No Such Chocolate by owlchecksnotes

Summary:
“Veritaserum,” Moody announced, coldly. “Nobody will be allowed in, or out, until each of you has taken a
dose and answered some questions.”

Remus smelled the room descend into shock and a cacophony of outraged noises.

He heard James mutter. “They can’t be serious…” He heard Peter squeak mournfully.
“Merlin’s beard,” from Gideon.
He caught Sirius Black, his ex-lover, and incumbent love-of-his-life, glaring at him, with a resentful twinkle
in his eye.

Chapter 1
Notes:
Potential triggers around pregnancy complications, medical procedures, alcohol and swearing.

Chapter Text
Remus stared at the two dozen-or-so little bottles lined up, neatly, on the table. Moody stood over them,
glowering and watchful. Dumbledore was observing them as well, peering over his rimless glasses,
shifting one little bottle, which was slightly out of alignment, into its place.

Remus’s school textbook had said that veritaserum was odourless. He even remembered dutifully writing
that it was odourless in his OWL examination. The textbook had not been written by a werewolf, and the
OWLs weren’t marked by one. The potion’s subtle scent, bitter and aniseed curled in his nostrils.

Remus wondered, briefly, whether any of the other two dozen or so Order of the Phoenix operatives,
crammed into this little sitting room in Hogwart’s headmaster’s cottage, knew what they were looking at.
Peter might have guessed, Remus supposed. He could hear his friend’s elevated heart-rate from across
the room, and smell the stench of his sweat.

No one else seemed concerned. Not even Lily, despite the fact that, if Remus recalled correctly- and he
did, veritaserum was contraindicated in pregnant women. There was an old story, a husband who tried to
use it as a paternity test. Disaster had followed.

Remus made a mental note to remind Lily, in case she’d forgotten. And Alice, and April, he supposed.
Although, he doubted any of them would have. And Dumbledore and Moody would stop them anyway.
Probably.
Moody cleared his throat, and peered at the assembled oddly, his new prosthetic eye rolling in an
exaggerated motion. Sloppy spell work, Remus sighed to himself. Someone ought to fix it. Not that
anyone would. There was no time for it. No one had time for anything just now.

“Veritaserum,” Moody announced coldly. “It is well known, to you all, that we have at least one spy, in our
midst. What is not known is that for the past several weeks I have been feeding false information to Order
members and observing how the other side react. Based on these findings, Professor Dumbledore and I
are convinced that the spy is somebody in this room. Ergo, veritaserum. The house has been sealed.
Nobody will be allowed in or out, until each of you has taken a dose and answered some questions.”

Remus felt the room descend into shock and a cacophony of outraged noises.

He heard James mutter. “They can’t be serious…”

He heard Peter squeak mournfully.

“Merlin’s fucking beard,” from Gideon.

He caught Sirius Black, his ex-lover and incumbent love-of-his-life, glaring at him with a resentful twinkle
in his eye.

An ice-bolt of pain stabbed Remus’s heart.

Eventually, James spoke up again, louder. “There are pregnant women here, Alastor…”

Moody shrugged. “Any pregnant person here may choose between taking the potion today, and spending
the remainder of their pregnancy under the hospitality of the aurors…”
“You are sending us to Azkaban if we won’t risk our babies?” Lily yelled.

“You can’t be serious Moody!” James gasped.

“Hospitality of the aurors? I AM an Auror,” Alice growled.

“The cells in the ministry,” Moody replied, firmly. “This is war, not playtime. This much veritaserum cost us
no small part of our war chest, and having a spy has cost us lives. Frankly, the three of you are fools for
getting pregnant in times like this.”

“Perhaps if our pregnant members go last, Alastor,” Dumbledore offered into the following heavy silence.
“If we find a spy, and their interrogation does not suggest the presence of another? Then, perhaps, there
will be no need for Alice, April and Lily to either take the potion or spend a confinement as your guest.
No?”

Moody glared at the old wizard. Something unsaid seemed to pass between them. Then, Moody relented.
“Fine. Those three last, then, if it lets us get on with this. Now, who is first?”

The room burst into chaos again. Lily was red-faced and on the verge of tears. Gideon was shaking his
head, while his twin placated him, wondering if this was for the best. James and Peter were loudly
declaring this an outrage; declaring that they, the order, were supposed to be the good guys, supposed to
be above this. Frank and Alice were embracing. Caradoc was looking at his own tapping foot as he
grumbled to Hestia, her shoulders slouched, arms folded across her chest. Marlene and Dorcas argued
with each other loudly. April hugged her own pregnant belly, and sobbed openly.

Everywhere, there was outrage.

Except Sirius. Sirius was staring at Remus. Waiting.

Remus met his cold, unyielding eyes. And then, his mouth moved of its own accord. Out of fury, out of
love. “I’m first,” he said. “I’ll go… I’ll go first.”

For a second the room was silent.

Then, Sirius spoke. Spat. “Good! That should save a lot of expensive potion…”

“Oh, not this, again!” James roared. “Sirius! Cut it out…”

“James, it’s fine,” Remus sighed. “I… I’ll go first.”

James shook his head furiously, looking back and forward between Remus and his ex, his best-friend.
“No! That’s doxyshit! Sirius is being…”

“We did all just find out that Lupin’s a werewolf.”

It was a voice from the corner. Aberforth, speaking up for the first time. Aberforth, who rarely attended and
even more rarely spoke up at these things at all.

“And?“ James replied. “And anyway, maybe YOU just found out. WE’VE known, for years. We’ve known
Remus for YEARS, and…”
“Perhaps it doesn’t matter who goes first?” Albus Dumbledore interrupted, staring down his brother, one
eyebrow raised.

It was too late, though. The murmurings were changing, sounding more like assent. Molly Weasley,
Gideon’s sister, who had been feeding a newborn in the corner, had gone from furtively glancing at
Remus to staring at him openly.

“Like Hell it doesn’t matter,” James muttered, holding his arms wide, as if to indicate the whole room. “No!
This isn’t… NO! I’ll go first….”

“Oh, come on, Potter, no one suspects you….” Aberforth began. but was quickly interrupted by Remus.

Remus had had enough. He strode forward and carefully picked up one of the bottles. Carefully, and with
two fingers, so no one could claim he palmed or swapped it. He angled himself, as he raised it to his lips,
so that Moody, so that Dumbledore, so that Sirius would be certain he had drunk it.

He swallowed, allowing himself to be slightly theatrical in doing so. The hurt, after all, was rising. Best he
let it out, here and there, so he could get through this, without losing control.

The assembled Order of the Phoenix members went completely quiet, all watching.

After a moment, Remus laughed, bitterly, letting out another little burst of hurt. The pressure was still
building unbearably . “Well? Somebody ask me something?“
No one spoke for a moment.

“Oh, Moony…” James whispered. It would have been inaudible to non-werewolf ears.

Moody cleared his throat. “You are Remus John Lupin?”

“Yes.” Remus wobbled slightly. It felt so strange. The answer flowed out of him, as if of its own accord.

“Born March 10, 1960? To Lyall and Hope Lupin?”

“To Hope Howell…” Remus found himself interjecting, not even being entirely sure why. His mother had
been married when she gave birth. Had changed her name. Only…

“And you are a werewolf?” Moody interrupted his thoughts.

“Yes.”

Moody cleared his throat. “How do you feel about being a werewolf?”

Dumbledore held up his hand. “Alastor…”

But the answer slid out of Remus, interrupting his old Headmaster. “I hate it. I’m a monster, and I hate it.
It’s agony, and it’s slowly killing me, and all I want is to get to the transformation that finally kills me
without hurting anyone.”

The words hung in the silent room. Remus could sense heartbeats slowing, adrenaline lowering. Except
among a few. James and Lily were getting angrier and Peter’s heart was still pounding furiously.

Dumbledore spoke, at last, softly. “Alastor, l think it might be best if all the questioning was done
privately….”

“Are you the spy?” A voice interrupted. Sirius’s voice. Remus couldn’t pretend otherwise. It seemed the
veritaserum didn’t even allow him to lie to himself.

“No.” Remus whispered. He didn’t know if Sirius was looking at him. He couldn’t bear to know.

“Open your eyes,” Moody ordered, but his voice held less of an edge than it had a moment ago. “Have
you ever to your knowledge passed on information to Voldemort or one or his agents? Or have you ever
revealed Order of the Phoenix secrets to anyone without authorization?”

“I told Sirius I was going undercover with the werewolf pack,” Remus blurted out. “With Greyback.
Professor, I’m sorry, I…”

“Any other occasion?” Moody interrupted.

“No. Just that… I told Sirius… I… we…”

“Are lovers, yes,” Moody interrupted, gruffly. “Or rather, were lovers. I don’t think that’s much of a secret to
anyone here.”

To Remus’s dismay, and further misery, a small titter ran across the assembled. Humiliation washed over
him. He could think of only a few times he’d felt worse. The Incident, of course, was one. Facing
Greyback in the pack. The aftermath of Sirius’s stupid prank. And maybe, at some of the quack healers
his father had dragged him to. The one with the silver enemas. Dear Merlin, if Moody asked him now,
about one of those….

“How do you feel about the other werewolves?” Moody asked, abruptly.

Remus quietly seethed. “How do I feel about a diverse and disparate group of people with exactly one
thing in common?”

“Just the ones in the pack, then,” Moody replied, perfectly calmly. “Greyback’s pack. How do you feel
about them?”

“I…” Remus tried not to answer, but knew he could only fail. “I feel like I could have been them. There but
for the grace of Dumbledore go I… I want to help them. But, they aren’t my family….”

“Is that so? Then who is? Who holds your highest loyalty?” Moody asked quietly.
Remus burst into tears, but the answer flowed out anyway. “Sirius Black.”

The room was agonizingly quiet. Remus glared at his shoe and refused to look at any of them. He could
still hear and smell them, though. Tensions were rising, again. Thudding heartbeats, the sharp smell of
adrenaline. Perhaps they had all finally realised that this, this ordeal, would soon be happening to them.

“And after Mr Black?” Moody pressed.

“James and Lily,” Remus sighed. “Their baby, Peter. My mum. Professor Dumbledore…”

“And Fenrir Greyback?”

“Never! He hurt me!” Remus stammered, while trying to jam his mouth shut. Please don’t ask me how.
Please don’t ask me how. Please don’t…

“Leave him alone,” Lily’s voice shouted suddenly. “Leave him alone! Just stop it… stop it! STOP IT.”

“I’m satisfied, actually,” Moody replied cooly staring down Lily.

“Perhaps Mrs Potter’s point was that these interviews could be conducted privately,” Dumbledore
reiterated softly. “There is no need for this to be so…uncomfortable. My friends, my house is at your
disposal, while you await your private interview with me and Alastor, in the drawing room. Remus,
perhaps you’d like to go splash some cold water on your face?”

Remus needed no further encouragement than that. He practically bolted for the sitting room door. Out of
that place. That room. Just… out.

He heard James start to follow him.

He heard Peter say, “No, I’ll go.”

Nobody came, though. He shut the door of the bathroom. He wanted to throw up, but was worried if
anyone heard, he would be somehow accused of cheating the potion. If all that had been for nothing?
Then, he didn’t think he could bear it.

He curled up on the tiles and let the tears flow.

“I’ll be right back, love,” James said, softly patting Lily’s back, when it was, finally, his time to go into the
drawing room.

“Hmmm,” Lily murmured, in acknowledgment. She had spent the last hour or so watching people get
summoned, one by one. At some point, after poor Remus, the group had informally decided on
alphabetical order, excluding herself, April and Alice. With each member taking their turn, Lily had felt a
strange mix of emotion. Terror of a friend turning out to be a monster, of course, but also, some hope of
being one step closer to being free of this horrid, suspicion-filled life. And, yet also, if they spy was not
found, to being one step closer to having to choose between possible miscarriage, or a gaol cell.
It was an old curse, wasn’t it? ‘May you live in interesting times’

“Be right back, love,” James repeated, this time pecking her on the cheek.

“Wait, what?” Lily replied, concentrating now. “Isn’t Peter next?”

James shrugged. “I think he’s still comforting Remus? So I’ll duck in ahead. Least I can do for him.”

“For Peter?”

“For Remus,” James sighed. “I’m… I’m so fucking angry with myself, Lily. How did I just stand there, and
let that happen? And there’s not enough chocolate in the world I can get him to make up for it…”

Lily shook her head. “James Fleamont Potter, that was on Sirius, not you. You shouldn’t feel bad.”

“You don’t feel bad?” James asked sounding a little incredulous.

“I didn’t say that,” Lily sighed. Of course she felt bad. “It was an ugly thing, and I personally hope
everyone in this room feels at least a bit bad about it, but… you tried to stop it, James. And Remus will
remember that. He’s nothing if not fair, that way.”
James rubbed his face. “Godric, Lils. I promised him, years ago, that I’d never stand for anyone treating
him differently. And yet, not only did I stay friends with Sirius after that business with telling Snape?
Now…”

“James, you know I think that Sirius has been an utter shit-weasel. But, you can’t think that Remus would
expect you to pick sides…”

“…And now, I let this happen.”

“James! You aren’t in charge of this! Moody and Dumbledore are, and you did try to stop it. You did. You
know Moony will forgive you…”

“It’s not about whether he’ll forgive me, Lils, it’s about…”

Lily swallowed. “Look. On the bright side, we all know for sure where Remus’s loyalties are now. Every
one of us. And, if Dumbledore and Moody come out of that room, after the last interview, and say they
didn’t find anything…”

James looked pale at the very thought. “I don’t even know what I’m hoping for…”

“Well, I do! I’m terrified of spending the rest of my pregnancy in a cell! And if they don’t find someone I
might have to!”

“That’s what you’d pick then?” James asked gently. “You wouldn’t risk the potion?”
“Risk our BABY?” Lily scoffed. “No chance. Moody doesn’t know what he’s in for, by the way. Me and
Alice raising hell, in his cells?!“

James grinned and looked at his shoes. “Can’t say I envy the man.”

“Arsehole!” Lily replied affectionately.

James kissed her again. On the lips this time. “Anyway, got to go get interrogated.”

Lily smiled and pulled herself upright. “And I’ll go shift Peter. Tell him he’s on deck. Need the lav, anyway!
Remus can’t hog the bathroom to cry, when there are all these pregnant ladies about, can he?”

“Be right back, love,” James affirmed, and walked towards the drawing room, while Lily headed the other
way down the hall towards the bathroom.

As if on cue, her baby did a little spin in her uterus and struck her bladder with a limb. “Ouch,” Lily
muttered. “I swear, it’s like you are playing Quidditch in there, already, Sprog! Knock it off, though, would
you?”

She knocked on the bathroom door, but didn’t really hesitate to open it, when she got no answer. The
worst she was expecting to see was Peter or Remus using the facilities, and they had all known each
other a while. It wasn’t exactly a sight she hadn’t accidentally come across before.
What she had not expected was Remus, lying on the floor, alone.

“Where’s Pete?” she asked, before she had even really taken Remus’s state in.

“I don’t know, do I?” Remus hissed miserably. “How the ruddy-hell would I know?” Then he flinched, and
sat up straight. The tile pattern from the bathroom floor was etched into his cheek, interrupting the familiar
scars of his face with an unfamiliar pattern. “Sorry, Lil. Didn’t mean to snap it, like that…”

“It’s the potion, luv, don’t worry,” Lily replied, softly. “Anyway, I just assumed Pete was still in here,
comforting you…”

Remus stared and her and frowned. “Haven’t seen him. Also… don’t need comforting. I’m fine…”

“Potion’s worn off, then?” Lily smiled sadly. “Because, that’s crap.”

Remus looked down. “Lily….”

“Remus, did you mean what you said? About being a monster? About how you were just waiting to die,
one of these days, and all you cared about was not taking anyone with you?”

Remus bit his lip. “Didn’t mean it like that, Lil…”

“Well that’s it. I’m making you Godfather,” Lily replied firmly. “That way, you have to at least try to hang
around. There is a war on, you know. Orphanhood is on the cards.”

“Merlin, Lily! Obviously, Sirius is Godfather…”

“Not after that shite he pulled today, he isn’t.”

