchestration of violence and blood-feuds that may very well consume an entire generation of witches and wizards. Lives have been lost. Blood has already been spilled, and yet most in the Ministry still believe in appeasement and negotiation.
Cowards, the lot of them.
Which brings me to my point. Although I will never be granted the opportunity to rise through the ranks at the Auror’s office, my time there was not in vain. I was able to befriend a field agent: one whose work ethic and general sense of morality were utterly unmatched, even amongst the most highly-decorated Aurors. I have no doubt, war or no, that he will accomplish great and marvellous things.
To protect his identity, especially in these unprecedented times, I shall refer to him only as His Royal Highness. As I was, and continue to be, a reliable expert on our Ancient and Most Bloodthirsty House, HRH has maintained a secure line of communication with me, despite my veritable exile and newly acquired title as a blood-traitor.
In our correspondence, HRH told me that they’ve been surveilling a man by the name of Tom Riddle. He’s been in The Prophet a lot lately. HRH believes Riddle’s more than talk—that he’s a radicalised pureblood extremist, despite the rumours of his own less-than-pure lineage. Most at the Ministry have written Riddle off as an orator with political agenda, hoping to leverage his connections to gain a foothold in the Wizengamot, but HRH believes…
Well, HRH believes he’s mounting an army to go on the offensive. And soon.
Riddle’s been seen at Grimmauld, Sirius. Three times in the last three months, along with other notables. Falco Lestrange and that absolutely arse of a man to whom I was briefly engaged. I don’t think I need to tell you what this means. This war is far less hypothetical—far less confined to Hogwarts—than either of us might have hoped.
And, Merlin, that brother of yours. I won’t lie and say I’ve forgiven him—or that I won’t ring his neck the next time I see him—but if ever you held out hope, as I once did, that Regulus has and maintains a half-way decent heart despite the nightmares closing in around him, you will find a way to reach him. You will search your riotously heroic Gryffindor heart and find a way to save your brother, Sirius Black. I’m not telling you to go home this summer. In fact, I am specifically and unequivocally advising against it. Uncle Alphard will keep you safe, away from Walburga, and, more importantly, away from Riddle. Based on what HRH reported, I don’t even want you to be on the same hemisphere as that man, let alone in the same room. You’ll instead have to be creative. Use some of that Gryffindor insanity, employ your Marauders—anything, to reach your brother. Alphard will help. He does so love scheming against your mother.
If you have that little seed of courage in your heart to try something mad—as long as it doesn’t involve setting foot in that place—I sincerely hope you find a way to reach out to Regulus. Even a few words, so he knows you haven’t forgotten him, could make a world of difference.
He doesn’t have to grow up to become like them, Sirius.
I am glad to hear about your wand. Your Remus truly is something special. Keep him close, especially with all that’s brewing. You’ll need your friends, when this all goes to shit. And I think we both know it will. It’s only a matter of time.
Stay safe, and know that both Ted and I are doing the same, on the other side of the world.
Don’t go to Grimmauld, Sirius. I love you.
Love,
Andromeda Fucking TONKS
(Please allow me the simple brilliance of that little double-entendre.)
Without a word, Sirius handed the letter over to Remus. He counted the minutes it took Remus to read Andromeda’s letter by the slow and steady rise of the nearly-full moon through the open window. Sirius didn’t look away, measured the bob of Remus’s Adam’s apple, followed the path of a jagged scar around the curve of his jaw, down his neck, wishing, dreaming, praying for a world where he could just reach out and touch. Finally, when Sirius was certain they would both drown in the ethereal light from the moon and the dreams that could never happen, Remus’s eyes—gold, Merlin, they were gold—met his.“Lilies,” Remus said, and… Sirius was lost. “What?”A smile, a tug at a scar that glowed sliver in the moonlight. “I told her to mention lilies in her reply. So we knew she was truly safe.”“Oh. Huh.” Smart. That was smart.But Sirius felt his heart had been torn in two—first by Lily, then by the words in Andromeda’s letter. He had nothing left, and Merlin, Remus’s eyes were gold. It was fitting, to feel as though he’d been torn in two, to feel the enemy closing in on all fronts. To feel as though everything he’d ever loved was drowning in unanswered questions, covered in scars, doused in flames. Sirius felt eviscerated, and it felt right.This was war, after all, and he’d been bred to be the sort of monster to revel in the slaughter.But, Merlin, how he hated the taste of blood these days.“It’s good to know that she and Ted got out,” Remus went on. “Good to know there is still happiness to be found.”Happiness, he thought, and marvelled at the word. Such things didn’t exist for people born with his name—for people whose souls had been marked and damned so very long ago. Or, if on the off chance that such things did exist, happiness was meant to be fleeting, half-remembered daydreams: a means to an end he’d rather not hasten. Far more cruel than kind, those wonderful memories, when they were used to maim, torture, and annihilate him, once Fate named her ransom price. For a moment, he was lost in that in-between place, where no one had faces, save for the echo, the phantom of the very real boy sitting next to him. The nothing-sounds echoed in his ears. He felt the brush of scarred fingers, the taste of moonlight and—Remus nudged the pillow between them, just enough to get Sirius’s attention. “What are you thinking about?”Nothing, and everything. All at once, he almost said, but something inside him strangled the words. There was still so much he had to do: bargains he had to make and questions that needed answers before he allowed himself even a moment to dwell in the in-between. Miles to go, before he slept. So, he said, “I asked McGonagall a question today. About you.”The only indication of Remus’s surprise was the subtle flash of his gold-rimmed eyes. “And?”“She didn’t answer it. In fact, she outright refused.” Sirius watched Remus carefully, for even the slightest tell, but Remus wore a mask made of moonlight. Sirius sighed, surrendered. There would be no revelations tonight, no answers to be whispered in the darkness. Not when the silver moonlight cast enough shadows to hide every secret between them. “I—I think she was scared of me,” Sirius said. “Scared for me.” Because this war brewing, festering both inside and far beyond these walls, had never been hypothetical. Not for people like them. “What was the question?” Remus’s words were said on a single breath. A last, desperate prayer. “It wasn’t the right one,” Sirius answered, and that seemed to soothe the maelstrom of emotions flickering amidst the scars and moon-shadows between them, if only for a moment. “I have yet to figure out the right question. It’s infuriating.”“You will.” It sounded like the last words of a man condemned to the gallows. Perhaps they’d share that fate, after all. Remus held up Andromeda’s letter. “What are you going to do about…?”Regulus.Because war had come to claim his brother, just as Sirius had known it would. War had come, demanded the prince forged in hellfire, and Sirius had been selfish, in accepting Alphard’s offer. It should have been him. He was the oldest. Sirius was already damned. He’d made his choices, for good or ill, but Regulus…
How can he ever face another? The death-marked prince has damned his brother!
Sirius Black knew something about creatures born of flesh and lightning, abandoned and forgotten by the ones tasked with loving them above all else.And, unfortunately, Remus was right. No matter how the story was spun, no matter the true identity of Frankenstein’s monster, the ending was unavoidable: desolation and tragedy. Damnation for all eternity, for the creature born of flesh and lightning. He had a choice. He knew he did. And this, here, was the knife’s edge, and Merlin, the fires that raged on either side. Damned, either way. So, what was he going to do?Something incredibly stupid. Naturally. It was the only real choice left, even if it was the wrong one. Even if it cost him everything.Remus, though, seemed to take Sirius’s silence as an answer—perhaps even something as ludicrous as a surrender. Sirius allowed him to believe that simple lie, just for tonight. “I’m here, with whatever you decide,” Remus said, and that too, Sirius knew, was a lie. There’d be pitchforks, come tomorrow. “James is too. You don’t even need to ask.”Sirius managed a smile, and it was a distraction: a cruel, gilded mask made of starlight and everything Remus wanted to see. “Andromeda’s right,” Remus continued. Nails in his coffin. “Together, we’ll come up with something. A way for you for you to talk to Regulus. Just let us help, okay?”A nod. A lie.Because Sirius Black already had a plan, and they’d never forgive the choice he’d made. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
May 26, 1972
Sirius was out of bed, out of Gryffindor tower, by five the next morning. He’d barely slept—too haunted by arguments yet to come—but what else was new? He undid the lock on the portrait hole with a quick flash of his wand. He was grateful, at least, that Snape had not spent the entire night sulking in the corridor. Sirius wasn’t exactly in the right frame of mind to refrain from hexing Slytherins this morning. He made his way to the owlery and spent the next hour going over the precise details of his plan with Rogelio. Once, twice, all the way through three times before Sirius was convinced the owl understood and would abide by the parameters of the mission. He needed to make sure it all went according to plan, that all his pieces were in play, before it inevitably blew up in his face. It’d be a cataclysm of epic proportions, in every possible way. Sirius didn’t care. Not anymore. He had to do this. It was the Gryffindor thing to do.He pulled out a roll of parchment and Remus’s ballpoint pen. Words etched in ink, etched into the fabric of eternity, then tied to Rogelio’s foot. From what he’d gathered, Inverness wasn’t far from Hogwarts: only about fifty miles, as the crow—or owl, in this case—flies. A powerful wizard could probably Apparate the distance without too much of a headache. And Rogelio was fast and reliable. If he followed Sirius’s instructions, Sirius should have Alphard’s reply before noon. With time to kill and half a day to waste in relative peace, Sirius wandered to the Great Hall and claimed the best spot at the Gryffindor table: equally far away from the head table and the Slytherins. Generally perfect for scheming and marauding. He was halfway through his third cup of tea by the time everyone else arrived: Lily, arm in arm with Marlene and Dee, followed by James and Peter. Remus, ever the boy who cursed the rising sun, shuffled and harrumphed in with a crowd of Hufflepuffs a minute later. Sirius had prepared Remus’s coffee nearly an hour ago. It was more of a shot in the dark, a prayer that he’d get to spend a few more hours of the day with Remus before everything went to shit, than any practical expectation that Remus would arrive any earlier than what was absolutely necessary. He had hoped… Well. It didn’t matter.Sirius waved a warming charm over the coffee, set it almost to boiling, and handed it off to Remus. Remus, who downed the coffee in all of two gulps. Despite having witnessed this feat nearly every morning for the better part of a year now, Sirius still had no clue by what means or miracle Remus had any tastebuds left.James and Peter were in a hurry. There was, apparently, a last-minute Quidditch practice before morning classes. According to James, Frank wanted to squeeze in a few more drills and manoeuvres before tomorrow’s final against Ravenclaw. James and Peter were only stopping by the Great Hall because James had lost a bet. Sirius wasn’t really listening, but he surmised it had something to do with Peter’s uncanny ability to predict how various professors took their tea. They were out the great doors again—Peter still trying to break the hold James had on his collar whilst simultaneously trying to stuff scones in his pockets—before Sirius could get in more than three words. After he was mostly revived and returned to the land of the living, Remus pulled out his Arithmancy homework and shot Sirius a look that was half sheepish apology, half desperate plea. Everyone who dared to take Professor Idunn’s class—mostly Ravenclaws and Slytherins—was desperately cramming for the final exam next week. To no one’s surprise, Sirius had something of a knack not only magical theory, but it’s practical application to numerology and astrology. Arithmancy was a simple matter of identifying patterns, testing hypothesis, and drawing inevitable conclusions. In Professor Idunn’s own words, evidence-based, no-bullshit Divination. It was probably his favourite and best subject. Sirius had just enough time to explain the twelve tenants of numerology before the morning bell rang. Remus stood, removed his robe, and shoved up the sleeves of his shirt, supposedly in preparation for the walk out to Hagrid’s hut for Care of Magical Creatures. Sirius’s voice caught in his throat, his mind reset to zero, as he took in the scars that laced Remus’s forearms. They were healed over, all of them now, but… Remus so rarely allowed anyone to see them. They were… distracting, for all the reasons they shouldn’t be. The scars, some of them carved by Sirius’s own spell, were marks of defiance: a primal, ferocious will to survive the nightmares and monsters that tore into the flesh of the living.“It’s hot,” Remus said, by way of explanation. Then, a little more sheepishly, “And I’m too damn tired to care.”A day for acts of bravery and minor miracles, then. At least for now. Sirius doubted very much that his luck would hold out for long. “You look badass,” Sirius told him. “If anyone asks questions, I’ll tell them you fought a dragon or something.” “Dragons are only violent when protecting their nests.”“Maybe you had a craving for scrambled eggs.”And, Merlin, how he laughed at the horrified look on Remus’s face. Remus didn’t roll down his sleeves. No one said a word about his scars.The first reply came as they made their way back to the castle from the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Rogelio swooped down, snagging a claw-full of Sirius’s hair before perching on the head of a nearby statue. Ordering his friends to save him a seat in Potions—far away from Snape, thank you very much—Sirius jogged over to the owl. Alphard’s response—still on the same parchment, as Sirius had requested—was short, succinct. Right to the heart of the matter. Sirius scribbled down an equally succinct, one-word answer, hooked the parchment back to Rogelio’s foot, then sent the owl off again with the few remaining treats in his pockets. He probably hadn’t needed to run to the dungeons. Slughorn didn’t notice when he slipped in late, and Sirius spent a majority of the lecture inventing new and exciting ways of keeping Remus awake, most of which had the added joy of watching Slytherins panic as their cauldrons exploded or mysteriously bubbled over. One glare from Lily was enough to dissuade him from trying anything on Snape, who sat alone in the corner of the room. Sirius was only slightly peeved when, after several rounds of Gryffindor versus Slytherin potion-ingredient-roulette, Snape had the most viable Dreamless Sleep draught remaining. Sirius fumed and cursed, though, when Slughorn awarded Snape top marks for the day, despite the fact that Sirius had successfully brewed the potion about fifteen minutes before Snape had. Peter had then dumped a heap of fairy wings in his and Remus’s cauldron, mistaking them for Slytherins. Remus said Sirius wasn’t allowed to hex a fellow Marauder in front of actual Slytherins. At lunch, Rogelio swooped in bearing another response. Despite the weird look from Lily and the slightly apprehensive tinge to Remus’s golden eyes and parsed lips, Sirius didn’t say a word as he stood up. He grabbed a crust of bread, a bit of jam, then placed Rogelio on his shoulder, heading out of the Great Hall. He needed to concentrate. Lunch could wait. He found an empty alcove in the library. Curled up and cross-legged on the ancient rug, unseen between the shelves, Sirius cast a disillusionment charm, just in case. He did not want to be disturbed just yet, couldn’t bear to answer questions. Not until everything was set in stone. He unfolded the parchment and read Alphard’s terms and conditions. He read them twice, to be certain he wasn’t agreeing to something that would come back to haunt him. As he read, he broke off bits of crust and fed Rogelio, who gobbled down every bite with happy, soothing coos. Finally, again drawing the ballpoint pen, Sirius offered a minor amendment, a quick explanation, then his agreement to all other terms. A few minutes later, after devouring the last bits of his lunch, Rogelio flew off again. When Sirius caught up with James and Remus in Arithmancy that afternoon—Peter had long ago dropped the class in favour of double Herbology—James offered Sirius a slightly smushed scone, curtesy of Peter’s pilfered breakfast. Sirius was hungry enough that he ate it without complaint. At Remus’s glare, he offered a lame excuse before Remus could launch into a lecture about Sirius’s reckless and self-destructive habit of skipping meals. They cared for him, James and Remus. Lily and Peter and the rest of his honour guard, too, of course. But James, his fairy tale prince, who loved him and claimed Sirius as his brother, and Remus, who held the answer to every unanswered question in Sirius’s heart… They cared for him. Sirius forced himself to remember that. The rest of the day passed by quickly. Soon, their free period was over, Peter’s Transfiguration homework was done in a show of thanks for the scone and a form of an apology for Sirius’s reaction in Potions, and his detention loomed. Sirius had, at this point, no idea why he was actually serving detention; he just accepted the reality that someone in the castle more than likely had probably cause for him to be serving one. That being said, he’d run the numbers and concluded that he’d still missed McGonagall’s record by a solid margin. Both Sirius and James had amended to make the toppling of the detention record something of a priority next year. They’d have to start much earlier. No more of this pay-the-ferryman appeasement bullshit either. That hadn’t worked out well, anyway. McGonagall didn’t say a word to him when he walked in and he had nothing more he cared to say to her after yesterday. Instead, he did his homework in silence, until he was certain his brain would melt from the monotony of listing and ordering major battles of the various Goblin wars. Eventually, he gave up on History of Magic and drew his wand, opting instead for randomly transfiguring miscellaneous items into small, cat sculptures. After each successful transfiguration, he waved a wandless animation spell over the sculptures with his free hand. He’d crafted at least six sculptures before McGonagall actually noticed. Her glare would have killed a weaker man. Sirius just smirked. Flicking his wrist, he made the latest cat sculpture—formerly the inkwell on her desk—meow. She kicked him out immediately.Lily and Remus were whispering conspiratorially, hunched close together near the common room fireplace, when he returned. Marlene and Dee danced nearby to a David Bowie song pouring out of the Muggle music box, their hands loosely linked. Sirius recognised the familiar, haunting notes of “All the Madmen” and hid a smile. Muggle or no, Bowie deserved a title as an honorary Gryffindor for that song alone.James and Peter, he was told, were at yet another Quidditch practice at Frank’s behest. For a brief moment, he envied them—James and Peter. The only thing either of them seemed to care about was the outcome of tomorrow’s match. It didn’t matter if the world was crumbling outside of Hogwarts, so long as Madam Hootch blew her whistle and tossed up the Bludgers at the scheduled time. Sirius didn’t hold it against them. They all probably needed the distraction. He just couldn’t allow himself to be swept into the Quidditch madness. Not yet. Not until he had Alphard’s answer.Waving a half-hearted goodbye to his friends, Sirius climbed the stairs to the dorms. He hadn’t realised how exhausted he was until he caught sight of the bed he and Remus shared. He hadn’t slept well since… Well, since Christmas, if he was being completely honest, which he did try to avoid on most occasions. For the sake of his lingering sanity. He collapsed face-first into Remus’s pillow, breathing in the comforting scent of midnight and wild things. By some rare miracle, he fell asleep almost immediately, relieved, at least for the time being, of the enormous burdens that had been gnawing at his heart. He wandered into a silent, dreamless sleep that seemed to drag his weary soul a few steps closer to the Void. He wanted to follow, to grab hold of those invisible hands and surrender. It’d be peaceful, at last. He could taste it, feel the comfort of nothing swallowing him and—Someone smacked upside the head with a pillow that may as well have been stuffed full of bricks. “Ow! What the—““What the fuck is this?!” Remus. A demand, an accusation, a dagger held to his throat. Sirius blinked, bleary and disoriented, both from the remarkably deep sleep and the rather abrupt wake-up call. Remus stood over him, face twisted with a rage Sirius had never seen: one that was feral, almost rabid, and longed to stain its teeth with blood. Golden eyes flashed, even in the relative darkness of the room, and a weaker man would have cowered in fear. But this was Remus, and Sirius embraced his fury. It’d change nothing, in the end.James’s words, from so long ago now, came back and crashed into him with nearly the same force as that pillow.
You scared all of us, but especially Remus.
Fear made fools of all of them, in the end. Lily stood close behind Remus, her arms wrapped tightly around her middle, her eyebrows pinched in a frown. James and Peter lurked just inside the closed door, both seemingly a little unsure if they should intervene or run and get help. “What. The fuck. Is this?!” Each word snarled through bared teeth. And, there, in Remus’s clenched fist, was a familiar piece of parchment. Acknowledging that his plan of breaking the news to his friends on his own terms had burst into flames right in front of him, Sirius pushed himself upright. He ran his fingers through his hair: a last-ditch attempt at elegance before his execution. Sirius stifled a yawn. “Where did you get that?”It was more curiosity than accusation. Remus huffed, snarling once more, as though the unassuming question was nothing more than fuel for his rage. He took a step back, a few deep breaths, his fists clenching and unclenching. He seemed incapable of conjuring the words necessary to answer Sirius’s question.So, eyes tracking Remus’s every move, Lily said, “Rogelio flew into the common room looking for you. He was tired and saw Marlene and flew to her for cuddles. She thought that letter was for her. She didn’t say anything. Just read it, then handed it to Remus, and… Well.” Again the same damned words from Remus, this time hissed through his teeth: “What the fuck is this?!”“He won’t let me read it,” Lily muttered. “He just keeps saying that.”“We followed,” James added. “Mostly to make sure he doesn’t strangle you.”Sirius was pretty sure that wasn’t entirely out of the question.With a sigh, Sirius stood and reached for the letter. “Remus, let me—“Remus jerked the letter out of his reach, stumbling back a step before he caught himself. “Do they know what you did?! Did you talk to them about this?!” Remus brandished the crumpled letter like a sword: held over his head in all its glory as he issued his war cry. “No,” Sirius said. Secrecy was a fundamental part of his plan, specifically to avoid this sort of confrontation. He’d needed the final answer, the final piece to the puzzle, before he planned to make his confession.That answer, now clenched in Remus’s fist.“You want me to read it to them, Sirius?!” Remus snarled. Not waiting for an answer, Remus unfurled the parchment and cleared his throat. Golden eyes, seething in pure molten fury, dared Sirius to beg for silence. Sirius Black begged for nothing. Not now.“‘Dear Uncle Alphard.’” His words, on Remus’s lips. In any other circumstance, Sirius would be mesmerised. Instead he felt… hollow. “‘I hope all is well. I want to first thank you again for your offer and the conditions of your negotiations with my mother. Knowing I’ll be staying with you over the holidays has quite literally kept me sane these last few months.”A truth, that Sirius had willingly surrendered. “‘I’m afraid, though, that I must beg another favour,’” Remus continued. “‘Andromeda wrote to me last night, and the short of it is this: I need to go to Grimmauld this summer. As soon as term ends, if at all possible. Regulus is alone. I know what you said, and I know what Andromeda said, but if you can find it in your heart to grant me this last mercy, I’d be entirely in your debt.“‘I need to see Regulus, if only for a single day. Even if it means returning to that place. Returning to my mother. I refuse to abandon my brother to every nightmare Grimmauld has to offer, without so much as a parting word. That is a cruelty I refuse to impart on him. Not when I still have a choice in the matter. I ask for your understanding, and I await your response. Whatever it may be.’”Remus lowered the letter, his breath coming out in pants, as though he had just finished running a marathon or wrangling a giant beast. “What the fuck, Sirius?” James looked as though someone had carved open his chest and held his still-beating heart in the palm of their hand. And still, there were more words scribbled on that parchment. His words, on Remus’s lips. The last will and testament of a condemned man, read by his executioner to the crowd that had gathered at his gallows. “Alphard didn’t question anything,” Remus said. “Just gave him a chance to back down.”Are you absolutely certain this is what you want? Alphard wrote. Short. Succinct. Just like Sirius’s answer: Yes.“Merlin,” James breathed, because everyone in that room knew Sirius Black was incapable of backing down from anything he perceived to be a challenge. And that’s what Alphard’s question had been: a challenge of his resolve, his willingness to knowingly walk into hell. “There’s more,” Remus growled. “Alphard wrote, ‘This plan of yours does present us with something of a conundrum: one that will need to be rectified before I deign to make arrangements with your mother. I mentioned a few conditions to my offer of sanctuary during our initial negotiations last December. My intention was to discuss these conditions with you upon your arrival in Inverness—a series of house rules, if you will—but present circumstances dictate I must take preemptive action. I am afraid, Sirius, that I must insist on enforcing these conditions in order to protect my own interests from the ravenous talons of your mother.’”“Wh—What does that mean?” Peter squeaked. Lily pressed her lips into a thin line. “Alphard’s changing the terms of their agreement.”“Can he do that?” James asked. “I thought Mum’s contract was magically sealed, or something.”“Protecting Alphard’s interests was part of the original negotiation,” Sirius explained. “I already agreed to that. He’s entitled to extra precautions because—““Because you asked to go back to fucking Grimmauld?” Lily snapped.“Exactly.”Remus huffed. Sirius imagined tongues of fire whispering, flittering from his flared nostrils, like a cornered dragon ready to face down and decimate legions of ill-fated soldiers. “‘If you choose this path,’” Remus read, “‘I ask that you agree to swear an Unbreakable Vow with me, to be bound at King’s Cross by a person of your choosing. The terms of the Vow are simple: You are not to reveal the secrets of Constellation’s Keep to anyone bearing the name of Black. In exchange, you have my unrelenting and unending promise that no harm will come to you at the hands of anyone named Black for as long as I live. “‘Your mother has been after my secrets for as long as I can remember, Sirius. She has infinite coffers to employ an untold number of spies and underlings, all of whom have sworn fealty to her and her silver throne. None of whom would have any qualms about casting an Imperious on you, then sending you off wander through the halls of Constellation’s Keep to dig up my secrets. An Unbreakable Vow is the only true way to know that you are in possession of your own mind once you leave Grimmauld. The Vow supersedes the Unforgivable, you see.
“‘Those are the terms, Sirius. I am not willing to negotiate this point. Whatever you choose, I await your reply.’”
“Shit,” James hissed. “He agreed to that?”“Of course he fucking did.” Remus’s voice, too, was laced with ash and flame. Sirius bit his tongue, drew in a breath. This would be one hell of a fight, and he wasn’t one to lay down and accept defeat. Every once in a while, though, Sirius remembered to bide his time. Wait for the death blow to reveal itself.Forcing an uncharacteristic facade of collected control, Sirius just said, “I haven’t heard Alphard’s reply, given that my letter was intercepted. I’d appreciate it, Remus, if you could read it so we’re all on the same page.”Remus looked like he had a million other words to say to Sirius—a million, dagger-sharp accusations meant to draw blood, prolong the inevitable end—but instead, he read the short reply: “‘I wrote your mother. She is expecting us for an early soirée, followed by dinner, next Sunday. We will travel straight from King’s Cross to Grimmauld Place. We will stay one night, and one night only. That is the limits of my tolerance of that house of nightmares. We’ll leave for Scotland as early as possible Monday morning, preferably before breakfast.’”With that, Remus crumpled the parchment and let if fall to the stone floor, before turning his back on Sirius. Scarred fingers clenched and unclenched a few times, then finally lashed out. The parchment dissolved in a quick burst of flames. That was… interesting. Sirius couldn’t ever remember seeing Remus use wandless magic. The world was silent, apparently waiting for him to speak. Waiting for Sirius’s explanations, his excuses, whatever words he might manage to conjure from the ether. Words, that could paint a portrait of nightmares for his fairy tale prince, his chosen brother. Words, that could wash away the shame that threatened to swallow him whole, for breaking Lily’s heart. Words, that might justify the end of this story. The end he’d chosen, after running from it for so long.Lily stared at him, and Merlin, he could not stand to witness the decimation on the face of his king. He looked at her, sought out and reached for that invisible thread that tethered them together. Marked them forever. Equal and opposite.“I can’t leave Regulus to become like them,” he said, and they were familiar words, familiar platitudes and justifications. Everyone in that room had heard them before. Just, words. Meaningless, really, as indicated by Remus’s near-feral snarl. Sirius redirected, took aim in the direction of the deeper truth. Words, truths, he’d never been brave enough to admit to himself, let alone voice out loud. Saying these words out loud would give them form, sentience, a modality for revenge. Words, that given life, would ricochet back and destroy him. Lionheart, the hat had said. Gryffindor.Words. Lies.Even so, even knowing what it would cost, he laid the truth at the feet of his king, his prince. At the feet of the scarred and heartbroken boy he loved so much.
Words.
