Somehow, and Remus didn't know or even begin to guess at, James was the first one up the next morning. What's more, not only was he up, but he was well rested and even chirpy as he bounced on everyone else's beds to wake them up.

'Come on, we have classes this morning!' He dragged Sirius by the foot until he was in the bathroom, the other teen whining the whole way like a dying dog. Peter, wisely, ran off before James could try the same trick twice, which just left James to annoy Remus. Thankfully years of living with James had made him almost immune, which meant Remus got those few precious extra five minutes before he had to get up or be late.

Breakfast was over too quickly for Remus' liking, Hagrid coming in half way through to take him away from the Great Hall and over to his own home. He imagined all sorts of horrors that awaited him on the job. It wasn't that he thought Hagrid was going to try and kill him or anything, but Remus supposed if the job was that hard that a half giant had to do it then Remus wasn't going to last very long.

However, as soon as they got there, Remus was invited in for a cup of tea and some rock cakes. They were tough on the teeth, but overall nice, and not at all what he was expecting for his first day.

'Here, take some more while I get Max ready. He's going to be your responsibility this year.' Five more rock cakes were put into his hand, Hagrid disappearing into what had to be his bedroom and returning with a mastiff.

His duties with Max consisted of twice daily walks and feeding him, a chore Remus was all too happy to take on. The castle was picturesque enough that it had Remus itching to go outside himself and take a walk, and since Max was an old dog, the two of them managed to make the most of their time outdoors. This particular morning saw the two of them chasing butterflies all the way back to Hagrid's hut, Remus trying to remember the last time he had just enjoyed himself like this.

Of course, it wasn't all fun and games. When he wasn't tending to Max he was to help Hagrid on his rounds. It differed on a day to day basis, Hagrid telling them they were the ones responsible for keeping this place running. Today they were helping Grubby Plank gather the unicorns for Care of Magical creatures. Surprisingly, the unicorns were quite happy to have them around.

'It's cause you're not quite human. If you were, these creatures would be shying away.' Which, Remus didn't know whether he was happy about or not. It was one thing to be told he wasn't human by wizards, and quite another for it to be sensed by creatures.

'They should be shying away regardless,' Remus remarked, even as he marvelled at the soft muzzle he was touching. 'I would probably try and eat them on a full moon.'

'Probably,' Hagrid agreed, not looking at all revolted by the idea like most people were.

It didn't take long for Remus to figure out why. Along with being a half breed himself, Hagrid seemed to be fascinated with the dangerous and deadly creatures that lived in the world. He confessed he'd always wanted his own dragon while they were setting up brooms for the first year's flying lessons. That, and he kept telling Remus how misunderstood this or that creature was, even as Remus remembered what their classification was on the Ministry scale.

Overall, it was an interesting way to spend the day, and tided Remus over until four. Hagrid sent him out for Max's second walk, telling him to get himself along when he was done to the great hall for dinner.

The feast that night was better than the one before, but that could have just been because Remus didn't really remember his first feast. He managed to pile his plate high with food before aghast looks from other professors had him slowing down. Still, that didn't stop him from stealing a few cupcakes when the call went up to return to their dorms.

He was munching on them happily when James started his interrogation about his day. He was more than disappointed when Remus said they had him doing nothing more than helping out.

'What did you expect?'

James shrugged, 'I don't know. A rogue centaur herd, an infestation of boggarts. Something interesting.'

Remus laughed, stopping in the middle as the thought came that something like that probably would happen while he was at Hogwarts, and knowing his luck he would be made to help out with it. 'Well, nothing like that happened today.'

With nothing left to add, Remus started on James' day, wondering if he really had kept his promise to focus on his career or delved back into that troublemaking teen Remus knew was lurking beneath the surface. It turned out it was a bit of both. James managed to be both studious, paying attention in class and even answering questions when the need arose, and mischievous by subtly messing up someone's potion. By the time Sirius and Peter clambered into the dorm, probably coming back from a prank James had not so subtly hinted at, Remus was helping James with his homework, James actually doing it for once.

The next day was much like the first, a walk with Max and then helping Hagrid out when he was done. This time it was chopping logs for the castles fires. 'Gotta get this stuff done early,' Hagrid said, hauling a log almost twice his size like it was nothing. 'Come winter all this stuff'll be wet, and what good will that be eh?'

Thankfully manual labour such as this was made easier by, probably, one of the few perks of being a werewolf. He had excellent stamina, and endurance enough to haul log after log over to the castle stores and back when others would have stopped.

He was on his thirteenth trip, the log heavy on his shoulders when he realised he had a bit of a crowd. Well, three people anyway, and at the front was the girl he'd seen on the train. Her friends weren't even trying to hide how scared they were, standing a full metre away from the girl and trying to call her back.

