"What do you think?" Giannis asked, distracting Sirius for what felt like the thousandth time. "Isn't it awesome?"

The Black Sheep set down the latest response to one of those letters Hydrus had made him send to look at the update on the child's project, then had to do a double take. What Giannis had shown him last time was a cruelly tortured and maimed hunk of wood, but now it was an almost perfect replica of some kind of rat. The resemblance was so uncanny it nearly made his nose curl at the reminder of his old friend. Then the thing moved and Sirius nearly shat himself.

"What the hell?" he asked. "Where'd that come from?"

"I made it!" Giannis beamed with enough pride to live up to the house Hydrus had given him's name. "It doesn't do much 'sides turn its head back and forth though."

"What, but…" True to the boy's word, the rat's head slowly turned from one direction to another, like some old fashioned animatronic. "How'd you, uh…"

"Make it so much better?" The boy finished. "Well I was gonna throw it away after I accidentally cut off the frog's feet, that's what it was before, but Dobby stopped me. He said we shouldn't waste things.

"Then when I asked him what I should do with it then, he said I should keep practising with it, but I said it was ruined, and he said no it wasn't we could fix it, and I asked how, and then he brought me to Mr. Dumbledore!" Sirius's eyes widened, but the boy was already beginning to answer the question he hadn't had a second to ask. "Oh my gosh that guy is so old! And cool! I told him what was going on so he cast a spell on the wood that made it so that what I wanted to happen happened when I carved up the wood and next thing you know I had made this guy, even the little whiskers!"

"Oh, I uh, I see—"

"He didn't mind me working in his office for a bit, so I started doing some runes on it to make him move. Did you know Mr. Dumbledore has a phoenix, and it's the same one who was there with Hydrus when he burned up all those zombies? His name is Fawkes, him and Apophis played while I kept working, and when it was all done Mr. Dumbledore said the rat was really good." How the hell was the kid just now taking a breath? "He told me I should give him a name, so I wound up calling him Little Whiskers, but he said I should call him Peter and I told him that was a dumb name."

Sirius coughed on his drink as the implications of what the kid had said and the comedy of him telling the most powerful wizard in the world to more or less fuck off set in. Why on earth was Dumbledore trying to remind him of that little shit stain Peter? Neither he nor any of the other Marauders had spoken to him since—

"Oh! Hey Mr. Potter!"

Sirius looked up to see James and Remus had come in. Maybe Arcturus wasn't completely off his rocker for having set up a floo alarm. Still, that was about the only thing he regretted getting rid of so far; it was definitely a good thing he'd ditched the old family wards.

"Think of the devils," he said, feeling the sudden rush of embarrassment at having previously ran away from his two oldest friends. "What, uh… What are you guys doing here?"

James just glared at him. "Don't act dumb. Where the hell have you been? Remus was worried sick!"

The werewolf elbowed the other man hard enough to elicit a grunt, and shook his head. "We've both been worried. When we heard about Arcturus dying…"

Sirius winced. "Well—"

"Who're you?" All three of their heads turned to look at Giannis, and Sirius cocked his head to the side when he saw something hard in the boy's eyes as he looked up at Remus. "Why'd you hit Mr. Potter?"

"Calm down," James said. He knelt down and scooped the boy into the air, and the smile on Giannis's face elicited a surprising wave of jealousy from Sirius. "He and I are best friends, and we're best friends with Sirius over there too. We just play around like that, okay?"

"Okay." The child was still staring at Remus suspiciously, but it had eased up a touch. "How come you guys are here?"

"Well," James started with a clearing of his throat. "Ol' Padfoot over there was hiding in a hole cus he didn't want to talk to us about his problems. Then his problems got bigger and bigger, and we got more and more bored, so finally we decided to come and get him to quit being so stubborn and just talk to us."

"How come you called him—, Hydrus! Bella!"

Any jealousy Sirius had at James being so much better than him with kids was lost in the wake of Giannis kneeing him in the stomach at least twice as he scrambled out of his arms to get to the newcomers. Hydrus levitated him up into the air and deposited him into Bellatrix's awaiting arms, and Sirius turned away to not show the wrinkles of disgust around his nose at the sight.

"Hey, kiddo," Hydrus said, and Sirius was finally able to turn back. It was amazing how much his son sounded like him; even their little mannerisms were similar somehow. "It's good to see you. You get all your stuff settled?"

Immediately the boy was back to speaking at a hundred words per second, but Sirius's son held up his hand.