“I’m not like you, Evans, and I never will be. You’ll forgive Snape for all he’s said, all he’s done. And that’s good. Morally commendable. Hurrah. But me?” A bitter, broken laugh, beholding to the madness inside him. “You asked me what I would do if it were Regulus—when it’s Regulus. And here’s the truth: I’d let him go, let him burn, Evans. I will surrender him to the darkness because I will not survive if I have to watch him fulfil their every cursed whim and prophecy. I refuse to live in that world. So, either I bargain for a miracle now, even if it costs me everything, or… Or I fucking surrender, Evans. It’s the same damn ending, don’t you see? I don’t get to walk away. This way, though… at least I have the illusion of choice. At least I get to believe I can still save him. I can fucking try before the gods have their feast on my fucking corpse. Maybe… this way, Regulus gets to survive.”Lily bore his heartbreak, his vulnerability, and the perilous truth he’d surrendered to her. She saw it, felt it, and she understood perhaps better than he’d ever dared to hope. And he loved her for it.But it was not his king who issued judgment on his confession. On his greatest sin. Because the truth was a weapon. Words, wrapped around his neck and fastened into a noose.Words, that the likes of Remus Lupin would never let stand unchallenged. “You can’t save him!” Suddenly, Remus was in his face, towering over Sirius in a show of dominance he so rarely displayed. “You are not the executer of divine justice. You are a kid, Sirius. I don’t give a fuck about whatever prophecies rest on your shoulders. You are a kid, and his soul is not yours to save. His choices are not yours to make! If he chooses to damn himself, it’s on him. You’ll hurt, because you’re fucking human and that’s how it works. His damnation will tear through your heart, a bolt of lightning that will feel like it’s rending your flesh from your bones, but so-fucking-be it. It is his choice. Not yours. You can’t save him from any of it!”Words, now, that had drawn blood. Sirius allowed the wound to fester, hurt. The pain felt familiar. Like an old friend.“Remus, come on, mate,” James said, taking a step towards them. Peter cowered behind him. “You don’t know what—““You want him to go back, Jamie?” A whispered snarl. A threat, directed at James, even as those golden eyes never strayed from Sirius.“You’re okay with this?”“Of course not. I—““Then shut the fuck up.”Remus stretched to his full height, and though he towered over him, Sirius refused to back down. Refused to so much as look away. Doing so would be a sign of weakness, an admission of defeat. One he could not afford. Not when Sirius was so close to victory. So, he allowed Remus to spill more blood, drink his fill. At least for now.“They almost killed you last time, you fucking arsehole!” Remus roared. “Mrs. Potter told you not to go back. McGonagall made sure you wouldn’t have to. Andromeda told you to stay away three fucking times and you didn’t fucking listen! For the love of Christ, Sirius, I do not care if I have to have Slughorn lock you in the dungeon or chain you to the fucking Whomping Willow myself, I will not let you go back to that house!”And there it was. The killing blow. Sirius tried not to smirk. It was probably unbecoming to gloat. “When do you leave, Remus?” Every drop of colour, every burst of flame, every sign of life snuffed out in an instant, a single heartbeat, punctuated by the question. Remus struggled to draw breath, as though his lungs had collapsed and left behind a carcass: a shattered, hollowed out chest of someone who used to be alive. “What?”A single word. A final breath. “When do you leave?” His voice was calm, collected, completely in control of the raging monster, the serpent, that desperately wanted to strike back at the world—at Remus—for pointing out its weakness.Lily glanced frantically between him and Remus, reached out a hand to Remus that Sirius cut down with a glare. James took a step forward, right behind Lily, his face, too, a maelstrom of emotions that Sirius no longer cared to read. Remus’s eyes—his beautiful, sun-flecked eyes—glimmered in the dull light with a sorrow known only to men who not only braved the darkness, but lived in fear of becoming a monster that lurks there, lost forever in the shadows. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”He’d hoped for the truth—prayed for it, even. He’d thought, perhaps, that they were beyond these ridiculous games. “Your eyes, Remus. They’re gold. They have been for two days. So. When do you leave?”Remus looked away, looked anywhere but at Sirius. “It’s a trick of the—““No, it’s fucking not and you know it.”Lily glared, fiery green eyes directed first at Sirius, then back at James, who stood with his jaw hanging open, a half-formed question on his lips. “Sirius, you need to—““How long are you going to be gone, Remus?” Sirius pressed. “Should we expect you at the Quidditch match tomorrow? How about during exams next week? I already told Pete he couldn’t cheat off me—it really wouldn’t be believable at this point—and you’re the next best option because Jaime’s handwriting is shit. So, can Peter count on passing his exams, or—““Sirius!” Lily snapped. To be fair, Peter didn’t look all that offended. Sirius marched right up to Remus, so close Remus had to look at him or risk crashing into Sirius entirely. Quietly, “When do you leave, Remus?”A voice, shredded down to splinters, from a lifetime spent screaming into the void: “In the morning.”Sirius took exactly three steps back. Nodded once. He’d expected as much. Still, the truth burned, ravenous and monstrous as he allowed it to consume him. He hadn’t expected victory to taste like ash. It scratched his throat, stained his throat. Tainted his words as they spilled out into the aftermath.“Don’t you dare,” he hissed, barely loud enough to be heard over the thundering rage devouring, decimating, breaking his fucking heart. “Don’t you fucking dare tell me I shouldn’t go back to Grimmauld, Lupin. You have no right. You don’t get to dictate shit about my life or my fucking choices. Not when I have to witness the fucking aftermath, after you allow them to tear you apart every fucking time you leave!”“Sirius, mate, you don’t know what—“ James started.But his mother had raised him in hell, forged him in fire. He’d been bred to savour that fatal blow. “You are a fucking hypocrite and a coward, Remus.”His name, shouted by James, spat out like a profanity from his king. A whimper from Peter. And…And, Sirius Black bared his teeth. “Does Dumbledore know? Does the Old Man know that you roll over and accept whatever torture the gods have dealt? Or is he the one who carved those scars?” A manic laugh to match poisoned words. “At least in the story, the monster fought back. He never accepted the fate that was written for him. How could he? Damnation was nothing compared to the torture he faced. Death-marked, damned… It doesn’t fucking matter! There comes a time where you have to do something, Remus. Choose something for yourself. Choose to fight back, even if the fucking ending never changes.”All-knowing, all-consuming golden eyes snapped to his. “Is that what it means, then, for Sirius Black to kill a god? To lash out blindly, to stab in the dark seeking the heart of fate, knowing in your bones that it changes absolutely nothing? You get to spit in the faces of fate and creation, but at the end of the day, you are as cursed and as damned to hell as you were when the prophecy was written. Is that what you want?”“Yes.” Oh, how the flames of hell danced on his tongue. “I will make every god, every shadow and whispered fate, rue the moment of my conception. I will raze all of creation to cinders and damn myself in the process, if it means my brother gets to live in a world of his own choosing, free from the prophecies and puppet strings. I am not the monster in this story, Remus. I am its executioner.” Sirius sneered, and dealt the killing blow. As was his fate and damnation. “If you were any sort of Gryffindor, Remus, you would have made the same damn choice the second they carved the first scar into your flesh.”Remus stared at the floor, his curls falling in his face. The only visible reaction was the slight twitch of scarred fingers. Sirius imagined he could hear the grinding of Remus’s teeth, see a spark of wild, uncontrolled magic in the corners of his eyes.Lily held onto Remus’s arm like a lifeline, her face a mask of righteous and divine wrath. “Salazar, Sirius, you don’t know what your fucking talking about!” James shouted, trying to shoulder his way between Sirius and Remus. “Don’t I?” Sirius glared up at James, at his off-centre glasses and ridiculous fucking hair. Sirius allowed the madness—the nothing and the dark he’d fought so hard to keep back for such a long damn time—consume what was left of his soul. “What the fuck do you know of fate and damnation, Potter? When has Gryffindor’s fairy-tale prince ever had to make that kind of choice? You get to show up on your white fucking horse and play the fucking hero. People die for you, Potter, not the other way around.”James’s face goes dangerously blank. Then, with no warning whatsoever, he shoved Sirius back. Once, twice, until Sirius’s back collided with the opposite wall. Vaguely, Sirius wondered if James is actually going to hit him. James was breathing hard, his fist clenching, presumably at the memory of the last time he’d taken a swing at Sirius. Instead, James growled, “It is in your best interest to stop talking right-the-fuck now, Black.”“Yeah?” Sirius smiled at the memory of blood in his teeth. He held James’s gaze for a moment, then let his eyes track to Lily, to Remus, who still had yet to move. “There’s nothing any of you can do to me that comes close to what my mother can do. So don’t fucking bother. This… This is a choice I get to make to save my fucking brother. I will not let him burn alone. That’s the fucking Gryffindor thing to do, isn’t it?”A sardonic, broken laugh. Sirius Black had never belonged in Gryffindor. He’d been a fool to allow himself to believe otherwise, even if only for a few, fleeting seconds. His king said, “It’s suicide.”“I don’t fucking care.”Because what was his life worth, if he couldn’t even keep his brother safe?Liquid-gold eyes snapped up to him. It was not the devastation and surrender upon which the ravenous nothing in Sirius’s soul had hoped to feast. No, this was something different: a feral creature Sirius did not recognise. One that savoured the screams associated with the rending of flesh, the decimation of entire worlds.It was inhuman, this thing behind Remus Lupin’s eyes. Merlin, it was the sort of creature Sirius only knew in his nightmares. “You want to kill yourself?” it asked. “Fine. Fucking fine! Don’t expect any of us to stand by and fucking watch.” A laugh that didn’t sound quite human. “It was never going to be a brand new ending, was it? You were never going to tear up the script. You’re Sirius Black. It was always going to end in self-destruction, wasn’t it?”The nothing in his soul, the darkness in his heart, rose up to meet the monster that lurked in Remus’s eyes. “Self-destruction?!” Sirius spat. “Where’d you get your fucking scars, Lupin?”He’d aimed the silver dagger—the fucking death blow—at the creature, at the monster he could not recognise. He meant to maim, to kill the beast below the surface, hiding in the shadows of Remus’s scars, to revel in the destruction of the unrecognisable thing, but… It was Remus who answered. “Some of us were never awarded the fucking luxury of choosing our own demise.”It was a riddle, an answer, that he was not meant to understand. It stole all the air from his lungs, the fire in his heart. He was left with nothing. “Remus, I—“But Remus was gone, followed by his king and a slamming door. Helpless, hopeless, Sirius turned his gaze to James, praying for a lifeline, anything to tether him to this reality. Salvation, an answer to the nothing that threatened to eat him alive. “James—““Too far, Black. You went too fucking far.”Cold. Cruel. Deserved.The door opened and slammed once more. James was gone—Peter with him. Sirius was alone. Abandoned—and rightfully so—but so very, very alone. It was dangerous, here, trapped in his own mind. Left to the nothing and the all-consuming darkness. His own self-destruction, self-made damnation. Barely breathing—not allowing himself to fucking think lest he be swallowed whole by the nothing—Sirius pushed off the wall and stormed over to his unused, untouched bed. He tore open the hangings, surprised for an infinite moment about the absence of dust on the covers.There should be dust. He hadn’t touched that bed in fucking months. The dust would taste like ash, like the remnants of his own self-annihilation. Sirius collapsed face-first into the pillow, gathered it under himself. He imagined what it might be like to suffocate—to stop breathing and finally face the ending as it was written.After a moment, Sirius surrendered to that awful, cloying, fucking relentless desire to survive, no matter the cost, and drew in a ragged breath. Even in his own self-destruction, he was a fucking coward. Disgusted, defeated, Sirius waved his hand and the hangings snapped shut. Another flick of his wrist—Silencio, this time.Then, Sirius buried his face in his pillow and sobbed. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
MAY 27, 1972
Sirius didn’t sleep.Remus wasn’t at breakfast—gone, to face whatever creature lurked behind his golden eyes. Alone. With no other choice.Frankenstein’s monster, and Sirius had raised the pitchfork. Called for torches and pyres. Merlin. When Sirius tried to apologise—a blanketed statement, a half-hearted, meaningless thing, because the offended party was off being tortured by a different sort of demon—the king of Gryffindor hexed him before a single word could escape his mouth. Invisible fire-ants crawling and fucking burning all over his skin. He was too much of a coward to ask Madam Pomfrey for a salve. He deserved to burn, after all. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius didn’t go to the Quidditch match. Not that he’d be welcomed even if he felt motivated enough to brave the stands without the assistance of his honour guard. Instead, he holed himself up in the library. He spent the afternoon pretending to read a book and trying to ignore Madam Pince’s constant death glares. Apparently, even the librarian would rather be spending the day watching the Quidditch final. Sirius assumed Gryffindor won the match, evidenced by the sudden explosion of crimson and gold fireworks that he could see from the open window, followed by the raucous cries of victory he could hear coming from the pitch, even this deep in the castle. Intent on avoiding all human contact for as long as possible, Sirius tucked himself away in the library stacks. This, in turn, allowed Madam Pince to pretend he’d left, so she, too, could join in the festivities. Or, join in Slytherin’s revenge plots. Sirius never really figured out which house the librarian belonged to. Thankfully, the great library doors were unlocked—either by happenstance or Madam Pince’s unforeseen compassion—when, hours later, Sirius emerged and made his way back up to Gryffindor tower.He’d been sure to allow enough time for the celebrations to be well underway by the time he arrived in the tower. He planned on slipping through the crowd of mostly-drunk revellers, sneaking back up to the dormitories, and spending another sleepless night staring at the ceiling. Misery was no less than he deserved, after all. But, when he reached the tower, the portrait hole was closed, locked, and the Fat Lady resolutely refused to so much as acknowledge his presence. Too exhausted to put up more than a few feeble pleas, Sirius collapsed against the opposite wall, knees drawn up to his chest and head tucked between them. Defeated and cast out. Like fucking Severus Snape. Trapped in mutual, miserable silence with a sentient portrait who’d gone ahead and added herself to the ever-growing list of people who refused to speak to him, Sirius resigned himself to spending the night wallowing in the dramatic irony of his newly acquired rejection and banishment from Gryffindor tower. It was, perhaps, a fate he probably should have seen coming. Nobody from the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black was ever supposed to find himself a home in Gryffindor tower. An hour later, he nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of footsteps coming from down the hall.Everyone was supposed to be at the party. Fuck.Fabian Prewett, still in his soiled and slightly-rancid Quidditch uniform, held a cask of butterbeer over one shoulder. He stopped. Frowned. “Black?” A simple, drawn out syllable. “What’re you doing here?”Sirius lifted his head, an exhausting, leaden weight on his shoulders. Stared straight ahead. Said, “I need you to let me back into the tower.”Fabian glanced behind him, then past Sirius, searching for some reasonable explanation, some unseen enemy. Finding none, a simple, “Why?”“The Fat Lady won’t speak to me.”Although a plausible and reasonable-enough explanation, Sirius wasn’t entirely convinced James or Lily hadn’t directly asked the Fat Lady to keep him out. It felt right, to be banished by his king, for the things he’d said. He hated himself for the words he’d allowed to escape. The nightmares he’d manifested with his voice. Fabian’s face scrunched up in confusion. “What? She has to. You’re a Gryffindor. That’s her job.”Either not hearing or deliberately ignoring Sirius’s derisive scoff, Fabian stepped up to the portrait. “Oi, Lady? What’s the problem, eh?”The Fat Lady turned up her nose in the other direction, ignoring Fabian entirely. “That’s the same response I got,” Sirius said.Setting the cask of butterbeer down, Fabian turned to face him, a half-amused eyebrow reaching for his hairline. “What did you do, Black?”Sirius barked a laugh. It came out cruel. “To her, or to the people inside?”Fabian’s teasing smile ticked down. Still, his answer was light. Care-free. “Well, let’s start with the Fat Lady and go from there.”Sirius sighed, resigning himself to list off the least of his crimes. Better Fabian Prewett be the judge than anyone else. “I set her up on a date with the satyr from the Astronomy tower. Told her he was madly in love with her. Really played it up. Had to get rid of her, you know? Then, she, well. She caught him with a centaur.”“Oh.”“A male centaur.”“Oh.” Fabian laughed, and it was real. He wiped a tear from his eye. “Merlin, you really buggered that one right up the arse, eh?”The Fat Lady let out a cry of indigence. Malaise and broken as he was, even Sirius Black couldn’t entirely hide his smile. Fabian slid down the wall next to him, mirroring his posture. He nudged Sirius with an elbow. “You want to confess the rest of your sins, Black? I’ll be your priest.”“You’d make a shit priest.”Fabian gave a fake shudder. “The celibacy alone might be the death of me.”Sirius snorted. “Let me guess, then,” Fabian went on. “You said some stupid shit?”The injustice of that blasé, laissez-faire tone coupled with the blind understatement threatened to suffocate him. Fabian let his head fall against the wall. It left him staring off somewhere in the middle-distance.“As someone who regularly says stupid shit, I feel obligated to tell you that it’ll probably be okay.”Sirius would beg to differ. Some things were Unforgivable. He knew that better than anyone. He’d had friends. He’d had a home. He’d had a friend—an equal—in his king, a fairy-tale prince who’d claimed Sirius as his blood brother, and… And a boy, with tawny hair and sun-drenched, whiskey eyes, who had perhaps more secrets than scars. A boy, who’d shown Sirius all the parts of his soul that might be deserving of salvation. And he’d still dragged them both to the gates of hell. “Is it a secret, this shit you said?” Fabian asked the deafening silence that stretched between them.Was it? Sirius didn’t know when he’d lost track. There were so many secrets. “How about a secret in exchange for a secret? One of mine for one of yours?” Fabian said. “Or, you know, if you still don’t want to talk, that’s fine too. But I think, Black, that you need someone to talk to, even if you’re not the one doing the talking.”Sirius blinked, tried to process all that. “You’re just going to tell me a secret? In exchange for nothing?”“Well, not nothing,” Fabian replied. “You’re going to, like, shut up and listen. There are other people in the world who have problems besides you, Black.”“Is it a good secret?” he asked. Fabian considered his answer. “It’s probably not on the doomsday, world-ending type of secret that the likes of Sirius Black tend to find just lying around the castle, but it’s no less devastating to me.”Shit. As if he could ever be worthy of that kind of secret. “Fabian, you don’t have to tell me anything. I’m not asking, and maybe it’s best if I don’t—“Fabian’s smirk was equal parts reckless and despondent. “I’m in love with Frank.”Sirius choked. “Longbottom?!”“That’s the one.”Sirius’s brain was expending an inordinate amount of processing power trying to reconcile everything he knew of the prim and proper Frank Longbottom with the living embodiment of chaos and lawlessness that was Fabian Prewett. “Wait. Shit. Hang on. What about—““Alice?”Sirius grimaced. “Yeah. Alice. They’re dating, right?”“Yep.” Fabian popped the syllable on his lips. “That started just this year, but he’s been arse over tit for her for a while. Since I met him, if I’m being honest. Can’t hold it against him either, which is all manners of infuriating. Alice is wonderful. She’s smart and kind and she might just be perfect for him.”Not knowing what else to say, Sirius asked, “How long have you—““From the moment I saw him.” Fabian sighed, his eyes awash with memories. “That’s not even the secret, Black—me being in love with Frank. Well, it is, but it’s the part of the secret I’m most willing to surrender. Gid says it’s as plain as day to anyone who cares to see it.”“But,” Sirius hedged, “Frank doesn’t care to see it?”“He’s got Alice.”
Ah.
“I can’t even hate her for it. For taking him away from me. I can’t,” Fabian hissed out the word as though it were accompanied by a spark of flame. “And believe me, I’ve tried. It’d be easier if I could hate her. But she’s… Alice, and Merlin, the look in his eye when she smiles at him.”“He’s happy,” Sirius guessed. “He’s in love.”
With someone else.
Fabian nodded. “Someone’s heart was always going to break in this little tragedy I’ve created. It’s better if it’s mine.”“Is that the rest of the secret? That you plan on allowing Frank to break your heart?”A smile tugged on the corners of Fabian’s lips—one that Sirius couldn’t quite place.“Have you ever just looked at someone—someone you don’t know at all—and think, Merlin, I’m going to die if I don’t get to know them? They exude this… something that is infinitely bigger than the resounding nothing that tends to follow you around. And you’re terrified, because there’s a chance that the abyss you carry around in place of your heart might open its maw and devour them too, because that emptiness inside you seeks only to consume and destroy. Then, you do the stupidest fucking thing possible: you go up and talk to them. Suddenly, their words drown out all your other senses, and they become, in less than a minute, your most damning addiction. You know that you’ll never be able to let them go. And then, the most ridiculously impossible thing happens: they offer you their friendship.”Sirius swallowed—or tried to.Fabian laughed, and it was just a bit manic. “Who the fuck am I kidding? You know exactly what I’m talking about.”“Yeah,” he breathed, because the confession burned. Sirius’s heart pounded out a rhythm that seemed to echo down the hall. “It was a bit different with me and James, though. He was… like that, but he hated me for a good minute there. It wasn’t—““That’s cute, Black,” Fabian said, flashing half a smirk. “But I am not even remotely referring to James.”
Oh.
Fuck.“You want to know the secret?” Fabian asked. “He’s good, in the infinite sort of way that I’m… That I’m not. But I love him in the tragic sort of way that’s only going to end up breaking my heart. That’s the secret, Sirius. If my heart breaks, it will be my own damn fault. I will never be worthy of Frank Longbottom. Not in the sense that Alice Fortescue is, but in the much more real sense that I will never be. “I am not a damned creature, Sirius. Or, if I am, I choose not to wallow in my own damnation. Salvation and happily-ever-afters were never written into my story. Those endings belong to people like Frank. People who are good.”And there it was: the secret. One minute, unspoken, carefully concealed and protected in the iron walls of Fabian’s heart, the next… Suddenly it was out in the world, left to rot and decay and seep its devastation into every open wound. Sirius had seen enough blood in his life. “Fabian, the world isn’t black and white like that. You’re Gryffindor, for Merlin’s sake. You’re—“Fabian’s elbow drove the air from his lungs. “Do not debase yourself with platitudes, Black. Thought us purebloods were above all that shit.” Fabian pushed himself to his feet, then paced a few steps in front of Sirius. He raised his chin, eyes flashing with defiance. “I am brave, because I choose the path no one else will. I am loyal, because I am true to myself and my heart. I am daring, because I choose to be kind in a universe is not. But good? Sirius, I’m never going to be good. But that doesn’t mean I’m not worthy of Gryffindor.”Fabian offered a hand out to Sirius“Lions were never meant to live in captivity, Black. To bear the heart of a lion means to embrace the ferocity of the wilderness, if only to defend your pride and your family. And sometimes that means you have to watch as your heart is torn from your chest.”That… That was something. He took Fabian’s hand and allowed Fabian to pull him to his feet. Sirius shuffled his feet. “Fabian?”“Yeah?”“How do you know about the nothing?”It was damning, that question. For the both of them. But, true to his word, Fabian chose not to allow the hellfire to consume him. Fabian laughed, and it was glorious—all rainbow freckles, crooked teeth, and world-ending smirk. “Sometime, when you’re a bit older, I’ll regale you with tales of Frank Longbottom and my constantly-breaking heart. Maybe, if you’re lucky, I’ll tell you why the nothing is all worth it.”Sirius, who’d faced the cruelty of gods and ferocity of nightmares, wanted to argue that he was plenty old enough for a love story, thank you very-fucking-much. Fabian clapped his hands together. “Now. How about we see about sneaking you into the tower?”Sirius’s face fell, just a little. “I— I can’t go to the party, Fabian. Not tonight. They won’t talk to me anyway.”Without missing a beat, Fabian pulled a small vial from the inner pocket of his robes. “Gid’s real good at potions. Comes in handy sometimes, especially considering I’m shit at it. He can get real precise in almost any recipe. This—” He swirled the murky vial for emphasis. “—is a house-special variety of Polyjuice. Gideon’s going to kick my arse for giving this away, given how long it took to brew, but you need it more.”Hesitating only slightly, Sirius took the vial.“I nicked a hair from Timothy Wolpers. He’s a Hufflepuff in our year. We were going to break into the kitchens before the final feast to—” Fabian cut himself off. “It doesn’t really matter. Just down that, and you’ll be Timmy. For exactly ten minutes.”“Won’t someone question a Hufflepuff at a Gryffindor party?”“Nah. Hufflepuffs always find their ways to parties. They’re like nifflers.”“All right, then.” Sirius was still a little skeptical, but he obeyed, then downed it. Almost instantly, Sirius felt himself shoot up a good six inches until he was taller even than Fabian. His hair disappeared from the back of his neck until it was just fucking gone. Apparently, Timothy Wolpers shaved his damned head. Sirius took a slightly-unsteady step forward—trying to wrestle with his brand-new, gangly limbs—then righted himself. “Now,” Fabian said. “I am going to cast a memory charm on the Fat Lady and hope she forgets you were lurking out here. Once you’re in, you can sneak up to the dorms.”“Thanks, Fabian,” Sirius said, his voice cracking on unfamiliar vocal chords. “For everything.”“You owe me a secret, Black,” Fabian replied. “I won’t forget,” Sirius promised, and meant it. By the time he reached the dorms, exhaustion and remorse weighed down his heart so much that he didn’t so much as bother to wait for the potion to wear off. He just sank into his pillow, on his bed—the one that decidedly did not smell like Remus and therefore brought him no solace or peace—and fell asleep. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
MAY 28, 1972
There were stars beneath his feet.
For a moment, he thought he was flying—falling—into the infinite abyss of the night sky. He was going to crash, face the same prideful obliteration as Icarus. Except there was no Daedalus in his version of the myth.
There was no one left on earth to mourn the annihilation of Sirius Black.
He’d fucked up, one too many times. He’d find no pity amongst the ranks of the damned.
Sirius stared at the stars beneath him, traced their patterns in the darkness. He found the one, bright ball of silver flames that bore his name and almost dared to wish upon it. If only—
No.
There were no prayers left in his heart that any god would dare to answer.
Sirius drew a breath. He almost convinced himself that he would drown in the starlight surrounding him, long before he plummeted to the ground.
Then, the blanket of stars shimmered, rippled, as though someone had thrown a pebble into the fabric of creation.
And…
There was stone beneath his feet, rather than oblivion, and his hands were securely braced on a railing.
A lake.
There was a lake sprawled out before him, rippling in the dark.
A lake that swallowed the stars.
Above his head, there was nothing—a nothing so infinite that it had surrendered its starlight to the black water below.
Sirius stood on a marble balcony, overlooking the lake that contained all light and life that might have once existed in the vast cosmos. It was dark, here, at the edge of the abyss. The only light came from the drowning stars, and…
Sirius turned.
He stood between a pair of enormous pillars, not unlike those built in to bear the weight of mortal prayers in ancient temples immortalising old, forgotten gods. In front of him stood a hall—a temple, perhaps—whose windows cast diluted, golden light against the ravenous shadows outside. On a breeze, on a whisper of breath, there was a melody Sirius could not quite hear.
Laughter, his brain supplied, in case he’d forgotten the sound.A love song, his heart insisted.
Sirius knew where he was. Of course, he knew. He should have known from the start.
Nightmares never play out the same way twice, after all.
“Christ, fuck! There you are!”
And there was Remus.
There went Sirius’s will to live.
Because Remus was beautiful, and it broke his fucking heart.
Bathed in golden light and clawing shadows, Remus Lupin walked across the marble courtyard with the same devastating grace as a god who crashed into the mortal realm quite by accident.
Sirius Black would always be the mortal man, trying to gouge his mark into the fabric of eternity. Remus was cast down from immortality—punished, perhaps, by a cruel jealous god who’d marred his flesh and chained him to a pillar.
Prometheus, the cursed, who brought the golden fire of the gods down to earth.
Prometheus, whose only crime was his love of the broken and damnable creatures that wallowed in misery on the earth.
Prometheus. Frankenstein’s monster.
But none of that mattered, really, because Remus broke into a sprint—as though he could outrun the shadows that nipped at his heels—until he crashed into Sirius with all the cataclysm of a star plummeting into a lake.
Sirius felt his back hit the pillar behind him. All the air left his lungs, but it didn’t fucking matter because Remus’s lips were on his, and who the fuck needs something as menial as oxygen when he could taste fire and starlight on his tongue?
A groan thundered in Remus’s chest. Sirius felt it, rumbling, roaring, beneath the palm of his hand, just as Remus bit down on Sirius’s lip. Sirius allowed himself to melt into the brutal kiss that followed—wanting it, desiring, and devouring the man pressed against him as though nothing else mattered in the damn universe.
Another grunt, another bite—this time just below his jaw—and gravity seemed to fail him entirely. It didn’t matter, though, because scarred hands caught him, hoisted him up, and pressed him back into the pillar. Sirius didn’t hesitate, didn’t question, because any damn second, he could wake up or be swallowed by the darkness blurring the edges of the dream. He wrapped his legs around Remus’s waist, pulled him closer, until Sirius was absolutely certain he’d be fused to Remus Lupin for all eternity.
Hands tangled in starlight-tinged curls, Sirius dragged Remus’s mouth back to his, whispered prayers he’d thought he’d forgotten into each and every kiss—prayers offered not to the gods that had betrayed him, but to the beautiful, scarred, mortal man in his arms. Effigies of stolen divinity seared into scarred flesh with each touch of his lips.
Sirius was drowning, dying, and he breathed in Remus’s every exhale like it was the goddamned breath of life.
Remus’s lips trailed across his jaw, down his neck, and Sirius felt the back of his head hit the cold, marble pillar just as teeth bit down on the tender flesh of his throat.
“Christ, Siri.” Remus pulled back, rolling his forehead against Sirius’s, only far enough away to squeeze the words between them. Sirius felt sharp nails dig into the flesh of his arse. He forced himself to swallow a groan—a plea—one that demanded something Sirius wasn’t yet prepared to acknowledge. “I’ve been looking for you. Is this where you’ve been? Hiding amongst the stars? God, I should have known.”
There was a time in his life when Sirius Black would have argued he had quite a poetic flair and command of human language. More than one language, in fact.
But words and languages had vacated his mind eons ago.
Remus nosed at his neck, just behind his ear. “I followed you. I found you. It was dark, and I couldn’t fucking find you anywhere, but… fuck! You’re here. You’re real. Nothing else matters.” Teeth tugged on the loop through Sirius’s ear. “I told you I’d follow you to the edge of the abyss, Sirius. Guess that wasn’t supposed to be literal, but here we fucking are.”
Words.
Words, pressed into his flesh. Carved into his heart.
“Christ, I fucking love you.”
And Remus kissed him again, and Sirius forgot the questions the words sparked in the back of his mind.
In fact, he forgot most things, other than the taste of fire and starlight.
Again, it was Remus who pulled back, this time with an air of finality about it. But, still, they stayed put, for a minute longer, fused together and hearts beating in tune with the chorus of shadows around them.
“Come on, love,” Remus said, lowering Sirius to his own two feet. He kept their fingers intertwined and gave a slight tug towards the main hall. “Let’s get you out of here. Once we’re back, we’ll take the night. Just the two of us. Then we can—“
His brain caught up with the words and all illusions of paradise shattered in an instant.
“No!”
Sirius yanked his hand away, pressed himself against the pillar. His legs felt wobbly, unsteady, without Remus’s strength to hold him together.
Remus blinked, face scrunching up in confusion. “What? Sirius, we have to leave!” He gestured wildly to the dimly lit hall. “People need you out there. I need you!”Sirius shook his head, violently, and maybe it dislodged a tear he’d been trying to hide, but he didn’t care. “No. Please, Re. I know I fucked up. I know. Just… Let me stay here. Just for a little bit. Then I’ll go. Just…” A sob that he couldn’t quite swallow. “Please, Remus.”Because if he gave up the dream now, he might never find his way back—back to this version of Remus Lupin.
Sirius didn’t deserve this dream. He never did.
He deserved Remus’s hatred in the waking world.
