More than a Dream

Chapter 4

Run-ins with a Rat

A week passed, then two, and both Sirius and Harry were beginning to get comfortable with having the eldest of the Weasley household knowing who they were. The children adored their new pets, and Harry would often go out with them to play, leaving Sirius able to converse with Molly and Arthur freely.

Arthur had sent of the letter to Dumbledore the morning after their unmasking, as Sirius and Harry were inclined to call it. Their answer came with the children's Hogwarts letters.

The owls swooped in at breakfast, dropping all of the letters in front of their intended recipient. The letters received a different reaction from everyone. The twins simply grabbed them as if it were no big deal, opening them without decorum, tossing the Hogsmeade permission slips towards their parents. Ron grinned widely, practically cheering. It was obvious that he was quite happy at the prospect of finally attending Hogwarts. Percy merely stared at his letter, which was considerably bulkier than any of the others, in absolute shock.

"What is it, Percy?" asked Mrs. Weasley in concern. Percy didn't answer, instead he reached for the letter with trembling hands and carefully slit the parchment envelope. A gleaming silver badge fell onto the table.

"I'm a Prefect," he breathed, wonderingly. The twins, of course, took it upon themselves to break the apparent magic of the moment.

"Well, of course you are, old boy!" cried Fred loudly.

"No one else is a studious-"

"-as bookish-"

"-as pompous-"

"-as prefect-"

"- as you are," they finished in unison. Mrs. Weasley frowned disapprovingly at them.

"That's wonderful, dear," said Mrs. Weasley, turning back to Percy, pride very apparent in her face. Percy grinned widely, polished the badge, and pinned it onto his jumper, a smug look just beginning to appear on his face.

"Congratulations, Percy," said Mr. Weasley. "I don't suppose that any of you would be interested in a trip to Diagon Alley today?"

The children cheered, rushing to finish their breakfast before running up the stairs to get ready to go. Arthur smiled, and waited until everyone that didn't already know about Sirius and Harry left the room. Then he opened the letter he himself had received. He read through it and nodded at Sirius.

"Looks like you're going to Hogwarts," he said. "Do you need to buy anything at Diagon Alley?"

::Yes, but I'm not sure about money-:: said Sirius' voice in his head. Apparently, he was speaking through Harry.

::There's that wallet...:: said Harry.

::Oh, right:: Sirius sounded uncomfortable. Arthur wondered how it was that they came across this 'wallet', before deciding that he probably didn't want to know.

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Sirius and Harry trotted at the heels of the Weasley family. Arthur had told them that he would exchange their muggle money for wizarding coins while the rest of his family went down to their vault. There was a brief scene during which Ron asked the Goblin whether or not the dogs could come with them down to their vault which had received a vehement refusal from the goblin in question. That left Harry and Sirius alone with Mr. Weasley, or at least as alone as you could be while inside a busy wizarding bank.

Arthur conversed animatedly with the goblin at the front desk, grumbling about the poor exchange rates.

Harry and Sirius looked around, Sirius in vague interest and Harry with avid curiosity. It had been years since Harry's one visit to Diagon Alley, and he wanted to see everything. Suddenly Sirius started, grabbing Harry by the scruff of his neck and throwing him behind a pillar.

::Sirius! What-:: started Harry, confused and slightly peeved at his rough handling.

::Wormtail is here,:: said Sirius sharply. ::We need to go. Hide somewhere or-::

::Sirius, the door right there,:: said Harry, gesturing with his forepaw towards a door that was slightly ajar not ten feet away from where they were. Unfortunately, in order to get to it they would have to break cover, and risk being seen by one of the few people who knew Sirius' form and would likely not hesitate to use it against him if he could. Sirius nodded curtly and Harry looked out at the anteroom from behind the pillar. He saw Peter and blinked in surprise. The man was fit. Nothing at all like the stocky and slightly overweight man who had once taken him to the Dursleys. He growled and resisted the urge to attack, instead flicking his tail once and rushing towards the door. He pawed the door open and he went inside quickly, looking back to see if Sirius was coming. He was, and so were several goblins who had apparently seen them going into one of the doors heading down to the carts.

::Let's go, Harry,:: said Sirius, grabbing Harry by the collar and wrenching him around. They ran down the stairway to a place where several empty carts were waiting. They jumped into one just as it started to move away and crouched, listening to the goblins search for them until they were out of range.

After the cart came to a stop they waited for a moment, listening for footsteps. Hearing nothing, they started to climb out of the cart just as the light from a lantern showed itself from around the nearest corner. They ducked back into the cart and hid under one of the seats. Harry transformed into a cat so as to take up less space.

