The five of us were frozen in shock. And then, with a dramatic flourish, James produced his Invisibility Cloak and said, "Well, come on then! We have to catch a Death Eater!"

"Yeah!" Sirius agreed, his gray eyes blazing as he drew his wand. "Which way did he go?" He demanded the Fat Lady.

The Fat Lady gulped and pointed in the direction of the upper stairwell. "That way. I think he was going towards the library."

"Let's go!" James roared, and with Sirius, he disappeared beneath his cloak.

"James! Sirius!" I hissed, but it was too late. They were gone.

"Get in the Common Room and stay there, Peter," Remus ordered the terrified-looking boy, who obeyed him at once. Remus turned to me, his scars more pronounced than ever. "Do you smell that?"

I realized that maybe it was our shared lycanthropy that enhanced our senses. "You smelled it too, huh?"

Remus wrinkled his nose. "I'll never forget that sickly sweet stench. Like rotting flowers."

"Folsom." I said darkly, drawing my holly wand like a sword. "The library?"

Remus nodded. The issue of Sean could wait. Without hesitating, we hurried up the moving staircases, being careful for the trick steps that we were so used to that we simply jumped over them automatically.

The library doors were ajar. I inhaled the air deeply. Faintly, I could smell James and Sirius: a familiar combination of deodorant, mint toothpaste, and sweat. I wondered if Remus had been able to identify us by smell all along, without telling us.

"There inside." I said to Remus quietly. His nostrils were flared.

"I can smell Folsom." Remus replied, glancing at me. His green eyes glowed in the darkness, and I wondered if mine did too, now that the blood of the wolf ran in my veins. "Ready?"

Nodding, we proceeded inside. The rusty, ancient hinges on the heavy door creaked ominously and echoed in the empty library. We crept inside on soft feet.

"Sirius?" Remus whispered. There was no response.

Following our noses, Remus and I stalked to the Restricted Section. Remus, being a fully-afflicted victim of lycanthropy, could sense better than I could. His willow wand was pointed directly at the dark, silent Restricted Section. Heart hammering, I followed him deeper inside, hardly daring to breathe.

"Lumos." I whispered, and my wand tip ignited. Remus threw me a startled look.

"Turn that off!" He hissed. "Now everyone knows where to find-"

"EXPELLIARMUS!"

"LEVICORPUS!"

The two spells shot out from beneath the nearest table. Remus was yanked into the air by his ankle while my wand flew out of sight. I heard a triumphant yell from behind me and whirled around to see Sirius holding my holly wand in his hand while James emerged from beneath the table.

"Got you!" James said jovially, then realized who he'd caught. Mouth hanging open, he blustered, "Liberacorpus!" and Remus crashed to the ground in a heap.

"What the bloody hell do you think you're doing?" Remus snarled, untangling himself and getting to his feet. I snatched my wand out of Sirius's hand. Both looked extremely shocked, their eyes wide.

"Sorry, mate!" James quailed, his glasses askew. "We thought you were a couple of Death Eaters!"

"You moron, James!" I snapped, then glaring at Sirius. "I'm sorry, but did you mistake us for Lord Voldemort's followers? What made you think you could just…"

But I broke off. The sickly sweet scent was so powerful that I gagged. Remus was wiping at his streaming eyes.

"What's the matter?" James asked anxiously. "Did you get something in your eyes?"

"He's in here!" I gasped, fighting the overwhelming desire to retch. "Folsom is here! I can taste him!" I did retch then, the cloying sweetness choking me like fumes of smoke.

"Where?" Sirius demanded, turning around in succession, searching. "I don't see him!"

"You're a wizard, aren't you?" Remus snapped. "Use a spell to find him!"

"Oh, right." Sirius said sheepishly. "Homeo revelio."

Nothing happened.

"Are you sure he's here?" Sirius asked haltingly.

"You idiot, Folsom's a vampire, not a human!" I raged. "Do I have to do everything? Vampires hate sunlight. Everyone use 'Lumos Solem' on three! One… two… three!"

Four extremely bright shafts of sunlight exploded into the darkness, hot and blinding. We swept them around in one massive beam of light, covering every inch of the room.

