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A/N: Thanks to the reviewers (do I detect a pattern here?), it's so nice of you to drop by. Your comments are much appreciated!

Chapter 3

The Poison in the Potion

It was an odd sensation at first, for there seemed to be a voice calling out right next to him.

Arcturus Adams… it whispered very quietly.

Always a light sleeper, Lupin woke very abruptly. He stretched his wolf body to its fullest extent, thinking that would probably be enough to scare anyone off. But the voice called out again.

His mind, at the moment, while not dangerous as it would be without his potion, was still very much a wolf's. He growled loudly and sprang forward, expecting something, anything, to be there. But there wasn't. Wishing that he was in a state to use his wand, he looked around, trying to smell, to hear something, but when the voice spoke again it sounded, to his great horror, very much like it was coming from in his own head.

You must let go, my friend, for you are dead, you must let go of your soul. Come to me. The voice spoke in a coaxing way that showed very clearly it wanted something…

My soul, thought Lupin feverishly. What was happening? The gears in his sleeping brain were turning very slowly.

Arcturus Adams…

Lupin stopped in mid-thought, confused. That's not me, he thought frantically. What do you want?

The voice hesitated very slightly. You are not the one I seek…who are you?

The werewolf kept perfectly still. He tried to summon what he knew of Occlumens, which, at best, was sparse. Nevertheless, he worked very hard, supposing it was much more difficult to perform it as a wolf. Magical infiltration of the mind, such as this, was always seen as something to be feared. Either that, or he was going crazy, which, he thought fairly, was a very probable occurrence.

Very well, said the voice. I must leave, for I am unwanted inside your being. But I shall return. Make no mistake. I shall return.

And, with a cool breeze, almost like a breath, the voice was gone, and so was Lupin in a way. He nearly collapsed, for the effort in which he had put into shut out his mind had been very straining. He was so tired, that no matter how he tried, he could not stay awake.

In the morning, he thought sleepily. I'll change back in the morning, and then I'll figure what that, that thing was.

But in the morning, by the time he had transformed, he wasn't sure it had been anymore than a dream.

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

Aurelia awoke the next morning, transforming. While wolf faces were hard up to show human emotion, if they could hers would be grimacing. While she was used to this by now, she'd been doing it every month since she was a girl, she still disliked it. It did not bother Alan or Remus as much as it bothered her, or at least they had accustomed themselves to it better. This was surprising, because as children Alan had always been the one who ran crying to Mother at the littlest bruise or bump. But Aurelia couldn't stand the tearing of her skin, the sprouting on the hair, the sharpening of her teeth; it still felt so extremely alien to her.

Often she liked to joke that turning into a werewolf was a bit like a second monthly cycle for her, like some travesty of menstruation. (She knew which one she preferred.) An old joke but a good one, she thought fondly. Remus had always liked it….

That put her in mind of him. She wanted to see him, she had to talk about the death, it was confusing her too much.

She hadn't even liked Adams that much. He was a bit sour-tempered, obviously, and he'd never been very nice to her. So why did she feel so bad about his death? Not just generally, but on a personal level. It confused her immensely and she knew she could talk about it with Remus. He would probably be feeling much more clear-headed now that the full moon had passed, she knew she did. So she sent her owl on ahead to ask him to go walking with her that afternoon. She didn't really ask as much as just told him, he never said no. She had to take the initiative to ask him to go somewhere, although, because if he did he would always invite Alan to come with them when she preferred them to be alone.

Sometimes Remus just doesn't get it.

Shaking her head fondly, she made breakfast.

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

Remus also made breakfast that morning, just some toast with some jam, thinking. His times as a wolf were always a bit hazy, even with the potion, and at night after he'd been asleep…at any rate, his memory of the voice was scarce, so when he met up with Aurelia that afternoon he didn't mention anything. She had the quality of being very dramatic and in something so odd like this she would probably fly totally off the handle. Plus there was the fact that even he wasn't entirely sure what had happened.

She was quite caught up in the events of the previous day, babbling excitedly.

"It was poison, wasn't it?" she asked him. "I'm nearly sure of it."

"You're positive?"

"Well, it's like you said, it looked an awful lot like poisoning."

"Yes, but I could be wrong--,"

"Of course you could be, it's more than highly probable, actually, but you'll remember that I, like you, was kneeling in Adams' spilled potion."

"So?"

Aurelia sighed exasperatedly. "Come now, Remus, you're not stupid. Were the knees of robes not burned through by the time you stood?"

Lupin's brow creased. "So they were…I hadn't noticed…the potion wouldn't do that, would it?"

"Of course not. It must've been the poison in the goblet that caused it, wouldn't you say?"

