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              It starts with a hurried, desperate, “do you have anywhere to go?”, one hand fisted in Buckbeak’s mane and the other clutched tightly in his godsons’; the gauntness to his pup’s face nearly a match for a decade of Azkaban.

And it wouldn’t have gone anywhere, but Sirius has spent all year watching what has happened to his pup, catching up on what he has missed, and he was too distracted with Peter then to dwell on it but Albus never ordered him a trial, and Sirius is a Black, born a Black, bred a Black, trained a Black. He’s hidden so successfully behind pranks and smirks that those who knew him have forgotten – but it isn’t a happy thing to realize, and Sirius had known the minute his cell door clanged shut.

So hours later, lesser a drop of blood, he steps into the molding remains of his childhood home. He’s half a plan in mind, a prickling terror of what is to come haunting his steps, and the faint memory of a woman he once called sister saying it’s more cathartic to tear it down, isn’t it echoing in his ears.

There is a muted pop as the door snicks shut softly behind him, and Sirius finds himself staring down at the wretched remains of his mother’s favorite house elf.

“You.”

Childhood resentment and petulant rage have already consumed him once this night, cost him Peter and his freedom. Sirius does not enjoy being an adult, but he is no longer a priority. Harry is.

“She ordered you away from me, didn’t she? Raised by a house elf wasn’t good enough for her perfect firstborn.” He still asks, can’t help himself.

Kreacher had never raised a hand against him, never cursed him or starved him or refused to serve him in favor of the rest of his family. Sirius’ hatred of the elf had come from omissions. Kreacher had hugged Regulus and soothed his injuries, snuck him snacks and ushered him out of the room and lied for him –

And Sirius had loved Kreacher for that, for protecting Regulus, as much as he had hated the elf for not doing the same for him.

His childhood had featured prominently during his time in Azkaban; he’s had years to examine every inch of his life down to the quick.

Kreacher gives a slow, wary incline of his head. And that’s enough. Has to be - has to be, for his pup’s sake.

“Seal Regulus’ room for me. I’m – I’m going to gut this place and I don’t want to…I don’t trust myself not to slip.”

“What does Master think he be planning?” Kreacher asks sharply, squinting, but some tension in the ancient elf’s wizened frame eases, and Sirius lets himself sag against the entryway wall.

“I named Harry Potter my heir, Kreacher. Dumbledore had me imprisoned without trial, on false charges, and sent Heir Black to live with muggles who’ve done nothing but mistreat and abuse him since.”

Kreacher’s rage is a slow thing; so different from what Sirius is familiar with, but recognizable all the same, like the receding tide foretelling disaster. Sirius savors it, that it matches the fury simmering in his own bones.

“And what does Master be doing to fix that?” Kreacher asks icily, as it if it is all on Sirius’ head, and maybe he’d protest and bristle and snarl at the insinuation – but it is. Not the blame, Sirius isn’t quite that far gone – but the fixing of it falls on him, and only him, and that is a burden he will take up willingly.

So he speaks.

X

The crux of it is, Dumbledore wants Sirius alive. Likely for his resources – Harry might be heir, but Sirius isn’t sure anyone knows that with Cissa’s kid running around, and the House of Black doesn’t just give itself over to an heir; it’s a process. There’s no guarantee that Harry would succeed without Sirius there to guide him, and Harry could not start that process with Sirius still breathing.

Sirius has a bargaining chip, is the point.

It’ll be a place, he thinks. Someplace secure. Dumbledore wants Harry brought to heel; what better way than to offer him sanctuary with the only man with the right to save him from his muggles? A base through which Dumbledore can parade his Order, a cage through which Dumbledore can keep an eye on Sirius.

So – Grimmauld. Sirius hates the place. Sacrificing it in a long con to snag his pup back is going to be nothing. He’ll remodel it, tear everything out of it, strip it bare. There will be no House of Black resources for Dumbledore to pilfer with his sticky little fingers when Sirius is done with the place, and Dumbledore will have no choice but to accept the gracious offer with a smile.

The best part is; it’s public. Grimmauld Place is the House of Black, synonymous to the wizarding world thanks in no small part to Walburga’s pride in the place and Orion’s mismanagement of the House itself. The only other property known to belong to the House of Black is Castle Black, where Grandfather lived, and even that’s uncertain – Sirius doesn’t even know if the place is still standing.

Grimmauld will, of course, be a decoy.

Sirius will need to sneak into Gringotts, again. He’d claimed his Lordship the first time, when he’d snagged enough funds for Harry’s broom. This time he’ll order an accounting of the Black properties. If there are none suitable, he’ll buy a muggle place and get to work.

Black wards are some of the best in the business; it was what got his family labelled Dark in the first place. They were so good at hiding things, protecting things, hoarding things –

“You wants to be letting blood traitors into the house.” Kreacher says flatly. Sirius almost protests, but –

“Uh, yeah. I guess.”

“Kreacher not be liking them.”

“As long as you do not actively try to kill them I do not care what you do to them. You are not beholden to them.” Sirius says, and that seems to mollify the old elf.

“Theys be staying out of Kreacher’s kitchen.”

“Of course.”

Kreacher nods, and looks around the sitting room – choked in dust and filth, curtains buzzing faintly with the dull pitch of doxie wings.

“Kreacher be ignoring the house while Master be gone.”

“I can see that.”

“Master not be asking why.”

“If you want to tell me, you will.”

Kreacher’s gaze is sharp, cutting, and Sirius is struck by just how intelligent this elf is, just how deeply this elf has had to bury that to survive his mother’s wand, his father’s hand, his grandfather’s inattention. Arcturus hadn’t physically harmed his elves, not like Walburga and Orion, but he certainly hadn’t trusted them – and there was only one solution for a servant his paranoia told him had gone rogue.

Kreacher stands, heaves himself out of the armchair he’d perched on like his bones are lead, and gestures with one long, spindly finger. Sirius follows; down the hall, up the stairs, all the way to Regulus’ room. An inkling takes root just before Kreacher opens the door, and he sucks in a sharp, painful breath, and then Kreacher is stepping into a room preserved in time and there, lying on the bed –

X

“Draught of Living Death.” Kreacher says gravely, stroking a strand of Regulus’ hair back from his face.

“This whole time?” Sirius whispers. He’s squeezing his brother’s limp, cool hand in his own so tightly he thinks Reg’s bones are creaking, but he can’t –

“No. Kreacher be trying to – fix. Kreacher wakes Master Regulus for treatments. But the Mark be getting dark. Kreacher ran out of time.”

Elf magic was powerful – could have likely undone Voldemort’s brand on its own, if it wasn’t for –

Sirius freezes.

“Kreacher, Reg told me he cast the spell in parseltongue.”

Kreacher looks up at him, mouth pressed into a thin line.

“Kreacher not be having access to a parselmouth.”

“Yes, you do. Harry is a parselmouth.”

It’s disconcerting, to see hope bloom on the elf’s face like something foreign; to feel the decade-long hole in Sirius’ heart where Reg had once sat throb anew, but it’s also – wonderful.

X

They hit the house like a whirlwind.

Technically, all Sirius is doing is moving the seat of the House of Black to a different property. This makes this incredibly easy for Kreacher; until Sirius gets to Gringotts, he contents himself with packing up the entirety of the house and stuffing the antiques and cursed objects and books and heirlooms into the attic.

Sirius waffles for about three seconds in the suddenly-bare foyer, bare save the pile of dead doxies and dust Kreacher had left behind, still feeling the oppressive weight of his mother’s shouting echoing in the empty room, and decides – wards.

