Chapter 28
‘Ow, seriously Lils, be gentle! It bloody hurts!’ whined James Potter, as his wife smeared Boil Reducer over his skin. ‘Sirius, explain it again. Why did you let the wards down when there were Death Eaters outside?’
Sirius gave a shrug. ‘I didn’t know that, did I? Someone knocked on the door, so I opened it for them.’
‘Not the door, Siri, the wards!’
‘Right. The wards. They’re very strong.’ Sirius nodded emphatically.
‘But not if you let them down when enemies are attacking! Merlin’s teeth,’ cried James. ‘Are you truly that insane?’
Sirius flinched, shuffling back against the wall. ‘Sorry, Jamie.’ He mumbled, looking properly ashamed.
‘Stop it, James! He can’t help it!’ hissed Lily.
‘He can’t just be letting the wards down when someone attacks! We are relying on him to keep the Order safe when we are here! Siri, look at me. You must not let the wards down again, do you hear me? No matter how many times someone – someone bloody knocks, you do not let them in, alright? Do you understand me?’ James was right up in Sirius’ face, gripping his shoulders hard.
Sirius’ flinch wasn’t entirely faked this time. He wasn’t even able to come up with some sort of nonsense to really sell the ‘insane’ persona. James was too close. Gripping too tight. The pain was making his mind want to drift, to get away. Sirius’ eyes began to glaze, and James let go, stepping back with a huff.
‘Bloody hell,’ he muttered. ‘We’re all fucked if this is what we’re relying on.’
Sirius thought that was supposed to be just to Lily, but he wasn’t deaf, no matter how much people seemed to think he was.
Sirius tried to shake it off. ‘Where’s that little boy? He was pretty cute.’ he asked brightly, but his eyes were sharp as he looked between Lily and James.
A flash of guilt on Lily’s face, anger on James’.
‘You let the wards down and they took him. Not to mention they hexed the lot of us and covered me in these damned boils!’ James snapped.
Sirius had heard enough. Time to get things moving.
‘Let’s go get ice-cream.’ He said brightly. ‘This house is going to be crawling with doxies soon. We should get out while they fix their nests after all the racket.’
‘What?’ asked Lily, confused.
‘Doxies. Lots of ruckus in here a few moments ago. The doxies like to fix their nests after that sort of thing – but if we’re here when they do, they’ll use bits of us to help. Mostly hair, usually. Pull it right out of your head. And from your arms and legs, and anywhere else they can reach.’ He said with a raised brow.
Lily glanced around nervously.
James gave Sirius a sceptical look. ‘Doxies? Really?’
‘The house is telling me to get out. The doxies are waking up. Kreacher!’ Sirius called.
‘Dirty fleabag master calls Kreacher from his hidey-hole right before the doxies are waking up. Dirty fleabag master must want something very important to risk doxy bites. Kreacher will make dog master regret it if Kreacher gets doxy bites.’ The sour little elf muttered, eyeing each of them balefully.
Sirius gave him a subtle wink. Kreacher was a clever elf. Winning him over had taken a while, but Merlin’s beard was it useful! No doubt the conniving little elf had been listening out of sight and was probably relishing the opportunity to scare the ‘filthy Light fools’ who had been helping themselves to his family’s house for years, trying to take things that didn’t belong to them and destroy them for being Dark. Nobody held a grudge like a house elf.
‘Alright, let’s get out.’ agreed James, shrugging his shirt back on carefully, wincing as it rubbed over his boils.
Sirius shepherded them out the front door, chattering about ice-cream flavours, before brushing a subtle hand over the door to set the wards on full alert.
He had a small boy to find, and he was not risking these idiots taking over his house again while he was gone.
In the front garden Sirius twisted into his dog form, tongue lolling out goofily, and bounded around in circles, nearly knocking Lily over. Before she could scold him, he tensed up, ears pricked and mouth closed and foot lifted, as he stared into the distance.
‘Sirius, you better not be off to chase a squirrel, I swear to Merlin!’ James growled.
Sirius gave him a doggy grin, then took off, bounding towards a tree down the road and barking. He could hear James running behind him, so he took off again, running faster and further, before barking at another tree just inside a small park. James’ footsteps faded, and he ran around a corner, then doubled back through the little park, straining his sensitive ears.
‘I’m not running after him, Lils, he’s too fast and my boils hurt!’ James was whining. ‘He’ll come back here later when he’s had his fun. Let’s go. He’ll be fine.’
Sirius watched as they ducked down a side alley, listening for the telltale pops of apparition.
He waited a little while longer, just in case, before transforming back to human form and strolling back down the road toward his house.
Time to find Harry.