Chpt. 57: Come Away With Me
Calamity rolled over and felt her elbow come into contact with something very solid, which hissed in pain.
"I keep telling Remus to get me a new bed," Sirius groaned rubbing his head.
"I keep telling you we should nap in your mom and dads room," Calamity reminded him.
"Thanks Dr. Freud, but no thanks," Sirius muttered. He moved half over Calamity & kissed her forehead lightly.
"Do you have work this week?"
"No, I have time off."
"Explains our cat nap. What did you tell Fudgemaker?"
"I told Fudge I was tired from my time abroad and needed some time."
"He's not even going to check on you?"
"I think I'm off his worry list with all the other issues going on."
Sirius sighed and rolled over, hand behind his head looking at the ceiling, "Must be nice, doing what you like when you like."
Calamity glanced over at him. His once tan skin was pale from being inside and he certainly looked like he wasn't eating as much as he did in Costa Rica. Though, he certainly ate when she was over.
"Sirius-" she began, but he rolled off the bed and stood, pushing his hair to the side and beaming to cut her off.
"Order meeting tonight! That means Molly will cook."
As if on cue there was the sound of Mrs. Black's portrait yelling below and a familiar voice saying "Sirius, the hags awake!"
Sirius' smile grew larger and he rushed from the room, leaving Calamity confused at the voice. Shouldn't Fred be in school? She found her confusion was well placed as she entered the kitchen to find Fred and George talking animatedly with Sirius, with Arthur half smiling next to his sons.
"Hey Calamity! How was America? Saw the paper," George said, cutting off Fred mid hand gesture.
"Should you be at school studying?"
Fred and George gave a devilish look to Sirius, who beamed like a proud father. "They've left with a bang."
Calamity sat down. "You left?"
"Fred & George have decided to start a business," Arthur said.
"Harry helped us," George added.
"Mum's underwhelmed, but she'll come around," Fred added. "And now we can be full time Order members!"
"Not yet you can't," Molly Weasley came bustling into the room. "Sirius, where is the bread knife? Oh Calamity! Hello!"
Calamity stood to hug her. "Molly, let me help you find everything. I don't reckon this one will be any help to you."
In the kitchen Calamity found the bread knife and put it on the counter before starting to chop what Molly instructed her to. They worked in silence for some time, which Calamity didn't mind. Finally, Molly spoke. "All of my children are doing everything they can to give me gray hair."
"I've always felt like that was the job of children," Calamity said with a smile.
"Ginny, Harry, and Ron got in trouble for some Dumbledore's Army they were a part of; Fred and George left school and won't stop talking about joining the Order; and Percy-" She paused. "You know, I lost two brothers the first time You-Know-Who was around."
"I know," Calamity said.
"I don't know if we'll make it out," Molly said. "They're all so stubborn!"
"Not sure where they get it from," Calamity said.
Molly gave her a quick glance. "How do you keep them safe when you don't even know what is going on?"
"I think you have to trust that you raised them well," Calamity said. "And I think you raised some of the best."
Molly didn't respond, but after a few minutes Calamity heard her humming to herself as she worked.
After dinner, the Order began to arrive- or at least those who could. It was a smaller affair than usual with some folks back at Hogwarts & others on assignments. Remus sat down next to Calamity and Tonks. Their discussion turned to updates on the giants and werewolves, and reports in and outside of the ministry. Calamity watched Dumbledore carefully. He didn't mention the ring. She looked at his hands. He wasn't wearing it. He caught her eye for just a moment before looking back at Remus who was speaking. He didn't look at her for the rest of the meeting.
Afterwards he stood to excuse himself as Remus, Tonks, and Sirius laughed at a story Fred was telling. Calamity followed him into the hall. He paused at the stairway and turned to face her.
"Sirius seems overjoyed that you've been back in the country," Dumbledore said cheerfully. "It's good for him to have company. I send him updates on Harry when I'm able."
"Do you," Calamity asked, surprising even herself with the cold tone. "And do you send updates about anything else?"
"I find it best not to worry people with things they cannot control," Dumbledore replied.
"Did you destroy the ring?"
Dumbledore glanced behind her before saying, "No."
Calamity felt a rage erupt inside her chest again, but she kept her voice even and low. "You're researching it?"
"There are powers at work you don't understand," Dumbledore began, but he seemed to decide there was no point continuing and stopped speaking.