Kreacher has to lead him to the wardstone, buried deep beneath the house, beneath the basement, located directly beneath a ritual room. Sirius thanks him awkwardly, hesitates for a moment, and then sinks down cross-legged behind the obsidian spire jutting out of the hard-packed dirt floor.

It comes back to him slowly, like syrup or honey, sweet and easy. He puts his hands on the wardstone’s surface, and closes his eyes, and sinks into the familiar pattern of meditation, and falls deeper and deeper and deeper until he is opening himself and –

Hours he spends, simply connecting to the generations of family wards layered and twisted and tangled around the stone. Simply learning the feel of it, the taste, the pattern, recognizing every spell and ritual and enchantment.

It’s – warm. Merlin, it’s warm. Welcoming. This is family magic in the purest sense, sharp and deadly and protective, and it surges at him, drags him closer, pulls him under. Presses itself against his fingertips until it has worn grooves in his memory, eager that he know it just as well as it knows him, and Sirius had expected a hundred thousand things but not this, never this, never love from the House of Black –

He sees his parents’ contributions. Not a rotting heart, or open lesion, not as he’d so long imagined it to be – but instead a thin layer of scum caked over the top of the wards.

All she’d done to him, and to Regulus, and Walburga’s poison wasn’t even worth the effort it takes to peel it away. It comes free like dried muggle glue, all in one slow, long drag. He’s reminded of peeling the stuff off of James’ great-great-great-great grandfather’s desk with Lily, cringing at James’ horror at all the glitter and mess craft night had resulted in –

His parents’ spells dissolve into nothing, without the family magic to feed from. The knot of wards beneath them shift, go lax, and when Sirius reaches out they begin to untangle easily, eagerly at his touch.

It’s easy, after that. So easy that when he comes back to himself, to his body, he finds himself wrung-out and sobbing, the familiar hollow of starvation aching in his gut and a disapproving Kreacher looming over him.

It takes him a couple days to recover. Kreacher makes him struggle upstairs to his own bed, but is kind enough to feed him while his magical core adjusts to its brand-new connection to the Grimmauld wards and the family magics in general.

The house feels – lighter. Stronger. Steadier. More like a home than a prison.

They don’t talk about it, but Kreacher never lets Sirius go down there alone again.

X

“Kreacher not be letting you destroy it.”

“I’ll destroy the wall. And then you can put her up in the attic. When we find the new place, we’ll set up a Hall of Portraits, or make one if there isn’t one there already.”

Kreacher squints suspiciously at him.

“Portraits are made to share information. She’s evil and insane, but who knows – she might know something we’ll need later.” About Voldemort, he doesn’t say, but Kreacher rocks back a little on his heels and suddenly looks a hell of a lot less threatening.

“Master be promising?”

“On my magic.”

“…Kreacher finds this acceptable.”

X

Regulus’ wand is like coming home; Kreacher pointedly looks away when Sirius sobs over the feel of it, that twist of loyalty not even Walburga had ever been able to untie between them.

Reg’ll need it back, when he wakes up. But for now – for now – it’s happy to work with him.

X

Some blood runes applied to the edges of the property later, atop where time and disrepair has washed them away, and Grimmauld is – ward-wise – back to its nigh-impenetrable state once again. Sirius lets himself be satisfied for all of three seconds before he throws himself back into it.

He has no idea what has been going on in the outside world, and he doesn’t like heading to Diagon blind, but he doesn’t really have a choice. Kreacher pops him into Knockturn just to be safe; a mangy dog goes unnoticed as he skates through the dim shadows edging the alley, to the less-reputable entrance Gringotts keeps for its creature clientele.

His account manager all but vibrates as he hurries Sirius into his office. He’s hardly able to transform back into a man before the goblin is barking out updates – Sirius’ only other instruction, at his last visit, had been to invest.

He’s there an hour before he can even ask for a property list; Grimjaw sneers and hands him an already-prepared full accounting of every Black property and Vault.

“You are making moves.”

“I’m going to – I don’t know if he’s authorized yet, but if not consider this permission – if my house elf, Kreacher, shows up, he’s to be given access as he sees fit. I’m still…” Sirius waves vaguely in the direction of the Ministry.

“As your agent.” It’s not asked, but it is a question – a properly authorized agent has much more freedom than someone granted mere access.

“He’ll need the protection.” Sirius affirms, and then pulls the accounting onto his lap.

The first folder includes a neat, brief overview of all of the House of Black’s holdings. Grimjaw hands him a quill; Sirius ticks any property mentioned to have a pre-existing structure with purple ink.

“I’ll need a map.”

“It will cost you.”

“I’d expect nothing else.” Sirius says flatly, and earns a flash of fang for his troubles.

Grimjaw withdraws directly from his vault; he’s given a scroll of parchment depicting a live-updating map, imbued with charms allowing for zooming in and out, depicting every black property in relation to each other. There are quite a few foreign properties; tempting, but Sirius doubts his ability to get Harry out of the country.

There are, however, just as many within Britain, and some of them are very well positioned. Sirius stares at them blankly for a moment, and then blinks, and looks up at his account manager.

“Can I rent your services as a personal shopper?”

“I am insulted.”

“I’ll pay triple the hourly rate, and I’m not going to ask you to get anything illegal.”

Grimjaw goes for the battle axe, but acquiesces when Sirius points out he can’t go get an owl as-is, and he can’t communicate with Grimjaw properly without one.

Any other goblin would’ve run him through, but Grimjaw is just as mercurial as Sirius remembers him being; he demands a list and leaves promptly.

And, sure, he comes back with way more shit than Sirius had asked for, but it isn’t like he doesn’t have the money to burn.

X

Kreacher is pleased by the potions ingredients and owl – a secure owl, the kind that cannot be tracked or avoided thanks to a sizeable sum paid out directly to Gringotts – but less pleased by the assorted clothing, newspapers, ancestral wands from the Vaults, and books. It’s more stuff, and the attic is already full to bursting. Sirius allays the elf’s irritation by spreading out his brand-new map on the foyer’s floor, after vanishing the dust and dead doxies, and asking for his input.

They narrow it down to six properties. Six properties Sirius will need to visit in-person. He will restore the wards on all six of them, choose his favorite, and make that the new seat of the House of Black. The other five will be cleaned up as back-ups, safehouses, and insurance too, but the priority is to get the first property handled so he can finish clearing out Grimmauld.

He’ll wait until Dumbledore approaches him and asks before giving the property up – it’d be suspicious otherwise – but he doesn’t want to get caught with his pants around his ankles. The sooner this is all set, the better.

 “I’ll start checking them out tomorrow. Do you want to apparate me there, or would you rather stay here? If you do, I can make my way back. I’ll need to pick up some muggle stuff to start in on the proper remodel.”

Spelling out what he intends to do doesn’t come easy to him, but it helps so fucking much with Kreacher; and Kreacher reciprocates, which Sirius appreciates – they do not trust each other, not quite yet. They are not yet at the point where movement, where action, without forewarning does not instinctively cause panic.

“Kreacher can be doing that.” The elf says, studying the map intently. Sirius does too.

The properties they have chosen are isolated. Three of them are located in hidden space in the wilds around Britain. Two are located on the outskirts of small, rural towns. One is in London – dangerous, but Sirius is inclined to think no one will consider them staying close. Although that property would be much more constraining than the others, in all likelihood – too risky to be spotted out and about.

All are reported to have standing structures, some more than one. Grimjaw has included acreage, both for the muggle space the property consumes and the true size encapsulated by the wards. Sirius has no other information on them.

“I’m going to write Harry. See…how he’s doing. If he can respond.”

