ice machines

The weather worsens.

If the gloom of the past week wasn’t enough, it is now pouring down, an endless, loud, annoying patter of rain on the windows, as if furious that they can take shelter inside, knocking restlessly to be let in. Even Filtch abandons the idea of gardening and resorts to setting them all at deep cleaning the house and doing small restorations that had been previously relegated to the bottom of the priority list in favour of tending to the garden. As the tallest, these were mostly Remus’s job – replacing old lightbulbs, painfully rehanging and straightening old paintings under Filtch’s fussy eyes, repainting and revarnishing around the house where chips had started to appear.

Despite the dullness of the tasks and Filtch’s near unbearable presence, he’s grateful to be separated from the others and given something to keep him occupied. He needs a distraction. Previously coveted moments of peace and quiet to read or think have turned into his nightmare as his mind inevitably strays.

Don’t.

Don’t.

Do-not.

Whereas before, he had been completely neutral and unbothered by his reflection, he now avoids his face in the bathroom mirror, unwilling to meet his own eyes. He looks, he knows, like he hasn’t slept in days. He’s not sure that he has. Nights are spent tossing and turning in bed, too cold and too hungry. So so hungry. It’s an awful, consuming, feeling at the bottom of his stomach and he can feel it wanting and wanting. Remus is not used to wanting. He thinks that maybe that’s it, that now he has finally has seen magic, has gotten a taste, that now he doesn’t know what to do in this world anymore.

Deep down he knows that that’s not what this is.

He can’t eat, he can’t sleep, he can’t think. He wants some more chocolate.

He’s embarrassed by it, by how much he wants it, how much he wants such a stupid little thing, how much a food has taken over his mind. But he doesn’t want anything else.

James is worried. He knows James is worried because every emotion he’s ever had is displayed all over James’ face and he keeps sending Remus looks and asking if he’s slept ok or if he’s sure he doesn’t want to eat a little more. He thinks Lily would also be worried if she wasn’t so mad. He’s sort of impressed really, by her ability to hold a grudge, how hot her anger burns. She hasn’t said a single word to him since that night, has barely looked at him.

Marlene is more direct.

“You look like shit,” she informs him as he comes into the library where she and James are playing chess, having finally gotten so sick of Filtch he’d begged to take a break.

“Thanks,” he says drily, “I feel like it.” He does. Breakfast – eggs, marmalade and toast, a favourite of his before the wardrobe – tasted like sand and he’d spent half of the night wandering the corridors, always eventually finding himself back in front of the wardrobe, half afraid that Lily might find him there.

James looks up from where he’d been scowling down at their game, chewing furiously on his lip, to give him another concerned look.

“Do you feel sick?”

“Nah,” Remus lies, “Just tired of Filtch.” Marlene snorts in agreement but James continues to watch him worriedly. “Where’s…”

“Lily?” guesses Marlene flatly, “She went on a walk around the garden again.” She and James have been, in a way, been put between Remus and Lily and though they’ve both mostly chosen to remain neutral – out of confusion most likely – it’s clear that, Lily, despite coming out of this looking considerable less sane than Remus, has more support. Neither of them are stupid, they know something happened, Remus hasn’t exactly done a good job at hiding that either, they just don’t believe the truth. He can hardly blame them, given that he outright lied about it. Is lying about it. They’ve repeatedly tried asking what happened and he’s avoided answering every time.

He nods and hums noncommittedly before guiltily taking a seat beside them. For a while its calm apart from their bickering and he lets himself just observe, relaxing into his seat and occasionally helping one or the other out when he sees a clever move. The hunger lessons.

Lily arrives a while later, dripping wet. It’s her new thing, these walks around the garden. From where he’s watched her from the windows, all Remus has seen is her going around in circles, looping the entire garden over and over until she gets too cold or tired or whatever it is that convinces her to come back inside. It’s made her Filtch’s absolute least favourite of all of them, because she always tracks in several puddles of mud and rain water with her when she comes back in. Remus doesn’t know if she likes the rain or maybe the cold just reminds her of Hogwarts.

James immediately jumps up from his seat and begins fretting.

“You’re soaked, let me grab you a towel and a change of clothes – and a blanket, careful Filtch’ll have your head-“

She just nods mutely. James dashes off.

Without him the atmosphere takes a turn for the worse as she spots Remus and her eyes narrow. To his surprise, however, instead of ignoring him like she has been, she marches right up to him, leaving a trail of footprints behind her. She’ll clean them later, he knows, but it stresses him a little all the same, Filtch’s shrieks ringing in his head.

