Really, the opening line hit me and just wouldn't go away. Forty-three pages later...
Many thanks to Moony's Girl and Rapunzel for the beta jobs. Hugs for you both!
1:
There is no time in Azkaban. Separated from the rest of the world as it is, the wizarding prison is almost removed from the stream of time. Change occurs only when a new convict is brought in or an old convict dies and is taken out. Prisoners have no way of telling one day from the next. They know that days still occur, as sunlight occasionally falls through the windows set high in the fortress walls. Without that light, they would not even know of the passing of days, and the dementors, being blind, do not even have this much. Most of the prisoners, being either entirely mad or mostly-dead, can't bring themselves to care about the days.
A number of new prisoners arrive upon the tide. One of them is different from the rest, the first non-human in living memory to be interred in Azkaban. Where the others quickly fall into a timeless existence, he finds this to be impossible. Since he was quite small, the life of Remus Lupin has revolved around time. Now that he is in Azkaban, the one place in the world where time doesn't matter, Remus finds that he just can't let it go.
He brings time to Azkaban.
For the other prisoners, time comes in the form of periodically-recurring nights filled with fear as the hungry cries of the wolf in the cell at the end of the hall tries to break free. For Remus, time is the neat line of twenty-eight scratches on one wall of his cell, separated into five groups of five and one of four. Remus starts counting somewhere in the middle of the line, and each day he notes where he is on his line.
One morning Remus wakes up and it is the day of mark twenty-eight. He stares at the mark for a long time before he silently turns away from the wall. He has no appetite today and ignores what food is brought to him. The day is spent listlessly pacing the floor, eyes fixed on the cell's single window, set in the wall high above his head.
Early evening finds Remus curled up on the floor, naked. The rough stone of the floor bites and drags at his bare skin, but Remus doesn't want to risk wearing his robes. As it is, tonight it will be enough of a miracle if any of his clothing escapes being torn to shreds by the wolf. The cuts and bruises he gains from the floor won't last long anyway; werewolves are very fast healers. Pale moonlight streams down and illuminates him as writhes in agonizing pain, and Remus transforms for the first time in Azkaban. In the cells that line the corridor leading to Remus' own prison, the other inmates cringe as his screams of pain rip through the night.
After some short while, the cries cease, and Remus paces the width of his small cell on four feet instead of two.
It is the first time in six years that the wolf has found himself alone during the change, not counting the summer hols between fifth and sixth year and those between sixth and seventh. He whines and sniffs the air experimentally, searching for some sign of his pack. But all that the wolf can smell is fear and rot and death. And under it all, under all the filth and disease, the sharp musky scent that he knows to be prey. The wolf throws himself at the bars of the cell door, trying to escape, trying to reach the creatures dwelling in the other cells that are giving off that tantalizing smell.
Though they know that the wolf will not be able to break free of his cell, the other inhabitants of Azkaban are silent with a fear that, for the first time since their coming here, has nothing to do with the guards that roam throughout the prison. This row of high-security cells is reserved for Death Eaters and other followers of the wizard who called himself Lord Voldemort. They are all from old, pureblood wizarding families, and they know what it means to be near a werewolf who can smell human flesh but is denied it.
Here is Bellatrix Lestrange, née Black. She is newly arrived, still haughty and full of pride. Azkaban's guards have yet to break her, but she is trembling in her cell just the same. In her mind she can hear words from her childhood, words that her mother told her in the dark of the night. "The werewolf is one of the sturdiest beasts in the world. Unlike Muggles and other animals, werewolves can only be killed a handful of ways, nearly all of which are not only difficult but time-consuming as well." Hearing the frustrated howls of the werewolf, Bellatrix curls up in a corner of her cell, her usually drooping eyes wide with fear. Waiting for morning, she repeats to herself all the ways to kill a werewolf that she learned on her mother's lap. "Silver knife to the heart," she whispers to herself. "Silver in the blood or in the food..."
The wolf scrabbles at the wall of his cell. He jumps up and drags his claws down the stone, hoping to tear down the walls and free himself of this cage he has found himself in. He needs to escape, needs to find his pack, find the dog and the stag and the rat – no. A low growl begins in the back of the wolf's throat, and in her cell, Bellatrix falls silent from the fear that claws at her throat. Her words are of little use to her in any matter, there is no silver here.
