Chapter 46: Werewolves
I was in the library. One of my past selves was in the common room giving Harry and Ron a quick recap of our most recent history of magic lecture which they'd slept through. Normally I wouldn't have done it, but Harry was still a little out of it from his quidditch accident and I felt bad for him.
Meanwhile, I had tons of homework to complete, including the blasted werewolf essay that Professor Snape had set which had just thrown my entire schedule out of whack. I decided to get that out of the way quickly, so that I could focus on more important things.
The topic of the essay was ways to recognize and kill a werewolf. It was pretty easy once I got going, and most of the information was written right there in my textbook. I was relieved that I wasn't going to have to do any additional research, because I really didn't have the time for it.
I started the essay by talking about how to recognize a werewolf in it's wolf form, then moved on to recognizing one in it's human form, and ended with methods for killing one if necessary.
The werewolf, or lycanthrope, is a human infected with a condition known as lycanthropy. This condition must be passed on through the bloodstream and it most typically transferred through the process of biting. Once infected, a werewolf becomes a slave to the moon, and once a month when the moon is full, the werewolf loses control of his or her body and is forced to transform into the form of the beast.
While in its bestial form, werewolves look very similar to regular wolves except for some notable differences. Werewolves have shorter snouts and tufted tails, and also retain their human eyes. If one were to get up close to a werewolf, these physical characteristics would surely be tell-tale signs that they were faced with no ordinary wolf. However, if someone were to get this close to a werewolf, the wolf would likely bite them, thus making physical identification pointless. The most common way of identifying a werewolf from a normal wolf is by its behaviour. Regular wolves fear and avoid human beings, only attacking when threatened. Werewolves seek humans out while under the control of the full moon, hunting them for sport and aiming to bite as many as they come across. Finally, if someone were to come across a wolf-like creature in an environment where wolves are not typically found, it would be reasonable to assume that it was a werewolf and not a regular wolf. However, it would be advisable to confirm via behavioural or physical identifiers before coming to a conclusion.
In their human forms, werewolves are much more difficult to distinguish from other humans. When a werewolf is in its human form, he or she retains all the same physical characteristics as before he or she was inflicted with the condition. There a couple of physical indications that one could use to identify a werewolf in human form. Due to the monthly transformations taking a toll on the body, werewolves age quicker than other humans, and they will also grow paler when the full moon is near, as their body anticipates the coming transformation. However, these are not foolproof indications of a werewolf and should never be used alone to identify one. Apart from keeping track of a person's activities during full moons and keeping careful track of the lunar cycle, it is very difficult to identify a werewolf in its human form.
Killing a werewolf in its wolf form is possible, but it is dangerous as it is inadvisable to get too close to one at the risk of being bitten. There is no specifically magical way to kill a werewolf, though a killing curse would be effective as with all living things. To kill a werewolf, one should be strong and fast, as the werewolf has enhanced speed and strength, and its hide is thick, making it difficult to pierce. While in human form, a werewolf would be as easy to kill as any other human, having none of the protections of its bestial form. However, as a part of the Werewolf Code of Conduct, legalized in 1637, in exchange for werewolves agreeing to lock themselves up during the full moon and not to attack humans while in their wolf form, it was made illegal to kill werewolves while in their human forms.
In conclusion, werewolves are most easily identifiable in their wolf form, and are almost indistinguishable from other humans while in their human form. While werewolves cannot be legally killed while in their human forms, they can be killed in their wolf forms if they are endangering other humans, but it is inadvisable to do so. The safest way to deal with a werewolf in its wolf form would be to run and hide, as their speed, strength, and enhanced senses make them extremely difficult, though not impossible to kill.
As I wrapped up my essay, I thought it was a little short, and wondered if I should add anything else to it. Professor Snape had asked for two rolls of parchment, which I had filled, but I felt like it needed something more. Then again, I had a lot of work to do and hadn't even started my muggle studies essay, which was due first thing in the morning.
I was about to close my textbook when I came across a paragraph I hadn't read before. I frowned, wondering how I could have missed it, and began to read.
