#jabber watches ee and is shook | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

halothenthehorns · 3 years

Text

All in the Family

Chapter 60: The Scar

Heat blazed down on them with such ferocity, it rained sand for a moment as they each rolled to cover their eyes along with the general downpour their landing caused. Most of them sat up spitting it out and ruffling it from their clothes and hair. Sirius got the misfortune of landing in water, and came up coughing through sea spray with a clump of seaweed in his hair.

For a worrying moment as he staggered to his feet back towards shore, he wondered if he'd pissed himself. Then he realized the water was simply that warm, far more than the lake at school had ever been. The view he caught sight of was breathtaking, more exotic than anything he'd ever seen in his life. The deciduous trees seemed to reach through to the heavens, the light mist coating their skin was as warm as the sun still shining powerfully through the clouds to cast down on a makeshift lean-too laid out upon a granite shore. Tropical birds roosted right above it further providing shade and almost making it look completely blended into the shadows if he wasn't looking directly at it.

Then he saw Peter taking off his shoes and stuffing his school robes into his bag, sweat already appearing on him like the others, and he bitterly remembered what would drive him to this place. Harry had no reason to be here, unless the Dursleys had gone mental and taken him on some extravagant vacation. He however had last been mentioned fleeing the country, and his own godson, because of him. This seemed a likely, remote, place he would have landed.

Cursing and muttering the entire time he went splashing through the water, fighting the impulse to go over to him once more and throttle him for being a two-faced cad the whole time they'd known him, by the time he'd waded back to shore the others had all gotten semi-comfortable, but clearly feared stripping too far down even in the glaring sun. Who knew where they'd end up next, Antarctica?

Regulus was shaking his legs through the sand like he'd had the jelly-leg jinx placed upon him as he wandered over to Peter and began trying to talk to him again. Rather wishing he had pissed himself than watch that, he saw Longbottom wiping sweat from his eyes and giving the girls an unhappy look as they went towards the shade of the trees and scratched unhappily at his skin.

Sirius was still wearing his Wimborne Wasp jersey, and the pants of his school robes and didn't feel the need to show off farther, unlike Prongs who had stripped down to his boxers unrepentant and was now running laps in the shore waiting for Sirius to finish approaching.

"I could have bloody drowned out there while you were showing off!" He shouted upon approach.

"Nah, Moony would have saved you," James waved off, keeping his eyes on Evans, who was with Smith heading towards the lean-too in a casual stroll, eyes traveling along for the book he supposed, or taking it all in. He was still doing the latter.

Sirius tried to exchange an exasperated look with said friend, but he had a very strained smile in place it took Sirius a second to process. He wouldn't meet his eyes, and in fact his face looked slightly more than flushed. Sirius was about to start preening as he realized his wet clothes clung to him damn near as much as Prongs showing off, but it also showed off the darkening stains of blood anew trickling down his side and painting the water. He muttered a curse and began reapplying the charms. Prongs was only fairing slightly better, the marks slashed across him were newly scabbed as well, and a fresh stain only a few paces away showed Peter had likely gone through much the same upon their new landing again.

All three of them nearly jumped out of their new skin when they heard the startled yelps of the girls.

James was fastest again, even never having run on sand before didn't seem to deter him, but before the others could scramble over to see what monster was on this island with them, they could also hear him laughing. By the time they jogged into the thrown together shelter, it was to see him in a spectacular bow to Buckbeak, the girls fighting back the sweat running into their eyes as they did the same.

The Hippogriff graciously did so in return, even if he did click his beak in agitation upon the new arrivals. James merely came forward and patted his beak for comfort. "Looks like you kept along a buddy Padfoot."

"And he's kept our ride safe," Alice noted the book in the piled leaves clearly meant for a nest.

