Peter Pettigrew
“Ok so let me get this straight,” Remus exclaims pacing up and down the corridor. “He brings a Death Eater into your house and that’s just cool? No one has any issues there?” Remus lets out another mini scream into his hands before pulling on his hair.
“Every time I come home it’s ‘Well you’ve been gone a long time, haven’t you’, it’s ‘I wonder where you went this time but I bet you won’t be telling us will you?’ just being such a snarky little shit like I’m not following Dumbledor’s explicit orders, Christ,” and well Remus Lupin pissed at Sirius Black could go on forever.
“I don’t See anything wrong with Regulus, Remus,” I interrupt stopping his tirade and pacing altogether. Remus leans down in an attempt to be at eye level.
“Marls, no offense, but I can’t see what you see, you know what I see? Regulus Black, known death eater, and Sirius just bringing him into your house???” Marlene is about to interject when a loud bang echoes from upstairs. One of the three other people still around marches down the stairs, Harry yelling behind them.
“Er, I really don’t think,” he says once in hearing range as he tumbles down the stairs following an irate Dorcas. An irate Dorcas never bodes well for Marlene.
“Dor?” She asks. “Everything alright?” Dorcas shifts her gaze to her and the cloudy look behind her eyes focuses.
“Len, when was the last time you saw Peter,” Marlene thinks back to the last Order meeting a few weeks ago. Peter’s whisps were as shallow and drawn as his completion. Marlene didn’t think much of it since Peter always seemed a bit ill during Order meetings.
“Last Order meeting, same as you, why are-”
“No Len, when was the last time you Saw him,” she insists and that makes her pause. For better or worse everyone knows Peter’s a bit of a shit dueler which gets him assigned less dangerous missions, if any, most of the time. Marlene spends most of her time trying to spy on death eaters with poor Occlumency and keeping an eye on Lily and Remus. Marlene takes a minute to read Dorcas before asking.
“What’s he done?” Dorcas pauses for a moment.
“I think you better talk to the spirits,” she replies finally, and that is… not good.
Harry doesn’t quite know what ‘talking to the spirits’ involves but everybody seems pretty grim about it as they crowd into Marlene’s attic space. It’s tight and the ceiling isn’t too high but it works as a full room for someone as short as Marlene and Harry himself only just needs to lean over. Dorcas isn’t much taller than him but Remus and Regulus are hunched over in a way that can’t be comfortable and leave, Regulus at least, feeling quite undignified.
“Well come gather around, you’re all adding your energy to the mix if we want our questions answered,” Marlene comments less bubbly than she’s been throughout the rest of the day. Dorcas is as grim-faced as she was when Harry told her about Pettigrew. She sort of… froze for a bit before marching down the stairs and Harry doesn’t know if all this is because she does believe him or because she doesn’t. Maybe this spirit they’re summoning is to take him to death where he belongs.
Harry follows the other's lead as they form a circle Dorcas and Remus both automatically settle next to Marlene leaving Regulus to shuffle over next to Dorcas and Harry fills in the space between him and Remus. Remus looks a bit like how Petunia did when Harry first saw her strangely the same and different all at once. The distinctive scar still covers the side of his face but it seems somewhat new and not the staple Harry was familiar with. Remus is considerably less scared, his short sleeves showing off mostly unmarred skin. His face is smoother, his condition wearing him out as he looks maybe a few years older than the others but all that much more remarkably younger than the Remus he knows. The Remus he remembers fighting with at Grimmauld Place, the Remus who showed up at Shell Cottage looking younger and happier than Harry’d ever seen him when he made Harry a godfather. His Remus, lying on the floor of the great hall arm extended as if reaching out to Tonks’ body next to his. The grief is fresher but also weaker than the others. Remus was dead maybe an hour before Harry faced his own death and the past week of chaos hasn’t garnered much acceptance of anything in his life let alone those last few losses he hasn’t had to face while in the past.
Marlene reaches over to the shelves behind her as they settle onto the floor and pulls out a container of salt.
“Cooking salt?” Remus asks.
“What? You can buy it in bulk, not everything has to be bought in Diagon Alley,” Marlene replies to which Remus only shrugs.
“Alright for those that don’t know any regular old salt can be used for a spirit circle,” Marlene starts and Harry must have made a face because she continues. “You know? A circle to contain the spirits?” Harry does not know. Harry barely passed divination when it was taught by Trelawney and Firenze never mind that he didn’t take it sixth year and the less said about this past year the better. Despite Harry’s lack of knowledge Marlene continues to make a circle with the salt that encapsulates the interior of the circle they naturally sat in. After Marlene moves to put the salt back she brings a few other things with her.
“North,” she murmurs placing a candle within the circle. “West,” she continues placing four candles in what Harry assumes are the four cardinal directions.