But, Sirius never pretended not to be selfish. He’d cling to the version of Remus Lupin who loved him and kissed him like it was the end of the fucking world for as long as he possibly could.
Remus’s fists clenched and unclenched at his sides, but he seemed to clock the desperation in Sirius’s voice.
Merlin, it wasn’t hard to miss.
“All right,” Remus said on a sigh. “A few minutes, Sirius. That’s all I’m going to allow. This place… You shouldn’t stay longer than you have to.”
Sirius reached for Remus’s hand, and Merlin, how easily he chose to forget that he wasn’t allowed to touch. Not in the real world. Touching was supposed to invoke the curse carved into his flesh, but here, in this in-between place…
The feel of Remus’s scarred, callused hand intwining with his own was nothing short of miraculous. A taste of ambrosia, a breath of divinity. A temptation to forge wings made of wax and dare to soar from the parapets.
And, here, he could soar.
“Don’t leave me, Remus,” Sirius whispered, tugging Remus closer once more. “Promise me. Please.”
Sirius felt the laugh bubble in Remus’s chest, beneath his fingertips.
“After that bullshit with your cousin, you’d damn-well better believe I’m never letting you out of my sight again. You do not even get to take a piss alone.”
His… cousin?
But questions didn’t matter now, because the promise that came after was a stitch in his heart, a tether between pieces of rent flesh and shredded arteries. A promise, enough to force his heart to keep beating.
“That so?” Sirius breathed.
“Yep. You’re mine.” Remus kissed him like he was telling the goddamned truth.
Sirius never wanted the dream to end. Never wanted to live in a world in which he didn’t belong to Remus Lupin, heart and soul.
This time, Remus manoeuvred them a little, dragging Sirius away from the pillar, until they were both leaning over the marble railing, overlooking the lake of stars. Sirius refused to let go of Remus’s hand. He moulded himself against Remus’s side, pressed their foreheads together and prayed for oblivion.Prayed for this, and nothing else.
With his opposite hand, Remus reached out and twirled loose strands of Sirius’s hands around his fingers. It’d come loose from its tie when he’d been pressed against the pillar, but Sirius couldn’t care less if he looked like a harlot from some sleazy inn in Knockturn Alley. Remus tucked the stray hair back behind Sirius’s ears, leaned forward, then…
Remus jerked back, suddenly, a deep frown carved into his face.
“Wha—“
Remus tugged him, brought Sirius into the dim light from the hall, and tilted Sirius’s head to the side, baring his neck. Sirius felt desperate fingers trace over the skin where Remus’s lips had worshiped just minutes ago.
“Where’s the tattoo?” Cold, when Remus’s voice had been fire before.
“What tattoo?”
Sirius knew he looked older, here, in this in-between place, but he could never exactly imagine himself willingly getting another tattoo. Not after the trauma of the first one.
Remus took three stumbling steps backwards, his eyes flaring a dangerous gold. A colour known to melt wax. Scarred, terrified fingers raked through tawny hair.
“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” Remus gestured behind him, to the hall, where Sirius could see shadowed, faceless figures beginning to stream outside to continue the revelry under the cover of darkness. “You’re just another fragment, lost in time. Christ, I should have known.”
Sirius frowned, lost and confused. Fairly certain he should be offended.
Still, Remus went on. “I’ve been searching for you for so damn, long and, Jesus, I wanted to believe... Fuck! That’s why you want to stay, isn’t it? You’re not you. You’re just another fucking ghost!”Remus was yelling, and Sirius would not tolerate it. Not here. Sirius pushed off the pillar, crowded Remus’s space just enough to force his golden eyes to settle on him. Sirius pressed the palm of his hand into Remus’s chest, right above his thundering heart. “I’m real, Remus. Don’t fucking insult me.”
Remus’s glare was unrelenting. “Where’s the tattoo?”
“What—“
“The one we got for them!” Another shout. Another manic gesture to the laughing, faceless shadows. “After they… Just after. We got them together, in the exact same spot. It was your fucking idea. You dragged me out of bed at arse-o’clock in the morning after three fucking days of drinking away the fucking pain!”
And, Remus turned towards the light, baring his neck to Sirius.
There was nothing, save a pale scar. Sirius ran his fingertips over it
“You don’t have a tattoo, Remus.”
“Of course, I do.” Except, now, there was a slight waiver in Remus’s voice. His own hand reached up, folded over Sirius’s, and…
After a moment, Remus nearly collapsed in on himself. He would have, but Sirius caught him, this time, arms folding around Remus’s waist.
Remus pulled him close, hands tangling in Sirius’s hair and holding Sirius close against his chest. “Christ, none of this is fucking real. You’re not you.”
This time, Sirius didn’t allow himself to be insulted. He took the dagger lodged in his chest for what it was: another nightmare, meant to break his heart.
“I’m real, Remus. At least in the waking world.”
“Yeah? And in this reality you come from, what fucking year is it?”
It almost cruel, the way Remus asked the question, and so much more desperate than the other times he’d whispered the same words in other versions of this nightmare. It demanded an answer, but tasted like a foregone conclusion—so much so that Sirius almost dared to hide the truth.
He knew he looked older than he was here. He’d seen his reflection, memorised his own face in the mirror the first time he’d stumbled into this in-between place.
He’d looked so much like his mother, Sirius doubted he’d ever be capable of forgetting it.
But his appearance, too, was part of the nightmare, and the truth was…
Sirius knew he didn’t belong in a place like this. It was… wrong. Warped around the edges.
The stars had been swallowed by the lake.
“1972,” he said.
Remus staggered back a step. “What?!”
Sirius didn’t bother repeating himself. He knew he hadn’t been misunderstood.
Remus studied him for a long moment, taking in every detail of his face, then cross-referencing it with the impossible truth Sirius just laid out before him.
“You’re serious?”
“Always and forever,” Sirius answered.
Remus half turned, seemingly lost, as he started to count back on his fingers. Sirius watched his brow furrow, his fingers repeat the count, until an eerily blank mask fell over Remus’s features.
“When in 1972?”
Again, the same question as the last time.
“May.”
“It’s a full moon tonight.” A statement of a fact, golden eyes unblinking.
Except… There was no moon in this nightmare place.
The sky was black and the lake had swallowed all the stars.
“How do you know?” A question. A struggle to remember if that was true in the waking world.
Sirius hadn’t bothered to venture onto the roof without his Remus there beside him.
“I always know.”
And, somewhere in the midst of all this, Sirius had lost the thread of conversation. The darkness seemed to close in, just a little bit more. “What does the moon have to do with—“
“Jesus-fucking-Christ,” Remus breathed, scrubbing both hands over his eyes in a clear sign of frustration. “You don’t know my—my secret yet.”
Another statement of fact.
Sirius crossed his arms, indignant. And lost. “No, and if you had any insights on that particular matter, Remus, it’d be greatly—“
Again, Remus cut him off. “We had a fight.”
Sirius had whiplash. “You yelled at me.”
Remus laughed in his face. It was a little bit manic. “If I remember, you yelled back.”
That made Sirius flinch, but Remus did not relent. After a moment, Sirius managed, “I’m sorry, you know. For the shit I said.”
It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough. But it was… something.
Remus’s lips twitched upwards. With a sigh, he stepped back into Sirius’s space, corralling him backwards until they were once more leaning against the marble railing. This time, they did not touch.
Sirius wondered if that was deliberate, if maybe now he was a fucking child in Remus’s eyes.
He’d never been a goddamned child.
“It’s all right, Sirius,” Remus said, and it was enough absolution to tide over the distance Remus put between them. “Best I figure, most of the time, shouting at each other is our favourite type of foreplay.”
Then, impossibly, Remus Lupin winked at him and Sirius swallowed his entire tongue.
And, miracle of miracle, Remus snagged his sleeve and pulled him close once more. Sirius buried his face in Remus’s clavicle—not at all to hide the bright red colour flooding his cheeks—and he felt Remus press a kiss to the crown of his forehead before two strong arms wrapped around his shoulders.
Sirius cursed the passage of time, because eventually, he knew, Remus would let him go. He’d have to wake up, return to a world in which he was pretty sure he was now hated by the man who currently held him, who kept pressing kisses into Sirius’s hair as though Sirius Black was something precious, meant to be treasured and loved rather than cursed and damned.
“I shouldn’t be here,” Sirius breathed into the rhythm of Remus’s heart.
He felt Remus’s arms tighten around him, as though Remus couldn’t bear letting him go. “Why not?”
“This is a dream, Remus,” Sirius said, closing his eyes to starve off the tears that suddenly welled up. Then, keeping his voice to a whisper lest the darkness and shadows overhear: “It’s a fucking nightmare and I don’t want to wake up.”
Remus pulled back, just enough to look him in the eye. “A nightmare?”
Sirius swallowed around the lump in his throat. “It’s everything I cannot allow myself to conjure in a daydream. Daydreams are fleeting and are never made to last. They’re not real. And out there… Fuck, I can’t even touch you, Remus, let alone allow myself to picture us like—“ Sirius cut himself off, instead opting to gesture meaninglessly between them, lest he jinx the whole thing by lending voice to the enormity of who Remus was to him. “Nightmares… Nightmares are always real. And nightmares last forever, even after I wake up.”
It was cruel, and unfair, but Sirius knew in his heart of hearts that Remus Lupin would understand. That maybe Remus was the only one in the universe capable of understanding.
Still, Remus argued, “It’s not a dream, Siri. Not to me.”
A pathetic laugh. “What is it then?”
“A memory. Stuck in time.”
Sirius looked up at him. “You’re from the future.”
Remus’s eyes squeezed shut. “No. Yes. Fuck.”
“The future is yesterday and the past is right now,” Sirius whispered, the haunting words from another nightmare eating away at his subconscious.
“Yeah. Something like that.”
“Any point in asking what year you’re from?”
“No fucking way,” Remus said. “Delicate balance of time and space and all that.”
“Figures.”
“Besides.” Remus trailed butterfly kisses all over Sirius’s face, pulled him tighter against his chest. “I’m not sure you want to know the ending.”
Sirius would very much like to know the ending. He took a stab in the dark, aiming at any sort of answer that he might get from shadows of days to come. “You said I’m a ghost.”
Remus was trembling. Sirius clutched at his shirt and absolutely refused to let go.
“No,” but Sirius could hear the lie and the desperation to force truth upon the single word. Remus tilted Sirius’s chin up, whispered against his lips, “You are my every nightmare, Sirius Black.”
This time, Remus’s kiss tasted like a promise.
“I don’t want to wake up,” Sirius breathed. “Please don’t make me.”
“You can’t stay here, love.”
“Why not?” Sirius’s voice hitched, entirely without his permission.
“Don’t you recognise this place, Sirius?”
“Should I?”
A hand at the back of his head, an arm tight around his waist. Sirius buried his face in the comforting scent of earth and rain.
“This is the Nothing Place,” Remus whispered into his hair, as though saying it any louder would cause the shadows at their heels to swarm up and devour them entirely. “The endless void that exists beyond the Veil.”
This… this place didn’t feel like nothing. Not when he was wrapped in the safety of Remus’s embrace.
Still, Sirius asked, “And… You’re stuck here?”
“We both are,” Remus said. “Though, I’d argue that part is entirely your fault. You never watch your damn back, Siri.”
That sounded about right.
“This place is… real?”
He felt the decimation of laughter rumble in Remus’s chest. “As real as any of us.”
So, potentially not at all.
“You never listened to that part of the rhyme, did you?”
Sirius’s head snapped up, nearly colliding with Remus’s nose. “What?”
Remus just smiled, and it was a calamitous sort of thing. “Of course you didn’t, oh great and wondrous hero. You, who were tasked with killing god. It never really mattered how the story was supposed to end.”
He knew how it was supposed to end. He’d never forgotten.
Now Nothing’s dictatingAnd that dark kiss is waitingFor the murder of the boy who killed god
But, Remus was right. “The ending doesn’t matter.”
Fingers dug into his waist, into the flesh of his arm. Tried to burrow their way into his soul.
“Fuck you,” Remus hissed. “Fuck you. It matters to me, Sirius. It’s why I fucking followed you through the— You know what? Fuck it! Come here. I want to show you something.”Then, Remus was gone, and Sirius was left struggling for air, teetering on the edge of annihilation at the sudden absence of Remus’s touch.
He could do nothing but follow, blindly, down a set of marble stairs he was fairly certain hadn’t been there before, across a frozen, frost-bitten lawn, to the edge of the lake made entirely of fallen stars. Desperate, uncaring of anything else, Remus waded in the lake up to his knees. The heavens folded around him, carving out a spot for Remus amongst the cosmos.
Remus turned back and offered his hand out to Sirius.
Helpless, Sirius took it, allowing himself to be dragged into the sea of starlight.
He didn’t feel the water. He couldn’t feel it lapping at his skin, soaking through his clothes and his shoes. It felt like… nothing.
Nothing, spanning an eternity.
“Look there,” Remus said, pointing into oblivion. “At the edge of the lake. Do you see it?”
His eyes tracked to the edge of the horizon—if you could call it that—where the lake met the infinite dark, and…
“The Nothing is closing in. The shadows are ravenous,” Remus explained. “The stars are ending, Sirius.”
He saw it, too. There, right at the edge, he watched the stars blink out of existence, one by one. The shadows crept closer.
Sirius bore witness the end of all things, hand in hand with Remus Lupin. Together, they stood, up to their knees in starlight.
Together, the last outpost of all there is.
“Call it what you will: convergence, Judgment Day, I’ve got no fucking clue,” Remus said. “The fate of the world boils down to the choice of one, damnably reckless, mortal man. Until that choice is made, past, present, and future—Christ, it’s all the same anyway—all of it stops. Everything crashes together, right here, until there is nothing left. Every fate, every life, every wished-upon star. No one escapes. Even the predestined—those cursed with handwritten fates—they just… fall. Puppets with their strings cut.”
“What choice?” Sirius dared to ask.
Instead of immediately answering, Remus pulled him close once more, and it was like Sirius could suddenly breathe again, the catastrophe before them be damned.
“I don’t know, love,” Remus said. “It was never in my cards to know.”
“But… It’s my choice to make.”
“Yes.”
But still, the gnawing doubt. “What if—“
“What if brave Icarus falls from the sky?” Remus supplied.
“That’s how the story’s supposed to end.”
“Says the boy who’ll kill god.”
“I don’t know if I can, Re. I’m not… I’m not enough.”
“Bullshit. You are always enough.” Remus emphasised his point with a quick kiss. Just a peck on the lips to leave Sirius desperate for more. “We’ll figure it out together. You and me. Like always.”
Sirius scoffed. “How?”
“Until the choice is made, I suspect you’ll keep finding your way back to this place. You’re stuck here, Sirius, same as me. Or, at least this version of me. This place is a fixed place in the universe, it seems. And I’m just… a planet stuck in an unknown orbit. At least for now.”
“This version of you?”
“You know. Older. A few more scars.” Remus straightened up to his full height, and Sirius rose up on his toes to minimise the distance between them. A small, dangerous smile danced on Remus’s lips. Sirius kind of wanted to taste it. “Wiser, obviously.”
Sirius barked a laugh. “Obviously.”
And before he could say anything else, dare once more to question the foundations of the universe, Remus kissed him, and this time, Sirius savoured the ashes of the cataclysm. His hands raked through unruly curls, pulling Remus closer, as though by devouring Remus Lupin, it’d quell the shadows and endless nothing creeping ever closer. Remus released him after only a moment and, together, they stood in the lake of stars, holding each other as the shadows ate away at the edges of the world.
“Are you out there, too?” Sirius asked, his fingers tangling in the curls at the base of Remus’s neck. “The version of you that knows this version of me?”
“That version of me never allowed himself to stray far from you,” Remus said. “He was much too afraid of losing himself to the monster that hunted him. I think you… You keep him grounded.”
A derisive snarl. “Not lately.”
Remus tilted Sirius’s chin up to look at him. “He still needs you, Siri. More than you’ll ever know.”
“He won’t even look at me, Remus.”
“That’s fucking shit. I can absolutely guarantee that he never stops looking.”
Sirius shook his head, not daring to think too long on that. “I don’t know how to fix this. The Nothing Place, or… Or me and him.”
“It’ll work out.”
“I called him a coward.”
“Did you mean it?”
Sirius’s eyes snapped up, startled. “No! I was… Fuck, I was angry and scared and—“
“He’ll forgive you.”
“But how do you know?” A stupid question, perhaps, but Sirius was heartbroken, desperate.
“Because I remember being him.” Remus flashed a triumphant smirk.
“Remus—“
“That boy,” Remus said, somewhat forcefully, smothering any further hope of protest. “You made him a promise, Sirius. Do you remember it?”
Sirius remembered the Willow, the stories he’d told, the rhythm of his magic—new and raw and something of a miracle—dancing in the rain above their heads. He remembered the boy he could not touch, the tear-stained scars, and the waiver in Remus’s voice as he asked for the damnedest thing, the simplest oath.
Words, bound not in magic and ghastly consequences, but in trust and friendship.
“When you break your promise,” Remus began, and Sirius struggled to breathe around the gaping hole the confirmation of betrayal carved into his chest. “I need you to be brave, Sirius. Braver than all the ruthless monsters that have already found their way to that boy’s heart.”
There were tears streaming down his face, Sirius realised. A callused thumb wiped them away, and it was almost… an absolution.
“Why won’t he—fuck, or you—just tell me?” Sirius begged. “What could possibly be so bad that—“
Remus gave him a sad, infinite smile: one that was carved in marble, with the scars from the chisel to show for it. He was so beautiful. “Fear is universal, Sirius. It’s haunting and all-consuming. Sometimes, even monsters are afraid of the dark.”
“I know, but—“
“I love you, Sirius. I will always love you. Until the darkness swallows the very last star,” Remus said, and these words, too, were infinite. And, Merlin, how they seared fragments of eternity into Sirius’s heart. “I love you. And I’ll tell you a different secret: so does he. Just give him time until he’s brave enough to find the words.”
“Remus—“
It came out on a hiccoughing sob, a half-formed prayer, but it felt like a goodbye.
“Wake up, my brave and indomitable Icarus.”
Thrown back into the agony of the breaking dawn, Sirius woke on sob, a swallowed scream, with tears streaming down his face. He rolled over in an empty bed, tried fruitlessly to claw his way back into the shadow world, and then surrendered himself to a prayer to the very god who wanted his head on a stake. He prayed that nightmares were not cruel enough to lie.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
MAY 29, 1972
Sirius showed up at dinner the night after the first day of exams. It was the first meal he’d bothered showing up to in nearly three days. Rather than accepting the tongue-lashing and dressing-down he probably deserved, Sirius had been subsisting on bribing the house elves and breaking into Peter’s secret stash of food when the other Marauders weren’t in the dorms. Which was most of the time. They were avoiding him. But, it could only last so long. Sirius had been starving and exhausted after the gruelling Arithmancy exam that afternoon, so he’d followed Fabian into the Great Hall, nearly attaching himself to his hip. Fabian hadn’t seemed particularly bothered. He’d simply ushered Sirius to the far end of the Gryffindor table—opposite of that occupied by the Marauders—and offered him a seat in between him and his brother. Frank and Alice were seated across from them, disgustingly smitten with each other, still riding high on the final Quidditch victory. As he piled food onto his plate, Sirius kept sneaking glances at Frank, then back at Fabian. Fabian, whose own gaze never strayed far from the prefect, and seemed to caress his every feature, every flaw, and lap up any thread of conversation Frank threw his direction. And Frank, who…Who only had eyes for Alice. Sirius’s heart ached for Fabian. A nudge. A conch shell clattered onto Sirius’s empty plate. Sirius turned to Gideon. Gideon, whose eyes were sad and haunted. “Worry about your own damn heart, Black,” Gideon whispered, gesturing to the shell. Sirius’s nose scrunched in confusion. “What is it?”“Call it an echo chamber,” Gideon said, in lieu of a real answer. He leaned forward just a bit, and Sirius followed Gideon’s gaze to the other end of the table. In the middle of the table, between the Marauders and Lily, was an identical shell disguised as a centrepiece. At Gideon’s pointed look, Sirius picked up the shell on his plate and held it to his ear. Peter’s voice rang through, loud and clear, as though Sirius were sitting right next to him. “So. When are we going to forgive him?”Sirius tried to swallow around the lump in his throat and dared to glance down the length of the table to watch the scene play out. “Say it louder, Pete. I don’t think they heard you in Hogsmeade,” James said, cuffing Peter on the back of his head. Then, a half-frown, directed at their king. “We are going to forgive him, right?”Lily barely looked up from her treacle tart. “If Remus does.”“Can I forgive him?” Peter asked. “Not yet,” Lily replied.“But… Remus isn’t back yet and I need to pass the Transfiguration exam tomorrow.”“Oi! I’m great at Transfiguration,” James said, his voice pitching up an octave. “Yeah, but you never study.”“Because I don’t need to!” James insisted. “And you really think Sirius studies?”Sirius didn’t, but he usually helped Peter study. It gave him extra practice with his resuscitated wand. And, to be honest, Sirius Black was never one to miss an opportunity to show off. Just enough to please the crowd. Peter just rolled his eyes. “Well, it’s not like he’s done anything to me. Why can’t I—““Solidarity, Pete,” James cut in, and Merlin, despite the topic at hand, it warmed Sirius’s heart how readily Lily and James stood by Remus’s side. The loyalty of Gryffindors, and all that. Remus deserved to have them on his side, loudly advocating for him even in Sirius’s absence. He deserved the unwavering loyalty and devotion of the Marauders and their king. Peter ducked his head a little, embarrassed. “I—I don’t know what that means.”James sighed, exasperated. “It means you’re a Marauder, and right now, three to one say Sirius fucked up.”“But if I side with Sirius, then it’s two to two,” Peter replied, his brow pinched, as though the math was just a bit too complicated. “So, he gets to help me study?”“Fine,” James groaned. “King’s vote is the tie-breaker.”Again, a short, no-nonsense answer from Lily: “Sirius fucked up.”Peter made a small noise that sounded like a dying animal. James patted him on the back. “Look, mate, I’m pretty sure Sirius isn’t on Sirius’s side anymore. He knows he fucked up.”And, Merlin, Sirius smiled for the first time in days. It was sad and broken at the undeniable truth in James’s words, but it was a start. “Then why don’t we just forgive him?” Peter asked.Lily set down her fork, straightened it, then pushed her plate away before planting both hands flat on the table. She glared at Peter, and Sirius could taste the flames from the other side of the Hall. “Because Sirius fucked up,” Lily said. “He didn’t tell us his plans and he… He said things to Remus. Things that only Remus can forgive. So, he gets to wallow in his misery.”Wallow, indeed. A fate deserved. “But,” Peter began, uncertain. “Will Remus actually forgive him?”Merlin. That was the question, wasn’t it?James and Lily exchanged a glance—in it, all of the fear and trepidation of abandonment that lurked in Sirius’s heart. Neither one of them offered an answer. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JUNE 2, 1972
Remus didn’t return until Tuesday morning. Sirius watched from the other side of the room as an exhausted Remus stumbled through his Transfiguration practical. Sirius clocked the way Remus kept an arm wrapped around his middle at all times, the way Remus’s hand gave the slightest tremble when he raised his wand. But, he’d also marked the determined set of Remus’s jaw, and the ferocious glint in his eyes as he performed spell after spell at McGonagall’s direction.Amber. His eyes were back to amber. Fuck. Sirius wished he knew what that meant. His own practical went flawlessly, if he did say so himself. McGonagall certainly didn’t, other than the perfunctory, “Full marks,” she muttered once Sirius lowered his wand. She hadn’t said much to him lately, but Sirius sensed her tracking his every move whenever he was in her sights. There’d been a cat sitting on the mantle of the common room the night before, long after everyone else had gone to sleep. Sirius had stayed up in the hopes Remus might try to sneak in late at night, but of course, he hadn’t. Just the cat, watching him, with far too much pity in molten green eyes. That morning, the framed copy of McGonagall’s detention records had been mysteriously absent from its place of honour. It didn’t matter, though, because Sirius had extra copies. He’d replaced it before breakfast. That whole week, they’d been swamped with exams. Everyone was exhausted. Sirius, all the more so, having spent a majority of the week not only acing his exams, but also avoiding his friends. Their final exam had been that afternoon: Care of Magical Creatures, which Hagrid let Sirius skip, in exchange for mucking out the thestral stables. Hagrid still gave Sirius top marks, because, “You got rid of ol’ Cuckoo. Spot never did much like ‘im, y’know. Kneazles always sniff out the best ones, Sirius. Never forget that.”Sirius didn’t plan on it. After the thestral stalls had been thoroughly scrubbed from top to bottom—without a drop of magic, thank you very much—Sirius, covered in unspeakable filth, snuck his way back into the castle and up to Gryffindor tower. He had no plans on attending the end of term feast. He had no immediate plans beyond a hot shower.Besides, he’d run the numbers. It was just as James had bargained at the start of term: Gryffindor won the Quidditch Cup, but came dead last in house points. Remus found him an hour later on the roof. “There you are.” A whisper, hauntingly reminiscent of a dream. Sirius was certain his eyes were wide enough to swallow the moon as he watched Remus sit down next to him, as though everything in the world was fine and nothing was broken. As though Sirius Black hadn’t spent the last week living as the resident ghost of Gryffindor tower.Remus winced, just a little, but Sirius never missed anything when it came to Remus Lupin.Well, that wasn’t true. He’d missed quite a bit, apparently. Suddenly, Sirius was quite sure he couldn’t do this: talk to Remus Lupin. Apologise. He wanted to be lightyears away from this place—this roof—just so he never had to navigate this fucking conversation. He’d fucked up so badly, and he’d been arrogant enough in the moment to think he’d claimed a victory. Instead, the poison in his veins—in his blood—leeched in and destroyed fucking everything. It’d break him, if Remus was here to tell him to fuck off for good. He didn’t know how to stop Remus from doing so. It was exactly then that Fabian’s words decided to rattle themselves loose from the cobwebs of his memory: Someone’s heart was always going to break in this little tragedy I’ve created. It’s better if it’s mine.The words were oddly comforting, because, Merlin, his heart was already broken. The world had already ended, more times than Sirius cared to count.So what did it matter if Sirius tried to fly into the sun?He said, “Hi.”Pathetic, really. But it worked. “Hi.” Remus’s voice was hoarse, as though he’d already been shouting. “Are you all right?” Sirius whispered, as though he still had a right to ask. “I’m fine, Sirius,” came the miraculous answer. He could no longer tell if it was a lie. The conversation fizzled into nothing. He might as well be sitting next to a stranger. A stranger, who haunted his dreams. His nightmares.“Can I ask you a question?”Remus eyed him, as though he didn’t quite trust him, and Merlin, Sirius couldn’t blame Remus for that either. It was Sirius’s own damned fault. “Sure.” Noncommittal. But something. “How likely are you to push me off this roof?”Remus’s eyes went wide. “What?”“I mean, is it, like, fifty-fifty? Or should I be saying prayers and practicing my cushioning charm?”“I think I’ll leave the murder plots to you, Sirius.”And, yeah, okay, that one hurt a bit, but there was the barest hint of a smile tugging at the corners of Remus’s mouth. That smile was kindling thrown on ancient embers, and Merlin, how it ignited a raging fire of hope in his soul. It made him brave enough to announce, “I’m still going to Grimmauld.”“I know,” Remus said, a heavy, tragic sort of sigh chasing the words. “I’m still not telling you about my scars.”“I know,” Sirius replied, even though it nearly killed him, this time, to surrender pursuit of that secret. But last time… Blood had been shed. Air suddenly vacant from his lungs, Sirius tried to breathe, because, “Merlin. We’re fucked, aren’t we? I fucked us up.”There were tears in his eyes, and it was all just… too much. Exhausted, annihilated, Sirius was absolutely powerless to stop them. He sobbed, and it was as ugly and broken as his fucking heart. Sirius cried, under the watchful gaze of the stars that bore the names and sins of his ancestors. But, he’d committed his own sins, too. Far more than he cared to count.In the echoing silence, his mother’s words, from a long-ago, half-forgotten tirade seemed to echo across the moors: Only cowards and saints cry over their sins, Sirius. You were not bred to be either of those things. His tears were not for his own sins. He cared little for his own damnation. It was a truth he wanted to shout back into the foggy abyss hovering over the castle. No, he’d made his peace with the hellfire that waited for him long ago. He wept, because in his terror and cruelty, he’d betrayed them: James, Lily, and… And Remus. Sirius wept, because his arrogance and pride had made a liar out of him when voicing a single, unobtrusive truth would have instead meant Sirius’s salvation.It was, perhaps, his greatest sin.Sirius gasped, tried to stifle the sobs more than once, but they just kept coming, as endless and infinite as the shame that ate away at the remnants of his soul. Remus let him cry. Silent, unmoving, for as long as it took for Sirius to catch his breath. Then: “Nah, you didn’t.”“W-What?” Because it felt foolish to gamble on that sort of miracle: one of undeserved, unrestricted absolution. “You didn’t fuck us up, Siri.”“But—““Some might call it self-destruction, being friends with you,” Remus said, on a wry, double-edged laugh. “But… That’s not what it is.”“What is it, then?” Sirius chanced. “Insanity?”“Inevitable.”
In every version of reality.
