Remus must have fallen asleep at some point in the wee hours of the morning, just before dawn. The house was silent, and he opened his eyes to the dim, gray light of early morning. He turned his head to find Lily lying on her side with her head propped up on one hand: she, apparently, had been watching him sleep, and the thought of her doing so was somehow comforting. He met her drowsy gaze as he pondered what on earth they had done last night, and how many times they had done it, and when they would be able to do it again. He tucked an arm behind his head and took in her sleepy face, her disheveled hair, her simple beauty. She looked new to him, as if he had discovered something in her unknown to the waking world, something, in fact, known only to him, something he could never begin to adequately describe. Lily's lopsided smile was exactly like the one she wore the first night she kissed him in the Hog's Head and on the road back to school after his drunken birthday party. He smiled back, hardly daring to believe that she had chosen him, that he was lying here in bed with her, that she was touching his chest with such possessiveness and care. Why? he thought. Why?

Now the backs of her fingers trailed across the scars on his face, and she leaned in close to kiss him. As she did so, Remus, without thinking about why he was doing it, searched Lily's memory for an animal, and he found it: a wolf with brown fur. It was crouched to pounce, and it was snarling nastily, bloody saliva dripping from its powerful jaws. A beast with blood on its forelimbs, where it had bitten itself. There was nothing human about this thing. Nothing at all.

Remus' heart plummeted into his gut like a cannon ball. Lily's lips met his as his eyes met the wolf's; it was all he could do not to cringe and pull away from her.

"Hi," Lily said sleepily into his lips.

"Hi," Remus responded automatically, trying desperately to process the image that he had stupidly gone to find and then stupidly allowed to claw into his brain, the image that he would never, ever be able to forget. Why had he looked for that in Lily's thoughts? Was he an idiot? It was almost too much to comprehend, but it was him. That was what he looked like as a werewolf. That hideous, snapping beast. His heart staggered and he felt ill, all the blood draining from his head to his extremities; but he struggled to keep his face neutral.

"Are you all right?" Lily's voice held a note of hesitation.

"Yeah," he muttered hoarsely. "Yeah." To keep the horrible vision away he focused on the curve of her lips. He wanted to stay but he needed to get out of the room, and quickly. He sat up and kissed her again softly, trying to make his voice sound normal. "I should leave before my parents wake up."

"Right." She gave his arm one last caress before she reached for her nightgown, still watching him worriedly.

Remus quickly dressed and hurried across the hall to the bathroom where he knelt, shaking, holding onto the toilet. He dry heaved twice, but nothing came up. He knew, of course, that Lily had seen him like that, transformed; but now, seeing himself as she had, the reality of it hit home. She had seen him, been horrified by that thing, by him – and still she let him touch her. He rested his forehead on the cold porcelain and rocked his head from side to side, staring at the small black and white tiles of the floor. Was she crazy? Was he? How could he have forgotten for one moment what he was? He sat perfectly still for a very long time, his eyes unfocused. Eventually his leg cramped and he leaned back against the wall and sat that way for another long stretch of heartbeats.

A small knock on the door jarred him out of his daze. Automatically, he stood to open it, thinking it was Peter needing to use the toilet. Had he noticed that Remus was gone last night? His brain sped to find a lie that he could tell him.

Remus opened the door to find Lily standing there, her lips pursed. "I'm coming in," she said in a low voice.

He stood aside to let her pass, and she shut the door and cast a silencing charm on the room. "We need to talk about this before we go." He knew she meant before they went to the funeral. "You're feeling guilty."

He stared at her. Then he stared at the floor, furrowing his brow. Was he feeling guilty? If James was his best friend, he should feel guilty. But strangely the answer, he realized, was no. He should feel guilty, but he didn't. The guilt, he knew, would come later. "It's not that," he said.

"Because there's no need for – what?" Lily stopped mid-gesture and did a double take.

"I, erm, no. No, I'm not feeling guilty. Oddly enough."

"Well, that's – that's good." The puzzlement on her face was nearly comic.

"It's just – "

Lily waited. She looked as if she were waiting for the other shoe to drop, and she picked at the sleeve of her nightgown. Remus watched her nervous fingers while he took several breaths in and out, wanting and not wanting to know the answer to the question he was about to utter. Just say it, he told himself.

"Aren't you scared of me?" he finally asked in a small voice.

