two
Remus gave a small smile towards the baby in his arms; he felt a growing attachment and a sense of strange familiarity. Gently, he rocked Harry back and forth edging him into a deep and comforting sleep, a sense of protectiveness growing the longer he held onto the tiny fragile baby.
A quick check towards the clock, had Remus realise the pure look of confusion and horror and his two friends faces. He gave them a smirk and continued out the door towards the great hall. “It’s dinner time boys,” He called to them.
“Should we take him with us?” Remus stopped at the question posed by Sirius. It was obvious that he shouldn’t be left alone or with a random member of staff, especially since he’d fallen asleep as it may scare him to wake up to strangers. But then again, he was 17, what did he know about looking after baby’s? Without a second thought, Remus continued toward the door to leave.
"I say we take him," Remus said, gathering his thoughts quickly, "I don't think it would be a good idea to leave the pup alone with someone he doesn't know," he continued, summoning a tone of logic and authority. "Granted, he may have just appeared in front of us, but at least he's familiar with us. If we just dump him with someone, say Madam Pompfrey, we don't know how he would react; after all he can see Hogwarts, he’s obviously not a muggle so we should try and reduce the risk of accidental magic before he breaks the windows or turns the Slytherins to snakes or something. Come on, I’m bloody starving."
When Remus finished, the two marauders, shrugged their shoulders and followed suit behind Remus towards the Great Hall. Whilst Remus held himself with composure and authority through the corridors inside he had the most horrendous anxiety looming at the pit of his stomach. What if people think I got someone pregnant? Or if- if they think I stole him? Breath. Breath. Breath. Babies can sense fear right? Or is that deer. Fuck. Breath. We’ll just say we’re looking after him for a little while and then immediately talk to Dumbledore. Yeah, that works, we don’t owe anyone an exp-. Remus was abruptly ripped from his anxious through process when Harry stirred, turning his head around and immediately falling back to sleep. That was close.
“Moony?” He turned and was greeted with two of his best friends semi-wrestling for who could speak first, clearly they had been whispering about something on their way towards the hall.
“Yes?” He forced a smile and acted as though any anxieties had simply vanished.
“If you want, I can get the baby,” James held his hands out towards Harry, Remus instinctively gripped slightly tighter than before.
“I’m good mate, why? You can hold if you want it’s just that he’s asleep right now, so I wouldn’t want to disturb him you know?” It slipped out before he even had time to second guess himself.
James looked slightly taken aback, but quickly smoothed over his expression before giving him a smirk.
“Getting protective there Moony?” Sirius could barely get it out for laughing.
Sighing, Remus made sure he had a firm grip on the baby in his left arm and headed towards the large doors of the Great Hall, at a much more relaxed and graceful gait than he was previously holding. It didn’t take long to realise they’d done that purposefully, he was showing his anxiety by the way he held himself, he felt much more like himself after his friends calmed him down.
Remus hesitated slightly before getting a tight grip on the door handle. Giving James and Sirius a quick look before finally heading in, immediately he moved down the long aisle between the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw tables. James and Sirius rushed forward clearly spotting Peter before Remus had even had a chance to look for him. It didn’t take long for him to locate a pale looking Peter, who was hurriedly shovelling food onto his plate not even realising his friends had entered the hall. As soon as he stepped through the doors, he could hear the whisperings, not that they were really whispers, more stag whispers.
"Oh my gosh! Look at the baby; he's so cute!"
"Where did he come from?"
"Why is he with Remus?"
"Do you reckon he's the father?"
“Does Remus have a girlfriend? I thought he was dating Sirius?”
Questions such as these were being spread through the houses like wildfire- even the Slytherins were joining in on the rumourmongering, who were indeed curious as to why there was a baby in the older boy's arms. It didn’t take long for the peaceful chatter to be disturbed.
Taking a seat next to James, who was sitting across from Sirius, he began to serve himself food agilely, trying to avoid moving the sleeping baby in his arms too much. He expertly loaded the food onto his plate without so much as stirring Harry, it was almost as if having a baby sleeping on him was nothing new.
