A/N: These characters belong to J.K. Rowling. I have to give her credit because there is no other story quite like Harry Potter!
The sun crept in through the bars of the prison window. It snaked across the wall and lit up a lonely corner of the cell. Sirius Black was curled up in that corner, asleep. Dark shadows and scaly hands wove in and out of his dreams, making him tremble ever so slightly. He turned over, trying to block out the nightmares. But they wouldn’t leave.
In the cell next to him, a woman’s voice cried out pitifully. Sirius jerked out of sleep, breathing heavily. For one glorious minute, Sirius thought he was in his old flat. But reality came rushing back to him. A bitter cold caught in his chest and horrible thoughts flickered across his mind. A strangled cry escaped the man’s lips. He gripped his dirty, mangled hair and shuddered violently.
“Sirius…Sirius…Lily and James…They’re dead…I’ve only just found out.”
His own voice echoed in his head. It sounded so unlike the one he used to have.
“No…No! You’re lying! You’re lying! They wouldn’t leave me! They just can’t be…They’re not…dead.”
Sirius jerked out of his horror with a shaking growl. His whispered hoarsely to himself through gritted teeth.
“You’re innocent. You didn’t kill them! Why would you? They were your best friends…they were the only thing that kept you from turning!”
As always, this seemed to help. He cleared his aching head and looked up. He could just glimpse the large yellow ball of light that peered through the bars of his window. With a strange light-headed spasm, he remembered the feeling of a warm summer’s day. And with that feeling came a strange, sudden memory that Sirius didn’t even know he had forgotten.
The sun was directly over head. It sparkled off a lake’s surface, broken here and there by the few kids who wanted to swim. A gentle breeze shook Sirius’ long dark hair and trees swayed in the distance. A lanky teen with extremely untidy black hair sat beside him. A wicked grin sat on his handsome face that clearly spelled “trouble”.
“Hey Sirius,” the boy said, “I wonder what would happen if we woke McGonagall up at three A.M.”
Sirius snickered. A disapproving voice sounded on the other side of Sirius.
“That is way to early to wake up a teacher. I bet that’s detention for a month!”
Sirius whipped around to scowl at the voice. The boy was small and thin with a sickly look to him. His shaggy brown hair was in need of a haircut. One of his eyebrows was raised so high that it appeared to be in danger of disappearing into his hair.
“They wouldn’t give them to us!” Sirius scoffed. A questioning look crossed the boy’s face.
“And why not?” he asked.
“Because, Remus,” piped a chubby looking boy on the other side of the black haired one, “James and Sirius are in detention so much that the teachers are under the impression that they like detention. I also heard the teachers are thinking about renaming it after them.”
A loud bout of raucous laughter followed this comment.
Sirius found himself laughing hysterically. He had forgotten that one could laugh so hard. Joyous tears wet his dirt-covered face, and he found his whole body absorbed in the laughter. His chest shook and his ribs were in danger of cracking. Several gaunt looking faces peered intently at him through prison cell bars.
“You’re l-laughing?” one asked, horrified.
“He’s finally cracking?!” another gasped.
Just then, the door at the end of hall banged open. Voices stopped whispering, and Sirius’s laughter died in his throat. A terrible aching cold swept through the hallway. A horrible feeling of doom unglued their minds. The guy across the hallway collapsed and fell whimpering. Sirius tried to make himself as small as possible against the wall of his cell. He shuddered involuntarily.
A pair hooded dementors glided across the hallway. They drew in a couple of ragged breaths and sucked in all happiness and sanity within range. The woman in the next cell cried desperately for her mother. Sirius’ body went numb and a ragged cry tore his throat. The memory he just remembered was like a precious sip of water that was trickling between his fingers. His mind reached out for it, but it was gone. It was replaced with the worst thing that ever happened to him.
Two pairs of dementors’ icy, dead hands held Sirius up. A horrible racking cold split through him every time he drew a shuddering breath. A fire was being put out in the distance, and a large gaping hole sat where a street had once lain. Dead bodies were scattered everywhere, creating a nauseating sight for all who were faint of heart. Several men sprinted back and forth, trying to fix the damage done. Sirius’ gray eyes were widened with fear as he watched the scene before him.
Among the frantic movements of the people, one man stood watching Sirius. A look of twisted anger sat on his face.
“So,” the man hissed, “is this what you wanted?”
Sirius mouthed wordlessly. He was too scared to speak. The man’s mustache quivered with each breath he took.
“You killed sixteen people, Black. You also destroyed Peter Pettigrew. All we found of him was his finger!”
“No, it wasn’t me!” Sirius cried, finding his voice at last. The angry man gave an evil laugh.
“Then who was it?” The man said almost jokingly.
“Peter Pettigrew did it. He killed all these people! He also betrayed Lilly and James to You-Know-Who!”
The man pointed his wand at Sirius, who quavered beneath the man’s fire-red eyes.
“You filthy liar! You killed Pettigrew and you betrayed Lilly and James! I’m sending you to Azkaban were you belong.”
“No I didn’t do it! Don’t send me there!” Sirius screamed.
“It’s only your word against twenty witnesses. I hope you rot in there!”
The dementors began to drag Sirius along the ground, scraping his shins and knees. He twisted around and shouted one last angry yell at the man standing there.
“INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY, CROUCH!”
Sirius woke up from the nightmare, drenched in sweat and shaking uncontrollably. The dementors had gone, but the air was still stale from their presence. He pushed himself up into a sitting position. Taking deep breaths, he tried to calm himself.
