Oblivious

[Pallas]

Oblivious by Pallas

Disclaimer: This is the house that JKR built. I am merely squatting. (I do however claim squatters rights over anything not canon)

Summary: What if there was more to Remus Lupin’s bite than a badly timed stroll in the woods? It’s never fun meeting your maker…



1: The Howling

The noise was unbelievable.

Remus Lupin forced down a wince at the blast of hot air and hard sound that rushed to greet him as he pulled open the grimy wooden door at the foot of the basement steps that plunged down from a half-lit street in the depths of Camden Town. In selecting such a location, the proprietors of this bar had chosen well – in this part of London well known for it’s gothic inhabitants, a place where out of place was the norm, a few oddly dressed arrivals would not even be glanced at. There was no way to tell the dark secret that dwelled within those who opened this door.

For this was The Howling.

The place where the werewolves came to let their hair down.

Remus hated it. But he had no choice. This mission was vital to the Order and no one but a werewolf or one invited by a werewolf could enter. He wasn’t certain how the distinction was made, but it was not a risk they could willingly take. This was too important.

The music – although Remus used the term euphemistically for he could think of no other purpose this blaring screech of rampant white noise and howling voices that filled the room was meant to serve – was deafening, all but shaking the rafters. Bodies writhed in every direction, some dancing and gyrating to the sounds that filled the low ceiling-ed room, others slumped against the bar, others still in dark corners talking, fighting and – well… Engaging in practices best left at home. Remus would never have described himself as a prude, but some things really should be done in private.

He would never understand the people who came to this place. It advertised itself as a place where werewolves could be themselves – play the good puppy by day and the bad dog by night. Places such as this, Remus was sure, had existed for centuries, but the Umbridge legislation and the institutionalised oppression of his kind she supported had driven custom to a new high. It was a kind of rebellion, almost a twisted resistance, a shove into the underworld as the world above clamped down. But Remus feared for the direction it was taking. There were better ways to resist, he felt, than acting to the very stereotype that created such attitudes in the first place.

Biting back a sigh, Remus shifted his shoulders, trying not to show his discomfort with the somewhat unusual wardrobe he had adopted for the purposes of keeping his cover. It had felt almost ghoulish at first, borrowing the leather duster coat and assorted other items of clothing he had found lurking in the back of Sirius’ closet, well worn, aged and probably not touched since his friend’s motorbike phase at nineteen. But there was simply no avoiding the fact that Sirius was not coming back for them, nor that he could certainly not afford to go shopping for an outfit himself. All the same, he couldn’t help the small smile that had touched his lips at the thought of what his friends would have said to see him dressed in such a way. Padfoot and Prongs would have laughed themselves stupid.

And he chose to remember them laughing. To wallow in his loneliness would have served no purpose – indeed, in spite of his own efforts to abate it, he had seen what it had done to Sirius, trapped in Grimmauld Place for so long. He did his friends no favours by losing his mind with grief – a lesson he had learned the hard way in 1981. He missed them and he would always miss them but he honoured their memory far better by moving on with his life.

All the same, it was a tribute to his upbringing and his friends that he was not a mindless wreck in the corner of this bar, quaffing firewhiskey and playing the monster to escape his tragic life as those around him did. Given all he had endured, it was astonishing that he had not outright turned feral.

He reminded himself to thank his father the next time he went to visit. He silently thanked his mother and his friends.

Moving carefully, and casting his gaze in search of any familiar faces, Remus made his way towards the bar. This was his third visit now to The Howling, the first two, earlier in the week, proving futile, and he was rapidly losing confidence that this meeting that Snape had alleged would occur here in the few days before the next full moon was actually going to take place. He had wondered briefly, on seeing the Potions Master’s undeniable smirk at the sight of his outfit, if this was not simply a ruse on Snape’s part to make him look ridiculous, half imagining the Slytherin would whip out a wizarding camera and post a picture in the kitchen at headquarters for everyone to laugh at. But no, Snape’s information had been, if not necessarily yet proved genuine, at least offered in sincerity. Making Remus look an idiot was merely a glorious bonus.

Tonks had said it suited him. But fond as he was of Tonks, he wasn’t sure he trusted her fashion sense. Oh well.

He had reached the bar. Settling himself on a stool at the corner of the counter, a position offering a fine vantage point of the rest of the room, he caught the eye of the grizzled, stocky barman known as Friedrek with his grubby robes and expanding bald spot. Whether it was his real name or not, Remus was uncertain. No one used their real names in The Howling. It was all part of the escape.

He’d lost count of the number of “Wolfgangs” he’d encountered. It seemed originality was not a strong suit amongst the patrons of this place.

“You again?” The barman grinned toothlessly as he approached, wiping a filthy glass with a filthier cloth. “Third time this week you’ve been in.”

Remus gave a half-smile. “Must be getting fond of the place,” he offered casually. “It’s certainly different.”

The barman’s grin widened. “That’s the aim of The Howling. Let yourself go after a hard day’s pretence. Be what you are and release your true nature.”

“It does bring out something in people,” Remus commented, biting his tongue in regards to saying exactly what.

Friedrek grinned again, missing the hidden slight on his establishment. “Drink?”

“Firewhiskey, double, no ice.”

“On it’s way.”

Friedrek moved off and Remus watched him go, his words playing against his mind. Release your true nature, he said. But that was hardly what seemed to happen here. This was the place where werewolves came to behave how they thought werewolves should behave. The true nature of the wolf was not to cavort in semi-darkness, listening to non-music and dressing like creatures of the night from bad muggle horror films. The true nature of the werewolf was the feral. The would-bes of The Howling had no idea.

Feral werewolves. The only kind of werewolf it was worth being afraid of. The reason he was sitting in this dark, noisy, godforsaken hole, praying that he didn’t look as much of a prat as he felt.

There was a feral in town. And Voldemort was eager to recruit him.

It was Snape who had discovered the intention, a half overheard conversation between contacts best left to his knowledge alone. A vicious feral, exiled from Britain for many years, had returned to his old territory at Voldemort’s invitation; they said he was more wolf than man, that he had a gift for chaos and a talent for vindictiveness and with Voldemort’s senior ranks so depleted by the events in the Department of Mysteries, he was exactly the kind of ally the Death Eaters could use. And this was where he had chosen to meet with Voldemort’s representative, on one night in the week before the full moon. Who he would meet and when, Snape had been unable to decipher. He could not even glean a name. That was where Remus came in.

He didn’t even necessarily have to overhear the meeting. He just had to be there. The rest they could sort out later.

Friedrek returned with his firewhiskey. Fingering the amethyst ring on his right hand that was warded to dilute the effects of alcohol, Remus knocked back the shot and ordered another. Playing the empty glass in his hands, he glanced along the bar at the other half-drunk figures, at the shadowy shapes of the dancers, the swinging of the door as people came and went, settling at tables to talk together or moving onto the dance floor. He watched the dim light play against the empty glass as the firewhiskey warmed his throat as it moved downwards.

And then it started.

A strange feeling seemed to well up, a tingle that ran like chilled fingers along his spine and whispered in his blood. His head suddenly seemed to pound as his heartbeat echoed against his skull and sent a staccato shiver through his limbs. A sharp tang of pain shot through the left side of his torso, tracing the line of the vicious crescent scar that meant he was welcome in The Howling.

Remus shook his head sharply. What in Merlin’s name was in that firewhiskey?

He had no time to dwell on it. Abruptly a young man dropped into the seat next to him, grinning almost manically, his hair slicked back and dyed jet black, his clothing making Remus feel rather more conservatively dressed, his eyes…

His eyes golden.

Remus’ gaze snapped to the young man’s hands, clutching at the counter. But the second tell-tale sign of the feral was not there. And as the young man met his stare, he realised.

Of course. Yellow contacts.

Must be muggle or muggle-born.

“Hey!” The young man’s greeting was breathless, his movements jerky, but Remus did not miss the desperateness of his gaze. “Great place, huh?”

“Great,” Remus agreed, accepting but not yet drinking his second shot from Friedrek as the barman took the young man’s order. He still could not shake the strange chilling sensation that the last shot had given him.

“Never knew there were places like this until recently.” The young man was bouncing on his stool, almost shouting to make himself heard over the blare of music. “Places where we can be ourselves, you know? Places where we can fit in. Nobody pretends here.”

Everybody pretends here. They just all pretend together. Pretending to be human by day, pretending to be wolf by night and no middle ground to be had. Remus swallowed the urge to speak his thoughts sharply; the middle of The Howling was not the place to discuss its hypocrisy.

“I’m Fenris.” The young man spoke abruptly. “Yeah, that’s me. Fenris. A proper name for a werewolf.”

Oh no, you’re not pretending at all. Well, Fenris at least was a little better than Wolfgang, if just as predictable. It occurred to Remus, rather ironically, that if he were to give his name here, likely no one would believe it.

Friedrek arrived with Fenris’ drink. The young man knocked it back in one swig, choking slightly but hiding it as best he could with a cough.

“This place is the best,” he declared, dropping his glass back to the counter. “I wish I could just stay here, you know? Live here forever. Be free. No bloody Umbridge, no more stares. Just being what I am.” The manic grin returned. The desperate eyes had never left. “I’m going to dance.”

And then he was gone as swiftly as he had appeared.

Remus was uncertain if his disconcerted feeling was a residual of the firewhiskey or the talk. The sentiment he could relate to. But the solution…

Life for Fenris must have been desperate indeed when this was the more pleasurable alternative.

He really disliked The Howling. False hope wrapped in a noisy, dirty package that would lead every person in this room down the path to oblivion. And there was almost nothing he could do to help them.

Please let the feral come tonight. He didn’t want to come back here again.

He fingered his drink. The strange tingle of his spine had not subsided. His bite scar had begun to ache.

He glanced around once more in the hope of a face even vaguely familiar. Although the capture of so many leading Death Eaters in the Department of Mysteries had been quite a coup, it had left the Order of the Phoenix at a peculiar disadvantage. The faces they knew, the names they recognised had now mostly been accounted for. Now, many of the Death Eaters doing Voldemort’s work were unknowns, anonymous and therefore much harder to spot.

But then, a figure caught his eye, a face vaguely familiar from Moody’s incessant briefings on identified Death Eaters. This was a face from the first war, albeit a low ranker, a minion of Wilkes back then as he recalled, Oldburn, or Oldstaff or somesuch other name. He was standing near the doorway having just risen from a table, whispering in hushed tones with a burly figure cast in shadows. Yellow eyes glinted against the flickering lights.

The feral.

Ignoring the shiver of his bones and the pain of his side, Remus started to rise.

He was too slow. In one swift motion, the feral rose and swept out of the alcove towards the door, his eyes sweeping the room. For a chilling instant, Remus could have sworn that the golden gaze had lingered a moment too long upon him.

But then the feral was gone.

Oldstaff or whatever glanced around a moment longer, his face filled with distaste and a hint of fear. The feral must have invited him inside. With the feral gone, the Death Eater was alone in a den of werewolves and he certainly knew it. As a few gazes turned in his direction, he gathered his robes and fled as well.

Remus took a breath and downed his second firewhiskey. Oddly, it seemed to settle the tingling feeling left by the first.

He had missed the meeting, it seemed. But it didn’t matter. It had taken place close enough and that meant that there were other ways to gain the information.

He just hoped that Dumbledore’s pensieve was still at headquarters.

Ducking his head against the heaving atmosphere, Remus slipped rapidly towards the exit and made his escape into the night.

A/N: Though I’ve written several fics for a Sci-fi show called Farscape, this is my first venture into the world of Harry Potter fanfic, although I have been reading it a great deal of late. What it has taught me is that writing fics for books is a lot harder than writing fics for TV shows, probably because in TV you know that everyone has the same imagery for the settings and the characters and you are an equal level in that you don’t know what any of the characters are thinking; it’s all interpretation. With a book, you can’t be sure if the readers are seeing and hearing the same things as you, so you have to be more careful. And characterising the thoughts of a character that you have only seen represented by the thoughts of another character is always interesting. It’s a fun challenge though. I hope I’m doing okay.

I have no idea how long this fic is going to be. I have about twelve parts planned, but one of my other fics that was supposed to be quick two-parter to be done in a few months, ended up 80,000 words long, taking a year to complete. I’m hoping it won’t be too long since I don’t have a huge amount of time to write. I’m not sure how often I will be updating but hopefully not too infrequently: I don’t like to leave people hanging so I am trying to stay a couple of chapters ahead. Oh and if you are worried about the grim start, though this will have a fair dollop of angst-drama and action, I am trying to insert a few lighter moments too. Please don’t despair.

Please Post Feedback here. I really would appreciate it. I don't know how to do one of those funky one words links so here's the full whack. http://www.cosforums.com/showthread....88#post1100288

[Pallas]

A/N: Many thanks to Chriss Corkscrew who has kindly volunteered to beta this for me in spite of her limited time. Thanks mate!

2: The Pensieve

The noise in The Howling was unbelievable.

“Quietus!”

Abruptly the volume level dropped sharply, fading back to a dull roar against the background as Alastor Moody sheathed his wand once more, his magical eye swivelling as he surveyed the now-hushed figures who danced on, oblivious to the presence of the three figures who had just materialised in their midst. It was hardly surprising though, Remus reflected, since most of those before them were probably tucked up in bed sleeping off their hangovers whilst their shadows danced their actions of the night before in the mindscape of Dumbledore’s pensieve.

“Much better,” Moody growled, rubbing a half-missing ear with a well-scarred finger. “No wonder you didn’t hear anything, Lupin, with that racket going on.”

Severus Snape surveyed the cavorting figures packed around him with a distinct sneer of distaste. “Charming,” he remarked mordantly. “It’s almost fit to house a dog.”

“As I understand, the barman’s dog died a while ago, Severus. So you’re probably right.” Remus ignored his former colleague’s curled lip and smiled politely. He had long ago reached the conclusion that rising to Snape’s remarks was a waste of time and energy – instead he responded to the jibes and barbs of the Potions Master with unfailing politeness and friendly courtesy. The fact that this mild response infuriated him far more than any amount of retaliation was merely a benefit.

“So where are you, Lupin?” Moody was still scanning the crowds, but his magical eye was little help against the false spectres of people passed several hours before – he could not see through walls that were not truly there.

“Behind you.” Remus turned to face the back wall bar that he had settled at earlier in the evening. “Sitting at the count… Good God.” His sentence broke off sharply as caught sight of himself and instinctively fingered his recently donned robes reassuringly. “I am never wearing those clothes again.”

Moody chuckled. “Hell’s teeth, lad, compared to your friends here, you’re dressed like a monk! And Tonks reckoned they suited you.”

Remus regarded the old auror with a raised eyebrow. “Nymphadora Tonks is a lovely young woman, an excellent auror and a good friend. She also has pink hair, Alastor.”

“Not every day.”

“When you two have quite finished.” Snape’s drawling voice interrupted the rapidly spiralling conversation. “I was under the impression we were here for reasons other than discussing Lupin’s fashion statement.”

“Right.” Moody was immediately all business. “So where did you see them, Lupin?”

“Over there.” Remus pointed to the alcove next to the door, currently unoccupied. He glanced over his shoulder at his earlier self, sitting at the bar and now talking to Friedrek. “They must have come in around the time I got my first drink. One of the other werewolves started talking to me and I got a bit distracted.”

Snape elegantly rolled his eyes but did not comment.

“Let’s get closer.” Moody grunted as he began to wade disconcertingly through the insubstantial figures. “I want a good look at them when they get here.”

Wordlessly Remus and Snape followed his lead, moving through the half-silenced, madly leaping figures to the shadowed table tucked in beside the exit. Even as they drew free of the spectral mass, the door wafted open and two figures slipped inside.

“Bernhardt Oldstaff.” Snape’s eyes had fixed at once upon the short, bearded man with the hollow eyes, wrapped in dark robes who glanced around The Howling with a scarcely concealed cocktail of distaste and fear splashing his features. “Fairly low ranking until recently, and his promotion has been much by default due to his long service and the capture of so many of his seniors.” He sneered. “I wouldn’t trust him to charm a teacup.”

Both Moody and Remus however had their attention fixed upon the dark-cloaked figure that followed him. Surprisingly not much taller than Oldstaff, he moved easily, loosely, clearly comfortable within his own skin, shrouded in a vast black cloak that shadowed his features, but Remus did not miss the golden eyes that gleamed within those depths, reflected the half-light disconcertingly from a mask of unseen features. The first sign of a werewolf gone feral was full moon eyes in human features, a wolf looking back from a human’s face, the essence of what truly lay inside reflected in a wolfish gaze. It made Remus shiver to think of it.

His own feral incident, brief as it was, so long ago but never forgotten, remained one of the worst moments of his life. He would never understand how anyone could live that way.

He could feel Moody’s eyes drilling into him – he could guess the old auror’s thoughts. He and Dumbledore had been the only witnesses that terrible day, November 2nd 1981 and he owed his freedom to their silence and understanding. In respect of that, he kept an iron grip on his moods and always wore the amethyst ring when he drank. He would not make the same mistake again.

A twinge of old pain around the crescent of his bite scar jerked him out of his dark thoughts – absently he rubbed his left side. Although the strange feeling had faded on leaving The Howling earlier than evening, his old scar had continued to ache in the wake of whatever the hell had been in that firewhiskey. After admitting his odd turn at the bar during his debriefing, he had, at Moody’s insistence, submitted himself to an examination by Hestia Jones, a St Mungo’s healer when she wasn’t working for the Order. She had failed to hide her wince at the sight of his terrible bite scar but had given him as clean a bill of health as a werewolf could have three days prior to the full moon. He could only assume it had been something in the drink that had disagreed with him.

By now, the death eater and the feral has settled into the alcove – the feral’s hood was still in place, but Remus could see the glint of his unnaturally sharp canines as he smiled. His pale fingers drummed absently on the table, the short, dark, vicious claws protruding from their tips cutting chips from the battered wood surface. The death eater was eyeing this with distinct unease.

Moving forward, Moody craned in to peer more closely at the hooded feral – it must have been disconcerting that his magical eye could not cut away the shadows here. Drawing his wand once more he waved it across the alcove.

“Sonorus!”

The death eater, Oldstaff, had leaned forwards towards the feral, his lips moving and abruptly his words became audible once more.

“…why you wanted to come in here, of all places. What if someone overhears?”

The feral gave a throaty chuckle but there was no humour in the sound – his voice when it came was a hoarse, gravelled drawl that seemed to curl around the edges of his words languorously as though speaking in a tongue not quite familiar. “You’d rather stand outside? In the clear night air, where even a whisper carries for miles? No one in here is listening. No one in here cares. And with this fine racket, they would not hear even if they tried.”

Moody smiled smugly. “That’s what he thinks. Pensieves as spy tools. One of the best ideas we ever had. As long as your spy is close enough, they don’t even need to hear what’s said.”

“Who is he?” Snape had moved forward to Moody’s side.

Moody grunted. “Not sure yet. But the voice rings a bell. Wish he’d take that blasted hood off – my eye’s useless in here.”

The feral was speaking again. “I got your master’s messages. I’ll admit it intrigues me. So much offered – and all he wants in return is this Potter boy dealt with?”

Remus jerked and met Moody’s glance with a frown. He could tell the auror did not like the sound of this any more than he did. Snape’s expression was impassive.

“What do you know about Harry Potter?” Oldstaff was clearly nervous – his eyes kept straying to the feral’s clawed fingertips.

“Nothing before the message. I’ve been…out of touch.” The feral snorted to himself. “But I have looked into it since. A fascinating child, but a child nonetheless and I have dealt with children before. I don’t see that he will be much of a problem. I have a few ideas.”

The slow unfolding of his shadowed smile was like a rictus. It was more a bearing of teeth than a sign of pleasure.

“Then you’ll do it?” A hint of relief flashed across Oldstaff’s place at the feral’s nod.

“What shall I tell my master? How soon shall it be done?”

“It will be done as soon as I have the time and inclination to do it. These things cannot be rushed. Tell him to have patience. I will deliver both the boy and the chaos he requires and I shall enjoy myself into the bargain. I do not do this for his precious ideology – I have no loyalty to his cause or even his reward. I do this because it will be fun.”

Oldstaff looked doubtful once more. “You will not take the Dark Mark?”

Slowly, coldly, his eerie golden eyes never leaving Oldstaff’s face, the feral drew back his tunic sleeve to expose vicious red teeth marks that scraped the length of his arm.

“I already have one mark to show the world what I am,” he drawled softly. “I do not need another.”

Suppressing a shiver, Oldstaff rose hurriedly to his feet. “The Dark Lord expected your loyalty, Kane.”

Moody’s gasp jerked Remus’ attention away from the concluding conversation.

“Kane?” he heard the old man hiss. For a moment his enormous eye darted towards Remus but twisted away when he caught the younger man looking. “Oh Hell’s teeth, we’re in more trouble than I thought.”

The feral – Kane – chuckled again, rising in one swift motion. “He can expect what he wants.”

With a vicious smile, he swept past the speechless Oldstaff, his eyes flashing as they passed across the room.

And lingered a moment. A spark of indefinable emotion glinted.

And then he was gone.

Remus felt himself shiver. He thought he had imagined that the feral’s gaze had paused on him. Apparently, he hadn’t.

Moody had seen it too. His mismatched eyes fixed sharply on Remus.

“You never told me he saw you,” he reprimanded abruptly.

Remus shrugged, trying to shake off the unpleasant chill that had settled in his stomach. “I didn’t realise he really had,” he admitted. “I assumed I had imagined it.”

“Never assume!” Moody’s outburst caused both Remus and Snape to jump. “Constant vigilance! What if he recognised you?”

“Why should he?” Remus stared, bemused at the auror’s sudden incandescent fury. “He’s never met me.”

Something indefinable glinted in Moody’s normal eye. Abruptly he turned away.

“Well, there’s nothing to be done now.” He paused, watching as the memory Remus left the counter and hurried out of the door. “What matters is we’ve made an identification. Abraham Kane has a ministry file the size of Hogwarts library. It shouldn’t be too hard for Tonks or Shacklebolt to find.”

Abruptly the scene around them faded to grey; with a misty swirl and a slight moment of disorientation, the three were standing once more in the drawing room at Grimmauld Place. Glancing at his two companions, Remus wordlessly retrieved his memory from the pensieve on the desk.

“You seem to know of him.” Snape stepped smoothly around the desk.

Moody grunted. “Bloody should. I helped drive him out of this country more than thirty years ago. Hoped he’d perished somewhere over the years but apparently not. I suppose it was too much to ask a character like Kane to die quietly.”

“What did he do?” Remus asked quietly, lifting the pensieve from the desk and following the auror and the professor towards the door.

Moody shot him a sharp look as he moved into the hall. “What didn’t he? Orphaned street kid, bitten by a feral when he was ten. The feral, Hel she called herself, she was just a teenager but she thought it would be fun to keep the kid around, mess with his head a bit, start herself a pack. Soon made a name for themselves, leaving blood and bodies wherever they passed, killing maliciously just for the fun of it. You can thank the two of them for Umbridge and her ilk – oh, people were always nervous about werewolves but these two really stirred them up and the memories die hard. The Prophet had a field day.” Moody pulled a face. “By the time they hit their twenties, he and Hel had both the Werewolf Capture Unit and the aurors out for their blood. The Ministry gave us permission to use any means necessary – so you know what that means.”

“Unforgivables.” Snape had started down the stairs, glancing disdainfully at the severed elf heads as he passed, Moody a few steps behind and Remus trailing.

“Exactly. We cornered them, Hel caught an Avada Kedavra from one of my team, Orestes Bevan, nice chap he was, with a young family, wife and two kids.” Moody’s face hardened. “Kane escaped and slaughtered the lot of them. Then he fled the country before we could tear him limb from limb.”

They descended into the hall in silence.

Snape waited until they had passed the heavily curtained portrait of Mrs Black and entered the basement kitchen before speaking. “So you believe he will have no qualms about going after Potter?”

“As I said, he’s targeted children before.” There was an evasive discomfort to Moody’s tone that Remus caught immediately. “Younger than Potter too. He wouldn’t even see there was a difference. All bloody playthings or food to him. You heard him. He kills for the fun of it. He’d kill Potter and anyone else in his way without blinking.”

Snape sighed. “Where is Potter at the moment?”

“The Burrow,” Remus offered as he placed the pensieve on the kitchen table. “He went to stay with the Weasleys a few weeks ago. A few of us have been taking turns to drop round, help Molly and Arthur keep an eye on things. I think Tonks is there right now.”

“I think, under the circumstances, it is time for him to return to Grimmauld Place.” Snape picked up the pensieve abruptly and moved towards the door in a sweep of black robes. “I will inform the headmaster. Werewolves,” he muttered as he hastened from the room. “They’re more trouble than they’re worth.”

Moody moved after him almost at once. “I’ll get hold of Shacklebolt, see if he can lift us a copy of Kane’s file,” he grunted shortly. “Nice job, Lupin. See you later.”

In moments, both had ascended the steps and moved out of sight, fading footsteps, the clunk of Moody’s wooden leg and then the opening and closing of the front door.

Remus was suddenly alone.

[Pallas]

3: Secrets

It had taken Remus several hours to shake the disconcerted feeling that tailed after him following the events of the night before. He lay on his bed in his darkened bedroom at Grimmauld Place, glancing at his book without reading the words and letting his mind race. Why had Moody been behaving so strangely around him? Remus was no fool – Alastor had been uncomfortable with him ever since they had encountered the pensieve version of the feral Kane. He could only conclude that the encounter had brought back bad memories for him of Kane’s reign of terror and such memories in close proximity to another werewolf he had seen give in to his wolf side, however briefly, must have been unsettling.

It was unsettling for Remus too. Did Moody not trust him? Had he ever? Did he expect him to turn at any moment and leave a trail of bloody destruction just like Kane?

He forced himself to stop thinking that way. It had been a long time ago. A moment of weakness in extraordinary grief. Alastor had understood that.

Unless he thought he was grieving again. He had reason to.

With a sigh, Remus gave up on trying to read and closed the book, depositing it on his bedside table as he rose to his feet and made for the door. Brooding alone was getting him nowhere. It was time for a cup of tea.

It wasn’t until he had passed the foot of the stairs and was halfway down the hall that he realised the kitchen was occupied. A familiar voice cut through the air.

“…should take Lupin off this mission immediately. Merlin knows what’ll happen if Kane gets too near him.”

Remus froze. Oblivious to his presence, down in the kitchen Moody continued. “The lad’s the spit of his dad and Kane knows Rey Lupin by sight. Crazy as Kane may be, he’s quick. He’ll have known who he is.”

“Have you told Reynard that Kane has returned?” So it was Dumbledore that Moody was speaking to. Ignoring the cold feeling in his stomach and a hint of guilt at eavesdropping on his former headmaster, Remus leant against the wall and listened silently.

“Owled him as soon as I could. Knew he’d want to know.” Remus frowned – Moody had contacted his father? He knew the two of them were friends from a long time back – his father had worked in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures for many years and had often collaborated with the Aurors on particularly difficult cases. But why call him now?

But Moody had continued. “Poor sod. Can’t imagine what he’ll think. But after what happened… He deserves to be warned.”

There was a pause. Dumbledore spoke softly.

“Does Remus know?”

A good question. Remus leaned forward carefully, hoping that Alastor’s magic eye would not roll his way. He could hear the clank of Moody’s wooden leg on the hard stone of the kitchen floor. The old Auror was pacing.

“I don’t think so, but the lad hides things well. I’m worried, Albus. I’m sure what happened with Black has upset him more than he’ll admit and Kane on top of it…” Moody’s grizzled voice was hushed. “He went feral once; oh yes, it was over quick enough and never again since, but it happened and there’s no avoiding it. I can’t help thinking Black’s death and Kane’s presence together might…”

“I have faith in Remus, Alastor.” Dumbledore’s voice cut sharply across Moody’s statement like a knife that sliced away the remaining words. “I trust he will not repeat the mistakes of the past. He is stronger now.” There was a pause. “But all the same, I shall be removing him from this mission, at least for now. I have another task for him. I assume he is here?”

There was no time to ponder the strangeness of the conversation. Remus backed down the hall as silently as he could manage, straining his ears for the sound of footsteps. When he reached the stairs, he hurried soundlessly up to the lower landing and paused a moment to catch his breath before proceeding more loudly back down, praying he hadn’t been noticed. By the time he reached the hall, Moody was passing the portrait of Mrs Black as he wrapped himself in his vast cloak and made for the door. His eyes, large and small, fixed on the younger man.

“Dumbledore’s here,” he informed him gruffly. “He wants a word with you. In the kitchen.”

Remus nodded with a smile. “Thanks Alastor.”

Moody merely grunted. A moment later he pulled open the front door and departed.

Remus stared after him for a moment. What in Merlin’s name was going on?

But Dumbledore was waiting. Forcing aside, his confusion, Remus turned and walked down the hall.

*******************************************

The full moon arrived as it inevitably did. There really was no avoiding it.

But despite the intense pain of the transformation, and the remembered loneliness of absent companions, this night was not the torture for Remus that it had been. Once the bane of his life, a time of mindless, half-remembered violence and shadowed horrors, the full moon had become a time of contemplation, a time to think over the events that had passed in his human life, a time, ironically, to get his head straight.

He needed it now. The last few days had almost spun his head from his shoulders.

He was going back to Hogwarts. He couldn’t believe it.

He had refused at first, just as he had the year before. He had expressed disbelief that Dumbledore had even asked.

He was a werewolf. The governors knew it. The parents knew it. The students knew it. The Ministry knew it. After his exposure in the Daily Prophet, most of the wizarding world knew it. And after what had happened last time, all would agree that it wasn’t safe to have a werewolf in the school. He agreed it wasn’t safe. The students would fear him. The parents would write. The governors would protest. The Ministry would have fits.

Dumbledore had smiled serenely. Remus had known then and there that he’d lost.

They would take extra precautions, he had said. They would take more care. They students he had already taught loved him; those he had not would quickly learn to. He would write to the parents. He would speak to the governors. The Ministry, he believed, had far too many problems of their own to care. He had no one else to turn to – Dolores Umbridge was, Remus conceded, the very dredges at the bottom of a very well scraped barrel – and would not wish to if he did. With Voldemort exposed, the children needed a good Defence teacher above all else. And with the new threat against Harry, he needed someone he could trust to keep an eye out for him.

Remus wasn’t convinced. But he had given in.

So he was going back to Hogwarts.

It was a strange feeling. He couldn’t decide whether he was ecstatic or apprehensive. The truth, he suspected, lay somewhere in between.

He had already had one thought however, on how he was to keep an eye out for Harry. He just hoped Harry had brought it with him.

Whilst he had been closeted upstairs in his bedroom, exhausted and nervous for the day preceding his transformation, the Weasleys and Harry had descended once more on Grimmauld Place. There was no mistaking the sound of them rampaging through the hallways – it made Remus smile in spite of his need for sleep. Molly had knocked cautiously on his door as he rested the afternoon before his change, peering reluctantly inside and offering a meal. He had politely declined, thanked her for her consideration and requested he not be disturbed until at least mid-afternoon the next day. The bellowing shouts directed at her rampant children, orders issued at full volume that they must be quiet and not wake him made him grin.

He had spent quite a bit of time with the Weasleys over the summer. Harry had been relocated there just two weeks after going to the Dursleys – with the loss of Sirius still raw, it had seemed best to place him somewhere with people who could show sympathy and understanding for his loss and that place was not Privet Drive. And with its memories and associations of Sirius, Grimmauld Place too had seemed a bad idea, at least initially. So the Burrow had been firmly warded and at least three Order members were present at all times during Harry’s stay, various combinations of Molly, Bill and Arthur together with whoever happened to be available at the time.

It had left Grimmauld Place very quiet, but Remus hadn’t much minded – with so much free time due to his previous unemployment, he was at the Burrow on duty a great deal in any case. He had been fed ruthlessly by Molly, who seemed to regard his thinness as a personal insult, chatted with Arthur and the children and spent more than a little time talking with Harry. James and Lily’s son seemed to be coping a great deal better than he had to begin with, but with all such things, healing was a matter of time. Given his own track record with grief, Remus did not feel he was in much of a position to judge.

He hadn’t given much thought to the conversation he had overheard between Dumbledore and Moody, mostly because it mystified him. At first he had assumed that it was concern regarding his feral incident in 1981 – that Moody somehow believed that close proximity to a feral might rekindle the feral flame in himself. But why would Dumbledore have then turned around and offered him a job at Hogwarts? If they feared his turning feral, surely that was the last place they’d want him to be. And what did his father have to do with all of this? What wasn’t he being told?

Does Remus know? Those three words haunted him. Remus didn’t know and he was starting to wonder if he wanted to. The entire business had left a cold chill against his heart. Just what was going on?

One thing was for sure. He was off the mission. And although he felt a kind of ashamed relief that he would not have to return to The Howling and its desperate, deluded souls for the foreseeable future, it had also sealed closed any chance he had of learning the truth behind his exclusion.

Remus uncurled his lupine body on the rug, stretching his limbs and sighed as he laid his head down to sleep. Like the patrons of The Howling, unknowing of the terrible price that the fulfilment of their wolfish desires would entail, it seemed that he was destined to remain oblivious. That certainly seemed the intent.

Half-knowledge was a dangerous thing. Ignorance was bliss.

And deep down, a part of Remus wished to be oblivious once more.

************************************************

Morning came and with it the pain and relief of the transformation back – another full moon passed. Remus had hauled himself off the carpet, deposited his sore and weary body in his bed and promptly slept like the dead until well after noon. Mid-afternoon had seen Molly’s return, a hesitant knock and an offer of tea and biscuits and this time he had accepted, propping himself up on his pillows and ignoring Molly’s fussing about his hagged post-change appearance as he sipped his drink and chewed on his chocolate biscuit. He promised to make an appearance at dinner.

Remus smiled to himself as she bustled from the room. There was something about Molly that reminded him of his mother, the care, the fussing, the concern to the point of spoiling at times. He still remembered watching his Muggle-born mum as she tucked him into bed after his changes, making sure that his drink and his book were in reach, that he’d taken his tonics, that he was comfortable, that his pyjamas didn’t chafe his wounds, that he would call or ring the little bell she placed next to his bed if he needed anything at all and she would be right there. He remembered his father standing against the doorframe, catching his son’s gaze and rolling his eyes with a grin.

They’d cared so much, his mum and dad. He’d been their miracle baby, their first child to reach full term after many years of trying and his complicated birth had meant he would also be their last. And then, aged just three, he had been bitten.

Fate could be very unkind.

His parents had been heartbroken of course. But they had never abandoned him. Through thick and thin, they fought for him and stayed by his side. He couldn’t have asked for better parents than Reynard and Diana Lupin.

Remus sighed. He missed his mum. She had given up so much for him, personally and professionally, abandoning a lucrative career as a Potions Mistress in order to focus on finding a cure for her son. Gone for four years now, lost in a stupid accident, he still half-expected the letters she used to send him after every full moon just to make sure he was all right. Every one had made him roll his eyes fondly just like his father in the doorway but he longed for that amused exasperation now it was gone.

He needed to visit his father soon. He had missed Christmas due to Arthur’s attack and, loath to leave Sirius alone at Grimmauld Place, it had been far too brief a stay at Easter. He’d been neglecting him.

And perhaps, just perhaps he might have answers.

He finished his tea alone.

A/N: Just to clarify, at this point of the fic, we are in mid to late August before the start of Harry’s sixth year. I’m not sure I ever made that clear. Thanks to all who have left feedback so far and thanks in advance to those who will. *smiles hopefully*

[Pallas]

A/N: This chapter was originally the second half of chapter three. However, since I am utterly incapable of writing anything concisely, it grew and lengthened and spawned a rather lighter chapter all its own. But never fear, the angst will be back in due course…

4: The Marauder

Dinnertime rolled around. Pulling on his shabby robes and ignoring the creak of his weary bones, Remus made his way downstairs towards the pool of light and cacophony of sound that was a kitchen full of Weasleys.

And full it was. Although Arthur, it seemed, had yet to return from work, Bill was helping his mother ladle stew onto the plates hindered as much as helped by the twins. Ron, Ginny and Harry were clustered together at the far end of the table, packing away a set of gobstones to make room for their servings, whilst Nymphadora Tonks, who appeared to be joining them, lingered rather anxiously just out of Molly’s range. Evidence that she had already tried to help lay in the cracked plate that Mrs Weasley herself was repairing.

“Honestly Tonks, you really need to be more careful… no, no, just sit down dear, we can manage, really…”

“But I wanted to help! I’m sorry about the plate…”

“I know dear, but really, just sit down.”

Looking vaguely distressed, Tonks plonked herself unceremoniously down next to the grinning twins and spotted Remus lingering in the doorway.

“Wotcher Remus,” she greeted brightly, eying him with concern as he moved slightly unsteadily into the kitchen and settled himself at the table. “You look rough, mate. You all right?”

“Tonks!” Molly reprimanded sharply. “Don’t be rude!”

Remus bit back a grin as he stretched slightly against the protesting aches of his body and rubbed his cheek with the heel of his hand. “That’s quite all right, Molly. I do look rough, after all. And I’m fine thank you Tonks.”

Tonks grinned at him as she collected her now mended plate. Molly gave him an uncertain smile.

Remus knew that smile. Five, four, three, two…

“Are you really sure that you’re fine, Remus dear? You are very pale. Perhaps you should go back to bed for a bit and rest.”

Considering she’d all but insisted on his presence at dinner, Remus found this a little inconsistent, but he refrained from saying so. Molly’s attitude towards him had always left him slightly puzzled. He knew from the too familiar half-glances at the mention of his condition and her nervousness regarding the presence of a werewolf in her husband’s ward at Christmas, that Molly Weasley, in spite of her efforts to feel otherwise, was not fond of the idea of werewolves. But somehow, from the first day they had met, this nervousness did not seem to include him. She treated him instead much like she treated her grown up sons, with a kind of fond protectiveness and good-natured fuss that was both sweet and exasperating at once. Remus could only assume that her children had put in a good word for him.

