Euphemia opened the letter the elf gave her and her eyes widened from shock as she read through it.

Mister Potter

You might not know who I am so I won't bother with introductions since it's not as important as what I actually wish to discuss with you.

But you might know my brother Sirius Black from what your son tells you so I'd like to humbly request something from you and I hope you'll be kind enough to do my bidding.

My brother's health declined terribly after having to endure the cruciatus curse five times, He can't come back to our house or else our parents will finish what they started.

My hope is for you to find him and take care of him until he recovers his health.

I couldn't do much for him but I managed to get him out of the house and left him in Durham Village near the train station at the outskirts of rural London.

We might never meet so I'd like to thank you through my letter if you ever decide to help my one and only brother.

R.A.B

Euphemia looked up from the letter and noticed that her son was back in the study.

She never thought she could be so furious at someone who she never even met but here she was wishing to punish Orion and Walburga Black and severely.

She looked up at her son and remembered how much she and Fleamont wished to have him, She couldn't imagine a world without her James and it only fuelled her anger more that Sirius had to go through such a thing at the hands of his own parents.

"Mother? What did the letter say?" James asked interrupting her thoughts.

"James, It seems that you were right your friend does seem to be in grave danger I can't even believe that someone could do such a thing to their child" Euphemia said.

James looked at his feet not knowing what to say.

"Have you known?" His mother asked him.

James didn't look up at his mother but nodded in response to her question.

"I only found out about it just now, His cousin told me about it" James said.

"Alright, Aside from the highly disturbing contents of that letter it also mentioned that your friend is currently staying in a village on the outskirts of London near the train tracks" Euphemia said.

"That's good, I'll go with Remus and Peter and..." James started.

"Honey, You won't be going anywhere I'll go get him myself, I'm a healer so it'll be better if I go" Euphemia said.

"I'm going with you" James insisted.

"James this is final I'll go tell your father and we'll go get your friend you wait here you don't know what might happen to you there if you and your friends go on your own" Euphemia said in a voice that showed authority.

"I don't want to stay here he's my friend and I want to help him" James said.

"I already gave you my answer" His mother said.

Then walked out of the room closing the door behind her.

James noticed that she forgot to take Reg's letter with her so he quickly grabbed it and read through it before writing the location down to make sure he doesn't forget it.

Then he took out the bewitched notebook from his pocket and wrote to his friends asking them to come to his house.

A minute later his friends came out of the fireplace.

"Reg sent me a letter and..." James started.

"See? I told you" Dorcas said interrupting him.

"Fine, Whatever you can have it" Marlene said as she begrudgingly handed Dorcas a golden coin.

"What are you doing?" Remus asked.

"Me and Marlene made a bet over whether Regulus would send James a letter or not and I won" Dorcas said.

"What do you mean?" James asked frowning.

Remus cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck, The others looked equally awkward.

James tilted his head to the side and frowned in confusion.

"Well, Out of everyone here you're the only one he's most likely going to talk to" Marlene explained.

"I don't get it" James said.

"Nevermind them James, What else did you want to tell us" Remus said interrupting the discussion.

"Right, So the letter said that Sirius is in Durham village in rural London we can go after my parents leave" James said.

"How are we going to do that?" Dorcas asked.

"Only two of us will go I'll use my cloak so we can go unnoticed" James said.

"You can use the fireplace at my house" Marlene said.

"At this rate we should go now because I think my parents are going to use it too" James said.

"I'm coming with you" Remus said.

"Alright then Peter you stay here and I'll write to you if I find anything, Remus let's go" James said.

Then the two boys went to the fireplace in the study and used the floo powder to appear in Marlene's house.

Marlene's family were all sitting around the fireplace when the two boys came out of it.

"Who are you kids?" An older man asked.

"Ummm..." James started then nudged Remus's side to get him to answer that question.

"We're Marlene's classmates, I'm Remus Lupin and this is James Potter" Remus said.

"And why did you appear through our fireplace?" A woman asked.

Remus cleared his throat and looked at the floor trying to find an answer to that question.

"We're looking for our friend, He went missing a week and two days ago and we received news that he's here" James said.

The people at the house looked at each other in obvious confusion.

"We don't have anyone at our house with that description and we haven't had any visitors in weeks" One of the men standing in front of James said.

James turned to the window he saw an owl flying into the house carrying a letter.

"That must be it, Think of something Remus we need to get out of here and fast before my parents arrive" James whispered to Remus.

One of Marlene's family members went to get the letter.

"We mean no harm, We only used your fireplace as a means of transportation solely because Marlene told us that you're all gifted with magic and we couldn't possibly do that in a muggle house so can you please let us out so we can look for our friend outside?" Remus asked.

The people who lived in the house seemed to believe what Remus was saying.

"Fine, Whatever as long as you don't cause trouble" A man sitting in front of Remus said.

Then the two boys were allowed to leave the house.

James took out his invisibility cloak and wrapped it around himself and Remus then they both started walking.