Kreacher’s ears twitch upwards by half a degree. Sirius suppresses a smile.

Kreacher hasn’t asked. Not yet. But Sirius has noticed how intently he pays attention, when Sirius mentions his pup.

“Master be doing that.” Kreacher says firmly, and then forcibly ushers him out of the room.

X

The first property is a cottage. It takes Sirius three hours to fix the wards there, and another to strengthen them enough to match Grimmauld. The cottage itself is in pretty bad shape, completely unmodernized even by wizarding standards, and small. It’s on a good-sized chunk of land, though, and the stone wall surrounding the house serves as a secondary ward, and the space between that wall and the cottage itself bears the ancient remains of a very nice garden – they’d be able to produce most of their own food.

There’s a well, too. Sirius takes another two hours to get that in working order – re-establishing the purification, safety, and cleansing charms faded out of the stone – and calls it a day.

He hits four muggle stores on his way back, heavily glamoured and disillusioned all the while. When he gets back to Grimmauld, he’s too keyed-up to sleep, so he unpacks his purchases and, Regulus’ wand humming contentedly all the while, gets to work on the flooring.

He uses some spells Lily had suggested, way back when. Spells he makes up as he goes – not a smart move considering the potential consequences, but Sirius is still that impulsive Gryffindor he’s always been – or repurposes for new use. He leaves shiny, freshly waxed boards in his wake, and has to take a moment to be fervently thankful he isn’t going to have to remove any carpet.

Kreacher drugs his coffee, when the elf finally gets up, and Sirius wakes eighteen hours later to find that Kreacher has finished the first floor’s flooring and is taking over the entire project from him.

“I want it lighter, though, not depressing like this place always has been!”

“Kreacher be knowing that!”

“No but – Kreacher, I trust your taste and judgement- “ a lie, but like most household elves Kreacher does have a better eye for color and style than Sirius ever will – “- but if Dumbledore’s going to buy this, I need the place to look very different. Like I am spitting in the face of the House of Black. It’s gotta be colorful.”

Kreacher takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly, and nods stiffy.

“Kreacher be picking up some red.” He says, spits the word out like poison, and apparates away. His protests about going into muggle shops had apparently been entirely based upon his ignorance of what to get; now that Sirius has brought back a goddamn mess of renovation material Kreacher is apparently satisfied with going out on his own.

Sirius sulks throughout his breakfast, but admits it is probably for the best. He’ll have more time to work on the other properties; and Kreacher won’t try to kill him for ruining Grimmauld.

He leaves before Kreacher gets back, and heads for the London property.

These wards are twice as complex as the cottage’s to compensate for the close press of muggles and the greater dangers of discovery, which tells him this had been someone else’s secret safehouse once, too. Sure enough, the property is like Grimmauld – a brownstone swallowed up into wizarding space, disappearing between its two muggle neighbors. It had been muggle built, he thinks – the interior had never been finished. Instead the whole goddamn place is packed to the gills with ancient, thankfully preserved, illegal potions ingredients of the magical creature variety. Someone was smuggling shit in.

This, Sirius thinks, is delightful. All of this shit is illegal to get nowadays without proper permits at best, and the quantities are massive. The things he can brew with this…

Despite their complexity, the wards are in much better shape and only take a few hours to sort out, reinforce, and examine. Sirius checks the brownstone thoroughly and catalogs all his finds. Why his ancestor didn’t just go out and buy a warehouse is beyond him; it’s hard to maneuver between towering stacks of vials and packages.

Given that the property was never fully finished, at least on the interior, it’ll be a bitch and a half to get in working order – connecting to muggle water lines, electricity, and the like – especially through the wards. But once he has a different place to store all the ingredients, it will work out very nicely, assuming he and Harry are content staying inside all the time.

Maybe he can discreetly purchase a next-door property, he thinks, and then immediately shelves the thought for later, and locks the property up.

X

The third property is a whole goddamn manor, the prior seat of power of some now defunct bloodline that the House of Black had conquered. Probably kept it as a trophy, Sirius thinks, because the wards are a hot fucking mess.

The previous family’s magic has been entirely hostile towards whatever Black came in and warded overtop of it; the place is hidden, but only because Sirius’ ancestor had either been a genius or a dumbass and chosen wardrunes that worked well with conflicting base layers.

It takes Sirius two fucking days to get the old family magic to properly integrate into the Family Black’s, to soothe the fury there and establish rightful command of the property’s wardstones.

It takes another three to sort out, rework, redo, and re-layer everything. He’s got a fairly powerful framework to work with, else the time would extend into weeks instead of days, but Sirius hasn’t had to do work this detailed or precise since before Azkaban, and he works slowly, triple-checks himself, and shakes with the rush of adrenaline and anxiety and satisfaction the work gives him.

He spends a week recovering at Grimmauld before Kreacher will let him go back, and Sirius can finally properly explore the place.

His conquering ancestors had never lived here, and they’d never gutted the place after taking it – instead, he thinks they’d used it as storage; every room in the manor looks more like a goddamn vault than a proper home, all cursed and dark artifacts, and why is his family so fucking bad about hoarding –

He finds the manor’s library late one afternoon, bathed in honey-gold light, and freezes, because these are the books left here by the manor’s original family, and every single one of the books stored openly and displayed publicly are on the art of mind magics.

Occlumency. Shit.

“I found our new home.” Sirius says in greeting when he gets back. Kreacher casts him a slow, sidelong look from where he is stretched up on his tip-toes on a stool in front of the stove, and Sirius lets himself flop boneless over the counter.

“Master be making Kreacher’s counters filthy.”

“Gonna have to teach the pup occlumency, aren’t I? And fix my own shit. Merlin. The – sorry. The manor. Whoever owned it before were experts in mind magics. Reminded me about it.”

“Master been avoiding it.” Kreacher says sagely, and Sirius blinks.

“Really?”

“Master been doing a very fine job ignoring the bad place. Master been staying clean and gaining weight. But Master not be healing.”

Aw, shit.

“In my defense, my mental health has always been shit.”

“Master’s permanent defects are no excuse.” Kreacher sniffs, and Sirius can’t even bring himself to be mad.

He has been, he realizes. Ignoring it. Like he had when hunting for Pettigrew. That means a breakdown is long overdue, which is not super great.

“How’s Grimmauld going?”

“Kreacher be done with the second floor. Master be needing to help pick through the vaults and properly furnish it, now.” Kreacher sounds horrifyingly gleeful at that prospect. Frankly, Sirius is too.

He might’ve bucked all the high-society pureblood nonsense of his childhood, but the joy he’s going to get out of only providing the bad furniture, uncursed sure but wobbly or fucked up or stained or unsightly, to the man responsible for his imprisonment is just –

“Mind if I look around?”

“Kreacher not be changing anything, but Master is welcome to marvel.”

Sirius barks out a laugh and pushes himself up, and trips the minute he steps out of Kreacher’s kitchen – it hasn’t changed much, beyond the stone lightening a few degrees after liberal use of cleaning charms.

Kreacher’s done the halls in a pale green. The foyer is burgundy. A sitting room is a cheerful, pale yellow. Spring shades. Warm oak and beige on the stairs, navy and black wood in the dining hall. Every room is a different color, themed, and bare of all fixtures or furniture. But none of the colors clash with the floor – the same throughout the house – or with each other, where they blend together.

Upstairs is much the same; Sirius gapes at the neutral colors in emptied-out bedrooms; he remembers these rooms as cramped and dark, unwelcoming at best and threatening at worse. Even Regulus’ room has been redone, though it hasn’t been emptied out; Kreacher’s done the walls in a soft grey. His still-comatose brother looks less like a corpse thanks to the change, and Sirius tucks himself into Regulus’ side and breathes.

