eavesdropping
18 December 1996
Euphemia's POV
I shiver as the door to the Three Broomsticks opens as snow and icy air blow into the pub. I wrap my hands tightly around my mug of Butterbeer, taking a long sip and relishing how the warm amber drink feels as it warms me from the inside out, and turn my attention back down to the book in front of me. Angelina and Alicia had been here earlier, but rather than wait for the Twins who are taking their sweet time, they went back to their shopping as both of them are behind on their Christmas shopping. Suddenly, cold hands cup my cheeks from behind me and I squeal and pull away. The Twins laugh as they sit down, pulling their hats and scarves and cloaks off. "I hate you two!" I laugh, shivering and holding my Butterbeer closer.
"George maybe, but you love me," Fred says, winking at me.
"I had to make friends with the Weasley twins, didn't I? I should go back in time and tell myself to steer clear of the whole lot of you," I tease, finishing my drink. "You guys want a Butterbeer?"
"I'll get them," Fred jumps up before I can pull out my coin purse. I sigh and look at George sitting across from me.
"I wish you'd let me pay sometimes," I grumble.
"A lady never pays, Phe," George shrugs, some snow still stuck to the ends of his hair that his hat didn't cover. The Weasley's, always unfailingly generous and caring, never let Harry and I help them with anything. Whether it was drinks at the Three Broomsticks or staying with them last summer. Harry and I inherited more money than we could ever hope to spend from our parents but the Weasley's never took anything we offered them. Before I can argue, Fred returns and sets a Butterbeer in front of me.
"Thank you," I say to the two of them and take a sip. "So, what the hell took you guys so long? Angie and Alicia left almost 20 minutes ago."
"We had some uh, business to do first," Fred says, looking down at his Butterbeer.
"You're not gonna elaborate?" I ask, chuckling.
"Nope," they say in unison, giving me their best 'look how innocent we are' look which I know better than to believe after 5 years of friendship.
Before I can challenge them, another cold breeze cuts through the air and I turn to see Hermione, Ron and Harry walking through the door. Harry immediately locks eyes with me and all three of them make their way over to our table looking very guilty.
"Harry, what the hell are you doing here?" I ask, angry, confused and maybe a little impressed but I won't tell him that. While I know how upset Harry has been at not being able to visit Hogsmeade, it has been a slight weight off my shoulders that he has been kept safe in the castle while Sirius Black is still free. Harry's wide eyes dart to the Weasley Twins behind me which is all the answer I needed. Grabbing my book off the table, I turn to the closest twin, Fred, and hit his shoulder. "OH! I told you to keep the map in a safe place! Not tell my little brother how to sneak out of the castle!"
"You knew about the map?" Harry asks, pulling a familiar piece of parchment from his back pocket. "They told me not to tell you!" He motions to the Twins who recoil from my gaze, knowing better than to challenge me when I'm angry.
"You gave him the map?! What are you thinking?" I take my book and hit Fred again before trying to reach across to get George too but George grabs the book out of my hands and hides it under the table.
"Snitch!" George grumbles to Harry, who takes a seat at the table next to him.
"Mama's mad," Fred laughs, and I smack his shoulder again with the back of my hand.
"How come you told her and not me?" Ron questions, crossing his arms over his chest and pouting at the Twins, as Hermione pulls up two more chairs to our table.
"You don't help with pranks!" Fred justifies, taking a sip of his Butterbeer.
"Harry, this is serious. You can't just leave that lying around for anyone to find and you shouldn't carry it around in Hogsmeade, especially!" I scold, unable to keep the worry out of my voice. Harry rolls his eyes slightly, tucking the map back in his pocket.
"I told him the same thing! What if Sirius Black finds out about the tunnels? It's like handing him a map straight to you," Hermione adds, seeming very pleased that someone agrees with her.
"Mia, it's locked, remember?" George reasons.
"And it didn't take us that long to figure it out! As first years, mind you. It could be all too easy for someone like Black to figure out." I remember when Fred and George came back to the common room that night, giggling with excitement. They weren't back five minutes before they were asking for my help to figure out how to work it. The twins had found in Filch's office that tapping your wand on it made it respond to you, so there we sat, huddled around it, and I tapped my wand against the paper, causing ink to spread over the surface.
"Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs sense a friend to mischief and chaos. But to access our secrets, hard earned and well preserved, a promise must be made. Are you up to no good?" The map had read in sloping cursive, which I read out in a whisper to the Twins.
"Yes! We are up to no good!" Fred had responded, more excited than I'd ever seen him.
"Swear it. Solemnly," the map had written out, in a different handwriting than before.
"We do swear it," George had said, tapping his wand against the parchment again. It took an embarrassingly long time to figure out exactly what it wanted us to say; I solemnly swear that I am up to no good. But once we had that figured out, the map became our secret weapon; not even Lee, Angelina and Alicia know about it.
"Mia! C'mon, it'll be fine! I'll be careful with it and I won't-" Harry started but another breeze from the door opening cut him off and I turn around to see Professors McGonagall, Flitwick, Hagrid and the Minister of Magic, who Harry and I met for the first time this summer, entering the Three Broomsticks. Hermione and Ron quickly push Harry under the table, spilling some of his Butterbeer in the process. The six of us watch as the group move towards the bar, order and then begin walking towards us.
