Chapter 4
Sirius has never felt this kind of rage in his life, it bubbles to the surface more and more as the veritaserum fades. His bones ache with a fire he didn’t know he possessed. He wanted to drag Snivillus into the dining room by his hair and torture the truth out of him. Surely the trust Dumbledore had in him was deeply misplaced. Surely he had caused this. His connection to Lily and he was the least obvious choice, unlike Sirius much to his fury. Meaning Pete or Remus would be too obvious too. Right?
“Where’s Peter?” Remus’s voice was exhausted and muddied with sorrow. Sirius’s heart cracked at the sound. But it shattered at the response.
“No one has heard from Peter in weeks.” Dumbledore does not give away any emotion in his words but his face shows his suspicion. Sirius feels hopeless and broken at the thoughts. Peter with his sweet round face and willingness to follow them through all of this hell could be a traitor?
“No.” The voice from before leaves no trace of itself. As Remus raises himself to his full height to look Dumbledore in the eyes his voice is icy cold and leaves no room for anyone else. “You will NOT do this to Peter too.” Yells accentuate his every other word.
“You do not have the right to stand before me and Sirius- HIS BROTHERS- and claim he is a traitor based on not hearing from him.” Sirius has never once been scared of Moony, his folded socks and thick wool jumpers made sure of that, but this Remus here- he was terrifying. Heavy breathing and yelling mixed with sudden calm, it was like watching him fight the moon to fight the anger rising in him. Teeth bared and fists balled Remus walked out of the room, his fist making a nice hole in the wall as he went.
Sirius was torn, between following his boyfriend and consoling him through their tragedy, and finding out answers. As always Remus won. Shooting a glare at Dumbledore he rushes from the room.
He was faster than Sirius, legs longer and the moon being this close always seems to affect him in more than just mood, not that Remus would even acknowledge that. By the time Sirius finds him Remus has smoked half a second cigarette and is sitting on a ledge near the rooftop garden. He ashes into an empty pot that once held lavender and mint, a gift from Lily before Sirius had run away, neglected after his departure.
"Mine if I steal a smoke?" It's not so much a question of whether he'll let him take the cigarette but a gauge of how open Remus is feeling in the moment. In this moment he only taps the top of a pack poking out of the jacket Sirius is wearing, but he does offer a lighter and a halfhearted smirk. They smoke in silence long enough for Sirius to light a second one before Remus speaks.
"I can't believe Pete's dead too." Remus says it like it's a fact about the weather, blowing smoke out and not looking at Sirius. Sirius chokes on his own smoke and has to cough a few more times in order to respond.
"We don't know that," Remus laughs without joy at Sirius's words. "No! We don't know for sure."
"Not yet," Remus puffs out a cloud of smoke as he talks. "But it's that or Wormtail is a rat." The look he gives Sirius is pointed, but hollow. Like it was once a funny statement but they can’t remember why now.
"Okay. He's dead." They sit in silence, Sirius smokes three more cigarettes before they go inside to figure out the next step. Remus smashes the pot they ash in, Sirius doesn't tell him what it was. No point. Everything else is broken, why shouldn't that be too.
*******
The wolf paced in his head, it had gotten quiet since the incident in the kitchen but the second they entered the house again it was alert and agitated. But that might just have been all Remus, the agony of the moon had nothing on this kind of pain. Dulled only by the knowledge that Voldemort was dead and Harry and Sirius were alive. He wanted so badly to rip himself apart and set the wolf on whoever had done this. Just so he didn't have to live with the consequences of doing it with his own human hands. Sirius seemed to be the only one as broken by this as him, but that didn't surprise him. What did was that everyone seemed to be crying tears of joy that the war was over. Like it meant the suffering was ending too somehow.
"Mr. Lupin," Dumbledore greeted them at the top of the stairs, not a moment's rest in the house. He wonders if this is just how life is now. "Mr. Black, come with me please. Our meeting was not over."
They follow behind him, Remus doesn't mean to but he walks shielding Sirius with his body. Protective. Possessive. Paranoid.
A hand on his shoulder shakes him from thoughts of grabbing Sirius and running for his cottage on the moors.
"We're going to be okay," Sirius says it like he actually means it. It's almost enough for Remus to believe it too. Almost.
He struggles to put a reassuring smile on his face for Sirius but he's sure it comes off more as painful.
As they walk into the kitchen the only one left sitting at the table is Severus Snape. Remus tenses at the sight and tries to block Sirius's way into the room but he fails quickly.
