There'll Be Bluebirds

Teddy groaned and pushed his head under his pillow. Going to see Madam Pomfrey was pointless. She'd just make him swallow some foul-tasting potion and make him lie down with cool cloths on his forehead. He'd once asked her if she could at least add honey or sugar to it, but Madam Pomfrey just tutted about ingredients losing potency if it were sweetened. -Just one more day... he moaned to himself.

'Teddy, mate, you're going to miss breakfast!' one of his year mates said urgently.

'Shhh!' Teddy could hear Joel shushing the others. 'Full moon tonight,' he reminded them. 'You know how tetchy he gets...'

Teddy thought he heard a note of contempt in Joel's voice, but shook it off as a symptom of the vague sense of paranoia that sometimes accompanied the full moon. The other boys left the room, allowing the door to slam noisily behind them. Teddy hissed in pain as the noise reverberated off the stone walls and floors, his hands clutching tightly on his pillow. The echo died away quickly and Teddy felt himself gradually relax into the bed, the relative silence a welcome respite. The fingers of one hand wrapped around the smooth leather cover of one of Remus' journals that he'd hidden under the pillow. Under the near-darkness of the curtain-shrouded bed, Teddy opened his eyelids to bare slits and slowly turned the pages. He couldn't imagine having a teacher like the Umbridge person his father mentioned from time to time. Every teacher at Hogwarts was skilled in their specialty, and sometimes almost equally skilled in another. From what Harry had told him about Umbridge during the summer, and what he'd gleaned from the journal entries, Umbridge was next to useless as a teacher. It made him wonder what N.E.W.T.s she'd actually taken and passed.

He gave up trying to read the next entry. The elegant copperplate script Remus customarily used was difficult to read under the present circumstance. It swam and blurred. Teddy closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

*****

'"Busy old fool, unruly Sun,/Why dost thou thus,/Through windows, and through curtains, call on us?/Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?" Obviously, John Donne wasn't a werewolf,' Remus muttered to the battered teapot on the table. He disagreed with the notion that the sun was a bad thing. He welcomed it. He couldn't remember a time when he didn't tilt his face up to the sun, especially the morning after the full moon, if he was lucky enough for it to be a sunny day. When he was older and indulged the wolf with outdoor transformations, he'd allowed himself a stolen hour or two to stretch out in an isolated field to sunbathe naked. Today happened to be a sunny day, so he had the thin curtains pulled back from the windows, allowing the light to straggle into the flat.

Booming knocks broke into his reverie and Remus stared at the door, startled. Who on earth could that be...? The only person who ever ventured up to the flat recently had been Dora, but he hadn't seen much of her in the last week, although she'd left a basket of food on his doorstep for him to find after the full moon the other day. At least he'd thought it was her. Nobody else would think to leave an ironic sprig of wolfsbane twined around the handle.

Drawing his wand from his pocket, Remus approached the door warily. 'Who's there?' he called out.

'Ted Tonks.'

Remus frowned. There was no way to ascertain if it was, in fact, Ted. But he could try. 'How did your wife choose Nymphadora...?'

'She was reading Greek mythology when she went into labor. And when it was obvious the baby was a Metamorphmagus, she settled on Nymphadora.'

Remus opened the door a bare inch, and kept his wand trained on the older man's forehead. Ted Tonks stood patiently on the landing. He didn't seem to be coerced and it looked as if he were alone. Still... Remus gave his wand the merest flick, but the only red light he could see outlined Ted. Satisfied, he widened the opening enough to allow Ted to slip into the flat. Ted looked around the small flat, at the bookcases filled to overflowing with books and the neat stacks of much-read cheap paperbacked books acquired in secondhand bookshops when he had the money to spare, or salvaged from someone's dustbin. 'If literature be the food of love, read on?' Ted asked wryly.

'Something like that,' Remus agreed, tucking his wand back into the pocket of his trousers, wondering why Ted was here. He'd only met the man once, more than a month ago at Dora's flat.

'I'm more of a music sort of bloke myself,' Ted mused. 'Classic Muggle rock. Beatles, Rolling Stones, Cream, Jefferson Airplane, the Who. Occasionally Led Zeppelin... Janis Joplin...' A beatific smile passed over his face. 'Used to sing in Potions class. Early Beatles. How I wooed Dora's mother.'

