A/N - I know it's taken a while again - but here it is, the next chapter! Thanks for all the reviews and thanks to those who added the story or its author to their favourites. It is great fun to write, but the inspiration is not always there. Or I know where I want to get but not how to get there :-) Enjoy!

Chapter 13 – Summer Days in Zanzibar

Tuesday, 1.6.1999 / Quintus

I'm really looking forward to start working again now. I'll miss little Addie, but we'll see each other on many weekends. I'm of course back to apparating from Switzerland to work every day, but I've done this before and it's not hard to do. After all, the kids do this just as easily.

I'm reporting to the department and to old Tiberius Vance. He gets up from his desk and greets me with a handshake and a heartfelt welcome back.

"It's good to have you back on the team, Quintus. The library could do with some of your tender loving care. I believe that it's become a chaos since you've left!"

"Not surprising. I must be the only systematic Unspeakable ever…" I grumble, but then thank him for the warm welcome.

"It's good to come home, Tiberius, I really look forward to work again."

"You mean to have fun?"

"Just about. – You know me too well!"

"That's what makes a good boss. – How is your son doing?"

"Excellent, Tiberius. I couldn't be prouder of him – he's been made Deputy Headmaster of Hogwarts."

"What! And he's still alive to actually start that job?"

"Amazingly yes. I suppose the relative quiet upon that nomination was thanks to his students. Most of them love him very much."

"It's about time I met Albus for a little chat again. Been too long…"

"He'll have a bit more time now, I suppose, since he'll retire by the end of the month. He'll be pleased, I'd wager."

Tiberius shows me the office I can use and I start to make myself comfortable. He has a first job for me, too, which coincides with one subject I wanted to study more thoroughly myself. The magic at play in the Priori Incantatem of course, as well as the magic at play in Avada Kedavra. In fact there is a whole group of related subjects that go into this study.

"If you hadn't given me the order to do this I'd have asked you for it, Tiberius…" I admit.

"Thought so. And I thought I'd come forth before you ask. It's an important matter anyway and since you were a victim of one and profited of the other magic I would think you'd be the first to want to investigate further. We're a bit short staffed these days, there are not many young people who come forth and show interest in our line of work these days. And most of those who applied have had really terrible abilities in analytical potions. You know how important that is for our job. I've personally written to Albus several times to emphasise more on the subject, but for years we've just seen either politically impossible candidates or badly educated ones."

"The reason for that would have a name: Severus Snape," I tell him.

"I know. Albus never concurred to have this man under control. I was really at a loss, but we never noticed anything, and it turned out that Augustus Rookwood was a Death Eater. I certainly wouldn't have suspected him."

"Neither would I. It was mentioned and I was really astonished. Anyone else on the staff?"

"Thankfully only one – who vanished himself immediately after Augustus was arrested. Baruch Burke."

"I'm glad to hear that the department wasn't really infested. Burke was not bad at what he did, but I don't think he was that much of a use for Voldemort. Augustus on the other hand… must have been quite the shock for Barty."

"I suppose so. He was never quite the same after the sentence he had to give his own son. And only son, too, as you know. Became even more ruthless and was finally just shoved off to the Department of Magical Cooperation. That's when Amelia took over and cleaned the Department of Magical Law Enforcement out. Did a good job, she did, that gal! Wonderful woman…"

"How did you get along with Fudge? Is he any better than Millicent?"

"If he is then I haven't noticed in what way yet. May not be as scatterbrained as old Milly, but he definitely doesn't have the interest of the wizarding population in mind. Only his own. As long as he can hold on to that office he will!" Tiberius replies and there's a fiery glint in his eyes now.

Those are strong words coming from someone who's as mild as Tiberius Vance! I do believe that there is no love lost between him and Fudge. He confirms that:

"This man is responsible for such evil creatures making a career in the Ministry as one Dame Umbridge and some other rather questionable persons. He's blatantly given to and taken favours from just about everyone who was ready to pay for them. I have seen a couple of Ministers come and go, Quintus, but he's taking the top of the list easily when it comes to corruption."

Yuck. I'm so glad that the Department of Mysteries is keeping a bit outside of the Ministry.

"Since you say we're a bit understaffed, Tiberius, I could try to recruit for a bit. I know a couple of young people who are good enough to join us here – and who might be interested to do so. If you do want to hire that is."

"You do? You must have come around among the youngsters a bit, I suppose, what with your son being at Hogwarts…"

"Yes, I got right into a circle of wonderful young people! One or two of them come to mind actually."

"How old?"

"Very young. You might want to wait until they gain a bit more experience, most of them have only just started Avalon Academy. And you can expect better potions results in the near future… the new professors should do the trick, so that every student will be able to learn potions, not only the Slytherins."

"Snape gone then? Finally! I could have strangled Albus for keeping Snape as a teacher. We could have protected him in a hundred different ways, but Albus wouldn't hear any of it. I have had very little contact to the younger section of our world lately. As you know my closest remaining relative is Emmeline, and she's not very often around these days…"

"Where is she? I haven't met her yet. She must be right grown now!"

"That she is! Wonderful young woman she's turned out to be. I've practically brought her up. She's travelling. Now that there's peace reigning again she thought she might see something of the world before deciding on what she really wants to do with her life. So tell me – who would you have in mind? We could do with an apprentice or two."

"One very able young lady would be Padma Patil. Very analytical, very interested in a multitude of subjects, excellent work ethic. Another I'd also could imagine very well here is Morag McDougal. She's currently going through Muggle high school. A former Slytherin who was at my son's safe house for two years, then returned to Hogwarts and was resorted. She became a Gryffindor. Not a brilliant mind per se, but a very hard worker. High moral standard and a good sense of research. The young Potters, mainly Hermione Potter, but she's into studying law. I suppose she has a political career in mind. Muggle born witch who has been top of her year from her first to her last year. She was in Remus' safe house, too, otherwise she would have been a certain head girl of Hogwarts."

"Sounds like an interesting crop. I give you free hand to contact these three young ladies."

"Thank you, Tiberius."

So – before I really can start to dive into research I'll have a look at that library. It still seems to lack a librarian. It is exactly as Tiberius said: a chaos. I start to clean up and send a message to the whole department to ask everyone to bring back every single book they have, here or at their homes, so I can get that library in order. It will take a couple of days and probably four or more reminders, but they'll come back. Once I'll have the catalogue in order again I'll let them take out books again. One of the first things I allow myself to do is to post an ad to the Chronicle of Magic and look for a librarian. This owl is off on this very first day I'm back at work. By the evening I have already seen about half of the Unspeakables who brought back all the books they currently use.

"Thank you, Barberis, you can come back and take them out in about three days. I need to clean this chaos up here."

"Good to have you back again, Quintus, even if it's unhandy that I don't have my books at the moment… we didn't find anything anymore!"

"And none of you morons thought about hiring a librarian?"

"A librarian? Indeed not!"

"Well, I've taken that off your hand now…" I reply with a smile. "I will hire one."

"Ah! Sensible idea that. Could be mine – could be mine…" he mutters while turning around and leaving the library.

I grin. This department hosts about 35 Unspeakables and of those 35 at least 30 are utterly crazy. Most of them are closer in age to Albus than to me. I'm the youngest in this place and that by far! Rookwood was two years older than I and that Baruch Burke was about ten years older than I. Other than that, most of the people in here are really old. Time to train young people is what I say. I do expect them to die one after the other within the next twenty years. We need to get out of them what they researched and studied in the last over 100 years before they go. Young people in here would be perfect to lure their information out and to write it all down. They can all read perfectly well, but I sometimes suspect they forgot how to write.

I'm very busy until the evening. I finish up at five and return to the Sunnegg. The young people are coming in and I join them for an aperitif. Lizzie and Andy come and greet everyone who's coming home. I watch Harry as the young man picks up his siblings one by one to greet them and to play with each of them for a moment.

"He's doing so well with them. I can't wait to see him becoming a father…" says James next to me.

"He is one fine young man, James. You can be very proud of him, but I know you are."

"Oh, I am. He's such a wonderful character that not even the foul treatment he suffered at my sister and brother-in-law's place could destroy his naturally good disposition. Looking back I know now just how spoiled I was, Quintus! I really thought all the world of myself, but seeing Harry, who's never had anything becoming such a wonderful person – I am now taking care that I don't spoil Lizzie and Andy too much. I was on the verge of making my parents' mistakes with Lizzie at the start, but I believe I'm doing better now."

"All parents make mistakes, James. That's part of parenthood. It has to be, so that we can learn from our errors. Your parents were still very fine people, don't forget. You were just given to them very late in life and when they almost feared that they would stay childless. Dorea blamed her inbreeding family for that. So you were so precious to them that they spoiled you. On the other hand you didn't turn out half bad, "

"Oh, I won't forget that, I loved them to bits. Mum was a wonderful mother. She just didn't know when to be more strict with me. I suppose it was because she experienced too much of that at her home. But the result was that I really thought a lot of myself."

"Yes, that could really be said. Dorea probably had the same kind of childhood as Sirius had."

"That's why she insisted of taking him in when he ran away from home. She knew exactly where he was coming from and was very understanding."

We watch the children for a moment while we're quietly sipping on our drinks. Then I see Padma walking by and call her over.

"Padma, may I ask you something?"

"Sure, Quintus. Hi! Did you have a good start?"

"Yes, I did. A very good start – I'm cleaning up that hell they dare to call a library," I say with a grin.

"Uh oh…"

"I used to look after it in my time, but since I was gone they kept taking books out and pushed them back in no matter where – if they even took them back!, so when I got in there today I basically just cleaned up a bit. It's going to keep me busy for a while."

"Not that you hate working with libraries…" she teases.

"I certainly don't. But that's not what I wanted to talk to you about in the first place. I was wondering if you could imagine becoming an Unspeakable. This department urgently needs fresh blood, because otherwise these old codgers start to die before they can pass their information and you need to start studying all over again."

