Disclaimer: As always I own nothing but the original characters and the situations the characters find themselves in. Thanks so much for continuing to read and for giving me feedback on my work. It's muchly appreciated and I do read every review you send me! Thanks for sticking around until the end.

Note: If you're curious, MY canon of a young Gellert is a young Ryan Phillippe. My canon for Regulus's look is Reeve Carney when he's in 'Penny Dreadful'.

An End. A Beginning.

The boys were almost in shouting distance of the groundskeeper's hut now and yet the two of them had yet to make a sound even Regulus's sensitive ears could hear. Ergo Teddy couldn't call out for help because of something Binoche had done to him. Currently the teenagers Regulus had to protect were far enough away that Binoche wouldn't have an easy shot-but there was also nothing blocking any jinx or curse he might want to send flying in Teddy and Allan's direction. Regulus knew that Teddy wouldn't leave Allan behind even to save his own life. Outside help also wasn't going to come in time to save the boys. There was only Regulus and possibly, though very unlikely, Siam. And in a choice between fighting the wizard and taking on the remaining three werewolves...Regulus knew he only stood a chance with the former.

There was no choice. He had to abandon Siam. The other wizard would understand.

Finding another burst of speed Regulus growled and snarled and generally made as much noise as a cat could as he ran towards Binoche as fast as he could. The werewolves were close behind him, too close, but they served the purpose of drawing more attention to Regulus. To the four of them, really. If he could bloody Binoche than maybe the werewolves would succumb to bloodlust and turn on the blond bastard.

That would be sweet.

Two curses were hurled in their direction, Regulus's lips curling into a vicious, feral smile when he heard a loud snarl of pain behind him. Excellent.

But then Binoche turned and threw a beam of red light in the direction of Allan and Teddy, Allan crumbling to the ground. The redhead took Teddy down with him.

Fuck. What was-

A scream of fury and unbearable pain split the air, Regulus stumbling in reaction to the inhuman and yet somehow very human sound. What the hell had made that-Siam. He couldn't afford to look behind him to check, but in his gut Regulus knew that Siam had made that sound. Had seen Allan take the hit.

Charging ahead Regulus added his own call of fury and fear as Binoche, rather than attempt to attack them again, had turned and was now running in the direction of the boys. Heading straight to where Teddy was once again on his feet, grabbing Allan under the armpits to try and drag the other boy towards Hagrid's hut.

Binoche was closer to them than Regulus was. And was surprisingly fast.

Then again...the little fucker had a large predatory cat and three werewolves at the very least coming at him. That would motivate a person to move.

Binoche was also tuning them out and seemed focused on getting to Teddy and Allan. Likely to execute them, Regulus reasoned, the idea a cold chill down his spine. The other two teens were the only ones who could potentially tell someone what they'd seen and who was responsible. Kill them and then running for the safety of the castle was Binoche's best chance of getting out of this scot free.

Flawed logic...but the boy was flawed in every way.

Cursing vividly in his head Regulus tried to pour on the speed and move faster, forcing the cold night air in and out of his lungs while trying not to feel the chill or the pains in his body. The werewolves behind him weren't breathing as hard as he was. Regulus could all but feel their breath on the back of his neck. Definitely heard their growls and snapping of teeth and knew that one stumble and they'd be on him. And that would be it.

Then every part of Regulus burned with fear as his ears picked up the words Binoche was shouting at Teddy. To move away from Allan and let the werewolves have him. Do that and he'd let Allan live.

And as Regulus watched Teddy let go of the redhead...and started moving away from his prone friend. Making himself an easy target, his hands visible and wandless.

No. No. No. No. No. NO!

Teddy was walking towards them, sideways, and-

In a last burst of speed, knowing that once he made it he would be done, Regulus just managed to slide and spin around at the same time to place himself between Teddy and the werewolves.

He had just enough time to note that there was only two of them and then they were on him with their slashing claws and sharp teeth. Slicing into him, his death blood scenting that air just that quickly as they tore and ripped into him.

Goodbye, Teddy.

)

Teddy hadn't been able to see what had been stalking Casper and the werewolves. He'd seen that it was an animal of some sort but that was all he'd been able to tell in those brief glances he'd allowed himself as he'd struggled to get Allan to safety. When the animal had run at him this time Teddy had seen its feline form more easily in the way it moved and brief moments where the moon had hit it right. It looked like a panther or a black mountain lion. If there was a magical creature like that Teddy didn't know of it. And even before it had spun around to protect him, put himself in harm's way to sacrifice himself...at some point in those terror filled milliseconds Teddy had known in his heart that despite the change in appearance...it was Noir. Somehow, despite all the obstacles...Noir had gotten free of the bedroom and had come for him. Come to die for him.

