Fic ~ The Queen of Pentacles by Bonfoi [PG13]
Title: The Queen’s Wolf
Author: Bonfoi / bonfoi
Type: Fiction
Length: ~ 8,300
Main character or Pairing: Remus Lupin; Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks, Remus Lupin/Severus Snape
Card: Queen of Pentacles
Card Interpretation: The Queen of Pentacles embodies the following: security is important; emotions are a necessity; a practical and loving parent is not just a description; a sensual and passionate lover is part of one’s being; and, the person who personifies this card is not flashy or ostentatious. Biddy interpretation
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: The world of Harry Potter, its characters and settings are the copyrighted works of J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros., her publishing companies and affiliates. No profit was made from the writing of this story nor was any malice intended in any way, shape or form to the author or the actors/actresses who so brilliantly have brought them to life.
This author is not responsible for underage readers. Please observe the ratings, warnings, and age of legal consent for your country.
Highlight for Warnings: * Alternate Reality; Canon Death; OoC Andromeda Tonks; Original Characters; Slash *
Summary: Before Remus ever came to Hogwarts, his life was touched by gypsy magic.
Author Notes: I have to thank my English teachers, my professors, and all the reading I’ve ever done. I really have to heap praise upon ravenna_c_tan for being so wonderful to host this festival once more. Many thanks for letting me play and for being so patient with me!
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Prologue
The gypsy, Baka Barica, was dressed in a peasant gown, red embroidery upon thick, white cotton across her chest. She had a black apron with pockets that seemed bottomless and wore strings of beads, corals, and strung gold and copper coins, some that looked as old as the Romans. Her babushka was a brilliant royal blue, with copper rounds along the edges that glinted as she shook or turned her head. There was no way to tell her age, and Remy wouldn’t guess aloud. Mam had said it was rude.
Remy stood at Papa’s side as Mam greeted the gypsy with a smile and a hug, her gap-toothed grin familiar after all these years. He winced a bit as the wound on his shoulder pulled, healing still, even after all the potions and the poultices his parents had used. The gypsy noticed and beckoned him forward with a crooked finger and an even more crooked grin.
“Come and let me see you, mali Lupin,” she said in faintly-accented English. “You are become ‘andsome boy.” Her hands hovered over his head and then flowed down the sides of his face and over his shoulders, stopping directly above his wound. Papa stiffened, but didn’t move as she pushed aside his robe and shirt, baring the werewolf’s bite.
“You should ‘ave brought ‘im to me directly,” Baka Barica scolded his parents. Papa and Mam shared a surprised look.
“We Ciganski ‘ave seen many things in the world. Do you think we did not meet the Moon Wolf in h’our travels?” she asked as her hands kneaded Remy’s shoulders. He closed his eyes and relaxed under her ministrations as she continued speaking. “You are not the h’only ones who ‘ave Moon Children.” Remy sighed as the pain dulled.
“I cannot break the Moon Wolf’s curse, but, because you give us respect and kindness, I will find the boy’s strength.”
Remy opened his eyes and smiled shyly as Baka Barica lifted her hands away. “It feels better, Baka. Thank you.” He bowed his head. “Hvala.”
Baka clapped her hands and the gold coins of her bracelets jingled merrily. “Yes, I will ‘elp him. ‘e will be h’our gift to the future, eh?” She grinned and then whistled. A young gypsy boy brought a table and chair for her. Baka pulled a deck of cards from the pocket of her apron and waved the Lupins to a log nearby. “The cards will show us, mali Lupin, a path. If you are brave and smart, you will find your way, and your ‘appiness.”
She shuffled the cards and then handed them to Remus. “Concentrate on being brave and true, mali Lupin. ‘old that in your mind and shuffle the cards three times, then set them down h’on my table.” Remus did as she asked and then leaned forward as she drew a single card and turned it over: the Queen of Pentacles.
“Ah, you are h’as I said, mladić. You h’are strong in the ways of Nature. You are strong, even without the curse of the Moon Wolf in you.” Baka chuckled and looked from his mother to his father. “He likes to pamper himself, even at this age, yes?” They nodded.
“Remy likes his chocolate. I often think he works for it,” Papa joked.
Baka Barica tapped the card with a wrinkled but strong finger. “This is his card. He will be the Queen’s man as well as the Queen’s wolf.”
~o°Ω°o~
After the Battle of Hogwarts
Remus Lupin hadn’t wanted to leave his family, but he’d known it was the right thing to do, protecting Teddy’s future as well as Harry’s. He hadn’t thought he’d be part of the battlefield when he thought of it again.
A raven landed by his shoulder and awkwardly dropped a small purse near his hand. Inside he found a baby’s dummy, a bracelet adorned with old gold coins, and a scroll. He didn’t need to see the writing on the scroll to know somehow Baka Barica had found him when he needed encouragement the most.
He groaned as he struggled away from Tonks’ body, the mud trying to suck him back in, toward oblivion. Once he was steady on his knees, Remus unrolled the scroll with shaking fingers even as he listened for more spell-casting, but he heard nothing but the wind gusting over the battlefield.
Remy Lupin,
Soon you travel a new road. Remember you are the Queen of Pentacles’ Wolf. You are of Nature, mladić. You are father, homemaker, protector, lover.
I give you a gift for your next journey, Moon Wolf. May you see with your heart what cannot be seen with the eye.
~ Baka Barica
Remus put everything back into the purse, cinched it shut, and then shoved it, gently, into the special pocket of his jacket. It sealed with a faint puff of air, letting him know nothing would fall out without a strong Alohamora and the password. He crawled to a tree where the raven sat and heaved a sigh. The sky was incongruously bright and cheerful, the birds and other animals of the Forbidden Forest creeping out with whistles and snorts. After all that death and destruction, life was pushing back its own veil.
He only had a faint inkling, the barest whiff of something foul, and then he was hit with a sizzling red curse. The raven cawed harshly and flew away. Seconds later, a man’s thin scream wavered in the air. Remus clawed at his chest, a burning sensation robbing him of his breath and sight and only leaving touch to let him know the hex had done what all the other spells hadn’t. His eyes closed and he slumped over.
~o°Ω°o~
“Bloody hell, Mrs. Tonks!”
“I may not have liked his taking up with my girl, Harry, but I know a thing or two about Dark Magic. Little Teddy will need his father and you’re going to help me.”
The two voices were hissing over Remus’ body as he struggled to follow what was going on. He rose and fell in the air, and came to the conclusion he was on a stretcher, going over rough terrain. Two people were carrying him without magic, and arguing fit to raise the dead. He chuckled weakly at that thought and the bouncing motion stopped suddenly.
“Did you hear that?” Harry asked. “I think he’s coming to.”
“Yes, I did. We’ve got to get him to the other side of the castle as fast as possible.” The bouncing commenced once more. “Did you ever find the outside entrance to Slytherin?” Andromeda Tonks asked breathlessly.
“Yeah,” Harry huffed back. “It was first on my to-do list last year.” Andromeda snarled something under her breath and Harry rushed on. “There were tunnels all over. There should be an entrance just above the Slytherin Common room. Has a statue of woman petting a wolf and surrounded by a bloody great snake.”
Remus struggled to open his eyes, to let them know he was aware of them, but to no avail. Whatever hex had struck him, he was its prisoner until it wore away or someone removed it.
Andromeda and Harry set the stretcher down as horizontally as they could on the blasted earth and walked away, her boots and his shoes crunching over withered grass and broken stone. Remus lay there listening as their voices grew fainter, only the breeze over the grass and the buzzing of insects letting him know he was still alive and not in some limbo.
Harry’s shout of “Over here!” had Remus trying to turn over, but a weight settled on his chest and he gave up. The weight cawed, and Remus knew the raven had returned.
The air fizzed as a hex flew over Remus’ body. The raven only dug its talons deeper into his tattered coat and chest as it made a growling noise.
“Harry! Come back here!” Andromeda called. “There’s a raven perched on him!”
Feet slithered and slid over stone. “I’d swear that’s the bird I saw pecking Dolohov’s eyes out,” Harry whispered loudly. The talons loosened their grip and seemed to turn to look in the direction of Harry’s voice. “If Snape were still alive, I’d say he was an Animagus, this thing has his eyes.” The raven seemed to be preening on Remus’ chest.
“It didn’t move when I sent a hex at it. What should we do?” Andromeda asked, her teeth beginning to chatter.
Harry’s voice was older and wiser when he answered her. “If it’s not hurting him, I say leave it be. Too much death today.”
Feet scraped and rocks were kicked into other stones. “I’ve found the cave, I think. We should get him inside before the Aurors get to this side of the castle.” They picked Remus up and soon he wasn’t bouncing but levitating down a cool tunnel, Andromeda and Harry pushing his stretcher along as they discussed plans.
“Did anyone see him fall?”
Harry drew in a deep breath. “As far as I can tell he and Tonks were surrounded by Death Eaters at the end. The centaurs and the vampires won’t be telling anyone anything, so it’s a safe bet we’re the only ones that know Remus is still alive.”
Andromeda gulped back what sounded suspiciously like a sob. “If only my poor girl hadn’t run away from Teddy…”
“Hey, now, Mrs. Tonks.” A brightness formed over Remus’ head. “You know she was an Auror. She thought she was doing the right thing.”
“No, Harry. I know, knew Nymphadora. She wanted Remus, so she got him. She wanted him to stay with her, so she got pregnant.” Andromeda’s voice echoed a bit from the tunnel walls.
“She got him drunk, Harry. I always thought Nymphadora was an honorable woman, but she was a Black as well.” She sighed. “Sometimes, we are a bit barmy when we fancy ourselves in love.”
The stretcher stopped moving. “You mean you knew she tricked him?” Harry’s voice was querulous. “And you let her?”
“Remus didn’t seem to mind too much and Teddy was such a gift after Ted’s death…” her voice trailed off and the stretcher began moving once more. “I didn’t see the harm in letting Nympha-”
“Didn’t see the harm in forcing Remus into a wedding, huh?” Harry interrupted. “And I helped! I thought he was just being noble, saying he was too old for her, holding her off. I should have known better,” he growled. “But I was too focused on this sodding war and I failed him.”
They walked in silence until the tunnel seemed to open up. Remus felt a cross-breeze on his cheek. The raven ruffled its feathers as it stretched its wings.
Finally, Harry spoke again. “Look, I’m bloody tired of it all, Mrs. Tonks. Let’s just take care of Remus, okay?”
“I’m trying to make it right, Harry. We all of us used the poor man.” Soft fingers patted Remus’ cheek. “I’m so sorry, Remus. I shouldn’t have let Nymphadora have her way in this, but an old woman gets lost when she loses her man,” Andromeda whispered softly.
The raven shuffled and Andromeda yanked her hand away. “Blasted bird!” she cried. “He pecked me!”
“Probably doesn’t like sharing Remus, spoils of war and all that,” Harry said in a tone of voice that had Remus picturing him grinning.
“You sound like Snape,” Andromeda groused as she cast a healing charm and then cleared her throat.
“Do you think this is the place, Harry?” Andromeda asked. Remus’ stretcher hovered in the air.
