Chapter Three: Moony Missing

Remus sat on his sofa and stared rather morosely at the clock up on the mantelpiece. Its hand was ticking ever closer to eleven o'clock; it was the first of September - and the Hogwarts Express would be setting off shortly… and Remus was not going to be on it, because today was also the night of the full moon. Truly rotten timing.

'How are you feeling?' Mr. Lupin asked, coming in from the kitchen and handing Remus a mug of steaming tea.

'Like I'm about to miss the start of term feast and spend the night turning into a slavering monster instead.'

'Remus … I know it's hard. I'm sorry -'

'No…' he sighed. 'I'm sorry. I'm just sitting here feeling sorry for myself and I know better than to do that.' He forced a smile. 'It's not so bad - really. Thanks for the tea.'

'You're allowed to feel sorry for yourself.'

'But it doesn't get me anywhere. Really - I'm fine.'

There was a pause, and then Mr. Lupin smiled. 'Well - good - in that case can I interest you in a game of chess? Gobstones? Exploding snap?'

Remus shook his head. His bones felt like they were on fire, and his head ached. Every bit of him ached, truth be known. Even his eyeballs felt sore. 'No… I think I just need to rest.'

'Alright,' Mr. Lupin smiled at his son, and then cast a worried glance at the mantelpiece - where a muggle photo of Remus's mother sat, smiling out at the pair of them. Remus knew his dad was missing her right now, and wishing she was here when Remus needed her - Hope Lupin had always been able to make them both feel better, even when things were as bad as they could be.

Remus closed his eyes. He wished his mum could be here too.

…

'Nearly eleven, Jim, here we go,' the young porter said, as the doors to King's Cross station opened and the first of the weirdos walked in - with an owl and a sweeping broom and trailing robes.

'Well, what do you expect, lad? It's always this way on the first of September.'

'I dunno … every year I think it can't happen again and then…'

'I tell yer, it's been this way ever since I've worked here. And probably for a long while before that. There's something fishy afoot in this building on the first - always has been, and probably always will be.'

'I wonder if anything like this happens at Waterloo or Victoria?' the young porter grumbled - and then braced himself for the most mental half hour of his year.

…

Sirius managed to wriggle his way out of his mother's clutches the moment he passed through the hidden barrier onto Platform 9 ¾ (it wasn't as if Walburga would care about saying "goodbye" or anything) and, dragging his trunk behind him, vanished into the milling crowds, looking for James.

The platform was wreathed in whisps of smoke, and figures seemed to loom up suddenly out of the mist - and Sirius had to dodge around them, scraping his trunk along the ground as he changed direction, and clanking it against more than a few ankles. The annoyed "ow"s drifted after him, but he ignored them. The Hogwarts Express itself was pulled into the station, gleaming scarlet and creaking slightly. The sudden shudders of its carriages, as the engine being readied for the journey sent vibrations down the train, put Sirius in mind of a sleeping dragon just on the edge of waking up.

He found James and Peter standing with their parents near the end of the train. 'Sirius!' James called to him, waving wildly and grinning like a lunatic, 'over here!'

He ran to them, trunk thumping and bumping along the ground, and was very pleased (though a little shy) when Mrs. Potter gave him a hug in welcome. 'So it's just Remus we're waiting for now,' she said.

Mrs. Pettigrew checked her watch. 'He'll be late if he's not careful. Miss the train.'

The boys all glanced at each other. Peter coughed.

'I got an owl from him this morning,' Sirius lied, trying to smooth over the awkward silence. 'He's under the weather - not well enough to make it. He'll have to floo in later in the week.'

'Poor dear,' Mrs Potter tutted. 'Make sure you give him my love and tell him I hope he feels better, when you see him, Jimmy.'

'Yes, mum.'

The train emitted a piercing shriek and a spout of steam and the whole chassis clanked and groaned. 'Time to get on, chop chop, you'll be late!' and Mrs. Potter, Mr. Potter and Mrs. Pettigrew helped all three boys shove their trunks up into a carriage and then stood back as the boys hopped on, slammed the door shut and then leaned out of the window to wave.

'Do try to be good, Jimmy, dear - and Sirius, dear - don't lead him into too much trouble!'