He'd used up all his strength and energy to try and drag Allan to safety. Teddy's hands were shaking from adrenaline and fear. And while he managed to pull his wand out of his pocket and aim...there was nothing he could do as Noir disappeared among the fur and fury as the werewolves pounced on him.

His stunning spell was weak...and useless.

Teddy couldn't even scream his pain and grief as the werewolf jerked from the spell but didn't hesitate to swipe his claws down towards the ground. Down to where Noir must be, unable to rise against their vicious attack.

Another feline scream split the air. But not from Noir as they tore into him. Instead a white form suddenly appearing in the air to latch its teeth into the shoulder of the werewolf in mid swing, the white cat to Noir's black. Siam?

The action made the werewolf's clawed hand scoop so that it swiped/pushed Noir out of the pile of thrashing bodies as the white cat took its prey to the ground with a snarl of victory.

Diving down towards the prone and still black cat Teddy had just enough time for his knees to hit the ground and to place his free hand on the cat's head. Then the cat-then Noir turning his head to look in Teddy's direction. Meeting his gaze for one long moment and then...he just...turned to dust.

Gone just like that as the dust floated off into the breeze like Noir had never been there.

Screaming his rage and heartache inside his head Teddy stared at the space still wet with Noir's blood and then lurched to his feet, his hands fisting at his sides as he tried to-

His name being bellowed in Hagrid's familiar voice made Teddy jerk and spin around.

The pink umbrella in Hagrid's hand sent a curse in the direction of the wolves, bringing Teddy's attention back to the wild animals fighting all but beside him. Or had been. The one werewolf was lying still on the ground, the other thrashing around but tied up with magical cord. And the white cat? The white cat was now running in the direction of Casper.

Casper shot off three wild and ultimately useless curses in the white cat's direction. They missed. And then it was the other boy that went down as Hagrid's spell hit its mark, sending the boy to his knees with ropes now wrapping themselves around Casper as well, pinning his arms to his sides.

But Siam didn't veer away or stop. No. He kept running straight at Casper.

And in true Black fashion...Teddy was okay with the idea that Siam would rip the fucker's throat out. For Noir.

Hagrid, who was kneeling beside Allan's unconscious body, still had his voice.

"DON'T KILL HIM! YOU'LL DAMN YOURSELF! AND ALLAN WOULDN'T WANT THAT!"

The words, which were true as far as Allan went, hung in the air.

And Siam, who'd pounced on Casper and now leaned over him with head drawn back like a snake intending to strike and rip the boy's throat out stilled.

He just held himself there and even from a distance Teddy could see how the creature shook with the effort it was taking not to kill.

More voices.

Turning his head Teddy saw multiple forms coming from all different directions. Human forms this time around, though there were also some patronuses leading the charge. Leading the people in question to them. It was over.

They were saved. Except for Noir.

Looking in the direction of Siam again, even knowing that the cat couldn't answer the many questions he had even if Teddy had a voice, Teddy opened his mouth and-

Gone.

There was no Siam in sight.

"Teddy! Teddy, answer me now! Are you all right, Boy?"

Shaking his head Teddy looked in Hagrid's direction dumbly for a moment and then started stumbling over towards him, like a baby hippogriff just learning to walk.

He couldn't speak, but he could nod to tell them he was okay. Even though Teddy wasn't all right as tears gathered in his eyes and slid down his cheeks as he slowly made his way over to Hagrid and his best friend who was still alive and breathing, Hagrid reassured him. So Teddy worked up a reassuring smile up in turn as he thanked Hagrid for the rescue and then turned to wave as his name was called by those who loved and had come to protect him.

All his family was about to descend on him, but one person, in all his furry disdain, wouldn't be there.

Would never be there.

)

Several Months Later

It was a shame to spend such a beautiful afternoon indoors, but Teddy had promised Allan that he'd come to his big quiz showdown and Teddy wasn't about to let his best friend down. Especially since this competition had been the one thing to liven Allan up since that night in November when they'd almost died and Noir and Siam had. Siam had turned to dust too. Hagrid had seen it. Given the amount of blood the cat had lost even before leaving the castle...that he had 'lived' as long as he had was a miracle.

Allan still blamed himself for what had happened. For not being able to help and being used as a weapon against them. Teddy and countless others had tried to make Allan see that none of it had been his fault, but Allan could be as stubborn as he was smart.

