Chapter 17
Remus soothingly stroked Sirius' hair as his brother slipped into a fitful sleep where he lay on the couch next to Remus in Remus' quarters. The little sitting room was cozy, with a warm fire going in the non-floo fireplace and the battered and worn, but very comfortable couch sitting so as to take advantage of the light and warmth. A small table sat in front of the couch and between two large armchairs arranged on either side, both of which were also in a similar state to the couch. Not that Remus minded the state of his furniture, it just meant that although they were rather hideous, they were just right to cradle aching bones.
Remus was far too certain that Sirius' bones were aching. Dementors had bad enough effects on a person's emotional state, but Azkaban itself was a harsh place, with no comforts at all, not even a pile of straw to sleep on. Yes, he had looked up everything he could about the wizard's prison. His brother was there, even if he had betrayed their pack. That information was the real reason that he hadn't tried to confront Sirius before. No werewolf could go to the prison without being immediately thrown in a cell for presumed attempted jailbreak. Sleeping on rock floors and having no warming charms to offset the harsh wet and cold climate, Sirius had to have developed some sort of arthritis. Well, he'd see if Madam Pomphrey could help with that later.
Remus reached out and tugged his best fuzzy blanket that had warming and comforting runes woven into it off the back of the couch and spread it over Sirius. Harry had gotten him the blanket. The first day they'd met after THAT night had been the same day that the reporters had been shown the founder's chambers so they hadn't had much of a chance to talk. However, he had gotten a chance to have a good long talk with Lady Evans. He'd agreed with her that his cub needed closer watching over, but he had managed to talk her out of hiring bodyguards for Harry. Harry had gotten him the blanket as a thank you for his efforts.
Remus glanced at his other hand, the one that held a banged up copy of the Daily Prophet. He couldn't look at it for more than a moment at a time, Mooney's rage threatening to boil over each time he saw the damning picture. Wormtail. He'd seen the transformation often enough to recognize Peter Pettigrew in his animagus form at a glance. The traitor was shown clearly, perched on the shoulder of one of Molly and Arthur's boys in the center of the picture. Peter was alive, just as Sirius had begged him to believe, to believe that it hadn't been him that had betrayed their pack, their family, their cub.
Sirius started, jerking up and staring at Remus. "Moony?" he asked. He reached out and touched Remus' shoulder. After a moment of making certain that Remus was real, Sirius broke down again. "I didn't do it, I swear, Moony! It was the rat! Wormtail betrayed us all! He's going to hurt Harry! I have to stop him!"
Remus caught Sirius' hand. "I believe you, Sirius. I see the picture too. He won't hurt our cub. Harry is in Minerva's office right now and the traitor is in Egypt. The Weasley's won't be back in England for another month. We have time. We'll teach that rat what it means to betray the Marauders and then we'll turn him over to Amelia."
Sirius frowned. "Amelia? What does she have to do with this?"
Remus smirked. "Your old girlfriend is now the head of the DMLE. She'll see to it that the traitor gets Kissed, and just as importantly, that you get your freedom back. Harry needs us, Padfoot. We can't let him down. Dumbledore kept him from us for too long. His aunt has already agreed to let us stay at Ravenclaw Keep during the holidays so that we can help finish raising our cub, but you have to get your freedom before that can happen. So!" With that Remus stood up and helped Sirius get to his feet.
"Off you go, straight through that door. It leads to my room and there's a bath through the door beside the bed. Go get cleaned up and I'll have one of the house-elves get you something to eat when you're done as well as a purging potion. Then you'll get looked over by Madam Pomphrey."
"Why?" Sirius asked suspiciously, drawing back from Remus, drawing the wand that Remus had given him.
Remus sighed. "Pads, you've been living with Dementors for years. There's going to be damage from that and I'm certain that the guards probably potioned your food. In fact, Itsy!" he called.
The house-elf assigned to Remus as the one in charge of the werewolf children's dorm popped in. "Yes, Master Wolfy?"
Remus smiled. "Itsy, Sirius here needs a chocolate feast. Hot chocolate, chocolate chunk muffins, anything and everything that you can think of with chocolate in it, and the darker the chocolate the better. He won't be able to eat much at first, and he needs real food as well, but he needs the chocolate now."
"Yes, Master Wolfy!" Itsy said before popping away.
"Chocolate?" Sirius asked, confused as he lowered Remus' wand.
Remus nodded. "Yes, it's the best remedy for Dementor exposure. It actually has a scientific reason behind it. Dementors actually change the chemistry in a person's brain, that's how they force someone to feel all the bad memories they have. Dark chocolate actually helps the brain reassert the correct chemistry to allow someone to feel good things. That's why Lily used to call it a mood booster."
Sirius looked blankly at him. Remus chuckled. "I went and got that Defence Mastery James and Lily said that I should, even though I had to go out of the country for it. Trust me when I say that the more chocolate and the darker the chocolate, the better for you right now." Itsy popped in with a mug of hot chocolate with mini marshmallows and handed it to Sirius. "Drink up, and off to the bath with you," he said again. "We've got a revenge to plan and you need to be in better shape for it."
With the sort of fussing that he'd done when they were boys, Remus got Sirius into the bath and beginning to scrub. It would take more than a single scrub down for the years of neglect and grime to be washed away, but they had to start somewhere. While Itsy watched over Sirius in the bath, (and Sirius was amazed that Itsy didn't disillusion herself while she did so), Remus headed for the Headmistress' Office.
