A/N: Sigh, here's where I admit wholeheartedly that I haven't done my research. Thank you everyone for pointing out the fact that Neville was indeed present when the trio first met Fluffy. I apologize, and please ask that everyone just ignore my lack of brain cells for the time being. I just thought that since it was a particularily small incident in the whole course of things that I wouldn't have to check up on my facts. I let the movies dictate my plot, and it was a stupid thing to do.

Slytherin Disclaimer: Perhaps if I gather my adoring fans close to me now while I am simply having a good time, then later I will be able to rule the literary world.

Chapter Nineteen -

Moony's New Pack

The morning of the twenty-third dawned grey, cold and rainy. The temperature was almost at the freezing point, and with the castle being so draughty, many students were forced to wear their heaviest cloaks to class.

Harry could only hope that the rain would stop early so that they could go out without being noticed. The rain was sure to collect on any person who was disillusioned, and make them look a bit like a wet plastic-wrap ghost. Besides, with the cold in the air, rain would make them all sick, and people would be wondering what they had been up to.

Luck won out, and just after Charms, during lunch, the rain stopped and the sun came out.

All six of the 'pack' as they were calling each other, looked up at the ceiling of the great hall in unison and smiled at the parting clouds.

Harry was in the middle of wondering where and when Moony was going to show up when a very bedraggled and sick looking Remus walked into the Great Hall.

Harry almost regretted having asked him to come. He stood up, and moved over to see his tutor, giving him a half-hug as soon as he reached him.

"You're not looking well again." Harry chastised him.

"I can't exactly control my appearance in this instance." Remus said chuckling halfheartedly. "All right then, what's all this about?"

"What?" Harry put on his most innocent face. "Can't I invite you to come and see me for a day?"

"Yes, but why now? I'm really not feeling all that great, and travelling around at this time isn't always that comfortable. I know something's up, and it has to do with tonight, so tell me what this is all about."

"We've got something to show you." Harry said, gesturing Remus to join their group at the Gryffindor table. Luckily all of the teachers had gone off to teach by this time, although some of the other students in the hall were giving the visitor odd looks. Remus had after all, been a teacher at Hogwarts for a year. Many of the leftover students were probably curious as to why 'Professor Lupin' had come back.

"Don't you have classes now?" Remus asked suspiciously.

Harry shook his head. "No. We've got potions this afternoon, but that doesn't start for another hour and a half."

Luna spoke up, gesturing to herself and to Ginny. "We actually have Divination, but we're both horrible at it, and aren't likely to get any better. Divination is an entirely unreliable art."

"That's my baby sister." Ron said proudly, rumpling Ginny's hair. She pushed his hand off, and smacked him in lightly in the back of the head.

"Anyhow," Harry continued. "We'd like to show you something in the room of requirement."

He stood up, and everyone else followed suit, standing and leading the confused Remus up to the seventh floor corridor opposite a tapestry of a poor goblin being clubbed by angry trolls wearing tutus.

"Here we are." Harry said, and began to pace, muttering to himself. When the door appeared, they walked inside. As soon as Harry heard the door click shut behind Luna, he thought hard about the feel of his body, said the word 'transanimagus' in his head and felt himself being changed into Greymane.

He heard Remus gasp loudly, and looked up to see the white face of his tutor staring back at them all looking slightly gobsmacked. Hermione, as Eyespy, fluttered over, and came to rest on Moony's shoulder, squeezing her talons comfortingly. Moony reached up and touched her brown feathers slightly reverently.

He turned back to stare at Harry. "When did you do this?" he asked quietly. "H-how? I thought it was a possibility after you mentioned it to me this summer, but..."

Harry turned back into himself, and answered Moony's question. "We've only just learned how last week, but I've been teaching the entire DA about wandless and soundless magic." Harry decided that he should now introduce the new nicknames of his friends. "My nickname is going to be Greymane." He pointed to Hermione. "Eyespy." Hermione bobbed her head in a sharp owl-like nod.

