"Go in, go see them." Audrey said softly behind her.
Minerva was still in shock; they were dead she seen them. Their lifeless bodies were laying on the floor in the great hall. How can these two people be still alive, after all these years.
"Come here sweet girl." Remus reached his hand out for his daughter.
Minerva walked over to him, and she hugged him as he held her tight in his arms. The tears were now pouring down her face and she was soaking his shoulder. "How?" She looked at him.
He put his hand on her face. "There is a lot to catch up on, and their will be a lot to discuss I think that right now we just need to take this in" He pulled her hair out of her eyes.
Minerva nodded and looked over at the other bed, she then found herself embraced in her mother's arms. She never really knew how much she missed their embrace until this moment.
"Oh, how I have missed this, how I have missed you." Nymphadora sighed.
"We have all missed you guys so much, and this has to be a dream." She kept looking back and forth at both.
Remus smiled at his girls. "I can reassure you that this is not a dream, that this is finally a reality. We never knew if we would ever get home to you and your brother. This is such a joyous time for all of us…"
"Mr. Potter I would not go in there." The security guard was trying to stall Harry from coming in.
"Do not be ridiculous there is no reason that I should not be in there." He looked at Audrey who was still at the door, and then into the room. "What have you done?" He hissed.
"I did what was right. What you should have done weeks ago when you located them and knew that they were going to be okay." She snapped back at him.
"This could cost you, no it will cost you your job." Harry was angry, and his voice was a bit raised.
"As it could cost you yours as well." Audrey smirked and walked away.
Harry walked into the room. Minerva stood up and walked towards him. "How could you do this?"
He snickered a bit. "This is because you deserve it, after all that you have done this is minor to what you deserve."
"Deserve! What I have done?! Harry what the bloody hell are you talking about?! These are my parents and…"
"That is the issue! They are not your parents! Our parents are dead, and you seem to forget that!" Harry stormed out.
Minerva took a deep breath in and walked back over to her parents. "I am so sorry about that." She sat in a chair between them.
"This must mean that Harry did not take the truth all that well." Remus sighed as he was still in shock about what he had just witnessed.
"No, not at all. He blames you guys for everything, and he blames me for not telling him when I found out." Minerva sighed, as she held back tears.
"What blame? What is there to place blame on?" Nymphadora asked.
"He thinks that I got the better life, and I had everything that he had wanted with you two." She looked at Remus. "I mean he is not wrong. I did have an amazing life thanks to you guys, and what did he get?"
"Minerva, none of that was your fault. Albus, Severus, and I decided that keeping you away from Harry was for the best." He managed to pull himself to the side of the bed and grab her hands. "The adults in your life let you down, we convinced you that you would be killed or get Harry killed if he knew. That is all on us, not you."
She looked up at him and nodded. "I know and I tell myself that all the time, but it does not lessen the hurt. I have always wanted a relationship with Harry and now that we can have one, he hates me."
"My child, give him time. Harry has James' hot head. I am sure that he will come around." Remus reassured her.
"I have given him time; it has been a year and he still hates me. Everyone keeps saying to give him time, but I have." She sighed.
"A year?" Remus seemed a bit confused. "What year are we in right now?"
"It is October first two thousand one." Minerva answered.
"Three years." Nymphadora spoke up. "It has been three years, Teddy is three." Tears fell down her cheeks.
Minerva nodded. "Yes and is an amazing little guy. So bright and full of energy. He is just like you." She turned and faced Nymphadora.
"Is he?" She smiled. "How is mother?"
"She is doing amazing as well. When the war ended, she stepped up and raised Teddy, she has done amazing with him." Minerva reassured her.
"I want to see him; I need to see him." She looked over at Remus.
"In time my love. Let's get all these wounds healed and then we will talk about going home to them all." Remus smiled at his wife.
Nymphadora nodded and laid back in her bed.
Minerva stood up and kissed them both on the head. "I will be back; I have to figure something out and then I will be back."
"Minerva." Remus spoke up.
"Yes?" She turned back to him.
"Do not tell anyone else. I want to surprise them all when we get well." He smiled at her.
She nodded at him. "Of course." She had no idea how she could keep this a secret from the whole family, especially her grandmother.
The head healer of the ward walked over to Minerva. "You must be their daughter?"
"Yes, I am Minerva Lupin. Can I ask why no one cared to inform me that they were found. That they were here?" She asked with a bit of an angry tone.
"I am so sorry Miss. Lupin we did not inform you because Mr. Potter asked us not to. He informed us that it would not benefit them to have you here. He said that you were the reason that they were presumed dead in the first place."
