Chapter 9:
Hunter's Moon
The woman began to laugh. "Lupin's boy. Aren't I lucky?"
Teddy didn't hesitate. He raised his wand and called, "Help!", hoping George's spell would work, or that whoever was coming to open the gate would get there soon.
Beside him, Ruthless yelled, "Petrificus Totalis!"
The woman, still laughing, went down hard, and Teddy saw at the last minute that Ruthless was running out toward her, stepping out of the shadow of the gate, and as he reached futilely for her, the grass rustled and four more shapes rose from it, growling. He shot a hex at the nearest one and dashed out, grabbing Ruthless's arm. "Come on!" he said. "Under the shadow!"
She whipped her head around and saw the others and to Teddy's astonishment, raised her wand at them.
"Get BACK!" he said, tugging her wildly and physically throwing her back into the shadow. She got to her feet and glared at him, but before she could do much more than that, a man rushed at them. As soon as he hit the edge of the shadow, he howled in pain and drew back, his shoes smoking.
Behind Teddy, the gate opened and Professor Longbottom ran out, followed by Vivian, Hagrid, and Robards. At the same time, a series of pops announced the arrival of three Aurors. Uncle Harry grabbed the man who'd been injured and threw him aside, then ropes shot out, binding him. Ron took aim at another woman, and she was bound in ice. The last woman took a step back as Professor Longbottom came at her, then reached around her neck and threw something on the ground. As he raised his wand, she dove for it and disappeared.
"What the hell...?" Ron said.
"I don't know," Uncle Harry said. "I intend to find out. Williams, go back to town, you're in charge for the rest of the afternoon. Tell Anthony I want to see him."
The third Auror, an unpleasant man with long red hair, said, "You did send for all of us."
"I know. But he should have used his head. Teddy's a primary target."
Vivian was crouching beside the woman Ruthless had Petrified. "This is Mina," she said. "She led the escape."
Uncle Harry nodded. "Ron, why don't you give those two a long holiday in the North Sea. I think we'll have a chat with Mina here before she joins them. Hagrid, may we impose on your hospitality?"
Hagrid nodded, and Professor Robards Levitated Mina until she was upright, and prodded her through the gate. Teddy and Ruthless started to follow, but Uncle Harry put a hand on each of their shoulders and stopped them just inside the protection of the proper Hogwarts grounds.
"Teddy, there is someone out there who wants you dead. I don't know how to put it more clearly."
"We were inside the protection waiting for someone to open the gate," Teddy said.
"You're on a dirt road, and I can see your footprints."
Ruthless said, "I did it. Then Teddy grabbed me and threw me inside." The memory of it, apparently, was enough to earn Teddy another glare from her.
"Yeah? Good for Teddy." Uncle Harry shook his head. "That was careless, Scrimgeour."
"I'm armed, they weren't."
"In case you didn't notice at the end, they're using some kind of magic we don't know about."
"To run away!"
"And you had a nice long chat to know what else they've got up their sleeves?"
Ruthless stared at him mutinously. "I've heard about what you - "
"I've long learned to embrace my inner hypocrite," Uncle Harry said. "So don't even try it." He turned to Teddy. "And, you..." He shook his head. "I know pretty redheads are distracting, but I'd like to keep you alive to have another date. If you're not actually at Hogwarts, you'll be either with a huge crowd or with me. Is that perfectly clear?"
Teddy nodded.
He seemed about to say something else, then just blew through his front teeth and shook his head. A moment later, he headed down toward Hagrid's.
"I'm not pretty," Ruthless said. "And I don't need rescuing."
The sun was hitting her nose very prettily as she said it and Teddy felt a very strange desire to kiss it, but the bigger desire was to shake her until she figured out that Uncle Harry was right. She had no business just running out there. "You did need rescuing, and if we'd stayed where we were, nothing would have happened. They'd have all just burnt their toes, then the Aurors would've been there."
"Hmmph."
"Also, you're pretty."
A look crossed her face, somewhere between pained and pleased. "All right. Sorry I ran out." She smiled. "Do you think we should go listen in on the one they caught, or would it be too dangerous for you?"
Teddy actually thought Uncle Harry would be disappointed if he didn't try, so he shrugged. "Come on. I don't suppose you've got an Extendable Ear with you?"
