Rating:
R
House:
Schnoogle
Characters:
Remus Lupin Nymphadora Tonks
Genres:
Action Romance
Era:
Multiple Eras
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone Chamber of Secrets Prizoner of Azkaban Goblet of Fire Order of the Phoenix
Stats:
Published: 11/11/2003
Updated: 11/16/2003
Words: 63,409
Chapters: 18
Hits: 34,751

Amid My Solitude

samvimes

Story Summary:
Remus Lupin, dependable, able, and trustworthy werewolf, has been tapped as Dumbledore's right hand in the new Order, leader of the fight against the re-formed Death Eaters. ````While trying to be Harry's new guardian, fumbling his way through a beginning romance, and calming suspicions of spies in the Order, Remus must chase his werewolf heritage -- though it may cost him the elusive happiness he desperately craves.

Chapter 17

Chapter Summary:
Remus Lupin, dependable, able, and trustworthy werewolf, has been tapped as Dumbledore's right hand in the new Order, leader of the fight against the re-formed Death Eaters. While trying to be Harry's new guardian, fumbling his way through a beginning romance, and calming suspicions of spies in the Order, he must chase his werewolf heritage -- though it may cost him the elusive happiness he desperately craves.
Posted:
11/16/2003
Hits:
1,300
Author's Note:
I owe much gratitude to the LJ crowd, who have been putting up with my miscellaneous postings of snippets from this work for weeks; also to the Y!M regulars for letting me bounce ideas off them. Special thanks to Judy, Jill, Tai, and Yap, who beta'd relentlessly and quite well.

How much it was of him we met
We cannot ever know; nor yet
Shall all he gave us quite atone
For what was his, and his alone.

-- Edwin Arlington Robertson

The hardest part, as it turned out, was learning to use his left hand again.

The muscles hadn't healed clean, thanks to the Muggle hospital he'd spent three days unconscious in. It ached when he flattened his fingers, and the Healers said there was only so much they could do. Already they were teaching him to walk again, helping to fade the dark scar-skin on most of his wounds, still dusted with the blue healing powder. Helping make sure his right hand healed better than his left. The pain was fading, it was true. And easier to deal with, because it was so much better to hide it when she was there...

He supposed he was lucky. In a Muggle hospital it would take weeks, months, for him to recover. In St. Mungo's it was a matter of days, sometimes even hours. That Harpy didn't come back, and instead Augustus Pye supervised his progress. Other Healers were brought in to see his wounds -- it was instructional, and a specialist in werewolf physiology even came in from Rome to study his progress.

And still, there was one even better thing: the Aurors would foot the bill.

The gnawing fear of debt, always present in the back of his head, faded a little when Kingsley informed him of that. Remus had shown them where a pack had lived, and led them -- however indirectly -- to a slaughter ground. They were grateful, and Jack Longbottom showed his gratitude freely.

Jack Longbottom also wanted to recruit him. Remus had been rejected from the Aurors years before, for his werewolf blood, and now had too much Order business to deal with to even consider training. He sent Longbottom a polite, subtextually bitter denial.

"We're almost there," Tonks said quietly, over the engine and the traffic noises. She was slightly overawed by the car that was taking them to Grimmauld Place; the Healers had said he shouldn't travel by floo or Apparation for a good two weeks, to be safe, and he heartily agreed. "Almost home."

"Home for me," he said, keeping his eyes closed. The cab was an unpleasantly jerky contrivance, and he felt less ill if he didn't look out the window. "Sad sort of place to call home."

"Not always," Tonks answered. Remus heard Arthur Weasley chuckle, from the seat across from him, and opened one eye lazily.

"You didn't have to come fetch me, you know, I'm not an invalid," he said, all evidence to the contrary. Even in the balmy summer day he was chilly, and while walking came easier, his breath didn't.

The cab jerked to a halt, and Arthur hesitantly paid the man; Remus kept an eye on the bills changing hands, to make sure he wasn't overpaying. Finally, they were out; 12 Grimmauld Place came rushing up from nothingness, and he began the walk from the street to the front door, well aware of the ragged state of his clothing. Tonks had brought spares from his bureau, though he suspected the shirt was newly purchased -- he didn't think he owned any this nice.

A new shirt didn't hide the deep hollows in his cheeks and under his eyes, he was aware of that. He hoped he didn't frighten anyone.

Arthur opened the door and Tonks put a hand on the small of his back as he walked through, expecting the usual silent sitting room he always came home to at Grimmauld Place.

