This is Lyra Potter's universe again, this happens in her sixth year, Sirius is still alive - they found the rat, Remus and Tonks are together, but Tonks asked Sirius and Lyra to join Remus in calling her Dora because they're family.. I've decided that they vary though - i know in my last stories she just referred to her as Dora but I've decided it will depend on who she is speaking to. Anyway, Remus is sent away to the werewolves like in canon, and comes back with far less self worth. He decided to break up with Tonks, and he also didn't write to Lyra because he didn't think he deserved to be part of her life (that part is in Merry Christmas, Sirius). Lyra only finds this out after writing a letter to Sirius asking why she hasn't heard from Remus. And that's where this story begins.

Disclaimer: nothing of Harry Potter belongs to me, it all belongs to JK Rowling.

Lyra was sitting in the Common room with Hermione, Ron and the rest of the Gryffindor students when, finally, Hedwig returned from Grimmauld Place. Lyra greeted her bird, rubbing her head gently on Hedwig who fluffed her feathers up and preened herself. Lyra quickly unfolded the letters from her godfather and Tonks and scanned them quickly, her gaze darkening as she read them. Her friends sitting with her didn't notice, Ron was busy with Lavendar and Hermione was too busy complaining about the couple. It took Neville's sudden sharp "Lyra?" to make them both focus on their friend, but they were too late as she stood quickly, Hedwig taking off quickly in alarm, and stormed out, the letters still gripped in her fist.

She ran through the corridors, barely breaking into a sweat as she ran the long route to Dumbledore's office. Lyra slid to a halt, before she snapped "Sherbet Lemon" at the gargoyle who guarded the entrance way. He moved aside just in time for Lyra, who steamed past him, leaping onto the revolving staircase and climbing the steps to get to the top faster.

When she got to the top, she barely paused outside the office, instead, she merely banged on the door before walking in. Although outwardly she showed no sign, inwardly she breathed a sigh of relief that Professor Dumbledore was alone, and not preoccupied with Mcgonagall, the other teachers, or worse, Snape.

Instead, Albus had been sitting at his desk, hands joined together and tucked under his chin, the points of his fingers just resting upon the bottom of his jaw as he pondered the school, the fight against Voldemort, and his inevitable demise. He pulled himself out of his mind when he heard someone running up the steps outside his office, leaping up them two at a time, before the door was knocked on loudly and then thrown open.

He blinked to see Lyra standing there, her long hair running down her back as if she had been running. But he barely noticed that, instead focusing on finding the reason why Lyra was standing in his office in the evening of a day where they had not a private lesson, and the reason why she was staring at him with a fury in her eyes he had never seen before.

Albus barely had time to pause and ask her, however, as she almost immediately started shouting at him. "How could you!" She yelled, her fist gripping the letters to her side, "haven't you done enough? Haven't you used him enough already?" Confused, Albus looked at her. "I'm afraid you're going to have to tell me what you mean" her eyes darkened at him, "it's Uncle Remus! He was happy with Tonks and now they've broken up and it's all your fault!"

Albus got up quickly from behind his desk and moved in front to where he could see her properly, but she edged backwards, her face shuttered against him. "Lyra?" He asked, as gently as he could, "what's happened?" "This!" She screamed back at him, her eyes starting to water with the tears she had been trying to hold back. He looked down at her hand, where she was holding two letters tightly. He took them from her, and unfolded one to read,

Dear Ly,

How are you Sweetheart?

I'm afraid Remus is having a bad time at the moment which is why he hasn't written to you - you know where he is, I told you before - and he has come back feeling worse about himself than he has ever done before. He's broken up with Dora, and he doesn't think he deserves to be in your life any more. I've tried to tell him he's wrong.. But it's not working.

I'm sorry Ly, it's been weeks and whenever I see him he's worse. I didn't want to tell you because I thought I'd slap some sense into him before you got back but I didn't want to lie to you when you asked.

He refuses to listen to me when I talk about you, but I keep catching him staring at the photos of you. He still loves you Ly, even if you think he doesn't.

I love you

Love

Sirius

While the other, covered in tear stains, read,

Dear Ly,

No, I haven't spoken to him recently. He's broken up with me, thinks he's too poor and old and dangerous. He doesn't think he deserves to be with me, or to be part of your life. I've tried so hard to tell him he's wrong, but he's sure he's right and he hasn't spoken to me since.

I've tried to tell him that I don't care if he's a werewolf, or that he's old or poor, it doesn't matter to me like it doesn't matter to you but while that worked last year it didn't work this year and now he's refusing to see me.

Merlin, I HATE Dumbledore so much for making him do this! Remus suffers from this enough already and now with the last few months.. He must be feeling terrible. Sirius told me that the last time he can remember that Remus was like this was back in second year when they found out about him and he was sure they'd hate him. Who knows what it was like for him when...

Here, the letter tapered off into a bunch of inky spatters, and finished. Albus looked up at Lyra, who was watching him with her arms crossed in front of her, one eyebrow raised. It reminded him so much of her mother that he was inclined to laugh if she wasn't so furious with him. He swallowed, and said "I had no idea that they were in a relationship."

Lyra carried on glaring, but spoke before he had a chance to. "No, course you didn't! Because they're all just puppets to you, doing what you want them to do and not having any lives of their own. Did it never occur to you that Remus might not want to go to the werewolves? Didn't you think about him when you gave him that mission?"

"He said he would go!" Albus finally said, before being cut off once more by Lyra. "Yeah, course he did! He respects you! You let him into Hogwarts and then gave him a job, course he respects you! If he thinks he can do something for you that needs doing then he does it! But you shouldn't use that to your advantage! It's not fair! You know how he feels about himself! He was happy and you took that way from him."

She broke down into sobs, and Albus couldn't help himself. He leaned forward and hugged her, and she stood rigid in his arms as she cried, before pulling herself away and taking the letters back. "I should probably go. Sirius and me need to sort out what to do to make him feel better thanks to you." She wiped her eyes furiously and almost ran for the door, leaving the headmaster standing in her wake.

He felt regretful, and wrong. It wasn't often that he felt that way, but was Lyra true? Had he used people where perhaps he should have known better and asked them properly what their feeling was?

Meanwhile, Lyra retuned to the common room, tears streaming down her face as she repeatedly wiped them away. When she entered, everyone looked up and her four friends tried to make their way over but she pushed past them and went up to bed.

"Lyra!" Hermione called, trying to get her to answer, but she refused. Instead she tucked the letters into her trunk and vowed to reply to both in the morning. It took her hours to get to sleep that night, as the hurt inside her kept billowing out. Remus didn't want to be a part of her life any more. Eventually, she cried herself to sleep.

A/N this links in to Merry Christmas, Sirius. I wanted to write the confrontation because I only hinted at it there and also I wanted Lyra to be as brave around Dumbledore as Harry is when he smashed up his office.