History in the Making

Chapter Four – Secrets

I forgot to do this with the first couple of chapters, but my disclaimer is, I do not own Harry Potter, which should be a given since I live in the middle of nowhere in Virginia and struggling in the post-graduate world of adulthood.

As the weeks went by and Liz and Remus began to spend more time together, the awkward air between them gradually disappeared. Liz mustered up enough courage to tell him about her parents, and Remus would tell her little things that people didn't know, except for one thing; his lycanthropy.

Not many people knew about Remus being a werewolf. In fact, within the school, the only ones (not including the professors) who knew about Remus's condition were Sirius, James, Peter, Cassie, and due to Sirius's prank last year, Snape. Over the past few weeks with getting to know Liz, he felt a bond with her. In part, he felt like she was a great friend, and if somebody saw them together, nobody would believe they'd just became this close within a few weeks. The other part of him wanted there to be more than a friendship with her, but when he told Sirius and James this, the two took to teasing him and trying to admit that he had a crush on his sister's best friend.

Finally, after the third week of patrolling, Remus admitted to his friends that he did have feelings toward Liz.

"I knew it," Sirius said, grinning as he laid back on his bed. "I knew you did two weeks ago."

"No you didn't," James protested, "I'm the one who told Remus that he'd end up falling for her."

"Guys," Remus said with a painful expression on his face, "this is bad enough."

"How is this bad?" Sirius looked at him with a perplexed look. "It's about time you found a girl that you liked!"

"You know why this is bad, Padfoot."

"Remus, take a chance," James said, catching onto what Remus was saying. "Just because you become a werewolf for one time a month does not make you dangerous all the time. You're going to have to just, take a risk. Trust her."

"I'm sure that if she feels the same way, she'll understand. She can probably help you, Moony," Sirius added.

"And how do you think she'll be able to do that? It's not like she's an animagus like you all."

"But Cassie is, I'm sure she's been helping her and their Slytherin counterpart."

"I don't want anybody else risking their lives for me."

"Tell her," James said encouragingly, "The sorting hat put you in Gryffindor for a reason."

Remus sighed as he contemplated the situation. He fell silent and lay back on his bed, listening to Sirius and James discuss strategies for the upcoming Gryffindor vs. Slytherin Quidditch game. His mind ran through different ways to try and being to explain to Liz how different he was. After a few minutes, he sat back up and looked at his two best friends.

"I'm going to tell her."

For the next few days, Remus tried to focus on finding the perfect way to tell Liz about his lycanthropy. He'd went as far as even asking Sirius and James for advice, but the only solution they could give was to just say it without giving it any thought, and Remus wasn't going to drop a bombshell that huge on Liz and lose not only the possibility of a relationship with her, but their friendship as well. Unfortunately for Remus, the first full moon of the school year was fast approaching, and Remus decided it would be best to wait until after the full moon to tell her.

The morning they were to depart down to the Shrieking Shack, the Marauders made it to the Great Hall in great spirits. James and Sirius were talking about the Quidditch scores in the Daily Prophet with Peter trying to get a word in on his favorite team. Remus followed in silence, glancing at the Hufflepuff table, seeing Liz and Cassie laughing at something one of them must have said before sitting at his own table. Throughout breakfast Remus let his mind wander from his friends plotting their next prank to Liz. What would she do when she found out? Would she run in fright and never want to be around him, or would she accept him like his friends had? And if she did accept it, what would happen between them?

"Oi, Remus!" Sirius's voice came into Remus's thought as he shook his as he looked back at his friends.

"What?" he asked casually.

"You've been zoned out for the past five minutes, looking at the Hufflepuff table," James said.

"Have I?" Remus looked surprised. "I…I didn't realize."

"Oh look, Prongs," Sirius said in a mock tearful voice. "Moony's in love, he's growing up so fast!" He pretended to weep and put a hand over his heart while James and Peter laughed. Remus glared at Sirius before smiling slightly.

"Shut it, Sirius," Remus muttered, turning slightly red in the face. Peter and Sirius laughed, but before he could say anything else, he heard James call out, "Hey! Evans!"

"You know, if you called her 'Lily' she may actually speak to you," Remus ventured as she past James and ignored him completely. James sighed and slumped his shoulders. Remus glanced back to the Hufflepuff table and noticed Liz and Cassie leaving. He stood up himself and grabbed his books, causing his friends to look up.

"Where are you going?" James said, still looking put out from Lily's rejection.

"I got to tell Liz-"

"That you have a furry little problem?" Sirius guessed, trying to cheer James up.

