Moon Madness!
It was the last week of February and it had been steadily raining for most of the week.
Tonks ran inside Grimauld Place quickly to avoid getting any more wet than she already was. After hanging her things up in the hall she made her way down to the kitchen, looking for Sirius and Remus.
She found both of them at the table, reading what appeared to be the newest addition of the Quibbler.
"Have you seen this?" Sirius asked tonks the second he saw her.
"No, why? What's wrong?" Tonks said, coming over to look at the headline.
It was about Harry.
Tonks scanned the page quickly, and saw that Harry had done an interview, where he called out Fudge and the ministry for keeping information from the Wizarding world.
he touched on everything from Voldemort's return to the recent breakout from Azkaban.
Tonks was shocked, Harry really hadn't held back. She wondered what the other order members would say about the article.
Everything they Harry had said was correct but she suspected that many at the ministry would revolt over the article. Tonks also silently wondered if there would be retaliation from the death eaters over what he had said.
"Well he certainly told them off didn't he." Tonks said.
Remus and Sirius nodded, agreeing with her.
There was going to be an order meeting later on that day, and Tonks was sure the article would come up in the conversation.
Later that afternoon, Sirius, Tonks, and Remus sat together in the front parlor.
Tonks and Remus were warming themselves by the fireplace, and Sirius was busily writing a letter to Harry. According to Sirius, Umbridge had forbid both him and the Weasley twins from playing Quidditch. she was certainly turning into quite the dictator, tonks thought to herself.
"What are you thinking about?" Remus asked. "You look lost in your thoughts." He explained to her.
Tonks nodded a bit before responding.
"Well, I suppose I kinda feel bad for all the kids at Hogwarts. And poor Harry goes through so much already, the last thing he needs is that awful woman constantly jumping down his throat."
Remus agreed. "Well, hopefully she will be gone soon. Pretty sure Dumbledore is the only one who has any control over her. Even Snape hates her. I'm sure all the teachers do, she's a nasty piece of work."
Tonks nodded, it was honestly true.
"She passed legislation about werewolves a few times, right?" Tonks asked, in a bitter tone.
"Mmmmm." Remus murmured.
"Yes, she's one of the biggest reasons that harsher legislation keeps coming out." He continued.
"I'm sorry, that's not right." Tonks told him.
"Well, I'm kinda- Well, I suppose I've gotten use to it."
"Yeah, and you shouldn't have to be use to it. It's not right." Tonks said, sounding resolute.
Remus gave her a small sad smile.
"And, if the world was as kind as you, it would be a much nicer place to be."
Tonks gave him a soft hug in return. She didn't want to hurt him. The full moon was that night, and he was feeling much sicker than normal.
They had spent most of the day sitting by the fireplace enjoying each other's company.
Remus watched as Tonks read a book next to him quietly. As much as he enjoyed her company, he couldn't help but feel guilty that she was spending her entire day sitting on the sofa with him, while he felt like complete death. She was so kind though, and Remus knew that she would never complain.
"Remus?" Tonks said. "Is it okay if I stay here tonight?"
Remus gave her a gloomy glare.
"No Dora. That's not safe." Remus said resolutely.
"But, Snape made you the wolfsbane potion." Tonks argued. "How is it not safe?" She continued.
"Because, Dora. I turn into a werewolf. Merlin forbid something happened and the potion didn't work." Remus trailed off, and didn't continue with that thought, it was too ghastly to even consider.
"If something ever happened to you, I don't think id survive that." Remus said, solemnly.
"But I'll stay way upstairs, all the way up in my room." She pleaded.
Remus stayed quiet for several moments, as if trying to collect his thoughts.
He understood that she worried about him a lot on the full moons. especially since she wasn't use to it like Sirius or he was. To her it wasn't normal.
He didn't want her to be scared all night for him at her flat. But Remus once again found himself wedged in between his natural instincts to be overly cautious about his lycanthropy, and dealing with life long demons.
Eventually, Remus finally spoke.
"If you stayed. You would have to promise me, that no matter what happens, you won't come downstairs. You won't even go near the door."
Remus said this all very seriously.
Tonks nodded her head.
"I don't care if you think I'm dying, you don't come down." Remus said.
"Tell me you promise." He pleaded with her.
