A/N: This chapter is from Tonks's POV!

...

The Crouch estate was located at the end of a winding lane in Swansea. It had taken the better part of an hour to undo the protective enchantments on the outer gates of the property, and as Anti-Apparition Charms were set in unusual locations along the shady lane, Tonks and Mad-Eye had no choice but to walk from one end of it to the other. It would take longer to undo the charms than it would to walk, leaving them both huffing and wheezing on their brisk walk toward the estate.

Tonks felt the adrenaline pumping throughout her body with every step she took. She could hardly believe that a man pronounced dead had come back to life and had escaped Azkaban, though the actual ordering of events was yet unknown to her. Dumbledore was off with the Wizengamot, alerting other high-ranking Ministry officials that there had likely been an escapee from Azkaban. Sirius and Remus were roaming Voldemort's old haunts – the Gaunt shack and the Riddle mansion, in particular – to see if Crouch Jr. was with him. Her parents, Andromeda and Ted, were tasked with keeping an eye on Harry and Dudley. Although Tonks knew Harry would balk at more adult supervision, if something should happen, Harry wouldn't be left without protection.

"Are we there yet?" Tonks asked grouchily, kicking away another large branch that got in her way. "Is Crouch Sr. really this paranoid?"

"It doesn't bode well for him that he's got this place warded so heavily," Mad-Eye replied grimly. "If he knew his son had escaped and didn't tell anyone, he's in for a one-way ticket to Azkaban."

Tonks nodded and wiped the sweat off her brow. They finally reached the front steps to the Crouch estate. It was an imposing old home; Tonks supposed it could be handsome in the daylight, but the heavy, dark bricks and shadowy gargoyle statues that guarded the entryway set her teeth on edge in the darkness of the night.

Mad-Eye stopped Tonks on the top of the stairs. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a Sneakoscope. It didn't light up, but that didn't deter him from casting his usual charms. A Human-Presence Revealing Charm indicated that no one was home. A more advanced charm indicated the presence of some life – Tonks thought it likely that it was a pet or house-elf – and once Mad-Eye was satisfied with his spellcasting, his eye whizzed around in its socket to pick up anything he missed.

"Single house-elf inside," Mad-Eye grunted. "It's bent over something, but I can't see it."

Tonks narrowed her eyes at the estate, wondering what lay within. She braced herself as Mad-Eye bust open the door and announced their presence.

While he rounded the corner to find the elf, Tonks let her eyes drift toward the portraits on the walls. Barty Crouch Sr. was in most of them, smiling proudly next to a wispy, frail woman. The woman had straw-colored hair and a pallid complexion. In most of the portraits, she either held or stood next to a boy with similarly colored hair. The boy grew older the further she went into the house, until the portraits no longer showed his image. It appeared that after his teenage years, the boy had vanished from the earth, leaving only sad, lonely portraits of his parents behind, until there were no more images of the wispy woman, either.

From where she stood, Tonks heard the pitiful, high-pitched wails of an elf. An acrid, sour smell invaded her nostrils; as she approached what appeared to be the kitchen, the smell grew fouler.

Tonks nearly retched when she entered the kitchen. The bloated body of Barty Crouch Sr. lay in the middle of the kitchen, discolored and disfigured in death. An elf clutched at it, screaming incoherently over the loss of her master.

"W-Winky has k-k-killed him! K-killed h-her m-m-master!"

Tonks cast a charm on her nose to prevent the putrid stench of decay from nauseating her further. Mad-Eye hadn't bothered with the elf called Winky. He muttered charm after charm on the body as flashes of light and color emanated from various spots. Tonks knew the spells; she'd cast them on cadavers before to determine a rudimentary cause of death, but she'd never had to cast them on a body so obviously in decay.

"Merlin's tits, Mad-Eye," Tonks gasped, gagging. He'd sliced into Crouch's arm and what oozed out was as horrifying as the body itself. "Do you have to do that here?"

"Until the others get here, yes." Mad-Eye huffed impatiently, continuing to ignore the elf's pleas to save her master and to punish her for all her wrongdoing.

"Shut up, Winky!" Tonks shouted. The elf's pathetic screams were too much.

Winky growled and spat, "You is not being Winky's mistress! You is not telling Winky what to do!"

"Who is your master?" Tonks demanded.

