As soon as Remus went into Defense Against the Dark Arts on Wednesday he could tell Dedenne knew exactly who stole her undies. She narrowed her eyes at James and Sirius, watching them saunter to their seats. At least her annoyance was on someone else besides him for once. Or so he thought. His essay he got back was a 9%. His lowest ever. He stared at it in absolute sickness. Slowly he looked up, meeting Dedenne's furious glare. She quickly looked away. There was no explanation on the paper for why he did so horrible. A tiny part of him considered just going to McGonagall. Then slowly he folded the paper up, sticking it into his bag, wanting to just forget about it.

After class, though, she asked only to see James and Sirius behind. Remus and Peter waited across the hall, of course, and then their friends came tumbling out a moment later. She had questioned them as delicately as she could without admitting they had been hers, wanting to know if they had done it or not.

"We lost a couple points for cheekiness," Sirius said.

"You lost the points," James snickered. "Sirius told her, 'well, ma'am, you're not the Head of our House and wouldn't this fall under her jurisdiction not yours unless you've got some personal involvement?'."

Remus's hands flew to his mouth while Peter doubled over. "You didn't!" he wheezed.

"I did," Sirius reassured him. "Lost ten points for that." He pretended to hook his thumbs under some suspenders and yank them out in a proud manner. "She's not very happy at the moment."

"She completely knows it was us," said James cheerfully as he began going down the corridor, "just doesn't have the evidence to back it up. Must be driving her up the wall."

He strode ahead down the middle of the aisle in his typical arrogant manner, making other students needing to get out of the way. Even older students. Remus wasn't sure why it was that made people do this. Was it his self-assured strut? Or did most the students just see Something Special in James Potter? In any case, he plowed the way for his friends to follow-not that Sirius needed it, no he had a similar strut that made others move. Remus and Peter needed it though, hurrying behind to keep up with their cocky friends who acted like they owned the world (which they could probably afford to do so). Once Remus tried that walk. It ended up with a fifth year not even noticing him, knocking him clean off his feet. At least he apologized as he helped Remus back up. Still, it was very embarrassing and Remus quickly resumed his typical head-down, make-himself-as-small-as-possible shuffle through the school.

The next day in Potions it was another day of working only on ingredients, not any potions. Remus took notes while Slughorn spoke at great length about some of the ingredients they'd be using, as well as the safety measures for handling said ingredients. Finally he put out the various plants on the desks, neat little boxes with the items in their own little section so they wouldn't touch. Some of the plants were in their potions kits, but some weren't.

Remus pulled on his gloves and began methodically working, glad none of the ingredients were particularly strong smelling. One of the scents made his nose itch uncomfortably though and he kept bringing his hand up, rubbing his nose on his sleeve. Eventually his nasal cavities began almost hurting. What was causing it? Nothing seemed strong...

He pulled out the next ingredient. It was poisonous so he had to be careful. As soon as he cut in he realized it was causing the problem. Aconite, he thought as he sliced, then froze. Aconite. Monkshood.

Wolfsbane.

He stared down, swallowing very heavily. He-didn't know what it would do him exactly, just that it caused some issues for werewolves. It wasn't like silver. It wouldn't kill him. Possibly. Or did it? He couldn't remember. It might kill him if he ingested it however he wasn't sure if it did anything else. Hopefully smelling it wasn't deadly.

He glanced up at Slughorn who had his eye on Remus. He ducked his head, returning to cutting the plant, hoping his hands weren't shaking too bad. His nose was vaguely burning but it wasn't so bad he couldn't deal with it. It was sort of like the feeling he got when his mother made incredibly spicy curry once. Painful, burning, but not agony (well, not for him, his mother on the other hand had ended up sobbing and chugging milk, getting annoyed when Lyall laughed, teasing her about her Good English Tastebuds. Remus had a few tears in his eyes but wasn't as bad off as his mum).

So Remus cut, gritting his teeth, pushing past the vague burning sensation in his nose. He had to sneeze a few times which he hoped sounded casual enough. Finally he was finished with the wolfsbane, glad to get that done with. He had to go dip his gloves in the cleaning solution in the back of the room to clean the residue off, and he made sure to dip them a few times just to be sure.

"Remy," whispered a voice that made him jump, nearly dropping his gloves. "Your face looks weird." It was Peter, giving him a strange look.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Your nose. It's all red. Like, a weird red."

"Oh. Err-"

"Maybe you're coming down with a cold?" Peter suggested. "You were sneezing."

Remus had the fleeting thought, I could kiss him for that excuse, then wanted to laugh at the absurdity. "Yes, that's probably it. I'll go to Pomfrey after. Thank you."

"Uh-huh. Um. Also..."

"Yeah?"

"You're holding up the line."

