Chapter Six: Remembering White Water
Time: Almost Midnight 7/13/95 (Memory Time Line: mid-June, 1979)
In Azkaban, sometimes day was almost as black as night. Sirius kept one lamp burning in his bedroom, so that if he woke before dawn, he would know instantly that the darkness had been only the latest bad dream. Everyone told him that he was quite safe from dementors inside 12 Grimmauld, but his gut said otherwise. When his dog self had plunged into those frigid waters, he had nothing left to lose. He had never expected to elude them this long, and had always believed that, someday, they would claim their prey. But for now, the little lamp and the occasional potion kept these thoughts and the dark at bay.
In Azkaban's cells, he had learned to have but one thought -- to drive all other thoughts away with the one. Since then, he had managed to think of very little but the present moment, until today. Today, the past had forced it's way into Grimmauld, into the present. He clinched his fists as he lay on the bed and, grim faced against waves of panic, launched into the currents of memory.
These memories might as well be from another man's pensieve, he thought. It seemed almost impossible that he had ever been the unburdened young man he now recalled in scenes summoned from the twilight of forgetting. That trip to the States had been a genuine lark -- an appropriately large and exuberant celebration of the end of 7 years of Hogwarts. Not that he didn't appreciate the party Mr. and Mrs. Potter had thrown for James, himself and their closest friends, or the Magi-Cook crock pot from his cousin Andromeda. (He could still hear cousin Andie quizzing him about his diet and declaring that he would develop some unpronounceable disease if he didn't eat a few vegetables now and again, rather than subsisting solely on butterbeer and cold sandwiches.) But still he had felt the official beginning of his adult life required something more. He already had his own apartment. Getting a "good job" could wait. And so it was that Sirius decided to spend a summer seeing America.
His original plan was that the four marauders would go together, but James wouldn't be away from Lily and, in those days before Wolfsbane potion was commonly used, Remus thought it irresponsible to be on unfamiliar territory with only one companion during a full moon or three. And Peter - well, Sirius couldn't remember his official excuse, but hindsight was 20-20 in this case.
It was several months before he gave up trying to persuade his friends to come, so it wasn't until the spring of 1979 that Sirius folded his over six feet into a muggle airplane, and discovered the joys of claustrophobia. When he deplaned at LaGuardia, he wanted nothing more than to stay outdoors a while. The tourist's guide he had read to distract himself on the plane had made a great deal of white water kayaking in the Southern Appalachians, and he soon located an opportunity to try it. He wasn't disappointed. It had been like riding a great, cold, muddy-green dragon, bucking, lunging and writhing it's way between boulders that flew at the kayak like so many monstrous bludgers, while the spray rose like the steam of it's angry breath. He had never imagined a muggle sport could be that much fun.
By mid June, following several runs down the Ocoee and Hiwassee rivers, his muggle money ran out. He had suspicions that the wizard money changer he had used in New York had cheated him, and he didn't care at all to try and apparate so far back to the seedy neighborhood where he had found him. There was nowhere in the middle of a national forest he could make an exchange from galleons to dollars, let alone draw on his Gringott's account, so he began wandering aimlessly in a vague pursuit of some source of revenue, not to mention food and drink. Being raised in London hadn't equipped him much as a woodsman, so living off the land for long in human form was difficult.
It was in this state that, early on the 21st of June, he set off in what he hoped was the general direction of civilization, wondering as he walked if he wouldn't do well to change into a dog and run down a rabbit. The chill mists of dawn failed to dissipate as the sun grew high behind him, but rather gathered themselves into a thin drizzle that turned the mosses and trees into vivid greens and rich browns, and doubled the musky sweet scent of the eons of leaf mold he slushed through. He might have remembered that hike as quite pleasant if he hadn't been so damned hungry. Just as he was thinking he'd better catch a rabbit before he was too faint to transform, he heard the song - distant and barely audible, but there was no mistaking it; a woman was singing.
Navigating with the keen ears of the dog form he quickly assumed, he trotted toward the sound. Even after so many years, he could still recall in detail his first sight of her. Her cape-like outer garment, which was drawn over her head to ward off the rain, was covered with unfamiliar runes. She was bent over, gathering plants from a little meadow and singing as she did. He had guessed she was performing a midsummer ritual peculiar to American witches; and a witch she must be. The more he had listened, the more he knew this was magic, but not any he was familiar with. Her song drew him. The strength of this alien entrancement had caused his dog's body to tremble with an odd mingling of joy and fear. This he remembered so vividly that a little shiver erupted and made Sirius reach for the blanket at the foot of the bed.
