Gibbous Eyes

by Notawriter_17

Summary:

This is a retelling of Remus Lupin's life, where he runs away from home before he can go to Hogwarts. His pack looks a little different, but he still manages to find his Marauders. Remus is healed by his own kind and accepted by three young wizards.

Notes:

Should I be starting another fic rn? No. Can I escape the lovely feels this idea gives me? Also no.

Chapter 1: The Bite

Remus woke up as soon as the window pane broke, scattering glass onto the carpet.

The loud smash followed by a blast of cold air and then there was a monster standing over his bed. In half a second. It moved like a shadow. It moved like a predator.

His parents had once told him he was a light sleeper. It was a trait neither of them had passed down.

So neither of them were coming to save him. Not in time.

Remus still screamed. Still cried for his Mum, asleep down the hall.

The monster grinned at the high-pitched shriek of the child in front of him. He struggled to suppress his bloodlust, as it was a specific message he intended to deliver.

Remus, tangled in the sheets on his bed, scrambled towards the top of his mattress, trying to wake up from what he was sure was a nightmare.

The monster wasted no time, stalking around the bed and grabbing the young boy by the arm.

He wanted to taste the boy's tears. Wanted to watch him shake like a leaf a little while longer. Draw out the anticipation. Relish in the terror.

Instead, he bared his teeth, growling and pulling the boy's wrist to his mouth. 

Fangs tore into Remus’s flesh and he knew he wasn’t dreaming. The pain ripped through him and he screamed again, louder. Loud enough that his father finally heard him. Knew something was wrong.

The damage was done. The monster’s task achieved. 

The monster’s glowing eyes turned back as he climbed back through the window, staring at the bleeding boy. For a moment, he thought about taking him with him. His father would be able to surmise what had happened. And he would know that Greyback had turned his son into the very thing he hated most.

No, better to leave him behind for his father to see. 

Footsteps from deeper in the house warn him off, and he goes charging into the woods to satisfy the monster’s need for blood instead.

“Remus!” His father pushes open the door, taking in the monster escaping outside of the broken window first, and then his crying son.

There is blood everywhere. The bedsheets that Hope had bought for Remus, with small music notes against white cotton, are ruined.

Lyall Lupin should run to his son’s aide. Should heal his wound and pull him tight against his chest and whisper calming reassurances in his ear.

But he doesn’t. He freezes, because he knows what has happened.

When his wife appears in the doorway beside him, taking in the same scene as her husband and knowing she has to help, he is forced to hold her back.

Forced to tell his son not to move. 

Forced to use his wand from five feet away, to clear the blood, and illuminate the room enough to see the monster’s message.

A bite, large and deep, spanning his young son’s wrist that changes everything.

For the first time in Remus’s life, he watches the people meant to protect him keep their distance.

Chapter 2: His Birthday

Summary:

Remus turns 11, but he doesn't stick around to read his Hogwarts letter.

When Remus awakens on his eleventh birthday, he can already feel the change in his blood. His entire body feels five degrees warmer, and his senses are heightened more than the day before.

He’s gotten used to it. The lead up to the moon. 

Nausea. Lack of sleep. Anxiety. Fear. Mostly the energy. Like something is trying to get out. 

Which isn’t altogether inaccurate.

The full moon is in two days. 

The wolf knows that. The monster. And it wants out.

When Fenrir Greyback broke into his bedroom seven years ago, Remus knew very little of monsters.

He had imagined slithering figures hiding in his closet, or underneath his bed. Terrors that never held shape because his mind wasn’t capable of imagining their true forms.

Now, all of his nightmares feature one monster.

The same monster that Remus is. A werewolf.

“Remus!” His mum calls from the kitchen.

He wants to stay in bed. It’s a Wednesday. Not that that means anything. He’s not allowed to go to school. 

Mum tutors him. Which is fine, because she gives him more days off than would be allowed if he attended the local primary school.

“Remus,” she calls again.

So he climbs out of bed and ambles downstairs, hoping his father has already left for work.

“Morning Mum,” he says, wiping the exhaustion from his eyes.

“Good morning, my love,” Hope says from in front of the stove. She’s making pancakes. 

His father is sitting at the table, drinking his tea silently. 

Six. That’s Remus’s guess for how many words his Dad says to him today.

