1. Not Sirius Enough by Kedavra
2. More Than You Bargained For by Kedavra
3. Perfect Clarity by Kedavra
“Appearance altering potions!” announced Professor Slughorn excitedly. “This is standard Auror training for those of you who are interested. The effects last far longer than your average disguising spell and the potion is much easier to control.”
Slughorn paced the front of the dungeon classroom in which the Gryffindor and Slytherin sixth years were seated. He watched as his favorite student, Lily Evans, dutifully jotted down notes on what he was saying.
“Now this potion is not as precise as its more complicated and more potent cousin, the Polyjuice Potion,” Slughorn continued. “You can pick your basic features and end up bearing an uncanny resemblance to someone, but you can’t expect the potion to be able to capture perfectly any one person’s set of features.
“Instructions for basic physical alterations like change in hair colour, eye colour, nose size” (James snickered furtively at this, poked Sirius in the ribs, and pointed at Snape) “are on the blackboard. I want you all to brew the potions today in class. You should be finished by the end, and for homework,” Slughorn rubbed his hands together excitedly, “drink the potion five minutes before the next class we have. We’ll have a fun time guessing who’s who, eh?”
He flipped the blackboard carrying the instructions for the potions over, and the class immediately set to work. Sirius, after gathering his ingredients from the store cupboard and taking a seat next to James, started to read the list of instructions and think of how he would alter his appearance.
His hair, he decided would be the first thing to change. He set aside the three newt’s eyes necessary to lighten the shade from black to a warm shade of brown. Then, he set to work on the facial features. A little lengthening of the nose here, a little shrinking of the ears there…
“Wishful thinking?” James smirked, glancing over at Sirius’s work.
“What’re you on about?” Sirius asked defensively. A little too defensively; he too had just realised whose appearance he had been modelling his potion after.
“Nothing,” James replied coolly. “Just looks like you’re trying to make yourself look like a good friend of ours.”
“A good friend of yours maybe,” Sirius muttered darkly. “He hasn’t spoken to me since the Snape incident.”
James paused for a second. The memory of Snape almost being mauled by a transformed Remus still brought a cold feeling of dread to his body. He shuddered very slightly and said, “He just needs some time to forgive, Padfoot. You two are perfect for each other. I’m sure you’ll be able to work things out eventually.”
“It’s been almost a month!”
James rolled his eyes. “Just because you have the emotional capacity of a teaspoon and immediately bounce back from every trauma in your life doesn’t mean that the rest of us do.”
“Don’t be thick, Prongs. Anyone should be able to get over something after a month. He needs to lighten up.”
A few tables to their left, Remus was carefully setting aside his ingredients for the potion. He placed them neatly into organized piles onto his desk. He glanced to his right and noticed that Peter, who was sitting at the table with him, had pulled out enough lacewing flies to grow his hair down to the ground. After kindly pointing out Peter’s mistake, he set to work readying his cauldron to brew the poison.
Although he could not overhear James and Sirius’s conversation a few tables over, another conversation floated by that he couldn’t help but notice.
“Look at him,” said the girl in front of him, eyeing Sirius rather like a hunting wolf would eye an unsuspecting deer. “That sleek black hair, the intriguing grey eyes, the cute little pointed nose. It makes you want to tie him up, shove him in a broom cupboard, and have your way with him.”
Her friend giggled. Remus glared savagely at their backs, and hoped fiercely that their appearance-altering potions would go wrong and give them both nasty warts on some prominently visible part of their faces. Turning back to his work he looked at his ingredients again.
Ground dragon scales, for transforming his hair into silky black locks; essence of quicksilver, for changing his normal brown eyes to a more intriguing shade of grey; hellebore root, for shrinking the nose slightly…
Oh wonderful, he thought to himself. Not only was he jealous over Sirius’s petty girlish admirers, but also he was so attached to Sirius that he had subconsciously chosen Sirius’s looks as his ideal appearance. Perhaps he just didn’t have the ability to stay angry at Sirius. It had been a month, perhaps Sirius deserved to be forgiven.
Suddenly, an image came unbidden to Remus’s mind, an image of a terrified boy, standing alone before a ferocious wolf. He felt dirty inside, tainted because of what he almost did to Snape and terrified that it might happen again. He remembered Sirius’s casual laugh, his casual avoidance of Remus’s guilt and horror. Fierce, hot anger bubbled up inside Remus.
No, he thought viciously, Sirius would learn to grow up and face real issues or he, Remus, would never speak to him again. He glanced at the clock on the wall. There wasn’t enough time to get new ingredients. He would just have to brew the potion as it was.
A few tables away, Sirius was entirely oblivious to both the girls’ giggles and Remus’s renewed anger.
“I’m going to talk to him,” Sirius said resolutely.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” James replied, clearly unimpressed by his friend’s determination.
“In fact, I’m going to confront him right now,” continued Sirius, completely ignoring James’s protests.
“How in blazes are you going to manage that?” James inquired. “We’re in class.”
But Sirius had already begun to rip a corner off a piece of parchment and was scribbling furiously with his quill. A few seconds later, he tossed the note a few tables over, where it hit Remus squarely on the head.
Remus picked up the crumpled parchment and without opening it, tossed it into the flames under his cauldron.
For some reason, Sirius seemed to find this very amusing and smirked.
“What’s so funny?” James asked him.
“I wrote ‘I know you’re going to throw this one away without reading it,’” Sirius replied.
He then set to work ripping more pieces from his parchment, pausing every once in a while to add an ingredient to his potion and stir it half-heartedly. His first message was followed by notes that read, “The second note probably won’t do much better than the first”, “Third time was never the charm for you” and “Right about now, you’ll be realising that I can keep throwing these at you until the end of class.” Remus promptly threw all of these notes into his fire.
On the fifth piece of parchment, Sirius wrote his first serious message:
Moony, we need to talk. I know you’re still upset but I really am sorry.
When Sirius tossed this note, Remus gave an exaggerated sigh and opened the parchment. He glanced at it for only a minute before scribbling down a response and carelessly lobbing it back.
It landed in Sirius’s cauldron. Fishing it out nonchalantly, Sirius opened the soaked parchment.
What do you WANT, Sirius?
He quickly tore a fresh sheet of parchment and wrote his reply.
I want to apologise. I was stupid and didn’t think about what would happen. Can’t we just forget about it? There’s a full moon in two nights.
That’s a shoddy apology and you know it, Sirius. You can’t just gloss something like this over. We haven’t got anything more to discuss until you grow up.
Who said I’m not grown up? I told you I was sorry and that I regret it. Isn’t love about forgiving and forgetting? Now how bout that full moon, want to have a go at the base of the east tower again? James reckons there’s a passageway down to the dungeons from there.
Sirius, you can’t just apologise and expect everything to fix itself. You haven’t changed at all. You’re still acting like an immature prat.
But a loveable immature prat.
No, I think the word that I’m looking for is ‘insufferable’
Fair enough, but if we don’t kiss and make up before the next full moon, I’ll be a heartbroken insufferable prat. Think on that. Do you want that weighing on your conscience?
