20 ~ Please, Do Not Give Up On Me

No spell could undo what had been done to her, and no words could make this right.

Remus' POV:

     "Lestrange, you always have to stick your nose into other people's affairs!", Sirius snapped and made himself taller by lifting his chin. He glared at her with grey eyes, yet this seemed to impress the black-haired girl very little.     Lestrange tossed her hair back with a smooth movement of her hand and strolled towards us. I examined her sternly, since her appearance could mean nothing good. Although she and Sirius had never been able to stand each other, we also bore our share of responsibility for that. Alongside Snivellus, Lestrange was often the victim of our pranks.     Therefore it was obvious that Lestrange did not speak well of us. Likewise we did not speak well of her, since she, as Sirius had already mentioned, always stuck her nose into other people's affairs. She always knew everything that went on in Hogwarts.

She is an annoying contemporary.

     I did not think further about the Slytherin, because in the next moment she joined our group and provocatively remained standing beside Sirius, close beside him.     "My nose is mine, yes, my affair, Black, but anyway. I heard that you are searching for a certain Phil?", Lestrange fluttered her eyelashes charmingly. I tensed at the mere mention of Phil. My eyes narrowed.          "That doesn't concern you one bit, snake!", Sirius hissed as expected and eyed the black-haired girl as if she should have dropped dead ages ago.     "Watch your tongue, mutt!", she replied, raising one of her slender index fingers in warning. Her eyes were nothing but slits, but then she turned to the rest of us. The Slytherin sighed theatrically, then said carelessly: "A shame that you don't need my help", she winked conspiratorially, "I mean, I would have your desired information, but as you wish."     She turned to leave, yet I sighed loudly, then called after her: "Wait!"          Lestrange immediately began to grin and stepped back towards us. It was a grin that could have meant many things. Whether it could bring us something good, Phil, was uncertain.     "So?", James asked tensely, impatiently.          The girl with the green tie cleared her throat.

Phil's POV:

     What did I feel?     I tried to gather my thoughts, but it was impossible. The pain was too great. What was I now? What had I become again? I had become the monster again that I despised...     I was at the very bottom. Could I fall even further, or had I perhaps climbed a few steps upwards?          Once again trapped in this situation, trapped in eternity. An eternity, because it would still be a long way until I would reach the point where good things would happen. But I could not do it. How could I accept something like myself?     I hoped that one day I would reach the point where everything would be clear. Where the dense threads of the curse would loosen.

Why exactly me...?

     When everything will be clear, then it would be as if I were walking along a path. While I walk along the path, piece by piece the burdens fall away that I have carried with me for so long, we have carried. I and the curse, because we are inseparable, until the end of the path will tear us apart, I will then only be me - be free, be able to breathe freely.     Here I think that it will feel like liberation, because that is what it is - a liberation of the good, because now its time has come to shine and to walk the next path alone. At the end of this path there will be a great gorge. I will stand at the cliff. My toes at the edge and small chunks of rock will slowly fall into the depths, until my eyes will no longer be able to follow them. They will have disappeared, like the burdens of the curse. I will scream, roar and fight - fight properly for the first time.          For a long time I have been silent, turning my back on the outside world. I will gather my courage, I will take the first step into the void.      My foot will meet resistance, afterwards I will walk over the depth. Hesitantly, however, because my curse will try to drive me back to the edge of the cliff and onto the path from which we came. It will try that because it cannot survive the path over the silent emptiness; the evil is doomed to fall into the depths, to die.     But, if I am strong enough and have won the fight, I will walk my path - the curse has long since fallen down - and at some point reach the other side of the gorge.

     But all of that is currently mere imagination, perhaps delusion?     I do not know, because I am ignorant, and no longer know what is delusion and what is reality.          I am blind, trapped in the sick shackles...               The shackles of the curse.

Remus' POV:

     "One of you brainless fools must know how to get out of the castle into the forest quickly, right?", Lestrange asked while we walked through the castle.      We had just passed arched windows and I looked outside. It was still early morning. One could see how the sun kept rising higher into the sky. Yet through the winter and the cloud-covered sky the sun appeared dull. The whole world looked grey, gloomy. It seemed a snowstorm was coming and in the forest it would be dark at this time of year.     When we had passed the row of windows, I looked at the others. We Marauders looked at one another because of Lestrange's question, consequently we nodded. Lestrange examined us with raised brows and had stopped in the middle of the corridor, which housed only us. We also stopped. For a short time it was silent. So silent that one could hear the breathing of everyone involved.Elizabeth Lestrange had told us that she had seen Phil yesterday evening in the castle as she had suffered a panic attack, or something like that. Phil had definitely been crying, screaming and had fled.

