A rescue mission
Out of all the stupid shit he’d gotten himself into, getting lost in the Forbidden Forest high off his ass was… not the worst. But it was definitely top five.
He leaned against a tree, breath rattling. The bark felt alive. Everything did. Too alive. The way the fog curled against his skin, the way the ground breathed beneath his feet. It wasn’t normal.
It was like the forest knew.
Like it was watching him.
Sirius laughed, sharp and empty. “Brilliant. Bloody brilliant.”
He lit another cigarette, hands shaking just enough to make the flame flicker. He didn’t even want it. He just wanted the warmth. The lie of it.
James would say he was being dramatic. Remus would call it self-destructive. Peter would nervously agree with whoever sounded smarter.
But none of them were here now.
Just him. Him and the thing in the trees.
He had seen someone. Near the lake. A flicker of robes, a too-long shadow, a fucking child. And then they had vanished, dragging his gut with it. Sirius had followed because of course he had. Because he was built to chase. Built to run toward the wrong thing every single time.
And now?
Now the wrong thing was running circles around him.
He dropped the cigarette. Crushed it under his boot.
“You’ve got about ten seconds to show yourself before I shift and rip your fucking throat out,” he said to the trees, voice raw and cracked.
Silence.
Then: a low, distant groan.
Not an animal.
Not wind.
Something older.
Sirius shuddered. He could feel it in the air—the pressure, like gravity turned up too high. Like the sky was leaning on him.
He wrapped his arms around himself. Partly for warmth. Mostly because he felt like he might unravel if he didn’t hold something together.
And then—her face flashed behind his eyes.
Lily.
Fuck.
He shouldn’t have looked at her like that. Not this morning. Not ever. Not when Remus’s hand was still warm from holding his.
But Lily had looked back. Like she knew. Like she let him.
He pressed his palms to his eyes until stars exploded behind them.
“Get out of my head,” he muttered. “All of you.”
A crack in the woods. He turned.
Another blur. Too fast. Too low.
His skin prickled. He shifted.
Bones snapped. Fur took over.
Padfoot was safer. Simpler. No words. No feelings. No guilt.
Just teeth.
And if the thing in the woods wanted a monster—well.
It just fucking got one.
Padfoot didn’t bark. He never did in the Forest.
He loped through the trees, low and fast, paws kicking up wet moss and rot. The scent was wrong. It was human—but not alive. Like the trace of a person, smeared thin over bark and bone.
It wasn’t the first time he’d smelled it.
That was the part that was really fucking him up.
He didn’t know when or why, but this this seemed like it all had happened before.
“You’ve been here before.”
He shifted back behind a fallen log, chest heaving. Sweat clung to his spine. He rubbed his chest now.
Who the fuck said that?
The pressure was getting worse. The air was thick with something older than Dark Magic. It didn’t pulse like a hex or crackle like a curse—it waited, patient and rotting.
There were stories. Quiet ones. Passed between seventh-years like cigarette smoke. Of a part of the Forbidden Forest that wasn’t mapped. Not by magic, not by Marauders. A place that had been shut off by the castle itself.
He hadn’t believed it. Until he’d seen the trees shift. Until the Map went blank. Until he followed something and ended up somewhere the moonlight didn’t reach. Hearing voices he couldn’t see.
He knelt, fingers touching the soil. Cold. Damp. Too soft.
There was a footprint. No shoe. Bare.
Another.
Too long. Too wrong.
And then—
Sirius.
He froze.
A figure stood in the clearing ahead.
Robe-black. Faceless. Tall. And—
Shifting.
Not like a person. Not even like a creature.
More like something pretending to be one. A puppet made of fog and bad memories.
It didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. But Sirius could feel it vibrating, like a held-in scream.
He tried to move. Couldn’t.
The figure raised its head—or the shape where its head should’ve been.
And then—it smiled.
No mouth. Just the idea of one. And Sirius felt—
He felt—
His knees buckled.
It was in him, suddenly. Rooting around. Flipping through his thoughts like pages.
Remus.
Lily.
James.
Regulus.
Walburga.
It wasn’t like remembering. It was like being peeled.
Each name it touched got dimmer. Each memory left a bruise.
It lingered on Remus. Too long. Like it liked what it found there.
A laugh. A hand in his hair. A night that never made it to daylight.
Gone.
Lily—her eyes. The fight. The flicker.
Gone.
James. The match. The map.
Gone.
It pulled and pulled until even the pain dulled, like water washing ink from a page. Until the only thing left was static.
And then—
Wait.
What was he doing out here again?
Looking for someone?
He opened his mouth. Nothing came out.
There was someone—he knew there was someone—he came with someone.
His hand twitched toward his wand but forgot why.
Something wasn’t right.
He turned, sudden—too fast—and the trees behind him had changed. That log hadn’t been there. That bend in the roots—off.
“Remus?” he called.
Or maybe he didn’t.
He couldn’t tell if sound was working.
Was he saying that name? Or just thinking it?
And—Remus. Who the hell was Remus?
Panic flared in his chest. Hot. Immediate.
