Disclaimer: Yeah. Thea, Archimedes, Rhys, Mel's and its inmates, and Crossroads and its employees are all my own invention. But Remus Lupin, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Wormtail, Padfoot, Prongs, Lily Potter, and Lord Voldything all belong to the great Rowling. Glory and honor and credit and millions to Queen Jo.

By the Light of the Moon

Thea was worried about Remus. For the first time ever, he hadn't come when he had said he would. He had cancelled on her, without any explanation. Thea had enjoyed herself at her farewell party at the café last night, with all the old Mel's people and her new friends from work at Crossroads, but she would have had more fun if she had known why Remus wasn't there.

Remus Lupin was probably the closest friend Thea had had in years, but she still didn't know what was up with him sometimes. She'd known him for over a year now. She knew almost everything about him. She knew his parents' names. She knew that he hated the colour orange and had never learned to ride a bicycle. He had told her that he was a wizard, and told her about the recent underground war with an evil wizard named Lord Voldemort. She knew about his friendships with three soldiers in that war, knew how all three had met their deaths either directly or through the treachery of a fourth friend of his: mass-murderer Sirius Black. Thea knew that Remus sent owls to Petunia Dursley sometimes with letters asking about Harry Potter, his friends Lily and James Potter's orphaned son, but that the owls always returned confused, still bearing the unopened missives, as if 4 Privet Drive didn't exist.

Yes, Thea knew Remus Lupin. She saw him almost every week, but she knew he still had a secret. There was something dark, dangerous, and- Thea thought- shameful that Remus had been sitting on since they had first met. He had been guarding this secret particularly fiercely lately, Thea felt. She didn't know what he might be hiding, but she guessed it wasn't as nearly bad as he so obviously thought it was. Remus was one of the best people she knew. She couldn't imagine him ever dangerous, or doing anything harmful. She supposed he might be hiding occasional weekend drinking binges and bar fights. It would neatly explain his periodic "illnesses" and the mild injuries and fatigue he always turned up with after his pretty much monthly disappearance.

Whatever Remus' nameless secret might be, it had until now lurked in the background of Thea and Remus' friendship, never referenced, and rarely felt. He had always been there, steady, quiet, kind Remus with the wicked sense of humour and the dark past. But last night he hadn't been all of a sudden, and Thea felt that whatever Remus was hiding had suddenly made itself known.

About a month ago, when Casey had first announced that he would be leaving Crossroads, and Josh Grant had offered to promote Thea from part-time intern to part-time employee, Thea had given her notice to Mr. and Mrs. Foster at Mel's. She'd let Remus know at the time that the café would probably send her off with a party, like Georgie Hess before her, and he had promised to come. But when she'd told him the day designated for the party last week, he'd frowned and fallen silent. He'd left her flat soon afterwards, still obviously bothered. Yesterday morning, Thea had found a short note on her door.

Can't come. Sorry. –R. Lupin

There had been no excuse. No reason. Remus had never let Thea down before. This was not one of his routine disappearances he always put down to "illness". This time it was different. Something was up.

Thea was on her way over to Remus' flat now to find out what. It was Saturday morning, and she knew he would be off work. He might not be home, though. Not for the first time, Thea wished that Remus would see fit to adopt a "Muggle" telephone like he usually adopted Muggle clothes. She didn't possess an owl to send to him, and the mailman was too slow. Remus always left a note on her door, thought, whenever he needed to tell her something, so Thea supposed that should he be absent, she could do the same. Accordingly, she gripped a pen tightly in her fist. She had a notebook and tape in her bag. She was prepared.

If only it weren't so freezing, she thought. She clutched her coat a little bit tighter, and her shoes crunched in the slushy remains of last week's snow. A lone crow alighted on the nearby street sign and gave a single raucous cry. Thea glared at it. "Oh, fly away," she snapped. "I don't like the weather much either. I ought to move to Greece. Or Spain. Or Africa. Someplace warm, anyway."

