t h e . f i x e d . f o u n d a t i o n s . o f . h e r . s t u b b o r n . h e a r t

The Fixed Foundations of Her Stubborn Heart
[by victoria p.]

Rating: Adult

Summary: England expects that every man will do his duty. ~Admiral Nelson

Spoilers: Major spoilers for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Notes: Title from Virgil's Aeneid (I think it's the John Dryden translation).

Date: January 16, 2006

Tonks can still taste Emmeline on her lips when she sits down across from her mother for their weekly tea.

These meetings have been tense lately, and not just because Mum knows secrets are being kept from her. Or maybe because the secrets Tonks is keeping closest aren't the ones her mother thinks they are.

"He's well," she says, because family is important, and that is always Mum's second question. At the raised eyebrow she gets in response, she amends it to, "As well as can be expected. I--"

"He hated being there, even when we were children." Mum sips her tea, leaving a faint red smudge on the white porcelain. Andromeda Tonks leaves a mark on everything -- everyone -- she touches. Sometimes her daughter feels as if she will never make a mark at all.

"He has visitors." She sounds defensive; her mother has never followed Dumbledore blindly, and chides her when she does.

"Ah." Mum smiles as if she knows something, and even though Tonks has been trained to resist tortures far more extreme, she squirms in her seat, fingers tightening on the fine porcelain of her teacup. She stills, hearing Mum's unspoken, "don't fidget," and forces herself to relax before she shatters the delicate cup. She knows some things can't be fixed, even with magic.

"I really can't stay," she says, rising abruptly, wondering if Emmeline will still be at the flat, or if she'll have rushed back to her own life after their interlude.

"Nymphadora--"

"Mum, I, I know." She bends and brushes a kiss over her mother's powdered cheek, inhaling the crisp scent of the soap she favors and the spicy fragrance of her ginger shampoo.

Mum grabs her hand, squeezes tight, and she can feel every bone, and the skin that's no longer as smooth as it once was. For the first time, Tonks thinks of her mother as fragile, even though she is in a powerful witch in her prime. For the first time, Tonks wonders if what she is doing is enough to protect her parents from the rest of their family.

"Be careful."

"Constant vigilance!" she says with a smile, and Mum laughs, but doesn't let go of her hand until she tugs herself free.

Emmeline is on her way out the door when Tonks rushes back into the flat, and it's easy to coax her back into the bedroom with desperate kisses and touches.

This is the one place Tonks never feels awkward or clumsy, and as she slides her fingers over the soft curves of Emmeline's breasts and hips, she wishes they never had to leave.

"Where were you yesterday afternoon?" Moody barks, and Tonks jumps.

"Tea with Mum," she answers, willing herself not to flush.

Moody's eye spins and Tonks forces herself not to think of the earthy scent of Emmeline's body, the pale pink of her nipples, her soft sigh as she came writhing beneath Tonks's fingers and tongue. No one knows if Moody's a Legilimens, and Tonks is not taking any chances. She thinks only of the scent of her mother's ginger shampoo, the look in her eyes, the strong bones of her hand wrapping around hers.

Moody nods and grunts, satisfied, and Tonks barrels off before he can change his mind.

She and Emmeline both know sneaking off while on Order business is a bad idea, but there is no other time, and Tonks is greedy, she wants, in a way she hasn't wanted in a long time.

Tonks started when Dido's hands slid over her hips, fingers curling into the damp curls between her thighs, automatically scanning the locker room to make sure they were alone.

"I've missed you," Dido said, lips against Tonks's ear, warm breath and unvarnished need making her shiver.

She turned into the embrace, kissed Dido hungrily, and then pulled away.

"Moody knows," she whispered against full, pink lips, eyes closed so she didn't have to see realization dawn. "We can't--"

"Tonks?"

"I'm sorry."

"This has to stop now." Tonks swallows hard, wondering if she should have just kept her mouth shut.

Emmeline shakes her head. "I don't-- I don't understand."

Tonks crosses her arms over her chest, hugs herself tightly. "It's too dangerous. It's a distraction. And I think Moody is starting to suspect."

"Moody is worried about Death Eaters, not who's getting into your knickers."

"And he's not wrong. You know that. And we can't be--"

"Distracted. Yes. I heard you the first time. That's all this is to you?"

No, she wants to scream. Of course not. "That's all it can be right now."

She leaves before Emmeline can see her cry.

The first time with Remus, after she gets out of St. Mungo's, is furtive, fumbling, strange -- angles where she's grown used to curves, jutting bones and old, silver scars instead of soft, pink flesh that gives beneath her fingers. There is no give left in Remus, and that both attracts and repels her. If this is survival, she's not sure it's worth the fight.

They don't speak as they surge together, awkward limbs tangling on the narrow, dusty sofa in the old, haunted house. When he comes, it's with a choking cry that may or not be Sirius's name. She chooses not to hear, straining for her own release.

They avoid each other's eyes as they dress, and he kisses her forehead with dry, chapped lips, like an old uncle instead of the man she's just fucked while the Order meets two rooms away.

The second time with Remus, they are both a little drunk, and she is a sobbing mess. Emmeline's death, so soon after Sirius's, has left them all shaken, and there are whispers now, before and after meetings, suspicious sidelong glances and tempers flaring over small things. Remus wears a small, tight smile, as if waiting for the weight of doubt to fall on him again, and he doesn't flinch when Dumbledore asks him to live among the werewolves.

There is a third time, a fourth, an eighth, a twelfth, and she knows her desperation isn't attractive, but if this is all she has left, she won't let it go without a fight.

"Don't go," she whispers against his thin lips, prominent ribs, concave belly. She hasn't yet counted all his scars, and knows there will be new ones when he returns. If he returns.

"We all have our parts to play," he replies, rolling away and pulling on his clothes. "And we can't afford--"

"To be distracted," she finishes dully, but she no longer believes it.

end

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