"We have to search the place." James said grimly. "Let's go!" The four of us left the Restricted Section, sweeping the gigantic beam of conjured sunlight over every aisle and beneath every table. The pain in my leg was starting to shoot up into my hip again, but I ignored it. Adrenaline was still pumping hard enough to block the worst of the pain.

"He's not here." Sirius said dully after we'd covered the entire library. "He must have escaped."

Remus sniffed the air deeply. "No. He's still here. I can smell him."

"I can smell him, too, Remus," I said in exasperation. "But that doesn't mean he's here."

"Trust me." Remus said darkly, fixing his electric green eyes on me so that a chill went through me. "He's here."

"What else can we do to find him?" James muttered, adjusting his glasses.

"We can keep looking, or wait." I responded, my eyes scanning the vaults of the ceiling. "Or I can try finding him. Sirius?"

Sirius' gray eyes lit up with understanding. "Right. Ready?"

I closed my eyes tightly. A moment later, I was standing not as a human, but as a griffin. In Sirius' place was a bear-like black dog. James rolled his eyes.

"I don't need to be an animal to find that bat." He muttered as I pushed off from the ground, flitting around on the dusty air. The high ceilings of the library allowed me more room to fly, but it was nerve-racking to avoid towers of book shelves and hanging contraptions that had been hung from the ceiling. A huge dragon skeleton bared its teeth at me as I circled it. Remus and James continued their search with lit wands while Sirius loped ahead, his nose snuffling loudly. My wings stirred up even more dust, and I sneezed loudly.

And so did something else.

I whipped my head around to stare at the source of the noise. I stared at the section of wall, narrowing my eyes. There was a small ventilation grate in the wall.

It couldn't be. That's impossible.

But it made sense.

He's in the walls. I realized. He's in the walls!

"He's in the walls!" I screeched, but my words were not English. Everyone looked up, but only Sirius understood me in his Animagus form and began barking excitedly.

I slashed at the grate. Remus and James directed their beams of sunlight at the grate, which I clumsily forced open with a set of cruelly-curved talons. The grate snapped off and fell with a crash to the ground. And as the sunlight breached the opening, a loud, agonized screeching emitted from the air vent. A powerful odor of sweet smoke poured out, and I gagged again.

"Get him, Lionheart!" James shouted from far below. "Hurry!"

I could make out the flitting shadow of a small, dark shape inside of the air vent, desperately trying to evade the sunlight. It was trying to escape up the air vent and away from us.

"No!" I screeched again, lunging after the bat. My shoulders jammed in the grate, but my talons scrabbled dangerously close the struggling bat, which screeched back and redoubled its efforts to escape. But it was trapped.

The red eyes of the bat made contact with mine, and a strange, tingling sensation like an electric current ran down my spine. Frozen, I couldn't move as the bat zoomed past and up to the open window at the top of the library's vaulted ceiling.

"Amber!" Remus yelled desperately. "Snap out of it! Get it! Quick!"

Folsom was escaping. Folsom, the vampire who'd tried to take my life twice. The same vampire who had killed his own family and tried to kill Willow's too. And I realized that if I let him go, I may never get the chance to avenge what he had done.

I forced a talon the wrong way on purpose. The pain of the breaking talon snapped me out of the trance, and I flapped furiously after the bat, who was triumphantly spiraling up to the open window. Bleeding, my talons reached up and clapped - closing around the bat like the jaws of a crocodile just inches before it reached the open window.

I soared back down to the library, bumping into several tall shelves on my way. The bat bit and struggled viciously, but to no avail. Victorious, I allowed James and Remus to Stun the bat and place him in a conjured glass jar. Remus tapped it and muttered a spell before James sealed the lid. Sirius was growling at the jar, his hackles up, teeth bared.

"Amber, you're bleeding." Remus noticed, shaking his head at my broken talon. I shook my head back, unwilling to change back into human, knowing that if I did, I would be naked.

"The spell is Attirea," Sirius told me flatly, once more human and clothed. I ambled awkwardly behind a tall bookshelf for privacy. Closing my eyes, I focused on the spell and upon being human once more. A minute later, I was on two legs again, and wearing my clothes.

"Thanks, Sirius," I said as I hurried back, gripping the end of my left pointer finger. The nail was completely broken off and bleeding.

"Here, let me see." Remus said. "Episkey."