"I've never thought about it. I'm studying transfiguration now, but I had a tough time deciding on my main subject. I basically just wanted to go to university, and didn't really know what I liked most."

"I would like to invite you to come to the department in your summer break and see if you like it. Just remember that I would have to memory charm you if you decide against working there. Though I find it the longer the more idiotic to be so secretive about it. I do have this idea that they do it so the old farts in there don't actually have to deliver anything and can just hang around. There are important and interesting facts of life and death studied that we need to let the general public know if they're interested. And most people there should finally start writing down their findings. There are at least two who have studied in there for more than a hundred years and have basically never written down a word."

"And you think I would be useful in there?"

"Very. I'll also go looking through the past few years of Hogwarts students who left school and see if I find more young apprentices."

"Keith Moon comes to mind. He was a classmate of mine at Hogwarts. We usually didn't know where his brain ended and then there's another girl, Luna Lovegood. She thinks so far out of the box you wouldn't believe it! But she's got a brilliant mind!" Padma tells me. "She'll get out of Hogwarts by the end of the month."

"Thinking outside of the box is one thing that is never wrong in research. Seemingly impossible theories can be the basis of some interesting findings. I'll talk to Remus about this girl. So, do you think you would like to come and look around for a bit?"

"Yes, I think so. See if I catch the research bug…"

I send a quick e-mail to Remus after dinner. When I check my mail just before going to bed I find that he's already sent a reply:

"Hi Papa!

Brilliant choice! She's a very different kind of personality, but she is kind and sweet – and highly intelligent. She's often been picked at, because she's strange to her classmates, but when you start to really talk to her you'll find that she's quite down-to-earth. I've just asked Filius about her career choices, but seemingly she didn't get very specific, so he basically suggested she should carry on with most of her core subjects and one of her chosen subjects on NEWTS level. She's done very well and has not had a problem with the amount of work. She's testing in nine subjects for NEWTS. I'm sure she'll pass most of them if not all.

So, after taking a short moment to speak with Filius and Minerva I would say, come up and speak to her yourself.

You might know that her father is Xenophilius Lovegood, the editor and publisher of the Quibbler.

Hugs right back, from Addie, too, she sends good night kisses.

Rem"

Very good. I print the answer and will take it to work tomorrow.

Wednesday, 2.6.1999 / Quintus

Tiberius grins when I show him the mail Remus sent me. He looks at the paper with a bit of a funny blink.

"That's not parchment…"

"No Tiberius, that's very simple Muggle paper… it's come right out of the printer. My son sent me this upon my question yesterday. Padma Patil actually dropped that young lady's name to me and I asked Remus what he thought. Since he's got a bit of an idea about the department he thought this…"

Tiberius reads and nods.

"Sounds like a good candidate. What about the other one?"

"Padma? She's actually studying Transfiguration at the Academy. But I invited her to come and see the department in summer."

"Transfiguration? I know for a fact that they do not often take apprentices for Transfiguration at Avalon…"

"No, they don't. But she's had an excellent teacher – my son-in-law."

"You don't have a son-in-law, Quintus. Or when did you pick up a daughter?"

I laugh.

"How about my son's life partner? They're as good as married and they've been joined a long time ago. He'll always be my son-in-law, whether they can actually get married or not. In any case Sirius is brilliant at Transfigurations, probably one of McGonagall's finest students ever."

"Very well. Then go to Hogwarts and speak with this girl. Merlin knows we could use some young staff members."

"I think so, too. Even if they'll only be assistants to the current Unspeakables. What can I offer them as a pay?"

"6000 Galleons a year maximum."

"That's not a bad salary at all for a starter. Gracious of you, Tiberius."

"The department is fairly rich. No problems. But it's time we get some stuff published again and these sleepyheads here don't write at all! Another reason why I'm so glad to have you back. Some fresh wind in here is badly needed!"

"I'll try to keep it blowing until the fire comes back. I'm off to Hogwarts at noon then."

Just before that time I apparate up to the gates at Hogwarts and take out my broom to fly up to the main door. It's open, as it's nice and warm already. I step into the big Entrance Hall and make my way to the Great Hall, where I can hear that lunch is served. When I come inside I see Remus at the head table. He sees me, too, and beckons me over to the table.

"Hello Quintus! How nice to see you," says Albus.

"Good day, everyone."

"Take a seat and eat with us, we've only just started," Minerva offers.

I find a place next to my son and he asks:

"Are you coming to speak with Luna?"

"Yes. Do you know if she already has an engagement of any sort?"

"I don't think so. – Filius, Luna Lovegood doesn't have a job yet, does she?"

"No, not to my knowledge. Would you really consider her for the Department of Mysteries, Mr. Lupin?"

"Yes, I think so. But of course I'd like to speak to her first."

"I think she'd do well there, papa. But I'm also a bit afraid that there's a danger she could just lose herself in there, too. She's already a bit of a loner here."

"I can see what you mean. We'll have to look after her then, won't we?"

I can accompany Professor Flitwick to his classroom, as Luna Lovegood's next class is Charms. At first I just sit and listen, look around and observe the young woman. She seems to cast charms easily. At the start of the second period Professor Flitwick asks her to come with me, so that we can talk. She gets up, gathers her materials, looks at me with great big eyes and follows me to some empty classroom, where I ask her to take a seat.

"Let me first of all introduce myself: my name is Quintus Lupin, and I'm coming to speak to you about the Department of Mysteries. Your name was brought to my attention first by Padma Patil, who said she was a year above you at Hogwarts and in your house…"

"That's right. What do you want of me, sir? Are you a relative of Professor Lupin's?"

"I'll answer the second question first, Miss Lovegood. Yes, Professor Remus Lupin is my son."

"He's one of the best teachers we have here, sir! Everyone likes him!"

"That's very nice to hear. I'm very proud of him, he really has done exceptionally well."

"Yes, I'm sure that not everyone would be able to live as well with lycanthropy as he does. My dad was very impressed!"

"He's certainly proven a few points. – So you don't have a problem with the fact that he's a werewolf?"

"Do you? Obviously not, or you wouldn't be proud of him, would you? No, I don't. I don't know anyone here who really has a problem. Some may be a bit afraid of him, but I wouldn't know."

"Thank you, Miss Lovegood. – Well, what I would like to ask you is: have you already thought about going into research?"

"Research? In what subject?"

"Just about any subject you like. The Department of Mysteries treats questions of deepest magical theories, life, death and everything between the two extremes and beyond. It desperately needs a few apprentices as it's hopelessly over-aged. So we are looking for young and interested people to join us. Would you be interested?"

"I'm not really sure if I would fit into that well… it's very nice of Padma to mention my name, but… you see, I'm a bit odd. I'm not like my schoolmates at all. They think I'm crazy."

"I don't think you are. May I ask you a few questions, Miss Lovegood?"

"Certainly."

I quiz her on a few themes and find that she does have answers to most of my questions – if sometimes not quite the ones I expect. But I'm beginning to see what Padma meant when she said that this young woman thinks outside of the box. She is not very fixed on facts in some areas. But in others she shows good basic general knowledge and has ideas when I give her a few prompts. At the end of our conversation I ask her:

"Would you tell me how we can contact you outside of Hogwarts? It might take a few days and I'd like to go through our conversation with my superior, so we can decide. It is well possible that we would consider to invite you to become an Unspeakable apprentice."

"I'd be pleased to, sir!"

She notes down her address and Commumirror ID and I take the scrap with a smile.

"Thank you for this very interesting conversation, Miss Lovegood. I will contact you soon."

I watch her leave the classroom. Then I get up and go through the school until I find my son's office. He doesn't seem to be back yet, so I go down to his classroom. I know that the current period must be about to end and really, just a few minutes later the bell rings. The door opens, the students come out of the room and I can go in.

"Hey there!" Remus greets.

"Hey there yourself. – That is a really nice young lady, Remus."

"She is. Bit of a lost soul sometimes I have the impression."

"Not shy, but held back at the start. She opened up quite nicely once I started to quiz her a bit. I think she could do well. I've also talked to Padma. She's interested to come and see the department during her summer break."

"Ah! Now there's someone who really would do well in there. Luna can be a bit of a sleepyhead sometimes."

"Well, that will help her to fit in with all the other sleepyheads in there. They're becoming awful, Remus."

He laughs.

"Must be bad for you."

"I don't know, really. I mean, it didn't disturb me before, now did it? It left me a lot of freedom. But these days I just can't stop thinking that one by one they'll just drop dead over their studies. How horrible is that thought?"

"Quite dreadful."

"Anyway, I didn't want to leave without saying goodbye. I'll see you on the weekend?"

"Not sure. We have exam preparation. That will take a while."

"Ah. Well, then see you soon!"

"You too, papa. I can hardly wait for the end of the month, to go on our vacation!"

"I can understand that. Must be hard – all that work!"

"It'll be much better after the holidays! Six classes instead of fourteen makes a huge difference!"

"Understandably. Doesn't take much maths to see that."

"Of course I'll still have the whole Hogwarts household on my shoulder."

"You get along perfectly well with the house elves! Shouldn't be a problem."

"And luckily Filch has decided it's time to retire! We'll get another caretaker."

"Another squib?"

"Most probably. Must be someone who has no magical power over the kids, but who is able to discipline them anyway. We'll see."

"Good luck then. Bye, my dear."

"Bye, papa! Say hello to the gang!"

"Will do!"

I'm going out and almost stumble over Sirius.

"Well, hello there, Quintus!"

"Hi Sirius! How are things?"

"Very well, thank you. And you? Did you get a good start?"

"Very good start, thank you. It's really good to be back home."

"Great! See you soon then!"

