Some boo boos get kissed better, some don't
"You're going to think I'm absolutely off my nut for saying this, but I reckon Ófnir isn't actually a werewolf at all, dad," his daughter said, sounding quite confident in her assessment before she promptly passed out in his arms. She then went entirely limp and caused him to nearly drop her in shock. If he checked the hair at his temples he was certain there'd be twice as much gray there at present than there had been when he'd woken up in the morning. This girl and all the trouble she got into were aging him faster than he had thought was humanly or wizardly or werewolfly possible.
He fought the frantic instinct that urged him to shake his child awake and demand answers from her in that very instant. Even in such a harried state he could recognize what a poor decision that would be. They might be werewolves, but they were a civilized sort. Or at least they tried to be. He looked over to his son, who sat next to him on the floor wide eyed. And wasn't that a relief that his eyes were the right color again. As handsome as his son had looked with his sister's grey eyes, for some reason the sight had chilled him to the bone. It had been utterly unnatural, and even just that small change had made him look like an entirely different person. Someone he almost recognized.
"Can you tell what happened to her from your connection? Does it work the same way if one of you is unconscious?" Remus asked Harry, joining them on the floor, and Fenrir was desperately glad there was another adult around who was competent enough in situations like this to think of the right questions to ask. He was so lucky to have the man in his life, he breathed easier just having him near.
His son hummed and shrugged "I can't actually see her memories without her awake to guide me to and through them, but I was paying close attention to her feelings and I do know that the entire time she was here talking to him, even after she was hurt, she wasn't afraid of him for a single second. And not just because she's stupidly brave. Whatever he did must have genuinely been an accident, because she wasn't upset with him. She was-… she was sad before that, though. I got this pain in my chest and it was as if she were suddenly heartbroken. I think he must have told her he was going to leave before he did it, and that's why she wasn't surprised at all when he disappeared like that," his boy surmised.
As fascinating and helpful as he was sure the information was, he still struggled to wrap his head around all of the bizarre the abilities and experiences his children were beginning to have. That they had audiences with goddesses. That they could sense each other when they were apart, share thoughts and memories and feelings. It was incredible, but so far beyond him that he worried they were becoming something alien and otherworldly. He wondered if he would still recognize them when they were finally done growing into whatever they would ultimately become, and if they would still need him anymore when that day came.
"How could she have been hurt so badly on accident? There aren't any signs of a fight or struggle here - nothing else is broken or knocked over. And what does it mean that he was able to hurt her so terribly and she still felt sad that he was planning on leaving?" He found himself asking carelessly, and winced. That was a foolish thing to say in front of his son, the type of thing fit for adult conversation. He was glad to see Remus put a steadying hand on the boy's shoulder while his hands were otherwise occupied, and he nodded at his lover in thanks.
"I'm going to double check that he healed her properly, for all that it looked impressive I have no idea what he actually did. I didn't hear him say any familiar spells and I couldn't understand what he was saying," Remus said, pulling his wand out of its holster on his forearm and bringing up a shimmery golden healer's diagnostic array over his daughter. It was impressive magic and it made the scene suddenly feel strangely clinical. He sincerely hoped the man knew what he was looking at because the runes and symbols might as well have been Greek to him. As it was, his eyes nearly crossed trying to make any sense of it.
"…It was an old Icelandic mending song," Hermione whispered weakly, and he looked down to see her eyes fluttering open, only barely awake but still outsmarting them all. He huffed out a disbelieving laugh, and leaned his face down to press his forehead against hers "I'm so glad you're alright, my girl. You scared the life right out of me! Remus, how is she?" He asked, not caring that he sounded a touch hysterical. The man in question was frowning and poking at some of the glowing numbers, and it was starting to make him nervous.
"How do your bones feel, sweetheart?" The man responded a bit awkwardly instead of answering, "denser, perhaps? The same density as they were before? …Do you have a good idea of how dense your bones are usually, by any chance? I can't tell if this is normal for you or not," and that only served to make Fen significantly more nervous. "I'd say you're as healthy as a horse, but from what I understand they have notoriously fragile bones. Break a leg and the poor things are done for, horses. That's just about the polar opposite of whatever it is that we've got going on here," Remus said under his breath absentmindedly, still inspecting the diagnostics. Whether he actually meant it as a joke or not it certainly fell flat either way.
"Merlin, I really don't think bones are supposed to look like that. Hang on, I need another set of results to compare against… Come here Harry, darling," he said, and the boy scooted across the floor towards him obediently. His wand elegantly conjured a second golden array and he swiped through it for what he was looking for, bringing the two close together and glancing between them. "…That simply can't be right," he said quite confidently, dismissing them both with another casual wave of his wand and casting instead on Fenrir this time.
