The Second War (A Remus Lupin Story)

19. Potterwatch

Remus was late. It was not until a quarter after six that he stumbled into the Burrow, seeing the Lee and Fred and apologizing profusely. They both grinned despite the fact that they had practically threatened him the night before to make him show up on time.

"We thought you might be late," Fred said. "That's why we told you six instead of six thirty."

Remus knew he should be offended by this, but they were right. He could not deny it. "So where is this secret place then?"

Fred explained, "We can't tell you where exactly it is, we can only bring you there. See, early on, we realized that they would find us eventually. There's ways of keeping it a secret, like the Fidelius Charm, but even that isn't fail proof."

"I'd be the first to tell you that," Remus gave a hollow laugh that the boys chuckled uncomfortably at.

"Yes, well after that we decided that we'd have to start moving around. There's obviously only so many places to go and not be found, so we thought it'd make it easier to keep it a secret if even our own guests didn't know where we are," Lee grinned at Remus's look of confusion, then in one motion, took a step forward, grabbed his robes, and Disapparated them both.

"Merlin, Jordan, you can't do that without some warning," Remus breathed, pulling himself away from Lee.

Fred Apparated right next to them, cackling. "Sorry, Lupin."

The place they were in now was a cottage, smaller than his own. It appeared that at least one of them had been living in it. Remus jumped as he realized that there was another person in the room.

Kingsley stood from the small round table, smiling at Remus. "Kingsley," Remus grinned. They had not seen each other since Kingsley had gone on the run for saying Voldemort's name. "I knew they wouldn't catch you."

Kingsley smiled and chuckled. "I practically invented all of those ministry idiots' tactics. They'll never catch me." Remus smiled and clapped him on the back, glad to see his old friend again.

The four of them sat around the table, Remus suddenly feeling terribly nervous, a lump forming in his throat, though he did not know why.

"Now here's the plan," Jordan said with a suddenly serious look. He pulled four pieces of parchment out of the inner lining of his jacket, and handed them to each person. Remus read the list, and raised his eyebrows, impressed. "I'll do the introduction. Then I'll introduce you all, we use code names just in case any Death Eaters are listening in. I'm River, Fred is Rodent—"

"Rodent! Why am I Rodent?" Fred argued.

"Well what do you want to be?"

Fred thought for a moment, then decided, "Rapier." There was a tone of finality in his voice that Lee did not argue with.

"Anyways.... Kingsley is Royal, and Lupin can be...." He looked at Remus with a questioning look.

Remus did not hesitate. "Romulus."

Lee and Fred looked confused.

Remus felt a little embarrassed that they did not get the reference. "It's from an old story.... Whatever it doesn't matter...."

Lee raised an eyebrow, then he picked up his quill and started writing on the parchment, then he paused. "Spell that for me."

"R-O-M-U-L-U-S," Remus spelled out.

"Okay, great. After I do the introductions, I'll announce the recent deaths."

Remus was surprised by the casual tone of Lee's voice as he said it. A young man of his age should not have to bare the weight of being the first to notify the wizarding community of recent deaths. Although, Remus was about his age when he experienced the first wizarding war.