Betrayal
Daily Prophet Special Report
Black Conspiracy:
Azkaban Escapees Hidden With Help of Convicted Murderer
Amid rising concern throughout the Wizarding world, following the escape
of ten Azkaban prisoners over a fortnight ago, Minister of Magic Cornelius
Fudge met again today with the Prophet to dispel rumours about their
continued evasion of Magical Law Enforcement officials. “For the record,”
said Fudge from his London office this morning. “Just because the escaped
prisoners were sentenced for their deeds while followers of You-Know-Who , does not, repeat, not, mean the Dark Lord has returned, so we have no reason
to believe the dementors allowed the escape on his orders. And though
all were members of his inner circle, he’s not harbouring the fugitives!
There’s nothing to connect either the prison guards or inmates to him. Except,” Fudge added on a chuckle. “That they’ve all been mentioned in this interview.”
Stories of You-Know-Who’s return have circulated for months. Initially
linked to the death of seventeen-year-old Hogwarts Contestant Cedric
Digory during the Tri-Wizard Tournament, they have taken on a life of their
own. “Unconfirmed reports about him continue to flood this office,” says
Fudge. “They only got started because Mr. Digory’s accident was witnessed
by Harry Potter, who vanquished the Dark Lord years ago. People are
always trying to pair the two of them. That association,” Fudge is quick to
point out “has blighted Potter’s life for years., until he, like the public, now
sees a connection that doesn’t exist. The unfortunate failure of Headmaster
Albus Dumbledore to dissuade Potter from his delusions or at least
contain them from public gossip has only added to the mounting panic. ”
“These rumours,” Fudge asserts, “hinder us finding the true mastermind behind the escapes. “Hysteria over You-Know-Who has distracted public notice
from the one person, who, by means yet unknown ever escaped Azkaban
before now, Sirius Black. Black, who has remained at large for nearly two
years, has likely used his secret knowledge to plot this breakout.”
Black, member of one of the Wizarding world’s oldest and most staunchly pureblood families, is known as the highest ranking and most notorious of
You-Know-Who’s supporters. Arrested fourteen years ago, after the murder
of twelve Muggles and Wizard Peter Pettigrew, he was guilty of conspiracy
in the deaths of James and Lily Potter of Godric’s Hollow. As reported
earlier, Black is the prime suspect behind the plot to free his old friends.
“Despite Black’s resourcefulness,” says Fudge. “his motives are both basic
and predictable. One need only recall that among those he helped escape
was Bellatrix Lastrange, who is, after all,, his cousin.”
“Because of that predictability,” concludes Fudge. “It’s only a matter of time until Magical Law Enforcement catches up with him and his Death Eater
cronies and has them back in custody. With all of his followers gone, the old
fears that spawned the ridiculous tales of the Dark Lord’s return, will go, too!”
-Ozzie Bodkins, Reporter at Large
To: Harry Potter
Gryffindor Tower
From Number Twelve Grimmauld Place
Mid-February, Harry’s Fifth Year at Hogwarts
Hey, Harry!
Thanks! When you asked at Christmas what was the happiest day of my childhood, you got me searching out an answer for you. I sat at this kitchen table one restless night a fortnight ago and set quill to parchment to assure you that, though I can’t yet conjure a decent patronus to ward off dementors, I have some great memories! I went to bed afterward and had my best sleep since returning to this dreary place. I appreciate it more than words can say!
In the days since Dapper set out with that letter, my thoughts kept coming back to something I wrote near the end. (No, not the part about studying too hard!) The part where I told you that I stay in this dreadful old house out of loyalty to Professor Dumbledore as the head of the Order of the Phoenix.
I’m still puzzling out if I was being honest when I said that.
If I were old and ill, I could sort of see myself remaining quietly under wraps here, though I think even then I wouldn’t much like it. I hope not, anyway. Or if I had a talent for cryptography, I’d probably be more than content to spend hours with stacks of parchment spread over the table as I deciphered coded messages. But in truth, I do almost nothing these days except serve cups of tea to people popping in to exchange information. And when Molly Weasley comes for the meetings, she makes a much finer job of that than I do.