'How did you find my address?' Remus asked.

'Not a state secret, is it?' Ted countered. 'I used to work in the Ministry.'

'Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures?' Remus snorted.

'No. Magical Accidents and Catastrophes. But I did look you up last month.' Ted gave Remus a hard look. 'Something any concerned father might do. And Dora won't talk about you.'

'I see,' Remus said stiffly. 'Can I get you something? Cup of tea, perhaps?' Remus offered belatedly, remembering his manners.

'Cuppa would be nice. Andi's trying to make me drink the decaffeinated stuff,' Ted said with a grimace. 'Been reading too many Muggle women's mags. Steamed veg, baked skinless chicken,' he added mournfully. 'Says I need to start watching what I eat.'

'And she can smell fish and chips on you from a mile away?' Remus guessed. He didn't think much got by Andromeda Tonks. Remus found a dusty mug in the cupboard and hastily gave it a cleaning with his wand, then began the process of fixing a fresh pot of tea.

'Yeah,' Ted sighed. He took a seat at Remus' small kitchen table and idly picked up the book of poetry Remus had left lying on it. 'Mind if I ask you something?'

'Don't suppose I could stop you from doing so,' Remus replied, spooning tea leaves into his old teapot.

'How do you keep from letting the werewolf gain control? According to your file, Greyback bit you when you were four.'

Remus stoically poured tea into two mugs and carried them to the table. 'Because I don't let it,' he said stonily. 'I'm nothing like Greyback.'

'Sort of like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, eh?'

'Except I don't enjoy my Mr. Hyde. Unlike Dr. Jekyll, I don't find a measure of freedom in my transformations. If only I had a portrait of my werewolf self,' Remus mused, sipping his tea.

'So you could stab it?' Ted said with a chuckle.

'Probably end up killing both of us,' Remus said. 'Can't really separate myself from the wolf.'

'Which brings me to why I'm here,' Ted began. 'Forgive me for being prosaic, but what are your intentions toward my daughter?'

Remus started, slopping tea over the edge of his mug. He brushed at the front of his jumper with a tea towel. 'I have none,' he admitted.

'So you're just toying with her?' Ted rumbled.

'No. I mean... I... I have no business becoming involved with her,' Remus recited. 'I'm too old and too dangerous.'

'But you do love her, don't you?'

Remus nodded, his lips pressed together, staring into his mug.

Ted sighed and set his mug down. 'I know you didn't choose to become a werewolf, lad. No one does. No more than I chose to be born a wizard. I was prepared to walk away from Andromeda for her own protection. A Muggle-born had no right to try and be with a member of the Black family. Not unless she was prepared to cut herself off from the rest of her family.'

'You'd disown Dora?' Remus asked skeptically.

'No.'

Remus felt his head reel. There was only one choice, really. It was the only one he had all along.

*****

7 March 1996

If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die?

No, I didn't choose to become a werewolf. But I'm still a human being. No matter what the Ministry might have to say about that.

I am nothing like Fenrir Greyback. Nothing. I do not bite small children during the full moon. I do not prefer to take revenge against adults by going after their children. I do not kill because I enjoy it. I do not give the wolf free reign over my life between full moons.

This is my life, damn it. MY life.

And any idea that I might have any sort of choice over it is simply an illusion. And any attempt to pretend that I can choose has been futile.

*****

'You've shaid - said - yourself you aren' keen about keepin' Diviniation as a subject.'

Dumbledore looked at Sirius over the rims of his half-moon glasses. 'You are inebriated,' he stated, the twinkle in his eyes shadowed by the stern look he currently gave to Sirius.

'So? What elshh... elsssse do I have t' do 'round 'ere?' Sirius drawled belligerently.

Dumbledore sighed and turned away from Sirius. 'My feelings about Divination aside, I have reasons for keeping Sybill on the staff of Hogwarts.'

'But she's not on staff,' Arthur said. 'Umbridge fired her.'

'She can still live at Hogwarts,' Dumbledore maintained. 'Dolores may have usurped my ability to hire and fire teachers, but I still have the right to say who lives at Hogwarts and who does not. And Sybill stays.'

'Why is it so important for Trelawney to live at Hogwarts?' Remus asked quietly.

'I have my reasons,' Dumbledore stated.

'Perhaps you could share them?' Remus persisted.

