I recognized Minerva's stern, urgent voice and resisted the temptation to reply with "Ickabiddle," a rather jolly little word I'd recently picked up from a Muggle children's book. I looked up. Minerva was standing in the doorway with a rather distressed expression on her face. Standing, I answered, "Certainly."
I expected her to come into my office, but instead she continued speaking from the door. "It's the Register. I think there's something wrong with it." Wondering why she was inspecting the registry so early in the year aside, nonetheless I followed her out of my office and through the many corridors towards the Owlery, which was adjacent to the room which held the Register. Neither of us spoke. A problem with the list of magical children to be admitted to Hogwarts could be grave indeed. I braced myself, expecting too many names, or perhaps a lazy quill which only wrote initials.
Yet everything looked in order when we examined it. I bent over the book, scanning the page. "I came up here to get an idea about how many letters I'd be writing," she said, a slightly frantic edge to her voice. "But when I came here --" She pointed at a section towards the bottom of one page. I saw what she meant.
Line upon line of names sparkled in green ink. Maryanne Wryst. Sirius Black. Michael Ledgewood. Severus Snape. But between Adrienne Osgood and Cormac Neeson, the space was blank. Or rather, almost blank. The name was there, though so faintly it was barely legible. Remus Lupin. I studied the name for a few moments more, then stepped back and gazed out the window.
Minerva watched me anxiously. "What does it mean, Professor?"
"It means," I replied thoughtfully, "that we have a special case on out hands."
* * *
The Lupin family moved around a lot after Remus was bitten. Owen Lupin was a wizard, though he lived in the Muggle world, using his mediocre skills in Potions and Herbology for self-made pharmacy. When they left Longwhite, he satisfied his neighbors by telling them it was rabies, and they were going to London to try and find treatment. But he knew the mark of a werewolf, and every time he watched his young son writhe in his bed, he was afraid.
The first full moon was perhaps the hardest. Remus ate nothing during their early supper, only staring at his plate numbly, asking questions in a frightened voice.
"What's going to happen to me, Da?"
"You'll take on a wolf form tonight, son, from the moment the moon hits you 'till the sun rises again."
"What'm I going to do?"
"You'll want to bite people. We'll have to keep you away, so you can't."
"Where are you putting me?"
"The old bomb shelter, near Mr. Radley's house."
Remus gazed at him with wide, scared blue eyes. "Will it hurt?"
Owen put his knife and fork down on his plate and looked back. "I don't know, son. Most likely it will."
Roberta stood up, biting her lip so as not to cry again, and began clearing away plates.
* * *
The sky was still fire orange and pink when the Lupins arrived the abandoned bomb shelter. It was a crudely constructed affair, more like a tornado cellar than anything else. The wood on the door was cracked and gray, and had warped so that there were visible gaps between planks.
Remus's mother knelt down and kissed him between the eyes. "This doesn't mean we love you any less," she said softly. "We'll come for you in the morning, alright?"
Owen too kissed his son, a rare occurrence. He searched his boy's face. "Anything you need b'fore we go?"
Remus had a stunned looked about him, and he was shaking all over, but he shook his head and whispered "No."
Owen looked over his shoulder at the sky and said, "We'd best be moving, Roberta, sun's nearly down." Remus watched his parents go, and only began to cry when the door was shut and the lock on the other side clicked.
There was an emergency light in the center of the ceiling, and after some effort and loud humming, it came on. When Remus's face was dry, he began looking around the room. Shaky wooden shelves lined two of the walls, empty of canned food or water. A plug was nestled on the far wall, an old one for an old radio long since removed. Everything else was concrete, bare and hard.
He wondered how long he had been in here. Surely the sun had set by now. He held his arms out in front of him and examined them. If it happened gradually rather than all at once, he certainly wasn't sprouting fur and claws just yet. There are no windows in here, he thought as he wandered toward the door. Maybe if no light comes in, it won't happen.
Outside, the moon came out from behind a cloud. As Remus backed away from the door, a sliver of light shot through a crack. Every muscle in him stiffened. And then he began to change.
And it hurt.
* * *
The sun rose at 6:02 AM. Owen Lupin opened the lock on the bomb shelter at 7:13, as soon as he arrived. He heaved the heavy door open and sprang back, unsure if his son or the wolf would greet him. When nothing happened, he peeked in.
All the shelves had collapsed, having been torn apart at the bottom. The light flickered untouched on the ceiling. Remus lay in a heap wedged in a corner, huddled and pressed as close to the wall as it would allow. His clothes were in shreds, and his body was covered with bruises and cuts. Owen felt his heart stop. "Oh, my boy," he moaned quietly, and walked over and picked his unconscious son up. He carried the boy in his arms, walking across the Salisbury until he reached his wide and their waiting car.
* * *
Every owl at the school worth his salt knew what day it was. Letters. Letters for all the students. Especially the newest ones. We formed a line at the window into the Registry as soon as he heard McGonagall's quill scratching parchment. All day I watched my fellows fly off from the front of the queue with that letter in their beaks. As the line shorted, I worried that they would run out of students, that I would be assigned elsewhere. Last year I had delivered the letter to the new Head Girl, for which they fed me quite well, but bringing the acceptance letters has always been my favorite job.
I waited until evening before I came up. And I was in luck! There was one letter with the green ink remaining. I stepped forward to take it.
"I'm sorry, but you're not needed."
I looked up at McGonagall and blinked. Not needed? If there's one thing you never tell a mail owl, it's that. Glaring at her, I scrambled forward to grab the envelope.
"Oh no you don't!" I received a short thwack! on the side and rolled over on the table. McGonagall scowled at me. "Fine, you can take this one if you're so intent on working." She handed me a parchment addressed to Mundungus Fletcher. Indignant, I ruffled my feather and looked away. "Oh come on!" she snapped. "That one's special, alright? The Headmaster himself is delivering it, so there's no need to act like you've been slighted."
With bad grace I took the envelope and flew away. The Headmaster
deliver it indeed...