Gently and ever so slightly the portrait moved. There was no one inside, and no one outside. Waiting a few seconds later Star got up from her favorite spot by the fire and though she hated to get up, she wanted to know who had just left, so she cautiously moved out of the portrait hole.
There was no one in the hall but her, although that meant little. James, Sirius or Remus could easily have been in the cloak invisible to the world. A shuffling noise came from behind, and she slid out of sight behind a suit of armor.
Sirius Black, covertly came out of the Gryffindor common room, he looked around and when he was sure no one else was there, set off down the hall. As he passed out of hearing distance Star came out from her hiding spot, curiosity and then annoyance plain on her face. She had turned to the picture of the Fat Lady was faced with the sight of a blank canvas. Biting her lip, she looked back to give the empty frame one last glance.
"Off with Violet again." She stated to no one but herself. Her voice came out soft and breezy like the wind, different but charming and beautiful none the less.
Looking at Sirius' retreading back, black hair shining in the moonlight, she quietly set off after him.
Sirius turned a corner, moved into a secret passageway and put his ear to the door.
"Bloody Hell!" Star said in a whisper, voice hoarse almost as if she hadn't meant to speak. She was angry at herself, she had lost him, just when she thought she was catching up. Suddenly, Star felt hands grabbing her, she let out a shriek, but it was cut off by a pair of hands that clamped down on her mouth.
Sirius had her, and drew her in closer as she began to fight back.
"Shut up or you'll get us both caught." He said calmly, his husky voice a low murmur, as soon as she heard his voice, Star relaxed and leaned into him, her heart still going a hundred miles an hour. She let out a breath that she had saved up.
"You scared me half to death! How else was I supposed to respond?" She replied, her voice turning itself into a question at the end.
"Well not waking up half the castle would have been nice." He replied, but his voice was light and teasing. "Besides, why were you following me?" He suddenly asked, wondering.
"Well I wasn't…" she faltered as he gently turned her shoulder, so that she spun around to face him. "Well, not on purpose anyways." She started again her voice defiant of the expression he gave her.
"I saw the portrait open, and I went out to see who it was, but no one was there, and as I turned to go back in I noticed that the fat lady was gone." she said her voice giving away no details that she had fudged the details.
"But surely you would have heard me open the portrait, and then you would have been able to go back into the common room, and that's not why you we—" but Star cut him off.
"I thought that you might have been Lily alright! I didn't want to get told off by my own sister. We bicker and argue enough at home especially with Tuney, butting in, and I don't want to fight. She's been even worse now that she is a prefect. I just can't stand it anymore." Star turned away to face the brick again. "Plus, I was curious." she said, barley audible under her breath.
"Curious, were you little pixie?" Sirius said, his voice humorous lightening the mood. At the same time he had tweaked one of her pointed ears. Star's face flooded a lovely rose color. Playfully she slapped his hand away.
"Perhaps, now will you tell me what your doing?" She asked her almond shaped eyes imploring, at the boy towering over her.
"Sure." Sirius replied, breathless, voice stunned. He wasn't paying attention but staring at her face, as though off in another world.
"Really?" Star asked surprise evident in her voice, Sirius never told anyone, other than a fellow marauder, what he was doing. But in a flash, a light came back into his eyes, a determined light, but not quite mischievous. Grabbing her hand, her motioned for her to be silent, while pulling her down the passageway, they came out near the charms corridor.
Star's eyes grew wide, as Sirius quickly broke into Flitwick's office.
"What!" She said in shock and outrage. Sirius never broke into their little charms teacher's office, he respected the man too much. She pulled back resisting his hand tugging, trying to pull her inside. He gave no answer to her earlier question but let go of her hand came back outside, picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, carrying her into the room. Putting her down, he instinctively grabbed her hands, now balling into fists. Sirius had been on the receiving end of her hands many a time, sometimes a warning slap and on a horrible prank gone wrong he had gotten friendly with her dangerous right hook.