Harry gestured to Ron, then moved on to the others. "Sidetrack, Sabertooth, Wrinkles, and Stickyfoot. We're your new pack."

Moony swept over to his best student, and wrapped him in a bone crushing hug. Harry felt him shaking, and pulled away from him to see the aged-looking man weeping silently. Tears were streaming down his cheeks in torrents, and Remus didn't even bother to wipe them away.

Everyone in unison changed back to human form. Hermione's transformation was particularly impressive, as she changed in mid-flight, and landed solidly on the brick floor on two human feet.

"Are you all right?" Ron asked worriedly. "We didn't do something wrong, did we?"

Remus sniffed and dabbed the sleeves of his cloak to his eyes, trying to rid his face of the evidence of his emotional outburst.

"N-no, you've done everything perfectly." Moony said in a husky whisper. "It just reminded me of when James, Sirius and... when they did the same thing."

Harry's eyes nearly began to water too, but he was able to stay reasonably sober. "How did they tell you?"

"They didn't tell me what they were doing either. They just went ahead and learned without telling me. One night they just asked me to stay up a little later than everyone else, and they just... showed me what they had done." Remus looked up at the ceiling, seemingly searching for the happy memory up there. "I've never had to use any other memory than that to power my patronus."

Harry nodded in understanding.

"So!" Moony said, taking a stabilizing breath to get himself under control. "Tell me about your animals. What do they feel like?"

Ginny began. "Being Sabertooth feels very natural to me. I don't know why she does, but it's awesome. I feel incredibly powerful and almost... reckless. I don't know. She's a carnivore, and strange smells make me want to eat them. Don't worry, I haven't gotten up the nerve to try anything yet." Despite her comment, she looked as though she was incredibly tempted to give it a try.

"I feel a little bit playful, because my mind sort of simplifies itself. I don't have to worry about school, or think about the nightmares I've had or anything like that. Everything I do is on instinct. When I first changed, in that five minute bit, where I actually forgot that I was Ginny, I wanted to attack Ron and Luna." Ginny looked very embarrassed and ashamed at this. "It went away when I remembered who I was."

Harry chuckled. "I was the same. I think Greymane wanted to attack you guys to play with your carcasses, more than to eat though. It was more of a threat to see how everyone reacted to my anger than any actual need to kill."

"That's exactly it!" Ginny exclaimed. "I'm sure that I still would have hurt someone if we hadn't had that impenetrable charm on the door."

Harry nodded. "We're stronger as Sabertooth and Greymane than we think we are. It's a little difficult to remember to restrain ourselves."

"Tell me about it." Hermione interrupted, rubbing at her arm. "I think I still have bruises from Sabertooth and her bird-catching stunt."

Remus laughed. "Did you try to eat her or something?"

"I was just playing." Ginny said seriously. "I'm sorry if I hurt you."

"Not at all, Sabertooth. I had to learn not to rile you somehow."

Harry was looking at Ginny. "I need to remember that you're able to slink around and be silent, wheras everywhere I go, my big heavy mane catches on leaves and twigs. I don't know how I'm supposed to hunt or anything. I'm too loud."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "It's the female cats that do the hunting in the wild."

Harry grinned. "So are you going to do my hunting for me? Bring rats to me on a platter?"

Ginny laughed, but didn't answer. She knew that he was talking about Peter Pettigrew, and Harry felt a little ashamed at having mentioned it. Remus furrowed his brow in reluctant understanding. Wormtail had after all been one of his childhood friends. It still seemed to be a sore spot.

"What about you, Hermione?-or rather Eyespy?" Remus asked pleasantly.

Hermione's eyes lit with excitement. "Being an owl is the coolest, most invigorating thing I've ever done. I've always been afraid of flying on a broomstick, but-"

"You're afraid of flying?" Ron interrupted. "You never said anything!"

