February 16, 1979
If there was anything Sirius hated, it was sitting and waiting. It was also an order he rarely obeyed.
Which is why when Dumbledore had visited the Potter abode late that morning and given Remus the go-ahead to keep infiltrating the werewolf meetings with an additional swift but solid order for the others to stay put, Sirius had made a scene of storming up to his room, and promptly slipped out of the window.
He hadn't Disapparated, preferring instead to walk, although it was cold out. His blood was boiling, and the exercise kept him from exploding.
Once Peter had dragged him back to the Potters' house from Knockturn Alley, Sirius had spiraled, loathing himself as much as he loathed Remus for what he had done. He felt like an idiot for waiting the entire day in the Leaky Cauldron for her to show up when his fate had been sealed for a week already.
And then Remus had appeared the night before, desperate with this sudden story that Mariah had indeed been kidnapped, by Fenrir Greyback no less, and Sirius didn't know how to feel anymore. Whatever he had been picturing as they'd searched for her on Valentine's Day, it had involved Death Eaters, sometimes Kurt Lovell specifically, sometimes Lucius Malfoy, or the Lestrange brothers, but Fenrir Greyback was something else altogether. From what Sirius knew of him, he was highly dangerous, unpredictable, and ruthless. He wasn't sure he believed Remus when he had said to Dumbledore that morning that they had until the full moon to find her.
"She might be dead already," he thought to himself. Flashes of Mariah's mangled body skipped through his mind and he shook his head. Then another image, Mariah in the Shrieking Shack, as Remus had been, her bones shifting, elongating, as her skin sloughed away revealing fur. Her body scarred, face pale and tired, like Remus's in the weeks before and after a full moon. He quickened his pace. What if she was bitten? What if she became a werewolf like Remus?
"Would you still want her?" a sly voice asked in the back of his mind, and he shoved it down. He pictured Remus comforting her, two werewolves against the world, and shoved that down as well.
Remus was one of his best friends. Sirius had become an Animagus for him, along with James and Peter. He had spent years of his life training himself in Transfiguration, risking expulsion and magical mishap, out of the loyalty he felt to Remus, because Remus was one of the best people he knew. But when he really thought about it, in a rare moment when he was truly honest with himself, he had not only done it for Remus, or for James, as another one of their adventures– he had done it mostly for himself. Becoming an Animagus had been another daring escapade, a sneaky subversion of the law. Having grown up in a house so tightly restricted he felt like he could barely even breathe, every prank and rule-break had felt like an intense release. Becoming an Animagus had felt like true freedom.
Sirius tried to picture himself living with Mariah if she had indeed been bitten, helping her brew the potion every month, supporting her when she couldn't get a job, dutifully locking her away every time a full moon bloomed, but the ideas were vague, and he knew they were unrealistic. He remembered Remus at the wedding, darkly drinking and talking about the registry, and laughed despite himself. He couldn't even help the one werewolf he did know, let alone a hypothetical addition. In fact, he couldn't picture a world in which he put up with anything without personal benefit for long.
"You piece of shit, you're not good for anything, are you?" he thought dully. Remus was right. He was a selfish bastard, and it was better that he was alone.
He continued to walk for an hour or so, his mind a mush of self-loathing, rage, fear, and sadness. He hated waiting, hated the idea that Remus was the only one of them who could get any useful information. He was set to go to more werewolf meetings every day until the full moon, since the Wolfsbane Potion had to be administered daily. Sirius felt a small wave of repulsion every time he had mentioned this Liam Wilder character. The way Remus talked about him sounded way too familiar considering Sirius was certain he had never heard of him before. He was beginning to realize that there was a lot more to Remus than he had known, and it made him sad to realize that most of it seemed to have emerged only in the past year. Where had he been? He tried to remember, but thinking back, he realized the only person to have seen Remus on a regular basis had been Mariah, and that made him feel worse.
