New Fic: Masks and Mirrors, Chapter 1
Title: Masks and Mirrors, Chapter 1 - Homecoming
Author: MrsTater
Rating: R
Summary: As Remus and Tonks rebuild their relationship, a dangerous Order mission only she can undertake dredges up the same old problems -- as well as an entirely new set when the family she was born into clashes with the family she has made for herself within the Order of the Phoenix.
Author's Note: This fic is part of the Transfigured Hearts universe and follows Don't Look Back. It's set in the fall of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I realize this premise will probably be squashed by canon, but that's okay. Many thanks to Godricgal for helping me work through plot points and encouraging me to try a WIP, as well as for her thorough beta work.
1. Homecoming
Tick.
Tonks' eyes, fixed on her investigation report of last night's Death Eater attack, flicked up to the clock at the corner of her desk.
Fifteen seconds.
Sucking hard on the end of her Sugar Quill to mask the distracting clock sounds, she dragged her gaze back to the paragraph near the end and returned her full attention to proofreading--
Tick.
Thirteen seconds.
Bugger proofreading.
Tick.
Ancient desk chair screeching like Mrs. Norris had the time an Augamenti prank meant for Filch had gone horribly awry, Tonks sat up straight and shuffled her sheaf of parchment, rattling the bottom edges against her desk in time with another
Tick.
She clutched her papers tighter, cast a critical eye over her much scratched-out and blotted handwriting -- which her mother called chicken scratch, though Remus was euphemistic enough to say that if Healers were entitled to hurried scrawl, Aurors deserved at least as much leeway--
Tick
--and though on a typical day words like patronising prat might have preceded some sort of silencing spell or bubbles-out-the-mouth charm to squelch his sniggers, today Tonks absolutely concurred with Remus. She was a dark wizard chaser, not a bloody grammarian; her report had all the important parts about the footprints in front of the garage being large enough that they most likely belonged to Crabbe, Goyle, that unidentified burly blond bastard, or even the Muggle who lived there -- or who had lived there, rather. No amount of proper comma usage or subject-verb agreement changed the fact that more innocent Muggles died last night in Kent -- uncomfortably close to her parents' house. There would probably be another Dark Mark above a quiet house tonight, and Tonks could only hope to Merlin it wouldn't be theirs.
The next
Tick
made her stand up, eyes unblinking, so as not to miss a step of the second hand's clockwork march that declared only eight--
Tick.
--seven--
Tick.
--six seconds remained till she could go home--
Tick.
--home (her pulse beat triple-time against the clock) for the first time in a week because tonight there would be open arms and warm lips and bright eyes--
Tick.
--instead of a locked, cold, dark flat.
Tick.
Staring at the miniature cuckoo clock stood in one of the nooks of her desk, sunshine yellow with vivid purple roof and shutters, which had never failed to make her smile since Remus had given it to her two Christmases ago, she realised she hadn't noticed it all week. As if time had stopped--
Tick.
--or had moved backward, to those days last year when she'd paid time no heed because the clock was in London and she was in Hogsmeade and Remus in neither place and there had been no home, only a place to stay, horribly alone.
Tick.
Hugging the sheaf of parchment to her chest, Tonks held her breath for the remaining half-second until--
With the blasting skirl of bagpipes (which made Dawlish in the next cubicle startle backward in his desk chair, thumping into the partition as he did every time she set this clock alarm -- which, Tonks realised with a laugh, hadn't happened since they'd both been assigned last summer to guard Hogwarts), the purple shutters of the cuckoo clock's centre window flung wide open, and a miniature Gideon Crumb danced a jig to his piping as below, two more windows opened, one featuring Kirley McCormack Duke grooving out on his lead guitar, whilst Myron Wagtail head-banged for a few beats before shaking back his mane of black hair and singing into his microphone:
Metamorph gal, Remus comes home tonight
Remus comes home tonight
Remus comes home tonight
Metamorph gal, Remus comes home tonight
So.....
Floo to your flat very--
"TONKS!" bellowed Dawlish over Myron's crooned sooooon; the Auror's face, like old leather and topped with wiry grey hair, appeared suddenly over the top of the cubicle. "Silence that bloody alarm before I put in a request to Robards to swap your night off for my graveyard shift! He'd do it, too, seeing as I filled in for Proudfoot last--"
"All right!" Tonks shouted back, tapping the clock with her wand, so that instantly the droning bagpipes ceased, and Gideon, Kirley, and Myron retreated into their little windows. "I'm going!"
She snatched her red robes off the back of her chair and shoved her arms into the sleeves as Dawlish watched with knit eyebrows and a furrowed forehead and looked as if he might request the schedule change just to spite her.
"Really, Tonks," he drawled with a snort, eyeing the clock with the same curled lip that generally accompanied observing Flobberworms, "don't you think your bedside table's a more...appropriate...place for that?"
"No. I don't."
Dawlish raised an eyebrow that clearly entreated her to explain why she didn't think her bedside table was a more appropriate place than her desk for her cuckoo clock.
Summoning her messenger bag from the peg on the wall, Tonks slung the satchel over her shoulder and jutted her chin, returning her colleague's steely gaze with a dare to try and pinch her shift. Which was probably pressing her luck. Nights off were rare these days, and exhausted Aurors' fuses short. Not to mention Dawlish was a Slytherin, and not above stooping to unfair play to look after his own scrawny arse.
But Tonks felt no need whatsoever to enlighten him as to how Remus had intended his gift of the clock to be useful for a great deal more than making sure she got to work on time. The shell was a genuine Muggle cuckoo clock, which he'd found in Arthur Weasley's workshop and talked him into selling. He'd ordered the figurines from a Weird Sisters novelty paraphernalia catalogue, then charmed them himself to sing whatever reminder Tonks spoke into Gideon's microphone.
Admittedly, the reminder that Remus was coming home today was more than a little superfluous. If she hadn't set it, she'd have stared at her wristwatch all day, willing the hands toward five o'clock. But because it had been so long since she'd had a reason to use Remus' clock, she'd set it anyway.
Plus there was that sensation she'd had all week of dreaming she and Remus were back together. She'd thought the alarm to rouse her to reality, so she wouldn't step out of the Floo in her flat with trepidation, half-expecting him not to be there.
Irritation rising as a hard, bitter ball in her throat that Dawlish had robbed her of that peace of mind, not to mention the simple enjoyment of hearing the silly ditty all the way through (it was a different tune every time she recorded a new message), she shoved her sheaf of parchment at him. "Robards wants a statement from you at the end, confirming my report."
Before he could speak, she spun on her heel and strode out of her cubicle --
-- and collided with Williamson, who'd just bounded around the corner, long ponytail streaming, his arms full of paperwork that scattered and looked like Engorged confetti and mingled with the violet paper airplane memos swirling in and out of the Auror Office.
"Sorry, Ben," Tonks said, catching a few and handing them back to her colleague as she started toward the office exit --
-- only to have a large, rough hand wrap around her wrist and pull her back to meet imploring eyes.
"You've got tonight off?" Williamson asked.
Tonks put his hurrying around the corner together with his fat load of parchment, now littering the floor and the tops of a number of cubicles, and realised his intention to ask her to do his paperwork. She couldn't think of the last time she'd been more tempted to lie, to spare herself having to say no. And she wasn't even a Slytherin.
"I'm sorry," she said again, grabbing his hand to pull out of his grasp.
Williamson's fingers relaxed around her wrist, but he continued to hold onto her, weary face pleading. "Please, Tonks, I promised the missus I'd be on time tonight -- s'our anniversary -- and Gawain's gone and dumped a load of files on me for immediate review. If you could take it, I'd make it up to you, I promise."
"I...sure..."
At Williamson's brilliant smile, Tonks shook herself, realising she'd been about to say yes -- as picking up shifts from anyone and everyone had been her habit for the past year. She wrenched her hand from Williamson's, and hitched her satchel up from where it had slipped off her shoulder.
"I can't," she said. ".Remus has been away, and the parentals are coming to ours for dinner...I haven't seen them since last June, so--"
"Announcin' your engagement?" came the lilting brogue of Eileen O'Sullivan from behind them.
Tonks turned, startling a little at the sight she'd not yet got used to, of her only female colleague appraising her with a magical eye instead of the familiar eye-patch she'd worn since Tonks began the training programem. Which Tonks almost missed, even though she knew Eileen was better suited for the job with full --- or extra, as the case was -- vision, and even though the prosthesis was far less disturbing set in a friendly, grinning face instead of Mad-Eye's craggy one with its expression of perpetual twitchy paranoia.
There was just something off-putting about people who always knew whether your underwear matched or not.
Of course Tonks had always harboured the belief that her mother had that ability, without the assistance of magical eyes. A thought that made her answer Eileen with a lot less perkiness than you were supposed to when talking about announcing -- or breaking, more likely -- engagements to your parents.
"Good luck," said Eileen. "But don't you be frettin'. You're an Auror. Your mam and da know you're capable of makin' responsible choices." The magical eye darted downward from Tonks' face, spinning in its socket as it focused in on Tonks' hand grasping the shoulder strap of her bag. Eileen's mouth twitched into a grin. "And your ring's lovely."
Tonks glanced at the delicate gold ring nestled at the base of her fourth finger. Remus had made it, too: the band he'd transfigured out of a link from his coming of age watch, which was a Lupin family heirloom; the miniature diamond, set between two even tinier pink and blue sapphires, was from the timepiece. The stones and polished metal gleamed and glistened in the artificial late summer afternoon sunlight beaming through the enchanted windows high in the Auror Office walls, giving Tonks the impression that they were laughing and winking and wishing her luck, too.
"Thanks, Eileen," she replied, relieved to hear her voice sounding a little more hopeful -- until she glanced over Eileen's shoulder and noted the wall clock, and her stomach constricted again. Bugger colleagues, she was supposed to have been home ten minutes ago. Her parents were due at the flat at six, and she still had to shower and dress and figure out a hair colour that was still her, but didn't put off her mum; and she could only pray Remus had got home as planned and found her note about putting the lasagne together. "Reckon shoving off and getting home on time'll help luck along."
"I reckon so. Cheers, Tonks."
"Night." Tonks strode toward the exit and, remembering Williamson, she looked back over her shoulder -- he was scrabbling about on the floor for his papers -- and apologised again for not being able to cover for him.
"Talking of covering..." some voice beyond a cubicle began, but Tonks broke into a run and fled the Auror Office before she could identify the speaker and be delayed yet again.
