The Time Tonks Married a Gay Werewolf (and It Became the Last Prank the both of them ever Pulled)

Oh, spare the judgement!

 It is complicated, okay? It is not what you think, it never was.

It all started the day they asked her to be their surrogate. Grimmauld Place was as sombre as ever, only that, for once, it was also silent. The kids were at Hogwarts, Fred and George in their brand new joke shop, soon to be opened, Bill was working, Arthur was on patrol in the department of mysteries—because yes, he’d been attacked last Christmas but life goes on and they needed all the help they could get—Kingsley was with the muggle prime minister and Molly… What the heck was Molly doing?! Surely Dumbledore must have sent her off somewhere, knowing that man…It matters not, point is, the house was so quiet the air was almost eerie and Tonks was not intruding if that’s what you think, they had been invited for dinner! 

“There is a spell,” Sirius said, “you and Moony will not touch each other.”

“Oh, thanks Merlin!” Tonks grunted.

“Wait, so will you do it?” Remus’ eyes lighted up as he looked at her. “It will be after the war, obviously, when it is all over.”

By then, Tonks had noticed a few things about Remus. For one, he always expected the worst in people—not in general, only where he was concerned. Secondly, he was deeply in love with her cousin, they were the type of couple who just couldn’t be apart, not for one minute, and Tonks couldn’t help but wonder how on earth they had survived so many years on their own, how it was possible Remus had not consumed to death in their old flat, not to mention Sirius, locked up in Azkaban. “I had him there,” Sirius explained to them once, “only in our worst memories, but he was often with me, and I preferred it, I liked it better than when he wasn’t in them at all.” Lastly, Remus had an awful perception of himself, constantly challenged by Sirius, and he would have never, ever talked about the end of the war with hope—not if said ending involved him. 

So yes, that was new. Remus dreaming with a life outside of that hellhole they were at? It seemed to Tonks Sirius was doing a good job. They made each other better, and only a fool could have not seen it.

“We just want to try out the spell—we’ll leave it unfinished, of course, it won’t be consumed—and see if you are compatible.” Sirius added.

“You are really down to doing this?” Remus checked again.

She grabbed his hand, and then Sirius’. Hanika had been killed a few months ago, and they desperately tried not to think about her. She would have wanted Tonks to do it, though, that much was obvious.

“Remus listen to me,” she whispered, “us queers? We’ve got to remain together, okay? How are things ever going to change, if we don’t support each other first?”

“And yes,” she added, remembering the conversation they’d had a few months ago, “I know what we all said about surrogacy, and I imagine you are still against it, as am I. But this is not the same, okay? You are not buying me, you are not renting my fucking uterus. I’m gonna do this because I love you, I want nothing in return, and I am gonna be the best fucking aunt in the whole planet.”

Sirius chuckled, although there was sadness in his eyes. Was he lameting Tonks had to be an aunt at all? That they were to be the only aunt that child was going to have? That it was Tonks and not Lily?

Remus, however, did not seem to follow the same train of thoughts.

“We figured that much.”

“Shall we do it then?” They asked. “Shall we test the spell?

“Now,” Sirius warned them, “don’t you breathe a word, cousin, to anyone, eh? We want it to be a nice surprise when the time comes. Don’t tell your mum, don’t tell Kingsley and, above everyone else, don’t tell Harry.”

“You don’t have to worry about that! What would be the point of me telling someone? I won’t get pregnant for years.”

And, just like that, Tonks destroyed the mood.

It was not a spell exactly, but more of an incantation. A long one, where Sirius chanted words in Latin she could not understand, but that linked her and Remus forever. It would be months since she’d think of that moment again, more than a year to be exact. Blue lights ran between Tonks and Remus, and, for a moment, it all stopped, it did so abruptly, it did not feel right but it was never supposed to.

“That’s it,” Sirius explained, “I cut it off almost in the middle, we would need another ten minutes, I believe.”

“But was it working?” Tonks asked.

Sirius sat at the table behind, clearly drained by such magic, and nodded.

“Pads,” Remus muttered as he held his hand, “we could have a baby someday.”

Sirius looked up in pure adoration, his eyes glimmering, his lips twisted in a way they did not get to see often. He looked exactly how Tonks’ mother described him, for a few seconds anyways. Before Azkaban, before the Potters’ demise, he looked as though he had grown up to be the man he was destined to be, and Tonks wondered who was going to pay for that particular murder, one nobody remembered but whose consequences you could see in Sirius everyday.

There is a special tragedy in ripping someone’s destiny out of them, because it is so often unrecognised, and yet people waste the rest of their lives desperately trying to live up to who they were supposed to become, before the trauma, before the pain, before cruel fate left them dry.

“He was magnificent.” Andromeda always told Tonks when he was younger, and Sirius was still a figment of his mother’s imagination—or he would have been, if Tonks had been born a couple of years later and did not have any proof of Sirius’ existence, no faint memory or photo of it. “Now, don’t you think he was a god, Nymphadora, he was not perfect by any means: my cousin had a temperament, he was hotheaded and didn’t think before he acted, he was too… Gryffindor. But from the very moment that fool was taught how to love, he did so deeply, with every bit of his being, he loved so much he was able to defy every law we’d been raised following. It was all too much, so much love had Sirius to give that, in his heart, there was no room for prejudice, none of it.”

“Where is he now mum?” Tonks had dared to ask once.

Andromeda had looked at her with a sad smile.

“His life was cut short, Nymphadora,” she’d explained, “he may have had no prejudices at all, but the rest of the world did. They treated him exactly how they treat mum.”

“The mean stares!” Tonks exclaimed, aghast, and Andromeda laughed at their indignation. 

“Indeed,” she confirmed, “the mean stares. They thought him capable of horrible, horrible things, and locked him up in that place where bad people go without a trial—that means, without checking he did what they thought he did. I tried to help, of course, but nobody believed me, only your dad. I have no proof he is innocent, do you understand, my Nymphadora? I can only offer them my conviction, the same one I’d have if it was your dad, or you, my certainty that he is a good person, and he would have been the best of them all if he had been given a chance.”

Ten year old Tonks, who barely remembered Sirius but had a picture of him holding her as a baby, sat in her sofa near a young boy with scars on his face and a jumper just as horrible as his, had been deeply saddened by these news, their mother’s assurance that there was nothing they could do to break him out.

“Sometimes,” Andromeda confessed to Tonks once, years later, “I wonder what would have happened if Sirius had never been locked up, and then, I have a good laugh.”

“Why? What do you think would have happened?” Tonks asked her.

“He is the only male heir alive, and, as much as he’d hate the news, he would have accepted the position without giving it a second thought. He promised it to me once, when he was sixteen, shortly before being disowned as I was. ‘Andi,’ he wrote to me then, ‘one day I’m going to set foot in the Wizergamont and I won’t stop until Remus is freaking worshipped just like he deserved (and the rest of beings are recognised as our equals).' 'Not Remus though,' he had the nerve to add, 'he will never be an equal, in my eyes, he is superior to us all.’”

“He loved this Remus guy very much.” Young Tonks guessed.

“A lot,” Andromeda confirmed, “he was going to marry him. He would have been the first Black to ever marry someone of the same sex and do it proudly. Our uncle, Alphard never had the chance but Sirius was gonna fight for it, you could see it in his eyes.”

Barely more than decade later, the day they tried the incantation, Tonks stopped Sirius on her way out and told him. They did so without knowing those would be the last words they would ever exchange outside battle.

“Sirius?” She caught his attention, and made him look back at her. “You do know you are the best of us, right?”

Sirius snorted.

“Have you ever laid eyes on me? I doubt that very much, cousin.”

“No, you are!” Tonks insisted. “And you will be a fantastic father. You already are one, I’ve seen you with Harry and… You are a wonderful dad.”

Sirius choked up, and Tonks left him there, alone.

He would fade into the Veil a few days later, Tonks was told he did not even hesitate, that like almost everything he had done in life, when he found out Harry was in danger, no force of nature could have stopped him. And Remus who, in another life, would have run after him and followed him if that was what it took to meet his love again, could only see him part while he held Harry back. He too had become a father, Tonks guessed, even if they would never get to expand their family the way they planned it, Fate had given them one last gift, a piece of comfort for that life together she still owed them, by allowing them to meet their godson, James and Lily Potter’s son no less.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Summer of 1996 was a hard one. 

Sirius' death hit them hard, and somehow, Remus' pain brought back a wound Tonks had believed healed. Hanika, her girlfriend, had died only three months ago, and Tonks had tried, they’d tried to forget, they’d told themself there was no time, that war waited for no one’s grief.

 It was not only his death, though, that much Tonks had guessed. Every time she went back to Grimmauld Place for a meeting, Remus was a wreck. And then they’d had to leave Sirius’ horrible childhood home, and Tonks couldn’t figure out if the news were a source of hope somehow, or the contrary.

“We don’t know if it’s been compromised,” Dumbledore explained, “I’ll check with Harry, see if Kreacher responds to him or…”

“Bellatrix,” Remus grunted, “if he doesn’t then…”

“Yes, he’d be hers.” The old man lamented.

“Headmaster!” Remus stopped Dumbledore at the end of the meeting. “Have you checked what I told you?”.

“Remus,” he told him off as you would a student, as he would have had more than a decade before, “Petunia is probably getting rid of the letters, if you are using muggle post… And she’s in all her right, you know? She is his guardian, she ought to choose who has contact with Harry and who doesn’t—not that I agree with her judgement, of course.”

"I'm worried about him," Remus growled.

“Now,” Dumbledore patted Remus’ back and ignored his protest, “how are you holding on? You know my door is always open, right? Well except tomorrow, we both have compromises tomorrow.”

Remus was meeting with a pack leader further south and, if it all went well, he would be invited to spend the full moon with them, but what on earth was Dumbledore doing? Well, Remus was intelligent enough not to ask—Tonks would have, he wanted to know!

Said question may not have been answered then, but Tonks remembers, how to forget? Next time they saw Dumbledore, his hand was black, rotten, almost as if its natural course had been interrupted half-way between life and death. 

By the time Harry was finally free from the Dursleys, Remus was not there to contact him. Tonks did not know Harry that well, they had not spent much time together, not as much as they'd had with other children, like Charlie's younger sister, Ginny. Still, she knew he needed it, he had just lost his godfather, he barely had any adult he could trust as it was, and who better to understand such loss than Remus? It was a pity he was still with the packs, hopefully he would be back on time for Harry's birthday on the 31st.

Tonks themself wasn’t handling it that well. How many days had it been since they'd walked outside for the mere pleasure to do so? Work, patrols, meetings, home; work, patrols, meetings, home…

She could still pretend she was touching Hanika's soft curls, that she was laying in Tonk's lap and not five feet underground. The pavement was wet before they got her, for a moment, all Tonks had heard was the rain, drops of rain bathing Hanika's body as it fell.

Doctors would have a hard time explaining it. How could this be? They'd wonder, how is it possible she was dead with no apparent reason. Hanika had never belonged to Tonks' world, and their selfishness, their refusal to let her go, ended up killing her.

It was in a gay bar underground, a muggle, illegal gay bar in the centre of London. Who the heck would have thought Death Eaters had been waiting for them there? It was tiny, and colourful, and incredibly muggle-like, proudly so. The main door was behind a dumpster, in a street with no end, and you had to let them know somehow you were safe before going in.

"Sorry," the guard had apologised to Hanika the first time this measure had been implemented, "cops are trying to infiltrate us, you know? To catch folks having gay sex in 'public' and put them in jail."

"It's okay Brad," Hanika had said, "we are friends of Dorothy."

And Brad had immediately let them in.

Friends of Dorothy and Polari usually worked well, as did wearing a green carnation pinned to your jacket or drawing an inverted triangle on your wrist if you happened to be out of time.

And inside… Inside you got immersed into another world, one much better than the one they were at. It was beautiful, to be surrounded by those like you, to know there was no judgement, and kissing Hanika in the middle of the dance floor was the best of it all.

"Gosh, we promised to take Sirius and Remus someday," he spoke out loud while he put his shoes on.

Yeah well, now that would never happen. One more thing to add to the list of losses cruel Fate had stolen with their deaths.

Yes, Tonks knew they looked horrible, there was no need for Molly Weasly to tell them so.

"Tonks dear, you are a bit peaky, you’ve got to take care of yourself! A cup of tea?"

She'd give that to Molly, that woman accepted her name from the very moment they corrected her and she had never dead-named her, not ever since.

"Oh, no thank you, Molly, I just…" Tonks, who was well aware of how gossipy Charlie's family could be for what the boy himself had told them, dropped their voice and approached the woman. "I wanted to know how Harry is doing? Remus asked me to keep track of him, you know? In his absence? I'll have a full report by the time he comes back, haha!"

Tonks tried to retain everything. The nightmares, how skinny he was, how there was no light in his eyes. 

"Except for when he is with my daughter, her spirit cheers him up I think, it makes him forget." Molly added.

It was too similar, it sounded too much like Tonks.

Tonks' own nightmares were very graphic as well. She always saw her laugh and dance, at 3 am in the entrance of the club. Then they came. They had no ropes, no masks, and Tonks only identified them because of the damn mark, and because they called them by their dead name and Tonks recognised some of their faces.

"Ohh… Look who we have here!" The death eater exclaimed with glee. "Nymphadora! Hi! Is this your girl?"

"What do you know Tonks from? And don't call them that, be a dear." Hanika defended her, and God, it was such a Hanika thing to say all they wanted was to burst out laughing.

The young man and his friends around him chuckled, and even that sounded condescending. They were all the same age, and they must have been friends or from the same circle at the very least, since not many death eaters knew each other, not unless there was a pre-existing relationship or they were Voldemort’s closest servants, which did not appear to be the case.

“Ohh! The muggle fights back!” Another one of them yelled at them, delighted.

It was all for fun, for the sake of it, Tonks would later realise. This was their idea of fun.

“Now, boys,” the first death eater intervened, pulling his wand out and as he left the firewhiskey bottle he was holding on the floor, “shall we get on with it?”

Tonks stepped in front of Hanika.

“Tonks? Who are they? What do they want?” They heard her ask.

“Now Nymphadora, don’t make things more complicated,” they were told, “you had to know what would happen when you got involved with her ! Fucking with a muggle was enough already, but that was to be expected, eh? You’ve got your mother’s genes!”

“But a woman!” The man laughed at his own joke and added. “You think  Mrs Bellatrix Lestrange neé Black would ever let you dirt the Ancient and Noble House of Black in such a way? You invert! You were not first on our list, yet here we are. Consider it a gift to Mrs Lestrange.”

Hanika pulled her back. She pointlessly tried to run, even while knowing there was no other end. Tonks pulled out their wand.

“Stupefy!” She yelled at one of them.

Her spell was counteracted, up to five death eaters surrounded Tonks on all sides. They thought Hanika was behind them, they swore she was, they could feel her, her quiet softs, her shaky breathing.

Tonks still did not know how long it was, a couple of minutes at the very least. They fought the five death eaters all by themself, and desperately looked for a distraction, a moment of peace they could use to send a patronus to the Order. It was so fast they did not have time to do even that. 

“We’ll come back for you, Nymphadora Tonks,” a skinny man with sulky hair said out of the blue, “we’ll get each and every one of you inverts.”

The death eaters disappeared before their eyes. 

“Cowards!” Tonks yelled at the spot they’d been situated, now no more than thin air.

She then turned around.

“Hanika, Hanika!” She walked towards the end of the street. “It’s okay baby, I’ll explain, I can explain everything.”

One, two, three steps.

Tonks saw the shape of their body on the ground.

Five, seven and eight.

She was breathing, wasn’t she? She had to be! No one had approached her.

Nine and ten.

There had been six of them, six death eaters , Tonks realised. They had only fought five.

Eleven, twelve.

