Forgive me, it's been years. I also lost the notebook that had all the notes I wrote for this fanfic and it had EVERYTHING, full moon dates, timetables, overlapping classes, character lists, EVERYTHING. I even had a full timeline with all the canon ages in it oh God it's all gone. So please forgive if things aren't as precise as they were before.

Also, I finished uni and became a nurse! Not that it'll help me to write this fic.

If you're reading this, wow, thanks, it's been a while, love you lots

~BS

26th October 1971

"Remus?"

The dormitory was still and dark. If it weren't for the weak moonlight outlining the frozen child against the window, Sirius would have dismissed the creaking.

"Yes?" Remus' guilty voice was barely audible, even in the deep quiet.

Sirius pulled back the curtain around his bed further, revealing himself to Remus. His eyes were misty and his voice was still thick with sleep. Remus relaxed slightly under his gaze and offered a tight-lipped smile.

"I'm going to finish Binn's homework before breakfast," Remus whispered. "I missed a lot of work already this month."

It was true. Remus' absence hadn't quite been talk of the tower, but his spotty attendance had been noticed and some gossip had broken out between the first years. His most recent disappearance had only added to the muttering. Sirius had tried to stay out of the gossip. His mother had an awful habit of bad-mouthing anyone and everyone her attention had been captured by that day, whether it be the Minister for Magic, Sirius' cousins or her own immediate family. It was an ugly trait, in his opinion, and though his friends' wondering about the whereabouts and safety of their classmate didn't have anywhere near the vitriol of his mother's ramblings, it still left an unpleasant feeling in his stomach.

But Remus was interesting to him. After the confirmation earlier in the month that he was the son of Lyall Lupin, Sirius has taken the opportunity to leaf through the old copies of the Daily Prophet catalogued in the Hogwarts Library to find the edition that had interested his mother so much. Luckily, it had made front page news.

POETIC JUSTICE?

Savage attack on Ministry Official by werewolf Fenryr Greyback, following Lupin's statement on werewolf classification, has been taken by many as a confirmation of their violent nature.

According to the article, there had been a werewolf attack involving Greyback following which the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures had been called upon to revise the classification of werewolves to grant greater protection to the wizarding public. Greyback had evaded capture by claiming to live as a homeless muggle, and the lack of diligence in updating active werewolf records had allowed him to freely prey on wizards and muggles alike for several years. Following his initial quote at the scene of the attack where he stated that the dangerous creatures should be destroyed for public safety, he had seemingly composed himself and released an official statement from his department about proposed changes to the legislation which would be reviewed by the Wizengamot in the following weeks.

"The werewolf problem in the UK is beginning to spiral out of control. The number of unregistered werewolves in recent decades has resulted in an exponential growth of an unregulated and dangerous population, breeding and living on the fringes of society. Attacks on muggles have become increasingly difficult to explain away and pressure from the muggle Prime Minister is mounting.

In the coming year, the wizarding community will regain control of this blight. Known and suspected colonies will be raided and catalogued and charged for their crimes. Adult werewolves innocent of violent acts will be given the choice to join their packmates in Azkaban, or accept Ministry tracing. Finally, a mass sterilisation of the werewolf population will be implemented to curb the growth of the community.

It is cruel and morally unjust to subject an innocent child to the life of voilence, solitude and animalism of werewolf colonies as they exist in the UK at this time. For those offspring who have been forced into this existence, the Department has allocated funding towards research which may hope to provide some quality of life and safe integration in the future."

Sirius had read on to discover that an unspecified member of the Lupin family had been injured in the attack, confirmed by a leak in St Mungo's. Lupin had bravely retained his position at the Department for the Regulation and Control of Dangerous Creatures, but had refused to provide further comment on the nature of the attack and refused to confirm or deny suspicions that he had, in fact, been changed himself in an act of ironic justice. After the attack, Greyback escaped capture yet again.

He couldn't honestly say he knew enough about werewolves to agree or disagree with Lupin's opinions, but the article did throw Remus' excuse into a new light.

"My mother is ill."

Sirius knew that muggles could not become werewolves. Almost every muggle attack results in death. Either the wolf would mutilate the victim to death, or the irreparable nature of werewolf bites would cause the muggle to eventually succumb to their injuries or infection if they did manage to escape. A muggle with a wizard partner who may have been treated at St Mungo's, however...

"I'll come down with you."

Remus looked up from his trunk where he was switching out textbooks from his bag and nodded. In companionable silence, Sirius dressed himself while Remus combed his wavy hair in the bathroom mirror and watery Autumn sunlight began to stretch across the grounds.

"So, where were you yesterday evening? You didn't come into the dorm last night."

Sirius was absently glancing over the same history homework that Remus was carefully completing. It was only just turning 07:00 and Sirius felt like his head was full of cotton. He had no idea how Remus was able to read and write yet. On early mornings, Sirius thought jealously of James' ability to wake up completely, almost as soon as he cracked his eyes open.

Remus' quill stilled for a moment before he answered. "I was in the Hospital Wing."

Sirius raised his eyebrows in surprise. "You stayed there all night? Are you alright?"

"Yeah," Remus' voice was a little high and his shoulders were stiff. "It was after curfew, so Pomfrey said I could just stay. I'm fine."

Sirius wasn't an idiot. He could see that Remus was hiding something, but he did seem fine and, curious as he was, Sirius wasn't about to sneak a look at the Hospital Wing admission book to confirm the story. He stood by what he'd said to James. If Remus wanted to keep something private, then that was his own business. Sirius had plenty of things he didn't want his new friends to air to the rest of the school.

"Good."

Remus seemed to melt with relief when Sirius chose not to push him further.

"Are you nearly done? I'm never awake this early. It'd be nice to get sausages before they're all gone. "

Remus glanced at his friend out of the corner of his eye and smiled down at his parchment as he added the final few annotations to his timeline.

Together they basked in James and Peter's jealousy when they finally joined the pair at breakfast, smugly eating the last of the sausages.