Rage

October 5, 1971

Sirius nearly fainted when the twins came back. They had dark circles under their eyes. Romulus had three silver strikes along his jaw and down his neck, Remus had four new scars across the bridge of his nose, and a black scab from the right side of his chin and the underside of his jaw. He also had a new notch in his eyebrow, that he somehow pulled off.

“What happened!?” James exclaimed. Both twins winced.

“Please don’t yell,” Remus spoke quietly, a dead look in his eyes. There were no twin amber flames, but a dark, defeated look. There was another thing, he had asked James, didn’t tell him to be quiet. This was scarier than his fury. James seemed to think the same. “Do you two need to lay down?”

“No, obviously not,” Remus replied. Sarcasm, that was a good sign.

“What happened?” Sirius asked softly. Remus gave a small, defeated smile.

“Got jumped. They kicked the shite out of us. They gave me an eyebrow notch though, so I'm not complaining. Took down the three biggest ones, and the smallest one there. Eight on two, I say we did pretty good,” Remus said. Sirius felt relieved, humour was returning back to Remus, and Romulus had a little more colour.

“Put in your septum piercing and you’ll look like a right punk,” James said. He had learnt that humour was a better way to talk to Remus than concern.

“Yeah,” Romulus said, “play dress up.”

“Nac!” Remus backed away from them a look of fake horror and astonishment on his face.

“Do it, or I’ll tell Marlene that you got beaten up,” Romulus said, a slight smirk on his face.

“Why does it have to be Marls?” Peter asked, confused.

“Wait, wait, wait. Does Remus-” 

“Finish that sentence, Black, I dare you,” Remus’s voice had a false politeness to it, a challenge laced in his tone. Sirius decided to take his chances.

“Does Remus have a crush on Marlene!?” He was astonished. How could Remus hide things so well? Then it happened. A blur of black Hogwarts cloak, and he was pinned to the ground. Remus was tapping hard on his head, fast and slightly painful.

“Name 10 candy bars!” he yelled. Sirius was so confused.

“What?”

“I said name 10 candy bars!”

“Oh, um, Chocolate Frogs, Hunydukes best, Steam Hazelnut, Nutter Nuts, Bellowing Banshee, um, um, I can’t think of anything! Stop it!” he yelled, to no avail. 

“Six more! Six more candy bars! Do you know any muggle ones?” Remus had a shit-eating grin on his face. He remembered something. He was on a walk and he saw a wrapper with MARS on it.

“Oh! Um, MARS bar, and I think Almond joy!”

“Four more!” he began to hir Sirius harder, he was starting to get a headache.

“Exploding Bon Bons, Fizzing Whizzbees Chocolate, and Fudge Flies!” 

Remus unpinned him, and walked towards his bed, yelling, “I’m taking a nap!”

“You. Are. Such. An. Arse,” Sirius growled.

“You deserved it, du,” Remus called over his shoulder. Sirius scowled, rubbing his forehead. James was trying to hide a grin. It was better than Romulus, who was laughing so hard there were tears streaming down his face. 

“Night du!” Remus said, then as an afterthought, blew a kiss in Sirius’s direction. It was a joke, but Sirius felt a flutter in his stomach, and heat creeping up his neck.

_

October 6, 1971

He ran hard, gasping for air, not able to catch it. The smell of forest and dew overpowering his nostrils. A branch whacked him in the face. He stopped, holding his nose. He knew he must keep going. He didn’t know why, but he did. He got up and ran.

There was a snapping of brush behind him. Fear spiked though him. He ran harder, but he would need to stop to be able to breathe. He tripped over something, and fell hard, skidding to the ground. He looked for the thing he tripped on.

A black mass on the ground. There was a liquid of some sort around it. He scrambled forward to see what it was. It suddenly moved, and the bloody face of his brother looked at him with dead eyes, mouth agape. 

Remus gasped. A strangled cry escaping his lips. Somehow he knew this was his fault. There was the rustling sound behind him again, and he turned. A huge black form loomed over him, dead, skeletal, leathery hands reached towards his neck, squeezing. 

Remus jerked awake at the hand shaking his shoulder, “Ahh! Off me damnit!” he yelled, confused.

“Hey! Hey, it’s just me,” Sirius’s voice shook him from his panic.

“Wh-what?”

“It’s okay. Just a nightmare. I was awake and I heard you thrashing about, so I came to see what was going on,” he said. His tone was quiet and soothing. Remus felt his fear start to dissipate. “Okay, well if you're alright, I’m gonna head back to bed,” he said with a yawn. Remus felt a touch of disappointment.

“Please stay,” he muttered so quietly that he was sure Sirius hadn’t heard.

“What?”

“I asked you to stay. J-just for a bit,” he murmured, his face going red.

“Yeah, okay.”