The crow ruffled its feathers and flew off in a distinctly superior manner, as if it were above exchanging conversation with a mad girl walking alone in the snow on a Saturday morning. Thea stuck her tongue out in its general direction. Thea turned into Remus' complex then, clutching her bag close. She made her way to Remus' flat, and rapped on the door three times.

For a long moment, there was only silence. Thea was just about to go rummaging through her bag for the notepad and tape when a rustling in the flat behind the door pulled her up short. The doorknob rattled, and the door creaked open just a little bit.

Remus peeked out at her with bleary, swollen eyes set in a face deathly pale. "Thea," he rasped. His voice was dry and hoarse, far from his usual pleasantly husky baritone. Thea read a fever in the sweat upon his forehead. "Not today, okay? Just-"he broke off. "I'll see you next week," he whispered. His knees buckled then, and he clutched at the door handle. Thea pressed her lips together, put her own hand to the doorknob, and stepped inside Remus' flat. Remus staggered back a few steps in the dimly lit flat. Thea caught him. She swung an arm around his shoulders, and her cheeks immediately flamed. She didn't let go, though, but instead closed his door behind them with her other hand.

She flicked the light on. She kept her eyes focused on the floor, though, on Remus' pant legs, frayed and dirty, and his bare feet poking out from under them. Anything to keep from looking at the very naked torso she was currently supporting. An afghan lying abandoned on the floor by the sofa, an open first-aid kit on the coffee table, and a half-full mug of tea told Thea the whole story. No wonder he hadn't been at her party last night. "Right then," Thea said. "Come on." She half-carried him back to the sofa. He seemed almost too weak to walk. She lowered him down to the couch, and he tried to sit up, but couldn't.

"Thea- I'm-"

"You could've just told me you were ill," she said softly. "In your note, I mean. Really ill this time, not just hung-over and beat-"she trailed off, noticing the first-aid kit again with new eyes. Her eyes went to Remus' body for the first time, and she gasped.

"Remus- my- how?"

Almost every inch of Remus' upper body was bruised to some degree, especially his shoulders and wrists. Both hands, his shoulder, hip, and left forearm, were swathed in clumsy bandages, and Thea could see blood seeping through some of them. There was a long shallow slice on his jaw, and his hair was absolutely wild. He shook his head helplessly, sending it even further into disarray. "Thea- just- I'll be fine. Just go." Thea could barely make out the words.

Her hand hovered over his wrist. She wanted to grip it in assurance, but she didn't want to hurt him. "Forget it!" she cried. "Go? With you in this state? No way, Remus! What can I-"she stopped. No use asking him, she thought. The man was feverish. He was shivering. She took up the afghan from the floor, obviously forsaken when Remus had somehow for some incomprehensible reason gotten up to answer the door. She draped it over him.

Thea went to the kitchen, wet a cloth, and went back. She applied the cool wet cloth to Remus' pallid, sweating face. "Thea-"he tried one more time. "You don't have to-"

"Shh-"Thea said. "Hush. I know. I want to. Try and sleep."She smoothed his hair back, and blinked. There was dirt in his hair, along with a couple of leaves. She didn't mention it, though, and Remus looked up at her mutely. Finally, one corner of his mouth turned up just a little bit, and she took it for assent to her continued presence. His eyes began to droop.

Thea judged him to be comfortable enough, and turned her attention to the flat. So Remus was ill. Really ill. Poor guy. She could stay today and look after him. He didn't have a parent, a girlfriend, or a roommate to do it, after all. From the looks of things, he'd been sick for a few days now. Things were piled up: not in their usual organised clutter-type way, but unhealthily so, pointing to the disability of the founder of the mess. Thea grabbed a few dirty dishes off of the coffee table, and walked them into the kitchen. She took them to Remus' sink and rolled up her sleeves, but to her surprise just then a sponge leaped to attention. The tap turned on, and the dishes began to wash themselves. "Um- okay," she said, deciding Remus must have some sort of ongoing spell set up to wash dirty dishes every time they approached the sink. "Should I stay to put you away?" she asked the dishes, feeling a little silly addressing stoneware. "Or do you have it all in hand?"

