"Vizet... he... he..." Lupin lowered his head and stared at the letter, his gaze so intensely focused that it even looked a little hollow.
"He asked me to gather M's staff..." His lips moved, releasing a faint voice like sleep-talking.
His voice was unusually dry. Answering Sirius seemed to be nothing more than an instinctive reaction, while his consciousness was still immersed in the letter.
"Gather M's staff?" Sirius's brows knitted together. "All the staff? Or just some of them? When does he want them gathered?"
"Only Werewolf Wizards..." Lupin continued in that faint, dreamlike voice. "We need to notify them first... preferably gather more Werewolf Wizards too... Christmas holiday..."
"Werewolf Wizards? Christmas holiday?" Sirius's brows twisted into a knot. "Gather Werewolf Wizards during the holiday? Remus, what is Vizet planning to do?"
Lupin stood there like dead wood, not answering Sirius, and no more sound came from him.
His lips merely opened and closed soundlessly, his eyes growing more and more dazed and hollow, as if he were still reading the contents of the letter, yet giving the impression of sleepwalking, adrift from everything before him.
Sirius could not hold back any longer. He grabbed Lupin by the shoulders and shook him.
"Remus, look at me!" His voice was much louder than before, as if he were determined to wake Lupin from a dream. "Tell me, what exactly happened? Why are you like this?"
Lupin finally raised his head. In his reddened eye sockets, besides the glimmer of tears, there was also a light Sirius had never seen before—
It was not the light of sorrow, but a bright radiance that had been suppressed so long it had almost forgotten how to bloom, a symbol of hope, like new shoots growing from dead wood.
"Vi... Vizet told... told me..."