Unclean Things

Ginny crept down the short flight of steps that led into the dark kitchen of number twelve, Grimmauld Place, doing her best to make as little noise as possible. The task turned out to be quite a bit more difficult for her than it normally would be, owing to the extreme fuzzy feeling stealing over her entire body. Her skin felt extra sensitive suddenly, as if she could feel even the tiniest particles of air brushing against her bare legs. She reached the last stair and stepped into the room with a small sigh of relief. She hadn't expected anyone to be awake at this late hour to witness her sneaking in, but it never hurt to be careful. Relaxing a bit and letting the tension drain from her shoulders, she started across the room to the pantry, shuffling a bit to muffle the sound of her boots against the rough stone floor. The room was pitch black, but Ginny was convinced that she could see anyway. To her, everything seemed almost technicolor, and she could swear that large, bright flowers of green and blue were blooming riotously out of the floor, guiding her path to the pantry door.

As she passed the long oak table in the center of the room, the flame of a single candle flared to life, making Ginny jump and cover her mouth with her hands in surprise. She had almost shrieked, and could only thank Merlin she hadn't--the whole house would've come running. She exhaled loudly in relief as her eyes registered the face illuminated by the wavering flame of the candle--Sirius.

"For Merlin's sake, Sirius!" Ginny whispered, taking the last few steps to the pantry and yanking open the door. "Why'd you have to go and scare me like that?" She was whispering, but even so Ginny could hear the slur in her voice. Probably from all the alcohol, she thought to herself with amusement.

Sirius regarded her with dark, unfathomable eyes and a small frown. "It's late," he told her, his eyes tracking her progress as she pulled a Butterbeer and a jar of peanut butter out of the pantry. "What are you doing up?"

Ginny sat down across from him and unscrewed the jar with a look of great concentration and anticipation. Sirius, she thought to herself, reminded her of some sort of big cat, all sleek black hair and elegant mannerisms. If she stared hard enough at him, she found, whiskers grew out of his face in a rather adorable manner. She blinked and looked down at the jar in her hand. "Getting a snack," she said, as if the answer was quite obvious. She plunged a spoon into the jar and began eating its contents with an inordinate amount of pleasure. She loved peanut butter, she thought contentedly to herself. Loved it.

Sirius raised one thin, delicately arched eyebrow, looking Ginny up and down with a slight smirk. "You're quite dressed up for a little trip to the kitchen for a snack," he remarked.

Ginny flushed and looked down at herself. When she'd left number twelve she'd been wearing an old pair of jeans and a t-shirt, but sometime in between then and now she must have changed. Her head felt cloudy and dizzy; her eyes were so blurry that her vision swam in and out of focus. She concentrated as hard as she could and managed to make out what she was wearing: a rather tight, artfully ripped black shirt made of some sort of shimmery, sheer material that made Ginny feel even fuzzier than before. She closed her eyes to block out the shimmering and immediately felt better. She opened her eyes and attempted to focus on Sirius, who was staring at her expectantly. It took her a moment to remember why. "Oh!" she said. "Er, well I..." She didn't know what to say. The dizziness was returning, making her feel pleasantly as if it didn't matter what she said, really. In fact, she thought giddily as she spooned more peanut butter into her mouth, she could sit here all night and just stare at the man sitting across from her, quite happily. "Sirius," she told him gravely, with a small sigh, "you're quite pretty, you know."

Both of Sirius's eyebrows shot up at this statement. Ginny giggled at his shocked expression--she felt too good to care if she was saying things she normally wouldn't dare say. "Have you been drinking?" Sirius asked, seeming bored by the whole affair, and Ginny could tell that he wasn't surprised at all. Ginny frowned at him. He should be shocked! He should be horrified! He shouldn't have been waiting for her in the dark, almost as if he expected this to happen...

"Among other things," Ginny answered finally. "You know how those Slytherins are when they get together. They may be rich, spoiled little brats, but they always have the best of everything." Ginny stood suddenly and hopped up on the table, swinging her legs around so that she faced him, one leg on either side of him. She saw now that she seemed to be wearing some sort of skirt, which was strange, because Ginny absolutely hated wearing skirts. These definitely weren't her clothes. She smiled brilliantly down at Sirius--he was certainly shocked now.