He hadn't revealed himself right away, but, waiting until she left the clearing, he followed her home by scent, stopping along the way to devour a fat frog, and so stave off starvation another day. He had been disappointed to find that the woman did not lead him to a village, but only a single cabin. There would be no choice now. Unless he wanted to take his chances in the woods again, he would have to approach the woman directly.
The low clouds had finally cleared, but shortly before reaching the cabin there appeared towering thunder heads that shook the sultry air with loud promises of violent weather. Slipping undetected under the cabin porch, Sirius covered dog ears with paws and tried not to whimper while it seemed all the bolts of Jove were being hurled at the acre he lay on.
By the time the storm was well over, dusk was advancing under the surrounding heavy tree canopy. From inside the cabin, only what seemed the light of a single candle or wand could be seen. He decided morning would be a safer time to introduce himself; beating a hasty retreat in this unfamiliar woods after dark might be perilous. A curious old mule stabled in a rude shed near the cabin gave this strange dog a thorough sniffing, but seemed to accept him and raised no alarm as he relocated to a bed of dry, soft hay and curled up for the night.
As his stomach rumbled him awake the next morning, he reverted to man shape, enlarged his pack enough to make it obvious he was backpacking -- not to mention letting it serve as a rear shield against hexes -- screwed up his courage, and knocked on the cabin's heavy plank door. One hand stayed positioned casually near his wand pocket as the door creaked open just far enough for two pairs of well matched wide brown eyes to look out. One pair belonged to a young woman, no doubt the one he had followed; the other were set in a face so wizened that Sirius judged the witch behind them might be older than Albus Dumbledore.
He wondered how many hexes a witch that old would have in her arsenal, with which to punish young men who got too fresh with her granddaughter, as such he guessed the young woman to be. The eyes continued to scrutinize him impassively, and he found himself wishing for a hat to remove in deference -- or just a rock to crawl under. But an empty stomach gives courage when nothing else will, and the smells coming from the cabin were more than a little enticing; so when the old woman asked in a rather nasal burr, "And who might you be?", he offered what he hoped was a disarming smile and introduced himself.
The young woman looked a little puzzled, but the crone replied, "You 'us named after th' dog star."
"Yes, ma'am," said Sirius, wondering if she was a legilimens. It was the first time since he'd left London that he hadn't had to spell his name before it was understood.
"It's hidden in th' sun this time a' year." Her eyes continued to drill holes in him. He wondered uncomfortably if somehow she disapproved of that particular star.
"I was hoping you could help a traveler find food and lodging, and perhaps a bank?", he said. The pairs of eyes turned to each other, then settled again on Sirius.
"You're not from around here," the young woman said in a broad voweled accent, with less bur in it than the crone's. Even her speech was full of music, Sirius thought.
"Oh, no. I'm from England," he explained.
The women's eyes met again. "Are you lost?", the young one asked.
"A little," he replied, trying hard to sound unconcerned.
"Etowah's the nearest town of any size. It's eight or nine miles as the crow flies, but almost twice that if you keep to the main roads. That little road picks up three-fifteen." She indicated a rutted path barely discernible under the leaves and brush. "Go west on thirty at Reliance and probably you can hitch the last bit on the highway."
Sirius was wondering if he had the strength to apparate nine miles to a place he'd never seen in his famished condition, when the old woman said, "Fetch us a pail a' water from th' pump behind the house." She indicated a large bucket on the porch near him. "When ya get back, there'll be somethin' for ya." The door closed.
He had wondered first why they didn't just "accio" for the water. Then it occurred to him that maybe they only wanted to get rid of him. Hoping for the best, he had approached the pump, which had a small can of water hanging on the spigot, opposite the long handle. He put the bucket under the spigot and lifted the handle. Nothing happened. Shrugging, he lifted his wand to the spigot mouth and summoned the water he knew was below. "Finite" he commanded when the bucket was nearly full.
He trudged back to the front porch to find an empty jelly jar, presumably for water, and a plate with a large piece of chewy, salty ham, two fluffy rounds of bread resembling scones (they call them "biscuits" over there, he remembered, smiling into the dark of his room) slices of deep red tomato and scrambled eggs. Obviously the women hadn't taken time to heat what he assumed were mostly leftovers; except for the eggs, the food was just "room temperature," but it didn't matter. In fact, he couldn't remember food ever tasting better.
