The Summer of the Phoenix

Chapter 16

Tonks, after all, had been in a hurry to get back to Grimmauld Place.

"I hope it's OK if I'm a little early," she said when Sirius opened the door to her. She had exchanged her spiky bleached hair for a mane of auburn curls that fell to her shoulders, and she wore a witch's robes today instead of Muggle clothes. Her eyes were a clear grey that went very well with the colour of her hair.

"It's perfectly OK," said Sirius, rather stunned by her completely changed appearance, which was certainly as perfectly OK as the fact that she was rather early for dinner.

Mrs Weasley and Bill looked no less impressed when they came back down to the kitchen together.

"Hi!" Tonks said in her usual bright manner, misreading their expressions as confusion. "I was the one with the short blonde hair on Friday. I'm Tonks. Can I lend you a hand with the dinner, Mrs Weasley?"

"It's Molly, dear," said Mrs Weasley, looking around for something for Tonks to do. "You could help us set the table, everything will be quite ready in a minute. Plates are in the dresser over there." She took the pots and pans off the stove while Tonks went to get the plates.

"Is it only us four then?" Tonks asked, and Sirius caught himself listening for a note of disappointment in her voice that might have been there, or might not.

"We'll be five with Remus," he said quickly.

"That's great." Sirius would have given a lot to see her face just then, but Tonks had turned away to the dresser, and eagerly picked up a stack of plates. A little too eagerly - the one on top slipped through her fingers and shattered on the stone floor. "Oh, I'm sorry!" she cried, blushing furiously. "I always do that. Reparo." At a flick of her wand, the pieces of broken china flew together again to form the perfectly immaculate plate they had been before. "My mum taught me that spell even before I went to school," she said apologetically. "Definitely the one I still need most." She carefully picked the plate up and placed it on the table with the others. Bill laid out the cutlery.

"Did Remus say when he'll be here?" Mrs Weasley asked Sirius neutrally.

"I have no idea," he replied. "I haven't seen him since Friday. He'll be downstairs in his own time when he feels like it."

Mrs Weasley cast an uneasy look in Tonks's direction, but Tonks only nodded understandingly, and asked no questions.

"Do you think he'd mind if we just got started?" Mrs Weasley suggested. "So Bill can have a proper dinner before he's off?" She held out her hands for their plates without waiting for an answer, and they began their meal.

"This is delicious, Mrs Weasley - Molly," Tonks said right after the first bite. "I wish I was as great at cooking. But at home I'm banned from the kitchen, my mum says I just mess things up anyway."

Mrs Weasley shook her head in mild disapproval. "How are you ever going to learn, then? If you want, I could show you some -"

"Tonks, how's Harry?" Sirius interrupted them. Praising Mrs Weasley's cooking might come first, but household tips definitely didn't.

Tonks, who had her mouth full, didn't answer immediately.

"I'm sure Harry's fine," Mrs Weasley replied in her stead, somewhat irritably.

"That's true," Tonks confirmed a moment later. "He's fine, Sirius. You'd hear of it straight away if he wasn't."

"So what's he up to?" Sirius inquired. "Fine", after all, meant everything and nothing.

"Not much, as far as I could see," Tonks reported. "He didn't leave the house at all while I was there. I walked around to the back alley and I could see him silhouetted against his open window. Like he was watching the sky, or waiting for someone, or something. I felt a lot like sneaking up under his window to have a little chat with him, but I didn't want to give him a fright. And besides, Arabella says he wasn't supposed to know that we're there at all."

"I just don't get it," said Sirius, sudden anger flaring up inside him again. "There's simply no point in keeping that a secret. The Order's existence, maybe, and the Order's other work, but why shouldn't he know someone's there protecting him?"

"Dumbledore thinks it's better for him this way," said Mrs Weasley firmly.

"And I think Harry would feel a lot better if he knew that his friends are around and taking care of him."

