Author's Note: Nothing much to say, save that this will probably turn up on Schnoogle at Fictionalley some time in the future. Also, if anyone would like to beta for me, it would be much appreciated. Next chapter in perhaps a week.
Chapter Two: Moving Mayhem
Nymphadora Tonks stood, her hands firmly planted in the voluminous pockets at the hips of her robes, surveying the small pile of boxes and crates Remus Lupin had assembled. Eying all of Lupin's earthly possessions, she said, "You sure you don't just want to dump them at my flat? It's not like I spend any time there, and this wouldn't take up much space."
"No, thank you, Tonks," Remus said. "I certainly won't impose, not when I haven't the faintest idea when I'll be back from – wherever it is I'm going. I wish Dumbledore had been more forthcoming." He rubbed the back of his neck, stretched, and winced as his vertebrae creaked.
"Worry about that after the next moon," the young auror said tartly. "C'mon. Let's get all of this junk out of here – where did you say you're leaving it?"
"Well, most of the furniture's going on consignment, and I'm giving my grindylows to Hagrid, for his Care of Magical Creatures class – heavens, the man does like his dangerous creatures – but I've found a reputable storage center in Diagon Alley which said they'd take it for indefinite periods of time. I just have to order Gringotts to take money from my vault every month."
Tonks frowned, her hands still jammed in her pockets. "What on earth is in those boxes, anyway? It certainly isn't much – aren't you taking anything with you, wherever you're going?"
"Oh, just books, and a few odds and ends. And that reminds me – I think Sirius would have liked you to have this… he left it with me last year, before we reclaimed Headquarters, and I hadn't found it until I was packing…"
Lupin was holding a small figurine of a black dog, a porcelain affair, deftly painted. When Tonks took it, she found it warm to the touch, and the incessantly smiling expression on the dog's face made her laugh softly – it was a Labrador, perhaps, with its lolling tongue and great brown eyes.
"Oh, Remus… no, I can't."
Lupin closed Tonks's hand around the figure with his own, and looked into her eyes, suddenly a watery grey. "I want you to have it. Sirius wasn't a sentimental man, goodness no, but he found a black mutt in our first year at Hogwarts, lurking around the edges of the Forbidden Forest, and he cried like a baby when Hagrid couldn't fix it up enough to live. Then, a little later, he had this miniature, and I don't think any of us were surprised by his animagus… well. It's yours, and I won't hear another word about it."
He smiled, a tight, aching smile, and straightened his cloak. "Let's get out of here, and quickly. My landlady's not a witch, and she's growing suspicious; it's why I have to move so often… well, at least I shan't have to pay rent any more. What the muggles charge is ridiculous these days, but I can hardly afford Hogsmeade or Diagon Alley, so…"
With a flick of his wand, Lupin shrunk the boxes and crates into a stack of tiny parcels, all of which he shoved haphazardly into a badly patched tote. On close inspection, Tonks noticed that the large plaid patch on the bottom left of the tote exactly matched the repairs done on the hood of Lupin's cloak. She winced.
To mask it, she said cheerily, "Well! Shall we get going, then?"
"Can we apparate into Diagon Alley?" Remus asked, frowning. "I don't know – I haven't been following Ministry security updates as closely as I should."
"Apparition's out, but the floos are still in service in The Leaky Cauldron. D'you have any powder?"
"I've got a little left. That's why rent's so expensive here – trying to find a cheap Muggle flat with a fireplace is like chasing snorcacks." He reached toward the mantle of his fireplace and then swore. "Damn it, I already packed the floo powder." He smiled apologetically at Tonks.
"Fancy a walk, then? Or we could use the Tube. The Muggle Underground really is a good idea. Now that apparition's mostly blocked these days, the Ministry should look into something similar – portkey stations, maybe. It would make life rather easier on those of us without brooms or autocars."
Tonks hooted. "Autocars? Who on earth says autocars, Lupin? I thought you were a halfblood!"
Looking affronted, but still courteous enough to hold the door open for his companion, Lupin said, "My grandmother was a very respectable woman, Muggle or otherwise, and she referred to them as autocars."
Still giggling, Tonks followed after.
Both of them had muggleborn relatives, and knew enough about the Underground not to embarrass themselves on the non-magic transportation. Remus got a few odd looks when he got his robes stuck on the turnstile, but Tonks, who dressed in Muggle attire unless forced to do otherwise, blended in perfectly. Her hair was canary yellow today, which looked absolutely awful with her pale skin and green eyes (all the Blacks except Narcissa had had dark hair and pale eyes), and she was wearing an artfully shredded Weird Sisters shirt with a pair of dungarees.
"It's nice to have normal old you be the one stared at, rather than me. Everybody here thinks I'm just another young hooligan. It's something to be said for the Muggles," Tonks remarked as she found a handrail on the train.
