A/N: Yay! Angst! And fluff! This is a SUPER long chapter, but it's my favorite in the whole story - prepare to be DAZZLED! Well, maybe not, but it's good; trust me, I wrote it (There's no way to say that I like it without looking like a arrogant fathead. That being said, I like it). By the way, for anyone who likes this story, I've started writing a Young Justice fanfiction. If you like that sort of thing, I'll have started uploading it by today. R&R, if thou pleasest. MockingjayWolf out!

Life in the Forbidden Forest wasn't bad; there were plenty of deer and rabbits and it was cool and dim under the cover of the trees. Katrina dug herself a shallow den underneath the roots of an old oak tree and proceeded to explore her new territory. All kinds of beasts lived in the most recluse places in the Forest; to find them, you only had to be very quiet. Pixies, Bowtruckles, Ashwinders, Kneazles, Jarveys and Mokes were just a few of the less interesting creatures running around in there. But those were the less dangerous beasts; Werewolves, Centaurs, Occamys and Unicorns inhabited the Forest too.
Katrina exchanged polite words whenever she and a group of centaurs crossed each other, and once she encountered a herd of unicorns (they seemed to understand that, as a wolf, she wouldn't touch them, and allowed her, as a human, to walk up to them and stroke their silky coats). However, she steered well clear of the aggressive occamys and the mysterious werewolves.
Occasionally, Katrina would lope back to the castle to talk to whoever happened to be around, Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, Gryffindors and even Slytherins. They all seemed to be impressed with her little act of rebellion and updated her on what she had missed - Umbridge came close to putting Sprout on probation, Umbridge was interrogating suspected D.A. members with Veritaserum, she and Filch were extremely close to discovering the location of the D.A. Some of the (Hufflepuff) girls, especially, thought she looked underfed and took the liberty of smuggling her food from the Great Hall, something she couldn't (and didn't) say no to.

"Hey, Kat?" Fred's voice, for once, was unsure. He stepped around the corner.
"Yeah?" Katrina had been watching the sun slowly rise over the top of the lake, splicing the sky with a barrage of soft, dreamy colors. She turned from her comfortable spot with her back against the willow tree at the edge of the Black Lake, slightly surprised. While she herself had gotten used to rising with the sun, the twins were more of the sleep-in-until-late-for-first-period stock.
"How's forest life?"
"Fine, I guess. But I can't wait until that fat goblin gets up off her arse and leaves, so I can come back."
"Uh... I just wanted to give you a heads-up." He shifted uneasily, avoiding her eyes.
"What?" Get on with it!
"George and I have decided, y'know, with all that's going on... maybe it's time to fly the coop." He finished hurriedly, as if afraid of her reaction.
Katrina's brow creased slightly. "You mean-"
"Yeah. We're leaving."
Instantly she was standing up, looking at him with wide eyes, silent.
He looked at her sadly. "You know, you could come with us, but your parents would want you to finish and all-"
Fred didn't get any farther before she hugged him. He was taken by surprise - Katrina, up till that point, hadn't been much of a 'huggy' person.
"Fred, I-I... understand." What else could she say?
No, don't go, I need the two of you.
Yeah, fine, go, see if I care.
No! YOU CAN'T GO! Petrificus Totalus!
Somehow none of them, especially the last one, seemed right. So she just was quiet.
A small breeze picked up, and Katrina stepped back, determined not to cry. "How soon?"
"As soon as possible. It could be next week, or tomorrow."
"Fred, how can you leave?"
"What?"
No, idiot, do go any farther than this. Just accept it. Too bad she never listened to that little voice in her head. "You have to stay!"
He looked vaguely annoyed. "No, I don't. This place has gone to the dogs. Honestly, I think you're probably having more fun out there in the Forest than any of us are in Hogwarts!"
"Oh, yeah, sleeping on the cold ground in the rain and having to hunt stringy rabbits to stay alive is real fun." She spat angrily. He didn't understand a thing.
"Well, fun or not, George and I are leaving. You can't stop us."
"Fine! Go!" She shouted. "Hop on your broomsticks and fly into the sunset like the little perfect boys you are!"
He looked as though she had hit him. "How are we... in any way... perfect?" His voice was dangerously low.
"Everyone likes you two!"
"Everyone likes you, too!"
Now he was just messing with her.
"I'm always the shadow, the third wheel. Yeah, there goes the Lupine girl; what was her first name again? Aw, who cares, she hangs out with Fred and George."
"No-one says that."
At this point, she knew she was being ridiculous; but it was too late now. "You're just...so... unpredictable!"
"Yeah? Well, so are you." He looked at her. "That's what everyone likes about you, Katrina. You could be the perfect little O-star bitch, but you're an athletic, roguish unpredictable Gryffindor Animagus - completely unique. That's what everyone says about you - that's what everyone likes about you... what I like about you."
Silence. Katrina was frozen. I am such a-
"Bye, Kat." He turned on his heel and strode away.
"Fred. Wait!"
But he was gone.
She closed her eyes and mentally punched herself, sinking back down to the ground, leaning against the tree. Oh, nice going, idiot. Now he's going to leave and you're never going to get the chance to apologize.

