Intended

[thirty five]

The days grow shorter, the weather cold. The students prefer to stay in their dormitories and the teachers in their offices, huddled up against the draughts that sweep in under doors and numb their skins.

There are other students, though, who take full advantage of the lull in activity to carry out their own schemes.

Sirius is one of them.

He shivers, chilled but amused, laughing as he stands beneath a statue in the deserted third-floor corridor. Above him, Peter is stuck, trying his best to wriggle out of a passage he had found but hadn't been too successful in opening. It had been easy enough to get in, but after exploring the passage and returning to Hogwarts it turned out that the entrance wasn't as wide as they expected, especially not with several bags tied to each person's waist, filled with sweets from Honeydukes' cellar.

'Ah, shit. We need a spell!' Peter mutters, twisting about, wincing as the stone cuts into him. The passage is old, the stone of the one-eyed witch's hump frozen with cold and time. No matter how much he pushes against it, the stone refuses to budge, and he gives Sirius a glare.

'Next time you find a way out of this place, you go exploring alone!'

'You weren't this grumpy when we were in Honeydukes! Serves you right for trying to take so much.'

'At least I paid for what I took.'

'In Muggle money?'

Peter simply huffs in response and continues trying to pull himself out of the hole. There are now voices floating up from within the statue, and Sirius guesses that by now, Lupin and James have caught up with Peter. For a second there is silence, and then a cautious voice.

'Sirius?' James knocks on the stone, sending a series of dull thuds echoing through the corridor. 'Sirius? Peter? Which one of you is that?'

'I'm out here,' Sirius calls back, moving closer to the statue. 'That's Peter, stuck in there.'

'I knew filching those cream cakes was a bad idea,' Lupin says dryly from inside the tunnel. Sirius snickers.

'Oi, you shut it, and get me out of here!' Peter hollers, then claps his hands over his mouth, realizing he is too loud.

'Mind saying that again? Only, I don't think the prefects heard you well enough,' Sirius says, glaring. He does not want to be caught out of bounds, especially not tonight. Andromeda does the third-floor rounds tonight, and he is well aware of what she thinks about all his mischief. Let alone the fact that the passage Peter is stuck in leads out of Hogwarts... the prefects and the school caretaker would have a field day over finding it.

'Then get me out of here!' Peter snaps at him, his voice a low hiss. The agitated look on his friend's face tells Sirius that he isn't too eager to be caught either. No one in his situation would be, stuck halfway up a statue with his pockets bulging, two other boys crouched beneath him.

'Shut up! I'm trying to think, all right?'

For a few seconds, there is silence as Sirius seats himself on the floor and thinks. He is sure that the passage, although old, was made for the express reason of getting out of the castle and into Hogsmeade. Whoever designed it couldn't have made it that small... There must be a spell to open the passage fully...

'Hello? I don't know about you two, but it's awfully dark in here.'

'And Peter? Swinging your legs doesn't help any- ouch!'

'Sorry, but quit moving around in there! I can't see you, you know... Sirius? Any luck?'

Sirius shakes his head. He is about to say something when a faint voice reaches his ears, a voice he knows too well.

Andromeda. And from the sound of things, she isn't alone. A short burst of laughter echoes over the floor, loud and painfully close.

'Shit! Prefects!'

'Quick, do something!' Peter whispers, resuming his frantic tugging at the stone, his fingers fumbling at the knots of the bags, unable to remove them from his belt. He is firmly wedged in the opening, unable to move further upwards. Sirius has another idea, though, and he knocks on the side of the statue.

'James? Remus? Can you hear me?' he says, his voice urgent, his ears focused on the nearing footsteps.

There is a muffled thump and then he hears Lupin's voice from somewhere on his right. 'Yes. What's going on out there?'

'Good. Listen, there are prefects coming... it's too difficult to get Peter out now, but can you help pull him back in? Grab his legs or something.'

Lupin says something but his voice is faint, indiscernible; Sirius has no time to listen, distracted by the growing volume of voices and footsteps. He climbs up to the top of the statue and places his hands on Peter's shoulders.

'We've got to push you back in... at least, until the prefects have gone.'

'But...'

'Look, we can't do anything else! Better in than out here, anyway,' Sirius interrupts, his voice now tinged with exasperation. Peter glares at him, but nods in reluctant agreement.

'All right, then.'

Balancing precariously on the edge of the hump, Sirius pushes as hard as he can. Peter winces as he begins to move down, the combined efforts of the three of them working, but agonizingly slow. Sirius clicks his tongue impatiently, not daring to speak because the prefects are too close... any second now...