She didn't listen, and was standing in front of Remus before any other action could be taken. 'Need a hand?' As if Remus had any say in the matter. She'd already discarded her robe and was grabbing the other end of the log before she'd finished speaking. They set it down, Remus seeing the girls friends following them at a distance. 'So, you're a werewolf.'

Interesting way to start, Remus thought. 'Yes.'

'And you're what? Working for Dumbledore?'

'Well, Hagrid,' Although he supposed he was working for Dumbledore. 'And I'm more helping out than working. Werewolves aren't really allowed a job. Not paid anyway.'

She crossed her arms, something telling Remus this was a regular look on her from the ease in which she did it. 'Everyone's saying you're staying with Potter. If you work for Hagrid why are you in the dorms?'

Remus shrugged, not sure how exactly to word it. In the end he just settled for what was basically right. 'He's my master.'

'What, like he owns you?' she asked. Remus nodded, although something told him he probably shouldn't have. It might have had something to do with the horrified look on her face. 'That's barbaric. You're not a slave, why the hell does he own you?'

'It's just the way things are done.' He was growing rather uncomfortable with the conversation, not least because he could see her bra through her white shirt. Really, for girls who had been wearing the same uniform for the past who knew how many years, he would have thought hey would learn that bright colours weren't easily hid through white. He would almost think she was trying to impress someone had he not been so fixated in finding an excuse to leave. Eventually he remembered the reason he was there in the first place, hinting towards the logs and leaving the girl to her fuming in peace.

He wasn't surprised to see James storm up to the head table that night at dinner. He was looking decidedly green, like all over green which had to be from some spell or another. 'Who've you been talking to? You know what, don't answer that. But if they comes asking again, tell them to piss off.'

'Why?'

James shook his head telling Remus the confrontation he'd had from a few muggleborns that afternoon. Not only did they have a go at him about keeping another human being prisoner, but hexed him when he tried to defend himself. 'They just don't understand. They were talking about going to the ministry,' and they both knew that if the ministry thought for a moment James wasn't taking his responsibility seriously Remus was going to end up with a silver bullet through his head.

'I didn't mean to-'

'No, it's not you. It's them. Just tell them to piss off Rem.'

James' bad mood was enough to send him off on a prank that night, One that had the great hall filled with Cornish pixies and girly underwear. He could see the girl he'd talk to yesterday eagerly grabbing a few things with a decidedly red blush on her face as the others came down for breakfast.

The prank seemed like it had deterred the girl from speaking to him again. For a whole two weeks he was left in peace, growing used to the routine and demands that came with being Hagrid's little helper. By the end of September he was surprised at how much he was enjoying himself. Sure, it was hard work, but Remus had seen and done things he never thought he would. He'd talked to centaurs, and thankfully not a rogue herd. He'd seen mermaids, ghosts and a number of nifflers that had decided they liked him enough to hang around for a few hours. He'd helped with Herbology, getting a few lessons himself when Professor Sprout saw him looking at one thing or another.

It was a good month overall.

Of course, it had to come to an end sooner or later. The first moon of the month came on October 1st, a decidedly horrid day for more than one reason.

He'd woken up in a foul mood, the other three in the dorm deciding that they were going to have another late night and keeping him awake too with their merriment. He tried to ignore them when he woke up, knowing that Peter was already on edge with him after James had declared loudly last Thursday that it was Remus' 'time of the month.' Easier said than done when he lived with them. They were loud, too loud for Remus' sensitive hearing. They left smells everywhere, most of them he'd been able to ignore since he'd grown used to the idea of sharing. But it was one thing to have the rest of the room be covered in their stuff and waking to find one of his shirts on Sirius' bed. He thought Sirius earned the glare for that stunt, James herding him out of the room before more could be done.

'Okay Remmy, lots of meat for breakfast and then off to the hospital wing with you,' James ordered. 'Hagrid already knows you won't be there today, so no excuses.'

Breakfast he was like a pariah. Any friends he had made on the staff seemed to have forgotten that, since not only did they keep a wide berth, but told any students to avoid his end of the table as well. He may have bitten into his breakfast with more teeth than necessary in response to that. Hagrid at least, treated him no different. He'd even baked him some rock cakes to take to the hospital wing with him. Too bad the nice treats were like ash in his mouth, almost making him retch as the only thing his stomach wanted now was meat.

He managed to get a good few hours nap in at the hospital wing, the matron, a nice woman, woke him every so often to take his temperature. Apparently this was the first time she'd tended to a werewolf, an experience she would no doubt be regretting the next morning. The way Remus had come to look at it was people would always be fascinated until they saw what it really entailed. Until he turned up the next morning with limbs missing and scratches on scratches littering his body.

Early evening, when his temper was at an all time high, he saw the girl James had warned him to keep away from poke her head into the hospital wing.

'Leave,' he bit out before she could even try to talk to him.

She didn't listen, venturing further in and stopping before his bed. 'I suppose Potter told you to say that. He wasn't pleased when I told him how sick this whole thing was.'

