Fic: Victory at All Costs
Dec. 21st, 2011 08:29 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
rosemaryandrue.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
small_giftsTitle: Victory at All Costs
Author/Artist:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rosemaryandrue
Recipient:yndigot/curley_green
Rating: PG
Contents or warnings (highlight to view): *Wartime setting with mention of air raids and internment *
Word count: 5000
Summary: It's the summer of 1940 and even wizards can't ignore the way the Muggle world is closing in around them.
Notes: I've put a few historical notes at the end. The title and the cut-tag are quotes from a speech made by Winston Churchill in May 1940. You asked for wizards in the world wars – I hope you enjoy this. Many thanks topenhaligonblue who once again came to my rescue and made this all much better than the first draft.
In the early summer of 1940, over three hundred thousand French, Belgian and British troops were evacuated from Dunkirk; Italy declared war on France and the United Kingdom; and at home in the UK, thousands more civilians were transported to internment camps on the Isle of Man. Among their number were three hundred witches and wizards: refugees, foreign wizards now resident in the country, and British wizards the Ministry of Magic considered to be 'undesirable.'
Remus Lupin quite unexpectedly found himself sleeping on a thin pallet in the Knockaloe Quidditch Stadium. His neighbour to the left was a jittery young Austrian cursebreaker, a Muggleborn who had been tortured by Grindelwald's followers before he fought his way to way to a portkey. On his right was a stocky member of the Bulgarian Quidditch team, a half-Veela who barely spoke English and who had a tendency of letting out howls of impotent rage every time he looked up and glimpsed the empty stands above them. Opposite them in the next row was a Italian wandmaker so elderly that he still thought it was 1893 and that they were sheltering from rebellious goblins.
After the first few days, during which every polite request to their guards had been met with snarled refusals, Remus stopped hoping he would get his wand back. There was nothing to do, so he spent most of his days walking along the cliffs, squinting out over the blue expanse of the sea, watching for ships. If he went out early, the seals would still be huddled on the rocks below, watching him pass with round, shining eyes as he tried to ignore the faint itch of the anti-Apparition wards which covered the Isle. Sometimes, when a heavily inked out newspaper made its way past the guards, he stole it for long enough to work out the answers to the crossword, although he had no pen to write them in with.
He got permission to walk to Peel one day, and wandered aimlessly through the narrow streets, ignoring the suspicious stares of the locals and the haughty scorn of the tailess cats sunning themselves on white-washed walls. He couldn't make himself talk to anyone; couldn't face the disgust or bafflement on their faces. Instead, he climbed up to the castle, and coaxed the resident spirit out to chase sticks across the grassed over ruins. When the Moddey Dhoo panted in his face, breath like splinters of ice, Remus couldn't rub his ears or ruffle the spirit's black fur, but it was almost enough. It almost felt like home.
No one had written to him.
"I do not think owls can reach us here," said Josef, the cursebreaker, and then shrugged when Remus looked across in surprise. "You have been watching the sky."
"One lives in hope," Remus said, shrugging a little. The words tasted strange on his tongue after days of silence.
"English?" Josef said, eyes rounding in surprise. Then he scowled. "A supporter of-"
"No!" Remus said hastily. "No, nothing like that. Just – just unlucky."
"Unlucky is fine. As long as you're not a traitor or one of those so-brave British Aurors."
"I'm neither," Remus said and turned away before Josef could ask any more questions.
He hadn't even finished his first year of training when they'd come to knock on his door, three embarrassed and apologetic ministry officials with a list of names that he had always hoped didn't exist. They'd let him go to school, after all, with Dumbledore's help; let him take his exams; join the Auror training program; rent a room in Diagon Alley.
No one had been home to urge him to run away, so he had simply picked up his wand and his hat and gone with them calmly. They had assured him that it was just temporary and that for someone like him, no real risk to security, it would be over quickly. He had believed them, the conscientious men from the Ministry, so concerned for the good of wizardkind.
Six weeks later, he was still here, watching the sunsets spill like blood across the western sky, day after day as the moon swelled and collapsed and swelled again. It was growing again now, and he could feel his temper getting shorter as the night skies grew brighter.
When the guards came to escort him down to the caves, he shrugged off their hands irritably and walked ahead of them, his head held high as the other internees watched and whispered behind their hands. He joined the line shuffling down the cliff path without a word, refusing to look too closely at those around him. He wasn't looking for a pack and he didn't want to remember their faces; didn't want to find himself making awkward conversation in some shop or hallway after the war was over.
There were over sixty of them in the caves that night, he estimated, more than at the previous moon. He sat cross-legged on the blanket they had issued him and ignored the round-faced man sitting next to him, who kept trying to start a conversation about gnome repellents as his hands shook and clenched into fists.
When the moonlight began to show around the mouth of the cave, Remus closed his eyes against it, and let his mind slide back through the years, to the forest and the wild glee of running under the moon, every muscle stretching as he raced the dog, the stag, the rat.
Were they looking at the moon tonight, he wondered. Were they wondering where he was?
He hadn't left a note – he hadn't thought he'd be gone that long.
Then the blood-heat of the moon slid over him and he let the quietness that he had wrapped around himself shatter as the wolf howled out, baying at the too-distant moon.
#
The next day, while Remus was still limping his way back to his pallet, the owls came.
They swooped over the pitch as if it was the first day of a new term, letters falling from their claws like confetti. Remus crossed his arms over his head in defence and rushed for his own pallet.
It was covered and his shaking legs gave out beneath him. He felt the scrolls crumpling under his knees as he sank onto them but he didn't care. He grabbed at the nearest letter and had to blink to read the address:
Remus Lupin,
Wherever the buggering fuck he's gone,
And it better be a bloody national emergency, Moony,
Or I will hex your arse until your boils have boils, I swear,
Somewhere in the UK
"And you got that past the censors?" Remus murmured and smiled for the first time in weeks.
Before he could open the letter, though, one of the guards was at his shoulder. "Lupin, you've got a visitor."
He took the letter with him in the hope that he wouldn't need to open it.
But it was not Sirius who was waiting for him in the canteen, nor James nor Peter. Instead, Albus Dumbledore sat behind the formica table, gazing placidly down into the dregs of what Remus knew must have been a truly terrible cup of tea.
"Extraordinary," he murmured as Remus sat down, wincing as one of the scabs on his leg pulled awkwardly. "My future appears to hold a reunion with an old friend, three new pairs of socks, a victory at the coconut shy and what is either a terribly large wand or an exciting afternoon of maypole dancing. However do they brew this?"
"It's better not to ask, professor," Remus said, feeling as if he'd slipped into a rather strange dream. Nothing seemed real any more, and Dumbledore's presence was just an oddity too far.
