Chapter 23:

Madame Pomphrey briskly walked through the light morning air across the marsh like ground to the Whomping Willow, she was not used to the whole 'wake up at 5:30 thing' yet. It had been okay when Lupin Sr. had been at Hogwarts, she had been young and fresh but Lupin Jr., well he was something else! She couldn't help but feel sorry for the boy: not only did he have the curse, he was so bright and powerful that really he would go to waste in the world unless something changed; personally she felt that Charlie Lupin would probably turn out to become an Auror or a professor, though a Quidditch player wasn't too far off the scale.

And now she walked once more across to the place where so many moons ago his father had once stood. She pulled out the key to the shack - for it was guarded by muggle means so that wizards wouldn't think of how to get in- and inserted it into the large rusted lock, a low grinding sound echoing across the foggy area as she turned it; with a small click the door fell open.

'Mr. Lupin? Charlie? Where are you?' she called out softly into the dead air; quiet creaks sounded from around the house, windows banged in their panes as the wind blew.

Silence.

'Mr. Lupin?' Madame Pomphrey called out again, but again to no avail. Time to search for him then, he was probably collapsed on the floor somewhere sleeping. With a small huff that held no real annoyance, she climbed up the wooden stairs to the main rooms of the house. Smears of what looked like fresh blood ran along the floor and occasionally the walls, long strips of red-y brown littered the area- this did not bode well.

With her eyes closed in nerves Madame Pomphrey pushed the door to one of the rooms slowly open, dreading what could possibly be behind it: a mauled body of a boy, Charlie sitting there normally, death.

'Charlie? You in here?' she was so out of practise. Really, where was her professional side now? She was freaking out over something she had witnessed many times before and would do many times to come; she brushed the hair out of her eyes as she looked around the empty room, nothing in sight except a few scratch marks and a- was that a dent in the wall? What had that boy been up to? With a silent thank to Merlin, Madame Pomphrey moved onto the next door, this one was a bit more battered and had scratched along the front and what appeared to be blood on the frosted glass; with I trepidation she pushed the door open to see a terrible sight.

Charlie James Remus Lupin lying in his own blood.

Scratched and bite marks littered his face and body, large bruises had blossomed over his body, blood in streams down his limbs; his eyes were closed and his arms dangling over his body and the floor- the last night must have been terrible! Why hadn't the Wolfsbane worked?

With a small shake of the shoulders, Madame Pomphrey tried to rouse Charlie but to little avail, even her growing in volume words couldn't break him from his sleep. With nothing else available to her, she scooped the damaged boy up and set out at a fast pace to the castle.

A head poked through the now green flames of his fire, it was Dumbledore as usual and if it were not for the fact that Remus couldn't see his face very clearly, he would have noticed that the ever-present twinkle of Dumbledore's eyes was not so ever-present anymore. 'Remus, my dear boy, please go to the hospital wing,' he said softly, his voice unusually melancholy.

'Why? What's happened?' Remus stood abruptly up and raced over to bend down next to the fireplace, his eyes were wide and contrasted horribly with his already pale face. The full moon had been an easy one in the great scheme of things but it still took its toll.

'I feel it would be wiser to see for yourself, walk through the floo and you'll arrive there immediately,' Dumbledore soothed before disappearing from the flames but he appeared a few seconds later an even more pained look on his face, 'And Remus?'

'Yes?'

'I am so deeply sorry,' and with that he departed leaving a distressed Remus shouting at an empty fire place.

'What's happened? Why are you sorry? DUMBLEDORE!' before fully comprehending what he was doing he leapt through the floo and tumbled out into the startlingly white hospital wing. As he stood up and brushed off his robes he noticed a group of people huddled round a bed at the far end of the room, the bed that was, when he was still at school, reserved for him; the group consisted of Dumbledore, Snive- Snape, McGonagall and Madame Pomphrey, not to mention the omnipresent Salazar Slytherin lording from on high. He briskly walked over and peered over Madame Pomphrey's shoulder to see the subject of everyone's gaze:

His dear little Charlie cub.