Winky wore a momentarily dazed expression. Her large, tennis-ball sized eyes glazed over until they rested on Crouch's ashen face.

"M-m-master is d-dead!" Winky bawled, throwing herself on top of Crouch's corpse and collapsing into a fresh fit of uncontrollable tears. "W-Winky k-k-killed beloved M-m-master!"

"Elves don't kill their masters," Tonks retorted, attempting to have Winky see reason. "You can't have killed him."

"P-poison! Winky is mistaken! Winky is a terrible, awful, rotten elf!"

Tonks put her face in her hands. Even Kreacher, an elf whose brains had been addled from years of solitude and madness, knew what he was doing. Elves were more powerful than most wizards knew; Tonks was sure something was wrong with the elf's explanation.

"You're not believing this bullshit, are you?" Tonks half-shouted at Mad-Eye. His magical eye whirred wildly in its socket as he observed every inch of Crouch's body.

"Not a word of it," Mad-Eye confirmed. "Elf's memory has been tampered with."

Winky wailed all the louder until Tonks couldn't take any more and silenced her. She continued screaming and knocking her little fists against the kitchen floor, but the silence that ensued was at once oppressive and relieving. The house was darker without the noise, and even Mad-Eye's steady presence with the bloated body of Crouch didn't soothe her. Tonks had the niggling feeling in the back of her mind that they were being watched whether by a portrait or live person.

"I'm taking the portraits away," Tonks said abruptly. Mad-Eye nodded at her. Just as she left the kitchen, she almost jumped out of her skin when Dumbledore walked into the home, flicking his wand in a fluid motion to take down all the portraits in the near vicinity.

"I heard you on my way in," Dumbledore said calmly. "Aurors Shacklebolt and Scrimgeour are on their way."

"Thank Merlin. I'd put a charm on your nose. It reeks in there." Tonks pointed to the kitchen. Dumbledore took a deep whiff and frowned.

"Indeed it does. Thank you, Tonks." He strode into the kitchen without another word, taking down even more portraits on his way in. Tonks watched him gently lift Winky from the floor once he'd exchanged a few words with Mad-Eye. He then removed the Silencing Charm on Winky and an ear-splitting yowl emerged from her throat. Tonks heard the same refrain as before – Winky had accidentally killed her master and was a rotten, evil elf for doing so.

Tonks whipped her wand out as soon as she heard the crack of Apparition outside the estate. Scrimgeour and Shacklebolt came into the estate, their wands pointed at her. They stood, transfixed at one another, until Tonks changed her nose to a duck's bill and back.

"It's me. And put a charm on your noses."

Scrimgeour pulled out a body bag from his cloak and rushed past Tonks toward the kitchen. Kingsley stayed with Tonks in the corridor, eyeing the goings-on in the kitchen warily; his nose was upturned from the stench and Tonks watched him press his wand against his nose, seemingly to remove the revolting odor of death from his nostrils.

"Is it true?" Tonks whispered to him. "Crouch Jr. escaped?"

Kingsley nodded. He looked over his shoulder and whispered, "They've already exhumed the body buried in his place. It was his mum's body – showed traces of Polyjuice Potion. Now this." He shook his head and leaned against the wall for support. "How did Dumbledore know to look?"

"Long story…for another day." Kingsley's face fell and though Tonks knew he longed to know what happened, she wasn't yet convinced they weren't being watched or observed.

Tonks finally heard the zipping of a body bag. By then, Winky's screams had stopped too. Tonks turned her head to look inside the kitchen. Dumbledore was speaking quietly to Winky. She looked as if she was in a trance. Dumbledore's face was pale and unreadable.

Mad-Eye and Scrimgeour were muttering at each other. Tonks heard snippets of their contentious conversation. Scrimgeour was put out that he hadn't been the one to discover Crouch Sr.'s body, while Mad-Eye was arguing over when to announce Crouch Sr.'s murder.

"Tonks!" Mad-Eye barked. "Go home. Our work here is done."

"What? I'm not going to find out—"

Mad-Eye's stern glare indicated that she was not going to find out what really happened to Crouch Sr. or how Winky had played a role in the foul play. She reluctantly agreed to go home, promising herself that the moment she had Mad-Eye alone, she'd bombard him with questions over Crouch's fate.

