Chapter Eleven
September passed, and Harry began to suspect that Ron and Hermione were having conversations without, and about him. Several times they stopped talking abruptly when Harry entered the tent, and twice he accidentally caught them huddled a little distance away, heads together and talking fast; both times they fell silent when they realized he was approaching them and hastened to appear busy collecting wood or water.
Ron was making no effort to hide his bad mood, and Harry was starting to fear that Hermione too was disappointed by his poor leadership. Even the news from Sirius and Remus could not buoy his confidence.
Two of Remus’ pack members accepted the offer to stay at Headquarters. The other three pack members opted to remain in hiding until the Full Moons, uncertain and shy as they were around Witches and Wizards.
Ayala was nearing thirty and petite, with fox-red hair and a pointed chin. One of her bright, watchful blue eyes was slashed over, leaving her partly blind, but the other eye never seemed to stop moving, scanning the room’s corners and shadows. She was too thin—her collarbones jutted out like the bones of a frail bird—but she ate like mad whenever Remus placed a plate of food in front of her. She had immigrated as a child to Britain from Norway, and still spoke in the clipped accent of her parents, and did so bluntly. She was skittish, but not shy.
“This kitchen is depressing,” she’d said as soon as she entered.
Sirius had barked in appreciative laughter, clapping her on her bony shoulder. She’d hissed too loudly, backing up into the wall. Remus had placed a steadying hand on Sirius’ back, and smiled at Ayala, “So it is. It could do with some light, couldn’t it?”
Diana was also near thirty, but was tall and strongly-built. She had long chocolate brown hair that she always braided in a neat plate. Her manners were impeccable—Walburga and Orion Black would have been well pleased with having her at one of their dinner parties. At least until they would have learned she was a werewolf.
She was quiet, and never strayed far from Ayala. The two women shared one of the guest bedrooms on the third floor, although Sirius and Remus both insisted they consider it their room from now on.
“You’re safe here. And as long as you wish to stay, you are welcome,” Remus had told them.
When the other Order members that frequented Headquarters met the two werewolves, there had been astonished silence.
“What happened to your face?” Ayala had said, breaking the stunned quiet around the table. She was staring at Bill with that still-seeing icy blue eye of her’s.
“Greyback,” Bill answered around a bite of roast, looking up to meet her gaze, “Was he the one that did something similar to your eye?”
Bill had returned from his long mission with the goblins with deflating news. Gringotts had been wrestled from under the goblins control, and was now under the control of the Death Eaters. And yet the goblins still had not picked a side—insisting they were not part of the war—and then they had properly banished Bill. Bill had sadly shared the news a few days prior that many of the goblins had fled, gone into hiding or exile.
Ayala had nodded at Bill and then she’d squared her shoulders, “Greyback’s as good as dead.”
“He’s worse than dead,” Diana had spoken up, dabbing her mouth daintily with a napkin before placing it back in her lap.
There was murmured agreement up and down the table. Fleur gave Diana and Ayala both a slow nod, and Tonks flashed them a winning smile. Even Sturgis looked impressed.
Then Teddy tried to insist he was finished with his supper and was ready for pudding, and so the nightly ritual of Remus coaxing Teddy to finish his vegetables ensued, and that was that.
As the days passed, Sirius found himself gaping at how the two women behaved toward Remus. They hung on his every word, their eyes always flashing to him, deferring to them upon how to act, their bodies always seemed somehow to be angled toward him.
Tonks would never say so to her second-cousin, but the manner in which the two female werewolves seemed to orbit their Alpha reminded her of Sirius, and the way he always looked and acted when Remus was nearby.
But whenever Remus was not in the room, Ayala and Diana leaned on another other. Tonks also noticed this.
A few days after these keen observations, Tonks entered Headquarters and went straight to the kitchen’s pantry. When Sirius and Remus found her an hour later, she was sitting alone at the table staring down at a glass of Firewhiskey.
“What’s happened?” Sirius asked her at once, hurrying forward, wringing his hands.
