Altair Black, son of Sirius Black, starts Hogwarts in 1992. His mother, Esta Goldhorn, does not earn any Mother-of-the-Year Award, and soon, everyone will know it.

Everyone.

The news reach deep into Azkaban, all the way to Sirius Black himself.

Thus starts a game of Preys and Predators.


Hey!

So.

Just to be clear. This isn't a Black Family story, it's a story about Sirius getting the hell out of Azkaban and terrorizing a few people on the way out, because his son and his godson need him. If anything, the family bonding happens off-screen, after the end of the story.

That being said, I also need to point out each chapter will have a different POV, so of course you won't know everything that's going on until the end. We're starting with Altair, because he's the one who starts it all.


Tags: original characters, Alastor Moody, Mrs. Pettigrew, Minerva McGonagall, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, Remus Lupin, Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter, implied/referenced child abuse, escape from Azkaban, Sirius Black has a plan, One Chapter One POV, rat hunt


Chapter 1: Altair Black

1992. Tuesday, the first of September. There was no day quite like this one, for King Cross: more than any other day of the year, the presence of wizarding people was overwhelming. Around five hundred families, pureblooded, halfblooded or muggleborn, present to send their children to school. As it was acknowledged that side-along apparition shouldn't be performed too often with young children – especially not in a crowded place where high-velocity transports ran – and after a disastrous attempt to install the floo at the end of the platform in 1937 – no one had thought about the numerous pieces of luggage the children would have to take with them, and the seven chimneys installed had quickly gotten stuck with all kind of trunks and pet cages – the families were supposed to come through the muggle side of the station, the second pillar between platforms 9 and 10 being in truth a portal to a hidden pocket of space where platform 9 ¾ operated.

Anyone with magic could come through, and the muggle families of muggleborns had a charm – a round little pin, with the M of the Ministry of Magic's seal embossed – allowing them to access most wizarding areas.

Of course, the child who crossed at ten seventeen with his mother did not need a pin for his family.

Should you ask him, he'd tell you that Esta Goldhorn was a pureblooded witch, though her family was not one of the great ones – in some circles, they'd be considered old blood instead of pureblood, but by the general admittance they were effectively pureblooded. Her father had married one of the countless Weasleys – who were poor, but of higher standing – and Esta herself was celibate.

The child in question was her son, Altair. He was the result of a casual relationship with the now infamous Black Lord, Sirius Black – and if his birth had involved her forgetting to inform the then Black Heir that she hadn't taken her potion, well. She'd always told Altair that it was between her and Walburga Black's need to assure the future of the House of Black, in purity and in name, as Sirius had been disowned and his younger brother had died without children.

Altair, thus, was known as Altair Black, the current Black Heir. He'd been taught by both his mother and his grandmother on his father's side what it meant to have such a name.

Walburga had always said her grandson was a bit too reserved for a Black, especially for a child of Sirius – the last thing he remembered her telling him before her death was that he reminded her more of his uncle, which was most likely a good thing, since Regulus Black had been a proper Slytherin, him, and hadn't deserted his family and duties, him. Not that Altair felt much like a proper Black, or a proper Slytherin, most of the time.

He'd only learned not to speak up, when he wasn't expected to – Mother had made certain he remembered that, especially if he had nothing positive to say.

His mother didn't consider much of what he had to say to be positive.

Either way. Esta Goldhorn had made certain his son knew exactly who he was, why he was there, and how it had come to be. Altair had thus learned that Sirius Black and his mother had reached an agreement, back then. Neither of them was interested in a real relationship, and wartime life demanded a lot of his father, considering he was running around trying to put out the fires – and, listening to his mother, Altair was a bit unsure of which fires she meant, but he knew she hadn't approved. Esta, herself, had been starting a career as a model for Witch Weekly – which was still going well and even branching out, thank you for your concern – and didn't care much for the intricacies of married life. She had been supposed to take care of Altair until the end of the war, then they'd share custody.

Of course, as Altair could tell you should you ask him, and as Mother had made sure he knew – repeatedly, whenever he did something she wasn't happy with – that had never quite been the plan on her part. Though Esta hadn't exactly expected Sirius to get thrown in jail for being a Death Eater – in fact, she'd been persuaded he'd end up murdered, possibly by his own psychopathic cousin – she couldn't say she was displeased with the fact that he hadn't had an influence on Altair's upbringing.

