On a Windswept Cliff (2/9)

[starfishstar]

ON A WINDSWEPT CLIFF

Summary:

On the cliff top where the fearsome Lord Black once stalked, an outcast man meets a big black dog, and things are not as they seem.

Or: The Remus/Sirius gothic romance AU.

CHAPTER TWO

"This might sound a bit odd, but is there, er, a man who hangs about here sometimes? Dark hair, bit of a…deliberately mysterious air?" Remus asked Molly the next morning.

They were sitting out in front of the museum, despite the grey clouds scudding overhead, and sorting through an enormous pile of archives, files and rolls of parchment on the history of the abbey. Molly claimed it was to better acquaint Remus with some background on the place, but he suspected it was at least in part because she wanted an extra pair of hands to help with a seemingly endless task.

Her youngest – a toddler and the only girl among the bunch, as far as Remus had been able to determine – was playing under Molly's chair with a toy wand cleverly disguised as a plastic Muggle sword. The next three youngest – twins of perhaps six, and another boy a year or so older than the girl – were within shouting distance, wrestling over a child-sized Quaffle.

Molly laughed. "Yesterday a dog and today a man? You do draw the strays, don't you, Remus? No, I can't say I know anyone who fits that description. But folks from the village occasionally wander up here, even though the grounds are technically closed at night. If he comes again and gives you any trouble, you do have the authority to call in the Muggle police if necessary."

"No, no, it was no problem," Remus said. "I was just wondering if that sort of thing happened often."

The man hadn't been trouble, exactly. At least, not trouble of any sort the Muggle police were equipped to deal with.

Molly handed him another slip of parchment. They were trying to sort the documents roughly by topic and era, though Molly had an extremely complex filing system that Remus had not yet fully grasped.

With each new record or file or letter, Remus winced in anticipation, steeling himself to see Harry's name jump out at him, or mentions of James and Lily's death, that night that had brought a final end to Lord Black's long reign of terror.

But so far, to Remus' relief, most of the documents had been older ones, relating to the Dark wizard's first bid for power in the late 19th century, when he'd bent the country to his will from this, his stronghold, Grimmauld Abbey.

Molly was scheduled to give an abbey tour to a large group of Muggle tourists that afternoon, and she chatted to Remus about it as they worked.

"There are a few true things I can tell them, of course," she was saying. "19th century nobleman – they don't need to know he was a wizarding nobleman – cruel and power-hungry, known for the absolute loyalty he demanded of those who served him. I tell them the legend that he arrived here in Yorkshire from a shipwreck off the coast, and that he swam ashore in the form of a big black dog. Children love that bit. He made Grimmauld Abbey his home, set about trying to wrest power from other lords and intimidate the general population into obeying him – then vanished very suddenly, amid rumours that he couldn't really be dead because he hadn't been quite human to begin with. That's where the Muggles get their vampire notions. There are legends, too, that he lay asleep in the crypt beneath the Abbey through the decades, waiting for the right the moment to return and try again to take control of the wizarding population and rule over the Muggles." She shivered. "Which is one part of the legend that turned out to be true."

"Quite aside from the legend," Remus said, keeping himself carefully blank as he steered the conversation back away from Lord Black's second rise, "does anyone know why he disappeared the first time, back then?"

Molly shrugged, the gesture not dismissive, but an acknowledgement that some things could never be known for certain. "Some other very powerful wizard must have managed to subdue him for a time, though not, er – finish things, if you know what I mean."

She nodded carefully in the direction of the little girl playing under her chair, and Remus couldn't help being momentarily diverted by the realisation that Molly didn't mind raising her family amongst the ruins of the place where the Darkest wizard in modern history had once ruled – but drew the line at discussing the death of said wizard in front of her children.

"Whatever Dark magic he'd used to make himself invincible meant he couldn't be, er, gone for good," she continued. "Still, though, stopping him even for a time must have been an extraordinary feat. Perhaps it's a bit mad, but I've always suspected Dumbledore of having had a hand in it, though he would have been very young then, just a teen. But of course he'll never say."

Remus himself had sometimes wondered the same. Dumbledore had been so deeply involved in vanquishing Lord Black this second time that it wasn't hard to imagine him having been involved the first time as well.

Remus wondered what had changed in those intervening decades to render a Dark wizard, determined to live forever, mortal once again.

"They say he had sons, back when he was still fully human," Molly mused, gazing out over the hills into the slate-coloured sky. "But no one knows for sure. I wouldn't envy anyone being a child of that family. Or the wife of such a man, for that matter."

She shook her head.

"Sorry! What dark talk. Have you found that title deed yet? I know it's in that pile somewhere; I had it just the other day."

From there, their conversation diverted into property deeds and Muggle versus wizarding property registers, and Remus was grateful.

After Molly had conducted her tour group around the abbey that afternoon – 20 eager Muggles, some even dressed in period costumes, with black capes and plastic vampire fangs – in the ensuing quiet, Remus did his rounds of the building, outbuildings and grounds. He had decided this would be his routine, checking every inch of the place daily, so that if the magic of it shifted even slightly, he would be the first to know.

