When she woke up the next morning, she felt as if her entire body was on fire. She coughed, throat scratchy, nose stuffed up, and brought a hand to her forehead. She was burning up.

"Mary," she croaked weakly. She snatched her wand from her bedside table, using it to open her bedroom door with a bang. "Mary!" She tried again.

"What!" Mary snapped hoarsely from her own bed, on the opposite wall from Adeline's.

"Come here," Adeline called. "Something's wrong."

Adeline heard Mary groaning, her bed squeaking as she rolled out of it. Mary appeared in her doorframe a moment later, hair a matted mess and makeup from last night running down her cheeks. She looked nauseous just from the effort of being vertical. "What do you want – " Mary started, her eyes widening when she saw Adeline. "Holy shit, Delle."

Adeline coughed. "I feel like shit."

Andrew appeared behind Mary, his chest bare and wearing only his boxers. "What's going – holy shit! Adeline, you've got dragon pox!"

Adeline groaned, grabbing a tissue from the box on her nightstand and blowing her nose. Sparks flew out of her nose as she did so, confirming Andrew's assessment. She looked down at her hands, which were covered in green and purple spots. "Someone's got to tell…Lily and James. So they can warn everyone who was at the wedding last night."

Andrew nodded once. "I'll stop by their place on my way to work. Hopefully they'll be decent enough to receive visitors," he snorted. He kissed Mary on the cheek before heading back into her room to get dressed.

"What can I get you?" Mary asked, looking Adeline up and down.

"Water," Adeline croaked. Mary waved her wand, summoning a glass from their kitchen, before filling it with water from the tip of her wand. She levitated the glass over to Adeline, who sat up and drank from it greedily. "Thanks," she said, water dripping down her chin.

"You should get some sleep. I'll floo Gideon and Fabian, let them know you won't be making it in today." Adeline was asleep before Mary had even left the room.

It was just moments later that she awoke. Still, the sun was now shining fully in the room, blinding her as she opened her eyes slowly. She realized with a start that a commotion in the living room had been what had woken her up. She heard someone speaking loudly, and Mary trying to calm them down.

"You can't go in there," Mary insisted, getting closer to Adeline's closed bedroom door.

"Watch me," someone snapped, elbowing past Mary and opening the door furiously. "Adeline!"

Sirius stood framed in the door, his long hair frizzy and unkempt, more-so than usual. He had a crazy, wild look in his eye as he roamed over Adeline's body, checking that she was okay. "You're okay?"

Adeline sat up on her elbows, out of breath from the effort of sitting up. "Sirius, don't come in here. I don't want to get you sick."

Sirius shook her warning off, storming right into the room so that he was kneeling on the floor next to her bed. He grabbed her hand in his, despite her efforts to shake him off. "Fuck that," he said gruffly, his eyes never leaving her face.

Mary threw her hands up in defeat. "I'm going to leave you two idiots to it then," she said, rolling her eyes. "But I swear to Merlin, Black, if you upset her when she's as sick as this, I will personally make sure that your bollocks are never the same again."

Sirius didn't bother answering her, merely pointing his wand at the bedroom door so it slammed in Mary's face. "Mum and Dad are sick too; it's bad. I spent the morning with them, until James came running out of the floo, shouting that you were sick. I came over as soon as I knew."

Adeline started. "Are they going to be okay? Where are they?"

"They're at Potter Manor. Tildy is tending to them."

"You shouldn't be here," Adeline said desperately, her eyes searching Sirius's. "You're going to get sick."

Sirius shook his head gruffly. "I can't. Remus checked – animaguses can't get dragon pox; because we're part animal, it doesn't affect us."

"Oh," Adeline said, furrowing her brow. She let the word fall in silence, noting the way Sirius's hungry eyes never left hers.

"Adeline, I," he began.

"Sirius," Adeline said, cutting him off. "No."

"No?" Sirius asked, taken aback.

"Not right now," Adeline amended, clearing her throat. "I feel like my entire body is on fire, my head is pounding, and I can not deal with having this conversation right now."

"But…"' Sirius argued.

"No," Adeline insisted. "I love you, Sirius, but…"

"And I love you!" Sirius said quickly.

"But, we have so much that we need to talk about. Love isn't enough for us, not right now. Especially not after you telling me that you didn't love me anymore."

"Trust," he said, solemnly. "Trust has always been our biggest issue. As much as I love you, I don't always trust you. But I do love you – I didn't mean it when I said I didn't, and I shouldn't have said it. I was just angry, but that's no excuse."

