The icy sun glared at the depthless sea. Its rays feebly crept through the tiny window, casting a bar of dying light into the emptiness. It was a sickly yellow, as though the stench of this nightmare had seeped into it. Day after day I would sit crouched in it, imagining that it was warming my skin, instead of freezing sweat born of screams to my face. Light was beautiful, and when we glimpsed it, for a flicker of a moment we felt hope, and a crumb of sanity would enter into our minds. For a shadow of an instant, we could actually picture a place where we would not waste away watching our breath curl into the air before fading away. We could see a place where delightfully gravelly and rough cement would meet our skin in place of the slime and filth that oozes over every solid thing in this wretched place. But then the vision would be gone, sucked from our hearts by the creatures that you thought were shadows, the nameless panic that seizes you when all is dark, that chill running down your spine.
And then came the darkness. You never knew when it would come to stay. When the sun would begin to set again in the fall, that's when we'd begin praying, "Please, God. Let the sun rise tomorrow!" But the nights would lengthen, our prayers go unanswered, and the nightmares would close in. The worst moments, the darkest memories of our lives would be lived again, haunting our soul, every time the sun sunk behind the endless expanse of black water. Then even the sun forgot us. Those were the worst times. Emptiness that stretched into perpetuum would creep into my soul, hollow out my heart, and break my mind and spirit. You didn't know if you were dead or alive, wondered if there had ever been anything in life besides the putrid stench of waste and rot, the endless battle for sanity, the tormented screams at night. Sewage froze to the floor and walls, and prisoners died from cold where the tattered insulation charm had worn through. The bodies would stay until spring. On a rare and wondrous occasion, a light would pierce the void - a swinging lantern from a rowboat bringing a new victim to our hell. I would hear the choked gasps of relief as proof of our former life silently approached. I could hear the rustle of robes as prisoners crowded around their windows reaching desperately toward the feeble orb of light. When the prisoners entered, they would wail that they hadn't done anything, weeping for their mothers, screaming for mercy. But a week would pass, and silence enveloped them, and the madness would take them. Sometimes a prisoner was released. Whenever a boat bore a prisoner away, the screams began. Men died of terror, for they knew what would follow. The Dementors would scream a horrifying scream like an icy gust of wind whistling through a dark alley. They would sweep through the shadows, sucking every drop of hope from the fortress to compensate for their lost victim.
I lived for the yearly inspections, when another sane being would be near me. But the first three years of my imprisonment, there was no inspection. After the fall of Voldemort, it took the world a year to find a replacement for the Minister of Magic, and he wasn't in office for two weeks before he was assassinated, right before the inspection date. Three months later, after Crouch's descent of grace, a timid Hufflepuff volunteered for the job. However, the day after his election was the inspection day, and, considering it too unpleasant to visit so soon after celebration, skipped the inspection altogether. Finally, soon after the 49th full moon since my arrival, Azkaban prepared for inspection. Spells were cast to hide the slime, the prisoners were taken to the courtyard where we were stripped and hosed off with water that numbed the senses and burned cold. But I still pined for the eyes of one who still had something to live for.
Insanity would grip me, slowly seething into my struggling mind. There were times when I just wanted to let go and let blessed lunacy take control. But I wouldn't let myself.
How did I survive?
I often ask myself that question. Padfoot, obviously, played a major role, but until now I've wondered - how did I manage to hold on? It was James. He entrusted me with his son. I swore an oath to raise Harry like my own should anything happen to he and Lily.
That was my reason for survival.
That was all my reasons.