Friday, 11.6.1999 / Sirius

It's exam time again. All the fifth and seventh years have another week to prepare, the first, second and third years are going through their exams this week. I'm having half a day for each of the two first and second year classes and a whole day for the third years. Next week it will be the turn of the fourth and sixth years. The tests are set up by ourselves and I've had to work them out if I didn't want to just copy from Snape. We've had the first years on Monday with a practical and a theoretical test. The second years came up on Tuesday, then the third years all of Wednesday. They've mostly worked very well as far as I could see. I'm now working through the whole load to grade. The mark consists of half the points for the potion they have brewed and half the points they will get for the theoretical questionnaire. The third years have half the points for the potion and then a quarter of the points for each an essay and a questionnaire. The same system is used for the fourth and sixth years.

Remus is working on his own tests. His practical stuff can be marked immediately, but there's a questionnaire and an essay for all forms, through which he's wading now. Especially the first years are a lot of work, since there are so many.

It's about five in the afternoon when there's a knock on the door and Albus pokes his head around it.

"I know you're quite busy, but do you have a few minutes left?" he asks.

"Sure, come in, Albus!" Remus says.

Albus steps inside and behind him Snape comes in.

"Severus is here to do some research in the library…"

"Come in! Tea?" Remus offers.

"Hello, Severus," I great him, get up and guide them to the other end of the room. The twins are here again and noisily play around this end of the room.

"Hello, Remus, Sirius," Snape says quietly.

Wow, he starts using first names! Working outside of the school must be doing him some good! Remus and Albus quietly conjure up some tea and we all sit down. I watch Snape as he looks at the children with huge black eyes. He doesn't know about them, I suppose, so I introduce them:

"I suppose you haven't met our children yet, Severus. The young lady is Seraina Lupin and that's her brother Dennis Black. They share their birth mother."

"Merlin, did you have to go and make more pests like yourself?" he asks.

I just smirk. We sit and as usual when we sit down it doesn't take long until the little ones want to climb on our laps. Seraina pulls herself up between Albus and I. He pulls her up on his lap and smiles at her.

"How are you today, young Miss Lupin?" he asks kindly.

She grins and babbles something. So far she's not been able to say Albus' name properly. The closest she's managed until now is something like 'Abu'. He doesn't mind, he's delighted that they like him.

"They really are delightful children, Severus and so far quite well behaved, I assure you. With the new system we are starting next school year they won't see their fathers as teachers before their fifth year."

"For which I'm actually quite glad," Remus remarks.

"I've heard you're the new Deputy Headmaster, Remus?"

"Yes. Next week we'll start on moving that part of Minerva's office up here. Her office will become one of the new Potions Masters' office. The old transfiguration classroom will then become the new Potions classroom, probably the one for the first through fourth years, because it's already a very big room. Sirius wants to keep his classroom as well as we want to keep our office together here, since we have plenty of space in here and it's so bright."

"Congratulations. You're getting to be a few firsts here…"

"First student, first teacher and now even first Deputy Headmaster, bla bla bla… in two years we'll have another werewolf student as Mandy Brocklehurst tells me. She has a ten years old girl under her care who will certainly get a Hogwarts letter."

"Shouldn't really be a problem if the child takes the potion."

"That's what we think. She'll probably transform with me though. At least until everyone is completely comfortable around her. And then she'll start on the Animagus training as soon as possible to relieve her from the painful transformation. If she can manage the Animagus that is. It has helped me beyond anything! Together with the potion the full moon nights just mean the transformation will take place, but it doesn't have such an impact on me anymore. – I just hate it if some of those little ones there pull my whiskers!"

"You mean, you let them near you?" Snape stares in shock.

"Yes, we do. They already know that Moony has teeth which are very dangerous, but they love to cuddle with him. We always let them be with him for a while, well, not now in summer, because they'll be asleep by the time he needs to transform, but when the transformation takes place before their bed time. And of course they're supervised, because Moony can't always keep them at bay without running the risk of catching them with his teeth," I say.

Since it's just after their nap, Denny and Seraina are rather active and don't stay in the same place for a long time. Denny moves to Severus and looks at him, then stretches his hands out, because if he does that so far everyone has kindly picked him up. Severus does offer him a hand and Denny pulls himself up. He can also walk by now and displays that proudly.

"How old are they?"

"Just over a year. That's why there's not much talking yet, but they walk and you see that they've perfected their crawling already. It's real fun to see them grow up."

"And we get to enjoy them as well. Only now Sirius and Remus don't bring them to the Great Hall for the meals anymore, so we have to come visit here to see them these days."

"So you have them fed in your flat or what?" Snape asks.

"One of us eats with them there. We don't have them fed, Severus. We do as much as we can ourselves. Winky watches them when we're in class, but we want to have as much as possible of their waking time. On the other hand we don't want them in the main school before they actually start Hogwarts."

We move on to other subjects and Snape asks about Draco.

"He's doing fine, Severus. He's working together with the Weasley twins and Lee Jordan and they're building a wizarding fun park in the French Alps. They want to have it open by next early spring. And he and Parvati Patil are engaged. The wedding is to take place in September I think."

"What! He's actually getting married to that girl? I thought she'd be just a phase…"

"Seems like she isn't. He's really in love with her and she's reciprocating, Severus," I say.

"Well, she's as good as anyone."

We talk about the gang and he actually tells us a bit about the job he now has at the Ministry, then it gets time to go to dinner. We all go downstairs to the Entrance Hall, where Remus and I turn to go to our flat.

Friday, 18.6.1999 / Padma

It's my first day at the Department of Mysteries. I'm apparating there with Quintus and he leads me over to meet Mr. Vance. Dear me, this man must be as old as Dumbledore! He looks me up and down and finally says:

"I'm pleased to meet you, Miss Patil. I will leave you to the able hands of Quintus Lupin, who will show you around and introduce you to the staff."

"Thank you, Mr. Vance."

Quintus grins when we go out and explains:

"Don't mind him, Padma, he's old and stuffy and he's somewhat a product of his Victorian century. He's almost as old as Dumbledore, but he's kept himself quite well, hasn't he? And once he gets to know you a bit he'll warm up considerably. I suppose he's only still here because he hasn't found a good successor yet and if you look at the people I'm going to introduce you to you will see why! I'm by far the youngest in the department."

The first stop is at an office that three Unspeakables share. They all look as dusty as the texts they seem to be working with. All also look like they're zombies!

"Good morning, gentlemen. May I introduce a future new member of the staff?" Quintus says, almost shouts.

"What?" one of them croaks while the other two look up.

"That hasn't happened since you joined the department, Lupin!" one of the two squeaks.

I have to hold back my grin.

"Well, it's necessary. Seeing you rotting lot it's very clear that we need some young staff. This is Miss Patil. She'll be here during her summer break from the Academy, where she's a Transfiguration student. Miss Patil's first job will be to assist some of you to finally write down some of your findings."

"You mean we have to write our findings down? Who ever said something like that? Been here for 83 years and no one ain't ever mentioned anything about writing!"

The man who asks this is a faint wizard with a very long pointed wizard's hat and robes like Dumbledore wears them, only his set is so faded that the stars on them are barely visible. He has the same kind of long beard and very similar half moon glasses, but none of the old teacher's twinkle in the eye.

"Yes, Barnaby, the idea of research is to write down what you found out. If you don't like it, go and talk to Tiberius. He'll tell you."

It is interesting that wherever we pass the conversations turn out to be about the same. Finally we arrive at an office where Quintus tells me to put down my things.

"This is my office. I have one for myself for the time being. You can install yourself here. Miss Lovegood will join us here after she leaves Hogwarts, which is in two weeks. And then we'll slowly but surely have to extricate all the information these near bodies over there have collected and once that's done they are ripe for retirement. That means we can then start to build up this department from scratch. I don't expect that to be before you finish your studies at the Academy, Padma!"

He grins at me. I get a bit worried though.

"Won't they look at you as a danger to their positions?" I wonder.

"I don't think they regard anything as a danger at this point. Tiberius is more alive than the whole bunch of these people. They don't have to work here anymore, they're all long past their retirement age, they could leave here tomorrow. But I don't want them to leave before we got some of the things they may have found out of them, written and possibly published."

"I see what you mean. They all live in their own world, don't they?"

"Exactly. But they know a few things and they have no right to keep that knowledge all to themselves. They've made loads of experiments besides their studies, so it will be your and Miss Lovegood's job to tickle that out of them, write it up and publish it in their names. Well, if they want it published under their names of course."

I gesticulate a crystal ball and say:

"Okay, so I foresee a lot of writing in my near future."

"Use a Dictaquill…" he replies, unfazed.

We both laugh.

"Oh, I'll interview them with a Dictaquill at work alright, don't worry. I think I might gain a lot of insight into their knowledge by doing that."

"Exactly. It will give the two of you a good head start for your research work later on. Don't forget to include their research techniques into your questioning."

"Hm. I had better get a catalogue of questions ready. I will pass them one by one and ask them a few basic questions, like when they started to do their research, what subjects they researched and then let them tell me about their respective fields of research. Then I'll go more in depth for the individual studies they made."

"Sounds like a good start. Also clearly ask about the results of their research and have them define whether these results are still theories or if they are facts corroborated through experiments. If they have no documents on their experiments you should insist that the experiments be made again with you and then properly document that."

The day passes quickly as I start to compile a list of questions. I'll try the usefulness of this catalogue on one of the Unspeakables and work out the flaws until Luna will join us in two weeks. Then I let her give me her input about the kind of questions and add some more of her own.

I also take some time to explore the vast area that's given to the Department. There is actually more than one library, in fact there are about six of them. While I explore the libraries for a bit I know that Quintus interviews applicants for the position as a librarian. I'll be glad if it's someone a bit closer to my age than the Unspeakables, who are mostly quite creepy.

