Choice
Choice
I knew the voice. He’d come by three times in the past fortnight with the same announcement. Without waiting for a response, the rapping began again. Louder.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Donald! Leave the door on its hinges, I’m coming!” Willow shot me a half irritated, half amused look as she rose. “Sorry, Stephen, we may have to finish this later. It could actually be the real thing this time.”
At her hand, the door swung wide, revealing a man in work clothes and muddy boots standing in the early twilight. “There you are!” he exclaimed as though he was amazed to find Willow at home. “Ellen’s in labour.”
I watched the irritation smooth itself out of Willow’s posture as she poised by the door, waiting. She let the amusement creep into her tone. “Donald, you know this because she actually told you so this time?”
At his nod, she gestured him forward. “All right. Come in, then. I’ll get my things.”
He stepped across the threshold. Stopped. Gave me a wary glance, then turned his head to follow the words trailing out behind Willow as she hurried through the doorway that led to her room. “When did the contractions start?”
“The pains? I don’t know. I was in the field, bringing in the last vegetable marrows for the market fair tomorrow. She told me when I came in that I should come straight away to get you.”
Willow was back. Laying her carry-sack on the table among the tea things, she began sorting through its contents. “Lavender for mild relaxation,” she murmured. “Got to think about that one, maybe valerian would be better. Red raspberry leaf for bleeding, good. Thyme and chamomile for antiseptic. Forceps if I need them. We’re ready!”
The man glanced at me again as Willow closed her sack and pulled her cloak from its peg beside the kitchen door. “What about him?” He jerked a thumb my way. “Wasn’t he here last time I stopped by?”
Maybe he thought I was seeking the healer as well and might delay Willow coming to his wife’s assistance. But I didn’t like how he almost snatched the sack from her hands, then reached for her arm to hurry her from the room.
She sidestepped his grasp and swung the cloak over her shoulders. “His name is Stephen.” she said. Even though I knew her next words were meant to put her, not him, in command of the situation, they surprised and touched me. "He’s a very dear friend of my family. He was taken ill on his way to London. He’ll be staying here until I decide he’s well enough to continue his journey.”
He shrugged, then gestured Willow to the door. “All right then, let’s go.”
Most of his harshness, I knew, came from concern for his wife. But I couldn’t help thinking about the neighbour who, on the night we met, had been so distracted by a false alarm that he allowed Willow to travel alone through a late night woods as a storm brewed, rather than extend her the hospitality of the hearth until morning.
“I’m coming with you.” I said.
Halfway to the door, Willow turned to look back at me. “You don’t need to-”
“Yeah, I do. I’m coming.”
I could hear the ring of resolve in my voice. If they ever, I decided, erected a statue in my honour in the halls of Hogwarts, they’d probably call it “Sirius the Stubborn”.
“Donald, this’ll take a moment,” said Willow. “I’ll catch up straightaway.”
He shot me an annoyed glare, then stepped outside, shutting the door loudly behind him. I could almost see him pacing back and forth in front of the house.
Willow walked to the table. Her chin was up, but her hand on my arm was gentle. “I appreciate your kindness in offering to come along, but-”
“Then accept it.” I stepped past her to the door and took down a coat she’d found for me in an old trunk in the attic, one that her son, Dylan, had left behind when he married.
“Stephen, you’ve only just gotten your strength back after an illness that almost killed you. I don’t want you risking-” she began.
“If it gets late,” I cut in. “You’re the one taking the risks more than me. Is he going to think to walk you home with a new baby in his arms?”
“It’s not like that here. I’ll be perfectly safe.” She said to my back as I slipped into the coat and stood with my hand on the doorknob.
Our voices were rising.
“I don’t believe in anything being ‘perfectly’ safe.” I snapped. “I’ve lived on the road, remember? All I know is woods can hold dangers at night. So can the roads, especially for anyone traveling alone and on foot.”
And without a wand, I thought, but didn’t say it.
“Don’t you think I know that?” she demanded.
