Disclaimer: The characters that look familiar to you belong to J. K. Rowling. The ones you cannot find in any of her books are mine. I don't intend to make any money out of this. I'm just having some fun.
Grimmauld Place
The afternoon was reaching its climax when someone knocked on the door. Remus Lupin tore his tired eyes from the book he was trying to read. Since Sirius' death, he just couldn't concentrate properly on things. He looked at the clock on the mantelpiece, it said 'No time for visits'. Remus couldn't agree more with it, he'd much rather be alone. But it might be important, so he went to answer the door anyway. He took his wand, just in case, and then opened the door cautiously... and stared at Albus Dumbledore. What was he doing here?
"Is something wrong?" Lupin asked immediately. Dumbledore didn't usually pay courtesy visits without a reason.
"I have some very surprising news for you, Remus, but don't worry, I think you're gonna like them for once," the old man said, a sad smile on his tired face.
Remus stood aside so that Dumbledore could come in and offered him some tea. Once they were comfortably seated, a smoking cup in their hands, Dumbledore cleared his throat and looked Lupin in the eye.
"I know this is going to sound unbelievable to you, Remus, and I must admit I had difficulty in believing it myself at first, but the source of my information is very reliable, so, although I don't have a direct proof yet, I believe it."
Remus nodded to show he understood.
"Remus," the Headmaster continued carefully, trying to choose the words that would lessen the shock of the news he was bringing; when he found none, he just said it straight away, "Sirius is alive."
Remus' cup fell from his hands. It was lucky he was sitting on the sofa, because he was sure his legs wouldn't have supported him. His eyes were rounded with shock, his lips slightly parted, as if he wanted to say something but couldn't.
"I know," Dumbledore said, "it's difficult to believe, but although I haven't seen him yet, I know he is alive. An ashanrii saved him. It seems she had some kind of grudge against Bellatrix and performed a ritual some years ago to stop her from hurting or killing someone. Sirius was the first she had to help. Probably there will be a long list, now that Bellatrix is free and has joined Voldemort again. Poor girl! But then, again, we must be grateful that she hated Bellatrix so much, because that's the reason Sirius Black is now alive, when he would have normally been dead."
Remus' mind was reeling. Ashanriis? Come on! They didn't even exist, did they? But he knew very well that Albus Dumbledore wouldn't joke about something like that, so he had to accept his words and hope that they were truth, that Sirius was alive, that he hadn't lost the last of his friends, his only friend. And with acceptance came the tears. He started shaking like a little boy, trying to control himself, but couldn't. The emotions running through his body were too strong. Sirius was alive, ALIVE! He covered his face with his hands and cried unashamed, while Dumbledore looked at the flames in the fireplace and tried to control his own shattered emotions.
After some time, Remus seemed to gain some control over himself. He wiped his eyes and looked at Dumbledore.
"What now?" He asked.
"I'm meeting Sirius this evening at Grimmauld Place. I didn't want him to come to Hogwarts. If someone saw him, imagine the chaos that would ensue."
Remus could only imagine. "Can I be there?" He asked hopefully.
"You can, but I want to talk to him first. The ashanriis hadn't met Sirius before. I want to make sure it's really him and not an impostor. We can never be too careful. You can wait in your room there, and when I finish talking with him, I'll call you and you can come down and greet Sirius yourself."
"Ok, that's fine with me." The young wizard said, he wasn't going to complain. He didn't care if he had to wait ten or fifteen minutes more. If he could see Sirius in a few hours, that was fine with him. "What about Harry? Does he know?"
