Author's Note: I take it you're all happy that Sirius is back. Don't get too excited, though, because Mary is everything but excited to see him…

Dedication: to Spongyllama. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: *sighs* I wish…

Twenty: Lost?

No. No, not him. This was not happening. That's all Mary's dazed mind processed when she wheeled around to the hoarse voice that spoke her name and found it had come from her murderous ex-fiancé who was standing in front of her. Bemused, unable to get her act together, let alone make words come out of her mouth, all she could do was stare at a man she thought she would never see again. Yet here he was. Why?, immediately shot through her head. Did he come to Brazil to finish whatever he had started all those years ago? And how did he find her?

Noticing she was gazing up at him in utter confusion and shock, Sirius, wearing an unreadable expression in his eyes, repeated calling her name. But Mary still couldn't move; her eyes were glued to his shocking waxen face; a terrifying face she recognized from the front page of the Daily Prophets but had nothing in common with the man she once fell in love with. With the exception of his eyes, that were still the mesmerising grey she remembered, but the gauntness of his face made them appear bigger than they probably were. The intenseness of the way he was glaring at her made it seem like his eyes were positively burning in their sockets. It took Mary another moment to figure out that he looked haunted. Which rather made sense, considering being Voldemorts number one-man would be anything but easy.

Was the Dark Lord behind this after all, then? Had he ordered Sirius to travel to Brazil and finish off his "Mudblood ex-girlfriend and their illegitimate child"? But how would that be possible? The only ones in Britain knowing of her whereabouts were Dumbledore and Hagrid. No matter how she looked at it, this did not make any sense. Sirius shouldn't be here. Still staring up at him in horror, she finally managed to stammer: "It cannot be."

Probably relieved she had finally said something, Sirius took a tentative step towards her. "Mary," he repeated once again while moving his hand to his chest, "it's me."

He took another step forward. Ironically enough, this careful and well-thought movement was the only thing that could have made Mary jump again. "I know who you are!" she called while backing away until her back touched the wood of Roberto's desk and she could not go further. "Why are you here?" she continued, trying to ignore the frightened tremble in her voice as she feverishly felt the desk behind her to get hold of her wand before he would.

Sirius stopped dead, frowning slightly at her. "Isn't that obvious?"

Mary, an uncontrollable shiver running down her back when she heard the hoarse rasp that was now his voice, stared at him, momentarily abandoning her search for the wand. Was he being serious? Could he really act this cool when he had come all the way here to kill her? Apparently he had become even more merciless than she already feared. She'd better locate her wand and quickly, before it was too late. "How did you find us?"

His frown deepened. "Dumbledore's owl should have explained all that."

"What owl?"

"The letter. The note Albus wrote you a week ago to…" Now he was staring at her. "You didn't get it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about. What letter? Did you force Dumbledore to write it? Did you kill him too?"

His stare turned from shock to annoyed disbelief. "Did I do what?!"

Where in Merlin's name was her wand? "You heard me," she continued shakily, right before her fingertips finally touched the piece of wood she was looking for. "Aha!" She grabbed the wand right when Sirius stepped forward again and pointed it straight at his heart, making him stop in his tracks. "Stay back! If you dare hurt me or my family, I swear I will…"

She glared at him, almost wishing he would make an unexpected move so that she could curse him, and expected to see a cold blooded rage of evil; only to end up surprised when she noticed the look in his eyes was one of hurt and mere disbelief. "Why are you-?"

"Stay away from me."

He blinked. "Mary, what the hell is going on here? The owl, you should have gotten it by now. Whose letter were you reading earlier?"

Her eyes briefly dropped to the folded parchment on the desk and back. "Earlier? Wh… Were you spying on me?"

She noticed it was taking him a big effort to not roll his eyes at her (which would have angered her even more). "Just answer the question."

Mary thought it was quite ironic for him to demand an answer when she was the one pointing a wand at his chest. Nevertheless, she looked straight at him and said: "It was a note from the ranch owner, giving me and the rest of the staff instructions to keep organized while he's away on business. What's your excuse?"

"My excuse? I've come a very long way to find you."

"Why?"

"Because I-"

"-To kill me? And finally finish what you attempted to do thirteen years ago?"