"No…that I can't patrol due to my furry little problem. I'll see you in class."

"Wait, what do you think about this prank? You think we can pull it off?"

"Do you want to be expelled?" Remus asked.

"Come on, introducing Snape to a giant human-sized plant that likes the taste of blood will not get me expelled."

Remus rolled his eyes before walking away. The Marauders called out a collective goodbye, and Remus headed out of the Great Hall, catching up with Liz and her friends at the top of the first staircase. "Liz!"

She turned around when he called her name, as did Cassie and Rose. "Hey," she said giving a bright smile.

"Hey," he said, "Listen, I can't patrol tonight…and I was wondering if Rose could take my spot?"

Liz looked up at Rose, who shrugged and looked back at Remus. "How come you can't patrol?" Liz asked. "Is everything alright?"

Remus looked at her with a sad expression. He didn't want to lie to her, but he didn't have a choice. He looked up at his sister hoping she would help cover for him like she'd always done. "Our mum is not doing all that great," he lied smoothly. "Dumbledore's gave me permission to go home for the week and take care of her."

"Is everything okay?" she asked worriedly, looking between Cassie and Remus.

"Yeah, it's nothing too bad,' Remus said, the guilt from lying to Liz beating at his chest. "Right, Cassie?"

Liz looked up at her best friends, who looked at Remus quickly before looking at Liz. "Everything's fine, Liz, don't worry. Dumbledore won't allow both of us to leave at the same time, is all." She gave an encouraging smile and looked between her friends and her brother. "Can I talk to Remus alone for a second? I'll meet you in class."

They looked at each other before nodding. Liz smiled at Remus and said a soft, "Bye," before Rose grabbed her by her robes and began pulling her up the stairs. Cassie waited until they were out of earshot before rounding on her brother. "Are you out of your mind?" she asked incredulously.

"What?" Remus said slightly perplexed.

"You're thinking about telling her, aren't you?" she said in a dangerously low voice. "You're going to tell her about your condition!"

"How do you know this?" Remus said curiously.

"I'm your sister, I see these things," Cassie said shortly. "Isn't it bad enough that you've told three people? Not to mention Snape knows thanks to his on-going hatred with James and Sirius. I would think you would want to keep this from people!" She had a tint of jealousy in her voice as she glared up at her brother. "Why do you want to tell her now, when you barely know her?"

"We're friends," Remus tried in a defense. Cassie scoffed and crossed her arms.

"Liz and I are friends," she said. "I've known her for the past five years, and you've just started talking to her as a result to being prefect partners!"

"That's not true!" Remus said defensively.

"Then why do you want to trust her with a secret this big?" Cassie retorted.

"Why do you care all of a sudden who I tell?" Remus said slightly aggrivated. One thing Remus hated more than anything was fighting with Cassie, and he knew she was the same way. But he finally figured that Cassie had a reason to not wanting Liz to know, and she was right. She'd known her five years, and he'd barely known her a month. Cassie had known about his secret all of her life, and felt it was one of the things that made her closer with her brother.

"I just don't understand why you want to tell her so bad," Cassie said. "It's not like you to tell others unless you can trust them, or if…" she trailed off, looked at Remus with a suspicious look.

"Or what?" Remus asked her.

"Nothing," she said shortly. "Just, nothing. I have to get to class."

"Cassie," he started, but she turned and headed up the stairs, leaving Remus standing alone and feeling more confused about the situation than before.

Two nights later, Liz and Rose were doing their last night of patrol for the week. For the first time in a couple of weeks, the patrols were uneventful, which allowed the two friends to gossip and have discussions without interruption. Halfway throughout the shift, their ongoing conversation finally made it to Remus's absence.

"Do you really think Remus is home with their mum?" Rose said as they made their way down the fourth floor corridor.

"Well, yeah," Liz said. "I mean, Cassie even said that she was sick, and she wouldn't lie about that."

"But don't you think it's a bit…odd, that Cassie hadn't breathed a word about their mum until Remus mentioned it?" Rose pressed further.

"Maybe she didn't want to talk about it," Liz said. "I mean, if one of my parents were sick, I wouldn't go around broadcasting it to the world."

"I guess," Rose muttered, still looking uncertain about it. Liz finally sighed and looked at Rose.

"Okay, Rose, what is this all about? You hardly ever doubt something Cassie says. Me, all the time-which I deserve-but Cassie? What's going on?"

"Well, Severus and I were talking-"

"You mean the two of you actually utter words other that "Hi" and "Bye" to each other?"