“Yes, he is!” Remus growled. “Because you are right, there IS a war. Something could happen… and
Harry could need someone and… and werewolf!”

Lily smiled. “Exactly! A werewolf that just declared, under veritaserum, that he is more loyal to my baby
than to Dumbledore himself! Just who I want in my baby’s corner. Seriously, Remus. I have nightmares of
him ending up in Petunias hands, and Voldemort showing up, and murdering my son, completely
unopposed. You think I don’t want to put a bad-arse werewolf in his way?”

“And all the most bad-arse werewolves do wear tweed…” Remus replied gamely. “Oh… and did you just
say the sprog is a HE?”

Lily twinkled her raised hands. “Surprise, guess what? It’s a boy!”

“Merlin help us!” Remus laughed.

Lily nodded agreement. “Merlin, indeed. But Remus, really, do you know where Pete went? It’s his turn for
the… for the potion.”
Remus’s scarred forehead creased. “I honestly haven’t seen him.”

Lily paused. She felt her stomach drop slightly. “What, you haven’t seen him, at all? He didn’t come to
comfort you, after…”

Remus smiled a small hurt smile. “No one did…”

“So, where IS he then?” Lily asked before her brain caught up with her. “Oh. You’ve been in here, alone.”

“Needed some time to myself, anyway,” Remus whispered, suddenly unwilling to meet her eyes.

“Oh, Remus, I’m sorry. What happened was ugly, and awful, and you didn’t deserve it. James is furious
with himself. Just furious!”

Remus smiled, more genuinely, at last. “Maybe I should go and comfort him, then? I’m… I’m alright Lily. I
really…I really am. It’s just the cost of doing business as a werewolf. I knew there’d be blowback, once
my mission outed me to the rest of the Order. It’s… I was expecting it. It’s fine.”

“Potion definitely worn off,” Lily sighed. “It isn’t fine. Not at all. And Sirius…”

“Let’s not talk about Sirius,” Remus interrupted gently, but firmly. “Let’s go find Pete, instead. Get him
ready for his close-up!”
And so, the pair of them went. Checked very room in Dumbledores house. Multiple times.

By the time they raised the alarm, the rat was miles away.

James exhaled and rubbed his neck. He was exhausted. This day had made him utterly exhausted, and
he was well aware- indeed, exquisitely aware - that Lily had been through everything he had been
through, and had done so pregnant.

“Backwards and in high heels, Red.” he whispered softly, thinking of how tired she must be, right now,
how bone-numbingly tired, if he felt like this.

But, they couldn’t leave just yet. After the Order fruitlessly searched the house for Peter, the checking of
the wards, the confusion and finally, James’s own halting confession about three unregistered animagi,
Moody and Dumbledore had said they could go. But James still had something to do, first. Something
important.

“You should come to ours,” James therefore said, to his friend’s turned back. “You shouldn’t be alone,
after what happened.”

A ripple of emotion ran through the muscles Sirius’s back, strongly of enough to be seen despite through
the leather jacket. “Shouldn’t I?”
“No,” James sighed. “I mean, I’ve been telling you this whole time that you were an idiot. An idiot who
threw happiness away with both hands, because of some stupid prejudice. But, I can only assume you
didn’t believe me. Now, though…”

Sirius turned, and a rueful smile quirked one side of his moustache. “Now, the truth must be evident even
to me, not to mention a room full of my closest friends and acquaintances? And, why dear Jamie, would
that mean I shouldn’t be alone?”

“Godrick’s sake, Sirius! We lost Pete today! We… why are you like this?”

Sirius shrugged. “We know Pete transformed, and snuck out. Doesn’t mean necessarily that he’s the spy.
Moody never did get to question him. We shouldn’t jump to conclusions.”

James’s eyes widened. “Now you don’t want to jump to conclusions? After what you did to Remus? Now
jumping to conclusions is bad?”

“Isn’t that better?” Sirius replied, haplessly raising his arms and lowering them again. “Isn’t it better that I
learned something? That I didn’t lose every… that I didn’t mess things up for nothing? I’d have thought
you’d approve, of me not jumping to conclusions, given how you were with… him.”

“Remus!” James found himself shouting. “Say his name! You know he’s innocent, now! Surely you must!
So, say his fucking name!”

“Hurts too much,” Sirius whispered

“I beg your pardon?” James asked, though he had heard him perfectly well.

“I said, maybe it’s for the best,” Sirius answered. “And, no thank you. I think you should be with your wife,
tonight. She’s had a shock, although, at least Wormtail’s departure spared her the potion. Still, I doubt she
ever thought being Dumbledore’s good soldier would land her in a position like that.”

“She was going to take the cell,” James said quietly. “Not the potion.”

Sirius sighed. “Yeah. That’s what Featherstone did.”

“Sorry, what?” James asked, confused and annoyed by the change of subject. Sirius was like that,
though. On a broom, James flew circles around his heart-brother, in an argument, Sirius flew around him.

“Moody let Lily and Alice go without taking the potion or the prison cell,” Sirius shrugged. “But April
doesn’t have a convenient auror husband to keep an eye on her, I suppose. Or maybe, they have some
evidence against her we don’t know about. Either way, Moody took her to a ministry cell.”

James hadn’t known that. “Damn.”

“Yeah…so functionally we are down both Pete and April,” Sirius agreed. “Starting to look less like an
mighty Order, and more like just a rag-tag knot of the tragically doomed, aren’t we? I wonder who will die
next, don’t you?”

“Stop it Sirius,” James replied firmly. “You won’t annoy me into leaving you alone tonight.”
“And, what about Remus, huh? Isn’t he the wronged party? Should he be left alone? Surely not! And,
surely, you don’t intend to inflict me upon him?”

James ground his teeth in an effort to keep his temper. He was close now. He had known Sirius a long
time, and he could just sense that his best friend’s true feelings had almost bubbled to the surface. If he
could just keep his temper a little longer, then Sirius might finally break. “Remus left with the M’s and
Dorcas. He didn’t want to inflict himself on Lily.”

“And, nor do I…” Sirius replied, his voice just catching at the very end.

“Too bad. You’re coming The M’s didn’t want you. They took Remus, so Lils and I get you.”

“Convenient for The M’s that they get Remus post-veritaserum. Didn’t see them offering up their place, a
few weeks ago, when I kicked him out. Or you and Lily, for that matter…”

“I did offer, actually,” James replied hotly. “Don’t project your prejudices against werewolves onto me. I
never…”

“It wasn’t because he was a werewolf,” Sirius shouted, and James felt a sort of weary relief that his
brother’s emotions had finally burst though.

“Doxy-shit.”
“It fucking wasn’t, James, okay?! It was about the pack, yes… but…”

“But what?”

Sirius sighed. “It doesn’t matter. I was wrong. But it was all for the best. Ending things was for the best.”

“For the best, my broomstick-splintered arse, Sirius!” James replied. “You broke his heart.”

“I did.” Sirius sighed. “But, he’s good at piecing himself back together. It might even be what he’s best at,
and that’s saying something. He’ll abide.“

“Godric knows you can be stubborn, Sirius,” James sighed. “Can take the Gryffindor out of the pride, but
can’t take the pride out of the Gryffindor. But, I’ve never found you to be cruel.”

“I don’t owe Moony a relationship, James.”

“Maybe not. But you do owe him an apology.”

“Well, if I do, he won’t be getting it tonight, will he? And, even if he did, he wouldn’t be ready fo hear it,”
Sirius sighed. “Leave it alone, James. Leave me alone. Go home to your wife.”
A few years ago, James would have stayed. Stayed all night if necessary. That night, however, James
left.

Lily was waiting, lying belly up on the couch, in front of the fire. She propped herself up on her elbows,
even as James appeared. “How was he?” she asked.

“Proud. Stubborn. Heartbroken. He was Sirius Black, basically,” James sighed, plopping himself on the
couch beside her, lifting her legs first and placing them down on his lap, after.

Lily frowned.

“Ah, you were asking about Remus,” James realised too late. “I sent him home with The M’s and Dorcas.
I expect he’ll want to drink himself silly, after this afternoon, and at least there he can do it with company.
Lils, don’t be mad, okay? I’m not taking sides, and if I were, I’d take Remus’s. I’ve learned my lesson after
what happened with Snape. I won’t do that to Remus again.”

“You’d better not,” Lily replied darkly.

“I won’t! Now, please, can I feel some kicks or something? I need some Sprog-time.”

Lily smiled softly. “I’m sorry. I think Sprog is napping. I can cast a Doppler spell if you like?”

“The sound won’t bother you?”

Lily shook her head, quickly waved her wand and cast Sonorus Utero. The sound of whooshing
heart-beats filled the room. “No… it doesn’t bother me. I love this sound, actually…”

“Yeah,” James sighed. “And, after today, I need a reminder of what we are fighting for.”

Lily looked troubled at that. “Jamie, would you have let Moody lock me up, for the rest of my pregnancy?”

“Nah! The Mauraders and I would have sprung you out,” James laughed. And then he stopped short. “Me,
Remus and Sirius would have, I mean.”

Lily reached for his hand. “I’m sorry about Peter, Jamie. I really am. I’m so sure this is all some terrible
mistake, somehow.”

“If it is, then we still have a spy in our midst,” James sighed, tilting his head back to rest on the top of the
couch cushion. “I mean… it makes no fucking sense it being Pete..? But, that was the problem, the whole
time, wasn’t it? Who does make sense? I… I think I’ll have to hear it from his own mouth, though. To
really believe it. When we catch him, that is. And, if we are wrong and it’s someone else? Then we’ve just
let them go. Unless…”

“Unless, what?”

James sighed. “You aren’t going to like this. But the prison or potion thing? It wasn’t just an empty threat
of Moody’s. They let you go, sort of under my supervision…?”
Lily’s green eyes opened wide. “They did fucking what?”

“And Alice, with Frank. But the Featherstone girl didn’t have anyone to vouch for her, I guess. So,
according to Sirius, Moody took her to a cell. I mean, he can’t plan to keep her there, can he? She’s
what? Five months at most…”

“She’s only 17 years old James! Jesus!” Lily’s head fell back to the couch. “Remind me again that we are
the good guys.”

James shifted uncomfortably. “Well… we have to be, don’t we? Voldemort and all his pure blood,
might-is-right stuff sure isn’t. And, she’s not a civilian, Lils. She knew what signing up to the Order
meant…”

“Did she though, James?” Lily sighed. “She’s still 17, pregnant, fresh out of Hogwarts, and I recruited her.
Fuck! Just… Fuck.”

It might have been James imagination, but as he watched his pregnant wife lie on their couch, trying not
to cry, he thought he heart their baby’s heart start to beat a little faster. Unconsciously, he placed his
hand on Lily’s belly and began stroking, waiting for the heartbeat to settle.

But, before along, the cat started to complain. Waiting to be fed.

“Oh be quiet, you furry menace, before I throw you out the window!” James grumbled.
And Lily laughed. “Such parenting instincts! My husband, ladies and gentlemen.”

And then, James laughed too, just a little.

And then, he thought about Pete again, and his smile faded.

Chapter 2
Notes:
Potential triggers around break ups, alcoholism, PTSD symptoms, self harm and some gore.

Chapter Text
Remus woke to Dorcas, gently patting his cheek.

“Rise and shine, there, pumpkin,” she whispered. “Marls has made pancakes, and you can use them to
soak up whatever booze is still in your stomach.”

Remus groaned. The couch-ache in his muscles joined the moon ache in his bones. To say nothing of the
grog-ache in his head.

“I’ve got you a tea, with some Pepper-up in it,” Dorcas added, opening the curtains with a flick of her
wand.

“Sadist,” Remus muttered as the morning light invaded. “And, I’m afraid, Pepper-up doesn’t agree with
me, this close to the moon.”

Dorcas looked confused for a moment, before her large brown eyes widened in understanding. “Oh yeah,
the full moon. Sorry Remus. Believe it or not, I keep forgetting that you… forgetting about that, I mean.”
“If only everybody else did too,” Remus remarked wryly, pulling himself up, and gruffly massaging his
watery eyes with his knuckles.

“Tell you what, luv, I’ll have this tea, and I’ll make you another,” Dorcas replied after a moment, patting
Remus solidly on the shoulder. “Hang on a tick…”

Dorcas marched off, in the direction of the kitchen, but it was Mary who returned, a minute or later with a
mug. A mug she clutched close to her chest, as if unwilling to pass it with him. “You scared the living shit
out of us, yesterday, Remus! That ‘I’m a monster, I’m going to die’ talk. You, mister, do not deserve this
tea.”

She looked ridiculous, trying to keep the tea from him. Mary was slight, and Remus towered over her by
nearly a full foot, and her purple terry dressing-gown and fuzzy slippers helped not at all. Nor did the tears
in her deep-set grey eyes.

“Please give me my tea, Mary,” Remus found himself asking. “I’m parched…”

“You’re pickled, you mean,” Mary grumbled, but handed him the mug anyway. “Come have pancakes,
would you?”

And Remus had no choice but to follow her into the kitchen, where he was presented with a plate by a
furious looking Marlene. “Some might say that I am actually the victim here!” he jested to the trio.

“Some MIGHT say, Remus,” Marlene growled. “But no one in this house. How dare you keep something
as huge as being a werewolf from us? We’re your friends, and I’m fucking furious that you didn’t trust us.
We could have helped you, we…” she cut herself off sharply, and slammed the pancakes down on the
table.

The plate reverberating did truly awful things to Remus’s head, which, in turn, did truly worrying things to
his stomach. Remus sought peace quickly. “I’m... I’m sorry Marls. And you, too, Dorcas, Little M. I should
have told all of you, years ago….”
“Excuse me, years?” Marlene roared. “You’ve been keeping this secret for years? Plural years? You;ve
been a secret werewolf for plural years? When did it happen?”

“I don’t really like to…”

“When, Remus?”

Remus sighed. “Four years…”

“You’ve kept this from us for four years?!”

“…old,” Remus finished. “I was four years old.”

In the silence of the kitchen Remus could hear all their heart beats, their held breath, their blinking,
horrified eyes.

Mary spoke first, and it was some time coming. “So, at Hogwarts…?”

“Shrieking shack!” Remus replied tightly. “The shack did the shacking and I did the shrieking. Anyway,
could we possibly..?” The rest of his sentence was cut off, sharply, by Dorcas’s rib crushing hug. “Steady
on, Dee,” he found himself saying. “I’ll get hangover all over your beautiful suit.”

It was beautiful, actually. She always dressed well. Remus never felt quite so shabby as when he stood
next to her. Charcoal with pin stripes, this morning, brought out the golden tones in her warm brown skin.

Dorcas snorted at the complement, though. “Beautiful suit, indeed. If you do, in fact, have taste, Remus,
what’s with all the tweed and elbow patches?”
Remus shrugged, amiably, glad the subject had shifted to his sartorial choices, rather than his blood
curse. “What can I say? I am a slightly tatty man, and I only look right in slightly tatty clothes. I’d disappear
in a tailored suit like that. You, however, wear it…”

“She wears it like the future Minister of Magic that she is,” Marlene beamed, coming around behind
Dorcas, and giving her an even more suffocating bear-hug than the one Dorcas was giving Remus.

Which, of course, left Mary alone to pout and whine “Me too! I want in, too.” She wrapped the whole lot of
them up, in her slender arms. “Group hug, group hug, group hug.”

Dorcas, closet to Remus, rested her head on his shoulder. “No more secrets, yeah? No more silent
suffering, either. You need us? You call. Something bites you? You call. Something… no, anything, goes
wrong? You bloody well pick up your wand, and cast your bloody patronus to come get us, yeah? I’ll not
hear of you waiting to die ever again, Remus. I’m not having it. I’m not.”

“Well, who am I to gainsay the word of the future Minister for Magic?” Remus sighed.

“And, as for Sirius Black? He’s an idiot,” Marlene muttered. “If we both weren’t gay as a glitter explosion in
a flannel shirt factory…”

Remus squirmed a little. “Can we not talk about Sirius? I can’t… I can’t think about him, just now.”