Lupin nodded. "I think I remember why I keep you around, Aurelia."

"The brains, is it?"

"Yes…"

"And my pretty face, of course. How could you forget that, Remus?"

"Of course, how could I? Daft of me."

"Really."
"But if it really was the poison in the potion, we all would've ended up on the floor like poor Adams," Remus pointed our after a long pause.

"Not if the poison was added after the potion was in the goblet."

"You're not suggesting…"

"Oh, come on, Remus, she's foul enough to do something like that, isn't she?"

"Yes, I suppose she could be behind it somehow, it would make sense," Remus admitted. "But she must not have been after anyone in particular."

"Why do you say that?"

"She couldn't have known which goblet Adams was going to take, could she? She just wanted one of us to die…" He looked thoughtful while Aurelia looked fearful.

"Why would she want one of us to die?" she whispered as they sat down at a park bench together.

"I imagine because of the only thing we all have in common…."

Deep inside, Aurelia shivered, thinking of last night and her transformation.

"We're werewolves," she whispered, more to herself than him.

"Well, thank you for pointing that out to me, love, and here I thought I was turning into a vicious animal every month because of my stomach flu." He was being sarcastic but his words lacked a bite most people had when they spoke in this manner. Nevertheless, it angered her.

"Fine, Remus, sorry that you can't understand one bloody emotion in your whole frickin being." She crossed her arms over her chest huffily.

Turning to look at her, he frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" she snarled. "Come on, let's go home." And she stood up and hurried toward the flat.

At first Lupin just sat, dumbfounded, bewildered as to what he had done to provoke such an outburst. They had been bickering less and less in the last couple of months and Lupin thought that they had been getting along fairly well.

Wrong again, he told himself slyly as ran to catch up to her. When he did, he saw she was crying.

Aurelia did not cry very often, but when she did it was quite a loud affair. Not pausing to ask anything, he put his arm around her and steered her back home. They caught quite a few stares from the passing Muggles, but Lupin didn't notice and Aurelia definitely didn't. Her face was buried in her gloved hands and she was sobbing quite profusely.

Finally they arrived at his flat and she calmed down.

"I'm sorry Remus," she moaned. "Being a bit…"

"Melodramatic?" he finished for her.

"Yes that's it, it's just…I feel very sad for some reason."

"Well, when people witness a death it can often leave them emotionally scarred, and I suppose to melodramatic people like yourself…." He was teasing again, but this time she laughed.

"Yes, but, the thing is, Adams and I weren't exactly what you'd call best mates, would you?"

"Not in the slightest," he assured her, thinking if her confrontation with him the day they'd heard of the D. Umb. Act.

"But I feel bad, feel like I should be out there doing something."

Lupin looked thoughtful. "That, I suppose, is a sort of cult mentality. We had a common bond with Adams before he died; we were in the some boat as him. Now we feel like we should be avenging him, if you want to go to extremes."

"Oh, I do," she assured him furtively, and for a second they were quiet as they sat together on the sofa, staring out the window, for it had started raining suddenly, a real downpour.

He had a comforting sort of arm, she thought, and that was not being sentimental, for it was quite true. She huddled against him, she could feel his heart beating in his chest.

"It's really not a cult mentality," she observed finally. "That's not how I think of it. And don't move," she told him after he had shifted slightly to get a better view of her. "I like this spot."

"What do you think of it as then?" he inquired.

Aurelia thought for a minute, pondering the words. She could still hear his heart beating.

"It's a pack mentality, that's what it is," she said at long last. "We're a pack and one of our own has been hurt, and we want to go after them." She moved her head finally to see his face, lined but somehow perfectly smooth. "That's what it is, isn't it?"

"That's it exactly," said Lupin, resting a hand on her very thick burgundy hair.

"Which is why we're going to look into this," said Aurelia, kissing him softly on the cheek.

"Right on again," he told, surprising her by kissing her back.

"We'll go back to the Ministry tomorrow. Inquire on the whereabouts of our friend the deceased."

"Mhm."

"You've never let me in before," observed Aurelia casually as she kissed him again, this time on the lips.

"What d'you mean?"

"You've never really noticed before. Me, I mean."

"Of course I have, I've known you for nearly four years."

"That's not what I meant. You've always been, detached, that's the word for it." He did not comment or argue on the truth of this statement and instead kept kissing her. "You've never been part of a pack before, have you Remus?" she asked.

He thought for a minute, then said, "No, actually. I did have somewhat of a pack, though it's nearly a decade ago now."

"I see," said Aurelia, as they rolled over and lay down and she kicked off her shoes. "Mind telling me about it?"

