Is It Over Now?

The last two weeks of the school year passes in a haze of weed nicked for the Hufflepuffs by the greenhouses, and expensive booze from the Slytherins. The strange group stayed with one another as much as they could as the summer drew close.

Barty, Remus and found out, liked his father about as much as Regulus did; which was a pretty way of saying not at all. The Gryffindor understood then just what held the two snakes together as they tried so desperately to be the perfect sons for people that they all knew would never care. As they each slowly stopped caring as well.

Evan came from a house much like that of the Blacks, but he didn't fit with their views as much as he should have, not when the boy had asked Remus about motorcycles, and had already tried to enlist the Gryffindor's help in stealing one. He had already successfully gotten Pandora's help in figuring out the runes that would be necessary to let it fly similarly to that of the way that a broom does, something that the lion was sure was at the least three kinds of illegal- and was just as sure that he would be helping in. Remus had no doubt in his mind that his already extensive criminal record - both muggle and magical - would be expanding sooner or later, but he couldn't find it in himself to truly mind. Not when he and Regulus were already researching charms to replicate a muggle bike, and were going to ask Dora to help them modify the spell so that it wouldn't break down as fast as most products of spells like the Gemini curse tended to do.

Pandora was probably the tamest of them all in her reasons for the dislike of summer, simply not wanting to be without the others if she could help it. But Remus pitied anyone that had Bellatrix as an in - law, even though the girl said that they never saw much of her or Dora's brother since the wedding. Even less since the pure blood families started having more and more political meetings. Since the war.

Regulus didn't want to go back for the most obvious reasons of them all and Remus couldn't fault him for that, not when Sirius had fled during the Christmas holidays as he did. Not since the Gryffindor boy was sure that Regious had helped Sirius run, leaning the flu powder by the fireplace, though the older Black brother was too full of himself to realize such a thing.

Remus found himself holding onto the others just as tightly as the promise of returning to St. Edmund's loomed over the boy's head. Though the Gryffindor was now one of the oldest boys in the home, summer still meant two months of no magic and being locked away in a room with silver bars on the windows and door as the moon came. It meant two months of breaking into places and stealing smokes, or fighting with the boys that still thought that he was a decent target, and being someone tray he knew James would never be able to look in the eyes if he were to meet him.

So they stayed close to one another.

You could never find one of them without at least one of the others, much to the dismay of the Gryffindors who so clearly did not approve of the unlikely inter house friendship, and the fear of the other Slytherins.

After leaving the Gryffindors outside of the Great Hall, the group made their way down to the dungeons, somewhere that Remus had never liked going to before but liked it then. He liked the music that he could hear coming from the other side of the Slytherin common room door, and liked that as dinner ended the snakes made their way down to the posh room as well and moved the tables out of the way. Alcohol and juice for the younger years were brought out, and Remus watched as the beginnings of a Slytherin party came about.

At the beginning, the lion thought that it would be like the Gryffindor parties: music, drinks, and dancing, but that theory was disproved quickly enough when a dueling lame was created.

"Illegal dueling?" Remus asked, and Regulus looked at the boy in a calm, almost appraising manner.

"You gonna tell on us, Mr. Prefect?" The other boy asked, a sly smile on his lips. 

Remus thought of the anger that he'd been biting at him since he spoke to James that morning, consuming the boy even as his bones ached from the moon. 

"That depends," the werewolf decided, "could I fight too?"

Behind Regulus, Remus saw Barty and Evan grin like devils and knew his answer.

The members of Slytherin house placed bets as the sickly Marauder took his side of the dueling lane. They all knew that the boy was a gifted wizard, no could truly deny they no matter how much of a sour taste it left in the snakes' mouths, but none of them knew just how strong the werewolf's magic was in the days leading up to and following the full moon. They didn't know how much control Remus held, how much the lion held back.

That night, with anger and adrenaline coursing through the boy's veins like blood, Remus Lupin didn't hold back at all.

Regulus watched every moment of every duel as if he was watching some beautiful masterpiece unfold. Pandora knew that in a way he was.

—-

For the first time in Remus's years at Hogwarts, it wasn't the Marauders that he sat with on the train. This year the infectious laughter wasn't from Sirius and James, but rather Barty and Evan throwing Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans at one another as they tried to get the other to eat the most disgusting ones that they could find. 

