FIC: The Truer Office of Their Eyes (Lupin/Tonks)
Title: The Truer Office of Their Eyes Author: Mechaieh (a/k/a bronze_ribbons) Challenge: Howl-O-Ween 2007 Pairing: Remus/Tonks Prompt:
'Tis now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world.
~William Shakespeare
Summary: Tonks and Lupin make use of a present. Era: Post-DH, but not quite compliant with canon. This takes place just a few years after the War, with the premise that a book version of DH as we know it (sans epilogue) became available to the Wizarding World long before it was distributed to Muggle readers. Kink: outdoor nookie Rating: NC-17 Count: 2,400 words Beta: aunty_marion. I embroidered on a spot or two after she vetted this; whatever infelicities you spy are mine (alas!).
KING Is there no exorcist Beguiles the truer office of mine eyes? Is't real that I see?
HELENA No, my good lord; 'Tis but the shadow of a wife you see, The name and not the thing.
William Shakespeare, ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL
A half-hour before midnight, Andromeda Tonks finished reading the orange-covered book she'd received as a birthday gift; as she closed the thick tome, she glared at her daughter.
Nymphadora Tonks Lupin grinned back unrepentantly and chirped, "See, I knew you'd love it!"
Andromeda lowered the book onto a nearby table with an air of fastidiousness, as if she were handling the mauled remains of a small animal. "Did you read what was written about you?"
From his armchair, Remus Lupin murmured, "I'm still finding stray shreds of her first copy all over our room. Her cleaning spells need work."
Tonks hurled a cushion at him. Andromeda's scowl softened into a smile. "Now that's my girl."
Tonks dropped the second cushion she had snatched up. "Wait. Wait. You approve? You don't think I should have done the girlie thing and snipped doilies out of it instead? Are you my real mum?"
Andromeda sniffed. "The one in this waste of paper certainly isn't. Can you imagine what Sirius would have said to me if I had ever let Remus feel unwelcome?" The portrait residing on the mantelpiece nodded vigorously in agreement.
Remus smiled at both the portrait and his mother-in-law. "Not to mention what he would have said to me if I'd married Tonks only because I thought I had to."
Andromeda laughed. "Considering I taught him his first contraceptive charms--"
Tonks looked scandalised. "Mother!"
Andromeda laughed again. "Someone had to. All those girls after him. I'd wager Galleons to Knuts that Hermione Granger took Harry aside--"
"Mo-ther!"
Lupin had a gleam in his eye. "I suppose it's you I should thank, then. Since I learned those charms from Sirius." He neatly fielded the bolster before it smacked his head and sent it spinning back to the sofa.
Andromeda stood up. "I'm glad of that. But it would also please me for you unlearn them long enough to give me a grandchild or two." She took out her wand and aimed a baleful glare at the orange book before Transfiguring it into a plush blanket. With another flick, she folded the blanket and sent it sailing into Lupin's chest.
"Mind you don't catch cold while doing so," she said, a demure smile on her lips as she left the room.
Tonks stared after her mother. "She did not just -- oh, Morgana."
Remus looked at the blanket and then at Tonks. At the mortified expression on her face, he began to laugh.
Instead of launching another cushion at him, she pushed herself off the floor and propelled herself into his lap. She punched his arm as he continued to laugh. "You. Are. Horrible. And so is Mum. And so are you," she said to the portrait. "I heard that snicker."
"Of course he's going to snicker. Be glad he isn't demanding to watch."
Tonks shuddered. "Don't give him ideas!" The portrait snickered again, and the clock chimed the three-quarter hour. Tonks said to Sirius, "Can't you go away for a while? Cousin Vika's in the attic, you could indulge in water-sports with her. Or bubble-wrap bondage--"
The portrait broke into full-out guffaws. Choking, Remus Summoned a glass of water. When he'd regained his voice, he said, "Some things I don't want to know, pet."
"Coward," Tonks said lightly.
"Survivor," Remus retorted affably.
Tonks leaned her head against his shoulder. "Shall we?"
"In a minute," Remus said. He helped her get to her feet, squeezing her hands for an instant before Summoning her cloak. "Here, put this on. You heard what your mother said about catching cold."
"I believe she was speaking to you, Mr. Lupin," Tonks said, and Summoned Remus's cloak. "Besides, we now have a blanket."
