Author's Note- first of, allow me to apologise for taking so long to update! I just moved away to college about a week and a half ago, and the Internet's been all screwed up because of the virus, so posting this has been practically impossible. Add to that the fact that my muse seems to have died before helping me edit this, and that I am in mourning because of her death, and classes here are keeping me insanely busy and I'm horribly homesick- have I given enough excuses yet to justify the wait? No? Darn. Oh well- here it is, the sixth chapter- the seventh is being written without the aid of my muse, so it's a slow process, but I assure you I'm not giving up on this story. The Welsh Word of the Day- Gwarcheidiol means Guardians. Now to respond to some reviewers- please note, I love you all incredibly, and would love to reply to each of you in person, but that would take a lot of space and then other folks would get bored. If I don't mention you by name, please don't think it's because I don't like you or anything like that! Also, I love email, and will always respond to any email you might send. Ahem-
Kady Rilla Wholi- thanks so much for all of your reviews! Like I said, didn't mean to ignore you! I don't actually know how long the story will be, or how long it will cover. I have specific plans for all the way through their second year, and plot bunnies for years 3-5, and as far as I can tell, I'll probably get more after that- that seems to be the way of things. I'll let you know if I ever make a decision. I think you'll find that there is Lily in this chapter- and please, people, don't tell me at the end that Lily was "out of character" with regards to her feelings about James, et al. I have specific plans in mind, and will not violate canon, I swear. Thanks! And Amddyffyniad means "Protections"
NightSpear- Thanks for your review! I agree with you about he Hospital Wing scene, and can only say that I couldn't get it to fit together any more smoothly than it did. I may revise that if I get a chance.
Sorry if I've forgotten to answer any questions, but I think you've heard enough of my mad author-ly ramblings now, don't you? On with the fic!
Or not. Forgot this- Disclaimer. Don't own 'em. Any of 'em. Wish I did, but I don't. JKR owns all. Please don't sue. Thank you very much!
6. Gwarcheidiol
Lily Evans found it hard to believe that it was December. It seemed like only a few weeks ago that the owl had arrived at her home, telling her that she was a witch, that she had been accepted to Hogwarts. Her entire world had turned upside down that day, and she was very glad of it. Lily loved Hogwarts, and loved learning magic. She was looking forward to going home over Christmas break and telling her family all about the wonderful new world that she was now firmly a part of. She did write to her parents every week, and she had tried writing to her sister Petunia once or twice, but Petunia didn't reply, and letters were really no substitute for actually seeing family.
So how had four months passed in such a blur? However it had happened, the fact was that it was now December- December second, to be precise, and the school year continued to speed by, and Christmas was fast approaching. Lily and the rest of the Gryffindor first years had just finished a particularly dull Potions class, with only a few minor explosions and no major injuries, so Lily counted it a good class. The dungeons where Potions class was held had been freezing, though, so everyone was in something of a hurry to get to lunch in the warm Great Hall.
Lily found herself separated from the rest of the girls as she hurried along; she was now walking directly behind the four first year Gryffindor boys. She couldn't help rolling her eyes a bit as Sirius complained that he had been unable to get a single firework to explode during class. That would of course explain the relative calm they had enjoyed, Lily thought. Sirius' words were cut off, though, by the arrival in front of their group of a tall boy in Slytherin robes. Lily didn't know if she had seen him before; he looked strong and well built, with light brown hair and intelligent brown eyes, and seemed very familiar, but Lily was certain she had never before encountered any of the Slytherin upperclassmen.
"Remus." The tall boy's voice was cold and mocking, and Lily suddenly realised that he looked familiar because he bore a strong family resemblance to Remus; probably an older brother. Remus had never mentioned him, though.
"Romulus." Remus replied; his voice, in contrast to Romulus', was mild and polite. Romulus looked at him with great dislike.