'What happened to him?'

Fred and George were perched on the corner of the bench in the dorm, Fred's pencil he had been using to doodle had been dissolved to nothing more that splintered wood and if George bit his lip anymore Fred would have sworn it would fall off entirely; they both waited anxiously to see Charlie. He had said the day before that he had a lesson but when neither him nor his dad showed up for breakfast they got worried.

'Do you think he's alright?' George asked timidly from behind his hand that covered a large proportion of his face.

'He's Charlie, he's probably fine,' Fred said quietly and tried forcefulness though it failed miserably, Fred was just as worried, if not more, than George; he and Charlie shared this connection that was so deep and profound that when he and Charlie were together it felt rather like they were twins themselves. Of course, Fred'd never admitted that to George lest he be cut off or shunned; though to be brutally honest, if he were shunned and cut off at least he'd have his other brother.

'Yes, probably being the main thing you just said,' George said darkly before looking into the fire. George wasn't sure what was up with Charlie but he knew this had something to do with it; no person would normally react so strongly to one of their closest friends asking a question about an aspect of wizarding society without having something to hide, no matter how big or small it was. Charlie had, in all the time that George had known him properly which was since the age of seven or eight, been ill fairly regularly, whether it be tired or just run down and it was always at least once a month.

'Fred?' George asked quietly, so quietly that it was almost inaudible.

'Yes?'

'You know Charlie's often ill?'

'What of it?' Fred said sharply to George, his eyes narrowed suspiciously. As usual, Fred was immediately ready to defend Charlie no matter who to; they were so close that Fred had picked up some of Charlie's idioms and Charlie Fred's

'Well, I've been thinking, you don't think that something's- well something's wrong with Charlie?' George whispered to Fred, he was always careful when discussing Charlie around Fred, he knew that next to Re- Professor Lupin, that he was Charlie's greatest advocate; he knew he had to tread carefully if he was to get Fred to see his point of view.

'No! Charlie's awesome, nothing's wrong with him!' Fred said incredulously, the very thought if Charlie being 'wrong' was outrageous!

'I think that it's something to do with the lunar cycle, the full moon in particular,' George murmured, not wanting to meet Fred's eyes, not wanting to see the shock and horror running across his brother's face.

'You don't mean-' Fred breathed, his forehead knitted in concentration.

'Yes-'

'Charlie is by no means a vampire! For one, he isn't sparkly and, secondly, he's decidedly straight.' Fred said firmly with his arms crossed; he had heard enough of that muggle Edward person to last him a life time- Charlie said the girl a few doors down got a book called 'Nightlight' or something from her muggle cousins for Christmas one year, he had then gone and purchased himself a copy after hearing her spout how brilliant and great this book was (according to Charlie, it would be better used as loo roll).

George rolled his eyes impatiently as he stomped his foot on the ground in frustration, 'No you nuggle head! A-' he looked around before leaning closer, 'A-'

Just as George was about to reveal his master idea and theory, the door swung open and in stepped a rather depressed looking McGonagall.

'Mr.s Weasley, Mr. Lupin has fallen ill overnight and is currently in the hospital wing, you can visit him tomorrow. Professor Lupin asks that you visit as soon as as Charlie apparently cannot stand the hospital wing,' McGonagall smiled a small watery smile before hurrying out, her hand wiping her eye as she went.

'Well that was quick' George raised his eyebrows in amusement.

'As soon as, eh? I always like Mr. Lupin,' Fred grinned before getting off the bench and running to his case; from behind, all George could see was socks and pants flying out along with the occasional book as Fred rummaged through his trunk, desperately searching for something or other. Finally, he stood up and with a satisfied smile, turned around to show George what he had found:

A long black cloak.

'A cloak? You went to all that drama and tension to get a cloak? Woah, my twin's excitable-' George moaned sarcastically though Fred could see he actually didn't know what the cloak was and who had made it.

