Black Mask

by Ieyre

Christmas 1979—danger, secrets, lies and their shared history loom large over the Blacks' first Yuletide season as a reunited family. While life as a fugitive proves bleaker—and more boring—than Regulus could have imagined, a botched espionage mission at Malfoy Manor draws Sirius deeper into the Black family web. [Sequel to 'In the Black']

24. Chapter 24

"You'd have thought Black and Potter were brothers," chimed in Professor Flitwick. "Inseparable!"

"Of course they were," said Fudge. "Potter trusted Black beyond all his other friends."

- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and Prisoner of Azkaban

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CHAPTER 24

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"Cigarette?"

Colette stared at the outstretched hand.

"You said you wanted to try one." Mrs. Tonks pulled one of the offending tubes out of the carton. "And there's no Sirius around to not mind his own business."

She shook her head and politely murmured a 'non.'

The other woman smiled, knowingly, before tucking the box back in her coat pocket, for safe keeping.

"Perhaps," Andromeda said, taking another drag of her own. "You only wanted to try it in front of him."

The girl tried to smile—but it came out as more of grimace. She wondered if she looked as pale and drawn as she felt.

Colette had never wanted to be alone with a person less than she did with the one across the table from her.

Well…she considered it, and a thought struck her which almost garnered an involuntary smile. She supposed being with Mrs. Black the night she'd caught them had been worse.

Mrs. Tonks had not been not unfriendly—but she was neither as open nor as naturally gregarious as Sirius, and Colette was too stunned by her revelation to know what to say.

She was spared the inner turmoil when Andromeda broke the silence herself.

"Does your chaperone know where you are?"

Colette felt her stomach drop. Mrs. Tonks took another long drag from the cigarette—the same one Sirius had left on the table, the same one she had taken back up as soon as her young daughter disappeared out the door.

These Black cousins shared something of a rebellious nature, whatever different forms their respective rebellions took. That was probably the real reason Colette had not seen from the first who Andromeda Tonks, née Black—the disgraced middle daughter of Cygnus and Druella Black—was, something Sirius had known she would eventually realize.

"I'm not sure I understand your meaning, Mrs. Tonks," said Colette, in a calm voice.

She pushed her plate—now a soggy mess of cold chips—aside. Andromeda watched the action with detachment.

"I'm not stupid. And Sirius may look like a bloody matinee idol, but neither is he, when it comes down to it." A plume of smoke rose above her head. "In my experience, the only thing stupider than a handsome man is the woman at his side."

She smiled, serenely—her brown eyes, which had up until now only looked at Colette with curiosity—sharpened.

"He can turn the cleverest of our sex into a reckless fool."

The implication was clear—though the words spoken had more of a tinge of pity than malice.

"Do you think I am under such a spell?" Colette asked her, voice tight.

"I'm almost certain of it. Battancourt…" The word tripped off her tongue with the perfect French accent that only an aristocratic education could have produced. "Quite a name. Among the Great Noble Houses of Europe—the magical ones, at any rate, which I'm sure you'd agree are the only ones worth knowing anyway."

Andromeda laughed—a hard, ironic laugh that was too cynical.

"Knowing Sirius as well as I do, and being able to guess much about you, I think the chances of this being a permitted assignation are fairly slim."

Colette could have burst out laughing—a hysterical laugh, when she considered the situation she now found herself in.

Oh, if only she knew.

Not even Andromeda could guess the truth of Colette's complicated personal affairs, though—so she watched the play of emotion's on the younger girl's face with only frank curiosity.

"I'm willing to be proven wrong, of course."

The French girl stared her interrogator down—determined not to be bullied or strong-armed this time.

"That would require my cooperation in—taking you into my confidences, Mrs. Tonks."

Colette tried to keep the tremble out of her voice—she did not want to betray how much Narcissa's sister intimidated her, especially now that she knew their relative positions. She could well guess why Sirius had been so skittish and eager to control the conversation, now that she knew the truth—that he had brought her to meet her new friend and companion's estranged elder sister.

This is why he kept trying to steer us away from any talk that would have lead us to Narcissa…

It all made sense now. How could Mrs. Tonks be happy to learn of Colette's connection to her most intimate family members? Colette would certainly not be volunteering that she had seen Andromeda's parents only days earlier—had dined with the mother and father that had not spoken to their second daughter in nearly a decade.

"Which you're under no obligation to do," Andromeda conceded, shrugging. "It might be easier for you, though—you may prefer it to my speculation."

Miss Battancourt's temper stirred—the presumption!

"You do not know anything about the matter!"

"It's not difficult to guess." Andromeda smiled, knowingly. "You have that look about you."

"What look?"

"The look of a girl who's had her first taste of freedom." She shook her head. "You're not used to sneaking about, clandestine-like, are you? I rather think you're enjoying yourself—not that I can blame you."

She set her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her palm—considering Colette thoughtfully.

"I see the appeal of Sirius for a girl of your…situation. He's more like the boys you will have grown up with, however many motorbikes he drives around." She snorted. "Well-bred with just enough of an edge to keep things exciting."

"He is not like any of the boys I know!" Colette snapped, forcefully. "He is not like anyone I've ever met in my life."

She glared fiercely at Mrs. Tonks, daring her to argue—but the older woman only laughed.

"I see how he is around you—very careful." Her tone softened. "You bring out his genteel side—he can be loutish with those friends of his. I've always thought he was putting it on a bit, playing it up for them." She puffed an elegant plume of smoke into the air above her. "That's the thing about breeding. You're born with it. Doesn't go away—whether it has a purpose or not."

"I do not think you know him as well as you think you do," Colette answered her, tartly. "And you do not know me at all."

"One can guess quite a bit from a family name."

"Like what, for example?"

Andromeda tapped her cigarette—one, two, three—against the ash tray, before calmly looking up and into the younger girl's face.

"What English wizard has your mother set her cap on for you, Miss Battancourt?"

Colette trembled—her face burned with shame.

"You…don't know what you're speaking of."

"There's only one reason I can think of for a nice girl from a good family to have come over from France right now," she continued, relentlessly. "Your parents must want you to make a good match, and they think you'll have better luck here than there."

Colette forced herself to not duck her head down and stare at the plate. If she had not been so angry she was sure she would start crying.

"Maybe they don't have someone in mind," Andromeda conceded, airily. "But I doubt it. A London season for a witch of good breeding is a very expensive proposition to embark on without a specific enticement."

Colette was reminded irresistibly of the first night she had met Sirius, of the anger his arrogant forwardness had stirred in her. He seemed—in that moment, at least—to have been designed to provoke her. Mrs. Tonks had something of the same in her, that elegant, cutting wit that could amuse just as easily as it could sting. It was that dangerous quality that she had begun to associate with his family.

Apparently disownment and disgrace did not remove the stamp of Black pride.

Colette was no fool, though—whatever Andromeda Tonks thought of her—and she knew better to mention Sirius's brother, the real reason she had gotten mixed up with their family in the first place. She did not think it wise to even say Regulus's name.

"My mother wants me to marry Rabastan Lestrange."

At these words, Mrs. Tonks' adversarial facade softened—fell away completely, in fact, and the woman who was left appeared to Colette to be kind, tired and most of all—properly ashamed of herself.

"Oh, dear…"

Colette felt the tears as they spilled out and down her cheeks, and she buried her face in the crook of her elbow to muffle the sob—just as Andromeda dropped her cigarette and reached across the table and grasped her other hand.

"I've made a mess of things now, haven't I?"

Her palm was cool—her grip firm. Through her tears Colette heard the sound of the woman groping about in her purse.

"I'm sorry—there was a time when I would have always had an embroidered kerchief on hand," Andromeda laughed to herself. "Very elegant. Alas, those were different days—"

When Colette looked up, face streaked with unseemly tears, Mrs. Tonks was holding out a wad of paper napkins. An apologetic smile graced the aristocratic features she still had, nearly a decade on from leaving the world that had seen fit to produce her.

Colette took them with gratitude, and her companion allowed her, without judgement, to wipe her face and to stem the tide of youthful, feminine emotion that had overtaken her.

It was a few minutes before Andromeda spoke again.

"I'm sorry. I have been beastly to you. I'm not usually like that, I swear—" She shook her head, and her face took on a distant, far-away quality, as if she hardly was thinking of the place she was or the girl in front of you. "It's—being around Sirius that does it to me. It brings out my—"

Colette peaked up and through the gaps in her fingers—and saw an expression of wistful self-reproach that she had seen, more than once, cross the face of both the wayward Black scion and his respectable father.

Her Black side.

"—Well, sometimes I can be a bit of a—bitch."

Colette may have been a sheltered girl—but she knew enough about language to understand what that word meant in the context of their conversation, and she was quick to assure the older woman she was nothing of the kind. Mrs. Tonks tossed her head and gave a self-deprecating shrug.

"I owe you an apology for more than one thing."

Colette sniffed and looked up from the napkin she'd been drying her face on.

"What do you mean?"

The older witch tilted her head—a careful gesture, deliberate in its manner—and her eyes crinkled with the heavy amusement of one about to land a devastating punchline, designed to leave the recipient in stitches—or worse.

"For Rabastan."

As she sipped from her beer, somehow making the gesture elegant—even graceful—Colette was struck by, for all the similarities, the stark difference between this woman and her sister and parents. She had a warmth and good humor that her family lacked—Colette wondered if it was this Ted, the muggle-born wizard whom Andromeda had given everything up for, and who she now saw fit to grouse over for being a 'slob'—that had given Andromeda her frankness, or if it had been these qualities that had drawn her away from them in the first place.

She wondered the same thing about Sirius.

What made a person leave everything and everyone they knew behind? She wanted to understand, and yet she was afraid to know the truth.

Colette Battancourt thought the weight of something so heavy might crush her.

"I take full responsibility," Andromeda continued, blithely. "For you and any other hapless girl he's been thrust upon by an ambitious mother."

The bright blue eyes, still red from crying, widened.

"You shouldn't have to marry someone just because I wouldn't."

The corner of Andromeda's mouth turned up at the look of profound shock on the younger girl's face.

"You mean—Rabastan is—"

"—My ex-fiancée, of course." Colette's gasp made her laugh aloud. "I jilted him most shockingly. It was quite the scandal."

Colette's mouth turned into an 'o' shape.

"I didn't—I never knew."

Andromeda shrugged.

"Oh, I'm not surprised. It was a long time ago—I imagine I'm not spoken of, much—" Her eyes crinkled with amusement. "—Except as a cautionary tale from maiden aunts, of course."

The thought of Aunt Eugenia flashed through Colette's mind, and she flushed.

When Andromeda continued speaking a moment later, it was with the detachment of a person speaking not about their own life, but someone else's.

"Well—you know—I say Rabastan was my fiancée, but it was never a formal betrothal. Just an idea of our parents'—very convenient, given the history of the families, but then, of course—"

She let out a heavy sigh of what Colette was sure was genuine regret, mixed with a kind of cynical humor that she associated with Sirius.

