Bitten

Fourteen

Two weeks later, Remus slipped into his room, just like he did every night. He had changed the room slightly, making it so that Remus was able to open the door as well. They spent every night together, running as wolves and developing a pack bond. It was easier than starting from scratch, considering he had been Moony's cub even before being bitten. In just two weeks, Remus was able to transform at will with relative ease.

"Evening Moony. Are you ready for tonight?" That night was the February full moon, the first that Remus would be spending with him.

"I guess. I still don't feel that I will be safe without the wolfsbane though cub."

"You'll be fine. Even if you don't keep your mind, Moony knows me and Rom, and we will be sealed in the room; you won't be able to hurt anyone."

"But I could still hurt you," Remus protested.

"It will be fine Remus. The worse you and Moony can do is scratches and I have potions for that." Remus ran his hand through his hair, sighing.

"I guess you're right. I'm still uneasy though."

"That's fine. Shall we head in?" Remus nodded and they both stripped, leaving their clothes in separate piles on the desk. The moved into the forest, the door sealing behind them in preparation for the night ahead.

"You didn't actually tell me; what have you been doing with the wolfsbane that Slughorn brings you?" Remus sat down on his favourite log, Harry sitting on a rock nearby.

"Well, I always drink it alone, so I've just been vanishing it. I can't really tell him to stop making it, because then I would have to explain everything and I don't want to out you, cub." Harry nodded, that made sense. They sat in a comfortable silence, waiting for the moon to begin rising. As soon as Harry noticed the moon peaking over the horizon, he moved off his rock into a crouching position, Remus following his lead.

They both remained crouched, waiting for the moonlight to hit them. The rays of light hit Harry first, hitting Remus just seconds later. They both began to transform. Within 2 minutes, Romulus stood in the clearing, waiting for Moony to finish the transformation. 5 minutes after he began shifting, Moony stood, fully transformed. Romulus gestured towards the forest ahead of them and together, they took off running.

They spent hour simply bounding together through the trees, playfighting and roughhousing around. Eventually, both Romulus and Moony seemed to tire out slightly, slowly, and calmly making their way back through the forest to the point they started. Romulus flopped to the ground first, Moony soon following and lying down next to him. They just lay there, relaxing in the peaceful woods.

The last beams of moonlight disappeared from the sky and both Moony and Romulus began to change back to their respective human forms. Remus and Harry continued to lay on the ground for a little while, before pushing themselves up off the floor and making their way over to their respective seats, Harry to his rock and Remus to his log.

"That was one of the best moons of my life," Remus commented once they were both seated, waiting for the sun to rise and the door to open again.

"Oh? What would top this?" Harry asked with a raised eyebrow.

"The November moon of my fifth year. That was the first full moon after they completed their animagus transformations." Remus eyes glazed slightly, as if he was seeing something else; he probably was.

"What did you do?" he asked, leaning forward slightly, resting his head in his hands, elbows on his knees.

"They came in after I transformed. It didn't take as long as we thought it would for Moony to get comfortable around them. He, he already knew them, their scents. We were a pack and he wouldn't hurt them, not while they were animals. Padfoot and Moony roughhoused a little bit, but Prongs broke it up before we did any damage. We just hung around the shack. It wasn't what we did that made it a memorable moon. It was the fact that I had company, that I wasn't going to be alone during the time that used to be torture." Harry watched as Remus eyes gained a slight gleam to them as he retold the memory.