Dumbledore's funeral was a blur of images and emotions. It might have overwhelmed him, if not for the anchor of Dora's hand in his, holding tight the entire time. Escorting the children to the train had been almost as difficult; Harry, Hermione and Ron were all but glued together, and he knew that this was the last time he'd watch James's son board the Hogwart's Express with his friends. The last vestiges of Harry's childhood had died with Dumbledore, and next year would be about fighting, not returning to school.

He watched the train speed down the track until all that could be seen was a plume of smoke. Only then did he turn to the woman standing beside him. For her sake he tried to find a smile. "Hungry, love? I have a few things to collect from the castle, but then I thought perhaps we could go for some curry?"

Talking to Snape was never an easy thing.  Asking favours of Snape was almost painful, and something he could only do for someone else's benefit, not his own.  He was eternally grateful to Albus that he had been the one to ask (or, knowing Dumbledore, tell) Snape to make the Wolfsbane potion for him; even then accepting the potion every month was a continuing lesson in humility.  He'd had to bite his tongue when, after the Order meeting last week, he'd asked Snape to make twice as much potion as usual.  It was a good thing Sirius had already gone upstairs, because he knew that his friend would not keep silent about the tawdry inferences the Potions master made about who, exactly, might be getting the rest of the potion.

It was worth it, though, in the end.  A first transformation would be difficult enough for Mana, there was no changing that, but at least he could make it a little easier.  With that in mind he showed up at her home one week before the full moon with a week's dosing for her and one night's dose for himself.  She didn't know, yet, what he was.  That was going to change tonight.  He just hoped it didn't ruin the friendship they were beginning to form, or his chance of helping her.

He stood in front of the door for a full minute before gathering up his courage and knocking.

He ran as fast and far as he could, his flight ended when he tripped over something and landed on his side on the forest floor.  Not thinking about running meant thinking about other things, and he hadn't even managed to halfway sit up when the contents of his stomach unleashed themselves on the base of a tree.  Wave after wave of dry heaves followed until he was trembling silently, his forehead against the harsh bark of the tree, not even able to control the muscles that would let him throw up again.

It was some time before he could control his breathing, even long until he could push aside the bloody images and find a memory strong enough to send a wandless Patronus.  Almost immediately a silver Phoenix found him, confirming what he already knew.  The Montgomery child was dead.

He couldn't be here.  He didn't know where he could be, but he couldn't be here, where he could still smell the blood, where the screams were still echoing in his ears, where he could still see the look on Greyback's face when he transformed.  So he did the very thing they'd been cautioned against at his very first Apparation lesson; he gave no thought to destination, determination, or deliberation and simply Apparated.

He found himself in a hallway that seemed familiar, but through the fog in his mind he didn't know why.  He leaned heavily against the wall, and when his knees gave out he slid down to the floor and closed his eyes.

"Hold on tight, cub."  The moment he feels the small arms wrap around his neck he Apparates, taking them from the living room of the small flat to the gates outside Marvelous Zhena's Mystical Zoo.  It's October tenth, and while it's his first birthday with Morgan (the first one was so close to the end of everything, and he'd missed it, and every one since,) it's her first birthday without her mum.  She's an orphan now, or as good as, with her mother dead and Sirius in Azkaban and no one left but a 25 year old werewolf that's so much older then his age.  For just a moment he allows himself to imagine how this should be, with James, Lily and Harry on one side, maybe with more children (they'd wanted three, Lily had said once) Sirius and some girl (he never could picture him married) on the other and Peter lagging behind.  They should have been a crowd, but now it was just the two of them walking through the gate and into the zoo.

"P'kins."  Morgan squirms in his arms to be put down, and he has to push away the might-have-beens for the here-and-now.  There's a large pile of pumpkins next to the grandlish's habitat - either a festive display or tonight's meal for the yellow and red creatures.