“Nor should you, pet,” Mary coo’ed, extracting herself from the hug and handing Remus his abandoned
tea again. “That beautiful idiot missed his chance, with the sweetest werewolf alive, and he’s got no one
to blame but himself.”

“That is, I’m afraid, Mary, still talking about Sirius,” Remus chuckled, uncomfortably and sipped his tea.
“Better to talk about Sirius than Peter,” Mary replied softly. “I still can’t believe it! Little Peter Pettigrew a
death-eater? I can’t believe I’ve fucked a death eater!”

“The way you fuck? I’d struggle to believe you haven’t.” Marlene snorted.

“Don’t be vulgar,” Mary replied with a haughty smile. “Or, if you must be vulgar, don’t be jealous!”

Marlene grinned back. “Got everything I want right here,” she purred, pulling Dorcas off Remus and into a
yet another giant bear hug.

Remus watched them, and as he did, his heart sang of Sirius. At least, with the veritaserum’s effects
dwindled down to nothing, he managed not to cry.

Sirius inhaled, and stared at the sunrise, which was having the bloody gall to be beautiful. “How fucking
dare you,” he muttered to it, before stubbing out his cigarette, this time, at least, on an abandoned plate,
instead of the back of his hand.

He missed the pain.

“For nothing,” he muttered, and glared at the plate. Remus had bought that plate. Or chosen it rather, and
Sirius had bought it. Remus never had any bloody money. And Sirius never had any bloody idea how to
have an opinion about plates. At least about plates which weren’t hundred-year-old Black family
heirlooms, and therefore due a smashing.

“I like these ones,” Remus had said, testing the weight in his hand, and Sirius had snorted. How do you
have an opinion about mother-fucking plates?

The plate shattered at Sirius feet. He had thrown it. It was inevitable.
All gone for nothing.

As he fumbled in his pocket for another cigarette, he heard the flapping of powerful wings, and turned to
recognise James’s owl, Hermia. The message was brief.

Please reply with proof you are alive, lackwit.

Sirius growled, and stalked into the flat and grabbed one of the small supply of howlers he kept for his
mother’s birthdays. “Fuck off” he screamed into it and sent Hestia winging back to James, without so
much as a caress of her caramel feathers.

And, with that, his socializing for the day was done.

He spent a while storming around the apartment, collecting what remained of Remus’s things into a box.
As long as Remus was the fucking spy, who was betraying his best-friends to Voldemort, Sirius had felt
justified in depriving him of his meager possessions. Now, however…. now, Sirius was the rich arsewipe
who had kicked out his impoverished boyfriend, without so much as a pot to piss and in. Had slammed
the door right in his face.

And it was all for nothing. Because, all along, it was that fucking weedy little rat Pettigrew, who Sirius
hadn’t suspected for one fucking second.

The rubbery, internal enlargement charm he’d cast on the box, bulged, as Sirius threw in clothes and
knick-knacks. Remus’s inexplicable collection of grindylow figurines. And books. It was honestly mostly
books.

Then Sirius found a mug that he had bought for Remus. When they’d gone to Brighton on a whim and
been beset by bad weather.
It’s that time of the month, the mug said. Stay out of my kill zone.

Why exactly muggles would make a werewolf themed mug, Sirius had no idea. But he’d bought it on the
spot for Remus anyway. Of course he fucking had. Had wondered aloud to Remus why Muggles might
have made it. Remus had stared at him and laughed, but had refused to ever explain. Sirius threw the
mug into the box.

The mug wasn’t what finally broke him though. It was a fucking bookmark. A bookmark with a dog, one
who looked just like Padfoot, howling at the full moon.

“You don’t need to buy EVERYTHING that reminds me of you,” Remus had said, when presented with it.
“You’ve got me. You’ll always have me.” And Sirius’s heart had swelled full to bursting.

And now it was all gone. For nothing.

Are you actually fucking crying about the fact I’m innocent, Sirius? Remus asked in his head. If so, fuck
you, ever so much!

“I was so sure,” Sirius whispered. “Suddenly, you couldn’t bear to touch me. You were quiet. Withdrawn.
You came and went. You cried at nothing. And you couldn’t bear to fucking touch me.”

And yet you heard me on the potion, didn’t you? Torn out of me, mortifyingly, in a room full of people? My
highest loyalty is still to you. Even now. And how did you treat me Sirius? What did you do?

“I’m too broken to love,” Sirius murmured. “You knew that. You know that. I told you that. I told you that, a
hundred-fucking-times. I told you not to love me. And yet, you ripped your big, sweet, bleeding heart out
of your own chest and handed it to me, anyway. So really, Moon-cakes, this is all your fault.”

On the bookmark, unmoving, the dog still howled at the moon.

By the time Lily arrived and The M’s flat, Marlene and Dorcas had already gone to work, Mary had settled
at her desk to write, and Remus had gone back to napping on the couch.

“How’s our boy?” Lily asked Mary in a whisper.

Mary set down her quill. “Hungover. And acting like his heart hasn’t been publicly smashed, into a million
pieces. Poor lamb. I know that, technically, this is all Pettigrew’s fault. And don’t get me wrong, if I ever
get my hands on that rat? I’m throwing him straight in the nearest Tandoor and slow roasting him alive.
But, honestly? Just now? Just this very second? It’s Sirius’s stupid pretty face that I just really want to
smash…”

Lily sagged into one of Mary’s beanbag chairs. “Oh, believe me, I get it.”

“I did not envy you, having to taking that pretty idiot home last night, and be nice to him. I could never
have managed it. So glad we got Remus duty instead. Only, Lils? We don’t know what to do about the
moon tonight. We’ve never done a moon with him, and…”

“James will take him tonight,” Lily interrupted. “Don’t worry.”

Mary’s eyes widened. “Oh yes! The animagus thing! You did know, didn’t you? Of course, you must have,
I suppose. What did James say he was, again? A stag? Say.. you haven’t ever…”

“What?”

Mary raised her eyebrows. “You know… while he’s a stag, you haven’t…?”

“Jesus-fucking-Christ, Mary! Get your mind out of the gutter!”

Mary turned up her nose. “Very majestic beasts, stags…”

“You are the worst person alive,” Lily groaned. “Seriously.”

“You might want to figure out how you’ll get out of that bean-bag without help, mama, before you start
insulting me.”

Lily sighed. Her eyes were starting to sting. “Fine. You are the best. I throw myself at your feet. And not
just because I can’t get up without help. Thank you for taking Remus, last night. The things he said
yesterday scared the shit out of me. He’s always been the one, you know? The one I’m worried about.
The one we’ll lose to all this. He gets this look in his eye sometimes, like he’s already got one foot through
the veil? But to actually hear the words come out of his own mouth…”

“It was veritaserum, not a prophecy, Lily,” Mary interrupted kindly. “He’s sad, right now. Of course he is.
And it’s not strange for him to think he’ll die young. Most werewolves do. It’s up to us to make sure he’s
the exception.”

“I love him so much, Mare,” Lily sighed. “But…”

“…But when the chips are down, you’ll always choose James, James will always choose Sirius, and
Sirius will always choose himself. And nobody chooses Remus.”

“Mary, that’s not fair.”

Mary shrugged. “I was speaking of true, not fair.”

“It’s not true, either. James said that, if he had to chose, he’d pick Remus, this time. And Sirius… Sirius
isn’t selfish. He’s just… he doesn’t know how to be in love. He needs time.”
“He doesn’t have it,” Mary replied flatly. “There’s a war on. And werewolves turned as children don’t live til
thirty. We all know this.”

Lily sniffed, and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Remus will.”

Mary paused. “I hope I’m wrong, too.”

“Moony?” James shook the shoulder of his sleeping friend gently. “Moony? You’ve got to wake up. It’s
time to go…”

Remus’s eyes were wild for a moment, after he opened them, wild for a few ragged breaths. But then, his
shoulders sagged. “Sorry, Jamie, what time is it?”

“Time to go.”

Remus pulled himself upright, his joints making multiple audible cracks, which James tried, very hard not
to flinch at. “I’ve been sleeping all day?” he asked.

“I’m sure you needed it,” James replied gently. “We do have to go, though. Good news is Lily did us a pair
of port keys earlier, so we won’t have to apparate, there or back. Nice uninhabited island. Chilly though,
she said. Right up north, so bring a coat, yeah?”

Remus nodded slowly and James watched as his friend stumbled about his house, gathering a coat and a
thermos filled with hot chocolate, and a second filled with tea. These days, Remus got a little clumsy just
before the moon, his hands developed a tremor and he was prone to trip. These weren’t symptoms
James remembered from his Hogwarts days, and they worried him enough that he had brought them up
with Sirius last moon, even though it had been shortly after their breakup, and mentioning either to the
other was its own form of misery.
“Banquets of food,” was all Sirius would say about it though. “Three steady meals a day he didn’t have to
find a way to pay for.”

James had felt stupid then. He always got defensive when money was involved. And so he hadn’t
pressed further. Watching Remus now, he wished he had.

“Are you getting enough to eat?” he asked Remus now, watching him fumble with the thermos cap.

Remus only gave him a wry smile. “Yes, mum. I get plenty.”’

“Plenty to keep a sparrow alive” James pressed, unconsciously quoting his mother. “You don’t look well,
Remus.”

Remus stared at him for a moment, before looking away and nodding. “I’m pretty old for a wolf. Even in
captivity, they rarely make twenty.”

James swallowed. “Lily and I were thinking of getting a nanny to help with the baby overnights. It can be
rough at first. And we need someone we trust. Pay is good…”

“James…”

“What? “

“You are not hiring a werewolf as a nursemaid. That’s ludicrous. And, please stop using a foetus to
emotionally blackmail me. If not for my sake, then for the Sprog, okay? Kids shouldn’t be born with jobs.
Look at what being born an heir did to Sirius… he…” but here Remus trailed off as if unable to continue.
“Remus…”

“I keep going to pack four of everything,” Remus interrupted. “I can’t seem to get my head around the fact
there’s only going to be two of us, tonight. I mean, look at this! Four tin mugs, four chocolate bars, eight
biscuits… I’m…”

“Sirius would be here in a second, if you asked him,” James said before he could stop himself. “You know
he would. Whatever is going on between you two, he… he’d come for this. He came last month…”

“He thought he was right, last month,” Remus sighed. “He thought I was the spy. He came to keep an eye
on me. He won’t come tonight.”

”Remy…you seem so sad,” James sighed. “Look I know Sirius messed up and he should be the one to…
but can’t you just ask him? He will come. I know it. And frankly I’m worried about you. You seem…”

Remus closed his eyes and didn’t speak for a moment. Finally he opened them again and tossed all four
chocolate bars back into the bag. “The wolf is old even if I’m not, and I’m so tired. That’s all it is.”

“Stop saying stuff like that,” James grunted. “About being old. This Fenrir bloke is older than you, isn’t he?
And he’s been a werewolf longer?”

Remus laughed sharply again at that. “He’d have to be…”

“He’s the one who bit you?” James asked; it was something he had long suspected.

Remus nodded but did not look at him. “Yep. I’ve got quite the pedigree.”

“He’s still around, is all I’m saying,” James replied. “Although, I’ve always wanted to ask…”
“Then just ask.”

“Remus, how did he do it? You are a completely different consciousness at the moon. You couldn’t
formulate and execute a revenge plan to bite, but not kill, a small child, if you tried. How did he pull it off?”

Remus shrugged. “Don’t know. Maybe he didn’t actually intend the werewolf-son as a punishment bit?
Maybe he just meant to flat out murder me, just pointed himself at me and let himself turn? Maybe when it
comes to Greyback, the wolf is more merciful than the man? I… I don’t know Jamie.”

“I’m not asking just to be nosy, you know,” James replied embracing him from behind, and noticing with
some distress that Remus now flinched at his touch. “If we could figure out how he managed it, maybe we
could use that knowledge to help you, and the others. Maybe I could…”

“Could pass it along to the potion-masters in the secret Lycanthropy Research Division you had your Dad
set up at Sleakeasy’s?”

James blinked, in spite of himself. “You aren’t supposed to know about that.”

Remus snorted. “Your Dad holds his firewhisky even worse than you do. Last Christmas, he was so far in
the fire-whiskey bottle that he kept telling me about progress in the FLP department, and tapping the side
of his nose.”

“Ahh, yeah, that would do it,” James laughed. “I didn’t make him do it, by the way. Mum did. And she
didn’t make him either, actually. Dad was only mad he didn’t think of it himself….”

“You definitely named it, though,” Remus replied, finally making eye contact with James, while pointing his
wand at him, jokingly. “FLP, indeed”
James checked the clock and held out the port key, which was an old can opener. Remus grabbed the
other side, and a moment later, they were standing in the frigid, salty wind of the outer Hebrides.

“There’s some shelter, behind those shrubs,” Remus yelled into the wind, and they settled there to wait
until moonrise, slowly chewing on the extra chocolate bars. “I can’t believe I have to take my kit off in this
weather!” Remus called “Remind me to have words with Ms Evans!”

James snorted. “Imagine Wormtail in this weather! He’d blow away.” Then his face changed. “I’m not quite
ready to give up on him. I mean yeah, it looks bad, but there’s more than one reason someone might
want to avoid taking veritaserum in a room full of people.”

”Like declaring your utmost loyalty to the man who unceremoniously dumped you?” Remus asked lightly.
“Like also mentioning your mum as if you didn’t know she was six months in the ground?”

There wasn’t time though, and so James transformed without offering any comfort and lay down in the
brackish heather, the stag pointedly averted its eyes, staring off down towards the beach, while Remus
tidily disrobed. While he wrapped himself in an old blanket and then folded his clothes into a neat pile
before storing them, along with his wand, into the enchanted bag for safety.

“May I just remind you that it is very cold?” Remus choked out, about his predicament, as if James hadn’t
seen him a naked a hundred times already, just as the effects of moonrise came upon him.

The stag did the closest thing he could to laughing, which was a sort of snicker-sneeze, but before even
that was fully out, Remus lost control of himself and began to scream.

The stag flinched. James had thought he would get use to this, some day. Used to his friend screaming,
as his bones and sinew stretched and snapped. But if he ever would, it had not happened yet. It still felt
exactly like seeing and hearing one of his favourite people being tortured. Sometimes, even a
photograph of a fullish moon would make James feel tight chested and panicky. For now, he tried to bury
his cervine head in the heather to avoid watching.

At last, the screaming stopped, and James poked his head out again. The yellow eyes of the wolf met the
brown eyes of the stag.
And then, slowly, and with an ugly grace that James would remember for the rest of his life, the wolf
turned away from the deer. It turned to face its own back haunches, then savagely took an enormous bite
out of its own thigh, and ripped out an enormous, dripping chunk of its own flesh.

And James learned that a deer throat can scream.

Chapter 3
Notes:
Potential triggers around smoking, injury (mild gore), self harm, violence against children,

Chapter Text
He lit a new cigarette with the dying ember of the last. Banished though he may be, Sirius Black was not
about to sleep through a full moon. He hadn’t for years. He was wakeful and restless, itching in his
human skin, almost as if Padfoot’s fur was trying to grow through it. His memory, which it seemed had
inherited his mother’s cruelty, had snagged him on Remus’s words from the veritaserum affair.

All I want is to get to the one that will kill me….

Merlin, let it not be tonight.

And yet, the moon was cruel. Scant minutes after it rose, a familiar blue stag-shaped patronus burst into
the air before him.

“Bring dittany, get the location from Lily. Hurry.”

He barely remembered to put the cigarette out.

There was no need to waste time with Lily. She had owled over a map of the island she’d sent them to,
earlier that afternoon. Not a word written; Sirius suspected that Lily had a great many words she wished
to have with him, but she’d shared none. Just a map with a circle.

The dittany, though, he had none brewed. Just a miniature bush of it growing in a window for
emergencies.

Emergencies like this.

He grabbed a large sprig, and the map, and apparated with a crack. Technically, he splinched, but only
just. A section of the end of his pony tail drifted down onto the floor for him to find later. He would picture
himself splinching off the back of his head when he did so. He would feel like he would have deserved it.