He scooted his chair back from the table a few inches, putting distance between them. "What did they give you?" Sirius demanded. Ginny thought his eyes looked a bit funny, almost as if he were angry at someone. Not her, she hoped.

Ginny shrugged casually. "Some sort of Muggle thing--a pill? Small and white. I feel absolutely fantastic!" she declared. With a smooth graceful movement that surprised them both, Ginny slid off the table and into Sirius's lap, straddling him. He was really shocked now, and could only stare up at her with wide eyes, his mouth hanging open a bit. "Absolutely fantastic," she murmured. Then she obeyed the tiny voice whispering in her brain and leaned down, pressing her lips firmly against his with a little moan of longing.

She got only a brief taste of him--peppermint and the faintest traces of Ogden's Old Firewhiskey--before he pushed her away, sending her sprawling onto the floor. She giggled and laid back, loving the feel of the cold stone against her legs and back, which, she only just realized, was almost completely bare. Whoever's clothes she was wearing definitely had some interesting if rather slutty taste. She turned her head to rest her cheek against that lovely coolness and sighed happily, letting her eyelids flutter shut.

Distantly, she head Sirius sigh from above her. "Ginny," his voice sounded far, far away, easily ignored. She rubbed her cheek against the floor and smiled blissfully. "Ginny," his voice was closer now, louder and harsher in her ears. "Get up." Ginny frowned and clenched her eyes shut.

"Go 'way," she told him petulantly. "I like it here."

"You won't when your mum finds you in the morning."

"Good point," Ginny said. Then, "I don't think I can move. The flowers are all over me. They'll die."

Sirius sighed again and she heard the rustle of his robes as he bent over her. Cool, dry hands slid under her back and knees, followed by a dizzying feeling of being shifted--Sirius had picked her up. Ginny pressed her face into the smooth, cool skin of his neck and smiled contentedly, trying to ignore the strange swirling sensation in her head as Sirius began walking. She opened her eyes and wrapped her arms around his neck, allowing her fingers to tangle themselves in the long, silky strands of his hair. She pressed her lips to the base of his throat. He stiffened and shifted her in his arms, but didn't reprimand her. They were in the front hall now, and Ginny knew he couldn't make any noise here, for fear of waking the horrible old portrait of his mother, so she kissed his neck again, softly, then gave into that tiny voice once more and began to suck at the spot of wonderfully smooth skin there. He began to climb the stairs and Ginny decided that this small bit of contact was not enough--she had the sudden need to mark him, force him to remember her. That's when she bit him, not too hard, but just enough to elicit a low growl in the back of his throat. Ginny pulled away from him with a giggle before turning back to his neck, with which she was fast becoming obsessed.

All too soon Sirius was depositing her in her bed on the third floor. She grinned up at him. Even in the darkness she could see the red-purple welt she'd made on the delicate flesh of his throat. Standing above her, bathed in moonlight and shadows, he really was quite beautiful. Until tonight and that lovely, magical little pill, Ginny had never really thought about Sirius as anything more than Harry's godfather, and before that as a crazed mass murderer. But now, she thought that she might just be in love with him.

"Don't leave," she pleaded, licking her lips slowly as she stared at him. "I love you," she declared.

Sirius smirked. "You'll be sorry you said that in the morning. If you even remember it." After a moment in which his brow furrowed with concern and he looked extremely thoughtful, he sat down gingerly at the end of the bed. Ginny sulked; he was much too far away. "Ginny, where did you go tonight?"

Ginny crawled across the bed and laid her head in his lap, sighing contentedly. He tensed, and she could sense he wanted to get as far away from her as possible, but he must have wanted to her hear her answer even more, because he didn't move. "Oh you know," she said sleepily. "Draco Malfoy's parents are staying at their Manor in Wiltshire and he's got the London townhouse to himself for an entire month."

"So it was some sort of party?" Sirius asked. "Why are you hanging about with a Malfoy?"

"Oh it's nothing to do with him, really," Ginny said, snuggling deeper into Sirius's lap. "He just throws the parties. Blaise says it's a riot to take me, because I'm Gryffindor. It's like a, whaddayacallit..."

"Novelty?" Sirius asked.

"Right, one of those. Blaise is the best," she told him. "My bestest friend ever."

"Did she give you those clothes?" Sirius asked.

"Dunno. Musta. They're not mine, thass fer sure. Can you 'magine Mum's face if she saw me in thisss?"

