Of a Different Breed

Remus awoke the next morning to wonderful aromas wafting into the living room. It all smelled so fresh and sweet, nothing like any meal he had eaten sine he had left Hogwarts. The food there was half the reason why he missed teaching so much he always liked to think. When he stood up, he expected the usual transformation aches and pains to hit him and prepared himself to fight against it just to say staying, but they never came. His body felt felt than it had in years, definitely not what he was used to feeling when he was only days away from the full moon. That's when he remembered the potion he had drank the night before. Olivia had actually came through for him. She had done the impossible, and more importantly she had given him some hope in his life once again. If she was able to appear out of the blue with the perfect solution to his biggest problem, what else did life have in store for him? Call it intuition, a gut feeling, or just being wishful, but Remus felt as if things, for once, were actually truly going to start getting better.

"Bloody hell, Remus!" Sirius exclaimed through a mouth full of food when Remus finally walked into the kitchen. "You've been holding out on me! To think every breakfast could've been this way, you bastard."

He stared at awe at the food on the counter tops. Homemade pancakes were piled high on a plate next to two different bowls of strawberries and blueberries. There was an oven tray full of bacon and sausages right by a platter of scrabbled eggs, along with toast, whipped cream, and syrup. It felt like a dream to see it all there in Grimmuald Place.

"Me? I just woke up. I smelled it and thought you decided to try your hand at cooking."

Sirius blinked, clearly caught off guard. "She did this? She wouldn't have!"

Remus walked towards the counter and began helping himself to a little bit of everything. The look of shock on his friend's face was sweet enough he was double thinking the syrup he had just put on his pancakes. "She actually came downstairs and talked with me last night."

His brow narrowed. "And it went well?"

"Clearly," Remus laughed, raising his plate a little, gesturing towards all the food in the kitchen.

"Merlin's beard, spy or not, she can stay as long as she wants if she's going to feed us like this every day."

His smile vanished. "You really still on about that?"

"Not letting it go until we hear from Snivellus," he mumbled as he bit into a sausage.

The lighter haired man groaned. "You're insufferable, Padfoot. She's trying."

"Mm hmm."

Remus sighed but joined him at the table to eat. He knew Sirius wasn't being mean spirited, it was just what he had become. They had become two sides to the same coin-he supposed it was the reason why they worked so well together. Remus was forever the encouraging optimist, even if he didn't truly believe his own encouragement most of the time, while Sirius was the never ending pessimist. As breakfast went on and they both drew close to cleaning off their plates for the second time, Remus began to wonder if it was going to be another day Olivia spent locked away. He couldn't help but to sigh as he stood up.

"Thinking about the brat?" Sirius begrudgingly asked as he leaned back in his chair, hands folded comfortably over his stomach.

He put his dishes down in the sink. "I'm going to convince her to come out."

"Of course you are," he groaned. "Well I'm going to go out for a bit."

"Alright, but no more rolling in dead things, you grungy old mutt," he offered with a small smile, trying to lighten the mood a little. He knew his friend was never able to get enough of being outside, even if he did have to hide in his animagus form when he ventured out.

Sirius broke out into a smile again. "I'll consider it," he chuckled before shifting into his dog form and heading out.

Remus relaxed his shoulders and headed up towards his old room. He couldn't help but to wonder what had changed between Olivia cooking and Sirius and himself discovering the food. Last night he felt like he had gotten somewhere and having breakfast waiting on them seemed to show that she was trying, or at least wanted to. So why had she retreated back to the room before he could even talk to her? When he arrived, he found the door wide open, bed made and room clean, and their house guest no where to be found. Immediately, he tensed up, a mixture of shock and fear running through him. Had she decided to run away? Before he had time to think anymore, he heard a crash from a room or two down the hall. He bolted down the hallway, threw open the door, and gasped at the scene before him.

Standing in the middle of the room, just a few feet away from an open wardrobe, was none other than Fenrir Greyback. Except that it wasn't-Remus knew a boggart or two had been hiding in the house, but he wasn't sure if Olivia was aware of that fact. She was staring, wide-eyed and trembling at the creature before her.

"Did you miss me, Bitch? I wasn't done with you yet," he sneered taking slow, deliberate steps towards her as she backed away. "You can't get away from me. I own you. Its written all over your skin. You can't forget me."

Remus rushed in and reached for his pocket but realized he had left his wand by the couch. "Bloody hell! Olivia, get behind me! Its a boggart!" He shouted.

She kept backing up till she collided with the wall, watching as a devious smirk enveloped Greyback's face. "You're wrong," she breathed.

The moment Remus got close, he hit an invisible barrier and was pushed back. "Olive! Your wand! Its just a boggart!" He cried desperately, trying to get through to her, but she didn't seem able to even hear him. The boggart had locked onto her and was persistent-he had never seen anything like it before.

"Oh really? Going to call daddy to come save you?" Greyback's form mocked, reveling in the girl's obvious despair. "You've got to admit you're his daughter before you can get his help, little Bitch. But we both know you're not going to do that so I'm going to have my fun."

Watching horrified from the other side of the barrier, Remus saw the boggart lunge at Olivia. She let out a blood-curling scream and ducked, shutting her eyes tightly and wrapping her arms around herself. He started throwing himself at the barrier, frantically trying to break it and get to her. Meanwhile Greyback loomed over her, just laughing. "Closing your eyes doesn't make me go away!" His thunderous voice echoed through out the room before he grabbed her by her arm and yanked her up.

"NO!" She screamed, but her body seemed limp, unable to do much more than weakly fail about.

