A/N:This is what I will call the Imperius equivilent of The Werewolf Lesson - the chapter in which I attempt to get across a lot of exposition in an interesting way. This is also the chapter that reveals an important idea that underlies this fic but at the same time, it is likely to make a few people suck their teeth and go "Hmmmm... I'm not sure that would work." To be honest, I feel the same ;) but it was such a funky idea when it came to me I decided to run with it and combined with a few unused bits and bobs from Oblivious, this fic was born.
3: A Werewolf’s Soul
The lift moved slowly, seeming to cover half the rise of the previous lift in twice the time. Beside Remus, Rebekah Goldstein was an unmoving statue staring intensely at the wall. She did not speak to him.
Well, he thought sardonically to himself. With such a friendly and welcoming atmosphere, I’m surprised they don’t get more visitors.
But he was here to do a job. Sound out Goldstein, Tonks had said. But in order to do so, some sound was probably going to be needed.
“So Profes… Rebekah.” His own voice echoed disconcertingly around the lift shaft. “What kind of work do you do here?”
The turn of Rebekah’s head was slow and deliberate. To judge by the gaze with she pinned him, an onlooker would probably have believed that he had just asked her opinion on the right and proper way in which to sacrifice a chicken.
“Research.” Her tone was dripping with dryness.
Remus sighed inwardly. “Into..?” he prompted.
Rebekah raised a slow eyebrow. “Feral werewolves,” she said, slowly and precisely, emphasising each syllable as it passed her lips. “Hence the name of the Institute.”
It was like pulling teeth. “I was hoping for something more specific. As I’m sure you can appreciate, this is a subject I have…interest in.”
Rebekah regarded him coldly. “I’m sure you do.”
The lift ground to a halt. But this time, no simple grill enclosed the shaft. A solid metal lattice was buried portcullis-like into the solid stone. The Institute symbol had been etched into the surface.
Extending her wand, Rebekah tapped the engraving six times in a staccato rhythm. “Rebekah Goldstein,” she stated softly. “Security Clearance Alpha. With guest.”
With an audible groan, the portcullis pulled itself clear of the rock and sank seamlessly into the mantle above. Smiling in a slightly disconcerting manner, Rebekah stepped out into the predictably grey corridor beyond and sharply turned to face him.
“Well, Professor,” she said softly. “Welcome to Level Six, for top security residents.”
“Residents?” Remus glanced around as he stepped out into the corridor, taking in the solid metal doors that lined the passageway; all were ajar revealing a barren, windowless cell beyond each entry. “Odd choice of words.”
Rebekah smiled coolly. “Werewolves interned within this Institute are not prisoners, Professor.” At Remus’ raised eyebrow and glance towards the nearest cell, her smile faded grimly. “This level is only used for werewolves that have turned fully feral and present a clear danger to the community at large. Of the forty-four permanent residents here, this level houses only five. The majority of residents, those who have shown the potential to turn feral but not submitted fully, live on levels one to three. Quite comfortably, I might add.” Her eyes bored into his. “They are provided with regular meals, a sleeping chamber that contains their own possessions and facilities for entertainment. This is not a prison camp, Professor, and these werewolves are not chained to the walls. They live well “ better in many cases, than they did before. They simply are not allowed to leave.”
Remus narrowed his eyes. “A comfortable prison is still a prison. And there is no evidence that one feral incident can make a werewolf more prone to turning.”
Rebekah’s expression was frosty, her eyes unreadable. “That, Professor, is what we are here to determine. I have devoted my life to uncovering the ways and means of the werewolf, the way it thinks, the way it acts and reacts, the effect it has upon the bitten because understanding the curse is the only way that I can see that the spread of lycanthropy can ever be stopped.” Her eyes ran almost clinically across him. “You carry within you a demon, Professor, a demon that destroys the innocent without the slightest thought.” Her stare darkened. “A demon I am determined to eradicate from this earth by any means I can.”
Remus fought to contain a shiver at the burning of her eyes. “The Wolfsbane potion…”
“…Is a suppressant, nothing more.” Rebekah shrugged dismissively. “Your mother’s work on the potion was exceptional, but it does not remove the threat. All it takes is one missed dose and we are right back where we started.”
Remus struggled briefly against his own painful awareness of the statement’s truth. “But to just lock these people away…”
“These werewolves have shown that they present a clear and present danger to innocent lives.” Rebekah’s tone was steely. “They should consider themselves lucky. Before the founding of this Institute, they would have all been sent to Azkaban. The Dementors would not have treated them so kindly.”
