A/N: For Afeleon276. Thank you for the prompt, angel.

*wiggles with glee*

xx-Kitten.

Little Moonlight

By Kittenshift17

Under the glow of the full moon, a witch stole down a garden path, her feet bare and her hair all in a mess. She was a wild thing stalking the darkness and she felt no fear of what lay among the shadows. Or at least that's what she told herself. Moonlight gardening wasn't a hobby she'd expected to enjoy, but one that bought her great happiness. By the light of the waxing moon, she harvested moonlillies and snowdrops, she weeded flowerbeds and tilled the soil, preparing the ground to sow the next batch of hollyhocks and miracle seeds.

She tended to it without a care for her loneliness until the low growl sounded from the darkness and the hairs on the back of her neck all stood on end.

"How long have you been standing there?" she asked quietly, for though only the growl had sounded, Hermione could think of only one beast bold enough to stalk her by moonlight.

Another soft growl met her ears and Hermione tensed, one hand on her wand, the other gripping her secateurs tightly, lest she have need of them. She never knew when he came to her if he meant her ill will or something else. She never knew until the very last second when he was close enough to lunge.

"Use your words, Fenrir," Hermione encouraged when the growling persisted until she looked over her shoulder, searching for him in the dark.

It was futile. She might imagine herself a creature of the night, but she could never blend so well into darkness as the werewolf haunting her back garden. He had a knack of folding himself into the smallest shadows and stealing away before the sun's first light could kiss them from the world. Until he was good and ready to reveal himself, she knew he would simply growl from the shadows, perhaps prowl back and forth beyond the edges of her vision.

When first, he'd come, she had believed he meant her harm, and she'd fled to the house and sworn she would not return to the garden after night had fallen for as long as she lived. But there was power in moonlight, and she'd learned a simple pleasure in gardening, and if she had to face the werewolf in the wisteria bush to indulge both needs, so be it.

"You've been gone a long while," she said conversationally, turning back to the seeds she was preparing for planting. "It's been strange, tending my plants without the prickle of your presence sending a chill down my spine."

Another growl met her ears at her words and Hermione tensed, hoping to Merlin that it really was Fenrir back there, and not some other werewolf who'd smelled Fenrir on her property and come to investigate. She didn't imagine her strange visitor would take kindly to another encroaching on his territory.

"How have you been?" she asked, speaking softly while she leaned on her hands and knees to reach the middle of the bed where she dug rows in the soil with her fingers before laying out the hollyhock and miracle seeds one after the other. She would have grass stains on her knees and dirt under her nails before she was done, but there was a simple pleasure in touching the earth and letting its soothing presence cleanse her spirit.

"Words, Fenrir," she reminded him a short while later as she moved around the bed, still planting. "Use them. If you're not going to talk to me, why are you here?"

The next time he growled, the sound came from a lot closer behind her and Hermione startled a little, gripping the handle of her trowel a little tighter as she tilled the soil. She peered over her shoulder and blinked in surprise at the sight that met her gaze.

A monstrous wolf stood in the middle of her garden, the glint of the moon setting the grey fur stripe along his spine and down his tail to a bright silver glow. He was terrible and beautiful to behold, and the breath caught in Hermione's throat at the sight of him. He'd never come to her in wolf form before. In the past, even if he arrived as a wolf, he never stayed that way in her presence. He always shifted in the shadows before revealing himself to her only when he was a man.

Hermione turned to face him, folding her legs beneath her and sitting in the grass by her flower bed, watching the wolf as he watched her, padding slowly closer on paws larger than dinner plates.

"Are you stuck in that form?" she asked mildly, still holding her spade and willing to use it should he choose to lunge for her throat, intent on ripping it out. For months now, he'd come to her by moonlight and sometimes he snarled and raged and yelled at her, coming to her for the sake of fighting with her before disappearing for weeks on end. Other times he came to her and he was sweet and apologetic, and she didn't understand how they could be one and the same man.

He growled again, softly, still padding closer and Hermione watched him, entranced by the sight he made.

