I was resting quietly on the old, ragged, couch in the library a couple days later, staring out the window while trying to keep a peaceful attitude. The spring scenery outside was captivating to my anxious and wandering mind. Since visiting Hogwarts, and Dumbledore's escape from the Ministry, I had not left Grimmauld Place. I had been too consumed with trying to layout and solve the puzzle that I had drawn out on the chalkboard. The board was now in the library, out of the kitchen, so that I could think over all of it in peace and quiet. Trying to figure out who was the Death Eater that attacked me had become difficult as people clanked their dishes, ate and talked loudly. Sirius kept putting his two-cents in and I was tired of hearing it, mostly because he was making points that I disagreed with and didn't want to hear.

He really did think that I was being paranoid about the news clippings Gabriel and I had found. He seemed sure that the vision Haiden had sent Gabriel was just a distraction. The Death Eater that had attacked me and burned down the brownstone had nothing to do with the two Death Eaters we had killed in their dingy flat. The news clippings, and the two Death Eaters, were just meant to distract Gabriel and I from what we were really looking for. Which, I did have to admit, that if my father wanted to distract me, the easiest way to do that was to suggest that someone was after Carrigan.

But what could my father be hiding? Surely, if he wanted me killed he would kill the Death Eater that failed and send someone else. If that was the Death Eater's true purpose why would Voldemort need to create a distraction that suggested Carrigan's life was in danger.

"You're over thinking it."

I sat up and turned to look at the library door. Sirius stood in the doorframe with a frank, calm expression on his face. His voice was just as calm as his expression as he spoke. "May I come in?"

"It's your library," I shrugged as I sat back on the couch.

Sirius laughed honestly at my comment. "That doesn't mean you wouldn't chuck something at me for entering."

"You're right in that regard."

"So, you think I'm wrong about something else?" Sirius smiled at me as he took a seat on the couch. He folded his arms and leaned back against the cushions as he peered out at the dusty, dark room before him. His eyes went to the chalkboard that was leaning against the bookshelves across from us. My writing and arrows were scribbled across the entire surface of the board. The news clippings I had collected were pinned to it in chronological order.

I didn't say anything to Sirius' remark. He turned his head to look at me. I stared right back at him with my arms crossed tightly over my chest. I had nothing to say to him. Of course, I thought he was wrong.

"I just think you need to step back and start from the beginning again," Sirius said. "Don't think about all of this—" he motioned to the chalk board, "—as one big conspiracy. Just look at it one event at a time. Focus on the Death Eater that you're missing, when you've learned more about him and what he's about, then worry about the other two you and Gabriel knocked off. For all you know they have nothing to do with the first Death Eater. You're trying to make connections where there aren't any."

I frowned deeply as I looked away from his midnight-blue stare. Looking at the board, I saw what he did. He was right. I was creating more chaos by trying to lay everything out. I was making connections where there might not be any. I sighed heavily and leaned forward, putting my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands.

"I'm just scared of losing Carrigan," I whispered. Sirius placed his hand on my back, providing comfort with his gentle touch. "I would never forgive myself if something happened to her and I missed a clue that could have prevented it."

"Of course you're scared of losing her," Sirius replied. "I am too. But you're not missing anything, Cadence. You are a good mother, but this is crazy. Let's not worry about missing Carrigan until she is gone—which I'm sure she won't ever be. You are too protective to even let her out of your grasp for one moment."

"She's out of my grasp now," I said with some bite. "She's at Hogwarts and Dumbledore isn't there anymore to protect her, or Harry. They're both in more danger now."

"There are plenty of members of the Order there to keep an eye over them," Sirius said. "They will be fine. Worrying to the point that you're not functioning normally isn't going to do anyone any good."

"I'm functioning normally."

"When is the last time you kissed Gabriel?" Sirius asked.

"Excuse me?" I looked at Sirius sharply. What was he getting at?

"When was the last time you kissed, or even saw, your husband?"

"I saw him yesterday," I replied.

"No," Sirius shook his head. "You didn't. The last time you saw him was three days ago. He was here yesterday. He came into the library to give you dinner, but you didn't even notice that he was there. You're too consumed with this rubbish to take in your life now."

I frowned and turned away from Sirius, because he was right. A sudden heavy, guilty feeling sunk over me. I wrapped my arms around my stomach and faced the window so I didn't have to look at my ex. Thankfully, there was a knock on the door that pulled Sirius' attention away from me.

"Yea?" Sirius asked as he stood up.