Her glassy eyes faced them from the pavement. Rain was bathing her whole but she did not react. Hanika hated the rain, she absolutely despised it, yet there was no reaction. Tonks fell to their knees and held her softly, it was the last time they had her head on their lap. And she cried, she yelled so loudly the security guard came out. She would later understand the death eaters had casted a silencio , that no one inside the club could have heard anything, and only when they left, noise resumed.

“Is she…? But she is not bleeding and we heard nothing! No, it cannot be!” The guard, Brad, tried to make sense of things.

“There were six of them,” Tonks sobbed, “it was quick, they said they were hunting us queers.”

Hanika’s funeral was simple, her family buried her next to her grandmother, and Tonks was not invited, but he attended anyway. They hated him as much as they always did, but they were probably too heartbroken to care. You did this, you turned her into an invert and got her killed, you did this! The eyes of Hanika’s mother told her. Hanka had had plenty of girlfriends before them, but Tonks had been the first one her mother knew of, and so, they were at fault.

Back in the present, Remus finally came back, although Harry’s birthday wasn’t as good as expected. Tonks wasn’t up for it at the end, but Remus admitted to them rather guiltily he’d contributed to make the party quite a depressing occasion. “Bill and Arthur wouldn’t stop bringing up deaths and disappearances, and as I was talking, I couldn’t help but think ‘Sirius wouldn’t let this happen, Sirius would have done a much better job,’” he confessed.

“Oh, Remus…”

Tonks wrapped him in a hug and invited him over for tea. Remus sat with her on the kitchen table, the table Tonks had chosen with Hanika barely a month before her death, and they talked. They talked about everything and anything at all, about grief and losing those you love dearly, about Harry and the war.

“I wasn’t brave enough to talk to him about Sirius, to tell him I’ve been writing to him all summer, that I haven’t forgotten him, that I care , god dammit!” Remus lamented.

“You will, you have to eventually,” Tonks reasoned, “it will do you good, and that boy needs it, he needs you .”

“I just…” Remus struggled with his words. “I wouldn’t get up in the mornings if it wasn’t for this, you know? Beating Voldemort and his death eaters, keeping Harry safe… I think, no, I know I died with him that day, in the department of mysteries, I died and my corpse is just going on until it is finally time to end it.”

“But Harry…”

“I know! I know Harry needs me, and I know Sirius wouldn’t want that!” He interrupted Tonks. “I don’t remember a time without Sirius, did you know that? My childhood was traumatic as hell, despite my parents’ best efforts to protect me from myself, from the wolf, I’ve blocked most memories out. Sometimes, I think I only started living once I went to Hogwarts, to Sirius, James, and yes, Peter . Then there was a time where he was not by my side, but I still loved him, and I knew where he was, I knew he was alive!”

“Did you love him despite believing he was a murderer?” Tonks asked, honestly baffled.

“Has your mother ever mentioned to you the Black madness? Bellatrix has it, it is sort of a mental illness I suppose—not that it exonerates you from your mistakes, it only reactivates what is already there, and makes you easier to manipulate—” Remus explained, “I thought… I blamed myself, you know? When did it happen? When did Sirius, my Sirius, get it? He would have never harmed any of us, James least of all, he wouldn’t, I knew that, I knew him. I spent an entire fucking year arguing with Dumbledore, pleading with him for a trial, believing what turned out to be the truth, that somehow, he was innocent. I was convinced he must have been tricked, or forced somehow, and didn’t stop until Dumbledore brought me to Peter’s childhood home and forced me to look at his finger, which his mum conserved with magic.”

“So yes,” he concluded, “I loved him so much I couldn’t breath at times, just at the thought of him. And as much as I hated the person I thought the illness made of him, I blamed myself for not seeing it, for not helping him. I killed James and Lily, I told myself at times, I did this. It was me, it was really me, because I was the one who knew Sirius the best, I could have saved him and I didn’t.”

Remus let out a broken soft. Tonks held him, he held him tightly and tried to stop the spasms going through his body. 

“And I tried, you know? I’ve spent most of my adult life drunk, in pain, or trying to get to Harry.” He lamented. “I sent him birthday presents, letters, photos, I’d spend my salary saving up for a Christmas gift, and I’d try to get sober for months just to go to Petunia’s and convince her to let me see him, then she’d refuse, it would break me and I’d get drunk all over again. That day in the train I met him? I think I’ve told you about that before. Anyways, that day? It was one of the worst days of my life, because he did not recognise me, I woke up, the damn dementors were looking for Sirius, I saved the children there, turned to Harry, the sight of him made me the happiest I’d felt in a long time, and there was no recognition in his eyes.”

“Your letters,” Tonks understood, “he had not… Petunia did not give them to him.”

“Not the letters, not the presents, not the pictures! Until his first year, he didn’t even know what James and Lily looked like. Truth be told, I already suspected, I did as soon as Hagrid wrote to me asking for more photos. ‘Harry would have written to you now he has an owl’ I told myself, and then another voice in my head would argue ‘hey! Maybe he is not interested! What child would be interested in meeting you ?’”

“Oh Remus, please tell Harry all of this, you have to Remus, you have to! He needs to know how much you care, that there is an adult out there looking out for him.” That hug lasted longer, far longer than any other they’d ever had. And for a second or even less,  the split of a second, Tonks felt much better, much like the old Tonks would have felt.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Just like Sirius, Tonks would have grown out to be a completely different person if life hadn’t stopped them, if it weren’t for Hanika’s death, for the loss of the love of their life, whose safety was risked by their presence. Regardless, the discussion was now pointless: they would never go back to how they were—not unless they made themself forget, and they would sooner die.

Maybe because Tonks lacked their sense of self-preservation from the moment she died, it took longer for it to click. It felt as if she had been living numb, and suddenly, one day she woke up. She opened her eyes, straight from a nightmare, and forced herself to relive it.

By the time she appeared in Remus’ flat, it was the end of the summer and the kids had returned to Hogwarts the day prior. Tonks, on duty, had helped Harry reach the castle after that Malfoy kid petrified him.

“Your life is in danger.” They declared.

Remus snorted.

“And mine too,” she added.

“Tonks,” Remus replied, “we are at war.”

“No, you don’t know, you don’t understand!” She grunted in pure frustration. Tonks raised her hands over her head and kicked Remus' old fridge, of an original green pistachio you could barely distinguish anymore. The whole house was old, they realised, as eccentric, but mostly old.

It appeared to be frozen in time, with the same Bowie portrait on the wall, crooked and whatnot, a huge record player that surely had stopped working a long time ago, dishes on the sink which could have been there for days and old leather jackets of a few different colours on the hanger in the entrance, of a vibe Remus would never wear.

He did not change it, not a bit, he didn’t move anything after that Halloween in 1981, after the day the Potters died and Sirius was imprisoned. Tonks understood. 

She slipped to the floor, and her hair grew in barely a second, as long as it took to cover her face.

“I’m so sorry, I’m so, so sorry, Remus, please forgive me, I didn’t realise, I—”

Remus sat next to Tonks and put his arms around them.

“What is going on Tonks? You can tell me yeah?” He whispered. “I too have told you things about me that haven’t been so pleasant, you know that.”

“I told no one how Hanika died.”

“You did,” Remus contradicted him, “death eaters. You fought them off, and while you were distracted with the fight, one of them got to her.”

“No, no, no, no, no, no…”

Tonks had trouble breathing, but they still did, they told Remus everything, even the parts they thought were forgotten. 

“You are in danger, do you understand?” Tonks insisted. “You, me, Kingsley, Charlie, Bill, Percy too from what I’ve heard… Everyone who was openly queer at Hogwarts. It was… It wasn’t even an attack, I could see their faces, they were drunk and wearing casual wizarding innuendos. It is their idea of fun. Five against one… The only reason I put on a fight was how wasted they were. They had probably spent the last three or four months spying on us”

Remus did not react to his own death sentence, nor did Tonks expected him to. Not with Sirius gone, not now he couldn’t see a future beyond the war.

“You are on their list, they are looking for you.” He said. “You should give Dumbledore the memory, give up your missions and go back home. Tell Andromeda, tell her you need a Fidelius on the house, and for the love of god, don’t let anyone else but yourself be the secret keeper. They should anyways, your dad won’t be safe for much longer.”

“You think they’ll take over the ministry? But what about you?”

Remus looked at her with honest compassion.

“Tonks… Don’t worry about me, Sirius and I had this conversation when I turned fourteen and came out to him, you know? I grieved how difficult life would be for me as a gay werewolf, and then we fell in love, and I came to the realisation there was only one of those two curses I was not ashamed of any longer, that I did not believe to be a curse. And let me tell you, it was not being a fucking werewolf.”

“Your safety—”

“I gave it up the moment we decided not to hide, I knew what I was doing.”

“I won’t let you Remus Lupin,” Tonks warned him, “I won’t fucking let you. I know what you’re doing, being careless with your life and all, I recognise it, I was like that myself. Hell, I probably woke up like that yesterday. But Harry needs you, and I need you, and I won’t let you die . Because I care, and because let’s be honest here, Sirius would hunt me in my sleep if I did.”

“What do you fucking want me to do Tonks?” Remus growled. “I’m the only werewolf on our side, most are neutral, believe it or not, they don’t give a shit about wizards, who treated them so terribly. I can’t do anything at all, that man is trying to kill Harry, I— It is the only thing I have left, this fight, Harry and this bloody war.”

“Marry me.” Tonks said, the idea fresh inside their mind. “Let’s get married, then announce it, Rita Skeeter would probably take the story.”

“I’m gay.” Remus argued, softly, as if he’d misunderstood.

“No shit, me too. So what?” They replied. “Be my beard, I’ll be yours. Let’s make everyone believe we realised our tendencies were against nature or whatever the fuck, and came to the right side. Let’s make the world think we’ve changed.”

Remus looked at her for a moment. He was really considering it, he was! For a second, Tonks thought she had him.

“I can’t do that to Sirius,” he let out in a broken voice, “I can’t marry anyone else, not after promising it’d be him.”

Tonks tried to tell him Sirius would want him to be safe, that he’d root for them to pull over such a scam. It was no lie either: Tonks had had little time to spend with their mum’s cousin, yet, thanks to Andromeda, they knew him so well it felt as if he’d always been present. It would hurt, yes, but, at the same time, Sirius would be delighted with the arrangement. He would, if it meant saving Remus’ life.

“Think about it,” Tonks said goodbye to him, “I’m going to the Weasleys, we’ll send a letter to old Dumbles there or some shit, and then to mum’s.”

Remus nodded.

“Take care.”

“You too, be careful, don’t let anybody into this flat.”

And off they went, on their way to tell a mother half of her sons were being persecuted by drunk terrorists who hunted queers for fun. Yeah, it was not that good a day after all that.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Mrs Weasly looked delighted when Tonks told her they were staying for supper. "The more the merrier, the more the merrier!" She exclaimed as she disappeared behind a huge cooking pot.

Tonks felt even more guilty. Why had it taken her so long to remember, to make the connection and understand they were being hunted? How many people she could have saved had been buried five feet under? 

"You look peaky dear, is everything alright?"  Molly asked.

"Yeah I just… Charlie told me he and Bill were coming? He's staying in the country for a few days, right? "

Molly took a step back, away from the pot, and frowned, but it lasted less than a second, and she immediately smiled at the mention of her sons.

"Oh yes, you are right! They're gonna be so happy that you are here!"

In her head, Tonks relived the conversation they'd had with Charlie in seventh year. "Bill and I… We came out to mum and dad during the holidays, the whole school knows Bill is dating that Ravenclaw seeker anyways, he wanted them to know he was bi."

"And you? How did it go?"

"I told them too, Bill and I agreed on that much, we wanted to do it together." Charlie confirmed. "I explained I was asexual and homoromantic and then, of course, I had to clarify what that meant."

Tonks snorted.

"What did they say?"

"Mum was sad she wouldn't have grandkids, but then Bill made her realise that was not the case at all, and I guess she was worried we are gonna have a hard life, harder than most that is." Charlie hugged them, and Tonks let themself be comforted by the Gryffindor seeker, just this one time. "Still, she told us she loved us and accepted us. Did you know my uncle Fabian and uncle Gidion were queer? She said she just wanted us to be happy."

"And your dad? He seems very chill, Arthur, like he wouldn't give a fuck."

Charlie chuckled.

"He didn't! He just frowned at me and replied 'oh, okay, you could have just said that.'"

Molly and Arthur knew and accepted their sons. Still, was there enough confidence for Tonks to bring up the topic on the table? Was Percy even out? Tonks heard from the twins once he was dating the Gryffindor keeper and captain, but he'd told everyone it was some female friend of his, Penelope, that he was dating instead. Still, she shouldn't mention that, she would never out him, and it wasn't a good idea to mention Percy either way, not after what he did. Should Tonks even sit around the Weasleys' table after taking them so long to reveal what happened that night?

Charlie's face changed when he saw them. They hugged tightly, and Tonks felt even guiltier. They reminded themself at least Bill was safe, that now he was dating Fleur—to Mrs Weasley’s dismay—it was far less likely that he was targeted.

"Actually Mrs Weasley, I need to talk with all of you, before lunch, probably with Dumbledore as well, there is a chance you won't want me at your table."

The woman snorted.

"Nonsense, come and eat."

Bill, however, who had just arrived, turned to his mum and told her to wait with a hand gesture.

"You know the night Hanika was killed?" The three of them—Arthur being missing for work—nodded. 

"I'm so sorry, I blocked out most of the details, I swear I would have said otherwise, and now people have died and—"

She took a breath, and started all over again.

"This morning, I woke up and I remembered, I dreamt about it last night, I remembered their words." And with that she had officially caught everyone's attention. "Bellatrix sent them there, to kill the woman I was dating, because she said being an invert was worse than loving a muggle, but both? They said they wouldn't let me embarrass the Blacks."

Tonks let out a sob, and tried to keep it inside covering their mouth but it did not work.

"It wasn't out of the blue though, they mentioned a list, they said they would come back for me, that they'd put my name forwards on the list."

Molly paled.

"A list of what dear?"

"Mum…" Charlie muttered. He knew, even before Tonks could answer, he knew.

"Queers, a list of queers." Tonks choked up. "They mostly go to muggle clandestine gay bars, we were in one of those that night, and kill them for fun. But they track us carefully, us wizards, they are haunting us and nobody noticed because absolutely nobody gives a fuck. It's been six months, how many deaths could I have avoided?"

With that, Tonks broke down. Charlie pulled them to him.

"You need to go into hiding," she muttered against his shoulder.

"We are at war," Charlie replied, softly.

"Please, go into hiding." Tonks whispered, making sure no one else could  hear them.  "And Percy… Percy doesn't know."

Charlie turned as pale as his mother, all of a sudden.

"I'll handle it," he promised, "he's back with Wood, I'll let them know."

Lunch was a sombre occasion after that. Charlie had a bit of pergamin and a quill beside him, and they tried to come up with as many people to warn as they could.

"You better destroy that afterwards Charlie," Molly warned her son, eyeing the list in distrust.

"Let's see, Bill and I can warn them, send them a letter or whatever, you Tonks—"

"I'll go visit Dumbledore," Tonks interrupted Charlie, "he may be all about the greater good, but he will care, about this he will care."

Tonks didn't reveal the reasons, he couldn't break Moody's trust, the secrets about the headmaster their boss had told them in private.

"And I need your help actually," they added, "with Remus, I need you to convince him before he gets killed."

"He is on my list, I'll send him a letter," Charlie said, not even flinching.

"No, I… I already went to see him." Tonks confessed. "I have a plan, to protect both of us, but he refused, he doesn't value his life."

Bill, sitting next to Molly, snorted and whispered what sounded like "of course he did." 

"What plan? What can we do?" He asked.

Tonks explained.

