Chapter 16 – Under the Surface

1st September 1980

Sirius had never had the same aversion to Knockturn Alley as his friends did. He'd been there often enough as a child, trailing behind his mother and father, playing with trinkets in the curiosity shop and jumping out at Regulus from behind the tall furniture in Borgin and Burke's. Of course, there were shops there that Sirius would rather avoid, like Dystyl Phaelanges, which was dedicated entirely to selling bones; Sirius didn't know how he managed to get by, unless more people than he cared to imagine had strange tibia collections in their cellars. The Coffin House was equally disturbing, selling expensive ingredients to grieving witches and wizards whom were desperate enough to try to concoct spells to raise their loved ones from the dead.

It wasn't all like that though. There was the beard trimming shop, where a friendly wizard used to give him and Regulus lollypops while they waited for their father, and there was Markus Scarrs Indelible Tattoos, which Sirius had always been intrigued by. The moving photos in the windows showcased a diverse range of tattoo work, from a roaring dragon to a portrait of Celestina Warbeck.

That day he'd been shopping in Diagon Alley, looking for more presents for Harry, and something to cheer up James. A trip to Quality Quidditch Supplies later and the pull of the tattoo shop had called him, so he'd wandered down the dimly lit street and stared through the shop window, much as he had as a child.

It was a brisk day, the first of September, and the streets were quiet. Sirius supposed most people were relaxing after dropping their children off at Kings Cross for the start the new school year. He still felt a pang of nostalgia when he thought of Hogwarts, despite the time spent away. Although their last two years at school had been tinged with the start of the war, Hogwarts had still felt like a safe place, where he, James, Remus and Peter had been invincible.

Sirius watched as a young witch came out of the shop, giggling with her friend and sporting a brand new Hollyhead Harpy's shoulder tattoo.

He smiled as he watched them leave, before his attention was caught by the jingling of the bell above the door of the next building over. Someone was just leaving the White Wyvern, their imposing silhouette filling the doorframe as they laughed gruffly. Sirius was unsure why, but he felt an uncomfortable shiver run through him.

He should really get going, he knew, but the stranger in the doorway was unnerving in a way that made Sirius unable to look away. He stepped fully out into the light, a tall man with a face heavily obscured by scars. Sirius supposed he was smiling, but the expression looked unnatural on his face, twisting his lips into a sneer.

Sirius' breath caught as he recognised the man; a figure printed across the front of the Daily Profit on many occasions, a man who he knew had done terrible things but none more terrible than what he had done to…

"You make some interesting points." Greyback said cheerfully. "Whether or not I agree with you."

He put his arm around Remus' shoulders, his long, yellow fingernails resting on the collar of his shirt.

Sirius didn't have time to think about what Remus was doing there. He didn't have time to think about how sensible it was to intervene. He saw Greyback, someone who had viciously attacked his boyfriend when he was only a child now daring to treat Remus like a friend, and he saw red.

He'd shoved Greyback back against the wall of the pub before they'd even noticed him. His forearm was pushing into Greyback's throat – a disarming move he'd been taught to use through the order if he found himself wandless.

"Who the fuck are you?" Greyback asked, gritting his too-sharp teeth at Sirius.

He could feel Greyback's hands shifting at his sides, presumably searching for his wand.

"Who am I?" Sirius repeated. "Who the fuck do you think youare?" He pressed harder against Greyback's throat, feeling oddly gleeful when he let out a strained breath.

"Stop."

The word belonged to Remus.

Sirius had been so concentrated on his own rage that he'd almost forgotten he was there.

"Don't make me–"

Sirius turned his head an inch away from Greyback. Remus was stood to their right, his wand drawn and lingering between the two of them.

"Do it," Greyback snarled, "show him who he's dealing with."

Sirius watched Remus' poise flicker, but he remained infuriatingly calm. "Let him go, Black."

"Are you fucking serious?"

"Let him go."

Sirius hesitated. What on earth was going on?

Well, Remus was working with werewolves. That much he knew. But how could he be working with Greyback? How could Dumbledore ask that of him? The thought of them being near each other was enough to make Sirius feel ill, never mind the fact that his boyfriend was pointing his wand at him, displaying no emotion towards him, no sign of shared disgust at the man whom Sirius could so easily hurt, stood here like this. No one in Knockturn Alley would bat an eyelid, if he just applied a little more pressure…

But he let go.

Because Remus had asked him to.

He released a spluttering Greyback and turned away, practically running back through Knockturn Alley, past the beard trimmers', the dark arts shops and the cauldrons made of materials that he'd never heard of.

