Sirius was already awake, skimming over the Daily Prophet, when Remus awoke the next morning

Sirius was already awake, skimming over the Daily Prophet, when Remus awoke the next morning.

"I saw that," Remus mumbled, voice torn to a whisper from all of the shouting and drinking he had done the night before. But God, did it feel good.

"What?" Sirius asked, hoping that his friend hadn't noticed how far he had jumped when he had broken the silence.

"You tucked a pair of reading glasses into your robes," Remus smiled, pouring himself some of the warmed-over tea and sitting at the bay window, glaring at the garden that was in need of a serious de-gnoming. Sirius just laughed, pulling out the glasses once again and continuing with the paper.

"You've missed an owl from Dumbledore. He said that the others would be here this afternoon," Sirius said in between quoting to Remus the more amusing personals in the paper. "Listen to this: 'Glamour spells and witchy makeovers available. Owl Mathilda McGirk for appointments. Discretion assured.' No why on earth would you need discretion to go get your face made up?" Sirius asked, handing Remus a plate of sausage and eggs that he'd been supervising in the kitchen.

"Well," Remus answered, after closely scrutinizing the plate and making sure that there was no trace of the Belch Powder Sirius often used to spice up his culinary creations, "Mathilda McGirk, if I'm not mistaken, is a hag. And I don't think a woman would make much of an impression if word got out that she had to go to Madame McGirk for beauty tips."

Things continued along these lines, as if neither man could bare to bring back the tension of last night, until Remus thought of how very little he had learned in his haste to get the one answer.

"Sirius, who died? At the tournament?"

"I think it was Diggory," Sirius answered, folding up the paper and tossing it onto the coffee table.

"Yes, Cedric would have made for an excellent Hogwarts Champion," Remus sighed, remembering the bright young man that, to many, had been the pride of Hufflepuff.

"I keep forgetting that you were a professor," mused Sirius. "What was that like?"

Again, Remus sighed. "I loved it, Sirius. Apart from having a job and a decent place to stay…it was Hogwarts. You know how it is, being there. Like everything is safe and calm. Of course, it's tainted now. Couldn't walk down the hall without remembering everything. Everyone." Remus paused, thinking back to how his heart had leapt into his throat every time he caught a glimpse of Harry out of the corner of his eye. The hope that, just once, it would be James standing there. But then, having Harry there was nearly just as good. Nearly. "And I really loved teaching. I think it was the first time that I felt like I was worth anything."

"Harry swears that you were the best teacher he ever had," Sirius smiled, deciding not to list the many somethings that Remus Lupin was worth. Then his face darkened, remembering why his friend no longer had that life. "What about the grease ball? What was he like?"

"Who, Severus?" Remus asked, pretending like there could have been some other "grease ball" at the school.

"Don't call him that," Sirius answered. "His name is Snape and it is to either be spit out, sneered or growled."

"Well, I've always called him Severus, even back when we were students," Remus reminded.

"And I always told you not to call him that, but I see you haven't learned."

"Well, to answer your original question, I was very grateful to have him there."

Sirius nearly choked on his Earl Grey. "What? Are you daft? He's the slime that got you sacked!"

"He didn't get me 'sacked'. I resigned. And I'm not daft. The man made me Wolfsbane before every full moon, and you know that that potion takes a lot of talent and time."

"He only did it because Dumbledore made him," Sirius muttered. "And you wouldn't have had to resign if Snape hadn't told."

"And I wouldn't have had to resign if I wasn't a werewolf, but some things we can't change," Remus answered.

"The man tried to sic the Dementors on me, you know," Sirius growled.

"And for that I'll dislike him for your sake. But he's not the only man that's ever rushed to conclusions, so give him some slack, won't you? You'll be seeing a lot more of him now than ever, I'm afraid. And you must admit that his is a task ten times more dangerous than ours."

"If you love him so much, why don't you marry him?" Sirius frowned, a sign that the argument was won and not by him.

"Now that's mature," Remus smiled, rising to clear the dishes. "There was something else I was going to ask you, but now I've forgotten," he continued after washing the dishes by hand, oddly too lazy to fetch his wand from his room.

"And here I thought that you remember everything," Sirius muttered. "Was it something I mentioned last night?" he ventured, hoping that it wasn't because, really, none of the matters broached the night before were fit for a lovely morning just made for Quidditch or flying motorbikes or walking down to the lake. Then again, Sirius couldn't think of any day fit for talking about some of those things.

"It might have been. But I imagine it couldn't have been that important seeing as it's totally slipped my mind. Is there anything you'd like to do before the others get here?"

"You mean you're going to let me leave the house?" Sirius answered in mock surprise. "With dementors roaming the country and my face plastered across Wanted posters from here to Timbuktu?"

