Chapter Text
“...I promise to love and protect you. And to stay loyal to you, my Moony, for the rest of forever.”
James stood to the side, waving his wand in circles over the two men’s clasped hands.
“What’s next, Prongs?”
“Remus, repeat after me: I, Remus, bond myself to thee.”
Remus’ eyes were misty and unfocused, but his words were strong when he repeated them.
“Now you, Sirius. After me: I, Sirius, bond myself to thee.”
“I, Sirius, bond myself to thee.” He nuzzled into the other man’s neck.
The light emitting from James’ wand became stronger, and his voice gained a resonant quality when he said, “I now pronounce you wed. You may kiss your husband.”
The two men shared a kiss that was both delicate and somehow powerful as the white light completely engulfed them. They pulled back, smiling at each other. The ceremony was complete.
---
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---
Remus’ head was pounding. Luckily—or perhaps unluckily—he was well accustomed to this process. If he wasn’t careful, he could cause further injury. So, he took stock of himself without moving his body or opening his eyes. He seemed to be mostly fine. His mouth was dry and his legs ached like he had done some running. There was a weird weight over his stomach and he was a bit queasy. Mostly though, it was his pounding head that was bothering him, but even that felt similar to a night of heavy drinking.
Oh yeah, he remembered, I was drunk last night, not a werewolf.
He cracked open his eyes to see that he was in the master bedroom at the Potter home. Sirius was on the other side of the bed and James was stretched out sideways on his stomach between them, so that the three men formed an ‘H’. Prong’s head rested on Sirius’ arse and his feet were propped on Remus’ stomach, which explained the weird weight.
While Remus was still trying to gather the will to carry on existing, James suddenly awoke. He lifted his head only slightly, to what Remus is sure was just a full-vision view of Sirius’ boxer-clad cheeks. He screamed. Loudly.
Even as Remus outwardly winced at the noise, his mind supplied, I would have had a much different reaction to that. His inner monologue paused for a moment, before adding, I’d probably bite it. Chomp.
“Ugh,” he said aloud. James’ scream had woken up Sirius, who was royally pissed off, which was pissing off Remus. “Shut the fuck up, both of you.”
“Yes, Moony,” they both replied, shutting up.
James crawled out of the bed, returning a few minutes later with vials of hangover potion. He presented one to Remus.
“I could kiss you, Prongs,” he said once the potion had worked its magic throughout his body.
James pursed his lips and made kissy noises until Remus gave in and kissed him.
---
After he left James’ house, Remus stopped by his and Sirius’ flat to shower and change clothes. Then he flooed to Hogwarts. It was early July, so the students had just left. He went straight to the restricted section of the library where he and Lily were working on their research project for the Order.
“You’re late,” she commented.
“It’s your future husband’s fault.”
“How was the stag-do?”
Remus shrugged, thinking back over the night. They had gone to a few Muggle clubs. James was obsessed with disco, so the places they went mostly had bright, flashing lights, spinning mirror balls, and shitty dance music. They had also gone to one punk club at Sirius’ insistence, but James found it far too shout-y and the patrons all seemed to want to fight Remus specifically, so they didn’t stay long. After that, Remus could only remember vague images. He thinks they were on the Knight Bus, and in a strange pink-ish garden, and maybe they climbed a tree and howled at the moon at some point? He’s unsure. “The parts I remember were fun. I have a feeling that there’s a lot that I’ve forgotten though.”
“That’s strange for you, isn’t it? Aren’t you meant to have a steel constitution when it comes to alcohol?”
He laughed, “I do, usually. James leaving our little group of bachelors is cause enough to overindulge, though.”
“He isn’t leaving.” One of the things that Remus has always disliked most about Lily Evans is her freakish ability to pick up on the nuances of his speech and expression that give him away.
She, technically, found out about his condition even more quickly than the Marauders. Remus and Lily hadn’t been friends as first years. She didn’t know to pay any attention to the scarred, scrawny boy that hung around ‘that toerag Potter and his daft side-kick Black.’ After being partnered for a Transfiguration project early second year, they quickly became close. Sirius cornered Remus right before holiday break to tell him that the boys knew his secret. Lily waited until after the break to let him know.
