November 1995.
"The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution."
The reunion of the Lupin brothers was so uneventful that it was almost an anticlimax. Remus simply walked into the office of the Capture Unit one day, sat down next to his brother, accepted a cup of tea and smiled.
And that was that.
It was Halloween when they made up, and perhaps that was fitting, since Halloween was nothing short of a family holiday in the British wizarding world. Not that Remus had actually planned on going to his family tonight - not his blood relatives, at least. He had promised to go to Grimmauld Place and spend the night with Sirius. It wasn't that much of a disappointment with his family; he hadn't spend last Halloween with them either. But, he had thought, he might as well spend a few hours wit his brother, before going 'home'.
Whoever had decorated the Ministry had put some work in it. The atrium was almost blindingly orange, and the golden statues in the fountain were suddenly and rather idiotically holding pumpkins - the goblin and house-elf looked now even more stupid. Flocks of bats flew around under the blue ceiling, narrowly missing the people walking around. The Office for the Control of Magical Animals had decorated around a theme - magical animals. There were masks and lampoons shaped like fierce beasts put up, and Remus even saw a huge paper dragon dangling from the ceiling with two lights for eyes. The bats were even more annoying here since most of the people had placed bowls of mugs with food on their desks. So many had done it that the bats were now expecting food from everybody, and they swarmed around every person who got out of the elevator. The downside of a Department full of animal-lovers.
Thankfully, the Head Quarters of the Werewolf Capture Unit wasn't as wildly decorated. There were only two pumpkins on the table, some paper chains shaped like witches on broomsticks, and a poster with somebody in a werewolf-costume, that said "did you scare your boss today?" (nobody had, yet).
Romulus was just getting his brother, Christoph and himself another helping of cauldron cakes, when Nicholas came in, looking utterly chagrined. He flung himself on a chair and glared at the other people in the room.
"What's the matter?" asked Christoph calmly.
"I hate her," Nicholas announced dramatically.
"Who?" Remus asked.
"Oh, hi," Nicholas acknowledged Remus' existence, then ignored him again. "I don't know why we even bother going there anymore. All she does is scold us. I go out of my way to visit her, on Halloween no less, and this is the gratitude I get?"
"What was it this time?" Christoph inquired.
"Oh, the usual." Nicholas aggressively bit a cauldron cake in half. "She was moaning about how she'd miss half her leg, and how people would hate her - ha, as if they don't already - and just bitching about life and everything."
"Forty-two," Remus muttered distractedly. Then he flinched. "I really am a geek. I've been trying to hide it for a long time, but now I've gone and confirmed it."
"The worrying part is that I know exactly what you're talking about," said Romulus.
"I don't," Nicholas said. "Should I?"
"Probably not," came Remus. "But could somebody fill me in about what you are talking?"
"I'll let you guys do the honours," Nicholas said. "I'm fed up with the whole matter." He took another cauldron cake.
"Well, it's this," Christoph began. "Last full moon there was a woman who survived a werewolf attack. A Muggle woman. We were in time to save her life, but, unfortunately, the Healers had to take off half her leg, since it couldn't be healed, not even with magic. It meant that we had a double problem - first of all, there suddenly was this whole world that she didn't know about and that needed to be explained. Magic was suddenly real. And besides that, who was going to believe how she really lost her leg? And that she was now a werewolf herself?"
"That was what she was harping on about," Nicholas interrupted. "She still flat-out refuses to believe she is one. Guess she needs to be shown the hard way."
Remus looked at him with a slightly disgusted frown on his face. "I didn't know you concerned yourself with… aftercare," he said.
"We don't, usually," Christoph explained. "We leave it to the Werewolf Support Service, most of the time. But dealing with Muggles usually involves a lot of explaining, and since we were the ones who 'brought her in' so to speak, and who saved her from the wolf who bit her and everything, they figured that we might be able to help. So far, though, it's been hard."
