Annabeth pressed an eye in a gaping hole in the door, worn away from misuse. Inside, she could see Harry, Ron, Hermione, the cats, and--
"It's Black," Annabeth informed them in a low voice. "And he has Ron's wand."
"Well then, let's get in there!" Percy said, his hand reaching for the handle. But Annabeth stopped him. "No, we need the element of surprise," she said.
"Expelliarmus," Black croaked, Harry's wand leapt from his hands.
"Now we go," Annabeth muttered, and judo-kicked the door down. Startled at the intruders, Black turned his wand to them as the demigods raised their weapons.
"Expelliarmus!" Black cried, his voice cracking. Annabeth's dagger was whipped out of her hands, and from the whistling sounds she could tell the others were too. Caught off guard of them having weapons, not wands, Black ducked quickly as two knives and three swords came hurling at him.
Harry, whose mind was blank with fury at the murderer, saw the opportunity and tackled Black on the ground.
"YOU KILLED MY MUM AND DAD!" Harry roared, then his voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. "I'll kill you."
Black snarled and wrenched his hands free. "No." he hissed. "I've waited too long for this." And a dirty hand found it's way around Harry's neck, when suddenly--
Jason aimed a kick at Black's head but a force jerked him back. He turned, stunned, at Nico's hand around his wrist. The Son of Hades had his face in a determined line as he jerked Jason back away from Black.
"Don't," he whispered dangerously.
Black, who was struggling to throw Harry off of himself, saw Nico defending him.
"You're the boy from the woods," he murmured. He was immensely grateful, and felt the strength to finally throw Harry off of him.
Harry crumpled onto the side, but then Hermione and Ron were there, getting ready to throw the murderer back to the ground. Percy felt Riptide return to his pockets and uncapped it, ready to swing the heavy handle into Black's skull to knock him out. The blade was lowered towards the ground, ready to gather momentum and make the final swing. But a heavy weight found itself on his head and leapt to his shoulder, scratching down his arm in an attempt to stop him. Percy tried to shake Bianca off of him, but the kitten held fast. At the same time, Crookshanks had leapt swiftly to the floor and made a wild swipe towards Ron and Harry's wands, which had rolled free of Black when he fell. Annabeth furiously kicked the cat away, sending him spitting onto Ron's back. He sank his claws into Ron's robes, and Ron let out a howl of pain.
"Get off me, you bloody cat!" He snarled and tried to toss him free, forgetting his leg was broken. He twisted and fell with a thump at Thalia's feet, knocking her to the ground. In the confusion, Harry had scrambled back up and snatched his wand from Annabeth's hands. He pointed it at Black, shouting, "get out of the way!" to Hermione. She didn't need telling twice and rolled free. Annabeth helped her up, but her gaze was locked solidly on Harry's wand being pointed at Black.
"Are you going to kill me, Potter?" Black whispered in a hoarse whisper.
Harry didn't break the stare. "You killed my parents."
Black stared at Harry through his sunken eyes. "I just as well killed them," he said. "I don't deny it. But if you knew the whole story--"
"The whole story?" Harry repeated furiously. "You sold them to Voldemort. That's all I need to know."
"You've got to listen to me," Black said urgently. "You'll regret it if you don't... you don't understand."
"I understand a whole lot better than you think," Harry said furiously. Annabeth regarded them both calculatingly, sighing at Harry's sentence. Kids, she thought in exasperation. They always think they know everything. Because there clearly was something that was going to change the whole story.
A soft mew echoed through the room as Crookshanks leapt onto Black's chest, settling right over his heart. He turned his squashed face to Harry.
"No, get off," Black murmured, trying to push Crookshanks off.
Harry stared down at Crookshanks, who was staring back at him as if challenging him. Harry's grip tightened, but his eyes didn't show any sign of change of heart. Annabeth well knew that Harry still planned to kill Black, and a cat wasn't going to get in his way. Her heart clenched. What was Harry becoming?
Then suddenly, Annabeth heard it. Well, felt it first. Soft vibrations of someone hurrying up the stairs, then the thuds of feet on the dusty carpet.
"WE'RE UP HERE!" Hermione screamed suddenly. "SIRIUS BLACK COME QUICKLY--"
Nico pointed his wand in Hermione's direction. "Don't!" He yelled. Harry turned furiously to Nico.
"Why're you protecting him?" He nearly shouted.
Nico looked back at Harry, then at Black. And Black saw, in the boy's eyes, that he understood. He didn't completely grasp the concept of what was happening, but he understood what Black was going through.
