Chapter Text
It was dark in here, but then, it was dark in Harry's cupboard too.
Harry looked around, rubbing at the goosebumps on his arms. The cupboard was always warm, warmer than even the rest of the house. It was so warm that every night, Harry folded his scratchy blanket and stuffed it underneath his bed to sleep, and then carefully smoothed it across his bed when he woke up, so that Aunt Petunia wouldn't get mad at him.
He wondered for a moment if maybe he could give his blanket to whoever lived here, because here, it was so, so cold, and Harry didn't see any blankets at all. He only saw bars over one wall and a thin window very high up on the other. And a dog.
Harry blinked, tilting his head. Yes, there was a dog pressed into the corner of the room, shivering and trembling and bigger than any dog Harry had ever seen in his life. It looked like what Aunt Petunia would carry Dudley across the street to avoid. It looked like it could kill Harry in an instant if it wanted to. So, naturally, Harry went over to it.
“Hi,” he whispered. The dog snuffled, but only seemed to sink in on itself more. “Where are we?”
Harry looked around. Across from them—he could see it through the bars—there was another room that looked the exact same, but nobody was in it. Harry returned to the dog.
“I was supposed to meet someone here,” Harry told the dog. “Only, I don’t know who.”
The entire place seemed awfully, awfully sad—so awful that Harry wished instinctively that the dog was somewhere else. He felt so bad for it, trapped and alone and cold… Harry crouched next to it and began stroking its fur. For a moment, the dog whined deep and mournful, and pressed itself in further.
Then, the dog’s eyes snapped open.
It lifted its head, looked around, and then—
Harry’s mouth fell open. The dog changed, unfolding and stretching out until it wasn’t a dog at all, but a man—a raggedy, wide-eyed, starving, terrifying, terrified-looking man—sitting against the corner and staring at Harry.
“You—what?” rasped the man. His voice was creaky with disuse. “You—you—” the man looked close to tears. “You can’t be—Harry?”
Harry blinked. “How did you know my name?”
The man stared at him for a moment, and for a moment, Harry stared back. The man looked scared, and tired, and so, so sad…
“Harry,” he said again, as if he didn’t believe it.
“Yes.” Harry swallowed nervously. “I was gonna—I wanted—”
“Harry,” the man said, and then Harry was crushed into his side.
Harry stiffened, but this wasn’t—it wasn’t like when Uncle Vernon closed his hand over Harry’s wrist, and it wasn’t suffocating like his cupboard. There were arms wrapped around Harry, like a heavy blanket, or a—a—Harry didn’t know how to describe it.
This was—
Ah.
Yes, Harry had heard of these. This was a Hug.
He’d seen parents give them to their children when they were being picked up from school. He knew that Aunt Petunia gave one to Dudley every night. No wonder people liked them so much. It was—Harry didn’t know how to describe it besides safe.
Yes, this must be who he was trying to get to.
But he had barely begun to nestle in when the man was pulling back, grabbing him by the shoulders and looking him in the eyes.
“But—” he said, “how? How are you—how?”
“How?” Harry repeated.
“Yes, how,” said the man desperately. “How did you get here?”
Oh. That was a reasonable question, Harry figured. The only problem was, Harry didn’t really know the answer.
“Well, I wanted to be here,” Harry said, wringing his hands. “I just… wanted it. I wanted it loads.”
“You wanted… you must’ve apparated.”
“What’s apparated?” Harry asked.
“It’s part of your magic, Harry.”
Harry blinked. “What magic?”
“What—what?” Sirius said. “What do you mean? Who…” Sirius’ eyes sharpened. “Harry, who are you living with?”
“My aunt and uncle,” Harry replied. “They’re the Dursleys.”
“Petunia…” the man hesitated. “But she… unless—Harry, do they… treat you… well? No, of course not,” he muttered to himself, “not if he—here, and—Harry. Harry, why did you wish to be here? It's horrible here.”
“I didn't want to be here, I wanted to be with you,” Harry said, frowning. Was this so hard to understand?
“With me?” The man repeated faintly. “Do you know who I am?”
“Haven't a clue,” Harry replied, “but I wanted to…” he hesitated, worried suddenly that he was wrong.
"Wanted to what?" said the man, looking at him intensely.
"I just," Harry started, looked down, and then quickly said, "I-wanted-someone-to-love-me." His face burned, first at the fact that he was desperate enough to wish for it at all, and second at the fact that he had to wish for it, that there was something broken about him that meant that he, unlike all the other children he had ever met, was not the sort to be loved. He wondered if the man might change his mind, now that he had met Harry, looked at him, seen his scar, seen him do something freakish, and realized how nobody else in the world wanted Harry at all.
Harry dared to look up. The man looked stricken. Harry couldn't bear not knowing, so he risked continuing.