"More like nearly impossible," came Nicholas sarcastically. "Emily told her the other day that werewolves aren't the most popular lot in our world. Boy, did that message go down well." He looked at Remus. "Honestly, I feel sorry for you, for being of the same kind. In fact - " he added darkly, "- I feel sorry for myself too, for the same reason."
"Oh, I didn't know you were a werewolf too," Remus said with a small, playful smile.
"No, but - oh, you know what I mean. That she's human. Although I sometimes doubt it."
"Now, Nicholas," Christoph said sternly. "No need to get rude now. It's understandable that she's in denial. She simply has it worse than others, but that's no reason to call her inhuman."
Nicholas huffed but said nothing to this. There was silence for a few minutes. Romulus crumbled a cauldron cake, then brushed the crumbs on a heap and began eating them. Remus looked at his brother oddly, but Romulus just shrugged. Christoph looked at the two brothers with a small smile on his face. None of them noticed that Nicholas had spend the last two minutes looking pensively at Remus until he broke the silence.
"I just had an idea," he announced.
Remus looked up, and his interested expression changed into an alarmed one when he saw the look in Nicholas' eyes. It was an almost Sirius-like look, and years of experience told him right away that this idea was very likely to involve him - and he probably wasn't going to like it.
"Why," said Remus, following his brother through the corridors of St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, "and how do I always end up in situations like these?"
"I have no idea," Romulus said.
"Is it karma?" Remus continued. "Did I do something wrong in an earlier life? Did I forget to sacrifice the proper number of goats? Does somebody up there - " he looked scornfully at the ceiling, "- really hate me?"
"It's probably simply because Life can't help but annoy you, just for fun."
Remus had to agree - the current situation was annoying. For some reason or other, in a sudden burst of inspiration that was indeed quite Sirius-like, Nicholas had got the idea of dragging Remus to St Mungo's, to show Margaret Wilson that werewolves were as much a figment of the imagination as her chewed-off leg was. He hadn't put it in those exact words, thankfully.
"Just so you know, I have an appointment tonight," Remus said. "I'd promised somebody to come over to his house, for Halloween." He had send Sirius a letter, just to prepare his friend for any disappointment, but he had planned on trying to go to Grimmauld Place nonetheless.
"Trust me, I wasn't planning on staying here this evening either." Romulus stopped and turned around. "Who're you meeting tonight?"
"I can't remember that being any of your business," Remus said evasively.
"Tied down a girl, have you?" Romulus said, with a most annoying look of amusement in his eyes. He looked rather smug, actually, and superior-feeling, and Remus was suddenly very aware that his younger brother already had a wife and children, and he was still a sad old bachelor, which was not the proper order of things, and it annoyed him to no end.
"I haven't tied down anyone," he said irritable. "And what a horrible expression anyway - it makes me think of cattle."
"Sorry, sorry, I was just asking." Romulus walked on again, but Remus was sure that he had seen an irritating small smile on his brother's face.
"And don't you dare get any funny thoughts," he threatened.
"The thought of thinking anything that's even remotely funny hasn't even begun to contemplate crossing my mind," Romulus replied. He was having difficulty keeping the laughter from his voice.
"Oh yes it has," Remus said darkly. "If Mum sends me an invitation for Christmas dinner, including a girlfriend, I know who to hit. Just so you know."
"'t would be a pity of the Christmas spirit, though," Romulus mused.
"Exactly."
They walked on. To Remus' surprise, Romulus didn't lead him to one of the larger wards. Instead, they walked towards one of the single-person bedrooms.
"Why's she not in one of the wards?" he asked.
"It was thought better," Romulus said, "makes it a little easier to adjust, and to grasp this new world, if it comes in at small bits at the time, instead of in a large ward with lots of people being injured by creatures that didn't used to exist." He stopped in front of the door. "Shall I go in with you?"
"Of course," Remus said. "You ought to introduce me." He opened the door.
