Rated PG for corruption and spite.

“I promise you both,” said Auror Dawlish, “it is dealt with. Absolutely. Miss MacDougal will never be harassed again.”

“I don’t feel that she is safe,” Remus repeated stubbornly.

“Then you are paranoid,” said the Auror. “Her assailants have been in custody since they were in hospital. They have been tried before the Wizengamot and sentenced to life in Azkaban for a clear-cut, uncontroversial and unprovoked use of an Unforgivable curse. Their wands have been publicly broken. It really was a very simple case.”

“Yes,” said Remus patiently, “but who else was involved?”

“Truth potion is expensive,” said Dawlish dismissively. “We don’t go wasting it. We only used a drop, only five minutes’ worth. There was no time to poke around for possibly non-existent accomplices. People who have any morals at all know that you can’t go casting Unforgivables and then use the claim that it was someone else’s idea as an excuse for mercy.” He smiled patronisingly, as if they were stupid. “Why do you want mercy for a couple of thugs who nearly murdered your girlfriend?”

“I don’t want mercy for them; I want to restrain the man who employed them. We believe that they were working for Walden Macnair.”

“Baldwin Macnair,” corrected Dawlish. “The young lout was named Baldwin. Walden Macnair is his father, a very upright citizen, very well regarded on the Wizengamot.”

Remus kept his temper and tried to imitate the deadly softness of an angry MacDougal. “I believe that the upright and well-regarded Walden Macnair is likely to make another assault on the life of Ariadne MacDougal.”

“On the contrary.” Dawlish sounded almost smug. “We have extracted from him an undertaking to do no such thing. He is perfectly aware that his son’s, er, crime tarnishes the reputation of the whole family, and the last thing he wishes is that any public attention should be drawn to it. He personally guarantees the good behaviour of every member of his clan, and is willing to stake a Dementor’s Kiss to himself that all the rest will behave, on one tiny condition.”

Remus remembered to save his speech about the perversion of justice until after he had heard in exactly what manner justice would be perverted.

“We are aware that Miss MacDougal has been interested in the welfare of a certain Mrs Smith. And, on the day before the trial, we did in fact conduct a private interview with Mrs Smith. Two Aurors spent nearly an hour asking her all kinds of questions and found her to be a very pleasant, co-operative person. Her words were, ‘I thank the public for its kind concern, but I have no idea who is asking after me.’ Nor had she ever heard of Veleta Vablatsky, and she could not imagine why she might look like this person. She said she had lived all her life at Macnair Castle, that she was employed by the Macnairs to use her special talents to their advantage, and that they had always treated her and her children very well. She did not know how she could help us, since she had no information beyond the details of her own ‘happy but uneventful’ life.” He coughed. “So, the condition, Miss MacDougal. That you drop all inquiries into the case of Veleta Vablatsky, confident that your unfortunate friend is truly dead, and that Mrs Smith, a stranger to you, has no desire to be further interrogated.”

“But… just like that? Did the Aurors use a truth potion? Was there any evidence that Mrs Smith was speaking under Imperius? Had she been memory-charmed? Was there any sense of blackmail?”

“You should have been an Auror,” said Dawlish, but not as if he meant it. “No truth potion – as I’ve said, it’s expensive, and Mrs Smith had nothing to hide. But she seemed very relaxed; there was no evidence of spell-work.”

Remus recognised the look in Ariadne’s eyes as desperation, but the Auror might have misinterpreted it as defiance.

“And all corroborating questions were asked? Did this Mrs Smith tell you her date of birth, her maiden name, her parents’ professions, the whereabouts of her husband, the ages of her children… ?”

“Calm down, Miss MacDougal; we have to see another client in ten minutes.” He flipped through his notes. “For your information, Mrs Smith never knew her parents. She does not know her date of birth, but believes she is about nineteen years old. Her maiden name was Johnson. Her husband is dead, and we did not see fit to ask any more questions about him. Her daughter is four years and her son about eighteen months old. Does this satisfy you?”