"I know that. But it still hurt – and I'm not ready to work through that yet. Trust has been an issue for us for so long, and I don't have the answer for how we fix that."

Sirius bowed his head in defeat. "What can I do?"

Adeline thought for a second. "Get up here and hold me."

Sirius got off his knees immediately, climbing in to bed behind her. He pulled her against his chest, wrapping his arms around her waist protectively, and tucking her head into the crook of his neck. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "I'm sorry, Delle," he whispered into her hair. "Once this war is over, we'll figure out a way to trust each other again."

Adeline let herself relax into his arms, grabbing hold of his forearm with one of her hands. "But for now, I feel like shit and I just want to be held."

Adeline spent the rest of the day snoozing in Sirius's arms. Mary checked in, scoffing to find the two in bed together, but delivering soup and sandwiches for them to eat. By early evening, Adeline was feeling well enough to sit upright on her own, but still Sirius didn't leave. They chatted quietly, avoiding the topic that Adeline knew he really wanted to broach, but enjoying catching up without too much awkwardness.

"I need to sleep," Adeline said, after she'd finished her soup. "I'll feel much better in the morning; and I won't be contagious anymore."

Sirius nodded, taking the plates from her and putting them on the nightstand next to him. He looked over at her hesitantly, his eyes wide with nervousness. "Can I…Can I stay with you?"

Adeline considered, but decided that she was allowed to be selfish, if only for today. She nodded. "Please."

Adeline settled back against him, her golden blonde hair splayed out across his chest. The green spots that had taken over most of her body during the day had started to recede; even covered in spots, sneezing sparks, and sweating through her t-shirt, Sirius thought she was the most beautiful witch he'd ever laid eyes on.

Terror. Terror had been the only thing to enter his mind when James had told him that Adeline had also caught Dragon Pox. He knew what the disease could do – typically harmless for young adults, but not always. At Dorea and Charlus's age, their case was much more concerning, but he couldn't stop himself from apparating to Adeline's apartment moments after James gave him the news. He had to know that she was alright; he had to confirm with his own eyes that she was going to recover.

He'd been such an idiot, thinking that he could ever fall out of love with Adeline Yarbury. He'd loved her since the moment he met her; and in one moment of anger, he'd thrown that all away. He couldn't imagine anything – anything – that would be able to take that love away completely.

He didn't sleep a wink that night; he spent the whole night watching Adeline as she slept. Watching her chest rise and fall with deep breaths; watching as she burrowed her head closer into his chest. She looked so peaceful when she slept; so different from the stressed and harrowed expression she'd been wearing at Order meetings lately. He should have known that she was working on something important – she'd never looked more stressed than she had the last several months. And he knew that he played a part in that stress – if he'd been supportive of her, rather than accusatory and argumentative, he might have been able to relieve some of that stress, rather than adding to it.

But the fact of the matter still came down to the fact that they didn't trust each other. They'd both struggled with it throughout the length of their friendship, and right now when tensions were so high with the war, it was even harder for them to trust. He couldn't fathom what could be important enough that it would warrant her making an Unbreakable Vow to keep it a secret from him; and it made him question what her motivations were. He knew that she had a bond with Regulus, one that Dumbledore would have jumped on exploiting. He'd even considered that perhaps, she'd turned into a spy and was infiltrating the death eaters – it would have been the perfect ruse, and one that he bet Dumbledore would have been more than happy to perpetrate.

The very thought made him angry. Adeline would have known that putting herself in harm's way like that would have been one of the few things that would have genuinely made him angry; he'd never want her to risk herself like that, especially with the threat of her brother and Dolohov out there. Which was precisely why he believed it might be the very thing she was keeping from him. He pushed the thought down – right now, her being alive, and relatively healthy, was the only thing that mattered. They'd have plenty of time for yelling and hashing out the details once the war was over.

She turned in her sleep so that she was facing him. She threw one of her legs over his, and he pulled her closer to himself, pressing her entire body into his. He promised Merlin, or God, or whoever was up there that if they did get a second – or third, really – chance at this, he wouldn't squander it.

He was just about snoozing, in the space between being awake and asleep, when Adeline's door opened. He sat up slightly, looking down quickly to make sure he hadn't jostled her awake. He squinted in the early morning daylight that the opened door was allowing in to the pitch black room.

"James?" He whispered. James stood in the doorway, his eyes wide and his hair messier than usual. Given the dark circles under his eyes, he hadn't slept at all either. "What's wrong?"