"You're not looking very well today." Romulus observed, smiling unpleasantly. True, Lily thought, Remus didn't look good- he was quite pale, even for Remus, and looked exhausted. She wondered if he was ill. "A word in private, if you please, Remus?" Romulus continued; it was obviously not a request. Remus shrugged, and the two walked a few paces away from the rest of the Gryffindors. Actually, only Lily, James, Peter and Sirius now remained, the rest of the class having already proceeded to lunch. Lily wondered whether to wait with the others or go to lunch herself. She could wait for a few minutes, at least; it was dull walking alone.
Remus and Romulus were now involved in a quiet conversation at the far end of the corridor. Romulus' face was quite unpleasant, and he looked like he was saying something that Remus did not like. Remus kept a pleasant, blank expression on his face, but Lily noticed that his hands were clenched tightly into fists, barely visible beneath the sleeves of his robes. Romulus' voice was rising now in anger, but he wasn't speaking in English; when Remus replied in a quiet voice, he spoke the same language. Lily wasn't sure what it was-
"Welsh." James said, standing next to her, evidently having seen the look of confusion on her face. "They're talking in Welsh, I'm pretty sure- Remus told us he speaks it, that his family often use it at home." Lily just nodded, unsure as to whether to say anything in response; she gave up trying to understand what the two were saying, and concentrated on figuring out what they meant by watching their faces. It was clear that Romulus was giving Remus a difficult time about something, and that Remus was struggling very hard not to get upset. Finally, Remus turned and walked away, back toward their group.
"Anghenfil!" Romulus spat after him. Remus ignored him, and began walking again towards the Great Hall, followed closely by the others.
"What was that?" Peter asked, though his attention was clearly more focused on the lunch ahead of him.
"That was my brother Romulus. I think you met him before."
"Yeah, we did, on the train." James said, shoving at his glasses. "But I think what Peter meant is 'what did that git want and why was he yelling you?' Isn't that right, Pete?"
"Yup. That's exactly what I meant to say." Peter said, now rifling through his bag looking for something. "What did that git want and why was he yelling at you, Rem?"
Remus gave a tiny sigh, and answered, "He didn't want anything, except to make me mad. He was yelling at me because that's what he does. Lovely person, my dear brother." But Lily could see, despite these words, that Remus was really sad; upset, perhaps, that they didn't get along? Or just bothered by whatever Romulus had said?
"Uh-huh." Sirius said. "Right. I have one of those myself, you know. What was that he yelled at you when you left? Some kind of curse?" Sirius looked interested.
"No. Just an insult." Remus said shortly.
"Never heard that one before." James said.
"No, you wouldn't have. It's Welsh."
"Told ya!" James crowed, grinning at Lily for a second before turning back to Remus. "And what's it mean?" Remus didn't answer, didn't look at any of the others, just shook his head silently. James and Sirius looked at each other, and broke into identical evil grins. It was obvious that they were now not going to leave Remus alone until he told them what they wanted to know. The boys took a bizarre amount of pleasure, Lily thought, in annoying each other.
"Reeeemus." Sirius whined, still grinning. "Tell us!"
"We want to know!" James said in the same tone.
"It sounded really cool."
"We want to know if we can use it at people who annoy us."
"And we'd just use it anyway, except that we need to know what it means for it to be properly insulting."
"Right. You can't just go around shouting random words at people and hoping they'll be insulted, you know."
"So." Sirius finished, cutting off the perfectly synchronized back-and-forth conversation that now had Peter in hysterics, giggling weakly. Lily didn't actually think it was that funny. Sirius caught up to Remus, and crossing his arms, leaned on top of the smaller boy's head as if he were a piece of furniture. Remus rolled his eyes. "What's it mean, Rem?"
Remus looked exasperated. "You can't call people that!" He told them rather hotly; coming from calm, quiet Remus, this was practically a screaming fit. Lily thought that Romulus must have upset him a lot more than he let on.
"Is it something really bad, then?" James asked, his face darkening with anger now. "'Cause if it is, we'll just go back and hex him." Sirius was nodding furiously, still leaning on Remus' head.
"You can't hex him." Remus said. "He's a sixth year. He knows a lot more magic than you do, including several illegal curses that he doesn't mind using. Stay away from him."
"Remus." James said firmly. "What. Did. He. Call. You?"