"No," Dumbledore answered, "I wanted to make sure first that Sirius was alive. I'll talk to him tomorrow morning. I thought it would be too much for him if it turned out there had been a mistake and the man I'm going to meet this evening isn't Sirius Black. I don't know either how this uncommon experience has affected Sirius, he might be a little bit changed." The Headmaster sipped some cold tea. "I had thought of delaying my visit to you too, but then I thought you had a right to know. Sirius and you have been friends for so long, though you have been apart most of the time. You're and adult, and thus stronger, too. And I must admit I'm quite confident that the man the ashanriis talked about was indeed Sirius. Ashanriis are very clever. It's not as if they would make such mistakes lightly. The description they gave of the man they have rescued matches Sirius' as well, so, in my opinion, there's very little margin for error."
Remus just nodded. He was glad Dumbledore had told him first. This way he would have a chance to talk to Sirius and then help prepare Harry for the news.
Dumbledore left his empty cup on the table with a clatter that awoke Remus from his musings.
"Shall we go, then?" The old wizard asked. "There's some more things I want to talk to you about, but we can finish our conversation at Grimmauld Place."
"Ok, I'm ready," Remus said with determination and stood.
"Mmmm," the Headmaster started, "Remus, maybe you should wash your face first."
"Oh, right!" Lupin agreed, his face a little bit red with embarrassment. It wasn't a good idea to welcome Sirius back with a tearstained face.
***
A few hours afterwards, Albus Dumbledore and Remus Lupin were waiting in Grimmauld Place. They had been waiting for quite a long time now. When there were only a few minutes left to the appointed meeting time, Remus had gone up to the room he stayed in when he was at headquarters, but after some time, as Sirius hadn't arrived yet, the Headmaster had come searching for him and had asked him to wait downstairs with him. It was silly to be alone in that big house and be in different rooms. It was obvious that something had delayed Amanda and Sirius, so at least they could chat while they waited.
And they waited and waited and waited.
Sirius didn't come.
***
Sirius laid on a white foggy floor, a single door in front of him with carved signs all around it. Amanda came a second later through it, though in a much more dignified manner.
"See? It's not so bad." She said half-laughing. "You even look like you've made yourself comfortable."
"Listen," Sirius stood in a flash, his face contorted with anger, "that was totally uncalled for. I didn't want to take an astral door and I won't do it. You might not be worried about becoming an errant spirit for eternity, but I can assure you that 12 years of torment in Azkaban and one death have been enough for me, thank you very much. If you don't mind, I'm just going back through that door."
Sirius pushed Amanda aside, but when the girl moved, he realised with a panic that the door they had come trough wasn't there any more. He turned to Amanda, who was standing beside him, with her arms crossed and not looking very happy herself.
"Well?" She inquired, her left eyebrow higher than the right one. "Has Mr. I-do-what-I-want finished with his childish complains or are we going to stay here much longer?"
Sirius didn't answer, he just passed his fingers through his hair and shook his head in despair. He didn't like this one bit. As he remained silent, Amanda went on with her tirade:
"I'm very sorry but you must realise that you are in my world now. I can take care of myself and I can certainly take care of someone else. I don't think you have any reason to complain so far about the way Sandrine or any of us has been treating you, so the least I expect from you is a little bit of trust. I've done this thousands of times. Astral doors are not dangerous, you just have to know where you are going, and I happen to know it. So if you'll be so kind as to follow me, Mr. Black, then maybe we can go on and reach our destiny in a moment. Of course, if you'd rather, we could stay here while our friends worry about us."
She uncrossed her arms, turned and started walking very fast. Sirius turned too and followed her, he was already there and couldn't leave on his own, wizards didn't normally use astral doors. He'd have to follow her, but Amanda was very wrong if she thought the matter was closed. He'd make sure that she knew Sirius Black didn't like this kind of tricks.
At the beginning, Sirius could see nothing besides Amanda. They were surrounded by white misty walls which seemed to be always at the same distance from them, it didn't matter that they were moving. Amanda stopped abruptly, and stood there looking in front of her as if there was something to see. Sirius strained his eyes, but couldn't see a thing, just white walls. And then they started to appear: doors. In front of them, rows and rows of doors were appearing out of nowhere. They all looked the same. Sirius couldn't have picked one for all of his gold in Gringotts.