"—I had to go and spoil everything and run off with Ted, instead."

At the recollection the woman laughed—at herself or at the world, Colette couldn't have guessed.

She was transfixed.

"Poor Rab," Andromeda continued, circumspect. "Utterly blind-sided, a total shock. I found out later from an old school friend—one of the very few that will still speak to me—that he's never got over it. That's the theory, anyway—why everyone thinks he hasn't married."

Hadn't Narcissa's face twisted in pain when she had asked, quite innocently, why a man of such breeding and fortune as Rabastan Lestrange should be as old as he was and still not married?

"Oh, Rabastan is—picky. I don't think he thinks anyone is good enough for him."

Andromeda snorted.

"It's funny—I can't…picture it, somehow. It never even occurred to me that he'd be upset—I didn't think him all that keen at the time. I was an…indifferent lover, at best." She frowned and furrowed her brow. "But I suppose that's just Rab. He's never exactly been one of the world's great imaginative thinkers, or one to recover from losing something, once he's got accustomed to an idea of having it. And of course he'd want what Rodolphus had—or the next best thing."

Her lip turned up into the closest Colette had seen to a sneer. It did not suit her—seemed more like an involuntary twitch, and Andromeda's face, as if conscious of this fact, reflexively softened. She picked her cigarette back up and took another long drag.

"When will you next see him?"

Colette blinked in surprise.

"Oh—tonight." She had nearly forgotten. "A party—here in London."

"Where—do you recall?"

"Ehrm—somewhere called…Walpole street."

She remembered the address, because it matched the name of a romantic hero in a book she'd devoured on her last holiday to Paris, when Colette had been so desperate to find some way of amusing herself that was not standing in the corning of a ballroom feeling self-conscious.

The name meant something to Andromeda.

"Oh—it must be an invitation to Alnwick House." Her voice hardened. "You will have an interesting time. You'll certainly meet all the people your mother would wish you to there."

Somehow Colette did not think Andromeda had a very high regard of Madame Battancourt's judgment in this respect.

"Have you seen much of Rabastan this trip?" Andromeda continued, in a tone of polite curiosity, as if they were speaking of the weather, not a man she had once almost married. "Generally, I mean."

Colette was too disarmed by Mrs. Tonks' bland delivery of it to second-guess why the question was being asked, so she nodded and listed the events in question. For many a pureblood matron, a ball, luncheon, supper and the theatre was enough time spent in company to garner a proposal, which Andromeda, smiling, was quick to point out.

"Do you think he's keen?" Mrs. Tonks asked, her voice kind. "Am I to congratulate you on your triumph?"

If someone had asked Colette that question a week ago, she would have stuttered out some embarrassed little remark that betrayed both her lack of confidence and enthusiasm at the prospect of marriage to Rabastan Lestrange.

But that was a week ago.

Her fortunes and priorities had changed so much since then.

"Not at all," the French girl replied, in a tone of voice almost as frank as her companion's. "I do not think he cares a jot for me."

The woman across from her was the last she could have even pretended she cared to— Mrs. Tonks was amused at this answer, her glass of beer did little to conceal her smile.

"Somehow…" Andromeda's eyes lingered on the empty chair next to her. "I think that feeling is mutual."

Colette didn't bother to deny it.

The men at the next table over decided that it was this moment that would be best for singing their football club's song, which gave each woman a natural pause in conversation, in which to collect themselves.

Colette's head was swimming with new information—her mind struggled to make sense of it all, and just when she thought she had a full grasp on the situation—

"And I imagine Cissy doesn't mind much either," Andromeda broke the silence, casually. "She's never liked Rab. He used to tease tug her plait and call her 'Cisspit.'"

The final blow. Colette felt as though her blood and the contents of her stomach were curdling at the same instant. Andromeda kept her composure through it all, finished the rest of her glass of beer and pushed it aside.

"How…did you guess?"

"It wasn't difficult. Don't feel bad—it's a very small set of people who'd put you in Rabastan's orbit, and the party you're going to tonight is at my cousin Evan's place."

She stared into the empty beer glass—then abruptly looked up again.

"In order to get in that door, you'd have to attach yourself to another witch of high standing, and my younger sister's just about the only one who fits the bill."

Her eyes hardened.

"Given how Sirius has been acting, so jumpy when I asked any question about you—well, it only makes sense he'd be trying to keep that little important detail of your holiday tucked away."

Colette slumped down in her chair—well, at least this woman wasn't shouting at her, however angry she might've been in her private thoughts. To her immense surprise and relief, these revelations had quite the opposite effect on Andromeda of what she'd expected. Instead of an increase in scrutiny and a deep suspicion of her motives and person from Mrs. Tonks, there was only a nod of understanding, the last piece of a puzzle falling into place.

The thought crossed Colette's mind that perhaps—just perhaps—there had not been a single moment of their acquaintance Andromeda Tonks had not known who she was.

The older woman gazed into the far distance, her thoughts somewhere Colette imagined had nothing to do with her.

Eventually, though, Mrs. Tonks snapped out of it, and it was in brisk, businesslike tones that she inquired as to how the young woman had come to know her younger sister. Colette explained the brief history, the garden party the summer before, the letters exchanged since and the inquiries her mother had pressed upon Aunt Eugenie to solicit an invitation that would put her daughter back in Narcissa Malfoy's orbit.

None of this pedestrian, run-of-the-mill tale surprised Andromeda in the least. She'd probably known dozens of girls just the same.

"And then—" Colette finished. "She invited me to stay with her for Christmas."

The look this answer elicited was somewhere between pity and understanding.

"Are you angry?"

"With you?" Andromeda quirked an eyebrow. "No. Why should I be? You didn't know who you were coming to meet today any more than I did."

Colette—who had by now learned to spot the tell-tale signs of the mercurial moods emblematic of Blacks—did not find this answer particularly reassuring.

"And…Sirius?"

A shadow of something passed over Andromeda's smooth features.

"It's better we leave him out of it altogether."

She stubbed the cigarette out with a kind of manic energy, as if she'd only lit it up to have something to do with her hands.

"I must tell you, I am curious." She folded her hands across the table, the picture of feminine self-control once more. "About one point in particular, which you've been very keen to avoid speaking of."

Never had she appreciated her mother's strictures on the danger of curiosity more than this moment. Fabienne have been more right than she realized!

"Which point?"

"How it is you first crossed paths with my disreputable younger cousin."

Colette clutched at her skirt—she missed her robes. They gave one far more fabric to sink one's fingers into than this flimsy garment that she, after all, had no business wearing in the first place.

"It's the part of this whole affair that I cannot wrap my mind around." Andromeda played with button on her coat lapel, thoughtfully considering the conundrum. "I know one thing for certain: Narcissa didn't introduce you."

The image of a blond, outrageously tall Norwegian shaking Mrs. Malfoy's hand—and the small grimace of distaste that had crossed his wooden features, the look Colette was certain only she had caught and only later had understood—flashed in her mind.

"I cannot tell you," Colette replied, stonily. "I've—I've been forbidden to speak of it to anyone."

A fact that had been weighing her down with guilt and uncertainty for the better part of the last few days. Now, with Sirius safely out of the way, she felt the burden most keenly.

Had Sirius known what a temptation he was placing before her, by bringing her to see Andromeda Tonks?

"What—by Sirius?"

She had no one else. No one to speak to who could even remotely understand.

"No, by his—" Colette caught herself. "—By my…chaperone."

Both of Andromeda's eyebrows—beautifully drawn arches, which unlike Colette's, were not shaped to give her a permanently surprised look—flew up.

"Your chaperone?" She laughed—a strained laugh of disbelief. "My dear, I think the time for worrying what your chaperone says has long passed, considering who it is you're wandering about London and Hogsmeade with—"

"—My chaperone knows exactly where I am."

The laughter drained from Andromeda's face. Colette pressed on, recklessly.

"And she knows precisely…who I am with."

Andromeda blinked slowly—and for whatever reason, she could never decide later what—perhaps it was the reckless, dangerous spirits that she had found herself in, or maybe just the crushing weight of secrets which she was in no position to keep indefinitely—Colette blurted out, in a stream of broken sentences, punctuated with broken England and French—

"She has known all along, she makes it plus facile for me to be with him, arranges just so, so I can sneak away and no one, c'est à dire, Narcissa will not know—mais elle m'a dit—she says I cannot tell personne, not anyone, not even him, and certainly not anyone else non plus, alors vous comprends, I should like to tell you very much all, mais— but I am so afraid, for I am not very good at keeping secrets, pas de tout, and there are too many now to keep track of, and I don't know what I shall do."

A long silence followed this speech. When Andromeda spoke, it was in a measured voice, as if she was not quite sure of the veracity of her words.

"Forgive me, Miss Battancourt—I was under the impression that you were here in London under the protection of my mother."

Colette shook her head from side to side, slowly.

"The character of the woman you describe is—very different from my mother," Andromeda continued, slowly, as if she did not quite believe herself what she was saying. "No one has ever trembled in fear at the prospect of crossing my mother."

"She is a very sweet, timid lady—"

"—There is another witch who lives in London I know. She fits the description of the woman of whom you have painted a picture—almost perfectly. And she is very fond of my younger sister, and occasionally allows Narcissa to visit her and stay."

Colette's lip trembled.

"It—I must confess, it never occurred to me you could be staying with her." Andromeda paused. "If you are…that changes a great deal about your situation."

Colette let out a little mouselike squeak of misery.

"Oh—you poor, wretched girl."

Colette thought she might burst into tears—and then Andromeda Tonks reached into her coat pocket and pulled out another one of the cigarettes.

"Are you sure you don't want to try one?"

Colette shook her head, fiercely.

"Well, then—you'll pardon me for indulging." She raised her hand to flag down the waitress. "But I think I am going to need something a bit stronger."

---

The Muggles who lived in Godric's Hollow—for there were many of them, many more living in the village than even a hundred year before—did not know the history of the town's namesake, as the witches and wizards who still inhabited it did, so they did not know there was a reason the pub in the center of the town square was called 'The Red Lion' beyond it being the sort of thing one called a pub.

The only thing that mattered to them, James thought, as he opened the door and heard the familiar tinkle of the bell, as that the ale flowed freely.

"Oh! It's Mister P." The middle-aged woman tending bar looked up from the bannister she polished and smiled. "No Missus with you today?"

James started in surprise—then smiled and said, in a friendly voice, that that his wife was too busy cleaning up the house for the Christmas to-do to come in for a drink this afternoon. Daisy nodded knowingly. He was fond of her—she reminded him a bit of Madam Rosmerta—a good sport as regarded the cheeky remarks of young blokes who came into her establishment and gave her the runaround.

Daisy had taken a fancy to the handsome young couple the moment they arrived in the neighborhood—and, surprised that they were married, for she declared neither looked old enough to be out of school, she had taken to calling them by the jocular appellations of 'Mister and Missus P.'

He and Lily and Sirius had once been regular visitors to this establishment.