There was a reason their relationship had been casual, past the fact that Esta herself wasn't interested in romance, and Sirius probably operated on the assumption that his own feelings and general comfort in life were secondary to the greater good, if Altair's mother was to be believed. As she'd informed her son, for all that Esta would never have joined the Death Eaters herself, she was a slytherin alumna. She had her own convictions, which would have clashed with Sirius' gryffindor temperament – though she'd seen his other half, the one that couldn't get rid of his education, the parts of him that screamed Slytherin to anyone who'd care to listen, and that she failed to find in her own son – and she was quite certain his parenting wouldn't have been approved by Walburga Black, which did pose a problem when you were trying to use the name of your child and the influence of their family to further your own ambitions.

Sirius and Esta would have raised two very different boys, and it so happened that they only had one.

Altair knew very well what most people thought of his father, and he also knew what his mother thought of Sirius Black. Nevertheless, he privately thought he might have been better off with his father – provided his mother was right, and the general public wasn't – than with his mother. At least the Blacks had some sort of loyalty towards their own, and, when they cast someone out, they did it in anger, not in indifference.

He usually didn't dwell on it, either way, because there was no point in rising a hope he knew to be unfulfillable.

Altair looked down, his eyes fixed on his mother's shoes, as he followed her confident stride and whispers started to be heard. He could guess what most of them were thinking, as the famous model strode through platform 9 ¾, a first-year-to-be on her heels. Her short strawberry blonde hair, her vivid blue eyes and her freckles were known by most of the witches present, and more than a few wizards – but they'd never seen any picture of her son before.

Altair Black. Heir to the House of Black.

Son of Sirius Black.

They'd see him, a child not looking anywhere but at his mother, his ink-black hair falling a bit over vivid – but reserved – blue eyes, and his freckled golden skin looking as far from a Black as could be. Everyone would agree that, apart from his hair, Altair Black had taken much more from his mother than from his father. The shape of the nose was the same, perhaps.

Good thing he looked nothing like his father. For his own good, really.

Between Sirius Black and Esta Goldhorn, the best parent was obvious enough.

So Altair didn't look up, didn't bother listening, didn't do anything but follow his mother, all the way to the last wagon. She probably didn't want to get caught in the crowd, and in order to escape that, the easiest way was to go the further away possible at the very beginning – where people would start going only when the other, easier-to-access wagons would turn out to be full.

Then Esta Goldhorn stopped, and turned back to look at her son. Her eyes seemed to be taking him in, to look for something to disapprove of – maybe she did look for something to approve of, too, but as far as Altair remembered, she had never found anything, she had never told him so. It was always about how he wasn't holding himself straight enough, proud of his name, or how he was standing too happy with himself. How he wasn't social enough, or how he seemed too much at ease, too cocky. There was never a middle ground, so he'd stopped trying years ago. At least, if she told him he was too forlorn, too reserved, and it didn't reflect well on her, that he wasn't making any kind of effort, that was the truth.

And if she berated him for not doing enough, it was always better than when she did it for doing too much.

Of course, Altair's mother didn't show her displeasure in public. It always had to wait, for them to be back home, to be alone.

He wasn't going home in a long time.

"Swipe back that hair, dear, you look like you are trying to hide."

He was.

She probably knew it, too.

But they were in public, and he wasn't going home with her. He was going to Hogwarts.

The christmas holidays were a long time ahead – not long enough, perhaps. If she accumulated too much to be angry about for when he'd get home...

Altair tried half-heartedly to take his hair out of his face – he could always put it back down once he'd be aboard the Hogwarts Express – and his mother's hand went to help him, convincingly bending down in affection, as she first mussed his hair and then tucked it behind his ears.

Altair wondered if she used to pretend like that with his father too, or if it had been more business than anything else. If his hair reminded her of someone else, a man her age, with hair like black silk and a dangerous look in his eyes, whom Altair had only ever seen on the newspapers cut his mother occasionally showed him – when she wanted to make it clear, exactly, what happened to those who thought too much of themselves.

Altair closed his eyes, the picture of his father – Grandmother Walburga had always managed not to show him any, so it was the only one he knew – appearing behind his closed lids.