Remus looked at his brilliant friend now, no longer the twelve-year-old that shyly patted his shoulder and told him that he didn’t have to hide from her. She raised an eyebrow that said, ‘get on with it.’
He sighed. “I know he isn’t leaving.”
“But…?”
“But we’ve already lost Peter to his fancy ministry job. He wasn’t even able to make it last night.”
“You haven’t lost Peter. We’re adults now. It’s normal for adults to be busy from time to time.”
“Too busy to make it to your best friend’s stag-do? I thought that was one of the things that friends are required to attend.”
“No one is required to attend anything.”
“You know what I mean, Lily.”
She put down her quill and rubbed an eye. The light coming from the tall window behind her made her look a bit like she had a golden halo on top of her scarlet hair. “Of course I know what you mean. I’m sure Peter will make it up to James since he couldn’t be there.”
“Yes, well.”
“And James would never leave the three of you. Can you imagine him abandoning Sirius?”
“No.” The thought was preposterous. Sirius and James were bonded more closely than brothers.
“And neither would abandon you either.”
Remus looked away. “I’m not entirely sure about that.”
“Well, I am. They would do anything for you. Sirius especially.”
All of Remus’ friends were optimistic. They all thought that everything would work out in the end. This war was just a speed bump on the way to their happy-ever-afters. Remus knew better, though.
He’s the only one of them that had actually been on missions so far. They had only been out of school a little over a year. Dumbledore would have been a fool to send such inexperienced fighters—with such great potential—into actual battle where there were real stakes. Instead, Sirius and James were training with the Aurors. Lily was doing research and training in specialised combat, whatever that meant. And Peter, honestly, just isn’t useful in Dumbledore’s eyes, so he probably would never be sent into a fight. He’s mostly used for recruiting within the ministry.
Remus, however, went on his first mission the week after graduation. Every full moon since, he has spent with packs of werewolves, trying to convince them to lay down their lives for a cause that cares nothing about them. He has also been called in as backup on missions where his lycanthropic status could be beneficial either for his superhuman abilities—strength, hearing, vision, dark magic detection—or as just a threatening presence.
He’s not optimistic after all he has seen. If Remus even survived this war—which he knew was unlikely—it would be a miracle for his friends to survive as well, let alone want anything to do with him after everything. No, they’ll probably just want to move on with their lives and leave all the darkness behind, including the dark creature.
Peter already is pulling away, focusing on his career in the ministry and dating a receptionist in his department. Lily and James are soon to be married and will most likely have children that Remus is too dangerous to be around. And Sirius will eventually want to settle down, either with Mary or with some other extraordinarily beautiful woman, and won’t want some pathetic, lovesick werewolf living off of him forever.
These are all things that Lily would try to refute, though, with her eternal optimism. So, Remus shoves his disbelief of her words to the back of his mind, smiles in acquiescence (even though she doesn’t seem to buy it), and gets on with his research.
---
Sirius was laying on the sofa when Remus stepped out of their fireplace. “Moony,” he whined. “I’m famished.”
“You should probably learn to feed yourself at some point.” He took off his shoes by the hearth and smiled despite himself.
“Nothing I make ever tastes as good as it does when you make it.”
“What do you do when I’m not here?”
The other man followed Remus into their kitchen. “Sometimes James feeds me, but usually I live off of cheesy bread and wait for you to come home.”
“Cheesy bread?”
Sirius shrugged, “Yeah. Bread, but you put a piece of cheese on top.”
“Your culinary prowess truly amazes me,” he quipped as he rummaged through the fridge and then the cupboards for cooking inspiration. “We’re going to have to go to a Tesco at some point. Pasta sound ok?”
The two made the food together. Remus was sure to thoroughly show Sirius every step of making it, even though he knew he would probably forget it right away. He has shown Sirius how to cook before and nothing has stuck. At this point, he only bothers in the hopes that with enough repetition, he’ll have to learn something eventually.
