"S-Sirius... Black?"
Carina Malfoy, face to face with the most notorious murderer of the age, went cold with fear the moment she grasped the situation.
Understandable. The man before her had killed seventeen Muggles and one wizard with a single spell.
No matter how skilled she was, Malfoy was still just a student. She stood no chance against him.
She wanted to run—right now, this instant—but her pride, and the sight of Harry Potter standing directly in her line of sight, kept her rooted to the spot.
Malfoy reached out toward Harry in a panic.
"Danger, Har—!"
"Calm down, Malfoy."
Harry Potter caught her hand gently and wrapped it in both of his, as if trying to reassure her.
"Trust me. He's not an enemy. He's not a murderer, either."
There was no rational basis for trust.
Every front-page story the Daily Prophet had run since summer—every word Lucius and Snape had ever said about Sirius Black—pointed to one conclusion: he was everyone's enemy.
Believing Harry Potter's word alone and standing down would be a profoundly irrational decision.
Carina Malfoy knew that, in her head.
But her body, it seemed, was not quite as rational as her head.
He had only taken her hand—and yet the warmth that began there spread through her veins like something slow and inevitable.
By the time she noticed, the trembling had stopped. Malfoy steadied herself, then fixed Sirius with a hard stare.
"Everyone. Let's move inside, for now."
Harry Potter led them both into the Shrieking Shack.
Malfoy edged along with her eyes locked on Sirius; Sirius, for his part, kept a wary eye on Malfoy. Harry seated them at opposite ends of the room—though even without his intervention, they would have arranged themselves like opposing poles of a magnet.
Sirius spoke first.
"Harry, the Malfoy family has been among Voldemort's most devoted followers for generations. Are you certain it's wise to reveal my identity to her?"
"Obviously not!"
Malfoy snapped, her hand closing around her wand inside her robes.
"If I'd known that dog was Sirius Black, I wouldn't have thrown him so much as a chicken bone!"
Sirius gave as good as he got.
"And if I'd known you were Lucius Malfoy's daughter, I wouldn't have eaten it."
"I should have known from the moment you ate the chocolate! I looked it up afterward—chocolate is supposed to be lethal to dogs!"
"Oh, is that so? You weren't trying to kill me on purpose, then?"
Malfoy and Sirius glared at each other, both bristling.
In the midst of it all, Harry Potter's eyebrow twitched, and he seized on a minor detail.
"You gave him chocolate? When?"
"Right after you collapsed from the Dementor! I was walking across the grounds and he just appeared out of nowhere—"
"You don't even like chocolate. You were carrying it around and just... gave it to a dog? Ah."
Before Malfoy could catch herself, Harry snapped his fingers.
"You were going to give it to me, weren't you?"
"W-What! You're imagining things!"
"Am I?"
"You are... well. Not entirely. But I only went there to watch you look pathetic! I happened to have it on me, and I ended up tossing it to a nearby dog instead!"
"Hmm. A shame, really—but since Sirius ate it, I suppose I'll let it go."
Sirius stared at them both, jaw slack, watching the exchange. The impression they gave now was entirely different from when he'd first seen them outside.
And for Sirius, who still carried the memory of the young James Potter, there was something unsettlingly familiar about Harry in this moment.
"Right, then. Malfoy—you said you had information about Sirius Black to sell me. Does that still stand?"
"...No."
"How much do you know?"
"That Sirius Black was your parents'... Secret Keeper."
"Hmm. Someone told you that much. One of the professors, I'd imagine... Snape, I suppose?"
Malfoy felt a jolt but kept her expression perfectly still. Harry didn't press further. Now that Sirius's identity as an Animagus had been revealed, it hardly mattered.
"If you know that much, I'll assume you know what the Fidelius Charm is."
Malfoy gave a small nod.
She knew it from Snape. A secret concealed within a single living Secret Keeper. And the fact that unless the Secret Keeper chose to speak, no one else could ever reveal that information to another soul.
"Then this will be easier to explain. Yes. My father chose Sirius as his Secret Keeper."
"And was betrayed."
"Don't put words in my mouth! I am not a traitor!"
Sirius's voice cracked with fury. Harry Potter, as though he'd anticipated exactly this, smoothly stepped in to contain them both.