She didn't, but when they got to Hagrid's, the window was open (as Teddy had half expected). Through it, he could see Mina, bound to a chair. Vivian was pacing back and forth in front of her, and Uncle Harry was sitting at the table watching coldly. Teddy had never actually seen Uncle Harry look cold, and didn't think he ever wanted to again. Hagrid was making himself as scarce as possible, and Professors Robards and Longbottom had Conjured chairs for themselves rather than looking ridiculous sitting in Hagrid's oversized furniture.
A crate had been pushed up under the window - in Teddy's mind's eye, he could almost see Uncle Harry doing it himself. It was too small for both of them, and they sat back to back on it. Teddy put his hand behind him, and a moment later, he felt Ruthless take it.
"I'm going to break the spell now, Mina," Uncle Harry said.
Mina coughed loudly. "How do you know my name?"
"Well," Vivian said, "aside from it being tossed around at Azkaban, I told him."
There was a pause, then Mina said, "YOU! You're meant to be dead. Greyback said he had Lupin kill you!"
"Have you ever noticed how stupid Greyback is?"
"Greyback's smart enough to still be alive, unlike Lupin," Mina said snidely. "And he'll come for me."
Ruthless squeezed Teddy's hand comfortingly.
Vivian laughed. It was a harsh, cruel sound that Teddy didn't associate with her at all. "Mina, he tossed you over to us like a broken toy. Who's he taken up with now? We all know you're too old for him. I'm probably too old for him these days. Has he made someone new? Some pretty little thing barely out of school?"
"Shut up."
"So he has."
Mina didn't answer.
Professor Longbottom's voice came gently. "Here, Miss. A glass of water."
There was a pause, then Mina said, "That tastes funny."
"That's because it's laced with Veritaserum," Uncle Harry said. "It's meant to be tasteless, but I always taste it myself. A bit unpleasant. Now, what's the device your friend used to get away?"
"No name," Mina said contemptuously. "We don't need cute names for something useful. Don't really know how it works. She made a sort of charm that does it now, that we can carry around, but she means to make it so we can move without it. Right useful, it is. Been all over the place. In and out and all about. She makes all sorts of useful things."
"Who?" Robards asked.
"That girl... Greyback didn't bring her to us, she came on her own. The little tart. She's from France. Went to that school what they got there, and she must've been right good at it."
"In France?" Vivian repeated. "Mina, did you know the girl?"
"Never saw her before in my life."
"How old is she?"
"Seventeen."
"Vivian," Uncle Harry said, "we need to - "
"I need to go to France," she said. "See if Alderman knows anything about this."
"Which is exactly what I was going to say we ought to do."
"This is pack business," Vivian said, then Teddy heard the door open. He was about to suggest that he and Ruthless might find a place out of sight when Vivian stormed around the corner of Hagrid's hut, hands on her hips. She shook her head. "I saw you through the wall, you know," she said.
Teddy frowned. "Well..."
"Get back up to school. You know Harry will tell you anything it's your business to know."
She left without waiting to see if they'd follow her instructions. Teddy started to stand up, but then Uncle Harry spoke again.
"How much does Greyback know about Ted Lupin?"
"Everything," Mina said. "He always knew about Lupin's Little Red."
"Little Red?"
"Like the story," Mina said. "With the Big, Bad Wolf. Lupin tried to tell him lies about her, but he knew. Little Red, the Auror girl. That other bloke told Greyback she'd up and married Lupin - "
"Other fellow?"
"The Dark Lord. The one you did away with. He told Greyback that Little Red had gone and taken one of his pack, and claimed him for her own. He even knew Lupin had managed to get her sprogged up. First Greyback thought he'd take care of it before the thing was born, then he thought he'd find out what it would be like. Maybe take it away from Lupin and Little Red and see how they liked it. But the other bloke said he had more important things to do. Never did give us anything, that one, even though he promised a lot. And then it was all over, and Greyback was in Azkaban. We went to Germany after that. Black Forest. Lots of werewolves there. Too many. So we decided to come back. Then you Aurors up and killed Stanfield, and I didn't much like any of the blokes who were coming up, so I thought it was time to get Greyback out. And he thought it was time to do something about Lupin's little leftover. We'd take care of Little Red, too, if she hadn't taken care of herself."
"Teddy, we should go," Ruthless whispered.
He shook his head.
"Harry!"