"Settle down, you can tell me all about it in a bit." He turned his attention to Bellatrix. "Could you and—"

"Why do you smell like werewolves?" Sirius's eyes widened, he hadn't noticed how close Remus had gotten to the teen. Moony practically had his nose in Hydrus's hair. "Werewolves and… Goblins?"

"Ah, that reminds me." Hydrus reached into his pocket, and his arm sunk nearly all the way to his forearm. "Sirius, you're not to be seen in public without this from now on."

From the expanded storage space, Hydrus drew a sheathed sword. Sirius didn't have to squint long before his son threw it towards him, and he only just managed the catch.

The sheath itself was just plain brown leather with some black stitching running up one side. On the other hand, the hilt was as ornate as anything he'd ever seen. The shape was simple, closer to one of those old gladiator swords with the round pommel and crossguard, but the material was a blended weave of what he could only assume was silver and gold. The handle was wrapped up in some sort of hair or fur that felt as smooth as silk even despite the odd strand or two splitting from the rest. Engraved into the guard was some skeletal looking snake, its nose touching the tip of its tail; into the pommel was a sun with a geometric face in its centre.

"What the hell is this?" Sirius asked as he drew the blade, and saw that other than looking sharp there wasn't much else to it. "And why do I have to wear it?"

"It's a goblin sword." Hydrus waved his hand dismissively. "Part of the reparations between me and them. Make sure to update your will to say it'll go back to them when you die." He began to grumble. "Don't need another mess to clean up…"

Remus cleared his throat. "That still doesn't explain why—"

"Yes, yes, believe me; you being here is actually a good thing. You and I have a lot to talk about." The teen jerked his chin at Sirius. "Why don't you take everyone besides me and Remus out for dinner, Bella will fill you in on everything. I have a job proposal for 'Uncle Remus' over here."

At least Sirius wasn't alone in his obvious confusion at that statement. He almost instinctively made a comment about how Remus got to be an uncle already, and James had clearly gotten something stuck in his throat too, but the third Marauder's body language silenced them. Moony was the only one who hadn't reacted at all outside of the way his hands were mechanically clenching and unclenching, one finger joint at a time in an unnatural way that spoke volumes towards his innate flexibility.

"Right, we'll get out of your hair," Sirius mumbled. "I'll bring home a doggy bag." Neither Hydrus nor Remus responded to the easy lob for a joke, the former moving to take the seat behind Arc—, Sirius's, desk, the latter choosing to stand directly across from it. "See ya."

"What happened?" Remus demanded once the others were gone. "Why do you smell like Greyback?"

"Kreacher." The house elf appeared but the werewolf paid him no mind. "Bring me a pensieve and two bottles, one of the old man's good shit and something for me to sip."

"Yes, Lord Master Black."

"You're going to drink that first bottle, and I'm going to fill up that pensieve." The teen leaned back in his chair. "I wanted to go about this in a more delicate manner, but since I've been caught red handed, I won't make things worse by asking you to wait for me to figure out how to do that."

It was incredible how the boy could look so much like his father yet act the exact opposite as him. There was almost nothing in the world Sirius hated more than positions of power, while Hydrus seemed to step into them like they were pairs of slippers. The way he'd propped his feet up on the desk, the way he'd held out his hand just in time to take the glass of… rum by the smell of it, the second Kreacher appeared with it...

Remus took the unopened bottle the elf had retrieved and popped its cork by cracking the lip of the bottle against the desk. It was a messy old party trick he'd learned from Sirius, and he felt a bit embarrassed to be peacocking in front of a teenager, but something about the way Hydrus was acting had his teeth on edge.

"At some point during this talk, you're going to want to hit something, most likely me." Hydrus was pulling memories from his forehead and depositing them into the pensieve. "When that time comes, I want you to instead take a dip in here, so I don't accidentally hit you back."

"Can we just get on with this?" Remus asked, setting the already half-drunk bottle back down. "What happened? Did you kill Fenrir without me?"

Hydrus sighed. "I killed four goblins less than two hours ago."

"What?"

"Might've been five, depending on if Steelgorge's youngest son lives," Hydrus continued on. "It's been a real long day, if that wasn't obvious. Could you please have just a bit more patience for me? Let me ramble on for a bit?"

That was just about the last thing Remus wanted to do, almost entirely because of how cagey the teen was being. He could've just lied and said 'I was hunting him and he got away again', and Remus wouldn't have doubted it for an instant. He'd caught nothing but dust trails from the alpha werewolf for years, Hydrus getting a bit closer than that but still failing wouldn't have been hard to believe at all.

"Fine."

