Thrice Defied Him

by Caspian28

James has always loved Lily. Lily has always loathed James. But throw a Dark Lord in the mix and perhaps something will change. Mauraders era one-shots until 7th year when we pick up in full swing in the midst of the war. How do James and Lily defy Voldemort? What causes Peter to turn? And what on earth is going on between Remus Lupin and Sirius Black?

17. Chapter 17 - Remus

A/N: Sorry this is a bit later than usual! Honestly, i have a bit of a rough time during the holidays, and it was hard finding the motivation to write and edit. I may take a brief hiatus next week. So, expect a chapter two weeks from now instead of one week as usual. I'm hoping I'll end up finding my motivation and being able to post, but honestly who know right now.

Remus woke stiffly on Saturday morning to Peter rattling around the dormitory. He stifled a groan – his head was pounding, worse than it usually did by this point after the full moon. He was fairly sure it had something to do with transforming at home, without the Marauders there to make his transformation easier. It was always harder on him when he was at home.

"Sorry," Peter's voice came from somewhere outside his curtains. "We wanted to leave you to sleep after yesterday, but I can't find my ink anywhere and I wanted to write home."

Remus pulled his curtain aside sleepily to see Peter rummaging through his trunk. He let the curtain fall back – it was darker inside his curtains and the light outside make his headache spike.

"What happened yesterday?" he asked fuzzily. It had been the first day of classes. Double potions with Slughorn in the morning, and then…

"Erm, when you fainted in Potions?" Peter said. His voice was hesitant, as if he didn't want to remind Remus of what had happened.

"Right," Remus said with a sigh. It came back to him slowly. He had collapsed near the end of potions. Someone – was it James? – had carried him to the hospital wing. He missed his other classes – arithmancy, transfiguration, and history of magic, he thought. Madame Pomfrey had let him go back to the dormitory after dinner when he promised he would sleep.

Light betrayed his eyes again as Peter slid the curtains open around his bed. Instead of standing there, though, Pete pulled himself onto Remus' bed and closed the hangings back around them. Remus felt his headache dull slightly.

Peter handed him something – a potion – in a small vial. "It'll help the headache," he said with a soft smile.

Remus took it and drank. The taste was slightly bitter, as most headache potions were, but the relief was almost immediate. Remus let himself smile back. "Thanks," he said. "Where are the other two?"

"Eating," Peter responded. "I was up earlier to grab a bite with Mary before she went off with Alice for the morning. They went down after we were done. They're supposed to bring some food back up for you, though."

Remus' stomach gave a loud grumble at that, which caused Peter to laugh. He sat himself up further, now that his headache was receding, but drew his blankets around his shoulders. Remus was cold often, but it was always worse after a particularly brutal full moon.

"Rem," Peter began, snapping Remus out of his reverie. He looked up at his friend, who had crossed his legs at the foot of the bed and leaned in forward, the way he did when he wanted to say something important. Except, he looked apprehensive, almost. Remus felt his stomach churn in nervous anticipation.

"Yeah?" he croaked, throat suddenly dry.

Peter must have noticed his apprehension, because now the other boy was smiling at him gently, eyes searching out Remus' from beneath sandy-blonde hair. "It's just – we know the moons are hard on you when we're not around. Harder, I mean."

Remus opened his mouth, ready to cut him off; deny what he was saying. But Peter cut him off. "Seriously, Moony. You can brush it off as much as you want, but it's so obvious. I'm just saying – you really worried us yesterday. If you need to, you know – take a day off, you can. We'll get notes for you or bring you lunch or whatever you need. We just…we worry."

"I'm sorry I worried you," Remus said automatically. His stomach churned again, this time with guilt. Even after all these years, he still had trouble recognizing his limits.

"We'll always be worried a little, you great git," Peter responded, nudging Remus in the leg with his toe. "I just mean, if you could collapse less, that would be good, yeah? Or if you're going to, maybe just do it during an exam? Might get us all out of writing one."

Remus laughed in spite of himself. He threw a pillow at Peter as the other boy jumped off his bed, the tension dissipated a little bit.