Professor Longbottom's voice was a sudden, sharp warning, and Teddy stood up, looking in the window. Uncle Harry's wand was raised at the chair where Mina was tied up, and Teddy didn't think he looked like a warning from an old friend was enough to stop him from using it. He'd heard of Uncle Harry's temper, but he'd never seen it, never really believed it was there. It was terrible.
Uncle Harry looked up and saw him. For a moment, their eyes locked, then Uncle Harry lowered his wand. "Mina," he said, "you are quite lucky the 'leftover' is around. Robards, I'm deputizing you. I imagine you remember the procedure for getting her to Azkaban?"
"Yes."
"Then get her there."
Robards started to bind Mina, and Uncle Harry came out the door. He came straight to Teddy. "I'm sorry you overheard that," he said.
"Vivian told us to leave and we didn't," Teddy said. "And Ruthless said to go as well."
"I expected you to be there. I didn't know what she'd say about Tonks. Come on. It's time to get back to the castle. I have work to do, and I'd rather know that you're safe inside today."
Victoire was making noises about walking down to dinner with Teddy and Ruthless that night - she'd been with them every second since they'd got back, and was disturbed by what had happened - but as Teddy suspected that Ruthless meant to take an indirect route to the Great Hall, he was trying to gently discourage it. Ruthless was looking like she was about to go for her wand when the portrait hole opened and Professor Longbottom came in. The first and second years all said hello to them, and he took a moment to be sociable, then checked the Lionbloom ostentatiously, then subtly turned to Teddy, Victoire, and Ruthless. "You three," he said. "A moment?"
He took them out into the corridor. "Ron just got back from Azkaban," he said. "They interviewed the others. Teddy is their focus, but Victoire, they are quite aware of you, and Ruth, I'm afraid the woman who got away will identify you as part of Teddy's circle."
"So what do we do about it?" Ruthless asked.
"As your teacher and Head of House, my job is to tell you that you're not to do anything. As a Gryffindor, I know you will anyway, so please keep it to what I tell you: Keep your eyes open. Watch. And go to an Auror if you see anything out of place."
"Has Vivian got back from France yet?" Teddy asked.
"No. I'm sure she'll tell you what she's found out when she does."
But she didn't come back that night, or on Sunday. Teddy made himself go back to his homework, of which there was quite a lot. Victoire was nervous and stuck close by. To Teddy's surprise, Ruthless's brother Kirk took to hanging about as well, until she chased him off with her Beater's bat. Teddy heard him protesting that if she was in trouble, it was his business as her brother to look after her. Her answer was not one Teddy thought he would repeat anywhere Granny would hear him.
Uncle Harry brought Teddy a letter from James at supper, containing a story he'd written about a flying ship, which was piloted by his cat, Martian. Checkmate, being Martian's sister, had been made first mate. They were looking for - of course - a treasure, which was on Mercury, and had to fight with something called a "sun dragon." James had given Checkmate the power to morph ("But only on Mercury, which is why she doesn't do it here"), and Martian wielded the sword of Gryffindor. Before they left, Checkmate assured Martian that all of the scary people after Teddy had been sent to Azkaban, and weren't allowed to have pudding ever again, which was why it was all right for the cats to leave. "Besides," she said, "our brother Bushy is still with Victoire, so he might look after Teddy if there is trouble." He had obviously spent a long time on it, and spell-checked it meticulously (Teddy knew he generally spelled Victoire's name wretchedly - it had ranged from Vitwa to Vikowa to, in one memorable case of unfortunate dictionary-checking, Viceroy), and he'd carefully made unrecognizable drawings in the margins. Teddy read it to Ruthless and Victoire, and Ruthless spent the rest of the day challenging Checkmate to duels.
By breakfast Monday morning, Vivian had returned, looking thoughtful, and the encounter with Mina seemed far away again (so did the encounter with Ruthless, which they hadn't been able to recreate with Kirk and Victoire about, and that was more pressing), and he wasn't thinking about it at all when the owls swooped in with the morning mail. One dropped a thin envelope in front of him, with careful, but still clumsy-looking, block letters addressed to "tED LUpiN."
"Did James write you another story?" Victoire asked, sorting her pile of letters from home into a neat stack.
"Too thin," Teddy said, but he was thinking it might be from Al and Lily. He certainly didn't expect the sheet of very thin parchment inside, which said only,
Is yor blod the same? I ramembir the tast.
For a few seconds, he couldn't make sense of the misspelled message, then he thrust it away from himself, startling the filthy owl that had brought it and spilling his orange juice.