The room, he noticed, was very similar to the one Wulf had had, last year. It had the same type of bed, a table and chair in a corner and a bedside table with flowers and a few books on it. Unlike last year, however, there was no sunlight streaming in through the windows - it was evening, the curtains had been drawn shut, and the room was only dimly lit by a small lamp above the bed. Although the rest of the hospital was wildly decorated, there was not a sign of Halloween here - it could have been any day of the year.
The woman in the bed looked up when they walked in. She was, Remus guessed, about ten years older than he was. Her blond hair was neatly styled in that typical style that middle-aged women liked; a bit like a man's haircut, only longer. She was wearing a neatly buttoned pyjama top, her hands had clean fingernails - she looked as if she had her life under complete control.
The bandages around her arms and the plasters on her face did spoil the picture a little though.
Remus saw an apprehensive look appear on the woman's face when she saw Romulus come in. Had he been somewhere else, in other company, he would've turned around and asked his brother whether this was the usual reaction to him, Romulus, walking into a room, but he restrained himself. Instead, he nodded in a sort-of-friendly way.
"Goodevening, Mrs Wilson," Romulus said. "How are you tonight?"
"Fine, thank you," she said stiffly. She looked at Remus. "Who's your friend?"
"Ah, he's not my friend. He's my brother."
Remus shook hands with her. "Remus Lupin."
"Margaret Wilson," she said. "What an interesting name you have."
"Blame our parents," he answered with a smile. "They have really ordinary names themselves, but insisted on burdening their sons with outlandish ones."
Romulus drew up chairs for him and Remus, and they sat down. Remus had a feeling that Mrs Wilson wanted to protest, but she was too polite to do so. Instead, she asked, "tell me, what brings you here?" in a somewhat stiff, haughty way.
"We decided to pay you a visit," Romulus said. "Since it's Halloween, which is a very important holiday with us."
The 'with us' seemed to hang in the air as if Romulus had said something offending. She had drawn up her eyebrows, but said nothing.
Remus quickly looked around the room for another topic of discussion. His eye fell on the books on her bedside table. Apart from a romance novel, there was a book about the magical world that was recommended to Muggle parents who found out that their child was accepted to Hogwarts (Magic in the Muggle world), and the essential book, the werewolf bible - Hairy Snout, Human Heart. Apparently, Mrs Wilson had done some reading to find out about this strange new world.
He nodded to the book he'd read so often himself. "I see you've read Hairy Snout," he said. "Excellent book, isn't it?"
"It's well-written," she said evasively.
"I really like how the author managed to tell his life-story, while he at the same time discusses various topics in different chapters, in an almost text-book like way. He doesn't stay personal, close to himself, but puts it in the wider scheme of things. And he has a realistic way of writing, he very accurately describes the way it feels to turn into a werewolf."
A silence followed this short speech. Romulus had a smile on his face - he had heard this before, and he was amused by the way Remus forgot all reserve simply because he was talking about a book he liked. Mrs Wilson, on the other hand, had a sort of horrified expression on her face.
"Who are you?" she said. "What are you?"
"Do I really need to tell you?" Remus asked in return. Her widening eyes told him that he didn't need to. She could guess.
"That's… that's not possible," she breathed.
"I seem to be living proof that it is." Remus said this rather wryly - he had a feeling he wasn't going to like the rest of the conversation.
"It can't be. Werewolves are just figments of the imagination, fairy tales - or from horror stories." She tapped her finger on the bedsheets to emphasise her words. "They do not exist in reality! This is all some kind of elaborate, sick joke."
"What kind of a twisted sense of humour do you think we've got?" said Remus incredulously. "Why on earth would we joke about something like this?"
"Proof it," she snapped.
"Proof it?" Remus repeated. He got to his feet, he was too agitated to stay seated. "Proof what? What, do you want me to Change right here, in this very room? Is that what you want?"
Romulus had got up as well. He was now standing close to the door, keeping out of the conversation but keeping a watchful eye on his brother. He was fairly sure that Remus wasn't able to Change when it wasn't a full moon, but when there's a werewolf involved, 'fairly sure' isn't enough - it was either 'damn sure' or not at all. If Remus was going to surprise him, he was ready to run.