Back when Sirius still spoke to me…

He peered around the bar. It was very quiet today…only a few old-timers in the corner, nursing ale and listening to the radio, piping in soft piano. His eyes raked the tables, searching—

"You won't find your friend that way, sir."

James's head turned sharply to the bar.

"My…friend…?"

She set the glass she'd been polishing down.

"Gentleman came in about twenty minutes ago looking for you. I set him up with a pint and put him in the private room in the back." Her eyes twinkled mischievously. "It didn't seem his sort of place, if you take my meaning, so I thought he'd be more comfortable-like there."

Daisy jerked her thumb behind her shoulder towards the narrow door that lead to the parlor where people, he knew, sometimes had private parties at the Red Lion.

James gaped at her for a five three seconds before he got the nerve to speak.

"Weird-looking bloke, is he?" James asked, trying to play off the question breezily. "Dressed… oddly."

"Oh yes," she laughed. "Very."

"In a—dress sort of thing?"

She wrinkled her nose and laughed.

"Oh no. He's not one of those." She smiled. "Very, eh—dignified. Not very talkative fellow, is he? I could barely get a word out of him."

She threw the towel over her shoulder and bent over to arrange some bottles of beer below.

James eyed the door to the back with trepidation—it was not fear, per-say, that made him uneasy. He was resolved in what he wanted to say—he reached into his pocket and squeezed the old parchment that was nestled in the fabric alongside his wand, as if the object were a talisman.

He hoped he wouldn't have cause to pull it out.

James took a few steps, put his hand on the doorknob—and stopped. He let out a long breath, steeling himself for this meeting.

It had to be done—but that didn't mean it was something he looked forward to.

James couldn't remember when he'd last seen Mr. Black in the flesh. It must've been many years—around the time Sirius had come to live with him, though he couldn't recall.

With a few very rare exceptions, his interactions with Sirius's parents had been confined to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, brief and stilted 'hellos' before they whisked Sirius away from him and back to the austere townhouse his friend had always described more as 'prison' than 'home'.

The image of the first time he had laid eyes on Orion had never left his mind. He was tall, stately, more marble statue than man—the picture of imposing severity—and he would never forget watching this towering presence, surrounded on the train platform by doting parents, grasp his twelve-year-old son's shoulder by way of greeting, before giving him a handshake, as if Sirius had just accepted a job at the bank.

He didn't even smile.

The years since had cemented James's first impression—that the Black patriarch was a wizard devoid of all fatherly feeling.

Though Sirius had rarely said it outright, he was also certain of something else.

Orion Black was a dangerous man.

When he at last pushed open to the door to the backroom, however, the sight that greeted him did not match his childish impression.

Orion sat at a table in the center of the room—looking as far from 'dangerous' as it was possible to be. The middle-aged father was slouched back in his chair, decked head-to-toe in a dark green tweed suit—a Muggle suit, though it had to have been tailored in the fifties at the latest, which explained Daisy's amusement at his 'friend's' appearance. Mr. Black stared moodily into a full pitcher of ale, and the pensive expression on his face actually reminded James, uncomfortably enough, of his elder son.

The comparison—the last comparison he had ever expected to draw—had the effect of disarming James and blunting his righteous anger.

He had only ever had one opening line, though.

"Oi!"

Orion looked up from his beer, as a man looking up from his newspaper in the study might.

"Are you blackmailing Sirius?"

Mr. Black's only reaction to this extraordinary greeting was to blink and raise an eyebrow. If James had not known better, he might have thought there some amusement gleaming in those sly eyes—though he remained calm and unflappable at such an incendiary accusation.

For the second time in under a minute, Mr. Black surprised him.

He stood up and gestured towards the chair across from him—almost as if he wanted James to sit down.

"You're late." Orion did little to hide his disapproval. "Would you care for a drink?"

James shut the door behind him and crossed to the table, determination in his step.

"I asked you a question."

"So did I." Mr. Black nodded at the chair across from him. "I suspect you already know the answer to yours—or believe you do."

He sat back down, a picture of patience and certainty. A man dressed that ridiculously had no right to be so calm, James thought, annoyed.

"I, on the other hand…do not."

His tone was light, pleasant—polite, but hardly friendly. Confused, James stared into his face—but he could not make out the older man's meaning. Orion was as smooth and implacable as his younger son.

What was his game? In these circumstances it was easy for James to forget that he had been the one to instigate this meeting in the first place. He ought to have been the one in control of the situation.

He didn't feel it.

"I—" He hesitated, a little foolish. "I didn't come here to have a drink with you."

"Oh?" Mr. Black raised one eyebrow. "You were the one who invited me to this…establishment. I thought that was what one did in such places."

Orion waved a wand at the tables and wall, doing little to hide his obvious distaste for their Muggle surroundings.

"To be honest—" James pulled out the chair and sat down across his adversary, careful to keep a healthy distance. "—I didn't really think you'd show. Let alone dress for the part."

The irresistible urge to tease—that defining trait of his, that no amount of gentle scolding from his parents or prodding from his wife could dislodge—rose up in James, and his mouth quirked in a smile.

The sight of Orion Black and his ridiculous tweed coat and trousers, which looked as though they'd been purchased from the estate sale of a recently deceased country squire, could not go unremarked upon.

"Does Sirius know you have those clothes?"

Mr. Black gave him a caustic look.

"I've never worn them in his presence," Orion said, dryly. "If he has cause to be as amused as you apparently are, I suspect I never will."

James's lip twitched.

"They're very old-fashioned—look about thirty years out of style. Practically a relic."

"I'm sure my son would find that fitting." His mouth thinned. "He describes me in much the same way."

James tapped his finger on the table-top. It was obvious Orion Black knew exactly why he'd called him to this place—it was not as though he'd expected to have the element of surprise, but it was a little unnerving to be squaring off against the main in these circumstances and have him appear so blasé.

"Well—I apologize for making you come here." He knew he didn't sound sorry. "I know we were to meet at the house, but something…came up."

Lily had unexpectedly changed her plans for the day, leaving him with no choice but to change his.

"Does your wife know where you are?"

James's eyes widened in surprised—it was as if Orion had read his mind. His first instinct was to tell this stuck-up toff that it was none of his damn business, but as that was as good as an admission of guilt, he settled on curtly replying that her presence at the house was the reason they were meeting here and not there.

From the way Orion Black nodded, thoughtfully, it was clear he had guessed as much.

"You've been married for—less than a year, I believe?" James nodded, stiffly. "A bit young to be lying to her already. Most men at least wait until the first anniversary before they begin on willful deceit in earnest. I had heard you were a talented boy—it seems you are ahead of your peers in all respects."

James's face flushed scarlet.

"I didn't—lie to her. I just—I didn't mention it, is all."

A meaningless distinction that not even the most flexible moralist would pretend to square.

"Of course. Very different."

He fiddled with his glasses.

"My wife tends to worry."

"Why would she have cause for concern about a meeting you requested and arranged for?"

The stare with which James fixed Mr. Black said more than words could.

"I suppose accusing a man of blackmail does present certain…difficulties," Orion continued, philosophically. "If you're wrong, no self-respecting wizard would stand for the insult—you might be facing a duel, then and there. And if you're right…"

He looked up from the table, his eyes intently fixed on the younger man.

"Well—then the danger speaks for itself."

"Am I right?"

Orion calmly considered him over his untouched beer. James practically vibrated with pent up anger and frustration, after days of stewing on the idea of Sirius being threatened—but now, faced with the object of these feelings, the villain of the story, he felt no sense of satisfaction. Orion Black didn't react to anything, he was totally placid—by all accounts he gave the impression of a mild-mannered, middle-aged wizard who was perturbed to have found himself in such an odd place, dressed in clothing that would have been better suited for a shooting party before the War.

James was sure this was part of his Slytherin act, but it didn't make it any less maddening.

"Allow me to take a liberty with you—one I'm sure you will resent exceedingly—and offer you some advice," the older man, said, finally—in a tone that, to James's ears, rang with a kind of weary and tired sincerity he would have never associated with Orion.

"Don't get in the habit of lying to your wife. It's rarely worth the effort, and they always find out—usually from someone else. Then the cure is worse than the disease."

"That wisdom come from direct experience, or is it just common knowledge?"

"It's both."

His grey eyes glittered across the table.

"Yeah, well—you're not exactly who I think I want to be taking advice from, just now." He shifted in his chair. "Or ever."

"Discounting sound advice because you dislike its source is also unwise."

He felt Sirius's father taking the measure of him—his eyes tracing over James's face. The younger wizard stared back, stonily.

He was not afraid of this man—not in the slightest, and he wanted that fact to be unquestionable in Orion's mind.

Mr. Black cleared his throat, abruptly.

"Where did you get this idea of yours in the first place?"

"Why does that matter?"

"Curiosity. I'd wager galleons it wasn't from Sirius." His eyes narrowed. "And that you haven't told him about this meeting anymore than you've told your wife."

The silence was self-convicting—and Mr. Black took an obvious pleasure in the knowledge that he had guessed correctly.

"Do you always presume to insert yourself into my son's affairs," Orion continued, cuttingly. "Or is this a special occasion?"

James gave him a surly look.

"If I see something wrong right in front of my eyes, I'm not going to sit back and do nothing."

"A man of action," Mr. Black replied, in a bland voice. "What would he say if he knew you'd asked to see me like this?"

James grimaced at the very thought—Padfoot's reaction was one he'd been avoiding thinking about.

"He wouldn't like it at all," James admitted, ruefully—and his right hand went up to the back of his head, a nervous habit he had never rid himself of completely. "He doesn't like me meddling—he…he calls me a nosy git."

Orion let out a snort.

"And yet, you persist."

James's back straightened. He was nearly as tall as Orion, but the posture the older man was accustomed to—the ramrod straight spine of a wizard who has known what it is to be scrutinized his entire life—made him feel more like he was facing down a particularly haughty dragon.

Or perhaps a cobra.

"Yeah, well—Sirius doesn't always know what's best for him."

"And you believe you do?"

The irony in Orion's tone cut to the quick.

"Well—who else is supposed to look out for him?"

These words—which came from a deep-seated, righteous and entirely sincere depth of feeling in James—had an unexpected effect on the older man.

Anger.

Orion was angry. But his version of anger wasn't hot-headed, like James might've expected from the father of his friend, who had an infamous gunpowder temper. It burned cold.

It felt positively chilly in the room.

"I wonder—under what authority do you think you act?" Orion bit out, coldly. "By your own admission, it's not on his willing behalf."

James bristled.

"I've only been his best friend for eight years."

"Which signifies nothing," Orion laughed. "I've been his father for twenty years, and you're accusing me of threatening him with God only knows what horrors."

"I guess I think I'm a better friend than you are a dad."

James had to admit—he did take a little petty enjoyment in seeing a flash of obvious irritation in Mr. Black's eyes.

"You are obviously not a wizard without means."

Orion nodded, in obvious deference to their relative positions, as if James gave a damn what other wizards thought the name 'Potter' was of an inferior class than 'Black.'

