Like the previous morning they went on an excursion, Remus woke Teddy up with the switching on of the lights.

"C'mon, Teddy, breakfast."

Just as before, Teddy trudged downstairs and ate chocolatines and drank tea with Sirius and his father. He felt particularly tired that morning, as he had not slept very well—he could tell something about this morning was different, though he had no idea what. Sirius kept giving him meaningful looks, as if trying to assuage Teddy's misgivings, while Remus read the paper. Once the two Lupin men had finished their meal, they bid Sirius goodbye and walked outside of Grimmauld Place, down the street, to an old telephone booth that had been configured into a portkey for this very mission. As soon as the two stepped inside and closed the door, the whole machine vanished.

The booth landed the two men in an open field in Northern Scotland. It was beautiful, but eerie: mist poured in over the field and the grass was damp with dew. The sky was a light grey and full of clouds, making the grass seem abnormally bright and the purple of the thistles unnaturally deep and royal-looking.

"The moors outside Inverness are really something, aren't they?"

Remus spoke and turned to Teddy, giving him a soft smile. The boy realized he must have been staring out at the grassy expanse.

"I once went here with my parents—we didn't go on many vacations, but my mother had always wanted to go to Loch Ness. Muggles don't see it, of course, but the creature in the lake is quite amazing. The area was perfect for me as a young boy as well—plenty of history, beauty, opportunities for me to run around and pick thistles for my mum."

Teddy smiled back at Remus. "It sounds lovely," he whispered, gazing past his father and to a plume of smoke in the distant. "That's the camp, then?" He asked. Remus nodded.

"I believe so—let's get to it, then."


The two men stomped through the moors, taking in the sights of the countryside as they approached the camp. It looked particularly grey and drab compared to the camp they had bene to before. There were no small campfires, no children running around—instead, Teddy saw a small group of sad and raggedy looking kids sitting on a circular rock formation in front of a single tent. There were several of these tents scattered around the only building in sight: a dilapidated log cabin in the middle of a clearing. The children looked neither frightened not particularly excited—they simply stared on at the two strangers with cold, dead eyes.

"Hello there," Teddy said quietly, starting his advance into camp. "I believe your pack leader is expecting us—would one of you go and fetch him?"

The children simply stared on, and one with nearly white hair and stony-grey eyes pointed behind Teddy and Remus. The elder Lupin spun around, followed shortly by his son to see a grisly looking man with long, unkempt strawberry-blond hair and dark amber eyes. He wore heavy combat boots and a large rain jacket. While most of his body was covered, Teddy assumed he bore heavy scars, judging by the long gashes on his face.

"Who are you."

Teddy looked to Remus to take the lead, and the werewolf cleared his throat.

"Remus Lupin," he began. "Sent on behalf of Alastor Moody to speak to Patrick Hughes. We are expected—this is Teddy, my associate."

The scarred, unkempt man narrowed his eyes for a moment and snarled:

"I don't know an Alastor Moody."

Teddy stiffened a bit, but replied hastily: "He goes by Mad-Eye, perhaps you've heard him by that name?"

A flicker of recognition spread across the blond man's face. "Mad-Eye," he repeated. "Yes, of course—let me find Patrick. You two," he pointed, "Stay. With the children. They'll keep an eye on you until I come back."

Remus gave Teddy a somewhat concerned look which the boy reciprocated. Why would he not have known they were coming? Why, if Moody had set up this stint, would his name not be recognized? The werewolf, whoever he was, walked past the Lupins and into camp. They then turned to the children, who continued to stare at them. Finally, the boy with the white hair and grey eyes stood up.

"You don't look like werewolves," he said flatly. "What are you doing here?"

Remus smiled. "I can assure you, dear boy, we are. We're simply here to talk to your leader—we have a question to ask him is all."

The boy narrowed his eyes. "A question, huh?" he snapped. "What are you trying to do to us?"