There was a jolt of pain, and then relief. My nail was intact.

"Clean that up, Moony," James said critically. "Tergeo."

The blood vanished.

"Excellent work, boys," I said admiringly, looking at my new, clean fingernail. It was healthier and shinier than the others.

"Back to the bat, if you don't mind?" Sirius asked acidly. Tense, the four of us stared at the captive bat, which was flapping angrily against the glass.

"I put an Unbreakable Charm on it, so he can't transform." Remus said tonelessly, his wand gripped in his hand. "Even though I'd rather kill him now, we should bring him to Dumbledore."

"Not yet." James said. "Not until after we've had a chance to figure out what to do with him. Once we turn him over to the Headmaster, we lose our chance to have our fun with him."

"Put airholes in the top, or he'll suffocate." I pointed out dryly. "He stinks, but I don't want him to suffocate. And make sure you don't make eye contact with him. I think he can hypnotize us."

The boys looked away immediately. "I don't smell anything." Sirius observed after he poked several holes in the lid. "Do you?"

James shook his head while Remus and I nodded. "All vampires smell bad to werewolves." Remus said. "I thought you knew that?"

"Doesn't matter." James said bracingly. "Right now, we need to go back to the Common Room. Before Filch hears us."

"We weren't that loud, were we?" Sirius asked.

I shrugged. "Not terribly loud. Why?"

A figure in a bell cap materialized before us. "Fifth years out of bed!" Peeves the poltergeist shrieked. "Peeves will have to teach them a lesson to stay in bed and to do as they're told!"

And without further ado, he toppled a bookshelf. The massive shelf moved slowly, horrifically, like the Hindenburg balloon. Then, the shelf knocked into the second shelf, like dominoes, until all the shelves had crashed to the ground, spilling thousands of alphabetized tomes and books. The four of us stared in horror. Even the bat was frozen in shock.

"PEEEEEEEEVES!" A hoarse voice shouted, drawing closer. It was Filch. "JUST WAIT UNTIL I GET THERE, YOU FILTHY, SCUM-SUCKING GHOST!"

"Let's get out of here!" James exclaimed, throwing his Cloak over us so that only our ankles showed.

We ran as fast as we could, barely managing to escape to the portrait of the bowl of fruit that was the secret entrance to the kitchens. A hand appeared morbidly from underneath the cloak as James tickled a pear, which chuckled and swung forth to allow us inside.

It wasn't until we stood near the massive hearth in the kitchen that James finally swung the Cloak off. Clutching the jar, I stared inside at the bat, its red eyes gleaming like rubies in the firelight.

"It's him." Remus said flatly, his lips drawn back in a snarl. "That scum is Folsom. Isn't it?"

I nodded. Remus grabbed for the jar, but I hastily jumped back, a stab of pain shooting up into my left hip from the jarring motion.

"What are you doing?" I cried, holding the jar away from him. "Remus!"

"That piece of filth tried to kill you!" Remus snarled. "I'm going to put an end to him. Permanently."

"What's the matter with you, mate?" Sirius asked, frowning. "We just went through all of that trouble to capture him. Now we have a chance to get some answers out of him."

"Do you really think he's going to talk to us?" Remus retorted furiously. "There's no point in trying to make any kind of discussion with a roach like Folsom. Let's burn him and be done with it."

I watched as Remus, Sirius, and James argued over the fate of the imprisoned vampire. I glanced down at Folsom in his Animagus form, the red eyes glittering malevolently.

And then I remembered what I had seen in my visions. Folsom had once had a family. He had once been in love with Willow. He thought himself to be Voldemort's right hand man, so he was full of secrets and invaluable knowledge, no matter how much of a monster he was.

Surely, somewhere, deep down, there was a shred of humanity left in him.

"We can't kill him." I said calmly, still gazing pensively at the bat, which hissed faintly. "Not yet, at least."

"What?" Remus snapped. "Don't be stupid, Amber. He has to die. He has to pay for what he's done. How many lives have been lost because of him?"

"I know." I said evenly, holding his furious green gaze steadily. "But Folsom told me something last summer, in the forest. Right before we duelled, he told me that nothing can kill him. Sunlight and stakes normally kill vampires, but that doesn't work. Fenrir said that."