Remus sat silently down opposite her, his face already one of weary misery.
“Death Eaters were staked outside of my parent’s house last night,” Tonks said, staring down at the amber liquor in her glass.
“Ted and Andy can stay here—” Sirius said immediately.
“My dad vanished this morning,” Tonks said, still not looking up, “We all know the Death Eaters have been increasing their round-ups on Muggle-borns. It was only a matter of time before they came for him. Dad left behind a note for me and Mum. Said he left to protect us, the daft idiot.”
Remus reached a long arm across the table, lightly touching Tonks’ wrist.
“Where’s Andy?” Sirius pressed.
“On her way here,” Tonks said with a sad smile, “Reckon she’d be good company for Ayala and Diana, eh?”
“I reckon so,” Remus said quietly.
When Tonks drained her glass, she didn’t wince.
Autumn rolled over the countryside as Harry, Ron, and Hermione moved through it. Wind and rain added to their troubles, along with the continued isolation and lack of company. The mirror became a too-small window to the outside world—a poor imitation of the comfort of Harry’s family. It rather began to feel as if life was passing them by. Their food supplies dwindled, and Hermione went on long forays into the woods searching for edible fungi. Harry tried his hand at fishing, and felt a sting of sharp pain at the memory of his first and only other time spent fishing—in the attic of 12 Grimmauld Place, on the day before his fifteenth birthday, with Remus and Padfoot.
“There’s bones in it,” Ron huffed, staring moodily down at the grey fish upon his plate one evening in the beginning of October. They were camped out for the night on the edge of a river in Wales.
“Well then you can fish tomorrow,” Harry snapped.
“And I’d like to see you try to charm it into something worth eating,” Hermione scowled.
“My mother can—”
“Shut up!” Harry hissed.
Ron glared menancingly at him, “Shut up about my mother?!”
“Ron—be quiet! I can hear someone!”
Harry was listening hard, his hands raised, warning Ron and Hermione not to talk. Then, over the rush of the river beside them, Harry heard voices again. He looked around at the Sneakoscope; it sat unmoving.
“You cast the Muffliato Charm over us, right?” Harry whispered to Hermione.
She nodded, “I did everything. All the usual. They shouldn’t be able to see or hear us, whoever they are.”
Heavy scuffling and scraping noises, plus the sound of dislodged stones and twigs, told them that several people were clambering down the steep, wooded slope that descended to the narrow river bank where they had pitched the tent. Harry, Ron, and Hermione drew their wands, waiting.
The voices became louder but still the sound of the river made them unintelligible. Hermione Summoned her beaded bag, a moment later withdrawing three Extendable Ears, and threw one each to Harry and Ron, who hastily inserted the ends of the strings to their ears and fed the other ends out of the tent entrance.
There seemed to be four footsteps and there was a male human voice, muttering low under his breath, and then another language that Harry did not recognize. The tongue was rough and deep, sounding akin to a ship’s hull grating over rocks. There seemed to be two speakers, one with a slightly lower, slower voice than the other.
A fire danced into life on the other side of the canvas; large shadows passed between tent and flames. There was the smell of roasting fish and then the clinking sound of cutlery on plates, and a male voice spoke, “Here, Griphook, Gornuk.”
Goblins! Hermione mouthed to Ron and Harry.
“Thank you,” the two goblins said back in English.
“So, you three been on the run how long?” said that same voice. It was mellow and friendly, pleasant and familiar…
Harry sat up with a jolt—Ted Tonks! He mouthed to Ron and Hermione, whose eyes both went wide in shock.
“Six or seven weeks…give or take…” answered another male voice. It was younger, and sounded very tried, but Harry recognized that voice. So many mornings in his Gryffindor dormitory he’d heard Dean Thomas croak as his alarm rang, asking to use the loo before the others, or throwing his pillow onto Seamus’ bed with a moan to “Quit your snoring!”
