Remus had to admit that he was feeling anxious. Well, more anxious than usual. Nothing had happened in the last few days to make him feel like this. But maybe that was the problem.

What exactly was Harry's plans that involved a goblin of all things? Remus almost wanted to go over and try and persuade Harry to tell him but he knew his pseudo-godson wouldn't. He hadn't been joking when he'd told Bill that Harry was incredibly stubborn. If he didn't tell you something then he wasn't going to tell you it. But that didn't stop him thinking.

"You, okay?" Dora asked. "You've been drumming you fingers on that poor table for a good twenty minutes now."

He looked down and saw that she was right. How had he not noticed that he'd been drumming his fingers?

"My apologies to the table," he tried to joke but Dora wasn't having it.

"Seriously, what's going on?"

Remus shook his head. He didn't know how to put what he was feeling into words.

"I just feeling something is happening today. Or should be happening."

That wasn't the best way to describe what he was feeling but it was the closest and it would have to do.

Dora tilted her head to one side and shrugged.

"Pretty sure we've all been feeling that for the past nine months.

"This is different. Maybe the wireless will tell us something."

He started fiddling with it as Dora scoffed at him.

"Like it's told us the truth at all this last year."

"Potterwatch," he said simply.

"Did the twins mention doing one today?"

"I don't know."

He plugged in the password for the programme and what luck! Lee Jordan's voice filled the room. They'd caught him mid-broadcast.

"- so, if you look up into the sky today you might just see the Gringotts dragon! Looks like Harry and the gang are living up to those days 'Adventures of Harry Potter' books, eh, folks? Just what is our saviour up to? What could they possibly need in the bowels of Gringotts? An ancient weapon? Stay tuned for updates as they come!"

They looked at each other with wide eyes as the radio fell silent.

"I knew I said I had been expecting something to happen today but I didn't expect that something to be dragons!" Remus said incredulously.

Dragons! In Gringotts! So, the rumours were true.

"Is it bad that there's now a dragon on the loose and all I can think of that Charlie is going to be hitting himself for missing this?" Dora asked.

Remus couldn't help himself, he actually laughed at that. It came out a little bit hysterically but still, he laughed. Of all the things to be thinking about. Dora started to laugh too, even though it really wasn't that funny.

Their laughter was interrupted by two silvery creatures rushing towards them. Patronuses. They stopped laughing immediately and watched them, both of them immediately on edge. Patronuses never meant good news these days. It was Fred and George's Patronus who were running towards them.

"Harry's at Hogwarts-"

"-and somethings happening."

"Dumbledore's Army mobilising."

"As is the Order."

How they managed to get their patronuses to do their twin-speak was something Remus had yet to find out.

The silvery creatures dissolved leaving the two of them standing there.

"You're going," Dora said quietly.

"And you're not." Remus stated.

It wasn't an order. It wasn't a command. It was a fact that they had both agreed to without even saying or discussing anything. It made sense. Teddy should have at least one parent that was guaranteed to be still alive. And it was barely a month since his birth - Dora hadn't fully recovered from that yet. She wasn't up to anything vaguely strenuous never mind the battle that this was guaranteed to be.

"No." She said slowly. "I'm not."

"And I am."

"You are."

They both stood there, staring at each other. Neither of them wanting to say anything. Remus didn't know what to say. What did you say to a loved one when you were about to leave for a battle? A battle you might not come home from? Were there even words for that?

He had tried to leave without ceremony but neither of the women would allow it. Andromeda gave him what had to be her strongest hug yet and Dora, without giving him a chance to even take another breath, spun him around and kissed him firmly. Testy was then thrust at him for a hug and whispered words.

Remus was still reeling from all of that as he entered Hogsmeade, joining the throngs of people. There were so many people. All of them were willing to fight? Remus felt his heart swell at that. Maybe, just maybe, they'd have a fighting chance. They had to.

With a jolt, Remus realised that they weren't going the usual way to Hogwarts. This was to the Hog's Head? He couldn't help but be amazed at the passage in the dingy, old bar. Never would he have thought something like that would have existed. And he had thought that the Marauders knew almost all of Hogwarts' secrets.

