Overture:
Chapter One: The Beginning.
Elise always felt that the beginning of school was when she was waiting for her friends at King's Cross Station.
A perfectly good reason for thinking that school began at King's Cross Station. After all, she only saw her friends at school, and hardly anywhere else.
Watching student both young and old walk across the platform- the younger students looking excited and in awe of everything, but the older students looking as if this was just another tedious journey to school.
Then, precisely at a quarter to eleven, she would see Sirius Black and James Potter stroll in through the wall, being as obvious as possible, with Peter Pettigrew trailing behind them, eager to please as ever, and finally- the boy she rather disliked, Remus Lupin, walking through the wall with a battered old cello case slung carelessly on his shoulder, pushing a trolley full of baggage, which mostly consisted of all the Marauder's trunks, and not just his own.
This time, there was no difference in the order. James entered first, hurtling himself through the wall, and messing up his hair for good effect, with a bright grin on his face on his face. Sirius strolled through suavely, his hands stuck nonchalantly in his pockets, giving him the appearance of not having a care in the world. Every female within 10 feet of him must have let out simultaneous sighs as the dark-haired Marauder passed by, as he smirked at them. Elise rolled her eyes with a good natured smile on her face, brushing her bangs out of her eyes.
Peter followed soon after, struggling to push the trolley which contained all the boys' trunks. Odd, Elise thought. Wasn't that Remus's job? She brushed the thought aside quickly, turning to face the Marauders that were currently walking over to her.
"Wotcher, Clement!" Sirius said cheerfully, coming over to sit beside her. "Looking for someone?" he tried to mimic her stare at the wall, trying to figure out what she might be looking so intently at.
"No one of importance." she shrugged, meeting the dark haired Marauder with a raised eyebrow.
Sirius clutched his hand to his heart, pretending to be mortally wounded. "That stings, Clement! I thought you loved me!" he said dramatically, hands waving all over the place.
"I love you as much as I love the Whomping Willow." Elise wrinkled her nose at his flamboyant display, while laughing merrily at his words.
"Ah, I think she's looking for a certain shaggy haired member of our gang, Padfoot." James winked at Elise before settling down onto the bench on the side of her that was not occupied by Sirius. Elise opened her mouth to say something cutting to him, but was interrupted by Sirius, who gave a huge gasp of surprise that was obviously fake.
"I wouldn't have thought you'd miss him, what with that horrible row you two had on the train end of last term." Sirius shrugged and sighed dramatically. "But then again, it is those with most passion and flames in their blood that give the most surprises." he pretended to touch her and recoil in mock horror. "Such a shame really. You're sitting next to two of the most desirable men in Hogwarts, and all you can think about is our scruffy best friend? I thought better of you, Clement." he shook his head sadly.
"I haven't given him a single thought all summer." Elise protested. "I don't even like him."
"Of course you don't." James rolled his eyes. "The odds of you two finally getting together is about as likely as me and Evans getting together."
"Which is, less than zero." Elise quipped.
"No, I'm sure she'll succumb to my manly charms the moment she sees me!"
"Think again, Potter."
"No, YOU think again, Clement."
"I'm sorry, I forgot that you were incapable of thinking. So you'll just have to take my word for it." Elise said smugly to an outraged James.
"As much as your banter entertains me, I'm afraid the woman in question has arrived." Sirius said, pretending to be very interested in his nails.
True to his word, a flame haired girl walked through the wall, the hat on her head knocked slightly askew, utterly failing it's sole purpose to stay on her head. She walked towards their little group with a smile on her face, and Peter squeaked in surprise when he saw her, and hurriedly moved the trolley of luggage away from that side of the bench so that she could talk to them without having to peer over the large trunks and such.
"Elise!" Lily greeted her friend with a warm hug. "Honestly, are you on steroids or something? It's like you grew even taller over summer, and how is that even possible?" she teased the girl.
"What are steroids?" Sirius whispered urgently to Peter and James. Both of the other Marauders, being magical folk, didn't know the answer, and both of them stared at him with blank faces, before turning to get an explanation from the girls.
"It's just something muggles use to enhance the way they do things, like if you wanted to run faster, you'd take steroids, and immediately run much faster than you did at the moment- oh never mind." Elise rolled her eyes as she saw the clueless expressions on the boys' faces.
"Muggles. We'll never understand them." James shook his head sadly.
Elise pretended to pat Lily's head condescendingly. "Perhaps one day, you will learn the secrets of growth, young padawan." she joked, using a Star Wars reference that she knew Lily would love.
Lily laughed - a sound that enchanted many people, and turned to the Marauders. "Had a good summer?" she inquired politely, although her gaze was pointedly not on James, even though he was trying to catch her eye. "Where's Remus?" she asked, noticing that the fourth (and most sensible) Marauder was missing.
"His mother is sick again." Sirius lied smoothly, without a change in expression. "Most unobliging of her to be sick so near the beginning of school." he joked.