Sirius, I’m going to say this one time and then I’m going to ignore you no matter how many wads of parchment you throw at me. You are not sorry. You’re doing the same thing you always do, trying to gloss things over by making a joke and changing the subject. But it won’t work this time. You almost made me kill someone, or worse, turn them into a monster like me, and you think you can just laugh it off and I’ll get over it. Well I won’t. What I have is a serious condition and you act like it’s a big laugh. To you, it’s an excuse to run around the grounds once a month and a convenient tool to threaten Snape with. This rivalry you have with Snape is immature. Your attitude towards me is immature. And until you grow the bloody hell up and learn that some things in life are serious, I can’t be with you. I can’t even be friends with you.
Sirius read over Remus’s reply quite a few times. For a few moments he fought a dreadful sinking sensation and the fear of uncertainty. What would he do if Remus wouldn’t forgive him? How was he going to go on knowing that Remus hated him? Quickly, he recovered from those dangerous questions. Remus would forgive him. They had always worked things out before. He just had to be distracting, lighten the mood. He scribbled a message back: Hey, I’m always ‘Sirius’.
Remus didn’t bother to open it. He promptly stuffed the note under the fire of his cauldron. Sirius’s spirits sank, and his shoulders slumped in disappointment.
“Bad luck, mate,” said James, observing his friend’s expression.
“He’ll come around,” Sirius said dejectedly, although he looked less sure of himself now.
He glanced at the cauldron where his potion had been brewing. Although the instructions had not said precisely how it would turn out because the potion varied depending on the appearance chosen, he had a feeling that the chunky tar-like substance in his cauldron was not going to change his appearance so much as poison him.
Everyone around him was packing up. As he ladled the potion into a phial, he made a mental note to keep a bezoar on hand before he took the potion. No doubt it was going to have some seriously unwanted side effects.
Over the next few days, Sirius stubbornly tried to reconcile with Remus, but nothing was going according to plan. Remus had shredded the singing card left on his bed, stunned the dancing suit of armour that had accosted him with an apology on his way to class and coolly used the Aguamenti charm to extinguish the flying Filibuster Fireworks that had spelled out what Sirius considered to be a heartfelt apology (“I’m Siriusly Sorry”)
Sirius was growing increasingly frustrated. He had begun his quest for forgiveness with the appropriate amount of optimism, but his patience was quickly dwindling. He stood alone in a boy’s bathroom on the fifth floor. He had just come from Divination and was about to take his appearance-altering potion before the afternoon’s potions lesson.
He gripped the sides of the sink tightly and stared at his own appearance in the mirror. Distractedly, he pulled from his bag a small, corked phial containing his potion. He surveyed it carefully, wrinkling his nose in disgust at it.
The black sludgy substance did not look promising, and the prospect of drinking it was doing nothing to improve Sirius’s sour mood.
If all went well, his appearance would shift so that he vaguely resembled the object of his frustration. If all did not go well, as he had no doubt would happen, he was going to need the shrivelled little stone at the bottom of his potions kit.
Distractedly, he dug into his bag, found his potions kit, and removed the bezoar. What was it going to take for Remus to forgive him this time? None of his old tactics were working, and he was quickly losing the battle against the creeping feeling of despair.
Never, in Sirius Black’s life, through the parents who could never understand him and the family who had disowned him, had he ever allowed despair to overtake him. But this time was different; this time it was catching up to him.
“Snap out of it, Black,” he muttered angrily to himself. “It’s nothing that won’t be fixed soon.”
But even as he said the words, he didn’t really believe them.
Two floors beneath Sirius, in another boy’s bathroom just outside the Arithmancy classroom, Remus was surveying his own reflection in the mirror and glaring suspiciously at his own phial of potion.
It was the exact sludgy consistency and pitch black colour as Sirius’s potion.
He shouldn’t have let Sirius distract him that way. Passing notes hadn’t allowed him to concentrate properly on brewing his potion, and Sirius had always known exactly what amused Remus and redirected his attention. But this time his anger and frustration at Sirius’s immaturity was too great to let him forgive and forget after a few insincere, but admittedly very creative, attempts at apology.
Remus dug his hand inside his bag, found his potions kit and pulled out a bezoar. He uncorked the phial and cautiously raised the hand holding it. Two floors above him Sirius went through the same motion.
As one, the two boys upended their phials and drained the contents into their mouths.
Both waited for the briefest moment, staring at their reflections, ready to shove the curative stone in their mouths at the first sign of pain. It never came. Instead, both boys felt something cool and calming washing over them, like a splash of water on a hot summer day.
A flash as though someone had shined a spotlight not on a body, but inside… a sudden, not so pleasant jerk that felt like the very essence of a person was being pulled in every direction…
Then the sensations stopped.
Sirius looked in the mirror at someone who looked remarkably like Remus.
Remus looked in the mirror at someone who looked remarkably like Sirius.
Each boy took the bezoar held in his left hand and shoved it back in his bag carelessly. “Excellent,” both boys said to their reflections, and each turned to stroll out of the bathroom, entirely satisfied with himself.
Both Remus and Sirius were late to Potions class. Sirius was the first to walk in.
“Sorry Professor,” he said casually. “I must’ve been turned around or something. I could’ve sworn I was on the fifth floor but turns out I was actually on the third.”
“No matter,” Slughorn assured good-naturedly. “But why haven’t you taken your potion, Remus?”
Sirius gave a little smirk. “I’m not Remus, I’m Sirius,” he explained easily.
“Ah… yes,” said Slughorn, still looking slightly unconvinced. “You know, Sirius, if I might say so, you will recall that I said you could not imitate a person’s appearance too precisely with this potion. But you appear to be a spitting image of your friend.”
Sirius shrugged. “Well Professor, I probably just got lucky and happened to come very close to the way he looks. If I was going to have to give up my good looks, I’d at least want look like the second most attractive guy in our year.” He flashed a toothy grin and ran his fingers easily through his hair.
“That’s Black all right,” a petite girl with white-blonde interjected exasperatedly. Sirius could only assume that this was Lily Evans, the only girl in their year who seemed to take Sirius’s overconfidence as a personal insult.
"All right," Slughorn said, although he didn't look entirely satisfied with the explanation. However, his face immediately brightened when he explained what they were to do next. "We'll have a few minutes of fun before we get started with today's lesson. Everyone write one true thing about yourself on a piece of parchment and hold it up. Then, one at a time, each of you will come to the front of the classroom and try to correctly identify one of your classmates.”
Sirius slid into his customary seat next to James. Or at least, he assumed it was James. The boy was extremely tall and lanky, even sitting down, but his reddish-brown hair stuck up stubbornly in the back, exactly the way James’s did.
The real giveaway was the message that James was scrawling about himself on a piece of parchment: “I am ruddy good at Quidditch”
Sirius gave a small snort of laughter when he spotted it, and James turned around to look at him.
“That’s just creepy,” James muttered, looking extremely unnerved.
“What is?” Sirius asked.
“You act like Sirius, you talk like Sirius, but you look exactly like Remus,” James shook his head as though flustered by the entire situation. “Must’ve been some job you did on that potion, Padfoot.”
“Well, what can I say? My potions prowess must surpass even that of little miss goody two shoes over there.”
James scowled as Sirius jerked his thumb at Lily.
Just then, Remus entered the classroom, out of breath and looking totally dishevelled. His shoulder-length black hair sagged forlornly into his eyes as he pushed them back with a totally frustrated expression on his face.
“Sorry I’m late, Professor,” he breathed. “I must’ve gotten confused and lost track of where I was, taken a wrong turn or something.”
“Nothing to worry about,” Slughorn assured him. “I assume you’re not Sirius then?”
