Full Moon

Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks were survived by their son Teddy and by Tonks's mother Andromeda, in whose care the baby remained. Andromeda, who had lost both her husband and her only child in rapid succession, thought that the baby should be the focus of all her love and give her hope for the future. She thought that she should take enough joy and comfort in the baby to compensate for her loss, but it was not enough, for Andromeda was distracted with grief. She had been expelled from the family of her birth for the love of Ted Tonks, and he had been the mainstay of her life for twenty-five years, and her fearless daughter had been her pride and joy. Their absence left a void in her that nothing could fill.

Andromeda had been a mother and knew how to take care of a baby, and she did not neglect the baby's physical needs, yet she knew that she was not bonding with him in the way that a child really needed, because too much of her heart was somewhere else. Harry was worried too, and spent whatever time he could spare with the baby, and was more lively and stimulating with him than she was. Both of them knew that Andromeda was not well, but that Harry was too young, too busy and too unsettled to be responsible for a child, and they regarded each other not with jealousy but with the same shared concern. Harry's concern deepened when he heard her wandering distractedly from room to room, softly calling "Ted? Ted?" because he knew it was her husband she was looking for, not her grandson.

Harry was living with the Weasleys, who were the closest thing to a family he had left. He and Ginny were secretly engaged, since the parents thought that they were too young to make such a decision, though Ginny was fond of reminding Harry that her parents had married without the consent of their own parents, who had thought that Arthur was too poor to start a family. Harry's Auror training was something of an open joke, and only consisted of him being shown the protocol of the Auror office and how the Aurors worked out of it, while the other Aurors hoped to learn as much as possible from him about defeating Dark Wizards. Harry had many demands on his time from his girlfriend, his friends and his work, but nothing interested him more than the welfare of his orphan godson.

At some point he noticed that Andromeda seemed to be more present, and he had hopes that she was starting to get over the worst of it. Then one afternoon over tea she said in a matter-of-fact tone, "You know Harry, I think we should try to find the Lupins." Harry's heart sank. So her spirits were improving because she had gone into denial about the fact that her daughter and son-in-law were dead. Though Harry had been called on to prove his manhood every year since he was eleven, it had been in a different arena, and he now felt he was being called on to take the responsibility of an adult in a way that he never had before. This was especially awkward because Andromeda was so much older than he was.

"Cousin Andromeda," he said, for so he had taken to calling her, since he had considered Sirius as good as a father, "there is one Lupin, and you can easily find him, because he is in a crib in the next room. Your daughter and your son-in-law are inside of him. This is where they need you now."

"No, no," said Andromeda in the same matter-of-fact tone, "I mean Remus's parents. I think they should know about their grandson."

Harry was stunned, and then ashamed. He had never seen Lupin's family, and never thought about them. He only remembered Lupin mentioning his parents briefly when talking about his childhood. "Yes, you're absolutely right," he said, "but how will we find them?"

"We could start with the records at Hogwarts. They keep a record of every student who ever attended, their dates, what house they were in, and their address at the time. They also keep contact information for alumni for as long as they want to keep in touch. Remus may have had brothers or sisters."

Harry doubted it, because he thought it more likely that he would have seen relatives who were closer to Lupin's age. If they were anything like Lupin, they would have been fighting Voldemort too. But he agreed that Hogwarts was the best place to start, and Andromeda sent an owl to McGonagall, who was now the headmistress, asking whether she could visit the school for this purpose.

The owl returned with a letter from McGonagall saying that she thought it was an excellent idea, and that she had already checked the records and found that there had been a Heather Lupin, a Ravenclaw, who had been nine years behind Remus, and whom she believed to be his sister. The alumni records showed that in 1990 she had married a Mr. Kevin Grey, who had been a Ravenclaw in the same year, and that their latest address was Seven Crescent Lane in Porkham, a mixed town in the midlands. McGonagall had searched back until she found another Lupin, who she believed might have been Remus's father, for Lupin was not a common name, and she suspected that Remus's family may have originated in France. In the alumni record, someone had written a note saying that this Lupin and his wife had both died in 1985.

Andromeda sent the owl back to thank McGonagall, and began composing a letter to Heather Lupin Grey. If she was indeed Remus's sister, it would probably be heartbreaking to her to find out that her brother had turned up after being missing for so many years but was now dead, yet Andromeda thought it would probably be better to tell her this outright than to give her false hope only to dash it later. Andromeda wrote that if Mrs. Grey was Remus Lupin's sister, Andromeda was a relative of hers by marriage, because Remus had met and married her daughter during the turbulence of the recent war, and that they had both been killed in the last battle of the war, but had been survived by their baby son, who was now in Andromeda's care.

Andromeda dispatched her owl again, and it came back quickly with a letter from Mrs. Grey, on which Andromeda could see several tear stains which the writer had attempted to blot out. Heather Grey said that Remus was indeed her brother, and that she was astonished to hear that he had been alive all these years, because she had always thought that he had been killed in the First War, and that Andromeda must visit her as soon as possible and tell her everything. Andromeda arranged to come that Sunday, and leaving her grandson and her poor exhausted owl with Harry, set off on her broom for Porkham.

She soon arrived at the small white house of Kevin and Heather Lupin Grey and rang the bell. A petite and rather pretty but nervous-looking young woman answered it, and Andromeda saw the resemblance in her features at once. "Please come in," said Mrs. Grey, and Andromeda entered the house.

It was a neat but cozy-looking house. There was a table beside the window in the main room on which had been placed a red and white checked cloth and a small crystal vase with what looked like a recently cut red rose. Andromeda looked out the window and saw a number of rose bushes, and also what looked like a vegetable garden. "Please, sit down," said Mrs. Grey, indicating the table. "I'll put the kettle on, shall I?"