“Happy Birthday, love,” Mum sets a plate on the table. Remus smiles and sits down before she has some strange idea like hugging her only child on his birthday.

“Thanks, Mum,” he tucks in, cutting the stack of six pancakes into bite size pieces. He’s always starving this close to the moon. The downside is that the nausea comes so fast, he can’t always keep it all down.

Hope sits beside her son and he can tell without looking up she is staring at Lyall.

“Happy Birthday,” his father says in a monotone.

“Thank you,” he glances at his father. Instantly, he regrets it. 

He doesn’t remember the way his father looked at him before the bite, but he hopes it wasn’t with so much contempt.

  Remus doesn’t think it’s on purpose. Or that his father even realises it is so obvious.

That doesn’t make it sting any less.

“I thought today, we could go for a hike at Maravel Falls,” Mum smiles, eating her pancakes.

“Sure.”

“I’ve got to be going to work,” his Dad stands up. The words don’t count. They are more of an announcement than anything else.

And directed at Mum, not him.

“Surely you have time for presents?”

A long pause nearly has Remus risking another glance up.

Dad sits back down, much to Remus’s surprise.

Mum sets three presents down in front of him. One very small one he can hear ticking. A rather large one that smells like leather. And a third that is shaped like a book.

Remus pushes his plate to the side, picking up the big box first.

It’s wrapped very neatly, with a card signed by Mum from both of them.

“A new pair of hiking boots,” he says, offering a shy smile at both of his parents. Remus really hates hiking. He’s either too close to the moon and his senses get overwhelmed or he’s exhausted from attacking himself during the moon before. His father thought it helped him to commune with nature or something. Soothe the beast within.

“The Falls aren’t very far. Perhaps we could break them in today,” Mum says.

He nods non-committedly and reaches for the smallest package.

Just as he suspected, it's an old time piece. It’s nice, but the gears are loud, grating. 

“It was my Dad’s.” Remus’s father speaks, tone gruff. 

That takes the word count to six. Remus is surprised though, that he would share something so sentimental with him. It was the sort of gift that father’s passed down to sons and so on.

Remus hadn’t felt like Lyall’s son in years.

“Thanks, Dad. It’s great,” he puts it on, knowing he’ll wear it even if it does irritate him. 

Remus would do anything to make his father love him again.

His father only nods.

So Remus reaches for the book and pulls the paper off, smiling genuinely for the first time that day.

It’s a new fiction novel. Muggle. Remus collects books like his body collects scars. 

“Thanks, Mum.”

He knows the book is from her. She was always spending money they didn’t have on books for him.

“I’ll be home late.” His father stands. More words not addressed to him.

Seems like six it is. Remus is getting rather good at the game.

His father kisses his mother on the cheek and then gathers his jacket from the back of the door.

“Be careful,” his father says loudly, and when Remus looks up, their eyes meet.

He thinks maybe his dad will say something else. Something more. 

But he doesn’t. He leaves Remus alone with words that don’t mean anything to him.

His entire existence is about being careful. Not touching anyone. Not leaving the house alone. Being chained up in an underground cellar with a magically warded door and no windows.

The wolf yearned for the moon. When his father shut him in, it was always pitch black. He theorised it would force the wolf to calm. It didn’t. It drove him mad. Remus woke up in the dark, happy not to be able to see what chunks the wolf took out of him that night.

“Darling, finish your breakfast. You’ll need your energy.”

Mum follows Dad down the hall to the front door.

Remus pulls his plate back in front of him but he can’t help listening in on their conversation.

“Did you see the letter? It arrived this morning,” his Mum whispers. They don’t realise quite how good Remus’s hearing is.

“I don’t understand how he intends to handle it,” his father replies, obviously upset. 

Remus is curious to know what letter they are talking about.

“He promised it would be perfectly safe,” his mother sounds desperate. 

He who?

“Safe for who? For Remus? He’s dangerous, Hope.”

“Lyle, this is something Remus needs. Something we were always going to have to do. He might even be better off there.”

Hope Lupin always acts as the voice of reason. 

Remus always thought it was because she didn’t quite understand what a monster he was. She pulled the wool over her eyes.

Lyle understood how dangerous his son was. That’s why he’d bought chains for the cellar. Why he’d stayed awake each full moon like a sentry, just outside the door to Remus’s cage. Why he never patted him on the shoulder or embraced him.

