James, that's illegal
Remus was in deep shit. He’d kept his eyes and ears peeled for any information he could gather on the bodies in the forest, and the more he learned, the more he could be certain it was the work of claws and fangs. Very likely his claws and fangs.
He should have known his wolf would be a bit unnerved being in unfamiliar terrain for the first time. Naturally, he was more aggressive when he was anxious, but he really couldn’t say no to coming here. He just got assigned to two really nice foster parents who took actual great interest in him, so he had to come to this unfamiliar city right before the full moon. He had no choice, if he didn’t want to throw away his shot at actually having a family.
But it was careless and egoistic. If he hadn’t been so reckless, those five people might have still been alive. His wolf might have settled for some bunnies and maybe a deer like the ones he usually found in the forest near his home. Orphanage. What he had right now was a home.
As if his day couldn’t get any worse, a foul smell permeated the air in his new classroom. It was his wolf that recognised it even before his human caught on. It smelled like the carcasses he sometimes found in the forest, too fresh to rot, too spoiled to eat. His nose told him to steer clear, his teacher assigned him a seat right behind the source of the smell.
The dead boy introduced himself as Sirius Potter, brother of a very alive James Potter who sat right next to him. Remus had seen vampires before, and he had to say: he never felt any guilt when his wolf managed to kill one. They were foul, evil, loathsome creatures and their morals were as wicked as their odour.
Meeting a vampire was something new. Seeing a vampire being all friendly with humans was something straight up strange. It was already a struggle for Remus to fit in, and he only felt bloodlust one night per month. Vampires knew nothing else.
The strange killings and the strange vampire had to be somehow related, right? How much did a vampire need to drink anyways? Was five victims enough to sustain him in a way that allowed him to resist the allure of the hundreds of human students around him? Had anyone at this school ever ‘mysteriously disappeared’? Did he con his ‘friends’ into allowing him to drink small portions of their blood every now and then?
Remus had seen vampires before. They didn’t stop at a few sips. They drank until they were satisfied and didn’t care if their victims survived their attack or not.
But Sirius was something strange… Remus didn’t trust him. He’d never trust any vampire, but especially not this one, because werewolves did actually care about humans for all the twenty nine days a month they weren’t a monster. So it unnerved him to see a vampire stroll so casually through their schools and to see humans being so close and comfortable with him.
Remus had no other choice but to confront Sirius if he ever wanted his curiosity satisfied. The vampire really should consider joining theatre club if he was going to keep this act up. He was good at pretending to be alive, regulating his breath to match his emotions -or at least the once he faked to get to Remus-, acting all scared like Remus would ever take pity to a vampire, but one thing none of them could fake was a heartbeat. Each and every vampire had nothing but dead silence inside their chest.
Except this one.
It was just once, and then it was dead silence again, but it was strange enough that it happened once.
“I don’t really bother with killings anymore…” Badum.
Though his fangs were out and his identity revealed and the vampire was clearly upset, Remus let him go. He pushed Sirius far away from him to think this through. A vampire with a heartbeat… It was unheard of. Remus didn’t know what it implied, but for now he decided to believe what Sirius said. He had nothing to do with the murders, nor any other vampire, so it all had to be the work of wolves.
“Are you quite alright?”, Lily had asked Sirius when they got back to their table in the cafeteria. “You look… paler than usual.”
“Wow, thanks Lily…”, Sirius said offendedly.
“She’s right though”, James said, “and you’ve barely touched your food. Are you feeling sick?”
It was disgusting to see how much the humans cared for their natural predator. “I think he looks just the same”, Remus noted.
“Yes, everything’s fine”, Sirius agreed. “But I’m really not hungry though”, he said as he pushed his plate away from him to support his statement.
“Alright then”, James said convinced, “if that’s the case you can join us tonight. Me, Lily, Dorcas and Marls are going to check out the forest for some clues on those murders.”
“James, that’s illegal”, Sirius correctly remarked. “The murderer could still be out there! That’s way too dangerous.”
“Come on…”, James whined. “Don’t be such a wuss. It’s as Remus said: they’re not going to massacre the same place twice. Aren’t you curious what happened?”
“Yeah…”, Sirius said, “and mother pays all her taxes so that the police can go and find that out for us.”
“I mean what really happened. Not some boring, censored report to spare us poor children from any unsettling graphic material.”
“I agree with James. It can’t hurt to take a look”, Remus said. He had to find out if he was the one responsible or not, and if these humans decided to explore the forbidden forest for the sake of some exciting quest, why not come with them?
“That’s the spirit!”, Lily cheered. “I’ll let the girls know you’re joining us.”