"Wow Moony," James commented after taking a bite of turkey, "you're like a pro at this." Sirius, who had his mouth stuffed with food, nodded in agreement.
It was then Peter had finally looked up from his plate, his mouth falling open dramatically.
“Merlin, Moony,” Peters brows furrowed clearly trying to put together the pieces of who this baby was “I- erm, I didn’t know you,” his voice dropped to a whisper, “had a kid.”
Remus just chuckled before going back to his own food, making sure not to jostle Harry too much.
Dinner passed by amiably, with the Marauders chatting about the classes they were going to be taking this year. It was around dessert when Remus noticed his little cub beginning to wake up.
Smiling gently, Remus said to the sleepy baby, "Well, hello there sleepyhead.”
At first, the rest of the Marauders were confused at what Remus had said, but then they too noticed that the bundle on Remus' shoulder had began to move and stretch.
Harry lifted his head up and gave a big yawn causing the marauders to chuckle.
"Still tired are we?” he said amusedly. "Are you hungry?"
The baby quickly woke up and squealed, Remus instinctively turned him around and sat him on his lap so he was now looking at the table in front of him. His mouth dribbled, cueing James to hand Remus a napkin tucking it into Harry’s top to try and protect his clothing somewhat.
"Do you want anything from the table?" Remus asked, seeing the Harry eying up certain foods on the packed table.
The baby exclaimed some kind of baby talk causing confused looks on the marauders faces. What on earth are ee-a arrs? Remus was deep in thought trying to decipher the sounds when he noticed Harry pointing to the plate of treacle tarts that were in front of James. Bemusedly, Remus took one from the plate in front of James, said person looking incredibly sad over the single tart despite a large plate still sitting right in front of him.
"Here you go, cub," Remus said, handing the child the treacle tart, unaware of the fact he had called the boy 'cub'. James aggressively kick Sirius under the table and pointed with his eyes to Remus causing the yelp from Sirius to stop midway through. They both made little snickers before continuing on eating.
Munching on the tart happily, the baby swallowed the bite in his mouth, and Remus gave him a goblet filled with pumpkin juice, unfortunately the elves didn’t generally give jugs of milk unless it was breakfast for their cereal so hopefully he would be fine without it.
Satisfied, Remus watched as the baby went for some of the other desserts on the table, such as the large wobbling jelly that barely anyone had touched, which he had somehow eaten a questionably large amount of, slices of fruit- cantaloupe, apples- and had even taken more of the treacle tarts, much to the dismay of one James Potter.
When it seemed that the baby had had his fill- he was leaning against Remus' chest contentedly about to slip into a food coma, when Remus started to ask questions causing him to jolt awake.
"Well, now that you're nice and full, do you think you can tell me your name?" Remus asked in a gentle voice, not wanting to scare him too much than he already had. Seeing a look of confusion and slight distrust- which gave Remus a pang in his heart for some reason- he introduced himself. "I'm Moony," Remus said, pointing to himself.
"Awwy," The baby garbled out. The Marauders all looked puzzled. Awwy… Awwy… what on earth did he mean?
“Harry, isn’t it? Just ignore these lot, they’ll never understand you” Harry rapidly looked over and nodded his head excitedly to the dark haired, pale girl with a great big grin on her face. She almost looked like Neville.
"Well Harry, its very nice to meet you," Remus said, regaining the attention of Harry. Harry giggled, Remus gently grabbed ahold of Harry’s hand and shook it.
From either sides of the table, Remus could hear the girls cooing and squealing in delight over how cute Harry was.
"Hey! Aren't you going to introduce us Moony?" Sirius asked, a pout forming on his face.
“Well, what about myself Remus? Don’t I deserve to be introduced considering I figured out his name?” The mystery girl said smirking.