“It does not, because that is impossible. If Mrs Smith is only nineteen, how can she have a daughter of four? Did this conveniently-dead ‘Mr Smith’ ever really exist?”

“Really, Miss MacDougal, if Mr and Mrs Smith made a youthful mistake, do you think it is the business of the Aurors to dig that up? The point is that you have been requested to drop your inquiries. And if you do not, then Mr Walden Macnair will not offer himself as guarantor, and therefore will not be able to promise that every member of his household will accept your curiosity as tolerantly as he does.”

Such a welter of confusing questions crossed Ariadne’s face that it was not surprising that she took refuge in silence. Auror Dawlish, who had a job to do, mistook silence for submission.

“So, Miss MacDougal, will you give me your word? You will drop all inquiry and give no more trouble to anyone in Macnair Castle?”

“I will not.” Her voice was so soft and expressionless that Dawlish misheard.

“Then I must ask Auror Savage to show you out… wait, did you say you’d not?”

“I did.”

“Well, that’s a relief. You’re a sensible girl, and you’ve agreed with me. Savage, Mr Lupin and Miss MacDougal are just leaving.”

Ariadne kept a profound silence until they were on the street. Then Remus told her, “They’ve gone. You can say it now.”

“Uncle Macnair’s seeming to have the Aurors in his pocket!”

“I daresay he has. You know better than I do how influential he is on the Wizengamot. He can certainly bribe and threaten his way out of an embarrassing inquiry – whether it’s about his relationship with his henchmen or his conduct to his ‘Mrs Smith’. He can get away with a direct threat on your life because he dresses it up in the crudest of disguises.”

“I cannot believe that Auror Dawlish misunderstood what I told him. He had to have known that I was disagreeing with him.”

“I nearly missed it myself, Ariadne. That was a spectacular use of your Soft Voice – Dawlish heard what he wanted to hear. And when it began to occur to him that you wouldn’t lie, he felt obliged to lie for you.”

“So my safety depends on Auror Dawlish’s corruption. He sacrifices his integrity to save mine. That’s not doing much to increase the world total count of honesty.”

“I doubt that thought would worry Dawlish remotely as much as it worries you.”

“And you’re going to tell me that I’m stupid to stake my life for a Cause.”

“No, I’m not. Sometimes we have to do that. The Potters did, and so did Peter Pettigrew. But next time you’re asked to offer up your life, make sure it is a cause worth dying for. If Macnair zapped you dead in the street today, it wouldn’t do a thing to save your friend Veleta. As far as we know, her life isn’t even at risk.”

She was quiet for a while. When he pressed her, she said, “I’m expecting I was naïve. I really thought that the Aurors would interview Veleta properly, and that she’d be coming home. I expected her to be at our wedding. So tell me. I was naïve to expect the Aurors to be pure and uncorrupted. You’re going to crush that piece of my idealism.”

“It sounds as if I don’t need to. Ariadne, we’ve had a long day. Are you sure you want to talk to your parents this evening?”

“I have to. If I do not tell them about us soon, they’ll hear it from somebody else. They would not like to hear the news from somebody who had just heard it from Sarah.”

“What have you told Sarah?”

“Nothing. Sarah works out my secrets from the questions that I evade. And anything that I do not specifically earmark ‘confidential’, Sarah personally marks as ‘public news’.”

Sarah personally noted that Ariadne was very subdued through dinner. She ran the gamut of guesses – bad news about Veleta, bad temper from Professor Jigger, bad results of experiment, bad quarrel with Remus, bad headache – before complaining, “You’re no fun tonight. You won’t even give me a hint.” She turned her attention back to Ivor, who had a great deal to say about his experiences in Egypt.

After dinner Remus sat in an armchair to the side of the hearth – Hestia brought him tea, and Ivor plied him with the Quidditch results – while Ariadne threw Floo powder into the hearth and instructed, “Kincarden Croft!”

Remus wondered how close to Ariadne he could crouch without her parents spotting him from the hearth.

“Good evening, my dear, I trust you are well?”

“Good evening, Papa. Is everybody well at Kincarden?”

“I’m hoping you are working hard for Professor Jigger, Ariadne. Are you learning a great deal?”