Landing in the Hebrides, Sirius only allowed himself to feel the wind for less than a second. It was a little
frightening, though, how much effort it took to not run, suicidally, towards the injured werewolf, without
bothering to transform. His heart was screaming for Remus, and far less terrified of the wolf than of
James’s message.

Bring dittany. Hurry.

The cold grew less, Padfoot’s coat was thick, but the iron smell on the wind grew infinitely worse. He
snatched the fallen sprig of dittany with his jaws and galloped toward the huddled figures in the distance.
The deer was scented with panic, the wolf with blood. The hateful moon lit the scene. A decent chunk of
the wolf’s right flank and thigh were just…gone. He translated the image onto Remus’s human form. It
was the location of the original bite; Greyback’s bite. The bite scar that had twisted, strangely inelastic, as
the boy grew around it, but that remained with him always.
Padfoot whined. The wolf turned to him, eyes dull and then turned away again, head resting listlessly on
the ground. The dog worried the wound with his nose, and lapped at it, anxiously. Dittany from the
dropped sprig still stung his tongue and the inside of his nose. He tasted blood that wasn’t his.

A hoof connected gently with the dog’s flank and Sirius remembered the deer, and James within it. He
looked closer and, even in the moonlight, he could see James right behind the dark orb-like eyes, the face
of the deer straining to convey emotions that a deer face could not convey. The deer took a bite of the
fallen dittany branch, chewed quickly, and then spat the resulting mush into the wound. Wearing canine
jaws, unable to grind and chew, Padfoot could only watch.

The blood was not spurting, but it was oozing, and pooling in the shredded cavity of flesh the bite, diluting
the dittany to a concentration below true usefulness. It might be the location, free from the large blood
vessels found on the inside of the thigh that saved the wolf- might save Remus- from exsanguination.

Sirius burned to know what had happened, but neither could dog ask, nor deer nor wolf answer. There
was nothing to do but awkwardly manipulate the, by now, filthy jacket they were using to add pressure to
the wound, and wait for morning. And so, dog and stag waited, comforted only by the pounding of the
wolf’s heart, of its continuing ragged breath, the warmth of its hulking frame.

At last, the sky bled red and the moon fell. The low growl of the wolf became shrieks. Flesh crushed back
into itself, bones stretched and cracked anew.

And then, it was him again, naked and screaming. His Remus.

James was human already, finally safe to render aid with human hands. “Remus, Remus, hang on…”
They made no move to dress him in the few moments remaining before Lily’s port key activated, James
fussing and gagging at the wound, Sirius still a dog. And Remus, once no longer screaming, fell limp and
shocky, heart fluttering too fast. To become human, Sirius would have to give up that the sound of that
heart beat. He was no longer welcome to press his ear against Remus’s chest, to wrap Remus’s limbs
around him. He was banished by his own words. By his allegations. By the slammed door.

“You’ll need hands to hold the bloody portkey, Pads,” James said. “Hurry!”

With reluctance, Sirius forced himself human-shaped, Remus’s heartbeat fading from his range of
hearing, and reached for the port key. As he did so, the fingers of Remus’s free hand twitched, but in what
emotion, Sirius was unable to say. And anyway, nearly at once, the portkey took them.

“Lily!” James called, as they landed, unnecessarily as it turned out, Lily was waiting for them, surrounded
by bandages and a veritable army of little potion bottles. James must have risked human form long
enough to send a patronus to both of them.

Lily was the closest thing to a Healer among the lot of them. She had won a prestigious apprenticeship to
a master potion-maker, before the war had swallowed her future whole. But she, on seeing the extent of
Remus’s injury, quailed. “Saint Mungo’s…”

“No,” Remus replied softly, but firmly. “They’ll put me on the registry. I’ll never get work, then…”

Lily glanced anxiously at Sirius. Her eyes seemed to be pleading something, but he couldn’t even begin to
guess what. St Mungo’s would recognise this as a werewolf bite, they would register him. There was
nothing Sirius could do about either thing.

“If it’s just the work thing, I can talk to Dad,” James whispered gently. “A job at Sleakeasy…”
“With my potion skills?” Remus rasped, clearly trying for a sarcastic drawl, but failing badly. “Jamie,
please. St Mungo’s can’t help me, anyway…”

Lily grimaced. “Remus… you’ve torn out the middle of your vastus lateralis. Most of the ileotibial tract is
gone…”

“And going to St Mungo’s wont change that, Lily. Please…”

Lily looked over at James, who shrugged helplessly. Sirius just felt sick.

Remus himself broke the silence at last. “If it’s alright, could you help me get inside? June or not, the suns
barely up, and it’s cold out here in the buff…”

Reanimated, James rushed to help him, leaving Sirius and Lily to watch, numb, in the little front garden.

“What’s going to happen?” Sirius asked her softly.

Lily sighed “Walking with a permanent limp…”

Sirius flinched.
“… is probably the best case scenario,” she finished flatly. “That’s if we can prevent an infection. If there
isn’t severe chronic pain. If he walks at all, if…”

“Stop!” Sirius interrupted sharply. “I’m sorry I asked…”

“Sirius, I…”

He didn’t hear whatever she had been going to say. With a crack, he apparated away.

Remus was trying, very hard, not to think about the agony in his right leg and moreover, what it meant for
him moving forward. He ruthlessly banished any thought of the future from his mind. Any thought of
self-pity.

You knew this was coming, he told himself. This or something like it. You knew, one day, the wolf would
do something like this. You are lucky your leg is still there. That it didn’t go for your face, your eyes. Don’t
make a fuss now, don’t…

But thoughts kept creeping in.

The memory of coming back to himself, and realising that the pain in his leg wasn’t fading, but was in fact
growing worse. The shock of looking down at the crater in his leg. The second or two of denial that this
was his leg, his body, that this was happening to him. When Lily had told him that one of his muscles was
practically gone, that a part of his body had been taken away from him, not just for a night once a month,
but forever. That Sirius had come. Had come, but had refused to so much as hold his hand.
He looked to the door as James lowered him off his shoulder, onto the Potter’s cream coloured sofa,
looked for his lover - former lover- coming through the door. Fruitlessly, it turned out, as nobody followed
Lily. That crack he’d heard. It had been Sirius leaving him to it.

Right.

Stop it, he told himself. Remember what your father said. Remember that there’s nothing more tedious to
others than self pity.

“Lily, I couldn’t trouble you for a glass of water, could I?” He asked, to explain his longing glances at the
door. “I’m suddenly rather thirsty.”

“Probably because you tried to bleed to death.”Lily came in hot. She was exhausted and frightened.
Remus could smell it on her. He’d frightened her. She was eight months pregnant now, and he’d
frightened her.

“I’m sorry,” Remus said, and meant it, even if he wasn’t sure quite what he was apologising for. Being a
werewolf, he supposed. For allowing her to become friends with him, when he knew a day like this, or
something very like it, had always been coming.

“James sent a patronus,” Lily sniffed. “I thought… Remy I thought…”

“How on earth did you apply dittany as a stag?” Remus asked James, because he couldn’t bear to let her
finish. “Chew up some stalks and spit the cud in the wound?”
“Spot on,” James replied mirthlessly.

Lily didn’t laugh either.

“Come on, folks, cheer up,” Remus tried. “We all knew this was coming. It was only a matter of time
before the wolf did some real damage. This is… this is par for the course, Lily. It’s… it’s fine Prongs… I’ll
be alright… I’ll…”

He stopped then, because he didn’t know what to say. “I’ll…”

“You could have died…” James said. “I thought you were going to bleed out, before morning. There was
blood all over me. All over my hooves and pelt. And I thought I was going to have to stand there, covered
in your blood, and watch you die. And that it would be my fault.”

“You won’t convince me that this is a deer bite Prongs,” Remus replied, gesturing at his leg. “And could
someone please get me a blanket? The wound is quite enough of an eyeful, to inflict on Lily, without
throwing my bollocks into the mix…”

“The veritaserum was my fault,” James replied, too loudly. “I just stood there and let that happen, and the
very next moon you all but killed yourself.”

“The wolf all but killed itself,” Remus corrected gently. “And it wasn’t your fault Prongs. It wasn’t.”
“Publicly interrogating you like that, was wrong.”

“I volunteered James.”

“The whole damn business was just…” James shouted, glaring at him. “Why aren’t you angry? You are
scraping to make ends meet, and the order could have paid you well with what all that veritaserum cost!
Could have fed you for what a month? Two?”

Remus snorted. “Six, probably. How much do you spend on food Jamie? Do you two just gorge on
oysters and caviar when I’m not around, or what?”

“Stop deflecting,” Lily interjected tightly. “We are trying to talk to you Remus.”

“There’s nothing to say, Lily,” Remus replied. “The wolf takes. This time, it took a chunk of me. One day, it
will take all of me. There’s no changing that.”

“There could be,” James said quietly. “The FLP division at Sleakeasy… they are making some progress.
Not a lot, but… some… there’s… you can’t give up, Remus. I won’t have it. I might have let you down with
the veritaserum…”

“James, you didn’t…”

“… But I won’t give up. And I need you not to, either, Remus! Don’t you get it? We lost Pete! We can’t
lose you, too. I can’t lose you. Sprog is going to need his Uncle Moony. You hear me? I’m not bringing a
child into this world, who isn’t going to have an Uncle Moony.”
“James…” Remus began, but his friend had turned away from him.

“I’m going to get Poppy,” he said. “She’ll know what to do about stopping an infection.” He left the room
without looking back.

Remus looked at the ground. “I don’t control the wolf, Lily,” he sighed. “I don’t… I can’t control any of this.
I didn’t choose any of this.”

Lily stroked his hair gently. “I’ll get you that water. When Poppy gets here, she might not let you have
anything by mouth. You know how she can be.”

Remus swallowed. He had to know. “Lily, did Sirius leave?”

Lily stopped on her way to the door but didn’t turn. “Yes, luv. I’m sorry.”

“Oh.”

“Come in, Mr Potter.”

James had been to the headmaster’s office more than a few times, mostly when Minerva McGonagall had
thrown up her hands, sick of dealing with him. Dumbledore had never seemed particularly angry on those
occasions, though. He’d let James and Sirius get away with murder. Almost literally, in Sirius’s case,
considering the business with Snape. He’s been strangely lenient, in fact, James thought now, viewing
things through the eyes of a parent. Perhaps he’d been recruiting them, even then.

“Care for a lemon drop, Mr Potter? No? Very well then. How may I be of assistance?”

“It’s Remus. He’s injured himself, badly. Obviously, after what happened he couldn’t have gone back to
Greyback’s park, anyway, but I assume that you were planning to send him to another one. But… he
can’t. He’s hurt. The packs are nomadic, and Remus can’t walk with this injury. Not for a long time. You
can send Pomfrey to examine him, if you don’t believe me. He needs to be with his family. With us. He
can help the Order some other way.”

Dumbledore frowned. “On the contrary, Mr Potter. I had rather hoped to send Remus back to Greyback.
The pack had no way to know it was an extraction, rather than just an Auror raid. No way to be sure,
anyway.”

James blinked. “But, we told you they took his wand. They had him manacled. In silver. They were hurting
him.”

Dumbledore paused, and James felt naked under his stare. “A risk perhaps, but a calculated one. I need
eyes in that pack. But as Mr Lupin is injured, I shall have to put thought into alternate eyes. Your
information about Mr Black was particularly interesting. A dog might go where a man cannot…”

“What’s so special about Greyback’s pack?” James replied. “Why do we need those werewolves so badly.
A few dozen people? Sick, poor and malnourished ones at that. Why do we need them so badly?”
“We don’t,” Dumbledore replied, calm, and reached for a lemon drop. “Are you sure I can’t tempt you?
No? You are thinking of this as a war, Mr Potter. Thinking of absolute numbers. Try to think of it instead as
a coup d’etat. Now, imagine you are Voldemort. Your ideology isn’t especially populist. After all, the
sacred twenty-eight and blood purists are outnumbered among the wider wizarding population. So,
without numbers, how would you seize control?”

James thought for a moment. “Manipulation. Fear.”

“Exactly. What if, instead of just a victim of a grudge, Lyall Lupin was a test case? A deliberate cautionary
tale. We need strong bloodlines to protect us from the monsters. Mighty houses that can control the
werewolf packs and the other terrors that bump in the night. If you were Voldemort, what would you do?”

James thought for a moment. “I’d recruit werewolves, promise them something. It wouldn’t have to be
much, the way they are treated, would it? I’d start with isolated attacks. Small, but big enough to make the
papers. Get people nervous. Then, something horrific. Something that demands change…”

“Something like attacking a station full of children and their parents?”

“I’m sorry?”

“We have been hearing whispers from the centaurs. A turning point in this struggle coming at the end of
July 1980.”

“What sort of turning point?”

Dumbledore frowned. “I don’t know. What I do know is that the Hogwarts Express will be carrying children
home from school on the 28th of July. The night of the next full moon. It might also interest you to know
that a peculiar number of parents, all from Slytherin, are opting to collecting their children from here in
Hogsmeade this year, rather than Kings Cross. A group skiing holiday in New Zealand, I’m told.”

“Oh.” James shuddered.

“As you can see, I needed eyes, in the werewolf pack, more than ever, this…”

“Change the date,” James interrupted. “Close the school early. Have the kids travel on a different day.”

“I will have to, I imagine” Dumbledore replied. “Although, I must confess I’d hoped to avoid it. Because, as
you would know, there have been sporadic werewolf attacks over the last few months. If I change the
public date for the Hogwarts express, even a very dim reporter will guess why. And terror will be
increased, anyway. Werewolf stigma increased.”

“You’d protect the kids though,” James faltered.

“I’d lose a pawn instead of a knight, yes,” Dumbledore sighed. “But, I’d hoped to avoid it.”

James frowned. He thought of his baby. “This isn’t a game, Professor.”

“A figure of speech only, Mr Potter,” Dumbledore replied calmly, taking another lemon drop for himself.
“Do excuse an old man. Now, I’m afraid I have an appointment with a Ms Trelawny, in Hogsmeade, this
evening. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“No,” James replied. “I don’t think there is.”

Lily stirred carefully, and watched the potion turn a rich cerulean blue. Of everything to do with being a
witch, excepting of course, her husband and friends, Lily most loved potion making. She loved her fat,
little caldron. She loved the warmth radiating from her stove. She loved the mystery and beauty of two
things mixed together becoming a third. The feeling that she was connected to generations of witches, all
standing before cauldrons, brewing for their families.

And the potions themselves! Spells made manifest, frozen in time, poured into little bottles. Potion making
was beautiful. And even though it made her think of Severus Snape, she still loved it.

Through the open doorway, she heard the living room fire crackle, heard James flu’ing back from
Hogwarts. “I’m in here, love!” she called, gently caressing the beautiful, blue potion with her ladle. “Making
some contagio exilium for Remus,” she dropped her voice to an appropriate volume, as James swiftly
entered the room.

“Looking beautiful, Lilybear,” James replied giving her a swift kiss on the cheek.

“It is a pretty potion, isn’t it?” Lily replied, fondly.

“I meant you, not the blasted potion,” James replied, sounding exasperated. “Although… actually it is a
pretty one, isn’t it? Sort of looks like you’ve got the Aegean Sea right there in your cauldron.”

“Oh stop,” Lily whined. “You’re making me want to go see Greece, and we can’t.”

James smiled cheekily. “We could, you know! Forget all this, run away to the Mediterranean…”

“But the war…” Lily snorted. “The baby.”

“Who cares? And bring the baby…”

“Remus.”

And with the name of his friend, James buoyancy ebbed out of him at once. “Ahh… yeah. How is he?”

Lily frowned. “He’s spiked a fever. I’m concerned. Hence the Aegean Sea here. How was Dumbledore?
How’d he take it?”

“Honestly Lil, I’m not sure,” James sighed. “I actually feel like I know that man less and less with each
passing day.”
Lily nodded. “You aren’t the only one. There are whispers. A lot of the Order are pretty upset about the
veritaserum business. Molly Prewitt, excuse me Weasley, is too scared to breastfeed her baby, after being
made to take it. In case it’s in her milk. She’s had to switch to formula and can barely afford it. Gideon is
furious. Hestia said that she’d never been so humiliated in her life. Caradoc is talking about moving to
Tibet again. And that’s not even mentioning poor April.”

