"In restless dreams, I walked alone,

Narrow streets of cobblestone.

'Neath the halo of a street lamp,

I turned my collar to the cold and damp.

When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light...

That split the night,

And touched the sound of silence."

The Sound of Silence.

His hand shook as he pulled on the cigarette between his lips, the glowing embers were the only light beyond the stars that fought the darkness of the night. The dressing wrapped around his arm was dirty where it wrapped around the heel of his hand. He had been released from St Mungos three days ago and now that the potions were leaving his system he couldn't sleep. Six broken ribs. A ruptured spleen. A punctured diaphragm. Third degree burns to his left arm. Brain swelling. His cousin had almost murdered him.

Sirius stared out into the inky black night from the wicker sofa on the Potters back porch. When he thought back to that moment before something in his family magic had intervened, Sirius could remember the murderous intent on Bella's face. She had wanted him dead with a passion and a hunger that he could not understand. They had wanted him to kneel. To submit. To do the one thing as the Black heir it had been bred in him never to do, to be subservient to their Dark Lord.

Who would have guessed that with every other way that he had rebelled his from his family and their expectations that stubborn pride would have been the thing to stick. Toujours Pur. Always pure. His family words, they were engraved on the signet ring on his left index finger that no matter how much he tried he could not take off. A gaudy black diamond embossed with their crest, which dated back hundreds of years and was the finest goblin made jewellery. Only the heir, the male heir of the Black family could wear it, as it was his birthright. And Bella, Bella had tried to cut off his hand to take it from him.

It was then the family magic kicked in, it seemed you could beat the heir, torture him even. But dare try and to claim his place and for that travesty, the blood magic of House Black had attacked everyone else in the family in his mother's parlour that day. Everyone there of his blood had fallen to the ground screaming. Bella had even turned blue and began tearing at her throat trying to breathe. He had felt his Fathers magic then, although how that was possible he was not sure as he was well aware that Orion had been out of the country with his latest mistress. His Fathers magic had transported him to St Mungos where he had promptly collapsed and caused several women in the waiting room to scream in terror at the sight of him.

Something in the way they had screamed and how the Potter's had hovered over him when he had awoken some days later had him refusing to even contemplate looking in a mirror. His left arm would heal they told him, but the scorch mark on his inner arm would leave a port stain scar. His bones had been mended but were still causing him pain and the potions that they had him on tasted so foul, that he was convinced that the healers had replaced at least one of them with goblin piss.

Dorea Potter, James' Mum had informed him that his Father was "dealing" with his family and had requested Dorea take care of his son and heir until he got to the source of the violence in his family. And so here he was, sat in their back garden staring into the embers of his pilfered cigarette and brooding over whether he was now the ugliest fuck in the Gryffindor tower and what exactly had possessed his family to try and kill him. Oh, he knew his mother despised him, she had done for as long as he could remember. He was not the son that she had envisioned herself having and when he had been sorted into Gryffindor that had been the final nail in the coffin of any affection the woman may have ever held for him.

Sirius was too much like his father. He had the same piercing silver eyes, aristocratic features just a shade too handsome to be thought of as stiff as some pureblood families appeared. He didn't have the pinched look on his face that seemed to say "Can I smell shit?" when he looked at people. He had an easy charm that made people like him and an explosive temper that rivalled Orions own. No one would ever doubt that he was his father's son, he was far too much like him, and that was one of the reasons that Walburga, his mother, had hated him. Sirius knew that he was one of the few things in this world that his father truly loved, an affection that his mother had never been bestowed.

Their relationship had been forced on Orion, as a debt that his father Arcturus had owed his cousin Pollux had allowed Pollux to force the union. And so Orion had wed Walburga but had never been in love. Sirius sometimes wondered if Walburga had been in love with the idea of Orion but when she realised that he would never love her with even part of the easy affection he had for his sons, she had blamed Sirius for being his heir and clung his brother Regulus all the closer to her. She loved Regulus with the same fierceness that she had hated Sirius and deep down, Sirius hated himself for envying his brother that affection.