"Are you him?" he asked, afraid that the man would say no and Harry's little dream would die. "I mean—do you? Because it's okay if you don't, because most people don't so I understand if you don't, you don't need to feel bad or—just tell me if you don't and I promise I'll never bother you again—"
"Harry," the man interrupted, and Harry immediately closed his mouth.
(He had once made Aunt Petunia a Mother's-Day-Card, because that was their assignment in Kindergarten class, and he'd decorated it with glitter glue and pink paper. She'd torn it up and she didn't give him dinner that night, and then when she let him out of his cupboard the next night, she very quietly explained that she was not Harry's mother, that Harry's mother was in fact dead and so there was nothing to be done about it, and that Harry was to never-ever say Aunt Petunia was his mother in public, or in private, or she'd lock him up again, and Harry was not to cry, and Harry, why are you crying again—?)
"I'm sorry," Harry said quickly. He'd always wondered if perhaps Aunt Petunia and maybe even Uncle Vernon had loved him, once, but he'd just been too bad and so they'd stopped doing it.
"Don't apologize," the man whispered. He took Harry's hands (which were shaking) in his own hands (which, Harry realized, were also shaking). "How can you apologize when seeing you is the only happy thing that's happened to me in years?"
Harry looked up. "What?"
"Yes, I'm him, Harry," rasped the man. His eyes were cloudy and grey, and the more Harry looked into them, the sadder they seemed. "I'm the one who loves you. Always, until the very end. I love you, so much, you don't even know—I thought—"
The man swallowed the rest of his words. That didn't matter. Harry's face split in a grin. He had known there was somebody just for him, he'd just known it, even when Dudley and Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon all said there wasn't.
“Okay. So, then,” Harry started, and got a little shy. “Would you—well, I mean—”
“Yes?” the man prompted, and Harry just stood there, with his hands held by the man. He wasn't used to people looking at him like this. Eyes usually jumped right over him. He didn't know if anyone had ever held his hands.
“Could you do it again?” Harry burst out before he could change his mind.
The man blinked. “Do what?”
“The, you know…” Harry fiddled. “The Hug.”
“The… hug,” the man repeated faintly.
“Of-course-you-don’t-have-to-it’s-fine-if—” Harry started, before he was wrapped in a hug even more crushing than before.
“Of course,” the man said in a strangled voice. “Sorry, Harry, I just… forgot.” He laughed breathlessly.
“Thanks,” Harry said, but squirmed. The man was pinning his bruised arm against his side. “Could you just—my arm is a bit squeezed—”
“Oh,” the man said in surprise, and loosened his grip. Harry squirmed until he sat comfortably in the man’s lap, with the man’s arms loosely around him. Yes, he liked this. It was like a living blanket, except it actually kept the cold out. He could see why people liked these so much. The man absently pressed Harry’s head into the bend of his neck, and Harry nestled in. He liked that, too.
The man began running his hand through Harry’s hair, which was so nice and soothing that Harry let out a little happy sound before he could stop himself.
“Sorry,” he said immediately after, just in case.
“For what?” the man said. Before Harry could explain that he was a bit too old to make noises, the man had honed in on Harry’s bruised arm like a dog on the scent. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” Harry said immediately, defensively, but if anything the man seemed even more suspicious from that.
And if this man loved him… well, then…
“Come here,” Harry said, sitting up a bit. “Lean in, I need to tell you something but you can’t tell anyone else.”
“Alright,” the man replied, obediently leaning down.
Harry leaned up against his ear and whispered, “I was bad. I—I stole food from my aunt.”
And Harry sat back, wondering what the man would say. Would he be mad, too? Would he put Harry in a different cell? Or worse—would Harry loose the Hug?
“Good,” the man said shortly. “She always was a bitch.”
Harry gasped, then giggled, then clamped a hand over his mouth.
“You can’t say things like that, my teacher did it and then she got fired,” he said, and then leaned closer and continued his story. “My cousin—Dudley—he caught me stealing, and he said that he would tell on me, but if he did…” Harry’s stomach cramped, and he skipped over that part of the story. “So I begged for him not to, and he said he wouldn’t tell so long as I did what he said, and then—” Harry swallowed; he had been trying not to think about this and the man had been such a nice distraction, “—I’ve been doing what he told me—he likes to have me carry his books around for classes, and he makes me give him my lunch, and his friends and him—I mean, he and his friends—they like to—to—”
“To what?” the man prompted.
Harry hesitated. He had told a teacher that Dudley hit him once, and she'd given him detention for telling lies. And when he got home, Aunt Petunia gave him the crusts of Dudley's sandwich for dinner, because bad boys and liars and tattletales didn't get their own sandwiches.
"Harry?" said the man quietly.
