Harry left the drawing room, his pounding head rendering him unable to cope with Ron's and Hermione's usual bickering. He headed downstairs toward the kitchen, which he thought was the most likely place for Kreacher to reappear when he returned from capturing Mundungus Fletcher. Halfway down the flight of stairs into the hall, however, he heard a tap on the front door, then metallic clicks and the grinding of the chain.

Crouching in the shadows at the top of the stairs, behind the decapitated elf heads, Harry drew his wand and waited. He momentarily saw the shapes of two men in the doorway, silhouetted by the streetlamp outside. The door closed and cast them into darkness once more, but Harry had caught enough of a glimpse to see that both were tall, and one had long hair.

Snape, he thought. He raised his wand.

As the two figures stepped inside, Harry heard Mad-Eye Moody's voice growl, "Severus Snape?" Then the horrific form of the dust-colored fake Dumbledore seemed to appear from the shadows at the end of the hall, and glided toward the two strangers, raising an accusatory arm.

"Neither of us killed you, Albus," said a quiet voice.

The jinx broke: The dust-figure exploded, as it had the night before, and it was impossible to make out the newcomers through the dense gray cloud it left behind.

Harry pointed his wand into the middle of it and barked, "Don't move!"

He had forgotten about the portrait of Mrs. Black: At the sound of his yell, the curtains hiding her flew open and she began to scream, "Mudbloods and filth, dishonoring my house!"

Another, harsher voice from downstairs bellowed, "Shut up, you old hag!" A jet of red light flew from the dust cloud and stunned the shrieking portrait.

Ron and Hermione came crashing down the stairs behind Harry, wands pointing, like his, at the unknown men now standing with their arms raised in the hall below.

"Drop your wands, now!" Harry roared down the stairs.

"Hold your fire, Harry. It's me, Remus!" said the quiet voice.

"And Sirius," growled the second voice.

"Oh, thank goodness," said Hermione weakly. She pointed her wand at Mrs. Black's portrait, and the curtains swished shut again. Ron too lowered his wand, but Harry did not.

"Show yourselves!" he called back.

Sirius and Lupin moved forward into the lamplight, hands still held high in a gesture of surrender.

"I am Remus John Lupin, werewolf, sometimes known as Moony, one of the four creators of the Marauder's Map, married to Nymphadora, usually known as Tonks, and I taught you how to produce a Patronus, Harry, which takes the form of a stag."

"Sirius Orion Black, also known as Padfoot, one of the Marauders, falsely imprisoned without trial for thirteen years in Azkaban before escaping by virtue of being an unregistered animagus, who takes the form of a black dog; and I bought you a Firebolt after I caused you to wreck your old Nimbus. I'm also your godfather, Harry, you little ingrate," he finished with a grin.

"All right," said Harry, lowering his wand, "but I had to check, didn't I?"

"Speaking as your ex-Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, I quite agree that you had to check," Lupin said with a small smile. "Ron, Hermione, you shouldn't be so quick to lower your defenses."

The three of them ran down the stairs. Both men were wrapped in a thick black traveling cloak, and looked exhausted, but pleased to see them.

"No sign of Severus, then?" Lupin asked.

"No," said Harry. "What's going on? Is everyone okay?"

"Yes," said Sirius, "but we're all being watched. There's a couple of Death Eaters out in the square."

"We know."

"We had to Apparate very precisely onto the top step, or they would have seen us appear," said Lupin.

"They can't know for sure you're in here or they'd have a lot more people out there," Sirius reassured them. "But they're staking out everywhere that's got any connection with you."

"Let's go downstairs," Lupin said, gesturing down the hall. "There's a lot to tell you, and I want to know what happened after you three left the Burrow."

They descended into the kitchen, where Hermione pointed her wand at the grate. A fire sprang up instantly: It gave the illusion of coziness to the stark stone walls and glistened off the long wooden table. Lupin pulled a few butterbeers from beneath his traveling cloak and they sat down.

"I'd have been here three days ago but I needed to shake off the Death Eater tailing me," said Lupin. "At least...that was the plan." He scowled at Sirius.

"Well, how was I supposed to know he was a real Death Eater and not just some brainwashed fool?" Sirius grumped.

"What happened?" Harry asked.