She raced down the corridor, dodging and not-quite-managing to dodge various Ministry officials, clerks, and custodians, en route to the lift -- the golden grilles of which were closing.
Picking up her pace, Tonks shouted over the thunderous clomp of her boots on the tiled floor to the group she saw inside, "HOLD THAT LIFT!"
It seemed luck was on her side today, after all; a tall young wizard she recognised as one of the new Magical Law Enforcement recruits pushed the grilles back with a bold swoop of his wand.
But apparently waving your arm in a gesture of thanks was also the signal for luck to abandon you.
As Tonks did so, she knocked her hand into a cleaning witch carrying a mop and bucket.
The bucket, of course, spilt.
Tonks' feet, naturally, pounded right into the water and promptly slipped out from beneath her. Her arms performed in the all-too-familiar motion of flailing for her balance even as her body plunged, unstoppably, toward the ground.
Over her own grunt as her backside connected with the floor (of course she'd have to bruise her bum the day Remus came home), and the cleaning witch's muttered spells to dry the floor and refill her bucket and grumbles about careless Aurors who got paid too much for just running around chasing things all the time, Tonks heard a series of clinking and rattling sounds on the tile. She whipped her head around to look over her shoulder. The flap of her bag, which she'd not bothered to buckle, had flown open, spilling her files, quills, Weird Sisters travel coffee mug, a couple tubes of lipstick, and an assortment of gum and foil-wrapped chocolates had skidded all around her. Tonks reached for whatever was closest, but immediately withdrew, hissing as a shock tore up from her tailbone. When a movement in her line of vision drew her focus back to the waiting lift, the young MLE recruit gave her a sympathetic look, shrugged, then waved his wand to shut the lift doors.
For a moment, Tonks gawped in disbelief that no one had run to her aid, then it dawned on her that now the lift had begun its course up to the Atrium, when everyone in the bloody Ministry was trying to get to the Floos and go home, it would be ages before another lift came. She would have to take the stairs. Six flights of stairs. With a sore bum.
"Dammit, Tonks!" she hissed, slapping her palms on the floor. "Don't be in such a bloody hurry. It always goes wrong for you."
She slapped the floor again.
"Always!"
And again.
The pop of flesh against tile hung in the still corridor for just a moment, till the swift clip of shoes reverberated, growing louder as someone approached from behind.
"Tonks?"
She turned her head to see Arthur Weasley hurrying toward her. In a flash of falling off her toy broom as a child, and her father running to her, Tonks had a ridiculous urge to reach out to Arthur.
"Are you all right?" Arthur asked, bending his tall, thin frame to take her arm and gently help her to her feet.
Still resisting the impulse to fling her arms around his neck, Tonks gave her head a little toss and said, "Fine, thanks. You know me, I just don't like to walk all over my mate The Ground."
Arthur chuckled, pulled out his wand, and effectively, albeit haphazardly, charmed her belongings back into her bag. "Headed home, then?" He summoned the satchel from the floor.
Tonks thanked him, looping the strap over one shoulder and settling the canvass on her opposite hip. "Right on time, can you believe it?"
"Nothing short of miraculous, these days!"
Tonks wanted to be buoyed by the balding red-headed man's cheer, but she found it only increased her irritation as she noted the lift indicator light stalled on the storey immediately above them. "I would've been out of here on time, if every Auror on the squad hadn't been chatty and made me miss the bloody lift."
"I had an owl from Molly," Arthur said. "She said if I saw you to make sure you knew Remus dropped in with Harry just after lunch, and Flooed straight home from the Burrow. Molly said she reminded him about the lasagne, and she wanted to remind you that however it goes over with your folks, we're happy for you."
Tense and agitated nerves ebbed away by waves of relief not too far removed from those which had washed over her after the Hogwarts battle, when Remus had at last met her eyes, Tonks flung her arms around Arthur's thin shoulders and stretched up to peck his cheek. When she drew back and saw his blue eyes wide and round behind his glasses, and the faintest of flushes on his dazed face, she laughed for the first time all day.
Remus was home! They were engaged, and tonight they would celebrate it, and share the news, as all couples did. True, she still felt a flutter of trepidation in her stomach at the very unlikely scenario of her mother dropping a basket of eggs and shedding tears of joy over the announcement as Molly had done. But Remus had promised: however it went over with her parents, there still would be a wedding.
"Arthur, you're lovely." Tonks squeezed him another quick hug, then bolted for the stairs.
"You won't wait for the lift?" Arthur called.
Tonks flailed to keep her balance as she wheeled to look throw back over her shoulder, "Stairs'll be quicker." The lift had only just reached level seven, and would have to come all the way down and go up again, making all those stops.
"I remember being young and in love and breaking world stair running records."
Arthur's chuckle followed her into the stairwell, resonating within her up six flights of stairs, which didn't aggravate her bruised bum in the slightest -- or if they did, she didn't care.
Because soon, the Ministry of Magic faded into a greenish swirl of Floo Powder, and a moment later Tonks stepped out of her fireplace, and into Remus' waiting arms.
Though she'd missed seeing his face this week, she burrowed hers into the softness of his wheat coloured jumper. She'd dreamt his face, but his scent made him real. He smelt of soap, and of tomatoes and herbs -- she smiled a little that yes, he'd been home to put together the lasagne for her -- and faintly of Floo powder. She inhaled more deeply of the last and leant fully into his thin, yet solid frame. Only then was she able to tilt her face upward to look at his.
Unlike the few times she'd seen him last year during brief furloughs from his mission among the werewolves, Remus, though pale and a little more prominently lined with fatigue from his week's errand and the approaching full moon, seemed dominantly characterised by that boyishness he'd managed to retain in spite of everything he'd been through. In fact, Tonks thought that in some ways, he looked younger than he had when they first met. He held his head more erect, and the fine lines around his eyes seemed to come down to his smile -- which filled his blue-grey eyes more completely than it had in a long, long time. His happiness -- the happiness he'd found in her -- was driving his personal Dementors away.
Tonks brushed a few strands of sandy fringe back from his forehead, and traced her fingers over the contour of his cheek, flattening her palm to rub against the silvery stubble of his day's growth of beard. She felt his breath, soft upon her face. So real...
"You're home."
"Mm," Remus murmured, arm tightening around her waist, pulling her closer as he brushed his lips across her forehead, over her temple. He smiled down at her. "Don't sound so surprised. So are you."
His voice lilted with amusement, but Tonks winced inwardly at a shock of guilt. Idiot! His own conscience was hard enough on him without her implying she didn't trust him. Because she did. Completely.
Didn't she? True, she'd been anxious, but that didn't mean...
"I didn't think I'd ever get here," she said.
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him about Dawlish threatening to dump his paperwork off on her, and Williamson wanting to swap shifts, but suddenly, in the light of his eyes, it didn't seem important anymore to explain anything. They sparkled like sunlight on water as they held her, and continued to do even when he'd closed the gap between them with his mouth on hers; she lost herself in the ocean depths of his eyes as his lips pressed and parted, every look and touch ebbing away a little more worry, a little more trouble. He was here for her, as he'd promised to be, and though he couldn't change a damn thing about her circumstances, he could help change her. She sensed him promising her again, as he gently coaxed her to open to him, and the change in her was immediate as every niggling thought was swept away in the sigh she emitted when his tongue skimmed along the inner edge of her lip, and then slipped inside to swirl with hers.
She closed her eyes then, giving herself over to the sensation of floating, buoyed by his firm arm around her, as much as by her own inward ebullience at the purely physical: soft pads of his fingertips stroking her neck, her cheek, as though she were made of silk instead of flesh; the scratch of his unshaven chin, prickling and making her shiver and giggle into his mouth; the achingly sweet kisses, bestowed with the utmost care, and which made Tonks think he must know some charm, because it seemed impossible that a man could have such soft lips; and then in the same breath, the same thought, his mouth would press more firmly against hers, his body leaning against hers till she felt the wall behind her and him before, reminding her what power and energy were contained within this man, as well. She loved the low rumble in his chest as she kissed him back, and the way his hand slid lower, over her hips, and cupped her bum (a little bruised, but she hardly cared, because it was real, and he was here) to pull her still closer into him, because it was so clear that he needed her as much as she did him...Did they have time to let their homecoming drift along in its obvious course?
Although, seeing as Remus had just slipped his other hand into her robes, and under the hem of her shirt, drifting hardly described the pace he was setting.
Whatever that pace was, it still wasn't enough time.
" TONKS ALMOST LUPIN!"
Her recorded voice screeching from the Tardiness Terminator memo stuck to a kitchen cupboard startled them back from one another.
"YOU'VE GOT HALF AN HOUR TO TURN THAT FACE INTO SOMETHING EVEN A MOTHER WOULD LOVE, SO STOP SNOGGING AND MOVE YOUR BLOOMIN' ARSE!"
Remus arched his eyebrows as his mouth curved into a smirk. "Expect kissing me to make you forget all about tonight's dinner plans?"
"Absolutely."
Tonks hoped she'd been successful at turning her sheepish expression into a flirtatious one; her pulse quickened and her grin stretched across her cheeks, so wide that they ached, when Remus' gaze dropped to the buttons of her robes, which his fingers absently fiddled with, and his fringe fell into his face. It was too endearing how, though he'd grown more confident in the idea that he actually had a profound physical affect on her, that he still became bashful when she actually spoke about it.
But when he pushed back his hair, however, the eyes that regarded her had darkened, more grey than blue now. Tonks knew the look well: concern, laced with responsibility.
His fingers brushed an errant lock of her hair back from her face. "You've been a bit anxious about tonight, then?"
It was the understatement of the age, but Tonks wasn't about to let Remus know. She glanced in the small oval mirror hung next to the fireplace. Good -- still bubblegum pink. Not the faded brownish-pink she'd caught it shifting to at particularly stressful moments this week, including today. Remus was watching the strands curl around his fingers, occasionally brushing a bit of soot out of it, almost as if he were inspecting it. When the furrows in his forehead relaxed slightly, Tonks recognised something like relief in his expression, and realised he must have been as unsure as she about what this time apart would mean to the level of trust they'd rebuilt since their reconciliation. He'd hate himself if he knew she'd lost sleep remembering all those other horrible nights alone, and for fretting those strands of mousy brown back into existence.
She gave her head a defiant toss. "Wouldn't you be anxious, too, if you knew your mum was going to judge every sheet of pasta and shred of cheese in that lasagne?"
