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wunderkind

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From:

jurisimpudent

[A shrug with one shoulder; his brows are furrowed together with embarrassment at that rebuke.]

I...don't know. What time is it?

From:

doggedly

Quarter after eleven. We'll be into the next day at this rate.

[He sighs, hugely, and leans back in his chair again, shoving his watch back into his pocket.]

Can you imagine going back to Hogwarts after this?

From:

jurisimpudent

[That elicits a scoff - almost an unhappy laugh - after a slight delay.]

God. No. I can't even imagine how the other students would react.

From:

doggedly

[He snorts. For a moment, they're on a very similar level, if not the same.]

Ah, you forget. You defeated the Dark Lord. They're going to have a parade for you.

From:

jurisimpudent

[That earns an open scoff.]

I'm not certain if you've noticed, Black, but most students there would sooner disembowel themselves than give me the time of day. Let alone throw me a parade.

[He shakes his head.]

A peek into the secret world of the Gryffindors: they don't like those who tell on them.

From:

doggedly

I hate to break it to you, Edgeworth, but that's not exactly a secret. None of it is.

[Gryffindors, man. He rolls his eyes a little.]

Not to stray too far off topic, but I still can't believe you're in with them.

From:

jurisimpudent

Well.

[He looks away and hopes this won't earn him any wrath.]

I still can't believe you're in with the Slytherins.

From:

doggedly

[There's no wrath. Instead, Sirius' mouth twists, and he looks down at the floor, jams the heel of his boot against the tile.]

Yeah. Well. Doubt I will be, after this.

From:

jurisimpudent

[And Edgeworth looks over, his foul mood for a moment forgotten in the wake of his curiosity.]

That's the part of what I said that you took issue with?

From:

doggedly

[He looks over at him--or, more, glares over at him, defencively.]

Should there have been something else?

From:

jurisimpudent

[And, steadily:]

Most students would resent being told they do not fit in well with their House.

From:

doggedly

Well, as this entire day has really been about me betraying my fucking family and more or less burning all of the bridges I've got, I'd say I'm not really in a position to be fussed about being told I don't fit in with a load of wankers I never really liked anyways.

[He finishes that, clipped, and shoves his watch back into his pocket, trading it for a new cigarette.]

From:

jurisimpudent

[And that shuts him up quite neatly.]

I - right.

[A pause, though, and because he can never leave well enough alone - ]

I still don't...It's not truly betraying them, though.

From:

doggedly

[Of course he still doesn't shut up. Sirius huffs a grim laugh, as he lights his cigarette.]

It's not. So what is it, then? I mean, it was more or less the eradication of all of the shit that they believe in, since it at least throws a bloody bubotuber into their precious system and society--but tell me, how that wasn't a betrayal.

From:

jurisimpudent

[He gives an uncomfortable half-shrug. This is a weak argument:]

You hardly swore allegiance to their beliefs. And I cannot really think that...prejudice and hatred are some central tenants of their belief systems.

From:

doggedly

[He doesn't answer, at first--just gets out his watch and holds it out to Edgeworth, closed. It's a heavy silver thing, much like his lighter, and the front is etched in the Black family crest. The motto runs along the bottom, in tiny block letters: TOUJOURS PUR.]

My father gave me this in first year. It wasn't even my birthday. He came to Hogwarts because the Board of Governors was meeting and he summoned me afterwards and gave me this watch--because I needed reminding, he said.

Toujours Pur. 'Always Pure'. That's the bloody center of their beliefs, and everything they are.

From:

jurisimpudent

[What a strange, sad thing that is, he thinks as he looks down at the crest. He has a watch as well, back in his room in the Gryffindor Tower; it's silver as well, and burnished, but lighter. The inscription on it, on the inside of the cover, is To my dearest Gregory. He's been given lessons, as well, lessons that he's carried to the present day even if at times he forgets them: to be honest, to be forthright, to follow the rules, to treat others as he wants to be treated. To not presume to stand in judgment over a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes. To treasure kindness. That no matter what happened, no matter what calling he found in life, he would always be loved.

Always Pure is what Sirius Black got.

It's a strange, sad thing.

He raises his eyes to Sirius' again. And he asks:]

Why did he think you needed reminding?

From:

doggedly

[He smiles, bitterly, shifting back in his chair a little so he can put it back in his pocket. Compulsively, he smooths his thumb over that surface again, the grooves of the carving catching a little at the pad of his finger.]

Because he'd heard that I was sitting through double potions at the same table with a muggle-born Ravenclaw. By my choice. That's the sort of thing you don't risk.

So there's your answer. All we've got is money, and a name, and our catalogs of peerage and prejudice. Anything else is a betrayal.

From:

jurisimpudent

Was it Quirrell?

[He doesn't look up at Sirius. He just explains his guess:]

He defended you when I had some...unkind words some months back.

[A long moment of silence. Then:]

Why are you different from them?

From:

doggedly

[He smiles, thinly, as he raises his cigarette to his mouth again.]

Then he's not yet learnt his lesson. Slytherins are bastards.

[Himself included. Quirrell, what a useless clod. That's what he'd say now, if he were asked, and he'd be right. There's nothing of first year Sirius in him. The watch weighs down his pocket, exactly the reminder his father meant it to be.

So at Edgeworth's question, he shrugs, sharply.]

I can't be that different. I went along with it, all of these years, didn't I. [But going along with it--that suggests that there was some doubt, somewhere in him. Before even this, there was doubt.]

From:

jurisimpudent

But your intentions are different. Your -

[He raises a hand uncomfortably to his chest, narrowly avoiding some idiotic and nebulous talk about Sirius' heart. He drops his hand a moment later, shaking his head. But not to avoid the topic; just to ask the question yet again, in a different way, anticipating Sirius digging in his heels a bit more.]

You went along with it, but you never believed it. Why not? Who influenced you to think otherwise?

From:

doggedly

[He shrugs, sharply, his expression closed and narrow, as he puts his cigarette to his mouth again.]

Does it matter?

From:

jurisimpudent

No, I'm asking for no reason.

[It's a quiet sort of sarcasm - devoid of anything really scathing, uttered more as a comfort to himself than anything else.]

From:

doggedly

Well, you do like to hear yourself talk.

[He lets the smoke out his nose in a long exhale. It stings, a little, but he doesn't so much as flinch.]

What's your reason, should I ask that instead? [But without waiting for an answer--] My cousin, Andromeda. She's a few years older than us. I don't think you know her.

From:

jurisimpudent

[Edgeworth shakes his head. If he heard the name, he'd guess she was a Black, but only because she keeps to the name scheme; the Purebloods all put such emphasis on who belongs to which family, but for his part, Edgeworth is completely unable to keep all of them straight.]

She...was sympathetic to Muggles?