A Darker Shade of Red

Coming Together

Then there was this horrible image. A twelve-year-old girl; A tall man with blonde hair; blood and pain and-

"NO! PLEASE STOP IT!" the girl screeched.

The man slapped her and started tearing her clothes away.

"Shut up, Lupin, it'll be easier that way."

Gin sagged to the floor as everything just stopped and she was in shock. He'd raped her. That bastard Lucius Malfoy had raped her.

"Oh my God." she muttered.

"Mummy, why won't you go see your friends?" questioned Katie's small voice.

The older woman smiled. "I can't, hon, not until that girl right there figures it all out."

"Oooh."

Ginevra lay in her bed, staring at the picture Colin Creevey had taken for her. It was of the beautiful note Nicole had left. The only thing she was really thinking about, though, was those two words.

"'Tand edo.'" she muttered, "What does that mean?"

She gave up finally and let sleep take her over.

"C'mon Gin... It's easy... Rearrange the letters." whispered a mysterious voice into her ear, "HURRY!"

The girl bolted upright in her four-poster in a cold sweat, her auburn locks sticking to her forehead and face. She tried to calm herself down before going into the bathroom and splashing water on her face. That voice was still ringing in her ears. She sighed and picked up the picture again.

"'Rearrange the letters'... " she murmured, biting her lip.

Put the 'd' there, and the 'n' there and...

"Oh. My. Goddess."

She had moved the letters around a bit and sucked in air as she realized what it said.

"Not Dead."

"YES! GO Gin, GO Gin, GO GO GO Gin!" the girl exclaimed, effectively scaring her daughter.

She blushed. "Sorry, sweet."

Ginevra ran. She ran until she got to Dumbledore's office with Laura and T.J. on her heels. "Gin what's... going... on?" Laura asked, her breath coming in pants.

"I moved the letters in Nicole's note around and it said this."

She handed her friends the peice of parchment she'd figured it out on.

"'Not dead'? But, Gin, we saw her body, she was in the ground." T.J. said, "Dead."

"I was not!" shrieked a voice behind them.

The three turned and gaped at what they saw.

Nicole.

Transparent, yes, but still there.

"Okay, I guess I was... Am... Whatever... But not forever." she reasoned.

"Oh, goddess." T.J. said, hyperventilating.

Her eyes rolled into the back of her head and she fainted. Soon enough, Laura and Ginevra joined her.

Cole rolled her eyes and looked upwards. "Katie, come here; I need you to do something."

Severus Snape sat at his desk, grading scrolls of homework for the sixth years when a 'swoosh' caught his attention.

"Hello?" he called, taking out his wand.

"Hi, Professor Snoop." said the giddy little voice of a child.

"Who is it?" he snapped.

A small form with raven curls and kind blue-gray eyes skipped forward into the Potion Master's veiw.

"My name is Kathleen Cordelia Lupin, or Katie." she said, "My mummy said you should follow me."

His eyebrow hit his hairline. "And exactly who is your 'mummy'?"

"Nicole Rosemaria Lupin-Keith, but she doesn't like the 'Keith' part so its just Nicole Rosemaria Lupin, or Cole or Nikki or Nik Nik or Coley or Spike." the child said, babbling.

Severus stood. "Where to, little one?" he asked, prepared to see where this was going.

"Professor!" exclaimed Nicole gleefully.

Severus looked at her in disbelief. "M-Miss Lupin?"

"The one and only." she said, "Heard you went to my funeral. I never knew you cared."

Severus rolled his eyes. "A pleasure to see death hasn't changed you."

Only then did he spot the three unconscious girls on the floor. "What happened to them?" he inquired, jerking his head towards them.

"Fainted."

"Ah, better get them to the infirmary."

"Probably a good idea." she said, smiling at him.

"And what about her?" he asked, nodding to Katie, who was holding her mother's hand as she walked alongside Snape.

"I'll explain later."

"Everyone please have seat." Cole said a few hours later.

She smiled around the hospital. All her friends were here, Dumbledore, McGonagall, Severus, Remus, and her daughter, too.

"Now I suppose you're all wondering what the hell is going on, right?"

"Yes."

"Well, you three-" she nodded to Gin, T.J., and Laura "-know I'm a Shifter, right?"

They nodded.

"Well, seeing as Voldemort has been tracking me down for all this time I decided to fake my own death. I took a potion that made me actually die and I turned all non-coporeal.

"The reason Voldemort was tracking me down was because of my blood. I told you I was one twelfth vampire, right? Well I also have some werewolf in me. Usually when vampire and werewolf DNA is mixed, the person would die instantly. But I was not bitten or scratched, it was genetic.

"There was a prophecy that said the one with the bloods of half would overrule the one of the serpent-tongued. That dumbass thought it was talking about me. When my mother was younger, around seventeen, she got a crush on Sirius Black. She, being the Lupin she was, eventually snatched him up and got him drunk and in bed. And then I happened.

"Since she never told my real father about me, no one else ever knew the truth. So later on my mother married this muggle ass-hat, Gregory Keith, and they lived unhappily ever after. Voldemort's out to wipe out all of the Blacks and Potters left so, there's your explaination on that matter."

They were all just staring at her now.

"Wait, that means- you and me are cousins." Laura said, "B-But, why haven't I-"

"I'm not a true Black, Laura, my real dad was disowned." Nicole said, pulling Katie to sit on her lap, "You really are the only true Black left. Me and Uncle Remy and Kate are the only Lupins left, and you and Scarhead, there, are the only Potters."

They all looked to Kate now. "What about her?"

Cole took a deep breath. "Well, Draco's dad raped me when I was twelve and I got pregnant. She's a Shifter, like me." the girl turned to Draco, "She's also your half sister. So, in a way, you and Scarhead are related."

The blonde boy and the raven-haired one shuddered at the thought.

"But can you two turn all bodily again?" Gin asked hopefully.

Nicole grimanced. "Only on the day I died and on my birthday, October 31st. So I'll be here for Christmas and Halloween." she replied, "Katie can turn anytime she wants."

"There isn't a potion or something you could take?" Blaise asked.

"Not that I know of."

Severus nodded. "I suppose you're right, Nicole."

"So you're gonna be like that forever, Mummy?"

Cole smiled down at her daughter sadly, "I think so, Katibell."

The small child made a face. "Really?"

"Yes, I'm sorry."

"No, Mummy, you had to do what you did. Or else your really would be dead. Y'know, in the ground." she pointed to the floor to empasize her point.

Cole smiled again. "Here, hon, go get you something to eat." she put Katie on her feet and watched as she floated away through the wall with the Gray Lady of Ravenclaw.

"She's cute, Cole." T.J. said after a moment.

"She is, isn't she?" she turned her gaze back to her friends, "Sorry about all of this. Not telling you, dying, leaving cryptic messages, everything."

They all grinned.

"Well, at least I can say I had one hell of a sixth year." Ginevra said.

End Chapter