Alone on the Moor by Mum-To-You
I don't know why I decided to go to Dartmoor. I just knew I couldn't stay in the city another minute. After all that had happened, the throngs of people were an insult to my loneliness; the incessant laughing and chatter stung like vinegar on a paper cut. One thing was for certain, though. The moor looked like I felt: desolate, bleak, grey, foggy, and chilled to the very soul.
"Sirius!" The scream tore itself from my throat in an anguished howl that echoed across the fen. It was just as well no one was there to hear it. My voice sounded harsh, grating, and desperate, even to me. But I didn't cry. Not then anyway. Instead, I walked, half hoping the gaping maw of the landscape would swallow me whole.
Anything was preferable to the half-life I was condemned to face, month after month, without him. Without Sirius, who had been my friend and lover for as long as was important. My mind shifted uncomfortably and made the correction that had not yet become a reflex: without the Sirius I thought I knew. As it has turned out, it had all been a lie.
What had Dumbledore been thinking? The Marauders had shared everything, and the sheer nonsense of all the cloak-and-dagger secrecy, the being forbidden to tell each other where we were going and what we were doing for the Order had driven us apart. We had always done our best work together! Why couldn't Dumbledore have foreseen this? At the end, we had all begun looking at each other suspiciously, furtively. I had cravenly suspected Sirius, and I know he had harbored doubts about me. How could he not? After the debacle at the McKinnons', it had been clear that it was one of us who couldn't be trusted. I clung without comfort to the disturbing belief that if Sirius and I had been working as a team, as we should have been, I would have known. I could have prevented it, for all our sakes. As far as I was concerned, Dumbledore had a lot to answer for.
I walked faster and faster across the stretch of wilderness, strident and agitated, thinking of Sirius. Had he been a dark wizard all along? I simply couldn't bear that thought. It made a mockery of the happiest years of my life. An eleven-year-old boy simply could not dissimulate like that. No, I rationalized, it just wasn't possible. Instead, he must have succumbed to something deep within himself, something he couldn't control, something not even I could reach. That thought hurt me deeply, I freely admit. A year ago, I would have laughed uproariously at the very notion of Sirius Black's being a Death Eater, but against all odds, the proof was there. And it hurt like a festering wound. Sirius had sold Lily and James out to Voldemort, then killed Peter and a crowd of Muggles as if they were so much vermin. And he had betrayed me with a kiss.
I stopped to catch my breath, leaning against a gnarled, twisted tree, panting hard from my frantic exertion. A sharp wind turned my breath to frost, but it couldn't cool the burning on my lips that Sirius' last kiss had left. He was so panicked, so urgent, so needy, and so was I. We were hungry for each other in a way we hadn't been for a long time, but he hadn't stayed long enough to make love. He was there just to say he loved me and to sear my soul with one last kiss before he left for good. The bottom line was that he couldn't afford to trust me. And I didn't really trust him, not as I once had. Now he was in Azkaban and would never get out. I'll never see him again, and I'm not even sure I want to.
It was there on the moor, with the damp seeping into my already aching joints and the wind whipping my robes into a frenzy, that I had the most uncharitable thought I've ever had for another human being. Why couldn't it have been Peter? Then remorse outweighed self-pity, and I was ashamed. He had been a harmless prat, after all, and he was dead. Killed by someone he had trusted. He didn't deserve this dishonor to his memory from me, from someone whom he had called a friend. But face it, he had always been something of a ligger--not very talented or intelligent, but he seemed to need our friendship and protection, and the three of us had sort of taken him under our collective wing. Why couldn't it have been Peter? The thought echoed relentlessly in spite of my best intentions.
"Sirius!" Another howl escaped. I hated feeling helpless to my grief. I wanted to be resentful or indignant or angry, anything to cover and protect the suffering and vulnerability that were like an open wound in my chest. I couldn't afford to be vulnerable just then. I raged into the gale to give my fury a voice, but it wouldn't speak. There was only pain. I collapsed onto the ground, and my body was so wracked with sobs that I was certain I would shatter.
The wind shifted, and I felt the cold on my wet cheeks. The clouds covering the moon became thin and ghostlike. I could feel in my blood that it would be full soon, and I stood up, filled with an inescapable dread, and started running like a lunatic. I ran relentlessly into the middle of the moor, far away from every light, every cottage, every danger. With such unutterable agony in my heart, I had very much feared that I would kill someone that night.
As I ran, I felt the lunar shift, and my sense of smell sharpened. Heather--sweet and musky, like a corpse. Running blind into the moor, I could feel the unspeakable pain begin. Sinews snapping, bones cracking and changing shape. It is always brutal. With the last vestiges of my own thoughts before the wolf mind conquered me yet again, I remembered how Sirius had never been repulsed by me, had always held me close throughout the whole wretched ordeal, had stayed by my side during every full moon, and afterwards had been there to nurse me back to health. Month after month after month. For that alone, I would be grateful. For that, I would always, always, no matter what, love him. With that last thought, I disappeared into the wolf, and the baying began ripping my throat raw. For the first time since I could remember, I made my transformation alone.