A lot of it had to do with the fact that Siam had suffered before he'd 'died' because of the enchantments and such that Allan had been forced to put up around his bed and bedroom. To escape from them Siam had had to hurt himself badly enough that he'd left blood all over Allan's bed and in a trail leading out of the castle. It was Siam's blood that had ultimately saved their lives in a twisted way. Fred had come around to Allan's room to ask Allan a late night homework question because Allan tended to be a night owl. Fred had seen the blood and when he couldn't force open the bedroom door he hadn't hesitated to call in reinforcements via the special coins they'd been given.

Better to look like a prat than lose a friend.

Hagrid, being the closest, had gotten to them first. The other adults had soon followed along with all the relatives and friends Fred could muster at such a late hour to ride to the rescue. Casper had already been captured at that point and was now in jail where he couldn't hurt anyone ever again. His motives and justifications had been as warped as he was. Thankfully his victims had all woken up after Casper's journal had been found with the spells and potions he'd used detailed inside. None of them remembered what he'd done to them, unlike the werewolves Casper had bespelled to attack hm and Allan. They'd all survived, but they'd been deeply wounded both physically and mentally. The bastard. Two of them had been friends of his dad's.

"I wonder which one he is."

Teddy shrugged in response to Allan's question, looking around the back of the stage with a lot less curiosity. They had no idea what the man they were looking for looked like after all. All they knew was that he was as brilliant as Allan was. Which certainly shouldn't have been possible, but the quizzes had suggested otherwise.

In March the Daily Prophet had started holding a trivia contest, a new quiz every Friday for a total of eight quizzes. Those who did it signed their name and then started a built-in clock that meant the quiz was only visible for ten minutes and then the whole quiz faded away and the answers recorded up until that point were sent to the Prophet. The idea had been that the time limit prevented people from being able to look stuff up easily, the questions all super hard. Teddy had tried to do the first one and had done okay...but Allan had actually finished it after Teddy had nagged him into it. Allan probably wouldn't have done the next one if not for the fact that in the Monday edition that had followed it was announced that someone had beat him. Allan had gotten one wrong, while a witch or wizard named G. Schwarz had gotten perfect.

Allan had never, ever, in the history of his seventeen years of life come in second.

The gauntlet, as it were, had been dropped.

By the end Allan hadn't gotten another question wrong and Schwarz had gotten one wrong too, though apparently the wizard had sent in an argument about how it wasn't wrong, which had led to his gender being mentioned in the Prophet's brief article on the matter.

Anyway, in the end it was decided that the two had tied and so instead the fight for the thousand galleon prize would be settled in a quiz battle. The Prophet even sold tickets for it, to reclaim some of their loss.

Shaking his head over that Teddy was about to ask Allan if he was nervous when his friend suddenly went unnaturally stiff and rigid.

Going the same automatically Teddy turned his head to look at what had caught Allan's attention. Make that who.

The young man who looked only a little older than them had most people's attention, the fact that he was gorgeous undeniable. His blondish brown curls were cut short and tight against his head, his eyes dark as they scanned the room. His face was all cheekbones and full lips, androgynous like Louis's. The man was also slender and very well dressed, his presence commanding in a way that had nothing to do with his looks.

Giving Allan a jab with his elbow Teddy was about to make a comment about the man's looks when the blond turned his neck to glance behind him, another equally well dressed figure appearing at the unknown man's side with a scowl.

Damn.

This man looked to be Teddy's age and had raven black hair, long bangs in front and the rest tied back in a short tail. His eyes were as dark as his hair, his face equally stunning and both feminine and yet very male. He was short though, and was giving off an aura that said 'approach me at your own risk'. The blond seemed to find him amusing.

Then the blond glanced in their direction. Went still.

Like an arrow shot from a bow the blond walked towards them, the crowds parting ways for him like cresting waves. The dark haired man followed along, his dark eyes staring into Teddy's like he couldn't look away. Teddy couldn't seem to look away either.

"Hello." The blond said when he came to a stop in front of Allan, not a hint of any accent in his voice. "I'm Gellert Schwarz. You are Allan Wimbledon, yes? I saw your picture in the paper."

"Oh." Allan blushed easily. "You're...G. Schwarz?"

"I am, yes. Please, call me Gellert. I have been looking forward to meeting you." The blond held out a hand, his smile dazzling, and when Allan took his hand the blond somehow switched the hold and brought Allan's hand up to his lips to kiss the back of it. "A pleasure."

