September 8th, 1976: Sirius Black
Sirius wakes up to sunlight filtering in through the windows and soft whimpers coming from Prongs's bed. He frowns for a second—Prongs isn't pansy enough to whimper, he's a snorer—but then Sirius realizes he can hear Prongs's snores, too. He glances over to the four-poster next to his; Wormtail's fast asleep, drooling a bit on the pillow, and Sirius is startled upright. They didn't.
He bolts out of bed and rips open the curtains over Prongs's bed, only to find Evans fast asleep and crying out softly, no Prongs in sight. Taking a page out of Prongs's book from last night—does he think they can't realize when they're being hexed? Sirius and Wormtail aren't that thick—he casts Muffliato so she won't wake anyone else up and draws the hangings again, climbing onto the bed and shaking her shoulder. "Wake up, Evans, it's just a dream," he tells her gruffly—he's never been good with crying girls.
Her eyes shoot open; the whimpers cease. "Black?" she mumbles, sinking lower beneath her covers. "What are you—where—"
"You spent the night in James's bed, apparently," he says, shrugging and moving to the foot of the bed. "You must not have gone back to your dorm at all; you're still in your robes from last night."
"Why do you boys always catch me at my most unattractive moments?" Evans sighs, pulling the blankets fully over her head. "What time is it?"
Sirius grabs Prongs's watch off his nightstand and fiddles with it. "A little after seven. Bloody hell, Evans, you don't take long to go into R.E.M. sleep, do you? We came up here after six, and then you patched us all up and talked to James after, too…" He only implies that he heard her nightmare, too uncomfortable to state it outright.
Evans ignores the hint. "It's after seven already?" she says, shooting upright and swiping her matted hair out of her face. "The girls are going to know I'm missing… I was going to sneak back down to the common room, but Marlene, at least, will already be up and know I'm not there."
He thinks quickly, tossing the watch aside again. "It's Herbology today—you're not enrolled, right?" She shakes her head. "All right, then… may I break your nose?"
"Excuse me?" Evans gapes openly at him, shaking off the covers.
"Or your arm or ankle—it doesn't matter, really," Sirius shrugs. Since she still looks baffled, he continues, "It'll give you an excuse to go to the Hospital Wing—you can say you spent the night there. I'm headed there to see Remus already; you can come with."
She yawns and pulls herself to her feet, stretching. "As much as I appreciate your creativity, Black, I'd rather not injure myself for an excuse—besides, Madam Pomfrey can heal broken bones in minutes, she wouldn't keep me overnight for observation. Emmeline already knows I was up late in the common room; I'll say I couldn't sleep longer than a few hours and snuck down to the library to do research for Arithmancy."
"Suit yourself," Sirius says, "but you might want to sneak out with the Cloak in case you run into anyone on the way down from the Tower. D'you still want to meet me in the Hospital Wing during class? I'll be in there all day—Peter's going to join me during Ancient Runes, too."
"I shouldn't; the girls will wonder where I am," she declines, shaking her head. "Tell him… just tell him to get well from me," Evans adds after a pause, tensing.
It takes him a minute to catch on. "He doesn't think—he and Peter don't think you're into Dark Magic, Evans," he says softly. "They just—with you talking to Snape and all, they didn't want—"
"I don't talk to Severus," she says sharply, "not anymore. If you'll excuse me, I should go take a bath before breakfast." She brushes past him, opening the hangings and draping the Invisibility Cloak over herself; Sirius sees the door creak open and closed a second later.
"Girls," he scowls to no one in particular. He casts the countercharm for Muffliato and find Prongs and Wormtail still asleep; they both look dead tired—all of them are dead tired—but Sirius knows it'll look suspicious if they miss Herbology. With gruff resignation, he goes first to Wormtail's bed and then to Prongs in Moony's, tempting them with breakfast to get them out of bed.
They sit with the girls as usual when they enter the Great Hall half an hour later. "Good morning," says Evans quietly, looking at them each in turn—Alice and Mary in particular look startled by this, but the boys just nod and greet her in a casual rush.
"Lupe in the Hospital Wing again?" presumes Marlene, passing a box of Common Welsh Greens cereal down to Evans. Sirius lets Prongs confirm this, heaping pancakes onto his plate and drowning them in syrup—he'll need the energy, after what little sleep he got last night.
"Poor Remus," muses Alice (though not until she's carefully swallowed her dainty bite of omelet). "He must have an awful immune system, or a horribly debilitating disease… I wouldn't know which; he's always so reluctant to talk about it."