The third golden array proved just as unhelpful apparently, because after dismissing it Remus conjured one on himself and then again on Hermione. He sighed frustratedly and his face was a portrait of profound confusion "Alright, well… Dearest, can you tell us anything else about the song he sang? Or how you were hurt in the first place? What was it that was wrong that had to be healed in the first place?" The man asked her gently, easing himself down off of his knees and sitting flat on his arse on the kitchen floor.
She looked up at him, her lower body was on the floor but he still held her entire upper body in his arms and he didn't feel like letting go any time soon. Her brother was slightly off to the side but he was clutching at her hand for dear life. Everyone around her loved her, and she was safe. She gulped and closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them again her eyelashes were wet, but she soldiered on bravely "It was Offy, but it wasn't something he did on purpose or even consciously," she said, her voice still small and weak.
His whole body tensed at the confirmation that his closest friend and trusted beta had in fact injured his daughter, even accidentally.
"It wasn't even something he did physically, he didn't cast a spell or anything. He was terribly upset and he lost control of his emotions for a single second, and a tremendous force left his body. It was like the whole weight of the world was on me and it knocked me to the ground and broke my sternum and a few of my ribs. And I think my collarbone as well maybe? But anyways, as soon as he calmed himself back down the force dissipated and he was horrified and started to heal me almost immediately," she insisted, and he simply had no idea what to make of such a statement. He'd never heard of an adult having a burst of accidental magic, and even when children did it wasn't anything like that. He glanced desperately over to Remus who grimaced and shrugged.
Exhausted and a little sheepish to boot, she nevertheless continued on like a determined little soldier giving a post-action field report "As for his song, well-… well, it's always been sort of a game we play, just the two of us. For as long as I can remember he's sung it to heal me whenever I've gotten hurt. Like I said, it's a mending song to sing while you're fixing something for someone you love. He said it was passed down from ancient times from mummy to daughter, and that he'd always wanted to sing it to someone but never had the chance before me. When it was a cut or scrape I had, the song was about darning a pair of socks to keep your dear one's feet warm. One time I broke a tooth and he changed the words to be about rethrowing a ceramic bowl to feed your dear one in time for dinner. He's sung this version before when I've broken bones, it's about mixing mortar and laying bricks to fix a hole in a wall to keep your dear one's house standing strong. It was weird though, but it felt so much more powerful just now than it's ever been before. Like all the times he'd done it in the past he was playing pretend with someone else's wand. I feel strong, but I'm so so tired," she said, and was cut off by a huge yawn that made something in her jaw crack. Her eyes started to drift shut and her voice tapered off, and as much as he desperately wanted to ask her many additional follow up questions, he hesitated.
"Neens, what made him so upset that he lashed out like that and hurt you so badly?" His son asked, still holding her hand tightly, their fingers entwined.
He had to stop himself from scolding the boy for not letting her fall asleep right then and there, if anyone knew whether or not she felt well enough to keep going surely it was her twin. She whimpered and whined low in her throat and the miserable sound pulled on his heartstrings "It didn't work, trying to get information out of him. Well, it did… but then it backfired. I was too honest, and he got nervous. I figured out one of his secrets without really meaning to, and he panicked," she said stutteringly, her voice reedy and tinged with misery.
His daughter's little face crumpled in the way it always used to when she was very young and about to start crying in earnest, and he pulled her close to his chest and let her sob it out. He and Remus both rubbed circles on her back and they let her cry. She sniffed and snerked like a trumpeting little elephant, nose congested and stuffed up from crying and eyes puffy and red. Tears streaming down cheeks that still held the faintest traces of baby fat. Snot dripped from her nose and he'd been a parent long enough now to no longer even truly feel disgusted by it, but to simply pull his hankie out and wipe it away as if on autopilot.
"You shouldn't have to find out like this, daddy, I don't even know any of the details or understand enough to actually explain it to you. He should have been brave enough to tell you this himself, and I'm sure he would have one day if I hadn't rushed him. I still think it's not my place to tell you, but we're being honest now. We're telling each other everything even if it doesn't make sense or if it hurts," she gushed, and his hackles rose at her trepidation and prevarication. Though he normally loved to hear it from either of his children's lips, it had been years since they'd called him daddy and it set him to alertness like a junkyard dog. He jostled her a bit in his arms proudly despite himself "That's right, my girl, whatever it is you can tell me. I'd rather know than not," he said, as encouragingly as he could manage when he was also so anxious about what she might reveal.
Her eyes when she looked up into his were enormous in her face, big and round and dark and wet like a harbor seal's, and she looked so terribly sad that his heart sank "I don't know how he hid it for so long or why he didn't tell you, but dad, Ófnir is one of the ones the goddesses said could help us - our grandsire. Somehow all this time he's been your father," she whispered, as softly and as gently as if she were holding a little bird cupped in her hands and didn't want to scare it away. He relaxed and shifted her in his hold.