Instead, every couch and chair in the room was full, and people stood against the walls, and sat on chairs stolen from the dining room, benches taken from the yard. Nearly the entire Order must be there, he thought, automatically counting heads. Yes; the entire Order, plus Harry, Ron, Ginny, and Hermione.

"A meeting?" he asked, confused. He turned to Tonks, who smiled and shook her head.

"Welcome home, Remus," Molly said, coming forward and hugging him, gingerly.

"Thank you, Molly," he said, bending into the hug, his voice sounding strange and alien even to himself.

"We thought about a real surprise party, but then mum said it'd kill you," said George, with a grin. "So. Surprise."

Remus' eyes swept the Order again. "For me?" he asked.

"We missed you," Arabella Figg said.

He looked around. "You do know it's my own damn fault?" he said. There was a ripple of laughter. Tonks leaned against his shoulder, affectionately.

"Not a bad place to call home," she said softly.

"Got marching orders for us, Lupin?" Mundungus Fletcher asked, with a sly grin. "Preferably involving food. And drink. Molly cooked an entire flock of turkeys."

"Two!" Molly said. "And they're small."

"That sounds good," Remus said slowly. "That sounds like a good plan."

The crowd began to drift into the kitchen, slowly, and Remus kept back, not wanting to fall into the mass of bodies just yet. Dumbledore caught his eye as he passed, and gestured him on.

"Molly's stuffing is really quite exquisite," he called. "She puts currants in it. Nothing I like better than currants in stuffing."

"Me either," Remus said, moving forward hesitantly. An idea was rising in the back of his head; in the way Dumbledore had looked at him when he'd walked in, in the way Harry had found his side and refused to leave it.

His legs were working better, but still stiff as he settled onto a bench in the kitchen, Harry on one side of him, Tonks on the other. The Weasleys and some of the more senior Order members sat around the table, and the rest of the Order on chairs nearby -- it seemed so large when he saw them all together, though in reality it was only perhaps thirty people, if that. Molly gave him a plate covered in turkey and stuffing, gravy, vegetables, and yorkshire puddings -- she knew he liked those especially. She must have been cooking for two days, he thought, eyeing the mountain of food before him.

He hadn't eaten well in the hospital, and suddenly he was ravenous...

He listened to the conversations go on around him: Harry discussing the motorbike still, and his plans to keep it in Hogsmeade; Kingsley and Tonks talking shop in low tones; Arthur discussing publicity with one of the newest Order recruits, a nervous young journalist for the Prophet. The lad had been able to keep Remus' name out of the papers, though not the slaughter of the pack; still, Remus was grateful for that small mercy.

"It is a dangerous way of working, but it is the only way," Dumbledore was saying to the journalist, solemnly. "If we wish to succeed, we must take risks."

"Although," Remus added, "There's a large difference between risks and stupidity." He held up his fingers, showing the jagged white scar across his palm where a wolf had tried to pull his right hand off. He saw Moody study it with interest; Molly winced, and Arthur put his arm around his wife's shoulders, looking away from the scar. "I crossed the line and I paid for it," Remus continued. "Let's not forget that. But I think..."

He glanced at Dumbledore. Dumbledore led the Order; it wasn't his place to decide these things, but it was his place to voice his opinion. Arthur and Molly were looking expectant. Dumbledore nodded, slowly. Remus swallowed, and continued, stammering over the first few words.

"I think it...I think it's time...that we started taking more risks," he said slowly. "I think it's time we ended this. No more playing at stopping the little things, no more skirmishes."

"Five on one isn't a skirmish, it's a slaughter," Harry murmured.

"I want to know what's been going on since the pack was destroyed," Remus continued. "We'll hold briefings tonight. And tomorrow..." he looked at Dumbledore again, but the older man was watching him intently. "Tomorrow we are going to start planning how to stop this once and for all. I want this done. I want him destroyed. Utterly and completely. I want him and his followers wiped off the face of this earth."

Snape, who had chosen a far corner and done little more than pick at his dinner, raised his head.

"Brave talk," he said.

"Either we're brave or we fail," Remus replied. "Which would you like, Severus?"

"Don't ask me about winning," Snape replied. "I've been waiting for someone to make up their mind about this for months."

"Then you'll be falling in behind the plan," Remus replied. "That's good. We'll need you."

"Best be sure I'm not just lying to you," Snape answered bitterly. "Best be sure I'm not going to feed this back to the Dark Lord."

There was an awkward pause. Remus glanced at Kingsley, and shook his head slowly.