"Thank you." The teen swirled his rum around its glass. "I'm not a good person, Remus. I'm sure that's not a jaw-dropping fact for you to hear after what you saw me do to the other werewolves at that sketchy-ass hotel."

He threw back the rest of his drink, held out the glass, and Kreacher appeared immediately to refill it.

"My… Let's just call him my 'grandfather', raised me with an expectation to be loved, before I came here. Taught me how to manipulate people into liking me, or at the very least respecting and admiring me." He took a breath. "And he was not a man you wanted to disappoint. I don't want people like my father, like you, to dislike me.

"But because you pick the worst fucking times to be places, I don't have much of a choice now." Hydrus shook his head. "I'm here to offer you one of two jobs. The first is to become the new professor for Defense Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts."

Remus blinked. "Defense… What on earth are you talking about?"

"Bellatrix will be retiring in order to become Sirius's advisor, and you're the person best suited for the role," Hydrus said. "I told you that a bookish job suited you best."

There were a million questions running through Remus's mind, but there was only one that he truly wanted to ask. The question he'd been trying to have answered ever since he was first turned assaulted as a child.

"Where is Fenrir Greyback?" he asked. "What happened?"

"He's where he's always been, with his pack." Hydrus took another long sip of his drink. "Which is the other job opportunity you have.

"I didn't lose Greyback that day. Well, I did, but he didn't manage to get far. I captured him, tortured him, and made him into my servant." Remus's mouth fell open. "I've been making use of him and his pack ever since. Bodyguards, assassins… Entomologists." Hydrus grinned at the apparent joke. "If you want to kill him, be my guest. I'll take you right to him. But you'll need to take his place afterwards, because I don't intend to lose control of his 'family'."

The werewolf shot to his feet, and the teen cocked his eyebrow at him before gesturing towards the pensieve. It suddenly occurred to the Remus just what sort of memories might be in it. The thought of what sort of torture his 'nephew' might've done to the monster… Slowly, he lowered his head into the pensieve.

The dream-like world he appeared in was plain. It seemed more like a summer camp than anything else, with log cabins and trees everywhere he looked. In fact, as he watched the half-remembered children running around, he realised that was almost exactly what it was. The only things in complete focus were Hydrus and Bellatrix Black who were walking hand in hand, obviously paying no mind to their surroundings whatsoever.

"See?" Bellatrix said. "I told you it was better to let her live. Waste not, want not."

"Mm," Hydrus acknowledged. "Go and get her, I'm going to check in on our pet."

"Of course, love."

After an uncomfortably long kiss between the fully grown, insane woman and teenager they parted, leaving Remus with no choice but to follow after Hydrus. More vague, spectral figures passed by them, leaving the werewolf to wonder just how little attention the boy paid to those he didn't care about. Bellatrix had appeared in a stunning clarity, as if she was actually in the pensieve beside him rather than just being a memory, but everyone else had been faceless shapes more or less.

The buildings and forest were all perfectly clear. The wind was strong and clearly coming from a particular direction. Even the way the air smelt, dulled as it was compared to Remus's own preternatural ability with the sense, was crystal clear with its notes. Finally another perfectly reproduced person appeared, but it was just a hurried looking child who nearly toppled into Hydrus before continuing to run past him.

Before too much longer they arrived at the largest cabin he'd seen thus far, and Hydrus wasted no time kicking open the door. He strolled in and immediately every one who'd been sitting shot to their feet and bowed. Remus didn't recognize any of the werewolves besides Fenrir.

The man who'd ruined his life looked terrified. Although he was wearing a royal-purple suit and enough jewellery to finance a small business, it was instantly apparent how submissive he was. His shoulders were bowed in, his eyes didn't look up from the floor, and he even had his arms folded behind his back. The man was acting like an abused house elf.

"Scion Black," Greyback said, nearly stuttering. "How can we serve you?"

Hydrus summoned up a veritable throne and plopped down into it, folding one leg over the other. "I've just come to borrow the woman I left in your care. While Bellatrix is retrieving her, I figured I should say hello."

"Right, got it." Fenrir cautiously straightened up, shooting furtive glances at Hydrus to check his reactions until he was properly standing. "Jason, Terry, go get Scion Black a drink."

Two of the other werewolves, all of them were fully grown and perfectly remembered, nodded and left. Hydrus was just panning his gaze around the room, judging each and every last one of them like a king studying his court.