Dumbledore looked up and speared him with a look of faint reproach. "Mr Lupin, you should know very well by now that it is always better to ask. Now," he continued, addressing the guard, "Mr Goudge, is it not?"
"Yes, Professor," the guard mumbled, shifting from foot to foot.
"I thought so. I shall never forget that truly marvellous bit of transfiguration you did in your fifth year – I've rarely seen a feather duster become so convincing a canary."
"Thank you, professor. Honour to have you here, sir."
"Oh, it's nothing," Dumbledore said. "Although I do hope there won't be any more misunderstandings about your guests' correspondence?"
"No, professor. Can I get you get anything, sir?"
"Another cup of tea each, perhaps, and I think Mr Lupin here could do with a couple of bourbons, if rationing allows."
As soon as the guard was out of earshot, Dumbledore leaned forward to say, "My dear Remus, I am terribly sorry I was unable to help you any sooner. The Ministry's wheels grind slowly, I am afraid, but it is all arranged now."
"What's arranged?" Remus asked.
"Why, your new posting, of course. Among Muggles, but that's all for the good."
"My new what?" Remus repeated.
Dumbledore twinkled at him. "Still keen on the crosswords, are you not? And I recall that you were quite excellent at Arithmancy. Exactly the assets needed for the job."
"What job?" Remus demanded.
"The Magical Cryptography Support Unit, Mr Lupin. Of course, they're all working on Muggle codes at the moment, but it's good training, very good training indeed."
"You want me to be a codebreaker?"
"Quite right," Dumbledore said and rose to his feet. "Ah, here is your tea and biscuits. Allow me to retrieve your wand."
#
Three days later, he was waiting on the pier at Douglas for the ferry to Holyhead. The pier was busy with a crowd of ATS girls in their smart brown uniforms, their laughs loud and confident. Remus stayed out of their way, but a couple of them noticed him and came across, giggling as they nudged each other forward.
"We've got a bet," one of them started, her accent soft and northern. "Sheila thinks you're on leave from the RAF, and I think it's the Navy, but Nell reckons you've come from one of them camps."
"Nell's right, I'm afraid," Remus said, hoping it would scare her off.
"Well, you sound like a normal Englishman, love.”
“Not on my mum’s side,” Remus said, with a shrug.
“Well, I think that’s a crying shame, putting people away on account of where their mums come from. No wonder you look so poorly.”
“I’m fine, thank you,” Remus said, and bit back his irritation. He had almost been an Auror, thank you, and one of the best duellists in his year, and he was sick of even Muggles treating him like an invalid. Sirius wouldn't-
He stopped thinking there and turned to the girls to say, “I’ll be fit to serve within a week or so.”
“And getting off the island just in time,” Sheila put in. “After the news about Guernsey.”
“What’s that?” one of the other girls called.
“Did you not hear? Mr Churchill announced on the wireless last night.”
“You oughtn’t be talking about it anyway,” one of the older girls said sternly. “Careless talk, girls.”
“Ah, not if it were on the wireless, Betty, don’t be daft.”
Betty sniffed and turned to Remus. “And who might you be?”
He told his cover story again, giving her his name and a wary smile.
“Polish name, eh?” she asked, looking down her nose. “Brave people. Very tragic.”
He didn’t correct her, but let the girls sweep him on board in a mass of good cheer. He couldn’t bring himself to share it - he knew he had laughed with friends once, but it all seemed so long ago, as if it had happened in someone else’s life. He was just a werewolf now, and one who had to pose as a Muggle at that.
It was a slow crossing, on a steam ship that had clearly seen better days. Two of the girls went a little green as the waves rocked below them but the rest smoked and chattered their way through the hours, voices light and quick around him.
Sheila and her friend Peggy stuck with him, both flirting with a sly confidence he hadn’t seen since his last year at Hogwarts. He didn’t encourage them, but he listened to them talk, and felt a little of the numbness inside him start to warm.
“My cousin Reenie, her husband’s family are Italian - they run a smashing little fish and chip shop in Hull - and anyhow the police came round to our Reenie’s place-”
“Bet she didn’t like that,” Sheila put in.
“She did not. They go to her, ‘We’s inquiring about the whereabouts of your husband and his brothers, Mrs Morello.’ And you’ll never guess what Reenie said to them?”
“Go on,” Remus said politely, as that seemed to be aimed in his direction and the girls were all smirking like they’d heard the story before.
“She goes, ‘If you wants my Tony, he’s in the RAF, and Sal’s in the Navy and Frank never made it back from Dunkirk so if you want him you can bugger off over there and ask bloody Hitler to give him back.’”
Remus joined in the laughter and wondered if the story had been meant to make him feel better or worse. His world had been all about magic and prejudice for so long that he’d barely realised that there were threats other than Grindelwald out there. He’d been as surprised as most wizards when the Muggle world suddenly convulsed around them. He wished now that he’d been paying a little more attention.
At Holyhead, they disembarked onto a lonely quay. The girls all piled into an army truck, waving goodbye with squeals and laughter. Remus waved them off and then ducked into the waiting room of the ferry office. There he opened the packet Dumbledore had given him.
It contained a Muggle Identity Card, a ration book, a railway ticket from Holyhead to somewhere called Bletchley and a sealed set of orders with an official looking Muggle stamp on them.
The ticket inspector came round before the train had rattled across the Menai Bridge, hissing disapproval as he pulled black blinds across the train windows. The lamp above Remus’ seat was dim and flickered with every jolt of the carriage, so he had to squint down at his letters now he could finally read them. Twenty were from Peter, at two day intervals. Not much of them was readable, but Remus managed to piece together the bits between the censor’s inkblots - Peter was somewhere on the south coast, working with Muggles and worried about Remus. Somewhere in the middle of the pile, it became apparent that he knew where Remus was, and then Dumbledore’s name showed up between blotches.
The six from James were unreadable - censor’s ink and appalling handwriting were a poor combination in such dim light. Sirius had only sent three - quick raging notes dashed off in sloping copperplate handwriting.
Remus could almost feel the rage and panic rising from them and they crumpled in his hand as he bowed forward. He hadn’t been forgotten. Sirius hadn’t simply let him go.
Then he sat up and wiped his eyes and read them again.
The last one was dated only a week after he had been arrested and he wondered, with a sudden jolt of panic, where Sirius was now. If he’d been that angry, he should have torn down the camps with his bare hands by now.
Unless something had happened to him. Unless even London wasn’t safe now.
The train jerked to a halt, brakes screeching. As Remus stood up, reaching for his wand, all the lights went out. Somewhere outside the window, a siren began to wail, whirring up to its full volume, louder and louder and louder.
“What’s happening?” Remus asked, shivers running down his spine.