"Malfoy, just listen to me for a moment. Sirius—you need to know how much she already knows, don't you? Stay quiet for a bit."
Having pulled the room back from the edge, Harry turned to face Malfoy and told her the truth.
"You're right that he's not a traitor. Because Sirius refused to be the Secret Keeper."
"What?"
Refused to be the Secret Keeper?
But it was common knowledge that Sirius Black had been James and Lily Potter's closest friend. Even Lucius had said as much.
And yet if he hadn't been the Secret Keeper—
The entire premise was crumbling. Malfoy set her face and listened.
"Sirius was my father's closest friend, and everyone knew it. If a Secret Keeper existed, it would obviously be Sirius Black—too obvious. So Sirius proposed a kind of psychological misdirection: he would pretend to be the Secret Keeper, while my father chose someone else."
Because everyone expected it, they would entrust it to someone no one expected.
From Malfoy's perspective, it was a perfectly sensible deception.
"Professor Dumbledore and Sirius deliberated carefully and chose the real Secret Keeper. But almost immediately, the Secret Keeper raised a concern. Voldemort would certainly go after Sirius—what if Sirius was tortured and revealed the Secret Keeper's identity? My parents' hiding place was protected by the Fidelius Charm, but the Secret Keeper's own identity was not."
The Fidelius Charm protected only the information itself—the location of the Potters' hiding place. The Secret Keeper remained exposed to danger. The misdirection changed nothing in that regard.
That was precisely why a Secret Keeper had to be someone you would trust with your life. They were the one who bore the threat in your place.
"It wasn't an unreasonable concern. So Professor Dumbledore and Sirius placed a binding on themselves—a prohibition against revealing the Secret Keeper's identity by any means whatsoever. They took every precaution they could. And yet... the Secret Keeper himself was the traitor."
"B-But... then that means..."
Someone's betrayal had killed Harry Potter's parents.
Sirius Black, in the immediate aftermath, had killed seventeen Muggles and a wizard named Peter Pettigrew—and been sentenced to life in Azkaban.
Everyone had pointed at Sirius Black as the traitor. But if Harry Potter was telling the truth, and he hadn't betrayed anyone—
Malfoy's voice came out unsteady.
"The Secret Keeper was... don't tell me..."
"Peter Pettigrew."
"But he's dead—"
"He's not. He knew that neither Sirius nor Professor Dumbledore could ever speak of him. So he staged an explosion and faked his own death. No one could prove otherwise."
It was plausible. But it gave her a far worse headache than the version where Sirius Black was simply the traitor.
Malfoy pressed her fingers to her temple.
"Why? If that's true, why didn't Professor Dumbledore speak up for Sirius? He could have said something before Sirius was sent to Azkaban!"
"The binding. He couldn't reveal Peter Pettigrew's existence by any means—so neither Professor Dumbledore nor Sirius could defend themselves. Even now, look."
Harry gestured toward Sirius.
Sirius Black was watching their conversation with bloodshot eyes. Not a word—but fourteen years of compressed feeling burned in his gaze. The desperate hunger for a truth he had never been allowed to speak. The bitter regret of a choice made long ago. And beneath it all, a rage that stormed and raged behind those eyes.
But nothing surfaced outward. No words, no expression, no gesture—no form of communication, verbal or otherwise. The magical binding held, and it held absolutely.
"He can't say a word. He cannot reveal any information that could lead back to Peter Pettigrew."
"But you said Professor Dumbledore told you!"
"That's because he's Professor Dumbledore."
Harry Potter lifted one shoulder in a slight shrug.
"He's the greatest wizard alive, and he knows how to work around bindings. And I was the only survivor who had been under the protection of the Fidelius Charm. I was the secret itself—which meant Professor Dumbledore could only pass this information to me, and even then only through a highly indirect method."
Malfoy had no rebuttal. However much the Malfoy family distrusted Dumbledore, he was, by any measure, one of the greatest wizards in the world.
In the end, she had no choice but to admit that every piece of information she'd brought was worthless. For a moment she felt a flicker of resentment toward her father and Snape—but this was knowledge only Dumbledore possessed, so there was nothing to be done.
"Fine. I concede. This is my... defeat."
"I wasn't trying to win anything."
The swell of confidence she'd carried deflated. With it went her pride, replaced by something uncomfortably close to shame.
