A big thank you to everyone who has stuck with this story and is still reading! And thank you to those who reviewed the previous chapter (lovely to hear from you again, Laurafxox!), reading your thoughts/responses really keeps me sane :)

The Creator was at her wit's end. The dreams she created for Lena weren't working, only making her more distressed. She never let her mask slip in front of Remus, but when she was left alone at home, Lena would stare at herself in the bathroom mirror with disgust. Inside their head, the Creator would listen at her door, and hear the horrible thoughts that filled the rest of Lena's mind. Dark, twisted ideas that no one, let alone a woman due to give birth in a few months, should have been allowed to think.

'How is it possible,' wondered the Creator, as Lena sat at the desk in her study, her restless fingers tearing at a piece of parchment, "that this version could be even worse than the one who killed her grandmother and father? How can someone who has only ever known kindness, admiration and love from others be so awful? How can someone who has been sheltered from all pain be so unfeeling? Her heart is protected by the man she loves, safer than it ever could be if it was still inside her, yet all she does is whine about it.'

And Lena still had no idea what she was sacrificing for her child – a child who would probably never know she existed. She was the one who should be moping and bitter, not the girl who was supposed to be living her perfect life.

"Nothing is truly perfect, Lena," Remus had told her. "That's one of the things everyone has to learn to accept in life."

The Creator picked up a photograph in her mentally-constructed bedroom. It was of Remus – her Remus, with a body even more scarred than the one of the new world. He was thinner too, as the current one hadn't experienced the years of poverty hers had endured. The one who, despite Lena's love and acceptance, still wished he wasn't a werewolf. Oh, she missed him terribly, even though she knew the new one was happier.

'I made everyone happier. Harry has his parents, and so does Neville. Sirius never spent twelve years in Azkaban. Maggie was adopted by a kind family when she was little. Voldemort is a good man – and I saved hundreds of lives by ensuring the War never took place.'

But how long until the total of causalities from all these natural disasters was equivalent to the combined death toll of the first and second Wizarding Wars? It was already approaching one hundred...

'Wars are worse,' she told herself vehemently. 'They destroy more than just people's lives. They poison society. Besides, people will always have to die – better it be from a natural source rather than someone else killing them.'

The problem was that these disasters were nature fighting back against the unnatural. Which was her. And the child. So really, all the deaths were still victims of a war.

It was just that this time, she was the one who had started it.

12 January, 1998:

Ever since Lena had properly separated Remus and Moony's personalities, the wolf no longer needed to be locked up during transformations. He was allowed to roam the house, although all he ever wanted to do was stay by Lena's side.

Tonight, he lay on their bed with her, his head resting on her upper thighs, his ear pressed up against her belly, listening to the sounds of the Little One as it moved around. According to Remus, she was at the end of something called her second trimester, which meant there were only a few more full moons until she finally gave birth.

As the Little One kicked, Moony made his soft half-growling, half-purring noise. Remus had also told him that the Little One had grown enough that it could now hear things from outside its mother's belly, and was starting to recognise voices – and it was important to Moony that it knew his voice as well as his human one.

He nuzzled Lena's stomach, wanting the Little One to understand its father was there, protecting it. Feeling Lena start to scratch his head, he looked up at her, and she smiled tiredly at him. Moony made another throaty noise, gazing at her adoringly. She looked so lovely, propped up against a large pile of white pillows, her long, dark hair piled on top of her head. Moony could sense that she was stressed, but was finding his presence a comfort. He stood up and moved closer so he could gently nudge her cheek with his wet nose, then give her a light lick.

Lena sat up a little more, and put her arms around him. Burying her face into his furry neck, she murmured, "Oh, Moony. What would I do without you, darling?"

Moony responded with a concerned noise. She sounded... lost, which wasn't something he was accustomed to hearing in her voice.

She pulled back and smiled again, although it was still slightly strained. "I'm okay," she said, stroking the side of his face. "It all just sometimes gets a bit overwhelming."

Pushing his forehead against hers, Moony growled softly. 'Let me help you.'

"You already are," she whispered back, her hands on either side of his face. "You always make me feel better."

They didn't move from that position for a while, matching each other's deep, slow breaths, Moony hoping it would relieve her tension. And inside Lena's womb, the Little One listened and learned.

On the last day of January, Remus and Lena went to the Potters' house in Hogsmeade for a celebratory lunch, as it had been Lily's birthday the previous day. As it was a Saturday with a scheduled Hogsmeade trip for the Hogwarts students, Harry was there too.

