A/N
Hi guys! The next chapter of Mors Ulnas should be out soon, I just had this idea on a walk in the evening yesterday, and wanted to get it down. Enjoy!
A haggard man in old, patched robes walked through dark corridors, following a route he clearly knew well. He made his way down some final stairs, and stopped outside a portrait. It didn't appear to be anything significant. It was of a dark castle in the night. The viewer was clearly at the top of a long climb, and the road disappeared downwards, reappearing some way in the distance, winding towards the faraway castle. This was almost completely dark, the outline simple a dark, empty space in the star-filled sky. A few lights glowed in windows, but very little else was visible in the picture.
The man was contemplating the picture, absorbed in the art, before suddenly looking around, furtively. Then he spoke:
"Wolfsbane."
The portrait swung open, and the haggard man walked in, looking around interestedly. The room he entered was lined with shelves, themselves filled with jars, containing everything from a myriad of different leaves to small stewed organs. Centre room contained a large number of brewing stands, many balancing cauldrons of differing sizes and colours. A dark-haired man stood with his back to the entrance, working at a particular cauldron. The cauldron contained a dark-coloured potion, bubbling at regular intervals.
"Lupin." The man called Lupin started, clearly absorbed in looking around the room, and turned to face the dark-haired man, who had not turned away from the cauldron he had been working on.
"Severus." The dark-haired man – Severus – scowled, but Lupin didn't see, as Severus still had his back to him. He simply motioned to a desk, a large, sleek, dark piece, situated further from Severus, and even further from Lupin. He made his way to it, skirting around Severus, bent over his cauldron, watching intently.
Picking up the potion resting at the side, Lupin quickly made his exit from the room, and hurrying up the stairs and through the endless corridors.
The portrait shut behind him, and Severus finally looked up, simply to check that everything was as it should, before returning to the potion Dumbledore had requested he make.
Remus Lupin lay, huddled on the rough, dirty wooden floor. As he lay, waiting for the pain to hit, he thought.
He was back in England, at Hogwarts. That in itself brought back painful memories – himself and his friends, The Marauders, sitting underneath a tree by the lake, just watching the water, with the occasional squid tentacle poking out every once in a while. Laughing as they watched another prank work perfectly. The four in Seventh Year, along with Lily and Gloria, Padfoot's girlfriend at that time.
But he was here for a reason. Too long had he abandoned Harry. And look where he ended up! Stuck with Lily's sister, Petunia, and her husband. They'd only met once, but that one visit was enough to prove just how bigoted the two were. They hated magic, and for Harry, who, at just a year old, was already having minor bursts of accidental magic.
Thinking of those days only brought back more pain. Just as the transformation hit, tearing his muscles and skin, snapping bones and resetting them, stretching tearing and reforming muscles, killing organs just to move them again. He let out a scream, pain-filled and desperate. This soon cut out, however, as his voice box was torn, before reforming so the brief silence was replaced with a howl.
The transformation complete, Moony padded around the room. Once again, he couldn't smell his friends. It had been so long since the air carried the scent of Prongs, Padfoot, even the rat, Wormtail. So long since he had heard the howls of the dog with his own, played with Prongs, wrestling and chasing each other around the room, with Wormtail watching from the side, never joining, but always there.
The loneliness Moony was forced into hurt. He missed his friends, the way they played in the room, the way they made him forget the pain of transforming from Lupin.
As he gazed out slits the panels in the window allowed, he caught the scent of something familiar, but so far away… Wormtail! Even now, despite the time it had been since he had smelt him last, he knew that odour anywhere… But Lupin knew Wormtail was dead, murdered by the Traitor, soon after Prongs and Lily had died.
Moony knew Wormtail was dead, and yet he still smelled the rat. Suddenly, the scent was gone, suddenly disappeared, and with it, Moony's hope at finally getting his friend back was gone. With the loss, again, of his friends, he let out a howl, filled with sadness, loneliness and loss.
The sound carried over the sleepy village, and all the way to the grounds of Hogwarts, where, invisible, three friends made their way away from the squat shape of Hagrid's hut, to the castle. The sound made one member of the trio stop. The boy, dark haired, wearing ugly, bottle-neck glasses was at the front, and so, when he stopped, the other two plowed into him.
"Harry! What are you doing!" The second of the trio, a lanky boy with fiery ginger hair and freckles covering his face whispered angrily.
"Can't you hear that?" Harry asked in return. The third member, a girl with wild, bushy hair, spoke up.
"A wolf! We need to go quickly, what if it's near?" The dark-haired boy merely shook his head.
"It's too far away. Doesn't it sound sad?"
"What the hell are you talking about, mate? It's just a wolf. Let's go, before we're missed!" Harry shook his head again.
"I know it… I remember the sound from somewhere, but not so sad. It's lonely. It can't find its friends."
"Oh, can you talk to wolves too now?" The other boy, obviously annoyed, asked.
Harry shook his head a third time, this time to clear it. He started moving again, his friends following, still under the cloak, as the sound continued to be heard, ever more faintly as they got closer to the castle, and further from the tree that could be seen moving, faintly, as if asleep, in the distance on the other side of the grounds, silhouetted by the light from the castle's windows.
A/N
Well, there you go, guys! I hope you liked it, and please review with your thoughts. I was just walking yesterday, and I looked up at the moon, and suddenly imagined Moony howling up at the same moon. Hence this story. See you later!
-MasterHyperion-Reborn