Wormtail says smoothly, "He'll be okay. He's not terminally ill or anything; he's got more good days than bad ones."
"I hope so," Alice continues, shaking her head. "Maybe it's some kind of an immunodeficiency?" She stops to take another bite of her omelet, and Prongs capitalizes on the opportunity to change the subject.
"Herbology first today; anyone have a free period?" Sirius gathers from the replies that Emmeline and (of course) Evans also dropped the class this year. Nothing follows from the conversation, though: Sirius and Evans both know they shouldn't publicly agree to spend time together today, and Emmeline doesn't much like Sirius to begin with, not anymore.
Sirius walks Prongs and Wormtail down to the greenhouses, then turns straight around and bolts to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey tuts at him for mucking up her floors and disturbing the peace, but she doesn't object when Sirius steps inside the only drawn hangings in the room and perches on the edge of Moony's bed. He's awake but drowsy, without a scar in sight—his recoveries have been much easier now that the Marauders have started spending the full moon with him. "Hullo, Padfoot," he says mildly. "How do you feel?"
"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" Sirius says, smiling. He reclines onto the cot next to Moony, propping his elbow up on the pillow and resting his head in his hand. "Aren't you tired?"
"Madam Pomfrey woke me up to check my wounds fifteen minutes ago; I haven't been able to fall back asleep since then." Moony rolls onto his back to look up at Sirius properly. "What time did you go up to the dorm?"
"Around six," Sirius says, lowering his voice, "but we were awake for a while after that. Evans took care of the scrapes we got and redid some of the earlier cuts we healed ourselves—for Wormtail and Prongs, at least, she did. She says hullo."
Moony rolls his eyes and trails a finger along a scar on Sirius's forearm. "I'll have to thank her for that later, if she's willing to talk to me, anyway. You wouldn't let her fix yours?"
Sirius intertwines the fingers of his free hand in Moony's to stop the motion—it tickles. "Remember what Marlene said about how they make me look—"
"Rugged, yes, I remember," Moony says, half laughing and squeezing Sirius's hand. He sobers up, though, and adds in earnest, "You've got to stop sleeping with her, Padfoot."
"But Moony—"
"No buts," he says over him, even though his voice is soft and cracking with fatigue. "It's not fair to her, and you deserve more than just a physical relationship—"
Sirius sighs. "I don't want to court her, or anyone else, for that matter, Moony. I save my feelings and shit for the Marauders—"
"Language, Padfoot."
Sirius disobeys with an even more vulgar swear word (Moony shakes his head like he's never seen anything like Sirius before). "I put my trust in my mates, not in some girl who gets all giggly and lightheaded when she's around me."
Moony counters, "Marlene McKinnon is neither giggly nor lightheaded, you know that." Sirius doesn't refute it, but he doesn't cave in, either. "One of us has got to get a proper girlfriend one of these days, Padfoot; I think Slughorn's starting to seriously believe we're gay."
"He wouldn't—do you know how many points I've lost in that class for flirting with Mary? Or for trying to flirt with Alice?"
He shrugs. "It might just look like friendly teasing to him. It's bad enough that you and Prongs bring me and Wormtail as your dates to every Slub Club party—"
"However much I'd love to see the look on Mary's face if I invited her—" Moony glares at Sirius and mumbles something about Marlene again "—I'm not going to let him just bring two of us and leave the other two behind. Alice will probably be going with Cresswell, so unless you can somehow convince Evans to take you—no, I didn't think so. While we're on the subject, would you care to be my date at the next party? It's next weekend—the Saturday, I want to say."
Reluctantly, Moony nods, smiling shyly—no matter how close they all are, he's always a little surprised (maybe even embarrassed) when any of the Marauders do something nice for him, the werewolf. "You should go back to the dorm and get some sleep. I'll be fine here, I swear."
"I'll get some sleep if you insist, but I'm not leaving you," Sirius says stubbornly. "Budge up."
"There you go again, making me look gay," mutters Moony, scooting to the very edge of the cot—Sirius realizes he's still holding his hand and lets it go as he lies down atop the sheets, flat on his back. "And you wonder why it's been so long since my last kiss."
"But Moony, you haven't even had your first kiss yet," Sirius reminds him, laughing.
He gives a huge yawn but still manages to snap, "Shut it."
