Chapter 71: Tonks Interlude I
Tonks was furious.
She was furious at Dolores Umbridge for creating the disgusting, bigoted law in the first place.
She was furious at Gordon and Robards for the way they'd come into the Auror Office complaining about being pelted with breakfast foods by unruly students rather than hanging their heads in shame because they'd humiliated a blameless man.
She was furious at Dumbledore for not forcing Remus to step down as the Defense professor as soon as it had become clear that Umbridge had her beady little eyes on him. At the very least, Dumbledore could have hidden Remus from Umbridge instead of leaving him exposed for the most vile woman on the planet to find.
Above all, she was furious at herself. She never should have worried about a little thing like time travel when Remus' intentions had obviously been completely pure and he had never pressured her in any way. He never pressured anyone in any way. He was thoughtful and compassionate and generous and almost too careful. No wonder you're so desperate to pretend that I'm her, she'd said. You want your son back and I'm the only person who can give him to you.
She'd been wrong. He hadn't been pretending anything. He'd just loved her, and she'd loved him, and now it was almost too late to tell him. The sentence for violating the Child Safety and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act was three months in Azkaban, but might that not be a lifetime sentence if there was no one there to bring him Wolfsbane Potion or staunch the bleeding when he clawed himself?
Calm down, Kingsley told her no fewer than five times as they made the trek from the Auror Office to the holding cell. It's good that you and I have this assignment. We don't want someone who doesn't know him to have it. Compartmentalize, Auror Tonks.
She'd asked Kingsley whether he'd known about Remus before the arrest, and Kingsley had been annoyingly noncommittal. Kingsley was a good man and she liked him more each time she worked with him, but he held his cards frustratingly close to his chest.
Now she stood before Remus' cell. He looked weak and ill. He needed someone to fuss over him, not someone to escort him to Azkaban of all places.
Compartmentalize, Auror Tonks.
She stepped back, both mentally and physically, and let herself observe.
The cell was secure. No one had tampered with the lock. The prisoner was a safe distance from the door. He was not visibly injured, although he slumped slightly as if exhausted. The camp bed in the corner of the cell had been slept upon. The red remnants of Howlers littered the floor; a small pile of letters, unopened, sat beside the mess.
"You listened to the Howlers, but you didn't open the letters?" she asked.
His smile was weak and humorless. "I could hardly avoid the Howlers. As to the letters, I do not need to read them to know what they say. You may have them if you wish. They may reassure you that some decisions you made recently were quite correct."
She placed the letters in her bag. They wouldn't convince her that the decisions to which he referred were correct, but it was better that she read them. If anyone had threatened him, she wanted to know. If anyone had spoken poorly of him, he didn't deserve to see it.
"We've been directed to ask why you were in possession of a wand originally sold to the late Regulus Black when you were arrested," said Kingsley in his deep voice. Kingsley could make an interrogation sound like polite dinner conversation.
"It was given to me by Regulus' brother, Sirius."
It was the right sort of answer. Polite and succinct. No obvious evasiveness; no voluntary elaboration. It was the sort of answer a man who was both intelligent and well-prepared would give.
"That sounds reasonable to me," said Kingsley. "Please step to the far wall of the cell. I am going to bind your hands, and then I am going to unlock the door and approach you. I will keep my hand on your arm while Auror Tonks walks behind us with her wand trained on your heart. If you attempt to escape, Auror Tonks will use whatever force is necessary to stop you."
They had all been trained to say exactly the same thing in this situation. There was usually a certain comfort in hearing a fellow Auror recite the rules. It reminded her that they were a team and that she was never alone.
"Auror Shacklebolt." Kingsley didn't turn to look at her— to avert his eyes from the prisoner would have been to break protocol— but she knew that he was listening. "Would you permit me to escort the prisoner while you stand guard?"
"As you wish," said Kingsley, and she silently sighed with relief. The most junior Auror normally acted as the guard, but Kingsley wasn't the sort to stand on ceremony without a reason.
She bound Remus as gently as she could and unlocked the door. Once inside, she looped her arm through his.
For the briefest moment, she could imagine that they were just about to step into the sunlight for a stroll through a beautiful park. He'd dazzle her with his intelligence. She'd make him laugh. They'd plan to take a holiday to some exotic spot neither one of them had ever visited before, unless they wanted to tour each other's favorite childhood places…
But she was on duty and they were in the middle of the Ministry. It was not the time for daydreams.