It was insane. All of this was insane. Fenrir Greyback was the monster who'd haunted Remus's nightmares since he was a little boy, but now his boogie man was cowering like a chihuahua. The other members of his pack weren't quite as terrified, but they weren't stupid enough to think that they shouldn't be afraid at all of whomever put their pack leader in such a position. When the two that had left returned they poured a pair of drinks and handed one to Hydrus, but when they tried to do the same for Fenrir he hesitated.

"Go on," Hydrus said with a small smirk. "I'll allow it."

The other werewolf finally took his glass and gave it a small sip. "Thank you. Other than retrieving the woman, was there anything else we could do for you?"

"Not especially," Hydrus said. "I don't save up tasks to send to you and yours, if there's something I need doing I have you do it immediately."

"Right, of course." Greyback nodded his head. "I understand."

What followed from there was the most uncomfortable silence Remus had ever been a part of. There were seven werewolves in total standing around the room, including Greyback behind his desk. Hydrus sat surrounded by them all, just as relaxed and unconcerned as a shark moving through a school of sea bass. The only time anyone moved was when Hydrus finished his drink and needed a refill. Even though this was just a memory and he had absolutely no way of changing anything, Remus began to squirm.

After what must've been close to twenty minutes of painful silence, Bellatrix finally reappeared. It was the first time he'd ever felt glad to see the woman, and she was smiling broadly as she half-dragged and half-threw an unknown woman into the room. The stranger was dressed in a plain looking dress and a stained apron. She had her hair pulled back tight into a bun and looked as exhausted and pathetic as anyone Remus had ever seen.

"Hello again, Rita," Hydrus said. "Have you enjoyed your stay here with our fine, furry friends?"

"Please," Rita said. "I just want to go home."

"What a coincidence." The teen stood and handed his glass to Bellatrix before squatting down in front of the cowering woman. "That's where I plan to take you. I need you to ask me a few questions at a press conference."

"Anything!" She shot up and grabbed hold of Hydrus's robes. "I'll do anything you want, I can't take this anymore!"

Hydrus shoved her off of him and stood, turning to Greyback. "The hell is wrong with her? You guys torturing her or something?"

"No, sir," the werewolf said. "Just have her do some cooking and cleaning for the kids. She doesn't live any worse than the other humans here."

"Magic…" He shook his head. "How pathetic. You're definitely coming back here when you're done."

"No!" Rita tried standing but Bellatrix kicked her back down. "Please, I can't stand this anymore! I'm sorry, I'll do anything—"

"Silencio." The woman's voice died in her throat. "Kreacher! Get her cleaned and dressed. Bella, let's get out of here."

Slowly the scene faded, but rather than coming back to the Black office, he appeared in some sort of dungeon. Immediately he noticed the scents were much stronger in this memory, he could smell stone and metal and blood and feces and urine. Behind the scents, which he always noticed first, came something much more horrifying. It was a howl of pain, hoarse and whining. The notes and volumes it reached shook Remus to his core, and he thanked any and every one of the supposed gods Sirius had told him about for the fact that he wasn't there in person to hear it.

He couldn't see Hydrus, but the scene still moved forward, so he assumed the boy was under some sort of invisibility cloak again. Before too long they stopped in front of a windowless cell, and the scene there had him dry heaving for lack of actual substance to puke up in this dream-like world.

A werewolf, Fenrir no doubt, was impaled in his bestial form into the ground with silver stakes. One in each of his ankles and wrists, elbows and knees, shoulders and hips. One through his groin, several more scattered about his torso in spots that must've missed the vitals and left him alive. Small wisps of smoke poured out from the wounds, no doubt something to keep him alive in spite of all the blood dripping out of him.

"Hello, Puppy." Remus jumped at Hydrus's sudden appearance. The boy had spoken at the end of one of Greyback's pained howls, when his lungs had finally run out of air to give. "It's almost time. Moon's almost gone."

"No," Remus whispered. "You can't be—"

The wolf began to turn back to a man. Hair was shed and teeth were shrunk. Limbs and bones rearranged themselves back into their human positionings with cracks and pops and squelches. Throughout it all, the silver stakes remained in place, far too strong for the moving flesh to uproot. They tore through Greyback's muscle and skin like a child dragging a stick through sand. When he finally finished transforming, the man's limbs were mangled beyond recognition and more of his organs were visible than hidden.

The monster wept.

"Pull yourself together, Puppy." Hydrus knelt down beside his head, and leaned over so that his ear was almost touching the dying man's lips. "Say it. Say it and it'll… There you go." The teen stood and with a wave of his hand the silver stakes vanished. "Now, let's see if I can actually put you back together again."

