Rose Leviosa

[rose-leviosa]

Penance

The cruelest joke of Remus Lupin's life is that he is still living it. He was never meant to be the one to survive, but here he is. Again.

Now widowed and left to raise the child he once tried to abandon, he must play his part to help usher in a new age for the Wizarding World while battling his own demons.

[rose-leviosa]

The Ties that Bind, Chapter Seven - Advanced Guard

The past few weeks had proved to be nothing but more of the same chaos. Troublesome children getting in the way of oftentimes even more troublesome adults. Cursed objects causing injuries left and right. Moody sniffing at her stew suspiciously while she tried to keep everything afloat.

Sirius had remained in a foul mood well after Remus had returned, looking ill and battered but in no need of Spellotape. The master of the house had taken to brooding again, rarely speaking other than to complain about the mad house elf or to lament the lack of urgency to bring Harry to headquarters.

It was one of the few things Molly agreed with him on.

She stood, as always, at the hob, mixing up dinner the way she had every evening since arriving, her time filled to the brim with chopping and stewing and stirring up food for the ever-changing sea of faces at her table.

Her spoon clattered as a bright light flashed behind her.

Her heart raced as the silvery stream circled her like a bloodhound before, seemingly finding her inadequate, whisking its way to the upper floors.

A minute later, two pairs of feet thundered overhead.

[againaweasel]

I don't think I'd find Remus and Tonks half as compelling together as I do if Tonks' response to 'I'm too old, too poor, too dangerous' had been 'no you're not' instead of 'I don't care'

[grantstrainers]

Meeting someone new is scary because how long will it take them to realise I’m actually a werewolf?

[swordtit]

the best thing you can do to a character make them averse to touch and absolutely starved for it

[rose-leviosa]

Penance Year Six, Chapter Twelve - Windows

The truck squealed to a halt outside Gorffwysfa’r Bugeilydd. Remus sat in the bed, staring straight ahead while he waited for the groan of the cab doors.

He had spent the ride pretending not to see Molly watching him anxiously through the rear window, as if he might throw himself from the truck without warning. She had held Teddy in her lap, fussing at his unruly curls while Lyall and Arthur had chattered loudly, filling the cab with a dull murmur that hummed through the glass.

Inside, the pub was filled with its usual collection of men, most with beards and almost all old enough to be grandfathers. The scent of beer left Remus' mouth watering, the rat stirring, but he squared his shoulders, falling in step behind the rest of the group.

They settled at a table in the back, away from the boisterous chatter of the locals, Remus taking care to sit with his back to the bar.

Teddy ran to the chair next to Molly, pulling it out with a spine-shuddering scrape. He clambered up, looking quite pleased with himself as he wriggled his bum. Remus shot him a wink that he didn't seem to notice.

Molly's eyes darted to Remus before she smiled softly, leaning in to cup Teddy's cheek.

"Teddy, dear - why don't you sit with Daddy?" she cooed. “He didn't see you the whole drive."

Teddy cocked an eyebrow, his face so incredulous Remus would have laughed if Molly wasn't giving him such a tragic look.

“It's alright," he said, smiling warmly at Teddy. “It's a special treat having you here, isn't it, Ted?"

Teddy stared at him for a painfully long moment before he nodded, grinning up at Molly. Remus' chest tightened with what he refused to call jealousy.

He kept his smile in place

[rose-leviosa]

Penance Year Three

In the wake of a devastating attack and a world still wary of his kind, Remus faces a choice that could change everything. As old wounds reopen and new threats emerge, Remus struggles to hold onto the life he’s built for his son, Teddy, and himself.

But ghosts of the past refuse to stay buried. A growing movement of hatred threatens the fragile peace, forcing Remus to confront the demons that have haunted him for years.

[thatbuddie]

people telling you they reread your fic is the biggest compliment you could ever receive. there are thousands of stories out there begging to be found, to be explored, but your story meant so much to someone that they came back to it eagerly, they went over every word again. to love is to return and loving a fic is rereading it. thank you to all readers and rereaders <3333

[rose-leviosa]

Penance Year Two

The war may be over, but Remus Lupin’s battles are far from finished. As he settles into a life he never expected to have, the scars of the past refuse to fade. Between navigating fatherhood, fighting for his place in a society that still fears him, and facing the ghosts of his own choices, Remus finds himself at a crossroads.

[rose-leviosa]

Penance Year One

Remus was never meant to be the one to survive, yet here he is. Again.

Widowed and left to raise his infant son in the wake of the war, Remus must learn how to navigate the pressures of life as a single father all while doing his part to help rebuild the world he fought for.

But the past does not rest easily, and neither do its ghosts.

Felt like some new covers 🙃

[beckettsimpleton]

Hope and Lyall Lupin - 1959

Hope and Lyall's muggle wedding - unfortunately I did not have the skill to pull off Hope dancing in her bare feet amidst all her drunken relatives but I can, at least, draw them staring into each other's eyes like the delighted saps they are <3

From Inevitable - 1969 Ch 16 - Tied

She'd known from very early that he was a wizard. He'd confessed it a week after they'd met. The third time they saw each other, she'd started talking in amused gratitude of his heroics and he'd gone very red and mumbled his confession.

