Chapter Two

Recap:

"Speaking of the king of short attention spans... I better go." She clearly didn't necessarily want to. She had a deep desire to take care of Remus when he looked so sick and tired.

"See you soon," He said with that same wan smile, frowning as Madam Pomfrey ushered his friends out of the hospital wing, advancing on him with a potion in her grasp.

"Finally!" Sirius snapped, rather irritably. "Let's get to the common room before she summons Hades fire. Besides, maybe James is back." He added on a bit of brighter note, heading for the grand staircase that led to the Dormitories.

"What did Remus say?" He asked rather conversationally as they ascended the stairs.

"Never you mind but we have charms homework tonight, so no fooling around, alright? We have to get through the month without another strike. Mother'd send a howler if one of us were to fail out a test." She said, gently as she could, but firm. Making it clear she'd accept absolutely no nonsense. She was used to taking care of her brother's welfare and nothing was going to change that. She knew he had her back, if she ever needed his help.

"Charms, right." He agreed. "Listen, Attie, I'm sorry about earlier, I was out of line. Besides, Peter is a much better target for my... Random acts of wand waving." He chuckled.

"Sirius, you know I'm not fond of the cold, and you know I'm not afraid to retaliate. Just... keep it in mind." She sighed, "And yes, he's a little rat in so many ways. He gives me the creeps, why do you guys let him follow around, anyway, pity?"

"It's James," He said with a sigh. "James feels bad about him not really having anyone... Because, well, Lily... Yeah, everything is Evans with him. So, Peter, being the leech he is, latched on... Speak of the devil..." He said, noticing Peter scurrying their way, not really possessing the initiative to deal with him... "Hurry, in the portrait hole!" He urged Atria as the Fat Lady swung forward to let them in.

Atria ducked in quickly, ahead of her brother. "Oh, bother..." She muttered.

Sirius hurried behind her, the portrait swinging closed behind him as they hurried up to the boys dormitories, Sirius slamming the large door quickly, sliding the large plank of wood in place to keep the door 'locked'. "Whew," He panted. "That was a close one."

Atria sighed, sinking onto her brother's bed. "Too damn close. I'm in no mood for that... thing... to be drooling all over me right now." She muttered. Tucking her bangs out of her face once more, as she undid her cloak and tossed it, folded, over to the chair.

"I swear, if he hits on you again, I deal quite a mean bat bogey hex." He said with a smirk, getting his bag and pulling out his charms book, settling into one of the plush winged chairs.

"Yeah, and so do I." Atria said, flatly, "But he didn't take the hint last time, now, did he? No." She moved to turn his book right side up, for him.

"Honestly." She tsk'd.

"I was getting to it!" He said with a frown. "Credit me with at least a little bit of intelligence!" He sighed, brushing his ebony tresses out of his eyes with a sweep of his hand.

Atria smirked, "Oh, I know you have it... but I can't but wonder if it's yet to be tapped into at all sometimes." She teased, playfully, summoning her own book, parchment, quill and ink, carefully, letting the supplies in the window, shutting it quickly from the cold.

"Oh, that's rich." He said grumpily, beginning to read the first question, unfurling some parchment, dipping his quill in its inkwell before jotting down an answer, which was a rather lengthy paragraph worth of writing. He felt pretty good doing his homework for once.

Atria smiled, getting to work, herself; very glad that she had her brother doing his work.

She checked on him, every few minutes, silently, to make sure he was still working.

Sirius got about half way though, quill stopping on his parchment. "Where the bloody hell is James?" He asked with a sigh, figuring that he was probably checking on Remus or something.

"He's probably necking with Lily in the common room. Keep working." She said, not even having to glance up to know he'd stopped writing.

"Remus put you up to this, didn't he?" He asked a dark undertone in his voice as he began to put his quill to his parchment again.

"Honestly, he's gotta stop doing this. It's bloody torture." He continued to scribble onto his parchment, the questions he was answering seeming to be become a bit agonizing.

"No, the homework was and is my idea, secondly, anyway, as firstly it was the professor's idea." Atria said, with a bit of a smirk.

Not about to betray Remus's wish for her to keep Sirius subdued, and she most certainly didn't want him to be aware of the added suggestion of what she really hoped might get to be a... dare she think it... date? Gods, how she hoped so...

