Over large bowls of pistachio and black cherry sorbet (Sirius) and anchovy ice cream with a chocolate covered wafer and four tablespoons of sprinkles (the yellow lady), they get down to business.

Which is to say, Sirius leans over the diner-style table on one elbow, arches a finely sculpted brow, and says, "The smell of that is putting me off my sorbet. Think you could maybe scooch back a little further?" The 'please' is implied in his winning smile and his flirtatious wink.

Her reply is that same blank, wide-eyed stare. She proceeds by lifting a heaped greyish spoonful of briny gloop to her mouth, never once moving to break eye contact with him.

(He's starting to wonder if she didn't hit her head more than once on the way through. Or perhaps she was dropped on it as a baby.)

Grin of a king sliding clean off his face, he slumps back in his chair – all the better to distance himself from the bowl – and pokes dolefully at his own, much classier, dessert. Sirius is already regretting not going for triple chocolate cookie, but that is neither here nor there.

The roguish man practices his indignant lounging and the yellow lady picks at her slimy abomination, and the silence that has descended upon their little window table like an erumpent with aching feet (that is to say, heavily), bears down on them. It rests on its laurels and lingers in a most unwelcome manner until Sirius feels his eye begin to twitch.

Finally, he caves.

"Look, okay, this is a Serious Moment," he says, slapping the flat of his palm against the table top for dramatic effect. "And I am a Sirius man. We must talk on this whole 'falling through the Veil of Death' business immediately."

(It is to be noted that he does not stomp his foot. Definitely not. That would be immature.)

"Oh, I didn't fall," says the yellow lady airily, waving her slimy grey spoon in the air and sending a waft of salt and sea life across the table to him. "I don't believe in falling. My body merely made the choice to lose balance without bothering to consult with my head."

Sirius sniffs in disdain (eurgh, big mistake), and crosses his arms. "Well, now you're just being ridiculous."

Determined to let that statement sink in, he turns very purposefully on his seat so as to face away from her, and stares through the smeary window at the street beyond with a very practiced pout. (It highlights his cheekbones and his full lips.)

For her part, fish-woman (she has very much been downgraded) hums an offbeat sort of tune and continues shovelling her slop into her mouth.

Only after she's scraped the bowl clean, with much torturous screeching of metal on china, does she push it away from her and turn her attention back to Sirius. It's been at least two minutes and, still holding his forlorn pose, he rather feels like he deserves a compliment. Or perhaps an apology, for her being obtuse. Preferably written.

"I once read a very interesting, though badly researched, article on ashwinders," she says instead, and Sirius cannot help but find it so incredibly frustrating that he turns back to face her and shoots her a piercing look. (She doesn't seem to notice.) "It highlighted the life cycle of the ashwinder and hypothesised that they don't so much live and breed and die as they do simply regenerate whenever there's a fire."

"Aren't those the fire worm things?" he says through a lengthy sigh, slumping down on the table and propping his chin in his hand. The only reason he recalls that at all is because he'd shoved a handful of ashwinder eggs into Snivellus' cauldron full of Felix Felicis back in seventh year, and it had dissolved almost the entire desk upon explosion. The foul steam rising off of it had left Snivellus with ugly red pustules all the way up his huge, hooked nose for a month. Ahh, good times.

"I thought it was quite a nice sentiment, really," she says, completely ignoring his (factually inaccurate) question. "Though there's so little really known about them in general, and especially not in relation to that theory. It isn't like it is with phoenixes, where there's plenty of research detailing their immortality and rebirths. After all, what is there to find out about ashwinders, other than that they like wriggling around in hot coals?" She sighs, sounding wistful, and puts both hands up in the air in question.

Sirius squints, works his jaw for a while, and says, "Not to sound polite, miss, but… what the ruddy hell are you on about?"

A disconcertingly happy smile spreads across her face. "Why, the Veil, of course."

"What." It is not a question.

"Well, it's a metaphor, isn't it? Normal death is the phoenix – which is to say, mysterious but well researched – and the Veil is the ashwinder. Quite possibly something interesting and very magical, but most likely… not much more than a short-lived 'fire worm'." She fiddles with one of her googly-eye earrings and adjusts her feather boa. "Especially to the simple folk."

Eyes bugging and indignation making him clench his teeth, he sits up very straight and slaps the table again. "Hey now," Sirius says – well, technically he shouts it. "I am most certainly not just some sort of 'simple folk'. I'll have you know that I am Sir Black to you, fish woman."

(Somewhere off by the counter, Mr Fortesque shoots them both a glare and grumbles about 'noisy nitwits'. Thankfully for us all, Sirius is too busy feeling insulted to notice.)

"You were knighted by the muggle Queen in this universe?" she says, all innocent curiosity. "How peculiar. Especially considering you were incarcerated for thirteen years, in the last one."

Caught somewhere between outrage and shock – she knows who he was, and she's just sat here with him? Him, a supposed mass murderer? By Merlin's sweaty butt crack, she really must be insane.

"Keep your voice down, would you," he says, all in a hiss, and hastily casts another muffliato. "You're going to ruin my reputation. I am a gentleman in this life."

Shaking her head, she looks at him sadly. "You poor, delusional man."

"I most certainly am not," he barks, feeling heat rushing up into his cheeks. "I'll have you know that I am very much rich, and that my head-doctor declared me to be a fine specimen of a man."

(Actually, he'd said that Sirius was a narcissistic arse, but that what wouldn't make others want to kill him would only make him stronger. Besides, none of that was on the official records. Sirius had checked.)

"Either way," fish-woman says, eyeing him for the first time with some level of scepticism. "There's a more important matter at hand."

He waves at her in a, 'yes, yes, get on with it then,' sort of manner, not nearly feeling as endeared to her or the preposterous, drooping sunflower making her ear stick out sideways, as he had when they'd been out in the sunshine half an hour ago.

"Are you going to eat your sorbet?"

It's clear to see that she's drained all of the fight out of him by the way he returns her unblinking stare for only a few seconds before he shoves his bowl across the table at her. "Have it," he says. "This whole, ridiculous situation has ruined my appetite."

"It's probably a good thing," she manages to say as she swaps out spoons and, quite without worrying about sharing germs with a stranger, tucks right in. "I was worried you might choke if I told you that I'd come here with the express purpose of finding you."

"You—what—me? But you just said you tripped and fell." If Sirius had been confused at any time prior to this point in their conversation, then by comparison, he now feels like his brain might start dripping out of his ears. (It gets worse.)

Stretching across the table and sticking her left hand all the way out like she expects him to shake it, she says rather suddenly, "Sirius Orion Black, my name is Luna Lovegood. It's my job to try and take you home."