After they finished eating, Lena excused herself to the bathroom, and Harry mumbled something about needing to go to his bedroom. As their son left the dining room, James and Lily exchanged a worried look, which didn't go unnoticed by Remus.

"Is something up with Harry?" he asked them. "He seems unusually quiet today."

Lily sighed. "I know something's been wrong for a while," she said, "but he won't say anything to me. I mean, all his schoolwork is fine, and when I see him at school with his friends he looks like he's okay, but... I just have this feeling." She half-smiled, and shrugged helplessly. "Call it mother's intuition."

"I reckon it's girl trouble," James put in, "but Lily says she hasn't seen any signs of him being interested in anyone since his breakup with Ginny."

Remus frowned, vaguely remembering Harry mentioning something was bothering him last summer. But they'd gotten distracted before they could finish the conversation.

"Is it possible," he asked hesitantly, "he still hasn't properly, erm, dealt with Dumbledore's passing? I know Harry really looked up to him."

Lily scratched her nose, considering the suggestion. "I suppose that could be part of it," she admitted. "I know he's visited the tomb at least a couple of times this year." She sighed again. "But I still think there's more to it."

James put his hand over hers, and smiled ruefully. "Or it's possible that we're simply being overly concerned parents, and this is just a normal phase of teenage moodiness." He winked at Remus. "You're lucky you have a long way to go before you have to navigate the murky waters of raising an adolescent."

Lily's expression became less concerned and more excited. "Oh, I can't believe Lena's in the third trimester! And Andromeda as her midwife, isn't that a wonderful coincidence?"

Yes, Sirius' favourite cousin, Andromeda Tonks, was the midwife St. Mungo's had assigned to Lena as she had entered her final trimester. Remus knew Lena had been relieved when they'd learned who would be helping her during the birth – not just because they already knew Andromeda a little, but because the midwife wouldn't be some bubbly, sickly sweet, young witch who spoke to expectant mothers in an infantilising manner. They both appreciated that Andromeda was a firm, stoic, no-nonsense woman, and Remus was certain that she would help alleviate some of the stress he could see was creeping into Lena's otherwise happy attitude.

"It was certainly a bit of good news," replied Remus. "Actually, it's been kind of incredible how smoothly everything's been going with the pregnancy. Lena's been coping so well with all the physical changes, as well as keeping on top of all her writing." He smiled. "It's a little awe-inspiring, to be honest."

Lily snorted. "Of course she is. In all my years of teaching, I've never had a student so put together as she was as a First Year."

James grinned. "Begs the question as to why she decided to marry a mess like you," he teased.

Remus chuckled in response, although there was a tiny flicker of doubt in his mind. 'Yes,' whispered the niggling at the back of his mind. 'Why, out of everyone she could have, did she choose you?'

But aloud, he only said, "I guess I just must have done something right."

As Lena left the bathroom – oh, how she missed having a properly-functioning bladder – to return to the dining room, she felt a twinge in her stomach as the baby shifted. She stopped, closing her eyes as she inhaled and exhaled deeply, trying to resist the urge to scream or hit something.

"Are you okay?"

Her eyes flew open, and she glanced up. Harry was looking down at her from the second storey, leaning forward with his elbows resting on the wooden railing.

Lena plastered a smile on her face. "Oh, yes." She lightly touched her stomach. "The baby just moved."

"Ah, right." Harry weakly returned her smile, then turned around and went back into his room.

Lena continued to stare up at the spot where he'd stood, letting the smile slip back off her face. Apparently she wasn't the only one inside the Potters' house who wasn't feeling all tickety-boo; although she was much better at hiding it.

For a moment, she looked between the entrance that led back to the dining room and the staircase that led to the next storey, biting her lip. Despite the closeness between Remus and the Potters, Lena didn't actually know Harry that well. However, there was something appealing about spending a bit of time with someone else who was also struggling. If he had a problem, perhaps she could try to solve it, and that would give her something other than the pregnancy to think about for just a minute...

Making her decision, Lena ascended the stairs and walked down the hallway, coming to a stop in front of the still-open bedroom door. Inside, Harry was sitting on his bed, staring out the window at the snow-covered street.

Clearing her throat, Lena knocked on the doorframe. Harry jumped slightly, his head turning quickly to look at her in surprise.

"Mind if I come in?" she asked.

Harry blinked a couple of times, then nodded. "Um, sure."