"But one does wonder why a man with a young wife and a child on the way—with so much to lose—would take such a risk?"

"I'm not afraid of you."

Mr. Black laughed, coldly.

"I don't doubt that." He set his hand down on the table and tapped his fingers rhythmically on the napkin. "But….perhaps you ought to be."

James felt a surge of satisfaction—a threat. Good—that's what he'd been expecting, and it made it so much easier to dislike the man across from him, to know he'd been right all along, that the almost human wizard he'd thought he'd caught glimpses of was just another facade—another mask.

But just as quickly, that threat disappeared—and Orion Black was all mild-mannered gentility once again.

"Or if not of me, than of my wife—" He laughed to himself. "She is a far greater adversary, I assure you."

James stared at him, bewildered and—did he think this was all a joke? He suddenly turned chummy.

This had not at all been what he expected. He was thrown off.

That's probably the point.

"What'll it be, gents?"

James was startled—he'd almost forgotten where they were, that Daisy would naturally want to check in and place an order. She didn't let people sit in her pub and not order a drink.

The publican glided into the room—and frowned at the sight of Orion's completely full pitcher of beer.

"Not to your taste, love?" She tutted and whisked it away, disapproving of the waste. "No—you're a brandy man, if ever I've seen one."

Orion said nothing—did not acknowledge her—which Daisy took as a tacit agreement to her suggestion and not the rudeness that it clearly was ("Tough customer, eh?"). Being a woman who had dealt with more than her fair share of louts, drunks and inebriates, the haughty wizard who refused to speak to her was not of great concern. James ordered a beer, knowing full-well he had no stomach for it. She nodded and promised Mr. Black, with a wink, that she would find something to his taste before going off again.

"You could at least act like you're aware of her existence," James muttered, when Daisy was safely away.

Orion turned up his lip and snorted at the very idea.

"There's nothing I could say to that muggle she wants to hear, believe me."

"She's just a person, like us."

"Hardly 'like us'," Orion replied, voice bland. "I haven't spoken to one of her sort in over twenty years, and it wasn't all too pleasant then. I don't intend to start again now."

Before James had time to marvel at how truly astounding it was that Orion had uttered these words without batting an eyelash, he continued:

"You must be more accustomed to places like this than I, given your…wife."

He gritted his teeth, felt the handle of his mahogany wand through the fabric of his pocket. He would dearly love to whip it out—this old toff was lucky Daisy was coming back so soon.

"Lily is a witch."

"By some estimations."

Even though James knew he was being baited, he felt the flush of anger rise in his face—just as he felt the cold look of bored satisfaction on Orion's.

"I don't know what it is you're insinuating."

Mr. Black quirked an eyebrow.

"There is the matter of her family."

The Black patriarch stressed that word delicately. James' fingers gripped the side of one of his legs—so hard he knew a mark would be left behind by it.

How dare he.

It was the sort of thing that bothered him more than it did Lily. It always had—since before they'd started dating, before she'd even liked him as a person.

"I don't need you fighting my battles, Potter."

It was criminal, James thought, the way she tucked her fringe behind her ear. He raised his hand to the back of his head—then those green eyes narrowed, and he lowered it again.

"Yeah, well—I didn't like those Slytherins talking to you that way—so I told them off." He stepped aside to let a group of third-year Hufflepuffs pass. Somehow the two of them had managed to block half the Charms corridor—probably had to do with her refusing to stand closer than an arm's length from him. "You might let people use that language, Evans, but I'm not going to."

Her green eyes flashed with an irritation he flattered himself only he could bring about—but Lily managed to hold her temper, and (disappointingly) only sniffed and gave him that look of abject pity that could send him into the deepest of depressions for days.

"I don't 'let them' do anything. I simply don't give those prats the satisfaction of thinking I give a damn about their idiotic opinions." Lily tossed her head—his stomach flip-flopped—there was no one like her, truly. "And I don't want them thinking I asked you to stick your nose in."

She turned and began to walk down the corridor in the direction of the Great Hall, leaving him, as was so often the state of things between them, upended and disarmed.

"Well—" James called, to her retreating back. "I never asked you to stick your nose in to me sticking mine into—"

But it was too late—the object of his affections had already rounded the corner and out of sight.

He'd do it all over again, if he had the choice—it was even worth the telling-off.

Things were different now. Lily was his wife, and he had every right to defend her.

And anyway, she wasn't here, so she couldn't get annoyed if he reached into his wand pocket and let loose a good hex on this smug old pureblood ponce. Who cared if it bothered her? No one had the right to—

Orion's warning about lies and the way they caught up with erstwhile husbands niggled at him, and his hand relaxed again.

"She—doesn't have any."

"Oh?" In spite of himself, he seemed interested—if that's what you could call that slight narrowing of his cold eyes. "None to speak of, at any rate."

"Just a sister—and we don't see much of her."

He thought of Petunia Dursley, and the pall her absence from their wedding had cast, the one cloud that had obscured the sun for Lily on that day.

Orion looked up from the signet ring on his right hand—he had been studying it for the better part of a minute. His eyes glimmered with something akin to genuine interest—or at least a very good approximation of it.

"And why's that?"

James let out a laugh—suddenly struck by the absurdity of that question from him.

"She doesn't like magic—thinks it's unnatural. Calls Lily a 'freak'—" James leaned back in his chair. "She's married to a Muggle, and neither of them will have anything to do with us. We're tainted by association."

"Association with…?"

"With other witches and wizards."

It took Orion Black upwards of ten seconds to process this idea—and then to let out a small laugh of disbelief at the utterly alien notion of it.

"A muggle of profound ignorance—" He said, shaking his head. "But I suppose that is their way."

James, who bore no love for Petunia, found, in this moment, for the first time—an odd sense of solidarity with his sister-in-law.

"Oh, I don't know—I think she has a bit of a point." He stretched out his arms above his head, casually. "About some wizards."

Another thought struck him, more delicious than the last—and then he began to laugh out loud. Orion must've picked up on the fact that there was a joke at his expense, for he asked what it was James found so funny in a very cold voice.

"I was just thinking what Petunia would say about your family. Pure to the core—witches and wizards straight down the line, for fifteen generations, at least."

The thought of his sister-in-law's horsey face, contorted in disgust at the idea of an entire family made up of Lilys, and his grin broadened.

"She'd call the Blacks a regular gang of freaks."

Mr. Black was not a man accustomed to bearing even a slight at his family's name. To hear the supposed musing of a suburban Muggle housewife on his family tree's freakishness made him color.

"Why, that is—" Orion sputtered. "—How—that is utterly absurd."

The younger man let out a little laugh of pity—which only made Orion bristle more, for he recognized it as such.

"Is it? Not from her perspective. People of your sort, proud purebloods, would be the worst kind. At least my wife has some normal relations—well, then again—" He leaned back in his chair. "—From what I hear, there's a few Black squibs down the line, so I guess there'd be some hope for your lot."

He pushed his glasses up his nose, delighted to find anger in the other man's face. He was really bothered by this idea, the sod!

"Are you surprised they hate you as much as you hate them?"

It didn't appear that the thought had ever occurred to Orion Black—and it, combined with the reappearance of Daisy, struck him momentarily dumb.

"Here you go—a pint for Mister P, and a brandy—" She set it down on the table. "My best—for the gentleman who doesn't speak."

James took his beer gratefully, while Mr. Black returned to studying his fingers and airily ignoring the woman in front of him.

"Thanks, Daisy."

She nodded, though she had her eyes fixed on Orion, who gave no sign of any interest in the magnificent drink in front of him. He was obviously still brooding on the idea of Muggles having the impudence to dislike his family.

She turned towards James and nudged him, conspiratorially.

"You know—your friend here would be quite good-looking, if he got off that high-horse of his and smiled a bit." Orion's jaw clenched—she quirked an eyebrow, amused. "'Course, he's got such a haughty face, it might not come off. Bit more of a grimace than a smile."

Orion tapped his fingers impatiently. Daisy definitely saw how eager he was for her to be off—which only had the effect of making her want to stay and tease him longer.

"He any relation of that mate of yours, Mister P?" She peered at Orion, whose eyes now flashed dangerously. "The very handsome blighter—cheeky bloke you bring in here, with that Suzuki he's always trying to get me to have a go on."

Orion's head jerked up at this. She grinned good-naturedly.

"To what, dare I ask—" Mr. Black addressed her directly—as if every word had to be forcibly pried from his lips. "Does the word 'Suzuki' refer?"

Daisy started, surprised—this had obviously not been how she expected to provoke him into acknowledging her.

"He does speak, after all!" She clasped her hands together, delighted. "What's it to you, love?"

Orion's mouth flattened into a thin line—and he picked up the glass of brandy and promptly downed half in one swig.

"If my son possess one," he answered, dryly. "I am sure it can be nothing good."

Daily looked to James—now, in spite of himself, trying to keep a straight face. Considering he'd come here to protect Sirius, this would be the time to intervene.

"Don't bother trying to explain, Daisy," James said, and the edge of his mouth turned up. "He won't understand, believe me."

She laughed—pleased as punch at the gentlemen who now saw fit to acknowledge her, however haughtily.

"So, you're his pal's dad. He has the look of you, that's for certain. Handsome devil." She gave Orion another once-over, with more personal interest this time. "Always have thought that one had a bit of a lordly edge to him, but I didn't know he came from money."

If Orion thought this Muggle's remarks on the subject of his family fortune were vulgar, to James's surprise, he did not let it show.

"There are days," Orion said, voice laden with irony. "I don't believe he knows it himself."

Daisy scoffed and slapped her shoulder with the wet rag dangling from her hand.

"Giving you and your missus the runaround, is he?"

Orion sipped at his brandy and considered the best way to answer this extraordinary question. He glanced at James, then back at the Muggle—and fixed his face (smug face, James thought, sourly) in an expression of sobriety.

"Not anymore."

Daisy frowned—and she took in the whole sight of the man, who James thought, at this moment, at least—looked rather deflated, pensive, even. But it was not quite as he had when James had walked in the room, and Orion had not known he was being watched.

This seemed…almost as if he was putting it on.

"He did before?" She clucked her tongue. "Oh—tell me what happened, love. I'm always a good ear. Everyone says so."

Mr. Black blinked up at her—and James stared at him in bewilderment, realizing what was about to happen a moment before it did.

"We….went through a very trying period with him a few years ago," Orion admitted, slowly. "A very awful time. He—" His eyes flitted to James. "The boy ran away from home."

"He never did!"

"Oh, yes. Terrible business." She tutted, sympathetic. "It nearly broke my poor wife's heart."

James placed his beer down on the table with rather too much force—it sloshed in the glass, getting suds all over his hands. Daisy ignored him—instead pulling up a chair and sitting down.

"Let's have the whole thing out, then."

The younger man watched in mute horror as Orion Black spun a story of a great family upheaval—a story which matched the truth in only the barest essential details, and a story James Potter was conspicuously absent from.