"This way," Amanda whispered, and started walking again.
They went to the third row of doors. Sirius felt as if in the middle of a muggle graveyard, surrounded by high tombstones. But they weren't tombstones, they were doors, and one of them was going to take him to Grimmauld Place, or so he hoped. Amanda reached for a doorknob without a second of hesitation.
"Wait! Are you sure this is the right one? I don't feel like getting into Malfoy Manor." Sirius inquired peevishly.
Amanda took her hand from the knob and turned to look at Sirius, anger in her pretty face. "Look! I need to concentrate properly in what I'm doing, right? So if you want to see your friends soon, SHUT UP!" The nerve of the man! Who did he think he was? Mr. Perfect? She turned again to the door and gasped. It had disappeared. "Look what you've done!"
"What have I done?" Sirius asked with contempt.
"You've made us too late. The door has sealed itself. We'll have to wait now until someone else comes in here through the same astral door."
"You mean we cannot get out?" Sirius asked with fear in his voice.
"No, we can not. Once in here you are supposed to go for the door you are searching for straight away. We've lost precious time trying to overcome your silly insecurities, and now we are stuck here until someone else comes in."
"Ha! I told you, didn't I?" Sirius shouted triumphantly. "I told you astral doors are dangerous. I told you we could end up stuck here. But did you listen? No, of course not! The all-so-powerful-ashanrii always knows best, doesn't she?"
"I told you, Sirius," Amanda answered angrily. "I've done this thousands of times, and this is the first time I'm stuck. We would be already in Grimmauld Place if you hadn't broken my concentration. I had already found the door."
"Of course, it is my fault, isn't it? Sorry, you oh-never-commits-a-mistake-goddess." He said, and bowed mockingly.
Amanda felt like slapping the man, but made an effort to control herself.
"So, how long are we going to have to wait, now? Days, months, YEARS?" Sirius shouted.
"You never know," the girl answered warily. "It depends on how long it will take for someone else to take the same incoming door again."
"Fine! Just marvellous!" Sirius commented ironically.
Amanda was going to retaliate, but just then she felt it, someone was coming in. She lifted a finger to Sirius' lips, she had to concentrate. She couldn't afford losing the exit door again. Only the Princesses knew how long they had been there already. A minute in the astral realm could be a whole lifetime in the human world. Suddenly the doors started to appear again in front of them, but Amanda didn't choose the same one this time. "Let's go," she said, and took Sirius' hand to make sure he was following her. She stopped again a few rows of doors further down, and reached for the first door's knob. Sirius wanted to ask her if she was sure this time that that was the right door, but checked himself in time. It was obvious she was anyway, because through the open door he could see the kitchen at his parents house.
"Gentlemen first," she said mockingly, and stepped aside to let Sirius cross the door first.
They stepped inside the kitchen and the door immediately disappeared behind them.
"Hello?" They called, but nobody answered.
Sirius went to inspect the rest of the house, his wand ready, just in case he encountered someone who didn't know about his 'resurrection' and had to defend himself. But there was no one.
When he went back to the kitchen, Amanda was sitting comfortably at the table, a newspaper on her hands.
"We are late," she said when Sirius came back from his inspection.
"What do you mean we are late? How late are we?" The wizard asked annoyed.
"A week," Amanda said, and shove the newspaper at Sirius, so he could see the date for himself.
Sirius was going to ask how could it be that they were a week late when it had felt as if they had waited only five minutes for the astral doors to reappear, but then they heard the wards going down. He turned and went to the house door.
"Wait!" Amanda tried to stop him, but he was already gone.
The door opened, and a girl with pink hair and muggle clothes entered the house.
"Nymphadora!" Sirius shouted delighted.
The girl turned around, her wand ready.
"Who are you?" She asked, her voice trembling, but her hand steady. "Why do you look like my mother's cousin? How did you get in?"