"Yes, please." Andromeda glanced into the kitchen and saw the other witch tap on the kettle with her wand, so it immediately boiled, and then pour the water into a china teapot. She returned to the table carrying a tray with the teapot, two cups, a small pitcher of milk, a sugar bowl, and a plate of scones.

Both women hesitated, unsure who should talk first and about what. Glancing around the room, Andromeda wondered whether the Greys had any children. If a child lived here, she thought, it was not a child like Nymfy. Considering how nervous the other woman seemed, Andromeda thought it might be best to make her acquaintance before launching into excruciatingly painful subjects.

"So you were a Ravenclaw, Mrs. Grey?"

"Please--call me Heather," she said, smiling for the first time. "Yes, I was a Ravenclaw. Do you want to hear how it happened?"

Andromeda wondered whether this might be some sort of slip. "Well, we were all chosen, weren't we? Although I think Dumbledore said that we really choose ourselves, and the hat recognizes our choice."

"I think that was true in my case. The hat hesitated, because the rest of my family were Gryffindors, and these things tend to run in families. I thought maybe I should be a Gryffindor because I knew Remus had been one, and that he was very brave. But just a little earlier I had seen this cute grey-eyed boy sorted into Ravenclaw, and he looked up at me hopefully, as if he wanted to welcome me to their table. When the hat was on my head, hesitating, I remembered how on the train I had heard some of the older kids describe the trophies of the four houses. I thought I would rather have a clear head than a sword in my hand, and in that moment the hat called out, 'Ravenclaw!' I went and sat down next to Kevin, and we've been best friends ever since. I would have been shy, except he was so friendly."

Andromeda smiled. "I've always been struck by how many graduates of Hogwarts marry their school sweethearts, but you may have set a record. I don't think I've met anyone else who met their soul mate the night they arrived at the school."

"We were not that much like the other Ravenclaws, so we always stuck together. Kevin was a Muggle-born wizard, and he was very smart but down-to-earth. To be perfectly honest, I don't think the Ravenclaws were more intelligent or more clear-headed than anyone else in the school, just more--cerebral, or something. You know, we would always come back to the tower together, and the door would ask some airy fairy question like 'Where do objects go when they disappear?' and Kevin would give a smart answer like 'I wish I knew that. I have more odd socks than matching ones.' The door sometimes accepted mocking answers, because we were supposed to be witty, and if it gave us a hard time we would keep going back and forth, because there were two of us, and since we were learning from each other it eventually gave up and let us in.

"I always admired the Gryffindors, because they stood up most for what was right, but I knew the hat was right not to put me there, because I wouldn't jump into danger the way they do. I always reflect before I act. But tell me about Remus," she said, looking anxious again. "He disappeared soon after he left Hogwarts. We knew he was in some kind of partisan army that was fighting Voldemort. I wasn't really surprised that he didn't come back, because I knew he had some kind of mental disability." Her voice had become shaky. "I know it was a good cause, but I thought it was cruel of them to send him into battle, knowing he had mental lapses. My parents never believed he was dead, because we never received an owl or a knock on the door. I thought they were in denial, because many witches and wizards disappeared or could not be identified. Could it be that they were right? War trauma probably made his condition worse. Had he forgotten where he came from?"

Andromeda thought the Wizarding World had no more use for lies. "Heather," she said gently, "you don't know what your brother's disability was, do you?"

"No," she sighed. "My parents said he was a sweet and clever boy, but that he sometimes had episodes when he forgot who he was and became dangerous to others. They said it was the result of an accident he had as a small child. I know they blamed themselves, because he had slipped away, and they thought they shouldn't have let him out of their sight."

"It was lycanthropy."

Heather spoke in a barely audible whisper. "You mean Remus was...a werewolf?"

Andromeda nodded. She could only hope this news would not provoke shame or disgust. But she saw tears start from the other woman's eyes.

"The poor thing! The poor thing! He must have been bitten! So that was his accident!"

Andromeda put a hand on her arm. "Heather, you know our society has done little to integrate werewolves, and you must understand that Remus was ashamed of being one. When he was young, he was unable to keep a job. He had no way of making sure he would not harm anyone. He thought it would be too hard on your parents, having a grown werewolf on their hands. But he and my daughter meant to try to find you all again when the war was over."

"Hard on them? Hard on them?" Her pity was turning to indignation. "They never got over their grief at his disappearance! They wore themselves out looking for him!"

Andromeda had become strangely dry-eyed since her daughter's death. "The partisan army you mentioned was called the Order of the Phoenix, and was led by Dumbledore. It regrouped when Voldemort came back, and Remus joined again. That was where he met my daughter. She fell in love with him and married him, knowing that he was a werewolf, and they had a baby who survived them. So you see, at least he had some happiness at the end of his life."

"And your daughter--oh, what a terrible loss. Your daughter must have been a very special person. What did you call her?"

"I called her Nymfy and her father called her Dora, but she called herself Tonks." Heather looked a bit confused. "I hope you will come and visit your nephew. It may be some compensation for all this loss."

"Yes of course! Send me an owl when it's convenient for you to have me--us? Can Kevin come too?"

"Of course," said Andromeda, smiling. "Kevin is his uncle."

***

Andromeda returned to find Harry leaning over Teddy's crib, apparently dangling something on a string.

"Remus's sister is a very nice woman," she said. "She had known Remus had a mental disability, but not what it was, but when I told her, she was sorry for him. She would like very much to see her nephew."

