AN: Thanks for the reviews! In response to suggestions that Sirius 1) did not slack off at Hogwarts or 2) did not shrug off responsibility—I completely agree. But I am writing from Sirius's perspective, and he does not have the big picture view that we readers do. He has spent the last fourteen years or so thinking about what he did wrong, and, as we tend to be our own harshest critics, I think he would have a skewed perspective about his part in the War and the Potter's deaths. The Sirius I am writing is guilt-laden, regardless of whether or not he has a reason to be guilty.
"Can I sit here?" James asked innocently, though Sirius knew it was an act. It was the same tone he used when McGonagall tried to get a confession out of him about why the Great Hall had been painted lime green or why Hagrid's carved pumpkins had been charmed to yell insults at passersby.
"Of course!" Sirius replied, hoping he didn't sound too eager. He was going to have a difficult time explaining why he suddenly found himself overcome with emotion and the urge to hug his new acquaintance.
James took the seat across from him. His caged cat looked doubtfully at Cressida. "You a first-year, too?"
"That obvious?"
"That only reason you'd be sitting alone was if you didn't know anybody or if no one liked you. You don't look like the kind of person that nobody likes."
"Oh. Thank you." Sirius was already starting to forget the real first words he had shared with James as he tried to stay grounded in the present. "I'm Sirius, by the way. Sirius Black." He stuck out his hand dutifully.
"James Potter." They shook hands, awkwardly and mechanically, but Sirius had to remind himself that a bad handshake was better than not getting to touch his best friend at all for fifteen years. He forgot how long it had taken them to become best friends; he could barely remember a time when he and the other Marauders weren't like brothers. "Your mum wouldn't happen to be Walburga Black, would she?"
Sirius tried not to laugh at the prospect of calling Walburga Black "mum." "That's Mother."
"My Mum, Dorea Potter, is your mum's aunt, which makes us some kind of cousins. I've grown up hearing about you, but Dad didn't seem all that keen to have us meet."
"Do you know why not?"
"He says your mum is—"
The compartment door slid open loudly, and a girl with dark red hair and bright eyes asked, "Do you mind if I sit here? The train's about to leave."
James shrugged and kept his mouth shut. He hardly bothered to look at his future wife, which was just as well, as Lily kept to herself and looked on the verge of tears.
"Are you a first-year, too?" Sirius asked, hoping to draw her out of her shell.
"Yes," she said quietly. After a long look out the window, she added, "I'm going to miss my mum and dad. My sister, too." Just saying Petunia's name made her lip quiver. At that moment, the train lurched forward, so Sirius pretended not to notice her whimper.
"You can use my owl to write home if you want," he offered.
Lily's face lit up. "So they really do use owl post?"
"How else would we get our letters?"
"Well, my family are Muggles, and my sister wrote… It's not important. Thanks for offering your owl. But won't you need to write home, too?"
Sirius shrugged sheepishly. "I get the feeling my parents won't want to hear from me too much."
"Why not?" she asked, almost scandalized.
"Well, my whole family is in Slytherin, you see, and I'm—"
"Slytherin?" James exclaimed, disgusted. The mention of his rival House had woken him from his daydreaming. "And I thought you seemed alright."
"What's wrong with Slytherin?" A familiar, whiny voice spoke up. The compartment door was open, and in the doorway stood a greasy-haired boy in second-hand robes. Sirius remembered the hushed conversations in the Order about the prophecy, Dumbledore's abridged account of who exactly knew about it and how, and his reluctant promise not to use any Unforgiveables on Snape. He wondered idly if Unbreakable Vows made in a past life had any effect on the present. He wasn't sure he wanted to risk it.
"You haven't met my family," Sirius said solemnly, "but I'm hoping I'll break the tradition."
Severus scowled and posed the other boys a question. "Where do you hope to get Sorted, then, if not Slytherin?"
James lifted an invisible sword. "'Gryffindor! Where dwell the brave at heart.' Just like my dad."
"If you'd rather be brawny than brainy," Severus muttered.
Sirius remembered how he had responded in his first life, but he held his tongue. He was still debating the effects of antagonizing Snape, and as of yet, the little bugger hadn't done much to deserve it. Instead, he simply nodded in approval of James's answer.
"Anyway, Lily," Severus said, "I came to see if you're alright. I saw Petunia—"
Lily cut him off. "It's okay, Sev. I'll be okay. And this nice boy is offering to let me use his owl."
