Chapter 1

I am dead, but yet I'm still breathing.
I am dead, but yet I'm still feeling.
I am dead, but yet I'm still here, I'm still alive.
How can I be alive?

A brown wolf lay on the floor, her blue eyes dull with grief. She didn't move except for her slow, steady breathing. Just one look at the depressed animal and one could tell that it had suffered a great loss; a loss that had changed her life forever. The wolf lay without a sound, not disturbing the dead silence that filled the house these days. It used to be the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix but now it wasn't used, abandoned until a later date. This place used to be so welcoming to the wolf with blue eyes, it used to be the only place she wanted to be, but now, it was her prison. She could have changed it, she could have moved away from it, but she didn't. Her suffering, her grief, her inability to leave was all because of the loss of the man she loved, Sirius Black. She wouldn't believe that he was truly gone. He would never leave her behind.

It had been weeks since the death of her love, but it replayed in her mind every day, haunting her, trying to make her believe in reality. She never would. During the time though, she spent most of it were she was now, on the floor of Number 12 Grimmauld Place but the other Order members grew concerned for her. She wouldn't eat, only enough to keep her alive. She wouldn't do anything but lay on the floor in a depressed state. They decided that they would take turns watching and caring for her, making sure that her condition wouldn't get any worse. Usually, the Order members took her to their houses so it would be easier for them to watch her. She hated it, moving from one house to another, just like she did when she was little.

She knew that they were only trying to help her, that they were only trying to make it easier for her to live again, but she didn't want their help. She just needed to be alone, to be able to think. "You can continue on with your Order," the Dark Lord's voice hissed in her mind with the memory of the Department of Mysteries, "or you can truly be a Death Eater, but either path you choose will end in your death. Choose wisely, Volkov…"

She just wanted this life to end and that's what the driving force behind her decision. She wanted to take the path that would led her to her death faster, she didn't care about living anymore, she stopped caring long ago. If she continued on with the Order, she felt that the Dark Lord would try to take revenge but the likelihood of her death was diminished because of the protection the Order had given her. If she continued with the Death Eaters, she felt that death was certain, inevitable. Although, how could she leave the only people that truly cared about her? The Order was her family now. Of course, she had alliances with some of the Death Eaters, like Lucius and Bellatrix.

Bellatrix, she snarled in her thoughts. How she hated her, for Bellatrix was the one who killed Sirius. An old fire flared within her from the time when she attacked Bellatrix. She wanted her blood in her hands. She wanted revenge for taking her love away. Her thoughts flashed back to the longing of her sinking her wolven jaws into Bellatrix's neck and ripping out her throat. Her hackles rose with the thought and she let a sinister snarl, low and dangerous. Anger burned in her blue eyes.

"Filthy half-blood, living in my Mistresses'' house even though Master is dead, acting like he will return to her if she waits," someone mumbled. Her eyes found the source, Kreacher, the house-elf for the noble and most ancient house of Black. "Who does she think she is? All she is is scum." She jumped up and snarled at him, her eyes blazing with rage, her body shaking with her fury. The house-elf gave her a smug look. "Master was useless and ungrateful. He didn't deserve to carry the name of Black."

Her body lunged forward and the house-elf shrieked. She tackled him and pinned him to the floor, her face twisted in a vicious snarl. Her fangs flashed white in the dull light as saliva dripped onto the house-elf. She wanted him dead for his words.

"SIRA!" someone screamed, the voice filled with a mixture of shock and rage. She shot the speaker a furious look. It was Anastasia Dalca, her friend from Hogwarts and a member of the Order of the Phoenix. "Get off of him, Sira! He hasn't done anything to you!" Sira's snarling continued as she stepped away from Kreacher. The old house-elf looked stunned as he shuffled out of the room quickly as if he was afraid of her. Let him be afraid, she growled. She looked at Anastasia as she tried to calm herself again. Anger left her, allowing herself to be numb again.