“I really am fine, Molly,” he reassured her quickly. “I’ve been doing this for almost thirty-four years now. I know my limits.”

Molly did not look convinced. But she made no further comment as she handed him a plate of stew and settled down beside him to eat.

“Hey Professor Lupin.” Ron deposited himself in the other seat next to Remus, Harry beside him. “Bill said he heard Moody say that you were coming back to Hogwarts this year. Is it true?”

In spite of himself, Remus smiled at the gratifying enthusiasm in Ron’s voice as he lifted a spoonful of stew. “Yes, it’s true.”

Ron’s joyful whoop almost caused him to spill it. Harry and Ginny were also grinning broadly.

“About time we had a decent teacher again.” Ron informed him happily. “Hermoine’ll be thrilled; she was worried we’d get another dud or something.”

“Couldn’t have been any worse than last year though,” Fred chipped in from across the table. “Mind you, an illiterate hippo in a tutu would have done a better job than Umbridge.”

Several spoonfuls of stew were snorted.

Molly sniffed. “Honestly, though I won’t hear a word against Dumbledore, I do wonder sometimes at the staff he employs. Not you, Remus dear, obviously,” she added hurriedly. “And of course Minerva McGonagall, strict but fair, though she’d just started out, of course, when Arthur and I were at school. But Severus Snape…”

She paused at the murmured assent of seven people at the table who had suffered through Snape as a teacher and one who had suffered him as a colleague. “I’m sure he’s a marvellous potions brewer but I’ve never seen a worse hand with children. What on earth possessed him to go into teaching, I will never know.”

“A vindictive desire to see others suffer?” George suggested with a grin.

Molly gave her son a look and continued as though he had not spoken. “I remember my first Potions teacher,” she reminisced wistfully. “Wonderful woman. Ever so patient. Even Arthur enjoyed her classes and he’s a potions disaster. We were all so upset when she left.” She fixed Remus with a glare of mock reproach. “And it was all your fault!”

Remus chuckled at the mystified stares of his companions. “I like to think my father had something to do with it.” He bore Molly’s exasperated smile at the comment with good grace. “But seriously Molly, I didn’t know you’d been taught by my mum.”

“Oh yes, first and second year before she went and got herself pregnant and resigned.” Molly smiled fondly. “You’re very like her, you know. Oh, not in looks, not at all, but you’ve the same streak of kindness in you, the same ease of manner. It’s a pleasure to see. You remind me of her very much.”

Remus was beginning to understand a little better why Molly had such a soft spot for him. “Thank you,” he said sincerely, raising his goblet to his lips.

Molly’s smile was suddenly mischievous. “I changed your nappy once.”

Remus almost choked. The far end of the table exploded with laughter.

“How recently?” Remus was fairly sure that the comment had been Fred’s although he was rather occupied at the time with trying not to hack up his lungs. Molly ignored the remark and the dull roar of s******* determinedly.

“Professor Lupin brought you in to class one day to visit us a few weeks after you were born. She let me hold you and later I changed your nappy. It was the first time I’d ever tried.” Molly was smiling again “I made a bit of a mess of it, I’m afraid. It flopped right off when she picked you up and when I tried to rescue it by magic, well…” She grinned ruefully. “I suppose there are better ways to get a boy’s attention than accidentally banishing a nappy at him, but it certainly worked on Arthur.”

At the far end of the table, the five teenagers appeared to be having hysterical seizures. Tonks and Bill weren’t doing much better.

Remus could feel a blush spreading across his face. He stared determinedly at his meal.

“Glad I could help with your courtship,” he muttered desperately, praying for a change of subject. His prayers went unanswered.

“She brought you back again the same time the next year and the next couple of years after that,” Molly continued relentlessly. “And she let me look after you several times. But she never came back during our seventh year. I remember asking Minerva McGonagall why not. She told me…” Molly’s voice dropped to a sudden hush as she stared down at the tabletop. “She told me you’d fallen ill.”

The laughter stopped abruptly. There was an uncomfortable silence.

It was Tonks who intervened to lift the sudden curtain of gloom, sallying forth with deliberate and determined cheerfulness. “Hey Molly, I don’t suppose you’ve got pictures of baby Remus? I can just imagine him curled up in a nappy, sucking his thumb and gripping his tiny cup of tea.”

The ensuing laugh relieved the tension almost at once. Remus fixed the young Auror, her hair this evening an eye-aching bright green, with a steely stare.

“Are you making fun of me?” he declared with mock solemnity.

Tonks’ grin was wicked. “No, Remus. If I was making fun of you, I would be describing that fetching leather and hide ensemble that you…”

“Yes!” Remus leapt sharply in to cut off the rest of her sentence. “Thank you Tonks! That’s quite enough.” The blush was back. Remus could feel eight pairs of eyes drilling quizzically into him

“It was for a mission,” he added defensively. “Never again.”

The s******* were back. He was learning to hate the s*******.

“Awww…” Tonks was not letting this go. “But it looked so good on you…”

It was definitely time to change the subject. Casting around desperately, Remus hit upon the question he had intended to ask Harry before the term resumed. He had hoped to do it in private, but these were desperate times and they called for desperate measures.

“Harry?” he exclaimed desperately.

The teenager glanced up at once. “Yeah, Professor?”

Remus smiled more securely. “In honour of my return to Hogwarts, I was wondering if you could do me a favour.”

Harry was regarding him with not entirely unfounded uncertainty. “What kind of favour?”

“I was wondering if I could borrow the Marauder’s Map.”

Simultaneous explosions occurred as both Weasley twins projectile choked their second helpings of stew.

“Fred! George!”

But neither Fred nor George were paying any attention to their mother. Both were staring, wide eyed and open mouthed at Lupin. Their expressions of shock were identical.

Remus regarded them uncertainly for a moment. “Is everything all right?”

“Fine!”

“Great!”

“Wonderful!”

“Magnificent!”

Both twins switched their gaze with almost unnatural speed. Both glared daggers at Harry.

“Anyway…” Remus felt this was a good time to move on. “How about it, Harry? I don’t want to keep it, you’ll have it back before the beginning of term, don’t worry. I just want to make a copy.”

Harry raised his eyebrows, ignoring the grilling glare of Fred and George as he addressed his teacher. “You can make copies?”

Remus shrugged. “Well, it’s not easy but it’s easier than starting from scratch. And if I’m going back to Hogwarts, it might be a useful thing to have. Don’t worry, I won’t spread it round the staff room. It’ll be for personal use only.”

Harry grinned at that. “Okay. You want it now?”

“If you’ve got it here.”

“It’s in my room. I’ll get it.”

“Thank you.”

“Harry, mate!” Fred rocketed to his feet with such violence that the table rocked. With George only a step behind, he bolted around the table. “Can we have a word?”

The twins all but pounced on Harry as he started for the door, flinging their arms around his shoulders as they bustled him up the steps towards the hall. Remus could hear the hiss of their indignant voices as they retreated.

“You told Lupin about the map? He’s a teacher!”

“What were you thinking? It’s supposed to be secret!”

“How does he know you’ve got it?”

“How does he know what it is?”

“He knows I’ve got it because he confiscated it in third year and then gave it back to me when he left.” Harry sounded vaguely amused at the twins’ indignation; Remus suspected his misspent youth was about to be exposed. “But I didn’t tell him anything. I didn’t have to. I think there’s something you should know…”

Their voices faded as they reached the stairs. Grinning broadly, Remus turned back to the table to be met by a wide selection of intrigued and suspicious gazes. So much for drawing attention away from himself.

Tonks was the first to venture the obvious question. “What’s the Marauder’s Map then?” she inquired cheerfully.

Remus did his best to sound casual as he got to his feet and carried his plate to the sink. Ron’s snickering didn’t help. “Just a little toy that my friends and I cooked up at school.” He stared over his shoulder in the direction of the departed twins. “I’d always wondered how Harry got his hands on it, but I think I’m starting to get the idea.”

“It is dangerous?” Molly’s voice was vaguely accusatory.

Remus shook his head firmly. “Of course not. It’s just a toy. But it can be useful and besides, it has sentimental value. I wouldn’t dream of taking the original off Harry but I wouldn’t mind a copy for myself – for old times sake.”

That seemed to satisfy Molly. Bill and Tonks both had the twinkle of suspicion in their eyes, but their wide grins implied that neither was planning to try and expose him. He grinned back appreciatively.

He’d always wondered how the map had come to fall into Harry’s hands. It was a question that he had never quite got around to asking. He knew that the map had been sealed into Filch’s filing cabinet of doom towards the end of their seventh year after James and Sirius had taken one risk too many. But in spite of the loss, neither had really minded – they had declared it bequeathed to future generations and it certainly hadn’t stopped their great prank on the last evening of term. “The Marauder Swansong” they had called it, although Padfoot and Peter had been all for “Stagsong” until James had pointed out that stags didn’t sing. When Remus had then pointed out that swans did not sing either, the ensuing pillow fight had lasted almost an hour.

Ah, the Swansong. That was an evening and a half….

An idea had begun to form in Remus’ mind, the kind of idea that he had long though lost without the terrible influence of Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs, the kind of idea in fact that would be perfect for taking his mind off things in one sense, and bringing some closure in another. He started to grin in spite of himself.

He shouldn’t. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t.

Would he?

Harry returned with the map a few moments later. Remus accepted the familiar tattered piece of parchment with a smile. “Thank you Harry. I’ll have this back to you as soon as I can.”

He turned towards the doorway only to find his way blocked by two redheaded statues that bore a striking resemblance to the Weasley twins.

Fred and George were staring at him as though they had never seen him before in their lives. Their mouths were hanging open. Their eyes were wide and filled with a cocktail of shock, respect and glee. Their expressions were almost awestruck against a pair of broad and euphoric grins.

Remus glanced at Harry. Harry grinned.

The werewolf raised an eyebrow in mock indignation. “Harry Potter! Have you been spreading rumours about me?”

Harry’s grin widened. The twins’ jaws slackened even further even as their eyes brightened.

“It’s true?” Remus wasn’t sure if it was Fred or George who spoke. “You made it?”

Remus chuckled. “I helped. I also picked the password.”

Awed glee melted into mischievous reverence. Remus found it strangely satisfying, a tingling reminder of a long forgotten time. Perhaps he would after all. Just this one last time. But he couldn’t do it alone…

“Actually, Fred, George, if I might have a word…” Remus tucked the map safely into his robes and placed a hand each on the twins’ shoulders as he guided them towards the door. “I think there’s something you can help me with…”

A/N: This is kind of random but… Regarding the age of Molly Weasley. I prefer to calculate the ages of Charlie and Bill Weasley by the more canon consistent “clues from POA” method rather than the less logical (ironically enough) “JK said in chat” – this makes Charlie seven years older than Percy because they last won the Quidditch Cup for Gryffindor when Charlie was seeker, seven years before Percy was Head Boy. This means that in OotP, Charlie is around 26/27 years old, which, assuming Bill is two years older, puts him at 28/29. If we believe that Molly and Arthur married and began reproducing in their late teens/early twenties, that puts them in their late forties to early fifties. Therefore, given that Snape (and therefore almost certainly Remus) is 35/36 in OotP (on this matter I do believe the chat) that means Molly was in her first few years at school when Remus was born. Not that it matters. I just enjoyed working it out.

[Pallas]

A/N: Many thanks to my beta, Chriss Corkscrew for suggesting the inclusion of the Snape scene. And I apologise for the weasel line. I really don’t know where that came from…

5:The Tribute

Silver light stained the overwhelming darkness, dappled patches that glinted and flashed at the eyes in a mockery of beauty. He could feel his own gasps for breath against his raw, painful throat, the tremble of exhausted limbs; he had run too hard, too fast but what else could he do? Branches slapped against his face, knocking him backwards again and again – desperate, sobbing and bewildered, he scrambled on all fours now, his clothing torn, blood leaking from exposed skin as he fought with all his strength to get away…

He could hear it coming. Just as he’d said it would.

He had never been so scared in all his life.

He had to hide. He had to hide now.

A tree loomed in his path, low branches dangling within his reach; leaping desperately, he grasped at the trunk, bark crumbling beneath his small fingers as she scrabbled for some kind of purchase, the height that would take him safely out of reach.

He was too slow.

He heard himself scream as claws plunged into his back, dragging him down and flinging him roughly to the ground to leave him curled on his right side, trembling and sobbing against the mossy earth.

It was over.

A dark shape, more than twice his size loomed from the shadows, its forelimbs stained with the dark taint of his blood. Teeth glinted against the silver light of moonshine, vibrating to a low and primal growl that seemed to shiver to his very core. Golden eyes gleamed.

It lunged.

And then he knew nothing but pain…

Remus flung himself bolt upright, gasping for breath. He could feel himself shaking from head to tow, an icy shiver that chilled him in ways he had not even know he could be chilled. His scar itched with an odd residual of remembered pain. He felt sick.

Breathing deeply, Remus brought his heaving stomach under control, closing his eyes as he fought back the shudders and calmed his racing heart. Only when the last of the shaking had subsided, when the feeling of nausea had passed, when the twinge of his scar had faded to nothing did Remus risk opening his eyes.

It was not the first time he had had such dreams. But they had always been vague before, glimpses of images half-seen and half-forgotten, a glint of moonlit glade, the slap of a branch, a flash of teeth. And the eyes. Always the eyes.

But this had been more. Much more.

Remus had never been able to remember the night he was bitten. He was too young, his mother had told him when he had tentatively asked about it years later, and the trauma of the event had created a wall inside his mind, a protection against an experience that no child should have had to endure. He was better off, she had said, without knowing.

Only once had he asked her how it had happened. She had burst into tears. He had never asked again.

But this dream was something else, something more than a flash of brief recollection. Remus felt almost as though something had broken in his mind; the wall his mother had mentioned, crumbling brick by brick over the years in the world of his dreams, suddenly half-collapsing to provide this sudden rush of imagery.

Remus fought back the returning shivers, staring mindlessly at the bedclothes. He could have lived without the memory. But he would just have to accept it. There was no putting it back.

He was in no doubt that he had just relived his bite. But why had it suddenly come back to him now?

He shook himself. He shouldn’t dwell on it. There was nothing he could do to change events more than thirty years in the past. Light was streaming in from behind curtained windows – it was clearly morning and probably time to be up. With a sigh he raised his head and glanced around the chamber.

He blinked. Where was he?

His brain clicked on. He remembered.

Of course. Hogwarts.

He had arrived the night before, apparating to Hogsmeade as the other teachers did and boarding the Thestral pulled carriage provided by Dumbledore for the ride up the school. He smiled to himself remembering his last journey to Hogwarts, three years before – exhausted by a difficult full moon that had left him too tired to apparate, too nauseous to use floo powder or risk the Knight Bus, and too disorientated to even consider taking a broom, he had nostalgically boarded the Hogwarts Express, settled himself in a compartment and had promptly fallen asleep for most of the rest of the trip. He had not expected to awaken to find the looming presence of a Dementor and his first sight of James and Lily’s son in almost twelve years.

Dementors. It had been after his first encounter with a rogue Dementor, almost twenty years ago now, that these dreams had started. And although the imagery he associated with Dementors had altered since, expanding with an alarming repertoire thrown at him by life that had meant he had not been lying to Harry when he had said he was no expert against them, those brief images had always haunted him.

But he was brooding again. That had to stop.

Pulling himself out of the comfort of his warm four-poster bed, Remus checked the clock. He’d slept late. But that was hardly surprising, considering the busy night he’d had.

He grinned in spite of himself as he remembered why he’d been so late to bed. He was probably going to get in trouble. But that was nothing new.

As he had predicted, the Ministry had not been impressed with Dumbledore’s choice of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. But despite a controversy that had raged several days, the Ministry of Cornelius Fudge was simply standing on ground too shaky to wage a war with an invigorated and once more respected Albus Dumbledore. Fudge, already battling calls for his resignation over his fluffing of the Voldemort issue, had tried to use this news to bolster his image once more. It had failed. After a few days, and a ringing endorsement from the headmaster on his behalf, the Ministry had folded its tents and slunk away into the night. The British wizarding community were by no means thrilled at the prospect of a werewolf teacher, but with one year at Hogwarts with (to their knowledge) no serious incidents, a good track record with the majority of the children, and Dumbledore’s support, they seemed at least willing to give him a chance.

He was determined not to waste it.

But he ought to get a move on. The children would be arriving that evening and he still had much to prepare. Filing away his thoughts for the time being, Remus pulled on his robes and hurried down to breakfast.

* * *

The Defence Against the Dark Arts office had changed very little in the two years since Remus had last seen it. He deposited his briefcase on the familiar desk with a grin, removing several books and slotting them easily back onto the shelves they had previously inhabited. With a matter of a few minutes work, it was as though he’d never been forced to leave in the first place and more importantly, it felt right. This was the place he was supposed to be. It was where he belonged.

It was a good feeling.

The house-elves had successfully wiped out all but a minor trace of the room’s previous occupant. The pink, perfumed doily he uncovered in one of the desk drawers was mildly alarming, but a quick flick of the wand banished it safely into the fireplace where it curled up and burned quite satisfactorily. Remus couldn’t help but feel slightly offended by it, however. If that Umbridge woman was so determined to make his life as miserable as she possibly could, the least she could do was muster the dignity to have taste.

It was in the midst of trying to recall exactly how his Grindylow tank was supposed to reassemble that he sensed, rather than saw the looming presence in the doorway. A quick glance at his crisp, fresh copy of the Marauder’s Map, unfolded neatly on the desk confirmed his suspicion. They had successfully managed to avoid each other the evening before and yet again this morning, but it seemed that his now no-longer-former colleague had decided to get the worst out of the way before the children came.

“Severus.” He did not bother to turn around. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

The Potion Master’s voice drifted smoothly across the office. “The Headmaster wished me to inform all the staff that the Hogwarts Express is now underway. All professors are expected to be ready and waiting in the Great Hall ten minutes before the students arrive.”

Remus finally glanced up at the black robed figure lurking in his doorway and smiled. “That’s useful to know. Thank you Severus.”

Snape’s nose crinkled in distaste as he swallowed the brief gratitude of a man he despised, his black eyes gleaming with dislike as he stared. Remus, still puzzling his way through the Grindylow tank managed to endure the scrutiny of the Head of Slytherin for a good thirty seconds before it finally became a little too distracting.

Depositing the sheet of magically reinforced glass on his desk, he met the dark gaze squarely and cheerfully. “Was there something else?”

Snape straightened himself, his eyes flashing. “I suppose you’re feeling very pleased with yourself.”

Remus blinked. “Pardon?”

“Worming your way back in here. Pity is one way to find employment, but it isn’t one I’d use. Not that I need to.”

Just as he’d expected, Severus was here to vent. Jolly good; it was just like old times. He was feeling more at home already.

He maintained the smile deliberately. “I didn’t worm my way in anywhere. Albus all but ordered me to come back and I wasn’t going to argue with him.”

“But you were so horrified when he did, I suppose.”

“I’m not sorry to be back, if that’s what you mean.” Remus turned away to hide the fading of his smile, depositing his mug and teakettle on the shelf behind his desk. “But my reasons for resigning stand.”

“And yet you are back here.”

Remus shrugged, his back still turned. “Albus said the school needed a good Defence teacher, especially this year. He told me there was no one else to ask.”

The vast and stony silence behind him told him eloquently that this had not been the right thing to say.

“And I suppose you will expect me to continue to brew your potion for you? Given your own ineptitude?” The Potions Master all but spat the words at the werewolf’s back.

Touché. “I would not expect anything, Severus.” It was time to turn round again, to face the suppressed maelstrom of emotion cloaked in black robes that lingered in his office doorway as though loathe to venture into the coveted territory of an enemy.
“But I would appreciate it.”

“Keep your gratitude, Lupin,” Snape sneered at him with dignified poise. “I neither want nor desire it. I know what you are and now so do the students. I’ll be watching you and so will they.”

Remus met his gaze once more, firm and direct. “I know.”

Snape’s dark eyes held his colleagues’ stare for an instant longer. Then with a disdainful huff, he turned and swept into the corridor.

Remus stared for a moment at the empty doorway. Severus Snape, as charming as ever. Well, that went as well as could be expected.

He could only hope the students would be a little more understanding.

In five hours, he’d find out.

* * *

Remus had forgotten just how noisy a hoard of children could be in the echoing halls of Hogwarts. For a moment he paused at the head of the stairs that descended down into the Entrance Hall, his slight lateness in spite of the earlier reminder allowing him to take in the mass of robed figures sweeping in chatting groups through the main doors and into the Great Hall. It was more than two years now since he had seen such a sight and almost half of these children had never known him as a teacher, only as that werewolf that they had made such a fuss about in the newspaper. Snape’s words rang uncomfortably in his head. Would they be nervous of him? Would they give him a chance to prove that he was just as human as they were?

Oh well. Now or never.

He started down the stairs.

There was a distinct hush. A mass of eyes turned.

The reactions were mixed. He was flattered to note that many of the older children were beaming at the sight of him; he spotted Harry, Ron and Hermione smiling together near the main entrance, Dean Thomas and Ginny Weasley grinning arm in arm, and Neville Longbottom, who offered a small wave and a shy smile. Some, mostly Muggle-borns who had probably not witnessed the battle in the Prophet over his reappointment, seemed surprised to see him but there was pleasure too.

But the joy was anything but universal; many of the children, even some of those he had taught, seemed wary and others, most of them Slytherins, regarded him with the same outright hostility as their Head of House. Of the younger children, many of those who did not know who he was appeared confused, but those who did looked nervous.

Remus sighed. It was going to be a long year.

He started across the Entrance Hall. The volume began to rise once more.

But not enough. Not enough to cover the sound of the drawling voice that echoed loudly and sharply in his wake.

“Oh, look. The werewolf’s back.”

The confused faces very abruptly joined the ranks of the nervous. The nervous had shifted towards downright terror.

Remus sighed again. First Snape. Now Malfoy. Oh joy.

“Dumbledore must really be scraping the barrel. What’s the matter – did they run out of human candidates?”

Ah, Draco Malfoy. Subtle as a Hungarian Horntail and with almost as much charm. Remus was fairly sure he could tell where this desperate display of assertiveness was stemming from. Malfoy’s precious father Lucius, his backup in times of crisis, was now sequestered in Azkaban; taking pot-shots at one of the people who had placed him there seemed to be his way of trying to claw back some kind of superiority. But Remus knew this game. If there was one thing that Malfoy could not abide, it was being ignored. And if you gave him enough rope, he usually managed to hang himself.

He kept walking.

“Don’t want to answer that one do you?” Malfoy’s voice had risen in pitch. “Or maybe you don’t understand what I’m saying at all? Perhaps I should be speaking to you in your own language.”

A mockery of a howl chased through the air, whooping and echoing across the Entrance Hall to skim past Remus. He stopped. Slowly, he turned to look back over his shoulder.

Malfoy was standing in the centre of the chamber, shadowed by Crabbe and Goyle, his hands on his hips as he grinned triumphantly at his teacher.

Remus simply smiled.

“Well, Mr Malfoy,” he said, his voice soft but carrying decisively across the now silent room. “If you wanted to tell me that your mother stole your underpants and the weasels are coming, you could have just done it in English.”

There was a moment of awestruck silence. And then the hall erupted.

Biting back a grin, Remus ducked his head and continued nonchalantly through the doors into the Great Hall, the vast swell of laughter bouncing from the walls behind him. It was good to be back.

* * *

The feast was excellent, as always. In spite of Molly’s fine cooking, he had certainly missed the Hogwarts food.

The anticipation only made it better.

Remus hoped he had timed it right. The time-lapse charm he had found in an old notebook of Sirius’ was quite complicated to perform and had taken more than a little practice to perfect. If he had indeed managed it correctly, then his timing would be good – he had judged the length of the feast almost exactly. That being the case, all he had to do was wait. It was almost time.

He hoped James and Sirius were watching. He hoped he’d done them proud.

He hadn’t felt this nervous in years. Sitting next to his old Head of House as he waited wasn’t helping his nerves. He had yet to meet a former Gryffindor of the last thirty years who was not still in awe of Minerva McGonagall. And it was she who had caught the culprits on the last occasion this had been performed. The fact it had been the last evening of term had not prevented her from giving them one last late detention…

And then Dumbledore rose to his feet, clapping his hands for silence as the volume dropped. Remus leaned forward in anticipation as the Headmaster gazed out over the now silent hall. “If I may have your attention please…”

He got no further.

A sharp explosion followed by a long high-pitched whine cut shockingly across his words. A flash of red traced a shuddering path into the enchanted ceiling.

BOOM!

The firework exploded in a shower of red sparks that giggled and chuckled as they drifted towards the floor like scarlet rain, but this laughter was drowned by another whine, and another and yet another as more fireworks erupted from the carved crevices of the walls of the Great Hall, flashing and exploding in a riot of spectacular colour and noise that drowned the chamber in rainbows. Streamers, confetti and long white curls of sticky silly string catapulted out over the four house tables to settle across the bemused heads of the students like snow. Catherine wheels rolled and danced across the air, rockets whizzed and combusted in a flurry of sparks to form dragons, unicorns and hippogriffs, stags, dogs and flowers that twirled across the mimicry of the sky overhead with the joyful enthusiasm of release.

The students stared. The staff stared. Behind his vast white beard, Dumbledore bit back a smile.

Remus grinned. Merlin bless the Weasley twins. The school wasn’t the same without them.

In the chair immediately to his right, an ominous throat was cleared. Arranging his expression as innocently as he could manage, Remus turned to face the steely-eyed glare of Professor McGonagall. The bangs and lightning flashes of colour cast shadows and light across the etched outlines of her features. A piece of silly string dangled unceremoniously from her hat.

“In your expert opinion, Lupin,” she intoned precisely in her Scottish lilt. “How many fireworks do you believe this prank involves?”

“At a guess?” Remus rolled his eyes in apparent thought, as he picked a piece of violet streamer out of his hair and handed it to Flitwick who was cheerfully decorating his hat with them; beyond him a sour faced Snape was unsticking silly string from his hair. “I’d say somewhere in the region of… two hundred and sixty-three.”

McGonagall raised an eyebrow. “That’s very precise.”

Remus smiled modestly. “Well, as you said, I’m the expert.”

The Deputy Head’s lips pursed but Remus had the sudden impression that she was fighting not to smile. “Don’t play the innocent with me, Mr Lupin. Don’t you think I know “The Marauder Swansong” when I see it? I still haven’t recovered from the last time.” She shook her head. “Honestly. I thought you were the sensible one.”

An excitable yellow rocket zoomed the length of the staff table, depositing golden sparks along the tablecloth with uninhibited exuberance. Many of the students had come to their feet, laughing and clapping as they stared up at the display, wading through the ever-growing debris as they pelted each other with silly string and streamers.

This time McGonagall did smile in spite of herself. “Remus, where on earth did you get them all? Have you spent your entire wage before you’ve earned it?”

Remus casually lifted his goblet out of the path of a careening Catherine wheel. “All supplies are courtesy of Weasleys’ Wizarding Wheezes. They were most supportive when I told them of my plans. They provided the entire display free of charge.”

Minerva chuckled dryly. “I should have known. But honestly Remus, whatever I am going to do with you? I thought you’d grown out of this long ago, if it was ever your style at all.”

The werewolf gave a cheeky grin. “Are you going to give me a detention?”

She regarded him with mock solemnity. “I think you’re a little old for that, Professor Lupin. And well beyond the point of it having any impact. Just answer me one thing. Why?”

Remus sobered up sharply. He regarded Minerva with a sudden seriousness. “As I’m sure you remember, this prank was played for the first time at the Farewell Feast at the end of my seventh year. It was conceived, ruthlessly planned out and executed with almost military precision by two very devious minds. It was their farewell to Hogwarts. Their swansong. A last moment of levity before the heavy reality of Voldemort and the real world set in. It’s also how I think they’d want to be remembered, as they were before harsh life got in their way; as two boys who liked to have fun.” He smiled softly. “Call it a tribute.”

Minerva stared at him solemnly for a moment. Then she smiled too.

“It’s very fitting,” she said gently. “Very fitting indeed.”

Remus smiled at her a final time and then turned to stare out over the mass of splashed colours and rampant sound of fireworks that vibrated through the Great Hall one final time. So much vibrancy. So much life. Only to be cut short and fade away all too soon as the fire within them died.

A fitting tribute indeed.

“Goodnight Padfoot,” he whispered softly. “Goodnight Prongs. Rest in peace, my friends.”

A/N: I’d be lying if I said I was completely satisfied with the prank I created for this chapter. Its inclusion was my nod to the events at the end of OotP; whilst I did not want this to turn into a Sirius-is-dead angst fic (simply because it is not very relevant to my plot), in setting this fic so soon after OotP, it would have been unrealistic to leave the matter unaddressed. I had a good long think about how I felt Remus might react – he’s never struck me as a wallower, more as the kind to either stoically bottle it up or find an outlet and deal. Since, as hinted as his backstory for this fic, his 1981 outlet did not prove very healthy *veg* I felt he would want to find another, more appropriate and less disturbing way to bring closure on his grief. I settled upon this tribute as a form of outlet/closure in the end, not because it is something I think he would have done himself (indeed, my beta suggested it was not subtle enough for Remus which is entirely true) but because I think it is the kind of tribute his friends would have wanted and it would be their wishes and not his own that he would consider. In my world of backstory, it was after all James’ and Sirius’ big farewell to Hogwarts once upon a time and in repeating it, Remus is allowing them to say goodbye to the world for good as he says goodbye to them. I hope that makes sense.

[Pallas]

A/N: Apologies for the delay in posting – my poor beta has not been well ((((Chriss)))). But I’m back now with what I can only call my exposition chapter. This chapter is a combination of important plot relevant information, significant background information and a few of my own ideas and speculations on the possible ways and means of Potterverse Lycanthropy, hopefully put together in a interesting and readable way that advances the story. I’ll leave it up to you to divine which is which….


6: The Werewolf Lesson

The sixth year Gryffindor and Hufflepuff Defence Against the Dark Arts class at Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry were staring at their teacher in stunned silence. It was not quite the reaction he’d been hoping for.

Carefully Remus leaned forward, resting his hands on the desk as he surveyed the shocked faces before him. He fought desperately not to smile.

“Is there a problem with my choice of subject matter?” he inquired innocuously.

The class blinked. A flurry of looks were exchanged.

“Ummm…” Gryffindor courage prevailed in the face of Hermione Granger. “You’re going to teach us about werewolves, Professor?”

This time Remus did smile. “Are you suggesting I am not an authority on the subject?”

The class gave a nervous laugh. Remus hoped it was a sign that they were starting to relax; it would be a most awkward hour if they didn’t. Although he had been teaching again for almost two months now, there were still times when he felt rather as though he was on some sort of probation. Exactly who he thought was judging him, be it staff, parents or students, he had yet to establish. It didn’t change the feeling though.

Oh well. Time to press on.

“I know that you have only covered this subject with Professor Snape.” Remus pushed himself upright and strolled casually around to the front of his desk, leaning back against the wooden surface easily. “And I am aware that his view of werewolves has always tended to be rather one-sided.”

Several class members snorted at that.

Remus continued. “But I do not intend to rose-tint this for you either. Lycanthropy is not a pleasant subject, as I know better than anyone. And although the majority of werewolves are simply ordinary people trying to find a way to live with a terrible curse, I will not deny that many of my kind are indeed extremely dangerous.”

He regarded the now rapt faces of his class for a moment. “So you see, whilst I do not intend to encourage you all to join the Werewolf Capture Unit, I will not, pleasant as it might have been, be starting a campaign to Hug Your Local Werewolf.”

This time the class laughed outright, melting the tension away in a heartbeat. Feeling a little more secure in his footing now, Remus allowed his shoulders to relax slightly and smiled again.

“So then, I think the best way to start this is to see what we have to build on. What do you know about werewolves?”

The first half of the lesson passed quickly in a flurry of question and answer. Remus stepped in quickly to correct several misconceptions, confirming the basic facts of a werewolf’s appearance and behaviour and the effects of the change upon its human host, covering the Wolfsbane potion and even, much to the discomfort of the class, ways in which werewolves could be killed.

“Oh come now,” he reprimanded easily after his description of the effects of aconite evoked a particularly squeamish exclamation from Parvati Patil and Hannah Abbott. “I’m not going to sugar-coat this and you do need to know.” His gaze drifted for an uncomfortable moment to Harry, Ron and Hermione; the only three people he could be certain would fully understand. They alone in this room had seen the wild fury of his full moon half. That they had lived to tell the tale had been more luck than judgement.

“If I failed to take my Wolfsbane potion and encountered you on a full moon, I would kill you. Simple as that. I wouldn’t recognise you, I wouldn’t care, I would just do what comes naturally, and what comes naturally to a werewolf is tearing humans limb from limb.” He sighed. “Werewolves are quick and deadly. And if you took that extra moment to remember that I was a human being a few hours before, if you hesitated to act, you would die. Because for that one night I would not be your teacher. I would not be anything but a werewolf. And I would rather that you killed me than have me kill you.”

He ignored the class’ distinct air of discomfort deliberately. “If there is one thing I wish you to take from this lesson, it’s this. When a werewolf is human, treat him human. But on the one night a month he is a wolf, beware.”

A thoughtful hush descended. Pushing his hair out of his face, Remus settled back into the chair behind his desk and gazed out at the pensive rows of faces, twitching his quill between his fingers.

“Right,” he said briskly. “Now, do you have any more questions?”

Several hands rose almost at once. Remus surveyed them thoughtfully for a moment.

“Neville,” he selected.

The plump Gryffindor fidgeted slightly. “Is it true that werewolves are killed by silver?”

Remus grinned. Ah, the old urban myth. “If you hit them hard enough with it,” he replied with a friendly smile. Neville gave a sheepish grin as the class laughed. “To my knowledge, which on a matter such as this I like to think is pretty extensive, silver has no more effect on werewolves than any other metal. I can handle sickles just like the rest of you. There is a Muggle legend that says that werewolves can be killed by a silver bullet shot through the heart, but frankly if you shoot any kind of bullet into a werewolf’s heart, it’s a fair bet you’ll kill it. Next?”

He considered the coppice of hands once more. “Dean.”

The young man regarded his teacher uncertainly. “When I was in Diagon Alley, there was this guy protesting about werewolves. He said…” He hesitated, unsure, but Remus’ gentle nod encouraged him onwards. After all, there was very little he could say that his teacher had not heard before. “He said all werewolves should be locked up because they’re too difficult to stop. He said they’re immune to stupefy and the Killing Curse. Is that true?”

Remus pursed his lips thoughtfully. “Partly. You’ve brought up a very good point Dean, thank you. ” He rose to his feet once more, tapping his quill on the desk before dropping it back into the ink pot. “Listen carefully to this – if you encounter a werewolf on full moon some day, this could save your life. Magic does not affect a transformed werewolf. You can cast whatever curses and hexes you chose in a werewolf’s direction, but on that one night a month they will simply bounce off. That is why werewolves are so dangerous. They cannot be directly damaged, slowed or stopped by any kind of spell. Even the Killing Curse.”

“But then…I mean…” It was not like Hermione to struggle for words. “But then how are they ever stopped? How does anyone survive an attack?”

“Violence.” Remus decided to be blunt. “As I said before. If you shoot a werewolf through the heart, it dies. Hitting it hard enough over the head with a large lump of silver should do it too.” He smiled at Neville again, who smiled back. “A werewolf is immune to direct magic but not to physical violence. In that way, magic can be used indirectly against a werewolf. Levitating a rock or a club to drop on it, banishing something sharp in its direction, summoning a weapon with which you can defend yourself, all are effective ways of self-defence. If they don’t kill the werewolf, they may just give you enough time to get away.”

“But what about the rest of the time?” It was Ernie Macmillan, the Hufflepuff prefect who spoke up. “Are you immune when you’re human too?”

Remus shook his head firmly. “No such luck. If you were to hit me with Avada Kedavra, right here and now, I would be as dead as anyone else. The same goes for stupefy, impedimenta and any other curse you’d care to name. There are only two spells that affect a werewolf differently in their human form and they are the remaining Unforgivables – the Imperius Curse and the Cruciatus Curse.”

“You’re immune to Imperio and Crucio?” It was Harry’s astonished voice that broke the stunned silence.

“I didn’t say that.” Remus sighed. How in Merlin’s name should he explain this? Quietly he moved away from his desk, pacing quietly in front of the blackboard as he gathered his thoughts. The class watched and waited, almost hypnotised by their teacher’s wanderings.

“The Cruciatus Curse causes as much pain to a human werewolf as it does to anyone else.” Remus tucked his hands behind his back, staring determinedly at the floor as he walked. “The difference is that due to the agony of their monthly transformations, a werewolf has a much higher pain threshold. They can walk through a crucio that would cripple anyone else.”

He did not miss the gasps that rose from the desks before him.

“It hurts then? It’s painful?” The uncertain voice belonged to Justin Finch-Fletchley. “Changing into a wolf, I mean.”

Remus hesitated, gazing out at his class with firm eyes. Truth was truth and he would not lie to his students again, not after their third year. His voice, when he spoke was soft, but clear. “They say the only thing more painful than being bitten by a werewolf is transforming into one. Yes Justin, it hurts very much.”

Tearing his gaze away from the horrified faces of his pupils, Remus began to pace once more.

“Now, the Imperius Curse, as I’m sure you’re all aware, puts the human mind into a dreamlike state in order that it be more pliable, more open to suggestion. The victim must then watch helplessly as his or her body performs acts that they themselves do not wish. I have been told that the experience is quite blissful at the time.” Remus paused, resting one hand against the wall. “Excepting the bliss, being placed under the Imperius Curse is very similar to what occurs with the mind of a Wolfsbane-free werewolf at full moon.”