“You think the old man has overplayed his hand this time?”

“That’s just it, James. Don’t you see? With an enemy like Voldemort, Dumbledore can’t overplay his hand.
We have to follow him no matter how far he goes, because the alternative is so much worse. What did he
say, anyway?”

James shifted and stuck his hands in his pockets. “He’s worried about the kids. An attack.”

“Moody said something about that. The empty seat on the Hogwarts board?”

“No? This was a werewolf attack, on the Hogwarts Express at Kings Cross. Don’t worry though, they are
closing the school a day early, before the moon. What’s your thing?”

Lily grimaced. “Lucius Malfoy, making a play for the seat on the Hogwarts board. His whole platform is
cutting the teaching of ‘One Source Theory’ from the curriculum.”

“What’s that when it’s at home?”

“Well it’s actually an obscure academic discipline, not taught at Hogwarts anyway. But what Malfoy is
really talking about, is the idea that magic in Muggleborns comes from the same source as it does, in the
ancient families. That my magic is equal to yours, basically. Malfoy says it’s only a theory, and that
teaching it to kids is muggleborn propaganda. Only I bet that, in private, he doesn’t use the word
‘muggleborn’.”

James whistled. “So what is the order doing to keep Malfoy off the board?”

“Nothing,” Lily replied shortly. “Moody says we are to busy with important things to mess with it…”

“Think you are over stirring your potion,-love…”

Lily looked down and saw that indeed her potion was looking grey and over-agitated. She saved it quickly
with a few drops of mermaid tears. “Thanks…”

“I could run?” James suggested. “Or get Mum to..?”

“Run where?”

“For the seat on the school board. Oppose Malfoy?”

“It’s a nice idea, Jamie-love, but we actually are too busy. Between the Order and the baby, now caring for
Remus, on top of our actual job? We have our hands full. It seems a shame, but…”
“Malfoy’s just one seat. Just one man, even if he is Voldemorts man. How much harm can he really do?”

Lily smiled. “You are probably right. I’m sure wiser heads will prevail. No one really believes muggleborn
magic is degenerate any more. That we cause squibs. Malfoy won’t get far.”

James kissed her forehead affectionately. “And we’ll have eleven years to clean up Malfoy’s mess before
our Sprog has to go. Can you imagine Lily? In a little over eleven years we’ll be standing at King’s Cross.
Our sprog with a owl in one hand and a racing-broom in the other.”

”Brooms are banned for First Years…”

James cackled sinisterly. “Outrageous rule, that. Maybe, I will run for the board...”

Lily laughed, and gave the potion for Remus a final stir.

“He’ll be okay, love.”

“Sprog or Remus.”

“Well, both. But I meant Remus. He’ll be okay. You’ll see.”

Chapter 4
Notes:
Very much beware the tags. This chapter includes graphic violence, physical and sexual, as well as
descriptions of injuries. It’s in the form of memories and hallucinations, but it is still graphic. It’s mostly in
the middle section (marked by line breaks) and this section is written to be skippable. There is also
discussion of injuries and implied medical procedures including the possibility of limb loss.

There are references/implied physical and sexual violence in the third section

The first section has some potentially triggering material around slut-shaming.

Chapter Text
James was meeting Sirius in a Muggle pub, a few streets away from Diagon Alley, in the hope that they
wouldn’t be overheard by agents of either side. He was wearing a Lily-approved outfit, after his first - a
light knit sweater vest, board shorts, rugby socks and flip flops- had his wife collapse into peals of
laughter.

He managed to order them each beer and chips, without drawing too much attention to himself, and then
he settled into the booth opposite his brother, his best friend, with whom he was just about as angry as he
had ever been.

“How’s Remus?” Sirius asked at once. “Is he…”

“No. I’m not going to discuss Remus,” James replied flatly. “If you want to know how he is, you can just…
fucking turn up for him.”

Sirius lowered his eyes. “He doesn’t want me there.”

“He absolutely does,” James replied, tiredly. “But I’ve already told you, I’m not going to discuss Remus
with you. So if that’s all you wanted…”
“It isn’t,” Sirius sighed. “I wanted to talk about Peter. About the OOP. About the veritaserum. I just… i just I
miss you, Jamie.”

“I haven’t gone anywhere, Sirius… I…”

“Do you really think I don’t want to just be there, like nothing happened? Do you honestly think I’d rather
be anywhere other than Remus’s bedside right now? That this isn’t killing me?”

James glared at the bowl of chips. “Then why don’t you…”

“I’m bad for him, Jamie. This just… this just proves it. Poor man already has one lifelong curse to live
with. The last thing he needs is another. I’ve told you…”

“We are talking about Remus again,” James interrupted flatly.

Sirius sighed. “Yeah. Sorry, mate. I… Have you heard from Pete?”
“Nothing. Not an owl feather. You?”

“Nothing. Godric, Jamie. He’s fucking guilty, isn’t he? If he needed to run out on the veritaserum for some
other reason, then he would have reached out to one of us by now. Surely?”

“Part of me was so sure he’d come for the moon,” James replied. “I couldn’t even remember the last time
he’d missed one, and he loves Remus so much. I was so sure. Remus even packed biscuits for him.”

Sirius took a long swig of his beer. “Do you think if Pete had been there, it might have made a difference?
Stopped the wolf from…”

“Sirius, I don’t…”

“Do you think if I’d been there, it would have made a difference?”

“Sirius, please, I can barely sleep because I can’t stop thinking about it. Please don’t make me…”

They sat in silence for a while.

“April,” James said at last. “I think we should do something about April. At least get her moved to house
arrest, or a tracing spell, or something. Moody can’t keep her locked up forever.”

Sirius took another long swig of beer. “He certainly thinks he can. I was down there the other day - just
some paperwork about that accidental magic on Cathedral street - and, if anything, Moody’s even more
suspicious of her, not less.”

“Why? She’s just a kid…”

“According to Moody, she’s had no visitors. No relatives, not even the father of the baby, whoever that is.
Moody seems to think that proves he’s right. A lone wolf, he called her, of all things…” Sirius flinched
then, at his own words. No matter how hard they tried not to talk about Remus…

“Not a single visitor?” James asked quickly. “Poor kid. Who is the father of that baby, by the way?”

Sirius took another long drink of beer. “She won’t say, which, unfortunately, is doing nothing to quell
Moody’s suspicions.”

“You must have heard rumours,” James prodded his friend, gently. “You always do…” Short of a quidditch
match, if anything could quickly lift Sirius’s spirits, it was a bit of idle gossip.
And Sirius’s face did lift, slightly. “Well, actually, it’s interesting. April’s half-blood, as you know, and I’m
sure you’ve noticed there’s been something of a rush for the sacred twenty-eight to publicly associate with
half-bloods…”

“I hadn’t noticed, actually…”

“Oh, shush, of course you have. Raynaud Bulstrode finally acknowledging his half-blood mistress? The
big fuss when that lesser Greengrass girl got engaged? Even last year, her mother was doing anything
she could to break them up. This year? Giant engagement party! It’s one huge game of ‘some of my best
friends are half-bloods’.”

“If you say so…”

“They’re hedging their bets. Don’t you see?” Sirius continued urgently. “The neutral big families. Politely
applauding Malfoys and Rosiers, in the Wizengamot, but also allowing themselves to be publicly linked to
half bloods, undesirable, but not too undesirable. They are waiting to see which way the wind blows.”

“And what does this have to do with..?”

“… a disgraced, pregnant teenager? Yes. So anyway, the rumor is that she’s pregnant to her boyfriend,
but no one knows who that is. The rumor though, is that he is a member of a big family, so exactly the sort
who would welcome a link to a half-blood about now. But… nothing! Poor kid hasn’t had a single visitor,
even…”
James shook his head and had another sip of beer. Sirius was near impossible to follow when he got
going with his high-society nonsense, but at least he was smiling. “So, it’s not an heir to one of the sacred
twenty-eight?”

“No! Jamie, pay attention. It is someone of the twenty-eight, but not one of the houses that are hedging
their bets. Ergo, Miss April Featherstone got herself knocked up by a Slytherin Blue Blood.”

“No wonder she won’t say,” James replied lightly. Then he felt bad. “Poor kid…”

Sirius snorted and waggled his eyebrows. “She who gaggeth for the snake, falls by the snake.”

James laughed. He couldn’t help it. He laughed so hard he almost missed the roar of confusion among
the muggle patrons as a shining patronus bear galloped into the pub.

“James come back, the fever!”

James saw the colour drain from Sirius’s face. If Lily risked sending a Patronus to a room full of muggles,
that meant…
“Go,” Sirius swallowed. “I’ll obliviate them. Go!”

James frowned. “You can’t be serious! You aren’t coming? Sirius, if you don’t come now, how will you
ever…”

“I’m coming. I’ll come straight after… I… of course I’m coming.”

James didn’t wait.

The fever settled into Remus’s bones. And with it, it brought ghosts. With it, it brought Fenrir.

It wasn’t only Fenrir. Some of the ghosts were beloved. His mother was there, Hope, wearing that blue
dress she had, with the white polka dots, the same dress everyone’s mother seemed to have. She wore
blue and white, and she smelled like the cigarettes she chained smoked. She had started smoking two
weeks after Remus’s first transformation. Two weeks before his second one. And she had finished
smoking the same day lung cancer took her mind away.

“Do you remember, cariad?” she said in her soft, plummy voice. “Do you remember when you were little
and you were going to be a polar explorer? Were going to escape the moon by hiding in summer days
six-months long. Then race to the other pole in a hot air balloon? Do you remember?”
Remus did remember the story, and he remembered her voice telling it, and she was six months rotting in
the ground, and still the word cariad, in the voice of any welsh woman, made him weep.

Hope was there.

The doctors were there, too, or one of them, standing in place for them all. The worst one. Some
nonsense about colloidal silver, and when taking it orally hadn’t helped, the enemas had started, Lyall
pinning him to the examination table, the doctor’s hand pressing on his hip…

Fenrir’s hands pressing on his hips…

Fenrir was always there. Sometimes, just in the corner, licking his lips, palming his groin. Leering at
Remus, at Hope, at Lily, and Poppy, when they bustled about the room using words he didn’t understand.
When Fenrir came to the bed, Remus would beg Lily and Poppy to leave. He didn’t want them to see.

Scouring agony and sticky humiliation. Fenrir in the pack, in the cave, Remus’s wand gone, his check-in
date passed. His mouth gagged open, with yet more silver. Each swallow burned his throat.

“You’ll only ever eat what you lick off the cocks you are offered, puppy,” Fenrir growled. “And what you
suck out of them. You’ll be too hungry to spit me out, before long, you’ll see.”
“I’m not there,” Remus replied. “I’m not there, I’m not there. Lily comes with soup and broth. I’m not there
anymore, not there.”

“Remy, hang on… Remy…” Lily is now James. James in the cave, James on the island, James in the
bedroom. James with his big, brown, deer eyes. “Remy, you’re safe. You’re in my house. Godric’s
Hollow.”

Remus was in Godric’s Hollow. And on a Hebridean beach. A cave in Yorkshire. A quack’s office in
Somerset. And his childhood bedroom.

“Jamie, the chains,” he whispers “Please.” The burns on his wrists, festering. The maggots hatching.
Linear bruises, each two parallel lines, bruises he’d thought wilted, bloomed again across his back. Pain
forking through him. Pain that didn’t seem to properly hurt, pain that flickered like electric light.

“If I cast cruciatus while I fuck you, puppy,” Fenrir asked, “Do I feel the pain, or do you just convulse
around me nicely?”

“Don’t,” Remus begged. “Don’t tell them. Please.”

“Don’t tell who, Remy?” Lily asked. “I don’t understand.”

Hope chain-smoked, and stared out the window. Lily begged James to tell her what he’d seen in
Yorkshire. Fenrir slid his hands down from Remus’s hips.

Remus begged for Sirius, like a child.

Poppy peered down at him. “It’s blood poisoning, his organs are being damaged. His body is shutting
down. If this doesn’t work soon, it will be St Mungo’s or the leg. We’ll lose him otherwise…”

“The leg,” said James

“St Mungo’s” said Sirius.

Wait, Sirius was here? Sirius! Sirius!

The shadows moved around him. Sirius didn’t appear. The heel of his left foot dug into the mattress as he
compulsively bent and straightened his knee. His right leg felt strange, hot and overfilled like a balloon.

“We promised…” Lily’s voice came.

Fenrir walked to the window, caught some of the ash from the end of a cigarette, and then forcefully
wrenched Hope’s long, brown ponytail. Ground the ash into her eyes.

“Stop! Don’t hurt her! Please!” Remus screamed.

Hope vanished in smoke, and Poppy appeared. “It’s okay, Remus love. Hang on, now.”

Voices murmured in the background. “…can’t use silver, obviously. Gold, might work…”

“Poppy?”

Fenrir walked up behind her, and slashed her throat with a white handled knife.

Remus screamed, and tried to claw at the visions, at his face, at his eyes.

“Poppy?!”
Poppy became James, who held Remus’s right hand between both of his. And his left hand… holding his
left had was…

“Sirius?” Remus wet his lips, they were so dry that they were splitting. “But you left… you left me…”

Sirius kissed his hand. “It’s alright love. I’m here. I’m right here. Poppy, can he hear me?”

“I think he’s in and out,” Poppy, appearing at the edge of his vision again, said through her somehow
uncut throat.

“The infection isn’t contagious, is it? It can’t hurt Lily and the baby?”

“It’s his own natural bacteria. Just they’ve gotten where they aren’t supposed to be. Growing out of
control. His immune system is weak from the moon…”

“Fenrir killed you,” Remus whispered to Poppy. To Hope.

“He’s delirious…”
“Don’t tell them. Don’t tell them, please.”

“Don’t tell them. Don’t tell them, please.”

Mary set some tea down for James. “He keeps saying that, poor lamb. Has he forgotten we all know
about the bite now? That we didn’t abandon him? Well… most of us, anyway.”

Sirius felt her eyes lock onto him like vices. “He doesn’t want me, Mary. He’d only send me away!”

“Well good!” Mary shouted, slamming her hand down on the bedside table, making James’s tea rattle and
jump. “He should get to kick you to the curb, if that’s what he wants. My point is that it isn’t up to you,
Sirius Black. He bloody well deserves you crawling back to him, on your knees, and you’ll do it, if I have to
cut your tendons and kick your arse along, the whole way, myself.”

Remus jumped at the sound, arching his back, and digging into the mattress again with his good leg.
“Jamie, don’t tell them, please.”
“Remus love, we know,” Mary soothed. “We still love you, pet. I, for one, refuse to be afraid of someone
who folds his socks. You don’t have to worry, love.”

“Jamie, please… I can’t bear it, don’t tell him.” Remus replied, eyes glassy and wet.

For his part, James looked ashen. “I promised. I promised him.” Then he crumpled, under Sirius’s stare.
“He really never told you?”

“Told me what?”

“I thought he just needed to tell you himself. I really thought he’d…”

“What are you both talking about?” Mary demanded.

“Yorkshire,” James whispered. “The pack…”

Sirius ruffled. “If you mean that he cheated on me, then I figured it out myself. Undercover or not, I have a
right to be…”
James eyes went wide. “Oh no! No no no…” he cradled his head in his free palm, refusing, even now, to
let go Remus’s hand. “Sirius, you didn’t…”

Mary had two hands free, and she used them to box Sirius’s ears.

“Ow! What the fuck did I do to deserve that?” Sirius yelled.

“Thinking Remus would cheat on you.” Mary roared. “Do you think he was up there on some sort of
bath-house holiday? Dorcas told me what it was like up there. Starving people, kids with scabies and lice,
Remus roughed up in some sort of scuffle…”

James burst into noisy tears at her words.

Sirius stared at him in shock, and Mary only managed to pull herself together a little faster.

“Jamie-luv, what is it?” She asked, coming around behind him again and rubbing his shoulders. “Should I
get Lily?”
“I see him, every time I close my eyes,” James sobbed. “In that cave? I found him first and I… I had my
cloak with me. I didn’t want anyone else to see. He didn’t want anyone else to see.”