The quiet mummerings weren't from Peter and the Ravenclaw girl that he was with - Desdemona - but rather Regulus, Pandora, and Remus himself as the trio poured over some books that Dora had gotten permission to bring home over the summer on the promise that she would pay for any damages found. The group just didn't tell Madam Pince that the project that they were working on was a sort of precursor to the flying motorbike that they had promised to make. She didn't need to know that, and Remus truly doubted that she wanted to. Plausible deniability and all that.

They were each going back to some varying level of hell, but it was fine. They were together for now, at least.

—-

St Edmund's was just as horribly mundane as Remus remembered it being and yet it managed to seem more dreary than it had only the summer before, with the boys whose hair was all cut short like skinheads, and the identical gray clothing that made them all look just alike. After living in a world so drowned in color for the better part of a year, it was always a particular kind of torment to be back here once more. It was like being shown a whole galaxy and then not being allowed to even look at a single star.

It wasn't long before the letters came; apologies tied to the ankles of a familiar bird and promosies that they were still okay tucked in along with them from James. Remus hardly read them at all though. He was sick of apologies that no one meant and empty promises made by a boy that had never known a day without love overflowing around him. 

Looking back on everything with the gift of foresight, the boy knew that the Marauders had been as thick as thieves and as close as brothers since the day that Remus Lupin struck Severus Snape across the face in potion back in their first year. Remus guessed now that he shouldn't  have been surprised as to how all of this had inevitably turned out, the Marauders knew exactly how Black treated his brother- even if Remus had only ever wanted to be more than that.

Remus spent the first two weeks of the summer holiday doing the homework that they had been assigned as the other boys played with a ball out in the yard. No one bothered him in those days, not when the sun was bright and the rain kept to a morning drizzle and little more. He did odd jobs with some of the other older boys at night that had been around for some years now and knew how to not get caught, abstaining from the bigger things that he thought held too great a risk. Remus was already sixteen after all, he didn't need to get nicked by the muggle cops, not with his problem. He didn't know if anyone from the magical world would step in and he didn't want to find out what would happen if they did either.

The boy had already completely prepared himself for one of the most mundane summers that had experienced yet since starting Hogwarts, when one day thay expectation was broken by a loud crack . 

Remus had been walking what was considered to be the grounds of the children's home - only a small chunk of yard and a few trees behind the building - when he'd found a good spot to read through the defense book for the following year that had already been sent to him a few days before. He'd only gotten a few pages in when the world had filled with the thick scent of magic, a kind as familiar as his own and another just slightly more wood - more pure, almost - than either of theirs.

The werewolf was already looking wildly around the small space before the cracking noise had torn through the air, and a pale boy with dark hair and a small creature - a house elf - appeared before him.

" Regulus ?" Remus breathed, a name that fell so freely from the boy's lips Ken would think that it was always meant to be there, because against all odds, that was who was standing before him.

Dark curls fell in front of gray eyes that got lighter as they went closer to the pupil, pale skin flushed by the summer's heat. Remus recognized the younger boy as if he had seen him only the day before, but before either boy could say anything more - or anything at all really - another voice spoke.

"How dare the nasty half - breed speak of Master Regulus so casually!"

Both boys looked at the thin house elf, at the nasty sneer as he stalked towards the older boy, the smell of magic thickening in the air, but Regulus yelled first. 

"Kreacher!" The younger boy screamed, his voice thick with surprise and something like betrayal as he looked between the aging house elf and the Gryffindor. "Remus is my friend , treat him as such."

The house elf's ears drooped in a way that made the older boy wonder if the younger teen had ever spoken to the creature in such a way before. The sad look in each of their eyes was answer enough.

"Of course Master Regulus," Kreacher said softly, slinking away from the two boys. "Kreacher will come and fetch Master Regulus when Master Regulus calls for Kreacher," and with that creature was gone with a loud pop .

Regulus looked at Remus with sorry eyes, an expression that the older boy never wanted to see on the face of the younger teen, but knew that he would more and more as the war pressed on.

"He's not usually like that," Regulus said in lieu of a proper hello, Remus didn't mind, nothing about their friendship was proper in the least.

"It's okay," Remus said carefully, trying hard not to clips his words, though he thought some of the accent must have leached through anyway if the surprise in the other boy's eyes was anything to go by.

"No, it's not."

No, it wasn't , but Remus didn't say that out loud, just as neither boy mentioned how Kreacher had called the Gryffindor a half - breed instead of a half - blood . Remus silently prayed to every god that he didn't believe in, that Regulus had misheard the house elf.

