Halloween Betrayal
October 31, 1981 10:30 pm
Sirius enters their loft and immediately starts rummaging through the cupboards and drawers looking for more candy. “Damn, I bet prongs has some extra candy.” he says to themself as he leaves the loft. Sirius appartated to his best friend, James Potters, house to see if he had any spare candy. But Sirius found the unthinkable.
They appeared across the street to see the door wide open. The house looked abandoned, Sirius stood there for what felt like an eternity, he wouldn’t dare think it, but he knew, deep down he knew. And the world stood still around them. What brought him back was the sight of their schoolboy nemesis leaving the house, once so filled with life and joy despite all that was happening in their world, Snape was leaving his bestfriends house in tears. As the crazy world started to fill in around them, one sound broke through. The sound of a crying baby.
Sirius knew that cry anywhere. It was her godson. Harry. Sirius couldn’t move, he wanted to run to his one year old godson and hold him. But Sirius could not force himself to move no matter how hard they tried, he couldn’t move, it would make it real if he moved. He kept hoping that this was some sort of terrible dream and he would wake up. When they didn’t, his legs grew heavy and collapsed under them, “Peter.” Choking back his tears, they said the name of one of his closest childhood friends with such rage and sorrow. “Potter…” He whispered. A tall man appeared next to him, as a single tear escaped their eye and rolled down his cheek. “Hagrid?” Sirius looked up at the man, tears now streaming down their face.
“I’m sorry Black.” The man responded, not knowing what else to say.
Sirius was standing now, tears wiped. “Take him,” He said, handing Hagrid a pair of keys.
“But what ‘bout- ?”
“I won’t be needing them anymore.” With a wave of his wand Sirius disappeared. They reappeared standing face to face with his ‘friend’. “What have you gotten yourself into this time Wormy?” Sirius said this with such anger. All traces of sorrow on their face were gone, and so was any affection he felt for the man standing before them.
“Padfoot!” He said with a big guilty grin trying to mask his terror.
“Don’t you padfoot me.” Sirius retorted with such disgust. “James isn’t here to get you out of this one, and I won’t be protecting you any more.” He finished holding their wand at the readdy. Pettigrew fired the first shot trying to disarm Sirius. He blocked the spell and fired back with a few hexs. Peter was never the best duler but he was very slippery despite his pudgy appearance. When he realized how little of a chance he had, the cowered transformed into his animagus form, but before he did Sirius managed to hit his finger. “You think that will protect you, I’ll kill a rodent!” Sirius yelled at his old friend in the form of a rat. Mad with anger Sirius continued to fire at the rat continuing to scare the already petrified muggles Pettigrrew had hit with his miss fire. Sirius hadn’t noticed the crowd around them of muggle and wizard alike, and he continued firing every offencive spell they could think of at the rat until the ministry had them.
Sirius hadn’t realized what was happening until the firm grip they had around his wand was released. SNAP! They had broken his wand.
“I’m gonna enjoy putting you away Black.” Said the officer who had them in cuffs.
“What!?”
“And you’re going away for a long time!” Another official said with a smile on his face.
“No. NO! Y- you’ve got the wrong guy. It was Pettigrew!” Sirius studured.
“Oh, and you expect me to believe that Pettigrew just left his finger behind?”
“H-he, I- I hit it just before. I- I’m innocent!”
“Before what?”
“H- transformed! He’s an animagus. A- a rat!” Sirius pleaded.
“Ha, from what I heard Pettigrew barely got into the ministry with his connections, he couldn’t do something as difficult as that. He’s not even registered.”
“Please, I- I’ll do anything. I’M TELLING THE TRUTH!”
“Shut up, will you Black?”
“I’ll go on veritaserum!”
“There's plenty of evidence.”
“I wouldn’t be able to lie-” they were cut off as he was transferred to the ministry.
After what felt like another eternity in a small cramped room Sirius was taken through a doorway, they were blinded upon entering. Sirius was being let to the middle of the room. His vision finally focused as they were seated. The room was filled, there was seating going around the room and going up the wall on platforms, and every single one was filled. In Front of Sirius on his own podium was the minister for magic, Minister Millicent Bagnold. The room was filled with voices and conversations, he knew what they were talking about even if they couldn’t make out a single word he knew.
“Silence!” Minister Bangold held, and within seconds it was silent. “Mr. Black,” The Minister said their name so seriously it sent cilles up his spine. “You are convicted of conspiring against the ministry, your involvement with you know who, and your part in the murder of Lily and James Potter. How do you plead?” He finished.
Sirius scoffed “You think I’m capable of-”
“How do you plead Mr. Black” Bangold interrupted.
“I plead innocent.” Sirius said with a little too much sarcasm.
“Alibi?”
“Does it look like I have a bloody dark mark to you,” Sirius retorted gesturing to their blank arm. “Does anyone ever think there was a reason I was disowned?” He paused, annoyed at the crown as they looked around at each other. ”James is- James was my best friend, he was my brother!” Sirius shouted angrily, his eyes now tearing up a little.
“Mr. Black were you or were you not the Potter’s secret keeper?” The minister asked coldly, clearly unaffected by what she had just said.
“No I wasn’t. I made James change it to Pettigrew because I kne- I thought they would go after me.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“Death eaters, I should have known he was one of them. Pettigrew” Sirius answered full of anger and hurt.
“Minister we don’t know he’s telling the truth” Said a lady dressed head to toe in pink, she had the most smug look on her face.
“Put me on Veritaserum!” Sirius blurted out, “Truth serum, I wouldn’t be able to tell a lie.” The Minister stood silent at this request for a moment before he nodded and gave the order to go retrieve some of the potion. After a few minutes a young woman burst through the door holding a vile of the potion. Sirius could have sworn they’d seen her before, maybe he had seen her around school before, school felt like a lifetime ago. Sirius would give anything to be surviving detention right now. The minister instructed the woman to give Sirius the vile. He looked up as the minister gave Sirius a node that told him to drink it. They sat in silence as they waited for the potion to take effect.
“State your name.”
“Sirius Orion Black,” Sirius paused and rolled his eyes. ”The third.”
“Were you the Potter’s secret keeper?”
“No. We changed it last minute to Pettigrew only the four of us knew.”
“Who are the four of you?”
“Me, James, Lilly, and Peter no one else.”
“And how did Pettigrew escape exactly?”
“Cut off his finger and went into hiding. I don't know where.”
“Why did he cut off his finger?”
“He didn't, I did. Just before he transformed I hit his finger with a curse.
I had nothing to do with the muggles that were injured, I didn't even know they were there until I was in custitiy-”
“That's enough Mr. Black” Bangold cut Siriust off before he could continue rambling.
“You believe me. Don't you?” Sirius asked with those Sirius Black puppy dog eyes that their friends knew all too well. ”You have to.”
Sirius was led out of the room after everyone else. His hands in cuffs, which were reluctantly taken off shortly after they left the room.
“You got off lucky Black.” The guard told them angrily.
Sirius simply did not have the energy to respond, so they simply showed him the finger and disappeared into the crowd. Sirius wandered the crowd but they soon found, towering over everyone else, a certain tall fluffy haired man covered in scars, “Moony!” Sirius yelled with a little smile.