Maybe
Chapter 4
By Anne B. Walsh
Chapter 4
Sirius Black wasn’t thinking much about what he was doing with his hands. His left hand was doodling idly on a scrap of parchment, not leaving any ink traces, since he hadn’t loaded his quill. His right hand was tapping a rhythm against the table.
His mind was the proverbial million miles away.
So. Tomorrow.
He smiled humorlessly. Annie may love tomorrow, but I’m not too fond of it at the moment.
Tomorrow was the day that a judge and jury, doubtless heavily biased against him, would decide his fate. He had no illusions — he was almost certain that they would find him guilty, and decide that he either deserved to go back to Azkaban, or to be subjected immediately to the Dementor’s Kiss.
His left hand dropped the quill and crumpled the parchment. What would that feel like, to have my soul sucked out? Would it hurt? Would I know it’s happening? Would I —
All right, stop that, said the part of his mind that often sounded like Remus. You promised, Sirius. You gave your word you wouldn’t do this.
One of the last things Aletha had asked of him was his word that he wouldn’t give up. "I know you’ll want to," she had whispered to him as they held one another tightly. "It would be so easy. But please don’t. For my sake, for Meghan and Harry, for all the Pack. We’ll get you out of this. I swear we will. But you have to swear to keep fighting. Don’t let the fear take you. Please."
He had promised, and he had kept his word. It had been hard sometimes, through these months, but he had held onto that promise, and the one she had made to him, although he honestly didn’t see how they were going to be able to help him —
But then, you didn’t think you’d ever get out of Azkaban, either.
He started flattening the parchment he’d crumpled. I think what I hate most is not knowing what happened to anyone else. The cubs were just gone... He halted that train of thought before he could lose himself in thoughts and memories of the four of them, of Harry’s voice and Hermione’s laugh and Draco’s smile and Meghan’s kiss goodnight...
We at least had time to say goodbye to Remus and Danger before someone came to take them away. And then Aletha and I had a few moments together. But that was it. I haven’t even heard anything about them since.
He tore a corner from the parchment moodily. Apparently I’m not allowed to. Deity of your choice knows, I ask often enough. And they get downright snippy about it at times. "We’re not permitted to tell you that."
Sirius drew himself up and mimicked the posture and tone of the snippy Aurors as he might at home, with the cubs as an appreciative audience and the other adult Marauders as a tolerant one.
Maybe talking to yourself is a sign of madness. But pretending the others are here is the only thing that’s kept me sane these past months.
A thought streaked across his mind before he could stop it.
I wonder if that’d work in Azkaban.
But he knew it wouldn’t. He’d lose them, there. He’d lose their faces and the sounds of their voices and the touch of their hands... all his best memories, everything he loved, gone like shredded parchment in the wind...
He shook his head sharply.
I am not going to give up. I promised.
The trial’s not till tomorrow. And even afterwards, there’s still hope.
Unless they give you the Kiss, that snide little voice whispered. There’s no hope after that.
Sirius firmly banished the snide voice from his mind, and to keep it out, pulled a fresh sheet of parchment toward him, picked up his quill, dipped it in the ink bottle, and began to write.
Not being allowed to post letters hadn’t kept him from writing them. He hoped that, if everything went completely pear-shaped, the Aurors would take pity on him and post the letters for him, so that Aletha would have something of him to keep.
But there’s no way things can go that wrong. It’s just not going to happen.
He hoped.
xXxXx
Harry Potter ran through the halls of his school, not daring to look back. He could hear the yells of Dudley’s gang just behind him, and he tried to look around for somewhere he could go where they wouldn’t dare hurt him — anywhere with a teacher —
"Going somewhere, Potter?"
Harry skidded to a halt. Malcolm and Dennis had somehow or other gotten in front of him and were cutting him off. Dudley, Piers, and Gordon appeared from around the corner, panting, and advanced on him purposefully.
I don’t want to fight, Harry thought desperately, watching them come. I really don’t want to fight...
But it wasn’t because he wasn’t any good. On the contrary. He was too good.
The last time he and Dudley’s gang had actually physically fought, he had sent three of them to the nurse and himself to the headmistress, and he’d been suspended from school for a day for fighting, even though he’d tried to explain that they’d started it — they were the ones who were hurt, and he wasn’t, so he got the blame.
Uncle Vernon was really mad. Especially because Dudley was one of the ones I hurt.
Harry’d spent nearly a week in his cupboard when he wasn’t at school or doing chores for that. It still made him shiver to think about. He didn’t want to repeat that.
Why are they still going after me? I proved I can hurt them — why won’t they leave me alone?
