Chapter 234

"Professor…" said Harry, who had been quiet this entire time, lost in his thoughts, "Please don't take this the wrong way. It's just a thought that I just had."

He had been using Gamer's Mind to rifle through possible defenses, and an idea formed in his head. It sat uneasy with him, but he had to share it.

"What is it?" Nicholas asked with a frown.

Harry's own voice sounded unbelieving to his ears as he spoke, "Those people in there, those grieving families and angry people, they're looking for someone to blame. Right now, that someone is Lisa. But what if they found someone else to blame. Someone who was twisted and resentful due to not having any magic. Someone who had been confiscating and collecting dark artifacts from students for decades. Someone who would appear to be willing to use those dark artefacts to do harm to a school that he had always been resentful towards. Someone who has been suspiciously missing for the last week."

And contrary to the instantly disgusted rejection of the idea that he had expected from both Nicholas and Dumbledore, their faces morphed into troubled frowns.

They were considering it.

It was a particularly gloomy night. The soft whooshing sounds of dozens of dementors gliding along the dark obsidian floors of Azkaban prison echoed across the cramped hallways, with the only other sound being that of the nightguard repeatedly clanging his baton against the bars of the doors as he checked on each of the prisoners.

A sickly thin dog huddled upon itself in the corner of one of the cells, shivering as it tried not to let the January cold seep into its heart and still it forever. The terrible memories were still there in his mind for him, the nightmares still persistent, but they were dampened. Blurred by the simple chemistry and thought processes of the animal mind.

He felt a spike of joy and gratitude towards his friends and his old Transfiguration teacher for teaching him so well that he was capable enough as a student to make this transformation without any professional help.

The chill near the room grew, and the dog hurriedly huddled into itself. The dementor must have sensed the joy, and was here trying to find its next snack. Its next morsel of food. That momentary spike of joy slowly drained away into a vast vat of nothingness, leaving behind naught but sorrow and misery.

Such was Azkaban. A place reserved for those the wizarding world felt undeserving of joy and happiness. Where prisoners couldn't even be granted the mercy of death unless they decided to slowly starve themselves away, or just managed to break out a splinter of their own bone and stabbed themselves through the heart with it. Where their bodies would lie undiscovered for weeks until the next nightguard came along to inspect the prisoners.

Suddenly, the cold started to slowly fade away, and the clanging of the nightguard's bell drew ever nearer. The dog, knowing that staying in that form would risk exposing the life-saving secret he had, shifted back to his human form, pulling his rags closer around himself to shield from the cold.

A pair of steps rang through the corridor.

CLANG! rang the iron baton against the bars of the cell next to his own. The nightguard's voice echoed down the corridor, "Wake up! Wake up you cunt! Good morning Bellatrix. Say hello to the morning sun you little bitch!"

More steps.

CLANG!

"Look here Black! Show me that pretty little face. Gotta make sure you're all alive here."

Black…that was his name. Sirius Black. He turned around to stare out the iron grates. The nightguard stood there in black robes with a grin on his face, his jackal Patronus shining a warm light around him. It was a momentary relief, tainted by the fact that it would soon be gone with its owner.

But moments passed, and the guard did not leave.

"Remember the lad you tried to get killed, Black? The one that blew your master up?", the nightguard asked with a cruel smile on his face.

'Harry,' his mind reminded him, finally functional in the shade of the nightguard's Patronus. He shook his head. He did not kill him. He did not try to kill him. He never even could have. He was his godson…his life. He loved him. More than anything.

The nightguard continued, taking the shaking of his head as a sign of acknowledgment, "Well lookie here. That lad not only survived his magic-hating family and his Defense teacher trying to off him last year but also a giant snake roaming around Hogwarts killing people. Pretty sure he helped save a kid or two too."

The guard pulled out a newspaper from his pocket before throwing it at him as hard as he could. The newspaper smacked him in the face before falling into his lap, leaving a stinging red mark behind.

"Read it, you bastard. Know, that you failed. Your master is dead. The kid you tried to kill has a new family to care for him now and is surviving anything the world is throwing at him. He survived an entire fucking massacre. Your entire damn betrayal was for nothing. Fucking let that sink in. I'll be back a few hours later to take my paper back."

And with that, the Patronus and its owner passed on, clanging on the next cells after his own, carrying with him the warmth that had momentarily graced him.

But oddly enough, the clarity of mind that the Patronus had momentarily gifted him with did not pass. The bruised face of his godson on the front page captured his entire attention, and the world around him faded away as he immersed himself into the words that rose up at him from the newspaper.

…8 students and 1 teacher had fallen prey to the terrible gaze of the Basilisk…

…He found the entrance to Chamber of Secrets and went in…

…I didn't want to risk anyone else's life…

…Massacre at Hogwarts…

He had failed. Failed to protect his godson from all that would harm him. Failed to save him from the nightmares of the world around him. Failed to give him a shoulder to lean on as he watched his friend die…

Failed…

Not anymore.

There were certain emotions that a Dementor could not suck away. Disgust. Self Loathing. Hate. Yet those were all powerful emotions, and it was their power that had given Sirius Black something that he had not had in over eleven years.

Purpose.

With a mere thought, his magic rose up like a coiled beast springing up into action, infiltrating every inch of his body as he commanded his Animagus transformation again. His bones cracked and shifted, his snout elongated, his backbone rearranged, and the rags that were his clothes slowly disappeared as long matted coat of black fur appeared all over his body.

Mere seconds later, where there was once a man, now once again stood the grim.

Later that night, when the nightguard returned from his round around the prison to take his newspaper before leaving for home, the cell was empty.

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