"How am I supposed to tell 'mister quiddich' that I can't even bring myself to touch a broomstick?" She asked, looking thoroughly irritated.

"Good point." Ron submitted. Harry couldn't believe that Ron would just leave it at that, and not tease Hermione in some way about it. Ron seemed to be taking it much more maturely than even Hermione had anticipated, because she was staring at him warily, as if she still expected some ribbing.

"Anyhow," she continued, "to Eyespy, flying feels natural. She feels graceful in the air. My eyes see things most people wouldn't, and sometimes it feels a little like I'm looking in every direction at once. I can pivot my head much faster and further than ever." She tried to demonstrate the action, and ended up making a loud popping sound in her neck. She winced, and clutched at the back of her neck painfully. "Obviously it doesn't work as a human."

"It would be useful for spying on people." Remus said thoughtfully.

Hermione tried to nod without moving her neck, then shrugged the tension away, rolling her shoulders a little. "Hence the name."

"And why are you called Sidetrack?"

Ron blushed furiously, and everyone else laughed. "I got sidetracked by a grouse that was just outside the door of the shrieking shack on the night we learned."

Ginny giggled. "Yeah, Sidetrack has a thing for birds."

"And when Harry suggested the name, I kind of had something in mind like 'sidekick.' It sounded like a good alternative."

"Really?" Harry asked, astonished. "I didn't mean it that way."

Ron shrugged. "Don't worry, I'm kind of used to being low on the command scale here. Besides, it's always more interesting to be a sidekick. You have less obligation, but you still get to join in all the fun."

Harry and Ron exchanged sad smiles, and an understanding of sorts went between them. Harry knew Ron had always been stuck in the back of his family as the youngest boy, and when he had become friends with Harry he was always known as 'Harry Potter's friend'. It wasn't that Ron didn't want to be famous in his own right, for just being 'Ron Weasley' but with hearing the prophecy, he understood that being everyone's hero meant that you had a duty to fulfil everyone's expectations. Neither Harry nor Ron were entirely happy with their lot in life, but they could accept just being each other's friends.

Remus noticed the dark mood, and strove to dispell it. "Neville? What about Wrinkles?"

"Wrinkles has trouble breathing." He let out a loud snort, emulating himself, and laughter rolled through the Room of Requirement.

Neville chuckled. "I can smell things pretty well when I'm actually able to breathe. My sense of smell is much better than my eyesight. My eyes are pretty useless. My ears are quite good when they prick forwards, but the noise of my snorting wouldn't make me very useful for spying. And I'm not great at attacking, considering my size. But damn, can I ever run!" He chuckled at the thought again. "I don't take much time to consider what's underfoot or worry about what I'm going to run into. That's probably why I have such a flattened nose. I guess I probably just feel that whatever I meet, I can run away from just as fast."

"You've got a loud bark too." Harry said laughing. "A lot louder and deeper than I was expecting."

"That too." Neville finished. "But don't worry. It's worse than my bite."

They all groaned and rolled their eyes. "Neville that was awful!" Hermione winced, only just holding in her laughter.

"Padfoot used to say the same thing." Remus explained. "Usually just before one of us would knock him in the head or something."

Harry saw that he looked wistful although pleased, so he let the subject go without comment.

"Stickyfoot is just that." Luna began without being asked. "I've got these awesome feet that although, they aren't really 'sticky' in the usual sense of the word, I can literally stick anywhere. I'm not really sure how they work, but I can grab on to just about any surface without feeling as if I'm about to fall off. Check this out."

She changed into Stickyfoot and scrabbled over to the nearest wall. She climbed the wall all the way to the ceiling, and before they knew it, she was looking down at them from the furthest side of the room. She had climbed right across the ceiling, without even pausing to wonder how it might be done. She was a natural.

She came down the other side and turned back into Luna once she had reached the floor. "Now I'm no expert, but being able to sit on the ceiling could be pretty useful for spying."

