It didn't take long for Sirius's family issues to make themselves known to his new mentee. He saw that as one of several reasons why he was not cut out for this at all. Marlene would surely be better off with someone who didn't have a little brother who took the dark mark.

So anyone other than me. Poor Marlene.

While Sirius was right that he held the distinction of being the only member of The Order of the Phoenix to have a sibling take the mark, he was not correct about his ineptitude as Marlene's mentor. At least not if you asked Marlene herself

For Marlene, seeing Sirius's fruitless efforts to hide his conflicted feelings while listening to reports about his only brother and the danger he may be in was like throwing gas on the already roaring fire of her infatuation.

She felt that all that conflict and turmoil over his family background made him even more admirable. The fact he was the only member of the order with a death eater sibling meant he was the one who had the most difficult decision to make. But he had made it and he'd chosen the side of the light. He would have had a much easier time keeping his head down and staying out of it, even if he privately detested Voldemort's ideologies. That would be what most people would have done in his position, Marlene thought. But Sirius was brave and daring. He stood up and fought for what he believed in, even if it meant fighting against his own blood family.

She looked at Sirius like he was a gallant knight out of a story book. He noticed. He noticed that she didn't look at him any differently when she sat down at her first meeting and heard Dumbledore's report that his brother was on the run. That all Order members were to keep eyes and ears out for Regulus Black because he might have information.

So, Sirius thought, Regulus wasn't just a death eater. He was a death eater who was extremely afraid of death and ran for the hills when he realized he wasn't cut out of war.

Bigotry and Cowardice. That's Reg.

That was his nearest blood relative and Marlene still looked to him as if he actually knew what he was doing. He kept waiting for her to realize he was rubbish but the realization just didn't happen.

Still, he felt so ashamed as they left the meeting. He knew he was as supposed to be teaching her something or another but part of him wanted to tell her to just go home because he was pants at this anyhow. He didn't. He couldn't bring himself to dismiss her once she was right in front of him, smiling like a ray of sun through the clouds. The part of him that wanted to keep her with him won out.

Warmth was the only thing Marlene had more of than than hair. It would have been easier for Sirius to ask Dumbledore to assign her to someone else if she hadn't been so enjoyable to be around.

It was still a little weird for him. It wasn't like him to really enjoy being around teenage girls with sunny dispositions who burst into the room and tell him that he's exceptionally good looking.

That was because he hadn't met any one particular girl who met that description before Marlene. It turned out he enjoyed Marlene quite a lot.

She seemed like someone he would have been friends with had she been in his year. She had a mischievous streak that she didn't even try to hide. It was just very easy to underestimate her trouble making abilities because she was way more adorable than your average delinquent. She was still intensely Hufflepuffy, but they had a more natural and immediate good rapport than he had with Peter. And certainly than more-so than Lily with any them. But he conceded that the whole reason he was even decent enough to be friendly with this little sunbeam was because of Lily. Lily made all of them more decent. He was glad she'd decided James was worth the effort.

He would have to say something eventually. He'd been standing there staring at her like I'd been hit by a stunning curse for quite some time.

"So uh… yeah I feel a little out of sorts after all that and I can't think of what we should do. Um… do you… have any questions? Or anything?"

Idiot.

He wondered why she didn't realize she got cheated out of actual mentoring. He knew that it was likely she thought he had lovely grey eyes (fair. They were lovely.) but there was no reason at all, in his own opinion, to think he was capable of teaching anyone anything.

"Are you feeling alright Sirius? You looked a bit sick back there. It must be awful for you. I can't imagine."

"You're… very kind Marlene. I'm alright. It's just part of life for me. You're lucky though. Your family."

"Yeah. I suppose I am. I mean I'm the youngest and the least impressive of five and that hasn't always been fun but seeing what you live with has made me realize how lucky I am."

"I don't know your siblings very well. Would it be terrible of me to say I'm quite a lot more impressed with you than I ever was with Grace? I had classes with her for 7 years and she isn't… you're different."

Grace McKinnon had just been part of the background noise for Sirius. She was by all accounts a decent person and a good student. She was order affiliated like all the McKinnons. She was not anything to write home about. If one were going to write home at all, which Sirius didn't.

But he found Marlene very interesting. And very cute. He did have to write a report of how things were going with her for Dumbledore, but he needed to refrain from mentioning how cute he thought she was. That was both irrelevant and likely to reflect poorly on him as a mentor.

"Well I am different. You have that right. But you're probably the first person to think I'm more impressive. Grace is in healer training. Grace was a prefect. Grace is lovely. She isn't… verbally clumsy...like me."

"Verbally Clumsy. That is a brilliant way of putting it. And I actually think that makes you more impressive? It's… well never mind. You're my favorite McKinnon for sure."

I could probably just stare at her all afternoon and soak up all that warmth.