Then suddenly, Professor Lupin came through the shattered door, his face bloodless. His eyes flickered to Percy, with Bianca latched onto his arm, Thalia, who had an arrow poised in her bow but was waiting Black out because Nico was so certain, Jason, whose wrist was latched in Nico's hand, Annabeth, who was still holding Hermione upright, Ron, who was crumpled on the ground as his broken leg throbbed, and Harry, his wand pointed directly at Black's heart.
"Expelliarmus!" Lupin shouted, and everyone's wands flew into Lupin's hand.
They all stared at him. Lupin, unaware of the fact, turned to Black.
"Where is he, Sirius?" And Jason was caught off guard at the suppressed emotions that lay thick in Lupin's words.
But he was even more surprised when Black raised a bloodied hand and pointed straight at Ron.
Mystified, they all looked at Ron, who was peering up at them with a bewildered expression on his face.
"But then, why hasn't he shown himself before now? Unless--" Lupin's eyes widened as though he was seeing something beyond what everyone else could see. "--unless, he was the one... unless you switched... without telling me?"
Annabeth was completely lost, and she hated that feeling as Black nodded slowly.
"Would someone tell me--" her question died in her throat as Lupin lowered his wand and walked over to Black, pulling him to his feet. There was unmistakable fondness in the two's eyes as Lupin embraced Black.
"I DON'T BELIEVE IT!" Hermione suddenly screamed. She had yanked herself away from Annabeth and pointed at Lupin, wild-eyed. "You-- you--"
"Hermione--" Lupin tried.
"You and him!"
"Calm down!"
"I didn't tell anyone!" Hermione shrieked. "I've been covering up for you--"
"Hermione, listen to me, please!" Lupin shouted. "Let me explain!"
Standing stock still before, Harry was now shaking with fury.
"I trusted you!" He screamed at Lupin. "And all the time you've been his friend?"
Thalia glowered at Harry. "Are you stupid?" She shouted. "Did you not just see the events that happened?"
"I saw him helping Black to his feet before hugging him!" Harry roared back.
"What about the whole time when he had his wand pointed at Black? He wasn't going to do a healing spell on him, you know! You could see it in his eyes. And did you not see what happened before they hugged? Lupin cleared something up, obviously clearing Black's name, and then helped him up! Honestly, Harry, sometimes you need to actually look around before threatening to kill someone!"
Harry drew breath to continue, but Hermione was back at it.
"No!" she screamed. "Harry, don't trust Lupin! He's been helping Black get into the castle, he wants you dead too-- he's a werewolf!"
There was a ringing silence. Lupin looked rather pale, though he forced a laugh.
"Not up to your usual standard, Hermione," he began. "Only one out of three, I'm afraid. I have not been helping Sirius get into the castle and I certainly don't want Harry dead..." A shiver passed over his face. "But I won't deny that I am a werewolf."
Ron, his face slack with terror, tried to extend the gap between himself and Lupin. His leg crunched ominously against the ground, and Lupin started towards him, looking concerned, but Ron gasped, "get away from me, werewolf!"
A well-hidden look of pain crossed over Lupin's expression, but he retreated. "How long have you known?" He managed to Hermione.
"Ages," Hermione whispered. "Since I did Professor Snape's essay..."
"He'll be delighted," Lupin stated coolly. "He assigned that essay hoping someone would realize what my symptoms meant... Did you check the lunar chart and realize that I was always ill at the full moon? Or did you realize the boggart changed into the moon when it saw me?"
"Both," Hermione said quietly. Annabeth mentally slapped herself for not noticing. Now that Lupin pointed it out, the signs were so obvious!
Lupin forced a laugh. "You're the cleverest witch of your age I've ever met, Hermione."
"I'm not," Hermione said in a quavering voice. "If I'd been a bit cleverer, I'd have told everyone what you are!"
"But they already know," Lupin said. "At least, the staff do."
"Dumbledore hired you when he knew you were a werewolf?" Ron gasped. "Is he mad?"
"Some of the staff thought so," Lupin said. "He had to work very hard to convince certain teachers that I'm trustworthy--"
"AND HE WAS WRONG!" Harry bellowed with rage. "YOU'VE BEEN HELPING HIM ALL THE TIME!" He pointed at Black, who was on the fourposter bed. Crookshanks leapt up beside him and sank into his lap, purring. Bianca yanked her claws free of Percy's arm and joined him.
"I have not been helping Sirius," Lupin said with exasperation. "If you'll give me a chance, I'll explain. Look--"
He threw all of their wands back to them. Harry caught his, stunned.
"There," Lupin said. "Now you're all armed. Will you listen?"
"That was risky," Nico muttered, and Lupin shot a side glance at him. "They won't listen if I didn't," he said, and Nico scowled, nodding.
