» a werewolf's heart » {wolfstar}

epilogue; 1996

-moony-

I'm floating on the lake on my back, staring up at the stars. It's a full moon. It seems hazy, tinged a bit green. The world is blanketed in quiet. It feels eerie.

I feel a nudge against my back, and I'm being pushed toward shore, lifted out of the water. Once I'm standing in the shallows, Prongs steps around me—but it isn't Prongs. It's Harry's Patronus, silvery and ethereal. It tosses its head, antlers glistening against the velvet black sky, and then walks around me and back across the lake.

Remus—shouldn't you be the werewolf? I hear the voice echo through my mind—sinister, high, trembling. It's Wormtail's voice. My eyes rise fearfully to the moon...

Yes, I should be the werewolf. I haven't taken the wolfsbane potion! I'll be loose—on Hogwarts grounds—a werewolf—

The moon winks at me, as if it's laughing, and I feel the change set in. My bones are lengthening, my joints reversing, and fur sprouts from my skin in waves...

I look down, and there's Sirius standing in front of me, black wings spread out like he's some sort of dark angel—an angel of hell, and of Azkaban, and of my heart. He watches me with his heart in his eyes, dim against the backdrop of Hogwarts, as if he isn't quite real.

And his eyes close. He tilts slowly backward... falling... falling... through the veil...

He fades away, and all that's left is the stone archway, tattered veil fluttering on an unreal wind with whispered voices from a land beyond mocking the feelings in my heart.

No, Sirius—you're not gone, you can't be—you can't be—

I wake with a start, splashing the water in the tub and sending it sloshing over onto the floor. I've been sleeping long enough for the heat to fade so that the water is chill, but my heart feels colder.

Sirius is gone. I'm alone. There's the Order, there's Harry, but no one as close as Sirius. I smile bitterly, but my eyes are tickling with tears, and there's nothing to be done for the aching emptiness in my heart.

The house seems filled with whispers and dark murmurs. It's always been a dark place, bordering on evil, but it was Sirius' house, and he had control over it, however limited. Now, it rebels against those of us still living in it, and all of the dark magic hiding away in shadowed corners comes out. The portrait of Mrs. Black rarely shuts up, and Kreacher looks particularly pleased with himself. I don't know what's to be done with him, but a part of me—a loud, insistent part—cries that he be beheaded and placed on the wall with the long line of house elves that would be so proud of him. That part is what Sirius left in me, the mark of what the two of us shared—so close we sometimes blended together.

I'm trembling. The darkness of the house is closing in on me. It'll swallow me whole, if I allow it. And I want it to, a little. I don't want to remain. Not without Sirius.

But I'm not done here. There's the Order, and Voldemort is still on the loose. And Harry is nearly as shaken as I am by Sirius' death. In some ways, maybe more. He feels guilty, a little; he shouldn't, it wasn't his fault, but I understand the way he feels.

Icy chills run down my spine, and I know that I need to get out of here. Out of this bathroom—out of the house, if I can. I can't dwell. It's strangling my heart, allowing myself to remember Sirius, mourn Sirius, want Sirius—miss him horribly.

I have to do something else. Anything else. I stumble out of the claw-footed tub, splashing water all over the washroom. It sneaks across the floor, silent and imperceptible as death. I'm shaking as I dress, hardly dry, my robes clinging to my damp skin. I cast a fearful glance back at the bathroom, and then flee.