Several large rocks seemed to be moving, grinding on each other. There was a crashing sound and then a rush of damp, musty air. “Yeah, this is it,” Harry shouted. “I stuck a chest of supplies in here behind the rock fall. We can take care of Remus for a bit, before we go back for Snape’s body.”
Remus shivered internally. Severus Snape was dead. It finally hit him that he’d survived while the greatest spy the Wizarding World would never acknowledge was dead. The raven seemed to sense his distress and rubbed its head into Remus’ chin.
“Does that bird know something?” Harry’s voice was closer and the stretcher bounced again as they cleared Harry’s rock fall.
“Ravens are intelligent creatures-even if they peck an unsuspecting body. They were often Wizarding familiars.” Andromeda pushed the stretcher down to the ground, the raven making a chirruping sound in its throat. “See? He knows we’re talking about him.” She stepped back, her boots grinding on the stone floor. “Unnatural bird,” she grumbled under her breath.
The sound of something scraping over the ground and then being opened startled the raven and it moved from side-to-side on Remus’ chest.
“Will the bird,” the raven squawked, “the raven affect our spells?” Harry’s voice was on Remus’ left.
“No. We’ll put the two of them to sleep for a day. That should give Remus’ lycanthropy a chance to repair some of the curse’s damage and our spells don’t need him to be awake.” Andromeda was on his right. “Can we leave them here safely, you think?”
When they began chanting, the burning pain receded. Remus felt the raven settling down, as if on a nest. The words flowed over him, cooling the burning in his chest and sending him off to sleep…to dream...
~o°Ω°o~
A House in the Country
“He’s a good man, was Remus Lupin.” Mundungus Fletcher stood twisting his shawl, tears glistening in his eyes. “’E never came the heavy wit’ me. Unlike somes in this room.”
“Fletcher!” Minerva McGonagall hissed.
“Aye, then. Here’s to tha foinest of werewolves and gen’lemen!” Mundungus raised a glass in toast and then drank it down in one go. He coughed. “Ta Remus Lupin!”
Other toasts followed and then Minerva stood up, a bundle with bluish-black hair in her arms. The voices grew still.
“We are here to welcome Theodore Lupin into our world.” Remus reached out and watched Teddy’s eyes change to the yellow of the wolf, little arms reaching out and little legs kicking in his blanket. Minerva glanced around and then muttered a swaddling charm to bundle up Teddy once more.
Remus touched her arm and suddenly images of lying on a sunny ledge, of long Wizarding and Muggle chess sessions with Albus and Flitwick, of a home in Edinburgh where there was an old wizard waiting with tea and Glenfiddich flooded his mind. Minerva stilled. Teddy kept trying to reach Remus.
She stiffened and then whispered, “There’s sum’un here!” Her accent was thick.
“Um, Professor McGonagall, Professor Lupin is standing behind you!” Neville Longbottom-bruised but standing tall-was pointing at Minerva, or behind her. His voice squeaked, but only a bit.
Minerva slowly turned around. Standing behind her was a very much alive, very much in need of more than the sheet wrapped around his waist, Remus John Lupin looking remarkably fit…with leaves growing in his hair.
“Oh! Remus!” He hadn’t expected Hermione to rush him and try to Splinch him with a hug, but it meant he truly was there, and alive. “We thought you were dead!” the bushy-haired girl sobbed into his chest. Neville hobbled close and shook his hand, eyes still almost bugging out of his head.
“No, I think…” Remus shook his head. “I think someone hid me away from the Aurors. Before that, I remember coming to near-” He swallowed down a lump in his throat. “Near Tonks. Then there was a raven, and a hex, and a cave.” Remus looked around the room as everyone else stared back.
“Where’s Andromeda and Harry?” he asked. Suddenly the happy faces were frowning. He clutched at his sheet, his son’s face crumpling up in a whimper as Minerva held him a bit too tightly for a second.
“I’m that sorry, Remus,” Minerva said softly. “They disappeared just before Teddy’s Welcoming Ceremony. That was a week ago.”
The temperature of the room-wherever they were-suddenly dropped. The shutters on the house closed over the windows, the fireplace sprouted flames where no wood was, and there was subtle shift in the air, as if the house was now a locked-down fortress.
“I need clothes, Minerva.” Remus turned to Hermione, still hanging on one arm. “Hermione, dear, I need you to tell me everything you can about ravens and a secret tunnel to Slytherin House.” Neville stepped back and began calming everyone one else, a fact Remus tucked away for later perusal.
Mundungus Fletcher was easing out of the room as silently as he could, but Remus’ voice stopped him cold. “Mundungus, you know something. You’re staying!” The door to the room wouldn’t budge when Fletcher pushed and kicked at it. The other witches and wizards huddled together, talking in hushed tones.
“I’m sorry, everyone, but I have to keep you here for a bit. That is, if you don’t mind?” Remus asked. There was steel in his voice, something they’d only heard when he was defending Snape. Heads bobbed in the affirmative and a few voices said “Aye. Yes.”
“Good. Now, about those clothes, Minerva?”
~o°Ω°o~
Remus could feel the house-his home-alive around him. The whole place seemed an extension of him. He felt the twenty-odd witches and wizards walking across the floors, the doors flexing as they guarded those within. It was…amazing.
“How did I get this house, Minerva?” he called from the master bath. He’d left the door ajar as he dressed. The fact that he could hear Teddy’s sleepy burbles settled him like nothing else.
Looking in the mirror, Remus had to grin a bit. His robes were richer than he was used to, of heavy velvet, embroidered with old spells of protection, hearth, and husbandry. There wasn’t one patch on trousers or vest to be seen. Remus almost missed his jacket-
“The deed arrived after the Death Eaters were routed. A goblin by the name of Tightfist delivered it to Andromeda’s and then came to me when he couldn’t find her. Seems a gypsy,” Minerva gave a superior sniff, “named Barbara Truegoodie bequeathed the house and a fortune to you should you prove, and I quote, ‘a husband, a father, a hero, the Queen’s man and the Queen’s wolf.’ Overly dramatic if ye ask me, but there, that’s a gypsy for ye.” Remus could just picture her crossing her arms over her bosom and rolling her cat-like eyes.
“I’d hazard a guess that’s Baka Barica. We often let her band of gypsies winter on the family land.”
“Well, as I survived that’s good enough for me, but what happened to Andromeda and Harry?” Remus asked as he pushed the door open. The robes were a bit unfamiliar but they fit well enough. “I remember them carrying me on a stretcher to a tunnel that led to Slytherin House, or at least, that’s what they were looking for.” He looked over at Teddy in his crib, hair shifting through a variety of colors as he dreamed.
“You still have leaves in your hair, Remus.” Minerva stood up and tried to pluck one out only to have Remus grab her wrist.
“They seem to be a part of me, Minerva. Believe me, I tugged one out and almost cried.” Remus let his former teacher’s hand go with a grimace. “Hurts like pulling great hanks of hair would.”
There was a knock on the door, and then it opened. Hermione Granger stood there, a wand in her hand, her cheeks reddened. “I thought you might want this.” She looked a bit dusty as she held up something. “I had to trick the house, Remus. I’m sorry. I climbed out a pantry window and then at the edge of your wards Apparated to the Ministry and Flooed to Hogwarts,” she said in a rush.
She gulped in a deep breath and started again as Remus and Minerva shared an amused glance; she hadn’t changed that much from when they’d taught her. She paced back and forth, once close enough to give Remus his wand.
“I found the cave you were talking about. We worked out a way to leave signs for each other and I found Harry’s, right where you…” Hermione’s voice wobbled. “…where you said. The tunnel entrance is quite clear and I found a cauldron and raven feathers inside. I also found your wand…and another one.” She held out a wand Remus had seen countless times before.
“It’s Snape’s, isn’t it?” she asked softly. The question was rhetorical.
“Och, what now?” Minerva queried.
She beckoned Hermione over and ran her own wand over Snape’s. “We often have to check wands when ye’re our students. This wand is definitely Severus’. It’s still warm, as Albus would’ve said.” She reached out and ran a gentle finger over the wand and then plucked it from Hermione’s hand and gave it to Remus. “You should keep this close, Remus. Knowing how our world works, Severus Snape is mos’ likely alive and in need of it.”
Remus blinked and his heart began beating harder. He could feel the leaves in his hair fluttering as if in a breeze. He looked into Minerva’s eyes and saw she’d known what he’d thought hidden. “How long?” he asked as he rubbed his fingers over Severus’ wand.
Teddy snuffled in his sleep and Remus walked over to soothe him.
“Since your time teaching. He’d always been a passionate lad, but only you could make him show it.” Minerva put her hand on Remus’ arm and drew his attention back her, both of them ignoring Hermione’s interested presence. “He went out of his way to drive you from the cursed position, then he sent me Wolfsbane to pass on to you. You’d gotten under his skin, no matter what vitriol he spewed.”
“Well, now it’s my turn to save him, wouldn’t you say?” Remus grinned, his prominent canines glinting as he did. “Hermione, come back to Hogwarts with me, will you? We’ve got some errant friends to rescue. Minerva, would you continue babysitting Teddy and Mundungus?” The two witches nodded and then left Remus with Teddy for a few minutes as the whole place brightened. Shutters opened, doors unbolted, and the house seemed to breathe as Remus straightened his shoulders.
~o°Ω°o~
Hogwarts Castle
Hermione and Remus stepped through the Hogwarts Floo near the Grand Hall. There was still a smell of death lingering, but the castle appeared to be airing out: the huge doors were open and several windows were missing completely as the sun and fresh air came in.
“It’s only been a week, but the castle seems to purging all the signs of war,” Hermione said in her teaching voice. “The windows pop in and out whenever a good breeze comes along.”
They walked out and Remus winced as the torn landscape. He could still see battles, spells burning the air as friends and foes alike were no more. He shook the images to the back of his mind and strode forward, Hermione just behind his right shoulder.
They rounded the castle and suddenly Remus smelled damp earth, and found the crunching sound of the broken stones under their feet familiar. “We’re close, aren’t we?” he asked. “I couldn’t open my eyes, but the smells and sounds seem correct.”
Hermione pointed at a shadow in the flank of Hogwarts. “There! Now, cross your eyes and push your magic out.” She waited while Remus crossed his eyes with a pained expression on his face. “I know it’s not easy, but do you see an H hovering in the air?” Remus nodded. “That’s Harry’s sign.” Remus blinked and shook his head to realign his eyes.
“You must have had awful headaches from that,” Remus remarked as they approached the cave.
“Nothing to what Harry had to go through before he learned Occlumency.” Hermione’s wand flicked through the air, the rune
forming between them and the cave. “That will keep anyone that might follow us out.” She tapped her wand against her other hand and grinned. “You know why I used it, right?”
“Algiz, also known as Yr and Elhaz, is for protection and growth. It also represents success through endeavor in a search, quest, or other enterprise. I am a Defense Against the Dark Arts expert, Hermione.” They walked through the rune, a shiver of awareness coming over both of them.