Across from Bellatrix is little Barty Crouch, Jr., come just the day before with Bellatrix and two others. Barty never thought he would find himself in Azkaban, he felt sure that his father would save him. He never suspected that the quiet Gryffindor prefect three years above him was a bloodthirsty beast. None of this seems real, and Barty adds his own keening voice to that of the wolf's as he rocks back and forth in the middle of his cell, his arms wrapped around his knees. Barty doesn't care that he's a man of eighteen, he wants his mother.
Grey lips curl back with disgust and the wolf's growl lengthens. He remembers that his pack has been betrayed by one of its own, by the traitorous rat. He remembers that the pack is not merely missing, but actually gone, almost utterly destroyed by the rodent's betrayal. A new anger builds in the wolf; the rat must be driven out from the pack. Better yet, the rat must be killed as the stag was killed, killed as the wolf's pack was killed (and a part of the wolf wonders if it is also killed as the dog was killed, as he cannot remember the dog's fate, try as he might). Ready to hunt the traitor and mete out revenge for his pack, the wolf lets out a miserable, gut-wrenching howl when he finds himself still trapped behind cold stone walls and harsh iron bars, and the sound causes a shiver to go down the spine of the man down the corridor.
This is not the first time that Augustus Rookwood has heard the lonely howl of a werewolf. He spent some time on the continent when he was younger, and as he lies awake on the floor of his cell, he recalls a night nearly twenty years previous to this. A night Augustus spent tense and nervous in his bed as he listened to the cries of two loups-garous echo across the French countryside. Though he has not thought of that night for many years, lying here on the hard stone Augustus can almost swear it happened just yesterday, and even now he can nearly hear the howl of another wolf crying out in answer to the one in the cell only a few yards away from him. Augustus wonders how many times he will have to listen to the wolf before either he or Lupin dies.
Again the wolf drags his claws across the walls, and the razor-sharp claws leave pale marks on the dark stones. But it is no use, the walls are unyielding to the efforts of the wolf. He makes another attempt at knocking down the door, throwing his entire body against it, but not even the weight of a full-grown werewolf is enough to bring down the deep-seated metal bars. Unable to avenge his pack, unable to reach the prey that teases his senses, the wolf is desperate for the taste of blood, so much so that he gnaws on his own legs, his own flesh. On occasion he breaks his frenzy to raise his bloodied muzzle and let rip a howl of despair at the betrayal of the rat, at the death of the stag, at the absence (death?) of the dog.
Moonset comes at long last, and Remus falls to the floor of his cell from exhaustion, a bloody, bruised mess. His arms and legs are nearly chewed to the bone, the muscled flesh around them looks nothing so much like strips of meat that have seen particularly harsh abuse at the hands of an overly vicious butcher. By the time he wakes in the late afternoon, most of these wounds have closed almost completely, and Remus drags himself across the rough floor to the corner where his clothing lies. The robes still retain the neat folds he made in them the previous evening; the wolf was too concerned with the loss of his pack last night to take any interest in the clothes, even though the cloth smells strongly of human, a werewolf's natural prey.
Clothed once more, Remus crawls with great difficulty to the wall that adjoins the one bearing his line of twenty-eight marks. He struggles to sit, and using the stones of the wall as a support, he draws himself upwards until he is standing far above the pale marks mad incised by the wolf's claws during the night. Remus lifts a chipped piece of rock to the stone wall and vainly tries to steady his hand. Finally, he decides that neatness no longer matters, and he drags the stone down the wall and up again, down and up, down and up, repeating the motion over and over again until there is a distinct if somewhat jagged line on the wall.
Remus stares at the mark for a moment, then moves to scratch something more to the left of the line only to collapse in a heap on the floor. He's pushed himself too far too soon after the moon, especially when he hasn't had proper medical treatment for his injuries. It takes him a full five days to completely recover from the transformation, the longest time ever.
Sirius is slow to recover from losing so much in so short a period. Though he is legally Harry's guardian, during these first few years Minerva McGonagall often feels as if both the child and the man have been placed under her care. Though she felt that she had come to know Sirius Black quite well during the seven years that she was both his teacher and his head of house, she soon finds that she never really knew him, or, even if she had, he has been changed so drastically by events of that cold October night that all of her past knowledge has been rendered completely useless.