"That's wonderful," said Harry, but Andromeda was not sure he heard her, he was so engaged with the baby. She saw that it was a disk that he had suspended over the crib. No, a triangle. He kept touching it with his wand and changing the shape, saying the name of each shape to the baby. Then he kept changing its color, saying the names of all the colors. The baby made noises such as "ga," "da," and "goo." When he had said "ga" on two different occasions when the object was purple, Harry turned to her excitedly.

"You see, Andromeda? He recognizes purple!"

"That means he's a wizard," said Andromeda cryptically.

***

In the weeks that followed, Harry's hopes for Andromeda's return to normalcy were dashed, for she seemed to be taken up by a new obsession. Indeed she was, for looking up the Lupins had sparked her interest in genealogy. Andromeda had begun to suspect that the Black family had protested too much about its purity of descent, because it had so protested more than any other family in the Wizarding World. Could a family really have survived from times "Most Ancient" while expelling so many of its members? Sirius had inherited despite his estrangement, since the family was patrilineal. If Sirius had lived and had been capable of marriage, he might have married anyone and had a son. Surely there had been some time of reproductive scarcity when there was no other heir but the child of a Black who had married a Muggle-born witch, or perhaps an illegitimate son whose paternity had been lied about. If it had passed through the female line, wouldn't the name have died out? A wizard like Lucius Malfoy would still want his son to be a Malfoy. The odds were overwhelming, she thought, that at some time the child of a Black who had married a Muggle-born had been accepted into the family.

She thought it mattered, because if she could disprove it in the case of her father's family, it might disprove the myth of pure-blood wizardry once and for all, and end this blight that had so long divided the Wizarding World. She knew the evidence would be difficult to find, because the family would have done their best to cover it up, but she knew where to start. She went searching through every document, letter and memoir she could sniff out at number twelve, Grimmauld Place.

Harry was very troubled to see her spending so much time at Twelve Grimmauld Place, because he did not think that it was a healthy place for anyone, least of all someone in Andromeda's fragile emotional state. When she told him what her research was about, he agreed with her hypothesis, but did not think she would ever find the evidence. But since it was a matter concerning her own family, and considering their age difference, he did not think he could close the place to her or tell her what to do.

The night that Andromeda finally found incontrovertible evidence of what she was looking for, she knew the game was over, and felt like leaving it all behind her. She put on her old black robes and her old pointed black witch's hat, mounted her broom, and flew off away from the city to a high hill from which she could look at the stars.

She lay down on the ground and gazed at the beautiful panoply of objects in the night sky. Nature's Nobility, she thought. As the night wore on, she looked for the namesakes of her relatives: Sirius, Regulus, Arcturus, Bellatrix, Cygnus...Andromeda? Had they given their children such names to try to exalt them above the rest? The antiquity of the stars made a mockery of her family's claim to be "most ancient." Their man-invented creed was against nature, because everything on earth was made of stardust, and the same blood flowed in the veins of all humans, wizard and Muggle alike. The Black family, in its quest for power or fear of the truth, had twisted the concepts of ancient, noble, nature, blood, and family. Her family was gone.

In the nights that followed, Andromeda flew to higher and higher elevations, farther from the lights of cities and towns, ever drawn by the night sky. Eventually she began to reach the highest elevations of the land, those of the mountains of the Scottish Highlands. One night some strange wind blew her through the mountains, toward a hidden shelf surrounded by forest. Andromeda could see light and movement there, and sensed that it was a magical place. As she flew closer she smelled delicious smells, and the noises started to resolve into talking. When she flew to the edge of the forest and parked her broom, she saw a strange and wonderful scene in the clearing.

The open area of the shelf in the mountainside was surrounded by beautifully carved wooden latticework, and through it she could see naked women and wolves, but the wolves were not attacking the women, they were walking among them, wagging their tails like dogs. There were two fires in the center of their space, on each of which was a ceramic cauldron from which the delicious smells were emanating. Then Andromeda saw something that astonished her. One of the women transformed into a wolf, and a little later, one of the wolves transformed into a woman. She realized these must be werewolves of some kind, and that, strangely enough, she had never before seen or heard of a female werewolf.

When she entered the clearing, they seemed friendly, but also very impressed.

"Are you a new Sorceress?" said one.

Andromeda was puzzled. "I'm a witch, but I'm not very new," she said.

"You must be a guest of the Sorceresses, then."

The werewolves looked no less impressed.

"I don't think so. I don't know who the Sorceresses are. They never contacted me."

"No one down there knows who the Sorceresses are, except the male werewolves, who pretend not to. You wouldn't have come if you weren't invited."

"Why don't you join us for dinner?" said another werewolf. "We are just about to eat. It sounds as if the Sorceresses are arguing as usual." She nodded toward the entrance of a nearby cave, from which a fainter light was emanating. When Andromeda listened she did hear the sound of female voices engaged in what sounded like some heated debate, though it did not sound rancorous. The werewolves made room for Andromeda to sit down on the ground, and one of them asked her whether she ate meat.

"What kind of meat?" she said a little nervously.

"Deer meat. There are many deer in this forest."

Andromeda was relieved. "Yes, please," she said, and the werewolf ladled some meat stew into a carved wooden bowl with a carved wooden ladle. Andromeda tasted it and found it was as delicious as it smelled.

"We also have a vegetarian stew, if you'd like to try that. We prefer meat, but the Sorceresses are mostly vegetarian, and they are teaching us to cook."

Delicious as it was, Andromeda had difficulty eating much, for she was very nervous. When she finished her bowl she thanked the werewolves and, apparently noticing she had finished eating, one of the Sorceresses peered out of the cave and beckoned to her to join them.