“I met up with Griphook and Gornuk about two weeks ago,” Dean continued, “What made you leave, Ted?”
“Knew they were coming for me,” Ted Tonks answered Dean Thomas, “One night, Death Eaters appeared outside my wife and I’s safehouse. I knew the jig was up. I refused to register as a Muggle-born on principle, see, but they all know my wife. She’s from one of the oldest pure-blood families in Britain. They wouldn’t give up tracking me down. So, I knew I had to leave. She…she should be okay. She’s got a safer place she can go to. Are you a muggle-born too?”
“Not sure,” Dean answered, “My dad left my mum when I was a kid. I’ve got no proof he was a Wizard, though. I made a run for it—missed the Hogwarts Express and all—but I got caught in Liverpool about two weeks ago. I was halfway to Azkaban before I was able to Stun Dawlish and nicked his broom. I reckon he’s Imperiused…I learned the signs in my fifth year.”
“Good boy,” Ted said quietly.
There was a pause in which the fire crackled and the river rushed on, and then Ted said, “And what of you two, Griphook and Gornuk?”
“We take no sides,” answered the higher-pitched of the goblins, “This is a Wizard’s war.”
“Be that as it may…or may not be…a war among Wizards unfortunately affects us all,” Ted said. His amicable voice sounded harder than Harry had ever heard it.
“Gringotts is no longer under the goblins’ control,” said the deeper voiced goblin. He sounded more upset by this than what Ted had said, “I recognize no Wizarding master.”
“None of us should,” Dean spoke up, “There should be no masters at all.”
The goblin didn’t seem to be listening to Dean, for he was whispering low under his breath to the other goblin, who snickered.
“What’s the joke, Griphook?” Ted asked.
“There are things Wizards don’t recognize,” Griphook answered, “I had my small revenge before I left Gringotts.”
“Good man—I mean goblin,” Ted said, “Didn’t manage to lock up any Death Eater’s in one of those high security vaults, I suppose?”
“If I had, the sword would not have helped him break out,” Griphook answered and Gornuk gave another dry chuckle.
“Dean and I are still missing something here,” Ted said.
“So is Severus Snape, though he does not know it,” Griphook said.
“A sword…” Dean murmured thoughtfully, “I heard from the coin—I mean, a communication device I’ve got from some friends—that some students at Hogwarts tried to steal the Sword of Gryffindor out of Snape’s office, isn’t that right?”
An electric current seemed to surge through Harry; jangling every nerve as he sat rooted to the spot.
“Which students?” Ted asked.
“Ginny Weasley, I know for certain,” Dean answered, “Neville Longbottom, too. She and him and a few others got caught trying to get sword down the staircase, away from Snape’s office.”
“Well, whatever they thought they were going to do with it,” Gornuk said, “Snape sent it down to London on You-Know-Who’s orders to be kept in Gringotts instead.”
The two goblins started chucking again.
“I’m still not seeing the joke,” Ted said.
“It’s a fake,” Griphook rasped, “It is a copy. The original was forged centuries ago by goblins and has certain properties only goblin-made armor possesses. Wherever the genuine sword of Gryffindor is, it is not in a vault in Gringotts Bank.”
“I see,” Ted said, and Harry sensed Ted was smiling as he continued, “And I take it you didn’t bother telling the Death Eater’s this?”
“I saw no reason to trouble them with this information,” Gornuk said smugly, and now Ted and Dean joined in the goblin’s laugher.
And then Ted asked the question that Harry was praying with all his might he would ask, “What happened to Ginny and Neville and the others? The ones who tried to steal the sword?”
Dean answered in a low voice, “Reckon they were punished cruelly. But it’s a point of pride to keep the pure-blood students in well-enough shape at Hogwarts, innit?”
There was another long pause, and when the four vagabonds spoke again, it was to discuss whether they ought to sleep on the bank or retreat up the wooded slop. Deciding the trees would give them better cover, they extinguished their fire, and then clambered back up the way they had come, their voices fading away.