She really was a very kind and compassionate child, he thought idly as he pressed her face back into his shoulder and shushed her. As he rocked her in his arms and patted her back and told her how well she had done, his mind raced. While he was quite certain that it couldn't possibly be true, he struggled to comprehend why Ófnir would lie to his daughter about such a thing. And so egregiously at that! He may not have remembered ever meeting his father, but he'd seen pictures of the man and heard his mother's stories of him. Whatever tale Ófnir had spun to his girl was patently false.
Fenrir was many things in life; a leader and a father, a wizard, a werewolf, a man entering his mid life and discovering an interesting twist to his sexuality he hadn't previously known was there. For all those different hats he wore, he had never considered himself a particularly complex man. He had relatively simple emotions and reactions, he had his thoughts and worries just like everyone else. He was a bit clever, but no real genius like his girl. He was strong, but no more so than any other werewolf.
He was certainly not the type to have such a dramatic and scandalous thing in his life as a long lost secret father. Just the idea of it was like out of one of Molly's ridiculous romance novels (that he would never so long as he lived admit to reading). He wasn't the type of man who could be lied to and made a fool of for nearly his entire life without realizing, or the type of wolf who could have so close a familial relation hidden under his nose without him ever recognizing their connection. It wasn't possible.
But for all his modesty he did like to consider himself a particularly insightful judge of character, and his gut told him that there had been a nugget of something not far from the truth beneath the obvious lie.
Looking back over the years of his life that the other man had been a part of, he started to notice some troubling patterns of convenience and timing. Ófnir had come to him when he was a young and reckless alpha who was having trouble getting settled and establishing himself. The older wolf had stepped up and helped him transition from boy to man - his guidance had been a blessing as keenly and as desperately needed as rain in the desert. He'd suggested that Fenrir reach out to the older loners who had craved pack and connection and the younger bucks like himself who had needed some discipline and sense of family. He'd pushed him to find all of his bastards and offer them a place in his pack.
Ófnir had been the one to tell him if he wanted to actually maintain a pack this size and keep it safe he needed a sanctuary for them to live in, one that was more like a nature preserve than a grody army barracks. At the time they'd been staying in a series of abandoned warehouses in the shipping district near a port city, and it had been absolutely terrible. Cold and wet in the winter and blistering hot in the summer, homeless muggles constantly trying to butt into their territory for somewhere to pass the night, pests and other afflictions that came with such rough living. It had led to the construction and heavy warding of the compound, and it had been a monumental step for them all towards being a civilized family rather than desperate beasts allied only for survival.
Once it had been completed and they'd all moved in they'd soon found others sniffing curiously at the doors, and Ófnir had led the diplomatic charge that had seen three smaller existing local packs enter the fold and submit to him as their alpha. Overnight it had made his pack the single largest gathering of wolves anywhere in the British Isles. He'd sent the man out on hunts for the others over the years and small families had joined here and there, coming in twos and threes and bolstering their numbers to bursting.
Ófnir had even been the one who introduced him to his wife and pushed them to be together when Fen had doubts. Suddenly he felt queasy, even a master manipulator couldn't have manufactured the call of a mate… could he? No, it disrespected his Hydra's memory to even think such a thing was possible. Others had also encouraged them to go for it when it had seemed like such a disastrously wrong time for love. Even with a war brewing and people disappearing every day her father Alphard had always been supportive, he had been so happy to see the two of them choose each other. Plus he now knew that if they'd been in their lives at the time her cousins would have most likely been cheering along during their ceremony as well.
With that in mind, his take on the situation shifted slightly - even if Ófnir had really been exerting some sort of influence over him for the last few decades, it seemed like it was overwhelmingly positive. All the best decisions he'd made in his life had been at the man's suggestion. His pack, his wife, even his child. She'd been so little when her mother had died, and for a few very dark days after their loss he'd considered giving her to one for the she-wolves to raise for him while he recovered and mourned. In hindsight it had been a terrible idea borne from the mind of a broken man, and he was immeasurably grateful Ófnir had knocked some sense into him. He'd threatened to end him right then and there himself if he abandoned his living child in his grief for someone who was gone. It had been the wake-up call he'd needed to push through and live for her when he couldn't manage to live for himself.
Now that he thought about it, the man had even approved and encouraged him to adopt Harry when his girl had brought him home with them. When he'd known the boy was supposed to be with them but had been unsure of in what capacity, the man had laughed and told him he was altogether too anxious for a father of two. One had to be a little more go with the flow when raising multiple children. It had been the exact thing he'd needed to hear, that all he had to do was love and care for the boy and that his children would decide for themselves what was the best. And they had - oh, how they had!
Maybe the man had meant it metaphorically, what he'd told Hermione. That he was like a father figure to him. Over all the years they'd known each other he had certainly acted like one, and Fenrir had benefitted tremendously from his doing so. Maybe Ófnir considered himself Fen's father in the same way Fen considered himself Harry's father - years of love and family and choice meaning more than the people one was necessarily born to. But then again he had adopted his son by blood, and he recalled that even the goblin records had shown him as a third parent on the boy's official lineage… Goblin records!