The tunnel wasn’t as long as Remus remembered, but then he was moving in a different plane and under his own power. They stepped out into a large chamber with what looked like other tunnels dotting the edges, probably leading deeper under Hogwarts Castle. A cauldron and a pile of raven’s feathers sat where Hermione indicated and there was a blanket and a trunk nearby which was probably Harry’s emergency supply kit.
Hermione began casting, but Remus stayed her hand. “No, not yet.”
Remus sniffed the air, untangling the scents. “Andromeda was…there!” He pointed to the far side of the chamber, and Hermione thought she saw a shade floating where Remus indicated.
“Harry slept here at least one night,” Remus said, indicating the blanket on the ground. He scuffed the floor and a puff of dust rose up and seemed to gather at chin height so he could sniff it leisurely. “Yeah, he dosed me with a foxglove tincture, the wily bugger. And heart’s-ease.” The dust dissipated and another shade appeared, this one with glinting eyes, much like Harry’s glasses.
“Um, Remus, what’s happening?” Hermione asked softly as she backed toward the cave entrance.
Blinking, Remus looked around and then saw the shades, right where he’d pointed out Andromeda and Harry’s last positions. “I don’t know, but I’d say that Baka Barica’s last gift to me is showing itself. She said I’d now be seeing what the eye usually cannot.”
He laughed, a bit shakily. “I’m just as surprised as you are.”
Hermione came closer and tugged Remus down so she could pat his cheek. “In this light, you look an awful lot like a Green Man plaque I saw as a child. I trust you. It’s just a bit, um, perplexing.” She leaned back. “Your eyes are more yellow now, too.”
“I think I’m more alive and connected to the Earth than ever before, my dear. It’s as if I’m the man I was supposed to be, finally.” Remus straightened and concentrated on the shades, willing them to do something, anything to show him what had happened in the underground chamber. When they didn’t move, he sighed; they disappeared without a sound.
“Look over there, where Andie’s shade hovered, Hermione. I’ll look over here. I’m missing my clothes from the battle. Perhaps if we find them, they might tell us something.”
For several minutes, they searched. Hermione found Andromeda’s wand in a pile of stones. Remus found his clothes-including his jacket-the stench of blood muted by magic. He smelled the raven’s scent on the material, and thought it reminded him of something just out of reach. He smiled when he opened his secret pocket and withdrew Baka Barica’s purse. “Ah, there you are,” he muttered.
“What’s that?” Hermione had glided over the gravelly chamber floor silently, probably a Levicorpus variant she’d created herself.
Remus shook out the dummy, the old bracelet of coins, and the scroll. “Baka Barica’s last gift to me. I think the dummy’s for Teddy, a sign of my parenthood. The bracelet, wealth and plenty, and, finally, the scroll was just a mes-” Remus stopped and stared at the scroll, the writing had changed. “Just a minute! The message is different,” he exclaimed.
He silently read the scroll and handed it to Hermione, who read it aloud:
Remy Lupin,
By now you have seen other parts of the living world. As the Queen of Pentacles revels in abundance, luxuriance, and harmony, so does her wolf.
It is your nature to protect your own, hearth, home, and husband. If you seek him, you will find him. If you go to where he should be, you will find your path. If you seek your family, they will be with him.
~ Baka Barica
“I don’t believe in Divination, but this gypsy is certainly more convincing than Professor Trelawney ever was.” Hermione handed the scroll back with a bit of a flourish. “Well, we can take one of the tunnels, although I don’t know where they lead, or we can go back and-”
Remus interrupted her, “No. I can lead us to the correct tunnel and straight to where Severus should be.”
Hermione’s eyes widened as she thought over the message and then she grinned. She repeated, “‘Hearth, home, and husband.’” A flick of her wand and the trunk was shut, shrunk, and seized. “You’re in love with Professor Snape, aren’t you?” she asked with a saucy glint in her eye. “I mean, you want to find Mrs. Tonks and Harry as long you find him, too, don’t you?”
“You are the smartest witch of your generation,” Remus muttered. “What do you think?” He levitated the raven feathers from the ground and cast a simultaneous cleaning charm on them, pocketing the bundle when they were gleaming black once more.
“Well, the leaves in your hair are fluttering as if in a stiff wind, and in this light, they look like they’re blushing, so I’d say I was correct.” Hermione’s voice was smug, as was the look on her face.
Rolling his eyes, Remus harrumphed and began sniffing at the air, walking toward one of the tunnel openings on the other side of the chamber. “Fine, fine. Now, c’mon, I’ve got a family to put back together.” Hermione giggled.
They made their way across finely-broken stone until it looked like they were on a rough path. “I’d venture to say Hogwarts is helping us herself.” Remus pointed down, the path was smoothing out as they approached a tunnel.
“Harry always said the castle was almost alive.” Hermione stepped onto the smoothed path and sighed. “It’s times like this make me wonder when he got so smart.”
“As my adopted godson, I can say Harry’s always been quite insightful. It’s just difficult to show when you’re the target of a madman from birth.” Hermione made a sound of agreement.
Remus paused at the tunnel entrance and took a deep inhalation through his nose. “Yes, this is. There’s Andromeda’s favorite perfume, Violet Viola, and there’s Harry’s scent, like dirt and boy, but mixed with beans and toast,” he muttered.
“Beans and toast is what he was eating morning, noon, and night some days. Of course he’d still smell like it.” Hermione wrinkled her nose at the memory of how odiferous Ron and Harry had been while they hunted the horcruxes.
They entered the tunnel without a backward glance. If they had, they might have noticed a point of light bobbing along behind them.
~o°Ω°o~
Remus led the two of them around blind curves and past other adits without a thought. Hermione renewed her Lumos as the angle of the tunnel floor changed, going downwards.
They reached a brick wall and Remus growled.
“Their scents are mixed here, as if someone pushed them together and left them here for a time.”
Hermione conjured Blue Bell Flames at the tip of her wand and touched it to the walls, leaving globs of flicking blue light behind. Remus watched and did the same on his side of the wall until it was bright enough to see the whole wall. “Where did you learn to do that with the Blue Bell Flames?” Remus asked as he looked around their circle of blue flames.
“I got bored one summer.” Hermione didn’t elucidate and Remus decided to follow up later.
“Why isn’t Ron with you?” he asked instead. He put his wand on his sleeve and cast a faint sticking charm to keep it there, handy, while he let his fingers wander the mortar lines of the wall.
“He…. Ooh, the great lump won’t stir from his mother’s side yet.” Hermione ground her teeth, a sound that carried in the closeness of the tunnel. “I know they miss Fred. I miss him, I do. He and George could make me laugh, no matter how dreadful things were.” She ran her fingers at the joint where the bricks met the tunnel wall. “I asked, but he said that if Harry was powerful enough to kill Voldemort, he could take care of himself now that Snakeface is dead.”
Remus glanced over at Hermione and saw her bite her lip. “I’m sorry, Hermione.”
She waved her hand distractedly. “No. I knew it wouldn’t last, how close we were, but I thought the chance to do something might bestir Ron. He was a marvel during those last days, you know.” Remus heard the pride in her voice and grunted a yes in her direction.
“Perhaps he just needs time, Hermione?” Remus reached over and patted her shoulder in a fatherly fashion.
Hermione stilled under Remus’ touch and suddenly asked, “Do you feel a breeze, Remus?” Her curly hair was fluffing around her head, as she pressed her fingers into a gap that blended with the shadows of the tunnel and the brick edges.
Remus leaned close and drew in a deep breath, the scents flowing over his tongue like fine wine. “Yes, yes,” he muttered. “The air’s more like the damp of the Slytherin dungeons than the tunnel.” Hermione’s fingers were pressing and tugging at the bricks when a section suddenly opened like a door pushed open. It wasn’t dark on the other side of the brick wall-there were torches flaring into the distance.
“I’d say we found our way in,” Hermione whispered. Remus nodded and motioned for her to get behind him.
When she didn’t move right away, he mouthed, “Cover my back.” Then she nodded in return and stepped back, following him into the Slytherin dungeons.
The brick wall closed behind them, but not completely. If Hermione had been one minute longer holding back, she might have seen the light traveling up the tunnel behind them.
~o°Ω°o~
They looked around the hallway, noticing snakes carved into the lintels and on a stone border near the ceiling. “Looks like it is Slytherin House, though older, maybe a part that’s not used anymore?” Hermione posited.
Remus sniffed the air and began coursing down the hallway, his boot heels ringing on the flagstones. “I can…. Harry was here, recently,” he murmured. “And there’s the raven and…and Severus.”
As Remus’ words faintly echoed in the hallway, the light that had trailed them rushed forward, blinding them with an explosion of light and sound.
~o°Ω°o~
Remus came to in somewhere inside the Slytherin Dungeons. He knew it had to be there from the carved snakes on the walls and the statue of Salazar Slytherin he was tied to. When he turned his head, he saw Hermione bound-and gagged-just a few yards away. There was a woman seated on a dais, in a heavily carved chair, her chin resting on her chest. At her feet, Harry-no one else alive had that messy head of hair-lolled like a marionette with its strings cut. Remus’ eyes darted around the room, looking for the raven or Severus, but neither was visible.
“Looney, loopy Lupin! Looney, loopy Lupin’s awake at last! Ha ha ha!”
“Peeves?!” Remus asked no one in particular.
A barely transparent being manifested between Hermione and Remus. “Creeping, creeping in my lady’s castle home,” Peeves sang, “I’ve gone and caught the Creeper and his creeping friend.”
“Untie me, Peeves!” Remus demanded. He struggled in his bonds, as did Hermione. “Untie me, damn it!”
Suddenly, Peeves changed from his normal strange attire to something straight out of Shakespeare, sporting a small ruff around his neck, a doublet and hose, and even a jaunty saucer hat on the back of his head.
“Nay, knave!” this new manifestation thundered. “I hight Puck, or Robin Goodfellow, if you will. I am the jester to my lady queen.” Remus followed Peeves’, Puck’s, finger as he pointed at the woman now sitting regaling on what could only be her throne. “My lady, Titania, Queen of the Elves!”
Andromeda Tonks climbed down from her dais with floating steps. Harry sat up and grinned at Remus’ dazed look.
“Ah, you are the one my Prince Harry brought to me, the one that escaped my pleasure,” Andromeda said. Remus saw her mouth moving, but with his second sight, he saw a being floating just above her skin, using her. He also took a breath and almost sneezed; her scent was musty and stale. “Soon, very soon, I’ll have regained my rightful place in this world,” she reached out to stroke Remus’ cheek, “with my wolf by my side.”
Remus shook his head and snarled. “No! This isn’t your world anymore.”
Hermione’s eyes were huge as she watched the possessed Andromeda heave Remus across the room to slide down the wall in a gasping heap.
“Where, little beast, do you think all that magic had come from? Where did you think it would go when you released it upon my fairy mound?” Andromeda/Titania asked. She pushed a stray inky curl back over her shoulder. “Even this witch, a daughter of one of my fairies, didn’t understand how much power you had awoken.”
“It’s been a thousand years since Hogwarts Castle was built. Why did this battle awaken you?” Remus gasped out. He tried to sit up, pressing against the wall and pushing himself up. Andromeda/Titania glided closer, as did Puck and Harry.