"Hey," Remus said from the doorway. "Harry is downstairs in the fire. He wants to speak to you."

"Harry?" Sirius questioned with concern.

"What's the matter?" I asked turning to Remus.

"I don't know, just said he fancied a chat with Sirius," Remus shrugged.

Sirius charged through the door, moving past Remus quickly. I stood up and followed right after them, afraid that something terrible had happened at Hogwarts. It had to be pretty terrible if Harry was contacting Sirius via the Floo Network. Sirius, Remus and I entered the kitchen hastily and crowded in front of the fire. Harry's face was sitting steadily in the green flames. He didn't look alarmed or stressed.

"Are you alright?" Sirius questioned as he knelt down. "Do you need help?"

"No," said Harry softly. "It's nothing like that…I just wanted to talk about my dad…"

I bit my bottom lip with surprise and released a thankful sigh.

"I'm sorry I worried you," Harry said quickly as he looked at me. "I don't have much time, so I'll get straight to it. Last night, during my lessons with Snape I saw a memory of his from when…well, when you were all in school. I saw you and dad picking on him. You flipped him over in front of a huge crowd of people for no reason!"

I watched as Sirius and Remus looked at each other for a moment. Neither of them said anything, then Remus spoke after a long pause. "I would like you to judge your father on what you saw there, Harry. He was only fifteen—"

"I'm fifteen!" Harry said irritably.

"Look, Harry," Sirius said as he looked sternly at his godson. "James and Snape hated each other from the moment they set eyes on each other in our first year. I think that your father was everything Snape wanted to be—he was popular, he was good at Quidditch, good at pretty much everything. And Snape was just this little oddball who messed around with the Dark Arts and James always hated the Dark Arts."

"Yea," Harry nodded. "But he just attacked Snape for no good reason, just because—well, because you said you were bored." Harry finished with a soft tone of apology towards Sirius. "He was a bully…"

"I'm not proud of it," Sirius said quickly. Remus gave him a sideways look, that suggested otherwise. I fought the urge to make a crack at how Sirius definitely was proud of it.

"Look Harry, what you've got to understand is that your father and Sirius were the best in the school at whatever they did—everyone thought they were the coolest—even if they got carried away sometimes—"

"If we were arrogant little pricks sometimes, you mean," Sirius interjected. Remus smiled.

"He kept messing with his hair," Harry said sadly.

Sirius and Remus both laughed whole-heartedly.

"I forgot he used to do that," Sirius said as he beamed to Harry.

"Was he playing with the Snitch?" Remus asked.

"Yea," Harry nodded. "Well, I thought he was a bit of an idiot."

"Of course he was bit of an idiot!" Sirius said. "We were all idiots! Well, except for Moony."

Remus shook his head. "Did I ever tell you to lay off of Snape? Did I ever have the guts to tell you I though you were out of line?"

"Well, you made us feel ashamed of ourselves sometimes…that's something…" Sirius said with a smile.

"And, he kept looking over at the girls by the lake, hoping they were watching him!" Harry said quickly.

"Well," I smiled softly. "That's because your mother was probably over there by the lake."

"Yea, he always made a fool of himself when Lily was around," Sirius nodded. "But, we all make fools of ourselves around girls we like, Harry." Sirius' eyes glanced at me, but I tried not to notice.

"How come she married him?" Harry asked. "She hated him!"

"Nah, she didn't," Sirius said.

"I would know best," I said wisely. "She didn't hate him."

"They started dating in seventh year," Remus added.

"Once James had deflated his head a bit," Sirius nodded.

"And stopped hexing people just for the fun of it," said Remus.

"Even Snape?" said Harry.

"Well," Remus said slowly. "Snape was a special case. I mean, he never lost an opportunity to curse James, so you couldn't really expect James to take that lying down, could you?"

"And my mum was okay with that?"

"She didn't know too much about it, to tell you the truth," said Sirius.

"Oh, she knew about it," I insisted. "We both did."

"Then why didn't you stop it?" Harry asked.

"Well, it's like Remus said, Snape cursed James every chance he got. Lily and I didn't blame him or Sirius for defending themselves."

Harry nodded in understanding, but still looked grim about the subject. Sirius sighed and leaned forward slightly. "Look Harry," he said. "Your father was my best friend. He was a good person. A lot of people are idiots at the age of fifteen. He grew out of it."

"Yea, okay," Harry acknowledge Sirius' point. "I just never thought I would feel sorry for Snape."

"Now that you mention it," Remus said slowly. "How did Snape react when you saw this memory?"