Mary frowned. “Dorcas said he was roughed up. That his wrists were bad, from the manacles. Burns. If
that’s what she did see, what didn’t she see?”

James just shook his head. “I promised.” Then he turned and stared straight into Sirius’s eyes. “You
accused him of cheating to his face, didn’t you? That’s what the big fight was. The breakup. I swear to
Merlin, Sirius. Only you could get this so fucked up!”

“He wouldn’t touch me,” Sirius tried to explain. “The look in his eyes when we were together. The most I
could get was an almost fully clothed fuck against a wall, and afterwards he’d…”

“Oh no…” Mary’s voice was flat.

James sobbed harder. “I promised him. I shouldn’t have done that. I knew he’d need help. I knew he
shouldn’t try to cope alone. But, I thought he’d talk to me, you know? And, you didn’t see him. Every time
I close my eyes. I… and the sounds he made, when I touched him. The fear. I’ll never forget… I… And
the moons just kept fucking coming. Not even a month off, a month to breathe. They just kept fucking
coming.”

Realisation came, with the weight of a corpse falling from the sky. Sirius dropped Remus’s hand without
meaning to, as he collapsed from his chair to the floor. He wanted strangely, and for all the world, to crawl
under the bed and refuse to come out. Refuse, forever, to come out. It felt like he had forgotten how to
breathe, and then, like his lungs had forgotten how to accept air, because as fast as he breathed, as he
pushed and pulled air, quicker and quicker, the feeling of suffocation only became heavier and heavier
and heavier and…

“Poppy!” Mary shrieked, because she was crying now too, she was hugging James from behind. “Sirius,”
she growled through gritted teeth, when the healer bustled in. “Panic attack.”

Poppy knew it. She knew, and had known, damn near every teenager in wizarding Britain for years now,
and she knew a Black teenager having a panic attack. “Breathe Sirius,” she said. “Slow and deep. It has
to be slow and deep.”

But his jaw had locked closed, and he could not suck in enough air around his teeth. Not nearly enough.
Brown and black spots appeared in his vision and he wondered if this is what it felt like to drown in a frigid
sea cave full of inferi. He had wondered that often enough these past few months and this? This felt about
right.

Chapter 5
Notes:
Potential triggers around limb loss and childbirth, and contents of last chapter.

Chapter Text
Sirius was holed up in James and Lily’s small laundry when he heard the door creak open.

“You got the short straw, did you?” he asked, whoever had been sent to deal with him, without looking up
to see who it was.
“I’m where I need to be,” came the answer, and the voice was Euphemia, and James Potter could ROT IN
HELL, as far as Sirius was concerned, because there was no one who could have undone him more than
their now-shared mother.

“I did something awful, Mum,” he found himself saying, his voice reflexively small. “No, don’t sit down!
Your hips!”

Euphemia humphed. “You are on the floor, and so the floor is where I am needed, and so the floor is
where I am going, bad hips and all.” She lowered herself the rest of the way, with a small sigh. “No one
said parenting was easy. Even, and perhaps especially, when you get started late.”

“You didn’t have James that old,” Sirius replied, feeling the ghost of a smile on his lips.

“I was talking about when I adopted you, Sirius,” Euphemia sighed. “The Black family insists on making
mothers out of women that never truly wanted to be mothers. And fathers, out of men that never wanted
to be fathers. The children suffer, and then the family has the cheek to be shocked when some of those
children rebel.”

“Most don’t rebel, though,” Sirius sighed. “And Andromeda had the decency to rebel her way into a
perfect, picket-fence life. Me, though? I tried to be in love, and look what happened.”

“Not all, no. But about a third rebel, at least a little,” Euphemia countered, pulling Sirius’s head into her lap
and stroking his long hair with her fingers. “Godric, your hair is beautiful, my son. My own mother used to
stroke my hair, whenever i needed comfort, but when I do it to James or Monty? All I get for my trouble is
a birds nest! Thank Godric for you, Sirius. Anyway, as I was saying, about a third of Blacks rebel, by my
counting. There’s an old saying, that under great torment, a third become tormentors -that’s Bellatrix and
Walburga, before her. A second third accept their lot in life passively, and call the evil good- and there you
see Orion and Narcissa. But the last third? There you find the rebels. There you find Alphard, and
Andromeda. And you, my son.”

Sirius exhaled slowly. “So what you’re saying is, I’m neither hero nor villain. Just a congenital fuck-up who
tossed a three-sided coin.”

“You can be that and a hero, Sirius,” Euphemia replied. “Or that, and a villain. You get to choose. And you
choose by what you do next.”

Sirius felt the beginnings of tears, and he fought them, because he always fought them. Such was his
habit, the habit of his youth before Euphemia. Euphemia has never told him that men don’t cry, let alone
boys. “Regulus is dead.”

“I know, my sweet boy. It’s awful, and I’m so sorry.”

“Regulus is dead and Remus…I’ve lost Remus too. And you know what? I thought I was being the good
guy. Keeping his cheating quiet, not making our friends choose. Not airing dirty linens. The Black Family
Way. I thought I was being dignified, and virtuous, and noble. But, it turns out, I got it all wrong. And
James KNEW. He KNEW, and he should have told me, and I want this to all be his fault. But, it isn’t. I
know it’s mine. I thought Remus threw us away, for nothing, but it turns out, it was me.”
Euphemia was quiet for a moment, almost long enough that Sirius began to wonder if he had finally
stumped her. If he finally worn out her seemingly endless love, and forgiveness, and irritating wisdom.
But, he should have had more faith than that.

“Sirius, my sweet, listen to me. When you were a child, and your parents abused you, it was a betrayal
unlike any other. It wrote betrayal right into your core, and now, you see it everywhere. You knew
something was wrong with Remus, and the darkness took the shape of betrayal, because that is what
your life has made you see. It’s a reason, but it’s not an excuse. And what you need to do now is make up
for it.”

“I don’t think I can.”

“I know, Sirius. And normally, I’d tell you to give time, and to take time. But, there is no time to spare right
now. In the other room, you have a brother who is still alive. And he’s trying to decide whether Remus
should spend the rest of his life as a registered werewolf or without his leg. But it’s you who should
decide, Sirius. It’s you who knows Remus best.”

Sirius swallowed. “And, what if I get it wrong?”

“If you choose wrongly, well, Remus might never forgive you.” Euphemia acknowledged quietly. “But if
James chooses wrongly, and you don’t even weigh in, then will you forgive yourself?”

“I did weigh in!” Sirius insisted. “I said St Mungo’s. I know the thought of being unemployable worries
Remus, but, while I’ve got two sickles to rub together, Remus can always have one of them. And
maybe… maybe after what happened last time, transforming in the silver cells in the Ministry would be
better for him. Safer.”

“For the rest of his life?” Euphemia asked, gently.

Sirius sniffed. “Just until someone makes Dorcas Minister for Magic. Then, she’ll fix anything.”

Euphemia smiled at this. “I’m sure she will try. Now, are you ready to stand up, brush off the grass stains
like the big bad Quidditch Beater you are, and fight for Remus?”

“No. But I’ll go anyway.”

“Good. Only Sirius? What you said? About sharing your money, and Remus transforming ‘safely’ in the
cells? Are those things Remus wants for the future, or things you want?”

Sirius shook his head. He couldn’t allow himself to think that way. He took a breath and went to find the
others.

Lily turned sideways on the sofa, on her left-hand side, and let her head drop into Marlene’s lap. Marlene
swept a loose strand of red hair, behind Lily’s ear and then just stroked mindfully. It was a habit from way
back in first year, Lily tearful and homesick, Marlene brave and stoic.
“Suppose we can’t use silver, if we have to conjure a prosthesis,” Marleen murmured. “You know, if...
Guess we’d have to use gold? That would be the closest?”

“ That’s what Poppy thinks. Only, how will we ever get Remus to accept a gift of that much gold? You
know how he gets, if you so much as try to buy him lunch…”

“One problem at a time, girls,” Euphemia soothed, as she came back into the room with tea for each of
them. “There’s gold enough in our family vault. That’s the main thing, for now.”

“Mum, is that you?” James crept into the room. Lily’s heart ached to see his hunched shoulders and
folded arms. “I thought I heard you.”

Euphemia instantly enfolded her son in a hug. “ Shera , what is the matter?”

“I think this might be my fault, Mum” Jamie whispered to her. “I think it might be all my fault. I kept a secret
I shouldn’t have, and i stood by while something bad happened. So i think its my fault. I don’t know how to
fix any of this. I don’t know, where to start or what to do.”
“It’s for the healers to do things for the minute, Jamie,” Euphemia whispered back. “And we will take it
from there, come what may. Do you want me to check in with the Healers we’ve put on at Sleekeasy?
Your father pays them well enough to take our flues, even at this time of the evening.”

Somehow this made James sob harder. “Don’t. The healers at Sleekeasy? I named it the FLP division.
Like it was a joke! Like all this was a joke. What was I thinking?”

“Jamie, don’t,” Euphemia replied with faux sternness. “If it helps the Healers, who work there, think it
stands for Fleamont’s Lycanthropy Project. They may be good at their jobs, but they certainly aren’t the
most creative bunch. Now, go have a good long cry, if you want to, or else you can help Mary and me
make some kulcha and lassi. I know better than to get you involved with the machhi.”

“I’ll do the lassi,” James replied quietly. “Thanks mum.”

“You kids always forget to make enough food, in a crisis,” Euphemia replied, a little emotion now creeping
into her voice. “No matter how many times I tell you… it’s like you and your brother think you can starve
your way to competence!”

“Opposite’s true, if anything,” James murmured.

Euphemia threw up her hands “Of course, the opposite is true! Not a drop of sense to share between the
pair of you. Now, where’s Mary? Lily dear, are you alright?”
James turned in surprise to stare at his wife. Lily was flinching and didn’t reply to Euphemia for nearly
twenty seconds. “Yes, sorry,” she gasped at last. It’s just these Braxton Hicks contractions. I can’t imagine
how much the real ones are going to hurt.

“Poor dear,” her mother-in-law replied politely but Lily did not miss the furtive glance Euphemia made at
the clock.

“I am not in labour,” Lily replied firmly. “It is a full three weeks too early.”

“Too early, as you say as you say,” Euphemia replied in a conciliatory tone. “Only, how far apart are they?”

“Ages,” said Lily.

“About five minutes,” said Marlene. “And they’ve not let up at all, since I made her sit down”

Euphemia frowned. “And they were all as long as that one?”

“No,” said Lily

“Yes,” said Marlene.

“It never rains but it pours,” Euphemia muttered. “I’ll go flag down Poppy.”

“I am not in labour,” Lily protested. “It is too early. Harry is staying put!”

Euphemia broke into a huge grin. “Did you say Harry? Excellent name! Is it Harriet for a girl?”

“It’s a boy,” Lily grumbled, aghast at her mistake.

Marlene laughed. “Are you sure you aren’t the spy, Lily? Because you are leaking baby secrets like a
sieve.”

Lily shifted uncomfortably, and then her face went red. “That’s not all I’m leaking,” she wailed. “I think I
just wee’d on my sofa! I hate pregnancy! Oh, I loved this sofa!”

“A spell will clean it just fine, Lily dear,” Euphemia replied calmly. “Only just let me check… amnion
deprehendere .”

A little fleet of apricot-coloured bubbles floated upwards from Lily’s jeans and sofa.
“Rowena’s Blue Tits,” Marlene muttered watching them sail. “Her water broke. She’s in labour.”

“I’m not,” Lily shouted at the bubbles. “I have three more weeks. And we are in the middle of a crisis.
Remus needs me. James needs me Sprog is staying put, and that’s all there is to it.”

Harry James Potter did not stay put, coming into the world just shy of three weeks early, well before the
end of July.

“He was supposed to be a lion, not a crab,” Lily said, running her fingers through his unusually thick baby
hair, while he sucked weakly at her breast.

“He’ll still be a Gryffindor lion,” James replied with calm, besotted confidence. “Just you wait and see.”

“I think he’ll be a Ravenclaw,” Lily replied just to be annoying. “I bet you a Coke.”

“What’s a Coke, again?” James asked, unruffled.

“We should keep all these cards and notes people send,” Lily replied, kissing and smelling the baby as he
fed. “Put them away for him. He might want them later. Mightn’t you, my sweet boy?”

“Not sure why he’d want the cards when he’s got the people,” James whispered. “Oh, he’s popped off. I
think he’s done. Are you done, beautiful boy? Are you full and warm and sleepy?”

“Try to get him to take a little more, Lily,” Poppy Pomfrey whispered. “The first milk is good for their
immune system, and he has joined us a little early.”

“He’ll be okay, though, won’t he?“ Lily asked anxiously.

“Just cast a Humidi-bubble spell over him when he’s sleeping,” Poppy replied calmly. “You both know the
spell now. I’ll teach it to Remus too when he’s feeling bettter. That boy is wasted being anything but a
healer…”

“He can’t brew potions,” James pointed out.

Poppy humphed and didn’t reply.

“Any chance Sirius can pop in now, Lil?” James asked gently. “I want Harry to meet his Godfather.”
“Remus is his godfather.”

“Lily, I promised!”

“Well, I promised too!”

James sighed. “Co-godfathers, then, yeah? And like, Sirius on paper, because of the werewolf thing? Just
in case. And please let Sirius come in, okay? Just for a few minutes? And I promise I’ll take him into see
Remus first thing tomorrow.”

Lily sighed. “Okay… but Remus is next, yeah? Next to meet him? James it will mean the world to him and
he needs it right now, more than ever. I still cant quite believe what we had to do.”

“Remus next, even if he’ll be too out of it to remember. At least we’ll be able to tell him he got to meet you,
Harry. Right after Mum and Dad and Sirius. And they are all going to love you, aren’t they, my Harry? You
have so many people who love you.” James gently squeezed his finger into the baby’s tiny fist. “That’s so
important, Harry. You’ll never have to be lost and alone, because you’ve got so many people who love
you.”

The baby clung, by instinct, to his finger, and James was a man enchanted. “Look at that grip! Ready to
hold a broom already,” he sniffed. “And, you’ll always be safe, Harry. I’ll always keep you safe. I promise”
Poppy smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. James raised an eyebrow at her curiously, and she
paused, as if deciding something, before motioning him to the hallway.

James left Harry and Lily’s side with some reluctance, and followed her. “What is it, Poppy? Is something
wrong? What aren’t you saying? Bad news about Remus?”

Poppy glanced behind her furtively and whispered. “It’s not Remus, this is about Harry… no no, nothing
bad!” she quickly added, even as James’s panic spiraled threatened to eat him alive. “It’s… have you ever
heard of a woman named Sybil Trelawney?”

James shook his head.

“She’s a sort of soothsayer, I suppose would be the charitable word for it. Reads people’s fortunes, tea
leaves and all that…”

“So, a fraud,” James prompted, anxious to get to whatever part of this concerned his tiny, perfect son.

“Well… yes, usually. Only, she had a meeting with Professor Dumbledore, about the divination position at
Hogwarts and… apparently, in the middle of it, she made a true prophecy…”
“That’s some job interview,” James remarked. “What’s this got to do with Harry?”

Here, Poppy paused. “I’m not quite at liberty to say. But I will say this, Mr Potter. Professor Dumbledore
asked me which of the pregnancies in the order were due at the end of July. I lied, and said I would check
my records. What I’m saying to you, now, is that Harry has been born at the beginning of July, and it
would be best if as many people as possible believed that this was when he was due. That’s the real
reason why I suggested Lily give birth at home. So there would be no hospital record of her official due
date, or of any slight prematurity. What I’m suggesting, James, is that the fact Harry was originally due at
the end of July, should never cross your’s or Lily’s lip’s again.”

James blinked. “You can’t just leave it at that Poppy. If there is a prophecy that concerns my son…”

“Prophecies are tricky things, James. I only suggest that you refrain from needling fate. Let’s say that
Harry James Potter arrived exactly when he was supposed to. And, if Merlin smiles upon us, Alice will
carry her child into August, and April will carry hers to term, and this prophecy will be forgotten. As should
the other 99 percent of things that come out of Sybil Trelawney’s mouth.”