“Where’ve you been the last few weeks, mate?” someone shouted from down the carriage. “We’re in Birmingham. That’s Jerry on his way, that is. Better get under a seat in case he’s aiming for the railway lines.”
Baffled, Remus dropped to the floor, squeezing under the seat with a wince at the damp muck under his hands. Outside, the siren continued to wail and he could hear more now, sound layered on eerie sound. Then, above the long keening of the sirens, he heard engines in the sky. For a moment he thought of Sirius and that bloody motorbike, but there was another note in these engines, something low and menacing and throbbing.
When the first explosion rocked the train, his first thought was Grindelwald! He grabbed his wand, snarling a protego as glass shattered above him, catching on the blackout blinds before it came streaming down. More followed, and he could hear the roar of flames rising, and the growl of the engines and the distant crumple of collapsing walls.
These are Muggles, he realised then, astonished and saddened. They do this to each other without magic, in spite of everything we do to protect them.
It seemed like an eternity before the roar from the sky went quiet but Remus was sure that his watch would tell him it had only been minutes. Somewhere along the carriage, a child was crying, sobs hiccuping over the long note of the siren again.
“There’s the all clear,” someone said and Remus crawled out from below his seat and went to help the crying child.
#
He finally arrived at Bletchley just after dawn. The orders told him he would be billeted at Little Horwood Manor, wherever that might be, but the station was deserted when he stumbled off the carriage. He dropped his pack down at the back of the station and sat on it to watch the train go out, steam billowing in the thin morning air.
The station sign had been painted over and the familiar bold posters advertising Cornish resorts and Northern spa towns had been replaced by exhortations to Give your seat up for a shell. Yawning, Remus leaned back against the slatted fence and closed his eyes.
He was woken by someone poking him in the side and muttering, “Oy! You Lupin?”
“Who’s asking?” Remus retorted, opening his eyes reluctantly. The sun was higher in the sky now, wreathed by white clouds. An acne-pocked young man was blocking his view of the sky, though, leaning forward with his mouth open to poke Remus with his wand.
“Name’s Shunpike. I’m from the Manor. You was s’posed to be here last night.”
“Bombs over Birmingham,” Remus said, climbing wearily to his feet.
“Cor,” Stan said, eyes widening. “Not that it’s the first time, mind. You should of heard the wireless - the Battle for Britain, the Muggle Minister called it.”
“Good thing he asked for our help, then,” Remus said, heaving his pack back over his shoulder with a wince.
“D’you reckon he did? Still a Muggle, ain’t he?”
“I’m fairly certain the Muggle Prime Minister knows of our existence,” Remus said. “Where’s this manor, then?”
“Oh, just hop in the trap. You can kip in the back, if you like. I don’t mind.”
Remus shook his head, breathing in deeply. “I’m awake now.”
Still, the jolting pace of the horse-drawn trap almost did rock him back to sleep. He shook himself, looking around as they left the town behind. After the cliffs and shining mist of the Isle of Man, there was something very comforting about low, green English hills, and he was feeling almost like himself again. Rolling the aches out of his shoulders, he asked Shunpike, “What’s this Manor like, then?”
“All Wizarding, so you don’t need to worry. All assigned down here - 'bout half and half between Bletchley and the airfield – the RAF like Quidditch players, y’know.”
Remus didn’t.
“So,” Shunpike continued, eyeing him slyly. “Which are you then - shirtlifter, Muggleborn or squib?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Still a Muggle war, innit? Nobody the Ministry of Magic likes gets sent to work with Muggles, even now. Go on, then. I don’t mind which.”
“Albus Dumbledore sent me,” Remus said coldly and pulled his coat around him, feigning sleep.
Little Horwood turned out to be a modern building. Once Shunpike had shown him to his room, Remus didn’t take in much else. He noticed that the other bed in the room was an unmade mess of rumpled sheets, but he was too busy falling onto his own bed to care.
He dreamed of Sirius, grinning at him across the table in their cramped little flat in Diagon Alley, as he flicked his wand at the record player, the sound of trumpets and saxophones booming out until the windows shook. The music blurred into days when he had fallen asleep over the crossword until Sirius had come blazing in on a gust of laughter, throwing his broom down to shake Remus awake and babble at him about the triumphs of the day. He dreamed of hearing Sirius breathe beside him in the night and turned his face quietly into the pillow, relaxing under the remembered warmth of beloved hands.
When he woke it was dusk outside the manor and his roommate had clearly been and gone, because the other bed was made and a faint scent of tobacco and leather hung around the room. Remus made himself get up and started unpacking the few changes of clothes he had brought with him.
When he opened the dresser in search of an empty drawer, though, he found it already full of his own clothes. Dumbledore had clearly planned this properly.
Changing gratefully into something fresh, he decided to make the best of this. He had a new posting to report to tomorrow, but once he’d found his feet there, he could start asking questions about where Sirius had gone. If there was a Floo connection he could use here, he could track down James and Peter. Suddenly, things were possible again. Not even bombs could stop him from finding Sirius now he had his wand again.
It was early evening and he could smell the familiar overcooked cabbage and treacle tart scent of institutionalised meals drifting through the open windows. As he combed his hair, he suddenly heard the rumble of engines in the sky again. Worried, he crossed to the window before he realised there was a different note to these engines.
As he watched, looking south, a flight of planes rose into the sky from behind a thin line of trees: sleek, stubby-winged fighters clawing their way into the sky. Then, as he was about to turn away, they suddenly soared, falling into tight formations with a startling grace. Remus caught his breath, and lingered by the window to watch them vanish into the clouds above, floating south to face Merlin-knew-what horrors.
He ate down in the mess with a tableful of other wizards, several of whom were glad to talk codebreaking with him until he dozed off again over his gritty cup of coffee. He made his excuses and stumbled back to his bed.
He was woken in the middle of the night, aware suddenly that cold air was blowing in the open window and someone had just come into the room. Groping under his pillow for his wand, he mumbled, “Lumos.”
Sirius was standing by the door, his eyes weary but his smile bright. He kicked off his shoes and said, biting back a yawn, “About time you got here, Moony. I've been waiting for weeks.”
“What- I- You’re here?” Remus managed, but Sirius was already striding across the room, shrugging off his flying jacket and collapsing onto the bed beside him.
“In the morning,” he muttered. “I had to hex a fucking Messerschmitt to get it off my arse and I’m bloody knackered.”
“But,” Remus protested, but Sirius had already thrown an arm around him and was snoring into the crook of his neck, his breath warm and damp. Remus lifted his hand very carefully and ran it down Sirius’ back, feeling the nubs of his spine through the sweaty cotton.
He was real. He was alive. He was here.
