Chapter 5
Sirius packed his wand, some sets of robes, his Puddlemere United poster, and his tattered old broom into his trunk and took it into Regulus’s bedroom next door. He changed into his pyjamas before thinking he should probably take his school books as well. So Sirius went back to his own bedroom to get them.
The minute he stepped in the room, he regretted it. Bellatrix was already there, smoking, lying on his bed with her legs up against the headboard.
“Nice bedroom, baby cousin.” she said casually.
“Could you at least take off your boots on the bed?” Sirius couldn’t resist.
“What, these?” she asked, feigning innocence, tapping her heavy boots on the already peeling wallpaper above her head. From the small bit of dust Sirius could see in the air he was sure his mother had restricted Kreacher from cleaning his bedroom while he was off at school.
“Want one?” Bellatrix asked, flicking the cigarette in her fingers.
“I’m fine.” Sirius replied, remembering what he was there to do. Bellatrix made a sound halfway between a chuckle and a humming noise.
“I doubt you will be for long.” she said airily, “The eldests rarely are in our family. Don’t know if you’ve noticed.”
Sirius picked up the pile of textbooks on his desk, deciding to ignore that comment. As he was carrying them toward the door, the Potions book in the middle of the pile fell and the rest followed it into a heap on the floor. Out of the corner of his eye, Sirius saw Bellatrix whip her wand back into her robes. He stared at her with what he hoped was a blank expression.
“Oops…” she said softly, swinging her legs down from the headboard and standing up just steps away from him, “McGonagall will kill you if you rip a textbook… Speaking of, how are your little blood-traitor friends?”
“How are your friends? Murdered anyone lately?” Sirius said boldly. He didn’t know for a fact any of them had hurt someone yet, but had heard rumours about many seventh year Slytherins trying to get the attention of some seemingly powerful wizard he had heard whispers of. Bellatrix’s eyes widened slightly and she cocked her head. Sirius hadn’t realised she was advancing until he backed himself into the wall. As she got closer, he felt his heartbeat grow faster.
“You think you’re so wise.” he could feel her breath near his face, “You know, I always suspected you wouldn’t choose our side. But oh, did Dromeda try to convince me otherwise.” She smelled of cigarette smoke and leather. It was all Sirius could do not to shrink into the corner.
“I don’t know what you mean.” he said anyway.
“You don’t, do you?” she said, “You will in time. But…I’d be good and listen if I were you.”
“Regulus is waiting.” Sirius said, still flattened against the wall. Bellatrix paused a minute then nodded toward the door. He scrambled around her and picked up the books strewn on the floor before hurrying back onto the landing.
Regulus was lying in bed with the quilt bunched up when he entered. Sirius had been planning on bringing another bed in but instead he just climbed into his brother’s. Regulus didn’t say anything, but shifted over to give him more room and rolled onto his back. This reminded Sirius of when they were young, they would mutter to each other through the darkness and sometimes make forts with the pillows. Except now they lay still and silent. Sirius felt this new barrier between him and Regulus that had never been there before and wondered if he felt it too.
Sirius got through the next week somewhat unscathed. He received an ancient quill from his mother and father for Christmas, a family heirloom belonging to his great-grandfather Sirius Black the second. He could not remember a time he had ever been given something new by his parents, only old heirlooms. Which made sense since there was barely anything else in the house than ancient objects. On his own orders, he had not received anything in the mail from James, Remus, or Peter. After the fiasco with James’s letter, Sirius had sent letters out to each one of them requesting not to be sent anything for Christmas. He snuck away once though, to some Muggle shop to buy them each a bag of sweets with the little Muggle money Andromeda had gifted him secretly.
He everything but ran down the platform, dragging his trunk he had enthusiastically packed that morning. When James was standing in front of him, Sirius dropped his trunk and pulled the boy into a hug. James, Merlin love him, dropped his own trunk and put his arms around Sirius back,
“Alright, mate?” he asked.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” Sirius answered.
Once gathered in a compartment, James, Remus, and Peter pulled out presents for Sirius. Even though he had bought them sweets, he hadn’t expected them to save his presents. Remus had gotten him a book, Peter gave him a new comb, and James a fanged frisbee along with homemade biscuits from Euphemia. Sirius felt sort of embarrassed that he had only gotten them sweets, but they were all nice about it.