A dishtowel snapped at her, clearly telling her to be on her way and to mind her own business. Thea smiled, and went back to the living room. She went across to Remus' bookshelf and perused his titles. One in particular caught her attention: a worn old textbook titled Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by someone named Newt Scamander. She shrugged, grabbed it off the shelf and sat down in Remus' armchair.

She looked over at the sofa. Remus was still sweating, but he had stopped sweating. He was breathing deeply. He'd fallen asleep. Over Remus' head, Winston Churchill was absent from his portrait. Thea was not unduly alarmed by this. Remus had told her once that there were a few other magical portraits floating around Britain that his own sometimes visited.

Thea leaned back, opened the book, and began to read.

At first, she was annoyed. The text was fascinating, for all it was a textbook (after all, Thea thought, she didn't know anything at all about magic: it was all new to her), but the whole thing had been scrawled in and over and commented on and drawn in by what looked like at least three different people. Thea loved books. She couldn't approve of such defacement, especially of a book she was trying to read. After a while, though, she began to notice that as interesting as Mr. Scamander's descriptions of the Cornish Pixie and the Chimaera were, the notes themselves were more interesting yet, especially to her. What did she know of fantastic beasts? When would she ever see them, unless Remus showed them to her in secret?

But the book was Remus', and once she recognised his square, neat hand among the writers, always sounding slightly amused, slightly worried, and slightly exasperated in his notes to the other defilers of the text (Stop writing in my book, Padfoot. Do you really think that's a good idea, Prongs? Oh, shut up, you idiots), she realised what this was. It was just like when she wrote random things in class (though she wrote hers in a proper notebook). The side notes in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them told about Remus' life at Hogwarts, and they told about his friends.

Remus, James Potter, Peter Pettigrew, and Sirius Black. Those, Thea realised, must be the four people that had written in Remus' textbook, bored to tears in some Fantastic Beasts class at Hogwarts. They only ever referred to themselves by nicknames, though.

Thea pored over the pages, trying to guess everything she could. Remus was Moony. That much was obvious. The others always addressed him as Moony, though Thea had no idea why. He had apparently been a voice of reason in the little group even then, and Thea guessed too that he had more often than not shared his textbook with Padfoot, who was the most frequent violator of the pages and seemed a rather careless personage.

From what Remus had told Thea of Peter Pettigrew, she supposed he was Wormtail. A rather unfortunate nickname, she thought. Wormtail had shaky, feeble handwriting, and seemed quite a bit dimmer than the others. His notes in the text were less frequent, too. They were nearly always questions about the beast being covered in class, and drawings. He was a rather good artist, though, Thea thought.

Prongs and Padfoot were obviously very close friends, almost brothers. They had similar senses of humour, and seemed to possess stronger characters than the others, Thea thought, not without a pang for her best friend Remus. If she'd had to pinpoint a leader she would have guessed at Prongs- he showed a propensity to idea generation and Thea guessed from his notes that he had exercised some manner of control over Padfoot, who seemed to have needed it. She liked Prongs- he was funny and clever and just a little bit mad. She really hoped that James Potter had been Prongs. It would be terrible to like a murderer, Thea thought, even in the limited capacity of the writer of juvenile notes in a magic class at Hogwarts.

Her musings on the nature of Remus' school days and school friends was disrupted by Archimedes. He leaned down and tugged at the pages of the book with his beak. Thea started. She hadn't even heard him land on the armrest. Stupid silent owls, she thought.

"Go away, Archimedes," she said quietly, trying not to disturb Remus. "Shoo! I'm trying to read."

She flapped her hand at him a bit gingerly. He clacked his beak at her, and she flinched. He stared at her with big, yellow eyes, and then bent over the pages again, turning them like he would preen feathers. Thea glared. She was quickly being annoyed out of her fear of the owl's lethal beak and talons.

"Shoo!" she said again, this time grabbing Archimedes' big, feathery butt and hoisting him off the chair. He hooted in dismay, and flew off, casting a resentful glance over his shoulder at her. Thea rolled her eyes and bent to the book. She blinked.

