A:N/ This isn't going to be one of those "everything works out in the end and everybody is happy" sunshine and rainbow fics. This is going to be relatively historically accurate. Slight Remione. Tonks is dead, Teddy was birthed. American Colonial AU. Multi-chaptered. Rated M for language and suggestive themes (but I also rate everything M just in case). There will be historical inaccuracies, mostly because I failed history and did absolutely no research. It's called an AU for a reason. Another short note, Hermione isn't an only child, families in that time were large, so it only made sense that she has at least two siblings.


SHAPE-SHIFTER

"There is a great evil among us," the pastor, Father Marcus, yelled, his wife, Mary Lou, stood beside him with her eyes screwed shut muttering prayers and continuously making the sign of the cross between her forehead, heart and shoulders. "I heard it's demonic growling just outside my window late in the night," a crowd began to form around the pastor, "and I heard the booming voice of God demanding me to spread the word that there is a shape-shifter among us." A woman gasped and covered the ears of her young daughter. The men spit on the ground and the women began to pray under their breath.

I saw Mr. Lupin and his young son standing on the edge of the crowd, his face struck with worry. His son looked thoroughly confused and he held on Mr. Lupin's shirt sleeve at his wrist. My mother huffed and whispered to me that there was no such thing and that I shouldn't worry. She commanded I follow her back home, but I wanted to stay and listen. I, too, had heard the beast lurking on the outskirts of the town where I lived with my family.

"I looked out the window and came face to face with a great beast, and by the grace of God I have survived to tell the tale," The pastor was riling up the crowd now, the butcher offered his services to locate and kill the beast, the young men all volunteered as well, trying to impress the young women who were eyeing them through batted lashes. "It had the shape of a wolf, but was larger than the largest wolf in the wood. He howled to the moon and the sound was so powerful, it shook the very ground, knocking my sacred cross to the floor where it broke right in two, that's how I knew it was the Devil outside my window."

A woman in the crowd fainted and the pastor began to speak in tongues. I watched Mr. Lupin and his son walk down the hill to his home, head hung low.

"Hermione, I know you do not disrespect me this way," my mother scolded, "Come, we must prepare supper for your father." I followed my mother east towards the river where we had our family farm.

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My father's father had run the farm successfully until his death at age 40, but my father had not kept with the family business, opting to become a doctor instead. We still had the barn and animals, however, which helped supply the town with eggs, milk, and meat. It was my job as the eldest daughter to tend to the animals every morning and give them feed, a job I did as quickly as I could so I could sit in the wood and read. My two younger siblings, Samuel and Mary, ran about my father's land all day playing with the chickens and the goats and the donkey. They were exceptionally brilliant at lying to our father about my whereabouts, telling him I was out trying to find courtship or praying at the church.

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I sat in the wood with a book I procured from Mr. Lupin called Poems in Burlesque by John Dennis. Mr. Lupin had once caught me sitting against a great tree in the wood squinting at a Bible when I was young. I was scared. Mother had scolded me when I asked her how to read, she said that young ladies need not know that information. She said knowledge was not a woman's place. I expected Mr. Lupin to take me by the arm and drag me to the church to be punished, but instead he smiled. He sat next to me, back against the tree, and for months he taught me to read.

We never spoke outside of the wood, and our discussions were limited to the stories of the word of God and the meanings of certain passages that my small brain could not decipher. Once I turned twelve, I had finished the Bible cover to cover and Mr. Lupin began to leave books in the wood he had bought when he lived in Boston with his wife, Tonks.

I hadn't spoken to him since his son, Teddy, was born. It was a quiet day in town and the women whispered rumors to each other that Mr. Lupin's wife had died in childbirth. He had fled to Boston for several years before returning to Plymouth with a four-year-old toddler and a suitcase.

While he was gone, I was stir crazy. I only had the one book, as I made sure to return all the others once I was done reading. I hadn't had a chance to return Mr. Dennis' book of poems. I tried to leave it in the wood, like I had done with all the rest, but Mr. Lupin never went to retrieve it, and I couldn't bear to leave it to the elements in hopes he would collect it. I had read it countless times, almost so much as I could recite the first poem.

As when the Ugly Face of Night,

The Sun does to the Ocean fright,

Neptune and Proteus, with their Train,

The merry Monsters of the Main,

The Red-fac'd God Carrowfing meet,

And with large Draughts his Presence greet;

I closed my eyes and dreamed of the creatures from Mr. Dennis' poem.

To whom three strange prodigious Creatures,

And Monsters of Amphibious Natures,

Half Beasts, half Fish, together hide,

Who though on Land they often lie,

Yet are they never thoroughly dry,

And when they cease to drink, they die;

Some days when I couldn't stand the boredom of being a woman, I took a horse from the barn and rode to the sea. I would sit on the sand and watch the waves for a glimpse of the creature, imagining her beaching on the sand and dragging me out to sea where I would dissolve into foam and escape the repetitive nature of life.

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When I opened my eyes, I saw the unmistakable doe eyes of Mary, who held a chick in her extended palms.

"She lay down and did not get up, no matter how many times we cried." I took the chick from her hands and held it to my chest, speaking a prayer.

"She's gone to the next place, Mary," I told her softly, "She's to be with God."