"I am sorry, Pete," Remus said once they had calmed down. He had slid to the edge of the bed, feet on the floor with his blankets still around his shoulders. "You're right about the moons being worse. I'm-" he sighed and paused to gather his thoughts. He didn't want to outright tell Peter that the moons without his friends as Animagi were almost unbearable in comparison; that his body was no longer used to being rend apart during the full moon; that it took him longer and longer to recover every moon he spent alone. So instead, he said, "I just don't want you lot to feel badly that you can't be there. I know you'd try if I told you they were worse, and part of me wants that. But- you're unregistered animagi. If you get caught there won't be anyone to run with me during the moons. So really, it's almost selfish."

"It's alright, Rem," Pete said with another calm smile. He lifted himself from the floor (where he had landed after Remus hit him with the pillow) to sit beside Remus on his bed. "James and Sirius probably would, too," he said with a chuckle. "Try to sneak off and get caught, that is. Pretty hard to catch a rat though"

Remus shot his friend a sideways grin. It was true – if anyone was going to run headlong into a situation without thinking of the situation, it was James and Sirius.

"The more you do things like collapse the more you'll make them want to, though," Peter said then. "And I'm not blaming you for not feeling well. I'm just saying – I mean, you could have skipped classes yesterday. The professors would have understood. We would have. And then I wouldn't have James and Sirius bugging me about what to do for the next hols that there's a full moon."

"I know I could have," Remus sighed. "Sometimes it creeps up on me. But I will try to pay more attention to how I'm feeling, alright?"

"Alright," Peter said, with another easy grin.

With that settled, Remus went to shower quickly and dress. He did take it slower than he normally would have. He was still feeling achy from the previous day, and after his talk with Peter, well – he didn't want his friends to have to worry unnecessarily about him.

By the time he was back in the dormitory, James and Sirius were there as well, along with a plate loaded high with meat. Sirius gave Remus a funny look when he walked in.

"Alright, Moony?" was all he said, though.

"Thanks," Remus decided to respond, grabbing the plate off his nightstand and digging in.

"You'll have to eat that on the way," James said to Remus. "We're tight for time as it is, but I want to be there a few minutes early."

"To see Evans?" Sirius crooned. James swatted him in the side of the head without even looking, but he also ran a hand through his hair. Honestly, the two of them were hard to keep up with, sometimes.

"Wait-" Remus said, realizing he actually didn't have the foggiest idea what James was talking about. "Where are we going?"

"The Prefect meeting?" James asked. "You know, happening in the Charms classroom in twenty minutes?"

Remus paused, his mouth full of food. He tried to swallow, almost choked, and then settled for saying "Oh" as clearly as he could around his mouthful of sausage.

"If you're not feeling up to it you don't have to go," James said, giving him a hard look. Remus could feel the eyes of Sirius and Peter on him as well, although neither boy said anything.

"No, I'm fine," Remus said, after swallowing. "I mean, I'm still tired, but it's okay. We have this, then I have all day to rest."

"Uh, we have Operation Hogwarts Prophet after lunch," Sirius said from his perch on his bed. Remus groaned internally – why could he not have a single day off?

"Okay, well, we have those two things and then I can rest. Plus, nothing to do tomorrow except catch up on the classes I missed, and I can do that from my bed if it will make you lot happy." He tried to smile, tried to make sure his words weren't coming across as bitter. Given the look on Sirus' face, he didn't think he succeeded. But honestly he just wanted to be treated like a normal boy – one who could manage himself, one who didn't collapse on the first day back in classes. Not one who needed to be babied by his best friends.

"Let's go, Rem, or we'll be late," James said, then. But Remus didn't miss the warning look he cast in Sirius' direction, knew that James was just pulling him away from what was sure to be a longer conversation later.

Remus nodded in agreement towards James, following him as he led the way out of the dormitory. "Are you sure you're alright?" James asked as the door swung shut behind them.

Remus had to take a deep breath to calm his annoyance before answering. "I'm fine, Prongs. Honest. I'm sorry I scared you lot yesterday."

