3 October 1972
~James Potter~
"Did you hear? Harry McGonagall made Seeker." Peter said from where he sat on the rug by his bed and flipped to the next page of Quidditch Weekly. "I didn't even know that the Headmistress had children, let alone ones in our Year."
"They're her niece and nephew. Peter, we've told you this before." Remus commented offhandedly as he revised his completed homework for the third time that afternoon.
"Oh," The chubby blonde boy said sheepishly, glancing towards Sirius and James with wide eyes. "I must have forgotten since the last time."
Sirius tossed a miniature quaffle in the air and caught it before it could fall on his face. "He caught the snitch in record time, I'm not surprised he made Seeker. Our House team is going to wipe the floor with all those Slytherin gits." He said and threw the ball again, ignoring Peter.
"Marlene is going to be a great beater, too. Made one hell of a bodyguard during tryouts." James pitched in, smoothly snatching the quaffle midair before Sirius could grab it again then tossed it over his shoulder at Remus.
Remus dodged easily and let the small ball roll underneath his bed, eyes still following the words on the scroll in his hands without pause. "You were a very coordinated team out there. I wouldn't be surprised if you started running drills together."
"That's a wonderful idea!"
"Happy to help," he gave a little two finger salute.
"What about the two of you? Are you going to be competing over who's a better Chaser?" Peter said, going down on his knees in search of the ball underneath Remus' perfectly made bed.
"Don't think so," James responded without a thought. It was true, Sirius and him were closer than just best mates, they were brothers in every way but blood and family name. They wouldn't let something like a friendly Quidditch competition get in between them. It also helped they were on the same team so they would share their victories.
"Jamie's right," Sirius nodded and turned to the other boys. "Remus, do you think we should tell Evans that James is only tied for star Chaser of the Gryffindor team?"
James straightened and glared between Sirius and Remus, although the grin on the other dark haired boy's face betrayed his seriousness. James rolled his eyes when his best friend began to chuckle but Remus still hadn't made a sound.
"I've got to go. I didn't realise how late it had gotten." Remus said, a tone of panic in his voice. He picked up an overnight bag from the corner of his bed. Carefully placing his assignment back on the nightstand as he went. "I'll see you Monday!"
The three boys chorused back their rehearsed goodbyes, wearing theatrical smiles, and waved as they waited for Remus' footsteps to disappear far enough away from outside their door before jumping into action.
James jumped off his bed, "Let's go!"
Sirius grabbed his wand off his nightstand and James tugged on his shoes, haphazardly knotting his shoelaces so they wouldn't come undone. For a moment James thought about taking his invisibility cloak but the others didn't know about it yet, so they left the warmth of the dorm without it. They stumbled over each other as they hurried down the steps before reaching the common room, it was still fairly crowded by the older Years so James didn't think Remus noticed the disturbance behind him as he ducked out of the Fat Lady's portrait. James led the way as they snuck the last few metres and hid behind the portrait, peeking out unnoticed.
"We're good, he didn't see us." Sirius whispered as Remus rounded the corner.
They waited a beat before stepping out and closing the portrait behind them. They spotted their friend down the hall as Remus' shaggy head ducked into the Transfiguration room. James held Sirius and Peter from following as they waited for their mate to come back out.
James was more than a little shocked when Dumbledore stepped out of the room. Sirius turned to look at James with a frown of confusion and James shrugged back in answer. Dumbledore led Remus out of the castle, a hand on the young boy's shoulder, as he steered him out through the halls. Remus' head lowered and his feet dragged behind him as he walked with their Professor.
"Where do you think they're going this late?" Sirius clamped a hand over Peter's mouth and James shushed him fervorously.
Sirius whispered over Peter's head, "He's right, it's a little late for a lovely moonlight stroll through the courtyard. What do we do?"
"We keep following them."
They walked past the greenhouses and when they made no sign of stopping in the clear field, James tugged his friends to a stop behind a glass wall in the last flowerlined house. He pushed away a few potted plants so he could see Remus and Dumbledore clearly.
"It's too risky to go out there in the open like this, we should wait until there's somewhere for us to hide before following them." James suggested.
"Are you sure we should be doing this at all? It feels like Remus' personal thing and we shouldn't poke our heads into it, no matter how curious we are," Peter squeaked out.
