"Tver, I saw it…"
Lupin suddenly rushed into the office, a thick sheet of parchment clutched tightly in his hand.
"Uh… what's going on here?"
He stared at Tver and Malfoy, who were chatting and laughing as they ate small cakes and drank pumpkin juice.
Even the dull thumping sounds coming from the trunk nearby didn't feel as strange as this scene.
"Want some? We didn't have dinner," Tver said, holding up a half-eaten cauldron cake, a few very noticeable crumbs still stuck to the corner of his mouth.
It was the first time Lupin had ever seen him this… unrestrained.
"It's already past nine. You're eating cake at this hour? You might as well go to the kitchen and get something proper," Lupin said, his gaze dimming as memories of late-night wanderings at Hogwarts surfaced.
"Right, Draco, are you still hungry? Want me to make a trip to the kitchen?" Tver asked casually, swallowing the last bite of cake.
"No need," Draco said quickly, finishing the last of his pumpkin juice. "I'm heading back to the dormitory anyway."
He wiped his mouth roughly, stood up, and turned to leave.
"Good night, Professor. Um… Professor Lupin too."
Lupin watched Malfoy's sudden friendliness with confusion. Even after sitting down, he still hadn't quite processed it.
"Like Percy and Neville, Draco's been studying magic with me recently," Tver said as he poured Lupin a cup of tea.
Lupin nodded in understanding.
He had seen Neville and the others attending private lessons before. What surprised him was the addition of a Malfoy, especially one whose father had once been a Death Eater.
Still, no matter how much he disliked Lucius, he wouldn't vent that resentment on Draco, nor would he show bias against Slytherin in class.
"You're quite close with the Malfoy family?" Lupin asked.
Tver tidied up absentmindedly. "Of course. Pure-blood families always have some degree of kinship."
Lupin frowned slightly, his grip on the parchment tightening.
"Lucius was a Death Eater."
"And have you ever considered this," Tver said calmly as he set his cup down, a faintly scrutinizing look flashing in his eyes, "if Voldemort were to return, and the Death Eaters around him were all our… partners, would so many people still need to be sacrificed?"
Lupin froze, momentarily lost in the image Tver painted.
"Wait. Voldemort's return? How did you come to that conclusion?"
"Dumbledore has been tracking Voldemort for years. The only thing he's been able to confirm is that Voldemort never died."
"And it's very possible that he'll return in the near future."
Tver deliberately softened his expression, easing the tension in the office.
Lupin, however, grew even more serious.
"So Dumbledore wants me to reach out to werewolves to prevent them from joining Voldemort's side?"
"Ahem," Tver choked slightly. "…You could put it that way."
"No wonder you've been working so hard on the bracelets and helping werewolves find jobs. Come to think of it, that really is a good thing for them," Lupin said, sighing as he set the parchment down.
"Let's not get into that," Tver said quickly, changing the subject before Lupin made him any more uncomfortable.
"It's so late. What brought you here? Is it related to that?"
He gestured toward the parchment, which carried faint magical fluctuations, clearly some kind of enchanted item.
It looked very much like a map.
"This is a map of the school," Lupin said, spreading the parchment out and revealing the intricate lines drawn across it.
Compared to Tver's magic-point map, this one had a far more elaborate style, with names decorated by flourishes and embellishments.
What truly set it apart, though, was that it could display the names of everyone who entered Hogwarts, something the magic-point map couldn't do.
Even Tver wasn't sure what kind of magic had been used to achieve that effect.
It was likely something provided by Black or James, some old magic passed down and preserved within their families.
"It shows every corner of the castle, along with everyone's name."
Lupin pointed to the name "Remus Lupin" on the parchment.
"Of course, I didn't see your name. You're the only one like that."
At first, Lupin had been genuinely shocked. As one of the map's creators, he knew exactly how much magic they had poured into it. They had used every spell they could think of. Even Dumbledore couldn't detect its workings.
But considering Tver's strength, pulling something like this off wasn't impossible.
Tver didn't explain. He simply raised an eyebrow and smiled faintly.
Even without knowing the exact principles behind the Marauder's Map, it didn't stop him from using name-based magic to hide himself.
"So?" he said casually. "Honestly, this map is pretty convenient for keeping an eye on the castle."
In a sense, it was even more useful than the Resurrection Stone.
"Do you know whose name I saw on it?" Lupin's expression turned serious as he got to the point.
"Who? Black?"
"No. Peter Pettigrew." His voice carried a disbelief even he couldn't quite suppress.
"I was a bit curious tonight. I wasn't trying to spy on anyone. I just wanted to look at the castle's secret passages."
"You know Sirius knows those passages too."
"But I saw someone who should have been dead, walking around the castle. Alive."
"Even though he went back and forth several times, even though his name sometimes overlapped with students, I saw it clearly."
"It was Peter Pettigrew."
Lupin's expression shifted constantly, his eyes flickering as he stared at the parchment, his mind racing.
What happened back then was definitely not that simple.
But what exactly was Wormtail trying to do?
That part still didn't make sense to him.
Tver finally showed a hint of interest. This matter was clearly approaching its conclusion.
"Do you know what kind of person is afraid of good people?"
Afraid of good people? Was he talking about Wormtail?
Lupin froze, saying nothing.
Tver didn't wait for him to answer.
"Bad people. Assuming you didn't see wrong, and the map didn't make a mistake, then if Peter had nothing to hide, why would he be sneaking around?"
"The map never makes mistakes," Lupin said firmly, immediately understanding what Tver was getting at.
"You mean… Wormtail was very likely the one who betrayed us back then?!"
Tver simply shrugged, neither confirming nor denying it.
Lupin was naturally cautious and sensitive. If Tver tried to fool him with prophecies or outright claims, it would only make him more guarded.
Hints like this were better delivered indirectly.
"Then what role did Sirius play in all this… wait!"
A sudden flash of insight struck Lupin.
"Wormtail's Animagus form is a rat. He was probably hiding in Gryffindor Tower, and Sirius went there to find him!"
"If—just if—Sirius and the others were betrayed by Wormtail, and everything was orchestrated by him, that possibility isn't impossible."
"But the problem is…"
"The problem is, we need to find at least one of them," Tver said, pulling out a newspaper he had prepared long ago.
"This is something a friend of mine at the Ministry told me. Apparently, Black saw this very newspaper before he escaped."
Lupin's attention snapped instantly to the rat in Ron's hands.
"That's right," he said softly. "That's Peter Pettigrew."
...
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