“When Oberon bid me retire into slumber all those ages ago, he stole my wolf, my favorite guard.” The Fairy Queen reached down and tipped Remus’ head up so she could watch his expressions. “In my dreams I sent Puck to hunt for it, to retrieve it if possible. Oberon stripped him of his fairy magic and bound him to my mound and then gave the wizards my home!” Her voices echoed around the room, making some of the carved snakes shiver and slither away.
“You puny witches and wizards hold so much magic, much of it untouched, untapped. When you came together, when blood and magic were spilled, I awoke once more.” Andromeda/Titania turned to smile tightly at Harry as he crouched by her side. “When Prince Harry entered my mound, I knew my time had returned. You see, he’d brought my wolf to me.”
Peeves laughed and flew in dizzying maneuvers over their heads, whooping and laughing. “My queen has come to save the day, Lupine one. She’ll make ye as ye were and then there’ll be no chains to bind us here anymore!”
Remus blinked and shook his head, trying to gather his scattered wits. He saw Hermione rolling side-to-side, slowly making her way toward a wall. “I’m not your wolf, and you’re not Titania. You’re a spirit that’s taken hold of my mother-in-law, Andromeda Tonks. You don’t belong here anymore!” Remus shouted, distracting the others from whatever Hermione was trying to do.
Harry sat back on his haunches and a calculating gleam came into his eyes. He winked at Remus and began scuttling back, out of Andromeda/Titania’s sight.
“Your time is passed, spirit. You might be Titania, but even a queen knows when to step aside.” Suddenly, Remus was upright, dangling as if an invisible hand pressed him against the wall. Unfortunately, his feet weren’t touching the floor.
He gasped. His vision clouded, yet it was as if he could see more clearly. There were other spirits with them, one a majestic man with a plain crown on his head who seemed to merge with Harry.
“Titania!” Harry shouted. Remus slid down the wall onto his knees, his throat rasping as he drew in gulps of air.
“Oberon!”
“Aye, my queen, ‘tis your king, you husband.” Harry stood up and folded his arms, Oberon’s spectre more obvious than Titania’s. “Long ago we forsook this land, giving it over to druid and wizard and man. Why have thee taken it upon thyself to enter this realm again?” He indicated himself and then pointed at Andromeda/Titania. “Hast thy power waned so that thy visage is but a pale shade laid over a woman?” A dark mist began to rise from the flagstones to swirl around Harry/Oberon and Andromeda/Titania. Puck yelped and disappeared through a wall.
“I shall live again, Oberon!” Titania’s power added to Andromeda’s magic called up a storm, lightning and thunder crashing in the confines of the room and making Remus’ head ache. Hermione disappeared beneath the swirling mist. “I want to live again.”
The flapping of wings overpowered the thunder and lightning and then the only sound was of cawing and chuffing. Oberon laughed, then Harry laughed as well as they separated. Oberon strode forward and wrenched Titania from Andromeda’s body with one tug. A dark shape fell from the ceiling, wings transforming into flapping robes as it passed through the mist.
Severus Snape knelt at Oberon’s feet as the fairy king held a struggling, snarling Titania by his side. “Lord Oberon, my thanks for your timely arrival,” Severus said. Oberon reached out and Severus flinched and then relaxed over his knee as Oberon patted his shoulder once.
“Many thanks for thine intellect, wizard. I’ll take my prize and will away to hallowed grounds,” Oberon shook Titania until she looked at him, “hallowed grounds that are for fairies to gallop and dance within. I’ll need my queen there at my side as well.” Titania slumped in Oberon’s hold and then faded away like a will o’the wisp.
“She’s headstrong, but she’s my queen,” Oberon said with a chuckle as he turned to grin at Remus.
“Sounds like a lot of women I know,” Harry laughed. He reached down into the mist and pulled up Hermione.
“May I rescue my…companion, Lord Oberon?” Severus asked.
“Aye, wizard. He is dazed, but unbroken by my lady’s tantrums.” Oberon looked at Remus, his gaze clear even through the mist between them. “She blesses you even as she covets your world, Lupin of Brittany. Aye, I recognize the old magic within you. You are not her wolf, but similar. I charge you help young Harry with his dreams, Lupin, and stand steadfast at my wizard’s side…” Oberon faded away even as his words drifted in the mist.
~o°Ω°o~
Severus stood up and turned toward Remus. After Remus half-heartedly pawed as his pocket, Severus retrieved his wand. The ropes were as nothing under his wand and he cast a couple of healing spells as well while Remus looked at him wonderingly. “Cat got your tongue, Lupin?” Severus finally asked.
“No. It’s just not every day I wake up from battle a week late and meet Shakespeare’s fairy king and queen and get rescued by a raven.” Remus put up a hand to his still aching head and winced.
“You should be happy you didn’t have a fairy queen wear you like an ill-fitting dress.” Andromeda sat up on the floor, the last tendrils of mist flowing over her. She grimaced as she tried to stand. Harry and Hermione rushed to her side and helped her to her feet. “Bloody fae cow,” Andromeda muttered darkly. “My head is ringing nineteen to the dozen.”
She turned her head and saw her son-in-law wavering against the wall. “Remus, are you really all right?” Andromeda asked softly.
They shared a look and then Remus smiled. “Oh, aye, Andie. I know you tried to help me. I did hear you.” He put up a hand and almost grinned at Severus’ put-upon look as he heaved Remus to his feet. “What say we go home and let Teddy show his appreciation, too?”
“Hey, yeah, how is the little guy?” Harry slung his arm around Hermione as Andromeda turned and slowly walked toward a door that hadn’t been there before. “I’m supposed to be his godfather, you know.”
Snorting, Severus kept a hand on Remus’ back as they all moved into the hallway. “The poor child,” he mumbled out of the side of his mouth.
Severus called out more loudly, “Andromeda, turn right and keep on straight. We’re in the oldest part of the dungeon.” His hand never left Remus’ back as they walked. Harry and Hermione stayed close to Andromeda as they wove their way back into the more recent portion of Slytherin.
~o°Ω°o~
A House in the Country
A quick trip through the Floo to Hogsmeade and soon everyone was showered and dressed in clean robes, sitting in Remus’ home. Hermione and Andromeda were cooing over Teddy while Harry and Snape filled Remus in what he’d missed. Mundungus and Minerva sat opposite each other, cringing and glaring, respectively.
Severus sniffed in a superior manner. “My Animagus ability only recently manifested-”
Harry gave a barking laugh. “Manifested? I’ll say! You should have seen it when he fell asleep on your chest as a raven and then transformed back. Almost smothered you in those manky robes of his.” His grin was wide, lightening the pain in his eyes.
Snape picked up his wand and lightly swatted Harry on the back of the head with a silent spell, and continued. “As I was saying, I learned I could transform into a raven weeks before the final battle. After Nagini bit me, and I gave Mr. Potter my memories-which I will want back soon, young man-I drank my healing potions and swallowed a bezoar. I also became the raven, and found my preventive measures were even better in such a small for-”
“You pecked me, you know, when you were a horrid bird,” Andromeda interjected. She laid Teddy against her shoulder and patted his back until he burped twice. “My finger still hurts.”
Shifting on his seat, Fletcher interrupted Severus’ reply. “Ye don’t need me anymores, Remus ol’ man, do ye?” Mundungus asked, one shoulder dipping low in a bid for looking innocent.
“You can go, Mundungus, but you’ll stick close, won’t you? Wouldn’t want to find out you had anything to do with bringing Titania back to these shores, would I?” Remus watched Fletcher’s face blanch, certain the thief had sold someone something above and beyond being illicit and illegal that had added to their adventure. “And I’d put back that short sword you took from the hall…”
Everyone watched as the thief bolted out of the room with barely a backward glance, laughing as the doors tried to pinch shut on his disreputable cloak and the purloined sword clattered to the floor in the foyer. Then, the conversations resumed and Remus sat back, content to listen to them bicker and talk over each other, his son slowly fading into sleep on his grandmother’s shoulder. Without the house or the money, he knew he was still a very lucky, very prosperous man.
~o°Ω°o~
Hours later, after a hearty dinner, only Remus and Severus were left in the parlor, the firelight and a few candles casting a warm glow over the two of them.
“…You were protecting me.” Remus leaned back in his chair, legs splayed out as he stared into the fire.
“Fat lot of good it did me.” Severus sat in a matching chair, his feet on an ottoman.
“How so? I’m here, I’m rich and landed, and it’s a gypsy contract which the Ministry dare not break or there’ll be hell to pay, and I’ve got you and Teddy, even Andromeda and Harry…perhaps even Hermione as family…” Remus’ voice trailed off.
“So tell me how did you get those things from Baka Barica?” Remus steepled his fingers and stared at Severus staring into the flames.
“You’re not the only one who’s met the lady, Lupin.” Severus slanted a sly look at Remus. “My mum used to buy potions ingredients from her when she came to town.” He held out his hand and conjured a small Blue Bell Flame on one fingertip. “She taught me some interesting defensive spells over the years.”
“So, all those Dark spells, eh?” Remus asked with a grin. “You’re telling me Baka Barica taught you those?” He shook his head and then laughed. “She taught me Defense Against the Dark Arts…gypsy-style.”
They shared more stories about the gypsies and then Remus suddenly stilled.
“You do want to be with me, don’t you, Severus?” He determinedly kept his eyes on the flames dancing in the fireplace.
Severus swung his legs off the ottoman and then stood up. In three strides he was standing in front of Remus, between those splayed-out legs. Then he knelt and reached out, bringing Remus’ face close enough to kiss. Minutes passed as Severus reminded Remus why he’d done everything. Those long, nimble fingers of his were gentle as they sifted through hair and leaves, holding Remus safe.
When they needed to breathe properly, Severus sank back on his heels, hands stroking down Remus’ chest and coming to rest on Remus’ lap. “Does that answer your question?” he asked softly. His face was flushed, his eyes heavy-lidded as he stared at Remus’ plump, well-kissed lips.
“Oh, aye, it does.” Remus leaned forward and pulled Severus back for another round of kisses. He grinned against Severus’ lips as they broke apart once more. “It means I’m going to be a wonderfully happy Queen of Pentacles from now on.”
Severus pulled back with a question, but Remus stole it from his lips. The fire crackled and the sounds of buttons popping and murmurs of happiness, directions, and pleas warmed the air. Around the pair, the house almost glowed with Remus’ rising joy. Everything was finally right with the world, and everyone was exactly where they were supposed to be.
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~~~ Comments, like rain in the desert, are greatly appreciated.
Thank you for reading. ~~~
References
EUdict is a collection of online dictionaries for the languages spoken mostly in the European Community.
Elder Futhark: Algiz
Glossary
1) Mali: (mah*lee) Croatian for young, small.
2) Ciganski: (tsee*gahn*ski) Croatian word for gypsy (plural).
a. Ciganica (tsee*gah*nee*tsa): gypsy (feminine).
3) Hvala: (h*fah*lah) Croatian for “Thanks”.