The whole damn place is unrecognizable. It’s hard to wrap his head around, even if he’d been the one to come up with the idea.

It’s nice.

X

The easy solution would be to move the furniture from the manor into Grimmauld, but Sirius is a paranoid bastard and Kreacher’s also leery of possible identification issues that might arise from it. Very little of the furniture that was in Grimmauld is useable, given the whole best face forward shtick purebloods have – it’s too nice, a family heirloom, not something Sirius can be willing to lose if he wants to keep Kreacher’s goodwill.

Kreacher decides to make a trip to the vaults, and orders Sirius to go check out the other properties – Kreacher doesn’t want him working on his occlumency alone, given the whole…situation.

He agrees because he actively wants to avoid his issues.

The fourth property is a cabin in fairly good repair, on a generous swath of land. It’s swallowed by a thick, dense forest, but there are two orchards on the property and enough space behind the cabin for a garden, if one that doesn’t get constant sunlight.

The cabin itself is small, but not exceedingly so – three rooms, a kitchen, a single bathroom, a family room, and a cellar. There’s a secondary cellar, detached from the cabin, located out in the woods – it’d been turned into a highly illegal ritual room at some point, judging by the remains Sirius finds inside.

The wards there mostly need a security update and a tune-up, and do not take much time.

The fifth property is an estate; smaller than the manor, but larger than Grimmauld. It’s been long-abandoned, likely due to whatever had attacked it; its protective wards are in tatters, the windows broken and stone scorched. The back half of the estate is rubble. Grindelwald, Sirius assumes, given the impression of time he gets as he fixes up the wards.  The front half of the estate could be salvageable, if they were willing to make it appear as ruined as it is, but given the other, better options he’s already been provided, he doesn’t expect much of it.

The last property houses an actual goddamn castle, sandwiched in between a muggle grocer and a farm field. It, too, is in obvious disrepair, but the thing’s made of stone, every block rune-carved and imbued, and to top all that off – the castle’s courtyard houses the remains of three greenhouses and a natural ritual circle. Ley lines, he realizes.

This will require Kreacher’s input, he decides, and he heads back before trying the wards.

X

“I can apparate to all of them now, so we could hypothetically just set one up as a farm.”

“Master not be doing that without more elves.”

“Or a pitch?”

“Yous be liking the muggle place.”

“The castle would be the best bet, but I favor that as a last resort back-up. The cottage and cabin we can make safehouses, or at least safe properties – I can get a wizarding tent and stash it at the cottage. The brownstone would…it’s more hidden. But I think the manor should be our new seat.”

The castle’s too cold, too uncomfortable. And there’s no grounds on it, save the courtyard. It’s defensible though – a perfect place to fall back. The muggle brownstone would make a great safehouse too, but Sirius is inclined to keep it closer to his chest than that; Harry has friends, and Hermione is muggleborn – she’d be able to get into that property without issue, compared to the more remote properties. Maybe it could act like a nexus, for Sirius to apparate guests from – since he does not intend to hook any of the properties up to the floo or anything so foolish.

Kreacher would only be happy with the castle or the manor. And the manor is – there’s too much valuable there to turn away.

“We do need more elves, but I don’t see how we could get around the whole fugitive thing. In any event – would you be okay with having more elves to boss around?”

The gleam in Kreacher’s eye is positively vicious. Sirius suppresses a shiver at the goblin-like smile he gets in turn.

Kreacher has technically been Head Elf since Arcturus and Walburga mounted his mother. But he’s never had other elves to boss around; he’s only ever been in charge of a force of one.

The thought is horrifically depressing.

X

Occlumency is a bitch, but it – helps. Now that the properties have been surveyed, Kreacher handles most of the work, and Sirius holes himself up in his near-unrecognizable childhood bedroom and tries to breathe through his tears and fears and panic and rage.

His occlumency shields had given out after a couple months, but his experience with the craft is repaying itself over and over and over again now, now that he is peeling the Dementor taint from faded memories of pranks and smiles and laughter.

There’s a common misconception that Dementors eat memories, happy things. They don’t, not permanently. The memories are still there. Just…buried. Burnt out. Torn from their emotional connection.

Picking them up and polishing them clean is a long, arduous process, and attaching them to severed, decayed emotional impacts a Merlin-damned puzzle in of itself, but the process by itself isn’t traumatizing. Reliving those things is, but it’s a good kind of pain.

Sirius has been unable to grieve the happy things, the good things. The Dementors had prevented that. He’d made his peace with the tragedy of James’ and Lily’s death, and Peter’s betrayal. He’d steeled himself against Remus’ inaction, abandonment –

The thought shatters his concentration.

Remus still hasn’t written.

Sirius buries his face in his pillow and screams.

X

Harry though, Harry writes.

He writes about everything, and that is heartbreaking.

Dumbledore has let too many people hurt his pup. Has let his pup down too many times. Sirius praises Harry’s bravery and cackles at his exploits, but seethes with every because Dumbledore wasn’t there or none of the teachers believed us or they told us it was nothing.

He hordes the superficial information he can glean from the letters; that Harry likes rainy days and cooking – when he can eat the result – and abhors cleaning and that mess stresses him out. He learns that Hermione sent Harry a whole stack of books to work through and that Harry’s friend Ron hasn’t reached out yet and that the Weasley kid’s on the outs with his pup and his friend.

He complained, Harry writes, that Hermione “got to go” with me, and Kreacher winces when Sirius relays the information to the elf.

And that’s the other thing.

Harry doesn’t have any allies. Except for his Hermione. And except for Sirius.

Remus hasn’t reached out to him either.

X

“I absolutely hate it here.” Sirius says, awed, and Kreacher smirks as he dips his head.

Grimmauld is now furnished and decorated fully, the attic and basement cleared out, and only Regulus’ room left unemptied.

The furniture all matches. Kreacher was careful about that. All in relatively good repair. He’s gone for the brittle rather than the ugly, although there are still some seriously ugly pieces waiting to leap out at them from corners or sharp angles, like a grandfather clock carved into a garish smile or an eye-searingly yellow shaggy rug.

The best part is, it looks exactly like it would’ve if Sirius had been given free reign and sole focus on spitting on his parents’ graves, but was a grown ass adult and not a twelve-year-old.

The manor’s a hot mess, still. The furniture and artifacts and things there need to be sorted out, and it also needs to be cleaned – the shit in the attic had to go somewhere. Sirius is constantly finding new rooms and hidden shit and the previous family had also apparently been very big fans of illegal artifacts. But it’s a start.

“I say we get the absolute bare minimum done on the manor, and then collect the kid. Would everything for Regulus be ready by then?”

“If Master Harry be speaking snake-tongue, Kreacher only be needing a few hours to prepare.” Kreacher says firmly. Sirius believes him. The elf has spent the past decade doing nothing but obsessing over the Mark. It might take a while with Harry’s help, but they’d get it in the end.

He offers a fist, for a ‘fist bump’. Kreacher calls him an ingrate and leaves.

X

Without another project to distract himself – since his occlumency has progressed enough to be nightly rather than an entire day – Sirius is forced to help Kreacher with the manor in a way he hadn’t with Grimmauld.

He moves furniture. He sorts through literal mountains of artifacts. He scrubs floors, and cupboards, and repairs the charmwork on sinks and stoves and toilets and tubs. He reseals windows, washes linens.