It was one thought too many. Harry suddenly felt his arms grabbed and pinned behind him. He struggled, but Malcolm twisted his wrist, and he stopped.
"Think you’re so much better than us with your fancy moves, Potter," sneered Dudley, his little piggy eyes narrowed with distaste. "What were you doing in my bag?"
"Looking for my homework," said Harry.
"What would your homework be doing in my bag, Potter?"
Harry’s ears caught a voice that sounded like a teacher around the corner, and he decided in an instant to take a risk. "You stole my homework last night and put your own name on it so you could get my grade," he said loudly. "Because the whole class knows you’re failing science."
"Nobody talks to me like that," growled Dudley, stepping closer. Harry braced himself for the blow —
"What is going on here?"
It was a woman’s voice, strident, demanding. Malcolm let go of Harry immediately, and he scrambled to his feet and turned to look at the speaker.
She was a middle-aged black woman, with whitening hair and glasses, standing with her hands on her hips and looking pointedly at all of them. Harry recognized the new school counselor, Miss Anderson, from the school assembly two days ago where she’d been introduced.
"You five," she said, pointing at Dudley’s gang. "You come with me. Mr. Potter, back to class."
The other boys shambled past Harry, making "we’ll-get-you-for-this" faces as they passed. Miss Anderson was still looking at him. "Go on with you," she said in a gentler tone. "I’m scheduled to see you tomorrow afternoon, we can talk about this then."
Harry nodded and started for his classroom, his mind strangely preoccupied with the sound of Miss Anderson’s voice.
I feel like I know her from somewhere. Like I’ve heard her voice before...
It was a very nice voice, Harry decided. It made him feel safe and comforted somehow. Almost like he was home.
He wondered if she sang. It sounded like she did. She spoke with precision, like she wanted to make sure everyone understood everything she said. He knew enunciation was very important for singers...
But how do I know that? I don’t sing, except in music class, and we never learn anything like that. The teacher’s always too busy trying to keep everyone from hitting each other with the tambourines.
It was just another one of those weird things that he couldn’t quite understand. There were a lot of them in his life. He’d gotten more or less used to them.
I can ask her tomorrow if she sings.
xXxXx
Aletha was grateful that she had left her wand in her office. The temptation to curse all five of Harry’s tormentors into oblivion might otherwise have been too strong for her.
She scratched her nose, pushing her glasses back into place. She didn’t wear glasses, usually, but these were special. She’d enchanted them to make her look thirty or forty years older than she was, and coincidentally a great deal like her Aunt Amy.
I don’t know if they’re watching the school, but after they almost caught me when I tried to get near the house, better not to take any chances.
Only fast reflexes and good Apparition skills had kept her from being caught when she had gone for a casual walk near number seventeen, Privet Drive, in mid-January. She had received a very polite letter later that same day, informing her that if she was seen anywhere near an area where any of "the children formerly in your care" were known to be, she would be immediately arrested again.
She had turned her energies to researching other ways she could get to Harry, while trying to search for Hermione, though knowing she was unlikely to succeed with the double handicap of not knowing the name the girl was under or having any indication of where she’d been sent. She couldn’t exactly ask every children’s home and foster program in England if they’d had any ten-year-old girls with bushy brown hair come in around Christmas...
But no use dwelling on the past. We know where to look now. Remus will take care of that — I do hope he finds her soon. She must be petrified, poor little mite — all alone, with no one at all...
We’re all going to need a long time to recover from this one.
She allowed herself a few blissful seconds of daydreaming, imagining a cozy den room, lit by the glow of a crackling fire and candles in sconces on the walls, with mattresses littering the floor and the Pack littering the mattresses, asleep perhaps, or awake and telling jokes, toasting marshmallows...
Aletha pulled herself back to reality. There’s work to do before that happens. You have a part to play. Make it good.
She opened the door of the school office and ushered the troublemakers in.
xXxXx
Jane White sat by herself with a book in the corner of the playground, her lion on her lap, hidden by her tucked-up knees. She liked best to be by herself. The other children didn’t like her.
"Don’t play with Jane," they said when they thought she wasn’t listening, or sometimes when she was, to hurt her feelings. "She’s weird. She’s strange."
But the worst of it was, they were right. They had to be. She was weird. How else could she make all these strange things happen?
Clocks ran backwards when she was around. Balloons popped. Light bulbs burned out. And once, when another girl had made fun of her for not being able to speak, that girl hadn’t been able to speak herself for a whole day.
I didn’t mean to do anything, Jane thought, staring at the words on the page without really seeing them. But I was mad. And it just happened.