"You've got to be kidding me," Charlie muttered.

"Well, maybe it'll be enough if he avoids muggle bars," Bill reasoned, ignoring his big brother.

"Bill dear, better to be safe than sorry." Morry argued. "You should all go hiding, under Fidelius."

"You don't understand, it is a miracle Remus is still alive." Tonks swallowed, and wished it was her mum next to her, that she was the one telling that story. "The remaining Blacks… My mum's parents, and then her sisters, that is, they always blamed Remus for corrupting Sirius, they think he stole their heir, that he… He turned Sirius into a 'faggot.'"

"Oh dear." Molly lamented.

"Well, that's the most stupid thing I've ever heard."

"Bill, it is no joke." Tonks insisted. "We need to get our names out of that damn list. Queer people in straight relationships should go and fucking parade it, call Skeater, I don’t fucking care. We need to convince them we’ve changed or whatever the bullshit.”

Bill clenched his jaw and looked back at her. He knew Tonks’ words were directed at him.

“Those people are no less queer for being in straight relationships,” he grunted.

Tonks nodded.

“Yes,” they said, deadpanned, “and you expect death eaters to know that.”

Molly, to her surprise, hummed in agreement.

“I’m afraid you are giving them too much credit, dear.” She patted Bill’s hand, nodded to herself, as though she was convincing herself of something, and turned to Tonks. “It would work, your idea I mean. During the first war, my…, my little brothers were both gay, it was a bit of an open secret. Kingsley was with them when they were killed, he was…, he was the only one who got out alive. He said they admitted they were specially keen on targeting them, that they told Fabian—he had this female best friend at school he hung out with often, and dated for a while—they had been hopeful he’d have come back to his senses.”

“They did it before? And you knew?!” Charlie demanded.

“You think I wouldn’t have told you if I’d known?” Molly clarified. “No, I thought they were hunting blood traitors, that the death eater meant they’d thought my brother would see the error of his ways, which did not make any sense because Fabian and Gidion were two peas in a pod, much like Fread and George are. There wasn't one without the other.”

“Now everything makes sense, of course.” Tonks concluded on Molly’s behalf.

“I will convince Remus,” the woman promised, “he comes here often, when he is not with the packs that is. He visits for Order stuff and also to get updates on Harry—Merlin knows why he doesn’t write to the boy himself!—I’ll talk with him.”

There was something determinant in her stare. Maybe, Tonks thought, it was not only about her own kids, maybe, now she knew the truth, Molly had a debt not to let history repeat itself. 

Tonks thanked her and saw her way out.

“Wait, where are you going?” Charlie stopped them.

“To Hogwarts.”

“Alone? No way!”

“Charlie, I literally had to patrol there anyways, my shift is tonight, so I’ll just stop by at Dumbledore’s while I’m around.”

Charlie still looked dubious.

“For Merlin’s sake, may I remind you I am a metamorphmagus?!” 

Tonks had stopped morphing after Hanika’s death. Not right away, it had been a slow process, one which lasted months, where he would wake up and find there was no longer joy in it. It was pointless, everything was. At that moment, however, when they changed their hair, made their chest flatter, and grew a few inches, after suppressing the usual pain of their bones, they felt all powerful, euphoric. For a few seconds anyway, they thought they could take up anything life came up with.

“I’ll let you know how it goes.” Tonks said goodbye to the family in a deeper voice.

Fawkes, the phoenix, was the only reason Dumbledore’s office was not all quiet, that its aura was eerie rather than dark. Inside those tall rock walls of giant painted glass, any experiment wizard would notice a peculiar scent in the air, a mix between light and dark magic that, in Tonks’ opinion, represented the headmaster perfectly: from what Mad Eye Moody had told her, from what she’d guessed during her time at Hogwarts, Dumledore was a flawed and complicated man. Driven by power, he got carried away in his youth and bonded with a boy set to become one of the most well-known, dark wizards of the world, Grindelwald. They fell in love, and even if their beliefs drifted them apart, even if Dumbledore had ended up defeating this old lover, they never forgot each other, which, at that point, must have been a curse, rather than a gift. Love and hate… So close to each other sometimes they can be easily confused.

Their conversation was interesting. He behaved, at first, as if the news came in the form of a spell, it would appear he had been hit by something. He clenched his rotten hand for a bit and, when he let it down, Tonks thought he’d changed, that those were two very different Dumbledores and this one didn’t care about more hate-driven persecutions.

“That’s what we fight for, Miss Tonks, that’s what we fight for.” He muttered. “To end them, to end acts like these.”

“Are you going to do something?”

Dumbledore nodded.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Ah, Miss Tonks?” He stopped them when they were about to leave the room. “Be careful, I’ll ask everyone not to take ah…, unnecessary detours.”

 When he arrived home that day, after his shift, he cried in his mum’s arms, as he would do when he was a little kid. She begged them to hide with them, to perform a Fidelius, and only let either of the two be the secret keeper. 

Tonks never told her mum about the bearding idea. They were at war, they all were targets, each and every single one of them, and it should not matter, then, that those fuckers were especially keen on killing them . 

Yes, marrying Remus would bring Tonks an extra protection. Hopefully they'd be hunted for being their mother’s child and not for being a lesbian, but that'd be about it for her. It didn't make a difference, not as much as it would for Remus.

They needed to convince Remus.

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Remus would later tell them it was her mum who did it. He was invited for tea, somewhere in May, and Tonks had left them alone for a few minutes, looking for the bathroom.

Andromeda, who had always been the sharpest Black in the family, apparently came to the idea all on her own. 

"Marry my child," she blurted out, "not for real but… Bella is after her—Bella, who killed Sirius—and the rest of death eaters are after her as well. They need to be convinced that Tonks is straight, that there is no reason to go after them on their own, as a pastime. And you Remus…"

Remus later told Tonks he had replied he did not care about himself, that this was not about him, but that he hadn't thought about it that way and, for that, he was very sorry.

"You should," Tonks' mum insisted, "my cousin loved you, a lot. I have dozens of letters I've been meaning to show you, they are from when he was a child, and even then, he couldn't stop gushing about you, it was very annoying. You think he would be mad that you are protecting each other? It would not be a real marriage, and Sirius, from wherever he is, knows that. There is no hiding from those beyond the veil."

At the end, Remus accepted for them, for Tonks' safety, and not for himself. But what difference did it make? 

The hardest part came when they told Dumbledore, after an Order meeting, and the man, while providing them with compelling arguments as to why, told them the opposite to what Remus had hoped to hear.

"Harry can't know about this." Dumbledore warned them.

Remus growled.

"Like hell he won't."

Dumbledore looked at him, unimpressed.

"Remus, my boy—"

"He is the only family I have left," Remus cut the headmaster off, "I care about him, I won't let him believe we are marrying for real. Merlin, Sirius and I didn't even have the opportunity to…, to talk to him about us before…,  you know, I can't do that. I want to tell him the truth, everything that is going on."

"I get that," Dumbledore tried to explain himself, "but how many people know already as it is? Me, the Weasleys I presume, your family, Tonks… Harry's connection with Voldemort—"

"—is no longer a problem." Remus interrupted him.

"No, I wouldn't worry about Voldemort spying in his head, I believe he genuinely thinks the connection is gone now, after…, after the department of mysteries."

"Then what is the issue Professor?" Tonks intervened.

Dumbledore sighed.

"I'm going to be blunt with you two: Harry has a tendency to…, rush into things, I suppose, he would do whatever or go wherever for those he loves, and you are included in that Mr Lupin. He is a good boy."

"He is," Remus nodded, a timid smile on both corners of his lips, "so what?"

"If he knows the death eaters are particularly keen on you, he won't be able to focus on anything else. We are going on a mission next week, and yes, Harry is coming with me—I'm sorry I can't tell you more than that, I promise to keep him safe with my life. Even after that, he will need to focus, to know you and the Weasleys, and you too Tonks, are safe, because if he finds out you are not, that his servants are hunting us as a mere pastime and you two even more so than the rest, he could put his own life in danger, and lose perspective from what is truly important."

Tonks barely registered Dumbledore had included himself while talking about queer people, and if Remus did, his surprise did not show. His fists fell to his sides, shaking—his whole body was. He greeted his teeth and nodded at the man.

"Swear to me Harry won't be harmed in that mission of yours," he said, "he is only a kid, he shouldn't… I know better than to try to dissuade you (or him), but you forget, you forget once again kids are not soldiers."

"I promise Remus," Dumbledore took his upper arm and grabbed it tightly, "I will give my life for his."

And Tonks, who could not phantom what was yet to happen, thought the old man sounded oddly serious.

"One more thing," he stopped them when they were about to leave, "you need to make up a story, how you fell in love and so on. Whenever you decide to do it, Harry needs to be there, and everyone ought to believe it. Minerva, Severus… Everyone."

"Any suggestions?" Tonks asked with irony.

"I think you will find, Mr Tonks, that often, the closer the lie is to the truth, the more believable it is." The headmaster said so with a rare smile, and Tonks swore he'd seen his eyes twinkle. "Perhaps Mr Lupin has been refusing your advances, perhaps you are head over heels for him, and his refusal left you heartbroken."

"Does this mean we have your blessing?" Remus, standing besides them, asked.

"There are worse things in the world, Mr Lupin, than two friends taking a sacred vow to protect each other no matter what."

Dumbledore's answer resonated in her head for a long time. As manipulative as the man may sometimes be, he had been right, on that particular occasion at least. Tonks cared about Remus, maybe not the way everyone expected them to, but that he did, he cared. And Remus cared about Tonks just as much, in the same way you'd care for a close friend. 

The day the death eaters broke into Hogwarts, the day Dumbledore died, merely a week later, Tonks remembered that conversation, and understood Dumbledore somehow knew it would happen. Nobody else believed her, though, after the battle, she tried telling a few people, and they all shut her down.

Tonks hadn't expected Remus to go through with it—not with the wedding, he already gave Tonks and Andromeda his word that he would do it, but with keeping the secret from Harry. However, it was him who stopped them before going into the hospital wing.”

"This is our chance," Remus told her.

"Are you mad?! Dumbledore just died!'

"And it is what he'd want us to do!" He snapped.

"Are you really…? Are you sure this is for the best?"

"Tonks," Remus explained, "Sirius was not really living in a cave two years ago, not all the time, I believe I told you that. He was on the run, abroad, but when Harry needed him and he returned, he stayed there for a while and then I tried to contact him and he came to me."

Tonks nodded.

"What does this have to do with anything?"

"Harry believed he was, because that fool met the kids where he was staying and had met them last before coming to my place, in Hogsmeade, a couple of times and he… He thought it was for the best, knowing his exact location, writing my name in their letters, it would be dangerous, so he decided not to update them on the radical change on his living conditions until the summer, then we moved to Grimmauld before he ever got the chance. The thing is: I saw it all."

"I saw how worried Harry was when he came back because of him," Remus added, "Pads showed me their old correspondence, how Harry tried to take it all back so that he would return to the Caribbean or wherever else he was, and later, last year, how Voldemort lured him with his love for Sirius."

"I can't let anything happen to him, I won’t make the same mistake, I need to keep him safe." He concluded, with unmistakable pain in his voice. "And if safe means fooling him, making him believe we are in love and there is no one after us more than there is after everyone else, then so be it. I don’t care if he hates me at the end of all this, if that means he will be alive to do so."

Tonks squeezed his right arm and swallowed.

"I will tell Molly and Arthur, they'll help." 

“Don’t be so sure, with Bill and everything…” 

“Bill is fine, just… scared,” Tonks argued, “they will, they will help us, you’ll see.”

They indeed helped.

It was nearly a well rehearsed theatre play, how even Minerva, who was well aware Tonks was gay as fuck seeing how many times she had caught them with a girl in some old closet and given them detention for it, intervened and said Dumbledore would be happy there was more love in the world because of it. Hopefully, someone would share the gossip—not that it mattered, they would get married soon anyways, and not even the death eaters would escape the news.

That was, maybe—probably—the biggest performance of their lives. So when Tonks arrived in their mum’s place and rushed to the bathroom, nausea taking over for the third time that week, it all made sense in her head: exhaustion was taking over. Her ultimate goal, as they walked to their bedroom, was sleeping until Dumbledore’s funeral at the very least.

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The day Tonks and Remus got married was sombre and pretty fucking depressing. One would think it was made out of love, which was not that far from the truth: is not the need to protect your friend a very valid type of love? Others would say they were hiding something, and that was not a lie either. Tonks, though... Tonks had been dead since before Sirius went through that veil, since the very moment Hanika, the love of their life, was murdered, so it is not as if he cared all that much.

Only Andromeda and Molly  Weasley had been present—Tonks’ dad had stopped working and, as a precaution, was staying at home. Of course, once it was over, they walked through the main hall, at the magic ministry, slowly, making sure people saw them—all of them, the good and the bad. They took the floo, back to the Burrow, and Molly went straight to the kitchen when they got there.

“Tonks dear, you can go to that room next to your mum and change into more comfortable clothes, it should be empty.” Molly pointed at the closed door, probably that of a closet.

Their mum nodded along and handed them the clothes she had been keeping in her bag. To her dismay, Tonks was forced to wear typical wizarding wedding robes, all for the sake of putting up a show. Once she changed, Molly invited them to a cup of tea, and it was then that she told them.

“Bill is getting married,” she said.

Tonks jumped from their seat and cheered.

“That dog!” They lamented, not all that seriously. “Why didn’t he tell me himself? He should have written to me, as soon as it happened! Or Fleur, what about her? I thought we were friends!”

Molly chuckled.

“Oh well, I shouldn’t have said, you will all get an invitation soon, anyways.”

“Wait,” Andromeda intervened, “but he is getting married for real, right? Not like this disastrous child of mine.”

“Hey!”

Their mum and Molly both ignored them, and Remus… Remus seemed to be somewhere else, in thought at least.

“Yes, yes! He’s been with Fleur for a year, they are very in love.” Despite looking radiant, there was something upsetting in Molly’s eyes. “They are both bisexual, my Billy and Fleur, I was worried they were rushing into things just because of this, and it wasn't genuine. But no, you saw them when…, when Albus passed. Bill…, his face is all scarred, I thought maybe Fleur would prefer someone else’s protection, and she shut me up pretty well.”

“That she did.”

Andromeda looked at them disapprovingly, but Molly didn’t take it as an offence. She smiled at Tonks and took a sip of her own tea.

“I’ll see you in a few weeks, Remus, you too Tonks,” Molly said to them as goodbye, a couple of hours later. “I can’t wait to bring Harry back here, the poor dear must be so frustrated, all clueless about what is going on, away from everyone in his relatives’ home.”

Remus’ muscles stiffened at the mention of Lily Potter’s sister and brother-in-law, but he nodded along. Although Andromeda had offered Remus to move in, as usual, the werewolf refused.

“I’ve been invited to spend the full moon with a pack near here,” he confided in them, “I’ll be gone for about a week, I’ve got to check they are still neutral, that they haven’t joined Voldemort.”

Andromeda and Tonks wished him good luck, and, true to his word, Remus remained gone for the next seven days.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Nausea became a lot more frequent early in the morning. Somewhere between Remus' mission and the last preparations for Harry's rescue from the Dursleys, Tonks' mum finally dared to mention the topic. 

"Maybe you should see a healer," she chimed in.

"And expose myself to unnecessary risk? I may no longer be on their list, but I'm still your spawn, and a half blood married to a werewolf." They snapped.

Maybe (probably) they were being too hard on them, but frankly, they were not in the mood. Everything bothered them lately—and that was weird, unusual to say the least: Tonks had a thick skin.

Andromeda looked worried.

"You think it is worse? Maybe it wasn't a good idea…"

"No," Tonks interrupted her, "they were about to hunt me, like a dog, they killed Hanika because of me, Remus wouldn't have much longer to live. Don't say that, don't ever say that."