Lena entered, curiously looking around Harry's bedroom. It was so different to her own at her father's house, which she had kept sparse; apart from the essential furniture, the only personal touches had been a couple of photographs, a magically modified cassette-player, a box that contained a dozen or so tapes of Muggle music, and two crammed, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Harry's, on the other hand, was decorated with Gryffindor banners, Quidditch posters, various knick-knacks that he'd most likely acquired over the years from birthdays and Christmases, and a large area on one wall which was covered with overlapping photographs of family and friends.

"I guess you actually get to see your bedroom a bit more than most kids at Hogwarts," she remarked, sitting down next to him on the bed.

Harry responded with a non-committal shrug.

Lena cocked her head, curious. "Is it still weird for you that I'm married to your parents' friend, when our time at Hogwarts overlapped?"

Picking at the quilt that covered his bed, Harry muttered, "I mean, you went from being the Head Girl and the most popular kid at school to dating a guy who's basically like my uncle in, like, the space of a month."

"I'll take that as a 'yes', then," said Lena drily.

He looked up at her properly. "It just didn't make a lot of sense to me," he said bluntly. "I mean, I know Remus is great, but on the few occasions I'd ever met the women he dated, they were either, well–"

"Painfully shy geeks or creeps obsessed with his lycanthropy?"

"... Yes."

Lena nodded, staring at the photograph-covered wall, but not really seeing it. "I'd never met anyone who made me feel the way he did," she murmured. 'Or feel at all,' she added silently. She shook her head a little, trying to clear her mind. "How is Hogwarts, anyway?" she asked. "It must feel strange, now that Dumbledore is... gone."

"Everything has felt strange since he died," said Harry quietly.

Lena's brow creased in confusion. "What do you mean?"

Harry looked out the window again. "I don't know, just... everything's felt.. off. And all these natural disasters happening all over the world..."

Lena didn't hear the last part; she was too focused on a memory from the morning after the funeral that was resurfacing.

Remus looked distinctly perturbed. "Sorry, I'm just feeling a bit... off," he told her.

She frowned. That was an odd coincidence. "When you say 'off'," she began, "what does–"

"Just little things," said Harry. "Like, when I'm recalling something, like how I first met Ron, I'll remember it completely differently for a second, before the right memory comes to me. And there's this girl at school a couple of years below me who I've never spoken to before, but every time I've seen her this year, I feel like I should know her. And Dumbledore..." He let out an aggravated sigh, running a hand through his messy hair. "I just know I'm missing something – something big – but I don't know what."

Lena considered this for a moment. What was it about Dumbledore's death...

'I don't know how he died,' she realised, her eyes widening. 'Nobody knows. We all just woke up one day and he was dead–'

"What is it?"

Lena blinked, and refocused her gaze on Harry. "Sorry?"

He was looking at her eagerly. "You looked like you just remembered something important."

"I did?" asked Lena, confused. She hadn't been thinking about anything important; her mind had just drifted to tedious pregnancy-related things, like the fact she and Remus still needed to buy a crib. "No, I just got distracted by baby stuff." She offered him a small smile. "Sorry, I'm not a very good listener at the moment."

Harry's shoulders slumped a little. "That's okay," he mumbled, looking out the window again. "They're probably missing you downstairs."

Yes, Remus was probably wondering what was taking her so long in the bathroom. He got concerned over the smallest things now.

Lena stood, and awkwardly patted Harry on the shoulder. "Well, I hope all this... 'off' stuff sorts itself out by the time you sit your NEWTs."

"Yeah, thanks," replied Harry, barely glancing at her as she left the bedroom. He couldn't understand why he had thought for a second that she had been about to explain why everything felt wrong, and that she would solve all his problems.

After all, he barely knew Lena Riddle.

The weeks of February and March flew by, and as Lena's baby bump grew larger and larger, so did her distress. She hated the kind smiles strangers gave her while she and Remus were out shopping. She loathed every minute she spent in the spare room they were converting into the nursery. Most of all, she detested being told she was glowing – unless they meant 'glowing' in the radioactive sense, like she was a nuclear reactor that was going to explode at any moment.

But all she did was smile back politely, and wax lyrical about how happy she was. And they all believed her without question: her husband, her father, her friends, even the healers.