Harry pulled out the two-way mirror at once. Sirius answered, opting to allow Remus to continue to sleep in their bed beside him, as Harry shared the news that Ted Tonks was alive and on the run in Wales with Dean, Griphook, and Gornuk.
As soon as Harry bade goodnight to Sirius, repeating that they were safe, that they had eaten a supper (of sorts) and that they were well-hidden, Hermione reached her hands into her beaded bag and with effort, yanked out the portrait of Phineas Nigellus.
“Obscuro!” Hermione cried as soon as the portrait was removed from her bag.
"What?! How dare—what are you—” Phineas Nigellus snapped as his dark, clever eyes—the same exact ones as his great-great-grandson—were covered in a black blindfold.
Hermione spoke in a stern, clear voice, “Professor Black,” she said, and Harry felt himself jolt, suddenly seeing the image of Sirius in front of a desk in a classroom at Hogwarts. Remus being Professor Lupin seemed part of his nature—intrinsic—but Sirius as ‘Professor Black’??
“…Professor Black,” Hermione said, “could you please tell us, please, when was the las time the sword was removed from its case? Before Ginny and Neville took it?”
Harry and Ron looked at her inquisitively but Hermione paid them no mind.
Phineas snorted beneath his blindfold, “I believe that the last time I saw the sword of Gryffindor leave its case was when Professor Dumbledore used it to break open a ring.”
Harry’s mouth could have hit the floor if it could drop that far.
Hermione whipped around to look at Harry, her eyes wide.
“Did you tell Snape you saw this?” Harry managed to ask.
Phineas frowned deeply, “Professor Snape has more important things to worry about than the many eccentricities of Albus Dumbledore. Good-bye, Potter!”
And with that, Phineas blindly managed to exit the corner of his portrait, leaving nothing behind him but his murky backdrop.
“Harry!” Hermione cried as she stuffed the portrait back into her beaded bag.
“I know!” Harry shouted, and unable to contain himself, he punched the air.
The sword could destroy Horcruxes. And it was not at Gringotts!
“Harry—how could I forget!” Hermione was saying, “The sword is goblin-made! And goblin-made blades imbibe themselves only that which strengthens them—Harry, that sword’s coated with basilisk venom!”
“And Dumbledore didn’t give it to me because he still needed it, he wanted to use it on the locket—”
“And he must have realized they wouldn’t let you have it even if he put it in his will—”
“So, he made a copy—”
“And a put a fake in the glass case—”
“And he left the real one, where?!”
They gazed at each other.
“Think!” Hermione cried, “Think! Where would he have left it?”
“Not at Hogwarts,” Harry said, beginning to pace in a way he knew mirrored Remus.
“Somewhere in Hogsmeade?” Hermione suggested.
“The Shrieking Shack?” Harry said, “Nobody ever goes in there.”
Hermione shook her head, “Snape knows how to get in, remember? From his own fifth year and then coming to the Shack in our third year.”
“Right,” Harry admitted, “So where…what d’you reckon, Ron? Ron?”
Harry looked around, and found Ron was lying in the shadow of the lower bunk, looking stony.
“Oh, remembered me, have you?” Ron said.
“What?”
Ron snorted, “You two carry on. Don’t let me spoil your fun.”
Hermione and Harry shared a perplexed look.
“What’s the problem?” Harry asked.
“Problem? There’s no problem,” Ron said, fingering the chain of the Horcrux around his neck, “Not according to you anyway.”
“Oh, spit it out, will you?” Harry snapped.
Ron swung his legs off the bed and sat up. For the very first time since Harry had known Ron, he looked mean. Utterly unlike himself.
“Alright. Don’t expect me to skip up and down the tent because there’s some other damn thing we’ve got to find. Just add it to the list of stuff you don’t know. That you’re oh-so-bloody-wonderful guardians can’t help us with!”
“Don’t speak of Sirius and Remus like that!” Hermione cried at once.