But what if Harry told the man, and the man was so disappointed that he stopped loving Harry? What if Harry lost the hug?
"Will you be mad at me?" Harry asked, looking up at the man's face.
The man traced his jawline. "Not ever."
"Okay." Harry looked back down, because it was easier that way, and also because it was a test. Aunt Petunia said to make eye contact when he talked to people. But if this man didn't tell him that, then he wasn't like Aunt Petunia.
"Okay," Harry began again, and felt the man's hand run through his hair. It felt like encouragement, so Harry continued. "Well—Dudley and his friends like to—push me, and kick me around, and hit me." The memory of that—the parking lot behind school, Dudley's mean laugh and his horrid friends—made Harry's throat curl up. "It would be okay if there weren't so many of them," Harry said, his voice going quieter as tears threatened to take it, "but—they—they're so mean. And I don't know—"
Harry cut himself off, worried that he might truly cry, but it was true whether he said it or not: he didn't know why. He knew there was something wrong with him, but no matter how much he thought about it, he couldn't figure out what.
"Usually I can run away," Harry said, and his voice only trembled a little bit, "but Dudley says that if I don't want him to tell to Aunt Petunia, I need to do what he says, so I've been just—they take me to the parking lot and beat me around, and then—I don’t want Dudley to tell Aunt Petunia, so I’ve just been—um, I’ve been just following them there when they tell me, and I just kind of… let them… do it. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.”
Harry’s voice went quieter at the end, and he wondered again what the man thought. It had been an awful week—Harry’s ribs were all bruised from Dudley and the other brutes, and he’d gone to tears in three different classes, knowing that he was going to be beat up and hurting as soon as school ended, and then, to top it all off…
“You have nothing to apologize for,” the man said. His voice was strained, and his hand had stopped carding through Harry’s hair.
Harry looked up. “Are you mad at me?”
“Of course not,” the man said tightly.
“Okay,” Harry said, but he worried. The man sounded mad. Maybe he thought Harry should’ve stuck up for himself, or—or fought back?
“I’m not mad at you,” the man said again, “I’m mad at your cousin.”
“Oh.” Harry smiled. That wasn’t so bad.
"It's nothing to be ashamed of," said the man. "They're bigger than you—uglier, too, I bet—" Harry giggled at that. "—And there are more of them. It's upsetting to you, and it should be, because it's wrong."
Harry beamed. He'd thought that might be true, but all the adults were much smarter than him, so he'd thought maybe they were right. But this man was saying otherwise...
"You were letting them hurt you so that they wouldn't tell on you." The man looked at him carefully. “What would your aunt have done if she found out you’d stolen food?”
“Well, she did find out,” Harry said, twisting his fingers. “Dudley told on me, even though—” his throat closed up. “Even though I’d done it all right…”
“And your aunt, what did she do?”
“She said that since I stole food I wouldn’t get any,” Harry explained, “and then she put me in my cupboard.” Harry swallowed. “It's been, um... three, no four days... school just let out, so, so I'm not missing any classes... and I got the crusts of Dudley's pizza, though, so... so that's good.” Harry swallowed at the memory. He'd rather be beaten every day and free than locked up for a week.
“And—your uncle?” the man asked, his voice thin. “Does he starve you, or ignore you?”
“Oh! Nothing like that,” Harry said quickly. “He just beats me.”
The man closed his eyes, looking very pained and a bit—what was the word? Exasperbated?
“Only when I’ve messed up,” Harry was quick to assure. He didn’t want the man to think he was whining.
“That’s not—that’s not—no,” said the man, breathing in deeply, his eyes closed. “No, that’s not—that’s not.”
The man took a deep, shuddering breath, and pressed one hand over his face. He was shaking all over, nearly sputtering. Harry watched him curiously. He seemed a little bit—wrong. Well, a lot wrong.
And, looking around the prison, Harry shuddered. Who wouldn’t be a lot wrong, living in a place like this? It was summer, and Harry was already so cold. And this man looked cold too; his weird-looking dress was made of thin and faded fabric…
“Who are you?” Harry asked.
“Sirius,” the man said quietly. “Or—” his voice broke. “Padfoot…”
“Okay,” Harry said. “Where are we?”
“We’re in…” Sirius took a deep breath and Harry watched with fascination as he just stopped, stopped panicking, stopped gasping, and just settled. Harry wondered if Sirius could teach him how to do that. “We’re in Azkaban, Harry.”
“Azkaban?” the name sent a faint chill down Harry’s spine. “What’s that?”
“It’s a magical prison.”
“Cool!”
Sirius looked at him carefully. “You’re taking this awfully calm. Do you believe in magic?”
“Well, he-llo,” Harry replied, rolling his eyes. “Five minutes ago, you were a dog!”