Sirius started to realise all throughout the train ride and dinner that James was acting weird. Almost giddy. Though he waited until they were all unpacking in the dormitory to bring it up,
“Have you got something to tell us, mate?”
“Funny you should ask,” James swung around to face them, as if he had been prepared for this question. He had a silvery object clutched in his hand and when he let it down, it hung like silk.
“Nice cloak.” Peter said. James chuckled cockily and pulled it over himself. The second it was around him, he vanished. There was a moment of profound silence. Sirius’s mouth fell open in shock.
“Wicked!” Peter exclaimed, in awe.
“Can I try?” Sirius asked eagerly.
“How easy will it be to get Snape back with this?!” James said excitedly, still invisible. Remus was the only one who looked confused.
“Cool, eh Remus?” James said, pulling the cloak back off and reappearing in the spot he had been standing.
“Uh, what is it?” he asked.
“What is it?!” Peter rounded on him, “This is an invisibility cloak!”
“Yeah, well, obviously.”
“Haven’t you ever heard of the Tale of Three Brothers?” James asked, genuinely curious. Remus shook his head.
“How did you get it?” Sirius asked James.
“Passed down in my family.” James said, “My dad gave it to me for Christmas. Said it was his dad’s too.”
“Whoa.” Peter muttered. Sirius was absolutely sure he would now concentrate even less in school thinking of all the ways they could get Snape back using the cloak.
“What should we use it for?” James asked, folding it and laying it carefully back in the depths of his trunk.
“Well the last play anyone made was us tampering with Snape’s cauldron so I guess we have to wait until he does something.” Remus said, back to unpacking his books.
“Why?” Peter asked.
“‘Cause otherwise it’s just mean, isn’t it?” Remus explained, logically.
“Who cares?” Sirius interrupted, but James said,
“What if we mess with Filch?”
“Yes!” Sirius clapped James on the shoulder, “He’s the one who caught us in the first place, the miserable bastard.”
Over the next week, Sirius slowly felt himself relax into being back at Hogwarts. His concentration on the actual schoolwork was as bad as it had been before the break, but he hadn’t expected anything to change.
Sirius came up with the idea to rearrange the trophies in the trophy room, during a particularly boring History of Magic class.
“Filch will go absolutely mental. He keeps that trophy room in top shape.”
“Brilliant!” James agreed, “When do we do it? Tonight?”
“Can’t. I have detention with Sprout for that mess with the Puffapods.” Sirius grinned.
“Saturday then.” James said, “Peter?” He elbowed Peter, who was hunched on the desk, quickly falling asleep. Peter nodded and closed his eyes again.
“Remus, you in?” Sirius turned to the boy beside him who was, as always, studiously taking notes.
“Shh,” Remus said, without taking his eyes off the parchment in front of him.
“Oh come on, Binns wouldn’t stop reading if a dragon burst into the classroom.” Sirius scoffed. Remus looked up and said sternly,
“This is why you have detention every night.” his eyes returning to the parchment, he added, “Of course I’m in.”
“Good,” Sirius said, slightly disgruntled, “And I’m not in detention every night. James is in detention more than me.”
“Oi!”
That Saturday night, Sirius was startled awake by a sharp pain in his side. He opened his eyes to James and Peter leaning over him, James’s knee prodding him.
“You said you wouldn’t fall asleep!”
“Get. Off.” Sirius grumbled, pushing them over and standing up to join Remus at the end of the bed, as James dug up the invisibility cloak from his trunk.
Luckily they all only just fit under it if they crouched, but elected to use it once they got to the portrait hole. Unfortunately, two people were sitting by the slowly dying fire when they arrived. James made to take out the cloak, but not before Lily and Mary noticed them.
“What are you lot doing?” Mary asked suspiciously, lowering her book.
“Nowhere.”
“What are you doing?”
“Going for a walk.”
Sirius, James, and Peter answered at the same time. Lily looked over at Remus.
“Remus, where are you going?” she asked.
“You probably don’t want to know,” he said, smoothly. Lily and Mary nodded, turning their attention back to their books.
“You’ve got the girls wrapped around your finger!” Sirius whispered to Remus once they were all bunched together under the cloak, in the corridor.
“I haven’t,” Remus shook his head.
“Oh, you so have,” James said, “What did you do?”