"He told me he'd never teach me Occlumency again," said Harry with a tone of indifference. "like that's a big disappointment—"

"He WHAT?" shouted Sirius, causing Harry to jump and inhale ash from the fire.

"Are you serious, Harry? He stopped giving you lessons?" Remus questioned before I could.

"Yea," Harry sounded surprised that Sirius and Remus were so concerned. "But it's not a big deal, I don't care—"

"No, Harry," I said quickly to him. "It is a big deal. Remember everything we've talked about? What Dumbledore said to you the night he left? It is very important—"

"I'm coming up there to have a word with Snape!" Sirius snipped. He began to stand up from the kitchen floor, but Remus grabbed his collar and pulled him back to his knees.

"If anyone is going to talk to Snape it will be me or Cadence!" he said firmly. "But Harry, first of all, you're to go back to Snape and tell him that on no account is he to stop giving you lessons—"

"Are you crazy? I can't tell him that," Harry responded with anger. "He'd kill me!"

"Harry, there is nothing more important right now then you learning Occlumency!" Remus retorted. "Do you understand me? Nothing!"

"Okay, okay," Harry said heavily. "I'll trying…but it won't be very easy…"

Harry's voice trailed off and his head turned, as if he were looking over his shoulder. "Is that Kreacher coming downstairs?"

"No," said Sirius, looking over his shoulder. "Must be someone on your end."

"I'd better go!" he said hastily. Without a 'good bye,' Harry's head was gone from the fire with a soft pop! I frowned and sat back on my knees.

"I hope he was wise to use someone's fire that wasn't being watched by the Ministry."

"I'm sure he's fine," said Sirius. "He's not an idiot like James and I were at his age."

"He's idiot enough to contact you via fire when the entire Floo Network at Hogwarts is being watched," I said. Sirius rolled his eyes at me.

"I'm going to write to Dumbledore," he said before standing up from the hard kitchen floor. My knees ached from being on it for so long. "See what he thinks about Snape not giving Harry lessons."

"Perhaps, we should send Gabriel up there to work with Harry."

"It will look too suspicious," Remus shook his head. "Let's just see what Dumbledore says. Maybe Harry can fix the problem on his own…"

"I don't know," I shook my head. "We all can imagine how Snape reacted to what Harry saw."

"More the reason to write to Dumbledore now," Sirius said. He exited the kitchen without another word. I stood up from the floor and stretched, before following Sirius' leave. Remus called after me.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"I think I'm going to go to the brownstone and take a look at the remains of my house," I said softly. "Gabriel hasn't had it cleaned up yet…and I'm out of ideas to get any leads on that Death Eater."

"Did Sirius tell you he thinks you're obsessing?"

"He said it more politely, but yes," I said frankly.

"He's worried about you, Cadence."

I looked straight into Remus' brown eyes and gave him a weak smile. "It's funny that everyone keeps telling me not to worry, but really you're all just as worried as I am."

"Well, Sirius will always worry about you," Remus shrugged with a hint at Sirius' love for me.

"I'm not his to worry about anymore," I said very carefully.

Remus bowed his head and I turned on my heel to leave the kitchen. I made my way up to the bedroom to change my clothes into something more suitable for investigating the scene of my destroyed brownstone. I changed into dark blue jeans, a black button up shirt and black combat boots. Before leaving the room, I tied my hair back in a ponytail and pulled on a long black cloak that buttoned from my hips to just below my breast.

When I arrived in the foyer, Sirius came from the sitting room looking satisfied with himself. He took one look at me and paused before the stairs that lead down into the kitchen.

"Send your words to Dumbledore?" I asked.

"Where are you going?" was his response. I sighed and crossed my arms and I looked at him with a hardened expression in my green eyes.

"Out, to look into something," I said slowly. "If you must know."

"Well, you look good."

"Thanks," I muttered awkwardly.

"I did send my words to Dumbledore," Sirius nodded. "Hopefully, they will help."

"We can only hope," I agreed as I head for the front door.

"Hey," Sirius called me back. I paused, my hand on the door handle, to look back at him. "Be careful out there, Cadence."

"I will," I nodded. "Don't worry."

Sirius just smiled at me. He nodded his head and turned away slowly. My heart sank at his actions. He didn't say anything because he was worried, just like Remus said he was. I sighed and pivoted to leave the house. I closed the door to Number Twelve behind me tightly.

Sirius should listen to his own words about worrying, I thought as I stepped down into the square.