Breathing out a long, shaky sigh, Remus put out his light and locked his arms around Sirius, closing his eyes. He breathed in the scent of leather and brylcreem and motor oil that was so unmistakably Sirius that his eyes watered at it and he blinked back tears as his breath shuddered against the top of Sirius’ head.
#
In the morning, Sirius woke him with kisses, and Remus arched joyously into his touch, rolling to press him against the plain cotton sheets and kiss him back so fiercely that they both moaned at it. Sirius’ eyes went wide and he breathed out, “Moony, oh, yes, Remus!” and their hands tangled as they fought to get their Muggle clothes off and finally, finally touch each other again.
Afterwards, Remus let his hand rest on Sirius’ bare back, feeling his sweat cool, until Sirius lifted his head and said, “You didn’t even leave a note.”
“They said I’d only be gone an hour or two.”
"Still should have left a note."
"I didn't want to worry you," Remus said into a mouthful of black hair, aware his voice had gone sulky.
"That worked well for you, didn't it?" Sirius grumbled. "Will you stop suffering these things in bloody silence? You're allowed to ask for help, you proud twat."
"They didn't give me a chance," Remus protested, because he didn't want to have that argument, not now they were both here and together and as safe as they could be.
“Bastards,” Sirius said contemplatively and rubbed his cheek against Remus’ shoulder. “Didn’t answer my letters either.”
“I only got them two days ago. Padfoot, what is happening here? What have you done?”
Sirius peered at him through his lashes, which Remus knew was designed to distract him, and said, “Well, I couldn’t let you move to the Muggle world by yourself, could I?”
“Padfoot.”
“I just found a way to make myself useful,” Sirius said, propping himself up on his elbow and grinning. “Besides, there’s a bloody war on. Matters more than Quidditch, that does.”
“Padfoot.”
“And you should see her, Moony. Sweetest girl there ever was - fast and sensitive and so fucking smooth. Even you would want to get in there and feel her-”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Remus cut in and blinked at himself. It felt good to swear at someone.
“The Spit,” Sirius said, all enthusiasm. “The Spitfire, Remus.”
“Um.”
Sirius’ face fell. “She’s an aeroplane.”
“And you’re in love,” Remus finished, and couldn’t help smiling at him. Typical.
“I am,” Sirius confirmed and leaned forward to press his mouth to Remus’. “And not just with the plane.”
“Good,” Remus said and kissed him back, his lips clumsy with delighted laughter.
Later, over breakfast in the drafty mess shed, as Sirius babbled incomprehensibly at him about Merlin's engines and Junkers, Remus looked out of the window. The moon was showing still, waning gibbous, although the sky was bright. It would be strange to watch the skies for different threats, he thought, and wondered if he would find it harder or easier than those around him.
He wouldn't be looking alone, though, he thought vaguely, watching Sirius lean forward, hands flying as he tried to explain something so technical that Remus doubted he understood it himself. It wasn't their war, not like the mess brewing with Grindelwald, but they'd all been drawn into it anyway. Even those wizards who barely acknowledged that Muggles existed had lost some of their freedoms now.
But in a few hours time, he would get on a borrowed bike. He'd cycle along a country lane to a mansion full of geniuses, Muggles and wizards side by side. And he'd do something to make a small difference. He'd never be a fighter pilot or hunt dark wizards, but he could do something. And although Dumbledore and Sirius had, between them, rescued him, it was his choice to stay – his choice not to turn his back on the part of the world that wasn't magical. He could choose this and no one had much more than that in wartime.
Sirius poked him in the arm with the end of his spoon. "You're thinking too much, Moony."
"I hear they're about to start rationing tea," Remus said lightly, letting the long weeks of silence go as if he was a child loosening his grip on a balloon. "I was thinking up ways to steal yours. Shouldn't be hard to fool your tiny mind."
"You can have it," Sirius said grandly, tilting his chair back to stare at the sky. "I am above such petty concerns."
Remus raised an eyebrow at him. "Who are you and what have you done with Sirius Black?"
"The girls in the NAAFI canteen bring me free coffee," Sirius admitted and grinned at him so brightly that Remus carried that smile forwards with him into the new day.
Historical Notes
Most of my information about civilian internment in Britain came from Juliet Gardiner's Wartime Britain 1939-1945 which has a whole chapter on the topic – Reenie's story was adapted from an incident included there. There's a simple overview of the topic here and a personal account by a Jewish refugee interned on the Isle of Man here.
The first air raids on Birmingham didn't actually take place until a few weeks after this story was set. Birmingham was the third most heavily bombed city in the UK. The siren sounded like this.
Author/Artist:
rosemaryandrueRecipient:
yndigot/curley_greenRating: PG
Contents or warnings (highlight to view): *Wartime setting with mention of air raids and internment *
Word count: 5000
Summary: It's the summer of 1940 and even wizards can't ignore the way the Muggle world is closing in around them.
Notes: I've put a few historical notes at the end. The title and the cut-tag are quotes from a speech made by Winston Churchill in May 1940. You asked for wizards in the world wars – I hope you enjoy this. Many thanks to
penhaligonblue who once again came to my rescue and made this all much better than the first draft.In the early summer of 1940, over three hundred thousand French, Belgian and British troops were evacuated from Dunkirk; Italy declared war on France and the United Kingdom; and at home in the UK, thousands more civilians were transported to internment camps on the Isle of Man. Among their number were three hundred witches and wizards: refugees, foreign wizards now resident in the country, and British wizards the Ministry of Magic considered to be 'undesirable.'
Remus Lupin quite unexpectedly found himself sleeping on a thin pallet in the Knockaloe Quidditch Stadium. His neighbour to the left was a jittery young Austrian cursebreaker, a Muggleborn who had been tortured by Grindelwald's followers before he fought his way to way to a portkey. On his right was a stocky member of the Bulgarian Quidditch team, a half-Veela who barely spoke English and who had a tendency of letting out howls of impotent rage every time he looked up and glimpsed the empty stands above them. Opposite them in the next row was a Italian wandmaker so elderly that he still thought it was 1893 and that they were sheltering from rebellious goblins.
After the first few days, during which every polite request to their guards had been met with snarled refusals, Remus stopped hoping he would get his wand back. There was nothing to do, so he spent most of his days walking along the cliffs, squinting out over the blue expanse of the sea, watching for ships. If he went out early, the seals would still be huddled on the rocks below, watching him pass with round, shining eyes as he tried to ignore the faint itch of the anti-Apparition wards which covered the Isle. Sometimes, when a heavily inked out newspaper made its way past the guards, he stole it for long enough to work out the answers to the crossword, although he had no pen to write them in with.