"A rather pitched duel," Lupin replied shortly. "But, as there were two of us, and only one of him, it didn't end well for him. But never mind that, we want to know what happened to you three? Did you come straight here after the wedding?"

"No," said Harry, "only after we ran into a couple of Death Eaters in a café on Tottenham Court Road."

Sirius choked. Lupin slopped most of his butterbeer down his front.

"What!?"

"Well, we thought it would be easier to hide out in the muggle world," Hermione explained. "We changed clothes in an alleyway and stopped into the café to plan our next move. We had hardly ordered coffees and started discussing what to do when Dolohov and Rowle walked in, sat down, and then attacked us. If Harry hadn't been invisible, I think we'd all be dead."

"But how did they find you so quickly?" said Lupin, aghast. "It's impossible to track anyone who Apparates, unless you grab hold of them as they disappear."

"We certainly tried hard enough to find a way. There's absolutely no way to find out where someone has gone," Sirius added.

"And it doesn't seem likely they were just strolling down Tottenham Court Road at the time, does it?" said Harry.

"We wondered," said Hermione tentatively, "whether Harry could still have the Trace on him?"

"Impossible," said Lupin. Ron looked smug, and Harry felt hugely relieved.

"But," Hermione persisted, "remember we had that argument with the Minister at the Burrow. He jabbed Harry with his wand before he left. Do you think…?"

Sirius shook his head. Lupin explained, "Apart from anything else, they'd know for sure Harry was here if he still had the Trace on him, wouldn't they? But I can't see how they could have tracked you to Tottenham Court Road. That's really worrying."

He looked disturbed, but as far as Harry was concerned, that question could wait.

"Tell us what happened after we left. We haven't heard a thing since Mr. Weasley told us the family was safe."

"It was down to Kingsley's warning," said Sirius. "Because of the advance warning, most of the wedding guests were able to Disapparate before the enemy arrived."

"Were they Death Eaters or Ministry people?" interjected Hermione.

"A mixture; but to all intents and purposes they're the same thing now," said Lupin. "There were about a dozen of them, but they didn't know you were there, Harry. Arthur heard a rumor that they tried to torture your whereabouts out of Scrimgeour before they killed him; if it's true, he didn't give you away."

Harry looked at Ron and Hermione; their expressions reflected the mingled shock and gratitude he felt. He and Scrimgeour had never seen eye to eye, but if what Lupin said was true, the man's final act had been to try to protect Harry.

"The Death Eaters searched the Burrow from top to bottom," Lupin went on. "They found the ghoul in your bed, Ron, but didn't want to get too close to it. Then they interrogated those of us who remained for hours. They were trying to get information on you, Harry, but of course nobody apart from the Order knew that you had been there."

"At the same time that they were smashing up the wedding, more Death Eaters were forcing their way into every Order-connected house in the country. No deaths," he added quickly, forestalling the question, "but they were rough. They burned down Dedalus Diggle's house—but of course, he wasn't there because he's still looking after the Dursleys—and they used the Cruciatus Curse on Tonks' family. Again, trying to find out where you went after you visited them. They're all right. Shaken, obviously, but otherwise okay."

"The Death Eaters got through all those protective charms?" Harry asked, remembering how effective these had been on the night he had crashed in Tonks' parents' garden.

"What you've got to realize, Harry, is that the Death Eaters have got the full might of the Ministry on their side now," said Lupin. "They've got the power to perform brutal spells without fear of identification or arrest. They managed to penetrate every defensive spell we'd cast against them, and once inside, they were completely open about why they'd come."

"And are they bothering to give an excuse for torturing Harry's whereabouts out of people?" asked Hermione, an edge to her voice.

"Well..." Lupin said. He hesitated, then pulled a folded copy of the Daily Prophet out of his robes.

"Remus," said Sirius warningly.

"They've got a right to know, Sirius." Lupin snapped. "They'll hear it sooner or later anyway. Here," he added, pushing the paper across the table to Harry. "That's their pretext for going after you."

A huge photograph of Harry's face filled the front page. He read the headline over it aloud: "WANTED FOR QUESTIONING ABOUT THE DEATH OF ALBUS DUMBLEDORE?"

