Chapter 29: Framed
Sirius Black felt the blast of cold wind on his face, wind that was now drying the tears of anguish off of his cheeks. He urged the broom underneath him to go steadily faster, pushing it beyond its limits if he was to have any hope of catching the tail lights in the distant mist of this Halloween night sky.
When the Order had notified him of the news, he hadn't been able to comprehend it, at first. His best friend, his brother, murdered on his own living room floor. His best friend's wife, practically his, Sirius's, sister-in-law, also a cold and crumpled corpse apparently found lying at the foot of her baby boy's crib.
Except there had been no sign of a body when it came to the baby. Aurors had searched the place and found the child missing, along with his blue baby blanket.
When Sirius had heard that, his heart had dropped like a stone. He would have thought that Voldemort would simply move to strike down the child there, but it appeared the twisted snake had fallen prey to his own diva instincts of wanting to put on a show. If into the den of the serpent the Dark Lord was taking Sirius's godson, well, then Sirius would just go in after them both. Rescue Harry before harm could come to him and avenge the deaths of James and Lily.
Giving a jerk of the broom handle, Sirius urged it on faster still, though this time he piloted up. He vaulted to great heights so that he was now gunning to quite literally overtake the lights beneath, the vehicle to which they belonged still obscured by clouds and a bit of fog.
It seemed an odd choice, for the Dark Lord, who loved to move in shadows, to use headlamps or whatever illumination it was to light his way.
Sirius took a deep breath and pushed himself up into a crouch, then a hunched position, surfing on the broom the way James had taught him. Sirius would be the first to admit he wasn't quite the broomsman, never mind Quidditch player, his best friend had been, but at this point, it was going to take every trick he knew – and many he didn't – just to stay alive. To keep Harry alive.
With a rebel yell, Sirius leapt from the broom and plummeted the twenty or so feet down to the lights that were carrying his godson to whatever danger lay in store.
He landed on someone hard and big, and whoever it was gave a startled shout of surprise. A roar, really – much too low in pitch and timbre to be the Dark Lord. The figure was also far too wide, and Sirius howled in shock as he felt a palm the size of a trash can lid flail out to whack him in the face.
Sirius went careening off of the vehicle, tumbling through space for a heart-stopping second in which he figured he was starting a fall to his death when firm wood halted him: his broom, catching him square in the middle of his back, and Sirius had to twist quickly to keep a grip on it. His feet still dangled in mid-air as the sound of an engine was cut.
"Watch yourself, Black!"
The mist cleared, in no small part thanks to what Sirius now recognized as the headlights of a motorbike. Their glare was now illuminating the wide face and scraggly beard of none other than Rubeus Hagrid.
"Hagrid?" Sirius panted, face falling in confusion. "I…. bloody hell, I thought you were a Death Eater numptie…." He now noticed the bundle Hagrid was cradling with a care not at all commensurate with the giant's wide girth, and Sirius gulped. "Is that Harry? It's…. not a body; he's not….?"
"Boy's alive," Hagrid grunted, eyeing Sirius with an odd coolness.
Sirius let out a grunt of his own as he wrestled with his upper body strength to vault himself back onto his broomstick, swinging one leg over. Manuevering his ride closer, he held out both hands imploring. "Well, then give him to me, Hagrid! I'm his godfather; I'll look after him!"
Hagrid was still eyeing him with a mistrust unexplained, even hatred. "Never took you to be the coddling kind, especially with tykes, Black! Or was that your plan all along?"
Sirius felt his blood freeze cold. "What?!"
Hagrid's dark eyes – really the only beady part of him – glared at Sirius with both anguish and loathing. "Is that why you betrayed your best friends? Dishonored your oath as Secret Keeper? So you could have Harry all to yourself?!"
The giant suddenly lunged at Sirius, and the younger, smaller man only barely swerved his broom away in time. Hagrid's inertia nearly sent him over the side of his own motorbike, but he kept astride the thing, and most importantly, kept a grip on Harry.
Sirius felt his heart sink as Hagrid's point of view began to sink in. "Wait…. you think I…..?" The very thought was too horrible to contemplate. "I wasn't their Secret Keeper! At least, not anymore!"
"DON'T LIE, BLACK!" Hagrid bellowed, shifting his body to keep Harry away from Sirius. "Lily made you the boy's godfather!"
"We changed plans, OK?! Yes, I was their Secret Keeper, but I convinced James and Lily to switch at the last minute. They appointed someone else!"
Hagrid glowered suspiciously. "If you weren't their Secret Keeper…. Then who is?"
The answer, and all the logic behind it, hit Sirius like a thunderbolt, and his entire expression collapsed into something dark.
"Peter."
He now made a sudden move for Hagrid, hoping to make a grab for Harry and get the lad somewhere safe – Grimmauld Place, likely – before he had to go a-hunting. Hagrid jerked away.
"No you don't, traitor! I have orders from Dumbledore to take Harry somewhere safe!"
"I'm somewhere safe! He'll be safe with me! And I'm NOT a traitor!"