Her face dropped; she took a deep breath because now was not the time. Minerva needed to figure out when she could get them home. "May I ask when you are planning to let them go home?"
"I was just going to owl Mr. Potter and let him know the newest update with the Lupin's." She smiled.
"No, you will not! I am taking over their care from here on out. I am their next of kin, I am their daughter." She stated.
The healer nodded. "Of course, Miss. Lupin. They are in a stable state. They may look like they are in rough shape, but I assure you that they are not. If I can release them into the care of a trained medical family member, I can allow them to go home in the morning."
Her face lit up. "We have a healer in the family, Audrey Weasley. Is that good enough for trained family member?"
The healer smiled and nodded. "Yes, she is more then acceptable as a trained family member. I will get all the necessary paperwork for you to sign."
Minerva sat down in the chair that was behind her, she smiled. This was all happening so fast, and she needed a moment to catch her breath. They were coming home; she and Teddy were going to have their parents back. Little Remus was going to get to have his grandparents in his life. Things were right, well almost, if only she could get Harry in with her family. Or did she want him to know, after this stunt she was unsure of what she wanted with her brother.
"Minerva." Audrey touched her shoulder.
She jumped a bit as she was deep in her head. "Um- hey." Minerva looked up at her.
"Are you okay?" She asked sitting down beside her.
"Thanks to you, yes." She smiled. "Audrey, I owe you big time."
"No, you own me nothing. We are family and we must stick together." She hugged her.
"I will repay this act of kindness one day, I promise you."
Audrey smiled at her. "I know you will. Healer Martha was just speaking to me, and she asked if I would be okay to check in on the Lupin's when they are at home. So that means they want to release them."
Minerva smiled. "I know, she was just filling me in on what the next steps were. I am going to spend the night here with them, and they are going to be coming home with me in the morning. Can I ask you one more favor?"
She nodded. "Yes anything, what do you need?"
"I want you to call an emergency family gathering for the morning. Make sure that grandmother and Teddy are there as well. Tell them I called it, and I need to see them all there." Minerva stood up.
"Of course, I will get on that right away. What should I tell them when they ask where you are?" Audrey pulled her cloak on.
"Just tell them that you have no idea where I am and all you know is I am okay, and will see them in the morning." She hugged her and headed back to her parents' room.
"So, what did you find out?" Nymphadora asked.
"How do you know that I was going to get information?" Minerva smiled.
"I know you my sweet child. I can read you like a book." She responded with a smile.
"It is great news." Minerva sat back down. "They are willing to let you go home."
"Yes!" Nymphadora squealed as she pulled herself out of bed to hug Minerva. "When?"
"Well, that is the best part." She looked over at Remus. "You guys are free to go home in the morning."
Nymphadora hugged her even tighter.
Remus seemed to be lost in his head, he was happy but was also unsure. Minerva knew that he would not say anything to destroy Nymphadora's happiness.
The next few hours consisted of Nymphadora planning all the things that she was going to do with all of them. She soon talked herself to sleep.
"Dad." Minerva sat on the side of his bed.
He turned and faced her. "What is it love?"
"Are you okay?"
He sighed. "I knew you seen it."
"What is wrong?" She took his hands.
"Honestly this terrifies me. We have been held captive for the last three years. What if Teddy fears us? What if he does not know who we are?"
She shook her head at him. "Trust me he knows who you are. Grandmother has a photo of you two that he says goodnight to every night before bed. He has so many questions about his mommy and daddy. We answer them, and he loves to hear stories about you guys. Trust me there is no way that he will not know who you guys are."
He smiled at her. "I am so glad that you and Andromeda were the two that were raising him these last three years."
Minerva looked away from him.
"Minerva, what is it?" He got curious.
"I ran away."
"Ran away? What do you mean?" He gently pulled her back towards him, so they were eye to eye again.
"After I lost the three of you, I ran away to Romania, and I was gone for a long time."
"How long? The three of us?" Remus asked.
"I was gone for two years with no contact with anyone. I lived with Charlie on a Dragon reserve." She wanted to avoid the other question.
He nodded at her. "Romania, that is a ways away. Did you a least go home to see Teddy and your grandmother?"
She shook her head. "No, I left the night of the war and never came back until the two-year anniversary of your guy's deaths."
"She was probably worried sick? She probably needed your help with all this loss. Minerva, why did you run away." Remus sighed.