Plunk, plunk, plunk. Rain was falling harder and heavier upon the tents’ canvas, it pattered on the leaf-strewn river bank around them. Dread doused Harry’s jubilation.
“It’s not like I’m not having the time of my life here,” Ron said, “you know, with nothing to eat now and freezing my backside off every night. I just hoped, you know, after we’d been running around a few weeks, we’d have achieved something.”
“Ron...” Hermione said, but now her voice was so quiet that Ron could pretend not to have heard it over the rain.
“So what part isn’t living up to your expectations?” Harry said, “That adults—even the best of adults, with the best of intentions—can’t help us sometimes? That we’d be finding a Horcrux every other day? That you’d be back to Mummy by Christmas?”
“As if you yourself don’t want to be back to your daddy’s and your little baby brother by Christmas!” Ron shouted and Harry felt a red-hot rage as he’d never felt toward Ron before.
“Ron!” Hermione cried, “Take off the locket!”
The rain was pounding the tent, tears were pouring down Hermione’s face, and Harry felt his heated rage turn into cold-blooded fury.
“Go home then,” Harry said to Ron.
“Yeah? Maybe I will!” Ron shouted, “Heard that about Ginny being cruelly punished, did you, Harry? And don’t puff up that nonsense about dating her for all of two months to say that you care—I’m her bloody brother! It’s my family that’s out there! It’s alright for you Hermione, your parents are safely out of the way—”
Hermione made a wounded noise in the back of her throat.
”And you, Harry—” Ron continued.
“My parents are dead!” Harry bellowed, “And Sirius and Remus are fighting every day—need I mention they’ve faced worse than death to help me, to help us?!”
“CHANGE THE BLOODY RECORD!” Ron roared, “My parents could be dead tomorrow and they haven’t got the experience that Sirius and Remus’ve got! Bill’s mangled—”
“He’s even stronger now—”
“I get it—werewolves are poorly understood, they’re stronger than us!” Ron shouted, “He's still bloody scarred to bits! And Ginny might be a bloody pure-blood at Hogwarts, but Bill’s not my only brother working for the Order, is he?! Fred and George are working undercover, selling their Anti-Dark magic contraband under the Death-Eater-controlled Ministry's nose and Charlie’s working to sway the government in Romania to fight against You-Know-Who—!”
“Then GO!” Harry could not hold himself back any longer, “Go back to them! Pretend you’ve got over your spattergoit and Mummy’ll be able to feed you up and you can take your pure-blood ass back up to Hogwarts—”
"You’re a fucking pure-blood too! As if it means shit to me!” Ron screamed, “And you’ve got your oh-so-special mirror—well it, and the men behind it, don’t mean shit now to me either!”
Blood roared in Harry's ears.
And then Ron made a sudden movement and Harry reacted, and before either wand was clear of the other’s pocket, Hermione had raised her own.
“Protego!”
An invisible shield expanded between her and Harry on one side and Ron on the other. Harry and Ron glowered at one another from either side of the transparent barrier as though seeing each other clearly for the first time. Harry felt a corrosive hatred toward Ron.
Something had broken between them. And among what caused those broken pieces, was Ron's acidic words about Harry’s dearest living family members.
“Never,” Harry said between heavy breaths, “Say another word against Sirius or Remus again. In my presence or not. Now, leave the Horcrux, Ron, and go.”
Ron wrenched the chain from his head and cast the locket into the closest chair. He turned to Hermione, “Are you staying or what?’
“I…” She stared up at him, “Yes. Yes, I’m staying. Ron, we said we’d go with Harry, we said we’d help—”
“I get it. You choose him.”
“Ron—no—please—come back, come back!”
But he’d already stormed out of the tent and out into the rainy night.
Harry stood quite still and silent, listening to Hermione as she ran out after him, listening to her sobs and her voice as she called Ron’s name over and over amongst the trees.
In the many mornings after, Harry adjusted to the sight of Ron’s deserted bunk.
He’s gone, Harry told himself, he’s gone. And he’s not coming back.
