"Cruelty is the remedy for wounded pride."
Friedrich Nietzsche

Comfortably seated next to an old plastic pumpkin, Remus was silently coloring an umpteenth ghost drawing. His favorite teacher, Miss Parkins, had printed them at his request. Largely neglected by the other children in favor of more colorful creatures, the spirits slept in a pile in the corner of the classroom, and Remus was happy to fetch them one by one.

Once seated at his table, the ritual remained invariably the same: Remus would first place Barney, his little stuffed specter, beside him to use as a model. He would then draw on paper the circles of his cheeks, followed by his smile, before tracing the contours of the large brown halos that stained his body with almost surgical precision. If Barney had survived the "night of the monster", like Remus, he also bore its stigma. No amount of washing, Muggle or witch, had been able to remove the mud stains embedded in his white fabric. On his flank, the darkest stretched like a long wound to the bottom of his veil. Remus couldn't keep his hands off it. His own scar, too, he manhandled, sometimes scratching it until it bled. It had been a year, but he and Barney were still wounded.

He hoped that one day they'd be able to heal. Like the drawings on which Remus worked to reproduce the stains before erasing them.

"What are you doing?" asked Brody, a child Remus didn't like very much because he often stole his things.

"I'm looking after Barney," Remus simply replied before sticking out his tongue to concentrate better.

"It looks like a cow," Brody commented wickedly as he observed the drawing.

The remark stung him, and Remus abruptly raised his head.

"Barney's not a cow!" he snarled, "He's a ghost!"

"Yes, he is," Brody sneered, "he's a ghost cow! I'm going to make him some horns!" he added, grabbing one of Remus's markers from his pencil case.

As he tried to push Remus away to get a closer look at the drawing, the tip of a pencil planted itself firmly in the back of Brody's hand. Crazy with pain, he let out a high-pitched scream, while Remus, weapon still in hand, began yelling at him:

"LEAVE HIM ALONE, I TOLD YOU! HE'S NOT A COW, HE'S A GHOST!"

"Remus!" exclaimed Miss Parkins from across the room, "what have you done to him?"

"He hurt me!" chortled Brody.

He raised his hand high, the pencil lead still embedded, a little blood trickling from the wound. If Remus was initially annoyed by his heavy tears, the sight of the wound froze him in his chair. His thigh suddenly went numb, leaving only a sensation of emptiness, a nauseating absence, and he instinctively slid his hand down his pants to search for the old wound. Furiously, his nails dug into his swollen skin, scratching the scar with such violence that his whole body trembled. Nothing, not even the hand the young mistress had placed on his shoulder, managed to stop him.

"What the hell are you doing?" screamed the young woman, distraught, "What's wrong? Stop it! Remus, stop it! You're going to hurt yourself!"

She finally grabbed his arm to pull him up by force, then winced as she saw the skin under his fingernails.

"Oh, look, look what you've done! You've scratched yourself! Again! We said you had to stop, Remus! Why did you do that? Marlene!" she shouted at her colleague who was trying to calm the other children, "Keep the class, I've got to take him to see the nurse! Oh no, but why does he always end up doing that?"

"I couldn't feel my leg," Remus replied simply, still a little haggard, "When I can't feel it, I scratch it. That way, it burns and goes back to normal…"

A long silence greeted his explanation. Marlene Morrow, the second teacher, an owlish-looking old woman with thick glasses, bent over the ghost drawings piled up on the desk, all colored and then erased to the point of almost tearing the paper. Blowing on the eraser crumbs, she finally whispered:

"I told you we shouldn't accept this kid. He's disturbed."

Miss Parkins didn't respond to her criticism. She simply took the two children by the hand and led them to the infirmary. Brody made a fuss on the way. Claiming he couldn't walk because he was in too much pain, he waved his arm in all directions, sometimes brandishing it in the air like a martyr's relic. He even came close to rolling on the ground in the playground. Strangely, as soon as the teacher turned her back to carry Remus up the stairs, he seemed to regain all his energy and started sticking his tongue out at them, hopping behind them like a kangaroo. He only started dragging his paws again once he'd reached the infirmary, which was a bit silly, as Miss Parkins so rightly pointed out, because it wasn't his leg that had been injured.

Both little boys received treatment. Brody pointed at Remus' scar with a look of disgust when Miss Parkins slipped away to call his parents, and Remus was yelled at by the nurse before he could reply. He was also scolded, more gently this time, by Miss Parkins, who explained that he shouldn't hurt others or himself just because he was angry. Then, back in the classroom, Mrs. Morrow put him in time-out.