He hadn't realised how far he'd walked until he found himself in a room. He was in Hogwarts now. With lots of other people. People from Hogsmeade. The Order. There were the Weasleys, Kingsley, students from Hogwarts. Dumbledore's Army, he realised. And Harry. There was Harry.

Harry slipped down a few stairs in shock. Kingsley and Remus were looking up at him, and Remus couldn't help but think that he looked both very young and very old at the same time.

"Harry, what's happening?" said Remus, meeting him at the foot of the stairs wanting to be close to him.

"Voldemort's on his way, they're barricading he school - Snape's run for it. What are you doing here? How did you know?"

One second the twins were saying how they go everyone mobilised and the next thing Remus knew was that Harry was saying, "We're fighting."

There was a great roar and a surge toward the stairs, Harry was pressed back against the wall as they ran past him. Everyone ready to fight. Dean Thomas called to Luna and she left. Remus tried not to think about if he would see her again.

The crowd was thinning. Only a little knot of people remained below in the Room of Requirement, and Harry joined them.

Ginny was arguing with Molly about her right to fight. Fight. She was sixteen. No sixteen-year-old should ever have to feel the need to fight like this. Ginny and Harry seemed to have a full conversation without speaking and thankfully she gave in and said she wouldn't fight. That was one less person to worry about.

Then Percy appeared, willing and ready to fight. Percy Weasley.

There was a long moment of astonishment, broken by Fleur turning to him and saying, in a wildly transparent attempt to break the tension. "So, 'ow eez leetle Teddy?"

Remus blinked at her, startled.

"I, oh yes, he's fine!" He said loudly. "Yes, Tonks is with him, at her mother's-"

Which did absolutely nothing to break the tension in the room but still, he could try.

"Here, I've got a picture?" He shouted, pulling a photograph from inside his jacket and showing it to Fleur and Harry.

"I was a fool!" Percy roared, so loudly that Remus nearly dropped his photograph.

It all happened so quickly that Remus' head spun. One minute Percy was being incredibly self-deprecating, Fred and George enthusiastically helping, and the next the whole Weasley family had converged on Percy in a massive group hug. Harry looked as bewildered as he felt.

"Ginny!" barked Molly, startling them all.

Ginny had been attempting, under cover of the reconciliations to sneak upstairs too.

"Molly, how about this," said Remus, suddenly coming up with an idea. "Why doesn't Ginny stay here, then at least she'll be on the scene and know what's going on, but she won't be in the middle of the fighting?"

That was the best compromise Remus could come up with. One that was agreed to, reluctantly on Molly's part, eagerly on Ginny's. That was one job done. If only the rest of them would be so easy.

He was soon striding down the old, familiar corridors - the candlelight appearing more foreboding than welcoming today. Ominous even. Remus drew his cloak closer around him.

"Minerva wants us," Kingsley said, falling into step beside him.

"Of course."

They had to plan what they were going to do. Evidently Harry had something he needed to do - Albus' plan? But that didn't mean the rest of them should be standing by.

Remus and Kingsley joined Minerva, Pomona and Filius in the room off to the side of the Great Hall. The two of them got a brief but warm welcome before they got right down to it. They simply didn't have any time for the normal pleasantries.

A plan was soon hashed out. It was simple. Basic. But it would have to do as they prepare for everything and anything. Split the Castle into zones. Give each zone a leader. He volunteered for the grounds, knowing that he would deal better with more space. They were all in agreement and they rushed back out.

Remus saw Harry hurry over to the Weasleys with an urgent look on his face. He wished he could step away to see what was going on but he knew he couldn't. Not now, anyway.

Kingsley had stepped forward on the raised platform to address those who had remained behind.

He outlined their plan for the towers and the grounds, pointing to each person who intended to lead the groups in turn. He was a good speaker.

We'll need somebody to organize defence of the entrances or the passageways into the school- "

"Sounds like a job for us." called Fred, indicating himself and George, and Kingsley nodded his approval.

"All right, leaders up here and we'll divide up the troops!"