'He leads me, Mrs. Potter!'

'Peter - no following them into the forest!' Mrs. Pettigrew said.

'As if we'd let little Pete get eaten!' James threw his arm around Peter's shoulder and squeezed.

'Gerroff! Don't fuss, mum - I'll be fine!'

And then, with more wheezing and clanking, the train started to heave its way out of the station. The boys leaned farther out of the window and waved and waved as their parents became tiny dots in the distance - and then, once they were out in the open and the Hogwarts Express was barrelling along, they closed the window and went to find a compartment.

'Of course - it's no fun without Remus,' Sirius said, bending over and taking hold of his trunk so he could drag it along. He heard a gaggle of high pitched giggling behind him; he frowned, straightened up and turned around. There was a group of third and fourth year girls, from various houses, in the nearest compartment and they were pressed to the windows watching him.

'Hi, Sirius,' Bettina Bagshot of Ravenclaw said. The girls giggled all the harder. He frowned even deeper.

'Hi, girls,' James said jauntily. It was the girls' turn to frown.

'What's going on?' Peter asked.

'The girls have gone mental,' Sirius shrugged, not very interested in why all these girls had suddenly taken leave of their senses. 'Come on.' He bent down to pull his trunk again and - amid a flurry of giggles, which he ignored - struggled down the carriage to find a compartment of their own.

They had barely gone a few steps, when another compartment door slid open, and Lily Evans stepped out, pulling up short as Peter's trunk nearly sliced her toes off. 'Watch it!'

James stopped, dropped his trunk to the floor with a thunk and straightened up. His hand flew to his hair and seemed to try to flatten it down (it always grew wild and every which way in the back). 'Hi, Evans' (his voice had that same jaunty note it had had when he had tried to speak to the other girls, Sirius had never really heard him use it before).

Lily nodded her head, 'Potter.'

'Did you have a good summer?'

She stared at him like he had three heads. 'What do you care? Look - get out of my way, I'm trying to nip to the loo.'

James took a step back and - with an elaborately flamboyant flourish, motioned for Lily to walk past them. She gave him another incredulous stare and walked away. He watched her go until she vanished from view - and then he caught sight of Sirius - who was also staring at him as if his number of heads was questionable.

'What, in Merlin's name, was that about?' Sirius asked.

…

'I just saw Potter out in the carriage,' Lily told her friends when she returned to her compartment. 'He was acting odd.'

'What - he wasn't acting like a giant arse?' Mary asked.

'No … no, he was still very definitely a giant arse … just a weird one.'

'A weird arse,' Petra suggested.

'As opposed to Black's nice one,' Mary giggled.

'Black's a nutter - nice arse or not,' Mandy said.

'So he's a nice arsed nutter. With an arse like that - does he need to be mentally stable?'

'You cannot fancy Black, Mary,' Petra told her, throwing a scrunched up ball of parchment at her head. 'We forbid it, don't we, girls?'

'Absolutely.'

'Forbidden. …Anyway, we need to get on.' Lily un-crumpled the parchment Petra had thrown, smoothed it out, and sucked on her quill as she contemplated what was written there. The girls ran a monthly magazine ( Sabrina13: The Monthly Mag for the Modern Magic Miss ) and released an issue the day after every full moon… which happened to be tomorrow.

Of course the girls had all worked on their content over the summer (Petra had done a write up of the World Cup, Mandy had written an article on Fall Fashions, Mary - their resident boy expert - had done a piece on 12 Signs He Likes You and another on Date or Ditch? How to Tell if a Boy is Worth It, and Lily had written a recipe for a potion which cured dark circles under your eyes, a full horoscope for Virgos and answered a few problems for the problem page) but they still had a lot to do in order to get the next edition ready to read, printed and bound in less than 24 hours.

And - most importantly - they had to write an article which would remind their readers of the dark forces amassing outside the castle. The girls had been huge fans of The Kneazles, the rock and roll band who had been murdered by wizards unknown back in April, and Lily and her friends were sure the blame lay with the Dark Lord and - though lots of people still wanted to pretend nothing was wrong - they girls wanted to make sure no one forgot what was out there. They used their magazine as a platform; slipped in between the boy talk and the pimple cures, they would write about the truth - even if The Daily Prophet wasn't writing about it yet.