"The school has owls for anyone to use, you know," he scoffed. "She's not a charity case."
"Cressida could use the exercise, though," Sirius pointed out, trying not to get riled up by Snape's attitude, and failing. "And since Lily obviously doesn't have an owl, I was only trying to help."
"She doesn't need your help," he replied coldly.
"Severus!" Lily exclaimed.
James burst out laughing. "What sort of name is 'Severus?'" He imitated Lily's shocked voice and looked at Sirius hopefully. Sirius stayed torn between wanting to taunt his lifelong nemesis and not wanting to 'burn his bridges,' as Mother said. "What—you don't think it's funny?" James asked him. Lily scowled. Severus looked ready to leave. "Don't tell me you're a Slytherin and you have no sense of humor."
How had James and Sirius become friends in his first life? Had their first meaningful interaction really been over damn Severus Snape? Their friendship had progressed into so much more afterward, but maybe it needed this as a starting place. But what if forging a friendship with the greasy git would prevent him from being a murderous, greasy git? Even being dead-set on Slytherin at age 11, was there hope to turn him around? Or maybe Snape was destined to turn out evil no matter what he, Sirius, did. Sirius weighed his options and broke out into a grin. "I only hope your girlfriend has better luck in the Sorting than you, Snivellus."
That remark sent both Lily and Snape storming out of the compartment. Lily paused at the door to say, "I won't be needing your owl," and marched after her friend. James and Sirius started copying that sentence in increasingly higher-pitched and snobbier voices. As a final farewell, James called out, "See ya, Snivellus!"
The two remaining boys laughed until their sides hurt. Sirius forgot the heavy weight of his past life, forgot the look of James's dead body and Peter's finger falling off and the depression the Dementors imprinted on his soul, and let himself be an 11-year-old. Any doubts about the consequences of marauding with James were dispelled; having a good laugh with his best mate was easily worth sorting out the Snape problem later. This, the simple joy of laughing with James, made everything seem easier.
A knock on the door interrupted them.
"I hope it's the sweets trolley!" James said, fishing for coins in the pocket of his robes. Sirius knew better.
"I'll get it," he said, sliding from his seat to open the door. He tried not to tremble with excitement at the anticipation of being reunited with Remus in their young bodies, bodies not so worn and beaten by years as a werewolf or a Dementor's plaything, eyes that could still light up with joy and had not yet seen the horrors of war. He slid the compartment door open and grinned—maybe they would think he was smiling at the prospect of sweets—into the face of Peter Pettigrew.
"Can we sit here?"
How could he have forgotten? Sirius had been so caught up in Regulus and James and Remus and stupid Snivellus that he had forgotten Peter. Forgetting Peter was easier, because then he didn't have to remember the four of them getting drunk together in the common room, the four of them making the Map, the four of them becoming Animagi and playing glorious pranks and talking about girls and living and dying and the future. If Sirius could pretend that the Marauders were only three, his heart was distinctly less heavy. But he could not forget a lifetime of antics and hilarity with one of his best mates, nor could he forget the hatred and betrayal that plagued him for nearly fifteen years. He hadn't even considered what he might do differently regarding Peter. He couldn't kill him on the spot, and he might not be able to kill him during their stay at Hogwarts at all because of security. Besides, being carted off to Azkaban for a crime he did commit would be only slightly better than for a crime he didn't. He could try harder to be a better friend, to not let him get sucked in by You-Know-Who, but just looking at the boy made him want to throw up. How could he have forgotten about Peter. Fucking. Pettigrew.
After a long, stunned moment, Sirius noticed that behind the chubby, blond boy was a frail boy with scratches on his face.
"Um. Yeah," Sirius said.
"You alright?" Peter asked.
"He thought you were sweets," James answered, looking similarly crestfallen.
The four of them took their seats in a square, avoiding eye contact for a very awkward minute, before Peter broke the silence.
"Thanks for letting us in. Some Slytherins were trying to make us eat eye of newt. Their idea of a joke."
"Well," James began, "you came to a proudly anti-Slytherin compartment. Sirius here is going to be the first Gryffindor in his family in at least three centuries, right?"
Sirius forced a weak smile, still a bit anxious about his Sorting. Not only did he dread his parents' reaction, but he wasn't even sure that he would still get put in Gryffindor, what with his brain full of someone else's memories. "That's the plan, though I would take Hufflepuff, too."
"I feel like Hufflepuff is the only house that would take me," Peter moped.
