Moony & Padfoot
Sirius Black of Number Twelve Grimmauld Place was very happy to say he was a father, thank you very much. Over the first week of summer holidays, he adopted his goddaughter, Siria Potter and the two filed to change her name to Siria Potter-Black, to her endless insistence on it. Though, for the week of her adoption, she had to stay with her Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and cousin Dudley, Siria could not be happier. She understood that an ancient magic kept her safe and required she return to her aunt and uncle's house every year. Siria accepted it gracefully this year and kept her head held high the entire week.
Today, Siria Potter-Black sat in the kitchen of Number Four Privet Drive, waiting for her father to pick her up. It was so early that even Aunt Petunia had not woken, yet Siria heard the unmistakable creak of the stairs. There was hesitation in the step following the creak, but they walked heavily into the kitchen. Wide-eyed and jaw dropped, Dudley looked to Siria with a look of defeat on his face. Siria sighed. Dudley turned to leave.
"I've got some mince pie." Siria told him in a very flat tone.
"So?" Dudley muttered with his back turned.
"Do you want it?" she asked. Dudley looked over his shoulder, his face looked like that of an uncertain puppy. Siria turned the dial of her trunk and opened it. Inside the trunk were two mince pies, which she'd received from Mrs. Weasley, and some sugar free candy that Hermione had sent. She pulled the two pies out, placed them on a paper plate, and put them on the table, in the spot across from where she waited.
Dudley cranked his head around the hall, to confirm the sound of Uncle Vernon snoring, before he waddled into the kitchen and sat down across from Siria. He eyed the pie suspiciously, looked to Siria, broke off a small piece, and, after convincing himself it wasn't poisoned, ate the pies so quickly he almost inhaled them. "Thanks" he muttered.
"Thank you." Siria replied. She knew Sirius would fight forever to adopt her, but Dudley threw one tantrum and his parents surrendered. Uncle Vernon had really only denied Sirius the right to adopt her because he knew she would still be stuck there for a week every summer and it would make Siria happy. Her uncle hated Siria being happy. Whether Dudley meant to make Siria happy or had some other reason, Siria didn't care. She was so elated that she could knew, if there had been a dementor, she would have no problem producing a Patronus.
The wandlike, third hand of Siria's watch ticked to what she knew to be travel: Sirius was on his way. Quietly, she allowed herself a small laugh. "What?" Dudley asked. She smiled from her watch to her cousin.
"I'm just excited. You saw the laptop Sirius gave me, right?" She asked. Dudley nodded. "Well, Sirius said that if I finished his 'agenda'," she air quoted the word, "then I'd get to go to work with him, and Hermione could stay until we go to the Burrow."
"Herm— do you have friends?" Dudley asked. Siria squished her lips together in a pout then clicked her tongue and sighed.
"Yes. Now that there isn't someone chasing me down to beat me up, I have lots of friends." Her tone was rightfully pointed. Dudley and his gang of friends had stomped out any chance younger Siria ever had of making friends. His rounded face fell with his eyes to the table.
"Sorry." he grumbled. Siria looked over her glasses at him. She opened her mouth to ask "what?" but knew she heard him perfectly. Instead she threw his plate into the trash and washed her hands.
Dudley had gotten so big that his bottom hung over both sides of the large dining room chair. His school nurse had insisted, despite his parents' protests, that Dudley had to go on a diet because the school didn't supply the uniform in his size. All week he had been on a diet of what Uncle Vernon called "rabbit food", which they would continue for the rest of summer.
"You know," Siria took her seat, "I might be able to talk with Sirius about getting a Smeltings uniform made for you."
"What's he got to do with that?" Dudley asked. Siria sighed and raised the top of her shirt, to flatten the words stamped across it, so Dudley could read: Moony & Padfoot. She let the fabric fall.
"Sirius co-owns the company. He could probably commission a uniform for you or something." She let her eyes fall to the kitchen floor. It was hard to sit there and talk with Dudley.
For years, Dudley had terrorized her, as his parents had. Even though he never got in trouble for breaking things, on more than one occasion, he accused Siria of breaking something, which got her locked into her cupboard or sent to bed without supper. He had chased off the people that wanted to be her friend. Dudley was spoiled brat that used his parents' affection for him to get what he wanted, but so was Draco Malfoy.
The very thought of Draco Malfoy made Siria irritated. Malfoy tried to get her in trouble under the pretense of wanting to duel her. In their second year, he had tried to sick a snake on her and said he wished Hermione died. Last year though… last year he caught her when she fell off her broom. When they stayed in the Hospital Wing, he said nothing about her friends, who he had previously insulted.
"What?" Dudley asked her. Siria looked from the floor to him and echoed his question. "You're glaring." He told her.
"I'm wondering if people can really change or if they're the same and do out of character things." She confessed. Dudley kept the same confused expression. Siria rested her elbow on the table and looked at her pink hued, round faced cousin. Part of her wondered if this is how Malfoy felt when he tried to talk with his lackies, Crabbe and Goyle.