Sirius shoves his shoulder playfully and falls asleep for the second time this morning within seconds.
Madam Pomfrey wakes them up what feels like a second later, looking scandalized. "I want to check on how your wounds are healing up again, Lupin," she says, then adds, looking disgruntled, "And you have a few more visitors who want to see you. Get out of my patient's bed, Black, save it for the privacy of your own dormitory."
Told you, Moony mouths at him as Sirius clambers into a sitting position and frees up some room for Moony to lie flat. Sirius glances behind Madam Pomfrey to see Wormtail and Prongs squeezing their way under the curtains—and, surprisingly, Evans, already in a chair and looking rather embarrassed to be here. "Shut it, Remus—I thought you didn't want to come up here, Evans."
"I should get going soon," she says hesitantly, "the girls are going to wonder where I got off to now that Herbology's out… it was just me and Emmeline, though, and she's not much for company. Didn't even ask where I was going when I left. Lupin—I mean, Remus—I—"
"And yet I'm still 'Potter' to you," remarks Prongs, looking mock put out. (Wormtail laughs, as if on cue, and Prongs rounds on him with a glare.)
"Look, Lily," sighs Moony, pulling down the sheets for Madam Pomfrey, "thank you for accepting—my condition—and everything." He glances every-so-slightly at Prongs, Wormtail, and Sirius in turn, since he can't specify "everything" in Madam Pomfrey's presence (or Evans's, even). "And about what I said earlier—"
Evans tucks her hair behind her ear, shaking her head a few times. "Don't worry about it, Lupin, all right? You, too, Pettigrew," she says quickly; she and Wormtail share a look, her blushing, him grinning.
"Now that we've filled the sap quota for the day," Sirius says briskly, breaking off the cozy looks. "Anyone up for a round of Exploding Snap?"
Madam Pomfrey scolds on her way out from under the hangings, "This is a Hospital Wing, Black—no explosives allowed. I'll be back with your lunch at noon, Lupin."
"So tell me what's new," says Moony after Madam Pomfrey's retreated to her office. "Quidditch tryouts are this weekend, right?"
"Gid says he's having them Friday night," says Prongs, nodding. "Should be an exciting day—we're finding out about the internships after lunch then, too."
Moony's face falls as Prongs realizes his mistake. Wormtail says quickly, "Don't worry about it, Remus, I'm sure we'll all get one—"
Moony shakes his head, his face falling. "I doubt it. Employers never want to hire werewolves…"
"That's ridiculous," Evans says firmly, her knuckles whitening. "It's just a daytime thing—your lycanthropy won't even be an issue on the job."
"Shouldn't, but will," mutters Moony, closing his eyes.
There's a beat, briefly. "You should get back to sleep," Evans decides, leaning down to rummage through her back. "Potter, I have your Invisibility Cloak still; we should wear it on the way out."
"It's not a crime to be seen in the Hospital Wing," Prongs points out, but he catches the Cloak all the same when Evans tosses it to him.
"I'm staying. We're not leaving Remus alone here," Sirius insists as Prongs tucks the Cloak in his robe pocket and turns to go.
Moony starts to claim that it's not necessary, but Wormtail talks over him: "You've already been here all morning, Sirius. I'll stay."
"No, you won't," says, unexpectedly, Evans. "All four of you could use a bit of rest before lunch—sooner or later, it's going to start looking suspicious when you're all exhausted every morning after Lu—Remus—ends up in the Hospital Wing, and besides, when are you ever separated? I will stay here; if anyone asks, I'll just say I've been helping out Madam Pomfrey. Tell that to the other girls for me, will you?"
"She has a point," says Moony fairly, blushing pink again.
Reluctantly, Sirius gets up, trying not to watch as Prongs stares at Evans with something tantamount to awe. "Thanks, Evans," Sirius says in a jumble before stepping outside the canopy with Wormtail—Prongs hangs back for a moment, and Sirius catches an indistinct murmur of banter—flirting from him, teasing rejection from her.
Neither Sirius nor Wormtail mentions this, though, when Prongs emerges, pulling the Invisibility Cloak from his pocket. "Pomfrey's not looking? All right, get under, quickly…"
After a much-needed nap and lunch, Sirius and Wormtail trade places with Evans, who's sporting a cautious sort of smile when Prongs accompanies her out. Moony's mostly asleep for the rest of the day, but they don't leave his bedside until dinner, and then only at Prongs's urging.
