Rosekiller

{Poems of great love and most of all songs of freedom}

A single pair of footsteps echoed through the halls, the students would be in class by now, he remembered pulling so many pranks here and running away from Minnie afterwards,
he found himself walking towards the forest, he avoided the windows of the classrooms he didn’t want anyone to know he was here.

As he reached his destination he smiled, It’s been over a decade since he’s been here, he walked over to the tree, the ‘Whomping Willow’ they used to call it,
He let out a shaky breath, the air was getting colder now that winter was approaching.

“Sirius?” He turned, Sirius hadn’t heard anyone follow him then again he wasn’t paying that much attention.

“Hi Poppy” the older woman hugged him, he remembered the first time she did that, it was after he told her why he wore the bandages, at the time he thought ‘This is how a mother should be’ and he stands by that.

“My word, It’s been ages, I told Minnie we should visit–but you know her; always busy with work” he chuckles.

“Yeah..I heard you got a promotion, congratulations Headmistress Pomfrey” she smiles brightly at him.

“Thank you dear-” suddenly her smile falters and turns into a worried frown.

“Dear, I heard about Teddy, are you okay?” He sighed. “I think I need some help” she nods.

“Let’s go to my office” she links arms with him, he takes one last look at the tree then follows her back to the castle.
______________________________

He looks at all the portraits and little things that’s changed in the room.
He's been in here enough times to know nothing has really changed, only some framed pictures on her desk along with a tea set on a table off to the side.

Instead of sitting in her main chair, she brings the tea set over and sits down next to him.

“Now then what is it you need help with?” He takes a moment then looks at her.

“I feel like I’m going crazy, though that is a genetic trait in my family I suppose” She gives him a small smile, she knows he’s stalling but for what?

“Sirius darling, It’s okay if you're not ready to accept the reality of the situation” he shakes his head.

“No I need to, I want to help, I don’t want Remus or anyone to look at me like that” she tilts her head.

“Like what?”

“Like I’m fragile, like I can’t handle the truth, I just need someone to tell me he's gone—not dead, just–missing” She reaches for his hand.

“Nobody tells me anything anymore, The girls can’t look at me without tearing up and Prongs tries really hard to smile-but whenever I speak it’s like I’m summoning the devil and he tenses up, and Reggie hasn’t spoken to me and Remus has been coming home later and later–I just-” Poppy gives his hand a gentle squeeze.

“It’s okay just breath, Sweetheart?” He nods.

“First of all, the way you talk about Remus coming home later, you make it sound like he's cheating” He sniffles.

“I wouldn’t blame him—Lately I’ve been–” she held up her hand.

“I’ve known all of you since you were eleven, the same age when Remus came to me and asked if it was possible to marry someone at school because he found the most beautiful boy ever” He frowned.

“I came out to him much later” she shrugged. “When he told me your name, I asked why he called you a boy, and he said it was because you flinched every time someone called you a girl” he stared down at the empty cup on the desk.

“Dear, if you told Remus to jump off a bridge, he’d find the tallest one, that man is smitten with you, he’d rather bash his head against a tree before he’d cheat on you” Sirius nods.

“Poppy can you?-” he trails off, She nods and takes hold of both of his hands.

“Sirius, Teddy was kidnapped on the Eighth of November, everyone has been looking for him and you haven’t been yourself lately and that’s okay because your grieving”

He feels tears fall before he can react. It’s almost funny, he wanted to know the truth so that he could feel better… but he doesn’t, now it just feels like there’s a hole in his heart, or is it that he has no heart at all?
She stands and pulls him into a hug, she holds him until he calms down.

“Why can’t they even look at me?” She takes a deep breath and helps him stand up.

“Sirius dear, you and Teddy bear a lot of similarities, in your looks, your voice, in everything really” she smiles and wipes away a stray tear.

“I know you might not see it, but everyone agrees even Remus-” she cuts herself off and looks at him warily.
“I know that look, you're not going to do anything illegal right?” He’s not ashamed to say he was considering it.

“Does it really count if I’m not the one doing it first? I mean this guy kidnapped my kid of course I’m gonna commit a crime to get him back.”She didn’t agree nor did she dismiss it instead, she shakes her head with a fond smile.

“Before you go-” she pushes a tin full of blackberry biscuits. “Have a biscuit Mr. Lupin-Black” he smiled and took one, she shoots him a glare, closes the bowl and hands it to him.

“You need it more, besides I have extra and I know Blackberry is your favourite” He chuckles, and walks towards the door, before he walked out he turns his head.

“Thank you Poppy, I mean it” she leans on her desk with a smile. “It was my pleasure dear, Try not to get arrested will you?”

