Defying the Stars

The Rat

   "Harry, can you take Amara while I untie Remus?" Dad asks urgently. Harry nods, and takes me back into his arms, gently stroking my arm.

"Thank you," Pop says as he stands up with Dad's help.

"I'm not saying that I believe you," Harry says, "But I trust Mara, and if she trusts you two-then I should at least listen." I look at him gratefully as I mouth a thank you.

"Then it's time we offered you some proof," Dad says, a small smile on his face, relieved that they're going to listen. "You, boy-give me Peter. Now!"

We all look at Ron, his eyes widening.

"Come off it," he says weakly. "Are you trying to say you broke out of Azkaban just to get your hands on Scabbers? I mean..." he breaks off and looks to Harry and Hermione and I for support. "Okay, say Pettifrew could turn into a rat-there are millions of rats-how's he supposed to know which one he's after if he was locked up in Azkaban?"

Pop chuckles. "You know Sirius, that's a good question, how did you know where he was?"

Dad fumbles with his pockets and pulls out a crumpled piece of paper. It's the Daily Prophet from after Ron and the rest of his family went to Egypt.

"How did you manage to get this?" Pop asks, thunderstruck.

"Fudge," Dad replies. "When he came to inspect Azkaban last year, he gave me his paper, and there was Peter on the front page...on this boy's shoulder...I knew him at once-how many times have I seen him transform? And the caption said the boy would be going back to Hogwarts...where Amara was...where Harry was-"

"My god," Pop says softly, staring from Scabbers to the picture in the paper and back again. "His front paw..."

"What about it?" Ron says defiantly.

"He's got a toe missing," Dad says.

"Of course," Pop breathes, "so simple...so brilliant...he cut it off himself?"

"Just before he transformed," Black says, when I cornered him he yelled for the whole street to hear that I'd betrayed Lily and James. Then, before I could curse him, he blew apart the street with the wand behind his back, killed everyone within twenty feet of himself-and sped down the sewer with the other rats."

"The biggest part they found of Pettigrew was-"

"-his finger," Harry breathes, cutting Hermione off.

"Look, Scabbers probably got into a fight with another rat or something! He's been in my family for ages, right-"

"Twelve years, in fact." Pop says. "Didn;t you ever wonder why he was living so long?"

"We-we've been taking good care of him!" Ron says.

"Not looking too good at the moment though, is he?" Pop continues. "I guess he's been losing weight ever since he heard Sirius was on the loose again..."

"He's been scared of that mad cat!" Ron says, nodding towards Crookshanks.

"This cat isn't mad," Dad says hoarsely, reaching out and stroking the cat. "He's the most intelligent of his kind I've ever met. He recognised Peter for what he was straight away. And when he met me, he knew I was no dog. It was a while before he trusted me. Finally , I managed to communicate to him what I was after, and he's been helping me-"

"What do you mean?" Hermione interrupts.

"He tried to bring Peter to me, but couldn't...so he stole the passwords into Gryffindor Tower for me...as I understand, he took them from a boy's bedside table..."