Reality must be much worse if I consider that Lestrange told everything without emotion.

     After the panic attack from Phil's side she had run out of the castle. Because of Lestrange's far too great curiosity the Slytherin had followed her.      Followed her until she had seen that the girl had run into the forest. At this point in her description Lestrange had shaken her head, claimed that she had not been suicidal, and had not followed her into the Forbidden Forest.     The Slytherin had gone back into the castle and in the morning she had heard all the Gryffindors talking about Phil, so us and the girls. Since Lestrange had not felt like Binns, she had followed us. Now she was following us.     She was almost Sirius' second shadow, who looked as if he would explode at any moment and kill Lestrange, but unfortunately he could not. Actually this account from Lestrange alone could have been enough for us to find Phil, yet the Slytherin kept a small detail to herself, namely exactly where Phil had gone into the Forbidden Forest.      Lestrange wanted to accompany us on our little adventure, and without her help it would be like searching for a needle in a haystack.

The Forbidden Forest is enormous...

     We had no choice but to take Lestrange with us, even if we disliked the thought.          "Okay", James ran a hand through his hair that stood on end, "if we push this painting aside, we can get out of the castle through a secret passage."     Lestrange looked surprised and examined the painting as if she could see the secret passage behind it.          "Remarkable, you are actually good for something after all." She looked at Sirius, nodded with her head towards the painting.     "What?"          "Make yourself useful."     "Who says that we're taking you with us at all, Lestrange?"          "Because I am of invaluable worth, Black."     "As if!" He blew air out of his nose, his jaw tensed visibly. The two glared at each other, yet there was no way around it, so I sighed: "We will have to take her with us, whether we like it or not."     "But, Moony!", Sirius looked at me agitated. "Why should we take her with us? Let's search for Phil alone."          "And where do you want to start, Black?", the black-haired girl asked provocatively and crossed her arms in front of her chest.     "Oh, whatever", James said and went to the painting, then he placed his hand on Sirius' shoulder. The Gryffindor's whole body was tense. His grey eyes told a completely different story than that he agreed with my and James' words.          "Yes, Black, follow your friends. I am coming along. Potter and Lupin seem to have understood the situation. Perhaps even Pettigrew."     "You're playing stupid, childish games of power, Lestrange!", Sirius hissed, yet in the end he turned around and Lestrange won the confrontation.

     The five of us walked through the painting. One after another we disappeared into the secret passage behind it. I got a strange gut feeling; I only walked along this passage at full moon.      Immediately the memories of those nights entered my awareness. Memories of pain and suffering, of this curse, as Phil had called it. Her words now seemed to make sense to me, because a curse, yes, that was it. One could not destroy it and had to live with it, even if it clouded the joy of life.     A few seconds of thinking later I was torn from my thoughts because I heard a scream. Lestrange had walked into a spider web and was now being loudly laughed at by Padfoot. I walked last and observed the others, who were mere silhouettes in the passage.     We all knew what we had to expect. Phil had returned and perhaps she was in trouble. Had Peter been right after all?

Does it really not concern us, and do we Marauders always stick our noses into other people's affairs, I asked myself, but could not answer these questions purely logically. In this case I had to listen to my heart. Phil perhaps did not want to be saved at all, or to return to the castle, where everything was different for her.      However, if she was in trouble, then I could never have forgiven myself if something had happened to her. Likewise Phil, according to Lestrange, did not seem to be in a good condition.

     We continued our way through the secret passage. Lestrange protected her face from possible spider webs. James went ahead and his wand provided the only light. Behind him walked Peter, then Lestrange and Sirius, who did not take his eyes off the girl. In another situation I would have found it amusing that Sirius was confronted with Lestrange, since the two were actually similar in many ways.     Actually Lestrange was not such a nasty snake like other Slytherins and Sirius simply could not stand her because they had clashed since first year. Lestrange was indeed arrogant, but one could not deny that Sirius also sometimes thought too highly of himself. All this and more were reasons why I would have found the situation amusing.

If it had not been about Phil...

     "I still don't understand why we have to take her with us", Sirius complained loudly and pulled a pout. That Lestrange was standing exactly beside him at that moment and had heard him perfectly was irrelevant to the Gryffindor. He did not pay attention to the feigned indignation of the black-haired girl at all and simply continued on his way.

Yes, those two are something else...