“No promises” he winks, and walks out the door, he needs to get back to London soon…
___________________________________________

The bustling sound of people filled the streets of Winchester, it always got crowded this time of year with christmas approaching and all, The plan was simple all he had to do was meet up with Barty at the ‘City bridge’, t
hat’s good and all but the problem is it’s nearly one in the afternoon and the other man hasn’t showed,
so now the question was: where the fuck is Barty?! Little did Raba know all of his questions would be answered in one simple phone call.

He picked up on the second ring.

{Hello?}

“Yeah Hi, where the fuck are you?”

He heard a groan on the other line.

{No, where are you, I’ve been waiting for two hours now and frankly if this woman offers me one more drink I’m gonna puke}

“Hold on, did you say drink? Where are you, some kind of pub?”

{Yeah that’s where we were supposed to meet, wait back up, where are you right now?”

“Winchester City bridge like you said, where are you?”

He heard cursing in the background, then a sigh.

{I said ‘Winchester bridge’}

Raba scoffed.

“Yeah that’s where I am”

{The Pub Raba!, ‘The Bishop on the Bridge, Winchester’ no fucking way, are you acutally by the city bridge right now?}

“Yeah I am, It’s not my fault you're so damn cryptic!”

{Okay fuck, just stay where you are I’ll be right there}

And with that the call disconnected, and Raba was left with two things on his mind, One: This was both the funniest and most embarrassing moment of his life and Two: he was gonna kill Barty Crouch Jr.

The man in question arrived a few moments later and spent a whole –not joking– twenty-five minutes laughing at him, and another six telling him to get a map next time.

It’s honestly hard to believe that this guy is a serial killer.

“Can we just focus right now, have you found anything?” he nods, and pulls out a location on his phone.

“The guy works at ‘Elephant Records’ . Do you wanna take this one?” he shrugs.

“Sure why not, but are you sure this guy is working with S.P?” Barty smiles.

“This ‘Guy’ is Evan’s ex, haven’t you noticed, this guy is using people close to Ev but we do still need to find a connection to those three Alice arrested” He internally curses, he forgot he has court tomorrow.

“We need to finish this up quickly–I have a case to win”
______________________________________________

He looks back at the address Barty texted him. “8, Kings Walk, Winchester SO23 8AF” he mumbled, the other man would stand as a look out,
They made sure not a lot of people were in the store at the time to avoid any unnecessary witnesses.

The guy's name was Daniel Kingsman, apparently he and Evan dated back in Hogwarts, the guy broke up with the blonde because he liked crime novels and podcasts,
It was probably best Raba went instead of Barty, the man looked about ready to throw a knife in an old lady’s head.

Kingsman should be on break now, he thought as he slipped through the small crowd of people to enter the break room (completely ignoring the employees only sign).

He followed the man through a door that led to the back of an alleyway, when Kingsman took out a pack Cigarettes Raba pinned him against the wall.

“What the-” before he could finish his sentence Raba got out a (Clean) long thin needle and pushed the contents up the brunette’s arm (yes he found a vein on the first try, you can fight me on that but I’m lazy so don’t).

“What did you just-”

“Listen to me very carefully, do you know Evan Rosier?” He nodded frantically. Raba rolls his eyes. “How do you know him?”

“He’s my ex, what is this about and what the hell did you just shoot up my arm!” he smiled.

“A poison I made myself, the more your heart rate picks up the faster you die, I have the antidote all you have to do Is calm down and tell me what I want to know, can you do that?” He nods.

“Good, now then do you know—”
______________________________

After he was done interrogating the guy he let him go, he started to walk off when he called.

“Wait, what about the poison?!” He turned his head with a smile.

“Oh relax Kingsman, It’s just a rabies shot”

“My names not Kingsman” what?

“Wait, what is it then?” The guy slumped down on the ground.

“My names Dean Mathews, if your talking about who I think you are, Daniel Kingsman is my brother in law”

Well fuck…
__________________________________________

Remus tried to grab his cane from next to him, James stopped him.

“No, I’m sure he’ll be back soon” he huffed and sat back down. “He’s right you know, Panda and Reg are out looking for him, if they don’t find him then you can go and I’ll gladly go with you, but for now have a cinnamon roll”
Evan agreed, placing a plate down on the coffee table. Lily walked in soon after with a tea tray.

“Come on Remus, I’m sure they’ll be back soon” she said placing a hand on his shoulder.

As if on cue the door opened, and as if his anxiety couldn’t get any worse it was just Reg and Panda that walked in.

This time he actually grabbed his cane and James didn’t stop him, then the door went open again and this time Sirius walked in holding a large tin bowl, a bag and a bouquet of white Lilies that had a bit of red on them.

Remus walked towards him.