As expected, the girls are more curious than is safe for Moony. "Where've you been all day?" pries Mary through a mouthful of stew. "You two were acting odd in Herbology… and, like…"
Wormtail and Prongs exchange a look. "Long night," says Prongs as offhandedly as he can. "McGonagall's essay, you know. Lily asked for our help with it."
This, apparently, is the wrong thing to say, judging by the look on Marlene's face. "Any of you trying out for Quidditch tomorrow?" Sirius says smoothly, piling mashed potatoes onto my plate. "We'd be honored to have one of you lovely ladies on the team with us."
Evans chokes into her pumpkin juice, attracting Marlene's attention. "You know, Lily, you should go for Beater," she says, smiling. "You were brilliant for a beginner at that game last June."
"I don't think so," Lily says unsurely, coughing into a napkin. "Quidditch isn't really my thing."
"To each her own," replies Alice, though Marlene isn't quite so content with Evans's decision. "I'm sure you'll both make the team again, Potter, Black—you play brilliantly."
Wormtail nods his excited agreement, Sirius thanks her melodramatically—and Prongs blushes and mumbles something incoherent. If you ask Sirius, Prongs needs to hang around Evans less.
They all leave the Great Hall together—Madam Pomfrey's kicked them out of the Hospital Wing for the day, claiming that Moony needs his rest more than he needs his mates, and they can't do much about her verdict. Mary's saying something about Veronica Smethley's hopeless adoration of Gilderoy Lockhart when he crosses their path, flanked by three other Slytherins, and stops dead. "Sirius—"
"Save it," Sirius says bitterly, shoving past him. "Don't you have your little Death Eater friends to suck up to now?"
"But I don't want—"
Marlene starts to say something that Sirius point-blank ignores. "Should have thought about that before you started talking with them about joining up, shouldn't you have?"
Sirius whirls around and stare him down—the other Slytherins are cracking their knuckles, but he puts a hand out to stop them, his jaw working wordlessly. Finally, he manages, "She burned you off the tapestry, you know. Just like Professor Tonks—"
"Can't even call her Andy anymore? Your own cousin?" Sirius snarls. "You continue to disgust me. Let's go." The other Gryffindors don't speak, don't even move. "I said let's go! Bugger off!" he bellows at the gathering bystanders.
The walk back is as tense as after Prongs confronted Snivellus last Thursday, except instead of subdued silence, the girls impose forced conversation. "Don't even think about him, Sirius," Mary advises him as they reach the Fat Lady. "Take it out on Slytherin in general—like in Quidditch, maybe. You're trying for the house team again, right? We could use the win, since, like, Slytherin came in second in last year's—"
"Merlin, Macdonald, do you every shut up? Or are you too thick to take a hint?" Sirius spits, shoving past Wormtail on his way through the portrait hole.
Mary recoils but doesn't respond; Alice starts to defend her (by taking off house points, no doubt), but it's Marlene who really rounds on him. "Leave Mare out of it! Just because you ran away from home—"
"Like you didn't do the same thing," Sirius mutters, fuming.
"Too afraid to say it to my face?" yells Marlene, stepping closer. "Speak up, why don't you? Own up to your—"
"I SAID LIKE YOU DIDN'T DO THE SAME THING!" Sirius explodes, his voice raspy.
"Break it up!" demands Alice—she's angry, angrier than Sirius would have thought possible from her—but neither of them pays her any mind.
Marlene lifts herself to her full height—she hadn't been expecting this reaction, from the looks of it, but it doesn't deter her. "All right, you want the whole house to hear about it, fine! I ran away from home last July because bloody Mum doesn't think I'm important enough for her to take custody of my orphaned mate, and Maggie went and told everyone because I'm not enough of a sister to her! And it sucks, but you don't see me taking it out on everyone, do you?"
"Right, because this conversation doesn't have anything to do with you."
"What it has to do with is that you can't treat my mates like shit just because you think it's all right to shag and drop—"
"ENOUGH!" roars Alice. They're startled into silence—Alice Abbott never gets angry. "Black, lay off her! Marlene, calm down."
Mary says viciously, raising her voice, "Does it look like we're talking to you?" Sirius glances around and realizes belatedly that the entire common room is staring at them—so much for privacy.
Evans, looking shaken, ushers Marlene up to the girls' dormitory; Prongs and Wormtail, in turn, steer Sirius up to theirs. "What was that all about, Padfoot?"
