Over the Threshold

"James!" exclaimed Sirius Black, throwing his arms around his rather startled best friend. Hugging James like there was no tomorrow, Sirius effectively prevented James's wife, Lily, and infant son, Harry, from crossing his home's threshold—much to the former's annoyance, and the latter's confusion.

James, taken aback but pleased, patted Sirius on the back awkwardly. "It's great that you missed me, Padfoot," he said reassuringly. He glanced at Lily, bewildered. She rolled her eyes expressively.

"U'cle Pa'foo!" cried Harry peremptorily.

Sirius paid no heed.

"Okay, Sirius, mate, oxygen becoming an issue," said James, making some effort to free himself. Sirius let go, but before either James or Lily could demand an explanation, he had thrown his arms around Lily.

"Hey!" she yelped, rather surprised, then cried "Baby!" pointedly, handing Harry to James to prevent his being crushed, and frowning at Sirius. "Whose costume you're supposed to notice, by the way. Black," she sighed. "You are such a weirdo."

At that, Sirius let her go, and grabbed Harry, swinging him into the air, and then clutching him to his chest. "Pronslet! Safe! Safe and sound!" he cried ecstatically. Harry squirmed to be free, and his godfather reluctantly loosened his death-grip, his tall frame still amply filling the doorway.

"Okay, Padfoot: what's going on?" asked James, reaching the limit of his patience. "I missed you too, but we saw you a couple of days ago—what's with the long-lost soulmate routine?"

"Yeah, that was some hug," teased Lily. "Should I be jealous?"

Sirius had the grace to look embarrassed. "Uh…" he mumbled, tucking a strand of too-long silky black hair behind one ear awkwardly.

"U'cle Pa'foo!" said Harry authoritatively, saving his godfather in the nick of time. "Down!" Sirius put him down, and Harry squeezed around him easily and ran into his threadbare apartment. Lily visibly restrained herself from blasting Sirius with a good hex and following her son.

"So…what's up?" asked James, adapting himself to the situation and leaning one shoulder casually against the doorjamb.

"Yes, do tell," muttered Lily, glaring.

Sirius responded in true dramatic style: "I thought you were dead!" he exclaimed, throwing out his arms and hitting his knuckles on the wall. He winced, but valiantly continued: "Voldemort burned your house down twenty minutes ago! They're still checking on your neighbors, but eyewitnesses claimed Voldemort stormed up to your house, yanked open the door, and disappeared inside. Not three minutes later, he stormed out again, sent some sort of light messenger thing—maybe a Patronus, but the Ministry hasn't been able to make sense of that part of the story yet—and then turned and set fire to your house! Blue and white fire, which just shows you—and then another black-robed figure showed up, and the pair of them practically destroyed Godric's Hollow—although, in all honesty, that part might be a tiny bit exaggerated. Still. We have to get you three in hiding again!"

"Yeah," Lily said sarcastically, white-faced. "Because that worked out so well the first time. You do realize what this means?"

"We need to find Peter," James agreed, his mouth set in an uncompromising line.

Sirius sobered immediately. "I know. I sent Remus a Patronus—he should be here any minute now. I can't believe we thought it was him, and all the time Peter was the spy. Little Wormtail—he was never all that strong, but I thought he was all right."

"Me too," sighed James heavily.

"Me three," said a new voice. James, Sirius, and Lily turned, to behold grey, shabby Remus Lupin, his eyes crinkling happily at the corners at the sight of them. His mouth remained hard and unforgiving, but his eyes gave him away.

"Moony," cried James and Sirius with one voice. "Can you ever forgive us?"

"Well…" Remus teased. "I might have to hold it against you for a few years, bringing it up when you argue with me, discount my advice…"

"Thank Godric!" Sirius said devoutly. The three young men exchanged a heartfelt, but brief, group hug, while Lily looked on indulgently, one hand on her hip.

"I never thought you were the spy, Remus," she assured him.

"Well, we're not out of the woods yet," said Remus, gently disengaging himself from James and Sirius. "In fact, we have a big problem."

