Facing Danger
Chapter 58: Doing What You Can (Year 6)
By Anne B. Walsh
Author Notes:
I disclaim the brief lyrics in the middle of the chapter.
Remus shoved his book onto the shelf as Danger shot him a précis of the conversation in the kitchen. How many? he asked, drawing his wand and shooting a quick "Get out here" messenger Patronus down the hall towards Sirius' bedroom.
I don't know if—three, she says, only three.
The word "only" seems somehow inappropriate in this context.
Would you prefer there be six?
Rolling his eyes, Remus Apparated down to the main hallway, which was already milling with Order members. He spotted Mare, bending over Brian, and Danger supporting Corona as Voni Pritchard helped her sip from a cup of water—Sirius had apparently judged the corridor too full for safe Apparition, as his footsteps were currently pounding down the stairs above Remus' head—
So much for the adults. Now for the "fun" part.
Explaining to the cubs why they can't come help us fight.
The Pride had claimed the doorway of the War Room as their observation post, of which choice Remus couldn't help but approve. No one can claim they're underfoot, but they're still able to see what's going on, and if we need a runner or a messenger, they're right here to volunteer…
He stopped for a moment, that thought percolating through his brain, adapting itself to the current crisis. Right here, but out of the way, ready to do what they can and be safe from what they can't—
I knew you'd think of something, Danger said approvingly as the perfect way to handle the situation lit up within Remus' mind.
Harry was looking distinctly mutinous as Remus arrived at the War Room's door. "We're not about to go and hide in the cellar with Bernie and the elflets—" he began.
"I wasn't going to ask you to," Remus cut him off. "Though I might if you show me you're more interested in your attitude than in what we need done. Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir." Harry hunched his shoulders for a moment, an echoing of Wolf's apologetic pose, then straightened up. "Where do you want us?"
Here's hoping this doesn't backfire horribly. "Get up to the attic. Make sure you have your Zippos with you. We'll need lookouts."
The Pride blinked at him for a second. Ginny was the first to recover. "Yes sir," she said, and grabbed Harry by one sleeve and Ron by the other, towing them forward behind her.
Remus stepped out of the way, running a quick finger down Neenie's spine as Ron passed him. Am I going to regret this?
Only if it doesn't work. Danger threaded her way through the crowd to meet him. Now I think you'd better take charge of this bunch of hooligans—
Me? Remus barely stopped himself from yelping it aloud. Why me?
Because we're still trying to find out where Albus has got himself off to, Arthur's got his hands full getting the Ministry to understand what help we need, and do you really want one of our Auror-types to head this up? They're trained at fighting battles with Dark wizards, not at stopping giants stomping through a heavily inhabited Muggle area.
And I am?
No, but you are trained, or rather, experienced, at getting a loose-knit group of people to come together and work towards a common goal. Danger's eyes had locked onto his and weren't giving an inch of ground. We have Sirius and Alice and Mad-Eye to head up the actual fighting. What we need from you is direction, the feeling, however erroneous, that someone understands what's going on.
You fill me with such confidence. Remus felt his Zippo buzz in his pocket and flicked it open, summoning a line of green fire upwards from it to his ear and mouth. "Yes."
"We see them," Harry's voice reported over the buzz of chatter in the background. "They're north of us, looking around at the houses, one of them leaning over and trying to figure out a parked car. Muggles running away from them, Death Eaters on broomsticks with them—"
"Hold a moment, Harry." Remus leaned out from the passage and made a hand-sign to Sirius, still three steps up on the main staircase.
"QUIET!" Sirius bellowed.
The entrance hall went silent.
"Carry on," Remus said into his improvised microphone.
"Heard that up here," said Harry with a trace of awe. "Three giants two streets north of us…"
As Harry repeated the report he'd given, Remus felt Danger's touch within the magic he'd used on the Zippo. Tiny specks of green fire floated outward from her hands to each Order member, settling into an ear apiece, and people's eyes went first wide, then narrow with intent as they understood what they were now tapped into.
"Get me a count on the Death Eaters with them, please," Remus said in response to Sirius' signal from the stairs.
"Um. One moment." A muffled, five-second argument. "Somewhere between six and twelve, we can see six brooms up but we can't tell how many of them are riding double at this distance—"
Ron said something irritable in the background.