"What do you mean?" Mrs Wilson demanded. She'd completely forgotten that there even was somebody else in the room but herself and Remus. "Don't tell me you can actually do that."
"Make me angry enough and you'll see," Remus replied. He was bluffing, actually - he had heard of werewolves being able to do it, once sufficiently angered, but he had never done it himself, and actually wondered whether he would be able to get angry enough for it. This woman was helping him a fair end towards it, however. He felt a sudden, intense dislike for her - her neat appearance, her perfect little life that was suddenly crushed by something she absolutely refused to believe in because it did not fit into the way she saw the world. He didn't fit into her world. It was infuriating.
What made it even worse was that she was rejecting herself as well. It wasn't in the way Remus used to do, what Wulf had scolded him for, that he didn't want to see and accept the darker parts of his nature. Margaret Wilson refused to even acknowledge that she was what she was. Werewolves didn't exist, therefore she couldn't be one.
"You don't look like a werewolf!" she said.
"Neither do you!" he bit back. He wanted to add "you stupid woman!" but decided against it. "We don't look like what the movies want you to believe! It's - for the average person anyway - not that easy to recognise us. We don't have bulky muscles or very pointed ears or whatever, it's just minor clues. And the scars, of course."
He was dimly aware of a click of the door in the background - Romulus had left the room.
"What sca-" she began.
Before she could finish the word, he had swung his leg on her bed and pulled up the right leg of his trousers. She gasped, completely indignant that he had dared to put his shoe on the bed - then looked in horror at the scars on his leg.
The werewolf - Wulf, he corrected himself - had made deep gashes in Remus' right leg from about two inches above the knee to the ankle, trying to claw itself a way to the boy's head, but being held back by repeated kicks in the head and the timely arrival of Remus' father. Pieces of flesh were missing, and as Remus had grown almost three feet, his scarred skin had stretched so that it was now rather ribbed and lumpy instead of smooth, like a normal leg. The hair that grew unevenly around the scars didn't exactly make it any prettier either.
In short, as Remus always said; there was a reason why he didn't like going to the beach.
She stared at his leg with eyes that were opened wide with horror. Her reaction was like the one you get when you see a horrible accident - disgust, horror, fear, and at the same time an inability to look away.
"And?" he said. "What do you think did this to me? A really large dog or something?"
She thought this over for a moment. "Well, yes," she said finally. "It could be."
Remus gaped at her. He couldn't believe it. Were all Muggles this thick? Was this the reason why his mother's family had no idea of what Remus really was?
He suddenly felt tired. It was no use. He swung his leg back off the bed. "Right," he said. "Obviously. My mistake. It was just a really large dog." He began walking towards the door.
Mrs Wilson gave him a puzzled look. She really didn't see it - she was forty-seven, and ever since she'd learned that there were no monsters under the bed, she had been under the impressions that werewolves and the like didn't exist either. It simply couldn't be true. She had no idea what had attacked her, but there was no way it could be a werewolf. And now this man turned up, after the throng of people who had already told her that werewolves were real, and he even insisted that he was a werewolf himself.
It was either some really insane joke or everybody here was mad and having the same kind of hallucinations, and this man, Remus Lupin, had it more severely than others. She hoped it was the first option since then she could get angry at people when they revealed the truth.
"Are you leaving already?" she said.
"Yes, I think we finished our conversation." He sounded rather sour, she noticed.
He opened the door. "I'm sorry for bothering you."
As he closed the door behind him, he mentally added: enjoy the full moon.
It had rained during their visit to St Mungo's, and the streets of London were shining in the orange light of the street lights. It was silent, except for the sound the feet of the Lupin brothers made on the pavement and of Remus' voice as he was raging at his brother (simply for lack of other people to rage at).