"I'm sorry, you're right." Andromeda's shoulders dropped. "I'm just worried, with Harry and Hagrid coming here before taking the porkey to the Burrow, the war, you, your father…"

"Mum, I apparate everywhere, my skin hasn't seen the sun for so long they'll include me in the vampires-hunt list soon."  

Andromeda laughed, and Tonks relaxed.

"You know, if you weren't a lesbian, I would think you are with child." She said out of the blue.

"Ha-ha-ha." 

"I'm serious! But I'm even more worried about that, because your intestines are clearly going through something, Dora."

Dora.

Their mum was the only person on this earth allowed to call them that.

"Dora." 

It sounded warm, familiar, and even comforting on her lips.

"First of all, how do you know I haven't slept with a trans woman?"

Andromeda raised an eyebrow.

"Have you?"

"There's been no one since Hanika, and she was cis" Tonks whispered, dropping the humour for her own pain for a moment, "but I could have! Bah! Genitals! If there is a woman I'm attracted to and she has a penis, I have no problem with that!"

"Well, in that case, I'd expect you to use protection, I remember teaching you the spell, Dora."

Tonks shivered, trying to get away from  the memory, from fifteen-year-old them having to bear their mum's version of "the talk" in the same sofa they were sitting on.

"Secondly," she continued making her point, while at the same time trying to move the conversation forward, "it is nothing of importance, it could be stress! It could be my diet! There are so many possibilities. Besides, your husband, aka my dad, is a healer and, the moment I say so, he can take a look at me."

Andromeda sighed.

"You're right, as much as it pains me to say it."  She conceded. "I'll go call Ted, he is probably locked in the studio, and we can end this right now." 

Tonks' blood ran cold.

"No!" He yelled. "I mean, why bother? Dad is busy, yeah? There is no rush, I'll tell him if it gets worse, you have my word."

There were two main reasons for this:

1. Tonks' dad was developing an anonymous radio program which would, hopefully, update the nation on the war in a dark humoristic tone, alongside the Weasley twins and some guy called Lee Jordan, who he met at Dumbledore’s funeral, and that was basically how he spent his days now he had decided to quit for his own safety, locked in the studio, exchanging letters, devising how to get some muggle recording gadget, and trying to find a safe location for it.
2. Tonks' mother did not have a clue about any of this. 

The day they were to bring Harry to safety, Tonks' mentor died. Remus had dropped by a couple times after he returned, but that last week, Tonks had spent it either working or with her parents.

Playing the couple in love for Harry, a few Order members and Bill's and Charlie's younger siblings was a bit ridiculous in highsight. They had biggest worries to occupy their minds on, but Remus insisted: as he reminded Tonks once again, he wouldn't make the same mistake twice.

Maybe outsiders would not have understood why Remus counted Sirius' faults as his own, but they did, they were well aware the decisions taken three to two years ago had been taken as a couple, and Remus did have a say in it, no matter how unaware Harry was of his involvement.

Mind you, he didn't need to be, the boy should be told how much Remus cared for him, but that werewolf turned out to be a stubborn one, in Tonks' experience. 

The point is: if Harry had been hurt by his own absence at their wedding, he didn't show it. It broke Tonks' heart, to realise that the now young adult was so used to being  left out he didn't even complain. 

He was happy for them—which Tonks did feel quite guilty about—and that was that.

When the time came, Tonks travelled to their designated safe house with Ron Weasley. The boy turned out to be surprisingly sharp and efficient in battle: the death eaters came, and he could almost keep up at Tonks—a fully trained Auror, and a damn good one, no matter how clumsy, first of their promotion—he was brilliant! Even if, for some reason, he underestimated himself.

Tonks made sure to tell him so.

Then they finally got to the Burrow, and clearly, the mood wasn’t that great. Moody would never return from that trip. Tonks hugged Remus, relieved he was okay, that no one else had left them that night.

At least she had Remus.

Her friend, her beard—as strange as it sounded—and the very cool young boy Tonks loved to play with when they were a baby, and he came to visit with Sirius—that was, of course, according to Andromeda. 

No, Tonks cried Moody, and decided on that same day they couldn't afford to lose anybody else. 

If there was an imposter, they couldn't find it. Harry insisted there was none and, as Remus would later confide in her, in that, he was all James, and he didn't necessarily mean it in a good way.

James Potter, who would rather die than distrust his friends—and that was exactly what he did.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Those four days between the 1st and the 4th of August were possibly, deaths and tragedies excluded, the worst of Tonks' life.

On the 1st, Bill's and Fleur's wedding was interrupted by the fall of the ministry, and everyone had to flee. Remus tried looking for Harry in the crowd.

"We've gotta get out of here, Remus!" Tonks fought to make themself heard.

"No, no!" He stuttered, looking around in horror. "He is my responsibility, oh god, what would Pads think of me? And James and Lily? I'm a fucking disaster, where the hell are they?"

He was, of course, referring to Harry's friends, Ron and Hermione. 

It was Molly who saved the day. She ran towards them, tears in her eyes.

"Remus, the boys are gone, they had a mission Dumbledore gave them, you know that, I tried to convince them to confide  in the adults, Merlin knows I tried, but… Ron left everything handled, he created a false to explain his absence and everything. They are gone."

Remus looked as if he was about to puke his guts, and so did Tonks.

"A… A mission?"

"Oh dear, you were back with the packs in our last meeting, and you Tonks did not attend either. We figured that is the case, yes, from the little they told us. Now get out of here, apparate to safety, go!"

Remus was visibly falling apart at Molly's words, and with nowhere else to go, Tonks side-apparated him to her parents' place.

They hit the floor.

Remus cradled away from them.

He let out a guttural growl. For a moment, barely a second, Tonks could see his wolf senses taking over.

"That man," he lamented in a pained, low voice, "is he really doing this even in death? They are cubs, merely teenagers! And we were barely any older. 'Harry is the best hope we have,' he told Kigsley and me, 'trust him.' But has anybody thought maybe a teenager shouldn't bear that responsibility? Look at us! Every time I miss someone I love, I go to a fucking graveyard, and sometimes I dont have even that. We  considered ourselves so strong, so brave, we thought we had been chosen because we'd really accomplished something. Bullshit! The truth is they were killing us so fast there simply weren't enough adults left."

"It is not the same as it was, back then, we won't let it be the same." Tonks tried to argue.

"Isn't it?" Remus let out a bitter laugh, in a cold voice Tonks had never heard of him before. "History keeps repeating itself, and I stay back and do nothing, every single time."

"We can look for them, find them, make them tell us whatever it is that they know."

There was a fierceness, a resourcefulness, in Remus' eyes  that did feel familiar, as much as breathing.

"Three teenagers, alone, in the streets of London, one of them being the biggest enemy of the most powerful Dark Lord of our times? No, I've got to find them, I will find them, and I refuse to look for bodies. If they wanna take him, they'll have to get through me first." Remus spat the title, "Dark Lord," as you would a disgusting aliment which had left a rotten taste in your mouth, and, as he got up, fixated on going back to his flat and grabbing a few things, the necessary preparations for a long trip, the nausea took over Tonks.

They did not see their mum behind them until they fell into her arms and Andromeda quickly accioed a plastic cube for her.

And next to her mum… Ted Tonks was carrying at least two bags filled to the top. He dropped them, and observed the scene with worry.

"Is it the first time this has happened?"

Andromeda scoffed at him.

"Honestly Ted, where have you been? Your stubborn and stupid child was supposed to tell you, so that you could examine them."

"It is nothing, okay?" Tonks defended themself when the vomiting was over. Remus though, did not look at them as if it were nothing, and neither did Ted.

"I'll do that now, before I leave." 

"Leave?!"

"Tonks, I…"

"Your father is going on the run, it is not safe anymore for him."

"We'll do a Fidelius, you two can hide."

"And endanger your mum?" Tonks' father argued. "No, I'm leaving."

"We don't even know what is gonna happen!" Tonks shrieked, getting her mother off her.

"Yes we do!" Andromeda had tears in her eyes, and her shoulders were shaking in a subtle movement that nobody else besides her family would have been able to identify. Even after all these years, her Black upbringing was still carved in her skull: Andromeda had been brought up to act impenetrable, no matter the circumstances. "Yes, we do, Dora, we know exactly what is going to happen. I was raised by them, I grew up hearing stories of how they would take over the ministry someday and force all the 'mudbloods' to give back the magic they 'stole.' Your father is going away, hopefully he can take a ship, then trespass the Irish borders, and seek asylum there because I can't bear to lose him."

"Why doesn't he apparate?" 

"Tonks, hey, listen to me." Their father grabbed them by the shoulders, softly, like when they were a child. "I can't apparate to a foreign nation without going through our and their ministries' regulations, there is a whole procedure, it could take a week for even a visit, seeking asylum would be more complicated than that, not to mention our ministry is now ruled by death eaters. They would only return me here if  I did."

"But you can do it the muggle way?"

"I have my muggle passport, I will go in as a tourist, then I'll try to convince them from inside, as will hundreds of others. Perks of being of muggle descent! Now let me check you, yeah? I wish you two would come with me, but I know it is pointless to even ask."

Remus, while all this was happening, had remained in the entrance, looking just as determined. Although his arms were now crossed in a peculiar way which suggested to Tonks he had possibly felt he was intruding in the family home. He could have left, of course, but Remus was too polite to do so without saying goodbye.

"Go," Tonks told him, "find Harry, go."

"Will you be okay?" 

"It is just a stomach virus, do not worry about me." They insisted.

Remus nodded.

The mention of Harry was enough to convince him.

It always was.

There was no world, alternative reality or else, in which Tonks was Remus' first choice. The key here is that being Remus' priority, for Tonks, was nothing more than a curse, a heavy weight they never chose to lift. Tonks loved Remus, of course she did, she loved him as a friend, a mentor even, and, somehow, as the last remains of Sirius, as unhealthy as that may be. 

With time, Remus became someone Tonks could turn to when everybody else had left. He became their shoulder to cry on, and they became his, and it was not a bad thing. For Tonks, theirs and Remus' story was indeed one of love, perhaps not the kind of love outsiders expected or took under any consideration, but love nonetheless.

And because Tonks loved Remus as much as Remus loved Tonks, and not any less, their first reaction had been one of pure dread. Oh  Merlín, they had lamented, don't let this be what makes him put me first. 

But that was a lie; a pathetic, filthy lie, reworded in Tonks' head to sound poetic. How on earth did anyone expect his reaction to be anything other than denial? 

"No I'm not," Tonks contradicted his dad.

Ted did the spell again.

And again, and again, and again.

"Tonks," his father repeated, in a sombre tone and an unusual oh slow pace, "you are pregnant."

"Dad, I have never in my life slept with someone with a penis, not even in my experimentation phase at Hogwarts did I go that far, do you understand? So yeah, forgive me for not buying it." They argued. "Check again."

Oh yes.

After denial, humour came by.

"Have you been clubbing recently? Did you ever lose conscience? Are there time slaps you don't remember?"

"Ted," Andromeda cut him off, "we are at war and she was being persecuted: no they haven't."

"That's it, I'm calling it!" Tonks laughed coldly, maniacally, in a way in which it was hard to stop. "I'm the next Virgin Mary!"

Of course, a pureblood may have figured it out way sooner. Not because they were any more intelligent, but simply because they didn't have a grandmother obsessed with the Bible who forced them to go to church with her every time they visited.

"Tonks be serious for a moment, how is this possible? You've had to sleep with someone, they could have performed an obliviate on you, they could have—"

Ted's voice broke down, he was going through the worst possibilities. Tonks said it, when it came to her mind, they said it, and it was not because they were sure of it—the mere idea was absurd! It couldn't be!—or considered it would be particularly helpful, but because, like any sane person would, they couldn't bear their father to think they had been raped, and needed to say something, anything.

Tonks hadn't been raped, had she? If she had, even if she couldn't remember it, she would have felt something. She would have woken up with bruises, swollen and scarred, at the very least. Besides, when would it have happened? And who? It must have been someone from the Order, if that was the case, or from work. Only that… Tonks remembered every moment of every day in the last month.

No, their theory felt comforting in comparison. It quieted the voices in her head at least, the monster in her throat.

"Sirius and Remus asked me to be their surrogate," she began to say, which, okay, maybe was not the best starting point. They were barely making any sense, and their mum looked at them as if they had lost their mind.

"Dora, Sirius is—"

"Dead, I know." He clarified. "This happened a year ago, a year and six weeks maybe? Seven? Before the battle at the ministry."

"I don't understand," his mother complained. "They asked you, you said yes I suppose, knowing you, you must have felt quite honoured. So what?"

"It is nothing, it's been so long, I know why I'm telling you this, I just cannot come up with anything better. This is not how the human body works, it's not how pregnancies work either." Tonks hesitated, truly seeing no point in telling them, although something in her still pushed her to do so. "Remus would have been the bio dad, the plan was to do it once the war was won."

Andromeda frowned.

"Remus? I guess my cousin was traumatised by incest, and refused to give any kind of direct blood descendance to the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black, Merlin forbid, but ummm… I'm surprised Remus—"

"Oh, I know what you're thinking. " Tonks cut her off, for a moment forgetting about the war, about the ministry being in the mercy of death eaters, Remus on his own looking for Harry and his father's bags resting on the main entrance. "He was convinced any son of his would be a werewolf, but apparently that's not how it works? Anyways, all they confided in me was that Sirius had a lot of research to do."

Tonks' mum snorted.

"That's definitely not how it works."

"Still," she added, "I don't see why it is relevant to your pregnancy."

Tonks explained further.

They talked about the spell, how it had only been a test, and, when it all stopped, Tonks had felt empty, unsettled, unfinished… Ted's face grew paler as they spoke, he recognised the incantation they had used, and later told Tonks all about it. It was common, usually recommended to be practised under professional supervision, but not always: it was long and required a high flow of your magic, but  not very complicated, and people often ventured to do it on their own.

"Dora," her father grabbed her by the shoulders, like he used to when they were a kid, and by the look of his face, by the name ‘Dora’ he so rarely used, Tonks knew it was serious. "Usually, when you leave a long incantation unfinished, it dissolves on its own accord. This is because each step depends on the next and, when you stop, it all crumbles down, like… domino ."

"Yes, exactly." Tonks nodded along, feeling immense relief. 

"Incantantations on the body don't work like that, healing charms don't work like that, Tonks." Tonks' father rubbed his eyes, clearly exhausted, and muttered something similar to "I can't leave." 

"That kind of incantation you did," he added, "it is like planting a seed. It is supposed to be done quickly, you are not supposed to stop, I don't think anyone would have— Look, if you hadn't been compatible and the magic had not taken on you, that's okay! That's not dangerous! So no one before has done this that I know of, people just stop immediately, before any harm is done, and reschedule it once they find another person who is."

Ted!" Andromeda snapped. "Please get to the point."

Ted sighed.

"The incantation was left unfinished, but the magic remained on the body. That's the difference, you are not using objects! They are your very much alive human bodies! You can't just—"

He breathed, in and out.

"You are pregnant, Tonks, and it is Remus'." He informed them. "The magic which should have been performed in under three hours has been slowly developing inside your body for a whole year, until finally, it happened. Once it did, the whole process did and will continue naturally."

"Take it out then, abort it."

"No."

"Dad!"

"No!" He insisted. "I wish I could, you know I'm very much for abortion, I've done thousands of them, sometimes clandestinely, in far worse places than a couch or a clean bed. But this magic is dangerous, you could die, it could kill you. We don't know how it will react, okay? We simply don't. The foetus, it is alive as far as I can tell, completely normal. But the way it was formed, the way it got there, is very much not . I'm not risking it. It is what I would do if you weren't my child, if I was capable of any objectivity in this, and it is what I'm doing."