During my exploring trip around the Department I've come across a small office, which seems to be empty. It seems to me like I could use this one for my interviews, so that I could talk to the Unspeakables without disturbing the others. I could decorate it to my taste and then set up my interview things… I go over to Quintus and ask about that little room.

"Quintus, do you think I could use one of those little rooms back behind one of the libraries to interview the Unspeakables? I could make it nice and comfy to make it easy and not disturb the other people in the offices."

"These are most certainly unused at the moment. I don't think there would be any problem if you want to use them. Do you want to make certain with Tiberius? He doesn't mind visitors at all, just knock on his door."

"Okay."

I have a bit of a funny anxious feeling to go back to the boss. I suppose I'd rather see Quintus as my boss here, so I hoped to have little to do with Mr. Vance, but when he calls me inside of his office he turns out to be a very nice person.

"Hello there, Miss Patil. What can I do for you?"

"Hello, Mr. Vance. I was just wondering if I could use one of the small offices behind the libraries? These seem to be unused…"

"Whichever you like, Miss. What are you going to use it for?"

"Well, Quintus wants me and Luna to tickle out information the other Unspeakables have collected over the years to have it written down. Seems they've never done any writing at all."

"Well I never! Jolly good idea. I could never get them to do anything sensible with the information they gathered. Good luck to you, girl."

"I'll redecorate the office for a bit and I bet a good platter of biscuits and their preferred beverage will loosen their tongues," I promise.

"Very good. Do that."

Thursday, 25.6.1999 / Remus

The leaving feast tonight! Sirius and I are both happy that this stressful year is over. It's been hard to work that much and have that little time for our children. But now it will be considerably better.

Minerva has moved all the filing cabinets to our office. There is the smaller one concentrating on affairs concerning the Gryffindors and there are the four large ones with all the students' files. There are all of the devices for the students' letters, especially the Book of Names, which records all the newly born children with magical talent. Sirius can't but quickly look up the twins, which are both there of course.

I'll have a lot of administrative work to do in the first week. I have to prepare the letters for the first year students. Minerva helps me putting the list and the letters together. There's a specially enchanted quill to write the letters and we use a dictaquill for the supply list. Two days are consecrated to the visits of the Muggle-born students. This year we'll have 48 new students, six of them are Muggle-born. It's my job to go and visit them now.

"Do you think you get it done, Remus? They usually ask for some magic to see and I'm usually using my Animagus for a first display."

"No, I think that I will be fine. Do you usually deliver the letters yourself?"

"Yes, but with an owl. Since we ask them to send their confirmation letter by owl they need to have one at their disposal."

"Okay. And what about helping them to Diagon Alley?"

"It depends. If they are fine with their child going to Hogwarts I usually go with them for the shopping. Then the visits occupy me for about three or four days. If they want to think about it I leave them very precise directions and give them the hints for the shops, Gringotts and so on… and because not all parents are wealthy I add a list with the cheaper shops."

I think, this is going to be a fun part of my new job! The first visit is in the London area, so it's going to be quick in case they want to add the shopping trip to my visit.

I watch the owl deliver the letter. It's a small house with a tiny front yard and probably not much bigger backyard. The owl flutters around a window on the back side of the house. About ten minutes later a man comes out of the house and passes me. A while later I ring the bell on the door. I have to wait for a moment, but then a woman who looks to be in her late thirties opens the door.

"Yes?" she says and sounds a bit irritated.

"Good morning, Mrs Snider. My name is Remus Lupin. I assume you have just encountered a very strange sight of an owl with a letter to your daughter Sarah?"

Her eyes widen and she asks:

"How do you know that? It's indeed what has happened! We thought it was quite the joke!"

"I'm afraid it's no joke, I'm the Deputy Headmaster of Hogwarts, the school we have invited your daughter to attend. I signed her letter. May I come inside and explain things more thoroughly?"

"How do I know that you're really who you claim you are?"

"Passport? Driver's license?" I offer.

"That would at least be something…"

I show her my passport. She nods, makes room and lets me enter. Then she shows me to a small living room.

"Summer break has just started, so my three are all at home now, it's rather messy, I'm sorry!" she says.

"Don't worry, I know that's not to avoid with three small children. Is Sarah your oldest?"

"Yes, she is. She's just turned eleven in April."

"Was there ever something strange or funny about her? Did she ever do things that no one could explain?" I ask her.

She looks around surprised. Then she smiles and says:

"Yes, yes, now that you mention it I can remember a few such things. My husband thought that she must have telekinetic talents. She can lift small things without touching them!"

"That's one of the most frequent forms of early magic such children display. Your daughter will be able to do much more than that once she's finished with her training at Hogwarts. Do you still have the letter?"

She blushes and says:

"Yes, but I'm afraid I have just torn it up…"

I smile and tell her:

"If you give me the shreds, I'll see to it that it's repaired…"

She gets up and brings the bits to me, then she goes to the staircase and calls:

"Sarah! Come down here, but this instant!"

A few minutes later a slim girl with dark brown long hair comes running down the stairs and cries:

"What is it, Mum? I was just going to call Belinda to fix a date… – who are you?"

The girl looks at me and at the shreds of the letter I hold in my hand.

"That's this funny letter that was just dropped by an owl! What are you doing with it?"

"Hello Sarah! My name is Remus Lupin, I'm the Deputy Headmaster of Hogwarts, I've sent this letter to you."

"It's true then? I'm really awitch?" she whispers.

"Yes, that's true."

I pull out my wand and say:

"I'll quickly repair this!"

With a quick Reparo-spell the parchment looks like it's never been crumpled or torn. Mother and daughter stare at it in wonder. Sarah takes a deep breath and looks at her mother.

"Mum, will you let me go?"

"Well, I don't know, luv, maybe we should discuss this with dad first?"

"Do we have to decide right now, sir?" Sarah asks me.

"No, you don't. We need a reply from you by the 31st July at the latest. You will need to send this by owl again. All you need to do is write my name and Hogwarts on the envelope and hold it out to the owl, it will take the letter. You will have owl visits every day until you give them a letter to carry back to Hogwarts."

Mrs Snider has looked over the school supplies and asks:

"These are rather exotic sounding things! Where do we buy them? Provided my husband agrees to let her come to that school…"

"I have a very detailed description written up and I can give you that. If you decide on the spot I can even take you there, because it's here in London. Only your daughter will see the entrance to the wizarding area though."

"Let me call my husband, he'll be back in a short time, if you have some time! I can't decide this right on the spot without him," she says.

"That's no problem, Mrs Snider, please go ahead."

While she calls her husband and just tells him that he's to come home immediately, Sarah sidles up to me and asks:

"Sir, can you show me more, please?"

"Yes, I can. Have you seen the book list you will need? There are quite a few subjects you will be taught and one of them is called Charms. That includes all spells you will learn. Though you won't learn all existing spells at school of course, but we at Hogwarts aim for the students leaving our institute to be capable to learn new spells on their own on the basis of the good amount of techniques we have taught. I'll show you a few, okay?"

Sarah's seen a range of useful spells to tidy up her room by the time Mrs Snider has convinced her husband that his presence is indeed very necessary. The room looks perfectly cleaned up and even the windows are freshly cleaned and the curtains look like they've just come out of the washer. Mrs Snider stares in surprise again.

"He's done that just now in a couple of seconds, Mum, without even moving one inch! – And I'll be able to do this as well?"

"All that and a lot more, Sarah. After all we don't only live by our household spells. Though personally I really think that household spells are one of the most enchanting branches of magic. I hate dusting, and I hate to wash dishes, so I'm really happy that a few waves with my wand are enough to grant me a perfectly clean apartment, which then consequently leaves me more time for the more valuable things in my life. Like spending time with my three small children."

"What are the other things?"

"Your other subjects will be Potions, that's learning to brew magical potions for many uses, transfiguration, that's changing something into something else…"

"That sounds interesting."

"It is. It's also quite demanding and often a bit frustrating in the beginning until you get the hang of it. Then you'll learn Astronomy, that's why you need the telescope. Herbology, that's something like Biology, but you will be working with magical plants. Then you'll learn History of Magic and finally you'll learn Defence against the Dark Arts."

"What's that last one?"

"I'll be honest and tell you quite frankly that like in your non-magical world there are some less savoury people around who will misuse magic for dark purposes. There are some nasty forms of creatures around, too. In Defence against the Dark Arts we cover all those things, so you will learn how to defend yourself should it be necessary."

"Creatures?" Mrs Snider asks. "What kind of creatures you mean? Animals?"

"Yes and no. There are animals among them, but there are many creatures that are mixed forms. That includes vampires, werewolves, centaurs, even goblins. Though with all of them you can't say they're nasty without knowing them. For I myself am a werewolf. You'll of course learn about that, Sarah, and many other things."

"You're a werewolf? They really exist???"

"They do. Unfortunately I have felt it far more often than I liked to. Though in the meantime I have a kind of medication, a potion, that helps me to stay calm when I'm transformed. I can also turn myself into a wolf any time outside of the full moon now and that is a very harmless creature."

"Show me! Please, sir!" she says.

"I'll be a real wolf, so don't be afraid! I can still understand what you say, only I can't answer until I transform back."

I transform and both ladies gasp fairly loud, but Sarah looks at me with interest.

"Wow! I've never seen a real wolf, well yes, at the zoo, but so close! You really look like one…"

I growl a bit and then I bark and howl for a moment. Then I transform back.

"That's bloody amazing!" the girl cries.

At that moment the door opens and Mr. Snider shows up. Mrs Snider quickly introduces me and shows him the letter. He reads over it and looks at me.

"That's you who signed this? And you're serious about that? She's done telekinesis for ages, so that's really magic?" he asks excitedly.

He reminds me of Arthur. I think I'll have to introduce them to each other.

"Yes, that's magic. We call that levitation and most magical children show this particular branch of magic as their first signs."

