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Chapter Text

For Sirius Black, the Auror Office's Entrance Examination is a piece of cake. Except for the bit at the end, which is a piece of bullshit.

The selection committee fawns over his N.E.W.T.s. Screw you, Mother, he thinks, it's high time someone appreciated an Outstanding in Muggle Studies. He brews six potions simultaneously, Vanishes the tablecloth underneath a house of Exploding Snap cards without so much as a single spark, battles the Ministry's training troll - a grumpy old bastard even by trolls' lousy standards -, and breezes through the physical fitness test barely out of breath.

"That was fun," James remarks when Sirius plonks down next to him in the auditory.

"That was boring," says Sirius. "I wish they still had that dragon! What's left?" He scans the programme slips they've all been given in the morning.

Individual interviews, it says at the bottom of the list. Motivation and mental health.

James snorts. "About time someone started asking you questions, Pads."

"Easy-peasy," says Sirius. "If that is their standard of mental health –" he jerks his head towards the madman currently clinking woodenly towards the lectern, "- I don't think we have anything to worry about."

Said madman introduced himself this morning as Alastor bloody Moody; you might know me from your worst nightmares.

Around them, the excited, exhausted, and already thoroughly thinned out murmur dies away. Moody slams his wooden leg down, but by then it's quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

"All right, you got through the easy part," the scarecrow in charge of them says, "or at least, a third of you did. I have no choice but to infer the whole cohort's full of wet blankets, so you better step up your game."

It's not exactly what the audience has expected. James leans over to Sirius and whispers, "I like him."

"You would," says Sirius. "He sounds like you during Quidditch try-outs."

"I'll tell you what," says Moody. "If you're still around after the day you've had, you probably can do the job." On the other side of the lecture hall, someone whoops. Moody's artificial eye, which Sirius finds highly distracting, swivels towards the noise. It dies mid-whoop.

"Whether you should be doing it," adds Moody calmly, once again enjoying their undivided attention, " – well, that's an entirely different beast. The interviews will be held under Veritaserum –"

This time, a groan goes through the hall, and Moody laughs mirthlessly. "Yeah, I know," he says. "It's only the Auror Office, let's just let in a bunch of basket cases and Death Eaters, shall we? If your delicate sensibilities can't handle a touch of privacy invasion, get out now. The rest, turn over your parchments."

The tension has certainly risen in the hall, but under the Moody's asymmetric watch, no-one dares leaving.

The madman waves his wand. "On the back of your parchments, you should see a list of guiding questions," he says. "Interviewers may divert from them at their own discretion."

Sirius scans his parchment. At the top, it says, Are you, or have you ever been, in contact with a known or suspected Death Eater?

"And there's no point in trying to lie under Veritaserum," says Moody casually. "The yelps of pain will give you away."

Sirius is aware that James is giving him a semi-concerned look.

He ignores both scarecrow and best friend. "Finally, a challenge," he says, and feels a grin spread over his face.

The highly ironical thing is that Remus Lupin would have aced this part. The Werewolf Registry requires biannual interviews under Veritaserum, and Remus has become a pro at hiding truths inside technicalities. Besides, he is the very picture of motivation and mental health. He might not even have had to lie.

He'd be the perfect Auror: More committed than James, more rational than Sirius, more hard-working than either of them. Except the bloody morons at the Auror Office had sent back Remus's application – twelve N.E.W.T.s, prefect, captain of the duelling club, peer mentoring, the list goes on – stapled together with a copy of the 1978 Control of Dark Creatures in the Workplace Act. Remus works in a bar now.

He's not there when Sirius gets home, which is bad because Sirius has questions. In a world in which Veritaserum is a thing, what's even the point of keeping secrets? Why has it seemed so important all this time? And how on earth can Sirius throw himself at the sofa and miss?

Mr Black, do you currently suffer from, or have you ever suffered from insomnia or feelings of restlessness?

Between endless winter nights in the Gryffindor common room and the fact it's currently four a.m., it's probably a fair question, even though Sirius has so far operated under the assumption that Auroring takes place largely at night, so where's the problem? Or maybe that's Remus's Muggle crime shows. His grasp on reality is a bit shaky right now.

He hears a key turn in the lock. It's Remus. Sirius hears him kicking off his boots in the hall, then walking over softly on socked feet. A creak of the sofa tells him Remus has settled down on the armrest.

"How was it?" he says. Probably giving him a look.

Sirius shrugs. "Wretched," he informs the sofa pillow. "Scary. Strangely intimate."

"Yeah, James mentioned it went a bit pear-shaped in the end," says Remus.

"Not for him, I don't think," says Sirius.

"He's worried." Remus smells of thick cigarette smoke and other people's spilled drinks, and his Welsh accent is slightly more pronounced than usual after a full shift at the bar. "What happened?"

"Ticked too many boxes," says Sirius. "Too little impulse control, too little sleep. Too many panic attacks. Too many nightmares. Too fucked up by my family." He flops over, to stare at the ceiling for a change. "Maybe a little bit too gay, too."