Dumbledore's face was inscrutable. 'She knows things about what Riddle wants in the Department of Mysteries,' he allowed.

'An' th' only place tha's shafer den Grint'tts 's 'ogwar's,' Sirius slurred sarcastically.

'Well, I see you haven't entirely pickled your brain in firewhisky,' Molly noted archly.

'Bugger off,' Sirius huffed.

'So have you thought about what you're going to do for the Divination class until the situation at school changes?' Arthur asked, desperately trying to turn the conversation back to the current situation and away from the potentially volatile explosion brewing at the other end of the table.

'I've asked Firenze to take over and share the teaching duties for the time being. It was necessary for him to indulge in a change of scenery for the moment.'

'A centaur?' Remus choked. 'That's going to put Umbridge's knickers in such a wad; she'll need an Entrail-Expelling curse to put things to rights.'

Dumbledore's lips twitched. 'That is an image I could have lived without.' He rose from the table and gave Remus a significant look, then flicked his eyes toward Sirius. Remus nodded once. Sirius' drinking had progressed to a point where it was hindering his limited ability to participate in Order business. And now Remus had to take care of it. Dumbledore swept from the kitchen after bidding farewell to Molly and Arthur.

'Do you need any help putting Sirius to bed?' Arthur inquired. Remus' gaze swiveled to Sirius' end of the table. He was slumped in his chair, head pillowed on the table, snoring softly.

Remus shook his head. 'No. But thank you.'

'Are you sure?' Arthur dubiously eyed Remus' thin frame.

'I'll Levitate him up to bed,' Remus said. 'If I happen to bump his head a few times, I doubt he'll feel it under the hangover he'll have when he does wake up.'

The howls of Mrs. Black's portrait rang through the kitchen. Sirius snorted in his sleep, then resumed his deep, steady breaths. The portraits rants were suddenly silenced and Dora appeared in the kitchen door, clutching a small brown paper bag. 'Have I missed it?'

'Dumbledore just left. Umbridge sacked Trelawney and tried to throw her out of the castle,' Molly told her, sniffing a little in disapproval at Dora's tardiness. 'But he intervened and is keeping her there for her own safety, but won't really say why, other than she know about what you lot have been guarding. And he's asked one of the centaurs to replace Trelawney for now.' She turned to Arthur and Remus. 'Is that it?'

The sharpness of Molly's mind, contrary to her normal appearance, never failed to impress Remus. 'Yeah, that's about it.'

'I'm sorry I couldn't get here sooner,' Dora began. 'I was on my way over and noticed I was being followed.'

'Followed?' Arthur asked sharply. 'By who?'

'I don't know. Whoever it was, they had on a cloak and the hood was pulled up over their face.' She held up the brown paper bag. 'I ducked into a Muggle shop, then after I bought something so I didn't look suspicious, went into the loo and Apparated to that alley down the street.'

'You'll need to let Kingsley know in the morning,' Arthur told her. Dora nodded and set the paper bag on the table.

'As soon as I get to work.'

'Good. Molly?' Arthur held out a hand, and Molly took it, her fingers trembling slightly. They left the kitchen, clutching each other's hands.

Remus sighed and rolled up his sleeves. He pointed his wand at Sirius and jerked it up. Sirius' head banged painfully against the wall behind his chair. 'What are you doing?' Dora asked curiously.

'Putting the mutt to bed,' Remus replied, getting a shoulder under Sirius' arm, and wrapping his arm around his waist.

'Would you like some help?'

Tell her no... Tell her you don't need it... Send her back home... 'Yeah, thanks.' Remus felt his ears burn. He'd all but promised Ted he would begin the process of disengaging himself from Dora's life. That they'd go back to being colleagues in the Order. But he couldn't make himself push her away. She was his weakness. An old Muggle comic book came to mind. One that he'd read when he was desperate for entertainment. Kryptonite, he mused. Dora moved to the table and wrapped her arm around Sirius on his other side.

Sirius roused a little. 'Know wha' I need?' he mumbled drunkenly.

'What's that?' Remus asked, humoring his friend.

'A goo' shag...' Sirius peered through his hair at Remus. 'I'ss been...' He trailed off and his eyes unfocused as he counted. 'Four'een yearsh.'

'Are you sure everything's in good working condition after such a long time?' Remus chuckled.

