The Marauders Year Five Part 2 #Wattys2017

Picking Up a Scent

Picking Up a Scent

The tiny wolf pup scampered across the control room floor, his little paws clicking on the floor as he went, his ickle bitty claws scraping along. He jumped at the waving tail of the pacing grown wolf, trying to catch onto it with his paws, growling playfully as he dove through the air repeatedly, his little teeth snapping as he let out little yapping barks. The grown wolf barely paid attention, pacing - pacing - pacing - pacing back and forth before the door, his teeth grinding, bared, as his eyes flickered from the door to Newt and Tina's watching faces through the windows. Pacing - pacing - pacing.

Newt's brow furrowed as he watched the wolf go by. "Odd," he murmured.

"What's that?" Tina asked. She was watching Bradley, her eyes never once leaving him, ready to run in and face the grown wolf at a moment's notice if he turned upon her boy. Every muscle tensed - and had been since the transformation had occurred.

"It's just that... he's searching, as though picking up a scent, you see. See the - the hackles there, he's uh, he's ready to defend his Alpha."

Tina spared a glance to the hackles, "Well that can't be, his Alpha would be Greyback, wouldn't it? Greyback's no where near Hogwarts."

Newt stammered, "I - I wouldn't think he would be, but - but perhaps Hogsmeade? Their sense of smell is stronger than ours..." He frowned.

"We need to warn Dumbledore if there's a chance of Greyback being near," Tina said.

"Yes," Newt nodded.

Tina stared as Bradley leaped for Remus's tail and missed, tumbling into Remus's back hocks. She looked to Newt. "What if he's here, looking for Ned?"

"Greyback?"

"Yes," Tina said.

Newt turned without answering and hurried to the ladder and out of the suitcase as Remus's wolf tried at jumping against the door in angst. Tina jumped back from the window, her eyes flickering to Bradley, still scuttling about Remus's ankles, and she pressed her palm to the window.

Sirius had been asleep when the smell entered his nose. It was a scent he'd only breathed a few times, yet it was indelibly burned into his brain. The smell of Fenrir Greyback. His hackles rose instantly and he woke growling, his eyes piercing the night, the flickering grey of the telly set, and Peter wrapped in his blanket burrito. He stood on the bed, Remus's old jumper falling off the bed and onto the floor, coated with a thick shedding of dog fur. He padded over to the window, the scent getting stronger with every step, the fur on the back of his neck at attention, his muscles tight. He pressed his wet nose to the glass, leaving streaks in the dust as he peered through thick white snow as it fell in absolute sheets of white, big snow flakes tumbling down. The trees were a dark blur, far off across the yard of the Shack and he squinted, his dog sight keen, even through the snow and the dark and the fog his breath made upon the window pane.

And then he saw it.

The form of the wolf of the grounds.

He started barking frantically, his voice echoing off the glass, shaking the windows as he focused better on the yellow eyes that stared back across the thick snow. He leaped over the bed and found that James and Lily were gone and he bolted past Peter, waking him up as his feet hit his pudgy little friend, racing down the hall, his claws catching the carpet and tearing it up a bit as he rounded the corner and bounded down the stairs.

Lily and James were on their way up the stairs at exactly the time that Sirius went running down them, and he passed between them, not slowing even a second as he ran for the door and expertly stood on his hind legs, using his paws to twist the knob. He'd practiced this move many a time with Remus and it was a good thing for the smoothness of it allowed him to race out the front door and meet the werewolf in the middle of the yard, rather than too close to the door.