"Ah, you see, we'd have to stop kissing for me to tell that story," he told her.

"Nonsense, we've been snogging and carrying on this conversation for the past five minutes."

"Yes, and while that is somewhat of a talent of yours, I'm afraid the mood of my story is somewhat depressing and it may put a damper on the mood of the moment."

Aurelia stopped unbuttoning his shirt and thought a moment. Remus kissing her and Remus opening up somewhat about his past life were both in of themselves rare occurrences and she wasn't sure which one she wanted more. Well, she was sure which one she wanted more, but she knew one was probably better for him to let go of. Taking a deep breath, she got off of him. "All right. Tell me."

He seemed taken by surprise, but did not hesitate. He also sat up and redid his shirt. Clearing his throat, he began.

"You didn't go to Hogwarts, did you Aurelia?"

She shook her head. "No, my parents didn't want us to, well, they didn't think it good for us to go. We lived on the countryside, you see, and father was a Muggle farmer. So my mother, the witch, taught me and Alan. We—we were nine when we got the bite."

Remus nodded. "Well, we lived in London, me and my parents, and when I got the bite we moved to the countryside also, to get away from the people. I was very young when I was bitten, I remember we had been in the woods; my father was researching something for his new book. He was a magizoologist, and an author." He stopped to think. "I think we got lost in the forest or something, I don't remember very clearly, but the forest we were in was obviously very dangerous, more so than one we had planned to go to. My father got it mixed up with another one. He felt very guilty afterwards."

"Poor man."

"Yes…well, eventually, it came time for me to go to Hogwarts and…I got accepted." He paused again, as though recalling an extremely pleasant memory. "I'd never been so happy in my life, for the headmaster had set up things to keep me safe while I attended, things that would ensure that no one would get hurt while I was there."

Slowly he sank into the story of he three friends, the Animagi, the Whomping Willow, the Shrieking Shack, it all came out naturally, as if he'd been yearning to tell somebody this his whole life.

"You've heard of Harry Potter, of course?" he asked her.

"Of course. He's not…"

"Yes, he was James and Lily's son. Well, he still is, I imagine. Lives in Surrey with some relatives, last I heard."

There was a silence.

"So James and Lily," she began tentatively. "They both—they were both…"

"Killed, yes. By Voldemort."

He felt her tense slightly at the name, but she didn't say anything for a while.

"What about Sirius? And Peter?"

"Maybe even worse than what happened to Lily and James." As quickly as he could, he told her about what Sirius had done…to James, to Lily, to little Harry, and, of course, to Peter. He'd killed Peter.

"So, he's in Azkaban, and James and Peter are both…dead." There was an odd finality about how she spoke. The sky, which had been growing steadily darker as they had been talking, was lit up suddenly by lightening and then another deafening clap of thunder.

"So that's the sob story of my life," he said finally. "Poor little Remus, all alone, got no one, eh?" He grinned slightly, though she didn't.

"You've got me," she whispered very quietly, settling her head against his chest again. She didn't want to see his reaction, for she was unsure of what it would be.

He didn't say anything, just stared at the dark red of her head, as if just seeing her for the first time. "Yes. Yes I do."

They spread themselves on the couch again and didn't talk much for the rest of the night.

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

An owl was waiting for Dolores Umbridge on her desk that morning. She scowled at it, for it had left some of it's breakfast on her files, files she really needed, the Minister was telling her almost daily that he would need them…

Sighing, she relieved the barn owl of its burden.

All owls should be hanged their ankles along with the werewolves, she thought vengefully. "Go on, shoo, go take a dump on someone else's paper."

The owl seemed to be able to read her mind, or at least the expression on her face, for it nipped her finger very hard before it took off.

"Ouch! Damn owl." She then chided herself for being so loud, for she wanted to read this letter in peace, she didn't desire people reading over her shoulder. Unfurling the parchment, she looked over her message:

Didn't work. Meet me at the Muggle park, same time.

"Dammit!" she said very loudly, then looked around. Her desk was in the anteroom of the Minister's office and there was very long line of people waiting to get in to the office. They all stopped talking and stared at her.

"Oh, um, sorry, Quidditch team lost." She pointed to the sports section of the Daily Prophet that lay open on her desk. She grinned sheepishly at the lot of them, and they all turned back to their business.

Wishing that it had been the simple matter of her team losing, she got to work.

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

A few hours later, it was around noon, a man dressed in a long trenchcoat was wandering seemingly aimlessly in a Muggle park.