A man, standing in the middle of a street full of rubble, with the shadows of several bodies blurred and out of focus, blood trickling down the side of his face, his dark hair blown behind him. On the short frame of time captured by the photographer – a witch who'd been stalking Aurors after the disappearance of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and who, therefore, had managed to get there mere minutes after the alert had come – you could see the silhouettes of the first responders apparating on-site, and then.

Black had turned around slightly, taking in the devastation and the new arrivals, you could see something ugly shifting in his eyes, and then he'd started laughing.

The only picture Altair had ever seen of his father, and it was of the very moment everyone had started considering him a maniac.

His mother's voice interrupted his recollection – Mother, her hand clutching at his wrist, the newspapers clipping in her other hand, right there, in his face, his father's mad laughter, and Mother, telling him what exactly everyone would think of him, of his name, of his father's family, if he ever acted out, if he wasn't clever and obedient enough, if he even gave them the slightest reason to doubt – and Altair opened his eyes.

"Please do avoid Gryffindor. It didn't do your father any good, and they wouldn't actually accept you there."

Esta had a kind look on her face – like she was saying that for him, because she cared, because it was true and they both knew it, because Sirius Black had broken the mold and gone to Gryffindor, but he was also considered to be one of the worst Death Eaters, because Altair bore his name and they wouldn't believe it twice. Like Altair didn't know her true reasons, because if his Hogwart House didn't accept him, she couldn't use the connections he wouldn't make, because he would be useless to her on yet one more point.

"Slytherin would be best, of course, I went there, you know, and the rest of your father's family did too. A lot of the children there have... familial reputations, they wouldn't dare to refuse you, and anyway you are the Black Heir, none of the Slytherins are stupid enough to waste that potential."

Because that sounded like yet another good way to make great friends.

But his mother didn't care for what he wanted – she never had, and in the end, Altair wasn't sure she even knew what it meant, to care about someone else; her own mother had stopped talking to her before he was born, her father, despite being a slytherin alumnus too, had a hard time understanding her, Altair's father had been a hobby, and she'd gotten into a spat with Arcturus Black over her expectations for him years ago.

So Altair said something true – even if he didn't spell out the implications, because some things were better left unsaid, because it would be easier for her to make her own assumptions – to pretend he agreed.

"Grandmother used to say I reminded her of Regulus."

Esta gave him a satisfied smile, and turned toward the train.

"With some luck, you'll also have taken the slytherin half of your father's temperament."

She'd said the same words, the day before, when they were still home, and she hadn't sounded convinced at all. She'd looked at him, and she'd said these words – but she'd looked like that was about as likely as his father escaping prison to bring him to the Hogwarts Express today.

Altair nodded mutely, taking in the people who'd joined them next to the wagon – the people she was performing for.

"I'll be well-behaved, mother."

"Of course you will be."

And she let go of him, as he maneuvered his trunk into the train – with a smile on her face as he nodded sagely at her.

So Altair found an empty compartment – which didn't remain so for long, of course – and went to sit in a corner, getting a book out before anyone could try and talk to him. He had no idea of how to react, if they asked him his name – he didn't want to talk to the kind of people who were most likely not to mind, and he didn't want to see the others as they would realize who his father was. In fact, his best chance was with muggleborns, except they'd be informed, fast, by the other children.

It was going to happen, anyway. But it didn't have to happen right now.

Slowly, other children came aboard, too. Four girls and a boy joined his compartment, and before one of the girls could ask him his name, he heard another whispering at her – "That's Black's son, Lana."

Altair kept his nose stubbornly inside his book – unwilling to face inspection, unwilling to make the effort and have them see him another way, not yet, not while they weren't even at Hogwarts. Maybe the other children thought he believed himself better than their company, maybe they thought he didn't like people in general.

Maybe it would be a problem, later.

Maybe he had no idea what else to do.

So he stayed silent, hidden behind his book, his dark hair, and his father's name, too, because now there was no avoiding it, now that Mother wasn't by his side, now that they couldn't compare Esta Goldhorn and Altair Black and decide he was much more like his mother.

He didn't want to be like his mother.