“No sir,” Remus replied shortly, and he quickly took a seat next to Peter. He assumed it was Peter because the boy he sat next to was the only person in the class to have managed to turn his hair a brilliant shade of green and yet change none of his facial features.
Ten minutes and many entertaining mistaken identities later, the class had successfully guessed which student had adopted which appearance. Slughorn set them to work brewing a potion to change the pitch of their voice for the remainder of the class period. Sirius however, kept getting distracted from the potion by his own appearance. He spent most of his time pretending to think himself irresistibly attractive, and this time he honestly believed it.
It was a very strange feeling, he decided, to be mesmerised by the way your own fingers daintily handled the potions ingredients and sprinkled them into the cauldron and the way your own hair fell into your eyes when you were trying to concentrate. How many times had he stared at Remus in class when he was bored by the teacher’s discussions? This must be how it felt to be Remus, working diligently in class and looking very attractive while doing it.
Sirius was rudely interrupted from his daydreams when Professor Slughorn announced five minutes before the end of class that they were to bring their phials of voice-altering potion to his desk when they were done and then receive a Restoring Drought to return to their normal appearances. Wanting to savour looking like Remus for a bit longer, he purposely left his cauldron brewing for too long, so that when he finally collected a phial and was walking to Slughorn’s desk, class was over and everyone was packing up to go.
Remus was just behind him, clutching a phial of potion that also looked rather overcooked.
“Alright then, Black,” Slughorn said, taking the potion from Sirius and handing him a small bottle with a clear liquid in it. “Drink this and restore your normal appearance.”
Sirius took the bottle reluctantly and drained the contents.
He waited for a moment. He didn’t feel any different.
Judging by the annoyed look on Slughorn’s face, he didn’t look any different either.
“I suspected as much,” said Slughorn, a scowl sitting firmly upon his face. “You boys didn’t take your potions at all did you? Thought you’d play a little joke, eh?”
He shoved another bottle of Restoring Drought at Remus, who looked thoroughly confused. Without a word, Remus drank the potion. Again, nothing happened.
“Well, I’m very disappointed with you boys,” Slughorn said in a rather miffed tone. “I would have expected better. I mean, you’re both very bright. Detention tonight, both of you.”
“But Professor”” Remus began.
“No buts Mr. Black,” Slughorn insisted.
“But I’m not Sirius, I’m Remus,” Remus protested.
“Yeah, I’m Sirius,” Sirius chimed in.
By this time, the classroom was completely empty of most of their classmates, but James and Peter had been waiting for Sirius and Remus to turn in their potions. Anxious to see what was causing the delay, Peter and James joined them at Slughorn’s desk.
“That’s quite enough boys,” Slughorn said sternly. “Joke’s over, and it wasn’t a very funny joke either.”
“What’s the matter, Professor?” James asked.
“Your friends here are trying to play a rather unentertaining trick on me,” Slughorn replied.
“We’re not trying to play a trick!” Sirius yelled, starting to feel extremely frustrated.
James did a double take at this violent outburst. “Professor,” he said slowly. “That’s not Remus. You know Remus is quiet and logical. He doesn’t get mad often or raise his voice, especially not to teachers.”
Slughorn raised an eyebrow. “Then what exactly are you suggesting, Potter? That I brewed my Restoring Draught wrong?”
“Wait a minute,” said Remus. “When I left the bathroom to come to class, I was absolutely certain that I went into the third floor bathroom, but when I came out I found myself on the fifth floor.”
Sirius’s eyes widened. “I went into the fifth floor bathroom before class, but I came out onto the third floor.”
Remus opened the bag hanging from his shoulder. He pulled out The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 6 and opened to the inside cover. On the upper left-hand corner were scribbled the words “This book is property of Sirius Black.”
“No way,” James said incredulously. “You don’t mean to say that you think you two didn’t just switch appearances, you actually””
“Switched bodies, yeah,” Remus finished.
Peter gave a terrified squeak from behind them, which they all ignored.
Slughorn stared at them, disbelieving. “Ask Black something only he would know,” Slughorn instructed James.
“How’s Kreacher?” James asked.
“Still wishing that we’ll chop his head off and hang it on the wall like his mother’s,” Sirius replied sourly, wrinkling up Remus’s face sourly.
Remus stared at them, utterly confused. Sirius had never spoken to Remus about life at the Black house. To Sirius, it was a dark part of him that he liked to keep sheltered from the happier aspects of his life.
“It’s definitely him,” James assured Slughorn.
Slughorn seemed at least marginally convinced. “Well boys, how did this happen?”
“I reckon I didn’t brew the potion correctly,” Sirius answered. “I was distracted.”
“That’s one hell of a strange mistake to make,” Slughorn said, but he seemed convinced at last. The boy who looked like Sirius was acting worried and fretful, exactly the way Remus would act, and the boy who looked like Remus was smirking, pulling a prefect badge out of his pocket and grinning at it.
“Excellent,” Sirius said enthusiastically.
“That’s MINE,” said Remus, snatching it from his grip.
“Oh come on, no one will believe that Sirius Black is a prefect. Give it back.”
Remus ignored him.
“Now boys,” said Slughorn, his suspicious glare evaporating and his pleasant temperament returning, “don’t go causing too much trouble, and forget about that detention business. You haven’t got any more classes today have you?”
All four of them shook their heads no.
“All right then, I will see what I can do to whip up an antidote and restore you to your proper bodies. You will meet me in my office in one hour. That seven o’clock, sharp,” Slughorn told them.
“But Professor,” Remus said anxiously, “are you sure you can brew an antidote that works?”
“Not to worry, Mr. Lupin. Of course I can manage it. Anyway, if not, I suspect that you will be restored to your regular states when the potion would have worn off naturally had it been brewed properly, which is in somewhere between twelve and fifteen hours. They usually last for about half a day. You would wake up tomorrow, right as rain. All right boys, off you go. I’ll see you two at seven.”
As the boys turned to go, Remus suddenly remembered something. “Professor,” he whispered anxiously. “It’s a full moon tonight.”
“Oh dear,” said Slughorn. “Well drinking the antidote shouldn’t take long. Surely you’ll be out of here by sunset at 7:20.”
Slightly mollified, though anxious about cutting his transformation so close, Remus turned and followed his friends out of the classroom.
“I’ve got some bad news, Padfoot,” James announced at dinner.
“What’s that?”
“Peter and I have detention tonight.”
Sirius blanched.
“But it’s the full moon tonight,” he said.
“I know,” James said exasperatedly, shoving a forkful of food into his mouth. “That’s why it’s bad news. Right after we took the potions and we didn’t look like ourselves, Peter and I figured we’d have some fun with Snivelly and turn his hair rainbow coloured, make it look like he hadn’t brewed his potion properly. You know how he’s always banging on about how easy potions is to him. McGonagall caught is at it though, and she wasn’t fooled at all, gave us both detention.”
“Remus still isn’t talking to me,” Sirius stated matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, I’m aware,” said James. “But you’ve got to do something when Slughorn puts you two back again. You know his transformations are awful if none of us are there. Who knows, maybe you two will even make up.”
Sirius gave a doubtful scoff. But the look of disappointment on James’s face at not being able to accompany Remus made Sirius add consolingly, “Yeah, I reckon your right. I’ll definitely go down there. After he’s turned, mind you, he’d send me right back out if he were human.”