Andromeda entered the cave and saw to her surprise that it had a high ceiling as round and smooth as a bowl, painted in beautiful colors with an abstract design. The faint light was emanating from a nebulous ball in the center of the floor. Most of the Sorceresses were sitting in a circle, dressed in what looked like deeply dyed cotton cloths of different colors, simply wrapped around them. There was one, however, who looked very ancient and was sitting on a ledge of rock that served as a bench, wearing an embroidered robe.

"Welcome, Andromeda," said a Sorceress to the elder one's left, who, unlike the others, was standing. She had long silvery hair that looked to Andromeda to be something between platinum blonde and white, and Andromeda could not guess her age. "I am Clara," she said.

"I am Dara," said a short-haired one, turning to Andromeda with a friendly look.

"I am Mara," said the dark-haired woman next to her in a more portentous tone.

"I am Sara," said one with long soft brown hair, whom somehow Andromeda had not noticed.

"I am Bonita," said a small roly-poly black-haired one, who Andromeda suspected was the youngest.

"I am Talachawinga," said the elderly woman on the bench in a commanding voice. "We are the Sorceresses."

"We give ourselves similar names, to avoid confusion," said Bonita helpfully.

"But we are not all the Sorceresses," protested Dara. "Some Sorceresses are out raining and stuff."

Andromeda was baffled. "But--who are you? How do you know my name? I've never heard of you."

"You haven't heard of us because they don't want you to hear of us," said Mara.

"Who doesn't want me to hear of you?"

"The powers that be," said Mara ominously.

"To be fair, Mara, we also have kept out of touch," said Sara.

"When have they ever been fair to us? What would happen if we got in touch?"

"It probably would not work yet," agreed Clara, "but some of them are realizing that they must change their ways if humans are to survive at all, and more are realizing it every day."

"They are not the ones who have power," said Mara.

"They have power in numbers," said Dara. "The women are rising. I am very optimistic."

Andromeda was beginning to wonder whether her questions would ever be answered, but Clara was looking at her as if knowing what she was thinking.

"We have invited you here for three reasons: because you seek the truth, because you need to heal a great grief, and because your daughter married a werewolf. You are not the only witch who seeks the truth, but you have recently made a bold step in that direction. You are not the only one, after the recent war, who needs to heal a great grief. But to our knowledge, your daughter is the only witch who ever knowingly married a werewolf."

"But how did you know?" said Andromeda incredulously.

"We can see and hear what goes on in a specific place down there, but only if we know exactly where to look. We located the headquarters of Dumbledore's army, because we were interested in the progress of the war. That was where we saw what happened between Remus and your daughter. You see," she said, indicating the mouth of the cave, "we have a particular interest in the werewolves."

Andromeda had so many questions that she felt overwhelmed, but Clara still seemed to be reading her thoughts, and she continued.

"We are witches who withdrew from the Wizarding World long ago, because we did not agree with the rule of wizards, and they would not listen to us. They talk of equality and give witches many opportunities, but only within a framework created mostly by men, who cannot give up a compulsion for dominance. If we had had as much influence as powerful wizards, the Wizarding World might not have been reduced to the alternatives of separation from Muggles or domination over them.

"There was a time long ago when witches and wizards were accepted among Muggles. There was a time when male werewolves were like these," she said, indicating the mouth of the cave again, "and they were accepted by other humans. Humans were closer to other animals then, and many witches and wizards were Animagi. We claimed that such things could still be possible. We called for tolerance, but powerful forces were arrayed against us. You see, all witches and wizards were originally descended from Muggles, for the first humans were Muggles. But you know there were powerful wizards who would see such knowledge as a threat to their power. Did they teach you all this at school? What was the subject everyone slept through at school?"

"History of Magic," said Andromeda, with a dawning comprehension. But surely the things Clara spoke of were prehistoric.

"They make it boring on purpose, because they don't want the students to get too many ideas. If they knew that things have been radically different in the past, they will know that they can be radically different in the future. History can teach people that there is nothing natural or immutable about the way things are. We have been left out of the books, but our knowledge has been passed through the ages. There are witches who lived for hundreds of years, whose voices were not recorded. Talachawinga is almost four hundred years old."

Andromeda looked at Talachawinga in astonishment, and then, looking around, she suspected that all of them were much older than they looked.

"We eat a very healthy diet, and the mountain air agrees with us," said Clara with a slight smile. Andromeda had begun to suspect that Clara was a Legilimens. Then another thought struck her.

"Are you all Animagi?" she asked.

"Bonita and I are werewolves who became Sorceresses," said Dara. "When female werewolves reach a certain age, we stop transforming automatically, though we can still transform at will. The other Sorceresses are Animagi, but we all prefer transforming into storm clouds."

"You can transform into storm clouds?" said Andromeda in wonder, though she remembered the statement about raining.

"Andromeda, we have long been developing magic that is different from what they do in the Wizarding World," said Clara. "We sometimes transform into clouds that rain and snow and even send down lightning, but we do not harm anyone."

"We only do it to vent," said Dara.

"What do you mean?" said Mara. "We will send down a mudslide if an unwanted visitor approaches."

"This place is enchanted so no one can find us anyway," said Clara a little impatiently.

"I always liked to rain on Hogsmeade and watch the little witches and wizards scurry for cover in the inns and the tea shop," said Bonita. "But Talachawinga," she said in a hushed tone, "Talachawinga transforms into a mist and sinks into Loch Ness, where she transforms into a big reptilian sea creature. She's been doing that for hundreds of years."