She is grateful to Dumbledore for allowing her to add Sirius, and by extension, Harry, to her contract as dependents. Sirius barely protests as she ushers him into the rooms that she occupies at Hogwarts, rooms that will now be his and Harry's as well. At barely twenty-one, Sirius is too young to be going through this alone, especially when he also has Harry to look after. If anything were to happen to Sirius, the boy would have to go live with his Muggle relatives, and Minerva, true to the curiosity that seems to be in the nature of all cats, has seen them. Harry will never even know that they exist if she has any say in the matter.
Part of her knows that one of the main reasons Dumbledore allows Sirius to stay at Hogwarts despite his contributing nothing to school is that his continued residence guarantees that Harry will remain in the castle, will remain under all the protections that its old stone walls have to offer. She supposes that, ideally, Harry should be raised away from the adoration of the wizarding world to prevent his growing up with a swelled head, but she can't bring herself to send either boy (because, really, Sirius is nothing more than a boy these days) away.
In a way, Harry's presence in the castle actually helps combat the formation of hero-worship or idealization. Though the students know who he is – it would be hard for them to not recognize the messy mop of hair that has been the star feature of the Daily Prophet for the past few months even without the distinctive scar – they have a hard time equating the shy little toddler with the august and remote child-hero of the papers. The girls coo over him while the boys play games with him, some rather rough and tumbley, though the girls always stop them before they go too far. Minerva never lacks for baby-sitters.
By the time that the winter holidays roll around, Sirius and Harry have been at the castle for over a month. Those students that go home for the holidays disabuse family and friends of the mythoi that has grown up around the small Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, telling them instead of the happy but lost child, eager to please and slow to anger. Though adults are quick to discount the words of children, it is not long before she ceases to hear Harry's name spoken with an air of hushed reverence when she visits the shops of Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley, and Minerva feels pride at the inadvertent work of her students.
Between the students and the other teachers, Harry is well on his way to adjusting to life without parents. Really, it is Sirius who worries the Transfigurations Mistress more. He moves through the days as if lost in a daze, rarely attempting to interact with the people around him. Harry is the only one who can bring him out of his shell on a consistent basis, and it rends Minerva's heart to see the two of them together, the tiny slip of a boy looking after the man as much as the man looking after the boy.
But Sirius still lags behind, avoiding the students and hiding from the other teachers. She knows that something is wrong, something about that Hallowe'en night that she does not understand. This is not the despair of a man who has lost three of his closest friends by the betrayal of the fourth, though it is not until she observes Sirius encounter Severus Snape for the first time since the former's coming to the castle that she truly sees how much Sirius has been changed.
A month after that first full moon, Sirius is walking, shuffling, really, his eyes on his feet, down the corridor to her classroom one evening, when he walks into Severus, headed the opposite direction and intent on the book he is reading. She tenses as she sees the collision, ready to separate the two men at moment's notice. Severus' own tension does not escape her sharp eyes either, and she watches in dismay as he berates Sirius for being such a clumsy fool. Sirius, his eyes still on his shoes, his entire body drooping, says nothing throughout the entire attack. Finally, unsure of what to make of the strangely quiet man that the nemesis of his school years has become, Severus winds down, a slightly bewildered look on his face.
Sensing the other man is finished speaking, Sirius mumbles an apology, carefully steps around Severus, and continues on to where Minerva is standing in the doorway of the Transfiguration classroom, stiff with shock. Harry, who has been clinging to the bottom of her robes as he is wont to do, rushes to his godfather's side and embraces a leg. Minerva fancies that there is a look of worry on the boy's face. Which is preposterous, of course, as Harry can't know the significance of Sirius not only admitting to Severus that he is at fault, but apologizing as well.
The entire occasion serves to drive home something that she has been trying hard not to acknowledge. Though he is far from being insane with grief, Sirius Black is a broken man, and Minerva despairs of ever learning how to mend him properly.