Often I ask myself how much loyalty has to do with why I’m here. Maybe what old Severus Snape said at Christmas was right after all. Under all my big talk, I’m really only a coward. To sit idle here by the fire, seems less and less like loyalty than like a betrayal of the brave Wizards and Witches such as Remus, my cousin Tonks or Arthur Weasley, who go out and face danger day after day as they attempt to hold back Voldemort’s rise to power.
Obviously I haven’t sorted it all out yet, ‘ccause I’m still sitting here at this same old kitchen table in Grimmauld Place with a quill in my hand.
I think questions of loyalty are weighing heavy on all our minds these days, what with the Wizarding world pulling itself apart from the inside. Even shut away as I am, I read it in the faces of the people who come and go, and in the pages of the Prophet. Instead of uniting against the rise of the Dark Lord as Headmaster Dumbledore urges, the Minister of Magic has chosen to take a different course. So the relationship between the Ministry of Magic and Hogwarts school grows more strained each day. That Ministry puppet, Professor Umbridge wants to pretend the whole situation does not exist. I can only guess at what sort of punishments she dishes out to those who puncture her chosen reality. And Cornelius Fudge says he doesn’t support Voldemort or what he stands for, but he does less than nothing to oppose him. He ignores your evidence of Lord Snake Eyes’ return, then uses the Prophet to label you and Dumbledore mad crackpots for speaking out about it. Still, I imagine he believes, or at least convinces himself to believe, he is acting out of loyalty to the community.
Confusing days. With so much going on, I can understand how it came to be this way.
When I was eleven and getting ready to head off to Hogwarts, I believed I knew all there was to know about loyalty. It was like what your Dad and I did the day we met in Diagon Alley. Stood shoulder to shoulder, defending each other against all comers, no matter what.
Before I went to bed that same night, Regulus smashed that simple belief into pieces.
How was it that he could betray me by trying to protect me?
Once I got Sorted into Gryffindor, I didn’t give that question much thought. Actually forgot about it altogether for a long, long time. If anyone asked me, I’d have said that I’d managed to put the meaning of loyalty back together for myself as a solid idea.
And then one full moon night in my fifth year at Hogwarts, only a few weeks before your dad and I were due to sit our O W L examinations, it was me who shattered that idea into a hundred questions.
What is it to give loyalty? To receive it? And what exactly, is betrayal? When the two ideas seem so opposite, how can they get so tangled up with each other?
Let me tell you what happened.
Betrayal
James was silent all the way from Dumbledore’s office. Except for his body. That said all kinds of things. From a few feet back, I heard his shoes slamming angry footsteps up the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. His elbows punched the air behind him as he moved. Sharp, furious jabs. I told myself I didn’t feel every one of them.
It was a lie.
“Vernal equinox,” he almost spat the password. The fat lady in the portrait guarding the common room door jerked awake. “Oh, it’s you two again!” she grumbled. I thought she’d add that students shouldn’t roam the halls so late at night. But there must have been something in James’s face that made her mouth snap shut. She slid aside to let him in, then narrowed her eyes at me. I knew she could tell I was in trouble and I deserved it.
James didn’t go to his favorite chair by the fire. He began a circuit of the room to see if anyone was there, maybe asleep on a sofa or at a study table in a corner. Nobody was. Walking to the window, he stood staring out.
Let him turn, let him shout. I was ready. He couldn’t say a thing I hadn’t told myself already ten times since leaving the Headmaster’s office. But he kept staring up at the stupid full moon that had started all this!
The silence got big, made a wall down the room between us. There was never a time in the almost five years I’d known James that I couldn’t talk to him. But words wouldn’t fix what I’d done. He had a right to every minute of his fury without me interrupting.
When he spoke, he asked a question. “Why’d you do it, Sirius?”
“Do what?”