More so than this, was the fact that once they moved camp, Ron would never be able to find them again. Not unless he went to Headquarters and begged of Sirius and Remus.
Harry felt for certain that Ron wouldn’t.
Harry delayed sharing the news about Ron's leaving with Sirius and Remus on the mirror, and when he finally did, Harry witnessed the yellow gleam of the wolf pierce through the brown iris’ of Remus’ brown eyes, and saw the storm of grey-and-gold magic shimmer in the air around Remus’ body as his jaw locked.
Harry did not know that to outlet the magic Remus went up to Diana and Ayala’s bedroom, and under a series of Protection and Silencing Charms, he and the two female werewolves shattered china plates and dishes from the Black’s heirloom collection that Sirius offered up from the doorway; Sirius silent and simmering in his own rage.
Later that same night, Sirius and Remus spent themselves with sex under a scorching hot showerhead—so hot it made their skin turn pink—and then, amplified by Remus’ fully-renewed Alpha magic, their joined bodies broke the wooden bedframe and headboard in their bedroom.
Harry knew Molly and Arthur’s wrath would come down upon his guardians and not himself, and felt guilt weigh him down like a boulder.
Harry did not know how Remus and Sirius sent Patronus after Patronus to the Burrow, sending word to Arthur and Molly in their home surrounded by the watchful eyes of the Aurors Imperiused by Death Eaters, of their own guilt upon not keeping a careful eye enough on Ron, of how they would search for their youngest son.
Harry did not know exactly what Sirius and Remus said, but he knew the two men well enough to know what they must have conveyed in the messages that they sent. And Harry knew Molly well enough to know that those messages fell against inconsolable worry; and Harry knew Arthur well enough to know that the man trusted Remus enough (and Sirius, secondly) to know that they had been trying their best…
But Harry had spoken true.
Harry had learned, somehow, somewhere along the way, that even the very best of adults, with the very best of intentions, can fail.
And that he, Harry, could fail his best mate, oh so spectacularly. And his best mate could fail him right back.
And Harry had come to understand that children, grown and not-so-grown, were their own arrows, sent forth upon the world (if they were so lucky) with the best of casting from a bow string. The bow string, if they were so lucky, would be one of love. But it could also, if they were the least of lucky, be a bow of the worst maleficence imaginable.
Yet even so, children are their owns arrows all the same. They will carry themselves forth; no matter the impediments, and often at the behest of their influencers. None but the arrow will say what caused them to hit which target. Sometimes the bow matters, sometimes not. Who is to say when and why it does.
Hermione cried a lot. She cried as she sat alone, keeping guard outside the tent while Harry cooked, and as she slept, when she thought Harry was asleep.
She knew she was vulnerable to the keel of her emotions, and chaffed against it.
Don’t be such a girl, she’d tell herself, and then later, butdon’t be so cold…
She’d always turned to her studies, to the warm cocoon of the library, to the soothing sound of her quill scribbling fast over parchment, as a salve with which to keep her emotions at bay. But there was none of that now. There was nothing new to investigate, even amongst the books she had brought. She’d read them cover to cover three times each by now. And none could tell her where the real sword of Gryffindor was.
None of them could comfort her against the fact that she was alone now, except for Harry and his two-way mirror, which revealed Sirius and Remus in the depths of a war that she and Harry were not apart of; which they were actively running from. They were on a side-quest that seemed doomed. That seemed already lost before it had really begun.
There was nothing to comfort her from the fact that Ron had left them. Had left her. Even after all they had been through.
All that she had was the knowledge of her parents' safety. She envisioned them on a sunny beach outside of Sydney, drinking cocktails with their feet in the sand, and without a worry in the world...
At night, when her and Harry ate their meager supper in sullen silence, Hermione tapped her wand to the radio Remus had gifted to Harry for his seventeenth birthday, and that she had so meticulously packed in her beaded bag (not that Harry had thought to thank her for it), and so she tapped her wand against the radio again and again until she found a song she liked. One that did not carry away her pain, but mirrored how she felt.