He got permission to walk to Peel one day, and wandered aimlessly through the narrow streets, ignoring the suspicious stares of the locals and the haughty scorn of the tailess cats sunning themselves on white-washed walls. He couldn't make himself talk to anyone; couldn't face the disgust or bafflement on their faces. Instead, he climbed up to the castle, and coaxed the resident spirit out to chase sticks across the grassed over ruins. When the Moddey Dhoo panted in his face, breath like splinters of ice, Remus couldn't rub his ears or ruffle the spirit's black fur, but it was almost enough. It almost felt like home.
No one had written to him.
"I do not think owls can reach us here," said Josef, the cursebreaker, and then shrugged when Remus looked across in surprise. "You have been watching the sky."
"One lives in hope," Remus said, shrugging a little. The words tasted strange on his tongue after days of silence.
"English?" Josef said, eyes rounding in surprise. Then he scowled. "A supporter of-"
"No!" Remus said hastily. "No, nothing like that. Just – just unlucky."
"Unlucky is fine. As long as you're not a traitor or one of those so-brave British Aurors."
"I'm neither," Remus said and turned away before Josef could ask any more questions.
He hadn't even finished his first year of training when they'd come to knock on his door, three embarrassed and apologetic ministry officials with a list of names that he had always hoped didn't exist. They'd let him go to school, after all, with Dumbledore's help; let him take his exams; join the Auror training program; rent a room in Diagon Alley.
No one had been home to urge him to run away, so he had simply picked up his wand and his hat and gone with them calmly. They had assured him that it was just temporary and that for someone like him, no real risk to security, it would be over quickly. He had believed them, the conscientious men from the Ministry, so concerned for the good of wizardkind.
Six weeks later, he was still here, watching the sunsets spill like blood across the western sky, day after day as the moon swelled and collapsed and swelled again. It was growing again now, and he could feel his temper getting shorter as the night skies grew brighter.
When the guards came to escort him down to the caves, he shrugged off their hands irritably and walked ahead of them, his head held high as the other internees watched and whispered behind their hands. He joined the line shuffling down the cliff path without a word, refusing to look too closely at those around him. He wasn't looking for a pack and he didn't want to remember their faces; didn't want to find himself making awkward conversation in some shop or hallway after the war was over.
There were over sixty of them in the caves that night, he estimated, more than at the previous moon. He sat cross-legged on the blanket they had issued him and ignored the round-faced man sitting next to him, who kept trying to start a conversation about gnome repellents as his hands shook and clenched into fists.
When the moonlight began to show around the mouth of the cave, Remus closed his eyes against it, and let his mind slide back through the years, to the forest and the wild glee of running under the moon, every muscle stretching as he raced the dog, the stag, the rat.
Were they looking at the moon tonight, he wondered. Were they wondering where he was?
He hadn't left a note – he hadn't thought he'd be gone that long.
Then the blood-heat of the moon slid over him and he let the quietness that he had wrapped around himself shatter as the wolf howled out, baying at the too-distant moon.
The next day, while Remus was still limping his way back to his pallet, the owls came.
They swooped over the pitch as if it was the first day of a new term, letters falling from their claws like confetti. Remus crossed his arms over his head in defence and rushed for his own pallet.
It was covered and his shaking legs gave out beneath him. He felt the scrolls crumpling under his knees as he sank onto them but he didn't care. He grabbed at the nearest letter and had to blink to read the address:
Wherever the buggering fuck he's gone,
And it better be a bloody national emergency, Moony,
Or I will hex your arse until your boils have boils, I swear,
Somewhere in the UK
"And you got that past the censors?" Remus murmured and smiled for the first time in weeks.
Before he could open the letter, though, one of the guards was at his shoulder. "Lupin, you've got a visitor."
He took the letter with him in the hope that he wouldn't need to open it.
But it was not Sirius who was waiting for him in the canteen, nor James nor Peter. Instead, Albus Dumbledore sat behind the formica table, gazing placidly down into the dregs of what Remus knew must have been a truly terrible cup of tea.
"Extraordinary," he murmured as Remus sat down, wincing as one of the scabs on his leg pulled awkwardly. "My future appears to hold a reunion with an old friend, three new pairs of socks, a victory at the coconut shy and what is either a terribly large wand or an exciting afternoon of maypole dancing. However do they brew this?"
"It's better not to ask, professor," Remus said, feeling as if he'd slipped into a rather strange dream. Nothing seemed real any more, and Dumbledore's presence was just an oddity too far.
Dumbledore looked up and speared him with a look of faint reproach. "Mr Lupin, you should know very well by now that it is always better to ask. Now," he continued, addressing the guard, "Mr Goudge, is it not?"
"Yes, Professor," the guard mumbled, shifting from foot to foot.
"I thought so. I shall never forget that truly marvellous bit of transfiguration you did in your fifth year – I've rarely seen a feather duster become so convincing a canary."
"Thank you, professor. Honour to have you here, sir."
"Oh, it's nothing," Dumbledore said. "Although I do hope there won't be any more misunderstandings about your guests' correspondence?"
"No, professor. Can I get you get anything, sir?"
"Another cup of tea each, perhaps, and I think Mr Lupin here could do with a couple of bourbons, if rationing allows."
As soon as the guard was out of earshot, Dumbledore leaned forward to say, "My dear Remus, I am terribly sorry I was unable to help you any sooner. The Ministry's wheels grind slowly, I am afraid, but it is all arranged now."
"What's arranged?" Remus asked.
"Why, your new posting, of course. Among Muggles, but that's all for the good."
"My new what?" Remus repeated.
Dumbledore twinkled at him. "Still keen on the crosswords, are you not? And I recall that you were quite excellent at Arithmancy. Exactly the assets needed for the job."
"What job?" Remus demanded.
"The Magical Cryptography Support Unit, Mr Lupin. Of course, they're all working on Muggle codes at the moment, but it's good training, very good training indeed."
"You want me to be a codebreaker?"
"Quite right," Dumbledore said and rose to his feet. "Ah, here is your tea and biscuits. Allow me to retrieve your wand."
Three days later, he was waiting on the pier at Douglas for the ferry to Holyhead. The pier was busy with a crowd of ATS girls in their smart brown uniforms, their laughs loud and confident. Remus stayed out of their way, but a couple of them noticed him and came across, giggling as they nudged each other forward.
"We've got a bet," one of them started, her accent soft and northern. "Sheila thinks you're on leave from the RAF, and I think it's the Navy, but Nell reckons you've come from one of them camps."
"Nell's right, I'm afraid," Remus said, hoping it would scare her off.
"Well, you sound like a normal Englishman, love.”
“Not on my mum’s side,” Remus said, with a shrug.
“Well, I think that’s a crying shame, putting people away on account of where their mums come from. No wonder you look so poorly.”
