Six faces glittered in the sparkly green flames. Arthur, Molly, Fred, George, Ron, and Ginny Weasley's eyes were fixed on their fireplace as Harry Potter and Sirius Black emerged from within. Six wands were raised, spells dying on their tips for fear of hitting their surrogate kindred.
"Woah!" said Harry, stepping in front of Sirius. In retrospect it may have been better for him to have gone through first. "He's — he's innocent."
"Oh Harry, dear!" cried Mrs Weasley. "Is this what this is about? Did he make you send that letter? Harry—"
"No!" Mrs Weasley had taken a step to pull Harry to their side but Harry wasn't having any of it. "He's innocent! He was framed!"
"Harry..." Ron mumbled, clearly caught between embarrassment for his crazy friend and fear for the murderer standing behind him.
Harry locked eyes with his best friend. "Please. You have to trust me." A part of Harry felt guilty, it was almost as if he was lying. And though the evidence had undoubtedly been given to him, it was obvious that all the parts of him weren't in harmony regarding trusting the man behind him. The Weasley's woes only worsened the wavering.
Arthur Weasley took a microstep forward. "Harry, this man sold your parents to You-Know-Who. What could he have possibly told you which could make you defend him? Are you Imperiused? Is that it?"
"Arthur!" the bubbling presence behind Harry suddenly overflowed. "We were in the Order together! I fought beside you for years!"
Arthur Weasley's face fell.
"What does Ron's rat have to do with all this?" asked Ginny, more confident than Harry had ever seen her. What had happened? "And you said he was framed? By who?"
"Those two questions are one in the same." Sirius Black took a step forward. Every word spoken in the Weasley household that night had been underlined by a vicious scuttling in a jar. Harry Potter shielded Sirius from the four remaining wands aimed at him, Arthur and Ron having lowered theirs. Each step the man made towards the rat amplified its insanity as it ripped its claws uselessly against the glass.
"He's been doing that all night," said Ron. It was a testament to his trust in Harry that he parted from his family and brought himself to stand beside the man he'd been told was a murderer for as long as he'd been alive.
"And haven't you wondered why?" asked Sirius.
"We just thought he was getting a bit sick of Ron, didn't we Fred?"
"Or maybe he just doesn't like murderers?"
"Quiet boys!" scolded Mrs Weasley.
Sirius Black slid a grimy hand down the edge of the jar. The rat went bezerk. "He fears me."
Every set of eyes was fixed on the rat. In a blur you couldn't quite be sure was real, the rat phased out of its form for the tiniest fraction of a second before collapsing back into its lumpy grey shape.
The final four Weasleys dropped their wands and gathered around the jar, unable to deny that their rat was not what it seemed. Harry had to shuffle to the far side of the room to give them all space to watch the rat's many failed attempts to shapeshift.
Though at first Sirius Black's voice may have come across as a gentle drawl as to not startle anyone, tiny cracks in it revealed the uncontrollable, frothing bubble of triumph expanding into every corner of the ex-prisoner of Azkaban as he stared at the scum who had put him there.
"You're not looking at a pet — that's Peter Pettigrew." Six gasps. "An Animagus, yes. We all were. He betrayed James and Lily and sought refuge here." Sirius looked straight into the eyes of Arthur Weasley. "I would have NEVER betrayed the Potters. Not then, not ever."
Guilt plagued every inch of Arthur's face in the millisecond before he faced the floor. It rose with a lamentful smile, tears sparkling the edge of his eyes. The two men embraced.
"I should have known," said Arthur, smiling deeply. Harry had never seen him this emotional. "Harry can't cast a Patronus. That was yours." Sirius nodded. "How on earth did you keep a happy thought after all those years in Azkaban?"
"I didn't need to keep an old one," said Sirius. He shot a wink at Harry. "I've already found something new."
And Harry's heart broke. Harry remembered the brilliance of Sirius' Patronus, the spectacle it had been to bask in its warmth. It was made of love for him! And for a moment Harry crumpled with guilt, all the mix and match segments which formed his consciousness shattering under the weight of the cruelty he had exercised that day: every time he had not quite trusted the man's flawless story, every fact he had questioned for a lie, every sensitive question he had dreaded. But then they returned, forming with perfect unity and focus. Harry took a step back. And another, and another, tripping to the ground as realisation after realisation tore through him.
He had a godfather! Someone who understood! Someone who the world had kicked as much as the Dursleys kicked him! Someone who's blood boiled with hatred, as clear the desire for murder as Harry felt himself. But Sirius did not act on it. Sirius had calmly explained again and again why he was not a murderer. He was better than Harry, a role model to Harry. Harry's missing piece. And Harry loved him for it.
Something like silence rang in the Burrow for a moment, as the Weasleys' attention was divided between the scuttling rat and the fallen boy.
Then a mighty crash boomed.
The Weasleys' door was blown off its hinges, every face in the room twisting towards the barade of spells which flew into the home.
Harry was the only one who could see the explosion of glass as the rat was a rat no longer. In its place was Peter Petigrew, scuttling out of the back door so quickly Harry could barely get a look at him.
Milliseconds ticked on as Harry's head swished to see his godfather crash towards the ground, the legion of Aurors only seconds away from storming in. Harry knew what he had to do.
He rolled off the floor and pelted after the imposter, a yellow curse slipping past his ear. Harry clawed his hands into the flesh at the man's arms, his vision swirling in an instant as his parents' murderer carried him further and further away from everything he called home.