"It's alright," said James. "Just…look, there's a lot been going on recently and I want you to be prepared so you aren't overwhelmed when we go in for this meeting but – honestly, Moony, you still look like death."

Audibly this time, Remus sighed. "Will you feel better if I go to Pomfrey after the meeting?"

James craned his neck to look back at Remus, who was trailing behind him. Eating while walking was a task that required, well – slower walking.

"It's not my feelings I'm worried about," he said, sounding almost annoyed. James Potter, who rarely got annoyed. Remus just raised an eyebrow at him, though. If he could handle Sirius Black's moods, he could handle James Potter's anything. "Look, it's just-"

He filled Remus in on what had happened at the end of the last meeting with the Hufflepuff girl, Lisa. Remus had to contemplate the situation before speaking again, and they were nearly to the charms room when he finally broke the silence.

"That's horrid," he said, finally. "Especially for Lily. But I don't understand what it has to do with me."

James gave him a hard look that Remus couldn't quite interpret before opening his mouth and closing it a couple times, sort of like a fish out of water, Remus thought. Finally, he said, "It's because of – you know, your furry little secret. And, well, Snivellus is going to be at the meeting. I'm worried-"

"Worried he might say something?" Remus asked, finally catching on. "And people will believe it because I look like shite?"

James shrugged, which Remus interpreted as a yes. They entered the charms classroom together, Remus settling himself on top of one of the desks before he spoke.

"That's always been a risk, Jamie. You know that. But I don't think he'll say anything. He'd be expelled at the very least." Remus rubbed the back of his head as he spoke, conscious of how James was looking at him – as if he were wrong, or just confused. But he was sure – or at least, fairly sure about this.

He was saved from responding, thank Merlin, by Lily's timely arrival. She smiled at James first as she walked in, then turned her smile on Remus as she said by way of greeting, "Alright, boys? You look horrible, Rem. Are you sure you're up to being here?"

James raised an eyebrow in Remus' direction, as if to say I told you so, but Remus tactfully ignored it. "I'm alright," he said instead. "I'll go to Pomfrey before I collapse, this time."

He smiled at her scandalized look, and even James barked out a quick laugh. "I'm glad we've gotten you to the point where you think you should go to Pomfrey before fainting," James said. "It only took us six years of lectures."

"Six years of lectures?" said Lily, with a mock-gasp. "And here I thought you could hardly string two words together before sixth year itself."

This, of course, caused Remus to crack up, while James looked highly offended. "You're not wrong," Remus said between giggles. "Pete gave most of the lectures for the first five years."

"Now that makes more sense," Lily said, with a wink in Remus' direction.

They were all laughing by the time the rest of the prefects began filing in. Remus moved to sit properly in his desk – Emmeline had come to sit beside him as Lily and James had headed to the front of the room to gather their notes.

The meeting started off without an issue. They divided up the first week's patrols rather fairly, Remus thought. Emmeline was his patrol partner for this first week, which was quite alright with him, although this would undoubtedly change once extracurriculars were well and underway. He wouldn't have been too focussed on patrol partners normally anyways – there weren't any prefects who slacked off or had horrid personalities or anything. But after hearing the story James told about the conversation with Lisa on the train – he could admit to himself that he was at least a little bit apprehensive.

"Right, we'll be able to let you all go in a minute, but we have one last order of business." James' voice cut through Remus' thoughts, making him sit up at attention. It was something in the tone of James' voice, in the confused way Lily was looking at him, that set Remus on edge slightly. "We won't be tolerating any drama this year, especially nothing about blood status. We will not be granting requests to switch partners for any reasons related to this, and any bullying will be reported directly to Professor Dumbledore. There's enough tension in the world already without us bringing it into the school. Are we all understood?"

There were quite a few scoffs and eye-rolls mixed in with the nods, but no one complained. Remus noticed that Lisa looked distinctly pink, and Severus was looking downright murderous, but for the most part the prefects simply gathered their things and began departing.