He dug in like a starving man -- which, in fact, he nearly was. As he swallowed, he considered that there could be any sort of potion or poison in this food he had accepted from strangers. He didn't care. If the strange witches poisoned him, at least he'd die on a good meal.
As he chewed, he heard the door close behind him. Turning quickly, he saw no one; but the water pail was gone and two more biscuits, this time full of jam, had appeared on a plate not four feet from him. It did not then occur to him to wonder why he had heard no steps on the porch. There were many ways to silently levitate and summon buckets and plates.
After mopping up the last crumb and resting gratefully against the porch posts for a few minutes, Sirius gathered his dishes and knocked on the cabin door. "I'm returning your plates," he called out, stepping back a respectful distance from the threshold. The door opened a crack. He had been prepared to put the dishes on the floor and back away, but the young woman extended her left hand and took them from him. He noticed that she kept her right hand, presumably her wand hand, hidden behind the door.
"That was wonderful!" Sirius said, quite sincerely. "Is there anything else I can do to pay for my meal?"
"You're welcome to it," the young woman said. She seemed on one hand nervous about opening the door between them, but also curious about this strange young foreigner on the porch. It occurred to Sirius that the two women might not have many visitors of any sort out here. As an awkward silence threatened to evolve, the crone's face appeared in the door. She eyed the almost spotless plates. "How long, not countin' just now, since you've et', young man?" she asked pointedly.
Sirius felt it would be risky to lie to one so experienced. "Well, I've, ... um, been traveling a while. Living off the land a bit you know."
The two women stood looking at him, as though he were a small child trying to claim that the wand scribble on the wall got there by itself. He hadn't wanted to reveal his dilemma to strangers, but there seemed no way around it. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, he thought, and continued, "If you have any work for me, I would love to earn another meal, or a few dollars if you could?"
"How much do you need to get where you need to go?" the young woman asked.
"I just need a bit to tide me over till I can draw some money from my bank account," Sirius said quickly.
"I have a little money but it's hard to convert it to mu... to the local currency." He'd almost said "to muggle money", but with the accustomed caution of dangerous times, he decided at the last second that he'd better have a bit more proof before he spoke to these two like his own kind. Besides, one didn't want to run afoul of the secrecy laws in a foreign country.
"I suppose the bank in Etowah could do all that," the young woman said, "but walking you'll never make it before closing. It'll be Monday before you can get your money changed." Immediately after saying this, she gave a start and looked as though she'd just seen a thestral. Biting her lips, she turned wide eyes on the crone, but the old woman still stared at Sirius with an inscrutable face. "Do ya mind sleepin' on a hay bed?" she asked.
"No, not a bit," said Sirius quickly. He knew almost with certainty just what hay bed she had in mind.
"Then you'll stick around 'til Mond'y," she said with finality. The young woman drew in her breath and bit her lips harder. Sirius thought she rolled her eyes a bit.
It was not hard for Sirius to sound grateful when he responded, "I'll try not to be any trouble to you. Just let me know what I can do to pay for my spot on the hay and, hopefully, some more meals like today's breakfast." The young woman exhaled loudly and looked beseechingly at the porch ceiling.
"I don't know your names." Sirius continued, smiling as charmingly as he knew how first at one lady and then the other. "Won't you tell me what to call you?"
"You can call me Granny McNiven. Granny M will do fer short. My granddaughter has five names..."
"Sapphire! My name is Sapphire!" she interrupted curtly.
"Are the other four as lovely as that one?" Sirius said giving her the tiniest wink.
"That's of no matter," Sapphire said, looking pointedly past him.
What happened between then and lunch was now an inconsequential muddle of little chores, but he still remembered that meal. Again, he ate on the porch, but now the women came out and handed him his food. Sapphire, who had been giving him rather terse orders about what needed doing, watched him out of the corners of her eyes as she came and went, but Granny McNiven sat down in a rocking chair to chat with him, her puffy feet propped up on an overturned basket that Sapphire had deposited in front of her with a tight lipped frown.
"Which of you wise and beautiful ladies made this excellent pie?" Sirius asked her, around mouthfuls of his second piece.
The crone fixed him with her imperturbable stare and asked,
"Which of us is th' wise and which is th' beautiful?"
