A/N: Am I the only person who thinks the removal of NC-17 will merely devalue the R to the point where it also needs to be removed? Would that not, in effect, eventually result in G rated smut? Why not merely state to all who complained that the NC-17 stuff could only be seen if you clicked 'Yes' in the pop-up box, which in effect, removes the right to complain if you are underage and saw it?
My little soapbox speech concluded, I started the prequel to this. Finally. This chapter is a bit out of the ordinary, and there's a new character who will likely surprise everyone but my dear editor. Two, in fact. Also, as I had announced in the last chapter's a/n that I had a new kitten, that statement is no longer accurate. I now have five. It started with Boots, and then we got Alex and Shadoe, and then I brought Charlie and Pyewacket home as well. They are darling and would be lovely if they didn't all insist on falling asleep on me in a great herd whenever I lay down. Anyway, here you go.

Chapter Sixty-One: Comforts

"Victim of love, I see a broken heart. I could be wrong, but I'm not. Victim of love, it's such an easy part. Tell me, what kind of love have you got?"
            -The Eagles

"Dare I even ask what went on in here?" Chloe remarked, setting down her shopping bags.

 There were discarded bits of clothing everywhere, some even torn, and Mitchie looked as if she'd just been very unpleasantly pulled out of a comfy nap. Her hair had been alarming in its normal state, now it was disheveled and looked like a rogue pillow had attacked her. The fact that she was wearing little besides a hastily pulled on bathrobe made it look even more amusing.

"Let me guess, the bad clothes were attacking and you slew them?" Julie asked, holding up a bra that looked remarkably like it had been chewed off.

"Mm-mumph grr niff tid," Mitchie mumbled, pulling her flared jeans on before stopping and locating some underwear. It also looked like it had been chewed off. With a look somewhere between blushing and looking disturbed, she went into her closet and emerged part-clothed. "It's a long and entirely odd story. Why don't you go get some munchies at the salad-bar place? I'm starving."

"You? Salad?" Chloe now fixed her friend with a look of suspicion. "What exactly were you doing a while ago?"

"I…it's a long story."

"Do tell," Julie invited, sitting down on the bed with a bounce, a muffled 'erf' coming from the mattress.

"Naw, really, it's very not-interesting. Lemme get this mess cleaned up, I'll be out in a tick."

"If I wasn't constantly appalled by your fashion sense anyway," Chloe ranted, picking up and then dropping a garment in shock. "What in the name of all that's good and sacred are those?"

"What?" Julie asked, picking the garment up. "Oh. Boxer shorts with little brooms on them. Guys wear- Michelle!"

"What?" Mitchie tried her damnedest to look innocent. "American chicks wear them, too…sometimes."

"Then why are they two sizes too big for you?"

"I –er, sleep in them. Comfyness."

"Oh. Okay. You gave me a fright there for a moment." Julie flopped down on the bed, again causing the mattress to make a weird noise. "What was that?"

"I was going to complain next time the maid came in, those bedsprings really do make a damn odd noise." Mitchie carefully kicked the boxers underneath the bed in question. Chloe bent down to look under it and she stopped her.

"Don't tell me there's a boggart under there," the French girl remarked sarcastically. "Has it even got springs in it?"

"Yes. I checked." Mitchie stepped in front of Chloe to prevent her looking. "What-all did you buy on the shopping trip?"

"You want to know about clothes and stuff?"

"I've got to agree, Mitch, you're acting like…naw, Chloe, she'd never cheat on Donaghan."

"I'm not so certain. Why are there clothes all over hell's half-acre, then?"

"Because I was looking for my stuffed dog, okay? I sleep with Barkley every night and I couldn't find him."

"He's right on your bed where he always is." Julie held up the battered stuffed animal.

"He is now."

"And where did this man's shirt come from?" Chloe inquired. And it's got 'D. McP.' on the tag, no less."

"I sort of borrowed it from him before I left, you know, in case I got lonesome?" Mitchie attempted to cover her tracks.

"Then why's it still-" Julie sniffed the shirt, "-smell like him?"

"Because I enchanted it to."

"No offense, Mitch, but you've really got it bad. I bet the boxers are his, too."

"What if they are?"

"How many of your clothes has he borrowed?" Chloe asked mischievously, relishing as her werewolf friend went crimson. "Fancy him frolicking about in one of her vintage-rock t-shirts."

"Or bras."

"Julie!"

"Or perhaps some of those tight little flares. He could open a butterbeer with that fine ass."

"Chloe!" Mitchie howled in agony, going almost violet at the remark.

"He does have a nice rear deflector, Mitch. Admit it."

"Both of you! This is not- doesn't he, though?"

"Yummy," Julie agreed.

The mattress suddenly began to cough.

