ANNE SAGE

To move around in absolute silence in the middle of Monday night in a dormitory filled with young, tired girls is a challenge only someone that grew up in toxic households, was forced to live in dormitories or a war veteran could ever manage, dear reader.

Fortunately (or unfortunately), Anne was both and got to move to the new, empty bed in the corner of the room (near the window turned to the Forbidden Forest) without waking anyone and without tripping on anything.

Anne smiled as she sat on the bed. It had been the exact same place she would sleep in her time. Ginny was on the bed beside hers while the wall was on the other side.

She peeked on the bed on her left to almost hold her breath in surprise. It was another red-headed girl, but it took her just a second to see it wasn't Ginny.

The girl wasn't stiff and didn't stir at every noise, she was relaxed and slept with her lips open, drool pooling on the pillow underneath her head; that girl was Lily Evans, her mother. In the dark, illuminated only by the moonlight of the moon the day before the full-moon, it was clear to see the vibrant shade of red hair and the pale skin tone; they had this much in common, but Anne's face had more angles, while Lily's was softer and she seemed quite shorter than Anne.

Anne took a moment to appreciate it and think that maybe her father was tall, because she was pretty tall when compared to Harry, five whole centimetres taller than him and Lily didn't seem much taller than Harry's height, so Anne must have got that gene from someone else.

She had never taken too much time thinking about her parents; they hadn't been in her life and she couldn't remember a single thing about them, after all she was only babe when they passed away – a few months old, while Harry was already a whole year-old.

She hoped in silence that things wouldn't be too awkward.

Lily's eyes opened when she felt too watched. In her sleepy state, she looked in confusion to the tall girl standing near the window and pulling sweets out of her pockets and putting them all underneath her pillow.

"Who are you?" Lily asked in a small whisper.

Anne turned and hesitated.

She thought it wouldn't hurt, but it did – her mother didn't recognize her. Not that she expected her to, but still her heart ached for a second.

"Anne Sage," she answered, "just transferred back from America,"

Lily squinted her eyes, looking her up and down as if trying to decide if she was real.

"No one told us about a transferee," Lily said. "I'm a Prefect, I would've –"

"I wasn't expected," Anne cut her off. "Go back to sleep. We can talk in the morning, it's very late."

Lily didn't seem too excited about ignoring the girl and going back to sleep, but it was Monday (well, not anymore; by that hour, it was Tuesday) and she was clearly tired about school and homework. She went to sleep seconds after the small discussion.

Anne sat on the bed and pulled her legs under the covers and watched Lily's back move with her breath.

Things were going to be more difficult than she expected. The way her heart skipped a beat when her mother talked to her had made it sure to show her that the several soon-dead people she'd see were going to make her feel heavy and guilty, even if she had nothing to do with their deaths – she was only a kid when most of them died, there was nothing she could do about it.

Lying wasn't difficult to her.

Anne had knack for lying ever since she was a child, easily escaping trouble by blaming other people and managing to stay close enough to the truth to make the other children so confused that they started believing they were guilty themselves.

After all, Petunia and Vernon had created the environment where liars would thrive and honest people would get punished more often – then, there was the explanation about how well she fit in Slytherin, she lied her way through interactions and managed to keep tracks about what lies she told to each person, never being caught red-handed and charming her way out of situations she didn't want to be in. She made quite a few people wonder if they were losing their minds under her gaslighting, not that she was all too proud of it, but she knew it was necessary.

Harry, however, was too honest and too open to be a good liar; he would get found out and punished for the smallest of things and smallest of lies, sometimes even doing so in purpose so people would stop looking at Anne and suspecting her to be the guilty one (even when she was), the only lie he learned to use so often that it sounded like truth in his lips was 'it was me'.

Understand the mind of children in abusive homes, please, dear reader.

Harry would take over the role of mother and father to Anne because they both lacked that much in their lives and, as older brother, he was taught in movies and books that it was his responsibility to make sure Anne would still be a child, even when he couldn't be one himself.

Anne, however, had been blind to the reality she lived in for years and through that sleeping in the cupboard was not something odd, she thought it was nothing but her duty to clean and cook when she had been taken in by the Dursleys – she had a fairly normal childhood when compared to Harry; he would take over her duties to let her play with the small and dirt rag that she called a doll when she was young and went as far as creating stories about why their parents weren't there when she was just six-years-old.

Anne had been a child, while Harry was never given the chance to do so.

