Fate's End

I don't own Harry Potter.

This is a prequel of a Sirius/OC (kind of) story I'm writing. It's unconventional, I guess, mixing elements of the time-travel/rewrite history type themes with more canon-compliant ideas. Anyway, this is a flash-fiction. Enjoy.

Summary: The unwritten life has stories to tell. Harry wants to understand his godfather. Hermione wants to understand everything. Together, they find more than they dared hope at fate's end.

"How prudently we proud men compete for nameless graves, while now and then some starveling of Fate forgets himself into immortality" - Wendell Phillips

January 2, 1996

Harry beckons, deceptively off-hand, "Hey, Sirius. I've been thinking, and I wanted to, er, talk about it... if you don't mind."

Not bothering to look up, Sirius mutters absently, "Dangerous pastime, thinking is. I always cautioned your father against it, but what do I know, eh?"

He and his godson are sharing a comparatively quieter evening in Grimmuald Place's library while the Weasleys and Hermione visit Arthur in his sick room on the second floor. Remus knows when to make himself scarce, and the other Order members have neither the time nor inclination to intrude upon Sirius and Harry's companionable silence among the dusty tomes.

Somewhat less than pleased by Sirius' lack of enthusiasm, Harry ventures forward, "I know you're... different from your family, but I've always wondered why? I mean... did something happen to make you choose or did you always hate them and the Dark Arts?"

Caught off guard, Sirius's eyes abandon his book, Advanced Protective Enchantments in Tranfigural Charms, flying to Harry's face. But after his shock fades, his expression becomes pensive.

Covertly, Sirius observes the firelight waver across the lens of Harry's glasses, hiding his green eyes. He sees James, misses James, remembers the same question posed under similar circumstances. They'd been in the restricted section of library at Hogwarts late at night, and his hapless best friend chose that moment to inquire 'why?'

"It wasn't that simple," Sirius starts, the same phrases rising to his lips after twenty-five years. "I didn't always hate them, and they weren't always hateful... or synonymous with Dark Arts. Not to me, at least. Children can overlook anything so long as there's fun to be had. Honestly, I didn't understand the meaning of irreconcilable differences until Bellatrix forced the issue, but... those differences had always been there. Even now, I'm not sure I get it. Perhaps, we had it right as children and then fucked it up as adults."

Frowning, Harry tries to understand, to find a grain of literality in Sirius' explanation. But he can't. His doggish godfather sounds a bit too much like Dumbledore or Lupin at the moment - curse word not withstanding. "Can you just tell me what happened, Sirius?" he goads, frustrated and desperate. In these uncertain times, who knows if he'll ever get the chance to ask again?

"... Pandora happened, Harry," Sirius replies succinctly, and though his meaning is even more vague, the raw grief in his voice dampens Harry's curiosity considerably. Sirius has never looked so... young, Harry decides, never so lost.

Turning back to his homework, The Standard Book of Spells: Grade Five open on his lap, the teenager offers, "I'm sorry, Sirius. It must have been awful." He doesn't know who Pandora is or was, for he assumes she's a real person and not a mythology reference, but she must be important. Losing someone important... It changes a person, steels and hones him.

Even if Harry doesn't know everything, he finally understands the force that drove Sirius as a boy; loss and longing drive Harry as well.

"It was," Sirius confirms, trying for equanimity. "But it led me to James and Remus, and later to Lily and to you. I'll always be thankful for that, even if I lost someone equally precious."

"Thanks for telling me, Sirius," the godson whispers, turning a page.

"Thanks for asking, Harry," the godfather whispers back, deciding on a whim that he'll give the boy his father's mirror so they might speak more openly of these and other like-matters.