“I don’t know! You’re probably right, it’ll be fine. But risks-”
On the door’s polished wood surface, I could almost see Bellatrix standing before me with her wand half raised. I drew a deep breath. The sound of it didn’t quite block the memory of my own arrogant, overconfident laughter as I taunted my cousin. Come on, Bella, you can do better than that!
Even wands couldn’t solve everything.
“Risks,” I said as my anger gave way to regret. “Are the things we are certain we can handle… until the instant we discover that we can’t.”
Her voice was resigned. “There’s nothing I can do to stop you coming, is there?”
“No,” I shook my head, moving aside so she could step out ahead of me, then lifted the lantern from its hook. “Unless you make a habit of tying up your houseguests.”
Willow walked with Donald. I could hear the rise and fall of her voice asking questions as I followed several yards behind. I meant to keep her company on the homeward journey, not to interfere with her duties as a healer.
A wind stirred the trees overhead. Through their half-bare branches I watched this afternoon’s clouds continue to gather. Would they bunch together into a blanket before we started home, or blow away, leaving our way lit by stars?
I might wait a long while for an answer to that question. Once Hessia had appeared late at an Order of the Phoenix meeting with a sigh and a comment that one of the big things about being a healer, aside from all the herbs and spells she had to learn, was knowing how to wait. Waiting for babies, she said, was often the hardest and longest.
That’s probably why I never thought about becoming a healer. Between Azkaban and my years in hiding, I’ve learned a lot about waiting. I’ve gotten fairly good- not great, just fairly good- at it. Still, I don’t like it much. But that evening, I waited.
Donald rather grudgingly invited me to sit by the fire, but after a while I got up and went out. I understood his not wanting a stranger present at such a private moment.
I walked down the path to where I could watch the cloud-misted moon rising to the east. Several days past full, I observed, thinking, of my old friend Remus. How many years he had struggled at the time of the full moon until a new wolf’s-bane potion had been developed that eased his werewolf symptoms! How many full-moon nights had our little animagous circle of friends, the Rat (though not yet a traitor) Peter, the great pronged Stag, James and I, Sirius the Dog, rampaged and roughhoused with him on the grounds of Hogwarts until he could drop off into exhausted sleep?
I turned my back on the moon and watched the stars come out to play hide and seek between the clouds until, at last, there were more hiding places than stars.
Would there be rain tonight? There had been a bite in the air the last several days that hinted at the year’s first snowfall, but the wind stirring the clouds all afternoon had been unseasonably warm. It could, rather, be bringing in the year’s last rainstorm. Might be helpful knowing before we started back. If I transformed, I could scent the wind and be sure. Maybe I could even take myself for a run? Test my wind? As a human, it seemed I had regained my stamina. Would it be the same way for me when I was a dog?
Merlin’s beard, it would feel good to check it out. Stretch my legs full out, running. Zigzag at top speed in and out of a few trees, leap an old log or two…
Behind me there was the high, startled first cry of a baby.
I jumped. The kid wasn’t the only one who was startled.
What was I thinking? Transforming? Here, in the open? When Donald or Willow could pop out for a breath of air at any moment? That would be worse than muttering in delirium about being a futuristic Wizard!
“Stephen, do you want to come see the baby?”
I turned and made my way toward the yellow glow framing Willow in the doorway. I looked from her to Donald who stood a few feet behind her. There was a bundle in his arms and a look on his face that was a beautiful, idiotic mixture of terror and delight. For the first time he smiled at me. “Hey, mate, come look at our Timothy.”
There was a lump in my throat as I looked from the red, squinched up features and tiny waving fists to Donald’s beaming face. I’d seen that look before, a mix of pride, amazement and naked tenderness. James wore it the night Harry was born.
“Congratulations, Dad.” I clapped his shoulder, ran a feather-light finger across the back of Timothy’s warm, silken fist and turned to Willow. She looked as delighted as Donald did.
“Ellen will probably be missing him already,” she said, stepping forward to touch the baby’s cheek. “Tell her I’ll stop round in a day or two. If she has any questions before that, just come and fetch me.”