It was like something out of a romance novel Victoire or Dominique might read.

Also if Allan went any more red he might faint.

The dark haired man mumbled something Teddy didn't catch. It made Gellert roll his eyes.

"And this is my rude and always impatient younger brother Regulus. I got all the charm in the family."

"We don't know that you're older." The dark haired one, Regulus, grumbled.

"Ah...what?"

Gellert's smile for Teddy wasn't nearly as bright as the one he'd shown Allan. "That sounds strange, I know. You see there was an accident a few months ago that resulted in my brother and I losing a large portion of our memories. We woke up after a magical explosion with no memory of our family or how we got there. Just our first names and our learned knowledge like spells and about the magical world in general. We know we're brothers only because the testing of our blood says we are. No one came forward to claim us as theirs, and no one in Germany could find records of us. Therefore our ages are unknown...though I'm clearly the older and more mature one."

"Yes. And the explosion was probably your fault too."

"And whatever sins I committed in the past, being stuck with you is obviously my punishment for them."

Teddy had to laugh at the very brotherly exchange of glares the two were doing, Allan chuckling as well.

"Ah, good. You've both arrived. Gentlemen, if you two would come with me we're ready to start the quiz." All beaming smiles the middle-aged witch who was in charge of the contest came hurrying over, her fuchsia robes very...eye-catching. "Your friends can stay backstage to watch from the wing of course. Or I can arrange for seats for them."

Teddy's statement that he had a seat reserved overlapped Regulus's statement of the same.

"Excellent, excellent. Now come, come. Let's get this show on the road, shall we?"

In a flurry of motion the witch had an arm through Allan's and then the other through Gellert's, all but dragging the two off with her as they headed for stage left.

Teddy watched them go and then turned his head to look at Regulus, jerking a little as the dark haired man was suddenly just in his personal space, even shifting up and onto the balls of his feet so that they were closer to eye level as those somehow suddenly familiar black eyes bore into his.

"Do I...know you? There's something about you. Something familiar and..." Regulus trailed off, color blooming at the top of those pale, sharp cheekbones before the man took a step back, looking embarrassed.

Wanting desperately to ask what the man had been about to say Teddy forced the words back, sensing that he probably wouldn't get a straight answer. "I don't think we've met. I'm pretty sure I'd remember you. Though there is something-maybe your eyes. Black eyes run in my family."

"But not in your case."

"I'm a metamorphmagus. My eyes are whatever color I want them to be." Teddy made his eyes go just as black as Regulus's to make his point.

"Fascinating. And it explains your hair."

Right. His hair was cerulean blue at the moment. He'd forgotten.

"We should take our seats...are you sitting in those reserved for his-your...?"

"Best friend. I'm Teddy, by the way. Teddy Lupin." Teddy's heartrate picked up speed as he maybe, just maybe, detected a hint of relief at that answer in Regulus's eyes as they shook hands.

A shiver of awareness and anticipation went up Teddy's spine. Was he...?

"I'm happy to meet you. Please call me Regulus." The foreigner inclined his head. "Perhaps we could sit together. If you like."

"I would like that, yes."

Pointing in the direction of the exit they needed to take Teddy found it surprisingly easy to fall into step with Regulus despite the man's shorter stride. Though Regulus certainly had a presence that made him seem bigger than he was. It was pretty cute.

The man was even cuter.

Aiming a beaming-okay flirty smile in Regulus's direction, Teddy's smile just got that much bigger when the other man gave him a small smile too before looking away, delightful shy it seemed when it came to this sort of thing.

But when they got to the right section Regulus gave James a look that had the redhead moving so that Regulus could sit beside Teddy, and as they took their seats side by side Teddy couldn't help but shoot Regulus looks from the corner of his eye.

Regulus was doing the same.

Huh.

And suddenly feeling very happy, like some last puzzle piece had fallen into place, Teddy beamed some more and settled in for an entertaining show.

He'd have to offer to take the Schwarz brothers out for dinner to make up for Allan wiping the floor with Regulus's brother.

Teddy couldn't wait.

…...

The contest lasted for four hours before the hosts canceled it. They'd had to start researching questions to ask and neither Allan nor Gellert was at all impressed by their caliber of the questions, not to mention the wording and limited knowledge of their judge. They'd started lecturing the judge AND audience about things they would all have been fine never knowing. In the end the Daily Prophet people were willing to give each man a thousand galleons just to end the insanity.

The double date afterwards...went very well.

As did all the other double dates that would follow over the years and decades.

The End