"Regulus couldn't have left him in a muggle occupied house so we should look for abandoned houses" Remus said.

"Alright I'll use my animagus and you can have the cloak let's split" James said.

Remus nodded and watched as James changed into a stag then put his friend's clothes in his pocket before using the cloak to walk around without being noticed.

James went to look North so Remus walked in the opposite direction.

After a few hours another sunset was happening and they still couldn't find anything useful.

James's parents were also looking around the village but it also seemed futile from what Remus could see.

Remus went to another abandoned house he could see and walked in carefully.

Like all the abandoned houses the place was reeking with mold but Remus could make out a different smell it was the smell of seawater mixed with an expensive laundry detergent and a forest like smell like eucalyptus.

The eucalyptus perfume James gave Sirius as a present on his birthday.

There was also another sickeningly dry, Sweet metallic scent in the air that made Remus's senses perk up.

He looked around the place and saw blood on the floor, The sight of the blood made his own blood run cold as he felt a chill run down his spine.

He knelt down to inspect it and realised that it belonged to Sirius.

He stood up slowly and walked over to the door but didn't leave the house, Instead of doing so he sat down on the doorstep and hugged his knees not caring whether James's parents see him or not.

James seemed to notice him first though so he ran over to him.

Remus looked up at the stag and stood up slowly before walking back inside the house so James followed him.

"Why didn't you tell us that Sirius was injured?" Remus asked.

James returned to his human form.

"Can you pass me my clothes first before I can answer your question?" James asked.

Remus gave James his clothes and James started putting them on.

"I didn't tell you because I didn't want you guys to be worried" James said.

"Well, We're worried anyway so what did keeping that secret change?" Remus asked angrily.

James looked at the wall and tweaked his ear in obvious  discomfort.

"I don't know" James said sullenly.

Remus nodded to himself.

"This is his blood, Since it came to this I suppose I should know what else you're hiding" Remus said.

James sighed and nodded then turned his attention back to Remus.

"His parents used the cruciatus on him, They wanted him to join the death eaters but he refused so they tortured him that's all I know" James said.

"Is that why your parents decided to take the matter into their own hands?" Remus asked.

"Yes, I suppose so" James said.

Remus nodded and rubbed the back of his neck.

"I can follow his scent but I can't promise if it'll be of much help" Remus said.

"That would be helpful for now" James said.

The two boys walked out of the house under the cloak and Remus started tracking down the scent but there were too many smells in the air.

"It has been a few days since Sirius was here I can't track his scent that easily" Remus said.

"Can you try at least?" James asked.

Remus focused but it was still difficult for him to find anything.

He could smell blood from a distance though so he grabbed James's forearm to stop him from walking away.

"There's the smell of blood on the grass" Remus said.

Then the two boys followed it to the train tracks.

"Bloody hell, Did he board the train?" James asked.

"It appears so" Remus answered.

The blood and eucalyptus scents both stopped near the train tracks so it was the only theory Remus could come up with.

"This is bad, Really bad" James said.

"Let's go back we can't do anything more at this point we'll just..." Remus started.

But stopped talking when he noticed that James was looking at the train.

"James?" Remus asked.

"Sirius has an uncle who lives in Edinburgh" James said.

Remus's eyes widened when he realised what his friend was thinking.

"You're not possibly thinking about..." Remus started.

The train appeared in their line of sight as it sped up their way.

"James, Don't" Remus said in an attempt to stop his friend from doing it.

"Too bad, You know I'm not going to listen to you anyway" James said.

The train got even closer to them so James turned to look at his friend briefly and smiled mischievously before grabbing the iron pole of the train door and jumped into the last compartment of the train.

Remus facepalmed.

"Blimey what am I supposed to do now?" He asked himself.

James landed on the train floor with a heavy thud then stood up slowly and covered himself with his invisibility cloak.

He's going to find Sirius no matter what and he's going to bring him back to Hogwarts.

•☆☆☆•

Sirius opened his eyes to the feeling of something warm.

He howled in pain and turned his head to the side but his vision was still blurry from fatigue so he couldn't see who it was.

It was a man though, He could tell as much from the feeling of his hand on his body.

Alphard noticed that the hound opened its eyes but closed it again soon after so he guessed that it must be still too weak.

He noticed an injury on its head so he started treating it as well.

The hound opened its eyes again and looked at him so Alphard moved closer to its line of vision and smiled.

"Don't worry little one, I mean no harm" Alphard said.

The hound looked at him for what felt like a minute then put its hand out for him to take.

Alphard took the dog's hand and patted it lightly hoping that it'll help with soothing it.

He was well aware that it wasn't actually a dog but a human with magic but he supposed that the person whoever they were couldn't return to their true form for some reason.

He hoped that tending to it will help retain its normal form so he did his work the best he could.

"I'll help you I promise" Alphard said.

He stood up and closed the doors and windows before letting the blinders down then took out his wand and started performing some healing spells.