He dropped to his knees again, breathing like he’d been sprinting. Pressed both palms to the dirt.
“Think,” he rasped.
He tried to picture a face. Any face.
Nothing.
——————————————
The trees got thicker the farther they went. The path, if there had ever been one, had vanished.
Lily’s wand was clenched tight in her hand, light flickering weakly at the tip.
“Lumos Maxima,” Remus muttered beside her, brighter now—but the fog still clung like wet fabric, soaking up every trace of warmth.
I shouldn’t be here. Not like this. This is bloody suspicious.
Every rational bone in Lily’s body screamed it. But she wasn’t rational anymore. Not when Sirius had been missing for two hours. Not when he’d looked at her the way he had at breakfast—like he couldn’t breathe. Like he was already halfway gone.
They pushed deeper.
“Point Me Sirius Black,” Remus said under his breath, spinning slowly. His wand quivered. Twitched. Then jerked due north.
They followed.
“Do you think he’s in trouble?” she asked.
Remus hesitated. “If I say no, I’m lying. If I say yes, I’m probably underestimating.”
Lily tried not to think about the last time she saw Sirius.
The look he gave her when James wasn’t looking.
This coupled with how the silence was too still,Too expectant, had made Lily’s heart beat like a snare drum against her ribs. And underneath that—under the cold, under the guilt—there was something sharper. That awful, jagged knowing that she was walking through a haunted wood with his bloody boyfriend. That every step forward was a lie.
“We shouldn’t split up,” she said quietly.
“No shit,” Remus muttered.
She almost smiled.
Then—something moved.
A blur across the path. No form. Just movement.
They both froze.
“Did you—”
“Yes,” he said, already raising his wand. “Protego.”
Lily turned to cover the other side. “Homenum Revelio.”
Nothing.
But something was there. She could feel it.
The trees trembled. The air thickened.
And then—crack.
A branch snapped violently to their left.
“Reducto!” Lily shouted, blasting into the dark.
A shape darted through the trees—low, thin, not human.
Remus ran after it.
“Wait—Remus!” she called.
He didn’t listen.
Of course he didn’t.
She chased him, breath tearing in her throat, guilt like bile at the back of her mouth. If something happened to him, to either of them—
It would be her fault. Hers. Because she’d lied. Because she’d touched Sirius like he wasn’t already someone else’s. Because she’d known. She’d known the entire time.
“Expelliarmus!” Remus shouted up ahead.
Another blast of light. A yelp.
They emerged into a clearing at the same time—and froze.
The fog peeled back like it had been waiting.
Something moved between the trees. Fast. Wrong.
Then—
Crash.
A black blur burst from the underbrush—fangs bared, low and furious.
Lily stumbled back, wand raised—but Remus didn’t flinch.
“Padfoot.”
The dog skidded to a halt, panting hard. His fur was soaked, matted with bramble. Those eyes—those fucking eyes—were wild. Bloodshot.
“Jesus,” Lily gasped. “Sirius—what the fuck—”
The dog let out a choked, broken sound. Almost human. Then staggered.
Flesh cracked. Bones shrank.
The dog was gone. Sirius stood in its place—shirt half-off, lips split, barefoot, teeth clenched like he’d been screaming underwater.
“What the hell are you doing?” Lily snapped. “You scared the shit out of me—”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Sirius barked. “Both of you. Did you follow me? Are you—are you thick? You twats! Trying to get yourselves bloody killed? Fuck!”
“We thought you were in danger, you lunatic,” Remus cut in, voice sharp. “You vanish, you miss the match, and nobody knows where the hell you’ve gone—”
“I didn’t vanish, I—”
“You didn’t go to warmups. You didn’t go to detention. You didn’t say anything.” Remus’s voice dropped. “You disappear into the Forbidden Forest high out of your skull, by the way, nice going leaving your bloody roll out there, and you’re asking us if we’re thick?”
Sirius’s hands twitched. His jaw clicked. “I am telling you. I saw someone, I- look I was out by the lake. There’s another person in this forest, and for fucks sake he’s hurt or she- I don’t fucking know, Remus—”
“Sirius you fucking asshole.”
Sirius eyes crinkle, “Moony, darling believe me.”
Remus snaps, eyes dark and burning. “We’ve been looking for you for hours,” he said, quiet and venomous. “I thought—” His voice cracked. “I thought I’d find you bleeding out somewhere.”
Sirius blinked. Like the words didn’t land properly. Like he hadn’t realized that was even on the table.
“I thought—” he tried again, but the heat was gone. Just cold now. “I thought you were gone.”
A silence stretched between them. The kind that makes your ribs hurt.
The wind picked up. It didn’t whistle—it hissed. Low and wrong.
Sirius looked down. Then at her. Lily. Bloody Evans.
Her eyes were rimmed with tears, like Remus had said all the words she wish she could’ve screamed at him.
And then he muttered—barely audible—“Didn’t think anyone’d notice.”
Remus inhaled sharply. “You’re a fucking idiot.”
“Yeah,” Lily added, bitterly. “A full-blown, gold-plated idiot.”
