The smell of hot cheese and tomato sauce greeted Harry and Sirius as they made their way into the kitchen. Lucy was just putting the pizza on a wooden platter to cool as they entered; she had already set the table for three, complete with snow-white napery and sparkling crystal.

"I'll let it cool for a minute or two so the cheese sets up and it's easier to cut," she said, wiping off her hands on a kitchen towel. "How are you doing, Sirius?"

Sirius smiled a crooked smile. His eyes, much to Harry's delight, were lively and full of mischief, not haunted and vacant. "Much better, thank you. And, I trust, a good deal less offensive to both the eyes and the nostrils."

Lucy made a derisive snort as she flicked the end of the kitchen towel at him.
"Watch it, skinny, or I'll 'accidentally' confuse you with the pizza. I'm a dangerous woman, you know," she said faux-maniacally, brandishing a two-handled pizza cutter at Sirius while Sirius and Harry laughed. Sirius pretended to cower under Lucy's mock assault, whimpering most pathetically as he laughed.

"Speaking of danger," Sirius said after a minute as Lucy got busy cutting up the pizza, "I want you to know that the reason I look like an escaped convict on the run is because I really am an escaped convict on the run."

Lucy stopped her cutting, turned to face Sirius, saw his serious expression. "You're not joking," she said. Her grip on the pizza cutter tightened a fraction.

"No, I'm not." His voice was quiet, compelling.

There was a few heartbeats' worth of silence before Lucy spoke.

"Yet you wouldn't be telling me this if you really were a danger to me, to Harry or to Marcus," she said somewhat tautly. "Either you're the world's best actor, or you're getting something off your chest that you think I should know."

"Lucy, don't worry," interrupted Harry. "I know all about it, and so does Dumbledore. Sirius was framed for betraying my parents and killing a few other people in the bargain. It wasn't until last year that the real murderer admitted to doing it, and that's not proof enough to free Sirius, so he has to stay on the run."

Lucy's piercing gaze didn't leave Sirius for a second, though her grip on the pizza cutter relaxed slightly. "You'd better tell me everything," she said, in a carefully flat, neutral voice.

Sirius and Harry, speaking in turn, told Lucy the whole story: How Sirius had trusted Peter Pettigrew with the secret of James and Lily's hiding place, only to find out that Pettigrew had betrayed them all and given them up to Voldemort, framing Sirius for the murders along the way. Lucy questioned both of them, searching for weak points in their stories, probing with such relentless finesse and firmness that Harry could well believe she had once been in Muggle law enforcement.

At last Lucy relaxed. A small smile crossed her face. "Well, Mr. Black," she said as she returned to cutting the now-cooled pizza, "your story seems to hold up, and you have one very persuasive advocate in your corner." She placed the slices on a plate and put them in the microwave for a few seconds to reheat them. "But something tells me that you had another reason for telling me this story. Something tells me that you have your suspicions about me, or about Marcus, and by telling your secrets you hope to encourage me to reveal my own." She turned to face Sirius and Harry, waiting for comments.

After a long, long moment, Sirius spoke. "I was at the Dursleys' place last night," he said, his tone fully a match for hers in gravity. "Not inside -- they never saw me -- but eavesdropping on the outside."

Lucy's face was unreadable, it did not register fear or concern. "And how were you able to pass unnoticed?" she asked quietly.

"By turning into this," said Sirius -- who then instantly assumed the form of a large black dog. His eyes still held Lucy's unwaveringly.

"Dear God in Heaven," Lucy whispered.