A/N: With no further ado, please enjoy. One request though, whether you like it or not, please review and tell me how you think of it. Thanks a millions!
––––––––––––––
Nobody's Home
––––––––––––––
It was a rainy day, nearly all the sunlight was blocked away by the heavy clouds. And inside the ancient castle located on an isolated island in North Britain, a bunch of cloaked figures were having their History lessons. The shining words written on the blackboard at the front of the classroom indicated that the time period discussed was 1939-1945. However, the students were neither being taught Adolf Hitler's Nazism nor Benito Mussolini's Fascism during the Second World War, but the Purges pursued by someone called Grindelwald, a wizard highly unknown to the Muggles.
Some sleepy yawns, accompanied by the scratching of quills could be heard throughout the classroom. It seemed that most students could do with a nice nap, and the ghostly Professor sounded on the edge of falling asleep too. Sirius Black was among the minority which was still wide awake, tilting his chair on two legs and lounging at his ease, all the while glancing around with a nonchalant expression.
Besides him, James Potter was busy peeking at the other side of the classroom where a certain redhead was engaged in an intense conversation with a Gryffindor girl. Brows knitted together and eyes narrowed, he ran his hand through his rumpled hair every now and then distastefully. Sirius chuckled; he knew better than to mess with James at such times, and James was always unentertaining when he was in a Lily-gaga anyway.
On the other side of him, Peter Pettigrew who had fallen asleep ten minutes into the lessons was drooling heavily on his book while Remus Lupin was listening intently with a slight frown on his exhausted face and jotting important points down.
He sat back at his seat and stared at the blackboard quietly, not really thinking about anything in particular for a few moments before the pictures published on the front page of Daily Prophet he just read earlier that morning rose up in his mind. More deaths. It was unsurprising in itself but evidently it was getting out of control, it shocked everyone that the family that made the headline was the Lytteltons, a family almost as deep-rooted in the wizarding world as the Blacks. His mind drifted off to the conversation he had with Uncle Alphard just a few days ago in the Diagon Ally. The massacre of largest scale ever just taken place on the night prior to that. They talked about it. Eventually Sirius asked Uncle Alphard, who had devoted half of his life in the St. Mungo's Hospital, whether he was immune to any emotions of seeing deaths after witnessing so many before. It was aimed as a casual question but Sirius couldn't forget the dirty look he got from his favourite uncle. The reproachful tone in which Uncle Alphard made his answer was foreign to Sirius and it still popped up in his mind every now and then.
Sirius fumbled in his pocket and pulled out something. He removed the sheath, revealing a bronze blade, then began carving letters on the wooden desk. The letters were deeply engraved on the desk but the moment he finished the word, the word disappeared. Sirius stabbed the knife into the wooden table again, then pulled it out, and watched in astonishment as the fissure automatically sealed itself, leaving no trace of the destruction.
"If Hogwarts can make itself invisible to the Muggles, you can expect it is also immune to Muggle ways of destructions," said Remus, eventually putting his quill down, as he knew if he didn't pay his friend any attention sooner or later, Sirius would probably be the first to end up in a detention for blowing up the castle.
"I know, I was just experimenting. I need something to distract me from the fact that we're sharing this lesson with Slytherins," Sirius said, appraising the desk with his fingertips. "Come to think of it, we used to have History with the Ravenclaws. Why all our lessons are arranged to be shared with the Slytherins this year is far beyond my reasoning."
He glanced over at the Slytherins who were seated behind the second table in front of them. Alecto Carrow and Vanessa Yaxley were giggling between themselves with their heads knitted together. His cousin Narcissa was engaged in a conversation with a pale, brown-haired Slytherin girl, Rainzzi Delanuit, who was nodding occasionally without much enthusiasm, her cheek on the palms, her thoughts seemed to be on anything but Narcissa's words.
Remus shrugged, "What with Voldemort and the Death Eaters taking over everywhere, it's only a matter of time before he lays his eyes on Hogwarts and starts recruiting from within. Perhaps Dumbledore is trying to maintain a check-and-balance on the Slytherins, and probably in hope of some inter-house unification."
"Getting along with Snivellus? I don't think so," Sirius stated in an exaggerated tone. "Now seriously," he added, fixing Rainzzi's back with an intense stare as she brushed away a strand of hair from her eyes, "I think Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin would both turn in their graves if we actually start acting friendly to each other."
Remus followed Sirius's glance thoughtfully. "But there are always exceptional cases."
"Majority never changes," Sirius shrugged, but his expression hardened as his glance landed on Narcissa. "Honestly, I would be really surprised if Bellatrix isn't already among the Death Eaters' higher rank. She has been so crazily obsessed with this pureblood mania all along, and Rodolphus Lestrange is just as lunatic as she is." At this point, James finally turned his glance to his best friends curiously, he only knew about Bellatrix through Sirius's description as she was already out of school when they joined Hogwarts. "The first time I saw them together was back at their wedding, and it took only a few minutes to convince everyone that the chemistry between them is going to make them ten times each more destructive. Obviously they are incapable of loving anyone other than Voldemort, but they are a perfect match in a sense that they share the same insanity and they understand each other."
