The rising moon

Remus

Everything was peaceful. Each blow of the wind, move of an insect and breath of a creature was in a perfectly free harmony. Light poured down from the radiant sun's glow, dripping and reflecting on the leaves of crooked branches. It filled the forest with warmth and life in a welcoming embrace. It gave a bright colour to all plants and greenery that stood side by side to a dry mud path. The path twisted in uneven widths of wide and thin, worn by the footsteps of a young family.

"Careful Remus, don't trip on the rocks!" cried a suddenly panicked mother. She was small, with a slender figure and a youthful face of clear skin. Her features looked soft from her even pink lips, to her kind and trustful round amber eyes. There was no question of her beauty.

"He'll be fine love, he's just running." chuckled her amused husband. Unlike the young woman, the man had a slightly rough face with a tuff of graying hair that flops in front of his tired eyes. He did not possess the graceful elegance, but instead, an awkward stumble from his tall body.

Lanky, clumsy arms wrapped around the mother's waist, holding her close to the father. The man pecked his wife on the cheek, as a loving smile spread across her face, and they just stood there for a while, taking in their surroundings, each other and these precious moments they live for.

The son soon came running back, arms stretched out towards his parents. Laughing and giggling, they both swooped him up off of his small four year old feet, bringing him into their warm hug. Everything was peaceful.

That night, Remus lay in his small bed, waiting for it to get dark. He looked a lot like his mother with big amber eyes, pink lips and tawny hair. The only thing he took from his father was his height.

Mumbles could be heard from the kitchen from a quiet conversation between Hope and Lyall Lupin, meaning he still can't leave his bed until they've gone. When they finally did stop and Remus heard the door of their bedroom close with a gentle click, the small boy quietly slid out of bed. His bare feet padded against the cold wooden floor all the way to the window. It wasn't completely dark yet, but the moon was definitely out to shine a beam of light down to their little bungalow. Remus hooked his short fingers around the bottom of the window where the wood bordered the glass panel in a frame, pushing it up with all his strength. Slowly, it slid up, letting in the freezing night air that caught at the back of his throat as it filled his lungs. Once it was fully up and there was a click to hold it in place, he pulled himself into a crouch on the window ledge before swinging little legs out to dangle outside. This was a nightly routine that the four year old looked forward to everyday. Indeed, it was a very strange thing for a person his age to do, yet it gave him an unusual comfort to stare off into the nights moon and stars before going to bed. It was quiet, untouched and something far beyond this world. It was something that he could use to banish nightmares. Now Remus looks back at how he used to admire the moon with bitter irony. How that night changed everything.

Remus kicked the outside wall with the back of his foot as he swung it to-and-fro. The cold was starting to numb his feet of the feeling of them hitting concrete, making him gradually hit them harder unknowingly. The sky was finally dark and the full moon boldly hung there as a glowing orb. Only the hooting of an owl and rustling leaves and branches in the wind could be heard. That was until a very quiet yet still distinctive sound of running feet on the ground. Frightened, Remus quickly tried to scramble away into his bedroom but was stopped by a sudden pull at his foot. Teeth clenched around his ankle, biting down, but not hard enough to break the skin. With a tug, Remus was pulled down off the window to the grass below, knocking the breath out of him. It all happened so fast that the only strike of agony he felt was when the teeth pulled away from him for a breath. A horrific scream erupted from the boy's throat, taking away his breath once more. Two dark, almost black, eyes moved forward to meet his amber, showing for the first time the creature that attacked him. It was like a wolf, but bigger and more muscular. It had an arched spine and legs that were longer at the back, yet it still walked on four feet. It was like a man.

The snarl grew as it got closer, bearing large pointed fangs, scattered around in rotting gums. Remus opened his mouth to scream again, but was too slow for the monster, who lurched their front paws forward onto his stomach to silence him. The first scream seemed to have been enough however because not even moments later, Hope and Lyall came bursting through the front door in shrieks of sobs and horror. Seizing their last opportunity, the creature lunged into the side of the four year old, piercing his skin with those teeth, and ripping into his body. The wound got deeper and deeper as it clenched down harder and harder, almost tearing away a whole chunk of flesh.

Curses were bellowed by the mother, who was the only one to bring a wand. Light hit the monster, blasting it off as it off as it too howled in agony. It quickly rolled off it's back as hexes chased it away. Finally, Remus could let out his cries as his father held him in his arms and his mother ran after the beast in anger and hatred. When it was out of sight, she rushed back to her son. Hot blood seeped from the teeth marks, running down his side and covering them all in a pool of it. It was an open gash that revealed ripped muscles and bone just above the hip. The screams died out when all energy left the boy's chest, leaving only the parents cries and a limp body in their arms.

"No! Please, no! Not my son!"

An hour later Remus was lying on the sofa in their living room, an old healer crouched next to him tending to his bite. His parent sat each side of her, clutching their son's hand.

"These bite marks... they don't make sense. What kind of creature was it?" her eyebrows were furrowed inwards and her frown gave even more wrinkles to her face.

"We're... we're not sure," Hope replied. Her's and her husbands eyes were still red and puffy from crying.

"Please, I must know. I have a suspicion, but... no. No it can't," she spoke the last bit more to herself than to them.

"What? What is it?"

"These bite marks look an awful lot like... like werewolf teeth. At the back there is a rounder edge and a larger surface area, see how it's bruising here. Molars. And here, where the cuts are deepest, the shape of canines. However, there's 32 teeth, all lined up in the shape of dog or wolf like snout. But it can't be. There's no unregistered werewolves not locked away on the full moons."

"Werewolf? I knew it! Those..." Lyall continued to swear and curse about his colleagues at the ministry. Once he had calmed down, he told the two women of a dodgy looking man he met the day before, a man with dirty rags for clothes and "a face of a beast". When finally the story was finished and the three adults now knew of the terrible fate of their son, the parents were sat together once again in tears, holding and supporting each other. All the old healer woman could do was stand with a pitiful and helpless expression.