Chuckling, Remus slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her to him again. "Luckily for you, I put the lasagne together -- so your mum will be far more concerned with whether I made it with extremely rare beef."
Tonks laughed loudly. "I'll give you ten galleons if you say that to her."
"Say what, precisely? 'I hope you like my lasagne, Mrs. Tonks - it's an old lycanthrope recipe'?"
"Yes, that, precisely," said Tonks, through her giggles, then suddenly the laugh lodged in her chest and she hugged him fiercely. "Merlin," she sighed into his chest. "I missed having you here to say Remus things at the end of the day."
Remus nuzzled her cheek. "And I missed having kissing sessions interrupted by your daft memos."
"Did you?"
"Mmm...I thought of nothing else all week..."
He was trailing tantalisingly light kisses all along her cheekbone, making it impossible for Tonks to think of a clever response. So she decided to stop trying and, taking his face in her hands, brought his mouth to hers.
"I did spend a fair amount of time lying awake thinking about these..." His lips melted into hers, lingering and so very intent, and Tonks thought hours might have gone by instead of minutes before he pulled back just enough so that his lips were a tickle against hers when he said, "Hungry as we are for that, I think your parents might be happier with a lasagne."
Tonks gave him a pouty look. "I thought you said you'd put it all together."
"I have -- but then a beautiful witch turned up in the Floo and distracted me from putting it in the oven, and call me a fuddy-duddy, but serving my prospective in-laws completely uncooked lasagne simply isn't worth ten galleons to me."
Remus turned to go to the kitchen, but smirked at Tonks over his shoulder. "Besides, aren't you supposed to be getting changed, Tonks Almost Lupin? Am I to take that to mean you'll be giving up Tonks and going by Nymphadora after all?"
"When will you get it right?" Tonks teased back, blushing furiously as she followed him into the kitchen. "I'm dropping that god-awful name and becoming Tonks Lupin. Hence Tonks Almost Lupin."
She reckoned a bit of embarrassment was worth seeing Remus' face register the same delight as she felt at the prospect of soon taking his name.
Delight didn't stop her from changing the subject as she waved her wand to clear her Wolfsbane Potion brewing supplies off the dining table. "Did Harry find what he needed in Godric's Hollow?"
Bent to put the lasagne in the oven, Remus' face was hidden. "I believe so. He didn't talk much about seeing the house, or James' and Lily's graves, but he seemed older, and more sure, than before he left."
"Did you go?" Tonks opened a drawer and rifled through a number of tatty tea towels with faded Hufflepuff crests, Quidditch team insignias, and Weird Sisters logos till she found a crisp white linen table cloth and napkins. Or they would have been crisp, if she'd ironed them, and not stuck them in a drawer and left them there since her mother gave them as a housewarming gift. "To the sites, I mean."
Straightening, Remus nodded. "Not with Harry, but yes."
Tonks waited for him to elaborate further, but Remus merely reached for the opposite end of the tablecloth as she unfurled it, and wordlessly helped her spread it over the table. The wonderful domesticity of it -- they were co-hosting a dinner for her parents! -- momentarily distracted her from the conversation, but then she remembered it and asked, "What did you find?"
His prior silence made her unsure of what sort of response to expect. Sadness? Regret? Closure with a past he'd laid peacefully to rest?
Certainly she hadn't anticipated the lines of Remus' face to harden, seeming more deeply etched, or his eyes to go steely as he summoned a stack of plates from the cupboard, or his voice to be low and grim and dangerous. "That if Dumbledore hadn't left us such indelible proof of Snape's loyalty to the Order, knowing everything that happened in that house sixteen years ago was his doing would drive me to hunt him down and kill him, not re-establish contact."
No. Tonks definitely hadn't expected this winded sensation of having been socked in the gut with a Bludger, that just beneath Remus' calm, dutiful façade, boiled that depth of anger.
Nor the bitter burn of bile rising in her throat, nor the pressure in her joints as her fingers clutched a dinner plate so hard she couldn't believe it hadn't snapped in two, at the realisation of how close the same rage lurked in her.
Odd that the plate -- very proper white china trimmed with a bold, yet still elegant black stripe -- which had so annoyed her when her mother had given it to her for her housewarming, quelled her mounting fury now. There wasn't time for anger now at the moment. And Remus was right -- Dumbledore had left inarguable assurances of Snape's loyalty. He might be utterly despicable, but the Order needed him.
"Any inspiration about the contact thing?"
While Tonks laid the table, Remus moved to a drawer and counted out place settings of silverware. "I still don't see any way other than to send in a decoy Death Eater. Finding a willing person, however...I can't think of anyone but me with a halfway decent cover for going underground. I could liaise with Severus through Greyback."
Luckily, Tonks had just set down the last of the plates, and set to work folding the napkins beside them. Her entire body went rigid, as though hit by a Stunner. Remus had not just said...
"Except you were seen at the Hogwarts battle!" she heard herself cry. "No one would believe for a second you're not Dumbledore's man!"
"If I convinced them I'd gone fer--"
"No!" Tonks shouted, unable to hear him finish the word, more profane and obscene to her than any dirty word. Her voice and the rattle of the plates as she slammed a napkin down on the table, hung in the thick atmosphere of the kitchen.
Remus' eyebrows went up in a look of surprise, but otherwise he maintained that damn calm as he raised a conciliatory hand. "Nymphadora, I--"
"Don't call me Nymphadora! If someone's got to liaise with Snape, it ought to be me!" Air returned with force into her lungs, and her chest heaved with rapid breaths as she strode around the table to approach him. "Why the bloody hell would Dumbledore recruit a Metamorphmagus for the Order if not because it might come in handy for infiltrating the Death Eaters?" She stood almost on his toes now, hands balled into fists at her sides and repeated, "It ought to be me. I can be anyone, dammit! Isn't that the ultimate cover?"
Looking up at him, eyes locked in a duel of wills, the air between them radiated with an energy that took Tonks back to the battle of Hogwarts, the Department of Mysteries... She hated anything to come between them, but it would be over her dead body that she'd allow the noble prat to even consider going back. And even then she bet she could put up a damn good fight.
Smiling wearily, Remus reached up as though to touch her, then withdrew his hand. "Right now shouldn't you be the bride-to-be getting ready for an engagement dinner?"
Tonks would have snatched one of the dinner plates and smashed it over the condescending prat's thick head. Except that somehow that damned mildness of his allowed him to say it without coming off a condescending prat. And anyway, he was right -- she glimpsed the kitchen wall clock over his shoulder. Less than twenty minutes.
"Bugger it," she muttered and bolted for the bedroom, tripping over her robes as she shrugged them off, and on her shoes as she kicked them off in the doorway. As her clothing came off, marking a trail behind her en route to the bathroom, she noted an absence of the week's worth of clothes she'd left strewn on the floor when she left for work that morning; the bed was made, too. Damn, it was hard to stay pissed off at the man who'd saved your arse by making a lasagne and tidying up after you before your parents came over.
The one thing that niggled was that they'd rowed over this before -- well, today it hadn't exactly been a row, since Remus hadn't got a word in; more she'd launched into a tirade, really -- and they'd most probably row over it again. Next time it might explode into something more heated, because clearly Remus, while lacking a better idea, wasn't willing to send her into danger.
And that was the first real problem Tonks seen in their relationship. Wouldn't it be a kick in the teeth to have got through what they had in the past year, only to discover that their relationship compromised their roles in the Order?
She turned the hot water tap on all the way, as if to scald away the thought, and stepped into the shower. No -- they could work through that problem, too.
Over the slap of water against tile, she heard the creak of the bathroom door, followed by the rush of the tap and the familiar sound of Remus splashing his face and lathering up for a shave. Usually he teased her when he came in during her showers, threatened to join her, or peeked in to see her naked and wet, and wore an adorable dopey grin. Not today.
It was just bad timing, Tonks told herself as she vigorously worked shampoo into her scalp. Bloody awful timing. What did you think would happen, talking about being separated again when they'd just spent a week apart? Of course Remus didn't want to think about missing you again, you great sodding idiot!
A sudden thought occurring, Tonks blurted, "Have you had any inspiration about that other thing we haven't made up our minds about?"
For a moment, the only sounds were of the water, and of the razor scraping over Remus' skin. Tonks could just picture him, moving so deliberately, maintaining his tight control. But control over what? Was he even following her train of thought? He turned the tap on again -- to rinse off the razor, she guessed, when the sound was followed by tapping against the sink.
"You mean our wedding date?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"I thought..."
Tonks poked her head out from shower curtain and, wiping water from her eyes, saw Remus' brow crinkle as he combed his hair. He'd changed into his new dark grey trousers and white shirt which hung, for the moment, unbuttoned over his vest.
His eyes flicked upward to meet hers in the mirror. "I thought you said now wasn't the best time."
"I didn't say right now or even soon," said Tonks, letting the shower curtain fall closed over her again. She squeezed raspberry scented soap onto a pouf, and thoughtfully rubbed it over her shoulder. Watching the foam slip downward over her chest, she said, "Only...Mum and Dad will want to know."
"We can tell them we haven't set a date yet. I'm sure lots of couples do."
"Hm."
"What?" Remus' voice sounded closer now.
Tonks shut off the shower, and when she reached out for a towel, Remus pulled back the curtain and wrapped a fluffy yellow one around her. She thanked him, and to her relief he finally smiled at her, albeit tentatively -- but it fell when she suddenly sniffed and wrinkled her nose.
"Does something smell a bit odd to you?" she asked.
"I'd say baking lasagne mingled with soap, shampoo, and shaving lotion qualifies as more than a bit odd."
"No..." Securing her towel around her, Tonks stepped over the edge of the tub, slipping a little on the water she dripped across the black and white tile floor. "It's something odd about the lasagne."
Remus caught her elbow and pulled her back from the bathroom door. "You're changing the subject. What brought our wedding date to mind?"
Reflexively, Tonks started to pull away from him, started to say she really did smell something odd and would he please trust her to investigate it, but, glancing back over her shoulder, she saw his forehead deeply etched with troubled lines. She sighed. What had got into her today? Why couldn't she bring up anything without turning it into an issue?
Why was she letting her nerves about seeing her parents get the better of her in everything?