He knew that wouldn't be a very useful lesson. He'd figure something out. Or else they'd just kill time until it became evident that nothing was getting taught today. It was strange but Sirius could deal with that.

He'd rather have Marlene smiling at him than not. That was what it came down to.


Sirius was not an extraordinary duelist. He was decent, and had demonstrated his abilities held up when actually face to face with Death Eaters. In the heat of a conflict his greatest strength was unflinching grit. He tended to act on instinct rather than calculating his moves based on his opponents weaknesses. So in controlled training situations, he was fairly unimpressive.

But with Marlene he couldn't muster any sort of aggression. His dueling was just awful and it was, in his mind, all her fault.

Damn her and her annoying cute freckles and her irritatingly sweet smile.

No one could be expected to send a curse at her with any kind of power behind it. Every instinct he had was more along the lines of "give the girl a hug" rather than "knock her on her arse".

"You don't have to let me win Sirius! You know that won't help me at all if I were to end up in a real battle." She looked a little annoyed with him. Annoyed but still excessively sweet.

"Sorry. I wasn't actually... It wasn't intentional. I just can't bring myself… what if I hurt you? You're uh… really tiny and breakable."

"I'm tougher than I look."

Marlene was telling the truth. It was impossible to grow up as the youngest of five and come away the delicate little flower Sirius believed she was. She was a sweet Hufflepuff with a petite frame, but she also had the top marks in her year in Defense Against the Dark Arts. She didn't need to be big to throw big spells.

She was gifted enough and had all the OWLs to apply to the ministry to be an auror, if she'd been of a mind to. She had a brother-in-law in the aurors even. Professor Sprout had been surprised bordering on disappointed that Marlene was not even considering a career in magical law enforcement.

It wasn't that she was afraid of a fight or didn't want to devote herself to taking down dark wizards, it was a matter of not wanting to work for the ministry.

"How about we just go for disarming?"

Marlene rolled her eyes. Sirius would have to get over this notion eventually. But she wouldn't push him. For one thing, she thought it was very sweet that he was afraid of hurting her.

She waffled over what that and every other little thing Sirius did might imply regarding his feelings towards her. She went over and over it, 30 times a day every day for at least the past week. She had no delusions that he didn't know about her crush. Anyone who spent the least bit of time around the two of them would have known. It was not hard to spot. She was fairly certain that he didn't find her entirely repulsive. He did seem to enjoy her company. That was a start.

"Fine fine. But you have to really try to disarm me. No half hearted expelliarmus! I will notice and we will have words."

"Well I'd hate for us to have to have words."

His tone rang out a little flirtatious in his teasing. He only noticed when he saw the blush creeping up under Marlene's freckles. She was highly attuned to these little things. More so than Sirius himself. She was brimming with nervous excitement.

Sirius was just plain nervous rather than excited. She already looked at him like he hung the moon. He felt he shouldn't encourage her little crush.

Except that he was really enjoying it.

He went about his mental self flagellation, wondering what was wrong with him, how could he be so mean to egg her on like that…

He questioned if he was really that much of an egotistical wanker that he'd encourage her in that direction because it was fun to have someone earnestly admire him like that.

Gross.

On the the other hand, that was far preferable than the alternative. He could handle being an arse. Plenty of people would have said he was already doing a fine job there. He couldn't handle growing feelings for her. Feelings were a whole other level of gross.

Scary gross

He took a breath and then a bow, to signify the start of this round of their duel. Soon he'd cast his expelliarmus and she'd thrown up her shield. Her shield was quite sturdy.

He tried casting an impediment jinx then immediately following it up with a disarming spell. But she ducked and shielded herself with more finesse than should have been possible for someone who tended to fall all over themselves in normal conversations.

Damn. She is… wow. Maybe she is tougher than she looks.

It took a lot more moving in on her and rapid fire spells than he'd thought it would, but eventually he got her on her knees, with her wand in his hand. He doubted he'd be able to beat her in a year. She was surprisingly good with defensive magic. Maybe, he thought, her sweetness was more of a bonus than a drawback in that regard. Opponents would underestimate her. He would try not to underestimate her again.

He felt it necessary, however, to take advantage of the full theatricality of a wizard's duel… He approached slowly, and got just a hair too close.

"Do you yield?"

He looked straight into her big brown eyes. From her knees she looked up at him with a hint of playfulness that felt, to Sirius, a bit… dangerous. She was fairly certain he was flirting and she was not backing down from the challenge. They were both having far too much fun with this show of a duel.

"I yield. Do your very worst."

He couldn't hold in his laughter as he pulled her up by the hand. He'd only meant to help her to her feet and return her wand but Marlene used the momentum to throw herself all the way into an embrace.

The more Sirius was around Marlene, the less in control he felt. It wasn't generally this fun for him to be ogled. He was definitely being ogled at that very moment.

He knew he should probably do something to discourage it, but there he was, not letting go of her, getting lost in the warmth of her smile.