Remus gives a soft whistle. "Thorough, weren't they."

"Sort of came out with all the rest," says Sirius.

The very obvious problem is that Sirius isn't a naturally open person. Remus is looking at his face the way he sometimes does, looking for the things Sirius usually hides. Then Remus slides down from the armrest to sit on Sirius's legs, probably anticipating an attempt to run away.

Sirius expects something that Remus considers soothing, something comforting, something like, Do you want to talk about it? To prevent that from happening, he employs an old joke.

"Dogsitting again, Moony?"

It doesn't even get him a smile. Instead, Remus says, "Is the Veritaserum is still working?"

Mr Black, have you ever experienced episodes of extreme terror or fear, even though you knew at the time that there was no immediate danger?

"Yes." The answer is out before Sirius has had a chance to think about it. "Thought it'd be over by now."

"Alcohol prolongs its effects, genius," says Remus. "Thought someone with an "Outstanding" Potions N.E.W.T. might know."

"Wasn't thinking."

"You're generally not," says Remus. He sighs.

Well, Sirius has certainly expected more sympathy and less disappointment.

In fact, the whole conversation doesn't go like he's imagined, pretty much like the wretched interview, but how could it, when he doesn't even know what he's going to say until he says it, with Veritaserum seeping around in his brain, creating voids that suck up words and explode them out of his mouth. No, not creating voids, creating truths that somehow come into existence because he says them out loud.

They're made up, right? Until today, he hasn't even known what a panic attack is; he's just sort of just assumed that it is normal to curl up and hyperventilate on the Hogwarts Express when it's chugging towards London, given what's waiting for him there. Apparently it is a sign of a weak and fragile mind, a sign that he shouldn't be an Auror. Unlike James, and they're supposed to be brothers, equals, partners in crime fighting.

Maybe he is more like Remus, after all, destined to try twice as hard as everyone else and still never catch a break. Or maybe he's like Peter, destined to be pathetic.

He doesn't realise he's expressing all this out loud until he sees the look on Remus's face. "We can just stop talking until it wears off," offers Remus.

"What's the point," says Sirius. "It's just secrets. Odd phrase, keeping secrets. I kept all my secrets, so of course they're still here. They still fuck me up."

He'd kept them badly, of course. James has bits and pieces, and Remus has, too, and Peter is probably more observant than they all give him credit for. Between them, they probably have most of the story. But none of that changes the fact that the only person who has a thorough understanding of what went down in Grimmauld Place is his own brother Regulus, and he still picked their side.

And now, of course, that lady from the Auror Office knows all his secrets, too.

Remus sighs, shifts his weight until he leans against the backrest, his legs still thrown across Sirius's. "You realise you're still talking out loud," he states.

"I ran, Moony," says Sirius. "I ran from them two years ago, but what's the point? I took them with me. I have them written all over my skin. I want to punch every reflection I see. Blacks aren't Aurors, for fuck's sake, and of course I'll never be one. I shouldn't be one. I'd abandon everyone to save my own Death Eater brother."

"I'll never be an Auror, either," says Remus calmly. "It's not the end of the world."

"Through no fault of your own," says Sirius.

"Sirius," says Remus, and he's using his earnest voice, the one that he uses for big, important things, not usually for one of Sirius's sulks on the sofa. "None of this is your fault. You were just a kid, and they… They were fairly terrible parents."

Sirius ponders his parents. He doesn't particularly want to think about them, dark muddled mess of memories obligations and pain, but the Veritaserum is designed to seek clarity where there is none. So that exactly is where his thoughts are going.

If he had to give one reason for why he's so crazy, he'd point towards his mother. Letter by letter and summer by miserable summer, she'd made him fear for the remains of his questionable sanity. His father, of course, had made him fear for his life.

But where Walburga had been a constant grating presence, Orion had been intermittent, impersonal. It's almost funny from a distance. While his mother clearly prefers his younger brother, Sirius has never been sure if his father can even tell him and Regulus apart.

"It's really not," says Remus. "Funny, I mean," and Sirius realises he's still talking, and he doesn't even mind.

"That's not the point," says Sirius. "The point is, the point is, Regulus has the same parents."

He knows Remus is not a big fan of Regulus Black, none of his friends are. But Remus is the one with the soft spot for fucked up childhoods, and he tries to be fair. "Told you. Terrible parents," he says. "Terrible choices, too."

"I made some terrible choices," says Sirius.

It's clear to both of them what he's referring to. Not even two years have passed since The Prank, as Sirius calls it, or The Whomping Willow Incident, as Remus calls it, or The Time Sirius Was A Colossal Idiot, as James and Peter call it. Twenty-two moons, and The Prank still occasionally resurfaces in the tension between them.

"I forgave you for that," says Remus eventually. It's not a topic he particularly enjoys, not because of some sort of weird Freudian denial, but because the past is not the boss of him (it had sounded better when Remus had explained it, but that is the gist as far as Sirius is concerned).

"Well, maybe you shouldn't have," says Sirius. "I never understood why."

"I never said," says Remus.