"I don't want her to be with God, sister. I want her to be with her mother, and her father, and her brothers and sisters," Mary fell to the ground and let out a loud sob, "Why must all I come to love die? 'Am cursed with the mark of the Devil, is what father say."

"There is no such thing, Mary," I hid my book under leaves and rose to my feet. "Come, Mary, we will bury her before father feeds her to the pigs."

Mary and I collected Samuel to sneak to the Church cemetery and have a proper burial for the chick Mary named Lisa after she cried that the chick never had a proper name. The sky was growing dark when we finished digging a small grave. Father Marcus had discovered us digging in the dirt with our hands and offered to speak a prayer so Lisa would ascend to the Heavens. I was taken aback by his action, I had never thought him to be a trustworthy man, he was always condemning the sinners and informing the community of wrong-doers. He rested a hand on Mary's shoulder as she cried and Samuel covered the chick with soil.

"We collect here on this day for the burial of one of God's children, Lisa, daughter of the chickens on Mr. Granger's farm," Marcus made the sign of the cross. "We ask our father to take her soul into his hands and give her peace in death, that she may never know sorrow or sickness or hunger, and that she live eternally in his pasture." We all said Amen and Mary made a cross out of small sticks to place as a gravestone.

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I sent Mary and Samuel home before it got dark and made my way inside the church to speak to the pastor. He stood at the front of the chapel at his podium, making notes on parchment.

"Father, I have questions about the sermon you gave outside in the square this morning." He looked up from his Bible and gestured towards the front pew where I sat and waited for his response.

"My dear Hermione, not a day goes by that you do not have questions." He spoke, not looking up from his work. "And what, may I ask, is this question?"

"Thank you father. If there is a beast in the wood, how come there have been no injuries? If the beast is truly dangerous, then why have there been no casualties?" I furrowed my brow and looked down at my hands that were folded in my lap. "Why must we kill something that means us no harm?"

"The beast is of the Devil, my dear. The Devil does not get his way by murder or injury," Marcus closed his book and came to stand in front of me, I looked up at his face. He pointed at my head. "The Devil intrudes here, in the mind, he makes you think and believe things that shouldn't be believed." His voice was firm and his expression dark. He pointed at my heart. "Then he intrudes the soul, makes you question your faith in God and tempts you with desires of the heart."

"Forgive me father, but how do I keep the Devil from intruding on my Mind and Soul?" I asked.

"Easy Hermione, don't ask questions. Knowledge is the work of the Devil, we must only seek the knowledge of how to praise and worship our creator, we shouldn't question the morality of beasts or consult other works of knowledge such as those books I know you read." I looked up at his with shock and stood to beg forgiveness but he lifted a finger and gave a soft 'shh'.

"Father, please do not tell father, I'll stop reading them, I'll pray for forgiveness, just please don't tell." I was on the verge of tears and Marcus rested his hand on my shoulder.

"My dear girl, I will not tell of your sin if you promise to tell me the truth, and only the truth, to this question I am about to ask of you," I nodded and he smiled a crooked and utterly terrifying smile. "Have you been witness to witchcraft in the wood you spend so many of your hours in?" I shook my head no.

"I've never seen anything of the sort, father."

"Good, and I ask one more favor of you," I nodded and he leaned in to my ear and whispered. "If ever you do see something that you cannot explain, you will come to me at once and report."

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I left the church with a heavy weight on my chest. I felt uneasy once again towards the pastor since seeing the manipulation in his expression once I made promise to him. I felt dirty and wanted to wash his words off my neck that lingered from his whisper. I had wondered if I should have spoken to him about me hearing the beast outside my home, but shook my head and concluded that he couldn't be trusted with that information. I still had my doubts about the nature of the beast and whether it was of good or bad moral.

I rounded the corner of the butcher's shop and saw the sun slipping into the horizon of the trees of the wood. I could see my home as a small speck in the distance and quickened my pace home. As I passed the town bar, I heard the shrill shriek of a girl and then a series of loud noises coming from behind the building. I paused and considered for a small second to investigate, wondering if something malicious was happening and I could stop it.

I crept towards the sounds with the side of the bar hugging my body so I wouldn't be seen easily and I peered over the back of the building to see Mr. Lupin and the unmistakable blond curled hair of the blacksmith's daughter, Elizabeth. Mr. Lupin was buried into her neck and was kissing and biting her skin as one of his hands lifted Elizabeth's skirt, exposing her bloomers and stockings. His other hand was at her hip and disappeared under the hem of her underclothes. She had her eyes closed and reached into his trousers. He growled loud enough to make me jump and make a small noise in the back of my throat that prompted Mr. Lupin to turn his head and look in my direction.

He didn't stop his movement under her clothes, but he stared at me with an amused look on his face that was uncharacteristic for the gentle man I knew. His eyes were no longer the light brown I remembered, but a harsh amber that made me squirm with discomfort. He turned back to Elizabeth's neck and pushed his body flush against hers when I turned and all about ran home.

I was seeing small black spots in my vision the time I got home and leaned against the post of the fence to catch my breath. I recalled the look in Mr. Lupin's eyes and deep rumble of his chest when he growled that sounded likeness to the growl of the beast from inside the wood. I wandered to the pile of leaves I had hidden the book in and turned to the poem I had read every day since Mr. Lupin's disappearance.

Too grave and antique far, for this Age,

To those he seem'd a Gifted Teacher,

To us who heard him rank Letcher.