There was a long silence after Sirius had finished. Harry was thinking of the way Crouch's eyes had bulged as he'd looked down at his disobedient house-elf back in the wood at the Quidditch World Cup. His son, then, must have been why Crouch had overreacted to Winky being found beneath the Dark Mark. It had brought back memories of his son, and the old scandal, and his fall from grace at the Ministry.
"Moody says Crouch is obsessed with catching Dark wizards," Harry told Sirius.
"Yeah, I've heard that it's become a bit of a mania with him,"said Sirius, nodding. "If you ask me, he still thinks he can bring back old popularity by catching one more Death Eater."
"And he sneaked up here to search Snape's office!" said Ron triumphantly, looking at Hermione.
"Yes, and that doesn't make sense at all," said Sirius.
"Yeah, it does!" said Ron, excitedly, but Sirius shook his head.
"Listen, if Crouch wants to investigate Snape, why hasn't he been coming to judge the tournament? It would be an ideal excuse to make regular visits to Hogwarts and keep an eye on him."
"So you think Snape could be up to something, then?" asked Harry, but Hermione broke in.
"Look, I don't care what you say, Dumbledore trusts Snape -"
"Oh give it a rest, Hermione," said Ron impatiently. "I know Dumbledore's brilliant and everything, but that doesn't mean a really clever Dark wizard couldn't fool him -"
"Why did Snape save Harry's life in the first year, then? Why didn't he just let him die?"
"I dunno - maybe he thought Dumbledore would kick him out -"
"What d'you think, Sirius?" Harry said loudly, and Ron and Hermione stopped bickering to listen.
"I think they've both got a point," said Sirius, looking thoughtfully at Ron and Hermione. "Ever since I found out Snape was teaching here, I've wondered why Dumbledore hired him. Snape's always been fascinated by the Dark Arts, he was famous for it at school. Slimy, oily, greasy-haired kid, he was," Sirius added, and Harry and Ron grinned at each other.
"Still is," Lalia added.
"Snape knew more curses when he arrived at school than half the kids in seventh year, and he was part of a gang of Slytherins who nearly all turned out to be Death Eaters."
Sirius held up his fingers and began ticking off names.
"Rosier and Wilkes - they were both killed by Aurors the year before Voldemort fell. The Lestranges - they're a married couple - they're in Azkaban. Avery - from what I've heard he wormed his way out of trouble by saying he'd been acting under the Imperius Curse - he's still at large. But as far as I know, Snape was never even accused of being a Death Eater - not that that means much. Plenty of them were never caught. And Snape's certainly clever and cunning enough to keep himself out of trouble."
"Snape knows Karkaroff pretty well, but he wants to keep that quiet," said Ron.
"Yeah, you should've seen Snape's face when Karkaroff turned up in Potions yesterday!" said Harry quickly. "Karkaroff wanted to talk to Snape, he says Snape's been avoiding him. Karkaroff looked really worried. He showed Snape something on his arm, but I couldn't see what it was."
"He showed Snape something on his arm?" said Sirius, looking frankly bewildered. He ran his fingers distractedly through his filthy hair, then shrugged again. "Well, I've no idea what that's about ... but if Karkaroff's genuinely worried, and he's going to Snape for answers ..."
Sirius stared at the cave wall, then made a grimace of frustration.
"There's still the fact that Dumbledore trusts Snape, and I know Dumbledore trusts where a lot of other people wouldn't, but I just can't see him letting Snape teach at Hogwarts if he'd ever worked for Voldemort."
"Why are Moody and Crouch so keen to get into Snape's office then?" said Ron stubbornly.
"Well," said Sirius slowly, "I wouldn't put it past Mad-Eye to have searched every single teacher's office when he got to Hogwarts. He takes his Defense Against the Dark Arts seriously, Moody. I'm not sure he trusts anyone at all, and after the thing he's seen, it's not surprising. I'll say this for Moody, though, he never killed if he could help it. Always brought people in alive where possible. He was tough, but he never descended to the level of Death Eaters. Crouch, though ... he's a different matter ... is he really ill? If he is, why did he make the effort to drag himself up to Snape's office? And if he's not ... what's he up to? What was he doing at the World Cup that was so important he didn't turn up in the Top Box? What's he been doing while he should have been judging the tournament?"