"I understand that we went to destroy an evil trophy," Calamity said tensely. "A trophy that can imitate the voices of lost ones and sense the intimate details about their demise and our involvement in it. That's darker than any magic I've ever seen."
Dumbledore remained silence, though his eyebrow twitched slightly.
"I found a copy of Secrets of the Darkest Art," Calamity said. "It's tricking you to survive, Albus."
"I will update you when it is time," Dumbledore said.
"How many people will die before that? How many people are you willing to leave behind for this research?"
"Good night, Clara."
He bowed his head half an inch and disappeared through the door. When she opened it behind him, she found he had vanished completely, leaving only the dark and quiet muggle street.
Sirius woke up to find the bed free of any extra elbows. The strange coldness surprised him as he rolled onto his stomach and placed his hand where she ought to have been.
Calamity had been acting strange for two weeks, ever since their last order meeting. He knew she and Dumbledore had exchanged words, but about what he wasn't sure. He had rarely seen her as mute about a topic as he had about this conversation and it was unnerving. Perhaps she missed America or was getting tired of having to see him in his most noble cage? He formed his hand into a fist around the pillow. Surely she knew if he could take her out and about he would. But he was trapped, more trapped than he had ever been before- even as a child, when he wasn't aware of his cage. To be trapped and knowing of his cage- knowing he could be helping Harry and the order defeat Voldemort, he couldn't feel more helpless.
He sighed hearing Kreecher's steps outside his door. He listened carefully as Kreecher ran through a morning ritual of sorts. He's creep up the creaking old stairs as quietly a his old bones would allow, then mutter some insults at Sirius' door, and finally he would turn to Regulus' door. Here he would mutter something in-cohesive from Sirius' place and push the door open. He'd be in the room for at least thirty Regulus' door clicked closed Sirius sat up. He supposed he ought to get out of bed and do something, but he'd done pretty much everything he could think of cooped up. So he huffed and lay back down staring at the ceiling.
At least in Azkaban he could listen to the insane yelling of those deatheaters. Before he could fully swing into a moody round of moping about how much he's rather be in Azkaban than this house, there was a knock on the door.
"Come in."
No one opened the door. Instead the knock came again. He stood and walked over to the door, pulling it open, and stopping in his track.
There was a book flapping in the air before him. If that wasn't surprising enough, the stairway down to the floor below was covered in a familiar Gryffindor red. The book nudged into his chest until he held out his hands where it fell delicately and spun its pages until it came to a note.
Come downstairs.
He followed the stairs, book still in hand. The walls were lined with pictures and he paused every so often to stare in amazement. There was an embarrassed and amused Moony watching as Sirius gave a drunken toast at James & Lily's wedding. Then James, Sirius, & Remus with shaggy hair in 3rd year, when a hair growth potion had gone wrong. An 18 year old Calamity reading as Sirius lazed next to her, tossing a ball up and down in the air. Dozens of pictures made his journey down the stairwell longer than it'd ever been as he paused to peer and smile at each one. When he reached the end he found not the usual parlor, but the decor of the leaky cauldron- the same room he and Calamity had stayed in as he recovered from the night St. Mungo's was attacked. Sirius touched his old wounds in memory. The room even smelled like the burn potion. Calamity was standing before him, two ice cream cones in her hands. The only thing Sirius could manage to get out was "What in Merlin's beard."
Calamity held out the ice cream cone, "like it? I had to call in some hefty forces to help."
"From ol' Fudgey," Sirius teased taking the cone. It tasted identical to the shoppe in Diagon Alley.
"You think Fudge can do this level of transfiguration and charm work," Calamity scoffed.
"Why all this work,ey?"
Calamity shrugged. "I figured if we couldn't go out for a date, we would do our best here."
"I thought you were regretting being stuck with a goon who is on house arrest."
"Well, my goon is pretty handsome, so it's not so bad," she sat on the bed and patted it. "Besides, don't get too excited. I'm not sure how long this will hold. Your house rejected a lot of my work."
Sirius obliged slurping some dripping cream from the cone. "Mum never trusted us to redecorate after an incident when I was nine."
"Given your taste now I reckon it was a wise choice."
