Remus Lupin and the Prisoner of Azkaban (#Wolfstar)

Chapter Twenty Five- The Servant

EDIT: I'm publishing this on December 10, 2018. Let's see if this stays up. Sorry for all the trouble with the chapters, it's making me really mad. Any advice on why my chapters don't stay up?  EDIT: LITERALLY FIVE MINUTES LATER ITS DOWN AGAIN?!??!?

Wordcount: 4321

Ron clutched Peter closer to his chest.

"Come off it," he said weakly. "Are you trying to say he broke out of Azkaban just to get his hands on Scabbers? I mean..." He looked up at Harry and Hermione for support, "Okay, say Pettigrew could turn into a rat -- there are millions of rats -- how's he supposed to know which one he's after if he was locked up in Azkaban?"

"You know, Sirius, that's a fair question," said Remus, turning to Sirius and frowning slightly. "How did you find out where he was?" He wondered why he had never thought about that before. 

Sirius put one of his clawlike hands inside his robes and took out a crumpled piece of paper, which he smoothed flat and held out to show the others.

It was a photograph of Ron and his family that had seemingly appeared in the Daily Prophet the previous summer, and there, on Ron's shoulder, was Peter.

"How did you get this?" Remus asked Sirius, thunderstruck. They did not get news in Azkaban, did they?

"Fudge," said Sirius. "When he came to inspect Azkaban last year, he gave me his paper. And there was Peter, on the front page on this boy's shoulder... I knew him at once... how many times had I seen him transform? And the caption said the boy would be going back to Hogwarts... to where Harry was..."

"My God," said Remus softly, staring from the rat to the picture in the paper and back again. "His front paw..."

"What about it?" said Ron defiantly.

"He's got a toe missing," said Sirius.

"Of course," Remus breathed. "So simple... so brilliant... he really cut it off himself?"

"Just before he transformed," said Sirius. "When I cornered him, he yelled for the whole street to hear that I'd betrayed Lily and James. Then, before I could curse him, he blew apart the street with the wand behind his back, killed everyone within twenty feet of himself -- and sped down into the sewer with the other rats...."

"Didn't you ever hear, Ron?" asked Remus. "The biggest bit of Peter they found was his finger."

"Look, Scabbers probably had a fight with another rat or something! He's been in my family for ages, right --"

"Twelve years, in fact," said Remus. "Didn't you ever wonder why he was living so long?"

"We -- we've been taking good care of him!" said Ron.

"Not looking too good at the moment, though, is he?" Remus retorted. "I'd guess he's been losing weight ever since he heard Sirius was on the loose again...."

"He's been scared of that mad cat!" said Ron, nodding toward the cat, who was still purring on the bed.

"This cat isn't mad," said Sirius hoarsely. He reached out a bony hand and stroked the cat's fluffy head. "He's the most intelligent of his kind I've ever met. He recognized Peter for what he was right away. And when he met me, he knew I was no dog. It was a while before he trusted me... Finally, I managed to communicate to him what I was after, and he's been helping me..."

"What do you mean?" breathed Hermione.

"He tried to bring Peter to me, but couldn't... so he stole the passwords into Gryffindor Tower for me... As I understand it, he took them from a boy's bedside table...."