Sirius sighed again and tried to shift out from under her, clearly intending to leave. "Wait," Ginny said, sitting up quickly and grasping his shoulders. Even with both of them sitting, he was still quite a bit taller than her. She looked up at him shyly through her eyelashes. "I'll be a good girl and let you go if you give me a kiss."

"Ginny," Sirius said impatiently, "you're drunk. And high! I'm not about to take advantage of your current state like that. This isn't something you'd want if you were sober. And," he concluded triumphantly, "I'm much too old for you."

"I'm fourteen!" she said indignantly. "A hundred years ago, I'd be married with a couple kids by now. And, my husband would probably be a lot older than you!"

"But it's not a hundred years ago, it's now," Sirius said, but he didn't move. "I'm not some dirty old man who takes advantage of innocent young girls."

"You're not old," Ginny protested. "And I'm hardly innocent. Plus, you've been drinking too. I can smell it. Blame it on that, if you like." She smiled at him hopefully.

A strange, closed look came into his eyes then, an almost calculating sort of look. "If I kiss you," he said, "will you make me a promise?"

"Anything," Ginny said eagerly.

"Promise you won't go to any more of these parties."

"I promise," she said immediately, and they both knew she was lying. "Now kiss me."

He did. Maybe it was the effects of the pill she'd taken, or the alcohol, but Ginny thought she would die with the pleasure of it. The whole world seemed to zoom down to only his lips on hers, his strong arms wrapping around her delicate frame, pulling her close. She parted her lips and his warm tongue was suddenly between them, licking at their fullness before plunging into the recesses of her mouth with strong, insistent thrusts. He kissed her with the sort of desperation and need that Ginny had never felt before--the sort of need that came from being without such intimate contact for years upon years. Ginny heard herself moaning deep in the back of her throat. Her whole body felt itchy and needy, and she pressed as close to him as possible, loving the feel of his hands sweeping up and down her bare back, fitting her against him tightly. Finally, with a reluctant little moan that drove her wild, he pulled away from her and stood in one fluid, graceful motion.

"Now, go to sleep," he commanded her, before turning and striding quickly from the room. With a contented smile Ginny fell back upon her pillows and drifted off into darkness.

"Ginny! Gin-nyyyy!" The shrill sound of her mother's voice screaming her name up the stair woke her with a start the next morning. Ginny groaned and rolled onto her stomach, burying her face into her pillow and willing the voice to stop. Two floors below she could her the distant sound of voices.

"What is wrong with that girl?" her mother asked. "I told her we were planning to clean the upstairs bedroom today! Well, I'd better go wake her."

"Let me," a deeper voice said. "I have to go up and feed Buckbeak anyway. I can bang on her door as I pass."

"You don't mind, Sirius?" her mother said. "Only, I've got to fix breakfast. The boys'll be down soon."

"Not at all," came Sirius's reply. A few moments later Ginny heard the sound of footsteps outside her bedroom door, then a hesitant knock. She tried to ignore it in vain.

"Ginny?" Sirius said from the hall. "Are you awake?"

"I think I've died," Ginny groaned, her voice hoarse and raspy. Her head felt huge, as if it was filled with water and about to burst. The vein in her right temple began to pound painfully. She moaned and pressed her face deeper into the coolness of her pillow.

She heard the sound of the door opening and closing, then the soft pad of footsteps approaching her bed. "Are you all right?" Sirius whispered.

Ginny rolled onto her back and glared at him resentfully. "No, I'm not all right. What are you doing in my room? This is my private space."

He raised one eyebrow and stared at her pointedly. Suddenly a strange image of her demanding that Sirius kiss her flitted into her mind. The whole incident came rushing back, making her head ache and pound even more than it had before. She covered her face with her hands and moaned in embarrassment. Had she really thrown herself at him like that? She'd made a complete fool of herself! "Oh, dear lord," she said.

Sirius cleared his throat. "Er, right. Well, you might want to change your clothes before your mum comes running up here. And here, I've brought you something to help with the headache."

Ginny removed her hands from her eyes and sat up, then had to clutch at his arm for support as a wave of dizziness crashed over her. She glanced at him miserably from beneath her lashes, but to her chagrin he seemed almost amused by her plight. He held out a glass of some brown, vile-looking liquid to her. "Go on, take it," he said. "I haven't poisoned it."