"Just a minute."  He tries to set her down gently, but she's insistent on seeing the pumpkins and it's making it hard to hold onto her.  He's trying to bend down when there's the thwap against his shoulder, and he looks behind him to find pumpkin guts on his coat and a smashed pile of orange at his feet.  There's no one between them and the gourds who might be playing a prank or letting out a bit of youthful energy, which seems to leave only one possibility.  "Did you do that?"

"Morgy's p'kin," the child declares, clapping her hands.  "Again!"

"No, not again."  The first pumpkin had been a small one, and other then the mess on his coat which should clean up with a Scourgify, caused no real damage.  He hates to think what might happen if she sets her sights on a bigger pumpkin this time.  Instead he sets her down, takes her small hand in his, and walks her over to the display.  "An entire zoo full of magical creatures and it's a pile of oversized fruit that catches your attention.  You are an odd duck, Morgan."

"Not a duck, Recess.  Cub."  She looks up at him and makes a sound that is a cross between a bark and a howl before throwing herself down on a pumpkin half as big as she is.

"Oh Merlin."

The water was hot enough to turn his skin red and burn the cuts on his hands, but he didn't adjust the temperature.  He felt dirty, not just from five days without bathing, but from all he had seen and all he had understood.  All the reading and interviews in the world couldn't prepare him for what a pack of werewolves was really like; the savageness and anger, the hopelessness and pain.  The wolf wasn't something that escaped once a month for them; it was their reality.  It would soon become his reality too.

Remus scrubbed at his skin with soap and cloth until it began to sting, and still felt the forest dirt clinging to his skin.  It was only when the hot water turned tepid that he got out of the shower and toweled off.  His timing was fortunate, however, since he only just had his trousers on when there was a knock at the motel room door.  Dinner, he assumed, as he pulled on a jumper.  He undid the locks, both muggle and magic, and opened the door.

He dreams of lilacs and bubbles, Indian bazaars pink hair; when he awakes he is trembling and it has nothing to do with the cold of the cave.

I'm in a mood to write some drabbles (perhaps it's the rain)  Anyone want a drabble/ficlet of Remus and your muse?  Give me a word, an idea or a song lyric.  Open to any verse he plays in.

Two days.  He felt the weight of time on his shoulders, a pressing countdown that told him that everything that hadn't ended in the days since Sirius had died would be coming to and end soon.  In two days he would leave Grimmauld Place, and Dora, and everything that mattered behind and become the part of himself that he'd fought against since he was a child.  Dread was too weak of a word to describe how he felt about the mission he was about to take.

But that was in two days, and he wasn't going to think about it tonight.  Tonight he was going to do his best to give Nymphadora Tonks the most perfect evening.  She deserved it, and perhaps he needed it too.  One perfect memory before he left.

It too a little more then the hour he had asked for to get ready.  He took a shower and shaved, dressing in his one good set of robes, dark brown with no patches or fraying.  Underneath he wore a deep red shirt that Sirius had sworn he had mistakenly ordered in the wrong size and insisted he keep since it just happened to fit him, cream coloured trousers and his usual worn shoes.  After two more stops he showed up at the door to Dora's flat.  In one hand he held a box of chocolates, in the other a potted lilac plant.  After a little shifting he managed to free one hand to knock on the door.

"Where is the place that the good souls go, where they take away, Take away the pain that they know?"

"I can not tell you, my little darling. All my faith has fallen, fallen, fallen."


After the battle they all returned to Hogwarts, grasping onto the portkeys Dumbledore had made, helping the wounded to hold on as well.  Madame Pomfrey could be trusted completely, they knew; the same might not be true of those at St Mungos.  She was waiting for them, almost as if she had expected something, and wasted no time in getting the most seriously wounded to beds, setting to fixing them with Molly Weasley as an assistant.  Why Molly was there he didn't know and didn't question.

Remus stood in the corner and watched the competent healer move from bed too bed, never staying still for long.  It reminded him of a time in his fourth year when a prank had backfired and all four of the Marauders had found themselves in the hospital wing, being scolded and comforted by Poppy Pomfrey.  Three days they'd been stuck there, leaving their beds every time Poppy's back was turned, coming up with an even better prank to try when they were released.  They'd been threatened with potions and full body binding curses to keep them still, but nothing kept the Marauders down for long.