Kreacher’s fucking with him, Sirius knows, but he does it mostly without complaint. The work can get gross, but never unpleasant, and he likes feeling useful. In his spare time, he works on mapping out the entirety of the manor, cataloging the secret rooms and hidden drawers. Just because the wards respond to him doesn’t mean the building’s given up all its secrets.

Sirius is in the library, as he has been at least three hours a day for the past week, cleaning and searching out expanding shelves and hidden displays, when he bumps a book, there’s a click, and a whole fucking bookshelf slides away from the wall.

It’s a study. Or a lab, or something. Someone’s private research hideaway. Sirius keeps his hands to himself as he peruses the notes still left scattered on the desk, floor, and tacked to the walls, as he deciphers a spidery scrawl faded with age.

The previous owners of the manor had been experts in mind magics, and time magics, he realizes.

He shouts loud enough to draw Kreacher to his side when he finds the fucking time turner hanging carelessly from a fucking coat peg, and Kreacher’s eyes get huge and –

“I can bullshit my way through teaching Harry – I can get him to teach his friend – “

“Master Regulus be recovering faster.” Kreacher says softly, and Sirius lets out a strangled noise and jerks his hands at the elf in agreement and melts into a puddle on the floor.

He doesn’t have the brainpower to handle the experimental research in here. Not in the way it deserves. But he can be damn grateful for what it’s given him, and make damn sure it’ll be ready for someone who can.

X

The kitchen is objectively beautiful. It is in the back of the manor, overlooking the gardens. The entire back wall and most of the ceiling is made of glass panes, flooding the place in natural light; the countertop that runs along wall below it had been filled with desiccated flowers when they’d gotten there. The pantry is big enough to fit a muggle house, the icebox large enough to walk into. The cupboards are now pest-free and automatically organized, and the large island in the center of the long room surrounded by comfortable stools.

Kreacher prefers his dungeon back at Grimmauld, but Sirius thinks Harry will love it.

Besides the kitchen, three bedrooms have been fully cleaned and restored; Sirius’ room is directly between Reg’s and Harry’s. Kreacher has claimed a whole closet for his own, and hit Sirius when he offered him is own room. The library’s main chamber is clear, but the various secret rooms and studies branching off it are still a work-in-progress. The library’s magical catalogue has been fully updated, expanded, and restored to a fantastically functional state; invaluable, especially now that Kreacher has Sirius adding the Black books to its shelves.

That is to say – the manor is ready.

Sirius has been wiggling in delight for the past hour, when Kreacher finally lets out a disgusted sigh – fake, entirely, the elf is literally vibrating in anticipation – and banishes Sirius from the house.

He makes for Surrey immediately.

X

Surrey is terrible, and Sirius hates it, and he hates it even more when he hoists himself up to Harry’s window and sees the holes and rusting bolts bracketing the fucking thing. He’s been in prison for damn near a decade, he knows what bars look like.

He taps on the glass gently with the pads of his fingers, and watches a flail of movement blur the shadows behind the glass, and then Harry’s pale face is pressed up against it, and Sirius doesn’t have to force the grin on his face.

“What are you doing here?” Harry whispers, once the window is open. Sirius seats himself fully on the window’s ledge, and reaches in to ruffle his pup’s hair, pull him in close and hug him. Harry goes eager and willing, nearly knocks Sirius from the windowsill in his haste.

“Dumbledore told you there were wards on this place, didn’t he?” Sirius whispers, and he cannot keep his voice light. Harry tenses in his arms.

“Blood wards, or something. That’s why I have to stay here.”

“Pup, there’s not so much as a warning ward on this place.” He says, and then Harry’s words catch up to him and –

Blood wards. Ah, hell.

He manhandles Harry into looking up at him, and –

“They never took. That’s a good thing.” Sirius says softly. Some of the anxiety in Harry’s face bleeds away.

“What do you mean?”

“You never called this place home. So the protection is dormant – inside you. When you find someplace, it’ll provide some pretty powerful protection on its own. The kind that can be passed down, generation from generation.”

Lily’d been great at charms, but her real passion had been ritual magic. Illegal in Britain. She’d been studying out of pureblood libraries for years before the war, and being forced into hiding had only increased her dedication to the subject even with a newborn.

The Boy Who Lived, when it had been Lily who’d found a way to trick the Dark Lord into a bargain. A life for a life – the oldest kind of contract magic known. She’d made it powerful enough to turn away Death.

“I don’t have to be here.” Harry echoes hollowly.

“Told you it was a good thing. Dumbledore won’t have a leg to stand on if he wants to send you back.” Sirius whispers. Harry looks physically pained, but nods, and presses close again.

Sirius glances around the room. It is small. Harry’s owl is perched, watching, on the headboard of a single bed adorned with nothing but a mattress, a pillow so flat and stained Sirius almost misses it, and a thin, ragged blanket. There are a couple books stacked neatly on top of a tiny, child-sized desk. He doesn’t see much else.

“They lock my trunk downstairs. In – in the cupboard under the stairs.” Harry says softly. He doesn’t avert his gaze – he stares at Sirius hard, challenging. Sirius slides into the room fully, and winks.

“I’ll get it. You pack up here. You’re not coming back, so don’t leave anything.”

“They’ll hear you.”

Sirius flicks Reg’s wand out, winks again, and casts a silencing spell on the room, and then on himself.

He almost misses it, when he pulls Harry’s trunk out – the faded splash of color on the cupboard’s wall, and he goes so cold all over he nearly drops Reg’s wand.

Harry’s Room, in red, in the painstaking penmanship of a child. Up in the corner, a buttery yellow ball, tiny and easily missed. Dust and spiders and three broken tin soldiers, and a crib mattress so stained it makes Harry’s pillow look pristine in comparison.

The boot cupboard smells like Azkaban.

It takes every second he’s spent on occlumency and every ounce of self-restraint he possesses to close that fucking cupboard door, to haul Harry’s trunk – so old it’s peeling, that its charmwork has bled out of it – back up those stairs and into what he now knows is a spare bedroom. It takes him biting through the inside of his cheek, and the splash of blood on his tongue, to gather his godson up in his arms and leave without burning that fucking house down with those Morgana-damned muggles in it.

It'll take more willpower than that to keep from coming back and killing them with his bare hands, in the coming months.

X

“Welcome to the brand-new seat of the House of Black, pup.” Sirius says grandly, sweeping an arm out towards the visible hoard of dusty junk behind him as Harry giggles.

“I have a lot to throw at you, but first – “

Harry’s eyes are too-large and too-shiny, when Sirius flings open the door to what will be Harry’s room. It’s near triple the size of the muggle room he’s just been rescued from, infinitely larger than that fucking cupboard. The bed is large, four-postered, and canopied in navy blues speckled with moving constellations. The bookshelves aren’t entirely bare – Sirius has personally stocked them with books he thinks will be useful, and some knickknacks he thought Harry might like – but are still empty, where they bracket the walls. A wardrobe, desk, dresser, comfortable chair, standing mirror, and owl perch fill the rest of it. Sirius had found the squashiest couch he could find to take center stage in front of Harry’s fireplace.

There’s an attached bathroom, already kitted out. There’s clothes in the wardrobe and in the dresser, and extra blankets beneath the window seat. Fresh writing supplies in the desk.

The colors of the room are soft, what Sirius remembers Lily and James choosing for Harry’s nursery. Soft greys and whites, blues and greens.

“I – “

“Feel free to change anything you’d like. Especially if you see something cool while we clean out this mess. I can show you the color-changing charms, or material transfigurations if you want.” Sirius says softly, and Harry blinks rapidly. His fingers squeeze tightly around the metal of Hedwig’s cage and the handle of his trunk.

