• Serena Black •

„Sometimes the person
you'd take a bullet for
is standing behind the trigger."

The wind tugged at Serena's curls as she marched through the thick grass, which bent in the breeze like the subjects of a king. The hole between the roots on the trunk of the willow was still open, but its branches were already trembling menacingly, as if she were about to break the spell. Head first, she climbed into the gap, slid down a slide of earth and landed at the bottom of a very low tunnel. Hunched low, she walked along the narrow, dark tunnel, following Professor Lupin's soft panting.

The secret passage seemed never-ending and Serena had to be careful to keep enough distance between herself and her godfather so that he would not notice her. But his lead seemed large enough. The stinging in her sides hurt and gradually she could no longer hear Lupin's footsteps and loud breathing. She fell further and further behind and made a silent promise to herself to exercise more in the future.

As the tunnel rose, she could see a faint spot of light falling through a small opening. Serena paused and struggled for breath before pulling herself up through the opening. With only cold earth piling up into a dead end in front of her, this was the only way the teacher could have gone. Unless he had simply vanished into thin air.

The room she was in now was trashed and dusty, the wallpaper peeling off the walls, the whole floor covered in stains and all the furniture broken as if someone had smashed it. The only source of light were the narrow cracks between the boards at the windows, through which the last light of the day fell.

Serena winced as it creaked above her head. Something had clearly moved on the upper floor. As quietly as the thick soles of her boots would allow, she crept out into the hallway and up the rotten stairs. A thick layer of dust lay on every level surface, only on the steps something heavy that had been dragged upstairs had left a bright, shiny streak. Serena felt her heart stumble, yet her legs continued as if they belonged to someone else. Someone far braver than she was. As if this person didn't care at all what, or rather who, she would meet up there.

She was not sure whether this reassured her or frightened her. She was now so close to her destination that she could hear a muffled voice. It was one that had become more familiar to her in recent months than any other. It clearly belonged to Professor Lupin. "Where is he, Sirius?"

Then there was silence again. It was so quiet that Serena could hear her own heartbeat, which was disturbingly fast. The number of questions haunting her mind grew. Where was who? Harry? A sickening taste spread across her tongue. Had they arrived too late?

"But then..." murmured Lupin, and the rest of the conversation was swallowed up in the distance. Slowly, Serena crept closer to the door where his voice came from. "Unless it was him... if you swapped... without telling me?" The voice grew louder with each of her steps.

"Professor," Harry put in. "What...?" At the sound of Harry's voice, Serena quickened her steps. A lump the size of Hogwarts fell from her heart. He was fine! She had now reached the door behind which the conversation was taking place. It was slightly ajar, allowing her to peek through the crack. Her stomach clenched at what she saw.

Remus Lupin hugged Sirius Black like a brother. She felt sick to her stomach. He had been lying to her all along! She felt abandoned and betrayed. Had he just been pretending to be her friendly godfather all this time, eager to get to know her better?

"I don't believe it!" cried Hermione, voicing what they were probably all thinking. She had straightened up and was pointing at Lupin with her eyes flickering with anger. Serena changed the angle she had been using to look through the crack and now got a better view of the room. Ron was lying on an old-looking bed. His leg, which was too strangely twisted not to be broken, had been laid up. Harry stood protectively in front of him, wrathful, with a bad bruise on his head.

On the other side of the room was Lupin, who was just detaching himself from his old friend. It was the first time Serena had been able to look her father in the face in daylight. He hardly resembled the boy from the Pensieve and the photos. He looked more like a skeleton if it weren't for the eyes, the stormy grey eyes that made him seem alive.They were filled with such anger that Serena was glad it wasn't directed at her, not until now anyway.

"Hermione, calm down!" cried Lupin, raising his hands placatingly. But none of the teenagers seemed to want to even begin to calm down. Serena included. She felt such anger inside her as she had never felt before. She had never met her father, he could never pretend to her as he did to his supposed friends. Yet Remus Lupin had exploited this broken side of her, pretending to condemn what her father had done. When he wasn't one bit better. Had he deliberately left the map face up so that she would follow him?

"No!" cried Hermione. "Harry, don't trust him, he helped Black get into the castle, he wants you dead too, he's a werewolf!"

Serena was shaking all over, but this time it wasn't from fear, another wave of anger washed over her. The thought that he might have deliberately tried to lure her here nestled in her mind like an uninvited guest. She still had the chance to run back to the castle and get help. She thought of Nate. No, she needed the answers she deserved and in an emergency her best friend would sound the alarm. Gathering her courage, she finally closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "Merlin help me."