"Gah!" Chloe leapt almost into Julie's arms as they both flattened themselves against the far wall, startled and terrified. Mitchie went as red as was humanly possible and helped Donaghan out from under the bed. He was wearing nothing but the boxers and one of her more outlandish t-shirts. There was a second or two of shocked silence, and then the storm began. Julie started laughing hysterically. Chloe abruptly turned into a small, blond Professor McGonagall and looked earnestly about to give them a sermon neither miscreant would ever forget when the humor of the situation hit her French side and she cracked up as well.

"You guys," Mitchie began, trying hard to salvage what was left of severely bruised dignity. Then Donaghan grinned at her and she wound up kissing him. A few moments passed, with Chloe and Julie feeling remarkably like third and fourth wheels on a motorbike going from zero to sixty quite rapidly.

"Let's leave them alone," Julie suggested, sotto voce, to Chloe. Mitchie's hand slipped down to squeeze the 'yummy' region suggestively, eliciting a soft growl. "Now."

******************************************************

"You don't suppose they-?" Chloe inquired as soon as they were outside.

"They might've. Do you really want to ask?"

"Can't you?"

"I don't really care to know. It's their –business, and if they feel like extracurricular activity, more power to the wolves."

"Aren't you the slightest bit curious?"

"Terribly. But I don't want to make Mitch uncomfortable, nor do I really want her gift for description used on the subject at hand."

"I would. I'm desperate for details."

"You want to know exactly what the Quidditch captain of Gryffindor does in bed?"

"Okay, maybe not those kind of details…a simple scale of one-to-ten rating and minor points of how-to and whether it makes you nervous as hell or not."

"I'd imagine it does...unless you're drunk or really certain that you want to."

"Or randy as a ferret."

"Ferrets aren't randy."

"Even when you go prancing about in that patchy shirt?"

"Chloe! I'm not shagging him!"

"Why the bugger not?"

"Because my dad would have him slaughtered and I'm sixteen!"

"I'm twelve and I sort of want to."

"Paws off," was Julie's stock reply.

"Not him. Aldous."

"Oh. Really?"

"I'm curious."

"No offense, Chloe, but that's a pretty sodding reason."

"Why'd you kiss Malfoy the first time?"

"Because he was cute."

"I thought that you two'd both been curious."

"Mainly because he was cute, though."

Chloe sighed heavily.

"But you can understand why I want to, right? I mean, I might never get another opportunity."

"But you're blond," Julie joked, not wanting any fatalism until lunch at least.

"You know what I mean. If fighting breaks out and some of us get hit..."

"Do you honestly think the American Aurory would let us die?"

"Julie, it's the Yanks."

"Ah resent that," a soft voice drawled from just behind Julie. It belonged to a tall young man with a tawny, lionish ponytail and piercing blue-granite eyes. The beginnings of a fairly roguish goatee and moustache were closer to a reddish shade. "The Yanks run the gov'ement, but we run the fightin' 'round heah, y'know." Listening to his Southern accent was having a disastrous effect on the two girls' knees. "Y'all mus' be Chloe an' Julie...I'm Theuh."

"Theuh?" Chloe asked, having never heard that name.

"Shawt fo' Theodoric, ma cherie."

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"I love yeh, Mitch," Donaghan reminded her.

"And I love you...good thing, too, or we'd both be stuck."

"Stuck?"

"To people we don't love for our entire life spans."

"Life spans, m'love?" The Scot looked at her oddly, a bit amused. "Yeh sound like Grandfather talkin' bout his collies." Very gently, he moved the hair aside from her neck and kissed the sensitive spot below her ear. "I read yehr assignment while yeh slept, an' the section on werewolves y'did for our textbook."

"Really? Did you like 'em?"

"Dear, yeh're human."

"I'm what? -What do you mean?" Mitchie turned to face him confusedly.

"Michelle, yeh base yehr entire self-definition on the fact that yeh're a werewolf. An' so yeh are. But yeh're a human, a dear woman, an' my lover."

"I know I'm basically human...you consider me a woman? Not more a girl?"

"A young woman if yeh insist on bein' technical. But yeh aren't unnatural for bein' a werewolf as well, na' more than yeh're unnatural for bein' a witch. I don' want yeh thinkin' the way I was thinkin' when I firs' got bit forever."

"You think I'm depressed?"

"A bit."

"Donaghan, I've been away from you for nearly a month! It's like not having oxygen! I missed you so much, and I've been so scared with things getting delayed so much for no reason...I think I've been more desperate than depressed."

"Well, they've both got an 's' in them." Donaghan kissed her gently and then again, longer and more physically than before. "If we weren't werewolves, would you still want me forever?"

"I've wanted someone to share my life with since my life began."

"If I wasn't a werewolf an' yeh were, would yeh-"

"Donaghan, if you were and I wasn't, I'd still want you."

"You've got me, darlin'," Donaghan promised, folding her hand with his so their fingers meshed. The gold ring he had given her was evident and she glanced at their joined hands.

"I was just wondering..."

