The Boy Who Killed God {Sirius Black | Marauders Era Fanfiction}

Frankenstein's Monster

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 dictating

And that dark kiss is waiting

For 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.