"I promise. Remus." Tonks told him, reaching out to touch his nearest hand. She rubbed it, trying to reassure him.
"I want you to trust me, Remus. I'm not going to do anything to disrupt that." Tonks assured him.
Remus relaxed a bit at this comment, but tonks could tell he was still uneasy about the whole thing.
Soon, Remus fell asleep with his head resting on the sofa.
Tonks took the opportunity to research a new interest of hers. Dolores Umbridge.
Tonks supposed it was a morbid curiosity of sorts.
Tonks looked through a lot of the newer books
In the library on the third floor of Grimauld place. She settled on three different ones.
"The history of the ministry of magic"
" control and regulation of magical creatures in the 19th and 20th centuries."
And the last was the most concerning.
It was a large black book that read,
"beast or being?"
That particular book had caught tonks eye because she noticed that it had been co written by Umbridge about 10 years ago.
As she looked through the books, tonks was surprised by just how much information they had about Umbridge in them.
Tonks was most interested in the legislation that she had passed regarding werewolves.
Umbridge' current job in the magical law Enforcement department had her in charge of many different aspects of Wizarding law. But, tonks also noticed that she was heavily involved with the rules and regulations surrounding the werewolf registry. For the past 15 years she had been attempting to continually take rights away from a whole menagerie of magical creatures, including werewolves.
The registry had been in place for decades before Umbridge even started working at the ministry. But, by the time she was in her thirties she had already started to pass anti werewolf legislation in the ministry. it appeared that she was one of the main reasons the rules regarding the registry were so strict.
Tonks read the mandatory regulations that werewolves had to adhere to. It was called The Lycanthropy Code Of Ethics. It looked like most of the rules had been changed over the years to become more strict as time went on.
1.All those inflicted with lycanthropy, must under the penalty of incarceration be listed with the ministry's werewolf registry by the age of 18, with no exceptions.
2.All Lycans must always have their registration documents or registration card with them at all times, with no exceptions.
3.Any establishment or residence may refuse entry or service to anyone believed to be inflicted with lycanthropy.
4.At no time can a werewolf refuse to present their official documents to any ministry officials. Furthermore, said individuals can also not refuse to provide information upon the request of the ministry, and can be brought in for questioning at anytime, for any reason, with no exceptions.
5.On file documentation with the werewolf registry must be updated every ten years, including photo cards, as well as a the individuals current address and a list of all people in the home.
6.All werewolves must seclude themselves from society while in their wolffish form, under the penalty of incarceration or death.
Tonks couldn't believe how strict the rules were. Looking back, she saw that the rules had been the same for almost 20 years, but of course people's prejudices had been plaguing those with lycanthropy for centuries before that.
For the life of her, she couldn't understand why no one had every tried to get the laws changed or dismissed entirely.
As an auror, tonks knee first hand the damage a Savage werewolf pack could create. And she knew that the rules were in place for a reason, but she could help but continue to wonder how any of those rules helped all the good werewolves out there. honestly that was her biggest issue with the entire list.
it punished an entire group of people for the actions of the few. Surely that wasn't justifiable, or at least to her it wasn't.
Tonks decided to take a shot at rewriting the rules. She spent the next hour rewriting the 6 main components of the code, crossing out large portions of her page.
After she had finished writing the entire thing, she looked at what she had created. She was actually pretty proud of herself. she felt like she had made a very just and moral list of ethics that didn't completely violate the rights of werewolves everywhere, and still protected the public from werewolves that could do them harm.
Tonks sighed as she looked over her revisions. She wished someone could simply do what she had spent barely an hour on.
But then she smiled a little. Realizing that no one else needed to rewrite a thing. She already had the revised law in her hand. She sat back, struck by the ideas in her head. Before Tonks tucked the piece of paper into her pants pocket, she wrote the words "Lupins Law" at the top of the and reminded herself to bring up her idea to Sirius later, once Remus had gone to the basement.
tonks decided to put all the books she had taken out back into the library. By the time she came back, Remus was sitting up, looking around. He looked a little dazed.
"Hey, you okay?" Tonks asked.
Remus nodded. "Just tired." He replied.
Tonks sat next to him, leaning gently against him.
"What time is it?" Remus asked her.
"It's almost four."