Wand in one hand, the other trailing firmly along the wind-weathered grey stones of the abbey's outer wall, Remus' thoughts wandered inevitably back to Lord Black.

His resurrection, after decades of dormancy, had come in the 1970s, when Remus was at school. It had come about by the help of loyal followers, witches and wizards enamoured of the Dark Arts and the illusion that a returned Lord Black would bring pure-blood wizards untold power over the Muggle world. By the time Remus and his friends had left Hogwarts, "He Who Must Not Be Named" had had Britain's wizarding population cowering on its knees.

They'd joined Dumbledore's secret organisation, of course, he and James and Lily. The Order of the Phoenix. How could they not? James and Lily were the bravest, most right-minded people he knew, and Lily was a Muggle-born witch. There was no way any of them was going to stand by and watch a megalomaniac destroy everything they loved.

Then came the prophecy, the one that said Lord Black's downfall would come at the hands of a boy whose description matched that of Harry, James and Lily's infant son. Remus' godson.

And James and Lily had taken baby Harry and gone into hiding, and they had needed a Secret Keeper. Remus, despite grave misgivings, had agreed to be that person. But on the evening they were to perform the spell, terrified that history would repeat itself and he would somehow lead danger to them rather than away, Remus had backed out.

James and Lily were understanding, had said they would fine someone else. But in that one day, between when Remus should have done it and when they would have found someone else, Lord Black had found and killed them.

By hesitating to protect them, Remus had fulfilled his own prophecy, and brought about their deaths.

Remus found himself choking, gasping for breath, clinging blindly to the stones of the abbey, as if the world had tilted beneath him and this was the last thing keeping him from being flung into the abyss.

He managed to sink to his knees, and the chill of the damp ground seeped through the fabric of his trousers. A few heavy drops of rain had begun to fall. He panted, desperate for breath.

Would it ever be possible to think of James and Lily without this crushing weight of guilt and grief?

Remus bowed his head, and breathed.

He tried to conjure up happier memories. Lily dancing with delight the first time she successfully brewed Polyjuice Potion. James proudly tossing his antlered head, then promptly walking into a wall because his spatial perception had not yet adjusted to his new form, the first time he and Remus had completed the Animagus transformation.

James and Lily. Remus had failed them just as he had failed his own parents.

Remus dragged himself to his feet, and completed his rounds of the abbey by force of will. When that was finished, he walked away from the abbey in a straight line, out across the hills and farmland, through the intermittent rain and the watery streaks of sunlight, simply walked until he was too tired even to think. Then and only then did he turn his feet back towards the abbey.

It must have been nearing midnight by the time he returned, the waxing moon high in the sky and the rain finally over. Remus approached his small cottage, then stopped. His senses, heightened ever since he'd become an Animagus, told him someone was nearby.

Once again, the dark-haired man he'd met the night before precipitated out of the shadows.

"Look at you, turning up like an unlucky Knut," Remus said, surprising himself even as the words left his mouth. Remus did not, as a rule, banter with tall, dark strangers.

"Look at you," the man returned, "wandering about in all manner of weather. Too cool to be caught wearing sensible outdoors clothing, are we?"

"Too good at waterproofing charms to need it," Remus retorted, and the man barked out a surprised laugh.

Remus had to hide a smile. Making this man laugh was unexpectedly easy, and unexpectedly amusing.

Far too late, Remus realised he had simply assumed the man was a wizard. He was not usually so incautious. Perhaps there was just something so otherworldly about this man that it was impossible to imagine him not possessing magic. Still, that sort of carelessness was inexcusable.

The man was giving Remus a sardonic look, practically rolling his eyes. "No, I'm not a Muggle. So you can stop squinching up your face in consternation like that."

"When meeting unfamiliar individuals, one should assume non-magical status unless explicitly proven otherwise," Remus said, then could have kicked himself for talking like a book.

Now the man – Sirius – did roll his eyes. "And I've finally met someone who's memorised the Statute of Secrecy in its entirety."

"Not in its entirety!" Remus protested, then realised he'd fallen into the trap of admitting he had in fact memorised parts of it.

He just happened to find wizarding legal history fascinating, that was all. It didn't make him the world's biggest nerd. Except the man was looking at him like it really, really did.

"Bet you were a right swot in school," Sirius said.

"Bet you were forever getting into trouble for being in places you shouldn't," Remus shot back.

He didn't mean anything bad by it. He and James had certainly spent time in plenty of places they shouldn't have been – in the Forbidden Forest at night learning to be Animagi, just for starters. But something in the man's face shuttered closed, making him look haughty and unapproachable in a way he hadn't before.

Another belated realisation: If they were roughly the same age – and it was hard to tell in the dark, but Remus thought they probably were – then why didn't he know Sirius from Hogwarts? He would definitely have noticed this man.

Something in Sirius' face forbade asking.

Searching for more neutral ground, Remus said, "You must live around here, then?"

"What makes you say that?" the man snapped.

Remus lifted an eyebrow, though the full effect of it was probably lost in the shadows. "Because this is the second time in as many days that I've found you hanging round my door?"