Tonks trudged back to the other end of the lane to get through the Anti-Apparition wards still in place. She was ready to turn on her heel to go home when a large, dog-shaped Patronus arrived in front of her.

"St. Mungo's. Now." The dog spoke in Sirius's voice. A low, swooping sensation coursed through Tonks's midsection. If Sirius had sent a warning to her, it could only mean one thing – Remus was in trouble.

….

"What the fuck happened?" Tonks demanded, crashing into the hospital room containing her husband, which happened to be on the farthest end of St. Mungo's, in a heavily warded area designated for non-humans. "Tell me!"

"Snake," Sirius replied, not taking his eyes off of Remus. "A big, motherfucking snake bit him."

"Is he going to be okay?" Tonks said, panicked. Remus was paler than she'd ever seen him. His neck was stiffly bandaged but blood still seeped through them. If his wounds weren't closing, he wouldn't recover.

"We don't know." Sirius hung his head and ran his hands through his hair. "Someone needs to tell Harry."

"I need to know he's going to be okay." Tonks frantically paced in the room, looking for any record of Remus's health. She found a thick roll of parchment on a table and unfurled it.

The first several inches were devoted to Remus's personal information, blood status, and lycanthropy. Huge red letters marked his hospital file, indicating him as a highly infectious, dangerous individual. Tonks decided the rage could wait another day, as she had other matters to attend to. At last, she unfurled the latest addition to Remus's record:

"Unknown poisonous bite. Patient brought in presenting with a sizable neck wound. Counteracting curses suspected. No prognosis yet available."

"They don't know what's wrong with him?" Tonks growled, keeping her effort on not tearing his hospital record to shreds.

"You saw what it says," Sirius replied tersely. "Counteracting curses suspected."

"What does that even mean?"

"Lycanthropy is a blood curse. Whatever venom that snake has must also be cursed."

"Is it the same one as before?"

Sirius nodded, adjusting the bandage around Remus's neck carefully. "We went to Little Hangleton when Dumbledore asked us to. Riddle mansion was occupied…we weren't careful enough. We don't know who was there but it's obvious we weren't wanted or welcome. That snake took a bite out of him, and I had to blast it back."

"Did you hear anything?"

"Hissing and rasping noises? Moony says he heard something – he's the one who went in first – but now look at him." Sirius sat down in a nearby chair and bent over to run his hands over his head. "It should've been me in that bed. Not Moony."

"Neither of you should've been hurt," Tonks snapped. She had Remus's hand in hers; her hand went up to his neck, but the sight of his blood stopped her from touching him. His bandages needed to be readjusted or he'd bleed to death. "Where is the bloody Healer? This isn't right."

Sirius snorted softly. "Healer treated him for all of ten minutes and left. Hasn't been seen since."

Tonks clenched her fists at her sides. Sirius gazed up at her with a curious gleam in his eyes.

"You know who would treat him? Poppy." Sirius swished his wand and cast his Patronus, sending the large dog bounding off with a message for Madam Pomfrey. He rubbed his hands together and added, "She always said she didn't have favorites, but Moony was her favorite."

Tonks paced in the hospital room, biting at her thumb nervously. Remus was unconscious, bleeding, and had either a poison or a new curse in his veins. She felt woefully inadequate and unprepared to treat him. She knew all the basic antivenins and remedies for poisons, but she doubted she knew enough to combat the gigantic snake that attacked her husband.

An hour passed before there was any movement at the door. It was almost midnight when Poppy Pomfrey managed to arrive at St. Mungo's with a large traveling bag in her hands.

She tsked instantly and pushed both Tonks and Sirius aside to examine her patient. Tonks had never heard the hospital matron mutter so many profanities under her breath. They were largely directed at the 'prejudiced Healers' at St. Mungo's, and had she known better, she'd have docked all those students points while they were at Hogwarts, among other colorful sentiments she had in mind.

Pomfrey unwrapped the bandages on Remus's neck. Tonks finally did retch into a nearby wastebin when she saw the damage to his veins and skin. Pomfrey worked quickly, throwing all manner of potions, salves, and other remedies at Remus, who gurgled pathetically, seemingly unable to breathe through the pain.

"Don't be alarmed, Miss—Mrs. Lupin," Pomfrey said crisply. "He's breathing." She worked her hands around Remus's neck tenderly, wrapping him in fresh linens so tightly that Tonks thought he might suffocate from the wrappings. Pomfrey's hands were covered in blood, but she washed them quickly, cleaning Remus up in the process until he was finally looking like a properly cared-for patient.