He tried to keep down the anger and confusion that were bubbling under the surface, and he made it back out into Diagon Alley before he finally slowed down, leaning heavily against the wall of Gambol and Japes.

His eyes were closed when someone touched him on the shoulder, and he instinctively jumped, reaching for his wand.

"It's me," Remus said softly. "It's just me."

"What the fuck?" Sirius replied, a spike of anger instantly resurfacing. "What are you doing?"

"Let's go home." Remus replied. "We need to talk."

He held his hand out to Sirius, and when he didn't take it Remus sighed, placing a hand instead on his forearm. He drew his wand and turned on the spot.

The next thing Sirius saw was a blur, before the front door of their flat materialised in his swimming vision.

Remus quickly let go of him and opened the front door before walking into the kitchen and pouring himself a glass of water.

Sirius followed, the silence between them growing more tense by the second.

Remus downed his glass of water in one.

"So," Sirius said, crossing his arms across his chest. "Care to tell me why you're all pally with Greyback?"

Remus glared at him.

"I'm not 'all pally' with him, Sirius."

"Well it certainly looked that way. I feel ill just thinking about it."

"And you think I don't? You think I enjoy spending time with him after what he did to me?" Remus demanded. He slammed his glass down on the kitchen counter and Sirius was surprised it didn't break.

"Why do it then?" Sirius shouted back, "I knew you were talking to other werewolves but seriously? Why didn't you tell me about this!?"

"Maybe because I knew you'd react like this!" Remus said, "Do you have any idea how badly that could have gone just now? You could have gotten yourself killed! And Merlin knows whether or not he trusts me now, I just ran off after you left, said I had business to take of."

"Oh, so I'm business now?"

"You know damn well that's not that I meant!"

"Well I'm so sorry that I didn't think about your reputation with a murderer before I tried to protect you from him."

"I don't need protecting!" Remus argued, "we're fighting a war."

"So, you're going to keep meeting with him?" Sirius asked. "That's ridiculous. You can't – I won't let you do this anymore."

"You won't let me?" Remus repeated. "Who do you think you are, my mother?"

"If she were alive do you think she'd want you doing this any more than I do?!"

"You…" Remus stopped, clearly about to say something but knocked off course by the mention of his mother. "Just, fuck you," he said. "I'll have to go and see Dumbledore now, so that he knows about" – he gestured angrily at Sirius – "all this."

"No," Sirius argued, "you can't just–"

"I have to," Remus said flatly. "And we're done here."

"What about tonight?" Sirius said, chasing after Remus as he fled. "It's the full moon."

"I'll stay at Hogwarts," he said, "Stay here. I don't need you there when everything is like this, it'll just make it worse."

"Remus…"

He opened the door to the flat.

"Remus, come on, I'm just trying to–"

It slammed behind him.

Hogwarts looked exactly how Remus remembered it. He supposed it had only been just over two years since he had left, but it felt like longer. The wizarding world was a different place to how it had been during his time at school: there was an infinity between then and now. Even though they'd all been aware of what was going on in the wider world while they were at Hogwarts, it had seemed distant somehow, until the death of James and Sirius' quidditch teammate Chloe had shattered the illusion.

It was the first day back at school, and Remus was let in the front gates to the grounds with the last of the students pouring in on thestral-drawn carriages. He followed them on foot down the path to the castle, steadily lagging behind them. By the time he reached the entrance hall, most of the students were already seated in the great hall, and Professor McGonagall was sorting the new first years into an orderly line.

They seemed so small to Remus, their heads only as high as his chest. They were so young to be part of a world that was being overwhelmed by darkness so quickly.

McGonagall saw Remus while she was in the middle of scolding a young girl for changing her hair colour every five seconds, flitting from blue to pink to green like disco lights.

"Oh, Remus," she said. "What are you doing here?"

"I need to speak to Dumbledore," he said. Several children looked over at him at the mention of Dumbledore, their eyes going wide. Dumbledore was a hero, to them. Remus wasn't sure what he thought of the headmaster anymore. "It's about – well, you know. Business. He said that I could contact him at school if I needed to, though I didn't think it'd be so soon."

"Is everything alright?" McGonagall asked anxiously. "Are James and Lily-?"

"They're fine," Remus assured her. "Just - can you tell Dumbledore to come and talk to me when he's done with the sorting? I'll be in his office."

"Of course." She lowered her voice. "The password is cauldron cakes."

Remus smiled slightly, despite himself. "Thanks," he said.

He turned towards the grand staircase, but McGonagall called to him.

"Remus - are you alright? Has something happened?"