Sirius barely hesitated before answering, "Whoever made this pie is exceedingly beautiful!"
Her wrinkled face split into an open mouthed guffaw. "And you may be wiser than ya look," she cackled. Sirius laughed too, but rather more nervously. He felt as though he had been given some sort of test, and hoped the mirth meant he had passed rather than otherwise.
That evening, as the sun sank, both women joined him on the porch. Sapphire brought out three candles in bottles along with the folding TV-trays they would eat on, and set one on each. As she leaned down to light his, Sirius saw a blue flame flash from inside her shirt neck, which, no doubt due to the sultry weather, she had not buttoned to the top. For a second, he thought of spell sparks, and drew back, but then relaxed and smiled at his mistake as he realized she must be wearing a blue gem pendant around her neck. Perhaps some sort of protective charm?
Alerted by his sudden movement, she noted his smile and followed his gaze to her open shirt neck. She scowled at him, as she straightened herself and tugged the shirt together. Let her think it; she's pretty enough to make a fellow want a peek. Meeting her eyes, he smiled more broadly -- and winked. She quickly turned her back.
When she delivered his plate, it dropped with such force onto the tray that it nearly turned candle and all into his lap. Sirius grinned again, and realized he was starting to feel safe with these strangers. Sapphire had seemed intimidating at first -- he judged her to be a few years his senior, and she'd been treating him like a wayward child -- but he suspected now that she could be lots of fun to tease. This bit of his adventure was definitely looking up.
After the supper dishes were removed, Sapphire settled her back against the frame of the cabin door. The door, she left open just a crack. Granny resumed the rocker. A couple of blankets for Sirius to use in the hay lay folded on the floor planks, and he pillowed his head on them as Granny began telling stories. "Our stories," she had called them, and they ranged from 14th century Scottish history to stories about what Sirius took to be a type of local Leprechaun. "Wee'uns" or "Yunwi Tsunsdi" she had called these magical folk who played pranks but sometimes rescued lost children.
She also told the story of how her own grandmother had been adopted by Presbyterian missionaries who kept her from being taken west with "the rest of her people." "She was said to be th' daughter of a Cherokee chief who was killed, along with her other family, while resistin' removal," Granny said. "So ya see, my family's been on th' losing side of almost ev'ry war we've been in fer 700 years."
"And on the winning side at the same time," Sapphire said, "which is why we still have this land to our name."
Granny laughed. "She listens well to the old stories! When I'm gone, she'll pass 'em on to th' next generation."
Sirius could make nothing of Sapphire's remark about both winning and losing at the time, though he would have occasion to think it prophetic just a few years later.
At the time, he had fixed on the information that they were descended from a chief -- really a type of king, he thought. "So you're a sort of princess, then," he had said, addressing the remark to both women at once.
Granny just grinned, but Sapphire snorted with contempt.
"Yeah, princesses! Welcome to the royal palace, with electricity and running water every other week and a makeshift servant when someone gets lost in the woods."
"You have electricity?" Sirius knew of it, of course, but had seldom been in a home that used it.
"Yes, we have electricity!" Sapphire, who was for some reason gesturing vaguely toward the ceiling, sounded annoyed. "We aren't cave people! They electrified this area around forty years ago. But when a bad storm knocks down the wires, or lightning strikes like yesterday, we don't get it back right away."
"Nor the phone," Granny added. At this Sapphire shot her a look with a caution in it, and Sirius had wondered why.
Granny continued, "It appears my granddaughter still has a bit t' learn. She's not so grateful fer what she has as she ought t'be. When I was a little girl we had no phone here, we always had t' haul wood fer th' stove, and water from th' pump, and burn candles t' see at night. If you wanted food kept cold, you had t' put it in a jar in the crick..."
"Oh, Granny, I don't think Sirius wants to hear about your walking twenty miles to school uphill both ways in daily blizzards," Sapphire interrupted her.
Sirius recalled wondering if there could be hills like the stairs at Hogwarts that sometimes changed direction so there was no downhill. Now he laughed at the memory, and then grew somber thinking how he had never had a grandmother, or anyone else for that matter, to tell him stories like Granny McNiven -- not unless you counted his father's dissertations on the superior blood lines of the Black family. Perhaps, he thought, it was the stories as much as anything that had first made him want to return to that cabin. And now, that decision was part of another story.
@3,862 words, Last Edit 7/14/07)
Posted by Madmaxime at August 1, 2007 05:03 PM