"Merlin, you're big," she murmured when he padded even closer, skirting carefully around the flowerbed she'd dug to stand before her, looming well over five foot at the tops of his ears. When he was stood before her, Hermione had to tip her head back to look up at him, and he sat back on his haunches before lowering his front half at the elbow until he half crouched in front of her, sniffing at her face intensely.

"May I?" she asked, suspecting this was one of the times he meant to be sweet to her, and so setting aside her trowel to reach a hand toward his ruff.

He nodded slowly and Hermione sank her hands into his thick grey fur, digging her fingers in and ruffling it. She smiled widely when he lowered his head to rest the top of it against her sternum, still sniffing her but surrendering to being petted. She never seen him in his form before, but she couldn't resist treating him like every dog she'd ever encountered, devoting herself to the task of scratching behind his ears and ruffling his fur until he gave a canine groan and leaned into her hands.

Just when she thought she might've found a happy spot to set his leg to kicking, Fenrir tensed and used his enormous head to topple her body backward until she sprawled on the grass.

"Fenrir!" she complained, gripping his fur tightly when he moved to stand over her threateningly, beginning to sniff her in earnest, his muzzle butting against her chest, and her stomach and then lower.

"Hey!" Hermine protested when he nosed aside the skirt of her nightie to try and sniff between her legs. "No!" Not okay. You're still a wolf! I don't go in for that."

He growled, pulling back from her and stepping over her. Hermione frowned at him as he padded into the middle of her freshly planted seed-beds.

"Greyback, come on. I just dug that. What are you doing? You're going to crush the seeds, big as you are."

She watched in surprise when his huge body began to shimmer a little, morphing before her eyes and she blinked when a large amount of grey fur fell from his body to scatter over the garden bed while he shook.

"Really?" she asked when he was human, balanced on his hands and toes over the plants and naked as a newborn.

"What?" he rumbled. "Hair is good for soil. Dig in in with the seeds. Be the best batch of Hollyhocks you ever grow, girly."

"Get out of there before you crush something," Hermione complained. "And what's the big idea sticking you muzzle up my nightie?"

He smirked at her, and Hermione blinked when he jumped from his hands and feet as though he was still a wolf, clearing the flowerbed and landing neatly in the same position before rising to his feet.

"Where are you going?" she asked when he walked across the yard and into the shadows.

He didn't answer, but when he reappeared, he wore jeans to hide his modesty.

"Do you have a secret stash of clothing in my yard somewhere?" she asked, surprised.

"Didn't figure you'd appreciate me turning up naked," he shrugged.

"Where are they? Why don't you keep them in the house? Won't they get wet and mouldy out here?"

"You worry too much, girly," he said gruffly, crossing to where she sat and offering her a hand to help her to her feet. "Come on. Are you done with your planting?"

"Yes," she nodded. "All the seeds are in."

"Lets get you cleaned up, then," he rumbled quietly, nodding her in the direction of the house though he turned his head this way and that, listening the sounds of the night.

"Is something wrong?" Hermione asked.

"Been away too long," he said quietly. "Take your harvest. Head inside. I'll be there in a minute."

Hermione frowned up at him.

"Is there someone else out there?" she asked.

"Just go inside and get warm, girly," he told her. "You're covered in mud."

He pointed to the stains on her knees.

"Yes, some big brute shoved me to the ground," Hermione deadpanned.

"If you don't hurry up, the same brute will shove you into a shower," he told her. "Now go on."

Before she could say anything else, his head suddenly turned sharply to the left and Hermione watched his eyes narrow before his hackles rose and he growled menacingly. Taking that as her cue, she headed for the backdoor quickly, the basket with her harvest tucked in the crook of her elbow as she went. When she reached the door and looked back, Fenrir was gone, but another loud growl from somewhere in the darkness followed by more snarling and some yelping made her think he wasn't alone.

