A/N: Candlemas is celebrated in the US as Groundhog Day.
11. Candlemas
After a quiet, yet joyous Christmas with Remus, Sirius retrieved Buckbeak from Grimmauld Place and began his journey to Hogsmeade. His travels took him from village to village as he made his way north. He and the Hippogriff would find a place to camp just outside of town and, under the cover of darkness while all the townspeople were sleeping, he would scavenge what food he could from garbage bins. During the long, cold nights of January they slept in the hollow of trees, caves, or abandon farmhouses, keeping warm by the flames of a small, conjured fire.
At the end of that first month, Sirius found himself on the top of a tall hill, looking down onto a small wizarding village. Night was falling and Sirius watched as the villagers lit candles and placed them in windows and along the front walk of each house. "Candlemas," he said out loud, shaking his head in disbelief. It had been a long time since he had seen this tradition practiced. He had been unsure if anyone, other than his family members, even observed the holiday.
Candlemas marks the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and the Vernal Equinox. In Sirius' memory, the holiday had three purposes, though it was not obvious how they were all linked. The first purpose was weather related. Candlemas was the day when witches predicted how cold the remainder of winter would be and whether spring would arrive warm and wet or frosty and cold. Candles were lit as a reflection of the stars in heaven, to encourage a smooth and quick transition to spring.
Candlemas was also the day on which witches and wizards celebrated the blessing of children. Because Candlemas falls nine months after the Beltane fertility festival, it was considered lucky to be born on or around that time. It was traditional in homes to prepare the children's favorite meal and to have lots of sweets.
The third purpose of Candlemas was to encourage people to have children, by celebrating the joy of erotic love. While at Hogwarts, Sirius learned that most people only recognized this part of the holiday and celebrated it two weeks later on February 14 as Valentine's Day. It was almost comic to him then to watch how his friends interpreted the rituals and symbols of Valentine's Day.
"That's not a heart," he told them once when he was a young teen, pointing to a red so-called heart-shaped decoration. They were in Hogsmeade on Valentine's Day and the tea shops were festooned with valentines and arrows.
"Of course it is," said Peter. "Everyone knows that!"
"Human hearts are round with blood vessels emerging from them. This looks nothing like it!" Sirius shot back.
"Then what is it supposed to be?" Remus asked.
Sirius smirked and told them, which caused his friends to break down into a fits of giggles. "You are sick!" James laughed, punching his shoulder.
"And the arrow," Sirius continued, enjoying his ability to pass on to his friends this small piece of knowledge about their favorite topic of sex. "It's narrower, of course, but picture it thicker, the point slightly rounded, and the feathers…well, use your own sick imaginations. The valentine with the arrow in it is just a pretty symbol for shagging."
Sirius didn't remember much of Candlemas celebrations when he was a child, except for the fact that he always felt very tired once the candles were lit and dinner was served. Now as an adult he was pretty sure that his childhood sleepiness was the result of a sleeping potion administered to keep the children away and allow their parents to get on with the business of the night. He shuddered at the thought. Like most humans, it made Sirius uncomfortable to imagine his parents as ever being passionate with one another; however, being fervently religious, it was highly likely that this was how they spent Candlemas night.
Although Sirius despised his parents, even he recognized that they were an extremely attractive couple. Orion Black was the handsome younger son of a wealthy wizard and a witch rumored to have the gift of prophecy. As a young man, Orion was quite skilled at Quidditch and in Sirius' youth he still had a fondness for attending professional matches. With his good looks and charismatic charm, he was a good businessman who owned most of the properties in Knockturn Alley, thus allowing even his most questionable tenants to practice whatever they pleased. He even used his influence to intervene on their behalf when Aurors and other Ministry officials tried to close these businesses, claiming illegal business practices.
Orion Black was generous and gregarious with his family, friends, and business partners. Those who did not know him feared him, for it was rumored that he knew more about the Dark Arts than any living wizard. While this may have been true, what those people did not know was that Orion was a very religious man. To him, the Dark Arts were sacred. They were an old, secret tradition passed down through pure-blood families for centuries, not to be shared with outsiders or those deemed unworthy to possess them. Orion believed that only the most devout were worthy to have this knowledge and he had long ago pledged himself to uphold the rites of the ancient faith.
As was common in old, pure blood families, the eldest child, whether male or female, inherited the family home. Orion Black was not in line to inherit, but came to live in one of the family's properties as a result of his marriage to his cousin, Walburga Black. Walburga was several years his senior and a very accomplished woman even at the time of their courtship. She was a superior student who went directly from Hogwarts to work in the Ministry. She was the youngest witch to ever serve on the Wizengammot and, in her early years, made many important contributions to Wizarding law.
It was Walburga who brought to the attention of the Wizangammot that the role of women in that body, as well as in the Ministry as a whole, had been diminishing over the years. Witches and wizards had always served equally, but over time men had taken on the more senior roles. Walburga attributed this to the number of Muggle-born and half bloods in the Ministry, who tended to regard woman as less capable than their male counterparts. Walburga's observations were met with a mix of gratitude and defensiveness, but strides were made to correct the injustice. She had many successes, but also some failures. For many years, she was able to keep restrictions on the Dark Arts to a minimum by promising that there would be self-monitoring by those who practiced the ancient faith. At first, the Wizengammot accepted her promise, but overtime Ministry officials, many of whom were largely unfamiliar with the old religion, demanded stricter controls.