He chewed his food slowly, pondering his mixed emotions about spending a night roaming the school with Remus, and inevitably being chastised in the morning. It would be bittersweet at best. The night could be wonderful but the morning would be painful.
Then, quite suddenly, Sirius stopped mid-bite. An idea had just occurred to him, a wonderful, brilliant idea. It was so perfect, so simple, and he was sure that it would convince Remus to forgive him.
A slow smile spread across his face. Sometimes he was amazed by his own brilliance.
Just before seven, Remus was already outside Slughorn’s office, knocking on the door.
“Ah, Mr. Lupin,” Slughorn greeted when he answered the door. “Come on in, the potion is almost done.”
Remus entered the office and took a seat in a nearby armchair. Slughorn stirred the cauldron slowly, then adjusted the heat of the flame underneath it with his wand.
Five minutes passed, the clock on Slughorn’s desk struck seven, and there was no sign of Sirius.
“Potion’s ready,” Slughorn announced. “But you’ll have to take it together for it to work.”
Another five minutes passed. Remus’s palms were sweating profusely. Where was Sirius?
Slughorn was evidently beginning to feel a little nervous too. He kept twirling the stirring rod in his hand and eyeing the two gobletfuls of potion waiting on his desk.
Ten past seven came, and Remus was beginning to feel frantic. Why had he not talked to Sirius before now? Made sure that he would come on time?
Because you’re not speaking to him, said an annoying little voice from a corner of his mind. You’re being stupid you know, holding this grudge and now you’re paying for it.
Remus silenced the voice and asked aloud, “What do you reckon is keeping him?”
“I haven’t got a clue, Mr. Lupin,” Slughorn answered.
At quarter after, a sudden, horrible thought occurred to Remus. It couldn’t be… but deep down he knew it must be true.
Sirius was not late because he had been accidentally held up. Sirius was late on purpose. In fact, Sirius was not going to show up at all.
After the argument and Remus’s refusal to forgive him, after Remus insisting again and again that Sirius was too immature to understand what being a werewolf was like and how serious it was, Sirius had finally taken Remus’s words to heart.
He had gone down the willow tonight, on the night of the full moon.
Sirius had never thought about exactly what the dishevelled appearance of the Shrieking Shack meant.
He had always assumed that the shack was simply unkempt, that it had fallen into disrepair because it was home to no one but a werewolf once a month. But now, as he felt anticipation coursing through his body at the imminent moonrise, and as he ran his fingers cautiously along the jagged edges of a broken table, he realized exactly what it meant.
So, this is what Remus did before they became Animagi. It had been a sensitive subject at best, and they had never really talked about Remus’s transformations before. Sirius had known that things had gotten better after they began accompanying Remus after every full moon, but he had been unaware of exactly how much they had changed.
Deep, vicious furrows ran along the walls of the shack in sets of four. The claw marks covered most of the surface of the walls, the crisscrossing patterns mutilating the wood into unrecognizable shapes. Sirius imagined the same lattice of deep gashes being carved into Snape’s body.
Suddenly, sending Snape down the Willow didn’t seem quite so funny anymore.
Maybe Remus was right. Maybe he didn’t really take the werewolf situation quite seriously enough. But Sirius was absolutely certain of one thing, and that was that if Remus wanted him to understand completely the implications of being a werewolf, this was the best way to find out.
Through the small crack in the wooden boards covering the window, the last streaks of sunlight were stretching across the sky as the sun slid itself neatly into the horizon. His body could feel that the changes were about to begin. Sirius gritted his teeth in anticipation, raised his face skyward and awaited the coming moon.
Remus was already halfway to the door of Slughorn’s office before the professor had a chance to react.
“Where are you going?” asked Slughorn.
“Sirius isn’t coming,” Remus replied shortly. He was in no mood to explain the argument and Sirius’s motives, not when time was running short.
Inwardly, he cursed Sirius for being so absolutely stupid and inarguably insane. Who in their right mind would want to transform into a werewolf?
Of course, it was this kind of cute, touching insane stupidity that was one of Sirius’s most endearing qualities.
Dimly, Remus was aware that Slughorn had turned very very pale.
“Does Mr. Black know about your, erm, condition?” Slughorn whispered worriedly. “Because if he isn’t coming and hasn’t taken the proper precautions…”
“He knows. He’s gone down the willow,” said Remus, his hand on the doorknob, ready to leave.
“But where are you going?”
“To find him and force him to take the potion before he does something he seriously regrets.”
“The sun has already set, you’ll never reach him in time,” Slughorn protested.
“I have to try!” Remus yelled.
Slughorn looked temporarily taken aback at Remus’s outburst, but Remus was beyond minding his manners. Blind panic was beginning to overtake them. The transformation would be excruciatingly painful and every moment alone afterwards was pure agony.
“Think about this Mr. Lupin. If you can’t reach him in time, he’ll bite you the moment you get there. The smell of human blood will be irresistible to him,” Slughorn said, recovering from his initial shock.
Remus froze, halfway across the threshold.
“Think about your friend. Tomorrow morning, even without the antidote, the effects of the potion will wear off. If he bites you, he’ll be like you for the rest of his life. Do you really want to do that to him?”
What a stupid question, Remus thought savagely. Of course he would never want to condemn Sirius to such a fate. Ice cold dread flooded through his body. The wolf was something Sirius shouldn’t have to ever experience, much less alone.
Then suddenly something clicked in Remus’s mind. The smell of human blood will be irresistible to him… Human blood. But this was Sirius’s body. He was more than just a human, he was an Animagus. Remus had to find a way to transform, to make his way to Sirius and help him through the night.
He turned to Professor Slughorn and said in an eerily calm voice that wasn’t his own, “You’re right professor, it is too late. If you don’t mind, I’ll go back to my dormitory now.” He pointed at the two phials of antidote sitting on the desk. “May I take those with me in case I see him in the morning?”
“Of course,” Slughorn said, handing the phials to Remus. “But the potion should wear off shortly after sunrise. It won’t last any longer than about 15 hours”
The had taken their potions at five in the evening. Remus quickly calculated in his head. 15 hours would be eight the next morning. Slughorn was right; the potion would wear off around sunrise, or shortly after.
“Thank you, Professor,” Remus said pleasantly before striding out of Slughorn’s office, displaying a calm that was completely absent from what he was experiencing inside.
Once outside, he decided to give the Animagus transformation a try. He cursed inwardly for never asking Sirius, James or Peter exactly how it worked.
I want to be a gigantic black dog, he thought to himself.
Nothing happened.
Well, he hadn’t really expected that to work. He tried again, this time concentrating on a mental image of Padfoot, willing his body to change.
Still, nothing happened.
He gave a sigh of frustration. What he needed was to find James. He didn’t know how to bring off the animagus transformation, but James would be able to help him. Vaguely he recalled that James and Peter were in detention. He would have a job trying to find them. They could be anywhere.
He was halfway down the hallway when he thought of the map. The Marauder’s Map would tell him where James was, and then perhaps they could slip away to the shack together. He quickened his pace. If he hurried he could reach Sirius before long, and Sirius would only have to spend a few minutes as the wolf.
“Well, well, well,” said a silky, sarcastic voice from the darkened corridor ahead of him, “if it isn’t the jokester Black. Hope you’re not in a hurry Black, because I’ve got a bone to pick with you.”
