A/N: Another chapter, and the story marches onward. And I really need to say that I adore the HP Lexicon. Really without that site I'd have a lot of mistakes when it came to places and times. I love the books, but I certainly can't remember everything.

Rheniel: Longest review, but really thank you. I adore the long ones (though really I love the short ones too) I'm glad you like Dobby and Tonks. As far as Dobby goes, well I didn't really think it through too hard. I just figured he wouldn't be as manic as before. And Tonks... well I don't really like it when people make her too mature, she's a great character to have fun with or to bring great clarity to a situation. As for Muggle Studies, I'm still deciding what I'm going to do with that class.

Leelo77: I made Leelo jump! There'll be plenty of the triangle that is Sirius, Snape and Aine. It's just fun to play with them. :)

YtheFrown2Day: Don't feel bad! I didn't mean I had anything against what you said... I just am personally sorry that I can't update more often. It was nice to do it once a day. Thank you though for the compliments :)

Chapter 21

I stared at one Nymphadora Tonks as she started to quickly go through a procession of different noses. Large, small, pencil like, tomato shaped. Snape's nose, Sirius's, even my own made an appearance. She likely thought the silent stare was due to what she was doing, instead I was just quite relieved that her seriousness has been a red herring to her silly nature. Silly was good. I quickly dropped the silence, and laughed at the different olfactory organs she produced. I even made my own suggestions, asking if she could make her entire face change. She then proceeded to slide her own features into the exact replica of Sirius. It was disconcerting to say the least, and caused Sirius to cough out the half chewed piece of meat.

"Sirius, are you done eating yet?" I asked as he drank some water to clear his throat. His bright haired cousin had resumed her normal face. "If you are, I wanted to know if you could give me a tour of this place."

I should have expected it. Without a moment's hesitation, his face slipped into it's wolfish facade. His grin was roguish and expectant, silver eyes danced as they looked over me. My asking him for a tour was immediately read into as an invitation into my bed. The man might have been sex on a stick, but that didn't mean I wanted to taste that particular snack at the moment. If ever.

"If you can keep your pants on please." A choked laugh came from Tonks. "You know this place, I don't. I could ask someone else, but with our mandatory connection, it's easier to just ask you." I didn't say my other reason. A tour might alight on some locations for his brother to have hidden things. The tour might bring back long since forgotten memories, secret corners, passageways. The man wasn't stupid, I knew well enough that he understood my other reasons for asking him for the tour.

"Sure." He pushed his chair back and stood up. Standing tall next to me, I was amazed at the body next to me. The robes only seemed to accentuate the lines, his hair tied neatly back, his body all laziness and readiness wrapped into one. He was certainly proving to be a difficult dichotomy. At one time the cock sure playboy, at others the vulnerable broken boy. "I can't promise about keeping my pants on."

There were no doubts about which one he was now.

With a mumbled goodbye to Tonks, the two of us headed out of the Great Hall, which Sirius explained as we walked out. Telling me in detail what the hall was used for, all the different great feasts that occurred during the year, how the banners changed depending on who won the cup. It was all knowledge that was useless, since I was already aware, but I let Sirius talk on. He had taken to his task of tour guide quite well, and there was no need to silence him now. There was also the likelihood that his talking was for himself as well. Somehow seeing that the speaking of what the rooms were for as a way to remember things. That perhaps in explaining the sorting at the beginning of the year, that he might remember something that would prove useful to why he was really there.

"Sirius, What's the empty portrait for?" I paused infront of the doors, and looked back at a picture frame that hung on a wall. It wasn't completely empty, instead it contained a room, and a chair, but nothing that would seem to necessitate having it hung prominently on the Great Hall's wall.

"Actually I don't know. That wasn't there when I went to school... or at least I don't remember it. But I'm finding things new all the time, and then later remembering them. You'll just have to ask Tonks or someone about that."

"I'll ask Severus." Sirius snorted at that statement, but surprisingly for him he didn't say anything else about it. Maybe it meant he was starting to mature a bit. We headed out the doors, leaving behind the empty portrait, though my concern over it disappeared the moment we stepped through the doors.

Starting on the ground floor, I was shown rooms that I needed to know about. The staff room was a necessity, where teachers could spend sometime away from other students, or sometimes for some meetings of the entire teaching staff. There was also Classroom Eleven, which housed the Divination class. I was confused by the sudden appearance of a forest clearing as the door opened, my senses being overwhelmed by the sudden change in environment and climate. Sirius though reminded me who the Divnation teacher was, and that a centaur needed an environment that they were comfortable in. Filch's office was a definite place I needed to know. Mainly from my desire to avoid the place at all costs. I wasn't looking forward to meeting the school's old caretaker. Though I was curious about Mrs. Norris, how any cat could be that bad was beyond me.

Other places on the Ground floor proved to be less desperate for me to know. Such as the broom cupboard, where Sirius told me about some clandestine meetings he had while in school. He delighted in the telling, until I rather calmly kicked him in the shin, my look telling him to get on with it. I didn't need to know about ever single girl he had snogged in the cupboard.

The first floor proved to be more important for me to know intimately, since it held both my classroom and Sirius's. The defense against dark arts room had high ceilings, windows lining one of the walls, and raised at the back of the room was door which Sirius indicated was to his store room.

"Sirius you are going to do a lesson plan aren't you?" I walked around the quite bare room, thinking how different it must have looked with all the different teachers of the subject. Sirius though hadn't had any time to put his own, stamp, on the place. He regarded me with one eyebrow raised. "I just can't picture you planning out your teaching for a year."

