Breaking Black (A Sirius Black Love Story)

Chapter 91

           

October 9, 1979

Sirius took Regulus' advice to keep an eye on his friends... Well... Seriously. Dumbledore noticed this and gave us tasks mostly pertaining to the spy in the Order. However, although Regulus basically told Sirius the spy was someone we went to Hogwarts with, Sirius still wouldn't accept it and investigated everyone in the Order.

Sirius felt horrible questioning our best friends and simply couldn't believe what Regulus said. Truthfully, I couldn't believe it either. Every time we invited the Potters, Peter, and Remus over to our house, I couldn't imagine any of them being a spy. I'd started to think Regulus was wrong. But despite the idea being preposterous to me, Sirius slowly became convinced as the months went by that the spy was one of our friends. He shared his theory with me.

Sirius thought the spy was Remus Lupin.

I couldn't believe his claim. Remus was probably closer to me than James, Peter, and even Lily. Sirius stated that Remus could be the spy because he was acting so withdrawn and was usually late to events or busy. I argued it was because he was still depressed about losing the love of his life. Sirius also said he had more to gain than anyone else because Voldemort was supposedly helping werewolves. I countered him by saying Remus was too innocent to be a spy. He folded his socks, for Merlin's sake.

We argued a lot about the topic.

Other than Sirius' accusations about Remus, our life was as great as it could be in the war. James, Lily, and Sirius were all starting to become very successful in their Auror training. Sirius and I seemed to fall deeper in love with every late night planning our future. Every time I saw his hand on the clock switch to 'travelling,' my heart sped up, knowing I would see my love in minutes.

However, things got worse with the Order. Edgar Bones and his whole family were murdered by the Lestranges. The Potters and the Longbottoms became the new faces of the Order and made headlines every week for their run ins with Voldemort's followers. Sirius and I tried to stay optimistic, fueled by anger about the spy, and kept trying to find solid evidence about who it was. We were either too horrified to truly admit one of our friends was the spy, or whoever the spy was had a way of evading our search.

But then, when the letters from Regulus stopped coming, Sirius started to get worried. It took nearly two months of silence from Sirius' brother for Sirius to finally tell me Regulus hadn't replied to any of his letters. There was no reason for it, and Sirius feared the worst. Neither of us wanted to admit what we thought the explanation was. We didn't want to lose another family member.

But finally, after another week of no responses and three more letters sent from Sirius, we decided to do the one thing Sirius never wanted to do again.

We decided to visit 12 Grimmauld Place.

We borrowed James' invisibility cloak and planned to enter the building, check the tapestry, and leave, avoiding all confrontations with monster-in-law and Kreacher. However, as soon as we stepped in the door, I tripped on the troll leg table and Sirius fell out from underneath the cloak, propelling him in view of none other than Walburga Black.

I clapped my hands over my mouth and hid beneath the safety of the cloak, bracing myself for an argument between mother and son. Walburga looked a mess. She was in the middle of bawling, a loud, mournful shriek coming from her mouth. She gripped at the picture frames on the walls, and her purple dress looked like she'd been wearing it for weeks.

Walburga stopped her howling and blinked at Sirius, who looked stunned. I held my breath from underneath the protection of the cloak.

"Regulus? Regulus!" Walburga exclaimed in a wobbling voice. She hugged Sirius, which surprised me more than if she would've allowed a Muggle in to her house. "I knew you would come home! I knew the tapestry was wrong! My beautiful son!"