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Dragon Smoke


It was late in the night when Sirius woke up to the sound of violent coughing in the hall. It was Charlus Potter. He could hear Dora’s whispered voice, “Are you alright? Should we take you to St. Mungo’s?”

“Go back to bed, Dora dear,” Charlus said, his voice scratchy from the coughing, “I’m just going to make myself a spot of tea… downstairs… I’ll be alright, don’t look at me like that… I’m alright, I just need a bit of time to catch my breath. Go back to sleep, love…”

“But darling --”

“I’m alright.” Charlus’s voice was as firm as he could make it.

Dora’s footsteps reluctantly went off back to the bedroom and the stairs creaked as Charlus went down the steps. Sirius rolled out of bed and crept to the door. When he heard the Potters’ bedroom door close, he stuck his head out into the hallway.

Downstairs, Charlus was coughing still - even harder than before.

Sirius frowned.

Charlus heated the water and poured it into a cup, dropping the leaves into the cup and swishing them about, watching them dye the water… he opened the cupboard and removed the potion the healers had given him - the potion he hadn’t told Dora about… He unscrewed the cap and poured some of the lime green liquid into the cup and stirred it carefully, then tapped the spoon dry on the edge of the cup.

There was a creak at the front door and he looked up.

The Death Eaters hadn’t been out front since the incident at Number 12 Grimmauld Place; hearing noises outside had become unusual again, and Charlus moved quietly through the house toward the front door, where he’d heard the sound and he squinted through the dark out the window, but saw nothing. Carefully, he opened the front door, wand drawn, choking back the urge to cough as his lungs filled with dragon smoke once again…

“Snuffles!” he said in surprise, seeing the black dog on the stoop. “Oh Snuffles!” Charlus bent down in excitement and held his arms out for the dog, who quickly wagged his tail and walked forward to accept the hug. Charlus squeezed the mangy mutt to his chest and rubbed his fingers about in the fur. “I’m so very glad to see you. Excellent timing, I’ve just been making tea. Come in and we’ll get you some biscuits.”

Snuffles ran down the hall, his tail wagging happily as Charlus followed after, beaming with joy, even as more coughs erupted from his chest, thick black tendrils of smoke escaping him. He banged his chest with his fist and paused at the kitchen table to catch his breath and closed his eyes. Snuffles stared up at him in concern.

“Side effect of the Dragon Pox,” Charlus told the dog, smiling sadly. “Every now and then my lungs just fill up with dragon smoke… The healers at Mungo’s dunno how to fix it.” He lifted the cup of tea and took a sip. “Haven’t told anyone - this is between you and I, Snuffles…” Charlus turned to the cupboard and took out a box of butter cookies. “Also between you and I,” he added with a wink, and he unwrapped the box and handed one of the biscuits to Snuffles.

Sinking into a chair, Charlus sighed heavily and leaned his elbows against the table, taking up his own cookie and stirring it in his tea moment before biting into it. The tea was absolutely awful thanks to the flavor of the potion - an elixir that would douse the dragon fire in his lungs for another six to ten hours, so that, hopefully, he could keep from hacking up the black smoke long enough that Dora and James would remain blissfully unaware of it. He hated keeping it from them, but he knew how worried Dora would be, and James already had enough on his mind - only fifteen and already talking about politics and worrying about things like Lord Voldemort! When Charlus was fifteen… well, that was in the days of Grindelwald and he, too, had worried the way James did… but he shouldn’t have had to. And neither should James have had to. And giving him more to worry about… it seemed unfair…

Charlus looked down at Snuffles and handed him another biscuit.

Snuffles chomped down the cookie happily and put his chin on Charlus’s knee. Charlus smiled and rubbed Snuffles’s head, scruffing up the fur with his fingers. “I sure did miss you, fella,” Charlus murmured, and he scratched Snuffles’s ears just right so that Snuffles kicked his leg against the floor in a thump-thump-thump. “Feels good, boy?” Wagging tail. “Yeah it does, doesn’t it…. Yes, Shnufflelufflegus likeshh it yeshh.. Yesh he dusshhh…”

Then he started coughing again, smoke exploding from his mouth and nostrils uncontrollably and he turned, thumping himself on the chest again with his fist, unable to catch his breath as the terrible smoke poured from him… It took a moment before Charlus was able to take another sip of the tea and regain control over his lungs. “Bloody hell,” he murmured, his eyes teared up, “Bloody hell.”

Snuffles pressed his nose against Charlus’s palm.

Snuffles stayed with Mr. Potter that night. Charlus made a second cup of tea when the first was gone and together he and Snuffles finished off the butter cookies and he carried a third cup of the tea and medicine into the living room and sank into the sofa cushions, exhausted from coughing - though he’d seemed to finally have gotten enough of the medicine into him to extinguish the fire in his lungs (for now at any rate) - and he fell asleep stroking Snuffles’s head, absently murmuring to the dog his gratefulness for a listening ear… for someone to tell about the coughing… “I don’t want to worry nobody,” murmured Charlus, “Don’t want… to worry… nobody…” he was falling asleep.

Snuffles lay across Charlus’s lap and stayed long after he’d drifted off, watching over him, making sure he was alright, that the coughing didn’t start again… and when the morning sunlight came in through the windows and he heard Dora Potter’s footsteps creaking across the floorboards upstairs, Snuffles snuck away into the kitchen, where he turned into Sirius, and Sirius grabbed a glass from the cupboard and filled it with water to pretend he’d just come down for a drink before heading back upstairs…

He didn’t bump into Dora, though, he made it back to the bedroom upstairs without being seen and he put the cup down on the little desk and he paced about the room, anxious, and worried for Mr. Potter. He sighed and sat at the desk, pulling out a parchment and a quill.