Apparently, Fenrir Greyback had not spent a lot of time practicing his spelling or his penmanship.
"Ew!" Victoire had let her eyes wander to the letter he'd inadvertently shoved in her direction. "That's disgusting!"
Teddy, trying to keep his hand from shaking, picked it up again and moved it back. "Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to throw it at you."
"Is that from - ?" She raised her eyebrows. "You have to tell," she said. "If that's from... him... you have to tell!"
"I know," Teddy hissed.
"Tell what?" Ruthless asked, looking up with a dangerous sort of mildness from her Transfiguration homework, which she was doing on Teddy's other side.
Teddy tipped the letter in her direction.
She narrowed her eyes at it. "Are the Aurors here yet? Where's your godfather? Are you going to write back? They could track the owl. I'll do that." She pulled out a fresh sheet of parchment from her bag.
"I doubt it's that easy," Teddy said.
"What's not?" Professor Longbottom said, coming down from the staff table. "Teddy?"
Teddy handed him the letter.
He went white. "I'll contact Harry right away," he said. "Teddy, you're out of Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures today. You're not to leave the castle. Victoire, I don't want to see your face in Herbology, either, while I'm at it. You too, Scrimgeour. You can all tend the Lionbloom for credit; it needs a bit of pruning." He frowned. "In fact, go up there straightaway. Whatever you have this morning can wait until Harry's had a look. Is this the owl?"
Teddy nodded.
Professor Longbottom picked up the owl and signaled to Vivian, who came down to join them. "Walk Teddy and the girls up to Gryffindor. I have a call to make."
He strode off toward the small room off to the side of the Great Hall, and Vivian led Teddy, Ruthless, and Victoire up to the portrait. Teddy gave the password, and it swung open on the empty Common Room.
Vivian stopped them from going in, and addressed the Fat Lady. "There's to be no one other than students allowed in, password or no," she said.
"Of course," the Fat Lady said.
Vivian nodded, and shooed them inside. Teddy caught a glimpse of her magical eye before it shut again.
Ruthless made a face. "He couldn't have sent it tomorrow? I have a Potions test that I wouldn't mind being forced to skip."
Victoire laughed, which seemed to surprise Ruthless. "Maybe he'll write every day."
"I'll be his pen pal, if it gets me out of Potions," Ruthless said. "Do either of you have any Herbology things here?"
"I have a pruning kit," Victoire said. "My mum gave it to me to take care of a little box garden she made for me." She ran up to get it.
Teddy was caught entirely by surprise when Ruthless kissed him, and didn't have time to put his hands in her hair or do any of the things that Fifi LaFolle said girls liked, but at least this time, they managed not to do any damage to each other. His lip had been a bit turned out when she caught it, and that seemed more pleasant. He thought perhaps next time, he'd try to be in charge of the kiss, if it was all right with Ruthless.
Victoire came down with a very well stocked Herbology kit a minute later, and they worked together on the Lionbloom, pruning back its leaves (which were dangling over the fireplace and starting to singe) and clearing out several fallen blossoms that had got tangled in the vine. Victoire asked if she might have the clippings to make mulch, but didn't take them up to her room. Instead, she sat down on the sofa and started to read the mail that had come to her at breakfast. Ruthless decided to study for Potions, on the chance that Greyback wouldn't give them an excuse to stay in the Tower again tomorrow, and Teddy took out the Marauder's Map to watch his friends in their classes.
"Oh, no!" Victoire suddenly exclaimed, sounding dismayed.
"What?"
"I saved Maman's letter for last," she said, slipping back into the French word she'd used as a small girl and had been trying, on the advice of Teddy's friends, to quit. "And she's... oh, it's just disturbing."
"What?" Ruthless asked, sounding vaguely interested.
"She's pregnant again."
Ruthless winced. "What's the count?"
"This will bring it to six," Victoire said.
Teddy shook his head. Two years ago, Frankie's mum had got pregnant again, and he'd been the same way as Victoire was (of course, now that he had his little brother Mac, he acted as though it had been his idea all along to expand the family). It didn't make sense.
"Most of them are sisters, though, right?" Ruthless asked.
"All but Artie."
"Well, sisters aren't as big a pain as brothers. So I think having four brothers still makes my family a bigger pain, even though there are only five of us."
"How old is the youngest one?" Victoire asked.
"Four. It was me, then Kirk, then Keith, then the twins. I wish they'd stop it."