Remus did not look at his students just then. He did not want to see the rows of intrigued or shocked faces as he described the worst part of his monthly torture. The physical pain, oh even pain such as the contortion of limbs, the melting and reshaping of bones, the pain could just be tolerated. No, what Remus had always hated most about his transformations was the moment when he lost his mind. Discussing in front of so many the facts of his life that he had previously only described to close friends and family left him feeling vaguely exposed. But they deserved to know.

“The human part of the mind fades, drops into a kind of numbness as the wolf’s mind takes control.” Remus knew his fingertips were biting sharply into the wall: he tried to force himself to relax. It didn’t work. “But the human mind is, in some part, still aware. The senses of a werewolf are very different to a human’s, very difficult to interpret and comprehend, so the images the human takes away from the full moon are confused, half-forgotten, vague impressions, no more. But you always know that you are trapped – that this is your body, what’s left of it, and you have no control. The wolf can do as it pleases and you can only watch.”

He could feel dozens of eyes drilling into him – he realised that, lost in his thoughts, he had strayed slightly from his point. Shaking himself firmly, he pushed away from the wall and moved to perch on the corner of his desk. He met the curious, saddened gaze of his students with determination.

“The same, as every werewolf knows,” he added softly. “Applies to the wolf during the rest of the month. It is, to some extent, aware. Waiting. And that is why the Imperius Curse is ineffective. The moment the victim’s mind succumbs to the curse, it replicates the numbing of their mind at full moon. The moment the human mind shuts down enough for it to be controlled, the wolf steps in and takes over.”

Hermione gasped. “It makes you transform?”

“No, there is no transformation. A werewolf can only change form under the full moon.” Remus sighed. “It is a kind of inverted Wolfsbane effect. The wolf’s mind takes over the human body. And there are few forces on earth more powerful. If the caster of the Imperius is lucky, they are simply thrown backwards by the force of their expulsion. If they are unlucky, the power of the backlash could kill them.”

Wide-eyed horror filled the faces of the watching teenagers.

“What happens to the werewolf?” The tremulous voice was Neville’s. “Once the curse is lifted?”

“That depends.” The class’ insightful questions were leading Remus into murky waters. He was absolutely certain that neither the Ministry nor the governors would approve of his spreading the information he was about to give to these young people. But then again, why shouldn’t they know? Why shouldn’t they be warned? The decision had been made not to inform Harry of the threat posed by Abraham Kane for now, but by teaching the signs of the feral in class, he could prepare him and his classmates for Kane’s possible appearance without revealing covert Order intelligence.

He met the curious stares of his students. “The affect upon the human side of the werewolf often depends on the strength of the human mind. You see, once a part of the wolf has found its way into the human, it can be very difficult to put back. It takes a great deal of strength and determination to stay human on the werewolf’s part in order to push the mind of the wolf back into dormancy. The wolf very rarely wants to go. This is not just something that those werewolves affected by the Imperius Curse have to deal with – it is a fact of life for every werewolf. We have to be as strong as we can, because we know that there is an enemy within who will pounce at the first sign of weakness.”

“What happens?” The hushed voice belonged to Ron. “What happens if the wolf gets in?”

Remus took a deep breath. Once more into the breech… “What happens is that the boundaries between the wolf and human minds are broken down; the wolf either becomes dominant or the two bleed together and become one. The phenomenon is known as turning feral.”

Shudders passed through the many of the wizard-born children in the class; some it seemed had heard of ferals.

“The wolf mind is the stronger.” Remus fought against uncomfortable memories that rose and battered his psyche relentlessly; firmly, he ordered himself to concentrate. “It becomes the driving force, the desire. A feral lives to hurt, to kill, to see others in pain. Any human emotion such as compassion or morality is lost, swamped beneath bloodlust. But it can have human intelligence too – it is a werewolf that can think, can plot, and its strength and senses are those of a wolf. There is very little in the world more dangerous. A feral is the only kind of werewolf it is worth being afraid of.” Remus forced back a shiver at the memory of the fiery chill of wolfish desires sliding across his vulnerable mind all those years before. “There are many ways in which a werewolf can turn feral. The most frequent is simply losing the will to go on, giving in to the wolf because the human simply cannot continue to live that life; this is a common occurrence in a werewolf who has bitten another, consumed by their remorse. These ferals go insane. They become nothing but a pure wolf mind in a human body, for in giving up the human part condemns itself to the same numbness as at full moon. It is a straight swap instead of an intermingling. Ironically enough, this type of feral is less dangerous.”

Remus took another deep breath – the next part of this explanation would take him into very personal realms of experience indeed. “Then there is those who turn feral by accident. As I said, the wolf is always waiting – one moment of weakness is enough. Extreme grief, misery, depression, anger or rage can provide an opening, especially in combination with alcohol. Alcohol lowers the mind’s defences and heightens emotion and it can become a catalyst to disaster for a werewolf. If, even for one instant, those defences are lowered enough, the wolf will force itself through. In most cases, it is a brief incursion, a quick flash of wolf fury before the human mind manages to regain control; this is know as a feral incident and is supposed to be reported to the Werewolf Registry immediately.”

“How come?” Susan Bones ventured the question. “If it goes away so soon, why does it matter?”

Remus sucked in his breath. Oh yes, personal territory indeed. “Because it is believed that a werewolf who has suffered a feral incident may be more prone to turning feral in the future. Therefore it has become Ministry policy in the last decade or two that if no one has been hurt, the werewolf should be sent immediately to a special facility for observation. If anyone is hurt or killed during the feral incident, the werewolf is either sent to Azkaban or executed.”

“Can’t see many werewolves coming forward and admitting it then.” Seamus Finnegan’s Irish lilt put an end to the ominous silence. “If that’s what they get for it.”

Remus bit his lip against the flood of unpleasant emotion. Oh, where, oh, where is the bell? Why did I start on this topic? What was I thinking, believing I could just talk about this as though I didn’t know what it means? Hermione’s astonishment at the beginning of the lesson as to his choice of subject was beginning to seem like foresight worthy of a seer.


“Indeed not,” he replied, proud of the evenness of his tone. Well, there was no going back now. He had no choice but to plough on until the end of the lesson. “The final kind of feral is easily the most dangerous. Those who turn feral by choice.” The gasps were becoming commonplace in this oddly out of control lesson, careening along like a runaway hippogriff through taboo after taboo. This had certainly not been what Remus had intended for this class. “These werewolves allow the wolf mind in, permit it to dominate their humanity and take control of their lives. They are, as I described, a wolf’s drive and desire combined with a human intelligence.”

“Why?” Hermione’s voice was a whisper. “Why would anyone want that?”

Remus allowed himself to smile in spite of his well-hidden shakiness. “You’re asking the wrong person Hermione. It is the antithesis of everything I believe in.” His mind wandered back to the deluded souls of The Howling, desperately seeking some kind of release without any idea of what it would mean. “Desperation, I suppose. A desire for power perhaps. A simple lack of understanding. I think some seek the feral as a freedom or strength that they feel they lack, or a better alternative to their often-victimised attempts to be human: if they are no longer allowed to be human, why not be wolf? Most probably do not realise that in becoming feral, they give up ever inch of their humanity bar the cold logic of their mind. And those that do realise deserve it.” Remus sighed, his own memories of that dreadful instant tugging at him ruthlessly as he shook his head. “I cannot comprehend any person who wish that. Luckily that kind of feral is very rare.”

“How can you tell?” Dean spoke nervously once more. “If a werewolf has turned feral?”

Remus gave an internal sigh of relief and silently blessed Dean Thomas for moving the conversation back into rather safer territory. “At full moon, you can’t – they’ll all try to kill you just the same. A feral might play with you a little more, might drag it out for the malicious fun of it – the remains of their human intelligence carry through to the full moon - but physically the wolf is no different. But the human feral is very distinctive; aspects of the wolf will merge into their human appearance. Their eyes are werewolf eyes, bright gold and very sharp. Their fingertips are topped by short, dark claws and they have unnaturally sharpened canine teeth; wolf-like in fact. They are also very strong and very fast. And of course, like every werewolf, they will have the scar of their original bite somewhere about their body - the wounds made by a werewolf, be it bite or claw, will always leave a scar that even magic can’t remove.” Remus smiled suddenly. “However I wouldn’t recommend trying to strip any potential feral naked in order to find it.”

The laughter was a relief. The atmosphere in the classroom had weighed down like a lead weight upon them all.

“Professor?” It was Seamus again. “Does that mean you’ve still got the scar from when you were bitten?”

There was a shocked hush. In spite of the intimate revelations of werewolf behaviour in front of the class, Remus had noticed a certain reluctance of the part of his students to address the matter of his lycanthropy directly. Seamus had apparently decided that it was time to cross this final line.

He nodded shortly. “It does. However, since I am not given to stripping my robes off in class, I have no intention of showing it.”

Another laugh followed. Better, better…

“Sir?” Seamus looked uncomfortable. Oh no, now what? Where is that bell? “It’s just, me mam was reading this article in The Prophet. The bloke who wrote it, he said that he reckoned that most folk who became werewolves… well…well, they deserved to get bit ‘cos they must have been doing something reckless or dangerous or evil for it to happen in the first place. I ain’t saying I believe it!” he added hurriedly. “But it’s just… how did you get bitten, Professor Lupin?”

If the class had been hushed before, they were utterly silent now, awed at the audacity of one of their number. Remus was pretty impressed himself. Rising slowly from his perch on the edge of his desk, he circled it slowly, resting his hands against the firm wood once more as he faced out over the most awkward class he had ever taken. Flashes of his dream tortured his mind, playing against his sense, the slap of branches, the glint of the silver moonlight, the drag of claws and teeth against his skin. But how had he come to be there, in the dark woods he assumed were the ones behind his childhood home, all alone, late at night, when only three years old? Why would he have been there? Where were his parents? But in this part of his memory at least, the wall held firm. And even if he could recall, the chances were good that he had been too young to understand.

He stared blankly for a moment. What could he possibly say?

He swallowed hard. “To be quite honest, Seamus,” he said softly. “I don’t really remember.”

Incredulity filled every face. “That’s a pretty big thing to forget,” he heard Ron mutter under his breath; a moment later he winced sharply as Hermione’s foot connected firmly with his ankle.

“Ron!” she hissed.

In spite of himself, Remus smiled at their antics. “I was just a child at the time,” he explained gently to the rows of curious faces. “Only three years old. I remember getting bitten…” He winced at the still fresh sensations of the dream – his side twinged sharply and he rubbed it absent-mindedly. “But I don’t remember how it happened. I don’t know about reckless or dangerous…” He forced himself to smile. “But I would have been a very precocious toddler to be doing anything evil.”

They laughed once more. That was something.

And then, oh yes, at long, tortuous last, the bell echoed through the classroom. Remus felt himself breath a huge sigh of relief.

“Good lesson, everyone,” he lied pleasantly as they packed away their quills and books in a bustle of motion. “Ten points each to Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Homework – well, never mind homework. I’ll let you off today.”

A cheer arose from the ranks of hurriedly departing children. In moments they were gone, leaving nothing but an echo of chatter and a very confused and shaken professor in their wake.

A/N: My idea for the nature of the feral werewolf arose from reading many fanfics in which Remus has acquired what I tend to call FWP – Funky Werewolf Powers. Although I have no particular objection to the idea of werewolves having stronger senses etc in their human form, it is not something I can read from or see happening in canon. The impression I get from reading the books and listening to JKR’s interviews is that lycanthropy is akin to a disease or disability and I can’t see it being of any advantage to the human side of the werewolf if that is the case. So the feral is kind of my compromise – it is possible for a werewolf to be stronger, faster and have keener senses but it comes at the cost of their humanity and their mind.

[Pallas]

Forgot to add - feedback makes me ridiculously happy. I think I'm just insecure...

http://www.cosforums.com/showthread.php?t=30659

[Pallas]

A/N: This chapter contains my first cliffhanger and some mild violence. Neither could be helped; you know what they say about people getting hurt when they play with sharp objects…*veg*

7: A Walk in Hogsmeade

Pulling his cloak tighter against the autumn chill, Remus glanced along Hogsmeade’s largest street at the hoards of Hogwarts students laughing and chattering as they darted from Zonko’s to Honeydukes, Dervish and Banges to the Three Broomsticks, revelling in this, the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year. The sun was bright against a washed out blue sky, clear but icy cold, the consequence of sunshine in autumn, as hands were rubbed and scarves were tightened against the cruel nip of approaching winter in the air. The odd sharpness of the sunlight lent a strange glint to the melting remains of the early frost that set the thin air sparkling.

The hairy head of Rubeus Hagrid towered head and shoulders above the crowds of children as he headed for the Three Broomsticks with Minerva McGonagall and Poppy Pomfrey – Remus responded to his wave and hearty hail with a broad smile and a friendly nod. A little further down, clustered together outside Honeydukes exchanging warming Pepper Imps, Harry, Ron and Hermione grinned at him as he blew on his hands and rubbed them fervently. It was definitely time to buy a pair of gloves. With actual wages in his pocket, he could, for once, afford them.

Pulling open the door into Gladrags Wizardwear, Remus almost collided headlong with the emerging Seamus Finnegan. The sixth year boy grinned cheerfully at his teacher.

“Sorry Professor Lupin!” he exclaimed as he hurried out into the cold air. “Didn’t see you!”

Flashing him a final smile, he dashed off. But it was too late. The voice alone, the voice that had previously asked a simple question, had been enough. Remus had been reminded.

Curse it. He’d managed not to think about it for almost half-an-hour. This was getting ridiculous.

Remus had dealt with the uncertainty of the circumstances of his bite for almost all of his life. He had grown used to not knowing. The wall in his mind was a part of him, and he understood perfectly his parents’ reluctance to talk about what both had referred to – when they thought him out of earshot – as the worst night of their lives. That at some point on a chilly November evening not long into his third year of life, he had found himself in dark woods alone and been set upon by a passing werewolf was something he had reluctantly come to accept. After all, it was not as though he could do anything to change it.

But the vivid horror of his dream combined with the innocently asked questions of a class full of sixteen year olds had lit a fire in his mind such as he had never encountered. He was no longer content to just to acknowledge it had happened; he was not prepared to shrug his shoulders anymore and declare it didn’t matter because it was all in the past. His life had been changed forever that night. Surely he had the right to know why.

That’s a pretty big thing to forget. Ron Weasley’s words. And he had a point. Was his youth really an excuse for such a total blankness? There were several spells that could retrieve a lost or forgotten memory from early childhood – he had experimented with most in his early twenties after his encounter with that rogue Dementor had dredged up the first of his vague recollections. But nothing it seemed could catch the edges of this memory deliberately – he was forced to live with nothing more than glimpses gleaned from dreams. It appeared his mind was not ready to give up its secrets and it made Remus wonder why.

He couldn’t help but feel slightly aggrieved that the entire world and its wife seemed determined to keep him in the dark. Albus Dumbledore, Alastor Moody, his parents – now even his own mind was getting in on the act. He still didn’t know why but he had a sneaking suspicion that the words “for your own good” would feature in it somewhere. However with the recent passing of his thirty-seventh birthday, Remus liked to feel that he was old enough to decide what was good or not for himself.

A cold chill struck at his heart. His birthday. It had been just over a fortnight ago. That meant this weekend… How could he have forgotten?

Two weeks and three days after his birthday. Tomorrow was the thirty-fourth anniversary of his bite.

So much for forgetting.

Absently rubbing his side, he selected a warm looking, reasonably priced pair of gloves, paid the obliging assistant, pulled them over his chilly fingers and wandered back into the cold of the street. He spotted Harry and his two friends a little way ahead, having moved on from Honeydukes to admiring the bright and feathery display in the window of Scrivenshaft’s Quill Shop, along with a huddle of Ravenclaw third-years, a plump woman with a basket, and a man wrapped warmly in a long cloak who leaned casually against the glass. On another day, he might have joined them.

Remus sighed. He had suddenly lost his taste for a day in the village. Perhaps he would head back up to the school, make a start on those fourth year essays about defensive hexes that needed to be marked by Monday. Plus he needed to owl his father about getting hold of a Grindylow before the end of next week – his dad’s backyard menagerie in the old garden lean-to, once the bane of his tidy mother’s existence, did at least have some uses…

There was no warning. And this time there was no Firewhiskey. But in spite of the endemic coldness of the day, there was no mistaking the icy chill that shot the length of his spine with a suddenness that made him gasp, the tingle in his blood, the echo of his heartbeat against his skull and the sharp, vivid pain that laced his scar and stopped him in his tracks.

Remus froze on the spot. What the hell?

“Professor? Professor Lupin? Are you all right?”

He turned his head sharply to the left to find three pairs of curious eyes fixed firmly upon him. It was Hermione who had called out to him, forward a few steps now, with her friends, from the cloaked man beyond, as she gazed at him quizzically from beneath a lopsided woolly hat that she had apparently knitted herself. Judging from their looks of concern, the three of them had clearly seen the expression of shock on his face as he had so sharply halted.

Remus immediately rearranged his face into his best reassuring smile. “Just a bit of a chill, Hermione,” he lied casually, avoiding their scrutiny as his eyes wandered to the window display behind their heads. “It caught me a bit by surprise, that’s all. Probably stepped right into a draft…”

His voice tailed off. His brain had just registered something that his eyes had been screaming at him.

The man in front of the quill shop window. The cloaked man. The man who was no more than six yards away from Harry James Potter, the Boy-Who (had up until now at least)-Lived. He was leaning on the glass, relaxed, at ease, his fingers splayed against it and gently tapping.

A dark, curved claw protruded from every tip. A reflected pair of golden eyes glinted.

Oh. Bloody. Hell.

Whether Kane had seen him, or whether he had coincidentally chosen this moment to strike was never clear. All Remus knew was that even as he went for his wand, roaring at the three teenagers in warning, the feral swivelled lightning-quick on his heels and dove forcefully at Harry’s still vulnerable back, teeth bared and clawed hands reaching. His hood whipped back, exposing short, dark, tightly curled hair shot with silver, a solid but well scarred face and an expression of fanatical, determined pleasure.

Which faltered only slightly at the solid thump of book meeting bone. Judging by the weight of the bag she had swung with all her might into Kane’s path, it appeared that Hermione had found time to visit the bookshop that morning.

The feral staggered sideways, his momentum shifted only briefly. But it was enough.

Remus had drawn his wand.

“Impedimenta!”

The force of the spell flung Kane backwards, lifting him from his feet and hurling him through the fragile pane of the quill shop window. Remus winced in spite of himself at the unintended damage as multi-coloured feathers whirled and danced into the air to the accompaniment of the tinkle and crash of falling glass. His eyes fixed upon the still shocked and bewildered faces of Harry, Ron and Hermione.

“Go!” He ordered sharply. “The Three Broomsticks, now! Get Hagrid and McGonagall! Call the Aurors!” He hoped he did not have to specify which Aurors he meant.

“But…” Ron was stammering as he switched his gaze rapidly back and forth between his teacher and the shattered window. “That was a… That was a…”

“Feral.” Hermione supplied impatiently.

Well at least he’d taught them something.

“Now!” he repeated forcefully, catching Harry’s shoulder and shoving him with rather more force than he’d intended up the street. “Run!”

They ran. The word feral had caught alight and was spreading like wildfire along the rest of the street. Shocked faces were staring at the shattered window and the Hogwarts professor advancing on it. Screams were rising behind him.

Remus ignored it all, ignored even the strange sensations running through his body that he was now certain were not connected to Firewhiskey at all, but to the presence of Abraham Kane. The fall through the window had been a nasty one, but ferals were irritatingly tough and the thick cloak he had been draped in would have protected him from the worst of any harm. And the spell to immobilise him would not last long. Any moment now he would…

Kane flipped upright from the debris, casting off his glass-strewn cloak as he balanced precariously for an instant on the window still. His golden eyes fixed on Remus even as the professor raised his wand.

“Well, well,” he drawled with icy grin, his golden eyes gleaming with an emotion his adversary could not quite place. “If it isn’t the Lupin brat.”

Remus froze with shock. It was not a clever thing to do in the circumstances.

Kane pounced instantly. Remus grunted with shock as he was hurled into the cobblestones, the breath shoved from his body by the force of the impact – it was only through great presence of mind that he managed to keep hold of his wand. The screams around him rose to a shocking crescendo as he caught a glimpse of another figure flung aside as Kane’s heels vanished into the dark alley that wound between Scrivenshaft’s and the Post Office.

Shoving himself violently to his feet, Remus swore fluently and took a risk. He apparated.

Disorientation caused his head to swim – the alley was darker than he had expected. Grasping his wand firmly in one gloved hand, Remus paused for an instant, allowing his eyes to adjust to the shock of sudden shadow after bright autumn sun, straining his ears for any hint of sound that might imply that Abraham Kane was upon him. The alley was slender, less than the width of his arm span, scattered with bent feathers and discarded paper. He could smell owl droppings.

His eyes focussed, taking in the dark bricks on either side, the rubbish bins, the divergence of the alley ahead as it encountered the rear of a smaller side street. His ears tuned in to the distant chaos of the panicking masses in the street twenty yards behind him. But there were no footsteps. No breathing. No sign of flight.

This was the right alley. So where was Kane?

Remus could feel his spine tingling. Firey eyes seemed to burn against his skull.

This alley was less than an arm span wide. Oh b*gger.

He looked up.

Braced above him, spayed spread-eagle between the two walls, Kane grinned.

There was no time to dodge. There was no room to dodge. Two booted feet swung solidly into his back; for the second time in as many minutes, Remus was hurled to the ground and this time his grip on his wand faltered, leaving him to watch helplessly as it bounced into the shadows and out of reach. Desperately he clambered into a half-crouch, scrabbling for something, anything he could use as a weapon.

He was far too slow.

Clawed fingers closed around his throat, lifting him off his feet and slamming him against the wall. The twin galleon eyes of Abraham Kane gazed at him up the length of an arm. His smile was a baring of teeth.

“Move and I squeeze,” he drawled softly.

“Let me go.” Remus was quite astonished at how calm his voice sounded, considering he was pinned to the wall by his neck by a vicious killing machine. “Others are coming.”

Kane regarded him for a moment. And then he began to chuckle, a low roll of sound that somehow managed to be utterly devoid of humour.

“Oh that was good,” he exclaimed, savouring each word as though tasting it. “Very convincing. If my hands weren’t full, I’d give you a round of applause.” His clawed fingers teased the skin of Remus’ throat in painful little circles. “You apparated, boy. I heard it. No one saw where you vanished to. No one knows you’re here.”

Remus ignored the icy chill as the truth of these words sunk in. “What do you want with me?” he gasped, his mind racing as he tried desperately to think of some way, any way that he could get free without Kane tearing his windpipe out.

Kane shrugged easily. “Haven’t decided yet. Who says I’m not just in the mood for a little family reunion?”

Remus felt his eyes widen. What the…?

“Family?” he rasped, trying to ignore the desperate pain in his neck and praying he would live long enough to digest any answers he received. “What do you mean by that?”

It was the turn of Kane to widen his eyes. “Don’t you recognise me, boy? Can’t you feel it?” He stared for a moment at the blank expression on Remus’ face and a wicked light seemed to ignite within his eyes. Laughter spilled from his lips once more, a cold, tangled sound that bounced from wall to wall and skipped away into nothingness. Lowering Remus carefully back down onto his feet, he leaned closer until their faces were mere inches apart; he could smell the older werewolf’s putrid breath.

“You don’t know who I am, do you?” Kane’s voice was barely more than a whisper, a hiss of air against his cheek. “You don’t remember and he hasn’t told you. It seems that your dearest daddy has been keeping secrets from his precious little boy.” Kane’s smile was mocking. “Doesn’t say much for your father-son bond, does it? Perhaps he’s not so keen on having a monster for a son as he pretends. Like father, like son it seems.”

Remus bit his lip, bracing his back against the wall as he fought not to scream with frustration.

“How do you know my father?” He managed to choke out. “What are you talking about?”

The grip of Kane’s claws had not lessened – if anything they tightened slightly. His icy malicious smile had not faded. “How sickeningly like them you behave. Mummy and daddy would be proud.” He chuckled coldly once more. “But they wouldn’t be so proud if they knew what you were really like, would they?”

His eyes gleamed fiercely. “Look at you. All indignant, all defiant, disgusted by the dreadful feral, Professor Lupin, the respectable werewolf. What a waste.”
He spat and shook his head. “But I know better than that face you paint for the world. I saw you, boy, saw you at The Howling.” His grin widened at Remus’ involuntary gasp. “What have you to say about that? Slumming it, were you? Seeing how the other half live? I’ve been asking the barman about you. Three times that week, he saw you. Told him you were getting fond of the place. And then suddenly you get your nice cosy job back and you’re too good for the likes of us all over again.”

Remus didn’t speak. There was absolutely nothing he could say. Oh yes, I was there, but I was spying on you for a secret organisation against Voldemort? That would go down a storm to a feral werewolf with his claws dug into his throat…

But Kane had not finished. “Do you really think you can just walk away?” His words vibrated with hidden energy. “You’ve tasted it before, touched the power. You can deny it all you want, but the wolf is in your soul. I know what kind of werewolf you are. I know what kind of werewolf you want to be. Some tamed milksop herding kiddies all day long, Albus Dumbledore’s favourite pet? I don’t think so.” His unblinking yellow eyes buried themselves into Remus’ stare. “You want to be like me. And I can help you with that. Just like I tried to before…”

“There, down there! That’s where he went! Behind the Post Office!”

The sudden voice echoed down the narrow alley; Kane’s head whipped round, his grip slackening slightly and Remus took the only chance he was ever likely to get. Bracing his back against the wall, he leaned as far back as he could from the feral’s grasp and slammed both feet into Kane’s stomach, smashing him with all his might into the opposite wall of the alley. Pain tore through his throat as Kane’s claws closed instinctively before being violently ripped free; toppling to the floor, he could do little but desperately gasp for breath as blood spurted from the nasty wounds and trickled down his neck, staining his gloved fingers as he grasped the damaged flesh. He heard Kane swear obscenely, saw a mass of shouting figures bundling and crowding into the narrow gap, heard the whistle and whine of spells thrown above him. But the feral was quick – taking to his heels he vanished into the darkness beyond. Thundering footsteps rushed past him, over him; he caught a glimpse amongst others of the bald dark pate and golden earring of Kingsley Shacklebolt and a head of shocking orange that could only have belonged to Nymphadora Tonks as they hurtled down the alley in hot pursuit. If Remus hadn’t been in so much pain, he would have smiled. Good kids.

An alarming amount of blood was pooling against his cheek, soaking the rough earth scarlet. The alley was starting to swirl. Black sparkles danced eerily in front of his eyes. Oh, that’s not good…

The pain he could handle – it was no more than he was used to. But breathing was becoming a challenge. And the blood loss…

More footsteps were approaching rapidly; Remus struggled to stay conscious as a dark figure hurried to his side and dropped to its knees beside him.

“Lumos!”

The concerned face of Minerva McGonagall appeared suddenly from the darkness. Her stare fixed on the expanding pool of blood and her eyes widened with horror.

“Remus, can you hear me?” she exclaimed. He felt his blood-soaked hand being carefully pried away from his damaged throat; something soft, Minerva’s tartan scarf he suspected, was pressed gently but firmly to the wounded flesh in its place.

He tried to speak but found he lacked the strength – no more than a gasp escaped. His eyelids felt as though Hagrid was sitting on them, the light and shadows dancing and twisting eerily as black and silver stars rose like a veil before his sight. He tried to nod instead. It hurt like bloody hell.

“Don’t move!” The Deputy Headmistress commanded, a shrill note of alarm in her tone as she supported his head with her free hand. Gods, he must look a sight if the unflappable Minerva was getting so upset. “Hagrid!”

“Professor?” The gamekeeper’s West Country lilt drifted from the far end of the alley – of course, Hagrid would be too large to safely manoeuvre in such narrow confines.

“Fetch Poppy from the Three Broomsticks immediately! Remus had been badly hurt!”

“Professor Lupin’s hurt?” Harry. Oh, no. Don’t let him come down, don’t let him come down, don’t let him…

“Harry Potter! Get back onto that street immediately! We don’t know it’s safe!”

Curse it. Too much like James for his own good.

Harry was no more than a blur, a glint of light against his glasses as he dropped down beside an irate McGonagall. The two gyrating shadows behind him he assumed to be Ron and Hermione. Poppy really did need to hurry up.

Footsteps sounded in the opposite direction – Remus didn’t even try to see who was approaching this time. Minerva looked up, now no more than a shadowed outline.

“Did you catch him?”

“Lost him.” The weary and alarmingly distant voice belonged to Tonks. “Tricky git. Snuck around the back of Madam Puddifoot's and slipped off into the woods near the Shrieking Shack. Kingsley and a few others followed but…” She sighed. “I found Remus’ wand just up there. How’s he do… Oh b*gger.”

“Quite.”

It was no good. The voices were far away and fading fast, his vision no more than a curtain of black and silver fireworks. His eyelids slipped closed. He knew he was losing consciousness but there was very little he could do about it.

“Professor Lupin?” Harry’s voice was a shrill murmur, all but tuned out. “Professor, Tonks, he’s…”

“I can see that.” Someone, Tonks he assumed since she was the last to have spoken, was violently tapping his cheek. He could barely feel it.

Sleep. Sleep is good.

“We got taught healing spells in Auror training. I know what we can…”

What Tonks could, Remus did not find out. The silver gave way to a wave of black that engulfed him utterly and dragged him into nothingness.

A/N:

[Pallas]

A/N: If this chapter seems a little uneventful, it is because it is yet another victim of my utter inability to be concise. Chapters 8, 9 and 10 were originally supposed to be one single part but I got carried away yet again and 15 pages to one chapter seemed like overkill. Hence, a three way split.

8: A Little Time to Heal

The first thing Remus heard as he drifted back in the direction of consciousness was the sound of raised voices. The hard ground of the alleyway was gone; as feeling returned to his body, he could feel the familiar crisp softness of sheets he knew too well, a sense of warmth spilled from a crackling fire and the distant, irate tones of an indignant Poppy Pomfrey. The Hospital Wing. He had woken here too many times in his youth to mistake it.

Well, at least he was alive. That was something.

His throat was aching badly, wrapped in a swath of bandage by the feel of it, but it was nothing like the agonising throb of freshly torn flesh that had driven him into unconsciousness in the first place. He risked a deeper breath and found he could. He was sore certainly – though after having one’s throat all but ripped out by a raging feral, that was hardly surprising – but there did not appear to have been any permanent damage. A few scars to add to his collection perhaps, but against the backdrop of years of full moon self-abuse, a few more marks against his skin were negligible.

“Absolutely not!” The tone of Poppy’s voice was immediately familiar – it was the manner she reserved for expelling those who might disturb her patients from her Matronly Domain. “He hasn’t regained consciousness yet and I will not have you disturb him!”

Ah yes. Spot on with the tone.

“Madam, a man died in Hogsmeade today.” The brisk voice that cut across the air was unfamiliar. “I merely wish to question one of the principle witnesses.”

“You’ve spoken with enough witnesses, Mr Dawlish. A street full of them.” Poppy’s voice was sharp and steely, a blade waiting to be swung. “And the state he was in when I arrived in that alley, you could have had two bodies on your hands. Leave him be!”

Remus could almost sense as the invisible Mr Dawlish drew himself up in the face of the imposing fury of Poppy Pomfrey. “Mr – sorry, Professor Lupin was, according to all accounts, the first to see the feral and the one who allowed him to escape. Twice. He was also alone with him for several minutes before my Auror squads arrived. I merely wish to establish what they were – ahem - discussing…”

He was patronising her. Mr Dawlish, an Auror by the sounds of it, was patronising Poppy Pomfrey. And Aurors were supposed to have good instincts. Oh dear.

The blade swung, cutting off his sentence. “Are you implying something?”

Remus could almost hear Dawlish’s mouth snap closed. He could imagine the hawk-like expression on the matron’s face. He struggled to suppress the smile that would expose his feigned unconsciousness.

“Because if you are implying something,” Poppy was building up momentum rapidly. “I will have you out of this school quicker that you can say delusional! I have known that young man in there since he was eleven years old and I can safely say that he hasn’t an evil bone in his body! How dare you wander into his sickroom after he risked his life for those children and make such insinuations? At least he did something! He didn’t stand on Hogsmeade High Street and send his colleagues into danger whilst he waited in safety! Werewolf or not, he’s a better man that you!”

Merlin bless Poppy Pomfrey! If she wasn’t his parents’ age, he might have married her. The smile was getting harder to conceal.

The deep rumble of Kingsley Shacklebolt intervened to restore order – Remus hadn’t even realised he was present.

“Dawlish, I think it is fairly obvious from what the children said that Lupin was trying to help. He probably saved Harry Potter’s life. And I don’t think he’s going anywhere. You’ll know where to find him when he wakes.”

“But…” Dawlish might have been willing to argue the point with Madam Pomfrey but Remus knew that Kingsley was very well respected in Auror circles.

The black man’s deep voice was soothing. “If you’re so worried, leave one of the juniors – Nymphadora Tonks, say – to keep an eye on him. She can wait until he wakes and conduct an interview. If you need to know any more, well he works here. He shouldn’t be a problem to trace.”

Dawlish folded in the face of an incandescent Poppy and a reasonable Kingsley. “Very well. Get Tonks up here from Hogsmeade then. But I want a full report!”

“I’ll make sure she knows that.” Kingsley’s voice seemed rather more distant. “Come on, Dawlish. We’d best get back to the Ministry.”

Footsteps receded. A moment later, Remus heard the door of the Hospital Wing being firmly closed.

“Good riddance!” he heard Poppy exclaim.

He couldn’t resist. “My hero,” he said, finally freeing his grin. His voice, always hoarse, was now positively croaky and very sore, but at least it was functional. He opened his eyes, squinting into the sudden light as he heard the rapid staccato approach of Madam Pomfrey’s footsteps.

“Oh so you are awake,” Poppy’s brisk voice was nonetheless fond. “I thought I saw you trying not to smile but I wasn’t going to say as much in front of that dreadful man.”

Remus started to push himself onto his elbows but was immediately shoved gently but firmly back into his pillows.

“None of that!” Poppy leaned in to take his temperature, peering into his eyes. “How are you feeling?”

Remus pulled a face but opted for honesty. “Tired. A bit shaky. Sore.”

“Hardly surprising, after what you’ve been through. Keep still. I want to take a look at how you’re healing.”

With careful fingers, she peeled away the layers of bandage, squinting at the exposed skin thoughtfully.

“I think we can leave these off for a bit,” she declared finally, touching a fingertip lightly to what remained of his near mortal wounds as she seated herself on the edge of his bed. “You’ve healed up nicely, just as you always did. There’s nothing I can do about the scars of course, but you’ll know that.” She smiled suddenly. “Honestly, Remus Lupin. I thought we were past the days when I had to patch you up for werewolf scratches.”

“This was hardly a scratch.” This time Remus ignored her protests as he pulled himself into a sitting position and leaned back against the headboard, propping his pillow against his back. “And unless you count stupidity, they were hardly self-inflicted.”

Poppy huffed at his statement but did not comment. A glint of colour caught his eye – glancing to his left he realised that the bed next to his was strewn with cheerful cards, sweet smelling bunches of flowers and brightly wrapped confectionary boxes. “Where did all that come from?”

Poppy smiled. “Get well gifts. They’ve been arriving all afternoon.”

“Who for?”

She gave him an exasperated stare. “For the bed pan. For you, Remus! Who else do you see?”

Remus stared at the bewildering pile. “For me? From who?”

“The students of course!” Poppy regarded him with a sudden glint in her eye. “I thought you might have noticed them around by now, young, shorter than average, more trouble than they’re worth?”

“Oh,” Remus smiled with mock thoughtfulness. “I wondered about all those adolescents that keep cropping up in my classroom.”

Poppy chuckled. “Sarcasm, professor? You must be feeling better.”

Remus mustered a look of indignity. “I was merely responding in kind. But seriously Poppy, all that is for me?”

She smiled fondly. “Indeed it is. The students have been very worried about you.”
Remus frowned slightly. “How did they know what happened? I wouldn’t have expected Harry, Ron and Hermione to gossip.”

The matron’s expression grew serious. “They didn’t. After you passed out, we had to conjure a stretcher to rush you back to Hogwarts down the High Street. Most of them saw you, Remus.”

Remus remembered the state he had been in, covered in blood and still bleeding from the neck and imagined the stares of a street full of confused students. He winced. “Oh dear.”

“Exactly. You’re very popular, you know. Many of them were extremely upset. Hence the sudden outpouring. That reminds me…” She smiled suddenly. “Albus noticed that a number of students, most notably those who take Defence with Harry Potter, seemed remarkably well informed on the nature of ferals. When you’re feeling up to it, he’d like a word about your sixth year curriculum.”

Remus grinned sheepishly. “I didn’t mean to tell them so much. It was a question and answer session on werewolves that rather mutated.”

Poppy laughed outright as she got to her feet once more, checking the stuttering light beside his bed. “Why does that not surprise me?”

Remus glanced towards the window, realising for the first time that the sun had gone down and that the Hospital wing was lit by torchlight. “Poppy, what time is it? How long have I been asleep?”

“It’s Saturday evening, about seven ‘o’ clock.” Poppy glanced at him thoughtfully at she made her way to the shelves of potion bottles that lined the wall beside her office. “You’ve been unconscious nearly eight hours. But considering the amount of healing you had to do, that’s no real surprise. Even with magical assistance, the body needs time. Here.”

She handed him a vial. Remus regarded it warily. “What’s this?”

“Blood-Replenishing Potion. You’ve had two doses whilst you were unconscious. One more should be enough. It should certainly help with the tiredness.”

