Rating of R

I do not own the characters, JKR does. I simply borrow them.

Blood Chronicles

"...Greyback specializes in children...Bite them young, he says, and raise them away from their parents, raise them to hate normal wizards"
-Remus Lupin, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, 334

What if, when Remus Lupin was bitten, Greyback stole him off into the middle of the night. What if he was never found. What if he never went to Hogwarts and never met three people that could change his life forever. What if he met one of them. Six years too late. This is that what if story.

I'm sorry for any mistakes you may find. I know that they're there, so no need to point them out. The most I can do is apologize. This has not been beta read but I really wanted to get the chapter out so I'd thought I'd give it to you guys anyway.

Ah, it almost feels like I can't write at the moment...Sorry for the awfulness that is the constant switching of the tense of this chapter, but every time I went to change it it just came out wrong. Sigh.

Blood Chronicles

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Sorry.

Was what he wanted to say, but can't.

Goodbye.

Was what he needed to say, but can't.

Sirius tried to make his tongue cooperate and say the former, but it wouldn't. Or maybe it just can't. Instead his voice caught in the back of his throat and came out choked.

"God damn you, Remus."

It is the first time in Sirius' memory that Remus offered no bitting response. Not even the slightest shift in body language to acknowledge that he's heard what's being spoken to him. Sirius thinks that maybe it's just his thoughts, chasing one another around in his head. He repeated himself, just to make sure.

"I heard you the first time."

It is also the first time in memory that Sirius has ever heard Remus speak so softly. No playful banter undertone or snapping bite beneath the surface.

Quite frankly, it scared him.

"God damn." His hands fisted in this hair and tugged lightly, repeatedly. "Why couldn't you just...Just have gone and lived with Tyler? I'm not asking anything impossible."

"But that's just it. You are asking something impossible."

"Stop being all melodramatic."

"I'm not. It's true. I'd rip him limb from limb before the first week was up. The first day even. I can't live like a house dog. A pet." His nose wrinkles back in disgust. "I don't want to go into some fucking rehab-"

"It's not-"

"It is. I'm done talking. I've made my choice, and I'm not changing it. No matter what you say."

"I..." Sirius trailed off, finding nothing more to say.

Nothing more to say because he had already said it all. Except for what he has wanted to say.

"Sorry."

"What're you sorry for? I'm the one that's got a bullet with my name on it."

"Everything. I'm sorry for everything."

Remus shrugged, tired and leaned against the wall opposite Sirius, arms crossed.

"S'not your fault."

"Yeah it is. If I hadn't been stupid enough to follow you back in the first place."

"If we're going back that far then it'd be fair to say that it's my fault for taking from you in the first place."

Sirius grinned sheepishly. "Now, if we're going that far back then we can blame it all on my uncle."

"Your uncle

"If he hadn't gotten so rich and hadn't given me such a nice chunk of the wealth..."

He felt stupid. Sirius felt even stupider when Remus stares back at him with a blank expression.

He stared. And stared.

And blinked. And blinked again.

Sirius found himself feeling very uncomfortable when Remus started to laugh and then suddenly stopped to draw a deep, shuddering breath. His voice recovered and Sirius learned that such a simple, two syllable word is not as easy as it seems to say.

"Goodbye."

It came out choked and is hard to distinguish exactly what it is at first. He hated himself immediately afterward when one silent tear dripped from the end of Remus' jaw line. It looked so shockingly out of place. Sirius realized that he has never seen Remus cry before and realized what a day for many firsts that this was turning out to be,

It is also the first time that they had cried together, clinging to one another in their desperation in the face of reality.

Remus was terrified. More terrified than he has ever been before in his entire life. More terrified than when he was first bitten. He had been too young to fully comprehend the full measure of things then. More terrified than he was when confronting with Greyback, although he would never let it show. Even more so since he'd be captured and facing the uncertain.

No longer was his fate uncertain. It was laid out in front of him. All viable with no tricks awaiting him unsuspectingly.

The truth of certainty frightened him.

It is the first time that he acknowledges the fact that he is afraid of death. Flirting with it as he has, he had no reason to fear it. But now that it snapped in his face and showed no escape Remus was hysterical.

He was so afraid that he was almost considering changing his mind. Almost thought about living with Tyler the pet werewolf. Almost thought about learning to become a tame werewolf just so that he can live. No matter how many newspaper beatings it may take.

He almost starts to consider it as it is lurking in the back of his mind, out of sight.

But as they say. Out of sight, out of mind.

Almost is never enough for Remus.

Remus felt bad as he cried like a five-year-old. His eyes regarded the growing wet patch on Sirius' shoulder as he felt his own shoulder dampen with tears.

It was an odd feeling. One that he had exposed to twice in this entire life. That feeling of responsibility and that feeling of playing the protector. Once on the morning after he'd bitten Aaron and then when Sirius had been angry at him for fighting with James.

This marked the third time.

He was ashamed that the number was so low as to still be single digits.

Remus struggled to get his uneven breathing and freely falling, salty tears under control. When he had managed that after some difficultly, he wrapped his arms in an awkward, comforting embrace around Sirius' shoulders. Sirius comes willingly, head resting on Remus' shoulder and nose nuzzling into his neck in a subconscious gesture of Padfoot.

As a silence is draped heavily and becomes thick and suffocating, Remus wished desperately for the rain. For the rain to come pouring form the sky. To pound on the roof and distract him from the silence. To soothe him.

"Don't cry. Please don't cry," Remus repeated awkwardly to Sirius the same way he had Aaron.

Sirius laughed weekly and murmured against Remus' neck. "I should be the one offering the words of comfort, not the other way around."

Remus shrugged. "I'm the one leaving you here, am I not?"

"I-"

"I love you," Remus whispers. "I...I think I really do. I've never felt this way before."

He glanced away shyly, to Sirius, the motion looks out of place.

"I love you," Remus repeats more confidently, to reassure the both of them. "Don't think I'm weird or anything."

Sirius half grinned through the tears and he swipes at his face angrily.

"Not weird," he murmurs. "Not weird at all. I think that I might just very well love you back."

He sealed his words with a kiss.

A gentle kiss that almost passed as child like innocence of a first, uncertain kiss. There was nothing hidden and sexual about it.

It was a goodbye kiss.

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