“And what if he kills someone, Hope?”

Remus’s blood rushes to his ears, his heart thundering. He drops his fork and stands up, ignoring the end of his parent’s discussion.

Instead, he heads upstairs.

They are talking about sending him away.

He won’t go. If they no longer want him, he won’t just let them pawn him off on someone else.

Reason escapes him as he stalks around his room, shoving whatever he can into a duffel bag.

“Remus?” His mum calls from downstairs. 

“Getting in a shower, Mum,” he lies.

“Alright, Pet,” she calls back.

Remus cringes. He hates when she calls him that.

Pants. Shirts. Shoes. His old hiking boots. The chains. A book. A second book. It’s when he grabs for a third that he realises it’s a mad plan.

Where is he going to go? How is he going to make sure he doesn’t infect anyone else? How will he survive?

It doesn’t matter. He won’t let them send him away to some new prison.

There is a window in the bathroom. 

He leaves his childhood bedroom without so much as a glance behind him. Turning on the shower, he stares at himself in the mirror over the sink.

He would have to lift onto his toes to see his chest. Remus is small for an eleven-year-old. Even though he doesn’t see a lot of people, he knows the wolf has eaten away at him. He knows that other children have full rosy cheeks. He’d seen them on the telly.

The scars across his face are ugly. He hates them. The ones on his chest and stomach are easier to stand. Easier to avoid. Just cover them with a shirt and pretend they don’t exist. 

He’s out the window in less than a moment.

---

Lyall Lupin is still looking for his son two days later as the full moon rises. He doesn’t find him. And upon morning, part of him gives up ever finding him. Because Lyall knows everything there is to know about werewolves. And his son is a killer now. So he isn’t his son at all.

Chapter 3: Turning Beneath the Moonlight

Summary:

Remus finally experiences a full moon outside under the moonlight.

Freedom. 

The cold mountain air turns the wolf’s snout to the sky.

Miles away, a heartbeat. 

Prey.

Running through the trees, smelling the air and the ground for the first time. 

Tearing into something.  A deer. 

A fox. Small. Needs more.

Sinking his teeth into soft flesh, tasting blood.

His howls echo throughout the mountains, warning the other animals of his presence. 

His paws in the dirt, finally able to open his eyes to the moonlight.

It’s beautiful. It feeds him, almost more than the blood, the meat.

Chapter 4: Struggling to Survive

He wakes up covered in blood. He spends all day wandering the woods, searching for evidence of the wolf’s prey. Sick to his stomach the entire time and praying to a God he doesn’t believe in. One that his mother taught him about in the pale light of their kitchen.

Praying that he hasn’t hurt anyone.

Remus had triple checked that there were no humans travelling the reserve but he was terrified anyways. His father was right to be afraid of the wolf. The chains Remus had taken with him did nothing to hold the wolf.

He’d killed at least two deer.

Probably a rabbit or a squirrel too. But he woke up without any new scars. And he neve doesn’t find any evidence of any human victims. So he tells himself he hasn’t killed anyone. He isn’t a monster. He half believes it.

The next month is the same. Bleeding from his own wounds, he tries to find his prey. To make certain it isn’t human.

---

Remus thought that the full moons would be the hardest part of living on his own. But it is the endless minutes in between. Finding food and shelter and avoiding the police. He ends up spending most of his time in the woods. Turning into something closer to a beast than a boy.

He loses weight he can’t afford to lose. Sleeps less than five hours in a night. He’s barely surviving.

He thinks about going home. In the dead of night, when the forest is loud with birds and bugs and animals. When he is rooting through a waste bin for a bit of breakfast. When he walks through the soles of his old boots.

It just isn’t an option.

He just keeps telling himself that over and over and over.

Going home isn’t an option.

Chapter 5: Finding a Pack

Six months after he leaves his childhood behind, Remus catches a break.

He wakes up in the woods with the smell of blood in his nose. From a quick glance, he knows it is his own.

And then he hears them. People. Humans. No- he wipes the blood off of his chin and sniffs again. Werewolves. Fear prickles. He thinks of his father, stationed outside the door of a cellar lined with silver.

They aren’t leaving. If he can smell them, they can certainly smell him.