Andromeda had been thinking. "I do remember learning that there was a time when witches and wizards were tolerated among Muggles. Not everything you say has been hushed up. And with the defeat of Voldemort, the creed of pure-blood supremacy has been discredited, and there is an opening for change. Are you so sure you won't be listened to now? Aren't you choosing to keep to yourselves?"

"Unfortunately, wizards are afraid of us," said Clara sadly. "They have not yet gotten over the idea that if witches challenge their domination, we are seeking to dominate them. If we come down now they will be very frightened, and try to fight with us. We do not want to make a scene."

"We know it is a very good sign that they defeated Voldemort," said Dara. "It shows that they are headed in the right direction. More and more of them will see the truth, and they will want us back. I am very optimistic."

"A few years under Voldemort might have shown them the error of their ways," said Mara. "They have not yet admitted it was the rule of men that took them there."

"At what cost of innocent lives?" said Andromeda, who was suddenly angry. "My husband and my daughter were killed in that war! None of us even knew you existed! Why didn't you help us?"

Clara and Dara looked and Mara reproachfully, and then Clara spoke.

"We are not goddesses, Andromeda. We do not decide who lives and dies down there. Even if we had landed a fatal thunderbolt on Voldemort, we did not know where his Horcruxes were, and he might have come back again. Lightning jumps, and if we had tried to hit your daughter's assailant, we might have hit her by mistake. Whom would it have helped if we had rained on the whole parade? The magic we have developed is not of the warring kind. The Wizarding World needed to solve a problem that they themselves created. There is yet another one with which we could not help them. We could never abide the government's use of dementors."

"Neither could Remus," said Andromeda in surprise. "Neither could Dumbledore!"

"They are using dementors to guard their prison again, as if they didn't learn anything from the war," said Sara. "They always said it was the only way they could control Dark Wizards. I once suggested that they try to find out why wizards went bad in the first place, instead of locking them up under conditions that made them worse, and they said I was soft on crime."

"Ah, Dumbledore," said Clara. "We think Dumbledore would have been glad to have us there, for he was willing to learn from his mistakes, and was open-minded towards those who were different. We wish more of them were like him. But we thought it would put too great a burden on him to ask for his help, because he had a hard time down there as it was. Other wizards would likely have thought he was using us to try to gain power for himself, or vice versa. We thought he was a force for good down there, and didn't want to be the death of him."

"I think Dumbledore asked unreasonable sacrifices of people," said Dara. "Of Remus, of the potions master, and especially of that boy wizard. He asked them to do things he wouldn't do himself."

"I hope he knew that boy would survive," said Clara, looking troubled. "We do not believe in human sacrifice."

"Not of the innocent," said Mara, "but in the days of Dionysus--"

"When none of us were around--" said Dara.

"We would sacrifice a ruler who did not acknowledge our power. We tore Pentheus--"

"Mara, spare us."

"Andromeda," said Clara, looking at her, "we will come down when they want us back, and I believe that time will come. But we will come down in the last extremity, whether they want us back or not. We cannot allow the human race to be destroyed, or the earth to become uninhabitable, because it is our home too. We are not so powerful that we can fly to another planet and create our own atmosphere."

"It already is the last extremity," said Sara. "Do you know what is happening to the oceans? Do you know what is happening to the atmosphere? But if we go down it will make things worse, because many Muggles have strange beliefs about the end of the world, and will think we are fulfilling them. They will destroy themselves even faster."

"It will be terrible!" said Mara, who, unlike the others, seemed to relish this prospect. "We will descend upon them like the furies of old!"

"We might as well just enjoy what life we have left up here," said Sara.

"Wait a minute, Sara," said Dara. "Just follow me for just a minute. As witches see what is happening, more and more of them will join us, and we will have enough weather to stave off catastrophe until things change. The world will change. Women are rising."

"We're talking about Muggles," said Sara. "We can't join with Muggle women, because most of them don't believe in magic, and Muggles will be confused and terrified, and it will only make a mess."

"Muggle women have more in common with witches than with men," said Mara. "In the final drama, they will answer our call."

"Let us not seek a final drama or make a mess," said Clara, "but try to find people we can cooperate with for the work that needs to be done. Women and men, witches and Muggles, animals and all of nature have a part."

The Sorceresses are arguing as usual, thought Andromeda, who suddenly felt very sleepy. She suspected these were the sorts of arguments they had every night.

"Andromeda, you've had a long day," said Clara. "We've made a bed for you in the next room." She showed Andromeda an opening to a small room off the main room of the cave. Andromeda stepped inside and there was a pleasant smell, and she found it was coming from a mattress that had been stuffed with dried plants, probably including some of their cooking herbs. Andromeda was about to lie down when she noticed a faint white light emanating from a crack on the other side of her little room. She followed it and found it was an opening to another room with a high domed ceiling, though not as large the first room. Little girls and wolf cubs were sleeping there, and the faint light came from a unicorn who was patrolling among them, seemingly keeping watch. The ceiling was painted blue, lighter around the rim, and deepening to a very dark blue at the top, and was set with twinkling stars. Andromeda lay down on her own bed, where a thick blanket had been left for her. The blanket was surprisingly soft and supple for its weight, and had a warmth of its own, and Andromeda realized it had been enchanted.

***

The next morning the werewolves were going hunting, women and wolves together, and they invited Andromeda to join them, but she politely declined. Her morning with the Sorceresses was not dull, however, for they had many things to show her. Bonita babysat the young ones, which she said was her favorite activity, while the others showed her some of their magic and crafts.

They showed her edible plants they cultivated from magical modifications of local plants, including the herbs that made their cooking so delicious. Clara said the herbs were also medicinal, which was one of the reasons for their longevity. They took her through the forest, which was full of red deer, but Andromeda also saw a couple of unicorns, and felt a pang of worry when she thought of the hunting werewolves. "Don't worry," said Clara, "they take care not to hurt the unicorns."

