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The Half-Breed Army


Fenrir Greyback was in charge of Voldemort’s half-breed army - and this was impossibly obvious as Ed prodded Remus along, his wand pressed into his spine between his shoulder blades. The woods were cluttered with tents and small shacks… Remus stumbled along, looking left and right at all the different faces looking his direction with interest, amusement, and smirking laughter. There were goblins with thick fingers, long noses and pointed ears, sharpening silver swords… rouge centaurs, their thick muscles flexing as they strung bows and feathered arrows… giants, crouching on boulders and logs, spinning spits with whole goats attached over large fires… and werewolves -- so many werewolves. Men and women with sneering faces, engorged front teeth, sharpened to points stared and cackled as Ed and Remus passed by.

“Ickle thing,” sneered one woman, leaning about a tree, breathing deep of his scent.

“Off, Esmeralda,” hissed Ed, “This one’s Fenrir’s.”

She backed away quickly.

Then Remus shivered as they approached a stone cottage in the trees, looming ominously in the thick of the forest ahead of him. He clutched his arms around himself, passing through trees that had a thin layer of ice - despite it being April and far too late in the season for ice… He barely had time to marvel at this, and the biting cold to the air, when a great hooded figure floated before him, hovering in the sky and his heart seized, the breath seeming to evacuate his lungs… Dementors - loads of dementors - hung about the cottage’s stone walls, guarding it. Remus had never seen one before in person, but now that he had he wished very dearly that he hadn’t. He felt all the hope that was left in him - which granted, wasn’t very much at this point - completely left him. He felt all heavy and strange, as though happiness was a faint memory… something he wouldn’t ever feel again.

“Ever seen one of them before, poppet?” asked Ed in a growling voice. “That’s a dementor, that is. Come right from Azkaban, the wizard prison in the sea… Make it angry ‘nuff, it’ll suck yer soul right out yer mouth, make you worse’n dead.”

Remus felt sick as the black cloaked figures leaned closer, inspecting him, as Ed pushed him along toward the cottage. “In you go,” he hissed, and he kicked the door open and shoved Remus inside.

The cottage was dark compared to the forest and Remus was blinded in it for a moment, blinking to adjust his eyes. A fire burned in a hearth, a tea kettle hung over it on a hook, and strange, mangy looking cat rubbed itself across the brick hearth as it stared at Remus and Ed with large, glowing eyes staring up at them.

Suddenly a woman with hair in thick, dark green braids came into the room, carrying a tray with tea cups and saucers piled upon it, and a small wood box. Her eyes glowed a shade of lavender when she saw them, “There’s our little guest…” she leered, “Greyback’s been waiting impatiently.”

“Bloody just woke up, he did,” said Ed.

The woman leaned down, staring into Remus’s eyes. In close proximity like this, Remus could see that the thick braids on her head weren’t braids at all, but snakes that sprouted right out of her scalp, undulating and coiling about each other. A gorgon. “Bit peaky, aren’t you?” she hissed lowly, and she pushed open the little wooden box and held out a sprig of aconite leaves.

Remus stared at the leaf uncertainly a moment, then reached up with a shaking hand to take it, turning it over slowly, inspecting it.

“We aren’t stupid enough to poison you now,” the gorgon woman said thickly, “Greyback wants you for himself.” Remus put the leaves in his mouth and chewed, feeling stronger instantly as the minty-licorice flavor of them filled his mouth. “Greybacks through there,” the gorgon said, nodding her head toward the door she’d come in through. Ed took a couple sprigs of the aconite from the box, too, before shoving Remus along through the door.

It was a parlor room, the windows boarded up and low burning candles lined shelves and tables all about the room, giving it a dark, flickering sort of feeling. Remus saw the mangy cat go dashing past them into the room, purring as it rubbed itself against a wide, worn out overstuffed chair that was missing half the velvet fibers in its fabric cover. Laying across it, legs hanging over one arm, back against the other, arms sprawled over the back and opposite arm as he lounged, was Fenrir Greyback. Druella hovered just behind the chair, her arms spread over the back cushion as she loomed, fawning over Greyback with a certain amount of adoration in her heavily lidded eyes, running her hands over his hairy arms as though she were touching the limbs of a god. She looked up, her eyes flashing with amusement, and she cackled lowly.