“Where in god's name have you been? We were all worried sick” he scolded lightly, he was more relieved than annoyed, the older man shrugged and placed down the bowl and the bag he had except the flowers.

“I went to scotland to visit Poppy, I spat on my parents grave, I beat up a guy that was trying to rob this flower shop for some reason,
Ignore the blood on the flowers, that’s from another guy, and that’s it–oh I got some pastries from this nice lady selling them down the street,
Ignore the blood on the bag, that’s from someone who mentioned the name Roland and I thought ‘oh my god isn’t Seph dead?’ So I walked up to him, yeah?

Then he wouldn’t tell me anything so I asked the lady to hold my bag while I dragged that guy into an alleyway, beat some info out of him and I got Blood on my hands.
That's how it ended up on the bag—-—-—Anyway, how was your day hon?”

Everyone stared at him god smacked.

“What the fuck!” Exclaimed James–wait did James just curse at his best friend? Can pigs fly now? He’ll look out the window later.

“What?” Sirius asked with the face of an innocent school girl, honestly you wouldn’t tell that this is the same guy who talked about Spitting on his parents grave and beating up two–or more–guys.

“How could you talk so casually about that..what about Te—-what about Teddy?” Sirius thinking that he was Still carrying Teddy had become something along the lines of a safe place for everyone, except the few who could not stand to look at the man because of the resemblance,
Remus was one of them, he mostly stayed out late at the police station, last night he slept over there, but this morning when he came home Sirius was gone.

Sirius frowned.

“I’m trying to find him, no thanks to any of you who like keeping things from me” he felt guilt overcome him. So he knew.

“You know if one of you just told me, the least I would have done is cry— but no you all chose to lie and avoid me do you know how that felt,
none of you could even look at me, Reggie you wouldn’t even speak to me and Moony you just out right didn’t come home for days, all while I was going mad,
I had to go to Poppy just for someone to tell me that Teddy was missing, so all of that stops today, right now okay?”

Pandora ran over to him and pulled him into a hug. “I’m sorry” she mumbled. “It’s fine Panda, oh–and I don’t want any apologies I forgive you guys”

Reg walked over to him after Pandora broke the hug. Sirius let out a gasp and put his hand to his chest dramatically.

“Does my baby brother, the Regulus Astrophysicist Black want to give me a hug?” The younger brother rolls his eyes.

“Not if you make it weird” he mumbled, Sirius pulled him into a tight hug. “James this is your one chance at a group hug” as soon as Sirius said that James made sure to pull everyone in the room into a hug.

Once everyone pulled apart, James announced that he was going to make dinner, Regulus went with him, Pandora and Lily went to call Alice or Ted for an update, and Evan walked to the library area to make a call that left Sirius and Remus in the living room alone.

A few moments of silence went by before Remus spoke.

“Listen I’m-”

“Didn’t I say I don’t want any apologies?” He sighed and the other man walked closer and kissed him, when they pulled back Sirius gave him a hug.

“Thank you for always being with me, I know these past few weeks have been hard on you too, I’m here now so you can let go” Remus hugged him tighter.

“I missed you ... .and I miss him” he spoke with a broken tone, Sirius pulled him on the couch and just continued to comfort him.

“I know baby, I promise we’ll find him soon”

Sirius always knew how to make it seem like everything was gonna be okay, that was a spell only he could cast on Remus… The spell of comfort.
___________________________________________

Evan closed the library door, at first he just wanted to give Sirius and Remus a minute alone, but he actually wanted to make a call now.

Nobody had seen or heard from Barty since that day, and Evan doubted that he’d even pick up, but it was worth a try,
So to save his sanity he decided to try three times if Barty didn’t pick up on the third try he’d stop calling.
The first try nothing happened, it was the same with the second try so he just left a voice message.

{This is Barty leave a message after whatever comes next, I guess?}

After the long beep cut through the line, Evan spoke.

“Hi Barty, It’s Evan, I just wanted to know what you were doing, nobody has heard from you in a while so just checking in, anyway call me as soon as you get this I miss you bye”

As he looked back down at the contact, he just wanted to—try again.

“Hi it’s me again–um, where are you? I–I’m really not kidding Bee I fucking miss you”

Again.

“Bee, what did you mean when you said you weren’t gonna play by that fucker’s rules, I swear if you got yourself killed-”

Again.

“—-I love you”

One more time.

“I said I love you, I mean I really do ... .What am I going to do? All of this everything, from the boxes to the notes, It’s all my fault, I keep trying to ask myself what would you do and I don’t—I don’t know…come home please”

He didn’t try again, he just stared at Barty’s number, suddenly he wished he could go back to the first time they met, things weren’t good then but they weren’t this bad.

“‘Tell me every terrible thing you ever did, and let me love you anyway’” he mumbled…
___________________________________