The Long Fight of Nymphadora Tonks

Chapter 14: Just One Night

The day was tortuous. All she kept hearing were rumours, whispers that told too many different versions of the story, some claiming the involvement of an entire gang of werewolves, others saying only one had performed the deed. But all were unified in their anger and revoltion at what had been done to that innocent child, and most seemed to blame the whole species for it, making no distinction in their threats of retribution.

By the time Tonks apparated in the usual deserted alley and made her way onto the street where her home stood, she was feeling completely drained, hoarse from arguing against the wave of unrelenting, non-discretional hate, and sick with worry. She stumbled up the steps to the front door, got her keys out of her pocket, dropped them, swore under her breath as she bent to pick them up, and inserted them gingerly into the keyhole. But she did not have to turn them in the lock. The door was opened to her from the inside by her mother.

"Nymphadora!" she exclaimed.

"Don't say anything, Mum," Tonks said wearily, dropping her keys again as she entered the hallway. "I know I look like death warmed up, but I don't want to talk about it, okay?"

"Have you been in a fight?" Andromeda Tonks asked, ignoring her daughter's remark. "Or are you ill? You've not been looking well for ages, Nymph, I do wish you'd see a healer."

"I'm fine," Tonks snapped. "I just want to go to bed."

"Not just yet, I think," her mother said. "You have a visitor."

"What? Who?"

"Remus Lupin."

Tonks's eyes snapped upwards from the floor to her mother's face. She had certainly not expected this. Nor, it seemed, had her mother. And as she examined her daughter's face, Andromeda seemed to begin to realise what had made her so quiet and ill-looking, what it was that she hadn't wanted to talk about for months and months, though it was evidently eating away at her.

"Don't tell me ... that's it, isn't it? Remus Lupin. You ...?"

"I fight for love, Mum. Surely that's something even you can understand," Tonks said testily, too tired to argue and too eager to learn whatever Remus had come to say.

"Sweetheart, he's ..."

"What?" Tonks demanded, her hands on her hips.

"In the living room," her mother said wonderingly.

Tonks hurried through the door she indicated at once, but for a moment she felt a rush of disappointment. The room seemed empty. It was dark, and she had to strain her eyes before she saw a slight movement in the shadows at the opposite end, beside the drawn curtains of the window.

"Remus?" she whispered.

"Tonks ..."

He somehow managed to fill the one syllable with a wealth of emotions she would never have expected, least of all from him. She had come to rely so on his self-control, his everlasting calm and annoying unmovableness. Yet now she heard relief, pain, pleasure, exhaustion, grief and even a certain appeal for help in his voice. In just that one word. One syllable. Her name. She crossed the room, took one quick look at his strained face in the dim light that her eyes were slowly becoming accustomed to, and put her arms around his middle, holding on for dear life.

"Oh, thank goodness!" she cried.

For a moment, he seemed to forget everything. He forgot to speak, forgot to think, and he forgot not to hold her as tightly as she held him. Then Tonks said,

"I heard this morning ... about that boy ... And I've been so frightened ever since ..."

He peeled her arms off him gently. "... that I had something to do with it?"

"Not exactly. But that you might somehow have been involved, even though you didn't want to. I knew you hadn't taken your potion, and that Greyback would gladly ..."

"It was Greyback," he interrupted. "He set out deliberately to do his worst. That is, I don't know whether he meant to kill the boy or just bite him, but he certainly meant more than mischief. They told me when I arrived there - at his "den", as he likes to call it. But I couldn't do anything about it." His voice shook a little. "It was too late. The moon was almost full, I had to lock myself up ..."

He turned to the closed curtains, his eyes distant, as though he were looking through the fabric at something she could not see.

"Remus," Tonks said quietly, "I'm so glad to see you, but ... why did you come?"

"I had to let you know it was all right, that I had nothing to do with this."

"You could have sent a message. That would have been safer than to risk Greyback's people catching you on your way to an auror's home."

"Yes. But ... I wanted to see you."

She drew her breath in sharply. "This must have shaken you up a good deal, then ... for you to admit that ..."

Turning towards her abruptly, he said in an unusually quick, eager voice, "Tonks, you know I ... how I feel ... It's just ... I can't let you ..."

"Shh. Not now." She covered his mouth with her fingers to silence him. "I've had a long day, worrying about you. You know everything I want to say, and I know all the excuses you can come up with. But I haven't got the energy to start arguing now, and I doubt you have. I can't see much of you in this light, but I know you're dead on your feet. Come and sit down, and let's not talk any more. Let's just not think about it all, just for one night."

"I should go home ..." he said slowly.

Tonks took him by the hand and led him to the sofa, then pushed him gently onto it. She sat down beside him and took his hand. He leaned his head against the backrest and just looked at her. Slowly his eyes began to close. Tonks watched him until she was sure he had fallen asleep. Then she nestled her head on his shoulder and allowed her silent tears to trickle down his neck.

It'll be all right. Some day all this horrible fighting will be over, people like Greyback will get what's coming to them ... damn Greyback! If it hadn't been for him, Remus and I could be like this, always. The age difference wouldn't matter if it wasn't for all the rest, and that was all his fault. Monster. Murderer.

Her hand closed more tightly around Remus's, and slowly Tonks too drifted off to sleep. It was her mother who woke her in the morning. Remus had left a note on Tonks's lap. On it were written just two words: Thank you.