“Wow, you really don’t like her, do you?”

“Dumbledore gave her the job,” Pompfrey grimaced. “I’m stuck with her.”
“And this prophecy, you won’t give me the tiniest hint?”

Poppy paused. “It concerned Voldemort, and a weight that should not be placed on any child.”

James swallowed. “And if Alice gives birth at the end of July?”

“Then, Merlin help Baby Longbottom!”

“Remus, love? I’m not sure if you can hear me, or if you even want me. Or if you’ll ever forgive me for
what I’ve done, or for what we’re about to do to you. But…I’m here, love. I’m here.”

Chapter 6
Notes:
Potential triggers around limb loss, sexual assault, chronic pain and sibling death/grief

Chapter Text
Remus felt restive, and overheated. Flush with fever which was, according to Poppy, fighting away the
remains of the infection, now that the main locus was… gone. The big black dog slept, exhausted, down
the end of the bed, where there was too much space. A spell levitated a blanket a few inches above what
remained, but beyond that, it was clearly…

Stop it, he demanded of himself, in the voice of his father, gravelly and uncompromising. You knew
something like this would happen eventually. There’s nothing more boring to other people than self pity.
Don’t use people up, the kindness they’ll give you, not unless you really need it. Because there is never
enough. Not for monsters.
His hand twitched and considered the blanket. The effort of moving it, thick and orange-brown tartan,
would make him dizzy, he knew, but it might be worth it. Because his leg didn’t feel gone. It felt both
crushed and bursting. Yet another flavour of pain to join the others that Fenrir had forced down his…

No. Don’t think about that. Not yet. One thing at a time. One thing at a time or you’ll burn away. One thing
at a time, or you’ll…

“Sirius,” he gasped weakly, in spite of himself. “Sirius, please…

There was a knock on the door, and he turned toward it too fast, unmooring his fragile consciousness, like
a pontoon in a brutal storm. When he could focus again, he saw Lily, wearing long green sleeping-robes,
and carrying a tiny perfect baby in her arms.

Someone had told him, he realised, though he could not recall who or when. He chastised himself for
forgetting. “Oh, Lily. Congratulations, he’s beautiful,” he said, but his voice dismayed him, brittle sounding
and flat. He wanted to be so happy for Lily. He wanted…

He wanted his mum.

“Bring him over, let me see,” he tried again, and sounded, at least to his own ear, more natural. “He’s so
tiny.”

“Oh Remus, he’s so beautiful isn’t he?” Lily gushed. “Just perfect! Ten fingers and ten…” her voice trailed
off and her eyes widened.

Remus made himself laugh. “It’s okay, Lily. You are allowed to be happy about your beautiful son. You
joined us a little early, little one, didn’t you? Couldn’t wait to come to the party?”

“Harry,” Lily whispered, affectionately. “And… err… no. He was born right on time.”

Remus frowned. “Was he? I could have sworn that he was due at the end of July…”

Lily’s face was tight and strange, and Remus began to wonder if it was now the end of July. If he’d been
floating in this caustic, sweltering Hell for weeks. “Nope!” Lily replied, her voice as bland and unnatural as
her expression. “Beginning… beginning of July.”

Remus made himself care. He did care. He loved this woman utterly, would die and kill for her. And at any
other moment he’d have no concern greater than her happiness, and that of the bundle she held. But
fever was burning him, inside and out, and he wanted to bellow, and scream and weep. There seemed no
safe harbour and the sea had caught fire.
Stop it. Such dramatics are for people who don’t have to prove their humanity. You need to catch hold of a
rope, and steady yourself. Do it now. Now.

“Lily, what’s wrong?” he panted, because speaking felt as effortful as running, and his chest was
beginning to burn. “You seem so upset.”

Of course she’s upset, Lyall’s voice came. She wants everyone to be happy and excited about her baby.
Only you’ve thrown a huge cloud over everything. You’ve ruined the happiest day of her life.

Remus took a deep, unquenching breath. He wanted his mum.

Lyall laughed in his head. Well, you can’t have her. You killed her, remember?

Lily reached out and touched Remus’s shoulder, startling him back into the room at Godric’s Hollow.
“Remus love… it’s okay to cry.”

Remus laughed, and somehow managed to keep the tears at bay. “Not when I’m meeting Harry Potter for
the first time! Looks like he’s got James’s hair, doesn’t it? It’s a good thing James’s family own
Sleekeasy’s, isn’t it? Because I think your household consumption just doubled.”
“It could just be baby hair,” Lily sniffed. “Is it wicked of me that I wanted a little ginger like me?”

“So wicked! You are practically Voldemort.”

Lily giggled “Harry, this is your godfather, Remus and that’s your other godfather, Sirius, passed out in
dog form. He does that, sometimes.”

The baby remained fast asleep during these introductions, but that didn’t seem to matter to Lily, one bit.

“You are going to be a great mum, Lily,” Remus said, pleased that his voice had finally found a natural
cadence. “One of the best.”

Lily groaned. “I do not feel like it. So far I’ve almost fallen asleep holding him and breastfeeding hurts like
a bastard. My nipples are pressed flat like they’ve been ironed. Sorry… is that a bit graphic for the
friendship?”

“I’m assuming you have my amputated leg stashed somewhere in your house, so I think the friendship will
survive ironed nipples.”

Lily flinched and Remus felt bad.

You’ll lose them, Lyall said darkly in his head. If you don’t pull yourself together, you’ll lose them. Lose
them all.

“Lily, I’m sorry,” Remus whispered. “That was an awful thing to say, I…”

“No it wasn’t,” Lily replied firmly. “You are allowed to make jokes, if you want. You are allowed to react any
way you need to. Remus… it’s… it’s okay to feel this. You… I think you need to really feel this.”

Some malevolent twist of mood made Remus honest, in that moment. “I can’t Lils. I can’t, ‘cause it’s all
tied together. Fenrir and the bite, my mum, the cave… it’s all…Once I start, I’ll”

“Remy please. What happened to you in Yorkshire? You can talk to me…”

“Can’t,” Remus replied, horrified by how far open he was gaping. “Kid present…”

“Remus…”
“He knew me, the second he saw me. Said I’d belonged to him, my whole life. He said he was going to
claim me, like I belonged to him. He chained me up, and he… He said he’d make it so that…” He couldn’t
finish. He couldn’t burden Lily. Not sweet, beautiful Lily. Lily rosy, and shining with the triumphant
exhaustion of new motherhood. He just let the silence finish for him.

“Remus…”

“I want my mum,” he said aloud at last. “Seeing you there, with your baby, all beautiful and maternal, it
makes me want… but that’s still cowardly. It’s easy to say I want my mum. Because she’s dead and she
can’t come, or not come. Can’t reject me. Can’t decide I’ve finally become too difficult. It’s cowardly
because the truth is… I want Sirius…”

Lily sighed. “Oh Remy. There’s nothing… look, let’s wake Sirius up. “

“No Lils, don’t. He needs his sleep, and…”

Lily ignored him entirely. She carefully cradled her son with one arm while she ruthlessly shook Padfoot’s
shoulders with the other. “Oy! Fleabag! Wake up. Human-form. Now. Remus says he needs you.”

It felt like an utter betrayal, her telling Sirius that.

It felt utterly true.

Sirius, human again, stared at Remus, for a moment, with his big grey eyes, and then launched forward,
taking Remus into a frantic hug. He kept shifting his arms, pulling Remus closer, as if worrying he’d not
quite collected all of him. “Remy, my Remy. Sweetheart, it’s okay. It’s going to be okay. I swear. I’ll move
everything in the world, until it’s okay. I promise, love. I swear.”

And, with the suddenness of a summer storm, Remus was undone.

James cradled and bounced his baby son, while Lily watched, and drank her tea. “And you hang on to
your broom, and zip, zip, zoom! After the snitch, quick as a twitch…”

“He’s trying to sleep, you know…” Lily said setting down her tea mug and rubbing her eyes.

“It’s my favourite lullaby,” James whined.

Lily shrugged in defeat. “Your funeral. I’m going to bed, after this tea, and if he’s not asleep, he’s your
problem. Merlin, what a day! At least, Rem and Sirius are doing better.”

Mentioning them was like popping a balloon. James’s good humour deflated and he settled for a sedate
rocking unpunctuated with quidditch lullabies.
“James…?”

“Yes Lil?”

“Where did you put Remus’s leg? Only he asked and…I assume, it’s somewhere in the house, and I don’t
want Sirius to come across it accidentally. Or anyone. Or me.”

James looked far away for a moment. “I.. um… put it in the shed.”

“The shed? Our shed?”

“Yeah… I assumed Poppy would do something. But honestly? She was pretty upset, when she left, and I
couldn’t bring myself to mention it. You know how soft she is for Remus. You never think about the
logistics of these things, ‘til they happen, do you?”

Lily rubbed her face, enjoying the sensation of her tea warmed fingers massaging at the tightness of her
forehead. “The shed’s fine, for the moment, I suppose. At least, they are doing better. Remus doesn’t
seem angry that we didn’t take him to St Mungo’s. I think he understands. ”
James nodded. “Yeah… those cells they make the registered werewolves transform in? They’re bleak,
Lily. They chain them down. Remus can’t… I can’t have them doing that to Remus. Not after…. Not ever.
St Mungo’s wasn’t really an option, Lils. Not for Remus. And there’s no guarantee they could have done
something different, anyway.”

Yorkshire, again, Lily realised. What in Godric’s name had happened there? “And he’ll bounce back, won’t
he? Remus? He always does…”

James looked away. “It might be becoming a father, I don’t know. But, I’m hard pressed to think about
Remus, without crying. He was four years old, when Fenrir came for him. Four! Can you imagine if
Harry..?”

“Don’t!” Lily interrupted. “Don’t even say it. I can’t…”

“And the cave…Yorkshire. We were supposed to be searching in pairs, but Dorcas was moving too
slowly, and we got separated. And, I found him first. And I could smell it. What they’d done to him. I mean,
I could see it, the bruises, the… the blood. But even if I hadn’t been able to see it, just the smell. I… and
he cowered from my touch, and made these sounds like… I can’t even describe them… Primal. Like a
wounded animal at the end of the world. I can’t… I keep waiting for the memory to get duller, but it never
does…”

Lily, set down her tea. Her body ached from birth, but her heart ached more. Ached for Remus yes, but
also for her husband. For James, who loved his friends so utterly, but had learned of the cruelties of the
world through them. Had learned what it was like to want for money, to want for parental love. To not just
be healthy, and unconditionally wanted, and full of unmangled promise. “Jamie… we haven’t made love,
since you got back from Yorkshire.”
James sniffed. “So? You’ve been heavily pregnant. It’s normal not to…”

“I suppose, I’m suggesting that might not be the only reason,” Lily posited gently. “Maybe you need some
time off… from the Order, from work? Jamie, maybe you need some help…”

“Nothing happened to me, Lils…”

“That’s not true, though, is it?”

“Lily, Remus is… is upstairs, in our house, having just… Lily! I’m fine. Of course, I am.”

“I’ve only got a few minutes,” Sirius said quietly.

April nodded, and pulled at her fingers “It’s kind of you to visit, at all. I haven’t had any visitors. Been
mostly talking to my baby, because then I don’t have to admit I’ve been talking to myself.” Her hair was
uncombed and she wasn’t quite meeting his eyes, but Sirius did not have time for this.

“Talking to yourself is normal, you know,” he quipped, lightly. “I told myself that, once. Anyway, I don’t
have long. I’m just stopping by the office, to collect a few things. I have to be back when Remus wakes
up. Without fail. I can’t mess things up anymore. Oh, what’s with the chain by the way?” He asked,
because a short metal chain connected April to the wall of the cell, rendering half its not overly large size
inaccessible to her.

April stared at the chain, as though she’d only just noticed it. “Anti-animagus charm,” she replied, at last.
“I’m not one, of course. But after Pettigrew, Mad-eye isn’t taking any chances. Might become one after
this, just to make it worthwhile! Although, maybe not. Some of the ingredients are expensive, and I’ll have
lost my internship by now. No show. And, I’ll have the baby to look after...”

Sirius sighed, silently cursing Peter and the sloppy, seemingly neverending nature of the mess he’d
made. “I’ll talk to Dad. See about getting you a job at Sleekeasy’s. Have any interest in hair?”

“Not particularly,” April smiled. “I grow it, I suppose, but that’s about it, Suppose beggars can’t be
choosers, though, so thank you. I’d appreciate it. Anyway, is Remus okay? You said things were messed
up.”

“I accused him of cheating on me, after something awful happened. And then, something else awful
happened,” Sirius replied, too exhausted by the thought of more details.

“I don’t think Remus would cheat on you,” April replied, quietly. “I’ve seen him around you, and he might
be the in love-est person I’ve ever seen, in real life.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. “Where were you, and your oh-so-pithy observations, a few weeks ago?”
She shrugged. “Sorry. If you’d asked me, that’s what I would have said.”

Sirius stared at his shoes. “April, why I’m really here… I know it’s a long shot, and that the dates barely
work out… but, that isn’t my brother’s baby, you are carrying, by any chance? Because, I am having a
really, really, dreadful few days, and i loved my brother, and he’s dead. So, if there’s any chance at all…”

“I’m sorry, Sirius. I… I can’t say”

Sirius slapped his hand against his thighs. “Well, of course you won’t say! Why would anything go my
way?”

“I didn’t say I won’t say, I said I can’t say.”

Something about her intonation have Sirius pause. “Unbreakable vow?”

April nodded slowly.

“So, definitely a rich Slytherin family, then,” Sirius muttered. “Also the sort of thing right up my mother’s
alley. I’ll find out anyway, you know. If that kid’s a Black, they’ll appear on the family tapestry. Stupid thing
to make an unbreakable vow about, really.”

“Teenagers are renowned idiots,” the seventeen-year-old April observed.

“Yeah, thank goodness I’m not one of those any more,” still twenty-year-old Sirius Black replied. “Say,
you’re a notorious swot, aren’t you. You don’t happen to know anything about magical prosthetics do
you?”

“Is that what happened to Remus? One of the awful things?”

Sirius nodded.

April paused for an overlong moment, blinking in thought. “Well, the traditional choice for the rich is
conjuring a responsive limb out of silver. Silver’s a bad choice here, so… um… Poorer people tended to
experiment with wooden ones. Use wand woods and cores. With careful rune and sigil work they can
work quite well. You should consult a rune master, and a wand master. But I came top in Runes, that’s
what my internship was going to be, so I could point you…”

“We were just going to substitute gold, I think,” Sirius interrupted.

April blinked again, and Sirius got the distinct impression she was calculating exactly how much gold that
was, mapping it against her understanding of Remus, and coming up with the same problem everyone
else had. “That should work, I guess? she said at length. “Only have someone you trust do the conjuring.
Some sneaky stuff can go on, otherwise. So I’ve read, anyway.”

Sirius nodded. “Yeah. We’ve got someone we trust. Look April… I’ve got to go. So, I just wanted to say. If
by the one in a million shot that that is Regulus’s baby…”

“Sirius, you shouldn’t…”

“… and if you ever needed anything. You could come to me. Or Andromeda Tonks. You wouldn’t have to
go to my mother or Cygnus or Druella. I wouldn’t blame you for switching sides after we’d locked you up
and chained you… well… I would, actually. Don’t be a Death-eater, April.”

“I’ll try to restrain myself.”

“… that’s… we’d help you. That’s all I’m trying to say.”

April stared at him. “I’m sorry about your brother, Sirius,” she said after a long time. “You must miss him
very much. I didn’t know him well, but he seemed like he loved you very much. “
“I see,” Sirius looked at the floor. “I’m gonna… I’m going to go. I’ll try and… I’ll make sure someone comes
to visit. Can’t have you talking to yourself, can we?”

“I’m sorry about Remus, too.”

“Yeah.” Sirius left quickly, before the disappointment could overwhelm him. It had been foolish to hope
that Regulus had left something behind. Foolish to think grief might be that easy. That kind.

