Fidelius Week

Fidelius Week

by Weaver

Part Four of Seven

Starring Miserable!Findabhair, Enchanted!Sirius, Tortured!Peter and Busy!Potters
In which the Potters prepare to move away, Voldemort discovers just who is the Secret-Keeper, Peter is captured and tortured, and Sirius breaks free from Fin's spell just a little too late.

SATURDAY: REDEMPTION TOO LATE

In a ruined manor house somewhere in Gwynedd, Fin sat on what had once been the pedestal of a statue and cried. Seeing Sirius again had brought so much back to her -- the happiness of her days at Hogwarts, the joys of having trustworthy friends -- and running through the rush of love and happiness, a twisted thread of bitterness and betrayal. She could not be whole again, not until the world was whole. The Dark Lord had offered her peace, and protection, and challenges to suit her mind - and she'd never seen the darkness hidden behind it until now. Oh, surely she'd known before -- but seeing the only man she'd ever loved fighting desperately against it brought the reality of it all home. She dashed the tears away as fast as they came, but there always seemed to be more. Alone under the sky, in the shattered ruins that had once been a home, she cried for a long time.

"What have you learned, Finthavir?" A shadow against the broken walls moved, and became Danielle Wilgarr. The vampire came across to stand before Fin, her long hair catching the moonlight and gleaming blackly. Fin glanced up miserably.

"Enough."

"Did he reveal the Thecret to you?" Danielle's lisp was hardly noticeable any more; when she had been younger, less used to her fangs, she had been almost incapable of pronouncing the letter 's'. Now she only slightly twisted Fin's name, usually. Her lapse tonight was the only thing that revealed her nervousness: every inch of the tall dark woman was regal and dignified. Fin caught her mind wandering and brought herself firmly back on-topic.

"He's not the Secret-Keeper," she said unhappily. "It's Peter. I needn't have even gone! Oh, Dan, you can't imagine how bad it was..."

A slight softening of the vampire's harsh stare was the only change in her expression. "The Dark Lord will be here shortly. Would - would you like me to giff your report for you?"

"Oh, would you?" Fin could hear the relief in her own voice, only just then realising how much she'd been dreading making that report. "I really don't want to stay... I just want to go home and be miserable alone." She sniffed. "I miss him so much, Dan! Seeing him just ... brought back so much... I hated to do that to him. I hate myself."

"You had to, Fin," Danielle said, sitting on the plinth beside her. "You had to do it. Don't feel bad about your dutieth, Finthavir, there is no other way. Tell me what you have to report?"

Fin sighed, sniffed a few more times, and dried up her tears. "There's a Resistance group in Belfast, apparently, and Remus Lupin is working with them. And another in Birmingham. And Peter Pettigrew's Keeping the Potters' Secret. That's it."

Danielle nodded, deep in thought. "Well, we can shut those down easily enough. I think the Dark Lord haz planned to gather the armief around Belfast way anyway. Lupin'z a werewolf, no? That will make things simpler."

Fin stared at her, half of her mind envying Danielle's way of planning so easily and effortlessly, the other half appalled at the casual way the vampire talked about murdering and killing - killing those she had once been friends with. And more, too - she was appalled that she had spoken the same way for years on end and never noticed. Something is different with me tonight. Sirius - Sirius has changed me. He always brought out the good in me, and now I am seeing the evil in myself.

"I think I should go, Dan... and thank you a thousand times. I'm going to go to sleep."

"You owe me," was all the other woman said.

*

Morning came, the light creeping slowly over the earth, and found Sirius making his way dazedly towards the Leaky Cauldron. He had no idea where to go, but he knew he had to find somewhere safe and to stay there. He had to speak to nobody. And something tickled at the back of his mind, something that he knew was vitally important -- but he couldn't grasp it, no matter how hard he tried. His mind felt hazy, loose, as if something else had come in and slit its moorings. He had to go somewhere safe and stay there. That was all he could think of. Go somewhere safe and stay there. Speak to nobody. Tell nobody I was here. Forget I was here. Go somewhere safe and stay there. The words echoed in his mind, the only certainties in a world of slippery ghost-shadows. They were rock, and he leaned on them for direction.

A wizard who he vaguely recognised came up to him in the street and took his shoulder. "Black? Black, are you all right? You look terrible."

Sirius shook his head, numbly, unsure why the wizard - who he vaguely recalled as a Hufflepuff from his year - would ask if he was OK. Didn't he look all right?