"Thank you," Tonks said, wanting to hug her former hospital matron for expertly working on Remus.

"Don't thank me yet," Pomfrey said bitterly. "That should've been done hours ago. Make sure he takes all of these and tip them down his throat if you must." She took out an impossibly large number of bottles from her bag and placed them on a nearby table. "I don't know what he's been poisoned or cursed with, but his lycanthropy might just save his life. Few curses are stronger than that. If he makes it through the night, his lycanthropy will win out."

Pomfrey looked back at Remus and sighed. "Next time something happens to him, you bring him directly to me. They will never treat him with the care he deserves at St. Mungo's." With a flourish of her wand, she gathered all she had left and swept out of the room as quickly as she had arrived.

"Merlin," Tonks whispered. "Thank you, Sirius, for remembering her. I can't imagine…if I lost him…" Tonks's eyes filled with tears at the mere notion of losing her husband. She trembled, and Sirius brought her in for a tight hug.

"You stay here with him and make sure he takes his potions. I'll go home and tell the others," Sirius offered. "Send a Patronus in a few hours. I don't care what time you send it. I won't be able to sleep, not knowing…"

"I understand," Tonks replied immediately. "Give Harry and my parents my love…Dudley too, I suppose."

Sirius raised a brow at her but said nothing else. He took his things and left the dingy hospital room. Tonks pulled up a rickety chair next to Remus's bedside and cast a Cushioning Charm to make it slightly more comfortable. She wasn't going to leave his side until he was ready to go home, alive and well.

….

"The boy, the boy," Remus rasped, recounting what he'd heard the night he'd received the snake bite. His hands reached up to his neck, but Tonks stopped him.

She held his hands down at his sides. She knew he was itchy around his neck bandages, but he was ordered to keep his hands away from his wound. It was healing excruciatingly slowly, and until the wound was fully stitched together, which could take weeks, according to Madam Pomfrey and one of the Healers she'd harassed into providing better care for him. Remus was no longer in the 'non-human' ward of St. Mungo's, but he was still on the far end of the corridor in a tiny room labelled 'highly dangerous.'

He would remain there until he was healed enough that Tonks could change his bandages without assistance. Five days after the snake attack, it looked more and more like Remus wouldn't go home for Easter, but might be home by the end of April, in a few weeks' time.

"Keep going, Remus," Dumbledore said calmly. "Take your time."

"It was Wormtail and someone else," Remus croaked slowly. He took shallow breaths between words and Tonks squeezed his hands to encourage him. "I think it was…him. Vol-de-mort."

"I believe you. If you heard hissing sounds and saw a snake, there is only one Parseltongue that I'm aware of in Britain, and it is Tom." Dumbledore's face was set and his jaw was clenched. "What else did he say?"

"Wormtail asked if it could be someone else." Remus cleared his throat weakly. "Voldemort was adamant. It had to be 'the boy.'"

"He said nothing else on what he needed 'the boy' for?" Dumbledore's electric blue eyes twinkled merrily, despite the seriousness of the topic.

Remus tried to shake his head, but he winced. The bandages were still tight against his neck and moving his head or neck in any way before he was healed could ruin all the progress they'd made. He cleared his throat and added, "It's all I heard before I got attacked."

"Thank you," Dumbledore said quietly. He sat back in his seat – a proper hospital chair, now that Remus was in a better-populated ward – and sighed.

"Can you tell us what happened with Winky and Crouch?" Tonks asked, irritated that many days had passed since they found Crouch's body, and all she knew from the cases were the many wild theories Rita Skeeter had planted in The Daily Prophet, including Winky's own admission of guilt.

"I'm under the impression that Winky the elf had her memory modified through very powerful magic," Dumbledore responded. "This is not the first time I have seen a house elf be framed for the murder of her mistress."

Remus and Sirius exchanged dark looks. Tonks grew doubly irritated; she knew they were watching memories of a younger Tom Riddle, Sirius especially, as they were hunting the horcruxes more actively.

