Disclaimer: If you haven't realised after the last fifty-something chapters that Harry Potter's world is not mine, I have no idea how you're managing to make sense of this story…
"Forgiveness is the final form of love."
(Reinhold Niebuhr)
REMUS:
The moment he opened his eyes, Remus knew that something was terribly wrong. For one thing, it was night time, yet he could feel from the tugging on his wolf-self that the full moon was already two days away. That meant he had been in his child-like state for longer than he ever had before.
For another thing, he was in agony. After ten years of suffering through full moons and abuse from his father, Remus knew he had a high pain threshold, but even he felt that this pain was beyond the usual, bearable level. When he tried to move his body, it was completely stiffened and coated with a mixture of bandages and potions.
What on earth had happened?
His little Hospital Wing room was gloomy, the only light coming from a candle on the little shelf over the basin. It flickered and sent shadows skittering across the walls, shadows that Remus knew would have scared Sirius had he been here. On the little cabinet beside his bed, there was a pile of sweets and chocolates, as well as a pain-killing potion.
"Madame Pomfrey?" His voice was pathetically weak and croaky, and his throat felt like it was coated in a layer of dry bread. She must have set an alarm-spell though, because in spite of his almost inaudible call, she bustled in a few seconds later, her arms full of potions.
"It's good to see you're finally yourself, Remus," she said as she leant over him and began casting diagnostic spells. She gently slipped her arms beneath his shoulders and helped to prop him up against his pillows. "Here, drink this."
Remus raised his arms stiffly, inhibited by the bandages and clumsily drank the potion she handed him. He felt the pain and stiffness abate a little.
"What happened?" he croaked, searching his fuzzy post-moon memories and only getting a strong sense of anguish and desertion. He remembered screaming a lot, and people – James, Peter and Madame Pomfrey – trying to calm him. Other than that it was pretty much blank. "Where's Sirius? What's going on?" He broke off to cough as his raised voice irritated his scream-damaged throat.
"Don't talk, Remus." Madame Pomfrey reached out and smoothed the hair away from his forehead and tucked it behind his ear. "I think it will be best if your friends tell you what happened. They're just finishing dinner. They should be here any minute now."
"Oh, Merlin," Remus whispered. "I hurt someone, didn't I? I hurt Sirius, didn't I? That's why he wasn't there. I h – " He was overtaken by another violent fit of coughing.
"No!" Madame Pomfrey sat on the edge of his bed and gripped his hand comfortingly. "Everyone is fine. I promise you."
It didn't escape Remus's notice that she said avoided saying 'no one got hurt'.
"Please," he whispered. "Tell me what happened.
"Remus, I really don't think – "
"Moony!" He and Madame Pomfrey jumped and turned to see James and Peter entering the room. Expressions of great relief decorated both their faces when they spotted Remus's calm, rational appearance. He guessed – from the raw feeling of his cheeks – that he had been crying a lot over the two days. Two days! The thought frightened him. What if – one day – his mind just never came back? What if he was stuck in his childlike state forever?
"Hey lads," he rasped at them. He looked beyond them to the door, waiting for Sirius to make an appearance. "Where's Padfoot?"
Both of them winced and Remus felt his heart jerk in horror. He turned to stare at Madame Pomfrey. "You promised!" he accused, hating the way his voice sounded so high and childish. He could feel Moony pacing restlessly close to the surface, making it hard to think. "You promised he wasn't hurt! You said he was okay!" This time he ended up coughing so badly that tears ran down his raw cheeks as he gasped for breath. There was a faintly metallic taste at the back of his mouth.
"He is okay, Moony," Peter reassured him, hurrying over to the bed, closely followed by James. "Please just listen. We have to tell you what happened."
"'Happened'?" His voice was barely more than a wheeze now.
"Um…" Peter looked to James, obviously unwilling to take on the task himself.
"I'll go," Madame Pomfrey murmured. "Try not to upset him too much please, boys." She stood up and left the room, shutting the door behind her.
"Moony." James moved to take Madame Pomfrey's place on the edge of Remus's bed. "What do you remember?"