Remus jerked again, looking back at the knot of students looking a bit annoyed at the fact he was just standing there with his gloves in the potion. Oops. He mumbled an apology, taking his very clean gloves back to his table. He finished going through the rest of the plants, the burning in his nose continuing the entire time. Finally Slughorn began waddling around, inspecting each group of prepped ingredients, letting kids know what they did wrong. When he got to Remus his eyes lit up.

"Excellent job, Lupin!" He nodded, leaning back, hands patting his big belly. "Excellent job indeed. You get an O there."

"Loopy learned to cut things," he heard Snape mutter somewhere behind him.

"Any luck he'll cut himself next then," said Avery. Avery, Mulciber, and Snape all snickered.

Remus kept his chin up as he put everything away and headed out of the classroom. He wanted revenge against Mulciber and Avery for calling Lily the bad word, but now that he thought of it he figured they needed some good revenge on Snape too. He'd suggest it in a bit, first he-no, he needed to wait for his friends, then he could check out his red nose. James was also in the hall and after a moment Sirius came out, then Peter. Sirius said the same thing Pete did, about his nose, and Remus mumbled he thought he had a cold.

"I'm going to go to Pomfrey, actually," he said, rubbing at his nose. It still burned a little bit though the sensation was fading.

"Want us to come?" James offered.

"No thank you, I'll catch up with you in a little bit." He headed to the hospital wing, ducking into a bathroom first. He had expected his entire nose to be red but it was mostly under and around his nostrils. He leaned in close. It almost looked speckled, like a rash. Or a burn, sort of. It was spreading out along just above his mouth. He tried rinsing it off but it still remained, still burned a little. So he went to Madame Pomfrey. He had to wait for her to deal with a couple others students before he could talk to her alone, explain to her what happened. She lit up her wand and inspected his nose closely.

"I'm not entirely sure what this does to you," she said, peering up his nostrils. "But it looks like a rash. Hold on." She fetched some cream which he slathered on his nose. It didn't seem to do much good. Nor did any of the other medicinal solutions she tried. Finally she decided the best thing to do was to just wait it out. "I don't really know anyone who knows a lot about werewolves. I don't think Diana does."

"Diana?"

"Professor Dedenne."

Remus flinched. "No, she-she d-doesn't seem to like-to know much."

Pomfrey narrowed her eyes. "She doesn't seem to what?"

"Know much. A-about werewolves," he mumbled nervously. "It's already fading a bit anyway, so I think it'll g-go away on its own. I'll b-be fine. I think. I don't feel-feel sick. Mostly just burns, and kind've itches." He clamped his lips tight as the doors opened. To his surprise, it was his friends. "I t-told you I'd be up in the dorms soon!" he complained.

"No, we need Pomfrey," Sirius said. That's when Remus realized Peter had his arms over both Sirius and James's shoulders, hopping on one foot, tears streaming down his cheeks. "Petey hurt himself falling. And by falling we mean someone knocking him with a spell that sent him tumbling down a flight of stairs."

Just then the doors burst open so Mulciber and Avery could come in, both of them freezing when they saw the Gryffindors were already there. Mulciber's tongue lolled out of his mouth, so huge it looked grotesque. Avery's arms were going every which way from a jelly-arm curse.

"Oo'ooh hhhhh!" Mulciber began complaining right away.

"Sorry, what did you say?" James asked sweetly.

Mulciber went for his wand but all he could get out were ugly mumbles. Pomfrey clapped her hand, demanding they stop, sending them to different beds. First she took care of Peter whose foot stuck at an odd angle. His ankle was broken so she set it carefully then gave him some Skele-Gro.

"Chug, chug, chug, chug!" Sirius chanted quite excitedly.

"NO!" Pomfrey snapped. "You two get out, you're both fine!" She shoved Sirius and James right out the door then turned to Mulciber and Avery, taking care of their hexes while Remus tiptoed over to Peter's bed, sitting next to him. Avery complained bitterly about the Gryffindors as Pomfrey worked until she told them it wasn't her business they'd have to go to the teachers. They left, grumbling loudly.

"What happened?" Remus asked.

"Ran into them, James started a duel," Pete explained, wriggling his foot. "It's better already. Didn't you get Pepper-Up potion?"

Remus bit his bottom lip, trying to figure out the best way to answer. He hadn't figured on seeing his friends anytime soon, and had planned on insisting it was a cold. But without the steam coming out from his ears... "Errr no, it's not a cold, it's-a rash. That's all."

"From what?"

"Uh..." He shifted his weight, tugging at his sleeves. What to say? "Not sure, really, but she gave me some medicine and it's going away. It already feels better." He stared into Peter's blue eyes, begging him to believe the story, to not look too deeply into it.

Peter stared right back, then smiled. "Okay! I'm glad you're feeling better cause that looked kinda nasty."

