Anika did not spot Sirius anywhere as she made her way across the grounds towards the lake which reflected the light of the moon making the world seem brighter. She gazed across the lake, slightly transfixed by the beauty of the grounds at this time of night.

The sound of thundering paws ripped her from her thoughts and she turned to see the same black dog which she had seen moments earlier running at full pelt after what she could only assume was a wolf followed closely by a large stag.

The wolf had its eyes fixed on Anika and before she knew it, the creature had reached her and lunged at her knocking her to the ground. Anika closed her eyes, prepared for the feeling of claws ripping into her skin, but it never came.

She opened her eyes tentatively, still feeling the wolf's hot breath on her face. What she saw when she opened her eyes confused her greatly, the wolf was sniffing her intently, not seeming to be about to attack as she thought it had been moments before. Its eyes didn't look like a normal wolf's, there was an intelligence behind its eyes that Anika didn't think any animal possessed.

The wolf was knocked away from her by a mass of black fur and the sound of snapping jaws and snarling could be heard as Anika scrambled to her feet. The stag put itself in between Anika and the fighting animals. The stag looked at her and she saw that its eyes too didn't look like a normal deer, far more human, its eyes also held a look of confusion in them. There was a rustle in the grass beneath the stag and Anika took note of a large rat, which also had it's eyes fixed on Anika.

The dog and the wolf broke apart and squared off, snarling at each other. It seemed that the wolf held status over the dog however as it seemed that the dog was forced to bow its head to the wolf when it snarled at the dog.

The wolf looked past the stag and back at Anika, seemingly it decided that she was no threat to it and it took off running again towards the forbidden forest. The stag took one more look at Anika and then took off after the wolf, the rat scurried away after the pair. The dog however made its way over to Anika, sniffing her feet as if checking if she was hurt.

The dog looked up at her and when their eyes met, Anika couldn't mistake the person behind those eyes. It was Sirius.

*

"Fuck!" was the first thing that Remus Lupin said when he was human again. The Marauders had continued to run around the grounds after the altercation with Anika, sticking to the Forbidden Forest, and had made their way back to the Shrieking Shack before dawn to allow Remus privacy for his transformation back to human.

"It's okay mate," James Potter said throwing some clean clothes in Remus' direction, "You didn't even attack her."

Remus scrambled to dress in the clothes James handed him, "Why?"

"No clue," Peter Pettigrew shrugged, "Maybe it has to do with the fact that she's not human?"

"Anika Flamel is just as human as anyone else," Sirius Black stated in a tone that all of his friends knew not to challenge. "It's my fault she was out there, I should have walked back to the common room with her and then snuck out."

"She followed you?" Remus asked incredulously, now fully dressed, Remus sat himself down on the torn-up four-poster bed in the room. He put his head in his hands half because of exhaustion, half because of stress from the events of the full moon night. "Merlin, what if I had attacked her, what if I had bitten her?"

"But you didn't mate," said James, sitting down beside his friend. "It doesn't matter why."

"It matters a great deal why," Remus replied, "but right now I can only think about what could have happened if I had attacked her."

"But you didn't," Sirius said, "you just sniffed her a lot mate, didn't even get your claws in."

Remus looked up at Sirius. It was no secret amongst the four boys that Sirius had developed feelings towards Anika Flamel, despite never having the nerve to speak to her until put in a situation where he had to. That was why Sirius had targeted Bertram Aubrey with his pranks, he was jealous, and that was why Sirius had developed the reputation with girls that he had gained for himself, he was trying to get away from the feelings that scared him. Remus would never have forgiven himself if he had hurt Anika, not only was she important to Sirius, Remus considered the girl a friend after their many times spent together in the hospital wing.

"We have to tell Dumbledore what happened," Remus insisted, "he should kick me out before someone else gets hurt."

"No way!" James shouted

"Not happening Moony," Sirius growled, "first of all, he has no reason to kick you out, nothing happened. And secondly, if we tell Dumbledore anything we'll have to explain that the three of us are illegal anamagi, I don't think he's be too happy about that."

Remus sighed, knowing his friend was right, he couldn't betray their secret like that, and after all, Anika hadn't been hurt.

"How are we going to explain it to her then?" Remus demanded, accepting what Sirius had said and moving on to the next issue.

"Why would we? She doesn't know it was us." Peter said. Sirius and Remus exchanged a look as if doubting Peter's words, but finding no way to see how she would know it was them.

"I 'spose you're right Wormtail," Sirius agreed. A short silence fell between the boys until James grabbed his invisibility cloak from the corner it was stashed in.

"We'd better make ourselves scarce before Pomfrey comes," James gestured for Sirius to join him under the cloak. Peter gave Remus one last smile and then transformed back into his rat form and scurried out of the room as James and Sirius, whose anamagi forms were too obvious for them to be able to sneak back into the castle, disappeared under the cloak.

Once they were gone Remus pushed over a chair in the room in frustration and began to think harder about why his werewolf self had not seen fit to attack Anika Flamel. Perhaps she really was less human than he had thought.