They reached a streambed from which Dara said they extracted the clay for their pottery. "We put it on a stone slab and set it spinning with our wands, and then we move a wand slowly up or down it as it spins, and make it into pots and bowls. You saw the domed ceilings in the caves? Those are big inverted bowls."

Last came the cooking lesson. "Cooking is our most practiced art," said Sara, "because we eat every day."

After lunch the Sorceresses led her back into the main cave, and sat in a circle again, looking very serious. Andromeda noticed that Talachawinga was still sitting on her ledge, and wondered whether she had moved since the previous evening. After a moment of silence, Clara spoke.

"Andromeda," she said, "it is time to answer your question."

Andromeda was not sure which question this was, but she did feel that the thing she was most interested in had not yet been discussed.

"You want to know about the werewolves, and where your son-in-law came from."

"He was a little boy who was bitten by a werewolf," said Andromeda sadly. "Isn't that where all werewolves come from?"

"They do now, but it was not always that way. Hundreds of years ago the females such as you see here lived, hunted, and mated with the males, and they had werewolf cubs. They did not attack humans, because they knew they were humans themselves."

"How did that change?" said Andromeda in amazement.

"The curse," said the others in a chorus.

"But who cursed them? Why?"

"The males brought it on themselves," said Mara. "They offended Artemis, goddess of the moon and of the hunt, and protector of the little ones."

"This Muggle mythology is not literally true, Mara," said Clara. "It is only metaphorical."

"What system of belief is not metaphorical?" said Mara. "Our ancestors, witch and Muggle too, knew the goddess in many forms."

"It was only some of the males who started it," said Dara, "but it began a downward spiral that no one knew how to stop."

"You see, the males were solitary hunters, and would sometimes abandon their cubs and their mates," said Clara. "The females always wanted their young to be protected, so they sometimes sought refuge among the wolves, who were social, or in the world of other humans. But the tolerance of other humans came to an end, for without the influence of the females, some of the males would hunt humans, and a few of them had the trait that their bite would turn other humans into werewolves. The werewolves created through the bite retained this trait, and the males who were bitten could no longer control their attacking of humans. The bitten males also had another strange trait: they transformed only at the full moon.

"Of course the biting males sometimes bit women and girls too, but the condition did not affect them the same way. They did become werewolves, and their bite could make other humans into werewolves, but they did not have the associated dementia that made them want to attack humans when they were transformed, nor did they transform only at the full moon.

"All werewolves became shunned by human society, and the females usually sought protection among the wolves, but soon they were shunned by the wolves as well, for humans had become the enemy of wolves, and werewolves were often in their human state. The first Sorceresses took the female werewolves under their protection, and they have been with us ever since. Our owls and bats watch and listen at the full moon, and report to us if a woman or girl is attacked by a werewolf, and out goes a storm cloud, which transforms into a Sorceress and brings her to join the others. If it isn't too late. If she escaped with just a bite. We know how to make branches into brooms."

"But why should they go with you?" asked Andromeda, bewildered. "Why should they trust a stranger? What about their families?"

"That is the most troubling part," said Clara, "but women know what it means to be bitten by a werewolf. Many werewolves are shunned by their families. The transformations of the females are unpredictable, and their bite can still transform other people into werewolves. Other humans might kill them. Their families, if they kept them, would seclude them. They would want to be with the male werewolves, who would attack them at the full moon, if they did not happen to be in their wolf state. Humans have never taken responsibility for the bitten among them, but alienated them as monsters, and they have paid a high price for it. When our new friends come they miss their families at first, but we surround them with love, and eventually they heal."

"But the male werewolves--they do not heal?"

"We never knew how to break the curse. The poor things pretend they care nothing for females or families, because it is something they cannot have. They do not even have such relationships amongst themselves, as we do, because social pressure is very strong with them, and they are afraid of conflicts with each other or of emotional attachments. They pretend they like to be werewolves and to hunt humans, because it is something they cannot control. But from the time Remus Lupin came here, we knew he was different."

"Remus came here?" said Andromeda in complete astonishment.

"We keep watch over this whole area. There is a forest near the coast north of here that we keep hidden from humans, because the last wolf pack in Britain is there, and they are also under our protection. They think they have survived because they are so clever, but in fact we have enchanted their forest so that humans cannot find it.

"One full moon a wizard Apparated on a ledge on the rocky coast, and he immediately transformed, so we knew he was a werewolf. But he let out such a howl of loneliness and despair as we have never heard from a werewolf, for male werewolves do not express their feelings in such a manner. He was wounded, and he rested on the rock, but then he made his way across the heath and into our forest. Since he was in his wolf state, it was not hidden from him. We saw him encounter the wolves, and heard their conversation. We heard him offer his life on the chance of being accepted into a wolf pack. He would not have done that if he did not know he wanted a family, or if he had had no hope at all. It was the reverse of what had happened ages ago, and we began to hope what we had long given up hoping: that it might be the beginning of the end of the curse."

"But--Remus never told us any of this!" But even as she spoke, Andromeda remembered that her daughter had told her that Remus never remembered what he did in his wolf state. She also remembered that for years he had Apparated to Scotland before his transformation.

"We did not know where he went after he transformed back, because we cannot track a Disapparition. But to our joy and relief he returned at the next full moon, and we no longer hid the forest from him in his human state either, because he had been accepted into the wolf pack, and we wanted him to keep coming back. We wanted him to know, however, that it was not safe to bring other humans there, and as always we kept our presence mysterious.