Wand raised, Serena finally yanked the door open, taking advantage of the moment of surprise. "Expelliarmus!"

The four wands flew in a high arc from Lupin's hand and fell to the floor at the doorstep. Serena hastily gathered them up and tossed Harry and Hermione each theirs and Ron's. She kept a firm grip on the brown one with the ball on the handle from her godfather for the moment.

"Serena, run and get help!" shrieked Hermione, but the Gryffindor thought nothing of leaving her friends alone with the two men again. True, they now had their wands again, but after all, that didn't have to mean anything.

"I trusted you," Serena called out, pointing the two wands at Lupin. She completely blanked out the man standing behind him as if he didn't exist. Her current anger was directed at the teacher who had taken her for a fool. He sighed and his expression showed that her presence did not fit into his plan. But that did not change anything. He seemed surprisingly calm considering the situation, if rather pale. "Serena, please listen to me! I can explain everything to you!"

"Serena..." Something flared in the eyes of the man behind him as he pushed past Lupin and limped a step towards her. Serena took two steps back, wand raised, startled, and could feel the fear paralysing her muscles, as well as goosebumps running over her body at the sound of her name coming from his mouth. That was how much she had dreaded this confrontation. The disappointment was readable on his face, like the latest headline in the Daily Prophet. But to her relief, he stopped.

Ron made a futile attempt to sit up, but slumped back on the bed, whimpering in pain. Lupin walked over to him with a worried look, but Ron yipped, "Get away from me, werewolf!"

The teacher stood rooted to the spot. Then he turned to Hermione with a closed effort. "How long have you known?"

"Since forever," whispered Hermione. "Since I wrote that essay for Professor Snape..."

Lupin laughed in agony. "You're the smartest witch your age I've ever met, Hermione."

"I'm not," she whispered, "If I'd been a little smarter, I would have told everyone what you are!"

"But they already know that," he replied dryly. "At least the teachers. I had a hard time convincing certain people that I could be trusted."

Serena had also kept his secret.... Had trusted him... He had convinced her too. Her hands, in which she held the wands, trembled and her throat tightened. She felt at their mercy, despite the fact that they were armed and the two men were not. Tears came to her eyes. "How could you," she whispered with a heart as heavy as lead.

Again her godfather raised his hands placatingly and turned to her once more. "Please, give me a chance to explain. It's not what you think."

"You've been helping him all along!" shouted Harry angrily, pointing a trembling finger at the convicted murderer, who started moving as if on cue. Exhausted, he limped towards the bed and sank down on it as if his legs no longer wanted to carry him.

"I didn't help Sirius," Lupin continued to explain calmly, taking long strides towards Serena, who still had both wands pointed at him. "Serena, please... you said yourself that there was something wrong with this whole thing and you were right."

Serena hesitated. By now she didn't know herself what or who to believe. But after all, she had come here to get answers, hadn't she?

"If you didn't help him," Harry said with an angry look at Sirius, "then how did you know he was here?"

"The map," Lupin replied. "The marauder's map. I was in my office looking at it."

"You know how to use it?" asked Harry suspiciously. Sirius had lifted his head, he too was staring at his former friend dumbfounded, as if he could hardly believe that the map still existed, let alone was in his possession.

"Of course I know how to use it," he said as if it were obvious, seeming to find his student's disbelief amusing. "I had a hand in writing it. I'm Moony - that was my nickname with my friends at school."

"Yourself...?" Harry looked confusedly at Serena, who returned his gaze. She nodded slowly, beginning to feel bad that she had never told him. Nor that his own father had been involved. Surprise came into his green eyes when she confirmed his statement, thus admitting that she had known all along.

"All that matters now is that I consulted the map carefully tonight because I suspected that you three might steal out of the castle to visit Hagrid before the Hippogriff was executed. And I was right, wasn't I?" Lupin was now pacing up and down the dingy room, looking at them in turn. His footsteps kicked up little clouds of dust. "I remember when Serena told me she had seen Peter Pettigrew on the map. I couldn't believe it, but tonight I saw it with my own eyes when you came out of Hagrid's hut. For now there was another."

"I beg your pardon?" protested Harry. "No, there were three of us!"

"I didn't want to believe my eyes," said Lupin, still pacing and ignoring Harry's interjection. "I thought there was something wrong with the map. How could he be with you when he had died?"