Ironically enough, the thing that hurts the most, the thing that plagues his mind day in and day out, is not the death of the Potters, nor that of Peter. He mourns for them, yes, mourns for them even when their memories have begun to fade and he can no longer remember the sound of James' joyful whoop at scoring a goal on the Quidditch pitch, Peter's nervous laughter at one of the others' raunchier jokes, Lily's soft soprano when singing little Harry to sleep. Mourns for them when he is so separate from the rest of the world that he can only vaguely remember why the three were important to him in the first place. But their loss is still not what hurts him the most.
The thing that hurts the most, the thing that never ceases to aggravate Sirius' mind, is that he never told him. Never told Remus (traitor, betrayer, murderer) how he felt. Never told him that he (don't think it, don't think it, don't let them know, 'cause it's wrong wrong wrong) loved him. And it hurts, hurts, hurts, because every full moon Padfoot still wanders the forest, trying to find Moony, his Moony. He howls at the moon, letting loose his anger, his sadness, his regret, his grief. Letting flow out all the things that he won't allow himself to feel or think all the other days of the month. Hoping, hoping, hoping that someday Moony will answer his howls. But his anguished cries are never answered. The night is silent aside from the soft whimpering of the large black dog.
Sometimes a striped cat joins him on his moonlight romps. Its presence is comforting, though it confuses him. He does not understand why it is here – full moons are for the wolf, the stag, the rat, and the dog, never the cat. But it twines around his legs, calming him, and he knows it to be a friend.
He becomes almost nocturnal sometime during that first year at Hogwarts. It is easier to avoid the students' stares and the teacher's pitying glances during the silent hours between midnight and dawn. His nights are spent wandering the corridors, and a part of him is not in the present as he goes. Instead it is lost in the past, mapping forbidden rooms and secret passages with his friends, sneaking into the Restricted Section of the library to learn how to be an Animagus, laughing, joking, playing with those three others. A part of him is still stuck in seventh year, trailing behind the others as they press on to some new adventure, watching the boy with the dancing golden eyes and the warm brown hair that's always just on the cusp of beginning to grey. Watching from the shadows where his gaze will go unnoticed.
Most of his days are spent in McGonagall's apartments, hiding under the covers of the bed she has told him is now his own. Sirius knows that she does not like his hiding, knows that she thinks he has been mourning for too long, that he needs to move on. He knows she's right, and would let go if he could. Every day when he wakes up, when he feels like it isn't worth it to live through the day, he remembers her words from the morning after that first full moon, he remembers Harry. He has to live and be strong because Harry, Harry's still alive. Harry's all he has left.
So he lives and breathes, but he isn't strong, because he can't let go no matter how much he knows he needs to. Can't let go of the boy with the golden eyes and the silver-streaked hair. The boy who became the man that betrayed them all, and Sirius can't help it but he still loves him. Still loves that soft, rich voice and those quick hands; still loves the shy smile and the soft laugh, and he hates himself for it. The emptiness and the longing and the guilt, the guilt of still loving Remus even after all he's done, all of it tears him up inside in ways that he's sure can't ever be healed. Only in Harry's innocent babbling and clumsy hugs, in McGonagall's strong support and gentle words does he find any sort relief.
Not long after coming to the castle, Sirius quite literally runs into Snape. Snivellus berates and degrades him, calling him a foul, loathsome worm, a creature not worthy to walk on two legs let alone tread upon the sacred stones that make up Hogwarts. Sirius takes all this in with nary a flinch, because he knows that every word out of Snape's mouth is the absolute truth. What kind of monster must he be, after all, to still love Remus after all the evil the man has done? If only Sirius had not been a Black, a member of that loathsome, hated family. Then James and Lily would never have mistrusted him, would never have made Remus the Secret Keeper, would have chosen Sirius instead. Remus might have killed him to try and get the secret, but James and Peter and Lily would still be alive and Harry would still have his parents, because Sirius would never, never betray them. If he'd only had a different name, a different family, Sirius would never have to feel this awful, aching emptiness in his chest.