For a minute, Sirius is just breathing, miserable and uncomfortably tipsy. "Why?" he says eventually.

"Why I never said?" says Remus. "Or why I forgave you?"

He's still sitting across Sirius's legs, and now he reaches out to grab Sirius's ankle. Remus does that sometimes, reach out and touch random body parts, whether to steady or reassure or claim, Sirius is not sure.

"Both," says Sirius.

"You were an idiot of the highest order," says Remus, his hand warm on Sirius's skin. "Worse, you were cruel, and you didn't think, and you didn't care. You deserved consequences, not forgiveness."

"I know," says Sirius.

"But you didn't deserve misery," says Remus. "And you'd been my friend for five years, and I couldn't throw that away. I had to at least pretend it meant something. So I forgave you."

"You're an idiot," say Sirius.

"I thought I was, at the time," says Remus. "But you proved me right in the end."

He lets go of Sirius's ankle and carefully rearranges his long limbs so he's lying half on and half next to him. Sirius sort of expects snogging now, but it doesn't seem to be that kind of day. Remus casually reaches out to open two buttons at the top of Sirius's shirt, splaying his fingers across the alchemical symbol tattooed over Sirius's heart. Amalgamation: something stable, something new, forged of lesser things that are no more.

Hope springs eternal.

"Why did you never say, then?" Sirius says.

"Because that forgiveness was mine to give," says Remus, letting his hand rest where it is. "If you knew why, you'd have used it the next them you did something stupid, and I wasn't going to let that happen."

Sirius takes a moment to process that. "I'm still on my last chance, then?" He can't believe he's unknowingly walked that particular tightrope since November 1st, 1976. Specifically, he can't believe how he hasn't fallen off yet.

"I was very hurt at the time," says Remus. His fingertips are putting a light pressure on Sirius's chest. "But I got better. So did you."

"Tattoos just go skin-deep," murmurs Sirius. "Deeper down is where it hurts."

His brain seems to be dead-set on being miserable tonight, but he registers that he's enjoying the closeness, the comforting weight on his ribs, the touch of nimble fingers on his skin. Naturally, he must sabotage this.

"Meet Sirius Orion Black," says Sirius, catching Remus's hand in his own. "My great-grandfather, my father, and everyone I hate. Gaze deeply into my mother's eyes and tell me you trust me. Prepare to be fucked over, it's written in the stars -"

"Sirius!" Remus's voice is sharp. He's held out for longer than usual, Sirius thinks, but clearly he is at the end of whatever patience he still has for Sirius's self-loathing bullshit. Sirius smiles for the first time tonight, because he secretly called it.

And then the bastard goes and proves him wrong again by pressing a light, dry kiss on his mouth. It's over before Sirius can think of anything to do in response.

"Take this from the Werewolf," Remus says. "Don't bend over for fate. It's never been there for you."

He extricates himself from Sirius and the sofa in a fluid, wolfish motion. "I'm making tea," he says.

Mr Black, have you ever engaged in behaviour that others have told you was reckless or risky?

The Order snatches him up, or either he gets caught in the Order like driftwood in a dam. He's exactly their type: Intelligent, independently wealthy, idle, insane. He knows Pureblood society like the linty inside of his pocket, has learned their convoluted family trees by heart, and Dumbledore is nothing if not opportunistic. Thus, in his nineteenth year on the planet, Sirius develops a disturbed relationship to mirrors – he's never quite sure who's going to stare back at him, since he's Polyjuiced to the gills half the time, in and out at dances, banquets, the Ministry, to spy, spy, spy.

Walburga called it ages ago, he thinks, when he has time to think. He's such a blood traitor.

Walpurgis night 1979, he spends an overly intimate twenty minutes with Lily in a cramped bathroom, and when he emerges, his friends stare at him. Their faces, like the mirrors he's avoiding, show no hint of recognition. Peter fans himself. Remus looks like he wants to.

"Nice job, Lily," croaks James.

"Oh, the make-up's all him," says Lily, the traitor. "I just did the hair."

Sirius huffs, grabs his breasts with both hands and adjusts them in the uncomfortably tight dress.

"Don't do that in front of company," says Lily.

"You're the expert," says Sirius. As it turns out, his voice is a surprisingly low, husky alto.

"Oh my god," says Peter. "I mean, oh my god. How do you feel? Confused?"

Sirius ponders this. "Very confused," he admits after a moment. "And a tiny bit turned on."

"So, no different from normal, then?" manages Remus.

Lily, grinning devilishly, grabs the rest of the Polyjuice potion containing a single hair from the head of Dr Meredith Fawley, famous Werewolf hunter, and transforms it into a bag of dinner mints. They're a lot less obvious than a hip flask, as long as Sirius remembers not to offer them to anyone.

She hands him the bag, then looks at him sternly. "Seriously, don't do that," she says.

Sirius looks up innocently, while his hands are busy freeing certain parts of his new anatomy from certain parts of his new wardrobe. "The underthings pinch."

"They're not optional," says Lily.

"Christmas 1977, Lily?"

Lily doesn't even blush. "Not optional," she insists. "You're going to a ball. God, do you even know how to follow?"