He didn't bother to read any further. He knew what it would say. He had read as much in the Daily Prophet before—Harry was the only non-Death Eater to have witnessed Dumbledore's death, and he had been seen running from the scene moments after Dumbledore had fallen. Added to the general opinion the papers had held of him over the past few years, it was really no surprise.

"I'm sorry, Harry," said Lupin sadly.

"So Death Eaters have taken over the Daily Prophet too?" asked Hermione furiously.

"As if they hadn't already," Sirius said bitterly.

"But surely people realize what's going on?" said Ron.

"The coup has been smooth and virtually silent," said Lupin. "Scrimgeour's murder has been covered up; the official story is that he simply resigned and was replaced by Pius Thicknesse. Who, if you remember, we know is under the Imperius Curse."

Harry nodded. Thicknesse's conversion was the reason behind the change of plans for Harry's evacuation from Privet Drive, which had led to Mundungus' flight and Mad-Eye's death.

"Why didn't Voldemort declare himself Minister of Magic?" asked Ron.

Sirius let out his usual barklike laugh. "Why should he bother? His puppet Minister and his Death Eaters are running things day to day and following his plan. He doesn't need to be there in person."

"Voldemort is playing a very clever game," said Lupin. "Declaring himself might have provoked open rebellion, especially since he cannot find Harry. Remaining in the shadows has created confusion, uncertainty, and fear. You see, there has been such a dramatic change in Ministry policy in the last few days, many people have realized what really happened."

"But they're terrified, and none of them has the nerve to speak up. Is that it?" Hermione demanded bitterly.

"Precisely," said Lupin with a wan smile.

"And this dramatic change in Ministry policy involves warning the Wizarding world against me instead of Voldemort?" said Harry.

"Of course," said Sirius. "From their perspective, it's a brilliant move." Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw Ron nod. He looked around.

Ron blushed a little, but said, "Well, I get it now. It just makes sense. With Dumbledore dead, people would rally behind 'the Boy Who Lived'. But now…" he gestured at Harry's newsprint face, which was blinking up at the ceiling. "You-Know-Who has everyone doubting you, and seeing the Ministry put a price on your head will just make everyone even more confused."

"They've started moving against muggle-borns, as well," Sirius growled, nodding at the paper as well.

Harry had no wish to read any more, thinking that he could guess what that article would say as well, so Hermione pulled the paper toward herself and began to thumb through it.

"The Muggle Born Registration Commission…" she murmured, her eyes flying across the page. "The gist of it is that supposedly, there can be no such thing as a 'muggle-born' witch or wizard, so anybody claiming to be one must have somehow stolen their magic–"

"But that's mental," Ron interrupted. "If you could steal magic, why would there be any squibs?"

"It's obviously not based on any real research, Ron," said Hermione tartly. "Anyway, the Ministry is conducting a census to prove everyone's 'blood status'—anyone who cannot prove that they are related to a known pure-blood witch or wizard is being taken in for 'questioning'."

"But people won't let this happen!" Ron insisted.

Lupin shook his head. "It is happening, Ron. Muggle-borns are being rounded up as we speak, all over the country."

Ron glanced sideways at Hermione, but Sirius cut in, "It's not like this is likely to affect you lot directly. You're already on the run with 'Undesirable Number One'; you're not likely to get into any more trouble."

"I expect he's moving on Hogwarts as well?" Hermione asked.

"Oh, yes," said Lupin. "Attendance is now compulsory—which is new, even if almost every witch and wizard in Britain has been educated at Hogwarts for the last ten centuries. Some people preferred to homeschool their children, or send them abroad. But now, Voldemort will have the whole Wizarding population under his eye from a young age. And it's also another way of weeding out Muggle-borns, because students must establish their blood status before they are allowed to attend."

There was a moment's silence as Harry, Ron, and Hermione digested what they had been told. Sirius stared into the fire, looking ill at ease despite having his feet up on the table. Lupin looked between them all, seemed to hesitate, but then said, "I'll understand if you can't confirm this, Harry, but the Order is under the impression that Dumbledore left you a mission."

"He did," said Harry slowly, "and Ron and Hermione are coming with me."

"Can you confide in me what the mission is?"

Harry glanced at Sirius, but his godfather continued to stare unblinkingly into the fire. He looked back into Lupin's prematurely lined face, framed in thick but graying hair, and wished that he could return a different answer.