"N-Nothing," Remus whispered, trying not to agitate his throat any more. "Sirius and I had a small argument in the l-l-library, but it wasn't bad, and we sort of made up. But I w-wanted to be on my own so I went to the hospital wing early. That's all I remember."
"You had an argument?" Peter asked. "You two never argue."
"I w-was trying to talk Lily around for you, James," Remus said. "To make up for h-h-hurting you. But Sirius came in and r-ruined it. He didn't mean to. He was j-just trying to protect me."
"Protect you?" To Remus's bemusement, Peter sounded a little disbelieving.
"Of course he was," Remus said, his voice rising a little louder than a whisper in his vehemence. "You know he always does. Snape was being mean to me. He c-c-called me a lapdog."
"Oh, Moony, I'm sorry," James said, reaching out to touch his bandaged arm.
Remus shook his head impatiently, then winced as his aching neck protested. "Just tell me what happened, please." He couldn't help his eyes drifting to the door. If Sirius wasn't hurt, why wasn't he here yet? Perhaps he was just held up eating extra pudding at dinner. Or maybe he was getting some for Remus. He did that sometimes.
"Moony," Peter said in the gentlest tone Remus had ever heard from him. "He's not coming." He dropped down into the chair next to the bed.
"Why?" Remus hated that his voice could sound that pathetic.
James took a deep breath, obviously preparing himself for a hard task. "After you left him for the Hospital Wing, he went and got himself drunk again." It was clear that he was trying to keep his voice calm and matter-of-fact. "I'm not really sure of all the details, but he somehow ended up wandering around the school completely smashed. He ran into Sniv-Snape."
Remus didn't miss the fact that James had not used Snape's derogatory nickname. He did not even want to imagine what could be so serious that James would be reduced to that small show of respect for the Slytherin.
"Anyway, I think they got into an argument or something and Sirius…he…he…" James swallowed and his fingers clenched in Remus's Gryffindor-red bedspread. "He told Snape how to…how to get through the Whomping Willow." His voice was so soft at the end, that if Remus hadn't had werewolf hearing, he probably would have missed it. As it was, Remus felt as though someone had shot him directly through the chest with a silver bullet. A sharp pain lanced through his chest and a harsh burning seemed to emanate from it throughout his body. "No…" he mouthed, not even able to say the word aloud.
"Moony? Moony?" James was shaking him gently, trying not to aggravate his wounds, but he needn't have bothered. Remus felt so distant from everything, he wasn't sure he would even have felt it.
James was peering at him with wide, worried hazel eyes, and Peter had reached out to grip his shin with a warm hand. "I don't…I don't think he meant to," James said, voice trembling. "He was drunk. And he tried to stop Snape after he realised what he'd done. I met him running down one of the corridors and told him to go and get Dumbledore. Then I ran out to stop Snape."
"You…?" Remus looked at James feeling dizzy and faint.
"I had to, Rem. I had to stop him before Moony got to him. Anyway, I ran out just in time to see him disappear into the entrance under the Willow, so I went in after him. I tried to call to him to stop, but when he heard me he just started going faster and yelling 'It's too late, Potter. I know about the passage now'." James twisted his hands further into the bedspread, his face tilted down so he wasn't looking at Remus.
"I ran after him," he continued. "And then ran into him, because you – Moony, I mean – had suddenly started howling. He stopped and went completely white and turned round to look at me. He said 'It goes to the Shrieking Shack, doesn't it?'" James gave a shaky laugh. "He didn't even sound angry. Just really, really calm – that calm you get when you're proper terrified. I said we had to run away, and I think he was about to agree, but then Moony started howling again even more loudly, because I think he picked up our scent. I heard him banging round the upstairs room and then coming down the stairs. We were so far down the passage we were almost at the Shack by then, and the trapdoor leading up from the passage wasn't shut properly, so I ran up and tried to slam it just as Moony got there."
Remus felt himself beginning to hyperventilate, his breath coming out in short gasps that he tried to control. James shot him a worried look, but continued when Remus sent him a pleading look.
