An Exploration
Title: An Exploration. Five
Author:![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
grandilloquism
Beta:nezumi1288
Rating: PG
Summary: Long term Hogwarts fic. Years one through seven.
Author's Note: Big thanks tonezumi1288 for doing such a wonderful job and getting it back to me so quickly.
“Precious things are for those that can prize them.”
-from Aesop’s Fables, The Cock and the Pearl
March, 1972
The four of them stayed over for Easter holidays. Remus spent most of the first week organizing notes. Putting subjects together, aligning correlating information, adding to things that needed it and throwing out things that were obsolete. James, Sirius, and Peter watched in disbelief for an afternoon before running off to explore the castle, terrified that if they stayed any longer Remus would recruit their services.
That week they discovered one secret passageway (a hallway set into the rock behind a mirror on the fourth floor that let out by way of a twisting staircase in a gigantic hollowed-out tree just inside of the Forbidden Forest), a corridor hidden behind a tapestry that took them from the seventh floor to the third without any stairs, and, through the corridor behind the door just to the right of the main staircase, the entrance to the kitchens.
It was the first day of the second week and they were eating their pilfered goods, cramming bits of turkey and bread in their mouths, when Remus looked up from his notes, frowning.
“Wha’?” Sirius managed, not dropping an ounce of the food stuffed behind his teeth.
Remus shook his head, looking down at the date scrawled on his most recent batch of notes, “Nothing, I mean- my birthday’s on Friday. I hadn’t realized it was this close, is all.”
“This Friday?” Sirius asked, voice carefully indifferent.
Remus glanced up again, eyes narrowed.
“Yes,” This reply was hesitant, drawn out, afraid of itself. Whatever thoughts were being set in motion, that look of careful indifference on Sirius’ face boded nothing good.
“Oh,” was all Sirius said, though he gave both James and Peter Meaningful Looks.
Sirius sat down at the desk under the window in their dormitory. He had waited for the others to fall asleep, running through the words he wanted to write down over and over until he knew he’d gotten the sentences just right. It’d taken nearly an hour for him to be sure no one was awake to hear his quiet footsteps across the parquet floors, the silent slide of the chair legs and the careful scratching of his quill against his best stationary, more than once he found himself diving back into bed at the hitch of a breath or a rustled sheet.
Uncle Alphard,
I’m writing in regards to the books on charms you have in your library. In particular the one with the chapter on spells to keep things hidden. I’d be much obliged if you would let me borrow this book for, perhaps, a week?
My regards,
Your nephew,
Sirius Black
He looked the letter over one more time. For three sentences it was causing him quite a great deal of trouble. He vowed not to think about what he’d do if his uncle wouldn’t let him borrow the book. He’d already checked the Hogwarts library, even consulted Madam Pince, though he hadn’t mentioned the particular reason he was interested in the book, but his searches had revealed nothing. He supposed, if his uncle refused his request, he could spend his free time combing through the books on charms the library did have, though he was bitterly against spending that much time anywhere, especially the cold quietness of the library.
This kind of thinking carried him through to the west corridor, shielded by James’ invisibility cloak, and into the tower of the Owlery. He picked a nondescript school owl, one of the only owls not out hunting, and attached his letter. With a strange feeling in his stomach he watched the owl until the darkness of the night closed around it, then ghosted back through the corridors to bed.
His reply came on Tuesday with the morning post. His stomach did a nasty flip before he realized the owl, his uncle’s own handsome grey, carried a good-sized parcel. It made an elegant turn of the hall before coasting to a stop on an empty bit of table. Sirius removed it of its burden and it nibbled his fingers affectionately before taking to the air. He opened the note, ignoring the curious looks from his friends.
Sirius,
You only need ask. I’m happy to share my library with you, though I’d appreciate a purely social letter now and then. I hope you’ve gotten a chance to glace over your Christmas present between classes, I thought the different perspectives might interest you.
I hope you find what you need in this book, but feel free to hang on to it, just in case something else pops up. Give my best to Professor Dumbledore and thank him for those notes on Grindelwald for me.
Alphard.
He looked up at the staff table, thinking he might actually pass on his uncle's regards if the book proved useful, before turning back to the package.