If it had been James or Sirius he knew they'd push the question. Thank Merlin Peter was just so trusting. Pomfrey checked Peter's ankle then gave him the good-to-go. Remus helped him off the bed, letting him lean against him as they went even though he really didn't need to. James and Sirius were down the hall a little ways, and the four boys went up to the Gryffindor tower together, James telling Remus every detail of the minor duel with gusto, bragging about the nifty jelly-arms curse he managed to get on Avery, disabling his ability to shoot off a straight spell.

Remus's nose still ached for quite a while, longer than he expected it to last. Most things healed up super quick except dark magic (like his own claws). As far as he knew wolfsbane wasn't dark magic. So it must have really been a vicious allergy. How come? Why specifically wolfsbane? Did it include other plants in the family? What would it do if it touched his skin? He shuddered, not wanting to think about that. He hadn't felt the same pull in his bones with the wolfsbane as he did with silver so was silver worse, then? Would wolfsbane kill him? These questions swirled violently in his head, one after the other, never ending, never able to be asked. He wished there was a book about the truths of werewolves, everything in exact detail without all the hateful myths and stereotypes.

Maybe I should write one down the line, he thought then bust up laughing so hard he dropped his book, not even noticing his friends' surprised stares. As if anyone would ever publish a pro-werewolf book!

"We've got a brilliant prank, want to come with us this afternoon to get the stuff needed?"

Remus was awoke rather rudely on Friday morning, not even out of bed yet and James was pushing his face through the curtains, eyes bright. "Uwah?"

"Is that a yes?"

Remus shook his head. "It's-too-early."

"Yeah, I couldn't sleep well." James fell onto Remus's bed, crawling closer. "I thought of it last night. We're going to make a proper visit into Hogsmeade this afternoon. Wanna come?"

"Hogs...meade?"

"Yeah! Siri and I've found some passages out of school but we've had to watch them to see which ones Filch knows about and which ones he doesn't. He knows about one of them. The other two seem to be good to go. Pretty sure they both lead into Hogsmeade. We went through to the end but didn't stay. So, wanna come?"

"You'll get into loads of trouble, sneaking off into Hogsmeade!" Remus argued.

James just shrugged. "I doubt the shopkeeps will care, if we're spending money. In, out, quick as a flash." His hand flew through the air as if indicating just how fast they'd be. "Y'in?"

"N-no! That's-no!" All right, so a tiny part of him wanted to. He squashed that down. Sneaking around after hours was one thing, sneaking into Hogsmeade was something else entirely! Though, very technically speaking, he 'snuck' off to Hogsmeade every full moon. "You'll be caught."

"Won't," James argued. "We'll be fine."

Remus rubbed his eyes, glancing at James's watch to ascertain the time. Not even 7:30. "You've never gone in before? Yet?" That seemed a tad suspicious. Them finding a way into Hogsmeade and never using it.

"Told you, we had to monitor the passages to see if Filch knew about them or not. I mean, it wouldn't do to go off into town only to come back and find Filch standing there! " James pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "We went through them, really, thinking they were just more inter-school passages but then found they took us out of school. Well, one's not into Hogsmeade technically-that's the one Filchy knows about. It goes off to the mountains that way." James pointed opposite direction of Hogsmeade. "But there's one we've been watching for ages-it leads to the mountainside right by Hogsmeade-and it's clear he doesn't know about it-none of the teachers seem to. Soooo...!" His eyes sparkled brightly. "We've decided to make a go of it today. I want to get a Howler."

"A... Howler...?"

"Yup. To send to Snivellus. Siri reckons we can disguise our voices well enough. Might need your help with that, though."

"I..." He wanted to go so bad. He wanted to see what Hogsmeade was like! "Good luck."

"Still a no?"

"Yeah, st-still a no, sorry." James was obviously disappointed. "M-maybe another time," Remus added. "What sort of Howler are you going to send to him?"

"A nice one!" James beamed. "Instructions on how to wash one's hair. We've tried before, but he didn't seem to understand written instructions, so maybe-uhh-out loud ones-"

"Verbal?"

"Yeah, maybe herbal instructions will work." Now James snickered. "It's going to be great. All right, well, maybe next time." He pat Remus's arm and rolled out of his bed (literally rolling, doing a somersault and crashing to the floor loudly with a yelp of pain).

Remus flopped back, closing his eyes, unable to get back to sleep. Besides he had less than a half an hour left anyways. After a couple minutes he went to get ready for the day, wishing he had the courage to go off to Hogsmeade with his friends. No... it wasn't so much the courage. It was breaking trust. He kept doing things that went against school rules which was going against Dumbledore-Dumbledore, who sacrificed so much for Remus to be there! He just kept doing bad things... He tried not to. He tried to follow the rules as best he could but part of him just got so excited over doing things like pulling pranks, sneaking around, etcetera, etcetera. A little voice inside of him urged him to do this stuff, to go along with James and Sirius. His inner... whatever they'd call themselves... Mischief Misfits? They hadn't really used that name. It didn't fit. What did, though?