"Moony banged against the other side of the trapdoor and flung me out the way." James touched his own shoulder, which Remus noticed was bulky with bandages under his school robe. "You…Moony, I mean, started to crawl through and Snape started screaming. I think he actually wet himself then and I can't even blame him. You're bloody terrifying in that form, Remus. Your mouth and teeth were already all bloody from tearing yourself up, and your hackles were up. You looked completely feral. Luckily I hadn't dropped my wand and I sent a blasting curse at Moony. It hit pretty hard - I'm really sorry about that. It tossed you all the way back along the hall and that old dresser fell on top of you, I think. Anyway, I slammed the trapdoor shut before you could recover, and Snape – bloody coward Snape – actually came up and leant against it with me. It's a good thing he did, too, because you got up and started throwing yourself against it again. I think you hurt Snape's arm."
Peter snorted and James shot him a reprimanding glare.
"Luckily," James said, wincing at the word and sending an apologetic look at Remus, "Moony was pretty beat up by then, so he wasn't so strong. I used that locking spell we use on our trunks and grabbed Snape's robes and we legged it back up the passage to the Willow entrance. The spell isn't that strong, so just before we got there, we heard the trapdoor break. We threw ourselves out and I just managed to bang on the knot of the tree before we got pummelled. Dumbledore was running towards us – completely barefoot and in his pyjamas – and I'm afraid he sent another blasting curse at Moony again to stop him escaping before the Willow started moving again."
James stopped then, and Remus couldn't help noticing that the strong, Quidditch-hands that clenched in his bedspread were shaking with suppressed emotion. Remus wondered what that emotion was. Fear from having seen his wolf side? Disgust? Remus felt a wave of nauseating guilt wash over him.
"Oh, God!" he whispered. "OhGodohGodohGod. I almost killed you. And I almost k-k-k-killed Snape. Oh God." And then something else clicked into place in his mind. "I'm going to be expelled, aren't I?" He looked at James, and knew his face was drained of colour. "Snape will tell everybody, and I will be expelled and sent to the Ministry and k-killed or put in a r-r-reservation." He knew he was getting hysterical, but couldn't stop himself. "And Sirius did this to me! M-my Sirius…"
To his shame he felt tears begin to trickle down his face again.
"Oh, Moony." James reached out and very, very gently put his arms around Remus. "You're not going to be expelled. Dumbledore made Snape promise not to tell. He won't tell. He won't."
"But he should." Remus's whole body trembling in James's hold. "I almost killed two people last n-night. I should be put d-down."
"No." This time it was Peter who spoke, tentatively taking one of Remus's hands in his own and trying to uncurl his fingers that were so tightly clenched his blunt nails cut into his palm. "It wasn't your fault, Moony. Not your fault at all. It was Sirius's fault, and Snape's for baiting him. And it was also Sirius's family's fault for making him go all crazy like that."
It was strange, Remus thought, the way he felt now. Part of him was just sitting quietly still and blank with shock inside his head. Another piece of him was burning with anger at Sirius and what he had done. And even bigger part of him was desperately trying to piece together James's story so that it would somehow fit in his head and make sense. Moony wasn't helping at all by keeping up a constant, mental howling over the betrayal of his most precious pack member.
It was like a dream he thought; one of those dreams where you keep switching from being in the scene and inside your head, to being outside and watching from a distance. And everything you see you know is right, and at the same time makes no sense at all.
"Moony?" James was trying to get his attention.
Remus looked at him blankly. "Leave me, please."
"Remus – "
"Please."
James and Peter glanced helplessly at one another, then stood up to go. James hesitated, hovering over the bed, his fists clenching and unclenching in helpless agitation. Remus knew he wanted to give him one of his trademark strong, manly hugs but was prevented by Remus's damaged state. In a sudden, impulsive, clumsy movement James bent down again and pressed his lips lightly to Remus's forehead. It was such an odd, un-James-like thing to do that a thread of surprise managed to penetrate Remus's blank state and he blinked up at James who looked like he already regretted the action. He pressed his fist tightly to his lips as if reprimanding them. Peter was staring at him in open-mouthed shock.