“Lupin.”

He winces.

“Lily.”

“Why?”

“What?”

“I just want to know why.”

Oh. He shuffles uncomfortably. Why he had lied. Honestly he doesn’t even know. Marlene leans forward, never one to prevent an argument. Remus is almost surprised she doesn’t start chanting ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’.

“That’s not-“ he begins with no idea what he’s going to continue the sentence with.

“Whats wrong with you?” Lily interrupts and he blinks, a little taken aback, as she leans forward with a frown. “You look sick.”

“I'm not,” he says tiredly and not particularly convincingly. She leans back with a scowl.

“You’re pathetic.”

I know, he wants to say, I know, I know, I know. I’ve known it longer than you.

James comes back, rambling as always, but she doesn’t even look at him, just keeps staring at Remus and repeats,

“Why?”

He wants to tell her. Wants to tell her about Sirius, about how he had made him smile and then almost (almost!) laugh, about the wolf-pulled sleigh, he wants to tell her that he’s so hungry he can taste blood in his mouth from where he’s bit his cheek and tongue and lips, he wants to tell her about the chocolate. About how it was the best thing he’s ever had, about how he wants more, about how he’s felt cold ever since. Wants to tell her that they can go back and she can try some and – don’t.

Don’t.

What comes out instead is – “I’m pathetic, apparently.” She snorts with contempt, rolling her eyes and – giving up on him – turns to accept James’s offer of a towel, her jaw clenched.

“I can’t believe I ever liked you,” she says, with one last upset look, before leaving, hands clutching the towel around her. With a reproachful look at Remus, James hurries after her and Remus is left with the silence of his own stupid words.

“You are fucking it all up,” Marlene remarks and he sighs.

“Thanks Marls.”

“I mean it, Re.”

“Yeah,” he sighs, “I know.”

Marlene clicks her tongue, looking him over thoughtfully before rolling her eyes and gesturing towards the abandoned chess board.

“Fancy a game?”

The tension continues the rest of the week, with Lily barely speaking to him and Remus barely sleeping or eating, until the weather takes a turn and they get their first real summers day of sun in weeks. At the first hint of warm weather James immediately cracks and stops caring about the tension or being a mediator, instead spending an hour bouncing around their rooms before dragging them all outside with Marlene’s help. The sun is out at last and gloriously so, banishing the previous weeks clouds to boast full ownership of the sky, but he shivers in the light breeze.

Remus and James drag an old cricket set, that James had found while emptying a shed for Filtch, including bats, balls and armor, out to the large neat lawn that wraps around the Manor while the girls whisper to themselves. When Remus dumps the box on the grass Marlene stabs her finger at him threateningly, a hand on her hip.

“You two,” she warns, sending Lily a look, “You're having a truce OK? No more sulking.” Lily sighs but agrees and Remus nods reluctantly. He feels twitchy and strange and a little like screaming at them that this is all a stupid waste of time, and they should be trying to figure out the wardrobe instead, but he lied about that and he's pretty sure he's going insane.

The game turns out to be good idea to distract them all and he forgets about the forest for a little while, letting himself smile at James's ridiculousness even though the other three all get ridiculously competitive which isn't really something Remus has ever been able to muster for sports. He’s just never really understood why people care so much. Still, he makes a small effort, mostly because he thinks Marlene – the other person on his team – would kill him otherwise. It's all going very well until Remus steps up to the bat and fucks it all up, because of course.

He rolls his eyes as James goofs off trying to sike him out before throwing the ball and flinches slightly when he completely fails at hitting it. James then, of course, 180’s on his sabotage attempts and attempts instead to show him how to hold the bat until Marlene gets sick of this, shoves him out of the way and shows Remus far more efficiently and coherently.

“Just smash it as hard as you can,” she recommends, before stepping back. This time when James throws the ball Remus hits it. Hard. It shoots straight into a magnificent upwards arc. They all watch in horror, as if in slow motion, as it sails straight to the manor and one of the second story windows, landing with a loud crash and a gentle delicate shattering sound as a glass breaks. For a moment no one says anything then Marlene says -

“Fuck.”

- at the same time that Remus says a heartfelt –

“Shit.”

James winces. Lily raises her hand to her mouth, eyes wide, then runs towards the house. They all follow her.

The window, Remus thinks when they get to the room, all panting and out of breath from how quickly they’d sprinted up the stairs, is very broken. Almost excessively so. It was only one small ball - did the whole thing really need to collapse in such small pieces all over the floor?