After they ate, they washed dishes together the Muggle way, Remus washing and Sirius drying, while they talked about their days.
“And then Moody had us running laps around the training centre because ‘we aren’t taking our lives seriously.’”
“Oh, no. Did he say that exactly?” Remus groaned, already knowing what was coming.
“So I said, ‘I always take things siriusly.’ Obviously, he didn’t like that. He said that I would be suspended if I made that joke even one more time. So, then I said, ‘Are you always this moody?’ And he legitimately– Remus! Let me finish the story before you start laughing! –He legitimately threw a book at me. It hit my head, Moony!” Sirius threw his arms in the air. “I tried to stop, because y’know, I was bleeding everywhere. But Moody yelled at me for that, so I just ran around and around, leaking so much blood that it probably spontaneously formed a ward around the perimeter of the training centre, until I fainted from blood loss.”
“No!”
“Yes! And then, do you know what he did? He just handed me a blood replenishing potion and told me to keep going.”
“That seems unethical.”
“He’s one of Head Auror Scrimgeour’s favourites. He can do whatever he wants, and what he wants is apparently to torture me.”
Remus handed him another plate to dry. “I don’t think he’s trying to torture you, Pads. I think he’s trying to get you to act right.”
“What does that even mean, to act right?”
“Well, for one,” Remus shook his head to get his fringe out of his eyes, “You could try learning the skills they’re teaching you in Auror training rather than questioning everything your mentor says.”
“I was trying to learn more by asking questions!”
“You were quizzing him on absurd hypothetical situations. There’s a difference.”
Sirius huffed. “What do you know? You’re not in Auror training.”
Remus dropped the glass he had just picked up back into the dishwater. Sirius knew it was a sore spot that he wasn’t in training with his friends. The ministry has a policy against hiring dark creatures. Remus, therefore, was automatically disqualified from becoming an Auror, regardless of whether he was a better dueler than James or more even-headed than Sirius.
“Wait, Moons. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Sure you didn’t, Sirius.” He dried his hands off with a nearby towel. “I’m going to bed.”
---
Over the years, Remus has had to learn how to accept himself. He was a tall, lanky, scarred werewolf with a big nose and a shitty attitude. There wasn’t a lot to like, so acceptance was the best he was going to get. There was one thing that he did like about himself, though, and that was his ability with Occlumency.
He had actually learned to occlude without knowing that he was learning it. Every time he hid his emotions from his parents so they wouldn’t worry about him, every time he hid his condition from his peers so he wouldn’t be ostracised, every time he was put into a cage or a creepy abandoned house and had to put aside his fears of becoming a monster so he could just get on with it, it became second nature for him to protect his mind. Now, as an adult, he was able to take that a step further and protect his mind from himself.
If he didn’t want to think of anything but whatever task happened to be at hand, he didn’t have to. And so, that’s exactly how he went about the next several weeks.
Dumbledore soon took him off his and Lily’s research project in order to send him back into the field. He spent a whole month—two moons—trying to convince an Irish werewolf colony to fight for their side to no avail.
“What happened to you?” Sirius gasped when Remus eventually showed up in their sitting room, covered in blood and bruises.
He looked down at himself. “The Irish like to brawl,” he shrugged.
“What the bloody hell were you doing in Ireland?”
“Mission,” Remus grunted on the way to shower.
“At least let me heal you,” Sirius called, but Remus didn’t stop, didn’t bother answering.
He scrubbed every bit of dirt and grime from his body, luxuriating in the hot water after bathing in a cold stream for several weeks. When he reached for his towel, his eye caught on some grime that he must have missed on his hand. It was a black smudge that looked a bit like an inkblot, and it completely refused to come off. He eventually gave up and decided to sleep for over twenty hours instead.
---
Lily and James’ wedding came right after Remus had a stint on a protection detail for a Muggle politician that the Death Eaters were rumoured to be targeting.