Sirius attempted and failed to look hurt while eating his ice cream. Before he could respond there was an unearthly sound from the floor above. Calamity jumped up, pulling out her wand so fast that it forced her to drop her icecream in the process, as she looked around as if they were about to be attacked by Voldemort & all of his deatheaters. Sirius realized what it was. Kreacher had finished his ritual in Regulus' room and had just entered the stairs.
As if to confirm this, Kreacher began to wail, "Mistress must not be angry at Kreacher! Kreacher has tried and tried but this filth! They have ruined Mistress' home! They have made it impure! They have ruined the Black tradition, they have made it scum!"
Sirius looked back at Calamity, who looked even more confused now, then down to her ice cream on the floor. Maybe it was her face or her overreaction to the house elf's wail, or just his own happiness at the whole affair, but Sirius found himself laughing harder and harder, unable to stop. He was laughing harder than he had since he escaped from Azkaban and Calamity was joining in. He was holding his side, his own ice cream dangerously close to the bed mattress as he gasped for air. He fell side ways on the bed trying to regain himself as Calamity plopped next to him, a smile left on her face as she brushed a stray hair from his forehead.
Looking up at her, his eyes full of tears from laughing, he suddenly felt that he could stay in this house, waiting for his name to be cleared, cheering the Order on until he was needed to protect harry, so long as she were here. He could manage it if she were here.
He finally regained his control, wiping tears form his eyes and gazing up at her. The ring he had once given her glinted on her necklace.
"Sirius," She said. "Let's get married. Let's do it now. Today."
He sat up beaming as he kissed her.
When he pulled back, he could see the transfiguration wearing off on the wall behind her. The old wall paper was beginning to show through and he felt a tiny bit of his joy lessen.
"I can't leave the house and I can't keep you here like that, trapped for a crime you never comitted."
"Don't be dramatic," She teased. "We could go away some place you don't have to hide so much. Back to America or Costa Rica or anywhere else."
"We're in a war."
"Who is in a war?"
He watched her carefully. She was turning something over in her mind, deciding if she ought to share more than this statement, but swallowed whatever it was. Instead she said, "You can't stay cooped up here."
"After this is over my name can be cleared and we can get married and Harry and Moony can be my groomsmen."
"We might now make it."
"We might not make it to the end of the month. Maybe we make it through May, we might not make it pass June. Maybe we'll make it for eighty more years. We've got to try."
The bed was turning back into the stiff couch that always occupied the room as Calamity ran her hand across the ring on her neck.
"I want to, Calamity," he said. "But I think this is best."
"I know," she replied, but she still looked concerned.
He lay his head on her lap and took her hand, peering up at her as he kissed her hand, hoping to wipe the concern away. "Here, I've got a riddle for you."
"Alright," she said.
"A murderer is condemned to death. He has to choose between three rooms. The first is full of raging fires, the second is full of assassins with loaded guns, and the third is full of lions that haven't eaten in 3 years. Which room is safest for him?"
"Not a very cheerful riddle," Calamity said.
"Don't stall," Sirius teased pushing away some hair. "You're brilliant, which room is it?"
"The third. The lions are dead if they haven't eaten for three years."
"Got it. Now you."
She paused in thought giving him time trace her face with his eyes. He could see what would happen after the war as clearly as he could her hand in his. He could see them in the courtroom, Dumbledore helping to clear his name. He could see Harry dress in a tux and Moony pretending not to be teary eyed. He could see them in an apartment in London, sending Harry off to his 6th or 7th year of Hogwarts, maybe his first day of work. It couldn't be too long, right?
"I've got one."
"Alright, let's here it," he said with a smile.
"A king is old & dying. he has 2 sons: twins. He calls them into his room and says that to decide who will get the throne and all his riches they will race. The last horse across the finish line wins. Then he sends them out. The brothers are baffled and wander the kingdom for a few days, unsure of what to do. They come across a wise man, who they ask for advice. The wise man listens to their story and gives them advice. As soon as they hear it, the brothers jump on the horses and race back towards the castle. What was the wise man's advice?"
"Kill your brother's horse," Sirius said.
"No, you monster!"
"This is British royalty? It's gotta be something like that- Tudor style."
"No," Calamity assured him.
"Well, what is it, then?
"Take your brother's horse."
"Clever, love."
"The most clever."
"I love you."
"I love you too."
Don't forget to review! It's almost time for the the inevitable next chapter is Chapter 58: The Veil.