Remus put his head in his arms on the desk and closed his eyes. He did not want to leave until James and Lily were ready. Partially because he wanted to see if anything else was going to happen, but mostly because he felt exhausted and didn't feel confident about dragging his feet back up to the tower alone, especially considering the events of the previous day. Plus, the headache potion Pete had given him was starting to wear off, and every scrape of chair on stone as the other prefects stood up and moved around felt like a knife to his head.

Of course, no sooner had he put his head down than a voice whispered in his ear, "Watch out, half-breed, or you'll be next."

Remus lifted his head to find Severus Snape glaring at him from across the desk. He couldn't see the other boy's wand anywhere, but that didn't mean he wasn't hiding it in his robes. But still, Remus couldn't find the energy in himself to deal with this today.

"Whatever, Snivellus," he said instead, and put his head back down. It was the wrong move – not that there was a right move with Snape – because as soon as his head landed back on his arms, he was struck with the most peculiar feeling of needing to sneeze. Instead of going away after a moment, it intensified – until suddenly he felt his nose hit the desk, despite the fact that his head had not changed positions.

He sat up. With a feeling of horror settling in, he reached up towards his nose. Too soon, his hand hit something in place of his nose – something long and thin and covered in fur – Snape had given him a snout!

He yelped; he didn't want to draw attention to himself, but couldn't help it. Tears pricked at his eyes and panic clenched at his gut, but he tried to force both away, tried to stop any sort of visible reaction that Snape, who was peering around the door frame looking grimly pleased, would find satisfaction in.

There weren't many people left in the room, but every single eye turned to look at him as soon as he yelped. He flushed red with shame, blind with panic – did he run out of the room past Snivellus? Stand and face everyone else? Would anyone guess his secret? What if –

Then there was a gentle hand on his shoulder. Lily. She pulled him out of the classroom, giving Snape a hard glare as they went, and into an abandoned classroom beside.

"We need to get you to Pomfrey," she said.

"No," Remus responded. He was shaking, didn't care if his words came across as rude or angry or anything.

"But, Remus, you'll need to let her fix this!" Lily exclaimed. She was standing in front of him – his back was to the door but he could tell from Lily's expression that there were people outside trying to peer in.

"No one else can see me," he gasped. "What if someone sees and guesses? What if it makes someone figure it out?"

"No one's going to guess," she said. Her voice was calm, but Remus could hardly hear her words. Hardly register them in his brain. "Honestly, everyone will just think it was Snape up to his usual bullshite." There was a hardness in the way she said his name, an anger that hadn't always been there.

Remus jumped and clamped his hands to his face as the door opened behind him, his heart racing.

"Just me, Moony," came James voice from behind him. Remus relaxed slightly as James came up beside him and threw an arm around his shoulders.

"He doesn't want to go to Pomfrey," Lily said, with a glower in their direction, "but it's not as if he can hide in here forever."

Remus felt James squeeze his shoulders. "I have a plan for that," he said, with such a James-like grin that Remus couldn't help but laugh. Except – laughing felt strange with a snout. He had never laughed as a wolf, he supposed; wolves didn't exactly laugh, anyways, they mostly just howled.

Remus watched Lily watch James curiously as he pulled out a mirror from his pocket. It must look strange to her, he thought, that James was looking at his reflection at a time like this.

"Is now the time to admire your hair, Potter?" asked Lily, as if Remus had read her mind.

Remus half-expected James to have some kind of smart comeback, but instead he just kind of gave her a crooked grin. "Always need to look my best, Evans."

Lily huffed. Remus kept his eyes trained on her as James said, "Sirius Black," into the mirror. Her eyebrows rose in shock and Remus had to stifle an odd-feeling snicker at the look on her face when Sirius spoke back.

"Prongs! Meeting done? Did Moony collapse again?" his voice was loud and clear next to Remus, and Remus couldn't help but let out an indignant yelp.

"I did not," he shouted, making sure it was loud enough for Sirius to hear him through the mirror. Lily was giggling now, but he chose to ignore her.