What if I get really mad and hurt someone?
A wet blotch appeared on the page.
Or what if I even kill someone?
Another blotch. Then another.
What if the reason my family is dead is because I killed them?
She buried her face in her lion’s fur and cried, silent as ever.
xXxXx
Peals of laughter rang out from the upstairs hallway of Longbottom House.
"What are you two doing?" called Augusta Longbottom sternly.
"We’re just playing, Gran," her grandson Neville called back.
"Playing what?"
"Er, nothing."
Augusta pursed her lips. The boy was a terrible liar. She walked grimly up the stairs to see what was going on.
Neville and the little girl from Family Services, Meghan, were sitting at opposite ends of the hallway, with a potted Omnivorous Snapdragon from the greenhouse between them. They were taking turns tossing bits of wadded-up parchment at it and watching it snap at them.
Neville looked up anxiously. "We’re just having some fun, Gran," he said beseechingly.
Augusta allowed him a small smile. "Put it back and clean this up when you’re done," she said.
"Thank you, Mrs. Longbottom," said Meghan, smiling at her.
"Thanks, Gran," echoed Neville belatedly.
Augusta’s smile lingered as she made her way back downstairs.
xXxXx
Lying on his bed with an enchanted cold pack over one eye, Theodore Nott sulked.
All I did was ask him a simple question.
xXxXx
In the room assigned to him, Draco Black finished rinsing out his shirt in cold water. He hung it over the edge of the counter to dry and went to put on his other one.
He deserved that. Asking if Padfoot beats me up.
xXxXx
Remus climbed the stairs to Aletha’s flat, feeling rather dejected on his own part — his search today had yielded nothing — but sensing, as he had since the middle of the morning, Danger’s glee about something.
And she won’t tell me what.
Brat, he shot at her.
You should talk. Wait until I can tell you both.
Remus adopted his whiniest tone. But I don’t wanna.
You’re worse than the cubs.
You say that like it’s a bad thing.
Danger opened the door and stepped out onto the outdoor balcony, at which Remus had just arrived. "Hello, stranger," she said aloud. "Need a place to stay?"
"As I recall, this isn’t your place to be offering."
"I wasn’t." Her enigmatic and highly satisfied smile appeared.
Remus groaned mentally. What did you do?
Just wait a few minutes, Letha should be back soon.
And what am I supposed to do while I wait?
Are you telling me you can’t think of anything fun? Danger waggled her eyebrows suggestively.
Remus raised his own. Well, I could always go floss my teeth...
Danger turned on her heel and went back into the flat, in what might have looked like a display of temper to a bystander, but which Remus knew was her way of getting some privacy before she laughed herself sick.
He looked down the street and spotted a familiar figure coming. Get it over with quickly, he advised. She’s coming, and she looks like she could use some good news.
Fine.
"What happened?" asked Remus as "Alice" climbed the stairs wearily.
"Oh, I just had to break up a fight today. A whole bunch of boys picking on one little skinny one." Her eyes flashed, and Remus knew what she meant.
She stopped Harry’s cousin and his gang from picking on him.
"Apparently, the skinny one’s gotten himself a bit of a name as a troublemaker," Aletha continued with a small, wicked smile, opening the door. "Seems he knows some self-defense. He sent three of the gang to the school nurse the last time they tried to corner him."
Remus smiled, feeling a rush of pride. That’s my boy. He and Sirius had both been responsible for teaching the cubs the rudiments of self-defense — it was how Hermione had known where to hit Snape when she’d been seven —
He shook his head, trying to stop the sudden rush of thoughts of his Kitten, and the longing that came with them, the wish to see her, to hold her, to mark her with his scent and warn the world away from his girl-cub...
Soon, murmured Danger, and he felt a gentle hand in his mind, helping him close off those memories for the moment. You’ll find her soon. We’ll have them all back soon. And now I can tell you what I have to tell.
Finally...
Danger ignored this. "We have our safe place to go," she announced as Remus and Aletha came into the living room. "Professor Dumbledore was here while you were gone. He’s offered us sanctuary at Hogwarts. For as long as we need it, he says. There’s a very nice suite of rooms near the kitchens we can have — he and I went through them, they have just about everything we could need — and if we have to be back in hiding for good, then the schooling problem has just been solved. What d’you think?"
Aletha’s face, young again as she removed the glasses, was quietly rapturous. "I think I’m going to hug that man when I see him next," she said.
That was worth the wait, Remus admitted.
And that’s not all. "Plus, I have a plan of my own. Involving the absent member of this little fraternity."
Aletha’s smile grew. "I was hoping you’d say that."