Sirius arched a brow at the look that seemed to form behind those blue eyes of hers; shrugging it off, finishing up his Charms homework, scribbling his name at the top right-hand corner before rolling it up and stowing it away. "There, all done!" He said enthusiastically.

"Not a chance let me see it." Atria sighed. Having just finished going over her own for mistakes, holding her hand out to her brother.

"Awww Atria, give me a break, I was gonna proofread later. You know what they say: You catch your mistakes better once you step away for a while."

"I want to be sure you actually did it all, correctly. I'm not going to check your grammar... which is in dire need of help, anyway... Come on."

"Oh, damn it all, here." He sighed, shoving the roll of parchment into her hand.

Atria nodded, "Thank you." She said, moving to glance over it, quickly. Knowing how much he wanted out of there. He was restless--she could tell, see all the little signs. She knew him too well. They were almost identical, anyway. Facial features, everything except that she was a girl, and he was a boy, and her eyes held more blue than steel. She knew all his moods, everything. And sometimes that disturbed her, but not all the time. She finished checking over his work, and handed it back. "Good." She said, in monotone, shaking her head a bit. "Thank you for not making me pull teeth to get you to work."

"Yes mother." He said with a smirk, kicking back in the chair, a bit less tense now that his homework was out of the way.

"Speaking of mother...Not that I care...Any word at all? I mean, apart from the nasty; trite, 'blood traitor' remarks. I swear, you could write to that woman about sunshine and puppies and she'd turn it into all sorts of other dismal crap."

"Only that if I don't bring you home for Yule, I can consider myself in the same sort of damage as you, and should keep in mind never to return home again..." Atria mused.

"It's beginning to sound like a good option, honestly." She rolled a shoulder, "You know she's disliked us since we were 11 for getting Gryffindor, that's not about to change over night, not with the trouble you had to start last summer, and I still cannot believe you left me to deal with her wrath for two and a half weeks." She sighed.

"I'm sorry," He apologized, lowering his eyes. "I had to leave I was going to kill her if she said one more thing about the Potter's. And what's this about being home for Yule? There's going to be a Yule Ball?" Sirius honestly had no idea of this goings on.

"No, but she's... oh what word did she use? Disgusted her children don't see her over holiday, and don't partake in family activities and the like. Apparently she's having one of her things where she invites people we're somehow related to over for black market roast dragon and the like. Pagan Yule, you know. Knowing mother, there'll be plenty of devil worship in the mix." She said, with mock-excitement.

"And torture closets." He said with a shudder. "But I doubt mother filled you in on that little tidbit."

"Oh, no, but they are promised. I vote we don't go. Let our dear little brother deal with her. She adores him, anyway." She said, waving a hand dismissively.

"I second that motion." Sirius agreed, running a hand through his hair. "Regulus is the perfect saint." He sighed, a bit of a frown tugging at his handsome features. "I don't want mum to put you in the locker, either, for not bringing me home with you... Maybe we should just tough it out? I mean, we've got each other, and if it gets positively horrendous, we can always visit James. Remus will probably be there too."

Atria resisted the urge to perk up considerably at the thought of seeing Remus over holiday.

"I like how you think... Sometimes." she teased with a wry bit of a smirk.

"If you're not going to mum's, I am most definitely not going." She gave a slight nod of agreement and finality then.

She sighed, "Hard to believe, only a little over a year left of school, then we're really on our own, isn't it?"

"So... We'll visit mom for a night, you know, just to get her off our backs, and we'll head over to the Potter's for some breakfast and presents. I'll just have to try my damndest not to let anyone piss me off." The last statement was one of apprehension. Lucius or Regulus, or his mother would always manage to tick him off... Then again there was always Andromeda.

"Try being the operative word, right?" Atria smiled a bit to her brother, softly.

"Yes, Attie," He replied. "Try most definitely being the operative word." He said, trying to avoid the feeling of oncoming dread. "When is Yule, anyway?" He thought aloud.

"For us the 23rd, I think... Break starts the 17th." Atria sighed, rubbing the back of her neck a bit.

"Good, I'll have time to prepare, and Remus should be up and kicking." He smiled, yawning a bit.

Atria paused, but didn't continue her thoughts alloud as she almost had, simply catching the yawn from her brother and shooting him a glare for it.