She just wanted to pay him back now. Perhaps it was simply selfish to want to take care of her brother because she didn't want to owe him anything, but the intention was more important than anything else when at situations such as these, she supposed.

Anne didn't sleep at all that night, she just sat on the bed and stared out of the window, seeing the big, bright moon sometimes shying away from view behind fast-passing clouds.

The almost full moon made her simply impossible to her.

She had never loved the moon as much as other people did.

While Harry would sometimes look out of the window and watch the moon for a few minutes before going to sleep, he would say it would calm her down. No, Anne – she felt like her heart clenched and shred every time the full moon appeared on the sky; now, she liked to think that it was because there was a little part of her that remembered how tired and destroyed her godfather Remus would look like when she went to visit them, and then she grew up and she noticed how he would have to sit down to be able to carry her on his lap when she was thirteen and visited him after Harry's almost-death experience on fourth-year.

She left the room and put her uniform to walk down to the Common Room, bored of just staying there in silence.

Downstairs, the Common Room was still empty when she got there and sat near the fireplace to warm her cold feet, but she couldn't be too comfortable for too long, because someone laughed nearby and walked nearer.

She glanced over her shoulder and froze, the boy coming towards her freezing too.

"You're not Evans," he said.

For a second, Anne was sure it was Harry, but then she met eyes she would see every day in the mirror. It hurt her heart – it was James. It was her father and he didn't even know her at that point.

"No, I'm afraid I'm not her. She's still asleep," she answered. "Hi," she smiled, getting up from her seat and reaching out her hand, "I'm Anne Sage. I just got back from America."

"I'm James Potter," he presented himself. "You don't have an accent," he said, eyebrows raising.

"Everybody has an accent," she answered quickly, eyebrows moving too. They had similar expressions and that brought a smile to Anne's face before she put her eyebrows down, uncomfortable. "I was raised here, I just studied in America. Mother and Father are British too, but live in Canada... distant relatives from the main branch of the Sage House, I'm a half-blood."

James, however, didn't seem very interested in the story of the House, the one she had been training to tell for a long time in the back of her head. No. James was interested in something else.

"Do Americans really think coffee is better than tea?" he asked, as if such question was a test.

She blinked.

"Forgive me?"

"Americans – I saw them drinking that bloody awful coffee once, they were travelling, and they said they liked it better than tea. Do all of them have such terrible taste?" he asked once more, specifying his question a bit better this time.

"Not all. Some like it, some don't. But I met Americans that liked tea better than coffee and British that were far too into coffee for my taste," she smiled.

He had a boyish smile, making him look younger than he really was once he got excited about something.

Watching him, Anne wondered if Harry didn't have such stress and almost-death experiences all the time he would have the same boyish, careless smile and attitude.

Her eyes almost filled with tears once she noticed the broom on his right hand.

"You play Quidditch?" she asked.

"Oh, yes! Do you?"

"Not well," she joked. "But my brother did... he was a Seeker."

"A Seeker! Wicked!" he smiled once more. "Do you want to..." he hesitated, "I mean, I'm not flirting or anything, I hope you know that... but... do you want to watch today? My friend Sirius is about to come down and go too, he's a Beater. Oh, and my other friend, Remus, will come too. He likes to watch us, laugh at us when we miss or when we fall – a prat, really, but a cool prat."

Remus, her godfather; the man that sent her back in time, the man that saved her life. The man that failed to save his own and his wife's. His son, alone with his grandmother; another victim of the war, another orphan left behind for a war they had no business fighting on. Remus should've got his son and wife and moved out of the country like Anne begged him to do, but he didn't – he said he wouldn't leave Harry and Anne behind, but the truth was that he wouldn't leave all the memories and bravery he had to gather to be in England at all; he was Gryffindor, and he would fight until the end.

Sirius, her best friend, her confidant from the late-night talks in Grimmauld Place. The man she had to watch leave her and her brother; the death that literally broke Harry, the death that made the war a bit too real to her. He had been the man that would make her tea and bring it to her room when she wasn't feeling well after she got back from the Dursleys and the man that made sure to walk her and Harry to the station in his animagus form even though he would be killed on sight if discovered.

"Hm..." she hesitated.

"Oh, yes, and Peter. He'll come a bit later, he still wants to sleep a bit more, but he'll show up at least for breakfast, I'm sure. He's cool too, a bit shy, but he'll open up after a bit, so don't feel too awkward around him."