"Don't ever do that to me again," he bit. "It was horrible. That stupid, stupid woman. You tell somebody the truth, you do something you'd otherwise never do, and how does she react? She refuses to believe it! Eurgh, I've never seen anybody so stubborn before in my life." (This was not true, of course, but when one is angry one usually does not concern oneself with trivial things like whether the statements one makes are true or not.)
He went on in that fashion for quite some time. Romulus was the only one who heard him; despite it being Halloween, the streets were deserted. It was probably a good thing too.
"And why is it that every time I meet another werewolf I end up having a blazing row with them?" Remus continued.
"Territorial fights?" Romulus suggested timidly, trying to clear the air with a joke. He was unsuccessful; Remus shot him an angry glare.
"What time is it?" he asked.
"Almost half past ten," Romulus said. They had been walking for nearly fifteen minutes now.
"Shit," Remus scolded. He wasn't sure whether he was referring to the time or to the weather; almost at that very moment, it began to rain again, and rather heavily at that. "Can't we ever have normal weather in this god-forsaken country!" he yelled at the sky. Who-ever was up there making it rain reacted by throwing an extra bucket-full of rainwater at him. Remus cursed again.
"C'mon, overhere." Romulus beckoned his brother towards the porch under which he was taking shelter. Remus quickly joined him.
"Sirius is going to kill me," he muttered moodily, looking at the downpour.
Romulus stared. "Sirius? Sirius who?"
Remus only now realised what he had said. He stared back. How on earth am I going to talk myself out of this? "What?"
"You said something about a Sirius going to kill you. Sirius who?" Romulus said this rather carefully. He had a suspicious of whom Remus might meant, but he was afraid to hear it confirmed.
"Sirius Black, of course," Remus said evenly. There weren't that many Siriusses in the world, and the odds of him meeting another one were very slim. He might as well come out with the truth.
"Sirius Black?" Romulus half-shrieked. "The escaped prisoner?"
"I only know one Sirius Black, and yeah, that's him."
"But… I thought you hated him?"
Remus smiled wryly. "I did. Except that I met him, two years ago, and I'm now convinced that he's innocent."
"Yeah right," Romulus said, sceptical. "So who did kill all these people then?"
"Trust me, you will not believe it."
"Who?"
"Peter Pettigrew."
"Peter Pettigrew?" Romulus repeated. "But… didn't Black kill him too?"
"No, Peter just faked that, so that people would blame Sirius for betraying the Potters. It's a long story, actually."
"Yeah, I can understand that it is…" Romulus rubbed his forehead distractedly. "So… you know where he is, right?"
"Yes."
"But you're not telling anybody. Like Kingsley Shacklebolt, who's in charge of the search for Black, and whom you seem to know very well."
"I don't need to tell him, he already knows," Remus said calmly.
It took Romulus a few moments to process this. "He already knows?"
"That's what I said."
"But… Remus, what is going on here?"
Remus hesitated. It would be so easy to spit it out right here and now, but he feared that it might all be too much for Romulus to swallow.
"It's very complicated," he said. "It's not just about Sirius, but it has to do with Harry as well - Harry Potter. And Dumbledore. And Voldemort."
Romulus winced at this name. "You don't mean to say that the stories Harry and Dumbledore told are true? I heard they're… slightly unhinged. Harry is, at least."
"No, that's what the Daily Prophet would have you believe. Look, I can't tell you all right now, this is not the right time nor the right place."
"Well, when is?"
"Just… just give me some time. I promise I'll tell you."
Romulus studied his brother's face. Finally, when he had apparently decided that Remus was earnest, he said: "alright. But I will keep you to your promise."
Reprieve of execution. It felt that way to Remus. He was nervous about having to tell his brother about the return of Voldemort and his own involvement with the Order of the Phoenix - he knew Romulus, and he was afraid that he would try and get into the Order as well. Remus resolved to prevent this at all cost - if Romulus died, he knew it would be his fault for letting his brother join the Order in the first place. He was not going to rob his niece and nephew of their father.