It was then, as Regulus glanced around the pitiful excuse for a yard, that Remus remembered exactly where they were just then, and felt an embarrassed blush creep up his cheeks.

"What are you doing here?" The older boy asked, his voice coming out a bit harder than he thought that it would, the discomfort more evident than he ever wanted it to be. Remus had never wanted anyone else to see this place.

Regulus's eyes turned back to Remus, and - not for the first time - the older boy found himself wondering if the younger could read his mind as Regulus didn't look angered or hurt by the other's tone, though he had every right to be.

"Mother and Father are at the Notts for some political meeting," the younger teen said almost solemnly, "they always are these days."

"So you thought that you'd just fancy coming and paying your favorite Gryffindor a visit?" Remus asked playfully, cheerfully even. A tone that the boy had no doubt would set Kreacher - or any of the other Marauders - into a right fit if they were to hear, though for much different reasons of course.

The younger boy looked away, suddenly finding the tree at Remus's side to be much more interesting than the boy himself, but the older teen could still just barely see the dimple that formed when Regulus smiled just so, and the blush deeping on the other's cheeks from embarrassment.

"You know, I could always just call for Kreacher and leave," the other teen threatened, still not looking Remus in the eyes, but both boys knew that Regulus wouldn't do so.

Remus dared a step closer as an idea came to him, a mischievous smile on the Marauder's lips as he did so. "Tell me, have you ever been to a Muggle town before?"

—-

And that was how the boys spent the days that Regulus visited, skiving off to the muggle town a little ways down the road from St Edmund's until the novelty wore off and they'd seen all that there was to see. But Remus marveled at the younger boy each second that Regulus wasn't looking on those days, as the absolute sight of him looking at everything with such shameless wonder. He'd laughed at the way that the Slytherin had coughed so violently drinking soda for the first time, the fizz buring the boy's unsuspecting throat, and had thought that it was some sort of comic justice for some of the wizarding world sweets that he'd had.

After the adventure of the twin and worn thin, the boys had gone to the old park and sat at the picnic tables (though Remus admittedly sat atop them, much to Regulus's supposed annoyance) with books strewn between them - homework and ones just for pleasure.

Smoke billowed into the air one day as they had gotten to talking, and Remus had laughed so hard that he'd almost begun to cough.

"You've never read Sherlock Holmes? " The older boy asked, twisting to look at Regulus fully, his legs pushed up against the younger boy's side.

" No ," the Slytherin replied snappishly, not liking to not know something that others so clearly did, even if it was muggle. But Remus's smile only deepened, forming into something that was all teeth- wolfish.

Regulus found that he loved it.

"Who was he then?"

And that was how the boys had spent an entire afternoon with Remus telling the story of how he had nicked a copy of some of the Sherlock Holmes books from the Matron, and how Regulus had learned every detail of A Study in Scarlet as if he had read it himself.

He did later that week when Remus had given it to him.

—-

"What are you reading about today?"Remus asked as he finished reading a chapter of next year's Ancient Runes text, new ideas already playing beautifully in the older boy's mind for things that the teen wanted to try.

Regulus grumbled in a way that Remus knew that he only did when the other boy was truly interested in what he was studying that day. Sometimes they would go hours without talking at all on days like this. Remus didn't mind. He watched as the younger teen slowly closed the book, bookmark in place and looked at the Gryffindor with none of the aggravation that the older boy was sure that the teen felt.

"It's a book on wandlore," the younger boy said, his eyes bright. "Interesting stuff really."

But Remus couldn't match the other's enthusiasm. "Wandlore?"

It was Regulus's turn to look confused then, gazing at the older boy as if he'd grown another head in the past few seconds. "You know, 'The wand chooses the wizard, '" the boy's voice got very airy in what Remus assumed was supposed to be an imitation of someone that the older boy should know, but so clearly doesn't, "and all that."

"The wand what ?"Remus asked dumbly, as Regulus looked exasperated- even more so than before.

" Blimey , Rem," the younger teen asked, "how did you get your wand then?" Regulus asked with equal parts genuine confusion and concern.

Remus only shrugged and told himself not to give into the remover rising in his chest as just how much he didn't know, couldn't know because they would involve being allowed into the wizarding world outside of school to do so. 

"It was my father's," is all the boy says instead, surprising the younger as Remus had never spoken of his father before, but Regulus soon tsked once the surprise died down.