"Right." The man seemed to relax fractionally. "Well, if you've got better things to be doing…"

"No, no. I didn't mean that."

Remus found himself tempted to invite the man inside, to suggest they chat by the fireside instead of in the harsh wind, if they were going to chat anyway. Surely Sirius didn't lurk around outdoors by choice?

That thought called to mind the legend – not strictly true, though a widely held belief even among wizards – that vampires had to be invited before they could cross the threshold of a house.

Whatever this man was, though, he wasn't a vampire. Even if he did seem, so far, only to come out at night. Remus had done an extensive study of Dark Beings as his final project in Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts – a school project with real-world relevance if ever there was one, given the period during which Remus had finished school – and he knew the signs. Sirius was an odd one, but he was not undead.

And yet…and yet… Inviting strange men into his house, no matter how alluring, ran directly counter to his purpose in living out here, which was to keep himself from forming the sorts of close ties that could only ever lead to tragedy. Molly, he fervently hoped, he could count as exempt, since the two of them were colleagues, not friends. But Sirius… No. Remus was not here to make friends.

But surely chatting for a little while here in the dark could do no harm?

Remus cast about for something to say. Asking the man about himself was clearly off-limits. "What sort of things are there to do around here, then?" he asked, hearing how banal the question sounded even as he spoke it.

"To do?" Sirius replied with a snort. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing. There's the sleepy little village down there below the hill, and that's it."

Why do you stay here, then? Remus wanted to ask, but of course he didn't.

Relenting a little, Sirius amended, "This place is beautiful, though, I'll give it that. So it's all right, if you like walking and cliffs and sea and that sort of thing."

"I do," Remus said.

Sirius was looking at him closely and for a moment Remus had the mad thought Sirius was going to offer to…what? Show him around? Meet up sometime for a walk, rather than only ever meeting by almost-chance here in the darkness?

Remus surprised himself with how much he wished for Sirius to suggest something very much like that.

Sirius, too, looked as though he wanted to say more, but something was holding him back. At length all he said was, "Well. I suppose that's all right, then." After another silence, he smirked and said, "Why'd you come here, then? Surely you knew it's a boring old place."

"It's a job," Remus said. "And I needed one."

Sirius tilted his head, there in the darkness, as if the idea of needing a job badly enough to take anything that was on offer were something he couldn't entirely comprehend. Remus wondered what he did for a living, or if in fact he worked at all. Going by the cut of his clothes alone, he probably didn't have to.

Another question Remus suspected wouldn't be welcome. Something about Sirius, though, intrigued him enough that he almost wanted to ask anyway–

No.

No, he should not be trying to get to know this man who had turned up on his doorstep. He should cut this off before there was any danger of going too far.

"It's late," Remus said.

"It's late," Sirius agreed.

Was that a note of disappointment in his otherwise posh and perfectly modulated voice? Impossible to say.

"Good night, then," Remus said. "Er, see you around, I guess." He stepped carefully around Sirius, to the cottage door.

"Good night, Remus," Sirius said, his voice going low and smoky as it had been when he had first appeared out of the shadows the night before. It sent a shiver up Remus' spine.

Remus turned back to look at Sirius. The moonlight threw his dramatic features into sharp relief and there was no other word for it – he was beautiful.

For one long moment, Sirius stared back at him, and his eyes seemed to bore right into Remus, find all his hidden fears, weigh them, and judge them lacking. Judge them not reason enough to turn away a man like Sirius.

But then the moment passed, the corner of Sirius' mouth lifted in the tiniest quirk of amusement, and he turned with a flourish and strode away across the bluff.

This time, Remus watched him go. Sirius was visible a long time in the bright moonlight, his dark cloak whipping about him and the wind throwing his hair back from his shoulders. Remus stood in the chill wind outside the cottage and watched until he was out of sight.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

(continued to Chapter Three)

Comments

[shimotsuki.livejournal.com]

Hooray for updates. And so we find out a little more about this Remus, and a little more about the war. No Peter, it seems, and Remus himself is the one to betray the Potters, but only through his crippling self-doubt.

That line about him having failed his parents too really has me wondering, now. And hmmm, will we learn that Sirius is the son of the nefarious Lord Black?

(Curious about Remus's Animagus form, too. Apparently sort of canine, from what we saw in chapter 1. A wolf, perhaps...as it seems he's not a werewolf here.)

[starfishstar]

Hee, it's really fun for me to see your reactions as you go along, since that's exactly what I don't know, but would like to know: how each part of the story reads when you don't know the rest yet! I hope the answers to these questions prove satisfying :-)

[huldrejenta.livejournal.com]

"But no one knows for sure. I wouldn't envy anyone being a child of that family. Or the wife of such a man, for that matter."
Oh now I feel for Sirius... Or am I assuming the wrong thing here..? ;)

By hesitating to protect them, Remus had fulfilled his own prophecy, and brought about their deaths.
Oh Remus...

These two seem like people in need for someone in their lives who understands a thing or two about grief.

[starfishstar]

Well, of course I don't want to give anything away ;-) ...but yes, there are lots of ways these two are well-equipped to help each out with some understanding and sympathy!