Chapter 193: Hogwarts without Della - Miss White of the Shrieking Shack (1)
The moon over Beauxbatons is really round tonight, and the moon over Hogwarts is just as round.
"Is this okay, Miss White?" Sirius pulled open half of the curtains of the window and looked at the doll he had moved onto the recliner and placed in the corner where the light was least intense. At first he wanted to call the doll White-headed Bird, but after all the voice was female, so he simply kept the word "white" and called it Miss White.
"I'm fine, Sirius." The puppet's face was still empty, with only depressions and ups and downs, but the voice was no longer as vague and shrill as it was at the beginning, and could even be called pleasant. However, Sirius did not notice this because they were always communicating and Sirius was busy practicing his language skills.
"My friend doesn't like the moon very much. It makes him unhappy," Sirius looked at the full moon in the sky through the dirty and blurry window, "but I like us under the moonlight."
"Are you and your friend alone?" The doll on the chair didn't move. There was only a simple immobilization spell on it, but Sirius couldn't remove it without a wand.
"There will be more than two, but now," Sirius paused, then snorted coldly, with a bit of ferocity on his thin face, "there will be only two."
"Your tone sounds bad," the puppet's eyes moved, "Is this why you came here?"
"Yes," Sirius looked at the moon again, turned around and sat on the bed, facing Miss White who was wearing a Hogwarts robe on the couch, "I still have sins, but I can't forgive Peter, so I escaped from Azkaban and must come here to kill him."
As he said this, half of his face was in darkness, and the other half was illuminated by the pale moonlight. He looked more and more like an evil ghost that had just crawled out of hell, ready to tear people to pieces if he got the chance.
"Do you want to talk to me?" the puppet asked, his tone was emotionless, just as calm as before.
"That's a story that makes me hateful," Sirius said in a low voice, his hands tensed and exerted force, which affected the wound caused by the Whomping Willow in the past few days. He hissed in pain and continued, "I don't really want to mention it, but under this moon, all the regret and hatred came to my mind."
Having said that, he glanced at the round moon in the sky again, and a look of nostalgia flashed across his eyes very quickly, which weakened his crazy temperament for a moment, but soon, regret, doubt, and hatred enveloped him again, turning him back into a demon.
"I've had a very happy time here," Sirius spread his hands to Miss White, "wonderful friends, extraordinary adventures, and daring attempts. Those were my happiest days. It's a pity that the Dementors didn't let me have such a beautiful dream when I was in Azkaban."
"But it's a good thing I didn't have such a dream," said Sirius, his expression becoming more vicious. "If I dreamed of that treacherous rat, my beautiful dream would be tainted."
"Peter betrayed you?" the puppet asked.
"He betrayed everything!" Sirius roared uncontrollably, "Everything!"
"He leaked the secret to Voldemort and caused the death of James and Lily..." Sirius was still roaring, but the grief in his tone turned his irrational roar into a cry. He bent down and covered his face, and the moonlight made a cross on the tears dripping from the corners of his eyes.
The puppet did not reply. Its sunken eye sockets moved calmly as it waited for Sirius to begin crying and vent out emotions that he had not expressed in more than a decade. The image of a couple slowly emerged in its mind.
One was the James Potter with light brown eyes and messy hair that he saw early in the morning, and the other was the newly appeared Lily Potter with green almond eyes and long red hair. Sirius felt the same regret for them.
The puppet felt a little confused.
It could sense the depth of that regret, but Sirius had no strong desire to see them at that stage.
The James Potter it saw at first was younger. Sirius seemed to miss the James Potter of his school days, but the puppet still did not sense his strong desire to see him.
Was it because the Dementors had sucked away his sanity and his dreams?
The puppet had no idea what a Dementor was, so it could only try to deduce clues from Sirius' words.
"And Peter is still with little Harry," Sirius slowly stopped crying, his voice hoarse, making his next harsh words carry a dangerous sexiness, "I must kill him!"
It was also an unusually strong emotion, and the puppet could read the short man, but it was so negative that it ignored it.
"Have you thought about what to do?" it asked Sirius, wanting to get closer to Sirius and also wanting to get more information.
"Catch him and tear him apart," Sirius said matter-of-factly.
“I’ve met very few people,” the puppet’s eyes moved, thinking of Maggie, “but I feel like your plan is a little crude.”
"..." Sirius wiped his face and shook off the tears on his hands with a calm expression. What the puppet said made sense. During the half month he came here, he had been doing nothing but hunting and was often hit by the Whomping Willow. His body and condition had not recovered yet.
"Ah!" As if he suddenly remembered something, Sirius looked at the doll, his tone carrying an urgency of self-affirmation, "I met a cat with a flat face today, and I think it's pretty good!"
"Cat?" The puppet couldn't read that, Sirius' feelings for the cat weren't strong enough or special enough.
"It seems to have figured out that I'm an Animagus, so it should have reacted to that stinky rat." Sirius' voice dropped to a whisper when he mentioned anything related to Peter. "It's just that it's too wary of me. I have to find a way to get along with it."
"And rely on the cat to tear the mouse apart?" the puppet asked following Sirius' logic.
"The rat must die," Sirius said first, then gritted his teeth, "but it's better if it dies by my hands."
"No, I can't go on like this," Sirius slapped his forehead, "The cat has to build good relationships, and I have to find a chance to sneak into the school."
The puppet had no inclination to criticize Sirius Black, but it felt that Sirius had not grasped the meaning of "the plan is a bit crude" at all, and was still constantly making crude plans, and it could feel that this man had a strong ability to take action.
This made the puppet a little worried. Although thanks to Sirius, it was free from the moonlight that destroyed it, it was still unable to move. And if this Sirius died, it was unknown when the next Sirius who could make it 'live' would come.
"Do you miss your friends?" the puppet suddenly asked Sirius, intending to try a slightly radical strategy.
"I think about it all the time. Why do you ask, Miss White?" Sirius looked at the doll.