“A very great deal, Mamma. My diet pills are being tested on rats this week.”

They talked through seven minutes of these pleasantries before her father thought to ask, “Had you anything in particular to say to us this evening, my dear?”

“I had.” Remus knew she had rehearsed her speech, but even so, her nervousness was surprisingly understated; he doubted her parents were noticing it. “Papa, Mamma, do you remember Remus Lupin, who used to work on the farm?”

“Indeed, he was a very good worker,” said her father.

“Mr Lupin did you a number of favours too,” said her mother. “Have you news of him?”

“Mamma, I’m going to marry him.”

The silence was so deadly that Hestia halted the dishes in the kitchen sink, and Sarah snapped her fellytone shut. Mr and Mrs MacDougal were merely at a loss for words. Ariadne was sitting quietly on purpose.

Finally Mrs MacDougal said, “Ariadne, dear, are you really needing to marry anybody at this stage? You’re very young, and there is plenty of time.”

“I am, Mamma, and I’m not particularly needing to marry. But I’m going to marry Remus in July.”

“My dear, do you think this is wise? It seems very precipitate to make such a final and binding decision on the strength of a few weeks’ acquaintance.”

“Papa, I have known Remus for a great deal longer than that.”

Mr and Mrs MacDougal exchanged glances, as if to reassure themselves that they were united on this delicate issue, and then Mr MacDougal spoke again. “My dear, are Miss Webster and Miss Dearborn in the room? Could you perhaps ask them for a little private time with your parents?”

Sarah and Hestia did not need to be asked. They pulled Ivor out into the hall, all three of them apparently finding the situation highly amusing. Remus sat exactly where he was. He heard Hestia pealing with fresh laughter when she realised that he intended to invade the MacDougals’ privacy. But he found it difficult to recognise the humour in the situation; the tension in his muscles, the rushing of his blood, felt suspiciously like anger.

Finally Mrs MacDougal was ready to address her misguided child. “Ariadne dear, we remember Mr Lupin very well. And it’s not that we do not like him. We think him a charming young man. But have you truly considered whether he will make a good husband?”

“I have considered it.” Remus didn’t know how they could hear their daughter’s Soft Voice so unsuspiciously; they must have learned by now that it meant that Ariadne was making a ring round them.

Her father tried again. “My dear, it’s not because he’s a half-blood. We would gladly accept even a Muggle-born son-in-law, if he had lived among wizards for long enough to know our ways. And it’s not because he’s English. We promise you that that’s not the kind of thing that matters to us.”

“I’m glad,” murmured Ariadne politely.

“But have you ever stopped to ask yourself why a young man like Remus was working as a farmhand? I’m knowing we brought you up not to be affected about such things, but did you never notice the difference between Remus and William? William works for us because he has no other capabilities. We have to care for him like a son – a son who will never grow up – because he cannot look after himself. But Remus clearly is a man who does have other capabilities. He has a fine mind, and he was not needing to settle for such menial work. Did you never stop to enquire why he was willing to undervalue himself in that way?”

“I did, Papa.”

This reply was naturally ignored. “Ariadne, I can think of only two reasons why a man of Remus’s capabilities would do that. Either there is something terribly wrong in his life – there is some criminal secret in his past – or, more likely, he is utterly lacking in ambition. My dear, are you really wanting to spend your life with a man who will never be able to earn enough money to keep your children, who will never set long-term goals or give you the opportunity to do anything interesting?”

“I am not, Papa.” An ambiguous answer if ever there was one!

“There’s a sensible lass.” Her father’s voice was rich with approval. “We were knowing you’d understand.”

“Ariadne, dear,” her mother chimed in, “do not let this young man frighten you. He’s a half-blood and has no money; he cannot be connected with anybody important. If you tell him nicely that you’ve had second thoughts, he’s in no position to do you any harm. Do not let him pressure you into the wrong decision.”

“I will not let anybody do that, Mamma. But Remus and I are engaged. I’m going to marry him.”