"Then one year he suddenly disappeared for a whole year, and we feared the worst, but he came back. But when he came back, the wolves no longer trusted him, for as in the beginning, he could not explain where he had been. He would leave offerings of dead prey here and there for the wolves, and they thought it might be a trap, but eventually the alpha female convinced them to take him back.

"Then Voldemort came back, and it was war again, and we began watching the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, and who should show up there? Remus Lupin! We were so proud. Not only was he accepted by the other wizards, but your daughter fell in love with him! Had he been accepted before, and was he different from the other werewolves for that reason, or was he accepted because he was different? In the end it would not matter."

"I think it was both," said Andromeda. "He had more of a chance than most werewolves ever had, but he was a very special person. Dumbledore must have realized he was a nice boy when he admitted him to the school."

"Yes, we got wind of the fact that he went to Hogwarts, and even more surprisingly, that he taught there!" said Dara.

"In that connection, we got wind of something else, and what had been a tentative hope became a near certainty to me," said Clara. "We listened to him talk to your daughter, and we heard that the year he taught at the school he had a potion that made his transformations harmless. We did not know about the Wolfsbane Potion until we heard about it from your daughter and your son. They wanted to try to get it again, but Remus thought the potions master would do nothing for him, although he had made the potion when Remus was at the school. We heard your daughter say she would write to him herself, and we kept an eye out for the potions master to see what he would do. We began to spy on Dumbledore's office at Hogwarts, though in the past we had not thought it was our business.

"One day a few weeks later a pale dark-haired man showed up in the office and immediately began talking about the Wolfsbane Potion, and we realized it must be the potions master."

"Severus, Dumbledore called him, and so did Remus," said Dara.

"Severus had a very interesting story," continued Clara. "He was an undercover agent pretending to work for Voldemort, and Voldemort trusted him, although we could see he obviously worked for Dumbledore. He wanted very much to make the potion for Remus, but there was a particular problem. Voldemort had guarded the places from which fresh ingredients needed to be gathered for the potion, because he wanted to make sure no one made the potion, because he thought the werewolves were part of his strategy. He was trying to bait them with prey, thinking he would gain their support that way, though eventually he planned to kill them all. He was afraid that if anyone made the potion its use might spread, and the werewolves might stop hunting.

"We heard that the ingredients were very difficult and dangerous to gather anyway, and now Voldemort was also guarding them with Dark Magic, but Severus knew a lot about Dark Magic. Since Voldemort trusted him, Severus asked Voldemort how these places were guarded, and offered to examine them himself, supposedly to make sure that they were well enough guarded. This was plausible enough to Voldemort, since the potions master was an expert on gathering the ingredients. So Severus checked out the Dark Magic at these locations, and found out exactly how it could be breached.

"Now Severus and Dumbledore agreed that if Severus stole the ingredients it would probably blow his cover, but Severus thought that maybe Dumbledore could steal the ingredients himself, because Dumbledore was such a powerful wizard that it might be plausible that he had figured out himself how to do it. But Dumbledore said there was still too great a chance of blowing the potion master's cover, because Severus knew so much more than anyone about how to get to the ingredients, and since he was a double agent, there were already followers of Voldemort who suspected him of disloyalty. And then we heard the strangest thing.

"The potions master demanded that Dumbledore promise that he would never let Remus know that he had done his best for Remus. Dumbledore should never tell Remus, or anyone who would tell Remus, that he had risked his life particularly for Remus. This made no sense. If that would have blown his cover, Dumbledore would not have done it anyway, but why would it have blown his cover? Even if Voldemort had tried using his famous Legilimancy on Remus,"--Andromeda noticed the contempt with which she spoke the word--"which he would not have bothered to do, since in his view Remus was only a werewolf, what would he have found out? That Remus thought that the potions master had tried, but not been able to make the potion? That would not have told Voldemort anything, except that Severus was playing his part well, since the wizards in Dumbledore's army considered him to be one of them.

"We gathered that at some time there had been some bad feelings between Remus and the potions master, but we knew that if Remus had known what had recently happened, he would have forgiven everything. He was a gentle and forgiving person, and he would have been happy for a reconciliation anyway. He was not like his friend, that other wizard who was killed earlier--"

"Sirius?" said Andromeda, turning a little pink.

"Yes, Sirius hated Severus, but Remus did not. There had been some misunderstanding that Severus was determined to perpetuate. He would risk his life for Remus, but not say a kind word to him. What kind of crazy pride was this?"

"The potions master was a strange man, and very difficult to read," said Sara. As if I needed Sorceresses to tell me that, thought Andromeda.

"We knew that Voldemort would lose the war, and that sometime after that, the potion would become available to the werewolves," continued Clara, "but a potion alone cannot break a curse. It would take a change of heart among the werewolves. As it was, they would think the other humans were trying to poison them, or at least take away what power they had by making them harmless. They would not imagine that other humans wanted to include them in their society as equals, let alone to marry them. Not if it hadn't been for the marriage of Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks.

"The werewolves will find out about this union, and find out that the surviving child is not a werewolf, because they keep an eye out for their own, and some of them will stop hiding from themselves that they want to have human relationships with other humans. Some will try the potion, whatever they tell their peers, and a few more witches and wizards will fall in love with werewolves, and it will be a cycle of life that will reverse the cycle of death that started so long ago. The werewolves will see that those who have families and jobs have better lives, and the others will see that the werewolves are humans like themselves, and judge them by their characters, not for being werewolves. They will have children, and their children will not be werewolves. Eventually the biting will stop, and eventually there will be no more werewolves."