“I love it.”

“I’m glad, pup.” Sirius murmurs, and pulls him in for another hug.

X

Harry meets Kreacher in the morning – it’d been late when Sirius had collected him – and Sirius watches their interaction with wary eyes.

Harry’s polite; greets Kreacher and asks how long he’s been working for Sirius, and looks amused at Kreacher’s immediate disgust. Kreacher, in turn, watches Harry carefully, hungrily, and the minute he’s finished serving them breakfast and fled the room Harry rounds on Sirius with questions on his lips.

“Is he – “

“Sorry, he’s fine, he’s gonna be weird for a while. I’ll explain after we eat.”

Harry seems to take that as a challenge, and practically inhales the food. Sirius desperately wishes he could pretend it was just eagerness, but Harry’s bones are as prominent as Sirius’, perhaps even worse. They’ll fix that, but first –

“So firstly; I intend to work against Dumbledore and Voldemort both. Is that something you’re comfortable with?”

“I – yeah. Hermione’s – we can’t write. She thinks our letters are being read. But before Hogwarts let out she…she’d done her research. On – me. And you.”

Right. Good. Sirius needs to go get that kid before too much longer, too. He scrubs the knuckles of one hand against the palm of the other, and leans back in his chair.

“We can talk about that more fully later. I’m sorry, pup, that he’s – anyway. My primary concern is getting you out from under his thumb. Safe. So, if anyone asks, we don’t live here.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nobody remembers just how much shit the House of Black owns, especially when it comes to properties. My childhood home is – publicly, everyone thinks that’s it. So for all intents and purposes, it is. I set it up as bait. We’ll visit later so you can get familiar with it.”

Something sparks in Harry’s eyes; his pup leans forward excitedly.

“So this is a secret house.”

“Yup. And if this one’s compromised, we’ve got safehouses as back-up. I’ll show you them later, too.” It’s gratifying to see the kid look so delighted by that.

“So we can hide out, if…when things go really bad.”

“Hermione too, and her parents if they are willing.” Sirius says softly, and catalogues every flash on his pup’s face – surprise, realization, relief, joy, gratitude.

“You’d – “

“You trust her.”

“Of course. She’s my best – “ Harry cuts himself off sharply, and curls in on himself. The Weasley kid, Sirius thinks. He scoots his stool closer to Harry, and slings an arm over his pup’s shoulders, pulls him in close.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Harry’s quiet for a moment, for a minute, for so long that Sirius is waiting patiently for his pup to pull away and flee when he finally speaks.

“Back in first year, Dumbledore hid the Mirror of Erised in the school, and – I saw my parents. Ron saw all these awards and trophies. That he’d outdone all his brothers. And I didn’t think anything of it at the time but he – he got mad at Hermione for being with me, that night, instead of him. And he keeps bragging about what we did, playing it off like it’s a fun adventure and I almost died. You were almost kissed– and Hermione – and he hasn’t written yet! All summer!”

Sirius has picked up on the rest of it from Harry’s letters; Ron has an inferiority complex and a thirst for attention that likely rivals all four of the Marauders’ put together. It isn’t a fatal character flaw, for all that the consequences of it hurt Harry, but at a time when Harry needs trustworthy and loyal allies –

“Have you ever heard about outgrowing friends?” Sirius asks. Harry doesn’t look up, but he shakes his head.

“I didn’t. Not before – not before you were born, actually. Lily liked educating me on all sorts of common-sense stuff. Said we were all too maladjusted to pick up on it ourselves. I think it’s why we – I think things would’ve been a lot less bad if we’d let ourselves drift apart, a little. Instead of trying to cling.”

“But they’re…they were your family, weren’t they?”

“’S like – James never really got the muggle stuff. He liked going out and making a spectacle of it, y’know? And Remus never liked crowds. But I’d drag them out anyway, and we’d all be miserable. Different people have different relationships. And sometimes you need one thing, and sometimes you need another. You don’t have to throw yourself all-in just because you’re friends with someone.”

It doesn’t make Harry look any less upset, but he nods, and squeezes his hand together in his lap like James used to do, and Sirius closes his eyes and hopes it helps.

X

“I do have some information I want to share with you, pup, but I can’t just yet. Not ‘till you learn occlumency.”

“Occlu…”

“Mind magics. Dumbledore can read your mind. I can teach you how to keep him out.” Sirius opts for the blunt approach; Harry trips over his own feet and nearly goes down, if not for Sirius’ quick reflexes. They’re on a tour of the manor, circling around through overgrown paths and weeds taller than their heads.

“He can what?!”

“Mm. That’s why, if you trust your friend, we should get her. I can teach both of you – it’s like riding a bicycle. Helps with – Azkaban. Y’know. Can’t forget how to do it.”

“But – what is it?”

“Ordering your mind. Learning yourself so well you can tell when something not yourself is there. Tricking people with false memories, or mental defenses. Very powerful tool for wizards – if you practice enough you develop an eidetic memory, faster reaction time, are more in-tune with your magic. It’s not something you want to spread around publicly – Ministry being batshit and all that – but it is very useful.”

“That sounds fake.” Harry says flatly, and Sirius laughs.

“Can I learn it all in a summer, though? It’s – we only have a month.”

“Pup, we have all the time in the world.”

Harry’s sheer outrage is…well worth the dramatics.

X

“How – so it’s taken all this time?” Harry asks, eyeing the inside of a nearby drawing room like he desperately wants to tear into the shit in there, and Sirius sighs and shrugs.

“Just me and Kreacher. Can’t go get any other house elves – they track that through the Ministry. So it’s…been slow going.”

Harry blinks.

“I can help with that.”

X

Harry negotiates service from a strange little excitable elf in return for a brand-new trunk and a new pair of novelty socks every month. Dobby is so excited to be serving Harry, and by extension Sirius, and by extension not Dumbledore, that he does a little jig, hugs Kreacher, and narrowly avoids being murdered on the spot by the old elf.

Dobby also, apparently, has contacts with other disenfranchised house elves, which sounds like a terrible idea until Sirius realizes he’s talking about elves from primarily Dark families who’ve been dismissed, who would then have the knowledge and skill to handle cursed objects, and that’s how he gets Rory, Tocky, and Tulip too. The three bond with him and immediately hound Kreacher for orders, and Kreacher seems to forgive Dobby for his presence in favor of indulging in a power trip the likes of which Sirius has never seen before.

“We could go get Hermione while they’re busy. I know where she lives. She – in case something happened.” Harry offers, backed up as far as he can get into Sirius’ side like that’ll save him from the gleam in the elves’ eyes.

“Go get your cloak.” Sirius says, and they bolt.

X

“That’s a big house.” Harry whispers, and Padfoot nudges his pup’s legs, and they scramble across the road beneath Harry’s cloak, up a cute little path through a well-maintained front yard, and up a fancy porch to a fancy door.

Hermione’s parents are, apparently, quite well off.

Harry pokes a white button on a slender box beside the door, and shuffles Padfoot off to the side, and they wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And then the door flies open so quickly Padfoot can’t help but yelp in surprise.

“Harry.”

“Hermione, can we come in?”

The girl pauses, narrows her eyes at the exact spot they are standing, what the fuck, and steps outside to make a show of looking around. Harry fists one hand in Padfoot’s scruff, yanks him through, and then Padfoot trips over his own paws, transforms on instinct, and hits the ground in a tangle of pup and cloak.

By the time Sirius has freed himself, the children are hugging. Or, Hermione is clutching Harry to her and asking him rapid-fire questions with hardly a pause for him to respond.

“Did you read the books I lent you?”

