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Part Three - 3
Initation
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Bloody Merlin this is freezing.
“Are you gonna do it?” James had his arms crossed, smiling brightly at Remus from the safety of a meter and a half back from the lake. Whereas Remus had his pant legs rolled up to his knees and was currently about shin-deep in the very cold, very dark looking water.
“Yeah c’mon, Lupin! Peter even did it!” Sirius was right next to James, an even brighter grin about his mouth. The two of them were clearly enjoying the show of Remus tip-toeing his way deeper into the water, cursing under his breath with each further step and desperately trying to come up with a way out of this.
Peter was currently sat on the ground three meters back, wrapped up in a blanket and shivering. He still looked terribly afraid, and of what Remus wasn’t sure. All Peter had said when he made it back out was, “Something grabbed me!” and after that it was all nonsense and he just sort of sat down and let James awkwardly wrap a blanket about him. Eleven year old boys weren’t the best at comfort. If anything, Sirius and James were now even more eager to have Remus complete the task.
“We did give you another option,” James informed, which only made he and Sirius break into laughter.
“You’d just have to kiss her, is all!” Sirius began to make kissy-noises at Remus, and finally the young werewolf had enough of their torment. His cheeks burned bright and he whipped about to face them, arms straight, balls in little fists of fury.
“I will not kiss McGonagall!” Remus was very adamant about that. He couldn’t kiss McGonagall. He would have to see her every day for the next seven years, and he would not have the shame of having kissed her in front of the entire school weigh on him. It just wasn’t an option. What was an option, however, was swimming out to the ball of light floating a good ten meters into the lake. Remus had asked what the light was, but Sirius and James didn’t have an answer and Peter was too emotionally scarred at the moment to really say much about anything.
“Then do iiiiiiit!” James and Sirius sang together, urging Remus on, clearly becoming impatient with his hesitation.
This was very much a make or break it kind of moment. If he didn’t go, he couldn’t be a Marauder. He couldn’t have friends. He couldn’t be normal. He couldn’t live one moment in peace with Sirius and James as his roommates. He couldn’t even live up to Peter’s courage.
Gryffindors had to be courageous.
Remus had to be courageous.
Otherwise he’d end up outside of the boys club and probably friendless and no one would ever like or accept him ever because they would find out he wasn’t actually courageous and then James and Sirius would torment him forever and Peter wouldn’t even try to like him anymore.
Or something similar might happen, also.
But he was desperate for friendship, as he’d never really had it, and seeing as miracles were already happening (he’d gotten into Hogwarts, after all), maybe this one could happen, too. And so he turned away from the taunting boys and the frightened Peter, took several quick bounds into the water, and disappeared into the dark, freezing, lake.
The world above disappeared and Remus was glad to no longer hear the chants and eggings-on of Sirius and James. However, it was also terrifying. He couldn’t see a thing, or hear anything other than his own movements in the water. Hell, he didn’t even have his wand on him, as for some reason or other that was part of the test. Sirius had said, “You’ll get it back if you pass the initiation ritual,” and Remus had no idea what would happen to his wand if he didn’t pass this trial.
It would probably end up in the lake and he’d have to fish about for it all night. Or risk finding a teacher and getting the lot of them in trouble. No, he could do this. He had to do this. But what if he couldn’t do it? The end goal seemed much farther away than it had from the shore. He didn’t even know how far he’d gone, and a sinking feeling that he was still meters away came over him.
For a moment he thought maybe he wouldn’t make it to the ball of light at all. And then that moment became much more frightening when something brushed against his leg.
Oh god, oh god, oh god.
Remus darted to the surface again, taking deep gulping breaths of air as he waded. He could see James and Sirius as shadows on the grass, hear them cheering, and quite suddenly realized he had actually made it to the light. Remus turned to the source, though it appeared to be nothing more than a floating ball of, well, light.
It was sort of ominous actually, but Remus was now filled with the excitement of having made it, of being cheered on, that he went against his better instincts and swam about the thing, back-stroking and laughing, showing off to his new friends. All thoughts of whatever had brushed his leg (probably just some plant, or maybe a small fish) disappeared, and Remus was quite elated.
