In those days where Olivia and Sirius waited, Olivia wanted to be happy. She had someone to look out for her, a plan in place to protect Harry, and a safe roof over her head.
Well "safe" is a relative term. She returned to find Sirius flagging her down a block from Grimmauld Place, obviously distressed. Apparently his assumptions earlier were wrong- Dumbledore didn't know that Sirius was innocent, and had told the ministry about Grimmauld Place. Now the place was guarded by Dementors 24/7, and they knew they had to find someplace else. Thankfully, this tied in with their plan for Harry, and they moved closer to Hogwarts.
They slept in the alleys around Grimmauld Place until term began, so Olivia could easily watch over Harry and report back to Sirius. It was hellish, but nowhere nearly as bad as Azkaban. They were both plagued with horrible nightmares, and often woke each other up by screaming. The nightmares weren't discussed for fear of reliving them, but they just sat with each other in silence until they drifted back to sleep or the sun rose. Eventually, as soon as the students boarded the Hogwarts Express, the duo left the area and started to travel northward.
At first they grabbed cabs, using money Sirius had grabbed from his house, but they started to notice people looking at them funny. Brushing it off, they made is as far as Glasgow in about seven hours before they saw why people were looking at them funny. The posters.
They saw faces on the posters- their faces- and they were posted everywhere, for muggles and wizards to see. And posted under Sirius was two very horrible deeds.
ALL WIZARDS ARE TO LOOK OUT FOR THIS MAN, SIRIUS BLACK, WHO WAS IMPRISONED FOR THE MURDER OF 13 MUGGLES. HE IS NOW HOLDING OLIVIA GAUNT HOSTAGE...
"You killed people?!" Olivia screeched the first second she saw the posters. Sirius shushed her, clamping a hand over her mouth and dragging her away from the crowd.
"Get your hand off me!" She snapped as soon as they were away from the muggles, "Is that why they locked you up? You just said you had been framed!"
"Liv, you need to calm down," Sirius warned, but he knew he would have to wait this out.
"Calm down?! No. I'm not going to calm down. I actually believed that you didn't kill my parents. I believed a criminal who was rotting in Azkaban," She laughed bitterly at herself, sounding hollow, "How could I be so stupid as to believe you?!"
Olivia realised in that moment that Sirius didn't know about her odd magic. And the only reason she realised that was when she accidentally flung him against the brick wall behind him, thankfully not hard enough to knock him out. Her rage subsided immediately as she saw him gasping for air, and knelt down next to him.
"Are you okay? I'm so sorry, I thought- I thought I had that under control. I never- never wanted to hurt anyone else," she started to ramble, her old friend paranoia settling in.
Sirius, in the midst of his coughing fit, managed to choke out, "Just- winded- what- was- that?"
"I have this weird magic where I can move things without a wand- it's not important. You need to sit up straight, here," She helped him sit up, his breathing still ragged but improving.
"Why didn't you tell me about this magic?" He asked as soon as the coughing stopped.
Olivia thought she had calmed down, but still snapped back, "Why didn't you tell me you murdered thirteen muggles?"
It wasn't until the day after they arrived in Hogsmeade that they actually told their tales, however, for muggles crossing the street started to notice the two were there. They traveled by mostly walking after that- in their animal forms when in densely populated areas, and in human forms when there wasn't anyone else around. Never stopping to sleep for longer than a few hours, it took them two days to reach Hogsmeade, and somehow they only got spotted once.
"'Ey! You! What're you doin' on my property!" The country woman had yelled from her porch, which was still quite a distance from where the duo walked along the road. They tried to hurry past her scrutinising gaze, but she still saw their faces.
"Yer' the blokes they're lookin' for! I'm calling the police, just you watch!" She yelled again, dashing inside. As soon as she was out of sight, they both changed into their animal forms and took off, soaring down the path and hoping to get away.
When they got to Hogsmeade, Olivia didn't even get to see the city before Sirius ushered her into a very spooky-looking building through a recently-dog-made hole in the foundation. The downstairs they entered into certainly matched its exterior- the wallpaper was peeling, furniture moth-eaten, and dust coated the furniture like layers of discoloured snow.
"Welcome to the Shrieking Shack. We found this place back in my Hogwarts days, and it's always been here for us. It's gone to shit now, but at least it's somewhere," Sirius tried to joke, dusting things off briefly before realising it was worthless.
"Gone to shit is right," Olivia muttered, running a finger over a nearby stair that was somehow missing a leg. Her finger ended up covered in dust, which she hurriedly wiped off on her borrowed pants. The open space only contained odd furniture, a kitchen buckling under its own weight, multiple boarded-up windows and heavily fortified front door. Sirius finished repairing his hole with some spare floorboards before turning back to Olivia.
"Hey, I'm the only one allowed to swear," Sirius joked again, "Follow me, there's still the upstairs to show off."
The upstairs wasn't much better, either. It had two bedrooms and a bathroom, which was better than the downstair's undefined state. It was still covered in years of dust, and the water only worked in the toilet and downstairs sink, apparently. Grimmauld Place may have been in disarray, but this place made it look like a mansion.
"So we're staying here? How do we get to Hogwarts without being seen?" Olivia questioned as she sat on one of the beds. She'd removed the dusty duvet first, and had just let it gather more dust on the floor.
Sirius paced the room, "We'll have to sneak into town to get food, I suppose, but that should be it. There's a tunnel that leads from here to Hogwarts, so that's not an issue," He waved off her question, "But how are we going to get enough food without being spotted?"
"I could create a distraction, and you could grab the food. We'd have to pick a day the town is empty." Olivia suggested, "I can just flutter about in the employees face, and you just pop in and dash out. Simple."
Sirius cracked a rare genuine smile, "You're your father's daughter yet." They shared the smile before Sirius made his way to the bedroom door, "I'll take the other bedroom, then. We both need a good nights sleep. After all that travelling. Don't be afraid to wake me up," He advised, "And goodnight, Liv."
"Sirius?" Olivia stopped him as he was halfway out the door, "Don't be afraid to wake me up, either. No reason for you to suffer to try and keep up some strong man act. Goodnight, Sirius."
He smiles again and left Olivia in the dusty room. The only light peaked in trough the boarded-up window, and she could see how deep pink the light was turning. She pulled the old sheets up over her, not caring about the conditions of the bed. No, the thing she worried about then was the conditions of her mind- and what her nightmare was going to be about tonight.
~~
Not a very happy ending, I know. And this book is now parallel to the book, so the date is September 2, 1993. I'll start adding those back to the beginning of the chapter when I switch to Harry's POV, though, because Olivia wouldn't really have a concept of the date at this point.
Anyway, please leave feedback and I hope you enjoyed!
PS: Can anyone guess what the title of this chapter is parodying? Leave a comment and see!