Remus Lupin was surprised when the two first years navigated their way to the seventh floor corridor, well actually Leevi led and Harry followed. This was unusual because the two had only been there a week; most of the first years still had trouble finding their common rooms and the Great Hall. He quietly followed them along sure that they hadn't heard him. He was shocked to see a wooden door that had never been there before.
The two boys quickly made their way through the door and closed it behind them before Remus had the chance to follow. Creeping forward he tired to turn the handle but found it locked, so he leaned his ear against the door but couldn't hear anything. Frowning he backed away from the door and sat down in the shadows waiting for the children to come back out.
Just as he was about to pull out a book he heard the door open and close. Looking up he didn't see anyone, but could hear feet shuffling along the stone floor.
"Gosh Leevi your breath stinks what did you drink?" Remus heard the loud voice of Harry ask.
"Shhh keep it down genius." Christelle muttered.
"Bloody Mary, haven't had one since I got to England. It was long overdue." Leevi answered back. "Now come on and keep your voice down or Filch will catch us before we reach the common room."
Remus waited until they were out of hearing distance before he moved towards the door and pushed it open, he was surprised to see a room with all kinds of items spread all over the place. Looking around in confusion at the piles upon piles of random items he picked up a book and looked at the cover, "Where to Find Anything." Frowning Remus put the book in his pocket and walked out of the door and back towards his office.
Meanwhile Harry, Leevi, and Christelle were creeping along the corridor back towards the common room. He sorely wanted to use the secrete passageways, but knew that it would look suspicious if he knew too many of them, after all he had only been there for a week. As they turned the corner onto the third floor corridor faint footsteps could be heard.
"Shh come on let's see who that is." Christelle whispered and started to move in the directions of the footsteps.
Leevi quickly covered Harry's mouth as he was about to blurt out something.
"Keep quiet." Leevi hissed and pulled him along.
Walking a short distance they saw that a door was slightly ajar, a door Leevi recognized very well.
Motioning for them to stop Leevi unwound Melton from his left arm and put him on the ground where the snake turned invisible and started to move towards the door. Once the snake passed through the door it sent Leevi feed back through their mind link.
'It's the potion's master.'
'What is he doing?' Leevi asked.
'Trying to avoid the three headed dog, he's also trying to kill it.'
Leevi frowned at the knowledge; it would seem that Snape was a traitor for longer than they ever knew in his home dimension.
'Is Fluffy in any trouble?' He asked worried knowing how much Hagrid loved the dog.
'He should be fine.' Melton answered before starting to laugh hysterically.
The three first years froze when they heard a pained cry come from the room followed by angry cursing. A cloaked man quickly came limping out of the room, slammed the door and threw a simply lock on it.
Cursing and liming the man quickly made his way down the corridor and back to the dungeons.
Harry released a breath that he had been holding, "What was that all about?"
"Doesn't matter, hold on a minute." Leevi replied as he went to the door and opened it to retrieve his bonded. To his surprise Fluffy didn't even growl at him, if anything the dog looked happy to see him.
"Melton what did you do to Fluffy?" Leevi enquired curiously.
'I didn't do anything, just talked to him; he is awful lonely up here all by himself with out any one to talk to.' Melton thought back.
Leevi grinned thinking that this could work to his advantage. Having Melton stay with Fluffy would not only help him get past the dog if he had to, but Melton could also alert him to any trouble the stone was in.
'I agree.' Came the smug hiss from Melton.
'Fine stay here, but I'll come up every week or so with something for you to eat, don't want to starve, know do we?' Harry said sarcastically and turned to leave after giving a nod of greeting to the dog.
Walking back to Christelle and Harry he jumped under the cloak and led them back towards the Gryffindor common room.
When they finally reached it Harry pulled off the cloak and turned to his cousins.
"Ok what was all that about? Who was that man in the forbidden corridor?" He demanded.
"That cousin dear, was our esteemed potion's master, and I think we should leave it at that." Christelle said before turning and walking up to her dorm room, leaving the two boys standing there.
After a few minutes of staring Leevi pulled his counterpart towards the stairs.
"Common we need to get some sleep, I have somewhere to be tomorrow, and we have to start planning our prank.
As Remus was walking towards his office he heard angry cursing and loud walking, almost as if someone was dragging something along. He quickly hid in the shadows and watched for the person to come into view.
Soon he saw Severus come around the corner limping and leaving behind a trail of blood.
Just as Remus was about to step forward to assist Snape, the man muttered something that made him stop. "Bloody dog, how are you suppose to get past it if you have to watch all three of its' heads?"
