Who: Sirius and Remus Where: Various areas of Hogwarts What: An illicit, moonlit meeting between everyone's favorite Marauders. Warnings: None Status: Complete
A large, black dog weaved through trees, his big black paws falling onto the soft rain-soaked earth. Its shaggy black fur was slightly matted up in drying clumps from the warm, summer rain. The dog glanced up with its bright silver eyes and sped to a lope as it caught a glimpse of the tall towers of Hogwarts through the thick foliage of the Forbidden forest. A joyful bark escaped its jaws, and its tail beat back and forth happily as it sped across the grounds.
Uncertain of whether or not Sirius Black was a wanted criminal, the dog retained its furry form as it neared the castle. It slowed slightly as it reached a huge are of where the castle wall had been blasted away. Tilting its head curiously, it neared the wreckage. A couple house elves, several goblins, and wizards wearing sturdy work robes were working on rebuilding the damage. The dog's ears drooped in a worried fashion and it trotted towards the construction scene.
One of the wizards, a young man with dark brown hair and hazel eyes glanced over at the huge, lanky dog.
The animal stopped, as if frozen by the glance, but its wariness was unnecessary, as the wizard smiled and beckoned for the canine to approach. "C'mere, boy! Do you belong to the gamekeeper? I heard he had a huge dog."
The dog's tail wagged and it opened its jaws to give the worker a canine smile. It pounced over to the man, leaning its wiry body against the man's leg affectionately.
Laughing, the worker stroked the dog's head. "You're friendly!" he said appreciatively.
"Wurf!" the dog barked happily, and then jumped onto one of the large pieces of stone beside the damaged wall.
"Whoa, now, careful there!" the worker said, but before he had a change to try to coax the animal back down, it leapt through the gap in the wall and into the hallway beyond.
With each leaping stride, its claws tapped on the stone floor. It bounded through the corridors, putting distance quickly between itself and the hole in the wall. The dog did not want to be taken back outside by a well-meaning worker.
After scaling a couple flights of stairs, and streaking through several rather empty hallways, the dog slowed to a walk. It sniffed the air, and mingles scents of many people flooded into its nostrils. However, the ones that the canine sought did not seem to be among them. The dog whined and paced up and down the hallway, a bit of frustration and worry apparent with its stiff movements.
Several floors above, a sandy-haired boy reaching for a book froze, eyes flicking to the library window. Tilting his head slightly toward the window, he stood completely still for a moment. Had he just heard a dog bark? For the first time since his arrival two decades into the future, Remus' heart swelled with relief, and his knees almost buckled with the force that it hit him: Sirius.
Almost immediately he slumped once more when the impossibility of it hit him. Sirius had undoubtedly moved on when Remus hadn't; he must be in his mid-thirties by now and well past his school days. There was no reason he would be at Hogwarts now — the idea of Sirius Black as a professor was laughably absurd. Yet Remus didn't feel like laughing at all.
He glanced at the pile of books on the table next to him. The dusty volumes, sporting titles such as Time Travel for Muggles, Theories of the Afterlife and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (the last for Remus' own comfort), seemed as forlorn and disappointed as he felt. In that moment Remus decided that he needed some fresh air.
He carefully replaced the books on their shelves — hurry was no reason to leave one's mess for someone else to clean up — but paused after replacing Shakespeare in the Fiction section, then grabbed it again and ran to Madam Pince's desk to check it out ("Ah, Mr. Lupin, I see you haven't changed," she said, offering a rare smile. "I swear you are the only student who has ever pulled this book off the shelf."). Finally, Shakespeare clutched protectively against his chest, he strode purposefully from the library.
The dog looked around the hallway hopefully as it heard some footsteps growing nearer. Its ears were perked up and silver eyes glittering. However, as the footsteps only drew away and left the dog in silence again, its head hung down sorrowfully. The dog sat down in front of a very ugly gargoyle and stared at it. It barked, but, as one would normally expect from a stone statue, nothing changed.
Remus halted again, this time on on a stairway headed to the second floor so he stumbled and had to cling to the banister for balance. The heavy book slipped from his grip; it tumbled downstairs with a series of echoing thuds, finally coming to a rest in a cloud of dust on the next to last step.