Exactly which one of the stupid things I’d done since supper was he referring to?
James turned from the window. “You know you could’ve gotten Snape killed?”
Killed. Awful word. Too big to get my mind around, though it was a growing hole of dread in my guts. “But I didn’t!” I said before the hole could get big enough for me to fall into. “I wouldn’t have let it go that far.”
“Oh, yeah?” He sounded how I’d been trying not to feel since he’d rushed past me in the underground dark. Scared. “How do you know you could’ve stopped it? You let Snape go in the tunnel!”
Better to be angry than scared. I stepped toward James. Raised my voice a shade above his. “He was picking on Remus again!”
“Yeah? So? He was doing what he always does! Big deal! You thought what you did was… what? Going to keep him from figuring out what Remus has been trying to hide since he came to school here?”
“Don’t be stupid!” I flared.
The truth was, I hadn’t been thinking at all. If I had been, wouldn’t I have come up with a better idea? Like Chasing him off, or, more fun, using an adhere-o spell to stick his robes to the door post of the Great Hall? Or maybe just punch him out…
All I’d kept seeing as I ran out into the night after Snape, was how he’d slipped from the Great Hall after supper, way ahead of everybody else. Weird, remembering that so sharp and clear now, when I’d hardly given it any thought at the time. It was a few minutes after he’d gone, when Remus set down his fork, pushed aside his barely touched plate and started for the Entrance Hall, that I realized the significance of Snape’s disappearance. Then warnings began shouting in my head, loud as howlers. “Go after him, go after him! Something’s up! Go now!”
I turned to James. Did he sense it too? But his chair was empty. Blast! I’d forgotten he had detention again! Laying my napkin over my half-empty plate, I rose and moved down the table toward the door. Careful, not too fast. Wouldn’t do to look like anything out of the ordinary was going on. Wouldn’t want to draw attention to the fact that I’m leaving, or that Remus is already gone… Not tonight. Got to keep the secret safe… Got to hurry… Got to move… got to go careful… got to…
It took all my will not to run. Stepping into the Entrance Hall, I spotted Snape and Remus at the foot of the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. Severus was dancing back and forth, back and forth in front of Remus, blocking his way up.
“Skipped dessert tonight, didn’t you, Lupin?” Severus was asking as I moved closer. His eyes sparkled with something like glee, though he wasn’t quite smiling. “Where could you be off to in such a hurry?”
Remus kept looking past Snape to the freedom of the stairs beyond. He sidestepped right, left, right again. Severus mirrored each move. Remus’s book-bag was held tight in trembling, white knuckled hands. He kept swallowing like his throat was dry and sweat beaded his forehead. Gooseflesh rippled the fine hairs on his wrists. It could have been chills but I knew it was more.
This was bad, really bad. Through the arched window over the front door the sky was a dimming blue. The sun was going down. Soon the moon would come up and…
Soundless, I crossed the entrance hall. Snape never glanced my way. All his mind was on Remus. Drawing my wand, I stepped forward and pointed to where the tip of Severus’s own wand poked from the pocket of his robes. Raising my hand, I drew a high, sweeping arc in the air. “Expelliarmus!” I muttered.
“What?” Snape gasped. His wand shot from his pocket and soared toward the ceiling. He grabbed for it and missed. It clattered to the floor. Remus leapt past him and sped away upstairs. Snape dove across the stones, then came up glaring at me, as his fist curled tight around his upside-down wand.
“Butterfingers!” I said, holding up my own wand.
“Blast you, Black,” he said, glancing around him and then up the Gryffindor stairs.
Remus was gone.
Snape’s face was white with anger. Later I wished I’d paid attention to him and what he did next. I could have distracted him til Remus and Madame Pomfrey were long gone. Instead I pushed past him and went up to the Gryffindor common room.