"Black, you should really go and lie down somewhere," the Hufflepuff advised him, looking anxious. "It isn't safe to be wandering the streets any more, especially not if you're drunk - you are drunk, aren't you?"

"Gotta go somewhere safe and stay there," Sirius mumbled, his tongue and lips feeling thick and heavy like lead. "Can't speak to anyone. Can't."

"Listen, you really look like you could use a hand -- are you going to the Leaky Cauldron? I can take you there, if you like..."

"Goin' somewhere safe," he mumbled, barely listening, just forging ahead. The Hufflepuff hurried along beside him, taking two strides to every one of Sirius's - it struck Sirius as vaguely funny that he, Sirius, was tall and broad-shouldered and the little man was short and tubby, but he couldn't raise a laugh - something seemed to have blocked him from being happy.

They reached the Leaky Cauldron, and the little Hufflepuff, with a glance at Sirius, paid for his room for a night. Sirius felt he ought to be grateful, but the man was gone almost as soon as he'd paid. He stumbled up the stairs and almost fell through the door of his room; old Tom the bartender helped him to the bed. Sirius, in the brief moment before darkness claimed him, wondered if he ought to take off his boots.

*

"Daoine Sidhe, Daoine Sidhe, will you wake?"

Fin groaned and lifted her head. She was lying on the floor, fully dressed, her eyes full of muck and something awful, something terrible, weighing down on her head. She felt the mesmer she'd placed on Sirius bulge, as if he was fighting back - and of course he's fighting! Did you ever know Star to give in without a fight, Findabhair? - but the enchantment held, and soon relaxed into the pattern that meant he was sleeping. Only then could Fin spare the attention to look around

Her house-elf was hovering around, hopping up and down in anxiety. "Daoine Sidhe, wake, you must wake!"

"I'm - I'm moving, Daine," she muttered, pushing herself off the carpet, which felt stuck to her face and skin. Daine hopped around her, squeaking nervously, until Fin backhanded her across the face. "Shut up."

"Oh, Daoine Sidhe, forgive me!" Daine cried, getting up from where Fin had knocked her. "Daine worried so, when you woke not - Daine feared for you - forgive me!"

Fin glanced down, at the worried creature almost as tall as her chest, and felt a stab of remorse. Had she really just swatted Daine? And how many times had she done that over the past years, taking no more notice of the elf than of a fly buzzing about her head? What had happened to make her this way? She shivered, suddenly aware of the many things missing in her life.

The room she had lived in since her 'death' was filthy, encrusted with dirt and spiderwebs. The light came in only dimly through the narrow window, itself almost opaque with age and dirt, but even that small amount of light was enough to show her the terrible mess. How had she never noticed that before?

Well, she knew the answer to that one, at least. She had been so devoted to the cause, spending every waking second in the Dark Lord's abode, that she'd never bothered about her own belongings except to see that the bed was comfortable enough to sleep in. Suddenly angry, she ran to the little window and banged at the latch. When it didn't open, she blasted the opaque glass with a word, and the sun flooded in. Dimly, she heard the glass shards tinkle on the corrugated iron roof many stories below, and she wondered if her life had gone with them.

She couldn't stay with the Dark Lord, she knew that now. Seeing Star's devotion to his cause, and yet his refusal to use the Dark Arts when he could so easily have stopped her with any minor Dark spell - something in that had called to her, and something in her had answered. She could not stay with the Dark Lord. There was not a chance. But -- what could she do?

And then the Dark Mark burned on her arm, a lance of fire straight into her innermost self. Gasping, she clutched at it, feeling the incredible pull of the Dark Lord's will. "I have to go," she called to Daine, and Disapparated.

*

"Accio Lily!"

Lily found herself flying through the air, the box she'd been packing falling to the ground. She had time to roll her eyes before she landed in James' arms. He grinned at her, that charming smile she'd watched him developing since his first year at Hogwarts, and put her gently down.

"I needed your help. I don't know how to make these books fit into this box straight."

"James," she scolded, taking his armful of grimoires from him, "that's not how you treat them! They'll bite you if you try to shove them in like Muggle books!"

"Oh, are these magic books?" He picked one up for closer inspection. "Muggles: A Comparative Study of Home Habits. Are you sure?"

"Yep, I'm sure," Lily said. "Muggles don't even know they're called 'Muggles'. Only a wizard would write a book with the work 'Muggle' in the title."