“Remus, I—“But before the half-formed apology could see the light of day, Remus interrupted him. “I’ve been stuck on a line in that damned book, and I think… I think maybe you were right.”Sirius choked on nothing. “I think Frankenstein is something of a love story.” Remus shook his head. “You kept saying it was, and I— Christ, I don’t know why it took me so long to see it. I-I don’t think I wanted to see it, but after… Fuck, I can’t get that line out of my head.”“What line?” And, Merlin, how Sirius prayed.“‘I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe,’” Remus said, and it was the truth carved into the very fabric of Sirius’s soul. “‘If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.’”“Fuck, Re, I—““You,” Remus said, firmly, “have never been the monster in this story.” No, thought Sirius, his own words echoing back and barreling into him like a runaway train at full speed: I am its executioner.“I don’t know how,” Remus went on, “and, Christ, for the life of me, I have no idea why you even fucking bothered, but you… I think maybe you are brave enough to love and rage alongside whatever beast lurks out there, in the dark. And I… Fuck.”Remus scrubbed a hand over his scarred face, and Sirius did not miss how Remus’s hand lingered, traced the leylines and conjured magic transposed with words of absolution. “I’ve seen your rage, Sirius. I’ve tasted it, allowed myself to get lost in its tempest. And, Christ, Siri, your rage is as glorious as it is lethal. Damn the fool that tries to navigate the storm.”“Remus,” Sirius said, because this was going nowhere, except careening off a precipice that would leave them both bloody and broken. And, if he was going to die, it might as well be with Remus’s name lingering on his tongue. “But your love? Sirius, your love is savage. It is a wild, tempestuous thing that no mere mortal should ever try to tame or quell. This thing you have and give and are, Sirius… It’s magic incarnate. Your love is insurmountable, unyielding, to all those whom you’ve deemed worthy. And… And—fuck!” There was a wry crook to Remus’s smile. “I think the way you love—unrepentant and all-consuming—it’s… It’s your shot at redemption.”For the life of him, Sirius Black could not remember how to breathe. “That implies that I’m worthy of such a thing.”“None of us are worthy, Sirius,” Remus said, on a broken laugh. “That’s the damn secret of the universe. All of us have been weighed, measured, and found wanting—starving—for more. It’s why we rage. It’s why we love.”“Out of… spite?”Remus shook his head. “No. To prove we’re human. To hold ransom over the cruelty of the gods who created us—who, in their vanity, tried to forge us into something other. Something monstrous.” It was a needle, a thread, and if Sirius were allowed to remain here, on this roof with Remus Lupin, as Remus whispered tales of love and rage in the wake of dying gods, he might just learn how to stitch his broken heart back together. But, there were sins—stains upon his soul—that would not yet bide his silence. “I need to apologise, Remus. To you, to Jamie, and—““No, you don’t.”“What? ‘Course I do. Remus, I—“Remus levelled him with a blank look. His expression brokered no argument, yet gave away nothing. “Are you still going to Grimmauld? To save your brother?”“Yes.”“Then you don’t apologise.” Remus’s declaration was absolute. “Just know that you are forgiven. Wholly and completely. Your brother is lucky to have earned your love.”That was too much. Because the way Remus said it made it sound like he—Remus—was excluded from all categories of or pertaining to Sirius’s love. And that… well.It couldn’t be farther from the truth. “I lied, you know,” Sirius said. A single eyebrow—the one split by the scar—went up.“I lied,” Sirius said again, when no response from Remus was forthcoming. “I lied and I think it was one of the worst things I’ve ever done. And, believe me, that’s no small feat.”Remus just waited. It was a different kind of torture. “I think you’re the bravest person I’ve ever met,” Sirius said, because in that single truth lived the confession to his greatest sin. Remus blinked, stared at him like he’d just done something ridiculous—like he’d set the world on fire or professed his undying love.Well. Maybe he had.“From the moment we met, you’ve been the bravest out of all of us. Merlin, Remus, there is no one in heaven or on earth that would dare to even conceptualise a Black in any other house than Slytherin. But you fucking said it out loud, minutes after meeting me.”He should have practiced. He should have rehearsed this in the fucking mirror, because the shit that was tumbling out of his mouth was nonsense—just words…Words, no longer lies. Words, bartered for absolution. “There are so many things, Remus, that make you brave. If you want, I can sit here all night and wax poetic about your bravery and all the ways it makes me a liar and a fool for ever daring to call you a coward. But—and let’s be honest here—that would be entirely humiliating and not at all good for what little remains of my dignity, so let me just say this:“That monster you face may break your bones and carve its marks into your skin, but it will never claim your heart. Your heart is Gryffindor and it will not yield.” Sirius stared right into unblinking amber eyes, and said a prayer. “You are good, Remus, in ways that a person like me cannot even begin to describe. You are good, and you are daring, and you are brave. And… fuck. I think that I l—“Suddenly, he was in Remus’s lap, swept up in a flurry of strong arms and a little bit of magic. Sirius choked on a gasp, a sob, and wrapped his arms around Remus’s neck, holding him tight. He breathed in Remus’s scent—rain and a midnight forest—and prayed that the fire that erupted in his veins, beneath the surface of his skin, was one of reconciliation.Merlin, if this was why saints wept for their sins, Sirius Black would stumble into a confessional every goddamned morning. Remus tilted his head, buried his face in the crook of Sirius’s neck, and for a single heartbeat, Sirius wondered if he’d fallen head-first right back into the Nothing Place. But this Remus—his Remus, whose touch was fire and anguish eternal—was saying, “How long can I hold you?”Not long, he thought as the fire curdled his blood, but how could he possibly give a shit about spontaneous combustion when Remus’s arms were around him?He must have said something to that effect, because Remus was laughing into his neck, still breathing him in, but then Sirius tasted magic, felt the sting of the Knockback Jinx, and suddenly, he was back in his spot. The sudden absence of touch was calamity incarnate.“Are you all right?” Remus asked.No, he almost replied, but this time, managed to bite it back.He’d been about to say something—before—but Sirius wasn’t nearly brave enough to force out the words now. Words, that would be the nail in his crucifix, the spark for his funeral pyre. Three. Stupid. Words.Perhaps it was for the best. Perhaps those words belonged only in his precious nightmare. Perhaps, even unspoken, Remus heard them anyway, across the infinite chasm separating daydream from nightmare and all the sacred in-between places. “Yeah,” he said, after a moment too long. “Good,” Remus said, a smile dancing on his lips, “because I’m pretty sure James is about to break the window.”Sirius frowned, then leaned forward to look around Remus, only to see James with his face pressed up against the glass, squinting out at them.For a terrible moment, Sirius was mortified, but then Remus said, “Don’t worry. I put a disillusionment charm and a silencing spell on the glass. Had to nick Frank’s Charms textbook for the disillusionment, but I think I managed. Good enough, anyway. He didn’t see or hear anything, Sirius.”Relief washed over him. Not that he didn’t want James to know he’d managed a halfway decent apology, but there were certain things that belonged to him and Remus alone. That’s just the way things were. Trying to save face, Sirius smirked. It wasn’t even forced. “I knew you were going to throw me off the roof. You even had a plan so Jamie didn’t hear me scream!”Remus grinned devilishly, then flicked his wand at the window. It popped open—inward—unfortunately smacking James right in the nose. His cursing could probably be heard from Ravenclaw tower. “Come on out, James,” Remus called. “Sirius is in need of saving!”“Oi! Do I look like a damsel in distress?”“Yes. Absolutely.”Still rubbing his nose, then subsequently adjusting his glasses, James made his way onto the roof, followed closely by—to Sirius’s surprise—Lily Evans. They sat on either side of Sirius and Remus—Lily next to and leaning on Remus, and James lounged comfortably on Sirius’s other side. With a nod and a smile from Remus, Sirius made quick, yet heartfelt, apologies to both of them, which James and Lily took in stride. They both nodded their appreciation, offered their forgiveness, then issued the obligatory, well-intentioned threats should he ever engage in that kind of shitty behaviour again. Sirius pitied anyone foolish enough to cross the King of Gryffindor. She could be quite… inventive.“Peter said he’d catch up with you tomorrow,” Lily said to Sirius, after all the grovelling. “He was adamant about not missing the feast. Though, that ended over an hour ago, and now he’s just asleep. Has he always snored like that? Surely Madam Pomfrey has something to help.”“You know,” Jame cut in, with a dramatic eye-roll, “we would have been out here sooner, if you two hadn’t spent literally forever wistfully staring off into the sunset.”“Don’t be ridiculous, Potter,” Remus said, leaning back. “The sun set hours ago. I’ve seen nothing but stars.” Something warm flared to life in Sirius’s chest.James leaned forward, looking at Remus around Sirius. “Have you given him his present yet?”“Present?” Sirius echoed. “Is it some Welsh tradition to give someone a present to show you’ve forgiven them? It should probably be the other way around, given that I did the offending and all. And—““Shut it, you ponce,” James chided. “This is a special present.”“Oh?” Sirius leaned forward, trying to get a good look at the expression on Remus’s face.Remus, however, ducked his head, and Sirius swore if there was more light than the pale silver from the waning moon, Remus Lupin would be bright-fucking-red. “I—“Lily leaned around Remus, patting his arm in half-admiration, half-maternal condescension. “He’s been working on it all week. Non-stop, around his final exams.”“Probably failed everything,” James added, helpfully.“Probably still did better than you, Potter,” Lily shot back. Then, to Sirius, she said, “Remus did all the research and performed the spells himself.”“Flitwick helped,” Remus muttered.“With the pronunciation,” James clarified. “He made it just for you,” Lily said. “So you’d never be alone at Grimmauld.”Whatever Sirius had been about to say got lodged in his throat.“It’s fucking brilliant, too,” James said. Then, growing impatient, he added, “Merlin’s fucking tits, just show him already!”Remus looked as though he couldn’t quite decide if he wanted to be excited, sheepish, or just take a nose-dive off the roof. Ducking his head once more and allowing his hair to fall in his face in what Sirius strongly suspected was a deliberate move to hide the blush staining his cheeks, Remus reached into the pocket of his robes. Because of the darkness—and not at all because he was completely mesmerised by the way the waning moonlight brought out the flush of amber in Remus’s eyes—Sirius thought for a moment that the thing Remus handed him was a wand. One of those thin, short wand—made of hawthorn, usually, but with no real magic—given to wizard children to practice wand form and hand motions safely, long before their journey to Hogwarts.Sirius had never needed a practice wand. Why would he, when magic had obeyed his commands, danced on his fingertips, leeched into his very blood and bones for as long as he’d been alive? But, he’d seen these wands before, in the hands of other pureblood children during one of his mother’s politically-motivated “playdates” she’d host at Grimmauld. (She’d never answered his questions when he’d asked why she’d only ever invited over young pureblood girls and never once a boy. Sirius wasn’t entirely comfortable with the answers his brain provided.)The thing in his hand, however, was not a child’s wand. It had magic, though: intricate and mischievous magic that zinged up Sirius’s arm. It sent a thrill through him, because he recognised that magic. It whispered secrets, in the soft touch of a willow’s branch, and tasted like midnight and amber. Like the forest after a rainstorm. This thing held the imprint of Remus’s magic, and Sirius knew right then that he’d never let it go. He looked down, expecting to see…Not that.“It’s a… pen?” Sirius held it up to the moonlight to get a better look. But even then, the pen remained a pen. Didn’t even turn into a frog or anything. It was just a pen, that felt like magic. But, for the life of him, Sirius couldn’t ascertain the origin or intention of said magic. “Is it a special pen?”Remus snorted, a shadow of a smirk dancing on his lips. He held up an identical ballpoint pen. There was nothing special about either pen, other than the vague tickle of magic that lingered in the air between them. The two pens were exactly like the handful of other pens Sirius had pilfered from Remus over the course of the school year. “The pens need a drop of blood for the spell to work,” Remus said, more than a little cautious, clearly anticipating Sirius’s reaction. “Sorry.”For all the times Sirius had given his blood to some spell or other, he had never hesitated so little than when it was Remus Lupin asking. A muttered spell, a prick of his finger, a swell of red. A smirk and a moment later, and Remus had done the same. “Touch the tip of the pen to the blood,” Remus instructed, while modelling the action. When his finger met the tiny little ball at the tip of the pen, Sirius gasped. The magic infused in the pen clawed its way up his arm, leaked into his blood, intwined itself around his heart. It was the source and summit of his every obsession, every addiction, this magic. Remus’s magic. It was as wild as the forest, as crucial as the air in his lungs. Sirius knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he could survive on this alone.And, Merlin, how Remus looked at him.
I love you. And I’ll tell you a different secret: so does he.
Vaguely, Sirius wondered what it might cost him to believe the whispers of a phantom from his nightmares. It was, perhaps, a ransom he’d gladly pay. So distracted by the everything that was Remus Lupin, he almost missed the muttered binding spell. He did not, however, miss the sudden bolt of lightning that ignited his blood. He felt it curdle in his veins, seep into his marrow and bones, twine together with all the familiar agonies he kept locked away. Pain, visceral and real, then… Then, it was gone. “Jesus fucking Christ,” Remus hissed through his teeth, apparently caught in the thralls of his own pen and blood-binding spell. “Man up, Lupin,” James said, wiggling where he sat like an excited puppy. “Just show him what it does already. We haven’t got all night.”Remus shot James a death glare, but waved a Lumos over all of them. He held up his pen. “Watch.”As if Sirius could do anything else. Remus rested his left hand on his knee, palm up. Then, in his neat, narrow handwriting, wrote something on the open face of his palm. The ink from the magic pen disappeared almost immediately—too quick for Sirius to read what he’d written.But then… he felt something, in the palm of his own left hand. Not pain—not exactly—just an itch. An awareness of something, the ghost of a touch. Sirius glanced down at his hand. To his utter shock, two words glared back up at him, fading into existence against the flickering spell-light.
Hi, Sirius.
With his heartbeat kicking up to light-speed, Sirius tried to push past the hitch in his voice. He met Remus’s eyes. “You… Is this…?”“Write something,” Remus said, in lieu of an answer. He gestured to Sirius’s pen. Sirius, naturally, forgot every single word in every language he spoke. Save for one.Remus, he wrote. A second later, Remus held up his left palm. Thanks to the magic now sealed with their blood, tangled in their souls, the five letters appeared on Remus’s skin just as Sirius had written them. “It doesn’t last long,” Remus explained, as the letters on his palm began to fade. “Just long enough to read it. Then the words are gone forever.”“No one will eavesdrop on anything you say,” Lily said.“If you’re lucky and just a bit smart,” James added, “that bitch you call a mother won’t ever find out about it.”Sirius opened and closed his mouth, shell-shocked and feeling very much like he might start sobbing again. He shifted, imperceptibly closer to Remus. “You made this? For me?”Remus nodded. Just the once. “So you have someone to talk to, even after you leave that nightmare place. Can’t have you festering alone in your own thoughts all summer.”That was fair. “But… I called you a coward.” It was said with all the fervour and desperation of an unanswered question. “Doesn’t matter. You’re still a Marauder. Your still ours.” This, with the finality of an answer. An unbreakable binding spell in spoken words. “Even if you say stupid shit, that fact will never change. You’re ours, Sirius, and now one deserves to be left to face their darkness alone. Least of all a Marauder.”“I…” But, once more, words failed to encapsulate the maelstrom that seemed to consume his entire being. Instead, he opted for, “Thank you.”“Merlin, you sap,” groaned James, breaking the tension in a way only befitting of a fairytale prince. “He hasn’t even told you about the best part. Yeah, yeah, it writes, but how many other writing instruments can— Oh, fuck it! Just give it here!”Before Sirius could say anything, James Fleamont Potter snatched the pen out of Sirius’s hand and tossed it off the roof. Sirius’s cry of dismay followed the pen’s plummeting dissent into the castle’s abyss. “Nice, Potter,” Lily deadpanned, over the thundering agony in Sirius’s head. He wondered if he’d go to Azkaban if he pushed James off the roof. Surely, the Blacks would step in and lend their expertise in covering up murders. His mother still needed an heir, after all. At least for the time being. “Check your pocket, Sirius,” Remus said, entirely unbothered. In a state of panic, blurred with a simmering rage, Sirius patted his chest, felt around the outside of his robes, and—No way. Bewilderment washing over his features, Sirius produced the ballpoint pen from his inside pocket. The magic ballpoint pen. “I used a homing and relocation charm on it,” Remus explained. “It’ll always find its way back to you, even if your mother takes it. As long as the blood spell is intact, you’ll always have someone to talk to.”Sirius didn’t know what to say. Lily leaned forward a little, peering over the edge of the roof. She tossed a sly glance back at them. “Think the same thing will happen if I toss you off the roof, Potter?”“He’s too big to fit in your pocket,” Remus replied, almost immediately. Three sets of eyes turned to Remus. “What?” Remus said, trying to hide a smirk. To Lily, he said, “In an attempt to anticipate your every desire, my king, I already asked Flitwick about the viability of throwing James off the roof on your behalf.”James let out a cry of dismay, and in between Sirius’s own bouts of laughter, he managed to hit James with a strong enough sticking charm to keep James from throwing the traitorous Marauder from the roof. “Plus,” Remus added, “the ability to spontaneously relocate to a set location would have a myriad of practical applications in the fine arts of mischief and marauding.”James relented immediately, oscillating from indignation to conspiratorial whispers so fast Sirius hardly had time to blink. They stayed out there a long time, despite the yawns they each tried to stifle as the hours passed by. Their last hours at Hogwarts, spent laughing and reminiscing on the Marauder’s greatest hits, planning for all the chaos that was to come with the new school year. The war, Sirius decided in the midst of all this, just didn’t exist up here. They sat on the highest parapet, hovering over the edge of the magical world, unscathed by the trauma of reality, if only for the night. It was perfect. He prayed he’d remember it forever. When they finally went inside, Sirius hesitated for only a heartbeat, before Remus grabbed him by the arm and pulled him towards his bed. The pain didn’t register over the enormity of the relief he felt at being back in Remus’s bed. “I won’t pretend that I approve of this whole plan of yours, or even that I understand why you have to do it,” Remus whispered, over the wall of pillows. “But you won’t be alone, and… And that’s something.”“It’s everything.” The words came without his permission, but Remus smiled, and the world was finally right its axis again. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦
JUNE 3, 1972
“I believe congratulations are in order,” McGonagall said, by way of greeting. He’d been summoned to McGonagall’s office immediately following breakfast. Sirius had scarfed down half a meal, then made his way up here, having absolutely no idea what to expect.It certainly wasn’t that. “What?”She sat behind her desk, poised and proper as always, her glasses perched perfectly on the bridge of her nose. She regarded him with a mask of passive interest. It was dangerous, that look. Sirius strongly suspected that mask of indifference had been the folly of several unassuming professors during McGonagall’s school days. “Have you not heard?”Not waiting for an explanation, McGonagall gave a quick swish of her wand and a parchment floated over to him. Sirius caught it, midair.Oh, he thought. The individual student rankings had been posted the night before at the feast, but none of them had been there, save for Peter, and he clearly hadn’t cared to report on the rankings, given he’d placed near the bottom of the list. “Oh,” he said out loud.“Oh?” she parroted back. There was a flash of something in McGonagall’s eyes. It might have been laughter. That, too, was dangerous. “It has been since before my tenure at Hogwarts began that not a single Ravenclaw placed in the top ten students in any given class. Flitwick is furious. He owes a certain party—who shall remain nameless for the sake of propriety—fifty Galleons.”“Well, that’s to be expected,” Sirius said, on a smirk. “Ravenclaws are never as smart as they like to think. The riddle into their dorms was exceptionally easy to crack. And not a single one of them has been able to undo the hexes on their roof. Shame, really. They may have the numbers, but—“He was rambling, and McGonagall cut him off.“It has been since Dumbledore’s time as a student that more than one Gryffindor made it into the top ten of their class. This year, four Gryffindor first years placed in the top ten.” McGonagall smiled. “It was on that point that Slughorn lost an entire cask of 1857 Ogden’s firewhisky to the aforementioned unnamed party.” Sirius glanced down at the list on the parchment. His eyes tracked over the #9 next to Remus’s name, and for the briefest of seconds, he thought of how unfair it was that Remus wasn’t higher on the list. He’d been gone for so many days, and Sirius really was shit at taking notes for him, but it was still an impressive rank amongst the hundred or so first-year students. He ticked up the list, over a Hufflepuff and several Slytherins, until he reached James Potter at #4.“James is going to hate that Snivellus outranked him,” Sirius muttered, mostly to himself, because next to #3 was Severus Snape. “The fact that Sirius Black, heir and pariah of the Noble and Most Ancient House, Marauder and Gryffindor, ranked first in his class cost Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore his obsidian-tipped phoenix-feather quill. Everyone, including the Headmaster, assumed that Ms. Evans would rank first. And although her second spot ranking is no trifling matter and deserves its own celebration, the thing I want you to take away from this, Sirius, is how wildly every single person in this school underestimated you. How badly we all misjudged you.” Sirius held her gaze. “Some of you lot came to your senses. Eventually.”“Hm,” was the only reply. McGonagall leaned back, just a little. Her eyes snagged on an elegant, red quill now making a home for itself on her desk. It truly was a beautiful thing. “This quill, I’ll have you know, captured the eye of the unnamed party quite a long time ago, when she herself was a student in Professor Dumbledore’s class. It is a treasure she holds in the highest regards and one she will no doubt lord over Professor Dumbledore at every feasible opportunity. It is a folly I dare not think the Headmaster will make again: doubting the capabilities of one of his students and the lengths to which said student will go to prove his worth.”He wondered if this was her way of advocating for the Old Man, even if she was doing so subconsciously.“Well done, Sirius,” McGonagall said. “You have done your house proud and more than earned your place in Gryffindor. Several times over, in fact.”Once more, his gaze fell to the list, to the #1 finding its home beside his name. He thought of the work he’d put in—or, more specifically, the work he didn’t put in, especially compared to Lily Evans. He thought of the rare, inscrutable look of pride that would wash over his mother’s face tonight, as she bragged about him to all present, because, to her, that’s what he was: a beautiful trophy, won in battle, but nothing more. “That’s not why I did it, Professor,” he said. “I didn’t need to… to prove my worth.”To his mother, he’d never be worthy, but that didn’t matter. He never wanted to be worthy of the cruelty befitting his title and house.“All the same, it is still an impressive feat, even if a conquest of Gryffindor pride—““It wasn’t pride.” That much was easy. He had so little pride left. “That’s not why.”McGonagall regarded him, as though even now, after everything, she could not quite figure him out. “Why, then?”He thought of the magic in his veins, how even now, he could feel the fabric of the universe shifting beneath his fingertips, eager and willing to bend to whatever shape he conjured in his mind. It was so simple, really.“Why do people fall to their knees in worship, when they stumble upon something sacred? To me, it’s the same answer.” He closed his eyes, conjured a flame to sit in the palm of his hand, let the tongues of fire dance up his arm, before snuffing out the fire with a flick of his wrist. “That’s what magic is to me, Professor.”McGonagall stared at him for so long—hardly blinking, expression blank—that Sirius half-considered just turning and walking out the door. Then, finally, “There is no one in this castle more guilty of misjudging the character of your heart than me, Sirius. For that, I am truly sorry.”Merlin. Sirius tried to swallow around the lump in his throat. “Alphard wrote,” McGonagall said, matter-of-fact. “He said he’s escorting you to Grimmauld.”The change in tone was abrupt, jarring, but Sirius could not detect even a hint of disapproval in her voice. He was sure it was there, though. It had to be, lurking somewhere under the placid surface of her words. “Yes, Professor,” he acknowledged. “Very well,” she said, and honestly, he was a bit taken aback. He’d expected another fight. She seemed to read the shock in his expression. “With your heart set and the arrangements already made, I wanted to talk to you about the proper sort of goodbye.”“The— What?” Sirius was lost in the torrent of her words, the whirlwind of the conversation. “Now, I assume someone of your station will have had many a lesson on etiquette and decorum, but given that all those lessons would have been provided by your mother or some tutor hired on her behest, we shall consider them all rubbish. We’re starting from scratch.”“Um.” Sirius was still rather confused. “All right?”“When saying goodbye,” Professor McGonagall continued, as though her classroom were full of students, “one should adopt a formal tone. One should expect to bow or shake hands—though, best avoid that in your case—and end the conversation with a polite, Goodbye, before making one’s exit. That is, of course, the polite thing to do. However—“McGonagall pushed to her feet, strode from behind her desk, clasped her hands behind her back and began pacing, just like she did when she lectured. “There is something I find highly distasteful regarding that manner of goodbye. The very word goodbye carries with it a burden of finality that is truly unbecoming of most circumstances. Goodbye, Sirius, is for funerals and the long-dead, to send them off from this world, because goodbye is unending. Forever. Do you understand?”Oddly enough, he did. It was a trick of language—a matter of nuance—but it was something that made sense in his brain. Goodbye was a certainty he’d prefer not to face.“Instead,” McGonagall continued, “in my many years of experience, I have amassed a few work-arounds for this particular social conundrum. A personal favourite of mine being the infinite variations of the phrase, Until next time. Or, if one is particularly amenable with the person with whom they are sharing a goodbye—if they’re… friends, perhaps—I might even opt for a simple, See you later.”Sirius blinked. The proper sort of goodbye, huh?Then, the door to McGonagall’s office was all but blasted off its hinges. “Oh, thank Merlin,” said James Potter, before rushing over to wrap Sirius in a quick, overly-dramatic hug that left Sirius with fire in his bones and his hair standing up in odd directions. Remus and Lily stood in the doorway. Sirius watched Remus fiddle with a hinge, making sure it was intact, before frowning and stepping in front of it. At the very least, they could no longer see the damage to the door. “Um,” said Sirius. “Hi?”If McGonagall was surprised to see any of them, she didn’t let it show on her face. “We’ve come to rescue you!” James declared.“From… Minnie?”“The carriages are leaving soon, and you weren’t there. And I am quite familiar, at this point, with your unnatural ability to stumble upon trouble. Plus, the Slytherins were looking extra shifty, kind of like they wanted to duel a poor, helpless first year before boarding the Hogwarts Express. So as your loyal second, I decided to rescue you.”“Truth be told, we—“ Remus chimed in, gesturing between himself and Lily. “—kind of just wanted to watch all this—“ Another gesture, this one encapsulating all the chaos of James Potter. “—play out.”“Yep,” Lily said, popping the syllable. “Why’d you blow the door off it’s hinge, if you knew I was in here?” Sirius asked. He know he’d told them where he’d gone. He’d shown them McGonagall’s note at breakfast and agreed to meet with them after. The obvious answer was that James Fleamont Potter was a drama queen, but there was no way in heaven or hell that he’d ever cop to that. “Well,” said James, eyes a little wild. “For all I knew, it could have been a Carrow in here. Or Lestrange.” He made a vaguely vulgar hand gesture. “Hexing all your bits off!”“My bits are fine, thanks,” Sirius deadpanned. Lily crossed her arms. “Why would Carrow or Lestrange be in McGonagall’s office?”James pointed a finger at McGonagall. “Polyjuice, Evans! She could be a Carrow. Slughorn’s been moaning about a few missing vials of Polyjuice.”“I suspect that may have been the Prewetts,” Remus said. “Fabian said something about both him and Gid using it to look like their older sister, just to confuse their mum.”“See, Potter? No need to act the fool in some piss-poor rescue attempt,” Lily said. “Though, at this point, I’m not sure if it still qualifies as an act.”“Oi, you!” James snapped, pointing an accusatory finger at Lily. Lily, in true king-like fashion, stuck her tongue out at him. “I was working a theory. It was a good theory.”Remus nodded, sagely. “Ah. There’s a method to his madness.”Lily turned on him. “Is there?”“Well, hypothetically.” Remus shrugged. “Admittedly, not one that I’ve figured out.”James turned to Sirius, a pathetic puppy-dog look on his face. “I’ve been betrayed. Avenge me?”“Maybe later, Jamie.”Sirius didn’t need to look to know the expression McGonagall wore on her face. The furrowed eyebrow, paired with the exasperated pinch of the bridge of her nose, was a familiar comfort at this point. She’d been patient, throughout the exchange, but now stepped forward. She was quite obviously pretending not to be assessing the damage to her office door while simultaneously regarding them. “Where’s the other one, then?” McGonagall asked. “Pettigrew?”“Saving us a carriage to Hogsmeade,” James answered, easily. “The one with the good thestral.”“The good thestral?” Sirius hadn’t known there were bad thestrals. “Yeah,” James said. “The one Remus likes. He made friends with her at Christmas.”Huh. Well, Sirius definitely remembered that. Remus had hugged him like it was the end of the world. “Jamie,” Remus hedged, a note of hesitation in his voice. “Can Peter even see thestrals?”“Um. Shit. Well, now that you mention it—““The four of you were conspicuously absent from the feast last night,” McGonagall cut in, her chin tilting up, just a little. “Pettigrew was rather… dodgy, shall we say, on his explanation of your whereabouts.”She didn’t ask a question, but everyone heard one all the same.James, naturally, took the lead. “We had a perfectly splendid evening, Professor. Thank you for asking. A perfectly fine evening indeed, in which words were spoken, pens were exchanged, and absolutely nobody fell and/or was pushed off of Gryffindor tower.”An eyebrow went up.Lily buried her face in her hands. This was supposed to be the proper sort of goodbye. “In the interest of time,” McGonagall said, “and in an effort to save Pettigrew from a very dangerous creature he cannot see, there is something I wanted to discuss with the four of you.”The four of them? To Sirius’s knowledge, he was the only one who’d been summoned. He’d started to say as much, but McGonagall beat him to it. “I’d intended to wait until the start of term, but given you’re all here, I’d like to make you an offer.”“Professor?” Lily asked, intrigued.“Next year, along with my promise to starve off any more unscrupulous gambling amongst the staff,” McGonagall began, “Professor Dumbledore granted my request to offer something of an… accelerated Transfiguration course. Advanced Transfiguration is only offered after your O.W.L.s, naturally, but this would be a precursor of sorts. All of you exhibit a unique aptitude for Transfiguration and academia in general. This would be an opportunity for your skills and abilities to flourish in a safe environment.”“You’re offering to… tutor us? Like you did for Sirius?” Remus asked.“Yes,” McGonagall replied. “This would not replace your scheduled Transfiguration class. It’d be an… addendum, if you will, to aid you in the study of magic.”“So, it’s like a club?” James asked.McGonagall inclined her head. “If you like.”“And…” There was… something in Remus’s voice. Something that sounded to Sirius remarkably like fear. Sirius fought the urge to glue himself to Remus’s side. “You’re offering this to… To all of us?”McGonagall’s features softened immediately. Merlin, the kindness in her eyes. “Yes, Mr. Lupin. All four of you. I can think of no one in this castle who is more capable.”Remus looked like he didn’t quite believe her—that shadow of doubt never leaving his eyes—but he nodded all the same. Then:“She wants to prepare us for war,” Lily Evans, king of Gryffindor, said.Seconds ticked by as they watched the truth of her words ricochet off McGonagall’s features: shock, to horror, to remorse, gone in a flash. It was true, then. Vaguely, Sirius wondered if this was, in fact, McGonagall’s plan, or if it was just another puppet string laced around Dumbledore’s finger. He wondered if the Old Man had been watching the four of them, noting their interactions in Defence this past month, and taking stock of their talents. He wondered if they’d be given a uniform, weapons, or if they themselves were to be the weapons: children, wielded as innocents against the merciless, blood-thirsty foot soldiers on some yet-unknown battlefield. Mostly, though, Sirius wondered if he actually cared. What did the games of false gods and prophets matter to the ants under their feet?War was coming. War was here. It was in their best interest to learn how to fight.“I’m in,” Sirius said, to the utter shock of everyone in the room. He did not back down. “Will you teach us to be animagi?”“What’s turning into an animagus have to do with us going to war?” Lily demanded.“You don’t know!” James said, always first to jump to Sirius’s defence. “Maybe his animagus form will be a bear. Or a lion!”“Not a cat person,” Sirius muttered. McGonagall might have let out a small laugh at that.“Your animagus would be a hedgehog, with all that ridiculous hair!” Lily shot back. James smirked. Blew a kiss in her direction. Sirius wondered if James would enjoy death at the hands of Lily Evans. He probably would. “You love my hair, Evans. Marlene said you wrote that in your diary.”