For a whole hour, Sirius sat there. A feeling of doom had surrounded him. He tried not to think or feel, but he was failing horribly. He was going to stay in this awful place for the rest of his days. He’d never be able tell the truth to the two people who deserved to know.
A pair of voices at the end of the hall interrupted Sirius’ musings. He listened to them.
“No, I’m not going to leave just yet McNair. I’m going to check up on some of the prisoners. We can’t have them finding a way to overcome the dementors,” said the first voice.
“Whatever you say, minister,” growled the second.
Sirius shook his head and whipped his eyes on his dirty and mangled robe. He had recognized the first voice. It belonged to the Minster of Magic, Cornelius Fudge. When he said ‘some of the prisoners’ he had meant Sirius. Sure enough, the minister entered his cell.
“Hello, Sirius. How are you?” the minister spoke as if he were facing a mentally ill person.
“Well enough for someone who has lived twelve years in this earthly imitation of hell,” sighed Sirius, his face to the wall. The minister was silent, so Sirius spoke again.
“When can I walk free? I can’t stand this anymore.”
The minister was normally a very weak person, but at the moment his eyes held a very fierce glow.
“Do you still believe your innocent,” he said.
“Yes.”
“And you still believe it was Pettigrew who killed those twelve people plus the Potters?”
“Yes.”
The minister shook his head in disbelief. “How come you seem so sane, and everyone else in this place has gone mad?”
“Because,” Sirius said, “They were guilty. My story, however, is not very happy. So how can the dementors take it. Pettigrew was my friend. A friend who became a traitor.”
The minister’s eyes were in danger of falling out of his head. Sirius’ heart gave a leap of joy. If Fudge believed him, he could be walking free. Maybe seeing how miserable Sirius is would convince the minister. If it did, Sirius silently swore he would always agree with Cornelius Fudge.
“How is he, Cornelius,” said Sirius, adapting his miserable manner.
“Who? Harry?”
Sirius nodded. The minister smiled at him sympathetically.
“Sirius, the boy looks so much like his father. It’s almost unbelievable. His attitude is a lot like James’ too. But one can see Lily in him. You know, he saved the school last year. Harry, who is only twelve-years-old, found the mysterious Chamber of Secrets that was built by Salazar Slytherin. He also defeated a basilisk. Sirius, if he is twelve now…what will he be like in couple years?”
Sirius’ eyes were streaming. And this time, he hadn’t forced it. He wanted to see his godson so bad it was like having a constant stomachache. He whipped his eyes again and looked up. Fudge looked terribly sad, now. He patted Sirius on the shoulder.
“I can’t let you go, Sirius,” he choked, “I know how bad you must hurt. But I can’t let you go. You might be innocent, but every wizard thinks you’re a deranged madman who killed thirteen people with one curse. I’m so sorry.”
It is funny how one statement can drown all your dreams. Sirius didn’t realize how far he had been getting his hopes up until they were destroyed. He changed the subject forcibly.
“You know what I really miss,” he said with pained smile on his face, “Doing the crossword puzzles in the newspaper every morning.”
Cornelius sensed Sirius’ want to be alone. He opened the cell door and handed Sirius a copy of a newspaper.
“The crossword is in there. And here is a quill,” he sighed, “I very sorry, Sirius.” And he left.
Tears were falling down Sirius’s face, but he didn’t bother to stem the flow. He flipped through the newspaper idly, reading here and there. A picture on page ten caught his attention. A large family was waving back up at him. The background was in Egypt. He read the caption underneath with curiosity.
MINISTRY OF MAGIC EMPLOYEE
SCOOPS GRAND PRIZE
Arthur Weasley, Head of the Misuse of Muggle Ar-
tifacts Office at the Ministry of Magic, has won the
annual Daily Prophet Grand Prize Galleon Draw.
A delighted Mr. Weasley told the Daily Prophet,
“We will be spending the gold on a summer holi-
day in Egypt, where our eldest son, Bill, works as a
curse breaker for Gringotts Wizarding Bank.”
The Weasley family will be spending a month in
Egypt, returning for the start of the new school
year at Hogwarts, which five of the Weasley chil-
dren currently attend.
Sirius took another look at the picture. Six boys and one girl stood around their parents. They all were laughing joyously and kept pointing at different things. Two boys, who were undoubtedly twins, kept trying to annoy an older brother that had a Head Boy badge pinned to his fez. Sirius watched as the brother lose his temper and yell at the twins who began to make faces. The girl beside them laughed and another brother pulled her into a one-arm hug. A rat on the other brother's shoulder cleaned its whiskers and scratched its ears.
There was something quite familiar about the rat.
Sirius turned to the page with the crosswords on it. Suddenly, he realized what was familiar about the rat. His heart leapt in his throat as he flipped back to page ten. The rat seemed ordinary enough, but one of the rat’s toes was missing.
You also destroyed Peter Pettigrew. All we found of him was his finger!
The words flashed across Sirius’ head like lightning. Pettigrew had cut off his finger the day Sirius had cornered him. And it was common knowledge to Sirius that Pettigrew could transform into a rat. An evil smile spread on the prisoner’s lips.
Twelve long years in Azkaban for a crime that he didn’t even commit. That rat had sent him to this place. Revenge flickered in Sirius’ eyes. He was going to escape this prison. He turned to the wall and chuckled,
“Innocent until proven guilty.”