Then Harry jolted, horrified. He'd been so carried away, he forgot—no attitude.
“I'm sorry,” he said quickly. “I—sorry.”
But Sirius was smiling faintly. “Don’t apologize, that was funny.”
“Oh. Well, thanks.” Harry hesitated, then shivered.
Sirius shivered too, harder than he’d been doing already.
His eyes went wide.
“Oh,” Sirius said, his hands scrabbling at the floor. “Oh, oh no… Harry, Harry, come closer.”
Harry obediently nestled into Sirius again, and Sirius curled around him.
“Don’t think happy thoughts,” Sirius whispered.
“I haven’t gotten any to think of but you,” Harry replied.
“Don’t think of me, then,” Sirius said quickly. “You’ll forget. You’ll—” Sirius let out a pained noise. “Just—stay close to me, Harry. I can—I can—I can.”
“What’s happening?” Harry said, curling in. Sirius was curled so tight around him that he couldn’t even see, but he heard it—moans and shrieks and weeping down the hall, getting closer and louder…
Harry shivered. His fingertips were going numb, and he thought suddenly of sitting in the cupboard, peeking under the slats and watching Aunt Petunia’s feet go by, asking, can I come out yet? and her responding, you'll come out when I say so, and for asking you’ll get another day in there—
And then he heard another scream, but this one was worse than the ones outside. It was a lady, and he—there was—
Then it was gone. Harry lay shuddering in Sirius’ arms as the screams got louder—but there was nothing in Harry’s mind except a vague sense of dread.
“Sirius?” he said tentatively into the man’s arm. Sirius was holding him hard enough to bruise, now, and shaking like a leaf.
The screams outside reached their peak—and moved on.
It all began to fade away, leaving Harry achingly cold and terribly frightened, but nothing more.
“Sirius?” he said again.
The man slowly loosened, his eyes wide and wild. Harry stooped out of the Hug hesitantly.
“J-James,” Sirius stuttered, unfocused, afraid. “W-where—I didn’t mean—didn’t want—”
Sirius took a gasping breath, and tears began to fall.
“Sirius,” Harry said tremulously. “What just happened?”
“D-dementors, Harry,” Sirius choked out, wiping at his face. “They make you—see—worst of—Harry, what happened to you?” and now Sirius seemed almost frantic with need. “What did you see?”
“Well, well I saw the cupboard, and heard a lady screaming,” Harry said. “And then it sort of… went away, but before the Dementor did.”
“Okay.” The man squeezed his eyes closed. “Okay. It worked. Okay.”
“What worked?”
“Just—you can—draw them,” Sirius said vaguely, “to yourself, away from others. If you…” Sirius shuddered. “Never mind.”
“What do you mean, draw them to yourself?” Harry asked. “Tell me. Please?”
“You just—” Sirius waved a hand vaguely in the air. “They eat happiness, so if you—give them your happy memories—they’ll focus on you.”
“Give them your happy memories?” Harry said, eyes wide. “Is that what you did?”
Sirius nodded and almost chuckled. “Couldn’t let them get yours, since you’ve got so few.”
“What memory did you give them?”
“I…” Sirius thought for a moment. “It was… we won… the Quidditch… cup…” Sirius’ voice broke. “There was some sort of—celebration, but I don’t know… what we celebrated, or how we won… can’t remember…"
“What’s Quidditch?” Harry asked eagerly. He liked the sound of the word, the way it sort of spat itself out. He liked the sound of that celebration, too.
“Sports game,” Sirius said through tears, and Harry realized there were probably more important things to focus on: namely, making Sirius feel better.
“You’re cold,” Harry said, biting his lip. “I don’t have a blanket, but… well…” Harry trailed off; what did he have to give?
He brightened.
“Here,” he said, and gave Sirius a quick kiss on the nose.
Sirius blinked, startled.
“One of the girls at school says her mum does that and it makes her feel warm,” Harry explained, and wondered if Sirius might do that too.
“I… I see,” Sirius said. Harry felt momentarily nervous—maybe it wasn’t something boys were supposed to do…
And then Sirius really, truly smiled, and it transformed his whole face into something much kinder and somehow more tired than before.
“Do you know, I think it worked,” Sirius said. “Feel much warmer now. But a hug would help too.”
Harry grinned and fell back in his arms. Sirius received him with a grunt.
“How old are you?” Sirius asked.
“Seven,” Harry replied promptly.
“Seven… been... six… I'm... twenty... twenty-eight... okay. Okay.” Sirius swallowed. “Okay.”
“You said this is a prison, right?” Harry said. “But you can’t be a criminal. Did you hurt someone?”
“I—” Sirius let out a sort of whine. “Do you know, Harry, I'm certain I did…”
Harry thought. Sirius didn't seem mean at all, he couldn't be a real bad person... and Harry himself had gotten in trouble lots for things he didn't mean to do. “Was it an accident?”
