Together [HP]

It took a few seconds for everyone to understand that this sentence was simply incredible.Then Ron said what Harry was thinking. "Both of you are mentally ill."

"Impossible!" Hermione said weakly.

"Peter Pettigrew is dead!" Harry said, "He killed him 12 years ago!" He pointed at Black, whose face contorted convulsively.

"I was trying to kill him," he growled, baring his yellow teeth again, "but little Peter got the upper hand, but not this time!" Black slammed into Scabbers, and Crookshanks was thrown On the floor; Blake's body was on top of Ron's broken leg, and Ron screamed in pain.

"Sirius, stop!" Lupine yelled, lunging forward himself, dragging Black away from Ron again. "Wait! You can't just do this. They have to understand, we have to explain."

"We can explain it afterwards!" growled Black, trying to push Lupine away, one hand still in the air, as if trying to catch Scabbers.Scabbers squealed like a piglet, grabbing Ron's face and neck, trying to get away.

"They... have the right... to know... everything!" Luhu gasped, still trying to grab Black. "Ron keeps him as a pet! There are things about him that even I don't understand! And Harry... you have to tell Harry the truth, Sirius!"

Black stopped struggling, but his sunken eyes were still fixed on Scabbers, who was pressed against Ron's bitten and bleeding hands.

"Well then," said Blake, still keeping his eyes on the mouse, "tell them what you want to tell them, but be quick. I've been imprisoned for murder, and now I'm going to commit that murder." .”

"You're nuts, both of you," said Ron uncertainly, turning to Harry and Hermione for support. "I've heard enough. I'm going." He tried to stand on his good leg, but Lupine pointed his wand at Scabbers again.

"You should hear me out, Ron," he said quietly, "and while you listen, hold on to Peter so he doesn't get away."

"It's not Peter. It's Scabbers" cried Ron, trying to force the mouse back into his pocket; but Scabbers struggled so hard that Ron wobbled and lost his balance.Harry grabbed Ron and pushed him back onto the bed.Harry then ignored Black and turned to Lupine.

"Witnesses saw Peter Pettigrew dead," he said, "a street witness!"

"They didn't see what they thought they saw!" said Black furiously, still staring at Scabbers struggling in Ron's hands.

"Everyone thinks Sirius killed Peter," said Lupine, nodding. "I believed so myself, until tonight when I looked at the map. Because the Marauder's Map never lies...Peter is alive." .Ron is grabbing him, Harry."

Harry looked at Ron, their eyes met, and the same thought came to their minds: both Black and Lupine were out of their minds.What they said made no sense.How could Scabbers be Peter Pettigrew? After all, Azkaban destroyed Black's spirit.But why did Lupine cooperate with him?

Then Hermione spoke, in that trembling, possibly composed voice, as though trying to get Professor Lupine to speak rationally.

"But Professor Lupine. Scabbers can't be Peter Pettigrew. It can't be true. You know it can't be."

"Why can't it be true?" said Lupine calmly, as if they were in class and Hermione had just discovered a problem while experimenting with Grindylow.

"Because, because if Peter Pettigrew had been an Animagus, people would know. We learned about Animagus in Professor McGonagall's class. I looked up that sort of stuff when I did my homework. Magic The Ministry supervises wizards and witches who can turn into animals; there are records showing what animals they turned into, and their marks and things. I checked Professor McGonagall's records, and there are only seven in this century. Nimagus, and Pettigrew's name isn't on that list."

Harry secretly admired Hermione's work on her homework, but this feeling was immediately interrupted by Lupine's loud laugh.

"You're right again, Hermione!" he said, "but the Ministry never knew there were three unregistered Animagus at Hogwarts."

"If you want to tell them something, hurry up, Lupine," growled Black, still watching Scabbers' every desperate struggle. "I've waited 12 years and I'm not willing to wait any longer."

"Okay, but you'll help me, Sirius," said Lupine. "I only know the beginning."

Lupine stopped talking.There was a loud crack behind him, and the bedroom door swung open of its own accord.All five looked at the door.Lupine walked over and looked over the landing.

"nobody..."

"This place is haunted!" said Ron.

"No," Luhu said, still looking at the door in bewilderment, "the Shrieking Shack has never been haunted... the screams and howls that the villagers often hear are from me. "

He brushed the gray hair back from his eyes, considered for a moment, and then said, "This is where it all started, when I became a werewolf. None of this would have happened if I hadn't been bitten. If I Not so reckless."

He appeared awake and tired.Ron tried to cut in, but Hermione said, "Shh!" She looked intently at Lupine.

"I was very young when I was bitten. My parents tried everything, but at the time it was hopeless. The potion that Professor Snape gave me was a recent discovery. You know, the potion Makes me safe. As long as I take this potion a week before the full moon, I'll stay sane when I transform, and I'll be able to crouch in my office, a harmless wolf, and wait for the full moon to pass.

"However, before the discovery of the wolfbane potion, I turned into a real wolf once a month. I would never have come to Hogwarts, and other parents would not want their children to touch me.

"But then Dumbledore became headmaster and he was very sympathetic. He said there was no reason why I should not come to this school as long as certain precautions were taken..." Lupine sighed, facing Harry "A few months ago, I told you that the Whomping Willow was planted the year I went to Hogwarts. It was actually planted for me to go to Hogwarts. This house... Lupine looked around sadly. "The tunnel that came here was opened for my use. Once a month, I was smuggled out of the castle and sent here to be transformed. Plant the tree at the entrance of the tunnel." , so that no one will encounter me when I am a danger to others."