He had never really known a mothers love. Oh Dorea doted on him, she had wanted a house full of children but the fates had only ever blessed her with James and she loved him with everything she had. But Sirius could see that she yearned for more children that she would never have and so to spite his own mother and to delight Dorea he had taken to calling her his Ma. It had amused Charlus, her husband and had driven his own mother into a fury when she learned that he behaved as a better son to the family blood traitor than he ever had for her. Sirius would have probably resisted the urge had Walburga loved him even a little, but she never had as far as he could remember. He was the heir, Orions child and therefore she could never truly have him to herself the way she did Regulus.

Sirius sighed into the night air and reached across the wicker sofa to the reason he had come out here alone in the dead of night. It hurt to move, but Sirius refused to be deterred. He needed to know just how much damage had been done to his hands, to his voice from all the screaming that had ripped his vocal cords as Bella had tried to break him to her will. He adjusted the beaten up guitar in his lap and winched at the pain in his ribs as he moved, but he would not be deterred.

With cautious fingers, he began to pluck the soft cords that evoked a haunting melody as he sang softly. "Hello, darkness, my old friend, I've come to talk with you again. Because a vision softly creeping, Left its seeds while I was sleeping.." His voice rasped as he sang, the overuse of his vocal cords making him sound older than his seventeen years. The song was a muggle song he had heard in a record store in London when he was younger. His Uncle Alphard had frequently whisked him away from Grimmauld Place to rescue him from his family and his uncle had a thing for muggles. He was fascinated by them and would often bring Sirius with him to museums and concerts broadening Sirius' young mind with the possibilities that as a Pureblood family heir he was never meant to know. It was taboo and Sirius had taken to it like a duck to water.

His left hand sent spikes of pain along his arm making him wince as he played but he refused to stop. He would endure this, he had to endure this. He refused to let Bella and his family take away one of the few joys he truly had in his life, he'd rather be dead than be so defeated. And so he played, each note plucked from the guitar like threads from his battered soul, his voice growing stronger as he sang until his lost himself to the pain in his soul and the freedom that singing gave him when nothing else could. "And in the naked light I saw, Ten thousand people, maybe more. People talking without speaking. People hearing without listening. People writing songs that voices never share, And no one dared, Disturb the sound of silence. 'Fools,' said I, 'You do not know. Silence, like a cancer, grows. Hear my words that I might teach you, Take my arms that I might reach you.' But my words like silent raindrops fell. And echoed in the wells of silence."

Sirius wasn't quite sure when James appeared next to him, only that between one moment and the next he went from being alone in his misery to feeling like he was almost whole again. James had always had that effect on Sirius, they had met on the train to Hogwarts on the first day of school and had been inseparable since. If one of them was in trouble the other was either with them and laughing or working on a way to rescue them before they could be caught. Remus had once remarked that he and James might well be soul mates, that such a bond is not always a romantic one, but simply a kinship that defied normal convention or reason. Sirius thought that Remus had taken a divination a little too seriously if he truly he believed such bullshit but he did not deny that he was closer to James than any other person he knew, not even his own brother.

James interrupted when Sirius paused for a breath. "That is a depressing fucking dirge your wailing there Pads, want me to call for a fainting couch so you can complete the dramatics and feint like a proper waif in need of rescue?"

And then there were times that Sirius wondered how he hadn't taken a bludgers bat to the sarcastic tosser just to shut him up. "Fuck off, Prongs. You'd give your left nut to be able to sing like this. Maybe then Evans would give you a shot in hell instead of a visit from her fist to your face."

"Ooh, he's testy when he's pitying himself. Whatcha think, Moony, should we trade his arse in for a less pathetic model. I mean he's worse than you right now after a full moon". James spread out on his half of the couch as Remus came to sit with his back resting on the space between James and Sirius.

"Moony, any chance I can skip the full moon this month in the hopes that you finally get the venison steak you've been hungering for. I think it's time Bambi got put back on the werewolf's menu." Sirius groused, even as he stopped playing and turned to look at his friends.