Doubling his pace and absentmindedly scooping Shakespeare into his arms, he looked around the landing for any sign of the dog. Now he was sure he'd heard a bark (Padfoot's bark, his mind supplied, but he ignored it, not daring to hope), and Sirius or no, Remus could use some companionship. He hadn't spoken to many people since his arrival in the future, just Professor McGonagall and that Draco Malfoy (suddenly he knew where he'd heard the name: Lucius Malfoy had married Sirius' cousin Narcissa straight out of school — was Draco his son?) through the journals. He would welcome anyone willing to become his friend, canine and human alike. And maybe the dog came with an owner who was not in as much of a hurry as Professor McGonagall and could give Remus some news of the twenty years he had missed.
He hurried down an empty corridor at random and was dimly aware from the stone gargoyles in the distance that he was headed toward the Headmaster's office, which he remembered visiting with terror of being expelled more than once following one of Sirius' and James' pranks.
The dog took a step forward, and slowly, it changed shape. A few moments later, a skinny form in a tattered black cloak stood in front of the gargoyle. The boy in his late teens stared down at the creature's ugly face with a pair of silver eyes. A bit of the dog lingered in the silky, but slightly matted black hair, and misleadingly innocent face. "Levitating sherbet balls!" he said in a commanding voice.
Nothing happened.
"Sugar quills…?" the boy asked a bit more timidly, with a convincing smile. "Chocolate frogs?"
Still nothing.
"Come on, open up! I have to see Dumbledore!" he said, kicking the gargoyle's stand. "OW!" Sirius hopped on one foot as he clutched the toes he had smashed into the very solid stone. "I don't have time for these games!" he stamped his foot into the ground. "If someone from the Ministry sees me, I'm done for!"
Remus' mouth went dry as he witnessed the transformation. It is! Losing his usual composure as waves of relief cascaded over him — Evidently, a tiny, wry voice in his head said, you were a lot less fine than you told McGonagall — the boy broke into a run that belied his frail, un athletic frame. "Sirius? Padfoot!"
"Moony?" he turned to look at the boy sprinting towards him. Sirius's silver eyes widened. "Merlin's pants! Moony, what happened?" He took a couple steps forward to catch Remus' shoulders to make sure that his friend did not trip. From this close distance, the strain of travel was apparent on Sirius's face. He looked tired, rather pale, and the low cut of his torn cloak revealed that his collar bones were unhealthily prominent. However, despite this, confusion and joy were written all over his face. "Did you fall into the Fountain of Youth while I was away?"
"What?" Even as Remus smiled breathlessly, bewilderment flashed into his clear blue eyes. "What are you talking about, Pads? You're as young as I —" Sobering instantly, he stepped back to take in his friend's haggard form. "You are as young as I am. You should be nearly forty, Sirius, what hap —" Pausing again, eyes narrowed slightly, he reached out a pale hand to touch Sirius' cheek. "You look terrible; what happened?"
"It's a long story," Sirius replied, a slight frown creasing his forehead as his gaze shifted out into empty space. "Parts of it I don't even understand…" He blinked and focused upon Remus again, relief and joy replacing the pensiveness. "But I'm so glad you're okay. The last time I saw you, you were battling Death Eaters. I've been so worried about you! — a-and about everyone." He added the last three words quickly, to justify the rest of his sentence, and a red tinge entered his cheeks.
Feeling his cheeks grow warm as well, Remus took a step back. "Er —" He tried to find something to say in the awkward silence that followed. Then he realized what Sirius had just said. "Hold on, Death Eaters? You — Vol — his people?" Sirius and James preferred to say "Voldemort" instead of "You-Know-Who" and frowned on those who did otherwise, but Remus wasn't as brave as they were. Normally he could muster the courage, but right now he was a bit too far out of his element. "Battling them? Sirius, my memories stop in seventh year. Would you care to update me a bit?" He paused; this story might be a tad too long for the second floor hallway. "Let's go to the common room first, actually."
"What…?" Sirius stared blankly at Remus, "You… can't remember? Anything?" He bit back the rest of his questions, and nodded. "Common room, right. Let's go." The malnourished teenager finally let his hands fall from his friend's shoulders and took a step towards the common room. He paused, and then turned back to Remus with a sheepish smile, "Do you know the password?"
"Of course, it's —" But "rock salt" had been the password twenty years ago, hadn't it? Remus blinked; the concept that the year was now 1998 seemed not to have sunk in completely yet. "Actually, I don't." Another awkward moment was prevented by the sound of his own stomach rumbling, and Remus, blushing harder, realized he hadn't eaten yet, and from the looks of him, Sirius hadn't either. "Er, shall we detour to the kitchens?"
"I couldn't think of a better place," Sirius agreed, clapping his hands together enthusiastically. "Let's go tickle some pear!"