Sirius lapsed into silence, still staring at the cave wall. Buckbeak was ferreting around on the rocky floor, looking for bones he might have overlooked. Finally, Sirius looked up at Ron.
"Your say your brother's Crouch's personal assistant? Any chance you could ask him if he's seen Crouch lately?"
"I can try," said Ron doubtfully. "Better not make it sound like I reckon Crouch is up to anything dodgy, though. Percy loves Crouch."
"And you might try and find out whether they've got any leads on Bertha Jerkins while you're at it," said Sirius, gesturing to the second copy of the Daily Prophet.
"Bagman told me they hadn't," said Harry.
"Yes, he's quoted in the article there," said Sirius, nodding at the paper. "Blustering on about how bad Bertha's memory is. Well, maybe she's changed since I knew her, but the Bertha I knew wasn't forgetful at all - quite the reverse. She was a bit dim, but she had an excellent memory for gossip. It used to get her into a lot of trouble; never knew when to keep her mouth shut. I can see her being a liability at the Ministry of Magic ... maybe that's why Bagman didn't bother to look for her for so long ... ."
Sirius heaved an enormous sigh and rubbed his shadowed eyes.
"What's the time?"
Harry checked his watch, then remembered it hadn't been working since it had spent over an hour in the lake.
"It's half past three," said Hermione.
"You'd better get back to school," Sirius said, getting to his feet. "Now listen ..." He looked particularly hard at Harry and Lalia. "I don't want you lot sneaking out of school to see me, all right? Just send notes to me here. I still want to hear anything odd. But you're not to go leaving Hogwarts without permission; it would be an ideal opportunity for someone to attack you and then Remus would attack me."
"No one's tried to attack me so far, except a dragon and a couple of grindylows," Harry said, but Sirius scowled at him.
"I don't care ... I'll breathe freely again when this tournament's over, and that's not until June. And don't forget, if you're talking about me among yourselves, call me Snuffles, okay?"
He handed Harry the empty napkin and flask and began hugging them goodbye. When he got to Lalia, he placed the paper bag he had been carrying in his mouth earlier in her hand.
"The untouched dew. Do not open it until you need it ," he whispered to her. "Remus told me about the egg causing you to repeat the prophecy, be careful, please?"
"I will," she whispered, unsettled.
"You haven't had more dreams with him?"
Lalia bit her lip as she shook her head, knowing she couldn't tell anyone that she had stopped taking the draught.
"Dad, do you know if Regulus had a child or a Mahealani Black?" she suddenly decided to ask the man.
"Not that I know of. Regulus died at nineteen, but if he did have a child. Stay away from her. I doubt my brother's offspring would be anything, but a Death Eater," Sirius growled.
Lalia bit her lip. She sighed and nodded at her dad, deciding not to tell him about his very much alive and not evil brother.
Sirius pat Buckbeak good-bye. "I'll walk you to the edge of the village with you," said Sirius, "see if I can scrounge another paper."
He transformed into the great black dog before they left the cave, and they walked back down to the mountainside with him, across the boulder-strewn ground, and back to the stile. Here he allowed each of them to pat him on the head, before turning and setting off at a run around the outskirts of the village. The four made their way back into Hogsmeade and up towards Hogwarts.
"Wonder if Percy knows all that stuff about Crouch?" Ron said as they walked up the drive to the castle. "But maybe he doesn't care ... it'd probably just make him admire Crouch even more. Yeah, Percy loves rules. He'd just say Crouch was refusing to break them for his own son."
"Percy would never throw any of his family to the dementors," said Hermione severely.
"I don't know," said Ron. "If he thought we were standing in the way of his career ... Percy's really ambitious, you know ... ."
They walked up the stone steps into the entrance hall, where delicious smells of dinner wafted toward them from the Great Hall.
"Poor old Snuffles," said Ron, breathing deeply. "He must really like you, two ... . Imagine having to live off rats."
---
The following day, Lalia decided to spend time with Ginny rather than go with the trio to write to Percy and visit Dobby.
Lalia wanted to make up for missing a Hogmeade trip with her. She planned a day just for her. The two were cozy in the Ravenclaw common room in front of the fire with their Ravenclaw friends. While everyone around them was doing homework, Lalia braided Ginny's hair. She put a face mask on the girl and began giving her a back massage.