Teddy was taken aback at how defensive and untrusting this boy of, he thought, no more than seven was. When Teddy was his age…well, his concerns were more about his gran buying him the right kind of cereal: Chocolate Pixie Puffs. This boy was scared, but clearly trying to cover it up with some sort of front. It was, to Teddy's astonishment, working.

"We aren't trying to do anything to you," he assured. "Truly—we will be gone within the hour, I promise." He looked at the other children, trying his best to smile. The others did not reciprocate. "These are your friends, yes?" He asked. The boy nodded. "While we wait, are there any games you would like to play?"

The children looked confused, but their 'leader,' the boy, scoffed. "Games? We don't play those. These lot here," he pointed, "Been werewolves since they were wee ones. I was only bit last year. I remember games, but the human children weren't allowed to play with me," he sneered. "So, we don't play games here either."

Teddy bit his lip. Children that didn't play games? He turned to Remus, trying to figure out a good course of action. He, apparently, only knew what to do with children who behaved like children, rather than traumatized young adults.

"That's alright—I never played many games either. It's hard to want to, sometimes." Remus said soothingly, coming to Teddy's aid. "I'm Remus—Remus Lupin. What's your name?"

The boy seemed to open up a bit and shifted his feet around. "I had a name from my parents, but when they abandoned me here, I changed it. I go by Mikkel—Mikkel Vargsson, after the one who bit me."

Teddy froze. Mikkel Vargsson. He knew that name, and suddenly he pieced together where he had heard about Patrick Hughes before. There had been a front-page article in the Prophet just a few weeks ago in his time:

VARGSSON FOUND: AZKABAN TRIAL AWAITS

Mikkel Vargsson, 31, captured by Ministry personnel outside of Essex. Vargsson, one of the many children raised in Patrick Hughes' camp (since dispelled after losses sustained during the war), has been accused of the murders of over thirty muggle children. Sources report that Vargsson would maim them beyond recognition during the full moon, leaving their bodies in their beds for their parents to find the next morning, often with childhood toys and games scattered around them. Muggle police have alerted the non-wizarding world that the 'deranged serial killer' had been found and will be awaiting trial. It is expected that Vargsson will live out the remainder of his days in Azkaban.

Hughes was well known for raising werewolf children, training them to become killers and monsters. A former partner of Fenrir Greyback, Hughes began as early as 1993 fighting alongside dark witches and wizards. He was killed sometime during the Second War, but not before his pack murdered (an estimate) of 756 in the wizarding community—the largest count of a single werewolf pack in history.

"Remus," Teddy whispered. "We have to leave." He looked with panicked eyes at his father. "We have to leave right now."

Remus furrowed his brows. "Teddy…Teddy what's wrong?"

The young Lupin's eyes flashed to the small boy in front of them. The boy who would one day take out his anger on children—likely reminding him of the children who wouldn't play with him as a young boy. As for Hughes…

"I can't explain," Teddy said, looking back at his father. "Not now. You have to trust me, we have to—"

"—Going somewhere?"

The icy voice belonged to him: Patrick Hughes. The auburn-haired mass-murderer whose actions had led to the deaths of so many, the stigmatization of relatively peaceful packs like the one Teddy and Remus had visited just a week ago, and so much more. It was werewolves like Hughes who gave the rest of them a bad name.

If I kill him now, Teddy thought to himself, Many innocent lives could be saved. It wouldn't be hard, he thought—to kill Hughes and Vargsson. He'd be savings hundreds of people of all shapes sizes and creeds. But he'd endanger the Order. He'd endanger himself, and worse, his father—and Teddy might never exist, the time continuum rupturing…or so he imagined it must.

"No," Teddy lied. "Not now…you must be Hughes, yes?" His voice sounding unnaturally calm, given the circumstances. Behind Hughes stood a group of five or so werewolves, including the grisly one who had greeted him and Remus earlier. They all looked vicious, angry, and stood with wands drawn.

"He's lying," Vargsson hissed. "He was just telling this Lupin man—they're going to leave!"