He often forgot, having been separate from the greater magical world for so much of his adult life, all the casual wonders it took for granted that the muggle world could scarcely dream of. There were ways to verify parentage with certainty, more accessible and more accurate than an expensive and inconclusive muggle DNA paternity test. He might be confident that Ófnir had been lying, but the man had introduced enough doubt to convince his daughter. In the spirit of honesty and not keeping secrets between family, he would be willing to submit to one of those papers at the bank to give them all some answers and peace of mind.
Petting his child's hair he breathed in and then out evenly, finally ready to respond to her "Thank you, little wolf. While I do believe that's what he told you, I'm not certain it's the truth, my girl. Part of me wants to believe that it almost makes sense, but I have my reasons to question it. I certainly saw him as a father figure, but after all this I don't know what to think," he said quietly into the crown of her head. He felt her nod and sigh much more heavily and more world-weary than a child her age should be capable of "I don't know if its true either, but I know he believed it. His heart was steady, so even if it's a lie he thinks it's the truth," she clarified. That was good to know, it made things a bit easier.
Not sure what else to say, he stood with her in his arms and gestured with his chin to the door for Remus and Harry to follow him out of the house, and made the walk back to their home. When they reached the cottage, he settled her on the sofa in the living room propped up with pillows and covered in throw blankets. He called for their little elf to keep her company and watch over her, pressed a kiss to her head, and let her sleep.
It was easy to let Remus take hold of his hand and lead him into the kitchen, he followed like a zombie. "So the radical pack transformation will have to wait for the next full moon it seems," his lover said, with a hint of an exhausted grin. It had been a long weekend to begin with, and this last fright had been more than enough to put them all just over the edge of discomfort and discontent. He nodded listlessly, he had approximately zero desire or energy to do the kind of work it would take to get over a hundred wolves up to speed and bitten and walked through their new abilities and endure the entire night of the full moon. His daughter might be upset in the morning, but frankly it could sit on the back burner for a month.
"What's up with her bones, Remus?" His son asked nervously, voicing something they'd clearly both been urgently curious about. To his great dismay his lover raised his eyebrows and shrugged "Search me, Harry. I'm admittedly no healer or medi-witch, but I've never seen readings quite like it. Not from werewolves or humans," he said a bit grimly, and they all paused to let that sink in. His son looked between the two of them and bravely took one for the team "Explain it like I don't even know what bones are," he said dryly, which made both men chuckle. Fen turned his head slightly and mouthed a thanks, to which his boy shifted his head up and down so fractionally it was barely an acknowledgement. He was really learning to be subtle at that school.
In on the joke but with good humor, the man went on to explain as if he were in fact a kindergarten teacher "Werewolves have denser bones than wizards, who also have denser bones than regular humans, but everything living has bones made of porous layers of calcium. Like in the song she told us about, they're the brick foundation of the house that is our body. When we're young like yourself they're flexible and springy because we're growing so much. They harden as we become adults. As we reach old age they get less dense and more fragile. More likely to break. Think of a chicken bone being left out to dry, it's relatively the same."
"Keeping that in mind, if we compare your father's bones and mine, two relatively healthy adults, our bones should be roughly the same density. Since I checked I can confirm that they are, by the way. Similarly, yours and Hermione's bones should have been roughly the same density. Harry, your bones are exactly as they should be. Still springy, good growth plates. But if yours and your dad's and my bones are all like bricks, your sister's are like poured concrete. There's still the living core, the marrow doing the work making blood and such. But the material they're comprised of, the calcium, it's extremely hard and dense and heavy and I don't know why or how they're like that. I don't know if she's always been like that and we just didn't know it or if Ófnir botched his healing spell. Maybe because he panicked he put more juice into it than he meant to, simply overpowered his healing spell, but whatever he did we've got a little x-man in there with bones like Wolverine."
Turning to Fenrir he must have seen the sheer panic on his face, and he grasped his hand and stroked the back of it sweetly "I swear on my life, Fen, as far as I understand things it genuinely doesn't look like she's in any immediate risk or danger. Other than being tired and worn out she seems as strong and healthy as an ox. As long as she isn't still in pain and can move like normal when she wakes up, she should be fine. But we really should still consult an actual healer to give a genuine medical opinion," he said, and Fenrir found himself comforted by it. Remus wasn't a man who would blow smoke up his ass and say she was alright if she wasn't. He nodded and relaxed fractionally "I'll send Andromeda a note, see if we can't try and get her here before the sun goes down and the moon rises. Might be a bit pressed for time though," he said, getting up to go fetch a piece of parchment.
His son rolled his eyes at him and summoned their elf from the living room "Kipper, I know you're watching Nene but if it's not too much trouble can you please send a message to aunt Andy for us?" He asked, his voice pitched low so as not to wake his sister. The little creature popped softly into the kitchen, landing on the table in front of his boy and dropping down onto her hindquarters to sit cross legged. She tugged one of her long floppy ears "Yes of course, of course. What is Young Master needing Kipper to be saying to Mrs Andy?" She asked politely, her voice so incongruously high and squeaky like a dog toy compared to her genteel manner.