Fenrir looked up at this, seeing Remus and Ed, and his mouth spread into a grin. He sat up, leaned forward and beckoned for Remus to come closer. Ed gave him a push and Remus stumbled up, nearly tripping over his trainers. Fenrir caught him by his chin, clutching Remus’s face with his grubby hands, his long-nailed fingers curling around the boy’s jaw. “My, my,” he murmured, “Look at you… so grown up.” He turned Remus’s face to the left, then the right, grinning as he did. “You look such a lot like your dear mumsy with that lovely curly blonde hair.” He released Remus’s face and sat back in the chair. “I felt quite bad when I heard about her dying - dear Bellatrix murderin’ her like that… I would’ve liked to have my way with her before they slaughtered her.” His eyes glinted menacingly.

Remus struggled to keep his face straight.

Greyback lay back the way he’d been before as the gorgon woman came back into the room, bearing the tray with the teacups filled with dark black aconite tea. She handed a large cup to Fenrir who murmured, “You’ve forgotten the honey again, Medusa,” and she bowed, promising to return with it. She turned to give a cup to Ed, and to the two other men sitting about the room, their teeth sharpened like Fenrir’s, their eyes dark honey-yellow. Remus was surprised when she offered the last cup on the tray to him. Tentatively, he lifted the cup from the tray and the woman left the room.

Fenrir waved his hand and the spoon in his cup spun, stirring the aconite tea with the movements of his fingers as he stared at Remus. “Have a seat,” he said, and with the words, Druella waved her wand and a three legged stool flew up behind Remus, knocking his knees from beneath him to force him to sit, nearly making him spill the tea. Ed went to a long couch to one side and sat, too, eagerly sipping his tea with loud gulps. When Medusa the gorgon had returned from the kitchen with a jar of honey, poured two spoonfuls into his cup, and retreated again, Fenrir said, “Let’s talk about your options, Mr. Lupin.”

Remus still hadn’t sipped any of the tea. As much as he craved the aconite, he wasn’t certain he trusted the cup, so he held it in his hands awkwardly, staring up at Greyback with wide, nervous eyes.

“It seems,” Greyback said, “That you currently have two options to chose from for how things will… shake out. First, you submit to the Dark Mark, join Lord Voldemort’s army, and help us to protect and serve the Dark Lord as he rises to ultimate power over the entire wizarding world.”

“Never,” Remus said.

“Hold yer horses, kid, I haven’t finished telling you all about your options.” Fenrir chuckled. “As a follower of the Dark Lord, you would follow my command as your Alpha and, together, we would go each full moon to collect more… recruits… for the Dark Lord’s army.” His teeth glinted in the flickering light.

Remus’s mouth was a hard line.

“Option two, we kill you.”

“Still better than option one,” Remus said dryly.

Druella’s voice was sharp, “How dare you speak to your alpha with such a tone?!”

Fenrir held up his hand to silence her, “I rather enjoy the sass, actually.”

Remus asked, “So when are you going to kill me then? Now? Or are you going to drag it out, try and make me suffer?”

Fenrir chuckled. “There’s no sport to it now, so close to the full moon. None of us are up to our full potential… Wouldn’t want to spoil the fun, now would we?” He grinned. “Ed… finish your tea and take our guest to his... quarters.”




Sirius woke in the middle of the night from a horrible dream, his breath caught in his throat, a strangled cry escaping his throat.

Lumos,” came a whisper in the dark, and with a flash, Dumbledore’s wand illuminated and Albus stood up, hastening over to Sirius’s side.

They were in the the room above the Hog’s Head pub, where Dumbledore had brought him when they’d left Number 12, Grimmauld Place. The pub owner, a grisly old man in desperate need of a shave, had shoved a cot into the room, avoiding Sirius’s eye, and Dumbledore had magicked an extra couple layers of plush mattress covers onto the cot and insisted Sirius take the bed.

“Mr. Black,” Dumbledore’s palm touched Sirius’s shoulder, gently shaking him awake. “Sirius.” Sirius opened his eyes, staring up at Dumbledore’s shining blue pupils with a desperate fear. “It’s alright, Sirius,” Dumbledore’s voice was low.

Sirius gasped and looked around, taking in the detail of the room, pulling his mind out of the dismal place it had been just moments before, his breath evening out.