I’d been caught up with the sight of the barely touched plate Remus left behind when he slipped from the Great Hall to drop off his books before going to the Hospital Wing. I was thinking, for as quiet as he was, the tower would seem kind of empty tonight. Like it always did when he was gone. Glancing out the window I made out two distant figures walking toward a large willow across the twilit grounds. There was a moment to wonder what it must be like to live in solitary exile each month, when an arc of light appeared on the grass. It widened, narrowed, vanished. The entrance hall door opening and closing!
And, wait! There was Snape, moving through the shadows!
Bloody hell! He’d gone out after them!
I didn’t wait to see Madame Pomfrey turn back to the castle before dashing downstairs.
For years Snape had been tailing James, Peter, Remus and me. He’d hide round corners or behind statues in the halls, listening to us talk.
“Do you think,” he’d ask, if we caught him eavesdropping. “You can keep your secrets secret forever?”
I sped through the Entrance Hall and out under the first scatter of stars. I saw Snape slip between two bushes and crouch to watch Madame Pomfrey walk back from the willow that swung its branches at anyone who didn’t know how to get past its spell.
Recalling his grin as his greedy eyes gobbled up the sight brought back my fury. I glared at James. “Snape had no business out there!”
“Of course he didn’t, you idiot!” The anger left James’s voice. Became something quieter. Worse. “But I can’t believe you’d do anything so stupid.”
“Well, believe it!”
Was it disappointment I’d heard in James’s voice? Turning away I walked to the fire.
“What,” said James. “Did you say to make him go in there, anyway?”
In the flames I saw Snape’s eyes widen in surprise as I grabbed his collar and pulled him up out of the bushes. “I asked him what he was looking at.”
“Yeah, then what?”
“He laughed. Said not to pretend I didn’t know. How he had waited a long time, but he’d figured out what we were hiding.”
“Not him, Sirius. You. What did you say to him?”
What did it matter what else I’d said? Or why I’d gone with Snape into the tunnel under the Whomping Willow? It was over. Done. Unchangeable. Unless James thought I’d told Severus what to expect there. Said the word at the middle of the secrets.
“I didn’t tell him, if that’s what you mean! I said that snooping in other people’s secrets was a stupid thing to do-”
“Stupid?” James’s voice almost cracked as his voice rose. “It was dangerous!”
I turned from the fire to face him. “Who’re you, talking to me about dangerous? This whole thing’s been dangerous! Ever since we found out where Remus goes at the full moon! Since we decided how to keep him company so he doesn’t have to face it alone! Since we got the transfiguration book out of the bleeding restricted section of the library and began teaching ourselves the spells for becoming animals! Discovered how to get past the Whomping Willow! It’s all been dangerous!”
“But we understood it! It was our danger! Not Snape’s.” James shouted.
“Don’t you think I know that?” I snapped.
I didn’t like Snape. Never had. Not from our first meeting! Hadn’t minded one bit the idea of putting a good scare into him so he’d stop spying on us. I hadn’t stopped to think I’d also be putting him in danger!
James’s words drew pictures that pulled me back to where we’d been an hour ago. Showed the rising moon, the Whomping Willow and the tunnel below. But not how the three of us returned safe to the castle. My rage faded, leaving only the watery-limbed feeling I got back in Grimmauld Place, watching my Mother’s fury lash this way and that at whatever got in her way.
I thought I’d left all that behind when I came to Hogwarts. Especially when the Sorting Hat sent me to Gryffindor House, not to my family’s traditional Slytherin. But that cascading temper had followed me here. Only now it was mine!
One after another, the images came. Snape, ahead of me in the dimness of the tunnel, stopping to stare at its far end where a figure changed shape. His jaw dropping open as its form was revealed. But this time no James leaped past me to snatch at his robes. No James shouted to shatter the shocked trance that held us both. No James chased us up into the moonlight or spun with his great Quidditch reflexes to raise his wand and seal the entrance as we saw a dark form hurtling toward it…
Fear danced cold fingers down my back, made me shiver. But I held my head up and stared James in the eyes. “I wanted to scare him! He knew about the opening under the tree! Said it was a matter of time til he learned what Remus was up to in there! So I used a branch to touch the knot in the trunk that stills the willow. I said he was an ignorant git who had no idea what he was talking about! But don’t let a little thing like that stop you, I said. Go right ahead then, take a look! See how much you don’t know!”
