The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part Two

LXVII: 23 June, 1994

"What are you acting like a complete nutter for?" Savage demanded crossly, letting her pull him up, "Bleeding hell." He clutched his nose, the change in elevation from sitting to standing smarting all the way up the bridge of it.

"Here." Tonks raised her wand. "Episky." 

There was a loud crack and Savage cursed loudly, slapping his knee with his palm at the pain. "You gotta warn a guy before you do that! Blimey!"

"Sorry. Now GO. Get up to the castle. Right away. Your mouth looks terrible and I can't do a bloody thing about that," she lied, exaggerating the damage the rock had done, "And that gash on your cheek, it looks terribly painful."

"Of course it's terribly painful!" Savage answered, frustrated.

"Well see? To make up for you thinking I stunned you - which I didn't, you tripped on that bloody exposed tree root over there -" she pointed to the tree root that most definitely had not been there before she'd conjured it up moments before ennervating him, "-- I'll watch your post for you! Make sure the Willow is well guarded!"

Savage eyed her suspiciously.

"Really! Go on! Before your face is stuck like that permanently! And wouldn't that be unfortunate!"

It didn't take much more convincing and he was off - he was very prideful in his good looks, after all, which was honestly at least half of why Tonks couldn't stand the man. 

She watched him go, nervous, and hopping from one foot to the other. What should she do? What should she do? She looked up at the full moon rising and the fading of the sunlight. If Remus came up out of the tunnel under the Whomping Willow into THAT moon - he was going to transform. He hadn't had the potion! 

"OHP! The potion! I'll get the potion! I can meet him at the tunnel with it and he can drink it and - and - and when he changes he'll be alright!" Tonks took one last look at the tunnel, hoping she would be able to get to the office and back again before it was too late.

She rushed forward, running across the grounds. Her hot pink trainers squealed on the stone steps leading up into the castle. She wished she had Hagrid's hippogriff now - he could fly her right to the office and back again and maybe she'd stand a chance of beating Remus's moment under the moon. 

Filch would complain for days about discarded rhinestones that dotted the corridors where they'd flown off her trainers.

She took the stairs three at a time, and was panting with burning lungs by the time she got there. The dungeon - the potion master's office - where Professor Severus Snape would have the potion for sure. She banged on his office door. "Yoo hooo!! Professor!! PROFESSOR SNA-AAAPE!" she shouted, "URGENT MINISTRY BUSINESS! VERY OFFICIAL!" 

He wasn't answering.

"Bloody hell," she muttered and she backed up from the doorway, glanced left and right to be sure no one was coming, then raised her wand.

A simple alohamora would never work - not with somebody like Snape, she reckoned. He probably had about 12 passwords and a bloody full length obstacle course to run through to get inside knowing Severus Snape.

"Welp," she muttered, "Already stunned an auror and broke his nose. Might as well get busted for breaking and entering." She aimed and shouted, "Reducto!"

There was a great shower of red sparks as the door exploded inward, landing a few feet back from the frame on the floor with an almighty crash. Tonks rushed up the steps and into the office, looking around frantically. She ran to the stores and started plucking up bottles, searching for anything labelled Wolfsbane. But there was none.

"Nooo," she gasped, panicking, "No, no, no - there has to be -- some where here --"

And then she heard something that made her go cold.

Purring.

Mrs. Norris.

She turned around slowly. The tabby was standing there in the middle of the doorway, staring at Tonks. 

"Shoo!" Tonks tried. "Go away, this is a very important thing I'm doing. I could have a warrant, you don't know!"

The cat  seemed to listen, jumping down, and disappearing around the door of the office.

"Well. That worked well," she said, and she dove back into her search.

In her haste to turnabout, though, Tonks's foot slipped on absolutely nothing and she tripped backwards into the shelf, knocking over a bright yellow bottle, which hit the ground, which released an intense amount of concentrated scent and set Tonks into uproarious laughter that would not stop - she picked up the broken bottle and saw it was a laughing potion. "Of - of course!" she was in tears over - well, nothing. And this fact alone was funnier than anything else and she leaned against the wall, wheezing but unable to stop.

She couldn't even stop when Argus Filch showed up in the door frame and cleared his throat.

"It's YOU!" she laughed, hooting with mirth, wiping her eyes. "Oh gods, I - I can't find the wolfsbane! And -" she could barely control herself, "I - I spilled the laughing tonic and -- you're just sooo funny! Look'it'choo!"

Filch grabbed onto her arm. "You won't be laughin' when Dumbledore finds out you're sneaking about in Professor Snape's stores!"

Tonks looked at his old, wrinkly hand grasping her elbow and she laughed all the harder, "Mr. Filch I'm not twelve anymore, I - I've been trained in defensive action at the Auror Training Center now!" tears were coming down her cheeks as she hooted at him, "I could kill you with my bare hands you old codger!" 

"Come with me!" Filch demanded.

Tonks wrenched away, "No, no, I'd rather not. Mr. Filch, where's Professor Snape? You seen him about?" She was still giggling a bit, but the potion was starting to wear off (she drank nearly an entire vial of giggle potion once as a dare with Cha-Cha Weasley and they'd both been laughing for DAYS back then so thank goodness this potion wore off quicker than that one had). As she pulled back, she saw a label on a shelf. Aconite. "OH! Wait! That's another word for Wolfsbane isn't it?"

"Stealing from the Potion Master's store! Thievery is a very bad offense! You'll be fired from the Ministry for this!" Filch reached for her again, but she moved quicker than he could and grabbed up the box that sat on the shelf over the label.

Filch over-compensated and grabbed for her yet again, but she was quick as lightning moving about and she stepped 'round him, hopping over Mrs. Norris, and out of the store room. "Lovely chatting with you Filch." She took off running even as Mr. Filch tried at grabbing for her once again, tripped over Mrs. Norris, and fell headlong onto the flagstone floor.

Tonks was on her way down the corridor and back up the stairs from the dungeons, clutching the box of aconite, sure she had the right thing and imagining herself saving the day by taming Remus Lupin's werewolf. Then, once Remus was tame, she'd hear the whole story and finally, finally get to see Sirius Black again! And get to help to clear his name!

She couldn't wait to hug Sirius and tell him she never once didn't believe he was innocent.

Would he thank her? Would he be proud of her?

What would he say?

She danced down the front stairs of the school, merry and confident as could be, not even noticing that she was dancing through full moon light, no longer a fading sunset but the full luminous moon. She was singing to herself - Hungry Like the Wolf by Duran Duran, obviously -and was just turning toward the Whomping Willow when a chilling sound filled the air.

Speaking of wolves.

Speaking of hungry wolves.

The night was filled with the howl of a hungry werewolf.

Oh no.