"But how does this come? I mean, she must have been born with it?"

"Yes, that's true. It's genetic. Every person alive has a certain amount of magical genes. Depending on the amount of them that are switched on in their body they show enough magic that they can actually do something like levitation. Though your daughter must have enough of those 'on' genes to actually be recognised as a magical child."

"And how do you know about that when you don't even know the child?"

"I don't until I open our Book of Names. There's a specially enchanted quill which records the birth of every child born in Britain and Ireland with enough magical genes to visit Hogwarts once they're eleven years old. The same letter is sent to all children, whether they were born into non-magical families or into families, in which magic has been present for centuries. Of course receiving the Hogwarts letter is a long awaited event in the life of magical children in magical families, while it means an incredible surprise for children like Sarah and also means an enormous change in their lives. Because let's face it, nothing in her life will be the same after this day. She'll be living between two worlds for now on and she'll learn to cope with that."

"This is still bloody fantastic!" he says and looks at his daughter. "You do want this, don't you, Sarah?"

"Yes, dad!"

"So, do you still need a written confirmation?"

"Yes, I do actually. It will be stored in her file. But just a short note will do and you can give it to me right away," I say.

"I'll do that just now, Mr. Lupin."

"And then we'll go shopping?" Sarah asks hopefully.

I look down at her and promise:

"Yes, then we'll go shopping. You'll need quite a lot of things."

We're on our way by bus and Tube a short while later. All three children are with us. Mr. Snider gets some cash at the nearest ATM to be able to change it into the wizarding money. At Charing Cross Road we leave the Tube and I show them the way to the Leaky Cauldron. Neither Mrs nor Mr. Snider can see the pub at first, but Sarah discovers it right away.

"There! Is that it, Mr. Lupin?"

"Yes, Sarah, that's it."

"It looks dingy!"

I grin.

"Just you wait until you're inside. Let's go."

I lead them all inside and only when we actually approach the door Mr. and Mrs Snider can see the entrance. We cross the pub and Tom of course greets me when I lead my group to the backyard.

"Hello, Professor Lupin!"

"Hello, Tom!"

I quickly guide the group to the tiny backyard and pull my wand to open the passage.

"Look at this, Sarah, so you will know it the next time. You have to tap this brick three times with your wand…"

I do that and the five people stare with open mouths as the bricks move apart and open up to an archway into the Diagon Alley.

"Welcome to Diagon Alley! This is the wizarding district of London. No Muggles, that's non-magical people, can see it unless they're shown like you now. Of course we will have to ask you to keep this secret from all of your acquaintances. We first go to change your money to wizarding currency. Be prepared to carry around quite some weight, because we're still using coins only. Gold, silver and bronze ones."

On the way to the bank I explain the money. Mr. Snider asks me how much he'll need for his daughter's supplies and how much the schooling costs. He and his wife throw very curious looks at the many people who are still mostly wearing robes on the streets.

"You only pay for the supplies. The schooling is free and works like the state schools, but Hogwarts is a boarding school."

"Ah! And where is it?"

"In Scotland. It's an old castle."

"And it's a boys and girls' school, isn't it?" asks Mrs Snider.

"Yes, of course. Has been since it was founded roughly one thousand years ago. The founders were two witches and two wizards, by the way. Witches have been much more emancipated than Muggle women throughout history."

"What about the many witch hunts? Weren't many killed?"

I smile.

"Unfortunately the ones who were killed were almost all Muggles. Some witches and wizards had indeed the bad luck to be killed, but never the ones who were burned. We have simple charms to freeze flames and then disapparate. So the Muggles really only successfully killed innocent people."

"Ewww… now that's ugly!"

"Absolutely. Especially since it hit so many good people! This is a very sensitive topic in the wizarding society, despite the fact that not many of us were killed through these hunts. But believe me, we aren't immune to our share of petty prejudice! And it led directly to the Statute of Secrecy, which came into effect in 1692 and hid the magical world completely from the non-magical world."

We reach the bank. While the Sniders wait in one line I quickly move to another after telling them that I would be gone for about fifteen minutes. In that time I'm down in my own vault to get some fresh supply of cash. I intend to have a look around Flourish & Blotts to get some reading material for the vacation we have planned. I meet the Sniders again when I come back from my vault. They are admiring the money they've got.

"Well, we should start with the robes shop. You can wear most of your regular clothes at school, but over them we wear robes as you can see. If you think that's too much clothing let me warn you, Hogwarts is a very old castle and rather draughty in winter. While the Great Hall, common rooms, dormitories and classrooms are always nicely heated the corridors are not, so you'll need warm clothes."

We stop at Madam Malkin's where Sarah is fitted with her school robes, a hat and a cloak.

"If you want to get her some regular robes as well you have quite a good choice here as you can see."

"Maybe later. At the moment she only needs the ones for the school, doesn't she?" Mrs Snider asks.

"Yes, that's right."

"Besides, I can take the pattern and sew her some myself."

Once the robes are off the list we go through the rest of it. All that remains at the end is her wand and the books. She has all of her new equipment in a large trunk, which comes fitted with little casters these days, so it's rather easier to pull. Mr. Snider does that and asks me:

"What about the wand? Is that something like the robes, needs to be replaced as she grows?"

"Oh no! I'm not telling you too much beforehand, you will see it. No, the wand can be something to be kept and used a life long. Some people have reason to change after a while, but mine for example is still the one my parents bought for me when I was eleven. And the witch or wizard must be there to buy the wand. It must match!"

"Ah! Sounds very mysterious!"

The mystery is solved fairly soon, as Sarah finds her wand quite quickly. She stares at it for a moment before she hands it back to Mr. Ollivander to pack it up in the box, which he gives to her with a polite bow.

"Well, all that's left now is Flourish & Blotts, that's the bookshop," I explain.

After three hours we're all done and outside of the Leaky Cauldron I wish the Sniders a good day. They head home and I head to my next new student.

With this work the first week of my summer break is being filled. For the remaining preparation I have to get the book lists for the next school year first and then the letters for the returning students will be sent out about three weeks before the start of the new term.

Another good piece of work is the preparation of the new students' files and the archiving of the departing seventh years' files. Minerva guides me to the school's extensive archives. It's a fairly large room in the dungeons, but far away from the former Potions Dungeons and also far away from the Slytherin dungeons. It's kept magically dry and I ask:

"Dear me! How many years back are those files stored?"

"One hundred years, Remus! Don't ask me why, but that's what is the rule. Anyway, all the newly archived stuff comes on these shelves, but first we have to push out the old ones."

It's done with a spell – no surprise there. A moment later we have a box of the size of a trunk in front of us.

"It contains the folders for every student in that year. 1899," Minerva declares and we watch as all the other boxes move up one space, finally freeing the one space needed for the latest box. Containing the box of the class of 1999, 38 remaining students all in all.

Minerva smiles and shows me the box before that. We quickly look at the files. There's Hermione's, which is quite large from all the extra credit work she did, all her honours and a few detentions and some point deductions. Minerva's smile gets wider.

"In all honesty, Remus, that girl didn't seem to belong to Gryffindor when she started. Then she got caught between Potter and Weasley and from then on… well, I have to say that if she'd never landed herself in any trouble at all I would have found her boring! She certainly gained, once she loosened up a bit."

"Minerva!" I say, mocking shock, "That's so unlike you! You're always the epitome of correctness and you're saying something like this!"

She actually snickers a bit and then she admits:

"Yes, yes, that's been my most important trademark, hasn't it? Well I'll be correct forever, but I do prefer people with a backbone. Hermione Granger had to grow hers, but grow it she did! It only endeared her to me more! I was a Gryffindor myself, after all. You don't even have an idea of the pest I used to be at school!"

"She's definitely a character," I agree, "And I'll hear all about the pest you were in your schooldays, Minerva McGonagall! I don't think I'll have to beat it out of Filius and Pomona."

"But it might become costly, Remus! They're not easily giving away my secrets. Now if Duncan was still around… he'd brag about them!"

We replace the lid on the box and push the latest one into the free space.

"What are we doing with the discarded box?" I ask.

"Would you believe that we're sending this to the Ministry? It's going into indefinite Ministry storage. I have the suspicion that they have stored the entire students and teachers' files since there is a Ministry. They'll make it tiny though. It's to be sent to the Department of Education, to the attention of Elizabeth Montgomery, she's the head there."

"Very well. Do we make it small already to send it? Looks a bit heavy for an owl…"

"We take it there, Remus. In person. Fix a date with Eliza, she's pretty flexible and usually you can go right away."

"Ah. Okay, will do."

Back at my office I send a letter to Mrs Montgomery and send it off with one of the school owls. After moving around in the dungeons I really enjoy the bright light coming through the four large windows of our office. And I do enjoy my next bit of work, preparing all the files for the new first years. 48 folders have to be named. Once the children are sorted I'll sort them into their respective drawers. Right now they're just spread over the available space in alphabetical order. That's the last thing I need to do today. Now I just have to wait for Mrs Montgomery to accept the proposed date for me to take the archive box to her.

I join Sirius, Addie and the twins, who are happily playing on the lawn of the inner courtyard. In a few days the five of us will meet up with Harry, Hermione, James, Lily, Lizzie and Andy to take a Portkey out of Diagon Alley to reach our vacation spot in a wizarding hotel on Zanzibar. We'll stay there for three weeks, and I'm really looking forward to get some rest. We'll do nothing but lounge in the sun on the beach, play with our children, read a few books and maybe write some on ours, enjoy the fresh air and otherwise do absolutely nothing.

At dinner I get the reply from Mrs Montgomery who is 'happy to receive me' tomorrow during the late morning. Good. That will all be done then.

Friday, 26.6.1999 / Remus

We can sleep in as long as the twins let us and Sirius gets up to get them out of their beds.