Remus had never been a fan of potions, in spite of his mother’s profession. He sometimes suspected that the keenness with which she had dosed him with them in childhood was somewhat to blame. Reluctantly, he unstopped the vial and swallowed the contents.

“Good boy.” Remus chose not to point out that far from being a good boy, he was in fact a thirty-seven year old Professor who had only two months before set off two hundred and sixty-three fireworks in the Great Hall of Hogwarts. “Honestly, for someone whose mother used to be our Potions Mistress, you always have been less than keen to take your medicine. Oh, that reminds me!” Poppy retrieved the vial from her patient and beamed. “Your father sends his love. He’ll be here to see you first thing tomorrow; he would have come tonight but Albus told him, whilst you were out of danger, you might not be conscious so it was probably best to wait. He’s very anxious to see you though – he was terribly upset when the headmaster told him what happened.”

Remus glanced up sharply – memories of a darkened alley and a bewildering conversation filled his mind in a rush. “You called my dad?”

Poppy misinterpreted his expression. “Grown man you may be, Remus, but your father still has the right to be concerned. One of those claws nicked an artery; if Nymphadora Tonks hadn’t been so quick with a good first aid spell, it might have been too late. Of course we called Reynard.”

Remus bit his lip. So his dad was coming to see him. Even yesterday, he would have been delighted at the news. But the strange and haunting words of Kane were playing in his mind; it seems that your dearest daddy has been keeping secrets from his precious little boy… Perhaps he’s not so keen on having a monster for a son as he pretends... And although Remus was almost certain that Kane’s taunts and jibes were no more than malicious troublemaking, his recent confusion regarding the events of his bite had struck a chord with Kane’s mockery about secrets. How had Kane known his name? How did he know his father? And what had he meant when he had called him family?

Can’t you feel it, he had said. And Remus could not deny he had felt something, that strange chill, that ache in his blood whenever Kane was near. He wondered for a moment if the feeling had simply been a natural werewolf reaction to the presence of a feral – but then why did no one else at The Howling seem affected that night?

Kane had implied that they had met before. He had recognised him in The Howling and been concerned enough to ask questions about him later. Why?

And his offer… Remus shivered in spite of himself. Kane couldn’t have known just how repugnant that idea would be to his captive; in hindsight, without knowledge of Remus’ true intentions, the conclusions he had reached had been quite logical. But why take the trouble to try and turn him feral? Was this some new plan of Voldemort’s or was Kane acting alone? Remus wasn’t sure which answer he preferred.

But what chilled Remus most had been Kane’s implication that he had known of the younger wolf’s feral past. You’ve tasted it before, he’d said. But how could he possibly know? In the world, only three people alive knew of his feral incident in 1981 and all three he trusted implicitly to keep his darkest secret; Dumbledore, Moody and his father. Unless it showed physically somehow, in some way that Remus was not aware of, he could only assume that Kane had been guessing, trying to get under his skin with those terrible words. There was no way he could have known.

Was there?

The thought disturbed him greatly. Slipping under the covers once more and settling back down against his pillow, Remus listened to the bustle of Poppy Pomfrey at work as he stared blankly at the ceiling and tried to shake the icy feeling in his heart that someone he cared about had been lying to him.

He failed.

[Pallas]

A/N: And here we have the second part of Hogwarts very own Hospital Drama. *g* I promise, it is winding in the general direction of getting to the point…

9: Marked

It soon became clear to Remus that he was not going to get any sleep. After a tray of nourishing food provided by Poppy had been gratefully, if carefully consumed, he had attempted, at her insistence to close his eyes and drop back into torpor. But his mind was far too full of whirling thoughts and tangled emotions to allow the relief of sleep to interfere – after a half-hour’s hopeless trying, Remus had given up and plaintively requested a book.

Poppy had not been impressed. But nonetheless, she had generously offered to take a quick trip up to the library to see what she could find. Remus had not concealed his gratitude.

Anything that would keep him from thinking.

He scolded himself sharply. There was no point to this. Until he spoke with his father tomorrow, he could not know whether or not there was any truth to the mockery of Abraham Kane. There was no point in troubling himself with it. None whatsoever. He should stop thinking about it altogether. Shut down his mind. Concentrate on something else. He should. He really should.

Where was Poppy with that book?

A knock at the Infirmary door roused him from his turbulent thoughts – desperately he seized on the distraction. “Yes?”

The rainbow-streaked head of Nymphadora Tonks peered around the corner, smiling to see her friend awake.

“Is it safe to come in?” The young Auror gave a cheeky grin as she stepped inside. “Dawlish said there was a mad harpy in here raving about werewolf rights.”

“Patient rights, more like it!” Tonks jumped a good foot in the air as Poppy appeared behind her, clutching a book under one arm as she swept back into her domain. “Mad harpy indeed!” she sniffed, depositing the book on Remus’ bedside table with a thump. “The nerve of that man! He’d best pray he’s never a patient of mine!”

Remus and Tonks exchanged a grin as they watched the indignant matron set about ruthlessly tidying the werewolf’s pile of gifts. The Metamorphmagus glanced around the Hospital Wing with a nostalgic smile.

“Strange being back here again,” she declared, depositing herself at the foot of Remus’ bed and helping herself to a chocolate. “I must have spent half my education in this room.”

“Indeed.” Poppy arranged the largest bunch of flowers in a sturdy vase on the tabletop, brushing stray petals from the surface absently. “Aside from Remus himself, I’m not sure I’ve ever had a more frequent patient!”

“Never mind, Madam Pomfrey.” Tonks gave her a broad smile. “I’ve learned a few first aid spells since then. I don’t need you to patch me up any more.”

“So I understand.” Remus smiled too as he pulled himself into a sitting position once more, ignoring Poppy’s tisk of disapproval. “From what Poppy tells me, I owe you my life.”

Tonks blushed sharply. “Don’t be daft, Remus,” she muttered, staring down at the bedspread intensely. “It was just a little spell, all in a day’s work for an Auror. Madam Pomfrey was the one who fixed you.”

Remus caught her gaze and held it. “Nonetheless, that little spell gave her time to do so,” he said sincerely. “Thank you, Tonks.”

The young woman waved a dismissive hand, her cheeks still scarlet. “Oh, don’t make a fuss. It was nothing, really. Anyway, that’s not why I’m here.”

Remus smiled. “So why are you here?” He spotted her hand drifting once more in the direction of the chocolate tray. “To eat my chocolates?”

She snatched her hand back at once. “Sorry!”

Remus laughed outright, ignoring the twinge of pain in his throat at the action. “Help yourself. In fact take the box. You’ve earned it.”

The blush had returned. She screwed up her nose slightly. “You sure? I mean, they’re yours…”

“Trust me, I’ve got plenty.” Remus gestured to the bed. “Besides, if I tried to eat that mountain alone, I’d end up the size of a dragon. Take it.”

Tonks’ smile returned; gratefully she picked up the box and popped another sweet inside her mouth. “Thanks, Remus. I haven’t had a chance to grab supper yet. Dawlish has had us running back and forth like headless Hippogriffs all afternoon.”

The conversation he had overheard earlier that evening returned in a rush “I heard him say earlier that a man had died. Is that true?”

The Metamorphmagus sighed. “Afraid so. A local man. He came running out the Post Office when he heard the window smash and got right in Kane’s way when he went for the alley. Slit his throat in one slash, dead before he hit the floor. Poor sod didn’t stand a chance.”

A figure slumping to the cobbles as Kane dashed away into darkness… Remus felt a sharp stab of guilt. If he hadn’t hesitated, if he hadn’t been so shocked when Kane had known his name…

Tonks must have guessed his thoughts, or some part of them – a gentle hand rested against his wrist soothingly. “It wasn’t your fault, mate. You did everything you could to stop him. The bloke just got in the way.”

Remus shook his head and winced at the ache in his neck that resulted. “He… surprised me. I hesitated. I could have stopped him there and then if I’d just…”

“Oi. Enough.” Tonks was regarding him sternly. “You’ve been beaten up enough for one day. You saved Harry. Just remember that.”

Remus twisted his lip. “Actually, Hermione…”

“…Responded to your warning. And she only slowed him down. You’re the one who spotted the danger. You’re the one who hit him with enough force to stop him cold. You’re the one who went after him and held him up enough that it was only sheer massed Auror stupidity that meant he got away.”

“By getting my throat ripped out.” Remus felt obliged to point this out. “There’s an important life lesson there for you, Tonks. Never kick a feral in the stomach when he’s got his claws sunk in your neck.”

Instead of rolling her eyes as he expected, Tonks looked vaguely impressed. “You kicked him?”

Remus sighed. “Bloody stupid of me, really. I thought I could get clear but of course he was quicker than me. It was suicide in all but name.”

“Yeah but with due respect, Remus,” Tonks offered him the chocolate tray and he took one gratefully, peeling off the orange wrapper. “If you hadn’t kicked him, he’d probably just have torn out your windpipe and scarpered anyway, and done the kind of job on it that even Poppy couldn’t fix.” She grinned. “A real win-win situation you got yourself into.”

Remus smiled in spite of himself. “True.”

“Anyway,” Tonks declared, cheerily depositing the chocolates on the bedspread beside her and reaching into the pocket of her robes to draw out a pad and quill. “According to his Right-Royal-Pain-In-The-Arsiness Dawlish, I am supposed to interview the dreadful werewolf teacher ruthlessly until he cracks and reveals his involvement with the feral Kane. You up for it?” She asked brightly. “I promise not to hurt you too much if you play nice and confess your terrible misdeeds up front. Honestly, that Dawlish.” She shook her head disdainfully. “What a pillock.”

Remus felt a cold chill. So much for his distraction.

He did his best to sound casual. “If you want. Though you’ll have to bear with me. I’m still a little hoarse.”

There was a streak of pure mischief in Tonks’ expression. “Course you aren’t a little horse. You’re a werewolf, mate. You sure you didn’t take a blow to the head?”

Remus fought desperately not to smile. “You’re a funny woman, Nymphadora.”

“Hey!” A projectile chocolate bounced off his forehead. “There’s no need for that! Come on, let’s do this then maybe we can both get some sleep.”

And so the interview commenced. Remus had very quickly decided that he would be entirely honest in all but one thing – he excluded all mention of any connection between either himself or his father and Kane. It was not something he wanted on the record until he had had a chance to sort out for himself what it all meant.

“He knew who you were?” Tonks inquired at one point, as he described Kane’s appearance in the window. Remus silently cursed himself for his slip of the tongue.

“Hermione had just called me by name and he was well within earshot,” he pointed out quickly. “And I’m sure Oldstaff would have briefed him about known Order members.”

Tonks pulled a face. “I’m not sure I should put that in my report. You’ve been in the paper lately though, haven’t you? Tell you what, I’ll put he said he got your name from there. Save us both some hassle.”

Remus smiled with genuine gratitude.

They soon moved on to the events of the alley – Remus found himself waging an internal war as to just how much of what had proved to be an extremely personal conversation he dared reveal. There was almost no part of that exchange of words beyond the first salvo that he was willing to reveal to a Ministry Auror; but to a trusted friend and fellow Order member?

“Look Tonks,” he said finally, making sure that Poppy was well out of the way in her office before he spoke. “If I tell you what was said, I’m telling you as an Order member and I want it kept off the record. All right?”

Tonks immediately dropped her pad and quill. She grinned. “Ooops! Clumsy me! Talk quick before I manage to pick them up.”

He did not mention his father or any secrets he might have. He did not mention the implied reference to his feral incident. He did not mention that Kane had called him family. But he did mention the offer.

“He tried to turn you?” Tonks was staring at him in stunned disbelief. “You, of all people?”

“He saw me at The Howling,” Remus admitted. “I don’t know why he remembered my face, but he did. And I could hardly tell him I was there on business for the Order of the Phoenix.”

“Ouch.” Tonks frowned. “But he must have thought you were viable, or he wouldn’t have risked it. Do you think Voldemort suggested it? Wants you on his side, maybe? A feral with the memories of a senior Order of the Phoenix member would be pretty valuable to him.”

The thought made Remus shudder. That was very true. “I’ve no idea,” he said honestly. “But it’s possible. It may be that Kane has told the Death Eaters I was in The Howling for several nights. They know about Sirius. They might believe I’ve cracked up from the grief and gone in search of my inner wolf.”

Tonks sighed. “Do you want me to pass this on to the others?”

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t spread it around. Just tell Dumbledore. Let him decide who to share it with.”

“Right.” Tonks picked up her writing tools once more. “Back to being an Auror. What do we tell my quill?”

“Say he threatened me. And that he admitted working for Voldemort. It’s true after all.”

“Right you are.” Tonks scribbled for a few moments. “I’ll just use my imagination, if you don’t mind. There.” She passed him the notebook. “How does that sound?”

Remus nodded and passed it back. “Good.”

“Great. Now, what was it you were saying earlier about kicking him? I want to hear that bit.”

The interview lasted another ten minutes or so before Poppy emerged from her office and scolded Tonks thoroughly for tiring her patient. Since the interview was pretty much over, Tonks gathered her notebook, quill and box of chocolates and much to Remus’ surprise, gave him a brief peck on the forehead as she made her escape from Poppy’s wrath. He watched her go with a smile.

“Honestly!” Poppy bustled around, tidying away the chocolate wrappers. “After all you’ve been through today, you should be resting that throat, not talking it to exhaustion. Nymphadora Tonks should have known better. Now settle yourself back down and get some sleep!”

“Ummm…” Remus would have been happy to oblige but there was one small matter that needed to be taken care of first. “Poppy, may I use the bathroom?”

From the look that the matron pinned him with, he might as well have asked if he could dance naked down Diagon Alley leading a conga-line of kappas and hinkypunks whilst playing the tambourine. The curt little nod she finally offered was the most grudging he had ever seen. Before she could change her mind, Remus flung off his bedclothes and moved stiffly but hurriedly towards the bathroom door.

* * *


Remus stared into the mirror. His mirror self stared back.

He was glad that the bathroom mirror of the Hogwarts Hospital Wing was not the kind enchanted to talk back. He didn’t need to be told how dreadful he looked.

Remus had never been the type to linger in front of mirrors – he had neither the money nor the inclination to be fussy about his appearance. But he couldn’t help but note that his hair was threaded with a great deal more silver than it had been the last time he had taken the trouble to regard it with more than a passing glance; his skin was paler and more creased, his features tired and almost gaunt, his eyes hollow. The weight of the years and the monthly strain of thirty-four years of transformations had certainly taken their toll. He was marked by his life in more ways than one.

He had never been an Adonis in the first place, even in his youth – pragmatic as always, he had to admit he had not had a great deal of looks to lose. Sirius had held the honours and the lion’s share of female attention in that category, and James’ Quidditch athleticism had meant that he too had rarely been lonely. Even Peter had possessed what he had heard referred to as “a kind of chubby cuteness” that certain types of girl seemed to appreciate. But Remus – slight, pale, unremarkable – had tended to keep thoroughly out of the spotlight. When harbouring such a secret as his, drawing attention to himself would not have been a wise idea, so perhaps a certain ordinariness of appearance had all been for the best.

He had dated, a few times. But most of his relationships tended to stall and peter out under the strain of what Sirius had rather mockingly christened “Moony’s Eternal Question” when he had explained the problem the year before – at what point in a relationship do you tell a girl that you’re a werewolf? At the beginning and risk disdain or worse, widespread exposure? Or later and be branded a liar and deceiver? He had tried both ways and had yet to discover a satisfactory answer. He suspected one didn’t exist.

Sirius had kindly pointed out that most people were aware of his condition now anyway, so what did it matter? Remus had acknowledged this but felt obliged to note that he had hardly been beating the ladies away with a stick ever since.

Not that being single bothered him, really. It just might’ve been nice to have had an alternative.

He was brooding again. He had promised himself he would stop that.

Grimly his eyes were drawn to the five violent streaks of red that burned fitfully against his throat. More scars to add to his collection. Yet more marks of his unusual life. Tenderly he touched a finger to the aching red raw flesh – if this was healed, as Poppy had suggested, how bad had it been at the time? – and shivered at the memory of how he had come by them. Yet in spite of Tonks’ assertion that Kane would most likely have killed him anyway, he couldn’t help but wonder – what would have happened if the Aurors hadn’t come, if he hadn’t lashed out and forced Kane into harming him? Having taken such an apparent interest in him, would the feral have spared his life? Or would he now be lying dead beside the local man from Hogsmeade?

He examined the wounds almost clinically – four harsh horizontal streaks along one side of his neck, and one deep, raw gouge across the other, running several inches long where the feral’s claws had sliced into him and dragged as he was thrust away. He had been fortunate until now – most of his worst scars had tended to be out of sight beneath his robes or above the hairline – but these were quite spectacularly noticeable. Oh well, it would make a fine talking point for dinner conversation, were he ever to be invited out. Oh these? I had my throat ripped out by a feral werewolf. Pass the salt, would you?

His finger touched upon an older twist of scar tissue – Remus hesitated. Ah yes, his old friends, a scattered ring of puncture scars that circled his lower throat just beneath his eye-drawing new injuries, a cluster of four that lingered on the boundary between throat and chest and a single alone towards the back of his neck. His father had told him that they had picked them up during his first full moon with the wolf. He had always managed to conceal them quite well beneath his neckline, unlike their fresher companions. The poor things were quite overshadowed now…

The thought tailed off. Remus stared.

Realisation struck as he looked, really looked, for the first time at one of his oldest collections of scars. How had he not noticed it before?

A ring of five scars around his neck. Too numerous and spaced far too widely to have been caused by the stab of any wolfish paw. But, as recent experience played testament to, exactly right for the grasp of five clawed fingers around a youthful throat.

His finger traced the line of the scars, old and new. His free hand drifted to his left side.

He had implied that they had met before.

No.

Surely not. Not him.

Someone would have told him.

Wouldn’t they?

It would explain a lot. Too much, in fact. Except for why.

Remus felt ill. Oh Merlin.

It was a good thing his father was coming the next morning. He would have been rather weak to make the trip to his home that would now have been completely unavoidable. Remus had a cold, dark feeling that a great deal more lay beyond the wall in his mind than even he had expected.

Poppy was calling to him. How long he’d been staring into the mirror, Remus was unsure. He knew only one thing now for certain.

Enough was enough. He would be oblivious no longer. He wanted answers.

And one way or another, he was going to get them.


A/N: So Remus has finally stumbled onto something that most of my reviewers seem to have spotted from the off. Bless him, he’s probably been tired…

[Pallas]

A/N: No reviews for chapter 9? Oh well, I guess you can’t win ‘em all. Hopefully this chapter will get more of a response.

10: The Dream

Pain.

His throat seared with discomfort but he dared not speak a word – he had no wish for his sobs to be met with yet another harsh backhand. He could see little in the gathering darkness, branches and brambles that scratched his face and arms as they ploughed forward, the last distant glow of sunset fading against the trees to his left.

The moon would be rising soon.

The man – if he was a man, for what man had he ever seen before with claws for fingertips? – had not loosened his grip upon him, one arm bundling him firmly against his chest to still his wriggles, the other hand, with its sharpened ends, digging hard against the soft skin of his neck in an unspoken demand for silence. His breath was a harsh reminder against the top of his head as he surged forwards through the undergrowth, heedless of any damage to himself or the child he carried as he pushed on, on, on, deeper into the woods, casting looks over his shoulder as he ran. Every so often, he laughed.

He did not like his laugh. He did not like this man.

He wanted to go home.

He didn’t understand what was happening, why the man had taken him away from his parents and fled with him into this darkening, once loved but now sinister forest on the outskirts of their home. He was confused, terrified, bewildered – he wanted to cry but he had quickly learned that the penalty for tears would be pain. The sun was all but gone now. He wasn’t allowed out after dark.

Why was this happening? Why was he here?

The man had shouted at his daddy. He had thrown things. He had cursed. He had smashed his way into the peace of their evening. He had used words that he did not understand.

Reparation. Retribution. Justice.

Daddy hadn’t liked those words. The man had not liked daddy’s answer. He had not liked mummy’s blow.

For it was then the man had snatched him up and dragged him away to this place.

Suddenly, shockingly he was hurled to the ground. He felt himself gasp at the bruising impact as roots and brambles slapped at his small body, swallowing hard at the pain in his throat as blood trickled from the five puncture wounds left as residue from the man’s claws. He had half-scrambled to his feet, when a sharp hand clasped his upper arm and hauled him around to face his kidnapper.

The man’s face was broad, crisscrossed with a pattern of vicious scars, the freshest of which, acquired just minutes before, was staining his cheek with scarlet. His hair was short and tightly curled. His eyes gleamed gold in the gathering night.

He hated the eyes. The eyes terrified him.

He whimpered and sniffed as he flinched away. He couldn’t help himself.

The blow rocked him backwards, the harsh grip on his arm all that kept him from tumbling to the floor. Silent tears streamed down his face as he fought not to make a cry. The man snorted with disdain.

“Pathetic.” His voice was an icy rasp. “Just what I’d expect from a brat of Lupin’s. A coward just like your father. But you will learn the folly of his hiding and excuses.”
His other arm was seized as the man all but lifted him off the ground, drawing his face close. His teeth glinted. Behind his head, the last vestiges of sunlight had disappeared.

“He’ll come for you, boy.” The man’s voice was a whisper, his face all but pressed against his petrified captive’s. “But he won’t come alone, oh no, because he knows what I’ll do to him; he’ll call his little Auror friends first. And that will give us time, just enough time to set things to rights and be away. Remus.” He shivered at the sound of his name on this man’s tongue. “How typical. Christened a victim, just as I was. But as was once done for me, I will make you better than your name. I will see you renamed, reborn. Do you know why?”

He shook his head. He was too afraid to do anything more. The man’s smile spread – it almost seemed, suddenly, to be a smile of a great many more teeth.

“Well.” The word was expelled in a gravely tone, almost a growl. “Your dearest daddy owes me boy, owes me for a life and a lifetime. And you’re my payment.” A glint of silver whispered behind the trees, a hint of rising moonshine. The man’s lips curled upwards, his golden eyes filled with vindictive bliss as he shifted and writhed with some strange sensation that the child did not understand. His shadowed outline seemed almost contorted, his grip against his arms suddenly odd.

“You’ll go now and my true self will come for you. You’ll thank me for this, one day.” The words were thrown out in a gasping rush as he threw his head back with a howl of joy. “I’m giving you a gift.”

The grip released abruptly; he tumbled backwards, slumping to the uneven ground as he stared up, transfixed in horror at the twisting form of his kidnapper.

The man was changing shape.

His head was elongating, his body sprouting tufts of fur as his clothes ripped away; he tumbled from his crouch onto all fours, gasping with painful pleasure. Half-changed, half-formed, he lunged suddenly towards the frozen child slumped on the earth before him, thrusting his muzzle-like face at the boy as he spat out a single order.

“Run.”

The child’s terrified scream echoed through the trees as he obeyed.


He screamed and could not stop. The pain was unbelievable, like nothing he had ever thought possible, a ripping agony that centred on the savagery of torn skin where the wolf’s jaws had ruthlessly clamped down. But it did not stay there. It spread in waves, flowing through his skin and veins like a creeping poison; was it his imagination that he could feel himself being twisted, the very makeup of his body rewritten into some new and mysterious code? And there was more.

There was a presence.

What was happening to him?

Hands, hands grasping him, people everywhere shouting, a voice calling his name. It sounded so far away, his mind shocked and strangely numb unable to create any response but screaming, more screaming. Something swathed him, a blanket perhaps as he felt himself lifted from the ground, as he caught a glimpse of his father’s face, his comforting voice whispering to him as his strong arms engulfed his son. He felt detached, removed from his own being and floating loose as the presence, the something pushed his limbs into a frenzy of contortions and blows, fighting against his father’s hold. Why was he fighting? He didn’t want to fight! He just wanted to hold on and be held until all the awful horrors of that night went away. But he was no longer in control.

It was.

He could feel it, sliding across his mind, vicious, vindictive desire tearing at his consciousness as though seeking to drive itself inside, into the very essence of him. It wanted to claim him. It wanted to be him.

He didn’t want it there! He wanted it out! Get it out, get it out!

All sense of time was lost to him – he did not know how long he struggled within and without before the walls appeared, the horrified faces that stared down as he was deposited onto softness, a bed of some kind in a long panelled room that he had never before seen. His father’s arms were abruptly gone, the hands that pinned him suddenly unfamiliar. With a last desperate heave he broke to the surface, screaming for his daddy at the top of his voice before being dragged sharply back under. Beyond the wall of unknown, white robed figures he caught a glimpse of his mother, pale and sobbing desperately and his father beside her, repelling the white clothed woman who hovered around him, his clothes soaked with blood, his stance peculiar, his neck scratched and bloody from his son’s own unwilling assault. He did not seem to care.

He was staring at his thrashing son with distressed, horrified repulsion.

And then suddenly, he was there, forcing aside the white clothed figures as he reached out and touched his wand to the forehead of his struggling son. He was going to fix it. He was going to send the presence away. His daddy knew about things like this. His daddy could fix anything.

His father’s face was pale and set. He spoke a single word.

“Obliviate.”

* * *

“Remus! Remus!”

Hands, hands shaking him, still shaking him; he gasped and fought instinctively to free himself from their grasp, eyes tight closed as he pushed back against the grabbing. He was not going to let them! He was not…

“Remus, for goodness sake, wake up!”

There was a shocking splash – icy cold water washed across his head to soak his hair and drip and dribble down his face. Gasping with surprise, Remus’ eyes flew open and fixed upon the concerned faces of Poppy Pomfrey and…

And his father.

Reynard Lupin was staring down at Remus with a mixture of relief and concern. His silver hair remained thick in spite of the passing of his seventieth year, his face, though more wrinkled, much like his son’s. One white-knuckled hand was grasping the cane that had helped him to walk for as long as Remus could remember – not that the length of his memory seemed to mean much now. The other was resting gently but firmly against his son’s shoulder. He smiled tentatively.

On the other side of his bed, Poppy was not smiling. An empty water glass, its contents the cause of his abrupt awakening, was clutched in one hand; her other hand was clamped firmly to his forehead. Her lips were pursed sharply but her eyes were filled with worry.

“Remus,” she said carefully. “Are you all right?”

A good question, to which the answer was no; he was not sure that he had ever been less all right in his life. Images from his dream swirled and contorted, mocking him; Kane’s laugh and half-changed face, his father’s determined stare as he raised his wand to wipe the memories from his son’s mind, and that presence, that horrible, horrendous feeling of invasion that he had felt - so he had thought - only once before, but recognised all too well.

1981 was no longer his first and only feral incident.

Kane’s knowledge of his feral past suddenly made a great deal more sense. He must have seen his struggles after he…

After he had bitten him.

Abraham Kane had bitten him, just as he’d come to suspect. And more. He had not wandered into the woods, he had been dragged there. He had been dragged there for a reason. But understanding of that reason eluded him. He could remember now what had happened that terrible night. But he had been too young to understand why.

He only knew that Kane had blamed his father. That somehow, in some way, he had felt he was settling some kind of score.

And his father had wiped out his memory to hide the truth of it, and kept it a secret for thirty-four years. Whilst his only son lived with and suffered the results.

Oblivious. Literally.

The wall was gone, collapsed by the weight of his realisation the night before of what must have lain behind it. And he was more confused than ever.

A soft touch made him start – his father, now sitting on the edge of his bed, was staring at him with concern.

“Remus?” he said softly. “Son?”

Poppy was walking away, grasping a damp towel. His face was dry once more. The matron had cleaned him up and he hadn’t even noticed. He was even sitting upright.

He stared at his father. His father stared back.

There was a hint of fear in the older man’s eyes. A terrible chill rose in Remus’ heart. This was his father. His only family. He loved him dearly and believed himself loved in return. And yet his dad had lied to him, kept secrets from him for almost all his life.

His hand drifted to his throat, to scars old and new. Secrets that had almost got him killed. Twice.

Confusion, hurt and anger waged war inside his mind as his entire collection of childhood memories came crashing down. Had it all been a lie? He had lost the purity of his school memories to Wormtail’s presence, the knowledge of what he would become a taint on happy times. Now the cherished recollections of his parents had shifted inexorably too. Was every good memory he had in his life destined to be tainted by the discovery of deceit?

Anger was winning the battle as the cold grasp of betrayal ran its fingers through his soul once more; he was too shaken and shocked to deny it. He wanted to know why his life had been ruined before it had really begun, and why his memories were now spoiled. He was owed that much, surely.

“What did you do?” he whispered.

Reynard blinked; his eyes narrowed uncertainly at the intensity of his son’s stare. “Pardon?”

“What did you do?” Remus repeated the question more sharply. His voice was stronger now, and cold – he had not felt this kind of icy rage since that dreadful night in the Shrieking Shack that had ended his last sojourn as a teacher. “What part of that night, exactly, didn’t you want me to remember?”

His father was staring at him with bewildered confusion. “Remus, what are you talking about? Look, you’re not well and you’ve just a strange turn in your sleep – you were thrashing all over the place! Just lie down and I’ll call Madam Pomfrey back…”

“No!” The weight and volume of his tone shocked even him. Reynard flinched back as though slapped by the word. Sharp footsteps sounded, approaching rapidly. Poppy had sensed her patient was upset.

He couldn’t wait, not now. He was not going back to sleep. He would not take a tonic. He did not need to rest. All he needed was to know just what the hell was going on.

He leaned forward, his voice a harsh hushed murmur for only his father’s ears.
“Thirty-four years ago today,” he whispered sharply. “That’s why I was thrashing in my sleep. Kane. Obliviate. I remember.”

Reynard froze, staring at the son he knew so well, drinking in the narrowed eyes, the quiet rage and the icy aura of betrayed disillusionment. All colour drained from his skin.

“What is going on here?” Poppy’s voice penetrated the moment, an unwelcome intrusion. “Remus, you need rest, not…”

“Poppy.” Remus cut her off with rapid abruptness, stopping the inevitable words of strict concern before she could hit her stride. “I need a word alone with my father. Do you think you could find something to do elsewhere for a while?”

The matron gaped. “Remus, for goodness sake, you almost died less than a day ago! And if the tone you were taking is any indication, this conversation will only make you more distressed…”

Remus interrupted yet again, his tone clipped and meaningful. He knew deep inside that he was being terribly rude but this was simply too important. “Poppy, the only reason I will be distressed is if I don’t get to talk to my father. Alone. I’d rather stay here, in the Hospital Wing, where I should be, but if necessary I will take this outside.”

The gaze he fixed upon her was both pleading and sincere, but at the same time betrayed a cool determination that even the steely matron could not match. “Please,” he said softly. “I need this.”

Poppy’s expression was both confused and troubled; she glanced at the older man for a second opinion. “Reynard?”

She did not find one. Remus’ father said nothing. He was staring blankly at the bedspread, breathing hard as though he’d run a mile. He was almost as pale as his son.

The Hogwarts matron was clearly not happy. But nonetheless, she could not match the stubborn resolution of her patient and sighed. “Very well, I’ll be in my office. But no exerting yourself!”

Remus waited until he heard the door to Poppy’s office pull shut before turning to face his father once more. He had demanded this talk – but now he could not find the words to say. He simply stared, stared at a man he’d thought he’d known better than any other, a man he had loved more than anyone but his much missed late mother and tried to suppress the ice around his heart that whispered he was staring at a stranger. He desperately wanted there to be an excuse, a reason, something that would make everything all right again between them, but he dared not hope for such a miracle. His hopes had been dashed on such matters too many times in the past.

He simply looked at him instead. Reynard’s eyes had lifted to stare at his son, brimful with a cauldron’s worth of fear, regret and weariness; a lifetime of secret keeping weighed heavy on the mind, it seemed. And he looked old. Rey Lupin had never looked old until the last few years, even when the last trace of brown had faded from his hair; not until the day his wife had died, a stupid fall from a window in a Parisian hotel, attending a conference in France to spread the word about her finally successful Wolfsbane Potion. That awful day, watching the coffin of the woman who had been his life for more than forty years vanish beneath the earth forever, he had suddenly appeared his true age. Now, sitting on the hospital bed of his angry son, he seemed yet even older.

Two sets of eyes met. Both frowned. Neither spoke.

It was Reynard who broke the silence.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice breaking slightly. “I never meant you to find out like this.”

Remus frowned, irritated by the platitude even if sincerely meant. “Forgive me, but I’m fairly sure you never meant me to find out at all.”

Reynard could not hold his gaze against such a fierce stare; his eyes dropped once more. “That’s sort of true,” he admitted softly. “But it was…”

“For my own good?” That phrase. He’d been expecting it. It fuelled the icy fire inside his chest.

Reynard looked up sharply, his expression one of vague offence. “Necessary,” he finished firmly. “You were too young, Remus. How could you understand…”

“I’m older now. Help me understand.”

Reynard shook his head abruptly, a hint of anger of his own creeping into his eyes. “That wasn’t what I was going to say either. Do you want to know the truth or would you like to keep interrupting?”

“Don’t talk to me like I’m five, dad!” Remus did not appreciate being reprimanded, snapping almost before he could think better of it.

“Then don’t behave like it!” Reynard shot the response back instantly, raising his hands sharply to cut off his son’s indignant response. “I know you’re confused and angry and upset. You’ve just had a horrendous dream and it’s shaken you. But please, calm down. Bawling at each other will get us nowhere.” He took a deep breath. “I hope you can appreciate that I’m more than a little shaken myself. It’s not every day a man gets a call from the Headmaster of Hogwarts telling him his son has almost been killed by the very same creature that…” He bit his lip as he fought to calm his rapid breathing. His eyes met his son’s over-brimming with a kind of tortured relief.
“You’re all I’ve got Remus and I love you very much. You’ve near enough scared the life out of me these last two days, all but bleeding to death yesterday, having fits in front of me this morning. I don’t think either of us are willing or able to make this a shouting match. You wanted to talk. So we talk. What do you want to know?”

Fighting the fire inside, Remus forced himself to regain control his anger. He felt suddenly ashamed; he had not considered the worry he had put his father through, bad enough in any light, but terrible to one who had knowledge of his history of Kane. Suddenly Moody removing him from the mission was making a great deal more sense.

And much as he hated to admit it, his dad was right; the memory of the dream - or the dream of the memory perhaps – had left him shivery and uncertain, shaking him from his usual composure and causing him to snap and snipe at his father like an irritable schoolboy. Enough was enough. This was no way to behave. He wanted to talk. Fine. It was time to get to the point.

“You memory charmed me.” He forced calmness into his voice, but could not keep out the cold. “In St Mungo’s. I was in pain and all you could do was memory charm me.” A plea crept into his frosty tone in spite of itself. “What was so important that that you couldn’t even wait until I’d stopped screaming to wipe out?”

Reynard was shaking his head before his son had even finished his sentence. “It wasn’t like that, not at all.” He sighed again. “Remus, how much do you really remember?”

“Everything.”

“That’s not helpful.” The older man retorted at once. “Your everything may not be the same as mine. I assume you know who bit you?”

“Kane.”

“Yes. And that he took you?”

“Yes.”

Each curt, one-word answer seemed to cut at Reynard like a knife. Nevertheless, he ploughed on. “Do you remember him appearing into our house? All the words he said? The confrontation I had with him?”

Remus hesitated, wading through a morass of foggy memories and found only a few vague images. Perhaps the wall, the wall he now knew to be his father’s Dementor damaged Obliviate spell, had been a little sturdier in places than he’d thought.

“Sort of,” he admitted. Oddly enough, his father’s familiar practicality was calming him, in spite of the situation; he barely paused a moment before clarifying. “Not really. I can see him standing there shouting at you but I don’t remember what was said. And I think I remember being pushed behind a chair by mum.”

His father twisted his lips thoughtfully. “I doubt it would have meant much to you anyway. Abraham Kane and I – it’s a complicated business in more ways than one.”

He stared absently at the ceiling, fingering his cane. “I got this gammy leg beating him off from you,” he muttered softly. “**** fine shot with those claws of his. Marked the pair of us didn’t he? Killed us financially too – I had to take a desk job, your mother gave up most of her contracts to look for a cure for you… Oh yes. He got his revenge very nicely in that respect.” He met his son’s eyes once more. Remus was astonished to see a hint of tears. “But he didn’t win, Remus. He thought we’d hate you, you see. He thought he would ruin our family. But we didn’t let it happen; if anything, it made our bonds stronger. We didn’t stop loving each other. That would have been his true revenge.”

Remus stared at his father. The anger had drained away, lost behind the flood of poignant memories. Whatever happened, whatever was about to be revealed, his father was right; whatever had occurred that night, it would not change the years that had followed. But still, he needed to understand once and for all. It was the only way that they could both come to terms.

“Revenge for what? Dad, please.”

Reynard regarded his only child. “Did he say anything to you? Do you remember?”

The words of the dream-memory replayed themselves in Remus’ mind. “He called you a coward,” he replied, his voice low. “He said that you owed him for a life and a lifetime.”

His father smiled, a humourless smile of bitter regret. “In a way, he’s right. I didn’t start this, Remus. To be honest, neither did he. It was forced onto both of us until it spiralled both our lives out of control. And then he went and dragged you in too. I know I made bad choices, but at the time they seemed the right ones – I had no way to know where it would lead. I think about it, even now and still it makes no sense.”

“Then tell me about it.” Remus sat forward, resting one hand beside his father’s on the bedspread. “It might make more sense if you talk it over.”

“I wouldn’t know where to start.”

“The beginning usually works.”

Reynard gave another bitter smile, this time tinged with ruefulness. “I’m not sure where that is anymore. My beginning, his beginning and he had more than one. It’s all confused. And a long story.”

Remus managed a smile, gesturing to the empty Hospital Wing and his injuries. “I seem to have time. I certainly haven’t much else to do.”

Reynard sighed, reaching over cautiously. When Remus offered no protest, he laid one hand over his son’s. “All right – I’ll try. I’ll do my best. But you’ll have to bear with me. As I said – it’s hard to know where to start.”