"Pretty stupid book," he remarked, dropping it towards the cardboard box. It flapped angrily, flicking its cover out at him and leaping up towards his face. "Aargh!"

"James!" She pulled the book off his nose and patted it, tucking it back into place. "Maybe you should go and do Harry's room, and I'll do these?"

James, rubbing his nose, agreed, and Lily applied herself to packing the books carefully into the box, soothing each one as she slipped it in. The silence from the back of the house worried her a little, but she determined to finish the bookcase before checking on her husband.

She found James sitting on the floor, watching Harry try to walk towards him. Both of them were laughing, happy: Harry stumbled as she watched, and James caught him before he hit the ground. Harry waved his baby fists in the air and screamed with laughter.

"Working hard?" she asked, grinning. James reached up, not taking his eyes away from Harry, and pulled her down to sit beside him. She rested her head on his shoulder, watching Harry clamber to his feet and toddle towards his favourite toy broomstick.

"He'll be famous one day, you mark my words," James told her, smiling widely. "Just look at the way he holds that broomstick..." And indeed, Harry clung to the tiny broom as if born to fly. Lily felt a sudden premonitory sadness, watching her beautiful son play, but she wiped it away, and soon it was forgotten.

*

The front door shattered, splinters of wood flying down the corridor and embedding themselves in the wall at the far end. Peter, who was eating his dinner, felt a sudden sharp relief. They've found me at last. I won't have to worry any more, and James and Lily will be safe.

He stood up, pushed his chair in and waited for the Aurors.

Unfortunately, it wasn't the Aurors, a fact he realised as soon as the first Crucio hit him.

*

A sense of something unfinished nagged Sirius into wakefulness. The clouds surrounding his thought were as thick as ever, but he couldn't remember anything important - only that there was something, and that lives depended on it.

The sun shone through the window, and he watched the square of light crawl across the floor while he fought to regain mastery over his own mind. It was something deeply horrifying, he was sure; something that hurt him immensely.

The light turned yellow-gold, and became less. Angrily, Sirius pushed through the clouds, getting angrier and angrier the more they fought him back. What was there to be remembered?

Somebody. He'd seen somebody. As the mist lessened, he found words imprinted there: "Tell nobody I was here. Forget I was here. Go somewhere safe and stay there. Speak to nobody."

I am safe. I am in the Leaky Cauldron

, he told himself, recognising vaguely the dirt-encrusted ceilings. The dust on the tops of the paintings recalled the mists to his mind, and he found himself wondering vaguely if the sky was really as dark as it seemed, if he'd really lain here unmoving the whole day.

Speak to nobody.

But he had a dim recollection of seeing somebody - an old classmate? - in the street, and saying a few words to him. So this - his memory supplied the word mesmer - didn't have him fully under control. That was good. That was heartening.

Mesmer

. Fin used to be able to use the mesmer on people, but he'd never known anyone else to - maybe there was another Sidhe around, working for Voldemort?

The image of a harshly black skull burnt into white skin came sharply to his mind when he thought of Fin, which was strange... he'd felt that his life was over when she died, but the Dark Mark surely hadn't been part of that?

He forced his way past yet another mist barrier, and found an image of Fin looking up at him, tears in her eyes. Last night -- something had happened last night, he was sure. Something to do with Fin and with Voldemort...

Then the fog gave way, and reality hit him with the last rays of the dying sun.

*

Peter's own screams rang in his ears, and it took him a long time to realise the pain had stopped. He became aware of dirt beneath his hands, of raw lacerations along his arms, of the dank air of his Master's strongest cells, and the coolness of night air. Looking up, he knew what to expect.

His wife hung on the wall in front of him, emaciated and deathly pale, her dull eyes fixed on him with desperate anxiety somewhere in their depths. The rags they wrapped her in were soaked in dry blood, stiff and caked; the same blood lay in grimy streaks down her body and in a dark stain on the ground beneath her. Peter fought back a sob, fought the helplessness and utter misery that always assailed him when the Dark Lord brought him before Anne.

"You withheld information from us, Pettigrew," an icy voice said behind him. He turned; it was a woman who had introduced herself simply as "Elaine", a tall woman with thick, shining brown hair, a freckled snub nose, and the coldest eyes he'd ever seen. He had seen her torture children without batting an eye. "The Dark Lord is not pleased."