They sat there, all of their muscles tense, trying to make their breath inaudible, as a goblin and a very large man boarded the cart. The large man took a seat on top of the one Sirius and Harry were hiding under and it bent from the weight, causing Sirius to gasp and complain mentally that he was being squashed. Harry looked upwards in a cat imitation of rolling his eyes and told Sirius to be quiet.

The cart began to move and after several rather jarring turns it halted in front of what Sirius recognised to be a very high-security vault. He mentioned it to Harry, who immediately took it upon himself to see what was so special that it deserved that type of guard. He jumped up, nimbly avoiding Sirius' grab at him, and looked towards the vault curiously. He watched the goblin run a long finger down the door to the vault, opening it. He leaned eagerly forwards to see what was inside but all he saw was a single small, grungy-looking package. The man looked around furtively before grabbing the package and putting it into one of his many pockets hurriedly, patting it as though he was afraid that it would disappear. The large man turned towards him and he ducked back under the seat, ignoring Sirius' scolding voice in his head.

The man and the goblin climbed back into the cart and it headed back to the main hall of the bank. After the two climbed out Harry and Sirius waited a suitable amount of time (making sure to get out before the cart began moving again) before they followed. Harry turned back into a dog as they walked along. They entered the main hall of Gringotts Bank stealthily, Sirius watching for Pettigrew and Harry watching for Mr. Weasley.

Sirius gave a sigh of relief, ::Peter's gone.::

Harry started, ::What- oh, right.:: He tried to cover up his lapse in attention by searching for Mr. Weasley again but it didn't quite work.

::What's wrong, Harry?::

::Who was that man, down there in the cart?::

::Hagrid, the gamekeeper at Hogwarts, or at least that's what he was last time I met him several years ago.::

::Oh,:: said Harry. He was curious as to what Hagrid had taken out of the vault. It must have been really valuable to need so much security. He was pulled out of his thoughts when he spotted Mr. Weasley standing nearby.

::There's Mr. Weasley,:: said Harry just as Sirius said ::There's Arthur.:: They grinned at each other and then trotted over to where Mr. Weasley stood, looking around for the two of them worriedly. Harry came up behind him and pulled on the back of his robes with his teeth. Mr. Weasley jumped and turned around.

"There you are," he said, relief rather apparent in his voice. Harry was surprised, he was worried about them? "I've been wondering where you got to. Care to tell?"

::Later,:: said Harry, ::after we're all done shopping and we're not somewhere so public. Unless you want to be seen talking to two dogs as if they could answer back.::

Mr. Weasley blushed, but proceeded to use more caution after that. "Here's that money that you wanted exchanged," he said quietly, handing a pouch over to Sirius. "Quite the amount of money you have there."

Harry evaded the implied question of how they had come across such means by ignoring it and dragging Sirius off to somewhere where they could change without being seen. He waved to Mr. Weasley mentally, calling out ::Sorry, lots to buy!:: before he exited the Gringotts building and ducking into the nearest alleyway.

Harry transformed, Otean sliding off his neck.

>>I wisssh that you would let me transssform more often,<< Otean complained.

Harry winced, he had been neglecting his friend of late. It couldn't really be helped, as he rarely left the Weasleys' home, and telling them that he was a Parselmouth was not high on his list of priorities. But it annoyed him to not be able to transform into a human on occasion, it must be positively horrid to be stuck as an inanimate object at all times.

>>I'm sorry, Otean,<< he said, allowing Otean to drape himself loosely over his shoulders. Harry turned to Sirius and took off his collar. Sirius transformed and cast Finite Incantatem over the collar, turning it back into its proper form of their trunk.

Sirius looked Harry up and down once. The boy was filthy from weeks without a bath (excluding that splashing fest that had passed for a dog-bath when they had first arrived at the Weasleys) , and he was likely not much better off. He cast a cleaning charm over them, the equivalent of a shower without the wet, and cleaned their clothes in a similar manner.

Harry grinned and dug in the trunk for a hat. He needed something to cover his scar. Sirius cast a charm over himself to give him random hair and eye colouring, ending up with light brown hair and exceedingly strange-looking violet eyes. He did the same to Harry, who turned out with pale blond hair and black eyes. Harry caught his reflection in a mirror on the inside of the lid of the trunk and frowned.

"Sirius, I think you need to undo that one. It looks really fake."

Sirius shrugged and cast another Finite Incantatem, this time over Harry, restoring his appearance to what it normally was. Harry jammed the hat over his head, closed the trunk and shrunk it to fit in his pocket. He and Sirius perused each other, making sure that the disguises were at least enough to get them through a casual inspection.

Sirius looked pointedly at Otean, "He's going to have to hide himself. It would do no one any good if we were to cause a panic in the middle of Diagon Alley because you're a Parselmouth." He said it in Spanish, just in case they were overheard.