"Well that explains why it works so well for you even though it's not yours ," the boy said more to himself than the other teen, but quickly backpedaled at the dark look from the older boy. "I'm not saying that you stole it," Regulus said quickly, though they both know that it wasn't outside of the realm of Remus's capabilities, "but the wand doesn't truly recognize you as the owner. You didn't win it from your father in a duel, or kill him for it, so it still - even after death - belongs to him. That's why almost all wizards are buried with their wands, because they could never truly belong to another," the boy explained.

Remus thought of the way that the wand had always felt just slightly off in the boy's hand, as if it was trying to mimic the magic of another instead of his own- two magics that couldn't be more different in nature, not with the wolf lingering inside of the boy.

"It works well enough," Remus had muttered quietly, taking another drag from his cigarette and wished that it was something stronger. The Gryffindor didn't want to be reminded of yet another way that he fell short of most wizards, of just how much harder he had to work to pull so far ahead so that he might have a chance at a good job after Hogwarts with the laws that made it so damn hard for those with his condition to survive. The laws that his father had created.

But Regulus was an unrelenting, unmovable force when there was something that he wanted and knew that he could have. He was a Slytherin after all.

"Tell me Remus," the other boy stated, his face carefully blank as it so often was, but his eyes so bright that it was almost blinding, "you ever been to Diagon Alley?"

That was how Remus found himself stepping into a dingy bar in London and being led out of the back by an eager Regulus, who drew his wand and tapped on the stones there while looking at the older boy as if waiting for a reaction, but the Gryffindor could already smell the thick scent of magic coming from the other side of the barrier.

He still lit up with a childish wonder though upon seeing the sight that he'd been denied for so long.

Regulus watched as the older boy looked at the alley as if he was gazing at the stars on the clearest of nights instead of a small wizard shopping street. Regulus felt something clench in his chest at the sight and pushed it down just as fast as it had come, instead watching as the older boy's fingers curled at his sides as if he wanted to reach out and grab the magic around him. Knowing Remus as he did, the younger teen had no doubt that if anyone could find a way to do just that, it would be the boy at his side.

Remus let the younger boy take the lead and swoon found himself standing inside of a rundown shop that not even the boys at St Edmund's would think to steal from. There were thousands upon thousands of long, sleeker boxes lining each of the walls and filling every shelf to the absolute brim. The shop was thick with the scent of magic, intoxicatingly so.

"Ah, Regulus Black," a wispy voice that Remus recognized from the Slytherin's immolation of it said, as a man with graying hair and a crazed look in his eyes came into view. The Gryffindor immediately felt on edge around the offer man, but couldn't tell as to why. "Black Walnut and Phoenix Feather, elven and a quarter inch. Flexible," Ollivander said, his eyes looking at the boys but truly seeing neither of them. "Difficult wand to master, but I trust that it's been working well for you?"

Remus watched as the other boy's eyes grew a bit colder before a soft resignation set in once he caught the other teen's questing gaze. "So long as I am not deceiving myself."

"Good. Good," the man muttered before his ghostly gaze turned to Remus. "Mr. Lupin, I was disappointed when I heard that you wouldn't be coming, though I suppose your father's wand had worked well for you these last few years. Ten and a quarter inch, Cypress wood and unicorn hair core. Pliable." The man's gaze tragedy uo and down Remus as if he was reading the boy like a book, then he hummed. "Yes, I can see how that would be a problem now."

Remus had no idea what the wand maker meant by that and didn't have time to ponder it as the man surged forward with a measuring tape in his hand. The Gryffindor thought that he saw Regulus smirk as the younger boy walked over to the. Hair in the corner of the shop, but could only glare at the wall in response.

The measuring tape started to move on its own as its owner began to pull out tens of boxes, the pile growing higher and higher but the moment as the crazed look in the man's silver eyes swelled to dizzying heights. Ollivander snapped the fingers and the measure fell to the ground in an unceremonious heap as the wandmaker gestured the older boy forwards.

Remus stopped before him at the desk and had a wand thrusted into his hand before his legs had even come to a stop. Holding the wand, Remus knew that it wasn't meant for him, he could feel the way that it protested even a hint of the werewolf's magic.

"Definitely not," the wandmaker said quickly and pulled the wand hurriedly out of the boy's hand, with another one at the ready.

They continued on like this for some time, long enough that Remus found himself glancing back at the Slytherin boy, expecting to find him in the thralls of boredom, but instead found the younger teen watching with what could only be described as rapt attention.

'Right ,' Remus thought, 'Reg likes wandlore. This is probably the most interesting thing he's seen all week .'

Remus was right of course, just not for the reasons that he thought.