"Just don't – please don't – do anything stupid," James muttered around his hand. "Merlin knows Sirius is doing enough of that recently for all three of us." Looking scarlet with embarrassment, he spun on his heel and stalked out the room, followed by a bewildered Peter.
Remus slowly, painfully raised a hand to touch his forehead. He had felt everything James had been unable to say in that kiss. All the things he had wanted to pass on in a hug. Helpless, brotherly affection. Protectiveness as the unofficial leader of the Marauder pack. An apology on behalf of the one who wasn't allowed to apologise – not yet. Maybe not ever.
It said – breaking through all Remus's barriers of shock and hurt and anger and confusion – you are not alone. You are not alone.
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Remus knew he had to be angry. He had to stay angry, because what Sirius had done was unforgivable. In the days following his release from the Hospital Wing, he had to force himself to completely ignore the pathetic, skinny shadow of a person that hovered round the edges of every class with hunched, defensive shoulders bent over his work.
He had to ignore the fact that the same shadow-person wasn't in the dorm and wasn't at breakfast or lunch or dinner for days that turned into weeks. He had to ignore the fact that this person got more skinny and more hunched and more shadowy every day.
He had to ignore him, because the minute he stopped and looked up, and saw that the gaunt, fragile, stooping figure was his Sirius – his Padfoot – he would helplessly forgive everything. Again. As he always did. Lapdog…lapwolf…that he was. Total, angry, irrepressible forgiveness that he was helpless to hold back.
It didn't help that he was also trying to ignore Snape's snide comments of 'dirty dark creature' and 'pervert' and 'animal', and Lily's unavoidable pitying expression, and James and Peter's fumbling attempts at comfort and advice.
He knew he shouldn't forgive Sirius, but everything in him was aching to do it. He missed Sirius with an intensity that was almost frightening. He couldn't eat properly, couldn't sleep, couldn't concentrate in classes. James and Peter, in uncharacteristic displays of compassionate subtlety, didn't comment the first time he crawled into Sirius's bed rather than his own at night, and curled around the other boy's pillow, breathing in the lingering blue-grey scent of approaching rainstorms that got fainter and fainter every night.
But of course, Sirius – being Sirius and impossible to ignore even in a state of deepest depression – had to break through Remus's fragile shields and sneak up to the dorm. And what was worse was that he hadn't come to beg for forgiveness. He hadn't come to intentionally disturb Remus at all. He had just hovered quietly beside the bed and watched Remus as he slept. But Remus wasn't sleeping and Sirius's guilt, sorrow and self-loathing was so potent Remus could actually smell it – sharp and bitter and silver, like a needle pressed through a frozen lemon.
And he was furious, because he felt that rising wave of irrepressible forgiveness rise in him in response.
Remus was not entirely clear on the conversation that followed. He remembered, too clearly, Sirius's story of the events of the night of The Prank. And he did understand, as he knew he would. And he did forgive. And the fact that he did made him shake with anger so he blurted things out at Sirius. They were jumbled, angry, half-formed thoughts, full of accusations of price and belonging and forgiveness. It was a dam breaking open and he was helpless to stop himself, even as he saw the way each word hit home like a physical blow, and Sirius's gaunt and shivering form shrank further and further away from him.
His heart screamed at him to stop, and eventually he did. But it was too late by then, and now he had to watch as Sirius left again. Left him again, and – Merlin - he deserved every minute of pain it caused him.
"That was really harsh, mate," James said, breaking the oppressive quiet that followed Sirius's departure.
Remus's breath hitched. "I know," he whispered. "But I couldn't s-stop once I had started. I couldn't stop. I should g-g-go after him."
He tried to climb out of bed, but James held him back. "It's in the middle of the night, Moony. You can't just go wondering round the halls."
"I have to. You saw what I did to him."
"It was harsh," Peter broke in. "But none of it was a lie. It was true, everything you said about him."
Remus jerked away from James and climbed off Sirius's bed. "But I didn't mean to say any of it. It just came out. And what if he...what if he goes off and slits his wrists or something?"