A tear rolled down Sirius’ cheek. “Yes.”
“Well—well I get locked up a lot for accidents too,” Harry whispered. “I don’t blame you, Sirius.”
Sirius looked heartbroken. His face crumpled, and he began to cry in earnest.
Darn it! That was the opposite of what Harry wanted him to do.
“Don’t cry,” Harry said.
“Sorry,” Sirius said thickly.
“Well, don’t apologize either!” Harry said with anger, and Sirius was breathlessly chuckling all of the sudden. Okay, that was a bit better…
“Sound like… you sound like my brother…” Sirius said, and then the laughing was gone, and he was weeping again. No, not better!
And then—there came a scream down the corridor, and a shiver up Harry’s spine.
“What?” Sirius whispered, looking crestfallen. “Double-patrol, again?”
The thing—the Dementor—prowled down the corridor, getting closer and closer, and Sirius scooped up Harry again.
“I can—I can,” Sirius muttered, almost to himself. “I can—can— Merlin, can—”
The Dementor went past their cell, paused, and peeked in.
Sirius went rigid, and then all of a sudden Harry was not in the arms of a man, but cuddled against a large and trembling dog.
Harry heard it—the Lady Screaming—and gasped. He went cold…
Then Sirius was back, wide-eyed, scooping Harry into his arms again.
“Merl—fu—shi—shoot, sorry,” Sirius gasped. “I didn’t mean to—oh, Merlin, just hold on… hold on…”
Again, Sirius pressed around Harry. Again, Harry didn’t feel anything but cold and sad.
Again, the Dementor moved on.
Sirius was trembling, and his eyes were swimming with tears, but he wasn’t crying like he was before. He was just very still, and very scared.
“Did you do it again?” Harry asked, crestfallen. “Did you—give up a happy memory? You don’t have to.”
“I will—you need,” Sirius stammered. He took a deep and shuddering breath. "I'll be okay..."
Harry settled against Sirius. “What memory was it this time?”
“When—I met—” Sirius’ voice broke. “When I met James…”
“Who’s James?” Harry asked. Wrong thing. Sirius started to sob again.
“Oh, how can you not know,” Sirius wept into his hand. “You’re supposed to know, you’re supposed to be—spoiled and cared for and fat and happy and—and have a big room in Potter Manor, and a guest room with me, and, Harry…” Sirius hiccuped. “James was your father.”
Harry launched to his feet, thrilled. “You knew my father!?”
“He was my best friend,” Sirius sobbed, “my brother. I’m your godfather, Harry, and I’m so sorry…”
“I have a godfather?” Harry whispered.
“You had everything,” Sirius gasped. “Father—mother—an uncle, a real one, godmother, grandparents, Neville was supposed to be your built-in-best-friend, you were… supposed… to be…”
“Can you tell me about him?” Harry asked eagerly. “About my dad? You said you were best friends, right? How did you meet?”
“I don’t remember,” Sirius sobbed, and Harry faltered. He had almost forgotten, in his excitement, about the Dementor.
“Is it going to keep coming?” Harry asked. “The—Dementor?”
Sirius nodded miserably.
“Stop giving them your happy memories,” Harry said. “You don’t need to do it for me.”
“They've already—taken most of them—and—and you can’t make me stop, anyway,” Sirius replied, suddenly angry. “I’ll do anything for you.”
“Then—then how about this,” Harry said, coming up with a brilliant idea on the spot. “You tell me—tell me the memory you’ll give up—and then I’ll tell it to you, after you’ve lost it.” Harry smiled. “And you’ll have it back.”
Sirius wiped at his face, taking a shuttering breath. This was a really, really good idea, Harry figured. Sirius could keep his memories, and Harry could learn more about his parents.
“Okay,” Sirius said miserably. “We need to talk about some other things too, though.”
“Great!” Harry, again, settled into Sirius’ lap. “But you should tell me one a story now, before anything else—you know, you don’t know when they’ll come back.”
“Right.” Sirius wiped his eyes. “Well, I guess we could start with… your parents, I’ll just tell you a bit about them… their names were James and Lily… your father had hair just like yours, messy and black…” Sirius laughed breathlessly. “He was always messing it up, thought it looked nice… he fancied your mother for years, but she wouldn’t give him the time of day… until, in seventh year, they finally went on a date, and I…” Sirius smiled for a moment. “I followed them… I turned into the dog, Padfoot, and then interrupted their walk… Lily was delighted to find such a friendly stray, and James was furious that I interrupted, but he couldn’t tell Lily why, because it was a secret that I could turn into Padfoot…”
“It was?” Harry asked. “Why?”