"Tutored these three losers before the Yule ball, didn't I?"

"This isn't working," says James. "You're just not very – I'm sorry, mate, but you're just not a girl. Even your face is somehow off."

"It's not my face," says Sirius.

"Yet somehow –" starts James, and then opts for just flailing.

Sirius sighs, wriggles off his comfy woollen socks and slips his silk-stockinged feet into frighteningly small, delicate, kitten-heeled shoes (even he hasn't been mad enough to try high-heels). He draws himself up to his full, considerably shorter than usual height, remembers not to perform a gender, but a type, lets his dark-red mouth curl into a subtle sneer at the sight of Lily ("Mudblood!"), lets his eyes flicker over to Remus with just a hint of threat ("You're next!"), gives Peter a look of derision that he admittedly doesn't have to work hard for, then informs James curtly that he may accompany him outside to the Apparition spot.

"Oh god, that's frightening," says James.

Sirius has a grand old time at Malfoy Manor. When he returns to his flat, still in the skin of the Werewolf hunter, it's with four vials full of stolen memories in his handbag.

He considers walking over to Moony and plain-out seducing him, all femme fatale movie style, because he's always wondered about Moony's relationship with girls – he claims he likes them, too, but Sirius has never seen proof of that. And fuck him, he's curious. Ironically, if here were using his own brain, he would never in a million years have hesitated, but suddenly he thinks of consequences, of the million prim objections Remus is going to have, and decides to wait until the Polyjuice wears off.

Maybe it's the Polyjuice. Maybe he's finally growing up.

The next morning, he wakes to sunlight streaming in through the windows, with all his bits and pieces back in place, but without Remus. Fucking Order.

Mr Black, have you ever been a victim of a curse classified as Unforgivable by the Ministry of Magic?

"No," says Remus.

"You're a shite boyfriend," says Sirius.

"Your definition of a good boyfriend involves setting Unforgivables on you?" says Remus.

"Obviously," says Sirius. "A good boyfriend would be concerned that I am so shit at resisting the Imperius. I don't want to find out how it works while I'm captured by Death Eaters."

Remus idly turns his wand in his hands while gazing earnestly into his eyes. "Be that as it may," he says. "I object for conscientious reasons. Ask James, or Peter."

"Just because my mum did it to me doesn't mean I'm delicate," snaps Sirius.

"Never said you were delicate," says Remus with a shrug, and that's true, Sirius remembers, because Remus has used so many words to talk about this, but not that one. Sirius wants to hit things now.

Instead he takes a deep breath and says, "Whatever, I'm making tea."

Remus smiles, ostensibly at Sirius's newest way of dealing with frustration.

Seething, Sirius marches over to the kitchen, boils water, fishes a teabag out of the tin, lets it steep for exactly two minutes, then adds a dash of milk. He brings the steaming mug of tea over to Remus.

"Thank you, Sirius," says Remus softly.

Sirius stares.

He has forgotten how terrifyingly competent Remus is with silent spells. And then he finds himself running to the toilet, where his breakfast makes a reappearance.

Remus gives him a moment, then saunters over to the bathroom door, tea still in his hands.

"Maybe a bit delicate," concedes Sirius, still kneeling in front of the toilet. He knows Remus can see him shaking. He wants to explain that it's not Remus's presence in his head that has made him lose it, largely because he's never even felt it. It's the memory of his mother doing the same thing to him when he was sixteen, and how he'd been so helpless to fight it, so betrayed by his own weakness. He can't find the words, and then something closes inside him and he doesn't want to.

"I'm sorry, Sirius," says Remus, his voice calm and comforting. "But they're not going to announce an Imperius. It is not fought out in the open, it is fought in your head."

"How?" says Sirius.

It takes the better part of two days, of Remus patiently teaching him how to look for differences between his own thoughts and those of an intruder. He learns that it requires constant low-level monitoring of his own impulses, which is… not his specialty.

But Remus is a terrific teacher. The first time Sirius can shake the curse off completely he is already getting ready for another trip, this time in the body of Avery the elder – and by far uglier – and maybe it's because Sirius's own thoughts feel so different when thought with another's brain, but this time the contrast between his own thoughts and Remus's gentle prodding is jarring.

"Can I try it on you?" he asks, before Remus gets the chance to realise that Polyjuice makes it easier.

Remus shrugs. "Be my guest," he says. Sirius makes him walk a circle in the middle of the living room, before sending him over to the slate in the kitchen where they write their shopping lists, and making him write, I promise Sirius a long sloppy blowjob for when he returns.

Remus turns, grinning mischievously. The slate just reads two words, Return, then, underlined three times, and Sirius laughs.

Of course, Remus has switched between bodies more often than Sirius ever will, and they both want different things. If anyone's capable of identifying their own thoughts in an avalanche of wants, it's probably him.

"Awright," says Sirius in Avery's obnoxious Northern accent. "Let's try Crucio next."

Remus throws a shoe at him.

Mr Black, how would you describe your relationship to your family?

To be continued.