*****
Sirius shoulders past Remus as soon as he sees who is sitting at the table. His blood is boiling. How dare he sit at that table looking so smug. He plans to rip the information out of him by any and all means possible, Snape is guilty and he knows it.
Snape leans back in his chair casually, “Blood Traitor,” he smirks as Remus grabs at Sirius’s arm. “Traitor of friends as well, it seems." Sirius sees red and then black briefly as he rips his arm out of Remus’s grasp.
His head is clouded by rage or he would've thought to grab his wand for this. Instead he throws himself over the table and grabs a hold of Snape by the collar as he knocks the chair he was sitting in over, now with both of them in it. It falls with a great crash and Snape smacks his head against the floor. Sirius swings one ring covered hand down onto his face. Blood spatters across both of them. The sight only makes Sirius angrier somehow. He manages three more hits to Snape's two by the time Remus wraps his huge arms around Sirius's middle and heaves him off the other man. Sirius is lifted like he weighs nothing at all, momentarily breathless from the sudden movement. His lip is split and Snape holds a handful of black hairs. They'll both have black eyes tomorrow. Sirius hopes he broke the traitor's nose as he watches a thick stream of blood drip down his face. He spits at Snape and screams profanities at the room as he is hauled away, he kicks against Remus and grabs at the walls to try and break free. His fingers catch on decades old scratches in the wood, left there by him in very similar yet entirely different situations.
"Let me go, Remus!" Sirius's throat scratches raw at his screaming, Remus sets his feet on the ground and grabs his wrists to keep him from beating against Remus’s chest. "I'll kill him with my bare hands he killed them! REMUS!" He's suddenly being pressed against the wall, held in place by the entirety of Remus's body. His head bounces gently off the wall despite the rough nature of the action. Hands pinned out on either side of his head to make any struggle harder.
"This won't bring them back." Remus's voice is in his ear. Neither his words or tone are harsh but it still stings to hear and it takes all the fight out of Sirius. He lays his full weight onto Remus's, arms falling to his side as Remus wraps him in a hug, and they stay like that for a few moments before returning to the meeting. Again. This time only Dumbledore remains.
*********
Remus doesn’t have to drag Sirius back to the kitchen but he leaves his hand on the other man’s shoulder until they get there anyway. He just wants to get this over with. He sits across the table from Dumbledore frowning.
“How do you know he’s innocent?” Sirius remains in the doorway as he speaks, a look on his face that would be unreadable to anyone who hadn’t known him as long as Remus had. He is terrified of what Dumbledore might say.
“Severus is the one who told me about Voldemort targeting The Potters,” it’s a simple statement. Like it explains everything away, as if Severus hadn’t been their number one tormentor for almost a decade, however mutual. Completely ignoring the fact that Peter has never been anything other than their brother and fellow man in the storm.
“What? So he has one moment of humanity and we all collectively forget Peter is loyal through and through?” Remus is sarcastic at best of times, this time he’s just straight up rude. Now he is the one leaning back defiantly in his chair, long limbs accentuating his disrespect. Dumbledore remains unperturbed.
“Why haven’t we dragged him in here with veritaserum?” Sirius is clearly getting impatient with Dumbledore’s lack of response. Hands placed flat on the table as he leans around Remus to look pointedly at the old man.
“We did that hours ago Sirius,” Dumbledore stands and folds his hands together in front of him. “Or would you prefer we dragged you around to every member to proclaim your innocence as well.”
Sirius’s face morphs into a twisted version of his pranking smile, the split in his lip cracking more and dripping blood, the look makes Remus’s stomach turn. It reminds him of the time he showed up at James’s house the summer of sixth year. Telling them about how he escaped his mother for good that time, the same sick smile on his face.
“If that’s what it takes to find who did this,” Sirius spits, venom dripping off every word. “I would die every day if that’s what it took. Never mind your fucking truth potion.” He leaves after that. Abandoning Remus to the rest of this cursed conversation.
“I will make this quick Mr. Lupin,” Remus stands as well to look at him better. “Do not leave here unless you have to. Leave finding Peter to The Order. Do not contact Harry.” With that Remus is left staring at where the old man had once been standing. Dumbledore apparating to avoid the questions he knew Remus would have. But more importantly to avoid the objections the other man would clearly have.
“Fuck,” Remus swears to himself before going in search of Sirius. How was he going to have this conversation?