“Do not be daft, dear. Of course you do not have to marry him, if it’s not for the best. Why do you not borrow Miss Webster’s owl and inform him before bedtime? Good night!”

The green flames flared, and Ariadne slowly rose to her feet beside the empty hearth. “They did not believe me,” she said.

Remus was at her side in two steps. “Sweetheart, you can’t make people believe things.”

“I’m expecting they did believe me really,” Ariadne corrected herself. She looked up, trying not to cry. “But they were asking me to choose between you and them. And they’ll be so hurt when they realise how I’ve chosen… Does it not hurt you, Remus, to find them so rejecting?”

For a second so many complicated thoughts ran through his mind that he could not voice any of them. He knew the MacDougals were right – he was an uninspiring prospect for a son-in-law; but he was angry they had forced an unfair choice on Ariadne. He was annoyed with them for making an obstacle to his own wishes; and he was astonished at his own arrogant annoyance since it would be no more than justice if Ariadne did change her mind. He was extremely gratified that Ariadne had remained steadfast; but it proved she had hardly begun to comprehend what living with him would really be like.

“Did you assume that rejection would only come from people who knew about the wolf?” he asked. “Welcome to the real world.”

A fortnight later, Mrs MacDougal Flooed the flat in Diagon Alley. She did not even check whether Ariadne were alone before launching into, “Dear, whatever has gone wrong? Your Aunt Macmillan asks what she should wear to your wedding.”

Remus would have been tempted to reply that, “Dress robes will be fine,” but Ariadne spoke like a professional soother. “Mamma, you must find this quite distressing.”

“Ariadne, we agreed two weeks ago that this marriage was impossible.” There was nothing cross or impatient about Mrs MacDougal’s tone; her pale face in the green flames was a mask of agony.

“Mamma, I’m knowing that you and Papa are not pleased by it.”

With heart-rending anxiety, Mrs MacDougal pressed on. “Did you not find the courage to tell Remus that you cannot marry him?”

“Mamma, I’m knowing it will take you some time to become used to the idea.”

“But, Ariadne,” spoken softly and sweetly, “your father and I indicated that you have to break the engagement.”

“Mamma, I know you’re not liking it when I do not comply with your wishes.”

Any other mother would have either backed down or lost her temper at this point, but Bethoc MacDougal only repeated, “Dear, you’re knowing this cannot happen,” as if that settled the matter.

Ariadne did cry that time, so much so that Remus fought through his scruples and held her hands. (She had once held his hands when he had been upset. And they hadn’t even been engaged then.)

“I really have hurt Mamma.”

“Yes, you have. But not remotely as much as she’s hurting you.”

Ariadne was very surprised by this idea. “What makes you think that?”

“You’re crying and she isn’t. Because it’s your whole life, but only a detail of hers.”

Remus found himself half-waiting for Ariadne to say that she would have to break off the engagement because it was the only way to make Mamma happy. But the fireplace was flaring again, and this time Lucius Malfoy appeared in it.

“Cousin Ariadne,” he said, “our Aunt Macmillan claims that you are engaged to someone called Remus Lupin.”

“Aunt Macmillan is correct, Cousin Lucius.”

“For your information, young lady, his name does not appear on the Black family tapestry.”

“He is not related to the Blacks, Lucius.”

“That is absurd. Every pure-blood of good character is related to the Blacks. In other words, you admit that you intend to besmirch the MacDougal name by a union with a disgrace or a half-breed.”

“Remus is of good character, Lucius, but he is certainly a half-blood.”

“Reconsider. The day before you marry any such person will be the last day any Malfoy ever speaks to you.”

In the ensuing pause, Remus came down from the sofa to kneel in view of the hearth. Malfoy ignored him with superb disdain.

“Think about it, Ariadne. Otherwise this is the last conversation we will ever have.”

“Good bye, Cousin Lucius.” The fire crackled, and the hearth emptied. Ariadne turned to Remus. “Oh, dear. I’ll never have to enter Malfoy Manor again. And I just cannot force myself to be unhappy about it.” The tears were dry on her cheeks, and she was almost smiling.