“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”
I picked up Willow’s lantern from a table by the door and followed her into the night. Turning, we waved to the new father who still stood with that baffled grin on his face.
We walked in silence. Not the awkward one of recent weeks, but a sort of shared wordless awe. Maybe Willow was looking down into the face of her own firstborn. Maybe she was reliving the joy of watching Ellen do the same. I was remembering James and Lily and the small wriggling child they placed in the ten-thumbed hands of the proudest Godfather in history.
The century between Harry and I seemed at once as vast as the distance between stars and so spider-web fine I could almost feel that well-remembered small weight as if I still held it against my heart.
Had I thought, even for an instant that the freedoms I found here, would be difficult to leave behind? My delight in them was nothing compared to the joy of seeing the fine person my tiny Godson had grown into! Or my eagerness to help nurture him toward young adulthood. Without purpose, without connections, the ability to come and go at will, in the open, wasn’t freedom at all. It meant nothing.
“Did you feel that?” asked Willow.
Before I could answer, the first cold raindrop tapped the tip of my nose. A second slid down my cheek, aiming for my ear.
“It’s raining!” we exclaimed in unison and started to laugh.
“Here we go again!” I cried. “Aahk! Right down the back of my neck!”
“And mine! Come on, let’s hurry.”
The lantern swung in my hand and Willow’s sack bobbed on her shoulder as we dashed along the path. There were spatters in my hair, on my shoulders, and then there were too many to count as the water came streaming down.
“It’ll be solid mud here in a minute!” she cried. “Come on, we’ll take the shortcut!” She dashed ahead of me up a small rise, her skirts swishing in the tall wet grass.
“Shortcut?” I called after her. The word started alarm chimes in my head. “Willow, wait! Isn’t this the pasture you were telling me about-?”
“Yes! Here we are! The wall! This will get us home twenty minutes dryer! You’re taller, so I’ll go first and you can pass the lantern over to me!” Her carry-sack thunked at my feet. As I bent to retrieve it, I heard quick scrabbling sounds followed by a muttered “Stupid skirt!” then a squelchy thump. “I’m over. Send the lantern first, then the sack.”
I passed them into her waiting hands, then looked for the footholds where she had scrambled over.
“Come on, Scruff! You can do it” Willow encouraged from beyond the stones. “Don’t tell me they haven’t got walls in town!”
Climb the wall then!
I remembered James’s silent voice encouraging me out of Azkaban.
I can do this!
“Oh,” I called. “There were lots of walls!” My shoe found a narrow opening. “Not only in town.” There was a good handgrip as well. “But around our back garden.” At
the top was a good flat surface. “And also our front garden.” I pulled myself upward and swung my leg over. “Not to mention the one around my school!” My second leg came over and I dropped, laughing to the ground beside her.
I heard more than saw her grin. “I suppose none of them could contain you, right?”
“My friends and I hardly knew the meaning of the word ‘wall’!”
Laughing, she handed me the lantern. “Try doing it in a dress sometime! Come on, we’ll be drenched if we don’t hurry!” She hiked her skirt to her knees and trotted ahead of me across the field, hair whipping behind her in the wind. From a few feet behind, I held the lantern high enough to mark a path for us through the tall, rain-swept grass.
Even blurred by the downpour, I saw it was a flat, open field with a few scattered trees swaying in the wind. Judging by the direction Willow was taking, we’d save ourselves half, if not three fourths of a mile by cutting across its centre instead of skirting its edge. We’d be back to the house in no time, I thought as, long skirts or not, Willow widened the distance between us. Back at the house. Dry by the fire…
Come on, Sirius, or Stephen or whatever! Pick it up a bit! Dry by the fire… Brew a bit of tea and drink ourselves an herbal toast to young Timothy.
There was the wall, little more than a faint glimmer through the curtain of raindrops. Couldn’t have come a moment too soon. The thought of that stuffed chair by the fire made it easier to keep going instead of stopping for a quick breather. Even so, I was falling behind. Willow was at least fifteen yards ahead of me.