"I loathe all of them," he seethes, crossing his arms moodily. "Why did he have to join them? Why did Andy have to come here, anyway? I don't need a babysitter—"
"If that's how it's going to be every time you run into Regulus, you might," says Wormtail quietly. "Maybe you should talk to him—"
"That makes perfect sense, since we're estranged now and all," Sirius mutters, picking at his bedspread.
They exchange a look; then Prongs says, "Just use the mirror when you're ready." Sirius doesn't say goodbye when they leave.
He's sure it's one of them again when the door opens next, so he's shocked to see Marlene swiftly locking the door and approaching his four-poster. She settles into his arms, somehow still rigid. "I miss you," she mumbles, abashed—apologetic.
"I miss Remus," he says, avoiding the subject, avoiding the look in her eyes. "Why does he have to be so bloody ill all the time?"
She stiffens even more. "You're an arse."
"I know it."
And then Sirius is shoving her beneath him and kissing her and hoping she can hear his steady tattoo of apologies against her mouth: I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm—
xx
After last class, Andy's contempt during Thursday's class is tangible. While taking roll, she won't say Sirius's name; when she asks him where Moony is, it's with venom in her voice and a distinct frown. As he starts scrawling out answers, the last thing he feels is her glare before she dives headfirst into a borrowed Pensieve to assess last week's duels.
Right then and there, Sirius can tell the week's not going to end well. Potions the next morning doesn't go much better: Slughorn gleefully informs them that last week's partners will be permanent for the rest of the year, landing Sirius with Marlene bloody McKinnon to deal with instead of Prongs. The way she keeps looking over at him when she should be watching the cauldron almost makes him want to break it off, just to be rid of her mood swings—almost.
His mood improves a little when Moony comes out of the Hospital Wing during the free period, but Moony's usual optimism is dampened when he doesn't get an internship—and neither does Sirius. "My bloody dad, I'll bet anything," Sirius hisses as he reads through his rejection letter. "The Ministry's right in the Blacks' pockets…"
The other Gryffindors' moods are equally lukewarm as they read through their results. "Tough luck, Sirius, Remus," says Prongs bracingly, skimming a rather thick information packet. "Why the hell did they put me in Accidents and Catastrophes? I signed up for Games and Sports!"
"The Department of Magical Games and Sports had the most applicants, after the Department of Magical Law Enforcement," says Alice, flipping through the pages of her own packet. "I'm so excited—I made the Auror program!"
"That's wonderful, Alice—did you get in, Marlene?" asks Evans, glancing between the two girls. Marlene nods yes and leans in to ask Alice about the program rigor.
Emmeline tosses her rejection letter into her pumpkin juice and slips Wormtail's letter out of his hands—he's too afraid to open it. Neatly slitting open the envelope, she reads the first lines of his packet silently and hands it back to him, saying, "Congratulations—Department of Magical Games and Sports. You'll be helping to set up the 1978 Quidditch World Cup."
Prongs stabs moodily at his pork chops. "I'm supposed to report to some junior minister, Cornelius Fudge—what kind of a name is Fudge, anyway? He heads the bloody Muggle-Worthy Excuse Committee, for Merlin's sake!" Mary tries and fails to comfort him, as she's more preoccupied with her acceptance not into the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures but the Department of Magical Transportation.
"What's yours in, Lily?" asks Moony politely. He's handling the news awfully well; though he's obviously disappointed, he hasn't complained since initially finding out.
"Oh—I got into International Magical Cooperation," she replies, smiling. "I'm shadowing a junior ambassador to France."
"If you run into any of my distant cousins, tell them I say hullo," Sirius says moodily. Evans winces.
The girls are still mad at him for Wednesday, he assumes from the dirty looks they occasionally give him throughout the day. He doesn't much care—he still has the Marauders, and Marlene forces the girls not to be hostile—but he's still startled by Alice's outburst. Whatever happened to the peacemaking prefect who keeps everyone in line—never crosses the line herself?
"She's mad on McKinnon's behalf, mate," says Prongs wisely when Sirius brings it up on the way to the Quidditch pitch for tryouts. "Girls are like that—they all stand up for each other. Screaming your brains out at her in front of half of Gryffindor House is going to rile her a little."
"I know, but this is Abbott we're talking about," Sirius says, gesturing wildly. "Whenever she catches us shagging, she just docks points and separates us, and that's the end of it…"
"You weren't shagging, you were rowing—nastily, too. I think she's right, Padfoot; you don't really—I mean, you and McKinnon shouldn't treat each other like—" Words fail him, so he just clutches his Nimbus 1001 and sighs emphatically. (Sirius glares at his inferior Cleansweep Four—that's all you get when you're a Black Sorted into Gryffindor.)