His son fidgeted in his seat, and Fen could tell he was full of nervous energy and nearly at the point of being overwhelmed from everything that had happened "Erm… Just that we need her to take a look at Hermione before the full moon tonight if she can. What else dad?" He asked, his voice tight and his hands starting to shake where they clutched the edge of the table in front of him. Fen came around and pulled him by the shoulder into a one armed hug "You go sit with your sister. I'll take it from here, my boy," he said comfortingly, running a hand through his messy hair as the boy visibly relaxed and rushed out of the room.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Kipper was abuzz with nerves and worry as she watched over her young Mistress Hermie, but not so much so that she didn't still feel a rush of excitement coursing through her veins! The girl was sleeping fitfully on the couch in the living room, propped up on a pile of fluffy pillows and buried under warm fuzzy throw blankets. She had felt the magic of the compound do something very strange and wild before the Master brought her home, and if there were any other elves around they'd have surely felt it and recognized it as well.
The Great Lordly Master had finally revealed himself to his family, and had performed some truly tremendous magic before leaving - it had been absolutely unmistakable in its color and flavor.
She had known her girl was strong, but she could still scarcely believe her little mistress had been in his presence while he'd wielded such magic and managed to survive it. He had apparently rewarded her resilience though, as she could feel the ancient magic thrumming through her girl and not only healing and revitalizing but empowering her. It was honestly a bit dizzying to be so near such a potent source, and her hand on her young Mistress' forehead tingled with little sparks and zaps. It was almost like she was sitting next to the castle's wardstone, and she had to hold herself back from absorbing what the girl was ambiently radiating.
It had been a gift given specifically to the child, she had to remind herself, it was not up for grabs... No matter how tasty the magic smelled! Kipper sighed despairingly.
The castle's magic was so old, it had aged like a fine wine over the millennia since the founders had lived and last empowered the wardstone. Eating the magic at Hogwarts was like a charcuterie plate of complex cheeses and nibbles. It was rich and some of the flavors were difficult but you were supposed to pretend you liked all of them anyways because they were fancy and uncommon in this day and age. In stark contrast, the Great Lordly Master's lingering magic that still radiated off of her young Mistress was fresh and verdant and zesty. Like a summer salad with walnuts and berries and tangy vinaigrette. It made Kipper's button nose twitch and her mouth water.
…But it wasn't hers to snack on! It was for her young Mistress Hermie, to help her heal and grow up to be a strong alpha like her father one day. It was enough just to be near it, to smell it and bask in it and imagine herself living in the days when magic like this was abundant. The goblinsies could still wield it to work their craft and make their wonders, but the number of great artifacts their kind produced was dwindling. Their pride was too fragile, and the curse they carried was much harder for them to bear than it was for the elvesies. Even the centaurs were better sports about their curse than the goblinsies, and they'd lost nearly all of the magic they'd had. Kipper couldn't imagine such a life and didn't want to try, it simply didn't bear thinking about.
She'd gladly rather be a servant for all the rest of her days than ever be cut off from the source of the power that sustained her and her kind.
Her young master Harry called her into the kitchen and she came at his summons, placing a light monitoring ward over her young mistress for the hopefully brief moments she would be away from her side. Her young master… it was still hard sometimes to look at him and reconcile that he was the same boy who had once been her sweet baby Harry. So much time together had been stolen from them, and having missed the simple tasks of caring for him as he grew was just as painful to Kipper as having missed the milestones that took him from baby to toddler to child to young man. She should have been there to feed and wash and change him, to put him to bed and scare his nightmares away. It had been her sacred job, and from what she had heard from Mister Rowle no one had done it in her absence.
It was a very unelflike thought, and she didn't dare to speak it aloud because she knew it was wrong, but she often wished she could punish her Mistress Lilly's cruel sister for what the foul woman had done to her boy. What she had failed to do for him. She had never known another heart so devoid of kindness. A part of her that craved revenge didn't care if she dropped dead on the spot afterwards, as long as Petunia Dursley suffered at her hands. She would never act on it, not only because it was so perversely unelflike but because it would rob her of the rest of the life she had now with her boy and his family.
For ten miserable years she had thought she would be an unclaimed Hogwarts elf for the rest of her long life, living and dying with no family to belong to or masters to serve. Suddenly like a miracle she was a Potter elf once again… sort of. It might be different than it was with her Master Jamie and her Mistress Lilly, but she served a Potter still, even if he was a Potter Greyback. That was more than enough for Kipper. It was the entire world.
So she came to the kitchen at her boy's call, and pushed down the instinct she always felt when she saw him to cling tightly and not let him go ever again, and told him that of course she could take a message to Mrs Andy. Then the Master asked if she could bring the woman back with her through their wards, and she might have almost been insulted if humans hadn't been constantly underestimating elvesies for as long as they'd been serving them.
