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(A/N: This is NOT my usual style. Warnings for language and some graphic images. And nothing you recognize from JKR's work is mine.)
He snatched up one of the wooden chairs and hurled it across the room, where it smashed into kindling against the wall.
May he die a thousand painful deaths and rot in Hell for this...
Somehow – he still had no idea how – somehow, the bastard had escaped Azkaban. Somehow, he had got hold of a wand. And somehow, he had managed to capture the Pack.
And now he's going to make good on what he was planning on doing to us all those years ago... and this time, Narcissa's not here to help us, and no one will know until it's too late...
Remus hurled another chair and watched it dent the wall. The place in his mind where he was still half-expecting a sweet, sardonic, witty voice to make a comment was blank. Not empty, as it had been when their link had been broken, but blank. Painfully, numbingly blank.
He didn't just Obliviate her. That would only have wiped her memories, and I could have given them back to her, or at least told her about them. No, he destroyed her mind. And he made me watch. The motherfucking bastard made me WATCH!
His last sight of his beloved had been of her kneeling at a low sink, dutifully scrubbing at a filthy cauldron, as Malfoy had ordered her to do. "She'll take orders from anyone now," Malfoy had said with a dirty smile on his face. "I wonder what she'd do if I ordered her to spread her legs for me..."
Had he not been restrained, Remus would have attacked the man and bitten him. Gladly.
After he had blasted Danger's mind, Malfoy had taken Remus down to the dungeons and explained, at length, what he had done to Sirius, Aletha, and Meghan.
"Three adjoining cells, werewolf, carefully charmed just for this occasion. The charms on the outside cells are such that no sound from one of them can possibly be heard in the other, and vice versa. However, the sounds from this middle cell pass in quite clearly. None of them, I might add, can hear anything from the outside world. All, of course, properly dark and otherwise atmospherically correct.
"In one outside cell, I place the father." Malfoy's hands gestured gracefully. "In the other, the loving mother. And in the center cell, the darling little girl, where her parents can hear her every cry, but can do nothing to comfort her, or each other." He shook his head in mock-sadness. "The only question now is, will they die first, or go mad?"
The cries that had been audible in the hallway still rang in Remus' ears. Sirius had sounded half-mad with fear and worry already. Aletha had been reduced to sobbing brokenly. Meghan was whimpering like an animal, with the occasional cry for one of her parents barely understandable.
And the boys... God, what he plans to do with them...
"A potion exists which will allow the Dark Lord to rise again, werewolf," Malfoy said, bullying Remus along the corridor. "You may know of it... bone of the father, flesh of the servant, blood of the foe... the blood must be fresh, unfortunately, or I would simply take what I need and kill the troublesome whelp now. But he will be little trouble to me under Imperius. And with the blood of his one-time vanquisher in his veins, the Dark Lord will rise stronger than ever..."
He gave Remus an extra-vicious shove. Remus stumbled and fell, painfully bruising his chin, since he couldn't catch himself with his hands tied behind his back.
"And as for my own wayward boy..." Malfoy hauled Remus to his feet again and pushed him to get him moving. "I assume you know of the Filio Fidelis charm?"
The gag in his mouth wouldn't let him speak, but Remus knew his horror was plain on his face. My God, that's the darkest magic there is... a permanent Imperius, only possible to perform on someone you're blood-related to... he wouldn't...
Don't be stupid. Obviously, he would.
And he will.
Malfoy smiled triumphantly. "I see you do. With that charm in place, my Draco will never even think of disobeying me again. His life will revolve around me. As it should. And as for you..." A jarring laugh echoed around the empty corridor. "I planned my time of attack well, did I not?"
Remus came back to the present. He did plan well. He planned everything. Filthy little wanker.
The full moon was rising. And he knew that what appeared to be a mirror on the wall was a disguised window, so that Malfoy would be able to watch his captive transform without getting too close himself.
Everything, except one. Without Danger, without any of them, I don't want to live.
Maybe, maybe, Harry or Draco or Hermione can get away somehow, save themselves...
He stopped, realizing something. Hermione. He never said anything about her. He never told me what he was planning to do with her...
His heart almost stopped as his mind leapt back in time.
"Your ward, you say. So she trusts you, loves you even. How amusing, then, to place you in the same room during the full moon..."
God – NO!
Please, no, not that, anything but that –
He knew, full well, that if the werewolf had a target for its long-caged fury, any target, it would not hesitate to attack. And with another target present, something to kill and rip to pieces –
He pressed his hands against his eyes in a futile attempt to stop himself imagining that happening to his Kitten. To stop himself imagining him, the wolf he would become, doing that to her.
And if she's here – I won't even be able to die...
Because the wolf's lust for blood would be sated with its helpless human prey, and it would not attack itself as it did when caged and untamed.
No, no, no, this can't be happening, this can't happen to me – NO!
Remus screamed, voicing everything he was feeling – all the anger, grief, disbelief, horror, everything – in one raw, despairing howl.
In the silence following it, he heard a low laugh.
"Very impressive, Lupin. Very... bestial."