“Nothing, I was just nice to them,” Remus shrugged, visibly wanting the conversation over. Peter made them all walk forward, mumbling to himself, trying to remember the way to the trophy room.
“Bullocks, you must have done something to get in their good books,” Sirius said.
It took a while to get to the trophy room, owing to the fact that James was sure it was on the north side of the third floor but turned out to be on the west side. But they did not run into anyone. The way back, however, was not as smooth. They met three obstacles on the way back; one of them being Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff Prefects on rounds, so the group under the cloak crept stealthily past. The second was at the top of a staircase onto the fourth floor. Peter, who was leading, flung out an arm to stop the others. Then Sirius heard the voice coming from around the corner. It was Bellatrix, he was sure of it.
“...Anyway, I thought your toadstool looked nothing like a toad,” she said, in the most startlingly soft voice he had ever heard come out of her mouth. Then another voice joined in, saying,
“Well, McGonagall didn’t think so,”
“Well, McGonagall is an old bat,” Bellatrix said. Sirius had never heard her defend anyone before. It felt wrong.
There was a pause in which the other person giggled slightly. Then Bellatrix continued,
“I know you’ll do brilliantly on your NEWTs, Rita.” Sirius knew the name Rita, Rita Skeeter, she was one of the only girls in Bellatrix’s group of cronies.
“I don’t know about that,” Rita said, “But you will… I’ll just end up being a housewife.”
“When I marry Rodolphus this summer I’ll be expected to be a housewife,” Bellatrix’s voice had changed slightly, irritated inflictions making it known that she was bothered by this.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” Rita said, quietly.
“We’d better get back to the dormitory,”
There were footsteps walking in what sounded like the other direction, down the corridor and the voices were gone. Sirius felt sort of panicked and looked around to make sure his friends hadn’t realised it was Bellatrix. As far as he could tell, they hadn’t.
After a tense moment, eight ears straining to make sure the students really had gone, they moved forward into the now deserted corridor.
Sirius had not heard Bellatrix speak like that to anyone since he was young. Maybe sometimes with her sisters but very rarely. By the way he’d seen her act around her friends, he was surprised she loved them that much.
The third obstacle came before Sirius knew it. They were suddenly on the seventh floor, mere corridors away from the Gryffindor common room and James was ripping the cloak off of them. Before any of them knew it, a booming voice came from down the corridor,
“What are you boys doing out of bed this late?”
Sirius twirled around, taking in the horrified look on James face then Slughorn standing in pinstriped pyjamas. He didn’t sound particularly scolding, but Sirius remembered they had the cloak and snapped his head around to make sure James had put it away. He had.
“Now I won’t get you boys into too much trouble,” Slughorn continued, as if this was a secret they were collectively keeping, “Anyway, Mr Black and Mr Potter, I was meaning to send you an invitation but this will do just as well… I have been known to hold dinner parties for select students whom I see particular talent in. The first Slug Club this year will be on January 30th. Will you two do me the honours of attending?”
Sirius was taken aback. They weren’t in any trouble? But they’d been caught out of bed in the middle of the night.
“Of course we’ll be there,” James says quickly. Sirius nodded, deciding to take James’s lead on this one.
“Wonderful…wonderful!” Slughorn looked satisfied, “Unfortunately I will have to take five points from all of you for being out of bed at this hour…principle, I’m sure you understand. See you all in class!”
With that Slughorn strode the opposite direction down the corridor.
“Out of all the professors that could have caught us, I’m bloody glad it was him,” Peter said, once they were back in the dormitory, “Imagine if it had been McGonagall.” he shuddered.
“That was ridiculous,” James said, as he folded the cloak into his trunk, “Slug Club. I’m rubbish at potions. And, no offence, but Sirius is too. He asked us to that party because of our parents.” There was silence in the room, then,
“Well, yeah,” Remus said, climbing into his four-poster.
“What do you mean, ‘yeah’?” James asked.
“I mean, Slughorn obviously has a thing for collecting famous witches and wizards. Did you not notice how he stopped at certain names, first class?” Remus said as if it was completely clear, “Just go. It might be good for making connections.”
James open and closed his mouth a few times before saying,
“I didn’t know I was famous.”
“Well, not you. Your dad,” Remus clarified.
“Barely,” James muttered.