     I came out of the secret passage last. We found ourselves shortly afterwards on the Hogwarts grounds, near the Whomping Willow. Quietly it stood there, like a guardian.     Outside it was cold, snow lay everywhere and the sky was grey. Lestrange wrapped her arms around her upper body, probably regretting coming with us. She looked back along the path from which we had come, while her breath danced silently in white clouds in front of her face.     "That certainly isn't the only secret passage in Hogwarts", the Slytherin stated, looked at all of us one after another, "you can actually use your heads after all."          "You, however, cannot", Sirius replied dryly. "Would you perhaps like to make yourself useful and lead us to your oh so secret spot?"     Lestrange rolled her poisonous green eyes, showed Sirius her middle finger and after she had finished this masterpiece, she seemed to find the path and set herself in motion. The snow crunched beneath our feet. We approached the forest with its trees covered in snow.     I still had a strange feeling that would not disappear. What it was, I did not know. In general I rarely listened to my gut. That was why I could hardly interpret my gut feelings.

She, the girl who is like me, has she lost the fight?Lost the fight to live with this curse?

     My feet moved slowly forward. I did not even notice how we marched across the grounds, the castle growing ever smaller and we drew closer to the Forbidden Forest.      On the way there Sirius and Lestrange bickered continuously, because the Slytherin had briefly lost her bearings and he had called her useless. I only shook my head, whereby my hair fell onto my forehead. I brushed it back and in doing so ran over a scar on my temple.

It is always present, one cannot escape, I thought, while suddenly cold wind blew around us. The snow swirled around, the sky darkened.      It was not even noon yet and a snowstorm seemed to be approaching. The whole surroundings also felt strange.          I normally only came near the Forbidden Forest at full moon. I associated it with terror and the edge of the forest looked like a dark wall. Without a full moon it was strange to be here, yet all memories of those nights immediately came to the forefront.

     My thoughts came to an end when I caught up with the others. I had fallen a bit behind, yet with long strides I quickly reached them again. I joined the people who were approaching the forest.           Once again cold wind surrounded us and I peered into the dark forest. Something was wrong - the darkness was too quiet.     We paused briefly at the forest edge, then Lestrange chose a direction. We walked along the forest edge, while the Slytherin was still our leading force.     My feet moved across the snow. I noticed how it grew dark. The sun disappeared completely behind the gloomy clouds and left behind a grey world, took the colours with it. The mood became oppressive and the clouds hung above our heads. Apart from the wind it was quiet, almost peaceful.           The constant bickering of Padfoot and Lestrange was not peaceful, not peaceful at all.     I pushed my thoughts aside. When the girl stopped, it began to snow. Slowly the world took on a grey shade, white snowflakes fell from the sky, grew from small into thick flakes.     I directed my attention to James. He had just begun to explain the plan when it happened. It happened quite suddenly, and yet it seemed to me like a rehearsed scene from a theatre play. As if fate had waited for this moment.      For the moment when the snowstorm broke out.

A howl sounds...

     "Okay, what in Merlin's name was that?!", Lestrange asked.          Now she no longer sounded loud.     After I had stared into the forest as if frozen, I looked at the Marauders one after another. Immediately we knew it, but that could not be possible, because it was not full moon. The howl of a werewolf could not be mistaken. The boys knew it, I felt that it did not come from an ordinary wolf.     My gaze met James, who nodded firmly. Probably to shake off his uncertainty.          "Okay about the plan: James, Peter and I go in this direction. You and Lestrange in the other. If we split up, we will find Phil faster", I said sternly. I looked at Sirius intently and he nodded vigorously. The boys also understood; Lestrange must not under any circumstances see what was happening here, therefore Sirius would lure her in the wrong direction.      The others agreed with this tactic. Immediately afterwards it was time, we set off, searching for the girl who by now was no longer quite like me.

Phil's POV:

How can it be that I am once again in this failed situation?

     The wolves were close on my heels, everything hurt and I ran. I kept running, my paws ran over the damp snow and I knew I could not hold out much longer. Unfair was only a word, but also a reality, my reality.

"You can do it!"

     I heard his voice in my head. Yet I knew the voice was not right. It was foolish to claim that this voice had ever brought me anything good. Yes, it belonged to a person who had been there for me, at least in the past. But at some point he had left, had removed himself from my life, then it had begun.     My life had only gone downhill. Ever deeper, and when I had thought one could not fall any further, I had realised it; the depth did not stop.

This voice belongs to my father.