Serena was now glued to his lips. She, too, finally wanted to find out what it was all about and her godfather now seemed to have an answer. At least one to her endless collection of questions.

"No one was with us!" Harry continued to stammer stubbornly and looked helpfully at his friends, who merely nodded in agreement. But Serena had seen the other person on the map as well.

"And then there was another dot moving rapidly towards you, named Sirius Black .... I saw him collide with you and drag two of you under the Whomping Willow -"

"One!" spoke up Ron angrily.

"No, Ron," Lupin said calmly, as if trying to explain to a small child that he was wrong. "Two of you." He had now stopped and let his tired eyes glide over Ron. "Could I have a look at your rat?"

"What?" the redhead asked incredulously, staring at him as if he had gone as mad as the man squatting on the bed beside him. "What has Scabbers got to do with all this?"

"A few things," he replied, holding out his hand. "Can I see it, please?"

Ron hesitated, then thrust his hand into his cloak and dragged out Scabbers, who was flailing frantically. Lupin stepped towards the Weasley and eyed the squirming rat intently. Serena held her breath.

"What?" asked Ron again, hugging his pet to his chest with a fear-filled expression, "What does my rat have to do with any of this?"

"That's not a rat," Serena's father croaked suddenly, drawing attention back to himself. Serena had almost forgotten his presence, so spellbound had she been by her teacher's possible explanation. Reflexively, she fixed her eyes on him, but he paid no attention to her. He had eyes only for the squealing animal.

"What does that mean? Of course it's a rat!" Ron defended his pet and pressed it harder against his chest. Serena honestly wouldn't have reacted any differently. If two crazy men wanted to hurt her cat, she wouldn't give it up either.

"No, it's not," Lupin said calmly. "It's a wizard."

"An animagus," his old friend agreed, and Serena began to remember that months before, when he had surprised her in the common room, he had already been looking for a rat. Fat. Ugly. Missing a toe.

"Peter Pettigrew," Serena whispered, startled as she slowly realised and lowered both wands. All the blood drained from her face. That was why Pettigrew had been on the map all along, accompanied by Ron! That was why Scabbers was missing a toe! So he was alive... But what that meant, she couldn't quite put together in her head yet. Only that her father was one murder less to blame. Did that change anything? Frowning, she looked to her godfather and hoped he would explain.

"You don't believe them, do you?" shouted Ron at her in exasperation, looking at her as if she had plunged a knife into his back.

"Peter Pettigrew is dead!" shouted Harry, pointing at the perhaps wrongly convicted murderer. "He killed him!"

"I meant to," the accused muttered, straightening up. "But I didn't succeed."

"Everyone thought Sirius killed Peter," Lupin said thoughtfully, not taking his eyes off the dross kicking desperately in Ron's fist. "I believed it myself for twelve years. Peter cornered Sirius and Sirius killed him, just as it said in the Daily Prophet at the time. But the marauder's map never lies.... this is our old friend Peter."

"Guys, I'm leaving," Ron announced shakily, trying to stand on his sound leg. He failed miserably, however, and plopped back onto the mattress. Hermione put an arm around his shoulders for support, but she hesitated to pull him back to his feet.

"You can leave if you wish," the teacher replied calmly, returning Serena's gaze briefly. "All four of you. But you must leave Peter here."

"That's not Peter, that's Scabbers!" the redhead repeated, again hugging the rat tightly to his chest. Professor Lupin sighed as if he didn't know how to continue convincing Ron of his crazy theory. He turned to Serena now and reached out for his wand, which she was still clutching tightly. "Do you trust me?"

Serena's dark eyes widened. She hadn't yet decided if and whom she should trust in this situation. Her godfather's statements sounded both crazy and logical at the same time. Her eyes unconsciously met her father's, whose stormy grey eyes seemed to implore her silently. "You say you give second chances?"

"If the person deserves it," she replied so softly it was almost a breath and looked him straight in the amber eyes again. He reached out further for his wand, almost touching the wood that continued to be pointed at him. "Then let me earn it."

Five pairs of eyes were fixed on her and all of them seemed to hold their breath tensely. Why on Merlin's earth should she of all people decide? She took a deep breath, not wanting to carry that burden, that it depended on her judgement. If her godfather spoke the truth, perhaps she could prove her father's innocence. At least in the case of Peter Pettigrew. If he lied, she would sign the death warrant of her friends.