(And then she'd gotten very annoyed that he was perhaps trying to take the piss and had gotten even more annoyed when he'd said well, I can't show you now, because they were out in public, and he'd been accosted by a vice-clench of fear that this might be the last time he spoke to her, if he carried on this way, so he'd pulled them out of the cafe and into an alley and set off a silent firework from his wand, and watched the colour and light burst in her dark eyes, and the waitress had run out after them for fear that they had been planning to leave without paying.)

Anyway, they'd had two ceremonies.

After all, there were two registries they needed to submit the union to (even though, these days, it was easy enough to get a muggle-friendly duplicate made of a wizarding wedding). He'd said that - that the Ministry had a whole department for that sort of thing. Had shown her his passport, made by the same people, even.

But then, when they'd talked though the reality of it, it became clear how logistically difficult it would be.

So, they could tell her parents, really, if they must. But then, to have anyone else attend, they'd have to tell them too. And that brought in friends, and cousins, and brothers-in-law and it all became too much (for him, really. Not for her. She would have told everyone, back then).

So they'd decided they'd have a muggle ceremony, and she'd show him off to everyone, and he'd be a liar if he said he hadn't beamed at that. That she'd wanted them all there, and that was why they were having a muggle one, as he'd explained to his parents.

It was his mam who suggested having two.

Said she'd had a wizarding ceremony, and it has been very exciting and beautiful, and made her feel like a proper witch in a way that it was sometimes difficult to, as a muggle-born who, up until that point, had had most of her existence in the muggle world, with snaps of magic here and there.

His mum had said just do both - she'll like it. And so they did.

Hope and her mother had planned the muggle one, and he and his mother had planned to magical one, and if he were honest, it had been quite fun, to plan a wedding for his wife that she had very little idea about. He'd enjoyed zipping his lips with a smug smile when she'd tried every creative method to get details out of him. Hope and his mum had gone out dress shopping for it, even though she had insisted she could just wear the same dress twice, and he'd been picked up by Hope's dad in his scuffed Bedford Envoy and taken down to the tailors for a very awkward few hours while he, Wilfred Howell, and Hope's brother-in-law, Jan, had been paraded in and out of little curtained changing rooms to have shirts and waistcoats and trousers pinned and oohed at. He'd never felt so painfully out-of-place in his body before.

Worth it to see her delight on the day of. And worth it to see her, dancing with her shoes off and her new dress hitched up out of her way, feet filthy from the Tonteg Social Club dance floor, red cheeked and grinning and spinning and laughing in the sea of the people that made up her life before he'd come along.

[beckettsimpleton]

Redraw of an illustration of Hope and Remus from my fic Inevitable - 1969

"Remus…" She shifted, turned on her side to face him, and he finally opened his eyes. His eyebrows were knotted together in the same way Lyall's did whenever he was trying to read the paper over the noise of the two of them talking. "I'm sorry I left, this morning."

"It's okay."

"I don't think it was. Your dad was upset. So was I, but it was… unfair to leave him- oh this isn't… you don't need to hear-" she sighed and tried to straighten her train of thought. "I wish you hadn't gotten hurt. I'm sorry we didn't keep you safe."

He blinked up at her, impassive. "I am safe."

"You got hurt."

"I always get hurt."

She knew he meant it literally. As a reminder and assurance. This happens every month, to some degree. Why are you getting upset about it now? But it felt more like a kick in the teeth.

"Yeah. And it's not fair. That grown ups can't control themselves, and you get hurt."

They stared at each other for a few moments. He was rubbing one foot absently against her prickly, two days' unshaved ankle and it made her strangely self-conscious.

"I don't know what you mean."

She kissed him on the forehead more to punctuate the end of the conversation, than anything else.

"Goodnight, Mouse."

He spent the night dream-twitchy beside her and she spent the next seven hours staring at the ceiling, listening to the cars and the little huffs of his breath and thinking about Lyall wandering around their otherwise empty house.

[robertfagden]

at some point The Character stops being a character and starts being a close personal friend

[golyadkin]

you'll get the urge as an artist or a writer to say out loud the things you're worried about "the proportions are off" "kind of out of character" "i'm not good at summaries" "didn't get as much detail as i wanted" "i made a mistake and here's how" and that's the self-conscious part of your brain telling you "it's bad and if you don't tell them you know it's bad then they'll think you're stupid" but you've got to ignore that little voice and pretend you think it's good or else that little voice is going to ruin your life

[incognito-insomniac]

Some of the best advice I have ever gotten was from a creative writing professor. She said never apologize for your work. Never critic it before someone else does.

Her reasoning was you are the creator. You made your work from nothing and can see all the flaws and seems and holes. But your audience may not see any of it. Maybe they will; maybe they won't. But if you TELL them about the holes and the mistakes and the problems....they will 100% see them. So don't tell them. Don't sabotage yourself just because you think you're not good enough.

[againaweasel]

It's very interesting that Tonks is so often characterised one-dimensionally in the fandom as always happy, cheerful, goofy, or, hell, even childish, given the way she's portrayed in, like, every book she's in.

