February 24th

At some point the next day, they had to come back up for air. Hours of fierce, frenzied activity broken up by long, lingering naps had been a decidedly pleasant way to waste a day. With no plans and nowhere to go, the unconventional friends made use of the opportunity to reacquaint themselves with the forbidden pleasures they had been forced to deny themselves for longer than either of them liked.

Sometimes it's nice to fall into bed with someone with no strings attached. Granny Granger might have had an ugly name for women who behaved that way, but Hermione didn't care. Life was brief and brutal. If she could forget the bleakness of reality for a short time, she would. Fuck anyone who thought otherwise. She was no frigid, dried-up, old prude and she for damn sure was no one's moral compass.

Fenrir never expected too much out of her. For what felt like her entire life, she was always held to a higher standard than everyone else. More was expected and demanded out of her. Why she was supposed to be some creature of perfection, she had no idea. Yes, some of that was her fault. She made impossible demands of herself at times. But it wasn't just her that was responsible. No matter how many years she had proven herself to be a formidable Death Eater, there were still those who questioned her motives, who questioned her integrity. There were some who expected her to turn against their master because she was Harry Potter's best friend once upon a time. Still others who longed to use her for what they could get from her. Fenrir never wanted more influence, more opportunities to whisper in the Dark Lord's ear. All he ever desired was to be treated as more than just a monster.

If she asked him, he would let her stay as long as she wanted. Others might make the same offer, but she knew he actually meant it. She had no fear that remaining there would give him the wrong idea about her true feelings. There had been a woman he loved once. Since her tragic death, his heart had been closed and it had grown bitter. He would never love another again.

Hermione made the mistake asking him the story about his lost love early on in their deviant encounters. The truth had been difficult to hear. She wished she had kept her mouth shut. He wouldn't let her come near him for almost a year after his heart-wrenching confession.

His path first crossed Eliza's when he was an uninterested student at Hogwarts. He never would admit what House he'd been in, but questions posed to the right people produced a surprising answer: Hufflepuff. It was easy to assume that all who went over the line to the Darkness came from Slytherin. Hermione knew better than most what a ridiculous assumption that was to make. He loved the witch from afar, too shy and cowardly to tell her. Not until they were both out of school and he was working in the greenhouse of an apothecary did he find the nerve to ask her out for a pint.

They were planning to get married by the time he was cornered by a werewolf transformed into its bestial form. Sent out to harvest glowing mushrooms that only became ready under the light of the Full Moon, his thoughts had been on his worries about financing the wedding that Eliza insisted they have. He would've been satisfied with a Ministry ceremony and a bottle of champagne in bed, but if his witch wanted something, he would do what was necessary to fulfill her desires. A moment of inattention ruined their plans and their lives.

Over his bandaged and bloodied form in his St. Mungo's hospital bed, his future father-in-law made it quite clear that no daughter of his was going to have a werewolf for a husband. Fenrir didn't understand how the wizard could sneer down at him like he did. Only days earlier he'd called him 'son' and told him how pleased he and his wife were to have him join their family. How could a single bite that he didn't even ask for change him into a being lower than mud on the bottom of his shoes? Wasn't he still the same man he had been when life was full of hope for the future?

Eliza didn't want to leave him. She didn't care about his affliction and still wanted to be his wife. Her parents worried that she was in danger of losing her mind, if not her life. She was one of those naïve creatures that actually believed that all two people needed was love to make it. Life hadn't yet been cruel enough to teach her she was living in a fantasy.

They made a plan to run away. It was difficult. Eliza's father had her practically a prisoner in his home out of fear that she would do exactly as she wished. A couple of weeks later when Fenrir was as fully healed from his attack as he ever would be, he snuck over to her house. She had her window opened just as she promised. Half past one in the morning she threw her bags out of the window and climbed out. Clinging to the bricks and searching for footholds, she began her treacherous descent down to the ground floor. Fenrir stood underneath her, terrified she was going to fall and ready to catch her if she did.

His attention was so focused on the woman he loved that he didn't even see her father until it was too late. The wizard's stunner wasn't nearly strong enough to actually deter the werewolf, but that didn't stop him from trying. Fenrir ignored the man's efforts to keep an eye on Eliza. She screamed at her father to stop. By the time her feet were firmly planted on the ground, her fiancé had had enough of his attacker's antics. With more confidence than he had ever possessed in the entirety of his life, the brand new werewolf grabbed the wizard's beefy throat with one hand and squeezed.

It was the first moment of his altered existence when he understood what it meant to have the lust of the kill overtake his senses. He'd described the feeling of tapping into his new werewolf traits in detail. Everything around him disappeared as he focused only on killing the weak man in front of him. He felt an obnoxious tug at his arm over and over again threatening to distract him from his task. Fenrir threw his free arm backwards, dislodging the annoyance.

Only the sound of his mother-in-law to-be screaming out Eliza's name broke his concentration. The rest of the world began to reappear around him as his grip loosened on the wizard's neck. Wails of abject misery were harsh to his sensitive ears. He spun around to see what was the source of the commotion.

Eliza lay in the grass with her deep blue eyes wide open and unblinking. The sharp scent of blood filled his nostrils. Fenrir removed his eyes from his beloved to glance up at the redness staining the side of the house. The same blood that coated the back of her head. Distraught, he collapsed to his knees, uncaring that her parents were demanding he leave and threatening to alert the Ministry. It occurred to him too late that the annoyance tugging on his arm had been his precious, innocent witch pleading with him to stop hurting her father. He hadn't known his own strength, hadn't understood that now that he was a werewolf it didn't take much effort at all to send someone as tiny as she flying backwards into the stones.

He had no reason to keep going without her in his life. Unable to bear staring at his crime any longer, Fenrir ran from the scene. Deep in the woods, in the very same place he'd been bitten just a short time before, he broke down. His truly was a cursed life. What use was there to keep on living with the knowledge that he'd been responsible for killing the only person who loved him?

Somehow he managed to find the strength to keep going. He always assumed it was pure hatred and spite that kept him alive. The closer the first Full Moon after his bite approached, the more incensed he became. While he might have been the one to physically kill Eliza, accident or not, it wasn't his fault. She would still be alive if her father hadn't demanded they stay apart. The sickness in his mind coupled with his grief was a dangerous combination. By the morning of the Full Moon, he knew what he was going to do.

Eliza's parents were fools to not expect him to come calling. They didn't even seem to be concerned. There were no additional precautions taken to keep their home safe. Fenrir waited outside in their back garden for night to fall. Moments into his agonizing transformation, he was running entirely on animalistic instinct. One howl was all it took to get the fool to open his door. Knowing the man was an enemy, but not remembering why exactly, the fully transformed werewolf ran towards the open door.

By the time the moon fell from the sky, Eliza's mother was dead and her father wished he was. Fenrir disappeared from polite society for many years after that to lick his wounds and try to figure out his purpose. It wasn't until early in the sixties when a Ministry official made the same mistake his almost father-in-law had by looking down at him as nothing more than a monster that his purpose suddenly became crystal clear. He would have to change the way his kind was viewed by the wizards in power. Only when the werewolves outnumbered the wizards would he rest.

So there was no fear in Hermione's heart that her continued visitation would lead to an uncomfortable development of feelings. Fenrir would never love again. He didn't even know how. She snuggled back under the warm covers, content with the knowledge that at least for a little while longer she wouldn't have to go back out into the uncertainty of the rest of the world.