Moony,
I miss you so ruddy much. I wish you were here. I hate being this far apart from you… I keep thinking of things I want to say to you, but you aren’t here and it’s awful. Like missing a bit of myself. A big bit, too...
I have something that’s bothering me, it’s about Mr. Potter and his dragon pox…


Sirius wrote the whole letter, telling Remus all about the scales on Charlus’s face and the medicine in the cabinet and the whispered words Mr. Potter had confided to Snuffles…

What should I do, Rey? I’m worried about him, I think he really does need to see the Healers again and I don’t think it’s right he isn’t telling Mrs. P, at least. What do you think?? H-E-L-P. I need your wisdom, O Remus Lupin - the all knowing Moony of the Marauders of Hogwarts, Most Responsiblest and Wisest On, my Love, My All, my Most Sexiest Fantastic Beast slash Snogging Genius?!

He got it all written out, all folded and into an envelope, sealed with a spotty bit of wax that he pressed with his own thumb because he realized too late he didn’t have anything else to press it with. Sirius was sucking the burn out of his thumb tip when he realized… He couldn’t send an owl to Remus. Dumbledore had said it was vitally important that Remus not be contacted “by conventional means” in order to keep him safe in Mr. Newt Scamander’s briefcase.

Sirius put the letter down and he stared at the envelope... then threw it away.

“I need that bloody mirror,” he whispered.




Lily Evans and Ali Prewitt met at a muggle department store, not too far from Diagon Alley. It was two days since Maryrose Jenkins had sent the invitation owls for her birthday party and they only had a few days to decide what to wear to it. “I haven’t seen Frank since he left Grimmauld Place with Andy last month,” Ali said, frowning and running her hand over a dress in the teen department that had bright pink flowers all over it.

Lily looked surprised, “Seriously? I’m surprised you haven’t gone mad. Have the two of you been apart that long at all in the last - what’s it been now? Two years nearly?”

“Nearly!” Ali nodded and she shook her head, “We haven’t. It’s weird, not seeing him. We’ve written owls, of course, but it isn’t the same. I can’t see that goofy face of his.” She lifted a cardigan with hearts all over it and turned it over, looking at the buttons that ran up the back. “Is this cute? I can’t tell.”

“It’d be cute on you,” Lily said, “You could wear anything and make it cute.”

“Aw,” Ali tucked the cardigan over her arm to think about and continued looking.

“How is Andy doing?” Lily asked, “Have you heard?”

“He’s alright, I suppose… he’s… rather sad. Frank said they gave him a cheering potion he has to take regularly,” Ali lowered her voice, “He’s completely blind.”

“That’s horrible.”

Ali nodded. She picked up a pair of green corduroy slacks, fashioned with wide bell-bottom ankles. “These are amazing,” she said and she held them up to Lily. “They’d go with your eyes.”

“And make my hips look huge,” Lily said, shaking her head. Besides, they looked like something Petunia would wear and Lily didn’t want to wear anything like Tuney. She took the slacks from Ali and folded them up, returning them to the table they’d come from. “I’ll probably just wear something I’ve already got at home, it’ll be easier…”

“You can’t do that!” Ali protested as she picked up a pair of the corduroy slacks in blue and added it to her pile on her arm.

“Why not?” Lily asked.

“Well everyone’s going to be there,” she said, “And I heard from Annalee, who heard from Marlene, who heard from Maryrose, who heard it from Peggy Odair that Jasper Odair fancies you.” She made a meaningful expression with her eyebrows at Lily.

“Jasper Odair? That boy from the Order?”

“Mmhm,” Ali nodded. “Fancies you right good, too, I hear.”

“Bloody hell,” Lily turned red, “You’re making it up.”

“I’m not. You know, he’s expected to be the Hufflepuff quidditch captain next term.”

“Really? That’s interesting.”

“Mhm,” Ali grinned. She turned slyly and ruffled through some more racks of clothes, keeping her eyes averted. “Frank’s been trying to speculate on who might end up Gryffindor captain - seeing as Andy’s not going to be able to do it this year… I mean, if Hogwarts is reopened, of course…”

“Which it will because Minchum’s going to win the election,” Lily supplied, “Or at least he bloody better win… Lily lifted a brown tweed skirt and looked it over, “Who’s he reckon?”

“Well, there’s himself, of course, but he’s modest and says he doubts that’ll happen; and then he said he thought maybe Meg Johnson, but I don’t reckon it’ll be her, really…” Maryrose pointed at the skirt, “That’ll be delightful on you. You should try that on… with this.” She grabbed a mustard-yellow cardigan with narrow green stripes from the table.

Lily took the cardigan and put it over her arm with the skirt. “So who do you reckon it’ll be?”

“Either Frank or James Potter,” Ali said.

Lily laughed, “James Potter! Captain of the Quidditch team?”

“Well he’s very good,” Ali said, shrugging, “And he knows quidditch very well.”

“You have to be nurturing to be a captain of a team,” Lily said, “James Potter isn’t nurturing.”

Ali smirked. “That’s not what you said when you were telling me about the Divination Room…” she sing-songed.

Lily’s face turned red. “I was flustered when I told you that, it had just happened and I was all emotional, feeling sorry for Sirius and scared of that bloody demented Seer’s ghost and -- don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Ali asked with faux-innocence.

“Like you know something that I don’t, or like you think I like James Potter or something.” Lily felt her cheeks grow hot at the words, a mental image of her own handwriting scrawling out Mrs. James Potter flashed through her head and she shuddered it away. “Because I don’t,” she added firmly.

“Okay,” Ali said and she turned, though she was still smirking, and she lifted up a green plaid skirt. “This would look lovely with that sweater, too…. Maybe with some of those knee-high socks over there…?” She turned and hurried to the display of socks.

Lily’s face was still burning as she followed after Ali.