Sirius did not respond to her last sneer immediately. He remained silent for a moment, merely gazing at her with that strained look in his eyes, a sight that was making Mary uncomfortable. She realized all too well she was getting on his last nerve (and he used to have a rather waspish personality to begin with). Yet she was the one carrying a wand, he was unarmed. Unless Voldemort had taught his pupil to use wandless magic as well? Mary subconsciously intensified her grip before shooting him a defiant glare. "What, lost your tongue? Because if you are, I swear I will take you down before you can get so much as near to me or my children."

Sirius's eyes appeared to be burning in his face. "I've been on this ranch for over a week. Trust me, if I wanted to attack you, I would have done it already. How can you possibly think I would ever try to hurt you, or Erin?"

Mary made a scornful sound. "Well, let's just say Dumbledore did not send us to Brazil on the same night James and Lily were murdered for nothing."

"What? No listen, Mary," Sirius said urgently. "Dumbledore already knows he was wrong about that, OK? They all were. I had nothing to do with that!"

"You may not have actually killed them yourself, but any reasonable wizarding court would banish you to hell for a low betrayal like yours."

Sirius turned away and stared out of the window and, for a moment, his mind seemed to be a million miles away. "I made a huge mistake," he said quietly. "And I'll have to live with the consequences of that for the rest of my life. But I'd rather died myself than ever betray them. Betray you."

Mary groaned in frustration and suppressed anger. "Oh, cut the crap, Sirius! You alone could have betrayed James and Lily. You were their Secret-Keeper."

Sirius turned back and glanced at her. "No, I wasn't."

He actually sounded sincere, and before that fateful Halloween she would have believed without a second thought. But now it was only frustrating to find that part of Mary desperately wanted to believe him, even though she realized he had always been a perfect liar. Mary thought of Lily and James and immediately felt a fresh wave of anger was over her. "You were!" she cried. "Stop denying it, I know all about it. Dumbledore told me so himself. You, and you alone, were the spy; the one who betr-"

"-ENOUGH!"

The thing Mary had been dreading the past few minutes finally happened: Sirius lost his patience. "That's because I lied to him: the whole act was a farce!" he yelled. "James and I thought this would be the only way to keep us all safe," he continued, taking another step towards her, and somehow Mary lacked the strength and persuasion to stun him at once. The things Sirius just said weren't making any sense: there had been a plan? What plan? How could James possibly have known about the betrayal?

Sirius must have been reading the confusion on her face, because his rage subsided somewhat when he continued: "Dumbledore was convinced you still had faith in me, whereas others did not. But here you are, and you seem to be hating me as much as the next person. I'm curious, what changed?"

Mary stared at him, surveying that waxen face full of suppressed anger, while countless thoughts haunted her mind. There were about a million things she wanted to know, most questions starting with – why -. Why did you betray your best friends? Why did you cross over to the Death Eaters when you'd loathed those people and their ideas your entire life? Why did you leave me? However, the thing she was most anxious to find out was the one reason that had made her lose faith in him after all. And that question did not contain the word "why". She took a deep breath, forced herself to look in his eyes (his only feature that still resembled the old Sirius) and whispered: "How did you escape Azkaban?"

He silently watched her for a moment before opening his mouth, and then closing it again. Mary sniffed and nodded slowly. "That's what I thought. Now just go away."

"No wait," Sirius said quickly. "I just… I didn't expect this question from you. I thought you were one of the few who would know how I did it."

She let out a mirthless laugh. "Oh please, know what exactly? That you had to turn to dark magic to defeat the Dementors?"

"Dark magic?? Are you mad?!"

"Then how did you do it?"

Sirius stared at her as if she had lost her mind. "I transformed! One night I turned into Padfoot and slipped past them when they opened my cell to bring food. I made it out of the castle, jumped into the sea and swam all the way to shore as a dog. That's how, and if you ever truly knew who I was and loved, you would have known that "dark magic" isn't in my vocabulary."

Mary, who had been trying to imagine a scruffy black dog running past the prison cells while being chased by angry Dementors, glared up at him in annoyance. "Oh, really? Then tell me something, Sirius: if you've always known you could escape as Padfoot, then why wait all those years to do it?"