To this end they had tried their hand at some investigative journalism, this summer, and met up at Diagon Alley and talked to some of the witnesses of the Night of the Glass Shards. They were trying to write a joint piece about shopping in the aftermath of the violence and were trying to strike a delicate balance in their tone - somewhere between their normal girly fluff (to make the truth more palatable to those who didn't want to know) and the hard hitting realism that such a serious subject deserved.

The four of them settled down in their compartment, with chocolate frogs and pumpkin juice, ready to spend the entire journey getting this right - if that's what it took. They were barely out of London, and already the floor was awash with the scrunched up balls of parchment that were their rejected ideas.

It was a good job the journey to Hogwarts was a long one.

…

'D'you think her hair looked different?'

'What?'

The boys had found a compartment all to themselves and were settling in, but James' expression was far away, as if contemplating great truths of the universe. 'Evans's hair was it … more red? More swishy? More silky?'

'It looked the same as it always looked, mate - Pete?'

'Didn't see any difference,' Peter confirmed.

'Are you both blind? There was a world of difference!'

'Well what was it?'

But James looked frustrated. 'I don't know…' He shook his head. 'Anyway - here', he rooted in his trunk and brought out Sirius's toaster and his pet puffskein, John, both of which Sirius had sent home with James over the summer as he did not trust either of them not to come to a sticky end if left alone with his own dark family.

'Thanks.'

'No problem.' And then James sighed, and stared out of the window, his expression becoming dreamy and far away once more.

Sirius shook his head at Peter, who shrugged in return and then pulled his comic out of his trunk and started working on it (Peter drew comics about a boy werewolf named "Moony" - and had faithfully promised Sirius that he would get a comic of his own, and a slice of glory, once Sirius too could transform into an animal).

With Peter occupied, and James gazing out of the window like a weirdo, Sirius opened up his own trunk and took out the copy of The Daily Prophet he had swiped from home this morning (they had set out early - and he doubted either of his parents had had chance to read it yet, and that thought gave him a small stab of satisfaction).

With John balanced on his knee, humming contentedly, he read the front page - which was yet another story on the shock resignation of Royston Idlewind, head of the ICWQC, right before broom up of the World Cup Final (his wand carrying ban had ended in disaster and humiliation and he had stormed out of the top box in a snit - which had rather overshadowed the match itself).

He turned the page and read an excoriating piece on the goblins from Mable Grable.

It is our money in those vaults

Mable had written.

And it is our right to know what the goblins do with it. Furthermore, it is our Ministry's right to know what the seditious element within our society are getting up to. Someone is funding these attacks on our community and if Minister Jenkins is too weak to make the goblins open up their account books ( and for the inside scoop on further failures, turn to page 17 to see my top ten list of "Woefully Weak Moments for The Minister") then it is the opinion of this writer (Mable Grable, the quill that downed a thousand brooms) that we should act of our own accord and walk our money straight out of Gringotts…

Sirius shook his head, Mable was barking if she thought anyone would seriously consider taking their galleons out of Gringotts. The rest of the paper turned to be as woefully lacking in real news as it always was, and it was with some relief that he reached the puzzle page at the back. He examined the crossword and started to fill it in, scratching his nose with his quill as he thought.

Four Down: the charm used to conjure water (9 letters)

'What's the water conjuring charm?' he asked the others.

'Aqua… something,' James said vaguely - still staring out of the window and contemplating the mystery of Evans's shiny hair.

'Dunno,' Peter shrugged.

Sirius sighed, and threw the paper down on the seat next to him. 'It's no fun without Moony,' he complained.

…

As disappointed as Remus was not to be returning to school on time, he had to admit - as he lay on his bed and tried to pretend he didn't hurt all over - that he was not sorry to not be spending the time on a rickety train, in a confined compartment, juddering along for hour after hour. Just the thought of bouncing along the rails, when his bones felt like this, made him want to moan in agony. (Not to mention, they would not reach school before the sun set and the full moon rose - which would result in a rather violent and grisly ending for everyone unfortunate enough to be trapped on the train with him.)

