the_debt_of_time

"I certainly do," Fudge replied.
"I can't believe that. What could possibly be worse?"
"You say you remember him at Hogwarts, Rosmerta," Minerva murmured. "Do
you remember who his best friend was?"
"Naturally," Rosmerta answered with a small laugh. "Never saw one without the
other, did you? The number of times I had them in here. Oh, they used to make me laugh.
Quite the double act, Sirius Black and James Potter."
"Precisely," McGonagall said. "Black and Potter. Ringleaders of their little gang.
Both very bright, of course—exceptionally bright, in fact—but I don't think we've ever
had such a pair of troublemakers."
"I heard the stories all the way down here in the village," Rosmerta chimed in with
a chuckle. "Those boys and that sist―" she started to say, but McGonagall cut her off
loudly by clearing her throat.
Hagrid took the opportunity to cut into the conversation. "I dunno," he said with a
chuckle, "Fred and George Weasley could give 'em a run for their money."
"You'd have thought Black and Potter were brothers!" Professor Flitwick chimed
in. "Inseparable!"
Padfoot inhaled sharply, still not used to hearing James being spoken of aloud. So
many years in Azkaban fighting off the dementors, clinging to the knowledge that he was
innocent in order to retain his sanity, and yet isolation had damaged him instead. There
were times when he almost thought his life had not been real. James and Remus and Lily.
Even now, as he breathed in the familiar scents of Hogsmeade, he could smell it—
smell her. She smelled like the forest after a rainstorm, and over a decade later, it was almost
as if she were still right there in front of him. The half-empty Soul Bond in his chest
thrummed, reminding him that he was alive and that a part of him was missing. Missing
but maybe not dead. Sirius had never been able to tell.
"Of course they were," Fudge said. "Potter trusted Black above all his other friends.
Nothing changed when they left school. Black was best man at Potter's wedding. Then he
named him godfather to young Harry. Harry has no idea, of course. You can imagine how
the idea would torment him."
Fudge's words pulled Sirius out of his thoughts, and he growled low. They had not
even told Harry who he was? No. He shook his head. Why would they? To them, he was a