Ginny took the glass and took a small sip of its contents, which she immediately regretted. "Are you trying to kill me?" she asked, rubbing at her tongue in disgust. The liquid was the most disgusting thing she'd ever had in her mouth.

"Just drink it," Sirius told her, backing away from the bed and turning to leave. He shut the door behind him.

Screwing up her courage, Ginny downed the liquid in one go, chugging until the glass was empty. Immediately a warm, soothing feeling rushed through her body and up into her head. The pounding vein gentled, and her head felt almost normal again. With a sigh she swung her legs over the side of her bed and prepared to change her clothes. It was then that she noticed what she was wearing. She wrinkled her nose. It had obviously been Blaise's idea--the girl was always forcing Ginny to wear her clothes to these parties she insisted on going to. Ginny didn't mind, really. She liked Blaise, and her friendship meant more than anything else in the world to her. She'd never had a real friend before, and if it meant that sometimes she had to wear strange clothes and hang around with Slytherins, then she was more than willing to do it. Just as long as the Slytherins could keep their mouths shut, she thought as she tugged off Blaise's boots and changed into an old set of faded robes. The last thing she needed was for Draco Malfoy to go blabbing to Ron or someone about what Ginny did in her free time.

Even now, Ginny wasn't really sure how it had all happened. She thought maybe it had started nearly a year ago, on the train ride to school last September. Ron--annoying git that he was--had told her to go away so he and Harry and Hermione could discuss important things that she was too young to understand. She had stormed off to find another compartment, and ended up being hailed by Warren Claymore, a Ravenclaw third year from her Herbology class. Ginny had sat with him happily, and that's how she'd met Blaise. Blaise's friend Amanda, a third year Slytherin from Ginny's Potions class, apparently had a huge crush on Warren. Blaise and Ginny had ended up talking for most of the train ride, and by the end had become fast friends.

Over the course of that year they'd become close, until finally, near the end of the summer term, Blaise had invited Ginny to the Slytherin's annual end of the year party in their common room. Ginny remembered that night with vivid clarity. She had been one of only four students from other houses invited to the party, and the only Gryffindor there. That had been her first real experience with alcohol. She'd gotten extremely drunk and played spin the bottle with rest, with the result that she'd now kissed over half of Slytherin house. Thankfully, she thought with a grin as she made her way down to the kitchen, the Slytherins never let Crabbe or Goyle play their little drinking games.

Now, it seemed, Blaise had finally accepted her fully as her friend, and for the first time in her whole life, Ginny had something that she didn't have to share with her brothers, and that they couldn't take from her. She had a friend, a real friend, who liked her and wanted to spend time with her and told her everything, even the most secret of secrets. Blaise had confided only the night before that she was in love with Theodore Nott and planned to seduce him before the summer's end. Personally Ginny thought her friend could do better. Draco Malfoy wasn't too bad, when he forgot to sneer, and he always had the best little pills...

Ginny frowned to herself, remembering the pill she'd taken at the party the night before. Much of the party was a blur to her. There had been dancing, and games--she clearly remembered spending "seven minutes in heaven" with someone who tried very hard to get her out of her top--but nothing beyond that. The pill had been nice, despite her headache this morning. She remembered flowers everywhere, great big, blue and green flowers. With a small smile she hurried down the short flight of steps and entered the kitchen.

"Oh good, you're awake," her mother said cheerfully, levitating a plate of bacon and eggs onto the table in front of her. "We need to get that upstairs bedroom cleaned out for the twins. And Hermione will be coming today, so she can help."

Ginny froze, a piece of bacon half way up to her mouth. "Hermione's coming?" she asked. "Er, why? I mean, doesn't she want to spend time with her parents?" Ginny cursed to herself. How was she supposed to keep sneaking out if Hermione was there? Because surely, Hermione would be sharing her bedroom...

"Well of course she does!" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed. "But Dumbledore seems to think she'll be safer here, so her parents have agreed to let her come."

"Right," Ginny said miserably. Hermione would ruin everything. She was too smart for her own good, that girl. She'd know if Ginny sneaked out, and she'd somehow figure out where Ginny was going, and then there'd be lectures and threats of telling her mother... Ginny dropped the piece of uneaten bacon onto her plate, her appetite suddenly gone. She needed to think of something, some way to get past Hermione. Blaise would be livid if Ginny didn't show up to the parties...