"Oh, sorry Moony," came Sirius' voice again.

"Look," James said. "We have a situation. Is Pete with you?"

Sirius was silent for a moment, Remus assumed he was either nodding or shaking his head. "He's with Mary, I think," said Sirius.

"Alright, can you get down here as fast as possible? With the cloak and map, please," James said. Remus was shocked – and glanced over at Lily, who mostly just looked confused. Were they going to let Lily in on practically all their secrets at once? Not even Mary knew, yet, and Peter had been dating her since sixth year.

Sirius asked something that Remus missed, but he caught James' response. "We had a-" Remus saw James shoot a nervous look at Lily, "Snape situation."

"Of course you did at the first prefect meeting of the year," Sirius scoffed.

He must have severed the mirror connection, because James moved to tuck it into his pocket. Lily moved closer two the two, perching herself on an incredibly dusty desk. Remus realized he still had a hand up over his face to cover his snout, but couldn't bring himself to drop it. Even if James had seen him as a fully transformed werewolf, this was different somehow. Worse. Especially with Lily here.

"You two," Lily said, breaking the moment of silence, "Are about to have so much explaining to do."

James, with his arm still around Remus, led them both toward a desk across from Lily. He hoisted himself up, and once Remus had done the same the other boy's arm was back around him. James had never been shy with physical touch, really, something Remus was often grateful for. It was a comforting feeling, to be able to physically lean on a friend.

"Well, Evans," said James, with a cocky grin, "We are about to let you in on a secret or two. Normally we'd have to hex you for knowing, but-" he cocked an eyebrow at Remus "-desperate times call for desperate measures."

"I am not desperate!" exclaimed Remus, blushing behind the hand that was still covering his nose.

"You are, my furry friend. You are very desperate," James looked cheekily over at Remus, who removed his hand from in front of his face momentarily to swat at James.

"What was that mirror?" Lily asked instead of acknowledging the banter between the two boys. Which was fair, Remus thought – the Marauders could go back and forth for hours, really.

"It's a two way mirror," James supplied. "I have one, Sirius has one, and my dad has one. You just say the name of the person you want to talk to in it. As long as they're on the other end, you can see each other and communicate."

"Where did you get something like that?" asked Lily. It was as if the two had completely forgotten about Remus now, still sitting beside James. Not that Remus minded, of course – not with his newfound snout and all. "It must have been terribly expensive."

James shrugged. "It was an old family heirloom. Dad gave Sirius and I each one to keep when we turned sixteen."

Lily's mouth opened and closed a couple times, but no sound came out. Remus had to hold back a laugh. "Your parents…gave you a family heirloom…when you turned sixteen?" she squeaked.

James gave her a funny look, which only made Remus want to laugh harder. "Well yeah. I mean, what good are they going to do if we don't use them? And they're downright useful."

The conversation was saved by continuing by Sirius, strutting in through the door. His long hair fell over his face as he tucked the map in his pocket. Remus felt a surge of longing in his chest, followed by a stronger surge of embarrassment about the situation.

"Alright, what's the-" Sirius began, before he caught sight of Remus "-oh." The corner of his mouth tilted up at Remus, who really just wanted to die of embarrassment right there on the spot, more embarrassed than he had ever been at any point in his life. "You're looking mighty wolfish today."

Remus let out an exhale of breath – not exactly a sigh, but he wasn't sure if that was because Sirius' comment didn't warrant a sigh, or because he couldn't really sigh with a snout.

"Snape," Remus groaned. "Did you bring the cloak? I don't want anyone seeing me."

"And map," responded Sirius.

"Map?" Lily asked.

Sirius gave James a look, and he shrugged in return. "We may as well show her," he said. "That's why I wanted Pete here. Guess we'll probably have to show Mary, too."

"Well if we're showing those two we may as well show Alice and Marlene as well," Sirius said. There was an edge of sarcasm in his voice. "Not like those four can keep a secret between them."

"Oi!" Lily exclaimed in retaliation. "Of course we can."