"How about this one?" Ollivander asked more to himself than anyone else in the room as he pushed the latest wand into the Gryffindor's hand.

Warmth that the boy had never known before spread through Remus almost instantly, a feeling of rightness washing over the boy as he held the wand, as if all of the magic in the world was just one movement away. Remus waved it surely and watched with wonder as silver and gold sparks shimmered like stars through the air, the magic coming to him in a thick swell without so much as an uttered word.

Ollivander clapped, a triumphant smile on the crazed man's face, but Remus only had eyes for the boy that had come to stand next to him, fingers ghosting over the delicately carved wood as their sides pressed so tightly together. The pair smiled quickly at one another and wondered how it could have taken them so long to find their way to one another.

"Beech wood, Dragon Heartstrings, twelve and a quarter inch. Brittle," the wandmaker said as he took the piece back and slid it into the box that it had come from. "Yes, this will work well for you, Mr. Lupin."

Remus reached into his trousers to pull out what little money he had, but was stopped by a sire jingling of heavy coins on the counter. When he looked up, the Gryffindor saw that Regulus had already paid and grabbed the wand box, grinding out of the shop and leaving Remus no choice but to follow.

"How much do I owe you?" The older boy asked once he'd caught up to the younger, it taking a bit of time with his bad hip protesting so much, but the Slytherin only waved him off and pushed the box into the older teen's hands. "Reg-"

"We'll just have Barty teach you how to play cards, then you can wipe those lions clean and pay me with their gold," the younger boy said almost dismissively, but Remus could see the blush rising in the other teen's high cheeks, the embarseed kind that came when one did something nice that they didn't want to speak of.

"Thank you," the lion said quietly, but earnestly.

"You're welcome," the snake replied just the same.

—-

"Do you think that Achilles loved Patroclus?" 

And Remus looked at the boy sitting next to him in the tall grass with surprise in his eyes, because this wasn't something that they were supposed to talk about so openly. Not when everyone acted as if it was sin. But the earnest look in the younger boy's eyes told him that it wasn't some sort of cunning trick to trap the older boy. 

Remus pressed closer to the smaller boy, their knees knocking together as they looked up at the vast night sky, trading a cigarette back and forth with the gentleness of a kiss.

"I think that he did."

Somehow the boy felt as if they weren't talking about the Iliad at all.

—-

Summer soon drew to a close and Remus smiled proudly as Regulus told him that he was made a Prefect, the congratulations falling from his lips just as easily as it had when Dora had written him of her reaching the same thing only a few hours or so before. The Gryffindor couldn't wait for patrols with the other two.

They were laying in a field just beside the old playground, the summer sun shining down on them and tanning Regulus's once pale skin to a comfortable glow that made Remus's heart race each time that he saw the younger boy.

"This will be the last time that I can see you before the school term starts," the Slytherin said as the clouds drifted by with an indolence that Remus felt in his bones, his body resisting movement more and more after each passing moon.

"So that means that I have a well to change my looks as drastically as possible then," Remus said, receiving a glare in return, but the older teen could see an interested glint in that of the younger's gray eyes and tried not to think too much if it as ideas bloomed in the boy's mind of just what he could do.

"Are you going to forgive him?" Regulus asked, his eyes tujeenyo to the sky and far away from the other boy, not that Remus wasn't watching the darkening sky as well, but he still knew that the other feared the answer. Remus knew that Regulus feared that all of this would disappear the second they stepped onto the platform and would go separate ways once more.

Remus feared it too.

"I'll be civil with him," the Gryffindor decided, neither boy having to ask who 'he' was, "maybe even friends, but I don't think that I will ever forgive him."

Regulus nodded, relieved, and Remus was too.

The thing that James didn't seem to unders about what Sirius had done was that if Remus had killed Snape, or even just turned him, Remus would have been out down like some kind of wild animal before anyone even told him what he'd done when he wasn't in control. He would have died a beast and nothing else would have mattered.

No, Remus Lupin wasn't going to forgive Sirius Black.

When both boys stood, they knew that there wouldn't be another summer like this one, not for either of them.

"I'll see you on the train?" Regulus asked, his voice unsure. Just because Remus was with them for two weeks in public at the end of last term, Regulus knew that this didn't mean that the Gryffindor would want to so publicly align himself with the snakes once more. 

"You'll come and find me on the train," Remus said with a finality that he knew the other wouldn't question. "We'll walk to the Prefect's carriage together."

"Alright."

"Right."