"We're going to walk to the end of the corridor and then take the stairs to the front hall. We will step onto the Portkey Platform. You do not need to touch the Portkey, although you may. There will be a five second delay before we will be transported to a rocky area near the water."
"Understood, Auror Tonks." She searched his tone for sarcasm or secret messages or confessions of undying love. She found none. He walked with her as detachedly as if she had been Kingsley or any of her colleagues.
Before the Portkey even deposited them beside the boat that would take them to Azkaban, she decided to let him run. He didn't belong in Azkaban. She hadn't spent half her life striving to become an Auror to put men like Remus in prison.
"Auror Shacklebolt, would you inspect the perimeter, please?"
"Yes, Auror Tonks." It wasn't such an unusual request. No one would hold it against Kingsley that he had agreed. No one would blame Kingsley when their prisoner escaped. His conduct would be above reproach.
The instant Kingsley was out of sight, Tonks wordlessly removed the bind from Remus' hands. "Go," she told Remus quietly. "It'll be difficult without a wand, but if you follow the coast straight north, there's—"
"Dora," he interrupted quietly, and he was Remus again, not a prisoner. "I won't escape."
"Why not?" she demanded.
"For one thing, I would never do that to you or to Kingsley."
"I want you to run, and Kingsley won't be blamed. At least, he won't if you go before he comes back!"
"You are needed in the Ministry far more than I am needed outside Azkaban."
"That's just stupid," said Tonks eloquently.
"It isn't," he said with the smallest of smiles. "We are in a far more precarious situation than most people know. If Lord Voldemort should rise again—"
"He won't. He won't rise again because of you."
"He won't rise again because the Department of Aurors employs people like you and Kingsley. Should Dumbledore need to reinstate the Order of the Phoenix, he will need well-positioned spies with the skills to recognize and combat dark magic."
"Dumbledore." Her anger bloomed anew. "I wouldn't join the Order of the Phoenix if that arrogant old man begged me."
"He's very fond of you."
"He claims to be fond of you, but instead of allowing you to step down from your post at Christmas, he left you there to be arrested by Umbridge as soon as her horrible law took effect."
"Dumbledore did give me the opportunity to step down," said Remus, sounding genuinely surprised that Tonks had thought otherwise. "He offered several times. I told him that I was determined to stay. I chose to stay because every month that I had with Harry and the other students— every week— every day— was a chance to protect them and teach them and help them grow. I lost my own son, Dora." His voice broke horribly. "Teddy. I sacrificed Teddy so that the other children could have a better world. I couldn't abandon them until I was forced to do it. We're so very close, Dora. We're nearly there. I've had so much that I never should have had. I had to take the risk. I did, and I shall suffer the consequences."
"If you wouldn't take Dumbledore's offer because you have a martyr complex and you feel guilty about Teddy—" She nearly choked on the name. It was a good name. It was, could have been, should have been, might be, her child's name. "If you wouldn't resign of your own volition, Dumbledore should have forced you. He was prepared to replace you anyway. As loyal as you are to him, he ought to have saved you from yourself."
"It isn't Dumbledore's job to save me from myself." He was composed and serene and she hated him for it. "Dumbledore may have his own reasons for allowing me to go to Azkaban. I do not know or care what they are."
"I do not know or care what they are," she mimicked. "Remus Lupin, you are the most infuriating man on the planet. You are at the center of a terrible miscarriage of justice and you don't even care."
"I do care. I simply care more about other things. I care about defeating Voldemort before he rises again. I care about giving Harry and Sirius the peace they deserve. I care about you and your happiness."
"Then run away with me." She said it quickly, breathlessly, and she knew it was right. "We'll both go."
"You are needed where you are. I wouldn't take you from your parents or your friends even if I would take you from the Aurors. My sentence is for three months. If at the end of that time you're still inclined to—"
She silenced him with a kiss. His lips were parched, but they were soft and clever and warm. She twined her fingers in his greying hair as she poured every ounce of anger and regret and love into the kiss. "I love you," she said when she pulled back, breathing heavily. "Hold onto that."
"I love you," he echoed. "And I will."
He stepped into the waiting boat without being directed.
"You're not meant to be able to see that without Kingsley or me revealing it," she pointed out.
He shrugged as he seated himself. "I happen to have had the opportunity to seek out magically hidden boats recently."
Of course he had.
"Are we ready?" asked Kingsley.
She wondered how much he had seen and heard. She decided that she didn't care.
Remus held her hand as they crossed the North Sea. It was a violation of protocol, but Kingsley didn't seem inclined to report her to Scrimgeour.