Yes, it had been a stroke of good luck to get Andromeda as her midwife. However, even that couldn't put Lena's mind at ease. She was barely even thinking about the actual birth part of having a baby – it was what came after that was making her want to tear out her hair, to break things, to scream at the top of her lungs. The word 'mother', which came up in conversation so frequently, never failed to make her insides twist. And when anyone asked, "Have you started thinking about names yet?", Lena wanted to throttle them. The last thing she wanted to be reminded of was that the thing inside her womb was going to grow up to be an actual person – it was frightening enough to think of it as something alive.

She kept her 'delighted mother-to-be' mask on, but it was getting harder and harder to keep it in place. She felt like she was losing her mind, which wasn't helped by the dreams of blissful motherhood, where an imposter wore her face and lived in her house and kissed her Remus. Lena truly despised her, this woman who loved so deeply, and knew happiness, and was so... human. It was like a part of her subconscious was mocking her, deliberately trying to make her feel worse about herself than she already did.

Lena was a ticking time-bomb. And she had no idea what would survive the eventual explosion.

Friday 10 April, 1998:

Three months after Remus told Mr Riddle about his strange, awful dreams, his father-in-law was yet to provide him with any answers. Although the dreams persisted – filling Remus' sleep with flashes of fighting, talk of people dying, and a growing sense of hopelessness– they both remained at a loss as to what was causing them.

On a more positive note, there had been a reprieve the past month from the unexplained natural disasters that had been plaguing the world since the end of last July. Some people thought that meant it had finished, that the world had returned to normal. Others worried it was simply the calm before the storm, and something catastrophic was on the way.

But Remus' worries were mostly confined to his dream-world; in real life, there was too much to be happy about. Lena was due to give birth any day now. Parenthood was imminent for both of them, and Remus couldn't wait for it. His and Lena's child – he had never felt so much love for anything in his life.

One Friday evening, Remus took a detour before returning home from work to speak to Mr Riddle at his house, just wanting to check the older wizard hadn't learned anything new. But Mr Riddle could offer him nothing more than an ear to listen to the stories Remus' dreams told, which was at least something. Being able to talk about them with someone did give him some slight relief, lessening the pressure on Remus' uneasy mind.

He returned home just after half-past-eight. Lena wasn't downstairs, so before he got himself some dinner, Remus went upstairs to look for her.

She was in the nursery, magically rearranging the furniture. Remus leant against the doorway, smiling as he watched her. He thought she looked wonderful, with her hair in a loose plait and wearing her maternity overalls; and the physical strain of the pregnancy didn't dampen her astonishing magical ability at all – she was moving everything wandlessly. She glanced at him briefly, not stopping her efforts at interior design.

"I was expecting you home at least an hour ago," she said quietly, turning her gaze back to the armchair hovering in mid-air.

Remus' stomach dropped slightly. There was tension in Lena's voice.

"Sorry about that," he said, as sincerely as he could. He went further into the room, getting closer to her. "I got caught up at work."

"Doing what?" asked Lena, still not looking at him.

"Oh, just some administrative stuff I missed earlier this week," Remus told her, reaching his hands out to touch her waist...

The armchair suddenly crashed to the floor, and Lena spun around to face him, with surprising speed for someone of her current size.

"Why are you lying?"

Remus flinched. "I'm not–"

"I know when you are lying to me, Remus," she snapped, her eyes unusually icy. "So, I will ask you again: what were you doing?"

He wanted to sink into the floor and disappear. She wasn't just annoyed – she was angry. And despite his drunkenness last time, Remus could still clearly remember what a horrible experience fighting with her had been.

"I went to speak to your father," he admitted.

She cocked her head. "Why?"

Remus hesitated; he still didn't want to tell her about the dreams...

But his reluctance to respond only made things worse.

"Are you trying to hide something from me?" said Lena, in a slow, dangerous voice.

"No!" protested Remus instinctively, which was the wrong move again.

"I just told you not to lie to me."

"I didn't–"

"Why were you speaking to my father, Remus?"

"It doesn't matter!"

"If it doesn't matter, why are you so intent upon not telling me?"

"Because I don't want to worry you about it!"

"Oh, so it doesn't matter, but if I knew, it would still make me worry?"

"That's not what I–"

Lena violently flicked her wrist, and the wooden crib they'd bought together two months ago was flung across the room and smashed into the wall, splintering into pieces.

Remus stared at it, shocked, then looked back at his wife. In the four years he had known her, he had never seen her like this – so angry, so uncontrolled – and he was beginning to feel afraid. But, like an instinctive reflex, he covered the fear with anger. "What the hell was that for?" he shouted.

"Why the hell were you speaking to my dad?" she yelled back.