“Hey!” I called, hearing the word blow back to me on the wind. “Willow-”
I was going to shout “Wait up a minute!”
The words caught in my throat as something large loomed ahead of us. Something with bright eyes that reflected the lantern flame. Something coming fast between me and Willow. Almost to where it would catch her scent trailing out behind her on the wind.
John Burkett’s bull.
But she’d told me he wasn’t pastured here-
He came at a lumbering run, not charging, but fierce with fear or anger at the storm and the strangers that had invaded his domain.
Willow was passing the last scatter of trees onto the final stretch of open ground before the wall. Open ground, where, if he saw her, there was nothing to protect her from his charging hooves and horns. If she kept up her even pace, she might not draw his attention. In another moment he’d be past us. Still in this field, still possibly dangerous, but not such an immediate threat. We could climb a tree out of reach, or, if he kept to his course and direction, make it over the wall and home to that cup of tea-
Willow stopped. Turned. “Hey, Scruff, what’s keeping you?-”
Every line of her body went rigid. She took a step backward, then another…
The bull’s head turned. Blue-white brilliance lit each motion as he gathered his great shoulders. He pivoted toward her as the darkness fell around him again.
“Willow!” I shouted, though she couldn’t have heard me through the slow rumble of thunder. “Run!” I swung the lantern high, gesturing at the last nearby stand of trees.
Whether or not she heard, she turned and ran through the tall grass, her skirts held high, flying on the wind. Faster, faster with each step-
The bull’s sharp front hoof pawed the ground. His head lowered. I started forward, lantern high, gauging the distance between her and the closest tree.
Too great. If he charged now, she’d never make it.
There was only an instant to spare. I flung the lantern as high and far as I could. It sailed in a graceful arc through the darkness. If he caught the movement, he might turn and charge the light! It would buy her time to reach the tree.
He paused, his head turning as the lantern crashed to the ground, the light within flaring brighter.
She was almost there. In another silver flash of lightning, I saw her running leap, her hands stretching toward an overhead branch. And missing.
The lantern sputtered in a spray of sparks and went out.
The bull stared at the darkness that had swallowed the golden light and dismissed it. Turned back toward the woman who had dared enter his field.
Overhead, thunder rumbled.
Willow staggered, caught her balance as the bull charged. She reached the trunk of the tree. I made out the paleness of her hands scrabbling for a hold on the bark, then her face as she searched for me through the darkness.
I started to run. But not fast enough. I’d never reach her before the bull did. And what could one pair of hands do without wand or rope to stop his furious charge-?
There was only one choice.
I knew an instant when everything I’d ever been taught as a Wizard reared up to block the impulse. You can’t, you mustn’t! Not in front of a Muggle!
She’s no Muggle, she’s Willow! My friend! Even if she wasn’t, so what? So what? I won’t watch her being attacked without doing all I can to help!
An instant to check the distance and remember all I’d learned about roughhouse play and dodging sharp horns on all those wild moonlit nights in the grounds at Hogwarts.
I ran a few more steps and leaped as high as I could into the air, arcing through another brilliant flash of lightning-
And came down fast and flying on four swift pads, barking as I ran alongside the bull’s pounding hooves, nipping and snapping at his legs.
Off to my left, Willow screamed.
The bull’s stride faltered. He skidded almost to a stop and swung away from Willow and round to face me.
There are places horns can’t reach to butt or gore. The memories of those late-night romps came back as though it were days instead of years. I leaped high and sideways as he came at me, soaring past his head, snapping at a spot behind his shoulder. Dropping to all fours, I watched as the bull, far heavier and less agile than a stag, was carried by his own momentum several yards into the darkness. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Willow scrambling up the tree, almost to the safety of the lowest branches.
Thunder masked the pounding of his hooves, but in the next lightning flash I saw the bull had turned and was coming back on a direct path toward Willow and her tree. Once more, I leaped aside.
