Chapter Seven: A Conscience Lifted

"Once Harry heard the whole story, he figured out why Snape hated Remus so much. As soon as Harry said it, however, we heard Snape's voice come from the corner of the room," Sirius said dramatically.

"What," James, Lily and Cedric said.

"How could that be possible," James said. "Even if he knew you were all in the Shrieking Shack you should have seen him enter the room."

"Remember I told you when Remus started telling his story we all heard the door creak?" Sirius asked his confused audience.

"Yeah," Lily said.

"That was Snape opening the door."

There was an intake of breath, but no one dared say anything.

"He had seen the Marauder's Map sitting on Remus's desk. Then he had found Harry's Invisibility Cloak just lying on the ground by the willow," Sirius said.

"How do you know all this?" Cedric asked, "I mean Snape wouldn't have just stood there and told you all this."

"As a matter of fact that is exactly what Snape did," Sirius said chuckling, "when he pulled off the Cloak he was covering Remus with his wand, and then he stood there and told us all about how he had found us."

"Why did he do that?" Cedric asked.

"Maybe he just wanted to brag," James said.

"Probably," Sirius sniggered. "But at the time I wasn't thinking about why he was doing anything. Not with Snape pointing his wand at Remus."

"Remus said something that Snape didn't like, so Snape bound and gagged Remus with a wave of his wand. I tried to charge at Snape, but he pointed his wand at me and I knew he would kill me if I gave him a reason."

Cedric looked shocked. Lily was confused, but James was angry.

"You know, I expect snooping around and stealing of old Snivellus," James said, "I am not even surprised by the threatening to kill Sirius part, but binding and gagging a fellow teacher is a new low."

Lily opened her mouth to defend her childhood friend, but found she didn't know how.

"The boy I knew would never have done that," Lily said.

"Well, I guess the boy you knew grew up," James said.

"Yeah," Sirius said, "into a nut job."

Lily didn't say anything.

James noticed.

"What happened next?" James asked, so Lily didn't have to.

"Harry and Ron didn't know what to do," Sirius said, "Hermione said Snape should listen to what we had to say, but Snape just told her to hold her tongue."

"But Hermione didn't listen to Snape," Sirius said, smiling happily at Hermione's disobedience.

"Let me guess," James said, "Snape didn't listen to her."

Sirius nodded.

"Snape got so mad sparks flew out of the end of his wand, which was still pointed at my face."

James flinched.

"I hear ya, mate," Sirius said, "not a comfortable situation."

"So now Snape started talking about how happy he was to be the one to catch me and all sorts of other petty stuff like that. To be honest, I wasn't listening then and I don't remember what he said now. I just said that as long as Ron brought his rat up to the castle I would come quietly."

"What really caught my attention was what Snape said next. He wasn't planning on taking us to the castle; just out of the willow so he could call the Dementors."

"Oh," Cedric said, sullenly.

"Oh what?" James asked.

"The Ministry had given the Dementors permission to kiss Sirius if they found him," Cedric explained.

James looked outraged. Lily looked mortified but said nothing.

"Now as you can imagine this freaked me out," Siruis said calmly, "I tried again to get Snape to listen, but he was too blinded by rage."

"Snape made the ropes attached to Remus fly into his hands and said that maybe the Dementors would have a kiss for him too."

The expression on Lily's face now was that of confused horror. Sirius was starting to wish he hadn't mentioned that part.

"He was willing to let the Dementors kiss Remus too!" James said shocked.

"Yep," Sirius said, "but it gets better in a sec."

"How?"

"Harry walked across the room and blocked Snape's path. He said Remus had more than enough opportunity to kill him this year in their private lessons."

"Tell me Harry got through to him this time," Lily said.

Sirius shook his head.

"If he had been this bad a listener at school, he never would have passed anything," James said.

"Yeah, you're right," Sirius said sniggering. "And Harry agreed with you for the most part."

"Harry called Snape pathetic for not even trying to listen just because we had made a fool of him at school," Sirius continued.

"Let me guess," James said, "Snape didn't listen."

"How did you know!" Sirius asked, smiling.

"Snape mentioned you, James," Sirius continued, "and told Harry that he should be thanking Snape on bended knee for saving his life."

