Chapter 121: Long-Term Plans

Sirius lasted until breakfast before complaining about Dumbledore's terms. 

"I spent twelve years in Azkaban," he said, stabbing a piece of toast. "Now I am free enough to remain inside my own house while other people verify a map I made." 

Edward poured tea. "You are also free enough to complain about it until Kreacher poisons you." 

"Kreacher would never waste good poison," the house-elf muttered from the doorway. 

The exchange eased the pressure without changing the plan. Sirius would not enter Hogwarts. He would not wander Hogsmeade searching for former Death Eaters. He would not approach Harry in secret, however much he wanted to see his godson. Dumbledore had authorized only limited movement near the Shrieking Shack after Remus inspected the old passage and confirmed that the wards still allowed controlled access. 

Edward preferred the narrower arrangement. Their first version had tried to solve too many unknowns at once: Peter, Voldemort's surviving followers, Harry's safety, and every suspicious adult near Hogwarts. The result had been less a plan than a list of fears. 

He tore that page from his notebook and started again. 

At the top he wrote one question: What can we actually establish? 

Peter's Animagus form was a rat. Sirius and Remus both knew it. Peter had lost a finger on the day of the explosion. Ron's pet rat was unusually old and reportedly missing a toe. The Marauder's Map, if Remus verified it, could show whether a person named Peter Pettigrew occupied Hogwarts. 

Those facts were enough for an investigation. 

They were not enough to assume Peter carried messages for Voldemort, had allies among the staff, planned to attack Harry, or possessed secret knowledge about Horcruxes. Edward crossed all four claims from the working page. 

Sirius watched him. "You enjoyed writing those possibilities more than deleting them." 

"Possibilities are easy. Evidence is slower." 

"That sounded painful." 

"It was." 

They agreed on a division that required less heroism from both of them. Edward would return to school and behave like a student. If Dumbledore scheduled a Map observation, Edward could attend with an adult witness. He could notice Scabbers in ordinary circumstances but would not create excuses to handle the rat repeatedly. Any alarming behavior went to Dumbledore or Remus, not to a private file that only Edward controlled. 

Sirius would recover. 

He objected to that wording. 

"That is not an assignment." 

"It is if poor health makes every other assignment worse. You still shake after holding the dog form too long." 

Azkaban had left Sirius thin, restless, and prone to periods of exhaustion he tried to hide behind motion. A healer had already warned that long transformations could become dangerous until he regained weight and strength. 

Edward refused to pretend that determination replaced recovery. 

Sirius eventually accepted a second task. He would prepare his testimony with Remus and an independent solicitor Dumbledore trusted. Dates, names, the Fidelius arrangement, the last time Sirius saw Peter, and the events on the street would be written while memory was calm enough to separate certainty from assumption. 

"I remember his face," Sirius said. 

"Then write what you remember. Do not write what twelve years of anger told you afterward." 

That silenced the room for a moment. 

Sirius nodded. 

The Two-way Mirrors remained useful, but Edward removed the idea of nightly reports about suspicious people. They would use the mirrors at agreed times for safety and family contact. If an emergency concerned Peter, Edward would contact Dumbledore first unless immediate danger made that impossible. 

"So I get to ask whether you ate dinner," Sirius said. 

"You may ask." 

"And whether you slept." 

"That is excessive surveillance." 

"Good. We finally found a use for it." 

Kreacher made a sound that might have been agreement. 

The rest of the morning went to less dramatic work. Edward reviewed his third-year books, answered letters from Draco and Daphne, and revised the Flame Serpent Alliance charter again. He removed a section that had allowed the group to maintain secret files on students considered potential threats. Written at twelve, it had seemed prudent. After seeing what rumor and incomplete evidence had done to Sirius, it now looked dangerously close to building a private accusation system. 

Members could record incidents they personally witnessed. Serious concerns had to go to a professor or another responsible adult. Nobody would receive a permanent label because Edward disliked their family, politics, or reputation. 

Sirius read the change over his shoulder. 

"You are making your secret society less secret." 

"It is becoming less of a society too." 

"Tragic. Soon it may become a study group." 

Edward nearly defended the name, then stopped himself. "A study group with legal interests." 

"Terrifying." 

The joke hid a real change. Edward no longer wanted the Alliance to become an answer to every institutional failure he saw. Students could share defensive knowledge, support access to books, document unfair treatment, and learn how laws worked. They could not appoint themselves judges, investigators, or a replacement Ministry simply because the existing Ministry had failed Sirius. 

That distinction became the second long-term plan of the day. 

The first was personal. If Sirius was cleared, his relationship with Harry would belong to Sirius and Harry. Edward could help establish the truth, but he could not design their family for them. Harry might be angry that Sirius had remained hidden during the investigation. He might not trust him immediately. Sirius had to accept that before contact began. 

"I know," Sirius said. 

His voice made clear that knowing did not make it easy. 

"I keep imagining James's son running toward me. I should probably imagine him asking why I was not there instead." 

"Both could happen." 

"Or neither." 

"Yes." 

Sirius leaned back in his chair. "You really are terrible at comforting people." 

Edward considered the accusation. "I am trying not to promise you Harry's reaction." 

"That is why it helps." 

By evening, the plan had become almost disappointingly ordinary. Recover. Preserve testimony. Verify the Map. Observe only what happened in front of them. Let adults handle the capture. Keep dangerous objects secured. Keep Harry outside the operation until the evidence could be explained safely. 

No one was infiltrating the school. No one was hunting hidden enemies through Hogsmeade. No one was carrying a magical solution that guaranteed Peter could not escape. 

Edward had once measured a plan by how completely it controlled every possibility. 

Now he looked at the pages and saw deliberate gaps where another person's authority, judgment, or consent belonged. 

Sirius folded his copy and placed it beside the Ministry reports. 

"I still hate waiting." 

"So do I." 

"Good. I was worried prison had made me patient." 

The next morning, Remus was due to inspect the passage to the Shrieking Shack. After that came the Map. 

For the first time since Sirius escaped, Edward was willing to let those steps happen in that order. 

Before they separated for the night, Edward made one final change to the plan. If three scheduled Map observations failed to show Peter, they would reconsider the entire theory instead of assuming he had discovered a way to fool the parchment. Evidence that contradicted them would count as evidence too. Sirius read the line twice, then signed beneath it. 

"I hate that clause most," he said. 

"Then it probably belongs there."