It took a whole day to convince Tonks' dad to run away. He didn't want to leave them, not with her new situation, but when the other option was death, there wasn't really an option.

Gryffindors may believe the only way to protect those you love is to step in and sacrifice your life, but Tonks' family knew better. Ted, had he stayed, would have been taken to the Wizergamont, his wand would have been broken. Helpless, possibly lifeless given who he married, Ted could do nothing for his family. 

By the time he left, it was 3 am on the 3rd of August, and he only did so motivated by a traumatic event. Tonks had a war to fight, and a pregnancy to deal with, and quite frankly, wasn't so sure as to which one was worse. 

Tonks had never wanted to be a parent. Hell, they didn't even feel any kind of paternal connection to the foetus inside of them—although that was to be expected anyways, it was nothing more than a 6 weeks foetus, after all. 

This was something more, though, it was painful, because what was supposed to be a beautiful journey they themself had chosen suddenly became their worst nightmare; and it was unnatural: how the magic had been acting on its own accord inside of them for so long… No healer in their right mind would ever call that pregnancy natural. 

"What are you going to do?" Andromeda asked.

"Go on as normal, Remus has to take care of Harry, he can't know, it'll destroy him." He answered.

"Tonks…"

"No!" He snapped. "I have to go, I should help him find the kids. He… I will tell him the truth and try to convince him, when things are a little better, to give the baby up."

Andromeda shook her head, and smiled, despite herself.

"Good luck with that." She warned her. "At first… He is like you that way, he will want nothing to do with it. Then he will step up, and he will never let that baby go."

"We will find them a good family, mum," they assured her, holding her shaky hands warmly, "it will be okay. It has to be."

Andromeda didn't contradict her, if only because the day had barely started and, quite frankly, Tonks had had enough. 

They spent that second morning of August, which should have been their first without their father, trying to locate Remus in muggle London, completely disguised by their metamorphmagus abilities, walking up and down the street and feeling like an idiot. 

There was a foetus growing inside her uterus, and nothing she could do to stop it without risking her own life. Sirius' and Remus' future kid to be exact, except it was no longer Sirius' and Remus', was it? Actually, maybe it was.

It was supposed to be theirs, not Tonks', so what if Sirius died? Did adoptive parents stop being so when they passed away? No they didn't.

So what if the magical adoption ceremony would never be performed and this kid wasn't going to have Sirius' genes—well, technically, it was, because Tonks and Sirius were… Never mind. The point is, they were carrying Sirius' baby as much as Remus', there was no doubt about that.

Should Tonks let Remus know as soon as possible instead of prolonging the whole thing? Was there any possibility Remus wanted anything to do with the foetus like Tonks' mum had said? Maybe things would be different if it had been biologically Sirius', as much as they found themself repulsed at the mere thought. But with things as they were, Tonks very much doubted that.

Their afternoon, not yet giving up on the Remus search, was wasted looking for the werewolf. He had vanished from the face of the earth. Finally, Tonks found themself exhausted and a bit dizzy, and decided to try his flat out of pure desperation.

Remus, about to put his coat off, looked quite puzzled to see her there, and also worried.

"Tonks! Are you okay? The nausea and— Is Ted—?" 

"Gone? No, mum is with him today, trying to convince him.” They explained. “He had a change of heart. And you? Did you have any luck?"

"With Harry? Kinda, but also, not at all."

Remus explained they could sense—werewolf secrets, it was better not to ask—traces of magic in a muggle Caffè. 

"It felt like a fight, but the employee was alive and had gaps in her memory, which means—"

"They won!" Tonks cheered.

"I lost the trace, though, there was no luck after that. I can't smell him in the area."

"Hold on," Tonks interrupted him, "you can smell Harry?!"

Remus smiled, although there was something sad about that too, a certain melancholy in his eyes.

"Of course," he confirmed, gushing, "he is my cub, he's part of my pack."

He cared for Harry so deeply that, for a moment, Tonks was tempted to tell him about the pregnancy. He almost did (almost).

Back at home, Tonks found their mother and father barely standing, the front door wide open.

“What the fuck happened?” They asked.

“They came here,” Tonks’ mum struggled to answer, “looking for Harry.”

That night, their dad finally came to his senses.Tonks felt him kiss their forehead in their sleep, like when they were a kid, and by the time they woke up, he was nowhere to be found.

The day turned out unfortunately similar to the last, the only difference being that, to that second search, they had gone together. Back at home, Tonks tried to avoid the topics of 1) unnecessary risking their life, 2) their mother and father being tortured and living to tell the tale, followed by Ted’s departure, and 3) PREGNANCY! AGHHH! And so, hanging out with Remus while unnecessarily risking their lives to try and save a couple of kids and take over their job at killing the most powerful wizard alive sounded pretty appealing at times.

The fourth morning was specially hard, because Tonks was fucking nauseastic and dizzy and they felt horrible.

"Are you going to tell me what is wrong with you?" Remus insisted.

"Nothing, I told you already! Come home with me and mum to have lunch, will you?"

Oh, how much she wished she could shout at her past self. "Hey! You! Moron! That's not a fucking good idea, you genius!" She should have known, really, she should have known her mother could only bear so much nonsense before taking the matter into her own hands.

"Did Dora tell you or not yet?" She blurted out.

"Mum!" 

Remus looked at them and nodded.

"Yes, I know about you and Ted," he replied, "I'm so sorry, I cannot even imagine how hard it must have been, and then him leaving..."

"Oh, I mean, it was the right call," Tonks' mum argued, "we are just relieved he is one day closer to safety."

Tonks kicked her under the table.

"Don't you dare," they mouthed at her.

Remus was dealing with enough, it wasn't fair, to dump such information on him. A voice inside their head couldn't help but complain at this. What about you? They repeated, on and on.

Tonks ignored that voice, although not for long.

"Tell me, Remus, are you hopeful you will find Harry?" Andromeda asked. "I really hope so, they are so young…"

Remus nodded.

"He'll have to tell me what they're planning and I will join them." He spoke as if he had everything figured out. "I know better than to try and stop them, but I'm not letting three seventeen year olds hunt by dark wizards alone in some kind of selfless mission assigned by a dead headmaster all too comfortable with sending kids into war."

His voice sounded harsh, and Tonks' own mum sounded choked up when she spoke next.

"Of course," she nodded, "you clearly care so much about Harry, it is nice to see he has somebody to rely on."

Remus shrugged.

"I do care, more than he'll ever know in fact. He is my best friends' son, I was supposed to be his uncle, he is my cub. But now I got to know him, it's more than that. I love Harry , as a person, he is a good kid, perhaps too good, Sirius and I… We dreamt of giving him a home, of being a family, and I— I haven't done a very good job with him lately, have I? In fact, I have been doing a terrible job all his life, since the moment I let Dumbledore take him, and just assumed he was getting everything I sent him and wasn't interested. They must be appalled at my behaviour."

Tonks squeezed Remus' arm. Neither them nor their mum needed to ask who " they" was. James, Lily, Sirius… They had been Remus' family, just as much as his biological one.

"You did everything you could and more." Tonks contradicted him.

Remus huffed.

"Yeah, I don't know about that."

He then excused himself and asked where the toilet was. Tonks' mum took him to the upstairs bathroom and, when she came back, threw Tonks a look she knew all too well.

"I'm not doing it, I'm not telling him." Tonks defended themself.

"You heard him talk about Harry, he would be a wonderful father." Andromeda argued. "Besides, this was his and my cousin's  project, this is because of them. They did this to you and now he has the right to know. He should deal with the consequences!"

"It was an accident, mum!" Tonks felt the need to defend Remus. "We should have known better than to stop an incantation on the body midway, yes! But we didn't, and nobody is at fault. We will deal with it on our own, and we will let Remus go after Harry, because yes, he is a wonderful father, and he should be allowed to be! He is all that kid has."

"What about that one?!" His mum yelled while she pointed at his plain belly, clearly distraught, although it was only visible in her raised tone. "Who will that baby have?! You say you are not their mother, so Ted and I can’t have any kind of relationship with them, and you don’t wanna tell Remus! They will have no one ”

“They are not a baby, they're a foetus!” Tonks snapped. “And I’ve told you millions of times! I plan on telling Remus after the war, and we’ll find them a good family!”

“They already have a family!”

Both of them had long forgotten Remus. The man was standing in the doorway, his face was pale as the moon—in fact, the fear in his eyes must not have been very far from that he experienced in front of the full—and Tonks was unable to guess how long he had been standing there, how much he had listened to.

“Ummm… When did you get there?” 

Remus swallowed, harshly, and turned to her..

"In 'incantation on the body'?" His voice sounded higher than usual, and peachy. Tonks suspected that, if he had not been leaning on the doorway so strongly, he might have passed out. 

"Remus—" 

"No," he interrupted them, "we did this to you, we made you sick. Can it—? Can it be stopped?"

"Dora is not sick, they are pregnant." Tonks' mum corrected him. She then explained everything, about the magic and why they couldn't interrupt the pregnancy.

Remus covered his face with his hands and grunted.

"I don't, without him, I can't—" He stuttered. "This wasn't meant to happen, and you weren't gonna tell me!"

"I was! Just not right now!" Tonks protested. "I didn't want to distract you, Harry needs you."

Remus seemed torn at her excuse.

"Still, I should get a say." He retaliated.

"You should get all the say, it's not my foetus in there." 

He looked honestly confused at that.

"Is it not?" He asked, at the same time her mum snapped "Don't call them a foetus!"

"Well," they clarified,"genetically, it is. But that's not my kid, remember? I'll either be the fun, lesbian aunt/uncle, and shower them with gifts, or we can find them a good family, close adoption, nice and easy. That's for you to decide."

Andromeda nodded along. She looked proud Tonks was standing their ground, and, for a second, they felt proud themself.

"Tonks, Sirius is—"

"Dead," they cut him off, "and so what? This was a decision you took as a couple, and Sirius is as much the father of this foetus as you are, is he not?"

"No!"

"Yes! Yes he is!" Andromeda intervened, to everyone’s surprise. "I know my cousin, we grew up together, I was in the room the day he was born. Wherever he is, he considers himself the father of this child, okay? I don't care how much it pains you to hear it. You are the father, and Sirius is the father, and that child should grow up knowing how stupid, and selfless, and bloody good he was. He should grow up with someone like you, their other father, someone who can tell them all about their family, the good and the bad, and how loved and desired they were. He should be a miracle, and not a curse."

Up until then, Tonks had thought their mum fancied being a grandma, that that was the problem: they wanted to be in this child's life. Now, however, they knew they had vastly underestimated her. It was much more than that. This was not only about becoming grandparents, roles their mum and dad would take with pleasure, this was about Sirius, about Sirius' legacy.

"We are at war." Remus lamented. "I am a poor, widower werewolf who can't even help the teenager already left under his care." 

"So what if you are a werewolf? The foetus is not, you know that, you would have never let us use your semen in the incantation if you didn't." Tonks contradicted him. "You are caring , loving, and very responsible. You are doing everything you can for Harry, we've discussed this. And money won't be a problem, if you wanna keep it, I'll help economically, I would like to be in that child's life,  just… not as the mother."

Tonks surprised themself at their words. They realised they were not untrue: they didn't want to be a stranger, the birth mother that child would never meet, despite insisting on giving it up, just because the option clearly gave their parents and themself peace of mind. If they had to do a close adoption, they would, but they agreed with their mum on that much: they wished Remus would keep the baby.

"I'm a mess! I can't take care of myself, how am I going to raise a baby? I won't even be alive by the end of this!"

"You don't know that! And you and Sirius did alright when Harry stayed at Grimmauld!" 

Remus' eyes turned bright and wide, like two lightbulbs.

"That's it, Grimmauld!"

Tonks gasped and stared at him, speechless. All those days looking for Harry, and the answer turned out to be so obvious.

"Go!" They urged him. "I'm only six weeks preggo, I don't need you, he does! Go with him and don't come back here, Remus Lupin."

Oh but he did. To everyone's disappointment, he did, and, for once, it was actually no one’s fault.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Nobody remembered by then Harry's version of events was very different from their own. In highsight, of course, it sounded like a misunderstanding they could have avoided.

"You told an orphan, who grew up without his mum and dad, that you were abandoning your pregnant wife with whom you are in love to go have an adventure with him and his friends because you were afraid your son or daughter would be born a werewolf?" Tonks looked at Remus in pure disbelief. 

"1) We're both gay, our relationship is purely platonic. 2) I know they won't be a werewolf, it was just what first came to mind. And 3) what was I supposed to tell him?!"

"The truth!" Remus, who had been pacing across the room nervously, stopped to look at them. "We are no longer in danger, at least, not because of our queerness, just everything else going on, so it wouldn't make him do anything heroic or stupid. And yes! He would be mad at you for lying to him, but once he knew I literally sent you there, he would have let you join them!"

"Oh."

"Yes, oh!" Tonks snapped.

She sighed, maybe she was being too hard on him.

"What are we gonna do now?"

Remus shrugged.

"Well, Harry was not wrong." He replied. "Your pregnancy is my responsibility (mine and… and Sirius') and I'm not gonna run away from it." 

Tonks hit him in the shoulder, out of sincere desperation.

"That's great!" They insisted. "It is such a relief, I didn't expect you to come around this quickly. Still, this?"

They posed a hand on their belly.

"It is a six week formed foetus. And that person in Grimmauld?" They pointed outside. "That's your seventeen year old nephew who needs you . He may not admit it, but he does! I have my mum with me, I'm fine . Now go!"

"You think I don't wanna protect him? He doesn't want me there!" Remus protested.

"Well, you'll have to find a way to disguise yourself. Don't let them know you are following them." Tonks argued in return.

"That's crazy, how would I—?"

" Unless you take me to Grimmauld and I convince him."

Not many people knew about Tonks' and Remus' excursion to Grimmauld Place the morning of the 5th of August. Even two out of the three teenagers sleeping inside would remain unaware of it.

It was 4 AM and, for some reason, they thought it would be safer to apparate around the neighbourhood during the night, rather than in plain morning. 

They were not wrong exactly, they never thought the danger could be inside the house, not on the outside. 

Somehow, the magic set to protect the property in the form of a fake Dumbledore ("who killed me?" Remus said he had asked the first time around) acted on its own accord when it sensed enemies. 

Of course, Tonks understood as they casted a protection spell around the two of them, the new master of the house practically denied Remus entry, we are natural enemies.

No, it was not the dead headmaster, they were not that lucky. Instead, hundreds of shadows hovered over them. Their  cold, low whispers made them shiver, but they barely could decipher the exact words.

Still, Tonks was pretty sure they were telling them to get the fuck out.

"Fucking house magic," Remus cursed and Tonks grunted, trying to shed some light over the figures. "Is there a way to stop them?!"

"No!" They replied. "We need the specific counterspell, created by the family, or, in this case, Kingsley I suppose."

"You are part of the family, maybe they'll disappear if I go, I can wait outside." Remus suggested to Tonks, and she was about to accept when a figure in the shadows down the hall pulled them all away.

The beings were drawn to their wand, which swallowed them in the most literal way possible, and Tonks realised the person must have known the spell. They prayed for it not to be Harry, although it would have been the most logical explanation.

It wasn't.

Hermione looked at them, aghast, standing completely barefoot and still in her pyjamas.

She drew her wand, and, despite her age, Tonks knew better than to not be wary of the young witch.

“What did you say to me when I went to your office before you left Hogwarts?” She asked Remus. 

Tonks guessed it must have been a private conversation between the two, something no one else would know—or else, it wouldn’t work as a security measure.

Remus smiled.

“I thanked you for being Harry’s friend,” he answered, “I told you I understood a fair bit myself of what it was like to find a family inside those walls, and that you and Ron, you made all the difference. You warned me Harry’s family wasn’t as caring as I hoped, and I promised I would be there for him, that I too would make a difference.”