"Shut up," Rose said. "Anyway, the topic somehow got to the Marauders and…he let a few things slip."

"Such as?" Liz said.

"He said something about Black almost getting him killed last year after that huge fight after O.W.L.s. He also said something about Potter saving him from Remus."

"From Remus?" Liz said in confusion. "But Remus has never done anything like that-we'd know from Cassie, or Remus would have told me."

"I tried to get him to explain," Rose said as they made it up to the next floor. "But he wouldn't speak of it anymore except to say there were certain things many people didn't know about Remus Lupin."

"Why are you telling me this?" Liz demanded. "And why is Snape all of a sudden trying to take what Sirius and James did to him on Remus?"

"I don't know about Severus," Rose answered. "But I'm telling you because you're like my sister, and I don't want you to get hurt."

"I'm not going to get hurt. And you know how I don't believe anything that comes out of Snape's mouth. No offense, but I don't."

"Just promise you won't let yourself get hurt."

Liz sighed and nodded. "Promise."

The conversation turned to Cassie and her mystery crush, and the two began to joke about who the person could be.

"Which house do you think he's from?" Liz asked.

"Well, I really don't think he's a Slytherin," Rose said.

"And I think we can safely rule out Ravenclaw," Liz continued. "So that leaves our house and Gryffindor."

"I bet its Amos Diggory," Rose said. "After all, he's a seventh year this term."

"Too old," Liz said. "I say he's either in our year or sixth year."

"Frank Longbottom."

"Ugh, nobody's that desperate," Liz said, making a face. "Just like nobody wants to date Peter Pettigrew."

"I don't know, that blonde Ravenclaw seems to be spending a lot of time with him," Rose muttered.

"How do you know?" Liz asked curiously.

"Because Severus and I had to run them out of a broom closet last week." The two looked at each other and started laughing.

Finally after they'd calmed down, Liz came to her own conclusion. "Wait, it may not be Peter, but it may be another Marauder."

"Who?"

"Sirius."

The two looked at each other and shook their heads. "No," they chorused.

"Okay, bad decision," Liz muttered.

"Well, I don't know," Rose said as she thought about it. "He's Remus's best friend, he seemed to be around when we saw Cassie over the summer…"

"The idea was crazy," Liz said. "Besides we know that Remus and Sirius were helping her with her animagus."

Rose shrugged. "I'm sure whoever it is, I'm sure that Cassie will tell us when she's ready to."

They finished their patrol and made it back down the stairs. They made it down to the corridor that contained the entrance to the Hufflepuff Common Room when they heard two people talking. The two prefects stopped short of entering the corridor and peaked around seeing who the two culprits that were out of hours were. Of course, as soon as they did, they wished they hadn't.

Because the last thing they expected to see was Cassie Lupin in the middle of a deep kiss with Sirius Black.

Rose stepped toward the couple, opening her mouth to yell at the two. Liz put her hand over Rose's mouth and pulled her back in case they'd been heard, but Sirius only held Cassie closer to him as he continued to kiss her. Rose bit her hand and was getting ready to shout when Liz quickly whipped her wand out and whispered, "Silencio!"

Rose glared at her and began to struggle against her best friend. Liz pulled her back into the connecting corridor as the two broke and saw Sirius whisper goodnight before heading the opposite way, Cassie watching him go before she entered the Hufflepuff's common room. Liz waited until the portrait closed before releasing the silencing charm off of Rose.

"When I get my hands on that cocky Gryffindor, I'm going to-"

"Rose, calm down!" Liz whispered urgently. She didn't want to grab the attention to anybody who may be nearby, especially a certain Poltergeist that liked to air everybody's laundry. "Cassie can't know that we know about this! She's obviously keeping this from us for a reason, let her tell us on her own terms!"

"How am I supposed to go on acting like nothing's wrong when she's dating that idiot?" Rose said getting upset. "I can't hide something like this!"

"We're going to have to try," Liz said finally. "We're just…going to have to try."

Pretending to not know about Cassie secretly dating Sirius behind everybody's back turned out to be easier than Liz and Rose thought. As the next month went by, the amount of patrol duties and the homework from their classes kept them plenty enough busy to keep the secret off their minds. OWL year made their previous years look easy and simple. Remus had decided to take his sister's word's at heart and wait to tell Liz until he could get his thoughts about her (and his emotions) straight. The Lupin siblings seemed to be keeping their secrets like they wanted.

But the truth always has to come out eventually.