“We're so fucked,” says Marlene miserably and he hums in agreement. Lily opens her mouth to reply but freezes instead and Remus frowns at her, concerned, before freezing himself when he hears it too. The unmistakable sound of Filtch making his way up the stairs, grumbling to himself.

They all exchanged panic looks before James lunges to the ball grabbing it off the floor and shoving Lily and Remus out the door and they're all running. Again. It’s giving Remus severe deja vu. Must he keep breaking things?

“Oh my God,” James is saying, “Oh my God.” And while he looks panicked, the idiot is grinning. He’s a thrill seeker at heart, James. Remus would roll his eyes if he wasn't so busy opening and shutting doors as they stumble hurriedly down the hall. Filtch, to his horror, is getting louder. When they hear a yell, he knows the broken window has been found.

“Hide,” says Lily desperately, “Hide, hide, hide.” Remus reflects regrettably on his short unfulfilling life as she yanks open the next door. As they pile into the next room even James's smile fades and they all hesitate.

The wardrobe.

But then Filtch's voice is getting closer to the room and they're racing towards and into the wardrobe and Marlene is pulling the door closed with a definite click behind them.

“Oof,” Remus grumbles when she falls into him two seconds later, digging her elbow into his side. “Ouch.”

“Then move,” she hisses back, “Why are you so long?”

“Long?” he replies offended.

“Lanky, whatever, you're taking up too much space.”

Remus stumbles away from her trying to give her said space and right into James. Bad move. They all stumble together for a second desperately grabbing onto each other and attempting to right themselves before tumbling to the ground with matching yelps and groans as Remus lands right on top of James.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” he gasps, trying to push himself off. And unfortunately pulling James's hair instead. He's so distracted he doesn't realize they've landed on actual ground and frost until Lily steps right over them a heartbreakingly hopeful look on her face and he stops, still half clambering off of James, to look up and see pine trees. James shoves him - he falls off with a grunt - and hops seemingly immediately to his feet.

 Theclearing.

 The lamppost.

It feels strangely good to feel the cold bite him from the outside as well as the inside. Stops him from wanting to crawl out of his skin. He struggles to his feet with far less grace than James, rubbing his elbow.

“Ohh,” says Marlene behind him and James just gapes mouth wide open. Lily spins around to them, the melancholy previously clinging to her gone, a wide delighted smile on her face.

“See?” she says, “It is real.” And despite it all, it's clear she had doubted herself. Remus swallows and looks away from her to the familiar trees.

“Whoa,” says James, readjusting his crocked glasses – as usual, even after he fixes them, they go crocked again, this time tilting in the other direction.

“This is so cool,” says Marlene admiringly, and Lily’s grin somehow widens.

“I'm sorry,” says James, seemingly coming to, a regretful look on his face, “I'm so sorry Lils, for not believing you, we should have –“ And then he turns and then he looks at Remus standing there awkwardly and they all go quiet. Remus swallows again.

He's so cold.

“Remus,” asks James. He sounds upset, betrayed. Remus doesn't have a defense or an explanation. He doesn’t say anything.

“Why would you lie?” ask James looking completely puzzled. Remus finds not for the first time both that he would kill to view the world as honestly and hopefully as James and that he wants to shake him as hard as he can until James somehow understands him and the ugly feeling in his gut.

“I don't know,” he says lamely, because he doesn't and it sounds so awful and stupid like that, but he has no explanation, no excuse.

“You don't know,” repeats Lily and to his horror there are tears in her eyes, “What is wrong with you?” Something, thinks Remus, something worse and far less mendable than whatever you're thinking.

“Lils,” says James uneasily.

“No, no, he let you think - he let me think I was crazy for no reason? How is that fair? I'm not - that's not OK or, or normal.”

No one disagrees with her. In this silent icy forest, the silent weighs heavier. Remus stares at his shoes.

“I think he should stay behind,” says Lily crossing her arms and Remus feels a strange bolt of panic. He doesn't want to be left behind. In the strange stuffy house against Filtch’s rath or the cold lonely forest. He thinks of the queen and is hit by a shudder of hunger so strong his hands start shaking again.

“I'm sorry,” he says and it's not enough. Lily just scoffs.

“We can't leave him behind,” says James gently but he sounds uneasy. If she pushes Remus knows he would take her side, and he can't help but feel irritated. Does it really matter that he lied if they're all here now?

“Let's go visit Mary,” says Marlene firmly, “All of us.”