"Oh, right. Hold for that number, please."
There had to be wizards along to get them here this quickly, Danger mused as the Zippo line crackled faintly. Brian and Corona would have Apparated out, so the Death Eaters must have Portkeyed the giants here along the Apparition trace…
"We have that number." Harry's voice was triumphant now. "Ten, repeat, one-zero Death Eaters, and it doesn't look like they all agree what they should be doing with the giants either."
"Let's just make sure they don't get a chance to come to that agreement, then," Remus said dryly. "Molly, any news from Arthur?"
"Most of the people we'd want are apparently out investigating reports of a troll attack near Cambridge." Molly's tone made it clear she didn't think much of Cambridge's trolls. "They're being recalled as quickly as possible, but we could be on our own for up to ten minutes."
"Right." Remus wanted to swallow hard, but didn't dare with every eye on him. "If your usual partner for missions isn't here, pick someone and stay with them. First priority is to protect the Muggles, second is to take out the Death Eaters. Don't engage the giants unless they're threatening you or a large enough group of Muggles that you can't help them any other way. Let's head out."
A murmur of agreement, and the Order of the Phoenix parted so that Remus and Danger could make their way to the door.
Tell me again why this is working?
Because you sound like you know what you're doing, and that's good enough for most people.
Somehow that fails to reassure me…
Harry gripped the windowsill tightly, Ginny's arms around his waist making doubly sure he didn't lose his balance. He had never realized how much he relied on his eyes for everyday things like remaining upright.
More power to Ron, then, for just getting back in the game, much less for giving me this.
He twiddled the unobtrusive wheel set into the right earpiece of his glasses, zooming back a bit from the Death Eaters' masked faces and getting a wider view. "That giant who was poking at the car decided to pick it up," he reported, hearing two or three sucked-in breaths behind him. "He had to use both hands, but he's got it. The Death Eaters are pointing at something—I think they want him to throw it into a house—"
"I've got this," Padfoot's voice echoed over the link. "Mucinno!"
The suddenly slimy car slipped from the giant's grasp, making him howl in dismay.
"Everyone cover your ears," Moony advised.
Harry spun the zoom wheel to normal and backed up from the window, careful not to step on Ginny's toes. Most of the Pride already had their hands over their ears. Ron was shielding Neenie's. Ginny drew her wand and cast a Privacy Spell around the two of them, then clapped her hands over her own ears just in time as the smashing of the car's windows heralded the much louder explosion of its fuel tank and the screeching in pain of the giant whose feet the resulting fireball had engulfed.
Moony said something Harry hoped his ringing ears had made him mishear, and the battle was joined.
Playing lookout, some uninvolved corner of Harry's mind had time to remark, was a cross between calling plays for a game of Quidditch where none of the players were particularly interested in what he had to say and replaying a Combat Club match without the detachment of passing time or little icons on a parchment map. These duelers were real, flesh and blood, fighting it out in the street below him.
And let's not forget they're fighting with real spells…
He lost track of how many times he alerted an Order member to a Death Eater swooping down from above, stalking up from behind, or coming in fast from the side, and spared one second to give brief, fervent thanks for Ginny's presence of mind in tossing her chain over his head to act as his voice and ears within the attic. Through her eyes he got flashes of Neville and Draco standing at the other two windows, Luna and Meghan beside them, each using her own particular Sight to add to what the boys could see through the Omnioculars Draco had Summoned from their bedroom.
Good thing they both had a pair. Ron had to take mine apart to get the spells to build into my glasses.
Ron and Neenie, in the attic's center, bent over the little map of the outdoors that Ron had conjured, keeping a tally on both sides as Ginny called out the progress of the battle and suggesting moves for Harry to send out to the Order.
Which Moony's rebroadcasting in his own voice, but that's probably just as well—half the Order thinks we get too much latitude for "a bunch of kids" as it is…
Status update, Ginny demanded, breaking Harry's momentary trance.