"I hardly think that you're one of the top priorities for the peoples of Timbuktu, Sirius. But it's nice to see that your ego hasn't suffered one bit over the years," Remus smiled, earning a rather hard, if endearing, slap on the back of the head from his companion. "Ow. Thank you, appreciate it," Remus answered, as he ran his hand through his hair.

"You've gone rather gray, haven't you?" Sirius noticed, brows furrowed at something, maybe lost youth, maybe forced age, maybe the simple passing of time.

"Very tactful," Remus pouted, pulling a wounded face but honestly not caring either way. It wasn't as if he had someone to keep up appearances for. He barely looked himself in the mirror. "It's the stress from having a friend like you."

"Well," Sirius continued, not wanting to dwell on how accurate that statement was, "I'd like to head down to the lake. I haven't had a decent swim in ages, apart from trudging through puddles in that monsoon we had here last month."

"Here? How long have you actually been in England?" Remus asked, having assumed that Sirius had spent most of his year abroad.

"Since October," Sirius answered. "Harry's scar was hurting," he explained.

"Why didn't you come see me?" Remus asked, a little upset that he hadn't even known his best friend had been in the country for nine months, and that he couldn't even be bothered to write.

"For one thing, I actually didn't know where you were staying, you move around so bloody much. But apart from that, I don't know if I'd have taken the risk of straying too far from Hogwarts, with everything that was going on. And you know, I spent one night in jail," Sirius added, hoping to draw attention away from the fact that he had simply been too uncomfortable to visit Moony and act like it was old times again.

"What?!" Remus bellowed.

"Muggle police caught me after I broke into a house to Firecall Harry," Sirius shrugged, knowing that if he acted as if it was no big deal that Remus would see it as an even bigger deal, which always made for an entertaining lecture.

"And they didn't recognize you?" Remus asked.

"No, didn't even drag me into court since I didn't take anything. Or maybe that female officer just wanted to use her handcuffs on me in a more private setting," he smirked.

"Well, how nice for you," Remus answered, not sounding sarcastic enough to fit Sirius's expectations.

"Is that it?" he asked. "No yelling and screaming? No threats to have me fixed if I don't behave myself? And I thought you cared!"

"And I thought you cared for the people in your life enough to keep yourself out of prison!" Remus snapped.

"Oh, come off it Moony. I had to warn Harry about Karkaroff, didn't I?"

"Was it so urgent that you couldn't owl him?"

"Well, it's kind of hard to get a hold of a messenger owl when you're a fugitive, you know," Sirius answered bitterly.

"You just wanted to see him," Remus answered.

"And why is that a crime?" Sirius demanded, his patience long worn.

Remus stared at his friend for a moment, wondering how far he would go himself to protect a loved one. Why was it so hard to imagine? Harry was James's son. Why didn't Remus have this reckless, selfless abandon when it came to the boy? Maybe it was the title. Remus was not his godfather. Still, he hated that he couldn't understand. "It's not," he answered. "I just wish you wouldn't risk so much for him, is all. I don't want to see you hurt."

"Why not?" Sirius asked.

"I don't know," Remus answered, sitting down and looking older than he ought to.

"Yes you do. I'm all you have left."

Remus hated that it was true. He hated it even more that Sirius had the nerve to point it out. "And is Harry all you have left? Is that why you put your freedom on the line?" What was this? Was this jealousy? Was Remus jealous of a fourteen-year-old boy that had lost his parents, been forced to live with three awful people, and faced death on a yearly basis since becoming a Hogwarts student?

"Moony, I do have you, you know. And that's no little thing," Sirius smiled. "But since when am I the cautious one? You know perfectly well that it was I who scoffed at the threat of a year in Azkaban just so we could become Animagous. And I damn near killed Severus Snape dozens of times. And that flying motorbike couldn't have been legal, and I'm an escaped convict and-"

"What was Azkaban like?" Remus asked, suddenly reminded of the matter that had been on his mind earlier that morning. Sirius halted mid-rant, Remus cursing himself for bringing that dullness back to his friend's eyes, if only for a moment. "If you'd rather not-"

"No," Sirius interrupted. "No, it's fine. Someone was bound to ask."

"I can't believe I'm the first," Remus said, knowing the curious nature of Harry and his friends, not to mention Albus Dumbledore.