4) Mladić: (mlah*dich) Croatian for adolescent, young man.
Author: Bonfoi / bonfoi
Type: Fiction
Length: ~ 8,300
Main character or Pairing: Remus Lupin; Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks, Remus Lupin/Severus Snape
Card: Queen of Pentacles
Card Interpretation: The Queen of Pentacles embodies the following: security is important; emotions are a necessity; a practical and loving parent is not just a description; a sensual and passionate lover is part of one’s being; and, the person who personifies this card is not flashy or ostentatious. Biddy interpretation
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: The world of Harry Potter, its characters and settings are the copyrighted works of J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros., her publishing companies and affiliates. No profit was made from the writing of this story nor was any malice intended in any way, shape or form to the author or the actors/actresses who so brilliantly have brought them to life.
This author is not responsible for underage readers. Please observe the ratings, warnings, and age of legal consent for your country.
Highlight for Warnings: * Alternate Reality; Canon Death; OoC Andromeda Tonks; Original Characters; Slash *
Summary: Before Remus ever came to Hogwarts, his life was touched by gypsy magic.
Author Notes: I have to thank my English teachers, my professors, and all the reading I’ve ever done. I really have to heap praise upon ravenna_c_tan for being so wonderful to host this festival once more. Many thanks for letting me play and for being so patient with me!
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Prologue
The gypsy, Baka Barica, was dressed in a peasant gown, red embroidery upon thick, white cotton across her chest. She had a black apron with pockets that seemed bottomless and wore strings of beads, corals, and strung gold and copper coins, some that looked as old as the Romans. Her babushka was a brilliant royal blue, with copper rounds along the edges that glinted as she shook or turned her head. There was no way to tell her age, and Remy wouldn’t guess aloud. Mam had said it was rude.
Remy stood at Papa’s side as Mam greeted the gypsy with a smile and a hug, her gap-toothed grin familiar after all these years. He winced a bit as the wound on his shoulder pulled, healing still, even after all the potions and the poultices his parents had used. The gypsy noticed and beckoned him forward with a crooked finger and an even more crooked grin.
“Come and let me see you, mali Lupin,” she said in faintly-accented English. “You are become ‘andsome boy.” Her hands hovered over his head and then flowed down the sides of his face and over his shoulders, stopping directly above his wound. Papa stiffened, but didn’t move as she pushed aside his robe and shirt, baring the werewolf’s bite.
“You should ‘ave brought ‘im to me directly,” Baka Barica scolded his parents. Papa and Mam shared a surprised look.
“We Ciganski ‘ave seen many things in the world. Do you think we did not meet the Moon Wolf in h’our travels?” she asked as her hands kneaded Remy’s shoulders. He closed his eyes and relaxed under her ministrations as she continued speaking. “You are not the h’only ones who ‘ave Moon Children.” Remy sighed as the pain dulled.
“I cannot break the Moon Wolf’s curse, but, because you give us respect and kindness, I will find the boy’s strength.”
Remy opened his eyes and smiled shyly as Baka Barica lifted her hands away. “It feels better, Baka. Thank you.” He bowed his head. “Hvala.”
Baka clapped her hands and the gold coins of her bracelets jingled merrily. “Yes, I will ‘elp him. ‘e will be h’our gift to the future, eh?” She grinned and then whistled. A young gypsy boy brought a table and chair for her. Baka pulled a deck of cards from the pocket of her apron and waved the Lupins to a log nearby. “The cards will show us, mali Lupin, a path. If you are brave and smart, you will find your way, and your ‘appiness.”
She shuffled the cards and then handed them to Remus. “Concentrate on being brave and true, mali Lupin. ‘old that in your mind and shuffle the cards three times, then set them down h’on my table.” Remus did as she asked and then leaned forward as she drew a single card and turned it over: the Queen of Pentacles.
“Ah, you are h’as I said, mladić. You h’are strong in the ways of Nature. You are strong, even without the curse of the Moon Wolf in you.” Baka chuckled and looked from his mother to his father. “He likes to pamper himself, even at this age, yes?” They nodded.
“Remy likes his chocolate. I often think he works for it,” Papa joked.
Baka Barica tapped the card with a wrinkled but strong finger. “This is his card. He will be the Queen’s man as well as the Queen’s wolf.”
~o°Ω°o~
After the Battle of Hogwarts
Remus Lupin hadn’t wanted to leave his family, but he’d known it was the right thing to do, protecting Teddy’s future as well as Harry’s. He hadn’t thought he’d be part of the battlefield when he thought of it again.
A raven landed by his shoulder and awkwardly dropped a small purse near his hand. Inside he found a baby’s dummy, a bracelet adorned with old gold coins, and a scroll. He didn’t need to see the writing on the scroll to know somehow Baka Barica had found him when he needed encouragement the most.
He groaned as he struggled away from Tonks’ body, the mud trying to suck him back in, toward oblivion. Once he was steady on his knees, Remus unrolled the scroll with shaking fingers even as he listened for more spell-casting, but he heard nothing but the wind gusting over the battlefield.
Remy Lupin,
Soon you travel a new road. Remember you are the Queen of Pentacles’ Wolf. You are of Nature, mladić. You are father, homemaker, protector, lover.
I give you a gift for your next journey, Moon Wolf. May you see with your heart what cannot be seen with the eye.
~ Baka Barica
Remus put everything back into the purse, cinched it shut, and then shoved it, gently, into the special pocket of his jacket. It sealed with a faint puff of air, letting him know nothing would fall out without a strong Alohamora and the password. He crawled to a tree where the raven sat and heaved a sigh. The sky was incongruously bright and cheerful, the birds and other animals of the Forbidden Forest creeping out with whistles and snorts. After all that death and destruction, life was pushing back its own veil.
He only had a faint inkling, the barest whiff of something foul, and then he was hit with a sizzling red curse. The raven cawed harshly and flew away. Seconds later, a man’s thin scream wavered in the air. Remus clawed at his chest, a burning sensation robbing him of his breath and sight and only leaving touch to let him know the hex had done what all the other spells hadn’t. His eyes closed and he slumped over.
~o°Ω°o~
“Bloody hell, Mrs. Tonks!”
“I may not have liked his taking up with my girl, Harry, but I know a thing or two about Dark Magic. Little Teddy will need his father and you’re going to help me.”
The two voices were hissing over Remus’ body as he struggled to follow what was going on. He rose and fell in the air, and came to the conclusion he was on a stretcher, going over rough terrain. Two people were carrying him without magic, and arguing fit to raise the dead. He chuckled weakly at that thought and the bouncing motion stopped suddenly.
“Did you hear that?” Harry asked. “I think he’s coming to.”
“Yes, I did. We’ve got to get him to the other side of the castle as fast as possible.” The bouncing commenced once more. “Did you ever find the outside entrance to Slytherin?” Andromeda Tonks asked breathlessly.
“Yeah,” Harry huffed back. “It was first on my to-do list last year.” Andromeda snarled something under her breath and Harry rushed on. “There were tunnels all over. There should be an entrance just above the Slytherin Common room. Has a statue of woman petting a wolf and surrounded by a bloody great snake.”
Remus struggled to open his eyes, to let them know he was aware of them, but to no avail. Whatever hex had struck him, he was its prisoner until it wore away or someone removed it.
Andromeda and Harry set the stretcher down as horizontally as they could on the blasted earth and walked away, her boots and his shoes crunching over withered grass and broken stone. Remus lay there listening as their voices grew fainter, only the breeze over the grass and the buzzing of insects letting him know he was still alive and not in some limbo.
Harry’s shout of “Over here!” had Remus trying to turn over, but a weight settled on his chest and he gave up. The weight cawed, and Remus knew the raven had returned.
The air fizzed as a hex flew over Remus’ body. The raven only dug its talons deeper into his tattered coat and chest as it made a growling noise.
“Harry! Come back here!” Andromeda called. “There’s a raven perched on him!”
Feet slithered and slid over stone. “I’d swear that’s the bird I saw pecking Dolohov’s eyes out,” Harry whispered loudly. The talons loosened their grip and seemed to turn to look in the direction of Harry’s voice. “If Snape were still alive, I’d say he was an Animagus, this thing has his eyes.” The raven seemed to be preening on Remus’ chest.
“It didn’t move when I sent a hex at it. What should we do?” Andromeda asked, her teeth beginning to chatter.
Harry’s voice was older and wiser when he answered her. “If it’s not hurting him, I say leave it be. Too much death today.”
Feet scraped and rocks were kicked into other stones. “I’ve found the cave, I think. We should get him inside before the Aurors get to this side of the castle.” They picked Remus up and soon he wasn’t bouncing but levitating down a cool tunnel, Andromeda and Harry pushing his stretcher along as they discussed plans.
“Did anyone see him fall?”
Harry drew in a deep breath. “As far as I can tell he and Tonks were surrounded by Death Eaters at the end. The centaurs and the vampires won’t be telling anyone anything, so it’s a safe bet we’re the only ones that know Remus is still alive.”
Andromeda gulped back what sounded suspiciously like a sob. “If only my poor girl hadn’t run away from Teddy…”
“Hey, now, Mrs. Tonks.” A brightness formed over Remus’ head. “You know she was an Auror. She thought she was doing the right thing.”
“No, Harry. I know, knew Nymphadora. She wanted Remus, so she got him. She wanted him to stay with her, so she got pregnant.” Andromeda’s voice echoed a bit from the tunnel walls.
“She got him drunk, Harry. I always thought Nymphadora was an honorable woman, but she was a Black as well.” She sighed. “Sometimes, we are a bit barmy when we fancy ourselves in love.”
The stretcher stopped moving. “You mean you knew she tricked him?” Harry’s voice was querulous. “And you let her?”
“Remus didn’t seem to mind too much and Teddy was such a gift after Ted’s death…” her voice trailed off and the stretcher began moving once more. “I didn’t see the harm in letting Nympha-”
“Didn’t see the harm in forcing Remus into a wedding, huh?” Harry interrupted. “And I helped! I thought he was just being noble, saying he was too old for her, holding her off. I should have known better,” he growled. “But I was too focused on this sodding war and I failed him.”
They walked in silence until the tunnel seemed to open up. Remus felt a cross-breeze on his cheek. The raven ruffled its feathers as it stretched its wings.
Finally, Harry spoke again. “Look, I’m bloody tired of it all, Mrs. Tonks. Let’s just take care of Remus, okay?”
“I’m trying to make it right, Harry. We all of us used the poor man.” Soft fingers patted Remus’ cheek. “I’m so sorry, Remus. I shouldn’t have let Nymphadora have her way in this, but an old woman gets lost when she loses her man,” Andromeda whispered softly.
The raven shuffled and Andromeda yanked her hand away. “Blasted bird!” she cried. “He pecked me!”
“Probably doesn’t like sharing Remus, spoils of war and all that,” Harry said in a tone of voice that had Remus picturing him grinning.
“You sound like Snape,” Andromeda groused as she cast a healing charm and then cleared her throat.
“Do you think this is the place, Harry?” Andromeda asked. Remus’ stretcher hovered in the air.