At one o'clock - and trying not to think about how the Hogwarts Express would be somewhere around Yorkshire right now - Remus went downstairs for lunch (Mr. Lupin insisted he eat something - and so he managed to force down a couple of sandwiches, which felt a very sorry meal indeed when he considered the items for sale on the Trolley Witch's trolley, and then the prospect of a feast at school) and then dragged himself back upstairs to rest.

He spent the rest of the afternoon snoozing fitfully, but never feeling refreshed.

…

The boys spent quite a bit of the afternoon napping as well (it was a long journey, with little to do) though it was uncomfortable in their seats, and they kept waking up in weird positions, cramping in weird places. They played exploding snap and tried to build a house of cards (which never got too far - as the train would always rattle just at a crucial point and send everything tumbling. The house did explode in James' face at one point, though, and singed his eyebrows off - just as Evans walked past and glanced in. James was mortified. 'Why do you care?' Sirius asked.)

The further north they travelled, the wilder the landscape became. The skies grew darker; inside the carriages, the lamps were lit, and eventually it was pitch black outside. The Harvest Moon shone down at them through the windows, and they blinked up at it, thinking of Remus.

Finally, they reached Hogsmeade station and tumbled off the train, leaving their belongings behind as instructed, and joined the swarm for the horseless carriages (though - due to James having collided with one once - the boys knew that carriages were in fact pulled by invisible horses rather than being truly horseless).

'It's bloody freezing,' Sirius said, stamping his feet, and thrusting his hands in his pockets. 'I always forget how cold it is up here… come on - hurry up!' he yelled at a group of seventh years clambering into the carriages ahead of them.

One girl turned around at his yell, and frowned. She was rather dumpy and had a squashed nose, upon which she wore a pair of square spectacles. She stared at the boys for a moment, considering them. 'Aren't there normally four of you?' she said at last. 'Where's the other one?'

'Come on, Bertha - we're ready to go,' her friend stuck her head out of the carriage and pulled Bertha inside, saving the boys the need to answer. But Bertha still peered out at them as her carriage rolled away, still frowning.

'Nosy cow,' Peter said - and the three of them climbed into their own carriage and - with a sense of relief that the journey was almost done - headed up to the school gates.

…

They took their place in the Great Hall at the Gryffindor table. (There was a flurry of giggling from several girls as Sirius walked in. James frowned. Sirius appeared not to notice.) The golden plates glittered and the pearly white ghosts gleamed in the candlelight, and - overhead - the enchanted ceiling reflected the night sky back at them. Sirius gazed up at the moon.

'He'll be fine,' James said absently, and Sirius tore his eyes away.

'Yeah - I know. He'll be back tomorrow. Tuesday at the latest.'

The doors opened, and the Hall fell silent as the new first years followed Professor McGonagall inside and then lined up, trembling, in front of the staff table. Professor McGonagall put a four legged stool down in front of the new students, and then placed a battered and ancient looking hat on top of the stool.

The first years eyed the hat warily, as if wondering if they would be expected to pull a rabbit from it or something. The older students leaned forward at their tables and watched - and then a tear opened up along the hat's brim and the hat began to sing:

No, I may not be much to look at

Dirty, patched and frayed and torn

But I am the Hogwarts sorting hat

The smartest hat you've worn!

I've lived a thousand years in all

(not bad going for a hat)

I've watched time flow throughout this hall

Where great wizards once have sat

And I'm the one who starts them off

Who tells them where they're going

Some may sneer and some may scoff

But I get their journeys flowing.

I look inside them, everyone

I see the makings of their mind

I learn their pasts, the deeds they've done

And sort them all in kind.

There are four houses, proud and true

One for each to call their home

And I find the one that's right for you

From which your heart will never roam.

First of all there's Gryffindor

The house for the brave of heart

And second there is Ravenclaw

Where wisdom plays its part

Hufflepuff is next along

Where hard work will always win

And last to finish out this song

The shrewd go to Slytherin

That's the four, that's where you'll go

To the house where you belong

To see you through life's joys and woe

And turn the weak to strong.

So put me on, and let me look

At all you've thought and said

For I'll guide you better than any book

Once I see inside your head!

The whole Hall burst into applause, as the hat finished singing, and Abercrombie, Anastasia was called forward to be sorted.