"You don't think they have?"
"When they hear that your mum's had a sixth, I'll bet they think, 'Well, if it's all right for the Weasleys, we ought to go ahead.'"
Irritated at what seemed the first congenial conversation that Victoire and Ruthless had had since summer, Teddy picked up the pruning shears and went back to the Lionbloom, trying to find any random extra growth he could, just to occupy himself while the girls bemoaned their huge, boisterous families. After a bit, they grew quiet again, but he'd found a nest of tangled vines to work through and didn't go back out. He heard Victoire go upstairs, and a few seconds later, a curtain of leaves moved and Ruthless came in.
She bit her lip. "Sorry, Teddy. I just realized what that must have sounded like. I can tell you that brothers are a right pain, but... well..." She shrugged awkwardly. "Sorry."
Teddy stopped working through the tangle. "It's all right. I reckon if I really had brothers, I'd think they were pains as well. I just sort of wish I had them."
"Do you want one of mine? I have spares." She smiled very prettily, and Teddy decided that he would be in charge of this very kiss. He touched her cheek, then sort of leaned in, pushing his lips out and sort of sliding them around on hers. She drew away, laughing. "That tickles."
This wasn't what Teddy had been going for, but at least she wasn't bleeding. He lifted up the leaves, and found Victoire standing there, staring at them with her mouth open. He didn't notice her hand in her purse until the dungbomb flew at him.
He jumped back and let it splatter on the floor, then cleaned up with a flick of his wand. "What the - "
Victoire's mouth twitched and she made a hissing sort of sound, then stomped off toward the girls dormitories. Teddy started after her, but Ruthless put her hand on his arm. When he turned to her, she had an odd sort of expression on her face. "Let her be," she said. She turned back to the Lionbloom. "Let's get this untangled before Longbottom fails us for the day..."
Uncle Harry came back on Monday night, the letter from Greyback in hand, and called Teddy into the anteroom behind the Great Hall, where Ron, Vivian, Headmistress Sprout, and Professor Longbottom were waiting. "I thought you might enjoy burning it," he said. "We've got everything we're going to get from it."
Teddy took it, crumpled it, and threw it into the roaring fire. There was more than enough wood smoke to cover the reek of burning parchment. He watched it until it was completely gone.
"I'm going to keep you up to date," Uncle Harry said, Summoning over a chair for him. "You don't technically have any need to know everything, but this is one case where I don't think you can be over-informed. I suspect there are some members of the general public who might disagree, but I think they don't really need to know."
Teddy understood, and nodded. "Can't see why they would."
Ron fidgeted. "Maybe you ought to tell Victoire..."
"That's Teddy's call," Uncle Harry said, which wasn't entirely comforting, as Teddy had a feeling the morning's dungbomb wasn't the last he'd see from her. She'd been pouting all day, and when he'd tried to talk to her, she'd turned up her nose and refused to listen. But he guessed the adults wouldn't care about that. Uncle Harry took a seat on an overstuffed ottoman. "Vivian, what did you find out in France?"
Vivian leaned forward, planting her elbows on her knees. From where he was sitting, Teddy could only see the unmarked half of her face, the shadows of the firelight moving peacefully across it. "It's not really Hamilton's fault," she said.
"Hamilton?" Ron repeated.
She nodded. "He was one of us. One of Greyback's... pups. He was always quite bright. He learned French faster than any of us. He speaks it better than he speaks English now, honestly. And he was broke. We're all generally perpetually broke."
"I'm not really putting the pieces together, Vivian," Professor Longbottom said.
"Well, he wrote a book," she said, and winced. "For the gold. He wrote it in French. He was going to do an English translation this year, but he didn't really like what happened with the French version. It was... it was about growing up with Greyback. He meant it to be a frightening sort of story, with people who came and rescued us... well, the fictional us, anyway. But apparently the business before the rescue was more vivid. There's an underground group at Beauxbatons who want to help werewolves, and I guess some of them... took it the wrong way. They thought it was about werewolves being forced out of their natural habitat or whatnot."
Teddy sat forward. "What?"
"And they think Greyback's a hero. They've got little buttons with his face on them, from the cover of the book. And one of them decided that she wanted to join the pack. She didn't know about us, but she did know about the ones in the Black Forest, and Hamilton, like an idiot, had told how Greyback got himself cursed. So she set a trap for the woman Janice - the one who killed your granny's cat, Teddy."