“Would you like to talk about it?” Dumbledore asked.

Sirius pushed himself up so he was sitting and looked down at his hands. “It was my Father… Voldemort killing him…” He picked at his fingernails nervously.

“Ah yes,” Dumbledore nodded slowly, “The most horrible experiences we have in life have a way of coming back to us in our dreams at times…”

There was something in his voice, something in the heavy way his tone hung over the words, that made Sirius look up at him.

Dumbledore hesitated, looking at Sirius’s face for a long moment, then, in the most vulnerable tone that Sirius had ever heard him speak, he said, “When I was just about your age… my father, Percival, died.”

“Were you close?” Sirius asked.

“Once,” Dumbledore answered, “When I was younger…” he paused. “He died in Azkaban, and though he had been long gone - having been arrested when I was only ten - I had intense nightmares for years after his death.”

Sirius stared up at Dumbledore, a lump rising up in his throat, “Was your father a Dark Wizard, too, then, like my dad was?”

Dumbledore’s fingers ran over his beard, “Perhaps; some would certainly say so.”

“What’d he do?” Sirius asked, very nearly breathless.

“There was… an incident… and my father was inclined to defend his family, and… some muggle boys were killed.” Dumbledore’s eyes turned to Sirius. “What he did was wrong, but he was still my father, whatever he’d done, so that when I heard the news he’d been killed, even after all the years that we had spent apart, I was still very deeply heartbroken.” He put his hand on Sirius’s shoulder. “Whatever happens, Sirius, however far we believe we have drifted apart from them, our families still mean a great deal to us and it is in no way a weakness to grieve for them.”

Sirius chewed his lower lip a moment. “Do you believe… darkness… can be inherited? Passed through blood? That someone who is born to dark wizards is… destined… to be dark himself?”

Dumbledore mused a moment, then he said, “Sirius, do you recall Professor Binns teaching of the ancient wizards - specifically a man by the name of Pythagoras?”

“Honestly, sir, we sort of… sleep… through Professor Binns’s class.” Sirius blushed a bit.

Dumbledore chuckled slightly, then nodded, “Yes, I understand. Professor Binns was no more exciting a teacher in life than he is in death.”

“Was he living when you went to Hogwarts sir?”

Dumbledore nodded. “Dead, too. It was in my fifth year that Professor Binns died in his study, though he never realized it. Simply continued on teaching, and seeing as Binns was the only one who knew the history as well as he does, none had the heart to tell him he’d passed, and so to this day he teaches on.”

The corners of Sirius’s mouth twitched with amusement.

“The Theory of Pythagoras is an ancient belief that every thing in this world has an equal opposite,” Dumbledore explained, “That for every sharp, there is a blunt. For every high, there is a low. For every left, there is a right. Every straight, there is a crooked… and so forth. So it is that, according to Pythagoras, for every light there is a dark. The concept of dualism was born from Pythagoras’s theory - that in each person, there is the potential for every equal opposite to occur. Within you there is both good and evil - both light and dark. Each and everyday that we open our eyes, get out of bed, and move through the world, we make choices that define who we are, and these choices, compiled together, will show who we are within. Choose light, Sirius, and light you shall be.”

Sirius had tears in his eyes. “Thank you sir.”

Dumbledore nodded.

Sirius drew a deep breath.

“Now, it is time to return to sleep,” Dumbledore said, “The morning will come very quickly and we have a good many things to do when the sun rises… so let us drift into dreams far better than the ones that have visited us thus far.”

Sirius nodded, sliding down in the bed so that he was laying again. Dumbledore pushed the blankets up over Sirius’s chest and got up, heading back to the cot and sitting down on the edge of the mattress. He laid down. “Nox.” The light at the tip of his wand extinguished and they were plunged into darkness once more.

“Sir?” Sirius asked.

“Sirius?” Dumbledore’s voice replied from the dark.

“When will we know about Remus?”

“I hope to have some word by morning,” Dumbledore replied.

“I miss him, sir.”

Dumbledore was quiet a long moment, “Yes,” he said, “I imagine that you do.”

Sirius fell asleep after that, but Dumbledore lay awake, thinking, his memories flooding him, filling his mind until he, too, drifted off… only to wake an hour later from a dream of a blonde haired boy of his own, staring out from the dark cell window of Numengard.