Half of a Heart's Desire: Entre Deux Guerres

Chapter 2: I Should Have Known Better

Sirius Black stepped out of the hospital wing, not sure what he could do to contain his nervous energy. He had sat long hours with James, his best friend, heard him babble less coherently than Sirius could ever remember him doing, even when he had lost his own parents. That bereavement had not been unexpected; James had always known that his parents were not young, even by wizarding standards, and he had seen them losing their vitality in recent years. His mother's death, following soon on the heels of his father's, had almost been something of a release. It had been Sirius, to whom they had been newly gained parents, who had been reduced to a wreck. James and Lily, though certainly devastated themselves, had nevertheless been strong for him, and today Sirius had felt acutely inadequate in attempting to return the favor. Yet James had insisted on his being there long after Harry had been fed, bathed, and put to sleep, and the two friends had sat there and talked for hours, until Madam Pomfrey insisted on sending James to bed with a Dreamless Sleep Potion. Sirius had been threatened with the same, but had managed to excuse himself, saying that Remus Lupin was still expected and that someone needed to be around to acquaint him with what had happened, at which point he had been expelled from the hospital wing for being too much of a nuisance and a distraction.

Dumbledore had told him to expect Remus's arrival by midnight, and in a way, Sirius was glad that Madam Pomfrey had decreed that James would be asleep long before then. Sirius knew that the bond he and James shared was unique, and he felt protective of James in the first throes of his grief, not wanting to expose him even to eyes as trusted as Dumbledore's or Remus's. Yet right now Sirius had no idea what to say to Remus, a man he regarded more highly than almost anyone in the world, even as he had gradually been convincing himself that Remus had to have been the spy. James had called him a daft berk, and Lily had given him a scolding and a smack, and if Remus had been there he would have smiled lightly and said that he had gotten his just rewards, but Remus hadn't been there; he had been around less and less, lately, and Sirius hadn't been able to stop himself from letting his mind wander in dark directions. Thinking the worst was a family trait, after all, one that even Sirius was not able to completely escape. And now he knew that the traitor had been elsewhere all along, and he had suspected someone he cared for and profoundly respected, and he had no idea how to punish himself. He had never been proud of his suspicions; he had never shared them with anyone but James and Lily, and he was heartily ashamed of himself now that his colossal misjudgment had had consequences he could never have foreseen.

Yet Sirius missed his friend, and couldn't wait to see him. His suspicion, ultimately, had stemmed largely from a feeling he had always carried that Remus could see through them somehow, and understood him and James perhaps even better than they did each other. Peter had been a much simpler sort of friend to have. Remus had depended on them, had been made dependent by his own secret, and he rarely overruled their impulsiveness with his better judgment, yet when he chose to exercise his strength he could control Sirius and James in a way that even Lily had never quite managed. His style was subtler than theirs, and perhaps it was force of circumstance that had given him a kind of self-control that he and James could rarely aspire towards, even after James had grown up and mellowed somewhat.

In the end it had been Sirius's respect for Remus that had earned him his distrust. Moony was clever, his circumstances had lent him a certain deviousness, and he understood people, with all their strengths and weaknesses. He was trusted by many on the side of Light, yet his secret made him vulnerable. Had Sirius been a Dark Lord, Moony would have been the first one he would have tried to recruit. And Sirius knew that for the sake of friendship and acceptance Remus could be nudged to act against his better judgment; he had, after all, shamelessly taken advantage of this abiding weakness of his friend's time and time again. But Sirius also knew that he should have remembered that goading Remus into orchestrating schoolboy pranks was very different from persuading him to betray those whose trust had given his life meaning. He should have thought the better of thinking that Remus would succumb to such persuasion. Remus was stronger than that, and he had known it well; he had been the one to let Moony down when they were boys, after all, and not the other way around. And now he had done again, and Lily, who had loved Remus like a brother, had been the one to pay the price.

And he was brooding on Moony now partly to keep his thoughts off his other friend, for he still could not entirely curb his impulse to leave Hogwarts and stalk the streets in search of Wormtail. He could not think of him as Peter now, and if Voldemort was calling him Wormtail then that would be what Sirius would call him as well. By now he must have known that his plan had failed, and that his Master had been destroyed. By the time they started the search for him it would be much too late. Wormtail was too inconspicuous. The time to hunt for him was now, yet Sirius was confined to Hogwarts, bound by a promise. He was itching to leave, and his nervous energy was by no means expended by his incessant wandering. Distracted by footsteps further down the hallway, he noted his surroundings, finding that he had taken a familiar path down to the Hogwarts kitchens. Clearly, it was a predictable direction, and as the footsteps came closer he saw that Remus had tracked him down. His friend looked tired and careworn, and his robes were shabbier than Sirius remembered them being. Sirius wondered momentarily whether his own state was something similar.