Shaking her head, she set aside her flowers and headed for the shower quickly, knowing he'd invade the bathroom with her if she took too long by his estimation. She knew he didn't mean anything by it. She'd learned many things about Fenrir Greyback in the long years since the war, and when he invaded her shower it typically wasn't because he was a pervert but because that's where she was and he didn't think twice about her nudity.

She dressed quickly once she was clean and headed back to the kitchen where she found him slipping in the back door with blood on his mouth and a nasty bite mark on his shoulder, some scratches on his stomach.

"Did you pick a fight with the neighbourhood cats?" she asked, though she suspected the intruder had been someone of a more magical origin.

"Anyone new moved to town while I've been away?" he asked.

"I don't spend much time in the village," Hermione reminded him. "I think the woman at the grocery store mentioned a new chap had moved in on the other side of town. Why? Werewolf?"

"Mmmm," Fenrir hummed, washing his mouth at the sink. "Not sure if he scented me and came to investigate, or if he's been loitering near your property."

"Crookshanks has been out of sorts all week," Hermione offered. "But I haven't seen anyone snooping around, and I can typically feel where there are things lurking in the darkness on my property."

"He wouldn't have crossed the wall onto your property," Fenrir shook his head. "He wouldn't have dared."

"If you're about to tell me about having whizzed on all the fences to mark your territory, I'm going to be cross with you," Hermione told him, putting her hands on her hips.

Fenrir darted a look at her before looking away and using a tissue to wipe at the blood from his wounds without speaking. Hermione had learned he did that when what he had to say was what she didn't want to hear.

"You better not have whizzed on my vegetable patch," she warned him. "I eat those."

"I'm not a complete barbarian," he said, shaking his head at her. "No one's made any attempts to call on you, or say hello in the village?"

"I haven't been down there in a few weeks," Hermione shrugged. "What supplies I've needed, I've grabbed in Diagon Alley on my way home from work."

"Might just be a curious pup, then," Fenrir nodded. "But he was lurking. I don't like it."

Hermione smiled softly. "Perhaps I emit some beacon for werewolves that lures you all here," she joked, grinning as she moved over to fish out the first aid box so she could put antiseptic on his wounds.

"Yeah, well. About that," he said gruffly, surprising her when he tangled one hand into her damp curls and used the grip to tilt her head before lowering his nose the crook of her neck and inhaling her scent deeply.

"Good Lord, Fenrir, must you?" Hermione asked, goosebumps prickling across her skin.

"You're not far off with your beacon idea," he told her, his mouth by her ear as he continued breathing in her scent. "You said the kneazel's been out of sorts all week?"

"Yes," Hermione said. "Why? Don't pull my head so far. You're cricking my neck."

He eased up on his grip slightly, but he didn't release her, and his next exhale came out as a low growl.

"Are you worked up after your scuffle?" she asked. "Is that what this is?"

"Mmm-mmm," he hummed negatively. "Bloody hell, girly. You're..."

Hermione tensed when he breathed her in again before she felt the tip of his tongue tracing over her skin.

"I'm what?" she asked tightly, unsure how to react to his attentions. In all the months he'd been calling on her, the closest he'd come to what he was doing right now was the night he'd bitten her shoulder angrily when she'd whacked him with a frypan.

"Fuck," he groaned roughly, his free hand snaking around her hip to fist the fabric of her shirt at the small of her back and pulling her forward, moulding her body to his. "You're in heat, little witch. Merlin, I could eat you up."

"I am no such thing, thank you!" Hermione snapped, pushing her hands against his chest and forcing him back, holding him at arm's length. "I'm not a werewolf. I cannot go into heat."

"You know what I mean," he told her.

"I don't," Hermione huffed.

"I don't know what it's called in human terms. All I know is that you smell like if I was to fuck you right now, you'd get pregnant," he said.

Hermione's cheeks brightened to pink.

"Ovulating?" she asked. "You can... smell that?"

He raised his eyebrows at her and pointed a finger at his own chest. "Werewolf," he reminded her.

"Right..." Hermione said, embarrassed. "But you can... oh Merlin, don't tell me what else you can smell. I don't want to know."