"It's just..." Tonks found Remus' searching gaze made it impossible for her to speak what was really on her mind, for fear of seeing them bend with hurt. As she averted them, she noticed his unbuttoned shirt, and set to work fastening them. "If we don't have a wedding date, and Mum thinks...you and me getting married's not a good idea...I think she'll try and talk me out of it."
Remus released her arm and caught her hands, which had worked their way up to the next-to-last button. "If she's going to try and talk you out of it, don't you think she will regardless of whether you've set a date or not?"
"Maybe." Tonks felt his eyes beckoning her gaze as he looked down at her, but she resisted their pull, swallowing hard against the lump in her throat. "She cares so much about appearances, though, calling off a wedding might..."
She stopped, realising how that sounded.
"Calling off a wedding might be a greater faux pas than marrying a werewolf?" Remus finished for her.
Tonks pulled her hands from his and raked them through her wet hair. "I didn't mean it like that."
As Remus took out his wand and cast a drying charm on her hair, his other hand cupped her cheek, and tilted her face up to his. "I know you didn't."
He smiled reassuringly, and Tonks returned it, weakly, before turning on her heel and shuffling to the bedroom. "Talking of faux pas, I haven't a bloody idea what to wear for this."
She rifled through the wardrobe for a moment, rejecting outfit after outfit, annoyance rising as Remus stood just behind her, looking into the door mirror as he knotted a necktie striped in varying shades of blue. When she muttered about everything being ridiculously easy for blokes, he abandoned his tie and gently brushed past her so he could look at her clothes. "May I?"
Tonks was only too relieved to step aside. Without hesitation, as if he'd thought about her outfit beforehand, Remus selected a white t-shirt, black miniskirt, black satin waistcoat with abstract purple patterns worked through it, and purple flats with bows on the toes. Laying them all out on the bed, he summoned a pair of leggings from the bureau, along with a purple bra and knickers set.
Though she was impressed by how he'd remembered every coordinating element of the outfit, Tonks eyed his choice dubiously. "You think?"
"I think you look sexy in this."
Tonks couldn't help but grin at the utter sincerity in his rasping tones -- or at the deeply appreciative look in his eyes as they swept her. But she said, "I'm dressing for my parents, remember. I've got to look...I don't know...bridey..."
"You'd prefer a set of white dress robes, then?"
Tonks poked her tongue out at him. "You know what I mean."
He shook his head slightly.
Sighing, Tonks flopped onto the bed and pulled on the knickers. "Grown up. Ladylike."
Moving to stand in front of her, slipping between her knees, Remus laid his hands on her shoulders. "You're always those things," he said, thumbs stroking her collarbones. "In your own way. And that's exactly how you should look tonight. Like yourself."
Melted by his sweetness, Tonks looked over the outfit again, and thought she saw a little more of the grown up lady in it. "Maybe with trousers..."
The tender look fell off Remus' face as his warm hands slid from her shoulders, leaving them cold and unprotected, to his sides. Bed springs groaning as he seated himself beside her, he tentatively took her hands and said, not quite meeting her eye, "If you're having second thoughts about whether we ought to--"
"No!" Snapped out of her malaise, Tonks clutched Remus' hands so tightly that her nails were sure to leave little half-moons in his palms. "Never a second thought, no matter what Mum and Dad think. I'm sorry I'm being so pessimistic about it."
Remus brought her hands to his lips. "You've nothing to apologise for. I'm the one who should be sorry this isn't a completely joyous time for you."
"It is."
He smiled at her -- a real smile, which told Tonks he believed her. But he said, quietly, "I'm sorry it's not simple, with regard to your parents, especially."
If she were completely honest, Tonks was, too -- and Remus knew without her saying now that she was, because she'd told him once that it did matter to her, deep down, whether her parents approved of their relationship. Now, however, part of her wished she'd never given voice to that thought; though she knew it would be hypocritical of her to expect complete openness from him at yet try and protect him from potentially hurtful truths.
"Well," she said, jumping to her feet. She dropped her towel, grabbed her bra, and put her arms through the straps. "If dinner with Mum and Dad doesn't go well, we'll just throw them out, say sod the parents, and Floo over to Arthur and Molly's for a little party."
Remus' long fingers were suddenly stroking the skin of her back as he brushed her fumbling hands away and fastened her bra for her. His breath on her neck made the hairs on her neck stand as he whispered, "Or just have a party of our own?"
His hands slipped under her arms, and curled over her breasts as he dipped his head and pressed warm, soft lips to the curve of her neck.
"Remus..." Tonks whispered in a shuddering breath. "That lasagne really doesn't smell right."
"It can't smell wrong," said Remus with obvious frustration as Tonks disentangled herself from his arms and snatched her dressing gown from the hook on the bathroom door.
"Why?" she threw it over her shoulders as she dashed for the kitchen, stumbling over the tie. "Because you made it?"
With a hint of smugness, Remus replied, "Because I made it precisely according to Molly's instructions."
But when Tonks opened the oven with her wand, even Remus couldn't deny the distinctly spoilt smell that wafted out. When she'd levitated it onto the counter, he bent to sniff it, then recoiled as though from a Flobberworm.
"I don't understand," he said, standing far back from the lasagne, scratching his head.
Tonks would have ribbed him about his cockiness, if having a perfect lasagne tonight weren't so bloody important. "Was the cheese past its date?"
She summoned it from the bin, but the cottage cheese container she caught gingerly between her fingers was marked well before the expiration date.
"Well, serving this to your parents won't plead our case," Remus said, vanishing the lot. "We'll have to take them out."
Tonks nodded. "I don't know why we didn't just decide that from the start."
It was a lie. She knew exactly why. Remus had suggested that the proper way to announce their engagement was to take her parents out for dinner. Tonks, had disagreed, saying she'd go a lot farther with her mother if she impressed her by playing Susie Housewitch. Part of her had believed it. But mostly she'd been afraid that Remus' fragile pride would be battered by playing the suitor winning over sceptical parents with a dinner he could not pay for.
"Where do you think?" Remus asked. "The Lion and Unicorn?"
Tonks thought fleetingly of the Valentine's Day dinner she and Remus and Bill and Fleur had won in a raffle to the posh Wizarding restaurant. "We haven't got a reservation."
"Won't hurt to owl, will it? And we could always have appetizers and drinks at the bar until a table becomes available."
"I'll have to re-think my outfit..." Tonks started for the bedroom, but stopped, startled, in her tracks as the fireplace Floo crackled to life and Molly Weasley's head appeared in the grate.
"Hello, dear. Not ready yet?" She clucked her tongue. "Just thought I'd see how the lasagne came out."
"Something's gone wrong with the cheese," Remus said with obvious frustration that made it impossible for Tonks not to snigger. "It's spoilt."
"Did you use your wand to put it on?" Molly asked.
"Erm..." Remus' sandy brows knit. "Yes...?"
"Didn't you know wands and cheese don't mix?" Molly asked as though a person would had to have fallen off the back of a broom not to know.
Remus coloured. "No. No, I didn't."
A hand emerged from the flames as Molly massaged her forehead. "I almost put it in the directions, but I thought since you..."
From beneath her palm, Molly's eyes darted sideways at Tonks, whose hands went defensively to her hips at what the older witch had left unsaid (rather amusingly, Tonks had to admit), that she wouldn't have thought not to include it, had she thought Tonks would put the lasagne together.
"Luckily," she said, "I've an extra on hand..."
"It's all right, Molly," Remus began, "we thought we'd take them out--"
But Molly had disappeared.
Though Tonks had wanted responsibility for the home-cooked dinner, she was too relieved that the issue of Remus' pride had been side-stepped, to care.
Sidling up to Remus, Tonks caught the end of his tie and tugged at it. "She looked right surprised it was you, not me, that mucked it up."
Remus rolled his eyes and had opened his mouth in what Tonks was sure would have been a truly sarky retort, when Molly appeared in the fireplace again, this time all of her, carrying a lasagne in what Tonks knew to be her very best serving casserole dish, which had been in the Prewett family for generations.
Thanking her, Tonks blundered forward to take it, but Molly kept a firm hold on it.
"I'll take care of it, dear," she said, casting a critical eye over the partially laid dinner table -- the creases in the never-ironed tablecloth, in particular. "You haven't got much time. Go get yourself dressed and made up. Remus, your hair's sticking up a bit at the back. You might take a wet comb to it..."
Back in their bedroom, Tonks quickly threw on the outfit Remus had picked out for her, without giving it a second thought except that it was a good choice and flattered her figure well enough that maybe her mum wouldn't suggest morphing.
But a suitable hair colour continued to elude her. Normally she would've matched it to the purple in her outfit, but purple did make her look peaky, and her mum's face would say so, even if she didn't out loud. It was such a rich shade of purple, though, and her dad had always been partial to it; and Tonks loved the way it framed her face in layers like she'd seen on a poster in a Muggle hair salon window the other day. Maybe if she just adjusted her skin tone a little...
"You were thinking about me, weren't you?" Remus' voice broke into her thoughts as they stood together in front of the bathroom mirror. "When you decided to have your parents here for dinner?"
Tonks' eyes dropped from the reflection of her cheek, on which she'd been trying out a bit of a tan. Damn. She knew she had to work a bit harder at stealth than most people, but had she really been so bleeding obvious?
She nodded, guiltily, but then Remus was enfolding her in his arms, dropping tender kisses down on her hair.
"I love you," he said, huskily. "I admit, I would have felt just a bit self-conscious about..." His eyes fell away briefly as he said, "...about paying..." but met hers again, darkening, as he went on, "We could have done, you know. I'd get over it, for you."
Palms pressed against his chest, fingers just curling to clutch the smooth poplin of his shirt, Tonks asked, "For us?"
"Yes." Smiling, he nuzzled her cheek, and dipped his head to kiss her properly. "For us--"
Tonks never felt the warmth of his mouth covering hers. When he was just a hair's breath away, he startled back at a
CRACK!
from the other room, followed by Molly's blood-curdling scream.
A/N: Thank you so much for reading this first chapter of Masks and Mirrors. The next instalment promises awkward conversations, broom rides, and Remus and Tonks in Order investigation mode. I'll do my best to update every week to ten days, though the Lovers' Moon Fic Jumble at metamorfic_moon might slow me down a bit.
Let me know what you think of this chapter, and choose the Remus of your choice to come home to after a stressful day: thoughtful Remus, who's cleaned the house and cooked a delightful lasagne dinner; romantic Remus, who's put on a tie and wants to take you out; or sexy Remus, who's turned down the blankets and the lights and planned a different sort of candlelight dinner...