Hermione swallowed, and lowered her wand. 

She lost no time, jumping at Tonks and trapping her in a warm hug.

“You should check on me too, you know.” They reproached her.

“Oh, shut up.” The girl muttered, her voice muffled by Tonks’ own clothing as she leaned on their shoulder. “I don’t know what you two are doing here, but congratulations, I’m so happy for you, you’re gonna be fantastic parents, I—”

Tonks shook her head and, feeling a span of guilt, knew they needed to tell Hermione the truth.

“Did you—?” She asked, misinterpreting their gesture.

“No, no! I’m fine!” Tonks reassured her. “We’ve got to talk, though, in a place where Harry and Ron can’t hear us.”

Remus nodded along, visibly relieved, and they both walked after the girl, who pointed at the stairs and shushed them as they passed by the living room where the two other teens were sleeping.

He noticed, as they walked to what used to be Hermione’s room on the second floor when she stayed over during the summer a few years ago, Remus’ glassy eyes and the subtle temblor of his right hand. Tonks squeezed it, between steps, and they stayed that way, with their hands locked as if they were true lovers.

It must be difficult for him, Tonks realised, I don’t think he has returned much since Sirius’ death, and this is where they last lived together, where they dared to dream with the after and asked me to be their surrogate.

Once the door was locked, they sat on the bed, and Hermione rushed them to talk.

“The house doesn’t want you here,” she said, and of course, nobody questioned her.

 “Promise me you won’t tell Harry any of this, I want…” Remus struggled to say. “He deserves to hear it from me.”

Hermione promised, and, with Tonks’ help, Remus explained everything as clearly as he could. As time passed and they reached the ending of the story, the young girl looked peekier, paler, but not surprised. Tonks guessed she had probably noticed there was something more than friendship between Sirius and Remus.

“I was confused, actually, with that scene in the hospital wing.” Hermione confessed, confirming Tonks’ suspicions. “I thought, I mean, I knew you and Sirius— And then you, Tonks, and it made no sense to me.”

“You know better than to assume the source of all my problems was my unrequited love for a man, huh?”

Hermione blushed, but nodded.

“Oh my god, and then you are pregnant with—”

“Mine and Sirius’ kid, yes.” Remus confirmed. “I only found out yesterday, I was rather shocked when I came to you, I was not in my right mind, and now I realise I should have told you three the truth.”

“Harry would have understood.” Hermione assured him. “I know he would have.”

“Yes, I realised that as soon as I walked out the door.” He agreed, his eyes filled with regret. “It’s been so many months of lies that I went into automatic mode, I think, and used the werewolf excuse even though lycanthropy is not inheritable, and now he won’t let me approach him, I made him think I was abandoning my child.”

“Hermione,” Tonks added when he felt the need to come in Remus’ defence, “please rest assured he is not abandoning his child. His child is a six weeks foetus growing safely inside my uterus, and  I was the one who told him to go with you three.”

A flicker of doubt passed through Hermione’s eyes.

“You did?”

“Of course, I’m safe at my mum’s, I don’t need him right now.”

“Hermione.” Remus grabbed her hands and tried to gain her trust, desperately, as though life or death depended on such a decision. “That kid sleeping downstairs? He too is mine, and I considered him my nephew, my cub, from the very first time I held him, as did Sirius. We swore we would protect him from everything and anything, were the worst to happen, we promised we would raise him, together. And I—”

“I don’t know what a poor, unemployed werewolf professor can do for any of them.” He added, referring too, to the foetus in Tonks’ belly. “I’m not sure, most days, I will live long enough to do anything at all, but I won’t abandon Harry and you two to go on a deathly hunt to do Merlin knows what, and now that I’ve ruined the easy path, I’m gonna need your help.”

Finally, Hermione gave up.

“Okay,” she accepted, “okay. Tell me what I can do.”

Remus explained he needed to be able to locate them at all times, and something to disguise himself.

“Polyjuice, ideally, but I can take care of that.” He said. “It would also be nice that you told me what the hell Dumbledore wanted to use Harry for.”

Hermione grimaced.

“He didn’t—”

“Oh, please,” Remus snorted, “Dumbledore spent most of his life trying to lure children into the fight, working for this ‘greater good’ of his.”

She didn’t answer. Instead, she asked them to stay put and left them alone for a bit. She came back with a small bag, which had no end on the inside. It was clearly altered by some kind of enlargement charm, and Hermione spent quite a bit with her entire arm inside it, looking for something.

“Ah, here it is.” She pulled out a bracelet, a normal, regular-looking bracelet.

“I’ve been working on this.” She explained.

“What is it?”

“It has a location spell on it, I was testing it just last night, after everyone went to bed.” Hermione confessed. “It is supposed to take you within a reasonable distance of the maker of the spell—me, that is. This was supposed to be Harry’s, I thought I could do another one for Ron and give one to each but this thing is in the wrong hands… They are looking for us specifically, you know.”

“Are you sure?”

She insisted it was for the best and Remus accepted the bracelet, of a soft green fabric.

“Can you please tell us what you are planning?” Tonks reminded her.

The young witch winced, but promised she would explain things as much as possible. By the end of it, Tonks felt the vomit climbing up her throat, for once, for a reason completely unrelated to the pregnancy. “He’s been manipulating Harry all year long,” Remus lamented, back home, referring to Harry’s private lessons with the headmaster “and I was not there for him. The only person who could have avoided this failed him.”

“You are making up for it now.” Tonks tried to comfort him.

“Hermione will keep me updated, I’ll follow them up close.”  

When Remus said that, it sounded more like a promise to himself than anything else. For Tonks, it was obvious. It was evident because they didn’t need any promises. If a wizard’s looks could kill, Remus would have been the person to watch out for. 

“What about the moons?”

“I’ll stay here in the meantime, with you.” He decided on the spot. “And, with this bracelet, I can go with the packs on the full and then come back to wherever they need me.”

True to his word, when Harry, Ron and Hermione infiltrated the ministry on the 2nd of September, not even the moon dared to stop Remus from camping outside, a polyjuice potion with his own stolen lock of hair in hand, even if unlikely he would ever use it: if those three were not out in time, he would go in himself, no disguise needed.

“They are crazy!” He panted when he got back. 

“Are they okay?”

“Yeah, they are camped in the forest of Dean.” He clarified. “They’ve got the horcrux now.”

“Good.”

Tonks knew then, the teens and Remus had an extremely difficult journey ahead of them.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Tonks spent months convincing her mum to let her join Remus.

"You are pregnant!" Andromeda would bellow at the mere mention.

"Yes, exactly,  pregnant!" Tonks would argue. "Not invalid! Just twenty four weeks pregnant!"

At that point, they were already in the part of the argument where Andromeda would use her crocodile tears to make her child detract out of guilt. 

“Your father is god knows where and now you want to risk your life and I— I can’t bear it!” She lamented.

Tonks had experienced it dozens of times, and was perfectly aware that, no matter how moving her words may be, their mother didn't display that kind of emotion—not even in front of them—unless, of course, someone she loved died tragically or anything of the sort.

Yet, Tonks had let themself fall right into it in every previous discussion. Because they were at war, because their mother was genuinely scared, because they didn’t know if Ted Tonks was alive or dead. Because, because, because… Not anymore, that day, they decided there would be no more excuses. 

And Remus, who knew better than to stop her, made her swear she would remain behind if anything happened. Ha! That poor fool… Deep down, Tonks felt guilty, knowing she was carrying Remus’ baby and risking both of their lives, but they were at war, risking lives was all they did, and nothing would have made them stay behind. 

“Ron has been gone for a while,” Remus explained before they apparated, “Bill tells me he is staying with him, but we are not supposed to know that. Harry and Hermione want— He wants to go to Godric's Hollow, visit Lily and James’ tombs.”

“Oh, Remus.” Tonks hugged him. “I’m glad I’m coming with you, then.”

“Are you sure you have nothing better to do on Christmas Eve?” Remus asked one last time. “I hate that you are doing this, but I don’t get a say. It’s your choice.”

Tonks smiled, weakly, as best as they could, and tried to keep the image of their mum, alone at home, from their mind.

“I didn't even remember it was Christmas Eve.” They admitted.

They landed on top of a small hill, and could see Harry and Hermione take polyjuice and transform from their spot.

“We are just in time, come on.” Remus said.

“We need to do an invisibility spell on ourselves, and a notice-me-not.” Tonks reminded him.

“Both?”

“Yes!” They insisted. “It’s better than polyjuice. Us Aurors often use both of those, for precaution.”

As usual—what? It’s true!---Tonks was right. They were unable to see them, yes, but also of hearing their steps, their breathings or even perceive their magic signatures. It was the perfect combination, and it allowed them to follow the pair closely. Tonks and Remus stood near them in front of the Potters’ tombs. 

“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” Remus read the inscription at the same time as Harry, sounding choked up. “I chose that, you know? I was their only family left, Petunia didn’t— I sent her a letter, about the funeral, she never came. And I chose what we always told each other before going into battle, and even before that, back at Hogwarts, before a Quidditch match, James and Sirius would hug, pat each other’s backs and say that, ‘the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.’”

“I’m so sorry, Remus.” Tonks hugged him while they watched Hermione make a beautiful bouquet of flowers for them.

“I haven’t changed them since before Bill and Fleur’s wedding,” Remus confessed, referring to the flowers, “I try to keep them fresh. Sirius and I wanted to bring Harry here last summer, we had talked about it extensively, we thought we were finally ready, we were looking forward to it, actually.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s attention was taken by the figure of an old woman.

“Bathilda,” Remus recognised her, and immediately relaxed.

Tonks blinked twice, expecting her to disappear, to be some sort of collective illusion, and contained a cry when she didn’t.

“Fuck.” She cursed. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!”

“What?”

“Listen to me, Remus.” She grabbed the man by the shoulders and explained. “The Auror department was investigating this before the death eaters took over. That woman is dead, okay? They were investigating her death.”

Remus’s face turned one of a ghostly white, and he began running after them, followed closely by a pregnant and struggling Tonks (seriously, don’t run while pregnant, they would not recommend it).

The corpse did not say a word on their way to Jame’s and Lily’s old home. Hermione acted obviously wary, but Harry was oblivious, he was so blinded by his parents’ remains he was unable to see how weird the whole thing was. That day, when the walking corpse asked for the fake couple of old age to follow her inside, what nobody else but them two and perhaps Hermione would be able to tell is that they were not alone.

Bathilda took Harry upstairs and Remus followed.

Tonks stayed with Hermione, honouring the promise they had made Remus and their mum before apparating: they would not put their life in danger. 

A loud noise, followed by Harry’s cry, made Hermione run upstairs. Bathilda’s body was on the floor, and Nagini, Voldemort’s snake, barely bit Harry before Remus (or who Tonks guessed was Remus, as they could not see each other either) drew his wand and threw a spell unknown to Tonks which kept the beast away.

Hermione had no time to question it.

Remus lifted his notice-me-not for a few seconds, only to yell: “apparate!” Harry was out of it, convulsing in pain, and Tonks guessed Nagini’s master, another living corpse in his own way, was coming even before he did. The old woman Hermione had transformed into before stepping foot into the village grabbed Harry’s wand from the floor—unfortunately, the wand was broken in two parts by then—and did as Remus told her.

Remus and Tonks held their breaths, watching Voldemort yell in fury and hoping their notice-me-not was strong enough. It probably wouldn’t be, on any other occasion, but Tonks concluded it was clearly good enough for the snake and her master, blinded by anger, was not in his right mind.

“Holy shit,” Tonks muttered when he apparated away, with the snake in his arms, “he was here, a few steps away from us, we could almost feel his breathing.”

“How tough?” Remus unmade his own spells, sat on the floor and laughed. “He has no nose.”

“I think I saw two small holes in there.” Tonks argued.

Remus laughed louder, although it was clearly not out of joy, but more like a trauma response. He rubbed his eyes and hit the top of his own head.

“That was the man who took so many of us, he was just there, I can’t help but think we could have hit him with the killing curse and then, we would have had only the horcruxes on our way.”

“Have you ever thrown a killing curse at someone?” Tonks asked.

“No.” Remus confessed. “I killed people in the first war, but not with an avada.”

“Unforgivables cannot be done wandlessly, and they usually do not work on your first try. Like a patronus, you have to work on your emotions, but in this case, on the worst of them all. Nobody but the truly wicked succeed on their first try, you would have gotten us killed.”

Remus nodded, and Tonks side-apparated him back to her parents’ home. 

“There is nothing else we can do for Harry and Hermione today,” they said to him, “you saved Harry’s life, he is probably resting right now.”

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Year 1998 seemed to be made of tragedies. Tonks’ dad died that March, and even though they had been expecting the news for a while—since they had not gotten word from him since he left, nothing confirming he had made it to Ireland—it still hurt like a bitch. 

His father, who had left them worried to death about Tonks’ situation, who had only wanted to protect them and live , live for them, for Tonks and Andromeda, was gone. For a while, it was impossible for him to believe it, absolutely impossible… Until it wasn’t. Hanika, and now their dad… Why was everyone in their life leaving them? Why did they have to suffer all the fucking time ?! Eventually, their pregnancy became one more of those tragedies.

Being thirty weeks pregnant was not an easy thing, let me tell you that. Tonks was massive, huge! They couldn’t fix it at risk of hurting the baby—yes, they had been forced to stop calling them a foetus after the twenty-fourth week, apparently, that was weird, Merlin knows why—and their pregnant belly made them feel extremely dysphoric when they were not perceiving themself too femininely.

Meanwhile, if Remus did not have enough as it was taking care of Harry, he had accepted to replace Tonks’ dad in his secret project with Fred, George and a couple more Order members: an illegal, clandestine, pro-Harry Potter radio program. It was in times like those that it hit Tonks Remus had been a marauder. Sometimes, they forgot (it was difficult to associate current Remus with the stories their mum had to tell about his, James’ and Sirius’ time at Hogwarts), and then he would pull some crazy shit and bam! They understood . 

“Yep, that checks out.” Tonks’ mum said when she was told.

That happened back in December, barely days after the attack on Godric Hollow, Remus assumed, after almost facing Voldemort and being killed, Harry and Hermione would be resting and so, they could manage a few days on their own.

“I’ll check on them at the end of the week,” he explained to Tonks, “they are distracted investigating the Deathly Hallows or some shit anyways. Tomorrow I’ve got to visit the twins and organise the rest of the radio sessions, next week’s location, collaborators and so on.”

Really, he should have known better, Harry was James’ son after all.

The night of the 31st of December, when he came back from checking on them, he did so on the verge of a panic attack.

“I left them alone,” he panted, “and they almost got killed. Hermione must have been waiting for me to show up, counting on me, and what did I do, huh?! Now that Ron is back, that’s another teen in mortal danger, great! He should have stayed with Bill, why did he not stay at Bill’s?!”

“Would you have if you were Ron?” Tonks intervened.

“Huh?”

“Answer my question.” They insisted.

Remus sighed in defeat.

“Well, no.” He admitted.

“Now,” they tried to clear things out, “why don’t you tell me what is going on?”

And that’s how Tonks learnt about the trip to Xenophilus’ place, how the man was working with the death eaters in the hope they would keep his daughter, Luna, alive. They did not pretend to make Remus feel guiltier, but it was very strange that he had not checked on the trio in almost a week, and they did say that to him.

“I did not tell you.” Remus realised. “I checked on them once, the night before the full moon, right before meeting the twins. It was the night Ron returned actually, although I only found that out because I got out the wards in order to go back and I saw him and Harry enter the tent from afar, seconds before apparating, and with the sword of Gryffindor too! How on earth—?!”

 Remus groaned.