"Mobiliarbus!" I whisper, moving the Christmas tree, which was sitting beside our table, to sit in front of the table, hiding the six of us from sight of the teachers and hiding Harry better than our legs would. The teachers sit right on the other side of the tree as Madam Rosemerta, the owner of the Three Broomsticks, delivers their drinks. We sit in a tense silence on our end of the tree, Harry crouched under the table between all our legs, as the teachers converse casually with Rosmerta, who has joined them for a drink, and each other. I silently kick myself for not making Harry return to the castle when I first saw him.
I'm trying to devise a way to get Harry out of the pub without being seen when Fudge speaks up, pulling me out of my thoughts, "What else but Sirius Black? I daresay you heard what happened at the school over Halloween? Well I believe he is still most certainly in the area." Hermione, Ron, and the Twins all look at me: Hermione's face worried, the Twins and Ron more bewildered than anything and I shift in my seat slightly to lean closer to the tree separating us from the adults.
"It's been very bad for my business with the Ministry sending dementors into my pub every other night!" Rosmerta scolds, an edge in her voice as she speaks to the Minister.
"Well they are a necessary precaution! We all know what Black is capable of," Fudge defends.
"You know, I still have so much trouble believing it. Of all the people to take the Dark Mark, I never would have thought... well I remember him when he was a boy up at Hogwarts," Rosmerta bemuses.
"I agree, Rosmerta. I was devastated," McGonagall adds.
"Rosemerta, you don't know the worst of it..." Fudge murmurs.
"What could possibly be worse than murdering all those people?"
"Well if you remember Black at Hogwarts, surely you remember who his best friend was?" ask McGonagall quietly.
"Well 'course! You never saw one without the other, did you? Sirius Black and James Potter were quite a double act," Rosmerta laughs softly. My heart leaps in my chest at the mention of my father and there is a large clang from under our table as Harry drops his tankard, causing the rest of us to flinch but the teachers don't seem to notice. Is that part of why Black is so determined to kill Harry and I?
"You'd have thought they were brothers they were so inseparable," Flitwick chimes in.
"They practically were," Fudge responds. "Potter trusted Black more than anyone else in his life. Black was his best man at his wedding and godfather to Harry. Harry and Euphemia have no idea of course, far too heavy a burden to tell them now." McGonagall hums in agreement and I feel my head spinning but there is no time to dwell on the information because Fudge keeps going. "Back during the war, Dumbledore was tipped off that You-Know-Who was going after the Potters. He told them their best bet was the Fidelius Charm." I make eye contact with Hermione, who shakes her head, as much in the dark on the spell as me. Hermione may be two years younger than I am but her knowledge of obscure spells and such is still beyond much of my own.
"What is that? How does that work?" Rosmerta inquires, sounding very interested in the gossip being exchanged. Flitwick clears his throat before speaking up.
"Oh it's terribly complex. The information, in this case the Potters' location, is hidden inside a single person, in their very soul, oft' called the Secret Keeper. This makes the location impossible to find unless the Secret Keeper gives them up." Flitwick explains, sounding very much like he does in our Charms lectures. "You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters could have searched Godric's Hollow for years and years and never would have found them as long as the Secret Keeper refused to speak."
"They made Sirius Black their Secret Keeper?" Rosmerta gasps. I close my eyes and put my hands over my face, overwhelmed, and feel an arm reach around my shoulders.
"Dumbledore tried to dissuade James from it, even offering to be the Secret Keeper himself, but James insisted it be Black," McGonagall continues. "There was a spy, you see, that seemingly had been passing information from our side back to You-Know-Who but Dumbledore wasn't sure who. He suspected Black due to his families' involvement with the Death Eaters but James insisted. I remember him saying that if he couldn't trust Sirius then he couldn't trust anyone."
"He was always loyal to a fault, James," Flitwick adds.
"Not even a full week had the spell been cast-"
"Black betrayed them?" Rosmerta gasps.
"He did indeed," Fudge confirms. I sigh and lean into Fred's embrace, his arm wrapped tightly around my shoulders.
"Filthy traitor!" Hagrid bellows causing the whole pub to jump, especially the six of us eavesdropping. Harry groans slightly and I peer under the table to see him rubbing the top of his head. McGonagall and Flitwick both shush Hagrid who keeps speaking. "I saw 'em that night, you know? Dumbledore sent me ter rescue Harry and Mia from the rubble, the poor things. Had jus' pulled them out of the ruins, bloody and screamin' the both of them an' parents dead... an' then Sirius Black pulled up on that flying motorbike. He was all white an' shaky, tellin' me to give 'em the kids. 'Give them to me, Hagrid. I'm Harry's godfather, I'll look after them now' he kept saying. Imagine if I'd given them to 'em! But I said no, Dumbledore had already set up a place for them. Then, he gave me his motorbike and ran off, probably hopin' to disappear."
"Well the Aurors caught up to him the next day, didn't they? And thank goodness they did," Rosemerta says, sounding incredibly satisfied.