Lily gazed at him dumbfounded for a moment, her eyebrow twitching once. She spoke quietly, deliberately. "I'm scared of the werewolf, not of you."

"But you've seen me – "

"There's nothing worse to see. We're past that part."

"Are we? Will we ever be?"

"I am," said Lily.

Remus sighed.

"I am," she insisted. "Why do you think I – we – " She stared past Remus at the wall, blinking hard. "How else could I have … it doesn't matter."

"I know, I know," Remus said soothingly, taking her face in his hands, making her look at him. "It doesn't matter to you." He was almost jealous of her certainty.

"One night a month. And I'll stay far, far away. Promise."

"You should be afraid, Lily," Remus said darkly, running a thumb across her jaw.

She paused. "If Peter Pettigrew isn't scared of you, why should I be?"

She had a point. He dropped his hands from her face. "But Peter isn't my girlfriend."

"Am I your girlfriend?" Lily blinked several times, her expression vulnerable, waiting for his response.

Remus' throat worked for a moment. "Do you want to be?"

She bit her lip and looked at Remus' hand before taking it. "If you're asking, then yes."

That sensation of everything changing washed over him once more, and there was a feeling of hope there, and of strength. Perhaps he'd lose his friends; perhaps not. Perhaps he'd gained something more last night with Lily; or perhaps he'd lose her in the end and have nothing. Somehow none of it mattered. He only knew that life was short, and if he let this woman slip through his fingers without giving her a fighting chance, he'd feel like the biggest coward he had ever known.

Resting an elbow against the wall, he leaned into her and kissed her mouth warmly, slowly, pushing the image of the werewolf firmly from his mind. Her fingers found their way to his jaw and held him gently. When he pulled his lips away, leaning his forehead against hers, his elbow against the old wallpaper and his other hand on the small of her back, he spoke softly. "After today, when we get back to school, I have to tell my friends about us."

Lily wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his neck.

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Remus, his parents, and Peter and Lily Apparated two blocks away from the cemetery in Wales where his grandparents would be buried; they walked to the gravesite together in silence. The group had to wear their most convincing Muggle attire because many of the Lupins' Muggle friends and relatives would be at the funeral, and most did not know that Jonathan Lupin was a wizard. The story that was told to the Muggle newspapers was that the Lupins were killed during a robbery; and, given the maps that were stolen, that was essentially the truth.

The service was a short one, but there were about a hundred people who had come to pay their respects. Late morning stretched into early afternoon as Remus spoke with his parents' and grandparents' old friends, many of whom he had never met before. Faces blended one into the next, and he heard himself saying the same things over and over again: Thank you. Yes, it was a tragedy. Yes, I'm going back to school tonight. We appreciate your concern. No, there's nothing you can do, but thank you.

Remus politely extricated himself from a solemn conversation with a little white-haired witch and approached the two coffins. The lids were closed, of course; Owen had told Remus and Rowena that the Healers and Ministry of Magic officials had not been able to repair the bodies very well. The coffins stood next to each other, waiting to be lowered into the two new open graves in the family plot.

Remus placed his hands on his grandfather's coffin. It was made of dark mahogany, smooth and simple. The wood was cold in the chilly spring breeze, and Remus left his fingers there until it seemed that his hands were part of the wood itself. After a time, he realized he was whispering out loud, repeating words under his breath. It took a moment for him to realize what he was saying: I'm sorry. He gripped the coffin hard and, wiping his eyes, crossed around the open graves to his grandmother's coffin.

It was identical to his grandfather's and he pressed his cheek to it, not caring if anyone saw him do it. He wished he could give his grandmother a kiss, inhale her talcum powder scent, make her laugh with a stupid joke. He wished he could hear her voice. What advice would she give him now? What romantic poem about death could possibly make him feel better? Resting his cheek on the cool, chocolate-colored wood, he watched his hand as it slid along the top, off the edge, and down the side. As it did so, he noticed a figure leaning against a tree, watching him. An older gentleman was speaking to the fellow against the tree, but soon they shook hands and the older man left.

Remus stood upright and stared at the man. He wore a brown and black checkered Muggle dress suit and seemed to be speaking into a hand-held device of some sort. His white-blonde hair shimmered in the sunlight streaming through the budding leaves above his head. His raised eyebrows gave him a peculiar expression of astonishment.

Remus strode toward the man. "Mr. Lovegood!"