Remus nodded quietly. “Just tell me. Give me a reason to believe that what you did really was… necessary.”

Reynard nodded, gently squeezing the hand he held. “It was. Truly. Well. I suppose I’d better begin somewhere…”

A/N: Thoughts? Please post feedback here

[Pallas]

A/N: Phew! *wipes brow* Made it to Part Two! Ladies and Gentlemen, you are now entering The Flashback Zone...

Part Two: The Bite

11: A Challenging Case

Derbyshire, Early November, 1962.

This was certainly proving to be a challenging case.

Reynard Lupin rubbed his hands together sharply, blowing against his chilled fingers to ward off the encroaching cold. Darkness was creeping in fitful shadows across the battered ruins of the deserted farm that the joint operation between the Auror division of Magical Law Enforcement and the Werewolf Capture Unit attached to the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures department had chosen as their base of operations.

Rey belonged to neither. The best title to fit his role in this, he supposed, was some manner of attaché; the representative sent, as always in such cases, by the Head of his division of the Magical Creatures department because he did not appreciate the idea of going out into the dangerous cold himself. And representation was needed. The Werewolf Capture Unit were a fine body of strong, quick, hunting men capable of delivering the kind of speed and violence necessary to bring down a rampaging beast immune to magic – but they really hadn’t half a brain between them. That was what Rey was for.

He was proud to be widely regarded as one of the best in the business. There were very few creatures in the magical world that he was not capable of dealing with – from simple Boggart removal to rogue Griffin capture, Reynard Lupin could be relied upon to get results. He had even begun to collect some of the finer specimens, much to the horror of his wife and fascinated delight of his young son, storing them in the old lean-to at the side of his mercifully remote cottage home in order to study their behaviour.

He learned enough in that time to consider writing a book someday, if he were ever to find the time. He wondered sometimes if the time should be found sooner rather than later. His job was often exciting but at times the basic work could become almost routine – banishing Boggarts, digging out Red Caps, caging pixies. More often than he liked, he found himself almost wistfully wishing for something a little more interesting.

But this case was something different. A real challenge.

Feral werewolves. Two of them.

Rey did not often deal with werewolves. His intense dislike of them was well known enough that most werewolf capture liaison cases tended to be deliberately and quietly diverted to a colleague by his boss. It was not as though there was a great deal to do on werewolf cases – the Werewolf Capture Unit did the grunt work after all – and so Rey had not minded greatly. But a recent flurry of utterly routine Grindylow nettings and Bundimun scrapings had left him almost in despair; so when a request was routed through for an experienced attaché for this joint operation to bring down the pair of ferals whose exploits had been splashed all over the news, Rey had jumped at it.

His boss had not approved. Ares Rowen, head of the Extermination and Pest Control Divisions of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures was an old friend of his father; a stern and crusty old sod that had in his day been as respected an operative as Rey was. He had summoned him into his office as soon as the request had reached his desk and suggested quietly that, given his history with werewolves, it was, perhaps, not such a good idea.

“It’s not that I don’t think you can do this,” he had intoned in his gravely tones, regarding Rey cautiously over the rim of his glasses. “Indeed, with Stebbins off sick with that Malaclaw bite, Lanark chasing that loose mountain troll in Scotland, and Riever on his holidays, you are the most experienced liaison I can send, apart from going myself of course.”

Rey had pictured the rotund, grey-haired, bespectacled form of Ares Rowen out in the field chasing ferals through wood and mire and bit back a smile that would not have done any favours for his career. Ares had been the best in his youth after all and he should not mock him, even silently. Someday he might be the one trapped behind a desk by injury or girth.

“But Reynard; you and werewolves.” Ares was shaking his head. “Given what happened with your sister and that Isaacs fellow… I don’t think it would be… wise.”

In spite of himself, Reynard had fought a surge of rage at the mention of that name. He controlled it carefully. “Ares, really, I appreciate your concerns. But I’m thirty-seven years old now, not some angry teenager. I’m a professional. I will not let personal concerns interfere with my work. I can do this case. Please.”

Ares had sighed, deeply. “Rafe Lupin was one of my oldest and dearest friends,” he said softly. “I’d feel like a traitor if I didn’t watch out for his son.”

Reynard had nodded. “I know. And I’m grateful. But I don’t need protecting. I can look after myself.”

Ares had stared at him for a long moment. Then he handed him the case file.

“Buxton, Derbyshire,” he informed him reluctantly. “The ferals are known as Abraham and Hel Kane. You’ll be liasing with Rudolf Bolt of the WCU and that Auror chap Alastor Moody.”

And so here he was, deep in darkest Derbyshire, awaiting the impending reports on the current location of the two loose ferals so that he could do the necessary liasing and make a plan of action. He had been surprised when Moody had shown him the official permission he had been handed – permission for mission members to use Unforgivable curses in the capture or execution of their prey. But then with all the publicity in the Prophet about the antics of these two, the so-called “reign of terror” they had invoked, perhaps it was not so unexpected after all.

Bolt had long since vanished inside for a meal and a good smoke – about all he was good for apart from being told where to point his weapons to be honest. Alastor Moody on the other hand, was lurking a few yards to Rey’s left, staring at the sky and the heavily waxing moon with a distinct edge of distaste.

Rey had known Moody for six years now, his partner on several other joint operations between their departments in the past. A year or two his senior, the Auror was a grizzled, well scarred but practical man who, like Rey, had a reputation for getting the job done. In spite of his gruff demeanour, Rey liked his straightforward approach to his work.

“I didn’t think they’d send you, you know.” Alastor’s dark eyes were still fixed on the moon as he spoke, leaning casually against the side of a battered barn. “When I asked Rowen for you a year or so back, during that business with that half-feral nutter in Surrey, he told me you didn’t work werewolf cases. Said you had personal reasons.” He grinned. “It was a pleasant surprise when you apparated in. I was expecting that useless fool Stebbins.”

Rey shrugged, following the Auror’s gaze to glance at the starry sky overhead and a moon too close to full. “He never told me you’d asked. I only found out about this case by chance. I do have personal reasons not to like werewolves but I certainly won’t let them interfere with my work.”

“Have a bad run in, did you?” Moody inquired.

Rey gritted his teeth. “No. But I don’t want to talk about it.”

It was Moody’s turn to shrug. “Fair enough. How’s Diana and the little one?”

Reynard grinned in spite of himself. Here was a subject he would willingly discuss. “Not so little these days. He had his third birthday just two weeks ago. Diana and I took him up to visit his Grandpa John on the farm. He kept chasing the sheepdogs and asking where the Puffskeins were.”

Moody chuckled. “It hardly seems yesterday that you were showing him off as a pink little bundle in the Ministry Offices. I swear I’ve never seen a grin that wide before or since. You looked like you’d pinned your lips to your ears.”

It was Rey’s turn to laugh. “Do you blame me? For more than ten years we tried every which way to have a child of our own. We’d all but given up hope when Remus came along. He’s our miracle.”

The Auror smiled, the expression odd on his grizzled face. “I was glad for you – still am. Can’t think of a couple who deserved it more. I have to say though – it surprised me after so long trying without success that you didn’t give up and adopt.”

Guilty memories flooded Rey’s mind – determinedly he bit them back. No. He was not going to think about the boy again. He had made the choice and that was the end of it.

“We thought about it,” he admitted softly. “Almost did in fact. But we – well, I – changed my mind. It just wouldn’t have been the same. And now I’m glad we waited. Remus is a dream come true.”

Abruptly, Moody stretched, hauling himself upright. “Getting nippy out here,” he commented. “Might head in and grab a bite to eat.” He paused, patting his friend on the shoulder. “It’s good to have you on the team, Rey. But if you do have any werewolf issues, clear them out your head right now. We can’t have them in the way in the field.”

With that, Alastor strode away, disappearing into the pool of light spilling from the farmhouse kitchen. Rey watched him go with a sigh.

Werewolf issues. In spite of his pureblood heritage and his own father Rafe’s well-noted dislike for half-breeds, he had not had any werewolf issues until he had met Adam Isaacs.

The worst part was that he had liked him. He had been a quiet man, given to moodiness at times and with a tendency towards the morose but he had not been – had not seemed – a bad man and Rhea had adored him, which had been a big plus to his cause. Rhea, his big sister, forthright, lively and idealistic, a relentless champion of causes, mostly those their father despised. Rhea and his father - they had been so similar and so different all at once, cut of the same cloth in character but with very different ideas about the world; their clashes had, at times, been spectacular.

Rafe was not a cruel man or an evil one – he had been supporting Dumbledore against the rise of Grindelwald for some time – but he was very much the old fashioned pureblood and had very definite views. And Rhea was a wild child, a rebellion waiting to happen in the uncertain days of the Muggle war with Germany and wizarding war against Grindelwald. Reynard had always taken more after their quieter mother – keeping his head down and letting his relatives slog their problems out unhindered. But he had loved Rhea dearly, admired her fighting spirit and respected her views.

Her latest mission had been werewolf rights. There was much talk in the Ministry at the time of creating a Register of Werewolves in Britain; Newt Scamander had suggested it and even begun a study to examine its feasibility. Her father was a staunch supporter of the idea but Rhea had been appalled. Fresh out of Hogwarts, being pushed towards a Ministry job and a nice pureblood husband by her father, she had abandoned his hopes and dreams and set out to make her own.

She took the Ministry job; but only in the hope of gaining independence from her reliance on their father’s money, although she had promised both Reynard and little Rolphe, their younger brother, that she would not leave them. Every free moment she could spare she spent on her campaign, drafting her brothers in to help whenever they were home from Hogwarts. And then she had met Isaacs.

Rey had not known he was a werewolf at the time. It was only later he had discovered just why it was that his father had so despised this apparently harmless man. He had met him only twice, secretly, once over the summer and again, at Christmas during his fifth year, smiling to see his sister’s happiness as she clung to Adam’s – Isaacs’ – arm. He had returned to Hogwarts as usual in January and settled back to await the usual flood of his sister’s chirpy correspondence.

Nothing came.

It was not until he went home for the summer that he was told that she had gone.

She had eloped with Isaacs just after he had returned to school.

Rolphe had never recovered from this apparent abandonment by the sister he had idolised; turning to his father for support, he became the model son that Reynard had somehow never managed to be. It was he who made the pureblood marriage, took on the respectable career – it had come as no surprise to Rey, on his father’s death seven years before, that all but a pittance of the family estate and fortune had gone to his brother’s perfect family. Rey’s lone rebellion in his life – his insistence upon marriage to Muggle-born Diana Griffith, daughter of an ordinary Welsh farmer – had never quite been forgiven. He tried, for many years, to regain his father’s good graces, even to the point of… But he had decided not to dwell on that. And though the rift had thinned over the years, he had never quite succeeded.

But Rhea had vanished. And then there was nothing. No more campaign, no letters to her brothers, nothing. Nothing until she showed up in St Mungo’s two months later…

Gods, he still had nightmares about that awful day – he was only grateful that his father had insisted on keeping Rolphe and his mother away. Even Rey was to have been excluded had he not happened to forgo the pre-school shopping trip to Diagon Alley that year and stay at home.

He had been at home that morning when the owl arrived. He had watched as his father’s face turned white as a corpse’s pallor, watched him dash from the room and apparate into nothingness without a glance or word of explanation to his son. For hours Rey had waited, wondered, torn between going in search of his mother, or awaiting his father’s return. Finally, as he had stood poised before the fireplace, floo powder in his hand and the name of the Leaky Cauldron on his lips, yet another owl had swooped into the open window and dropped a letter into his hands.

The terse missive was written in his father’s scrawling hand. It told him that his sister was in St Mungo’s. He, Rolphe and their mother were to wait at home until he called.

Rey had seriously considered obeying. Briefly.

Then he had deposited the note on the prominent table in the main hall, and still grasping his handful of floo powder, hurled in into the flames.

He had not needed to ask the Welcome Witch where to find his sister. He could hear her screams all the way from reception.

For a confused moment, he had wondered if he had been mistaken when he followed the terrible sounds of his sister’s agony to a maternity ward. A glance inside explained everything.

His sister was in labour. And it was not going well.

And she was screaming. But this was not the pure effort of childbirth – over and over again, his sister was screaming her plight. He had tricked her into leaving. He had held her against her will. He had forced himself upon her. She did not want his child. She had just wanted to go home. She hated him. She hated Adam Isaacs.

Over and over again. Those same words.

And then his father, looking hagged and anxious in the corner of the room, had glanced into the doorway and seen him.

He had been all but hurled from the room. The porter was browbeaten into escorting him back to the fireplace and ensuring that he was well and truly gone.

And so he had waited.

His mother came home soon after, all alone; by blessed chance, Rolphe had encountered a friend in Diagon Alley and had been invited to stay the night. He had reluctantly told her of what he had seen and instantly regretted it as he comforted her intense burst of weeping until the evening when the fireplace glowed. His father had stepped out of the ominous green flare, his skin pale, his shoulders tense and his usually immaculate hair dishevelled. His eyes were haunted.

Rey had known then his sister was dead.

The labour had been difficult. The stress had been too much. Both mother and child had been lost, his father said. And Isaacs was at large.

His sister was gone. His impulsive, vivacious sister had been stripped of her verve, her dignity and her life. That werewolf had tricked her, deceived her, killed her spirit and taken advantage for his own ends. And now she was dead.

And it was all his fault. Isaacs.

If Adam Isaacs hadn’t killed himself before Rey had found him, he would have happily done the job on his sister’s behalf.

Werewolf issues indeed.

“Mr Lupin! Mr Lupin!”

Rey started violently – lost in the thoughts of his past, he had not seen the swooping broomstick of one of the Auror scouts drop sharply into the yard in front of him.

“Sir, we’ve found them! The ferals, they’re less than a mile from here!”

Reynard’s brain snapped into focus. “Send a message to the other scouts; tell them to keep the ferals in sight but don’t let them see you if you can help it and certainly don’t approach. Then join Mr Moody and me in the farmhouse with every scrap of information you have about their location. Understand?”

The man nodded eagerly but Rey had barely noticed, his professionalism clamping down over his feelings as he turned on his heel and rushed towards the farmhouse. This challenging case was coming to a head and this time there would be no mistakes.

They would bring the ferals down.

It was time.

***************

Feedback Here Please

A/N: This flashback section is what I originally envisioned this fic as – a few chapters from Reynard Lupin’s perspective about how his son came to be bitten by Abraham Kane. There are a large number of Remus bite fics around but most I’ve noticed tend to have the bite as an accident. I must admit it’s always struck me as a little odd, the thought of a very young boy (in the words of JKR) out after dark probably all alone on a full moon to get bitten in the first place – what were his parents thinking of? One theory I haven’t seen is that there may have been something more sinister about it and from this thought, a fic idea was born. But I wasn’t overly keen to write the entire fic from an OC perspective and I was very keen to write for adult Remus *g* since he is probably my favourite character anywhere in literature, bless him. So I added a chapter either side of Remus asking his father what happened. But then I thought – what if he didn’t just ask out of the blue? What if he asked because he had met Kane? In the original plan, Kane was killed after biting Remus, but that conclusion to the flashback had to go for the new plot to work. And that left matters a little too unresolved for my liking, so I thought it through and took a few other random ideas that I had but had never been able to work into a plot before, twisted them together and out came Oblivious. But this section ahead, with a few additions and adaptations, is the core idea I had for this fic in the first place. Enjoy.

[Pallas]

A/N: Many apologies for the delay. Hopefully things will be back on track now, although I may slow my posting rate from three days to every four or five, just to take the pressure off my poor overworked but much appreciated beta.

12: The Chase

“Hell’s teeth!” Moody’s quiet exclamation in accompaniment to the now-too familiar thwack of bramble against skin made Rey grin in spite of himself. “They couldn’t have holed up in a nice suburb somewhere?”

“We should probably be thankful they didn’t.” The low voice that responded from Moody’s other side belonged to Orestes Bevan, a tall, irritatingly good-looking young Auror in his late twenties with whom Rey had often worked before; the two fathers had spent several enjoyable hours in the farmhouse exchanging toddler horror stories earlier in the evening. His startlingly blond hair was dishevelled now, and a large scratch across his face implied that in spite of his words, he was not enjoying the terrain any more than his more senior partner.

“You could have taken a broomstick,” Rey inserted diffidently, gingerly pushing back a wall of thorns with his mercifully gloved palm. “Greenwood did offer…”

“Broomstick!” Moody snorted disdainfully. “Do you see the ferals sprouting wings? No. I’m not going to hide on some floating twig. I’m staying where the action is!”

Bevan grinned. “Then I think you’ll have to forgo your right to complain, Alastor.”

Moody made a disdainful sound. “Bugger that!” He said with feeling. “A man’s right to complain is a civic necessity!”

“I still don’t see why we couldn’t just have apparated.” The slightly sulky baritone belonged to the hulking form of Rudolf Bolt, who was following a few steps behind and grasping a Muggle handgun and a wicked-looking crossbow almost possessively.

Moody paused, wearily rolling his eyes. “For the fifteenth time, Bolt, apparation is noisy and disorientating and ferals are bloody quick off the mark. We want to catch them by surprise not the other way around. I thought you were supposed to be an expert.” He glanced at the gun. “And don’t go firing that blasted thing off around my men! I wouldn’t trust you to hit the broad side of a Norwegian Ridgeback!”

Vaguely aware that he’d been insulted, Bolt hunched his shoulders and glared. Moody sighed substantially and resumed his battle with undergrowth.

“Talking of noisy,” Rey dropped his voice to a whisper. “We need to be careful and keep it down. Ferals have annoyingly good hearing and we can’t be far from this ruin of Greenwood’s.”

Moody nodded curtly and glanced at Bevan. The younger man nodded in response and raised his hand over his head in a series of sharp gestures. Other hands appeared in the undergrowth around them as the message was passed along to the surrounding teams.

“What about my men?” Bolt’s voice was a petulant and carrying hiss as he fiddled loudly with the catch on his handgun.

Moody looked a few steps away from murder and the look on Bevan’s face implied he would quite happily give him an alibi. “My team will pass the call for silence on,” he breathed sharply and almost soundlessly but with astonishing restraint. “That’s why we assigned mixed teams in the first place. Now if you don’t shut your bloody mouth and stop fiddling that Muggle piece of troll-dung, all those ferals will find of you is an interesting stain on the grass and a very unpleasant smell. Okay?”

Rey bit his lip to prevent a highly inappropriate chuckle at the look on Bolt’s face. The Werewolf Capture Unit, frequent destination of those without the grades or brains to be Aurors, was yet again living up to its reputation. If it weren’t for the fact that this case fell nominally under their jurisdiction, Rey would have happily seen them left at home. No wonder the likes of Isaacs and these ferals could get away with murder with these prize idiots as their adversaries. And Bolt was one of the bright ones….

The team now moved in silence, easing their way through the painful undergrowth with care, avoiding the snap of twigs and casting silencing spells under their breath on the clutter of leaf litter before them. The wind whispered through the loosened riot of autumn leaves leeched black by night-time’s falling, the already cold air chilling their sweat soaked backs and casting their breath as mist that they were hastily forced to regulate. The jarring alarm call of a Tawny owl rose in the trees above them.

Ahead now, the trees and bushes were thinning as the slender hillside defile up which they had been creeping narrowed upwards to a rocky gorge down which a pale stream struck by moonlight tumbled. A small waterfall danced from the shadowed rocky gap to tumble into a pool at the narrow valley’s head and to one side of the sparkling water, the battered stone-heaped roofless remains of an old cottage lay darkened and unmoving. Were it not for the difficult approach and the danger that lurked within, the spot would have been a paradise. But for the cry of the owl and rush of the wind, all was silent.

If the ferals truly were within the ruins as Greenwood had said then the capture team spread out across the slender approach had them cornered.

Reynard glanced at Moody – the older man was staring at the darkened scene with narrowed eyes.

“I don’t like this.” The Auror’s words were all but inaudible but muttered with sincerity. “Something’s wrong.”

Rey felt inclined to agree. His instincts were screaming at him, roaring as loudly as they could that something was desperately amiss.

The Tawny owl’s screeching echoed overhead once more. The wind gusted and shivered down his back as he clutched his wand.

His back.

The wind was at his back.

They had approached upwind.

And ferals had a werewolf’s sense of smell.

The Tawny’s screeching rebounded off his own sudden sense of overwhelming stupidity. The owl was afraid of something.

He looked up into the tangled branches. And saw the shadow as it dropped.

“Look out! ”

His warning saved Moody’s life. The slash of claws missed his throat as the Auror dived instinctively aside, ripping instead into his soft flesh of his ear. Alastor bellowed with pain as he stumbled back but the fact that he still had enough windpipe to do so was a stark reminder it could have been worse. Bolt charged into the fray with a cry, discharging his gun on impulse – Bevan, who had just taken aim with his wand, was forced to duck out of the bullet’s path with a furious cry of frustration. Rey, knocked backwards by Moody’s dive to safety, caught a glimpse of a lithe figure, a flash of wild blonde hair and golden eyes before it hurled itself at Bolt with a screeching cry. The professional werewolf hunter stumbled back, dropping his weapons and clutching his face with a scream as claws raked down his skin; Bevan was back on his feet, a curse on his lips but the shadowed feral saw the danger and darted sharply back into the darkness, leaving only an echo of cold laughter.

Even as the four men froze, stunned, to catch their breath, Bolt on the ground and gasping in pain and Moody grasping his ear with a furious expression over the fact that the ferals had literally got the drop on them, the undergrowth to their right crashed apart as the nearest teams rushed to their aid. To their left, screams and bellows and the roar of spells told that both ferals had attacked simultaneously.

Ignoring the blood that now poured down the side of his face, Moody snapped back into action.

“Bevan!” he ordered sharply. “Take Team two after that bloody thing! Team three, you’re with me, we’re going to help the others. Lupin.” He forestalled Rey’s motion to follow with one hand. “You stay here with Bolt. No arguments.” His sharp gaze cut off the protest on the younger man’s lips. “You’re a **** fine exterminator but this is out of your league; Diana would never forgive me for making her a widow and neither would your lad. Keep your head down and watch your back. The rest of you, move! ”

In a thunder of footsteps and crashing branches, they were gone. Rey and the still writhing Bolt were alone.

The worst of it was he could hear the battles, the tearing of undergrowth, the swearing, the screamed out spells and the desperate cries of pain. He could hear the echoing laughter, the shrieking howls of the two ferals as they attacked first to his left, then to his right, ahead, behind, all around him. He would catch glimpses of the Aurors and the hunters darting between the trees, occasionally charging through the small glade in which Bolt had fallen with barely a glance in their direction. He had never felt so helpless in his life. It was only Moody’s blunt words and the thought of Remus and Diana left alone that prevented him from charging to their aid.

He turned instead to Rudolf Bolt. The hunter’s whimpering appeared to be justified – his face and chest were a scratched up mess and Rey didn’t fancy the chances of his left eye ever again being much use. He cleaned the man up as best he could, muttering a few basic healing charms that were compulsory in his line of work, but the groans and moans were starting to grate on his nerves. He was shamefully grateful when the WCU leader dropped unconscious.

A change in volume of the distant battle made him pause. Were those footsteps coming closer?

A scream pierced the air, shockingly close by – even as Rey darted to his feet, his wand clasped firmly in one hand, the shape of Arton, one of Bolt’s men came flying backwards out of the shadows just yards from where he crouched, arms flailing as he catapulted into a tree with shocking force and slumped into a bloody heap on the ground.

A pair of golden eyes glinted in the shadows. They fixed upon him, glowing like burning embers.

Oh Sweet Merlin. He was in trouble.

“Stupif…”

Too slow. A dark shape barrelled into him with a force that sent his wand flying and shot arrows of pain through his ribs and chest; his heels caught on the recumbent form of Bolt as he tumbled over backwards, crashing into the tangled leaf litter as the feral’s momentum sent him rolling overhead. He managed one solid kick to the chest of his attacker before the weight of this wolf in human shape slammed him back into the ground, straddling him as clawed fingers splayed above his face with intent to rip his eyes out.

And then paused.

It was the male, Kane, who had pounced him; his hair wild, his cheek scratched and bloodied, his weathered solid face far too old for his age. But it was his golden eyes that seemed to pin Rey down, narrowing sharply as they drank in his features then widening with sudden astonishment.

“You! ” he hissed.

Rey had no time to ponder this hate-filled exclamation from a stranger. With all the force he could muster, he brought his knee up.

The instant of shocked pain on the feral’s face was distraction enough. Rey’s hand closed on Bolt’s fallen crossbow.

He didn’t bother to aim it. He simply swung the hefty weapon with all of his might into the side of Abraham Kane’s head. Kane crashed to the ground with a strangled cry as Rey scrambled clear of his grasp, wielding the crossbow like a club as he groped for his dropped wand. The feral’s furious eyes burned into him as he flipped to his feet, blood streaming from his temple and staining his face with darkness.

“They’re going to be finding pieces of you in Tibet, Lupin!” he snarled viciously.

Rey didn’t doubt it, his eyes wide and unashamedly terrified as the feral bared his teeth and charged. Oh Merlin, what would happen to Diana, to Remus? Wand, wand, where the hell was his wand…

“Impedimenta! ”

With shocking force, Kane was flung to the ground, struggling and snarling against the force of the spell that had entangled him in invisible bonds. The tousled blond form of Orestes Bevan surged out of the trees.

“Bloody hellfire!” The Auror exclaimed, panting heavily. “That was close…”

Chaos erupted in the trees at Bevan’s back, cutting off his sentence at a strike.

“Bevan!” The bellow was Alastor Moody’s. “Behind you! ”

It was too late. A blonde fury hurled herself spitting and screaming out of the trees, slamming into Bevan’s shocked and half-turned form as her claws ripped the skin from his arm. With astonishing composure considering the writhing ball of rage that had just latched herself to his chest, Bevan rolled backwards with the impact, grasping his attacker’s arms as he flung her over his head and away. Ducking out of her flight path as she hurtled into the undergrowth with an infuriated scream, Rey tumbled upon his elusive wand but before he could bring it to bear, the feral Hel was on her feet once more and diving for the still half-prone form of Bevan.

Rey didn’t think. He simply acted.

His hand closed around her ankle as he pulled with all his strength.

“Avada Kedavra! ”

Half-distracted, off-balance, Hel did not have time to dodge. The green light of Bevan’s spell struck her squarely and threw her lifeless to the ground.

“Hel! ”

With a shocking wrench fuelled by grief, Abraham Kane broke free of the fading spell that had bound his limbs. For an instant his fire-like eyes swept the tiny glade, drinking in the dead form of his companion, the motionless shapes of Bolt and Arton, Orestes Bevan still half-lain in leaf litter his wand extended before him from the spell that had sapped the feral female’s life, and Reynard Lupin, crouched, wand caught loosely in one hand, the other hovering over the now deceased form of the woman he had successfully distracted to her death.

And then with a furious snarl, he was gone.

Rey met Bevan’s eyes. Both were gasping for breath.

And then with a thunderous crash, Alastor Moody and the rag tag bloodied remains of his four teams hurtled into the glade.

“Which way? ” The senior Auror roared. “Where? ”

“There!” Bevan pointed with his wand, gritting his teeth against the pain in his blood-streaked arm as he tried to rise.

Moody nodded sharply as he gestured to those members of his party still undamaged enough to run. “Bevan, Lupin, you’re in no fit state. Send up sparks to Greenwood to sort this mess out and get yourselves back to HQ. The rest of you with me!” His gaze lingered momentarily on the lifeless form of Hel. “At least we got one of the b*stards.”

And then, limping heavily and still streaming blood from his ear, Moody vanished after his men.

A heavy silence descended over the glade. The sounds of pursuit faded down the defile to be swallowed by the night.

Bruised and aching, Rey forced himself wearily to his feet and stumbled over to where Bevan was crouched, cradling his savaged arm with a grimace. He smiled at the attaché’s approach.

“Good work there, Lupin,” he said, still gripping his wand painfully as he allowed Rey to steady his shoulders as he helped pull him to his feet. “Quick thinking. Thanks.”

Rey smiled unsteadily as he took the blond Auror’s weight. “You saved my life. It seemed only fair to repay the favour.”

Bevan grinned at that. Wincing slightly, he shifted his wand to his good hand and raised it over his head. Red sparks exploded in the air above them.

“There,” he said quietly. “That should get our flying squad’s attention.”

Rey stared at the spray of sparks as they scattered and died against the dark roof of the sky. His entire body ached with the residue of his fight with Kane, his mind still half-reeling from the feral’s strange recognition of him as he supported his bleeding colleague and awaited rescue. A thought struck him. “Bevan.”

“Yeah Lupin?”

“Do me a favour?”

“Of course. What do you need?”

“If I ever take a case with you again because I say I’m bored with Grindylow catching, please slap me across the head and tell me not to be so stupid.”

Bevan’s grin widened in spite of the pain in his features. “Will do, Lupin. Will do.”

* * *

Dawn had broken, the low glow of sunrise staining the eastern horizon before Moody and his weary band trudged back to the derelict farmhouse. One look at their disconsolate faces told Reynard that Kane had not been caught.

“Tricky git, that Kane.” Moody’s words were almost a snarl as he settled down reluctantly beside the mission Healer to allow his mangled and unmistakably beyond repair ear to be tended to. “Caught young Dawlish a right wallop – knew I shouldn’t have brought that kid straight out of training but he was so keen to come.” He sighed.

“He gave us the slip in the woods about an hour ago. I sent Greenwood and the surveillance boys to see if they can pick up his trail but I don’t fancy their chances. He’ll be long gone. And he wasn’t happy either. Raved about us killing his mate whenever we got within ten yards. Kept going on about vengeance.”

Rey took a seat beside him, wincing at his bruised ribs; Bevan, his torn arm now in a sling, rested his free hand against the back of his chair and leaned forward.

“So what now?” The younger Auror asked the question that burned in the air between them. “We lost Arton and Burley. Bolt’s out for the count. All bar two members of the ground teams are sporting some manner of serious injury. We brought down Hel but there’s no sign of Kane. Do we keep looking or…”

“No.” Moody cut the sentence off. “We’re in no fit state for this. We need to regroup.”

“Agreed.” Bevan was nodding his head at once. “New intelligence, a new plan. And this time we go in better prepared.”

“And not upwind.” Reynard saw no point in covering his own mistake. When the two Aurors regarded him quizzically he added, “The wind was blowing straight up that defile. They must have smelled us. I should have realised sooner, I’m sorry.”

Moody waved a dismissive hand. “It wasn’t as though we could have approached them from any other direction. Not your fault, Rey; we’ll know next time. And you two got one of them. You’ll likely be getting commendations from the Ministry for that.”

Rey and Bevan exchanged glances of mild horror. “Do we have to?” Rey exclaimed.

Moody laughed out loud, only to be scolded by the Healer for moving. He scowled at her before turning back to his friends. “Don’t fancy being kissed by the Minister’s wife at the presentation, eh?”

“It’s the warts.” Bevan’s tone was a shudder. “But the halitosis alone is enough…”

“Ah, the price of success.” Moody grinned. “Serves you right for doing your jobs properly.”

There was an exchange of rueful smiles.

“Well, if that’s all for now.” Reynard rose creakily to his feet. “I’d probably best be off. Diana is going to take Remus up to Hogwarts again today for the annual spoiling of our son by her former pupils. I promised her I’d let her know if I was alive or dead before she left. She does like to know, for some reason.”

Bevan nodded. “I think my Elise would appreciate the same favour, especially since it’s only a couple of miles walk home for me from here. I don’t like to worry her too often – that couch is damned uncomfortable.”

Moody laughed again. “That would be why I’m still a bachelor. Go home, gentlemen. Get some rest. We’ll reconvene in two days at the Ministry. Hopefully we’ll have picked up Kane’s trail by then.”

Reynard nodded to the two Aurors as he turned and made his way towards the door.

“Oh! Lupin?”

It was Bevan calling; Rey glanced back over his shoulder at the tall blond. “Yes?”

Bevan was regarding him quizzically. “I meant to ask – how did Kane know your name?”

Rey blinked. “Pardon?”

“In the glade,” Bevan persisted. “As I was running in to help you. Kane called you Lupin. How did he know that was your name?”

Rey stared in blank disbelief, his mouth working furiously as he tried to gather his tired and weary thoughts. He had acknowledged Kane’s odd hesitation and apparent recognition of him but this shocking familiarity had managed to escape his notice.

“I…” he stammered, facing the two Aurors with an expression of bewilderment. “I don’t know.”

Bevan and Moody exchanged uncertain glances. “Have you met him before?” Alastor asked sharply.

Rey struggled to engage his brain but after the long night in the woods, it really wasn’t in the mood to be woken. “Not that I know of,” he admitted. “As far as I know, I’ve never seen Abraham Kane before in my life. I have no idea why he’d know me.”

Bevan was frowning. “Could you have run across him before in your work?”

Rey exchanged a look with Moody. “I don’t work werewolf cases often. Unless I knew him before he was bitten, I don’t see how I could have.”

Moody regarded him thoughtfully. “What about these werewolf issues you mentioned? Could it be related to that?”

Rey grimaced. “The werewolf I had issues with is long dead. I can’t see how this would be related to him killing my sister.”

Both Bevan and Moody winced sharply. Moody swallowed hard at this abrupt revelation. “Here,” he said suddenly, holding out a round, blue disk that Rey accepted with bemusement. “It’s an emergency beacon. You get in trouble, you press in the middle from both sides and the one I keep on me will tell me you’re in trouble.”

Rey felt a cold chill as he tucked the little disk into the inside pocket of his cloak. “You think I’ll need this?”

Moody’s expression was grim. “We need to be constantly vigilant in this game. I’m not risking it. If Kane has you picked out somehow, for whatever reason, I don’t want to be called to your house sometime to identify your corpse. Send Diana and the kiddie up to stay with her folks for a bit, get them out of the way. There’s no point in risking innocents.”

The chill was spreading like icy fingers across his heart at the prospect of harm coming to his beloved wife and precious son. “I’ll speak to her tonight when she gets back, have them packed off tomorrow morning. Remus likes the farm and I’m sure Diana’ll understand.”

Moody nodded. “Good man. Don’t look so worried, Rey, it might be nothing. But better safe than sorry, eh?”

Rey nodded, trying to ignore the ice that threatened to paralyse him. “Better safe than sorry.”

He did not say what he was thinking, did not admit the fear that had plunged his heart so violently as the truth of his predicament sunk in. He did not confess to the hovering vision of Kane’s face lingering over him. Because to do so would have been to admit that the danger to himself and his family might be real.

But that did not change one simple dread, one horrible suspicion that he was unable to shake. He did not know why. He did not know from where. But he pictured the feral’s face and he felt it.

Abraham Kane was as familiar to him as he had seemed to Kane.

The question now was why.

Feedback Here Please

[Pallas]

A/N: A quiet chapter for you. Call it the calm before the storm…

13: Family Ties - Part One

Home.

With a sigh, Rey quietly pulled the front door closed behind him, glancing around the small, cosy hall of the little two storey thatched cottage that had been home to him ever since his marriage to Diana. Winter Hollow, it was called - it had belonged to his wife’s mother, built by her parents, a Muggle family of artists called the Winters, who had found the delightful secret Welsh valley in which the cottage now nestled, with its floral meadow and tinkling stream, whilst on an expedition and quickly chose to settle there. It had been the gift of Diana’s parents on their wedding day and Rey couldn’t have thought of a better one.

For adaptation into a wizarding home it couldn’t have been more suitable – hidden away high in the hills, shrouded by trees and surrounded by forested mountain, not to mention a good mile from the Muggle road in the larger valley below, it was unlikely to draw attention from passers by and therefore perfect for a Ministry Exterminator with an unusual penchant for keeping his victims and a Potions Mistress who insisted the strange clouds of pink and orange smoke that she shoed out of the window of their kitchen were entirely intentional. The large stone fireplace that dominated one end of the kitchen proved perfect for Diana’s vast selection of cauldrons, the little meat hooks in the roof ideal for hanging herbs. True, it gave the narrow stone-floored room an interesting aroma at times, especially given his wife’s tendency to experiment, but as Diana had testily pointed out, if he could keep his malodorous rabble of creatures in the lean-to behind the house for the fun of it, she was damned well going to use the kitchen for real work.

And use it she did – even after gaining the position at Hogwarts. It was not unheard of for married teachers to commute after all, and with well-publicised “office hours” three evenings a week, the remaining two nights plus weekends allowed her to walk back and forth from the Three Broomsticks and floo into the less cauldron-cluttered fireplace in their lounge. After an incident involving the temporary misplacement of her left elbow, Diana had never been a keen apparator.

But now of course, with Remus in their lives, Diana was once again working from home and Rey felt the happier for it. He was aware that she had loved her job at Hogwarts, but he couldn’t help but feel a selfish pleasure now that her less demanding schedule allowed him to see more of her. And seeing the look of joy on her face whenever she held their son, he did not believe that she was particularly upset by the change in lifestyle either.

The house was hushed in the thinning dark of morning – despite the breaking of dawn at the Derbyshire farmhouse, the taller mountains that hemmed in their more westerly home had delayed the sunrise here. Unwilling to waste time lamp lighting, Rey removed his cloak and hung it on one of the little hallway hooks by the wintery light creeping into the kitchen windows through the open door to his left. Ahead, the wooden staircase ascended into darkness but Rey knew every step of it by heart – he did not need to see where he was going to know the floorboard on step three would creak and that it was steps six and eight that wobbled. He moved forward with the confidence of familiarity and made his way upstairs.

Once on the landing, he hesitated, his eyes drawn to the slightly ajar door to his left. On impulse, he touched his fingers to the door and pushed it back, entering on silent feet as he glanced around at the scatter of toys and games that belonged to an occupant who had not yet learned to be tidy. Little hippogriffs danced in playful circles silhouetted against the light that filtered through their curtain playground, making faces at the man who invaded this child’s domain. A glimmer of light caught his gaze – the sparkling little glass orb filled with bright golden shimmers that doubled as a nightlight and alert system that awoke its counterpart on his wife’s bedside table should their son awake in the night.

