A/N: Chapter title from Tennyson.
A flicker from ahead seems to beckon impatiently, a flaming torch held above the blinding darkness. His eyes meet the light and he catches his breath at the promise it holds.
His claws scratch restlessly against the loose soil underfoot. Muscles ridge through his back, tensing. His belly scrapes the dirt as he crouches, ready to pounce forward.
There is no pain. There is only the lofty torch ahead.
The darkness slides into a greyed blur as the wolf creeps forward. Clarity is held in the light. Clarity is solely reserved for the flaming torch ahead. All else can fade to the obscure, to the dry leaves scraping beneath paws and the surrounding beat of darkness.
The pounding of adrenaline clenches the air taut with promise. A heartbeat drums a tattoo into the wolf's consciousness, and yet lucidity waits ahead in the light of the flames.
Follow the torch, follow the light…
Enough, enough, and the pervasive thrumming quickens, and the wolf leaps through the blurred darkness. Agile and swift, muzzle bared in anticipation, teeth glinting in the echo of the flames ahead, the creature is fixated on its goal. Cold air rifles through its fur, and the wolf feels nothing.
There is no pain.
There is no moon.
There is a torch held aloft in the distance, and nothing else registers in the simple plane of the wolf's mind.
A howl pierces through the surrounding blur, and then another, and another, until the tortured wailing overcomes the percussive pounding of a heartbeat.
Now there is pain, searing against ribs and torn flesh and muscles that ache with misuse, and yet the wolf pays no heed.
Find the torch, find the light…
The wolf slips through the wretched cacophony with the ease of pure focus, sliding through the night like thread through shining needlepoint. A new scent catches at the air, flooding into a snout that lifts and twists with suspicion. Familiar. It is a familiar scent to the wolf, and holds no remembered threat. Familiar.
Friend.
Ahead. The scent courses through the airstreams from ahead, the direction of the light, and the wolf quickens pace gladly. It travels alone, that is the way, that is accepted; but pack is instinct too. Pack. The familiar smell is compliant. No threat.
Alpha.
Assured of its dominance, the wolf bolts through the darkness like lightening slicing clouds asunder. The torchlight flickers steadily ahead, more enticing than the bloodied carcass of a kill. The light is a beacon.
The night is adrenaline, and thrill.
The wolf can feel new vibrations underfoot, the rhythmic pounding of another, the owner of the familiar scent. A dark tail brushes across the path of the wolf's vision, momentarily blocking the light. Speed is essential now for clarity. The wolf tears soil apart as it overtakes the dark shape of its friend.
As the wolf passes, its muzzle twitches to the side, eyes leaving the torchlight momentarily. The silver glint of a familiar eye slashes through the blackened blur.
Focus is broken.
When the wolf turns back for the clarity found in a flickering flame, the torch is gone. All is darkness, and howling, and heartbeat, and –
Padfoot.
Remus woke up, sweaty and twisted in his blankets. Disorientation smothered at his senses as he struggled to see the flame. His breathing quietened as he gazed blindly about the room, finding it black and still as an underground lake.
The stillness seemed stagnant after the rush of the hunt. His fingernails tore into sheets, searching for dirt and leaves. He stopped himself quickly, but his eyes searched on through the darkness. His heart could not be forcibly stilled.
Where was the light? Where was the torch?
Senses heightened to inhuman intensity, Remus could not prevent himself from sniffing at the air. Despite the close darkness, and the lack of movement, there was a worrying scent about.
Had he been properly awake, Remus might have dismissed this worrying smell to be the by-product of the practice of sharing a room with several rather worrying teenage boys. However, half-wrapped in sleep and cloaked in canine senses, the scent was more carefully examined.
Fear. Below the immediate sharpness, a quieter tang. Tears.
If human ears could prick, Remus' did. His sleep-tussled head swivelled in the darkness to the immediate right. Familiar smell. Tainted with tears.
Sirius.
Before he could properly recognise what he was doing, Remus had dragged himself from his sheets and padded drowsily to the bed beside his. The cold air gasped at his skin, stealing the warmth of blankets and adrenaline.
He ignored the sudden cool. His clouded focus was fixed on the tuft of black hair that was sprawled vulnerably across a pillow. It was only by squinting that Remus could make out these shapes in the darkness. There wasn't a face to be seen, only the hair, and no movement, but Remus advanced nonetheless. He could smell tears. He could smell Sirius.