"Fuck you, Padfoot," James said without any real venom.

"Dream on, Prongs, we all know the real reason you can't make a move with Evans is 'cause your secretly hoping you have a shot with me." He smirked, wincing a little as the movement reopened his split lip "It's a burden being this sexy".

Remus, ever the mediator simply pushed James back in his seat and pressed a potion into Sirius' hand. "Drink, you'll feel better."

"You drink it, Moony. tastes like goblin piss" Sirius groused even as he took the potion being forced into his hand as Remus took on his role of nurse once more. A role that he had taken to with a fierceness that even had Dorea giving way when Remus thought he knew best.

"Have a lot of experience with goblin piss, Pads?" James quipped, earning him a stinging hex from Sirius and an eye roll from Remus.

Sirius ignored him and tried to push Remus away when he began reaching from the dressing over Sirius's hand. Remus growled and his eyes glowed amber but Sirius had had enough of feeling fucking helpless. "Get fucking off me. That's it, no more of this coddling bullshit. I can't stand it so just fucking stop." He went to stand but before he could James was blocking his path, halting his exit because he knew Sirius did not have the strength to go through him.

"Get over your fucking self, mate. You almost fucking died. They starved you, tortured you for weeks. We couldn't reach you, and then we get an owl in the middle of the fucking night from Mary McDonald saying you just appeared in St Mungos and shes pretty certain you're going to die. You spent a week in a coma from blood loss and trauma, almost lost a hand, almost lost your mind from what the healers said and you think we ain't gonna hover. Fuck you and that Black family pride bullshit you've been sniffing." James' face was mottled red with the rage Sirius knew his friend had been bottling, a rage that he was finally letting explode.

"I thought you were fucking dead. I thought my best mate was going to die in that hospital bed and I swear to Merlin himself if you ever tell me to stop caring about you again I will personally gut you myself. You are my family. You, me, Remus and Pete are fucking brothers, and yes Moony talks some star crossed bullshit 'bout me and you but fuck you he might be right. 'Cause I wanted to fucking die to if you didn't pull through. I'm not perfect, I'm an arrogant tosser at the best of times but I fucking love you like you are the brother I never had so man the fuck up and accept that some people in this world actually give a shit if you live. You guys, and my folks, that's all I've got in this world so fuck you and almost dying on me you selfish son of an evil bitch."

James was shaking with rage when he stopped, his finger trying to poke a hole through Sirius' chest as he prodded him over and over as he talked. Just when Sirius was going to angrily snarl a retort at James, Remus cut in before he could. "No one told me." He murmured. His voice was deceptively soft, but the glowing amber eyes let you know that it was Moony in control right then, nor Remus. "No one told me to go to the hospital, but Moony had been raging inside me for days and I was restless so I went for a walk. A walk Sirius. I walked from Luton, thirty miles into London and didn't stop until I was by your hospital bed. I was there before anyone else was. I was there before your father got there, there before Prongs and his parents arrived. Moony knew. He knew you, his pack, my family was in danger and the moment he could, he seized control and walked me, my body to your hospital side and I watched as they painstakingly fought to keep you alive as they put you back together.

"Your Dad, by the way, almost had to be sedated after he saw you. He stunned three Aurors who dragged him from your side to question him before the healers could calm him down. That man was broken when he saw you, we all fucking were. So pity yourself, but fucking don't shut us out. We're all we fucking have in this world, so accept that people love you and would be devastated if you died and let us fucking help you."

When Sirius did not say anything but looked between the other two marauders helplessly as though uncertain how to react, Remus simply took his hand and began checking the wound has he had been before, leaving a heavy silence to fester in the air. When Sirius couldn't handle it anymore he broke it "My Dad?" he questioned and James blew out a heavy breath as they all sat together again.

"I thought my Mum was scary, fuck me, your Dad could looked like he was ready to commit mass murder when he saw you…" but as James spoke Sirius hated the voice inside him that asked why Orion had not been there when he had awoken.