     Trapped in the body of this disgusting creature I moved forward. Behind me I heard them, my former family. They came closer, tried to catch me, and then? What would they do to me? What would they do if they caught me, kill me?          Yes.     A werewolf was stronger than a wolf, but could I take on my entire pack? Did I really want that? Could I even blame them? I had betrayed them, had gone to the humans. They no longer wanted me and I understood it. I no longer wanted myself.

Remus' POV:

     "How? Could it be that she is then a real werewolf?", Peter asked and looked at me. I did not know, but James had his theory again, because he said: "I told you from the beginning that Ethan J. Aquila was not a normal werewolf or is not."     And he seemed to be right, because this howl could only come from a werewolf. I turned to the two of them and said, in a subdued voice: "I think you are right.", afterwards I pressed my lips together and the three of us went into the forest.

There, where terror awaits us...

     We had been walking for some time and once again this pulling in my stomach visited me. It did not want to fade, since it had crept up on me. Meanwhile it seemed to have its origin in the truth of the riddle that Phil carried within herself. I could not imagine that there were people who could transform into a werewolf without a full moon - like an Animagus -, yet that was exactly what was happening now.     My feet sank deeper and deeper into the snow the deeper we pushed into the forest, but giving up was not to be thought of. She was out there and she was in danger.     Was I to blame, were we to blame? Had we not taken proper care of her, had we not seen her problems? However, what could we have done?     Not even the girls seemed to have reached Phil, and now she was somewhere in the forest. Fearfully she had fled from the castle, pursued by inner demons, and even now there was no escape for her.      Phil undoubtedly had a difficult past. I even believed that she had not told Dumbledore about it in full detail.

She is a reserved person, but one cannot blame her for it.

     I was lost in thought when I saw it. At first I could not trust my eyes. Immediately James stopped, his hand stretched towards me and prevented me from going further.     Ahead of us the forest cleared a little, and the sight that presented itself to us, well, it had become reality. The suspicion had been confirmed. There she was, a werewolf.     She seemed to struggle with walking, stumbled along. Behind her were wolves, then our gazes met. I could only see fear in her eyes. Something else as well, but I could not place it exactly.

Was it shame, sorrow, anger?

     Phil's eyes, those blue eyes, looked back at me, but this eye contact did not last long, because immediately the werewolf turned around and attacked its smaller kin. The pack did not even recoil; it was set on fighting.     Howling and squealing could be heard whenever one of the wolves was bitten. I could see how the wolves jumped at the werewolf, clung to him, until they were shaken off. It was cruel, brutal.      The first patches in the snow turned red and I trembled, yet I knew what to do. I looked at Wormtail, then Prongs. They knew it as well; we had to help, immediately!     We fought our way towards her through the snow. Cold wind came towards us and we ran to the place of action. The clearing was gloomy, snow swirled everywhere through the air. It was cloudy, nowhere light, only grey. Fitting.     With an oppressive feeling deep in my neck, I reached into my pocket, pulled out my wand and fired off whatever curses came to mind.      As Prongs came closer to the werewolf, he transformed into his Animagus form and attacked several wolves with his antlers. He would not have needed to transform, because he would not have had to fear being attacked by Phil, being injured.      Everything pointed to the fact that Phil was conscious. No ordinary curse, no coincidence - she was the child of Ethan J. Aquila, that man who had been obsessed with breaking the ancient curse and creating something new, something crueller. And in that moment it became clear to me:

He succeeded...

     I hurled a curse at a wolf that had come too close to her. The fight was confusing, but the wolves had not expected spells. The flashes, the bangs and the following pain drove them away. The wolves fled, ran back and left behind a Phil who was at the end of her strength.     She transformed back, fell to her knees and into the snow. Quickly I was with her. I knelt down beside her and placed my cloak around her shoulders. It was cold, she was crying and trembling with fear. Although the danger was over, her body was trapped, trapped in the past situation.      Phil was covered in wounds, her eyes fixed rigidly on the ground. I noticed how Prongs and Wormtail stepped towards me and gasped briefly at the sight of her.     As if it had been a wake-up call, the red-haired girl blinked her tears away, looked down at herself. Yet she seemed less shocked about her injuries than about the situation, because she began to tremble again.      I pressed Phil against me and she sobbed, but she did not resist. I tried to calm her, spoke reassuringly to her, then she whispered: "I can't do this anymore...", she sobbed barely audibly, then Phil looked at me with tearful eyes, "Please, do not, do not give me up..."

***

Heya :)

I just wanted to drop by in honour to the 20th chapter. Big thanks to everyone who reads this fanfic and special thanks to @astafire and @Alena2408354 for the new votes!!!

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Best regards, RaVen