'Does yoursh even wor'?' Sirius said snidely.

Remus felt Dora's eyes on him. 'Enough of that now,' he murmured, feeling the ripple of a flush climb up his face. He pointed with his chin to an open door and with Dora's help, managed to guide Sirius' body into his bedroom and dumped it on the unmade bed. Tonks pulled Sirius' slippers off and dropped them next to the bed, then helped Remus roll Sirius onto his stomach, angling his head so his face nearly hung off the edge of the bed. 'There, if he vomits, he might not choke on it,' Remus muttered, Summoning a small dustbin and positioning it next to the bed.

Tonks flicked her wand at the fireplace, bringing it roaring into life, filling the dark, damp room with light and warmth. 'Why do you have to care for him?'

'Because I need to do what I failed to do when we were in school.'

'Which was...?'

Remus dropped onto the small sofa in front of the fire. He gazed at the bag in her hands. 'What'd you buy at the shop?'

'Oh.' Dora looked at the bag, startled. She seemed to have forgotten all about it. 'Ice cream,' she said wryly. 'Chocolate.' She pulled a small carton from the bag. 'Want to share? Save me from eating it all by myself?'

Remus smiled a little and waved his wand. Two spoons appeared in mid-air, and he wrapped his fingers around the handles and inclined his head to the seat on the sofa next to him. Dora pried the lid off the carton and accepted one of the spoons. 'So... Why...?' She waved a hand at the figure sprawled across the messy bed.

'When we were in school, I never tried to convince him what he was doing was destructive. And I was a bloody prefect. Never chided him for what he did or said.' Remus scraped the spoon across the surface of the ice cream, closing his eyes in pleasure as it slid down his throat. 'I never had friends when I was younger. My parents kept me sort of isolated, because of the lycanthropy. So when James and Sirius befriended me, and remained friends with me, even after they found out about me, I was so desperate to keep them as friends, that I refused to do anything more than put up a token protest at their behavior.

'So now, I have to do what I didn't want to do then.'

'Do you think he'll be angry at you for calling him out on his drinking?'

'Probably,' Remus sighed. 'I'll do it when he wakes up.' Remus glanced at Sirius. 'Maybe after I make him some coffee,' he amended.

*****

9 March 1996

I didn't do it. I couldn't bring myself to confront Sirius. Because I am coward. Especially when it comes to people who do actually like me.

I couldn't do it when Dora offered to stay and I ought to have made her leave.

I couldn't do it when Sirius woke up. I don't want to lose his friendship, and it's not that I think our friendship couldn't withstand a little criticism, but I can't risk it. But at the same time, he needs to stop using alcohol to insulate himself against the fact he can't leave Grimmauld Place.

That being said... I don't know why Dumbledore doesn't allow him to leave Grimmauld Place. It's not as if we don't have methods at our disposal for allowing him to leave without being recognized. He could use Polyjuice or Disillusionment charms.

Unless... No... Dumbledore couldn't possibly be that diabolical. He couldn't possibly be deliberately destroying Sirius...

Because if he is... what purpose would that serve...?

*****

'Teddy?' Victoire called softly through the curtains of his bed.

'Ungh?'

'I brought you some soup...' she said hesitantly. 'And Madam Pomfrey said you're to take this...' A small vial filled with purplish-blue liquid was thrust between the edges of the curtains.

Teddy reached up groped blindly for the vial. His fingers closed around it and he pried the cork from the vial with his teeth, spat it out, then drained the liquid, gagging as he swallowed it. In a few moments, the pounding in his head receded and he sat up, pulling the curtain back a little. The light still bothered him, but not as much as it had before. The scent of vegetable soup reached his nose and his stomach gurgled noisily. 'You have soup?'

'Yeah.' Victoire held out a bowl cradled in a tea towel, and pulled a spoon from her pocket.

Teddy began to hungrily devour the soup. All too soon, the spoon scraped against the bottom of the bowl. He set the bowl aside and looked up. Victoire was standing uncertainly by the door of the dormitory. 'I really am sorry about shouting at you yesterday,' he muttered. 'It wasn't you...' He took a deep breath. 'But, Vic, when I say leave me be, I mean it...'

'All right.'

*****

A/N: The two quotes come from John Donne's 'The Sun Rising' and William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice.