The passageway beneath the tree went on for ages, twisting and turning, rising and falling, even narrowing and widening throughout. The group was very uncomfortable and Harry couldn't stop thinking about how painful it must be to be dragged through here by a dog's teeth.
After the group kept falling over again and again, Blaise had had enough, and so focused on the earth around them and on his magic, working the two together in his mind to help him manipulate the earth. He placed his hands on the walls and all throughout the tunnel things evened out and widened in the narrowest points, even removing roots from the path. Upon doing this Blaise was immediately tired out, not quite exhausted, but more tired than he had been for a while.
The other boys sounded their thanks as they continued the now much easier walk into the unknown.
After nearly twenty minutes of walking, the passageway ended in a wooden door, which swung open to reveal that it was a painting, concealing the tunnel. They climbed through and Harry found himself staring at the painting. It depicted a hunter and his son, the wolf was attacking the son to get revenge on the hunter. It was a rather morbid sight.
A single whimper forced Harry back to the present and over towards Elias, who was bleeding.
As soon as he saw Harry, he knew he would be safe.
The instant Harry rounded the corner he saw a hand coming towards him and time slowed down, he managed to duck and avoid it, at the same time pulling out his wand and aiming it at his attacker. When time returned to normal Harry was in the position of strength, being the only one armed, and the attacker, it was Sirius Black, looked pleased to see him?
"Harry, you look so much like your father, it's like I have my brother back. I'm sorry for hurting your friend, in hindsight it might have been better to turn back into a human first… where are my manners? I'm Sirius Black."
"I'm Harry Potter. Now, you're going to explain to me what the fuck is going on, or I'm going to get violent. I don't know why you attacked Elias, but if you have any hopes of seeing tomorrow you won't try anything."
"James was like that as well, always protecting those he cared about. I'll tell you everything you want to know, but first I have to give you proof. Yes, that's what I'm going to do, show him." Sirius ranted and muttered, causing Harry to question his sanity, and also pity him.
"Let's start with why you're here." Harry's tone was kinder now, he knew the effects of prolonged isolation and didn't wish it on anyone.
"The rat. It was the rat, he betrayed them. I tried to stop him, he faked his death. All those muggles blew up."
"The rat? You mean Scabbers?"
"Huh? Not Scabbers, Wormtail. It's him."
"Can you show me?" Harry was seriously questioning if this guy even knew where he was.
"You believe me? You don't think I'm crazy? Thank you Harry, thank you."
"Show me Wormtail and we can talk."
Just after Harry said this there was a bang before a shout sounded from the next room.
"I know you're in here, Black, let the kids go and I won't be forced to kill you," Auror Alastor Moody shouted sternly as he came into sight, his wand raised and his magical eye locked onto Sirius.
"No! I can show him, he is here. He hurt them, sold them out to him."
"What are you talking about Black? You betrayed James and Lily Potter and then killed Peter Pettigrew, and they say I'm mad."
"Auror Moody, as the one most impacted by his potential actions, I should get the final say here. I want to see if he can produce this proof, if not you can have him, but if he can then isn't it worth seeing?" As Harry said this, a small piece of the light of sanity had returned to Sirius' eyes.
"You have two minutes to prove this, after that I'm taking you in myself."
As soon as the danger was over Sirius darted for Elias, to get the rat from him, which caused Moody and Harry to keep their wands at the ready.
"I need someone to force him back into human form. Alastor, would you mind?" Sirius asked the Auror who nodded sharply and then cast the spell. As the rat began to bulge and distort, almost like wax, Sirius dropped it and before the rat splattered against the floor it became a man, a very skinny and gaunt man, who cowered on the floor.
"Are you Peter Pettigrew?" Mad-Eye questioned the quivering wreck of a man on the floor, who seemed to not be able to hear anyone due to his fear. Deciding it would be better to deal with this back at Hogwarts, Moody stunned and levitated Pettigrew, ordering Sirius to walk ahead and the children to walk behind him.
As Harry was walking behind the Auror he noticed a certain piece of parchment sticking out of Moody's pocket. He searched his own and confirmed that he didn't have it. He would never get it back if Moody was to leave with it, so, using the skills he had learned as an orphan in London, he pickpocketed the map as subtly as he could, a task made easier by the newly acquired neatness of the passageway.
What Harry didn't know was that Moody was watching him the whole time, using his magic eye, and allowed him to reclaim the map.
As they came to the end of the tunnel and out from beneath the tree, they saw Professor Lupin sprinting over towards them, holding a piece of parchment that reminded Harry of his map.