Sitting in the corner, Barney firmly anchored in his arms, Remus watched the rest of the class gather around the two teachers.

"As you all know, it's almost Halloween!" declared Miss Parkins cheerfully.

The news was greeted by shouts of joy. Remus too fidgeted in his chair, impatient. He'd never been to school before this year, and his mother had told him that for Halloween, children could come to class in disguise. He had prepared a beautiful ghost costume for the occasion, and couldn't wait to show it off to his classmates.

"Now's our chance to do some activities together!" resumed Miss Parkins, "To prepare for this party properly, we're going to create some paper-mâché masks, a little decoration to hang on your front door, and, most importantly, we're going to learn a song!"

Mrs. Morrow, who had been staring at Remus with an annoyed expression since he had set foot in class again, added in a stern voice:

"It'll be a matter of learning it by heart because we'll be singing with the other classes in front of your parents on Halloween. We've selected three different songs for you to choose from. There's one about ghosts, another about witches, and finally, one about werewolves."

The cry that escaped Remus's throat carried further than he had thought. The other children turned to stare at him in amazement. Miss Parkins did the same, nervously tucking a lock of hair back behind her ear as she gazed at him, obviously fearing another tantrum. Only Mrs. Morrow reacted. Sighing, she looked up at Remus before asking in a firm voice:

"What is it now?"

Remus lowered his head, feeling embarrassment welling up inside him. His fingers caressed Barney's flank for a long moment before he finally found the strength to reply:

"I don't want the wolf song…"

His voice was so low that Remus himself could hardly hear it.

"What did you say?" asked Mrs. Morrow.

She left the blackboard and stomped across the classroom to tilt her big, owl-like head at the little boy. The latter slumped in his chair as she approached, trying to hide his budding tears behind his stuffed toy.

"I don't want the wolf song…" he whispered again.

"Ah! You don't want the song about the werewolf!", Mrs. Morrow replied in a voice that was going off at a high pitch, "But, you know, you're not the only one in this class! You can't decide for the others! You'll have to choose the song together!"

"Wait, Marlene" interrupted Miss Parkins, "It's coming back to me now that his parents didn't want him to do any wolf-related activities. They were adamant about it. We should simply remove it."

"But I want to sing the werewolf song!" exclaimed Brody in a falsely innocent voice.

Remus would have loved to throw his pencil case at him, but Madame Morrow surely wouldn't have let him.

"You see," she said, pointing at Brody, royally ignoring her consort, "there are some who would like to sing this song. So you're going to be good, for once, and let the others choose what they want. And if they want the werewolf song, you'll sing the werewolf song. Now, you're going to be quiet and listen to it."

"N-no." stammered Remus.

A tide of surprised gasps filled the room, and Madame Morrow opened eyes as round as her glasses.

"What did you just say to me? Did you say 'no' to me?"

"Marlene," repeated Madame Parkins, "I think we can just keep the other two songs."

"Elisabeth, I remind you that you're only a trainee," Mrs. Morrow replied curtly, "This is still my classroom! It's not all about that child! So, Remus, you said 'no', didn't you?"

Remus had no time to reply. The old woman had taken a firm hold of his arm and dragged him to her desk. His vision blurred by tears, he saw the distorted faces of his classmates flash before him before being forcibly seated in a chair next to the old tape player.

"Marlene," Miss Parkins tried once more to intervene, "it would be better…"

"He'd better listen at last!" cut in Mrs. Morrow, "He's not a little boy who's going to lay down the law in my classroom! He's got to learn to act like the others! Play the song!"

"But, we could…" tried Miss Parkins again.

"Put on the song!" ordered Madame Morrow firmly.

No matter how hard Remus tried to resist, Madame Morrow's hands closed over his shoulders like large claws. Shaking his head in all directions, he pleaded with Miss Parkins to stop, but it was too late. The music had started.

Remus felt his heart beating faster and faster. His hands grew clammy and, while he first tried to wipe himself on his pants, he began to furiously scrape the fabric with his fingernails, trying to reach the emptiness he felt growing in his thigh.

A strange melody echoed through the room, soon followed by a childish chorus that slowly began to pronounce the words:

Beneath the crescent moon, the quarter moon's gleam,

The half-moon's glow, like a distant dream,

But beware, oh beware, when the full moon is near,

For the silver moonlight brings the monster to fear!

