October brought cold mornings to Hogwarts. Mist clung to the grounds until late afternoon, and the air smelled of wet stone and woodsmoke.
Inside the castle, things felt… normal.
Classes were steady, Quidditch practices relentless, and Lockhart was more insufferable than ever, now lecturing about "the virtue of poise during peril."
Harry had learned to tune him out entirely.
But beneath the laughter and the chatter, he was listening — always listening.
Pettigrew was careful, but not perfect.
There were moments when the magic slipped: when Scabbers's eyes darted too intelligently, when he twitched before loud noises, when Harry's attunement caught that flicker of human thought behind an animal's simplicity.
Each time, Harry would mark it — a pulse in his memory, a node in a growing web of proof.
He had waited long enough.
⸻
It was Hermione's idea, though she didn't know it.
Defence Against the Dark Arts had become a farce. Lockhart's teaching was useless — all theory, no technique. So when Hermione suggested diasappointedly to Ron that they practice "real defensive tactics" in an empty classroom after hours, Harry offered to supervise, "just to make sure no one ends up hexing themselves into the hospital wing."
Ron brought his wand and — of course — Scabbers, who clung to his shoulder like a limp gray badge.
Hermione charmed the classroom door locked. The desks had been cleared, and candles floated above them, casting warm light over the dust and old spellwork stains on the floor.
"All right," Harry said calmly, stepping into the center. "We'll practice basic disarms and counter-jinxes. No showing off — precision matters more than power."
Hermione looked excited. Ron looked vaguely terrified.
Scabbers twitched.
⸻
Harry demonstrated slowly — wand in hand, posture balanced, movements measured.
"Magic isn't just motion and sound," he said, echoing his parents' old notes. "It's intent. Most of you focus on what you want the spell to do. Instead, focus on why. A spell cast without purpose is like an arrow without a target."
He aimed his wand at a candle flame and murmured, "Expelliarmus."
The candle's light flickered, then steadied — untouched.
Hermione frowned. "You didn't disarm anything."
Harry smiled. "Didn't need to. I wanted to control the outcome — not win."
Ron muttered, "Brilliant. Philosophical dueling. Next you'll tell the flame to apologize."
Harry rolled his eyes. "Fine. You try."
Ron pointed his wand at Harry. "Expelliarmus!"
The spell missed and hit a desk instead, which flew backward with a bang. Scabbers let out a terrified squeak and darted off Ron's shoulder, racing across the floor toward the wall.
"Scabbers!" Ron groaned. "He's gone mental again—"
"Wait."
Harry's tone cut through the noise like a blade.
The rat froze mid-scurry. Its tiny body trembled, fur bristling.
Harry could feel the wrongness blooming — the pressure of a soul trying not to exist.
"Don't move," he said quietly.
Hermione blinked. "Harry?"
His eyes never left Scabbers. "Hermione, lock the door again. Ron — step back."
The candles flickered. The air felt heavier, charged.
Something unseen pressed against the walls — the castle itself watching, waiting.
Harry crouched slowly, wand steady. "You've hidden long enough, haven't you?"
A hiss escaped Harry's lips. "I can feel you," he whispered. "Drop the disguise."
Nothing.
The creature only hunched lower, pressing its body into the flagstones as though it could sink through them.
Harry's magic flared. "Finite Animagia."
The rat's form convulsed — bones bending, cracking — but the transformation held. Scabbers gave a shrill, furious screech, and Harry felt the counter-force of a desperate will push back against his spell.
"Stop it!" Ron shouted. "You're killing him!"
Harry's expression didn't change. "He's already dead. He just hasn't admitted it yet."
Hermione gasped. "Harry— it's resisting—!"
"I know." His tone was grim now, controlled fury sharpening every word. "You've hidden long enough."
He stepped closer, eyes locked on the trembling animal.
"Do you really think," he said softly, "that you can fool me?"
For the briefest heartbeat, the rat looked almost offended — and then it attacked.
A burst of raw, distorted energy erupted from its body, slamming into Harry's shield with a sharp, metallic crack.
Ron yelped and stumbled backward. Hermione's wand flicked up to reinforce the barrier.
Harry didn't retreat. He planted his boots, raised his free hand, and let his voice fall into the rhythm of old power — measured, absolute.
"By truth revealed and shape betrayed," he said, each word a pulse of will, "I strip the false from what you've made."
The room shook. The rat shrieked, twisting violently, its form blurring, elongating — half-man, half-beast.
One last, ragged scream tore through the air. Light burst from the creature's body — white and green — and when it faded, a man lay gasping on the stone floor.
⸻
Peter Pettigrew was even smaller than Harry remembered.
His hair clung in greasy patches to his skull. His skin was gray with fear and guilt.
He blinked, disoriented — then, seeing Harry's wand, began to crawl backward.
"You—" he croaked, voice cracking into disbelief. "You're just a boy! How— how did you—"
Harry stepped forward, wand still raised but steady as iron. "Because I'm not the same boy you left alive."