>>Did you understand him, Otean?<<

>>Yesss,<< hissed Otean in annoyance, but he slipped inside Harry's jacket without any more protest.

Sirius picked the pouch of money off the ground where he had dropped it. "Ready?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Disguises?"

Harry rolled his eyes as Sirius began their old routine of using a verbal checklist, but obliged him all the same. "Check."

"Trunk?"

"Check."

"Supply list?"

Harry dug in his pocket for the list they had copied from Ron's own that had come with his letter. He pulled it out and waved it in Sirius' face, "Check. Can we skip the rest of it, please?"

Sirius merely grinned at his godson's impatience. Waving towards the street he said, "Be my guest, let's go."

And with that, they strode out into Diagon Alley, the first time for them to do so since the day Harry had received his wand.

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The rest of their day in Diagon Alley went by without further incident, though they did have to dodge Peter once in a while. While their disguises could probably hold up under the eyes of strangers, they weren't going to risk themselves being seen and recognised by any of the people who had once known Sirius well.

Finally they finished picking up all of the supplies that Harry would need for his stay at Hogwarts. They had even picked up robes since they would be far less conspicuous than their muggle clothing.

Harry spotted Mr. Weasley and overheard him telling Ron that he was sure that "Scruffy and Blackie" would show up before they had to leave.

"Maybe we should pack up," said Harry, gesturing towards the Weasley family, the youngest of whom were now shouting out the names inscribed on Sirius and Harry's respective dog-tags. Sirius nodded and they ducked into another alleyway, put their bags in the trunk, turned the trunk back into a collar for Sirius, and transformed. Otean refused to turn himself back into a collar for Harry unless Harry promised to take him out into the woods later that day so that he could spend a decent amount of time as an animate being, which Harry quickly agreed to.

They rejoined their owners, much to the joy of the youngest children, and Mr. Weasley led their rather large group out of Diagon Alley and into the Leaky Cauldron where they flooed back to the Burrow. Mrs. Weasley then shooed the children up the stairs to pack their things and set off herself to prepare dinner, leaving Sirius, Harry, and Arthur in relative privacy in the living room(Charlie had gone off nearly a week earlier to an internship with some magizoologists who were currently working with dragons).

Arthur turned to the duo, who had transformed moments before, and asked, "So where did you two disappear to at Gringotts?"

Sirius explained that they had seen Peter and had been afraid of being recognised, so they had ducked into one of the many doors leading out of Gringotts' main hall.

Sirius sat down on a chair, making himself comfortable, "How did Peter become an Auror, anyway? Before I went to Azkaban he was just an executive in the Goblin Liaison Office."

Harry curled up against Sirius' feet, once again choosing to remain in his dog form, and looked up at Mr. Weasley in interest. He had been rather curious himself. Everything Sirius had ever said about Peter had pointed to the supposed fact that he wasn't all that good with magic, and being an Auror required a very good grasp of magic, as well as a good deal of power.

Arthur frowned slightly, "I'm not quite sure, actually. It seemed that everything was quiet for about a month after Voldemort died when there were suddenly about twenty different attacks almost all at once. People panicked. Voldemort was dead so everyone thought that it was all over. Then the Longbottoms were attacked. It seems that Death Eaters thought that they could tell them where their master was. They couldn't, of course, so they were tortured. According to the reports from the Death Eaters and the Longbottoms themselves, three people showed up and fought with the Death Eaters. Then two of those people seemed to disappear into thin air and suddenly Peter was the only one left, comforting the Longbottoms' young son and sending a message off to the Ministry so that they could get assistance." Arthur looked up at the ceiling, brow furrowed as he tried to remember.

"Peter was made to look as though he was the sole saviour of the Longbottoms. He was given the Order of Merlin, second class, and a chance to become an Auror. He brought in quite a few Death Eaters on his own, and lately has become quite influential in the Ministry. He's seen as quite the hero. In the eyes of the Ministry and the public he can do no wrong. He's saved enough people and done enough things to make it so that the Ministry will let him get away with anything."

::So even if Sirius were to get a trial, it would be hopeless to try to prove that Peter was in the wrong,:: said Harry with a sigh. As if things weren't bad enough, it seemed that they would have to wait for Peter to make a really big mistake before they had a hope of living normally.

Arthur nodded solemnly, "I'm afraid so."

Sirius sighed and leaned back, massaging the bridge of his nose. He heard the thumping of feet descending the staircase and transformed.

::I'm going to go explore the forest for a bit, alright Sirius?:: said Harry into Sirius' mind alone. Sirius nodded absently and Harry ran out to make good on his promise to Otean.