Lucas Lovegood started, as if he hadn't expected the subject of his essay to speak to him. He clicked off his recording device, pocketed it, and extended his hand. "Hello, Remus! Nice to see you, nice to see you. I suppose I should tell you that I'm here to interview friends of the Lupins. Jonathan Lupin was quite a respected wizard, but I don't have to tell you that." He spoke gravely. "I don't wish to disturb you or your parents today. My sincerest sympathies to you all."

"Thank you," said Remus, shaking Lovegood's hand. He probably should have felt offended by the presence of a reporter today, but he felt strangely glad to see him here. "It's good to see you again," Remus said sincerely. "We didn't get a proper good-bye the first time we met."

"We didn't? I don't recall …"

"You had an appointment to make. Did you ever spot the Crumple-Horned Snorkack?"

"What? When? Where?" Lovegood circled himself, looking about the cemetery as if the mythical creature would pop out from behind a tombstone.

"Er, no, not here. The last time we met you were off to Shropshire to … oh, never mind." Remus loosened his tie. "But why are you here? This is a funeral. I thought you wrote about fantastic beasts."

"Yes, yes, I did. I do. I'm covering the, er, passing of your grandparents."

"But that has nothing to do with fantastic beasts," Remus said, his voice lowered. "It was the Death Eaters. The Dark Mark was over the house."

"Yes, indeed," Lovegood nodded. "But I have a friend now at the Ministry. He told me to go and take a look at the – the, erm, the scene of the crime."

"What do you mean?" Remus said, feeling a hollowness somewhere inside his chest.

"The injuries were a bit – " Lovegood faltered, his eyebrows dropping. "Remus, I'm not certain I'm the one to tell you about this. And it's all speculation, anyhow."

But Remus had to know. And it would be easy enough to find out. Why shouldn't he learn what the reporter had discovered at the Lupins' house? They were his grandparents, after all. If he couldn't use his Legilimency to track down his grandparents' killers, then what was the point of having the ability at all? After a moment's hesitation, he deliberately reached into Lovegood's memory and saw his grandparents' bodies again, but this time he saw their faces … and the trio of slashes across their left cheeks.

Madam Honeyduke's resonant voice echoed in his mind, and he could almost feel her fingers on his own scarred cheek now: Fenrir's signature.

Greyback had killed them. It felt as if the world had shifted underneath him; with wobbly knees, he quickly sat down on the ground, grasping new shoots of grass under his fingers. It felt as if he were at a carnival, spinning on a ride that was too fast for him. He wanted to put his forehead on the ground to stabilize himself, but he managed to keep himself upright by focusing on the earth beneath his hands.

"Remus!" Lovegood squatted next to him. "You all right, chap?"

"Yes, it's just been … rather a hard couple of days," Remus muttered, gritting his teeth and staring down at the dirt under his fingernails. His hands involuntarily gripped the earth as he tried to keep control of his emotions, to stay in the here and now.

But Greyback seemed to be doing away with Remus' family systematically. Why? What had Jonathan and Margaret Lupin ever done to offend Greyback, or Voldemort, or the Death Eaters? Was it Greyback who wanted the maps? Remus felt rage brimming inside him, a bubbling fury that would soon, he was sure, make him scream and scream if he didn't get out of here soon. He had never thought he could kill someone; but if Greyback had been standing in front of him now, he thought that it would be easy, ridiculously easy, to hurl a killing curse at him. He would do it gladly, and serve time in Azkaban if he had to. He would end his days in satisfied madness, alone and justified. He could do it.

Remus turned his contorted face away so that Lovegood wouldn't see his scars. What if Lovegood had recognized the gashes on his grandparents' faces as those inflicted by a werewolf? If the journalist hadn't done so already, Remus didn't want him to make the connection between himself and the werewolves, or worse, Greyback. He had never felt so unclean in his life, so damaged, so diseased. He wanted to erase it all, to erase himself, so that Greyback would leave his family alone.

"I can only imagine what you've been through," Lovegood agreed, sitting on the cold earth with Remus and wrapping his arms around his knees. The reporter suddenly looked very young indeed, his pale skin looking wan in the bright sunlight. The two sat in silence for some minutes. From a distance, Remus saw Peter and Lily talking quietly a few feet away from his parents. Finally, heart pounding, he decided to press the reporter again.