The door opened. Hermione stumbled forward, propelled by a shove from Malfoy. In the second before the door shut, Remus caught a glimpse of two pairs of horrified eyes behind the man – one green, one grey –
Oh my God.
Harry and Draco.
He's going to make them watch.
His control was failing, in an instant he was going to start trying to break down the door, even knowing, as he did, that it was magically sealed and he didn't have a prayer –
"Moony?" said a small voice.
Hermione was pressed against the far wall, staring at him in fear.
Remus tried once to speak and failed. "Come here, Kitten," he whispered on the second try.
She took one halting step away from the wall, then another – then she was running – then she was pressed against him, shaking, and he knew he was shaking too.
"I'm so sorry," he whispered into her hair. "I'm so sorry, Kitten, I'm so sorry. I never meant this to happen. I'm so sorry."
"I have something," she whispered back. Her fingers closed around his hand and slid it up her sleeve. His fingers encountered a vaguely triangular shape of cold metal, with something wooden attached to one end –
He froze in sudden comprehension.
"I stole it from the kitchen when he wasn't looking," Hermione whispered again. She pulled away to look pleadingly up at him. "Do it fast. Please."
Remus' heart was pounding, every tiny sensation suddenly magnified – the moon was less than a minute from rising, but that wasn't why.
She knows. She knows what Malfoy wants to happen.
And she's done something about it.
She's only eleven, my God, the courage this must take...
Yes. I will do it fast. Better for it to happen like this, when I know what I'm doing, when I can do it without hurting her more than I have to...
He nodded, carefully pulling the purloined item out of her sleeve, making sure the action was hidden from the mirror on the wall. "I love you, Kitten," he said quietly. Good last words, I think, even if there's no one left to hear them...
"I love you, Moony." Hermione lifted her face as if she wanted to be kissed.
Remus bent and kissed her on the forehead.
And slashed through the side of her neck with the knife she'd stolen.
She collapsed forward into his arms, blood gushing onto his robes and over his hands. Remus felt her go limp and knew she was dead. Gently, he laid her down on the floor.
And now, my turn.
"Expelliarmus!"
Remus felt the knife fly from his hand and heard it clatter against the far wall. Snarling, he leapt up, only to be flung back by a spell and pinned in the corner.
"Well done," Malfoy sneered, advancing. "You've killed the child you claimed to love. What father could do more?"
Then he screamed in pain.
The spell holding Remus against the wall ended as Draco wrenched the wand from his father's hand. Harry pulled the bloody knife from Malfoy's back and stared at it, horrified.
"GO!" Remus shouted at them. "Lock the door! Colloportus!"
The boys ran, slamming the door behind them. Malfoy was on his hands and knees, panting.
"Just you and me now, Lucius," snarled Remus, feeling the red haze of the beast beginning to rise in his mind as the moon came above the horizon. "You and me..."
The Pack lives. Some of us may die, but the Pack lives.
The moon was fully up – his mind was clouding – Malfoy's face was terror-stricken –
A gentle touch made itself known within his mind, wordless but inexpressibly tender. He turned, half in disbelief, and met brown eyes, open and alert even in the darkness of the bedroom.
It was a dream. It was all a dream.
Relief engulfed him. It was all he could do to keep from breaking down and crying then and there.
You were so convinced I was gone that you locked me out, the voice he'd thought was lost forever told him, as two slim fingers touched his cheek in a scent-touch. I could see everything, but I couldn't break in – I couldn't change what you were doing to yourself. Not until after you'd... She faltered.
Killed Hermione? Remus finished for her. She nodded. So the boys attacking Malfoy, and me getting my chance at him – that was you?
Yes – it was the best I could do on short notice, without breaking all the parameters – which I don't like doing, and in this case I simply couldn't. Her arms wrapped around him, ignoring the fact that he was shaking terribly, soaking wet, and probably smelled horrible. You're stronger than you know.
Remus held his wife without answering, simply allowing his mind to take in that it wasn't true, that his Kitten wasn't dead, he'd see her whenever they went to Hogwarts next, that Sirius and Aletha were asleep next to one another in the other master bedroom, and Meghan in the cubs' room down the hall, all of them alive, sane, safe – that he hadn't failed in his duties as alpha, that his Pack lived, and lived in safety.
Wordlessly, Danger offered him comfort, and wordlessly he took it, feeling the heat of their passion dry his clothes and sheets, and finding peace in the beautiful body Malfoy had carelessly threatened to soil with his filthy hands...
See, that's the part I thought would have clued you that it was a dream. Lucius Malfoy, degrade himself so far as to sleep with a Mudblood?
Remus growled, pressing himself into her. He's not worthy even to pick up a book you've read.
Agreed. So why don't we stop thinking about him, and start... thinking... about... us...
Danger fell asleep after they had finished. Remus lay awake for a few minutes, glad that Danger couldn't see the thought currently inhabiting his mind.
Maybe I am stronger than I know.
But I'm also weaker.
I can't ever let myself forget that.
His eyes closed again, but this time, Danger was waiting for him just beyond the bounds of sleep, and together they dreamed a pleasant dream of running beneath the moon as wolves, running the night to dawn.