"Stay, Remus, you've been doing much more work in the last week, I'll take them!"

"Thanks, love!"

I'm quite glad to turn around and sleep an hour or so more. I finally get up at nine, eat something small in our kitchen and go up to my office to get my archive box and take it to the Ministry. I state my business at the apparition point and get my badge, my wand is checked in and I go to see Mrs Montgomery, who turns out to be quite a spirited lady of about 85 or so. She asks how Minerva is doing and tells me that they were classmates in their Hogwarts days, oops, strike 10 years off, Minerva has celebrated her 76th in late April. I hand over my box and tell her the latest gossip from the school.

"You sound like you're genuinely happy to be there, Professor Lupin!"

"Oh, I am! Though right now I'm really looking forward to have a few days of undisturbed vacation with my family."

"Baby twins, a pre-teen and full time teaching must be rather exhausting. I was lucky enough to have a couple of years off during the time I had little ones."

"Yes, we could have done that, too, but we didn't want to let Albus down. It will still be much easier now that we get the additional teachers."

"I can imagine. Well, I won't hold you up, Professor, it's been very nice meeting you! It's rare that I'm meeting such polite young people these days."

"Thank you, Madam! Well, I must be going anyway, we'll have a lot to pack for our vacation."

With that I'm departing and find my way back to Hogwarts in no time. We pack up what the children will need and prepare some of our own stuff, the Pensieve and the brooms. Then we take leave from Minerva, Filius and Pomona, who are still at the castle. We then fly down to the gates and apparate the children back to the Sunnegg.

Saturday, 27.6.1999 / Sirius

After a frenzy of packing our stuff for the vacation, last minute shopping of sunscreen, beach toys and a few books to read we reduce our suitcases and the strollers to matchbox size and place it all in a bag, then we pick up the twins, already nicely covered in sunscreen, take Addie by the hand and get ready to apparate to Diagon Alley. James and Lily, Lizzie, Andy, Harry and Hermione are going to be with us, which pleases us especially. Hermione is over her worst bouts of morning sickness and looks forward to the peace we expect on the island. We will stay on the eastern side of the island in a full wizarding dwelling, and we can't wait to get there now.

Harry and Hermione finally come down to the living room, Hermione chiding Harry for his tardiness, but he's only grinning, because we still have about an hour before we need to be at the station. We're apparating to the station and only half an hour later we arrive at our destination, a small place called Kiwengwa. We've been transported right to the reception area of the resort. We're then shown to our accommodation, which consists of three lovely cottages, all with an extra bed for the children. Addie will sleep at Harry and Hermione's cottage. All three cottages are next to each other, all three have two floors. Ours has two large four posters, one downstairs, one upstairs, but in addition to the regular curtains the beds are covered with mosquito nets. They are all furnished traditionally in beautiful warm colours and all the furniture is made from precious woods. The stone floors on the ground floor and the dark hardwood floor are covered with lovely Omani rugs. There's a tiny kitchenette and a fairly nice bathroom and the sitting area on the ground floor has two sofas and two armchairs. I really like the bed curtains and all the other fabrics around, they're colourful and are kept in olive, yellow, orange and rust shades.

"Wow, this is beautiful!" Hermione gasps.

"Isn't it, though? But it's really warm here!" James replies.

"Well, we can drop most of our clothes, I suppose," Remus remarks.

We spend the afternoon unpacking and getting used to the heat. Lizzie, Andy, Seraina and Denny are put to bed for their nap. We are happy that there are silencing charms, so we can give them the bed downstairs without any problem. We'll spend the evenings together at Harry and Hermione's cottage, so that the little ones will be left alone to sleep undisturbed. As usual we have a set of Extendable Ears through which we can hear if something should be amiss.

We wait for the children to wake up again. Then we quickly give them a new coat of sunscreen and apply some of it on our skin as well. All of us are in swimsuits and we just add a t-shirt and shorts to our basket. Harry blows up a ball and a few rings for the children and off we go to the beach, which is simply stunning. The sand is brilliantly white and the water a deep emerald, covered by a perfect dark blue sky. Where the sand beach borders the vegetation it's lined by coconut trees. The vegetation is tropical, as this place is just a few degrees south of the equator. We're all having a time to get used to those brilliant colours and the bright light. It's very warm, but there's a slight breeze from the ocean, so it's quite nice. We find the beach almost empty! There are a few guests of the resort, but not many. It's wonderful to put down some towels on the beach, leave our bag and take the children for their first touch of seawater. Remus picks up his daughter, I pick up my son and we both follow Harry and Hermione, who are already off in the shallow water with the wonderfully soft surf. The waves are not coming in high or forcefully like on all the Atlantic shores, they gently roll up the beach in soft rolls. Our children really like the water and we take them by the hand to guide their first steps. Denny squeals when he feels the water and pulls a disgusted face when he tastes it for the first time. I take him up to my chest and slowly walk out in the water.

"We're going to sway in the waves for a bit, Denny! You'll love that and we'll take care that you don't get much water in your mouth, okay?"

He nods and Remus comes to my side with Seraina on his arm. Both of us have to walk out for quite a bit until we can let go and let the water carry us. The kids get used to it and start to grin again. After a while we take them back to the shallow water, where Addie awaits our return. We let the twins crawl in the sand and feel the water running up on them. Lots of squeals ensue of course. We're quite amused and it's another opportunity to take pictures of our little ones.

Addie is a sight to see. At first she feels very self conscious in her new swimsuit, last leftovers of the rigid prudishness of father's upbringing. But then she starts to come out a bit and dares to go into the water. She plays with Lizzie in the shallow water and the two girls seem to get along with each other fine. James and Lily are in and out of the deeper water to have a good look at what their children do.

Harry and Hermione have their own fun and swim for quite a while. And then they snog out in the water for quite a while. And finally they join us again to play a little with the twins and release Remus and I so we can go and swim a bit as well. We're both out in the water quickly and then we get to enjoy some snogging time. Being gently rocked on the ocean waves and kissing is a great feeling!

We return to the hotel before it's time for dinner to get dressed. Robes, albeit very thin ones are the rule for the dinner to respect the mostly Islamic customs of the island, so we all get dressed in colourful silk robes. We find the restaurant of the hotel, which is really nice with a large area under huge tropical trees and in the middle of a lush garden. Of course it looks out to the sea. We're served a very nice grill of mostly fish with lots of salads and fruit. More fruit and sherbets are for dessert.

Shortly after dinner it's bedtime for the children. They're really tired and don't even last half a page out of a book. We can place them both in the big bed, which we charm so they won't fall out. We gently close the mosquito nets and watch out that it's really covering everything. Of course we've all received malaria prophylaxis, and we're still taking the potions here, but the nets have to be, or we would find too many bites. They're nasty in their own right, not even counted the possibility of malaria.

Remus has placed his potion on the kitchen counter. He's down on his last dose tomorrow morning, then tomorrow night he'll transform. I plan to take him out for a walk tomorrow night! To see that fat full moon on this beach, with very little artificial light disturbing us will certainly be quite nice.

But right now we're leaving our cottage to spend some time with James and lily at Harry and Hermione's veranda, who welcome us with a cool drink on their veranda. We've all sprayed our body with mosquito repellent spray, so we won't be bitten too badly out here. The stuff seems to work, as I don't have to shoo any mosquitoes away. We enjoy a quiet evening.

"This is great here! Just as good as our honeymoon on Fiji," Hermione comments.

"Great! It's also great that you've come with us. We're very happy about that, because it will provide us with the occasional babysitter…" I say.

Harry grins.

"That was one of our reasons to come along. Besides our liking that kind of setting here…" he remarks.

"So Fiji was similar?"

"Very similar. More bougainvilleas though."

I laugh. Well, there are other flowers here. I've seen magnolias with huge flowers! Tons of flowers I could probably never keep the names.

Lily and James bring their usual cheerfulness along. They're almost indecently happy and cheerful! As usual we talk about old times at some point and Remus informs Harry and Hermione – and Addie, who sits still up very late and has wide open eyes:

"You should have seen their snog-fests in our seventh year. The common room was usually empty in just a couple of minutes. And Mr. Headboy here used to smuggle Miss Headgirl into the boy's dorm all the time. Peter suffered from us, believe me. Back then I almost felt sorry for him. He had to put up with Sirius' and my nightly exercises and then in seventh year James and Lily added theirs."

Even though I'm more than glad that the rat sits in Azkaban not knowing anything about anything anymore I have to agree with Remus, that Peter was really patient with all of us back then.

"Didn't he have a girlfriend?" Hermione asks.

"Just very short flings and I'm not even sure if he even got past a bit of groping – ever. He wasn't very attractive, painfully shy and usually clammed up around girls," James says coolly.

"I see."

"I've been thinking about that and I thought it's possible that this was the reason why he turned away from us. I mean, we did help him with everything for school, but we really couldn't go and ask girls out for him. Maybe he expected us to…" Remus remarks.

"You mean he betrayed us because of sexual frustration???" Lily asks.

"Could be, couldn't it? That and he was looking for more power. More power would have made it possible for him to ask someone out. Besides he would have received permission to rape women whenever his boss was gracious. But in all the months he probably didn't dare asking anyone out either, because of the mark on his arm," I reason.

"That's the poorest excuse I could imagine, but it would fit Wormtail," James says.

"Well, he's been taken care of anyway," Hermione reminds us.

"I for one am very glad about that, though it must have been horrible…" says Lily.

"Well, the Dementors can't hurt him anymore, he has no bad memories that could become painful," I say.

Then we turn back to brighter subjects again. Hermione starts to show her pregnancy. Harry caresses her belly constantly and is all smiles. Lily and James watch this display with amusement. Lily turns to her husband:

"You know, Harry reminds me so much of you now! You were just the same when Harry was under way."