Again the memory changed, but this time Remus was too numb to take in much. They were in some office, Hydrus, Bellatrix, and a chained up Greyback were there. Hydrus said something to the effect of needing someone who can get their hands dirty. He made some threats and promises. Fenrir told him to fuck off. Nothing got through to Remus until it all faded away and he was back with the real Hydrus.

He immediately threw up into the pensieve.

"Oh for fuck…" Hydrus sighed as Remus retched. "I put in that long ass moment of silence for you to settle down."

It took another minute for the werewolf to do just that. "Backwards… You put the memories in the wrong order."

"Oh." Hydrus looked away with a bashful look on his face, even a slight tinge of red to his cheeks, completely at odds with the devil he'd been in those memories. "Well, fair enough then. My apologies."

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Remus demanded. "What on earth would… Would… Would make you even think of doing something like that to someone?"

Hydrus just smiled, soft and small. He poured himself another glass of rum, then glanced at the bottle, and took a long swig straight from the source. There was a small tremble in his hands as he moved. He shook his head when he finished swallowing and sucked his teeth.

"Who knows. But like I said, if you want to kill him, I'll take you there right now." Hydrus licked what little rum had been left on the edge of his lip. "But if you do, you need to be the one to take over leading his pack. It'll be anarchy otherwise, and that's the last thing I or the world need."

Remus was torn between disgust at what he'd seen, and disgust at what he now knew. "How could you let him live in the first place? Do you realise what he's doing to children like that Williams boy you saved?"

"Oh I do, and I'm giving you the opportunity to stop it." Hydrus looked away. "It wouldn't take much to revolutionise his forces. Greyback is an idiot with more brawn than brain; he's bitten off more than he can chew already with the amount of mouths he has to feed and minds he has to educate.

"If you come in, it'll be easy to convince the others to stop expanding and start building upwards. To teach those kids how to become things their people will need, like specialised doctors and runesmiths." Hydrus waved his glass, nearly spilling his drink, and an illusion of a barren landscape appeared between them. "I received a rather large swathe of land from the goblins thanks to recent events, more than enough space to turn that shoddy little camp you saw into a proper village for you and yours to live in."

Remus tried to find something to say, but Hydrus kept going.

"Kill Greyback and, and forgive me for borrowing his metaphor that I know you hate, and become the new father of your family. Build a society that doesn't steal children, but births and raises their own." Another wave of his hand replaced the empty tracks of earth with homes and fields. "I'm giving you the opportunity to change things, to turn you and yours into a people, rather than just a species or an ailment."

When Remus had woken up that morning, the biggest problem he thought he'd have to deal with was cheering up Sirius. James had told him yesterday what his daughter had said, and the two of them had prepared for a long time spent day-drinking and cajoling the man into joy. Now Hydrus was telling him he was going to give him everything he'd ever wanted, and the chance to set in motion something that could change the lives of people like him for the rest of history.

As the illusion faded, he asked, "Why?"

"Because I know you're smart enough to do it right, have ample amounts of internal motivation to do it right, and I just got this feeling in my gut that you'll do it right." Hydrus grinned. "If you say no, like I said, I'd still like for you to become my professor. You won't need complete control over your working hours anymore since you won't be hunting for Fenrir, and we both know Hogwarts is more than capable of helping you through the rough nights."

"I mean, why are you doing all this?" Remus asked. "What do you get out of it? If I say no, are you just going to let Greyback keep running wild?"

"No, I'll just have to change things myself and micromanage him through the transition," Hydrus said with a sigh. "It'd be a lot easier to have you on the ground handling it directly, but I can manage. And what do you mean, what do I get out of it?" The teen scoffed. "I get to make the world a better place, that's all I could ever ask for."

"Bullshit." Finally Remus took hold of the half-full bottle of whiskey he'd left behind, and drank down the rest. "Anyone capable of… Of doing what you did isn't like that."

The werewolf wasn't sure he'd ever be able to forget that awful sight. Before now his nightmares had almost exclusively been ruled by Fenrir Greyback, but now they'd be haunted by that same man's shrieks of wolven pain and sobs of human suffering. And Hydrus had watched it all, done it all, without an ounce of care. Just the thought of one those silver spikes being rammed through his body, let alone carving through it as he went through the already agonising process of transformation, made pits of his body that he didn't even know he had freeze over.

"You're wrong, that would be a catch twenty-two." Hydrus shook his head. "Men like me are the only ones who can change the world, for the better or otherwise."

"You're…"

Remus trailed off, not sure of what word could properly describe the boy.