"You're up early." Lily was already in the Great Hall. Despite having woken Remus up early, James wasn't there, so he sat with Lily and Colgate.

"I was rudely awoken," Remus yawned, plopping down onto the bench. "Then he scarpered o-off." Actually James hadn't been in the dorm when Remus left so... where was he? Had Sirius been? He couldn't remember whether Sirius's curtains had been open or closed.

"Hey Lupin." Colgate leaned forward, her brown curls cascading down. "What's your favorite class?"

"Huh? Oh..." He frowned, trying to think. Favorite class? That... seemed confusing. Complicated. "I-I suppose... right now... Transfiguration? Maybe Charms. I-I love History but Binns is too b-boring." He thought he'd really like Defense too, with a good teacher, but he wasn't about to say that. Also he mostly said Transfiguration because of Professor McGonagall. She was the best teacher. He knew from books and movies that kids often developed crushes on their teachers but he didn't think the feelings he had were a crush. More like a fierce adoration. She was so kind, and talented.

"Charms is mine," Lily said brightly. "And Potions."

"Charms and Astronomy are mine," Colgate said. "I wish we had Astronomy more than once a week."

"I guess we all agree Flitwick's a great teacher though," said Lily. "Err-not saying the others aren't..."

"Except Binns," Colgate put in and Lily nodded.

"And-" Remus stopped, not wanting to say Dedenne's name. They both looked at him curiously. "Who would even s-say that B-B-Binns is their favorite?"

"Anyone who takes naps!" laughed Colgate, sending Lily and Remus into giggles as well. "I wonder who the other teachers are..."

They all looked at the High Table, at the Unknown Ones. That raggedy man Remus saw in the night before his birthday who was currently stabbing at a piece of sausage with the hook at the end of his arm. There was also a very tall willowy grey-haired Chinese woman, a shorter, muscular woman who usually wore a beehive hairdo and cats-eye glasses, a tidy sort of elderly black wizard who was often talking to the woman with the beehive hairdo, a sort of nondescript middle-aged wizard who looked perfectly average in every way, an Indian woman who always wore beautifully colored headscarves under her hats, a very round grey-haired man whose laugh was very loud, a rather elderly dark-skinned woman who often was seen talking to herself, and then finally a very young witch with long black hair who really didn't seem to be much older than the seventh years.

There were too many teachers for the electives, Remus knew that much.

"The one with the hook is Professor Kettleburn," Colgate said. "He teaches Care of Magical Creatures. I know that much. My father used to be friends with him, before he passed away. My father I mean. Obviously." She gave a nervous sort of laugh at that then said quickly, cutting into the awkward silence just as it began, "I'm not sure about the others."

"The very young witch is Professor Vector," Inkwood said. "She's assisting in the Arithmancy department. She and my sister knew each other. She's only nineteen."

"I'm excited for when we get more classes," Lily said, perking up quite a bit. "It's going to be so fun. I read about them in Hogwarts, A History. Care of Magical Creatures, Arithmancy, Divination, Muggle Studies, and Study of Ancient Runes."

"I love animals so I am definitely taking Magical Creatures," Colgate said. "We're supposed to take two, though it's not mandatory."

"I've no idea what I'll pick," sighed Lily. "At least we won't have to decide for another year. What are you thinking about, Remus?"

"I'm thinking about what-" He quickly stopped before he could finish with, James could possibly be up to, as he realized she meant what he thought about electives, not what he was actually thinking in that moment. "-c-uh, c-classes I-I might take and-honestly I'm n-not so sure. Study of Ancient Runes s-sounds really fun though."

"Fun?" Colgate asked a little disbelievingly.

"It does," Lily agreed then laughed as Colgate wrinkled her nose up. "It does!"

"Sure, studying a really complicated, dead language is quite the riot."

"It isn't dead," Remus argued. "It's used all the time, still. It's just... uncommon."

Lily nodded in agreement. "I've seen loads of books in the library that were written in runes. I'd love to be able to read them. We should take Ancient Runes together."

Remus smiled. "I'd l-like that."

Well that was one class probably chosen. He didn't have to worry about it until next year, as they didn't pick until the end of their second year. He sort of wanted to take all the classes. Was that feasible? He hoped it was. He was sure he could talk to McGonagall about it when the time came to start deciding, and if he couldn't take them all well... well... he'd figure it out then. Probably Ancient Runes then whatever class the other boys wanted to take, since he hoped they'd still be friends when the time came and wanted to be in as many classes with them as possible.