“That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard!” said James.
I turned back to stare into the flames. He caught my arm, tried to pull me round to face him. “What were you thinking, Sirius, if you were thinking at all? Or were you just completely mad? I thought I knew you, mate.”
What was I supposed to say? Of course you know me?
I didn’t know myself. I hated the reckless rage that had poured hot and dark through my veins! It was careless! Cruel! The sort of righteous arrogance I’d seen at home. I tried to jerk free of James’s grasp, but he held tight. “I was angry, okay? Seeing him smirk down his big old nose, saying he knew our secret! James, did you ever think maybe we didn’t always catch him spying? That places we thought were safe maybe aren’t? I wanted that smirk off his face! Wanted him to know for a minute what it was like not to feel so smug and secure!”
I heard the echo of rage in my words, though I didn’t feel it now. Didn’t feel the warmth of the crackling fire either, only the cold dread that was big enough to make my teeth chatter.
I was the one who sounded smug! Spiteful! It was a relief to hear revulsion creep into my tone. And fear. “All the while I was talking to Snape, I kept thinking ‘better stop it now, Sirius, better be quiet!’ And the more I thought that, the more I didn’t want to stop!”
James’s hand dropped. “Okay, I get it! Snape’s a git, you were angry! Okay! This isn’t exactly about him. You set Remus up to take out your revenge on Snape for you!”
“What do you mean?”
But I knew.
I hadn’t thought of it when the fury pounded blood in my ears. The knowing only came later, as Severus, James and I staggered up out of the dark. When James released the willow and sealed the grounds off from the tunnel and I became aware of the words Severus was panting. “There’s a werewolf in there! A werewolf!”
And I remembered who that werewolf was.
I hugged my arms against my chest, wishing the fire had some warmth to it. Not that my shivers had as much to do with cold as with horror. “It’s over now,” I tried to reassure myself. “Professor Dumbledore told Snape not to talk about what he saw tonight.”
“Yeah?” It was good hearing anger back in James’s voice. We could both be angry with me. “How much do you think that’ll mean to Snivvelus tomorrow?”
“He said he saw a werewolf in the tunnel! He might think Remus is doing something with it for a class, not that Remus is…” I hated the desperation in my voice.
“He’s not stupid, Sirius! You as good as shouted the secret at him. Did you ever think what Remus will say when he finds out?”
“Remus? Find out? Why would he? Dumbledore swore Severus to secrecy…”
That wasn’t the point. I knew it. It had been Remus’s secret to tell. Or not to. Because we lived with him, James, Peter and I had figured it out and then vowed not to speak of it beyond our circle. Now, by giving in to a stupid impulse, I’d broken their trust. Let my fury get loose enough to twist like a snake in my hands. I hadn’t protected the secret, I’d turned it to a weapon of revenge! However bad I felt, whatever danger I’d put Snape in, it was now Remus who would be hurt the most by what I’d done.
His worst fear was harming anybody while under the influence of the moon and I’d made that a real possibility tonight
Regret ached in my throat. I stared at the fire. Saw the orange light break into prism pieces as sick, silent tears formed.
“Oh, man, Sirius, you just don’t get it, do you?” said James behind me. I thought he’d say more. But a moment later I heard his footsteps moving toward the dormitory stairs.
Should I go after him, say I did understand what he meant? No. He had a right to his disappointment. I had no business trying to talk him out of it. Not when I shared it.
I waited, giving him time to get into bed before I went up. Tonight I had no right to gather courage gazing into the eyes of my old friend. I had to find it in myself. Tomorrow, in the Hospital Wing, I’d need it to look into the eyes of another friend and cause him worse pain than I was feeling now. I only hoped my words wounded him less than if he learned from anybody else how I betrayed him.