Hermione was so still, lying on the bed she'd been carried to, Ron and Harry at her side.  Moody was in another bed, tossing restlessly, and Ginny was in a third, her foot elevated.  Tonks had refused to lay down once she awoke, and was sitting on the end of her bed, legs curled to her chest and arms wrapped around herself.  He should go to her, touch her, hold her, offer some words of comfort, promise that they would make it through this.  He did nothing.  His arms still felt full from the boy who had fought to go through the veil, not understanding where it led.  The only words he was capable of forming were 'He's dead.'  He couldn't offer her anything because he was empty, used up, without hope.  Broken.

When the promised half hour ended and Dumbledore returned from the Ministry Remus slipped out the door, his sentry duties ended.  They were all in better hands now.  He walked down the stairs and out the front door.  Just past the entrance gate he could have apparated; the others would be meeting at headquarters soon to figure out what had happened, what it meant, what they would need to do.  They would meet without him.  He walked to the Whomping Willow and didn't bother with the knob to still its movements, not caring that the whipcord movement of one branch sliced open his cheek and made it bleed.  The tunnel was dark but he stumbled through it without light.  Once inside the house that was the closest thing he claimed to a home his knees buckled and he fell to the floor, letting out a howl that came from deep within both man and beast.

It was Tonks's fault, really; she was the one who had asked them for stories of their old school pranks, and after a while it just seemed like a demonstration was in order.

[She pushes her pelvis down and shudders slightly again, sighing shakily.]

Remus...

............

"I'm a bit old for the couch, love. I wish we..." And before he could finish the thought the fireplace before them was gone, a fourposter bed in its place.

The first time he returns from his undercover work to find Tonks with mousy brown hair and a haunted smile he doesn't need Molly Weasley's glare to make him hate himself.

The I'D HIT IT Meme

Remus does not approve of this meme.

He knows all too well how short life can be, how uncertain the future is, but sometimes at night when she's curled up against him he thinks to himself that if tomorrow never comes this will have been enough.

It's spelled out on the front page of the Daily Prophet, and though he knew it was coming it hurt more then he expected it to; he was a second class citizen, no longer allowed the same rights as wizards, no longer considered human.

Wolfsbane potion imbibed by a wizard now flowed through the veins of a wolf, calming him, keeping his more dangerous predilections at bay.  Sometimes the draught was enough to cool his blood and allow him to curl up before the fire and sleep, but not tonight.  Tonight he prowled the room he could not leave, thanks to charms he could not undo in werewolf form.  The same charms blocked the sound of his howls so they did not disturb the others that called Grimmauld place home.

He paced below the window that displayed the full moon, clawing at the glass in a bid for freedom.  The air was different tonight, the smells of the room not what the wolf was used to.  Someone else was here.  He could smell her in the air, the carpet, his own fur.  Mostly, though, he could smell her on the bed.  He tore at sheets and pillows, sending feathers into the air, trying to get at her even though she wasn't there.  The wolf didn't know her name, and could only call her mate.

He prowled for hours, only falling asleep in front of the fire an hour before the moon set and the sky began to lighten.  The man didn't wake up when the transformation ended, only clenching the ripped pillowcase closer to his nose and breathing in the smell.

 

Their first anniversary came a month after her death; he spent the day telling Teddy stories about his mum and the night sitting at her grave, not saying a word.

With the last class of the day over, Remus was eager to clean up the lesson and get to the hospital wing to collect Teddy, who he had not seen since lunch.  He fed the lobalugs they had been talking about in this past class, as well as the pixies from fifth form, and made sure that both tank and cages were locked tight; it wouldn't do to have either creature get out, either on accident or with the assistance of some troublemaker.  Not until he turned around to collect the notes from his desk did he realize that he wasn't alone; one student had stayed behind.

"Hermione?  Did you need something?"