When Remus woke up, he found himself crumpled on the floor back in his cell in the castle. He was lying on his front, his cheek pressed against the cold stone. It was obvious to him that he hadn't been here for too long, maybe only an hour or so. His body was trembling with post-transformation aches and pains that were only made worse by the coldness of the floor beneath him. Groaning to himself, he slowly drew his hands underneath him and pushed himself up on shaking arms. He managed to sit himself up against the wall and quickly looked over himself for any injuries that needed his attention. 

There was a gash against his ribs where he'd obviously clawed himself at some point during the night. He also had a few black and blue bruises against his shoulders and hips when the wolf had thrown itself against the walls of its prison. Other than that, he had the usual wounds around his wrists from the silver cuffs and in the palms of his hands where he'd closed them into fists as he transformed. He had tried to stop the habit, especially as his claws grew they stabbed into his palms. But the pain of the transformation always became too much to bear and he always ended up digging his nails in to distract himself from his mind slowly unraveling. 

In the corner of his cell sat a measly pile of bandages and a bowl of water. After every full moon, a guard would drop some medical supplies of some shape or form in his cell that never was quite enough to help but enough to make his life ever so slightly easier.

Remus sighed, crawling towards the supplies. He quickly glanced up across the corridor into Lily's cell, spotting her red hair within the straw she was given. She seemed fast asleep. Probably was too if it was as early as Remus thought it was. He moved his focus back to the bandages, tearing a small square off and dipping it in the water. Biting his swollen lip, he brought the damp cloth to the silver burns around his wrists, wincing as he dabbed them clean. Once he had finished cleaning those wounds, he wrapped the bandages around his wrists, trying not to cry out from the sting of the burns. To his dismay, he realised that he didn't have enough bandages for the gash on his side or the claw marks on his palms. He felt tears well to his eyes out of pure frustration but he forced them away. There was no point crying. He just had to make the best of a bad situation. 

His dipped the ragged bit of bandaged into the water again, lifting up his shirt and wiping the gash. It wasn't as deep as he'd first thought so perhaps he could get away with not wrapping it. Finally, he turned his attention to his palms, once again cleaning the blood away. Unlike his ribs, these cuts were pretty deep. But there was nothing he could do about them now so he turned away, unable to look. 

Huddled back in the corner of his cell, Remus looked across at Lily and tried not to think about how awful his life was. He hated negative thoughts. Negative thoughts had a horrible habit of spiraling out of control and Remus couldn't afford that. He couldn't. He just had to hope that one day, he might see the sun again as a free person.

He busied himself with arranging the straw on the floor for a few minutes, making himself a little nest where he could hopefully curl up and sleep for the rest of the day if he wasn't going to be disturbed by anyone. Sirius' cloak was still there as well and he drew it around himself to keep warm. As he pushed the straw up into a little mound, a scraping sound distracted him from his work.

The false stone was moving.

Irrationally, Remus' first thought was that the Death Eaters were coming back to lock him in that terrible hole again. His breathing quickened and he backed up against the furthest corner of his cell. No, he couldn't go back there. He'd only just escaped. Please, no, not again.

But as the stone was propped up and fell away, Sirius Black's head popped up from the hole. Remus immediately sighed with relief. "Sirius," he breathed as the other boy threw up a rucksack from below. "What are you doing here? Haven't you got lessons soon?"

"I couldn't sleep," Sirius replied, coming closer to the bars and sitting himself down on the stones. "I was worried about you. We came down here last night but you were gone and Lily told us the Death Eaters had taken you. I just wanted to make sure you were okay." Remus, now over his initial fear, also moved away from the shadows and sat opposite. He plucked at the loose threads from the rip in his trousers above his knee.

"They did take me," he said softly. "But I'm okay. They just wanted to ask some questions, like usual." Sirius looked him up and down, his gaze cool and calculating as he examined him. Remus almost felt naked, as if Sirius could see right through him. Apparently, he could.

"You're lying, Remus," Sirius told him. "I know you are." Remus snapped his head up, his eyes wide and shocked. His hands started shaking, his body trembling with fear and nerves. 

"What-what are you t-talking about?" he stammered. "I-I'm telling you the truth." Sirius sighed, rubbing his face with his hands.

"Look, I know, Remus," he said, his voice sharp and accusing. "I know you're a werewolf." Remus immediately scrambled back, pressing himself into his back corner again and burying his face into his knees and hugging them tightly to his body. Blood was roaring in his ears, his heart beat loud and accusing. He could barely breathe as the weight of Sirius' words came crashing down on him. He hated him now. Remus could see it in his eyes. Oh God, he hated him. The only friend he had in this cruel world hated him. Remus had successfully messed up the only good thing he'd ever had.

"Merlin, Remus, I didn't mean to say it like that," Sirius was saying. Remus glanced up at him through his arms to see that he had stood up, clutching the bars. "I'm sorry, Remus. Please, come back and talk to me. Please." 