Two giants down. Harry allowed himself a brief grin at the sulky expression on the face of the giant with the burned feet, who was sitting in the middle of the street with his arms crossed, ignoring the battling of the smaller people around him. Another was inadvertently helping the Order by swatting at the three Death Eaters who were buzzing about his head, trying to bring him back under their control. Third one is—
On your right, Neville says. Ginny's arms were steady around his waist, helping keep the disorientation down as he turned his head to follow the directions. Pearl says he's taken some hits but nowhere near critical yet. Luna agrees.
"Giant moving east," Harry said into his Zippo, tracking the coarse-haired head with his eyes as it bobbed up and down between the rooftops. "Hurt but still able to do plenty of damage."
"We're on it," Moony's answer came back. "The Ministry should be here momentarily to help us mop up. Can we get a location for Corona Gamp? She got separated from her partner and we can't find her."
"Hold for that," Harry said aloud, at the same moment tossing an image of Luna into Ginny's mind. Ask her, please?
Already on it. A quick exchange of voices, and Ginny's mind-sense went shrill with alarm. Death Eater! Just talking to her now, but it could go to wands any time! One block south of the main battle site, in an alley behind a house with a white door—
Harry relayed this as quickly as the information came into his mind, heard Moony repeating his directions to Mrs. Longbottom and Professor Jones, felt Ginny's mental fingers crossing that they would be in time—
"That's one of the last Death Eaters, that Corona's talking to," Ron said, the words echoing double in Harry's mind from his own ears and Ginny's. "The rest are either down or scarpered, or still trying to get that one giant to do what they say—"
A series of brisk cracks, like a string of firecrackers going off, heralded a wave of Apparitions around the giants, most of them in the bright blue of Magical Creatures, several near the second giant in Auror red. Harry spun the wheel on his glasses one final time and closed his eyes, massaging them gently with his fingertips. How do you like your birthday surprise? he asked Ginny.
Not exactly what I wanted, but as long as nobody died, I'll take it.
"Everyone alive down there?" Harry asked the green flame still flickering in his hand.
"Thanks to some excellent work from our lookouts, yes," Danger's voice answered. "Well done, all of you. We'll have to remember this as a good technique for next time."
"I don't know about anyone else, but I'd just as soon there not be a next time," said Draco, Luna leaning against him with her eyes closed and her head on his shoulder. "The Muggle-Worthy Excuse people are going to be working overtime today, not to mention the Obliviators."
"How long until something happens they can't excuse away?" Neville asked quietly. "This was a small attack, probably spur of the moment when they spotted Brian and Corona, trying to either catch them before they could report or follow them to our headquarters. What will they be able to do when they really try?"
"Regular little ray of sunshine today, aren't you?" said Ron, Vanishing his conjured map. "Can we concentrate on the whole 'nobody died' bit for the moment? Not to mention, we did something right, and it wasn't some kind of fluke or just a lucky break." The snarkiness in his voice could be excused, Harry thought, given that the rescue mission which had cost him his sight had been called both those things, several times behind his back and once within his hearing. "We helped today, we did our bit, and they can't take that away from us, no matter what."
"You're right." Neville rotated his shoulders, wincing at an audible pop. Meghan pressed his hand, and the tension in his face eased. "We helped keep people alive, and that's not nothing."
"And now they've seen how well it works to have lookouts up high, they may try it for future battles." Ginny reclaimed her chain from around Harry's neck, tucking it away under her robes. "Maybe have someone on every team with a portable broom, someone good with Disillusionment or with an Invisibility Cloak…"
"But it's almost impossible to wear a Cloak when you're flying," Harry objected, thinking of experiments done in the Weasleys' orchard on just this subject. "You'd need some way to fasten it around you and the broom, or the Death Eaters could just look up and see you under it."
"Sew a few buttons on it, of course," Ginny retorted as Draco opened the door to the stairs. "Do I have to think of everything?"
Harry tried out several answers to this question, but none of them made more sense than keeping quiet.
Smart boy, Danger said approvingly, collecting and dispersing the last of the earflames she'd created for the rest of the Order. Already knows when it's not wise to dispute his lady.
I didn't know there was a time when it was wise.
There isn't. But he doesn't need to know that yet. Danger smirked. Let him keep the illusion that he's in charge for another year or so.
Another year, hmm? Remus dismissed Danger's earflame along with his own, closing the Zippo in his pocket to break off the connection with Harry's. That just happens to bring us to Ginny's sixteenth birthday…
Danger attempted to look innocent.