"My – my Dad said that werewolves might have been involved," he lied, managing to keep a surprisingly even tone in his voice. His father had kept everything from him, to protect him; but Remus wasn't a child anymore. He had a right to know. Remus swallowed and went on. "He said that werewolves might have been there with the Death Eaters when my grandparents were murdered."

Lovegood sighed and looked toward the coffins. "That's what my friend at the Ministry thinks. That's what I think, too."

"Who was it?"

"My friend? Well, technically I'm not supposed to reveal my sources – "

"No, which werewolf was it?" Remus asked firmly, blinking rapidly.

Lovegood stared at Remus in surprise. "Surely you could guess," he said bluntly.

Remus felt fear creep into his belly and settle there like a sickness. He inhaled to respond, but stopped himself quickly.

Lovegood continued softly. "Don't worry, Remus. This story is going to be about werewolves and their possible alliance with You-Know-Who … but you have my word that I won't write about you. You're still in school. I promise you here and now I will never reveal that Fenrir Greyback attacked you. I'm leaving that out of my report."

So Lovegood had finally discovered that Remus was a werewolf. And why wouldn't he? Remus had asked the journalist point blank about Greyback at their last meeting. Any reporter worth his salt would wonder why a seventeen-year-old was snooping around for information like that. But Remus' public Werewolf Registry record was supposedly sealed during his years as a student at Hogwarts. Had Lovegood's friend at the Ministry told him? Or, scars aside, was it simply obvious to anyone that he was a werewolf? It wasn't the first time he had wondered such a thing.

Remus scrutinized the reporter warily. "Why would you make me a promise like that? This is a big story. You could make a lot of money."

"It'll make me a lot of money whether or not I mention you," Lovegood smiled wryly. He looked at the coffins again and went on. "Someone did a favor for me once and helped me keep my job at the Quibbler when Greyback's family was trying to get me fired. You're going to have a hard enough time finding work when you finish school without some journalist publicizing your condition a year ahead of time. Besides, you've been through enough as it is. I don't want Greyback to ruin any more lives than he already has."

Lovegood cocked his head at the look of consternation on Remus' face and clapped him on the shoulder. "Oh, think nothing of it; I'm just trying to pass along a good deed." The reporter sighed and surveyed Remus with an expression of understanding. He lowered his voice. "I've met a few werewolves over the years. Most of them are just average people trying to get along like anyone else – except for twelve really bad days a year, of course. I'm sure you're no different."

Suddenly Remus thought that Lucas Lovegood wasn't nearly as absent-minded as he liked to appear. Remus nodded curtly, not certain how to reply to the man's generous words. Lovegood stood and offered Remus a hand to help him to his feet again. The two shook hands as they said their goodbyes.

"One more thing," Remus said quickly.

"Anything."

"Do you remember how you got into the Greyback house? How you got past the protections?"

Lovegood frowned and looked upward, his pale blue eyes darting back and forth as if he were sifting through mental files. Finally he brought his gaze back to Remus. "Can't say that I do. It's been a long time." He narrowed his eyes, a look of concern sweeping across his features. "You're not thinking of going there?"

"No, just curious," Remus lied.

And with no qualms whatsoever, he searched Lovegood's memory again. But what he came up with was a melody. It was a child's song, and a tune that he recognized: a simple little ditty with nonsense words, although he couldn't place it at the moment. This had to be some random memory Remus had somehow accessed by mistake. Perhaps the reporter really had forgotten how he got in. He shook himself, now feeling vaguely disgusted with himself that he had so casually entered a good man's thoughts, not once but twice.

"Your story is likely to stir up trouble," he said softly. "Please be careful, Mr. Lovegood."

"And you," Lovegood replied, squinting in the sunlight.

Remus went to rejoin his parents and Lily and Peter, leaving the reporter to interview more of the Lupins' friends. As he passed between the two coffins he noticed, for the first time, the sea of daffodils blooming near the family plot. They seemed out of place, too yellow and alive and innocent in such a grim and proper setting. He thought dimly that someone should pluck them all and put them somewhere else.

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A/N: I figured if I survived the last chapter without too many flames, I'd go ahead and post this one! Thanks for the kind reviews.

So, finally getting back to the werewolf plot. But another can of worms is about to be opened with the Marauders.

As Remus has just had a funeral, I'm not sure that a bribe is in order. So, review only if you feel moved to do so. ;)