The chorus ended with the howl of a wolf, and Remus choked on his own saliva. His throat was blocked, and not a sound could leave his mouth. The surge of anguish almost knocked him over as he rocked back and forth in his chair.

Angry and famished, the werewolf awakes,

Seeking unwary children, for its hunger can't wait.

With a roar and a growl, a terrifying sight,

Leading them to a realm hidden from light.

It seemed to Remus that a window had shattered somewhere, that something had entered the classroom. That He had entered the classroom. Remus could make out his silhouette in the shadows. He could feel his moist breath. The coldness of his teeth. The warmth of his tongue. And his nails, so hard they scraped his thighs as he spoke his name.

"Remus! Remus!"

He had to get away. Die, he was going to die if he stayed here!

"REMUS!"

Hands pressed against his face and Remus emerged with a deep breath. The room danced around him. Miss Parkins held his cheeks while Mrs. Morrow tried to make him let go of the tatters of his pants. The cries of the other children drowned out the music. Screams of fear, so similar to his own. An attack? Perhaps. Certainly. Yes.

He was there.

"I see him… He's close… Close to me… I… see him. Let me go… I've got to leave… Let me go… Let me go!"

He wanted to get up, run away, hide. But they wouldn't let him. There were these pressures all over his body, these hands gripping him to hold him down, preventing him from breathing, making that ball rise in his stomach. That dizziness in the back of his head… All that blood on his thighs…

And then, between his legs, the head of the Beast.

"Let go… LET GO OF ME!"

There was the shattering sound of desks against walls, bookcases bursting with fury and passing through windows. There were complaints, screams, and cries.

Then, suddenly, nothing.

-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-

Wrapped in an old blanket, Remus huddled in the back of the car, watching in the shadows as his parents exchanged words with one of the Aurors in the hospital parking lot. The tension was palpable, barely audible words slipping past their lips: "Destruction", "Wounded", "Protection", "Danger". Glances met, charged with anger and anxiety. Remus wanted to shout, to demand answers from these adults who seemed to know and understand everything. Yet his words remained caught in his throat, choked by the fear of what might happen if he discovered the truth. He simply clung to Barney, his last vestige of security. He couldn't remember what had happened, but his life had been turned upside down again. He could feel it.

The world outside seemed blurred, almost unreal, as the headlights of the other cars flashed like stars in the night. The day had slipped away without him realizing it. Sitting in the darkness, his eyes riveted on his parents, he had a strange feeling of being swallowed up by the void.

"Asshole!"

His mother's voice roused him from his torpor. She was pushing the Auror violently with both hands, and his father had to grab her from behind to force her to stop. The Auror's voice became more threatening, and both his parents finally retreated, slamming the car doors loudly as they settled into the seats.

"Hope," her father tried to calm her down, completely discomfited, "I told you we should have come to get him as soon as the teacher called us. It was irresponsible to leave him there."

"He had started to calm down after his anxiety attacks! He'd been scratching himself a few times, and then he'd stop! He was getting better! I wanted to encourage him!" his mother defended herself.

"Oh, because you call what he did 'getting better'?" her husband snapped back.

"It wasn't his fault! He was forced to listen to some damn song about werewolves! We forcibly held him in a chair, Lyall, we forcibly held our child in a chair! He flipped out because those horrible women pushed him over the edge! We told them he shouldn't be anywhere near an image of a wolf! You were the one who said that child wizards could cause accidents by releasing magic due to stress! And ours is suffering from post-traumatic stress! So, no, it wasn't his fault, it was theirs!"

Lyall stood speechless for a moment before resuming more vehemently:

"I never said it was his fault, but you seem to forget that he hurt other kids! He caused a tornado in his classroom! There are children, Hope, children his own age, who have been thrown against the walls! Where were you when the Aurors explained what had happened? Do you realize how dangerous this is? He could have killed them! Especially since we had to call in a whole team of Mediwizards and then cast forgetfulness charms on the whole neighborhood!"

Suddenly, memories flooded back into Remus' mind, unfolding at dizzying speed. The dazzling explosion, as if that brilliant light had devoured the whole world. Objects flying through the air, walls shaking. Chaos and screams. The arms of the firemen and then the wizards closing in on him. Books scattered across the courtyard. All the stretchers in the great hall and all those misunderstood looks.

Sticking out of the ambulance, the strange angle of Miss Parkins' leg …

A powerful nausea seized him, and he had to bend double to keep from regurgitating, stifling his cries by biting down with all his might on the worn blanket.