Pettigrew tried to summon a sneer, but fear curdled it. "You can't know— you can't see me like this— it's not possible—"
"It is when you've run out of places to hide."
He raised his wand slightly, and Pettigrew flinched as though struck.
"You hid behind friendship once," Harry said. "Behind a name, behind fur, behind a lie. But you forgot — lies rot from the inside."
The man's trembling turned to shaking sobs, then to sudden, trembling rage. "You don't understand what it was like!" he screamed. "He would have killed me— he will kill me—"
"You murdered them," Harry said, his voice trembling not with anger but grief. "You gave them to him. You killed my parents. You framed Sirius."
Hermione covered her mouth with a shaking hand. "Harry, he— he was a rat. How—"
"Animagus," Harry said flatly. "A coward who traded his soul for survival."
Ron's face had gone chalk-white. "That thing— that man— he's been in my house— in my bed—" His voice broke into a sound somewhere between rage and disgust.
Pettigrew whimpered, "Please, I didn't— it wasn't me, I had to— he'd have—"
"Don't," Harry said softly. His wand didn't waver. "You always had a choice. Everyone did."
The magic in the room felt alive, almost sentient — old wards humming through the stones. Hogwarts itself seemed to recoil from the man who had once betrayed it.
⸻
The air shifted — a faint gust that carried power and light.
And then Dumbledore was there.
His presence filled the room like sudden gravity — calm and immense, but the calm of a storm's center, not its end.
He took one look at Pettigrew, then at Harry, and his expression — usually kind, patient, endlessly composed — broke.
The light in his eyes hardened. "Peter Pettigrew," he said softly. "Alive."
Pettigrew collapsed into incoherent sobs. "Headmaster, I—I never wanted them dead! I was forced— the Dark Lord— he—"
"Silence."
The single word thundered through the air, vibrating in the bones of everyone present.
Dumbledore rarely raised his voice. But fury — real, righteous fury — burned beneath that single word.
"You," he said, stepping closer, "stood at Lily Potter's wedding. You held her child. You swore yourself their friend. And for what? Fear?"
Pettigrew's lip quivered. "He— he would have killed me—"
"And so you killed them instead."
The room felt smaller now, the candles guttering in the weight of his anger.
For a moment, Dumbledore was not the genial headmaster. He was the wizard who had once faced Grindelwald — and won.
⸻
The door slammed open. Snape strode in, wand drawn, robes snapping behind him. McGonagall followed a heartbeat later, breathless.
"What is—" Snape began — and stopped.
His gaze fell on Pettigrew. Recognition struck like lightning. His face went ashen, then twisted — not with contempt, but with pain so sharp it bordered on madness.
"You," he whispered. "You."
Pettigrew shrank under his glare. "S-Severus—"
Snape's voice broke into a snarl. "Don't you say my name!"
He was shaking. Years of control cracked open in an instant. "It was you. You were the one. All these years, I thought—" His breath hitched. "Lily… she— she trusted you."
Dumbledore placed a hand on Snape's arm, steady but firm. "Severus."
Snape wrenched free, eyes burning. "You let him live! He hid among children while we— while she—"
"Enough."
The word came from Harry this time, quiet but commanding.
Everyone froze.
Harry's eyes were steady, not cruel but impossibly cold. "He's not worth it."
Snape stared at him — and in that moment, something shifted. Anger collapsed into exhaustion. He turned away, jaw tight, shoulders trembling.
Pettigrew began to cry again, a small, pitiful sound that no one pitied.
McGonagall conjured bindings that glowed faintly silver, wrapping around Pettigrew's wrists. He didn't resist.
His eyes darted to Harry, pleading. "You don't understand— he'll come back— he'll kill us all—"
Harry's voice was quiet. "Then you'll be there to answer for it."
Dumbledore straightened, his fury cooled into solemn purpose. "Peter Pettigrew," he said, "you will stand before the Ministry of Magic and account for your crimes. The truth will no longer hide in fur or shadow."
Pettigrew whimpered, bound and trembling.
Dumbledore looked at Harry then — the anger in him tempered now by sorrow. "You've done what we should have done years ago," he said softly. "But I wish to Merlin you'd never had to."
Harry nodded once. "So do I."
Hours later, silence filled Gryffindor Tower.
Hermione sat by the fire, staring into the flames. "I can't believe it," she whispered. "He was right there all along."
Ron sat beside her, pale and hollow-eyed. "That thing… slept in my bed."
Harry didn't answer. He stood by the window, watching the dawn creep over the mountains.
Below, owls were already carrying Dumbledore's letters toward the Ministry.
He didn't know if they would listen.
But it didn't matter.
He had seen justice breathe again — not vengeance, not anger, but truth.
And when he finally spoke, it was only a whisper.
"Sleep easy, Sirius. I'm fixing it."