“I’m fine, thank you,” Remus said, and bit back his irritation. He had almost been an Auror, thank you, and one of the best duellists in his year, and he was sick of even Muggles treating him like an invalid. Sirius wouldn't-
He stopped thinking there and turned to the girls to say, “I’ll be fit to serve within a week or so.”
“And getting off the island just in time,” Sheila put in. “After the news about Guernsey.”
“What’s that?” one of the other girls called.
“Did you not hear? Mr Churchill announced on the wireless last night.”
“You oughtn’t be talking about it anyway,” one of the older girls said sternly. “Careless talk, girls.”
“Ah, not if it were on the wireless, Betty, don’t be daft.”
Betty sniffed and turned to Remus. “And who might you be?”
He told his cover story again, giving her his name and a wary smile.
“Polish name, eh?” she asked, looking down her nose. “Brave people. Very tragic.”
He didn’t correct her, but let the girls sweep him on board in a mass of good cheer. He couldn’t bring himself to share it - he knew he had laughed with friends once, but it all seemed so long ago, as if it had happened in someone else’s life. He was just a werewolf now, and one who had to pose as a Muggle at that.
It was a slow crossing, on a steam ship that had clearly seen better days. Two of the girls went a little green as the waves rocked below them but the rest smoked and chattered their way through the hours, voices light and quick around him.
Sheila and her friend Peggy stuck with him, both flirting with a sly confidence he hadn’t seen since his last year at Hogwarts. He didn’t encourage them, but he listened to them talk, and felt a little of the numbness inside him start to warm.
“My cousin Reenie, her husband’s family are Italian - they run a smashing little fish and chip shop in Hull - and anyhow the police came round to our Reenie’s place-”
“Bet she didn’t like that,” Sheila put in.
“She did not. They go to her, ‘We’s inquiring about the whereabouts of your husband and his brothers, Mrs Morello.’ And you’ll never guess what Reenie said to them?”
“Go on,” Remus said politely, as that seemed to be aimed in his direction and the girls were all smirking like they’d heard the story before.
“She goes, ‘If you wants my Tony, he’s in the RAF, and Sal’s in the Navy and Frank never made it back from Dunkirk so if you want him you can bugger off over there and ask bloody Hitler to give him back.’”
Remus joined in the laughter and wondered if the story had been meant to make him feel better or worse. His world had been all about magic and prejudice for so long that he’d barely realised that there were threats other than Grindelwald out there. He’d been as surprised as most wizards when the Muggle world suddenly convulsed around them. He wished now that he’d been paying a little more attention.
At Holyhead, they disembarked onto a lonely quay. The girls all piled into an army truck, waving goodbye with squeals and laughter. Remus waved them off and then ducked into the waiting room of the ferry office. There he opened the packet Dumbledore had given him.
It contained a Muggle Identity Card, a ration book, a railway ticket from Holyhead to somewhere called Bletchley and a sealed set of orders with an official looking Muggle stamp on them.
The ticket inspector came round before the train had rattled across the Menai Bridge, hissing disapproval as he pulled black blinds across the train windows. The lamp above Remus’ seat was dim and flickered with every jolt of the carriage, so he had to squint down at his letters now he could finally read them. Twenty were from Peter, at two day intervals. Not much of them was readable, but Remus managed to piece together the bits between the censor’s inkblots - Peter was somewhere on the south coast, working with Muggles and worried about Remus. Somewhere in the middle of the pile, it became apparent that he knew where Remus was, and then Dumbledore’s name showed up between blotches.
The six from James were unreadable - censor’s ink and appalling handwriting were a poor combination in such dim light. Sirius had only sent three - quick raging notes dashed off in sloping copperplate handwriting.
Remus could almost feel the rage and panic rising from them and they crumpled in his hand as he bowed forward. He hadn’t been forgotten. Sirius hadn’t simply let him go.
Then he sat up and wiped his eyes and read them again.
The last one was dated only a week after he had been arrested and he wondered, with a sudden jolt of panic, where Sirius was now. If he’d been that angry, he should have torn down the camps with his bare hands by now.
Unless something had happened to him. Unless even London wasn’t safe now.
The train jerked to a halt, brakes screeching. As Remus stood up, reaching for his wand, all the lights went out. Somewhere outside the window, a siren began to wail, whirring up to its full volume, louder and louder and louder.
“What’s happening?” Remus asked, shivers running down his spine.
“Where’ve you been the last few weeks, mate?” someone shouted from down the carriage. “We’re in Birmingham. That’s Jerry on his way, that is. Better get under a seat in case he’s aiming for the railway lines.”
Baffled, Remus dropped to the floor, squeezing under the seat with a wince at the damp muck under his hands. Outside, the siren continued to wail and he could hear more now, sound layered on eerie sound. Then, above the long keening of the sirens, he heard engines in the sky. For a moment he thought of Sirius and that bloody motorbike, but there was another note in these engines, something low and menacing and throbbing.
When the first explosion rocked the train, his first thought was Grindelwald! He grabbed his wand, snarling a protego as glass shattered above him, catching on the blackout blinds before it came streaming down. More followed, and he could hear the roar of flames rising, and the growl of the engines and the distant crumple of collapsing walls.
These are Muggles, he realised then, astonished and saddened. They do this to each other without magic, in spite of everything we do to protect them.
It seemed like an eternity before the roar from the sky went quiet but Remus was sure that his watch would tell him it had only been minutes. Somewhere along the carriage, a child was crying, sobs hiccuping over the long note of the siren again.
“There’s the all clear,” someone said and Remus crawled out from below his seat and went to help the crying child.
He finally arrived at Bletchley just after dawn. The orders told him he would be billeted at Little Horwood Manor, wherever that might be, but the station was deserted when he stumbled off the carriage. He dropped his pack down at the back of the station and sat on it to watch the train go out, steam billowing in the thin morning air.
The station sign had been painted over and the familiar bold posters advertising Cornish resorts and Northern spa towns had been replaced by exhortations to Give your seat up for a shell. Yawning, Remus leaned back against the slatted fence and closed his eyes.
He was woken by someone poking him in the side and muttering, “Oy! You Lupin?”
“Who’s asking?” Remus retorted, opening his eyes reluctantly. The sun was higher in the sky now, wreathed by white clouds. An acne-pocked young man was blocking his view of the sky, though, leaning forward with his mouth open to poke Remus with his wand.
“Name’s Shunpike. I’m from the Manor. You was s’posed to be here last night.”
“Bombs over Birmingham,” Remus said, climbing wearily to his feet.
“Cor,” Stan said, eyes widening. “Not that it’s the first time, mind. You should of heard the wireless - the Battle for Britain, the Muggle Minister called it.”
“Good thing he asked for our help, then,” Remus said, heaving his pack back over his shoulder with a wince.
“D’you reckon he did? Still a Muggle, ain’t he?”
