FicWad

It wasn't hard to draw the right conclusion. After all, what else could it possibly have been when two very familiar looking Muggles were dragged, kicking and screaming, down the damp corridor past his cell? It was nearly enough to make him sit up and shake off the hard-earned lassitude of his canine state.

Well, well. Petunia Evans. It /has been a while. And your great lump of a husband's here, too? Fantastic. Looks like we can start the party./

He bared his teeth in a snarl and shifted back once the Dementors had passed. If Lily's sister was here, there was only one thing he could think. Something had gone wrong - horribly wrong - in the Dursley household, and Harry had suffered the brunt of it.

No matter how he tossed and turned that night on his narrow mattress, sleep refused to come to him. His mind was drawn inexorably to his godson. Where was he now? What had happened? Why would anyone want to hurt Harry?

The greatest misconception others had of him in his youth, back when he was one of four, was that Moony was the dreamer and he was the strategist. Moony would prove the speculation wrong again and again in the dark of their dormitory beds, turning their grand ideas into workable pranks and schemes.

His imagination had the upper hand for the first half of the night. Bloody, broken visions of black hair and green eyes filled his mind, and he wondered, yet again, if he should simply give insanity a try to escape the pain.

No. He thought of Vernon, fat piggy red-faced Vernon, and his imagination went happily in another direction. Insanity seemed to be overrated in Azkaban, anyway. A sour, long-necked, horsey Petunia was an interesting addition to the violent dreamscape.

The screams in his vengeful fantasies kept him company throughout the night.

All through the following day, an itchy restlessness filled his bones. In the cells across from him, not a single taunt was thrown his way by the Lestrange trio. He paced his quarters ceaselessly, counted cracks in the ceiling, and invented more ways to kill the Dursleys. He shot his cousin a wild glance as the Dementors came by with the food, and as the screams in his head grew louder from their presence, they continued to stare at each other.

"Still playing at being a Gryffindor, cousin?" she called across laughingly when the eerie spectres were gone. "Or are you ready to rejoin your family?"

He took a bite of the gruel and scowled at her. "Everyone tries to kill him. Everyone. You Death Eaters, though...you did it because of a prophecy. Those Muggles...they did it because he has magic. Their own flesh and blood. Just for magic."

"Ignorance and jealousy are powerful motivators," Rabastan Lestrange said. He looked at his bowl of food suspiciously and set it aside. "Muggles have killed magic users before, Black. Don't forget it."

"Just for magic," Bella echoed. She laughed. "Sirius, Sirius. I saw your beautiful godson when he was little. He was so precious, so full of life and power. And he looked just like his mummy and daddy, too. They killed your lovely godson because he shone like everything they couldn't be."

Sirius gritted his teeth and glared - at Azkaban's grey walls, at the Muggles, at Voldemort, at Wormtail, and at fucking interfering greater-good Dumbledore.

"Would you kill them, if you could, Black?" Rodolphus Lestrange asked. He smirked. He knew the answer; they all knew it.

"When I get out," Sirius said hoarsely, "the first thing I'm going to do is go to their cell and make them bleed." He grinned at the thought. "I think I'll just let them bleed out on the floor. It's not like a Muggle can call the guards, anyway."

Bellatrix smiled sweetly. "Welcome back, cousin. When we all get out, will you come hunting with us?"

A little, sad, terrified part of his soul tried to roar its Gryffindorish disgust at the invitation. That part was eight years gone. That part had been starved of food and glutted on nightmares. It was only a whisper.

The smile he returned was no less sweet for its anger. "Let's start in Surrey."

**

That night, Malfoy came striding in like he owned the prison fortress - like he owned everything in the world.

He sat up on his mattress to stare in detached amazement as six cells were opened, six bodies were floated in, six wide-eyed prisoners became escapees. Before the invisibility cloaks were handed out, he spoke up, and they turned as a single body.

"Cousin," he whispered.

She walked across the space of the corridor to grip his hand. Malfoy watched carefully, his wand pointed casually, deceptively, at the floor.

"Cousin," she answered. She beamed, and the smile lit up her whole face. "My poor cousin, still in his cage, and the rest of us free to play. It is an unjust world, isn't it?"

He squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Go see the sky for me," he said quietly. "I'll find you when I get out, and we'll go play in Surrey together."

"We'll wait for you," she said with a breathless laugh. "The Black family needs its Sirius back." She pulled away and ducked under the cloak.

He smiled in spite of himself.

Malfoy and he exchanged a glance, and the aristocrat seemed to struggle with himself before walking over to the barred door of the cell and tapping a single vertical iron rod with the tip of his wand. "Black," he murmured. "It isn't common knowledge, but you ought to know...Dumbledore is the one who placed your godson with the Muggles."

The wave of anger that washed through him at that statement - pure, righteous anger - made him stagger back from the cell door. Malfoy nodded.

"We'll be in Little Hangleton if you decide to follow," he said.

As they walked away, the six invisible escapees and their patrician guide, he stayed at his door to watch them leave, leaning his entire body against the confining iron.

One of the bars shifted under his weight silently. He pulled back, startled.

He freed me?

The thought was too much. He sat down on his mattress and chuckled...and giggled...and shook with mad, howling laughter until tears streamed down his face. He picked up his crockery bowl and threw it against the wall. No more! I'm free! The laughter slowed and stopped, and he took great, gulping gasps of air to calm himself. He had to think rationally.

He knew he could leave right then and there, but that would draw attention to the bodies in the other cells. If he gave it one more day, even those twenty-four hours would be enough for them to hide their trail. He smirked. Sitting around in Azkaban when he could simply walk out appealed to his Black family sense of humour, anyway.

The glint of the pottery shards caught his eye, and he reached for one, pulling back with a startled hiss when the thick, broken earthenware sliced his finger.

He sucked the blood off the digit absently, and a dark smile spread across his face. Yes. I can wait a day before I make those pigs bleed.