Remus fought down a shiver at the thought, his own mind unable to escape the thought that by wizarding law he should have been interned within these walls himself when he was no more than three years old. Would they have sent a child to Azkaban?
“We’re wasting time,” Rebekah’s interruption was brusque. “I didn’t ask you here to debate the rights and wrongs of what we do here, Professor. I asked you here for an opinion regarding Abraham Kane.”
Abruptly, she turned on her heel, marching briskly away along the corridor. Fighting once more with rampant butterflies, Remus hurriedly caught up, falling into step at her side. She did not turn to face him.
“You were not at the Kiss, I believe? Rebekah asked, her tone sharp but businesslike.
Remus shook his head. “I was invited. I chose not to go.”
“Pity. You missed an interesting spectacle.” They turned a corner, revealing a row of four sealed doors, each watched over by a red and grey robed guard. Rebekah nodded politely to each man as they passed. “As an expert in Defence Against the Dark Arts, I’m sure you’re aware of what usually happens when a person is Kissed by a Dementor.”
Remus nodded absently, his eyes drawn almost unwillingly towards the four sealed doors. Faintly, beyond the foot thick metal of the nearest, he could hear the faint strains of a drawn out screech. It seemed Rebekah had also heard “ she paused briefly in front of the door’s guard with a vaguely clinical expression.
“Selkirk, when Dr Croll makes his rounds, tell him that Ulric’s dose of sedative needs to be increased again.” She raised an eyebrow at the sound of something heavy thumping into the walls. “He seems to have developed immunity to his present dose.”
The man nodded. Ignoring Remus’ penetrating stare, Rebekah proceeded on down the corridor, picking up the thread of her conversation as though nothing had happened. “As I’m sure you’re aware, a person Kissed by a Dementor becomes a shell, soulless, mindless, alive but without character, without a sense of self, an empty body with a void inside. Until Kane’s Kiss, it had been widely assumed that the effect on a werewolf would be no different. We were wrong. Very wrong.”
Ahead, the corridor came to an abrupt end at a large metal door. Standing cross-armed in front of it was Alexander Aylward, the grim security officer who had first escorted Remus inside. He inclined his head slightly in Remus’ direction. Remus politely returned the gesture.
“Well?” Rebekah addressed the tall man abruptly but Aylward immediately shook his head.
“He’s having a bad day, Professor Goldstein,” he said, his deep voice apologetic but firm. “He didn’t like his meal and got upset. It won’t be safe for you and Professor Lupin to go inside the cell. You’ll have to observe him from behind the blind for today.”
An expression of deep irritation flashed across Rebekah’s features. “Very well,” she said, her tone rich with bite. “Open the door, Alexander.”
With a nod, Aylward turned, tapping a sequence into the metal with a muttered incantation. Rebekah turned back to Remus.
“Professor, I have asked you here because I have a theory. And as you are the most notable werewolf scholar in the magical community, not to mention possessing a personal connection to the subject in question, I felt you were in a unique position to offer some significant insight.”
Remus suppressed the buzz of chilly anticipation as best he could as he nodded. “I’ll certainly do my best.”
“Good.” Behind them, Aylward had released the door locks, pushing the vast door open to reveal a small chamber. It seemed much as the rest of the facility had, grey and bland but for the upper half of the opposite wall, which curved outwards towards them, dark and glassy, ending only in another door, this one narrow but equally sturdy, leading into an unseen room beyond. The only furniture was a couple of plain chairs and a table scattered with papers, measuring instruments, potion vials and what looked like a rather more conservative Quick Quotes Quill, posed and ready for dictation.
Without a word, Rebekah stepped inside. His heart thumping far too fast, Remus followed her. Aylward closed the door behind them with an echoing thud.
The similarity of location to his last encounter with Kane was too much to be ignored. I don’t want to do this, I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to see him again. Whatever state he’s in…
Rebekah’s voice broke into his thoughts. “I have been studying Abraham Kane since he was brought here last December. And his… behaviour following his Kiss has forced me to reach a quite startling conclusion. As far as we are able to ascertain, it appears that werewolves possess something that is very akin to a soul.”
Remus felt anger flaring within his mind at her patronising words. “Of course we have souls,” he exclaimed at once, his voice remaining level only through great effort. “We are born as human as anyone else…”
“Your protest is noted, but you misunderstand.” Rebekah cut sharply across the remains of his sentence. “I did not mean to say that a werewolf in his human form is soulless. In fact, it appears you may have two.”