Casually, twirling his wand deftly in his fingers, Severus Snape stepped out of the shadows in front of Remus, blocking the corridor and cutting Remus off from the one thing that could save Sirius a night of pain and torment.
The first thing to change was his hands, his beautiful, perfect hands.
Sirius felt his fingers shorten and draw together. He bit his lip to keep from crying out as the long sharp claws made their way across his lips.
And that was only the beginning.
His organs and bones were shifting inside him, rearranging themselves into the anatomy of the wolf, and he could feel every miniscule motion. He could feel the appearance of every new feature and the disappearance of every old one.
He could no longer keep himself from crying out. He let loose a terrified, pained shriek that sliced through the air and issued from the shack. But no one knew there was a person trapped inside the Shrieking Shack. “There goes those ghosts again,” they would murmur.
As the changes wracked his body, as he gasped and struggled to breathe, as he crumbled feebly to his knees and cried out over and over again, Sirius thought he was beginning the understand.
Being a werewolf meant excruciating, unbearable pain once a month. He had never been put under the Cruciatus Curse, but he imagined that it might feel something like this.
But Sirius had not even scratched the surface. As he writhed on the floor, struggling to cope with the physical changes that came with transforming, he didn’t know that the worst was yet to come: the mental changes, the loss of coherent thought and the absolute savage brutality that was the wolf.
“I don’t have time for this, Snape,” Remus said not unkindly. Snape was the victim. They, he and Sirius, had almost killed Snape after all, but at this moment he had no time to deal with their rival. Sirius was transforming, and he needed to find James.
“I’m afraid I can’t schedule things according to your convenience,” Snape sneered. “Not everyone considers you the embodiment of all things perfect, Black. I’ve told you already that I’ve got a bone to pick with you, and you’re not leaving until we’ve settled this.”
“Get out of the way, Snape,” Remus snarled, drawing Sirius wand, forgetting to be nicer to Snape. “I’ve got no time to deal with you right now.”
“Haven’t got time?” Snape asked in mock curiosity. “What could possibly be more important? Got girls to snog? Pranks to pull? Parents to talk to? Oh wait, I forgot, you don’t speak to your parents do you? What’s wrong, Black? They’re not impressed with the fact that you show murderous tendencies? I’d have thought they’d be pleased.”
“Don’t you talk about his parents!” Remus shouted back hotly.
“What the bloody hell do you mean ‘his’ parents, Black. Have you gone mad? Taken one too many bludgers to the head have you? Well I suppose you should be glad they can affect you through that tremendously thick skull of yours. Let’s hope they don’t ruin that face of yours.”
A wide, malicious grin spread across Snape’s face, indicating that this was exactly what he would like to see.
Remus didn’t have time for this. “Sirius being disfigured wouldn’t help you out, Snape. You’re not exactly next in line with the girls,” he retorted easily. “You should try washing your hair, I hear it’s really in this season. Now get the hell out of my way, Snape.”
Remus tried to push his way past Snape but the other boy moved to block him. The calm expression on Snape’s face slipped for just an instant, but he quickly recovered himself.
“Murderers don’t deserve anything or anyone, Black,” he spat. “You’ll be alone for the rest of your life if I can help it. If Dumbledore won’t punish you, I suppose someone has to.”
Gripping his wand tightly in his clenched fist, he pointed it straight at Remus. “You’ll pay for what you did to me, Black.”
Remus raised his own wand, but although his body may have been Sirius’s, his awareness was his own. He was a touch too slow. It was over in a few colorful flashes. Snape attacked viciously, fueled by anger and bitterness at nearly nearly being killed. After the first few exchanges, Remus didn’t have time to bring off a shield charm before Snape yelled “Incarcerous!”
Thick, twisting ropes shot from the end of Snape’s wand, wrapping themselves firmly to Remus’s wrists and ankles, binding his hands and feet. Remus overbalanced and fell awkwardly to the floor. The gravity of the situation hit him with the same intensity as the force with which he hit the floor. He wasn’t going to be able to bring Sirius help before long.
“Say good night, Black,” Snape sneered above him, and Remus could only watch helplessly as Snape raised his wand.
He smelled blood.
It was faint and far away, but the odor dominated his mind and commanded his actions. Hot, coursing human blood.
Frantically, Sirius pawed at the walls of the shack. Out. He needed out. He could taste the sensation of hot, coursing blood in his mouth, the soft feel of flesh shredding beneath his paws.
The wolf whimpered in frustration. It threw itself bodily against a boarded window to no effect.
Desperate and unable to find a way out, the wolf sprinted around the room. Blinded by the all-consuming need for blood, it collided painfully with the half broken table that stood in a corner of the room. The splintered edges of a severed table leg buried themselves into one of the wolf’s front let.
The sweet, acrid aroma of blood pierced the air. It was not the same as the human blood that his body so that he so longed for, but it awakened a deep instinct within him. To draw blood, to smell it, to cause pain, to hunt, to kill.
A vicious bite on a hind leg. The wolf howled in pain, but the tinge of deep red liquid on its teeth reminded it that the sacrifice of discomfort should be readily made. Again, it struck, this time clawing at its snout with its paw. And again, a chunk from its side.
A nip at its tail… a gash in its flank… a deep puncture in its paw…
As the night wore on, and the moon traveled its slow deliberate path across the starry sky, the lone wolf attacked itself again and again, howling in pain but unceasing in its efforts.
Remus had no idea what time it was or where he was when he awoke. All he knew was that it was totally dark all around him.
His head hurt quite a lot, and he was still bound tightly in the ropes that Snape had conjured. He groaned a little and tried to focus his eyes to survey his surroundings.
Either there wasn’t really a full moon tonight so the sky was a lot darker than he remembered, or he had been shut in some very small, very strange spelling room. He wiggled a little bit and tried to loosen the ropes that held his hands to no avail.
Suddenly it occurred to him that it could be any time and he could be any place. Someone might not find him for hours and he had no clue where he was. Sirius had definitely transformed by now and Remus had no way of knowing how long the other boy had spent as the wolf.
His wiggling became significantly more desperate. A bottle of some sort of liquid fell over and splattered all over the floor. Judging by the smell, it was some sort of cleaning agent. Great, that meant he was in a broom cupboard. He could be anywhere in Hogwarts, stuck in the dead of the night behind a door that no one would bother to open.
It was ironic that this was exactly the trait of broom cupboards that made them such appealing destinations for him and Sirius to sneak off to.
Desperately, Remus squirmed on the floor, trying to loosen the bonds around his hands and feet.
Another something clattered to the floor, but this time it wasn’t just a cleaning agent. His eyes adjusting slightly to the darkness of the cupboard, Remus shifted so that he was looking out at the object that had evidently just fallen out of the pocket of Sirius’s robes.
It was a small, ornate mirror that would fit comfortably into the palm of his hand, had he possessed the ability to free his hand at the moment. Remus stared at it, and through the worry for Sirius’s safety and the desperation of the situation, he remembered what the object was.
The two-way mirror! A spark of hope burst into Remus’s chest. He had been so intent on finding James that he had forgotten that Sirius always carried something on him for exactly that purpose. How could he have missed something so simple, so obvious? If he had only thought to use the mirror he could have saved Sirius, prevented him from Cursing himself for his own stupidity, he shifted himself so he was directly above it, and hissed into the mirror.
“James!”
Nothing happened.