Unaware that he was awake, Hope continued to scream:

"Yes! Yes, I'm aware of that! I'm aware that it could have been even worse than that! But what do you want us to do? Lock him in his room forever? I'm not sorry I enrolled him in this school, Lyall! I'm just sorry nobody listened to us! No one adapted to his needs!"

"But how do you expect them to adapt to his needs? They're Muggles, they're not equipped to take in a child like him! We can't leave him with them! It's bound to happen again! I told you this was a bad idea from the start! Whether you like it or not, we're going to have to keep him at home!"

It seemed to Remus that if his mother could have leapt at his father's throat, she would have. Each new inflection in her voice made him bite the cloth between his teeth more ferociously, his saliva soaking the rough wool.

"He's six years old, he needs to socialize! I remind you that it's your fault that no witch kindergarten is willing to take him! And it's also your fault that the other families in the neighborhood won't let their children near him! You're the one who condemned him by declaring him to the Ministry and putting him on that damn list! Why should werewolves be put on a list in the first place? And why should we be forced to go round the houses to warn the neighbors? Remus is a child, not a sex offender!"

This time, his father remained silent. Eyes fixed on the steering wheel, he ran his fingers through his graying hair before finally murmuring:

"I know… I've… I've always worked for the Ministry. I trusted them. I thought if I followed the procedure, it would make his life easier… I mean, they promised us an aftercare, and we got it… I just didn't think declaring it would backfire. I… I just wanted to do the right thing… I wanted to do the right thing…"

He repeated his last sentence several times absently, his hand pressing against his forehead before sliding down his face to cover his mouth.

"What aftercare are you talking about?" his mother asked, "The crazy old woman who taught us how to keep our son caged? Talk about help! All we got was his name on the banned list!"

"It allows werewolves to be registered. It was made to improve the safety of the inhabitants and…"

His father didn't finish his sentence, not seeming to believe what he was saying himself. In fact, even if he had, he probably wouldn't have continued it, given the rage in his wife's eyes. Remus, too, was silent. He'd already cut a hole in the blanket and was now gnawing on a new piece, barely breathing as he rocked back and forth.

"And what?" insisted Hope, "What security are you talking about? We've already been taught the necessary spells for the full moon evenings! We even have official addresses for "guardians" working on behalf of the Ministry, if need be. Our neighbors are already safe! Explain to me, Lyall, why are we being forced to put his name on a list that everyone can consult? Why is it noted in his school file? Why do we have to tell everyone? Why are we prevented from living in a Muggle neighborhood? Because they can't see the list? For their own safety? And what about our safety? Do you feel safe? Do you feel safe when someone tags your house to tell you to move? When someone throws eggs at your door? Do you feel safe when your whole street signs a petition for you to leave?"

"Hope…", Lyall tried in vain.

The young woman didn't listen to him, continuing to speak in a more sobbing voice this time:

"What about when you take your son to the park and all the other parents stand up and demand that he play by himself in a corner, and they watch his every move and gesture with their hands on their wands? Do you feel safe?"

So that was why he took out their wands? His father had always told him it was because wizards were always vigilant. He'd lied to him.

He'd lied to him and Remus had just cut a third hole in the blanket, nervously chewing the threads before swallowing them. Everything tasted like bile.

"Hope, I…"

"Do you feel safe? Because I don't…"

This time, Lyall didn't answer anymore, simply staring at the cars passing along the road. Eyes filled with tears, Hope watched him in silence before resuming in a strangled voice:

"So, we're moving to a Muggle neighborhood. And we're not going to tell anyone."

"You know that's impossible," Lyall whispered, "It's forbidden and punishable by fines…"

"We'll go to a Muggle neighborhood!" insisted Hope, marking each of her words with a desperate wave of her hand, "We'll find a new house, on a street with lots of kids, so he can make friends. Because I remind you that we moved around a lot when he was a baby, and he never had any real friends. But now he's going to have some, and… And he'll go to school with them."

Her last statement suddenly roused her husband from his lethargy:

"There's absolutely no way he's going to school!"

"He'll go to school!" his mother roared, "Just like the other kids! Like he should have done before you got yourself into trouble with that Greyback!"

"Ah because you think I did it on purpose? You think I knew what he was going to do to Remus? You think I argued with him deliberately?"

"I don't know, remind me why you told a 15-year-old kid he was worthless because he was a werewolf?"