For the rest of the day Ginny thought long and hard, trying to concoct some sort of plan that would throw Hermione off. In the end it was Hermione herself who inspired what Ginny would later think was her most devious plan yet. The older girl arrived just before dinner, and she and Ron managed to get into several rows before the meal had even ended. Ginny caught Sirius glaring down the table at them a few times, and delighted in winking at him or running her tongue along her bottom lip, which never failed to make the man turn a fetching shade of pink. Ginny was over her own embarrassment now. After all, she had been drunk and high on whatever it was Draco had given her at that party, and thus wholly unresponsible for her actions toward Sirius. He, on the other hand, was clearly a cradle-robbing, dirty old man who was begging to be exploited.

Hermione left the dinner table angry, saying that she was exhausted from her trip, and wouldn't Ginny like to come help her unpack. Ginny opened her mouth to say NO (hell no!) but, seeing the look on Hermione's face, as if the girl were somewhere between crying and throwing something across the room, Ginny stood obediently and followed her up to the room they shared, sending wistful glances back at her uneaten portion of cake.

"That boy!" Hermione exclaimed the moment they reached the sanctuary of the bedroom. Ginny flopped down on her bed and waited for the inevitable rush of scathing words from Hermione. "He never thinks, does he? Wanting to owl Harry when Dumbledore expressly told us--" She broke off quickly, sending a guilty look toward Ginny. "Sorry," she mumbled, seeming to calm down a bit, "I forgot. I'm not supposed to say anything about it to you."

Ginny repressed the urge to kick something and settled for smiling blandly instead. This was exactly why she needed Blaise, needed to keep going to Draco's and having fun: because no one there ever told her she was too young, or wasn't allowed to know. "Its all right," Ginny said. "I'm quite used to it by now."

"Its not my idea to keep you in the dark," Hermione said quickly, having forgotten her anger at Ron in the wake of this new crisis. "Anyway," she continued, searching around for a new subject, "How're things going with the Harry situation?"

Ginny groaned and rolled over onto her back. Last year she'd made the mistake of telling Hermione about her not-so-secret crush on Harry, and ever since then Hermione's favorite topic of conversation tended to be quizzing Ginny on her "progress." Ginny hadn't had the heart to tell the other girl that she had long ago given up on Harry. Hermione always seemed to get such a big kick out of it, probably because it reminded her of her own situation with Ron. But the excited, eager look on Hermione's face was sparking an idea in Ginny's head...

Ginny rolled back onto her stomach and smiled shyly at the older girl. "Er, well..." she began. She bit her lip in what she hoped looked like nervous excitement. "I didn't want to say anything at school, because I didn't know if anything would happen, but Hermione..."

"Yes, what is it?! Is it something to do with Harry? Did he finally--"

Ginny cut her off with a laugh. "Oh its not Harry. I've given up on him. He's completely oblivious, you know. I was just making a fool of myself. No, remember that Ravenclaw boy I danced with at the Yule Ball?"

"Michael Corner?" Hermione asked, breathless. Ginny felt a brief spurt of pity for the other girl. She really needed to get some friends who weren't boys. She was desperate to gossip.

"Yes, him," Ginny, who hadn't remembered his name at all, smiled a bit in relief as she spun a lie off the top of her head. "Well, he asked me to Hogsmeade, you know? And so we went, and it was just a couple Butterbeers at the Three Broomsticks, and really I wasn't sure he liked me at all. I mean, he's in Ravenclaw, and they're so scholarly in that house, and I was so worried he'd want to talk about Arithmantical Theory or something."

"Oh, I just love Arithmantical Theory!" Hermione enthused.

Ginny sent her an exasperated look. "Hermione! The point is, we got on really well, you know? And then on the train home, well." She lowered her voice to a whisper. "He kissed me."

"Honestly?" Hermione gasped. "Oh Ginny, that's just marvelous! Is he your boyfriend now? Did you give him permission to owl you over the summer?"

Ginny hadn't thought that far ahead when she decided to make up a boyfriend as an excuse to sneak out. But Hermione seemed quite capable of filling in all the details on her own, so she decided to just play along. "Well, of course I did. But you know how Dumbledore doesn't want too many owls swooping around the square. So its been rather difficult. I'm afraid..." Ginny attempted her best "about to cry" face, the one she'd always used to get out of trouble for doing something horrendous to her brothers when she was a kid. "Oh Hermione! I'm afraid he'll break up with me if I don't write him. He'll think I don't like him anymore. And he wants me to meet up with him--he lives in London, you know--only I'm afraid of sneaking out..."

