Another Prisoner, Another Professor

"She followed me out of the infirmary and volunteered," Black said when Pansy had gone. "I wouldn't want you to think that I took advantage of this situation to talk her into it."

"She volunteered?" Harry asked incredulously. "How'd she know that Swift was - "

"I have absolutely no idea," Black replied. He pressed his lips together and frowned slightly. "The Malfoys must've got wind of it somehow - I was going to ask her but then she started crying again and we ended up in here." Suddenly, he started laughing. "If the three of you can get Pansy to tell you why she's turned on Draco, trust me, you'll be very entertained. Don't bother her about it now, though, she's still upset about - " His voice slowed as the laughter left his face. "The Valentines."

There was a silence. "Professor - " Hermione began.

Black held up his hand. "I don't want any of you to say another word until I'm finished," he said. "I don't know if any of you had anything to do with it, but I'm a teacher, and if I find out anything about who really made those cards, I can't keep it to myself and maintain a clear conscience. Right now I've got a few theories as to who did it and no way to prove any of them. Whoever did it, it was a very stupid idea." A flush of color rose in Hermione's cheeks, but Black continued without a pause. "However, it's done now. If Pansy finds out who made the cards and that person is connected to this matter in the slightest, I think the odds are good that she'll change her mind about testifying. That person - or those people - are also going to end up severely punished, though they might avoid being expelled."

As quickly as it had appeared, the color drained from Hermione's face. Even though she'd loosened her standards about breaking rules, Harry was sure Hermione would still rather die than be expelled from Hogwarts.

"Great," said Ron, his hand going straight for the doorknob. "We've got to go or else we'll miss curfew. Come on, Hermione."

Harry followed behind the two of them, not daring to look back. "You're not getting expelled over this," Ron said to Hermione as they reached the stairs. "If you go confessing to Black or anyone else, I'll tell them I did it instead."

"And if Ron confesses, I'll confess," said Harry. The thought of Hermione being expelled was bad enough, but the thought of her being expelled for trying to help Buckbeak was worse. "They'll have to figure out which one of us is lying - "

"And then they might expel us all," Ron finished. "We'll have to go live in Hagrid's hut and be assistant gamekeepers."

"Don't be silly," was all that Hermione said.

Over the next few days, the question of who had written "the Slytherin Valentines" turned into something of a running joke in Gryffindor. "Bet it was McGonagall," said Lee, balancing his tarantula on top of his dreadlocks. Ginny was staring at him in horrified fascination. "Part of her secret plan to help us win the Quidditch Cup."

"You're mad," said Fred, watching as the enormous spider tapped Lee's forehead with one hairy leg. "It's Cedric Diggory. His secret dark side's triumphed at last." He leaned back in his chair and called out, "Oy, Ronniekins! Come see what Lee's tarantula is doing!"

"Do me a favor and hex his eyebrows off," Ron muttered to Harry. They were one table away from Lee and the twins and Ron was looking resolutely in the other direction, sorting through his Chocolate Frog cards. "Hex them off and then reattach them so they're coming out his nose."

"Well, I don't think it was Astrophil," Lavender said. She was sitting across from them, reading the mysterious letter for what Harry thought must be about the dozenth time; Crookshanks, ever-protective of his favorite piece of paper, was sitting on the table with his paw over it's not often. "This letter is old, Hermione."

"What?" Hermione asked, setting down her Ancient Runes book and peering over Lavender's shoulder. "How do you know?"

"Because it smells like mothballs," Lavender said matter-of-factly. "Plus, look, it's starting to yellow at one edge. Where did Crookshanks get this?"

"I'm not sure - he didn't have it on the train to school and then he had it in the Entrance Hall that same day - "

"So it could be from anybody's pocket," Lavender said. "Can he open trunks?"

"I don't think so..." Crookshanks rolled onto his back, his head covering a whole corner of the letter. "I wish you could talk," said Hermione, scratching him behind the ears. Crookshanks began to purr loudly.

"Maybe he wrote it," said Ron, stacking his five Cliodna cards on top of Circe. "Maybe he's an Animagus and years ago he gave it to McGonagall, only she told him it was over and - "

"Be quite a minute," Hermione said suddenly. "Crookshanks..." The bottlebrush tail thumped against the table. "Ron, could you say it again?"

Ron blinked. "What?"

"The bit about Crookshanks and McGonagall, say it again."

"Okay," said Ron, giving Crookshanks a wary look. "Maybe he wrote it and he's an Animagus - "

It was undeniable. At the word "Animagus," Crookshanks's ears had perked up.

"Let me try it," Harry said. He folded his arms on the table and rested his chin on his hands. "We were reading in Transfiguration about a wizard who was an Animagus - " The ears twitched again.

Lavender's voice was hushed. "Does he understand English?"

"I - I'm not sure," Hermione replied. "Crookshanks, if you understand what I'm saying, jump off the table - "

The huge ginger cat thumped his tail again. "Jump off the table and go find the Animagus - "

Crookshanks didn't jump off the table, but his ears perked up once more.

"Big deal," said Ron, rolling his eyes. "So someone taught it to him. One time George trained Errol to fly in circles anytime anyone said the word 'cummerbund.'"

"Maybe," said Hermione, but Harry thought she didn't quite sound convinced.

Harry's anti-dementor lessons weren't going nearly as well as he would have liked. Even though he'd produced a fairly good Patronus at the Quidditch match, the most he could manage now were large clouds of silver fog. "You've got too many other things on your mind," Black said, picking up the tiny, defeated boggart-Lupin and throwing him into the box. "I think that's only to be expected."