Remus Lupin was also in the park that afternoon, for Aurelia was still sleeping, he could not rouse her. He was, at the moment, contemplating getting a job being hot dog vendor here in the square. Less of a tight work schedule, he supposed, he could always get the full moon off, and he'd always liked the smell of mustard for some reason. It was then that he noticed a short squat figure. He saw her face before she hurried to the tree where the shady man was loitering.

Magic folk didn't come to this park very often, so it puzzled him what she was doing. So, going up to the real hot dog vendor in the park, he bought a hot dog and tried to eavesdrop. He normally thought it exceedingly rude to eavesdrop, but in these circumstances he thought the subject most definitely deserved it.

Umbridge and the man were talking very low again, so Lupin pretended to tie his show to buy time. As he listened, he grew sure that the man was the same he'd seen talking to her before in the Ministry.

"The watch wasn't his…we didn't get the right one…" the man mumbled, leaning against a bench and lighting a cigarette.

Umbridge's normally pale face grew red and she barely bothered to keep her voice down. "Who was it that you contacted?"

"Another one…think his name was Lupin, according to the Speaker."

After hearing his own name he turned his back on them and pretended he was just Muggle eating a hot dog in deep thought, listening for anything all the while. Unfortunately for him, a large loud group of American tourists came upon the hot dog stand at that moment. Their chatter and laughter drowned out any further conversation between Umbridge and this other man.

"Well, Adams is out, we couldn't get by something else of his, his family has sealed off the whole house," said the other man decisively. "But apparently the Speaker has another idea."

"And what's that?" Umbridge spewed angrily.

"He wouldn't say, much too tired when I left, but I think it has to do with your lupine friend over there." He pointed to Lupin's back. The front was glaring almost malevolently at the group of tourists, who showed no signs of abating their chatter or going somewhere else. Umbridge saw who it was also and grinned, and they both hurried away from their clandestine meeting.

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

That night at dinner Alan proclaimed what he had been thinking nearly since birth.

"I," he said grandly to all of them, "Alan Callard, your friend and brother, am, indeed, a genius."

The entire table turned to look at him, all somewhat bemused. Marie and Maylor had invited Alan, Aurelia, and Lupin to dinner. Marie had just started dishing out the casserole.

"What is it you have then, Alan?" asked his sister, glaring at him. He always liked putting in a show too much. "Cut to the chase, will you?"

"Of course, of course, my sister never had any patience, did she? Well, you see, I went to the Ministry again today."

"Without us?" asked Aurelia, acting offended.

"Well, thought I'd just have a poke around, nothing too heavy, you understand. Well, as I was there, I saw Umbridge. She was hurrying out, her cloak was nearly hanging off of her, she looked, all in all, very worried. And then, it occurred to me. She wouldn't be at her desk, why shouldn't I go and have a peek around?"

"Why would you want to do that?"

Alan shrugged. "M'not sure, made sense at the time. Anyway, I found the way to her office, told the man at the front I had to speak with her. He let me in, looked a bit sleepy, actually, maybe that's why the security was rather lax, but anyway, I went to her desk. There were quite a lot of people around, and there was nothing remarkably interesting around except this." He pulled out of his bag an aged magazine. "Take a look at what our dear friend Dolores has been reading up about." With an air of cloying smugness, he flipped it open to a marked section.

The title on the top of the yellowing page was:

The Mystical Principles of Werewolves

Lupin took the magazine from Alan and read what followed. " 'Long has it been suspected (but never proven) that the werewolf, a creature often demonized and feared, could in fact be one of the most powerful magical creatures on the face of the planet. Their physical strength, while quite great, does not come even remotely close to that of a dragon or other sizable monsters, however. A werewolf's power is seen as "more internal than anything else," says magical theorist Bayford Billings. "It's unknown what the usefulness of this could be, as it is a very modern theory and we haven't gotten much chance to test anything as of yet" This is because no werewolf to date has volunteered for any sort of experimentation'" Lupin looked around the stunned table. "That's mildly unsettling, isn't it? I don't wonder why no werewolf's ever volunteered."

Aurelia grabbed it from him now. "When they say power…what the hell does that mean?"

"I'd imagine," said Maylor. "That it's a bit like dragon blood, isn't it? Could have healing powers. Perhaps give strength, intelligence, something like that. Does it say anymore, Aurelia?"

"Nothing," she replied. "Goes off on something about out-of-control kneazles after that."

"What would Umbridge want this for?" asked Marie, sitting down finally. She looked distinctly worried.

"I've got an inkling," said Lupin, and he and Aurelia told them of the former's encounter at the Ministry the previous day and at the park that morning.

"They were talking about you, Remus?" asked Maylor, looking even more worried than his wife.

"I think so. But I'm not sure why," admitted Lupin.

"I expect you'll find out," Alan pointed out.

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