Besides, Scrimgeour hadn't minded that she'd killed a man the last time she'd been out in the North Sea in a small boat with Kingsley. Why should he mind this?
"We need to bind your hands again, Remus," said Kingsley when the shadow of Azkaban reached across the water toward the boat. "The dementors were blind. The hit wizards aren't."
Remus gave Tonks' hand one final squeeze before he placed his hands behind his back and submitted to Kingsley's spell.
They climbed the uneven stairs in silence. A team of hit wizards met them on the third floor and directed them to Remus' cell. There was a thin mattress on the floor, a bucket in the corner, and a pitcher of water next to the mattress.
"Auror Tonks, please make the boat ready to leave. I will finalize the prisoner's transfer," said Kingsley. They were no longer alone and he was asserting his position as the senior Auror on the team. Nothing would look suspicious. No one would have reason to believe that Nymphadora Tonks, youngest Auror in the Department, had begged a prisoner to run away with her not an hour before.
But every step she took away from Remus was painful.
She would rather lie on the stone floor of Azkaban with him than in the most lavishly appointed bedroom without him. She knew that now. She could admit that now.
As she reached the winding staircase her eyes fell on a prisoner she recognized at once.
By Ministry design, she had never caught a glimpse of Bellatrix Lestrange during her previous visits to Azkaban. Although they had never met, their blood relationship was too close to allow for professional interactions. For appearance's sake, Tonks was not meant to approach her Aunt Bellatrix. She should not have been permitted to escort a prisoner who would be housed on the same floor as Bellatrix; the sudden hyper-focus on an outrageous fear-driven law had allowed this nearness to slip through.
She saw the distorted mirror image of her mother in person for the first time. With it came the shame she'd felt since she'd learned what it meant to be a Death Eater; the fear she'd rarely admitted to feeling; and the anger, all over again.
It took Bellatrix a moment to realize that she was being observed. Once their eyes met, Bellatrix knew Tonks as surely as Tonks knew Bellatrix.
"So you are the abomination." Bellatrix's voice was hoarse from lack of use, just as Sirius' voice had been at his trial. "You are the child Andromeda spawned with that filth. You should not be out there while I am in here."
With remarkable swiftness, Bellatrix lunged at the bars of her cell. Tonks was prepared; she froze Bellatrix in place without uttering a word. She took a final, long look at her aunt before she spoke.
"There are people outside who belong inside and I've dedicated my life to trying to put them here. There are people inside who belong outside and that breaks my heart. But you and I, Aunt, are both exactly where we belong."
Tonks and Kinglsey had left the fortress and returned to their boat when the spell broke and
Bellatrix's outraged howl echoed across the water. It sounded far more animalic than any sound she had ever heard Remus make, and yet Remus was the one who was legally classified as a beast.
I will come for you, little one. I will drown you like the rat you are.
The rest of Tonks' shift lasted far too long. How could she concentrate on reports and research and witness interviews when she had just abandoned the man she loved on a cold rock in the middle of the sea?
Cold.
It had been so cold, even without the dementors.
How had Sirius lasted for twelve whole years?
She felt a desperate, frantic need to see her cousin, and she Apparated to his house the minute her shift ended. She didn't consider going home to change or stopping for a snack, let alone a meal. All she wanted was a reassurance from someone who had lived through much worse that Remus would survive.
It was Harry, not Sirius, who opened the door with a sullen look on his face. Tonks could appreciate sullen. Oh yes, she could.
"Hullo, Tonks. Did they make you throw him in the cell personally?"
"There was no throwing involved. He walked in as gently as you please."
"That's how he left the school this morning as well. Those Aurors who were with him were disgusting."
"Yes, they are," Tonks agreed. "Gawain Robards is the one who disciplined me for killing Igor Karkaroff. Maria Gordon's a bit better, but only a bit." She didn't entirely like the smile that she felt creeping across her face. It was too hard; it was too vengeful. It was too Granddaughter of the Blacks. "I heard that they were covered with scrambled eggs by the time the students got done with them."
"If we'd had more time, we would have done better." Harry's scowl deepened. "We only knew what was happening about thirty seconds before they came in. We walked out of classes for the day in protest— at least, most of us did— but we're going back tomorrow."
"Too right you are." Sirius' voice finally drifted in from the next room, and Tonks followed Harry back to the small dining room where Sirius sat slouched with his chair kicked back onto two legs. It was utterly unsurprising that an open bottle of firewhiskey sat in the middle of the table. Tonks poured a glass for herself and downed it in one gulp. Sirius nodded in approval.