“Well?” Asked James, patience obviously worn thin. “Who’s it from?” His expression was something like apprehension mixed with keen interest. Remus too had a like expression, though it was tinged with something like worry. Peter alone looked uninterested; having already ascertained that Sirius’ reaction wasn’t one to worry about, he’d gone back to his toast.
Sirius ran his fingers over the brown paper wrapping of the book before setting it carefully in his bag. He shook his head, “My uncle. A late Easter gift, is all.” It wasn’t even a lie, Sirius thought happily, since his uncle had given him the book.
Remus’ curiosity was not appeased, he’d caught the header at the top of the stationary. “Your uncle works for the Ministry‘s Historical Guild?”
Sirius shrugged, “In artefacts retrieval, mostly.” At his friend’s impressed looks he shook his head, “No, nothing interesting. It’s mostly going around to old wizarding homes and asking how much gold they’d take for this or that old heirloom, he took me once.”
“S’what’s the gift?”
“Some book he thought I’d like. I’ll just put it upstairs and meet you down at the lake.” He removed himself from the bench and hurried upstairs, thinking perhaps he’d be able to find the right chapter before they came looking for him. He was thinking of Remus, how he’d returned from his trip home last week with a fresh pink scar beginning behind his ear and disappearing under his collar, when he collided with something as he turned into the corridor leading to the portrait hole.
He didn’t realize exactly what it was he’d hit until he looked beneath him, the force of impact having dumped both of them on the ground. It was a first year girl, unruly red hair pinned back and knotted at the base of her neck, green eyes betraying impatience and exasperation. Sirius sprung to his feet, offering his hand to her with the tiniest of bows, “My apologies, Miss…?”
“...Evans,” she supplied. She took the proffered hand with reluctance, taking the boy’s chivalry for mocking, not realizing that Sirius’ preoccupation had caused him to slip back into full on Black manners.
Sirius nodded, recognizing her finally. “I hope you’ll excuse my clumsiness,” he rushed off.
Lily, expression mistrustful, stared after the boy. Taking his words for a joke (because who taught manners like that anymore), she readjusted the strap of her bag and walked off to breakfast.
It took Sirius two nights to work out the mechanics of the spell he needed to use and a third to apply it practically. Though it resulted in a handful of sleepless nights in secret places and slews of curses tucked in between pleading charm work, what he had by midnight of Remus Lupin’s birthday was the best present that was in Sirius’ ability to give.
Remus woke up in quite the usual way on March the tenth. This is how he knew he was in trouble. Sirius had been Up To Something since Sunday, slinking around and disappearing for hours at a time, always in possession of the slim volume he had received Tuesday.
Remus often wondered about the way Sirius acted towards him. Towards James Sirius was the brother, the comrade in arms, knight or squire, depending on what was needed; they were equals, vanquishers of foes in a quest bigger than themselves. To Peter, Sirius was a mix of things; friend, always, because a friend is someone you share meals with, someone who laughs with you whether they get your jokes or not, someone you sing obnoxiously with down hallways and stand up for whether if they’re the wronged party or not.
But Remus feels, though he is all of these things to Sirius, he is something more. There is something different in the way that Sirius will stop before he says something, only occasionally and never often enough (since it seems Sirius’ life goal is to be decreed Supreme Arrogant Berk), but Remus thinks it might be that second Sirius allows for his thoughts to finish forming in his head before he speaks them aloud that is the difference between Sirius and James, or Sirius and Peter and Sirius and Remus.
And it is the way that Sirius is carefully avoiding Remus’ eye, acting as if he doesn’t see the boy, which makes Remus suspicious. It’s that he won’t break down and hand the stupid surprise over already that puts Remus on edge.
It continues this way through the day. Though James and Peter manage to act normal, eating meals and keeping themselves entertained with just the barest hint of mischief behind their eyes, Sirius is manic with the energy of a secret. He throws himself into everything with such fervent and intense heat that Remus is genuinely surprised he hasn’t started melting away at the edges, or that he hasn’t burst into flames from the pent up energy contained within him.