Chapter Text

Sirius stares at the rectangular hole in the floor, feeling out of place, out of time in the shadowy chill of the Black mausoleum. He bows his head. His fingers are itching, hell, his brain is itching, for him to do something truly symbolic and horrendously stupid. Like getting out a can of Muggle spray paint to graffiti the tomb slab.

Let it be known for posterity what exactly he thinks of Orion Black.

He can't, he can't. He's not sixteen anymore, and has since developed at least a rudimentary notion of impulse control. Sirius conjures a single, white orchid, and lets it flutter down on the closed casket. Good riddance, he thinks. Rot in peace.

When he turns to Walburga Black to grasp her hand and tell her he's sorry for their loss, his mother doesn't let go of his hand. Instead she keeps him there, her grip iron-strong, her eyes flickering over his face as if she's trying to find something she's lost.

The face Sirius wears today is of a near-stranger on the other end of the family tapestry, and he holds Walburga's gaze. The Polyjuice is expertly brewed by Lily, as always, and Sirius's Occlumency is on point. He's not quite sure what's gone wrong today. Something in the way he holds himself? The way he flicks his wand? He's quite thorough with his disguises, but then, Walburga can draw on sixteen years of scrutinising her former heir's every move.

Dear god, is he ever going to be done running from this family?

Walburga beckons him near, much too close for comfort – of course, to him, a comfortable distance from Walburga Black is about two hundred miles - and speaks softly in his ear:

"One wrong move, and I'll tell them."

He nods almost imperceptibly. No point in denying this, no matter his acting skills, because his mother will not admit to being wrong. She doesn't have to say who. Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband are looming silently close to the only exit, flanked by Antonin Dolohov and a haughty-looking man whose features Sirius has memorised en passant. He won't stand a chance.

Walburga lets go of him. "Thank you for coming," she says curtly, before dismissing him. Sirius is most decidedly not a planner, but right now he'd like to take a moment to make up an escape plan or six – he really doesn't like being at his mother's mercy - but the queue moves on, and there he is.

Regulus.

Sirius startles, but it's not exactly surprise. He hasn't had a proper look at his brother in at least a year – since Hogwarts, he thinks, the memory of which is already as distant and jumbled as a dream. And Regulus looks terrible. He's too pale, he's too thin, like he's wasting away – no, like something's eating him, quite literally eating him - and he looks like he's been crying.

Sirius takes a wild guess it's not for their late father.

Very rarely is he thankful for his Pureblood upbringing, but he has to admit that having an autopilot for this type of situation is occasionally helpful. Thus, he grasps Regulus's hand and tells him he's sorry for his loss, that the passing of Orion Black will leave a void, and that he's sure Regulus will step up admirably. He half wishes that Regulus, too, will see past his face and know Sirius is there. But his brother hardly looks up.

"Thank you," Regulus says, hoarsely and on the same kind of autopilot that Sirius is running on, and Sirius wants to scream: At Walburga, at his twisted family and their revolting peers, every single one of which Regulus has worked so hard to make happy. Because they're not, they take and take and take and they're still so bloody miserable, and Regulus is miserable, too.

He wants to scream at Regulus, too, tell him to run while he still can, while there's still life in his body and a conscience in his head. To take his hand and run until he's free of them. Sirius briefly, madly, considers an Imperius, just for ten minutes, just to get the boy to safety. The very thought makes him sick in a way he can't begin to describe.

Sirius feels Bellatrix's gaze bore into the back of his head, and, in this near-stranger's brain, the impulse dies a long and well-considered death. He lets the autopilot take him away.

Because it's too late, he's seen it in the paleness of Regulus's face, the tremor in his hands. There's nothing his side has to offer Regulus anymore, except a life sentence in Azkaban.

Mr Black, have you ever engaged in behaviour that could be considered self-destructive, such as self-harm, excessive or underage drinking, or drugs?

Remus comes home late that night, his skin cold and his hair wind-swept and smelling of campfires. He finds Sirius on the sofa.

"Isn't it time you stopped?" says Remus softly.

Remus has got it wrong, of course. Sirius has stayed in the near-stranger's body for eight hours after he left Regulus at the funeral, because he's honestly not sure what he'd do if he were tied to his own idiotic, impulsive brain. This is him being careful.

But for now he's run out of Polyjuice. The near-stranger's features are fading from his body, and his skin becomes his own again. Remus traces the tattoos that are coming through on Sirius's bare arm, new tattoos over old scars. Sirius put them there with a paradoxical notion of change – of changing his own volatile self into something stable, something permanent. Something that can survive. Something that can protect those he loves. Something like Padfoot, but human.

He understands now that he is on a journey, but he can't see the end. Yet. Maybe when they have won the war, in that golden, impossible future when they won't need to be invincible. Maybe then he can stop changing. Until then, he'll inoculate himself with ink, blood, and the bodies of strangers, and he'll welcome the pain.

"Stop," says Remus again.

"Not yet," Sirius replies.

He's starting to think the Aurors might have been right about him.