Author: MrsTater
Rating: R
Summary: As Remus and Tonks rebuild their relationship, a dangerous Order mission only she can undertake dredges up the same old problems -- as well as an entirely new set when the family she was born into clashes with the family she has made for herself within the Order of the Phoenix.
Author's Note: This fic is part of the Transfigured Hearts universe and follows Don't Look Back. It's set in the fall of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I realize this premise will probably be squashed by canon, but that's okay. Many thanks to Godricgal for helping me work through plot points and encouraging me to try a WIP, as well as for her thorough beta work.
1. Homecoming
Tick.
Tonks' eyes, fixed on her investigation report of last night's Death Eater attack, flicked up to the clock at the corner of her desk.
Fifteen seconds.
Sucking hard on the end of her Sugar Quill to mask the distracting clock sounds, she dragged her gaze back to the paragraph near the end and returned her full attention to proofreading--
Tick.
Thirteen seconds.
Bugger proofreading.
Tick.
Ancient desk chair screeching like Mrs. Norris had the time an Augamenti prank meant for Filch had gone horribly awry, Tonks sat up straight and shuffled her sheaf of parchment, rattling the bottom edges against her desk in time with another
Tick.
She clutched her papers tighter, cast a critical eye over her much scratched-out and blotted handwriting -- which her mother called chicken scratch, though Remus was euphemistic enough to say that if Healers were entitled to hurried scrawl, Aurors deserved at least as much leeway--
Tick
--and though on a typical day words like patronising prat might have preceded some sort of silencing spell or bubbles-out-the-mouth charm to squelch his sniggers, today Tonks absolutely concurred with Remus. She was a dark wizard chaser, not a bloody grammarian; her report had all the important parts about the footprints in front of the garage being large enough that they most likely belonged to Crabbe, Goyle, that unidentified burly blond bastard, or even the Muggle who lived there -- or who had lived there, rather. No amount of proper comma usage or subject-verb agreement changed the fact that more innocent Muggles died last night in Kent -- uncomfortably close to her parents' house. There would probably be another Dark Mark above a quiet house tonight, and Tonks could only hope to Merlin it wouldn't be theirs.
The next
Tick
made her stand up, eyes unblinking, so as not to miss a step of the second hand's clockwork march that declared only eight--
Tick.
--seven--
Tick.
--six seconds remained till she could go home--
Tick.
--home (her pulse beat triple-time against the clock) for the first time in a week because tonight there would be open arms and warm lips and bright eyes--
Tick.
--instead of a locked, cold, dark flat.
Tick.
Staring at the miniature cuckoo clock stood in one of the nooks of her desk, sunshine yellow with vivid purple roof and shutters, which had never failed to make her smile since Remus had given it to her two Christmases ago, she realised she hadn't noticed it all week. As if time had stopped--
Tick.
--or had moved backward, to those days last year when she'd paid time no heed because the clock was in London and she was in Hogsmeade and Remus in neither place and there had been no home, only a place to stay, horribly alone.
Tick.
Hugging the sheaf of parchment to her chest, Tonks held her breath for the remaining half-second until--
With the blasting skirl of bagpipes (which made Dawlish in the next cubicle startle backward in his desk chair, thumping into the partition as he did every time she set this clock alarm -- which, Tonks realised with a laugh, hadn't happened since they'd both been assigned last summer to guard Hogwarts), the purple shutters of the cuckoo clock's centre window flung wide open, and a miniature Gideon Crumb danced a jig to his piping as below, two more windows opened, one featuring Kirley McCormack Duke grooving out on his lead guitar, whilst Myron Wagtail head-banged for a few beats before shaking back his mane of black hair and singing into his microphone:
Metamorph gal, Remus comes home tonight
Remus comes home tonight
Remus comes home tonight
Metamorph gal, Remus comes home tonight
So.....
Floo to your flat very--
"TONKS!" bellowed Dawlish over Myron's crooned sooooon; the Auror's face, like old leather and topped with wiry grey hair, appeared suddenly over the top of the cubicle. "Silence that bloody alarm before I put in a request to Robards to swap your night off for my graveyard shift! He'd do it, too, seeing as I filled in for Proudfoot last--"
"All right!" Tonks shouted back, tapping the clock with her wand, so that instantly the droning bagpipes ceased, and Gideon, Kirley, and Myron retreated into their little windows. "I'm going!"
She snatched her red robes off the back of her chair and shoved her arms into the sleeves as Dawlish watched with knit eyebrows and a furrowed forehead and looked as if he might request the schedule change just to spite her.
"Really, Tonks," he drawled with a snort, eyeing the clock with the same curled lip that generally accompanied observing Flobberworms, "don't you think your bedside table's a more...appropriate...place for that?"
"No. I don't."
Dawlish raised an eyebrow that clearly entreated her to explain why she didn't think her bedside table was a more appropriate place than her desk for her cuckoo clock.
Summoning her messenger bag from the peg on the wall, Tonks slung the satchel over her shoulder and jutted her chin, returning her colleague's steely gaze with a dare to try and pinch her shift. Which was probably pressing her luck. Nights off were rare these days, and exhausted Aurors' fuses short. Not to mention Dawlish was a Slytherin, and not above stooping to unfair play to look after his own scrawny arse.
But Tonks felt no need whatsoever to enlighten him as to how Remus had intended his gift of the clock to be useful for a great deal more than making sure she got to work on time. The shell was a genuine Muggle cuckoo clock, which he'd found in Arthur Weasley's workshop and talked him into selling. He'd ordered the figurines from a Weird Sisters novelty paraphernalia catalogue, then charmed them himself to sing whatever reminder Tonks spoke into Gideon's microphone.
Admittedly, the reminder that Remus was coming home today was more than a little superfluous. If she hadn't set it, she'd have stared at her wristwatch all day, willing the hands toward five o'clock. But because it had been so long since she'd had a reason to use Remus' clock, she'd set it anyway.
Plus there was that sensation she'd had all week of dreaming she and Remus were back together. She'd thought the alarm to rouse her to reality, so she wouldn't step out of the Floo in her flat with trepidation, half-expecting him not to be there.
Irritation rising as a hard, bitter ball in her throat that Dawlish had robbed her of that peace of mind, not to mention the simple enjoyment of hearing the silly ditty all the way through (it was a different tune every time she recorded a new message), she shoved her sheaf of parchment at him. "Robards wants a statement from you at the end, confirming my report."
Before he could speak, she spun on her heel and strode out of her cubicle --
-- and collided with Williamson, who'd just bounded around the corner, long ponytail streaming, his arms full of paperwork that scattered and looked like Engorged confetti and mingled with the violet paper airplane memos swirling in and out of the Auror Office.
"Sorry, Ben," Tonks said, catching a few and handing them back to her colleague as she started toward the office exit --
-- only to have a large, rough hand wrap around her wrist and pull her back to meet imploring eyes.
"You've got tonight off?" Williamson asked.
Tonks put his hurrying around the corner together with his fat load of parchment, now littering the floor and the tops of a number of cubicles, and realised his intention to ask her to do his paperwork. She couldn't think of the last time she'd been more tempted to lie, to spare herself having to say no. And she wasn't even a Slytherin.
"I'm sorry," she said again, grabbing his hand to pull out of his grasp.
Williamson's fingers relaxed around her wrist, but he continued to hold onto her, weary face pleading. "Please, Tonks, I promised the missus I'd be on time tonight -- s'our anniversary -- and Gawain's gone and dumped a load of files on me for immediate review. If you could take it, I'd make it up to you, I promise."
"I...sure..."
At Williamson's brilliant smile, Tonks shook herself, realising she'd been about to say yes -- as picking up shifts from anyone and everyone had been her habit for the past year. She wrenched her hand from Williamson's, and hitched her satchel up from where it had slipped off her shoulder.
"I can't," she said. ".Remus has been away, and the parentals are coming to ours for dinner...I haven't seen them since last June, so--"
"Announcin' your engagement?" came the lilting brogue of Eileen O'Sullivan from behind them.
Tonks turned, startling a little at the sight she'd not yet got used to, of her only female colleague appraising her with a magical eye instead of the familiar eye-patch she'd worn since Tonks began the training programem. Which Tonks almost missed, even though she knew Eileen was better suited for the job with full --- or extra, as the case was -- vision, and even though the prosthesis was far less disturbing set in a friendly, grinning face instead of Mad-Eye's craggy one with its expression of perpetual twitchy paranoia.
There was just something off-putting about people who always knew whether your underwear matched or not.
Of course Tonks had always harboured the belief that her mother had that ability, without the assistance of magical eyes. A thought that made her answer Eileen with a lot less perkiness than you were supposed to when talking about announcing -- or breaking, more likely -- engagements to your parents.
"Good luck," said Eileen. "But don't you be frettin'. You're an Auror. Your mam and da know you're capable of makin' responsible choices." The magical eye darted downward from Tonks' face, spinning in its socket as it focused in on Tonks' hand grasping the shoulder strap of her bag. Eileen's mouth twitched into a grin. "And your ring's lovely."
Tonks glanced at the delicate gold ring nestled at the base of her fourth finger. Remus had made it, too: the band he'd transfigured out of a link from his coming of age watch, which was a Lupin family heirloom; the miniature diamond, set between two even tinier pink and blue sapphires, was from the timepiece. The stones and polished metal gleamed and glistened in the artificial late summer afternoon sunlight beaming through the enchanted windows high in the Auror Office walls, giving Tonks the impression that they were laughing and winking and wishing her luck, too.
"Thanks, Eileen," she replied, relieved to hear her voice sounding a little more hopeful -- until she glanced over Eileen's shoulder and noted the wall clock, and her stomach constricted again. Bugger colleagues, she was supposed to have been home ten minutes ago. Her parents were due at the flat at six, and she still had to shower and dress and figure out a hair colour that was still her, but didn't put off her mum; and she could only pray Remus had got home as planned and found her note about putting the lasagne together. "Reckon shoving off and getting home on time'll help luck along."
"I reckon so. Cheers, Tonks."
"Night." Tonks strode toward the exit and, remembering Williamson, she looked back over her shoulder -- he was scrabbling about on the floor for his papers -- and apologised again for not being able to cover for him.
"Talking of covering..." some voice beyond a cubicle began, but Tonks broke into a run and fled the Auror Office before she could identify the speaker and be delayed yet again.