"It wasn't about you, if that's what's bothering you so much!'

She glared at him. "Then why are you so scared to tell me what it is?"

"I'm not scared, I just didn't want to burden you with anything when your main focus should be on the baby!"

This time it was a box of baby clothes Lena furiously threw across the room.

"FOCUS ON THE BABY?" she screamed at him, making Remus recoil. "I CAN'T THINK OF A SINGLE THING OTHER THAN THE BLOODY BABY, EVERY MINUTE OF EVERY DAMN DAY! IT'S ALL ANYONE WANTS TO TALK ABOUT! IT'S ALL YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT, AND I HAVE TO LISTEN WITH A FUCKING SMILE ON MY FACE!"

It was like she was a completely different woman. Gone was the calm, self-assured composure, the sparkling charm and the heart full of joy; in their place was a whirlwind of anguish, desperation and violence. And the single drop of doubt about her in Remus' mind became an ocean.

But Lena hadn't finished yet. Slamming the armchair into the wall and denting it, she continued to scream, "EVERYBODY TELLS ME WHAT TO THINK, WHAT TO FEEL! 'YOU MUST BE SO HAPPY, LENA! YOU MUST BE SO EXCITED, LENA! BECOMING A MOTHER WILL BE THE BEST PART OF YOUR LIFE, LENA!' WELL, I DON'T FEEL ANY OF THOSE THINGS! I WISH THIS HAD NEVER HAPPENED TO ME!"

Remus' heart was pounding, and he felt cold all over. He now vividly remembered the dread that had briefly surfaced during their last fight – that none of it was real. Now he knew for certain that it hadn't been unfounded.

"I thought you were happy," he said hoarsely. "I thought that once we'd talked about what was making you anxious–"

"You wanted me to be happy!" cried Lena. "And I always try to give you what you want – or at least an illusion of it. I try to make you happy, because I hope that one day it'll be enough to make me happy. I make it easy for you to love me, because then maybe one day–" Her eyes widened and she covered her mouth.

But it was too late. The words were already echoing around Remus' head. 'Do you even love me?'

For a few seconds, he closed his eyes, worried that otherwise tears would form. He dragged his shaking hands down his face, his breathing growing ragged.

She had been pretending – not just for the last nine months, but for the last four years. Remus hadn't been an exception to her manipulation; he was just more foolish than everyone else to believe he was special.

He heard Lena say in a small voice, "Remus?"

"Why?" he whispered, opening his eyes at last. "Why did you have to make me believe everything was so perfect? Why couldn't you just be honest?"

Lena's chest was heaving, and her face was even paler than usual. "Because... because..." She struggled to finish the sentence at first. Then Remus stepped closer again, and words poured out of her. "Because I was made wrong. Because if I was honest about who I am, nobody would want to be in the same room as me, let alone love me. Because pretending to be nice and kind and happy feels better than just being numb. Because I was scared of dying alone, and nobody caring I was gone."

There was a long silence. Neither of them moved; Remus' mind was struggling to process Lena's words, while she appeared to be struggling to believe she had said them out loud.

"I'm sorry," she whispered at last, turning away from him. "I was selfish."

Remus supposed that, in a way, she had been, and a part of him wanted to be angry. But another louder, more compelling part of him didn't care. He didn't care about all the lies she had told him. He didn't care that he barely knew who she really was. He didn't care if she didn't feel the same way he did.

Because loving her wasn't a choice; it had never been.

Both his head and his heart hurt, but Remus moved behind Lena and gently put his hands on her shoulders. Softly, he said, "Lena, please tell me what I can do to help you."

"There isn't anything."

Remus shook his head. "There must be something," he said stubbornly.

Lena didn't reply.

"Do you want me to tell you I still love you?" he asked. "Because I do. Do you want me to promise I'll never leave you? Because I swear I'll stay. Do you want me to take over all responsibility of looking after our child once it's born? Because I will." When no response was forthcoming, he continued, "Do you want me to explain why I went to see your father this evening? Okay, I've been having bad dreams–"

"I want you to call the midwife."

Remus tensed. "Why? Is something wrong?"

Finally, she faced him again. "My water's broke," she told him, wearing an expression of quiet terror. "The baby's coming."

The sun began to rise as Lena completed her seventh hour of labour. She was in the second stage, her cervix fully dilated, and had been pushing for two hours. And it hurt.

"All right, Lena," said Andromeda, her hands feeling around Lena's pelvis. "You're getting there. Just try to slow your breathing a little."