Peter. The traitor. The disgusting and vile little rat that was the reason for every second of Anne's suffering. The man that had held onto her skirt as he begged for his life in the Shrieking Shack, telling she was as pretty as her mother – she had never been so disgusted for being called pretty before, she had never been as disgusted for being touched before, and she hated being touched already.

"Oh," she mumbled once more, hesitation leaving her voice and only fear trembling it. "I... I suppose I could go. I don't know anyone yet."

"That's alright. I'm sure Remus will be happy to show you around, he's a Prefect. He's sort of forced to be that type of person," he winked.

"I could never," she tried to joke, trying to forget the yellow teeth of Peter chattering as she held him down on the floor before punching him for the first time when she was fourteen. "I'd rather die than be nice all the time to everyone."

"You're being rather nice to me," he teased.

She smiled in secrecy, but didn't answer.

The outside of the castle was colder than she imagined it to be when she looked outside through the window and, now, she was quickly starting to regret not bringing some type of coat. It didn't take long before she remembered she didn't have a coat with her.

Remus glanced at her through the corner of his eyes once more, clearly uncomfortable with the noise of her teeth chattering as she watched the practice with attention.

"Oof!" she made when James missed a goal. "Just a little to the right and he would've gotten it," she mumbled to herself.

"Anne?" he called, she looked at him. "Do you – Do you want my jacket? Your lips are turning blue."

"You're too kind, Remus, I wouldn't dare," she said in her most diplomatic voice.

The truth was that Remus' presence was far more comforting than she remembered it to be. He didn't have all the gory memories and terrible guilt and mourning in his heart; he was young and wild, he was ready for adventure, but not for a war. He was boy. He was innocent. And Anne wanted to keep him like that.

Remus seemed to have liked Anne. She didn't look twice at his scars and didn't ask questions, still she didn't uncomfortable with him nor curious, nor scared to ask. Anne had accepted those scars and secrets as part of him; that was because she knew all his truths, but of course he didn't know that part of it all, but still it was valid for him.

"Nonsense. I run hot often, so whenever you're cold you can ask for my jacket. I wear it for style more anything else," he teased.

He wore jacket more because the scars on his arms were far worse than the ones in his face and people would stare more often, not because he was cold – he barely felt any difference of temperature with or without his coat. There was nothing stylish about his clothes, either, especially that old jacket; it was old, there was parts he had mended himself in the muggle style and it was far from pretty with its yellowish-beige colour.

"Style that I admire," Anne jumped into the conversation, smiling at him. "You look like a muggle history professor in Oxford or something," she joked. "You are only missing elbow-patches."

"I love elbow-patches," he said. "I'm just holding on from buying them for when I really get into Oxford," he joked back as he took off his jacket.

"I'm sure you could do it," she said.

Without his jacket now, he turned to her and held it behind her back, willing to help her get it on. She smiled at him, thankful, as she passed her arms through the holes, eyes still darting around the people flying in the broomsticks.

They hadn't been talking a lot during their time together in the Quidditch stands.

Remus had been very focused on his Charm's Book and a bit uncomfortable with the idea of making conversation with a girl he didn't know without his friends nearby to support him, while Anne seemed very interested on the training itself – eyes glued to the people flying, sometimes looking down and freezing in place, clearly lost in thought, before shaking her head and going back to cheer mostly in silence. But now, Remus thought it was a good moment to start a conversation as he closed his book and put it beside him.

"So..." he hesitated, "do you like Quidditch?"

"I'm an enthusiast, yes, but a terrible player. I have no motor coordination at all. I suppose my brother got it all before me," she said, shrugging. "Of course, Harry is the best Seeker I've ever –" she stopped herself. "Harry was the best Seeker I've ever seen," she corrected, voice shaky.

Remus blinked once in shock.

Alright... No talking about Anne's brother (Harry). Whatever had happened it was not his business just yet.

"I can understand that," he said, nodding. "I love Quidditch, really do. Been watching it faithfully through all my years in Hogwarts, but never really got to feel well on top of the broomstick. My feet were made to stay on the ground."

"Yes!" she laughed, nodding in excitement that someone had finally understood her. "Sirius is very good, very quick. But James – oh James! He's wonderful!"

Remus looked down, not embarrassed or disappointed, but somehow uncomfortable. He should've expected one of the only girls that was so nice to him to have her eyes stuck on Sirius or James as soon as she met them. No, he wasn't interested in her in any malicious way – he had never been interested in a woman in such a way before; but he had really hoped her attentions would be turned to him just for a little bit more.