"I'm gonna go take my potion." Remus told her, before kissing her in the head, and heading towards the kitchen.
A few hours later, Remus was about to go down to the basement, but was taking one more second to police both tonks and Sirius.
"I mean it, neither of you is allowed to come down there, no matter what." Remus said very sternly.
Tonks nodded that she understood him.
"Why does it matter if I go down, you can't hurt my animagi form anyway." Sirius argued.
Remus gave him a cold look.
"You easily forget, that the last time you transformed with me, James was there. He often took the brunt of the wolf. there were tons of times that I went after you and tried to hurt you, the stag was just able to stop me."
"Oh you're so dramatic. That happen like the first two or three times we were with you, then you calmed down." Sirius said, in a laissez-faire type of way.
"Besides." Sirius continued, without letting Remus respond. "You took your potion, before you didn't have it." He complained.
"Enough!" Remus shouted at him.
Sirius sighed, realizing it was going to win this fight.
Tonks watched as Sirius put all the protective barriers up around the entrance of the basement.
She couldn't help but feel sad when it was time to leave Remus.
She put one of her hands on the outside of the basement door, before she left to go upstairs with Sirius.
Tonks sighed as she sat down in the sitting room with Sirius.
"So we just wait?" Tonks asked, feeling helpless.
"I'm afraid so." Sirius said, as he also took his seat.
Tonks sighed again, pulling her legs close to her body.
after a few more minutes, tonks spoke again.
"You know, I did something." She said.
Sirius looked at her oddly.
"What did you do?" Sirius asked, chuckling to himself.
"Well I was bored, and had been looking through some things about Umbridge." Tonks explained.
"Naturally." Sirius said, sarcastically.
"And, well. I sort of rewrote some of the laws she might of helped write." Tonks continued to explain.
" Mhm." Sirius murmured, not sure where she was going with this topic.
"Well, maybe I should just show you." She trailed off, before taking a piece of paper out of her pocket and handing to him.
"I know those new improvements wouldn't be possible now, but maybe after the war." tonks added as Sirius looked over the changes she had made to the current Lycanthropy Code Of Ethics.
Sirius looked at the paper quizzically, and stayed quiet for some time.
Eventually, Sirius chuckled a little, before pointing to the sitting room door with his wand, closing it.
Tonks just stared at him waiting for him to say something about it.
But, instead of saying something. Sirius took out a quill and wrote a few extra things on the paper before handing it back to tonks.
"It was good, I added somethings." Sirius said.
Tonks looked at it, he had added a 7th amendment. It read, "no Lycan can be denied the right to a proper education, the right to liberty, or justice."
Tonks thought it was perfect. Remus had almost never even gone to Hogwarts. If it hadn't been for Dumbledore, he probably wouldn't have. In addition to that, crimes against werewolves were rarely reported. Sirius had made a good addition.
Tonks smiled down at the paper.
"Don't tell him about it. It would make him feel like we were fussing over him." Sirius said.
Tonks nodded.
"So." Sirius continued. "How long have you been in love with Remus?"
Tonks blanched.
"That's not true! Don't say that to him!" She snapped.
Sirius laughed at her. "Don't worry, I won't tell Remus."
"There's nothing to tell!" Tonks said, quickly.
Sirius laughed at her again.
"And, stop laughing at me, will you!" She squeaked.
"Look, you want to pass a law that would purposely benefit him. That's not love?"
Tonks just looked at him.
"It's not just to benefit Remus either. It's for all the good werewolves, that suffer because of the bad ones."
"You so love him." Sirius said under his breath, causing Tonks to feel exasperated.
Later that night, Tonks was curled up in Remus' bed, with his blankets wrapped around her. His bed smelled just like him. It made her miss him. tonks knew that was kinda silly given the fact the he was just a few floors below her, but it was the truth. She had grown so use to their sleepovers that it just felt odd without him there. Tonks looked at the moonlight that was streaming in from the windows, and wondered how Remus was. All had seemed calm all night, but she remained anxious for morning to come.
Tonks thought about what Sirius had said to her a lot as she started to fall asleep that night. Realizing that he had potentially been right. Perhaps she did love Remus. She wondered this to herself, considering the idea.
Was this what it felt like to be in love with someone she thought to herself.