“Yes.”

“And the penmanship guide helped? Lavender said it was for more formal scripts, but I noticed you preferred those in History of Magic.”

“It helped a ton. I’ll show you later.”

“Oh, good. And Sirius – you’re doing alright? You certainly look better!”

Morgana, she’s terrifying.

“We’ve come to kidnap you.” Sirius says gravely. She blinks at him, mouth snapping shut. Turns her head sharply to Harry, who sheepishly nods, and she stares blankly at him for a moment, calculations nearly visible in her eyes, before she nods.

“Give me fifteen to pack and I’ll be good to go. For the rest of the summer, I suppose?”

“Your parents will be okay with that?” Sirius asks, because he’s responsible, and his heart kind of sinks a little when she makes a dismissive sound and bounds deeper into the house, pulling Harry after her.

Sirius hasn’t been in many muggle homes, but he’s never seen one so sterile before – Harry’s muggles had still had character, even if it was unpleasant. The only pictures on the walls are staged to a painful degree. The furniture is designed for appearance, not comfort. There are no dishes in the sink, or drying on the counter. There are place mats on the table. There are no stray socks or toys, or even books lying about.

“Is it the magic?” He asks, when the children reappear, a familiar kneazle and a floating trunk in tow. Harry tenses. Hermione’s eyes go distant.

“They were prepared for the child they wanted.” She finally says, and Sirius impulsively slings an arm around her shoulders.

“Well. That’s what you’ve got us for.”

“People who almost get eaten by a werewolf together stick together.” Harry says sagely. She punches his shoulder, but takes Sirius’ offered hand, and that is that.

X

Harry carries Hermione’s things to his room before Sirius can think to argue, and he should, but he doesn’t, won’t. Not in the face of her sharp-eyed concern, not in the face of Harry’s own eagerness.

“I assume you have a purpose for kidnapping me?” Hermione asks, breathless. She does her best to face the two of them, but the mess of a manor has her attention and Sirius can’t fault her for it.

“Sirius is going to teach us how to keep Dumbledore from reading our minds.” Harry announces, and it’s stupid, but Sirius cannot help but laugh at the look on the girl’s face.

X

“So this is – common.” She asks. She sounds disturbed in the same way Sirius remembers Lily being, so shortly before her own death, and he lets out a gusty sigh.

“Not – well. It’s technically illegal.”

“But what someone could do with this ability, and if Dumbledore’s been able to do this the entire time – “

“It’s very easy to detect, if you know what you’re doing.” Sirius cuts in, before she can really get going, and that has both kids looking at him sharply.

“Legilimency, I mean. It’s – your mind is fragile, and easily hurt by outside interference. Your head’s only big enough for you, not for another person. One of the biggest downsides – and why most people don’t even see if they have the talent for legilimency – is that it’ll show up as a wound on even the most basic of medical detection charms. What I’m going to show you is going to…bruise, for lack of a better term, your minds, temporarily. It will fade and heal with a good’s night rest – your mind is more resilient than any other part of you – but like I said. It’s very easy to spot.”

The children – and Sirius – have already downed a frankly questionable number of muggle pain-relieving pills in preparation; a trick he’d learned from Lily, who’d learned it from Snape, back when she’d still considered him a friend.

“Wouldn’t Dumbledore know that we know this stuff then? If he could just…check for it?” Harry asks.

“There’s no known medical scan or detection charm to reveal a history of every injury ever sustained by a person. Nothing we’re about to do will cause enough damage to be permanent or require special treatment, or scar. We’ll use the time turner to make sure you two have enough time to learn, and that your minds are fully healed before you go back to Hogwarts. Won’t be that big a deal anyway – I’ll only need to touch your minds rarely for you to learn.”

Hermione still looks unconvinced.

“But – doesn’t that mean memory charms would leave traces too?” She asks, and Sirius blows out a breath of hair and flaps his hands in the general direction of up, where the manor’s library is.

“Whole library you can check out later on mind magics, I do not have all the answers for you. I know how to protect a mind, that’s about it.”

“We can trade off researching it later, Hermione.” Harry says quietly, firmly, and he reaches out and takes one of her hands in his. Sirius watches and suppresses a smile; she scowls deeper but then sighs and nods.

“And you want us to learn this before you’ll tell us anything else.”

“Better not to take risks, even though I think you’ll both catch on quick.” He replies, and feels the soft flutter of relief in him when both children nod.

X

Back – before. Before Azkaban, before the war, before graduation –

Peter had been the first to figure out a proper meditative state. Sirius had been impatient for his animagus form, and so had James, and Peter hadn’t had the words and so the three of them had done something incredibly stupid and incredibly dangerous and Sirius feels his eyes growing wet just thinking about it, because –

That had been the Peter he’d loved, and known. Bright red with pleasure and embarrassment, but eager and willing to share his knowledge, the tentative brush of a warm-bright mind against his own as Peter shared his own memory, his own understanding with the two of them, and –

It’d sped up their transformation by weeks, if not months. Neither his pup nor his friend are the kind of people to just get how to connect with their magic with words. Sirius pulls that memory to the forefront of his mind, meets Harry’s wide, eager eyes, and gently, clumsily, pushes forward.

And then all hell breaks loose.

X

That stupid fucking scar cracks open and golden light pours out, and Sirius blankets his thoughts across Harry’s and heaves with all his strength.

He shouldn’t be able to visualize the bruise on his pup’s mind as clearly as he is now, shouldn’t be able to see the indent where that black thing has been scrabbling for too long, shouldn’t be able to see the agony and pain and damage done to his pup so clearly, but Sirius shouldn’t be able to help pull it out either and that is what he is doing, pushing back against a paper-thin wall of golden light echoing sister and family, and of course Lily would’ve foreseen something like this happening, of course she would’ve been prepared.

Sirius pushes, and she pulls, and the thing claws and roars and screams, but slowly the infection is pushed out, bleeding like black death out of that scar, flesh peeled back and Harry –

Harry is quiet, soundless, thoughts pressed right up against Sirius’ to balance him, anchor him, help him, and –

There is a snap, and Sirius is back in his own head, sprawled out on his back in the middle of the manor’s ritual room, staring up at the ceiling. At that golden light, wrapping itself methodically and carefully around a writhing, twisting knot of evil. At the silvery threads of magic crisscrossing over the whole mess.

Kreacher and Dobby are both standing there, staring with wide eyes and pale faces. Hermione has Harry in her arms; his pup’s face is screwed up in pain, breathing heavily.

Sirius pushes himself up slowly, shakily.

“You recognize it. Both of you.” He says. The elves both flinch. Or – No. Dobby flinches. Kreacher twitches.

“The diary.” Harry rasps, and Sirius has heard this story, heard this danger, and his blood runs cold because the diary –

“Horcrux.” Kreacher hisses, the word long and slow and drawn out and venomous. And Sirius wants to shake the elf, because there is no surprise in the elf’s voice, but he cannot bring himself to move because Kreacher could only recognize this if –

“This is what Regulus…”

“What’s a horcrux?” Hermione whispers. She looks terrified, and Sirius cannot blame her.

Dobby, wringing his hands, scuttles forward and crouches at her side. Presses long, thin fingers to the wound on Harry’s head – burbling now, beading with blood. Sirius watches the elf seal it up with a drag of a nail, watches his pup’s famous scar go pale and silvery.

“How many did he make?” Sirius rasps. Kreacher gives him a considering look, and glances towards the children.

“As many as he could.”

X

“How did you know what it was?” Hermione asks. Sirius scrubs a hand over his face, and then dunks his hunk of bread into the bowl of soup steaming before him.