A hard look came into Hermione's eyes, and for a moment Ginny was afraid she'd been found out. Hermione loved rules. She lived for rules. She probably wished that there were more rules, and then rules for creating new rules. She'd never approve of Ginny doing anything so illicit as sneaking out to meet her nonexistent boyfriend.

But Hermione surprised her. "Well, don't be!" she said with a tinge of anger in her voice. "Honestly Ginny, if anyone deserves to be happy and have a boyfriend and be normal, its you. You're not in any danger anyway--its Harry they want. And there's no reason why you should have to be trapped inside this weird old house because of that!"

"Oh Hermione!" Ginny said, smiling happily at the other girl. "Will you really help me?"

"Of course I will!" Hermione promised. "Now when are you supposed to meet him?"

Now that Ginny had a back up story, she realized she needed someone to fill the role of Michael Corner, who would surely be sending Ginny loads of owls if he were really her boyfriend. To this end she snuck up on Sirius in the third floor bedroom the next day, where he was feeding Buckbeak.

Sirius had been avoiding her ever since the morning after she'd snuck in. Once she'd lost her embarrassment, she delighted in teasing him over the incident, and had begun to wonder if she didn't sort of want a repeat. Sirius was a good kisser, she thought, even if she had been drunk. And he was sort of good looking if you liked the dark, brooding, surly type. Ginny found that more and more, she did.

Sirius jumped when he heard the door click shut and swung around to face her, his wand held high. "Bit paranoid in your old age, eh?" Ginny asked, leaning against the door and effectively blocking his hopes of escape.

He lowered his wand slowly, his eyes shifting nervously from right to left. "What are you doing here, Ginny?"

"Oh stop fluttering about like a nervous old maid," she said crossly. "I'm not going to jump you or anything. Although judging from the other night, you could really use a bit of sex. Awfully desperate, if you catch my drift."

He shifted nervously, his dark hair swinging forward to hide his face from view. Ginny sighed impatiently. He was obviously preparing for a nice sulk. "You shouldn't be here," he said.

"I need a favor." While Ginny liked baiting him, and he did look awfully cute when his cheeks flushed pink with embarrassment, patience had never been one of her virtues.

His head snapped up at her pronouncement and he stared at her uneasily. "I'm not going to kiss you again," he said firmly. Ginny smirked. She knew if she wanted him to kiss her, he'd be doing it again.

"Well that's a relief. I'm not sure I can take much more old man drool." She rolled her eyes. "I've got a problem. Hermione. I can't go on my, er, late night excursions with her sleeping in the same room as me, now can I?"

"What do you want me to do about it?" Sirius asked. "And anyway, you promised me--"

"I lied," Ginny admitted, unashamed. "I've made up a boyfriend and used him as an excuse to sneak out. She thinks it's romantic and anyway, she's so desperate for a bit of snogging, even if she has to get it vicariously through me, that she'd believe anything I had to say as long as it involved a proper, nice boy. I made him a Ravenclaw," she explained.

"So let me guess," Sirius said, his eyes regaining a bit of sparkle. "You want me to pretend to be this boyfriend? Send you owls and things?"

"Exactly." Ginny beamed at him. Really, she thought it would be harder than this.

"Only there's the small problem that I won't do it," Sirius said triumphantly. "I'm not going to help you go sneaking off to parties thrown by baby Death Eaters. You don't even know what you took at the last one! Your mum would murder me if she knew I was keeping this secret."

Ginny laughed. "Oh Sirius! You're such a riot. You think you actually have a choice? Maybe Mum would murder you if she knew that you hadn't squealed on me, but believe me, she and my six older brothers would no doubt castrate you if they found out about our little... transgression." She smiled thinly. "And you know I could get out of it so easily. I'm traumatized, remember? Or maybe you don't know about that little incident. But regardless, who d'you think Mum will believe? Her precious, innocent, horribly molested little girl, or a man who spent twelve years in Azkaban and left poor Harry to be brought up by Muggles who hate him?"

"You're evil," Sirius said, sounding both appalled and impressed at the same time. "Brilliant, but evil."

She smiled brightly at him. "Hogwash. I just know how to get my way."