It was like a replay of the day after the Yule Ball. Katrina was too depressed in the morning to even get up, and lay with her furry chin between her paws for hours after she had woken up.
A voice calling her name late into the afternoon made her look around. She huffed bad-naturedly as Hermione came into view, ducking under a protruding branch.
"Katrina? Are you here?"
"Go away!" She, now in witch form, sat with her knees pulled up to her chin. "I am not excepting visitors right now."
"Katrina, I've just spent the past thirty minutes trying to find you in this maze of a forest. Please, just listen to what I have to say."
"Fine." She glanced up. Hermione wore a patterned sweater to protect her from the chill. Her school robes were nowhere to be seen. Was it Saturday? "Please leave a message at the tone. Beep." There was no emotion in her voice.
"Were you awful to Fred yesterday?" Hermione came over and sat down next to her.
Katrina sighed, deflating visibly. "Yes. Has he told everyone?"
"No. That's the point. He won't talk to anyone, even George. He's just been moping around. You two must have had a pretty big fight."
"Yeah. I was just a bitch to him about his leaving."
"George was mentioning something about that. "
"God, I just got so possessive, like a kid with a toy. I'm not his mother. I can't stop him from leaving."
"No. You can't." Hermione looked thoughtful. "But you could give him something to remember you by."
"What do you me - oh. Wait a minute - I don't like Fred like that!"
"Well, that's just my opinion. Good luck, Katrina. But… just don't be in a fight with him when he leaves." She got up to go.
"Thanks." Then, as she was walking away, Katrina suddenly called, "God help me when I start taking love advice from you, Granger!"
Hermione smiled over her shoulder. "You're welcome!"

"Have you seen Fred?"
"No." A Ravenclaw who looked like he had somewhere to be.
"Have you seen Fred?"
"Bugger off, wolf-freak." A Slytherin who looked disgusted to be within ten feet of her.
"Have you seen Fred?"
"No. If I do, I'll tell him though." A Hufflepuff.
This continued, until, finally, Katrina just asked people when she heard their footsteps, looking down at her feet.
"Have you seen Fred?"
"What do you want, Katrina?"
Katrina's head snapped up. Fred looked at her dully.
"Fred, I-" She hadn't planned this part.
"What?"
"I-I-"
"I've got to get to class, Katrina."
"Wait!" But he was already gone, striding down the corridor. She ran after him, planning her apology. She grabbed his robe, and-