"Ugh... think we could go to dinner, without you getting expelled, or should we just go to the kitchens and avoid temptations altogether?"

Sirius rose fluidly from his seat, his grin a mile wide. "What's life without temptation?" He asked, dropping his cloak onto the chair, rubbing his hands together. "Let's go."

"Ah... maybe I should take this..." Atria said, slipping her brother's wand from the pocket it sat in, after straitening her things to take them up to her own room; sticking it in the inner pocket of her robes, with her wand.

"I don't want you in trouble. Just hold out the semester without any more, please?" She pressed. They had a conversation or ten of this nature every day.

"Hey! My wand! You can't just take it!" He said feeling a bit vulnerable. "What if I get hexed? It'll be on your head, Attie!" He said a matter-of-factly.

"You get hexed, and I'll give whomever a what-for, for you, how about that?" Atria suggested, smirking a bit.

"I just don't want trouble, okay? You can go one meal without hexing Severus can't you?" She demanded, as they headed down the stairs, and she paused at the bottom before heading back up her own, as she knew he couldn't follow her up.

"Ugh! Damn you!" He cursed, frowning, far too involved in being frustrated to see Peter running up to him. This irked him to an incredibly heightened degree as well. Peter was just the kind of person he would usually need his wand for.

"S--Sirius! I tried catching up to you earlier, but you mustn't have seen me!"

Oh, I saw you all right. He said inwardly.

"Oh, how odd, I guess not." He said rather civilly. Gods, now he was sugar coating things? He was beginning to have an inkling of fear that he would have to shelve his wit for the time being. At that thought, he bristled inwardly.

"Peter, won't you join us for dinner? Attie's been dieing to see you!"

Atria gave Sirius an absolute look to kill, before hurrying upstairs, rather than responding. She hung her cloak up, and put her things away, making sure her brother's and her wand were safely in place, before she took the time to head back downstairs, 'accidentally' tripping into her brother, landing heavily with the heel of a Mary Jane onto his toes. "Ah, stupid stairs!"

Sirius yowled in pain, positively furious. "When this is over I'm going to hex you into next year!" He hissed softly.

"H--hello Atria," Peter stammered, blushing slightly.

Atria sighed, "Hi, Peter. Did you manage to finish your charms homework okay? I remember Lily said she was going to help you after lunch." She said, being painfully polite, after sharply elbowing her brother, once more 'on accident'. She was disgusted by this rat of a boy, but knew her friends--of the female persuasion, anyway--took pity on the roly-poly young boy.

"I did!" He squeaked in a response. "Lily is so very helpful to me; such a nice girl." He said jovially.

"Yeah, yeah, real nice girl, now let's go!" He urged the both of them, shooting a dagger at Atria.

"If you'd have given me my wand, we wouldn't have this problem, would we?" He asked, smiling sweetly at her concealing an utter malice behind the plastered expression.

"Knowing you? Yes, yes, dear brother we likely would." Atria said, rolling her eyes, "I'm not letting you let your temper get the better of you, not right now. Do you understand me? I'll tell Annee you don't like her, if you cause me one more shred of grief. I can tell her so many things, or I could tell James how you were making fun of Evans this morning." She hissed at her brother. They could be downright evil children to one another. Now was just one of those times.

"Oh, you witch." He said, his eyes narrowing into steely slits. But suddenly he straightened up, putting on a rather calm expression. "Well, played." He admitted. "Lets just get some damn dinner and be done with it!"

"P--pardon me, S---Sirius, but w-what pro---problem would th--that be?"

Sirius waved his wand hand dismissively. "It's resolved, no harm done." He said with a slight sigh of defeat. "I'm behaving," He said, suppressing a shudder.

Atria smirked, with a bit of triumph in her pretty eyes, and she put an arm around her brother's shoulders, "I'm just that good, but I must admit I learned from the best." She teased, light-heartedly.

Once in the Great Hall, she went off to sit with Lily and the other girls from their year, so as Peter couldn't follow her, with no more than a 'Ta' to her twin.

Sirius ate hurriedly as though the whole partaking in the natural, yet necessary gesture was the most painstaking thing he'd ever put himself through.

While Peter started into his food, sighing a little sadly at seeing Atria go off with the other girls of their year.