As the days passed, however, his worry about his brother was pushed back by something else: Umbridge's newest stunt. She had gone and expelled Harry, Fred and George from the Gryffindor Quidditch team. This time, Remus and McGonagall weren't the only ones scolding at Umbridge. All Weasleys were voicing their intense dislike. Their feelings were, however, topped by what Sirius felt. He spoke with an intensity and eloquence that Remus would have admired - had the content been a little less vile and hateful. He thought it better not to go and talk to Sirius about it, though. Sirius wasn't exactly happy with him either. All because of Halloween.
Remus had arrived at Grimmauld Place only very late in the night, past midnight. Romulus had asked him to come with him to the Ministry, to see if there were others from the Capture Unit they could report their visit to. But there had been no-one, everybody had gone to celebrate Halloween. Remus immediately went to Grimmauld Place, but when he arrived there, Sirius had gone to bed. The empty bottle of Firewhiskey on the kitchen table had seemed like a silent accusation to Remus: you left me all by myself, while you knew how important this day was to me. Sirius never mentioned it, but he never could hide his anger well. It was visible in his bodylanguage, those few times he spoke to Remus.
More than three weeks passed before Remus saw Romulus again. He got an invitation - not from Romulus, but from Ralph, Remus' one-year old nephew. It said, in Romulus' handwriting, with a definite sense of irony: more than a week ago, I celebrated my first birthday. Sadly, you weren't there to celebrate it with me. You're still invited to come, though. And under that: hint hint.
Remus felt ashamed, bought something he hoped a one-year old child would like, and went to his brother's house, dreading… he wasn't quite sure, actually, but he dreaded it. The welcome he got, however, was a very warm one - not that it eased his feelings. In fact, they only increased because of the look Romulus gave him. He wasn't going to get off easily.
To his pleasant surprise, his parents were there too. He hadn't seen them in months, he had been too busy. Judging by his mother's reaction, it had been too long. Her normal worries about the most 'fragile' one of her children had been only increased by recent happenings; the article in the Daily Prophet, mainly, and Dolores Umbridge's new job.
Remus managed to calm her down and pry her off himself so that he could drink something and give his present. Ralph welcomed the plush elephant happily and immediately proceeded to strangle it.
"Well, at least it's appreciated," Mr Lupin smiled. "And what's the use of a stuffed animal if you can't strangle it?"
The rest of the party quite agreed with this. What followed was a long conversation about the merits of stuffed animals, which was actually quite a normal subject for the Lupin family. They had dinner, then put the children into bed. Thirza was ecstatic - instead of the usual one bedtime story, she got three, courtesy of mum and dad, grandpa and grandma. And when she snuck out of bed again to ask for a glass of water, uncle Remus went silly, picked her up, turned her upside-down and carried her off to bed again. She'd never had so much attention before in her life - that she could remember anyway. She didn't realise that her mum and dad were glad that there was only one toddler with the ability to climb out of bed in the house. And if she realised that, she didn't care.
The smile on Remus' face quickly faded when he came back into the living room and saw everybody else looking at him. He raised his hands in a defensive way.
"Okay, okay," he said. "I'll talk."
"Good," Romulus said. "Because there are some questions that need answers."
"I suspect I'm your man." Remus took position by the fireplace; he felt more comfortable standing during explanations, and he feared this was going to take some time. He saw his mother give him an anxious look, and he smiled reassuringly at her.
"What do you want to know?" he asked.
"Tell me about Sirius Black," Romulus said. He had taken position opposite Remus, leaning against the hearth as well, almost closing the others out. This was going to be a conversation between brothers, really; the others were more audience than participants.
"I'll have to go back a long time," Remus began. "More than fourteen years, in fact." He summarised the events, he didn't think it was necessary to go into everything in-depth. The summarised version was shocking enough as it was anyway. Nobody interrupted him to express their surprise or shock, but the expressions on their faces told him enough.