He was exhausted by all of the wards he had had to cast, and that was even before he stood outside of a locked room all night, listening for the distinct pop of apparition. His schedule only allowed him a couple of hours of sleep before he needed to meet up with the rest of the Marauders.
Of course, he was late. When he finally arrived at the groom’s quarters at their wedding venue, James was just happy that he had come at all. It didn’t bother him that Remus had missed the first round of pictures, because the photographer was planning on stopping by again anyway.
Sirius, however, was furious. He ignored Remus most of the day, only acknowledging his presence occasionally with a barb about not prioritising friendship or how some people have no sense of loyalty. Remus thought it was a bit much for being twenty minutes late to something, even if it was a wedding. It’s not like he missed the ceremony, for Christ’s sake.
The wedding was beautiful, of course. The Veritas Vow was cast on James and Lily by James’ father. In Remus’ opinion, it was the most beautiful type of marriage: the simplest bond to perform but also the strongest. All it required was a promise of love, protection, and loyalty then a bonding statement. That’s it. Two steps and you’re married. The ingredients are the complicated part of it.
A couple has to be completely sure of their feelings for one another, with no doubts. They have to know in their hearts that no matter what the other person did or became, they would still love them. It’s an awful lot to ask of anyone, to love unconditionally. Remus wasn't sure if he could ever promise anyone that and he knew for sure that he could never expect someone to love him unconditionally, with what he was. The couple also has to know with complete certainty that they would never do anything to intentionally hurt the other, that they would be devoted to them above all others, never to betray. In a sense, Remus could understand that one. He knew that he would never betray the Marauders. He would rather die.
And that is exactly the stakes for any doubt when the vow is performed. The beauty of the vow—and why it is so rare for a marriage—is that the couple would be struck down where they stood if their devotion was untrue.
James and Lily never had anything to worry about, obviously.
-
Every time Remus glanced at him during the reception, Sirius was chugging alcohol. Their eyes would periodically meet, Sirius nearly casting flames at him with the sheer force of his glare. So, it wasn’t surprising when, halfway through, the other man stumbled over to him and asked him to dance. Remus, far too sober, reluctantly agreed.
Even plastered, Sirius could lead an impeccable waltz. Remus, who had been taught to dance by Hope Lupin and not a professional dance tutor, was only decent on a good day. They twirled around the dance floor a few times. As always when Sirius decided to drunkenly dance with Remus, he tried to enjoy the feeling of a strong hand on his waist and the intoxicating focus directed solely at him. It was even more difficult when the other man was angry.
“Enjoying the wedding?” Sirius slurred.
Remus just hummed, knowing that he wouldn’t actually wait on an answer.
“You almost missed it. It would have been so shitty.”
“Have you really let me being a little late ruin this day for you?”
“You didn’t come home last night either!” His raised voice drew the attention of the couples dancing around them.
Grabbing his wrist, Remus pulled Sirius to the edge of the open tent the reception was taking place in. “I told you I was on a mission last night,” he hissed.
“That’s bullshit, Remus,” Sirius spat. “Dumbledore isn’t letting any of us on missions yet.”
“I have special skills that Dumbledore utilises. You know that. What do you think I’ve been doing for the past year if not missions?” Sirius was silent. “Where is this coming from?”
Instead of answering, Sirius only glared before spinning around and stomping off.
-
That night, Remus noticed a dark ring encircling one of his fingers. It looked an awful lot like a Muggle tattoo. It took him a long time to even come up with a theory of what it might be. His best guess was some kind of curse, but he couldn’t imagine when it was that he could have been cursed.
“Fuck,” he murmured drowsily. He had been awake for essentially forty-eight hours and didn’t feel like dealing with this. Besides, every person that he could think of that might be able to help him with a strange curse on his finger was either on their honeymoon (James and Lily), belligerently drunk as of a half hour ago (Marlene and Dorcas), or pissed off at him for reasons unknown (Sirius). So, Remus decided to take his chances, at least until he was rested enough to comb through a library.