Both James and Peter went pale. "You think he would?" Peter asked tremulously.
Remus just looked at him.
"Oh Merlin, we have to find him!" James flung himself off his bed and skidded across the floor to throw open Remus's trunk. "Map, map, where's the bloody map?"
Map! Remus cursed the fact that his brain was so sluggish and unresponsive. He should have thought of the map.
"It's not here!" James said, flinging Remus's possessions around on the floor.
"Maybe we put it back in one of our trunks," Peter suggested. "We haven't used it since…you know…Sirius…"
Remus hurried over to James's trunk and started rooting through it, while Peter tried his own. James finished with Remus's trunk and started – hesitantly – on Sirius's. It was almost ten minutes later that James gave a triumphant yell and held up the piece of blank parchment.
"We'll need the invisibility cloak," Remus said, his brain just managing to catch up and function.
The three of them looked at their chaos of jumbled belongings and groaned. Then Peter let out an even louder groan and slapped his forehead. He held up his wand and said, "Accio invisibility cloak."
James and Remus avoided one another's eyes, both feeling rather sheepish.
"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," James muttered, tapping the map with his wand. Remus and Peter bent over it as well, their eyes flicking over the tiny, named dots of Hogwarts' occupants. Luckily, most people were in their beds which meant that there would be less confusion as people moved around.
"He's not on here," Remus whispered eventually, his voice cracking. "What if he…what if he already…"
"He has to be on here somewhere," Peter said, bending even closer over the map. He sounded as tearful as Remus felt.
"I can't see – "
"There!" James interrupted Remus, jabbing a finger at the map. Remus thought his heart might explode in relief when he saw a tiny moving dot labelled 'Sirius Black' weave its way clumsily up the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack.
"You think he might be drunk again?" James asked, sending Remus a worried glance. "He doesn't look very steady. He keeps bouncing off the walls of the tunnel."
"I don't care," Remus said, snatching the cloak from Peter's hands and hurrying towards the door. "Come on - the minute he reaches the end of the tunnel he'll disappear off the map."
James and Peter scrambled over the mess of belongings cluttering the floor to join him. The three of them didn't really fit under the cloak, especially since they were travelling at such a fast pace. Remus wondered if it would actually be better or worse for Filch to catch three bodiless legs wandering the corridors at night rather than three full humans. Perhaps his shock would give them time to run away?
He needn't have worried. James kept his eye on the map and guided them away from corridors containing Filch. They headed towards the door leading outside from the Hospital Wing corridor. It was already partly open and creaked in the cold October wind that whistled through it.
"Hurry up," Remus begged, as James paused to close the door behind him.
"If it slams shut in the wind, Pomfrey will wake up and realise Sirius is gone," James snapped, his worry making him short-tempered.
"I'm so stupid," Remus muttered, as they pulled off the cloak and jogged towards the Willow, uncovered. "This is all my fault."
"Nonsense," James panted, casting round for a long stick to poke the knot in the tree trunk. "This is just a really horrible, unavoidable mess that we're going to fix as soon as we've found him."
He found a long, flexible branch and jabbed at the knot, hitting it on his second try. Remus didn't wait for Peter or James. He put on an extra burst of speed, fuelled by his werewolf stamina, and plunged himself into the entrance of the secret passage, running, stumbling, down the long tunnel, pausing only to pull his wand out of the waistband of his pyjamas to light his way. He could hear James and Peter behind him, struggling to catch up.
At last he reached the trapdoor up into the hall of the Shrieking Shack. It was cracked and buckled from the events of the last full moon. Remus hesitated for a second before he pushed it open and pulled himself through.
Where was Sirius? He lifted his head and breathed in deeply. The whole house smelled of mould, dust and rotting wood, overlaid with blood and wolf. It was powerful and nauseating, but in amongst those smells, he could just make out Sirius's gentler scent, heading up the stairs. There was something slightly off about it. Something not-quite-Sirius, and Remus felt his stomach tighten in worry.