His brother was gone, his lover was racked almost beyond his endurance, and Sirius himself was about to
break.

Chapter 7
Notes:
Potential triggers around a sexual assault. There is some initial victim blaming which is resolved quickly.
Also there is a graphically described violent revenge fantasy and alcohol use

Chapter Text
Sirius did break, and it was in the bathroom of the Toil and Trouble, a loud and unpleasant pub on
Knockturn alley that James had dragged him out to.

“You can’t just sit vigil away at Remus’s bedside.” James had insisted, before practically dragging him out
by the collar of his jacket. “You’ll burn out. You need to decompress.”
The bar at a loud pub was usually a good place for James Potter to decompress. Usually, although Sirius
was a little perturbed by the speed at which his friend put the first two shots of firewhisky away. “You’ve
got a baby back home,” Sirius had said, channeling Minerva McGonnagall as best he could.

“ ‘Xactly,” James replied. “Lily’s breastfeeding, so I’ve gotta drink her share.”

Sirius nodded noncommittally, and sipped his way through the evening. Loud pubs were work for him, not
a source of stress relief, and really all he wanted was to get back to Remus.

The allure of the whisky was strong, however, and Sirius was just a little too tired to count it well. By the
time he needed the lav, he had drunk enough that his lightheadedness and passivity took him by surprise.

The man who followed him into the gents also took him by surprise.

“Pretty,” the man exhaled with breath that burned Sirius’s nostrils.

“Get off,” Sirius muttered and pushed, but he found himself exhausted, and the man hard to shift. Before
he could really think, the man was rubbing the crotch of Sirius’s jeans and had forced his filthy thumb into
Sirius’s mouth.

“You’ve been making eyes at me all night,” the stranger said, and Sirius laughed because he honestly
could not recall even noticing this man, before he’d been slammed by him against the tiles.
“Down you go, Pretty,” the man said pushing down on one shoulder, and pulling down on Sirius’s hair.

His balance was done in three drinks ago, and so down to his knees Sirius went. The world blurred and
swayed. He heard a zipper and smelled a sudden fetid miasma of musk.

The thumb was back and it pressed on his lower teeth and Sirius tried, for all the world, to coordinate
some sort of ‘NO’, but his head was buzzing and…

“….The fuck?” James’s hand had him by an armpit and was hauling him out of there. Sirius collided with
his friend and trod hard on one of James feet, fighting to stay upright.

James was telling him off, possibly about his feet, but Sirius was barely listening. Buzz buzz. James
pulled him out onto the street, and, in the cold air, it was slightly easier to think. Sirius decided that the
gutter looked like an excellent place to wedge himself into, and then take a nap.

And, it was about then that James’s face changed. “Sirius, did you say no?” He was asking urgently.
“Sirius?”

Sirius ran the back of his head along the rim of the gutter, trying to ignore James patting his face, which
felt unpleasant in some undefinable way. “I can’t… I can’t remember. Tried to…”
And then James was gone, storming back the way they had came. That probably wasn’t good, and so
Sirius, reluctantly, stuck his head out of his guttery hide-y hole and blinked at the too-bright pub.

There was a clatter, and a few feminine shrieks, and then James Potter and Bathroom Man were taking
swings at each other, in the street.

James Potter, Hogwarts dueling champion, was swinging fists, which struck Sirius as funny. Bathroom
Man was bleeding from the lip, James, Sirius could not see.

“It’s not my fault your boyfriend’s easy,” Bathroom Man yelled as unformed figures dragged him away
from James.

Bathroom Man…. Sirius suddenly remembered that Bathroom Man’s filthy, presumably unwashed thumb
had been in Sirius’s mouth, and he gagged and spat in the gutter.

When he looked up again, Bathroom man was gone, and James was standing, hangdog and
slump-shouldered, in front of Kingsley Shacklebolt.

“Kingsley, where’d you come from?” Sirius asked.

He went unanswered, because Kingsley was engaged with James. “Pull yourself together, Potter,” he was
muttering.

James hissed, and pulled at his own hair. “Fucking rapists, everywhere, Kingsley!” he said, and to Sirius,
his voice sounded full of tears. “I just had a kid and…Can’t you see it? It’s Voldemort that’s doing it.
They’re all coming out of the shadows. The monsters. The real ones. Kingsley, I just had a baby…”

“Go home to your wife, and sleep it off,” Kingsley ordered, and turned away. “And Black?Get out of the
gutter. It doesn’t suit you.”

Sirius stood up shakily, and remembered James was angry with him, but instead of more yelling, James
pulled him into a hug. A real, Euphemia hug.

Sirius started to cry.

“Jamie? Moody’s here. Pepper up. Come on.”

James stirred, which somehow made the world’s worst headache worse, and cracked his eyes to see the
potion Lily was dangling in his vision. Lily, mother of his child. Mother of his very recently born child.
Fuck.

“Lils, I’m so sorry,” he began.

She stopped him with a quick kiss to the forehead. “No need to be sorry. Definitely my turn tonight,
though! And you need to get up. Moody is here.”

“No… I’m really sorry, Lils. Leaving you with the baby and Remus. That wasn’t cool…”

Lily shrugged. “Remus had his wand, and you know he’d die rather than cause any trouble… damn. It’s
not right to joke about Remus dying, is it? When he almost did…”

“It was just a normal figure of speech, Lils.”

“We nearly lost him though,” Lily replied. “Maybe things shouldn’t be normal. We nearly lost him. Peter is
a spy, and Remus nearly died, and we are parents now. Everything’s different.”

James looked down. “We don’t know about Pete. We’ve got to at least give him a chance to come back,
and explain.”
“You are too good for this world, Jamie,” Lily said, standing on her toes to kiss him on top of his head.

“That’s a big call from a woman who got left with a newborn, so I could go down the pub…”

“I’m a natural born leader,” Lily replied. “I make the big calls.”

“I’ll say,” James replied, smiling at her admiringly. “Dorcas might have a run for her money, if you decided
to go into politics… But really, Lil. I’m sorry.”

“Just don’t make a habit of it love, okay? And come down and talk to Moody. Get him out of my kitchen. I
don’t have enough bread to give him lunch.”

James nodded and pulled himself together, as quickly as he could, chugging the Pepper up with a wince,
and quickly changing, gargling and wrestling his with his hair, before descending the stairs to his kitchen.

Moody surveyed him grimly. “I’ve been waiting, Potter.”

“Cut us some slack, Moody, alright?” James muttered. “Peter was a shock, alright? And we’ve just had a
baby…”

“Lily had a baby,” Moody corrected darkly. “And she was awake to let me in…”

“…Remus lost his leg…”

“… he’ll survive. Take it from me.”

“What do you want, Alastor?”

“Well let’s start with why Kingsley Shacklebolt found you brawling with some lowlife in Knockturn Alley,
last night.”

“He attacked Sirius,” James muttered. “The fight guy. Not Kingsley. Deserved worse than he got.”

“Is that so?” Moody muttered. “Either way, I don’t like it. I need my soldiers to be thoughtful and
measured. And I don’t need their names in the paper.”
“It was a couple of swings outside a pub, Alastor. Hardly newsworthy. And I’m not your soldier.”

“Dumbledore’s then…”

“I mean, I’m not a soldier,” James shouted too loudly. “I’m just a…. person, Alastor. And my friends are
missing or hurt and I…”

“I need you for an assignment.” Moody interrupted. “I need eyes on the wolf pack, coming up to the next
moon…”

“… the train attack, Dumbledore told me. But he changed the term dates.”

“The pack will pick another target,” Moody replied darkly. “Children. A large family, perhaps. Something.
And we need eyes. And given your information about certain illegal animagi…”

“A stag listening in on werewolf campfires is going to stand out as pretty unusual…”

“A dog won’t.” Alastor replied, impatiently. “If you would ever let me finish. We had planned to put Sirius
up for the Board of Govenors of Hogwarts. The Black Heir disgraced or no, would be a defensible
candidate. However now we need a mangy mutt to skulk around the pack, I was going to propose your
father. He seems to be setting up for retirement, and he even has a shiny new grandson to explain his
interest. Congratulations by the way. And, failing your father, you.”

“You should appoint Dorcas. She’s campaigning for a seat on the Wizengamot. She’s got this whole
grassroots Muggleborn campaign. A position on the Board of Governors would raise her profile and…”

“An unmarried half-blood woman? Leave the politics to the grown ups, kid, okay? I need you to talk to
your father, and talk to Sirius.”

James shrugged. “My father I get, but you can talk to Sirius himself, surely?”

“I did, earlier this morning. He turned me down. Said he wasn’t going to that wolf pack with any other
orders than killing Greyback, as slowly and painfully as possible. Now, I know Greyback roughed up Lupin
a bit, but this reaction was well out of proportion. Surprised it didn’t wake you actually. Care to tell me
what it was about?”

James shook his head.

Moody pursed his lips. “I don’t like secrets, Potter. Especially not from you. You are best friends with a
spy, a werewolf, and the prince of a dark magic house. If you were me, how would you feel about a man
like that keeping secrets?”
“You interviewed me under veritaserum less than a week ago, Moody. You’re paranoid.”

“And I’m alive, while better men are dead, Potter. Iggy Gromswallow, Lester Wildsmith, both dead, thanks
to your friend Pettigrew. And, I’m alive. I may not have caught the bastard, but I smoked him out. So
pardon me, if I don’t re-examine my life choices, on your say so. Hmm?”

“Sirius really does want Greyback dead. He wasn’t joking.”

“Black can follow orders. Do what he’s told. It’s that, or we send Lupin back in. We are out of options,
Potter. Now will you talk to him or not?”

James sighed. “Fine. I will.”

Sirius needed a walk after Moody had the gall to turn up, first thing in the morning, to send him to
Greyback’s pack for any other purpose than ripping the throat out of the bastard. Sirius had learned, on
one of his father’s ill-advised hunting trips, about the pluck. That you could pull out a dead animals tongue
out, through the bottom of its jaw and keep cutting and pulling and eventually the trachea heart and lungs
would come out all in one piece.

That might do for Greyback.

Moody suggesting he beg for scraps from the man, and curl up at his feet? That was… that wouldn’t do,
and how dare Moody think otherwise.

He doesn’t know, his more reasonable side put in, as he strode through the brisk morning air, ignoring his
rolling stomach and his aching muscles, his breath, puffs of mist before him. Moody doesn’t know.
Nobody does except James and Mary.

And Sirius himself.

Sirius stopped, for a moment, to breathe. He wanted to run back to James’s house, and crawl into bed
with Remus, and just cry into his shoulder.

But instead he strode on.

Because, fuck Moody! Even if he didn’t know about the…

… about the state James found Remus in, he did know that Greyback was the one who bit Remus. Every
moon-ache, every unhealing scar, every scream Sirius had ever heard from his lover, was down to that
man. That monster attacking a child- a sweet, tiny, bashful child- knowing that that child would never
know another pain-free day in his life.
Never mind the bloody pluck, the Death of a Thousand Cuts. That might do, for that monster. Slowly
taking him apart. Slowly ripping the…

…. a phantom thumb slipped into Sirius’s mouth, and he gagged. Gagged so hard that Old Bagshot’s
roses got unexpectedly fertilized.

Fuck.

And he had to tell Remus. Before James did.

He turned and walked back more slowly, trying to figure out how any of that would even go.

Morning, pumpkin. While you were lying here, last night, getting used to being an amputee, I went out,
tied one on, and then nearly sucked off some bloke in the bathroom. Lucky James was there, huh?

Merlin .
He had no new ideas all the way back to James’s, and then proceeded to have no ideas, all the way up
the stairs, and then proceeded to have no idea at all, leaning against the open door frame of the
bedroom.

“Are you going to come in at all?” Remus asked, with a quirk that was almost a smile. Which was almost a
miracle, considering. And it made Sirius suddenly feel the whole terrifying weight of the love he had for
the man.

“I love you so much, I think I might cry,” Sirius said aloud. “I’m just… I know we need to talk, because I
was the worst of all arseholes to you, but I’ve got to confess something too, and I guess I’m trying to
decide the order. Pick between two smaller fights or one big one. Any thoughts?“

Remus blew out a puff of air. “Can’t we just skip the fights. I don’t think I’ve got it in me…”

“No, I have to, love,” Sirius sighed. “Listen… I got drunk last night… a man followed me into the
bathroom. Said I was pretty.”

“You are pretty,” Remus replied. “I can’t blame a man for saying that. If I saw you in a pub, I might come
up to you and say you were pretty.”

“This man was nothing like you,” Sirius replied, reaching up to tidy an errant strand of Remus’s hair.
Taking the opportunity to quickly caress his cheek.
“So… not another one-legged werewolf, then?” Remus quipped.

“Silly. You are technically a three-legged werewolf. You’re a one legged man.”

“Fair point. And Sirius, if you flirted a bit with some guy that called you pretty, that’s… that’s okay. We’ve
all been through a lot. Shocks to the system, as the muggles say. It’s…”

“I didn’t flirt,” Sirius said. “At least I didn’t intend to. He knocked me to my knees and…”

“He hurt you?” Somehow, even in human form, Remus could raise visible hackles.

“Knees are a bit bruised,” Sirius whispered. “Nothing happened. James pulled me out of there, before…
and I didn’t want anything to happen… I was trying to get out a no….”

At times like this, Remus could appear to Sirius to be entirely made of a pair of huge hazel eyes. “Oh
Sirius. I’m so sorry that happened. I’m furious that happened. I… I’m sorry that I wasn’t there for you.”

“No,” Sirius shook his head. “This isn’t coming out properly. I’m fine. Well, not totally fine. I badgered the
Featherstone girl pretty badly. It was so dumb, and I got it into my head that the baby was Regulus’s, and
I practically offered to coparent with her. I was about to say we would even adopt the baby! So not totally
fine. But the bloke was… he was nothing.. what i’m trying to say is, I didn’t cheat on you, and…”

“Sirius, you can’t cheat on me. And we can’t adopt a baby. We’re broken up…”

“No we aren’t,” Sirius replied automatically, and then realised that they, in fact, were broken up. Those
were the words he had said. He had kicked Remus out, slammed the door in his face and… “I take it
back. We aren’t broken up, because I take it back.”

“It doesn’t work like that, Sirius,” Remus replied, sounding tired. “You don’t have any obligation here, I
mean, I appreciate the apology…” he paused then, perhaps realising that Sirius hadn’t actually
apologized.

“I do! I do apologise! I am sorry, Remus. That monster hurt you, and I.. didn’t understand. I still don’t
understand why you didn’t just tell me…”

Remus’s face closed off and he looked down. “Sirius… we aren’t together. You broke us up, and… and
you were right to do so. A relationship without trust is… well, it’s where we were. And it was no good, for
either of us…”

“Remus please don’t do this…”

“I didn’t do anything, Sirius. This was your choice. You chose… you wanted to be apart. I’m sorry I gave
you the wrong idea, crying on your shoulder like that. It was… it was a weak moment. I shouldn’t have
done it.”

“Yes you should have! Remy, please. My shoulder is where your tears belong. Always…”

“Sirius! I can’t keep doing this. I… well I only have so many limbs, for a start.”

And that was too much. Sirius ran from the room, his breath heaving, heart hammering in his chest,
desperate, and deeply confused as to how the conversation had gone so badly, so quickly.

With a shock, he realised he’d expected the conversation to be difficult. He’d expected he’d need to
apologise and eat many a crow, he’d expected to declare his love, and battle his way through Remus’s
self-doubts and insecurity. But deep down, he’d never expected Remus to say no.

With Herculean effort, against all his instincts, Sirius turned around. “Remus, this isn’t you. I know you
love me.”

“Of course, I love you. I’ve always loved you. But that isn’t the point, Sirius. I need… I need to think about
things… I need to figure out what my life is now. You… you ended things. You slammed a door. I’m… I’m
not ready to open it again.”
“But you said you wanted me. You told Lily…”

But Remus wouldn’t look at him, Wouldn’t say anything more, and Sirius could never handle silence.
“Fine. Whatever you want. But this is you Remus. You doing this to yourself.”

Remus just stared downward not looking at him.

Sirius left.

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