"Master Wolfy be wanting to know if Kipper is being able to bring a member of his family through his wards into his home… is master also wanting Kipper to be darning a sock while she is at it? It will be taking the same amount of effort," She replied with a chuckle and a shake of her head. She supposed the goblinsies were right, and that even wolf humans were still humans at the end of the day. With a snap of her fingers and a twirl through the ley lines running pathways like veins connected to the beating heart of the very planet beneath her feet, Kipper arrived at the Tonks residence in London less than three seconds later.
She paused at the last minute as she arrived at her destination. It had been a very long time since she'd traveled through London, and having bonded with her young Mistress had keyed her into an entirely new set of wards. She was an elf of house Potter Greyback, but she was also technically the personal elf of the Head of the House of Black. Her ears twitched and when she reached out with her magic she sensed that there was a property belonging to her young Mistress nearby. While she could almost feel the edges of it, the interior was hazy. She could probably get right next to it if she tried, but wouldn't be able to go inside. That meant it had to be under someone else's warding schemes - someone had hidden an entire house that should be in her family's possession!
Before she could consider the implications of such sneaky trickery, she was pulled out of her thoughts by Mr Ted greeting her politely and inquiring as to the wellbeing of her family. Reminded that all was not well with her young Mistress despite the magic she had been gifted, she nervously reported that they urgently needed his wife to come in her capacity as a healer. He checked his watch and glanced at her with his brows raised, and she knew the question he was too kind to ask "It is being many hours until moonrise sir, and Madam is only being needed to confirm that young Mistress Hermie is well. She is being already healed sir," Kipper said perhaps a bit more tartly than she should have, but it put Mr Ted at ease and he nodded and went to fetch his wife.
Eyeing the small but tidy kitchen in the muggle house, she indulgently gave in to the urge to spitefully polish things. They hadn't had any modern appliances at Hogwarts, and it had been a decade since she'd been in a muggle kitchen, but she still remembered what all the noisy electrical things were and what they did. She didn't want to risk her magic interacting poorly with anything too sensitive so she focused on hardware, and she was sure their refrigerator and dishwasher handles had never gleamed quite so brightly when she was done with them. While she was at it she fixed the chipped enamel on their kitchen stand mixer.
She suddenly remembered her Mistress Lilly seeing them for sale in a catalogue once and exclaiming about how expensive they were, but there had been stars in her eyes as she said it. They had come in so many lovely pastel colors like little Easter eggs, and she couldn't decide which she thought was prettiest. Master Jamie had winked at Kipper over his wife's shoulder and she'd known that it would be one of the presents waiting under the tree for Christmas that year. Her poor Master and Mistress had never made it past Halloween. Metal was sturdier than flesh and bone, though. If there had ever been a stand mixer, it might still be hidden away in a closet somewhere in the wreckage of their destroyed home.
She was sitting on the counter sadly, slumped against the mixer and hugging its bowl when Mr Ted and Mrs Andy returned to the kitchen. They were kind people, but she didn't know them well enough to bother them with her burdens, and so she wiped her eyes and hopped down off their counter. Holding her hand out and up for the woman to take in her much larger one, she sniffed and cleared her throat "Mrs Andy is being needed to check on Mistress Hermie, please," she said, glad her voice hadn't broken despite how it had trembled. There was a terribly soft and compassionate look in the woman's steely grey eyes, but thankfully she didn't say a word about the awkward position they caught her in. She simply kissed Mr Ted's cheek and told him she'd be back shortly.
Gripping her large hand tightly, she took her on the slower and much gentler ride that elvesies used for transporting humans, which was similar to how they apparated themselves. It was a low-impact folding through space, rather than a rough blast along the ley lines of the earth that her kind preferred. The invitation of a wormhole, the embodiment of it into one's physical form, the manifestation of the other side of it at the specific endpoint one wished for it to lead to. Ridiculously needlessly overcomplicated, a nearly obscene waste of magic and energy, but somehow elegant all the same. There was a beauty to it that had to be acknowledged. Kipper briefly wondered what substitution she might have come up with if the ley lines were as treacherous for elvesies as they were for her fragile almost-humans.
They landed noiselessly in the living room of the cottage.
After thanking Kipper, Mrs Andy hurried over to her young Mistress. She said hello to the young Master, who was still at his sister's side and who moved out of the way for her to sit next to the girl. Both Master Wolfies came in from the kitchen and greeted Mrs Andy, and Kipper realized that she really ought to start calling them by their actual names or it would get confusing. When Master Remus had been the only wolfie around it had been one thing, but now she was surrounded by them. As it turned out werewolves made for good masters. She should show them more appreciation than just lumping them all together. Besides, she could call her boy that as well now too, couldn't she? Alpha Master Wolfie, Master Wolfie, and young Master Wolfie. That would get very confusing indeed.