James clenched his fist. That old snake was trying to—to get her on his side!

Daisy had heard every story under the sun, and she was no soft touch—but she had inexplicably warmed to the man, and as a consequence bought every half-truth he fed her. Worst of all, James couldn't interrupt with his objections, after all—given the fact that he'd been cast in the role of unnamed villain of the piece, the one who had sheltered poor Mr. Black's lost boy, gone astray too soon.

As if your lot all didn't push him out the door in the first place.

At the culmination of this tale of woe—the miraculous reunion between mother and son, which Mr. Black made sound like godsend comparable in scope to the events that surrounded that first blessed Christmas—she actually wiped a tear from her eye.

"Thank goodness for that." Daisy looked to James for his agreement. "But how awful for you all. Your friend never said a word, Mister P. What a terrible time he's given his poor old father here."

As he noticed her wink, James tried and failed to stutter out a protest, his mind stuck on the horrifying realization that Daisy had begun to flirt with Padfoot's dad.

Orion shrugged and nodded—the sober, battle-scarred warrior, all modesty in the face of overcoming his grand family trial.

"It was very difficult," he said, reflectively. "He lost sight of who he is for a time."

This—more than anything, stirred James out of his stupor. That familiar stab of hot, righteous indignation rose in his chest.

"Luckily—only for a time," Orion's eyes flashed in James's direction—a taunting look. "He has remembered again."

James felt for the wand in his pocket again—and clasped the parchment beside it.

"Things are as they should be, once more." Orion continued, pleasantly. "His mother's got him well in hand now."

The woman laughed—a knowing laugh, as if she could just imagine what a strict, high-born lady Sirius's mother was. As if Walburga Black—the witch who would have called her filth if she saw Daisy on a public street—was someone who had been hard-done by, had a heart that could be broken, was not the cold, merciless harpy James knew her to be.

Daisy shot Orion a cheeky grin.

"Your old lady always gets her man, eh?"

She did not notice how pale James was, how his fingers gripped the glass of ale too hard to be entirely natural.

The smug snake, resembling—in James eyes—a bulging python who has just swallowed a rabbit whole and is basking in this sun, enjoying its obscene conquest, looked over his glass of brandy and smiled.

She went off to see to her other customers—with the promise to check in and bring more brandy, should it be needed. It was when the door to the parlor shut again that Mr. Black spoke.

"Quite a pleasant woman." He sipped the drink. "Perhaps I have misjudged her kind."

You forked-tongued old serpent.

"That is not what happened," James said, his voice low and furious. "Not at all."

Mr. Black set his glass down and considered the younger man, infuriatingly calm.

"No? The heir to one of the greatest magical houses in Europe runs off in the middle of the night to a cottage in Dorset without so much as a goodbye to his own mother." Each word was pronounced with cold precision. "How would you describe what he did?"

"That—is not Sirius."

At this, the cold humor left Orion's face—leaving only contempt in its wake..

"It's what he was born to be," he replied, as if there was no distinction between the two concepts. "So in point of fact—"

"—It's not who he is now."

Mr. Black folded his hands on the table in front of him, looking like schoolmaster about to give an unruly pupil a hard lesson.

"What do you base this on…what?"

His tone was patient—if aggravatingly condescending. James sat up straighter in his chair—fearless. He had no doubt of his own righteousness.

"On being his best friend! On—knowing him better than anyone does."

Mr. Black snorted, obviously unimpressed by these credentials. James felt himself bristle. In the years they'd been friends, no one had ever before questioned that he understood Padfoot best.

"He's always told me as much," James continued, slowly, punctuating each word with a jab of his finger. "He's never wanted that life. He thinks you are a pack of puffed-up hypocrites obsessed with blood and gold, and if Dumbledore wasn't making him, he'd have nothing to do with the lot of you."

There was a short pause following this speech—and then, all at once, Orion began to laugh. James felt his face redden in anger.

"I don't need a lecture from you," Mr. Black said, relishing the younger man's obvious anger. "On what my son says about his family, believe me. I've heard his melodramatic strictures against me and his birthright all before—in tedious detail."

Orion smiled—a smile of grim triumph.

"In this matter," he continued, voice smooth. "There is a chance I understand him better than you."

"What are you—"

"—What Sirius says and what he means are not the same thing." Orion's lip curled. "And as for what he wants, or thinks he does—I must admit, I don't much care."

"No," James shot back. "All you care about is what you want."

The temperature in the room once again dropped.

"If that were really true, boy—" His eyes, devoid of warmth, narrowed. "—We would not be sitting here having this conversation, believe me."

James stared at the man across the table—unable to get the image of Regulus wearing the same expression out of his head, the night in the flat when he had spoken with such confidence about how their father 'had something' on Sirius, and that he was back in their family for good, no matter what Sirius wanted.

His confidence faltered in a way it never had before.

The longer he let the silence between them grow, the more he felt he was conceding that Orion was right.

"I notice you still haven't answered my question," he said, at last.

Mr. Black blinked at him and pretended to think about it—as if he couldn't quite remember what it was James was speaking of—of that accusation he had begun this meeting with.

"How I conduct my family affairs is not something I am accustomed to laying before the eyes of the world," he said, blandly. "Let alone to striplings wholly unconnected to myself."

James breathed in and out slowly—but his anger must've been obvious to the other man, for the look Orion Black gave suggested a man savoring a fine vintage of wine.

"If my son should choose to obey his father and take his place in the rightful succession to which he was born—" Orion continued, masterfully. "—What business is it of yours or anyone else why he does so?"

James started to rise from his chair.

"If you—if you're threatening him—"

"—You said yourself he's laid the charge of presumption on your doorstep," he interrupted, voice brisk. "That he doesn't view it as your concern anymore than I do. You may choose to be direct with me—to, as they say, 'lay your cards on the table'—but I may not choose to be the same in return."

A bitter laugh bubbled out of James's lips.

"Then why did you even bother to come?"

"I was interested," Orion said, flatly. "I wanted to hear what you had to say. I was curious to discover what it was you thought that confronting me in this manner could possibly achieve."

Orion straightened up—no longer playing any games, and it was at this moment that James realized he never had been.

"You seem to see yourself as my son's champion and defender—what is it you think you can do for Sirius he cannot do for himself? You're just as young, just as recklessly foolish—and are, I suspect, guilty of the same crime."

The color drained from his face—paralysis, similar to what he suspected being bit by a venomous snake would achieve, took over. The sensation of realizing that he had just done something very, very stupid overrode everything else.

Lily—the baby—he was supposed to be thinking of them, only he hadn't been—

What had he done?

Mr. Black let his words sink in for the appropriate amount of time to achieve full effect before he continued.

"So, I suppose—if we are playing a game of questions—"

Hadn't he bloody given Sirius a speech about this that morning it all began, when he had come for him, looking for friendship, for solidarity, for someone to be in his camp? 'You're making everything about you, Padfoot', 'I have responsibilities now', 'This is a war, and I'm interested in winning it.'

Had he believed any of that when he'd said it?

"—I have one for you."

He had had not wanted to say those things, really—had couched it in these noble statements that Sirius probably thought he believed, because Sirius had told him more than once, barking laugh following, that he was the 'noble prat of the forest'—but it had been Dumbledore's wish, and the old man was clever enough to know to send James's wife as the messenger, for he had understood better than anyone that James's first instinct, his primal instinct, would be to support the friend he had long since elevated above all others.

The friend he thought of more as a brother.

"Sometimes I think you believe you're still living in a dormitory with Padfoot, and I'm just the one who's moved into it." James kissed her on the shoulder—which was usually how he started to placate her when the subject of his—their—best friend popping in whenever he felt like it.

Sometimes it worked and lead to very enjoyable things.

"Don't you try to distract me from the issue at hand, James Potter."

More often than not it didn't. Grinning, he lifted his head and rested it in the crook of her shoulder.

"Course I don't think that. This is nothing like our dorm." He nuzzled her hair—he would never get over how bloody amazing it smelled. It was like being drenched in Amortensia. He didn't think he'd ever believe he was married to her—loved by her—that she let him love her in return. "There's no Wormy here, for example. You wouldn't like his snoring at all."

She turned to face him, and though her almond-shaped eyes were crinkled in humor—he saw her concern, too.

"I just hope," she groused, running her fingertips through his hair. "That when we have children, you'll remember he's not one of them."

"What has Pads done to you, that you've become so opposed?"

"You are so attached to each other, darling."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"I just—worry about him. I don't even know why he bothered taking out a flat in Central London. When he's not volunteering for the most dangerous Order missions and nearly getting himself killed every other week, he's here."

And if he could have given it up and moved into their cottage, he'd have done it in a heartbeat—that was what remained unspoken, though they both knew it.

James would have let him. There was a part of him—a part he pushed aside, buried in the bravado that takes over a man who is hardly more than a boy—that felt as long as Sirius was near, as long as he was close and James, who knew him best, for whom he would have gone to the ends of the earth—that he could protect him.

That he wouldn't lose him.

At the end of the day, who was the hypocrite—the one who hadn't grown up?

Who was the one who needed to let go?

"Why—" Mr. Black savored the disdain he managed to infuse in that word. "—Are you doing this?"

James struggled to control his breathing—he realized, with a start, that he was shaking with emotion, something akin to the feeling that he had had when the healer walked back into the sitting room where he'd held Lily's hands for hours, days, waiting for the inevitable—that his mother and father had been reunited in death.

Grief and loss had been a wave that nearly swallowed him whole.

Now that he knew what it was, truly knew—loss was the only thing in life he was afraid of.

But…no.

Even if he was afraid of losing Sirius, that wasn't the reason he was here. It was not what was driving him. He had never acted out of fear in his life.

He hadn't begun to today.

James looked up from the worn table and into the eyes of his best friend's father—no longer afraid, or doubtful, confident that whatever mistakes in his life he'd made—and there were many—facing this man was not one of them.

"I know he'd do the same for me."

---

She couldn't get Ted and Dora and that damned bicycle out of her head.

Ted had insisted on teaching Nymphadora to ride himself—something about it being the last thing his father had taught him before he died—but having magic hadn't made their daughter any less clumsy than a typical Muggle child, and after falling off her pink-and-white birthday present for the umpteenth time, the seven-year-old girl was ready to give up.

Ted wouldn't let her, of course.

"Come on, Dora. Once you get it, you'll never understand why you couldn't before. Riding a bicycle is like—" Ted groped around for the proper metaphor. "—Remembering something you— never knew in the first place."

From the ground where she had curled up in obstinance, Nymphadora scowled.

"You can't remember things you never knew, Daddy."

Ted nodded and accepted this childlike logic without question. He had far more patience for their daughter's difficult and mercurial nature than his wife did. Unsurprising—he'd fallen in love with her, hadn't he?

"Then—it's like remembering something you forgot so long ago," he amended, his grin broad. "—You didn't know you'd forgotten—until you remembered it."

Andromeda tapped the ash into the bottom of her empty glass, watching as the amber dregs turned to sludge before her eyes.