Lily tutted in sympathy, but Elise merely rolled her eyes. The boys had been using that excuse since third year, and each time she had tried to dig further to the truth, all she had managed to get them to admit was Remus's favourite colour, and how many detentions he had gotten over the course of 3 years (which was, surprisingly, only 5.)
"It's really too bad about his mother-" Lily began, but was cut off abruptly by the emergence of Marlene McKinnon, human koala bear. Soon, Lily and Marlene were a mess of tangled auburn and ebony hair, as Lily struggled to get the smaller girl off her back. They only pulled apart when Sirius and Peter started making bets as to who was going to win the small wrestling match in front of them, as well as the wolf-whistles and catcalls they were getting from other students in the station.
After they disentangled themselves into proper human beings once more, Marlene rushed to hug Elise, nearly knocking her down in her rush.
"All this touchy-feely ness is so touching, isn't it, Prongs?" Sirius said, pretending to give his fellow Marauder a hug, only to be firmly rejected by James, who stepped well out of his way.
Marlene let go of Elise before hitting Sirius playfully on the arm, then hugging him, before hugging everyone else, including Peter, who squeaked and turned a bright shade of red.
"Well, we'd best get inside the train." James said. "Don't want it to leave with all of us still in the station!" he stood up, noticing that the previously thick crowd of students in the station had begun to thin, and there were only a few stragglers behind now. "You girls coming?"
"We're waiting for Mary- who is as usual, late." Elise explained, twirling her wand expertly between her fingers, before dropping it. "Damn!" she cursed, and picked it up, blushing a bright tomato red as Sirius twirled his own wand with far more skill and grace than her, smirking as she muttered curses at him under her breath, stowing her wand up her sleeve again.
"Well, in that case we'll save a compartment for you. Come on, Padfoot. I see Bertram Aubrey's head is just begging for a swelling charm." James said, and Sirius strolled off with him, each carrying his own trunk. Strangely enough, Peter was nowhere to be seen.
Marlene and Lily sat down on either side of Elise, in the seats that had just been vacated by the boys. "So, how was your summer?" Lily asked conversationally, fashioning her red hair into some sort of braid.
"Hmm, same as always. Nothing much. I was at camp for most of summer, after all." Elise explained to her friends.
"Well, Bryony and I were just hanging out at her house, soaking up sunshine. I daresay your summer was much more interesting than mine." Marlene scoffed, checking her watch impatiently. Elise laughed at the sight of two witches- soaking up sunshine in Scotland, one of the coldest places in England.
"Well, anyone missed me?" a cheery voice tinged with a hint of an Italian accent asked, pouncing upon the four of them.
"Aw, Mary, why did you spoil the moment? We were just having so much fun without you!" Marlene teased, getting up to hug her friend.
"Don't be silly." Lily said reprovingly, also joining the group hug. "We've been waiting for you! What took you so long?"
Elise joined the hug as well, all their different hair colours blending into a big mess.
Relief crossed her mind as they entered the compartment that Marlene and Lily hadn't questioned her too closely about camp. After all, she wasn't about to tell them that Remus Lupin, her archenemy had been at the camp.
"Willows whiten, aspens quiver/ little breezes dusk and shiver / through the wave that runs forever / by the island in the river / flowing down to Camelot." the boy chanted softly to himself, lying on the emerald green grass, and idly plucking on his cello strings, which was laid on top of him, so he seemed like some elf prince, lying there on the grass in wait for his next human victim.
In fact, it would have been the perfect summer evening, if not for the fact that he was about to turn into a horrible, disgusting beast within a few hours.
He was used to it of course, after doing it for nearly 15 years, alone. And everytime, it had felt like the first time, painful and agonizing. He was intimately familiar with the transformation. Not being able to tell whether the beast was him, or he was the beast. The howls and screams mingled so closely that it masked the earsplitting cracks of bone lengthening and stretching. He shuddered despite himself, a slight blemish in the glorious sunshine. He brushed the thoughts aside quickly. There would be enough time to think about that later- in fact, he had the rest of his life. He thought of Hogwarts instead, and his friends. What were they doing now? His best bet was that they were creating some mischief somewhere, and causing McGonagall copious amounts of grief.
He glanced at his watch, and it told him that they were still on the train. Most likely hexing people then, or playing card games and gossiping in their compartment with the girls.
He paused midway fingering an Elgar concerto, a sudden memory flitting through his mind of a girl playing the violin, her brown hair falling in delicate waves, obscuring her face from view.
A spasm went through his body, signalling that the transformation was coming soon. Remus looked at the sun, almost willing it to stay up just a few more seconds, so he could enjoy his last day of summer as a normal body. But of course, he could not control the sun, and so it started to set.
He quickly cleaned up his cello, packing it away with an air that suggested years of intimacy with the instrument. He brought it inside the house, careful to avoid his mother. He didn't want to see her forlorn face or feel her arms around him. He did not want to see her cry.
He knew that he was a horrible son. He would never be able to live a normal life as a wizard, he would be forever shunned by the wizarding society.
So it would be better if he did not see her.
He left the house silently, and went into the forest.