Dwelling on Dreams (A Marauders Fan Fic)

The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black (Present Part Five)

A/N: This is the second upload today (I know, I'm amazing, please all bow down to me and tell me how much you love me, preferably while voting at the same time :P ) so if you haven't read the previous chapter, I would advise that you do so :P

The Black family tree sprawled across the wall, the tapestry faded and fraying in places, only the golden thread which linked the descendants of ‘The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black’ still shimmering in the dim light of the gas lamps. Sirius stood in front of it, Harry beside him as he contemplated his family history.

“You’re not on here!” exclaimed Harry as Sirius gazed at it. “I used to be there,” he replied, pointing to where his name had been replaced by a small burn. “My sweet old mother blasted me off after I ran away from home – Kreacher’s quite fond of muttering the story under his breath.”

“You ran away from home?” Harry asked, his voice sounding slightly incredulous despite all he had suffered at the hands of the Dursleys, and surprising Sirius; it had never occurred to him that anyone could stay in Grimmauld Place and not want to get as far away as possible. “When I was about sixteen. I’d had enough.”

“Where did you go?”

“Your dad’s place,” Sirius answered, telling Harry about how his grandparents had taken him in  and why he had left. His explanation of the tapestry was interrupted by Mrs Weasley’s arrival with lunch but Harry stayed beside him. “I haven’t looked at this for years,” Sirius muttered, pointing to various members and telling Harry all about their defining characteristics and the strange things they had tried to do. “Andromeda married a Muggle-born, Ted Tonks, so-” he said, as he described how he and Tonks were related, miming blowing a hole in the tapestry and laughing bitterly.

“You’re related to the Malfoys!”

“The pure blood families are all interrelated,” Sirius replied as Harry stared at another name. As he did so Sirius saw the name of one of his great aunts and frowned. It was astonishing how one name embroidered on an ancient tapestry could instantly change his mood.

Cassiopeia Black, 1915 – 1992. He vaguely remembered seeing her at family gatherings; a tall and forbidding woman with long black hair and the inherent Black beauty, as well as the typical pro-pureblood leanings and a fondness for her other great-nieces and nephews, especially Bellatrix, she was almost the opposite to his Cassiopeia. She had never married, claiming that her siblings’ children were enough for her but Sirius rather thought she had been too intimidating for any man; she was known for being notoriously cold to anyone outside of her family, and even some members of it. He knew, however, that she hadn’t been disowned and so found himself wondering why she was the only Cassiopeia on the Black family tree. ‘She wouldn’t be if it weren’t for me,’ he thought to himself bitterly.

Harry stood beside him still, completely unaware of the direction of Sirius’ thoughts; the thoughts which he suddenly tore Sirius from as he thought out loud. “Lestrange…” he muttered, staring at the names of the married couple beside Narcissa and Lucius.

“They’re in Azkaban,” Sirius replied shortly, a scowl crossing his face as he thought of his cousin and her husband. “Bellatrix and her husband Rodolphus came in with Barty Crouch Junior. Rodolphus’ brother Rabastan was with them too,” he continued, remembering the two brothers who were the epitome of Slytherin members. Rodolphus had left the year before Sirius arrived but Rabastan had been in the same year as Bellatrix, both of them seventh years during his first year at Hogwarts and members of the group of Slytherins who delighted in torturing innocent students, bullying them daily merely for not being a pure-blood; it was no surprise that all of them went on to become Death Eaters and Voldemort’s most fanatical supporters, at least in the case of the Lestranges and Bellatrix.