She landed hard on her ass, groaning.
Fred sat up next to her. "Where the hell did you take me?"
"The- The Forbidden Forest, I think."'
"Learning from those Apparating classes, I see." He got up, dusted himself off and walked off in a random direction, into the shadows of the misty-surrounded trees.
Not again.
"Will you slow down?" She had to jog to keep up with him. "Do you even know where you're going?"
"No. I'll find my way out, though."
"Fred, wait." She stopped dead at the edge of the clearing they had just entered.
"What?" He looked annoyed.
"Stop." Something in her voice made him stop. "That's a Quintaped nest."
"Oh, really. The same Quintapeds that only live on the Isle of Drear?" He looked skeptical. "Is this a prank? Cause if it is, it's not funny."
"Fred, this is not a prank. I don't know how they got here." She gulped. "Just don't do-"
"Incendio!" A burst of flame spurted from his wand towards the nest.
"No!" She shrieked in fear as scores of hairy spider-like beasts began to crawl out of the nest, screeching in high-pitched voices. "Fred, you idiot!"
He drew backwards in shock at the army of red-brown hairy beasts that crowded out of the hole in the ground that was their nest – now on fire. Unfortunately, the beasts seemed to be unharmed.
"Me? You're the one who Apparated us here!"
She stumbled backwards. "You're the one who cast a frickin' Incendio spell at their nest – Reducto!" she yelled, pointing her wand at the nearest Quintaped. It exploded in a puff of fur that was almost comical, if it hadn't enraged the others further.
Katrina screamed as one leaped and latched itself onto her foot. She fell on her butt and scrambled backwards, trying to loosen the Quintaped's hold on her jeans. It steadily crawled up her leg instead, shrieking all the while. In a strange moment of panic, she remembered something from Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find The: the Quintaped particularly enjoys the taste of human flesh.
Oh, freakin' fantastic.
Fred was occupied with the ever-present swarm of advancing Quintapeds; besides, even if he was free to cast a spell, he was more likely to hit her.
Her hand closed over a rock. In last minute desperation, she grabbed it and began smashing the Quintaped with it. It screamed and bit down hard on her leg, it's fangs entering through her jeans. Katrina yelled in pain, and brought down the rock one last time, crushing the beast's head. It unlatched itself, quite dead.
Pain. She rolled over, moaning. The world took on a dazing quality; everything was unfocused and slow, muted and alien. Fred, wand still drawn, ran over and yanked her to her feet.
"Well? You're the – Incendio – Care of Magical Creatures expert! What do we do?"
"Run." She felt strangely calm. It was as though the Quintaped had sucked out all her panic and bitten some sense into her.
"What?"
The world snapped back into focus. "Run!" She grabbed his wrist and towed him frantically away from the man-eating spiders-like creatures.
"I can't believe you were stupid enough to Apparate us to a random place in the Forest without even thinking!" Obviously he was still mad.
"The only reason I did that was because you were too stubborn to even stop to hear me out!" She tripped over a tree root in her haste to be self-righteous.
He pulled her back up on her feet, as the Quintapeds continued to chase them. Fred ducked under a branch. "Alright. You know what? I'm sorry!"
The breath now ran ragged in her chest, but it was easier for her apology to come spilling out now that he had done it. "I'm sorry too – for being such a bitch to you yesterday. I should have – Petrificus Totalus – stopped when I realized what I was doing, but – Incendio! "
"I'm sorry for telling you so late about our leaving. I should have mentioned – Evanesco – it earlier, it must have been too much of a shock for you."
"I'm sorry for Apparating us to who-knows-where!" She put on a burst of frightened speed, adrenaline coursing through her veins, as a particularly quick Quintaped made a wild grab for her ankle. She yelped as its clubfoot grazed the back of her jeans.
"Appa-Apparating! That's it!" Fred grabbed her arm. "Hold on!"
"Fred, what are you-" Then, they were gone, leaving a very confused, very hungry group of Quintapeds behind.