Salazar’s fucking balls.
“If this is something you’re willing to do…” McGonagall said, raising her voice just a little. She paused, waited as the four of them exchanged looks, then, accepted the chorus of Yes, Professor, with a single nod. “I will have a schedule for you at the start of term. I will make sure nothing interferes with Quidditch practices, Potter. Until then, I hope you all have a wonderful summer holiday.”James raised a finger, despite the clear dismissal. “Well, actually, Professor, on the subject of Quidditch… I had a few things regarding tryouts that I wanted to run by you before—Ow, fuck!”Lily’s stinging hex hit James squarely in the forehead.McGonagall appeared more stunned than any of them. Her jaw dropped open.“Sorry, Professor,” Lily said, not even remotely apologetic. She examined her cuticles. “It just couldn’t be helped.”Remus sighed, walked over to James, and slung an arm around his shoulders. “Time to go, Jamie.”James rubbed his forehead, went a bit cross-eyed. “But… Quidditch, Remus.”“Yes, darling,” Remus cooed, and both Sirius and McGonagall struggled to hold in their laughter. “But Quidditch will be there when you come back next term. I promise. It’s not going anywhere.”“But—“This time, Remus ignored him. He grabbed James by the collar of his robes and frog-marched him out of the room. Lily, triumphant, followed close behind.“See you at the carriages, Sirius!” Remus called. A rush of magic swung the door shut, only for the hinge to pop off entirely and the door itself to tilt, rather off-kilter. Then, the echo of Remus’s voice: “Sorry about the door, Professor!”Sirius laughed, then turned back, only to see McGonagall staring at the broken hinge of her office door. “Are they always like that?” she asked, voice flat.Sirius didn’t hold back the smile that spread across his face. “On the good days.”“They love you,” McGonagall said, as though that simple fact were not enough to destroy his entire world.“I know.” He cleared his throat against the tears and the myriad of confessions that tried to spill from his lips. “So,” he said. “A proper sort of goodbye?”McGonagall smiled down at him, and it was warm and sincere, almost like he deserved that sort of thing. “See you later, Sirius.”His heart swelled, his bones ached with a divine sort of reverence for this woman who’d given him the dignity of a fighting chance, time and time again. “Until next time, Minnie.” ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ The carriage and train ride to King’s Cross was entirely uneventful. Lily opted to ride with Marlene and Dee, stating firmly that she’d had enough stupid boy drama to last her a lifetime. Sirius figured it was better that way, because, Merlin, if it ever got back to his mother that he walked off the train with a Muggle-born, he’d be dead the second he set foot in Grimmauld. He’d said goodbye to his king and his friend on the platform in Hogsmeade, and just as he’d been about to promise he’d write, she slipped a piece of parchment into his pocket. It had a ten-digit number on it. “Let’s hope that uncle of yours knows how to use a telephone,” she’d said, before smirking and wandering off to find Marlene and Dorcas.The four Marauders piled into the same compartment at the very back of the train where they’d all met, so long ago now. Peter and James argued briefly, but then agreed to pool the few Galleons they had left together to essentially buy out the trolley cart. Sirius didn’t know how they could be so hungry when they’d just had breakfast, but he didn’t turn down the sugar quills and lemon drops Peter handed him. Sirius felt himself yawn, but was mostly able to bite it back. The cloying feeling of dread creeping up the base of his spine, however…Some demons were not so easily banished. He wasn’t going to dwell on it. Not here. Stuffing Peter’s, James’s, and his own winter coat between himself and Remus, Sirius leaned his head against the vague shape that was Remus’s shoulder. He fell asleep to the ghost of a touch, to the soft brush of Remus’s stray fingers as they carefully twined with the loose strands of his hair. He woke with a jolt, when the train stopped. It was so sudden, it nearly sent him sprawling into Remus’s lap, but he managed to right himself at the very last second, before he ever made contact. “My mum’s meeting me outside the station, at a café across the street,” Peter announced, rising to his feet. James stood as well, helping Peter get his trunk down from the top rack. “She doesn’t like crowds. Guess this is goodbye, then.”The other three Marauders echoed the sentiment. James and Remus each gave Peter a hug. Sirius gave him an awkward wave. The platform offered the same brand of magical chaos Sirius remembered from last September—and, vaguely, from Christmas. Families reuniting, excitement and joy hanging thickly in the air, against whiffs of coal and owl feathers. It was impossible to walk without brushing against all sorts of wayward travellers, so James, Remus, and Sirius opted to stay on the train for as long as possible. They lingered in the doorway of their compartment, with James leaning over the guardrail and occasionally shouting at passers-by. As the crowd began to thin, James let out an excited whoop! From a bench a good way down the platform, still surrounded by a thrall of students, Mrs. Potter gave an answering shout of excitement. Sirius didn’t bother hiding his smile as he watched Mrs. Potter give a little hop of undiluted joy before waving frantically at James. Fleamont Potter laughed into his wife’s shoulder, quite literally anchoring her to their bench with his arms, but he too waved.James turned to Remus and Sirius. “Right. I’m off then. Have a nice summer, Lupin.”He yanked Remus by the sleeve into a hug. Remus let out an oof, then bent his frame to accommodate the awkward angle. James shoved him back a second later. “Love you, Sirius.” James Potter grabbed him, too, and planted a kiss right in the centre of Sirius’s forehead. Then, James was gone, waving back at them as he all but sprinted towards his parents. Sirius smiled softly, eyes a little misty, as he watched Mr. and Mrs. Potter embrace their son from across the platform. Between smothering James’s face with kisses and trying to pat down his wild, untameable hair, Mrs. Potter managed to look up one last time and met Sirius’s eyes. She smiled at him, nodded once, and gave a final, small wave. “Love you, Jamie,” Sirius breathed, so quiet he was certain it’d be lost in the crowd. He turned back, and…Merlin. When Remus Lupin looked at him like that, Sirius almost dared to believe the promises that were whispered in his nightmares. Sirius swallowed. “You don’t have to wait with me.”“Yeah, I do.” Then, before Sirius could protest, Remus added, “You owe Alphard an Unbreakable Vow. Someone’s got to bind it.”“Remus—““I volunteer,” Remus said, then clamped his jaw shut. He looked down, shuffled on his feet. “If… If you’ll have me.”Merlin, there was no one else. Unable to force words out of his mouth, Sirius nodded. Remus’s face broke into a smile so shockingly brilliant, it was a true miracle that Sirius Black—and everyone else on that platform—didn’t go blind. “Shall we?” Remus asked, a single, split eyebrow going up to emphasise the question. The crowd had thinned, quite a bit, but Remus seemed to catch his hesitation. “I’ll shove the stragglers out of the way. It’s been awhile since I tackled a senior citizen. I have missed it.”Sirius snorted, then followed Remus into the fray. They picked their way across the platform, occasionally stepping aside to press against a nearby wall in order to avoid contact with someone. It was slow going, but Sirius didn’t mind. Every moment he delayed here was a moment longer he got to spend with Remus.“Who’s picking you up, then?” Sirius asked, craning his neck in search of his uncle. “My dad,” Remus replied, rising up on his toes to do the same. Except Remus had a significant height advantage. Sirius tried not to pout.“He won’t mind if you’re late?”“No,” Remus said. “We don’t have plans. Mum’s waiting for us at home. She’s Muggle. She can’t get past the barrier. Plus, she hates London.”“Too crowded?” Sirius could relate, as he squeezed himself between a trunk and the brick wall to avoid the bulbous shape of a man who bore a striking resemblance to a walrus. “Too English.”Sirius barked a laugh. “I think I’d like your mum.”“She’d like you.” Remus smiled.“Even though I’m English?”“You speak French.”Sirius smirked. “Oui.”Finally—Merlin—the crowd parted, and Sirius caught sight of Uncle Alphard. More specifically, the ornate, slightly ridiculous top hat he wore, in a dreadful, Slytherin green. Alphard stood not fifteen feet from them, his arms crossed primly behind his back—ever the distinguished gentleman, in ways Orion Black could never hope to be. His uncle smiled, softly, genuinely, to the tall, almost lanky man with whom he was holding a conversation. The man, who—“Da?”Sirius turned, wild-eyed, only to see his own shock reflected in Remus’s face. The man turned, and Merlin, Sirius recognised him. This man existed in his memory—the sacred one, when he’d first caught sight of Remus—but he mostly existed in the features he’d passed onto his son. The man’s eyes were a dark amber, not quite as ethereal, but home to just as many secrets. His hair was darker, not quite as curly as his son’s, and he was missing the laugh lines on his cheeks that Sirius always imagined Remus having when he reached his farther’s age. This man was not familiar with laughter. “Remus!” exclaimed Lyall Lupin, his wide grin faltering slightly, when he caught sight of Sirius standing half a step back from his son. His dark eyes took on an expression of bewildered terror, as though he would never quite recover from the shock of witnessing his nightmare come to life. It was there for a heartbeat, this look of horror, then it was gone. Kindness was a mask, and Lyall Lupin wore it well. Sirius narrowed his eyes, hackles raised, but then Remus was in his father’s arms, clinging to him and pressing his face into Lyall’s chest. Lyall held his son just as desperately. Sirius had never known love like that. He’d thought—Merlin, he’d thought a lot of things. He’d thought this man had hurt Remus, had broken his bones and carved into his flesh. But Lyall Lupin held onto his son as though Remus were something precious, something sacred that perhaps he’d come too close to losing one too many times. Sirius had a thousand questions and none of them were tailored to the reality of genuine, familial love he saw before him. Lyall released his son, but kept Remus close to his side, a hand resting on his shoulder. Sirius watched as a familiar glimmer of fear flicked across Lyall’s features when the older man regarded Sirius. He’d seen that look in almost everyone he met—everyone wise enough to recognise what kind of threat Sirius posed simply by virtue of his name and station. “Da,” Remus said, cutting the near-palpable tension lingering in the air. “This is Sirius Black. My friend.”Those last two words were said just a little more forcefully than the rest.Lyall did not offer his hand, and, honestly, it wasn’t like Sirius was going to extend his own. Sirius wondered if the breech in decorum was because Lyall Lupin knew something of the Blacks and their archaic traditions, or if the distrust etched into his features was boiling over into blatant hostility. “Walburga’s son?”“Christ,” Remus breathed. “Da—““Yes, sir,” Sirius said.Lyall turned just enough to throw a suspicious glare at Alphard. “You’re not here to pick up one of you own?”“Salazar, no,” Alphard said, on a laugh. It was remarkably amicable, despite the passive accusation that had been thrown his way. “Just my nephew.”Alphard put a hand on Sirius’s shoulder: a clear and deliberate mirror to Lyall’s hand on Remus. “I wasn’t aware that you and your sister were close, Alphard.”“Merlin knows that we are not,” Alphard said. “But, Sirius and I have so much in common. Us pariahs must stick together, after all.”Lyall’s face was a mask of confusion.“Don’t you read the papers, Lyall?” Alphard asked, a small, dangerous smile dancing on his lips. “Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor.”The shock that washed over Lyall’s features could be nothing short of genuine. He turned to his son. “You never mentioned…”“You never asked,” Remus replied, his voice remarkably even. Lyall’s mouth opened and closed, half-formed words bubbling to the surface, but remaining trapped.Luckily, Alphard was quick to step in. To Remus, he said, “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced.”“Remus Lupin.” Then, with a glance at Sirius, Remus tacked on a perfunctory, “Sir.”Again, no hands were extended, but this time, nods of acknowledgement were exchanged. “I’ve heard quite a bit about you, my boy,” Alphard said. Remus looked profoundly uncomfortable. His eyes kept tracking over to his father, then back to Alphard. Sirius could almost taste the suspicion radiating off both Lupins. Alphard seemed to sense it as well, because he added, “Oh, don’t worry, son. I’ve heard nothing terrible. At least, nothing that’ll scare me off. Your father and I are old friends.”It was then that Lyall Lupin decided to find his voice. “Acquaintances,” he corrected. “Colleagues, once upon a time.”Colleagues?! Sirius glanced at Remus, only to see his own questions percolating in Remus’s eyes. “Lyall, I was at your wedding,”Alphard said, exasperated. “I gave a speech!”“You only showed up to the wedding because Hope promised you a bottle of that French wine you like,” Lyall snapped. “And you gave that speech because you were drunk.”“I always give speeches when I’m drunk!”“You danced with Hope’s mother the whole night! You charmed her shoes so she’d be able to do all the steps properly. She was a Muggle, for Christ’s sake!”“I used a memory charm,”Alphard huffed, indignantly. “That woman would have taken me to bed, if I’d been less of a gentleman or even remotely interested. Or, if her husband hadn’t been watching, I suppose.” Then, conspiratorially, to Remus, Alphard whispered, “Though, I can’t say I’d have minded if he’d joined us.”What. The. Fuck.Remus looked a little green. Those were his grandparents, after all.“Jesus Christ, Alphard,” Lyall said. “You still have no sense of propriety.”“And you, old friend,” Alphard said, “still swear like a Muggle.”Remus swore like that, too.Finally, the dam of hostility marring Lyall’s features gave way once more to the kindness Sirius sensed lurked deep in his soul. Lyall Lupin had been right to be cautious, after all. One should never let their guard down around the Blacks. “It’s been an honour and a privilege catching up with you, Alphard,” Lyall said, emphasising his uncle’s name in the same tone that Alphard had said old friend. “Remus and I had best be going, though. Hope is waiting for us back at the cottage.”“Of course,” Alphard said. “Give Hope my best. And tell her to save me a bottle of wine. I’d love to see where you’ve been hiding all these years.”It was, perhaps, the wrong thing to say. Lyall’s face soured instantly. His grip on Remus’s shoulder tightened, almost imperceptibly, but Sirius did not miss the whiteness in Lyall’s knuckles, the ancient, horrific pain in his eyes. “Perhaps.” His voice, too, had frosted over. “Remus, let’s—“Except Remus ducked out of his father’s hold with what can only be constituted as an indignant sigh. Lyall tried to grab him, but Remus brushed him off, stepping closer instead to Alphard and Sirius. Then, to Alphard, with a degree of authority not necessarily befitting to a mere boy just out of his first year at Hogwarts, Remus said, “You said Sirius could choose who binds the Vow.”“Vow?” Lyall sputtered. “What vow?”He was, naturally, ignored by all parties.Alphard’s gaze sparkled with poorly concealed amusement. “And he chose you?”Remus didn’t so much as blink. “Yes.”At his uncle’s smirk carelessly thrown in his direction, Sirius cleared his throat. Found his voice. “I trust him.”He didn’t want to think about why he nearly choked on those three little words. It was true, after all.But it was so much more than that. Lyall again: “Remus, I think it’s best—““You’re sure?” Alphard asked, once more ignoring Lupin. “I’m almost certain the Potters are still lurking around here somewhere. Euphemia would certainly be glad to—“A desperate cry of protest bubbled in his throat. Even as Sirius fought to swallow down, any meagre objection Sirius might have raised was completely drowned by Remus’s sudden, snarled, “No.”Even Alphard appeared taken aback by the ferocity of that single word. Sirius’s heart soared, danced, echoed the erratic drumbeat an unwritten song.“It should be Remus, Uncle,” Sirius said, though his voice didn’t sound like his own. His heart didn’t know why the words that came out of his mouth rang true, down to the very depths of his being. It had to be Remus. There was no other way Sirius would allow himself to be bound to the kind of oath his uncle demanded. He’d made that mistake with Malfoy. Then again, that’d been worth it, in the end. It had kept Remus safe, even if it’d cost him his pride, his dignity, and an undefined future. This time, Lyall all but shoved himself between his son and Alphard. He glared down at Alphard, looming over him in such a way that certainly would have intimidated a lesser man. Alphard, though, was born to kings and vipers. Sirius couldn’t imagine his uncle bowing to anyone or anything on this earth. “What’s this all about, Black?” Lyall demanded. “My son won’t do shit until you tell me what the hell is going on!”Remus rolled his eyes, rather dramatically. “Da—““My nephew has agreed to become my ward and heir, so to speak,” Alphard said. “As per the terms of our agreement, Sirius must swear an Unbreakable Vow to me in order to safeguard my interests against betrayal or disloyalty, unwitting or otherwise.”Lyall’s answer was swift. Inexorable. “No.”“I assure you, I mean your son no harm,” Alphard said. “Said the scorpion to the frog.”“Da,” Remus cut in. “I’ll be fine. Trust me.”Lyall’s expression softened, just a little, as he turned to his son. “I trust you just fine.” His eyes cut to Sirius, and it felt like a threat, an oath of vengeance still unfulfilled. Lyall pointed a long, ink-stained finger at Sirius.“It’s him I don’t trust. You have no idea what people like him will do to people like you.”People like… Remus? Remus was a half-blood. There were so many other named enemies of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Why would anyone bearing the name Black give a shit about a brilliant, yet traumatised Welsh boy with a Muggle mother? Sirius felt the questions churning, aching, deep in his soul. He rolled them over on the tip of his tongue, ready to jump in and demand—Except the hurricane of waste and ruin that washed over Remus’s face was answer enough. There were very few times in his life when Sirius Black had witnessed such utter destruction.A flash of the Cruciatus, eternal pain setting Sirius’s blood on fire, his insides to mush, his brother’s agonizing cries as he begged their mother for a mercy neither of them had thought she would give.A plan of elopement, meticulously calculated, erupting in the face of his mother’s tenacious cruelty.A table set for thirteen, the weight of a death omen already digging it’s claws into Sirius’s own flesh, only to have his brother stand and take his place in the ruined pages of destiny.That look was agony and the shattering of a ravaged heart.Lyall’s eyes closed, and Sirius watched him try to pull the words back. “I didn’t mean that, Remus.” This was said gently—genuinely—and both father and son schooled their expressions back to something close to neutral. Lyall swallowed. Redirected. “You have no idea what the Blacks will do to people like us.”Sirius narrowed his eyes. He was sure that the juxtaposition of you and us would keep him up at night. “I’ve seen plenty,” Remus snapped. “I know exactly what Sirius’s family is capable of. Every wizard in Britain knows how far they’ll go to claim their birthright over us mere mortals. I’ve witnessed their cruelty and I—” Amber eyes tracked to Sirius, and Remus’s voice cracked. “I have to do this, Da. To keep him safe from all that.”“Remus—““I’ve made my choice,” Remus said, raising his chin in defiance of the world. “And… I ask that you can at least try to respect that.”Lyall regarded his son for a long, eternal moment, as though Remus were the greatest mystery in all the cosmos. Then, impossibly, “Okay.”Said with all the enthusiasm of a man whose son had just tied a noose around his neck. Alphard clapped his hands together, just once, and it was enough to snap the tension lingering in the space between them. “Right,” he said. “Best get on with it, then.”Without any preamble, Alphard led the three of them to a small alcove near the platform barrier. It was enough removed from the pedestrian traffic, but not so dark and gloomy that it would arouse any sort of suspicion from a casual passerby. Alphard drew his wand—a gnarled, wild looking thing—and, with a brief shared glance, both Sirius and Remus did the same. Lyall bit his lip, in a clear attempt to keep more protests at bay. To Sirius, Alphard said, “If rumour is to be believed, you’ve done this before.”Sirius nodded, because there was no use in denying it. Lucius Malfoy did so like to brag. Alphard offered his free hand and Sirius took it, clasping his uncle’s wrist. Sirius swallowed his gasp at the nothing that itched under the surface of his skin. It was familiar, this nothing. It was a symptom of someone who shared his name and his curse. Instead of allowing himself to drown in it, Sirius turned his gaze to Remus, who stared at their joined hands with wide eyes, filled to the brim with equal parts terror and apprehension. “There’s no spell,” Sirius said, to the silence that threatened to choke them. “Just call upon your magic. It’ll know what to do.”A red tendril of flame swirled to life at the tip of Remus’s wand. It spiralled around them, intertwined around Sirius and Alphard’s clasped hands, and—Fuck.Sirius could taste Remus’s magic on his tongue. He felt drunk, dazed, lost in the reckless euphoria of this wild and impossible thing. Remus’s magic was a song, a poem, a melody that harmonised with the shattered pieces of Sirius’s own soul. It should sound tragic, he thought. Heartbreaking, this unwritten song composed by their intertwined magic. But it wasn’t. How can one possibly be expected to describe the feeling of rapture stirring in the depths of one’s own soul?Words would never be enough.For a moment, Sirius allowed himself to get lost in the song, in every possible promised future lost in unwritten lyrics. It was beautiful, echoing ad infinitum, to the steady beat of their hearts.As always, the cruelty of reality came screaming, drowning out the temporary peace he’d found at the mere brush of Remus’s magic. “If you fuck him over, I will tear out your throat.” It was said casually, as though Remus were remarking on the weather or inquiring after Alphard’s favourite book. Then, almost as an afterthought, Remus snarled, “With my teeth.”Alphard’s laughter was almost enough to drown out the sudden burst of curse words streaming from Lyall Lupin’s mouth. “Not to worry, my boy,” Alphard said. “The Vow will kill me first.”“If you’re lucky,” was Remus’s only reply. Alphard smiled, as though he actually liked Remus, despite the fact that Remus had just threatened his life. Then, turning his attention back to Sirius and the wild magic joining their hands, Alphard said, “I, Alphard Pollux Black, solemnly swear that I will protect and safeguard Sirius Orion Black against all harm, both physical and magical, brought about by anyone bearing the Noble and Most Ancient Name of Black. Sirius will be my sole heir, set to inherit all my property and assets at the moment of my soul leaves this world.” Alphard sent a wink in Remus’s direction, but his voice remained steady. Solemn. “Sirius Black will be safe, so long as I remain in this world. I offer all this, in exchange for Sirius’s oath to never disclose or betray my secrets, or those of Constellation’s Keep, to anyone bearing the Noble and Most Ancient Name of Black. Wittingly or otherwise.”Sirius had no reason to hesitate. This was nearly everything he’d begged of various, uncaring gods. This was, perhaps, his first step to salvation.“I, Sirius Orion Black, do solemnly swear to never disclose or betray the secrets of Alphard Pollux Black, or those held in Constellation’s Keep, to anyone bearing the Noble and Most Ancient Name of Black, whether wittingly or otherwise.”There was a crescendo, a cacophony of magic dancing around them, searing itself into their very souls, then…Then, it was gone, and Sirius could breathe again. “Is… Is that it?” Lyall hedged, but the words didn’t register in his brain. How could they, when an unwritten song still reverberated through his entire being? The song ricocheted against the pieces of his heart, lodged itself in the gaping wounds in his soul, and made him whole again. He’d danced to this song, in a dream, in a nightmare. It was slow and tragic and laced with incomprehensible wonder. This song, the harmony of his magic, intertwined with Remus’s, was…Everything. Uncaring of the wide world around them, oblivious to the mad hustle of King’s Cross station on a Saturday morning, Sirius dropped his uncle’s hand, lost in the beautiful void of amber eyes. It was treacherous, this feeling welling in his chest, gnawing at his bones. It broke his heart and made him whole all at once, with the rhythm and crescendo of the song. He knew what it was, this feeling. He’d known for awhile, but naming a thing gave it power. Made it real. And four stupid letters could never hope to encapsulate this thing, this song, between them. Absently, Sirius found himself wondering how this had happened—when this had happened. When had this stupid, relentless four letter word taken root in his soul and irrevocably tethered him to Remus? The thing was, Sirius couldn’t remember a single damn minute since he’d met him when he hadn’t been recklessly, treacherously in love with Remus Lupin. With his name a whispered prayer on scarred lips, Remus took a step closer, pulled up short. Reached out a hand, a fraction of an inch from Sirius, then let it drop once more. Sirius bit back an anguished wail. That, of course, was the cruelest fate in all of creation: to be so close to the other half of his soul, yet unable to touch, to hold, to consume entirely. He’d burn every god for this one cruelty. He’d cast the stars from the heavens, banish them to a lake—no, and endless ocean—and build his castle on the boneyard of the gods. The boy who killed god, indeed. Sirius Black was the executioner who’d revel in the gods’ death, who’d share the spoils of victory with every broken creature that still roamed the earth. Sirius didn’t fucking care anymore. He snagged Remus’s wrist, clenched his teeth, and all but dragged Remus into him, clinging to him for all he was worth. He wrapped his arms around Remus’s neck, and felt two strong arms wrap around his waist in turn. Remus clawed at his robes, dragged him closer. Together, they tried with all their futile prayers and songs to fuse themselves together, to manifest the tether anchoring one soul to the other into the physical world.Sirius sobbed.The agony was fire, and the fire was alive: a living, burning creature yearning to break free. The fire was in his veins, raging, devouring every piece of his existence. The fire was reckoning and retribution, undeserved. It was the consequence of the cruelest fate. And, if Sirius were to let go of this beautiful, perfect boy, if he were to pull back, draw his mother’s silver knife from the inner pocket of his robe… If he were to drag that blade over the vein in his wrist, it wouldn’t be blood, but fire, spilling from his veins: a furious, hungry creature lusting for revenge on the indifferent god who’d long ago whispered the spell that had given life to this inhuman agony inside him.“Sirius,” Remus breathed, his voice breaking. “I need to let go.”No, a furious, vengeful creature roared from the darkest corners of his soul. Sirius tried to bite the word back, but this creature, made of fire and agony, was not to be tamed. The word came out as a sob, but it did nothing against the shadows starting to swirl in the edges of his mind. The stars would be swallowed into nothing, but now was not his time. There were tragedies yet to be written.When he pulled away—slowly, reluctantly—he saw the embers of his own agony reflected in amber eyes. Remus gave him a smile that whispered of their shared anguish and ruin. When he finally bothered to acknowledge the two adults who’d lingered, watching them, he saw Alphard, barely holding back an unreadable smile, and Lyall…Lyall, whose mouth hung open, catching flies. Remus did not look at his father. He couldn’t quite tear his eyes away from Sirius. That fact did funny things to Sirius’s bruised and broken heart. “You should be proud of your son, Mr. Lupin,” Sirius announced, mostly to see the red flush that crept up Remus’s scarred cheeks. It was incredibly distracting. Reminiscent of a thousand half-forgotten moments stolen from various nightmares. “He’s loyal. Brave. The best of any of us.”Lyall nodded, knowingly, his lips pressed into a thin line. “I—Shit.” Lyall broke off, as though his voice simply gave up. Surrendered to the emotion that suddenly choked him. He coughed. Composed himself. “I know he is.”Sirius held Lyall’s gaze, his chin tilted up. “I wouldn’t have made it through this year if Remus hadn’t been there.”It was the truth, and Merlin, it cost him, but it was worth it, if only to see Lyall’s reaction. It was subtle, almost imperceptible. Just a tick of a jaw, and…And a flash of… something in deep brown eyes. Something eerie, something that dared to linger. Something haunted. Sirius had no idea what that meant. “We best be off, Sirius,” Alphard said, pretending to glance at a non-existent watch. “Your dear mother does so hate it when we’re late.”They exchanged pleasantries, but Sirius mostly tuned them out. His world—his damned soul—was tethered Remus Lupin, and nothing else fucking mattered. A whispered goodbye, a perfunctory check that the pen was still in his pocket—tucked safe beside his wand—and Sirius followed his uncle through the barrier. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Alphard insisted on taking a cab. A Muggle cab. Sirius had, predictably, never been in one, but his uncle flagged one down, opened the boot, and tossed in Sirius’s trunk as though he hadn’t grown up in a house of nightmares and had instead been flagging down Muggle cabs his whole damned life. Sirius shot Alphard a look as he slid into the back seat. It smelled like ash and cigarettes and a million things Sirius Black was never supposed to touch. He loved it, instantly. Alphard shot him a smirk. “Thought you’d enjoy this. One should always travel by cab when in London. How else can you possibly expect to see any of this wondrous city, if you’re always skipping about, popping up here and there with no rhyme or reason?”“Thought you just wanted to piss off Walburga,” Sirius muttered, because there were few things that would enrage his mother more than the two of them showing up in a Muggle cab. It wasn’t like she could do a damned thing about it. Not with Alphard’s oath.That thought was… liberating, to say the least. “That too,” Alphard admitted, readily. He leaned forward and gave an address to the cab driver. It was a few doors down from Grimmauld, naturally. The house on the corner, but it wasn’t like a Muggle cab could just pull up outside Number 12. It was Unplottable, invisible to Muggles, and impossible to locate unless you already knew where it was. “How long will it take to get there?” Sirius asked.The cab driver spoke with a thick Cockney accent. “‘Bout twenty minutes, give or take.”“In that case,” Alphard said, fishing around in his pockets, “take the scenic route. By the palace.”He slide some paper Muggle money up to the driver, and received a grumbled, “Yessir,” in response. “You ever seen the palace?” Alphard asked.Sirius snorted. It was just a touch derisive. “You must know I haven’t.”“Lived in London his whole goddamned life. Merlin’s tits, Walburga,” Alphard muttered, mostly to himself, cursing at the disembodied idea of Sirius’s mother. “You’d like it, I think,” Alphard continued. “The queen has these funny looking dogs that are not all that dissimilar from potatoes with tiny little legs. I’m on a mission to steal one, but I think the Royal Guard is on to me.” He tossed a wink in Sirius’s direction. “Though, naturally, the British monarchy is an archaic and pervasive symbol of the horrors of colonialism around the world, but the palace is… neat.” “Oi!” said the cab driver, indignant. “That’s your bloody queen you’re talking about, mate!”“Ah, a royalist. Excellent,” Alphard said, almost giddy. Uncle Alphard then launched himself headfirst into an unrehearsed tirade on the morality of imperialism. Ordinarily, Sirius would listen, probably contribute. He had a lot to say on the matters of kings and loyalty thereof. But, as it was, Sirius could not get the haunted look etched into Lyall Lupin’s face out of his mind. It clung to the forefront of his consciousness, like a few repeating measures of a song to which he could not remember the ending.Haunting. Sirius fished the ballpoint pen out of his pocket. With a glance at Alphard, who appeared thoroughly distracted, Sirius wrote, I don’t think your father likes me.Remus’s reply was quick. Sirius felt every letter form in the palm of his hand.