"So…" Romulus said when he was done, "You're saying that Peter Pettigrew was in league with… You-Know-Who, and betrayed the Potters to him?"
"Yes," Remus said simply.
"I can't believe that," Mr Lupin said. "Peter was always such a timid boy. And he always looked up to James."
"I know! I know," Remus said. "But for some reason that wasn't enough. Sirius thinks Peter joined Voldemort - " The others flinched. "- because he thought that was going to be the winning side, and it would be better to be on that side once the war ended. I myself, I don't know."
"Seems like a pretty lousy reason to betray your friends though," Julia said. "Especially when they have a small child."
"Absolutely right. Though, of course, in a twisted way, it was sort of helpful too - if Peter hadn't send… alright, his boss to the Potters, he wouldn't have come across Harry, and you know what happened next."
They thought about the twisted ways fate worked in for a moment. Romulus broke the silence with: "and where is Sirius now?"
"I know where he is," Remus said, "but I'm not going to tell you."
Romulus cocked his head in a silent question.
"I know I can trust you," Remus continued, "but there's a life at stake. The fewer people know, the saver it is."
"Okay, that's reasonable. Just tell me - he's not hidden somewhere in your house, is he? That we walked passed him on numerous occasions."
"No, he's not," Remus smiled. "Not anymore, at least." He looked at his mother and grinned. "Might as well come out with the truth now. Those socks you found last summer, and the extra plate and cup, they were Sirius's. I thought it better not to tell you then."
"Oh…" she said, slightly taken aback. Her mind was still reeling with what she had just heard. "Well… that explains something."
"But if Sirius Black is innocent," Romulus said, "and Kingsley Shacklebolt knows of it, and Dumbledore, then why hasn't anyone told Fudge?"
"Because, sadly, we have no proof, nothing to convince Fudge that it's the truth, except the words of some rather unbelievable witnesses," Remus explained. "Dumbledore and Harry are thought to be off their rockers, Harry is underage anyway, I'm not thought to be very reliable either, and of course Sirius will say that he's innocent. The story is so strange too - Peter Pettigrew isn't dead, instead he's the one who betrayed the Potters. It's too strange to be true."
"Hmm…" Romulus said pensively. "How come he managed to convince you, though?"
"I know Sirius," Remus said calmly, "and I know when he's telling the truth. Besides, the situation was so… he would gain nothing with lying. He had to be telling the truth."
"And what's Kingsley Shacklebolt doing with all this?"
"He showed up at my house one day, asking me to help him find Sirius. I figured that getting the Aurors off Sirius' back might make things easier for him, so I told Kingsley what I just told you, managed to convince him, and now he's on our side."
"And still pretending he's looking for Sirius," Romulus said shrewdly.
"Well, yes, else he'd be out of a job, wouldn't he?"
"That's true."
There was another moment of silence. Remus looked around the room. The only who didn't seem lost in thoughts or slightly confused was his sister-in-law, Julia. She had heard of Sirius, the Potters and Peter Pettigrew, but she had never actually met them, so the news didn't really hit her as much.
He looked back at Romulus, and saw that his brother was smiling faintly.
"What's so funny?"
"Not very much, actually. But I just thought that the version of the story you just told me - with Peter betraying the Potters instead of Sirius - makes a little more sense. In a 'my world got just twisted upside-down' kind of way."
"And that's a good thing, I hope?" Remus asked, just to be sure.
"Yes, I think it is."
"But there's another thing." Mrs Lupin's voice suddenly cut through her sons conversation. She had got to her feet and looked anxiously at her eldest son. "Besides Sirius."
"What do you mean?" Remus shot Romulus a puzzled look. Romulus looked back with an expression that didn't promise much help.
"There were stories…" Mrs Lupin continued. Her husband had taken her hand in a comforting way. "Last summer. About Harry Potter, and… that You-Know-Who had returned. There were rumours."
"Yes, I heard that too," Remus said calmly. He knew his mother wasn't going to like this, but it would be no use to try and keep the truth from her.