"You'd have taken something like this lying down when you were a student?" asked Harry.
"Of course not. But you didn't take it lying down. You've made your point, but you're no longer in a position to punish the people who are responsible for this."
"That's what Cedric said." Harry took a sip of his own drink and made a face; he clearly wasn't used to drinking anything stronger than butterbeer, not yet. As she considered what he'd been through in his short life, Tonks found herself admiring him anew. There was something special about this boy. Something beyond the way Avada Kedavra had bounced right off his forehead. "Cedric says that staying out of class will just make Dumbledore look weak and make the Ministry more likely to give the Defense position to Umbridge instead of Snape. Mind you, I'm not sure one is worse than the other."
"Snape is an arsehole who knows what he's doing and will teach you while he's demonstrating his double standards. Umbridge is an arsehole who doesn't know what she's doing and won't teach you anything while she's demonstrating her bigotry. That's the difference," Tonks put in quickly.
"Exactly what I told him," nodded Sirius. "Harry needs to focus on his OWLs and keeping Umbridge away from his vulnerable classmates, not on leading a revolution."
"He wants me to do nothing, is what he means," said Harry to Tonks. "I don't like not doing things."
"None of us like not doing things," Sirius returned. "I'm certain Remus hated having to cower behind me this morning and letting himself get walked through the Great Hall like an animal. He did it because he believes that that's how he can help us the most right now. You, on the other hand, will have much too much to do very soon."
"How soon?" asked Harry keenly.
"Give me until the weekend to explain." Sirius took another drink.
Tonks reached for the bottle of firewhiskey; it tumbled over as if of its own accord. Sirius lazily set it upright with a flick of his wand before Tonks could even apologize, but in her eagerness to help Tonks tripped over her own bag and fell to the floor.
"All right, Tonks?" asked Harry, extending his hand to help her. "Wait— you've lost your letters." Indeed, dozens of scraps of parchment had scattered across the floor.
"Not mine," she told Harry as he scampered about collecting them. "Remus started getting mail about five minutes after they arrested him. He listened to the Howlers but ignored the rest of it. Said I could have it and it would convince me that I was right to chuck him."
Both Harry and Sirius looked at her in a way that signaled in no uncertain terms that she hadn't been right to chuck him.
"I know that!" she snapped even though neither one of them had said anything. "I love him, I told him I love him, I'll marry him the minute he gets out if he'll have me, all right?"
"All right," said Sirius far too calmly as her own heart pounded in her chest. "Let's read his mail. If it's that bad, he never needs to see it and the rest of us will know exactly where we stand with certain people."
Tonks and Harry nodded in agreement.
Dear Professor Lupin,
You are the best Defense professor we've ever had and we would have told you sooner if we'd known that you were leaving. The Ministry is out of order for this. Thank you for everything.
Sincerely,
Terry Boot
Mandy Brocklehurst
Michael Corner
Anthony Goldstein
Padma Patil
Lisa Turpin
Isobel MacDougal
Stephen Cornfoot
Oliver Rivers
Sue Li
"That's most of the Ravenclaws in my year," said Harry.
"I suppose he should see it after all," said Sirius, and he put the letter aside on top of a chest of drawers.
Dear Professor Lupin,
This stinks, and this is not fair, and we don't care if you're a werewolf. (Some of us think it's cool.) We don't want any other professor but you. Don't let them grind you down in Azkaban.
Gryffindor Forever!
Seamus Finnigan
Dean Thomas
Parvati Patil
Lavender Brown
Colin Creevey
Dennis Creevey
Ginny Weasley
Christianne Steele
Heather Hadley
Jason Wagner
Quincy Fawcett
Fred Weasley
George Weasley
Lee Jordan
Alicia Spinnet
Angelina Johnson
Namrata Vemulakonda
Margarita Jewell
John Buckley
"That must have been just who was in the Common Room when they passed it around," said Harry. "I didn't sign it, nor Ron, nor Hermione, nor, I'm sure Katie would have, and Neville, and—"
"Send it to the Daily Prophet when you get everyone's names," suggested Tonks.
"As if the Prophet would print it," said Sirius with a sneer.
"Luna Lovegood's father has a newspaper. Perhaps they'd print it," Harry mused.
"Lovegood? As in, The Quibbler? That might do more harm than good."
"At least it would be out there somewhere. At least people would know."