“JAMES!” Remus yelled this time, not bothering to keep his voice down. If someone came to tell him off for being out of bed late, he would curse them into oblivion on sight, teacher or not. He was beginning to regret not taking this exact course of action with Snape.
There was a clattering sound at the other end of the mirror. Remus assumed it was a sleepy, groping hand searching on a nightstand for a pair of glasses and a wand.
“Lumos,” muttered a sleepy voice from the mirror. The glass of the two-way mirror glowed with wand light, allowing Remus to see a groggy looking James. “Wassamatter… s’late.”
“James, get the map.”
James hesitated, evidently confused that he was talking to a completely dark mirror.
“It’s Remus. Sirius has gone down the willow, James. We need to find him before long. He can’t spend the night alone.”
Immediately, the disoriented look disappeared from James’s sleep. It was replaced by a look of sharp focus, and Remus could hear the shifting of covers and the click of a latch to a trunk opening.
Suddenly, James’s face dropped, as though he had come to a realization that something terrible had happened.
“Remus,” James said slowly. “It’s too late.”
“What’s bloody too late? Just get the map, James, and come untie me.”
If James thought that Remus being tied up and trapped somewhere pitch black was abnormal, he did not show it. Instead he just shook his head slowly.
“It’s already dawn, Remus,” he said sadly, turning the mirror toward the window of their dormitory, where the first weak rays of sunlight were already filtering through the curtains.
“No,” Remus whispered, his heart filling with dread. Inwardly he cursed himself for not thinking of the mirror, cursed Snape for landing him in this situation, cursed Sirius for being thick-headed enough to want to transform. But mostly, he blamed himself for telling Sirius that he could not understand. Sirius had been so desperate for forgiveness, so eager to prove that he was capable of being serious, that he would willingly become a werewolf.
Deep down, Remus knew he should be touched, but mostly, he was just angry.
James had found the Marauder’s Map. Remus heard him mutter “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good” through the mirror and waited while James scoured the map for him.
“Blimey…” James said, sounding amazed.
“What is it?” Remus asked immediately, wondering what more could possibly go wrong.
“It’s nothing,” James assured him quickly. “It’s just the map. We did do some job on it, eh? It really does never lie. You’re still labeled ‘Remus Lupin’, stuck in a broom cupboard on the fourth floor. I’ll be there in just a moment.”
The mirror went dark, and Remus was quite alone in the cupboard. He lay there, trying not to panic and trying to let his mind wander to Sirius. An entire night as the wolf… how horrified would Sirius be? Would he even want to speak to Remus anymore?
Fighting the cold dread building in his heart, Remus waited impatiently for James to arrive. He tried to block out the memories of what it felt like to be the wolf, tried not to imagine what Sirius might look like, what he might think now.
Remus thought he knew, for the first time, what it must feel to be Sirius. To be affected by Snape’s words. Although Snape had thought he had been insulting Sirius, the words about spending the rest of his life alone had struck particularly close to home with Remus. Hadn’t that always been his worry? That because of the wolf, no one would ever love him, would ever understand him.
Why oh why couldn’t he have forgiven Sirius earlier? Remus had been so sure that he was going to be alone, and then Sirius had come along. He had forgotten exactly what Sirius had done for him, and now it might be too late. The wolf changed people. Who knew what Sirius would be like now? Remus thought it was likely that Sirius would never want anything to do with him again.
Alone… he would be alone, without Sirius for the rest of his life.
God he hated Snape for pointing that out.
The seconds ticked by every so slowly, and finally, at long last, the door to the broom cupboard swung open.
James, silhouetted against the faint flickering light of the torches in the hallway and the creeping rays of weak sunlight stood in the threshold. When he caught sight of Remus, he stopped dead.
“What is it?” Remus asked.
Remus thought he imagined a flicker of a smirk cross James’s face, but it was replaced almost immediately by a look of concern and worry. James bent over and severed the ropes with his wand. Pulling Remus to his feet, James asked, “What happened to you?”
“Had a run-in with Snape,” said Remus, still seething over the encounter. He brushed the dust off of his robes, and started to say that they should hurry when he noticed that James was still staring at him peculiarly.
“What?” Remus asked, unnerved.
“Snape must’ve been really mad at you,” James said simply.
“Look the moon’s already set, so Sirius should be back to normal by now. Do you… do you mind if I go find him by myself James?”
James hesitated for the slightest of moments, but then a look of understanding crossed his face and he gave Remus a half-smile. “Of course.”
Remus dashed down the corridor, bursting out the oak front doors and sprinting the distance of the lawn.
The soft orange light from the crack in the window seemed unbearably bright to him. Shaking and sore, covered with scratches and bruises, Sirius gingerly crawled his way toward his wand.
He hadn’t thought about the fact that changing into a werewolf would shred his clothes. That was his problem, wasn’t it? That he never planned ahead.
With shaking fingers, he raised the wand and tried to conjure a blanket. Clothes were too complex for him in his current state. On the fifth try, he managed to produce a raggedy old blanket. He shivered and pulled it around himself.
Exhausted, Sirius sank against the bare wooden wall of the Shack and huddled himself in a corner. Soon, when he regained his energy, he’d make an attempt to leave.
Shuddering, he closed his eyes and tried to shut out the memories of the previous night. A vivid image of his blood-stained mouth and hungry howl appeared unbidden in his mind. He shuddered violently and drew the blanket even closer around him.
Every month, he thought to himself, Remus did this every month. He could not imagine, could not know the pain of doing this every month, nor could he begin to think about how he would feel if he attacked Snape like this. It was monstrous. He was monstrous. This thing that grew inside his body was not his own, and yet it controlled him utterly and completely.
He clenched his fists tightly into the blanket. Still shaking slightly he squeezed his eyes shut tightly and tried to will the evil thing out of the body, to make it leave him. He was not evil, he was good, what was this thing doing to him.
Half lucid, shivering violently, huddled against the corner of the wall, Sirius sat, lost in his own thoughts. The wolf was alone. The wolf was isolation. He, Sirius, had been alone with evil. Who would ever want to go near him again?
Suddenly, with a bang, the door from the passage burst open.
“Sirius?”
He had never seen Sirius look so forlorn.
Of course, the shivering, terrified figure in the corner looked exactly like Remus Lupin, but one look into the boy’s eyes made it painstakingly clear that Sirius was inside that body. In the eyes of the crouched boy on the ground was a look of pure unadulterated horror, but Remus did not give himself entirely to emotions; it was Sirius who had always been the passionate one, the only person Remus knew who could have made such a complete transformation.
Only Sirius could be affected like this. Only Sirius could take the vicious fury of the wolf and turn it into pure horror and guilt.
Remus reached out with his hands and took a few cautious steps toward Sirius. “Sirius?” he repeated, as though saying Sirius’s name would allow the other boy to accept his presence.
Sirius did not move. His eyes were staring unfalteringly at Remus, as though not recognising him.
Slowly, acceptance and recognition filtered across Sirius’s face, and Remus took this as his cue to cross the final few steps between then and drop to his knees at Sirius’s side.
With trembling hands, Remus reached out to brush Sirius’s straggly brown hair out of his eyes. Sirius flinched at the contact and drew back, wrapping the blanket tightly around himself.
Remus faltered, hesitated, and decided that a stupid question would be the best course of action.
“Are you all right?” he asked, cringing inside as the words left his mouth.