"I can. It's not an easy question to ask. Can't casually slip it in with an inquiry about the weather. And then, it's not an easy question answer. Especially for me, with my ever inflated ego that you so missed. Never did like admitting defeat. Injury. Emotions. But in Azkaban, that's all you ever feel. I'm sure you know what it's like to be near a Dementor. And even the great Remus J. Lupin couldn't have mastered the Patronus charm the first try. Maybe the second, but not the first. So you've had to have felt the hopelessness. The regret and pain and the memory of every bad thing you've ever felt and thought and done. But they never backed away, Remus. They were at my door, day and night, breathing in every good thing I had and leaving me with…with the guilt. Me not crying at my mother's funeral. Me sending Snape to the Whomping Willow. Me breaking a few hearts, getting my heart broken. Me suspecting you. Me trusting Peter. And then Halloween, going to his house, not finding him. Seeing Godric's Hollow, the smoke, the Dark Mark. My first thought not about James and Lily, but about what spell he used. Why did he blow up the house? He would have used Avada Kedavra. And then…the bodies. And Harry. Knowing what I'd sentenced him to, with my mistake. And what I'd sentenced you to. Then I went after Peter, but when the Dementors were leaving me these memories, things became twisted. Peter, in my dreams, became innocent, and I was just killing another friend. And I saw myself blowing the street apart, the blood, hearing the screams and laughing. Always laughing. And when the Dementors left me, it was even worse. I could smell the fear, Remus. And the death. Looking out the barred window above the door, I saw so many people go mad. Screaming, throwing themselves against the walls, falling silent, and then you knew they were gone. It was only a matter of days. They'd stop talking, stop eating, and they'd die. If they were lucky. The Dementors had their favorites. Maybe some people's happiness tastes better than others. So they kept them alive, only visiting their doors once a month. And they healed them, if they tried to take their lives into their own hands."

"Did you…?" Remus began, not being able to ask, fearing the answer.

"Yes," Sirius whispered. Remus had told him some of the horror stories of his earlier transformations, and the consequences of them, so he felt he owed his friend the truth. "They aren't very solid, the walls of that place. They don't really need to be when the captive can barely stand. But sometimes I'd transform, when it got to be too much. And once I was scratching at the wall, wondering if, if I wanted it enough, I could break through. I never did, but once I clawed out a piece of stone. I can't even remember grinding it down to make a sharp edge. I can't even remember cutting myself, but I do remember…I can see myself waking up, seeing the shadow of a Dementor at the door, and looking down, seeing my legs torn, my stomach, seeing my hands covered in blood and hearing James screaming, thinking it was his blood. A ministry mediwizard must have come then, fixed me up. That's not the only time it happened, but that's the cleanest one and I'd rather not discuss the rest."

"Of course," Remus answered, still pale and shaking from Sirius's words. "I'm sorry."

"No need to apologize. I probably needed to tell someone."

"No, I'm sorry," Remus repeated, knowing that one word couldn't fix that night for him, or anything else for that matter, but hoping that it did something.

Sirius was silent for a while, locked in Azkaban once again, until Remus noticed the smile spreading on Padfoot's face. "What are you thinking?" Remus asked.

"I was just wondering why you didn't disagree with me saying that I'm all you have left."

"Maybe because it's true?" Remus answered.

"But why is it true? Why is there no Mrs. Lupin?"

"Mumblegrumble."

"Pardon? I missed that."

"Maybe it's because I've gone gray," Remus frowned, not liking the direction this conversation was going, even though it was marginally better than talk of suicide and personal demons.

"Moony," Sirius nagged.

"What?" Remus sighed.

"What happened to that lady killer we all knew and loved?"

"Appropriate words when speaking to a werewolf."

"Ahh, you'd never hurt a fly."

"Maybe that's because werewolves are the only known beasts that actually prefer human prey." Remus wasn't about to tell Sirius that the reason there was no Mrs. Lupin was because he had simply stopped looking for her. For some reason, Remus knew that Sirius would find that fact more deserving of a laugh than any inability to successfully hit on a woman.

"Fine," Sirius muttered, marveling at how quickly he gave these things up these days. "Did you have any plans for today, before I came and ruined your party?"

"You haven't ruined anything, Padfoot. You know perfectly well that any room with you in it is infinitely brighter," Remus answered, sarcasm threatening to drown them both.

"Well, yes, everyone knows that," Sirius answered, flashing his million-galleon smile.

"You looked just like Gilderoy Lockhart just then," Remus smiled, not entirely sure if Sirius would understand the reference but chancing it all the same.

"Take it back!"

He got it. "No. And to answer your question, I did have plans. I still do, actually, so you'll be on your own for a few hours. But I'll be home before the others arrive, I'd expect. You said this afternoon?"

"Yes, but where are you going?" Sirius asked, a little disappointed that they had to cut the reunion short. And more than a little apprehensive of being the only one at the cottage when the others arrived, given Remus's tendency to be late for everything.

"I'm not going to be late," Remus answered as if reading Sirius's mind.

"I wish you wouldn't do that."

"What?"

"Know what I'm thinking."

"Would you rather take away the many years we've had together in which I learned how your mind works?"

"Shaddup."

"Well, there you go."

