Chapter 23. 1994 (Part 2)
Harry Potter was dead. Had been for three days now apparently.
"Du." A gloved finger poked him in the chest. "You are British, yes?" Kjell asked. "You vent to Hogwarts, yes?"
Draco nodded vaguely but didn't look up from the Daily Prophet. Three days. As his poor eagle owl Ulysses tore into a sausage, Draco cursed the mountains encircling the Durmstrang Institute for Magical Learning. Three whole days.
"Did you know Harry Potter?"
"Know him?" Draco asked, finally looking up. "I'm the one who killed him."
Kjell looked at him like he was crazy. "You are joking," he said. "You haff been here for months."
Draco looked down at his new blackthorn wand. "Doesn't mean I didn't kill him."
He would never forget how small Harry Potter had looked collapsed on the grass, golden sand in his face. Never.
"You are crazy, Malfoy," Kjell decided, and Draco just shrugged.
Let Kjell think what he wanted, he thought. Draco knew the truth of his most horrific mistake. Somedays it felt like he was the only one who did; his father was very good at burying secrets. He carried the heavy weight of it in his chest as he should.
"It says right here it vas Sirius Black," Kjell continued, poking the Daily Prophet. Draco ignored the little photo of Potter that looked back at him.
"Hmm," he hummed doubtfully. "And who was the article written by?" Draco countered.
"Rita—"
"Skeeter, yes," he interrupted. "She is infamously unreliable, Kjell." And in his father's pocket. There was a reason Draco's expulsion hadn't hit the news.
"I see," he said. "So I am just supposed to believe that you managed to succeed where the Dark Lord himself failed?"
"With an Expelliarmus," he said darkly.
Kjell began to laugh but Draco couldn't even bring himself to smile. How could he?
He was a murderer.
Sirius Black was a murderer. Again apparently. That alone—the injustice!—would've been enough to raise his hackles, but no. They had to go and claim that the person he murdered was his fucking Godson! Even as a dog, the thought made him almost blind with rage. Because Harry couldn't be dead. He couldn't.
Growling as he loped through the corridor, he sent two third-years squealing down the hall past the very man he was there to see.
"Worry not, girls," Albus Dumbledore called after them, "Snuffles here is quite harmless!" He received no reply and the old man looked down at him and sighed, gesturing for Sirius to follow. "You shouldn't have come," he said.
Sirius bared his teeth and Albus smiled sadly.
"I know you had to."
The two walked, man and dog, past several classrooms and up two flights of stairs in silence until at last, they stood before the gargoyle concealing the entrance to the Headmaster's office.
"Blood pop," Albus said.
The gargoyle stepped aside and Sirius bounded up the spiral stairs, nudging the door at the top open with his snout. As he entered, his canine eyes examined the office to find it empty besides the portraits, several of whom eyed him with curiosity. After a moment, Albus too entered. Sirius didn't hesitate to shift to his human form once the door was closed.
"Tell me it isn't true, Albus," he demanded loudly, ignoring the gasps of the portraits as he watched Albus walk over to the opposite side of his desk. "Tell me this is just another elaborate plan you've cooked up to draw out the enemy or something because H-Harry—" His voice broke and he swallowed. "Lily and James' boy." His eyes closed. "My Godson—" A tight throat reduced his words to whispers. "—cannot be dead."
Albus seemed to wilt under the weight of his desperate stare; the old man had never looked so weary. To his horror, he whispered, "Sirius..."
"No." Hands came up to grip his hair. "No." This couldn't be.
"I'm sorry."
The words came to him from somewhere distant and somehow Sirius spoke, lips numb. Everything was numb. "How?" He needed to know. "How did he... die?"
"He died peacefully."
A hiss of air escaped through his teeth, the words brutally carving at his chest. They were meant to be a relief, he could tell, but they weren't.
"He had been in a coma—"
"I know that," Sirius snapped, his voice suddenly loud as fury burst white-hot in his aching chest. His hands dropped from his hair to form fists at his side. "I've been stalking the entrance to Mungos for months now. Months. What I want to know is why he was there."
It took Albus a moment to speak. "There was an accident, Sirius."
"An... accident?" If he didn't explain... If he withheld...
"Yes. An accident involving a Time-Turner."
The dark fire in his chest sputtered in confusion. "A Time-Turner?" he asked incredulously. "And why, Abus? Why on Earth—" His fists smashed onto the desk in anger, "—was Harry anywhere near a Time-Turner?!"
The old man looked infuriatingly calm. "Hermione Granger was given a Time-Turner by the Ministry in order to assess the viability of implementing a program for gifted students at Hogwarts. She used the Time-Turner to great effect to attend additional classes and," he paused, "to free you, Sirius."
Sirius just stared as the pieces clicked together. "That's how...?"
"Yes."
After a while, Sirius remembered himself. "And the accident?"
"The Time-Turner was shattered against Harry's face. He was covered in Time Sand. Short of a miracle, there was nothing anyone could do."