"He's our best friend." Sirius said, not taking his eyes off the retreating figures of Dumbledore and Remus as they bled into the horizon. "I don't like any of this. It's past curfew, where could Dumbledore possibly be going with him?"
"We're going to find out," James was about to run after them but an arm pulled him forcibly back to kneel on the dirty floor. "Peter! What the hell?"
"Look!" The blonde boy pointed at the Transfiguration Professor, coming back towards the castle, hands tucked into his robes and a calm look over his elderly features. Coming back from the Forbidden Forest without Remus. "Where's-"
"The only thing out there is the Forbidden Forest. Merlin knows what kind of trouble Remus could get into on his own. What is Dumbledore thinking leaving him there on his own?" Dumbledore walked over a hill and disappeared from their sight under a stone archway. "Let's go before we lose him in the dark."
They hurried down the path, keeping low to the ground to avoid detection if Dumbledore decided to double back for Remus. James' nerves were alight with worry about why their best mate was being abandoned to fend for himself in the Forbidden Forest every month. Assuming this is where he was every time he disappeared, it begged the question, wasn't it forbidden for a reason?
As they walked the edge of the forest, James noticed the branches of the Whomping Willow were frozen in mid-strike, the leafed bough hanging ominously above their heads. James saw a suspicious hollow at the roots of the terrifying tree. James dropped to his knees, Sirius and Peter copying his movement without pause. Crawling on their hands and knees, James dropped into the dingy passageway. Spiderwebs twisted themselves on the back of Sirius' jacket as he fell in after him and Peter landed on an abandoned rat trap.
The light of the full moon filtered down through small cracks in the ground above them. James heard the rattling of metal ahead in the tunnel and sweat ran down his neck as he breathed in the filthy air. He didn't pull out his wand, if Dumbledore left Remus there then it must be safe. Inching out of the damp soil underpass, James felt safer with Sirius and Peter behind him. There was candlelight coming from underneath a splintered wooden door.
A scream ripped through the air. It cracked across the tunnel and tore at the bark of the tree roots. It felt like the air itself was crackling.
Looking at Sirius, James nodded towards the door, and together they pushed it open. Cringing away from the creaking of its rusted hinges they stepped over the threshold. At the centre of the room, tied in shimmering silver chains, was Remus. His knees were hugged against his chest and his chestnut coloured head was buried in the fabric of his sleeves. James watched his shoulders tremble as his lanky body rocked back and forth against the wall.
"Remus?" The boy's shaking stopped and he slowly lifted his head, green eyes watering at the sight of his friends. "Oh, Remus, what has Dumbledore done to you?"
James found himself furious at their Professor. Dumbledore was supposed to protect children, instead he was chaining them up alone in the middle of the night. James clenched his fists in anger, he felt the fury radiating from Sirius at his side as they continued to look at Remus.
"What are you doing here? You can't be here!" He screamed at them, pulling further into the room, struggling to fit himself into a tight corner and away from the three horrified boys at the door. "Get away from me!"
James took a step into the rundown room, trying not to look too closely at the chains around his friend's wrists and ankles. Until a sickening crack stopped him cold in his tracks. Remus fell forward, head snapping down, forehead resting against the moulded floor. His breathing laboured and his body spasmed uncontrollably.
"Leave me alone! Get out of here!" Remus growled out as his arms splintered back, his back arching and the plain t-shirt he had been wearing tore into ribbons. "Go away all of you! Now!"
"We just want to help you! Tell us what's going on!" Pleaded Sirius from next to James, Peter staying safely outside of the dim room. "Remus-"
Remus bared his sharpening front teeth. "Out!" His voice is nothing more than an animalistic snarl towards them. "Run!"
James was frozen as he watched the quiet boy he lived with scratch at his own flesh, ripping gashes against the already scarred skin. He didn't hear the yelp behind him until Sirius tried to grab onto his arm as he was dragged back and out of the room. James panicked, drawing his wand he pointed it at the door which Sirius and Peter were pulled through. He glanced back at Remus and placed himself between his friend and the door.
Even with his back towards Remus, James could still hear and smell the torn body, but he didn't move away. He would protect his friend, even with his suspicion about what was going on with Remus, the condition that James was realising his mate had. There was a sudden yank of metal and James jumped, turning to the boy who was no longer there.
In his place was a creature that James remembered reading about once.
