Chapter 1: The First Drops of Rain
July 27th, early evening, Malfoy Mansion
In an office that looked like it was participating in a wealth competition with the czar's throne room and winning, Lucius Malfoy scowled at the paper in his hand. This was of note, as Lucius Malfoy simply doesn't scowl. Firstly, it's not dignified enough, but mostly – he hadn't much of a reason to scowl – not in a few years, at least. That was true, of course, until a certain letter was delivered to him.
Lucius,
I have recently met with Arthur Weasley, (You may have seen he won the Prophet's Grand Prize Galleon Draw!) and I must confess his arguments for the Muggle Protection Act were very convincing. Apparently, the numbers you gave me were outdated! Arthur didn't blame you my good man; said you weren't the first to make that mistake. What a nice lad. Consequently, however, I was forced to withdraw the ministry's objections to the matter. I hope you understand.
Your friend and Ally,
Cornelius.
Arthur Weasley, Gryffindor's most gryffindorish griff out-manipulated me? I don't know whether I should be more disgusted or ashamed.
Sighing deeply, Lucius folded the letter and put it in a drawer. It was awfully inconvenient, but not too consequential.
Still, as always – a change in the board must dictate a new strategy.
"Dobby!"
The small elfish creature appeared with a pop.
"Yes master?" It sobbed.
"Tell Narcissa there's a change in plans. We can't go with Draco on the fifth. I will send further notice with the date. Tell her it might be on a rather… short notice. Tell her… Tell her we will discuss it upon my return."
Bowing deeply, Dobby disappeared.
Picking up his dress robes, Lucius stood and started making his way to the leaky cauldron. There he would exchange some words with unsavory individuals over the affairs of a certain family. One would notice that instead of apparating there immediately, he chose to apparate from his living room, while standing on an extravagant Persian rug.
Azkaban, July 31st, night-time
In the lowest pit of Azkaban, where two Dementors stood guard day and night, and warmth wasn't felt in over three hundred years, Sirius Black was screaming in agony. That was how the last ten years of his life looked like. Well, about most of them – the other minority in the form of a dog, and so mostly immune from Dementors.
One might wonder why he hadn't spent all his time as a dog; the level of concentration required to maintain his dog-form was nearly impossible with constant Dementor exposure. On a good day, Sirius would manage an hour or two of relief. On a bad one, only precious minutes.
There was, however, one day a year he never even attempted to revert to his Animagus. Whether it be through some law of magic or other, Sirius Black always spent the twenty-four hours of July 31st as a human.
The screams faded into silence. Sirius gasped for air, shaking on the filthy floor. Raising his head slightly, he saw one of the ten human guards outside the cell, the Dementors keeping a slight distance. Surprised he was capable of thinking such clear thoughts, Sirius coughed loudly.
"The date?" He asked.
The guard's eyebrows jumped to his receding hairline. "July 31st. Well, for a couple more minutes, anyway." He chuckled nervously. Azkaban was a monthly shift in the hit-wizards department. It was boring, and a bit unpleasant with the cold, but that's all. The prisoners should be in a state of such lunacy they're incapable of acknowledging the guards on check-ups, especially immediately after exposure to Dementors!
Harry's birthday. "Year?"
"Ni-ninety one." The hit wizard said, his voice failing slightly.
Ten years. I'm so sorry, Harry!
Sirius made a move to stand up, but he lacked the power to do so. The try was enough to frighten the guard, who took two steps backwards. Sirius raised his head again. He noticed there was something in the guard's hand.
"What… in your hand?"
Startled, the guard looked at his hands. "Oh, that's just the paper. Well last week's, they don't deliver them here obviously-"
"Can I have it?"
"The paper?" He asked. Instinctively, the guard threw it to him. Only after, has he realized what he'd done. He stood there, froze in terror for a full minute, before setting off in a quick step without looking back – resolved to never speak of what occurred here. The Dementors returned to the cell, but it seemed they were unable to lure their hostage into another nightmare. The man in question was now sitting and not lying down, his eyes affixed to the rat sitting on a young boy's shoulder. A rat with his last finger missing.
"Well, this is a rather serious discovery."
Mad laughter echoed through the cell.
A/N Notes:
Malfoy – we have to assume there was a reason he gave Ginny the diary at the start of CoS. Why her? Why then? Well, we know Lucius and Arthur hate each other, and it seems to go deeper than two sides of the war thing. We don't really know anything about the way wizard laws are written, but assuming the ministers, or directors (i.e. the executive branch of whatever government the wizards have) have a say in them (which they do in all parliamentarian methods. Whether an actual vote, or the right to speak in front of the legislative body), it's clear Arthur and Lucius would be on opposite sides of the political map. So, what if the reason Lucius gave Ginny the diary was to create a scandal around one of his political rivals? If so, it's easy to assume winning the galleon draw would change things a bit, an impromptu meeting with Fudge would speed up events that were bound to happen either way, and the "Muggle Protection Act" would pass, say, half a year earlier? And, if that were to happen, would Lucius not take the opportunity to strike back immediately?
Sirius Black – This one is a bit more of a stretch, but not anymore than the original storyline. A-Priori, and given that the events are uncorrelated, the odds the only paper Sirius ever gets will coincide with the only one that holds the information he needed are next to none. It's safe to assume there are some human guards in the prison, because it would be pretty fucking nuts to leave the Dementors there with no-one, I'm going to chalk this up to a monthly shift of the illustrious hit-wizards. And so just like in the original universe, Sirius gets his somewhat Deus-Ex-Machina moment – the realists among you can either blame Rowling or decide there's an omnipotent force that keeps making this happen on a whim, I don't really care.