"Was he, now?" Harry asks.

"Well, if you turn out to be exactly like your father I don't want to be around you in the last month of Hermione's pregnancy, Harry, because James drove everyone crazy! Your Mum threw him out of the house three nights out of seven. He turned up at ours like a dog that had been kicked," I tell the young ones with a grin.

"That's so not true!" James tries to argue weakly.

"Oh, that's so true! I was even sorry to dump you onto Sirius and Remus, you were so bad! Couldn't wait, was totally anxious, always thought I'd fall or something and hurt myself and lose the baby…"

"But I didn't want anything to happen to you is all…"

"I felt like being a Sacred Vase or something – like the heir you expected was more important than anything else…"

"Now you're being plain mean, Lils! I was worried about you and the baby."

Lily grins and pats James' hands.

"Yeah, I know. But you were still insufferable."

We all laugh and Harry says:

"Meep! I promise not to become like that! Don't need to follow my dad in everything after all, do I?"

James scowls at him, but gives up quickly.

"Just take care of that grandchild of mine!"

"Aye, aye, captain, will do!"

"But as you saw he was a lot better to be around when I was pregnant with Lizzie and the triplets," Lily concludes.

"Agreed!"

Remus and I say goodnight relatively early and send Addie to bed, too. We're both very tired and want to get a lot of sleep during the vacation. Of course, once we're back at our cottage, we look after the children, but they are sleeping soundly under their canopy and the mosquito net. They look so cute, both of them. We check the spell around the big bed which keeps them inside, even if they start crawling around and go upstairs to crawl into our own bed. It's still awfully warm for us, so we just shed our clothes and close all the parts of the mosquito net really well. Remus snuggles up and I spoon him and then we're asleep…

Sunday, 28.6.1999 / Hermione

It's the first rays of sun that wake Harry and I. First thing is that I feel his hand on my stomach, slowly caressing it. I open my eyes and look at Harry. His eyes are still closed, but they flutter open when I start to stir and kiss him. It feels so very romantic, us in that bed with the mosquito nets, the old-fashioned African fabric canopy and the tropical morning rising. I look at the bedside clock and find out it's just before seven in the morning. I'll set the alarm for six thirty tomorrow to be able to see the sunrise.

"Morning, love…" I say softly.

"Morning, Hermione. I'm still mostly asleep. Just needed to feel you beside me."

I kiss him tenderly and reply:

"That's alright, Harry, if you want, then just go ahead and sleep in, it's early. I need to go to the loo…"

I do that and when I come back from the bathroom I look out the open window and the balcony. This is what we'll enjoy for three weeks! It's absolutely beautiful, can only be compared to the view we had during our honeymoon. We'll stay here throughout the vacation, but all three couples have booked a very special room at a very special hotel in Stone Town, the old town of Zanzibar. When it will be Remus' and Sirius' turn Harry and I will look after the twins and Addie. Of course we've also planned a few outings around the island, but mostly it will be time to relax under a sunshade on the beach. Harry and I have both brought some work with us, but it's only reading and we might be much too distracted to do much. When I turn back from the window and look to the bed I can see that Harry is asleep again. I open the mosquito net and slip into the bed again to cuddle up and get some more sleep.

Remus

I'm waking up because I hear one of the children calling. Smiling I get up and pad down the stairs to the large room, where the twins share their big bed. Seraina is crawling around and calls me, but when she sees me coming I get a big grin and a cheerful:

"Papa!"

"Good morning, my little sweetheart! You're already awake?"

I take off the spell and pick her up. Denny wakes up, too and comes forth from his blankets. They're wearing nothing but a thin t-shirt and their nappies. I quickly change Seraina, then I let her on the floor, then I change Denny and banish both nappies into the rubbish bin in the kitchen area. I take the children up to our bedroom and pull the net apart to let them on the bed. Denny crawls to Sirius and cuddles.

"Daddy! daddy!" he calls, but Sirius is still fast asleep.

I grin while I let Seraina follow her brother. Denny keeps trying to wake Sirius, but it seems that my lover really sleeps very deeply! All of a sudden, Sirius jumps up and growls, grabbing Denny and tickling him. Denny squeals and shakes with laughter after that. He giggles and giggles and Sirius keeps tickling him for a good moment before saying:

"A very good morning to you little ones!"

Both children get a hearty kiss on their cheeks and both of them return the hug.

"Are you guys hungry?" I ask.

"Hung-y!" Seraina confirms.

Somehow she's faster with learning new words than Denny. She articulates a bit better, too, and Sirius claims that I must have been that way when I was such a small child.

"Okay, we get up and go for breakfast soon."

I'm taking a quick shower and return to the bedroom, while Sirius vanishes in the bathroom. Half an hour later we're all dressed and off to the restaurant. We spend the day lazing around on the beach or in the cool of our cottage and go for an early dinner to the restaurant. I'm not sure about when the moon rises, but I don't think it will be before eight or nine. We get back at something after seven and to be very sure I transform and spend the evening in my wolf form. Hermione and Siri take the children to bed after a while and when it gets all dark, Sirius gets up and gives me a light slap on my back.

"Come on, old boy, we're going for a walk!"

"I'll baby-sit the children, Siri, you go for a lovely walk under the moon," Harry says with a grin.

"I'm coming along with you, if you don't mind," Hermione says.

Who says I'm going for a walk? I want to stay right here! But Sirius pesters me until I get up with a growl. He laughs and coos:

"Come on, Moony, you know you feel like a stroll!"

I sigh – at least it feels like I do and follow them. The two of them talk quietly while I'm walking along with them. The evening is really wonderful and Moony wants to howl at the moon, but I hold back. I nuzzle Siri's hands occasionally and he gives me a good caress of my head just behind the ears on my neck where I like it best. I don't know how long we're outside, but we're there for a long time and we meet quite a few other guests who were drawn out of their rooms and cottages by the full moon. Most of them look at me and give me a wide berth. That's when Sirius usually caresses me demonstratively.

Then we pass a couple with their children and to my dismay I discover they're students of ours. Jonathan Gibson is a fourth year Hufflepuff and Sabina is a sixth year Ravenclaw. Of course they spot Sirius immediately and greet him.

"Professor Black? Oh, it's so nice to meet you! Hello, Professor Lupin!" Sabina cries and her brother follows suit.

Her parents look a little bit weary, but seem to accept it that their children are comfortable with meeting a werewolf teacher.

"Hello, you two!" Sirius replies and turns to the parents. "Mr. and Mrs Gibson, it's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Sirius Black, have so far been your children's potions teacher and will be Sabina's transfigurations teacher from the start of the new term."

"Oh, it's nice to meet you, Professor. I hope, my children are well behaved at Hogwarts…" says Mrs Gibson.

"Much better than I ever was as a student, I assure you, Mrs Gibson! Though my partner here would probably tell you that that's a pretty easy thing to do. Due to the full moon you meet him in his alter form tonight… he's your children's Defence against the Dark Arts professor. Though Jonathan won't have him next year, only Sabina."

"I'm sorry, but it seems so silly to say, pleased to meet you, Professor to a wolf. No one would think he's anything but a tame wolf, the way he sits next to you!" says Mr. Gibson and grins a bit.

I growl. Not sure what I detest more, fear of me or mockery! But then Sirius says casually:

"Well, believe me, he's the real thing. What you see here is the workings of the Wolfsbane potion. Remus is like an Animagus right now, his own self inside of the wolf with some wolf instincts. Open your mouth a bit, Remus!"

I do and he places his hand inside. I gently close my mouth and he explains:

"If he'd bite down now and draw blood I'd start transforming next full moon. But there you see how this potion works. Remus would never do that. Were he without his potion we'd all been torn to shreds by now."

"Wow," Mr. Gibson says and continues: "My children have told me a lot about you, Professor Lupin and both really liked your classes. I do have the feeling they finally learned some useful stuff in that subject. With all respect to good old Albus Dumbledore he's never had a good hand with finding good people in Defence! Our oldest has been out of Hogwarts for two years now and the array of teachers he's had… come to think of it, you were one of them and if memory serves me right he said you were the best of the lot. Only one other held up. Alastor Moody or something…"

"If only it would have been Alastor, Mr. Gibson. It was a Death Eater polyjuiced as Alastor. Alastor himself would have done a growling, but good job."

"You know the man? I've only heard he did wonders as an Auror."

"Yes, I do. He's trained me as an Auror after Hogwarts."

"You must be a pretty good all-rounder if you change from teaching potions to teaching transfigurations at Hogwarts?" Mrs Gibson says.

"I think I am, Madam. Of course those are subjects you need to be good at to become an Auror. But I'm definitely better at transfigurations than at potions."

"And he's very good at potions. I've had him for three years and made an outstanding OWL and an outstanding NEWT with him as a teacher. In both subjects, by the way," Hermione says.

The Gibsons turn to her.

"This is Hermione Potter, she's been taught by Remus Lupin and I at a safe-house while Voldemort and his cronies were after her and several other students. She's left school a year ago and that's when Remus and I returned to Hogwarts. At the safe-house we tutored thirteen students of her year from all four houses and both of us had to cover all the subjects we could, especially the main subjects, so Remus taught Defence and Charms, I took over Potions and Transfigurations."

"Oh. Pleased to meet you, Mrs Potter. Don't we have you to thank for the Commumirrors? I thought your face was somewhat familiar," Mrs Gibson says, looking pleased.

"Yes, that would be me."

"What a wonderful invention. Is it true that you did this on an assignment for school?"

"Yes. Remus was my Charms teacher then. He thought he might give us something to tax our minds and invent some spells of our own. He's pretty good at that. It was a lot of fun!"

"Well, we must meet during the daylight then when you'll be back, Professor! I'm actually very content that my children have teachers with whom they're happy. It's so hard to motivate them to study these days."