As discussed, werewolves change at every full moon. However, this can be a rather painful process, creating a sense of fear in those that must change. For this reason, werewolves are most afraid of the moon. Furthermore, when faced with a boggart, it will turn into a full moon. If left undealt with, the boggart will cause an unscheduled change in the werewolf from man to wolf which will last until the boggart is dispelled.
Next to the paragraph, there was a picture of a werewolf staring at a full moon that was hovering in the middle of a room. The caption indicated that it was in fact a Boggart. Upon examining the picture further, I found that I had a vague memory of having seen something similar before. It nagged at the back of my head as I quickly scribbled an extra paragraph into my essay about boggarts and how it could be used as another way to identify a werewolf in their human form.
Just as I was rolling up my essay and stowing it in my bag, I realized where I'd seen the image before. It had been in Professor Lupin's class on boggarts. Just when Harry had been about to go, Professor Lupin had stepped in front of him and the boggart had turned into what we'd all assumed at the time was a crystal ball. But it hadn't been a crystal ball. It had been the full moon.
But Professor Lupin couldn't be a werewolf. If he was, he'd have to leave the school once a month to transform, because there was no way he could undergo his transformation on the Hogwarts' grounds, so close to so many students, and not have been detected. But then I remembered that he had been absent last week. Professor Snape had said he was ill, but what if it was more than that?
Frantically, I grabbed my astronomy things from my bag and consulted a lunar chart. Technically it had just been the full moon. If Professor Lupin wasn't a werewolf, he'd come down with the flu at a vey suspicious time. I felt my heartrate pick up as my mind ran through everything I knew about werewolves. They aged faster once they were infected, but that wasn't something I could judge Professor Lupin on, because I didn't know how old he was. I also knew that werewolves got paler when the full moon was coming, but I didn't spend enough time with the defence professor to know whether he'd been pale recently. What I did know was that he'd been absent during the full moon, and his boggart was a moon. And those were two pretty strong facts.
But Professor Dumbledore wouldn't hire a werewolf to teach students. According to my textbook and Professor Snape's lecture, werewolves were dangerous and couldn't be trusted. The Werewolf Code of Conduct had been created to reduce the dangers posed by werewolves to society by giving them incentive not to infect others with their condition. But that didn't mean they should be trusted to be around so many underage witches and wizards all the time.
My first thought was that I had to report this to a teacher. If there was a werewolf in the school, the teachers had to be notified so that they could ensure our safety. Then I realized that of course, the staff must already know. If not the entire staff, then Professor Dumbledore must know already for sure. He wasn't stupid enough to be fooled, and if I'd figured it out, then surely, he had. That meant that Professor Dumbledore hired Professor Lupin in full awareness of his condition.
There were now two possibilities I could see. Either Professor Lupin was dangerous like the textbooks said and Professor Dumbledore had exercised bad judgement in hiring him, or Professor Dumbledore fully trusted him and had precautions in place to protect the students.
Professor Lupin had been living in the castle with hundreds of students for about three months now. If he were a threat, something would have happened already. And Professor Dumbledore was perhaps the wisest wizard alive. He wouldn't have hired Professor Lupin without being sure that it would be completely safe to do so.
I finally came to the conclusion that there was nothing for me to do. There was no point telling Professor McGonagall or Professor Dumbledore, because they should already know. I didn't see a reason why I should tell Professor Lupin I knew; if he hadn't told us yet, he probably didn't want us to know. I considered telling Harry and Ron, but that would be an invasion of the professor's privacy. There really was no reason to tell anyone since I fully trusted that Professor Lupin was completely safe to be around.
Suddenly, it occurred to me how coincidental it was that Professor Snape would choose werewolves out of all the creatures in the curriculum to cover and that he assigned an essay emphasizing how to recognize them. Did he know that Professor Lupin was a werewolf? Did he hope a student would figure it out and denounce Professor Lupin? Why not just tell us? Had he been sworn to secrecy and thought better of it? I swayed as I tried to ponder Professor Snape's snaky mind.
Since I was ridiculously tired, I decided that figuring out Professor Snape's motives for teaching us about werewolves was not a priority. Instead of puzzling over it like I normally would, I gathered my muggle studies notes and began working on my next assignment. There would be time one day to worry about this, but right now I had too much to do.