Just after dinner this energy hits critical. Remus thinks that if he touches the madly vigoured boy that he might actually be burnt. He is led by a hand to the shoulder from the Great Hall to their dormitory, out through their dormitory window to the roof, where he is left blindfolded, to sit until they return. He hears them, smells them too, making the trek in and out the window, smells the Prophet’s used as wrapping paper, can smell chocolate under that, and glue binding pages together, but also something deeper and not at all easy to place. It smelt like, like the shack before a transformation (not old blood and dust, but the smell that fell thick and heady through the room just as the moon tipped over the horizon), like the air after an apparition or the wave that hits him when he opens a truly ancient book. The smell is old magic, Remus realizes. Potent and dangerous, Sirius’ gift, he knows.
The blindfold is removed.
Sirius’ excitement has been contained to an impatient kind of quivering which might have, at one point, been a simple toe-tap, but since, has taken over his entire body, causing tremors and a truly intent facial expression. Remus thinks this might mean Sirius will spontaneously combust if he doesn’t pick his present first. Remus picks up James’ present.
“Happy birthday,” James says, taking a great pleasure in the look Sirius is shooting him. “I know it won’t be as good as whatever that prat’s been working on for the last week,” James shoves Sirius and Sirius shoves him back and the only reason it doesn’t escalate into a wrestling match is not because they are on the roof of Gryffindor Tower but because Sirius disengages and lunges forward to push his present in front of Peter’s.
Remus finishes unwrapping the book. It’s a handsome looking thing, black leather and gold-embossed letters. 'Practical Defence in Charms and Transfiguration' reads the title, and under that, 'finding the useful amongst the muddle.'
“I ordered it from Flourish and Blotts last week, I thought you’d like it, since we threw your last copy in the lake.” It had actually been Sirius, who, in one of his moods, declared reading a silly thing to do during holiday and had tossed the book over his shoulder. James knew better than to point this out, he had also known that Sirius would never replace something so practical and that Remus would never accept it unless he saw it as a legitimate present.
Remus smiles, says a very polite, very heartfelt thank you and picks up Peter’s present. It’s the chocolate, of course, good Honeydukes stuff that he must have bribed an older student to pick up for him, which is especially touching since Peter is neither disgustingly rich nor normally inclined to talk to anyone outside of his own year. Remus thanks him as well, shares around the chocolate, and then finally picks up Sirius’ box.
Sirius’s second thoughts are not showing on his face, although he fears perhaps Remus won’t like his gift or laugh or make that quietly disapproving face that Sirius has some sort of love-hate relationship towards, his face stays frozen. He watches with intense, wide eyes as Remus peels back the newspaper and pulls out a folded parchment box, about the size of his palm.
Remus frowns, looks up at Sirius. He can feel the magic in it, smell it to, though maybe less so now that he has his sight back, “What is it?”
Sirius launches forward, takes the box from him, shows him the swivel-way to open it. “It’s a hideaway,” he looks for recognition on his friend’s face, finding none he launches into an explanation, words tumbling from his mouth in the rush to show Remus how perfect a present this is. “You can open it different ways, it’s folded so different things can be hidden in parts. It won’t run out of space either, or is shouldn’t,” he glares at the box, reminding the poor thing that it was he who made it and it would take a lot less work to take it apart. Sirius thinks he sees the box shiver, though it could be a trick of the light, and he nods self-assuredly. “Size doesn’t matter either, though it won’t do body parts. Ruined the first few trying to shove my hand in them. Anything else though, it should handle pretty well.” Sirius realizes he’s babbling and promptly stops.
Remus is a bit overwhelmed, he’s also impressed, shocked, and dubious, but he’s mostly overwhelmed. And it’s the overwhelmed part of him that grins, that full-out grins, and hugs Sirius around the shoulders. And Sirius beams and returns the awkward hug and they let go a few seconds later when James calls them both absolute women and threatens to eat all the cake himself.
Remus thinks he wouldn't have minded too much though, once they are back in their dorm and changing into pyjamas, because he has the best friends ever, and presents, and the full moon isn’t for nearly three weeks and tonight he can go to sleep content and tomorrow, well, they still had a full weekend of Easter holidays left.
March the Twenty-Fifth through April the Fourth, 1972
Author:
grandilloquism Beta:
nezumi1288 Rating: PG
Summary: Long term Hogwarts fic. Years one through seven.