“Anzus,” she continues placing a carved stone nearly centered in the circle. “Othala,” she places the next stone in the center. “Valknut,” she ended placing the last stone so three were lined up at the center of the circle. Next, she pulled a pot over from by the window from behind Dorcas and plunked one of the flowers.
“Fresh death,” she said more solemnly than Harry would have thought capable from the woman he had met earlier that day. She placed the flower over the runes in the center. “Incendio,” she murmurs lighting the candles wandlessly. Finally, she faced the rest of the group.
“Alright, I need you all to listen closely. This is serious ritual magic so we only get one shot at this for a long time. We must all cross our arms, right over left, our right hands facing down and our left hands facing up. Then we will join hands. After that, I will begin the ritual and no one can let go, okay?” She waits for them all to nod their head or give another form of agreement before continuing. “Once I complete the ritual, if it works, we get to ask a question. Do not get the attention of the spirits if not indicated to, is that understood?” She asked to which we all nodded again as if unable to speak.
Harry’s mind whirled just thinking about it. Harry had communed with the dead before and had even been to Nearly Headless Nick’s deathday party once but this felt different.
“Invoco te maiores mei, maiorum omnium, illi qui praecedunt, illi qui post, illi qui nunc. Responde, responde nobis quaestiones, sicut mea potentia ut Vates respondeat mihi.” Marlene closed her eyes for the ritual but she opens them again as it ends. The room goes cold like it was filled with dementors and from within the circle the flower starts to burn. The candles burn brighter as the flower crumbles into ash, smoke filling the middle of the circle.
The smoke takes on a strangled formless shape as it condenses and pushes at the edges of the circle while staying firmly inside.
“Who calls on us,” the words echo menacingly as if said by maybe three or four people simultaneously as an older woman’s face pulls out from the smoke. As fast as it appears the face falls back into the smoke, into the side of another face.
“Marlene Mckinnon of the Mckinnon Clan,” Marlene answers them, voice twisting into the same grabbled mesh of voices as those coming from the smoke. At this point, the faces fall and appear too quickly to make out any distinct features before they’re gone.
“Mckinnon,” the voices mumble, a woman with the same flash of blonde curls as Marlene flashes through the frame. “Daughter of Catriona Mckinnon and Yun Dae-Hyun. Sister of Angus and Elspeth. Seer of the Isle of Skye. You invoke our power.” Marlene takes a shuttering breath before continuing.
“Who is Peter Pettigrew,” she commands them the answer and they reath and twist angrily.
“THIS IS NOT WHAT YOU ASK OF US,” they exclaim angrily the voices adding and adding into a crescendo.
“WHO IS PETER PETTIGREW,” Marlene demands again and the smoke stirs some more before settling.
“A friend,” they respond at last images flashing in the smoke of what can only be a young Peter Pettigrew with young versions of James and Marlene that shift into Pettigrew, James, Sirius, and Remus together. “A son,” they flash again to the same boy with an older couple. “A rat,” the familiar form of Wormtail appears. “A coward, a traitor,” an image appears of Pettigrew still young but a man, probably as he is now, kneeling at Tom’s feet and Harry feels Remus’ hand tense in his. “A death eater, a betrayer,” his dark mark shines visibly on his arm in the next image and this time it’s Regulus who shifts, almost imperceptively. “A debtor,” the final image shows Pettigrew as Harry knew him, Harry himself in the image as he recognizes Malfoy Manor as Wormtail’s metal hand chokes him to death. A debtor, Harry thinks remembering what he had said. It doesn’t show but Harry doesn’t hear it any less. You owe me.
Next to him, Remus is shaking his head and Harry clamps his hand hard to snap him out of it. He doesn’t exactly know what will happen if Remus interrupts the ritual but he figures Marlene was so infatic about it for a reason.
“No,” he hears softly next to him. For a moment everything goes deadly still and then Harry sees Marlene’s wide panicked eyes from across from him.
“NO,” the form screeches turning to face Remus. “YOU DOUBT OUR KNOWLEDGE REMUS LUPIN. WEREWOLF AND WIZARD. SPY AND SOLDIER. HOW YOUNG YOU ARE TO BE SUCH A FOOL. YOU DOUBT OUR SACRED KNOWLEDGE. DO YOU?” The voices get loud again as they scream at Remus and Marlene starts chanting in the background.
“Relinque hoc loco,” Marlene's chanting nearly drowned out by the contorting mass. “derelinquas nos be.”
“WE WILL KILL YOUR DOUBT, FOOLISH ONE,” more images of Pettigrew flash by faster than the last. Wormtail with Tom over and over again, images of him fighting with Sirius the street going up in flames, images of the shack that night Harry realized Sirius was innocent, and the go on and on.
“Perfecisti negotium tuum. Nunc omitte.” Marlene yelled fruitlessly.
Finally, as the form seemed to run out of images to show them it blew up the circle.