Remus snorted. Try it on someone who doesn't know you like I do.
Or maybe someone who can't read my mind?
That would help as well, yes.
Mare took her turn sliding into the cover of the Fidelius Charm on Headquarters, all the while pondering on how strange a thing was memory. Her muscles knew the smooth action of draw and cast, her voice could provide the words to match, as long as she wasn't thinking too hard about what she was doing. If she did…
Then I fall apart in confusion, and someone else has to rush in and save me. Fortunately it only happened once, the person who did the rushing in was Hestia Jones, and she attributed it to the fortunes of battle, not to my own personal incompetence.
She stepped inside the house, listening with half an ear to the exhausted, jubilant chatter around her.
We got off easy this time. No one dead, only minor injuries… next time we might not do so well, and it might be my fault. Someone could get hurt, even killed trying to take care of me. Do I have a right to put them in that kind of danger?
Near the back of the hall, a sparkle of light caught Mare's eye, twinkling in the way she'd learned from Meghan meant someone was being affected by a spell. Excusing herself at every step, she made her way through the crowd to discover the glitter coming from Corona, who was wrapped in Brian's arms, one hand resting against his cheek.
"…didn't hurt me," she was saying as Mare came into earshot. "She never even touched me. She only went after you to get my attention, and all she wanted was to talk to me, though to Elladora that means shouting at me, mostly about what a disgrace I am to the family and how maybe someday I'll come to my senses and be useful to them again…"
"You know you shouldn't listen to her." Brian turned his head and kissed Corona's palm. "She may be your sister, but didn't she disown you right along with your grandmother? By her own doing, you should be free of her now."
"Are you sure she never touched you?" Mare asked, feeling a trace of guilt for breaking into a clearly private conversation but salving her conscience with the knowledge that neither Brian nor Corona could see what she could. "You have magic on you, affecting you somehow. I can see the traces."
"Magic on me?" Corona looked briefly baffled, even afraid, then laughed aloud, her face clearing. "Oh, that! Elladora tried to cast a spell when I first got near enough, but I dodged it and it caught my robes. You're probably seeing the residue from that. It can linger for days, I've heard."
"Probably." Mare shifted her sight and nodded in agreement as the shimmer of light faded, then vanished altogether. "Nothing to worry about, then."
"No." Brian kissed Corona's cheek. "Nothing to worry about at all."
And a partial answer to my question. Mare moved a few feet away to give the pair some privacy, then spotted an open door and made for that. I may not consider that I have a right to put these people in danger, but if I asked them, I'm sure they would say something different. They care for me—and I'm starting to believe that they truly do care for me, not just some residual feelings for Aletha. As for my feelings…
She slipped through the open door and closed it behind her, breathing a sigh of relief at the diminished noise.
Why bother lying to myself? I'm halfway in love with Sirius already, and the rest of the Pack isn't too far behind. They're smart and funny, loving and accepting—exactly the kind of people I want in my life. And whether or not I feel connected to them, I am connected, by my allegiance in this war if nothing else.
Wearily, she sat down on the backless bench which was the closest seating to the door. I could always go away from here. Emigrate, make a new life somewhere else, or just stay abroad for a year or two until everything blows over. But what would that say about the kind of person I'm making myself into, if I run away from a fight this important, this necessary? I may not have chosen it, but neither did any Muggleborn these past twenty-five years, and that didn't stop them from having to fight it.
She sighed. "Too much to decide all at once," she said aloud, scooting to the end of the bench and spinning herself around on it. "Time to try out another piece of muscle memory."
One which, if I'm not mistaken, often helped Aletha work out her knottiest problems…
Sirius was on his way to the War Room to clean up his rough account of the battle when he noticed something odd.
What's that door doing shut? Moony's not in there, he's upstairs with Danger, and the cubs are all down in the kitchen demolishing Ginny's birthday cake…
He cast a Silencer on the doorknob and hinges, then carefully eased the door open, wand at the ready.
The sound which emerged from within went straight to his gut.