"That remains to be proven, Evans," said Sirius sulkily. He made eye contact with Remus for a moment, searchingly almost, before sighing. "Fine, if it'll help get Rem to Pomfrey quicker."

Remus gave Sirius a small smile in return. Truthfully, he didn't want to tell Lily – especially without Peter here. It felt like a betrayal of the Marauder spirit. But she'd be relentlessly curious now, and Remus really, really didn't want to have to go around with a snout any more often than he already did.

"Cloak first, Pads," James said by way of response. Remus couldn't help smiling a little bit.

"Flashiest item first?" he asked James.

"Precisely, my dear Moony," said James. Sirius pulled the cloak out of his satchel. It wasn't invisible, precisely, when no one was wearing it. Instead, it was a sort of shimmering silvery colour that changed the more you looked at it. Lily, of course, appeared flabbergasted.

Sirius handed the cloak to Remus instead of James, and Remus took it gently. James and Sirius were – well, rough on some items. And even though James swore up and down that this was a genuine invisibility cloak, one that wouldn't fade or wear down, Remus still liked to be careful. It was quite unique, and quite special, after all.

"Do us the honours, Moony," Sirius said, gesturing at Remus to put on the cloak. Remus slowly removed his hand from in front of his mouth, watching Sirius' face carefully for a reaction since he hadn't seen the snout in it's full glory before. Sirius didn't give one. Instead, he just smiled encouragingly at Remus when their eyes met.

Remus swung the cloak around his shoulders, putting the hood over his head simultaneously, laughing when he heard Lily's yelp of astonishment.

"Remus?" she asked tentatively, looking around the room. He took a moment before responding to creep up to her until he was directly in front of her face.

"Here," he whispered, causing her to jump and scream. Both James and Sirius were cackling and he let himself laugh a little too, even though it felt weird still, with the snout. Lily huffed, but he could see a small smile forming on her face.

"No wonder you four get away with so much mischief," she said with a huff. "Honestly, I always wondered."

"That's not all," James said with a grin.

Remus stepped back carefully from Lily. He pulled the end of the cloak up a little bit so the others could see him and know where he was, but he didn't feel like showing his face now that he could so easily hide it. He drifted to go stand by Sirius instead, who had pulled out the map and tapped it with a muttered "I solemnly swear I am up to no good."

The password was one of Remus' favourite parts of the magic. It had been complex to weave into the charms on the map, but every time he watched the lines on the map appear from the blank piece of paper he was always momentarily awed that they had created it.

Sirius handed it off to James and Lily. Lily was looking at it already with wide eyes, fingers roaming across the papers as she drank in all the different details. "Where did you even get this?" she finally asked.

"We made it," Sirius said proudly. "All four of us together."

"This is…wow," she said, looking at each of them in turn and then back down to the paper, as if she couldn't believe they had actually done something like this. Remus couldn't blame her, really.

"The first floor hallway to the hospital wing is your emptiest route right now," James said toward Sirius and the invisible Remus. "Why don't you two head that way? I have a feeling I'll be here answering questions for the next little bit." He grinned at Lily when she looked sheepishly up at him.

"Sounds good to me," Sirius said, before glancing at Remus' shoes. "You ready?"

"It feels weird when you talk to my shoes," Remus said by way of response, following Sirius to the door.

"Well I can't see the rest of you," Sirius quipped back with a grin.

Their walk to the hospital wing was quiet. It wasn't as though they could talk with the occasional student passing by and Remus under the invisibility cloak. Not unless Sirius wanted a reputation as being quite batty, which Remus was fairly sure he didn't.

When they got to the wing, Madame Pomfrey took one look at Remus and sighed. "I don't suppose you'll tell me who did this?" were the first words out of her mouth, but Remus just shook his head resolutely.

She ran a few tests on Remus, waving her wand in complicated patterns across his face, while Sirius sat beside him the whole time. After what felt like ages, she sighed.