So knowing it to be true, Sirius takes all of Snape's abuse, and would even nod his head in agreement if the guilt didn't weigh so heavily on it. Sirius' silent acceptance of everything he says only serves to anger the young teacher more, and Snape starts yelling at Sirius, desperate to provoke some reaction from the broken man. Sirius is called a murderer, a betrayer, a traitor, a dog who turned and bit the hand that fed it. And Sirius knows that Snape still speaks the truth, because if Sirius hadn't been so blind, so stupid, he would have remembered that Voldemort was courting Dark Creatures, tempting them with equal status and the ability to be their true selves, not the domesticated animals wizards forced them to be, toothless beasts that would not and could not hurt a child. He would have remembered that Remus is a werewolf, a creature that is dangerous and vicious to human beings and not just Padfoot's playmate Moony. If Sirius hadn't been foolish with a love that would never be returned, he would have realized that Remus was the traitor. Sirius knows that it is his own fault his friends are dead, he just hadn't realize that Snape knew it as well.
Finally Snape winds down, confused and at a loss of what to do. He's said everything he's ever wanted to say to Sirius Black. All the hatred that has been building up inside of him since their first meeting on Hogwarts Express more than ten years ago has spilled out, and for the first time ever, Severus Snape is left with nothing to say to the man in front of him.
Sirius distantly realizes that Snape is finished, and he manages to muster a mumbled response. "I'm sorry," he says, "my fault. I'll try not to do it again." Then he shuffles around Snape and continues on to where McGonagall and Harry are waiting for him. Harry detaches himself from her robe, rushing over to hug his leg, and Sirius stares down at the boy with detached amazement, unable to understand how the boy can stand to touch him at all, because Snape's words are still rebounding in his head and Sirius can barely stand to even be himself.
When McGonagall first takes Black and the Potter spawn under her wing, Severus is not happy about it at all. Unlike nearly everyone else in the castle, he is glad that the werewolf has taken down Pettigrew and led Potter Senior and his goody-two-shoes wife to their deaths. His only regrets are that Black was not killed as well and that it was the fucking Potter spawn and not Severus himself who took down the Dark Lord. How dare that blasted babe take away his one chance to redeem himself? And without even trying! That the child-hero and his guardian have invaded his one sanctuary from a world that hates him only serves to add insult to injury.
After being informed of Black and his cursed godson's installation in McGonagall's rooms, Severus allows his anger to simmer under the surface, letting it build up in preparation for the confrontation that he knows will come when his path finally crosses with Black's. He terrorizes the students in his potions classes unmercifully, hardly caring that he is building for himself a reputation as a nasty, bitter man, an awful teacher.
But though he sees the Spawn nearly every day, wandering the castle under the watchful eye of this or that student, he never sees Black. He knows the man is in the castle, has heard the whispered conversations of the students about the strange man they once saw lying in the infirmary, has heard the bone-chilling howls that fill the night every full moon, howls he knows to be Black's. The fact that Black has a canine Animagus form is no secret, since as soon as McGonagall learned of it, she forced the man to register with the Ministry. The registration serves to set off yet another crop of rumors in the school as eager students romanticize the tragic figure that Black cuts, a man willing to do anything for the sake of a friend who repaid the effort with betrayal.
Severus thinks it fitting that Black has finally learned that not everyone loves him. He even begins to regret that he has not seen the man, as he would dearly love to throw Lupin's betrayal into Black's face. That the perfect Gryffindor four weren't really all that mighty gives him a feeling of uncontrollable glee, and Severus really can't help the nasty smirk that creeps onto his face every time someone mentions the werewolf's misdeeds.
When Severus finally sees Black, over a month has passed since the Dark Lord's fall. The man actually has the gall to walk straight into him, which delights Severus because it almost excuses the tirade that he lets fly upon finally seeing his schoolday nemesis. All the anger, all the hatred, jealousy, spite, frustration – it all breaks loose in a flood, crashing forward to attack Black again and again and again. Glee fills Severus initially, but the feeling soon fades when Black fails to respond to his words, instead simply standing there with his head down, not even bothering to meet Severus' eyes. Real, bitter anger comes now, and Severus pulls on that which he'd intended to hold in reserve until a later meeting.
He screams at Black, calling him a murderer, a pathetic creature who couldn't even save his own friends. He calls Black a betrayer and a traitor for living while they all died, even though Severus knows that his anger is not because Black betrayed his friends, but because he betrayed Severus by not dying along with the rest of them. He reminds Black that his friendship was never enough, that no matter what he did, Lupin was still a monster, still a fucking werewolf and he killed them all.
