"Severus, what are you doing?!" Snape's sudden action surprised Professor McGonagall.
She hurried over to Peter and saw that he had his head drooped weakly and had fallen into a drowsy state.
"Severus, what did you feed Peter?" Professor McGonagall grabbed Snape's sleeve tightly and pursed her lips sternly, "I know you had a lot of conflicts with James and others at that time, but now it has been more than ten years!"
"Severus, there's really no need for you to hold a grudge to this extent..."
"There's no need to worry about him. It's just a little bit of truth serum." Snape's eyes were still fixed on the drowsy Peter, and he said stiffly, "I hope that what was poured into his mouth was not truth serum, but poison made from mandrake juice."
"What exactly are you doubting about?" Professor McGonagall frowned tightly.
At this moment, Dumbledore, who had been silent all this time, suddenly interrupted Professor McGonagall.
"Let Severus go first, Minerva, I told him to do this," he said.
"Albus?" Professor McGonagall turned her head and looked at the sofa where Dumbledore was sitting, and asked in surprise, "Why did you do this?"
"I just want to confirm some things." Dumbledore shook his head gently at her, "Don't be too impulsive, Minerva. Many things you see are not necessarily the truth."
Professor McGonagall looked at him doubtfully, but finally decided that her trust in Dumbledore was much stronger than the emotion she felt for her former student.
So she loosened her grip on Snape's sleeve and took two steps slightly to the side.
Snape never relaxed his gaze on Peter from beginning to end. His eyes gradually became bloodshot and his eye sockets turned red.
"Tell me, twelve years ago... who betrayed Lily, and who betrayed that arrogant idiot Potter!" He forced his tone to be calm, but his words were obviously trembling.
Everyone present turned their eyes to the short and fat figure with his head down and a haggard look, wanting to see what answer he would give.
"It was me... I was the one who betrayed James..." Peter said in a tone without any emotion.
His first words made Professor McGonagall's eyes widen and she covered her mouth in disbelief.
"But... isn't Sirius Black James and Lily's secret keeper?" Professor McGonagall stepped forward and asked anxiously.
"He was originally chosen in the plan... but Sirius thought he was too conspicuous. Anyone could have guessed that James would choose the smart Sirius as the secret keeper, so he persuaded James and Lily to change the secret keeper to me at the last minute..."
Professor McGonagall's eyes suddenly tightened, Snape clenched his fists, and grabbed Peter's collar hard.
"Tell me, Pettigrew, why did you surrender to the Dark Lord?!" He said viciously in a trembling voice, "How could you surrender to the Dark Lord? How can you be worthy of Lily's trust in you!"
"The Dark Lord is too powerful. I don't have the courage to stand against him. I'm a coward and I don't deserve to be in Gryffindor." Peter said, "It's a coincidence. Not long after I agreed to the Dark Lord, Sirius persuaded James and Lily to replace the secret keeper with me..."
"I thought I could gain great merit and no longer have to worry about my safety. But the Dark Lord disappeared on the night he went to Godric's Hollow, and no one could contact him..."
"I was terrified because I had to endure the pursuit of two camps at the same time - Sirius questioned me why I betrayed James; the Dark Lord's supporters thought I was still working for the Order of the Phoenix and deliberately tricked the Dark Lord into Godric's Hollow to make him fail..."
"So I have to think of a way to keep myself alive."
"At that time, Sirius had already found me. He always knew where I would hide... So when I was facing a life-and-death crisis, I suddenly had an idea and shouted on that street, 'You betrayed James and Lily', and then blew up the entire street before he could do anything, turning the area dozens of feet nearby into ruins."
"Sirius is such an excellent person, he certainly wouldn't die easily under such an attack. But he actually didn't know that I was not as weak as they thought. He thought that I was just emotionally excited and caused the magic to go out of control, and blew myself and the street into ashes..."
"But I didn't. I saved myself under the spell and cut off my index finger so he would think I was dead. Then I turned into a rat and escaped into the sewer, where I mixed with other real rats... until I was adopted by the Weiss family."
"I've been a pet rat ever since, but at least I survived."
Under the influence of the truth serum, Peter's tone was still unhurried and level, which made the people present sound even more depressed.
Professor McGonagall couldn't believe that the student who was so timid and couldn't speak clearly back then had actually turned himself into a demon step by step, causing the deaths of dozens of people including his friends!
She took a deep breath for a long time before she finally let out a breath.
"But... but if you are afraid, why don't you tell Dumbledore? We don't have to let you join the Order of the Phoenix. You can quit at any time!" Professor McGonagall said sadly, "Besides, Dumbledore can clearly protect you..."
"Dumbledore can't protect everyone." Peter continued expressionlessly, "As a friend of James, Sirius and Lemus, three loyal members of the Order of the Phoenix, I am naturally on the opposite side of the Death Eaters. They will come after me no matter what."
"If I become a Death Eater and am captured by Dumbledore, I can at least spend the rest of my life in Azkaban; but if a member of the Order of the Phoenix is captured by the Death Eaters, then I will definitely die in their hands..."
"I didn't want to die, so I chose the Death Eaters."
"Oh my God! I really can't believe it..." Professor McGonagall turned her back, took off her glasses, and wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes with a handkerchief.
Snape on the other side couldn't bear it anymore, and the expression on his face seemed to be distorted.
"Don't want to die? Haha..." Snape grabbed Peter's collar with one hand and raised his wand with the other hand. "Then have you ever thought that there are also people in the Order of the Phoenix who don't care about those ridiculous rules!"