Quickly, he pulls his pants on and buttons them, painfully aware at how loose the waist is now.

He emerges from the small foxhole, trying not to shake too badly. He pulls his bag over a stiff shoulder and holds the strap tight.

The click of his bones settling into their natural positions fills his ears and sets his teeth on edge.

There are two men, dressed in fur-lined coats and plaited trousers. It’s a strange combination.

“It’s alright, pup, we aren’t gonna hurt ye,” one of the men says, offering a wolfish grin.

Remus wants to make a run for it, but there are three more men spread out in the woods. He can smell them.

“Get separated from your pack?” The man steps forward and Remus shakes like a leaf. “Ey?” 

Remus shakes his head.

“You need to sit down, pup.” The man whistles and one of the other men walks out of the woods.

“Another stray, Alan?” He asks when he steps out of the woods and joins the two currently watching him like he is going to collapse. Which he might.

This man is less intimidating than the man named Alan. His clothes are threadbare and his face is clean shaven and young.

He resembles Remus’s father a bit. From the pictures on the mantle. From before the bite.

“We can’t just leave him, Ricky,” Alan bends down and smiles once more. “Come on, you are swaying on your feet. If you sit down, I promise we’ll keep our distance.”

He hasn’t really got any better options.

Walking a few yards away from Alan, he walks at the same pace as Ricky, so that they stay the same distance apart.

Once he reaches the bench he drops his bag on it and slumps back against the smooth wood.

“Casey, Killian, come on out ‘ere already,” Alan summons the other two wolves.

“Killer, Alan. I told you to call me Killer,” a young man complains as he emerges, all scruffy faced and wearing too few layers for the late autumn air.

“You want to petrify the kid?” The man who must be Casey shoves Killer’s arm. He’s a bit older than Killer, with a long scar across his cheek, much like Remus has.

Remus relaxes a touch. These are the first people he has seen in three months that haven’t chased him off. And they are all like him.

“Hungry?” Alan asks, ignoring his… his what? Are they his pack? Family?

Remus nods, knowing his bag is empty save for the last of the freeze dried apple slices that he’d nicked from the store.

“Ricky. Feed the kid.”

Ricky pulls a bag off his shoulder and pulls out a sleeve of water biscuits. Which is good, because Remus won’t be able to keep much of anything down for a few hours.

He’s pretty sure he ate a deer last night. Or a fox. Something bigger than usual but no challenge for the wolf.

There are bits of game still in his teeth.

His stomach roils and he swallows whatever is trying to come out. Vomiting in front of these men would be humiliating.

“Catch,” Ricky throws the sleeve and Remus catches it.

“So what do you think? Gonna tell us your name?” The last man asks, standing a bit apart from the other four men.

He’s not sure he should. Maybe his parents are still looking for him. He doubted it. It’s been six months.

“Remus,” he says around a mouthful of crackers.

“Remuth?” Killer asks.

He shakes his head and Killer laughs. Guffaws actually.

“Remus,” he swallows.

“I’m Alan,” Alan says, smiling. “That’s Ricky, Killian, Casey, and Derrick.”

The man called Derrick steps a bit closer, seeming to have realised Remus poses less than no threat.

“You’re werewolves,” Remus answers, curious. He never heard them last night. Can’t remember hearing them at least.

“Same as you,” Killian says, tossing a chocolate bar at Remus. “Eat that too. It should help with the pasty complexion.”

They’re laughing at him. He can understand. He knows what he looks like. The state they’ve found him in.

“What are you doing out here by yourself?” Alan asks.

He’s clearly the leader. Though he doesn’t appear to be the oldest. Derrick and Ricky seem older. Maybe the tallest. Or maybe he’s been a wolf the longest.

“Keeping away from humans,” Remus shrugs.

“Not been turning for long, huh?” The one identified as Casey asks. “Those first few months take their toll.”

“Seven years actually,” Remus bites out, the flash of anger spiking. That’s been happening more often as of late. His anger overflowing before he can breathe through it.

He watches as the information sinks in.

Looks are shared and Remus manages a small self-satisfied smile.

He isn’t new to turning. 

“How long have you been on your own?” Alan asks, pity leaking into his voice and wiping the smile from Remus’s face.

“Six months.”

“How old are you?” Killer asks, pity in his voice too. 

“Eleven.”