"I withheld nothing! I swear it! I meant to tell you!"

"The Dark Lord is not pleased," Elaine repeated, unmoved.

"I was coming to tell you today!" Peter cried, desperately. "Please- please don't hurt her!"

Elaine raised one perfectly manicured eyebrow. "I think your behaviour has already earned her a certain amount of pain... we do become so disappointed when you disobey, you know." A snowy smile added to the menace her presence was. "Perhaps we'll burn her a bit... suitably painful, you think?"

"No - please -" Peter blurted, feeling utterly wretched. James would never have gotten into this ... Sirius would have fought his way out at the first opportunity. I can't do that... I can only do what they say, only try to save Anne...

"Are you not paying attention, Pettigrew? I said, do you think burning is painful enough?"

"Please don't - please!" he begged. Anne stared down from the wall, impassive - he suspected they kept her drugged or under the Imperius curse. Oh, God, Anne...

Elaine smirked, and fell silent. Peter heard footsteps down the corridor, and he blanched, knowing what that meant. The thick door swung open noiselessly: a Death Eater entered, followed by Lord Voldemort himself. Peter cringed.

"So. Wormtail."

"My Lord," Peter whimpered, miserably.

"You did not see fit to inform me of the fact that you are the Potter's Secret-Keeper?"

"My Lord, I intended to come tell you today..."

"Oh?" That one syllable was more threatening than anything Peter had heard before; and somehow, something in it woke the anger that had always smouldered deep inside him. He was tempted to make a smart answer, but knew that wouldn't get him anything.

"Yes, my Lord," was all he dared say.

"Well. You are temporarily useful to me, Wormtail, so I shall instruct Elaine not to hurt you too much."

Elaine's smile grew wider, and she moved forwards.

"Please, no! My Lord, I did everything I could!"

"You will tell me exactly what you did, Peter -- when Elaine has finished. She gets terribly bored, you see - I have to let her have her amusements."

"My Lord, have mercy!"

"I am very merciful," Voldemort said. "I will not touch your woman; only you."

The burst of relief this announcement elicited in Peter was only cut short when the door closed behind the Dark Lord and Elaine's fist slammed into his face.

Every minute I withstand this is another minute gained for James and Lily to escape,

he told himself. His front teeth felt loose.

Elaine put a delicate hand under his chin, forcing his face upwards. She studied his jaw intently, frowning slightly. Quickly, lightly, she wiped the blood that trickled from his mouth away; then she delivered another smashing punch.

The treatment continued, for an endless, aching time. The world turned inside out; all he could see was pulsing redness, but he could feel everything she did to him as she systematically and clinically beat him up. Pain rose until it blocked out every other sense: he felt on fire, he froze, he jerked and twitched spasmodically. Finally, darkness rose before his eyes, carrying with it one last image of Elaine's satisfied smirk before it claimed his mind entirely.

*

James leapt up at the frantic pounding on the door, his heart in his mouth. The whole house seemed to be shuddering in time with the bangs. Lily dropped her coffee in shock, and the liquid spread quickly over her white robes, disregarded by either adult.

"Get Harry, Lil - I'll get it," he said, hurriedly. She nodded, looking frightened, and hurried away. James picked up his wand in one hand and the poker from the hearth in the other: somehow, the heavy weight of iron felt more reassuring than his wand, even though he knew he could do a lot more damage with the latter.

The door was leaping almost off its hinges with each thump, the noise shattering the stillness of the night. James stared at it uneasily. Peter wouldn't be coming around this late at night, surely? And why would he be in such a hurry?

The banging ceased, followed by a thunk as if the unseen knocker had slammed their head into the wood. A familiar voice - familiar, but broken and desperately unhappy - yelled "Shit, James, I know you're in there - open up, dammit!"

"Sirius!" Relief swamped James. He threw open the door and stepped back.

Sirius ignored him completely, head still resting against the air where the door had been. "Open up, James! It's important!"

James stared. "It is open, Sirius. What's wrong?"

A lock of hair fell across Sirius's face, and he impatiently swiped it away. Then he pushed himself off the door-space and recommenced banging furiously on it. "James! Lily! Can you hear me?"

"Yes, I can hear you!" James yelled, just as loudly. "What the hell are you playing at?"

Sirius continued to ignore him completely, and James stood back, baffled.

"It's the Fidelius," Lily said, coming up behind him with a sleepy Harry in her arms. "He can't see us or speak to us, or even see anything we do."