"Do you think she is already a Death Eater as well?" James jerked his head towards Narcissa.
"Narcissa? I doubt so. It won't be long before Narcissa gets her own Dark Mark though, judging from the lot she is close to. But I guess she will not commit herself until when Voldemort's power becomes more consolidated and recognized, because she lacks the determination and unconditional faith that distinguish Bellatrix."
"You know what, Sirius?" said James mildly, "Sometimes I still have problems believing that you're actually related to Bellatrix Lestrange."
Sirius made a sardonic laugh, "I bet with a thousand galleons that my mother have already blasted my name off from the family tree at Grimmauld Place on the same day I ran away, much like the time when she blasted Andromeda's name off when Meda got married to a Muggle-born. So practically, Bellatrix and the rest of them are not my family anymore."
Sirius could see from the corners of his eyes that James and Remus exchanged surreptitious glance but he decided to pretend as if he didn't see anything. Despite his openness to discuss about his family among the Marauders, he always kept the conversation rid of emotions because it still frustrated him to talk in depths.
Sirius wouldn't act as if he had never liked his parents. After all, who hadn't been once ignorant and obedient in their childhood? He had tended to think his parents were the best of adults, like what every other child had. But his admiration for them didn't last long. From the way his parents had always kept him away from people whom they considered as inferior, he had known at an early age how much his parents prided themselves over their pureblood heritage. He had been surrounded only by people from the blueblood society then, and he was left with no opportunity to get to know the magical world in reality. At first he was untroubled by his parents' discriminative behaviour, but when he grew older, he started to discover the darker sides of their parents and their peculiar taste for dark magic had eventually appalled him.
From that time on, while not challenging his parents head-on, he showed tendency of a divergent stance. However, it wasn't until he started schooling at Hogwarts where he was introduced to a complete different magical population that he started to rebel against his parents. He had tried to make them see sense from his point of view but to as much avail as his parents tried to indoctrinate him with the importance of purity of blood. Time passed as the alienation from his parents grew stronger and stronger. He could tell that his parents had assumed in early years that his rebelliousness was a temporary act brought forth by adolescence but when it persisted, his parents tried to make him compromise by extremes. They even liaised with Professor Dumbledore in an attempt to have him resorted into Slytherins. While his parents could easily bribe their way into the Ministry to have whatever they wanted, Sirius was grateful that Professor Dumbledore was stubborn and unyielding in his polite rejection of their request.
When he later thought about all these years again, Sirius was astonished by the breadth of his own tolerance of the Blacks. He couldn't reason how he had endured all those torturing years but he could remember clearly the crushing force that had shattered the last bit of respect he might have for his parents at the moment the Blacks expressed their support of Voldemort.
Stretching his arms, Sirius met the glare of Severus Snape, a greasy Slytherin who seemed to have nothing better to do than to keep trying to gather ammunition to get them expelled. Snape withdrew his glare when Sirius glared back with the equivalent loathing, after shooting him a meaningful smirk, as if he knew something confidential.
Remus pretended unconcerned as James interchanged a look with Sirius. Ever since the fatal Whomping Willow incident last year, in which Snape might have died if James hadn't pulled him out of the tunnel at the last minute, Remus had been trying his best to avoid any kind of encounter with Snape. And dangerous pranks-pulling of Snape had become quite a taboo among the Marauders.
"God, it's so tempting," Sirius sighed dramatically. He moved closer to Remus and read his notes, shaking his head dubiously. "What's all this shit about?" he said, as he felt around.
"The Grindelwald War," said Remus, stating the obvious.
"I don't know why you still bother to jot notes," Sirius's hand found what he needed; he shifted slightly and passed it to James under the table. "It's not like you don't know all of it."
"I know all of it because I jot notes," Remus said, totally oblivious of anything unusual, "You've mixed up the causality."
Sirius shrugged and sat back casually after he heard an incantation made besides him, feeling light-hearted and expectant. He tilted his chair back on its two legs to get a better view of Severus Snape. A mischievous smirk crept into his face as he caught sight of the little fire finding its way up from the hem of Snape's cloak. Judging by the fierceness of the fire, it would spread to the end of his hair in no more than a few seconds. And Snape might get an explosion if he was lucky enough, as the grease and oil on his hair would probably turn an accomplice against him.
Unfortunately, the flame was perceived almost at the same time as the imagined picture of Snape getting an explosion on the head visualized in Sirius's mind. "You're on fire, Snape!" someone shrieked loudly, waking everybody up.
All of a sudden, people were receding away from Snape as if he had got an infectious disease. Lily Evans got out her wand, and before Professor Binns could turn around, she had pointed her wand at him, yelling authoritatively, "Unda!"
In a nanosecond's time, Snape was drenched from head to toe, standing there and looking silly in his burnt cloak. Though the fire was extinguished, the rotten smell hadn't quite left him. There was a flabbergasted silence as a thread of burnt hair fell from the back of his head, but then some guy broke out laughing hard, and everyone gradually joined in.