"It's Mum and Dad," James said hoarsely. "They're in St. Mungo's."

Everyone was quiet. Deadly silent. Lily and James sat next to each other, James's knees bouncing violently as Lily read from a book. Adeline noticed that she hadn't turned a page in over an hour, and that her eyes were staring blankly at the same spot. Alice and Frank were stationed in the hallways with the Prewett twins, on guard for anyone suspicious that might use their gathering as an excuse to attack. Mary was sitting next to Adeline, watching Remus as he made coffee for everyone in the corner of the room with Peter's help.

Adeline sat with her hand in Sirius's. He held onto hers tightly, a lifeline. They only knew two things; one, that Charlus and Dorea had fallen into a coma, and likely wouldn't wake up. And two, that someone had infected them, likely purposely, with the disease. High amounts of the disease were found in their stomachs, suggesting that they'd ingested something that had been highly contaminated.

"It must've been the cake," Adeline mused, breaking the silence. Everyone turned to look at her, questioning her. "They went to bed right after the cake. And I…I gave Charlus a hug right before they left. That's probably where I got sick. Someone must have put it in their cake."

Peter squeaked in the corner, having just knocked over one of the cups of coffee that he'd been trying to pick up. Everyone ignored him. "It's possible," James said, hoarsely. "But who…"

"Someone's selling us out," Sirius hissed. "How else are the death eaters always one step ahead of us; we've been ambushed how many times in the last six weeks? Almost like they were waiting for us exactly where we planned to be?"

"You think there's a snitch in the Order?" Lily whispered. "I don't believe it."

"Anything's possible," Mary mused. "How well do we really know everyone in the Order? Any one of them could be working for You-Know-Who. It could be one of us."

Adeline sighed and shook her head. "This is how we drive ourselves crazy!"

Lily shook her head. "I agree with Delle. I trust everyone in this room."

"Me too," James agreed.

"Me too!" Peter chimed in, scurrying over to the group, and passing out coffees. Adeline took hers, but didn't take a sip. In fact, she decided then and there that she was going to be careful taking anything from anyone without examining it first.

Remus and Sirius exchanged subtle looks, but didn't say anything.

They were saved from continuing the conversation by a giant bang that came from the hallway, which immediately had everyone on their feet, wands drawn. Gideon rushed into the room. "Death eaters. About five of them. Come on."

Adeline rushed out of the room, throwing Gideon a brief encouraging smile. When she entered the hallway, she saw that a large piece of the ceiling had fallen, likely the cause of the bang that they'd heard. On one side of the hallways, Alice and Frank were fighting two masked death eaters. On the other, Fabian was holding off the other three. Gideon immediately joined the fray, jumping in next to his brother. Spells were bouncing off against the walls; Adeline saw Mary grab her arm in pain as she was hit with a nasty looking purple hex. Mary fell to the side, hitting her head against the wall; she was knocked out cold. She was about to rush to her aid, when a voice from behind her caused her to freeze in her tracks.

"Dellie!" The gleeful voice called. She turned on her heels. Finnegan stood there, leaning casually against the wall, admiring the scene in front of him. Though he wore a smile, Adeline thought she could see an emptiness in his eyes that betrayed a conflicting inner emotion. "I've been hoping I would run in to you."

Adeline pulled her wand, pointing it at her brother, her hand steady though she felt like she was about to vomit. "Funnily enough, I haven't felt the same way."

Finnegan didn't answer, his gaze going over her head, not even fazed by her wand which was pointed directly at his chest. Adeline snuck a glance over her shoulder; three of the death eaters had lost their masks – one she didn't recognize, but the other two were…

"I couldn't convince Dolohov to stay away, once he realized you and your boyfriend would be here," Finnegan sneered. "And once young Black realized Dolohov would be coming, he immediately volunteered to come as well. Does your Black realize that his little brother is in love with you? Quite the love triangle you've gotten yourself involved in, eh, little sis? I dare say Mum and Dad would have been quite a bit happier had you chosen the younger of the two, but what's done is done, I suppose."

"What do you want, Finnegan?" Adeline hissed, jabbing her wand at him. He hadn't even bothered to pull his own.

Finnegan ignored her, pushing from the wall and taking a step closer to her. "Remember when you were a little girl, Dellie? And you used to cry and cry until I picked you up?"