"We are not discussing loyalty or lack thereof tonight," he said. "Tonight we are discussing what we know, and what we can use."

"Then I think you'd better look in the backyard first, after dinner," Arthur said. "Snape's got an experiment out there you ought to see."

***

Snape's experiment turned out to be an enormous cement birdbath, a spare car tyre, three garden gnomes, a large, broad metal washtub, and a tin Christmas-tree topper in the shape of an angel -- with a small, jaunty witch's hat cocked over her halo.

"Fred and George built it," Harry said, as Remus stared in awestruck horror at the monstrosity.

The bird-bath sat in the washtub, and the car tyre sat flat in the birdbath; the gnomes were clustered in a sort of pyramid of bad taste on top. The Christmas Witch was apparently somehow glued to the tips of their hats.

One of the garden gnomes was fishing off the end of the birdbath. Fred and George had tied a small Hogwarts pennant flag to its fishing pole.

"What on earth is it?" Remus asked. Arthur chuckled. Snape came forward, descending the porch steps to stand next to the thing. It was taller than he was.

"As horrifying as it is..." he growled, digging in his pocket for a black silk pouch, "...it serves its purpose."

He bent and drew a finger through the water filling the washtub. After a second, he sprinkled the powder into the water, and murmured a few words, stirring the surface with his wand.

There was a spark, and he stepped back quickly; the water began to pour -- upwards, over the bird-bath, the tyre, the gnomes and their Hogwarts pennant, and the tree-topper. It burst off the top of the Witch's hat, splashing back down over the entire thing. Other jets of water shot out from the noses of the gnomes, and the floral accents on the birdbath.

It was the most bizarre fountain Remus had ever seen. Snape regarded it with a mixture of pride and distaste.

"It's a Crinon," Remus said.

"As usual, your grasp of the obvious is truly remarkable," Snape answered.

"Severus has a theory," Tonks said softly. "Everywhere we've found traces of the Dark Lord -- "

" -- we've found Crinons," Snape finished for her. "I've been studying them while you've been...recuperating," he added, lip curling slightly. "They're tapping into the magic inherent in the area -- children born with magical ability, old artefacts, anything that might supply some form of power."

"How is that possible?"

"Dark Arts," Arthur muttered.

"The rest are probably hidden. The only times we've found them are when he's already moved on," Fred added. "He may even have a few in big magical centres -- nobody'd miss a little magic in Diagon Alley, if it wasn't taking too much."

"Funneling power back to him," Remus mused.

"A lot of power," George said. "We think."

Snape picked up a pinch of something from a bowl near the fountain, and tossed it against one of the gnomes. The water cascaded down into the washtub again, and, after a moment, was still.

"The trouble lies in finding out how he arranged for the fountains to work that way in the first place. They're not designed to," Snape said. "And, once we discover that, how to stop them."

Remus gestured to the now-defunct fountain. Snape shook his head.

"It won't be that easy," he said.

"Can you do it?"

"With time, and resources."

Remus nodded. "I'll make sure you have what you need."

Snape pointed to the twins. "They're not entirely untalented."

Fred and George grinned at each other.

"They're yours," Remus answered. The twins snorted in amusement.

Remus ducked back into the house, following Arthur and Molly. He could feel Tonks' hand on his shoulder, could hear Fred and George already bickering with Snape. Harry still hadn't left his side.

"Call everyone together," he said, in a low voice, to Tonks. "We'll hear everything tonight. Harry..."

Harry glanced up at him, and nodded. "Ron and Hermione and I'll go play gobstones or something," he said, only mildly sarcastically.

"I'll tell you later," Remus promised. He reached out and tousled Harry's hair -- good lord, the lad was almost as tall as he was, now.

"Doesn't matter," Harry said with a grin. "I could suck it right out of your brain if I had to."

Remus gave him a smile. "I wouldn't advise it. I'm still your guardian until you're eighteen. I could confiscate the motorbike, you know."

Harry just shook his head, and broke off to bound up the stairs, followed by Ron and Hermione. Remus continued into the sitting room, finding his favourite chair, and dropping into it. He ought to hide his exhaustion; it shouldn't tire a man his age to walk from the kitchen to the yard and back. Slowly the others filed in, including Dumbledore. Remus looked to him, and the Headmaster nodded.

"Now that we are all assembled," Dumbledore said, his voice firm and carrying, "I should like to know what is going on in the wide world outside Grimmauld Place."

Remus steepled his fingers and leaned forward. The scar on his arm throbbed.