“Would you like to come with us into town? We’re just going to get some breakfast,” Alan offers.

Remus shoves another cracker in his mouth and shrugs.

What does he care? It isn’t as if he has anywhere else to be.

Besides, it might be nice to not be so alone anymore.

---

And then Remus is adopted by a pack of werewolves, unaware of his magical abilities. Abilities that he himself has been having a difficult time suppressing. Of course, he doesn’t have a wand like his father had, so it isn’t that big a problem for him. He just pretends the strange things that happen around him are caused by other things. Not him. He isn’t a wizard.

He’s a wolf.

The pack teaches him to centre himself so that the wolf and the boy can coexist. They provide him with guidance and a family that he is all too eager to accept.

They teach him to hunt in a pack. To make a fire. To build a shelter that keeps out the worst of the wind and the cold.

They have a truck they use to move throughout the country, never staying in one place long enough to attract the attention of wizarding authorities.

Things improve. He even finds himself happy. Marginally.

---

“You can’t go by Remus. You’ll get eaten alive,” Killian says a couple of months in, ruffling Remus’s hair. Killer wasn’t really sticking as much as the young man wanted it to.

“Why not? His name is Alan,” Remus points at the man who had let him into their pack with kind eyes and open arms.

“What’s your middle name again?” He ignores Remus' good point.

“John.”

“Well that’s boring.”

Remus ignores him right back, standing up and walking towards the fire he’d helped build.

They live in the forest for the most part, in tents. Only stopping into local towns when they run low on supplies. Remus likes it. Things aren’t much easier, but they are better once he has others in his corner.

Chapter 6: Tick Tock

After his first moon with Alan and his pack, Remus finds it easier to breathe.

They take him under their wing.

Try to convince him that the wolf isn’t a monster. That he isn’t.

He really likes all of them. Even if he doesn’t quite believe them.

Derrick is quiet, but his travel sack is stuffed full of books he lets Remus read.

Killian, Killer, isn’t quiet, nor does he have books, but he makes Remus feel like he is still a kid.

Casey tells terrible jokes and makes the best breakfast porridge.

Ricky makes sure Remus is always warm enough, and asks him the most about his life before. 

And Alan. He is gruff, but he makes it his mission to show Remus he is a person before he is a wolf.

They are laying out under the stars on a cool night, everyone quiet after spending the day hiking deep into the woods. Far enough away from civilization that the wolves wouldn’t kill anyone when the next full comes.

Remus is exhausted, but his stomach is full and he isn’t afraid.

Staring up through the break in the trees, he tries to find the constellations Mum had taught him.

He only knows a couple.

Orion’s belt. The Big Dipper. 

“Alright, R.J., you have got to lose that timepiece, it is driving me insane,” Killian says, breaking the silence.

Remus knows what he is talking about.

His father’s watch.

The gears are loud.

If he can hear it, so can the rest of them. He had learned to tune it out.

Pulling his wrist towards his chest, he covers the watch with his other hand. It does little to nothing to cover the grating sound.

“Yeah, sorry. I’ll get rid of it tomorrow,” he whispers.

He sits up and goes over to his backpack. He pulls off the watch and shoves it into the bottom of his bag.

It muffles the sound enough that he thinks the rest of the pack won’t hear it.

“Hey, kid,” Alan says, coming to stand next to him as he repacks his bag.

Remus tries to smile.

“You don’t have to get rid of it. Killian can suck it up.”

Remus shrugs.

He isn’t really sure why he has still been wearing the watch.

It isn’t like his father knows that he has been wearing it ever since he ran away. In fact his father probably regrets giving it to him.

“No, it's fine. I don’t need it anymore. What use do I have for telling time?” Remus asks, trying to smile. Trying to make it seem casual. That he doesn’t care about the watch.

Alan looks at him sadly.

“Can I see it?” Alan asks.

Remus fishes the watch back out.

Alan takes it in soft hands and flips it over. Before Remus can object, Alan has popped open the back. He fiddles with something and then the grinding stops.

The watch has gone silent.

“This way you can still wear it,” Alan says, closing the watch and putting it back around Remus’s wrist.

Remus wipes his other hand across his face and mutters, “Thanks.”

His father had given him that watch. For whatever that’s worth.

Remus and Alan go back and join the rest of the pack, enjoying the peaceful sounds of nature.