“What?”

“I said that I would stay,” Sirius said, a look of amusement on his face.

“Oh, okay,” they sat in silence for a while. Not an awkward silence, a comfortable, content one, that both of them were scared to break.

Finally, Sirius spoke up, “Do you want to talk about it? Your dream. Sometimes it can make you feel better.”

“I don’t want to whinge,” Remus replied. 

“S’not whinging,” Sirius said, with a quirk of an eyebrow.

“Okay, I’ll try. I was running. Running faster than I ever had. I knew I needed to get away from something. I didn’t know why, but I knew I needed to keep going. I couldn’t get a breath, my lunges were on fire. I tripped on something. It was Romulus. He-he was dead. I stopped for too long, and the thing caught up with me. It was like a dead person. Blackened, leathery skin, bones pointing out like hairs,” he said, the nightmare replaying in his head like a movie. He sighed, and rolled over, turning his pillow over to the cold side.

“Hey it’s okay. Sounded tortuous. No wonder you jumped so bad when I woke you,” Sirius was grinning at him. Remus chuckled.

“Thank you,” he said, “for staying.”

“A proper way to thank me would be teaching me to say ‘thank you’ in Welsh,” he said, looking genuinely curious. 

“Diolch,” Remus said.

“Diolch,” Sirius said.

“Swydd da,” Remus replied.

“What does that mean?”

“Good job,” Remus said.

“Oh.” Sirius layed back on Remus’s bed. “Guess I shouldn’t be getting too comfortable.” Though as he said it, he didn’t make any move to get up.

“Remus?”

“Hmm?”

“What happened? I know you didn’t get jumped. I know you went home to see your mum. Was… was it your dad?” Sirius sounded nervous. Remus felt a tinge of irritation. Wouldn’t he like to know…

“No,” he snapped. Sirius flinched, and he instantly felt bad. “Flin,” he muttered.

“What does that mean?”

“Sorry.”

“It’s fine.” They laid in silence for a bit, and Sirius’s breathing evened out, and Remus knew he had fallen asleep. He smiled to himself, and soon fell asleep himself.

_

October 27, 1971

Romulus was with James, Sirius, and Peter, walking to class. He hadn’t known where Remus had slipped off to. He had been doing that lately. He didn’t know when it started, but he had noticed only recently. They were walking to transfiguration, and he heard a manic laugh down the corridor. 

“Well! Little one can’t even stick up for themselves!” He recognised the voice as Bellatrix Black, a sixth year Slytherin with a mean streak longer than the Great Wall of China. 

“Well, Bellatrix, what do we have here? Picking on a firstie? Go fight someone your own sise,” with a small note of panic, he realised that voice as his brother. “Can’t you be insane somewhere else? Say, like, the loon bin? Who let you out in the first place?” His brother knew how to be intelligent. Like yesterday in Potions, he brewed the Draught of Peaceful Sleep by memory. But alas, he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“Ooh, looks like I have double the firsties! Maybe I can tie you up and make you watch me touture this one, then it can be your turn,” Romulus felt the beginnings of anger boil up. He looked at James, who was white faced with terror, Peter was the same. Sirius… Sirius looked as angry as him, actually.

They marched forward, Peter and James bringing up the rear. The scene in front of him could have been worse. There was a small first-year Hufflepuff, he thought his name to be Jake Harpour, but wasn’t sure, trembling with fear, Bellatrix Black, with her usual manic sneer, and his brother, oddly, perfectly calm. He could smell the fear on the Hufflepuff, and it messed with him a little, making him slightly jumpy, but forced it down.

Bellatrix raised her wand, “Pretri-,” 

“Silencio!” Remus shouted, taking her voice. “Expelliarmus.” he had the world's largest shit-eating grin on his face as he caught Bellatrix’s wand. If Bellatrix still had a wand, she would have screamed some filthy curses at Remus.

“Petrificus Totolus!” Sirius had wrapped invisible bounds around Bellatrix.

“Swydd da,” Remus said, looking slightly surprised.

“Um, right, diolch,” Sirius replied. Romulus looked between the two.

“When did you start giving Welsh lessons?” he asked. Remus grinned at him.

“Be quiet. The only thing he knows is how to say yes, no, thank you, good job, and a few colourful curses. And whatever he picked up, I guess,” he said, faking exasperation, though he was clearly amused. Romulus laughed.

“Right well, obscivate,” Bellatrixs’ body seemed to disappear, though he could the the outline. “Locamoter,” using the levitation spell, he put the vague outline that was Bellatrix in a corner, and stuffed his want back in his sleeves. 

“Erm, what are you going to do with her?” Sirius asked.

“Wait for one of the teachers of prefects to find her,” Remus replied.

“Ah.”

And with that, they headed to transfiguration.