Hufflepuff is for loyalty, Sirius thought, not Muggle-killing, back-stabbing, Dark Lord-worshipping bastards.
"You stood up to those Slytherins pretty well earlier," Remus noted. "That's how we met; you told them to let me go, even called one of them 'a fat-faced troll.'"
"But then I got picked up and had newt eyes shoved in my face," he said. "That sort of thing doesn't happen to Gryffindors."
James beamed at Peter. "Well I'm impressed with anyone who can insult a Slytherin."
The boy blushed. "Thanks. My name's Peter, by the way."
"James."
"Remus."
"Sirius."
The rest of the train ride passed almost perfectly: the sweets trolley came along, and Sirius treated them all to a mountain of Chocolate Frogs, starting Remus's collection with Agrippa, Circe, and Dumbledore; James and Sirius recounted the earlier events with Lily and Snape, much to Peter's delight and Remus's disapproval; James led the discussion on how exactly the Sorting process worked, suggesting Herculean tasks or a multiple choice test; Peter sighed happily that he hoped they would all end up in the same house; but Sirius could not fully enjoy himself in Peter's presence.
They all sensed it, and nobody was exactly sure how to handle it. Peter tried to present a peace offering in the form of his newfound Ptolemy card—"I buy enough of these that I'm bound to find another sooner or later"—and Sirius lied smoothly that he already had a Ptolemy in his collection at home, simply because he did not want to touch anything the rat had touched. This served as a temporary fix to their tension as it gave James the chance to boast about his rare silver-edition Merlin, his Falco Aesalon, the first Animagus, and his personal favorite, Godric Gryffindor, whose card came not in the traditional purple-and-gold spangled setting but in maroon-and-gold stripes. The mention of Gryffindor sent the boys back down the conversation of Sorting and Houses.
The train crawled to a halt, and soon hundreds of robed teenagers flocked past their compartment. The four boys gathered their things and followed the crowd to catch their first glimpses of the Hogwarts grounds, but the bustling crowd and din of voices made it very difficult, especially for short first-years. A weary-eyed witch requested all magical animals be given to her before students boarded either the boats or carriages, while a giant, bearded man beckoned the first-years. Sirius felt a deep sense of gratitude upon seeing Hagrid, remembering his time with Witherwings. Before he knew it, he was in a small rowboat with Remus, gliding along the Black Lake. When the castle came into view, he heard gasps of awe in stereo. The towers pierced the night sky, the yellow light of candles and lamps lit up the windows like stars, and the sprawling landscape held everything from a Quidditch pitch to the Forbidden Forest to the Herbology greenhouses. Hogwarts was every bit as magical as he remembered and could still fill him with wonder.
Remus looked uncharacteristically peaceful. He kept his eyes glued to the glowing windows of the Gryffindor Tower. "It already feels like home, doesn't it?" he asked in a distant voice.
"You have no idea," Sirius said.
Custody of the first-years shifted from Hagrid to Professor McGonagall, who was much less wrinkled but every bit as strict as the last time Sirius had seen her. James quickly established that he was not going to be her favorite student when he declared that there was no need to Sort him as he already knew where he belonged. (To his credit, that loud and proud attitude nearly proved him right.) Sirius held his tongue and drank in his surroundings, letting his eyes meet as many faces as he could and enjoy the warmth and familiarity of the castle. This was the Hogwarts of his memory, not the dwindled numbers of Harry's year—oh, how it stung to be in that dormitory with only five Gryffindor boys in their year—but the population boom of his own time when classes could have a hundred students. There were the usual purebloods, dozens of Muggle-borns, and an immense amount of half-bloods. He knew why it was so different. After Grindlewald's war, Muggles and wizards were so desperate that magical and non-magical boundaries barely existed. They had fought a war together, so what would stop them from doing life together? But the First Wizarding War would undo any progress in Muggle-Magical relations, and the many Muggle-borns would be catalogued and hunted down. It really should not have surprised him that by Harry's time in Hogwarts, the population plummeted. Sirius tried not to wonder about how powerless he was to stop it from happening.
Professor McGonagall's commanding voice reminded him that he was not in Harry's time, and the hundreds of deaths he remembered had not happened yet. Only three students preceded him in the Sorting, so after Aubrey, Bertram scampered off to the Ravenclaw table, Sirius was sitting on a stool before all of Hogwarts with a talking hat on his head.
"Well, aren't you the most peculiar head on which I've had the pleasure to sit?" the Hat said.