“Anyways, so I spoke with Hermione while Harry was away.” He concluded. “She told me they were fine, but that Harry— Harry saw the night Lily and James, you know, in Vol— I mean, that awful being’s mind.”

Oh, right.

The curse on his name.

“She also told me about the hallows, although she said not to believe in them, and honestly, I’m equally sceptical. Do you know what she did not do? Warn me they were gonna go to Xenophilus’!”

After that day, Remus promised not to miss a trick when it came to Harry, Ron and Hermione. He did say he would be back for the birth, he promised so, and Tonks did not feel offended by his absence either. Again, she was locked in her mum’s house and heavily pregnant! And there was a war going on! They needed Remus out there more than the baby waiting for him inside Tonks’ belly.

For all Tonks knew, Remus would only leave them for a couple of hours when it was his turn to collaborate on the radio program, which was maybe once a week for so. Tonks and their mum were alone when it happened, when they were told Ted had died only two months after the trio’s visit to Xenophilus and the beginning of Remus’ absences. Tonks and Andromeda had spent by themselves, hiding in their own house, the entire third trimester of her pregnancy.

“Soon you will be out into the world,” Tonks told the baby, with whom he would speak quite often, “you will have an amazing dad and grandma taking care of you, and I will go back to the battlefield. After this is all done, if you like, I can be your auntie. You’ll have me, I’ll be there for you, don’t you worry.”

The baby kicked in response, and, like every time they did, Tonks loved them a little more.

“Did you know grandma was your pappa’s cousin?” They continued telling him. “It is confusing, I know, you have a messy family, my future niece or nephew, but with time, you’ll learn those tend to be the best ones.”

The baby kicked some more.

It made Tonks laugh, and they realised it was the first time in three weeks that they did so, that they laughed .

By the time Remus returned to her, in a state of nerves of course, it was the end of March and she was huge. It couldn’t take much longer for Tonks to give birth. They heard the story he had to tell from his own lisps.

Apparently, Remus had apparated away to the “radio station”—if you could call it that—, and he had come back to chaos. There were snatchers there, and he quickly realised someone must have said Voldemort’s name out loud. 

Snatchers, who had killed Tonks’ dad and so many others.

Snatchers, who could turn as deadly as they were stupid.

If it hadn’t been for Remus’ and Sirius’ future son or daughter in Tonks’ belly, he would have attacked them on the spot. 

He didn’t.

He waited, he played in safe, and it was so out-of-character that Tonks, as he was telling the story, looked at him in astonishment, and understood how much he cared about the baby, that their mum had been right and Remus was already a father of two, that, for the first time since Sirius died, Remus wanted, needed, to get out that war alive.

This baby is a blessing, they said to themself, it may not be an ideal world to bring a child into, but they are the only thing keeping Remus alive. Without them, he would have given his life for Harry twice already.

His future kid made Remus act in a way which would have made a Slytherin proud.

“I heard them say they were taking them to Malfoy Manor,” he explained to Tonks, “they hadn’t been recognised, Hermione transfigured their faces so they wouldn’t call Vol— Shit! That asshole on the spot. I began thinking of ways I could apparate inside the wards, and I thought ‘Oh! I wish I had a house elf!, which is how I remembered something about Harry’s time at Hogwarts, something he had told me and Sirius: he is friends with Malfoy’s old elf that he liberated, Dobby.”

Remus’ voice sounded somewhat choked up at the end, which Tonks did not understand until hearing the ending of the story. He had called Dobby, which came to him at the sentence “Harry Potter needs your help,” and, invisible and with a notice-me-not on, Dobby had apparated him into the cell.

Unfortunately, Remus had been too late to save Hermione from being tortured by Bellatrix.

Bellatrix, Tonks’ aunt who had asked for them to be murdered.

The person who sent crazy murderers after Hanika, the love of Tonks’ life.

The person who killed Sirius.

Remus wanted to go up the stairs, but Dobby began apparating on and off, taking Dean, Luna, a goblin and Ollivander, fellow prisoners, to safety, and he had no means to get out of there on his own. Helpless, hearing Hermione scream, he smelled the scent of his old friend, Wormtail, the traitor who sold them out to Voldemort, before Harry and Ron ever did.

He had seen the man die, and he had not felt a thing.

“He was dead already.” He said to them when he told the story. “The Peter we knew and loved died the moment he took the mark.”

Up the stairs.

He fought Bellatrix off Hermione, an invisible force who, somehow, was interfering in the battle.

Bam! Puff! Boom!

Spells were flying in every direction.

Remus attacked the death eaters trying to get to the trio, and Harry and Ron, focused on their way out, did not notice. Hermione did, though, she looked at every direction, seeking him out, and Remus squeezed her arm in reassurance. 

A green spell Remus knew all too well flew towards Harry.

His wolf reacted even before his mind did.

He pulled Harry to the ground, and the teen got up and claimed to Ron it was probably the chaos of the fight.

There they were.

Dobby grabbed them, and Remus hung onto the tiny elf’s arm at the last moment.

A knife flew by.

Bellatrix’s.

They apparated away.

They landed at Bill’s cottage, of course, and it only took them a moment to realise Dobby was bleeding.

“He died in Harry’s arms,” Remus later confessed to Tonks, “there was nothing we could do, healing spells act differently on house elves, I did not know anything that could save him.”

“What did you do afterwards?” Tonks asked.

“Afterwards?”

“That was yesterday, so where have you been?”

As it turned out, Remus spent the day watching Harry sleep. He sat on his bedside, and checked on how the boy was doing. Eventually, he lifted the spells off himself, trusting that Ron and Hermione were also asleep, and stayed there, refusing Fleur’s or Bill’s propositions to take turns and help except for the cup of tea Bill made him drink eventually.

“You are gonna run out of energy, mate,” the redhead argued.

And Remus gave in.

After a couple of hours, Remus left the tea on the bedside table and put a hand on Harry’s forehead, worried he had been tortured like Hermione before he got there and now, he may have a fever. He would also check on Hermione and Ron quite often, but at that moment, Remus couldn’t bear to leave Harry’s side. He put his untamable hair away from his eyes and kissed the boy on the same spot in his forehead.

“That’s how my mum would do it,” he confessed to Tonks, “back when I was a kid, after the moon.”

Harry’s eyes opened slowly, although he only sounded half awake.

“Remus?” He asked, softly. “You are here!”

Remus chuckled.

“I am,” he said, “I’m always with you, cub.”

“Tonight too?”

“Tonight, yesterday, always!” He squeezed the boy’s arm and hesitated, if only for a moment. “Sirius too, you know? He is always with us.”

“Mmmm…”

Harry had fallen asleep, his head leaning on Remus' shoulder, and most definitely did not hear Remus’ last statement.

Back at Andromeda’s, Tonks looked at the werewolf, barely able to contain the tears, feeling far more emotional than it was usual for them—for  their pre-pregnancy self at least. 

“He knows then? What did he say to you after he woke up again?” They asked him. “Did you tell him about, well, everything ?”

Remus shrugged.

“The spells were back on, he did not see me and he doesn’t remember a thing,” he replied, “Harry was practically out of it then, he probably thinks he dreamt it.”

“Oh.”

Well, that was unfortunate.

And so bloody unfair too! Why the hell couldn’t those two hold a long and meaningful conversation once and for all?!

"Right."

Splash!

For a moment, Tonks was sure she had peed herself. It took her a second to remember her giant pregnant belly and what it meant.

"Shit!" They cursed. "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!"

Remus paled, looked at the floor, then at Tonks, then at the floor again.

"MUUUUUUM!" Tonks bellowed, making Remus jump backwards. "THE BABY IS COMING!"

Right.

Do you know how in the movies you have a couple of contractions and then the thing just pops out? Well, it wasn't exactly like that for Tonks. It lasted hours, contractions coming closer every time, but at a ridiculously slow pace, and with only their mum's stupid advice and Remus' panicky and overbearing attitude.

"Try walking for a bit, dear." 

"Uhhhhh…. Can I bring you anything? Water? Tea? Anything?" 

"A healer!" Tonks cried to both of them. "That's what I need! I need St Mungo, and I need DAD!" And they were crying, why were they crying?! Tonks never cried that easily.

Right, so eventually it was time for the actual birth. Had it been ten hours? Eleven? Tonks was not sure, they only knew it hurt like hell, even with all the spells their mother put on them.

Tonks pushed, held Remus hand while she did, and pushed again. She did so following Andromeda's indications, and the baby came out, it may have felt like it would never going to end, but it did, a baby boy with blue hair and a loud crying voice was put onto her arms, her mother cut the placenta and Tonks was warned she was not done pushing.

"The umbilical cord is left," Tonks' mum said, but she did so in a choked up voice, looking at the baby whose head rested on Tonks' bare shoulder.

"He is a metamorphmagus," Tonks gushed, "like me."

"How can you be so sure?" Remus whispered. He sounded terrified, and pretty damn emotional at the same time.

"That's not a normal hair colour, duh."  Tonks looked at the baby, caressed his cheeks and felt as though she had always loved him, even before they met. It was not a maternal kind of love, though, it was not what a mother was supposed to feel like. And yet, Tonks would kill for that tiny human in her arms, she would kill and die for him, and it occurred to her that their love may not have been meant to be conventional, that they were not a conventional family, that it was different, but that didn't make it any less strong, or any less valid 

"Hey," Tonks whispered to him, "welcome to the world baby nephew."

When they handed it to Remus, they felt no grief, not like what many other pregnant people who did not get to raise their babies experienced. It wasn't like Tonks was giving him up, because she would be in that child's life, if war didn't kill them first, she had decided so months ago. Instead, she was sharing that love, in handing him to his dad, Tonks saw a very different kind of birth.

"Are you—?"

Remus’ hands trembled.

"He will not break," their mum told the werewolf softly, "he is your son, and he needs your arms."

Remus nodded and finally, he bent to Tonk's height, extended his arms and left them put the baby on them.

"Edward," he announced, looking and Tonks and her mum alternatively, "he will be named Edward, Teddy for short."

Tonks took it as a gesture, that Remus wanted them to be Teddy's family, but also as a nod to their dad, who would have considered himself a grandparent, to how much that child would miss, to how incomplete their family was without him.

They saw their mum take a hand to her mouth, but barely registered, mesmerised by the way Remus looked at Teddy.

"Edward Lupin-Black," he announced in a soft voice, as he approached the baby to the window and the sky full of scars behind it. "See?" 

He pointed at the constellations.

"That's Regulus, he would have been—, he is your uncle, you have so many aunts and uncles up there, there is uncle James and aunt Lily, aunt Dorcas and aunt Marlene, ohh, those two were married as well, did you know that? They remained married for a whole month before they—, before they left, and that one, the biggest star in the whole sky, that's Sirius, your father. Sirius had too big of a heart for him to carry sometimes, he used to be hot headed and a fool, a fool who didn't think before he acted, and a hopeless romantic too, someone who, despite his upbringing, wore his heart in his sleeve. I'm sorry you won't meet that version of Sirius, I'm so sorry because, sometimes, I don't even think I remember it myself, I fear I will always see him broken and in pain, he was like that when we began thinking of you, of bringing you to the world, when we dared to hope for a better future, but most people are. I don't know what I can do without him, cub, but I'll try, I promise I'll try. I will try to make it feel enough, with you and me, and your aunt Tonks, and your grandma, and Harry, who is gonna be your godfather, by the way. He is uncle James’ and aunt Lily's son, Harry is his name. We will fix the world, yeah? And it will have to be enough."

Finally, it was time for Tonks’ mum to meet Teddy. She gushed at him, when he rested in her arms, and Tonks realised that was the happiest they’d ever seen him since their dad died.

“Hi, I’m grandma.” She said, immediately wincing at her own words. “I hope that’s alright, I don’t want to—”

“Nonsense,” Remus cut her off, “you are his grandmother, and it’s not just about biology. I knew Sirius better than I knew myself once, Andromeda, he may have seen you as a big sister rather than a cousin when you were kids, but you grew up and he stayed a kid, Alphard died too soon and for years and years, you were the only adult in his life he could trust. Then he met Euphemia, and she practically adopted him, but even then, we’d be back in school and he’d send you a letter every time he was in trouble, needed advice, got a good mark or a detention. He’d write one for Mrs Potter and another one for you , and then it was Christmas, and we were together at last, and he asked me to meet his family and I thought he was joking, because I’d been visiting the Potters since we met at Hogwarts and there was—, Regulus had taken the mark, in that house, and there was no one else, and yet, he was so freaking nervous. He brought me here, in those ridiculous sweaters he’d bought in a muggle shop nearby a few days before, and he said ‘Moons, this is my—, this is Andy.’ So yes, you’ll be Teddy’s grandma, if you want to that is, and Tonks, if you ever choose to be something more than an aunt or uncle, that’s for you to decide, yeah? I wouldn’t—, it wouldn’t erase Sirius, this kid needs as much love as he can get.”

Tonks could only watch as her mum hugged Remus. She nodded, when the both of them looked her way, not knowing what to say. The words died in her throat, but she knew being Teddy’s aunt was what felt right at the moment. Maybe, some day, the kid would consider them a third parent, in which case they would of course accept such role, but it didn’t feel right, not yet and maybe not ever, it would be lying, to mark the bond they already felt with Teddy, as deep and truthful as it was, as paternal when Tonks was not sure it would ever develop that way. Tonks had not been born to be a parent, they had understood that fact about themself back when they were ten, and began learning about human reproduction at muggle school, they had never planned to become one and, despite just having given birth, in the middle of a war no less, despite adoring Teddy from the moment they first laid eyes on him, they reaffirmed their decision of loving him in their own way.

He has two fantastic parents already, they told themself, one watching over him from afar and another one right here, but no aunts or uncles alive, this is what I can give him, and what he, too, needs from me. He will have a dad, a brother, a grandma, and me, perfect set. 

Teddy changed hair colours within the first hour, with Remus holding him in a chair near Tonks’ bed and Tonks almost asleep.

“Oh, sorry, did I wake you up?” 

“Yes, yes, he is a methamophagus,” Tonks grumpled, “get used to it, babies and toddlers can’t control it very well (or at all). I was the same.”

“I just…” Remus sighed, even though he was holding Teddy and looked more at peace than Tonks had seen him in a long time, it was like he was still missing something. I wish Harry was here, that's all.”

“Go to him!” Tonks urged him. “He doesn’t know much, he thinks he made you so mad you ran away, when he saw you last. He’ll want to know you love him still, and that his godson was born, don’t you think? Bill as well, tell him everything went okay, will you? You can bring one of the pictures my mum took after the birth. Teddy and I will be here, asleep.”

Remus put Teddy in his crib, near Tonks’ bed, and nodded. He hesitated, looking back at the baby.

“Lupin!” Tonks shout-whispered, sincerely exasperated. “He’ll be fine , go!”

He didn’t need to be told twice. Tonks knew Remus, they knew he wouldn’t be able to leave Teddy behind to go after Harry, Hermione and Ron now he was out of the womb, even though Tonks’ mum would be more than happy to take care of the newborn if that were the case, that it would hurt, and he’d wish to be in both places at the same time, that he’d lose sleep and not only due to a crying baby. Tonks knew Remus’ visit to Bill and Fleur’s cottage would be the last, and for that reason and that reason alone ( definitely not because they were knackered), they chose not to wait for him awake.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Two weeks after Teddy’s birth, Tonks went back to work (not at the ministry, now it was taken, but at Grimmauld, where Kingsley and Molly were ruling what was left of the Order). Days passed and they all felt the same, just as hopeless, as pointless. They were losing, and everyone knew. That was until the 1st of May, when they woke in the middle of the night and, without meaning to, heard Remus and their mum chat in the dark.

But it was not a chat, was it? It was more of a meaningful conversation, held in whispers, while Remus held a sleeping Teddy on his chest. “I woke up, Teddy was crying and there was an owl howling in my window, with a letter on its peak.”