"No, you're the one going and I believe I asked you where that might be before you went all telepathic on me." Sirius had missed these vocal skirmishes. By the shine of Remus's eye, it seemed he had too. But then that light faded as Lupin answered the question.

"The Werewolf Registry office in the Beast Division."

"Why? You're already registered."

"There've been a few deaths in the Midlands and Lake districts. Some Ministry officials have been pushing for new policies and there's going to be a protest today at the Registry office, which you'd know if you read anything other than the comics and personals."

"Well what are these policies? Must be bad if you're actually going to protest."

"Me? Protest? No, I'm just going as a favor to Amos Diggory, to try to keep things peaceful. And besides, Dumbledore wants me to ask around, find out if Voldemort has approached any of the dark creatures yet. Then I'll go over to the Werewolf Support Services office to find out about these new laws up for consideration. Can't trust what the paper has been reporting."

"Remus, what has the paper been reporting? And don't tell me to read it myself! I want the abridged version."

"It's a miracle you passed the O.W.L.'s."

"Moony!"

"Fine, I'll explain and then I'll go, since it's nearly eleven. Some people, like Walden Macnair and his committee-"

"Death eater scum."

"Yes, that one. He wants every werewolf to have a blood sample on file to aid Muggle authorities. He wants the right to destroy any werewolf on sight during the full moon, instead of just stunning them. He wants the right to destroy or imprison any werewolf who has ever committed an act of violence, even while in human form. And he wants us tagged."

"Tagged?"

"Yes, with locator charms. And he wants the location of werewolves to be listed in some public forum, so you can know if there's one in your neighborhood."

"It's like the Dark Ages!" Sirius shouted, voice torn between disbelief and blind fury.

"Yes, well, at least they don't have permission to skin us or hang us. Yet," Remus smiled.

"How can you sit there and smile like that? Don't you understand what these policies would mean for you?"

"I understand a lot more than that. In your haste to worry over me, you may have forgotten that if this law is passed, the Ministry will alienate all werewolves, precisely at the time when we need them on our side. We do not need more enemies at this point. Which is why I'm going to the Support Services office at the Being Division. The people there are generally more level headed, since they deal with creatures that have the capacity to argue their case. And I'll find out what the proposal is exactly, who its supporters are, and what odds it has of becoming Ministry law. Until then, there's nothing I can do."

"Moony, if they try to put a dog tag on you, so help me God I'll bite someone's head off!" Sirius growled.

"I'll keep that in mind," Remus smiled. "I'll be sure to come back by two. If anyone comes and you feel uncomfortable about it, just make your excuses and leave them here. I don't mind being an ungracious host. Or you can just leave them a note and go to the lake like you wanted."

"How about I come with you?" Sirius offered. It wasn't that he was terribly worried about entertaining a few old friends. Dumbledore said that he had informed them of his innocence, and all of these people trusted Albus Dumbledore's judgement, as much as they trusted their own. Still, there would be looks, suspicion, doubt. There might be apologies, false boasts that they always knew he was innocent, of course. And there would be memories. Sirius was so tired of memories. Every fiber of his being was just screaming for rest. For one moment away from lucid.

"I don't think your presence would go over well with the Ministry," Remus chuckled, tossing dish rags aside in his attempt to locate his wand and copy of the amended 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct.

"So you're going as a favor to Amos Diggory? I'm surprised he isn't taking time off work."

"He might be, for all I know. The last time I spoke to him was on Wednesday. I still can't believe Cedric's gone. Did that letter from Dumbledore mention if he announced the cause to the students?"

"Yes, he's made an announcement. I'm a bit surprised that it wasn't in today's paper, actually. It won't be kept quiet for long, even if Fudge wants it to be. But what sort of man is Diggory? Do you think he'll help Arthur Weasley get some Ministry support for this?"

"Amos is a very good man. I can't really fault him, for all of my dealings with him. He was one of the few that sent me a personal letter, asking me to reconsider my resignation. And he's always been very open minded when it comes to werewolves, giants and the like. I think we can count him as being on our side, especially now. That's why I hope he does all that's in his power to stop Macnair and his crew. And he'd also be wise to speak to Fudge about the Dementors."

"What about the Dementors?" Sirius asked, eyes dulling into a deep-sea blue.

"Well, I'm sure I'm not the first to point out that, should Voldemort return, the Dementors would hand over the Death Eaters in a matter of weeks. Fudge won't go for it though, from all I've heard. He's in love with those creatures. I sometimes wonder what he hears, when he walks beside them. Anyways, I'm off. Behave yourself or I'll have you fixed," Remus smiled, patting Sirius on the head as if he was in Animagous form and then heading out the door.

"You know I always do!" Sirius called after him, as he turned towards the kitchen in search of ingredients for some sort of Itching powder that he could spread over Remus's bed sheets.