She and James make a good team, ignoring all of Remus’s fuck ups. The mention of Mary alone is enough to lift some of the anger from Lily's face and a slight blush to settle on her cheeks and Remus feels that same sick stress he gets every time he thinks about it. Hopes the other two don’t notice.

Ignore, ignore, ignore.

“OK,” she says, “OK. You'll love her, Marls.”

Marlene nods eagerly and covertly sends Remus a dark behave look that he ignores. Lily seems to decide that she simply is going to pretend he doesn't exist which is understandable, he likes to do the same thing sometimes, and James, in a clear effort to move hurriedly past it, goes digging through the wardrobe coats to find some they can use.

It makes Remus nervous, like the wardrobe could suddenly decide to shut James away from them. Don't, he prays.

Marlene gets handed an admittedly rather cool leather one, dark red with white fur but it seems to be the only actually nice coat James can find because although the one he hands Lily is acceptable the one he pulls on himself is truly ugly, although with James it's hard to tell if maybe he just likes it. The one Remus is given however, is even worse. It might be the ugliest item of clothing he's ever seen. It's also clearly for women. When he frowns, James gives him the most passive aggressive challenging smile Remus has ever seen let alone ever been on the receiving end of.

He puts the coat on.

It barely fits his gangly teenage body stretching uncomfortably at the shoulders and he trails behind the others for a bit fiddling with the confusing shaped buttons in an attempt to close it. They pass the lamppost, with wide eyed looks from both James and Marlene, and take the opposite direction from the one Remus had taken when he’d come, going slightly downhill through the trees. James keeps sending him conflicted looks that he ignores in favour of focusing on not tripping in the deep snow. Remus is not made for winter.

Lily explains in hushed whispers everything Mary told her about the ‘Witch’ and the curse of eternal winter on the land. Remus looks uneasily up at the trees and does his best not to listen. He thinks of the queen and her smile. The calm of her voice. The chocolate. Sirius. She couldn't be evil. Mary must be lying. But why?

“It'll be lovely,” Lily was saying a genuine smile in her voice, “Roaring fire, tea with sugar and sweets and she's so –“ Her rambling comes to an abrupt end as they come to the bottom of a small cliff. It takes Remus a moment to see the door and then to register that it's open and at a strange angle, having clearly been broken and ripped off its hinges.

A strangled sound comes out of Lily and she's running and disappearing inside. James takes off after her immediately, Marlene on his heels. Remus follows more hesitantly. He's not sure how much he likes how willing they are to run into potential danger.

Spinning slowly, he takes in the surroundings, noting only still and silent trees before ducking inside after them. A scene of destruction awaits him. It has clearly been a nice cozy place before someone came and took a knife at it. There were clear signs of a struggle - a smashed plate on the floor accompanied by its cutlery and remains of a dinner and overturned furniture torn apart with large slashes as if attacked by a wild beast, also running through the carpet, armchair and walls. He steps on a picture lying on the ground, crunching the glass and takes a startled step backwards.

A beautiful woman with elaborate braids decorating her greying hair and a small child in her arms smiles up at him. Lily stands in the middle of the room staring at the empty overturned armchair. Remus has never seen her look so still. James hesitantly reaches for her elbow and she jerks it away.

“I - I can't but-“

Remus looks away, a lump in his throat and his eyes land on a page nailed to the door. His hands are shaking as he tears it down to read. The sound has the others turning to him and he clears his throat before reading out loud, hoping it'll stop the tears clearly threatening on Lily’s face.

“Ahem, by order of Her Imperial Majesty, the queen of Narnia, Mary MacDonald has hereby been arrested for high treason and been brought to face her crimes -”

“Crimes?!” exclaims Lily, she looks furious again. “What crimes?”

“High treason?” replies Remus skimming the rest of the page. Wrong thing to say.

“High - ? No, no she- oh my God, she - the queen must have found out about me - this is- she's been arrested because of me.”

“We don't know that,” says James uneasily as Marlene comes to read for herself behind Remus’s shoulder.

“Maybe she's just a criminal,” says Remus who's feeling awful and anxious and sick and thinking about how he told Walburga her name which gets him an annoyed look from all of them, even James, and an elbow in the side again from Marlene.

“She's not” snaps Lily.

“You don't really know her,” Remus tries carefully, and Lily is suddenly in his space jamming her fingers in his face.

“Don't you dare.”

He takes a careful step away and Lily spins away from him putting her head in her hands.

“I have to help her, I have to I just - I just know it's my fault and-“ She takes a shouldering breath and cuts herself off. Remus doesn't say anything. Thinks about telling her name to the queen. Still doesn't say anything. James frowns a little, looking almost equally as upset.