'It's Charlie's, he made two and have one to me for safe keeping, he made me swear I'd never use it unless it was to see him cus, according to him, it is quite addictive,' Fred gabbled excitedly as he held the cloak up to the light, almost as if by holding it up he could see something extra.

'Addictive? But I though only dark magic was addictive?' George stuttered.

'Yeah, well Charlie described it as being 'experimental' so who knows?' Fred shrugged non-committedly; he preferred to stop asking questions about Charlie's work when it edged into the grey/darker side of magic, which with Charlie was a fairly often occurrence.

'And what does it do?'

'It is, I believe, an edited invisibility cloak,'

A lone figure crept along the darkened corridor towards the hospital wing, every so often it would disappear from sight and reappear a few metres down the corridor, always in the shadows. The soft padding of footsteps shouted out against the deafening silence that previously enveloped the way; portraits shrunk away from the figure as it slunk along the corridor in a state of rushed calm, the effect was only broken when a stumbling sound echoed around.

'George! Shh!' a voice chastised from the darkness.

'Sorry!' another voice sounded, after a small sigh, the figure became clearly two figures, two ginger haired figures. Fred and George.

'We may as well just run, the cloak hasn't hidden much,' George sighed.

'No! Well I'll wear it then! Charlie said it had other things on it as well I think,' Fred whispered back before tugging the cloak back over himself and walking a bit further on, 'Oh fine! Okay, I'll just run,' Fred grumbled before shrinking the cloak and storing it in his breast pocket, 'Race ya there!'

They sprinted through the dark, lonely corridors like shadows, moving through the halls with such knowing of where everything was that they didn't even have to really think about it. Very quickly they ended up outside the hospital doors.

'You unlock it, I'll nip in first,' Fred whispered as he drew he wand.

George held up three fingers and slowly mouthed counted down, one by one the fingers dropped.

'Alohomora!' the door swung open with a quiet click and Fred skidded in to the silent infirmary, his eyes scouring the room for his best friend and brother in all but blood.

'There!' Fred pointed to the end of the room where a figure lay silently, he sprinted over to the bed closely followed by George only to meet a terrible sight:

A pale and abused Charlie. Large cuts ran across his face and arms, bruises shimmered across his face, his lip split. This was not the Charlie they knew, this was not Charlie. It couldn't be.

Fred prodded Charlie carefully to try and wake him up, his bottom lip trembling, 'Charlie, Jamie,' Fred called him using the nickname only he used, 'wake up Jamie, come on, wake up,' Fred's voice cracked with sobs as he shook the still body of his best friend.

'He's not moving Fred,' Georhe breathed wide eyed. True to his word, Charlie was still and silent on the white bed.

'He has to be! Jamie, come on!' Fred carried on prodding Charlie.

'Fred- he's- He's dead,' George stuttered.

'No he can't be, Charlie! JAMIE WAKE UP!'

'Fred, there's nothing you can do, we've got to go,' George insisted though he lacked any real conviction as he tore his eyes away from him best friend.

'Jamie! Please Jamie wake up,'

And with that Fred, ushered by George, left the room.

A/N: Wow that was hard to write! I'm interested to see what you guys think's gonna happen, is e dead? Or alive? I know, I've already got some of the next chapter down... Please review like normal, thanks for reading and I want 20 reviews before I update again!

Let me rephrase that: no reviews, no next chapter.

And just to tempt you, here's an excerpt of the next chappie:

'Remus, my dear boy, you are not to blame!'

'YOU LIE! I NEVER SHOULD HAVE ADOPTED HIM! IF I HADN'T HE WOULD BE OKAY!' Remus screamed through his sobs.

'Charlie is-'

'Charlie WAS okay, he-' Remus stuttered but Dumbledore cut him off.

'Remus, you cannot do this, you didn't do anything this drastic after James died and you cannot do it now, hope is not lost,'

'Dumbledore- I- I need to be alone,'