The subject of this attention was dwarfed, almost lost, in the sturdy and rather too big for him bed that rested its head against the far wall as it jutted out into the room. Curled up against his pillow and wrapped up tight against the cold in his oversized quilt, all that could be seen of the youngest member of the household was a smudge of light brown hair and a small hand, firmly grasped around the toy sheepdog his Grandpa John had given him for his birthday. Rey grinned in spite of himself. Out like a light as usual. He had never known a sounder sleeper than Remus.

Carefully picking his way through the labyrinth of fallen toys and scattered books, Rey moved to his son’s bedside. From this angle, the little face of his barely-three-year-old boy could be seen peaking out from beneath the quilt, half buried against his new toy collie with a hint of a smile on his face. Gently Rey reached down, stroking the soft hair tenderly for a moment, unable to keep his own smile from spreading. His son. His son. There had been a time when he had given up on ever having a moment like this, a child of his own, their miracle. And he knew that he would tear down the eaves of the world to keep him safe.

It couldn’t wait. He would speak to Diana this morning.

Pausing for a moment longer, Rey bent down and pressed a kiss to his son’s forehead, watching briefly as the little smile flickered unconsciously in response to this affection. Then, stepping carefully once more, Rey edged his way out of his son’s bedroom and made his way down the landing to the room he shared with his wife.

There was no avoiding the fact that Remus’ penchant for sound sleeping had been inherited from his mother. Diana was a mass of dark brown curls against her pillow, flat out and fast asleep, a generous lump beneath the blankets. Rey smiled to himself. Whilst he would never in a thousand years have dared to call her plump, there was no denying that Diana was not exactly a vision of willow-slender elegance. Many jokes, mostly of their own devising, had been made about tall, wiry light-haired Reynard and the contrast with his small, dark curled, slightly ample wife. Opposites did indeed attract.

He considered waking her there and then, would have done in fact if he had not spotted the little curl of paper resting serenely on his pillow. Moving with a quietness born of years of creature stalking and marriage, Reynard slipped around the bed and retrieved the note, carrying it to the window where he angled it to catch the pale light that filtered through the crack in the curtains.

Next time you’re bored, please take up a new hobby or something - I stayed up well past midnight worrying about you. I hope you realise that if you’re not still alive to read this, I’m going to have to kill you.


Rey grinned in spite of himself. He loved his wife.

By the sound of it though, she hadn’t got much more sleep than he had. Perhaps he would not wake her after all – there would be plenty of time to speak to her before she and Remus left for Hogwarts just before midday and he could certainly drop their things at the Griffith farm near Aberystwyth whilst she was in Scotland and explain the situation, as far as he could, to her parents. His wife and son could stay the night at Hogwarts or in Hogsmeade and nip back by floo for Diana’s broom and its child harness to make the trip from their home over the mountains to the farm the next morning. Yes, that was probably best.

He would just have to stay awake – just for an hour or two, until Diana came round. He considered going down to his study or the lounge to read for a while, but reading made him sleepy and he was tired enough as it was from his long night. No, his best bet was simply to get into bed; with the kind of drama Diana always made out of getting up of a morning, she was bound to wake him even if he did happen to drop off.

Quickly he stripped off, pulling on his pyjamas and slipping into the bed beside his wife. He snuggled down carefully, dropping his head to the pillow as he tried to focus his thoughts. This would be a good time to plan his mission report. So… the mission leaders convened at the abandoned farm house near Buxton following information obtained by aerial surveillance and…

Surely it wouldn’t hurt to plan the mission report with his eyes closed.

Abandoned farm house near Buxton… aerial surveillance…he had spoken with Alastor Moody and Rudolf B…Rudolf… what’s-his-name… and they had… they had… What had they?

Lost in a welter of confused and shifting thoughts, it completely escaped Rey’s notice that he had begun to snore.

* * *

Light burned against his eyelids. Rey groaned.

Mission report. He had been planning… wait. Had it been this light before?

His eyes snapped open. The curtains were wide open, the low arc of autumn sunshine beaming directly onto his pillow. And he was alone in the bed.

Rey bolted upright instantly. “Diana!”

There was no response. He strained his ears for the clatter of pans or cauldrons in the kitchen, for the familiar morning sound of his wife’s melodious voice and his son’s laughter. He heard nothing but silence.

Kane’s face hovered against his half-drowsy mind. The feral was laughing.

Danger. His family was in danger.

D*mn! Where are they?

Half-conscious and clumsy with drowsiness as he was, he hurtled out of bed at once, almost tumbling over the quilt as it tangled itself around his feet. Kicking it off, he bolted across the landing to his son’s room – one look around the door told him it was empty. He rushed helter-skelter down the stairs, still in his pyjamas, stumbling in the hall as he darted into the kitchen. Empty. Across the hall he hurried, grasping the doorframe of the lounge as his eyes roamed from broad window, to sofa, to tidy fireplace and shelf of books, but no wife and no son. In desperation, he even bolted down the passage alongside the stairs to the study he shared with his wife, taking it in turns to write their papers from the books that lined the wall. Nothing.

Back to the kitchen. The windows that looked out over their slightly wild garden revealed nothing but almost leafless trees and autumnal grass, the merry little stream and his wife’s small kitchen herb garden, mostly at rest for the winter. The cellar door was half-ajar – but peering down revealed nothing but the rough pile of boxes that Diana had stored down there containing her more volatile ingredients.

Rey stood motionless for a moment, breathing hard and trying to gather his scattered and panicky thoughts.

Where were his family?

They couldn’t have gone. They couldn’t have gone. They couldn’t.

But they had.

Images of bloodstained bodies danced across his mind. He would have heard. If they had been taken or hurt, surely he would have heard…

He glanced at the clock. It had just gone noon. On the calendar beside it, a large red circle outlined that day’s date. And in Diana’s writing, two letters.

HW.

And then as his sleepy, shocked brain struggled back into working order, the truth hit him with a rush and a distinct sense of stupidity filled him from crown to sole.

Hogwarts. Of course.

It was the day of Diana and Remus’ visit to the school. His mind had been so full of reports, of danger, that he had managed to suffer a ridiculous lapse in memory. But for a moment, he’d remembered only Kane and been so sure…

Bloody hell, Rey. Getting senile in your old age.

There was no sign of a struggle. Nothing broken and nothing missing. They must have simply set out that morning as planned; his wife had told him she had intended to leave around late morning and midday had come and gone in his slumber. But why on earth had Diana not woken him? Told him she was going? Could she not have at least left a…

A note. Sitting on the kitchen table.

Rey snatched the neatly folded piece of paper from the tabletop and voraciously devoured its contents.

This marriage by note is becoming a habit. It’s nice to see you are alive, even if you don’t act much like it – if it hadn’t been for the snoring I might have been worried. And you call me a sound sleeper! I didn’t like to wake you so I left breakfast (or more likely lunch) in the little cauldron on the counter – don’t mix it up with the one by the fire, I don’t fancy talking my gibbering husband down off the ceiling when I get home. Remus and I have gone to Hogwarts and we’ll be back late this afternoon or early this evening. I’m sure Remus would be very grateful if his daddy would get us something to eat for when we get back, since we’re pretty sure that by the state of him he won’t be doing much else today. See you later, my love. Diana.

Intense relief waged war with violent disappointment. Relief at this final confirmation that his family were not lying dead in a ditch somewhere but disappointment that there was a chance they still could be. His plans to get them to safety that day had evaporated – by the time they got home, Remus would be far too tired to make the necessary journey by broom to the Muggle farm of his grandfather or even to go back to Hogsmeade by floo; his son was no more keen on floo powder than his mother was about apparating and two journeys in one day would be more than enough for him. He fought to take deep calming breaths to prevent himself hurtling into the lounge and flooing to the Three Broomsticks in his pyjamas.

He was being irrational. Kane was on the run. His partner was dead and half the magical community was out to kill him. And just because, for some strange reason, he happened to know Rey’s name that did not mean he necessarily knew where he lived. Very few did; Moody and Bevan, his two most frequent Auror partners, had dropped round once or twice after missions to write their reports in comfort – Orestes Bevan had even brought his wife Elise and their kids three months before to play with Remus. Ares Rowen had come by to offer his condolences after his father had died and Rolphe and his wife had visited once, just after Remus had been born. None of these were people who were likely to inform a raging feral of his whereabouts. Moody and Bevan at least would sooner die.

It was one night. He was overreacting. They would be safe enough until morning.

Still grasping the note in one hand, Rey made his way to the small cauldron on the counter, investigating its contents. A warm porridge-y aroma wafted across the kitchen as he lifted the lid – bless Diana and her long-lasting warming spells. Sliding the note carefully under a nearby sugar pot, Rey helped himself to his breakfast/lunch and settled at the table to eat. It was one night. It would be fine. They would be safe and gone tomorrow and Kane none the wiser.

If he said it often enough, Rey wondered if he might even believe it.


Feedback Here Please


A/N: As the title may have made you realise, this is yet another of my split chapters, hence the reason why very little actually happens – it was supposed to be a simple lead in to the events of what is now part two. But guess what? Yep. I wrote too much. Normally under these circumstances, I would have given either part one or part two a different chapter name to cover my conciseness ineptitude. But the name Family Ties is so integral to both parts that for once, I have allowed it to stand.

In Other News – I have started my new job still five chapters short of fic completion. I now have to hope that I have enough chapters stockpiled against this contingency to complete this fic before catching up with myself…*crosses fingers and hopes for the best in the manner of the Chudley Cannons*

[Pallas]

A/N: Ladies and Gentleman, I give you - the storm's leading edge...

14: Family Ties – Part Two

No five hours in the history of the known universe had ever passed so slowly. As the afternoon wore on, Rey started to wonder if he would need to drink the contents of the pot by the fire to be scraped gibbering down off the ceiling.

There were only so many times he could feed his menagerie before they grew ridiculously fat. His mission report was so polished that it shone. He even tidied for Merlin’s sake. The meal making might have taken up a good portion of time if his culinary abilities hadn’t been limited to the brief and rapidly make-able likes of cheese on toast and boiled egg. Rey would have wondered at his wife’s odd urge to experience her husband’s uncertain skill in the kitchen if he had not been certain that she and Remus would have filled up thoroughly in Hogwarts Great Hall over lunch.

He managed to drag out the food making by burning the first three rounds of cheese on toast to small charred heaps. That was something.

On the fourth attempt, he managed a few rounds that were vaguely edible and was just debating whether to eat them himself or attempt the warming charm his wife was so proficient at, when he heard the flare of the floo in the lounge. Hurriedly fanning out the smouldering remains of his previous attempts to cook, he had taken only three steps towards the kitchen door when Diana appeared, wearing a broad, happy smile and clasping a sleepy looking Remus in her arms. Her eyes swept across the kitchen, taking in the haze of smoke, her husband’s ruddy face and the distinctly blackened offerings that were laid out on plates on the table. She raised an eyebrow with deliberate slowness.

“See that Remus?” she said with bantering cheerfulness. “Daddy made us bad cheese on toast. We’re surprised, aren’t we?”

In spite of the fact that his eyelids were drooping, Remus still managed to grin and shake his head.

Rey folded his arms, taking his cue from his wife’s playful tone as he adopted a posture of distinct offence. “So you’ve finally corrupted my son. It had to happen, I suppose.”

Diana’s eyes twinkled as she deposited her sleepy bundle of son onto the specially child-warded kitchen chair nearby. “I fail to see how good taste and common sense constitutes corruption. I mean, look at the state of that toast, Reynard Lupin. And judging by the smell, I’d say that was your best effort.”

Rey stood firm against the playful teasing of his wife. “If you don’t want it, why did you ask me to cook?”

Diana grinned openly. “I thought it would be funny?”

“Charming.” With grim determination, Rey lifted a piece of his charcoal toast and bit down. “Mmmm,” he lied. “Just how I like it. And very nice for those of us who haven’t been gorging ourselves on house-elf fare all day.”

Diana gave him a long hard look as she bustled over to the sink to inspect the damage to her utensils. “Are you casting aspersions on my sylph-like physique?”

It was an open goal-hoop. Even with the risk of a night in the spare room or on the couch, there was simply no avoiding it. “If you keep eating Hogwarts sized servings, your sylph-like physique won’t be able to fit through the doorframe.”

The wet tea towel he had to admit he had earned. The porridge ladle however, hurt. The small snicker from Remus at the antics of his parents didn’t help.

“Ow.” Rey rubbed his forehead. “What sort of example is that to set our son?”

“Serves you right.” Diana sniffed as she retrieved her projectile and deposited it back in its pot. “You know if I wasn’t in love with you, you’d be in a great deal of trouble right now. If you wanted to marry a beanpole, you should have stayed with that Sylvia Venner.”

Rey groaned. Oh dear Merlin, there were times that he wished he and his wife had not been in the same year at school. “Why is it always Sylvia Venner? So I went to Hogsmeade with her. Once. In fifth year. Before we started dating. I hardly even remember what she looks like.”

“You know she’s sixteen stone now. And in a show-marriage with an effeminate German Quidditch player with a bad moustache.”

“I don’t care about Sylvia Venner!” Rey had no idea if his wife was telling the truth or spinning one of her glorious webs of fantasy – it was usually best not to ask, for showing any kind of interest in old girlfriends or other women led inevitably couch-wards. Diana was a wonderful human being; the kindest woman he knew, gloriously witty, infinitely patient, amazing with children and a wonderful wife and mother but she also had a much-denied but unavoidable streak of insecurity. And she never, ever forgot.

At this emphatic denial, Diana smiled. “Good. Glad to hear it. Now, Remus.” She crouched in front of the chair of her nodding son. “Do you want some of daddy’s nasty burnt food or would you like to go to bed?”

Remus regarded his mother with sleep filled eyes. “Bed,” he murmured at once. “‘M not hungry.”

Diana ruffled his hair, making him giggle. “Good choice. Honestly, no wonder you’re so tired, the fuss everyone made of you today. I thought Molly Prewett was going to run off and take you home with her, bless her heart. She couldn’t get enough of you.” She chuckled and grinned conspiratorially at her husband. “Poor Arthur Weasley looked terrified. I hope the poor lad doesn’t mind a big family.”

Rey shook his head. “Will he have a choice?”

“I doubt it.” Diana turned back and rose to take a hold of her little boy once more. “Come on then, sweetie. I’ll just take you up to get washed and changed and then I’ll choke down some of grumpy daddy’s toast.” She glanced over her shoulder at her husband with a smile as she hoisted their limp son back into her arms and started towards the doorway. “I’ll bring him down for his goodnight kiss when he’s clean.”

Rey watched her as she carried their precious child into the hall, his entire world encapsulated in those two fragile human forms and fought back a sudden chill.

“Diana?”

His wife’s dark head appeared back around the doorframe. “Yes, love?”

He met her eyes and saw the light-heartedness of her expression drop as she read the sudden seriousness of his gaze.

“Be quick. Something happened on the mission last night that I need to talk to you about. It’s important.”

Diana’s features tightened as she drank in her husband’s welter of emotions but she was restrained from asking more by the sleepy stretching of Remus in her arms. She nodded. “I won’t be long.”

Rey listened in silence as his wife’s footsteps vanished up the stairs. A moment later he could hear her pattering about in his son’s room overhead. He sighed.

His family meant everything. To live without them would not be living at all. If anything were to happen to Diana or to Remus because of this confusing mess with Kane, he would never be able to forgive himself. It might be nothing, Moody had said. But in spite of himself, his instincts were telling him over and over that this was real. Kane’s face was familiar and the hatred that had filled it on seeing him inescapable. Perhaps it was paranoia, fear of losing all that he had fought so hard to gain. But what if it wasn’t?

This, it seemed, was the price of boredom. It was not a price he considered even remotely fair.

He rested his head in his hands as he slumped into his seat at the table. What had he done wrong in his life to deserve this mess?

Aside from abandon the boy.

Guilty feelings rose in his heart once more as he remembered the one event in his life of which he was desperately ashamed. But his father had been so angry and he had so wanted his respect back – the sacrifice had seemed worth making at the time. And he had not just been his sister’s son but Isaacs too – how could he have looked at him every day knowing how he had come into the world, knowing that in his moment of gaining life, he had taken away Rhea’s?

It had been ten years before he had learned that his father’s use of “lost” instead of “dead” had been deliberate. Rhea was dead. But her child was not.

Isaacs had played one last card that awful day. He had snatched the child from the hospital and fled.

He still remembered clearly the day a little over ten years ago that an Auror and a senior official from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement had approached him at work and asked him to join them in a quiet office. He had been deeply surprised to find his father and Rolphe already there. But more shocking still was what they had to say.

Adam Isaacs had been found dead that morning. He had hanged himself.

A ten-year-old boy had been found furious and crying in his house. His mother, according to the suicide note left behind, was Rhea Lupin. And it was into her family’s care that the boy was now to be offered.

Rafe had exploded. He called it a lie, an abomination – any child of his daughter’s was long dead and he would not raise the gutter-brat of that creature and some other brood-sow he had captured. For all he cared, the monster’s child could drown. Neither he nor any member of his family would touch the spawn of a werewolf.

Then he had stormed out. Rolphe had followed him.

But Rey had hesitated. For so long, he had wanted a child but somehow he and Diana had been unable to create one. They had been considering adoption. Could he adopt his sister’s son?

He had asked questions, many of them. Were they sure the child was Rhea’s? As sure as they could be. What was he like? Difficult, they had admitted – Isaacs, apparently depressed and moody for some time had not made the best of single fathers. Was the boy magical? Possibly, they said – he had shown signs but it was unlikely he would ever be very powerful. Was the boy a werewolf? Although Rey knew the condition was not hereditary, there was a chance that the boy could have been bitten by his father. But no, they had said. The boy was human. Could he meet him? Gladly, they told him. What was his name?

His name was Abel. Abel Isaacs.

He had discussed it at some length with Diana. She had been quite happy with the idea. But the boy was his family, she had said. The final decision lay with him.

And so he had gone to meet him. Abel Isaacs, a sullen boy whose dark eyes held pain much beyond that a child of ten years deserved. He had been snappish, unpleasant, temperamental. He had asked his uncle where he had been for the last ten years.

Rey’s answers – that he had not known of his existence, or where to find him – seemed to placate him a little. At times in the conversation, he even thought he caught a glimpse of hope.

But he had not been sure. The boy had truly had a difficult upbringing but he was far from friendly; he seemed to possess his mother’s fire with his father’s personality, not a pretty combination by any measure. It would be difficult and they would not have much time to bond before the boy would be off to Hogwarts. Adopting this child, he sensed, would be a great deal of burden for very little reward.

And then his father had found out. That had been rather less than fun.

Rafe Lupin had been incandescent with rage. Being disowned had been the least of his threats. Take that thing in, he had been told, and he would be wiped from existence in Lupin terms, never to see or go near his family again. Marrying a penniless Muggle-born had been bad enough but this would be the limit. The end. From this, there would be no going back.

Rey and his family had not always seen eye to eye. That did not mean he did not love them. And more than anything else, he longed for his father’s respect.

Was it worth it for a sullen child who would probably not even thank him? Was it worth it for the son of the werewolf that had caused his sister’s death?

He had decided not. He had turned down the adoption.

He had asked if he might be allowed to see Abel sometimes. But they told him the boy did not want that. He was given to foster parents and that was the end of any contact.

Rey sighed. It had probably been for the best. But he still wondered what had become of Abel. He would be somewhere in his early twenties by now…

His train of thought stopped short. He went cold.

He pictured Abel’s face.

And then he imagined Abel’s face older.

No!

He came to his feet, unaware of anything but pure, blinding shock as he stumbled into the hall and across into the lounge, grabbing one of the pictures from the mantle and staring at it. A family photo taken at Christmas, the last before his sister died, his parents, Rolphe, Rhea and himself. He stared at his sister’s beaming face and crossed it in his mind with Adam Isaacs. He juggled features, swapped parts and got the same result.

He got the older Abel.

He got Kane.

Kane was Abel. Abel was Kane. Oh Merlin, no wonder he’d seemed so familiar!

But he hadn’t been bitten. He hadn’t been a werewolf, not then. He had been safe, well as could be expected and most definitely human, given to the care of his foster parents. What had happened to him since that day? How had he come to this?

“Rey?”

Diana was standing in the doorway, a pyjama-ed Remus still yawning in her arms. She was staring at his stunned features with the deepest concern.

And then the fireplace flared with emerald light.

There was no time to react. Even if he had not been in such shock, it still would have happened too fast.

He felt something hurl against him, lifting him almost off his feet as he was catapulted across the room. Silver light glistened on black as his head struck the wall with a thud – he felt himself slump to the ground but could do nothing to prevent it. He heard Diana scream, heard Remus cry out and saw them dragged past him into the room, both tumbling to the rug with a thump with expressions of terror and shock. The door slammed shut beside him.

And then a blood-splattered face straight out of his horrified realisation filled his sight from side to side.

Abraham Kane grinned. It was the coldest expression that Rey had ever seen.

“Hello uncle,” he drawled softly. “Remember me?”

A/N: Thoughts, questions, comments?

Feedback Here Please

[Pallas]

A/N: The storm hits. Under normal circumstances, I would have split a chapter of this length in two, but there was simply no point at which it could be done without ruining the flow of the scene. So for once, I have allowed an overlong chapter to stand at its original size. Enjoy.

15: Into the Woods

There was a moment of terrified silence.

Reynard could feel the pounding of his blood in his veins, the echo of his pulse against his ribcage and temples as he fought dizzying disorientation and rampant shock caused by the force of the impact and barely realised recognition of his foe. Kane loomed above him, golden eyes aflame, his face and clothing stained with an array of blood and gore that Rey did not like to consider the origin of. He groped for his wand only to find himself empty handed – he had left his only weapon on the kitchen table. Almost unconsciously, his gaze shifted towards him family – to Diana, dishevelled and wide eyed as she rose to a shaken crouch by the hearth, her expression filled with realisation of the same truth that had moments before struck her husband; to Remus clasped, almost engulfed in her arms as he peaked out at the sinister stranger with terrified bewilderment. So vulnerable. So exposed. So trapped.

But looking had been a mistake. Kane - Abel – the feral - his nephew – had followed his gaze.

In two steps, the blood-splattered feral was towering over Rey’s wife and child, running his tongue along his sharpened teeth and grinning nastily as they shrank back.

“So you would be Mrs Lupin.” His golden stare drilled down into the cowering woman and the precious bundle in her arms. “Or Mother, as it might have been, if your husband had not been such a coward. What kind of man did you marry, that he still obeys the whims of his father when he’s grown?”

Diana did not reply, her lips pressed together tightly, her face white. Pressed against her chest, Remus gave a tiny half-sob.

It was enough. The cold yellow eyes fixed upon the little boy, who shrank back into his mother’s arms at once. Kane’s stare was glacial as he drank in the child before him.

“And what’s this?” he drawled softly. “Well, well. It seems that you’ve finally got yourselves a replacement for me. And a replacement of your blood at that.”

Diana’s grasp on her son tightened sharply at the hinted threat in the tone. In spite of his dizziness, Rey half-staggered to his feet, determined to distract the werewolf from menacing his son.

“Abel…” he gasped, but got not further.

Kane wheeled upon him instantly, his golden eyes ablaze with fury. “You will not use that name!” he roared. “That name is nothing, the child who bore it gone! It was a name for those who lose, who die, who fall, a name given by a worthless father who squandered his potential to wallow in his misery. I will not follow his path!”

His features contorted into steely, determined rage as he strode to within inches of his retreating uncle, his voice dropping to a vivid whisper. “I will be the striker of the blow and not its victim.”

Rey could feel Kane’s foul breath against his face, see the burn of his eyes. He shrank back against the wall in spite of himself. He saw the feral’s half-smile at his successful intimidation.

“Still the coward, Lupin,” he breathed softly. “Did you think I wouldn’t know why it was you would not take me in? I heard that stringy social worker discussing my case on the day he took me to stay with those ridiculous foster parents; I heard his belief that Rafe Lupin had scared you away. But you must have let yourself be scared, must not have cared quite enough, or perhaps you wouldn’t have rushed so much to obey the man who killed your sister.”

The world tilted violently. Rey’s breath choked in his throat.

Kane’s teeth gleamed as he smirked maliciously. “Didn’t know that, did you?”

Was he delusional? Was he mad? Or did he really believe what he was saying? Rey wasn’t entirely sure, but the very half-hint of suggestion was ridiculous. He knew what had happened to Rhea. He had been there, heard the words from her own mouth. Just what stories had Isaacs filled his son’s head with?

Rey found his voice. “You’re lying.”

“Am I?” The feral chuckled cruelly.

“Isaacs killed her.” Rey steeled himself. The werewolf was playing games, he was sure now. He was spinning lies, trying to upset and confuse him and he was not going to succeed. “Your father kidnapped my sister and held her against her will.”

This time Kane laughed outright. “My father? That spineless depressive? He wouldn’t have had the nerve! The one bold move he made in his life was snatching me from that hospital and frankly I’d rather he’d left me.”

Casually, coldly, he rested one clawed hand against the wall beside Rey’s head, scratching restlessly at the wallpaper.

“No, no, no.” He shook his head as his eyes ground into his uncle. “She went of her own free will, if not really because she wanted to. Your charming daddy left them no choice. He was not happy when he found out his little girl was carrying – how was it he said he put it? - the spawn of a werewolf, much less that she carried it willingly. At one point, he was threatening my father with Azkaban. So they left. They fled.”

Rey fought to contain a rage of his own that would have likely killed them all. “How would you know?” he retorted. “You weren’t even born.”

A large chunk of paper was rent from the wall with a shriek of torn plasterwork; Kane examined the pattern skewered on his claws with bland thoughtfulness. “My father was a talkative drunk. And he was drunk a great deal of my childhood, bemoaning the woes of his life to the world, how no one would accept him because of what he was, how people avoided him, would not employ him and of course, the epic tale of his lost love and the cruel father who had ruined everything. He never shut up about it. When he finally hung himself, it was almost a relief.” He snorted disdainfully, peeling the paper from his fingers and flinging it to the ground. “Lycanthropy was wasted on him.”

There was little Rey could say to such an extraordinary statement.

“You seem surprised.” Kane cocked an eyebrow, tapping a foot impatiently as he turned circles mindlessly on the spot, pacing like a caged animal. Beyond him, Rey caught a glimpse of his wife, moving with surprising stealth as she edged her son quietly behind the nearby armchair. “But it’s true. Adam Isaacs was a pathetic excuse for a werewolf. So much power, so much potential and what did he do? Drowned it in alcohol and moped.”

The feral flexed his claws absently as he paced the small room, his eyes still inexorably fixed on Rey.

“He could have been so much more,” he drawled softly, his eyes distant. “I learned that much from his binges. It was there, so often, the little glint of gold in his eyes, the moment of power, of possession, when the wolf would appear through his drunken haze, when, just for a moment, he would be strong. Just for a moment, I could almost respect him. He must have tasted the truth of his existence in little bursts a couple of times a week. But he never embraced it. He would start muttering about your bloody sister and what she would have wanted and back would come the drunken sot who reeled into unconsciousness. I suppose even wolves have standards and no self-respecting wolf wanted to stay in that undignified mess of mind and body for long. It was enough to make me vomit.”

The pacing halted sharply – in three steps Rey had been backed yet again into the wall by the sheer force of those wolfish eyes. “And it was all thanks to dearest grandpa.”

Hard as it was to read emotion from the alien golden eyes, Rey was receiving one message loudly and clearly. “You’re insane.”

“Admittedly true.” Kane smirked and buffed his blood-soaked claws easily against his leather jerkin. “But your family made me this way.”

With the feral’s attention once more drawn, Rey could see out of the corner of his eye that his wife was moving once more. Her grasp on Remus had been released, the boy tucked away out of sight behind the furniture. The mother of his child was now edging her way towards the opposite side of the hearth – towards the coal scuttle and…

And the poker.

Good old Diana! It wouldn’t lay a feral out for long, but it might be enough for Rey to get through the door, across the hall and to the kitchen table where his wand was waiting. But only if they could keep Kane distracted.

Time to talk and keep him talking. Nonsense or not, it was buying them time.

“Your father kidnapped my sister.” Rey repeated the words firmly, almost reassuringly as he boldly met the werewolf’s gaze. “She said so. I was at the hospital, I heard her. I don’t know what lies you’ve been fed…”

“I’m not the one who’s been fed lies.” Kane snapped his sentence away, slamming his palm against the already beleaguered wall with enough force to make Rey jump. “I was fed nothing but the ravings of a drunkard too inebriated not to tell the truth. It was you who were fed lies, you and your sister. By the time your father was done with her, she didn’t know what she was muttering. Powerful things, Confundus charms.”

Rey gaped. What was he saying? Had he really just accused Rafe Lupin, a once highly respected member of the magical community, of confunding his own daughter?

“That’s ridiculous!” he spluttered in disbelief.

Kane laughed grimly. “That’s what people said, when a werewolf tried to claim it. That’s what was so clever about it. He found them, you see. Found where they had run to, where they had hidden to escape his wrath, traced by his bully boys over a search lasting months. They found them that morning, the day I was born as it turned out, held captive and restrained by Lupin’s mob until the man himself responded to the owl they sent him. And when he arrived, my heavily pregnant mother was told that if she abandoned the child and came home where she belonged, all this madness, as he called it, would be forgotten. She refused. As my father tells it, she spat in his face.” He smirked humourlessly. “I’m certain he loved that. The fact that he drew his wand on her was a fair indication of his feelings. And then he told her that this…” He snorted again. “Was for her own good.”

And owl fluttering through the window of their home – his father’s pale face and sudden disappearance. No. Rey pushed the rebellious thoughts back down. The werewolf was lying. The werewolf was lying. Whether he truly believed this tale or was reciting his own invention out of vindictive pleasure, Rey was not certain. But his father would never… Yes, he had been strict and argued often and loudly with his daughter, and no, he had not been fond of werewolves, but he had loved her. Surely he would never have done something like this to his own child. Not unless he truly believed she was in danger, unless he truly believed that it was…

That it was for her own good.

A common phrase his father had used around Rhea. He had loved and hated her all at once. All he had ever wanted, Rey knew, was for her to simply do as he told her, take the nice safe job, the nice safe husband, have the nice safe life. It was for her own good, he had told her in one of their blazing rows. If she did not know what was good for her, he would have to show her.

But no. He would never have taken an action such as this.

Would he?

“The first spell he cast was a memory charm, wiping her mind of a willing departure, of any happy times with her werewolf lover.” Kane’s gaze was sharpened blade of gold. “And then came the Confundus charm, and as she reeled confused, he whispered poison in her ear. My father had tricked her into leaving. He had held her against her will. He had forced himself upon her. She did not want his child. She just wanted to go home. She hated him. She hated Adam Isaacs.” Kane’s eyes glowed. “And when the shock caused her waters to break and they dragged her to the hospital, that was all she was able to say.”

No. No, no, no, no. But repetition could not kill the whispered yes within his mind. Those words, near enough exactly, had been Rhea’s. Over and over again, as though learned by rote. How could Kane have known them? He had not seen Isaacs in the hospital, he was sure; indeed he remembered from his questions of ten years ago that it had been more than an hour after his sister died that Isaacs had made his dash into the hospital to snatch the baby. So where had he heard those words to repeat them to his son if not when they were drilled into Rhea’s head in the first place?

“My father broke free in the chaos of rushing your sister to hospital.” Kane had resumed his circular pacing, forcing Diana to still her careful advance to her weapon.

“He waited outside, until he saw that the bully boys had been sent away. He sneaked inside, waited until your father had left to sign the death paperwork and snatched me away. And thus began his ten years as a drunken self-pitying waste of skin. His death was a blessing to both of us.”

His eyes fixed once more upon Reynard. “And that, my dear uncle, is where you came in.”

With a vaguely disquieting expression, he lifted one of the several family photos scattered on shelves and mantles around the living room and gazed down at it absently. Diana’s hand wrapped around the poker just out of his line of sight, drawing it into concealment beneath her robes.

“A very pretty picture.” Kane’s voice was oddly soft, but a cocktail of bitterness and disdain sharpened its edges. “And to think, it could have been me. We could have all been sitting down to supper together right now, whilst I babble on about my nice boring job in the Ministry. Just think of the fine upstanding citizen I might have been if you had actually taken me in and given me the benefit of a wholesome upbringing.” He sneered. “Pathetic.”

With a venomous lob, he hurled the picture against the stone of the fireplace, where it shattered into fragments, narrowly missing Diana who leapt back with a cry. Rey’s half-start towards his wife was forestalled by an extended handful of claws.

“Just stay where you are, Lupin, there’s a good chap.” Kane’s lazy, sadistic drawl was filled with the easy confidence of a man convinced he was in complete control of the situation.

“Contrary to what this little exercise might imply, I wasn’t heartbroken when you rejected me; you didn’t impress me much in our little interview.” Kane shrugged easily as he turned smoothly away to kick at the shattered picture fragments with his foot. Rey hoped it was only in his imagination that the feral’s eyes drifted to the slight hint of movement and stifled sobs behind the nearby chair. “But I was angry at why, angrier than I think I’d ever been. Yet again, Rafe Lupin had slammed the door on my having half-a-life. And you had been weak enough to let him. There is nothing I hate more than a coward.”

A clawed finger ran the length of a bookshelf, scratching away the varnish with an agonising squeal. “The foster parents they sent me to were worthless – simpering, fussing milksops, no use to anyone. My father’s morose drunkenness became almost appealing against a backdrop of vapid smiles and their desperate, insincere efforts to care. Oh they tried to like me, they really did, but it was always there – the little glances, the uncertain looks when they thought I couldn’t see them. They were scared of a ten year old boy.” He gave a snort. “So, albeit in a different way, they made it very clear just as Rafe Lupin had that you didn’t have to be a werewolf to be treated like one. I was guilty by association.” Kane almost casually slashed the spine of a book with his fingertip. “I was gone from that hole within three weeks. I was tough. I had as good as raised myself after all. I would take my chance on the streets.”

The smile he fixed upon Rey was predatory and utterly vicious. “And then, I met Hel. You might remember her. You did help that Auror kill her yesterday.”

Rey winced at his wife’s quiet gasp, causing Kane to smile with glee. “Hadn’t you told your wife about that Lupin? What a lovely open marriage you have.” He sneered at the exterminator. “Hel was everything my life had been missing. A strong presence, powerful, capable of teaching me to survive and to prosper. Her wildness fascinated me, the glint that I had seen and respected in my father’s eyes bursting to life in hers. I told her I wanted to be like her. I thought she was going to kill me but she didn’t. She invited me to her hideaway. I watched her transform before my eyes that full moon night and then I placed my arm in her mouth myself and relished in the pain. I abandoned my foolish attempts to follow my father’s miserable path, to be accepted by a world that did not want me. I let the wolf become my world, my truth, and I have never looked back. If I was going to be treated as a werewolf, as a monster by association, then I was determined to deserve it.”

He walked slowly over to Reynard, his face hovering less than an inch from his prey.

“So you see, my wonderful childhood was courtesy of your bloody father. Just as my wonderful adolescence was courtesy of you. Not that I mind much now – you probably did me a favour, all told, giving me a chance at this power. But I don’t like being abandoned out of cowardice. Rejection isn’t something I handle well. Especially when the man who rejected me sees fit to wipe out the woman I had turned to when he so easily cast me aside.”

Slowly, with a flash of teeth, Kane drew back, sauntering back to the shelf of pictures as he lifted a proud shot of Rey’s parents and drew his sharpened fingers down the glass with an agonising shriek of sound.

“My darling grandpa,” he murmured viciously, without turning. Diana had started to rise, poker grasped behind her back. “Ah yes. One of my greatest regrets in life is that Rafe Lupin was inconsiderate enough to die of natural causes before I was strong enough to tear him limb from limb. But at least I still have you. And them.” He gestured over his shoulder to the abruptly frozen Diana and their hidden son. “And now that you’ve taken my Hel from me too, I think you deserve something special. Certainly more special than I gave your Auror friend.”

Rey froze, fighting a sudden wave of coldness as his eyes swept over the bloody mess that stained Kane from head to foot. “What?” he breathed sharply.

He was not certain he wanted a response. He was right to. He got the one he’d dreaded.

With a casual shrug, Kane smashed the second picture against the bookshelf and turned once more to face his uncle. “You may be wondering, perhaps, how I found you?” The feral’s grin was cruelly triumphant. Slowly, languorously, he drew the back of one clawed finger down the still fresh blood that stained his cheek. With repulsive pleasure, he slipped the finger in between his lips and smoothly licked it clean. He smiled, teeth glinting.

“I’ve just been speaking with Orestes Bevan. And of course, his lovely family.”

Rey’s stomach dropped like a stone. Oh Gods, no! Please!

Kane chuckled at the shock and rage that swelled unbidden in his captive’s eyes. “I had no idea that such a prominent Auror lived so close to my former hideout until I spotted him strolling along the lane this morning. Casual as you like, he was, as though killing my mate was no more than a day’s work for him. And although I am not really a stray, I felt a sudden urge to follow him home.”

He thoughtfully examined his gory fingers. “They kept me waiting mind, sending the children to a neighbour whilst his wife bundled him off to St Mungo’s to see about that arm of his. But I found myself to be in one of those lovely trusting neighbourhoods, where folks, even Auror folks, do not always lock their doors. The attic made a comfortable enough hideaway as I rested and waited until I was quite sure that all the family were home.”

Repulsion and horror rampaged through Rey’s soul. “You killed them all? Just to find me?”