That summer turns into autumn and Remus is hardly around anymore, but it's clear what he'd have to say. Sometimes, Sirius almost agrees with the Remus in his head: Surely, spending six weeks disguised as Mr Borgin, the evil antiquarian from Knockturn Alley, is not a normal way to cope with stress.

The very idea is typically Sirius, brilliant and ingenious and insane. As Mr Borgin, people are actually inviting him into their homes, eager to show him their most fucked up possessions, a shrinking Victorian corset, a flesh-eating bed, a carpet with a trapdoor – and he listens to himself reciting about their hidden beauty, their elegance, deriding the Muggles whose lives these things claimed.

It's horrifically easy to be Mr Borgin. All he has to do is open a door in his head and step back into Grimmauld Place, and the words come to him, the precise gestures, the stiff gait. But that's just surface. That's what the others see, the Malfoys, the Selwyns, the Notts of this world. Surface is enough for the job.

But the body he inhabits is not just surface. It's old and aching and its liver hates alcohol and its stomach hates everything, and its brain…

Borgin's brain is a pond, no, a swamp, infused with a foul and festering mind. Whatever comes out of that mouth has been considered for centuries, and what emotions he has are as ancient and leathery as a bogman. Sirius is used to feeling like he's someone else on Polyjuice, but then again, on a mission there's no place for his inner idiot, Sirius Black, and his insanity, his lack of foresight, his terrible decision-making.

But this is new. Polyjuice changes bodies, yes, and these bodies have brains, and these brains hold minds, but Sirius has always thought it's still him. Now he's not so sure.

In the evenings, when Sirius changes back for the night, it all comes rushing back, his old life, The Prank and his brother and Remus out cold on the floor of the Shrieking Shack. In the mornings, when he takes the first dose of Polyjuice, it flees to make place for different things, driftwood, swamp monsters, the dead and the drowning. Mr Borgin scares him more than anyone before him.

("Don't you ever worry you'll get stuck as a bad person?" Remus has teased him, once, but frankly, that ship has pretty much sailed the day Sirius was born.)

Mr Black, are you currently experiencing, or have you ever experienced intense, persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, or guilt?

He's glad they haven't practised Crucio on each other. In all honesty, Sirius is not sure whether he would have continued with the Order, had he known what was waiting for him at the end of a Death Eater's wand. He's panting heavily, his throat raw from screaming. The temporary respite is so welcome he has to resist the impulse to kiss his torturer's boots.

Somewhere beside him, he hears Remus talking, he's using his prefect voice, lying and lying and lying, their cover story complete and compelling. Sirius is not sure he could even remember his own name at this point.

The next Crucio hits Remus, because he probably shouldn't have used his prefect's voice, he should probably have gone for stuttering and broken and scared. Remus stops talking, in fact he stops breathing, or moving, or making any noise whatsoever, until the curse is lifted.

"We're not with any Order, do we look like monks to you?" says Remus, because sometimes he's an even bigger idiot than Sirius. He receives another Crucio for his trouble.

Meanwhile, Sirius slowly regains his senses, just in time to feel his disguise fade, and he tries to turn away from them, keep his head lowered, stick to the shadows, but of course the Death Eaters recognise Sirius bloody Black in the end.

That's not good, that's really not good.

That's, in fact, how they end up in a ramshackle hut, bound together for the last four hours. Sirius's every nerve ending is on red alert, perceptions rushing in. He can smell the cracked wood of the hut, the forest beyond. A lone Death Eater guards over them, immersed in the Daily Prophet. Their wands lie at his feet, on the other side of the world.

What the fuck is he waiting for?

Sirius is slumped forward, this time not trying to hide himself from view, but Remus. He tries to be thankful that they're not in the city, that there's no-one here but a Death Eater, and that said Death Eater is probably not going to kill them in the next four minutes. Four minutes is all they'll need. But Sirius is not thankful. He's too busy being terrified.

Remus isn't calm anymore. He is pale and sweating and starting to shake. Words, prayers, break out of him in waves, the moon's tide crashing onto a willing shore. He's currently going through the Lord's Prayer for the third time. Remus only gets religious in the twilight before the moon.

The newspaper is folded away and the masked Death Eater saunters over to them, nudging Sirius's shoulder with his boot.

"What's his problem?" he asks Sirius.

"Thy kingdom come; thy will be done – "

"You tell me," says Sirius. "You tortured him."

"But did I?" The Death Eater laughs. "Didn't even scream, the little bitch," he says. He speaks with a pleasant Southern inflection, an accent that could be from a hundred places. "I bet you could make him. Isn't that right, Black?"

Sirius declines to comment, and the man crouches down in front of him, grabbing him by the lapel. "You're a bit of a celebrity in certain circles, Black," he says. "Is it true that you're a shirt-lifter? Is that why they threw you out?"

"Oh, I'm gay," says Sirius, looking the masked man up and down. "But for you, I'd be willing to make an exception."

And that is probably not the sort of joke he should be making when he's Sirius Black and captured by Death Eaters. Fortunately, the man has decided on a different form of torture.