Severus isn't exactly sure of what all he says, shouts, screams. He doesn't even care that McGonagall, the teacher who he always secretly feared at school, the woman who is now not only his senior and superior but also Black's protector, is only a few yards away and can surely hear every single thing that he says. His words really are a flood, the dam has burst and he is no longer able to stem the flow of them from his mouth. He goes on and on, saying everything he's always wanted to say when he was at school, everything he held back because while he might not have been a good boy, he likes to believe that he had some semblance of manners, that he was somehow better than Potter and Black, so he always tried to never go too far. But now it's all spilling out until, until, until...
Until there's nothing left to say, because he's said it all. And Black is still just standing there, his head bowed, disputing none of it – almost waiting expectantly, as if he's ready to take still more. Severus can't understand it, can't comprehend this new, silent Black. It is not the boy who tormented him when was younger, nor the teenager who, despite making his life a living hell, he secretly, desperately needed to imitate when he was older.
Black shuffles his feet, not only mumbling an apology (and Severus wonders whether the apology is for walking into him this one time or for all the awful things Black has done to him in the past) but admitting that he is at fault. It shocks Severus; the boy that he knew in school rarely apologized and never admitted to his mistakes. Black carefully walks around him and continues on down the corridor, and for the first time Severus realizes that Sirius Black has been broken, perhaps irretrievably.
It bothers Severus that this revelation brings him very little happiness.
After the confrontation in the corridor, Severus does not see Black again during the daylight hours, partly because he is busy hiding in the dungeons, unwilling to acknowledge the unease he felt at observing Black's broken state, but mostly because, as he later learns, the other man hides in McGonagall's rooms during the day. Severus does not, however, cease to see Black entirely.
Since leaving the Death Eaters, insomnia takes Severus most nights, and he often spends the hours between dusk and dawn patrolling the corridors of the school. It is during these midnight patrols that Severus sees Black, sees the other man wandering through the castle at night in a daze. Unlike the one time that he walked into Severus, Black always has his head up and his back and shoulders straight during the nighttime hours; he walks with pride and eagerness. Black's eyes dance about, and the occasional smile ghosts across his face. Sometimes he turns his head to the side and his lips move, then stop, then move again, almost as if he is holding a conversation with someone no one else can see, though Severus never hears any sound come from Black's mouth. Severus finds this almost as disturbing as the broken man he's already seen. This madman is eerily close to the Black that Severus remembers, the young, carefree Gryffindor who believed that he and his friends were immortal.
For a while, the hatred returns, and Severus welcomes it. It is easy to hate Black when he is like this, back in those mannerisms that Severus grew up hating, and Severus finds it almost comforting to see Black's return to his former behaviour. He enjoys Black's apparent madness, revels in the fact that the man is so pathetic, so idiotic, that he cannot manage the world around him and must seek solace in his glory days.
Severus is surprised when, nearly a half a year after the coming of Black and the boy to Hogwarts, McGonagall takes him aside and grills him on what exactly Black does at night. It has not occurred to Severus that he might know more about the man than Black's self-assigned defender. What's more, that McGonagall has chosen to come to him for information on Black's nightly wanderings is even more bewildering. It is a common knowledge among the staff of the school that Dumbledore keeps tabs on nearly everything that occurs within the walls of the castle. The mastering of the Animagus transformation by Black and his friends while at school was the exception rather than the rule.
Severus is at a loss as to what he should tell McGonagall. How can he explain to this woman, this woman who as a child he was in awe of, and whom he now, as an adult, admires, that Black, her pride and joy, the man she believes she is successfully, if somewhat slowly, nursing back to health – how is he to tell her that he is insane? That he wanders the castle conversing with the ghosts of his memories in complete silence?
In the end, much to his surprise, Severus does not tell her everything, only that he sees Black wandering the corridors much as he himself does many evenings. To his disgust, he even lets her know that she needn't worry for Black's safety, as he steers Black straight before the man can place himself in any serious danger. This brings tears to McGonagall's eyes, and suddenly she is throwing her arms around Severus, embracing him in the same way that he has seen her hug the Potter spawn. Severus is shocked, he has never been hugged before – neither of his parents were particularly affectionate when he was a child.