“Do you know anyone else we could talk to?” he asks Lily, “Maybe we could go to this this queen and explain that it's a misunderstanding?” Remus isn't the only one to turn to him incredulously as Lily is seemingly shocked out of her distress by the naivety of this statement.

“What? No - the ‘queen’,” she spits, “Is an evil dictator - she's banned humans”.

“Oh,” says James.

“Wait,” says Marlene, “So what's Mary?” This, Remus thinks, is a good question. He thinks of the queen and her son - surely they weren't evil, she had been so nice, so lovely ,she'd even fed him. His stomach tightens painfully, and he thinks of her words, the castle behind the mountains, he’s here now! He could see her! He feels flooded by his turn sudden sense of urgency to do exactly that so strong he almost misses Lilly’s answer.

“She's a hedge witch,” she explains, “Like small bits of magic potions and stuff.”

“A witch,” Remus repeats uneasily, “How did you know that she isn't the evil one? Can we really trust a witch who's been arrested for high treason?” Lily’s furious look is turned at him once more.

“What is wrong with you?”

“Lily,” James intervenes carefully stepping between them.

“No he's been weird since - since he came here the first time, acting all angry and mistrustful and lying and –“ she pauses and her face shifts as she looks him over more carefully. Remus has never wanted to leave a room more. “- Did you meet anyone while you were here Remus?”

“What?” he says mouth dry. Not the right moment. “No I told you I –“

Lily is taking a threatening step forward, too clever not to realize something when the door creaks and they all spin towards it, Remus’s heart is thumping so fast he feels sick although that could be how hungry he feels. Marlene grabs a butter knife off the floor and points it threateningly at the door which creeks again before falling inwards and falling to the ground with a loud crash to reveal a fox.

Remus releases a deep breath of relief but Lily steps forward.

“Who are you?” she asks.

“Um Lily - it's a fox,” says James and the fox manages a haughty air.

“And we're all the same, are we?” The fox – he just - a fox talking looks decidedly wrong, Remus decides, just odd. Marlene almost falls over in shock.  “I’m Gideon - did you know Mary?” A suspicious fox also looks weird.

“I'm Lily,” Lily says uncertainly and the fox - Gideon – freezes.

“Lily? Lily Lily? Of Lon Don?” - he leans forward to whisper – “Human Lily?” Lily nods.

“And I'm James,” says James holding out his hand politely before realizing he's talking to a fox who doesn't have hands, as foxes tend to do, and awkwardly pulling it back.

“Why are you talking?” asks Marlene, another good question. Gideon looks offended.

“Why wouldn't I be?”

“Animals talk here,” says Lily dismissively, harshly leaning towards Gideon with urgency, like that isn't a wild fact to just drop. “You know Mary? Is she all right? Where have they taken her?” The room gets immediately more hushed as Gideon shakes his head gravely.

“The queen has her but –“ He glances around,  “- it's not safe here, I’ll explain later, somewhere safer. We should go and quickly.” James and Remus exchanged a glance.

“Hey wait, Lily,” says James as Lily and the fox start for the now doorless exit, “Wait, wait, we don't - we don't know you I don't want trouble or-“

“James,” says Lily, “It's Mary.”

There's a pause as Remus, James and Marlene stared at her blankly.

“I have proof we’re friends,” Gideon promises, “At the safe house.” Marlene and James exchange looks this time. “Listen I know you’re new here, but the queen really isn’t someone you want to find you here, or any of her minions – and they’ve been passing by regularly to see if you come back.”

“How do we know you’re not one of her minions and that you’re not just lying to us?” asks Marlene, who Remus has to admit, has been asking all the right questions today.

The fox snarls, clearly outraged at the thought before hesitating.

“I swear on my life and honor,” he says solemnly at last, “That I am a friend of Mary and of yours – she told me about Lily of Lon Don, who came through a wardrobe before she was taken, and I will do whatever is in my power to help you. I have no love for the queen.”

“I'm going,” announces Lily, “I owe it to Mary – and he clearly knows her, how else would he know I came through a wardrobe? You can all just leave.” -the ‘like cowards’ goes unsaid- “But I'm following Gideon.”

They all exchange uneasy glances but-  

“We're not leaving you here alone,” says Marlene and James sighs but nods.

“We need to hurry,” says Gideon.

Remus is left standing in the dark broken home among shattered glass for a quick strange moment before he hurries to follow them out.