“You’re not supposed to do it without permission,” Sirius said softly. “But we did. That’s another story, though.”
“You turned into one in front of the dementors,” Harry recalled.
Regret flashed across Sirius’ face. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to—leave you. It’s just—easier. That’s what I usually am when they come… keeps me from going insane.”
Harry felt fear and guilt trickle into his stomach. “But you’re not doing it now… is that because of me?”
“Don’t worry.” Sirius stroked Harry’s hair. “Seeing you makes me more happy than the Dementors could ever make me sad.”
“Okay,” Harry said, grinning. He liked that, he liked it a lot.
“And it’s not like it’ll be forever,” Sirius added. “That’s what we need to talk about, actually. If you’re missing from the Dursleys, Aurors will find out—”
“Aurors?”
“They’re—um, they protect people, basically—they’ll hear that you’re not there, and eventually they’ll think to ask me if I know anything… then they’ll find you and bring you back.”
Harry’s heart fell. “Back… to the Dursleys? But I want to stay with you.”
Sirius shook his head. “I’m sorry, but you can’t."
“But—but if you tell them it was an accident—” Harry started.
“They won’t believe me,” Sirius said.
“If I tell them—”
“Absolutely not,” Sirius said quickly. “Harry, you need to get away from the Dursleys. If you start spouting off about how I’m innocent—they’ll think that I—acted kind, and told you to get away from the Dursleys, so that I could take you in instead.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Harry cried.
“They don’t trust me,” Sirius said, “and they never will, so don’t you dare try to change it, Harry, please, I can’t risk you staying there.”
Harry’s lip trembled. “But I don’t want you staying here.”
“I—I won’t,” Sirius said, swallowing. “I’ll find a way to escape. It might… take a while, I’m sure they’ll tighten security, but I’ll do it, okay? I’ll find my way out of here. Just—just promise me that you’ll find your way out of there.”
“I’ll try,” Harry said tearfully, “but what if they don’t listen?”
“Dumbledore will listen,” Sirius said, “he’ll want to talk to you. Tell him about the Dursleys. Tell him everything. Just don’t tell him that I told you to tell him, got it?”
Harry blinked. It was a very confusing command.
“Just say that—that you wished to leave the Dursleys, and then say why,” Sirius said. “Say all of it. Say they starved you, and locked you up, hit you. If Dumbledore won’t listen, tell Professor McGonagall. If she won’t, then tell—” Sirius’ voice caught. “Tell Remus.”
“Okay,” Harry said, brow furrowed. It was a lot of things to do.
“And Harry—” Sirius’ voice turned urgent. “Whatever you do, don’t tell them about Padfoot.”
“Why not?” Harry asked.
“I need him,” Sirius said desperately. “If I don’t have you then I need him. I turn into him when the Dementors come, he keeps me—he keeps me. Please, please, nobody can know that I can do it.”
“Okay.” Harry nodded determinedly. “Tell Dumbledore what the Dursleys are like, then tell McGonall—”
“McGonagall.”
“—Then tell Remus.”
“Only if the other two don’t listen.”
“And don’t say that you told me any of this, and don’t say that you can turn into Padfoot,” Harry recited.
Sirius nodded. “Good lad.” He seemed to almost smile. “You’re very clever.”
Harry smiled shyly. “I learned to read last year.”
“Really?” Sirius said with quiet pride. “At six?”
“I didn’t… didn’t really have anything else to do,” Harry confessed. “The librarian was really nice, she helped me. I’m—” Harry leaned in closer and whispered, “Uncle Vernon tossed out an old book, so I took it out of the trash and I’m reading that. It’s a grown-up book.”
“A grown-up book?” Sirius gasped.
Harry grinned and nodded. “It's called The Dictionary, and it's the only one in the whole world!”
“Hmm, and you understand the words?”
“No,” Harry said earnestly. “I don't understand most of them at all."
Sirius barked a laugh. “Then why are you reading it?”
“Well—” Harry leaned in closer and said, “I took a flashlight from my teacher’s drawer—don’t tell. I have the flashlight and the book hidden under my bed, so I read them when I’m locked up. I don’t get most of the words, but that just… figuring them out just makes time go faster till I’m out.”
Harry smiled proudly. Sirius’ eyes were soft and sad.
“You’re very clever, Harry,” he said. “You don’t—the Dursleys are wrong. Whatever they tell you—that you’re worthless, filthy, unwanted, unloved, wrong inside—”
Harry blinked in surprise. How did Sirius know all the things they said?
“—It’s none of it true,” Sirius said. “You don’t deserve any of it. You deserve happiness, so much of it, and you’ll get it someday.”
“I will?” Harry said.
Sirius nodded. “It’s what your father would have told you.”
“You think so?”
Sirius laughed breathlessly. “Harry, trust me on this. I know so.”