"What I meant by this?" She nodded and Donaghan suddenly got up. Very abruptly he took his hand from hers and removed the ring, then went over and into the bathroom. Mitchie pulled her t-shirt on and almost went to follow him, heart in pieces by the shock of his departure. She should never have questioned his intentions. What would happen now? Sitting on the edge of the bed, she fought not to cry.

Donaghan returned in his boxers and stood directly in front of her.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have-"

Oddly enough, he was on his knees.

"Michelle Isolde Tyler, dearest one, my lover and my Life, will you marry me?"

For a moment she didn't know what to say.

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It was close to six o'clock and the winter sun was just fading behind the trees and kudzu of New Orleans. Jen put her bass into its case and clasped the lid shut. She leaned it neatly against the wall and carefully repacked her bags. She had several vials of the Tegretolus and one smaller one of another potion, all of which she lined up just as carefully on the nightstand. Finally she took off the clothes she had been wearing, leaving only her bra and the sort of skimpy underwear, which was all she owned.

Her first impulse had been to use her straight razor. The idea of bleeding to death sounded correct, symbolically draining her of everything evil and wrong she had had within or had done to her. But then today, after her mistake with the werewolf, she realized what such a dramatic end would do to the friends she was leaving. So Jen took a leaf out of her grandmother's book and acquired a small but suitable quantity of poison. It was tasteless and odorless, and would merely look as if a seizure in her sleep had caused her to suffocate.

Sometimes Lyff was still incredibly convenient.

A voice in the hall outside called for someone, over and over at intervals. She couldn't quite make out the name, but knew it wasn't hers or anyone's she knew. Jen climbed under the covers and put her head on the pillow. She took the tiny vial from the nightstand and turned around to remove the small cork.

A furry face stopped her in her tracks. She shrieked in terror.

"Shadduh!" the voice from the hallway cried. Theodoric strode across the room and picked up the fluffy gray creature. "You little rogue...beggin' your pardon, ma'am."

"Who –what is that?"

"M'cat, Shadduh. You mus' be Jennifer. I'm Theodoric, from the 'Merican Aurory."

Evidently Shadow found the vial in Jen's hand to be fascinating, because he leapt out of his owner's arms and back onto her bed to bat at the vial with a furry paw. Jen quickly moved away from the beast, exposing her bra in the process of this.

"Ma'am!" Theodoric cried, covering her up and accidentally brushing her neck. "I'm sorry, Shadduh's usually a gentleman."

"Oh...it's alright..." Jen glanced at the vial and hurriedly stashed it under a pillow. Theodoric made to go, still scolding the cat, before turning on his heel.

"Ah would be belyin' muh true nature if'n Ah didn' ask jes' what that vial was."

"And what is your true nature, Mr. Theodoric?" Jen asked, terrified and indignant at the same time. "Surely a southern gentleman like yourself doesn't come bursting into girls' rooms."

"Ah never said Ah was a gentleman, Miss Blodgett," Theo pointed out. "Jes' indulge my fiendish curiosity; is that cold medicine, sleeping drought, or poison?"

"What do you care?" she spat, clutching the bedcovers to her neck.

"Accio vial!" he called, summoning it to his hand. Jen watched in horror as he uncorked it and sniffed the contents. "Ah don't smell sleepin' drought, so Ah'm goin' to taste the stuff. Any objection?"

"Give it back or I'll-" Jen threatened.

"Your wand's across the room, Jennifer," Theo reminded gently, his voice almost a caress. Effortlessly he tipped the entire contents of the vial down his throat.

"No!"

Jen leapt out of the bed and fought him for the vial, seizing it and trying to drink it, but not even a drop remained. Wildly, she leaned over and kissed Theodoric, trying desperately to die if she couldn't save his life. He caught her wrists and returned the kiss in surprise, then held her head against his shoulder as she sobbed. "But- but you're poisoned!" she cried, looking at him in surprise a few moments later as he still stood strong.

"Funny thing, Miss Blodgett... Ah have a cousin from England who once recommended Ah build up a tolerance to iocaine poisons." Theodoric wiped a stray tear as it raced down her cheek. "You wouldn't by any chance tell me why you had it, or why Shadduh stopped you from leavin' your friends?"

"I...there's too much..."

And Jen started to sob again.

"Shh," the almost-stranger comforted.

"I don't want to talk about it."

"As you wish."

A knock at the door made Jen and the Southerner fly apart. "Solacio," Theo whispered, drying Jen's tears. The door opened and two red-haired werewolves entered.

"We heard a scream," Mitchie explained, before recognizing the young man with an expression of intense surprise.

"Why, Mitchie Tyluh," Theodoric greeted, a laconic Malfoyish grin starting at the left corner of his mouth. "You look like someone jes' walked over your grave."

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A/N: Alright, there are three separate film references hidden in this chapter. Special thanks goes to my third kitten, His Royal Highness Shadoe Lintball of Pickfair East, for attacking my Diet Coke can mid-slurp and inspiring me.
-J. McN.