"I was able to piece together Winky's memory," Dumbledore replied patiently. "While her master's magic and orders prevented her from showing me everything, Alastor and I are working under the assumption that Crouch Jr. killed his father days before he was spotted by Dudley. We aren't certain why Crouch Jr. committed patricide, but given the dates of Mrs. Crouch's death, it appears that Crouch Jr. was free for many years. Why he chose to kill his father now is another mystery for us to solve."

"You're sure he killed his dad?" Tonks asked dubiously. "Crouch Sr. didn't have any other enemies?"

"It's possible that he did." Dumbledore stroked the end of his beard pensively and gazed at the bandages around Remus's neck. "It seems rather odd to me that Crouch Jr. would kill his father, as Crouch Sr. had such steady access to Harry."

"Harry is the boy," Remus said hoarsely, elongating each syllable with each breath.

"I believe so," Dumbledore agreed. "Without his father involved with the Triwizard Tournament, I must conclude that Crouch Sr. was possibly in the wrong place at the wrong time. Perhaps Crouch Jr. was unaware of his father's true involvement in the Tournament."

Tonks furrowed her brow and put her chin in her palm. She shook her head slightly in disbelief.

"It's got to be more than that," she concluded. "Barty Crouch Sr. must've done something wrong. I don't know how or why…but he did, and that's why his son killed him."

"Turn him in?" Remus suggested, gasping after each word.

"Save your voice." Tonks brushed her fingers gently through Remus's fine, sandy-brown, silver-speckled hair. "You could be right. Maybe old Crouch Sr. didn't want to keep up the charade anymore. But where's Junior now? You're sure you didn't see him when you were attacked, Remus?"

"No…not there."

Tonks sighed deeply. Just when she thought she was one step closer to figuring out what was happening, she ended up taking two steps back. Remus and Dumbledore's grim, pale faces indicated they agreed with her assessment, and she bid Dumbledore a good day, having had enough of theories and grisly, familial murders.

….

"A little at a time," Tonks said, placing a tiny morsel of chocolate in Remus's mouth. "The Healer really doesn't want you to have solid food yet, so it's got to be like this."

Remus opened his mouth obediently and Tonks placed another bit of chocolate inside. It was the week after Easter Sunday and she'd just dropped off Harry at King's Cross, along with Sirius. Tonks gathered all the chocolate that remained and presented it to Remus, who had spent Easter Sunday miserable, alone, and half-conscious while he recovered from the worst of his snake bite.

"How were they?" Remus said, his voice cracking as he spoke.

"The kids? Surprisingly good. It's one of the things I wanted to tell you about." Tonks gave him another morsel, watching him savor the taste in his mouth for a few seconds before swallowing carefully. "You'll never guess what I heard Harry and Dudley talking about this morning."

"What—"

"Save your voice. I'm just going to tell you," Tonks said eagerly, now sitting at the edge of her seat. "Remus, they apologized to each other. I don't know who or what made it happen, but Dudley said something about being sorry for all the times he was an arsehole as a kid, and Harry apologized for his own shit in the last year."

Remus gaped at her with his mouth slightly open and his eyes wide and unblinking. Tonks put another sliver of chocolate in his mouth to give him something to focus on.

"I think Dudley went first, but I'm not sure. They weren't weepy about it, and I can't tell you how hard it was not to barge in on them and hug them for their progress." Tonks took a sizable chunk of chocolate and popped it into her mouth, savoring the sweet taste on her tongue.

"Just wait for the best part." Tonks shivered in her seat, the excitement putting a huge grin on her face. "They actually shook hands before Harry left for school. They shook hands, Remus."

Remus blinked rapidly and tried to shake his head. Tonks wheezed in laughter and took his hand. "I know, I know. It's hard to believe, but they did it. You've no idea how badly I wanted to smother Harry in hugs and kisses on the platform but I held back. I know he's embarrassed by all that – I'm just so proud, you know?"

Remus's head moved up and down for a moment before he hissed in pain.

"I told you. You have to stay upright," Tonks said, adjusting the pillows behind Remus to keep him comfortable. "You'll be home in a couple weeks, we think."

She reached into her bag and pulled out a book, showing the cover to him.

"Wicked?"

"I stopped by your old bookshop to see if they had anything new. I told them I was your wife, and they gave me this for free," Tonks said, showing him the book. "They said it's about a green witch or something like that. Want me to read it to you?"

Remus's lips moved up to a smile. Tonks opened the page and began to read.