Kane smirked as he waved a dismissive hand. “Of course it wasn’t just about you. How egotistical you are! I had a few things to say to Bevan in regards to the death of my Hel. But he was most uncooperative about your location. I think he may have doubted my good intentions.”

I wonder why, Rey thought blackly but was wise enough to restrain his tongue.

The feral ran his tongue along his teeth. “Auror stubbornness is a nuisance. In the end, I had no choice but to slit his gullet and have done with it.” The cruel smile spread alarmingly. “But his wife – she was very helpful. Especially when I so generously cradled her frightened children. Shame it didn’t help them – or her – in the end. They really did make a terrible mess of the carpet.”

Rey’s gaze fixated upon his wife. He couldn’t look away. He could see Diana’s expression shifting from repulsed shock to horrified fury as she squared her shoulders determinedly and rose to her full, if not spectacular, height, both hands clasped around the poker concealed beneath her robes. He remembered how well she had liked Elise Bevan. He remembered how fondly she had played with her kids. He could see her fears for her own precious child alive and blazing in her eyes.

She was going to take Kane’s head off if she could.

And Kane still hadn’t noticed, hadn’t considered her a danger. Elise Bevan had been a quiet woman, eager to be protected by her big strong husband – was he perhaps expecting Diana Lupin to be the same? He was in for a very rude awakening if he was.

Praise be for small favours.

“Of course, once I had the name of your home, it was simply a matter of borrowing a little floo powder. It wasn’t as though they would be needing it again.” Kane continued to drink in Rey’s horror, oblivious to the danger from behind and Rey knew there and then that he had to do whatever he could to keep Kane’s attention to the front. “ It really was a stroke of good fortune, Bevan living within walking distance of that old wreck of a farm you were all holed up in. Otherwise I might never have found either of you.”

Once again, Kane was upon him in seconds, all but thrusting through him the wall as he hurled him backwards once more, clawed fingers tapping against his uncle’s chest. He leaned forward with a vicious smile of victory.

“And I’m so very glad I did. You see Lupin, as I see it, you owe me; owe me for the life I could have had and the life you stole from my mate. And I’m not prepared to let that go. I want reparation. I want retribution. I want justice.”

Reparation? Retribution? Justice?

Anger swelled in Rey’s chest at hearing these words spoken by this murderous, vindictive killer. He had slaughtered countless people for no reason but his own pleasure, butchered a good man and his young family out of petty spite. And if his ever flowing life story was true, he had asked for this, inviting the bite and becoming a feral out of some foolish, childish desire. He had given up his humanity out of sheer resentment. True, Rey could not escape the guilt that he had driven him in to a position where he could be made such a thing. But this was not his fault. He had been dragged into it from a misplaced sense of kindness and the love he had had for his sister. Whatever his father had done, whoever had been told the truth and who fed a pack of lies, he had not been involved in the events of his sister’s death – his only wrong was a decision not to adopt a child he had been under no real obligation to care for in the first place. He had made one mistake. Did he and his family deserve to die for it?

It was too much. He simply snapped. It had been a long day after all.

“Reparation for what? For a life you’ve said yourself you didn’t even want, for a family you disdain? Why do you care about my cowardice if being a feral makes you so happy? Retribution for what? For the behaviour of my father? I am not Rafe Lupin, you have no right to take your frustrations with a dead man out on me! I loved my sister, I would have done anything to save her but I was a child! Justice for what? For stopping your precious Hel from tearing my stricken friend limb from limb? For preventing one death by allowing another? Hel Kane was a murderous, insane killer, whereas Orestes Bevan was a good man with a good family that you slaughtered for doing his job, for trying to protect the innocent! Reparation! Retribution! Justice! The words should stick in your throat! How dare you storm into my house and lecture me about your awful life? You didn’t have to be this way! I didn’t force your hand into the werewolf’s mouth! You chose your life so don’t blame me if you aren’t happy with it. And if you are happy, why do you even care what I did? What do you want me to do?”

He saw the blow coming but there was no time to do anything but deflect it to somewhere not lethal. The pain was stunning as Kane’s claws raked his shoulder, catching him as he tried to twist his throat out of range and hurling him into a heap in the shattered glass that had been his father’s picture. He felt Kane’s foot smash down against his back, pinning him in place as he loomed ominously over his uncle and bent low.

“I want you to bleed,” he hissed.

And then, Diana struck.

There was no denying that it was a fantastic shot, a powerful two handed swing worthy of a Quidditch Beater, driven by the infuriated strength of an indignant wife, mother and friend. Kane’s dodge was impressive as he wheeled at the last moment to face the sudden danger, but he was just an edge too slow – his head snapped back with the force of the poker’s impact, blood of his own splattering fresh crimson across his cheek as he cursed obscenely. Kicking free of his foot, Rey rolled in spite of the glass that dug against his skin, grasping one of the larger fragments and plunging it with all his might into the soft flesh of Kane’s calf.

The feral howled with pain and shock, stumbling backwards under the abrupt onslaught, but he did not lose his head. Diana’s second blow slapped against his palm as he caught the poker mid swing and wrenched it harshly from her grasp, sending her careening backwards with a vicious shove to tumble against the armchair, tipping it sharply over. Suddenly exposed was Remus, cowering, tearstained and bewildered, scrambling instinctively out of the way of the falling furniture and his half-stunned mother to stumble out of his corner into the room beyond. He did not see the sweeping hand until its claws closed viciously around his throat and yanked him off his feet with a gasp.

Rey froze. Diana froze.

Remus whimpered.

Kane smiled slowly.

“Why Lupin,” he drawled. “That was almost brave.”

Rey was paralysed. His boy, his Remus was clutched viciously in the claw tipped fingers of Abraham Kane, one arm, the hand holding the snatched poker, clasping the child securely against his chest, the other still wrapped horrifyingly around his throat. His son was shaking with shock, pain and fear, his brown hair tousled, his cheeks deathly pale and wet with terrified tears and his eyes wide and fixed upon his father, filled with a mute, desperate appeal for daddy to come to the rescue. Blood was trickling down his neck from where the feral’s harsh one-handed grip had pierced the fragile skin.

His son. Kane had his son.

No, please. Anything but Remus.

Slowly, unsteadily, his eyes never leaving his child, Rey rose to his feet.

“Give me my son,” he said softly.

Kane smirked incredulously. “Be careful you don’t drown in all that righteous indignation. Honestly, Lupin. Why should I?”

“You can have me instead.” He meant it. “I’m the one you came here for. I’m the one you want. You can torture me, kill me, do whatever the hell you want, but put down my son first.”

His nephew gave a cold chuckle. “Put down. What an interesting choice of words. But no.” Slowly, carefully, the feral began to move towards the window, his eyes darting between husband and wife and rapturously drinking in their terror. “I think I’ve found a better way. You and your wife are getting a reprieve for your little flash of bravery, a stay of execution. But believe me, it’s only a stay.”

With a flick of his wrist, the poker went flying, smashing the pane of the nearest window into fragments that clung like saw teeth to the frame. A few sideways kicks of Kane’s boot cleared the gap more thoroughly. His grip on the terrified Remus never loosened.

“Do you know what tonight is, Lupin?” There was a kind of lazy satisfaction to the feral’s drawl. “Have you checked your lunar calendar?”

A chill like arctic winter engulfed Rey from top to toe. He remembered the heavily waxing moon that had gleamed over the farmhouse the night before, full in all but name and his eyes widened. Merlin!

“Full moon.” Kane’s smile confirmed Rey’s worst fears. “And look out there now – all but dark, the sun almost gone, and soon a full moon rising. I can feel it coming. And when it does…”

His golden gaze flicked to Remus. He snapped his teeth.

“No!” It was Diana’s horrified gasp that responded first, half-starting forward only to be instantly stilled by Kane’s slight tightening of his grasp on her child. Her eyes fixed hopelessly upon the vicious predator in her living room. “He’s too young,” she whispered, pleading, desolate, drained of her fire by the icy cold danger to her only son. “Don’t you know what will happen if you bite a child that small? He won’t be able to cope.”

Kane was laughing before she even finished. “Exactly,” he breathed, maliciously smiling at a mother’s grief. “Oh I won’t kill him – I’ll be very careful. But I know what will happen. His mind won’t be strong enough to fight it. I won’t even have to talk him round.” He teased the tender neck of the little boy with his fingers, tearing at the skin and smiling at Remus’ sobs of anguish and his parents’ desperate-to-comfort eyes. “And then I’ll have a pack again, an adopted son of family blood. And I’ll bring him up well in your honour; I’ll make sure to teach him everything I know. I’ll raise him in my image, just as my poor Hel raised me in hers. And when he’s old enough – when he’s ready – he will be the one who will come back to kill you. And you and your wife, Lupin, you can live your lives in anticipation of the day your prodigal returns to claim his rights in the knowledge that it was your own cowardice that brought it about.”

With an agile leap, he landed poised for a moment on the windowsill, Remus dangling terrified in his clasp, and turned to revel one final time in the terrible fear in the two pairs of eyes before him. He smiled.

“I hope you enjoy the wait,” he said. “I know I will.”

And then he was gone.

They were both gone.

Rey bolted for the window instinctively; his eyes fixed at once upon the fleeing figure and the fragile human bundle in his arms. But before he could even half hoist himself onto the glass strewn window frame, the shadows swallowed them as they plunged into the woods and vanished into darkness.

Kane was gone.

And Remus soon would be.

Feedback Here Please

[Pallas]

16: By Moonlight

This couldn’t be happening.

It couldn’t.

Please let this not be happening.

But it was.

Diana’s sudden gasping sob rent his soul, his wife’s bright spirit suddenly shattered by the abduction of her darling son. Rey himself was frozen with desperate, disbelieving shock, staring blankly, mindlessly at the patch of tree-shrouded darkness that had enveloped the fleeing figures of Kane and his son as though at any moment they would reappear and declare the entire thing a joke.

But they didn’t.

They didn’t.

Abraham Kane was Abel Isaacs. He had accused his father of causing his sister’s death. He had killed Orestes Bevan and his family. And he had taken Remus.

Taken him to bite. Taken him to make a werewolf. Taken him to turn feral.

He was going to make his son a monster. And then use him to kill them.

No.

Something flared in Reynard Lupin, a sudden surge of fury, fear, rage and bloody-minded determination. This was not going to happen. He was not going to take their son. He was not going to ruin their family. There was no way in seven kinds of Hell that Abraham Kane was going to hurt his boy whilst he still had half a breath left in his body. How dare he drag an innocent child into this ridiculous feud? Whatever it took, that ******* would not destroy Remus, would not steal away his mind and ruin his life before it had even started. He was not going to let that feral turn the most important thing in his life into something repulsive. He was not going to win.

Whatever happened, bitten or not, Remus, his Remus, the sweet little boy who had been the centre of their lives for three years was going to come home. And he was going to be himself.

He would make sure of it.

He had not even realised he was moving until he noticed that his wand had been snatched from the kitchen table and slipped into his belt, that the cudgel that was occasionally necessary in his line of work had been lifted from the umbrella stand in the hallway and experimentally hefted in his hand. Moonrise was alarmingly close – if he were to encounter Kane transformed, his wand would be no more use than a knitting needle. The cudgel was needed.

Kane would kill him. Of that much he was certain. To face the werewolf alone in those woods tonight would be suicidal. But he had meant what he had said to Kane in the lounge as he had stared into the terrified eyes of his hostage child; if he could save his son’s life by giving his own, he would do exactly that. All he had to do was buy time and keep Remus safe until reinforcements arrived.

Speaking of which…

His work cloak hung where he had left it that morning. Moving forward rapidly, Rey dragged it from the hook and rummaged in the inside pocket.

“You’re going after him.”

There was a kind of resigned emptiness to Diana’s voice, her words a statement rather than a question. There was no accusation, nor any encouragement, no trade off between husband and son. She understood the fate that was lurking in those dark trees at the slightest misstep, but at the same time it was her child that had been stolen. She stood, pale, bleeding slightly from the temple, a ragged stream of blood staining her cheek darkly against the flow of tears, staring at her husband with torn and distraught eyes.

“You’re not coming.” Rey bluntly rebutted the unspoken question. The blue disk that Moody had presented him with at dawn that very day fell into his hands from the folds of cloth – pressing the disk from both sides, he tossed it to his wife. The pale blue pulse of its flashing glow lit her face a sickly shade of misery as she caught it deftly. Rey answered the query in her gaze.

“It’s a beacon Alastor Moody gave me in case of emergencies. If Kane hasn’t killed him too, he’ll be on his way.” Rey met his wife’s shell-shocked gaze. “I need you to stay and send him after me. I’ll need all the help I can get.”

Diana nodded slowly. “All right.”

She was in shock, that much was obvious. The son who was her world, her life and soul, was gone, her furious energy sapped by the futility of her efforts to protect him. Her husband was walking into probable death in a most likely equally futile attempt to bring him back. Her mind, unable to balance the love for her child and need for his rescue against the love for her husband and need to keep him safe, had given up trying and shut down her emotions in defeat.

Under any other circumstances, Rey would not have dreamed of leaving her alone. But this was an unavoidable exception.

He slung his cloak over his shoulders, wincing slightly as the material brushed across the still bleeding slash of Kane’s claws, brandished his cudgel and reached for the front door.

“Rey.”

He paused. He turned. Her eyes were bright with terror.

“Don’t die.” The words were a whisper. “I couldn’t… Not both of you. Don’t die.”

Rey forced back a surge of terror of his own. Was this the last time he would see his beloved wife?

“I’ll do my best,” he softly replied.

And then he turned and swept into the gathering darkness.

He thought he heard the distinctive crack of apparation on the lawn behind him as he plunged into the trees but he did not pause to turn and see. Even beneath the shadowed weight of the skeletal woodland canopy, the feral’s trail was easily spotted to an experienced tracker such as himself, broken twigs, scuffed leaves and twisted undergrowth pushed aside in his hasty passage a marker to his direction. Kane was not taking any care to hide his tracks. Either he did not expect pursuit or he simply had no fear of it.

The first would make him a fool. The second would make him a danger.

Rey suspected the latter. But he no longer cared.

Darkness was gathering, dusk pushed aside as the last gleam of sunset vanished behind the mountains. The trees were a looming presence all around him, dark, twisted limbs clinging to the tattered vestiges of their foliage, flexing against the whispered breeze that stirred the fallen leaves that clothed their roots. Ivy curled and crept its way up the bark of those trees taller, older, a sheath of green against the cold dark night and the waiting shadow of winter. Damp leaves, the bright and lively oranges and yellows of autumn leeched from their hue by the sinking of the sun, clung to his boots and crunched and slithered as he ran. A hint of silver light played across the branches.

He paid no heed to bramble or thicket; abandoning all pretence at stealth, he simply blasted them from his path. He could feel his breath screaming against his throat, the cold air scraping the soft skin before bursting back to freedom in mist; he ignored his breathlessness determinedly. His bruised ribs ached, his torn shoulder throbbed and his arm and back tickled with spots of pain that he suspected were caused by his fall into the glass. Steeling himself, he forced back the petty distraction of his injuries and plunged on, straining his ears for any hint that he might be closing upon his quarry.

And then, he heard the scream

A child’s scream.

Ice clamped his spine as his stomach plummeted.

Remus.

It had not been a scream of pain. That, at least was something. But it had been a scream of absolute fear. His little boy was terrified.

Silver seemed to flood the woods about him. The full moon gleamed as it slipped into the sky.

A wolf’s howl split the cold night air asunder.

The hair on the back of his neck stood on end with primeval terror. Oh Merlin.

Hesitating a moment, Rey sheathed his wand. It would be little help to him now.

The howl had been ahead, a few hundred yards perhaps up the slow rise of the wooded hill towards the hulking silhouette of the mountain above. Was it worth the risk?

Yes.

With a crack, Rey apparated.

Disorientation caused his head to swim – he swivelled in a rapid circle in spite of his dizziness, cudgel braced and ready for attack, but there was no snap of jaws, no cry of daddy. He froze, listening desperately but heard nothing. Despair plunged his heart – had he sacrificed a clear trail for nothing? But then, a torn thicket caught his eyes, a broken branch; scrambling forwards Rey stumbled into a tiny clearing. The leaf litter was scattered with scraps of bloodied cloth, recently ripped to shreds and flung from end to end by terrible force. This was where Kane had transformed.

There was no sign of Remus. Alive or dead.

He started to turn in search of an exit trail. The undergrowth behind him erupted.

Rey swivelled on his heel, cudgel raised, a cry of fury on his lips. He stifled the blow just in time.

A wand thrust into his nose. The scarred face of Alastor Moody stared at him wide eyed.

“Bloody Hell, Rey!” he swore violently, pulling his wand back.

Other faces appeared, Aurors, perhaps five or six that Rey knew by sight at least, if not by name. All looked, to various degrees, sickened, shocked and infuriated. How Moody had gathered so many so quickly was anybody’s guess but Rey was glad to see them nonetheless.

He had his reinforcements. There was no time to waste.

“This way!” he ordered sharply, ignoring Moody’s frown that exclaimed quite eloquently that he was on the verge of sending the exterminator back to his wife. But not this time, not when his son was involved; Rey would not allow himself to be expelled from the field of danger like a naughty schoolboy again. “The trail goes down here!”

Moody was at his side instantly as he hurtled once more into the silver-streaked woods. “Diana filled me in best she could,” he gasped breathlessly, his superior fitness no match for an adrenalin-pumped father in search of his boy. “Kane said he wasn’t planning to kill your lad, right?”

“What he wants to do is worse,” Rey snapped back. He was in no mood for looking at the limited positives of this awful situation.

Moody grimaced as he stumbled slightly on a patch of loose leaves before glancing at his companion with dark eyes of steel. “If it comes to a battle, you hang back. I won’t…”

“If you tell me to stay out of the fighting, I’m taking your head off Alastor! This is my son!”

“Then you concentrate on your son!” The Auror barked back sharply. “Get the boy and get out! I will not see another family massacred today!”

Rey felt a hollow shiver. “Bevan…”

Moody shot him a surprised glance. “You know?”

“I know.” Rey’s jaw solidified grimly. “He took great pleasure in telling me.”

“I was on the scene.” Moody had finally settled into a solid rhythm of running, his voice shaking with both exertion and emotion. “When the beacon went off.” He gestured over his shoulder at the gaggle of Aurors on their tail. “I grabbed every man there and sent them down the floo whilst I apparated. I thought for a minute… Two friends in one night…Two young families…” He gulped down a breath and continued. “We saw what he did at Bevan’s, all of us. Every man here wants him dead. No more kids. We won’t let him.”

Rey nodded grimly. No more kids, he echoed silently. Especially not mine.

But a moment later, he knew that he was already too late.

Another scream ripped through the peace of the night, barely eighty yards ahead.

This time the scream was of agony.

No! Remus!

Outstripping Moody in seconds, ignoring his restraining cry, Rey thrust ahead and burst onto a scene taken straight out of his greatest nightmares.

An enormous bristling silver wolf stood braced in a moon-washed centre of a small glade. A limp little figure dangled face down, blood-soaked and motionless in its jaws.

Golden eyes snapped up. With a flex of its mouth, the clamp of teeth released, dropping its minute burden into a bloodied heap at its feet. There was no sign of movement.

A low growl vibrated in the air.

Rey did not hear it. He did not care.

The world had ceased to exist, banished into insignificance by the enormity of emotions rampaging through his mind as he stared, unable to look away from the bloodstained little body slumped pale and deathly still on the cold, hard earth. Shock, anger, horror, misery, fury, disbelief and rage mingled together around the edges of the overwhelming void that had hollowed out in an empty space in his soul where his son should have been.

Kane had lied. He had killed Remus after all.

He had killed Remus.

Remus was dead.

That couldn’t be right. It couldn’t. The world could not keep turning if those words were true.

A second growl spun upon the breeze. With narrowed eyes, the werewolf had dropped to a crouch, poised to spring upon the stunned and grieving father standing statuesque and motionless before him.

The growl shuddered in Rey’s ears. It shivered down his spine, shaking his body and igniting a sudden flame in the turbulent hollow of his grief. Fire exploded in the volatile cocktail of emotions, burning his body from top to toe as red mist flared in his eyes.

Kane had killed Remus.

Kane had killed Remus.

Kane had killed Remus.

He had to suffer. He had to die.

Oblivious to anything and everything but the growling silver werewolf and the body of his son, Rey screamed in desperate rage and charged like a berserker.

He did not hear Moody’s frantic cry. He did not see the flicker of surprise in the over-intelligent eyes of the feral werewolf. He was aware only of one thing; his overwhelming need to cause the werewolf pain.

The strength of bereaved fury surged through his body with almost superhuman results. The first blow struck square between the gleaming eyes, half-knocking the wolf from its feet as it stumbled back to dodge this fearless, mindless, cudgel-wielding apparition of absolute and breath-taking rage. The second swept with crushing force into the side of its head, staggering it sideways before it could recover. The third smashed against a forelimb, drawing blood from a half-crushed paw as it tried to turn away. The fourth battered its exposed side and knocked it finally to the ground. And then, grasping the cudgel powerfully in both hands, he raised over his head to deliver the fifth and final skull-crushing blow to his sudden stricken foe.

It never landed.

For then Remus screamed.

The sound echoed through the trees with horrifying clarity, the moments before motionless figure of his little boy suddenly twisting and writhing on the floor, his tiny fingers scraping at the earth as he buried his face against the leaf litter, shrieking and screaming and sobbing in the unmistakable throes of extreme agony. Blood stained the ground where he lay in alarming quantities.

Rey stared for an instant, his world righting itself with an abruptness that made him sway with a mixture of dizzy relief and desperate horror.

Kane had not killed Remus.

Remus was alive.

Remus was in pain.

Remus had been bitten.

Remus was a werewolf.

And he was too young. Kane’s plan had worked. Oh dear Gods, no….

The cudgel froze and wavered. Kane did not.

A moment later Rey had an agony of his own worry about. The werewolf’s claws sunk into his left thigh to depth of bone and dragged downwards the length of his leg.

Unbelievable pain pierced him – the cudgel slipped from his fingers in numb shock as he tumbled to the floor with a thump and a cry. For a terrible instant, his eyes met gold as Kane lunged viciously towards his exposed throat.

They had forgotten Moody and his Aurors. The fallen cudgel leapt to life as a spell caught it, swinging it untouched to wallop into the werewolf’s charging jaws. A Reductor curse blasted a hole in the earth mere inches from the werewolf’s side – all at once, the loose rocks freed by the explosion were lifted and flung in a hail of stones at the still reeling Kane. For a moment it seemed his full moon rage would overcome the remnants of his human intelligence, for he bared his teeth and half started back at his assailants. But another flurry of debris convinced him otherwise – for a moment longer he lingered, his golden eyes fixing upon the writhing little boy with a vague hint of satisfaction. But then with a final defiant snap of his jaws, he turned tail and fled into the darkness.

“That’s RIGHT!” The furious roar belonged to Alastor Moody. “Run, you *******! But don’t think you’ll get away! Every Auror in this country will want you dead! You won’t live the week, Kane! And when we’re done, death will be a MERCY!!!!”

Rey was not listening. His entire consciousness was focus on the thrashing little form a few yards to his right. Ignoring the searing, agonising pain in his left leg, he dragged his screeching body half upright and crawled across the battered earth to his son.

Even in the darkness, he could see that Remus was unnaturally pale. His hands were filthy and bleeding as he scratched at the earth in desperate pain, his clothing torn to shreds, the skin beneath a tattered mess. His small face was screwed up in unbearable agony, cheeks wet with what tears he had not already cried that dreadful night, his voice already hoarse from his pain’s vocalisation. His eyes were tightly closed.

Ignoring the shouting forms of the Aurors as they gathered themselves and then rushed in pursuit of the fleeing werewolf, Rey stretched out as he dragged himself across the final yard to clutch his son’s shoulder. Anxiously, frantically, he called out Remus’ name, hauling himself finally to his side as he grasped the shaking little form and tried to still his convulsions. He was still bleeding far too strongly, shivering with shock and cold – Rey quickly pulled his own cloak from his shoulders and tucked it warmly around the little boy, pulling himself painfully into a sitting position as he lifted his child from the earth and wrapped him in his embrace, pressing the shuddering little head against his cheek as he cradled him. For a moment, Remus’ eyes flickered open, but his gaze was absent, blank, and filled with pain – Rey had no way of knowing if his son had even realised in whose arms he was being held. He prayed that the slight tint of gold around the edges of his eyes was only in his nightmarish imagination.

“It’s all right,” he whispered the words in spite of the fact that they had never been less true. “It’s going to be all right, son. I love you, your mother loves you and nothing or no one is going to change that. I’m so sorry I failed you, I’m so sorry I couldn’t keep you safe. If I could change places with you now, I would, without a hesitation. But I can’t change places and I can’t turn back time and untangle this stupid mess and make it better. But we’ll look after you. We’ll do anything and everything we can for you. Just stay with us. I love you.” He pressed a soft kiss to the tousled head. “You’re a good lad, a strong lad. Please, for God’s sake, don’t let it win.”

But something was wrong. The nature of his son’s contortions had shifted – suddenly they were not convulsions of pain but the thrashings of anger. Remus twisted and writhed in his grasp, his little fists flailing and battering his father’s chest with a great deal more force than Rey knew his son could have usually mustered, his fingernail scratches even drawing blood from his neck. This time when his son’s eyes flashed open, he knew the golden highlights had not been imaginary.

Oh no. Oh God, no! Not my son…

There would be, could be no transformation this night – the body needed time to adapt, for the infection was too new, too unsettled, to drive the newly bitten werewolf into the dreaded change yet. But the full moon was rising in the sky above, flooding the glade with silver moonlight, and the wolfish mind at least could feel its call; it would see no need to wait for his body to catch up. And once it was entrenched in a mind so young, so vulnerable…

There had to be something he could do to stop it. There had to be.

Footsteps intruded on his train of thought – a hand upon his shoulder made him start. He glanced up sharply into the dark, sympathetic eyes of Alastor Moody.

He was not alone. Another Auror, who Rey had a feeling was called Castleton, was supporting him heavily, whilst trying to ignore the wash of blood trickling down his forehead. A wad of rag was pressed to a gash in Alastor’s side.

“Caught us both a wallop as well,” Moody commented wryly, although his eyes were drifting to the now aggressive little form clamped in the exterminator’s arms. “The others are still chasing and I’ve called for backup. Hopefully we’ll get him when he has to stop at moonset.”

Rey nodded blankly. Dizziness was threatening to wash over him as his leg throbbed piercingly but adrenalin forced it back. His son needed him.

The stares of both Aurors had fixed upon Remus.

“He’s turned, hasn’t he?” It was Castleton who spoke, bluntly and with a hint of distaste. He was fingering his wand. “Look Lupin, I know it wouldn’t be fair to expect you do it. Just lay the lad down and I’ll make it quick…”

His voice tailed off under the ice filled glare that pierced him, freezing the remains of the sentence on his lips.

“What? ”

Castleton almost visibly squirmed. He glanced at Moody almost appealingly. “The boy’s gone feral. Surely a quick, humane dispatch now would be better for everyone…”

“Castleton, shut up.” Moody could see the dangerous look on Reynard’s face, the look of a man who had not only reached the end of his tether, but lost the tether entirely some time ago. He knew without a doubt that if the exterminator had not had his hands full with his precious burden, he would have already throttled the younger Auror to death a good ten seconds before. Privately, Moody could not avoid a lingering sense that Castleton was right – but he knew as well just how much Remus meant to Rey and Diana. There was no way on earth that Reynard Lupin would be let his son die or be lost without a fight.

Uncomfortably, he pulled himself free of Castleton’s support.

“Apparate back to Winter Hollow,” he ordered the younger man sharply. “Get Mrs Lupin and escort her down the floo to St Mungo’s. We’ll meet you there.”

Castleton gaped. “You’re taking it to St Mungo’s? But…”

“Now.” Moody cut the man off before he engraved his name any deeper on Rey Lupin’s hit list. For a moment it seemed that Castleton intended to argue the point further but twin stares of deathly threat convinced him that departure would not be a bad idea. With a crack, he disapparated.

Rey tightened his grip on his still writhing son defensively as he met Alastor’s gaze. With a wince of pain, the Auror bent and retrieved the battered cudgel.

“Here,” he said softly, extending the weapon before him as he dropped uncomfortably to his knees beside father and son. “Grab onto this and make sure the boy does to. We’ll have twenty seconds.”

With his free hand, he tapped his wand against the wood. “Portus.”

Grasping one of Remus’ tiny hands in his own, Rey pressed it firmly against the newly made Portkey, clasping his still screaming son as tightly as he could.

Castleton’s harsh words still rang painfully, infuriatingly in his ears. How dare he, how dare he stand there all self-righteous and talk about putting his son down like an animal! Fiery determination flooded his body from head to toe. He was not going to give them the satisfaction. He was not going to give Kane such a victory. He was not going to lose the son he loved so much.

“I won’t let it happen, Remus.” The words were a whisper against his son’s ear, born of a pain far stronger than the one that seared his leg. “I won’t let that wolf take you away, either of them. You’re going to come back to me and I’m going to raise you to be the person that you should be, that you will be. You’re going to be happy, you’re going to be good and above all else you’re going to be human. I won’t let anyone take that away from you. You will be everything that Kane is not, I promise you. He won’t destroy you and he won’t destroy our family. We won’t let him ruin this. We won’t let him win. You’ll still be Remus Lupin. You’ll still be my son. And you’re going to stay that way.”

Moody’s eyes were fixed on Rey, his gaze an indecipherable mix of sympathy, anxiety and hopelessness. “Here it comes, Rey. Three, two, one…”

A moment later the glade contained nothing but moonlight.


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[Pallas]

17: The Wall

It took all of Alastor Moody’s powers of persuasion to make Reynard Lupin relinquish his son to the St Mungo’s healers. Now Rey wished he had clung on more stubbornly.

His son needed him.

He had called out to him. Just for a moment, an instant, the terrible gold of those wolfish feral eyes had faded and his son had stared in terror around the room at the mass of white-robed healers pinning him ruthlessly against the bed and screamed out for his daddy.

If it hadn’t been for the fact that Rey was barely capable of standing, let alone walking, he would have been at his son’s side like a shot.

Diana had been waiting when the Portkey had deposited them on the floor of the St Mungo’s reception, gasping in horror at the sight of her bloodstained son and crippled husband. Despite the fact he could not stand unaided, he had refused to let go of his thrashing child – in the end a healer had stepped in and cast a temporary charm on his leg so that with Moody’s help he could rush Remus to the ward on the first floor where the wide-eyed healers and the Auror had finally managed to prise the boy from his protective grasp. Moody had been whisked off for treatment at once but Rey was a great deal more stubborn. With a distraught and sobbing Diana at his side he had shaken off most of their tender ministrations, hinting at his desire to be left alone through an angry glare that all bar one had taken to heart and reluctantly backed away from his son to give the healers room to work.

And now Remus was seriously hurt, separated from his parents in the hands of strangers, trapped and terrified inside his own body and rapidly losing control.

And this bloody woman was trying to help him. Didn’t she have priorities?

“Mr Lupin, please let me look at that leg. The charm is only temporary and that’s a very serious injury. If it doesn’t get treated soon, we may not be able to fully heal the damage…”

Rey knew Healer Jarvin quite well – in his line of work, he and his colleagues were frequent customers on the Creature Induced Injury wards. Up until now he had considered her an intelligent and capable woman, if a little over fussy.

“Look,” he declared sharply, meeting her gaze with steely eyes. “This leg can wither and drop off for all I care. Why aren’t you helping my son? ”

Jarvin’s expression was an alarming mixture of sympathy, compassion and understanding; the look that peg-legged Reiver had designated her “that-leg-is-going-to-have-to-come-off-sir” look. It never meant anything good.

Rey was not in the mood for a long and winding explanation, punctuated by compassionate pauses and sympathetic pats of his wrist. He cut in before she opened her mouth.

“Straight facts please, Jarvin. Don’t spare my feelings and don’t beat around the bush. I want to know what you can do for my son.”

Jarvin bit down on her lip and glanced at Diana inquiringly. In spite of her tears, she met the healer’s eyes and nodded.

“The facts,” she repeated firmly.

Jarvin bowed her head, her brisk professionalism just failing to conceal eyes that were bright with sadness. “Very well. Bluntly, Mr Lupin, Mrs Lupin, this isn’t looking good. The bite wound itself, severe as it is, we can heal with time. But a werewolf has bitten your son and even though the infection is too new to invoke a physical transformation, the mental effects are already manifesting themselves in his mind. And in a mind so young and immature, these initial effects can have a devastating impact.”

“What kind of impact?” Diana was grasping her husband’s arm, her brave expression undermined by the horror in her eyes.

Jarvin simply turned and gestured to the bed where Remus’ little form continued to thrash and scream and squirm in the grasp of her fellow healers as they tried to treat his wounds. His eyes were now streaked with unmistakable gold. “That kind of impact. It’s too much for him. His mind is too young to be able to process everything that has happened to him this evening, the stress and trauma of all that he’s been through; it’s overburdened, overloaded. If he was older, it wouldn’t matter so much, because a more developed mind could perhaps have coped better, have created the necessary boundaries in spite of the shock of being bitten. If the events surrounding his bite had not been so traumatic, again, he might have stood a chance. But the presence of the wolf is too strong for him in this state of distress. Wolf minds capitalise on emotional vulnerabilities and after so much horror, your son is very vulnerable. He can’t fight that invasion off on top of everything else.” She sighed deeply, her factual demeanour wavering in the face of parental grief. “I’m truly sorry,” she said sincerely. “But I don’t think there is any more we can do.”

Rey stared blankly at the writhing form of his only child, his thoughts swirling, his features creased with a combination of distress and horror. He couldn’t fight it. He was too young to fight it. He was going to turn feral, just as Kane had threatened…

No. There had to be another way.

Diana was speaking to Jarvin, her voice soft and desperate. “But surely, once the moon sets, the wolf’s mind will retreat. Remus will be Remus again.”

Jarvin sadly shook her head. “That would be the case if he had been able to form the necessary boundaries to repel the wolf. But these early hours are crucial. If he cannot establish an initial barrier between his mind and the wolf’s, the two will merge together and become inseparable. And once that happens…”

“He’s feral.” Rey’s soft whisper drew the gaze of both women. “True feral. And then, there’s no going back.”

Jarvin nodded silently, her face sombre. Diana simply stared.

The healer’s soft touch against his arm was tentative. “It goes against everything I believe in to say this,” she said, her voice soft and uncertain. “But I just can’t see how he can have any kind of life like this that doesn’t involve the Ministry and a cage. Under the circumstances.” She paused to take a breath. “It might be kinder just to let him go now…”

“Don’t say it.” His tone slapped away her words. “Don’t even think it.” His mind was working furiously. There had to be some way to help Remus, some way to fortify him against the assault of the wolf. She’d said something about his vulnerability…

“Jarvin, you said the trauma of the evening and the bite had weakened his mind,” he declared abruptly, shaking his arm loose of her hold and meeting her gaze with wild but determined eyes. “If it wasn’t for that trauma, those memories distressing and confusing him, would he be able to make the necessary barriers?”

The healer stepped back slightly, intimidated by the intense and slightly unhinged gaze of bloodstained father before her. “Maybe,” she admitted nervously. “He must have a strong little mind to have been able to break through for a moment to call to you the way he did when you brought him in. Even given his age, it may have been possible…” She shook herself out of the speculation abruptly. “But that’s irrelevant. You can’t turn back time or unwind what’s happened. There’s no way to test it.”

It was an idea. There was no mistaking it. An impulsive, untested, possibly ridiculous idea, but it was all the hope he had and Rey was well beyond the point of being careful. He was no healer. He had no idea what the impact would be. For all he knew, he might weaken his son’s mind even further. But if Jarvin’s words were any judge, he had lost Remus already, lost the only thing he had to lose that mattered.

But if it worked…

If it worked, he would have Remus to gain.

He would be a werewolf – that was inescapable. But he’d still be his son. He’d still be Remus.

If he won the battle. But he was a strong boy, Rey knew it, and he could fight and win if only he was not handicapped by circumstances. He could not give his son victory.

But he could send him into combat better armed.

What else could he do but give him the chance to try?

It needn’t even be permanent. Just until his mind was ready. Just until he was older…

He started forward abruptly and at once almost collapsed as his weakened and damaged left leg gave way under him. Only Jarvin’s quick reactions kept him upright.

“Mr Lupin!” she scolded sharply. “That leg! I must insist…”

“Help me to my son.” Yet again Rey dashed away her words.

She stared at him. “Mr Lupin…”

He met her stare with eyes brimful of icy determination. “Help me to my son,” he repeated deliberately.

For a moment, she hesitated. But then, she looped one arm around his shoulders and helped support his weight as he edged the few steps across the room to the bed where Remus lay.

In spite of his weakness, it took little effort to barge his way past the huddle of healers clustered around his little boy. For an instant he stared at his icily pale son, with his dishevelled, sweat soaked hair, his ragged clothes, his bloodstained torso and his wild, half-gold eyes as he screamed hoarsely, his voice a pale echo of its earlier agony, sapped of volume by harsh use but not of its source. His convulsions had weakened to half-hearted flailing through sheer force of exhaustion, but Rey was certain his son would have continued to thrash and cry with the same sharp force as in the forest if his too-young body could have taken the strain.

Please, please, please, in Merlin’s Name, don’t let this be a mistake.

Drawing his wand, he extended it and pressed it gently but firmly to his son’s forehead. His face was set. He drew a deep breath and concentrated every last iota of energy he could muster. He couldn’t afford to make a mistake with something as delicate as his son’s memory.

Please, please, please. Let this work. Let this work.

His father had used a memory charm on Rhea, if Kane was to be believed. But this was different. A memory charm had started this mess. It would not be fixed by another one. But at least it could temper its effects.

You can do this. You can do this.

Just last night. He had to concentrate, to hide only what needed to be hidden, no more, no less. Just last night.