He had done it. He was going to be a Marauder. Part of a real Boys Club, and they would be best friends and do everything together and he would never have to be lonely again. Ever since he could remember he had been on his own, without any friends, without anyone to confide in, without anyone to write letters to, or even wave hello to on the street.
And then the reality of having friends began to sink in, and Remus stopped his back-stroking. He couldn’t really confide in them, not all his secrets. There would be things he could never tell James, or Sirius, or even Peter who seemed most trustworthy of all. Remus would have to lie to them every month, would have to keep himself under control whenever the full moon approached. He still got touchy during the first few days beforehand, and oh god, the first few days after were always the worst.
Maybe having friends wasn’t worth it.
Maybe he was supposed to be lonely forever.
Maybe that’s what the real curse was.
“C’mon Remus!” Peter had gotten up without Remus even realizing, and his voice rang clear to where Remus still waded behind the ball of light, “You’ve done it, mate! Come back!” He was so excited for Remus, it was very evident. Whatever fear Peter had had seemed to be washed away.
So all of his own doubts and worries went away, and Remus began towards the shore again.
And then something tugged on his leg.
And then Remus cried out.
And then he disappeared under the water, and his lungs filled with liquid, and he completely panicked.
I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die.
What a truly awful thing to have happen. He had just made his first set of friends, he had just decided that whatever secrets he had to keep weren’t such a big deal, he had just passed the Boys Club Initiation Trial. The worst of it was probably hearing Peter so excitedly call out to him to come back.
Come back.
Come back.
“Come back!”
To this day Remus couldn’t quite remember what had happened in the lake, nor how he had really gotten out. The next thing he knew he was coughing up water on the grass, a wet Sirius and James hovering over him, begging him to breathe again. Peter was there with his wand, eyes wide and frightened, practically screaming that, “It got him! I told you there was something! It got him!”
Despite his fear and panic, Peter had been the one to save Remus, truly. Sirius had pulled him from the lake with James’ help, but Peter was the only one with enough first-aid training to know the spell to clear water from drowning lungs. Remus later found out that before Peter had learnt to swim, he had drowned several times and nearly died twice. In total Peter had nearly died seven times before coming to Hogwarts, but Remus didn’t know all of those stories.
Luckily it had given Peter plenty of knowledge regarding healing and life-saving spells. His mother had even gotten him a first-aid spell and potions book when Peter had gotten his Hogwarts letter. He was clumsy, sure, but despite that, Peter Pettigrew would end up being The Marauder’s personal nursemaid when they could get by without going to Madam Pomfrey.
That night Remus was kept in the infirmary (which started a fair habit of lying to Madam Pomfrey, or “using selective truths” as Sirius called it), though upon his return to his friends the following night at dinner, Dumbledore had prepared a very lovely bit of advice for The Marauder’s, as well as the rest of Hogwarts.
“As a reminder, there is a marker in the lake to keep swimmers separated from some of the nastier creatures. I would advise all of you to keep night-swimming to a minimum, and if you cannot overcome the urge, at least stay out of the depths. Dreadful things in that lake, hm?” Dumbledore’s gaze fell upon the four boys, looking at them over his half-moon glasses, and for a moment Remus could have sworn that Dumbledore smirked at them. Of course, he wasn’t sure, and he never would be, whether or not Dumbledore actually was amused with their antics or whether he just tolerated them extremely well.
What he was sure of, however, was that James, Sirius, and even Peter, were all beaming for the same reason: Remus was alive. They had saved him. In fact Remus would hear over the next week over and over again how they had saved him, and each time it was a little different, a little more daring, a bit more outlandish. Just like all of their stories ended up being, the more people that heard them the more far-fetched they became.
But it Remus smile, even now.
They had saved his life, several times over. They had been his best friends, his closest companions; they had given him a reason to live when it seemed there wasn’t anything else to live for.
Passing that initiation trial was the start of a new life for Remus, and though having a close set of friends had posed several problems for Remus, he wouldn’t have given them up for the world.