"Yeah, I suppose they are," he mumbled.

Anne didn't seem to react to his awkwardness. She didn't even seem to notice it.

"Sirius could, however, pay more attention to whatever he's doing though. With his eyes travelling around like that, never paying real attention to the Bludger, he'll kill someone – reckless and irresponsible," she said, shrugging. "But James... is he trying to show off to someone? Why is he flying like that? He should focus on the goals, and that's all."

Remus chuckled in surprise.

"And here I thought you'd be swept away in just one training session," he teased.

"Me? It takes a lot more than watching boys flying around to sweep me off my feet, Remus," she teased back. "Besides, James only invited me out of pity."

"Pity?" he asked. "James is not the type of guy to feel pity for someone, let me warn you now,"

"He saw me alone right before the practice and asked if I wanted to tag alone when I asked him about the broomstick. It was pity after he confused me with Lily Evans, who he very clearly had not expected to see on the Communal Room in the early morning," she explained. "Sirius is being nice to me because James told him to be so, but he doesn't really like me being near you all, hence the two words he spoke to me in the three hours I'm here – 'good morning,' that was all he said. And you, well, I'm not sure why you're being all nice to me, but you're clearly not interested in me, because you're far more interested on Tauro Harriman over there, who, by the way, is very much interested in you, mate, so... go for it, I guess?" she rambled.

Remus just stared at her for a few second.

"What the –?"

"I'm good at picking up social cues, Remus. Don't worry. I'm not into gossip or something, I find it rather boring, really," she said, rolling her eyes. "Date whoever you want, it's none of my business,"

"No, it's not your business," he agreed. "But you gathered it all pretty quickly, if you got here just last night."

"He looks at you like you're something to eat and... well, you don't do much better when you're looking at him," she answered. "I don't blame you. He's wonderfully fit. Go for it!" she shook her right hand as if she was shaking a pompom like a cheerleader. "R-E-M-U-S," she sang lowly, getting distracted by James going full-speed towards the goal once more and stopping singing soon after. "Oh, come on, just one goal!" she begged the skies.

James missed the goal once more. Anne cursed a bit.

"Alright... so, you know I'm a poof," he said, nodding to himself.

"That's what you call it?" she asked, glancing at him before looking up again.

"How do you call it?" he asked.

"Gay," she answered. "Is that a bad word? I wouldn't know."

Remus shrugged.

"I wouldn't either," he answered. "So, you know I'm queer. You think Sirius is reckless, irresponsible and doesn't like you because of your surname. And you think James pities you because he saw a pretty girl alone in the early morning. You're not as good at social cues as you think,"

She looked at him.

"Oh, really?" she asked.

"Yes. James probably asked you here because he thinks you're pretty and, therefore, wants you cheering for him and being nice to him in public to up his game with the girl he confused you with. Lily Evans, you said? Well, you do look like her."

"James is not interested in me. That'd be disgusting," she said more to herself than to Remus. "He was just being nice."

Remus nodded again. James sometimes would be nice to random people just for the wish of being nice, but it usually would be towards very young students or random male Hufflepuffs, but never a random new-student of older years.

"It could be," he said, not really believing it completely, but not wanting to bring it up. "James is nice a lot,"

In Anne's mind, the image of Severus Snape yelling at her and telling her to look away from him while he struggled to get up from the ground after a small accident on their private Occlumency lesson when she pushed back his advances a bit too hard, just enough to get into his mind by accident, came forward. She looked down, remembering her father laughing as Sirius held Severus and pulled his trousers down.

No, James was not nice a lot.

Of course, contrary to her brother, she didn't cling to the idea that Remus and Sirius passed down to them that their father was perfect and good and brave; no, like any Slytherin, Anne was taught very early to see and understand people's weaknesses and mistakes, either to use them or to love that part of them just as well.

She understood too that, much like Harry and Draco, James and Severus seemed to have a rival-thing going on; it was not one-sided bullying or teasing.

Seeing that Anne didn't answer, Remus looked at her to see her looking away from him and from the game. Her eyes were stuck to a tree near the Black Lake, the tree where Severus Snape had been tied up on his memories – memories that didn't happen yet. They would happen soon.

"Anne?" called Remus.