"Anghenfil." Remus' voice was small; he obviously resented having to share this information. "It means- well, the kindest translation is 'freak'. Satisfied?" He ducked his head and pulled quickly away from Sirius, who stumbled, nearly falling over as his support was removed. Remus resumed walking, followed closely by the others. Sirius dashed up beside Remus, clapping a hand on his shoulder.
"Don't mind him, Rem. He's a git." Sirius' voice was cheerful, as was the grin he flashed in Remus' direction; Remus just shrugged, as though it was unimportant. Lily felt for him; Romulus reminded her somewhat of Petunia. She and Lily had never been close, but ever since Lily had received her Hogwarts letter, Petunia wanted nothing to do with her little sister. Lily had been very hurt by her sister's reaction, but there was nothing she could do about it. She couldn't help what she was, and it was Petunia's problem if she couldn't accept that.
When they reached the Great Hall, Lily went to sit with the other girls, and didn't see much of the boys for the rest of the day. Lily wasn't very close to any of the Gryffindor girls; they were all friendly, but not exactly friends. After dinner that evening as she sat in the Common Room working on homework, she saw the boys come through the portrait hole, after curfew, as usual. Well, three of them, anyway; Remus wasn't with the others. As they passed her armchair, Lily leaned to the side to talk to them.
"Out losing more points again tonight? Where's Remus? Why isn't he with you?"
"He had to go home." Peter told her, as James and Sirius pretended they couldn't hear her; they disliked being needled about their escapades. "His mum's really sick again." Lily nodded sympathetically; Remus' mother seemed to get sick a lot, and they all felt bad for him.
Remus was absent the next day, and the day after. That evening, though, as Lily was studying in the Common Room again, she looked up to see him walking through the portrait hole, looking exhausted. She waved at him, and he came over, taking a seat across the table from her. Lily liked Remus; he was the quietest of the four boys, and very kind. The two were the most studious of the Gryffindor first years, and often studied together. Remus came to Lily when he needed help with Potions, his weakest subject, and Lily brought all of her difficulties in Defense Against the Dark Arts to Remus for help. He was the only one of the boys that she would really call her friend.
"Hi." Remus said, smiling at her tiredly. "Would you mind letting me copy your Charms notes, Lily? I missed class today, and you take much better notes than any of the guys."
"Of course you can copy my notes." Lily said, grinning back at him. "How's your mum?"
"Oh- she's much better now, thank you." Remus took the notes she handed him and began to look through them, checking to see what he had missed.
"Hey Remus, I was wondering if maybe you could give me a hand with something for Defense, if you have a minute." Lily said after a moment. She hated to bother him when he looked so tired, but she really could use his expert assistance. It was a well known fact that Remus was the top student in Defense, despite the teacher's seeming hatred of him. Nobody understood that one.
"Sure!" Remus said, brightening. He really did love helping people; Lily thought he would make a fantastic teacher, certainly better than Muerno. "What do you need help with?"
"Boggarts, actually. I've read all about them, but Muerno wasn't very clear about how you're actually supposed to get rid of them, and I remember our first class- you got rid of that Boggart with no difficulty. I had no clue what to do- I was just so frightened by it when he made us face it in class."
Remus looked thoughtful. "Well, what shape does your Boggart assume? If you don't mind telling me, I mean; I understand if you don't want to."
"No, it's fine. It becomes a werewolf." Why did that make Remus go so tense? His face was suddenly a careful blank mask, and he didn't say anything for a minute. When he did speak, though, his voice was as polite and pleasant as ever.
"Really?"
"Yes. When I was growing up, I didn't believe in werewolves, of course, being raised as a Muggle. And then I found out that magic does exist, and so do monsters. The other girls told me some stuff about werewolves, and then I read about them in our DADA book- they terrify me." Lily didn't mind telling Remus this, though she would have been horribly embarrassed to say it to anyone else. Remus was just so trustworthy that she never felt uncomfortable telling him anything.
"Well," Remus said after a moment of thought, "when dealing with Boggarts, you have to force them to become something you don't find frightening. What could you do to a werewolf to make it seem amusing to you?"
