the_debt_of_time

time for you. For all of you. I can see by that look on your face you could hear Charlus
telling Mia that I'm not going to make it."
He shook his head. "Please, don't―"
"You'll look after them won't you?" she interrupted, ignoring his pleas. "Look after
my girl? My boys? Look after yourself?"
He nodded quickly. "Yes, ma'am."
"I mean that, Remus Lupin." Her grey eyes hardened into a recognisable threat. "I
will be very cross if you let something bad happen to yourself because you sink into grief
instead of rising above it." She patted the back of his hand with her free one as he held the
other tenderly in his grasp. "These are dark times, and our world needs courage like yours.
Your father was a good man. A good man who let his dark times take over. You can't do
that now."
Remus's jaw tightened. "He wouldn't even let me see her."
"I imagined he wouldn't. Which was why, when I saw him here yesterday morning,
I slipped into your mother's room. Hope and I had a lovely chat."
He looked up at her with wide eyes. "You saw my mum?"
"I did. I had been planning on bringing you here today to visit her. Your father had
a previous engagement that he couldn't get out of, so he wouldn't have known.
Unfortunately, she was very ill and didn't know if she would make it in time to see you."
Dorea reached for her robes, which had been folded and placed on the table beside her
bed. Seeing that was what she was doing, Remus was quick to grab them for her so that
she did not strain herself.
Digging a pale green hand into a pocket, Dorea withdrew a small stone on the end
of a looped gold chain. "Your mother asked me to give you this."
Remus gaped at the item reverently as it was placed in his hand. "This is her
necklace. My father gave it to her on their first date."
"An amethyst," Dorea affirmed with a sweet smile. "It's very beautiful. She told me
the story of how they met. Do you know it?"
Remus nodded slowly, recalling the story with the hint of an amused smile. "She
was living just outside Cardiff. She took a walk through a forest one day and was attacked
by a man that turned out to be a boggart."