‘Course he does. Don’t be ridiculous
.
Sirius scoffed, tried think of a reply, but Remus’s came first: My da wants to know if you’ve ever killed anyone. Sirius’s laugh was real and visceral. His uncle and the cab driver ignored him entirely.
Yep. Between being top of the class and occasionally getting professors sacked on the weekend, I’ve managed to amass a collection of dead bodies as well. I stuffed most of them in Jamie’s trunk.
The words trailed down his arm, as he ran out of room. Twisted around his wrist a little, but it still made sense. Probably.
Thought as much. That’s why his trunk always smells weird.
Let’s hope that’s the only reason.
Sirius looked out the window, ignored the heated-yet-friendly debate inside the cab, and watched the London skyline pass by. Muggles were everywhere, lurking, chatting, eating, living. Probably all listing to David Bowie. Merlin, Sirius loved it. Again, the scraping of letters across his skin: My da doesn’t believe you’re top of our class.
Neither did Dumbledore. He lost a bet with Minnie.
Did he really?
Yep. Is your dad mad that you’re not the top of the class?
But Sirius knew even as he wrote the words that they weren’t true. That look in Lyall Lupin’s eyes hadn’t been even in the near vicinity of disappointment. It’d been something that cut much deeper.
Nah. He doesn’t care about that,
Remus wrote.
He’s just glad I got to go to Hogwarts in the first place.
That was… interesting. Sirius pressed on, Why? Did he think you were a Squib?Remus’s reply took a second. Given the itch under his skin, Sirius got the distinct impression that Remus may have scratched out a few replies.
My da says you ask too many questions.
Only because I don’t get answers.
This time, the reply was immediate:
You haven’t asked the right question yet.
Fuck.That was the crux of it, wasn’t it?Sirius still hadn’t found his way to the right fucking question. He’d been close, had prayed the answer would fall at his feet entirely by accident, but…But that had all ended in disaster, hadn’t it?
My da wants to know why I haven’t written about you in any of my letters home. He thinks I’ve been keeping you a secret.
A part of him would be honoured to be Remus Lupin’s secret. It’d mean they had something special. Something indescribable, incomprehensible by any word in any human language.
Am I your scarlet letter, Remus?
He could almost hear Remus’s subdued groan. Fuck. Did Evans let you read that?
Yep. Can’t say I cared for it. Very maudlin, that Hawthorne.
It’d been an interesting read, The Scarlet Letter, to say the least. He’d related to the premise of the story more than he would care to admit. Ostracised and set apart from society by a mark, a stain, a sign of his sin over which he had no control. American, came Remus’s reply.
That explains it.
I told my da you read a lot.
Sirius wondered if that would win him any points with Lyall Lupin. He’d always been under the impression that Remus pilfered his books from his mother’s collection.
Tell him about Frankenstein.
Absolutely not.
I love Frankenstein.
I know you do. Da does not.
He’s wrong.
Honestly, it was an objective truth. Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein was a literary masterpiece. Claiming to despise Frankenstein would be like claiming to despise the oxygen that filled your lungs.
I told him you complained that Evans didn’t have a French copy of Les Miserables.
Sirius smiled at the comfort of that memory.
I was promised a riveting tale of love and war. The title was French. It took place in France. So I just assumed. It was in
English
, Remus. I still liked it. It just would have been better in French.
My da says you’re very posh.
Thank you.
And that you’re also a bit of an arsehole.
Again, Sirius stifled a laugh.
I retract my expression of gratitude.
Alphard suddenly broke off his conversation with the driver and touched Sirius’s arm with the back of his hand to get Sirius’s attention. Alphard gestured out Sirius’s window. Buckingham Palace was a sight to behold, even from in the briefest of glances, from a considerable distance, separated by hedges and fences. It was unlike the castles Sirius knew—far more elegant and less… haunted. “Flag’s raised,” Alphard said. “Means the queens in residence. So are her dogs, presumably.”He winked at Sirius, a devilish smile dancing across his face. It occurred to Sirius, rather suddenly, how little he actually knew of his uncle. His mother had done her damned best to keep Alphard’s name out of conversation. Sirius had only met him sporadically, formally, and with the exception of last Christmas, hadn’t ever talked to him about anything real. He knew nothing of Alphard’s life, nothing of the span of years after Walburga had married Orion and taken up the role of matriarch of House Black to now. Nothing, save for the fact that his uncle lived in Scotland, hated his mother, and ran some kind of sanctuary. All that, and the fact that Uncle Alphard somehow knew Remus’s father. It was a puzzle, but the pieces didn’t match up. He’d sworn an oath to protect the secrets of a man he knew nothing about. Logically, he could understand why his friends had reacted to that in the way they did. So, Sirius asked, “How is it you know Lyall Lupin?”Alphard laughed. “I was wondering how long it’d take you to ask. You seemed quite… friendly with his son.”Right. Friendly. “He’s…” But there weren’t words for everything Remus Lupin was to him. Alphard, thankfully, took pity on him. “Lyall and I met at Hogwarts. We were in the same year. He was in Ravenclaw, of course.” Then, with a wink that nearly sent Sirius into a tailspin, “I always did have a thing for Ravenclaws.”Sirius had no fucking clue what to say to that.“Lyall Lupin is from an old pureblood family,” Alphard went on, entirely unbothered by the bewilderment etched on Sirius’s face. “Nothing Noble and Most Ancient, mind you, but he can trace his bloodline back to the old kings of Wales. As you might imagine, it caused quite the stir when he ran off with that lovely little French girl—and a Muggle, no less.” Alphard’s smile was genuine. “Frankly, I don’t think I even remotely respected Lyall until he met Hope.”Sirius frowned. “Why not?”“Lyall was the top of our class by a rather significant margin. He was and is, objectively speaking, one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever met. He is also the most stubborn,” Alphard said. “He was never my enemy—and Merlin knows, I made plenty of those—but one could easily claim we were rivals. We were certainly not friendly.”The way Alphard said it—the way he leaned into his words, the way he raised his eyebrow, and tossed the words left unspoken in Sirius’s direction—very heavily implied an afterthought, an addendum: Not friendly in the way that you are with his son.“After school, we were… antagonistic, shall we say, in a professional capacity.” Alphard paused, seemed to parse through the words he used to tell his story the same way a man would consider a shelf of expensive wines. “Our fields of study were tangential in nature. There was quite a bit of overlap. Lyall was the best of the best. People came from all over the world to inquire after his knowledge and expertise. But, as I said, Lupin’s stubborn. He had an annoying habit of pissing people off.”Alphard sighed. “He adhered to the old ways, you know. More so than I ever did. He could be an arse, and we got into it more times than I cared to count. Then, he went to France.” A small smile laced with memories crept across Alphard’s face. “After he met Hope, he cornered me at a Muggle bar in Inverness. The arsehole never apologised, of course—his pride would never allow it—but we got drunk. Decided being enemies was something of a useless endeavour. Friends was still a bit of a stretch, but Merlin, we had a grand old time.”Sirius tried to picture it: a younger version of Lyall Lupin drinking with his uncle. His uncle, carefree and open and the epitome of everything a Black was never supposed to be. Lyall, in a tweed suit, talking as much with his hands as with his words, gesticulating his way to a drunken point.The picture in Sirius’s mind warped into some nightmare-born future versions of him and Remus far sooner than he’d care to admit. “I haven’t seen Lyall Lupin in… Well, it’d be about eight years now.” The look Alphard gave him a look that was an inquisition unto itself. “The last time I saw him, I had the privilege of meeting his son. Your Remus. They came to Scotland after—“But Sirius’s brain shorted. “You’ve met Remus?”“I can’t imagine he remembers me. He was so, so young.” There was a shadow, a ghost—one Sirius could not name or recognise—hiding in every crevice of Alphard’s features. “No more than four years old.”Sirius opened his mouth, a question on the tip of his tongue. It felt important, this question, but Alphard spoke first, gesturing to the pen still clutched in Sirius’s hand. “He gave that to you? Your Remus?”Your Remus. Those words settled somewhere deep and warm in Sirius’s heart. Still, he had half a mind to hide the pen from his uncle, lest it be used against him. Alphard seemed to read his hesitation. “Let me guess. It lets you talk to him?”Sirius swallowed, weighed the benefits of lying, but decided against it. He needed Alphard on his side. Slowly, he nodded.Alphard laughed. “Figures, he’d be clever enough to do that kind of magic. Lyall should be proud.”“I meant what I said,” Sirius said. “Remus is the best of any of us.”“Of that, I have no doubt.”Sirius glanced out his window. The streets were starting to look more familiar. Dread coiled in the pit of his stomach. He picked up the pen again. Are you back in Wales?His words disappeared after a moment, but Remus’s reply came through in a fraction of a heartbeat. Yeah. Da Apparated us.
Is your mum there too?
Yes, Remus wrote.
She says you sound like a lovely boy.
Not for the first time, Sirius wondered what kind of woman Hope Lupin must be. She was as much an enigma taking up real estate in Sirius’s mind as her son. He knew so very little about the Muggle world, but Remus Lupin carried so much of its beauty and imperfection in his heart, in the stories he placed in Sirius’s lap in the middle of the night.
So, you’ve been telling lies about me?
Only little ones
, Remus said. The words kept coming, tracing all the way down Sirius’s wrist.
Like how you’re bald and really self-conscious about it, so your family buys you really expensive wigs and pays off the papers to make sure no one leaks the story.
You’re a blight on humanity, Remus Lupin.
Thanks!
Sirius snorted a laugh, but outside, he knew these streets. He’d walked them as a child, his hand clutched tightly in his mother’s hand, as though she heard he’d been moments from tearing free from her talons and tumbling blindly into the wide, miraculous world. His hand itched. He looked down.
Are you there yet?
The cab rolled to a stop, a few doors down. Sirius closed his eyes. Took a breath. Yeah. Just pulled up.Remus’s answer seemed to got lost in the aether, unwilling to manifest in the ink on Sirius’s skin. He waited, as Alphard got out of the cab. He waited, as he felt more than heard the boot of the cab slam shut. He waited.Then, two simple words: Be safe.Always, he almost wrote, but then Alphard opened the car door. Sirius tucked the pen into his pocket and stepped out onto the street. The Muggle cab driver pulled away, zooming down the street in what Sirius could only assume was abject horror. Because, in between Numbers Eleven and Thirteen, Number Twelve Grimmauld Place clawed its way out of the netherworld with all the fury and hunger of a long-forgotten demon. He was home. Home. A word that evoked such hope and comfort did not belong in the same damn sentence as Grimmauld Place. This… fortress, built on the bones of cruelty and oppression, had earned its own chapter in the record of human depravity ten times over. It was slightly surreal, watching his uncle use the ornate knocker on the front door. The gaudy thing was a cawing raven, cast mid-flight in silver. Sirius could not recall a time in his life when he had so much as touched the damned thing. Why should he knock on the front door of his own damned inheritance, after all?Was he not the heir to this nightmare of a keep?Well, perhaps not anymore. That’d been his mother’s condition, after all. Sirius would inherit Constellation’s Keep and all its myriad secrets.Regulus would be left with Grimmauld. “This should go without saying,” Alphard said to the gnawing silence, “but try not to piss her off.” Alphard half-turned, his hands folded neatly over his cane, and stared down at Sirius. An ominous cloud hovered in his uncle’s soul-black eyes. “As a scientist, it goes against my every instinct to deny a mother’s innate drive to protect and care for her own child. Nature demands the propagation of the species, after all, and that in turn translates into an instinctual mandate of care and sacrifice. A drive that may require the mother’s very lifeblood, in some cases. It’s natural, this instinct, and it exists in almost every species on this planet. It’s not quite love—that is an entirely human thing—but it seems to be the law of the land.“Your mother,” Alphard said, through grinding teeth, “has always been a perversion of the natural order of things.” His uncle’s voice was cold. Matter-of-fact. “She hates you, Sirius, with a rage and a fire far surpassing the laws set for us by the gods. If not for the oath staying her wand…” Alphard didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t need to. “Walburga’s clever. Far more clever than I’d prefer. There are more ways to torture and torment a person than are stipulated in the terms of her oath. The moment you cross that threshold, you will be in more danger than you’ve ever been. Do you understand me?”Sirius nodded, but it didn’t fucking matter. Because: “Regulus.”It was an answer, a resolution. A promise. Sirius Black would never leave his brother. That went against the natural order of things. Alphard huffed. It may have been hiding a laugh. “How did that damned woman ever question where the Sorting Hat intended to place you? Stupid, bloody Gryffindors. Always so willing to get your heart broken.”The heavy, curse-tempered door slowly creaked open, as though the person on the other side barely had the strength to counterbalance such an immovable object. When the door was finally opened wide enough to peer inside the fortress containing Sirius’s every childhood trauma, it was not Kreacher there to greet them.“Sirius?”Never in their lives had the Black brothers been sent to answer their own front door. That was a job for their lessers, far beneath the station for the heirs to the Noble and Ancient. His brother’s eyes were wide, but the shock and terror did very little to mask the hollowness in Regulus’s features. Regulus had grown since Christmas—nearly standing as tall as Sirius now—but he was thinner. Older, too, perhaps, but it was the gaunt features and loose clothing that did very little to fill out Regulus’s frame that nearly sent Sirius into a spiral. Starvation had always been his mother’s favourite method of torment. He’d been right to come here, to this nightmare of a place. There were ghosts behind Regulus’s ink-black eyes, desperate to escape into the wide, wild world. Before he could properly document each and every change, before Regulus could voice any manner of the horrors known to him, Sirius surged forward, enveloping his brother in his arms.It didn’t hurt—holding Regulus never caused him any sort of pain—but his brother was… cold. His bones were stiff, prodding at Sirius at nearly every point of contact. Merlin’s tits, his brother felt like a corpse.Regulus resisted the touch for a solid three seconds, trying to pull away even as Sirius pulled him closer. Then, with an audible surrender, Regulus sobbed into Sirius’s shoulder. Small, bony fingers clawed at Sirius’s robes as though Regulus planned on stealing Sirius’s vitality, the warmth of his lifeblood. “You shouldn’t be here,” Regulus sobbed into Sirius’s neck. “Fuck, Sirius, why are you here?”Regulus hadn’t known Sirius was coming. Fuck. Despite the accusations and protests hidden in his words, Regulus did not release the death-grip he had on Sirius.“Had to see you, Reg,” Sirius said, around the lump in his throat. “I couldn’t just fuck off to Scotland without saying goodbye to my baby brother.”The proper sort of goodbye.The humour Sirius forced into his voice fell flat, dead and rotting between them. Finally, reluctantly, Regulus pulled away, pushing Sirius back until there was a healthy distance between them. Visibly struggling to control the expression on his face, Regulus glared at him.Regulus looked so much older, a faceless ghost of his future self. “You shouldn’t be here, Sirius,” Regulus said again, this time with feeling. A shadow passed over his eyes. Regulus cast a wary glance behind him, somewhere in the darkness, as though some nightmare or other might claw its way free from between the mounted skulls lining the walls. “You can’t be here. Not now.”“He’ll be all right, Reg,” Alphard said, his voice calm and diplomatic, despite the warning he’d issued Sirius mere moments before. “I promise.”Regulus shook his head furiously. “No. No. You don’t understand. You have to go. Now. Before—“His brother’s manic rambling was cut off abruptly by an ancient, creaking voice emanating from somewhere in the darkness behind him. “Master Regulus,” Kreacher crooned. “Have my Mistress’s final guests arrived?”Strange, really, to be referred to as a guest in the house where you grew up. All things considered, Sirius wasn’t mad about it. He much preferred to be a guest. For the most part, and with a few notable exceptions, guests tended to walk out alive. “Her final guests?” Alphard echoed, his voice pitching up in evident surprise. “I was under the impression that this was to be a family affair.”Kreacher mumbled something about blood traitors tainting his Mistress’s name, but Sirius wasn’t listening. Not really. Instead, Sirius watched in growing terror as a single tear tracked down his brother’s face. Regulus stared unblinking, straight ahead, at something in the distance over Sirius’s shoulder. Freedom, perhaps. An escape. He seemed to see everything and nothing all at once.Finally, black eyes tracked to Sirius.“Please,” Regulus mouthed, as though he no longer had strength enough to give the word a voice. “Come,” Kreacher said, with just a single note of impatience. “My Mistress is waiting.”Regulus’s fingers dug into Sirius’s arm. Weary, haunted eyes that knew nothing beyond the horrors that existed inside Grimmauld Place stared up at him.“It’ll hurt, Sirius,” Regulus said, “when you shake his hand.”It was a warning—that much Sirius knew—but before he could formulate a question, Alphard coughed loudly, glaring first at Regulus, then at the empty hall. A frown etched on his face, Alphard shouldered his way past them, after the house-elf. Sirius stayed back, just long enough to help Regulus push the massive door closed. Then, grasping his brother’s hand—silently relishing the menial solace of the touch—Sirius led the way down the dark, candlelit and skull-lined hallway. The Warden stood outside the door to the drawing room: a looming, ominous shadow dancing in the embers of the cataclysm. This woman had given birth to him, had nursed him, raised him. By every law of nature, this woman was ordained to love him—or, at the very least, ensure that he survives long enough to ensure he can contribute to the propagation of their line. This woman —this witch— from whom he’d inherited almost every physical feature, had instead tried to drain him of life more times than Sirius cared to count.Muggles used to burn witches. He’d siphoned away that fact amidst the monotony of a thousand History of Magic classes all jumbled together in his memory. It was the reason the Ministry had ordered and continued to enforce the Statute of Secrecy. They’d wanted to prevent ordinary folk from burning innocent witches. Walburga Black had never been anything that was even in the same vicinity as innocent. She’d been a snake in the grass, from the moment of her conception. And, Merlin, Sirius would love to watch his mother burn. He’d roast marshmallows over her funeral pyre: the Muggle way, on a stick, just as he and Remus had done, curled under a pile of blankets in front of the Gryffindor mantle, just telling stories and waiting out the winter chill. Walburga smiled at him as though she hadn’t actively tried to murder him the last time he’d been in this house. “Sirius. Alphard.” Her voice was warm. Welcoming. It was deeply disconcerting. She held out both hands, palms facing up, perfectly manicured fingers reaching for something. “Your wands, if you please. This is a… business gathering, and our guest of honour has asked that everyone present surrender their wands in order to prevent any unfortunate—“ Here, her eyes cut to Sirius and swam with the that familiar, predictable murderous rage. “—incidents..”Alphard huffed. “Walburga, please, this is—“A flash of venom. A promise of violence. “You will obey me, brother, or I will see to it that you are banished from this house. Both of you.”And that was unacceptable.Sirius refused to leave, to surrender. Not until he had a chance to talk to Regulus properly. Not until he knew for certain his brother was safe. Forcing himself not to think—not to panic—at the thought of surrendering his wand to his mother, Sirius drew it from his robe pocket. He placed it in her beckoning hand. She’d been glaring at her brother, lost in a silent battle of wills, not even bothering to acknowledge his existence. The second his wand touched her skin, though, she stopped. Just… stopped. Slowly—menacingly—she turned and regarded her first-born son. Walburga Black’s jaw dropped open, a look of incomprehensible amazement washing out the cruelty in her features. “You… How…. You’ve fixed it.”Never let it be said that anyone bearing the Black named lacked an inherent bond with the magic that flowed through their veins. She could sense the vitality in his wand, same as Sirius. It was magic, raw and unfiltered and so very much alive. He could taste it in the air.Sirius forced away the insanity of a smirk. He couldn’t imagine gloating would end well for him. Instead, he just nodded. Once. “How?” Despite her ravenous demeanour, Walburga Black could not mask the abject sense of wonder in her voice. “Ollivander.” It wasn’t a lie—not one his mother could sniff out, anyway—but it was nowhere near the full, miraculous truth. “I wrote him. Went to Diagon. He fixed it. I was back at Hogwarts before dinner.”Never mind that he’d missed dinner because he’d been distracted by the rather arduous task of ensuring his former professor was well and truly sacked. His mother regarded him with something akin to curiosity. It was wholly and uniquely disturbing, to be appraised in such a manner by Walburga Black. It was as though she were truly seeing him for the first time.Sirius would much rather she remain blind. Then: “Come, Sirius. Let me introduce you to our esteemed guest.”Next to him, Regulus let out a desperate, strangled whimper. The flash of fury in the Warden’s eyes told him she’d heard it too. Regulus cast his eyes at the floor, squeezing on Sirius’s hand, taking a half-step backwards. When Walburga’s glare faded back to relatively neutral, Regulus gave a firm, but nearly imperceptible tug on Sirius’s hand. Nails digging into Sirius’s palm, Regulus jerked his head, just once, in the direction of the front door.His brother wanted Sirius to run.What good would running do now, when the die had already been cast?Alphard, too, watched the Black brothers, a frown tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Walburga, perhaps it would be best if—“A blaze of molten silver in his mother’s eyes. She may as well have drawn a blade on her younger brother. “I am well aware of my oaths, Alphard. As I’m sure my son is aware of his obligations to me and this House.”A muscle in Alphard’s jaw ticked. Regulus tried to edge closer, but Sirius expertly extracted himself from the relative safety of his brother’s touch. He would not allow this to end until he’d spoken with Regulus.Sirius walked up to his mother, tilted his head up to meet the familiar cruelty in her gaze. He hated that he still had to look up to her, but he allowed his mother to see the surrender in his eyes. He’d play her games, for now. It was better this way. His mother’s smile was as sinister as it was triumphant. It curdled the blood in his veins, but still, Sirius Black stood his ground.“Come,” Walburga said again, bony fingers digging into the flesh of Sirius’s shoulder as she ushered him in front of her. Kreacher opened the drawing room door, bowing to his mistress as she walked Sirius over the threshold, never relinquishing the death grip she had on his skin.Moments ago—eons now—when Sirius first heard mention of other guests, he’d assumed it was some diplomatic ally of his father’s, granted an evening at Grimmauld in advance of some Wizengamot vote or other. He’d assumed it was a Lestrange or Shafiq or even fucking Fawley, vying for the power, wealth, or influence of the Blacks as the other Sacred Twenty-Eight were wont to do. He’d even have placed good money that this was all part of his mother’s scheming: that there’d be some poor pureblood brat and her parents behind that door, coming to make dowry offers to the matriarch of House Black in exchange for Sirius’s hand in marriage. Never in his goddamned life did he expect to see Tom Riddle lounging in the drawing room of Grimmauld Place, sprawled across a chaise, swirling a glass of wine as though he owned the fucking place. Sirius froze in the doorway, only for his mother to unceremoniously shove him forward half a second later. He stumbled, but her taloned fingernails kept him from faceplanting at Riddle’s feet. The only other person in the drawing room was his father, leaning against the mantle with what Sirius assumed was some ungodly expensive scotch, frowning down at his oldest son. Walburga manoeuvred Sirius to stand in front of her, both hands clasped on his shoulders: a clear presentation. An offering, perhaps.An unwitting sacrifice: the pariah heir before the matriarch. “My lord,” Walburga said, “I’d like to present my eldest son, Sirius Orion Black.”Never in his goddamned life did he expect to hear his mother refer to any man as lord.Tom Riddle waved his free hand, his wine glass levitating over and resting on the side table with a finesse that Sirius himself would probably struggle with. Riddle stood, his hands in his pockets, the tails of his robes flaring behind him like a raven’s wings. He strolled over to Sirius with all the poise and cunning smiles of a wayward schoolboy, but Sirius saw straight through the facade. He’d seen this man before, etched into infamy by the photographer from The Daily Prophet, and once, from a distance, hiding under a cloak with a boy with more scars than freckles, tucked in a corner of some forgotten courtyard in Knockturn Alley. But now…It was empirically impossible to describe Tom Riddle as anything other than unforgettably beautiful, but in this context, wearing that face, beautiful meant anything but desirable. Riddle possessed the beauty of an exploding star: blinding and rare, but destined to collapse in on itself. He was was a force of gravity, in the centre of the universe, pulling all other helpless creations towards the event horizon. He was chaos and the forbidden allure of oblivion, dressed in robes and given an enchanting face to mask the rot underneath. Fitting, for the man who named himself the master of death.Up close, Sirius could see Riddle’s age in his features—far more evident than at a distance—but the creases around his eyes did little to detract from the aura of eternity this man seemed to exude. And, Merlin, his eyes. Sirius had thought Riddle’s eyes were black—as black as the charred embers that seemed to have replaced his soul—but… They were green. As dark and malignant as the flash of the death curse. Vaguely, Sirius wondered if they’d always been that colour, or if the violence and vice by which Riddle lived his life had simply caught up with him and demanded ransom. Riddle leaned forward, just a pace or two away from Sirius, his teeth glinting in the dull firelight from the mantle. Riddle’s smile, too, was as wicked as it was mesmerising, an indescribable riot of madness and depravity. It was the fatal gleam of sunlight to those whose souls had only ever known darkness.“Ah,” said Riddle.