The Way Back to Daylight

Author's Notes: I've been posting this story at my livejournal for the past couple of months, so if you want more immediately, I'm trailingoff. Otherwise, I'll be posting here every couple of days until I'm up to chapter five. After that, I can't make any promises about how regularly I'll be updating, except to say that I'll finish this story, by hook or by crook, for my own satisfaction! I've got it all planned out, and it will probably be about fifteen chapters when complete.

This is an action/adventure, plot-driven story, but at its heart is a romance between Remus and Sirius. The prologue, however, is Remus/Tonks. For the purposes of this story, I needed to begin with the end of their relationship. If the idea of Remus/Tonks squicks you so unbearably that you can't read about them breaking up, then please don't read any further. Some other relationships will appear too: Ron/Hermione, Harry/Ginny, James/Lily, Snape/Regulus, and a pairing I've never seen before, Luna/Parvati. However, there will only be love scenes featuring Remus and Sirius, because they're the focus.

One last thing: the prologue and first three chapters are unbeta-ed, but from then on, the lovely cursedinsanity has been (and will be) beta-ing, and she's a kick-arse beta!

All feedback is appreciated to the point of worship! If you're reading and you like it, please let me know. And if you're reading and you don't like it, please let me know why, because constructive criticism is my favourite thing of all.

Night and day lie open the gates of death's dark kingdom:

But to retrace your steps, to find the way back to daylight--

That is the task, the hard thing.

- Virgil, Aeneid, VI. 128-130 (Oxford World Classics Ed.)

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Chapter One

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Harry was shelling peas into a bowl, his mouth drawn tight. A pile of pods, mangled and empty, lay at his elbow. He hadn't spoken since he'd run inside from the rain half an hour before, carrying a basket filled with the peas, some tomatoes and lemons, and a bushel of rosemary that Remus had hung to dry above the sink.

Now the rain was lulling, a decrescendo against the roof-tiles and windows. Remus was sitting opposite Harry, watching him while feigning interest in The Prophet cryptic crossword. There was a jug of red geraniums on the table between them, but Remus could see enough to know that Harry was about to speak. The boy kept glancing up, surreptitiously, then shrugging, grimacing and looking down at his hands again.

When he'd emptied the last of the pods, he swallowed, pushed the bowl towards the centre of the table and cleared his throat. Remus glanced up from the crossword with a neutral half-smile, laying down his quill.

"The weather's been strange lately, hasn't it?" Harry began.

Remus's smile widened. "Yes, it has."

"It doesn't feel like summer yet, and it's nearly August," Harry continued, tugging on the sleeve of his navy-blue jumper.

"Yes. My garden is certainly suffering for it. Hardly any lemons this year."

"Hmm."

There was a pause.

"How long are you planning to rent this cottage?" Harry asked.

"I'm not sure. Perhaps just until the end of summer."

There was another pause, and Harry cleared his throat again. "Remus?"

"Yes?"

"Were you...when you were living with Tonks...were you planning to marry her?"

Remus raised his eyebrows. "I - no. I'm not exactly the marrying kind."

"Oh." Harry bit his lip and kept his eyes on Remus's right ear. "Sorry."

"Harry, is there something troubling you?" Remus asked, reassuming the role of a sympathetic Professor. "Something you'd like to talk about?"

"Look, I need..." Harry began. He shook his head, but then he nodded and said, "I need your advice. I need the opinion of someone with your experience."

Remus stifled the quirk of his lips with a cough. "Experience in affairs of the heart?"

"Exactly," said Harry, relieved. Then, suddenly, he was tense again. "But, I mean, it's all right if you don't want to...I understand if it's too personal."

Under the combined scents of rain-damp wool, peas and earth, Remus could smell Harry's nervous, excited sweat, and if he listened hard enough, he could hear the humming thump of the boy's heart. Was Harry about to -? No, surely not.

"You can ask me anything, Harry. I might not be able to answer your questions, but I promise I'll do my best. I should warn you, though, that there are things about me you might not be aware of; things I've deliberately kept from you. Concerning affairs of the heart, that is."

Harry smiled and spread his palms flat on the table. "If you're talking about you and Sirius," he said, meeting Remus's eyes, "I already know."