"I wish I could say we did but it was Peter Pettigrew, another one of the Potters' boyhood friends," Fudge corrects. I've never heard the name Peter Pettigrew before, although I guess I'd never heard of Sirius Black before this summer either.
"Pettigrew...? Oh! That little lump of a boy that always followed James and Sirius around, yes?" Rosmerta asks to which McGonagall hums in agreement.
"Eyewitnesses- Muggles- told us that Pettigrew cornered Black sobbing and talking about how could Black have done such a thing. Then reached for his wand but Black was quicker, blew about a dozen people up along with sweet little Pettigrew," Fudge explains quickly. "I was Junior Minister in the Department of Magical Catastrophes back then and I was one of the first on the scene, I'll never forget the sight... He had blown a crater in the street, bodies were strewn all about and in the middle of all the chaos, Black stood there laughing with a finger at his feet. A finger, that's all that was left of Pettigrew by the time we got there.... Took twenty Aurors from Magical Law Enforcement to contain Black and he's been in Azkaban ever since."
"Oh my..." Rosmerta breathes and the table is quiet for a moment before she speaks again, "You think Black has escaped to go after the Potter children? And then what? Revive You-Know-Who?" Fear creeps into her voice and I shudder at the thought of coming face to face with the man who betrayed my parents, anger mixing in my chest with the familiar sadness I feel anytime someone talks of my parents.
"We must assume the worst, yes that may be his plan. But we hope to catch Black long before any harm comes to anyone, let alone the children. Just this-" Fudge says, sounding more nervous than moments before.
"Minister, if you are to dine with Dumbledore, we really should start towards the castle," McGonagall speaks up, causing a stir of movement and goodbyes.
Once the danger of being caught has passed, Harry emerges from under the table and the six of us sit in an uneasy silence for a moment. Harry and I meet each other's eyes across the table, my own confusion and anger and anguish reflected in my brother's eyes. Eventually, Hermione speaks up: "We should start heading back. It's near dinner time."
Harry and I leave the others to walk back the normal way, and I follow Harry into the Honeydukes cellar and through the passageway.
"Harry, wait," I say, stopping as we near the end of the tunnel. My brother turns to me, waiting for me to continue. "Promise me you won't do anything stupid?"
"Like what?" Harry crosses his arms over his chest.
"Like trying to go after Black," I say and Harry tries to speak but I cut him off, continuing to speak. "He isn't worth dying for. You heard the Minister, it took twenty aurors to catch him the first time. You can't go running after him like you've done the last two years. He'll kill you!"
"Mia, don't start!" Harry yells, the pain in his voice echoing off the stone walls of the tunnel. "And I wouldn't let him kill me because-"
"Because you'll kill him first? Harry, listen to yourself. You're not thinking clearly!" I plead.
"Malfoy knows. He told me so in Potions: 'If it was me, I'd hunt him down myself... I'd take revenge.' I bet his dad told him all about how Black turned-"
"And you're going to listen to Draco Malfoy over me? Of course Malfoy would love it if you ran off to try and hunt Black down because you wouldn't come back!" I yell, getting more and more desperate for my brother to listen to me. Harry shakes his head and begins walking again, turning his back on me. "If you go after him, you play directly into Black's hand! Harry think about it, Mum and Dad wouldn't want to you to get killed in a suicide quest for revenge!"
"Well I'll never know what they would think, will I? Because of Black, and unlike you, I've never spoken to them!" Harry yells, turning back to face me. "You don't understand!"
I stop in my tracks for a moment, stunned. Sure Harry and I bicker like all siblings, but very rarely have we ever had the kind of blow up fights I've seen the Weasley siblings have. Harry and I depended on each other too much for that. "Harry, that's not fair. I don't remember any of the time I got with them anymore than you remember the first 3 years of your own life! Not any of the good, anyway. Of all the people in the world, I am the one person who does understand. Believe me, Harry, I would love to go after Black and make him pay for what he did to us but we can't."
We are silent for a long moment before Harry finally meets my eyes again. "McGonagall, Dumbledore, Hagrid... they all knew and didn't tell us." I nod, angry about it too, but I stopped expecting adults to tell us everything after Harry's first year.
"I know... Listen, the dementors and the Ministry are gonna catch Black. Then this summer, we're gonna find an apartment in London, and we'll have as normal a summer as we can muster. Away from the Dursleys and Black and Voldemort, all of it. But in order to get there, you have to promise me not to go after him, okay?" I step towards my brother, gripping his shoulders, needing him to understand me. Eventually he nods, "Promise." Smiling, I pull him into a hug. He's grown a lot this year and has quickly gotten taller than me. Where I used to cradle his head against my shoulder as he cried silently in the middle of the night so as to not wake the Dursleys, I can barely look over his shoulder now. "C'mon, let's go get some dinner," I say quietly as we break away. Harry nods, pushing up his glasses as he turns down the tunnel and begins walking again. I look down at my left hand, where the lighting scar stretches down the back of my hand to wrap around my wrist, swallow my own anger, and follow my brother back to Hogwarts.