Author's Note: Big thanks to
nezumi1288 for doing such a wonderful job and getting it back to me so quickly. “Precious things are for those that can prize them.”
-from Aesop’s Fables, The Cock and the Pearl
March, 1972
The four of them stayed over for Easter holidays. Remus spent most of the first week organizing notes. Putting subjects together, aligning correlating information, adding to things that needed it and throwing out things that were obsolete. James, Sirius, and Peter watched in disbelief for an afternoon before running off to explore the castle, terrified that if they stayed any longer Remus would recruit their services.
That week they discovered one secret passageway (a hallway set into the rock behind a mirror on the fourth floor that let out by way of a twisting staircase in a gigantic hollowed-out tree just inside of the Forbidden Forest), a corridor hidden behind a tapestry that took them from the seventh floor to the third without any stairs, and, through the corridor behind the door just to the right of the main staircase, the entrance to the kitchens.
It was the first day of the second week and they were eating their pilfered goods, cramming bits of turkey and bread in their mouths, when Remus looked up from his notes, frowning.
“Wha’?” Sirius managed, not dropping an ounce of the food stuffed behind his teeth.
Remus shook his head, looking down at the date scrawled on his most recent batch of notes, “Nothing, I mean- my birthday’s on Friday. I hadn’t realized it was this close, is all.”
“This Friday?” Sirius asked, voice carefully indifferent.
Remus glanced up again, eyes narrowed.
“Yes,” This reply was hesitant, drawn out, afraid of itself. Whatever thoughts were being set in motion, that look of careful indifference on Sirius’ face boded nothing good.
“Oh,” was all Sirius said, though he gave both James and Peter Meaningful Looks.
Sirius sat down at the desk under the window in their dormitory. He had waited for the others to fall asleep, running through the words he wanted to write down over and over until he knew he’d gotten the sentences just right. It’d taken nearly an hour for him to be sure no one was awake to hear his quiet footsteps across the parquet floors, the silent slide of the chair legs and the careful scratching of his quill against his best stationary, more than once he found himself diving back into bed at the hitch of a breath or a rustled sheet.
Uncle Alphard,
I’m writing in regards to the books on charms you have in your library. In particular the one with the chapter on spells to keep things hidden. I’d be much obliged if you would let me borrow this book for, perhaps, a week?
My regards,
Your nephew,
Sirius Black
He looked the letter over one more time. For three sentences it was causing him quite a great deal of trouble. He vowed not to think about what he’d do if his uncle wouldn’t let him borrow the book. He’d already checked the Hogwarts library, even consulted Madam Pince, though he hadn’t mentioned the particular reason he was interested in the book, but his searches had revealed nothing. He supposed, if his uncle refused his request, he could spend his free time combing through the books on charms the library did have, though he was bitterly against spending that much time anywhere, especially the cold quietness of the library.
This kind of thinking carried him through to the west corridor, shielded by James’ invisibility cloak, and into the tower of the Owlery. He picked a nondescript school owl, one of the only owls not out hunting, and attached his letter. With a strange feeling in his stomach he watched the owl until the darkness of the night closed around it, then ghosted back through the corridors to bed.
His reply came on Tuesday with the morning post. His stomach did a nasty flip before he realized the owl, his uncle’s own handsome grey, carried a good-sized parcel. It made an elegant turn of the hall before coasting to a stop on an empty bit of table. Sirius removed it of its burden and it nibbled his fingers affectionately before taking to the air. He opened the note, ignoring the curious looks from his friends.
Sirius,
You only need ask. I’m happy to share my library with you, though I’d appreciate a purely social letter now and then. I hope you’ve gotten a chance to glace over your Christmas present between classes, I thought the different perspectives might interest you.
I hope you find what you need in this book, but feel free to hang on to it, just in case something else pops up. Give my best to Professor Dumbledore and thank him for those notes on Grindelwald for me.
Alphard.
He looked up at the staff table, thinking he might actually pass on his uncle's regards if the book proved useful, before turning back to the package.