Hagrid sneered. "Then PROVE it!" With that, the giant gunned the motorbike's engine and sailed off for the moon at the edge of the horizon.
Sirius watched the giant fly off with his godson, before guiding his broom into a sharp turn and dive. Oh, he would prove it, all right, and when he got his hands on that little rat….. the rat would squeak and squeal.
Peter was going to pay.
Sirius found the turncoat at his mummy's house, as he figured he would be. It took only one look at the meek little mouse before Sirius was dueling to kill. Even after his wand snapped, he continued to dodge Peter's curses and finally tackled him, the two former friends kicking, scratching and clawing until the brawl spilled out of the Pettigrew home and rolled into the streets of London.
"You….. you rat! You – filth!" Sirius bellowed, slapping Peter's wand arm away and landing a hit – a full punch to the face, breaking the bastard's noise. Peter's howl sounded like a rodent being caught by its tail. "I'm going to KILL you, traitor!"
There was a flash of red light and a BANG and Sirius felt himself spinning through open air before his shoulder met the pavement. Dazed, he regained his vision and his footing to see Peter running for his life into the busy street and crowd. Growling, Sirius gave chase. For a moment, he considered becoming his black dog Animagus and mauling the cunt – it would be faster, and bloodier - but he didn't want to alert the Ministry to his illegal status. He continued on foot.
He ran Peter down all the way into the shadow of the Tower of London, where Peter attempted to blend in amidst the bustle of busy tourists.
"Don't try to hide in the gutter, Peter!" Sirius bellowed, pointing a shaking finger at his former friend. "Only rats hide from the light of the truth! If you're a wizard, then admit what you did! Admit how you handed over your friends – our friends – to DEATH!"
For a moment, Peter stood there in a small gathering of Muggle passerbys who were now slowing to rubberneck what they probably assumed was a drunken misunderstanding in danger of escalating.
And then something changed in Peter's expression. Gone was the simpering weakling who would stick out his bottom lip and tremble at so much as a Cornish Pixie. The glint in Peter's eyes now was entirely unfamiliar and devious, and by the time Sirius caught onto it, he was already too late.
"Peter….?"
"EVERYONE, LISTEN!" Peter called in an uncharacteristically loud and clear voice. "LET THE RECORD SHOW THAT THIS MAN –" and he pointed his wand arm at Sirius menacingly. "- BETRAYED LILY AND JAMES POTTER: A BETRAYAL WHICH LED TO THEIR MURDER THIS NIGHT!"
With that, Peter whipped his wand behind his back and closed his eyes.
"Peter, don't -!" Sirius lunged forward.
KABOOM.
The Blasting Curse lifted Sirius off his feet and slammed him into the cobblestoned base of the Tower of London. Screams split the air within seconds, making his ears ring as he staggered to his feet, blood lacing his back. Stumbling at a hunch over to the wreckage, it took several seconds for his eyes to adjust to the gruesome sight before him:
At least a dozen Muggles lay sprawled and lifeless, including at least one bobby and also a member of Her Majesty the Queen's Guard. Sirius noticed a panhandling hobo lying crumpled on his side, the man's guitar propped over his body.
All that remained of where Peter Pettigrew had been standing just a second ago was a crater, so deep it had cracked to the sewer pipe below the cobblestoned street. Bodies were everywhere. Many more Muggles were injured and screaming, some were running. Stooping, peering closer, Sirius's eyes bulged as he discovered:
….. nothing but a heap of bloodied robes, with only a single, fragmented finger sticking out from the pile of cloth.
The incompetent bastard, the half a Squib, had blown himself up, and taken twelve innocent people with him, all after trying to save his own skin based on a lie.
Wand backfired. It had to have. Which, frankly, now that Sirius thought about it, sounded like classic Peter.
He began to laugh. The laughter grew louder, reaching higher, until it sounded more crazed, more maniacal. Sirius may not have gotten his revenge exactly the way he wanted it, but he had still gotten it, of a sort. Peter had merely delivered his own comeuppance, and the realization made him laugh even harder.
Sirius laughed and laughed and laughed even as the police surrounded him and handcuffed him, leading him away. He kept laughing and laughing as Aurors then took down the Muggle feds and Obliviated them before he was transferred into magical custody.
Sirius laughed all through his sentencing enough that it didn't fully dawn on him what was going on, and he kept laughing all the way to his imprisonment on that most notorious of island rocks, what some circles referred to as 'The Magical Alcatraz.'
Only once he had nearly lost all the air in his lungs and he emerged as if from a dream to find himself stuck in a cell in Azkaban, for crimes he hadn't committed, did he stop laughing.
Now, Sirius Black, convicted, framed murderer screamed in anguish and rage for how he had been wronged. Three of his friends gone, two of them at the hands of the other, who had opted to rather die than confess. Harry, off and spirited away somewhere.
When the rumors of the Dark Lord's downfall trickled back to Sirius, it was only minor, pyrrhic and bittersweet. The Dark Lord was dead…. but at what cost?
Sirius knew, as his dark eyes narrowed into resentful, vengeful slits.
Everything.