Dear Professor Lupin,
I wanted to tell you that I'm sorry. When I first found out that you were a werewolf, I didn't want to take lessons from you anymore and I even wanted to tell Undersecretary Umbridge. Cedric talked me out of doing it (and Susan really told me off, if you want to know the truth), and I'm so glad. I'm sorry this happened. I wish it had never come to this and I wish they had never passed that law. You were one of the best teachers we ever had and you were always so patient with me, especially when I had trouble learning to resist the Imperius Curse. I miss you already and you did not deserve what happened to you this morning.
—Hannah Abbott
P.S. Ernie is sorry too. He's writing his own letter but he's choosing his words very carefully and I don't know whether it will get to you in time, so I thought I'd better add this.
"Hannah and Ernie changed their minds," said Harry, twisting the square of parchment about until Sirius took it from him and placed it on the pile with the others. "I know Lupin said— last year— that he didn't think it was possible for him to teach long enough to change peoples' minds about werewolves, but—"
"Those won't be the only minds he changed, you're quite right."
"I knew Hannah and Ernie would come through," said Tonks, even though she hadn't even known that there had been an issue with Hannah and Ernie.
"I'd like to have seen Susan tell Hannah off, all the same," said Harry.
Dear Professor Lupin,
I don't know whether this will ever reach you, but I wanted to thank you for everything you taught me. I didn't think I would ever love dueling, or even want to study Defense at the NEWT level, but I do because of you. I hate that it ended this way.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Wheeler
"I don't even know who she is," said Harry.
"She's the Slytherin girl who won the dueling championship for the sixth years the night you won for the fifth years," Sirius informed him.
"A Slytherin?"
"They aren't all horrible bigots," said Tonks. She remembered her aunt's face snarling at her from behind the bars of Azkaban. "Loads of them are, of course."
You are disgusting and foul and a lifetime in Azkaban won't be enough to make up for all of my friends who you probably raped.
"Amazing how no one had the courage to sign this one," said Tonks.
"I don't think we need to save that one for Moony." Sirius tossed the parchment into the fire.
No wonder you're so ugly. Mystery solved. I knew Dumbledore was off his nut, but I never thought he would go this far. I'm glad someone finally got rid of you. Also you always smelled bad. I feel sorry for the other prisoners in Azkaban.
"Let me," said Tonks, and she transfigured the missive into a paper crane that flew itself into the fire.
Dear Professor Lupin,
Margarita wrote me this morning and told me what happened, and I wanted to write to you straight away. I wasn't ready to go to boarding school when I was eleven. I missed my family too much. I was scared and lonely all the time. My memories of Hogwarts are a blur except for your class. You were always so wise and kind and patient. You are the kind of teacher every student deserves. I don't regret leaving Hogwarts, but I do regret not being able to have more lessons with you. I hate that Margarita and Namrata and all the others won't be able to learn from you anymore. I hope that you aren't scared and lonely, and I hope that if you are, someone is as kind to you as you were to me.
—Simona MacAlastair
"Well," said Tonks around the lump in her throat. She remembered Remus mentioning the little MacAlastair girl, and she thought that this letter with its one signature might mean more to him than the Gryffindor Common Room letter with its twenty signatures.
They had just finished sorting through the letters— most supportive, a few disgusting— when an owl rapped its beak against the window with yet another roll of parchment strapped to its leg. Harry, who was nearest the window, relieved the owl of its burden. The owl, though, perched next to Tonks in anticipation of a response.
"My friend Tulip's owl," she explained to Harry and Sirius. Harry handed the letter to her.
Tonks—
Well, I knew he was hiding something but I wouldn't have guessed this! How are you? Do you want to talk now that everyone knows what happened? We could meet at Marquelle at 8? Let me know.
—Tulip
She didn't want to say goodbye to Sirius and Harry, but she needed to disabuse Tulip of the notion that anyone understood what had happened. She grabbed a quill from her bag and scribbled a response.
Yes, see you then. Invite Penny please.
Penny would have figured out by now why Tonks had wanted Wolfsbane potion last summer, and Tonks might as well get all of the awkward conversations with her closest friends out of the way at the same time.
As always, Marquelle was loud and hot and crowded.
A rude comparison entered Tonks' head: Azkaban was cold and isolated and usually quiet. When it wasn't quiet, it certainly didn't pulse with the music of the Weird Sisters.
Move your body like a hairy troll
Learning to rock and roll
Spin around like a crazy elf
Dancin' by himself
Boogie down like a unicorn
No stoppin' till the break of dawn
Put your hands up in the air
Like an ogre, who just don't care…
She liked this song, normally. It was loud and carefree and funny and encouraged everyone to dance.