Harry didn't understand what Lupine meant by saying this, but he was fascinated nonetheless.The only sound other than Lupin's was Scabbers' scream of fear.

"In those days, my metamorphosis was, it was scary. It was very painful to be a werewolf. I was away from people when I wanted to bite, so I bit myself and scratched myself. The noise and the screaming that the villagers heard , thinking they were hearing noises from particularly ferocious ghosts. Dumbledore encouraged people to spread such rumors. Even now, the villagers dare not go near the house, even though it has not had such noises for many years. But. I was happier than I was before, except for my transformation. I had friends for the first time, three good friends. Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, and of course, your father, James Potter."

"Then it's impossible for three of my friends not to notice that I disappear once a month. I make up all kinds of stories. I tell them my mother is sick and I have to go home to see her. I'm especially worried if they find out I'm Werewolves would just ignore me. But of course, Hermione, they figured it out just like you did. And they didn't ignore me at all. Instead, they did something for me so that I could not only Endure the pain of the transfiguration, and make it the happiest time of my life. They learned the Animagus."

"My dad too?" Harry asked in surprise.

"Yes, indeed," said Lupine. "It took them almost three years to do this. Your father and Sirius here are the brightest students in the school. They are lucky because Animagus Transfiguration can go awry and go horribly wrong. That's why the Ministry of Magic keeps a close eye on those who try to do it. Peter needs a lot of help from Sirius and James. Finally, in our fifth year, they learned shapeshifting. Each of them can transform into a different animal at will."

"But how does this situation help you?" Hermione asked, seemingly puzzled.

"They couldn't keep me company in human form, so they kept me in animal form," said Lupine. "Werewolves are only dangerous to people. They sneak out of the castle every month under Jaime's cloak of invisibility. They Transformed, Peter became the smallest animal so that he could get under the hammering branches of the Whomping Willow to press the knots that held the tree still. Then they slid down the tunnel to find me. Under their influence, I Not so dangerous. My body is still a wolf, but when I am with them, my mind is not so wolf-like."

"Lupin, come on!" Black growled.He was still watching Scabbers, with a terrible longing on his face.

"That's it, Sirius, that's it. Now that we can all shapeshift, we have an extremely exciting range of possibilities before us. We left the Screaming Shack in no time and went to the school grounds at night and wandering around the village. Sirius and James turned into very large animals capable of deterring werewolves. I don't think there are any students at Hogwarts who know the Hogwarts grounds and Hogsmeade as well as we do. So We drew the Marauder's Map and signed our aliases. Sirius is Padfoot, Peter is Wormtail, and James is Prongs."

"What kind of animal?" Harry asked, but Hermione cut him off.

"That's still very dangerous! Running around in the dark with a werewolf! What if he accidentally bites someone?"

"The thought still haunts me," said Lupine gravely, "and there were near-bites, many times. We joked about it afterwards. We were young and naive , Just be proud of your cleverness.

"Of course, there are times when I feel ashamed that I have betrayed Dumbledore's trust. He accepted me when none of the other headmasters would accept me, and he had no idea that I had broken the code, which was for me. and the safety of others. He never knew that I led three classmates to learn Animagus illegally. Every time we sat down to plan our adventures for the next month, I kept trying to forget this burden. guilt, and I haven't changed."

Lupine's face hardened, and there was self-loathing in his voice. "I've been fighting with myself for a year, wondering whether I should tell Dumbledore: Sirius is an Animagus. But I didn't say it. Why? Because I was too cowardly. Tell him, it means I had betrayed his trust as a student, which meant acknowledging that I had brought others with me. And for me. Dumbledore's trust was extremely important. When I was a child, he accepted me into school, and I was an adult After that, I hit the wall everywhere, because I was a werewolf and couldn't find a paid job, but he gave me a job. In this way, I convinced myself that Sirius used the evil method he learned from Voldemort to sneak into the school Yes, his being an Animagus had nothing to do with it. So, in a sense, Snape was always right about me."

"Snape," said Black hoarsely, looking away from Scabbers at Lupine for the first time in minutes, "what does Snape have to do with this?"

"He's here, Sirius," said Luhu heavily, "and he's teaching here." He looked up at Harry, Ron, and Hermione.

"Professor Snape was with us at the school. He was very opposed to my appointment as Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. He kept telling Dumbledore that I couldn't be trusted. He had his reasons, you see, little Sirius once made a joke on him, almost killed him, and that joke has something to do with me..." Black made a mocking sound.

"He deserves it," he sneered, "surreptitiously looking around, wondering what we're up to. He hopes to get us fired."

"Severus is very interested in where I go every month," Lupine told Harry, Ron, and Hermione. "We're in the same grade, you know. We, oh, don't like each other very much. Don't like James."

"Jealous, I think, of James' talent on the Quidditch pitch. Anyway, Snape saw me walking across the field with Madam Pomfrey one evening, and she led me to the Whomping Willow." Transformation. Sirius told Severus: Just touch a long stick to a knot in the trunk, and you can follow me into the tree hole; Sirius thought it would be, oh, fun. Well, of course Snape would Tried that. If he got to the house, he'd meet a total werewolf. But your dad, when he heard what Sirius was doing, came after Snape and pulled him back, himself Risking his life too, but Snape saw me, at the end of the tunnel. Dumbledore forbade him to tell anyone, but, from that moment on, he knew what I was."

"No wonder Snape didn't like you," said Harry slowly, "because he thought you were in on the joke."

"Yes," said a grim voice from the wall behind Lupine.

Severus Snape pulled off his Invisibility Cloak, pointing his wand at Lupine, with Jacqueline trying to maintain a harmless smile beside him.