Shadows and Magic

Chapter 10

Sirius

Sirius was staring at the boy in the corner. The boy was wearing a dark, ripped shirt, black hiking pants, and a dark aviator jacket. A deep gash was on his shoulder, and a scar tracing from the side of his eye to the corner of his lip. He had shaggy, feathery hair, deathly pale skin, but the most interesting part of him was his eyes. At that brief moment when his dark pupils had met his, he saw something that the boy had been carefully hiding the whole time. Sirius recognized the look in Nico's eyes. Nico was broken. He had been through something, something bad, that could break his soul to pieces, that could tear his mind apart. Sirius had the same problem when he had been through Azkaban. They both had a shattered look in their eyes, which they tried to keep hidden under layers and layers of other emotions. They both preferred to keep hidden, and act like everything was still okay. Staying hidden kept them safe. Nico reminded Sirius of himself, even more than Harry did, which Sirius found weird and a little guilty of. Other than that, this boy was a complete mystery, which only made Sirius intrigued to find out more about him. 

Nico was sitting against the wall, pretending to be asleep. He was a good actor, that was for sure, but Sirius could tell he was faking it due to his breathing patterns. His chest was rising and falling too quickly. After a moment of silence, Sirius decided to try and break the ice.

"So.. how did you know that Remus was a werewolf?" Sirius questioned casually, hiding his desperation to learn any information. Nico forced his eyes open and glared at Sirius, irritation clear. Sirius winced. Bad mood then. How do you deal with grumpy children?

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Nico asked sarcastically, gritting his teeth. The boy rolled his shoulder, then stopped, gasping softly.

"I would very much like to." Sirius replied, ignoring Nico's pain. The boy had made it clear that he didn't want anyone asking how he was, and as much as Sirius hated it, he had to respect that. "It's fine if you don't want to answer that though. What about something unrelated. Family? It doesn't have to be specific. Just, anything. Like if you have a sibling, something about your parents-" 

Oh no. 

Sirius shot up faster than Moody could shoot a spell, eyes wide. "Bloody- your family. Nico, your family-" he choked, unable to speak in panic. Nico's family must be panicking to a state of who knows what. His gaze whipped up to Nico's face....

... to find the boy staring at him, gaze flat. "You just realized that?"

Sirius stared at him, tongue tied.

Nico sighed. "You people really kidnap someone, lock them in a room, discuss whether or not to give them a truth potion, without considering their background other than 'they consume death'... whatever that means? Morons, you bunch."

"You-" Sirius spluttered, stuck between a scathing retort from being called an idiot, and the disbelief when he realized the boy as right. Even if Nico was a death eater, they should have considered the fact that Voldemort would send someone else to check on his minion, or the death eater's family would send out a search party as well. What were they thinking?

"You weren't." Nico deadpanned, as if he could read his mind. That was disturbing.

Sirius latched onto the first thing he registered. "How did you know we were talking about a truth potion?"

The boy in black raised an eyebrow. "It isn't common knowledge?"

"You don't seem like a wizard."

"I'm not. I'm a witch." 

"Very funny."

"Well, I could." Nico rolled his eyes at him. "But maybe you should've stopped to consider that the name of the truth potion was in Latin."

"Latin?" Sirius stared blankly. 

"Never mind." Nico sighed, rubbing his head. "Okay, how's this answer? Dead sister. Dead mother. Absent father. We have family reunions in the graveyard. Yay." The last word sounded pained and unenthusiastic. Sirius stared at him.

"That's dark."

"Dark..." Nico mused. "Very accurate word to describe our family as well. Though it's nothing compared to my extended family. You want me to give you a rundown? So there's my uncle who married his sister, after having a kid with his other sister, who his brother also had a kid with that turned out to be a-"

"Stop." Sirius held up a hand. "Please stop before I leave this room more traumatized than ever."

Nico shrugged. "You asked."

They fell into silence. Then out of the blue, Nico spoke up.

"What do you mean, more traumatized than ever?"

Sirius hesitated. Should he...?

"I already answered a question of yours." Nico muttered. "Seems fair to answer me as well."

"Have you ever been to a place... that drives you mad, looping thoughts that aren't your own, radiating fear and depression, sucking hope out of you?" Sirius whispered, struck by a torrent of memories he didn't want to relive, before starling. Of course Nico wouldn't-

"Yes."

"Yes?" Sirius stiffened, baffled. He whirled around. "Yes!?"

"Yes." Nico's face was unreadable. 

"But... yes???"

"Do you want me to say it in another language? Italian? Spanish? Greek? Latin? Idiot? It's YES."

Sirius blinked. "What?"

"By all the gods... get out. You're giving me a headache."

"You're giving me one too." Sirius shot back, but he stood, dusting imaginary flecks off his pants to hide how confused he was. He turned to leave... when Nico spoke again.

"Wait."

Sirius turned, eyebrow raised, to see Nico hesitantly pull up a corner of the sleeve of his shirt to reveal a nasty mess of tissue and scar. Sirius felt sick just staring at it. 

"Lycaon." Nico muttered, refusing to meet his eye. "Ran into a werewolf about a year ago. It's still healing. That other guy had the same aura." He dropped his gaze to the floor. "You can leave now."

Sirius nodded slowly, turning to leave. "I'll be back soon." He shot absentmindedly towards Nico, shutting the door and making his way down the stairs for supper.

The stairs creaked as he made his way down. Plates clinked and people bustled around, as Sirius entered the room with his head now spinning with more questions with answers.

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Well this feels half finished...

So... don't hate me.

I can explain-