"Me? Old? I'm all of thirty-eight, thank you very much," Remus said, doing his best to look affronted.
The two of them chatted idly as they approached Charing Cross Road, Tonks looking out of the windows with obvious curiosity. As nobody could hear properly in the noisy train, the young witch dared to ask, "Do they get many creatures down in the tube? I mean, all these tunnels, you'd think they'd attract boggarts and nifflers and redcaps."
"It's nothing to joke about. Muggle workers have been disappearing in mists, their bodies found later sucked empty by dementors. They've been breeding." Lupin shuddered, and peered balefully into the darkness, every now and then seeing a glimpse of a platform.
The conversation died on the train after that cheery note, but the two were in good moods again as they walked into the Leaky Cauldron, said a quick hullo to Hagrid, who was drinking what looked like a pitcher of ale with Madame Maxime, and headed out into Diagon Alley proper. While the pub had still been its usual congenial self, albeit without the diverse clientele it had once attracted, Diagon Alley was markedly different. It had lost its perpetual holiday spirit: the street vendors had stopped selling sweets, and were now offering protective amulets (Lupin jumped straight in the air when he brushed against a Lycanth). Worse, though, was the atmosphere – there was no idle chatter any more, no laughing.
Tonks sighed, and turned to Lupin. "I hate to be a bother, but can I ditch you for an hour? I just noticed, Dawlish isn't on duty by the entrance to the Alley, and it's his shift. My auror senses of duty and justice are urging me to be a good girl and take his place until his replacement comes, which should be in … an hour. Anyway, meet you at Fortescue's?"
"That sounds lovely," Remus said. "Diagon Alley is lucky to have someone as dutiful as you are."
"Not even my shift," Tonks grumbled. "I'll give Dawlish dutiful when he gets back…"
After haggling with the witch behind the counter of Bucklehaus, Bucklehaus, & Snodberry's , 1583 over a suitable price for a self-transfiguring bed and sofa set, Lupin headed over to the ice cream shop, exhausted. He didn't care about his possessions, not that there were many, outside of his books and a few photos, but he did want to have some little money set by whenever he returned from his job for Dumbledore. Whatever that was, whenever he'd find out about it.
Tonks stormed into the shop fifteen minutes past their agreed time, her hair bright red and her nails clawlike again. It was her "angry face", all too familiar to Order members who'd been at her debriefing during the long year before the Ministry's recognition of Voldemort's return.
"D'you know why stinking Dawlish was gone? D'you want to know why?" She slammed her chair down in front of the little table outside the café. "Because Rufus Scrimgouer's just gotten the top job at the Ministry, after Fudge, and – get this – nobody bothered to rearrange the aurors' schedule! Dawlish is head of the Aurory now, but he didn't have the presence of mind to make sure somebody else was covering his shift. This is the idiot who's going to be my boss! And they have Kingsley working as a secretary. It's retaliation, is what it is! Oops, you were right, let's stick you in a dead-end job and hope everybody forgets you knew the bloody truth while everyone else was behaving like Ostriches with their heads stuck in the ground. I swear, I'm filing a complaint with Scrimgoeur as soon as I get back into the office. I am not going to –"
"Tonks," Remus said, "you're shaking the table."
Indeed she was – she was so angry, she kept gripping the flimsy little café table and then releasing it, making it rock back and forth, the brightly-colored umbrella leaning precariously toward Remus.
"Oh. Sorry." She blushed, her cheeks as scarlet as her hair. "Gods, I'm sorry, Remus, but if there's one thing I can't stand, it's incompetents like Dawlish who still get rewarded in all the bureaucratic shuffle. He's been here for twenty years, nobody's ever complained loudly about him, hasn't distinguished himself in any way but he hasn't been a bother either – here's a medal, now sit behind this desk all day and make more of a muddle out of things than your predecessors. Great idea."
"I think you've just pinpointed why I never joined the Ministry," Remus said dryly. "Well, that, and the little problem of my being a werewolf." He grimaced. "Did you know that it's illegal for werewolves to get a job in the Ministry? Or to vote for appointments to the Wizengamot? Even if you've never done a single untoward thing in my life – though I can't say that would be me, given all the fiascos I've caused – even if you've been the most exemplary adherent of all two hundred and ninety-seven clauses in the Werewolf Code of Conduct – you're still not a citizen, of Britain or any magical nation, as far as I know. Not even the NAMF (North American Magical Federation), as far as I know, and they're by far the most liberal. Oh, Merlin, sorry. First you're ranting, then me." He smiled apologetically.
"Naw, that wasn't ranting, Remus. You don't have it in you, quite, to rant. You're too mild-mannered, quiet, unassuming. This, my friend, is ranting." She stood up, and suddenly, she began to grow taller, her cheeks redder, her hair brighter, her nails longer and sharper. She opened her mouth to speak –
And with a sharp yank to her hand, Remus dragged her back into her seat. "What on earth are you doing?" he hissed.