Sirius reached a busy road and had to stop, waiting for the walk signal to change. With a pang he remembered when Mariah had routinely reached her hand into the crook of his arm to stop him crossing streets in Muggle London without waiting. He had teased her, and she had protested his taunts, but she had continued to do it every time they'd gone out, unable to stop herself from making sure he stayed safe.
Sirius's vision blurred, and he blinked, feeling hot tears leave his eyes.
"Ah, fuck," he muttered, wiping them away quickly. He sniffed, and drew himself up, taking a deep breath and letting it out in a sigh that evaporated into white fog in the cold winter air. 'Keep it together,' he thought, forging ahead as the sign turned, and he crossed.
There was still a chance. Whatever the situation would be when they found her, the important thing was that they get her back alive. As long as the werewolves needed the potion, she was still alive, and as long as it was not yet the full moon, she had not yet been bitten.
They just had to find her.
A pharmacy across the road caught his eye, and he felt a spark of inspiration. Waiting on the light to cross the other way, the gears in his head began to turn.
He ducked into a small alley next to the pharmacy and Disapparated next to the bins, reappearing outside of an identical pharmacy miles away. Remaining in human form this time, he followed his mental map to the unremarkable house he had not seen since the wedding, walked up its short pathway to the front door, and rang the bell.
The door opened after a minute, and Sirius laid eyes on Emilie Delacroix for the first time in almost a year. Her dark hair was loose, and fell past her shoulders, and her grey eyes hardened as they recognized him, the corners of her mouth turning downward sharply into the familiar pout she had always worn at school.
"No," she said shortly, closing the door in his face. Sirius rolled his eyes and jabbed wildly at the doorbell, hearing the ringing echo throughout the house. A moment later the ringing stopped, and Sirius deduced that Emilie must have used a silencing charm on the bell. He rapped his knuckles on the door in a loud, fast rhythm until finally the door gave way under his knuckles and Geoff appeared in the doorway.
"Oh," he said blearily, and Sirius noticed he was wearing pyjamas.
"Make him leave!" Emilie bellowed from somewhere deeper in the house.
"Please leave," he said tiredy.
"I need a favor," said Sirius. Geoff groaned.
"I wish you'd like...slipped a note or something," he said, glancing back into the house. "We're in a bit of a state."
"There's no time," said Sirius. "Can I come in?" Geoff looked at him with some exasperation.
"Sirius…"
"You owe me, Mansfield," said Sirius. "Twice over at this point." Geoff sighed. He stepped back and let Sirius inside, closing the door quickly behind him, locking it, and tapping it with his wand. Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Oh now you lock your doors?"
"After you broke in last time? Yes, I lock my doors," said Geoff. "What do you want?"
"I need access to some records from the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures," said Sirius. Geoff raised his eyebrows so high they disappeared behind the fringe of ginger hair that had grown down over his forehead.
"Merlin, Sirius, Ministry records? That's a pretty tall ask, considering I don't work at the fucking Ministry," said Geoff. "What do you want me to do, break in?"
"But your dad used to work for that department, yeah?" pressed Sirius. "Don't you think you could pull a few strings?"
"I don't see how I can just call up my dad's workmates and ask for Ministry files," said Geoff. "Sorry, mate."
Sirius cursed, running a hand through his hair, and thinking.
"Could you still try? It's important," he said. Geoff narrowed his eyes.
"What's going on?" he asked. Sirius looked at him, pursing his lips, his eyes flicking once to the long hallway down which Emilie had disappeared earlier. He'd bet money that she was standing just out of sight, listening.
"Look. I wouldn't ask you if it wasn't important," said Sirius. "You wanted out, I'm leaving you out, but I need this." Geoff chewed his lip, thinking.
"What records?" he asked.
"Anything on Fenrir Greyback's whereabouts for the past few years. Registered addresses, employers, that sort of thing," said Sirius. Geoff raised his eyebrows again.
"Okay," he said. "You want the records for a werewolf famed for living off the grid?"
"Anything you can get your hands on," said Sirius, waving off the tone. "And anything on Liam Wilder, as well."
