We Invented the Remix...Redux V

Title: Without Legend (Between The Lines Remix)
Author: reddwarfer
Summary: He can feel it, the distrust bubbling to the surface.
Fandom: Harry Potter (Book Verse)
Pairing: Remus Lupin/Sirius Black
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: J.K.R. et al owns the Potterverse.
Original story: The Family Tree by comtesse_sin
Notes: Thanks to my betas. Your help was invaluable.



The reaction was instantaneous, happening before he could rein it in—distrust—the almost-vindication of catching Sirius in a lie was overpowering. He shouldn't have felt that way. They had supposedly worked through that, had trust in each other, had proof that none of those charges leveled at Sirius were true. Yet the niggling feeling in the back of his brain—even when he was kissing Sirius in his bed—wouldn't stop. Instead, it would wait for anything, everything to prove those fourteen-year-old fears true.

They had been cleaning out old rooms, getting rid of things tainted with dark magic, and collecting things that'd prove useful. Sirius was cleaning one of the bedrooms, and Remus was his using own expertise in the best place possible. The library held many such things, books, loose papers, journals, and scrolls. He had just dumped three books that would render anyone attempting to read them blind into the trash when he'd come upon a paper tucked behind a row of books on the self. He unrolled the scroll, searching for something, anything that would help in the upcoming war, the Order, instead, he found an old family tree—Sirius’.

He almost rolled back up, but his eyes were riveted to a spot just above the burn that should have been Sirius' name. Two names, unfamiliar, dates, the same, and he almost assumed he was looking in the wrong place until a quick check told him otherwise. He re-rolled the scroll, almost crushing it in his hand—and sought out the only person who could answer his questions.

The words, You lied to me, were on his tongue; he swallowed them back down and tried to adopt a casual façade. Remus knew that the one thing that made Sirius unreceptive, defensive, was being accusatory with him.

Forcing a smile on his face, Remus let his fingers unclench before entering the room. Sirius was pretending to dust it, staring instead out of the window and onto the streets below. Remus almost felt bad, almost, because he knew Sirius wanted nothing more than to get out, but he quickly reminded himself that he was angry, and suspiciousness was clawing at his gut.

"I thought,” he said, hoping to sound questioning rather than biting " your mother's name was Cassiopeia?"

He looked at Sirius' face, searching for that look a person got when he realised he'd been caught in a lie, but only found a slightly bemused expression.

"It is."

Remus set the scroll down on the table, fingers trembling as he unrolled it, and pointed to the evidence to the contrary. "It says here that her name is Walburga."

Barely giving it a glance, Sirius smiled that smile of his, half-crooked with a touch of arrogance, and waved a hand at it. "Just a decoy, that."

His insides churned in response. Remus could recall a thousand and one things Sirius had told him over an eleven-year period that felt more like a lifetime. He could hear the words of Sirius Black, Third Year Gryffindor, echoing in his head, just as he could hear the sharp barbs and subtle accusations from a twenty-two-year-old Sirius Black, months short of going to Azkaban. He’d had years—more than a decade—to run through them in his mind, trying to pinpoint just when they went from truth to lies, from honesty to deception.

He’d swirled them around in his head, checking fact against fact until he was so sure that Sirius did nothing but lie and all he had was the memory of Sirius' face on a battered copy of the Daily Prophet haunting his sleep.

Swinging his hips in time with off-tune humming, Sirius bustled about the room, faux-cheerfulness in his steps, and Remus tried to smile in return. It wasn't important, really, just a few names and dates, and that could be forgiven, right?

Except the bitterness crept up his throat, and Remus could taste it on his tongue—so reminiscent of Sirius' kisses that he felt heat in his body and anger all the same. From the moment he realised it was Peter and not Sirius, that it was Sirius he could trust, and Peter was alive and spy and a traitor, he’d tried to compartmentalise everything. These were truths and those were lies and they were trustworthy, unlike them.

It was just so much easier when he both hated and loved Sirius, so much easier when Sirius was that traitorous bastard he’d fucked as a teenager, and not the adult before him, still brimming with unspent youth. The absence of hate made things difficult, only love remained and it felt awkward in his chest.

Without knowing why, Remus pointed down at the family tree, restating his point. "But it says here that your father's name was Orion and was four years younger than your mother."

Barking out a laugh, Sirius joined him at the table, smirking faintly at the scroll. "It's fake. Look, it says that Regulus died in nineteen seventy-nine. He would have still been in school, and you know he survived year seven to toady around Voldemort for a few years after."

The logical part of his mind agreed, saw the numbers and knew it was a fake, but the other part of him, the part that refused to remain buried, didn't want to trust Sirius, didn't want to have been wrong for so long, didn't want to let go of his pain, and didn't want to trust—didn’t want to have another chance to lose Sirius again. "But what about the burnt off names, and the youngest generation?"

"It's not a decoy if you can tell it's fake, now is it?" Sirius ran his fingers over the burn hole for Andromeda. "Blood magic is too strong, too powerful. Can't let certain information fall into the wrong hands."

"You mean Dark magic," Remus said with a frown. "Blood magic is hardly used for anything but nefarious purposes."

Remus allowed the scroll to partially roll itself before he picked it up, busying himself with straightening it. He didn't want to look at the fake family motto a second longer.

There are many stories between the lines.

Those words didn't want to be unread or forgotten, and they pushed forward, pressing against the forefront of his thoughts.

Too many stories were between the lines. Too many stories were nothing more than lies and half-truths and misnomers crushed together in some queer approximation of what could be fact, if one let it be.

"Hey, Moony," Sirius said from behind him. He turned just in time to see as Sirius crumpled the scroll, and tossed it out the window. He bit back the reprimand when Sirius spoke again. "Let's go upstairs and look at the real horror that is my family tree on that bloody tapestry which won't come off the wall."

Smiling a little easier, Remus followed after him, trying to focus on the Sirius in front of him, and not the phantom he'd hated for so long.

"See," Sirius said, tapping against the proper date of his brother's death. "This is the real thing. Can't write on it or change it. A few charms add all of the dates, names, and births automatically. Still, the charms can't prevent all magics," he added, fingering his own burn mark.

Remus said nothing, and watched Sirius scowl at the tapestry before him. He took a deep breath and exhaled, trying to push the distrust out with it. They were different now, together, better.

"Plus," Sirius said with a grin, "nothing could be more obnoxious than our real family motto, Toujours Pur. ‘Always pure’, indeed."

Feeling the anger slowly ebb away, his body loosen, he tugged Sirius' hand and led him upstairs. There would be no more waiting for Sirius Black to fail, to fall; he wouldn't allow himself those thoughts any longer. Forcing away the bitterness, Remus smiled genuinely and breathed again as he opened the door to his bedroom.

He wanted to know if Sirius' kisses would taste different now.