One that sang in the voice of a woman. A woman that sounded like her. And that said the words she wished to scream out into the night around their tent.
Sometimes I wonder if I’m ever gonna make it home again
It’s so far and out of sight.
I really need someone to talk to
And nobody else knows how to comfort me tonight.
Snow is cold, rain is wet,
Chills my soul right to the marrow,
I won’t be happy ‘til I see you alone again,
‘Til I’m home again and feeling right.
Harry did not know how to comfort Hermione.
They did not discuss Ron in the days that passed.
Harry began to pull out the Marauder’s Map, wondering how he could have ever forgotten to look at it knowing Ginny was in the castle.
Harry was waiting for the moment that he would see Ron’s labeled dot appear in the corridors—so that he could rejoice, and pull out the two-way mirror and share good news—but also so that the most vengeful part of him could confirm that Ron had returned to the comfortable castle, shielded by his pure-blood, no matter how much Ron claimed not to give a shit about blood status.
But Ron did not appear on the Map, and instead Harry found himself taking the Map out simply so he could stare at Ginny’s name in the girls’ dormitory.
Harry soon came to the realization that he did not know who he was angrier at—Ron or Dumbledore. Harry had not the faintest idea where would Dumbledore have hidden the sword. Dumbledore had left Harry with virtually nothing.
The weather grew colder and colder.
Padfoot joined Remus’ pack for the Full Moons of October 15th , November 16th , and December 17th. He recognized Ayala without having to watch first-hand her body contort and transform by her wolf’s scrawny body, her slashed right eye and her tawny-pelt. Padfoot knew Diana's wolf by her dark brown fur and muscular build, her imperious stance. The other three pack members that chose not to live at 12 Grimmauld were all male—one had an off-white coat, another had jet-black short fur, and the last was older, in his fifties, with a haggard pelt of weak grey.
Moony pressed his muzzle against Padfoot’s flank, pushing him to stand at his side. And to Padfoot's utter shock and awe, the pack bowed to Padfoot as it bowed to Moony.
In that first dawn as a pack after the October Full Moon, Sirius murmured wickedly to Remus, “Who is standing in whose shadow now?”
Moony smiled, lifting a tremoring hand to cup Sirius’ cheek, whispering in that wry voice of his Marauder youth, “What does it matter, if we are both one of the twins that helps establish a Golden Age?”
Sirius kissed him fiercely, and later that night, Sirius cast the Silencing Charm before they broke their bedframe once more.
And so, each Full Moon, the pack hunted and spared with one another, building their strength, and they searched, searched, and searched. But they did not find Greyback.
Remus never said so to Harry, but his own resolve to find and kill Greyback was becoming as bleak as Harry’s quest for Horcruxes.
It was December 22nd and Harry stared at the Christmas trees shining in the sitting room windows of the houses in the small coastal Scottish town of Oban in which he had ventured in under the Invisibility Cloak. He’d just left a supermarket, tucking pears and cartons of spaghetti under the Cloak before secretly depositing cash in the till. It had been ages since Harry had handled Muggle currency—British pounds, that is. Now he stood at the end of the pavement; where the lane ended and the forest began, and he turned away from the Christmas trees twinkling in the windows of the homes around him, and looked out toward the harbor of Oban.
Beyond the stone homes, the harbor waters, fed by the North Sea, winked black with night, the soft waves only discernible due to the weak rays shining from the lighthouse at the end of the cove.
Something was staring at Harry. Even under the Invisibility Cloak, it was staring at him. But Harry felt not a shiver of fear, but a small breath of warmth; like a kindred spirit.
Harry stared at the black water, and the lighthouse’s white light turned its circle over the small harbor, and there Harry saw the smooth, grey-mottled head of a seal, its enormous black eyes were staring right at him.