He glared back at her, his fists clenched by his side, and his grey eyes turned a shade darker before becoming expressionless; it were those familiar roll-down shutters that were coming down once again and hiding his true feelings from view. Mary already knew he was never going to tell the truth when he finally opened his mouth to speak: "That doesn't matter right now."

Mary glared at him. He was unbelievable! She momentarily considered hitting him a black eye instead of cursing him before forcing herself to calm down. She needed to stay focused. "Fine, let me rephrase that final part, then: what made you want to escape after all those years?"

Sirius appeared more at ease with that question. He slowly reached into his dirty robes and got out a crumpled piece of paper, which he smoothed flat and handed to her. Mary glanced at what appeared to be some kind of holiday picture of a family in Egypt. None of the people on it seemed familiar. "What's this about?"

"Do you see the rat on Ron's shoulder?"

She looked up, frowning. "Ron who?"

"The tall boy in the middle of the photograph, who's embracing his little sister? Do you see the rat?"

Mary, who was starting to think Sirius was tricking her into something – this photograph could be jinxed after all – grudgingly looked back at the piece of paper and indeed spotted a small rat on the boy's shoulder. "What about it?"

"That's Peter. Don't you recognize him?"

She looked up again, this time convinced that Sirius had lost his mind in Azkaban after all, and shot him an incredulous look. "I beg your pardon?"

Sirius groaned and shook his head. He started pacing the room while muttering to himself, and Mary couldn't help but notice how extremely thin he was. "She hasn't seen Wormtail that often, so it makes sense that she wouldn't know what he looks like, but there must be something to make her see-"

"-Sirius,"

"-Maybe I can get a Pensieve and show some of my happy memories with Wormtail… That is if I still have any…"

"Sirius," Mary repeated. For some weird reason he didn't seem that threatening anymore now she knew he was obviously insane. "Peter died."

Sirius stopped in his tracks. "What?"

"Peter Pettigrew is dead," she said in a slow and clear voice, as if explaining to a confused toddler where his teddy bear had gone to. "You killed him on the day of your arrest, the morning after James and Lily died."

"No, I didn't! Mary, you have to listen to me: Pettigrew is still very much alive. He is the rat in that photo!"

"How can you know that for sure?"

"Look at his front paw. He's got a toe missing."

Mary glanced back the photo and established that, indeed, the rat was a missing a toe. But so what if it did? "I can't see why that has anything to do with it."

Sirius moved so quickly that Mary couldn't have acted if she wanted to: he was standing right in front of her in two seconds and grabbed her shoulders; it was the first time he touched her after all those years and even though she didn't want him to, her body still remembered his touch and sent shivers running down her spine. If Sirius had noticed anything, he surely didn't act like he did. Or maybe he simply had other, more urgent, matters in mind. "It has got everything to do with it," he hissed through gritted teeth. "When I cornered Peter that morning after Voldemort killed James and Lily, he cut off his own finger before blowing up the entire street, and thirteen innocent bystanders along with it. He had long transformed and sped down into the sewer with the other rats by the time I was arrested."

Mary stared at him, although she wasn't quite sure she was seeing his face properly. Her mind was whizzing forward and back with all the information she was trying to take in. Sirius's story sounded nothing less than absurd, but then a rather disturbing fact from Peter's death came back to her. "And all they could find of Peter…" she whispered, dropping her wand to the floor when something in her mind finally clicked.

"Was his finger," Sirius finished with a flourish. "I'm not the traitor, Mary. I wasn't even Secret-Keeper, Pettigrew is. The little rat framed me for the betrayal on James and Lily."

She clapped her hand to her mouth and stared back at him with big eyes. "Oh God…"

One of his claw-like hands was still resting on her shoulder and he was watching her closely when he finally asked: "Now do you believe me?"

Mary could say nothing at all for a moment; this was way too much to take in all at once. Despite what everyone – Dumbledore, Fabio, Jonathan and everyone else around here – had been telling her all those years, she had been right about Sirius all along. He was not the vicious murderer who wouldn't think twice of betraying her and his best friends in one night, or even a Death Eater: Peter Pettigrew was the traitor! Sirius was innocent, had escaped Azkaban as a dog instead of turning to dark magic and had suffered a great deal over many years; not only did he have to live with the decision to make Peter Secret-Keeper, he probably felt terribly guilty over losing her and Erin as well.

