A/N: Huge thank you for all the reviews, favorites and follows from the last chapter! And big thanks to lanamarymack for alpha/beta reading this chapter. You can find me on tumblr (nauticalparamour) where I post sneak peeks, story updates and answer questions.
Please let me know what you thought of chapter twenty-two and be on the lookout for chapter twenty-three soon!
Once Sirius had finally accepted that she really was who she said she was, it was clear that he wanted to spend more and more time with her. They began carving out time in their busy schedules to meet up in the Room of Requirement, away from prying eyes, so they could talk about everything and anything. It eventually got to the point that she only needed to catch his eye across the Great Hall during dinner to know that he wanted to speak with her.
Hermione was happy to talk to him whenever he wanted. Even though he wasn't the same Sirius she knew from the future, their time spent together was still enough that he eased the ache and felt like home. And, when he was here and so lively and so young, it was easy for Hermione to forget that he was dead in the future that she came from.
Their meetings increased until they were spending a night or two a week with one another, lasting until curfew and they would have to go their separate ways, despite Sirius's promises that he knew the Head Boy and he could get out of any punishment that they were given.
Sometimes, they spoke about his friends. Hermione often wondered what they thought that he was up to when he was sneaking off. "Don't you worry that they are going to discover that you are spending time with the enemy?" she teased, knowing that they had famously not gotten off on the right foot.
"I think that James already knows, if I'm honest," Sirius admitted, running a hand across the back of his neck. "But, I think he respects that it's a family issue. He never pushed me too much about Regulus either. I guess, since he's an only child, or maybe he just doesn't think that he could understand."
"But he wouldn't be mad at you, that you were talking to me?" Hermione asked, cautiously. The last thing that she wanted was to create some sort of rift between Sirius and James, knowing that the Potters would need a dependable friend in the coming years.
Sirius sighed. "I think he expects that I'll explain it all, eventually, once I'm ready," he said. "We've always understood each other like that."
Sometimes Hermione even cautiously broached the topic of their family. There were still so many hurt feelings between Sirius and the rest of the Blacks that sometimes it felt completely hopeless. He simply could not accept that his parents had regrets about how things had happened, no matter how many times Hermione tried to tell him that they all missed him. "Fine, even if you don't want to speak to Mother and Father again, could you at least see some path to speaking with Regulus?" she begged. "He misses you, too, you know?"
"I thought that he was quite happy with all his new friends," Sirius said with a sneer on his face that looked far too familiar for her liking. "He's hanging out with Snivelous and all the other little dark magic acolytes."
"I've got him to agree never to take the Mark," Hermione revealed, proudly.
"Careful, or he'll drop you when he discovers that you are a blood traitor, sister or not," Sirius warned, obviously still feeling a certain way about how things had gone down between the brothers.
"Regulus has been a lovely brother to me this whole time. And, I haven't exactly made myself easy to like, I'm sure," she snapped, wishing that Sirius could see the way that things had changed. "I think he's come to realize that maybe Voldemort isn't all that he's been led to believe."
Those conversations were always tough because it meant that they usually parted ways upset with one another, but they always came back a few days later when cooler heads prevailed and they could apologize to one another.
Sometimes, he questioned her about her friends, like the pretty Elvira Bliss — who Hermione informed him was heavily involved with Angus at the moment — and Priscilla Fawley — who Hermione wondered if her attentions could be swayed to another Black brother instead of Regulus.
"What's going on between you and Baby Lestrange?" he asked one evening, trying to sound casual, his eyes focused on the book that he'd plucked off of the shelf in the Room's approximation of the Black Family Library (she'd gotten there first and had picked the locale).
"Baby Lestrange? Rabastan?" Hermione asked, her voice pitching up half an octave or two. "Nothing is going on between us. We are just... well not even friends, I don't think. He's Regulus's friend. Sometimes we revise in the library."
"Uh huh," Sirius said, his grey eyes making it entirely too clear that he didn't believe one word of what she was saying. "He seems to spend an awful lot of time revising with you, walking you from classes, back to the Common Room, in the Common Room."
"Okay, okay, I get it," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "Have you been spying on me? Are you watching me on the Map?"
"How do you know about the Map?" Sirius demanded.
"Oh please, I'm from the future, remember?" Hermione said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Stop avoiding the question. Have you been spying on me?"
"Maybe a little!" he huffed, annoyed at having to admit it. "And I don't think of it as spying, just like... watching out for you, okay? Like, if someone is going to be sniffing around my baby sister then I—"
Hermione couldn't help herself. She lunged over at him and wrapped Sirius in a tight hug, too pleased that he was acknowledging her as his sister. It was all so complicated, but to know that in the past, where she literally had no one, to know that the Black family had taken her under their wing so completely, it made things not seem so dire and terrible. Before she realized it, she was tearing up. "Thank you," she said, her words muffled by his chest.
Sirius stood stunned for a moment, but eventually he wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug. "Well, of course," he said. "I just want to make sure that... that you are alright. And I suppose that Lestrange isn't the worst of them, if you have to pick one of those idiots."
She pulled back, laughing, wondering if he knew just how right he was about those words. "Well, you don't have to worry about Rabastan," she reassured him, her smile slowly turning into a frown. "He thinks that I'm stubborn and that I have poor judgment and... yeah, I think that he only tolerates me because I'm Regulus's sister. And well, maybe he does feel a little pity for me after all that stuff with Rosier."