A thought struck Andromeda as her eye rested on the mouth of the cave. "But what about these?" she said, gesturing in the direction of the werewolves.

Clara smiled. "They will either become Sorceresses or die a natural death. Eventually, when the biting stops, no more female werewolves will be created either. It will be the end of the werewolves."

"The end in this era," said Talachawinga. "In another era they may come back and be as they once were."

"If humanity could survive until another era," said Sara. Oh no, thought Andromeda, they're not going to start that again. But Clara had turned to Andromeda again.

"The outcome was still uncertain when your son and daughter were wed, because Remus had not yet accepted the idea that he could father a child. When your daughter became pregnant by him, he tried to run away."

"No!" said Andromeda indignantly. "That's impossible!"

"He did not stay away for long, and I am not surprised that they hid it from you. But he showed up at Order headquarters, very agitated, telling the boy wizard and his friends that he should not reproduce, although he had already done it. Like the werewolves of old, he tried to abandon his cub and his mate. Our hearts sank, for we knew the curse was still upon him. He asked to join the young ones in their mission, because Dumbledore had entrusted them with the most important mission in the war against Voldemort. But the orphan boy called him a coward, and he soon came to his senses. In his wolf state, he had risked everything to have a family. In his human state it took him longer, because as a human he had learned to hide from rejection and social stigma, but his hope finally won out over his fear.

"We watched your house when he returned to your daughter. He told her everything and asked her forgiveness. He offered himself unconditionally to his family. He offered to do something he had never been able to do for himself: to stand up to other humans for his right to live among them as an equal, at whatever cost in possible rejection or humiliation. What he could never face for himself, he would need to face for the sake of his family. He finally found the will to do whatever it took to be a husband and father.

"When Remus asked forgiveness for himself, he did not know that he was asking forgiveness for those male werewolves who long ago had begun the downward spiral by abandoning their cubs and their mates. But he asked, and was forgiven, and so Remus Lupin broke the curse."

"No!" thundered Talachawinga from her bench, and all eyes turned to her. "It was Nymphadora Tonks who broke the curse! Her love for Remus broke the curse!"

"Nymfy broke the curse?" said Andromeda in a small voice. She had always believed her daughter capable of almost anything, but this was starting to sound like a fairy tale.

"We are proud of you, and proud to have you as our guest," said Clara. "You must be a very special witch, to have raised such a daughter."

"A powerful witch," said Dara.

"A wonderful witch," said Bonita.

"No! I am not powerful or wonderful! I am just an ordinary witch!" And suddenly the source of her grief reached the surface of Andromeda, and suddenly the tears came. "She thought I was not afraid for her when she married Remus, but I was, and he loved her and wanted to protect her. She thought I had never cared about being expelled from the family of my birth, but I did, and they were evil and wanted to kill her. She was so much braver and smarter and better than I was. Why should I have outlived her? Why? Why? Why?"

Andromeda was on her knees and seemed to be desperately imploring the Sorceresses for their understanding.

They were my sisters...I used to play with them when we were little...I was always afraid of Bella, but she was my sister...my sister tried to kill my daughter...my sister wanted my daughter dead, wanted her husband dead, wanted my grandson dead...my sister's husband wanted my husband dead...my sister's husband killed my husband, killed my daughter, killed her husband...my love went into hiding and I could not go with him...my love is dead and my sister's husband lives...my sister killed my cousin...my sister tried to kill her niece...my family killed my family...I used to play with them when we were little...my...family...is...dead.

Andromeda did not know for how long she wept, for she had lost all sense of time. But eventually a very soft shower passed over her, washing away her tears, and she knew it was Bonita. And then a gentle warm breeze dried her, and she knew it was Dara. And then something warm and light seemed to radiate through her, and she knew it was Clara. When she looked up, she faced Talachawinga, still sitting on her stone ledge, illuminated by the same white light that Andromeda had seen the previous evening, and she thought it must be evening again.

"Andromeda Tonks, your family is not dead. Your grandson is sleeping in a house ever friendly to children, built for that purpose on a pigsty in a town on the other end of this island. He is well taken care of, but they anxiously await your return. You are of their world, not of ours." Talachawinga produced Andromeda's broom. "Take your broom, Andromeda. The moon has risen. The moon is full. It is time for you to return to them."

Andromeda took her broom and embraced them all, except Talachawinga, whom she dared not touch. She kicked off from the side of the mountain and flew between the earth and the moon, which had a yellowish tinge that night, and seemed reassuringly nearby and familiar after all her gazing at the cold light of the distant stars. She continued to fly in front of the moon as seen from the ground for most of the night, and anyone looking up from the ground in England that night could see a classic image of a witch in a pointed hat riding on a broomstick, silhouetted black against the full moon. A few witches and wizards looked up and chuckled, because they knew that a witch was having some fun.

Many Muggles also looked up and saw this image, for that night the full moon fell on the 31^st of October, and many people were out at night. Some were frightened, but most were delighted, and wondered how on earth anyone was pulling off such a brilliant prank as to make the thing appear. They knew that with modern technology, almost anything was possible, but anyone with such a mastery of it truly deserved to be called a wizard.

As Andromeda flew, she felt an abyss beneath her, but had a sense of finality as she steered her broom toward Ottery St. Catchpole. The male werewolves would marry witches, or possibly wizards, obtain the potion, be assimilated. The female werewolves would become Sorceresses, and eventually be no more. But from the abyss she felt the memory of lost generations, the generations of male werewolves who had suffered under the curse, pretending all their lives that they did not want what they could not have; and she felt that the generations of female werewolves gone, who had written off their male counterparts because they had abandoned their cubs and their mates, would never know that they had lost a brother.