"Hang on, let me write this down," said Geoff, and he left Sirius, his footsteps pounding lightly up the stairs to the second floor.
Sirius sighed, his eyes wandering. He noticed for the first time that the house had lost its Spartan charm. There were stacks of clothes draped over the chairs in the dining area, and boxes stacked into the corners and against the walls. When he turned his eyes back to the hallway, Emilie had emerged, leaning against the wall.
"What are you up to?" she asked suspiciously.
"Are you moving?" asked Sirius, flipping one of the flaps on a nearby box and peering inside. He saw stacks of books inside.
"No, just selling a few things," said Emilie.
"A few?" repeated Sirius, eyeing the cluttered dining area. "I hope you saved the mattress at least."
"Stop dodging," said Emilie. "What exactly are you dragging us into?"
"Don't worry about it," said Sirius.
"Don't tell me what I should or shouldn't worry about," said Emilie, turning and rolling her eyes. Sirius noticed a pronounced curve to her figure before she crossed her arms again, and narrowed his eyes.
"Trust me, the list is so long I'd never get through it if I tried," he said dryly. "All I need is information, Delacroix, then I'll be out of your hair for good."
"Until the next time you need something," said Emilie. "If you come back here again, I'll hex you so hard you won't remember where your own house is, let alone ours." Sirius rolled his eyes.
"Shall I just…" he headed up the stairs after Geoff without waiting for a response. Glancing inside each room at the top, he saw Geoff in the room they had spoken in when he had broken in after the wedding, only there was no furniture anymore. Geoff was crouched on the ground, writing on the back of a used scrap of parchment.
"Anyone else?" he asked. "Or should I just ask her to pull the entire registry?"
"Can you?" asked Sirius. Geoff laughed indulgently and got to his feet.
"Look, I haven't spoken to any of my parents' friends since the funeral except Claire, so just temper your expectations," he said. Sirius felt the knot in his stomach pull painfully, and shook his head.
"No, I can't, mate. It's life or death," he said. "I need those records." Geoff stared at him.
"You're really serious," he said, frowning. "What's going on?"
"You wanted out, what do you care?" countered Sirius hotly. Geoff stepped closer.
"I thought you said I didn't get to be out," he said quietly, so that it did not carry.
"Oh you're listening to me now?" said Sirius, raising an eyebrow. "What's changed your mind?"
Geoff opened his mouth, but didn't say anything. He clenched his teeth, and finally said, "The world's not getting any safer the longer we stay here."
Sirius regarded him evenly.
"Does Delacroix know how you feel?" he asked. "Because she still seems a little extra hostile."
"She's just worried," said Geoff. "We both are."
Sirius narrowed his eyes. Glancing around the empty office, then back to Geoff, he chanced a question. "How far along is she?"
Geoff hesitated, but his face reddened. "Two months," he said shortly. Sirius nodded grimly.
"Congratulations," he said finally.
"Thanks, it's a nightmare," said Geoff. "But we're very happy."
"I can see that," said Sirius, gesturing at the bare room. "Two teens cut off financially from their families, selling their furniture and clothes to pay for a baby. No wonder Emilie's on the verge of manslaughter. As a fellow pureblood outcast, welcome to the club."
"So are you going to tell me what's going on or aren't you, Sirius?" asked Geoff. Sirius's humor disappeared, and he thought for a long moment before responding.
"Mariah's been taken, we think," he said finally. "We need to find her."
"Shit," muttered Geoff. "Okay. I'll do what I can. When do you–"
"Yesterday," said Sirius. Geoff nodded.
"I'll try to get something by next week," he said. "Tuesday."
"Monday night," said Sirius. Geoff shrugged.
"I'll try," he said.
"Thanks," said Sirius. He sighed, feeling a small amount of relief. He felt reassured with his own plans in motion. At least then he wouldn't be completely useless.
"It'll be alright, Sirius," said Geoff, watching him. Sirius glanced up at him, recognizing the hope he had felt two days previously that had long since disappeared in his own mind.
"Of course it will," he said, forcing a smile.