“Well?” Asked James, patience obviously worn thin. “Who’s it from?” His expression was something like apprehension mixed with keen interest. Remus too had a like expression, though it was tinged with something like worry. Peter alone looked uninterested; having already ascertained that Sirius’ reaction wasn’t one to worry about, he’d gone back to his toast.
Sirius ran his fingers over the brown paper wrapping of the book before setting it carefully in his bag. He shook his head, “My uncle. A late Easter gift, is all.” It wasn’t even a lie, Sirius thought happily, since his uncle had given him the book.
Remus’ curiosity was not appeased, he’d caught the header at the top of the stationary. “Your uncle works for the Ministry‘s Historical Guild?”
Sirius shrugged, “In artefacts retrieval, mostly.” At his friend’s impressed looks he shook his head, “No, nothing interesting. It’s mostly going around to old wizarding homes and asking how much gold they’d take for this or that old heirloom, he took me once.”
“S’what’s the gift?”
“Some book he thought I’d like. I’ll just put it upstairs and meet you down at the lake.” He removed himself from the bench and hurried upstairs, thinking perhaps he’d be able to find the right chapter before they came looking for him. He was thinking of Remus, how he’d returned from his trip home last week with a fresh pink scar beginning behind his ear and disappearing under his collar, when he collided with something as he turned into the corridor leading to the portrait hole.
He didn’t realize exactly what it was he’d hit until he looked beneath him, the force of impact having dumped both of them on the ground. It was a first year girl, unruly red hair pinned back and knotted at the base of her neck, green eyes betraying impatience and exasperation. Sirius sprung to his feet, offering his hand to her with the tiniest of bows, “My apologies, Miss…?”
“...Evans,” she supplied. She took the proffered hand with reluctance, taking the boy’s chivalry for mocking, not realizing that Sirius’ preoccupation had caused him to slip back into full on Black manners.
Sirius nodded, recognizing her finally. “I hope you’ll excuse my clumsiness,” he rushed off.
Lily, expression mistrustful, stared after the boy. Taking his words for a joke (because who taught manners like that anymore), she readjusted the strap of her bag and walked off to breakfast.
It took Sirius two nights to work out the mechanics of the spell he needed to use and a third to apply it practically. Though it resulted in a handful of sleepless nights in secret places and slews of curses tucked in between pleading charm work, what he had by midnight of Remus Lupin’s birthday was the best present that was in Sirius’ ability to give.
Remus woke up in quite the usual way on March the tenth. This is how he knew he was in trouble. Sirius had been Up To Something since Sunday, slinking around and disappearing for hours at a time, always in possession of the slim volume he had received Tuesday.
Remus often wondered about the way Sirius acted towards him. Towards James Sirius was the brother, the comrade in arms, knight or squire, depending on what was needed; they were equals, vanquishers of foes in a quest bigger than themselves. To Peter, Sirius was a mix of things; friend, always, because a friend is someone you share meals with, someone who laughs with you whether they get your jokes or not, someone you sing obnoxiously with down hallways and stand up for whether if they’re the wronged party or not.
But Remus feels, though he is all of these things to Sirius, he is something more. There is something different in the way that Sirius will stop before he says something, only occasionally and never often enough (since it seems Sirius’ life goal is to be decreed Supreme Arrogant Berk), but Remus thinks it might be that second Sirius allows for his thoughts to finish forming in his head before he speaks them aloud that is the difference between Sirius and James, or Sirius and Peter and Sirius and Remus.
And it is the way that Sirius is carefully avoiding Remus’ eye, acting as if he doesn’t see the boy, which makes Remus suspicious. It’s that he won’t break down and hand the stupid surprise over already that puts Remus on edge.
It continues this way through the day. Though James and Peter manage to act normal, eating meals and keeping themselves entertained with just the barest hint of mischief behind their eyes, Sirius is manic with the energy of a secret. He throws himself into everything with such fervent and intense heat that Remus is genuinely surprised he hasn’t started melting away at the edges, or that he hasn’t burst into flames from the pent up energy contained within him.