Sirius realised his mistake. It was obvious nobody had told Tonks that he was alive.
"Listen, Tonks, I'm him. I mean... I am me. I mean... Sirius, I am Sirius Black, I've come back from the dead, Tonks." Sirius managed to say, and then flashed her his characteristic smile.
Not a very convincing explanation, though. Tonks was going to stun him when she felt the magic run through her body. She was paralysed, she couldn't even blink.
"Tonks?" Sirius asked concerned.
"I paralysed her," Amanda said from the kitchen's door.
"You WHAT?" Sirius was very angry now.
"I PARALYSED HER, because it was obvious that she was going to attack you. Though I'm not sure why I didn't leave you alone and just went back to my friends." She answered.
"PITY YOU DIDN'T," Sirius was beside himself with fury now.
Amanda and him were staring daggers at each other when the door opened once more. This time it was a man with brown hair flecked with grey. Lupin. He took in the scene in front of him: Tonks looked frozen in place, Sirius was in front of him, slightly turned to his right, where there was a very beautiful and angry-looking girl. Before any of the others could react, he had his wand ready, but didn't attack.
"Sirius?" He asked cautiously.
"Remus! It's me! Listen, you've got to believe me. I didn't die! Well... I died, but then came back to life again. I'm not an impostor. Dumbledore knows. You've got to believe me!" Sirius implored with some desperation in his voice.
Remus raised his left hand to make him shut up. "Who is her?" he asked.
"Amanda Ming. She's an ashanrii. She brought me here. We took an astral door and got stuck, that's why we were late. We..."
Sirius stopped talking. Lupin had put his wand back in his sleeve and in two long strides was embracing him. Sirius felt as if his bones were going to break. 'Moony needs to control his strength a bit better,' he thought, but returned the embrace gladly.
"Merlin, Sirius! If you do anything stupid again, I'm gonna kill you myself, and I'm gonna make sure no ashanrii, wizard or deity can save you." Remus said, his voice faltering with the emotion of seeing his friend again.
"You do that," Sirius whispered, "you do that, Moony."
Seeing everything seemed to be all right, Amanda released Tonks, who had been able to hear and see everything and now fell to her knees, her left hand covering her mouth, tears streaming from her eyes.
Sirius released himself from Remus' hold and, kneeling in front of her, hugged her fiercely. "It's ok," he whispered, "I'm fine, I'm fine."
"How...?" She tried to speak.
"Shhhh," Sirius calmed her, "don't worry, I'll explain everything. Just calm yourself, Nymphadora..."
"It's TONKS!" The girl shouted hysterically. This was too much for her.
Meanwhile, Remus had approached Amanda and they had shaken hands.
"Are you the one who saved him?" Remus asked awkwardly.
"No," Amanda admitted, "I just brought him here. A friend of mine did it, but she couldn't come."
"I see..." Remus said thoughtfully, "well, thank you anyway for everything, and please, make sure to thank your friend for me too. I wish I could thank her myself."
"Maybe you will able to do it. Now that Voldemort is back, we might have to meet now and then, to co-ordinate the defence."
Remus nodded smiling. "That would be great." Then a thought came to him. "What took you so long anyway?"
"Oh!" Amanda looked at the floor. "We had a kind of... disagreement, and we lost the exit astral door, so we had to wait until someone else used the same incoming door we had taken. We were lucky we only had to wait a week." She commented with a sigh of relieve.
"I see," Remus smiled, although he wasn't sure if he had understood the girl properly. He didn't know much about astral doors. Anyway, what did a week matter when in the end he had Sirius back again?
Lupin turned to Sirius and Tonks, who were still kneeling on the floor. "I think we need something strong. If I'm not mistaken, there's still some firewhisky in the cupboard under the sink. Come on, you two, you need it much more than Amanda or myself."