Something has to give, and that something is one of the bags. It rips loudly, sweets scattering both inside the tunnel and outside the statue, scattering on the floor. Peter yelps loudly, his shout being cut short as he disappears into the statue. There is a loud thud and some scuffling, and Sirius peers into the darkness to try and see what is happening.

'Shh! They'll hear you!'

'What about you...'

'I'll hide out here. Now shut up!'

'Take this, then!'

Sirius grabs the invisibility cloak thrust up at him and leaps off the statue. He ducks down behind it, just as the footsteps turn into the alcove. He skids on some of the sweets, his feet almost sliding out from under him but he barely manages keep himself from falling and making even more noise. The cloak will keep him from being seen, but he hopes that neither of the prefects think of looking up or they will surely notice the half-open hump of the witch.

Heart beating wildly, he peers around the side of the statue. From where he hides, he can see the two prefects clearly. One is obviously Andromeda, the light from her wand dimming but just enough for her face to be seen. The other is a tall Hufflepuff boy he's only vaguely familiar with from his experience with him in first year. He seems to be hunched over a piece of parchment, frowning, the lines in his face etched deep by wandlight.

Sirius holds his breath and flattens himself against the back of the statue as they raise their wands and look about. The thin beams of light teeter, bending around the edges of the statue and dangerously close to his hiding place, and he holds his breath. He doesn't know if the light would pass through the cloak and cast shadows on the wall, but he isn't eager to find out.

Andromeda had warned him against sneaking about, after all, and she had specifically warned him not to be around tonight. She wouldn't be too happy if she did happen to find him here.

'There's no one here. You're hearing things, Andie.'

'I'm telling you, I'm sure I heard voices from here.'

There is another quick laugh, the same as before. 'Come on. It was probably a couple of ghosts, out for a chat. There's no one here at all, see?'

'And those sweets?'

Sirius swears silently. It's too late to pick up the scattered sweets and hide them under the cloak with him, too late to hide the evidence. However, the Hufflepuff prefect comes to his rescue with a perfect excuse.

'Probably some student dropped them earlier. Filch hasn't been around here yet, or he'd have thrown a blue fit by now.'

'Maybe,' Andromeda says quietly, 'but I could swear I heard Sirius here, just a minute ago...'

Sirius stiffens at the sound of his name. There is something in her voice when she says it that makes him sit up and listen; something sad, almost remorseful, the words lying heavily in the air and in his ears. He listens intently now, making no noise, trying to pick up her words.

'Oh, come on. You don't mean to tell me now you're hearing him everywhere, too? You've got to stop thinking about him, Andie. You've got to let go.'

'It's not that easy! I haven't told him yet, you know.'

Told me what? Sirius wonders. His curiosity will not let him be. He steps lightly over the sweets, drawing the cloak tight around him so that there is no chance of being seen. They are moving again, walking slowly, and it is easy, almost too easy to catch up to them and listen in on their conversation. Sirius finds that if he keeps to the shadowed wall, he can hear them easily, but remain far enough from them to escape being detected.

'Then what's stopping you?'

'Ted, you don't understand. Sirius isn't just some boy. It's not fair to him. None of this is fair to him.'

They stop in front of a window. The moon outside is almost full, and for once, there are no clouds in the sky. The moonlight floods over them, marking out their tense features: her eyes, tired and disturbed; his face, drawn and uncertain. Sirius stops behind them, watching, waiting, biting his lip in nervous anxiety. He knows there is something wrong here, something Andromeda is not at all happy with. And, for some reason, it involves him.

He just doesn't know what it is.

'Look, I know he's your cousin...'

'He's not just my cousin, Ted! He's my Intended!'

'Whatever. I still don't get why you want to stick to these things, if you hate your family so much... anyway. I know you're attached to him, but... you've got to tell him, and soon. Like you said, it's not fair to him. It's not fair you're lying to him.'

Sirius feels his stomach twist. There is obviously something big happening, something that Andromeda has not been telling him about. The mere thought that she has been hiding something from him becomes a seed of doubt, of anger, but he refuses to pay it heed. Instead, he consoles himself that he has misheard them, that perhaps they are talking about something small, trivial, something that she doesn't want to share with him because it he might not understand... yes, it must be something like that...

Andromeda and Ted walk ahead, but this time Sirius stays behind. He doesn't want to hear any more. He would rather imagine that he is mistaken, that the excitement of this night's adventures has affected him. He would easier believe that some stray dust on the wind masked their voices and made him think that they were talking about him than admit that maybe there is something going on, something he should know about.

You're just being paranoid, he thinks, and walks back to the statue. With each step, he pushes away all that he has just heard.

But in his heart, he knows that these are all lies, the same lies he has told himself every time he hears the name 'Black'. They all hide things from him, yes, even Andromeda... they all think him to be unworthy of knowing what they know, of being one of them.

*