“I’m fairly certain the Muggle Prime Minister knows of our existence,” Remus said. “Where’s this manor, then?”
“Oh, just hop in the trap. You can kip in the back, if you like. I don’t mind.”
Remus shook his head, breathing in deeply. “I’m awake now.”
Still, the jolting pace of the horse-drawn trap almost did rock him back to sleep. He shook himself, looking around as they left the town behind. After the cliffs and shining mist of the Isle of Man, there was something very comforting about low, green English hills, and he was feeling almost like himself again. Rolling the aches out of his shoulders, he asked Shunpike, “What’s this Manor like, then?”
“All Wizarding, so you don’t need to worry. All assigned down here - 'bout half and half between Bletchley and the airfield – the RAF like Quidditch players, y’know.”
Remus didn’t.
“So,” Shunpike continued, eyeing him slyly. “Which are you then - shirtlifter, Muggleborn or squib?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Still a Muggle war, innit? Nobody the Ministry of Magic likes gets sent to work with Muggles, even now. Go on, then. I don’t mind which.”
“Albus Dumbledore sent me,” Remus said coldly and pulled his coat around him, feigning sleep.
Little Horwood turned out to be a modern building. Once Shunpike had shown him to his room, Remus didn’t take in much else. He noticed that the other bed in the room was an unmade mess of rumpled sheets, but he was too busy falling onto his own bed to care.
He dreamed of Sirius, grinning at him across the table in their cramped little flat in Diagon Alley, as he flicked his wand at the record player, the sound of trumpets and saxophones booming out until the windows shook. The music blurred into days when he had fallen asleep over the crossword until Sirius had come blazing in on a gust of laughter, throwing his broom down to shake Remus awake and babble at him about the triumphs of the day. He dreamed of hearing Sirius breathe beside him in the night and turned his face quietly into the pillow, relaxing under the remembered warmth of beloved hands.
When he woke it was dusk outside the manor and his roommate had clearly been and gone, because the other bed was made and a faint scent of tobacco and leather hung around the room. Remus made himself get up and started unpacking the few changes of clothes he had brought with him.
When he opened the dresser in search of an empty drawer, though, he found it already full of his own clothes. Dumbledore had clearly planned this properly.
Changing gratefully into something fresh, he decided to make the best of this. He had a new posting to report to tomorrow, but once he’d found his feet there, he could start asking questions about where Sirius had gone. If there was a Floo connection he could use here, he could track down James and Peter. Suddenly, things were possible again. Not even bombs could stop him from finding Sirius now he had his wand again.
It was early evening and he could smell the familiar overcooked cabbage and treacle tart scent of institutionalised meals drifting through the open windows. As he combed his hair, he suddenly heard the rumble of engines in the sky again. Worried, he crossed to the window before he realised there was a different note to these engines.
As he watched, looking south, a flight of planes rose into the sky from behind a thin line of trees: sleek, stubby-winged fighters clawing their way into the sky. Then, as he was about to turn away, they suddenly soared, falling into tight formations with a startling grace. Remus caught his breath, and lingered by the window to watch them vanish into the clouds above, floating south to face Merlin-knew-what horrors.
He ate down in the mess with a tableful of other wizards, several of whom were glad to talk codebreaking with him until he dozed off again over his gritty cup of coffee. He made his excuses and stumbled back to his bed.
He was woken in the middle of the night, aware suddenly that cold air was blowing in the open window and someone had just come into the room. Groping under his pillow for his wand, he mumbled, “Lumos.”
Sirius was standing by the door, his eyes weary but his smile bright. He kicked off his shoes and said, biting back a yawn, “About time you got here, Moony. I've been waiting for weeks.”
“What- I- You’re here?” Remus managed, but Sirius was already striding across the room, shrugging off his flying jacket and collapsing onto the bed beside him.
“In the morning,” he muttered. “I had to hex a fucking Messerschmitt to get it off my arse and I’m bloody knackered.”
“But,” Remus protested, but Sirius had already thrown an arm around him and was snoring into the crook of his neck, his breath warm and damp. Remus lifted his hand very carefully and ran it down Sirius’ back, feeling the nubs of his spine through the sweaty cotton.
He was real. He was alive. He was here.
Breathing out a long, shaky sigh, Remus put out his light and locked his arms around Sirius, closing his eyes. He breathed in the scent of leather and brylcreem and motor oil that was so unmistakably Sirius that his eyes watered at it and he blinked back tears as his breath shuddered against the top of Sirius’ head.
In the morning, Sirius woke him with kisses, and Remus arched joyously into his touch, rolling to press him against the plain cotton sheets and kiss him back so fiercely that they both moaned at it. Sirius’ eyes went wide and he breathed out, “Moony, oh, yes, Remus!” and their hands tangled as they fought to get their Muggle clothes off and finally, finally touch each other again.
Afterwards, Remus let his hand rest on Sirius’ bare back, feeling his sweat cool, until Sirius lifted his head and said, “You didn’t even leave a note.”
“They said I’d only be gone an hour or two.”
"Still should have left a note."
"I didn't want to worry you," Remus said into a mouthful of black hair, aware his voice had gone sulky.
"That worked well for you, didn't it?" Sirius grumbled. "Will you stop suffering these things in bloody silence? You're allowed to ask for help, you proud twat."
"They didn't give me a chance," Remus protested, because he didn't want to have that argument, not now they were both here and together and as safe as they could be.
“Bastards,” Sirius said contemplatively and rubbed his cheek against Remus’ shoulder. “Didn’t answer my letters either.”
“I only got them two days ago. Padfoot, what is happening here? What have you done?”
Sirius peered at him through his lashes, which Remus knew was designed to distract him, and said, “Well, I couldn’t let you move to the Muggle world by yourself, could I?”
“Padfoot.”
“I just found a way to make myself useful,” Sirius said, propping himself up on his elbow and grinning. “Besides, there’s a bloody war on. Matters more than Quidditch, that does.”
“Padfoot.”
“And you should see her, Moony. Sweetest girl there ever was - fast and sensitive and so fucking smooth. Even you would want to get in there and feel her-”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Remus cut in and blinked at himself. It felt good to swear at someone.
“The Spit,” Sirius said, all enthusiasm. “The Spitfire, Remus.”
“Um.”
Sirius’ face fell. “She’s an aeroplane.”
“And you’re in love,” Remus finished, and couldn’t help smiling at him. Typical.
“I am,” Sirius confirmed and leaned forward to press his mouth to Remus’. “And not just with the plane.”
“Good,” Remus said and kissed him back, his lips clumsy with delighted laughter.