Sirius closed his eyes after that so Alphard went to his cauldron and made a few potions then made Sirius drink them.

His nephew fell asleep after that and Alphard changed his bandages.

"Some of these will definitely leave scars" Alphard said to himself as he examined the slowly healing wounds on Sirius's torso.

After he was done with healing the cuts he started looking for other injuries and luckily he couldn't find any.

The healing spells and the potions he used on the hound would most definitely be enough to heal any internal bleeding and fractures so he decided to work on cleaning the dog up a bit.

He brought over two buckets of warm water and started cleaning it thoroughly.

After sometime of working the grey and snow colored fur changed into a lustrous black color.

Then Alphard let it sleep and went to prepare his dinner.

•☆☆☆•

Regulus was still confined to his room even though it has been a week and two days since he helped his brother escape.

Kreacher came to visit him in his room everyday and Regulus used the elf in several tasks.

But he never managed to find anything new about his brother except for the fact that Sirius was no longer in Dulwich village where he left him.

It confused Regulus to no end, He left him feverish and suffering from the aftermath of torture so he didn't know how his older brother managed to move and leave the place.

It didn't settle his concerns though it made it worse since he didn't know if his brother recovered or not.

He got an idea that he hoped would be helpful in the current situation.

"Kreacher, I want you to send a letter to my uncle Alphard in Edinburgh I'll write down the address use your apparition magic, Make sure to get a letter from him in return do you understand?" He asked the elf.

"As you wish young master" Kreacher said.

Regulus walked over to his desk and started writing a letter to his uncle then gave it to the elf as soon as he was done.

"Now go" Regulus said.

The elf disappeared from his sight.

He walked over to his desk once again and started writing another letter.

There was a knock on the door of his room so he walked over to it.

"Reggie, It's me" Andromeda said.

"Andy, I need your help there's a letter that I want you to give to Remus Lupin" Regulus said.

"You're going to get yourself an even bigger punishment if you don't stop" Another voice said.

"Sissy stop being such a killjoy besides aren't you worried about Sirius at all?" Andromeda asked.

"I'm worried but..." Narccissa started.

"Then be quiet and listen to him or just leave and don't tattle on us" Andromeda said.

"You're as reckless as a..." Narccissa started.

But Regulus was quickly losing his patience with his two cousins especially since he was being punished and if they get caught the entire plan will be exposed.

"You two stop talking and listen to me we don't want to get caught" Regulus said in a sharp deadpanning whisper.

"Right sorry" Narccissa apologised.

"I want you to take that letter to Remus Lupin" Regulus said again.

Then passed the letter to them from under the door and Andromeda took it.

"We're going now" Andromeda said.

"Alright" Regulus said.

The school year starts tomorrow so Regulus has only one day left of his punishment.

He went back to his bed and closed the bewitched chains around his wrists again.

Hopefully his parents won't know.

•☆☆☆•

The next day Remus was packing his stuff for school.

His parents offered to give him a ride to the train station so he was currently in their car.

"Don't worry honey I'm sure Effie and her husband will find Sirius" His mother said.

"It's not just Sirius now, It's Sirius and James" Remus said.

He remembered how furious James's parents were when they found out that he fled to Edinburgh on his own and without telling anyone about it.

They promised a big punishment in the howling letter they sent their son but Remus knew that it was all an act to cover up their worry.

Remus's father started the engine of his car but suddenly cursed causing Remus to look at the front of the car.

There were two girls standing in front of the car, He recognised one of them as his Slytherin school mate Narccissa Black but he didn't recognise the other one.

"Are you two insane? You can't just stand in front of a car like that you're lucky I wasn't driving yet" He heard his father say to the girls as soon as he got off the car.

Remus got off when he noticed that Narccissa was looking at him.

"Is something the matter?" He asked frowning as soon as he stopped in front of Narccissa.

"I have a letter for you from Regulus, His parents I mean uncle and auntie are personally taking him to school themselves so he couldn't come, We shouldn't be here too so I just came to give it to you before going back to my family" Narccissa said.

Remus nodded and put his hand out so Narccissa gave him the letter.

Then she took the other girl's hand and they apparated.

Remus opened the letter and read it.

Remus

I already know that it was a mistake to leave my brother there untended, But he seems to be in good health considering that he left or at least I hope so.

Anyway I think that you should know that our uncle Alphard lives in Edinburgh Stutton Street in the third villa from the left to Devon bakery store.

R.A.B

Remus took out his bewitched notebook and wrote the address hoping that James will take notice.

•☆☆☆•

James looked at his watch and groaned in annoyance when he found out that he has two hours before the Hogwarts train arrives to get him.

He had a howling letter from his parents and he still couldn't find Sirius in the big city of Edinburgh.

"Just perfect" He said.

He took out his notebook and noticed that Remus wrote him a note.

Alphard Black's address is the third villa from Devon bakery store in Stutton street.

"Truly perfect" James said smiling to himself.