She returned to her place by her young Mistress, sitting on the arm of the sofa closest to her head and dropping the monitoring ward she had left behind. She had only needed it for a few minutes after all, and as far as she could tell from it nothing important had happened in her absence. Young master and mistress didn't need to know that she regularly cast it on them in their sleep in their dorms most evenings. They were getting older and might be embarrassed to know that they often had baby wards over them, but it put her mind at ease to know that they were safe and sound all through the night.
"What happened to her?" Mrs Andy asked her Masters softly as she brought up several colorful healer's arrays over her Young Mistress' head. She poked and prodded at the runes and numbers with her wand, scanning through them rapidly until she slowed and stopped at two readouts in particular. She turned around to fully face the two men, her arms crossed and a single arched brow raised accusingly "Would either of you gentlemen care to explain why this eleven year old girl's bones are as dense as concrete and her muscles fibers are like spun steel cables?" She asked them sharply.
They both tensed, and glanced at each other before turning back to her sheepishly "Overzealous healing spell? We aren't entirely sure," Master Remus said lamely, more a question than a proper report of the facts, and Kipper and Mrs Andy both rolled their eyes at the general incompetence of males. The healer tapped her young Mistress on the arm gently to rouse her from her sleep "Hermione? I need you to wake up for me please, dearest," she said kindly but firmly. Kipper liked Mrs Andy a great deal. Her girl's eyelashes fluttered and squinted open, and she smiled as soon as she saw who was at her bedside on the sofa "Aunt Andy!" She said happily, and to Kipper's delight her voice was stronger and she seemed more alert than before as she began to wake up.
She tried to sit up and her brother laid a hand on her shoulder "You should let things keep settling before trying to get up Neens, just because you feel better doesn't mean you're healed all the way yet," he said, sounding wise beyond his years. Mrs Andy and Kipper both nodded in approval, "He's right dear, you just keep on laying down as you were. I would like it if you could tell me how you're feeling though," the woman said, and her girl lay back and closed her eyes for a moment. She brought her little hands up above the blankets and pressed them lightly to her own chest "Feels much more solid, I can tell that everything's back in the right place and knitted back together the way it should be," her girl said, sounding quite pleased.
Out of the corner of her eye, Kipper saw all three masters looked sincerely relieved to hear it. Master Fenrir came close and sat on the floor next to her young Mistress and held her hand "We won't keep you this close to the full moon Andy, I just need to know if this is something to be worried about. It wasn't any of us that cast the spell, and the person that did isn't here for us to ask. Is it dangerous?" He asked nervously, his voice low and in clear deference to the healer. Surprising both the humans and herself, Kipper piped up, unable to keep herself from soothing his worry when she knew it was over nothing.
"Kipper is not knowing it is being young Mistress Hermie's vitality that Master Fenrir is worrying about. She is being strong already, and the blessing the Great Lordly Master imbued her with is being very powerful, it is filling her with his ancient magic," she reported dutifully. Her Master reared back, shock coloring his face, and Kipper felt her ears droop anxiously "…W-What did you say?" He asked her, voice shaking. She looked up and saw that all the other humans in the room were staring at her curiously. Only her young Mistress Hermie's eyes were bright with delighted interest, the rest were frightened.
She hesitated until she felt her boy's hand on her shoulder "Kip?" He prompted softly, and her resolve broke. "The Great Lordly Master… he is unleashing his great and terrible magic here on the compound, he be breaking and then fixing young Mistress Hermie. Then to make up for his mistake he is blessing her! It is being a great gift and an honor. Kipper is feeling it all when it is happening, it is being like an incredible explosion of magic, like an earthquake in the ocean that is causing the water to ripple into a tsunami. The other elvesies back at the castle is going to be so jealous when they feel the residual energy on Kipper and her young Mistress!" She said excitedly, still riding the jubilant high of the magic emanating off of her girl.
"That's exactly right Kip, that is what it felt like," her girl said, and their grins matched each other. They had a shared understanding of the reality of things. Even if the others were still fearful, the two of them both knew how lucky they were just to be in proximity of a Great Lord, let alone to be known and beloved by him. Kipper had been proud to be a Potter elf her entire life, but now she felt truly fortunate to serve a family connected to and descended from the Great Lordly Master.
As her great great grandsire Nippington had often said, good things came to those who waited - and she had waited a very long time indeed!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The full moon was undoubtedly going to be strained with both Ófnir and Hermione absent. Although everyone respected and looked up to Fenrir as their alpha, his beta and heir were beloved and their presence went a long way in keeping the peace as over a hundred nervous wolves shifted and ran amuck over the countryside. As the pack gathered outside in the pavilion courtyard for a picnic dinner, Remus overheard a few older teens gripe and grumble about the chili they'd smelled Ófnir making all afternoon not being out on the tables. He fixed the lot of them a stern look and also a plate of sandwiches, and it was apparently a winning combination as they grinned at him and took off to sit on the grass a few yards away before chowing down.