“Ah well of course, Harry this is Alice, she’s really nice,” Alice smiled towards him and Harry felt his heart break. If he had been able to speak properly he would have told her right then and there not to worry about Neville, that he becomes the most brave and kind Gryffindor there is and that he is loved by his friends and family. Tell her, that she did such a good job as his mother, tell her Neville will always love and protect her.
"I don't know about you two," Remus said with a mischievous glint in his eyes. "I'm not sure you two would be responsible enough to know him. You are far too immature."
"I resent that!" James cried indignantly, a look of outrage on his face. "Don't compare me to him!"
"Oi! That's totally uncool Moony. Come on!" Sirius whined, the pet lip growing larger.
"Hmm," Remus said, looking as though he were in thought. He turned to Harry. "What do you think Harry? Should they get to know you?” he stage whispered.
Harry put on a pensive expression, which made Remus smile. Remus watched as Harry looked suspiciously at the other two marauders, who had hopeful expressions on their faces. After what seemed like a long while, Harry nodded his head to Remus, who grinned happily.
"Great!" He exclaimed, turning Harry in his lap so he could get a better view of both Marauders. "Right then. Harry, the boy with the birds nest for hair is James." Alice snorted before pulling back her composure and continuing the conversation she was having with the girls to the other side of her.
"Hey ya kiddo," James said with a smile, sticking his tongue out at Remus for the hair comment, "I'm James, but you can call me Prongs if you prefer." A small grin on Harry's part assured Remus that he was fine with James, so he moved on to Sirius next.
"And this," Remus gestured to Sirius, who was bouncing in his seat excitedly, "is Sirius. Although you'll never catch him being that."
Sirius rolled his eyes at the lame joke produced by Remus, but introduced himself to Harry.
"Hey there pup, I'm Sirius," A grin appeared on his face and his eyes lit up when Harry smiled at him.
Finally, Remus swivelled him so he was facing Peter. “Harry, this is the final member of the Marauders- Peter, he’s a little shy but I’m sure he’ll warm up to you in no time,” Remus grinned at Peter trying to encourage him to introduce himself.
“Erm-“ he cleared his throat, “Yeah, I’m Pete, oh er, Peter, but you could call me Wormtail too,” he squeaked out. Harry put on a fake smile before quickly shuffling himself to face Sirius and James once again.
Harry was enjoying himself; ever since Sirius had died, he and Remus had become closer. He was happy to see his surrogate Uncle much healthier than he had been in the future. Plus, he was able to see what his father was like, and Sirius also, he had such little time to truly get to know what his god father was actually like.
He was amused by the antics of the three marauders, and occasionally Peter joining in, enjoying the attention they gave him. Normally, he wouldn't want the attention he was getting from anyone, sick of the spotlight he had received as the Boy-Who-Lived. But, this was different; he was getting attention from the people he had wanted to be with most in the world. Currently, he couldn't remember any other time where he had been happier than this- there just wasn't.
Being introduced to the Sirius and James the way he had, had made Harry laugh inwardly. Now, while he didn't know his father at all, he did know Sirius, and the way he had acted then was pretty much the same way as in the future- albeit younger and not slightly insane from the years in Azkaban but from what he knew of Sirius he was virtually a carbon copy behaviour wise.
Now, listening to them talk, he was content; he even laughed inwardly when Sirius said he would be the next marauder once again, he seemed set on the idea of having a marauder protégé.
“Moony, you don’t think he could be a marauder do you?” Sirius was bouncing up and down on his seat.
"Oh stop that Sirius; he shouldn't be involved so young," Remus scolded once again, the only marauder with a head on his shoulders after all.
"I swear Remus is the only one with any sense between you lot." A voice came in, and the group of Marauders- and Harry- looked over towards the new voice. The voice seemed to come from a girl the other side of James causing him to miss he throughout the evening. Harry looked over to the source of the new and incredibly soothing female voice. Said owner had beautiful auburn hair that gracefully fell over her shoulders to half-way down her back. But what got him was her eyes; striking green eyes said to look like emeralds, like his eyes. And Harry realised with a whirlwind of emotions who this girl was.
This girl was Lily Evans, his mother.