At the churchyard, Tonks had to admit that the blanket felt fantastic against her skin. There were no bodies interred beneath the wide stone engraved "LUPIN," although the only people cognisant of that fact were her mother, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Remus, and herself; the remains of the two Aurors who had impersonated Remus and Tonks during the final months of the War had been returned to their next-of-kin.
Each time she and Remus visited the faux graves, Tonks silently murmured her thanks to the woman who had quaffed Polyjuice for a year, primarily to guard Andromeda during Tonks's secret missions to Albania and Greece. There were times Tonks couldn't help wondering if, given a choice, her mother would have preferred keeping the other woman as her daughter; the decoy Nymphadora had been more sylphlike and far more interested in feminine frills than Tonks ever would be.
"Thank God you don't expect me to wear a ring," she said aloud.
"Well, I do kind of miss the one you used to sport in your eyebrow," Remus said, kissing the spot in question.
"Doesn't go with the current assignment," Tonks said.
"I know," he replied, kissing the side of her nose. "It wasn't a criticism. You're thinking too much again."
Tonks said, "Then you should do something about that, shouldn't you?"
Remus smiled. "I'm getting there. I was always slow off the mark--"
Tonks hissed as his fingers closed in on a nipple. Remus continued, "So it's a good thing this isn't a sprint. Isn't it, my dear." Tonks's hips had already begun to cant upward as Remus's fingers rubbed and squeezed the nipple with just the right amount of pressure.
"I'm still thinking," she said.
"We can't have that," Remus replied. He lowered his mouth to her other nipple and began to tease it with his tongue and teeth, pinning her body underneath his. She loved the contrast between the plush blanket beneath her and the rough textures of Remus's jumper and jeans against her bare skin. She loved feeling both the wet heat of his mouth on her breast and the cool night air on her face at the same time. She loved that the man currently gliding a possessive hand along her hip didn't actually expect her to shut up when they made love, although he had often brought her to a state of incoherence and now and then managed to render her outright speechless.
"You know, we're cheating," she breathed. "Does it really count as outdoor sex when we're Disillusioned and hiding behind Confunding charms?"
Remus snorted. "It's dank out here. If someone didn't have a penchant for cemetery canoodling, I'd be doing this indoors, where it's warm."
"And where my mother could hear us."
"Still more privacy there than most of the places we've frequented."
Tonks tugged on his ear. "I don't care who hears us, as long as it's not my mother." Remus grinned and pushed himself up enough for her to undo his zip and push his pants out of the way. As was his wont, he stretched up to kiss her brow, her nose, and her lips in succession before he settled back between her legs and pushed into her.
Tonks gripped his arms tightly as he began to thrust. "Ohhh... ow!" Remus immediately halted. "Bloody rock under the blanket -- thought we'd cleared them all --"
"Like I said, your cleaning spells need work." Remus rolled onto his right side, holding Tonks flush against him so that her back was off the ground. He spoke a German command over her shoulder; in response, a small cloud of pebbles and dust scooted out from under the blanket.
Tonks sneezed and squirmed. "Show-off," she said.
"I so seldom get to," he lamented. "Undercover surveillance is such a bore."
Tonks rocked backwards onto the ground, pulling Remus with her. "Suppose you turn your mind to other types of boring. And drilling. And other under-the-cover type things." She punctuated each phrase with her hips, delighting in how he caught his breath and drove harder into her, even as his eyes flared with both lust and laughter.
"Hard to be under-the-cover out here," he said.
"You seem -- oh! -- hard enough to me," Tonks teased.
"All your doing, wench," he said, pinning her wrists to the ground. Tonks bucked against him, revelling in the solidity of the flesh that met hers: Remus would never acquire the build of a Playwitch model, but he'd gained enough weight since the end of the war that she no longer felt shy about throwing her strength against his. He'd also gained a marvelous confidence in his ability to please her -- she loved, loved, loved the intensity of his gaze on her as she soared into her climax, and how his eyes never wavered until he himself came, collapsing on top of her with a contented grunt.
She giggled at the sound, and he lightly swatted at her without lifting his head. The motion made her giggle harder, prompting him to mutter "So much for romance!" in a tone of mock disgruntlement.
"It's very romantic!" she protested, still laughing. "Werewolf And Wench Beneath a Waning Moon."
She could feel his body vibrate against hers as he too succumbed to amusement. "Sounds like one of those novels Potted Parchment likes to feature. You know, the ones your mum habitually disguises as gardening books."
