Ink in Paper - Regulus Black

Chapter Twenty-Six

Another one! We have angst and fluff in thsi one. I'm impressed with myself, I'm working fast! 

Bridgerton will drop at 4 am in my country, so I'm really sad. Make me happy by leaving comments, please?

Hope Jensen's arms was Remus Lupin's favourite place on Earth. She was soft, warm and comforting when everything in the world seemed to be freezing and sharp – cutting and breaking him down when he had, finally, thought that he and his friends were safe in their own little world.

The small room in St. Mungus that both his sister and he had been put in had light green walls, high (and locked) windows with small magical creatures moving in the walls. It was the Children's Ward of the hospital, and it was also one of the emptiest wards in the whole building, which left him comfortable enough to just relax in his mother's arms.

"I almost killed someone, Mum. I almost killed another person," he cried against her neck. "How am I any better than that monster?"

His mother shushed him softly, which reminded him a lot of Madame Pomfrey and how she treated him in his worst mornings and nights. The same comfort that worked just because it was them; the shushing was the hoping that he would stop talking and, therefore, change his mind about what he was thinking, but it never seemed to happen when it was someone else, because when they did it, it felt like their reminder that they were still there.

"You weren't in there, baby," she whispered in his ear. "It was the full moon; you weren't in there at all. It wasn't you. You have no control about what happens during that night, it's just... the animal."

If he truly believed that things would've been so much easier.

As he finally calmed down, he cleaned his tears and glanced at the other side of the room, where his father was whispering in Luna's ear. She hadn't wakened up yet since they arrived. The Healers said that her heart was weak, she needed rest above it all, but had given her potions; amongst them, silver extract. Remus wasn't stupid, though clearly his parents thought that he had not put the scars and the silver extract administered every three hours together.

It was with the comfort that his sister was still deep in her sleep that he gathered his courage to ask.

"Who was that attacked Luna?"

Lyall's face turned to him so fast that Remus winced. His mother, sitting at the edge of his bed, got up and fixed her shirt around herself.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Her scars," he said. "I had caught a glimpse of it before, I mean, we share a room, but she wears big shirts most of the time. I thought it was from the heart surgery she got when she was a babe, but that's not it. That scar is werewolf made, that's why they're giving her silver extract."

Lyall and Hope exchanged a long, worried look.

Hope hesitated, so Lyall got up from the chair he was sitting on and walked closer to his son, fixing his coat around himself in his awkwardness. He was clearly uncomfortable with the subject, but the truth needed to come out.

"Your sister never had a heart surgery, Remus," Lyall admitted. "When she was small, she... -- you see, your sister loves you very much, Remus, so much that she couldn't bear the hear when you were in pain during the transformation in the full moons. It was our fault. You had yet to go through your first year of transformations, so we were so focused on you that we didn't notice that she wasn't in her room until it was too late."