"Evil? Rotten? A monster?" Hydrus grinned and looked down at his glass. "I won't argue with you, but that doesn't mean I can't do things for the right reasons. It just means that I don't have a problem handling the rotten bastards that good men like you and my father aren't cut out to cut off."

Hydrus stared at Remus, wondering what the werewolf's next question would be. This conversation had gone better than he'd feared it would, especially when he realised how much sooner it was happening than he wanted, but he was still reeling from the horror and disgust his former general had shown for him. Never before had the man he'd respected and cared for so much looked at him that way. Hell, it wasn't even something he came up with. The silver stakes method was a torture that Remus himself had designed while trying to break a member of Fenrir's pack in order to find out where the rest of the bastards were.

And now the actions he himself had done were so repulsive to him that he had to ruin a perfectly good, and expensive, pensieve.

Various rationalisations and distractions ran through Hydrus's mind. Things like, it's better this way, or this is how things should be, or at least it isn't Sirius who found out. His godfather hadn't made it to the end of the war, hadn't lost that spark of righteousness that almost every other member of the rebellion had as time went on. He'd died long before he could become ruined like Harry, and so in his eyes there was nothing to hold against him.

"No matter what," Hydrus said. "I'd appreciate it if you could keep this from Sirius, at least about the memory of what I did to Greyback. Not sure I can deal with him looking at me the way you do."

"I…" Remus shook his head. "Just, just tell me what on earth made you even think of something like that?"

"Another werewolf came up with it," Hydrus said quietly. "And that's all I'll say."

"Why does everything have to be so secretive with you?" The once and hopefully future professor demanded. It really was something to see how much more aggressive he was in this world. "Why can't you just be honest with people like me who care about you?"

Hydrus nearly spat out his drink. Leave it to Remus to hit him with an emotional gut punch like that when he least expected it. If it weren't for the fact that he knew the werewolf was exactly the sort of person who'd care a great deal for him after what little time they spent together, he might've thought he was exaggerating. He was going to have to come up with a new strategy for this, so he tried figuring out what Dumbledore would say, specifically the soft one of this time, so that Remus could understand.

"Because I want to be happy," he said. "Like I said, the way you acted once you knew the truth? The way you feel about me now compared to how you did when I first walked into this room?" Remus blinked and Hydrus could see the gears in his head turning. "I don't want any more people that I care about to feel that way. It's why I rely on people like Dumbledore, love a woman like Bellatrix. They accept and love me despite knowing what you now do; that I'm a monster.

"And if I'm going to be building an entire society for werewolves and someday implementing governmental changes to improve their status in the world," Hydrus continued. "Don't I deserve that small bit of happiness?"

He blinked when he realised there were honest to goodness tears forming in his eyes, and the action sent the moisture slowly sliding down his cheeks. With a huff of annoyance he vanished them away and blamed it on the liquor.

"Just pick a damned job," Hydrus muttered, still angry with himself for the 'outburst'. "I know you'll want at least one or the other."

"Okay," Remus said, a humiliatingly gentle tone to his voice. "I want them both."

Hydrus's head shot up from where he'd been staring down the bottom of his glass. "What?"

"You said it yourself that we can just micromanage Greyback," Remus said. "He's the one who ruined my life and countless others, he deserves to have to put them back together."

Any anger in the man's expression was gone, replaced entirely with a stoic mask that he only ever put up when he didn't want people to know he was pitying him. Unlike the blank expression he'd put up when he was trying to hide other, more embarrassing, emotions, he would never have the slight upturn to his lips.

"That's certainly one way of looking at it," Hydrus replied. "You sure composed yourself fast."

Remus shrugged. "Guess I just needed to see there was still a person beneath the 'monster' you think of yourself as."

At least some things about people never changed, no matter what the timeline they happened to be in. Remus was still the most dependable person for just about any situation Hydrus or Harry could possibly find himself in.

"Remind me to keep you as far away from Dumbeldore as possible," Hydrus said. "Fine, I'll take care of the arrangements. Make sure to clear up your schedule for the foreseeable future; you don't need to be a private eye or whatever anymore."

"I never needed to be one." Remus gave him a bemused look. "It was just the job I chose since my original plans got ruined."

Hydrus frowned. "How'd that happen?"

"Don't worry about it," the werewolf said, waving his hand dismissively. "Just some bad business with a former friend."

"Hey Sirius?" Giannis asked. "Have you seen Little Whiskers anywhere?"

Their grandfather looked around for a moment, then shook his head. "No, did you lose him?"

"I didn't lose him, I just can't find him," the small human said. "I left him right here."