That idea just doesn't hold up to scrutiny, and I'm pulling out my soap box and going on a rant.

Tonks absolutely brings the jokes in The Advanced Guard chapter. She's not afraid to make fun of herself ('did you hear me break that plate') or ask really stupid questions ('I suppose it varies, just like with wizards?'), or make fun of Mad-Eye ('you do know that's disgusting don't you?').

But, beyond 'The Woes Of Mrs Weasley' ('my head of house said I lacked the necessary qualities [...]like the ability to behave myself'), she doesn't crack jokes at the quite same rate ever again.

She's still funny, the narrative hasn't actually forgotte, it's brought up all the time ('at least Tonks is a laugh'). But it's not the key thing that she is in every single instance.

There's so much more to her.

By Christmas in Ootp, we see she's got a bit of a bite: casually threatening Stan Shunpike with violence ('say his name again and I will curse you into oblivion' muttered Tonks, menacingly') and being serious and abrupt getting the kids to school ('And [Tonks] shoved Harry forward toward the steps').

She's "bossy", in charge, and in control there and in the Advanced Guard ('“We’re not going through clouds!” shouted Tonks angrily.'). From the very beginning.

There's a vindictive, vengeful streak that rears it's head in DH ('I just wish I got her, I owe Bellatrix') whilst being very casual about violence ('we definitely injured Rodolphus').

And that stems from her almost irrational guilt complex that, whilst not the most pressing issue, is part of her struggle throughout HBP ('She thinks it was her fault [Sirius] died').

She's a solider and a fighter. The only other member of the Order who matches Tonks being in every key fight, is Remus. She's the protege of the most successful auror in the country, is known to be smart ('And she’s more intelligent,'), and commits treason the first time the opportunity comes up.

I'm not sure I'd really classify Tonks as always cheerful or always goofy in just The Advanced Guard when she is definitely 'on' and, we can assume, lightening the mood ('stop being so cheerful Mad-Eye, or he'll think we're not taking this seriously') never mind all. of. the. time.

She's just funny.

It's a one-dimensional pigeon hole that you don't usually see other funny characters (like Remus or Sirius) getting stuck in at quite the same rate that Tonks seems to.

There's so much left unsaid about Tonks, the contradictions she's made of, the journey she goes on far in the background that has nothing to do with the kids, that it makes me want to hold her between my teeth and shake her like a chew toy.

[beckettsimpleton]

Lupin Family, Halloween 1963

Gwen knocked before letting herself in, Sara standing shyly behind her legs.

"P’nawn da!" She called, offering Lyall a friendly wave and trying to coax Sara out from behind her. "Look, show Remus' dadi your costume - bet he'll like it."

Lyall played along, beckoning them to the sitting room so he could sit down and hopefully come off a touch less intimidating to Gwen's daughter. She was wearing a very neat, but obviously home-made black dress that had been cut at the bottom into those ragged strands that muggles, for some reason, thought witches wore. He had never understood why the muggle-witches didn't just mend their clothes with magic, but actual witches had their own confusing habits, so he supposed he couldn't comment.

"Wow, Sara," he said, much more quietly than if he'd been talking to Remus, who could honestly do with being a touch more timid. "I like your hat."

"Your hat is wrong!" Remus had appeared in the doorway, pointing his sparkly wand at Sara. "Real witches don't have the- the…" he gestured to the brim of Sara's hat. Gwen snorted, though Lyall levelled Remus with a hard stare.

"Calm down, you're being rude." He beckoned Remus over, who obeyed with a touch more decorum. "And besides, you're wrong. Sometimes, witches have a brim on their hat. How are they to keep the rain off their face when flying in bad weather?"

Remus stood between Lyall's knees, rolling his new wand between his palms, watching the little flecks of glitter flutter down to the floor.

"Sorry, Sara," he muttered contritely, before turning to Lyall and tapping his own hat with his glittery star. "Why don't you have a- a-"

"A brim?" He raised his eyebrows at Gwen, hoping she would assume he was playing along with Remus and not read too much into the conversation. "Oh, I don't care much for flying on broomsticks."

Remus let the matter drop, apparently satisfied with this answer. Sara held out her broomstick for Remus to see. "Mami bought me it."

"Can I play with it?"

Sara glanced at Gwen, obviously not keen on sharing her new toy, but Gwen shrugged and stood to greet Hope, who had arrived in the doorway looking unusual with her hair in a plait and wearing his clothes.

"You can look at it," Sara offered, and Remus hurried over, using all his self control not to snatch it out of her hands. Lyall could tell by the tightly clenched fists he held at his sides.

"I've never roden on a broomstick," he said, conversationally - inspecting the wooden handle with his face about an inch away from it.

"Er, neither have I?" Sara looked bemusedly at Remus, blonde eyebrows up in her fringe. She seemed to put his odd comment down to him being a silly baby, given the two years between them. She acknowledged Remus' wand, who was very happy at the opportunity to show off, and waved it for her, pointing out the glitter it was shedding and claiming it was actual magic.

From Inevitable - 1969

[veronicaleighauthor]