Fic: I Need You to Trust Me (5/?)
Title: Tiny Spark
Rating: R
Words: ~2,200
Pairing(s): RL/SB, background JP/LE
Warnings: References to rape, swearing
Summary: Remus gets by with a little help from his friends.
Disclaimer: None of the characters belong to me, I make no claim to own them and am not making any profit, fiscal or otherwise, from the publication of this work.
Prequel || Chapter One || Chapter Two || Chapter Three || Chapter Four || Chapter Five || Chapter Six
Remus feels terror build in his throat, feels his stomach shake with the rest of his body and it's all he can do to stay standing where he is, not to bolt and save himself. He hopes that Bellatrix and Lucius can't see the tremors that he feels. Next to him, Sirius is wrestling the cloak from Lucius, imparting a few choice swear words upon their two new guests. Once he frees it from the Slytherin's grasp, Sirius turns to his brother, and Remus can tell from his expression that he isn't scared. Sirius is livid. "What the fuck, Regulus? You brought Remus here so that you sick bastards could get another go?" He reels back to punch his brother but Remus grips Sirius' elbow to stop him and Bellatrix interrupts Sirius' tirade.
"It's nice to see you, too, cousin." She waltzes over and drapes an arm around Regulus who looks for all the world as though he, too, is trying not to be sick. "But don't blame little Reggie, here." She pinches his cheek and Regulus pulls a face, leans away from her. "He didn't know we were coming. We thought he might be up to something after his behaviour in the Great Hall this morning, so we followed him up here." She looks through Remus. "Good hunch." Remus shivers to know that Lucius is standing behind him, but he refuses to turn around again and give away his nervousness.
"What do you want?" Remus asks, voice tremulous; even in his attempt to sound wild, he comes off more as a hurt animal.
In one swift and sudden movement, Bellatrix rips her arm from around Regulus and strides forward to grip Remus' face in her long, cold fingers. She presses his lips together in a pathetic pantomime of a kiss and he can feel her skeletal phalanges pressing into the softness of his face, leaving marks of white on the hot pink of his flesh. Before Remus has the chance to tug his head away, Sirius has taken Bellatrix's wrist in his hand. "Let go of him!" he's saying, his voice angrier than Remus has ever heard it before, and he realizes that Sirius is the wild animal here - he's the one everybody should be afraid of. Bellatrix's fingers come away from his face, unwillingly and leaving thin scratches in her wake and it takes too much will power for Remus not to reach up and touch the barely bleeding wounds.
Remus sees a flash of anger in Bellatrix's eyes at being rebuked, but then it is replaced by the usual glint of something frightening and she leans back against the low wall, resting her elbows upon it and looking nonchalant in the darkness of the new moon. "I thought little Reggie might tell you what he had overheard." She sneers at Regulus who is looking lost and hopeless, standing - too afraid to bolt - very still. "But he didn't know the whole story. So I wanted to tell you the truth. The real truth."
"I think we've heard enough," Sirius says, grabbing onto Remus' sleeve and tugging at the boy. "Come on, Remus, let's go," he whispers to his friend. Remus knows that they should go, because nothing Bellatrix has to say will offer him any sort of comfort or closure. The hatred in her eyes tells him that all she wants to give him is poison, poison that will make him feel worse than he has in the last three days. But for some reason, he is rooted to the spot, unable to move of his own volition, and he rocks sharply as Sirius tugs on his sleeve.
"He wants to hear me out, Sirius. Don't be such a slag. Let your boyfriend make his own choices."
"He's not my boyfriend," Remus says quickly, and maybe - he thinks - he shouldn't have, because Sirius yanks his hand away as though he's been burnt with something too hot.
"Really?" Bellatrix asks quietly, her sneer growing. "Because I thought that if you fucked someone, they were your boyfriend?" There was that word again, making Remus feel vile and disgusting under the eyes of others. He rubs his forearm and doesn't reply to Bellatrix, tries to block out Lucius' quiet sniggering behind him. She glances over the edge of the wall, down towards the ground, and when she sighs loudly, Remus knows that she is getting bored. "He didn't want to do it, you know?" Remus turns his head. "See, we found out you were a werewolf because ickle Regulus let it slip last year. And then this year, dear old Severus wanted to join the Dark Lord's circle - but I don't just let anyone in. I told him that he had to complete an initiation, that everyone has to do it. And who better to use than you?" She smiles lasciviously and walks in a circle around Remus, Sirius reaches out to touch his friend. Bellatrix is close enough to touch, but she hasn't yet.
"See, I don't know if you're aware, or not, but up until last year, Sevvie talked about you non-stop. I don't know if he had a little crush on you or if he was just jealous but he couldn't keep his bleeding mouth shut about you. Then, all of a sudden, last January, it was as though you had died." Regulus looks ill, he is clutching at his robes and his eyes are darting, looking everywhere but at the group of people in front of him. "I thought, what better to do than get him to fuck the boy he doesn't love anymore?" Remus' stomach clenches and his knees feel like they might buckle. He's going to fall, he knows it, he can see the ground swimming in his vision, but then Sirius' swift arm is underneath his armpits, supporting him. "So I made him do it. He didn't want to use the Polyjuice potion, he didn't want to do it at all. But I told him he had to. And so, he did." She exhales a vicious laugh in Remus' face and he gasps, trying not to breathe in the scent of her. "And I told him to bring back your wand as proof. You really shouldn't have one anyways, you know." She reaches out like she is going to touch him and Sirius is quick, using himself as a shield for Remus.