Apophis was basking atop a nearby table at the food-place the humans had gone to, and the fake-creature slowly dissolved in his stomach. It had tasted horrible, but that was no excuse not to punish it for stealing his family's attention. Mother was probably the only one of them that remembered he was there, but she wouldn't tell on him. No one would ever know that he—

"Apophis probably ate it," she said. "He gets jealous."

"Betrayal!"

His hiss was immediately noticed, and Giannis glared at where he was invisibly lying. "Hey! No eating my things!"

'Hmph.' He looked away and coiled himself a bit tighter. 'Stupid humans. Father would have been more loyal.'

Hydrus stretched as he stepped out of the Potions classroom, relieved to have managed to pass his final exam. It was still a question of whether or not he'd get a perfect score, but that was fine for now. Next year he'd actually have to put in effort for classes like this though; he'd never bothered learning much about potions once the school had fallen and that was evident in how much more actual studying he already had to do for this class compared to some of the others.

"How'd you do?" Draco asked. "I completely fell apart on the preservation charm section, I had no idea he expected us to remember those."

Hydrus snorted, that was the one thing he was absolutely confident on in the exam. "I'm sure you did fine, just remember next year to hang on to everything we learn."

This was the last exam they had, and tonight would be the last meeting of the Study Club which they were heading to now. He didn't have anything particular planned for it, but he did advise the children to expect something next year. Between the tournament and everything going on outside of school he just hadn't had time to plan for something this go around.

"You excited for tomorrow?" Hydrus asked. "It's your big day."

Draco gave half a frown before realising what he meant. "I… I actually forgot tomorrow's the last duelling contest."

"Atta boy," the time traveller said, clapping him on the back. "Keep it up, and you'll look as cool as me someday."

Draco's cheeks flushed and he glared the other way as Hydrus laughed. "Shut up."

The Study Hall was packed to the brim as students mostly just chatted and celebrated. He might not've planned any big event for the evening, but that didn't mean he couldn't put out some food, drink, and music. He'd had Hermione coordinate with some of the Hogwarts ghosts in order to have them 'play' some self-performing instruments. She'd been thrilled to get the chance to interact with the ancient folk and enchanted artefacts.

As the party went on, Hydrus sat in his usual spot beneath the WWW emblem and suffered through people coming up to wish him well over the coming break. On one hand there were a lot less awestruck smiles and stutters than when he'd first returned from becoming the 'Black Saint', but that almost made it worse since now everyone wanted to talk for a lot longer. When it finally settled down he thought he was going to get a moment's peace.

Bang.

That thought, along with a large section of the wall behind him, went up in smoke. Without turning he put up a shield to stop any potential shrapnel from hurting someone, but nothing slammed against it. A second had passed since the explosion so he finally rotated around and realised what had happened, and so with a roll of his eyes began to levitate the emblem of the Weasley twins' business.

"Nice try, you idiots." And it really was, he wasn't sure how they managed to detonate the wall without actually launching any debris at people. "But it's going to take more than that to bring it down."

The crowd of students began to laugh, but it continued on long enough for Hydrus to frown and turn back around. The emblem was completely fine so why were they…

On the back wall of the now-connected room, graffitied in such a way that it perfectly surrounded the emblem, were phrases like 'Don't believe it!', 'Lies!', 'Complete bollocks!'. The paint even glowed and slowly rotated through various colours. He gave a rueful snort and turned back around.

"Alright," he said. "I'll let them have that at least."

Thankfully for him, Bella was attentive to the fact that he could no longer get up and get food for himself, and so brought him some snacks and a drink. They chatted for a while about the exams, her grading them and him taking them, and slowly students began to filter out till it was just down to him, her, and several of the students he had shown a particular interest towards.

Draco and Luna were chatting about something, and if Hydrus of all people noticed the way Luna had leaned her leg against Draco's then everyone else must've as well. Pansy definitely had, the girl was staring daggers at the unbothered blonde. Neville was there as well, apparently trying his best to hold a full conversation in Spanish with Hellena as Tamina and Michael watched on bemused. Crabbe, Goyle, and Blaise were playing exploding snaps, Daphne and Hermione were discussing their expected exam results, and Cedric was there too; seemingly just taking it all in like Hydrus was.

"It really has been a fun year," Hydrus said, loud enough for everyone to hear. "I'm glad I made the decision to continue my education here at Hogwarts."

Cedric raised his glass of punch. "Cheers to that."

A few people gave 'hear, hear's and Hydrus grinned. "Thank you all for joining me here, and for making it so fun."