Neither of them spoke for a moment. The kitchen was silent except for the rain.

Then, "Oh," said Remus. "How?"

Harry shrugged. "Hermione told me. She saw the two of you, years ago, when we stayed at Grimmauld Place over the holidays."

"She...she saw us?"

"Just kissing, was what she said," Harry replied, shrugging again as though it wasn't important.

The poor girl must have had the shock of her life, Remus thought, recalling how rarely he and Sirius had kissed without one of them being shoved against a wall.

"She didn't tell anyone else; not even Ron," Harry continued. "I mean, we haven't talked about it, but I'm pretty sure I know what he thinks about que -" he stopped himself just in time, a hand pressed over his mouth "- anyway, I thought it was better not to."

"So you've known about us, all this time?"

"No, Hermione didn't tell me until last year."

"Ah," said Remus, with a quick, knowing smile, "so that's why you didn't visit all through spring?"

Harry looked down and started fidgeting with a peapod. "Yeah," he admitted. "I was really busy, with the Auror exams and everything, but...but that was the main reason. I didn't handle it well. It's a good thing Hermione didn't tell me earlier, because I wouldn't have handled it at all."

"How did you come to terms with it?"

Harry smiled, keeping his eyes on the pod as he twisted it between his fingers. "I realised I was being a git," he said. "Back at school it was always a joke, an insult; I'd never thought about it seriously before." He looked up suddenly, meeting Remus's eyes. "You and Sirius loved each other, though, didn't you?"

At moments like this, Remus felt as though he was standing at a distance from himself, watching his body as it spoke. It was odd, even now, to hear Sirius referred to in the past tense, and even stranger to respond to it.

"Yes," he said.

Harry grinned, but his eyes were wet behind his glasses. "I'm glad someone loved him, and I'm glad it was you."

Remus tried to speak and failed, so he coughed instead. His hands were clenched, white-knuckled, and hidden in his lap. He hadn't been this close to breaking down in years.

Finally, his voice returned. "Thank you, Harry. I'm glad you feel that way. Sirius would have been, too. He wanted to tell you about us."

"Why?"

"Well..." Remus considered it for a moment. "I suppose, mainly because we hid our relationship from your father. As far as I'm aware, James never found out. Your mother may have, but I can't say for certain. Sometimes she would give me this look, this knowing look...but that's all water under the bridge, now. The important thing is that Sirius wanted you to know who he really was, because James never got the chance. But I...I reminded him that you aren't James. I said we should wait."

"I think you were right."

"Maybe I was, but it shouldn't have been my decision." Remus's voice had lowered, had darkened, but he couldn't stop speaking. "Padfoot was always too quick to obey me. He should have done what he thought was best. Who knows how it might have worked out? After all, your well-being was always his top priority; you were the first person in his thoughts. He knew he could never replace James, and he didn't want to, but he still cared for you like a father."

"He made me feel like a son," Harry replied, speaking almost in a whisper. "I'd never had that feeling before, you know...that feeling of someone watching over me, all the time, wanting the best for me. I made all these plans. I'd lie awake half the night sometimes, thinking about them. We were going to live together; be a family."

"I made plans, too," Remus confessed.

They sat in silence for a couple of minutes. Remus wondered whether he'd said everything there was to say; if he'd ever need to speak again.

Then Harry asked, in a faltering voice, "Remus, did you ever think about -?"

Remus knew what Harry was about to ask, and he couldn't hear it. "No."

Harry took a deep breath. "It's just that I looked into it, and -"

It was too much. Remus got up and walked to the window. He stood with his back to Harry, bracing himself with his hands on the sill. Outside, the rain continued to fall, and the garden continued to grow. The birds still sang. The sun still rose every morning and set every night. Tonks was in Romania. Sirius was dead. Remus was standing in the kitchen of a rented cottage, and he was alive.

"Remus?"

"No, Harry," Remus managed. "Please, whatever happens, don't. It can't be done without Dark Magic; it breaks every law of nature. Not only that, but it never works. Believe me, I've seen what happens. They come back blind and hairless and unable to walk or speak. I would rather die myself than..."