Everything Harry Potter had done now made sense. Slipping out to Hogsmeade in secret. Muttering "missed him" after Sirius's supposed attack on Gryffindor Tower.
"You went to Hogsmeade to make contact with Sirius Black."
"Yes. Less conspicuous than meeting inside Hogwarts."
"And you told me to give food to the black dog."
"I already knew from Professor Dumbledore. That Sirius was an Animagus who could take the form of a black dog."
"...You must have been laughing at me. There I was, telling you not to go to Hogsmeade, and I didn't even know that much."
On that point, Harry Potter shook his head.
"Did I not say it? That I was grateful you worried about me."
"You were being sarcastic."
"I've never lied to you."
Malfoy's face went briefly red, then returned to its usual composure. She cleared her throat quietly.
"So. What do you plan to do from here?"
"About that."
Harry Potter drew the words out, and smiled—a patient, almost gentle smile. The kind one might use to soothe a child throwing a tantrum.
"Step back, Malfoy."
"...What?"
"The reason I told you all of this about Sirius is because I thought you'd keep digging if I left you to your own devices. You don't need to involve yourself any further."
He was pushing her away.
She hadn't expected it. She hadn't imagined he would cut someone loose who had come this close to the truth—and so Malfoy, forgetting all composure, stumbled over her words.
"You tell me all of this, and then you tell me to step back?"
"Malfoy, what I've told you may seem like a great secret—but compared to the diary, it's nothing. All it amounts to is that a convicted criminal was an unregistered Animagus. That's all."
The diary.
The moment that word left Harry's lips, Malfoy felt her heart drop.
"Now that I've made contact with Sirius, Professor Dumbledore will arrange a safe house for him. Any protection the Professor prepares in earnest—no one will find it. Sirius is safe now."
"And—and what about me?"
"This is where it ends for you. What comes next doesn't require your involvement. More than that—it's better for both of us if you stay out of it. For you as much as for me."
"Why? I'm already involved. I've already—"
*Tell me.*
*Don't leave me knowing nothing.*
Malfoy cast aside even her pride—the thing most essential to her—and spoke as though pleading. But—
"I didn't want to have to say this."
Harry's refusal was more absolute, and more ruthless, than she had anticipated.
"It's not just you who could be put in danger—it's your family. You have to think about them, Malfoy. Whatever you might say about the others, your little brother Draco has done nothing wrong. Would you be all right with him being put at risk?"
It was a genuine threat.
The kind Malfoy had no choice but to accept. The kind that took her younger brother Draco and made him a hostage.
In the most unforgivable way possible, Harry Potter pushed her away—all the way to the end.
"...Do you mean that?"
She asked it with her pride already broken. She was begging him to take it back.
There is a difference between holding a weapon and actually raising it. Harry Potter was raising the secret of the diary right now.
And yet Harry Potter declared it with a coldness that left no room for doubt.
"Yes. There is no place for you here."
Carina Malfoy does not cry.
Showing tears in front of others is an act of exposing one's own weakness while simultaneously begging for another person's pity.
Her pride does not permit it. The daughter of the noble Malfoy family must never show tears before another soul.
So what is running down her face right now is rainwater.
It must be raining.
"...From now on."
Carina Malfoy chose her words carefully. She wanted to wound him. She wanted to leave a scar on Harry Potter—one that would not fade—as he prepared to walk away from her.
But no matter how long she thought, nothing came to her.
So she said what she honestly wanted.
"Don't smile at me."
She pulled the Button Warmer from her robes and threw it. The small round warmer bounced off the floorboards, rolled in a wide arc, and disappeared through a gap in the planks.
Malfoy turned and walked out of the shack.
It was still raining.
The moment she was gone, only Harry and Sirius remained. Sirius was trying to work out how to break the silence when, mercifully, Harry spoke first.
"It couldn't be helped. If Malfoy becomes any more entangled in this, she'll genuinely be in danger."
It was the most desolate tone Sirius had ever heard from him. He was still trying to think of how to offer comfort when he chose a rather poor approach.
"Er. Well. I suppose it's for the best? As I said before—the Malfoy family has always sided with Voldemort. I'm not accusing her of anything, but if she were to let something slip..."
"Sirius. I didn't tell Malfoy those things because I trusted her to keep the secret."
Harry cut him off, his voice flat and cold.