Remus could only blink at this extraordinary statement. Was she saying…? “You think the werewolf inside me has a soul? A soul apart from mine?”
Rebekah smiled slightly. “Not exactly. It may not be a soul as we consider it, more an essence, a sense of drive and character for the wolf that only usually arises beneath the light of the full moon. When questioned, most of the werewolves here have described their werewolf side as some kind of entity separate from them, sharing a body but different in mind, which certainly supports the idea. Two beings trapped together, fighting for control of one body, but how could the wolf fight so well if there were not something more behind it? It has memories after all, recollections it will share with its human host only grudgingly, and enough of a sense of self to occasionally fight for domination at the first sign of weakness. It could be that this something more, this werewolf essence is strong enough that it could be taken as a soul by a Dementor.” She cocked an eyebrow at Remus. “And since Kane was feral, since his werewolf essence was the dominant force within his body when he was Kissed, that, it seems, is what the Dementor drank…”
Remus could only stare. His mind was racing. The malevolent presence of the werewolf inside of him was something he had grown accustomed to over the years and he had always known that it possessed a life and a drive all its own; indeed he had experienced its attempts to gain control of the human it coexisted with at far too close a range. But the idea that such an essence, as Rebekah had called it, could be taken as soul-like, that he truly was sharing his body with…
Within his own skin, Remus Lupin began to feel distinctly uncomfortable. And not very alone.
And Kane “ if the Dementor had taken his werewolf essence….
“Leaving what?” His own voice sounding strange against his ears. “If the Dementor drank his feral soul, what did it leave behind?”
Rebekah nodded to Aylward “ stepping forward, the security guard tapped his wand briskly against the glass. It turned instantly clear.
“This,” she said.
And Remus saw Abraham Kane.
“Not fair!”
Remus took an instinctive step back as a cracked wooden bowl clattered against the glass, smearing splatters of a gruel-like substance down the now clear surface in unappetising globs. It was not alone “ the brown sludge coated the opposite wall in drying clumps and stained the floor in smears skidded by the passage of bare feet. A pile of cushions and a sleeping mat had been tossed in all directions to lie haphazardly in corners and bizarrely, what looked like a red rubber ball was rolling casually across the floor. Remus had seen Kane’s violent attacks on his confinement before, but somehow this was different, for nothing was shredded or mangled or maimed, just tossed and kicked and hurled, in a manner not dissimilar to a small child’s angry tantrum. This was not a mindless, destructive rampage. It was a petulant one.
And there, in the centre of it all, stood Kane. There was no denying he looked different, his dark, curly hair grown longer and wilder, his toned muscles shrivelled by his confinement, the claws that had tipped his fingers filed down to impotent stumps. And the change was there too in the way he moved as he stumbled across his cell, loose robe flapping as he kicked the bowl again, the unconscious ease the feral gone, the sleekness and grace with which he had moved vanished into a kind of jerky, awkward twitch. Even his voice, low and gravelled and ever smooth had warped into a hoarse and breathless screech.
“Not fair!” he screamed again as the bowl ricocheted off the wall, tumbling into the softness of a battered pillow. “Not fair! Not fair! Not fair!”
And then he was on his knees, beating his fists viciously against the floor as he chanted his mantra over and over, not fair, not fair, always not fair in time with the thwack of his hands against the ground. And then, as suddenly as he had started, the violence ended; scrambling on his hands and knees, Remus watched in disbelief as the most feared feral werewolf of his time curled himself abruptly into the nest of pillows and blankets, hands wrapped around his knees as he rocked slowly back and forth in time with a rhythm that no other but he could discern. His lips were moving. Low and constant, the same words slipped out.
“Notfairnotfairnotfairnotfairnotfair…”
His eyes stared blank and unseeing at the glass screen.
His brown eyes.
It took a moment for the realisation of what he was seeing to sink in. Although Kane clearly still bore the marks of a feral, his fingertips clawed and his teeth sharp, the cold golden eyes that had haunted Remus for so long were gone. Brown eyes, not remotely sane, but definitely human, stared out at him.
“His eyes…” The words slipped out almost unbidden.