Suddenly Sirius's calm story-telling voice turned into gleeful excitement.

"This is my favourite part," he said, "Harry, Ron and Hermione all pointed their wands at Snape in unison and yelled 'Expelliarmus!'"

"They did what?" Cedric said.

"They knocked Snape out cold," Siruis said with a loving sigh, "he was lifted off his feet and slammed into the wall. His wand flew up, up and away." Sirius was chuckling now.

"How were they not expelled?" Cedric said in wonder.

"Hermione had the same reaction," Sirius said, smiling. "She started saying things like 'we attached a teacher' and 'oh, we are going to be in so much trouble.'"

"Though now I think it's really a great story, at the time I thought Harry should have left Snape to me and I told him so. But he didn't reply."

"Please tell me someone untied poor Remus," James said.

"That would be me," Sirius said. "And then Remus thanked Harry."

"Ahh," James mocked, "and not you."

Sirius said something under his breath, but otherwise ignored James.

"Harry said he still didn't believe us, so Remus said it was time for proof and asked Ron for Peter."

"But Ron had a question. He asked how I knew Peter was this rat if I was locked up in Azkaban."

"Remus said it was a fair question, so I answered it."

"Ron was still unconvinced. Ron made up excuses for Peter's missing finger and Remus pointed out how they didn't make sense."

"Ron blamed Crookshanks for his rat's current state and called him mad, but I contradicted him. Crookshanks, as you all know, is intelligent enough to recognize Peter and help me sneak into Gryffindor tower."

"I still can't believe it was a cat that got you into the tower," Cedric said.

Sirius grinned.

"When Hermione asked how her cat had helped me, I explained everything to her."

"When I said that faking his own death had worked once for Peter, Harry suddenly went back to the 'you killed my parents' shtick he had been repeating all freaking evening." Sirius sighed.

"I told him 'no' to the you-killed-my-parents question, and 'yes' to the are-you-here-to-finish-off-Peter question."

"Harry was apparently not impressed with the I-was-there-to-kill-someone thing, even if it wasn't him," Sirius sighed, and turned to Lily.

"He is too much like you."

"I beg your pardon," Lily said.

From the look he was getting from both Lily and James, Sirius decided to drop it.

"Remus tried to explain by saying it was the other way around," Sirius said, "but Harry said that it wasn't true. He said that I had said so before Remus showed up."

Sirius's happy demeanour vanished as he looked down at his feet and said, "I shook my head at Harry and said I as good as killed you."

Lily put her hand under Sirius's chin and made him look up, her annoyance at him gone.

"It wasn't your fault," she said.

"But I made you change Secret-Keepers at the last moment," Sirius said.

"You made us do no such thing!" Lily said. "It was a good idea, Sirius. It is Voldemort who is responsible for our deaths, not you."

Sirius lowered his head again.

"Is this what you didn't want to tell us before?" James asked.

Sirius nodded.

"I noticed you falter when you first started to tell us your story," James said. "I was worried you were hiding something big. I'm glad it was nothing important."

Sirius looked up again at this. "NOTHING IMPORTANT!" he yelled. "How can you say that! I get my best friends killed and it isn't important!"

"As we have already said," James said, "you did nothing of the sort! Now stop feeling guilty for something you didn't do and keep telling your story. 'Cause right now I don't see how you are going to get Harry to believe you at all, let alone how you end up befriending him."

"What did you think?" Lily said. "If we had been mad at you, don't you think we would have showed it when you first showed up?"

"I knew you weren't mad at me," Sirius said, "I thought that maybe you did blame me, but you had I don't know forgot or something since you have been here so long."

"Ever since we found out you were blamed for our murders we have felt sorry for you," Lily said. "We never blamed you. You should have seen James's face when we found out you escaped."

Sirius turned from Lily to James.

"It was very funny," James said, "the wizard who told us almost fell over from shock when the 'victims' of the spy were happy he got free."

The two friends smiled at each other.

Sirius didn't say anything for a while. He was feeling lighter than he had in longer than he could remember.

"Ow," Sirius said as Cedric kicked him. "What was that for?"

"For stopping your story at a really good bit," Cedric said. "We are all starved for entertainment around here and you are making us wait."

Sirius glared down at Cedric in a falsely annoyed way.