It was the second week in November, and Liz was sitting in the courtyard with her Charms book, waiting for Cassie and Rose to join her. It was late Friday, and even though it was the weekend, Liz was behind on homework due to double patrol duties, and needed to get caught up. While the Wizarding World was in the midst of war with You-Know-Who, Dumbeldore thought it was best to keep the castle well protected. Liz wasn't exactly sure what a pair of students would be able to do against any Death Eater that decided to attack Hogwarts, but she wasn't going to question the Headmaster's rules.

She was sitting on the stone seat, legs crossed and engrossed into her book when a shadow fell over her. She looked up seeing Severus Snape, the last person she ever thought would come up to her and even speak.

"What do you want, Snape?" she asked briskly, looking back down at her book. "If you're looking for Rose, I don't know where she is."

"It's not Rosalina who I wanted to speak to," he replied in his usual tone.

"Then why are you talking to me?" Liz looked up and gave him a hard look.

"I wanted to ask you if you're oblivious to life."

"Excuse me?" Liz closed her book and stood up. "What does that mean?"

"I think you know," he sneered.

"Okay, Snape…Rose may be able to interpret that warped brain of yours, but I'd rather not play riddle games with you," Liz said angrily, brushing past him.

"It's about Lupin."

Liz rolled her eyes and turned around. "You do realize that there are two Lupins at this school? You're going to have to be a bit more specific."

Snape glared at her. "The Gryffindor," he spat.

"What about him?"

"He's a werewolf."

Liz looked at Snape with an odd look before laughing at him. "Yeah, right," she chortled. "And I'm secretly a mermaid when I approach water. The next time you decide to spread rumors like a little girl, I suggest you have at least a believable story." She rolled her eyes and started walking away before he spoke up again.

"You can't tell me you haven't noticed certain…signs," he called. "Always absent after a full moon, sick and weak a few days afterwards. Any other person would make a connection between the two. Either you're too blind to see it, or you're pretending not to notice."

Liz stopped dead in her tricks, and she could feel Snape's smirk of victory over beating down on the back of her neck. The wheels in her mind began to turn, thinking about what Snape said. Remus always made an excuse to not be around during the full moon, that was true, but Cassie had always confirmed what he said to her, assuring her everything was okay. If was true, why had Cassie lied to her as well? Had Remus asked her to? That was the most obvious reason-after all, they were brother and sister and would do almost anything for each other. And Remus seemed to always be weak and slightly sick after he was gone…she'd just never realized until now. Was it true?

"Liz!"

She looked up, seeing Rose and Cassie coming toward her. She turned back to see if Snape was still lurking about, but he'd vanished. Her two best friends finally reached her and looked at her worriedly.

"Liz, what's wrong?" Rose looked concerned. "You're white as a ghost!"

"What happened?" Cassie asked. Liz didn't know what to do, how to respond. All she could think was the possibility of Remus being a werewolf.

"Is it true?" Liz choked out, her voice cracking as she looked at Cassie in disbelief.

"Is what true?" she responded in confusion. "Liz, you're starting to freak me out."

"Remus. Is he a werewolf?"

"What?" Rose said, looking between Liz and Cassie. "Where did you hear something like that?"

"Did he tell you?" Cassie asked quietly, looking at Liz in shock.

"No, that greasy git Rose associates with told me!" Liz felt the rest of the color in her face drain completely. "So it's true! He is!"

"Liz, you don't understand," Cassie said quickly. "You…you weren't supposed to find out this way."

Liz clutched the book in her hand to her chest and turned away from Cassie and Rose, heading for the school in a quick pace, ignoring their pleas for her to stop. She knew they were following her and quickened her steps as she ran up the stairs that led to the entrance hall, her vision partially blurred from her tears. She stopped dead however when she heard Remus call out her name. Liz looked up, seeing him halfway up the stairs coming down with Sirius and James. He saw her current state, the tears that were in her eyes and left his friends and rushed down to her.

"Liz, what's wrong?" he said in concern. "Are you okay?"

Liz didn't respond, but just looked up at him feeling so many different emotions she couldn't tell them apart. When she didn't respond, he placed a hand gently on her shoulder, still giving her a worried look. She flinched involuntarily away from him and backed away from him. Liz looked around, Cassie and Rose now caught up with her looking at her in the same way that Remus was. She pushed her way past Remus and, ignoring his pleas, ran up the stairs and out of sight, her heart feeling heavier with each step she took as the realization of what Snape said was actually true.

And the truth is out. Bonus points if you caught the two movie references that were thrown in and tell me what they are!