“Interesting, isn’t it?” Rebekah’s voice was clinical. “The teeth and claws remained unchanged. But when the Kiss was done, his feral eyes were gone. That was my first clue as to what might be going on. They do say that the eyes are a window to the soul “ or in his case, what’s left of one.” She met Remus’ shocked gaze coolly. “The Abraham Kane you knew is gone forever, the evil that made him what he was consumed by a Dementor’s Kiss. For that we can only be grateful. But when the Dementor had taken its fill, the tattered remains of the human part of Kane were left behind. And Kane was bitten and turned feral as a child.” Her smile was twisted. “All that remains of the great and fearsome werewolf is a damaged body and the excessively unbalanced and deeply traumatised mind of a ten year old boy.”
Remus broke away from her gaze, staring once more through the glass to where Kane sat, rocking backwards and forwards in time with his muttered litany. But it was not Kane, not really, not if Rebekah was right, for Kane had been the creation of a twisted joining between the human and the wolf and with only the human left…
Abel.
He was Abel Isaacs, or what was left of him, the crushed remains of the human boy, his cousin, who had willingly placed his arm into a werewolf’s mouth and begged to be made stronger. And now here he was, more than forty years later, locked in a cell, weak and insane, clinging wild-eyed to what shreds of his mind had not been swallowed first by the feral Kane and then by a Dementor.
All the damage he had done because of one foolish impulse to get back at the world that he felt was treating him so badly. Pity mingled with anger in Remus’ heart as his fingers slipped almost unconsciously to his side and the crescent scar of his bite. Stupid, stupid little boy…
“He won’t respond to us.” Once more, Rebekah’s voice broke into his musing. “He won’t talk except to shout and scream or mutter to himself about how unfair everything is. He won’t even answer to his own name.” She shook her head. “But I suppose that’s no real surprise. His human mind has been crushed beyond all repair by his years as a feral, suppressed by the weight of a wolf’s mind for so many years that it cannot be recovered. A team of experts from St Mungo’s examined him thoroughly when he was first brought here but there was simply not enough of his humanity left to restore. Half his mind is gone and what is left is utterly damaged. He is irretrievably insane.”
Remus watched Kane’s mouth work, watched the glint of sharpened teeth. “Is he still a werewolf?” he asked softly. “Now that the essence of his werewolf half is gone, does he still transform?”
He tried not to show his slight shiver of disappointment when Rebekah nodded. For an instant, he had wondered…
“Oh yes, he still changes.” Rebekah was gazing through the glass almost thoughtfully. “Every full moon, just as before. The physical infection of his body remains uncured and incurable. But the difference is that there is no wolfish mind to take control. The effect is like Wolfsbane potion but without the need to suppress because there is nothing there to hold back. He becomes a wolf with the mind of an insane ten year old. Which is always fun,” she added sardonically.
Remus ignored her remark as he stared again at the pitiful figure rocking in his corner. “Does he remember being Kane?”
Rebekah sighed. “I told you, he won’t talk to us. We have no idea if he knows what he was, what he became.” She glanced at Remus. “That was part of the reason I wanted you here, Professor. I was hoping to see if there was any recognition; after all, you played a pretty significant part in his life in the latter months before his capture. And the Ministry are understandably keen to know if they are truly rid of the feral that he was.” Her expression darkened. “But his little temper tantrum has put pay to that “ it will be hours, perhaps even days before he properly calms down. I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to come back another time.”
It took a moment to sink in. “Come back?”
“Yes.” It was remarkable the way that Rebekah managed to suck all hints of enthusiasm out of such a simple word. “There were experiments I wanted to run in your presence but of course now there’s little point. I’m afraid, Professor, that you seem to have had a wasted journey.”
Come back In the shock of seeing the state of Kane, it had rather slipped Remus’ mind that he had been supposed to be investigating for potential Death Eater activity. And even so, it was a little difficult to slip questions about a fondness for painful tattoos or a hatred of Muggles into a formal conversation about the mental state of an insane werewolf. But if he came back…
“Very well.” Remus nodded. “Then I will be happy to come back another time.”
Rebekah looked less than thrilled at his acceptance. For a fleeting moment, he allowed himself to wonder if she was hiding some Death Eater plot she had no wish for him to lurk about and uncover “ but then, a sensible corner of his mind pointed out that if that had been the case, he would never have been invited in the first place. Rebekah Goldstein was rude, cold and clearly did not like him without bothering to know him but that didn’t necessarily add up to in the thrall of Voldemort. He would just have to keep his eyes open.