"Look, do you want me to ask Sirius about the uniform or not? The Smeltings nurse prescribed you that diet and—" she emphasized the word "— exercise. You're just going to be miserable and unable to fit into their stupid sizes without exercise, so, if you aren't happy about it, change the way you're doing it." Dudley squished his face together in a way that reminded Siria of his fake crying.
"Are you making fun of me?" he growled at her. Siria sighed.
"No, cousin, I'm not. I'm trying to return a favor— your tantrum got your dad to let Sirius adopt me faster. Even as someone who only had to pretend to commit to this diet, I can say it sucks." Siria rested her other elbow on the table and held the first in the palm of her hand. Dudley muttered something too quietly for her to catch it. She leaned toward the center of the table.
"I want it." He grumbled. Siria leaned back into her chair.
"Cool. I'll ask him when he gets here."
The only Moony & Padfoot location Siria had seen was a boutique on Cheshire Street. When Sirius told her that she would finally get to see him at work, she had fully expected to see him there. Upon arriving to the towering, glass structure of his actual office building, she felt both foolish and speechless. From the moment they could see it from the car window, she was in awe. Each floor of the interior was even worthy of her amazement.
Someone had painted the ground floor to look like the woods, complete with autumn leave painted trees, and the occasional fallen leaf painted on the ground. Each floor was painted to look like the outdoors, as if it was part of a cartoon, or a spectrum of a color's shades. When they reached Sirius's floor, Siria paused. Sirius walked onto the painted floors and she extended her foot onto the floor. "Why would you do this?" She asked.
"It's funny." He smiled at the icy painted floor. The floor had been painted to look like an iced over lake. It was textured with fine, snow like details in patches that had fallen from the cloudy looking roof. There were thin cracks painted into the ice. She stepped fully onto the floor and sighed with relief.
"It isn't real ice." Sirius grinned at her. "I couldn't do that here."
"If you did this at home, I'd be so mad." Siria confessed while they passed through a pair of doors that were painted to look like snowy tree trunks. The inside looked as if it had been hit with a catapult of cloth. While there were obviously three desks, their chairs, and a series of different sized mannequins, there was even more obviously heaps of cloth and samples. They couldn't stand anywhere without stepping on something.
"Err…" Siria looked around the room and to Sirius. There was a small smile in the corner of his mouth. He sighed, whipped out his wand, and gave it a wave. The fabric bolts rolled up and sorted themselves by colors on giant pegs that had been welded into the wall. Cut fabrics folded up and filed themselves in filing cabinets behind the row of mannequins, which straightened out. Buttons and beads around the room pulled themselves into mason jars that fastened to the magnetic bottom of a long bookshelf with baskets, where fabric scraps rolled or folded into.
"Chloe." Sirius smiled at Siria. "She gets a little carried away if she's left in the office because she counts on us to clean up after her." He sighed and sat down at the desk in front of peg wall. Siria walked around the room.
"So," A blush crept into Siria's cheeks, "Padfoot got the idea from seeing me in handmedowns that I'd fixed up, got Moony to agree to help, and they were lucky enough a down on her luck designer overheard them talking?"
"We were." He nodded. Siria stood before the windows, looking out onto the city. "Remus and I didn't know anything about Muggle money. If Chloe hadn't overhead us, Moony & Padfoot would have been a lot more magically oriented, but we would also be unheard of.
"Now, I can leave you with a fortune in both worlds." Sirius told her. Siria's throat sank into her stomach.
"Leave?" She choked.
"Oh, not for a good long while. Despite what you joke, you're old man is pretty young."
"Good!" Siria marched from the window to his chair and hugged him. "You need to live to be at least as old as Dumbledore." He laughed.
"I'd be very lucky to get that old." Sirius patted her back. "To business though."
Sirius called Kreacher, who popped into the room with a crack. Kreacher gave Siria a large grin and beamed up at her. Sirius had Kreacher guard the door while he closed the curtains. Siria stood in the middle of the room, feeling her heart hammer. "Remember," Sirius told her. "As Secret Keeper of Number Twelve, you have to tell people you live at the flat, okay?" She nodded.
The unmistakable crack of someone Apparating caused Siria to jerk her head. Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, in a magnificent set of blue and purple robes, stood before them. He had a kind smile, but serious feel in the twinkle of his blue eyes. Something about Dumbledore, Sirius, and Kreacher being there for the transfer of Secret Keeper moving from Sirius to Siria that made it both wonderful and terrible for her. Though Sirius had said he would make her Secret Keeper because he felt bad that they didn't know when the storm required for her Animagus transformation would occur, she knew it was more.
