Author's note: This chapter has been lurking in my brain for a very long time, so I'm glad it's here now. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns the canon, world, and characters portrayed below and you can tell I'm not J.K. Rowling because #transrights

Hogwarts: Assignment #4, Extinct Languages Task #1 Write about someone well known/famous in the Wizarding World and the effect that fame has on their life.

Warnings: NA

Any and All Questions

He could hear the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs chattering away from down the hall. They were boisterous today and probably happy that Remus hadn't assigned any reading to them over the holidays. The pit of Remus' stomach felt like a rock quarry as he walked to his classroom, his book bag thrown over one shoulder and one hand stuck in his pocket, holding a letter that Dora had sent via owl that morning since she'd known what his lesson plan for today was—which was to say, nothing. We love you. You've got this. -Dora and Teddy. He'd memorized the note instantly.

"Hello, everyone," Remus said, walking into the classroom. A few students jumped down from the desks they'd been sitting on and chatty cliques broke apart as the fifth-years before him took their seats.

A few of the students shouted their hellos back but overwhelmingly, it was quiet as his students watched him. He only recognized some of the seventh year students from his last bout of teaching in the castle, but he felt recognition in the weight of their eyes on him. He had not been immune to the whispers in the Great Hall at the Feast last night, when McGonagall had introduced him. He put his bag down, found some chalk, and wrote his name on the board.

"I'm Professor Remus Lupin," he said. "I taught at Hogwarts many years ago and was invited back by Professor McGonagall after the war. I look forward to getting to know all of you."

He put the chalk down and turned back around so that he could sit on his desk.

"I have the notes from what you learned last year," Remus said. "However, I'm aware that the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor position was vacant and that you were sharing a professor with the Dublin Institute of Magic which, while Professor Morgana is admirable, was not ideal. I promise to do what I can to prepare you for your OWLS but please don't be afraid to slow me down at any point if I'm going too fast. Alright?"

A few students nodded, a handful scribbling some of his words on the parchment before him. Remus had found the lesson plans he'd drawn up when he had first been hired—first years learned how to recognize curses and cursed objects, second years learned protective magic and basic countercurses, third years learned about creatures and beings, fourth years learned about the history and regulation of dark magic, fifth years started dueling and prepared for OWLS, sixth years perfected dueling and learned more elaborate countercurses, while the seventh years prepared for NEWTS and discussed magical ethics. Dumbledore had been impressed with the curriculum all those years ago, and Dora had since endorsed his plans too—so he felt quite confident in them. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny had quite sweetly bemoaned the fact that they'd only had him as a teacher for a year. But still, despite these plans he was going to be doing the same thing in his classes all week—at least for the first week of classes.

He looked around the classroom at the students looking back at him.

"Alright," Remus said. He got up again and moved back towards the blackboard as he spoke. "We're going to start today a little differently than our other classes because I want to give you a chance to ask any and all questions you may have—there won't be any stupid questions in this room."

He took the chalk and wrote the word on the board, circling it. Werewolves.

"What do we as a class know about werewolves?" Remus asked.

A few of his students looked at each other nervously.

"Sir?" one of the students asked, putting her hand up.

"Yes," Remus said. "What's your name?"

"Margery Burbage, sir. You… you didn't assign any reading to us about werewolves," she pointed out.

"That's correct, thank you Margery," Remus said. "We can do some reading later if that interests some of you, but for now let's think about the things that you casually know or have simply heard."

There was quiet in the class again. Some of his students shifted nervously.

"I'll start," Remus offered. He scribbled his answer on the board. "Werewolves are classified, by the Ministry of Magic as Beasts with an XXXXX rating—putting them amongst the most dangerous batch."

He turned back to his students. A boy with floppy brown hair raised his hand.

"Your name?" Remus asked.

"Nicholas. Jeremy Nicholas."

"Thank you Jeremy," Remus said. "What can you add to the board?"

"Werewolves are monsters—well, they're people but they become monsters on the full moon," Jeremy said. "And they bite others so then those people become monsters too."

"Good," Remus said, scribbling down the answer. "10 points to Hufflepuff for speaking up first, Jeremy, thank you. Werewolves are human beings who, on the full moon, become something else. A bite from a werewolf will indeed transmit lycanthropy, which is what the condition is technically called. Do we know what that 'something else' is? What does a werwolf look like, once transformed?"

"Like… big," one of the Gryffindors said which elucidated some laughter.

"You aren't wrong," Remus said. He added it to the board. "The average werewolf is about seven feet tall if transformed and standing at full height, though that's quite rare."

"They're supposed to look like a wolf but the shape of the snout and the size and the muscles are different," one of the girls said quietly.

"Correct," Remus said. He wrote on the board; appearance of wolf with some differences. Remus paused. "What else?"

"Silver hurts them," a Gryffindor boy called out.

"Yes," Remus said. "Silver can be quite painful in the week before the full moon, let's add that. Keep adding things to the board, please, just shout things out."

Once he got his students going he could barely keep up with the note taking as he filled his classroom's blackboard.

"They've got twice as many teeth as human beings."

"The Ministry's got a list of them in case there's an uprising."

"They can smell you from over 10 kilometres away."

"The moon makes them lose all sense of right and wrong and they can't really control themselves."

"They were allied with Voldemort during the Wizarding War."

There was a hush that fell on the class after that last one.

Remus added it onto the board anyways, before going back to sit on his desk.