"What's happened?" Professor Binns asked cluelessly with the least bit of annoyance of the interruption. He looked at Snape for an explanation.
"It's Black and Potter!" Snape accused agitatedly, pointing his finger at the two Gryffindor who had been sitting at their seats very quietly.
"We didn't do anything, Snivellus," Sirius said calmly, eyeing him with falsified exhaustion.
"It has got to be you two!" Snape almost spat at them. Somehow Professor Binns was looking at Sirius and James amazedly; they were famous for talking out of the punishments for their pranks.
"We can check their wands for proofs," Lucius Malfoy suggested.
Appearing unconcerned and bored, Sirius and James handed him their wands fearlessly. The audience held their breaths as he raised his own wand and placed it tip-to-tip with James', "Prior Incantato!" But it was just a repairing spell; Snape's face was flinching furiously. When the replica of a levitating spell was conjured from Sirius's wand, the Gryffindors actually started applauding.
The bell rang before Snape could utter another word. Darting a quick glance at Snivellus, Sirius caught James' eyes and gave an inward smirk. Without so much as an apologetic nod at Snape, they swept the books into their arms and darted out of the History classroom indomitably. Looking at the way they walked out of the classroom, one would think they had never entered any forbidden land in their whole lives.
Remus and Peter jogged behind to catch up with their fellow Marauders. "It's brilliant," Peter praised, wiping the drooling marks on his bottom face, "It's so brilliant. Snivellus' got to have a haircut."
Sirius and James exchanged a glinting smirk but both of them said nothing. Remus swiftly glanced around the corridor. "How did you two manage it without using your wands?" he interrogated.
Raising his eyebrows in innocence, Sirius replied, "You're the bad guy, didn't you realize, Remus?"
James smiled slyly at Remus. He slowed down his pace for a bit so that he could walk with Remus side-by-side. "Check your wand," said James in a chortle.
Thunderstruck, Remus was producing the imprint of the last spell his wand had conjured when a high-pitched scornful laugh echoed throughout the corridor and interrupted them from behind. Perhaps it was not that audible after all, it was just a short laugh that could easily be mistaken as a sarcastic laugh at an off-color joke but Sirius could recognize the voice instantaneously. He had nearly lost track of the number of times he had heard that laugh directed at him. He gestured for his friends to stay out of it while he took a few steps backwards before he turned around.
"What, Pureblood Narcissa?" Sirius said, with an arrogant snicker forming in the corners of his lips.
Narcissa continued proceeding until she was right in front of him, unaccompanied by her fellow Slytherins. The Black cousins, both having inherited the trademark good looks from their family, stared daringly at each other with eyes of the same shade of grey. It was difficult to convince people at Hogwarts that they had once been very close as cousins as they were born to the Black families within months.
"I was just thinking that clearly Sirius Black hasn't sunk low enough yet," said Narcissa aggressively, wrinkling her brows and eying Sirius's companion with a nauseate expression. "Befriending Muggle-borns and shabby lots, that's not good for you."
"I can see you are befriending Death Eater Wannabes," said Sirius. "I would rather think by now it's pretty obvious that we have very diverse opinions over what is good and what is bad."
"What is good then, Sirius?" asked Narcissa pointedly. "Handpicking Severus Snape as an archenemy randomly and tormenting him for fun?"
Sirius nodded, "Yes. That's good for the public."
Narcissa faked a shrill laugh. "I heard about what you said to Aunt Walburga. Trying to be unique, aren't you? You pride yourself over the little brilliance of yours and you act as if you don't care about the purity of your blood just because you're already born with it. But you seemed to have forgotten that your talent and the purity of your blood are something you have unthankfully inherited from your parents, haven't you?"
"If talent is something I have inherited from the Blacks, then I don't see how you're related to them. You don't even know how to think independently." He sneered some more as Narcissa's facial expression tensed. He took a step closer, towering his cousin with his predominant height, and looked down on her. "You talk big, Narcissa. But you are not half as capable as you may think."
Narcissa hissed at him, "You'll be surprised by what I'm capable of."
"Sure," Sirius shrugged, evidently unconvinced.
For a moment, Narcissa looked like she would have left the heated conversation there, but decided against it at a second thought. "And I'll wait for the day when you finally realize the horrible mistakes you've made by running away from your parents and beg on your knees for their forgiveness."
"Yeah," Sirius snickered coldly. "Probably when hell freezes over. I hope you really enjoy the waiting process." He gave her another patronizing glance before he strode back to where his friends were waiting for him. Sirius kept the snicker on his handsome face until they were out of sight of the blonde Slytherin. To think that he would ever regret about leaving the Black family was ridiculous. But it didn't really turn his determination down, it always gave Sirius the satisfaction to prove people's perception of him wrong.
A/N: PLEASE REVIEW! And tell me honestly if this piece is any improvement from the previous one ;) Please!