"Yeah," Harry said, watching as Black buckled a leather strap over the box. The boggart inside rattled and lurched. "There's a murderer after me, Buckbeak might end up executed, I've got to beat Malfoy to the Snitch in another few weeks..." Still, he was disappointed with himself. If he knew how much the dementors affected him and he was determined to learn how to fight them, why couldn't he force everything else out of his mind when he needed to?

"You forgot about school," Black said, smiling.

"Oh, yeah, school...and this summer. How many empty bedrooms did you say there were? Six?"

"Yes, six. I wrote to Kreacher last week to say that you were coming home with me in June - "

"And he's not happy," Harry finished, sitting down in one of the armchairs.

"He sent me a dead fish in response."

"What does he do all day in that house, anyway?" Harry asked. "You said the house is a wreck and no one's cleaned the empty bedrooms in years - "

"I said the house is on the verge of being a wreck."

"Oh, sorry, the verge of being a wreck - "

Black grinned, reached over, and ruffled Harry's hair. "Yes, the verge - very important difference." He stepped back and sat in the other chair. "I'm not really sure what Kreacher does all day. He spends a lot of time talking with my mother's portrait, I know that."

"Does it talk back like the ones here?"

"Unfortunately. I can manage to keep her quiet if I pull a curtain over it, but - "

At that moment, there was a loud knock at the door; Harry jumped. "Let me in, Sirius, for God's sake," said someone outside. It was a strange sort of voice, either low for a woman or high for a man. Black, however, seemed to recognize it, and got up to open the door.

A plump, ruddy-faced wizard in a spring-green cloak rushed in. He had ornate silver buckles on his boots and strawberry blond hair that contributed to the impression that his head was entirely pink. Before he had time to say another word, Harry had guessed who he was.

"You're - "

"Later," said the wizard, reaching into the pocket of his cloak. "You have to hear what's in this book, Sirius."

"This is Brutus Swift," Black said to Harry. "Brutus, this is - "

"Obviously," replied Brutus Swift, thrusting an old, musty-smelling volume towards Black. "This, less obviously, is called The Fair Art of Blood Magick. I got a letter about it yesterday from your Miss Granger." Just as Black was about to take the book, Swift snatched it away from him and opened it. "It has instructions towards the back for how to perform blood magic - "

"It can't," Black said at once. He looked stunned.

"Of course it can. Be quiet and listen to me.

"'Recipe for Protection,'" Swift read aloud. "'At a dawn near summer's end, take thou a virgin egg from its mother phoenix's nest. When one and twenty hours hath passed, crack open thy egg and vanish wholly its yolk. Combine then with this lingering white the red of thy own veins. On the night the moon is black, expose thy potion to the stars' light, for then it shall verily take on its power. When thou hast done all that is writ, spill thy potion to protect. If the object be away, write his name as it thou say. If thy object be nearby, the potion on his threshold lie.'"

Black exhaled slowly. "Brutus, I used to teach Potions back in Berlin and I only understood about half of what you just said. Slow down, would you?"

"Here, read it yourself if you can't keep up!" Swift rolled his eyes and thrust the book at Black again. He must be a very good lawyer, Harry decided, because Black obviously wasn't hiring him for his social graces.

Black read the passage again while Swift waited. "What does it mean?" Harry asked after about a minute had passed.

"It's a recipe for a protective potion," Black said, looking up. "Early in the morning near the end of summer, you take a virgin egg - an unfertilized egg - from a phoenix's nest and then crack it open twenty-one hours later. After you've got rid of the yolk you mix the white of the egg with your own blood."

"Then you expose the whole thing to starlight on a night where there's no moon," said Swift, who seemed to think that Black wasn't explaining it quickly enough. "If you're away from whoever you're protecting, you say his name as you write it with the potion. If he's close by, you spill it outside his door." He stopped, looked at Black, and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"If you're trying to tell me something, just say it, Brutus," said Black. He closed his eyes and pinched the top of the bridge of his nose.

Swift looked extremely vexed. "It's so obvious - "

"It's not obvious to me, Brutus, so do me a favor and - "

"Fine, then," Swift retorted. "Your Remus is trying to protect Harry."

Black's eyelids flew open. Harry didn't move; it was as though his entire body had frozen, except for his heart, which was beating rapidly. Lupin was - Lupin couldn't be -

"Do you have any idea what you're saying?" Black asked Swift. His voice was dangerously soft. "Remus betrayed James and Lily to Voldemort. He killed thirteen people with a single curse. Why on earth would he - "

"You're asking yourself the wrong question," Swift said calmly. The irritation seemed to have left him. "Protecting Harry goes with nearly everything you know about Remus Lupin - it's the betrayal and murders that are incongruous. What if he was under the Imperius Curse?"

"I don't let myself think things like that."

Swift looked at Black as though Black had lost his mind. "You don't let yourself think things like that? He was your - "

"I don't let myself think things like that," Black repeated, "because he's hurt me enough. I'm not going to let myself believe something I know isn't true - "

"Don't give me that. You're not going to consider something because you're afraid it isn't true, but what if it is true? Don't you think you owe yourself - "

Something in Black's face changed. The first time he had seen him, Harry had thought that Black looked like a marble statute; now the marble had cracked. Something had broken. As Harry watched with shock, Black leaned over, buried his face in his hands, and started sobbing.