I'm just as confused as you are, mate, Sirius thought. I can't explain it either.
"Welcome back, Mr. Black. What to do with you, I wonder? I've Sorted you before, apparently, but this brain is so much different than the first. You'll be the most brilliant student in your class, you know, with all of your… foreknowledge. You are loyal, so loyal to your friends that Time Itself sent you back to save them. And there is the matter of your family. I've never seen a Black who wasn't destined for greatness."
I need my parents to believe that I'm asking to be in Slytherin—which I'm not—because I have to be in Gryffindor. My parents would disown me on the spot if they thought I wanted to be different; they did it before. I don't have time for that.
"And what do your parents have to do with anything?"
If this goes anything like last time, they're going to arrange a meeting with you and me and Dumbledore, and probably Slughorn and McGonagall, too. They'll want to "sort things out." So I'm asking you to lie, please.
"Why should I? I have nothing to gain."
You'll get the wonderful consolation of knowing that you prevented an eleven-year-old boy from being destitute and cut off from his only brother… again.
"But you're not really eleven, are you?"
Please just say you'll lie.
"Your plan is so very Slytherin of you, you know. It would hardly be a lie at all to say you were asking me to put you there."
But it's only because I need to save my friends and avoid getting disowned so I can save my brother. Hero complex, see?
"Very well. You can relax, Mr. Black. You are, and always will be, a GRYFFINDOR." When the Hat finally bellowed that last word, Sirius relaxed and grinned at his table waiting for him. Despite knowing the impending wrath of his parents, he found comfort in at least knowing exactly how they would respond, unlike before. Across the Great Hall, Andromeda whispered worriedly to Narcissa, who was looking anxiously at her boyfriend Lucius to gauge his reaction. Sirius took his seat as the first of the new Gryffindors on an empty stretch of bench, ensuring room for James and Remus, at least.
He watched with only mild interest Boot, Laurence (Hufflepuff); Bristol, Anderson (Hufflepuff); Brown, Rose (Gryffindor); Bywater, Briony (Gryffindor); Carrow, Ares (Slytherin); Clutch, Helena (Ravenclaw); and so on, until Evans, Lily approached the stool. The hat had only to touch her head before she joined the Gryffindor table. She declined sitting beside Sirius, but she did take the seat across from him. Still in line, Snape, Snivellus looked distraught at his friend's luck.
His classmates slowly filled the empty seats in the Great Hall. With each shout of GRYFFINDOR! he saw not his classmates but their futures, and it made so much sense why the Hogwarts population was lost by half. He watched the familiar faces join their table: Flannery, Siobhan (married a Muggle); Goldstein, Alice (tortured to insanity); Green, Topher (lynched); Jones, Jack (lynched); Karkoff, Aloysius (fled Britain with his family in seventh year); Longbottom, Frank (tortured to insanity); Lupin, Remus (in hiding); McDonald, Mary (married a pureblood but still on the run); McKinnon, Marlene (dead); Meadowes, Dorcas (dead); Munch, Venus (dead); Pettigrew, Peter Fucking (as good as dead); Potter, James (DEAD); Prewett, Barney (dead); Perks, Lester (Venus's widower); Walters, Calliope (lost her parents in fifth year). And for the smallest moment, Sirius envied Harry for having such a small class because it meant he had fewer people to lose.
After a Zabini, Amber took her place at the Slytherin table, Dumbledore stepped forward. "I don't know that I've ever seen a Sorting with two hatstalls," Dumbledore began, "but welcome to Gryffindor, Mr. Black and Mr. Pettigrew; I'm sure you didn't mean to keep us waiting. I would like to remind all of you that the Forbidden Forest is, as the name suggests, Forbidden to unaccompanied students. This is for your safety. Our latest teacher of Defense Against the Dark Arts is Professor Amaris Shacklebolt," an intimidating woman stood up from the professors' table to a short road of applause, "whom we welcome with open arms. Now, as I'm sure you've all been ready to do since you arrived, let us all tuck in!"
Food appeared on all of the tables, turkey and ham and roast beef, plates of cheeses, bowls of every sort of green, fresh rolls and loaves of bread, hot soups and stews, and goblets of pumpkin juice. Every face lit up, and tuck in they did. Sirius juggled conversations between a boisterous James, a quiet Remus, and an obviously insecure Frank Longbottom. Frank had been a good man in his other life, but Sirius hadn't known him well before joining the Order. Whatever emptiness Peter left in his heart, Frank could easily fill.
