The Shrieking Shack
Remus spread the map back out on his desk. Peter had not moved. ‘OK,’ he muttered to himself, ‘OK. So Sirius didn't kill Peter. Could be true - they never found a body did they? Just a finger. Which finger? Doesn't matter. No body. But he did kill all those Muggles, so perhaps Peter got lucky.’
Remus pictured Sirius for a moment, duelling with James. Practising. He didn't often miss, unless he was really angry. A memory of a dream floated to the surface.
'James asked me to do it, of course I'm going to do it. You'd do it if he'd asked you.'
'Of course I would,' said Remus, 'But it's still worth thinking carefully about. Don't you think it'll make you a target? As soon as they realise they've disappeared, who do you think they'll be after?'
'It doesn't matter,' Sirius said defiantly. 'I'd die before I gave them up.'
Maybe Sirius had been listening after all. Remus had always thought he was too obvious an option. Everyone knew about James Potter and Sirius Black, but no one would have suspected Peter. Hell, it had taken Remus twelve years to think of it. But if they'd swapped then why had no one told him? A horrible thought dawned on him and he felt a realisation wash through his body. The feeling began just behind his ears and travelled down his neck, hovering like a poison in his chest. His heart clenched painfully. They'd known there was a traitor and none of them had thought it was Peter…
He felt sick. He put a hand out to steady himself. What should he do? Go straight to Dumbledore? He imagined that conversation:
‘Remus, whatever is the matter?’
‘Albus, I lied. Sirius probably managed to escape Azkaban because he is an unregistered Animagus. Thing is though, Peter is too and I’m pretty sure he's currently under the floorboards in Hagrid's cabin, because I can see him on the map we made to facilitate pranks as teenagers which had been previously confiscated but recently came back into my possession via Harry, who I'm pretty sure has been using it to get to Hogsmeade through a secret passage. Don't worry though, that's not how Sirius has been getting in, he's been coming via the Whomping Willow. In dog form, obviously.’
No, that wasn't going to work. He needed to find out what had actually happened. He needed to find them both. As soon as possible. He was going to have to go to the shack.
He gathered up the map and shoved it in a bag. He looked around, wondering what else he might need. He grabbed a spare jumper, a pair of socks and the loaf of bread he'd been using to make toast in the mornings. As he made his way through his classroom, he picked up the glass box he'd had the pixies in last term and shoved it into his bag, he slung it over his shoulder and opened the door -
‘Morning Professor!’ Percy Weasley was standing outside his classroom, Penelope Clearwater just behind him. Remus looked down the corridor and saw most of his sixth year class lined up, patiently waiting for their first lesson of the day.
Remus froze. He had completely forgotten. Forgotten it was Friday. Forgotten it was 9am. Forgotten he was a teacher, with a job, in a school. He took a step backwards, panicking internally. What could he do? He was going to have to teach this lesson, and probably the one after that, but he was free after lunch. Was he? His timetable had vanished from his mind. Either way, he couldn’t go running off now could he, he needed to be subtle about this, work out what was going on before anyone else did…
‘Can we… come in?’ Percy asked, bringing Remus back to the present with a bump.
‘Of course, of course,’ Remus stuttered over his words, he moved to one side, allowing the students to file in, and shoved his bag down the side of the bookshelf by the door. As they took his seats, he moved to the desk and placed the map face up beside his planner, Hagrid’s hut on display. Peter was still there.
By lunchtime, Remus felt that he had taught the worst two lessons of his life. The sixth years had been confused by his essay instructions and it took him at least ten minutes to work out that it was because they had already completed them for homework and each had a neat roll of parchment ready to hand in. In the end he had told them to do some research, and spent most of the next 90 minutes staring obsessively at the map. He did manage to read his planner before the fourth years arrived, and so at least had written the correct instructions on the board, but he couldn’t focus and about half way through the lesson Sally Barker put her hand up to ask him if he was feeling alright, a question which he did not think he had answered plausibly. Finally, finally, it was lunchtime. The students piled into the corridor, heading for the Great Hall, and Remus picked up his bag and headed down the stairs to the Entrance Hall.
‘Not coming to lunch Remus?’ a voice called out to him. He closed his eyes and cursed his luck, praying it wasn’t Dumbledore. He turned and was relieved to find that it was just Filius.
‘Just popping down to Hogsmeade,’ Remus called back, trying to keep his voice light, ‘I need to pick up some things for next week, don’t want to go tomorrow so thought I’d get it out the way today!’
‘Ok, have fun!’ Filius called, ‘come along to the staff room when you get back and we can have that chess rematch!’