Mare sat at the ebony baby grand he'd restored himself from the dusty old relic left behind by some long-ago musical Black, her eyes half shut and her fingers coaxing soft chords from the keys. She was only humming the melody, not singing it, but that didn't matter. He knew all the words already.
Woman needs man and man must have his mate,
On that you can rely...
Biting his lips to keep from speaking or running to her side, he began to half-consciously hum along with her as she began the final stanza. It took no effort at all to see her as she had been fourteen years ago, dressed in flowing red and playing this same song, giving him a reassurance beyond words that his exile was over, that he was welcome in her home, in her arms, once again.
It's still the same old story, a fight for love and glory,
A chance to do or die!
The world will always welcome lovers
As time goes by...
"You are so beautiful," he breathed as she rippled notes upward to finish the song.
Then he ducked out of sight into the War Room as she gasped and spun around.
There is a limit to how far reenactments should be taken. Sirius blotted at his cheeks with the back of his hand, scowling. I promised myself I wouldn't push her, and I won't.
But Merlin's spotty forehead, it hurts not even knowing if she's going to stay…
Late that evening, Albus Dumbledore arrived at number twelve, Grimmauld Place, and after wishing Ginny many happy returns debriefed the birthday revelers about their role in the afternoon's battle. Once he understood fully, he dismissed them to their own pursuits, retaining Hermione, in her role of Pride liaison within the Order, and Harry, with whom he spoke briefly alone.
"Half about starting proper Occlumency lessons with Snape this fall," Harry said with a grimace when he arrived in the den room. "But the other half was odd. He says he has something to show us, and he'd like to show us all, but it's dangerous, so we each have to decide for ourselves. Do we want to know 'something that could change the course of the war, and something Voldemort would kill to keep from being known'?"
"Thought we already did." Ron was experimenting with finding his way around the den room unaided, since Hermione was still downstairs. "We've all heard the prophecy, haven't we?"
"But that's something he would kill to find out." Draco scrubbed his hand back and forth along the nap of the carpet. "This is something he would kill to keep from being found out."
"Which means we might actually be safer, in some ways," Neville put in. "He'd torture us if he knew we could tell him the prophecy, but if he finds out we know some secret of his, he'll just kill us to stop us telling anyone else."
"Still nothing I want to happen, but I see your point." Ginny had her knees drawn up to her chest. "We can't exactly be in a worse case than we are. And the same argument applies as last time—who'd ever think Dumbledore would tell us anything important?"
"Voldemort won't." Luna's tone was quietly certain. "He doesn't tell anyone his most important secrets, because he doesn't trust anyone. He thinks it makes him safe, but it will destroy him."
"Destroy is a good word." Harry flopped down full-length onto one of the long cushions which littered the floor. "I like that word."
"We still have a lot of work to do before it happens," Luna added. "But it'll all come right in the end."
Meghan rose hastily from the corner where she'd been plaiting the fringe on a blanket. "I'm just… I think I should… I'll be back later."
Ron took a hasty step back as she brushed past him. "Oi, watch where I'm going there!"
"She wasn't watching much of anything," Ginny said as the door banged. "I wonder what's wrong?"
"It'll all come right in the end," she says. Meghan scowled and kicked savagely at the base of the wall in the first-floor corridor. How can it? How can it, when my Mama Letha is going to go away and leave us? How can it when I saw Dadfoot crying over her? He's not supposed to cry—he's supposed to hold me when I cry, and tell me it will be all right—except it won't, and it can't, and I hate everyone who thinks it will, and—
She stopped. A light was coming from a room near the stairs.
That's the tapestry room. Who would be in there tonight? I thought everyone who wasn't with us was down in the meeting with Professor Dumbledore…
Rising to her tiptoes, she slipped down the hall as light-footed as her Animagus form, and peered cautiously around the doorframe.
What she saw had her stuffing her sleeve into her mouth to keep from crying out.
Nearly an hour later, Sirius trudged towards the stairs, perversely welcoming each ache and pain his overstressed muscles could throw at him. Aches and pains gave him something to consider other than the proposal set forth and adopted in the meeting which had just broken up.
We're too centralized here, Albus says. It's too dangerous to have us all in one place, even under Fidelius. We need to start spreading out, to establish secondary bases so we have somewhere to go, just in case. Also so we can react more quickly all around the country, but mostly so we don't get caught this way again, having to defend the one place where all our secrets, all our knowledge, and particularly all our children are.