"I'll put something down, though I doubt I'll even remotely stick to it. Old Moony was the one for plans and lists and the such. But I'll certainly keep old McGonagall happy. She's my boss after all."

We moved then to my class room, and it was certainly different from Sirius's. One large circular window was cut into the wall, beaming down light into the room. The teacher's desk was placed at the front, and four lines of smaller desks were lined in front of it. It was strikingly similar to was I was used to in school. In the back right corner was a door, that upon further inspection proved to be my office. Probably from the former teacher of the subject, random muggle objects laid strewn all over the office and classroom. A telephone, a bicycle, a car engine, an umbrella. Such mundane things all points of great interest for some wizards and witches. It made me laugh softly, as I inspected the old bicycle. Certainly an early model. Teaching this class was going to be interesting. I was likely going to have to do a real overhaul to the course as well. I doubted Muggle Studies was ever really dealt with too seriously.

"You're going to have fun with this." Sirius had noticed the soft laugh, looked pleased at the sound actually. He was playing with a little stuffed bear, squeezing it in his large hands.

"It'll definitely give me a new outlook on my normal life. Imagine being a foreign species."

The tour progressed from there. The first floor also contained the History of Magic room, McGonagall's old office which Tonks now occupied, and the location of the old hospital wing. On up to the second floor showed Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, which Sirius chose to stay out of. I doubted this was based on it being a girl's bathroom, instead based off a need to not meet with the perpetually depressed ghost. I though made a note to go back later, just to see the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. I was here at Hogwart's, I certainly wanted to see all the places of interest from the book.

The second floor also held one place I had already seen, the entrance to the Headmistress's office. And down the hall was Sirius's office. It was quite bare, like his classroom, but I didn't doubt that soon enough he'd have a large comfortable couch in there, random books on the shelves, pictures of his old friends lining the large fireplace's mantle.

Third floor; charms classroom, forbidden hallway, trophy room, hospital wing. I was rather surprised when with no trouble remembering, Sirius recalled the location of the secret passageway to Hogsmeade behind the Humpbacked Witch's statue. So not all of his memories were being blocked, or fuzzy to his view. Though this memory of his old marauder's discovery of all the places secret in the school was a good one, there was no reason to not remember.

Fourth floor; the only thing of real interest on this floor was the large library. It took all of Sirius's pleading, pushing and guiles to get me to leave the enormous room overflowing with books. And all on things I had an interest in. It was possible that the solution to our problem was in there as well, but Sirius demanded to finish the tour. And he was right, I needed to know where everything was.

Fifth and Sixth floors flew by, nothing but bathrooms, corridors, the arithmancy and ancient runes classrooms.

Seventh floor though held Professor Flitwick's office, the old Divination classroom, the Gryfindor entrance and most interesting of all the Room of Requirement. It didn't take much cajoling to get Sirius to show me how it was used. Right across from a rather silly looking picture of what looked like some tubby little teletubbies prancing about to the direction of a strange looking man, the room was supposed to be. Sirius had me walk back and forth in front of it three times, thinking hard on what I needed.

All I needed at that point was to see how it worked. So after three times I turned to look at the wall, and saw only a blank wall.

"It only appears when you really need something. So it's not surprising it didn't show up. After all you're just curious, not needy."

I was a little disappointed, but shrugged it off. At some point when I knew what I needed I'd certainly be back to make sure that the room did in fact work the way Sirius had explained. I wondered briefly if I could make it have a television and radio for when I was bored. Plain old muggle devices...

"I bet you used this to meet all your girls didn't you?" My snide comment brought a small blush to the older man's cheeks, indicating that what I had said was in fact true. I definitely didn't want him bringing me to the room and being in charge of the requirements. I didn't need to see the type of room he would think of to try and romance a young girl. The fact I was 29 didn't really matter in this case.

Leaving the failed attempt to get into the room of requirements, the last part of the castle pointed out to me were all the towers. We didn't bother going up them all, not needing to do anymore walking then we had already done. Moving around the castle was practically a five mile jog in terms of exercise for me.

We took a leisurely trip back down the floors, and this time I looked around at all the strange things, the moving staircases, the portraits that spoke and walked off, the random ghosts floating everywhere. Sirius made sure to remind me of certain things on the way down. 'Don't step there, you'll get stuck'. 'Watch out for that painting, the knight is a little balmy'. 'That door isn't a door, it just likes to pretend'.

"Aren't you going to show me the dungeons?"

We were now back on the ground floor, and judging by Sirius's growling stomach it was already time for lunch. That tour had taken about four hours...

My question seemed to surprised Sirius a bit. Like he didn't think his lack of attention to the lower levels of the school needed any explanation.

"The only things that live in the dungeons are snakes."

"And me."

He looked somewhat abashed at my statement. He never did think before he spoke, already forgetting that my own rooms were down in the dungeons. I never really thought I looked like a snake, though my skin might not have been as soft as I would have liked, I didn't think it was really scaly.

"You know you are going to be a teacher, so you need to put this little grudge against Slytherin behind you. You can't play favourites." I said this sensible thing, even though I knew quite well I wasn't going to follow my own advice. Ever since I had started teaching I always had my chosen students. Sometimes the students were even surprised. I liked to pick the ones who hated my classes the most. It was fun to tease them.

"I don't plan on playing favourites. I just plan on making the bad students suffer. It's not my fault that they're all going to be from Slytherin."

I snorted at his stereotyping, even though I knew that he knew more about the subject then I. But it wasn't possible of an entire house of students to be bad, right? I'm sure quite a lot of the people he had gone to school with might have not liked Sirius, but that didn't mean they then started to hate all Gryffindors. Of course, that might have been the case if they had been Slytherins. Really the little feud was quite impenetrable.