He heard Harry's chair creak back, then swift footsteps on the tiles behind him. A warm, tentative hand came to rest on his shoulder.

"So would I," said Harry. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up. I just thought if there was a way, another way, you'd know about it."

"There's no need to apologise, Harry," Remus replied, somehow keeping his voice steady. "I overreacted."

With a breath of relief, Harry removed his hand and stepped back. Remus turned around and gave him a quick, reassuring smile.

"How about I make a pot of tea?" he asked. "Then you can tell me what's been troubling you, and ask me whatever you like."

---

That night, after they'd eaten dinner and Harry had Apparated home, Remus opened a bottle of red wine. The rain had stopped, so he took a chair outside and sat on the lawn, under the stars, drinking straight out of the bottle. When he finished it, he lay down on the damp grass and stared up at the sky. The moon was fingernail-sharp and close to the horizon, and the balmy air smelt of mud and overripe roses. It was the kind of night, Remus thought, that should be shared; that shouldn't be spent alone.

He closed his eyes, tried not to think, and soon fell asleep. He dreamt, as he often did, of running through the Forbidden Forest, chasing a large black dog. When he woke, hours later, the night air had cooled, but the stars seemed even brighter.

Shivering, he was about to get up and go inside to bed, when he heard something rustle on the grass beside him. He turned his head, alarmed, and realised it was only Sirius.

"Hello, Padfoot," he said with a smile.

"Oh, you're awake," Sirius replied, turning to look at him.

Sirius was twenty years old, unlined and unmarred, with a careless grin. He was lying sprawled out on the lawn, dressed in his favourite leather jacket and jeans. His silver earring glinted like a diamond. There was something odd about him, though. His skin was bone white in the starlight, and Remus couldn't see his eyes, not even a gleam. Still, it was Sirius. He was solid, he was real, and his breath steamed out into the cold air.

Remus reached over, took Sirius's hand, blood-warm and smooth, and twined their fingers together.

Sirius squeezed his hand. "What've you been up to, Moony?"

"Missing you."

"Ah," Sirius replied, with a solemn nod, though his mouth turned up at the corner. "So, you can't live without me?"

Remus chuckled. "Oh, I wouldn't say that. I'm doing all right."

"Bollocks. You're pining away."

"Alas, alack," Remus murmured, stroking his thumb across the back of Sirius's hand.

"How's Harry?"

"Looks more like James every time I see him. He was just here today, actually, visiting me. He's a good lad; comes to see me more than I saw my parents after school."

"A good lad," Sirius mimicked, in a teasing whisper. "You sound old."

"I am old, Padfoot."

"Not really. You're barely middle-aged."

Remus raised an eyebrow, letting his silence speak for him.

"You're only as old as you feel," said Sirius, in an earnest whisper this time.

"Yes," Remus replied, equally earnest, "that's why you'll always be thirteen."

"Oh, don't say that, Moony," said Sirius, laughing. "They'd lock you up for that."

Remus smiled. "It's good to hear you laugh."

They lay there in silence for a while, stargazing, their hands still clasped on the grass between them.

"Tell me more about Harry," said Sirius. "I'm curious."

"He looks like James, but when it comes to decision-making, he takes after Lily. You should have heard him today, Padfoot. It turns out he's been agonising over whether he should ask Ginny to marry him."

"The little Weasley girl?"

"She's grown into a very attractive young woman. They've been seeing each other since the end of the war, and they moved in together last year."

"So, he wants to marry her. What's the problem?"

"There's no problem, as far as I can see. Harry just wanted my advice. He thinks they might be too young; he's concerned he won't be able to handle the responsibility. But I think that, at the heart of the matter, he's worried she'll turn him down."

Sirius shook his head, bemused. "You told him to go for it, yeah?"

"Of course. Her answer will never be certain, but if he really wants to spend his life with her, he should ask as soon as possible. I'm sure she'll say yes; I've seen the way she looks at him. He's lucky to be loved so well, at such a young age. I'll be picking out an engagement gift soon, there's no doubt about it."

"I hope you're right," Sirius replied. "Remember when James asked Lily?"