"I – can't," gasped Lena, squeezing Remus' hand so hard that he was wincing. "It – just – hurts – argh – so – much!" She shut her eyes as she let out another whimper. She had lived a life so free of physical pain that she hadn't been at all prepared for this.

"I know," said Andromeda gently. "But just think – once you've finished pushing, you get to meet your baby."

Lena just wailed in response.

She was lying on their bed, propped up by pillows, with Remus kneeling beside her on the right and Andromeda between her open legs. She had changed into a plain, sleeveless, white nightgown while waiting for the midwife to arrive, and its hem was currently bunched up around her thighs to give Andromeda access to all the necessary body parts.

"You're doing wonderfully, darling," Remus assured her.

Lena knew he meant well – and that he hadn't walked out the moment she'd let slip that she didn't love him was more than she deserved – but she couldn't stop herself glaring at him. If he so desperately wanted to be a father, why couldn't he be the one who had to push it out of his vagi–

"Argh!" she howled again, as her body – on its own accord, it seemed – pushed again, moving the baby closer to the opening.

"Try not to scream, Lena," Andromeda pleaded with her, not for the first time. "Remember, grunting or moaning–"

"I wouldn't be doing it if I could help it!" snarled Lena.

Wanting it to be over, she tried to focus on pushing. She barely heard Andromeda's words of advice or Remus' encouragement over her own laboured breathing and frequent shrieks of pain.

'Why the hell was I so sure I could handle this?' she thought, angry with her own arrogance. How could she have been so stupid to think it would all be fine – she, Lena Riddle, who had lived for twenty-two years without so much as a scraped knee?

She pushed again, and Andromeda called out, "Yes, Lena, good!" as Remus, with concern-filled eyes, kissed her hand.

'How can he still look at me with so much love? Even when he knows I don't return it, that I've been lying, that I am a monster... What did I ever do to earn that?'

Another push, and–

Lena had thought the pain before was bad, but it was nothing compared to the excruciating burning she felt as she distantly heard Andromeda cry, "I can see the baby's head!"

She felt like she was on fire, the pain spreading from her pelvis to the tips of her body. Her magic responded, making cracks in the floor, walls and ceiling. Agony completely overtook her mind, and Lena didn't think it was possible for anyone to endure so much pain...

"Stop crying!" Bellatrix bellowed, sending yet another Stinging Hex at two-and-a-half year old Lena, who let out a yelp of pain, her tearstained face staring up at her mother in confusion.

Why did she hate her? Why did she hurt her so much...

A five year old Lena, her wrist broken and her forehead split open, tried to run down the hallway. But with a few steps, her father blocked her exit. She looked up at him pleadingly. But he remained unmoved.

"Crucio!"

A scream filled the entire Lestrange house, echoing throughout all the halls and rooms, as Lena fell to the ground, twisting and writhing...

Eleven year old Lena lifted Hecate's Orb out of its case. For a couple of seconds, she didn't feel anything. Then the pain hit her and she thought she was going to die.

She couldn't breathe; she felt like she was being drowned and burned alive at the same time; a thousand knives cut her to pieces, an avalanche of boulders crushed her. And she was given the choice: to end the pain and die, or to live and endure it.

She chose pain...

In the Chamber of Secrets, seventeen year old Lena fell apart. The ground began to tremble. Cracks started to appear. Dust and chips of stone fell from the high ceiling.

"What – what are you doing?" Harry called out nervously.

Lena didn't respond; her head had started to painfully throb. Clutching it, she whimpered. A jolt of pain ran through her entire body, soon followed by another excruciating wave, making her clutch her sides and scream. It was only when she caught sight of the black veins on her pale hands that she finally understood. It was her own magic that was attacking her body. It was trying to stop her, to stop the destruction she was causing around her. So Lena stopped fighting and let the pain completely take hold of her...

Eighteen year old Lena staggered down the narrow passageway that led out of the Slytherin Dungeon, having just nearly drowned five of her housemates for attacking her best friend. The Orb's poison was spreading through her, making her head and chest hurt. She was dying – painfully. But she had chosen it. She would always choose pain over doing nothing...

With her burned right hand, twenty year old Lena made a fist, drew back her arm, and punched the door that kept her Voldemort's prisoner. There was a small splintering in her knuckle, and her entire arm jarred. But she didn't allow herself the time to acknowledge the agony, throwing another punch straight away. It grazed the skin off the knuckle, causing more blood to join the cut from the broken glass. Yet she punched again, careful to make sure she hit the exact same spot as the previous two times. She could feel the bones in her hand breaking, but she pushed through the pain and punched again. And again. And again. Because this was what would get her back to Remus...