But would he really? Wouldn't he rather feel imprisoned, just like Sirius did himself, useless and depending on others? Maybe he'd even do something stupid, like run away from there just because he hated the feeling of being watched and confined to his Muggle family's home? That was just the kind of thing Harry might do. He'd run off from that place before. Maybe he was better off not knowing after all - for his own safety. But then, being cut off from everyone and everything had to be terrible for him, after all that had happened.

"Look," Bill began, but his mother's voice drowned his.

"Harry's just a child," said Mrs Weasley rather loudly, "and if Albus Dumbledore thinks there are some things he shouldn't be burdened with, I must say I quite agree."

"It wouldn't be a burden," said Sirius heatedly. "He's got a right to know what's going on, and that we're there and doing something!"

But that's not true, a little voice in his head said. You spend your days sitting somewhere watching the sky, too. None of you are actually doing anything, and you yourself least of all. You're all just waiting for the blow to fall, and if it falls anywhere near your godson, Sirius, you won't be there to take it in his stead as you promised you would.

"...and that's how it should remain," Mrs Weasley's words rose over Sirius's thoughts. They were followed by a frosty silence. Bill and Tonks exchanged a very uncomfortable look across the table.

"And now," Mrs Weasley announced to no one in particular, and got up from her chair, "I'm going to put some of this back in the oven to keep it warm for Remus, if he won't come."

"Do you think he's all right?" Tonks asked Sirius rather anxiously.

"Oh, he'll be," Sirius said. "It's not the first time it's a full moon, he knows how to handle that."

"But I'd still advise you not to go and check," said Bill lightly.

Mrs Weasley gave her son a stern look. "You don't say things like that, Bill" she chided him.

"Oh, but he's right," said a voice from the door. "And trust me, I should know."

Framed in the doorway was Remus Lupin, looking rather thin and worn in his shabby robes, and with what seemed in the flickering firelight like a few more grey strands in his brown hair. But his voice, Sirius noticed with relief, was the same as ever, and its lightness was real. Lupin quietly closed the door and came into the room. Tonks, who had been sitting with her back to him, got up to greet him.

"Oh - Nymphadora," he said, recognising her. "How wonderful to see you again."

Tonks opened her mouth.

"It's Tonks," said Sirius, meaning to anticipate her reaction, but she only asked, "Are you all right?" in a tone of such genuine concern that Sirius felt rather stupid.

"As fine as anyone could be, with the smell of a delicious dinner wafting through the house, and finding such pleasant company to enjoy it in," Lupin replied.

Good old Moony, Sirius thought, slightly amused. At least he'd found his voice again. Next, he'd be kissing her hand. And maybe he would have done so, if Mrs Weasley hadn't at that moment placed a steaming plate on the last empty place at the table, and invited him to sit.

"That's lovely," he said, accepting the invitation. "Thanks ever so much, Molly."

And this was where the pleasantries ended. They resumed their meal together, and Lupin did his best to catch up with the others at an amazing speed. He literally - there was no other word for it - wolfed down his dinner as if he hadn't eaten anything all weekend, which, Sirius realised as he watched him with sympathy, was very likely the case. But his friend was doing very well - he was recovering from the full moon, but he wasn't recovering only from that.

For the moment though, Lupin was obviously not going to talk, unless it was to ask for a second helping, and Sirius didn't feel like resuming the conversation he had just had with Mrs Weasley, so he was quite thankful when Bill finally turned to a safer topic.

"So, Tonks," said Bill conversationally, "how do you do that, changing your looks like that, I mean? Are you really a Metamorphmagus, or did your cousin once try to transfigure you into a chameleon and messed up?"

Tonks laughed. "I wouldn't put that past him," she said, and gave Sirius a quick smile. "But no, I am a Metamorphmagus."

"You're the first one I've ever met," Mrs Weasley rejoined the conversation. "They're quite rare apparently."

"Is it that hard to learn?" Bill asked.

"I'm afraid you can't learn it at all," said Tonks modestly. "Either you are or you aren't. You're born with it."

"Some say you can learn it," Sirius interjected.