She raced down the corridor, dodging and not-quite-managing to dodge various Ministry officials, clerks, and custodians, en route to the lift -- the golden grilles of which were closing.
Picking up her pace, Tonks shouted over the thunderous clomp of her boots on the tiled floor to the group she saw inside, "HOLD THAT LIFT!"
It seemed luck was on her side today, after all; a tall young wizard she recognised as one of the new Magical Law Enforcement recruits pushed the grilles back with a bold swoop of his wand.
But apparently waving your arm in a gesture of thanks was also the signal for luck to abandon you.
As Tonks did so, she knocked her hand into a cleaning witch carrying a mop and bucket.
The bucket, of course, spilt.
Tonks' feet, naturally, pounded right into the water and promptly slipped out from beneath her. Her arms performed in the all-too-familiar motion of flailing for her balance even as her body plunged, unstoppably, toward the ground.
Over her own grunt as her backside connected with the floor (of course she'd have to bruise her bum the day Remus came home), and the cleaning witch's muttered spells to dry the floor and refill her bucket and grumbles about careless Aurors who got paid too much for just running around chasing things all the time, Tonks heard a series of clinking and rattling sounds on the tile. She whipped her head around to look over her shoulder. The flap of her bag, which she'd not bothered to buckle, had flown open, spilling her files, quills, Weird Sisters travel coffee mug, a couple tubes of lipstick, and an assortment of gum and foil-wrapped chocolates had skidded all around her. Tonks reached for whatever was closest, but immediately withdrew, hissing as a shock tore up from her tailbone. When a movement in her line of vision drew her focus back to the waiting lift, the young MLE recruit gave her a sympathetic look, shrugged, then waved his wand to shut the lift doors.
For a moment, Tonks gawped in disbelief that no one had run to her aid, then it dawned on her that now the lift had begun its course up to the Atrium, when everyone in the bloody Ministry was trying to get to the Floos and go home, it would be ages before another lift came. She would have to take the stairs. Six flights of stairs. With a sore bum.
"Dammit, Tonks!" she hissed, slapping her palms on the floor. "Don't be in such a bloody hurry. It always goes wrong for you."
She slapped the floor again.
"Always!"
And again.
The pop of flesh against tile hung in the still corridor for just a moment, till the swift clip of shoes reverberated, growing louder as someone approached from behind.
"Tonks?"
She turned her head to see Arthur Weasley hurrying toward her. In a flash of falling off her toy broom as a child, and her father running to her, Tonks had a ridiculous urge to reach out to Arthur.
"Are you all right?" Arthur asked, bending his tall, thin frame to take her arm and gently help her to her feet.
Still resisting the impulse to fling her arms around his neck, Tonks gave her head a little toss and said, "Fine, thanks. You know me, I just don't like to walk all over my mate The Ground."
Arthur chuckled, pulled out his wand, and effectively, albeit haphazardly, charmed her belongings back into her bag. "Headed home, then?" He summoned the satchel from the floor.
Tonks thanked him, looping the strap over one shoulder and settling the canvass on her opposite hip. "Right on time, can you believe it?"
"Nothing short of miraculous, these days!"
Tonks wanted to be buoyed by the balding red-headed man's cheer, but she found it only increased her irritation as she noted the lift indicator light stalled on the storey immediately above them. "I would've been out of here on time, if every Auror on the squad hadn't been chatty and made me miss the bloody lift."
"I had an owl from Molly," Arthur said. "She said if I saw you to make sure you knew Remus dropped in with Harry just after lunch, and Flooed straight home from the Burrow. Molly said she reminded him about the lasagne, and she wanted to remind you that however it goes over with your folks, we're happy for you."
Tense and agitated nerves ebbed away by waves of relief not too far removed from those which had washed over her after the Hogwarts battle, when Remus had at last met her eyes, Tonks flung her arms around Arthur's thin shoulders and stretched up to peck his cheek. When she drew back and saw his blue eyes wide and round behind his glasses, and the faintest of flushes on his dazed face, she laughed for the first time all day.
Remus was home! They were engaged, and tonight they would celebrate it, and share the news, as all couples did. True, she still felt a flutter of trepidation in her stomach at the very unlikely scenario of her mother dropping a basket of eggs and shedding tears of joy over the announcement as Molly had done. But Remus had promised: however it went over with her parents, there still would be a wedding.
"Arthur, you're lovely." Tonks squeezed him another quick hug, then bolted for the stairs.
"You won't wait for the lift?" Arthur called.
Tonks flailed to keep her balance as she wheeled to look throw back over her shoulder, "Stairs'll be quicker." The lift had only just reached level seven, and would have to come all the way down and go up again, making all those stops.
"I remember being young and in love and breaking world stair running records."
Arthur's chuckle followed her into the stairwell, resonating within her up six flights of stairs, which didn't aggravate her bruised bum in the slightest -- or if they did, she didn't care.
Because soon, the Ministry of Magic faded into a greenish swirl of Floo Powder, and a moment later Tonks stepped out of her fireplace, and into Remus' waiting arms.
Though she'd missed seeing his face this week, she burrowed hers into the softness of his wheat coloured jumper. She'd dreamt his face, but his scent made him real. He smelt of soap, and of tomatoes and herbs -- she smiled a little that yes, he'd been home to put together the lasagne for her -- and faintly of Floo powder. She inhaled more deeply of the last and leant fully into his thin, yet solid frame. Only then was she able to tilt her face upward to look at his.
Unlike the few times she'd seen him last year during brief furloughs from his mission among the werewolves, Remus, though pale and a little more prominently lined with fatigue from his week's errand and the approaching full moon, seemed dominantly characterised by that boyishness he'd managed to retain in spite of everything he'd been through. In fact, Tonks thought that in some ways, he looked younger than he had when they first met. He held his head more erect, and the fine lines around his eyes seemed to come down to his smile -- which filled his blue-grey eyes more completely than it had in a long, long time. His happiness -- the happiness he'd found in her -- was driving his personal Dementors away.
Tonks brushed a few strands of sandy fringe back from his forehead, and traced her fingers over the contour of his cheek, flattening her palm to rub against the silvery stubble of his day's growth of beard. She felt his breath, soft upon her face. So real...
"You're home."
"Mm," Remus murmured, arm tightening around her waist, pulling her closer as he brushed his lips across her forehead, over her temple. He smiled down at her. "Don't sound so surprised. So are you."
His voice lilted with amusement, but Tonks winced inwardly at a shock of guilt. Idiot! His own conscience was hard enough on him without her implying she didn't trust him. Because she did. Completely.
Didn't she? True, she'd been anxious, but that didn't mean...
"I didn't think I'd ever get here," she said.
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him about Dawlish threatening to dump his paperwork off on her, and Williamson wanting to swap shifts, but suddenly, in the light of his eyes, it didn't seem important anymore to explain anything. They sparkled like sunlight on water as they held her, and continued to do even when he'd closed the gap between them with his mouth on hers; she lost herself in the ocean depths of his eyes as his lips pressed and parted, every look and touch ebbing away a little more worry, a little more trouble. He was here for her, as he'd promised to be, and though he couldn't change a damn thing about her circumstances, he could help change her. She sensed him promising her again, as he gently coaxed her to open to him, and the change in her was immediate as every niggling thought was swept away in the sigh she emitted when his tongue skimmed along the inner edge of her lip, and then slipped inside to swirl with hers.
She closed her eyes then, giving herself over to the sensation of floating, buoyed by his firm arm around her, as much as by her own inward ebullience at the purely physical: soft pads of his fingertips stroking her neck, her cheek, as though she were made of silk instead of flesh; the scratch of his unshaven chin, prickling and making her shiver and giggle into his mouth; the achingly sweet kisses, bestowed with the utmost care, and which made Tonks think he must know some charm, because it seemed impossible that a man could have such soft lips; and then in the same breath, the same thought, his mouth would press more firmly against hers, his body leaning against hers till she felt the wall behind her and him before, reminding her what power and energy were contained within this man, as well. She loved the low rumble in his chest as she kissed him back, and the way his hand slid lower, over her hips, and cupped her bum (a little bruised, but she hardly cared, because it was real, and he was here) to pull her still closer into him, because it was so clear that he needed her as much as she did him...Did they have time to let their homecoming drift along in its obvious course?
Although, seeing as Remus had just slipped his other hand into her robes, and under the hem of her shirt, drifting hardly described the pace he was setting.
Whatever that pace was, it still wasn't enough time.
" TONKS ALMOST LUPIN!"
Her recorded voice screeching from the Tardiness Terminator memo stuck to a kitchen cupboard startled them back from one another.
"YOU'VE GOT HALF AN HOUR TO TURN THAT FACE INTO SOMETHING EVEN A MOTHER WOULD LOVE, SO STOP SNOGGING AND MOVE YOUR BLOOMIN' ARSE!"
Remus arched his eyebrows as his mouth curved into a smirk. "Expect kissing me to make you forget all about tonight's dinner plans?"
"Absolutely."
Tonks hoped she'd been successful at turning her sheepish expression into a flirtatious one; her pulse quickened and her grin stretched across her cheeks, so wide that they ached, when Remus' gaze dropped to the buttons of her robes, which his fingers absently fiddled with, and his fringe fell into his face. It was too endearing how, though he'd grown more confident in the idea that he actually had a profound physical affect on her, that he still became bashful when she actually spoke about it.
But when he pushed back his hair, however, the eyes that regarded her had darkened, more grey than blue now. Tonks knew the look well: concern, laced with responsibility.
His fingers brushed an errant lock of her hair back from her face. "You've been a bit anxious about tonight, then?"
It was the understatement of the age, but Tonks wasn't about to let Remus know. She glanced in the small oval mirror hung next to the fireplace. Good -- still bubblegum pink. Not the faded brownish-pink she'd caught it shifting to at particularly stressful moments this week, including today. Remus was watching the strands curl around his fingers, occasionally brushing a bit of soot out of it, almost as if he were inspecting it. When the furrows in his forehead relaxed slightly, Tonks recognised something like relief in his expression, and realised he must have been as unsure as she about what this time apart would mean to the level of trust they'd rebuilt since their reconciliation. He'd hate himself if he knew she'd lost sleep remembering all those other horrible nights alone, and for fretting those strands of mousy brown back into existence.
She gave her head a defiant toss. "Wouldn't you be anxious, too, if you knew your mum was going to judge every sheet of pasta and shred of cheese in that lasagne?"