"I can't, Remus, I'm sorry. If Dumbledore didn't tell you I don't think I can."

"I thought you'd say that," said Lupin, looking disappointed. "But I thought we might still be of some use to you. You know what I am and you know Sirius, of course. We could come with you to provide protection. There would be no need to tell us exactly what you were up to."

Harry hesitated. It was a very tempting offer, though how they would be able to keep their mission secret for any length of time he could not imagine.

Hermione, however, simply looked puzzled.

"But, what about Tonks?" she asked.

"What about her?" said Lupin.

"Well," said Hermione, frowning, "I understand Sirius coming along, but he's not married! How does Tonks feel about you going away with us?"

"Tonks will be perfectly safe," said Lupin, "She'll be at her parents' house."

There was something strange in Lupin's tone, it was almost cold. There was also something odd in the idea of Tonks remaining hidden at her parents' house; she was, after all, an auror and a member of the Order. As far as Harry knew her, she was likely to want to be in the thick of the action.

"Remus," said Hermione tentatively, "is everything…all right…?"

"Everything is fine, thank you," said Lupin pointedly.

Hermione blushed, but Sirius let out a derisive snort. Lupin glared at him, then, with an air of forcing himself to admit something unpleasant, he said, "Tonks is going to have a baby."

"Oh, how wonderful!" squealed Hermione.

"Excellent!" said Ron enthusiastically.

Harry said nothing, looking from Lupin to Sirius and back again.

Lupin gave an artificial smile that was more like a grimace, then said, "So…do you accept our offer? I cannot believe that Dumbledore would have disapproved, he appointed me your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, after all, and Sirius was your guardian, Harry. I must tell you that I believe we will be facing magic that none of us have never encountered or imagined."

Ron and Hermione both looked at Harry. Lupin was watching him keenly. Sirius, however, was still looking away. The firelight played over his godfather's face, revealing an uncharacteristic harshness in the set of his jaw. He turned back to Lupin.

"Just to be clear," he said. "You want to leave Tonks at her parents' house and come away with us?"

"She'll be perfectly safe there," Lupin repeated. "They'll look after her." He spoke with a finality bordering on indifference. He looked Harry directly in the eye and said, "Harry, I'm sure James would have wanted me to stick with you."

It was the wrong thing to say. Harry felt a muscle jump in his cheek as he clenched his jaw, and off to his left, he thought he saw a similar twitch in Sirius' face.

"Well," Harry said slowly, "I'm not. I'm pretty sure my father would have wanted to know why you aren't sticking with your own kid, actually."

Lupin's face drained of color. The temperature in the kitchen might have dropped ten degrees. Ron stared around the room as though he had been bidden to memorize it, while Hermione's eyes swiveled backward and forward from Harry to Lupin.

"You don't understand," said Lupin at last.

"I'd be happy to hear you explain, then," said Harry, coldly.

Lupin swallowed.

"I… I made a grave mistake in marrying Tonks. I did it against my better judgment and have regretted it very much every since."

"I see." said Harry, "So your plan is to dump her and the kid and run off with us?"

Lupin sprang to his feet: His chair toppled over backward, and he glared at them so fiercely that Harry saw, for the first time ever, the shadow of the wolf upon his human face.

"Don't you understand what I've done to my wife and my unborn child? I should never have married her, I've made her an outcast!"

Lupin kicked aside the chair he had overturned.

"You have only ever seen me amongst the Order, or under Dumbledore's protection at Hogwarts! You don't know how most of the Wizarding world sees creatures like me! When they know of my affliction, they can barely talk to me! Don't you see what I've done to her? Even her own family is disgusted by our marriage, what parents want their only daughter to marry a werewolf? And the child… the child…"

Lupin actually seized handfuls of his own hair; he looked quite deranged.

"My kind don't usually breed! It will be like me, I am convinced of it! How can I forgive myself, when I knowingly risked passing on my own condition to an innocent child? And if, by some miracle, it is not like me, then it will be better off, a hundred times so, without a father of whom it must always be ashamed!"

"Remus!" whispered Hermione, tears in her eyes. "Don't say that…how could any child be ashamed of you?"

"Oh, I don't know, Hermione," said Harry. "I'd be pretty ashamed of him."