"I don't know. That's actually exactly what has me stumped. I know the incantation and everything else." Lily said after a moment.
"When you see the werewolf, do you see it in wolf form or human form?"
"Wolf. But I'm terrified of them in either form, you know. That's the worst part- werewolves look human most of the time, so you wouldn't even know they weren't really. I mean, just think, a werewolf could act human most of the time and completely fool everyone. That's really scary."
Remus had dropped his quill while she was speaking, and ducked under the table to fetch it. When his head popped back up, he looked a little flustered.
"Alright then, so we can't make it assume human form, since that would still frighten you. What about making it look like some other kind of animal? Can you think of an animal that would amuse you?" Lily thought again, but didn't say anything. Remus suddenly grinned brightly, and asked, "What about a mouse? You're not frightened of mice, are you?"
"No, not at all- I used to have mice as pets at home. I think they're cute. That might work!"
"We haven't got a Boggart to practice with, of course; maybe we can find one, though. I'll keep an eye out, and if we find one, we can practice on it. I think you should be fine, though, now that you've got an idea of what to do." He smiled encouragingly at her.
"Thank you, Professor Lupin." Lily said, grinning. "You'd be a good teacher, you know." Remus blushed.
"Was there anything else you needed help with, Lily?"
"No, but thank you. I think I'll be alright now." Remus nodded, and pulling out quill and parchment, began to copy the Charms notes Lily had lent him. It was quiet for a while at their table, with only the scratching of Remus' quill breaking the silence. Lily finished her DADA homework, and began to try to read the assigned chapter for History of Magic. Remus, the only student who did not consider that class to be naptime, had assured everyone else repeatedly that they missed nothing while asleep, and that if they just read the chapters, they would be fine in Binns' class. It was an extremely dull read, though not as stultifying as the class itself.
When Remus' quill fell silent, Lily dragged herself out of the History-induced stupor she found herself in and looked over the edge of the book at her friend. She stifled a laugh as she saw that Remus had fallen asleep on his completed notes, with her copy of the notes neatly stacked in front of her book. His arms were crossed, the sleeves pulled up to his elbows, and his head was on top of them, as if he were sleeping on a pillow. His hair was tousled, and Lily could only see part of his face; he looked exhausted, even in sleep.
Lily put her book down, looking at him more closely. When awake, Remus tended to look older than his friends, but in sleep, he looked very young. It was his eyes that made him look older; there was a quality to them that seemed to belong to someone much older, someone who had seen far more than any child should. With his eyes closed in sleep, Remus looked like a little boy, all purity and innocence. Lily felt oddly protective of her friend as she watched him sleep. It must be those maternal instincts Mum always said I had, Lily thought wryly.
The portrait hole opened, and James and Sirius came in from detention; they had gotten in trouble earlier in the day for daring Peeves to write insulting remarks on the blackboard during Charms class. Peeves had been more than thrilled to do it, of course, but had placed the blame on the boys when he was caught by Professor Flitwick. Peter had been involved too, of course, and had been assigned detention with them. Lily supposed he had been made to stay late, as often happened when he had detention.
"Hey, Remus!" Sirius crowed as he spotted his friend. Lily jumped up and rushed over to the boys, shushing them.
"Shut up, would you? He's sleeping!"
"On the table?" James asked incredulously. "That's not comfortable- I always wake up with a sore neck when I try that in Binns' class."
"He looked really exhausted." Lily told them as they walked back to her table.
"When did he get back?" Sirius asked, standing next to Remus.
"He came in about an hour ago, and we've been studying since then."
"Typical." James snorted. "That's Remus for you. Comes back all exhausted, and sits down to study." He glanced at Remus, then looked again, narrowing his eyes. Lily saw he was looking at Remus' arms, still uncovered as he slept. She gave a little gasp as she saw what James was staring at.
Remus' lower arms bore several nasty-looking cuts and bruises; where there were none of these, the skin was marred by silvery scars that looked like they came from cuts or deep scratches. The fresh cuts and bruises looked no more than a day or two old. Lily didn't know why she hadn't noticed before. She was horrified at what she saw. What had happened to him? He hadn't said a word about any of this!