"What's happened, Sirius? What's going on here?"

"What do you mean? Hasn't Dumbledore told you anything?"

"Dumbledore told me to talk to you. He called me earlier and told me that James needed us, and that I should come here at all costs tonight. I saw some of our kind celebrating on the streets rather rashly, and I heard something about Voldemort's defeat, but I was rushing here and I didn't wait to find out what was going on. What's happened? Why is James in the hospital wing? Are they all in there?"

"Where have you been, anyway?"

"In Egypt, this evening. I've been researching some scrolls for Dumbledore at the Library of Alexandria, and other magical libraries around the world."

Sirius had been wondering all this time what was keeping Remus, and it had never occurred to him that there was a very good reason for his delay. Cross-border apparition was a tricky business, especially across bodies of water. There were physical as well as jurisdictional hurdles, and given the customs barriers and the mandatory rest periods to prevent splinching, Remus had made remarkably good time. No wonder they hadn't seen as much of Remus as they were used to seeing. If this had been his errand for the Order it was remarkable that they saw him as often as they did.

"Why aren't you telling me anything, Sirius? What happened?"

There was no easy way to say this. Sirius looked him in the eye, willing him to read his mind, but knowing that that was no way to do this, he started to speak, avoiding his friend's real question.

"Voldemort attacked in Godric's Hollow tonight. You heard correctly. He has been defeated. He's lying in a pile of ashes in Harry's nursery right now."

"I'm not asking about Voldemort, Sirius. Where are James and Lily and Harry?"

"James is here, with Harry. Harry's the one who defeated Voldemort, Remus, can you believe it? They're sleeping in the hospital wing. Lily... Lily's dead, Remus. This is all my fault."

When Remus spoke, it was in an odd, choked sort of voice. Sirius, who knew how rarely his friend allowed such a reaction to show, felt all the more the burden of his own inadequacies that had led to such a moment.

"What have you done, Sirius? Please tell me you didn't complete the Fidelius, that there was some delay. How could you? You were the secret-keeper... unless you switched... without telling me?"

Sirius didn't say anything. He couldn't speak. He would have looked away, but he maintained eye contact, knowing that he owed his friend at least that much. Remus held his eye for a long moment, and then moved so rapidly that Sirius actually flinched before he was pulled into a hug. Sirius didn't know how to react; Remus was so rarely given to physical overtures that this reaction would have been shocking had he even deserved an ounce of sympathy. He certainly hadn't earned his friend's compassion, but he realized now how much he needed it. Remus really did know him much better than he knew himself.

"You should blame me, Remus. This is all my fault. I as good as handed them over to Voldemort myself. James... Merlin, Remus, you should see James. I can't get him to stop crying... I can barely stop myself from crying, except that he needs me, and Harry needs him. He made me promise to stay here, Remus. He wants to keep me from getting in trouble. This is all my fault. Did you know he fell in love with Evans the very first day on the Hogwarts Express, right after she slapped him for pulling her pigtails? And now she's gone, Remus, and it's all my fault."

But the Remus he knew was back, controlled, reassuring, and able to take control. Sirius had often chafed at his friend's quiet ability to take charge when he so desired, so different from his own more aggressive style, but at times like this he could not have appreciated it more.

"But it isn't your doing. You weren't the secret keeper. Peter, then?"

"I made them switch. I thought it was too obvious. I thought we needed a decoy. It should have been you. That was James's first reaction, and Lily's too, but you were never around, and I wasn't sure, and I..."

"You suspected me. I know."

Remus spoke casually, but to Sirius's culpable ears, there was a wealth of meaning in his words.

"Forgive me, Remus."

"Of course."

And there it was. It was much too easy; for Sirius, who would have raged and agonized at such a moment, Remus's quick forgiveness smacked of dismissal, yet Sirius had too much experience in apologizing to his friend to doubt that it was sincerely meant, and ought not to be spurned. It was he, Sirius, who had trouble taking this at face value, since he could not forgive himself. He tried another tack, unable to drop the subject.

"How did you know? Why didn't you say anything?"

"I suppose I was afraid. What was there to say? All I knew was that it wasn't me, and I knew there wasn't any way I could prove it. It was only logical for you to suspect me. It was pretty clear it had to be one of us. You and James were never going to suspect one another, and of course Lily was out of the question. That left me and Peter. I was always traveling. Peter was always present, always friendly. I know how you think, Sirius. I would have suspected me too. It wasn't your fault."

"But it was, wasn't it? You didn't suspect the wrong person. It's not your fault she's dead. I as good as killed her myself."

"No, I don't think I did any better than you, Sirius. I just... I couldn't suspect any of you without proof. I could never suspect my best friends, but I knew it had to be one of us. I could never decide, never act. I stopped myself from trying to find out, because I thought that by finding out I would betray my best friends. In a way I suppose I betrayed all of you. I never made the slightest effort to even to think about it, or talk to Dumbledore, or do anything. It always comes down to inaction, doesn't it, for me? I don't think it was the better choice, Sirius."