Chuckling, Remus slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her to him again. "Luckily for you, I put the lasagne together -- so your mum will be far more concerned with whether I made it with extremely rare beef."
Tonks laughed loudly. "I'll give you ten galleons if you say that to her."
"Say what, precisely? 'I hope you like my lasagne, Mrs. Tonks - it's an old lycanthrope recipe'?"
"Yes, that, precisely," said Tonks, through her giggles, then suddenly the laugh lodged in her chest and she hugged him fiercely. "Merlin," she sighed into his chest. "I missed having you here to say Remus things at the end of the day."
Remus nuzzled her cheek. "And I missed having kissing sessions interrupted by your daft memos."
"Did you?"
"Mmm...I thought of nothing else all week..."
He was trailing tantalisingly light kisses all along her cheekbone, making it impossible for Tonks to think of a clever response. So she decided to stop trying and, taking his face in her hands, brought his mouth to hers.
"I did spend a fair amount of time lying awake thinking about these..." His lips melted into hers, lingering and so very intent, and Tonks thought hours might have gone by instead of minutes before he pulled back just enough so that his lips were a tickle against hers when he said, "Hungry as we are for that, I think your parents might be happier with a lasagne."
Tonks gave him a pouty look. "I thought you said you'd put it all together."
"I have -- but then a beautiful witch turned up in the Floo and distracted me from putting it in the oven, and call me a fuddy-duddy, but serving my prospective in-laws completely uncooked lasagne simply isn't worth ten galleons to me."
Remus turned to go to the kitchen, but smirked at Tonks over his shoulder. "Besides, aren't you supposed to be getting changed, Tonks Almost Lupin? Am I to take that to mean you'll be giving up Tonks and going by Nymphadora after all?"
"When will you get it right?" Tonks teased back, blushing furiously as she followed him into the kitchen. "I'm dropping that god-awful name and becoming Tonks Lupin. Hence Tonks Almost Lupin."
She reckoned a bit of embarrassment was worth seeing Remus' face register the same delight as she felt at the prospect of soon taking his name.
Delight didn't stop her from changing the subject as she waved her wand to clear her Wolfsbane Potion brewing supplies off the dining table. "Did Harry find what he needed in Godric's Hollow?"
Bent to put the lasagne in the oven, Remus' face was hidden. "I believe so. He didn't talk much about seeing the house, or James' and Lily's graves, but he seemed older, and more sure, than before he left."
"Did you go?" Tonks opened a drawer and rifled through a number of tatty tea towels with faded Hufflepuff crests, Quidditch team insignias, and Weird Sisters logos till she found a crisp white linen table cloth and napkins. Or they would have been crisp, if she'd ironed them, and not stuck them in a drawer and left them there since her mother gave them as a housewarming gift. "To the sites, I mean."
Straightening, Remus nodded. "Not with Harry, but yes."
Tonks waited for him to elaborate further, but Remus merely reached for the opposite end of the tablecloth as she unfurled it, and wordlessly helped her spread it over the table. The wonderful domesticity of it -- they were co-hosting a dinner for her parents! -- momentarily distracted her from the conversation, but then she remembered it and asked, "What did you find?"
His prior silence made her unsure of what sort of response to expect. Sadness? Regret? Closure with a past he'd laid peacefully to rest?
Certainly she hadn't anticipated the lines of Remus' face to harden, seeming more deeply etched, or his eyes to go steely as he summoned a stack of plates from the cupboard, or his voice to be low and grim and dangerous. "That if Dumbledore hadn't left us such indelible proof of Snape's loyalty to the Order, knowing everything that happened in that house sixteen years ago was his doing would drive me to hunt him down and kill him, not re-establish contact."
No. Tonks definitely hadn't expected this winded sensation of having been socked in the gut with a Bludger, that just beneath Remus' calm, dutiful façade, boiled that depth of anger.
Nor the bitter burn of bile rising in her throat, nor the pressure in her joints as her fingers clutched a dinner plate so hard she couldn't believe it hadn't snapped in two, at the realisation of how close the same rage lurked in her.
Odd that the plate -- very proper white china trimmed with a bold, yet still elegant black stripe -- which had so annoyed her when her mother had given it to her for her housewarming, quelled her mounting fury now. There wasn't time for anger now at the moment. And Remus was right -- Dumbledore had left inarguable assurances of Snape's loyalty. He might be utterly despicable, but the Order needed him.
"Any inspiration about the contact thing?"
While Tonks laid the table, Remus moved to a drawer and counted out place settings of silverware. "I still don't see any way other than to send in a decoy Death Eater. Finding a willing person, however...I can't think of anyone but me with a halfway decent cover for going underground. I could liaise with Severus through Greyback."
Luckily, Tonks had just set down the last of the plates, and set to work folding the napkins beside them. Her entire body went rigid, as though hit by a Stunner. Remus had not just said...
"Except you were seen at the Hogwarts battle!" she heard herself cry. "No one would believe for a second you're not Dumbledore's man!"
"If I convinced them I'd gone fer--"
"No!" Tonks shouted, unable to hear him finish the word, more profane and obscene to her than any dirty word. Her voice and the rattle of the plates as she slammed a napkin down on the table, hung in the thick atmosphere of the kitchen.
Remus' eyebrows went up in a look of surprise, but otherwise he maintained that damn calm as he raised a conciliatory hand. "Nymphadora, I--"
"Don't call me Nymphadora! If someone's got to liaise with Snape, it ought to be me!" Air returned with force into her lungs, and her chest heaved with rapid breaths as she strode around the table to approach him. "Why the bloody hell would Dumbledore recruit a Metamorphmagus for the Order if not because it might come in handy for infiltrating the Death Eaters?" She stood almost on his toes now, hands balled into fists at her sides and repeated, "It ought to be me. I can be anyone, dammit! Isn't that the ultimate cover?"
Looking up at him, eyes locked in a duel of wills, the air between them radiated with an energy that took Tonks back to the battle of Hogwarts, the Department of Mysteries... She hated anything to come between them, but it would be over her dead body that she'd allow the noble prat to even consider going back. And even then she bet she could put up a damn good fight.
Smiling wearily, Remus reached up as though to touch her, then withdrew his hand. "Right now shouldn't you be the bride-to-be getting ready for an engagement dinner?"
Tonks would have snatched one of the dinner plates and smashed it over the condescending prat's thick head. Except that somehow that damned mildness of his allowed him to say it without coming off a condescending prat. And anyway, he was right -- she glimpsed the kitchen wall clock over his shoulder. Less than twenty minutes.
"Bugger it," she muttered and bolted for the bedroom, tripping over her robes as she shrugged them off, and on her shoes as she kicked them off in the doorway. As her clothing came off, marking a trail behind her en route to the bathroom, she noted an absence of the week's worth of clothes she'd left strewn on the floor when she left for work that morning; the bed was made, too. Damn, it was hard to stay pissed off at the man who'd saved your arse by making a lasagne and tidying up after you before your parents came over.
The one thing that niggled was that they'd rowed over this before -- well, today it hadn't exactly been a row, since Remus hadn't got a word in; more she'd launched into a tirade, really -- and they'd most probably row over it again. Next time it might explode into something more heated, because clearly Remus, while lacking a better idea, wasn't willing to send her into danger.
And that was the first real problem Tonks seen in their relationship. Wouldn't it be a kick in the teeth to have got through what they had in the past year, only to discover that their relationship compromised their roles in the Order?
She turned the hot water tap on all the way, as if to scald away the thought, and stepped into the shower. No -- they could work through that problem, too.
Over the slap of water against tile, she heard the creak of the bathroom door, followed by the rush of the tap and the familiar sound of Remus splashing his face and lathering up for a shave. Usually he teased her when he came in during her showers, threatened to join her, or peeked in to see her naked and wet, and wore an adorable dopey grin. Not today.
It was just bad timing, Tonks told herself as she vigorously worked shampoo into her scalp. Bloody awful timing. What did you think would happen, talking about being separated again when they'd just spent a week apart? Of course Remus didn't want to think about missing you again, you great sodding idiot!
A sudden thought occurring, Tonks blurted, "Have you had any inspiration about that other thing we haven't made up our minds about?"
For a moment, the only sounds were of the water, and of the razor scraping over Remus' skin. Tonks could just picture him, moving so deliberately, maintaining his tight control. But control over what? Was he even following her train of thought? He turned the tap on again -- to rinse off the razor, she guessed, when the sound was followed by tapping against the sink.
"You mean our wedding date?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"I thought..."
Tonks poked her head out from shower curtain and, wiping water from her eyes, saw Remus' brow crinkle as he combed his hair. He'd changed into his new dark grey trousers and white shirt which hung, for the moment, unbuttoned over his vest.
His eyes flicked upward to meet hers in the mirror. "I thought you said now wasn't the best time."
"I didn't say right now or even soon," said Tonks, letting the shower curtain fall closed over her again. She squeezed raspberry scented soap onto a pouf, and thoughtfully rubbed it over her shoulder. Watching the foam slip downward over her chest, she said, "Only...Mum and Dad will want to know."
"We can tell them we haven't set a date yet. I'm sure lots of couples do."
"Hm."
"What?" Remus' voice sounded closer now.
Tonks shut off the shower, and when she reached out for a towel, Remus pulled back the curtain and wrapped a fluffy yellow one around her. She thanked him, and to her relief he finally smiled at her, albeit tentatively -- but it fell when she suddenly sniffed and wrinkled her nose.
"Does something smell a bit odd to you?" she asked.
"I'd say baking lasagne mingled with soap, shampoo, and shaving lotion qualifies as more than a bit odd."
"No..." Securing her towel around her, Tonks stepped over the edge of the tub, slipping a little on the water she dripped across the black and white tile floor. "It's something odd about the lasagne."
Remus caught her elbow and pulled her back from the bathroom door. "You're changing the subject. What brought our wedding date to mind?"
Reflexively, Tonks started to pull away from him, started to say she really did smell something odd and would he please trust her to investigate it, but, glancing back over her shoulder, she saw his forehead deeply etched with troubled lines. She sighed. What had got into her today? Why couldn't she bring up anything without turning it into an issue?
Why was she letting her nerves about seeing her parents get the better of her in everything?
"It's just..." Tonks found Remus' searching gaze made it impossible for her to speak what was really on her mind, for fear of seeing them bend with hurt. As she averted them, she noticed his unbuttoned shirt, and set to work fastening them. "If we don't have a wedding date, and Mum thinks...you and me getting married's not a good idea...I think she'll try and talk me out of it."