He wasn't in the mood to give some big fancy speech, but that seemed to do the job and everyone grinned and nodded or raised their glasses. Slowly they got up in groups to leave, and before long it was just him and Bella left.

"I know I talked a big game before, but I am going to miss having you around for Study Club." He leaned against her side and she wrapped an arm around him. "Maybe if you do a good job getting Sirius into shape, we can spend my last year here together."

His love sighed. "Please, it would take a lifetime to get him in order. The only way to speed things up would be for you to go back to who you were."

Hydrus's eye twitched. She'd been pressing him on that ever since she found out that this wasn't his real body, and despite him trying to impress upon her how important his third bargain was, she wasn't giving up. He could understand her wanting a grown man to be with instead of a teenager, but unlike his previous romances she wasn't quite as accepting of his priority list. Still, he knew better than to try and argue with her. Better to change the subject.

"We should invite Luna and her father to some event Draco will be at," he said. "It'll be fun to tease him."

"Oo, that would be fun," Bella said. "We could bring them to Sirius's inheritance ceremony, call them members of the press."

The inheritance ceremony was a big gala to celebrate a new patriarch for their family, and they'd planned to hold it not too long after the school year ended and they could say they'd mourned Arcturus long enough. It wasn't something most families did anymore, but most families weren't the Blacks, and most families didn't have a man who'd be as embarrassed by the celebration as Sirius would be.

"We should make him wear a crown," Hydrus said. "We've got to have a couple of those in storage right?"

"Oh I know just the one." Bella was practically bouncing up and down now that the subject had turned to something she enjoyed, tormenting her cousin. "It's made of brass-coated wrought iron and absolutely covered in jewels."

Just the thought of that made Hydrus's neck sore, so he gave it a nod of approval. "Good. See about getting him one of those fancy, fur lined capes too."

Bella settled into his lap as they continued to think up ways of making the ceremony as ostentatious as possible, and once more Hydrus was reminded of how lucky he was to have her. His talk with Remus had really helped him put into words why the woman meant so much to him despite all the horrors she'd caused in the past. She was a monster just like him, even if she didn't bear a fraction of the sins she once had, and she would never look at him with that haunting look of disdain like the werewolf had.

"I love you, Bella," he said, interrupting whatever she'd been saying. "Thank you for getting through to me."

"I love you too." She gave him a soft kiss and pulled back far too soon for his liking. "There's only one thing I could possibly think of that would make me love you even more…"

Hydrus sighed and pressed his head into the nape of her neck as she began to once again recant the various reasons and explanations behind why he should break his third bargain.

BBaRtS

Fourty-four, feeling sore. Sorry for the late chapter, but moving forward I think I'm going to change from an every-Saturday release schedule, to a every-weekend release schedule. More often than not the chapters will come on Saturdays, but times like this week we might have to wait till Sunday. I was just completely caught up binge drinking and binge watching horror movies through Friday night and long into Saturday morning with friends, finally wrapped things up around one in the afternoon, then by the time I woke up it was technically Sunday already lol. Like I said, 95% of the time chapters will still come out on Saturday, there just might be a few times it'll have to wait till the day after because of my bad habits.

Anyways! Let's just get straight to reviews so I can get back to enjoying my weekend and chugging gatorade.

"Hydrus' speech was perfect." - I really tried to figure out a nice way to give a send off to a character that literally almost everyone who knew him hated, and it was the best that I could come up with. I felt like it was very in line with how Hydrus himself would feel about the situation, where he can relate to what Arcturus went through, even if he handled it with more grace.

"Ohhhh I love Amelia almost getting the drop on Hydrus." I'm really looking forward to showing where she goes from here. She is meant to be a very competent, composed character without being 'op' like Hydrus and Dumbeldore, or even folk like Sirius and Bellatrix. There's a reason she's the heir apparent to the DMLE, even if she herself is nervous about her position, now moreso than ever.

"I get big Mirror Universe from Star Trek vibes from the Dumbledore vs Dumbledore scene... complete with evil beard and everything." - Not the evil twin goatee 😭

"Also the way you set up the chess game, and how you described Hyrdus as the chess piece was phenomenal. Really felt like the littlest bit to them is the absolute most to us. One little piece that doesn't move right." - Didn't get the chance to fully share what he did that threw a boardgame-piece sized wrench into things, but did put the foundation down, and we'll see that next chapter.

And that's all! Like I said, gonna get back to recovering and relaxing. Love you all, appreciate all the responses, appreciate the readings, lessthanthree, see you next weekend!