Later, over breakfast in the drafty mess shed, as Sirius babbled incomprehensibly at him about Merlin's engines and Junkers, Remus looked out of the window. The moon was showing still, waning gibbous, although the sky was bright. It would be strange to watch the skies for different threats, he thought, and wondered if he would find it harder or easier than those around him.
He wouldn't be looking alone, though, he thought vaguely, watching Sirius lean forward, hands flying as he tried to explain something so technical that Remus doubted he understood it himself. It wasn't their war, not like the mess brewing with Grindelwald, but they'd all been drawn into it anyway. Even those wizards who barely acknowledged that Muggles existed had lost some of their freedoms now.
But in a few hours time, he would get on a borrowed bike. He'd cycle along a country lane to a mansion full of geniuses, Muggles and wizards side by side. And he'd do something to make a small difference. He'd never be a fighter pilot or hunt dark wizards, but he could do something. And although Dumbledore and Sirius had, between them, rescued him, it was his choice to stay – his choice not to turn his back on the part of the world that wasn't magical. He could choose this and no one had much more than that in wartime.
Sirius poked him in the arm with the end of his spoon. "You're thinking too much, Moony."
"I hear they're about to start rationing tea," Remus said lightly, letting the long weeks of silence go as if he was a child loosening his grip on a balloon. "I was thinking up ways to steal yours. Shouldn't be hard to fool your tiny mind."
"You can have it," Sirius said grandly, tilting his chair back to stare at the sky. "I am above such petty concerns."
Remus raised an eyebrow at him. "Who are you and what have you done with Sirius Black?"
"The girls in the NAAFI canteen bring me free coffee," Sirius admitted and grinned at him so brightly that Remus carried that smile forwards with him into the new day.
Historical Notes
Most of my information about civilian internment in Britain came from Juliet Gardiner's Wartime Britain 1939-1945 which has a whole chapter on the topic – Reenie's story was adapted from an incident included there. There's a simple overview of the topic here and a personal account by a Jewish refugee interned on the Isle of Man here.
The first air raids on Birmingham didn't actually take place until a few weeks after this story was set. Birmingham was the third most heavily bombed city in the UK. The siren sounded like this.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-12-28 08:51 pm (UTC)Six weeks later, he was still here, watching the sunsets spill like blood across the western sky, day after day as the moon swelled and collapsed and swelled again. It was growing again now, and he could feel his temper getting shorter as the night skies grew brighter. Good lord, that is just gorgeous. Sometimes fanfiction is so focused on character (not that yours wasn't focused on character) that the beauty of scene becomes lost. It was lovely to read such beauty in yours.
But it was not Sirius who was waiting for him in the canteen, nor James nor Peter. Instead, Albus Dumbledore sat behind the formica table, gazing placidly down into the dregs of what Remus knew must have been a truly terrible cup of tea.
"Extraordinary," he murmured as Remus sat down, wincing as one of the scabs on his leg pulled awkwardly. "My future appears to hold a reunion with an old friend, three new pairs of socks, a victory at the coconut shy and what is either a terribly large wand or an exciting afternoon of maypole dancing. However do they brew this?" Despite the seriousness of the subject, it was so lovely to see that this was not without humor - and very English humor at that.
After the first few days, during which every polite request to their guards had been met with snarled refusals, Remus stopped hoping he would get his wand back. There was nothing to do, so he spent most of his days walking along the cliffs, squinting out over the blue expanse of the sea, watching for ships. If he went out early, the seals would still be huddled on the rocks below, watching him pass with round, shining eyes as he tried to ignore the faint itch of the anti-Apparition wards which covered the Isle. Sometimes, when a heavily inked out newspaper made its way past the guards, he stole it for long enough to work out the answers to the crossword, although he had no pen to write them in with. BTW, this bit was extra cool because of the crossword reference. In fact, I loved how "Sirius" Remus' incarceration really felt. It was an interesting reversal that worked exceedingly well.
He dreamed of Sirius, grinning at him across the table in their cramped little flat in Diagon Alley, as he flicked his wand at the record player, the sound of trumpets and saxophones booming out until the windows shook. The music blurred into days when he had fallen asleep over the crossword until Sirius had come blazing in on a gust of laughter, throwing his broom down to shake Remus awake and babble at him about the triumphs of the day. He dreamed of hearing Sirius breathe beside him in the night and turned his face quietly into the pillow, relaxing under the remembered warmth of beloved hands. Oh, that's just beautiful. Pure, R/S beautiful.
Second, your characters were spot on (for canon), but, perhaps even more compelling for being non-canon. I loved the Muggle girls and Shunpike and even the brief mentions of the other inmates of the camp.
Third, you really captured a sense of the time period. Mentions of Churchill (of course he's know about Wizards and would have set something up like the mansion) and bits like this: When the first explosion rocked the train, his first thought was Grindelwald! He grabbed his wand, snarling a protego as glass shattered above him, catching on the blackout blinds before it came streaming down. More followed, and he could hear the roar of flames rising, and the growl of the engines and the distant crumple of collapsing walls.
These are Muggles, he realised then, astonished and saddened. They do this to each other without magic, in spite of everything we do to protect them. really sang. And, of course, Sirius would be a pilot. He so very much loves machines, does he not? Besides, it's kind of hot, isn't it?
no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:26 pm (UTC)I spent a brief weekend on the Isle of Man a couple of years ago and it made a huge impression. It's such a beautiful place it's not hard to push a little harder for the right words.
There's something irresistible about putting Dumbledore into incongruous settings and I had fun trying to decide what could be in his tea leaves in 1940.
It all looks much nicer than Azkaban on the surface, but it's only appearances, which is part of what was so creepy about the real life camps as well.
I've got a book on my to-read pile called Churchill's Wizards which is actually about military tricks and deception in the world wars, but which could so easily be the starting point for an epic fic.
The moment I saw this prompt, I just went, oh, yeah, Sirius flies a Spitfire and the rest came from there. And they were celebrities in their small way - danger and glamour and daring.
I'm glad you enjoyed it :)
no subject
Date: 2011-12-29 03:48 am (UTC)Your grasp of history, as slways shines through and I love you and your writing for it.
So very much enjoyed!
no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:30 pm (UTC)Glad you enjoyed it.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-29 11:37 pm (UTC)And naturally Sirius is in love with a plane -- it's a giant piece of machinery that flies, which is right up his alley. ^_^
no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:34 pm (UTC)Making Sirius a Spitfire pilot was my first instinct with this - he fits the type so perfectly. If you read their memoirs, they all romanticise the plane so much and that really seemed to fit with Sirius' character.
I'm so glad you enjoyed it :)
no subject
Date: 2011-12-30 04:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-31 03:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:36 pm (UTC)Thank you for your help with this - my writing muscles feel very stiff and creaky at the moment and I really appreciated the help.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 04:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 09:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-22 05:38 pm (UTC)