Sirius didn’t speak. In fact, he pressed his lips so tightly together that they were nothing more than a thin white line on his already pale face.
“I’m sorry,” Remus said, feeling that this was rather lame, but once he had started speaking, the words came flowing out, words he had been longing to share with someone else who had experienced the wolf.
“I know it’s terrifying, and it’s painful, but I… I never meant for you to do this.” He closed his eyes briefly, willing himself not to cry. “I want you to know that whatever the wolf makes you think, whatever it does, it’s not a part of who you are. I found that out when you guys became Animagi. The wolf can be tamed and… and it doesn’t have to be alone.”
Sirius blinked at the last words, and a bit of warmth seemed to seep back into his expression. Encouraged, Remus reached out again. This time his fingertips brushed Sirius’s cheek and the other boy did not pull back.
“I’m scared too,” Remus whispered.
Quietly, he conjured a shabby set of robes for Sirius, holding his wand deftly so that the robes wrapped around Sirius’s bruised and bloody figure as they appeared. Sirius, although now fully clothed, did not drop the blanket, and didn’t move.
“Sirius?” Remus asked again. Sirius didn’t respond, just continued to stare blankly at Remus, as if lost in his own thoughts. Remus felt his heart sink. This was it. Snape had been right. Sirius had seen Remus for what he really was and Sirius was disgusted.
With a deep calming breath, Remus spoke again. “If you don’t want to be with me anymore… I’ll understand.”
He had to work hard to keep the edge of panic out of his voice.
For the first time Sirius’s eyes focused on Remus. The eyes still carried a bit of a haunting, terrified look that Remus suspected Sirius would never entirely be able to get rid of, but now something else had appeared in Sirius’s face. Was it indignation?
“Don’t be thick, Moony,” growled Sirius.
Yup, Remus thought, definitely indignation.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Remus twisted his lips into a small smile. “You don’t hate me for putting you through this?”
Sirius gave him a dubious look. “I put me through this Moony, because I wanted to. I wanted to understand what it felt like, to know why you were so angry.”
He turned away, his eyes staring now at the wall, following the freshly scratched furrows down the sides of the wooden planks. Shuddering, Sirius imagine what would have happened if he had encountered Snape last night. He wiped a droplet of blood off his arm and said in a far-off voice, “I think I get it now.”
The words wrenched at Remus’s heart. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“I wanted to.”
“I didn’t want you to.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Sirius said resignedly. “Its done and I don’t regret it. I needed to know.”
Suddenly, his voice cracked a little and the somewhat collected appearance that he had seemed to waver and crumble. “I’ve never felt so scared in my entire life, like I could destroy someone’s life, and what’s more, I wanted to.”
Remus hung his head shamefully. Sirius reached out and slid his hand under Remus’s chin, lifting it up so that their eyes met.
“But I know now. I’ve felt it,” Sirius continued. “So this time, when I say I’m sorry, will you believe that I mean it?”
Remus didn’t answer. Instead, he knew at that instant exactly how Sirius had felt. Both of them had known the wolf. Both of them had felt that terrifying feeling of viciousness. Both of them had been scared senseless at the idea that the wolf was so heinous that they would be alone for the rest of their lives.
But they wouldn’t be alone, they had each other.
It was a moment of perfect clarity, and in that moment, Remus Lupin understood everything. He knew that he was in love.
Sirius was still waiting for an answer. Remus gave him one. Leaning forward slowly, purposefully, he pressed his lips against Sirius’s firmly.
It had been far too long since they had kissed, Remus decided. Of course it was his fault, but he was more than making up for it now. His lips began to move fervently, more insistently, and Sirius returned the kiss with just as much passion, just as much desperation.
Everything that had come between them in the past month seemed to melt away. Everything that had happened the previous night, the horrors and terrifying emotions they had both endured, faded into the background. For them, for now, there was only each other.
The blanket slid off Sirius’s back as he reached his bruised and bloody arms out to encircle Remus’s waist and pull him closer. Remus vaguely regretted conjuring the shabby set of robes. They stayed entwined for a long time, locked in each other’s embrace, afraid to let go.
At long last, the broke apart, chests heaving, fingertips trembling and minds reeling.
Slowly, a wry smile crept onto Sirius face.
“Remus,” he croaked, “what have you done with my hair?”
“Huh?”
Utterly confused, Remus reached up absentmindedly and pulled a strand of his hair across his face so that he could see it.
The usually straight, sleek black hair was arranged in a neat curl and finished with a fluffy pink ribbon.
“Snape,” Remus muttered angrily.
He pressed his hands to his face, checking to see if any other damage had been done. As he drew his hands away he saw large purple spots on his hands where the ink that was drawn on his face had rubbed off.
He let loose a string of angry curses at Snape, embarrassed that he had spoiled such a romantic moment with his absurd appearance. His anger ebbing, he blushed furiously at the thought that Sirius had had to kiss him while he looked like this.
Sirius gave a small smirk. “I didn’t even know I could blush like that,” he said easily. Then, in a soft voice that was only half joking, he added, “As terrible as last night was, as scared as I was, if it meant that you would forgive me, I’d do it all over again, as many times as necessary. You can’t possibly think I care what you look like.”
Sirius grasped his wand from the floor next to him and pressed the tip of it onto Remus’s face, into his hair, removing all the hexes Snape had put in place one by one. Finally, when he was finished, he set his wand down.
“Say, you’re one devilishly handsome fellow,” Sirius said. Then he paused, as though thinking. “But not as devilishly handsome as I am.” He waved his hands at himself to indicate Remus’s body.
With a laugh, Remus leaned in and captured Sirius’s lips in his own. Sirius returned the kiss fervently, passionately. For a few brief moments everything was forgotten, the month of not speaking, sending Snape down the willow, even the horror of the transformation that they had now both experienced.
Then, there was a brilliant flash of white light and a harsh, unexpected jerk on both their souls.
Panting, they pulled away.
Remus was once more staring into the passionate grey eyes of Sirius, and Sirius looked deeply into Remus’s tranquil brown eyes.
“So,” Sirius said. “That’s it then. Potion must have worn off. We’re back to normal.”
Remus gave him an understanding smile. “Better than normal,” he amended.
“Better,” Sirius repeated.
He seized Remus’s hand in his own and together, they headed down the secret passageway back to school.
“So Slughorn ended up telling Dumbledore then?” James asked Sirius at dinner that day.
“Apparently,” Sirius replied, shoving a forkful of potatoes into his mouth nonchalantly. “Dumbledore called me into his office and everything.”
“What’d he do?”
“Just wanted to make sure that I was all right, and that no one got hurt. To be honest, he seemed… not happy about it but like satisfied, you know? Like he had known all along that it was going to happen, ever since what I did last month.”
Sirius shifted his eyes guiltily and shuddered slightly at the memory of the wolf and imagining what Remus might have done to Snape.
“Then he let me go,” Sirius finished.
“Just like that?” James asked.
“Just like that.”
They ate in silence for a few minutes. James wondered vaguely how exactly Remus had forgiven Sirius. He had assumed that Remus was heading for the shack this morning in order to offer Sirius comfort and perhaps forgive him for the previous month’s events, but he had not expect his two best friends to return, fully reconciled and closer than ever. They seemed to have some sort of unbreakable connection, some new bond that he could not touch. They just fit with each other, perfectly and completely.
Now if only Lily Evans were a werewolf, then he’d know exactly how to get her to like him.