Harry did not know where his rage was coming from, but it had propelled him to his feet too. Lupin looked as though Harry had hit him.

"If the new regime is rounding up Muggle-borns," Harry said, "what do you think they'll do to a half-werewolf baby of a known member of the Order? My father died trying to protect my mother and me, and you reckon he'd tell you to abandon your own kid to go on an adventure with us?"

"How dare you!" said Lupin. "This is not about a desire for—for danger or personal glory… How dare you suggest such a—"

"Are you feeling a bit of the daredevil?" Harry said, "You think Sirius was having all the fun, and you fancy stepping into his shoes?"

"Harry, no!" Hermione begged him, but he continued to glare into Lupin's livid face.

"I'd never have believed this," Harry said, laughing derisively. "The man who taught me to fight dementors, a coward."

Lupin drew his wand so fast that Harry had barely reached for his own; there was a loud bang and he felt himself flying backward as if punched; as he slammed into the kitchen wall and slid to the floor, he glimpsed the tail of Lupin's cloak disappearing around the door.

"Remus, Remus, come back!" Hermione cried, but Lupin did not respond. A moment later they heard the front door slam.

"Harry!" wailed Hermione. "How could you?"

"It was easy," Harry snarled. He stood up, he could feel a lump swelling where his head had hit the wall. He was still so full of anger he was shaking. "He had it coming to him."

He stalked away from Ron and Hermione and stared into the fire. He had once spoken to Lupin out of that fireplace, seeking reassurance about James, and Lupin had consoled him. Now Lupin's tortured white face seemed to swim in the air before him. He felt a sickening surge of remorse, battling with the rage still coursing through him. Neither Ron nor Hermione spoke, but Harry felt sure that they were looking at each other behind his back, communicating silently.

Broken images were racing each other through his mind. He thought of Dumbledore suspended, broken, in midair; remembered a flash of green light and his mother's voice, begging for mercy; he heard the whisper of his father's voice in the graveyard of Little Hangleton. Would James have backed Harry in what he had said to Lupin, or would he have been angry at how his son had treated his old friend? And what would Sirius think?

He froze, then turned slowly on the spot. He had completely forgotten that Sirius was there. His godfather had not risen from his chair, but he was looking at Harry with a piercing, unreadable expression.

"Well?" said Harry. "You didn't say anything back there. What do you think of him running out on his wife?"

"As a matter of fact, when he gave me the same argument, I told him he was a damned fool," said Sirius quietly. His tone gave no hint of his feelings on the subject. "I told him over and over that he ought to go back to her, but he insisted on trying to track you down, to see if we could go with you."

Harry stared at Sirius. "What do you think my dad would have said?"

"Oh, I've no doubt James would have had a vocal opinion of him for leaving her behind, to say nothing of what Lily would have done to him." said Sirius. "But that's neither here nor there, Harry. You hurt Remus badly. Think of him as you've known him. Does he really strike you as a coward?"

"No," said Harry grudgingly. "But he's acting like one! And…and if it makes him go back to Tonks, it'll be worth it…won't it?"

Sirius opened his mouth to respond, but before he could speak, a deafening crack echoed around the kitchen.

For the first time in three days Harry had forgotten all about Kreacher. His immediate thought was that Lupin had burst back into the room, and for a split second, he did not take in the mass of struggling limbs that had appeared out of thin air beside the chair he had been sitting in. He hurried over to it as Kreacher disentangled himself and, bowing low to Harry, croaked, "Kreacher has returned with the thief Mundungus Fletcher, Master Harry."

A/N: This is in response to a friend of mine-also a writer-who was kind enough to start asking me questions about my plot for NOV that I couldn't immediately answer, because I had mostly handwaved everything in Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows as being "basically the same as canon".

These questions were mostly of the "Well how did this go down?" variety, focusing on interactions between people who died in Harry Potter's canon (most blatantly Sirius, and also some others to a lesser extent), so I've been composing scraps like this to fill in the blanks for myself.

Then I thought-why not just go ahead and post it for others to get a feel for where I'm coming from? So here we are.

There will be more to this particular section (what happens next with Dung will be different since Sirius is present, for instance, so I'll have to address that before I can get the trio back on track with canon.)