Good. It would keep him awake.

He found Mundungus Fletcher, who was giving a report on rumoured Death Eaters among some smugglers off the coast of Scotland, and listened carefully, absorbing the information as he had since he was a child -- by listening, and watching, and asking questions.

***

It was midnight when Molly Weasley noticed, across the room, that Remus was asleep.

There were far fewer people there now, as Dumbledore had dismissed people after their reports were done. Remus had been leaning forward, listening intently, chin resting on his hands; he still was leaning forward, but she saw, past the shadows, that his eyes were closed. She nudged Dumbledore, seated nearby.

"Thank you, Schobel," Dumbledore said, smiling encouragingly at the young Prophet reporter. "I think you're the last of the night."

Schobel nodded, and swallowed. "I'll just...floo then..." he stammered, nervously. The flare of flame from his hasty departure woke Remus, who tensed, and straightened.

"Is that all of them?" he asked, blinking. Molly grinned.

"All for tonight. For you anyway," she said.

"I wasn't sleeping."

"Of course not."

"I wasn't," he insisted, eyelids drooping. Tonks stood, tugging on his right arm.

"You're not supposed to overextend yourself," she said, as he rose and rubbed his jaw, sleepily.

"I hardly think sitting and listening is overextending," he answered, sullenly. A yawn interrupted his complaint. "Tomorrow we should have a meeting...Snape and the Weasleys and Dumbledore and you and Kingsley and me, and..." he groped for more names.

"Arthur will take care of it," Molly said. "Get him to bed, Tonks."

"Hah..." Remus leaned on Tonks' shoulder, nuzzling her neck affectionately. "Bed indeed. Goo'night..."

Tonks guided him towards the stairs, up to the landing, and through his rooms, silently, supporting him when he stumbled on the stairs.

"Not that tired," he muttered, leaning against her as she reached out to unbutton his shirt. "I could've stayed up."

"Could you now?"

"Don't patronise me," Remus said, another yawn rather interrupting the drama of the statement.

"Don't act like a child," Tonks replied, fingers sliding down his shirt, deftly undoing the buttons. "I thought you were going to be on good behaviour."

"Am," he answered, pulling her close, pinning her hands against his chest. "Good behaviour. Being a leader. Planning things. Not thinking about anyone at all being a spy."

"Good," she answered, pushing gently. "But I think what you need now is sleep."

"A good hobby," he yawned, as she tugged his shirt off his shoulders. The phrase stopped her, and she looked at him, stunned and hurt. His lips curved upwards. "Guess I can give it up though...makes a better life, really, than a hobby."

She thought she saw, just for a second, a spark of amber in his brown eyes; she must have imagined it.

"Thinking of making a career of it?" she asked, with a smile.

"Well. We'll see," he said, leaning in to kiss her. "Sleep, were you saying?"

"You should. You're exhausted. You don't look well."

"Thanks."

"You know what I meant."

"Mm. Want to stay? Here, I mean?" he asked. There was a sort of pleading in his eyes that she was shamefully glad to see.

"I think I might like that," she answered. "You go on. I'll be there in a second."

He nodded, and began to remove his shoes, while she crossed the landing and leaned down the stairs.

"Molly," she called. "Think I'm needed?"

Molly's friendly face appeared at the bottom of the stairs. "I think not, Tonks," she called back. "We're just seeing everyone off."

"Going to make sure he doesn't fall asleep in a chair or something."

Molly grinned, slyly. "Good idea. Don't wear him out."

"Promise," Tonks replied, with a likewise grin, the sort that struck terror into the hearts of men. "Night..."

"Night, Tonks," the reply drifted up, as Tonks moved back through the dark rooms. He'd managed to undress in the few minutes she'd been gone; he was curled up now, in the usual mess of sheets and blankets that his bed perpetually seemed to be. By the time she was ready to sleep, he was snoring softly.

"Man of my dreams," she sighed, and slid under the covers, curling up against him. His hands moved, covering her body, arms wrapping around hers. The movement was so automatic, and so instinctual, that she smiled.

"Got you," he mumbled, against her neck. "Can't get away now."

"I'm not the one who wanted to run," she answered softly.

"No," he said. "That was your fool of a boyfriend."

"He's dumb, but loveable."

"Love you, Dora," he muttered.

"I know," she answered, feeling his hand on her stomach. Her own covered it. She felt him sigh, and slip back into sleep. After a few minutes, her own eyes shut, though it was a long time before she truly slept.