"What happens when you remember?"

"Why—it all makes sense—and you'll never forget again."

Why am I thinking of that now, of all things?

She glanced up from her glass to the girl—she was a girl, still, not a woman yet, and Mrs. Tonks pushed aside the uncomfortable comparison her own mind had made to another girl, of similar prospects, who ten years ago had thought herself a woman, too, and capable of making a woman's choices.

She had made them, in the end, whether she'd been ready to or not.

Miss Battancourt was waiting for her to speak—had been waiting since she finished speaking herself, a tale told in broken, incomplete sentences—in stops and starts. A tale full of such fiendish characters that the wildest fantasist would have dismissed them as fabrication from a diseased mind. Those aren't real people—no one still thinks that way—and there've never been people who would actually do something like that—

Let alone an entire family of them.

Occasionally she'd had to stop her—to clarify a point or provide some context for the things that, for all the time and years of distance, Andromeda understood far better than this slip of a girl.

Oh—I know why I'm thinking of it.

The things you don't know you've forgotten until you remember them…

I'd forgotten what they were like.

She remembered now, thanks to Colette Battancourt.

Lucky, lucky her. She didn't know whether to buy the girl another drink (she needed it) or strangle the life out of her (which she might, in the end, prefer to the alternative).

Either way—and Andromeda had to resist her urge to let out the heavy sigh that reached the marrow of her bones—she supposed she should break the silence.

Her conversational partner was frozen in an almost comic tableau of misery. Ingenue Ennui—that's what she would call it, if she had to put the plaque up in the Louvre.

"Well. That is…a predicament. Quite a pickle, in fact."

Understatement didn't always calm people down, but she was not one for hysterics or emotional displays. The pickle described was, thankfully, not hers.

"What should I—" The girl twisted her hands in her lap—was that a nervous habit? Yes, it must be—only she was used to doing it with robes and not a denim skirt. "—That is, what would you do, if you found yourself in my…situation?"

Mrs. Tonks arched one wry eyebrow.

I would never have got into it in the first place, you little fool.

She dropped the bud of her cigarette in the glass and pushed it across the table. The scraping sound on the wooden table made the girl flinch.

"Oh, I'm afraid that broom has long since flown."

Andromeda shrugged—the look of utter dismay on her companion's face would have probably moved Ted to pity—he'd have asked if Miss Battancourt wanted to go for a walk, or get another drink, or he'd have offered to buy her an ice cream cone.

Something sentimental like that. Ted was what was properly called a 'soft touch' when it came to a girl in trouble. He was from that class of men who always play the white knight.

If only they knew what callous, spiteful bitches we all are, at heart.

Andromeda pushed the thought away. She couldn't go down that rabbit-hole—not today.

"You're too far into it, now."

The girl bit her lip—impossibly doe-like eyes blinking tears away—except for one that clung to an eyelash. She reminded Andromeda of a fawn caught in a trap in the thicket.

No wonder Cissy liked her—on the surface Colette Battancourt appeared to be nothing more or less than a pretty doll, easy and agreeable, a girl one could pick up and play with at one's leisure.

Narcissa always loved her dolls.

I doubt she's considered this one has a mind of her own.

"You won't…" Whatever request she was about to make, she was definitely ashamed of it. "You won't…tell anyone, will you?"

Andromeda watched her fidget in her chair. She let her do it for a longer than she needed to, for rather perverse

"Oh, you needn't fear that. There's no one I could tell that would care."

And most wouldn't believe it.

"Not even—"

"—I think it's better if we keep Sirius out of this altogether."

It was easy enough for Andromeda to read the disappointment on the girl's face at this solemn promise.

She wants me to tell him… Andromeda narrowed her eyes. But why? To assuage her guilt? If she's playing her own game, she's very good at it.

She recognized the train of thought—herself, and an involuntary reaction, like a muscle spasm. How quickly one could slip back into it, if one let oneself.

Don't be daft, Andromeda—it's because she hates lying.

"Miss Battancourt. You are a grown woman, out of school. You'll have to make up your own mind as to what to do—no one can make it up for you, and I wouldn't dream of giving you advice, in any case."

"Why not?"

"I don't want the responsibility if it goes horribly wrong."

Which it very well might.

"But you do have an opinion about what I should do."

"Oh, yes. But I don't think you'd want to hear it, in any case."

The girl flushed to the roots of her hair—Andromeda smiled. As she had said, she knew that look very well.

She'd seen it all once before.

"Instead—I will ask that you promise me something, Miss Battancourt—if you please."

"Anything."

What a promise—how bold, how brave, how reckless a promise to make to a complete stranger.

You probably don't seem like a stranger to her…

"At this party you're going to this evening—" She paused, thinking of how best to say the next part without causing alarm. Or ought she to do so? "—If she's there, I want you to steer clear of my sister."

Those eyelashes fluttered over enormous blue eyes, puzzled—no, this one was not playing a game—or at least not very well. That was not studied.

"But…" She chewed her lip. "I can't. I will…be going with her."

"I meant my other sister."

Colette breathed in quickly—it sounded like a gasp.

"Why would you ask that of me that?"

A small wisp of smoke still lingered in the air above Mrs. Tonks. Her eyes darted down to the glass, and the sad remnants of the fag she had deposited there. She watched it float in the dregs with regret—but whether it was for the cigarette, the drink, or something else entirely—Andromeda couldn't say herself.

She looked up, face expressionless.

"Oh—I want a clean conscience. That's all."

---

Until she had married Ignatius—at the ripe age of thirty-nine—Lucretia had never considered that the priorities of other families were not like those of her own.

She had an unusual amount of dexterity for a Black, and so the adjustment to the 'Prewett way' had been easier than it might've been for one of her kinswomen—but that did not mean she preferred the new reality to the old. Far from it, in fact—once the novelty had worn off, Lucretia had taken to calling her in-laws the 'Prudish, Priggish Prewetts'—sometimes to their faces, for she found them, by and large, a tiresome, sanctimonious lot. Her marriage may have been motivated in part by a desire to get out from under her father's thumb—but she still thought her family's ways preferable to anyone else's.

It turned out that other families worried about tedious things, like morals.

By contrast, the Blacks—and she, by extension, for she was in every way still a Black, marriage be damned—preoccupied themselves with what they did best.

Glamour, drama—and blood.

In her fifty-four years on this earth Mrs. Prewett had seen a great deal of all three from her family—and a great deal more shocking behavior than usual in the past week.

But a bout of conscience from her sister-in-law was by far the most extraordinary event of the decade, as far as she was concerned.

"But my dear—" She was on the verge of laughing at the absurdity of the words that had just left Walburga's mouth. "—Of course you must tell Orion. How is that even a question?"

Mrs. Black looked up from her untouched cup of tea, her face pale and troubled. The ladies' tea room was not quite as grand as the dining room of the Jarvey, but it gave one privacy, and less danger of being set upon by some acquaintance, former lover, or worse—a member of one's family.

It had the added bonus of not kicking one out when one finished one's meal, which suited Lucretia just fine. She was looking for a peaceful place outside the home to wile away the afternoon. If one was not home, one could not be called upon.

And today, one did not want to be called upon.

So when Walburga had showed up at her door, so unusually worried, not the bustling, active steam engine she had become since the re-emergence of her beloved firstborn, Lucretia had been only too happy to suggest they go for a spot of refreshment. Where better than a place they could talk and not be bothered by Ignatius complaining about his library being used for something besides reading?

Of course, that meant having to speak in a sort of code.

The two young, delightful scamps who were the main subject of conversation could not be mentioned in public—not even in an empty tea room.

"Well—I suppose—" Burgie's voice faltered. "Because I feel…odd about it. I did promise him I wouldn't."

Lucretia leaned back in her chair and took in the the full picture of her sister-in-law. When was the last time she had heard uncertainty from Walburga? She had never seemed so weary.

And she was so pale and drawn…well, given the story her dearest friend had regaled, in halting stops and starts, that made perfect sense.

Lucretia tapped her cigarette holder against the crystal ashtray floating at her side.

"Well, what about the other one?" 'The other one' was what they had taken to calling Sirius—at least in this conversation, where for once he was not the primary subject of discussion. "I don't know how you can even keep track of all the lies you've told him."

"That," Walburga snapped, testily. "Is an entirely different matter."

"How?"

Lucretia noticed the way Walburga's eyes darted to her ivory cigarette case…why did the woman deny herself, so?

"Because—well—they are so very different." She gave Lucretia a cross look, as if she was the one who was being obtuse. "The other one is—well, he's more like me. He's resilient."

"What does that have to do with you lying to him?"

"Well, he won't take it the same way!" Mrs. Black said, tetchy—as she always got when Lucretia dared to imply her mothering was less than ideal. "He may be…cross and in a foul temper for a few days, but he'll get over it soon enough—once he sees it's all for the best."

Lucretia choked on the tea that she had fortified with brandy a quarter-hour earlier. Goodness, gracious—Burgie couldn't possibly believe the son who shared so much of her spirit would roll over without giving any resistance, did she?

No—surely not. She didn't believe that for a second. The fight was what made it fun for her.

"I think the other one feels things rather more deeply than you realize, Burgie." She privately thought Walburga did, too, but she was not stupid as to say it just then. "And I must tell you, I do not think those two much enjoy being treated so differently by you. Children never do."

Mrs. Black scowled and muttered some aphorism to the effect of children not knowing what was best for them.

"As for the other other one," Lucretia continued, sanguine. "What are you afraid will come from breaking his confidences? He'll never leave you. He's so devoted." She snorted. "All three of them are, in fact—poor men."

Mrs. Black's eyes flashed with temper.

"How can you say that?" Walburga hissed—never had she sounded more put-upon in all her life. "When Orion lied so to me—" Her voice darkened. "And after what the other one did three years ago—"

"And why do you think he did that? He's as enthralled as the other two. You are a regular Svengali—he had to break your spell somehow. The remedy was a bit extreme, I'll admit, but—also a credit to you, in its way."

It had probably been too much to expect Walburga to understand how her son running away from home could be a 'credit' to anything, let alone the strength of her power over him, but Lucretia was not known for holding back what she thought.

"I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about," Mrs. Black said, coldly, making some vague overture to standing up and marching out of the room. Lucretia rolled her eyes.

"Oh, don't fret, my dear—having now seen him, I can say with full confidence that he's as entranced by you as he ever was." She laughed. "He must've known he'd be ensnared the moment he saw you again—that's why he stayed away." Lucretia gave a serpentine smile. "It's too late for him now, though. The work of three years undone in a fortnight. Masterly."

Walburga, soothed by this compliment, lowered herself into her chair again and murmured some acceptance of this paltry apology, though she did add a tart remark of thinking it idle flattery of the first order.

"I never flatter."

"Well, then—you're a fool," she murmured, biting into a biscuit with feeling. "He hasn't changed! Still sneaking about with all manner of filth and scum—just this morning he taunted me about having lunch with someone he knew I'd disapprove of. He's an impudent, brazen boy and—he's very lucky I've made arrangements for him."