They’ve relocated into the kitchen. The ball of Lily’s magic and Voldemort’s horcrux spins anxiously at the far end of the counter from them. It’s kind of horrifying to eat near it, but none of them are willing to take their eyes from it.

“Horcruxes are an idiot’s idea of perfect immortality. I don’t know much about them. Just enough so that a proper heir to the House of Black would know they were stupid and not to try it.” Sirius finally says. There’s a thread of wistfulness in his voice he can’t quite cut away in time, but – those lessons had been…they’d been good. He and Reg, Cissa and Andy and Bella, all sat at Auntie Druella’s feet. Away from Walburga and Orion, back when the House of Black was still – still meant something beyond mourning.

“Dark magic is considered Dark because it comes at a cost. Most of what the Ministry labels Dark isn’t. Most Dark magic isn’t inherently evil – it’s a trade, and if you’re willing to pay it, that’s on you. Things get sketchy when the cost involves other people, that’s stuff that’s…truly evil, even if the outcome is benign.”

“Like a firstborn.” Harry rasps. He’s an ice pack stuck to his forehead with a sticking charm, and a massive bandage wound around his temple just to be safe. But other than a raging, agonizing headache and a shakiness in his hands he’s – he seems okay. Sirius had nearly wept with relief, but Lily never would’ve done something to hurt her son, and…

“Yeah. One of the more infamous examples.” Sirius rasps. Hermione folds her fingers tighter around Harry’s, and twists her spoon in her own bowl absently.

“You said it’s – stupid. Why would he…”

That, Sirius can answer. He snorts.

“Horcruxes are – accessible. Theoretically and practically. Easy, I guess, but the thing with Dark magic is that the easier it is, the greater the cost. It’s not like there’s a lot of public advancement in the field of immortality, either – horcruxes have been the most stable, common form of attempted immortality for centuries. Cursebreakers run into them all the time. It’s – it can be – pretty common to find some rattling around old ancestral homes.”

“Isn’t that – dangerous?”

“Not if the wizard only made one.” Sirius sighs, because that’s the crux of it. That’s the – he can hardly believe it. Luck, for them, for those that would oppose Voldemort and his followers.

“Horcrux theory is based on soul theory. You split your soul into two symmetrical chunks, and tether part of yourself to an object. It becomes impervious to most methods of destruction. Living creatures are an option, but a bad one – they don’t receive that same protection, and the horcrux dies when they do. When the soul shard housed in the wizard’s body dies, the wizard’s consciousness will just…shift into the horcrux.”

“But he’s made more, and you’re only talking about two. Why is that such a big deal?”

“It’s symmetry that’s the big deal. It shows up a lot in ritual magic, and in wards. ‘S why I remember it so well. The larger chunk of soul will always be the primary. Horcruxes make you cut pieces of yourself off. You’re diminishing yourself, if you make more than one. The pull of it will ruin your magical core, your sanity, the physical vessels. Your magical core and consciousness need a soul to function; they’ll shift to the greater piece on their own. Voldemort’s…magically powerful enough to keep himself centered on whatever bit he’s got right now, but…”

“His obsession with Harry, with pureblood supremacy even though he’s a halfblood. None of it makes logical sense because he’s insane. Because he drove himself insane.” Hermione whispers. Harry lets out a sharp bark of laughter, and then winces.

“Ah – I thought so. He was – Tom’s diary was…I could see why people followed him then, but not…” Harry breaks off, eyes darting away, and Sirius’ heart aches because his pup looks scared, for a minute, just for that admission and it’s –

“He used to come over for family dinners.” Sirius finds himself saying, and both children’s heads snap up.

“He was a family friend of my grandfather’s. And my…my parents worshipped him. He was – interested in me. Heir to the House of Black. I ran to the Potters to avoid the mark as much as I did to get away from my parents. That Imperious defense worked so well because it was based on truth.” Sirius adds, and he can’t help the way his fingers twitch, tearing the remnants of his bread to crumbs and tapping away at the counter.

“Did…Did my parents know?” Harry asks softly. Sirius’ smile is sharp.

“They all knew. Peter – Peter too. I think I – framing me was his idea, not Peter’s, I think.” Because it had been premediated, Sirius had been sure of that. Not in the moment, but in the years after, looking back on it all – Peter had led him by the nose.

And despite it all he thinks, sometimes, in his worst moments, that Peter would never have been so cruel to do that, on top of everything else, if Voldemort had not ordered it of him.

“And…so he made a bunch of these things. And Harry had…Dumbledore had to know. That’d – that’d make everything make sense.” Hermione whispers, and –

Sirius sighs, and pushes his food away, and slumps over the counter. Because – yes. Yes, it did. And yes, that is exactly what Albus would do.

“So we – um. Figure out how many he has. And how to destroy them. And we’ll try occlumency in a few days, when my…will there be lasting damage?”

“Does it feel different?” Hermione asks, and Sirius snaps back to the present, because his pup is nodding, face screwed up.

“I – yeah. I mean, it hurts, but it’s – I feel kind of spacy.”

“Shouldn’t be lasting. Not with your mum’s magic there to protect you. Lily always thought of everything.” Sirius whispers, and Harry looks at him, eyes wide, and then to the floating cage of magic and –

“She…?”

“He wouldn’t be trying to kill you if he knew what you were, pup. Your mum planned to kill him if he ever came for you. She must’ve – planned for it. I don’t know if she knew what he’d done, or if she expected it as a consequence of whatever ritual she used. But that’s – her.”

And then there is quiet, his pup and his pup’s friend staring at what is left of the woman Sirius called sister once, and Sirius lets himself tremble in the quiet, and then –

“We should try the Basilisk fang you kept.” Hermione says suddenly, and, again, all hell breaks loose.

X

Kreacher demands to be the one to do it.

None of them argue. Harry rummages around in his trunk and pulls out a carefully folded cloth, and unfolds it to reveal a fang the size of his forearm, still glistening, and sets it gently in Kreacher’s hands.

Sirius watches, clings tightly to his pup and his pup’s friend, the other elves clustered behind them, as Kreacher violently thrusts the fang through his silver cage, as Lily’s magic swiftly parts to allow it entry, as the evil held within screams.

It’s over as quickly as it began, and Kreacher dismisses the now-useless cage, and Lily’s magic drains back towards Harry in slow, lazy loops of gold, and then Kreacher snaps his fingers and a ferociously ugly locket appears on the counter in front of him, and Kreacher stabs that, and the real screaming starts.

X

After, Dobby smacks Kreacher with a kitchen towel and they all hole up in Reg’s room, because there’s no point in hiding that anymore. Harry curls up right next to Sirius at Reg’s side, and stares down at his god-uncle with huge eyes. Hermione scrubs her hands over her face in Kreacher’s customary seat.

Sirius pretends he’s not crying. He hardly catches a glimpse of the proceedings through his tears.

It takes Harry only a handful of whispered hisses before Kreacher snarls and tears, and there’s a sound like a sigh and a sound like a squelch. Hermione makes a startlingly age-appropriate ew, and Sirius dashes his tears from his eyes in time to see a ball of sickly green-black magic disintegrate in Kreacher’s claws.

Kreacher looks wild-eyed, elated. Frantic in a way Sirius has never seen him before. He claps residual magic from his hands and growls until it all finally vanishes, and then clicks his fingers and summons a vial.

Regulus bolts awake almost instantaneously, gasping for breath and hand flying for his previously marked forearm.

His first words, upon seeing his brother hanging about by his bedside, are –

“Sirius you shitfuck – “

X

Occlumency lessons go much better after that.