He wasn't sure he wanted to be like his father – mostly because he had no idea what his father was like. Because there was what everyone said about him – the Black Traitor, a title which took two different meanings depending on the person who said it – and there was what his mother said about him. If Mother was right, he'd much rather be like his father, even if she certainly didn't share that point of view.

Then again, perhaps not.

What was certain was that he wouldn't share those thoughts with anyone.

When the train stopped in Hogsmeade – and Altair had managed not to talk to anyone in hours, even waiting for all the others to get out before doing it himself – another thought hit him, for real this time.

Mother would not be at Hogwarts.

Altair was standing there, looking at all the other students – so, so many, but the older ones were already leaving, making their way on foot towards something he could not see in the crowd – and wondering if he should try and follow, when a booming voice got his attention.

He blinked, and turned around, searching for the voice's owner.

"First years, over here! Everyone, come on, the others to the carriages! First years!"

Altair noticed a light, high in the air, and several children, all of them more or less his height, going toward it. He hesitated a moment, his eyes going to the older students, but eventually followed.

A very tall, very large man was checking the newcomers, his eyes squinted in the general darkness. Altair wondered if he was counting them – good luck to him, then, because he'd say there were several dozens, maybe more than a hundred children – or if he had some magic tool to make sure all the first years were here with him.

The man cleared his throat, and his lamp moved a bit, allowing Altair to guess the shape of large gates wide open, and a narrow path disappearing in the darkness ahead.

"Alright, kids! We're walking a bit, so don't lose the light, understood?"

A general grumble of agreement, and the man nodded and started to get on his way. The children just after him followed, and Altair could make out a head of bright red hair with the light of the lamp shining on it at the beginning of the procession. For a moment, he thought they wouldn't have any light, because he was toward the end, but six other lamps started levitating behind the one held by the big man, as if following its trail.

They walked down the path for about ten minutes, give or take, and most children weren't talking at all – it was late, and most of them had been excited during the train ride, so they had to be tired – and Altair heard the man's voice again.

"You should see Hogwarts soon, lads. One last bend, and..."

Altair heard the wonder of the students ahead before he could see anything, but soon enough, indeed, the darkness – and the trees – receded, and his eyes fell on the dark silhouette of a castle, windows twinkling in the night, upon a mountain with a dark lake at its feet. He said nothing, but his eyes went to the night sky behind – Sirius wouldn't be visible before midnight, but Altair was somewhere out there.

That's what he looked for, when the man had them all get into small boats to cross the lake. Everyone had their eyes on the castle, but him – he was looking for himself.

He found Altair just before he had to duck under a curtain of ivy, and the sky disappeared as the boats continued their journey into a dark tunnel.

Eventually the boats stopped at a small harbor, and Altair had to jump out and onto a floor of pebbles and rocks. A girl almost fell on him – he recognized Astoria Greengrass at the last moment, and vaguely realized he actually knew some of the children here – when she slipped on the pebbles, and Altair helped her stay on her feet without saying a word, hoping the general darkness and his hair falling on his face would prevent her from recognizing him.

As far as he knew, it worked. Astoria sure didn't say a word, apart from thanking him quietly for his help.

The man led them up a stone passageway, and they saw the sky again when they felt grass under their shoes. They were right next to the castle, and the first year led by the big man headed for the ancient oak doors without waiting. Altair thought the man may have been giving them all a look, probably making sure he'd lost no one on the way.

Then the man knocked three times, and the doors opened on their own, revealing a witch Altair thought he'd already seen on the cover of a magazine of transfiguration – his mother had scoffed, and said that was exactly the kind of things his father would have wanted to know about, too bad he'd landed himself in Azkaban, wasn't it? Tall, stern and with her hair in a chignon, the witch wore emerald robes and a witch hat just as green.

The witch took over, the children followed her into a small room – as small as a room able to accommodate more than a hundred eleven-years-old could be, anyway – where she explained that they would be Sorted – though not exactly how – into the different Houses, and that they'd be able to earn or lose points for their Houses during the year. Altair, of course, knew that already – though it was tradition to keep quiet about how the Sorting Ceremony worked exactly, and he didn't know that.

Altair saw how her gaze swept across all the first years, stopping when she noticed something – such as the crooked tie of the boy next to him – but she barely took notice of him. A reminder, once again, that he didn't look like his father, that the first thing people saw when they looked at him wasn't a mass murderer.