Not everyone would shift when the moon rose, there were a few human spouses that were happy to stay that way, and of course some of the children were too young to be turned. They were still here though, partaking in the community feast. A chubby toddler waddled past him with a hotdog clutched in her little fist and it made him think of the children he now found himself lovingly co-parenting.
He still struggled to believe that Hermione had really shifted as a newborn infant, but in the last year of his life he'd certainly seen stranger things here. The part of him that wanted nothing more than to make himself permanently at home here with the small family he was falling in love with wished he could have been there to see it himself, but thoughts like those were on the border of dangerous territory. In his greedy imagination it wasn't Fenrir and his human wife Hydra who held their baby daughter as she shifted under the moonlight for the first time, but rather two male wolves who cradled her between themselves.
(Or maybe two wolves and a dog? No, that was so far our of the scope of reality it was pure fantasy, and he wouldn't allow himself to even think it. If he was going to start deluding himself that badly he might as well imagine all three of them raising both babies together right from the start. Ridiculous! When she was that little Harry wouldn't have even been born yet. Absurd!)
He'd stepped up a bit over the last few weeks that the twins had been away, not only tutoring the pack children every day but also helping out with the younger men that he now knew were his lover's many sons. For someone who so craved a sense of intimacy and family connection, he was surprised how little it bothered him that the man had a dormitory full of bastards. He figured that it showed a remarkable sense of personal responsibility that Fen had actually gone to the effort to reach out to them all and offer them a place in his home, and that he took the time to know them when he didn't have to, despite it being clear that he didn't consider them his children in exactly the same way he did Hermione and Harry. It was just another thing that endeared the other man to him.
And so in the spirit of stepping up and helping out, he had coordinated with Matthias and gotten the lads organized. They weren't exactly skilled labor, but they were more than capable of carting tables and hefting full platters and steaming crockpots. Over the course of the evening many of them enquired as to where their little sister was off hiding, and he'd repeated that she was feeling under the weather enough times already that the response had become rote.
Harry had bristled just as grumpily as his father was wont to do every time one of them asked after her, as he'd desperately wanted to stay by her side while she rested. Unfortunately for him, it would have pushed uncomfortably at the bonds of the pack to have so many members of the alpha family absent for the full moon. The boy had been told he could stay close to Remus or his father all night long if he wanted, so long as he was out with them all. He must have taken it to heart, as he'd clung like a little limpet to Remus' side since they'd left the cottage earlier.
It had been stilted and awkward from the moment Kipper had started waxing poetic about the greatness and magnificence of the magic and how lucky they all were to have been close enough to feel it. The little elf had been like a totally different creature than the one he remembered serving James and Lilly so devotedly, nearly worshipful in her zealous admiration of some total unknown. She'd completely clammed up when they had tried asking her who or what Ófnir really was, insisting that if they didn't already know than it wasn't her place to tell them. The kids hadn't had the heart to even consider commanding her to tell them, but Fenrir had tried and been rebuffed spectacularly. Kipper had sent him a devastating glare and warned him not to press his luck again, and all three adults had been rather unsettled by her display of temper.
Andromeda had left shortly afterwards with clear instructions to let the girl sleep and to fill her in on absolutely everything that had transpired at a more convenient time, by which she meant as soon as they were no longer actively transformed. Although always happy to see the kids or help out of someone was hurt, she'd been quite put out to be called over for such a non-emergent matter. He respected her professional boundaries tremendously, and still felt like an arse for panicking the way he had. In his defense though, he'd only been co-parenting for a few weeks. Also how in Godric's name was he supposed to know the first thing about what was and wasn't critical in regards to pediatric osteopathy? He really ought to have stuck to his mum's tried and true rule - no blood or bones sticking out meant you could likely handle it yourself at home.
With a heavy sigh and a shake of his shoulders, he tried to loosen himself up for the approaching moon. Even knowing that transforming could no longer hurt him now that he'd made peace with his wolf, the memory of a lifetime of indescribable pain were hard to forget. To shift so seamlessly, as easily as breathing, was like a miracle to someone like him who had suffered so terribly as an ignorant loner. He was glad that Harry and Hermione had never had to endure a transformation where every bone in their body gruesomely broke and rearranged themselves twice in a single night. It was truly nightmarish, and he didn't think he'd ever be in a place where he wasn't still somewhat traumatized by it, no matter how much he grew and adapted to his new circumstances.
Harry looked up at him with a raised brow, confusion written on his face. He grinned down at the boy "Ah, just glad I don't have to strip down to my bare arse anymore. It's not going to be summer forever," he said with a cheeky wink, and his rotten little darling rudely pretended to retch and gag. He flicked his ear and laughed. These were what he'd missed out on. A decade of the little things - and any parent worth their salt could tell you that's where all the best things lived.