Remus nodded and smiled, unconvincingly he thought, but Filius seemed satisfied and disappeared back towards the Great Hall. Remus turned and hurried down the steps. It was raining lightly and he pulled his hood up, grateful for the anonymity it offered.
It took him about three quarters of an hour, moving as fast as his stiff legs could carry him, to reach the Shrieking Shack. He had hurried up the hill that led to the overgrown garden, but once at the gate he stopped, suddenly unsure of his plan. Would Sirius even be in there? What was he even going to say to him if he was? He looked down at the gate post. The coin was gone, but just as likely washed away by wind and rain as anything else. He pulled his cloak more tightly around him, and hoisted the bag higher onto his shoulder. He was here now, he thought and he had been thinking about coming here for months. Maybe it was time.
The gate opened with a low moan, and he picked his way carefully along the path, trying to avoid the more poisonous looking plants. He climbed the wooden steps onto the porch, which was partially collapsed, and hesitated, hand on the door handle. Should he knock? Bursting in on an insane murderer seemed like possibly a bad idea.
‘Sirius?’ he hissed through the door, ‘Sirius it’s me, please, if you are in there, I just want to talk. I know.. I know about Peter.’
There was no answer. Remus felt like an idiot. He was talking to a door.
‘I’m going to come in,’ he whispered, anyway, against the keyhole.
He pushed the door open and stepped into the dank front room. A rotten settee stood in one corner, covers ripped and stuffing damp and stinking, Remus could see some mushrooms growing out of one of the cushions. He wrinkled his nose. He moved slowly towards the door at the back of the room, which he knew led to the staircase.
‘Sirius?’ he whispered again.
Suddenly there was a sound from along the hallway, a soft thump and then quiet footsteps. Remus shrank back against the wall, wand in his hand, and at the top of the stairs appeared a cat. It was the cat he had seen skirting the forest, it was big, very fluffy and orange. It looked at him with huge amber eyes, as if asking a question.
‘Do you know where Sirius is?’ Remus asked it, not really knowing why.
The cat continued to stare at him, unblinking, and then very slowly lowered and raised its head. Was it nodding?
‘Can you bring him here?’
The cat did the same thing, and then turned back along the landing. Remus followed it, taking the stairs two at a time and arriving in the bedroom just in time to see a fluffy tail disappearing through the broken window. Had he just had a conversation with a cat? He supposed he’d just… wait and see?
He looked around himself - the room was as vile as he remembered it. The four-poster bed that stood in the centre smelled damp and was covered in a thick layer of dust. How many pints of his blood had soaked through those covers he wondered? Of course Poppy had cleaned up after each full moon, but all the vanishing spells in the world couldn't wipe his memory.
‘Moony, Moony, wake up, Pomfrey will be here soon and we'll have to go.’
Remus groaned and tried to roll over but the pain in his hip stopped him from making it all the way. His skin felt cold and damp with sweat. He shivered.
‘Hey, hey, it's ok,’ Sirius said and Remus felt warm hands on him. ‘I’m going to sit you up, ok? Help me if you can?’
Sirius very gently rolled him onto his back, and then with a hand behind his shoulders pushed him into a sitting position. Remus blinked, the room slowly swimming into focus. Sirius pulled the bedsheet up around his shoulders and over his lap, leaning forward and holding it closed around him.
‘Ok?’ he asked it this time, his pupils were wide in the dark room and Remus wondered how frightening he looked.
‘Yeah, ok,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘Bad hip - transformation probably just threw it out.’
‘Sirius,’ hissed a disembodied voice from the corner, ‘that was the door, come on now!’ James was under the cloak, Pete probably already in his pocket.
‘We’ve got to go,’ whispered Sirius, reaching under the sheet to squeeze Remus’ hand. ‘If you're not back by dinner I'll come and find you.’
He hurried from the bed and vanished, just as the doorknob turned and Poppy bustled in, a bag of remedies over her shoulder. Remus watched as the open door moved slightly behind her and listened for the creaky bottom step that would tell him his friends had gone.
The creaky bottom step. Had it been part of the memory, or had he just heard it? Suddenly afraid, he backed away from the door towards the window. He held his breath as he watched the doorway, waiting for someone to appear but it was only the ginger cat. It sauntered into the room and leapt onto the bed, yellow eyes on him, unblinking. Remus exhaled.
‘You're back’ he said to it, ‘couldn’t you find him?’
‘Oh no, he found me,’ a hoarse voice travelled from the hall. ‘Hey Moons,’ said Sirius Black as he stepped into the doorway.