I agree with that part of it, at least in theory, but why did Moony have to bring up people's homes for the secondary bases? Doesn't he understand what going back to the Den would do to me right now? I'd see Letha there, in every corridor, every room, and I don't know how long I could control myself around Mare…
He snickered once, without true humor. Who would've thought my lovely boyhood memories were actually good for something? As long as I concentrate on them and not on the time I spent here with the people I love, I can be a gentleman. But that won't last much longer, and I'm afraid of the way it's going to end.
Sirius' head came above floor level, and he stopped, frowning at the light which spilled out invitingly into the corridor. "Wonder who's after a bit of edited genealogy at this hour," he muttered aloud. "Might as well find out."
Mounting the last few steps, he paused to massage an especially persistent ache out of his left thigh, then crossed the corridor to the drawing room and entered.
As his daughter had before him, he stopped in shock.
The Black Family Tree had been transformed.
Which may not be exactly the right word, but I'll be a flobberworm's uncle if I know what is!
Beneath the stern motto of "Toujours pur", a new phrase had been introduced. Neatly woven into the fabric, as though they had been there from the beginning, were the words "de la coeur".
"Always pure of heart," Sirius translated under his breath. "Maybe it wasn't always that way, but I've sure as hell tried."
The main body of the tapestry also showed alterations, or perhaps in this case, Sirius thought, restorations would be the more appropriate term. Every name and connection which his mother had blasted away had been painstakingly returned to its original state. The burn marks were still visible in some areas, but the names were readable and clear, and there could be no doubt they belonged where they had been placed.
It's showing the truth, for the first time since I can remember. Isn't that a kick in the twigs?
He stepped closer, kneeling on the sofa which had been moved to conceal the mutilated lower portions of the tapestry. "There's Uncle Alphard," he murmured, craning his neck. "And there's Andy and Cissy, and Tonks and Draco right where they belong underneath them." And Ted and Lucius get equal mention. Wouldn't that just burn the both of them? Well, not Ted so much, he's pretty easy-going, but Lucius… one of these days, if I get the chance, I might just mention it to him.
His gaze traveled to the left, and he smiled to see Regulus' name shining in its gold thread. Thanks for the help, little brother. I may not always sound like it, but I didn't really want to be dead. As long as you're alive, there's always some hope that what you want will happen, even if it's the slightest little thing you can imagine…
Drawing a deep breath, he allowed his eyes to slide to the left once more.
As he had suspected, his own name had returned to its place beside Regulus'. A line led downward from him as it did from Andromeda and Narcissa, though his had two branchings. Sirius swallowed against the usual lump in his throat at the simple notation "Marcus" with its one year embroidered neatly beneath, looking away from it at the thing he'd never thought to see—his beautiful, bright-eyed daughter acknowledged in her proper place as a child of the House of Black.
I suppose it does matter to me, as much as I've always said it didn't. She's as good as any pureblood brat, and better than most of them. Why shouldn't she have her rights?
Whoever fixed this thing up, I owe them the price of that, along with the rest of it. Wonder who it—
His thoughts froze as he noticed what he hadn't before.
His name had yet another similarity with that of his two cousins.
As though he were under Imperius, Sirius felt his gaze moving further left still, along the dotted line which indicated an alliance by marriage. The notation at the other end was simple, exactly what had been shown for his cousins' spouses.
Aletha Carina Freeman
Born 1959
Married 1982
Renewed vows 1995
As he reached forward to touch the name, scarcely breathing, a tiny sound made him look down at the floor between the sofa and the wall where the tapestry hung. A girl and a woman lay sleeping there, nestled against one another like the two missing pieces of his heart.
My daughter. And my wife.
The sight slotted everything into place for Sirius, fitting it together as neatly as the tapestry.
She did this. Mare—no, Aletha—she did it for me. To tell me she's going to stay, she's going to give it a try. Give us a try. It won't be perfect, just like the tapestry's not, but hell, who wants perfection? What fun would that be?