Her week at the Dursleys' was full of visits from Sirius for more than adoption paperwork and her name change to Potter-Black. He had been open with the fact that he, Dumbledore, Remus, and others wanted to be ready. Siria didn't have to ask why or for what. They were preparing for Tom Riddle's return as Voldemort— the Dark Wizard that terrorized the Wizarding World, Muggles, and had killed countless people, Siria's parents included.
When Sirius broke the Fidelius Charm on himself, Siria wasn't sure it had worked. Nothing seemed any different, until he placed it on her. There was a rush of pressure. It felt like she had been thrown under water. Her palms thrust to the floor in an attempt to keep herself up. Siria's very breath escaped her until Dumbledore placed his hand on her shoulder. He and Sirius pulled her to her feet.
Once she stood up, the weight was still there, but felt less like the pressure of being under water and more like an invisible hand was pressing against her chest. She took a large, full breath. The weight stayed. Sirius gave her a small smile. He asked where she lived. "38 Baker Street, flat D." She grinned at him. Sirius crossed his arms. Siria looked to Dumbledore. "I don't suppose I'll get to learn how you melted the locket this summer?" She asked him. Dumbledore and Sirius smiled at her. Siria rocked on the balls of her feet while she grinned at them. She knew it wasn't fair to impair their plans, but she wasn't about to give up the chance of learning how to take care of cursed objects.
"Well," Dumbledore looked over his crescent moon glasses, at Sirius. "Like father, like daughter."
The rest of her second week of summer was spent between two of Siria's favorite places: Hogwarts and Grimmauld Place. She was never without Kreacher, Sirius, Dumbledore, or Remus, and they were almost always doing something magic and wonderful. Part of Siria felt she learned more in that week than she had in her first two years of Hogwarts combined. Dumbledore taught her Fiendfyre and its' counter. Remus tested her Healing Spells and taught her defensive ones with Sirius. She dueled with Sirius for at least two hours a day. He refused to move on until she could produce a Shield Charm every time.
Saturday night, at 38 Baker Street, Hermione arrived with Chloe. "It was the craziest thing!" Chloe told them as she sat down to eat. "I was going to show Hermione your old place, but I could not remember where you used to live for the life of me!" She gave a loud sigh. "I can't possibly be getting old." Chloe looked into a decorative mirror with her face in her hands, as if she were trying to stop her aging.
"It's cool." Siria said while she piled some mashed potatoes onto her plate. "If 'Mione really wants to see, I'll have Sirius swing by before we go to Ron's." She wasn't about to tell Chloe that they were going to the "old place" tonight. Chloe was a Muggle and the less she knew, the better.
"Speaking of seeing," Chloe shot a sharp look to Sirius. "Tomorrow we're going to the optometrist and getting your daughter some new glasses. I'm not letting her leave until we get her at least two pairs."
"I'm getting glasses!" Siria asked and looked to Sirius. He clicked his tongue.
"It was going to be a surprise, but yes." he replied flatly. Hermione smiled.
"You knew?" Siria asked her. Hermione looked apologetically over her fork. "'Mione!"
"It was a surprise." Hermione whispered. Siria sighed, but couldn't hide her excitement.
For the last six years, Siria had worn the same pair of old, repeatedly broken glasses. Sometimes they gave her headaches. Lately, street signs and billboards had gotten blurry. She gave a dreamy sigh. This was shaping to be the best summer yet: Adopted, Secret Keeper, hands-on training with Dumbledore and Remus, dueling with Sirius, she got to see Moony & Padfoot, and would be getting in glasses in time for the Quidditch World Cup.
"Have you heard from anyone?" Hermione asked Siria.
"Yeah. Astoria and Colin have sent me a letter everyday— Colin's brother already got his acceptance letter." Siria replied.
"Astoria told me. She said he was already getting worried that his brother may not get in. I think she was almost as relieved as he was about it."
"She's sweet like that." Siria looked to Sirius. "Hey dad, what do you think about giving me a sister—" Sirius's face fell. "A Remua Black?" She chuckled. Hermione chortled.
"If you really want one…" Sirius snickered.
"I suppose I could always marry someone with a sister." Siria suggested playfully.
"You know who would be great? I hear Daphne Greengrass has—" Hermione winced when Siria kicked her under the table.
"Greengrass?" Sirius asked in a startled tone. Siria dropped her eyes to her plate. Chloe pulled out her phone. "Oh my, would you look at that?" Chloe said while she got to her feet. "It's just past time to talk and is time for me to leave!" She waved and closed the door of the flat behind her.
"Pureblood Greengrass?" Sirius asked.
"I don't like her! I like Travers!" Siria's hand shot to her mouth. Hermione looked wide-eyed at her. Siria pushed her plate forward to plop her head on the table.
"That's fine." Sirius told her. "I'd rather you liked someone that wasn't Pureblood, but that really isn't fair for them."
"Travers is a girl." Siria whispered at the table, "Like Hermione."
"I'd really love to hear more. If it's alright with you, we'll table this talk, until we're home and Hermione is settled."