The werewolf had deep cream coloured skin underneath the thick brown fur covering his body. James could feel his hands shake as the wolf paced in his magical prison of chains. "Remus, hey mate, it's me. It's James. Everything is going to be okay."
Not-Remus snapped his jaws at James and jerked forward in an attempt to tear at him, causing James to stumble backwards, right into a waiting pair of arms. He struggled at first, wanting to stay with his hurting friend but a frazzled Sirius and Peter kept his attention long enough for the girl to raise her wand.
"Protego!" The little bushy-haired witch cast her spell, the soft blue mist covered the door before she reached for the handle and slammed it shut, locking it with a flick of her wand for good measure. "What were you three thinking, walking in on a werewolf during a full moon like that?" Hermione McGonagall whispered harshly.
Earlier
~Hermione McGonagall~
"Harry." Hermione tried to rouse him but the exhausted boy dug himself deeper into the couch cushion, mumbling incoherently. "Harry! Wake up! Your father and godfather have decided to barge in on Remus' monthly visitor."
Hermione dove for the window, searching for the three troublesome figures that snuck towards the frozen Whomping Willow. Glancing back to her slumbering best friend and back to the suicidal idiots, Mya grabbed her wand and rushed out of the door, closing it behind her softly.
Thankfully the Willow hadn't managed to shake off the petrification charm Dumbledore had thrown at it by the time she ran through the grounds.
Gryffindors, courage and stupidity are close enough to be interchangeable.
The eerie familiarity of the tunnel startled her, she hadn't ventured inside it since her Third Year. Ironically Peter, Sirius and Remus also starred in that nightmarish scenario. She briefly wondered if these boys would turn her hair grey before her twentieth birthday.
She spotted the choppy blond hair of Peter first, cowering away from the steps leading into the Shrieking Shack's bedroom. Hermione could hear James and Sirius trying to talk to Remus as he screamed back at them. Hermione's heart broke when she heard the snaps of bones.
Remus was a good person, he didn't deserve this. If she could only hurry up in figuring out the Wolfsbane potion it would make his life so much easier. Suddenly, clarity fell over her, if Fenrir Greyback showed his face at that moment she could use an Unforgivable without regret. Hermione wouldn't hesitate to kill the man- no, monster - who bit a three-year-old child out of revenge for their parents speaking out of turn.
Peter whimpered as she passed by him, hissing a warning to stay where he was and not move a muscle. She crept closer, her feet silently padding up the stairs, trying to remember which boards were loose and actively avoiding them. Sirius' hands shook at his side, fingers gripping his wand but he stood firm next to an equally scared James.
Hermione had to admire their loyalty.
Grabbing the scruff of Sirius' neck she wrenched him away from James and the transforming Remus, savagely pulling him out of the room. He struggled against her but adrenaline was pumping in her veins, giving her the strength to yank him away. Hermione managed to push him against the wall next to Peter.
"So help me Merlin, stay here or I will hurt you." Hermione pointed at his feet and turned back the room. She needed to hide the last of the idiot trio in the hall before Remus hurt them or himself in his attempts to escape. No wonder her universe's Severus Snape always picked on her little Golden Trio. They were a pain in the arse just like the Marauders.
"Wait!" Sirius grabbed her wrist. "You know, don't you? What's happening to Remus?"
"I'll explain when I get James out of there! Unless you'd rather stand here and chat while he's stuck in a room with a werewolf!"
She snatched James by the back of his jumper and yanked him into the hall, casting a protection shield as she stepped out of the room. Remus wouldn't be able to get out of the room if he somehow broke through his chains. Chains. Hermione would have some serious words with her aunt about the boy's treatment.
"What were you three idiots thinking, following a professor into a creepy house and walking in on a young werewolf during a full moon?" she whispered harshly. "What's next on the agenda? Swimming with the Giant Squid? Knitting jumpers with Acromantula webs?"
"Werewolf?" Peter's eyes were the size of saucers and he glanced rather nervously towards the door she had warded.
Nodding, Hermione tried to drown out the screams coming from the room. "You have to know that he would never hurt you willingly but the wolf isn't his free will and does whatever he damn-well pleases."
Hermione knew that eventually the three of them would be running alongside Moony in the forest as animagi, but right now it wouldn't do any good for them to wander into the Shrieking Shack while virtually defenceless. James moved towards the door again but Hermione stepped infront of him, stopping him, her hands pushing gently against his chest.