Remus winced upon hearing the chapter title, he'd had enough Scars to last his lifetime, and elbowed his way back out of the suddenly crowded space. Peter stumbled over his feet and nearly crashed to the ground as he tried to get out of his way. Remus stopped on instinct, even reached out to help catch him without thinking twice, then he saw the nick in his ear that would never regrow. Shoving blindly past everything else, he made his way back to the unforgiving sun.

He felt James and Sirius following him, but did not want to turn around and face them. Their comforting words, their promise they didn't blame him. None of that erased the harm he'd done to them, and would inevitably do again. How could he blame Peter for some future deeds of his when his actions still held garish marks on them all?

Surprisingly short on breath, he stopped only a few paces into the shaded trees and leaned against the nearest one, soaking in the warmth while he could. It wasn't just their casual dismissal of him nearly being a murderer. It was also his intended victims, how none of them had even so much as looked at him since it happened. It was the numb shock he still couldn't get out of his brain that Peter had it in him to someday be the cause of this future they were living through. Maybe not now, but the fact that he hadn't been able to deny it to James' face left his mind spinning so fast he thought he was going to be sick again.

"Ynoom ecalp siht evol d'uoy."

Remus kept his eyes closed, even as he scowled in confusion. That was Sirius' voice, but unless he was trying to make him laugh from sheer randomness, that hadn't made a lick of sense.

"Suolaej os eb dluow sgnorp."

Then he did open his eyes, only to see Sirius and James right next to him, looking as baffled as he felt and glancing around wearily, wands drawn. Remus didn't blame them, but something about what he was hearing tugged at his memory. It didn't sound like any language he knew, but-

"Rats live on no evil star."

He looked up, to see a bright-eyed bird staring very intently at him. "Oh," he gasped in surprise, finally cluing the other two in. "Looks like an emordnilap found us."

"A what?" James asked in surprise.

"I remember Kettleburn mentioning these," Sirius agreed as he smiled at the beast. "They speak backward for you. Though I don't recall ever having said any of that."

The bird clicked its beak upon Sirius speaking, turning attention directly to him, and then recited, "Taht fo yna dias gnivah reve llacer t'nod I hguoht .Uoy rof drawkcab kaeps yeht."

"Fascinating," James muttered at once. "Looks like Sirius, err, the Sirius on the run here and not mine," he needlessly gave him a playful shove, nearly overbalancing him as he grinned at the bird, "a friend."

"I like him," Sirius agreed at once.

"Mih ekil I."

His grin only grew. "Can I keep her Prongs? I want to name her Ava."

"Ava mih eman ot tnaw I, sgnorp mih peek I nac."

James merely went cross eyed as the bird continued to jabber away, he wasn't particularly impressed. It was massive for one, even as she fluttered down to land on Padfoot's head it was nearly double the size of any owl he'd seen, with a beak the size of his face in a rainbow of colors. The sleek black feathers were large enough he wouldn't be surprised if there were some fancy emordnilap quills out there, and the claws were giving him nervous ticks even as gently as they were clearly being on his best friends head.

Sirius lifted his arm, and Ava obligingly stepped onto that instead, still staring at him intently.

"I wouldn't recommend it Pads," James decided. "Maybe when we get out of this mess we can come back and get you your own, but this one might get hurt along for now."

Sirius pouted but seemed to agree, even before Remus added, "Besides, you've already got Buggle. I hardly see you needing two birds."

"I could cross-breed them!" Sirius suddenly said in excitement, cocking his head to the side and hearing the book already flesh out his idea. "You see, I'll bet this is the one I've been sending letters to Harry, mix the two birds together and who knows what would happen."

"You're turning into Hagrid," James grumbled, but was over shouted by the bird saying in one long speech, "Neppah dluow tahw swonk ohw dna rehtegot sdrib owt eht xim ,yrrah ot srettel gnidnes neeb ev'I eno eht si siht teb ll'I ,ees uoy! Meht deerb-ssorc dluoc I."