"Dad used to tease her about those." A hint of sadness crept into Tonks's smile. Remus, understanding, continued to cuddle her as she sat up and began to pull on her clothing, his hands roaming her body even as she proceeded through the contortions necessary to get dressed. She tugged and zipped his own garments back into place as well, and then splayed her hands across his ribs.
"Not too shabby, Mr. Lupin. Your reputation notwithstanding."
He lifted her right hand to his lips and kissed it, and then got to his feet, pulling her up with him. "Reputations are useful. Even unflattering ones." He paused. "I wouldn't dare saddle my name on anyone, but I do like the thought of naming a sprog after your father."
"Poor moppet," Tonks said, referring to "Teddy Remus." The boy had been adopted by one of his real aunts -- one who remained unaware of her sister's sacrifice on behalf of Tonks. The child wasn't a metamorph, of course -- Tonks didn't know what the man who'd impersonated Remus had been thinking, starting that hare. According to Kingsley, however, Remus had already developed a reputation for unreliability prior to Pseudo-Remus's assumption of his identity. (Her outrage notwithstanding, Tonks had had to concede that Remus had always been hopeless at correspondence.) Pseudo-Remus's missteps had helped cement that reputation, with Harry and his cohorts all too ready to assume that Remus's sanity had cracked under his myriad burdens.
"Not quite poor," Remus murmured. "Not with Harry eager to spoil him."
"I suppose," Tonks said. "That's one thing your lad did right, at any rate."
"He got quite a bit right," Remus said. "More so than I might have. Among other things, I wouldn't have thought to ask it of Harry. He had enough on his plate as it was."
"Godparents don't have to be responsible. Look at Sirius."
Remus sighed. "Godparents with the sense to stay alive..."
Tonks grimaced. "Well, there's that. Not that people believe it of us."
Remus said, "A pity we can't afford to prove them wrong."
"Not in our names," Tonks agreed. "We'll have to content ourselves with living well. I fancy I'll be ready for something new in a couple of years --"
"And by then we'll have enough for that cottage in Gascoigne --"
"Somewhere near a cave or a forest for your transformations --"
"And when the kids are old enough for school, I can see if Beauxbatons will hire me. Maybe save on the fees that way -- "
Tonks blinked. "That's getting way, way, way ahead of ourselves."
"No more so than your mother showing me the jewelry she plans to bequeath to our daughter, provided we get around to producing one."
Tonks sighed and slumped against Remus. "Mum's subtle for a Black. Which is still nowhere near subtle enough."
Remus rubbed her cheek and spoke against her hair, which shimmered silver and rose in the moonlight. "I am glad she's fine with me fathering your children. I'll be happy to help you produce them when the time comes, but only when you're ready."
"Remus." Tonks swallowed. "About being happy... oh, never mind."
Remus glanced sharply at her. The silver streaks in her hair seemed more pronounced than they had been a minute ago; he'd noticed how they tended to materialise when she was trying to be mature about things like insecurity.
In response to the question she hadn't dared to ask, he drew his wand and murmured, "Expecto Patronum." The ghostly rabbit hopped towards Tonks, halting at her feet. It crooked its ears and tucked one of its front paws behind the other, as if making a formal bow.
Tonks smiled. "At your service, monsieur lapin." The rabbit broke its pose and scampered around the lovers in joyful circles. Tonks, laughing at its antics, spoke in Remus's ear: "If I believed that rot about patronuses and true love, I'd be wondering about you and Luna Longbottom."
"You cannot possibly be serious," Remus huffed indignantly. "I wouldn't -- oh," he trailed off, seeing Tonks's smirk. "Minx."
"Your minx," she emphasized. "And mink, for that matter." Her own Patronus -- not a canine, but a slinky, silvery mammal -- appeared alongside the rabbit. The two forms began playing hide-and-seek with each other, racing around the headstones, darting behind tufts of grass, and irreverently vaulting through wreaths.
Tonks squeezed Remus's arm. "What should we do with the blanket? I don't think it'll launder too well."
Remus waved his wand and murmured a spell that caused the orange fabric to crumble into a mound of pumpkin seeds. A second spell scattered the seeds not only all across the churchyard, but over its stone walls and through the rails of its battered iron gate.
Tonks blinked. "Mum would hex you for that, you know. She's forever cursing the weeds that invade her garden."
Remus shrugged. "Some forms of contagion can't be helped. And pumpkins are far more benign than the things people do shun me for."
"I see," Tonks said. "Your small revenge upon the world --"
"Until we have children." Remus's smile was a touch feral.