She suddenly felt an enormous urge to hug Sirius and looked up; that's when she noticed he was still watching her with an urgent and questioning look in his eyes and realized she had not answered his question yet. Still speechless and unable to say she believed him, she merely nodded instead, and from what she could decipher from the expressionless mask that was Sirius's face, Mary thought she was detecting a smile. But right when she was about to raise her hand and stroke his cheek, Sirius suddenly got up straight and nodded curtly. "Good," he said shortly. "Now what I like to know is why the hell you left England."

Mary, bemused and slightly taken aback by this sudden change of mood, frowned at him. "If you've been to Dumbledore like you say you are, you already know that it was he who sent me here."

"Right, right… Well, I'm not buying that. You see, the Mary I knew didn't like being told what to do. Especially not when she's just found out about the death of her best friends and possible betrayal of her boyfriend."

"Perhaps… But then you of all people should know how convincing Dumbledore can be when it comes to situations like these. And I was utterly confused, Sirius… I mean, how would you react if you were told I had betrayed Lily and James?"

Sirius snorted. "I'd think they had lost their heads."

"Exactly," she nodded. "So, when Dumbledore continued pressing that taking care of Erin was now my prior concern, I obeyed."

"And he sent you to this tropical paradise? Merlin, what a nightmare that must have been."

His obvious sarcasm was totally rubbing her the wrong way. "How dare you! You have no idea what it's been like for me."

"Can't been half as bad as Azkaban, now can it?"

Mary glared at him. "There may not be Dementors here to haunt your memories and dreams, but it hasn't all been rainbows and butterflies for me either."

Sirius snorted and shot her a wicked grin that did not quite reach his eyes. "Sure it's not, but after whatever "ordeal" you've been through, you simply tie up a hammock between two palm trees, have a nice coconut-cocktail and watch the sunset."

"Stop it, that's not funny!"

"It most certainly is not!" Sirius yelled back. "I've been in hell while you were prancing about on a tropical beach."

"Prancing ab- If you had any idea what I've been through-"

"I know what I have been through; I was thrown into Azkaban. Azkaban, Mary, and where were you?"

"I was having daily covers of the Daily Prophet to remind me of that," Mary countered angrily, but she wasn't sure Sirius was even hearing her.

"You left me."

"Not by my own choice! I'm telling you, it was Dumbledore who-"

"You left when I needed you the most!"

Mary had trouble believing her own ears; Sirius was acting like all of this was her fault when, sure enough, without his stupid master plan to save the world, she would never even have heard from a place like Rancho Borboleta. "I only left because of Erin," she said, her voice trembling with suppressed anger. "To keep her safe. I couldn't care less if those Death Eaters would get me after all, but I did what you made me promise you that night in St. Mungo's."

She had expected Sirius would calm down slightly after that statement, but it only seemed to anger him even more. "IF I DIED!" he roared, seething with rage. "NOT AFTER I GOT TOSSED INTO AZAKABAN FOR A CRIME I DID NOT COMMIT!"

"Hang on a minute, you act like all of this is my fault?! Let's be honest, Sirius: I wouldn't even be here if it weren't for you."

"That's ridi-"

"Is it? Is it? If you wouldn't have left dinner early that night, if you hadn't acted like you were James and Lily's Secret-Keeper to begin with… That would have made all the difference in the world, and you know it."

"If's aren't going to change anything."

"No, they won't. Besides, you've made perfectly clear how you feel about me. And I've had enough of that, of you. I'm leaving, and if you ever as much think of coming over to my house, I will curse you into oblivion before you've even properly introduced yourself."

Sirius stared at her, his fathomless expression once again making shivers run down her spine while she was crouching down to retrieve her wand, but he did not say anything again, and Mary felt like she should be even more clear with him. "I'm serious. Ever try and get close to me or my children again and you will regret it," she said before immediately disapparating with a loud pop, realizing that for once, she actually meant it.

- End of Update -

Song from the title: Lost? by Coldplay (beautiful piano version without that stupid Jay-Z messing it up ;P )