A shadow crossed Remus' face, and I felt a chill of dread as well. Fenrir was responsible for Remus' affliction and for my scars. He was more of a monster than Folsom.

"What are you proposing, Lionheart?" James asked seriously, adjusting his glasses on his nose.

"All I'm saying is that we wait on what we do." I said. "If we can't kill him, there's no point in trying."

"There's got to be a way to kill him." Remus said at once. "Maybe we can try Fiendfyre."

The three of us stared at him. Remus looked away, his dark eyes full of violence.

"That's forbidden, Remus." Sirius said quietly. "None of us can control that kind of power."

"Not yet, anyway." James added.

"Don't you see?" I asked, looking at each of them pleadingly. "This is exactly why we need to wait to decide what to do with him. He's a captive and he can't go anywhere. The jar has an Unbreakable Charm on it. We can feed him blood to keep him alive. He isn't going anywhere, and until we can figure out what to do, he can't do anything for anyone. Not even for Voldemort."

The tense silence was broken only by the crackling flames. Then, James let out a gusty sigh.

"Fine. We'll try it your way, Lionheart. It's diplomatic, but it's a stalling tactic, too."

"I know." I acknowledged. "Just trust me."

James met my gaze squarely. "Fine. What do we do now? Filch is still prowling around out there. His she-devil Mrs. Norris is probably scouting for us, too."

"We've got food and a fire." I pointed out, sitting down by the fireplace. The warmth felt good. "Why don't we camp out here for a bit?"

"What about Peter?" Sirius asked, frowning. "He's all by himself up there. He'll feel left out."

"Lily might talk to him. She and I had words before I joined you." I told them.

"About what?" James asked, his hazel eyes intense. "About me?"

My gaze fell upon Remus, who glanced at me and then stalked off to the pantry in search of chocolate. My heart thumped painfully as I watched him walk away. In spite of losing Sean, the anguish I felt over Remus was ten times worse.

"Girl stuff." I answered vaguely.

"Well, what do we do in the meantime?" Sirius asked, sitting beside me cross-legged.

I smiled wryly. "It's our fifth year. We can talk about how we're going to pass our O.W.L.S."

James and Sirius groaned loudly. "We can just drop out and be male strippers if we don't pass." Sirius pointed out brazenly.

"People would pay you to keep your clothes on, Padfoot," James retorted. Sirius punched him in the arm, and soon they were rolling in a wrestling ball in front of the fire, grunting and swearing as they fought Muggle-style.

Remus returned with two slabs of dark chocolate. He offered me a piece, sitting nearby but too far away for me to feel the heat of his body. He stared moodily into the flames, oblivious to everything else. I bit back the words I wanted to speak to him. I wanted to tell him I was sorry, that I didn't understand why things were happening the way they were, but I knew better than to speak them now. There was a time and place for everything, and right now wasn't the time to give voice to my thoughts and feelings.

I reached out a hand tentatively and took his. Remus allowed my fingers to intertwine with his for a heart-stopping minute. The perfect interlocking filled my entire body with sweet heat, the same kind of melting pleasure I'd felt when I'd kissed him all those seasons ago. Memories and hopes came flooding back, obliterating the reflections on the encounter in the library with Folsom.

Words bubbled up inside of my throat. I opened my mouth to speak, but before I could make a sound, Remus abruptly pulled his hand away, leaving only cold emptiness behind. I watched him walk to the portrait hole and disappear, heading for an unknown destination.

I closed my eyes and clutched the jar with Folsom in my arms, trying to remember that even werewolves and vampires still retained human emotions and actions.

Maybe loving someone else meant that your heart was torn to shreds. I thought bitterly. Maybe it love is more a ferocious sacrifice than anything else.

The bat rattled against the jar furiously, bringing me out of my reverie. Folsom bared his tiny fangs, hissing loud enough for me to hear it clearly through the holes in the top of the jar. The blood-red eyes were full of hatred and malice and translated to one thing: I want you dead.

"Oh, shut up." I snapped, rolling my eyes and covering the jar with a conjured scarf so I wouldn't have to keep looking at him.

I hoped that we could find a solution sooner rather than later. Otherwise, I wouldn't give Remus the chance to finish Folsom once and for all. I would do it myself.