They landed harshly just outside of the Forest. Katrina forced her heartbeat to slowly calm down. Then she turned to Fred.
"You-"
"You-" Apparently they had the same idea.
"Um- thanks for, uh, getting us out of there." She tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear self consciously, very much aware of how stupid she looked.
"Um, no problem." He got to his feet and pulled her up.
She tried to take her hands away, but Fred held on. Katrina looked up at him, confused.
"Before I went, I wanted to say... that..." Get on with it, Weasley! Fred chided himself. "I...I.. oh, hell with it."
He leaned forward and kissed her. Katrina froze, her eyes widening to the size of dinner plates.
And suddenly she found herself kissing him back. His lips were soft and warm. A small, sweet ache in the middle of her stomach confirmed that this was right, that she wanted to be nowhere else but here right now, that this was perfect and she wanted to freeze time and never end this moment...
She pulled back for air, breathing deeply. Fred looked at her.
Katrina swallowed. She took him, trying to be gentle, stifling the lust-filled wolf inside her, by the back of his neck and pulled his face down to hers. He took her lower back as their mouths pressed together. It wasn't an ache anymore; it was a flame that roared inside her for more. He moved his hands up and twisted them into her hair. A shiver of delight ran up her spine and she kissed him fiercely.
And as soon as it had begun, it was over. Fred pulled back from Katrina, hazel eyes meeting brown- the fire she had felt was mirrored in his eyes. They were both breathing hard.
"You kiss like you learned it from a book." It was the only thing that was in her mind.
"Huh?"
"Romeo and Juliet."
"You're such a geek, Kat." He took a deep breath. "I love you, Katrina."
She said what she had wanted to say for months. "I love you too."

She watched the red-haired rebels shoot around the courtyard, throwing fireworks everywhere.
"A discount on all Weasley's Wizard Wheezes products to any student here who comes in and tells us they're using our products to get rid of this old bat," George whooped.
"Stop them!" Umbridge shrieked, quite frazzled after a chasing from a terrifying firework dragon. It was too late anyway.
"Give her hell from us, Peeves." Fred calmly nodded to the poltergeist.
Peeves sprang to a salute as Fred and George sped out of the courtyard into the sunset.
Katrina turned from the shadowed corner she was standing in, so as not to be seen by Filch or any of the Inquisitorial Squad, and smirked. They had definitely outdone her.

"The thestrals should be right over here, Harry - oh!" Luna Lovegood, a fifth year, practically tripped over the dozing wolf. Yet she didn't seem in the least scared. "Hello there. You wouldn't happen to be sixth-level nargle, would you?"
The wolf, annoyed her nap had been disturbed, grumbled and rolled over and morphed quietly into Katrina Lupine.
"Oh, no. I supposed it would be you, Katrina. Sixth-level nargles are ever so hard to find, as they can change their appearance to suit any non-magical beast."
Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Ginny stumbled into the small clearing behind Luna.
"Hi, Katrina." Harry seemed impatient, so Katrina decided to be annoying and ask the obvious question.
"What's going on?"
"We're going to the Ministry of-"
"Shut up, Neville!"
"Ginny, it's okay. You know Katrina. She's fine."
Indeed, Katrina had met Ginny. They were on neutral terms, but Ginny had never quite forgiven Katrina as the young red-haired Weasley seemed to think that her twin brothers would have spent a lot more time with her had the natural Animagus never come into the picture.
"Katrina, why don't you come with us? You're a sixth-year, so you know more advanced spells." Hermione looked pleadingly at her.
What the hey. It was getting boring anyway. "Okay; but first, where are you going and what are you looking for?"
"Harry thinks Sirius is trapped in the Department of Mysteries and is being tortured by Voldemort," Ron said quickly.
Harry flinched.
Katrina slit her eyes. "What if it's just a trap?"
"That's what I said!" Hermione looked relieved to have someone of common thinking with her. "Harry, what if Voldemort has just set this up so-"
"No, Hermione! Sirius is in trouble, and we have to save him!" Harry turned and stomped further into the forest.
"Harry." Luna's voice was calm.
"What?"
"The thestrals are the other way."
He turned around without missing a beat and disappeared into the trees.
"Doesn't miss much, does he?" Katrina walked after him, and the other fifth-years followed.