If Remus had been there, he would have told Harry of Hope Lupin’s love of selkies. Of her belief that they really existed; that a selkie was a wild woman that lived within the body of a seal, that thus swam free beneath the ocean’s cobalt, cold waves, and was only brought to shore through the stealing of her coat by a man who hungered for her. The man then kept the selkie ashore for his own pleasure, and therefore hid her coat, and her path to freedom, tightly locked in a safe.
But Harry had never known Hope, and he had not heard all of the many stories she had imparted to Remus. Those stories of her's could have housed their own book. Their own collection, rather. Such is the way, often, with quieted and contained women.
Harry had not been a child raised by Remus. He did not know that Remus had already shared the stories of selkies told to him by his mother to his youngest son. To Teddy Black Lupin. That, surely though, was of some consolation to Hope.
And so, Harry stared through the Invisibility Cloak into the eyes of that harbor seal, and found himself transfixed by the knowledge and power looking back at him, inconceivably, through his Cloak of deepest magic. It seemed an Invisibility Cloak was of no matter to a selkie.
When would men stop underestimating women's wild spirit? Asked the Selkie. The boy Wizard did not answer.
Harry Potter had did not know nor fully appreciate, as many before him, the depth and wildness of unharnessed magic in the form of a woman, unbound. Or, for that manner, that of a simple seal. What bravery and cunning a mammal such as a seal must have, to choose to forgo the safety and bounds of dry land, and instead choose to dive into the depths of an unforgiving sea. To choose to adapt, with such predators hungering for its soft flesh, and to live, to fly, within that imponderous realm.
Minutes later, Harry pulled back the tent’s flaps and shed the Invisibility Cloak.
Hermione was sitting in a chair, knees curled up to her chest. She was reading The Tales of Beedle the Bard.
The radio Remus had gifted Harry for his birthday, that Hermione liked to listen to, was playing.
Harry set the Cloak aside, and still felt that odd and wonderful chill of those oceanic eyes on him—mysterious and otherworldly. And kind. And knowing. He did not know why, but those eyes reminded him of Ginny. And of Hermione, too.
And somehow…those eyes also seemed to harken back to that most ancient of wilderness that beats inside all children. The one that says, Don't fret, my little one. Mother Earth will call you home.
The radio issued static and then the song changed. The song jolted Harry, made his heart beat like a drum in time with the music.
“Hermione?”
She looked up. Her eyes were puffy from lack of sleep and nights spent crying. It was cold, and she was bundled up in an oversized wholly sweater and knit stockings.
Harry stepped forward and extended out his hand.
Pass me that lovely little gun
My dear, my darling one
The cleaners are coming one by one
You don’t even want to let them start
Hermione looked up in uncertainty, but Harry nodded, and so, she took his hand. He pulled her into standing, and in the way that Sirius had taught him through the mirror in his fourth year, Harry pulled Hermione gently into a dance.
They’re knocking upon your door
They measure the room, they know the score
They’re mopping up the butcher’s floor
Of your broken little hearts
Harry spun her, and he saw Hermione’s tear-stained smile grace her cheeks as the singer crooned—
Children...
Hermione spun back into his arms, and then leaned her head back, and Harry did the same.
In a bedroom in a hidden house in Islington, London, two men were waltzing to that same radio’s frequency.
Remus Lupin had bought a replica of the same radio he’d gotten for Harry, and magically connected the two radios, so that he could always hear what Harry’s radio was broadcasting. And now the song carried as he held Sirius' hand, pressed his waist to his, and met those dark eyes—
Forgive us now for what we’ve done,
It started out as a bit of fun
Here, take these before we run away
The keys to the gulag...
Hermione and Harry spun, their hands holding tight as they danced.
And Sirius and Remus swayed in a small circle, their foreheads pressed tightly together.
In a bedroom nearby to the two waltzing men, the child named Teddy slept on, dreaming of seals, their agile bodies swimming in smooth arches beneath calm waters.
O children...
Lift up your voice, lift up your voice
Children...
Rejoice, rejoice
Hey little train, wait for me
Once was blind but now I see...