At the edge of the wooden bed frame, Remus paused. His bare feet gripped the floorboards with growing unease, but he had come this far. A sniff wrenched through the air, deafening. Infinitesimal. Cacophony to Remus' night hearing.
"Padfoot?" he whispered, voice hoarse from sleep.
No response.
Remus' hands dangled helplessly above the covers of the bed. Something inside him yearned to ensure comfort and security. He vacillated.
Another threadbare, barely-there sniff.
His hands lunged forward without the direction of his drowsy brain. Remus pulled back the covers with effort. The silvery glint of Sirius' eyes interrupted the room's stubborn darkness. Familiar grey was brightened with tears.
"Padfoot," Remus repeated, sliding slowly to his knees. "You – you okay?"
Sirius' empty hands seemed to grasp for the blanket that had been peeled away. Remus could see the slender white shapes of fingers too elegant for their masculine body, and remembered their strength. He remembered the confident grasp of that morning, the cockiness that belied the tenderness that had been all-too-evident beneath.
Taking a breath that seemed too deep in the stillness of the bedroom, Remus brought his own hand down and entwined his fingers in Sirius'. Silver slits closed as if in relief. The pale light that peered through the railing of the curtain glanced upon a solitary tear track. Remus, who had come into full consciousness with sudden worry, moved instinctively, pressing his warm face against the hand he held clutched in his own.
"Bad dream," Sirius breathed, and the unevenness in his voice was barely audible. "Don't worry, I'm fine, you can go back –"
Sirius' unsteady voice broke off as Remus shook his head slowly, rocking his cheek against the skin below. He could sense the lie even without the aid of human intuition. Remus was no stranger to bad dreams. The air still smelt of fear.
"Stay with me, then, I don't care," Sirius muttered tiredly, and Remus wondered if he should blush. He didn't. The night was too still, the room was too dark.
Without warning, the bed beside Remus' head crinkled with moving sheets. He raised his cheek questioningly, and found that Sirius had rolled across to the far side of the mattress, leaving a bare expanse interrupted only by their woven hands.
Remus eyed the empty space. Tiredness roared like an aching yawn through his body. His cold-prickling skin could almost feel the heat radiating from the sheets. It was only when Sirius gave a desperate little squeeze on his fingers that Remus managed to decide, and he rolled onto the bed quickly after that. He could be soothing. He could do that.
Sirius produced a tight little smile as Remus peered across their shared pillow in concern. He didn't need to ask if Sirius needed to talk about his bad dream. They knew each other too well for that. If Sirius wanted to talk, he would talk.
The band of protective friendship that squeezed worriedly about Remus' chest at this moment banished all thoughts of the past six months from mind. Right now, it was just the two of them, two sixteen-year-old schoolboys secure in the simplicity of friendship.
Sirius rolled his head forward across the pillow and pressed his forehead to Remus', slowly, as if in caution.
Remus froze. He tried in vain to settle the sudden drumming that was assaulting his chest. A wry voice inside queried the simplicity of their friendship, and he almost pulled away. It was the sorrowful glint in familiar grey eyes that relieved the abrupt tension. It was the swelling of the scent of fear, and the widening of wet lashes.
Remus closed his eyes, feeling himself give in to the warmth of the bed and the heat of the contact. He knew fear. He knew pain.
As the heat seared through Remus, enflaming his cheeks and rippling up from his fingertips, he cracked open his eyes and peered once more across the pillow. Sirius' eyes, so close, were open, and his face had relaxed from its mask of tension. As the pallid light caught on the wet grey glint, Remus thought he saw a flicker of something indescribable.
Find the torch, find the light…
Follow the torch, follow the light…
He closed his eyes once more, tightening his grasp on Sirius' fingers, and luxuriated in the warmth of a silent gasp that brushed across his face.
A/N: …
CLIFFHANGER: Will Remus truly see the light this time?
Oh, loved this chapter. Loved writing it. Loved the fact that so much can be resolved without fumbling words and awkward interruptions.
The story is drawing to a close, and the plot is possibly even tightening into actual unangsty fluff, so be excited.
REVIEW!
xx Froody