"It certainly could." Remus said smiling. "As long as nobody looks up."

000000

Potions that afternoon was an absolute mess.

Harry and Neville were yet again, sharing a cauldron, which was probably what started their bad luck for the rest of the class. All it took was for professor Snape to walk in the room, and begin berating them.

Neville was flustered, and made one too many mistakes adding ingredients. Next thing they knew, students were being sent to the infirmary, and they had gotten detention for the coming Sunday, which was supposed to be a Hogsmeade day.

"Rotten luck." Said Ron as they all packed up their things, and slunk out the door. "At least it's over."

"Next time, Harry, double check what Neville's about to add to your potion. It could have ruined our plans for tonight if he'd decided to keep you in detention immediately." Hermione scolded.

"At least none of us got hit." Harry reasoned.

Neville laughed. "Yeah, did you see the way it fountained up and went right for the Slytherins? It's like it was destined for them or something. I'll have to see if I can get that result again."

Hermioine shook her head. "Only you, Neville, could pull that off without Snape suspecting that you hadn't done it on purpose."

Harry wrinkled his nose. "Yeah, he'd probably find some way to blame it on me."

Ron stopped and put his hand in the air dramatically, as if he were about to make a speech. "One of these days, Harry, someone else in some other house will incur Snape's boundless wrath. And when that day comes, the people in Gryiffindor house will celebrate, and salute you as the guest of honour."

Harry snorted. "Until then, the other houses see me as Snape's scapegoat, and they're all having a laugh at their own parties. I tell you, It'll be good to get away from all of this tonight."

That evening just as the sun was setting, a large group of disillusioned people made their way out to the shrieking shack. One might have noticed they were there if they had looked for ghostly puffs of breath in the chilled air.

They took the disillusionment charm off of each other while they walked through the long dark earthy tunnel. When they arrived at their destination, Harry put an impenetrable charm on the entrance tunnel, and another over the window exit, adjusting the board so it covered as much as possible. He immediately transformed into Greymane, and turned around to see that everyone else was also now in their animal forms.

They sat down, staring at Moony, and waited. Stickyfoot climbed up to the ceiling, and Eyespy flew up to perch on top of a broken cabinet.

"I don't mind if you watch," said Moony, looking slightly nervous, "but be prepared. It's not pleasant to see... this sort of thing." Remus looked as though he thought they might be afraid of him after tonight.

Greymane put his paw up on Moony's knee to let him know they weren't going to abandon him. He was also subtly reminding him that he had already seen it once while in third year. Sirius had protected them by turning into Padfoot. As scary as it was at the time, it had somehow morphed into a happy memory, wherin his godfather went to such extremes as to attack his best friend on Harry's behalf. He was sure this would be no different than that time. It would be frightening for sure, but only for a moment, and it felt incredibly good to know that they were helping Remus by being his new pack.

"Thank you." Remus nodded appreciatively at Greymane as he sat on the remnants of a broken chaise-longue.

It was less than a minute before Moony shuddered. "It's starting." He mumbled, then he began to gasp. He stood up, his unfocused eyes widening, and another shudder rippled down the werewolf's spine. Greymane and Sabertooth readied themselves to pounce if necessary. Both Sidetrack and Wrinkles hid themselves behind the two large cats' hindquarters.

Remus' gasps of pain turned into snarling yelps, and his body was no longer standing on two feet, but shifting itself downwards onto four paws. His eyes darkened, and began to glow faintly yellow in the shafts of moonlight now streaming in though the edges of the boarded up windows. His ears sprouted pointier than they had been, and hair grew all over his body. Claws sprung out, his nose elongated and a long matted grey tail poked from his behind. He snarled ferociously in pain as the bones of his body snapped and rebuilt themselves. He slowly grew so that his body size was roughly equivalent to those of both Greymane and Sabertooth combined.

The werewolf howled, and Greymane roared in sympathy.