"Oh."
"And she dropped out of school and got herself bit. That was last year. She's been quite a little terror on the continent since, except that she dropped out of sight in early August."
"When she found out Greyback escaped," Uncle Harry surmised. "Wonderful."
"I can't say for sure, but it certainly would fit. Madame Maxime said she was a talented student, and she'd particularly been studying magical transportation. She'd been working on charms to help children who didn't have any training get away in case of emergencies. It sounded a lot like the devices that Mina and the others had."
"Are they Portkeys?" Ron asked.
"I don't know. I don't think so. They're not timed, and people use them as they please. Mina said they were like the gate we used to escape, which means they lead to a sanctuary, but obviously, they're portable. I'd guess they have one point that they gather in, then can move out to where they need to be."
"Can they get through the Hogwarts protections?" the Headmistress asked, looking alarmed.
"If they could, they already would have," Vivian said. "They wouldn't have been outside the gate. But if that's what Greyback has her working on, he'll work her until she gets through or dies trying to. And until he gets what he wants out of her, you're not going to see her in one of his little traveling parties."
"Well, we'll have to find where they are," Ron said.
"It sounds like they could be anywhere." Uncle Harry shook his head. "I'm going to put a few more people on research. They might not be in the country. We should see if anyone else is having problems. Vivian, is there anywhere you can think of? Do you think they'd stay in the Black Forest?"
"No. Mina seemed sincere about it being too crowded there. There've always been colonies in Transylvania, but they've been more subservient to the local vampires than Greyback will want. I doubt he has particularly fond memories of subservience."
There was more talk, but no one had any concrete ideas. Teddy wasn't particularly comforted. After the others left, Uncle Harry told him to keep the Marauder's Map on him and check it before he went wandering around on the grounds, which was somewhat more of a comfort, as it would certainly show quite a lot of strangers appearing out of nowhere. "And bring it to the Shack on Thursday for our lesson. The Keys to the Castle as well. I want to see if we can get it to be a more active help."
The moon was waxing toward its November fullness - the Hunter's Moon, according to the lists. Life went on. There were more energetic kisses from Ruthless, and an attack of Creepy Crawly Confections from Victoire, after which she seemed to think herself suitably avenged, and simply refused to speak to him. Teddy brewed the painkiller potion for Vivian again on Wednesday afternoon, though she said he didn't have to, and gave it to her before she disappeared for the evening. He watched her go, then headed back up to the castle with Professor Longbottom, who was unusually quiet. They parted ways at the corridor where his office was, and Teddy checked the time. It would be dark - and the moon would be up - for at least an hour before curfew. He checked the Marauder's Map and found that the Astronomy Tower was empty, as were the corridors leading to it. He climbed to the top of the castle, to the turret where Dumbledore had died and students had gone back to faking their way through star charts, and shut the door carefully behind him, locking it. He sat down on the stones and looked up at the moon.
"Hi, Dad," he said. "Are you watching?"
There was no answer. It was all right. Teddy lay back to look at the sky, letting his mind clear, enjoying the moonlight as well as he could knowing that Greyback would be hunting beneath it, and Vivian would be in pain. He pushed the thoughts away. The night was cold, a preview of winter, but it was refreshing. He let the icy breeze blow over his face. It smelled like the lake, the wood smoke from the chimneys, and the dying leaves in the Forbidden Forest.
He didn't know what he expected - or wanted - from this anymore. It was a ritual, a communion. This time, it didn't seem to be doing much. He couldn't feel Dad nearby, or Mum, or the Marauders.
He sighed and sat up. There wasn't much peace to be had.
"Oh, well. Shall we have a memory?" He looked up at the moon again, and pulled Dad's ring from its chain around his neck, settling it on a piece of parchment. "I could use a good one. Cordis Patronum."
The dark Scottish night swirled away, replaced by a gray sky. High above, Teddy could see a hawk circling, and he thought he might have been brought back again to Dad's memory of the hawk his mother had let him feed. But he could feel the body he was in, the different shape of it, the heavy center.
Something moved.
Inside of him.
He gasped - he'd stumbled onto one of Mum's memories, and it was while he was still inside of her. He was feeling himself moving.