For our family. For Remus.

Do it.

“Obliviate.”

Gasps rose from the healers around him, from Diana standing a few yards clear staring in shock and realisation at what her husband was trying to do. Jarvin was gazing sharply at him with dawning comprehension and a sudden hint of admiration – pushing her way quickly to the bedside, she took in the dazed and suddenly shocked to stillness form of the little boy and extended her wand also.

“Dormio.”

At once, Remus’ eyelids fluttered; after a moment’s struggle against the force of sleeping spell, he slipped into unconsciousness, finally stilled and silenced after so much raw pain.

“There,” Jarvin murmured. “Now at least he can sleep until the pull of the moon is passed. After moonset, he stands a better chance.” She smiled gently. “Good thinking, Mr Lupin.”

The adrenalin seemed to drain from Rey’s body as he stared down at his suddenly peaceful son, knowing in spite of this of the battle that must be waging beneath the boy’s repose. But he’d given him a chance. Please let this have given him a chance.

He felt strangely dizzy. The bed and walls began swirl before his eyes. Sparkles of silver and black taunted his vision.

“The trauma’s gone,” he whispered softly. “It’s just the wolf to deal with. Now it’s up to Remus.”

A hand slipped gently into his: Diana. She gazed down at her son, her tear-streaked face determined once more. “Now it’s up to Remus,” she echoed.

Rey glanced at his wife and just about managed to smile before his legs gave way beneath him and the dizzying darkness swept him away to oblivion.


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[Pallas]

A/N: And here we are – the final flashback. A quiet chapter of reflection…

18: Waiting

Blankets. Warmth. Quiet. The dull stain of dawn light against his eyelids.

Rey smiled. He loved waking up at home.

Was Diana up already? Would he find breakfast waiting on the table, the soft hum of his wife’s voice as she set the morning table? Or would they both be awoken by a sudden impatient visit from Remus as he scrambled up the foot of the bed and bounced cheerfully between his parents with a cheeky smile until sleep was a forgotten dream?

Gently he extended his left hand in search of the presence of his wife and encountered crisp tightly tucked sheets and the edge of the mattress.

What the…?

And then he realised the pain. The itching throb that ran the length of his left leg. The bruised catch of his ribs. The sharp sting across his shoulder. The pounding of his skull.

Memories flooded through his mind. The chase. Hel. Bevan soaked in blood. His sleeping son. His smiling wife. A flare of the fireplace. Kane. Abel. The poker. The forest. The wolf. The hospital. Obliviate.

Remus.

Rey burst into consciousness.

A firm hand slapped against his shoulder, forcing him back against his pillows. Diana’s pale face, framed in dark curls, filled his vision. Her smile was tentative.

“Lie back down,” she said softly, her voice a whisper. “You’re exhausted and hurt. Considering the amount of blood you lost, Healer Jarvin says it’s astonishing you didn’t keel over long before you did.”

“Remus.” Rey was not to be deflected. Dawn light was creeping through the curtains that shrouded the high window towards the far end of the ward; surely they must know by now…. “What’s happened? Is he…?”

Diana’s expression clouded slightly. ”He hasn’t woken yet. Jarvin topped up her spell with a sleeping draught just to be sure.” Her eyes flickered with a pain that Rey wished he could only imagine. “We’ll know in an hour or so.”

She glanced to the bed on Rey’s left. Her husband followed her gaze.

A small figure lay dwarfed in the large hospital bed a couple of yards away. He had been cleaned up at least, the dirt, grime and blood washed from his body, the tattered and bloodied remains of his pyjamas stripped away to be replaced by a simple hospital gown. His brown hair, half buried in the large pillow, swept with surprising neatness across his forehead, arranged, Rey suspected, by the constant gentle stroke of Diana’s hand throughout the night. His skin was pale, too pale, his face almost mockingly serene. His eyes remained closed.

“They wanted to put him in a private room.” Diana’s voice was all but a whisper. “Hide him away from everyone in case... But I asked them – how could they expect me to choose between the bedside of my husband and my son? So Jarvin arranged for this little ward to be emptied instead. So I could sit with both of you.”

Poor Diana. What a night it had been for her. The peace of her happy home shattered, her beloved son abducted, bitten and facing a fight for his sanity and to top it off, her husband collapsing unconscious. There was no measure by which she deserved such a fortune.

Dragging his aching arms from beneath his coverlet and ignoring his wife’s brief flash of indignation at his action, Rey pulled himself half-upright and engulfed Diana in his arms.

She burst into tears.

It took a good ten or fifteen minutes for Diana’s storm of weeping to pass. Rey did not relax his embrace for an instant, clutching his wife’s head against his shoulder as she sobbed herself dry, holding back his own tears only out of a need to remain coherent enough to offer comfort. Diana had been forced to be strong when he passed out. Now she needed release and it was his turn.

Finally, finally, Diana ran out of tears to cry. She nestled her damp face against the crook of his neck as he rubbed her back comfortingly, his fingers drawing little circles between her shoulder blades. Her breath whispered against the tear-soaked wetness of his shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured at last. “I thought I was stronger than this.”

Rey closed his eyes as he tightened his hold. “Don’t be stupid. What’s happened would have tested anyone. I think you’re entitled to a bit of a cry.”

There was a muffled half-hearted snort. “You call this a bit of a cry? Reynard Lupin, master of understatement, strikes again.”

Diana making silly remarks. A touch of normality briefly invaded this most abnormal of situations. But elusive and quick, it was rapidly gone.

Slowly, her hair a brush of silk against his throat and cheek, Diana drew back, stroking her husband’s arms with her fingers as she wordlessly rested her forehead against his.

“Rey,” she murmured softly, her eyes betraying a deep anxiety and a desperate fear. “I’ve been thinking. I’ve had all night to think, to do nothing but think. And I just can’t stop wondering…I can’t help but realise…” She sighed deeply, her fingertips redoubling their efforts as her gaze slipped down to the bedclothes to escape her husband’s gaze. “Even if Remus is still… Even if he’s himself when he wakes…” She bit her lip, hesitating yet again as she tried to articulate the one fact that neither parent truly wanted to face. “Whatever happens when Remus comes round, we can’t escape the fact that he’s going to be… Rey, our son was bitten. Our son is… Is…”

“A werewolf.” Rey too had dropped his gaze, his own composure difficult to maintain in the face of the flush of mirroring emotions that flooded his wife’s features. “I know.”

Had it not been for the fact that her tear ducts were dry, Rey was certain tears would have been once again falling from the eyes of his wife. As it was, her pain was instead translated into her features.

“They’ll be arrangements.” Diana was all but gritting her teeth as she struggled by force to be practical in the face of turbulent emotion. “He’ll have to be registered, of course. I was worried for a while about whether his… turn… in the hospital would have to be reported too, but Healer Jarvin says she and her staff won’t mention it if we don’t. The Ministry don’t react kindly to werewolves that… And Jarvin says she could never condemn an innocent child if it can be avoided.” She smiled wanly. “She’s a good woman.”

Rey nodded silently, rubbing his forehead against his wife’s curls. He didn’t trust himself to speak.

“And then we have to think about what to do when we take him home.” Diana ploughed on with the agonising determination of someone who needed to get these words off her chest before she exploded with the force of them. “I was thinking that we could clear all my potion ingredients out of the cellar and let him… let it happen down there. The walls are solid, that window is high and far too small to be squeezed through and we can easily reinforce the door. I can move my things into the cupboard under the stairs and we’ll put the cleaning things in that old chest in the hall instead. I was going to suggest the old lean-to first but then I remembered how strong a werewolf can be. It might do whilst he’s small, but once he gets older, it won’t be able to take the strain, I’m sure. This way seems the best, don’t you think love?”

She was trying so hard to hide the tremble in her voice, discussing the practical ramifications of their son’s newly acquired condition as though it was a simple domestic problem. He knew Diana well enough to realise that this had been the only way she had been able to stay sane through the long night alone – to try and find something, anything that she could do about it, to ease it, to make the enormous burden of the shattered future they faced just a little less daunting. She needed something tangible to deal with, to occupy her thoughts, something that would prevent her dwelling on the stark truth and house arrangements seemed to be it.

Rey wished with all his heart that it was going to be that simple. His son was a werewolf. The very thought made him feel sick to his stomach. For as long as he could remember the word werewolf had been associated with anger, hatred, bitterness and betrayal, and whether or not those feelings had been justified, he could not simply banish them away. And yet, they were the antithesis of everything he had ever felt in regards to Remus, the little boy who had brought nothing but light into his life. To try and mesh these two polar opposites was simply appalling. And although he knew that his love for his son would always triumph over his werewolf negativity, the adjustment would take time. House arrangements were perhaps a place to start.

Bitter irony kicked in. When the bright side of a situation was the prospect of arranging his house to accommodate his werewolf son, it was unavoidable to consider that life had taken a dire turn indeed.

And that was the best scenario. The worst…

But Diana had already anticipated his thoughts. A night’s worth of brooding had led to coverage of most possibilities.

“But…” The tremble in her tone escaped her iron-tight control in spite of herself. “The next full moon – the first change – that’s going to be difficult. He’s rather young to have this explained and he won’t remember being bitten in any case. And there’s no guarantee – even if he forms a barrier… We can’t know that it will hold out against a second onslaught. If he does slip back… There’s nothing we can do, no more memories to wipe. And that’s if it works.” Her eyes caught her husband’s once more. “Rey, what if we lose him? What if the wolf wins? What are we going to do?”

Rey steeled his jaw. “We do what’s best for him. We… We let him go.”

Diana closed her eyes sharply, blinking back the dry itch of spent tears. “I know. I just needed you to say it.”

* * *

The next hour dragged with agonising slowness. Diana flitted nervously between her twitchy husband and her unconscious son, anxiously slipping from one bed to the other, to her chair, and then up to pace the otherwise empty ward before rushing back once more to the side of her family. Rey was painfully aware that but for his injuries he would have been climbing the walls at her side. In that respect, the straightjacket of hospital sheets was almost a relief.

About twenty minutes after Rey’s return to consciousness, Healer Jarvin reappeared. She examined him thoroughly, checking his bandages and rate of healing, dosing him with a wide selection of potions and performing several minor spells. Then with a sigh, she sat on the edge of his bed and informed him reluctantly that the news about his leg was not good. Even without the delay in his treatment, the wounds had been very severe, damaging muscles, nerves and tendons and the scar tissue, that could not be removed magically due to the toxic nature of werewolf induced injuries, was not going to help his recovery. There was little to no chance that he would ever regain full use of his left leg.

Rey took the news stoically. He was too numb by now to much care.

Healer Jarvin had examined Remus too. His physical injuries, she said, were healing cleanly and well. Any damage to his mind remained to be seen. He would wake, by her estimation, within the hour. She paused to weave a precautionary restrictive spell over his limbs and told them to call her the moment he came round.

Once she had gone, Rey retrieved his wand from his bedside table and determinedly used a spell to scoot his bed over to beside his son’s. He was determined not to be out of reach. Rescuing her chair before her husband could crush it in his zeal to rearrange the furniture, Diana settled on Remus’ other side and gently held his hand.

It was a slow crawling ten minutes later that a slightly limping but otherwise mostly intact Alastor Moody appeared in the entrance to the ward. At Rey’s half-nod to his uncertainty, he slipped inside and made his way over to join them. His eyes fixed on the still form of Remus at once.

“Has he turned?” he ventured softly.

Rey met the dark, sympathetic eyes of his friend. “We’ll know when he wakes.”

“Ah.” Moody knew when to leave a subject well alone. “Well, I come as the bearer of tidings. I’ve good news and bad news for you.”

“Oh?”

With a grunt, Moody dragged another chair across the ward and settled beside Diana. “Well, your bad news is that bloody Abraham bloody-hellfire-cursed Kane seems to got away from us.”

Rey felt his stomach drop. Kane had escaped. Kane, his errant nephew, the man – the creature – that had destroyed his son’s future and possibly his sanity was still out there. And with his vengeance so rudely interrupted, who could say that he would not be back….

The exterminator met the gaze of the Auror with firm coldness. “Tell me exactly what good you can find out of that.”

Moody winced slightly at the tone and sighed. “Well, the good news is that he seems to have left the country.”

Both Reynard and Diana stared at the Auror. “How can you possibly be sure of that?” Rey asked incredulously.

Alastor pulled a face. “Because about an hour ago, a naked, battered blood-covered man matching Abraham Kane’s description leaped out of a local connection fireplace at the International Floo Network Terminal, killed two customs officers and hijacked a connection to the continent. He dropped out at a farmhouse near Zagreb, as far as they can trace. We think he broke into a wizarding house in a village over the far side of your mountain not long after dawn and used their fireplace just like he used Bevan’s. We’ve put a stop to that though. I’ve spoken to the Floo Regulation people about this and they put up a marker on Kane’s trace. If he tries to floo back into this country or use any internal connection again, the fireplace he uses will literally blow up in his face. No more sneak attacks for him.” He gave a grizzled grin of satisfaction. “We know he can’t apparate or make portkeys either; he’s had no formal magical training and what talent he has is wild and weak. He’s got a bit of a walk ahead of him if he’s thinking of heading back here.”

“Do you think he will?” There was a tremor of fear to Diana’s tine – her grasp on Remus tightened noticeably. “Come back here, I mean.”

Moody shook his head. “I doubt it. It was made very clear to him in the course of his chase that the only welcome he can expect in Britain is a healthy amount of violence and a lingering execution. Aurors don’t take well to those who attack innocent children and murder their colleagues. His description is well circulated. Hopefully he’ll show a flash of sense and find a nice quiet corner of Europe to curl up and die in.”

Rey made an attempt at a smile, but he suspected the result was much closer to a grimace than he’d have liked. “Thank you Alastor. For everything.”

Moody shook his head as he rose stiffly to his feet. “Don’t thank me.” He sighed and met his friend’s eyes once again. “I’d best be going.” He hesitated awkwardly. “Your lad’s a strong ‘un, Rey. He’ll pull through. Diana.”

“Alastor.” Diana replied with a nod, saving Rey the trouble of finding more words. With a final half smile, Moody retreated from the ward once more.

And the wait resumed.

It was Diana who noticed first. Rey had all but dropped off, his head lolling on his pillow, his eyelids drooping as the exhaustion of the last few days caught up with him, when suddenly he was jerked into wakefulness by a little half gasp from his wife. Diana was staring down at the little hand she grasped with surprise and sudden dread, her features a contrasting mix of hopefulness and fear.

“He moved!” she breathed, her eyes snapping up. “Rey, he moved! His hand twitched!”

Rey scrambled onto his elbows, ignoring the pulse of pain that shot through his ribs and shoulder as he drew his wand from beneath his pillow and leaned from his bed onto the adjacent edge of his son’s. A moment later they knew that Diana had not been mistaken for Remus rolled his head against the pillow, his limbs stretching slightly against invisible bonds as he struggled back towards consciousness. But just who – or what – would they find when he opened his eyes?

His eyelids fluttered. Diana’s gaze was fixed on her only child in desperate, anxious hope; Rey grasped the edge of the bed, his grip on his wand tightening sharply. Much as he longed to hope for the best, he could not afford to take any chances.

Please be Remus. Please be Remus. Please be Remus.

And then, his eyes slipped open. There was not a hint of gold.

“Mummy?” A half-dozy, distinctly confused little voice split the silence. “Daddy?”

For a moment neither Diana nor Rey could move. They could barely breathe. After so much they had barely dared to believe… Could it be true?

Remus was staring at the unfamiliar surroundings in confusion, his small face creased by the sudden realisation of pain. His lip trembled.

“It hurts,” he murmured, his tone both deeply bemused and distinctly not happy. “And I feel all funny.”

Mothering instincts overrode shock – with a cry of utter relief combined with a powerful desire to comfort her confused child, Diana released Jarvin’s spell with a flick of her wand and leaned forward, wrapping her son up in her arms and stroking his hair as she clasped him against her. The disconcertion melted from Remus’ face at the familiar proximity of his mummy – with a little sniff he buried himself reassuringly into the cuddle. In spite of the fact that he was clearly in some pain from his bite wound and had yet to realise just how his innocuously christened funny feeling was going to change his life, he managed a little smile.

Rey stared at them, simply stared, drinking in the sight that he had feared so deeply he might never see again, his little boy snuggled contentedly in the comforting arms of his mother. Gently he reached out a hand and stroked it along his son’s shoulder.

He did it. He won. My little boy. He won.

We’re going to be all right.

And he knew it. Oh yes, the future they faced was difficult; they were by no means out of the woods that Kane had plunged them into. There would be challenges, many challenges ahead, the bright and easy life he had dreamt of for his son lost with the snap of wolfish jaws. And there was still the uncertainty of the next full moon.

But they were still together. They were still a family. They still had each other. And they would beat those challenges. They would be fine. Remus would be fine.

He was sure of it.

Feedback Here Please

A/N: I know the wait won't have been as tense for those of us who knew of course how Remus was going to be. But I felt that seeing how two people take the first steps on coming to terms with such a thing would be an interesting thing to write and read.

[Pallas]

A/N: And now, back to the present….

Part Three: The Waiting Wolf

19: A Matter of Blame

Hogwarts, Early November 1996.

A deathly stillness permeated the length of the Hogwarts Hospital Wing.

The silence seemed to stretch for years.

Two motionless figures stared at each other; the younger man, his brown hair greying slightly, his throat red-raw, resting back against the headboard of his bed as he watched the older man sitting on the edge of his mattress as he struggled to compose himself enough to continue. It was not an easy task.

“Even then, we weren’t sure.” The words when they came echoed against the weight of what had passed before; Reynard Lupin’s grasp on the hand of his son had not lessened once throughout the telling of his tale. “Oh, we had more hope than we’d dared to dream of the night before, but we still had no way of knowing what would happen after your first full moon. You’d formed a barrier, yes, but how you’d handle another incursion from the wolf, especially since I’d taken the memory of your first one, we just had no idea. You’d be starting over. We did our very best to explain it to you – but how do you explain to a three year old the concept of becoming a werewolf? We cherished that month – for all we knew, it was going to be our last together. And when the full moon came…” His voice faltered slightly as he squeezed his son’s fingers almost as though to reassure himself that he really was there, alive, full grown and sane. “That night almost broke both of our hearts. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so bad in all my life as I did that night watching poor Diana carry you down those cellar steps and leaving you down there in the dark, confused, unwell and naked to face that change alone. And then sitting in the kitchen, listening to you scream as the moon rose…”

“Dad, don’t.” Remus stepped in before his father upset himself further, reaching out to grasp his father’s shoulder with his free hand. “You don’t have to…”

His father’s eyes rose to meet his son’s. “But I do have to. Remus, I’ve bottled this up for thirty-four years and more, barely even discussing it with your mother for fear of upsetting her again. Selfish as it sounds, I need this.”

Remus sighed. His mind was still reeling, struggling to absorb the string of revelations that had emerged from his father’s tale of the past. Abraham Kane was Abel Isaacs. His cousin of all things. And if it hadn’t been for his father’s unexpectedly speedy pursuit and quick thinking in the hospital he would either be dead by euthanasia or raving golden-eyed in The Howling and slaughtering his friends and family for the kicks.

The thought of how close he had come to either fate made him shudder.

He remembered the depth of shock and horror that his parents had never quite managed to conceal when the truth behind that feral night in 1981 had been revealed to them. It must have been as though their worst nightmares from his childhood had sprung back to life.

“That first night, listening to you down there, transformed, tearing at the walls, howling and shrieking –it was agony.” Reynard resumed his tale, his gaze absent and faraway in the past as he delved once more into his most painful memories. “Our child was in the greatest pain and we could not even say whether or not he would still be the son we loved when morning came. But when the moon went down and you fell silent, your mother dared to open the cellar and there you were. In pain, yes, scratched up from head to foot, confused, bewildered, sobbing and terribly upset, but all that could be soothed away with a little time – what mattered to us was that you were still yourself. It was only then that we knew once and for all that we would be all right.”

He toyed absently with his cane with his free hand. “I’d be lying if I said it was easy after that – every full moon was almost as dreadful as the first for us all. And it wasn’t just the adaptations we had to make to our lifestyle because of it – for myself at least, it required a serious mental overhaul. In one night I’d gone from hating werewolves with a passion to having one for a son.” He smiled crookedly, but there was a hint of uncertainty, as though he feared how his son would react to knowledge of his former standpoint. “It took a little getting used to.”

Remus smiled too, reassuringly. “I can imagine.”

Rey’s smile grew a little more confident. “The likes of Kane and his ilk I’ll always despise,” he admitted with feeling. “And after all he did to us, I feel no wrong in doing so. There’s werewolves and there’s werewolves and the world would be a better place if more people understood the difference. But when it comes to what you go through and others like you, those who don’t ask for it, don’t want it, don’t let it take over their lives, I’d fight to the death for your rights.”

Remus grinned broadly; this he knew for certain to be true. “I know that. I bailed you out of the Ministry holding cells just before last Christmas for beating up that Anti-werewolf protestor in Diagon Alley, remember?”

Rey sniffed, but his smile was wry and slightly crooked. “The man was an idiot. He didn’t know what he was talking about. And he started it; I refuse to believe that sideswipe with his placard was an accident. Besides, one good slap with a cane is not beating up, thank you.”

Teasing his father was one trait that Remus had inherited from his mother with enthusiasm. “That carol-singer described you as – how did he put it? Oh yes, a spitting ball of white-haired fury. Honestly dad, you’re lucky your idiot didn’t press charges.”

Rey’s sudden grin was slightly wicked. “Thirty years of age and beaten up by a seventy year old with a gammy leg? He was too embarrassed.”

The brief laughter lightened the heavy mood for a moment. But only for a moment.

Reynard’s expression was suddenly sombre once more as he stared as his pale son, curled up yet again in a hospital bed. His eyes drifted to the red gashes at his throat.

“I should have told you this sooner.” His voice was a whispered hush. “If you’d have known, you might have been prepared…”

Remus gave a rueful chuckle. “Dad, I’m a Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. That’s about as prepared as it’s supposed to get. I can get into trouble quite well enough by myself without needing you to try and steal all the blame.”

Rey was shaking his head. “But still… The memory charm was necessary at the time, I hope you understand that now, but I should have told you when you were older. But we were just so afraid that if we told you and you remembered, it might all come back…” He sighed deeply. “All through your childhood, we tried to shield you, to keep you away from anything that might upset you, distress you in any way. We were terrified to take you out of our home, of taking you anywhere that you might face the kind of disdain and prejudice that people direct at werewolves. We coddled you to an absurd extent, I can see that now, but at the time it was all so fresh in our minds, what had happened, what could happen again if your emotions got away from you. I’ll admit – for a while I was all for keeping you out of Hogwarts even if they’d have you.”

He smiled, a soft smile tempered around the edges with still sharp grief. “But Diana – she could see you weren’t happy at the idea of being a recluse. She saw the looks on your face when you watched other children play near the farm, the wistful pleasure whenever we dared to go anywhere different like Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade. And she knew that in spite of our fears, Hogwarts would be the best thing for you.” His smile spread with sudden recollection. “Oh she fought old Armando Dippet like a tiger when he told her that Hogwarts would not accept a werewolf pupil. I swear sometimes he retired just to get her to leave him alone. And then Dumbledore became headmaster, your mother’s closest friend amongst the staff…”

Both men shared a smile for a moment, before Rey met his son’s eyes once more. “I suppose that would have been the time to tell you. We had lost the excuse of your being too young – if eleven was old enough for Hogwarts, it was old enough to understand. But you were so happy at the idea of going to school – we couldn’t bring ourselves to spoil it.”

He sighed as he dropped his gaze once more. “We decided then that we would tell you the next time you asked us. And we waited, with some trepidation for the inevitable questions. But they never came; you never asked. And secretly, we both drew a sigh of relief.” He raised his eyes once more, an eyebrow cocked quizzically. “I’ve often wondered Remus – why didn’t you ask? You must have been curious.”

Remus closed his eyes at the memory. “I did ask. When I was nine, I asked mum. She burst into tears all over the place. After that I was afraid to ask again in case…” He removed his hand from his father’s shoulder to wipe it wearily across his brow. “I couldn’t stand the thought of making mum upset. And if one innocent question could hurt her so much…”

Reynard’s grip on his son’s hand tightened yet again. “Remus you were the most precious thing in our lives – you remain the most precious thing in mine. You were the only child we had, the only child we were going to have and we both loved you very dearly. Even yesterday, I almost had a heart attack when Albus Dumbledore called me in the fire to say Abraham Kane had all but torn your throat out.” His features looked drawn and suddenly tired. “That night with Kane, the night you were bitten, was the very worst thing that either of us had ever, could ever have been through. It was our worst nightmare, worse than our worst nightmare and it was real. We went from thinking you dead or worse, like him, to finding you bitten and bleeding and then watching you writhe and scream and rage like a feral before our eyes, knowing that our son was underneath there somewhere, unable to get out and probably terrified. Do you blame your mother for crying at the thought of it?”
Remus shook his head. “Of course not. But I didn’t know that. I was a child and I’d made my mum cry. She almost never cried and I had caused it. I wasn’t about to try it again.”

Rey nodded thoughtfully. “Diana told me about it afterwards. But we didn’t realise it would have such an impact on you.”

“I loved mum. Do you think I wanted to see her cry just to satisfy my curiosity? I told myself it was the past, that it didn’t matter. It wasn’t as though it could be changed.”

Rey stared at the ceiling for a moment. “No, it can’t be changed. But unfortunately, it does matter.” He sighed again, dropping his eyes. “You were so happy at Hogwarts, happy with your friends. And then when you left school and got involved in the war… How could we add to your burdens like that? We were so afraid for you in those awful days, not just because your life was in danger, but because of the stress, the grief, the fear; what if it overwhelmed you? It began to look as though we would have to tell you, if only to warn you of how important it was to keep yourself controlled. But we put it off and put it off, thinking we’d still have time…” His voice trailed off into cold blankness, his eyes haunted. “But we didn’t.”

Coldness welled within Remus’ chest. “1981.”

His father nodded. “1981.”

A slow, terrible realisation slipped into Remus’ mind. “Two feral incidents. By the rules in those days, I would have been executed without trial. Even by today’s standards, I should be locked up and probably facing Azkaban.”

Rey was struggling to retain his composure. “Believe me, I know. When Alastor flooed in to tell us that day, still bleeding from where you’d hit him in your frenzy…”

He shuddered. “If it had been anyone but Alastor and Albus Dumbledore who saw it - it was only by good will that those healers and the other Aurors kept quiet when you were a child, one word would have been enough. Alastor had to all but threaten Jasper Castleton not to report you when you first registered and he never stopped resenting him for that. And at the time of your… incident, he was fairly high up in the ranks. If he’d have got word of it…”

Remus could feel his stomach plunging with horror at the closeness of his call. “Dad, I’m so sorry, I…”

“Stop that right now!” Reynard cut his son’s apology off sharply. “You have nothing, absolutely nothing to apologise for in this. You couldn’t help what happened that day, you had no idea you were more vulnerable than might have been. And given the depth of your grief, even if you’d known…”

He closed his eyes, kneading his forehead with the fingertips of his free hand. “We should have told you then. No more excuses. But now it had happened, now that we knew our fears had been real all along, we were too afraid…”

There was a long silence.

This time when he spoke, Rey’s voice did break. “And then when your mother died, I was so afraid again, if you grieved too much, if you were angry enough, I might lose you as well as her…”

The barricades finally gave way. Reynard Lupin broke down and burst into thirty-four years worth of repressed tears.

Remus immediately flung himself forward and wrapped his arms around his sobbing father, drawing him rapidly into a comforting embrace. Rey clung to his son, face buried in his shoulder as he vented a lifetime’s worth of pent-up emotion in a sudden rush, his sister’s death, that awful night in the woods, the bite, the terrible sounds of all those full moon nights, his son’s feral incident, his wife’s death, all held back in an effort to be strong behind walls that could no longer take the strain.

He cried for some time.

Remus cried too. Cried for his mother, for his father’s pain, for his lost friends and broken family. He shared his father’s grief and wept.

Finally, when the storm of tears for both had passed, father and son slowly broke apart, pale, damp-cheeked and faintly embarrassed as they wiped their faces dry and shared a rueful smile.

“Well, that was exhilarating.” Remus commented with deliberate nonchalance. Rey fixed his bloodshot eyes on his son as he fixed him with a mock glare.

“Watch it,” he retorted, half lifting his cane. “I’ve never had to discipline you before but its not to late to start.”

Remus managed to grin. “Would it make it easier if I dressed up as an Anti-werewolf campaigner?”

Rey tried to suppress the smile but failed in spectacular fashion. “Dear Gods, my boy, you are far too much like your mother. I knew I shouldn’t have let her spend so much time warping your mind when you were young and impressionable.”

Remus laughed again. “I think it was fairly well warped by genetics.” He paused, allowing more serious thoughts to fill his mind as he touched his father’s arm with concern. “Are you all right now?”

Rey waved a dismissive hand that told Remus eloquently that his father was still shaky but would sooner die than admit it to his son. “I’m fine,” he said softly, a hint of a catch in his tone that he struggled to conceal. “It’s just I had a long night worrying about you, thinking about all of this and then retelling it all on top of talking about when your mother…” He caught his breath determinedly. “It still hurts, I suppose. I think it always will. And if I live to be three hundred, I’ll never stop missing Diana. One more thing to thank Kane for I suppose…”

What?

The words registered sharply. Remus head snapped up even as his father’s mouth snapped closed, a sudden fear slipping across his eyes as he seemed to realise he had let slip something he had intended to remain concealed. The intense emotional release of moments before had apparently shaken his composure rather more than he had realised.

“What did you say?” Remus’ gaze bored into his father sharply.

He could tell at once that Reynard was going to try and shrug it off. “It’s nothing really, forget I…”

It was Remus’ turn to cut away the words. “No, dad, don’t you dare, not after all we’ve been through. I know what I heard. What did you mean by it?”

There was a weariness in Reynard’s gaze and an unconcealed apprehension. “You have to promise me,” he said softly. “Promise me that if I tell you that you won’t do anything stupid. I almost lost you yesterday and I couldn’t stand to go through that again.”

“I promise I’ll be careful.” Either Rey missed the dodge or he was too tired to dispute it. Remus suspected the latter and fought a twinge of guilt.

Reynard was once more staring at the bedclothes, his eyes strangely empty. “The morning before your mother died,” he said softly. “She sent me an owl from her hotel in Paris. She said…” For a moment the words seemed to catch in his throat; he struggled to continue. “She said she thought she had seen someone following her in one of the markets. She thought… she was afraid it was… She said it looked like Kane.”

The world seemed to rock on its axis. Remus fought the ice that threatened to bury him completely as he drew back from Reynard in shock.

“I told her to come home.” His father’s stare remained fixed stubbornly downwards. “But she was finally getting some recognition for her potion, she was so determined for it to be a success…” He sighed. “I know nothing for sure – nobody does. Only that your mother was not clumsy and not stupid and don’t see how she could have managed to fall out of a window without… help.”

Remus was struggling to avoid drowning in the turbulent tumult of emotions that plunged and swirled through him – only the stark realisation of what drowning could mean helped to keep his head above water.

“You think he pushed her.” At articulation of the words, the torrent surged.

Rey nodded wordlessly.

“But why push her out a window?” Coherent thought, that was important – he had to hold onto to coherent, logical thought. “Why not just kill her as he killed the Bevans?”

Rey gave a bitter smile. “The French laws on werewolves are pretty severe. A feral killing would lead to an enormous hunt. I think Kane was lurking, looking for an excuse to come back into the country now he was mostly forgotten. To have a fuss kicked up would have been the last thing he needed if that were the case; alerting the British Aurors to a possible threat.”

“But then why risk killing mum?” The words tasted fiery and bitter on his tongue.

“Opportunity.” Rey sighed. “I don’t think he knew she would be there. I suspect he probably just saw her on the streets and followed her back to the hotel. Coincidence, I imagine. A lucky chance for him.” His hands were shaking, his voice a tremble. “I don’t know if he did it out of spite, for revenge, for the pleasure or just to see what it would do to you and me. I never found him to ask him.”

Remus felt his jaw drop. “That’s where you went after the funeral? Looking for Kane? Dad, you told me you just needed time to be alone!”

Rey sighed, his jaw clenched. “I had to, Remus. It was Diana…”

Remus was all but gasping for breath. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come with you, I would have helped…”

“No.” Reynard’s voice was steel. “Things were finally starting to go right for you. The Wolfsbane potion was working at last, Albus had offered you the job at Hogwarts; how I could I spoil it for you when your life was finally coming together? Besides, I wondered then and I still wonder now – what if Kane still wanted to kill you or even turn you? He’d view you as a challenge in either case, I know he would. I couldn’t let him get near you, for either reason…”

“Dad.” Remus reached forward and laid a hand across his father’s arm, ignoring the chill that ran the length of his spine as Kane’s words in the alley tumbled through the chaos in his mind. “Trust me. I have no intention of letting him do either. And you’ve talked about your losing me but what about me losing you? He would have killed you if you’d found him…”

“I know.” Reynard met his son’s eyes at last. “But at the time, that option didn’t seem so bad…”

Firmly, Remus drew his father into another hug. “That’s enough of that,” he ordered sternly. “I expect to have many more years in which to tease you, understand?”

He felt his father smile against his shoulder. “If you must.”

“I must.” Remus eased out of the embrace and risked a smile. “It’ll be all right, dad. And you don’t need to worry about me.” Gingerly he rubbed his throat. “Hard as it may be to believe right now, I can look after myself.”

Reynard was also eying the scars of Kane’s attack. “Of course you can.” He gave a deep sigh and flexed his shoulders. “Well, it seems I’m all done with turning your world upside down. How about I fetch Poppy and see about some food? It must be going on for noon by now.”

Remus nodded quietly. “That seems like a good idea.”

Awkwardly, leaning heavily on his cane, Rey pulled himself upright once more, gingerly twitching his bad leg as he massaged his knee with his fingers.

“Stiff again,” he explained with a half smile. “Bloody thing. My father used to have trouble with his knees but I doubt it was for the same reason.”

At the mention of his long dead grandfather, a question sprang into Remus’ mind. “Dad?”

Rey glanced down, fingertips still working his sore leg with the absence of practice. “Yes son?”

“Who was telling the truth?”

Rey frowned. “About what?”

“Kane or your father – about what happened to your sister. Who was telling the truth?”

Remus immediately regretted asking as pain spilled across his father’s features.
“Honestly?” he said softly. “I don’t know. Perhaps Kane really was telling the truth as Adam Isaacs had told it to him – but whether Isaacs was lying or Kane or my father, I really couldn’t say. Perhaps none of them told the whole story. Perhaps they all believed the tales they told. I don’t think we’ll ever know.”

Remus nodded thoughtfully. “Or about mum.”

Rey bit his lip. “Or about Diana. We can only guess, I suppose. I’ll go see Poppy about that food.”

Bracing himself against the stiffness in his sore leg, Reynard Lupin turned and made his way with awkward dignity across the room towards Poppy Pomfrey’s office.

His son watched him go, his mind awash with thoughts that his father would not have welcomed.

Kane had killed his mother.

He was sure of it. As sure as his father was.

He would have to take care. He would not be foolish, would not make any more silly mistakes; he was not willing to give the feral any more means by which to hurt his father through him. But Kane had bitten him, tried to turn him feral and almost destroyed his family. And now it seemed, he had been responsible for the death of the mother he had loved more than anything.

The thought made him burn and freeze as one. The thought made him furious.

He would keep his promise to his dad– he would indeed be careful. But he had to act. And thanks to Kane’s slip about speaking with the barman, he knew exactly where he planned to start.

As soon as he was well enough, Remus was going back to The Howling.

Feedback Here Please

A/N: Ah, chapter nineteen. Doesn’t look much like a battleground, does it? But innocent as it seems, this chapter gave me absolute hell when I tried to write it. For well over a week I wrote, rewrote, erased, wrote again, edited, stared blankly at the screen, drank copious amounts of Ribena and ate far too much chocolate, beat my head against the desk and sobbed quietly in an effort to get this chapter onto the page. There are whole tracts of text relegated to my “cut” folder that shall thankfully never see the light of the net. Why was it so difficult? I’m honestly not sure but a few possibilities are that it was the jump back into the present after really hitting my stride in the flashbacks; the Olympics were on, distracting me terribly whenever I got stuck; and I got bogged down trying to write around a speech I’d written for Rey before the chapter even started – in the end I gave up on it, cut it out and only a fraction remains in the explanation for Diana’s crying. But I think my major problem was Remus himself – how I had planned him to react and how he reacted when the time came to write it turned out to be two very different animals and plotting reasons, this proved a hurdle. I think it was Lady deMimsy who made a very perceptive comment regarding Remus whilst writing him for her fic “Remedial History” – she commented that he tends to only get worked up when he feels it is on behalf of others, rather than for himself, and I agree with that. Therefore he wasn’t likely allow himself to start after Kane because of his own issues. And he certainly wasn’t going to get worked up whilst Rey was upset – I will admit I have unashamedly modelled their relationship in this chapter on me and my mother in that when one of us is upset or distressed about something, the other automatically shelves their own feelings in order to offer comfort. The revelation regarding Diana’s death had been on the cards for a while but I was torn as to whether or not to use it for fear of, well, overkill – in the end, I had to simply because it was the only suitable catalyst I had. It was only when these elements of the chapter clicked that I finally got a version down on paper that I felt was correctly characterised – and even then my beta expressed concern over whether Lupin men were too reserved to cry (my response was in public, yes, but not with each other and I stand by that – everyone needs some kind of outlet… ).The reaction of Remus is perhaps then a little understated considering how many of my reviewers have expressed their anticipation as to what his reaction would be – but I feel that it is also the most in character response I have managed and that is probably what matters most of all. So I hope you all agree.