HIS BARK AND HIS BITE
by A. Vulgarweed
[usual disclaimers; ya know, not mine, not by a long shot. Debt is owed here not only to the Mother Goddess JKR but to Canis M and Rage Point who've explored similar themes so beautifully.]
His scent came down the tunnel first.
Human, male, not a child; young mature. Not of the Pack. (Little bit of Remus mind left in the corners says, NO not him, not here, not now. No, go back.) Very little bit of Remus-mind--goddamn it, my mind. Lost in scent of blood. Wolf peers down the tunnel; black shoes first, black robes, footsteps, breathing. His. Coughing; dusty air. Glint. Coming closer, closer. Unaware; doesn't smell, doesn't hear. Humans can't. Growing smell of meat, of thin throat-skin, of veins and tendons, bones to gnaw.
He sees. His air smells of fear now; sweet fear, tasty fear; he makes a little sound from that pretty neck I'll snap...and but wait! new scent new sound?
Another one. Thicker, bigger. Shouts, announces his presence. Arm around the skinny one's waist, pulls him back. He sees too and I smell his fear too, you bastard-of-the-Pack, this-one-is, not so tough in human shape, almost as full of luscious fear as the other one; blue eyes, black eyes wide and scared.
I smell his blood too. Just as tangy meaty makes-me-hungry as the other one.
But the One-of-the-Pack drags them both back and slams the door. Snout hits wood. Pain. Hunger.
And there in the hospital wing in his tossing sleep he dreamt not of what had happened as he'd gnawed his own limbs in a terrible sense of starvation, but of what he'd wanted: Throat collapsing in his jaws; struggling, dying body writhing underneath him. Muzzle drenched in blood, digging deep in shattered ribcage. In his bed he twisted and stiffened. Sheets made sticky--that was hunting, it did that, made him hard, carried him over edges. In his dreams he chewed the bloody rags of winter neck-scarves: green and silver, red and gold.
He was awakened. Jumped up still unawares: checked his human hands and face; despoiled sheets, wounds but no blood, tissue in his mouth just his own. Cold and shaking, brought back to a simple clean place that gave him nothing.
And there the black-haired bastard was, having the balls to look contrite, down at the floor. And Remus started to fly from the bed and was brought up short by the hopelessness of it all.
"You told him. I know you told him," he said, his voice raspy from the far-from-human sounds he'd spent the whole night making. "I know we weren't followed."
"Well, that greasy little stoat-faced shite--"
"Don't even start, you son of a bitch," growled Remus, not knowing what his own next words would be until he heard them. "Don't even start about how much you hate him. I don't give a fuck about you and who you want to kill but won't yourself. You're a fucking attempted murderer, Sirius, and you wouldn't have given it another fucking thought until you saw me down at the Ministry dog pound being put down."
Sirius's eyes went wide and then suddenly, terribly sad. "I didn't think--"
"'Course you didn't. Here's something else to fucking practice thinking about: I could have killed James just as easily."
Sirius flinched and goggled, horrified. "No. Absolutely fucking not. I won't believe that."
"Oh yes, Black, yes I could have done. Your precious James. See, now that makes you upset. You do NOT understand what I am. You simply don't." Lupin sat back, appalled at himself. He hadn't meant to let that slip; goddamn, it was all horrible enough, did he have to let that bit of extra horror, the cherry on the top of the sundae of utter blasted desolate misery, go out there into the ether to hover around for ever too? But to see Black's reaction, it was almost worth it. Almost.
Black was crumpled and small, hunching against the wall as if his stomach hurt. "Remus, I'm...god, man, I'm so sorry. You're right, I didn't think, I never do. I just wanted to scare him...he knows too much."
That was it. Remus leapt from the bed with the next to last of his strength, advancing on Sirius with the little bit that remained of the wolf, his eyes vicious and yellowish in the dim light of the infirmary at dawn, his voice a quiet growl. "You wanted to scare him....with me....your fucking ooga-booga bogeyman, that's me, your fucking killer pet! He knows too much...so your fucking brilliant idea is to show him everything!"
Sirius tried to back up, but there was nowhere for him to go. He stood there helplessly, his eyes fixed on his friend; shirtless, wearing only thin cotton pyjama pants stained with blood and....oh God, with, with that....hanging barely on lean hipbones, ribs countable, wounds healing. That terrible, beautiful face, haggard, dark-circled. Oh Remus. You don't understand what I am either. But he does, and that's why...Oh God. That's it. That's how we're all going to die, because of our secrets and who knows them and who doesn't.
Remus lunged, with his teeth bared. Sirius dodged, and Remus smacked the wall, hard; Sirius caught him as he started to sink, feeling feverish flesh burning beneath soft bare skin; angled bones moving with their weary intelligence of wirey tendons; smelled his scent, wild and primal and noble but dirty and tired too, and almost started to weep. But in the midst of this he needed even to see if he could get away with burying his nose in that soft honey-colored hair...fur....for just a second, if he'd never be allowed again. Wonder if under the veil of supporting, a fingertip or two beneath that waistband was possible, just below the sweet flatness at the bottom of his back.
Remus recovered long enough to land a punch at close range that drew a little blood from Sirius's nose; then he collapsed into the black-haired boy's strong grip and tried with all his teenage might not to cry. Snuffling just a little he murmured with a terrible emphasis on every word, "Padfoot, if you pull a stunt like that again I swear next time I will bite you. I won't kill you. I won't eat you. I will bite you, and then you will understand what I am all too well. Do you get it, in your thick head?"
"Yes, Moony," Sirius whispered, helping Remus back to bed. All he wanted to was to lay his head on that thin chest and hear his heart, perhaps lick his salty skin just a bit. He refrained, kept his muscles tense and arousal averted, grateful for his robe that concealed. For all the biting he could do could never turn Remus into another like he was, if it weren't in his heart and loins already, and he told himself that the odd beseechment he sometimes saw in those brightest of eyes was only a figment of his imagination; a reflection of the moon.
~fin~