"Who spoke the curse?" A voice said, though it sounded muffled through the ringing of my ears.

"There's been different stories. Some say Artemis Black, others say Damien Goyle. Even had a few say that Remus Lupin or Peter Pettigrew could be the culprits."

"Peter and Remus? Neither one of those boys are capable of speaking such a dastardly curse."

I heard shuffling and other comments being made though not clearly through my struggled hearing. I felt the hospital bed under me and a sharp pain start throbbing from my abdomen.

"Will the boy live, Poppy?" The voice asked. There was a pause.

"I've dealt with Lupin in worse conditions...the boy should be fine."

I drearily opened my eyes. A heavy weight sitting on top of them. Gravity seeming too powerful to achieve the simple task with ease.

Was Remus hurt? Did I hurt him? I can't remember anything after I was pulled off of Damien. I completely blacked out, memories being nothing but a blur of vision, the sound of my blood pumping and then a green flash...to nothingness. Now a voice spoke of treating Remus in worse conditions and asking if a boy was going to survive?

I pulled up the weight of my body onto my elbows, a panic rushing through me. I looked around the room, I had been covered by hospital screens and couldn't see past my sectioned area. I had been changed into a white gown and had bandages across my arms and as I felt my stomach, across there too.

My vision was double for a few seconds, adjusting to the florescent lights of the room. Seeming to have a strange pale blue tone coating my vision as it adjusted. Dark green and black blobs from light damage danced across my eyesight.

Pins and needles accumulated statically in my toes and fingers as I dragged myself up into a seated position, my feet gently touching the cold sanitary floor. I gagged a little at the motion, my body reacting negatively to the forced movement.

Slowly I managed to stand up, holding onto the bed frame for support like a toddler who was learning the ropes and balancing for the first time. Instantly light headed and verging delirious.

Standing didn't feel real and all too real at the same time. As if my mind and body weren't in the same timeframe, a lag happening between them both.

I stood with my eyes closed for a few seconds. I had to go see Remus, if he was hurt I had to go find him. I had to be with him no matter how much of a struggle it might be to get there.

Eventually I managed to pull the hospital screen apart a little, in order to slip out into the main area. Madam Pomfrey was distracted and busy creating tonics in her tiny office in the corner towards the far side of the room, so she didn't see me wobble over to the other sectioned off bed.

I pulled back the screen...only to see Damien in the bed, looking worse than I felt. There were blood soaked bandages all over his bare chest, arms and even some soaked plasters across his face.

I glanced down to my own slightly bloody bandage and pulled it away from my skin...revealing nothing but a faint white line. So faint it was hard to focus on in the bright lights...much like the many faint white lines over Remus' face and hands.

Had Remus been in this situation before? Had Remus been hit by a curse?

I stumbled silently over to Damien's bed. He was still knocked out with no sign of coming to yet, like I had done only moments ago.

I took a shallow intake of breath as I gently peeled back one of his drenched bandages...no open wounds. Another couple of faint white lines, just like mine. He had been healed the same way I had been. Though he seemed to take the impact of the blow a lot harder than I did if I was going to judge by the bandages.

"What in Merlins name are you doing out of bed?" Suddenly a stressed sounding Pomfrey said behind me in a squeaky voice. Before I could begin to explain I was grabbed and rushed back to my bed.

She lifted her wand and mumbled something before I started feeling heavy and delirious again.

"You need sleep to heal fully, brain and all." I heard her voice say becoming distorted. She had cast a sleeping spell.

*

I woke up to darkness and the sound of distant bickering. I couldn't quite figure the noises out.

Distorted speech, creaking floorboards and general strange movement sounded very quietly in the room.

I had obviously come to from the sleeping spell, a familiar dizzy dissociative feeling clouding my judgement and fogging my brain. Perhaps I was just hearing things, some kind of sleep paralysis where I'm still dreaming though awake.

I closed my eyes again, if it was night I might as well try and get back off to sleep if that's all I could do. Even if I had already slept for a good healthy handful of hours.

"Should we wake her, I don't want to." Suddenly a voice whispered close to me. A voice that made a lump appear in my throat. The voice of someone who earlier I forced myself up to try and find.

I started crying. Crying like a child who had just found its lost favourite toy after an overwhelming, emotional search for it. Drained and exhausted and just relieved to experience something so familiar that carries such warmth.

I opened my eyes and there at the end of my bed were the boys.

Remus, Sirius, James and Peter.

"Hey hey don't cry! What's wrong?" Remus cooed and quickly came over and bent down next to the bed.

Though it was a struggle, my body feeling heavy and odd (much like last time), I managed to pull myself up and wrap my arms around him. I buried my head between the crook of his neck and cried for a bit.

No one spoke.

There was a few minutes of nothing but the feeling of Remus rub my back gently, the smell of his skin and the sound of my sniffles sounding in the silence.

I pulled away and locked my eyes with his hazel, green ones. I opened my mouth to speak but Remus shook his head and made me concentrate on him.

"Don't try and apologise, sometimes all we need is a hug. Don't even begin to say sorry for that." He smiled, reassuring me by almost reading my body language exactly, knowing what I was going to do.

"Do you feel well enough to get up?" James spoke. I looked at him, finally picking up on the strange atmosphere. They were waiting, but for what?

I didn't reply but with the help of Remus extending his hand out to me I managed to drape my legs over the side of the bed and stand up with a wobble.

"You were real badass today, Arty!" Peter smiled big at me.

I didn't feel it. I felt weak, confused and disappointed in myself.

"Who...was it me?" I asked about the curse. I had a vague memory. The type of memory that I could have very well convinced myself I had done it and created in my own mind or was real and already repressed.

They all slowly nodded.

Shame instantly hit me and my bottom lip began to quiver a little again. I was a hypocrite, worse than Bellatrix. I was the danger. I hurt someone, with intention.

Sirius stepped forward and...hugged me. My bottom lip stopped quivering with surprise. A warm feeling created a small smile upon my face at his genuine gesture of gratitude.

"Thank you." He said still hugging me. I held him back tightly.

This was the moment.

Sirius trusted me.

He pulled away and Remus smiled at us both like he was witnessing a powerful scene in front of him.

"So we actually had a discussion," Remus began.

"You standing up for us all, especially Sirius," Peter continued.

"-Damien's a big guy, it took guts to fight him. You went batshit crazy mind but we appreciate that." James laughed.

"Basically what James is trying to say," Remus glanced at the other boys.

Sirius smiled at me and took a deep breath in to speak.

"Welcome to the Maurauders, kiddo."