A dazzling green light suddenly burst out from the wand in Snape's hand, turning Peter's unfocused little eyes green.
Just as the killing curse was about to hit Peter's face, a red light suddenly arrived and hit Peter's face first, knocking it heavily out of Snape's hand.
Similarly, it also made him fly out of the range of the killing curse.
Stone foam flew everywhere, and a green beam of light slammed into the wall behind him, creating a hideous gap in the solid stone wall.
"Albus, do you want to protect this shameful traitor?" Snape turned his head and looked at Dumbledore fiercely, "You know, he killed Lily!"
"Yes, I know, Severus." Dumbledore sighed softly, "But he has other uses, and I cannot allow you to kill him like this."
"What use can he have?!" Snape shouted, no longer as cold and gloomy as usual, "Do you still want to use this traitor to vindicate the wanted criminal Sirius Black?"
"Severus, now that the truth has been revealed, we can confirm that Sirius is innocent." Dumbledore said softly, "He sneaked into Hogwarts just to catch Peter and avenge James and Lily."
"But he has no fault?" Snape said in a cold tone, "If that egomaniac hadn't thought of himself as so powerful and conspicuous, how could he have thought of handing over the Secret Keeper to such a traitor!"
"Severus, your prejudice against Sirius is still too deep." Dumbledore shook his head helplessly.
"I'm just stating a fact!" Snape said through gritted teeth.
"I saw through their true nature 20 years ago... Arrogant, conceited, and pushy, they never care about other people's emotions and feelings. They deserve this fate!"
Snape paced back and forth in the staff lounge angrily, spewing unpleasant adjectives one after another from his mouth, all of which were pinned on the original group of four, venting the emotions that had been pent up in his heart for more than a decade.
Dumbledore looked at him silently without interrupting.
Dracula also watched with interest the frustrated behavior of the Potions Professor, who always had a gloomy face, and found it very interesting.
The first one who couldn't stand it anymore was Professor McGonagall.
"Severus, James and Sirius were indeed a little willful and naughty when they were in school. I admit that they were the most troublesome students I have ever taught, but they did pay a lot to fight against You-Know-Who."
Professor McGonagall had wiped away her tears and put on her glasses again, returning to her capable and neat image. Only her still slightly red eyes showed that she was still not calm.
Snape's curses paused.
He was one of the mysterious man's followers that James and Sirius had fought against. He felt a little unconfident in facing Professor McGonagall's rebuttal.
"Since you think so, then so be it." He curled his lips and pushed open the door of the lounge. "You can do whatever you want with me, but I don't think the Ministry of Magic will compromise so easily for a former criminal!"
After saying that, he left the staff lounge without looking back.
Every time he looked at the culprit who caused Lily's death, his heart would ache more... After all, it was he himself who actually gave the Dark Lord the idea of killing James' family.
"Albus, what do we do next?"
In the staff lounge, Professor McGonagall looked at Dumbledore hesitantly and asked.
"In any case, let's lift the martial law in the castle first." Dumbledore looked at the sky outside the window and said softly, "It's almost dawn, and it's time for another important person to wake up."
…
In a small bedroom, the curtains are closed and the walls are covered with soundproofing spells.
At this time, Remus Lupin, pale and haggard, woke up from his coma in pain.
Even though Snape was asked by Dumbledore to make the wolfsbane potion for him, which enabled him to stay awake on full moon nights, the transformation process was still not easy.
It's not because of the pain of transformation, but because of the psychological pressure.
Lupin always considered himself a wizard, not a werewolf, so when he transformed into a wolf, he always felt disgusted with his body.
This mentality started when he was in school. Fortunately, he had three good friends who were willing to transform into animals to accompany him through every full-moon night. This prevented him from collapsing in this torture year after year.
After completely integrating into the werewolf community in the past two years, he chose to fight to resolve the discrimination against werewolves in the wizarding society, and this psychological burden was gradually alleviated.
"Professor Lupin, are you awake?"
Just then, a mellow voice came from outside the door, passing through the heavy soundproofing spells.
Lupin stood up with difficulty, straightened his clothes a little, then walked over and opened the door.
"Professor Dracula, you woke up really early." Seeing the silver-haired figure outside the door, he greeted casually.
"That's not the case." Dracula chuckled, "To be precise, Dumbledore and I didn't sleep the whole night."
"More than one big thing happened last night, Professor Lupin!"
Dracula led Lupin to the staff lounge and gave him a brief account of what had happened that night.
Including Sirius sneaking into the Gryffindor common room, he and Dumbledore caught a mouse and found out it was Peter Pettigrew, Snape used truth serum on Peter and found out that he was the real traitor...
Lupin's mood changed from surprise to astonishment, then to shock, and then to enlightenment.
"I should have thought of it earlier," he murmured, "at that time, Sirius and I actually had some concerns about each other..."
"Sirius thought I was a werewolf, and most werewolves joined Voldemort's camp at that time; and I thought he was a member of the Black family, and his brother and cousin were the most loyal Death Eaters at the time..."
"We two couldn't give each other complete trust. Unexpectedly, it was the most inconspicuous and trustworthy Peter who betrayed James."
Lupin's eyes were full of shame, as if he considered himself a sinner.
"More than a decade has passed. There's no need to regret it now, Professor Lupin." Dracula turned his head and glanced at Lupin. "Why not take this opportunity to tell me what interesting things happened to you at that time and think about where Sirius Black would hide..."
Dracula raised his lips, "You are the person who knows him best in the entire magic world. Your ideas are of great reference value to us."
…
…