Sirius dragged a hand through his hair. He looked like he was trying not to break something. “There was something out here. It wanted me to see it. Like it—like it was pulling me.”
Remus took a deep breath, then flicked open the Map. “The dot…It wasn’t a fluke.”
“It was watching me,” Sirius said. “It let me chase it. Then it stopped.”
His gaze met Lily’s.
She held it.
And something cracked open in the space between them. A line too taut, too hot. Her mouth parted slightly—like she was going to speak—but nothing came out.
“You shouldn’t have come,” Sirius said, lower now.
“Yeah,” she said. “You shouldn’t have left.”
They didn’t blink.
Didn’t breathe.
Remus who had been busy eyeing the woods a few feet away, looked back.
Lily exhaled shakily, stepping back. “We’re going. Now.”
But Sirius didn’t move.
His eyes were still on her. “You felt it too, didn’t you?” he said. “The pressure in the sky. Like it’s sinking.”
Her voice was barely above a whisper. “Yeah.”
Remus snapped the Map shut. “Brilliant. Then we’re all in agreement—something’s fucked. Let’s get the hell out before it gets more fucked.”
Another groan echoed in the trees. Closer now.
They turned together, slowly, back toward the castle.
None of them ran. But none of them looked away, either.
And Sirius—mud-streaked, chest heaving, fingers itching for a cigarette or a lie—knew deep down:
He wasn’t walking out.
He was walking in.
[Later – Just past the greenhouses – the walk back to the castle
“Brilliant work, really,” Remus muttered, dragging his sleeve across a cut on Sirius’s cheek. “You went full Victorian ghost story and nearly got yourself murdered.”
“I was investigating,” Sirius said.
“You were stoned.”
Lily snorted. “Still is.”
“Cheers, Evans. That’s helpful.” Sirius squinted up at the sky, which hadn’t lifted. The fog was still thick—unmoving. “You lot act like I wanted to chase some haunted first-year into the woods.”
“Oh, sure,” Remus said flatly. “The fog lured you. Maybe next time it’ll invite you in for tea.”
Sirius cracked a grin. “Depends. Does the fog have biscuits?”
“You’re a moron.”
“And yet somehow,” Sirius shot back, “I’m the only one who saw it.”
“I still think we should go back”
Remus didn’t answer. Just wrapped his arms tighter around himself and kept walking. His mouth was drawn, jaw tight. The kind of tight Sirius knew meant afraid.
And that—well. That made Sirius want to say nothing at all.
They fell into silence, boots crunching over the gravel path. The castle loomed ahead, its towers half-swallowed by mist. Sirius kept pace just a step behind them both, fingers twitching like they wanted to do something. Say something. Touch someone.
He didn’t.
Lily walked ahead, her hands shoved into her robe pockets. He could see the edge of her blouse peeking out from her jumper—creased, slightly damp from fog. Her hair was sticking to the back of her neck.
He hated how much he noticed.
She didn’t look at him. Hadn’t since the clearing.
Good.
But also—no.
He wanted her to.
Look at me. Just once. Please.
Remus slowed as they reached the stone steps.
“We tell James it was a false alarm,” he said. “Nothing in the forest. You wandered off. Got spooked.”
“He’ll never buy that,” Sirius muttered.
“Then say you needed air. Got cold feet. Saw a squirrel that looked like Snape.”
Sirius cracked a dry laugh.
Lily didn’t.
Her voice came out too level: “Just don’t make us liars, Black.”
That landed like a stone.
Sirius met her eyes.
They were too close now, the three of them. Close enough he could smell her shampoo—jasmine and something herbal—and feel the static rising off her like a wire pulled too tight.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he said, voice low.
Remus didn’t notice.
He was already pushing open the door, stepping into the warm, flickering glow of the Entrance Hall.
Lily lingered.
Sirius didn’t move.
They stood like that—seconds stretched long—until she finally said, almost too quietly, “You scared me.”
“I know.”
Her fingers curled around the edge of her sleeve.
“I thought you might’ve done something stupid.”
“I did.”
Her throat bobbed.
He looked at her. Really looked. The flush in her cheeks.
“You should go in,” he murmured.
“I know.”
But she didn’t.
Not right away.
She hesitated—one foot on the step—when he caught her wrist. Cold fingers curling around her like iron.
And then, before she could stop him, Sirius pulled her in—
Not gently. Not hesitantly.
Like a man starved.
His mouth hovered near her jaw, not kissing her, just breathing her in. Forehead to hers. Hand flat against the small of her back.
“Baby,” he whispered, voice wrecked. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
She shuddered.
Her fingers curled in the fabric of his torn shirt. She could feel his heartbeat hammering through it. His breath warm and trembling against her cheek like he was seconds from breaking.
Then—
Footsteps.
Fast. Too close.
The front door creaked. Remus’s voice calling from inside:
“Coming or what?”
Lily stepped back like she’d been burned.
Sirius didn’t watch her leave.
He just stayed there, alone on the steps, staring into the fog that hadn’t moved all morning.
And he whispered, so quiet the stone barely caught it—
“Who the fuck am I?”