Moony stood now on four shaky legs looking balefully at the assemblage of creatures, and Harry momentarily wondered at having ever been even remotely afraid of this beast. He was tall, leggy and a patchy grey brown in this form, and his stance was no less daunting to look upon now than that of a large and slightly decrepit dog. He seemed to have more power in his hind legs than a normal wolf, and Harry knew that he probably had the ablity to balance while standing upright. His snout was longer, and two menacing looking fangs poked out of his lips on either side of his jaw. The placid nature of his former defense teacher was still there, however the gleam in his flashing yellow eyes said all too much about how little it could take to set this beast upon some hapless victim.

With the explosive howling, Moony had released all of his pain and sorrow. All the weight of being human had flown out through those savage lips and it was only then that Harry understood.

He thought he'd known his tutor.

He had mistakenly assumed that Remus hated the wolf inside him and would have done anything to just be a normal human being, but he was wrong.

For this full moon, Remus could let himself go.

He could be what he craved and do things that were full of passion and hate and need and revenge. The Remus that Harry knew was repressed, overly self-conscious and sullen. The Moony that Greymane beheld in this moment was carefree and alive. He would be unable to keep his own mind restrained.

Remus must have hated that about himself.

What would it be like to know that if you ever wanted to be free, you had to give up all ability to restrain yourself? To possibly risk attacking someone you cared about? How would that feel? He knew that the wolfsbane potion was used as a part sedative for the wolf, and part neutralising agent, which made the wolf able to keep himself under control, but Moony would not have the benefit of his own restraint this full moon.

The wolf began to prowl the edges of his self-imposed cage, sniffing at the wooden slats that covered doors and windows. He pressed his face against the spaces and hungrily drew in the sweet smell of human flesh that wafted in from the town of Hogsmeade just beyond the hill.

He sighed wistfully, and turned to the group. He slumped his rear end to the floor as if to say, 'so what now?'

The pack all moved forwards tentatively to sniff or observe the new arrival. Eyespy shifted on her bookshelf perch, and Stickyfoot trembled as she silently crept down the wall.

Greymane and Sidetrack, being natural pack animals, immediately accepted the new friend with little more than a press of flanks and a sniff. Wrinkles remained repeatedly to the back of Greymane and didn't dare touch Moony until he had seen that Sidetrack, being comparable in size to his pug form hadn't been eaten or maimed.

Sabertooth was content to let everyone else nudge and jostle and hoot and purr and yip while she cleaned her own shoulders in the corner. The tiger is not generally a pack animal, and knowing this, no one attempted to get her into the fray. She did press forwards once to sniff Moony once the rest had abandoned their sense of curiosity, but was otherwise reasonably content to believe in everyone else's assurance that he was safe.

One thing that Greymane discovered which was rather interesting was that he and Sabertooth could almost talk to one another in these forms. The only problem they had was they seemed to growl in different languages, or it was more like a different dialect of 'cat'. He was speaking lion, and she was speaking tiger. They were very close, but not enough for them to notice it immediately. Once they had spent a little bit of time sorting out tenses and basic definitions they could talk quite comfortably with each other, the dialect slowly expanding with use.

Sidetrack, Wrinkles and Moony seemed to be in the same boat, but they spent less time making up their own language, and more time learning the more complicated forms from Moony, who had apparently been speaking in 'dog' with Padfoot for quite some time. He also showed them all some interesting games they could try out as animals.

Sabertooth was surprisingly good at hide and seek they discovered. Once Moony, Wrinkles and Sidetrack had been able to convey the purpose and rules of the game through example, it was a very pleasant way to pass the time.

Greymane always seemed to be the first one discovered. The gangly lion now possessed a similar afinity for clumsiness as a slightly drunk Tonks. He barrelled about the shrieking shack knocking over bookshelves and tables, and tripping ungainly, landing on his whiskered face every time he used the stairs. He was repetitively made the 'seeker' throughout the game, but in this form it was a job he rather preferred. At first he only used his nose, but pretty soon their scent was everywhere in the house, and he actually had to use his other senses.