A plate of food came about half an hour later, slid between the bars.
Sirius gave it to Harry. “Here, I ate earlier.”
“Thanks,” Harry said, relieved and excited. Aunt Petunia hadn’t fed him in at least a day. He ate it quickly, and then glanced at Sirius. “Sirius?”
“Hmm?”
“What time is it?”
“I don’t…” Sirius swallowed. “I don’t know. You can’t—really tell, here.”
“Oh.” Harry frowned and thought. It had been night when he apparated, and he was tired…
Sirius seemed to read his mind, and smiled a bit. “Come here, kiddo.”
Eagerly, Harry abandoned the plate and climbed into Sirius’ arms.
“No beds,” Sirius said softly. “But I think I make a decent pillow, right?”
Harry grinned at the teasing. “I think you do. Are you going to sleep as well?”
“Yeah,” Sirius said softly. He rested his head on top of Harry’s. “Yeah, I’ll do that.”
The Dementor came… Harry didn’t know how long after. He just knew that he came, disrupting the deep sleep and sending shivers down his spine.
Sirius seemed to be more ready than Harry, and once again he curled around Harry, bending over and shielding him. Once again, Harry felt terribly cold—but he didn’t once hear that terrible scream. And Harry knew, even with the crying and the cold, he preferred being here over being in Privet Drive.
When it was over, Sirius took a while just sitting there, breathing in short sputters, tears dripping down his face. Harry didn’t ask him anything—he thought maybe Sirius wouldn’t want to talk, right now. He would wait until Sirius spoke up instead.
And so Sirius did, perhaps five minutes after the dementor left. His breath was still short and his eyes were still shattered, but he spoke.
“It’s…” Sirius faltered. “Their names. What are their names?”
“Who’s names?” Harry asked.
“Theirs,” Sirius whimpered, gnawing at his finger. “I don’t… I don’t remember… gave too much…”
“Oh, my parents!” Harry realized, and then recited the story that Sirius had told him: “Their-names-are-James-and-Lily-and-James-has-hair-like-mine-and-they-went-on-a-date-and-you-went-to-as-Padfoot-but-Lily-didn’t-know-and-James-didn’t-like-it.”
"James," Sirius gasped, tears spilling out of his eyes. "Right, right, J-James, James Fleamont, Lily Joan Evan, no, Potter... right. Right. That’s right, I remember. Oh, Merlin…” he let his head hit the wall with a thunk. “Thanks, Harry.”
“Welcome,” Harry said with a smile. “Let’s go back to bed, then.”
When Harry next woke, he wondered if Sirius had slept at all. His eyes were reddish and he had big bags under them.
“Look, food,” Sirius said softly. Indeed, there was a plate in the middle of the room, with—lentils, Harry thought—piled on it.
“This one’s for you,” Harry said, turning to Sirius. “I had the last one.”
Sirius shook his head. “They gave me a plate while you were sleeping.”
“Oh.” Harry hesitated. “Oh, okay.”
So Harry ate the plate of lentils, while Sirius curled up in the corner, his arms folded against his stomach. Twice, Harry offered to share (because Sirius just looked so hungry), and twice, Sirius denied.
Sirius told him another story over the food—a story about Professor McGonagall, who was apparently his teacher at school (“she might still be teaching there, Harry—could end up teaching you.”)
It seemed like hours before any Dementors came, but come they did. Harry was used to the routine by now. He tried, for a moment, giving the Dementor a happy memory so that Sirius wouldn’t be hurt—but he felt such a jolt of panic at the thought of forgetting Sirius that he abandoned his plan right away. It was a bit shameful, but, well—Sirius said he shouldn’t, so it had to be okay.
And the Dementor moved on. Harry parroted back the story about Professor McGonagall, and Sirius in turn told a new story about a club he’d made (“the Muggle Appreciation Club, we would just—watch the tellyvision, and sing songs and the like…”). Harry committed the story to memory, and settled down in Sirius’ lap again.
Harry liked it here. He was hungry, but no more so than he’d been before. He was trapped, maybe, but it didn’t feel like a trap with Sirius there. Harry wondered if he could go away the same way he came, but he didn’t really want to—besides, Sirius said not to, and that he might “splinch” himself if he did.
Sirius seemed to get more faint and fragile with each hour, and it took Harry—how long, a day? Two?—to realize that he wasn’t eating.
“You’ve been giving me all your meals!” Harry said, eyes wide.
“It’s okay…” Sirius smiled from where he was tucked up in the corner. “You’ve missed out on a lot of them…”
“That doesn’t mean you should!” Harry cried, looking down at the plate he’d just finished, then back up at Sirius. Sirius had his arms pressed tight against his stomach, and he looked so exhausted… every time Harry thought that Sirius couldn’t get more tired and sad, Sirius proved him wrong.