"Of course, your brother isn't much better," he says. "The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black mates with itself, and what do they get? A nancy and a coward."

His gloved hand is suddenly out, caressing Sirius's cheek. "That's right, nancy boy," he says. "Your brother is a failure and a fucking coward, and if you knew any shame, you'd be ashamed. But we are generous. We'll let him prove himself. Let him prune the family tree."

"Let him –"

The Death Eater smiles down on him. "Don't be scared of death, Black," he says. "You'll be helping him."

Sirius takes a deep breath. So that is the fate they have in store for him. For them. Together at last. "And where is my brother now?" he says.

"It's not where he is, but what he is," says the Death Eater. "And what he is, Black, is late."

Regulus has never been late to a thing in his life. But Sirius doesn't have time to ponder what this could possibly mean, because a heavy blow explodes in his face and he knows nothing. Some bone in his face just gives up and cracks.

So much for the proverbial Black beauty, he thinks through the haze of pain, maybe Regulus can be the pretty one now. At least, this makes him feel marginally better about what is going to go down in here in less than a minute.

"Father," says Remus, and Sirius is sure there's an eyeroll somewhere behind the Death Eater's mask.

"Your loony's starting to get on my nerves, Black," he hisses. "If he misses his dad, maybe he shouldn't have gone and played war."

"Oh, don't mind him," says Sirius. "He just thinks he's Jesus right now. Don't worry, it'll pass."

"Father," says Remus again, taking deep gulps of breath, "if thou be willing, remove this cup from me –"

The Death Eater strikes him, too, and Remus laughs shakily around the blood in his mouth. "Nevertheless," he starts. "Nevertheless –" and then his voice is too far gone.

"- not my will, but thine, be done," says Sirius, who has heard all this before.

Remus breathes out, and his entire body stills, and for a moment, there is peace.

Peace.

Then a scream rings through the silence, a long, drawn-out confession of pain and despair. Mercilessly, it shifts resonance, timbre, pitch, until the beast emerges, free of the ropes that held it, free of human boundaries, free of a conscience.

With his last human thought, Sirius is thankful that Regulus isn't here.

Then Padfoot joins the wolf and tonight, he lets it kill.

This was different, and of course the aftermath is different, too. Their friends worry around them like so many mother hens, James with the food and complicated thoughts he brings, and Lily with her potions and healing spells and endless cups of coffee, and Peter with his increasingly emphatic suggestions that maybe they leave Sirius and Remus alone now.

At the end of it, Remus is still face-down on their sofa, which he hasn't left except to throw up in the bathroom, ridding himself of black mangled things that came with him when he turned back, and Sirius is in front of a mirror that he wants to bash in. His skin still tingles with the aftershocks of what was done to him, bones aching, joints cracking, lungs burning. Half his face is bruised black, but it's not enough, it's still his face and he wants none of it.

The Prank is filling the silence between them, and Sirius finally understands the enormity of what Remus has forgiven him for.

It takes him a while to realise the silence is there because he is waiting for Remus to say something profound, or at least to tell him to get the fuck over himself. But then, it's usually Sirius sulking on the sofa. Since the roles seem to be reversed for this one, Sirius starts off by making tea, then tries to think of something helpful to say.

"They'd have cut off your fingers," he points out eventually, when the tea has gone cold. "If you'd warned them. They'd have cut off your fingers and hanged you with a silver wire."

"Maybe they should have," says Remus. "You've seen what I'm capable of when I'm the wolf."

"Yes," snaps Sirius. Is he really this insufferable when it's his turn? "And you've seen what they're capable of when they're fully human. They were going to have Regulus kill me, is that sick enough for you? They tortured us. You must have noticed, you were there."

All very good arguments, Sirius thinks, but Remus isn't having any of it. "What do humans know of pain," he says.

"Oh, just drink your tea," says Sirius.

He really isn't very good at this.

What is it, Auror Vance, have you finally run out of questions? There's so much more to the story, you know.

November 3rd, 1979. Sirius decides to take the day off, not because it's his birthday but because he's exhausted.

It is stupidly early and pitch-dark when he awakes to a warm body wrapped around him and a mouth pressed to his, and somehow that isn't a surprise even if he's sure he's gone to bed alone, and before his muddled brain can think of a dull security question, his arms tighten, his mouth kisses back, his back curves and his legs fold so he's touching, touching, skin to rough wool and cotton and jeans. His hand tangles in a shock of hair that is cold and wet with drizzly rain, and he breathes in and smells pine trees and earth and the forest.

"Missed you," he says. Eventually.

"Happy birthday," murmurs Remus against his mouth. "Congratulations, you survived your teenage years."

"How long?" says Sirius.

"Portkey," says Remus. "Ten minutes. I'm sorry."

"It's been a month," says Sirius groggily. "I assure you, ten minutes will be plenty." Remus laughs, and he cups Sirius's face in his hands and kisses him again, soft and warm, as if they have all the time in the world, and he takes his hand and turns it over, and then he laughs again.

Sirius is confused. Until he remembers about his ever-changing body. "Like it?" he says. His newest tattoo is probably his most stupid yet, a raised middle finger on the inside of his arm where the Dark Mark would be.