Lucretia smiled into her teacup at these maternal grouses—Burgie was having a time of it. Mrs. Black clearly did not share her sister-in-law's confidence that she had the other one well and completely caught—no, of course not. She was a fastidious woman, and after the great heartbreak of his first escape from her clutches, would be taking no chances.

He could not just be caught—he had to be domesticated. Or as Papa was fond of saying of his prize horses, 'broken in.'

This was a pointless line of inquiry—she'd hit a wall with Walburga. Where Sirius was concerned, her sister-in-law would not see reason—at least not yet. Lucretia wisely brought the conversation back to the matter of hand, and reminded Mrs. Black of her original question—why she should fear the consequences of breaking her word to Regulus by telling his father about the unfortunate incident that had taken place that morning.

"I suppose—I am afraid he'll become like your brother, and when he finds out he'll stew over it for years, and brood." Her expression darkened like a storm cloud. "He's grown secretive and—furtive. He never tells me anything anymore. It's vexing!"

In other words: her son had grown up, and was no longer the pliable boy who did everything his mama said.

"Why is he afraid of the water?" Lucretia asked, conversationally. "I don't understand it."

The mask slipped, and something like fear crossed Walburga's face—but she tempered it quickly.

"Oh. That. It was—" Her hand slipped on the cup as she tried to grab the china handle. "Something that happened that night. In the—in the place where he was. The…cave."

Mrs. Prewett had not failed to notice how vague her friend got about this particular aspect of how her family had been reunited. Whenever she tried to ask for clarity on the subject, the other woman grew very quiet and troubled before snapping that she was too nosy for her own good.

Lucretia supposed she was too nosy for her own good—and a shiver of fear ran down her spine at these moments. What Death Eaters did in the middle of the night was not the sort of gossip that appealed to her, even when they were nephews of hers.

"Don't you know, Burgie?"

"I didn't ask for details. They talked it over," Mrs. Black snapped, defensive. "Orion and—him."

"The other one?"

"No—he was fast asleep." She pursed her lips. "That old fool. He told them—something of what happened."

Oh. Albus Dumbledore.

"But where were you when this conversation was going on?"

"Tending to the other one."

"I thought you said he was asleep."

"Well, I—needed to check in on him."

More like check that handsome boy of hers was really there, in her grasp, and not a fantasy or illusion.

"But didn't you…dear, didn't you talk about it?" She lowered her cigarette. "Didn't Orion tell you what was said afterwards?"

Walburga looked as though she regretted ever allowing Lucretia to lead her to this line of inquiry. Very rare was the day that Mrs. Prewett had her best friend on the back-foot.

"He didn't! He really didn't tell you!" Lucretia exclaimed, indignantly. "Honestly, Burgie, I cannot understand why you put up with it. Orion is so patronizing. If it had been my son—"

Walburga hissed at her to be quiet and kicked her under the table.

"—I'd have told him to stuff his pompous ideas about 'delicate constitutions' and what women need to be protected from and to give me all the details at once."

"There was no need," Walburga said, her voice low and tremulous. "I—I saw what had happened, I tended to Reg—to him, as well as the other one, and I know he—what happened—"

Her voice caught in her throat.

"Something—tried to drown him."

Walburga busied herself with the teapot, but she could not hide that her hands trembled.

"And it…nearly succeeded, and I don't need anymore details than that from my husband, so I'll thank you not to lecture me about marriage, children or anything else."

Lucretia was stunned, the wind knocked out of her, and for a spell she could think of nothing to say. Rare though it might have been for Burgie to doubt herself where scheming and manipulation for the good of her family was concerned—for her to nearly cry in public was unheard of.

There was a long silence between them.

"I suppose that would make one not keen on baths."

Walburga sighed—and her anger evaporated. That was the nice thing about Burgie—her temper ran hot and burned out just as quickly. In that respect perhaps she was right about Sirius taking after her—for all his sulking and complaints, he really was a good-tempered boy at heart.

"Yes, but for how long?" Walburga asked, voice on the edge of despair. "He can't go his whole life scared of his own shadow."

"His own shadow is not what he's afraid of, Walburga."

Walburga sucked in another breath—which sounded rather like a dry sob.

Lucretia reached across the table and patted the hand that had grasped the tablecloth—as if she needed some anchor to the real world.

"He is still young—barely of age, and knowing what happened now, I must say—if you don't tell 'Rion, I will." Walburga colored. "I won't hear any objections! He is my godson and I feel a responsibility for him."

Walburga rolled her eyes.

"You are nearly as tedious as Orion," she muttered, tetchy. "I've got the situation well in hand—"

"—No, you don't." Mrs. Prewett smiled, blithely. "You can't take everything on yourself. And this is my brother's bloody job—so let him do it."

Walburga huffed out something about there being no need for rough language, but Lucretia recognized that look. She was taking her words to heart.

"But what about—oh, he'll know it was I who told Orion."

Mrs. Prewett guffawed.

"Who cares? You're his mother and it's for his own good," Lucretia said, bluntly. "Besides, I don't like this martyr streak he seems to have developed. That must be stamped out. It's dangerous for a Black to start thinking that way."

Mrs. Black nodded, slowly—the idea had obviously not struck her, but once it was pointed out to her, she could not ignore that her sister-in-law had a point.

Nothing ever good came from a Black getting ideas about noble self-sacrifice.

When she was confident that her friend had digested her advice and was likely to follow it, Lucretia felt she could voice her opinions again.

"I still think Orion is very high-handed with you."

Walburga laughed, pettishly.

"Well—that's the men from your side of the family, isn't it?"

Lucretia took another drag from her cigarette and snorted.

"True. Treating us 'womenfolk' as if we were still twelve-years-old is one lesson from Papa that's stuck." Mrs. Prewett grimaced. "If I had a galleon for every time Arcturus Black spoke to me as one would an infant—"

"—You'd have an even larger dowry," a voice interrupted, coldly. "Than the one he gave you when he threw you away on that useless wretch you call a husband."

The hand that clasped the ivory cigarette holder froze.

Across from her, Walburga lost the little color she'd recovered, and her gaze turned upwards—to a spot just above Lucretia's right shoulder.

Lucretia squeezed her eyes shut, as if this would wake her up or make the presence looming behind her go away—but the loud sound of a throat being clear directly behind her disabused Mrs. Prewett of that notion quickly.

When at last she turned around, she found herself eye to eye with the one person she had been trying her damnedest to avoid.

Damn it all to hell.

"Good afternoon, Lucretia," her father said, sarcastically. "I see your tongue is still as sharp as your wit."

Arcturus Black stood before her—expectant, as he always was with Lucretia. Her father was still an elegant man, in spite of the deep lines on his face and grey streaks in his hair—and age had done little to soften his imposing, haughty manners. He wore velvet robes of office and a grim smile, and the way that he used his cane reminded his firstborn child of an admiral brandishing a sword more than the crutch of an enfeebled old wizard.

She rose hastily from her chair—her cigarette and case had mysteriously vanished by the time she had kissed him on each cheek.

"Why, Papa—you are sly! Did you creep up on us like that just to frighten me out of my wits?" Lucretia felt the color in her own face, the blotchy and unbecoming sign of embarrassment only he could bring upon her. "Burgie and I never heard a thing."

"I did. My ears were burning," her father replied, dryly. He nodded towards his daughter-in-law, whose face had turned into a stony mask the second he had appeared. "Walburga."

"Arcturus," Walburga replied, impassively.

Any shock Mrs. Black might've felt at the untimely arrival of her esteemed father-in-law gave way to the customary cold respect he was due as head of her family—for she was nothing if not a believer in proper family protocol. Walburga did not share Lucretia's tendency to get flustered in Arcturus's presence, though the two held no overly warm feelings for one another. Formality kept the two from voicing any direct points of disagreement between them, and Walburga was often shielded from his most imposing qualities by dint of her unique position.

Since the death of Lucretia's own mother Melania, Walburga, as his only son and heir's wife, was the most senior ranking female in Arcturus's family—that demanded a degree of respect Lucretia certainly wasn't owed.

I'm his daughter, and I get diddles.

"What brings you here, Arcturus?" Walburga asked, without an ounce of shame that she and Lucretia had been caught impugning his good name. "Not one of your usual spots, I believe."

Mrs. Black gave a pointed look around the decidedly feminine surroundings. Her father-in-law did not rise to the impudent bait.

"No," he replied, voice terse. "I just happened to be lunching in the dining room and thought I heard two of my family's 'womenfolk' gossiping like a pair of hens."

Arcturus narrowed his eyes, with thinly-veiled disapproval at the cozy picture the two witches made. Lucretia settled herself back in her chair and risked an eye-roll while her back was still turned to him. As a dyed-in-the-wool Black, her father had a healthy distrust of friendship—particularly between women, and worst of all—women from the same family.

"Black witches ought not be allowed to scheme together. It only leads to trouble."

He was of the deep and profoundly offensive view that all women must, by the nature of their strange, feminine minds, secretly hate the others. As a consequence, it was better for all parties involved that intimacy between them not be encouraged, lest they drag the entire family down with their destructive, emotional jags.

Lucretia might have wholeheartedly agreed, but it was still quite galling to hear it from him.

And anyway, she and Burgie weren't like those other spiteful cats.

"I don't believe you were having lunch here at all, Papa." Lucretia said, primly, adjusting her serviette in her lap. "I think you came looking for me. Did one of your pet spies tip you off we were here?"

He curled his lip but did not deny it. How could he? It was well known in the family that he had a paid network of informants in every respectable establishment in England. She should have known the tearoom wasn't safe.

Nowhere was safe from him—once he got the scent, he was dogged, like a prize Crup chivvying out a Jarvey hole.

"If that was the case, Lucretia, I could hardly be blamed. You don't make yourself easy to find," Arcturus returned, arching an eyebrow up, sardonically. "Did both my owls go astray, perchance?"

His daughter shot him an evasive look.

"What owls?"

"I sent you two informing you of my intention to pay you a visit this morning."

The clipped, sarcastic voice indicated the Black patriarch's displeasure at his orders being defied so baldly. Lucretia poured cold tea into her cup and ignored the accusatory look Walburga shot across the table. She supposed she ought to have told Burgie there was a chance Papa would come looking for her and make a scene—but really, wasn't that always the danger?

Oh, if only Walburga would have agreed to go to tea at the Ritz. He would have never found them there.

"One would almost think," he continued, voice dry. "That you've been avoiding me, my girl."

Lucretia fidgeted in her chair. Underneath the table, she felt the irritated kick of Burgie's well-heeled boot.

"Of course not!" Mrs. Prewett said, flustered. "I'm simply—not in the habit of sitting at home waiting for my father to pay calls on me."

He gave her one of his signature probing looks.

"Obviously not." His lip turned up in amusement at her petulant huff. "It would seem neither of my children are anywhere to be found when one needs them."