'What was Snape doing on the third floor corridor?' Remus asked himself and resolved to talk to Dumbledore very soon as the potion's master limped out of view.
He finally made his way back to his office and private room.
Making himself a cup of tea he took a seat in front of the fire and reached his hand in his pocket for the book.
Frowning he felt around in his pocket, yet didn't feel anything. He quickly sat the tea down and stood up so that he could turn out his robe's pockets. The book was nowhere to be found. Remus was actually baffled, it was possible that he dropped the book, but he thought he would have noticed something of the sort.
Sitting back down he decided to think about what he had learnt about his young charges. He almost snorted in amusement when he realized that a Bloody Mary was an alcoholic drink. The way Leevi had spoken about it he was quiet use to drinking them, and had not had one since he had came to England. Maybe it was a good idea for the Potters to take in the children after all, young children should not be drinking at all. But something that confused Remus was the fact that he had seen no alcohol in the room that the children had been in. Perhaps they had it on them? He mused; after all he had never had a Bloody Mary and had no inkling of what went in to it.
Taking a piece of parchment out of a desk nearby, he grabbed a quill and began to write down everything he knew about the Maximus'. When he was done he frowned at the list as he realized how little he truly knew about them. Somehow they had lived with the Potters for almost a month and he hardly knew anything more about them than when they arrived. Thinking back on it now, it seems that they were always able to direct questions about themselves away from them and onto different topics about the Potter family, and friends. They did it so skillfully that no one had noticed at the time.
Glancing at the clock he finished his tea and headed for bed, perhaps a good night of rest would help him figure things out.
The next morning Leevi and Christelle were up early and already at the breakfast table when Remus walked in. There were only a few other people about this early owing to that it was a Saturday morning. When he entered and started to walk towards the teacher's table both of the twins waved politely to him and grinned. He nodded back in greeting as continued his trek.
A full forty minutes later Harry, Ron, and Neville came into the hall and took their seat next to the twins.
Grinning Leevi looked over at the scowls on their faces.
"What took you three so long?" He asked in a humored voice.
"Believe it or not we got lost." Ron muttered piling his plate as if there would be no food for the next week.
"We've been here for almost a week and have yet to be lost once!" Harry yelled grabbing some bacon and toast. "And we get lost on a Saturday!"
"The only reason we are never lost is because we follow around Leevi and Christelle, they have to have photographic memory or something." Neville replied looking for the jam.
Just as Christelle was about to agree with them a large black owl flew down and landed in her bowl of cereal.
Harry immediately recognized his family's owl and pulled it out of his cousin's food. He then untied the three letters off of its leg and handed them to their addressee.
Leevi for a minute looked shocked before shoving the letter in his pocket to read later. Christelle and Harry however tore into theirs and stared to read away, while Neville looked on wistfully, and Ron continued to shovel food into his mouth.
After Neville was finished with his breakfast Leevi said his farewells and led the-boy-who-lived out to the lake for a chat.
Once they had both sat down under the Golden Trio's favorite tree Leevi turned to Neville.
"Something bothering you Neville?" He asked in a casual voice.
"What? Why would something be bothering me?" Neville asked not meeting Leevi's eye.
"Just asking, you became oddly quiet when we received letters from the Potters." Leevi said picking up a rock and attempting to skip it across the water.
"I was just thinking how nice it would be to receive a letter from my parents. Most of the children just take it for granted that their parents will always be there for them, that they'll have a family." Neville said in a voice full of emotion and sadness.
"You didn't have a family?" Leevi asked, wondering once again who Neville was raised by.
"I have a family, but they don't like me very much." Neville said picking up a rock.
"I am a burden to them."
Leevi frowned at what he heard.
"Why don't you live with other relatives then? You're a great kid; I think that any of your relatives would feel lucky to raise you." He said with confidence.
Neville frowned in thought and a bit of hatred, "Dumbledore said it would be best that I live with them. Something to do with the protection left by my mother or something."
'Back to those useless blood wards are we?' Leevi thought to himself. After Dumbledore died in his original world Voldemort attacked the Dursleys, and surprise surprise the wards did not hold up. It would seem that even if they were blood wards they would not hold up under force because the Dursleys never wished to provide him with any decent protection. He would have been better protected at almost any wizard's home in the world, God forbid even the Malfoy's.
"Neville I'll see what I can do about that, maybe you can spend the summers at the Potters, after all they do have some pretty extensive wards." Leevi replied.
Offering his hand to Neville, Leevi helped him to his feet before the two growing friends headed back towards the castle. One hopeful for a better life, and the other seething at an old man.