"At least I don't need an N.E.W.T. in Ancient Runes to get it," says Remus. "You'll be the first against the wall, love," he adds, and that's not really a word they use between them, not yet, but Sirius's limbs are still sleep-heavy, and Remus burrows against him, and exhaustion takes over, and the next time he opens his eyes, he's alone.

It's still dark, and that is not part of the plan, but there is a persistent tapping outside the window. He doesn't really get owls anymore, they are too easily intercepted.

In fact, the last owl he got was from his mother, informing him curtly of his father's death. Oh god.

Sirius is up like a shot to open the window, and the owl – a black, shiny, pedigree thing, sickly and moody – drops a black-rimmed letter into his shaking hand. The copperplate address, the seal, the heavy parchment: Same as last time.

Maybe it's Mother who died, he thinks desperately, maybe she finally died, and Regulus thought I should know -

It's not his mother who died.

Of course he's known for a while. Regulus was a dead man walking when he failed to turn up for Sirius's murder. The letter doesn't say dead, it says missing, but these days, it's all the same, isn't it? Sirius has seen what the Death Eaters to those they deem cowards.

There's a post-scriptum at the end of Walburga's letter, a cryptic note that says Find him, and he wonders what the fuck that's supposed to mean when a fine dark hair falls out of the envelope.

He stares at it.

His first thought is that this has got to be a joke. But his mother isn't exactly renowned for her sense of humour. And if there's one thing he never had reason to doubt, it's her love for Regulus. No joke, then.

Sirius keeps his stash of Polyjuice in Remus's muggle fridge, where it turns cloudy and takes on the taste of leftover curry. But perceptions deceive. Polyjuice belongs with the Dark Arts – Sirius has read Moste Potente Potions in its horrible entirety – it's just so darn practical for spying that the Order has conveniently ignored this.

But if the past year has taught him anything, it's that Polyjuice is subtly evil, the kind of evil that his family understands on a deep level. Maybe that's how Walburga knows. Maybe that's why he's drawn to it so much.

It doesn't just change appearances. It changes thoughts, it melts things together. It forms bridges. For no two perfectly identical things can exist in this world without resonating. If one of them changes, the other must, too.

Sirius should really have bloody guessed, because Regulus has been his near match for so long. He was brought into this world as his spare, his equal, his saviour – his replacement. They resonate, too.

When he adds the hair, the potion turns into a pleasant ruby colour, like old wine, or blood, and it tastes like memories, bittersweet and heavy. It burns all the way down.

The change is gentle, there's barely half an inch and maybe a pound difference between them. The ink in his skin runs together, forms rivers, currents, whirls, before pooling elsewhere. Some of his scars smoothen out, others travel.

His first thought is darkness. His second is that he's drowning, and he knows the feeling, it feels like Grimmauld Place, and his third is calm, like the bottom of a lake, and he knows that's where his brother is, weighted down by stones or dark magic, too heavy to float. The death of a traitor.

He thinks of Mr Borgin and his swamp thoughts, of Dr Meredith Fawley and her cold determination, of Avery and his disturbing nonchalance. Regulus's thoughts are dark, heavy, but there is resolve, there is purpose, and above all, there is courage.

He grabs that courage by the throat and, very slowly, he pulls up the sleeve of his robe and reveals it, the Dark Mark, the ugly skull and the even uglier snake on the pale skin of his forearm. But the tattoo is not moving under his skin. A deep, deliberate cut splits the skull in half, beheads the snake.

"Oh, brother," he says with Regulus's voice.

There are whispers, then, echoes, Oh, brother, they repeat and degrade, slip past a veil to return to him. Brother.

"I'm sorry," he says, and lets the echoes in, sorry, I'm sorry, so sorry, they're his words and they're familiar, he's said them often enough, but when he hears them in his brother's voice, they're so much more. So full of meaning.

The third is the hardest, but Sirius thinks of Remus, aged sixteen, who said them first, who took a leap of faith and dared to be an idiot. "I forgive you," he whispers, I forgive you, forgive you always, and he almost collapses with relief, but he's not done yet.

"You're an idiot," he says, and listens, whispers of idiot, idiot, pot, kettle, Black. Regulus first made that joke when he was six, and he never really stopped.

"Come then, idiot," he says. "To the roof."

His body is heavy with grief as he moves towards the fire escape and climbs four flights of stairs. The building's roof is like the Astronomy Tower, but rougher, less picturesque, and with the city glow of London there are never too many stars. A faint pink glow announces the sun, and he is reminded of so many nights at Grimmauld Place, a place that made children seek comfort in things that couldn't possibly be farther away.

"You don't smoke, brother, do you?" he says into the crisp early morning air, shaking out a cigarette from the beaten pack he's found in his pockets. "Let's share one anyway."

He lights up with shaking fingers and tells Regulus not to be scared. And when his hour is up, he lets his little brother fade from his skin, from this world, not the way he did, but the way he deserves.

With the sun in his eyes, and without regret.

The End.