Adeline furrowed her brows at his odd comment. "Yeah, well, you weren't a psychotic murderer back then…"

"I wonder at what point we diverged on to such different paths," he mused, mostly to himself. "I fear that…" He was interrupted by a flash of red light that soared over Adeline's shoulder. In an instant, a wand that hadn't been in his hand moments before, had appeared and he'd deflected the curse. She turned, keeping her back to the wall so that it wasn't facing Finnegan.

It seemed that the curse that he been sent Finnegan's way had actually been a deflected curse sent by one of his own – Dolohov's to be exact. At the moment that Adeline turned, she realized that Gideon and Fabian, who were standing back to back fighting the remaining two masked death eaters, hadn't realized that James and Lily, who'd been fighting Dolohov moments before, had both been stunned. Remus, Peter, Alice and Frank were fighting the unmasked death eater that Adeline hadn't recognized, while Sirius engaged his brother in a vicious duel. Adeline realized what was about to happen seconds before it did; she'd opened her mouth, ready to scream for Gideon's attention, when Dolohov shot green flames at him, a grin on his face. Gideon fell, dead. Fabian realized instantly that something was wrong; his split second hesitation as he realized that his brother had been hit was all it took. He was hit with two converging spells from the two masked death eaters, and slumped down, on top of his brother.

Adeline's eyes widened in shock, and she realized that she was screaming. Remus, Peter, Alice and Frank had taken down their death eater, and had turned to see who was screaming. Immediately, Remus jumped in, taking down one of the masked death eaters, while Alice and Frank started dueling the other. Peter had kneeled down to check on James and Lily. The last thing she clearly saw, was Dolohov turning towards her, a grin on his lips. He took a step towards her, but everything went black before he could even turn his wand towards her.

Something had hit her in the head; she brought a hand up weakly to realize that her head was bleeding from the impact. It took her a moment to realize that someone had pulled her away from the battle, her bucking body trying in vain to kick them off.

"Delle, stop," the deep voice commanded.

"No, no! Gideon, Fabian," she sobbed, tears blurring her vision to the point that when she turned to see who held her, she couldn't tell which Black brother it was, she only saw dark black hair.

"Delle, I don't have much time, and I need you to calm down and listen," Regulus ordered. "Can you do that? I blasted down the ceiling, but they'll get through any second now."

Adeline nodded, tears still streaming down her face. She shook her head, pushing down the pain. "How'd you get away from…from your bother?"

"As soon as he saw Dolohov take down those twins, he ran to fight him."

"Finn?"

"No idea. Now will you shut up? I don't have much time. I have one."

"One? One what?" Adeline asked dumbly, her head throbbing to the point where she couldn't even think straight.

"A horcrux," Regulus hissed. "I can't explain much, but here," he thrust something into her hands. "You get that straight to Dumbledore, you hear me? As soon as you can without it being suspicious. I'm sorry about the twins, but I had to orchestrate this ambush so I could give it to you. I should've known Dolohov wouldn't miss a chance to get his hands on you."

"Regulus, I…what?" Adeline floundered. Regulus shook his head sharply, gesturing to the rubble, which was moving as someone tried to move it and open a pathway. She pulled out her wand. "As soon as the passage opens, you disapparate, ok?"

Regulus nodded. "There's a spy, among your group…" Regulus said quickly. "I don't know who. It's how we knew you lot would be here today."

"Find out." Adeline demanded. Regulus nodded once, but then widened his eyes at the parcel that she still held in her hand; not a second later, the rubble fell and Sirius stuck his head through, a quizzical expression on his face. She shoved the package into her pocket before throwing a stunning hex at Regulus, purposely missing and shooting it over his left shoulder. Regulus made a big production of realizing that Sirius had broken through the rubble, and disapparated on the spot.

"Fuck," Sirius cursed, slamming his hands down onto the rubble. "You okay, Delle?"

"Fine," Adeline said, her hand going to her pocket to check that she still had the horcrux. Once she made sure she did, she walked over to Sirius, accepting his help stepping over the rubble to the other side of the hallway.

Alice and Frank sat, clutching their bleeding heads; they must have been hit by the debris from the ceiling collapsing. Dolohov, the unmasked death eater, and the two masked death eaters, sat stunned and bound against the wall. Everyone else looked to be in fairly decent shape.

Adeline fell to her knees in front of the Prewett twins. Lily was sitting, sobbing quietly into James's shoulder. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder, pulling her closer to him. Adeline took a deep breath, and with one last look at her fallen friends, she stood up; she pushed the pain down, somewhere deep inside of her, to be dealt with at a later time.