The Orb was draining her life, and it was taking all of twenty-one year old Lena's strength to stop herself from succumbing to it. She just needed to hold on so she could hear Remus say it one last time.

On the other side of the invisible barrier, Remus told her, "I love you."

Seeing him so heartbroken hurt more than the excruciating pain she'd felt when she picked up the Orb again. But Lena embraced the pain. It meant she was human. And as long as she remembered what it felt like, she could survive without her heart. She would be Lena.

So she gave Remus one last smile. "I know." And she ripped out her heart, because she was the only one strong enough to do it.

Lena Lestrange had known the worst of pain. And she had known the best of love.

With one final push, the baby was born.

"It's a girl!" announced Andromeda, the baby's great aunt, smiling at the new mother.

Remus, without letting go of her hand, stared at the newborn with wide eyes. "Oh," he whispered, a tear sliding down his cheek.

A second later, the baby girl uttered her first cries. And despite the pain she still felt, Lena Lestrange leant forward and took her daughter in her arms.

"It's okay," she whispered, wiping her blood off her child's tiny forehead with a gentle thumb. "I'm here. I'm here."

Remus knew something had changed within Lena the moment their daughter was born, but he wasn't sure what. He didn't think it was just that she had connected with the baby, despite her fears that she wouldn't. It was deeper than that, like she was an entirely new person. There was such... compassion in her eyes when she looked at him, almost like she knew him better than he knew himself. Yet somehow, she still felt distant.

After the placenta had been delivered, Andromeda gave both Lena and the baby another check-up. Then she changed the bed-sheets and went back to St. Mungo's to report the birth, leaving Lena and Remus to become acquainted with their tiny daughter. Neither had slept in over twenty-four hours, but they were both wide-awake as they sat on their bed, the baby still in Lena's arms, now asleep.

Remus gazed down at their little girl, with her tiny hands and a smattering of brown hair upon her head. "I know you wanted to wait until she was here to discuss names," he murmured to Lena. "Now we've finally met her, do you have any ideas?"

Lena slowly nodded, not taking her eyes off the baby. "I think her middle name should be Hope."

Glancing at her, Remus smiled. He didn't think his mother's name would have worked as a first name for the child – there was something just too odd to him about his mother and his daughter having the exact same name. But as a middle name, it worked perfectly. "I like that. And what about her first name?" It seemed like such an enormous decision, and he didn't have any idea where to begin.

For a little while, Lena didn't respond. Then she finally looked up and met Remus' eyes. "Matilda," she said.

His heart fluttered. "Like the book, from the day we first met?"

She stared at him, and Remus' stomach sank slightly when he detected a trace of sadness in her eyes. Then she looked back down at the baby.

"Yes," she said quietly. "Like the character from the book. Intelligent and determined with a keen sense of justice – what more could you ask a girl to be?"

Trying to put Lena's melancholy out of his mind for a moment, Remus mouthed the name to himself: Matilda Hope Lupin. 'Yes,' he thought, looking at their daughter. 'That's her name.'

At that moment, the child opened her eyes, staring up at her parents.

"Hello, Matilda," whispered Remus, gently touching her small hand with a finger.

Matilda made a sound in return – not a cry or a gurgle, but something softer, almost as though it was a noise of recognition. And although at only a couple of hours old there was very little she understood, there was one thing she knew for certain.

Her parents loved her.

It wasn't Lena's father or Remus' mother who was the first to meet the new arrival, but Sirius, who turned up a few hours after Matilda was born. And even though the exhaustion had finally hit Lena, and she was ready to sleep, she knew from the moment she saw Sirius that something was wrong.

He didn't say anything at first, just listening to Remus excitedly telling him about their daughter and looking at the baby girl lying in her crib (which Remus had repaired about a minute after Lena's water had broken) with a genuine smile on his face. But the Animagus could no longer hold in the terrible news for long.

"Just after six o'clock this morning," he told them, "there were four natural disasters that happened across the world at exactly the same time: a volcanic eruption in New Zealand, a tornado in South Africa, a tsunami in Alaska; and a sinkhole opened up in London, just about two miles south of here."

Remus stared at Sirius in shock. "A sinkhole?" was all he could say at first, before adding, "In London?"