Remus shook his head slowly, fighting back a smile now at Sirius' far too pleased expression. "Well, it's certainly as noisy as you. I always said if you weren't a dog you'd be some sort of bird, though I always imagine you more of a peacock."

Sirius sniffed, and now with an impish grin in place said perfectly clearly right next to the bird, "and I always said I wanted to be a duck! They're awesome creatures, can fly, swim, and walk, not to mention-"

James reached over and smothered his mouth before he could go on a whole rants worth. The bird blinked for only a moment before saying back what Sirius had managed to get out.

"Noitnem ot ton ,klaw dna ,miws ,ylf nac ,serutaerc emosewa er'yeht !Kcud a eb ot detnaw I dias syawla I dna-"

Remus was pleasantly surprised to find that once he'd stopped snickering at the pair, his head wasn't spinning so much. The two had done it again, but it didn't completely erase the empty gap he was sure the other two felt about this newest experience. Guilt was already pouring in he hadn't said anything to Peter since it happened, but he didn't even know what to say. It should be nothing to forgive what he hadn't even done yet, but now he was afraid. If he ever looked him in the eye again, would he always see this future lingering over his head?

Jerking his head sharply from side to side, rather than letting his stomach plunge farther into despair, he instead held his arm out hopefully. Ava appraised him for a moment before hopping over, and Remus nearly buckled under the weight. He hadn't been expecting the bird to be so heavy, for as casually as Sirius was holding her. Then he thought for a moment, and grinned as he told the bird, "Step on no pets."

Her large black eyes seemed to appraise him for some time, before repeating back now in his voice, "Step on no pets."

James and Sirius burst in surprised laughter. "How'd you come up with that so quickly!" James protested slightly. The chapter was winding down now, and his mind was scrambling frantically to see if he could try the same rather than dwell on everything Harry was.

"Just something I realized a while back, never thought it would have any practical use," Remus shrugged with a smug grin. "I'm wondering how long it took Sirius to come up with that rats live on no evil star thing," he finished with an uneasy wince, he hadn't meant to say that out loud.

Sirius turned away, but not before Remus had seen the boiling anger once more. He used his wand to blast bark away from a tree, startling Ava who flapped her wings in protest and nearly bit Remus' neck off.

"Oh, wait, I've got something," James said quickly and peaceably. He held his arm out and bounced hopefully on his heels for the bird. She didn't seem particularly happy about it, but finally, after some coaxing from Sirius who had slowly turned back around and smiled at the bird, Ava did indeed move onto Prongs' jiggling arm.

James looked very intently at the bird, and then pointed at the mouth of the tent. "Pretty please, tell that redhead, Snave thgirla?"

The emordnilap clicked her beak in response, and then took off.

"That wasn't a sentence," Remus frowned in confusion as he tried to work out what James had said. He didn't get much time to think about it, as he heard Alice call a warning she was on the last sentence. They all scrambled to get their things back on, he wasn't even sure if Evans had gotten the message before they were gone.

HPHPHPHP

My favorite palindrome is Go Hang A Salami, I’m A Lasagna Hog. Let me know yours!

Fun fact about this chapter, I tried to figure out which tropical bird JK was imagining when writing this so I could say Sirius was there, but the largest species of owl can be up to ten pounds. The largest tropical birds are only five pounds. So what she was imagining I've no clue, as even the smallest tropical bird should fit through any window an owl can. Hell, Hedwig is comparatively larger than toucans, if we're talking wing size and body mass.

Personally, I always thought she meant a toucan and just grossly overestimated how big they were, so I just went with that and magically enlarged them. After all, if this world has one of the 'stupidest' species of birds delivering messages, who's to say they don't have other modified versions of our animals.

#Harry Potter #fanfiction #reading the books #GoF #Wolfstar #Jilly #palindrome #James Potter #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #Peter Pettigrew #Regulus Black #Lily Evans #Frank Longbottom #Alice Smith

5 notes · View notes