"Vita enim mortuorum in memoria est posita vivorum"
"The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living"
When Dumbledore had found him, Remus was in a dilapidated cottage in the Yorkshire, living a life more similar to the one of an animal than a man. Embarrassed, he had been ready to run but the old Headmaster's proposition had been the light he had never known he was craving.
«I want you to come to teach at Hogwarts, Remus.»
«Wha… no, I don't…»
«I cannot think of anyone better than you for this position.»
«But I am a werewolf!»
«But it's not the only think you are.»
Accepting the spot for Defence against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts, the only place where he had been really happy, had been the best decision of his life, but also the hardest. When he had seen Harry on the train, his heart had been caught in a grip so painful that it had taken his breath away. Even pale and weak due to his encounter with a Dementor, he had been so similar to his father that for Remus staying close to him had been almost unbearable.
«I know you met Harry on the train, Remus.»
«Yes.»
«And how was it?»
Wonderful. Terrifying. Painful.
«He looks so much like James. Except for the eyes. He has his mother's eyes.»
Offering to give him private lessons to help him fight the Dementors had been a bad idea, but he hadn't been able to stop himself.
«When they get near me, I can hear Voldemort murdering my mum.»
That words had had the same effect as a Cruciatus. The idea that that boy, who had suffered more in thirteen years than many adults, could be forced to relieve the night which was hunting his own dreams had been unbearable to him.
«Are you going to tell Harry that you knew his parents?»
«I don't think it would be a good idea. Nothing of what I'd tell him would bring them back to life.»
«You don't need to bring them back to life, you just need to bring them back to him.»
Then watching the boy facing the Boggart time after time, getting back up on his feet more determined after every fall had been a window to the past, to that determination – stubbornness – that had been so typical of his best friends.
«We are going to become Animagi.»
«What?! Why?!»
«It's obvious, Moony. Or were you thinking we were going to leave you on your own to face your furry little problem?»
He still remembered that moments of freedom they had spent in the Room of Requirement between the third and fifth year, with James and Sirius challenging each other, betting on who, between them, would have been able to become an Animagus first. Many years had passed and of that three boys, nothing was left anymore.
James was dead, Peter too.
Sirius had betrayed them and, once he would be back to Azkaban, a fate even worst of the one his action had brought to his friends was waiting for him.
And he… he was alone. Again.
The happiness he had known during his years at Hogwarts had been ripped from him within one night. He had left to complete a mission for the Order that he had three best friends, Lily and Harry – the only thing close to a family he had ever allowed himself to have – and he had come back that he had nothing. Everything had been ripped away from him in the blink of an eye, without him even knowing about it.
The miserable life that he had lived from that day on had been the punishment he had inflicted to himself for not being there. For not realizing that Sirius was the spy before it was too late.
«Hey, Moony! I bet five Galleons that tonight I'll run faster than you!»
«A werewolf will always be faster than a dog, Padfoot, don't forget that!»
«Look at you two, furry animals really understand each other on a deeper level, mhm?»
«Shut up, Prongs!»
Sirius, with his laugh similar to a bark and a mischievous light in his dark eyes, that had run alongside him every full moon for years. Sirius, that when James and Lily had asked him to be Harry's godfather, had cried.
Where had gone that Sirius? Had he existed at all?
And Peter? Peter, who had never been strong, but he had tried to take on his friend anyway, losing is life because of it?
«I don't think I can do it… b…become an Animagus it's… it's a s…sirius business …»
«C'mon Peter, stop whining and grow some balls!»
«B…but… what i…if…»
«Everything is gonna be fine. We are doing it for Remus, remember?»
And James…
«I heard my dad. That's the first time I've ever heard him – he tried to take on Voldemort himself, to give my mum time to run for it...»
When Harry had said that words an imaginable pain had threatened to engulf him.
Remus hadn't been surprised to discover that his best friend had tried to slow down Voldemort to save Lily and their child. He had been like that, willing to die to protect the people he loved. It was another one of the qualities that, during their lessons, he could see in Harry. The bravery, the dedication.
«Dumbledore suggested that we hide from Voldemort. I don't want to do it, but…»
«James, Dumbledore is right, and you know it.»
«Remus, I don't want to leave you working for the Order alone. You could die!»
«I know. But he doesn't want us, he wants Harry.»
«Moony is right, Prongs.»
«Sirius…»
«Everything is gonna be okay.»
But it hadn't been okay. James and Lily had died, betrayed by one of the few people they trusted. That Remus trusted. But their sacrifice hadn't been in vain. Harry was alive, and so long as he was going to be alive a piece of them would keep existing in him.
And Remus was going to do anything to protect what was left of his family.