"About a quarter of a mile in diameter, in a residential area," explained Sirius in a heavy voice. "It collapsed about ten streets, nearly two hundred houses. They still haven't finalised the number of deaths, but it's over five hundred at the moment."

Quietly, Lena asked, "And how many casualties from the other disasters?"

"Again, there's no definitive number yet; but all up, it's at least another hundred people."

Lena closed her eyes. She had been expecting this. Opening her eyes again, she excused herself from the nursery, saying she needed to use the bathroom. Once in their bedroom's en suite, she slid the door shut and sat on the stool inside, staring at herself in the mirror for a moment, before putting her face in her hands. Her body still hurt from the birth, but she barely noticed.

"What have I done?" she whispered to herself, Hecate's heart pounding in her chest. She wanted to cry, but she refused to let the tears fall from her eyes. It would be self-pity, and right now, that was the last thing she deserved.

She remembered everything – not just life before she had changed Time, but the flashes of Hecate's memories from three thousand years ago, and the sad, twisted existence of Lena Riddle. She had lived all three lives. And she had destroyed each one.

She had tried so hard to make this world perfect, but she had failed. Without her memories, she had been unable to truly love Remus. Now she had them back, she still couldn't love him – because he wasn't her Remus. He hadn't done the things and said the words that had made her originally fall for him. And he only loved her because he had to, his unknowing possession of her real heart warping his mind so that he was filled with a love that he had never understood.

And Matilda – the name that came from the book that had been sitting on her lap as she had proposed to him, not in her hand the day they first met, as Remus thought – only existed because her mother had traded hundreds of lives for her; not just the victims of the disasters of this timeline, but all the people she had murdered in the previous world to obtain the power she had needed to create a world where Remus would 'willingly' make love to her again, as well as to repair her damaged ovaries. She had bargained and lied and wilfully blinded herself to the consequences of her hubris.

And Lena knew it wouldn't stop here. She could feel it all around her, the cracks in reality deepening with every beat of her daughter's heart. As long as Matilda lived, she would continue to unknowingly take the lives of others – innocent people; the young, the old, the magical, the non-magical, the bad and the good.

'We told you there would be a Reckoning,' whispered the air around her. 'You cannot make the Impossible reality, and expect there to be no cost. You can have Order or Chaos, but you cannot have both.'

"I was just trying to make things better," Lena told it, her voice cracking. "For everyone."

'Liar. It was all for yourself.'

"No! I wanted to make them all happy – Remus, Harry, Voldemort–"

'Because you didn't want to feel guilt anymore. You tried to rid yourself of all pain. But you forgot the most important thing.'

Lena looked in the mirror, her pale, tired face staring back at her. "What?" she asked, desperate to understand.

'Happiness means nothing if you do not know sadness.'

Monday 13 April, 1998:

Moony gazed down at the Little One – Matilda, he reminded himself. Lena had lain her down on a blanket on the nursery floor, and his daughter, not yet even three days old, looked back up at him with curiosity. And the wolf knew she understood this strange, four-legged, furry creature was as much her father as the two-legged version she'd spent the last couple of days getting to know.

He curled himself around her, and gently nudged her tiny face with his nose. In response, Matilda's little hand reached up, brushing the fur on his snout. Moony growled softly, and the noise didn't frighten her at all.

He looked back around at Lena, who was sitting on the armchair, hugging her legs which she'd drawn up to the seat. She half-smiled at him, but her eyes were sad.

Moony whined at her. 'What's wrong?'

Lena shook her head. "You won't understand, sweetheart," she said quietly. "Don't worry about it – I'll sort it out. You just take this time with Matilda."

He whined again but turned back to Matilda as she started to cry. Wanting to comfort her, he nuzzled her, and within a minute, she was quiet and content again. And so wrapped up in his adoration and wonder for his daughter, Moony didn't see the tear that escaped the corner of Lena's eye.

Again, I'm very nervous about the response to this chapter; so if you can share your thoughts/feelings/criticisms, I'd really appreciate it :)

I was really struggling with finding a title for this chapter, but then I happened to be listening to the Barry McGuire song, and it just kind of felt perfect. But on a music-related note, I have a question: in the scenes where I've incorporated music, how does it read if you're not familiar with the mentioned song? Because generally I try to use ones with lyrics that have meaning pertaining to the actual content of the story, but of course, the music itself can influence the mood of the scene so much if you know it. So I'm just curious as to what the experience is like if all you're getting are the mentioned lyrics?

As always, thank you for reading, and until next time, cheers :)