Trying to take his mind off a certain red-haired prefect, James started in on his and Sirius’s favourite topic of conversation.
“Want to have a go at Snivellus?” he asked enthusiastically. “We should think up a punishment for the trouble he caused yesterday.”
Sirius shifted uncomfortably. “You know, I reckon we’d better lay of Snivelly for a while. I did almost kill him after all. He deserves at least a few months’ break for that.”
James stared at him incredulously.
“Are you sure you two switched back?” James asked. Sirius had never turned down a chance to plot against Snape before.
“Remus should be getting back from the hospital wing soon,” Sirius said, changing the subject quickly.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Just a few cuts and bruises, courtesy of yours truly. Madam Pomfrey healed him up just fine within a few seconds, but she insisted that he stay in bed for the day.”
Just then, Snape strode into the Great Hall, seemingly very pleased himself for trapping who he thought was Sirius Black in a broom cupboard for the night. Snape gave them an exaggerated sneer as he passed the Gryffindor table.
“Git,” James muttered under his breath.
Sirius wasn’t looking at Snape. He had just spotted Remus, fully recovered, walking inconspicuously through the doors. Sirius smiled at Remus. Remus returned it with a smile somewhat more mischievous than Sirius remembered.
Wondering if being in his body had been a bad influence on Remus, Sirius turned to see that James was reaching for his wand, clearly trying to think of a curse that would cause Snape significant embarrassment but not be discovered by the teachers sitting at the high table.
Before James could fire a spell or Sirius could discourage him from doing so, Snape distracted them both by exploding in a cloud of glittery pink smoke and emitting a series of violently purple sparks.
Every head in the Great Hall turned to look at the disturbance.
As the smoke cleared away and the sparks subsided, the figure that stood in its midst looked like an exceeding ugly girl wearing a horrendous dress the exact same shade of purple and pink as the cloud had been.
Snape (Sirius could only assume that this hideous girl-like creature was Snape) was clad in a purple dress that seemed to be covered in an excessive amount of frilly pink ribbons tied in bows. His hair was long and wavy, swept off his face with a sparkling silver hair band. Caked onto his face were layers upon layers of heavy make up. He reminded Sirius of his little cousin, Nymphadora Tonks, when she tried to morph herself to look like her dolls.
Snape ignored the rumbling laughter and snickers that began to sweep the Great Hall and stumbled awkwardly toward the Gryffindor table. Sirius noted that Snape was wearing extremely tall high heels and seemed to be having a bit of difficulty walking in them.
Two steps from the table, Snape tripped over the hem of his dress and almost went crashing into their plates of food, but he caught himself at the last moment by flinging out his hands to break his fall.
Fingers gripping the table so hard that his knuckles were turning white, Snape snarled, “YOU!”
Snape’s face contorted in ill-concealed rage. He jabbed a long, accusatory finger (which bore a large plastic ring) in Sirius’s face.
Sirius stared back at Snape, vaguely amused but completely nonplussed.
“Nice look for you, Snape,” Sirius said. “Did you wash your hair?”
“You did this to me, Black,” Snape hissed. There was a mad sort of look in his eyes, as if he were so angry that he had lost all semblance of self control. “You couldn’t handle being bested by me outright in a duel, so you had to resort to sneaky, underhanded tactics, you dirty, cheating Gryffindor.”
“Haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about, Snivella,” Sirius replied nonchalantly. James gave a snort of laughter beside him.
“Last night!” Snape insisted. He looked as if he was going to burst with fury.
“I didn’t see you at all last night, Snivella,” Sirius said truthfully. “Don’t go making up fantasies about us now. Sorry, but I’m just not physically attracted to you.”
“I hexed you! You’re just too bloody bigheaded to admit it, Black. Maybe I didn’t go for the public embarrassment like a coward, but we both know that I caused more damage than you did.”
There was too much truth in this statement than Sirius cared to admit, and not for the reasons that Snape suspected. The ability to retort escaped Sirius, and Snape continued.
“Your little prank lacks originality, Black,” Snape sneered. “Only an insecure prat like you would find such a crude joke about masculinity amusing. Besides, you lose points for making it so easily reversible.”
Snape reached for his wand to get rid of the dress, only to find that what was tied to the waist of his dress was not a wand, but a large, droopy sunflower.
“Yeah, I reckon you’re right, Snape. Only your secure masculinity allows you to pull off that dress,” Sirius said, smirking.
“I mutilated that stupid smug face of yours and trapped you in a dirty broom cupboard for the night,” Snape fumed, pelting the sunflower at Sirius. It flopped pointlessly in mid-air and landed with a plop in Sirius’s dinner. Snape’s face seemed to lighten up a little bit as he relished the memory. “Not so attractive then, were you, Black? And how’d you get out, anyway? Bang your great thick head repeatedly against the door until it cracked from the strain?”
“You did what?” demanded a stern voice from behind them.
Professor McGonagall had left her seat at the top table, probably originally to help Snape, but at this revelation, she had changed her mind.
“Professor, I’ve been cursed,” Snape said immediately, gesturing with his hands at his attire. Sirius noted that Snape’s fingernails were painted with sparkling blue nail polish.
“So I see. What’s this about cursing Mr. Black and trapping him in a closet all night?”
The look on Snape’s face told Sirius that Snape was trying to do some quick thinking, but evidently he wasn’t quick enough.
“Detention!” Professor McGonagall said. “Unacceptable, assaulting another student like that.”
She waved her wand at Snape and the dress and makeup instantly disappeared. “We’ll be seeing your Head of House now, Snape. Make no mistake about it! I daresay you deserve a harsher punishment, but we’ll see what Professor Slughorn thinks. Attacking other students at night! Trapping them in broom cupboards!”
“But I’m the victim here! He cursed me,” Snape protested.
Covertly, James was amusing himself by pointing his wand at Snape from underneath the table and writing messages on the back of Snape’s dress (“I am a bloody stupid git” and “I can’t attract girls, so I became one”). Neither Snape nor McGonagall noticed. Sirius, however, had to struggle to contain his laughter.
“Locking another student in a cupboard all night is a far worse offense than cursing someone at dinner,” McGonagall replied. “You put another student in serious danger, Mr. Snape. We’ll deal with the culprit here after we’ve taken care of your punishment.” She cast Sirius a suspicious glare that clearly said “What I mean is I’ll be dealing with you later.” Sirius gave her the most innocent look anyone could muster while suppressing gales of hysterical laughter.
“I was put in worse danger,” Snape pointed out shrewdly.
McGonagall paused for only a second. “That matter is out of my jurisdiction, Mr. Snape,” she said quietly. “You were told by the Headmaster not to address it.”
But her voice softened considerably after that. “Now come along, Snape. We have to see Professor Slughorn.”
Snape had no choice but to follow her. He gave Sirius a scathing look that implied there would be hell to pay later for this most recent embarrassment, but Sirius just shrugged it off.
As McGonagall and Snape disappeared out of the doors, the Great Hall filled with amused chatter. Sirius chuckled a little to himself after he was sure that McGonagall was gone. He had a feeling that he knew who was responsible for Snape’s sudden brush with his feminine side, and sure enough, as he turned to glance down the Gryffindor table, he saw Remus pocket his wand.
Remus winked at Sirius, and went back to eating his own food as if nothing had happened.
Sirius couldn’t help but to smile to himself. He was a lucky bloke, really.