"I told her because it wouldn't matter if she didn't."
It was both a declaration of intent and a quiet indictment of Sirius himself.
Secret Keeper.
Sirius had been willing to serve as bait—but he hadn't thought carefully enough about the people around him.
There had been other options. Professor McGonagall, for instance. Members of the Order of the Phoenix who, while not close friends, had proven their loyalty and character beyond question.
But everyone's circumstances had been difficult, and the burden of the secret felt too heavy to place on any of them—so they had given it to the friend with the fewest responsibilities and the greatest talent for running.
In other words, Peter Pettigrew had been... the easiest choice.
"...I'm sorry. I—the person I was then trusted someone I should never have trusted. I didn't think it through."
"Forget the past. What matters is now."
Harry Potter turned around. His expression had already been composed, sealed away.
"At the end of first year, when Quirrell—with Voldemort attached to the back of his head—attacked me, we learned that Voldemort had survived by some means."
For ten years, Voldemort had been missing, and most had assumed him dead. That attack confirmed his survival.
From that point on, Dumbledore had begun gathering people and telling Harry the truth: that Voldemort lived, sustained by some unknown method.
"At the end of second year, when Lucius Malfoy exposed the diary, we learned that the method was Horcruxes."
A year later, the Chamber of Secrets opened and an old tragedy repeated itself. After everything it took to destroy the diary, Harry had handed it to Dumbledore—and Dumbledore, after careful study, had reached his conclusion.
The diary was a Horcrux. A spare life, created by tearing off a fragment of the soul and sealing it away.
That was how Voldemort had returned.
"Placing a Horcrux in Ginny's bag. Lucius Malfoy's foolishness handed us an extraordinary opportunity—but..."
Voldemort's method of resurrection: Horcruxes.
Not one Horcrux, but many.
Voldemort had entrusted some of them to his followers.
And despite being capable of returning, he had not yet performed the resurrection ritual—he was waiting for something.
All of this had come to light because of Lucius Malfoy's blunder.
"The diary—that Horcrux—contained the clues that led us here. Lucius Malfoy handed his own master the blade that would be used against him."
"But what does it matter? If they're destroying themselves from the inside, isn't that all the better—"
Sirius stopped mid-sentence.
The easy, free-spirited air was James's—but Lily's traces were visible in the lines of his face.
A face that seemed to have gathered only the best of James and Lily, handsome enough to earn goodwill from almost anyone at first glance.
But the eyes that fixed on him through those glasses—those were neither the mischievous eyes of James nor the warm eyes of Lily.
"Sirius."
No. He had seen eyes like those before.
James, when he learned that Voldemort had set his sights on his family.
Harry spoke with cold, settled resolve.
"That is not going to happen."
"...Understood."
Clap. Clap.
Harry Potter brought his hands together. Having neatly reset the atmosphere, he rose to his feet with brisk energy.
"We have work to do. If Voldemort entrusted a Horcrux to the Malfoy family, he likely did the same with others. The most probable candidates would be the Lestranges, the Blacks, and the Flints. Even he couldn't have shredded his soul into too many pieces—so he wouldn't have distributed them too widely."
"The Blacks... I'm afraid I won't be much help there. I was struck from the family tree after I came of age. My brother might know something, but he's been missing for years."
"That's more than enough. When it comes to the Blacks, I can't think of anything beyond the colour black."
"But there's something that has to come first."
"Catching Peter Pettigrew."
Bound by the prohibition as he was, Sirius said nothing—only sat in silence. Harry Potter looked at him with an expression of complete understanding.
"Professor Dumbledore has called someone who can help. Someone who was a friend of my father's, and the only person who can explain the truth about Pettigrew... Remus Lupin."
"He's been thorough."
"Of course. Professor Dumbledore hasn't exactly been idle for the past ten years."
The preparations were complete. Before Voldemort could return, he would lose every spare life he had stored away.
He would die as ordinary people die—once, and finally.
Harry was still turning that over in his mind when he touched the corner of his mouth. Everything had gone according to plan. So why was there a bitter taste in his mouth?
He sat with it for a long moment. Then, almost as an afterthought, he asked:
"Sirius. May I ask you something?"
"What is it?"
"If you don't want to smile... what do you do?"
The face of Harry Potter as he said it already looked like someone who had forgotten how.