Archimedes had turned the leaves of the book to its most densely packed page yet. There was an enormous block of type about the creature Scamander was describing, but all around it, in very tiny print, all three of Remus' friends had added information. A lot of information. Thea frowned. It wasn't jokes and drawings, either, like on the other pages. It was genuine, creature-related information, serious in tone and meaning, or it seemed to be.

She turned her attention to the beast the page described. WEREWOLF, ran the heading. Thea had to restrain a snort. Seriously? Dragons were one thing. She'd seen fairies. But werewolves? She sat back. Apparently so. Alright. Werewolves. She read the entry. Bitten by a werewolf, become a werewolf, every full moon yadda yadda, feral monsters that would rip your head off as soon as look at you, blah blah blah. Scamander didn't mention silver, though. Maybe that wasn't a weakness of theirs. That was interesting. She turned her attention to Remus' friends' comments.

"They try and tell us that werewolves are evil monsters," Wormtail had written at the top, sounding more assertive than Thea had seen him yet. "But they're not. At least, they don't have to be. A werewolf usually can't find a job in our world. A lot of people would beat someone up and kick them out of town if they suspected them of being a werewolf. But that's wrong."

Here, Padfoot had taken over. "People don't know Knuts about werewolves. If they'd talk to one, stop for just a second to be decent, open-minded human beings instead of prejudiced gits, they'd realise. For twenty seven days out of twenty eight, a werewolf is just an ordinary guy. Maybe even cooler. For one thing, they have incredibly keen hearing and smell, even when they aren't wolves. They're great people to have around if you're pulling something off and you need someone to keep a lookout. They're also amazingly strong. For another thing, just to face the stupid world every day, a werewolf has to be phenomenally brave."

"The werewolf transformation is incredibly painful," Prongs had written below that. "And that once a month when a werewolf is a proper monster, they literally need room to run, stuff to chew on. And if they can't get people- say if the werewolf locked himself up some place safe so he couldn't hurt anybody as a wolf- they beat themselves up. And though werewolves have an awesome healing rate, werewolf-caused injuries can't be healed by magic. A bad werewolf transformation can take days to recover from."

Wormtail again. "There's not a cure for likan—What's that word you used again, Padfoot?"

"Lycanthropy, Worm," Padfoot had interjected impatiently here.

"Yeah, that. A werewolf is a werewolf forever. Once they get bitten, they have to deal with it, and all the stuff that comes with it," Wormtail had written.

"And nobody chooses to be a werewolf," Padfoot had said. "No one signs up for that hell, though there are some sick sadistic bastards that exploit the condition once they've got it and set out deliberately to hurt others."

"But those people are the real monsters. The Lord Voldythings of the lycanthropic kingdom (great word by the way, Padfoot)," Prongs had finished, squeezing in the last lines in his spiky, spindly handwriting. "They are by no means representative of the whole class. A werewolf, Mr. Scamander, is first and foremost a victim. And one I know personally is a hero."

This- Thea could only think of it as a second entry on werewolves- was written all around Scamander's entry. Above, in the margins, below. The very last words had been penned by Prongs.

"-June 1977. Moony, whenever you get this out and reread it again- oh, we know you and your pathological love for books, even sawdusty old school volumes, we love you. We're behind you. Always. Marauders Forever! "

All three had signed it. Thea stared for a long moment.

The odd disappearances. The varied jobs. The incongruous injuries that seemed to vanish almost overnight. The silvery scars she sometimes imagined she saw on his arms, like bites from some impossibly enormous canine. Every month he was ill, every month exactly. It'd been staring her in the face, hadn't it? Moony.

A sudden fear and revulsion raced through her, followed immediately by a terrible, crushing guilt, and then by a hot, burning anger, both at herself and at Remus. She sprang to her feet, hurling away the textbook. It hit the table and then the floor with very loud thumps. Remus gave a cry and sat up with a start. His eyes went to Thea's face, focused, then to the discarded textbook. "What on earth-"his voice was a little clearer now. He had stopped sweating. Already the cut on his cheek looked shallower (awesome healing rate, Thea thought).