"Hah, scared you," Tonks said, leaning back in her chair. "Really, you get too worked up about things, Remus. You need to relax, take a joke, go with the flow."
"You sound just like Sirius," Remus muttered, but he couldn't help smile. It was true – Tonks could be very much like her cousin. The Black blood flowed true, it seemed, though Remus was very glad that it was from Andromeda's particular strain.
At the mention of Sirius, Tonks's face fell, and, contrite, Remus leaned over, and impulsively grabbed her hand. "Oh, Nymphadora, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have said that, I know you're still grieving. We all are." Embarassed again, he withdrew his hand.
Sniffling, Tonks smiled, although she looked tearful. Her hair had suddenly shifted to mouse brown, and Remus worried, if she were loosing control of her morphs so easily. "Don't call me Nymphadora. No, Remus, it's okay. You couldn't have known – well. I was just a kid when Sirius went to Azkaban, and it was very hard on my Mum. She and Sirius were very close as kids, he looked up to her, and she'd always felt responsible for him. She couldn't believe that he'd killed his friends and all those Muggles, and it was a bad way with her for some time. When she'd get angry at me, if I'd done something very bad, she'd say that I would turn out just like my cousin Sirius. I'd only met him once or twice, but I'd liked him so much at the time… I didn't really know what he'd done, and I thought, 'Well, I liked him so much, maybe I really am like him, I must be a bad person.' It was the sort of thing a kid thinks…"
Remus didn't know what to say, so he settled for looking out into the fast-moving streets of Diagon Alley. The café was nearly empty, since these days, nobody much felt like lingering in public places.
They sat in awkward silence until Florean Fortescue himself came to take their order. The man was dressed in his usual dapper blue, but his face looked strained. Tonks ordered three scoops of pistachio icecream with butterscotch syrup and a cherry; Remus opted for vanilla with chopped almonds.
"Honestly, you're so boring," Tonks said, through a mouthful of ice cream.
"I don't know how you escape indigestion," Remus said, perfectly content to be stodgy in his ice cream.
"We Blacks have iron stomachs," Tonks said. "Actually, the Tonkses do, too. My grandmother, on my mother's side, she's a matron of the depression era. All my Dad ever ate was roast mutton, peas, and mashed potatos. Every day. Tasted like shoe leather, he said, and after Chrismas Dinner at Granny's I'm not about to disagree."
"Did you notice how edgy Fortescue looks?" Remus said.
"Everybody's been in a bad mood lately," Tonks replied. "Hell, even Ollivander's been antsy. He called the Aurory just last night, complaining about prowlers. I've never seen Ollivander spooked before, nobody has – not even in the last war. It's like things are darker now, in the underworld. Savage, he's our criminal expert over at the Aurory, and Mundungus – they say that everybody's scared, especially the low-level crooks. There's stuff going on that's never happened before. The Death Eaters mean serious business this time, they're pissed about that thirteen-year enforced holiday, and I think it's gonna be worse than ever before."
"Well, that's nice to know," Remus said. "Comforting, you might say, given that I'm about to head into that underworld."
"No laughing matter," Tonks said, serious for once. "I'm scared for you, Remus. Dumbledore's asking a lot from you, and you've given him so many favors over the years…"
"My debt to Dumbledore is one that I can never, ever make up. I will do anything for him, and for the cause."
He and Tonks continued to chat for nearly an hour, until a very nervous Fortescue told them that due to safety concerns, the parlor would be closing an hour early.
Remus insisted on paying for the ice cream, given the illusion of wealth that pawning off nearly all his earthly possessions had given him. As he rose to leave, he took Tonks's hand and gave it a slight peck, though he hadn't planned on doing any such thing and hadn't kissed a lady's hand since he was twenty, and so desperate to get a girl, any girl, that he'd acted like something out of a cheap romance novel.
"Remus, are you feeling all right?" Tonks asked, as she scooted in her chair and headed for the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron.
"Perfectly fine, Tonks. Simply overwhelmed at the prospect of bidding so lovely and dedicated a lady as you adieu for the evening." He smiled, and laughed softly.
"Speaking of which, where ARE you holing up?" she asked.
"I was going to go to go to Grimmauld Place, now that our ownership is cleared…"
Tonks looked at him in horror. "Oh, no, you can't. I won't let you sit in that dismal shack by yourself waiting for Dumbledore to… to throw you to the wolves!"
"I've got no other place to go, Tonks," Remus said. "I couldn't stay on at my flat, since I can hardly afford the rent if I'm not going to be in it."
"C'mon," Tonks said, grabbing his arm. "You're coming home with me."