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Augusta Longbottom stormed into Longbottom manor through the front door and headed straight for the cellar. She was so incensed that she didn't realize that the boys, (Neville, Harry and Dudley), were all in the parlor as she stomped by the open door, cursing at the top of her lungs. The boys immediately dropped what they were doing and followed her at a safe distance. It turned out that the Longbottoms had a dueling practice room in one end of the manor's cellar. When Augusta threw open the door and stormed inside, the boys hurried to watch from the doorway.
Dummies made up of cloth and wood exploded as Augusta rained hexes down upon them. More popped up and she tore them to shreds with cutting curses. Stuffed heads rolled, and limbs flew through the air as she vented her anger. Then she moved on to more creative cursing. One dummy had it's lower section encased in ice and then crushed. The boys winced as they realized just what her target had been, and Harry and Dudley turned wide eyes towards Neville. He simply looked pale and nodded at his friends.
Next Augusta caused a bit of cloth that was on the floor to strangle the dummy she was facing. Then another seemed to ooze it's insides out from where it would have had ears if it had been human. One turned inside out, literally. All of the stuffing and wood was on the outside and there was no sign of the outer coverings. Another was bombarded with crabs which tore it to pieces. And on, and on until finally Augusta was wheezing from exhaustion. "Gran?" Neville asked, not exactly wanting to know what had brought this about, but at the same time realizing that he probably really needed to know.
"What?" Augusta said as she turned around to find the three wide eyed boys staring at her. "Oh Neville, I'm sorry you saw that. All of you, actually. It's just," here she started to sniff. "If it wasn't for your Mum and Aunt, Dudley and Harry. Oh dear." At that point she actually broke down crying, well in a very contained sort of way. Tears poured down her face, but she wasn't sobbing so much that she couldn't talk. "It seems that Petunia was right. Someone was hurting Frank and Alice behind our backs, preventing them from getting better. I removed them from St. Mungo's and moved them to a private muggle hospital, well actually it's more like a muggleborn hospital as all of the staff are muggleborns but the muggles are aware of it. It's called St. George's Hospital for Hopeless Cases. They treat both muggles and wizards."
"Why do they call it that?" Dudley wanted to know. Harry nudged him, but the other boy didn't seem to get that it wasn't a very polite question.
Augusta laughed bitterly. "Both to discourage people with trivial problems wanting to seek out their services and because they take on cases that no one else will touch." She took a deep breath and wiped her face. Then she came over to the boys and took Neville's hand. "They have a very good track record of treating unusual problems with a mix of magic and muggle methods, although they're still very careful about keeping the statute.
"A legilimens witch sat with your parents for an hour today. It was the first test they underwent. The good news is that Petunia was right. They are sane inside but they are locked inside their own minds. They can be treated and some other things were uncovered, but don't you worry, the responsible parties have been turned over to Madam Bones. The rest of the news is that with any luck, your parents might be able to greet you and your friends when you get off of the train at the end of this next school term."
"Really, Gran?" Neville asked excitedly, the good news eclipsing the news that someone had been arrested for doing something to his parents.
"It's not for certain," Augusta warned him, "but yes. There's a chance that your parents will be released for day trips in a year's time, and within two they could come home." With that more tears spilled down her cheeks, this time matched by Neville's. The two clung to each other and neither noticed as Harry tugged Dudley out of the doorway.
"I hope that whoever it is that was hurting them rots in Azkaban for life," Harry growled softly. Dudley nodded in agreement. The two of them found Petunia looking in the parlor for them.
"Oh there you are boys, have you seen Madam Longbottom?" she asked.
"Yeah, she's down in the dueling practice room with Neville," Dudley said. "She kind of tore the room apart and now they're, well, crying together."
"Well of course they are," Petunia said firmly. "I doubt Augusta has had a good cry in over a decade and they both deserve the chance to let their feelings out. Now, do you have any questions about why they are upset?"
Harry spoke before Dudley could gear up for a question. "Who hurt them, Aunt Petunia? Who hurt Neville's parents?" he asked with a growl.
Petunia sighed and sat down on a divan, with both of the boys in front of her. "Head Healer Bartholomew Burke. I won't tell you what he did, but you should know that Madam Bones got a full confession and he was a sympathizer of Voldemort's. He felt that as blood-traitors, the Longbottom's did not deserve healing. I'll be going to his trial, but as he has confessed, the only thing we will be debating is his punishment."
"He's an oath-breaker, Aunt Petunia," Harry said firmly. "There's magical consequences for that sort of thing. You should look into those, and then put him in Azkaban for the rest of his life."
"What do you mean, oath-breaker?" Dudley wanted to know. Petunia leaned forward to listen intently.
Harry took a deep breath and managed his anger. He'd had a lot of practice with that. "Healers take oaths to heal and do no harm, that sort of thing. So if he hurt, or even caused them to be hurt by someone else, that means he broke his healer's oaths. If someone breaks a serious enough oath, they can lose their magic or even die. I don't know what will happen to him but there are always consequences for oath-breaking, and if he didn't take those oaths, well then everyone in St. Mungo's should be checked to see if they got around taking the oaths too."