"If you haven't been helping him," Harry said with a furious glance at Black, "How did you know he was here?'
"The map," Lupin said. "The Marauder's Map. I was in my office examining it--"
"You know how to work it?" Harry asked suspiciously.
"Of course I know how to work it," Lupin said, waving his hand impatiently. "I helped write it. I'm Moony-- that was my friends' nickname for me at school."
"You wrote--"
"The important thing is, I was watching it carefully this evening because I had an idea that you eight might try something like this to sneak out of the castle and visit Hagrid. I was right, wasn't I?"
He began to pace up and down, looking at them. "Now, you might've been invisible under your little hijinks and your father's old cloak, Harry--"
"How'd you know about that?"
"Even if you're invisible, you still show up on the Marauder's Map. I watched you cross the grounds and enter Hagrid's hut. Twenty minutes later, you left Hagrid and set off back toward the castle. But now, you had a friend with you."
"What?" Harry asked. "No we weren't!"
"I couldn't believe my eyes," Lupin said, ignoring Harry's outburst. "I thought the map must be malfunctioning. How could he be with you?"
"No one was with us!" Harry exclaimed.
"ANd then I saw another dot, moving fast towards you, labeled Sirius Black... I saw him collide with you, I watched as he pulled two of you into the Whomping Willow--"
"One of us!" Ron said angrily. "Hermione was just following!"
"Two of you," Lupin said. He had stopped pacing, his eyes fixed over Ron. "Do you think I could have a look at the rat?" He asked mildly.
"What?" Ron asked, dumbfounded. "What's Scabbers got to do with it?"
"Everything," Lupin said softly. "Could I see him, please?"
Ron hesitated, then pulled Scabbers out of his robes. The rat emerged, thrashing desperately. Ron firmly pinched his tail to keep him from escaping; Crookshanks stood on Black's leg and made a soft hissing noise while Bianca just regarded Scabbers with beady eyes.
"What?" Ron asked again. "What has Scabbers got to do with anything?"
"That's not a rat," Sirius croaked suddenly.
"What d'you mean, of course he's a rat--"
"No, he's not," Lupin said quietly. "He's a wizard."
"An animagus," Black said. "By the name of Peter Pettigrew."
There was a very stunned silence.
"What?" Thalia asked incredulously. She turned her razor sharp dagger in the direction of the rat. "How can a human be a rat? I mean, Nico's pretty scrawny, but he doesn't look like a rat. And the Mist isn't so strong that it--"
"An animagus," Black replied impatiently, his face twitching in Scabber's direction. "And missy, you'll have to explain a lot when this is over. Like why you have a bow and arrow with you, and what the bloody hell all of this mist is."
Scabbers, who seized the opportunity to make a mad escape, dropped to the ground and wildly dashed for any hiding spot he could find. Bianca hissed and bared her teeth before springing several feet and landing perfectly on top of the rat scuttling towards a rotting floorboard. Scabbers twisted under her claws, but Bianca held fast as she firmly grasped him in her teeth and brought him back to Crookshanks, who purred in approval. Then the little cat moment was interrupted by Sirius, madly snatching at Scabbers.
"Sirius, no!" Lupin yelled. "Wait! You can't just do it like that, they need to understand! We've got to explain!"
"We can explain afterwards!" Black snarled.
Annabeth stepped in. "Why on earth would you do that?" She exploded. "That's exactly how people escape! They get captured, then the bad guy decides to explain the extremely long master plan while the convict is figuring out a plan to escape, then while they're distracted the make a wild run for it!"
Black stared at Annabeth through sunken eyes. "Exactly," he whispered, and grabbed for the rat again.
"We have ten people and two cats looking after the rat!" Lupin yelled. "I think we're okay!" He paused to draw breath. "And you have a right to know everything," he said.
"That way you can enjoy watching me kill him," Black said. "Just hurry it up, Remus. I want to commit the murder I was imprisoned for..."
"You're both nutters," Ron announced shakily. "I've had enough of this. I'm off."
He tried to get up, but Lupin pointed his wand at Ron. "You're going to hear me out, Ron," he said quietly. "Just keep a tight hold on Peter while you listen."
"He's not Peter, HE'S SCABBERS!" Ron yelled, trying to force his rat back into his front pocket, but Scabbers was fighting too hard.
"There were witnesses who saw Pettigrew die." Harry reasoned. "A whole street full of them..."
"They didn't see what they thought they saw!" Black said savagely.
"Did you never grasp the concept of the Mist?" Nico asked with exasperation. Harry turned furiously to him.
"Don't side with him!" He hissed. "You saw him in the woods, but didn't tell me?"
