Argentum

~~~

He is different tonight. His fingers curl in Remus\' hair so tightly like he means to tear the strands from their roots and there is a feral, dangerous look flashing in his grey eyes that is more frightening than arousing. Remus can feel that mouth twist in dark triumph as it presses against his own, the rough, pouting lips bruising and the tongue strangling his throat, pushing too hard, too deep, so harsh that Remus thinks Sirius must be drunk. But the man has never been more sober.

Remus whimpers when Sirius shoves him back against the bed, their bed, not understanding why the movements are so violent, wondering what he\'s done, and whispering meaningless platitudes against Sirius\' neck, trying to apologize, and plead, and breathe in the same moment. It is impossible because Sirius is on his chest now - Sirius is everywhere - pressing down all over his body, snarling against his neck and panting hot dog-eared breathes that Remus wishes he still wanted to memorize.

The wind picks up outside - swift October wind that howls like ghosts, like demons, like wolves. Sirius whispers something against the shell of Remus\' ear that makes Remus sit bolt upright in the bed, eyes snapping open and glossy with horror.

\"What?\" The word is drawn out of him, tone disbelieving, accusatory, and confused.

\"It\'s going to be sad to see James go,\" Sirius repeats, voice lower and darker this time, eyes dilated in the dim of the room to hollow black. His mouth quirks into a smile that is not a smile, and Remus lets a breath hiss out between his parted lips to fill the silence. He isn\'t quite sure what to say.

\"Hopefully you had the chance to say a proper goodbye,\" Sirius adds, smirking as he straddles Remus\' torso and presses a cruel kiss on his cheek.

Remus knows that, these days, it is considered natural to be suspicious of everyone. There is a war on and people would be foolish not to worry. But Remus had never dreamed that Sirius - his Sirius - would betray them all.

So he simply refuses to believe it, uses logic because his emotions will be of no help to him now.

\"You\'re their secret keeper,\" he chokes out, still hoping that this is all some horribly ill-timed joke, but knowing it can\'t be. Sirius has a better sense of humor than that.

\"Was their secret keeper, Moony,\" Sirius says, using the nickname like a belittling dismissal rather than a term of affection, \"Peter\'s the secret keeper now.\" He grinds his erection against Remus\' thigh and adds quietly, through punctuating breaths, \"He\'ll do well.\"

Remus squirms beneath the weight of Sirius\' body, mind swirling with bitter realization that tastes sour on his tongue. He feels Sirius\' fingers migrating over the front of his trousers, his palms pressing teasingly against the bulge of Remus\' cock, and Remus has to fight to keep himself from moaning, because this shouldn\'t be happening and it can\'t be happening and he hates Sirius right now, and he\'s confused and angry and frustrated and he\'s not going to let himself enjoy this because he has to get to James, to Lily, to Harry, to the Ministry, and he has to get to his wand - why did he have to leave it on the dresser?

\"Moony, Moony, don\'t look at me like that,\" Sirius says coaxingly, kissing Remus lightly and smoothing back his hair. Remus fights with him with his hands, clawing at Sirius\' back and pushing against him. It only serves to increase the friction between them, and Remus feels his breath growing quick and shallow and his mind is still tricking him, telling him that this is Sirius, Sirius whom he loves and who loves him, his Sirius. But Sirius is whispering horrible, dirty secrets, and Remus knows his mind is lying, his mind is cruel and Sirius is cruel and Sirius is grinding against him in that familiar way and he hates both Sirius for doing that and himself for letting it happen. This is all happening so quickly and Remus wishes he could just erase the past ten minutes, and then none of this would be true. They would be calm and smiling and kissing and nothing Sirius had just said - was still saying - (what had he said?), none of it would be true. It wasn\'t true. Sirius wouldn\'t do this.

But he did.

Remus moans, mouth opening into a hollow, broken sound, and Sirius swallows it with his lips, stealing Remus\' voice just like he\'s stolen everything else. Remus imagines his own heart pounding somewhere inside the cage of Sirius\' chest like a prize.

\"Why even tell me this?\" he asks breathlessly. He should give up fighting - perhaps he already has. Sirius is easily stronger than him when he has the will to be, anyway. Remus\' head is spinning too fast for him to think, to scratch, to kick, to punch. The words that glaze the air like snow flurries and ice are the only thing Remus is able to process. He feels like fainting, or perhaps like he already is fainting.

\"Why tell me this now?\"

\"Because it\'s going to happen tonight.\" Sirius fumbles in the pocket of his jacket for a moment and Remus doesn\'t have to ask what will happen tonight, and he doesn\'t need to look, either, to know that Sirius is retrieving his wand. He looks instead into Sirius\' eyes, finding the grey foreign and dark now - dark that drives out any hope that this might be Imperius.

Sirius raises his wand and speaks a spell, two words that Remus is surprised are not Avada Kedavra. He waits a moment while nothing happens, watching a bitter look - with not a hint of remorse or regret - trace its way across Sirius\' mouth.

And then it comes. His wrists are pulled back by binds, shackles, cuffs, and it is then that Remus recognizes the spell that has been cast. The first word turns over in his mind and he wants to scream. Argentum. Silver. He feels the burn on his skin before his mind can understand it. His mouth is open but no words are coming out and he swears that this must be a dream because this sort of pain - and he\'s thinking not of the brilliant tear at his wrists - can\'t possibly exist in the real world. It is too much and at this moment, Remus wants that curse to have been an Unforgivable after all, wants to beg Sirius to kill him, because how can anyone live when their still-beating heart has been snatched out and branded black, and cold, and broken with traitorous lies and words that sting at his lycanthropic core worse than silver ever could.

Sirius crawls off of Remus and murmurs in what could almost be a lover\'s whisper, \"I have somewhere I have to be.\" Remus says nothing because there is nothing left to say. He simply closes his eyes and waits for Sirius to apparate away, and thinks dimly that his hands have gone numb.

When he opens his eyes again, he finds that Sirius has taken his wand down from the dresser and placed it within Remus\' reach.

He reverses the binding charm and sets his hands down in his lap, looking at the twisting spiral of red that wraps around his wrists where the silver has left deep welts that will surely scar.

He wonders if he\'s been dreaming, if he can snap his fingers or pinch his skin and he will wake up with Sirius at his side, pressing into his shoulder and laughing lightly before kissing him back from the nightmare.

That\'s all it is, a nightmare.

But he doesn\'t wake up.

He sits there, on the edge of the bed, in dull shock for at least an hour, knowing darkly that James is dead, must be dead, by now, and that he did nothing to stop it. He knows, too, that Sirius has betrayed them all, and that he will never be able to sleep again with that thought, with that terrible knowledge. He can\'t live with that. It sweeps over his insides like a stain and he can\'t keep that.

And so he does the only thing he can. It is selfish but it is the only thing he can think to do.

He forgets.

Raising his wand, Remus whispers a word in a low, determined murmur.

\"Obliviate.\"

~~~

Azkaban does things to a person\'s mind. It can make someone believe themselves innocent, forget their past, or remember different ones. It can make them create delusions of alternate histories, imagined feelings, pasts that make so much sense in the troubled mind of a madman that they become true.

~~~

When Sirius sees Remus for the first time in thirteen years, they stand on the creaking floorboards of the Shrieking Shack and look at each other, amber brown eyes meeting grey. Sirius\' mind is blank and he remembers nothing from that night.

And neither does Remus.

~~~

They embrace.

~~~