That was too difficult of a question to answer honestly, so he just shrugged and said, "I'll survive."

McGonagall looked over at him sadly, an unusual expression on her usually severe face. "I hope you are able to do more than just that."

They held each other's gaze for a long moment, and then the doors to the great hall opened, and the moment was broken. McGonagall briskly ushered the first years inside, fear and excitement on all of their faces, and Remus watched them with a sadness he couldn't quite place. Then the doors closed behind them and he walked up the staircase alone.

He wasn't waiting for long, sitting in the chair opposite Dumbledore's desk, where he had sat so many times when he and his friends had found themselves in trouble.

"Apologies for keeping you waiting," Dumbledore said as he strolled in and sat on the other side of his desk. The phoenix on its perch perked up at the sight of him and Dumbledore absently stroked its head with his forefinger. "Is there a problem?"

"Sort of." Remus ran his hand across his tired eyes. "I met with Greyback's followers again today."

"Did they work out that you are a spy?"

"No, nothing like that." Remus frowned. "But on my way out, I ran into Sirius."

"Ah." He saw understanding in Dumbledore's eyes. "He saw you with Greyback?"

"Yeah. I hadn't told Sirius that he was their leader, like you told me not to." A pause. "Maybe that was the wrong choice."

"Secrecy is sometimes a necessity."

"Not when it's someone you love," Remus said. He thought of his friends not telling him the precise day that James and Lily were going into hiding. He thought of the distrust brewing between them all, unthinkable given how inseparable they had once been. "Secrets just push you apart."

All the anger from his earlier argument was resurfacing, but he found himself less angry with Sirius than with Dumbledore. Of course Sirius had been angry that Remus was forced to spend time around the person who had made him a werewolf. Remus had had nightmares about Greyback all the time at Hogwarts, waking up the whole dorm with them. Some days, Remus thought he hated Greyback more even than he hated Voldemort. Remus would be angry too, if Sirius was forced to spend time with someone who had hurt him.

"What did Sirius do when he saw you?" Dumbledore asked.

"He freaked out and attacked him. It was all I could do to stop him before someone got hurt."

"And did Greyback realise the connection between you?"

"I don't think so," Remus said. "He doesn't know we know each other because I don't use my real name. Sirius didn't reveal that, at least."

"Then it sounds as though your position is safe," Dumbledore said.

Safe. As though any part of this – going undercover, joining the Order, fighting in a war – was safe.

"I guess so."

There was noise outside the office as students began to make their way up to their dorms. The Gryffindors would be going past, up to the tower that had been Remus' home for seven years. They could hear talking and laughing, the most carefree sounds Remus had heard in so long. Maybe Hogwarts wasn't safe, but these kids still at least had some illusion of normalcy to hang onto.

"You aren't sure about continuing to spy on the werewolves?" Dumbledore asked, noticing his reluctance.

"I don't know," Remus said. "Greyback's influence is growing, and he's been talking more and more about taking action against the Ministry, even the Order. He doesn't explicitly talk about working for Voldemort, but everyone knows that's whose backing him. I've talked a few people out of joining him, but most are so lonely and desperate that they'll do almost anything."

"But?" Dumbledore prompted.

"But Sirius doesn't want me to. And I can hardly bear doing it – Greyback terrifies me more now even than he did when I was a child."

"You are the only one who can do this job, Remus," Dumbledore said, steepling his fingers as he looked at him over his glasses. "Without you, we would have no idea what Voldemort is planning with this particular faction of his. You are an asset."

"I know," Remus said heavily. "I know."

There was silence between them for a long time as Dumbledore studied him with his piercing blue eyes. Remus was the first to look away. Dumbledore didn't pursue the subject, but Remus knew this conversation would continue another day. Dumbledore didn't give up easily.

"You're welcome to use the shrieking shack tonight, if you need to," Dumbledore said. "No one has entered it since you last used it."

"That was my plan," Remus said. "It'll be just like old times."

There was more bitterness in his voice than he'd meant for there to be. He hated the pity in Dumbledore's expression as he stood up to leave.

The castle was quiet as Remus walked back downstairs and out onto the grounds. He reached the whomping willow quickly and pressed the knob on its trunk.

He looked behind him one last time at the school, its windows now dark, save for a few flickering candles in the towers. He wondered if the first years were lying awake, thinking about what the year would bring them, or whether they were so tired from the excitement of the day that they had fallen straight asleep. He caught sight of an owl overhead, no doubt searching for her nightly prey, and with a creeping feeling of dread, he stepped into the tunnel.

Remus had no idea that was the last time he'd see Hogwarts for another thirteen years.