But not quick enough this time. I yelped as a line of pain streaked up my right foreleg. I cried out again as I crashed down on my side and the air whooshed out of me. Lightning flashed across the curve of one great horn as the bull swung back around. My paws flailed in the air. It was an eternal instant before I got them under me, rolling aside as he swept past, so close I could feel the wind of his passing ruffling my fur.
But it was enough. His course had shifted away from the tree before the rush of his momentum carried him onward into the dimness again.
Lightning flared. At last Willow had reached the branch. She was sitting on it, her arms hugging tight to the tree-trunk.
Panting for breath, I staggered to my feet, limped a step or two and spun around, as, this time, I heard the thunder of approaching hooves.
There was a sort of numbness and a distant throb, but the leg took my weight and propelled me forward. Flesh-wound, I had time to think before the bull swung past me, heading directly toward the tree that sheltered Willow.
He couldn’t have reached her. I know that. But did he have to keep going after her? Trap her up there? I leaped after him, biting at his hocks. Overhead, the thunder came again, more of a purr now than a rumble.
Sensing that the storm was leaving his pasture, he lumbered past Willow’s tree, allowing me to stay behind him as we widened the space between us and her. There was no need to bite or bark, though I followed him through the slowing rain for a ways, watching from a greater and greater distance. His run became a lope, a walk, an amble. When he stopped to take a bite of wet, sweet-smelling grass, I turned away.
I barely noticed the water soaking my fur or the pain in my leg as the numbness of shock wore off. They were distant things compared to the ache settling round my heart.
Willow was safe. She would go home to her snug little house, dry herbs, make preserves and tell stories to her grandchildren. I was glad in every bone and muscle, all the way to my deepest heart. But as I walked, there was no wag to my tail and my muzzle drooped lower and lower til it almost brushed the pasture grass.
Every day I’d lived in her house and pretended to be a Muggle was a lie. It weighed heavier on me with each painful, limping step I took. She had every right to be furious with me. I hadn’t lied to take advantage of her. But had it been for her protection, so she wouldn’t fear the stranger she had taken in? Or for mine, so I wouldn’t be turned out on the road, sick and starving, or taken away as a madman and locked up again behind bars?
My slip had turned my urge to protect us both to a shambles. No, this was worse than a slip. I had chosen to do Magic in front of someone not educated in Wizardry. When the bull charged, why had I resorted to the quickest and easiest solution?
I shouldn’t have stayed so long. I could have left a fortnight ago, or a week- even this morning and no damage done. I was fit enough to travel. She had tended the root cellar for years before I came. Probably could have handled the job twice as fast without me.
If I’d gone before, my lies would have at least served to leave her sense of reality intact.
Whatever she had to say, I’d listen, then go to her house, change to the clothes I came in and leave without protest. But first, I must face her, honestly, in my human form.
The storm clouds were breaking up. In a spreading patch of moonlight, I she stood with her carry-sack under a tree, long hair streaming, face unreadable.
“You all right?” I asked.
She shrugged, nodded, shook her head. Made a sound that was almost a laugh. “At least, I know now why that dog never slept in my shed.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
She waved my words away. “I’ve wondered about it for quite a while now.”
“You saw everything then?”
She nodded. “And heard. If I didn’t believe it a few minutes ago, I believe it now.”
“What do you mean?”
I followed her gesture.
It was vivid in the moonlight. Evidence. A rip in my coat sleeve and a dark stain spreading over the cloth and breaking into several small black streams that ran across my hand and between my fingers. Blood. From where the bull’s horn caught my foreleg.
“Come on,” she said abruptly. “Let’s get back to the house. The last thing either of us needs is to take a chill standing here in the cold and the wet. Besides, that wound needs tending and there’s not enough light to do it properly here. We’ll get a night’s sleep and go from there. But, Stephen, you know, we can’t pretend nothing happened tonight.”
I nodded and released the last lie that stood between us. “My name’s not Stephen.”
“I know. Come on, there’s no point standing here, soaking wet. I need time to think. Obviously, we both know you don’t belong here.”