The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part Two

LXXIII: 23 June, 1994

"I just like to watch it burn."

Achlys was watching him, Sirius, burn.

She started to draw the third breath - and he felt as though his entire heart was being torn out of his throat. He was drawn up, a guttural wrenching of a sound rising up from his lungs as she dragged, hard and deep and his breath left him completely.

It was like he could feel himself go --

Could feel himself coming up out of his own body...

Blinding white light filled Sirius's eyes. He couldn't see anything beyond the light or through the light. All he knew was that the light had blasted away Achlys and her lips were gone, her hands were gone, the rattling sound of her breath -- all gone -- all replaced by blindingly brilliant white...

He gasped, sudden, sharp, deep, and he sat up.

The white light was gone, the lake dark save for the luminance of the moon hanging overhead. Sirius gasped for air, his lungs tight from having had the breath forcible sucked out of him. He looked around wildly, his heart racing... Somewhere there was the sound of something crashing through the trees.

He looked around.

Harry Potter lay face-down on the stones to his right, and Hermione Granger just beside Harry. They'd landed criss-crossed, his arm protectively draped over her on one side and over Sirius's own legs on the other, as though he'd been guarding... and fallen mid-fight.

Panic rose up in him and he scrambled, reaching for a pulse.

Harry's heart beat was strong in his jugular. So was Hermione's.

He sank back, still catching his own breath, and his eyes searched the skies. Where had they gone? Where had they all gone? The very moon itself had been blotted out for their numbers...

Suddenly, there was gasp behind him and he whirled about to find a short, petite girl with hot pink hair sliding down the slope from the grounds above, holding her wand tight in her fist, her auror's uniform fluttering about her as she came to a stop.

She stood at the edge of the shore line, where the grass met the pebbles, staring at him.

Her voice was soft. "Wotcher Sirius."

He stared in disbelief, squinting, the pain shooting through his body causing his eyes to cross... "Nymphadora?"

She nodded. "Are you - are you alright?"

"Bloody hell. You're a grown woman."

She looked down at herself, then back up at him, "Yeah I s'pose I am."

"You were - you were still small last I saw you."

"Yeah," she said, "'s been twelve years."

Sirius nodded.

"I - I've never doubted you, I know you didn't do it!" she gasped. Tonks's cheeks were pouring over with tears. "I never --"

"I know you didn't."

"You do?"

"I do..." and Sirius reached into his pocket, his hands shaking, skin pale. He was dizzy - barely able to focus on her, even as he reached for the only things he had to call his own...

When he splayed out his hand a second later, it was to reveal not only the oragami-heart folded letter, but several more letters on bright colored papers with bright colored inks and folded in all sorts of different shapes... There was a woven thread friendship bracelet, a folded fortune teller, a strip of photobooth pictures... All things that she'd sent him over the years by owl post.