Silence descended, cloaking the room until it became unbearable, and Sirius whispered the question he swore he wouldn't ask. "How could you let this happen?"
Pain. Pain twisted Albus Dumbledore's face and he breathed, "I failed him."
"Yes." The dark fire raged but its flames were cold. "Yes, you did."
The old man's face crumpled further and suddenly it was too much. Sirius whirled away from him and stalked to the window. He looked out upon the Quidditch stadium as something to do only to wince as he remembered hiding in stands to watch Harry play. He'd been even better than James... He never got to tell him...
A sudden, lamenting cry filled the office, and Sirius turned. It was the phoenix. Where it came from, he didn't know, but its cry went on and on, a perfect duet to his own pain. When phoenix cry finally ended, Sirius' cheeks were wet and the fire in his chest doused.
He looked then to Albus, who stared resolutely down at his desk; he too had tears on his cheeks. "I have failed Harry," the old man said simply. "This I cannot change."
"I know," Sirius said.
"But," Albus continued, "I can ensure that I do not fail the people Harry loved." He looked up, electric blue eyes wet but determined. "This isn't the end, Sirius. There is still work to be done."
"Work?" he asked sharply. "What work?"
"Voldemort," he said, and Sirius wasn't surprised. "He will return if he hasn't already. With Harry gone, he will believe none can stop him." Albus stared at Sirius hard. "He will be wrong."
He nodded jerkily. "What do we need to do?"
"We must gather the old crowd and prepare," Albus said, and Sirius nodded again.
"I can—"
"There's more," the old man interrupted. He examined Sirius thoughtfully.
Sirius paused. "What is it?"
"Tell me, Sirius," he said slowly. "What do you know about Horcruxes?"
The air in Godric's Hallow tasted like the start of fall as Remus Lupin sat in the middle of the crowd in his only set of dress robes, his throat tight and his hands tangled in fur. Albus was talking of bravery and kindness and friendship but he heard none of it. He could only hear the heartbroken whines of the dog on his lap.
How could the universe be so cruel?
As his fingers continued to stroke through Sirius' fur, Remus' eyes wandered past the twisted faces of friends and former students, their pain echoing his own, until his eyes were drawn across the aisle to Minerva McGonagall. Something twisted in his aching chest. The older woman was crying silently, her eyes trained not on Albus but on the two students in the front row: Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger.
Their shoulders shook and shook.
"Let us rise."
Remus' hands stilled and Sirius let out a tortured huff of air; the sudden movement of the crowd was cacophonous.
"C'mon Snuffles," Remus murmured. "Up now."
The dog moved slowly, as if pained, and Remus stood. Albus Dumbledore waited for the last of the noise to dim before he raised his wand. "To Harry Potter," he said.
A hundred hands stretched toward the sky, wands lit. "To Harry Potter," the crowd echoed.
"To Harry Potter," Remus whispered.
To the boy-who-lived-no-more.
The sea crashed and churned and bubbled against the black stone of Azkaban but not a drop of salt water touched Lord Voldemort. He hovered far above it all, pleased, for even the roar of the powerful ocean was not enough to drown the far-off screams of the guardsmen.
Wixen guardsmen.
Lord Voldemort laughed softly, the rattling breathing of a hundred dementors at his back. He'd stolen them all. As he watched flashes of spellfire light the stone prison below him, he wondered. How long had it taken for them to notice? How many days had Azkaban stood unprotected after he bent the dementors to his will?
Clearly, it hadn't been long. He had... underestimated their forces. His smile grew wider. How fortune favored Lord Voldemort. His glorious return would be baptized in blood.
He laughed once more and felt rather than heard the collective shudder of the dementors; he could taste their desperate need to snuff out the sound. They dared not for fear of him. An unexpected benefit to tearing his soul.
Below him, the screams began to wane and he summoned his most loyal servant. The one to rid the world of Harry Potter. The masked man appeared in a crack of Apparation astride a broom.
"Lucius," Lord Voldemort hissed.
"My lord," Lucius Malfoy breathed, head bowed. "How may I assist you?" To his credit, the blond man barely shivered despite the oppressive gloom of the dementors.
"Tell me, Lucius," Voldemort said. "The screams... Are they ours?"
"No, my lord," he said, and Voldemort was pleased. "They are the screams of Ministry men. They are few in number now."
"Perfect," he purred. "We will need survivors to spread the word. Go. Inform the others. The rest are to be restrained. We shall free our brethren now. I will join you soon."
"Yes, my lord."
Lucius disappeared with a crack and Lord Voldemort turned his attention to the night sky above him. It was clear, the stars bright without the pollution of Muggles, and the half-moon hung a bright beacon. He smiled. It would not be clear for long.
Triumph sang in his blood as he raised his wand of yew. This night would mark his return and he would mark this night.
"Morsmordre!"
The Dark Mark spread like split ink against the sky forming his skull of emerald stars and his serpent tongue of verdant light. Immediately, the faded screams below renewed and a thrill ran down his spine. This was it. He was back. And there was no one left to stop him.
He laughed and laughed and laughed.