When McGonagall calls on him at his dungeon quarters a few months later during the summer holidays, Severus supposes that she comes because of his stupid slip of tongue concerning Black. She smiles pleasantly, which really should be enough to set off warning bells in Severus' head, but as he is young and still has much to learn about the world in general and Minerva McGonagall in particular, he invites her in without much trepidation. Out of all of the teachers at the school, McGonagall and Dumbledore are the only two who have not given him looks of suspicion over the past two years he has taught there, it would not be good for him to alienate one of his two sole defenders. As she enters, Severus eyes the brat, who clings to the skirt of McGonagall's robes and watches him silently, a small satchel clutched in one hand.
"I was hoping to do some shopping today, Severus," McGonagall says brightly as she seats herself gracefully on his sofa, pulling Potter's spawn into her lap. "But I really don't think that Harry is old enough to be wandering about Diagon Alley – he might get trampled or turned into something nasty."
Now the trepidation begins to set in, and Severus starts to sincerely regret that he allowed himself to be duped by McGonagall's innocent face as he can see all too well what McGonagall is leading up to. "No," he says, but his throat is dry and the word comes out as a rasped whisper instead of the sneering statement he intends.
She ignores him, and breezes onward. "Normally I would ask Pomona to watch him, what with all the students gone for the summer, but she has her hands full with the Venomous Tentacula right now. You wouldn't have to do much, Harry's really such a well behaved little boy and can keep himself entertained easily; he just needs someone to make sure that he's fed at meal times and put down on time for his afternoon nap."
She wants him to act as a child-minder. For Potter's obnoxious spawn. Severus cannot believe she that she seems to seriously think he will agree to this. "Can't Black-" he begins, but she quickly cuts him off with the wave of her hand.
"Oh, it is well enough to have Sirius mind Harry when there is a third person to keep track of them both, but Sirius really hasn't progressed to a point where he can be left alone with the boy." McGonagall bites her lip nervously, and for a moment she looks strangely young to Severus, though he knows her to be more than twice his age. "He sometimes just stops whatever he's doing doing and... sits. Staring off into space," she adds with a note of despair.
Later, and he is not exactly sure how it happens, Severus finds himself alone with the brat, McGonagall having gone off to do her shopping. He glares at the boy sitting on the sofa, and the brat stares up at him, his green eyes large under a fringe just as impossibly messy as his father's once was. Severus sneers at the hair, wondering how it is that the prim McGonagall allows it to remain such a fright. The boy says nothing as he opens his satchel and removes a black, floppy plush dog from inside. Severus moves into the other room, intent on completing the project he was in the midst of before McGonagall came and foisted the brat off on him.
The Potter spawn is remarkably well behaved for a child not yet two. He plays quietly with his dog all morning, stopping only when it is time to eat lunch. Despite what McGonagall has told him, Severus finds that he does not even have to remember to put the boy down for a nap, as he falls asleep completely alone. While he is loathe to admit it, Severus finds at the end of the day that the boy is not anywhere near as spoiled as he expected. McGonagall gives him a box of chocolates when she comes to pick up the boy at the end of the day, thanking him profusely for his troubles.
Time passes. September comes and with it the children, to Severus' absolute disgust. On occasion, he finds himself wondering why they cannot be as well behaved as the Spawn, though he would never admit such thoughts to anyone. Black continues to wander the castle at night, and to his shock, Severus realizes that, somewhere between screaming his lungs out at Black and witnessing Black's mad midnight wanderings, he has ceased to hate the man. Which is not to say Severus likes Black now, just that he no longer feels an all-consuming hatred towards him.
Then one evening, it suddenly occurs to Severus that Black is nothing but a poor mimicry of what he once was. Disgusted, Severus feels cheated of the revenge he believed he had achieved. Having decided that Black's madness is no longer amusing, he resolves to take matters into his own hands and put an end to this pathetic charade once and for all. He tries not to think of the fact that in doing so, he will be helping a man who once tried to kill him. Just because Severus dislikes the way Black has allowed his life to be consumed by denial doesn't mean he is against the feeling entirely.