"Moony? What are you doing here?" Sirius had to ask upon seeing his old friend, this was unexpected.
"I could ask you the same thing, Sirius." Remus had his wand level with Sirius throat, believing him to be a threat, that was until he broke eye-contact and realised the behind him were: Moody, Peter, Harry, Theo, Blaise, Dudley and Elias, who was being carried by Harry.
"Will somebody explain to me what the hell is going on?" Lupin shouted after processing the scene before his eyes.
/*** **-** ***/
"So you mean to tell me that we've all been tricked by Peter, who was hiding out as Ronald Weasley's pet rat, and you've managed to capture him, injuring a student in the process. Have I got all of that right?"
"Honestly lad, if I hadn't been there myself to witness it, I would have called the whole situation crazy, that being said I think I need to get this sad excuse of a wizard to the Headmaster. You'll watch over the students, won't you?" Alastor answered the frantic wizard, emphasising the last two words as if to remind him of the fact that he was a teacher and responsible for these students. After making sure that everyone was accounted for, the Auror left to take Pettigrew inside.
It took a few minutes for the overwhelmed man to return to his senses, and upon doing so became very pale and just quietly let out a whisper.
"Oh no."
"Kids, run!" Sirius shouted at them all, when they didn't move he followed up with "what are you all waiting around for? Please get out of here. It isn't safe." As he finished this sentence the boys finally realised what was going on.
Professor Lupin's face began to snap and stretch, followed by his torso and limbs, audibly cracking and reforming as his clothes started to tear, fur covering the briefly exposed areas of the man's arms and legs. His eyes turned from Amber to yellow, however, once the transformation was completed nothing else happened, except Sirius becoming a dog again and starting to growl.
"Professor?" Harry called out causing the werewolf to turn towards him. "Have you taken your Wolfsbane? I've helped brew it with Professor Snape enough times to recognise that someone was a werewolf. I was expecting Professor Sinistra personally," Harry joked, becoming nervous as the seconds went by without any acknowledgement that he had been spoken to, before finally the werewolf nodded slowly.
Sirius had returned to human form to ask.
"What is Wolfsbane? I can't say I've heard of it."
"It allows a Werewolf to retain their human brain while transformed, it was created by an Armenian wizard over a century ago, but only released into the world upon his death. It actually works on werewolves better than the Mardagayl it was developed to combat…" Harry was cut off by Dudley exclaiming.
"You've become Hermione, mate, I think Sirius understood after the first sentence. I can call you Sirius right?" Dudley was suddenly unaware if he should be so familiar with a man most believed to be a vicious killer.
"What else would you call me? Besides you're ignoring the best part, our Moony can still be himself even as a wolf. Oh Moony, my boy, we're going to cause so much mischief again."
Even as a wolf it was clear to see that Remus was already done with Sirius and his shenanigans.
While they were standing around having this conversation they noticed the air becoming cold, very cold, and Sirius immediately began to panic and turned back into a dog, bolting off from the group as the Dementors swooped down. Harry immediately handed Elias over to Theo, drawing his wand, he began to run over to Sirius, seeing the Dementors ignoring the group for the most part, not wanting to fight a Werewolf.
As he ran, his magic speeding up his movements, he saw one Dementor had managed to grab Sirius' back leg and yank it backwards, snapping the leg in the process and causing him to revert to human form. There had to be hundreds of them, and even though Harry didn't know the man at all, he couldn't let them kill Sirius. He saw one of the Dementors lower its hood and go to perform the kiss on Sirius' unconscious form, and he immediately screamed out.
"EXPECTO PATRONUS!"
Silvery white light began to fill the area as a doe burst forth from the end of his wand, running full out to stop the Dementor from sucking out Sirius' soul. As they collided the Dementor let out an unearthly scream and began moving for Harry. His Patronus charged back towards him, repelling the Dementors closest to it, but ultimately not making a difference. As the dozens or so Dementors tried to get close to him, Harry began to panic, even more so when he saw Theo running over, carrying Elias over towards him.
As the two boys got closer Elias drew out his wand and cast a mist form Patronus towards Harry, allowing it to mix with Harry's, resulting in it becoming golden and yet not splitting into two as had happened when Harry and Hermione had done so. Even still the Patronus was noticeably more powerful, driving away the Dementors more permanently. They began flying away, however not all were sent away, some were incredibly stubborn and the one with a lowered head was trying to fight against the golden Patronus. As Harry and Elias began to feel exhausted, a welcome sight appeared in the form of an additional Patronus, followed by another, and another. Seeing that he was safe, Harry passed out, swiftly followed by Elias.