Sirius nodded tearfully from the floor, let go of Tonks and then helped her stand. The girl was still crying, the shock of recovering the only member of her family who didn't despise her was too much for her.
After five rounds of firewhisky, everybody was feeling much more relaxed. Even Sirius and Amanda were joking again with each other, their previous disagreements forgotten.
"Maybe we should tell Dumbledore," Lupin finally said.
"Yeah," Amanda agreed. She tried to say something else, but her tongue felt strangely heavy in her mouth and she couldn't let the words out.
"You do that," Sirius told Remus, "you are the only one still sober enough."
Remus nodded, but immediately regretted it, because everything started to spin around him. When the kitchen settled itself again, he slowly approached the fireplace and threw some powder into the fire, then said as clearly as he could: "Albus Dumbledore, Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
Dumbledore's head appeared immediately between the flames in the fireplace.
"What is it Remus? Is there something wrong?" He asked worried.
"No," Remus said, shaking his head - which he immediately regretted again. "It's just that Sirius finally decided to turn up. An ashanrii is here, too, I think her name is Amanda."
"Are they ok?"
"Oh, yeah..."
At that moment, a loud thud was heard from behind Moony. He turned slowly. Tonks' head had hit the kitchen table, she was going to have a big blue bruise in her face the next day. Lupin turned again to the fire.
"Yeah, they are ok," he went on saying. "We've been... celebrating Sirius' return," the young wizard admitted a little bit ashamed.
Dumbledore smiled widely from the fireplace. "That's ok," he said, "I doubt we will have any better reasons to celebrate in the near future. I'll go and find Professor McGonagall, and then we'll both come to Grimmauld Place. I assume that's where you are, right?"
"Yes," Remus confirmed, without nodding this time though.
"Ok, see you in a minute, then," Dumbledore said, and disappeared from the fire.
Remus raised slowly from the floor and returned to the kitchen table.
"Time for some coffee," he announced, and started putting the cups on the table. He didn't dare to use his wand, he didn't want the cups to end up on top of the fridge or in some other uncommon place.
His companions seemed to need the coffee very much, or maybe even something stronger. Pity they didn't have any anti-hangover potions at headquarters, Remus thought, and a tiny smile lightened his face. As far as the young wizard could remember, this was the first time that he could feel the start of a very bad headache and still go on smiling.
*****
Thanks for the reviews!
Thanks all for reading and reviewing!
Well, finally home, both, Sirius and myself. Let me know what you think of Remus and Tonks' reactions. Chapter 8 is almost ready, I'll try to post it today or tomorrow, as a compensation for your patience during my short holidays. ;-) Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny and many other familiar characters will be back in Chapter 9, which I'm writing right now.
Kady Rilla Wholi: Thank you for your comments. I've already corrected Chapter 6. I hope you liked this chapter too.
hermionegreen: I'm glad you think Sirius was wonderful with the children, and I can tell you that a certain character who we are gonna meet in later chapters is gonna agree with you. ;-)
Kabbebalers: Thanks! I had some difficulty as well to post the first chapter. Once you get familiar with FFnet is not so difficult though, so go on trying to post your fic. ;-)
K-Black: Thanks, I hope you liked this chapter too.
I-love-sirius73: Thanks! Well, you'll have to wait a bit to see how the ashanriis react when they discover Remus is a werewolf, because you can be sure they are gonna know it sooner or later. We'll see Harry in Chapter 9, but I'm not sure yet if he'll meet Sirius in it or in Chapter 10, depends on how long Chapter 9 turns out to be.
Knight Samar: Well, Albus Dumbledore obviously knows 'everything'. ;-) He knew the ashanriis were real, because he met them in Grindewald's times. And he had met Amanda, Sandrine and Sha-adi too when they were younger. He's gonna meet many other ashanriis, though, because he's very much interested in winning them over as allies, that's really what this story is about, you know, 'finding allies'. Let's wish him luck!