Teddy and Remus instantly drew their wands. "Expecto Patronum," Remus muttered, a ghost-like wolf appearing from his wand, running off somewhere in the distance.

Why would he do that? Teddy wondered. We're about to die, and he's practicing Defense Against the Dark Arts?

Teddy looked on, eyes wide, as Hughes grinned and used the opportunity with Remus somewhat distracted to hit him with something, red sparks flying out of his wand. Remus flew backwards, hitting a rock and keeling over, passed out. Teddy growled, shouting as many spells as he knew. It was, for the time being, one against five.

"Confringo!"

"Stupefy!"

"Sectumsempra!"

Teddy was by no means a master dueler, and in that moment, he was sure he would die. While the werewolves were not Hogwarts-educated and certainly did not know as many spells as he did, he was still greatly outnumbered. The children scattered, and Teddy noticed that one of his spells had knocked one of Hughes' men to the side—Sectumsempra. The werewolf was bleeding out.

Four against one. The odds were getting better. Hughes, seeing one of his men dying, snarled, and bared his teeth like a wild animal.

"Avada—"

"EXPELLIARMUS!" Teddy shouted, the wand flying out of Hughes' hand, sending the man backwards and onto the ground. The pack members, for a moment, were shocked, and Teddy was able to use this pause to cast a spell back to Remus. "Liberacorpus," he whispered, flicking his wand in his father's direction. It wouldn't wake the man up, but it should keep the worst at bay. Remus Lupin needed to live. Then, Teddy felt his own legs buckle underneath him.

"CRUCIO!" one of the other werewolves had yelled.

A searing pain filled Teddy's entire being. He had never known something so painful ion his entire life—it paled in comparison to anything he went through around the full moon. It felt like his insides were melting from a hot fire as his muscles tore themselves, his skin pricked with the sensation of a million tiny knives piercing into the fabric of his being. Teddy screamed, louder than he had ever screamed before in his life, as he knelt onto the ground.

"PLEASE!" He choked out. "PLEASE!"

End it. Kill me. End it, was all he could think in his mind. I'd rather die than live like—

"EXPELLIARMUS!"

As Teddy buckled in pain on the ground, he saw a flash of pink. Mom, he thought to himself, eyes blurred with tears and hardly able to see. Soon, other members of the Order also appeared—dark black hair and an emerald hood, a man in a tall hat—their names escaped Teddy's addled mind, but he knew these were friends.

He had wondered why Remus had taken the time to summon a Patronus, but he now knew that this was it: he had sent word to the members of the Order that they were in trouble, and they responded in the nick of time. Any later, and Teddy was sure both men would be goners. He heard screaming of spell names he both knew and didn't, yelps of pain, shouting and firing and all things his mind could not comprehend. He felt zombified, lying on the grass, twitching and hardly able to move.

Eventually, sounds wore down. Before he could tell what was happening, his stomach lurched, and he knew he must be apparating. The next thing he felt was a thump as his body hit the moor. Tonks was kneeling over him, mumbling healing spells Teddy could not recognize. He grabbed her arm.

"Teddy—"

"Remus first," he croaked. Tonks shook her head, astonished.

"He's doing better than you—"

"REMUS FIRST!" He yelped, wincing in pain and setting off a new round of twitching. "HIM!"

Tonks looked on at the boy with fear and shock. She was supposed to help those in critical condition first, those who were younger…Remus would never want her to attend to him before Teddy.

"TEDDY!" She yelled. "Listen to me—"

"REMUS!" Teddy sobbed, face in the grass, tears stinging his eyes. "Please," he whimpered. "You must. You must…save him, and don't tell…"

"Teddy," Tonks whispered. "Remus is fine—Emmeline's got him, he's stabilized. What can't I…"

Teddy's vision blurred, and everything got fuzzy. He felt his body go warm and tingly, black splotches clouding his vision. The last thing he remembered was his mother's look of shock as he lost control of his Metamorphmagus ability, and everything in his mind went black.


Action scenes are not my forte, so apologies there. Next chapter will be more dialogue-heavy.