“Nor do you seem too unhappy about distressing Mr Malfoy.”

“He’s not distressed. He’s glad to discover a concrete reason why I’m just as worthless as he was always hoping… oh, not again.”

For the flames were yet again turning green, and this time Severus Snape was demanding audience. Remus was still sitting next to Ariadne, but Snape ignored him, much as Malfoy had, and launched straight into business.

“Ariadne, I need to ask you plainly: do you understand what you are marrying? Are you quite certain that your half-blood lover has told you the whole truth about himself?”

“I am, Severus.”

“Has he told you that he once tried to kill me?”

“You are mistaken, Severus; it was Sirius Black who tried to kill you. Remus was in no state of mind to know anything about what was happening.”

“That’s his story.” Snape turned to Remus for long enough to fix a ferocious glower on him. “Lupin plays the innocent, but don’t you think an innocent man would have resented being used in a game of murder? Yet he and Black remained inseparable for years after that little adventure. You are a fool to believe him, Ariadne.”

Nine years had passed, yet Remus still felt his stomach turn when he remembered how blindly he had accepted Sirius’s excuses on the morning after The Prank. The truth about Sirius’s character should have been obvious from that moment, yet he had refused to accept it. But he still found it very difficult to admit his mistake to Snape, especially when Snape was using the incident as an excuse to insult Ariadne.

Ariadne was steering the conversation away from the sensitive topic. “Severus, are you here to tell me that this is the last time you will ever speak to your foolish cousin?”

“I am not so treacherous,” Snape snarled with another unfriendly glance at Remus. “The time when my cousin makes the biggest mistake of her life is the time when she most needs her friends around her. I am here to tell you that I shall be at the wedding. And once disaster hits, and you come to your senses, you may be sure that I shall not be among those who desert you to the consequences of your own folly.”

“Thank you for your support,” Ariadne murmured.

Snape must have understood the irony, because he muttered a curt, “Until the wedding,” and his head vanished.

This time they reached the sofa, and Sarah lifted down the powder-jar to begin a call of her own, but before Floo touched flame, a blaze of emerald heralded the head of thirteen-year-old Dreadnought Macmillan. “Hey, Ariadne, are you needing somebody who can take photographs? I take good ones, do you remember the ones I took the other Christmas?”

Remus followed Ariadne back to the hearth, although she could probably manage Dreadnought without moral support. “They were excellent, Dreddy,” she was saying. “There was one that I’ve carried around in my wallet ever since.”

“Well, are you needing a photographer for the wedding? I bet I can take photographs just as well as those fancy professionals who charge a bomb.”

“Our friend Mr Jones has already said… ” she began.

“Oh, brilliant. Some snooty friend of yours is more important than your own cousin! He’s grown up and not needing a career boost the way I am. And I was going to offer to do it for free, so that you could save money, and I could start a portfolio of my work. But, no, I’m supposing you’d rather pay a thousand Galleons to this Jones… ”

Even after calling Ivor to the fireplace, it took twenty minutes to soothe Dreadnought and negotiate a compromise that would involve co-operation between the two photographers. Dreadnought was outraged to learn that his rival was not a professional photographer and was also offering a free service, and utterly unmollified by the news that Remus and Ariadne would be delighted to have two people working on the project together.

“Can’t you make your cousins shut up?” called Kingsley from the kitchen table. “Some of us are trying to do homework here.”

“In this house?” asked Remus. “If I’d seriously needed to finish my essay tonight, I’d have stayed at home.”

Ivor sat down next to them. “I have a report to write too. Hestia, would it be better if the visitors left so that there’s no one’s work to disturb when Ariadne’s cousins want to annoy her?”

Hestia took the hint and cast a Blocking Charm on the Floo connection. “I don’t know how you tolerate it, Ariadne. Why don’t you argue back or run away like the rest of us?”

Ariadne smiled slightly; Remus recognised that a great many thoughts about her cousins were flitting through her mind. All she said out loud was:

“But surely you have not misunderstood Dreddy just because he made a fuss tonight? It all came from generosity; the Macmillans are a very good family.”