Melancholy || Harry Potter's twin brother

3: chapter twenty one

By some miracle, the group managed to get an unconscious Snape, a tied up Pettigrew and an injured Ron back through the tunnel and into the Hogwarts grounds.

"Do you know why your father named you after me?" Black asked Sirius as the two set Ron down onto the grass, his leg looked bad, not just bad, it also looked really gross. Sirius shook his head in answer to Black's question. "I bet your father that if he had twins he had to name one after me, it was a joke of course, we didn't expect your mother to have twins, but then you were born." Black laughed. "You're a lot like him you know."

"Thanks." Sirius smiled at Black, who as he had found out, was Harry's godfather. Harry was stood a little ways from the group, looking at the castle bathed in moonlight. "Go talk to him." Black nodded and left the group, going to talk to Harry, taking in his first glimpse of the castle in years.

"Are you three alright?" Lupin asked them, ron just nodded. "Hermione?" He asked the girl, who nodded. "Sirius?" Lupin turned to his godson, who nodded slowly.

"Little bit overwhelmed." He admitted with a shrug.

"Thank Merlin it's not just me." Ron mumbled with a small smile, but happiness was hard, they were finding it hard to smile when they were committing a man to a date worse then death.

"He does deserve it you know." Lupin told Sirius, who nodded.

"It still doesn't sit right with me, this isn't what he would have wanted." Sirius shook his head.

"I know,  but we need closure on this matter, we need justice." Lupin told him.

"Its been twelve years." Sirius replied quietly. "We have bigger things to worry about then the past."

"What makes you say that?" Hermione asked, with a frown.

"He's going to find a way to come back, we know he is, you-know-who will return, we need to worry about that. My parents death was a tragedy, I know that, but this will just tarnish their memory." Sirius said.

"I can't let him get away." Lupin was being strangely adamant about this.

"It shouldn't be your choice, its mine and Harry's parents he killed. I don't want him to die, he was scared, he made a mistake, maybe we can help him to be better, or don't you believe in second chances?" Sirius challenged.

"I can change, I can." Pettigrew simpered, crawling over to them.

"I'm not changing my mind on this Sirius, I'm the adult here, and for all I know he's used the confundus charm on you." Lupin shook his head, stepping away from the group, Sirius sighed irritatedly. He couldn't just watch them condemn the man, he at the very least deserved a fair trial. The only evidence that it was Pettigrew who sold his parents out, was the word of a mad man, who had just spent twelve years in Askaban.

Glancing over to Lupin, Sirius noticed the full moon appear from behind a cloud.

"Hermione, that's not very good, is it?" Sirius asked the girl nervously.

"No, Harry?" She yelled, getting the attention of Harry and Black, who rushed back to the group, Black running up to Lupin to try and get him to focus on his humanity, to stop the werewolf transforming.

It didn't make any difference. Lupin transformed and pushed Black out of the way, turning to the group, just as Snape awoke. "Potter!" He exclaimed angrily, before noticing the werewolf and immediately pushing the group behind him, shielding them from the werewolf. Pettigrew waved at the group and transformed back into Scabbers the rat, scampering off into the forbidden forest.

"Ew." Sirius mumbled as he watched the transformation of the rat in disgust, he knew if he tried to catch him the werewolf would lunge for him and he would either be bitten or killed, neither of which he particularly wanted to happen to him.

Suddenly, Black, as Rowan, ran at Lupin, distracting him from the group and leading him away, getting beaten up fairly badly in the process. 

"Sirius!" Harry ducked under Snape's arm as he tried to grab him and rushed after the dog and the werewolf.

"Harry!" Sirius yelled, stopped by Snape as the potions master managed to catch him.

"Potter, don't."

"Sorry professor, but someone has to stop him being stupid." Sirius ducked under his arm and ran after his brother, who was being cornered by the werewolf. "Harry!" He yelled again, lupin turned on his and with one swipe of a muscular paw had him crashing straight into the womping willow, which as though Sirius was a cricket ball, thwacked the boy into the ground.

It was safe to say the whomping willow was not good at cricket. A rather fake werewolf call came from the forest, gaining the werewolf's attention and saving Harry's life.

Clutching his head, Sirius by some miracle managed to get to his feet, watching Harry run after Black, who still in dog form, was limping off through the bracken.

"Potter that was incredibly foolish." Snape berated as he came over to Sirius.

"Had to do something." Sirius mumbled, not sure how to react to Snape actually being a nice person and grabbing his arm to help him get steady on his feet.

"Potter are you okay?" Was that concern in Snape's voice.

"Professor, why can I see two of you?" Sirius asked with a genuine frown before his vision faded to black and his body crumpled in front of the potions master.

^^^
"But you were there, you were just right there!" Sirius heard Ron asking in genuine confusion.

"Honestly Ron, how can a person be in two places at once?" Harry and Hermione laughed.

"What's going on?" Sirius mumbled, finally opening his eyes.

"We saved Black." Hermione told him.

"Oh good, he doesn't deserve to die." Sirius said wisely. "Does anyone have any food? I'm starving."

"Sirius it's midnight." Harry pointed out.

"I fail to see your point Harry." Sirius sighed, his head was aching and his wrist was bandaged up, he found out later that he's had a nasty break and it would take some tricky magic on Madame Pomfrey's part to fix it, and she wasn't prepared to do it in the middle of the night, that would just be ridiculous.

"Wow you two look awful!" Sirius finally set eyes properly on his brother and Hermione, who were still stood in the middle of the room.

"You should see yourself." Harry shot back with a smile.

"Really feeling the love here Harry!"