'You know, I can't help but notice that the hat still has nothing good to say about the Slytherins,' Sirius said casually, clapping along with everyone else as Crouch, Bartemius was sorted into Ravenclaw. 'Everyone else is brave, hardworking, wise … but shrewd? That's just a nice way of saying "calculating sons of bitches".'

'Well, your brother is your mother's son.'

Sirius snorted.

'They're not all evil though, are they?' Peter said.

'Aren't they?'

'Snivellus is, and Mulciber and Avery … but Upwin and Pryce are blameless enough. They keep themselves to themselves - don't hex anyone.'

'Must be awful for them - sharing a dorm with the junior branch of the Knights of Walpurgis,' James said.

But Sirius snorted again. 'They should have been brave or hardworking or wise then, shouldn't they? If I managed not to be put in Slytherin, with my name - any one else should be able to manage it.'

'You could never be considered "shrewd" though, Sirius, you're the most bullheaded, reckless tosser I know.'

Sirius cuffed James around the back of the head. The sorting continued until finally Yaleman, Felicity was sorted into Ravenclaw and then - once Felicity had taken her seat next to Crouch - Dumbledore rose to his feet. The Hall went quiet again - and the Headmaster beamed at them all.

'Welcome, welcome,' he said. 'How wonderful it is that we are all given another chance to gather together at the start of another year, with everything to look forward to. This is the moment filled with the greatest potential - a whole vista of knowledge awaits and here you are with a clean sheet, a fresh start and the chance to make what you will of every opportunity that will be afforded you. Nothing has yet been missed or lost, all doors are open, all paths clear. This moment - before it all begins - this is truly the moment of magic. I hope, with all my heart, that each of you will seize all that potential and fly with it. Now - before we begin our feast, I have to announce that we have a new professor joining our ranks. We were all deeply saddened by the loss of Professor Tenebris, however it gives me great pleasure to introduce our new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher: Professor Malidictus.'

A short man, with greying, bristly hair and narrow, dark eyes stood up and gave a jerky bow in the direction of the students, who applauded politely.

All apart from Peter, who had squeaked when he heard the name (and received an embarrassed glower from Sirius in return). 'That's the man from the wireless,' Peter hissed at his friends, beneath the cover of the applause. 'The one Mr. Lupin knows, the one who wants to prove the Knights of Walpurgis are funding the werewolves.'

James and Sirius craned their necks to get a better look at the new professor, suddenly much more interested in him. He was only a slight thing, at first glance he might even look meek and mild, but there was a hardness to his eyes - and he did not smile around the Hall, when he was introduced.

'I'm sure you will all join me in wishing the professor the very best of luck,' Dumbledore continued. 'And now,' he clapped his hands, 'the feast.'

And suddenly the food appeared on the tables out of nowhere, mountains of meat, piles of potatoes, vegetables, stuffing, gravy… and the students fell upon it, after their long journey, making short work of it and still leaving room for pudding.

Once the feast was done, and Dumbledore had given out the usual notices, the benches were scraped back and the entire student body made their weary way back to their common rooms, dorms and bed.

The three boys followed a convenient prefect (they hadn't heard the new password yet) and then scrambled through the portrait hole and followed the winding staircase to the top of their tower, where the door now read: fourth year boys.

They piled inside, their trunks were already there, and Peter - yawning widely - opened his up and began rooting for his pajamas. Sirius, however, just sat on his bed and stared up at the moon, which hovered just outside their window.

James looked at him. He glanced at the moon - and then back to Sirius. 'Alright,' he said.

'What?'

'If you're just going to sit there mooning over Moony…'

'I'm not…'

'Then I've got an idea,' James raised his voice to speak over Sirius.

'What?'

James just smirked knowingly, opened his own trunk and - rather than taking out his pajamas, took out his dad's old invisibility cloak instead. 'You got us a silver spoon didn't you?'

Sirius nodded.

'Right then - tonight's the night. Full moon - time to start the ritual. Let's sneak out to the greenhouses, grab some mandrake leaves and just do it. We'll be halfway to being animagi by the time Remus gets back to school.'

Sirius's face had lit up. 'You think we're ready?'

'No time like the present.'