"That's our friend in there!" James shouted, which only made the howling grow louder and more persistent. He pointed his wand at her unsteadily. "Get out of the way or I'll curse you."
"Remus being able to smell and hear you is why he's hurting himself." Hermione said, ignoring the wand. Sirius looked furious and James matched him. "He would rather hurt himself than accidentally scratch or bite you and turn you into a wolf too. Stay out here and keep quiet, it's better for Remus that way."
They looked at her thne each other before James slowly lowered the wand.
Sirius slumped against the wall and picked at his nails with sudden interest. "How do you know all of this stuff about werewolves, and Remus in particular?"
"And how did you cast that charm? It's a Fourth Year spell." James piped up from his new seat on the floor, legs stretched out in front of him.
"I read." Hermione said simply, sitting next to the door and listening to the waves of pathetic whimpers that flooded out. Her heart was in shreds over the pain Remus was going through and she sighed heavily, promising herself to look harder into the Potions section in the library.
After she ignored their continued prodding, the boys talked quietly amongst themselves, leaving her to draw in the soft dirt with the tip of her wand. Eventually, Peter slipped into uneasy unconsciousness while James and Sirius were too busy listening to their friend howl to bother her. Hermione wondered how much longer it would be until sunrise.
Several hours later, Hermione heard the weight on the floorboards in the room lessen, shift and then stop altogether. Climbing to her feet, she lifted the barrier and threw open the door. The sound startled Peter out of his nap, James and Sirius already peering over her shoulder to see inside. Remus lay on the floor, moaning in pain and exhausted.
His clothes were shredded and he weakly tried to open his eyes before flinching away from the sunrise light. Hermione tapped the chains at his wrists and ankles with the tip of her wand. "Take him to the infirmary quickly."
"Aren't you coming with us?" Hermione wasn't sure who asked but as James and Sirius lifted Remus off the floor, her eyes swam in red. Anger drained her face of colour. Peter dropped his cloak around the sleeping boy.
"No," Hermione clenched her jaw. "I have to talk to my aunt about these." She kicked at the bloodied chains lying around Remus.
Sirius looked at the chains in clear disgust. "Good."
4 October 1972
~Remus Lupin~
He blinked his eyes open and when the familiar hospital wing came into focus, Remus relaxed into the mattress underneath his sore limbs. It felt so good to sink inside the feathery warmth after spending the night on the splintered floor in excruciating pain.
Wait, mattress?
Remus spread his shaking fingers on the soft fabric of the hospital sheets and pushed the pillowed surface under his head until it bounced back up. This wasn't right. He was used to waking up alone on the cold ground of the Shrieking Shack, covered in aches and bruises. He was not used to waking up to the scent of disinfectant and lemon. Had Dumbledore gotten him back?
His body snapped forward and his back lifted entirely off the scratchy blankets because it hadn't been Dumbledore who got him back to Hogwarts at all. Remus remembered his friends. James and Sirius had been there, he remembered smelling Peter but he hadn't seen the boy.
The three of them had seen him change,.
They had seen him go feral.
Primal fear dug deep into his mind, his heart, his very soul. What if in the haze of the full moon, the monster that came out had bitten one his friends?
This was awful. Everything would fall apart. The friends he had made and even the school he was allowed to attend because of McGonagall's kindness would disappear. Remus' breathing felt rushed, quick expels of air that dizzied him quickly. He tried to focus on the bland curtains around his bed but the blue blurred and bled into one blob of meaningless colour.
"Hey, Moony. About time you woke up, we've been going mad with worry for you." Sirius strolled into the sectioned off space. A steaming plate balanced in one hand, he pulled the fabric closed with the other and took a seat on the chair next to Remus' bed. "Since you missed breakfast, I thought I'd bring you some. Peace offering?"
Remus' eyes widened at the comfortable aura Sirius extended. "What?"
"You don't like Moony? James thought it was rather clever." Sirius said with a slight pout, hand still outstretched and holding out the food. "You know because your alter ego only comes out during the full moon, hence Moony."
"No, I get the reasoning behind the nickname. But-" Sirius shoved the plate into his hands and lolled his chair on its hine legs.
James poked his head through the curtain and grinned widely. "Look, who's finally awake! Welcome back to the land of the conscious, Sleeping Beauty. For a while there we thought one of us would have to kiss you."
"I'd have fought you to do it." Sirius said.