"This place is so creepy." Ginny's hushed whisper brought Katrina back from her thoughts.
The seven of them moved down the aisles in a pack, the glowing orbs lighting up the dim room, like some sort of paranormal grocery store.
Wonder if there's one about me? Let's see... Lochester, Rachel... Loohl, Eric... Lyma, Wendy. Nope. Damn. That would have been interesting.
Harry, meanwhile, had found an orb with his name on it. Katrina narrowed her eyes as her stomach gave a nervous jump. Something was wrong.
"Guys." It was a sharp command for everyone to be alert.
Neville, Luna, Ginny, Ron, Harry and Hermione tensed, listening.
A curse flew out of the darkness, and Katrina, with quick physical reflexes (but slightly slower mental reflexes) sent back the first curse that came into her head - "Reducto!"
A burst of black, and a Death Eater, who had been about to curse Luna, exploded into a thousand pieces.
Whoops. Oh well.
Suddenly, voices all around them, and they were surrounded by Death Eaters. One of them took off his mask - Lucius Malfoy.
"Potter - the prophecy. Now. Hand it over, like a good boy." Lucius held out a hand.
"No!"
"Very well." He nodded to the other Death Eaters. They lunged forwards, and before anyone could react, they Apparated.

A hooded figure stood with his wand against her throat. She breathed in and out steadily, trying to hold back the rising wave of panic. Everyone except Harry, who stood in the middle of the black room, had a captor and a wand against their necks.
"Now, Potter, the prophecy." Malfoy looked impatient.
"Let - let the others go, and I'll give you the prophecy."
Malfoy laughed - a mean sound. "You are in no position to bargain, Potter. You are helpless, and none of your little friends can assist you here."
"Wanna bet?" It was the stupidity talking, but Katrina was running on adrenaline. She traded her trapped human skin for the sleekness of her silver wolf, who twisted around and snapped at the face of the Death Eater. He yelped and dropped his wand. She stood up on her hind legs and pushed him into the wall, rendering him unconscious. Meanwhile, the fifth-years were taking advantage of the chaotic situation, whirling about and stunning the Death Eaters. Katrina turned human again and cast a Petrificus Totalus spell at an attacking Death Eater.
All of a sudden, a voice came right next to her ear. "Little wolf puppy wants to play, does she? Well, how does she like torture games?"
Before she could react, Bellatrix Lestrange shrieked, "Crucio!"
And the pain was white-hot and agonizing - needles and knives thrust themselves into her body and twisted, twisted - Katrina fell to the floor and convulsed, clawing at her body. Dimly she heard her name being screamed out, and the laughing of a madwoman.
Then, the pain was gone - at least most of it. The throbbing pounded her head and a hammer smashed into her skull. Everything went white, then red, then black.

"Kat? You waking up?"
Her eyes flickered open. Light pierced her irises. She slammed her eyelids shut and moaned - her body was being crushed by a hundred-ton weight.
"Come on, Kat. Don't make make me force-feed you Canary Creams."
She unlatched her eyes and looked into a concerned, red-headed face - Fred.
"Hey, stranger." He smiled.
"Fred. Where am I?"
"St Mungo's Department for the Psychiatrically Disturbed."
"What?" She struggled into an upright position, ignoring the burst of pain. "I'm not - I can't be-"
"Relax, Kat. You're in St Mungo's. That Cruciatus Curse Lestrange hit you with was pretty strong." Fred tensed angrily. "On the bright side, it's nice to know you're still naive. And alive."
Katrina hugged him, wrapping her arms around his neck. From his sitting position, he hugged her back.
"Wish I could have been there. I would have murdered that madwoman and maybe Sirius wouldn't have-" He cut himself off.
"Wouldn't have what? Fred? What happened?"
"Uh, George is back at the shop. I should let him know you're awake."
"Fred."
"Kat... Sirius was killed by Lestrange. Right after she tortured you, she duelled Sirius... and he lost."
"Oh... ohmigod." Katrina was too shocked to let the literal meaning of the sentence sink in. "Fred..."
"I know."