Remus released her arm and caught her hands, which had worked their way up to the next-to-last button. "If she's going to try and talk you out of it, don't you think she will regardless of whether you've set a date or not?"
"Maybe." Tonks felt his eyes beckoning her gaze as he looked down at her, but she resisted their pull, swallowing hard against the lump in her throat. "She cares so much about appearances, though, calling off a wedding might..."
She stopped, realising how that sounded.
"Calling off a wedding might be a greater faux pas than marrying a werewolf?" Remus finished for her.
Tonks pulled her hands from his and raked them through her wet hair. "I didn't mean it like that."
As Remus took out his wand and cast a drying charm on her hair, his other hand cupped her cheek, and tilted her face up to his. "I know you didn't."
He smiled reassuringly, and Tonks returned it, weakly, before turning on her heel and shuffling to the bedroom. "Talking of faux pas, I haven't a bloody idea what to wear for this."
She rifled through the wardrobe for a moment, rejecting outfit after outfit, annoyance rising as Remus stood just behind her, looking into the door mirror as he knotted a necktie striped in varying shades of blue. When she muttered about everything being ridiculously easy for blokes, he abandoned his tie and gently brushed past her so he could look at her clothes. "May I?"
Tonks was only too relieved to step aside. Without hesitation, as if he'd thought about her outfit beforehand, Remus selected a white t-shirt, black miniskirt, black satin waistcoat with abstract purple patterns worked through it, and purple flats with bows on the toes. Laying them all out on the bed, he summoned a pair of leggings from the bureau, along with a purple bra and knickers set.
Though she was impressed by how he'd remembered every coordinating element of the outfit, Tonks eyed his choice dubiously. "You think?"
"I think you look sexy in this."
Tonks couldn't help but grin at the utter sincerity in his rasping tones -- or at the deeply appreciative look in his eyes as they swept her. But she said, "I'm dressing for my parents, remember. I've got to look...I don't know...bridey..."
"You'd prefer a set of white dress robes, then?"
Tonks poked her tongue out at him. "You know what I mean."
He shook his head slightly.
Sighing, Tonks flopped onto the bed and pulled on the knickers. "Grown up. Ladylike."
Moving to stand in front of her, slipping between her knees, Remus laid his hands on her shoulders. "You're always those things," he said, thumbs stroking her collarbones. "In your own way. And that's exactly how you should look tonight. Like yourself."
Melted by his sweetness, Tonks looked over the outfit again, and thought she saw a little more of the grown up lady in it. "Maybe with trousers..."
The tender look fell off Remus' face as his warm hands slid from her shoulders, leaving them cold and unprotected, to his sides. Bed springs groaning as he seated himself beside her, he tentatively took her hands and said, not quite meeting her eye, "If you're having second thoughts about whether we ought to--"
"No!" Snapped out of her malaise, Tonks clutched Remus' hands so tightly that her nails were sure to leave little half-moons in his palms. "Never a second thought, no matter what Mum and Dad think. I'm sorry I'm being so pessimistic about it."
Remus brought her hands to his lips. "You've nothing to apologise for. I'm the one who should be sorry this isn't a completely joyous time for you."
"It is."
He smiled at her -- a real smile, which told Tonks he believed her. But he said, quietly, "I'm sorry it's not simple, with regard to your parents, especially."
If she were completely honest, Tonks was, too -- and Remus knew without her saying now that she was, because she'd told him once that it did matter to her, deep down, whether her parents approved of their relationship. Now, however, part of her wished she'd never given voice to that thought; though she knew it would be hypocritical of her to expect complete openness from him at yet try and protect him from potentially hurtful truths.
"Well," she said, jumping to her feet. She dropped her towel, grabbed her bra, and put her arms through the straps. "If dinner with Mum and Dad doesn't go well, we'll just throw them out, say sod the parents, and Floo over to Arthur and Molly's for a little party."
Remus' long fingers were suddenly stroking the skin of her back as he brushed her fumbling hands away and fastened her bra for her. His breath on her neck made the hairs on her neck stand as he whispered, "Or just have a party of our own?"
His hands slipped under her arms, and curled over her breasts as he dipped his head and pressed warm, soft lips to the curve of her neck.
"Remus..." Tonks whispered in a shuddering breath. "That lasagne really doesn't smell right."
"It can't smell wrong," said Remus with obvious frustration as Tonks disentangled herself from his arms and snatched her dressing gown from the hook on the bathroom door.
"Why?" she threw it over her shoulders as she dashed for the kitchen, stumbling over the tie. "Because you made it?"
With a hint of smugness, Remus replied, "Because I made it precisely according to Molly's instructions."
But when Tonks opened the oven with her wand, even Remus couldn't deny the distinctly spoilt smell that wafted out. When she'd levitated it onto the counter, he bent to sniff it, then recoiled as though from a Flobberworm.
"I don't understand," he said, standing far back from the lasagne, scratching his head.
Tonks would have ribbed him about his cockiness, if having a perfect lasagne tonight weren't so bloody important. "Was the cheese past its date?"
She summoned it from the bin, but the cottage cheese container she caught gingerly between her fingers was marked well before the expiration date.
"Well, serving this to your parents won't plead our case," Remus said, vanishing the lot. "We'll have to take them out."
Tonks nodded. "I don't know why we didn't just decide that from the start."
It was a lie. She knew exactly why. Remus had suggested that the proper way to announce their engagement was to take her parents out for dinner. Tonks, had disagreed, saying she'd go a lot farther with her mother if she impressed her by playing Susie Housewitch. Part of her had believed it. But mostly she'd been afraid that Remus' fragile pride would be battered by playing the suitor winning over sceptical parents with a dinner he could not pay for.
"Where do you think?" Remus asked. "The Lion and Unicorn?"
Tonks thought fleetingly of the Valentine's Day dinner she and Remus and Bill and Fleur had won in a raffle to the posh Wizarding restaurant. "We haven't got a reservation."
"Won't hurt to owl, will it? And we could always have appetizers and drinks at the bar until a table becomes available."
"I'll have to re-think my outfit..." Tonks started for the bedroom, but stopped, startled, in her tracks as the fireplace Floo crackled to life and Molly Weasley's head appeared in the grate.
"Hello, dear. Not ready yet?" She clucked her tongue. "Just thought I'd see how the lasagne came out."
"Something's gone wrong with the cheese," Remus said with obvious frustration that made it impossible for Tonks not to snigger. "It's spoilt."
"Did you use your wand to put it on?" Molly asked.
"Erm..." Remus' sandy brows knit. "Yes...?"
"Didn't you know wands and cheese don't mix?" Molly asked as though a person would had to have fallen off the back of a broom not to know.
Remus coloured. "No. No, I didn't."
A hand emerged from the flames as Molly massaged her forehead. "I almost put it in the directions, but I thought since you..."
From beneath her palm, Molly's eyes darted sideways at Tonks, whose hands went defensively to her hips at what the older witch had left unsaid (rather amusingly, Tonks had to admit), that she wouldn't have thought not to include it, had she thought Tonks would put the lasagne together.
"Luckily," she said, "I've an extra on hand..."
"It's all right, Molly," Remus began, "we thought we'd take them out--"
But Molly had disappeared.
Though Tonks had wanted responsibility for the home-cooked dinner, she was too relieved that the issue of Remus' pride had been side-stepped, to care.
Sidling up to Remus, Tonks caught the end of his tie and tugged at it. "She looked right surprised it was you, not me, that mucked it up."
Remus rolled his eyes and had opened his mouth in what Tonks was sure would have been a truly sarky retort, when Molly appeared in the fireplace again, this time all of her, carrying a lasagne in what Tonks knew to be her very best serving casserole dish, which had been in the Prewett family for generations.
Thanking her, Tonks blundered forward to take it, but Molly kept a firm hold on it.
"I'll take care of it, dear," she said, casting a critical eye over the partially laid dinner table -- the creases in the never-ironed tablecloth, in particular. "You haven't got much time. Go get yourself dressed and made up. Remus, your hair's sticking up a bit at the back. You might take a wet comb to it..."
Back in their bedroom, Tonks quickly threw on the outfit Remus had picked out for her, without giving it a second thought except that it was a good choice and flattered her figure well enough that maybe her mum wouldn't suggest morphing.
But a suitable hair colour continued to elude her. Normally she would've matched it to the purple in her outfit, but purple did make her look peaky, and her mum's face would say so, even if she didn't out loud. It was such a rich shade of purple, though, and her dad had always been partial to it; and Tonks loved the way it framed her face in layers like she'd seen on a poster in a Muggle hair salon window the other day. Maybe if she just adjusted her skin tone a little...
"You were thinking about me, weren't you?" Remus' voice broke into her thoughts as they stood together in front of the bathroom mirror. "When you decided to have your parents here for dinner?"
Tonks' eyes dropped from the reflection of her cheek, on which she'd been trying out a bit of a tan. Damn. She knew she had to work a bit harder at stealth than most people, but had she really been so bleeding obvious?
She nodded, guiltily, but then Remus was enfolding her in his arms, dropping tender kisses down on her hair.
"I love you," he said, huskily. "I admit, I would have felt just a bit self-conscious about..." His eyes fell away briefly as he said, "...about paying..." but met hers again, darkening, as he went on, "We could have done, you know. I'd get over it, for you."
Palms pressed against his chest, fingers just curling to clutch the smooth poplin of his shirt, Tonks asked, "For us?"
"Yes." Smiling, he nuzzled her cheek, and dipped his head to kiss her properly. "For us--"
Tonks never felt the warmth of his mouth covering hers. When he was just a hair's breath away, he startled back at a
CRACK!
from the other room, followed by Molly's blood-curdling scream.
A/N: Thank you so much for reading this first chapter of Masks and Mirrors. The next instalment promises awkward conversations, broom rides, and Remus and Tonks in Order investigation mode. I'll do my best to update every week to ten days, though the Lovers' Moon Fic Jumble at metamorfic_moon might slow me down a bit.
Let me know what you think of this chapter, and choose the Remus of your choice to come home to after a stressful day: thoughtful Remus, who's cleaned the house and cooked a delightful lasagne dinner; romantic Remus, who's put on a tie and wants to take you out; or sexy Remus, who's turned down the blankets and the lights and planned a different sort of candlelight dinner...