Sirius knew where Dumbledore's office was, he had been there just last month after he had told Snape how to get past the Whooping Willow. When he got in front of the griffin that hide the entertain to the office he panted and shouted, "Sweet tarts."
The griffin did not move.
"Oh come on," Sirius thought. Of all the times for Dumbledore to change the password; he needed to see Dumbledore now.
"Honeydukes"
"Chocolate Frogs"
"Every Flavor Jellybeans"
"Gumdrops"
At once the griffin moved aside and a staircase appeared.
"Our headmaster has a sweet tooth problem," Sirius mumbled as he headed up the stairs.
When he got to the door, he pounded on it. A small 'come in' was heard from the other side and with that Sirius hushed in.
Dumbledore was sitting behind his desk and looked up when Sirius came in.
"Ah, Mr. Black, I was wondering who would be trying to knock my door down," said Dumbledore with a smile.
"I think I know what happened to Remus."
"How have you managed to do that when our own head nurse has no idea what kind of poison was used," Dumbledore asked.
"That not what I mean," Sirius said.
"Please continue."
"I was thinking about what happened to Remus and I have come to the conclusion that for Remus to have been poisoned he would have had to have ingested it in some way," Sirius said.
"Naturally," said Dumbledore
"Well, after we had discovered Remus' secret a few years ago he told use how a lot of times when people discovered what he was they had tried to kill him. There was even one time when he was nine a neighbor had tried to poison him. He would know not to eat or drink something that some random person had given him."
"Where are you going with this Sirius," Dumbledore asked.
"The only way that Remus could have been exposed to that poison would be if he had eaten it from the Great Hall. I went and talked with the house elves and they denied everything, but I have a house elf at home. You can also tell when a house elf is riding something from you because someone else in the family told them not to say anything. Only the head of the family can overrule a member of the family. Hogwarts elves would be the same way," Sirius explained looking Dumbledore straight in the eyes. "Whoever poisoned Remus had one of the house elves put it into his food."
Dumbledore did not miss a beat. Right after Sirius had finished his explanation he was up from his desk and out the door, leaving Sirius standing were he was.
After a moment of confusion Sirius followed Dumbledore out the door and down to the kitchens.
Once in the kitchen Dumbledore got the attention of every house elf there.
"I have reason to believe that someone here had been asked for a different ingredient be added to one of Remus Lupin's meals. If anyone knows anything about this, please come forward."
Tini, who had been in the back of the kitchen, made her way forward her whole body shaking as she went.
"I was the one to put the potion in Master Lupin's breakfast," she said, "It was an order I could not refuse."
Dumbledore bent down to her level, "I understand that if you had been ordered to do so you would have to, so you are not in trouble. What I need to know is do you know who had ordered you to do so."
"Oh, yes sir," Tini answered, "He comes in here every now and again, Master Severus Snape sir."
If the headmaster had not been standing right there, Sirius would have stormed into the Slytherin common room and focused Snape to drink poison himself. As it was Dumbledore was there and before Sirius could even begin to think of a reason to leave Dumbledore had him following him back to his office.
Before Sirius even knew what was happening he was standing in Dumbledore's office with Slughorn and Snape.
Sirius glared at the Slytherin wishing he had the ability to cause him pain just by looking at him.
"It appears that a witness has you ordering a house elf to put poison in Mr. Lupin's breakfast," Dumbledore said looking at Snape, the twinkle in his eye completely gone. "Believe you know how serious these accusations are?"
"I'm afraid I don't, sir," Snape replied, "According to the Werewolf Registration Law article 8 section 4, if someone feels threatened by a werewolf in any way they can take whatever actions they feel necessary. While I myself did not attack Lupin, if anyone found out what he was they may feel threatened by him and than by law they can do something like poison his breakfast. And in case you have forgotten, I was attacked by him only last month."
"Why you like rat," Sirius said slowly letting his angry come out with each word. "You were the one who had went down under the Whooping Willow, and Remus wasn't even the one to tell you how to do that, that was me. This is all about prejudice you're just using the law to justify it."
"Sirius, that is enough," Dumbledore said calmly, before turning back to Snape.
"While you claim that you have not done this crime, the evidence against you cannot be over look. As such I will like to know what was in the potion that you gave to Remus."
"How should I know, sir," Snape said, "I did not give him anything and even if I did, do you honestly think that as a fourth year I could make a potion like that."
"No, put I do believe that you could get it from an outside source. I would like to know who that outside force was," Dumbledore said.
"If I did not do anything how could I tell you where the person who did got the poison."
Dumbledore sighed, "If you are unwilling to give us anymore information very well, we have evidence that you were the one who order the potion put in Remus' breakfast, so there will be punishments. For this I will be taking 200 points from Slytherin house, all of your privileges will be revoked and you will serve detention every night from now until the end of the year. We will discuss if any of these punishments will continue into next year."
Both Snape and Sirius started to complain about this, but Dumbledore cut them off before they could get a word out.
"My decision is final. Severus will you please follow Professor Slughorn so that you can discuss your detention."
Snape glared at Dumbledore but said nothing as he followed Slughorn out of the office.
"He poisons Remus and that all he gets," Sirius shouted once the door had closed.
"Sirius please keep your voice down." Dumbledore said.
"He tried to kill Remus," Sirius said, "in fact he could still kill him."
"Snape was not wrong about the law, if he feels threatened by a werewolf he can legally take whatever action he wants."
Sirius' jaw dropped and his eyes grew wide.
"In fact many would question giving Snape any punishment at all. However, it is against school rules to be in the kitchens as well as to brew dangerous potions like the one he used on Remus without supervision." Dumbledore continued, "So I am able to punish Snape but if I expel him it will bring unwanted questions, questions that could cause more trouble for Remus."
"It is legal for him to poison Remus," Sirius asked.
"Yes," Dumbledore answered, "That is why when his neighbor tried to poison him when he was nine there was no charges pressed. I had to go through many hoops to get the Ministry of Magic to allow Remus to come here and one of them was my word that they will not have to deal with any issues regarding Remus. If a student is expelled because of Remus for any reason, the Ministry will not take kindly to that and there will be trouble."
"So Snape gets away with poisoning Remus, so that you don't get in trouble."
"No," Dumbledore said, "Snape is not getting expelled because it would cause trouble for Remus. Which I might added is what saved you from being expelled last month."
That made Sirius stop for a moment. It was odd that he had put another student's life in danger but was not expelled because of it. At the time he was more worried about Remus forgiving him to even think about how lucky he had been. Now he saw that he was lucky and the only reason for that was to protect Remus.
"What about the potion, are you just going to take Snape's word that he does not know what is in it," Sirius finally asked.
"Sirius I do believe Severus when he says that whatever was in the potion is beyond his skill level," Dumbledore answered, "I would have like if Severus had told us were he got the potion from, but it appears that is unlikely."
"So we are back where we started," Sirius sighed. He had thought that when he discovered who had poisoned Remus, they would know how to save him.
"Not quite," Dumbledore said, "We now know how the poison got into Remus' system which goes a long way in discovering it nature and a way to cure it."