The revelation branded Remus's mind red-hot. No one had ever told him that the monster who had attacked him had a name. In fact, no one had told him anything about it, and Remus had never imagined that the thing that had assaulted him could be a human like him. Greyback was a boy too. A big boy, but not yet an adult.

He'd been attacked by another child.

And, in turn, he'd attacked the kids in his class today.

His stomach twisted a little more at the thought, and he groped through the plaid for his thigh.

"I was helping the Werewolf Registry with identity checks!" his father raged, "They were understaffed, and I wanted to give them a hand! Several members of the Greyback family were suffering from lycanthropy, and they hadn't updated their new address! They were hostile, and things got out of hand! What's your point? You want to make excuses for him? You want me to say it's okay that he got even?"

"No! I don't want to say that! This kid is evil! I hope we find him, and he goes to jail! Where he belongs! But, the day a member of the Ministry says that to your son, how will you respond, eh?"

"I don't know, but I sure as hell wouldn't go biting his kids for revenge! What the hell do you want? What's the point of this conversation? Tell me! What do you want?"

Her mother's fist came down like a hammer on the car's dashboard as she screamed at the top of her lungs this time:

"I WANT HIM TO GO TO SCHOOL, LYALL! I WANT HIM TO HAVE FRIENDS! I WANT HIM TO BE NORMAL!"

In the back of the car, Remus continued to curl in on himself. His leg seemed to have become ghostly, and he struggled to remove the wide bandage that encircled his thigh. The blanket was no longer enough to stifle the beginnings of his sobs, and it was Barney he clutched between his jaws, suppressing his cries as best he could. The only one he couldn't hold back was covered by his father's voice, which began yelling in the car:

"BUT HE'S NOT NORMAL, HOPE! HE WAS BEFORE, BUT IT'S OVER, HE'S NOT ANYMORE! YOU'LL JUST HAVE TO DEAL WITH IT! HE'S NOT NORMAL, DO YOU HEAR ME?"

Trembling under his father's fury, Remus finally managed to slip his hand under his bandages, coming to fiddle with the barely closed wound. The raw flesh under his fingers caused him to hiccup powerfully, and Barney left his mouth to land on the floor. A single plaintive note escaped his lips, the same high-pitched sound, forming a long, uninterrupted cry.

His parents suddenly turned their heads in his direction and paled like death at his sight. The silence was stifling, everyone holding their breath, unsure of what was to come.

Then an agonizing sob escaped Remus's throat and he began to weep with inhuman violence, snapping his parents out of their stupor. His mother was the first to react, rushing between the seats to take him in her arms.

"Hey, hey," she tried desperately to reassure him, "Calm down! It's all right!"

Remus would have liked to, but he couldn't. He suddenly felt like a stranger in his own skin, as if this cry was coming from somewhere else, from a part of him he didn't know.

"I'm sorry," he managed to articulate between two hysterical gurgles, "I'm sorry I'm not normal…"

His father, who had opened the car door to sit directly in the back, hugged him in turn.

"No, no, no! You're normal! You're normal!" he said as well, hugging Remus so tightly he almost suffocated him.

It wasn't enough. Rails of despair continued to emanate from Remus, the hissing of a wounded beast. He wished the sound would stop, that he could regain control of himself, but the pain was too deep, too crushing.

At his feet, Barney smiled, his head resting against the tip of his shoe.

For the first time in his life, the sight of the little ghost did not console Remus.

So much for this little interlude, which I hope didn't shake you up too much (I'm lying, I really hope it broke your heart).

Mrs. Morrow's behavior may seem exaggerated to you, but I swear it's based, like Miss Parkins, on the two teachers I had in first grade. Strange as it may seem, both were called the French equivalent of Maria-Angel. One was young and kind, the other old and stern. For some reason, still unknown to me today, she actively hated me and was always trying to punish me. She liked to take me violently by the arm and gave me time-out for imaginary misdeeds, accusing me, for example, of whistling in class when I never knew how to do that. As a result, my father and I called her Maria-Devil.

Maria-Devil finally stopped persecuting me the day she claimed - falsely, of course - that I'd stolen a classmate's pencils, prompting my mother to swoop in like a rabid pit bull and chase her into the classroom. One of my best elementary school memories. x)

I hope you're satisfied with the story so far. Don't hesitate to leave me a little comment, even just a "nice !", it's always a pleasure to read you!

Even if you want to leave me one in your original language, I'll be happy to translate it! I love translating texts!