'The only thing sick here is you meddling. Leave,' he growled, not surprised at how inhuman it sounded.

For the first time she looked slightly frightened. Good, he thought. Yet still she didn't leave. 'Look, I want to help you. What they're doing to you is wrong, and I know this isn't the best time to be telling you this, but Potter's had you on watch for the past few weeks so this is the only time I could get to you.'

He tried to be civil, he did. 'As nice as that sounds, you're doing more harm than good. Now if you don't mind I'm a few hours away from ripping myself to shreds and I would appreciate not having to talk to you before that. So leave.'

She huffed, but complied, and was out of the hospital wing in time for Remus to get another hours sleep.

Her words followed him all the way to the shack, circling around his head and pulling up questions on what was going to happen this time. Was she going to go after James again? Was she really going to go to the ministry? Had she already? For all he knew there would be a horde of Auror's there in the morning waiting to take him out.

The moon wasn't a good one.

He woke more disorientated than usual, and considering the stream of bad moons he'd been having this year, he was surprised that his threshold for a bad moon was, once again, being reconsidered. His neck hurt when he moved it, his nose following the familiar smell among the medical potions until the only thing it could scent was James. Those wild curls were poking him in the eye, but Remus was willing to forgive it. His ears picked up the long ingrained snores as the rest of his body started to come back online. He almost wished it hadn't as the familiar pin pricks of pain and new scars started almost immediately.

He had thought it was night, yet the light was too bright to be a candle. James must have skipped class then, or Remus had slept through the whole of Friday. Both were a good possibility. It took a while before the matron came to check on them, seeming unsurprised to see James which meant he'd been there a while. She had to pry James away from him to get a potion down his throat, Remus' pin pricks almost disappearing as soon as he'd downed it.

'Poor thing,' she tutted, Remus not knowing whether she meant him or James in that moment as she went to look over her other patients.

Awake, James scurried up to the seat next to the bed. 'It's Saturday. You had quite the wound when they brought you in.' James theorized that either the wolf was aggravated or just itchy. In any case it tried to scratch Remus' neck, the claws imbedding themselves and tearing out a good chunk of skin and even a bone. Apparently it was just before morning, otherwise, and Remus could see the fear, he wouldn't have made it. 'Don't suppose anything happened before the moon?'

He thought back, remembering the girl. Still, he shook his head. A confrontation wouldn't do any good. She said she wanted to help, and from the way she talked about James there was no way he would be able to get through to her. He would have to do it himself. Make her understand that this wasn't as bad as she thought it was.

Until then however, he was stuck in the hospital wing re-growing a bone in his neck. James, thankfully, had chocolate, as well as Hagrid's rock cakes he'd neglected to eat before the moon to keep him occupied. Sirius came in at some point, more sweets on his person to have Remus letting him stay.

Around the time the chocolate frogs had been demolished Remus noticed some kind of silent conversation happening. A raised eyebrow, a pointed nod and elbow from Sirius later James was turning to Remus with the weirdest, bordering on creepiest, smile he'd ever seen on his face. 'So, Rem... Sirius and I were having this, sort of, conversation the other night and, well, you came up, actually that's a poor choice of words. Anyway, we were wondering if you, you know, had urges like other kids our age?'

'What kind of urges?' Although he had a pretty good idea from the red overtaking James' face. Sirius seemed to be pretending nothing was actually happening, his gaze elsewhere as James made a rude hand gesture. Remus didn't really know what to do with that, too tired to even attempt to analyse it, which was probably why James had chosen this as the best time to ask him. 'You're wondering whether I toss off?'

'Well I never see you,' James pointed out.

'I should bloody well hope so. Why did this even come up?'

'Well Pete and I were talking about that girl he'd met over the summer, which led to girls in our year. And then we had a little fight about who was better looking, and since Sirius couldn't break the stalemate I thought of you, but then Pete asked whether you even liked- girls,' Remus thought the real word there was humans, James just omitting it for politeness. 'and Sirius said of course because you are a healthy seventeen year old. But when Pete asked for proof, well, I've never heard you, and you've never like had a shirt or made a midnight sheet run.'

Remus bit back a smirk at the memories that brought up. Obviously at school it wouldn't be that bad to wake up with wet sheets, but when your parents made daily inspections and did the washing it made for an embarrassing talk. Remus had been employed during those years before James had figured out a new system, to handle James' washing in exchange for wizard sweets he'd bring back from Hogsmeade. He missed those days, more than he thought he ever would he missed them.

'Well, you're going to have to continue to wonder since I'm not answering you.'

A pout settled on James' face, 'Oh come on. At least answer whether you like girls or not. Or is it guys? You know I'm not too judgy Remus. Even if you say you find Hagrid's dog attractive, just give me something. Please?'

'No.' He thought about it, 'I don't know. Can we talk about something else?'

Another private conversation was had, James scowling over at Sirius before a nod had them talking about what they thought their Quidditch chances were this year.