Nico turned his eyes coldly onto Harry. "Harry, I did it for a reason. But you obviously don't care what anyone else has to say right now except for Lupin. So just shut up."
Harry drew breath to keep going, but Sirius let out an animalistic growl and Harry thought the better of it. "Hurry up, Remus," he said through gritted teeth.
Then Hermione spoke.
"But-- Scabbers can't be Peter, I've looked up the list of animagi and Pettigrew wasn't on there..."
"Ah," Lupin looked amused. "But yet was Sirius on there either?"
Hermione opened her mouth to speak, then closed it.
"Exactly. See, there were three unregistered animagi running around Hogwarts--"
The bedroom door suddenly opened on its own accord. Everyone froze and looked towards it, Nico drowning in concentration. He felt death-- it was near-- and yet... there was no soul with it. The presence of Death just grew stronger and stronger...
"This place is haunted," Ron whispered. Lupin shook his head.
"It never was. The screams the villagers heard were from me. And that's where this story begins, me becoming a werewolf.
"I was bitten when I was very young, and there was no cure. The potion Professor Snape made for me was a very new invention, so at the time I was helpless to the bite. It seemed impossible that I could ever come to Hogwarts. But then suddenly, Professor Dumbledore became headmaster and he was sympathetic, said that there was no reason not to admit me, so long as they took precautions. Harry, I told you the Whomping Willow was planted the year I came to school. The truth is, it was planted because of me. This house, the tunnel, it was all built for my purpose. The tree was planted as a barrier. To protect the students. I was separated from humans to bite, so I had to bite and scratch myself instead. The screams the villagers heard thought it was from a particularly angry spirit. Dumbledore encouraged the rumor, and now even when it's silent, they don't dare approach it.
"But despite the pain, it was the happiest years of my life. I had three great friends. Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, and of course, James Potter. But they could hardly ignore the fact that I continued to be ill every month, despite the excuses I made. I was terrified they would desert me. But of course, in the end, they worked out the truth and they didn't desert me. Not at all."
Ron looked around guiltily, remembering the disgust and horror in his voice earlier.
"Instead, they did something that would make my transformations more bearable. Not only that, but the best times of my life. They became animagi."
The others stared in awe, silence broken only by Scabbers' frantic squeaks.
"And finally, in their fifth year, they managed it. Each turning into a different animal at will. Then, each time I transformed, they would sneak out and go down the tunnel- Peter would touch the knot as the smallest and fastest- and they would help me through my time as a werewolf.
"Naturally, we were all thrilled with the idea of being able to sneak around with no one knowing who we were. We were roaming all around the school and the village at night. I highly doubt any other Hogwarts student has ever found out as much about Hogwarts as we have. And that's how we came to write the Marauder's map with our own nicknames-- Sirius is Padfoot, Peter is Wormtail, James was Prongs."
"That's extremely dangerous though!" Hermione protested. "Sneaking around when you could've accidentally bitten somebody!"
"there were near misses, many of them," Lupin admitted heavily. "And that's something that still haunts me. Sometimes I felt guilty about lying to Dumbledore, after all, he admitted me to Hogwarts when no other would have done so, and he had no idea I was breaking the rules he had set down for my own and other's safety. But I always managed to push out my guilty feelings every time we sat down to plan our next month's adventures.
"All this year, I've been battling with myself, wondering whether or not I should tell Dumbledore that Sirius was an animagi. But I didn't do it, because I was too cowardly. I would be admitting to breaking his trust, and Dumbledore's trust meant everything to me. And I was so convinced that Sirius was using dark arts to get into Hogwarts that I never even fathomed that he would use his talent... I guess, in a way, Snape was right about me all along."
"Snivellus?" Black looked up, startled. "What's he got anything to do with it?"
"He's a teacher here too, Sirius," Lupin said heavily. He looked to the third-years. "See, Snape had a reason not to trust us, after a very-- erm-- nasty prank Sirius here played on him. He was very curious, you see, to know where I went every month. We never liked each other much, all in the same year and such. He especially hated James-- Jealous, I assume. Anyways, he had seen me crossing the grounds with Madam Pomfrey one evening toward the whomping willow. Sirius thought it would be amusing to tell Snape that he could freeze the tree by poking it with a long stick. Well, of course he tried it and almost got to the house had James not caught it in time. He pulled Snape back, but not before Snape got a good look at me. Dumbledore forbid him to tell, of course, but from then on he knew what I was..."
"So that's why he doesn't like you?" Percy asked. "Because he thought you were in on it too?"
"That's right," a sneering voice came from the wall behind Lupin. Snape whipped off the invisibility cloak, his wand pointed directly at Black.