"Who says so?" Tonks asked back.

"Someone in the January 1974 issue of Transfiguration Today," Sirius shrugged.

"Whoa." Bill raised his eyebrows ironically. "Our discussion is certainly reaching awe-inspiring academic levels here."

"The funny thing is," said Tonks quite seriously, "it is related to Transfiguration in some way or another, but nobody knows exactly how. It seems that learning Transfiguration systematically really boosts your range of appearances, while at the same time Metamorphmagi find it much easier than most wizards to master other complicated Transfiguration techniques, too. I mean - " She stopped short, a little embarrassed that she sounded as if she was boasting about it. "I mean, I've just always liked Transfiguration, like back at school."

"Professor McGonagall must have been delighted," Mrs Weasley said kindly. "It was your favourite subject, I suppose?"

"Oh yes. A definite favourite - beat even Potions."

"Potions?" four voices asked at the same time, all in various tones of surprise and disbelief. Even Remus Lupin had stopped eating, and put down his fork and knife to stare at Tonks.

"That must have been before Snape's time," said Bill.

"No," Tonks said gravely, "that was actually because of Snape. I mean - " She laughed at their doubtful faces. "You know, in my first year at Hogwarts, it was still the old Potions teacher, Professor what's-her-name, I can't even remember. This elderly lady that didn't ever teach us anything useful except household stuff and little cures for sore throats and things."

"But she was really good at that." Mrs Weasley sounded slightly affronted.

"Maybe she was," Tonks conceded, "but still, nobody ever took Potions seriously, and nobody was sorry when she retired. Then Professor Sprout took over for a year. Now Professor Sprout is a great herbologist and a wonderful person, but outside her greenhouses, she simply had no idea what she was doing, I'm sorry to say. So, in my third year, Snape got the job, and there -" Tonks snapped her fingers "- was Potions as Potions should be."

"I don't know about that," Bill muttered.

"He was brilliant," Tonks said emphatically.

"He might be a brilliant potion-maker," Mrs Weasley remarked sceptically, "but I'm not sure Professor Snape was exactly born to be a teacher."

"To put it mildly," Bill added, grinning appreciatively. "That's the first time I've ever heard you speak ill of a Hogwarts teacher, Mum."

"Professor Snape has given each and every of my children nightmares in their turn," Mrs Weasley told the others defensively.

"That's not quite true though," Bill corrected her. "With Fred and George, it's probably more the other way round."

They all laughed heartily.

"I know he can be a bit mean," Tonks admitted. "But it kind of takes the edge off it when you can take your revenge by growing long greasy hair and a hooked nose behind his back." More laughter followed her words. "Anyway," Tonks continued, "he knew what he was talking about. Snape was cool, in his own way. He was different. And he was young, for a teacher. Even now, he can't be much older than you two are." She nodded in Sirius's and Lupin's direction.

"He isn't," Sirius said, unsmiling.

"Was that supposed to be a compliment?" Lupin asked her mockingly, at the same time giving Sirius the slightest look of warning.

Tonks blushed. "Sorry," she said. "It's just - they were great classes. Particularly the last two years. We were only four students in his NEWT class then, only those that were really interested, you know. We were his elite, kind of. Snape taught us the most amazing things, stuff far beyond even the NEWT curriculum, things that students would normally never even hear about. Top-flight Potions, believe me. There were days when he actually seemed to enjoy teaching us."

"Next thing you'll be telling us is that you've seen him laugh," Bill grinned.

"No," said Tonks, suddenly serious. "That, never."

"You're certainly exceptional in more than one way, Nymphadora," said Lupin. "You must be the only Hogwarts student who ever liked Snape's classes."

"Do you think I should tell him, one of these days?" Tonks asked brightly. "To cheer him up?"

"What, that you enjoyed his classes or that you were the only one who ever did?" Bill asked back.

"What do you think will cheer him up more?"

"The latter," said Lupin dryly. "Otherwise he'll think his teaching methods have failed."