Chapter 7: Unicorn Blood

Running through the woods, Remus happens across all kinds of incredible things. None more miraculous than unicorns.

So when he wakes up, with blood on his hands and silver hairs stuck to him, he is terrified he’s killed one.

For nearly an hour he stumbles around, searching for the beast, finally stopping when his wounds have bled so much that he can’t see straight.

He finds his clothes, his bag, the only things he has, tears streaming down his cheeks.

By the time he finds his way back to the campsite, his vision is blurring and he feels like he might pass out.

“R.J.!” Someone's arms wrap around his torso, helping him onto a soft surface, probably a blanket.

R.J. the voice had said. It must be Killian holding him. He’s the only one who calls him R.J..

Remus shakes.

“Is he crying?” Someone else asks.

“Let’s maybe focus on the bleeding, Casey.” Another voice scolds. Derrick, he’s pretty sure.

Remus can hardly breathe, he’s so upset.

Dittany spills onto his skin and the bleeding slows. They don’t have a lot. Remus knows that.

“No, don’t,” he protests, not deserving of the relief the medicine brings. “I killed- I killed the unicorn.”

A sob escapes him.

Hands move over his body, and then two hands are cupping his face.

“Unicorn blood is silver. Not red. Lad, you wouldn't kill a unicorn. The most your wolf would do is howl at the poor creature,” Alan says urgently.

Tears pour down his cheeks.

Relief floods him.

He nods and lets them use the dittany.

They stitch him up and force food on him.

Later, after the others have gone to bed, Remus stays up with Alan, stoking the fire.

“You should hold onto these,” Alan says, passing Remus a clump of silver hairs. “Might make for a good wand core.”

Remus looks at him, surprised.

“How did you know?” Remus asks.

“I figured it wasn’t a coincidence that as soon as you joined our ragtag group we stopped waking up soaked from rain. Or that the fire never seems to burn out no matter how inattentive Killian tends to be with it.”

“And you don’t mind?” That I’m a wizard? 

Alan shakes his head and smiles at Remus.

“Of course not, son,” Alan says.

He has no idea what it means to Remus, for him to use that word.

When Alan grips Remus’s shoulder in comfort, Remus can’t help the tears that spill down his face.

Chapter 8: Bowtruckles

The rest of the pack figures out that Remus is a wizard pretty quickly after that. And Remus is relieved to discover that none of them care. They all know that he can’t be a part of the wizarding world.

That he would be ostracised at best, hunted at worst.

Still, Alan tries to convince Remus that he should have a wand. That he should get to know what the rest of wizardkind gets to know. How to control the magic in his veins.

What it feels like to cast a spell and achieve a desired result.

So Remus asks how he is supposed to get a wand. Afterall, he can’t walk into Ollivanders. Not only is he a runaway, he is a werewolf. And he can’t steal one because if any witch or wizard wanted they could have him locked up and thrown in Azkaban on little more than their word.

Alan comes up with a surprising answer.

He tells Remus that he can make himself a wand.

That he knows a sympathetic wizard who knows how to do it.

All Remus needs to do is find the wood for a wand.

His wolf hates the wand feeder trees. They are filled with bowtruckles. Small creatures who protect their branches from being pilfered for wands.

They also have a penchant for irritating the wolf, the wizard, and the hair on Remus’s head.

Still, he manages to find a good branch to harvest for his wand. 

The branch is short, maybe only 8 inches long, with an S near the hilt. 

It is from a laurel tree.

Alan knows a wizard, Thatcher, who helps him figure out how to combine the core with the branch to create a wand bonded to Remus.

The wizard knows a lot about wands. Their cores and the characteristics they can host.

The unicorn hair is said to produce the most consistent magic. The laurel wood is a perfect harness.

Interestingly, the wizard also tells Remus that wands with unicorn hair cores tend to be the most difficult to sway towards dark magic.

Werewolves are dark creatures. Everyone knows that.

Still, Remus’s wand works exactly as he’d hoped it would.

And so he practises with it every day.

Chapter 9: Time Flew

Remus is 13 by the time he meets a wizard his age.

By then, he knows they aren’t to be trusted. Any of them.

Even the man who had helped him with his wand turned around and tried to trap Ricky during the full.

He’d been planning on forcing him into a fighting ring. 