Sirius had seen too. He caught her eye and shook his head, telling her silently not to say a word. James got the same message, and then Sirius laid a hand on Remus' shoulder and shook him gently.
"Remus. Come on, Rem, wake up." Remus came awake quickly, sitting up and rubbing at his eyes with his fists. As he dropped his hands back down, his sleeves fell back into place, covering his arms once more. He looked sleepily at James and Sirius, taking a moment to register their presence.
"Oh- hi guys. When did you get in?"
"Just now." James told him. "You?"
"Not long ago, I think."
"How's your mum?" Sirius asked.
"She's doing much better, thanks." Remus said, fighting a yawn.
"OK, that's it." James said sternly, amusement glinting in his hazel eyes. "It's bedtime, Remy." He spoke as though addressing a recalcitrant toddler.
"Don't call me Remy!" Remus said, looking affronted. "And anyway, I can't go to bed yet, I've got mountains of homework to do."
"Nope!" Sirius said. "You've got no homework to do. Not until you've slept. Go to bed." Remus looked rebellious, but seemed to realise that James and Sirius were not going to let him go back to work. Sighing, he gathered up his books and parchment, and left with a quick farewell. Sirius shook his head at Remus' retreating back.
"He's got an overdeveloped work ethic, that's his problem."
James turned to Lily. "Lily, can we talk to you for a minute?"
Lily was not fond of either James or Sirius. They were loud, wild and rather obnoxious, and she normally didn't have much to do with them. Now, however, they both looked uncharacteristically serious and a bit worried. She nodded, and they all sat down around the table. James looked at Sirius, and they both looked at Lily.
"We're worried about Remus." Sirius told her. "This is the third time he's done this."
"Yeah." James said. "He goes away to visit his mum for a few days, and comes back looking ill and exhausted and all beat up like that. We saw last time- he had the same kinds of cuts and bruises."
"What do you think is going on?" Lily asked, looking from one to the other.
"We don't know." Sirius admitted. "He won't tell us anything at all when we ask- he just shuts down and won't speak. We think maybe something's going on at home."
"We wanted to ask you to help us keep an eye on him." James said solemnly, looking straight at Lily. "He likes you- says you're like the sister he never had." Lily was extremely flattered to hear this. She tended to think of Remus as a brother, and it was nice to have the sentiments returned.
"I will." Lily told them. "Let me know if there's anything I can do to help, OK? I hate to see him like that."
"We do too." Sirius told her. Lily had never seen the two mischievous boys this serious before. She hadn't realised that they could be this concerned for their friend; Lily wondered if maybe she had misjudged them.
The conversation was interrupted by the sudden return of Remus, who came flying down the stairs, looking very excited.
"I just got an owl from my parents." He told them, waving a piece of parchment. "I asked them if you could come stay for the first part of Christmas break, Sirius, and they said yes!" Lily knew that Sirius had wanted to go to the Potter's house for Christmas, but that important Potter family plans would not allow him to come stay until after the 26th of December, so Sirius had planned on staying at Hogwarts until that time. Remus had suddenly become very shy, saying, "I - that is, if you want to. If you don't, that's fine- but it's just that everyone else is going home, and- and no-one should be alone at Christmas."
Sirius grinned at Remus. "I'd love to come. Thanks, Rem. Thank your parents for me, would you?" Remus smiled back, and nodded, then went back upstairs. Sirius looked much brighter.
"Weird." James said. Sirius and Lily looked curiously at him. "It's just that Remus just left home this afternoon, right? So why are his parents owling him? Couldn't they have just told him before he left?" Sirius looked puzzled and shrugged.
"Thanks, Lily." Sirius said, turning back to her. "We appreciate your help- really."
"Not at all. Let me know if anything happens, all right?"
"Sure." James agreed. "'Night, Lily." With brief smiles, the two boys had left, following Remus up the stairs to their dorm. Lily sat for a few moments in thought. If someone had told her a few hours ago that she would have shared a serious conversation with James Potter and Sirius Black, she would have thought them crazy. Strange how opinions could change so very fast; perhaps they weren't really so bad after all.