“What did it say?”

“It was Bill, he doesn’t know where Harry and his friends are, they left, he says, they had been confabulating with the goblin we rescued.” Remus sounded scared, and worried, but as soon as Teddy let out a cry, he shushed him in a calming voice. “It’s alright, it’s alright,” he whispered to his son.

“Do you know what they might be doing? Gringots related perhaps?”

“No idea, it only came to my mind the fake Gryffindor sword Bellatrix had, that day at the manor. She must have taken it from them, they had it when I saw them last, just when Ron returned, and Bill says Ron did not get it while he was staying with him. I just—, they need a payment, for the goblin to help, but what? If the sword was fake, then—”

“What if it wasn’t?” Tonks’ mum whispered back, slightly perturbed by the mention of her oldest sister. “What if they just tricked Bella into thinking it was?”

“Oh Merlin…”

Remus came into the realisation of something, because he gasped audibly, in a way even Tonks could hear from the other side of the door.

“Horcruxes are mainly destroyed by basilisk venom.”

“So what?”

“Didn’t Harry fight a fucking basilisk with that sword in second year? The thing must be impregnated on it.” He guessed. “But why would he be giving it away then? And where did they get it from in the first place?”

“That doesn’t matter now,” their mum cut him off, “if he made a deal with a goblin, it must be related to Gringotts, and if he plans on breaking his word, then… He doesn’t know what he is playing at.”

“But what is there in Gringotts that he wants? There can’t be a horcrux in— Oh…”

“What?!”

“Your sister, Andromeda, she is you-know-who’s right hand. Harry told me and Sirius he left Lucius one of his horcruxes, and that’s why the whole basilisk petrifying students episode happened. Don’t you think he could have done the same with Bellatrix?”

“But that’s—!” Her mum’s voice was louder than usual, and it woke Teddy up. The baby broke into heart-felt cries and Remus cursed. “No, that’s okay, little one,” he muttered to his son as he carried him to bed, “I’m here, I’m not leaving you, okay? I’m here.”

Those definitive words left his mouth even before he could process them, or that’s how Tonks interpreted it. Because as they got out of bed and peaked at the hallway, they saw him stop on his tracks, with Teddy still inside the crib, crying, and cover his mouth with his own hands.

“I can’t leave,” he understood, sitting on the floor with his back against the crib bars, barely registering Tonks approaching him and picking up the baby. “If I go to Harry, I would be abandoning Teddy, and if I stay here, I’m leaving Harry on his own. Harry, a seventeen year old I was supposed to care for, breaking as we speak into Bellatrix Lestrange’s vault, with two teenagers and a goblin who is probably aware of his plans and, for that reason, has probably decided he is not deserving of his help anymore.”

“It is 7 am, the sun has been out for barely an hour and Gringotts has just been opened,” Tonks pointed out. “They were probably waking up when Bill, aware they were leaving this morning, wrote to you.”

“I can still stop them…”

“Remus,” Tonks’ mum intervened, observing them from the hallway with a milk bottle in hand. “I know you don’t wanna hear this and that he is too young and it’s unfair, but as someone who has seen her only child part to battle multiple times over the years, there is nothing you can do to stop him, okay? He’ll have to do this his way, because he is an adult in the wizarding world and you have your own battles to fight, right here.”

She pointed at Teddy, still in Tonks’ arms.

“Is that the last bottle of milk?” Tonks asked.

Andromeda looked at him and nodded.

“I’ll plumb more later.”

“Are you sure you want to continue doing this?” Remus asked him, not for the first time. “Doesn’t it make you dysphoric?”

“Not necessarily, only sometimes, when I’m not feeling quite so fem.” Tonks explained. “I want to do this for him, though, let me do this for him."

Remus nodded and, after apparently making up his mind about something, looked at the outside window and casted a patronus.

Sirius' dog form, Padfoot, came out of it. Tonks' patronus had turned into Padfoot for a while, after his death, after he died and she failed to stop it. She could have, she revisited each and every second of it, in her mind, she felt so guilty, Hanika was killed because of her, and then she got Sirius killed too! Would everyone she loved pay for their relationship with Tonks with their own lives? Maybe she should disappear, start a new life somewhere away from everything and everyone, protect the people she loved with her absence…. And it was with this set of mind that her patronus turned into Padfoot.

"Ha! That's mine too!" Remus joked when he saw it, after Dumbledore’s death. 

"Yeah, I think Harry assumed he must have been wrong and it was your wolf all this time, since we are so in love or whatever."

The werewolf had smiled, in a nostalgic and somewhat sad way, that hadn't made Tonks feel  any better.

"That was Sirius'," he'd confessed, "it was always like that, from the moment we learnt how to cast a patronus. His was Moony and mine is Padfoot, always will be."

"You really are soulmates, huh?" Are, because Tonks hated to act as if Sirius was gone forever, as if there was nothing else and he'd just disintegrated inside that veil of death or whatever the fuck.

Remus chuckled.

"I don't believe in soulmates," he corrected them, "I believe in people, flawed people working things out. Sirius had his own theory, you know? He said he'd gotten Moony because I didn't appreciate him enough, that he did, that because I loved Padfoot and Padfoot loved Moony, this way, I would have to learn how to love Moony too."

"He will go, my own version of Padfoot, he will part when I let the real one do the same," Tonks had understood back then, after listening to Remus, consequently promising so to him. "I have to forgive myself, for not noticing he was fighting my aunt, for not seeing, for not helping… And then he will leave."

And Tonks had been right, he had produced his usual patronus soon after that, and Padfoot had only ever appeared when he was called by Remus’ wand, as bright as ever.

Tonks saw, at that moment, back in his childhood home with his newborn nephew in his arms, how Padfoot returned to them once again.

"Padfoot," Remus spoke to the patronus, "I have a message for Bill: Keep me updated on Harry, Hermione and your brother, if you have any news on them, that is, we think they are breaking into Bellatrix’s vault at Gringotts and made some sort of promise to the goblin they don't plan on ever fulfilling. If—, if something happens, if he needs us, if the Order calls us into battle, wait for me, I would apparate at the cottage and we'd go together, I would be there, no matter what."

The patronus didn't leave, why wouldn't he leave?

"Padfoot, go." Remus croaked.

"Is this supposed to happen?" Tonks whispered, and saw their mum  shake her head in response.

"Pads… Please ."

The grim-looking, black dog approached Tonks, who only needed a moment to understand his true motive wasn't them, that who he was in reality after was none other than the sleeping baby in their arms. Teddy, Remus and Sirius' son. Tonks kneeled, carefully, trying not to wake their nephew up, and, to everyone's surprise, the patronus with the shape of Padfoot bowed to Teddy. He did so for a prolonged period of time until, finally, he left.

"Rarely, very rarely," Andromeda would explain eventually, while they were waiting for an update on Harry, "in situations like this one, a patronus can act like a portrait, and yours, Remus, is a representation of Sirius' soul."

"It's not him," Remus snapped.

"No, I never said it was," Tonk's mum reaffirmed herself, "but he is an accurate representation, this tells us Sirius, from wherever he is, recognises Teddy as his son."

Hours, many hours later, they got word that Harry was alive.

“Gringotts is in complete chaos,” Bill’s patronus told them, “they did not catch them, in fact, they are saying they escaped on a dragon !”

Tonks and their mum cheered so loudly Teddy woke up. Not Remus, though: Remus didn’t cheer or celebrate, instead, he groaned and pulled his own hair in frustration.

“A dragon!” He lamented. “A dragon!”

He then proceeded to look at the sky outside and point at it.

“This is your fault James!” He said. “You and your fucking genes!”

“I’m sure James and Sirius are delighted to hear the news.” Andromeda affirmed, deadpanned.

Remus smiled, only a little, and took a crying Teddy from Tonks’ arms.

“‘Delighted’ is an understatement,” he admitted, rocking his son back and forth as he did. “Most of the time I think Harry is all Lily, inside, they are so very similar, their personalities are uncannily similar, and then he pulls shit like this. That is not to say Harry is not Harry, he is his own person, my love of him does not depend on how different he is from his parents, but we all take after our folks in some ways, even when… Even when we don’t even remember them or never met them.”

He looked at Teddy as he said this, and Tonks did not need to know the werewolf as well as he did to guess what was going through his mind.

“He will remember you, he will be raised by you” he told him, “and he will meet Sirius, they will meet through you, Harry my mum and I, through everyone who loved him.”

“I’m not so sure, lately,” Remus contradicted him, “I feel something will happen and he—, I have so many things I want to say to him and Harry, if it does, I feel like we should prepare, all of us.”

Remus spent the rest of the day locked in his room, tending over Teddy when he needed him, but also keeping himself busy with something else when he didn’t, Tonks would never know what it was. Maybe it was related to what Tonks was doing, though, for all they knew, they might have had the same idea.

Maybe, both of them had written letters. Tonks wrote one to their mum, and another one to Harry—yes, to Harry, because they feared there were things Remus would never tell him, because he wasn’t brave enough, didn’t want to perturb him so many years later or thought it was for the best, whatever the reason may be. If Tonks lived past the war, then they would ensure Remus told him, and if they didn’t… Well, they would tell him themself.

They went into their father's study, for the first time since he died, and found the small memory jars he kept for his dying patients in one of the drawers under his desk. Yes, this would do.

Lastly, Tonks wrote a letter to Teddy, a letter the little boy would hopefully never get to read: if everything went well, it wouldn’t be necessary. They selected and extracted the memories they wanted to show, bottled them and tied them to Harry’s and Teddy’s letters—they decided they’d work just fine for either of them. 

Maybe it was a premonition, even though Tonks did not believe in such things, because the afternoon of the 2nd of May, they were indeed called into battle. It was Kingsley’s patronus who did it, shortly followed by the Weasley twins’.

“Harry is at Hogwarts,” they all said, “you-know-who and their followers are coming.”

Tonks grabbed their wand, stepped forwards and met Remus’ begging stare. The werewolf had been cuddling Teddy and murmuring something Tonks had difficulty to hear.

“I’m so sorry, please forgive me, I’m so, so sorry.”  He was saying on and on. “It’s so that you can have a better life, a good life. What good would it be if I stayed here, Harry was killed and they won? This is the only way, please forgive me, don’t hate me, I’m so sorry.”

It was right after that that he met Tonks’ eyes. 

“No,” they warned him, “I’m fighting, I’m part of the Order, I’m going with you.”

“You are one month postpartum.” Their mum tried to intervene, without much luck.

“I’m a valuable asset, I’m going.” Tonks insisted.

Remus put Teddy in their arms. 

“ Please. ”

Tonks looked at Teddy, and the baby cooed.

“Shit.” They cursed.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

“Just… go.” They asked him. “Promise us you’ll be careful and go.”

“I will, I don’t want to die, not anymore.” Remus said. “I felt indifference towards living for a long time, I did when I was a kid, before meeting Prongs and Pads and… and Wormtail, I did again in Halloween 1981 and when Sirius died, but I want to live so badly now, I promise, if… If it happens, it won’t be out of recklessness, I care , I care so fucking much Tonks.”

Tonks squeezed Remus’ shoulder, saw him hug her mother, and let him go.

“If the worst happens,” he said before he apparated to the cottage, just like he had agreed on beforehand with Bill and Fleur, “I’ve left some letters and memories in the first drawer of my bedside table. I’ll never be able to thank you enough, Andromeda, for letting me stay here and everything, just… Take care of Teddy, make sure he knows he was loved and wanted, and who his parents were.”

Tonks lasted two whole hours, rocking Teddy back and forth even though he was already asleep, before giving up. 

“You are going, aren’t you?” Guessed Andromeda.

“I’m… I’m an Auror, it’s my job,” Tonks justified themself, “if I don’t go, who will? The muggleborns ripped out of their magic, fighting to stay alive out there? Regular witches and wizards who have not duelled one another to death in their lives? Most people don’t join wars, mum, and I belong to the minority who does. There are teens and young adults fighting on both sides as we speak, Harry is fighting, and it’s people like me who are supposed to go and protect all of you.”

They kissed Teddy on the forehead and gave him to their mum. 

“Be safe, baby boy.” They whispered. 

And off they went, ready to fight a war.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Dear Harry,

Wow, I’ve always had a flair for dramatics, but this is next level!

Anyways, I’ll get to it:

If you are reading this, that means I kicked the bucket. 

(Pfff! That sounded way cooler in the movies, for some reason, I don’t know what I’ve done wrong).

There are a lot of things you don’t know, Harry, and I’m aware Remus left you a letter of your own (if you haven’t gotten it, ask my mum! She was supposed to make sure that you did!), just like he left Teddy another one, for when he is old enough. I know you Harry, much less than I would have liked, but I still do, and I know Remus, which is why I’m afraid he will let you live in a lie just because it sounds prettier than the truth.

I don’t want that, I need you to know who Remus is, at heart, who I am (was? Blimey, this is weird!), and how much he cares for you. Hermione will probably tell you what she can if Remus refuses, but she doesn’t know everything and that’s what made me do this. Before you see the memories, please promise me (or my memory, I guess?) that you won’t be angry at us, for keeping things from you. You can’t, nobody with a heart like yours would deny someone’s last wish (ha!). 

Seriously, be angry if you must, shout, destroy things and curse at the sky. Just make sure Teddy knows who I was, who his parents were and why they can’t be with him. Hopefully Remus is there with you and this won’t be necessary, but, if he is not, I’m afraid my mum will try to hide the truth from you and Teddy (it would be so cool if you read him my letter and showed him the memories someday).

There is one more thing, Harry, just one more thing: don’t you dare to blame yourself, okay? It is not your fault, and yes, I know you don’t want to hear this, but you will turn eighteen in two months, you are still a kid, the law be damned. I know I was one, even though I never felt like one at the time, and I would have cursed everyone’s bollocks for calling me such a thing. Now I look back and I realise I needed the adults in my life, more than I would have ever cared to admit.

I didn’t die for you, Harry, and I’m sorry if me saying this hurts you, but it’s the truth, I’m not fighting for you alone and, if I perish, it won’t be for you alone, and much less because of you. I fight for a world in which people like me (or rather, if my suspicions are correct, people like us ) won’t be persecuted. For a world where muggleborns are equals and we are not divided into categories depending on our blood status. I fight for survival, Harry, just like you do, and I don’t know if it will be you who will kill Voldemort, I hope it isn’t, I hope you are finally treated like the teen you are, instead of as a soldier, but if it is, remember prophecies are just that, prophecies, and Voldemort existed way before Harry Potter did. I thank you, if that’s what happened, and leave you with the hope that you will only have to deal with grief (which is no small thing), and not with guilt. Because as someone who was once destroyed by both, I can affirm we all eventually learn to live with the first, but I have yet to see anyone  forever able to bear the second.

Live, Harry, live for me, for Pads and Moony, who wanted the best for you, and for their son, Teddy, who I hope you love like you would a younger brother bound by blood. Don’t take big responsibilities, don’t go immediately into the Aurors and don’t collaborate with the ministry, let yourself heal, let yourself stop fighting. And if… If, by any chance, Voldemort won and you are still alive, go to my house, push forward that big, old wardrobe in my room and take off the loose slab underneath. There is a time turner there, a special one which can take you between one day and two years into the past (there were five of them, some of us were asked to keep them safe the day before the ministry fell). Let Kingsley do it if he is alive or, if you must, take someone with you, don’t go alone unless there is no one else left.

Good luck!

Hoping I’m there with you and you will never get to read this, 

Tonks.

🌈⭐🌙🌑

Harry pushed his own tears away and gasped.

He made the decision even before seeing the memories, with Remus’ own packet left untouched out of fear, sincere dread the last marauder would be gone for good once he opened it.

“They can live,” he breathed, barely a couple of hours after their funerals, “they can still live.”