"So, they're false? Just rumours? You seem to spend a great deal of time with Albus Dumbledore these days."
"No," Remus said, speaking slowly to make them take in every word, "the rumours are true. Voldemort has returned. Harry has seen it with his own eyes."
This time, the gasps and flinches were not just because of the name. Romulus reflexively grabbed the stone fireplace, staring wide-eyed at his brother. Both Julia and Mr Lupin had abruptly sat up straight, their faces pale. Mrs Lupin had only paled a little - she had already feared the worse, and she only saw those fears confirmed.
"Tell me," she said softly, her voice shaking almost unnoticeably. "Tell me. Has Albus Dumbledore started his Order again?"
Julia had been stroking her hand over her forehead in distraction, but she stopped in the middle of this movement. "What Order?"
"A secret Order founded by Dumbledore," Remus explained. "It used to fight Voldemort and his Death Eaters last time. Me, the Potters and Sirius were members of it. It sounds cooler than it is, actually."
"And have you joined him again?" his mother whispered. She had taken a few steps forward and was now standing right in front of Remus. He could look her straight in the eye - a slim, somewhat frail old woman, her white hair still long and as always tied back in a long braid. Her brown eyes, which she had fixed on Remus, were filled with fear. They were begging him not to tell her what she knew he was going to say.
"Yes," he said, and wished he didn't have to say it.
"You lie," she said. "Please tell me you're lying."
He smiled sadly, feeling immensely sorry for her. "I'm not."
She gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth. She closed her eyes and, like Julia earlier, stroked with her hand over her forehead. An immense sadness shown through that simple gesture. However, when she removed her hand and opened her eyes, her face was set.
"No," she said. "I won't have it. It's too dangerous."
"I can't just step out of it," Remus said gently. "I have to do this."
"But think of it… Remus, you ran enough risk last time! Think of the people who died, because of this stupid Order!"
"Would you rather that we did nothing, and let Voldemort do as he pleases?" he said, sharper than he had intended. "Trust me, this time around we actually had a head-start, and we have spies, we know what - oh Mum."
His mother had burst into tears at the prospect of losing her eldest son after having fought for him for so long. In the first war, she had spend every day dreading a visit from Aurors or other members from the Order, to tell her that Remus had died a gruesome death. Although she had felt sorry for the Potters, of course, a part of her couldn't help rejoice that at least Remus was safe again. And now it started all over again.
"Please, Mum, don't cry, please." Remus rather helplessly embraced her in much the same way he had done with Molly, a few months before. She clung to him, her shoulders shaking with sobs she tried to repress. The others looked on about as helplessly as Remus felt, until Mr Lupin got to his feet, gently pried his wife off Remus and took her in his arms himself. He patted her on her back, making soft, shushing sounds.
Remus looked at his parents, his father comforting his mother, and he was strongly reminded of Arthur and Molly Weasley.
In a war, parents were usually the first to feel it.
Author's Note
That was probably the cheesiest last line I ever used. Wow. New record.
Funny thing: this chapter earned me a freaky experience, and it was all my own fault. You see, when I first thought up Margaret Wilson, I immediately had a very strong picture of her in my mind, even before I'd thought of a name for her. She was pretty much a spitting image of my Cultural Antropology of the Middle East teacher. She's one of my favourite teachers and doesn't resemble Mrs Wilson in ANY way - character-wise, at least!
I just hadn't realised that she'd be teaching me this semester...
I had the first class yesterday, and it was weird. I had to keep myself from grinning insanely as she walked into the classroom. It was literally as if one of my characters had come to life! It got especially freaky when she said the following: "people used to believe that their lives were controlled by forces from outside. I'm not sure whether it's ever been studied, but people used to believe that the moon had influence on them, that they behaved differently, for example, when it was a full moon."
Me: oO thinks: say "werewolf" and I'll scream!
It was just a REALLY strange coïncidence!