"You're a werewolf," Thea said. His eyes went wide. His shoulders froze. "Oh, good Lord, you are, aren't you?" She began to pace. "Why didn't you tell me?" He opened his mouth to answer, but Thea cut him off. "No, strike that, that's a stupid question. I know why you didn't tell me." She laughed. The sound rang out through Remus' flat, a bit hysterical and mad sounding. "You're a werewolf." She said again. "My best friend is a werewolf. Heavens above, it's like one of those really bad fantasy dramas Erin goes mad over. I'm right, aren't I? You are."

Remus' face had become set, hard. "Yes." He said. His voice was flat. Then suddenly, he was standing, angry himself. The afghan fell to the floor. "I told you to go, didn't I? I didn't ask you to come poking around, Thea! I certainly didn't tell you to start reading my old magic textbooks! Could you have just once minded your own business and left well enough alone? Well, now you know." He spread his arms wide. "I'm a werewolf!" he cried. "I'm a monster every month. And now what? What of it?" He crossed over to Thea in two short, long, quick strides, amazing for someone who hadn't even been able to stand three hours ago. He gripped her shoulders tightly. Painfully tightly. His hands were like iron. "Do you hate me?" he asked, and his voice was controlled now, though his eyes burned. "Are you scared of me, Thea Ramora?"

Thea stared at him. She stared at Remus, her best friend, and didn't see a monster at all. And for the first time, his face was completely open. The secrets were gone, and Thea took a breath. The air tasted of freedom. "You're hurting me, Remus," she said quietly. He dropped his hands in a millisecond, and his face contorted. "Go put a shirt on," she said.

It was Remus' turn to stare at her. "What?"

"You heard me," Thea repeated. "I'll go put the kettle on."

When Thea came back from the kitchen bearing two fresh mugs of tea, Remus was standing up by his door, wearing a jumper and jeans. He'd brushed his hair, too. "Much better," Thea told him. "Here."

He took the mug wordlessly. Thea sat down, holding her mug between her hands. Remus remained standing.

"Well?"

"Well," Thea repeated. "I've been an idiot. I don't know why I thought I could believe in dragons and fairies and ignore the nastier things like sphinxes and lethifolds- I was thinking earlier I wanted to move to the tropics, Remus. I've changed my mind. Those things are terrifying. Anyway, I suppose I wasn't looking for werewolves, or I probably could've guessed. Is it this bad every month?"

She gestured to the first aid kit. Remus plopped down beside her in surprise. "No," he said. "Not always. Sometimes it's better. Sometimes it's worse. It's bad whenever I'm stressed- right after Halloween- I had to go to St. Mungo's a couple of times." By Halloween, Thea knew he was referring to the night James and Lily Potter had died and he had realised Sirius was a traitor. "But- aren't you furious?"

"At myself," Thea said. "The split second I realised what's been going on all this time, I was afraid." She studied her shoes. "Forgive me," she said lowly. "I know you better than that."

"What- Thea- I'm the monster, and you're sorry? I've kept it from you all this time."

"Werewolves are first and foremost victims," Thea quoted.

Remus winced. "James used to say that," he said. "Thea- if I had seen you last night, I would have torn you limb from limb without a second thought. How much of a victim would you have called me then?"

"But you didn't rip me limb from limb. Instead you tore yourself up," Thea objected. "How long?"

Remus sighed. "Almost since before I remember. I was- five, I think. For curiosity's sake, what tipped you off? Just the werewolf entry in the book?"

"You haven't read that since '77, have you?" Thea asked. She picked up the textbook and turned to the werewolf page. She handed it to Remus.

Remus read it in silence. When he was done, he closed it gingerly and set it on the coffee table. There were tears in his eyes. "That- that would do it," he said.

"Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. Peter, Sirius, and James?" Thea guessed.

"Yeah."

