Squib On The Run (sequel to Squib In The basement)

28. Journey Of A Lifetime

Cassiopeia had Narcissa set her up a subscription for the Daily Prophet, for she wanted to keep an eye on what the press was saying about her and Sirius.
Every day she had to force herself to read through the lies that were being told to the public. But she forced herself to read these horrible things because she wanted to keep tabs on Sirius's whereabouts.
Whenever the papers would write about a supposed sighting of Sirius, Cassiopeia would sneak out and head there herself. But she never managed to find any trace of Sirius.

With Harry and Draco at school, and Narcissa being forced to keep her distance in case the Ministry thought she was in contact with Cassiopeia, the youngest Black was beginning to feel very lonely.
Cassiopeia knew it was dangerous to leave the house when the whole wizarding world was looking for her. But since Harry didn't need her protection, Cassiopeia had stopped caring about herself.
The only thing she wanted was to see Sirius again.
Her brother had been one of the only good things in her life, and she just wanted the chance to have one more conversation with him.
So, whenever the Daily Prophet revealed a new sighting of Sirius, Cassiopeia would head out at night, to try and find him.
But the weeks slowly turned into months, and Cassiopeia hadn't even caught a glimpse of her brother.

When it was announced that Sirius had potentially been spotted near Hogsmeade, Cassiopeia knew what she had to do.
She packed a back and left the house in the dead of the night, leaving a note for Narcissa explaining where she had gone.
Without magic, Cassiopeia could not simply apparate to her location, and with the whole wizarding world looking for her, she knew she would have to use Muggle forms of travel instead.
Since she didn't have any money, Cassiopeia knew she would have to make the majority of the journey on foot. But she was willing to do anything to see Sirius again.

Cassiopeia did most of her walking in the evenings and at night, as there was less chance of anyone seeing her then.
She knew that she had been on the Muggle news, so she couldn't afford to take too many risks, as being caught by a Muggle would be very humiliating.
She slept on the streets and in forests during the day, and ate what she could from rubbish bins so that she didn't have to steal too much from shops and peoples homes.

There were times when she wanted to stop and return to her nice warm bed back home. Sometimes she doubted whether Sirius was even anywhere near Hogsmeade, since there were Dementors posted at Hogwarts, so it would be dangerous for him to go there.
But deep down she knew that Sirius cared about Harry just as much as she did. So it made sense that after 12 years in prison, Sirius would want to reunite with his godson, for he was the only part of James that Sirius had left.

After several long weeks of travelling, Cassiopeia finally reached her location; Hogsmeade villiage.
It had been many years since she had set foot there, and so many things had changed since then.
She knew that with everyone around her having magic, she would have to be extremely careful not to be noticied, so kept her face covered with a scarf, so that she wouldn't be recognised.
She spent several days scouting the area, but found no sign of Sirius.

With no other choice, Cassiopeia began to ask the locals if they had seen anything suspicious lately. And to her surprise they had an answer that she had not been expecting, and that was that a large, black, shaggy looking dog, had been spotted around the town, eating scraps of food from people's bins.
Cassiopeia knew that Sirius's animagus form was a black dog, so she just prayed that it was really him and not just a stray animal.

That evening she headed up a large hill, in the direction that the locals had seen the dog disappearing in.
This route took her towards a building called the Shrieking Shack which everyone said was haunted.
Cassiopeia thought that if the dog really was Sirius, then it would have been smart of him to hide in a place where everyone was too afraid to go near.
Despite the hunger pains in her belly, and the exhaustion she could feel around her body, Cassiopeia pushed on, feeling closer to Sirius than she had in years.

When she reached the shack she carefully stepped inside, holding her knife in one hand, in case she met an enemy inside.
As she carefully climbed up the creaky staircase, she began to hear voices, but she couldn't figure out who they belonged to, or what was being said.
Eventually she reached a door that was slightly ajar, and behind it she could hear multiple people's voices.

The sudden sound of an explosion followed by screams made Cassiopeia jump out of her skin. And despite not knowing what would happen, Cassiopeia burst into the room prepared to fight whoever was on the other side.
She quickly scanned the room, identifying all the people inside.
There were 2 students sitting on the floor, who Cassiopeia assumed were Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, since Harry was stood in front of them with his wand raised defensively.
Cassiopeia looked at where Harry's wand was pointed and saw a man with long black hair, and dark robes, who was sprawled out in an unconscious heap on the floor.

There were two more men in the room, who were stood in front of her.
Despite his shabby appearance, Cassiopeia recognised Remus Lupin immediately, as they had spent so much time together while he was dating her brother. And even though he appeared to have aged about 30 years, instead of 13, since she had last seen him, she knew it was him.
The final man in the room had long, wavy, black hair, a sunken face, and wore tattered prison robes.
But despite this, Cassiopeia knew who he was.
After so many years apart, she was finally face to face with her brother Sirius once more.

Even though there were other people in the room, Cassiopeia did not care.
She dropped the knife she had been holding and sprinted towards Sirius, throwing herself into his arms.
Time seemed to melt away as they held each other tight.
"Hi Siri" whispered Cassiopeia as she tried to hold back tears.
"Hi Cass" he croaked back.
"It's you" exclaimed Cassiopeia, squeezing him tighter.
"It's me".