"I am so sorry. I was scared, I had no idea how to live without the three of you. You guys were all I ever had; all I ever knew." She held back her tears. "I was scared I would look at Teddy and see you, that it would hurt too much. Then there was the dream, it kept coming back night after night. I am so sorry. I let you down."
"You did no such thing. You did what you felt was right for you at the time and in that moment. Do not regret anything. My love, life is too short to have regrets." He kissed her head. "You keep saying the three of us, it was Severus, wasn't it?"
She nodded and the tears now found their way down her face again. "Yes. The night of the war I left the house while grandmother was sleeping."
"That does not surprise me with you." Remus added.
She nodded at him. "I arrived at the shrieking shack; I knew there was a passageway, Uncle Sirius told me about it. When I arrived, I seen Severus in one of the rooms with the Dark Lord, they were talking about the elder wand." She took a deep breath in, it had been a while since she had told this story, or even recalled it. "It started to get a bit heated, and the Dark Lord was not pleased. I wanted to go in and help but Severus must have known that I was standing outside the door listening. He put a full body binding charm on me, I could not move to help him."
"He was protecting you, he loved you." Remus rubbed her hands as she spoke.
"He did, right until the end." She took another deep breath in. "Things turned bad quick. Severus was encaged in his snake's cage, and she attacked him over and over, he was helpless. There was blood everywhere, he was bleeding out. Then the Dark Lord let his snake finish him off. He was so cold, so heartless all over a wand. Severus was killed over a wand."
Remus pulled her into his chest. "You seen him die, I am so sorry. I should have stayed home with you and the others. I never should have left my family to go fight in this war."
"You fought for us, you fought for your family." She kissed his cheek. "I would have expected nothing less from you. Severus was not fully dead; he was weak enough that the charm that was binding me was gone. I wanted to go in to help when Harry, Ron, and Hermione entered the room. He made Harry take what looked like memories, they were in the form of tears. Then there was a cold voice, it was the Dark Lord giving everyone time to collect their dead. When the others finally left, I ran over to him, I had to help him somehow, I did not want it to be the end of Severus. I did so many spells and chants that I managed to get him to breath for just a bit longer. He told me that it was too late, he knew he was dying. He wanted me to look at him. His last words I can recall so clearly." Minerva looked off into the dark corner of the room. "You look so much like your mother. Minerva please stay safe."
Remus sighed, he felt like he had failed her because he was not able to protect her from the war. "Baby, I am so sorry that you had to see that. What happened after that? Did you leave the school?"
She shook her head as she looked back at him. "No, I held his limp body in my arms. I was soaked in his blood, but I could not believe he was gone. Charlie came looking for me, he knew I was not at home. He held me and tried to convince me I would be safer at home, he was trying to keep me from seeing you and mom dead up in the great hall."
"Baby, I am so sorry. I am guessing that he did not get you to go home." Remus knew her way to well.
"I had to find the two of you, I wanted to hold you guys. I needed you to tell me everything would be okay. I ran through the passageway and came out at the school; it was a mess. There was so much blood, bodies, and a darkness that I never thought Hogwarts would have. As we entered the great hall there was so much loss and heartache, so much death. I walked and was hoping that either you or mom would come running to me, but it never happened. When we were towards the end of the hall, I seen all the Weasley's circled around a body."
Remus seemed shocked. "Who did they loose?"
In that moment Minerva remembered that they do not know who we lost in and the war. "It was Fred, he was killed in the battle. When Charlie told me this, it distracted me for a moment. That was until I looked over at the bodies that were laying next to him." She sighed. "There you and mom laid, lifeless, dead, and hands touching. I broke, I lost it in the great hall. I was so distraught that I did not care that the whole hall was now looking over at me. That is when Professor McGonagall convinced Charlie to take me away from the school because it was not safe for me. He managed to get me off your bodies and out, that is when I told him that I wanted to go with live with him in Romania. He said once I was there, I was lost, that my expression was distant and like I was dead myself for weeks." She wiped her face as she looked back at her father.
He looked back at her. "Love, I think that is enough for tonight." He knew that look in her eyes, and he did not want to see that kind of hurt.
She nodded. "Yes, we have a busy day in the morning." She kissed his cheek and laid on the cot that they had supplied for her.
Minerva laid there with the night of the war now playing repeatedly her head. She kept thinking of Charlie and all he did for her that night, and she could have been killed if he did not get her out of there when he did. He did love her, and he always put her safety first. How could she have done what she did to him these last few months? He was the love of her life, and now she needed to think of a way to show him.