Mum lifted her hand and set it on her stomach, spreading her fingers out, looking down, away from the circling hawk. She felt calm, happy, perhaps a bit afraid. They'd heard from her dad that morning, and he was all right, but it hadn't taken much reading between the lines to know that he'd Seen something he didn't much like in his Scrying. He'd asked a few too many questions about how careful she was being. Still, he was all right. Dad/Remus had got back safely from another visit to Lee Jordan, and Granny/Mum had resigned her position at St. Mungo's rather than play along with Umbridge's obscene rules. They were safe here, in the protected bubble of the house. Granny's house. Mum was in the garden, sitting on the low stone wall. Teddy wanted to yell at her to stay there, but of course, it was no good.
"Dora?"
Teddy felt her head turn, then Dad came into her field of view.
He was wearing some old robes of Sirius's that Mum had scrounged from Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place, and looked quite a bit neater than he usually did in the few glimpses Teddy'd actually had of him. He also seemed well-fed and content. He sat down on the wall beside her.
"He's moving," Mum said. "Do you want to feel?"
Dad nodded and put his hand on her stomach. Teddy again had the disorienting sensation of feeling himself move, kicking hard against the hand.
"I think he thinks I'm intruding," Dad said.
"He's just saying hello," Mum promised. "Are you still dead set against naming him after yourself?"
"I just think it would feel strange to yell, 'Remus, clean up your room!'"
"I suppose I can see that. What about a middle name? That would be perfectly traditional."
"If you really want to. What if the Scrying was wrong? What if it's a girl? Shall we call her Nymphadora?"
"She will be called Jane. Possibly Jane Ann."
Dad laughed and looked up at the sky. "Did you see the hawk? Did I ever tell you that my mum was a falconer?"
"No."
"What about Julia for a girl? Julia Dora?"
"Julia's fine. Why didn't you mention you'd like that?"
"You seemed set on Jane."
Mum smiled. "Jane's just a joke. Not that it's not a perfectly fine name. But I rather like Julia. Not with Dora, though. We could name her after both of her grandmothers. Julia Andromeda."
"All right. But the Scrying's probably right. I think that's a boy. What do you want to name him?"
"Well, I've been thinking about that," Mum said. "Really. I had my Astronomy book out last night. We could give him a proper Black family name. I was thinking of Tarf or Muphrid."
"Sure you were."
"Oh, I was, though! We could recreate the whole star chart if we put our minds to it. Perhaps Tegmine. Or Procyon." Teddy could feel the corners of Mum's mouth twisting.
"I beg you in the name of our future children to burn your Astronomy textbook before you decide to name one of them Vindemiatrix."
Mum laughed again and curled up in the crook of Dad's arm, which was about as romantic as either of them had let the memories become (for which Teddy was infinitely grateful). She looked up to the sky again and watched the hawk flying high above them, and they chose names, dozens of them. None of the names was "Ted," as they'd expected at the time that Granddad would come home any day. Among the names, they spun stories together, the children who might go with names like Julia or Johnny or Raymond (the closest Dad would allow to naming after himself, as he'd used the name undercover once). Though Mum was joking about the star names, Teddy could feel them stirring in her mind. The ones she'd named were deliberately horrible, but, to her amusement, she really had marked normal-sounding star names like "Mira" and she positively loved "Orion," though she was hesitant about giving someone the name of Mad Auntie's husband.
"I love every single one of them," Dad said, and then the world faded around Teddy, and he was alone again on the Astronomy Tower at Hogwarts, bearing the name of the grandfather who'd disappeared so soon after that memory, with no Vindemiatrix in sight.
But it was Mum's sense of contentment that lingered at last, her happiness at her pregnancy, her love for Dad and for the baby she was pretending to name. Teddy cleared his things up and went back downstairs. He dreamed that night of siblings he might have had, and at breakfast, imagined them sitting among the crowd of first years. Julia might be over at the Ravenclaw table, bending over a diagram with the black-haired boy and his friend. Maybe Johnny would be with him in Gryffindor, joining Kirk Scrimgeour in utter embarrassment at the behavior of their older siblings, or maybe he'd be friends with Story Shacklebolt instead. Maybe Victoire could lob dungbombs in his direction instead of in Teddy's. Teddy could sit with Ruthless as she complained about her crowd of brothers, matching her tale for tale with stories about how Raymond always managed to break things and Mira kept stealing his books. He wrote the names down, so he wouldn't forget them.
At six o'clock, he gathered up the Marauder's Map and the Keys to the Castle, and headed downstairs to meet Uncle Harry for his lesson.