"Please! One hit to your knees and you'd have been down for the count." James sat on the corner of Remus' bed.
"If I go down, I'm taking you down with me, Potter."
"Why are you being so nice to me?" Remus murmured into his lap, fingers tearing apart a buttered scone. Like he could have done to them last night. He dropped his head in shame as tears filled his vision. "I understand if you want me to leave the dormitory and you never have to talk to me again and- and…" he hiccuped into his hands. "Hogwarts."
Sirius pulled the uneaten plate of food out of his unsteady lap and slid it onto the empty nightstand next to his usual bed. "Of course we're not going to have you kicked out! Why on Merlin's green earth would we do that?"
"Because- because I'm a monster! I'm dangerous!" Why couldn't they understand?
He wiped at his eyes, it wouldn't do him any good to blubber like a child now. It would only serve to make him more pathetic in front of his former friends. Might as well go with some dignity.
"Stop being so dramatic."
"You fold your socks, Remus. Forgive me if I'm not trembling at the sight of you." James reached his hand out to grasp his.
"But-" He was cut out when two pairs of gangly arms wrapped around him. His friends hugged him tight enough for him to understand they weren't going anywhere but not hard enough to aggravate his healing injuries.
"You aren't going anywhere." One of them muttered into his shoulder. Not being able to help himself, Remus squeezed them back and let the dam break, sobbing in their arms.
When the three finally broke apart, Remus was grateful beyond words. "I'm sorry!"
"For trying to eat us last night or for not telling us about your-" James paused for dramatic effect before leaning forward conspirically to whisper, "Furry little problem?"
"Both?" He replied meekly. "I'm really sorry. I can't ever make it up to you."
James waved away his apology with a smile as he stole a piece of bacon. "Don't worry about it. We're in one piece and we know now. Although, I should warn you, you drooled on Peter's cloak while we were bringing you here so we don't want it back."
Sirius tried to swat James' stealing hand away, then glanced between James and his friend in the hospital bed. "Hermione knows about you too, I'm betting that she's told her brother. If he didn't already know too."
Remus exploded again. What little reassurance he had started to feel thanks to James and Sirius was very quickly drained out of him. "What? They must hate me now!"
"Mate, she yelled at us for making you hurt yourself and then stormed off to scream at her aunt and Dumbledore for chaining you up so I reckon you'll be okay." James nodded along with Sirius, looking a little afraid of the curly-haired witch.
"Speaking of, why didn't you tell us you were into that sort of thing? Chains and all?" Remus was shocked when James didn't flinch away from him as he playfully whacked him behind the head.
They talked about what he had missed during the day of his potion-induced slumber.
James tried to convince him that Lily had magically fallen in love with him during the day while Sirius told him about a rampaging dragon that ate Snape. The boys' story featured Dumbledore skinny dipping in the Black Lake and Frank Longbottom marrying Emma Vanity in a secret ceremony performed by a Mountain Troll. The ridiculousness of James and Sirius' imagination proved to Remus how dedicated his friends were to making him feel normal.
By the end of their story, Remus was happy to just be sitting between his friends laughing. Happier than any amount of hot breakfast in a soft bed could ever make him.
When the next full moon rolled around, things were different.
The magically strengthened chains disappeared after Hermione found out, but there were several wards put around the Shrieking Shack to keep him inside and other people out until sunrise. Madam Pomfrey always expected him the next morning, potions in hand and an arsenal of healing spells for his self-induced wounds. A bar of chocolate usually sat on the nightstand waiting for him when he woke up too.
But the best part about what happened that night were the other boys.
Sirius, James, and Peter.
They didn't treat him any differently like he feared they would. They still joked with him, stole and hid his books if he didn't pay enough attention to them, and every morning after the full moon when he woke up in the Hospital, they would be there. Plates of breakfast food and wild stories about things that Remus knew couldn't have happened in twelve hours.
If anything, things had gotten better.
Full moons were, and always would be, a nightmare but he was treated more humanely and that meant the world to him. Remus had wanted to thank Hermione for all she had done the night of the incident but she had gone back to avoiding him and pretending like he didn't exist. At first he had been scared that being a werewolf was the reason for her cool exterior, until he got the next set of neatly written notes on his desk, like from before he found out she knew.
Notes he had been receiving every month.
All Remus could do was wonder, how did she find out in the first place?