Several large rocks seemed to be moving, grinding on each other. There was a crashing sound and then a rush of damp, musty air. “Yeah, this is it,” Harry shouted. “I stuck a chest of supplies in here behind the rock fall. We can take care of Remus for a bit, before we go back for Snape’s body.”
Remus shivered internally. Severus Snape was dead. It finally hit him that he’d survived while the greatest spy the Wizarding World would never acknowledge was dead. The raven seemed to sense his distress and rubbed its head into Remus’ chin.
“Does that bird know something?” Harry’s voice was closer and the stretcher bounced again as they cleared Harry’s rock fall.
“Ravens are intelligent creatures-even if they peck an unsuspecting body. They were often Wizarding familiars.” Andromeda pushed the stretcher down to the ground, the raven making a chirruping sound in its throat. “See? He knows we’re talking about him.” She stepped back, her boots grinding on the stone floor. “Unnatural bird,” she grumbled under her breath.
The sound of something scraping over the ground and then being opened startled the raven and it moved from side-to-side on Remus’ chest.
“Will the bird,” the raven squawked, “the raven affect our spells?” Harry’s voice was on Remus’ left.
“No. We’ll put the two of them to sleep for a day. That should give Remus’ lycanthropy a chance to repair some of the curse’s damage and our spells don’t need him to be awake.” Andromeda was on his right. “Can we leave them here safely, you think?”
When they began chanting, the burning pain receded. Remus felt the raven settling down, as if on a nest. The words flowed over him, cooling the burning in his chest and sending him off to sleep…to dream...
~o°Ω°o~
A House in the Country
“He’s a good man, was Remus Lupin.” Mundungus Fletcher stood twisting his shawl, tears glistening in his eyes. “’E never came the heavy wit’ me. Unlike somes in this room.”
“Fletcher!” Minerva McGonagall hissed.
“Aye, then. Here’s to tha foinest of werewolves and gen’lemen!” Mundungus raised a glass in toast and then drank it down in one go. He coughed. “Ta Remus Lupin!”
Other toasts followed and then Minerva stood up, a bundle with bluish-black hair in her arms. The voices grew still.
“We are here to welcome Theodore Lupin into our world.” Remus reached out and watched Teddy’s eyes change to the yellow of the wolf, little arms reaching out and little legs kicking in his blanket. Minerva glanced around and then muttered a swaddling charm to bundle up Teddy once more.
Remus touched her arm and suddenly images of lying on a sunny ledge, of long Wizarding and Muggle chess sessions with Albus and Flitwick, of a home in Edinburgh where there was an old wizard waiting with tea and Glenfiddich flooded his mind. Minerva stilled. Teddy kept trying to reach Remus.
She stiffened and then whispered, “There’s sum’un here!” Her accent was thick.
“Um, Professor McGonagall, Professor Lupin is standing behind you!” Neville Longbottom-bruised but standing tall-was pointing at Minerva, or behind her. His voice squeaked, but only a bit.
Minerva slowly turned around. Standing behind her was a very much alive, very much in need of more than the sheet wrapped around his waist, Remus John Lupin looking remarkably fit…with leaves growing in his hair.
“Oh! Remus!” He hadn’t expected Hermione to rush him and try to Splinch him with a hug, but it meant he truly was there, and alive. “We thought you were dead!” the bushy-haired girl sobbed into his chest. Neville hobbled close and shook his hand, eyes still almost bugging out of his head.
“No, I think…” Remus shook his head. “I think someone hid me away from the Aurors. Before that, I remember coming to near-” He swallowed down a lump in his throat. “Near Tonks. Then there was a raven, and a hex, and a cave.” Remus looked around the room as everyone else stared back.
“Where’s Andromeda and Harry?” he asked. Suddenly the happy faces were frowning. He clutched at his sheet, his son’s face crumpling up in a whimper as Minerva held him a bit too tightly for a second.
“I’m that sorry, Remus,” Minerva said softly. “They disappeared just before Teddy’s Welcoming Ceremony. That was a week ago.”
The temperature of the room-wherever they were-suddenly dropped. The shutters on the house closed over the windows, the fireplace sprouted flames where no wood was, and there was subtle shift in the air, as if the house was now a locked-down fortress.
“I need clothes, Minerva.” Remus turned to Hermione, still hanging on one arm. “Hermione, dear, I need you to tell me everything you can about ravens and a secret tunnel to Slytherin House.” Neville stepped back and began calming everyone one else, a fact Remus tucked away for later perusal.
Mundungus Fletcher was easing out of the room as silently as he could, but Remus’ voice stopped him cold. “Mundungus, you know something. You’re staying!” The door to the room wouldn’t budge when Fletcher pushed and kicked at it. The other witches and wizards huddled together, talking in hushed tones.
“I’m sorry, everyone, but I have to keep you here for a bit. That is, if you don’t mind?” Remus asked. There was steel in his voice, something they’d only heard when he was defending Snape. Heads bobbed in the affirmative and a few voices said “Aye. Yes.”
“Good. Now, about those clothes, Minerva?”
~o°Ω°o~
Remus could feel the house-his home-alive around him. The whole place seemed an extension of him. He felt the twenty-odd witches and wizards walking across the floors, the doors flexing as they guarded those within. It was…amazing.
“How did I get this house, Minerva?” he called from the master bath. He’d left the door ajar as he dressed. The fact that he could hear Teddy’s sleepy burbles settled him like nothing else.
Looking in the mirror, Remus had to grin a bit. His robes were richer than he was used to, of heavy velvet, embroidered with old spells of protection, hearth, and husbandry. There wasn’t one patch on trousers or vest to be seen. Remus almost missed his jacket-
“The deed arrived after the Death Eaters were routed. A goblin by the name of Tightfist delivered it to Andromeda’s and then came to me when he couldn’t find her. Seems a gypsy,” Minerva gave a superior sniff, “named Barbara Truegoodie bequeathed the house and a fortune to you should you prove, and I quote, ‘a husband, a father, a hero, the Queen’s man and the Queen’s wolf.’ Overly dramatic if ye ask me, but there, that’s a gypsy for ye.” Remus could just picture her crossing her arms over her bosom and rolling her cat-like eyes.
“I’d hazard a guess that’s Baka Barica. We often let her band of gypsies winter on the family land.”
“Well, as I survived that’s good enough for me, but what happened to Andromeda and Harry?” Remus asked as he pushed the door open. The robes were a bit unfamiliar but they fit well enough. “I remember them carrying me on a stretcher to a tunnel that led to Slytherin House, or at least, that’s what they were looking for.” He looked over at Teddy in his crib, hair shifting through a variety of colors as he dreamed.
“You still have leaves in your hair, Remus.” Minerva stood up and tried to pluck one out only to have Remus grab her wrist.
“They seem to be a part of me, Minerva. Believe me, I tugged one out and almost cried.” Remus let his former teacher’s hand go with a grimace. “Hurts like pulling great hanks of hair would.”
There was a knock on the door, and then it opened. Hermione Granger stood there, a wand in her hand, her cheeks reddened. “I thought you might want this.” She looked a bit dusty as she held up something. “I had to trick the house, Remus. I’m sorry. I climbed out a pantry window and then at the edge of your wards Apparated to the Ministry and Flooed to Hogwarts,” she said in a rush.
She gulped in a deep breath and started again as Remus and Minerva shared an amused glance; she hadn’t changed that much from when they’d taught her. She paced back and forth, once close enough to give Remus his wand.
“I found the cave you were talking about. We worked out a way to leave signs for each other and I found Harry’s, right where you…” Hermione’s voice wobbled. “…where you said. The tunnel entrance is quite clear and I found a cauldron and raven feathers inside. I also found your wand…and another one.” She held out a wand Remus had seen countless times before.
“It’s Snape’s, isn’t it?” she asked softly. The question was rhetorical.
“Och, what now?” Minerva queried.
She beckoned Hermione over and ran her own wand over Snape’s. “We often have to check wands when ye’re our students. This wand is definitely Severus’. It’s still warm, as Albus would’ve said.” She reached out and ran a gentle finger over the wand and then plucked it from Hermione’s hand and gave it to Remus. “You should keep this close, Remus. Knowing how our world works, Severus Snape is mos’ likely alive and in need of it.”
Remus blinked and his heart began beating harder. He could feel the leaves in his hair fluttering as if in a breeze. He looked into Minerva’s eyes and saw she’d known what he’d thought hidden. “How long?” he asked as he rubbed his fingers over Severus’ wand.
Teddy snuffled in his sleep and Remus walked over to soothe him.
“Since your time teaching. He’d always been a passionate lad, but only you could make him show it.” Minerva put her hand on Remus’ arm and drew his attention back her, both of them ignoring Hermione’s interested presence. “He went out of his way to drive you from the cursed position, then he sent me Wolfsbane to pass on to you. You’d gotten under his skin, no matter what vitriol he spewed.”
“Well, now it’s my turn to save him, wouldn’t you say?” Remus grinned, his prominent canines glinting as he did. “Hermione, come back to Hogwarts with me, will you? We’ve got some errant friends to rescue. Minerva, would you continue babysitting Teddy and Mundungus?” The two witches nodded and then left Remus with Teddy for a few minutes as the whole place brightened. Shutters opened, doors unbolted, and the house seemed to breathe as Remus straightened his shoulders.
~o°Ω°o~
Hogwarts Castle
Hermione and Remus stepped through the Hogwarts Floo near the Grand Hall. There was still a smell of death lingering, but the castle appeared to be airing out: the huge doors were open and several windows were missing completely as the sun and fresh air came in.
“It’s only been a week, but the castle seems to purging all the signs of war,” Hermione said in her teaching voice. “The windows pop in and out whenever a good breeze comes along.”
They walked out and Remus winced as the torn landscape. He could still see battles, spells burning the air as friends and foes alike were no more. He shook the images to the back of his mind and strode forward, Hermione just behind his right shoulder.
They rounded the castle and suddenly Remus smelled damp earth, and found the crunching sound of the broken stones under their feet familiar. “We’re close, aren’t we?” he asked. “I couldn’t open my eyes, but the smells and sounds seem correct.”
Hermione pointed at a shadow in the flank of Hogwarts. “There! Now, cross your eyes and push your magic out.” She waited while Remus crossed his eyes with a pained expression on his face. “I know it’s not easy, but do you see an H hovering in the air?” Remus nodded. “That’s Harry’s sign.” Remus blinked and shook his head to realign his eyes.
“You must have had awful headaches from that,” Remus remarked as they approached the cave.
“Nothing to what Harry had to go through before he learned Occlumency.” Hermione’s wand flicked through the air, the rune
forming between them and the cave. “That will keep anyone that might follow us out.” She tapped her wand against her other hand and grinned. “You know why I used it, right?”
“Algiz, also known as Yr and Elhaz, is for protection and growth. It also represents success through endeavor in a search, quest, or other enterprise. I am a Defense Against the Dark Arts expert, Hermione.” They walked through the rune, a shiver of awareness coming over both of them.