"Finnegan?" She asked Remus. He was supporting Peter, who was nursing what looked to be a broken ankle.

"Disapparated when the ceiling came down. Regulus?" Remus asked.

"Coward left as soon as he saw me," Sirius snapped. "At least we go this one," he said, kicking Dolohov slightly with his foot.

"Right. Someone should report to Dumbledore," Adeline said.

"I'll go," Sirius said quickly.

"No," Adeline said. "You need to stay here – you're an Auror and this is a crime scene. You can't leave, and neither can you three." She pointed to James, Alice and Frank, who all nodded in agreement.

"You should help him get that looked at," Adeline said, addressing Remus and Peter. "And someone needs to look after Mary. I'll go to Dumbledore."

"I'll come with you," Lily said quickly, standing to her feet and wiping her tears.

Adeline shook her head again. "Stay with James. He needs you."

"But," Lily protested.

Adeline gave her a pointed look. Lily seemed to understand –the last ten minutes had completely pushed Dorea and Charlus from their minds. She nodded, sitting back down next to James, who was still staring at Gideon and Fabian, his eyes wide. "I'll go. I'll be back when I can."

She reached over and squeezed Sirius's hand once, before turning on her heel.

She didn't see the look that Sirius gave her before she left, nor the lingering gaze on the place where she'd disappeared, as misguided understanding filled Sirius's chest. It had hit him, as she was insisting that she be the one to leave – the one to tell Dumbledore what had happened. He understood now; Adeline wasn't spying on the death eaters. She was a double-agent. She was working with them – passing them information. And she needed to make sure that Dumbledore heard the story that she wanted him to hear.

He couldn't believe it, but the evidence was right there in front of him. He'd seen her put something into her pocket – something that Regulus had obviously just given her. And she had been pulled away by both Finnegan and Regulus to have conversations that no one else had heard. In fact, he didn't think she'd thrown a single hex throughout the entire fight.

The dragon pox – she'd infected his parents. She was the only one who'd gotten sick; she must have mishandled it and accidentally infected herself. And every time they'd been ambushed by death eaters, she'd been involved in those Order meetings and known the entire plan. How long had she been working with them? Had she always been with them; had the last three years all been a part of some convoluted plan? Had she sent those death eaters after him and James, the last time they'd been at St. Mungo's? Had she ever really lost contact with her brother, with her parents – or was that all a plan to get her into the Potter's household – to get her closer to the Order?

Sirius sank to the ground, putting his head in his hands. He'd been convinced – absolutely convinced – that Remus was the traitor. He'd been gone so often, infiltrating werewolf packs, that he'd really grown apart from the Marauders. James's wedding had been the first time they'd seen him in months. How could he not have seen that the girl he loved was a death eater? Was she that good of an actress? Were they coercing her? Was she under the imperius? Maybe Peter was right; he'd been telling Sirius for months that he thought Regulus and Adeline might have been having an affair. Apparently, Peter had caught them sneaking around together while in his animagus form several times at the end of their seventh year. Sirius had shrugged it off originally, the very thought ridiculous…but maybe it wasn't so ridiculous.

He'd been wrong, he realized - back in fifth year, when he'd told her that he knew nothing would ever turn her to the darks arts. Hadn't she shrugged when he'd asked her if anything ever could? Hadn't she told him that she thought they were like their siblings? Hadn't she wondered if whatever had caused Bertram and Regulus to turn would cause them to turn? Maybe she hadn't just been pondering; maybe she'd been trying to gauge if she could convince him to turn, just as something must have caused her to. It'd been shortly after that conversation that she'd informed him that his father had been snooping around, trying to see if she could convince him to join the death eaters. He'd run away, and she'd showed up at Potter Manor not long afterwards. Had it all be a part of a bigger scheme to get closer to the Order? Had her master changed the plan when they'd realized Sirius couldn't be turned?

There were too many unknowns, and he didn't want to alert her to his suspicions, in case she turned completely. He wanted to be able to use her to their advantage; to use her to feed false information to Voldemort. So he decided that instead of confronting her, he would simply limit the information she knew to the best of his ability. He knew that if he brought his suspicions to Dumbledore, he would simply insist that she was acting on his orders. Dumbledore believed the good in people to a fault; no, if he was going to prove that she was a traitor, he was going to have to gather much more evidence.

And perhaps, he would be proven wrong. For the first time in his life, he hoped so.