"James is nice a lot," she repeated. "But Sirius is not, but he's trying for James. They seem close."

"They are. They're brothers, much closer than real brothers," Remus answered. "If I didn't know them any better, I'd say they were a couple."

Anne chuckled.

"They'd make a good couple," she commented.

Remus laughed.

"Sirius is very protective over James, so don't take it too personal. He doesn't know you and James seems to want to take you under his wing for whatever reason," Remus explained. "Sirius just wants to make sure you're good enough to stay near James."

"I can understand that after all he's been through," Anne mumbled, too lost in the fact that she hadn't slept at all, ate very little and was very much tired under so much pressure to care that Remus wouldn't understand her very well.

Once again, Remus looked at Anne in hesitance.

"What do you mean by that?" Remus asked.

Anne blinked twice, coming back to her new reality.

"Sirius Black... everyone knows about the family Black and its scandals here in England, no surprise to see him being so protective over someone with a surname that was close to the Blacks a few decades ago," she lied exactly what Dumbledore told her to say.

"Anne Sage," he pondered. "The Sages and the Blacks were close?"

"A very long time ago. Our grandparents time," she answered.

"So, you're a pureblood," he guessed.

"Half-blood. Dad's pureblooded, Mum's a muggleborn... hm... Lilian Granger, well Lilian Sage now," she lied, using the easiest surname she could remember.

She couldn't very well use the surname Dursley, could she? If Lily heard, she would maybe ask questions, because it was impossible that such a hateful and distasteful surname to be common enough for her to hear from someone in school and from her sister's soon-to-be-husband.

"I'm a half-blood too," Remus said. "Dad's a pureblood, Mum's a muggle. Rather romantic story, really. Proper bookish. She was attacked by a boggart and Dad saved her," he told, smiling a bit.

"That's sweet," Anne admitted.

"And your parents?" he asked.

She hesitated and Remus took a small breath, trying to understand.

"Not nearly as romantic, I'm afraid. Mum hated him, Dad loved her – he made it clear through time and after some time she decided to give him a chance after he matured enough to be a proper human-being. They dated a bit and married right off school," she shrugged. "Dad was cocky, for all I'm told. Mum was proud and a bit snobbish."

"Pride and Prejudice all over again," Remus teased.

"With a lot less money and balls involved, but yes," Anne laughed.

The loud whistle made Anne jump and hold Remus' left arm with her hands, holding him in place and preparing.

For a moment it was like going back in time all over again, waiting for the loud boom that often followed the whistle of a falling bomb, the shifting inside of her calling for her attention and telling her to hide and prepare to explode away.

Remus winced a bit when her nails stabbed him as she closed her eyes tight, but he didn't let go of her, he just wait. He wasn't stupid enough for him to not understand how a traumatized person would react – he had seen it before in the muggleborns that got back to school after their parents were threatened, he had seen it in movies and he had seen it in the mirror every time he felt the particular smell of rotting meat... the smell of... Greyback.

"Sage?" he called. Anne didn't move. "Anne?" he called again.

Her eyes flew to him, not wide, but worried and hesitant.

"I'm sorry," she managed to choke out. "Um... The noise. I don't like whistles."

It was piss-poor explanation, but it was one that Remus had no reason to confront her about. It was none of his business.

His thoughts, however, were interrupted by James and Sirius stopping their brooms – against the rules – on the stands and walked to them, both laughing and talking amongst themselves.

"Hey!" James said. "So, what did you think?" he asked Anne.

Anne blinked a few times, grounding herself by looking at James.

"You need to focus more, show off a bit less. But you're good in general," she said.

James smirked, but Sirius didn't seem to like the feedback his best friend was receiving.

"Do you play?" Sirius asked.

James turned to his friend and glared at him, clearly not liking that he was just now deciding to talk to Anne, who had been nothing but nice to him through all the time he was absolutely in silence.

"No, but I used to help some players in my other school. My brother was on the team, so I helped to create plays," she explained. "I was smaller and thinner at the time I started doing it, so I was used to sneak around to watch the other teams play."

"If you don't play, how come you can give your –" started Sirius.

"It was just her opinions, Pads. Leave the girl alone," Remus cut him off.

Sirius turned to Remus, clearly feeling betrayed by how quickly he had turned towards the girl and against him, even if in a silly discussion as if she played Quidditch.

Sirius did not speak to James, Remus or Anne for the remaining of the way back to the castle and was holding onto his broom a bit too tight.