"How-how did you find out," Remus whispered. 

"A few things, actually," Sirius replied, a weak chuckle escaping his lips. "You are the only prisoner that ever comes back after being taken - and you're only ever taken on the full moon. You count down the days to the full moon on the wall over there and every guard or student calls you beast or half-breed. It wasn't hard to connect the dots once we had all the clues."

"We?" Remus' heart seized in terror again. "James and Peter and Lily know as well?"

"Yeah," Sirius said. "But don't worry. We don't hate you Remus." He cursed to himself. "I'm sorry, I should have said that earlier. I promise, we don't hate you. Please, just come and talk to me." He dug through his bag and pulled out a sandwich, thrusting it through the bars. "Here, I have food for you."

"I'm not an animal, Sirius," Remus spat, anger suddenly coursing through him. Sirius looked mortified.

"Oh God, I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't think. I just thought you'd be hungry." Remus looked up at him, taking in Sirius' genuine and almost desperate gaze. Slowly, he crawled forwards again to the light but sitting a good distance from the bars so Sirius couldn't reach him just in case he decided to attack. Sirius was digging through his bag again, this time grabbing bandages and different brightly coloured potions.

"I stole these from the hospital wing," he said, setting them down on the stone. "I didn't know if you'd be hurt or anything so I thought these might help." Remus stared at them having never seen potions up close before. He wondered what it would be like to make them but quickly forced the thought from his mind. "I really am sorry, Remus," Sirius said. "I didn't mean to be so harsh. I just...well, I was angry that you didn't tell us...or me."

"I couldn't tell you," Remus said softly. "You'd be scared of me."

"But I'm not!" Sirius said. "I'm not scared of you!"

"Everyone is scared of me, Sirius," Remus whispered, hugging his knees to his chest. "I've never had friends before. The only people who have ever cared for me were my parents and I don't even know if they're alive anymore. I was afraid that if I told you what I am, why I'm locked up down here, you wouldn't want to see me anymore. When you guys are down here, for once in my life I feel normal. You talk to me about your classes or about Quidditch and you don't care that I know nothing about magic or favourite teams. You treat me like I'm worth just as much as you, even if that isn't really true. But people are scared of werewolves for a good reason. We're monsters...I'm a monster."

"You're not a monster," Sirius said defiantly. "I don't care what you think, you're not a monster. You can't help that you're a werewolf. You're only a werewolf once a month! I-" He faltered. "I thought I knew about werewolves. My mother and father always told me they were horrible creatures. But I've never met a werewolf until I met you so perhaps I don't know anything about you at all. But I'd like to learn, if that's okay with you." Remus stared at him. No one had ever asked him anything about being a werewolf. They all thought they knew everything and that was that. But here Sirius was, a pureblood and son of one of the royal households, sitting there and asking Remus to tell him what being a werewolf was really like. Remus didn't know how to react. 

"But not right now," Sirius spoke again. Remus was relieved that he didn't have to answer. His brain was so exhausted that he wasn't sure if he could speak another word. "I-um-I could help you with your injuries, if you'd like? They seem pretty bad and those bastards probably didn't help you."

"They gave me some things," Remus said weakly.

"Typical of you to defend them, Remus," Sirius replied, rolling his eyes. "Come on, come here. I'll help you." Reluctantly, Remus scooted closer, leaning his head against the bars tiredly. Sirius gently took his hands, drawing them through the bars towards him whilst being careful of his wrists. He had picked up a purple potion and a clean cloth, dabbing away at the wounds in Remus' palms.

"This cleans them," he explained. "Otherwise they could get an infection." Remus grunted a little as the wound stung. "Sorry," Sirius said meekly as he wrapped some clean bandages around his palms. "Um, do you mind if I have a look at your wrists?" Remus shrugged and Sirius unwrapped Remus' hasty work from earlier. 

"Bloody hell, Rem," he whispered as he stared at the silver burns. "What the hell are these from?"

"Silver burns," Remus muttered, his eyes slipping closed. "From silver shackles...to stop me...getting to violent." He didn't see Sirius reaction but felt him pour more of the wound-cleaning potion on and re-bandage them. 

"I'll get you some burn salve when I can," Sirius was saying. "This...this is horrible."

"It's okay, Sirius," Remus murmured. "They stop me...from...hurting myself..." He didn't finish his sentence before exhaustion took over and he fell asleep against the bars. He didn't notice Sirius check the gash on his ribs or spread a yellow bruise healing paste over his shoulders and the top of his hips. He slept peacefully, only waking up in the evening after Sirius had long gone. 

But he did see a note that had been carefully tucked in his hand out of sight from the guards:

You're not a monster. 

S.B.

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This was a cute chapter to write :) I do love a bit of Wolfstar mwahaha

Next up, Sirius gets more suspicious of James as he's disappearing more and more...