"I think, we both have a few things up our sleeves that can be very motivating. You'll have an addition to your regular school letter, Sabina, which will make your sixth year look a bit less dull. Sixth year is so often disregarded as a pause between the two exam years."

"Oh, I can't wait! I've been good in transfigurations, but rather in spite of Professor McGonagall. Not to be disrespectful, but she is sometimes a bit hard to understand…"

"You'll be very pleased with Sirius, I can promise you that," Hermione says with a warm glance at Siri.

"Why thank you, Mrs Potter. Are you trying to flirt with me? I'm afraid I'm very taken, you know!"

"Knowing that your mate is going to growl at you any moment, I'd never dare, Mr. Black. And that's beside the point that Mr. Potter would probably make kebabs out of you, godfather or not…" she shoots right back.

Yes, I think, a little growl is in order here. Sirius laughs and puts his hand back on my head.

"Can't risk our poor children to become half orphans…" Sirius gives in.

We part from the Gibsons after promising we'd see them again on the beach.

Then we walk on, not looking back. I want to walk more when I'm human again, this is too beautiful out here. But for the moment I have enough and nudge Sirius to turn around. He looks down, his hand resting on my head.

"Got enough?"

I nod.

"Okay, we'll walk back."

We return and at our cottage we release Harry from his duty and go to our room to sleep.

Friday, 3.7.1999 / Harry

This is the weekend, Hermione and I will spend at a hotel right in the middle of the old town of Zanzibar. It's our first trip to the 'city' and when we get there with our rented car we both find it breathtaking. After a bit of asking around, many people here speak a bit of English, we find the place we're staying at for two nights. We get to our room and it's simply breathtaking. Old colonial style mixed with Arabic ornaments and colourfully painted African fabrics, the ever present mosquito net around the four-poster bed and a bathroom with some stone bathtub of a pretty enormous size for a Muggle hotel. The colours of the room are a rich earthy brown, white-washed walls, beamed ceiling, mahogany hardwood floor and ceiling, and the balcony as well as the arched windows are done with intricate Arabic latticework. There are windows, but they are all left open. There are no shutters, just thin curtains, but the latticework high balcony railings are covering quite well. The floor is covered with a rich carpet and the sitting area is roomy, with two couches and two armchairs. We're tired from the day's driving, so we just fall into the spacious bed and cuddle for a while, necking and discussing where to go for dinner. Stone Town offers a wide range of very nice restaurants and when we pass at the reception later on we get a few tips. We've showered and put on some light summer clothes, but Hermione is pretty well covered.

We find a good restaurant and order some seafood for dinner. Hermione doesn't eat anything uncooked, but she thinks our baby would have to love seafood and fish later on, because we're eating so much of it at the moment. We're waited on very well and we leave a good tip after the meal. I take Hermione's hand and we simply stroll around for a bit, admiring this very special atmosphere. It's probably very Arabic. A trademark for that is the fact that in many of the narrow alleys the houses have a front door and otherwise no windows at all to the street. We have to look up to see more intricately carved stone lattice. These lattice walls look like filigree.

"They want to keep their homes very private, but up above there they want to catch the cool night air, so they have few windows to open and close, but these grids where the wind can enter their homes. At the same time the grids work as a wind breaker, so it doesn't storm inside, you just get the breeze. That's typically Arabian," Hermione explains quietly.

I can see the point. Since almost all of the people here are Moslems, this makes sense. They want to keep strictly private. It's the reason why Hermione wears something light, but covering her arms and legs. She doesn't go as far as to wear a scarf around her head, but I can see that some people give her affirmative glances.

We're eager to return to this great hotel though and do so fairly quickly. The room is just wonderful. We have a feeling of being outside, but we feel perfectly private. It's these balconies…

We spend a night of lovemaking and in the end we both fall asleep very exhausted. I hold her very tight and like every night since she's told me I need to feel that womb which hosts our future child. As she's beginning to show her pregnancy quite prominently this baby becomes more and more real for me. She's in her seventeenth week now, as good as halfway through. Still, the beginning of December seems so very far away!

Saturday, 18.7.1999 / Sirius

Merlin, time just flew! This island is pretty big, but we've seen it quite well now, having spent a bit of time on the road to see the sights. We've been to the old town of Zanzibar, we've gone to different beaches, we've done a bit of snorkelling, and we've been to the forests to catch a glimpse of the local fauna. We've got a whole mass of new photos! I'll need to spend some time next week to recuperate from the heat and just busy myself with creating a photo album of the weeks spent here.

Remus is beautiful! For once he allowed the sun to reach his skin, almost all of it and he's beautifully tanned. He looks great! We've been doing a stroll every night, sometimes on four legs, mostly on two, hand in hand or arm in arm. There are no problems with clothes shed down to the swimming trunks in the holiday resort, but otherwise we respect the sensitivity of the local people and pull on light kaftans or wear covering western clothes.

Seraina and Denny both look like little brown hazelnuts. They have grown a bit and learned a few new words, even two in Kiswahili, the local language. Both learned to walk in the sand, which was a good training to walk more easily on solid ground. At almost fifteen months they're still crawling on all fours, with quite an agility even, but they start to prefer to move on two legs now. Addie has tanned even darker. Her grey eyes shine with happiness. We've spent a lot of time together and did a few specially child-friendly outings. I have a good feeling that her horrible early childhood will start to fade and that she's finally able to make herself happy memories.

Harry and Hermione look equally healthy. Hermione has started to feel the baby kick! She's been so excited about it and told Lily as soon as she could. The two of them have become such great friends. She's also mirrored her Mum about it and I think, Helen was almost crying.

We return to the Sunnegg and look forward to another month of vacation, but spending our time on that island was so much like being completely in another world! Of course we recommend it highly to the gang!

Monday, 26.7.1999 / Sirius

I take that time I promised myself and fill four lovely albums with the photo impressions we gained of Zanzibar. It was in every way as exotic as we imagined it would be and we didn't think we spent one moment too long there. My albums are soon admired by all in the family and even more so, my family at Hogwarts. Most of them have not much of an idea of how it looks elsewhere.

Saturday, 31.7.1999 / Hermione

Harry's birthday. He doesn't want parties anymore – hey, we're grown now. I quite understand, but he'll still have his favourite food for dinner. Most of us are around and we might go dancing. Have to enjoy our summer break after all! Not that we don't do some cramming through the days, we need it. We're reading some books that have been recommended and that we didn't have the time to read during the school year. There's a fair number of them, but I have mine done, Harry just needs to read two of them still.

Lily is working with Addie on some basic maths now. Morag and I have been to the bookshops yesterday to find some basic stuff in many different subjects and Sirius has written to Madam Reeves asking her for the school books that are used at her primary school. Addie needs to catch up on five years of school! I agree with Sirius that she best does that alone with a tutor and Lily will do great! Addie already adores her. She's astonishingly open to everything, but then I do think she has Sirius' superb mind. We know the Blacks have used the same spell Sirius and Remus used on Lily for their children. Sirius showed us some pictures of his brother and Regulus clearly looked clearly like Sirius' twin brother. According to Sirius he had enough of his mother's personality though. I dared to remark that in that case maybe his father wasn't the worst person, but Sirius cuts it off and tells me he actually was worse than his mother:

"Totally unreadable he was. You could never predict what would come. He was capable of a lot of cruelty, believe me, I've felt it, not only from her, but from him, too. He's cursed me with Cruciatus. That was the thing that made me leave finally. I wasn't going home after fifth year, but they insisted. We had been in the restricted section looking up the spell to make a Portkey just a few months before, in case something like that should happen. I couldn't escape them, they were both waiting at the station and I had to pass them. So they plucked me. And Regulus told them about Remus and me, even though there wasn't anything going on between us yet. That was the first round of cursing, by my mother, then two days later my father wanted to force me to join the Death Eaters. I said no and he cursed me. I was lucky they locked me inside of my room with my trunk and all and forgot to confiscate my wand. So I made a Portkey out of my alarm-clock, took my trunk and landed on the Potters' doorstep. Gave auntie Dorea the shock of her life. After that I've never seen that place again until a few months ago."

If anyone deserves to have some peace it's Sirius! What he's been through in his life is actually too much for one man. But that he's managed to pull himself out of all of this just proves the power within him.

We spend the day mostly outside. I'm sitting on a deckchair under the shade of the pergola we've built a while ago. We've planted it with vines, clematis and other climbers, which start to build a lovely cover in summer. Sirius and Remus take the children to the public bath over lunch and then to the Lueg for ice cream. When they come back shortly before dinner, Sirius tells us that they've arranged for a dinner at the Lueg for the next Saturday. He's inviting the whole gang there. We all check that we have nothing going on, but it's okay, so we'll drive up there for a lovely dinner. The Lueg has a first class kitchen, so the food should be great.

The dinner tonight is nice, we have candlelight and afterwards Harry has a few gifts to open. Some of the people go out to dance, but I'm too tired, so Harry and I stay at home and go back to our room for a bit of necking. I'm glad for a quiet evening. The baby has started to move and I can feel it quite well now. Even Harry can feel it from the outside and my belly has swollen quite a bit already.

"I love to see you right now, Hermione, you're so beautiful!"

"Not that I feel like that at the moment, love, it's so good that you tell me that! I really appreciate it."

I've had my share of mood swings, but they've not been too bad. I'm moved more easily right now and when I'm underway somewhere I observe myself looking after practically every pram I see. It gets a bit more uncomfortable to sleep now, but I'm lying on my sides and often use Harry to pull up one of my knees and lay it on his legs. Otherwise the pregnancy doesn't cause me too many problems. Apparating is getting a bit more troublesome, I have to concentrate more, but according to the healer I can do it until the last month before the birth. That means that I'll have to stay at home from on November. But since Harry records every lecture I'll have them in written. Keeping up to date shouldn't be a problem.