"The Chudley Cannons, Peter?" James exclaimed. "Really? You could at least root for the Harpies. Sirius, who's your team?"
"Puddlemere United, usually," he answered over his shoulder, "but the Harpies have the advantage of being hot."
"See? Someone with sense!"
Sirius drowned out James's ensuing rant by talking to Frank. "What's your team?"
"The Wasps, usually," he said. "I think it's sort of noble to root for the Cannons, though. Someone has to, at least."
This sent both boys into a fit of giggles, and Sirius dribbled beef stew on his robes. Remus made an offhanded comment about the Montrose Magpies but clearly was not interested in the conversation.
"The Harpies are cute," Frank admitted.
"I'm sure the dorm would benefit from a few posters, yeah?" Sirius suggested. Remus rolled his eyes but could not suppress his smile. Lily, who had since scooted closer to Rose Brown and Marlene McKinnon, huffed at the overheard conversation, but Sirius found some comfort in the idea that she was listening to them.
The feast left them all with painfully full bellies and ready for bed. Jennifer Jones, the older sister of Jack and one of the Gryffindor Prefects, guided them through the castle to their rooms. Their dormitory was a two-leveled room with five beds and a bathroom to each floor. A simple staircase wound around the wall, connecting the rooms. James claimed the upper room for himself, Peter, Remus, and Sirius. The final bed was given to Frank with a nudge from Sirius. Les, Aloysius, Topher, Jack, and Barney took the lower floor. Under the pretense that he had to explain the issue of his Sorting to his parents—which was not entirely false—Sirius avoided making introductions and brought a quill and parchment to the common room. He let himself feel eleven again, to simultaneously want to appease his father and be nothing like him. The older Sirius faded to the back of his mind and made room for his younger, confused, and terrified self, whom he channeled into his letter.
Dear Mother and Father,
Something has gone terribly wrong and please please please don't be mad at me. I am not in Slytherin. I don't know what happened, but I'm in Gryffindor and I don't know what to do. You can owl Professor McGonagall, my Head of House, if you want. I don't know what I did wrong. I don't know what's wrong with me.
You will be happy to know that the boys who share my room aren't bad, two half-bloods and two purebloods. It could be worse. I mean, there is the other sort, but they sleep in the room below me. I promise to say hello to Narcissa and Andromeda in the morning.
I'm so sorry for whatever I did and for potentially embarrassing the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black. – Sirius.
Regulus's letter was going to be harder to write, but at least it would be significantly more honest. All the brotherly feelings he never let himself feel before crept up, and, for the first time in his life, he wrote Reg a letter.
Reg,
I'm sure you'll think this whole mess is just another joke, but you're the one who gets to live in the house with our parents when they find out I'm in Gryffindor. It turns out that I have the ambition of a troll, but really—you're not surprised by that at all, are you?
Well, I promised you insider secrets, didn't I? Aside from the minor catastrophe that is my Sorting, Hogwarts is amazing. The train ride can be rather dull, but there's a trolley with really cheap sweets. You know how Mother has that Aunt Dorea? Her son is in my year and rode in my compartment. He actually called Walburga my "mum." Imagine one of us actually saying that to her face! Is Aunt Dorea still on the tapestry? I want to know if this James Potter bloke is going to piss Mother off as much as I think he will.
The first-years ride in boats to the castle, I guess to give us our first good look at it. It really is amazing, but I guess you'll want to look cool and unimpressed when it's your turn. And then the Deputy Headmistress—she's a Gryffindor, so I doubt you'll have much luck sucking up to her—put us in alphabetical order for the Sorting. It wasn't anything spectacular, just a talking hat. All that talk Father and cousin Bella made about how grueling Sorting could be was just to scare us. The Sorting Hat listens to your thoughts and even lets you think back at it. I took the longest, it turns out, probably because it didn't know what to do with a dumb, loud Black. I bet you won't take long at all, you being Mother and Father's angel child. Sometimes I think they think you are Salazar incarnate. (You'd tell me if you were Salazar incarnate, right?)
Enjoy being the only recipient of our parents' attentions.
Your brother who most definitely did not get drunk last night,- Sirius
PS: Remember that Holyhead Harpies edition of Seeker Weekly that Father got all upset over? Any chance you could owl it back to me? It's under my mattress. Thanks.
When he watched Cressida take off in the dark of night, Sirius felt a certainty he hadn't felt in years that he was finally doing something right.