Even after everyone else had been found, however, Sabertooth remained sneakily absent until Greymane roared in frustration at the rest of the house. One wouldn't have expected a large jungle cat to just go missing in such a small building, but she seemed to be able to do just that. She would come slinking out of nowhere to his calls, looking very haughty and proud. No matter how many times they played, her hiding spot remained tauntingly elusive.

Stickyfoot should have been the one with the ability to hide easily, but her bright yellow skin and the fact that she always chose an open ceiling to hide on made her an easy target. Over the course of the night, she slowly improved her camouflage, and at one point remained undetected until after even Sabertooth had abandoned her invisible post.

The pack discovered just how dangerous their new wolf leader could be to humans when the sound of raised voices made the grey ears flatten in threat, and the throat begin to rumble with unsuppressed anger.

It is well known to the Wizarding community that a werewolf has no true need to go around eating people, but will attack with more fervour and skill in order to bite or maim an unsuspecting human. Other animals are always quite safe to him, but a human being would suffer a fate worse than death itself if a bite should come their way.

They would become a werewolf themselves.

It still wasn't too late in the morning, and even though the voices were far away near the outskirts of town, the singing still caught their sensitive ears. It was obvious that the wolf was finding it difficult not to throw himself at the loose slats over the door and go running out into the night after the two drunken Wizards. He even began to howl, and eyed the window that faced the forest, obviously plotting out his avenue of attack. They had replaced the rotted plywood board over it and charmed the opening, but it wouldn't be enough to stop Moony should he really feel the neccessity to escape. He was far too large and powerful for that.

Greymane took two steps to the right, effectively cutting off the boarded exit, and Moony stood upon hind legs, getting ready to box his ears. Before he got in more than a threatening jab at the now hissing lion, Sabertooth abandoned her invisible hiding spot and came to stand next to the growling Moony and purr loudly in his ears to cover up the sound of the laughing and singing men in town.

Their efforts calmed him, and after a few tense moments, where Moony slumped back to the floor, and shook off the desire to attack, the pack was able to loosen their bunched muscles and almost reluctantly continue the games.

After this sight of Moony when he was out of control and on the hunt for human blood, Greymane knew he would be keeping a close watch on the moon phases from now on.

000000

The rest of the pack left Harry alone with Remus, who was resting on the mutilated bed in the Shrieking Shack at about four thirty AM, just after the moon had set.

Ron and Hermione promised to cover for Harry if anyone wanted to know where he had gone. They didn't have classes that day since it was Saturday, but people might still wonder where he was. Harry had thanked them, and they disappeared through the passage to the Whomping Willow. Harry made sure Hermione was confident in removing a dissilusionment charm before they went, so they could become visible again once they were safely back inside the school.

Harry conjured a blanket, and covered the shivering form of Remus with it. He also cast a heating charm around the room to ensure that Remus would stay warm.

"Th-Thank you." Remus stuttered through chattering teeth.

"Do you need anything else?" Harry asked, looking concerned.

"J-J-Just a bit of t-t-time. I'll be o-okay."

As Remus slept the morning away, Harry conjured a quill, some ink, parchments and envelopes. Over the course of the morning, he wrote and wrote and wrote, and after quite a long time of this, he stuffed all the letters into their envelopes, magically sealed them, and wrote on the front. This took him a total of about three hours. By the time he was finished, the morning sun was coming through the open windows, and he was quite tired.

Looking around the house revealed no extra sleeping accommodation other than the ripped up chaise-longue in the living room. It didn't look any more comfortable than the floor, and he thought he would rather be nearer to Remus in case he woke.

He went back up the stairs, and changed himself into Greymane. He circled the room three times sniffing for predators, then curled up happily at the bedside of his mentor.