Just after dinner this energy hits critical. Remus thinks that if he touches the madly vigoured boy that he might actually be burnt. He is led by a hand to the shoulder from the Great Hall to their dormitory, out through their dormitory window to the roof, where he is left blindfolded, to sit until they return. He hears them, smells them too, making the trek in and out the window, smells the Prophet’s used as wrapping paper, can smell chocolate under that, and glue binding pages together, but also something deeper and not at all easy to place. It smelt like, like the shack before a transformation (not old blood and dust, but the smell that fell thick and heady through the room just as the moon tipped over the horizon), like the air after an apparition or the wave that hits him when he opens a truly ancient book. The smell is old magic, Remus realizes. Potent and dangerous, Sirius’ gift, he knows.
The blindfold is removed.
Sirius’ excitement has been contained to an impatient kind of quivering which might have, at one point, been a simple toe-tap, but since, has taken over his entire body, causing tremors and a truly intent facial expression. Remus thinks this might mean Sirius will spontaneously combust if he doesn’t pick his present first. Remus picks up James’ present.
“Happy birthday,” James says, taking a great pleasure in the look Sirius is shooting him. “I know it won’t be as good as whatever that prat’s been working on for the last week,” James shoves Sirius and Sirius shoves him back and the only reason it doesn’t escalate into a wrestling match is not because they are on the roof of Gryffindor Tower but because Sirius disengages and lunges forward to push his present in front of Peter’s.
Remus finishes unwrapping the book. It’s a handsome looking thing, black leather and gold-embossed letters. 'Practical Defence in Charms and Transfiguration' reads the title, and under that, 'finding the useful amongst the muddle.'
“I ordered it from Flourish and Blotts last week, I thought you’d like it, since we threw your last copy in the lake.” It had actually been Sirius, who, in one of his moods, declared reading a silly thing to do during holiday and had tossed the book over his shoulder. James knew better than to point this out, he had also known that Sirius would never replace something so practical and that Remus would never accept it unless he saw it as a legitimate present.
Remus smiles, says a very polite, very heartfelt thank you and picks up Peter’s present. It’s the chocolate, of course, good Honeydukes stuff that he must have bribed an older student to pick up for him, which is especially touching since Peter is neither disgustingly rich nor normally inclined to talk to anyone outside of his own year. Remus thanks him as well, shares around the chocolate, and then finally picks up Sirius’ box.
Sirius’s second thoughts are not showing on his face, although he fears perhaps Remus won’t like his gift or laugh or make that quietly disapproving face that Sirius has some sort of love-hate relationship towards, his face stays frozen. He watches with intense, wide eyes as Remus peels back the newspaper and pulls out a folded parchment box, about the size of his palm.
Remus frowns, looks up at Sirius. He can feel the magic in it, smell it to, though maybe less so now that he has his sight back, “What is it?”
Sirius launches forward, takes the box from him, shows him the swivel-way to open it. “It’s a hideaway,” he looks for recognition on his friend’s face, finding none he launches into an explanation, words tumbling from his mouth in the rush to show Remus how perfect a present this is. “You can open it different ways, it’s folded so different things can be hidden in parts. It won’t run out of space either, or is shouldn’t,” he glares at the box, reminding the poor thing that it was he who made it and it would take a lot less work to take it apart. Sirius thinks he sees the box shiver, though it could be a trick of the light, and he nods self-assuredly. “Size doesn’t matter either, though it won’t do body parts. Ruined the first few trying to shove my hand in them. Anything else though, it should handle pretty well.” Sirius realizes he’s babbling and promptly stops.
Remus is a bit overwhelmed, he’s also impressed, shocked, and dubious, but he’s mostly overwhelmed. And it’s the overwhelmed part of him that grins, that full-out grins, and hugs Sirius around the shoulders. And Sirius beams and returns the awkward hug and they let go a few seconds later when James calls them both absolute women and threatens to eat all the cake himself.
Remus thinks he wouldn't have minded too much though, once they are back in their dorm and changing into pyjamas, because he has the best friends ever, and presents, and the full moon isn’t for nearly three weeks and tonight he can go to sleep content and tomorrow, well, they still had a full weekend of Easter holidays left.
March the Twenty-Fifth through April the Fourth, 1972
this chapter turned out great, it still makes me smile at the end.
Ugh, I just love how you write them! I don't even know how to express it~
This...this is the thing I have always wanted. Someone to write a series for the Marauders. Do keep it up won't you? I'm really loving this.