"I asked you to tell me what you knew because, as I expect many of you to know, I am a werewolf myself," Remus finally said. Some of them hadn't known and hid their shock with varying degrees of success "I am, actually, the first known werewolf to be awarded an Order of Merlin First Class although I have been publicly known to be a werewolf for several years now, even before the creation of the Werewolf Registry. I was bitten when I was four years old by another werewolf you may have heard of named Fenrir Greyback who was, in fact, allied with Voldemort during the Wizarding War."

The students looked at him curiously and uncomfortably. He had known that some of them would recognize his name from The Prophet's various stories on him, since Rita Skeeter couldn't seem to write an article on the Wizarding War without mentioning his monthly endeavours. He had also known that some would assume that he must be a different Remus Lupin because why in the world would a werewolf be teaching at Hogwarts.

"While I'm at Hogwarts, I will be taking the Wolfsbane potion monthly to ease my transformations, meaning that I will not become a true werewolf on school grounds," Remus said. "Under the influence of Wolfsbane, which is an incredibly useful but incredibly rare potion, I pose no more danger than Professor McGonagall in her Animagus form. That being said, I understand that all the things that are on the board behind me are frightening things to hear or know. And so, before we do anything else this school year, I would like to offer you all a chance to ask any questions you have about werewolves and lycanthropy."

The classroom shifted a little bit as his students mulled over their options. Remus gave them a moment and then a girl with auburn braids who was taking notes with gel pens raised her hand.

"Yes," Remus said. "And your name, please."

"Aubrey McKonohay," she said. "Does it hurt to transform?"

The concern in her voice was rather unexpected and sweet. He suspected that she was a Muggleborn and perhaps had different ideas of what he might be. Still, it eased the tension in Remus' shoulders immediately.

"Yes," Remus said. "It is. Most of us need a few days after the full moon to recuperate and feel better."

Someone else raised his hand.

"Sean Molemba," the student said. "Is it true that werewolves like Greyback can change people even when they aren't in werewolf form?"

"Good question," Remus said. "The answer is no; though Greyback did everything he could to hurt as many people as possible while in human form with the specific intent of causing fear. He did hurt many people, but he did not transform them. You, in the back?"

"Myriam Shwartz," she said. "Is it true that werewolves have superhuman senses all the time?"

"No, that would be too convenient," Remus said with a smirk. "This is an extremely inconvenient condition. It is typically safe to assume that any possible advantage to it is false."

There was giggling in the room and Remus smiled too. He nodded to another student with a raised hand.

"Is your wife a werewolf?" the student asked. She seemed uncomfortable with the question instantly. "You… you're wearing a wedding band and she… she's in the paper..."

"Yes, I am married," Remus said. "But no, she isn't a werewolf. Just a very exceptional witch."

"If you have kids will they be werewolves too?"

"I do have a son," Remus said—glad that they had managed to keep Teddy out of the press enough for that question to exist. "He's two years old now and no, he isn't a werewolf. He would need to be bitten to become one."

"How many werewolves are there?" someone asked.

"That is another very good question whose answer we simply don't know," Remus said. "I know about fifty, personally, but the amount of stigma surrounding lycantrhopy means that many of us prefer to hide our condition—which creates other problems."

"Can Muggles become werewolves too?"

"They can, but they're more likely to die from their wounds than wizards, unfortunately," Remus said. "Like I said, it is very painful and quite traumatic."

"Have you ever bitten someone?"

"Thankfully, no," Remus said. "I'm very careful on full moons."

"Is there anything werewolfy that stays when you transform back to being a human?"

"No," Remus said. "Only injuries will carry over, which leads to some interesting scars and bruises."

"Do you remember what happens on a full moon the day after?"

"Some werewolves do, some werewolves don't," Remus said. "Experience seems to help, but they bring imperfect memories. It's like… well, I don't know how I'll explain it to the first years if they ask but some of you may have overindulged with alcohol and woken up the next morning remembering certain things that you made, unable to remember why you did them with that memory being your first experience of that moment. I see some nodding which I will ignore for the sake of a successful allegory."

"Is the sex thing true?"

Remus startled.

"What…" his mind blanked. "What sex thing? You know what, I'll assume because I don't know about it that no, it isn't."

There was some giggling.

"Are all the things on the board true?" Myriam asked.

"Not quite," Remus said. "Shall we go over them?"

"Yeah, that'd be good," Jeremy said.

"Alright," Remus said, sliding off his desk and circling back to the blackboard. "Which one should we start with?"

"Start with the thing about the ministry having a list," one boy with curly hair said. "Is that true?"

"Ah, the Werewolf Registry," Remus said. "Yes, there's certainly a lot to unpack there… do you want the long answer or the short one, everyone?"

He got a chorus of mixed answers so he crossed the item off the list and explained to them how extremely failable the list was because of stigma, among its many other problematic features. He'd been nervous about being in class again, but the words came to him easily and the students seemed genuinely curious. Remus was somewhat surprised when the bell rang and they ran out of time.

"Any homework for tomorrow, professor?" someone asked.

"Go sit by the Black Lake at some point," Remus told the class as he tapped his wand to the eraser so that it began scrubbing the blackboard. "It's beautiful outside. I'll see you all tomorrow."

And even if they unquestionably knew he was a werewolf now, none of them protested. They just said goodbye on their ways out the door.

WC: 2189