"You know you don't have to make up for hanging out with your friends," Ginny muttered, too comfortable to put effort into her speech.
"I know, I just wanted you to know I appreciate all your help with my random sicknesses this year."
Ginny got off the floor and tossed the mask in the trash. She sat next to Lalia on the couch and pulled the girl down with her so they laid, cuddled together on the couch.
"You two are so cute!" Morag screeched suddenly looking over at the girls.
"Gosh, a little loud," Lalia said, jumping at her friends voice.
"I'm sorry. But you guys are adorable," she said, gesturing to them when Ginny pushed Lalia's hair behind her ear.
"Ugh, I want a boyfriend!" Morag groaned.
"Are you, guys, girlfriends?" Maddie asked from the girls dormitory stairwell.
The group looked over at the girl. Lalia and Ginny glanced at each other and began blushing.
"Uh... no..." Ginny said. "We haven't really talked about it..."
"Yeah, what she said... C'mon guys were barely thirteen and fourteen. We're not really ready for that. We're just enjoying time with each other."
Lalia bit her lip nervously, worried what Ginny would think, but the redhead just smiled at her and nodded.
"Oh okay," Maddie said, leaving the common room.
"What's it matter to her?" Sue whispered.
"I know that was weird," Morag responded.
"Well, I thought she was just being curious," Luna said, still focused on her homework in her lap.
"So you guys really aren't dating?" Morag asked suddenly.
"We haven't even had our first kiss!" Lalia said exasperatedly. "C'mon, guys, we just like each other. It's all innocent crushes right now, promise."
"Agreed," Ginny said, squeezing Lalia's hand.
Their friends smiled and nodded at them before focusing back on their homework.
---
The next day Lalia sat with the trio during breakfast due to Hermione's urging.
When the post owls arrived, Hermione looked up eagerly; she seemed to be expecting something.
"Percy won't've had time to answer yet," said Ron. "We only sent Hedwig yesterday."
"No, it's not that," said Hermione. "I've taken out a subscription to the Daily Prophet. I'm getting sick of finding everything out from the Slytherins."
"Good thinking!" said Harry, also looking up at the owls. "Hey, Hermione, I think you're in luck -"
Lalia glance to the empty seat on her right, that was now being filled by Ginny. The two smiled at each other.
Lalia looked back to see a gray owl soaring down toward Hermione.
"It hasn't got a newspaper, though," she said, looking disappointed. "It's -"
But to her bewilderment, the gray owl landed in front of her plate, closely followed by four barn owls, all of whom were jostling close to her, trying to deliver their own letter first.
"What on earth -?" Hermione said, taking the letter from the gray owl, opening it, and starting to read. "Oh really!" she sputtered, going rather red.
"What's up?" said Ron.
"It's - oh how ridiculous -"
She shoved the letter to them. It was not handwritten, but composed from pasted letters that seemed to have been cut out of the Daily Prophet.
You are a WickEd giRl. HarRy PotTER desErVes BeTter. G0 back wherE you cAMe from muGgle.
"They're all like it!" said Hermione desperately, opening one letter after another. " 'Harry Potter can do much better than the likes of you ... .' 'You deserve to be boiled in frog spawn ... .' Ouch!"
She had opened the last envelope, and yellowish-green liquid smelling strongly of petrol gushed over her hands, which began to erupt in large yellow boils.
"Undiluted bubotuber pus!" said Ron, picking up the envelope gingerly and sniffing it.
"Ow!" Hermione said, tears starting in her eyes as she tried to rub the pus off her hands with a napkin, but her fingers were now so thickly covered in painful sores that it looked as though she were wearing a pair of thick, knobbly gloves.
"You'd better get up to the hospital wing," said Harry as the owls around Hermione took flight. "We'll tell Professor Sprout where you've gone ... ."
"I warned her!" said Ron as Hermione hurried out of the Great Hall, cradling her hands. "I warned her not to annoy Rita Skeeter! Look at this one ..." He read out one of the letters Hermione had left behind: " 'I read in Witch Weekly about how you are playing Harry Potter false and that boy has had enough hardship and I will be sending you a curse by next post as soon as I can find a big enough envelope.' Blimey, she'd better watch out for herself."
"No offense, Harry, but that's really stupid and annoying that all these people care about someone they never met's school drama," Lalia said, scrunching her nose in disgust at all the letters.