"Whoever did this was smart," she said. Remus felt his stomach sink in nervous anticipation – afraid of what she was going to say. "Whoever put this spell on you meant for it to last for about a day. It looks like if I try to reverse anything it will increase the amount of time the transfiguration lasts for. And if I'm not careful, I might make it very difficult to remove. No, the best thing to do is for you to stay here for the night, and if it hasn't resolved itself by tomorrow at lunch we'll have to see what Professor McGonagall can do to fix it."

Remus couldn't help it – he groaned in response. Madame Pomfrey merely gave him a small smile. "I can't blame you," she said to him. "If I were here as often as you, I'd hate me."

"I don't hate you!" Remus exclaimed in shock. "You keep me out of the Hospital Wing more than I'd otherwise be here."

Madame Pomfrey just gave him another small, almost sad smile. "I'll be back to bring you lunch, alright love?"

Remus just nodded at her as she left, then sunk down in his bed. He'd frown if he could, but the wolf snout prevented it.

"Least it means you get your rest," Sirius said. He looked as if he were about to reach out to Remus, but he didn't. He tucked his hands in his lap instead. Remus tried to tell himself he wasn't disappointed.

"Guess so," Remus said dully. "I'm going to miss the meeting this afternoon."

"'S'alright," Sirius responded gently. "I promise we'll survive without your genius brains for one day."

Remus scoffed at that.

"And I'll visit afterwards to fill you in on what you missed," Sirius continued.

"Bring chocolate," Remus said dolefully. "And all my books from yesterdays classes. May as well catch up while I'm here."

"You know," Sirius said, a thoughtfully teasing tone to his voice, "I think that sets a record, even for you. Behind on your first day of classes. I'm impressed, really."

"Shut it, Pads," said Remus, but he couldn't help the small grin that broke out on his face. At least – he hoped it looked like a grin, and not like his wolfish mouth wanted to eat Sirius.

Sirius was true to his word later that day. He came back during dinner, lugging Remus' school things, with Honeydukes chocolate to boot. He flung himself on Remus' bed when he arrived.

"I can't believe your books weigh more than mine. I didn't even think that was possible," Sirius groaned dramatically. Remus tried to ignore the fact that the other boy's head was resting on his lap.

"I take more classes than you," Remus said instead, hoping his voice didn't sound as wobbly as it felt.

"Still," Sirius said with a yawn. "We were successful, anyways, with the project. Lils bound a master copy of the book that will go out to everyone. Marlene had an article, and some of the others sent in articles by owl."

The meeting today, of course, had been to bind their master copy of the publication that would end up sitting at the foot of everyone's bed – not just when it was distributed, but every time it was updated. They had ironed out the rest of the spells for it over the end of the summer, mostly thanks to Lily. Still, Remus felt a little bit upset that the very first publication had gone out without him present.

"Hmmm," Remus hummed. "So it's in everyone's dormitories now? You did the duplication spell?"

To Remus' surprise, Sirius shook his head in response. "Evans managed to figure out a time delay on it," he said. "I told her about your – ah – snout being stuck as is until tomorrow and it gave her the idea."

"Great," Remus groaned, throwing his head back against his pillow. "That's great."

Sirius gave him a look – just the tips of a grin and a quirk of an eyebrow that made Remus feel like melting a little bit. "It'll go out tomorrow at breakfast," he said. "Can't wait to see how everyone reacts. There were four – maybe five articles in it. One about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, one about the Death Eaters, a couple about some muggle disappearances across England. Benji wrote an interesting one – under a pen name, of course – about the ministry's role in everything. You'll like it."

Remus nodded at Sirius, feeling almost instantly tired. "It's going to make people angry. So angry."

"'Course it is," Sirius responded gently. "But it's going to make more people feel – well, maybe not happy, but informed, you know? Plus, it'll piss off Reg and Snivellus, and that's a bonus to almost anything."

Remus huffed in response. Sure, he had collapsed during his first day of classes and he how had a twenty-four-hour-snout, but in some ways this felt like the perfect way to end his last year of Hogwarts. Pranks, dinner with Sirius, and political debauchery. Plus, really, what else could go wrong that hadn't gone wrong yet?