The tunnel wasn’t as long as Remus remembered, but then he was moving in a different plane and under his own power. They stepped out into a large chamber with what looked like other tunnels dotting the edges, probably leading deeper under Hogwarts Castle. A cauldron and a pile of raven’s feathers sat where Hermione indicated and there was a blanket and a trunk nearby which was probably Harry’s emergency supply kit.
Hermione began casting, but Remus stayed her hand. “No, not yet.”
Remus sniffed the air, untangling the scents. “Andromeda was…there!” He pointed to the far side of the chamber, and Hermione thought she saw a shade floating where Remus indicated.
“Harry slept here at least one night,” Remus said, indicating the blanket on the ground. He scuffed the floor and a puff of dust rose up and seemed to gather at chin height so he could sniff it leisurely. “Yeah, he dosed me with a foxglove tincture, the wily bugger. And heart’s-ease.” The dust dissipated and another shade appeared, this one with glinting eyes, much like Harry’s glasses.
“Um, Remus, what’s happening?” Hermione asked softly as she backed toward the cave entrance.
Blinking, Remus looked around and then saw the shades, right where he’d pointed out Andromeda and Harry’s last positions. “I don’t know, but I’d say that Baka Barica’s last gift to me is showing itself. She said I’d now be seeing what the eye usually cannot.”
He laughed, a bit shakily. “I’m just as surprised as you are.”
Hermione came closer and tugged Remus down so she could pat his cheek. “In this light, you look an awful lot like a Green Man plaque I saw as a child. I trust you. It’s just a bit, um, perplexing.” She leaned back. “Your eyes are more yellow now, too.”
“I think I’m more alive and connected to the Earth than ever before, my dear. It’s as if I’m the man I was supposed to be, finally.” Remus straightened and concentrated on the shades, willing them to do something, anything to show him what had happened in the underground chamber. When they didn’t move, he sighed; they disappeared without a sound.
“Look over there, where Andie’s shade hovered, Hermione. I’ll look over here. I’m missing my clothes from the battle. Perhaps if we find them, they might tell us something.”
For several minutes, they searched. Hermione found Andromeda’s wand in a pile of stones. Remus found his clothes-including his jacket-the stench of blood muted by magic. He smelled the raven’s scent on the material, and thought it reminded him of something just out of reach. He smiled when he opened his secret pocket and withdrew Baka Barica’s purse. “Ah, there you are,” he muttered.
“What’s that?” Hermione had glided over the gravelly chamber floor silently, probably a Levicorpus variant she’d created herself.
Remus shook out the dummy, the old bracelet of coins, and the scroll. “Baka Barica’s last gift to me. I think the dummy’s for Teddy, a sign of my parenthood. The bracelet, wealth and plenty, and, finally, the scroll was just a mes-” Remus stopped and stared at the scroll, the writing had changed. “Just a minute! The message is different,” he exclaimed.
He silently read the scroll and handed it to Hermione, who read it aloud:
Remy Lupin,
By now you have seen other parts of the living world. As the Queen of Pentacles revels in abundance, luxuriance, and harmony, so does her wolf.
It is your nature to protect your own, hearth, home, and husband. If you seek him, you will find him. If you go to where he should be, you will find your path. If you seek your family, they will be with him.
~ Baka Barica
“I don’t believe in Divination, but this gypsy is certainly more convincing than Professor Trelawney ever was.” Hermione handed the scroll back with a bit of a flourish. “Well, we can take one of the tunnels, although I don’t know where they lead, or we can go back and-”
Remus interrupted her, “No. I can lead us to the correct tunnel and straight to where Severus should be.”
Hermione’s eyes widened as she thought over the message and then she grinned. She repeated, “‘Hearth, home, and husband.’” A flick of her wand and the trunk was shut, shrunk, and seized. “You’re in love with Professor Snape, aren’t you?” she asked with a saucy glint in her eye. “I mean, you want to find Mrs. Tonks and Harry as long you find him, too, don’t you?”
“You are the smartest witch of your generation,” Remus muttered. “What do you think?” He levitated the raven feathers from the ground and cast a simultaneous cleaning charm on them, pocketing the bundle when they were gleaming black once more.
“Well, the leaves in your hair are fluttering as if in a stiff wind, and in this light, they look like they’re blushing, so I’d say I was correct.” Hermione’s voice was smug, as was the look on her face.
Rolling his eyes, Remus harrumphed and began sniffing at the air, walking toward one of the tunnel openings on the other side of the chamber. “Fine, fine. Now, c’mon, I’ve got a family to put back together.” Hermione giggled.
They made their way across finely-broken stone until it looked like they were on a rough path. “I’d venture to say Hogwarts is helping us herself.” Remus pointed down, the path was smoothing out as they approached a tunnel.
“Harry always said the castle was almost alive.” Hermione stepped onto the smoothed path and sighed. “It’s times like this make me wonder when he got so smart.”
“As my adopted godson, I can say Harry’s always been quite insightful. It’s just difficult to show when you’re the target of a madman from birth.” Hermione made a sound of agreement.
Remus paused at the tunnel entrance and took a deep inhalation through his nose. “Yes, this is. There’s Andromeda’s favorite perfume, Violet Viola, and there’s Harry’s scent, like dirt and boy, but mixed with beans and toast,” he muttered.
“Beans and toast is what he was eating morning, noon, and night some days. Of course he’d still smell like it.” Hermione wrinkled her nose at the memory of how odiferous Ron and Harry had been while they hunted the horcruxes.
They entered the tunnel without a backward glance. If they had, they might have noticed a point of light bobbing along behind them.
~o°Ω°o~
Remus led the two of them around blind curves and past other adits without a thought. Hermione renewed her Lumos as the angle of the tunnel floor changed, going downwards.
They reached a brick wall and Remus growled.
“Their scents are mixed here, as if someone pushed them together and left them here for a time.”
Hermione conjured Blue Bell Flames at the tip of her wand and touched it to the walls, leaving globs of flicking blue light behind. Remus watched and did the same on his side of the wall until it was bright enough to see the whole wall. “Where did you learn to do that with the Blue Bell Flames?” Remus asked as he looked around their circle of blue flames.
“I got bored one summer.” Hermione didn’t elucidate and Remus decided to follow up later.
“Why isn’t Ron with you?” he asked instead. He put his wand on his sleeve and cast a faint sticking charm to keep it there, handy, while he let his fingers wander the mortar lines of the wall.
“He…. Ooh, the great lump won’t stir from his mother’s side yet.” Hermione ground her teeth, a sound that carried in the closeness of the tunnel. “I know they miss Fred. I miss him, I do. He and George could make me laugh, no matter how dreadful things were.” She ran her fingers at the joint where the bricks met the tunnel wall. “I asked, but he said that if Harry was powerful enough to kill Voldemort, he could take care of himself now that Snakeface is dead.”
Remus glanced over at Hermione and saw her bite her lip. “I’m sorry, Hermione.”
She waved her hand distractedly. “No. I knew it wouldn’t last, how close we were, but I thought the chance to do something might bestir Ron. He was a marvel during those last days, you know.” Remus heard the pride in her voice and grunted a yes in her direction.
“Perhaps he just needs time, Hermione?” Remus reached over and patted her shoulder in a fatherly fashion.
Hermione stilled under Remus’ touch and suddenly asked, “Do you feel a breeze, Remus?” Her curly hair was fluffing around her head, as she pressed her fingers into a gap that blended with the shadows of the tunnel and the brick edges.
Remus leaned close and drew in a deep breath, the scents flowing over his tongue like fine wine. “Yes, yes,” he muttered. “The air’s more like the damp of the Slytherin dungeons than the tunnel.” Hermione’s fingers were pressing and tugging at the bricks when a section suddenly opened like a door pushed open. It wasn’t dark on the other side of the brick wall-there were torches flaring into the distance.
“I’d say we found our way in,” Hermione whispered. Remus nodded and motioned for her to get behind him.
When she didn’t move right away, he mouthed, “Cover my back.” Then she nodded in return and stepped back, following him into the Slytherin dungeons.
The brick wall closed behind them, but not completely. If Hermione had been one minute longer holding back, she might have seen the light traveling up the tunnel behind them.
~o°Ω°o~
They looked around the hallway, noticing snakes carved into the lintels and on a stone border near the ceiling. “Looks like it is Slytherin House, though older, maybe a part that’s not used anymore?” Hermione posited.
Remus sniffed the air and began coursing down the hallway, his boot heels ringing on the flagstones. “I can…. Harry was here, recently,” he murmured. “And there’s the raven and…and Severus.”
As Remus’ words faintly echoed in the hallway, the light that had trailed them rushed forward, blinding them with an explosion of light and sound.
~o°Ω°o~
Remus came to in somewhere inside the Slytherin Dungeons. He knew it had to be there from the carved snakes on the walls and the statue of Salazar Slytherin he was tied to. When he turned his head, he saw Hermione bound-and gagged-just a few yards away. There was a woman seated on a dais, in a heavily carved chair, her chin resting on her chest. At her feet, Harry-no one else alive had that messy head of hair-lolled like a marionette with its strings cut. Remus’ eyes darted around the room, looking for the raven or Severus, but neither was visible.
“Looney, loopy Lupin! Looney, loopy Lupin’s awake at last! Ha ha ha!”
“Peeves?!” Remus asked no one in particular.
A barely transparent being manifested between Hermione and Remus. “Creeping, creeping in my lady’s castle home,” Peeves sang, “I’ve gone and caught the Creeper and his creeping friend.”
“Untie me, Peeves!” Remus demanded. He struggled in his bonds, as did Hermione. “Untie me, damn it!”
Suddenly, Peeves changed from his normal strange attire to something straight out of Shakespeare, sporting a small ruff around his neck, a doublet and hose, and even a jaunty saucer hat on the back of his head.
“Nay, knave!” this new manifestation thundered. “I hight Puck, or Robin Goodfellow, if you will. I am the jester to my lady queen.” Remus followed Peeves’, Puck’s, finger as he pointed at the woman now sitting regaling on what could only be her throne. “My lady, Titania, Queen of the Elves!”
Andromeda Tonks climbed down from her dais with floating steps. Harry sat up and grinned at Remus’ dazed look.
“Ah, you are the one my Prince Harry brought to me, the one that escaped my pleasure,” Andromeda said. Remus saw her mouth moving, but with his second sight, he saw a being floating just above her skin, using her. He also took a breath and almost sneezed; her scent was musty and stale. “Soon, very soon, I’ll have regained my rightful place in this world,” she reached out to stroke Remus’ cheek, “with my wolf by my side.”
Remus shook his head and snarled. “No! This isn’t your world anymore.”
Hermione’s eyes were huge as she watched the possessed Andromeda heave Remus across the room to slide down the wall in a gasping heap.
“Where, little beast, do you think all that magic had come from? Where did you think it would go when you released it upon my fairy mound?” Andromeda/Titania asked. She pushed a stray inky curl back over her shoulder. “Even this witch, a daughter of one of my fairies, didn’t understand how much power you had awoken.”
“It’s been a thousand years since Hogwarts Castle was built. Why did this battle awaken you?” Remus gasped out. He tried to sit up, pressing against the wall and pushing himself up. Andromeda/Titania glided closer, as did Puck and Harry.