They stayed perhaps a half hour longer, discussing Rebekah’s theory regarding Kane’s condition as Kane himself continued to rock unchecked in his corner. But then Rebekah turned to Aylward, whose silent presence Remus had quite forgotten and indicated that it was time to leave. A moment later, the security guard had tapped his wand shapely against the glass “ darkness swallowed it as the rocking Kane was mercifully concealed from view.
And Remus was not sorry. The image had shaken him more than he cared to admit.
They left immediately, leaving Aylward behind on duty and moving back down the corridor past the guards and the sealed doors to where the empty cells gaped like hungry mouths. Rebekah did not speak and Remus did not try to make her.
It was not until the lift was carrying them slowly back down to Level Five that Remus chose to break the silence.
“When did you want me to come back?” he asked quietly as the lift came to a standstill. “Only it will have to be a weekend…”
For an instant, something odd seemed to flash behind Rebekah’s eyes. “Because of your teaching commitments. Of course. Is next Sunday too soon?”
Remus winced internally at the thought of what his father would say about him missing a second Sunday dinner in a row. Those Sundays had become a committed ritual ever since Kane’s Kiss and both father and son had come to rely on them. But this was for the Order and by extension, the good of the wizarding world. His father would understand.
He forced a smile. “That will be fine.”
“Good.” Abruptly, Rebekah tapped out the code and stepped sharply out of the lift. “Reception is that way, Professor. I’m sure you can find your own way. Cymone will be along shortly to escort you out.”
And then, without so much as a fake pleasantry, Rebekah Goldstein turned and strode away down the corridor.
Remus watched her go with eyebrow raised.
“Lovely woman,” he muttered wryly to himself. “Absolutely charming.”
He wanted to get out of here. Out of this grey prison full of lunatic ex-ferals and deeply unpleasant researchers, away from the echoes of his past and what could have been his future. He could only hope that Tonks had finished entertaining herself and was waiting in reception for him. With a weary sigh, he turned and strode quickly down the corridor. Enough was enough. No more shocks, no more sneers. He just wanted to leave.
And so it was that Remus was not best impressed when he walked into reception and found Felisha Hathaway rifling through the papers on Cymone’s desk.
Remus froze. Oh for Merlin’s sake, he had told her and told her to stop using that disguise! It had been vaguely funny once, just once, when in order to spring him from Ministry custody, she had adopted the face of the former school mate with whom he had once spent most of the night locked in with in the Prefect’s Bathroom, but it had long since become tiresome. Why the hell Sirius had ever seen fit to inform his cousin that Remus had since been unable to spend any time in her presence without blushing was a mystery. He could only assume the former convict had been bored.
But this was serious. They were in the middle of the Feral Institute searching for a Death Eater threat, and Tonks chose now to start playing games?
He would have to have words. For goodness sake…
He strode hurriedly to her side. “What do you think you’re doing?” he hissed furiously. “This is hardly the time!”
“Felisha” jumped furiously, spinning to face him, brown eyes wide in a face ringed by long, dark brown ringlets. In spite of the situation, Remus had to admit he was impressed “ this mockery of Felisha was far closer to the mark than any of Tonks’ previous efforts, the soft features gently edged by a touch of age, the long lashes framing eyes of exactly the right shade of brown. He couldn’t help but wonder who she had been talking to in order to get such an accurate description.
But there was no time now. And for some reason, “Felisha” was staring at him as though she hadn’t expected to see him there at all.
“Remus?” she croaked.
Remus blinked. Even the voice was…
“Professor Lupin?”
He turned. Standing in the doorway a few feet away, the blonde curled form of Tonks-as-Undine was staring at him over the top of her clipboard with a growing smirk upon her face.
Remus stared at Tonks. He stared at “Felisha”. He stared back at Tonks.
But wait. If that was Tonks…
Oh.
Good.
God.
Felisha Hathaway “ the real Felisha Hathaway “ was staring at him wide eyed, her fingers crumpling around her handful of paper with unconscious shock. A scarlet blush was creeping up her cheeks, a blush that Remus could feel mirrored upon his own features, burning his skin like fire.
He’d missed his dinner with his father. He’d come inside the Feral Institute, the one place in the world he’d never wanted to be. He’d been sneered at by Arcadius Croll. He’d been snubbed by Rebekah Goldstein. And he had been forced once more into the presence of what was left of Abraham Kane.
And now Felisha Hathaway was staring at him like a lunatic because he had just mistaken her for Nymphadora Tonks in disguise.
Oh yes. He’d definitely had better days.