"It was better than my choice."

"No, Sirius. You placed your trust in someone who you thought had earned it. The betrayal is all on Peter's side."

"It's my fault, Remus, and I have to do something about it. He's out there, and we both know how easy it is for him to get away. We should be hunting him down like the rat he is right now. I could track his scent, Moony, Padfoot could track him down, but I can't, I promised James, but now he's sleeping, and I can't sleep, I can't think - what are we going to do now, Moony?"

"You have to trust James, Sirius. I think he needs you right now more than he needs revenge."

"But Wormtail is still out there, Moony. How are they going to find him? Nobody knows about him except us."

"Who knows what dark magic he's capable of now? There are spells he could be using that we'd never be able to track in a thousand years."

Sirius let out a sudden, bark-like laugh. A voice somewhere in his head registered that this was not an entirely appropriate reaction at a time of such gravity, but he ignored it. Who was he to be conventional at a time like this, after all?

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves here, Remus. This is still Wormtail we're talking about."

Remus snorted.

"You're right, of course." His face hardened suddenly, into an expression Sirius had only seen once before. "And he will live to regret this. He should have known better. He should have known that we would have given our lives for him, but we're not afraid to take his, now."

Sirius's expression grew eager at that, though Remus's tone was still measured and even; Sirius might have called it clinical in anyone else, but there was an intensity in it that was every bit as sincere as all of Sirius's sound and fury.

"Are you planning to go hunt him down, then?"

But Remus was looking contemplative again, and Sirius knew that he would not get the easy answer he wanted. It was not that Remus lacked courage by any means, but sometimes Sirius thought that for a Gryffindor, he understood a little too well when restraint was the better part of valor.

"James is more important than Peter right now. Tell me honestly, Sirius. You know him better than anyone else. What would he want me to do?"

"Damn it, Moony! You always know how to ask the difficult questions. I want to send you hunting after Wormtail right now, but if you had seen James earlier, you wouldn't need to ask. He needs you here. Harry needs you here. I'm not good enough for this alone, Moony. Lily would kill me if I let you go away at time like this."

Remus looked at him and nodded, then hesitated for a moment.

"Then there is something else we need to do as soon as possible, Padfoot. We need to tell Dumbledore about Wormtail. We have to give the Aurors the best chance possible."

Sirius's eyes widened.

"Tell him about all of us, you mean?"

"It's your secret to keep, Sirius. I don't want to get you or James in trouble with the Ministry. But do you think Dumbledore will believe that Peter managed it all by himself? I'll have to tell him it was all my fault. I'll say I helped Peter."

"That'll never work, Remus. He'll know you can't do it. Besides, I know you too. It's hard enough for you to keep things from Dumbledore; you won't be able to lie to him. I'll come with you; we'll tell him the whole truth. He'll keep it from the Ministry. What's the worst that can happen, anyway? If it comes to that we'll tell the Ministry we managed it last week, and the animagus roster will just have to get a little more crowded."

"We'd better go talk to him, then. I have a feeling he knew we'd have something to tell him."

"Impossible to say. He always has that omniscient look about him, but we've managed to keep a few secrets from him over the years. I was meaning to ask, earlier. How did you find me down here, anyway?"

"That was easy enough. Madam Pomfrey told me she had chased you out, and you weren't with Dumbledore. Short of Filch's office, there weren't too many other choices. Besides, I'm starving; even if I hadn't found you here I would probably have stepped in for a snack."

"Why are we standing out here, then? Let's get you something to eat before we go up and face the old sphinx."

Remus shook his head, and started to turn away, but Sirius was already tickling the pear, his face lit up in fond remembrance, and once the picture popped open, the House-elves came bustling towards them, and it would have been impossible to leave. Remus resigned himself to an ample supper before making his revelations, while Sirius put away a snack almost as hearty. It was strange, Remus thought, that he could be sick at heart, and yet, he could sit here and enjoy this simple camaraderie. One of his best friends was dead, and another was mourning her, the love of his life. A third had betrayed them in such a manner as to make it impossible to ever think of him as a friend again. And yet here he was, and Sirius was his friend, and trusted him, and James was his friend, and needed him. Sirius and James, who had had everything themselves, and who had still taken him in, and offered him the one thing he had never thought to have. He did not have much to offer in return, but he did have friendship, and loyalty, and they would always have that, from him.

Facing Dumbledore right now, to tell him they had betrayed his trust, would be difficult. Facing James tomorrow morning would be harder still, knowing that there was virtually nothing he could do to alleviate his friend's agony. But just the presence of his friends had meant so much to him at so many points in his life that Remus could only hope that his presence too would count for something now.

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