To her credit, Walburga was the first to publicly recognize the weakness of the Ministry of Magic – a weakness that Voldemort took advantage of years later. She saw that the demonization of the Dark Arts was the result of the weak and the fearful condemning something they didn't understand for fear that it would be used against them. She knew that forbidding a practice only drove it underground and into the hands of those who were not skilled in the sacred ways. Individuals committed to the proper use of these arts would no longer be able to regulate its practitioners.
When Sirius hid Buckbeak in Grimmauld Place, the portrait of his mother truly surprised him. Not just how it shrieked at him, although Walburga was always very collected and rarely raised her voice to curse as the portrait had, but because of how she looked. Throughout Sirius' childhood and adolescence his mother had always taken great care of her appearance. She was tall and curvaceous with long, wavy black hair, milky skin, and red lips. She made frequent trips to potion makers to maintain her good looks and purchased clothes that emphasized her striking features as well as her womanly figure.
Walburga Black possesed the type of power that other women envied, but were never able to replicate. Her power was in her absolute convictions. She believed that, as a Black, she was designated by the gods to serve their will and everything she did rested upon that belief. It was the guiding tenet of the old religion that magic was a gift graced upon a few chosen families. In exchange, those families and their children were obligated to uphold the faith and all of its ancient rituals. Over the years many families had fallen away; "blood-traitors" they were called as their blood mingled with that of Muggles and they abandon the gods who had given them the most precious of all gifts. As she studied the pages of Nature's Nobility, making note of how few pure-blooded witches and wizards were left, and how few of those continued to worship in the old way, Walburga made it her life's goal to bring back the glory of ancient faith, the traditional practices, and the power of the pure-bloods. To her, being a Black was like being a member of royalty: it had great responsibility along with recognition and reward.
Her niece, Bellatrix, had always admired Walburga's ability to wield and maintain power. However, as Sirius and his brother and cousins knew, she would never be able to attain the power her aunt held, because, unlike Walburga, Bellatrix was most concerned about herself and how others saw her. Sirius' mother never worried about what others thought about her. The truly powerful are never self-serving, but Walburga probably knew that most people feared her. She was also not inherently cruel. Certainly, some of her methods, her beliefs, and her actions were unkind, but that was generally a casualty of the ends justifying the means. It seemed to Sirius that being cruel was Bellatrix's intention most of the time.
When Sirius was fifteen, Bellatrix married Rodophus Lestrange. The Lestanges were an old pure-blood family that met the requirement of being committed to keeping alive the old ways. Unlike the Blacks, however, they did not engender the same type of respect among their peers. Orion and Walburga Black, along with Bellatrix's parents, were willing to take on the responsibility of fighting new Ministry restrictions, whereas the Lestranges were content to sit back and let others argue their case. When the Lestranges met a man who not only shared their vision, but was willing to work outside the Ministry to bring back the Dark Arts, they introduced him to their future daughter-in-law with the hope that her substantial family fortune could also support his cause.
Bellatrix was immediately taken in by the man who called himself Voldemort. Not only did she commit to funding his quest, but she volunteered herself, along with her fiancé. Although she was an apt pupil during her years in religious training, Bella never had the same convictions to serve the gods as her parent, aunt and uncle did and was quick to share her vast skills in the Dark Arts with Voldemort. She saw that Voldemort looked to her in the way that others respected her Aunt Walburga and she felt powerful in his presence.
At first, Sirius' parents were not impressed by Voldemort and felt his ways were vulgar. Walburga continued to serve in the Wizengammot and clung to the hope that her once, influential presence could still save the wizarding world from what she felt were corrupting forces. However, as the Ministry grew weaker her battles produced more frustration than accomplishments, she watched as her position became marginalized.
When he left home at age sixteen, it all seemed so clear to Sirius. His parents were following the one who pledged to restore pure-blood supremacy and open discrimination against Muggleborns, and he could not bear to be a part of that plan. He did not want to be a member, let alone the heir, to a family that supported those views. However, years later as he looked down over the quiet, candlelit village below him, Sirius wondered if it really was that simple. As Harry's godfather he had learned that when you loved something or someone, you would do almost anything to protect it. He wondered if his mother's anger and shame had driven her in desperation to the one who promised to give her what she wanted. Democracy and the proper channels had failed her; had she believed that this was the only way?
Walburga Black would not have wanted power from Voldemort. She knew that power is not given but earned on one's own, and she was not that selfish. She also knew that he cared nothing for the gods and goddesses to whom she had devoted her life. But, as a realist she must have seen that he was her best option for reclaiming what was most important to her: a religion that had slipped away so far that all that was left were torn remnants of traditions, their precious meanings lost to time.
Thanks for the great reviews on the last chapter. I hope I continue to please.