He hurried up the stairs and flung open the door to his battered bedroom. He was about to plunge inside when he skidded to a halt. Inside the bedroom, crouched under the window, its hackles raised, and lips drawn back in a snarl of defensive surprise, was the Grim. It was a massive, black spectral dog; its body as large and shaggy as a young bear's, its ears pointed and demonic in exactly the same way it was in illustrations.
Remus was frozen with shock. All he could think of was a line from his third-year DADA text book. The Grim is an omen of death. Having a vision of the Grim can foretell one's own death or the death of a loved one…
There were hurried footsteps on the stairs behind him, and suddenly James was beside him, skidding to a halt, just as Remus had done. "Oh Merlin," he breathed in horror. "We're too late."
Then Peter arrived, and not having been blessed same coordination as James and Remus, bashed right into them, sending the three of them sprawling on the floor. Remus received a mouthful of James's hair and dust from the floor, and his hand landed in a crusted, tacky patch on the floor that his sensitive nose recognised as dry werewolf's blood.
He stiffened when he heard Peter's excited shout.
"Padfoot! You did it!"
Bemused, and struggling to escape from the tangle of boy-limbs on the floor, Remus turned to stare at Peter in shock. The chubby Marauder was staring at the demon-dog with an expression of delight on his round face, and suddenly everything clicked in Remus's head. He remembered Sirius's delighted exclamation after he had broken out of his meditation from the animagus potion.
"The Grim! The Grim! I'm the Grim. Take that, you mangy hedgehogs!"
The huge black dog, which was currently backing away from them and slinking under the bed was Sirius in his animagus form. Of course! How completely and utterly stupid he was! Of course it was Sirius.
He noticed that James was looking more than a little embarrassed as well.
"Padfoot?" Remus jerked himself away from the Marauder-pile he had landed in and crawled across the floor to peer under the bed. This close, his nose couldn't be fooled. It was definitely Sirius under there, though his scent now carried a new, jagged, canine aspect. "Padfoot, you did it!"
There was a soft whimper from under bed, filled with doggy-anguish.
"I'm sorry I shouted at you," Remus said, peering into the shadows and trying to make out Padfoot's dark shape. The air beneath the bed was sharp with the scent of grief and hurt and guilt, but there was no trace of fear. Remus wondered whether Sirius had overcome his dilapidating fear of darkness, or whether it was such a complex, psychological terror that it didn't fit into Padfoot's simplified canine brain.
"I do forgive you," Remus said, keeping his voice as gentle as possible. "And I want to forgive you. I'm sorry I said those things to you, my Padfoot. You're worth any price I have to pay for you. I've missed you so much the last couple of weeks – you must know that. You found me in your bed, for Merlin's sake."
There was an answering whine from under the bed and a shifting in the shadows. A furry, black head emerged to peer sorrowfully at Remus through large, grey eyes.
"Come on," Remus whispered, reaching out with a shaky hand to touch the top of Padfoot's head. "You're a dog now. Can't you smell how sorry I am?"
The canine language wasn't equipped to deal with the complexities of this situation. It didn't contain words like 'inconsolable' or 'heart-broken', or 'soul-wrenching guilt'. It didn't even really have suitable words for a simple phrase like 'I'm so very, very sorry that I don't think I can ever make it up to you.'
But Sirius did the best he could under the circumstances. As Remus reached under the bed and slid his arms around the trembling, soft-furred chest, and dragged him out and into his lap, Padfoot breathed out a stream of soft huffing whimpers that were translated by Remus's wolf-side to, "Bad dog...bad dog...Padfoot bad dog! Hurt Moony - hurt Padfoot's Moony. Bad dog..."
And Remus couldn't help a broken, sobbing laugh from escaping his lips as he bent his head to bury his face in the thick fur of Padfoot's ruff. He hated the fact that he could feel every one of the dog's ribs clearly defined under the covering of his black coat.
He ran his hands along Padfoot's head, shoulders and sides, trying to comfort and reassure.
"Yes," he mumbled against Padfoot's ear. "Yes, you were a bad dog, but you are my bad dog and I will always love you anyway."