"Flitwick has werewolf hair, it's Remus', and he's been trying to charm it back human, but he's coming up empty. I need to make sure that he doesn't figure it out—Remus is my friend, and I think these spells are dangerous, and they are rebounding onto him, it's just not safe." Sirius said finally coming clean with what he was doing. "I need to replace the sample so if he does find anything out; it's not Remus' hair he's got."
"You run around the dark forest quite often, right? Why not just get it then?" She asked wondering. She had been friends with Remus since before he was a werewolf, before she had even known she was a witch. Remus had been the one to tell her. She felt honored to be trusted with such a secret.
"Because if we wait, Flitwick might accidentally do something really harmful. It has got to be a secret, and the fur needs to be taken now!"
Star held up both hands, sighing. "Alright already, calm down! I'll go with you, just to make sure you don't forget or something."
Sirius' grin was knowing and slightly impish. "Oh, sure. Whatever you say…" Star flushed a bit and Sirius chuckled low and husky in his throat.
"Are we going or what?" Snapped Star, eyes narrowing, "Move you tease, or I'll go straight to McGonagall, and I know you don't want that." Star let the threat hang in the air, and grinned as the taller boy grimaced.
"Right… so you say." He picked up the vial that contained a gray-brown sample of ragged fur, glancing briefly to assure himself that it belonged to his fellow marauder. "Now let's go before—"
The door burst open and a small juggernaut launched between the two students, an indignant and squeaky voice rapping out with the authority that only could belong to a teacher. "Aha! What are you doing, what's all this then? What's it all?" Flitwick's sudden appearance startled a scream out of Star, and she bumped into Sirius, who in turn dropped the vial onto the floor, where it shattered like a bursting star.
The little teacher's open mouth quivered with outrageous anger as the flawless sample of healthy werewolf fur dissipated into thin air, blown away like spider-silk in a night breeze. "Why… what are… you insolent little… you, children doing in here?" Flitwick menaced them both with the point of his small, intricately shaped wand. The two students, despite the fact that they towered over Flitwick, backed away from him as wolves back away from an angry viper.
"That was the best sample I've seen since the sample McGonagall brought me on her first assignment, and even better for it belonged to a young, healthy male!" The wand glowed like a holy firefly, and the half-dwarven teacher waggled it sternly at Star and Sirius as he continued speaking in rapid and aggressive-sounding dwarf language.
Star glared at Sirius from the corner of her bright green eye. For once, he didn't meet her gaze and looked down at his feet like a well-chastised child. I'm gonna kill the blundering idiot for getting me into this! She fingered her wand, longing to pull it loose like a gunslinger and jab Sirius hard in the ribs with it, then tell him exactly what she thought of him at the moment, but unfortunately her mind went into overdrive as if she were channeling Lily.
Stepping up she took a deep breath, "Professor, I-We are deeply sorry… Sirius found out that you had the sample and what you could possibly be doing, but… I had a friend who was a werewolf, he was killed before I came to hogwarts, since then I have been trying to find out if I could help others with this disease. After overhearing Sirius I wanted to see if you had come close, my research is not coming along very well." Biting her lip she waited to see what their little but none the less intimidating professor would say.
Sirius looked up eyes wide, his jaw dropping, stepping on his foot, Star barely kept their cover.
"I can sympathize with your past my dear, but you had no right, absolutely NO RIGHT to be searching my office. I may have talked theory with you allowed you to look at my research before, but sneaking behind me shows that no matter how noble the actions you do not use reason for thinking about how this looks to others. You obviously do not trust me, so therefore you are to lose 50 points for being out of bed, 25 a piece, and if you don't want many detentions and your head of house to hear about this you can find another werewolf sample! Now back to bed both of you, and I expect to have the sample by the end of this month or you are out of luck! Dismissed!" With a huff he marched back to his quarters, as fast as his little legs could carry him.
Anger fueling her emotions, Star took out of the office and marched down the hall, making Sirius jog to keep up. She kept this up for two hallways before walking straight through a wall, or what looked like a wall. As soon as Sirius followed her in, she started pummeling him with all the force she could muster.