"Of course. Completely spur of the moment. Or, at least, he never breathed a word to us about it."

"You almost choked on your porridge when he told you. I had to slap you on the back."

They grinned at each other, and Remus realised he was playing with Sirius's fingers, stroking and gently bending them, as he'd done when they were teenagers.

"Remember when I asked you, Moony?" Sirius asked, in a rough, low voice.

"Yeah," Remus replied, in kind.

"Remember what you said?"

"I said we'd never be able to get married. I said it was impossible."

"And then?"

"I said as far as I was concerned, we were already married. So it didn't matter, anyway. It didn't matter what anyone would think, if they found out. I loved you, and you loved me. No one could change that, no matter what they did to us."

Remus pulled his hand, slowly, from Sirius's grasp. He turned his head to face the sky.

"I still feel that way, Padfoot. I think I always will."

This time, Sirius didn't reply. Remus didn't have the energy to pretend anymore. He knew, all too well, that Sirius wasn't going to return on a summer night, to lie out on the lawn beneath the waning moon and a sky of countless glittering stars. Sirius was gone.

Even so, Remus thought, as he got to his feet and stretched his aching muscles; even so, it felt good to pretend.

---

The first time Remus thought Sirius was dead, they were fighting a group of Death Eaters behind a pub in Brixton.

They'd signalled for back-up, but it didn't look like they'd be needing it. The two of them were shielded by a pile of rubbish, while the Death Eaters were trapped against a brick wall, exposed and vulnerable. They were obviously young and inexperienced, probably still at school. Two were knocked out already; the others were huddled together, trying to protect themselves with shaky spells, on the verge of giving up.

Then, suddenly, Remus lost his footing on an empty beer bottle and swayed sideways into the line of fire. As he righted himself, he saw Sirius walk out in front of the Death Eaters. He saw a flash of green light hit Sirius in the chest.

Never mind that Sirius was crouching beside him, safe behind the rubbish heap. Never mind that Sirius had grabbed his legs and was telling him to, "Get down, get down, get the fuck down, Moony!" Sirius had been hit by an Avada Kedavra, and was lying in front of Remus in the alleyway, dead.

When Remus woke in St. Mungo's, Lily was sitting beside his bed, reading the latest Witch Weekly. She put it down when she noticed him stirring, and met his eyes.

"It's all right," Remus told her, hoarse-voiced. "I know Sirius is dead."

Lily didn't reply for a moment, as though she couldn't find the right words. Remus knew, then, that it was true. Sirius was gone.

"Remus..." she began.

"Please, don't say anything. I saw him fall. I know he's dead. I'd like to rest now, if that's all right."

"You must have been hit by a Confundus charm," Lily said, speaking too quickly for him to interrupt. "Sirius isn't dead. He just went to get some tea; he'll be back any minute."

Remus nodded but he didn't believe her, not until the door swung open and Sirius walked into the room. He was holding a mug of tea in each hand; it was a wonder he hadn't scalded himself.

"Oh, good, you're awake," he said, when he saw Remus. "Want a cup of tea?"

Lily got up, smiled at them both, and slipped out of the room. Remus could only stare.

"What?" Sirius asked. He sat in the chair Lily had just vacated and set the tea on the bedside table. "What is it, Moony? Have I got something in my teeth?"

Remus shook his head. "It's just that...well, that you're alive. I saw you die, but you're alive."

Sirius moved to sit on the edge of the bed, pulling Remus into his arms. Remus stroked his hands over Sirius's shoulders and back, comforted by their warmth and solidity, and by the steady beat of Sirius's heart. He pressed his face against Sirius's neck, kissing the smooth, hot skin he found, and licking Sirius's Adam's apple. Sirius smelt of aftershave, soap and dog, and he murmured reassuring words into Remus's hair.

"I never want you to die," said Remus. He said it matter-of-factly, but he was crying, tears soaking into the collar of Sirius's robes.

"I'm going to have to die sometime. Everyone does."

"Then I want to die first."

Sirius just held him tighter. They never spoke of it again.

---

"I've been thinking about you, baby,

By the light of dawn, and in my blues,

Day and night, I've been missing you."

- Massive Attack, Live With Me