“The Gryffindor.”A real Gryffindor would not have winced at being named for the character of his heart by this monster of a man. The smile that spread across Riddle’s face now was a death mark: an oath sworn in the name of nightmares to come. Sirius did not so much as blink as Regulus and Alphard took up positions in Sirius’s periphery, his uncle to his right and his brother, cowering slightly, to his left. Walburga kept her hands on Sirius as she said, “My brother, Alphard Black. And, of course, you know my youngest. Come here, Regulus.”Sirius’s blood froze at his mother’s words, his stomach lurching at the idea that his brother had been alone here, with Riddle, for any amount of time. Merlin, the grin on Riddle’s face turned feral as he turned his attention towards Regulus. Sirius saw the calculation in those deadly green eyes, the hunger as he salivated over the future heir of House Black. “Regulus.” His brother’s name rolled off Riddle’s tongue like the melody of a song. Sirius ground his teeth to keep the maelstrom of fury and magic at bay. “It’s a shame you didn’t join us last night for cocktails. But it sounds as though you had quite the… eventful night. I must say, all things considered, I’m impressed.”And that… fuck. Unease clawed its way up his spine. Regulus was as pale as a ghost. If Sirius hadn’t been able to touch him, to know he was solid, real, he’d assume his brother was a ghost, trapped in this nightmare forever.Rage and fury like Sirius Black had never known settled in his veins, danced to the roaring chaos of his heartbeat. It itched at his fingertips, sparks subdued only by a fist clenched at his side.This man had no fucking right to claim familiarity with his brother. Regulus was his. “Who are you?” Sirius demanded, despite knowing the answer. Anything, to distract Riddle from salivating over his brother. Besides, Riddle hadn’t bothered with the introduction Sirius was due. “And why are you here?”Ordinarily, abrupt questions like that posed to his parents’ guests would earn him a solid curse or two, or at the very least, a verbal reprimand. Instead, neither his mother nor his father so much as looked at him. It was only the subtle, stern shake of Alphard’s head that let Sirius know he’d even spoken out loud. Riddle laughed. He took a step forward, closing the gap between himself and Sirius, and offered his hand. There was an ancient, silver ring on his pinkie finger. “My given name is Tom Marvolo Riddle, but that is no longer who I am,” he said. “This world has yet to accept and embrace me by my chosen name, but they will. For now, Sirius Black, you will refer to me as lord.”I-will-the-fuck-not! Sirius had to bite his tongue to keep the words back. Without thinking, Sirius reached to shake Riddle’s hand, expecting—Fuck! Not that.Sirius swallowed a gasp as Riddle shook his hand, a poisonous smirk dancing on his lips. This was a different sort of pain: one Sirius Black, a known connoisseur of the various ways pain can be inflicted on a person, could not quite identify. This was not the echoing, endless nothingness he’d expected from touching another pureblood, nor was it the excruciating agony that set his soul on fire every time he touched Remus Lupin. It was…Pain and magic. Magic and pain. It was a cloying sort of thing, Riddle’s magic. Sirius could feel it, leaving its invisible, yet sticky residue, even as Riddle released his hand. Riddle’s magic felt… off, as though someone had reached gnarled fingers into the mud in search of human bones to grind into a elixir of death. It was dark, that sort of magic. Darker than anything Sirius had dared to touch.It’ll hurt, Sirius, Regulus had said, when you shake his hand.“You’re not a pureblood,” Sirius said, through clenched teeth, staring down at his own hand, turning it over to make sure it hadn’t shrivelled up and died from Riddle’s touch.Riddle did not react how Sirius thought he would, though there was undeniable rage simmering behind the green flames in his eyes. Instead, he shoved his hand back into the pocket of his robe and strolled over to the chaise once more. He picked up his glass of wine. Swirled it. Took a drink. No one said anything. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Sirius Black.” Sirius was growing increasingly uncomfortable with the way Riddle kept using his full name. “Your mother’s told me everything. Your wandless magic, your thirst for knowledge.” Then, in a conspiratorial whisper, “Your first spell.”Sirius swallowed bile. It was a hell of a thing, when the devil himself discovered your darkest sin. “Your blood is strong, your magic even stronger. I can sense it, you know.” Riddle held up the hand with the ring, examining it, as though Sirius’s magic had imprinted on Riddle the same way Riddle’s magic had on Sirius. “And top of your class, I hear. Congratulations. I bet the Old Man was thrilled.”Once more, Riddle set down his glass and walked right up to Sirius.“All that potential,” Riddle said, his voice quiet as he ran a hand next to Sirius’s face: a gentle caress that never quite made contact. Merlin, how Sirius’s blood still boiled. “All the purity and ancient power in your veins, and still you side with the enemy of your House.”Sirius felt as though the floor had dropped out from under him. Next to him, Alphard stepped forward—never laying a hand on Riddle, but enough to make his presence known. “I mean no harm,” Riddle said, the flash of his green eyes contradicting the benevolence of his tone. Alphard’s scowl only deepened. “I will abide by the terms of your oath. You have my word.”“What is it you want of my ward, then, Mr. Riddle?” Alphard demanded. “Lord,” Orion snapped. Alphard regarded his brother-in-law cooly. “To my knowledge, Mr. Riddle has earned no such title, nor is it owed to him by nature of his blood.”Well. Fuck. A finger reached out, plucked a strand of Sirius’s hair from where it hung loose in front of his face. Riddle twirled the hair in his fingers while Sirius tried desperately not to move, not to breathe, lest he provoke the wrath of the man in front of him. “They tell stories, you know. About the Sorting Hat,” Riddle said, his voice frighteningly casual. “Have you heard them, Sirius Black?” Riddle did not wait for a response. “They say that for some—those touched by destiny, perhaps—the old, ratty thing does not offer so much a decree, but a choice. Two paths, two threads of destiny, divergent of each other, and a choice.”The words the Sorting Hat whispered to him all those months ago echoed now, a resounding cry against the terror building deep in his soul: Is this truly something you want, to be made into a pariah by your family, to be tormented by your peers, to be judged by your name, until you prove the true intentions of your heart by your actions?“For me,” Riddle said, releasing Sirius’s hair and taking just half a step back, “it was simple. As it should be. The Sorting Hat was on my head for less than a heartbeat, before it announced to the world what I already knew to be true. I was Slytherin, down to the very blood in my veins. But you…” His smile was beautiful, radiant, but utterly without mercy. “Tell me, brave Lionheart, what do you know of the cruelty of fate?”A deranged part of Sirius wanted to laugh. What, indeed?He’d been born to a woman who thought of him as nothing more than a stain on the ancient tapestry of her bloodline. He’d had no say, no modicum of choice, when she’d dragged him from the comfort of his bed on the morning of his eighth birthday to carve his destiny into his flesh and set him apart from the rest of the world. He’d begged, he’d screamed, and Merlin, not only had his prayers not stayed his mother’s wand, but he’d been utterly powerless to save his brother from the same fate a year later. He’d been damned from the very beginning. Long before Silas’s prophecy, eons before he’d cast an Unforgivable at his tutor. Damnation was nothing new. Sirius figured, in another life, damnation was something he could have lived with. Maybe even something he could have accepted. But then… Then, he’d met the boy with the beautiful amber-gold eyes, who had perhaps just as many secrets as he did scars lining his face. The thing was, Sirius didn’t set out to spite his mother or to become a soldier in the war that was brewing in the drawing room of his childhood home. This wasn’t a plan he’d concocted late at night or some dispassionate attempt at adolescent rebellion. He was, for all intents and purposes, supposed to be in Slytherin. It was, as they say, quite literally ordained by the stars. The thing was, Sirius Black would never have been brave enough to ask the hat for Gryffindor if it hadn’t been for Remus Lupin. The boy he would never be allowed to touch.Merlin. What, then, did he, Sirius Black, know of the cruelty of fate?“Everything,” Sirius heard himself say, his teeth grinding and hissing over every syllable. Next to him, Regulus let out something like a strangled sob.Riddle’s grin was inhuman. Something entirely, horrifyingly other. “I thought so.” Then, suddenly, Riddle was right next to him, hovering, leering over Sirius like the fucking shadow of death. His breath tasted like rotting flowers over a fresh grave. Whispering, so only Sirius could hear, Riddle said, “I’ve seen your name, Sirius Black, stitched into the tapestries of tomorrow, whispered at the edges of prophecy and dreams. You, Lionheart, carry a touch of destiny.”This, too, Sirius knew. He was no longer foolish enough to discount the inedibility of his fate. Riddle pulled back, rather suddenly, and threw a devious grin somewhere in the direction of Uncle Alphard. “The papers were kind to you, all things considered,” Riddle went on. “They proclaimed sensationalised ideologies, that you, Sirius, were a victim of the hand of destiny. That the hat stalled because you argued yourself blue in the face, pleading for Slytherin, for the honour and privilege granted to everyone else bearing your name. But that’s not the truth, is it?”No. It wasn’t. That story was more than likely the result of a well-placed bribe to The Daily Prophet.The truth was, a boy with constellations of freckles and leyline scars treated him with kindness when he was deserved nothing more than damnation. The truth was that for the first time in his fucking life, Sirius Black had dared to dream of a different future than that ordained by his mother, his blood, that godforsaken mark upon his chest. Riddle spun on his heel, arms outstretched in what might have otherwise been supplication, but instead exuded something far more frightening. Something dangerously like victory. “You, Sirius Black, chose Gryffindor.”The truth was, Sirius Black had loved Remus Lupin from the very start. He’d have done anything for one moment more, lost in the eternity of Remus’s eyes. He’d be damned, now, if he’d surrender any part of Remus up to a man like Riddle. Sirius Black raised his chin, in defiance of the gods and the inhumanity of Tom Marvolo Riddle, in a way he prayed would make his king and fellow Marauders proud. “Yes.”Just one word, echoing, reverberating from the very depths of his soul.Just one word, and it marked him for death. “Blood traitor,” came his mother’s snarled hiss. His father slammed a fist against the mantle. “Easy, Walburga,” Riddle said, with a placating wave of his hand. His death-curse green eyes flashed with a brutality known only those familiar with the end of all things. “A traitor who spits in the face of privilege and opportunity deserves a chance do explain, don’t you think? So, explain yourself, Gryffindor.”It was a trap. The frantic shake of his uncle’s head was enough to confirm that. But Sirius Black was Gryffindor, goddamnit. He raised his chin in defiance of the cruelty of the world around him. “My choices are my own. I don’t regret them, especially if my choice sets me apart from people like you.”He may as well have spit in Riddle’s face.Regulus let out a choked sob. Riddle, though, appeared more annoyed than anything. He let out a derisive huff, not unlike that of a pouting child. “Have you yet grown weary of Gryffindor’s disillusioned claims of moral superiority? Of this false dichotomy of good and evil they’ve invented to spin their narrative? Honestly, what good is morality to those of us born to be gods?”“From the looks of things, Riddle,” Alphard said, with a casual cruelty befitting to the Blacks, “you were born to be nothing. An orphan, wasn’t it? Born to a Muggle father?”Riddle’s eyes flashed, and Merlin, the savagery of the magic that flared to life around him. “I am the heir of Salazar Slytherin,” Riddle raged. “I am the last of Slytherin’s blood. His fate, his purpose, is my own.”“A half-blood who dares to preach blood purity?” Alphard scoffed. “Hypocrisy, at its finest.”“Not hypocrisy, Mr. Black. I speak of true dichotomy,” Riddle corrected with a sneer. “It is in the contradiction of my blood that my destiny is made manifest.”“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Alphard asked, indignant.Riddle turned his focus from Alphard to address the rest of the room.“The Old Man preaches equality, of fantastical notions that those who come from nothing have a right to claim what belongs to us.” Riddle spoke as though he were addressing thousands, caressing their egos and biases with insidious words meant to sew the seeds of malcontent. “Equality.” Riddle spat the word, as though it were the darkest of curses. “What brazen hypocrisy, when there has only ever been one man daring enough to match the might and power of the old tyrant in his mighty fortress. And what did the Old Man do to the one man who was his true equal in strength, in tenacity, and lust for power?” Riddle’s face contorted into something far beyond rage and fury. Something dangerous, that craved vengeance and retribution. “Albus Dumbledore defeated his equal in a duel, stripped him of his wand, utterly humiliated him, and saw him vilified in our histories.”Alphard met Riddle’s fury with a sneer. “Gellart Grindelwald was a mass murderer.”Truly blasphemous words, within these halls, where Sirius knew there to be ghosts of ancestors who’d fought and died for Grindelwald’s cause. “Gellart Grindelwald,” Riddle echoed, in a strategically measured voice, “was a visionary. A prophet, a herald, issuing edicts on the true crisis of this age.”“Please.” Alphard laced his words with a heavy dose of sarcasm. “Do enlighten us.”Tom Riddle was all too eager to comply. “Our magic is dying, our blood diluted with paltry filth. What was once noble and ancient is now in the hands of peasants and swine. All in the guise of egalitarianism.” Riddle sneered. “Men like us were not bred to be equated with such barbarians and thieves.”Alphard’s eyes narrowed. “What exactly are you proposing, Riddle?”“Freedom from the bonds of banality and ineptitude.”“Freedom,” echoed Alphard, “under the guise of servitude to you.”Riddle’s smile was unwavering. Treacherous. “Every army needs a general.”“It’s true, then,” Alphard said. “You mean to declare war.”“War was declared eons ago, Mr. Black. When the first savage clawed its way out of the mud and the filth of this earth to stake its claim upon that which was divinely ordained to belong to us. These Mudbloods deserve the vengeance they’ve wrought.” Riddle spread his arms wide, his voice a thundering cacophony in the silence that followed. “For the sake of the ancient magic that flows in my veins, I will not stand for this treason. War, Mr. Black, is my birthright.”There, in the silence that followed, was the echo of drums from a thousand different heartbeats, marching in formation to fight in an ancient war that would crown no victor—no survivor—from the killing fields. Freedom, equality… It made no fucking difference. They were cannon fodder, marked from birth and left on the battlefield, amidst the mud and carrion birds. All in the name of an ancient, pointless grudge. Left to die in the stead of pretender kings and false gods. “And what of the innocents that will inevitably fall before your war machine?” Alphard asked. Not for the first time, Sirius wondered if, perhaps, his uncle, too, should have been placed in Gryffindor. “There will be those with blood more pure than yours that will stand against you, Riddle, simply out of loyalty to Albus Dumbledore. Are you willing to allow their blood to spill in the same mud that spawned the supposed rot in our bloodlines?”Slowly, Riddle turned his gaze to Sirius. “They’ve chosen their fates. It’d be a kindness to cleanse the world of their foolishness.”Sirius felt numb, broken and defeated on every imaginable front. There was no escaping this, no delaying it. No chance of ransoms or parlay. Might as well dive straight into the melee. “Why are you here?” he asked again, silently cursing the shadows of ruptured pride that leeched into his words. “Is that not obvious?” Sirius refused to answer. Riddle seemed to enjoy the sound of his own voice. He hardly left time for speculation before he conjured an answer to his own question. “I am in need of lieutenants. Those who’ve sworn loyalty to me to act as my emissaries on a brand new front. One that the Old Man has monopolised for far too long.” Riddle’s smile was cruel. “Hogwarts.”Alphard’s rage was immediate and violent. “You mean to send children into your war?!“But Sirius didn’t care. He was familiar with war. It’d been at the forefront of his mind, gnawing at the seams of his nightmares, for so many moons now.“Merlin,” he hissed. Perhaps it was stupid—reckless, even—but Sirius could not be fucking bothered to hold back the broken laugh that bubbled in his throat. “If you think I’m swearing anything to a man like you—““Darling.” His mother’s false endearment rang a like a death knell over a sea of corpses. Her smile was wicked. Bloodthirsty. “He’s not here for you.”Sirius’s heart came to a sudden, thundering halt. He turned, slowly, deliberately, to meet his own silver eyes set in his mother’s cruel, unforgiving face. Her smile was all kinds of unnatural, born from something savage and inhuman rather than from the regality of ancient bloodlines. Sirius knew that look in her eyes.It was the same one a lion wore after tearing out the jugular of its prey. He remembered his mother’s vow from so, so long ago, half-forgotten in a haze of agony and regret. Obey, or Regulus takes your place. He had endured, survived, but Merlin, he had never obeyed.Beside him, Regulus drew in a shaky breath. His brother was so pale he no longer resembled anything that could even remotely be considered alive. Regulus was a ghost of his future self, a corpse conjured back to life. An Inferni, clawing its way back to the land of the living from the darkest corners of the underworld. “Take no offence,” Riddle said, as though the universe hadn’t just collapsed in on itself. “Your blood, little Lionheart, remains pure despite some of your more… brazen choices. But my aim necessitates someone whose conscience is not marred by such trifling sentiments that so often gnaw on the hearts of people like you. Your brother, however—“Sirius reacted before any conscious thought had time to flit across his mind. Barbarity and instinct and magic danced on the tips of his fingers, on the catastrophic noise that tore free from his throat. There was no need forwords in any human language, no muttered spell or measured curse. Just desperation and intention that spoke the same ancient tongue as the magic in his veins. He reached out—His wand was in his hand, pointed at Riddle’s throat, before anyone in the room had the chance to fucking blink. Sirius Black revelled in the wild, raging, untamed magic that sparked in his eyes, roared through his entire being, stitching together the tears in his shattered soul. “You don’t get to touch him,” Sirius snarled. “You don’t get to say his fucking name!”To his absolute fucking horror, Tom Riddle laughed.“Ah, yes,” Riddle cooed. “There it is. The infamous rage of a Gryffindor. The truth in the corrupted heart. It is a privilege to be the object of such a beast.” A wild, reckless, unnamed curse burst forth from Sirius’s wand, almost unbidden, aimed directly at Tom Riddle’s chest.Riddle moved fast, a flash of lightning over a battlefield. His hand reached up, knocked Sirius’s curse out of the air as though it were a harmless insect rather than a deadly spell. Riddle didn’t even draw his wand. He just—He Apparated. He was gone, vanished, but before Sirius could breathe free—An death-cold hand wrapped around his throat, and all he knew was agony.Riddle stood behind him, locking him in place. Vaguely, Sirius registered his uncle’s shouts, met with orders and drawn wands from both his parents. He watched Regulus dart in front of him, tear his wand from his hand, presumably in the hopes that Tom Riddle would release him if Sirius was no longer armed. But Sirius could feel Riddle’s laughter in the hollow of his neck, creeping up his spine, settling in some dark crevice of his soul. “Careful, Lionheart,” Riddle purred. He was no longer trying to strangle, to suffocate. Instead, Riddle grabbed Sirius’s chin and tilted it towards his brother. “Your rage betrays your weakness.”Then, Regulus—brave, foolish, damnable Regulus—pointed Sirius’s wand at Tom Riddle’s throat. Sirius watched in abject awe and horror as familiar magic sparked to life in the corners of his brother’s oblivion-black eyes. “Let him go.”Again, Riddle just laughed. He leaned forward a little, close enough to whisper in Sirius’s ear. “Are you aware of your brother’s sins, Sirius Black?” Riddle hissed. “They are truly glorious.”Then, with a shove, Riddle released him. Sirius fell to his knees at his brother’s feet. When he looked up, Regulus held out his wand, but…There was something different in his eyes. Something uniquely haunted. Sirius hauled himself to his feet. Planted himself firmly between Tom Riddle and his brother.“There’s a ransom on your head, you know,” Riddle said, examining his fingernails as though he had nothing fucking better to be doing. “I’ve heard it whispered in the cracks between this world and the Veil. You’ve been marked for death, Sirius Black.”This, he knew. He’d known for a long time. But he was Gryffindor. He would look death in the eye and fucking revel in it, just like his brazen king. “That doesn’t change a goddamned thing,” Sirius said. “Death will be a mercy when the time comes. Do you understand?” Riddle vowed. “Because when death comes for you, Sirius Black, I will ensure you feel its agony for every second of whatever damnable eternity Fate conjures for you.”Merlin. He knew a thing or two about agony.Agony was the tip of his mother’s wand. Agony was the secret, stolen kiss from a half-remembered future—from a fucking nightmare—that only served to remind him what he could never have in the waking world. Agony, was loving and knowing he’d never be loved in return. Agony was fucking relative. “I look forward to it,” Sirius said, with all that remained of his Gryffindor courage. Then, Sirius turned. Carefully, he took his wand back from Regulus’s still outstretched hand. Searching his brother’s vacant eyes, Sirius took Regulus’s hand. Without another word to anyone in the room, Sirius tugged Regulus towards the door. He pulled it open—“One last secret, Lionheart,” Riddle crooned, from somewhere behind him. “Your brother? He’s already mine.”Cursing the stars and his own cowardice, Sirius grit his teeth and all but fled with his brother in tow. ✦ - ☽ - ✧ - ☾ - ✦ Sirius dragged his brother through dark halls lined with house elf skulls and the taunting echoes of long-forgotten ancestors. His vision blurred, his jaw clenched tight against the panic threatening to break free from the hallow space in his chest. He refused to stop, to slow down.He needed to get Regulus out of here. Somewhere safe.“Sirius,” his brother hissed, tugging slightly on Sirius’s death-grip on his arm. “Siri, slow down!” They were running, now, from every nightmare that nipped at their heels. Sirius choked on the poisoned air in his lungs. Heart thundering, he stopped, leaned against a stoop, just for a second. Just to catch his breath.“Sirius, there’s something I need to—“Not now. There wasn’t time. Sirius shook his head, furiously. He needed to think. He needed a plan. He needed—There was only one room in this godforsaken house that could even remotely be considered safe.Regulus pulled up short when they rounded the corner. He dug his heels into the floor, batted at Sirius’s hand still clamped on his wrist at the sight of the giant doors, but Sirius didn’t care.Reverently, Sirius ran a delicate finger over the raven perched on a willow branch carved into the ancient mahogany. The raven leaned into his touch, then bowed its head. The locks clicked open for him, despite the intricate spells he knew his mother had placed upon the doors to keep him out. This room answered to no one—least of all to the matriarch of House Black. It catered only to its own secrets and intentions, and only welcomed those who were deemed worthy enough to keep them.This place had been his sanctuary, his haven of solace, in all the years he’d been trapped inside the walls of this house. It was holy ground.He’d always be welcomed in the library of Grimmauld Place.“Sirius, please!” his brother begged, finally yanking his arm free. Sirius turned, only to be met with his brother’s tear-stained face. Regulus sobbed, wiped his nose, and started to back away, casting glances behind them.Was Riddle following them, desperate to claim his prize?No. Sirius pulled the doors open and shoved his brother inside. The second the locks clicked behind them, Sirius drew his wand and cast every variation of locking spells he could possibly think of. Then, just for good measure, he scrunched his eyes shut, concentrated, and painstakingly levitated a large, marble statue of a wyvern in front of the door. The statue was… heavy, to say the least, and the second it landed, Sirius nearly collapsed against it. Hands on his knees, Sirius drew in razor-edged breaths. He closed his eyes against the tears suddenly blurring his vision.He had to get Regulus out of here. Fuck, he needed a plan. Alphard couldn’t help, but maybe—He felt a slight itch in the palm of his left hand. He looked down.
Are you all right?
Sirius absolutely refused to consider the irony of Remus’s timing: whether Remus had some unnatural sense that Sirius’s world had ended, or if Remus possibly knew that Sirius had been seconds from begging Remus to find him in the aftermath.He was the furthest thing from all right. He was fucking desperate. At the sound of a strangled sob, Sirius glanced up. Regulus had all but moulded himself into the ornate wallpaper. His face was deathly pale, stained with tears, and an agony Sirius knew all too well. His eyes squeezed shut, accentuating the exhaustion, the lifeblood, that seemed to slowly seep from his bones, forming dark bruises under his eyes. Sirius set his jaw. “We’re leaving. You and me. Right fucking now.”“I can’t.” Just that. Just two, broken words. No other explanation. It didn’t matter anyway. There was a mantle somewhere in the centre of this room. It wasn’t connected to the Floo Network, but this room held every secret known in the Wizarding World and Sirius Black was top of his fucking class. He’d figure out how to hot-wire a connection. Remus could get word to the Potters and they’d hide both him and Regulus long enough for them to figure something else out. Sirius reached into the pocket of his robe for the ballpoint pen. On his hand, he wrote, Riddle is here.In hindsight, he probably shouldn’t have led with that.Remus’s panic was a immediate, violent, and almost entirely illegible. The words itched and burned a little as they laced down Sirius’s wrist. He didn’t read most of them.He didn’t have fucking time for this.
Frustrated, he scratched out,
Calm down. I’m okay, for now. I have a plan. Give me a second.
Well, it wasn’t so much as a plan as a shot in the dark, but it was all he had.First, the floo.He ignored the itch of Remus’s reply. Instead, he grabbed Regulus’s hand once more and dragged him towards the hearth, the centre of the library. “Sirius, wait!”Sirius couldn’t afford to wait. Tom Riddle would come for Regulus. It was only a matter of time.So, he ran. The library at Grimmauld Place was renowned the world over. It was quite possibly the single greatest trove of magical knowledge this side of the Veil. It’d been meticulously curated for countless generations, tucked away in the sanctuary of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black. Shelves stuffed full of ancient and forbidden magical tomes lined every wall, from floor to thirty-foot ceilings. Stacks of scrolls and loose volumes littered the floored in a semblance of organised chaos.This place, this sanctuary, was truly a labyrinth of equal proportion and grandeur as the one Daedalus built for King Midas. Its corridors shifted and changed, cast illusions to divert the average visitor from the library’s more sensitive secrets. But Sirius was no Theseus; he had no need for Ariadne’s golden thread. This labyrinth knew him, spoke the same tongue as the magic in his veins. These hallowed shelves and ancient tomes had shielded him from more nightmares than he’d ever cared to remember. The shelves creaked and parted like the spine of a book, obeying his every fragmented thought, urging him forward, further up, further in, leading him to the hearth, to the centre—Sirius pulled up short. Behind him, Regulus gently slid free of his grasp. Instead of Minotaur awaiting him at the centre of the labyrinth, promising death and eternal torment, Sirius came face to face with the aftermath of a massacre. Death, already wrought, with no monster in sight. The once-beautiful Egyptian rug—upon which he’d spent so many nights snuggling close to his brother in front of the mantle, allowing the fire and company to ease the ache of loneliness, of heartbreak, in their bones—was marred with dried blood. The putrid copper tones seeped into the once vibrant greens and silver, smeared across the whites of the lilies around the border of the rug. Books, torn from shelves, pages torn from books and shredded by unseen claws were strewn across the floor. And, on the long, stone table in the centre of the room—
Merlin.