Eventually, she stopped snarling and Anastasia let out a sigh. "Sira, what's wrong with you?" she asked, her voice almost accusing. Sira rolled her blue eyes and went back to the spot where she was laying, sinking to the floor quickly and continuing to gaze blankly at Anastasia. "Will you ever talk about what happened? Will you ever talk about your feelings?" no, Sira replied strongly in her thoughts. Many people tried to comfort her, tried to get her to discuss her feelings, and every attempt she denied. Anastasia sighed again.

"What's happened to you?" she asked with concern. "You're a completely different person ever since the day at the Department of Mysteries. I know that you were devastated by Sirius' death but everyone was, everyone felt some type of grief, and everyone has recovered from it except for you. You used to be happy, you used to be perfectly normal, and I'm not talking about when you joined the Order. I'm talking about before you ever joined, when we were back at Hogwarts. What's happened to that Sira? The happy one? The caring one? Where has she gone?" Sira gave Anastasia an angry glare, Anastasia looked furious. "Sira, please talk to me."

With that, Sira stood and shifted from wolf to human for the first time in weeks. Her dark-brown hair fell in dull, ragged curls that needed to be cared for. Her beautiful face showed her stress and was starting to deteriorate a bit, hollowing her cheeks and giving her sweet face a harsher look. There were dark circles around her eyes from her lack of sleep and her sorrow. She was thin, her ribs easy to feel beneath her black, fitted t-shirt. It was easy to tell that she wasn't caring for herself just by looking at her.

"What, Anastasia? What do you want?" Sira snapped her voice hoarse from going a while without speaking to anyone. Her blue eyes were hazy with her grief.

"I want you to talk to me!" she stressed back.

"Well, what am I doing now?" Sira asked angrily.

"Not that, Sira," Anastasia said with a little snarl. "Tell me what's happened to you."

"Life! Life is what has happened to me!" Sira barked at her. "Leave me alone."

"Sira, you need to talk about what you are feeling. You need help," Anastasia stated fierily with agitated in her brown eyes.

"Leave. Me. Alone," she barked again with fury burning in her eyes.

"No, Sira, you need to talk about this!" Anastasia shouted. Sira started to shake with blind rage. Right now, she hated her; she hated everyone, especially the ones who tried to 'help' her. Something with her flared, she hadn't felt the feeling for a long time. It was dark. It was evil.

"I don't need to talk about anything, Anastasia," Sira growled cruelly. "I don't need to talk about my feelings, I don't need help, and I definitely don't need any of this." She gave Anastasia one last glare and stormed out of the room, up the staircase, and into Sirius' room, slamming the door behind her. She went over to the bed and jumped into it, trying to calm herself down with the flood of memories that this room had given her. It didn't though; it only made her fury worse.

She pulled the covers up around her and lay silently in the bed. Sirius' scent still lingered on the sheets, giving her a little comfort and a lot of grief that mixed with her rage towards the world. It was a cruel and evil place now without him. She knew it would be, she always knew. Her eyes looked over at his dresser where her gift to him still sat; untouched since the day he found it. The pure-whit rose was still prefect and looked freshly-cut as droplets of blood welled up on its petals. Footsteps came from the hallway.

"Sira, can I come in?" Anastasia's calm voice asked.

"No," she said firmly, still filled with anger as she glared at the door.

"Sira, I just wanted to say that I'm sorry. I shouldn't have pushed you into trying to discuss your feelings when you weren't ready. I know you love Sirius, Sira, and I'm sorry that you lost him. I can't imagine what you are going through right now and I want you to know that I'm here for you and so is the Order. We all want you to be okay, we don't want you to suffer," Anastasia explained kindly from the other side of the door. "I just wanted you to know that, Sira, and there is an Order meeting tomorrow night at the Burrow, if you want to go. I was asked to tell you that and I hope that you will come. Goodbye, Sira. I'll leave you alone now." The footsteps faded from the hallway and the staircase. The front door opened and closed and then the silence returned to the house. Sira finally realized that her body was trembling with rage.

No one knew her; no one would ever know her. Sirius did but he was -. No, he's not gone. He can't be gone, she told herself as a sigh broke out of her chest. What would she do now?

She didn't know, she really didn't know.