She could see Tulip in the far corner of the room. Tulip had staked out one of the best tables; she'd likely tricked some unlucky soul out of it.
It hurt, somehow, to weave her way through happy, gyrating, half-naked bodies to reach her friends. Everyone else was part of one world; she was from another world entirely.
Ooh, come on
Mmm, you gotta move it
Like a groovy creature
Creature of the night
In a flight
Ah, a creature of the night
Well, do ya feel alright?
Do ya feel alright?
She didn't feel all right. And she resented the implication that creatures of the night were somehow carefree. More, she resented the entire concept of creatures. Who decided that another sentient being was a creature, let alone a creature of the night?
She reached the table just as Penny set down a tray of food and drinks. Tonks hadn't eaten all day and she started to thank Penny, but her thanks turned into a sob as Penny wrapped her into a hug.
She didn't know how long she cried on Penny's shoulder, but by the time she had pulled herself together and been safely ensconced between Penny and Tulip, the music had changed to a Muggle song. At Marquelle, magical songs and Muggle songs always played in turn unless there was a live performance. That was one of the reasons both Penny and Tonks liked it so much.
And I miss you
Like the deserts miss the rain
And I miss you
Like the deserts miss the rain
"I miss him," she said.
"Didn't you dump him?" asked Tulip, who wasn't always tactful. It wasn't her fault, not entirely. Her overprotective parents had made it very difficult for her to learn to make friends, and it had taken her several years at Hogwarts to get the hang of it.
"Tulip!" scolded Penny. "It does make sense, though. You told us that you weren't compatible. Of course you wouldn't want to… wouldn't want to be with a werewolf." Penny shivered. "But he's why you had me brew Wolfsbane Potion for you last summer, isn't he?"
"Yes," said Tonks. Good. That was over with.
"Did he threaten you?"
The idea was so ludicrous that Tonks burst out laughing instead of being offended. She wouldn't have been offended anyway. Asking Penny to imagine being in love with a werewolf was like asking Tulip to be tactful.
"I think that's a no," said Tulip to Penny. "And for someone who by all accounts actually is an expert in Defense Against the Dark Arts, he never seemed very threatening. Unless he was going to threaten to go home before the party really got started because he had a class to teach in the morning."
"I did dump him. Not because he was a werewolf. I knew about that all along. He told me the first time we kissed."
"That kiss that you said was the best kiss you ever had?" asked Penny in disbelief.
"That's really very brave of him," said Tulip. "Considering how you might have reacted to finding out what he is."
Tonks nodded. It had been very brave of him. It was also very brave of him to walk straight into Azkaban. Brave and misguided.
Could you be dead?
You always were two steps ahead, of everyone
We'd walk behind while you would run
Wasn't that the truth.
I look up at your house
And I can almost hear you shout down to me
Where I always used to be
And I miss you…
She was going to make him dance with her to this song if they ever saw each other again.
"I never should have let him go," she told them. "I never cared about the werewolf thing and the other thing… the other thing… I over-reacted. He proved I was wrong. I just love him. I love him."
Whatever plans Tonks might have had to explain to her friends that Remus was wonderful and that not all werewolves were like the one who had killed Penny's friend Scarlett fell by the wayside. All Tulip and Penny could do for the rest of the night was hug Tonks while she cried.
To be continued.
Disclaimer: Do the Hippogriff by the Weird Sisters was produced by Mike Hedges for the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Missing by Everything but the Girl was written by Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt. Its peak UK chart score was number three in November 1995; it spent over seven months on the UK Singles Chart.
Author's Note: As always, I hope you're healthy and safe. If you're working to battle the pandemic, I send you my utmost gratitude. No need to comment on this chapter (obviously) if that's just one more stressful thing. If you do decide to comment, please be kind; if this isn't the fic for you, the good news is that there are many other fics that are the ones for you.
Recommendation:
Just Another Marauders Story by Severity. It is story ID number 1507222 on this site.
Summary: Poking fun at the cliche Marauder fics. Featuring: Angst!Snape, Travel-through-time-promiscuous!Hermione, Sexy!Sirius, Conscience!James, Pimp!Remus, and Cardboard-Cutout!Peter Wo0t! COMPLETE
Usually I try to recommend a fic that features some of the same characters/themes as the chapter it accompanies. This time I just wanted some silly satire. And now I want a Junior Death Eater League Decoder Pin.