"Paffoo!" was Harry's stellar contribution to the conversation. "Wan' Paffoo!"

"Merlin," James said, staring at his frantic friend. "What can we do?"

Lily looked just as unhappy as he felt. "Nothing. Not unless Peter turns up suddenly. Whatever we do he won't be able to see."

James looked back to where Sirius was slamming his fists into what was apparently solid air. "He can't even hear us? He'll hurt himself..." And indeed, Sirius's knuckles were already spitting from the force with which he banged the 'door'.

"Nothing," Lily said. Harry squirmed around, and she put him down gently. He immediately got up and toddled through the door, diving for Sirius's legs -- and fell straight through his godfather.

James bit off an expletive, staring. "This is awful! What can be wrong?"

Lily shrugged, scooping up a perplexed Harry. James saw the glint of tears in her eyes. "I don't know... I don't want to watch. I'm going back inside."

"Wan' Paffoo! Paffoo wan' Harry?" Harry heaved himself up to peer over Lily's shoulder at Sirius, his wide green eyes puzzled and upset. "Paffoo no wan' Harry?"

"Of course he wants Harry," Lily reassured him. "He's just busy now. Don't worry, he loves you."

James stared at his best friend, feeling helpless and desperately anxious. Sirius continued to alternately bang on the door and swear violently for another ten minutes: behind James, Harry began wailing, and he heard Lily trying to soothe him. Eventually Sirius gave up in mid-thump, obviously realising he wasn't getting anywhere -- he spun on his heel and ran towards the gate, Disapparating in mid-stride as soon as he had leaped it. James gazed at the empty air where he had been for several minutes more, his mind in turmoil.

What was that all about?

*

"Thank you for your time, Auror Fletcher," Dumbledore said politely, ushering the furious man out. "I'm sure you'll catch them next time."

Fletcher, his craggy features fixed in a scowl, stormed away down the hall. Dumbledore gazed after him, a small smile easing his worried features, and then turned and hurried through the corridors to the broomshed. As he soared over the grounds on his way to the ministry, he spotted far below a figure sprinting along beside the lake, indistinct through the night but obviously in a hurry to get inside. Dumbledore frowned -- I do hope that's not more bad news -- but he did have to get this to the Ministry before much later, and there couldn't be much more important than the sheaf of paper Fletcher had handed him. Sighing, he poured on the speed, leaving Hogwarts behind quickly.

*

Sirius raced back the way he had come, his long-legged stride covering the ground quickly. He barely noticed, his mind boiling frantically. Dumbledore had just left, according to a frowning Professor McGonagall, and wouldn't be back for some time -- Sirius hadn't waited to hear any more. One thought was foremost in his tumultuous mind: Find Peter. Voldemort knew -- Peter was in danger -- James and Lily were in danger -- Harry was in danger - he had to find Peter!

As soon as he crossed the Hogwarts bounds - a fact registered by the sharp tingle of ward edges all over him - he reached for his severely drained energy reserves and hastily fixed Peter's house in his mind. The Disapparate spell took more out of him than he'd believed possible, but sure enough, the world dissolved around him into swirling white mist.

It didn't reappear. Exhausted, traumatised, in shock, it took Sirius several seconds to recognise that he hadn't managed to Apparate - that the white mists of the in-between places were still swirling fluidly around him. When he did, the utter disaster of his situation hit his disembodied mind with the force of a sledgehammer. Wizards and witches had died here - Disapparating too hastily, they'd failed to Apparate at all, and they'd vanished for years. Time passed differently here. Rip van Winkle flashed through his mind - the man was the most famous case of Misapparition ever known, even so much that the Muggles knew his name, if not the correct story - and faded back into despair. What was he supposed to do?

Firmly dispelling the urge to scream, Sirius tried to remember what he'd been taught. Focus your mind, concentrate, pull yourself together and visualise properly... With a supreme effort of will, he recalled his tangled thoughts and pushed them towards the image of Peter's house, so far away. I can do this. I can do this. I can get out of here.

Slowly, reluctantly, the swirling mists parted as though they were being prised open, and he fell through the gap with a thud.

At least, most of him did. The tear in the world seemed to slam closed on him half-way through, ripping him apart - he distinctly felt the splinch of his legs being torn painlessly away from him. Landing heavily on the lawn, Sirius began a litany of obscenities, and passed out.

*

Revised 11th January 2003