He snaps, "Don't tell me how to treat my girlfriend, Prongs."
"Technically, what you do with her doesn't make her your girlfriend," Prongs points out as they reach the pitch. Sirius scowls but don't say anything—they're late, and Gideon's already setting up the tryouts.
"Good, you made it," he says, jabbing his thumb behind him. "Find the group for your position—you want Chaser and Beater again?" They nod. "James, you're with Edgar's group; Sirius, to Edgar's left."
Sirius joins a gaggle of underclassmen—a few of the girls are ogling him, and he indulges them idly, flicking his hair back over his shoulder. Fabian meets his eyes from the group of hopeful Keepers and smirks.
"All right, I want you all to play against each other. Split yourselves up by age—the six youngest Chasers, the four youngest Beaters, and the two youngest Keepers and Seekers, and so forth—and then each age group will further divide into two teams and play a quick game. Youngest players first," announces Gideon, raising his voice.
There are seven Beaters—three second years, one fourth year, two fifth years, and Sirius. The fourth year agrees to play twice, less from a desire to get two chances than from age-based obligation. "I was nervous enough just having to try out once," she complains, but Sirius can barely believe that she's anything less than completely confident from the way she carries herself.
"Don't worry," advises one of the fifth years. "Nerves never get you on the team."
"And yet I've never seen you play in a house match before," says the fourth year. Sirius holds back a grin as the fifth year bristles indignantly.
The first game isn't very well played, though a few players do stand out. Sirius can't help feeling glad when the fourth year is a particularly apt Beater, and one of the Chaser hopefuls is good, too—not that he stands a chance against the current team players, Gideon, Edgar Bones, and Prongs. Since they're short on Chasers, Gideon employs him to play another round, along with the fourth year Beater; she ends up on Sirius's team against the fifth years, but the Chaser isn't so lucky, playing only with Edgar of the three.
The more pretentious fifth year Beater isn't too good, but his quieter friend, to Sirius's dismay, is. He's a little anxious—for the fourth year's sake, anyway—but from the smile Gideon shoots Sirius at the end of our match, he himself has little to worry about.
Gideon gathers together the old team members at the end of tryouts and tells them quietly that they've all made it back on. "Too many second and third years who can barely stay upright on their broomsticks," he says, shaking his head. "We need a new Beater, though, since the last one graduated—it'll have to be one of the ones from your game, Sirius. Which ones did you think were good?"
Sirius is a little taken aback—Gideon isn't the sort of bloke who asks for anyone's advice. "The fourth year who played twice and the fifth year girl," Sirius says promptly. "The fifth year bloke wasn't any good. I like the fourth year, personally, but—"
"She nearly knocked me off my broom," remarks Edgar, grinning ruefully. "Doesn't happen often. I can't think of her name—"
"Anna Moon," provides Meghan McCormack. "The fifth year was Ophelia Jones."
"Hestia's cousin?" asks Fabian, perking up. Meghan nods. "I'm tempted to give it to her. Unwritten rules and all—"
Sirius cuts in swiftly, "Unwritten rules be damned, Moon hit more Bludgers and you know it. We can always keep Jones on as a reserve."
"And that Chaser—Ryan Robins, was it? Train young blood for next year and that… Both reserves, then?" Gideon proposes, and they nod (though Fabian's a bit put out). "Right. I'll let them know… Sirius, a quick word first?"
Baffled, he nods and signals to Prongs that he'll catch up with him later. Fabian doesn't stay for this, though Sirius catches him shooting Gideon a dirty look before departing. "Sirius," he says, his voice taking on the grave nobility that accompanies all his lectures (Sirius starts tapping his foot impatiently), "My fool of a brother found out from his girlfriend a few days ago who she chose as the new Slytherin Seeker." Sirius waits for it dully. "It's Regulus."
His foot stops tapping. "Meadowes picked that—"
"I thought you should know," says Gideon wearily, "so that you can prepare yourself for it. By all means, vent your aggression on your Bludgers, but if there's any foul play in our first game because of your family resentment—"
"I'll watch myself," Sirius says dully, turning to go. "Thanks—for telling me."
He's not looking forward to playing on the team this year nearly as much anymore.