Hermione recognized her mistake as soon as the words left her mouth. "All that stuff with Rosier?" he asked, his voice deadly serious. "What exactly do you mean, Hermione?"
"It's not a big deal, Sirius, honest," she said, hoping that she wouldn't have to have this conversation with him, too.
"If it's not a big deal, you should have no problem telling me," he said, looking at her significantly. "What did Rosier do?"
"He was at our Yule party. I guess I drank too much and he got me outside by myself and well..." she trailed off, seeing how upset he was looking. "He didn't actually do anything, I swear, but he was going to try to. Rabastan found us before anything could happen."
Sirius exploded into a rage. "That fucking idiot!" he seethed, before he made a lunge for the door. "I am going to kick his sorry ass!"
She got in front of him, needing to head him off before he did something rash. "Sirius, Sirius, that's all in the past," she said, grabbing onto the front of his wrinkled, white uniform shirt. "Listen, Father already handled things and so did Regulus. And then, so did I, the other week. It's been handled."
She could still see the fury plainly written on his face, but he did calm himself a bit. "I suppose if there is one thing our family is good at, it's getting even," he grit out, though she could tell that his mind was still racing a mile a minute. "How was he handled?"
"I don't know specifics," she admitted, thinking about how they tried not to involve her. "I know Father was upset about him spreading rumors about me being Alphard's love child, too. He heard from his father. He challenged Regulus in a duel a few weeks ago, though, and I stepped in. Let's just say, I don't think that he will be bothering me anymore."
Sirius sighed and ran his hand across his face. "That's not fucking good enough if he tried to duel Regulus," he said, anger still radiating off of him. "I should still kick his sorry ass, for even thinking about touching you."
Hermione couldn't help but smile at his protective nature, out in full force, when only a few months ago, she was certain that he detested her. "I appreciate the offer, Sirius, but I think it's fine," she said. "Besides, school is almost over for the summer and by next year, I am sure all of this will be behind us."
He looked at her like he didn't entirely believe her words, but he wasn't going to fight her on it. "If you insist, but Hermione, you have to promise to tell me if he starts bothering you again," he ordered, taking this whole big brother thing seriously.
"I promise," she said, gripping his hand tightly in her own.
He let out a deep breath, trying to calm himself. "So, the Marauders Map still exists in your time then?" he asked, hoping to get things on a happier track.
Hermione smiled at him. "Yes, and James's Invisibility Cloak — yes, I know about that, too, so don't even think about trying to use that to trick me either," she said with a smile. "Honestly, I was against it at first, but after a while, I could admit that it was a really brilliant bit of magic."
"Of course it was," Sirius said with a smirk. "I made it."
"I was led to believe that Remus was the mastermind behind most of the Charms work," Hermione countered with a grin of her own.
"So you and Harry used the Map to sneak around the castle, huh?" he asked, sounding somewhere between awe and pride. "God, I wish I could tell James this sort of stuff."
Sirius loved to hear her talk about Harry and all the fun things that they got up to. He would even listen to the danger he was frequently put in by the various adults in his life and when he was under threat from Voldemort. Even though he knew what happened, he didn't like to focus too much on what happened to Lily and James. It made him moody and upset.
"Say, I just realized, you never really talk about Pete," he said with a frown. "Don't tell me my other friend is dead, too. Everyone in my life has a target on their back."
Hermione grimaced. She knew that this conversation was bound to happen eventually, but she wasn't looking forward to it one bit. "I have to tell you something about Peter," she said, looking down in her lap. She wasn't sure what his reaction was going to be, but there was basically zero chance that this would go over well.
"He's dead?" Sirius asked, his face falling when he saw how serious she became.
She shook her head back and forth. "You know how I told you that people assumed you were the Potters' secret keeper and you sold them out?" she asked. "Well, you guys figured that everyone would assume that. And, so, you talked them into using someone else as their secret keeper."
Sirius blinked a few times as the words set in, but then realization came over his face. His other friend had sold out Lily and James to Voldemort. Hermione thought that his anguished cry would haunt her forever. Unsure of what to do, she wrapped her arms around him tightly, holding him in place.
"I'm so sorry, Sirius," she whispered again and again, until he was trying to stand up, wanting to leave the Room of Requirement.
"I'll fucking kill him before he gets the chance!"
"You can't!" Hermione said. "At least, not yet. I have no idea when he became a Death Eater. There is a chance that you could keep him off of that path. And now you know that he can't be the secret keeper for the Potters. But, you can't just kill him now. He hasn't betrayed anyone yet. And he may never betray anyone."
Sirius pushed himself from her hold and began pacing back and forth in front of the fireplace. "But I know he has a betrayer inside him. I should still kill him before he gets the chance," he begged.
"By all means, if he becomes a Death Eater, kill him," Hermione said. "But you can't just kill him now. He's just a student, scared like all the rest of us. And I can't have you go to Azkaban again. I need you here." She wrapped her arms around his middle, unwilling to let this Sirius go. It would hurt too much to lose him again.
"Fuck, how do you do this?" he asked, tears shining in his eyes when he realized how restrained he really was. "You have so much knowledge, but you have to be judicious and wait for the right time. How do you decide what to do? I can't stand it. I feel like I'm going insane."
Hermione swallowed over the lump in her throat. "I suppose I know that everything I know from the future can change in an instant. One small change that I make could have huge ripples and I have to think about it carefully. There is no sense in being rash, Sirius. It's over three years off. We have time to figure it out."
"Merlin, I hope you are right," he said, resigned to do as he was told — for now.