"Oh, this is such a pretty form. Maybe I'll take a bite or carve it up. You could use another reminder of who you really belong to now," the boggart growled through his grin as a dagger appeared in his hand and he started pushing the sleeve of her cloak down her arm.

"GET OFF ME!" Olivia screamed, this time much louder and more powerful than before. A surge of energy bounced through the room, making the boggart vanish in a cloud of black, wispy vapor while furniture was knocked back, the open wardrobe doors rattled, and Remus fell a few feet backwards onto his ass.

In a split second without even bothering to think, Remus was on his feet again. He didn't even notice the absence of the barrier this time as he rushed to Olivia, wrapping his arms tightly around her. She immediately clung to him, sobbing into his chest as the room finally stilled once more. "Shh," he whispered, petting her hair and trying to soothe her. "It wasn't real. It was just a boggart. You're safe. I promise. He can't get you here."

Her crying eventually calmed down, but she didn't back away from him. Her hands were dug tightly into his shirt while her forehead was still pressed against him. As her breathing slowed and steadied, she began to trust and believe his words.

Carefully, he detached himself from her and looked down to her face. "Olive, are you hurt?"

he shook her head, keeping her gaze down as her hands dropped to her own lap.

"Come on, let's go get you some chocolate. It'll help," he offered kindly.

Together, they rose up to their feet. Remus kept her tucked tightly under his arm as he guided her down the stairs. He stopped in the living room, grabbed his wand, and sat her down in the armchair. After getting a fire going in the hearth, he wrapped her up tightly in a blanket and summoned a chocolate bar straight from the kitchen.

"Here, eat up," he instructed with a warm smile as he unwrapped the bar and passed it over.

They at in silence as Olivia slowly ate the chocolate. He didn't bother her or pressure her, but kept a watchful eye on her to make sure she was okay. They both just sat and listened to the fire crackle as they calmed down and caught up to the rest of the world around them.

"I'm sorry," Olivia whispered when she finally seemed to find her voice once more.

"What were you doing in that room, Olive? I gave you a room for when you didn't want to me around me and Sirius."

She wouldn't meet his gaze, just pulling the blanket more snugly around herself. "That's your room though. I figured after I made breakfast I would go lean a room and surprise you so you didn't have to sleep on the couch anymore."

Remus immediately frowned, thinking back to the previous night and how she had commented about how loud his thoughts were. Had she really heard them? Did she go through all that trouble just because she found out how much he missed his own bed from his thoughts? He noticed a blush spreading across her face the more he dwelt on it. "The sentiment was very nice, but its rude to read people's thoughts, you know."

By now, her face was beet red. "I'm so sorry, I don't always do it on purpose. Sometimes my mid just connects with other people or creatures You're a werewolf, so my mind likes to connect with yours a bit more. It does that with most magical creatures."

It was Remus' turn to blush. "I'm a wizard, Olive. Not a creature."

She gently shook her head. "You're both, like me."

"What do you mean?"

Olivia shrugged. "Half breeds I guess. You and I have that in common. My entire species is all female, so we're all half breeds. My mother was a BellaSera, my father a wizard. And werewolves don't exactly pass down lycanthropy to their children. A werewolf is created from a muggle or a wizard, so, in a way, you and I are similar half breeds. I think that's why I have to actively fight to keep from seeing your thoughts."

His frown deepened. What else had she seen that he wasn't aware of?

"I promise I'll do better and be more proactive about it. I promise."

Remus let out a small sigh. "Its alright. I believe you, but you still shouldn't have been wondering around the house alone. much less trying to change things by yourself. This house was uninhabited for many years. There's no telling what else is hiding in dark places.

He could have sworn he heard her gulp. "Yes sir. I'm sorry."

Leaning over, he put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm just glad that you're okay. When I tried to get to you, there was an invisible barrier that separated us. I've never seen that happen with a boggart before."

"I don't think that it was the boggart that caused it. I think that it may have been my magic."

"Your magic? How?"

"I don't know," she whispered. "Sometimes when I get emotional, things just happen. There's a lot about my magic I don't know or don't understand. I never had anyone to teach me."

Remus' brow pulled into a tight, disapproving line. "No one at the school you were attending were able to help?"

She let out a bitter laugh. "School? My adoptive father never let me go to a muggle school for my basics, much less a wizarding school when I was old enough. And its not like there's any record of my birth, so I don't have the trace. No school had any way of knowing about me, let alone finding me."

"Why? Why would he want to keep you so cut off from the world?"

Olivia shrugged again. "He always said I had to be protected because of what I am. I guess he thought hiding me away from the world was the best way to do that."

"Which is what pushed you to run away in the first place, wasn't it? You just wanted a taste of the world."

She smiled weakly. "Exactly, but the two weeks I had before Greyback found me weren't nearly enough. It did show me though that he was right about it being dangerous for me to venture out."

"You poor thing," he sighed.

"I'll be alright."

"I don't doubt that; you're incredibly strong, going through what you've been through and still holding yourself together," he returned softly. "But what I don't understand is why he's so hell bent on finding you and keeping you. It doesn't seem that he's interested in turning you like he does with most children."

She shifted uncomfortably in the chair as her mind went back to her days of being trapped with him. "No, he can't turn me. When he tried and failed, he realized what I was. From what I understand, he wants to use me as leverage when the time is right."

"Leverage? For what?"

"I'm not entirely sure," she admitted quietly. "He probably wants something from my father since he's a man in a powerful position. I don't think he realizes though that my father isn't the type to play into the demands of creatures like him."

Remus studied her or a moment, watching as her fingers returned to habitually pulling at the hem of the sleeves on her cloak. "Olive," he began gently. "Who is your father?"