Arcane [Sirius Black]

Chapter 23 - Butterbeer for the Soul

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    It took three jittery movements of Marlene repositioning the Gryffindor scarf around her neck for Mary to grab it with a sigh and fold it on the table.

    "Hey!" Marlene exclaimed, watching as Mary delicately patted the top of the scarf and slid it out of Marlene's reach.

    "You can fidget with it later. We're not even outside yet, there's no need for a scarf!"

    "But I want to make it look nice..." Marlene pouted.

    "And I want to eat my breakfast in peace, thank you very much," Mary responded, sinking her spoon into a bowl of sugar-sprinkled porridge.

    Diana bit back a chuckle at the interaction. Mary looked tired today, and though she'd never seen the girl cranky, amused agitation was certainly her weapon of fatigue's choice.

    "How am I meant to do all this in time?" Lily asked from Diana's side, sighing deeply as she sifted through a substantial stack of parchment.

    "You're winding me up," Marlene said, staring straight at Lily with wide eyes. "Please say you're winding me up. If that's really a stack of school work I don't know what I'll do."

    "And what would be so wrong if it was?" Lily looked up confused.

Marlene pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. "Lily! Not only is it a Saturday morning but it's the first Hogsmeade visit of the whole year!"

"And...?" Lily continued, still not understanding Marlene's exasperation. "If I don't get this all scheduled and done with then I'll fall behind."

"I can tell you now you won't be falling behind."

"And how can you be sure?" Lily now squinted her eyes with a half-amused question.

Marlene huffed and grabbed the first few pages off Lily's stack. She thumbed through them quickly before looking up with a satisfied glint.

"Because," Marlene began, "I haven't even read through a single one of these assignments yet. None of them is due until after next week!"

Lily rolled her eyes and grabbed the pages back. "Exactly. I've only got a week to finish it all!"

Diana's attention faded toward the rag-tag group of boys now stumbling into the hall. Her gaze settled on Remus who was walking a tad bit slower to the right of his other friends. She took in a breath and followed the four with her eyes until their buzzing flock collapsed into the seats to the left of the girls.

Diana didn't bother looking back at Marlene, Lily, or Mary as they conversed, her eyes glued to the boys as her eyes squinted involuntarily. She had a theory. A theory that, through the course of the last few days, had been overriding all other concerns of her brain.

Remus was a werewolf. He had to be. She nearly felt stupid for not noticing sooner. He was good at hiding it but Diana knew better than that. The only thing she couldn't wrap her head around was the sheer coincidence. From her knowledge, lycanthropy wasn't an incredibly common ailment, especially not in the teenage population. It also wasn't something usually allowed at schools.

Her old school head at Beauxbatons didn't know about Oscar. He was already enrolled at the school when it happened and did his best to hide the condition from the people in his life. Diana wondered if Remus hid it from his teachers as well or if Dumbledore was aware. She also wondered if his friends all knew. They must have; she'd never seen a group so close.

She also figured they knew due to their responses at breakfast Wednesday morning when she brought up the way Sirius and Peter both had run out of the common room so quickly. She disguised her questioning with a fake veil of amused curiosity, but her true intention was to gain evidential proof for her hypothesis.