"Owch! Oouu… No… Star stop please!" his whisper was sharp but as he dodged a few more swipes from her he got out a few coherent words. "How'd you come up with a story on the spot like that? You can't lie!" Quickly he stopped talking as the look she gave him could've burned through his robes.
"I can cover myself when I need too, unfortunately you were covered too you great babbling buffoon! Ugh! I never should have followed you or agreed to any of this, now we lost house points thought not as many as we should have, but he almost blackmailed us into this! How are we going to find another sample before the end of the month? You do realize that this leaves us only one full moon, which is tomorrow?" Anger dissipating into hopelessness Star slid down the stone wall hugging her knees to her chest. Sirius sank down into a kneeling position before answering.
"Wow, ok I am not a babbling buffoon, though I think McGonagall would disagree, she would like that one, but anyway he did not almost blackmail us he did, but I don't blame him either." With a deep breath he looked over into her deep emerald orbs. "And yes I do happen to know when the next full moon is I do room with Moony remember? We'll go into the forest and get it tomorrow night but as for now we should get back to the common room, because Filch will likely check this um…corner, that is if he knows about it, thought her probably does, but I didn't even know about this. When did you find it?" Sirius would have gone on but Star pressed a shaky finger to his lips, a small smile playing around her own. Giving an apologetic smile he slid down into a sitting position. Sighing Star leaned her sleep heavy head onto his shoulder.
"I do agree that we should go tomorrow, do you want to meet somewhere after dinner?" An inquisitorial glance raked over Sirius' face while he grinned down at her.
A look of mischief stole over his devilishly handsome features. "I'll meet you in the astronomy tower, about midnight?"
"Alright, I'll meet you there. Now we really need to get back to the common room, help me up." Her eyes slid closed waiting for him to stand up, before with a great lurch Star started to blush madly, with her heart started to pump wildly. Sirius had stood up and then reached down and picked Star up honeymoon style. Holding her close he began to jog back to the common room.
"What are you doing?" Star barely let out in a quiet squeak.
"Helping you up, and into the common room, I didn't want to get caught with you falling asleep while we walked back." Grinning he picked up his pace as they came to another corridor. Shaking her head Star simply leaned back into his extremely comfortable chest. "Wait you never answered my question." A dawning realization had come across his face.
"Which one?" Star asked seemingly confused.
"My question about how you knew about that…enclosed corner." Giggling Star turned a slight tinge of pink.
"Lets just say one of the older students wanted to… um, well, for lack of a better word ravish me."
Sirius' face was a mask as he slowed his pace to a walk. "Ohh, um sorry I asked-"
Shaking her head Star cut him off, "No, it's fine, he regretted trying to get me to do that."
A brilliant smile flashed across Sirius' face, as Star leaned her face into his strong chest. Inhaling deeply, a woody smell surrounded her brain in fog.
To quickly a deep voice jolted her out of her dream.
"Isn't it tradition to cross the threshold, like this?"
Smiling sleepily Star shook her head and mumbling "No that's only for the groom to do to the bride." Only then did she see her slightly blurry surroundings, they were in the common room, and she should go upstairs to her dormitory, but her eyes so heavy with sleep already, they gently drifted closed again. Sirius knew he couldn't make it up the stairs to the girls dormitories, not with Star clinging to him. So with only two alternatives he took the one he was more inclined to, and started up the stairs to the boys dormitories leaving the lumpy couches behind.
Remus was gone, as it was the night before the full moon, so there was one extra bed open, but it was also right next to the door. Sirius set Star down in his bed instead so that when she woke it would be to the sun rise in the window right next to it. Transforming he curled up at the end of the bed, watching her sleeping prone form gently rise and fall with steady breathing, as he too fell asleep.
AN: So sorry for the long delay. I have finally come back to the story and I revamped the chapter. The ending is a bit different, and while I liked the other ending, this one is better! Hope all is not lost with those following this story. Loves and many many cookies sent out!