"I love you so damn much," he whispered, brushing his fingers against his cheek and blinking in surprise when they came away damp. "Just show me what you need. Help me do what's right for you." He reached down and touched Meghan gently on the cheek, blinking harder than ever when she smiled in her sleep. "Don't let me screw this up, not again, not when you just gave me back my life…"
His hand was intercepted on its second trip down by a slenderer, darker-skinned one, which conveyed it to a pair of lips. "Shh," breathed the woman he loved, after placing a soft kiss on his fingertips and releasing him. "Don't wake her."
Sirius shook his head. "Won't," he mouthed. "But—why?" He indicated the tapestry. "Why now?"
She sat up, gently disentangling Meghan, and swung herself over the back of the couch with the lithe grace he found so irresistible. "Because I knew if I left here, if I left you, I would always wonder," she said quietly, taking his hand once again. "And when I heard you humming in the corridor, while I was playing, when I heard your voice nearly break on that one note, that's when I knew…"
"Knew…" Sirius summoned his courage and slid his free arm around her. "That you loved me again?"
She shook her head with a smile. "Not that I loved you again. More like I never really stopped."
Lips met, clung, then parted after only a few seconds when she pulled back. "I don't want you to misunderstand. It's not…" She chuckled a little, the warm and rich sound that never failed to make his heart stutter. "Not like magic. I haven't suddenly become exactly the Aletha that I was before this all happened. I'm still much more of Mare. But I've made up my mind that I'm going to learn to be myself, all of myself, not just the old and not just the new but both. If you understand."
"I think I do, but I'm just glad whichever you you're being at the moment doesn't think I'm utterly repulsive." Sirius ran a hand through her hair. "Do you want to use Mare still, or…"
"No, I'll go back to Aletha." She grinned. "Or should I say, Professor Black."
"Beg your pardon?"
"I spoke with Headmaster Dumbledore earlier—we met in the hall, just as he was coming in—and he asked if I would be willing to take the Potions position at Hogwarts this year."
"Potions, hmm?" Sirius considered this. "You're definitely qualified. Wonder what's happening with Snivellus, though."
She smacked him on the back of the head. "Behave. It's no wonder the cubs get up to the antics they do, with you as a role model."
Sirius pouted and rubbed the place where her hand had impacted. "Ow. You never used to hit that hard before."
"Oh yes I did." She kissed her fingertips and laid them over the spot. "But then I did that, and it was all better again. Isn't it?"
"Mm-hmm." Sirius leaned back against the couch and spent a few moments just looking at her. "Letha?"
"Yes?"
"I've missed that. Just saying your name, knowing you'll answer me." He slid a finger across the smooth, cool skin on the back of her hand. "I've missed a lot of things."
"And some of them, you're still going to have to miss." She squeezed his hand once, then released it and scooted back a few inches. "I'm not just taking the position because I was asked to, Sirius. I'm taking it because it will give me a place, a role, a… a new person to be, almost. Someone who's needed, who's necessary, but who doesn't have quite so many demands on her as Aletha Freeman-Black always did. And also, please don't be offended, because it will give me some distance from you. As much as I love you, if I try to figure out who this new Aletha will be right next to you, I have a feeling I'll become someone neither of us could put up with for long."
Sirius sighed. "Sad, but true." He winked at her. "I do tend to corrupt everyone I come in contact with, after all."
"Of course you do. If you didn't, you wouldn't be you." She got to her feet in one smooth motion. "I need to get to bed, and I'm sure you do too. Will you take Meghan to the girls' room? She shouldn't sleep on the floor all night."
"Sure." Sirius climbed over the couch, then paused. "Letha?"
"Yes?" She stopped in the doorway, turning to look back at him.
"Don't stay away too long."
"Don't worry," Aletha said softly. "I won't."
Author Notes:
A/N: I was considering adding one more scene, but this seems like a good place to end the chapter. Not everything has to be a cliffie. Hope you like this first stop on Aletha's road—she's got a long way to go yet, but she's on her way, which is what matters.
Now that the insane portion of my summer is over, it's possible I might go back to weekly updates. Let me know if you would like that, and don't forget to hit up my Facebook page, facebook (dot) com (slash) annebwalsh (dot) page, if you haven't already! The more people who show up there, the further I go on a certain semi-secret project which I think you will all like…