By 13, Remus knows that he might be a beast, but he isn’t a monster.

Wizards are the true monsters.

They lock up werewolves in cells in the Ministry of Magic. Force them onto registries. Deny them jobs, education, healthcare. Kill them for sport. All while pretending it is the wolves they need protecting from and not the other way around.

Alan brings the pack to Scotland in the winter, to a small village where they rent a couple of rooms to hide from the worst of the winter snowstorms.

They can also make a bit of money working in the logging camps near the base of the mountains.

Stay in the inn and find out what is new in the wizarding and muggle worlds.

Hogsmeade.

It is the first time Remus sees Hogwarts. His father had gone there. He hadn’t talked about it very much, just rare memories with his schoolmates.

Alan tells him not to go near the school, and Remus obeys.

He has no reason to go see something he isn’t allowed to have.

Of course, the students come down from the school on the weekends. Long black robes and scarves from the different houses around their necks.

Remus doesn’t have a set of robes. He’s got a coat that he bought from a rummage sale and a pair of mittens he refuses to wear after Killiam tells him he looks like a little kid in them.

One such weekend, a couple weeks after Christmas, Remus is standing outside the Hog’s Head with a cigarette between his icy fingers. If Alan catches him with it, he’ll cuff his ear and give him a long boring talk. Remus doesn’t care. He hasn’t been a kid in a really long time.

“Aren’t you cold?” A voice cuts through his fog.

Remus had been outside for over an hour. The moon is tomorrow and his body is like a furnace.

He’s wearing his coat, but he doesn’t even have it buttoned up.

The voice belongs to a boy his age. Or at least Remus thinks they are the same age.

The boy is handsome, with sharp features and long black hair. His lips form a perfect cupid’s bow and his eyes are bright.

Remus ignores the feeling low in his stomach.

And ignores the boy.

From the red and gold scarf around his neck, he is a student.

A wizard.

Not to be trusted.

“I’m serious,” the boy says, coming closer. Too close.

Remus stops leaning against the wall and drops his cigarette in the snow, stamping it out with his boot.

“I’m fine.” Remus tries to brush him off.

“Not about the cold. My name is Sirius. Sirius Black.” He introduces himself in that annoying impeccable manner that Casey imitates when they watch the Queen speak on the telly.

Black. Remus knows that name.

The boy's father, or uncle maybe, had recently asked the Wizengamot to require all werewolves to spend the full in a Ministry cell.

He had called them “appropriate accommodations” in his pitch. Alan had crumpled up the article and thrown it in the fire.

“Good for you,” Remus sneers, shouldering past the boy.

“Wait- I didn’t mean to offend you,” Sirius Black says, grabbing Remus’s wrist.

Remus isn’t sure why it makes him stop in his tracks. Probably because no one else has touched him in a very long time. No one that isn’t also a wolf anyways.

“Not offended, just not interested.”

“Well how do you know that? All you know is my name,” Sirius Black defends himself.

“It's enough.”

And then Remus stalks away from the handsome boy with the posh manners and dangerous surname.

Chapter 10: Another chance meeting

 

Remus sees Sirius Black again a week later.

He is with two other boys, all similar in age but different in appearance. One is taller than Black with glasses that hide mischief in his eyes and the other is a short blonde boy whose smile never fully leaves his face.

When Sirius spots Remus, he distracts his friends with the sweet shop and then turns back. Remus has plenty of time to put out his cigarette and go inside the inn.

Instead, he decides that he isn’t scared of Sirius Black. That he was there first and he shouldn’t have to go inside.

“Probably a good idea,” Black says as he walks over. 

He’s looking at the mitten on Remus’s left hand. Before he’d pulled out the cigarette, he had been wearing both.

Not being so close to the moon the cold tended to seep in a bit more. And they couldn’t afford cough syrup.

“Glad you think so as I was certainly seeking your approval, little lord,” Remus answers snidely.

Black looks perplexed for a moment but he doesn’t leave.

“How do you know who I am? You don’t go to school with me, I asked,” he says, clearly not intimidated by Remus’s gaunt face and wiry frame.

Remus is surprised to hear that he’d asked around about him. Even if it was to a bunch of people Remus will never know.

“Not that I mind it. Only, you should know that I loathe my family. All of them. Evil bastards.” Sirius grins, though his cheeks redden a bit with the swear words at the end.