He turned his eyes in the direction of his daughter-in-law. She met his gaze—coolly unflappable, at least on the surface, for she was not afraid to play dumb and not ask the question his remark begged. Unfortunately, Arcturus was not one to mince words—or wait.

"Orion wasn't at the club this afternoon."

He managed to make an otherwise anodyne statement accusatory and threatening at the same time. His daughter-in-law remained unfazed—she would not give up the game that easily.

What a sight the two of them were, when squared up against each other. Lucretia wished she could sell tickets

"Were you expecting him?" Walburga blinked up at the old wizard, innocently. "Did you arrange to meet?"

Arcturus replied, in the cold tone of voice of a man who knows his conversational partner is feigning ignorance, that he had no need to make an appointment with her husband, as his son was always at his club on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, where he made himself available to his father, to discuss both personal and financial affairs. Lucretia could not help but remark, half-under her breath, that Arcturus certainly was lucky to have one such perfect child.

This comment's meaning was not lost on her father.

"Well, he certainly understands his duties better than some." She slouched down in her seat, pettishly. "That's why I thought it very strange for him to fail to turn up."

He tapped his cane on the parquet floor.

"I've—generally thought he has been acting oddly this week."

Walburga pretended to study the emerald ring on her right hand.

"I haven't noticed anything."

"Haven't you?" Arcturus drawled. "Perhaps you are being an inattentive wife. You should look to that."

The remark hung over the table like the blade of a guillotine.

Walburga's eyes glittered—the first sign of her poise shaken. Lucretia, by now feeling rather guilty she had dragged Walburga into her game of cat and mouse, hastily stepped in.

"Really, Papa—what does it matter if he wasn't at the club?" She laughed—a nervous laugh. "You'll see 'Rion tomorrow at the Christmas party! You've probably seen him at least three times this week. Doesn't he deserve a night off, a rest from your haranguing?"

Arcturus's grey eyes turned back in her direction—causing Lucretia to shrink down in her chair.

"Christmas is the season to spend time with one's children," Arcturus replied, smoothly—and as quickly, he rounded on the other woman. "I would think Walburga would understand better than most the importance of keeping a close eye on one's son."

Walburga lowered her teaspoon and carefully set it on the table. Her breath hitched in her throat.

He tilted his head and gave her the piercing look of an eagle.

"Naturally," she replied, her voice soft—dangerously so. "It's not a lesson one easily forgets."

A warning not to push her.

She and her father-in-law stared at one another for a long moment. Were they each trying to use Legilimancy on the other, Lucretia wondered, or was it simply a matter of seeing who cracked first?

Like two statues each trying to make the other blink.

To her surprise, it was Arcturus who broke eye contact first.

"Very good," Arcturus murmured, in his usual brusque voice. "I'm glad one of you has her priorities in order."

Whatever the moment was—whatever it had meant—it had past.

Lucretia would have dearly liked to stick her tongue out at her father, but as he was watching her like a hawk, she thought better.

"I'm surprised you have the time to sit and wile away the hours having tea," he remarked, turning back towards Burgie. "Given you are hosting the entire family tomorrow evening, shouldn't you be too busy with preparations to waste time on frivolous conversation?"

Mrs. Black bristled before replying that, after twelve years of playing hostess for Christmas Eve she had rather mastered the art. Still, she could not argue with him that it required a great deal of preparation, and she had already dallied too long and must get back to it. She stood up, indicating her intention to leave. Arcturus nodded.

"A very wise decision, I would say."

Lucretia hastily followed suit, rising from her chair and practically tripping over herself to walk her cousin out—ready to make any excuse to leave before Papa got the idea of inviting her to join him for lunch or a drink, or worst of all—a visit to Noire House she couldn't get out of. Luckily, whatever purpose he had had in seeking Lucretia out, for the time being, at least, it was fulfilled—and he made no point of insisting she remain in his company. Until—

"There's one other thing, Walburga—"

Both women turned around in unison. Lucretia had the immediate stab of anxiety that always precipitated one of his high-handed orders.

"When you are setting the seating chart for tomorrow—" He tapped his cane on the recently vacated table. "—You will make a point of placing Lucretia next to me at dinner."

Mrs. Prewett flushed crimson.

"Really, Papa!" She fingered her clutch purse—really, he made one want a smoke and a drink all at once. "Your bully tactics hardly encourage daughterly affection."

He gave her a severe look—and even across the room, it caused her to shrink back.

"I'll settle for less cheek, at present," he said, dryly. "I'll expect you to be on your best behavior tomorrow evening, Lucretia. And no slipping off. I'll have none of your disappearing acts—you'll give your father the attention he's owed."

She opened her mouth—then saw the look on Burgie's face and shut it, again. This was the time or the moment to push him—and anyway, even her impertinent streak had its limits.

Her father smiled—fondness tinged with that self-satisfaction he always got when he got his own way.

"It seems an age since you and I have had a good long talk." He nodded, indulgently. "I'm looking forward to it."

"I'm glad you are."

Her father's mouth turned down—and she knew she'd gone too far.

"When you stop acting like a child, my girl," Arcturus said, imperiously. "You'll stop being treated like one—not before."

Walburga, tired of being witness to a scene she had seen so many times before, curtly turned on her heel and glided elegantly towards the door. Lucretia followed her, embarrassment and anger—as well as a little dread following in her wake.

Damn, if only they had gone to the Ritz.

The two women did not speak again until they made it outside onto the pavement—well out of Arcturus and any spies he had in the restaurant's earshot. Walburga had not looked at her best friend, had not even shown any signs of acknowledging her presence since her father-in-law had shown up.

"I haven't told him anything—" Lucretia hissed, from under her umbrella. "Not about the other one. I swear, Burgie. He was probably just talking about Regulus being in France, you know he didn't approve of your silly marriage plan—"

Walburga's nostrils flared—that, coupled with her grip on her wand, so tight her fingers were white, was proof of her rage.

"—And what if he wasn't speaking of Regulus?"

Lucretia stopped dead. That was too much to consider—

"If he knew about the other one, he'd have already done something, Burgie, trust me."

"Why should I?"

Walburga scowled—once again she seemed nearly on the edge of tears, though this time they were one of anger and frustration—a far more comfortable mode of being for her.

"I knew it was a mistake for Orion to have confided in you." She vibrated with anger. "I knew it! And I followed suit. What a fool I have been to speak of my most private business with the biggest gossip in this family by far. Who would be so idiotic as to trust you with a secret?"

This, coupled with the sting of a public-dress down, got Lucretia's temper up.

"Well, if you and your husband ever actually spoke to one another," she shot back, acidly. "Instead of always using me as the go-between, you wouldn't have to, would you?"

Walburga's face turned mottled red, she raised her wan, furious—and then disapparated without another word.

Mrs. Prewett glared at the spot her cousin had just vacated, let out a string of curses—and then sighed and turned back down the street, walking in the direction of the Leaky Cauldron. She suddenly felt she needed the fresh air.

Oh, fiddle! She shouldn't have said it to Walburga, even if it was true. They had not rowed like this since they were girls. She couldn't remember the last time she'd got Burgie's back up to such a degree that she'd disapparated in the middle of an argument.

Hopefully Walburga was right about her own temper being quick to cool, and she would calm down by tomorrow and see sense. Lucretia knew she was not the best at keeping her mouth shut—the great blabber of the Blacks, that's what Alphard had always called her—but she had been careful. Didn't Burgie realize that was the reason she'd been avoiding being alone with Papa?

And now she'd have all of Christmas Eve with him breathing down her neck.

Hopefully by then she could convince Walburga that it was not she who had tipped off her father that something was amiss in their family—it was hers and Orion's extraordinary behavior.

For days, something noticeable had slowly come over them both—and it was becoming more and more apparent to everyone else, however much Walburga denied it. Was it a change, perhaps?

No—surely not. A leopard didn't change its spots and a Black didn't change his nature—not essentially, not even if he wanted to. Lucretia couldn't do change any more than Sirius could.

The best they could do was adapt.

She wondered at her brother skipping out on his usual time at the club—and smiled to herself, tickled pink at an idea.

Perhaps 'Rion was adapting.

---

It turned out that taking an eight-year-old girl ("I'm nearly nine!") with you on an expedition, however banal, involved at least four detours and being questioned and/or whinged at twice. If he had known this he would probably not have agreed to escort Nymphadora to the lavatory, let alone down a public street. She would've been quite the handful even without the ability to change her hair bright orange and sickly green in front of the passing police constable, and by the time they made it to the telephone booth Sirius was afraid Colette would had been sent out on expedition to look for them.

"Sorry that took so long," he said, when the receiver had been handed over by the surly barkeep. "Dora dragged me off to the shop across the street and made me buy her an Aero bar, of all things. It's just about the most the crap chocolate on—"

"She's wearing a pair of my mother's earrings, Sirius."

The clipped voice on the other side of the telephone, which had not even a trace of a French accent, made his blood freez.

It was that feeling that one could only get from a woman in his family. A sort of delicate, brittle stunner to the gut.

"They're sapphires. One of a kind. They match her eyes beautifully—I suppose that's why Cissy's lent them to her—I can't think of any other reason she'd loan out a family heirloom."

She let this benign observation sink in. It did so, with the speed of a knut in wet tar.

Sirius sucked in a long, slow breath. From the other end he heard nothing but static—as if Andromeda, unlike mere mortals, did not need to breathe.

He knew the next words he spoke had to be chosen…with care.

If there was anything that was known about Sirius Black, it was that choosing anything with care was not his strong suit.

"When did you notice?"

"Oh—I don't know—I can't remember." Andromeda managed to sound bored and furious simultaneously. How did she do that? "She has a bad habit of tucking her hair behind her ear when she's nervous."

"So in other words—" Sirius kicked the corner of the telephone box. "The whole bloody time."

"More or less."

Sirius banged his forehead on the glass plate of the telephone booth and groaned.

To ask 'what had he been thinking' was to suggest he ever thought anything through before he did it. This was doubly true where Blacks were concerned.

Why had he ever thought it would be different? As far as negative expectations went, his family was fastidious about meeting them.

"Here's what's going to happen."

Andromeda's voice was a slow hiss—her mouth pressed to the receiver.

"We'll meet outside the pub. You will bring the girl back to Grimmauld Place." Damn, she probably knew everything. "I will bring Nymphadora to her grandmother's. Then you and I will have a little talk."

"I'm—in a rush," he mumbled, weakly. "I—don't have time to wait around for you to take a round trip bus ride to the East End."

"Hang the bus," she replied, placidly. "I'll apparate."

Then the receiver clicked, leaving nothing but the distant beep of a dial tone.

"Damn."

From outside the telephone booth, Nymphadora turned her hair jet black and grinned at him through the glass, toothily. He opened the door with a jerk and looked down at her—then laughed at himself. Who else could he laugh at?

"You do me a favor and grow up to be like your dad, you hear me, Dora?"

---

Hello, folks! I am, at last, back. It's been a difficult couple months, so I hope the extra long chapter makes up for the long wait. Please let me know what you think.