Rather Than This
Title: Rather Than This
Author: jellybgood
Recipient: toujours_nigel
Rating: PG
Highlight for Warnings: *Implied violence and unspecified character deaths*
Word Count: 1072
Summary: The world may think the worst of Remus Lupin, but all he cares about is Sirius.
Author's notes: I took inspiration from Plato's quote "For what lover would not choose
rather to be seen by all mankind than by his beloved, either when abandoning his post or throwing away his arms? He would be ready to die a thousand deaths rather than endure this. Or who would desert his beloved or fail him in the hour of danger?" from Symposium and tried to apply it to a relationship during the First War, sprinkled with some subtle emotion. I hope it turned out be just the right treat for you! ^_^
“You ran away,” said Sirius in a flat voice, the anger and disgust carefully ironed out. Regardless, Remus still flinched, barely but noticeably, and looked back down at the thick tome he had opened in front of him.
“You ran away,” Sirius repeated, his voice wrinkling with the previously hidden anger and disgust and, now, a little disbelief and hurt at not receiving an explanation as he had hoped. He put his hands down over the book, covering the pages with widespread fingers. “Remus,” he said, although the other man had not moved a muscle.
He saw James come and lean against the outside doorway, his tired face developing a wary speculative look as he tried to determine if it would be a good idea to interrupt them or not. He looked down at the top and back of Remus’ head, the golden brown hair longer and shaggier than it usually was because he hadn’t had time to get it cut in the past few months; he hadn’t had time for Sirius either.
Sirius resigned himself to not getting an answer from Remus right then, and he looked directly at James, saying, “Everything okay?”
James rested his head against the doorway, the corners of his mouth pinched outwards as he attempted (and failed) to smile and nod casually. “Dumbledore wants to speak with you,” he said; in the months since they had started working for the Order fulltime, the natural exuberance of James’ voice had dimmed to a somber mature tone. Sirius missed how everything was before, when James laughed more, and when Remus wasn’t continuously away on missions that ended with his friends being killed because he had run away.
“All right,” he said, although he did not move to leave. James hovered in the doorway, watching him, before he nodded a little more strongly and went back to wherever Lily was, comforting Molly. Sirius waited a little bit longer, his hands still spread over the pages of the old book that Remus still pretended to read. “All right,” he said again, in a whisper, looking down at Remus’ head. He ached for something magical to happen at that moment (and wasn’t that irony for you). Nothing happened, but he raised his hand to stroke Remus’ hair once or twice before he sighed, again, and left to speak with Dumbledore.
Remus bowed his head further forward until it hit the book, resting in the crease of the binding of the open pages. He folded his arms over his head; inhaled and exhaled a deep breath, breathing the age and weight of the book in and out of his lungs. Then he sat up properly, ran his thumb down the index tabs jutting out from the sides of the pages, and flipped to the cartography section. He had to memorize the layout of the valley - the quick ways in, the quicker ways out - before his next mission.
XXX
Remus had been an excellent student in school, and graduating and leaving school to face the real world, and a war, had not diminished his capacity as an attentive pupil. He caught on very quickly to the game that he and his friends had become a part of; they had volunteered to fight for something they believed in, and they would probably die like the pawns they were being treated as.
However, as Remus had learned, every game of chess reaches the point where the players initiate their endgame strategies. And just because he was one of the pawns in this game, it didn’t mean that he couldn’t implement his own strategy.
He volunteered for the dangerous missions that involved spying, interacting, even befriending the most likely followers of Voldemort. These were the sort of jobs that bordered on, if not outright appeared to be, treasonous and unforgiveable behavior in the eyes of his friends. But these were the sort of jobs that the senior ranking Order members had wanted Sirius to do (because he’s a Black and he would fit right in with that lot). Remus has endured a lot in his life and being called a monster, or being labeled as a coward, behind his back isn’t going to cause him any emotional distress now when it hadn’t before.
Sirius looks at him as if the distance between them is growing to be as much as it is between earth and his namesake. Remus worries that it is.
XXX
James and Sirius, thought Remus, always had the terrible knack for getting into trouble together. The older they had gotten, the more alarming the trouble that they had gotten into.
At that moment Remus was on a ridge, looking down at the two of them taunting the ragged looking, but very dangerous, wizards that were closing them into a tight circle. The Dark creatures in their cages were hissing and snarling at the fusion of bloodlust and sharp magic in the air; the humanoid Dark creatures, like the werewolves, like Remus, were also creeping up close around James and Sirius. The illegal market of Dark creatures was a highly secret one, and the wizards that dealt in the trade, and the other beings that benefitted from it, would not let a couple of boys who had brashly stormed into their camp with noble attentions leave it alive.
Dumbledore would have wanted Remus to leave, quickly and quietly; there was an old hunter’s path that wound through the forest that he could have followed to a clearing far enough away that he could have apparated from. He probably would have said, with a rueful smile, that James and Sirius had always been as good as getting out of trouble together as they were getting into it, and there would be no need to worry about them.
Then Sirius raised his eyes and looked straight at Remus.
Remus didn’t care if the whole world thought that he was a monster or a traitor or a coward; he almost didn’t care that because everyone else thought this, sometimes Sirius did too; but he would never abandon Sirius to the slightest bit of danger, so long as he lived.
The wizards started throwing deadly spells, one of the werewolves leapt forward with a gleeful snarl, James snapped off a clever defense, Sirius looked away to focus his attention on the nearest opponent, and Remus: he went into the escalating battle, to James and Sirius’ side, and fought.
also @ rs_small_gifts