"But why those nicknames? I mean, I understand Moony, but-"

Remus smiled. "You read about the transformation? James didn't want me to go through it alone. He was a Transfiguration prodigy. It was Sirius' idea, though, to become Animagi- wizards who can transform at will into animals," he explained at Thea's questioning glance. "A werewolf is only dangerous to humans. They kept me company every year from fifth on, even after Hogwarts. Even when Lily was pregnant and the war was going mad. We ran around. It wasn't so bad, then. I didn't have to- you know- when they were there to play with. Peter could turn into a rat. Sirius- he turned into a dog and James into a stag."

"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs," Thea murmured. "I see." And also just what sort of friends the "Marauders" as James had called them, had been. How much Remus must feel their loss, even now. "Remus- is there anything I can do? Anything at all?"

"Stop fussing, for one thing," Remus said. "I'll be fine by tomorrow afternoon. Otherwise-"he sighed. "I hardly have the right to ask. I should've known you better, too…but just be here, okay? You help make it better, a little."

"Not alright."

"No."

"But better." Thea tentatively moved towards him. "Will I…" she cut off, gesturing to his bandaged hands and such.

"It's fine," he said. Thea nodded, and she kissed him on the cheek and hugged him gently. She sat up then, and drank some of her tea.

"Where's your boyfriend?" Remus asked after a moment.

Thea blinked, completely taken aback. "Rhys?" she said.

"Yeah, well, he took you to the party last night, didn't he? You've been going out for a couple months now." His voice was casual, but he wasn't looking at her.

"Well- yeah, we go out every now and then, but I don't think he's my boyfriend," Thea said. "That is, he's never called me his girlfriend."

Remus chuckled. "Have you told him that it's not official?" he said. "I'm sure the bloke would be interested to know that he's been taking you out exclusively for almost three months and you don't think the two of you are a couple."

Thea frowned. "He never said he was taking me out exclusively," she said. "How do you know he's not seeing other girls?"

Remus rolled his eyes. "I tagged along with you two a couple weeks ago," he said. "The football game, remember? By the way, that was awkward- I'm never doing it again. But I saw the way he looked at you. He's not seeing anyone else, trust me. Besides, it's you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Thea demanded. "And why should I know where he is, anyway? I saw him just last night, but I don't keep track of Rhys Davison's whereabouts twenty-four seven."

"Do you like him?" Remus asked bluntly.

"Of course I like him," Thea said. "I wouldn't spend time with someone I didn't like. I…I like him a lot, actually." She ducked her head and blushed. "He- he kissed me three weeks ago," she confessed. "I'm sure I was awful- I'd never kissed anyone before… but he kissed me last night, too…why am I telling you all this?" she asked.

Remus was wearing a very odd look on his face. "I don't know," he said.

"Well you should," Thea told him. "You're the one that asked about Rhys in the first place. Why are you interested anyway?"

Remus stared at her. Thea shifted, suddenly uncomfortable. "Never mind," Thea said. "You're looking a lot better," she observed. "Are you feeling better?"

Remus sighed. "Yeah," he said. "A little tired, a little sore, but better. Naps and tea work wonders."

"I imagine the werewolf healing stuff doesn't hurt, either," Thea said drily. "What I wouldn't give for that ability when I trip over something and sprain my ankle. You feeling up to a little Chinese? There's that place just around the block…it's not far."

Remus looked somehow disappointed. "Yeah," he said. "Sure, Thea."

A/N: Thea's so smart sometimes. But other times she's so completely clueless. It's a flaw in her otherwise spotless, shining, character. That and she really is a bit nosy, even when she thinks she's not. And that she tries to take care of everyone she meets. And goes around singing and talking to crows. And has a fish she calls Larry. Who am I kidding? She's a complete dork.

Poor Remus. If he actually got up the nerve (and the OOC selfish intelligence as opposed to his usual noble brand of stupidity) to say something to Thea at this point in the story he might be surprised, even if she DID just find out that he's freakin' werewolf AS WELL AS being a wizard. But he won't. And by the time he does, it might be too late. Even when Thea's clueless, she's only clueless up to a point.

Keep reading for "Never a Time for Us", coming probably as soon as I get through with finals here. Leave a review if you especially liked or disliked anything you read here today.

God Bless,

LMSharp