Predictably, Peter Pettigrew's injuries faded away quickly under the watchful eye of Madam Pomfrey. He left the hospital wing just hours after he arrived, a smile already back on his face.

"Oh, and Mr. Black," said Madam Pomfrey as the Marauders left the wing, "if you wouldn't mind coming back in tonight? I'm concerned about your legs."

"I'm fine," Sirius said, smiling tightly.

"Oh, I'm sure you are," she said. "All the same, here." She handed him a small, green piece of parchment excusing him from the last half hour of Potions.

He nodded, irritated, and left with his friends.

James and Remus did not seem at all perturbed by what had happened to Peter. In fact, James laughed about it as soon as it was clear that Peter was okay, marking down another tally in his notebook.

"Don't you think it's weird, though?" Sirius whispered to Remus while Peter and James walked a few paces ahead.

"What? That it attacked him?" Remus paused thoughtfully. "No, I don't think so. Pomona said you needed to approach the plant confidently and that it could sense nerves. Peter always gets scared of things that could kill him."

"Yeah, that's true," Sirius mused. "Only… well, Pomona also said that whole thing about us being fine unless we were undercover Dark wizard spies-"

Remus giggled uncomfortably. "Pete? A Dark wizard? You can't be serious."

"Oh, I can be Sirius," said Sirius, "in fact, I always am. But no, that's not what I was trying to say. It just- I feel weird about it. Like I can't trust him."

Remus hummed. "Well, if you don't mind me saying so… you have a lot of barriers to trust. I think you kinda tend to- latch onto things, read more into them when you don't need to. Find reasons not to trust someone, if you will."

"You're saying I have trust issues, Moony?" Sirius said, but he was grinning. Remus was right. His family had made it incredibly difficult for him to trust people; to believe that they were good, or that they could care for him. He was seeing something that wasn't there. "All the same, though, I think I'm gonna go talk to Pomona. About the plant's properties. Pass it off as natural curiosity, d'you reckon?"

"She'll see right through that," said Remus, running a hand through his tawny hair as he smiled. "You're not really the stay-after-with-questions type."

"Oi, Padfoot, Moony, you coming?" James hollered, turning back in the Great Hall and gesturing for them to catch up. The four walked together down to the dungeons, entering Potions, surprisingly, right on time.

"Mr. Black, Potter, Pettigrew, Lupin" Professor Slughorn greeted them as they came in. Sirius wondered if it was intentional, ordering their names by the prestige of their families. They took a seat at one of the tables in the back as Slughorn walked up to the front of the classroom to present the day's assignment.

"Today you'll be making Amortentia."

Whispers and giggles from the class.

"Well, from that reaction I take it you know what this potion does. Mr. Malfoy?"

A seventh year Slytherin with platinum blonde hair- also known as Sirius's awful bigot of a cousin, Lucius- grinned. "It's a love potion, sir."

"Very good, ten points to Slytherin!" said Slughorn, never one to miss an opportunity to give his house points. "Of course, love is a wondrous thing. It cannot be manufactured. This potion is only a simulation- a very powerful, dangerous simulation. After being scored, you will dispose of your potions, so as to ensure that there is no usage inside or outside of class. Understood?"

The class nodded their agreement, and with that, Slughorn flipped the chalkboard over to reveal a neatly written list of instructions.

Obediently, Sirius began grinding his moonstone powder.

"Oi, Black."

He turned around in his seat, eyes landing on a teenage boy with greasy black hair and the Slytherin tie. "Snivellus."

Snape smiled sarcastically. "Try not to screw up this potion too badly. I know higher-level classes must be difficult for you."

"Well," Sirius said, with a slow grin, "you've never been able to make love before, have you? What makes you think you'll do it this time?"

James and the rest of the class laughed appreciatively while Snape's normally pallid face flushed pink and he turned back to his potion.

Lily Evans turned around in her seat next to James. "That was really mean," she told Sirius, frowning slightly.

"Oh, c'mon, Evans, he brought it on himself. I didn't even engage with him at first."

"Yeah, well, he was just trying to provoke you a little bit. Then you completely insulted his sex life-"

"Hard to insult something that doesn't exist-"

"Oh, be quiet, you're just proving my point," Lily said, scowling. Her long, red ponytail swung in the air as she turned back around.

Sirius raised his eyebrows at James. It seemed like a potential problem in their relationship if Lily couldn't take a little lighthearted Snivellus slander, and Sirius knew James well enough to communicate this in a single glance.

James's responding shrug said, I know, mate, but what can you do?

Sirius didn't want to see James lose himself to Lily.

But James could absolutely never lose himself.

The rest of Potions was rather uneventful. Remus's perfectly brewed Amortentia led to a rather romantic moment, when Sirius told him he might have slightly overdone it on the cologne and they both blushed as they realized it was the potion he was smelling. Sirius didn't have time to finish his before he had to go see Madam Pomfrey, so he asked James to leave it on the fire for ten minutes and then submit a flask. Sirius wasn't too concerned about his grades, but didn't want a T that he didn't deserve.

"Mr. Black," Madam Pomfrey said in greeting.

"Hi," he said, almost nervous. "What do you need?"

"Well, Saint Mungos wrote to me over the summer about your condition," she explained, "and you've been on that cane for what, a month now, is that right?"

Sirius groaned. It was none of Pomfrey's business. "About, yeah."

"Alright, well, I'm supposed to do a quick examination. Do you feel like you'd be able to walk without it?"

"Erm," he said. The honest answer was no, not really, but he didn't want Pomfrey to think he couldn't handle himself. "Probably."

She nodded. "So walk across the room for me, then."

He placed his cane against the wall and walked slowly across the room. One step, and then two- painless, but wobbling on his legs- before he fell to the ground.

Pomfrey's face wore a rather odd expression, some mix of self-satisfaction and grim disappointment, as she offered him a hand.

"I'm fine," he said tersely. "It doesn't hurt."

"Yes, well," said Madam Pomfrey, "it's muscle atrophy, which we can normally reverse quite easily through a couple of healing potions, proper nutrition and exercise-"

"But..." Sirius prompted.

"But," she agreed, "you're walking around every day, presumably eating well, and your records show that Saint Mungo's gave you everything I would prescribe."

"So what do you want me to do?" he asked, privately wondering if it was ever going to get better. Had his mom's curse really left him with a lasting medical condition?

"Well, I have one last idea," Pomfrey said. "There is someone who might be able to brew a cure-"

"Who, Slughorn?" asked Sirius. "Dumbledore?"

"No, a student in your year, actually."

Sirius felt the blood drain away from his face. "Not-"

Indeed, Pomfrey's next words were, "Severus Snape."