"I think we've heard more than enough," he says through gritted teeth, voice like venom to Remus' ears.
Bellatrix smiles and waves Lucius aside so that Remus and Sirius can pass. As they are readying themselves to go down the stairs, her voice stops Remus cold. "Just one more thing, werewolf." She waits until he turns to look at her reluctantly. "What was it like, having someone take all of that power from you? What did it feel like, being a fool under someone else's control?" Remus flushes red and pushes past Sirius to pound down the stairs. He doesn't stop running until he gets to the portrait hole, where he falls in a small pile to the floor. Sirius is just behind him and he, too, drops to the ground, panting and wrapping his arms around Remus.
He presses chaste kisses to the shaking boy's forehead and Remus wraps desperate arms around the limbs encircling him. The werewolf presses his face into his friend's chest and lets out a low, mournful sound. Sirius is at a loss for what to do, so he just keeps murmuring, "Forget her, Moony. Forget her."
Remus knows that he needs to write his mother back. It's been three days since he received her letter and if he waits much longer, she's going to start worrying (more than usual) and she might talk to Dumbledore. And that is the last thing he needs right now. He's so distracted, thinking about what he's going to say to her, that Professor McGonagall asks him a question three times before James elbows him in the ribs - gently - and he snaps back to the present. He blinks at his professor, but instead of repeating her question, she moves on to another student. Remus thinks he's off the hook, but at the end of the class, she holds him back. "I don't want to be late for Defense, Professor," Remus says, watching his friends shuffle reluctantly out of the door.
"I don't think this will take long, Mr. Lupin. Close the door, if you please, Pettigrew." Peter shuts the door and Remus knows that his friends are going to start walking slowly to class, not wanting to leave him, but unable to linger. McGonagall crosses her arms over her chest, wand dangling from her fingertips, and marks Remus with a concerned stare. "You're having problems." It isn't a question but a statement and Remus falters slightly under the usually stern woman's kindness.
"Yes," he whispers, playing with a scrap of parchment, a note from Sirius, in his pocket.
"Would you like to talk about them?"
"No, thank you." He folds the paper in half, then in half again before McGonagall speaks again.
"Well, I don't know what it is that's bothering you, Mr. Lupin," she says, suddenly sounding more like her old self, "but you'll need to start focussing in class again."
"Of course, I'm sorry. I'll be…better by next day." He offers her a smile that he knows is too small and too pathetic on his face. But she takes it anyways and ushers him out the door.
"If you're late to class, just tell Professor Graves that I held you."
"Of course."
Remus hurries to his next class and makes it just before his professor starts the lesson. He sits down next to James who slides a note surreptitiously across the table. What's eating at you? Remus smiles humourlessly - there's a lot that could be bothering him at the moment, a lot that James isn't privy to, and he doesn't intend to share it via scrap pieces of parchment scuffled silently behind a professor's turned back. He looks at James and shrugs his shoulders noncommittally. He turns the parchment over and next to an etching of Lily's name, writes We'll talk about it at supper. He has to hope that it is enough to appease James for the time being.
James doesn't hand him anymore notes, but half an hour into the class, when they are all reading page 374 of their textbooks, Peter prods him in the back and Remus feels another note dropped into the hood of his robes. He reaches back awkwardly and grabs it, smiling politely at Graves when the man walks by. He unfolds the note to find Sirius' and Peter's handwriting crammed into the small empty space above a horrible illustration of Prongs. Are you okay? Peter's ink blotted words ask. Do you want me to beat Wormtail's head in? Sirius has scribbled hastily underneath. Remus doesn't turn around, but shakes his head obviously enough that he knows his friends will see it. After class, they walk to supper together and Remus hopes that James is focussing too hard on Lily's swaying hips to remember Remus' promise.
But when the four of them sit down at the table, James stares at Remus from under his ruffled fringe and corners him with a stern glare that is unnervingly like McGonagall's. "So, what did she say?"
Remus pokes at one of the potatoes on his plate and shrugs noncommittally. "She asked what was wrong. Said I wasn't focussing."
"Too true." James agrees. "Why aren't you focussing?"
"Bugger off, Prongs," Sirius says lightly. "If Remus doesn't want to talk about it, he doesn't have to."
"Oh, so you two are keeping secrets from me and Pete now?" Remus frowns at the hurt way Peter hangs his head.
"No," Remus says. "No, we're not keeping secrets from you guys." He scratches the back of his neck and loosens his tie. "I just…I got a letter from my mum on Saturday night and I guess Madam Pomfrey told her something happened. I'm not sure how to answer the letter."
James smirks and spears one of Remus' potatoes, even though he has plenty of his own to eat. "Moony, Moony, Moony. Why didn't you say something before? This is going to be a breeze for four brilliant blokes like us." And even though James seems to be treating the situation with less tact and seriousness than one might find prudent, Remus feels a soothing sense of reassurance at his friend's cocky smile.