"Peter," James and Sirius once more spoke together.

"Snuffles!" exclaimed Lily, her hand flying to her mouth.

"What?" the three men asked, bewildered.

Lily glared. "Our cat! The poor thing!"

"Oh, right," said James vaguely, looking slightly conscience-stricken. Lily rolled her eyes, and went to check on her son.

"There's Peter, but the problem is you three," Remus continued. "James, you and Lily really need a new protection spell. Like, right now. If the media's got it right, Voldemort is royally ticked you lot weren't home to welcome him with tea and biscuits when he came by to murder you. We have got to act fast."

"What, no textbook talk?" teased Sirius.

"Now, Padfoot. Let's go to your kitchen and do the darn spell. I brought everything we'll need, and then you and I can swing by Dumbledore's office and warn him, and then we'll hunt down Peter. Got it?"

James and Sirius exchanged a look, but they knew when to quit. "Got it," James sighed, not looking forward to yet another period of enforced isolation while his two best friends in the world hunted down his oldest friend—he'd known Peter since they were both toddlers, and never, never, never in a thousand years would he have dreamed Peter could betray him like this—and killed him. Because that was what it would come to—he could read it in Sirius's posture, and Remus's practical, clipped tones. With a sigh, he turned toward the door of Sirius's apartment, to tell Lily the new plan, hoping she wouldn't waste even more time begging Moony and Padfoot to admire Harry's pumpkin costume, and, in spite of himself, rather longing for a nice, fast and furious duel with the greatest Dark wizard who had ever lived, just because it had been so long since he'd had any fun.

Meanwhile, some few moments before the Potters arrived on Sirius Black's dilapidated doorstep, a tall, dark figure in an enveloping black cloak was pacing up and down angrily in front of what had been, until very recently, number 3 Shady Lane, Godric's Hollow.

A loud Crack! precipitated the arrival of his favorite henchwoman. Bellatrix Lestrange was a young witch at the height of her powers and her rather incredible beauty. She was also extremely loyal to him. Voldemort liked that in a woman.

"Master, you summoned me?" she asked, after bending down and kissing the hem of his robes reverently.

"Yes. The Potters!"

"You killed them?" she ventured, glancing inquiringly into his white face.

"They weren't there!" he lamented, gesturing at the wreckage of their home idly. "Months of effort—Pettigrew, the snot-nosed idiot, told me they would be here!"

Making a silent vow to torture Peter Pettigrew to death at the earliest opportunity for vexing her Master, Bellatrix murmured sympathetically, "Do you want me to find them, my Lord?"

"No!" Voldemort paced angrily, crushing what few planets had survived the flying sparks from the fire under his feet. "After all that work, to be foiled by—who? Someone must have warned them—told them Pettigrew couldn't be trusted! There's no other explanation! But who? Dumbledore! Of course! That Muggle-loving fool has always stood in my way! Suppose the prophecy was a deliberate ruse, just to make me concentrate all my efforts on those pestilential Potters!"

"Forgive me, my Lord," Bellatrix began, inwardly quaking with nerves and shivering with joy that her Lord was confiding her, but determined to make the most of this opportunity to enjoy a conversation with him that lasted longer than: "Bellatrix, these are my orders. Kill So-and-So. Bring me that," and "Yes, Master."

"What prophecy?" she asked nervously.

It was a testament to how completely overset Voldemort was at the Potters' unexpected absence that he answered Bellatrix's question, rather than torturing her for being so nosy. "The prophecy! It supposedly said something about the 'one with the power to defeat the Dark Lord' being born in July, to parents who had defied me three times—there are only two such children, of course, but I was so sure the Potter brat—"

"Well," suggested Bellatrix diffidently. "If there are two such children, wouldn't it be more prudent to kill them both?"

"Hmmm," murmured Voldemort, a slow, evil smile spreading across his face. "Bella," he said, looking down at her, "you have your uses."

Bellatrix flushed with pleasure. "My Lord," she murmured ecstatically. "I live to serve you."

"I know," Voldemort murmured, flicking her cheek with a careless finger. "I know."