'Pete?'

Peter looked like he had serious misgivings but - if he did - he managed to swallow them down and nod in agreement.

'What are we waiting for then?' James asked, 'Let's go.' And he threw the invisibility cloak over the three of them.

…

They were very used to wandering around at night by now, and - even though they were encumbered with the cloak - moved with the surefootedness of the practised rule breaker. They did, however, pull up short and - invisible or no - lurk deeper into the shadows, when they heard Professor McGonagall's voice float around the corner. 'I just don't understand why you hired him, of all people, Albus - you can't stand him.'

'That is, perhaps, a touch strong, Minerva,' Dumbledore, himself, answered.

'It's bang on the money and you know it. His ideas - they're dangerous. Especially with, well especially with us having you know who in the castle.'

'Lord Voldemort?'

'No. You know who I mean.'

Dumbledore sighed. Their voices were getting closer. 'Perhaps I am a wicked, old man,' he said.

'You are.'

'But -' he continued, a note of amusement in his voice, 'I have grave misgivings about the fate of Professor Tenebris. I took on her role myself last year as I did not wish to expose anyone else to possible harm. But I cannot teach Defence indefinitely, I need a new teacher - and I fear anyone taking that job may be in danger. I would, therefore, rather take this flight into the unknown with an older, experienced wizard who has their eyes opened as to what they are getting into and is willing to accept the risk.'

They rounded the corner - and the boys could see the pair of them now. 'And - as you can't stand him - you don't really mind if he is killed?' McGonagall said dryly.

'Minerva! I would never go that far…'

'Is that a fact?'

They disappeared around the next corner, and the boys looked at each other, under the cloak. 'What was that about?' James asked. But they had their eyes on a bigger prize than castle gossip, that evening, and so they abandoned Big Macca and Dumbledore to their late night powwow, and scurried off in the opposite direction, heading for the boys' bathroom with the secret staircase that led out directly by the greenhouses.

The greenhouses were locked, when they got there, and alohomora would not budge the doors (this was, perhaps, not a surprise; the greenhouses were home to a great many deadly plants and Professor Sprout did not want anyone wandering in after hours). However, after a few minutes casing the joint, they found a small window propped open on the far side of greenhouse three.

'It'll have to be Pete who goes through,' Sirius said, 'it's too tight for us.'

So James and Sirius gave Peter a bunk up, and Peter scrambled through the window and dropped into the greenhouse below. 'Be careful,' James hissed through the glass. 'Don't disturb the mandrakes - they'll knock you out if they cry.'

'Or kill you,' Sirius added helpfully.

Peter frowned, and then scuttled off through the rows of plants, until he found a whole load of baby mandrakes waiting to be repotted by the new second years in their first Herbology lesson of the year (the Hogwarts curriculum never seemed to change). He held his breath, stuck one finger in one ear (which was a useless gesture, as it still left his other ear exposed) and then ripped three leaves off the nearest mandrake plant.

Then, when the plant did not start screaming, and he was not knocked unconscious, he scuttled his way back to the window, stood on an upturned wheelbarrow and scrambled back through - falling through the air until Sirius and James caught him. 'Got 'em,' he announced proudly.

…

Once they were safely back in their dorm, they examined the leaves carefully. 'So, this is it,' James said. 'We put it under our tongue and keep it there for an entire month. Full moon to full moon. It'll be tricky…'

'But worth it,' Sirius said and - without further ado - popped his leaf under his tongue. With a bit more trepidation, James and Peter did likewise.

Peter screwed his face up 'Dat's uncomderdle,' he said.

'What?'

'I daid "Dat's uncomderdle".'

'I don' undderdand.'

Sirius sighed. 'Dis is doing do be a long donth.'

But it was the first necessary step in their journey into becoming animagi, and so - discomfort, difficulty in speaking, and all - they were just going to have to put up with it. The thought of being able to help Remus at the full moons would have to be enough to sustain them and - as Sirius got into bed - he smiled at the thought of what Remus would say when he arrived back at school tomorrow evening to find their plans were already underway.

He pulled the curtains around his four poster bed, but the moonlight still shone in on him. Soon he thought soon you won't have to spend these nights alone, and we'll be able to spend them with you.