Remus would like to mortify him with the amount of swear words he knows. It happens when you spend time working with lads in the middle of the woods.

He’s not sure, but he thinks the boy is telling the truth. That he hates his family.

“I’m R.J.,” he switches from his left foot to his right, making no attempt to seem cordial. Though he is intrigued by the wizard standing in front of him, eyes bright and uncommonly friendly.

“Sirius,” he replies as if he is worried Remus has forgotten his first name in the past week. 

“I know,” Remus says, pulling his carton of cigarettes out of the pocket of his jacket. Once he has one in his mouth, he lights it without thinking. A habit that he should never have adapted. 

One that earns him a gobsmacked look from Sirius Bloody Black.

“You’ve got magic.”

Remus shrugs, trying to remain casual about what a colossal mistake he’s just made.

“Why aren’t you at Hogwarts?” Sirius Black asks.

“Why the fuck would I be?” Remus asks.

The other boy laughs. Remus can’t help but stare at his face. It’s incredibly symmetrical. His long straight nose makes Remus want to punch him and kiss him in the same moment. To feel his skin against his in some way. Even if it ended with blood smeared across pale skin.

“Well, you could learn more than just how to light your cigarettes,” Sirius answers.

Remus scoffs. He and Sirius Black couldn’t be more different. If someone were to walk by the pair right now they’d probably ask Sirius if he needed help. Then they’d call a policeman on Remus.

The air is empty. No one else is nearby. A couple of foxes in a den to the north. 

Sirius smells like cinnamon. Strongly.

“What makes you think I can’t do anything more than light cigarettes?”

“Can you?”

“Yeah,” Remus says, annoyed.

“Oh.” Sirius looks at his feet, clearly feeling abashed.  “Well, you could learn loads more.”

“Well I can’t go so it doesn’t matter,” Remus answers, without thinking.

“You from Scotland? England?” Sirius asks, throwing Remus off even further.

“Wales.”

“Right, well that would make you eligible.”

Yeah it would. He would be eligible based on the fact that he is from Wales and he is capable of magic. 

Only his eligibility is wrecked by his monthly problem.

Remus knows how wizardfolk feel about his kind.

They would never allow a werewolf to attend the same school as all of their precious children. Future little lords like the boy in front of him.

He can’t help but wonder what Sirius Black would say if he knew he was chatting with a werewolf.

“I’m homeschooled,” Remus offers, thinking about the only other wizard he knows.

His father.

“Really? Do you like it? I’d hate having to stay at home.”

Remus doesn’t correct his assumption that he has a home.

“It beats having to interact with ponces like you.” Remus is being a dick. It feels like the only option. The only way to keep a cavern between himself and the handsome wizard.

Sirius laughs. 

Remus blinks. It’s a perfect laugh. Because of course it is.

He takes a long drag of his cigarette to avoid the feelings that laugh drums up.

Wind whistles through the trees.

It’s getting colder. Life will only get harder as Winter marches on.

“Look at you, R.J., hitting where it hurts. I’ve been trying to shed my poncy status for years. I’m devastated to hear I’m so easily labeled.”

This boy doesn’t quit. 

Remus nods, not smiling. Definitely not smiling.

He doesn’t like Sirius Black.

Sirius Black is everything Remus will never get to be.

Remus hates Sirius Black.

Has to.

It is the only thing that makes sense.

Luckily, Remus doesn’t have to come up with another witty response because Sirius’s two friends come out of the candy shop and yell his name.

“Just a minute, lads! Making a new friend!” Sirius shouts back, smiling.

Remus shakes his head.

“I’ve got to go,” he says, once again dropping his cigarette and stamping it out before it is done.

He can’t keep standing here talking to a boy his age who thinks he is funny and knows he has magic and had come back to talk to him even though he’d been an arsehole to him the last time they spoke.

“Oh come on, we were only just getting to know each other. I got your name, or at least two letters of it, and I know you are from Wales. We are practically best friends at this point.”

“R.J.,” Casey says, walking out of the inn. He looks cross. 

“Yeah, I’m coming,” Remus says, turning away from Sirius again without a word.

Notes:

I've never written wolfstar so IDK if this will be good, but it will at least be full of angst. LMK what you think!