The corpse was pale, ghost-white, unseeing eyes staring up at the silver chandelier. One hand hung limp over the table’s edge, as though reaching for a salvation that would never come. Flesh was torn, brutally rent asunder from the bones of what had once been a ribcage. A copper-tinged pair of pants barely preserved any sort of modesty, but there was no dignity in a death like this. Whether it was a spell or some savage monster that’d done this, Sirius didn’t dare speculate.The stench of rot lingered in the air, heavy like incense over what had once been hallowed ground. Sirius wretched, bile burning, searing its way free of his throat. He vomited on the rug, amidst ruin and blood and the final glimmer of hope that had so stubbornly held fast to his heart. His eyes watered. He tasted damnation: the ashes left from blazing hellfire. Breaths coming in ragged, broken gasps, Sirius hauled himself to his feet, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Reg—“Except, his brother was no longer next to him.Sirius blinked, tried to focus. Hearing nothing but the raging thunder of his own heartbeat, Sirius looked up. Regulus stood next to the table, regarding the corpse like a perverse sacrifice upon an ancient, stone altar. He was no longer crying. No tears stained his cheeks, no sobs escaped his lips. He was as deathly still the dead man before him.Eyes as dark and lifeless as the abyss at the end of the universe looked up to meet Sirius’s gaze.“I’m sorry,” came the rasped, echoing death-knell of Regulus’s voice. Sirius stumbled back a step, his bones no longer strong enough to support him. Regulus had…No. No.Except, he could read the truth in his brother’s eyes.Sirius thought about praying. He really did. He thought that if, perhaps, he shouted loud enough, if he caused enough of a scene, offered the right form of supplication, some long-dormant god might finally deign to listen.But God was dead, and his corpse lay at the feet of his executioner.This was supposed to be Sirius’s fate, but here it was: a riot of blood and flesh splattered over once-holy ground. His fate, stolen and fulfilled before his very eyes. His sanctuary had become a mausoleum. “Regulus.” His voice no longer sounded human. “W-What have you done?” Regulus met his gaze, even and calm, as though Sirius’s entire universe hadn’t just collapsed in on itself. He blinked once, twice, but gave no indication he intended to speak. Sirius swallowed whatever bile remained lodged in his throat. He shook his head, furiously, resolutely. He began to pace, tearing his hair loose from its tie, because—“No. This… This isn’t real. This can’t be. It’s a dream. Merlin’s tits, it has to be. It’s just another fucking—““Nightmare?” Regulus supplied in a voice that was far too neutral for the devastation he’d wrought. Regulus heaved a sigh. “Nightmares never lie, Sirius. They just show us what we’re most afraid to lose.”Sirius felt the evisceration of his brother’s words. Agony was fucking relative, but this was not something Sirius Black could endure. Still, he croaked, fucking demanded, “What happened?”Regulus swallowed. His eyes tracked over the corpse as though it were just another oddity amongst the ancient shelves. He nodded once. Then, he confessed: “Tom Riddle has been here for three days.”Three days. Three days was more then enough time to poison a beating heart. Fuck, Sirius couldn’t breathe. “He arrived with Falco and Rodolphus Lestrange. And…” Regulus trailed off as his gaze once more drifted over the corpse. “His name was Ephraim Shaw. He… he told me that before he died. I think he wanted someone to remember. It’s right that it’s me who carries the burden of his name. I’m—““His executioner,” Sirius snarled. “Yes.” Regulus did not balk at the accusation. A small, pale hand reached over the corpse, as if to touch, to heal, to fucking reincarnate, but Regulus pulled back. Cold, black eyes met Sirius’s. “He was a werewolf, you know.”“A… werewolf?”Regulus nodded. “The Lestranges hunt them. They usually keep their hunts in France and spread out over Eastern Europe, where their kills won’t be noticed, but lately…”Lately, Tom Riddle has been spotted in Knockturn Alley, recruiting and negotiating with Dark Creatures. I want an army, Riddle had said to Lorna Kane. Fuck. “Ephraim has—had—a small pack in Scotland, near Aberdeen,” Regulus continued. “It was just his second, and… and Ephraim’s two daughters. They’re twins. They’re my age.”Sirius’s jaw dropped open in abject horror. His brother had not only murdered this man, but he’d robbed those girls of their father, and—“His pack was small, but Ephraim carried significant influence in the werewolf community. He’d been a Muggle, before he and his daughters were turned. It was his wife who…” Regulus trailed off. “Fenrir Greyback bit her. She went feral. He… stopped her, but not before she turned all of them. She… didn’t make it.”Once more, Regulus hovered a hand over the body of Ephraim Shaw, as though by doing so, he could conjure the man’s story back into the world of the living. “Ephraim was an Alpha, and a strong one at that,” Regulus said. “By the first moon after he’d been turned, he’d gone to great lengths to ensure that he and his daughters were well away from humans. He found them a place in the forest, and tried to ease the agony of that first transformation. After, he cared for them, loved them, and taught them to be better than the likes of Greyback. To do no harm, no matter what.” Regulus sighed. “A most noble endeavour.”Said the executioner standing over a fucking corpse. “Soon, other victims of Fenrir Greyback began seeking out Ephraim for help. He knew how to survive, how to ease their pain and mend their scars. They wanted to join his pack,” Regulus said. “He never allowed it. Pack, was just for family. He’d teach the other wolves what he knew, stay with them for a moon or two, then send them all on their way with the knowledge of how to endure. No one stayed, except for one.“His second was—is—called Elio Vega,” Regulus said. “I… I think Elio is Ephraim’s mate. The way Ephraim talked about him was… He loved him. More than I’ve ever known anyone to love another person.”Merlin, Sirius’s lungs could no longer draw air. His heart no longer remembered the rhythm of its own beat. Regulus squeezed his eyes shut, his face contorting into something akin to… shame.Finally. “If the stories are true,” Regulus breathed, “when a werewolf loses its bonded mate, the surviving mate feels every second of their lover’s death. Every agony, until the very last breath is drawn. Then, because fate is cruel, they are left to survive. Endure, knowing they’ll never again glimpse the other half of their soul.”Sirius watched a single tear slid down Regulus’s pale cheek. The tear landed on Ephraim’s outstretched hand. “Ephraim knew all this,” Regulus croaked. “He knew Elio would live. He knew what his death would do to his mate.”Fury and agony, like Sirius had never known, ignited in the pit of his stomach. Just a spark, but it roared to life in the depths of his soul: a monster, an uncontrollable beast, yearning for blood. “You did this!” Sirius yelled, starting to pace once more. “You did this, Reg! To Elio. To his daughters!”Once again, Regulus answered with a gratingly neutral: “Yes.” Then, horrifyingly, “But they lived.”And, for a moment, curiosity overwhelmed the oncoming storm brewing in his soul. “They… How do you know all this, Reg?”“I told you,” Regulus said, simply. “They’ve been here for three days. Lestrange and Riddle captured Ephraim during the full moon last Sunday, right before dawn. He fought just long enough for his mate and daughters to escape.” Regulus cast his vacant eyes over the room. A corrupted sanctuary at the heart of the labyrinth. “Riddle wanted Ephraim to recruit dissenters for his war. He’s already signed a treaty with Greyback’s pack, but there are many—especially those brutalised or turned by Greyback—who refuse to comply. Ephraim had influence. Power. But, when he refused, Riddle allowed the Lestranges to torture him. And… Salazar’s fucking tits, Sirius.”Then, Regulus just fucking broke. He began to sob uncontrollably. He cried in a way Sirius had never seen anyone cry. It was ugly and manic and so far beyond the depths of anguish and misery. “I stayed with him, Sirius,” Regulus screamed. The rage that had almost destroyed Sirius a moment ago now consumed his brother. “For three fucking days, I watched as Riddle asked his fucking questions. I watched as Rodolphus would eviscerate him, only for his fucking father to heal the wounds, just so they could do it again. I fucking stayed. I never fucking left. I haven’t slept. I fed Ephraim the meals Kreacher would bring me. And when Riddle and the Lestranges would leave to go get drunk with Father, I fucking stayed. I mopped his blood from the floor. And… I talked to him.”Sirius didn’t know how his heart could possibly break any more. “That was Riddle’s plan. Or, at least I think it was,” Regulus said. “Riddle wanted me to report what Ephraim told me. But, I haven’t and I won’t. Not on the pain of death. Riddle wanted Ephraim to trust me, and it worked, because I offered solace instead of pain. Ephraim told me about how he protected his pack, how he allowed Lestrange to capture him to give them time to escape. He told me I reminded me of his daughters. He said…” Regulus choked on another sob. “He said I was strong enough to endure. But… but, he wasn’t.”“What?”“He was going to break,” Regulus snapped. “Riddle wasn’t going to kill him. Not when Ephraim knew so much about those who stood against him and Greyback. With what they were doing to him, no mortal on this earth would have blamed Ephraim for breaking. For seeking relief. He was an Alpha. He had protected his pack. But he wasn’t strong enough to endure.”Sirius felt his voice catch on his words. “So you fucking killed him?”Regulus’s glare was lethal. “No, Sirius. I fucking saved them.”Sirius reeled back.“Ephraim was Muggle when he was turned, but that was years ago,” Regulus said. “He had plenty of time to learn about our world. Our magic. But even if he hadn’t, even if he’d never be granted a fucking wand, Merlin, Sirius, there are some kinds of magic that are so primal, so fundamental to the laws of nature that even Muggles hear whispers of them.”“What are you—““Sacrifice. Love,” Regulus answered. “Soul magic. There are few things on this earth more powerful.”“Salazar’s tits, Reg, please tell me you didn’t—““Specifically,” Regulus continued, “the kind of soul magic that requires a willing sacrifice.”Sirius didn’t recognise the sound that escaped his throat. “It was his choice,” Regulus said. “He knew he wasn’t going to last much longer. He was more than willing to sacrifice his own life, if it meant the eternal protection of his mate and daughters. So… Ephraim asked me to offer the sacrifice.”Sirius couldn’t move, couldn’t fucking breathe. “There’s only one spell that shatters a soul enough to offer that kind of protection, Reg.”Regulus nodded. “Yes. There is.”“You used—““Avada Kedavra, Sirius.”“You… You don’t have a wand.”“I know.”“That’s not… That’s not possible.”Sirius Black stared at the stranger who used to be his brother, at the atrocities and unforgivable sins spanning the distance between them. He wanted to cry, to vomit, to beg Regulus for the same relief he’d offered Ephraim Shaw. This couldn’t be real.But Regulus twirled his hand. Sirius watched dark green—nearly black—flames dance across his brother’s palm and up the length of his arm. His void-dark eyes sparked silver, and for the briefest of seconds, Sirius thought he’d glimpsed something ancient and powerful, lurking there in the inky darkness. Something like a falling star. Nightmares never lie, Regulus had said. In Sirius’s nightmares, the blackened abyss devoured stars.Regulus watched the dark flames dance across his skin with an air of curiosity. “Say what you want about his fucking war, but Riddle is right, Sirius, about the magic in our blood. In our veins. Especially you and me.” Ancient secrets, forbidden words, death-marked flames licked across Regulus’s skin. “He’s right to lust for our power, crave our subjugation. Even the gods know to fear this magic in our veins. Merlin, we could reshape the world, Sirius.”Something ancient, something long forgotten stirred to life in the gnarled abscess of his soul.Deep in his bones, Sirius knew his brother was right. The world, the galaxy, the fucking universe would be theirs, if they were bold enough to claim it.Bile rose in his throat. He didn’t want it. Not now, not ever.He’d let the stars fall as they may, lost to their graveyard of darkness and Nothing.His voice felt like an open wound, raw and festering from endless nights spend screaming at phantoms trapped behind the Veil. “No one should wield that kind of magic, Reg.”“I know.” Regulus closed his fist, extinguishing the flames once and for all.The silence thundered between them, lost in the maelstrom of devastation and the putrid rot staining both their souls. “I can’t go with you, Sirius.”That, and not all the nightmares he’d endured, all the monsters he’d faced within the walls of this home, that was what shattered the soul of Sirius Black. He collapsed to his knees, sobbing into his hands. A puppet with his strings cut, left without form or conscience. Only the eternal agony of abandonment. His brother let him cry, let his heart break, and bore witness to it all. It was a mercy—a kindness perhaps—not at all dissimilar from the salvation Regulus had offered Ephraim Shaw. And just like the werewolf, Sirius felt his soul shatter.Finally, after his sobbing subsided and Sirius instead gasped for breaths, for oxygen to once more fill his lungs and give him life, he felt a hand on his shoulder. Gently, Regulus pushed him, until Sirius’s back was resting against an emptied shelf. Regulus helped Sirius draw his knees up to his chest, to breathe deeply and with intention, before Regulus finally settled on Sirius’s other side. Then, just like he’d done countless times before the end of the world, Regulus grabbed Sirius’s hand and laid his head on Sirius’s shoulder.“I am not yours to save, Sirius,” Regulus said. “You do not get to play the hero in this fucking house. This place is not your battlefield, Lionheart.”Sirius tightened his grip on his brother’s hand. “I can’t leave you, Reg.”“Yes, you can.”“Look what fucking happened! I can’t—““Sirius, you and I are destined to fight this war on different fronts,” Regulus said, his gaze drifting over the carnage all around them. “My fate is not yours, nor can I follow as you pull at the strings of your own destiny. I am not brave and you are not cruel. Whatever happens next, I know we are not meant to take the journey together.” “Reg, I—““Whatever happens,” Regulus continued, emphasising every syllable, “know that I will find you at the ending, on the very last page. That, Siri, we will do together.”Sirius’s face scrunched in confusion. “What will we do together?”“Don’t you remember? You and I were born to kill God.” Regulus nudged him. It was almost playful. “At the end of all things, you and I, Sirius, will be the executioners of Fate herself.”And, Merlin, what an ending it’d be.An ending that seemed so far away, now. And so many monsters lurked in the darkness between.“You can’t trust him, Reg, even if he offers you the fucking world. There’s something… wrong about Riddle. I feel it in my bones. You can’t—““Trust him?” Regulus laughed, and it almost sounded real. Then, his voice turned just a bit feral. “I swear on the marrow of my bones and the magic in my veins that I will fucking destroy Tom Marvolo Riddle and anyone who dares to call him Lord.”He pulled back to properly read the truth in his brother’s eyes. “You’re serious?”“Nope. That’d be you.” And Regulus fucking beamed.
Merlin, fuck.
“He’ll kill you if he thinks you’ve betrayed him.”Regulus shrugged. “He’ll kill you if you keep coming back to this fucking house. Stay gone next time.”“You should, too. Alphard can—““Different fronts of the war, Sirius. That’s the way this goes,” Regulus repeated “Besides. There will be more people like Ephraim before the end of all this. Someone has to make sure the valiant leave behind survivors.” His voice was thick, laced with regret. “People like Ephraim deserve to be remembered.”Sirius sobered, his gaze tracking to the table that served as Ephraim’s final tomb. Regulus fished something out of the pocket of his robe. It was a soft, brown leather pouch, tied off with a frayed chord.“Ephraim wore this around his neck when they brought him in. I assume he had it so he wouldn’t lose what’s inside when he shifted.” After a moment’s hesitation and a deep breath, Regulus offered the pouch to Sirius. Sirius traced the soft leather with his fingertips. “Ephraim nearly tore out Falco’s throat when he broke the chord. It was the closest I ever saw him get to escaping. Both Lestranges ended up in St. Mungo’s. It was pure chaos. I saw the pouch fall and… I don’t think anyone saw me take it.”Regulus shifted, then hauled himself to his feet. His eyes found Ephraim’s vacant stare. “I gave the pouch back to Ephraim… before.” Regulus nearly choked on the word. “He cried when I returned it. He told me that I would endure because I dared to show this last kindness. That even if I felt the same agony he’d faced, I’d survive, because my heart remained pure.” Regulus shook his head, fighting back tears. “I don’t fucking believe him. There is nothing pure in my heart.”A single sob escaped, but Regulus quickly choked it back down. The time for tears was over. “Ephraim held it close to his heart when I… when he died. It was precious to him.”Sirius turned the pouch over in his hands. Etched into the fastening on the front of the pouch were the initials E.S. and E.V. “I haven’t opened it. I have no idea what’s inside. It’s not my place to know,” Regulus said. “But you… Sirius, I have no right to ask you to pay the debt of my sins, but I have no other way to find salvation in any of this. Because of the Unforgivable, Elio and Ephram’s daughters are hidden from me in this life and the next.” Regulus drew in a breath. “They’d want this back. They deserve to have it.”Sirius didn’t hesitate. “I’ll find them. I’ll bring it to them.”It may prove impossible, but he’d pay any ransom to bring his brother peace. No matter his brother’s sins. That would never change. It wasn’t absolution—Sirius wasn’t sure he could even offer that—but Regulus accepted it with a slight nod. Then, Sirius watched his brother’s eyes track to something behind him.Suddenly terrified, fearing Riddle had wandered back into this desecrated sanctuary, Sirius spun, dragging himself to his feet—Alphard stood between two parted shelves, arms crossed across his chest. A scowl had etched itself deep in Alphard’s face. He glared at Regulus, as though he didn’t quite recognise his nephew, and was trying to calculate whether or not he posed a threat. “You both should leave before dinner. Falco Lestrange is expected to make his return tonight from St. Mungo’s,” Regulus said, his eyes never leaving Alphard’s.Their uncle nodded once. His features gave nothing else away.Sirius breathed against the sudden, instinctual wave of nausea that threatened to drown him at the thought of leaving his brother in this damned house once again. But…Regulus was right. They’d fight this war on different fronts. Regulus stepped close to him and threw his arms around Sirius’s neck. Sirius held his brother tight and allowed himself to imagine, just for a moment, that they’d accidentally stumble into a different world. One without wars and magic tattoos and death curses. “I love you, Sirius,” Regulus breathed into his neck, hiding the words and all their promises from Alphard. “I’ll find you at the end of this story.”Sirius choked a sob and echoed the vow. Then, his brother was gone.Still clutching Ephraim’s leather pouch close to him, Sirius turned fully to face his uncle. Alphard’s scowl had not softened.“How much did you hear?” Sirius asked.The deadly silence was answer enough. Fuck. Sirius ran anxious fingers through his hair. He itched to pace once more, but he forced his feet to remain planted. He tried to gauge Alphard’s reaction, tried to piece together the likelihood that Alphard planned to seek revenge for Ephraim’s death. Tried to determine if Alphard’s posture indicated if he’d already called the Aurors and if his brother was destined for Azkaban before he even went to Hogwarts. But, no. His uncle was Slytherin. Alphard was nothing if not loyal. Even if—Whenever Sirius closed his eyes, all he could see was Ephraim’s mangled corpse, his outstretched hand. His vacant, death-glazed eyes.“Fuck,” Sirius breathed. “How could he do this?”Sirius didn’t know if he was talking about the murder of Ephraim Shaw, the wandless Unforgivable, the impossible task of delivering peace to Ephraim’s broken pack, or… Or the fact that, after all of that, Regulus willingly walked back into the company of Tom Riddle. “That’s not the right fucking question, Sirius.” Alphard’s tone was clipped, bordering on cruel.Sirius stood up, just a little straighter. He raised his chin. “Then what is?”Alphard’s eyes seemed to darken. “How long, darling, can you withstand that kind of heartbreak?”Sirius jerked back. “He’s my brother.”“And I was hers!” his uncle roared.Alphard let that truth settle, echo across this unholy space, and sink its filthy claws into the gnarled, festering scar that had cleaved Sirius’s heart in two. Then, something like remorse broke across Alphard’s features. He heaved a soul-weary sigh.“I loved her, once, you know,” Alphard said. “Same as you love Regulus. So long ago now, but time can never negate or destroy the love I once held for her. I want to tell you she wasn’t always like this. I want to tell you there was a time when she smiled, and meant it. I want to tell you there was a time when I thought I could see a glimmer of kindness somewhere amidst the void in her chest where most people lock away their hearts. I wish I could tell you all that and more, but it’d be a lie.” Alphard scrubbed a hand over his face, scratching at the stubble on his chin. “I knew what Walburga was—what she’d always be—long before I went to Hogwarts. A creature like her is utterly incapable of something as primitively human as love. And my foolish heart chose to love her anyway.”Walburga Black did not deserve her brother’s love or loyalty.Nauseatingly, Sirius realised that might just be the point his uncle was trying to make.Instead of lingering on that thought, Sirius asked, “When did you stop? Loving her?”The look on Alphard’s face was a plea for understanding, for forgiveness, for an acknowledgement of some mortal sin born of the purest of intentions. It was a confession with no hope or solace of absolution.“Oh,” Sirius breathed. There were tears in Alphard’s eyes, words trying to form on his lips, but no sound escaping his throat. Instead, it came out as a gasp, a sob. An echo of Sirius’s own heartbreak. “Sometimes,” Alphard finally managed, “the most courageous thing you can do is get out, before you find yourself damned for someone else’s sins.”What did it matter, really, if he was damned for his own sins or his brother’s?He’d be met with hellfire either way.“There are so many things, so many people, on this earth, Sirius, that are worth facing the fires of damnation,” Alphard said. “The soul of a wayward child born to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black will never be one of them.”Sirius Black absolutely fucking refused to believe that.Alphard sighed, more than aware that his please fell on deaf ears. “Take a moment, Sirius. Merlin knows you are owed at least that. Grieve for the valiant dead and make your peace. I’ll meet you outside. You’re brother’s right. It’s best we not stay the night.” He turned, but paused as the shelves reoriented to form a path out. “And for fuck’s sake, Sirius, read the damned messages on your arm and put that Lupin boy out of his fucking misery. He’s clearly worried about you.”Startled, Sirius looked down. His left hand and some of his right were scattered with dozens of messages from Remus, ranging from It’s been more than a fucking second to What’s going on? and then more of increasingly large renditions of his name and various curse words in multiple languages. As his eyes skimmed over each message, they slowly began to fade back into his skin. Salazar’s tits, he hadn’t felt a single one arrive.“Tell him you’re safe, Sirius,” his uncle ordered. Alphard seemed to be holding back an urge to roll his eyes. “He’s probably called in fucking reinforcements by now. Merlin knows we can’t have a bunch of half-cocked Gryffindors storming our fucking gates. Far too many innocent lives have ended behind these walls as it is.”Alphard was gone by the time Sirius fished the ballpoint pen out of his pocket and read over Remus’s most recent message.
Speak in French. That’ll be our code.
In English, Sirius wrote,
How can our code be speaking in French when my entire family speaks French? That’s not much of a code, if everyone can read it.
Then, almost as an afterthought, Sirius scribbled down,
I’m fine, by the way. Not in any sort of mortal peril at the moment. Alphard and I are leaving soon.
He took aim at casual indifference and forced it into his words. It was the only logical choice. He didn’t dare tell Remus about the dead werewolf not five feet from him. He may have been relieved of his duties as his brother’s keeper and protector, but that didn’t mean Sirius was going to go about revealing Regulus’s secrets to anyone who asked.Even if that anyone was Remus Lupin. What was one more secret, anyways?
Remus’s reply tickled the palm of his hand.
One, that sounds exactly like something someone in mortal peril would say. Two, you didn’t use the code, therefore I cannot be truly certain you’re you. So, tell me something only the real Sirius Black would know.
Despite himself, despite his fucking surroundings, Sirius couldn’t quite hold back his smile. It was dangerous and living on borrowed time, but he revelled in the thrill of it all the same.
Last night, in your sleep, you rubbed your face all over your pillow whilst muttering the word, “Chocolate,” over and over and over. You then
licked
your fucking pillow.
Not a single word of that was true.
Did I really?
Remus asked.
Hm. Well. That’s rather humbling.
Just as Sirius was about to conjure more unflattering lies about Remus Lupin—mostly, of course, to distract from the cataclysm currently threatening to swallow the last shred of his sanity—his palm buzzed with another message.
But, really, Siri. Are you all right? I was worried.
Once more, Sirius could not quite chase away the smile that spread across his face. I’m… safe. Physically speaking. I promise.He felt the hesitation in Remus’s slow reply. And… not physically speaking?Ephraim’s vacant stare seemed to rip apart his soul.Not physically speaking, Sirius was fairly certain he’d never be all right again, for as long as he fucking lived.
So, naturally, he dodged the question.
It’ll be better once we get back to Scotland.
Which basically meant Sirius was going to search Constellation’s Keep, top to bottom, for his uncle’s stash of firewhisky. He’d never officially tasted the stuff, but today was as good of a day as any to start a life-long reliance on mind-altering substances.
What happened?
Remus asked.
And, Merlin, something in Sirius ached to tell Remus everything, then and there. To spill the secrets locked in this chamber and damn the fucking consequences, simply because the truth deserved to be spoken. The life lost here deserved to be remembered.But, he’d never do that to Regulus.
I’ll tell you later,
he lied.
Unfortunately for him, Remus called him on it.
Is that code for, ‘I need time to decide how much to tell Remus’?
Fuck.Yes, he wrote. He could almost hear the heaviness in Remus’s sigh. I’ll be here.The thing was, Sirius knew he should leave. Outside these once-sacred doors, the war raged on. Tom Riddle was amassing his forces, rallying to strike. Sirius did not have time to linger around the dead and damned. Perhaps, then, that was why he stayed. Why he finally mustered enough courage to walk up to the stone table and gaze into the infinite Nothing that swirled in Ephraim Shaw’s unseeing eyes. Alphard was right. Someone should mourn the valiant dead.“I’m sorry,” he whispered to whatever remained of the man before him.Secretly, he prayed Ephraim’s ghost wouldn’t be foolish enough to linger here. Ephraim did not need to hear Sirius’s empty, meaningless apologies. He deserved to run free, in whatever version of paradise awaited martyrs and saints.Sirius closed his eyes, reverently holding Ephraim’s pouch over his heart. Words meant nothing. He knew that much. Nothing would absolve the stain of death. If he still believed it’d make a goddamned difference, Sirius Black would have prayed—would have bargained for the life of Ephraim Shaw. For the redemption of his brother.He opened his fist, fingers tracing over the worn leather of Ephraim’s pouch, over Elio’s initials. Merlin. Elio, who’d had to endure the agony of his mate’s death.He should leave. He should run from this place and never return. Leave the dead to sort their own endings. But, standing in what could now only be described as a crypt, Sirius reached for the ballpoint pen.
Remus?
Once more, the reply was immediate. Yes?I need help finding someone, Sirius wrote. He’d promised his brother. He owed it to the dead man before him. To the family that’d been senselessly destroyed. Merlin, he didn’t even know the names of Ephraim’s daughters. Three someones, actually.
Okay,
Remus said.
I can help.
They’re Muggles. Or, mostly Muggles, I think. Muggles, most of the time?
Sirius bit his lip, unsure of how much to reveal. He also had no guarantee Ephraim’s family were living as Muggles. It’d certainly be the safest thing to do, given recent Wizengamot rulings. The Muggle world was probably the best place to start. Who better to help him navigate that brave new world than Remus Lupin, purveyor Muggle literature for lonely scions of Ancient Houses?
What does that mean?
Remus asked.
Well. In for a penny…
They’re werewolves.
Sirius. He felt each and every letter of his name, felt the caution and muddled emotion in Remus’s steady penmanship. Why the fuck are you hunting werewolves?Remus underlined fuck three times.Not hunting, Sirius wrote, mildly offended. The Lestranges hunted werewolves. The very thought nearly sent him into a chaotic spiral of nausea and dread. Trying to find.Sirius underlined find three times.
Why.
It was not a question. Remus did not punctuate it as such. Sirius tasted the suspicion in the single word, but still he said, Can’t tell you that.
WHY.
Again,
Not telling.
Fine,
Remus said.
What are their names?
Once more, he lamented he hadn’t asked his brother for the name of Ephraim’s daughters. One of them is Elio Vega.
I don’t know an Elio Vega.
Sirius blinked, staring at Remus’s reply until the letters began to fade from his skin. Just to make sure he’d read that right. His eyebrows creased in confusion.
Um
, he wrote, after a long moment.
Didn’t expect you to? That’s why we’re finding him.
WHY are we finding him?
Merlin, this was going in circles.
I have something that’s his
? Sirius tried.
What?
A hand went into his pocket, where he’d placed it. I have a pouch.
What’s in the pouch?
Remus asked.
I haven’t looked.
Open the pouch, Siri. Exasperation, thy name is Remus Lupin.
That’s… rude.
If I don’t know why I’m looking for him, I should at least know what it is I’m returning to him. I need clues and context, Sirius.
Sirius rolled his eyes. Fine.He put the ballpoint pen in his mouth, having no other place for it, then, with a glance at the dead man not five feet from him, Sirius reached into his pocket and pulled out the pouch. It was sacrilege, to violate Ephraim’s privacy like this, but Sirius couldn’t deny he was a little curious. It was vile, to open what clearly did not belong to him, but if it offered any clues as to where Ephraim’s family might be, Sirius owed it to them to return that for which Ephraim was so clearly willing to die.Sirius pulled the drawstring synching the pouch closed. Two rings matching tumbled into his waiting palm. The band was steel, rather than silver. Not as polished or shiny by any means, but still elegant when etched with the knot designs. The stones were large, deep-set onyx: midnight black and entirely mesmerising. Not traditional wedding bands by any means, but they were beautiful. What was it? Remus asked. Fumbling for the pen, Sirius wrote. And some rings, and—The pouch still had weight to it. There was something else in it.
Okay, wha—
Shh. Give me a second. Merlin, he didn’t have enough hands for this.
No. Don’t do that to me again.
Hush. I need to try something.
Biting the pen once again, Sirius used both hands to pry open the small pouch. Squinting, he peered inside. There was nothing. Except, that was impossible, given the weight, which would mean—Sirius spotted the rune etched into the fine leather just inside the lip of the pouch. It was ancient Norse. He remembered it from Professor Idunn’s class. It was a rudimentary concealment charm. Ancient magic, accessible to Muggles. For the right price. Not bothering with his wand, Sirius waved a quick Revelio over the bag. Runes were only effective up to a certain point. With a shimmer, a long, leather chord appeared. A necklace…?Sirius pulled it out, expecting—
Merlin’s tits.
Attached to the end of a chord was a tooth. Sirius’s breath caught, his heart thundering to a rhythm he no longer recognised, because Merlin. The tooth was a long, curved canine. Deathly sharp, lethal in every imaginable way, and…And so full of magic Sirius could almost taste it.It was a magic that was almost familiar, but not quite. Almost like home and love and forever, but as though he’d accidentally stumbled into someone else’s forever instead of his own. It felt like a nightmare populated by people without faces, save for one. Instinctually, Sirius knew that this tooth belonged to Elio Vega: torn from the maw of his wolf and given to the one he so desperately loved as a sign of perpetual devotion. Behind his eyelids, perhaps aided by the magic in the tooth, Sirius could see the story of Ephraim and Elio: the ferocity and terror of their first encounter, the peaceful days after the full moons, their… love, the likes of which most mortals will never be privileged enough to know. This tooth contained multitudes, contained their story—But the only story Sirius saw was his own. He saw a boy with beautiful amber eyes across the platform at King’s Cross. He saw scars, with intricate, leyline patterns that spoke of an agony that even he, Sirius Black, could not know or understand. He saw that boy, covered in blood and wounds no magic could heal, bleeding on a bathroom floor, in the corridor outside the Great Hall.He saw those same eyes melt to a molten gold that only promised more pain.At last, he saw that mangled, valiant boy in Diagon Alley, amber eyes pleading with the wand-maker for something just shy of a miracle. And, held in an open palm, presented as an offering—a sacrifice—still covered in blood…A tooth. Merlin.His vision swirled, his breaths coming in rasping, desperate gasps. There was no fucking way. Was there?His eyes slammed shut, his brain racing and trying to concentrate—to remember—but it was everything, all at once. Golden eyes, bleeding scars, teeth, teeth, teeth—He had to be sure.Stumbling forward, Sirius raced towards the stacks of books, but the library was already shifting around him. He felt it: the aching, rumbling scratch of the labyrinth reshaping itself entirely on its own volition.Because this room, this library, this sanctuary understood Sirius Black like no other. It brought him what he needed before he’d had time to even conjure the thought. The shelf, containing the answers to life, the universe, and everything appeared right in front of him. Lunar charts. Fumbling blindly, Sirius skimmed the spines of the volumes until he came to the right year. He tore the book free, more or less flung it open, scanned the dates—5 September. Remus had left, just a few days after they’d arrived at Hogwarts. He’d told them his mother was sick. 2 November. The day before Sirius’s birthday. Remus had broken into McGonagall’s office and given him his copy of The Little Prince, because he wasn’t going to be there to celebrate with Sirius.31 December. When Sirius had woken up in the hospital wing, he’d borrowed Remus’s clothes. Remus’s clothes that’d already been there.And—Merlin’s tits. 30 January, 1972. Remus had missed Lily’s party. The next morning, Sirius had watched him collapse, tumble down the stairs, his wrists dripping with fresh blood.Sirius slammed the book closed. He didn’t need to read more.(Last Sunday had been the full moon, Regulus had said. Last Sunday, Remus had left.)Once was a coincidence. Twice was highly-fucking-unlikely. Three times was a pattern. Any more than that was proof.Sirius stumbled back into the crypt, to the stone alter with the sacrificed corpse. He looked down at Ephraim Shaw, and Merlin, how did he not notice that before? Ephraim’s face was littered with scars, most of the jagged and old: lingering remnants from moons long ago. Around his outstretched wrists, Sirius saw the same parallel scars he’d first seen in that second-floor bathroom, but this time… This time, he understood. The wolf had dug its teeth into the bones right above its own front paws, more than likely to numb the pain of the transformation.Without any semblance of conscious thought, Sirius reached out for Ephraim’s outstretched hand, because if he could touch, if he could be sure—Agony. Fire shot through his veins: a living, breathing creature carving its way through his very soul. He allowed the pain, allowed the anguish and terror to devour him whole, because—He pulled back, numb to the familiar pain.You, Remus had said to him, have never been the monster of this story..Remus had tried to tell him. The truth had been there, this whole goddamned time, but Sirius hadn’t bothered to recognise it. Sirius was the blind man, unaware that Frankenstein’s monster sat across from him, reading him poetry and whispering stories in the dark.Merlin, he still loved the monster all the same, even as the truth threatened to destroy him completely.Remus Lupin was a werewolf. Sirius couldn’t breathe.Once, so long ago now, he’d made Remus a promise, sitting cross-legged under a willow tree. Once, he’d stared into amber eyes and sworn to never ask the question he’d been searching for.Once, in a dream, in a nightmare, Remus had told him he’d break his promise.He had to know. Nothing in the fucking world was more important.He hastily shoved the tooth necklace back into the leather pouch, tucked carefully once more with the rings. He pocked it, fumbled for the pen.
He wrote,
I need to ask you a question and I need you to tell me the truth.
Okay. Such a simple answer for such a monumental betrayal.He wrote, Promise me you’ll tell me the truth. Even if you’re scared.Promise. Ask your question, Sirius.
He wrote,
The core of my wand is the fang of a werewolf.
That’s not a question.
He wrote,
Where’d you get the teeth, Remus?
Remus?
Remus?
Remus?