“We’re sharing,” Harry declared furiously.
“I can’t… take…”
“Well, I won’t eat the other half,” Harry spat. “So—so it’ll just waste if you don’t eat it—so there!”
Sirius looked miserable, but when the next plate came, he ate half. He tried to sneak some of his food to Harry’s half of the plate. Harry, glaring, tried to sneak it back.
And somehow glaring turned to giggling, and then laughing, so violently that a bit of Harry’s food spattered off the plate and onto the floor.
Sirius scooped it up and licked it off his finger before Harry could do anything.
“What?” he said, raising an eyebrow. “I’m part dog, Harry.”
And Harry found this exceedingly funny, and they laughed more.
After the next dementor visited, Sirius thought long and hard about what story to tell next.
“Running out,” Harry heard him say to himself. “I’m running out of them… I haven’t…” Sirius cleared his throat and looked very sad for a moment. “Harry, I haven’t told you about your grandparents.”
“Oh, you haven’t,” Harry said, eagerly. He hadn’t really thought of them at all, but he supposed they must have existed.
“Your dad’s parents were… amazing people,” Sirius said. “They took me in. Their names were…” Sirius licked his lips and glanced at the door. “Euphemia and Fleamont Potter. And I need—I think I’ll forget those, because they made me very happy, so I need you to tell them to me after, alright?”
“Alright,” Harry said, nodding.
“Alright,” Sirius said, and told Harry more about his grandparents. Like every story he told, it was sweet, but also really sad. They’d died of dragon pox, he said, but before they died they were full of life… like second parents…
Sirius had barely finished telling Harry how they’d taken him in, when they both shivered in unison.
“Another round,” Harry said miserably, rubbing his arms.
“Hey.” Sirius turned his chin to get his attention. “You cold? Don’t worry. It’ll be okay.” Sirius pressed a kiss to Harry’s nose, and Harry smiled. The girl at school had been right—it really did make you warmer.
Harry snuggled into Sirius’ shaking arms, and Sirius inhaled deeply. “It’ll be over soon…”
And it was over, that soon. When the dementor cleared away, Harry shook himself out of Sirius’ arms to find three people standing in the hallway.
For a moment, they all just gaped at each other.
“Sirius,” Harry whispered, slapping lightly at Sirius’ face. “Sirius, it’s the Authors.”
Sirius—who seemed to have fainted—jerked awake. “What? What? Oh—oh.” Sirius inhaled deeply. “Aurors, Harry, they’re called Aurors.”
“Harry Potter?” breathed one of the people in the hallway.
Harry swallowed and pressed closer to Sirius. “Yes…”
“What are you… how are you…” the second auror stammered, and then his face hardened. “Step away from him, Harry. He’s a dangerous man.”
Harry glanced at Sirius uncertainly. “It was an accident.”
Sirius shook his head in a warning, and Harry remembered what he’d been told to do.
“Harry, he’s a liar and a murderer,” said the first auror urgently. She whipped out a thin stick—a wand, like Sirius had told him about—and pointed it at Sirius through the bars. “You—Black. Don’t move.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Sirius said, and Harry looked at him in surprise. Sirius looked in-control, and confident, but… his hands were still shaking. He was… pretending.
“McAlvain,” said the first auror, “get in there and get the kid.”
“Wait,” Harry said, but the door was burst open and Harry was scooped up and taken out quickly.
“Take him, go!” said the first auror, slamming the door shut. “Get him out of here!”
“Wait!” Harry said as he was rushed down the corridor, and then Sirius was standing, stumbling over to the bars.
“Wait,” Sirius called, his voice fragile. “Wait, he needs to tell me about his grandparents.”
“He’s cracking,” muttered one of the guards, backing away.
“NO!” Sirius screamed, and now they were so far away that Harry couldn’t even see him. “He needs to—their names! HARRY, WHAT ARE THEIR NAMES!?”
“EUPHEMIA!” Harry screamed back, as they rounded the corner. “THEIR NAMES ARE EUPHEMIA AND FLEAMONT POTTER!”
Had Sirius heard? He had to have heard. He couldn't have done all of that and not even gotten their names back. It wasn't fair.
And would it start to be? Nobody had ever listened to Harry before. Would that change, starting with Sirius, or was Sirius the only one different? Would Sirius and Harry both be stuck apart again?
Harry was picked up and put down. He was taken to one place then another. He was given food—lots of it—and sat down on a white bed in a white room. Dumbledore will talk to you soon, said the Auror lady, and that got Harry’s attention.
Dumbledore. Tell Dumbledore—tell McGonagall—tell Remus (but only if you need to).
Sirius said he could escape. Harry trusted him. He just had to—had to do his part.