“When Oberon bid me retire into slumber all those ages ago, he stole my wolf, my favorite guard.” The Fairy Queen reached down and tipped Remus’ head up so she could watch his expressions. “In my dreams I sent Puck to hunt for it, to retrieve it if possible. Oberon stripped him of his fairy magic and bound him to my mound and then gave the wizards my home!” Her voices echoed around the room, making some of the carved snakes shiver and slither away.
“You puny witches and wizards hold so much magic, much of it untouched, untapped. When you came together, when blood and magic were spilled, I awoke once more.” Andromeda/Titania turned to smile tightly at Harry as he crouched by her side. “When Prince Harry entered my mound, I knew my time had returned. You see, he’d brought my wolf to me.”
Peeves laughed and flew in dizzying maneuvers over their heads, whooping and laughing. “My queen has come to save the day, Lupine one. She’ll make ye as ye were and then there’ll be no chains to bind us here anymore!”
Remus blinked and shook his head, trying to gather his scattered wits. He saw Hermione rolling side-to-side, slowly making her way toward a wall. “I’m not your wolf, and you’re not Titania. You’re a spirit that’s taken hold of my mother-in-law, Andromeda Tonks. You don’t belong here anymore!” Remus shouted, distracting the others from whatever Hermione was trying to do.
Harry sat back on his haunches and a calculating gleam came into his eyes. He winked at Remus and began scuttling back, out of Andromeda/Titania’s sight.
“Your time is passed, spirit. You might be Titania, but even a queen knows when to step aside.” Suddenly, Remus was upright, dangling as if an invisible hand pressed him against the wall. Unfortunately, his feet weren’t touching the floor.
He gasped. His vision clouded, yet it was as if he could see more clearly. There were other spirits with them, one a majestic man with a plain crown on his head who seemed to merge with Harry.
“Titania!” Harry shouted. Remus slid down the wall onto his knees, his throat rasping as he drew in gulps of air.
“Oberon!”
“Aye, my queen, ‘tis your king, you husband.” Harry stood up and folded his arms, Oberon’s spectre more obvious than Titania’s. “Long ago we forsook this land, giving it over to druid and wizard and man. Why have thee taken it upon thyself to enter this realm again?” He indicated himself and then pointed at Andromeda/Titania. “Hast thy power waned so that thy visage is but a pale shade laid over a woman?” A dark mist began to rise from the flagstones to swirl around Harry/Oberon and Andromeda/Titania. Puck yelped and disappeared through a wall.
“I shall live again, Oberon!” Titania’s power added to Andromeda’s magic called up a storm, lightning and thunder crashing in the confines of the room and making Remus’ head ache. Hermione disappeared beneath the swirling mist. “I want to live again.”
The flapping of wings overpowered the thunder and lightning and then the only sound was of cawing and chuffing. Oberon laughed, then Harry laughed as well as they separated. Oberon strode forward and wrenched Titania from Andromeda’s body with one tug. A dark shape fell from the ceiling, wings transforming into flapping robes as it passed through the mist.
Severus Snape knelt at Oberon’s feet as the fairy king held a struggling, snarling Titania by his side. “Lord Oberon, my thanks for your timely arrival,” Severus said. Oberon reached out and Severus flinched and then relaxed over his knee as Oberon patted his shoulder once.
“Many thanks for thine intellect, wizard. I’ll take my prize and will away to hallowed grounds,” Oberon shook Titania until she looked at him, “hallowed grounds that are for fairies to gallop and dance within. I’ll need my queen there at my side as well.” Titania slumped in Oberon’s hold and then faded away like a will o’the wisp.
“She’s headstrong, but she’s my queen,” Oberon said with a chuckle as he turned to grin at Remus.
“Sounds like a lot of women I know,” Harry laughed. He reached down into the mist and pulled up Hermione.
“May I rescue my…companion, Lord Oberon?” Severus asked.
“Aye, wizard. He is dazed, but unbroken by my lady’s tantrums.” Oberon looked at Remus, his gaze clear even through the mist between them. “She blesses you even as she covets your world, Lupin of Brittany. Aye, I recognize the old magic within you. You are not her wolf, but similar. I charge you help young Harry with his dreams, Lupin, and stand steadfast at my wizard’s side…” Oberon faded away even as his words drifted in the mist.
~o°Ω°o~
Severus stood up and turned toward Remus. After Remus half-heartedly pawed as his pocket, Severus retrieved his wand. The ropes were as nothing under his wand and he cast a couple of healing spells as well while Remus looked at him wonderingly. “Cat got your tongue, Lupin?” Severus finally asked.
“No. It’s just not every day I wake up from battle a week late and meet Shakespeare’s fairy king and queen and get rescued by a raven.” Remus put up a hand to his still aching head and winced.
“You should be happy you didn’t have a fairy queen wear you like an ill-fitting dress.” Andromeda sat up on the floor, the last tendrils of mist flowing over her. She grimaced as she tried to stand. Harry and Hermione rushed to her side and helped her to her feet. “Bloody fae cow,” Andromeda muttered darkly. “My head is ringing nineteen to the dozen.”
She turned her head and saw her son-in-law wavering against the wall. “Remus, are you really all right?” Andromeda asked softly.
They shared a look and then Remus smiled. “Oh, aye, Andie. I know you tried to help me. I did hear you.” He put up a hand and almost grinned at Severus’ put-upon look as he heaved Remus to his feet. “What say we go home and let Teddy show his appreciation, too?”
“Hey, yeah, how is the little guy?” Harry slung his arm around Hermione as Andromeda turned and slowly walked toward a door that hadn’t been there before. “I’m supposed to be his godfather, you know.”
Snorting, Severus kept a hand on Remus’ back as they all moved into the hallway. “The poor child,” he mumbled out of the side of his mouth.
Severus called out more loudly, “Andromeda, turn right and keep on straight. We’re in the oldest part of the dungeon.” His hand never left Remus’ back as they walked. Harry and Hermione stayed close to Andromeda as they wove their way back into the more recent portion of Slytherin.
~o°Ω°o~
A House in the Country
A quick trip through the Floo to Hogsmeade and soon everyone was showered and dressed in clean robes, sitting in Remus’ home. Hermione and Andromeda were cooing over Teddy while Harry and Snape filled Remus in what he’d missed. Mundungus and Minerva sat opposite each other, cringing and glaring, respectively.
Severus sniffed in a superior manner. “My Animagus ability only recently manifested-”
Harry gave a barking laugh. “Manifested? I’ll say! You should have seen it when he fell asleep on your chest as a raven and then transformed back. Almost smothered you in those manky robes of his.” His grin was wide, lightening the pain in his eyes.
Snape picked up his wand and lightly swatted Harry on the back of the head with a silent spell, and continued. “As I was saying, I learned I could transform into a raven weeks before the final battle. After Nagini bit me, and I gave Mr. Potter my memories-which I will want back soon, young man-I drank my healing potions and swallowed a bezoar. I also became the raven, and found my preventive measures were even better in such a small for-”
“You pecked me, you know, when you were a horrid bird,” Andromeda interjected. She laid Teddy against her shoulder and patted his back until he burped twice. “My finger still hurts.”
Shifting on his seat, Fletcher interrupted Severus’ reply. “Ye don’t need me anymores, Remus ol’ man, do ye?” Mundungus asked, one shoulder dipping low in a bid for looking innocent.
“You can go, Mundungus, but you’ll stick close, won’t you? Wouldn’t want to find out you had anything to do with bringing Titania back to these shores, would I?” Remus watched Fletcher’s face blanch, certain the thief had sold someone something above and beyond being illicit and illegal that had added to their adventure. “And I’d put back that short sword you took from the hall…”
Everyone watched as the thief bolted out of the room with barely a backward glance, laughing as the doors tried to pinch shut on his disreputable cloak and the purloined sword clattered to the floor in the foyer. Then, the conversations resumed and Remus sat back, content to listen to them bicker and talk over each other, his son slowly fading into sleep on his grandmother’s shoulder. Without the house or the money, he knew he was still a very lucky, very prosperous man.
~o°Ω°o~
Hours later, after a hearty dinner, only Remus and Severus were left in the parlor, the firelight and a few candles casting a warm glow over the two of them.
“…You were protecting me.” Remus leaned back in his chair, legs splayed out as he stared into the fire.
“Fat lot of good it did me.” Severus sat in a matching chair, his feet on an ottoman.
“How so? I’m here, I’m rich and landed, and it’s a gypsy contract which the Ministry dare not break or there’ll be hell to pay, and I’ve got you and Teddy, even Andromeda and Harry…perhaps even Hermione as family…” Remus’ voice trailed off.
“So tell me how did you get those things from Baka Barica?” Remus steepled his fingers and stared at Severus staring into the flames.
“You’re not the only one who’s met the lady, Lupin.” Severus slanted a sly look at Remus. “My mum used to buy potions ingredients from her when she came to town.” He held out his hand and conjured a small Blue Bell Flame on one fingertip. “She taught me some interesting defensive spells over the years.”
“So, all those Dark spells, eh?” Remus asked with a grin. “You’re telling me Baka Barica taught you those?” He shook his head and then laughed. “She taught me Defense Against the Dark Arts…gypsy-style.”
They shared more stories about the gypsies and then Remus suddenly stilled.
“You do want to be with me, don’t you, Severus?” He determinedly kept his eyes on the flames dancing in the fireplace.
Severus swung his legs off the ottoman and then stood up. In three strides he was standing in front of Remus, between those splayed-out legs. Then he knelt and reached out, bringing Remus’ face close enough to kiss. Minutes passed as Severus reminded Remus why he’d done everything. Those long, nimble fingers of his were gentle as they sifted through hair and leaves, holding Remus safe.
When they needed to breathe properly, Severus sank back on his heels, hands stroking down Remus’ chest and coming to rest on Remus’ lap. “Does that answer your question?” he asked softly. His face was flushed, his eyes heavy-lidded as he stared at Remus’ plump, well-kissed lips.
“Oh, aye, it does.” Remus leaned forward and pulled Severus back for another round of kisses. He grinned against Severus’ lips as they broke apart once more. “It means I’m going to be a wonderfully happy Queen of Pentacles from now on.”
Severus pulled back with a question, but Remus stole it from his lips. The fire crackled and the sounds of buttons popping and murmurs of happiness, directions, and pleas warmed the air. Around the pair, the house almost glowed with Remus’ rising joy. Everything was finally right with the world, and everyone was exactly where they were supposed to be.
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~~~ Comments, like rain in the desert, are greatly appreciated.
Thank you for reading. ~~~
References
EUdict is a collection of online dictionaries for the languages spoken mostly in the European Community.
Elder Futhark: Algiz
Glossary
1) Mali: (mah*lee) Croatian for young, small.
2) Ciganski: (tsee*gahn*ski) Croatian word for gypsy (plural).
a. Ciganica (tsee*gah*nee*tsa): gypsy (feminine).
3) Hvala: (h*fah*lah) Croatian for “Thanks”.
4) Mladić: (mlah*dich) Croatian for adolescent, young man.