It should probably reassure him.

The witch left, with the promise that they were about to have a magical year of learning and discovery.

For the few following minutes, a lot of the children whispered amongst themselves, talking each other up as to the Sorting, what exactly they would have to do, how they could be Sorted into four different Houses.

Altair didn't really care.

He was more worried about fitting in in general. Everyone expected him to go to Slytherin, except they'd expected the same of his father, and see how that had ended. He didn't think himself particularly brave, or ambitious, or wise, or loyal.

But he guessed, it wasn't up to him, anyway – or, not quite, not that way. He'd be in a House, and that would be it.

Professor McGonagall came back for them, and led them to what she called the Great Hall. The doors revealed four long tables, with a lot of teenagers already sitting there, and looking at them with curiosity in their eyes. Farther away, another table was occupied only by adults, including the big man who had led them to the castle, and the famous Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore.

The line of eleven-years-old stopped just before that table, on a sign from the stern witch. Altair's eyes strayed to the starry sky hiding the ceilling, and wondered if it actually showed the stars above, of if it was more random than that. He passively noticed a voice starting a song, and then the sound of applause, his eyes still up high, caught on Jupiter.

He was brought back to attention when he heard Professor McGonagall's voice, calling a "Areild, Janet". The girl brushed past him, and went to sit under an old, used hat on a stool.

After a few seconds, the hat opened a mouth – well, that was new – and a loud "RAVENCLAW" echoed across the Great Hall. Janet Areild took the hat off, blushing, and headed for the table where the students were clapping the loudest.

Predictably, Altair's name came soon – he was the fourth student to be Sorted, actually – and there was a heavy silence as he made for the hat, his eyes down. He didn't need to look up to guess the calculating looks at the slytherin table, or the apprehension in the eyes of everyone else.

But he should have worried about something else, he realized, as his left sleeve slipped down when McGonagall handed him the hat, and her eyes caught on the purple, hand-shaped mark on his wrist.

Just behind the professor, at the staff table, a fork fell and echoed into an empty plate.

Altair didn't look up, and went to sit on the stool, the hat on his head.

They'd seen, hadn't they?

At first nothing happened.

Then a voice resonated in his head, small and unassuming, but filled with knowledge.

"Altair Black, ah? You could be a Gryffindor, you know, you have to be brave to live like that... But, yes, just like your father on that one, though he wasn't hard-working enough to fit in. I can see such loyalty, to those who deserve it, I know exactly where to put you."

Altair frowned under the hat, unsure on what that had been about, with his father and loyalty, and then he remembered the qualities for each House...

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

Altair took a deep breath, and stood up, taking the hat off – able to see, once again, the Great Hall, and actually looking, for once. He caught a glimpse of astonishment on many faces, as he turned around and handed back the hat to Professor McGonagall, who, herself, let nothing show and gently directed him to the right table.

As he made his way, cautious clapping started from the hufflepuff table, which eventually turned into genuine applause. Maybe they weren't quite sure what to make of him, yet, but they were giving him a chance – and Altair realized, he'd probably ended up in the House most likely not to care. A place where he might actually make friends.

The feast went – not quietly, no, but Altair himself didn't talk much, even if the others tried to get him to speak. At first, he'd been too hungry to remember, and he'd talked a bit, then hunger had taken a step back, and his eyes had crossed Professor Sprout's at the teachers' table, and...

As the Headmaster sent them on their way to the dormitories, Professor Sprout walked down to him and put a careful hand on his shoulder while nodding at a prefect.

"I'll escort Mr. Black down myself, thank you, Diggory."

Then, looking at Altair.

"Could you stay behind a moment?"

Altair watched the other Hufflepuffs leave, some of them glancing his way, and he hid behind his hair as he agreed and followed his Head of House instead.

His stomach contorted violently when he was brought to what he immediately learned to be the Hospital Wing, and Madam Pomfrey, the nurse, said she had to take care of his wrist.

Then, Altair made a decision. Esta Goldhorn did not deserve his loyalty.

They would see the bruises, the small scars, and they would know.


In case you've read the first chapter of "Canis Major", yes, Altair is the lone kid in room 13.