He grinned at her, his eyes sparkling with amusement.

"Don't look at me like that, Greyback," Hermione huffed. "Go and shower, please, so I can treat these properly." She waved a finger at his wounds.

"They'll be fine," he dismissed.

"Fine, you stink," she told him. "Go and bathe. Now."

He curled his lip at her, looking like he didn't believe her, but Hermione scowled at him until he conceded and prowled out of the kitchen. She didn't bother directing him; he more than knew the way. Whenever he came to call on her in one of his good moods, he tended to make himself right at home in her cottage, so he knew where to find a clean towel and in truth, the toothbrush she'd given him was still in the holder beside hers.

While he was gone, she fixed herself a pot of tea and set out a cup to make him one too, before helping herself to the biscuit tin with the freshly baked shortbread she'd made that morning. She carried it all into the lounge and curled onto the sofa to wait for him to return, ferreting a book from the bookcase, but also flicking on the telly, knowing he rather liked watching it. She was immersed in her novel when he reappeared, and Hermione jumped violently when he leaned over the back of the couch to whisper in her ear.

"Happy now?" he asked, before laughing when she dropped her book in surprise.

"I hate you," Hermione told him, scowling over her shoulder.

He didn't answer before clambering over the back of the couch rather than walking around it, sliding into the seat beside her and helping himself to the teapot and the biscuits she'd put out. They didn't talk while he devoured the food, and Hermione noticed that he'd been right about his wounds not needing tending. They had already healed to shiny pink scars; something she could still see because he was still shirtless. He was always shirtless when he called on her. She expected he only owned one pair of jeans, actually. The rest of the time he simply wore fur.

"You were gone a long time," Hermione said conversationally once he sat back with his tea in one hand and slung his arm along the back of the couch. Hermione knew it was an invitation to burrow into his side if she wanted to. Fenrir Greyback, much to her surprise, was quite touchy feely and fond of cuddling when he was in a good mood.

"Couple of months," he agreed. "Was travelling."

"Travelling?" Hermione frowned.

"Aurors are hunting me again," he shrugged, his eyes on the telly.

"Harry again?"

"New group," he answered. "Led them a dance to the North. They won't come looking for me here."

"Of course they won't," Hermione sighed. "They expect that if you did, I would know, and I would notify them."

"Why don't you?" he asked, darting a look at her before sipping his tea. "I'm usually a shit to you when I show up. Why don't you tell them where I am so you can be done with me once and for all?"

Hermione sighed. She'd been asking herself that question for as long as he'd been calling on her - well over two years now, though often with long stints between visits.

"Who else is going to whizz on all my fences and scuffle with the neighbourhood beasts to keep them out of my garden?" she wanted to know, twisting around to lean back against his side so she could prop her book against her knees with her legs pulled up on the cushions.

She noticed the way he turned his head and lowered his nose to bury it in her curls, breathing in her scent again before he curled one scarred arm, ropey with muscle and sinew, over her chest and across her stomach to rest intimately on her hip.

"Why really, girly?" he asked into her ear.

Hermione bit her lip.

"Does it matter?" she asked in return because the truth was, she didn't know why she never reported him, and why she let him keep coming, so much so that he had his own toothbrush in her bathroom, and his own teacup in her kitchen.

"It matters," he said softly, "Do you know why you haven't chased me off? Or are you unsure?"

Hermione turned her head to look at him.

"I'm not sure," she admitted. "Sometimes you come and you're vicious and mean and you bite me and snarl and break things. But other times you come and your nice and you hunt down things to put in my freezer so I don't have to buy protein, and you see off the local creeps that think I'm unattached - not by my own free will - and imagine their sad attempts to woo me will surely win them a place in my bed. I ought to hate you, knowing what you are and some of the things you've done... but..."

He watched her intently and Hermione watched him in return before shrugging her shoulders.

"But?" he prompted when she didn't continue. "But sometimes I'm good company? But you secretly want to jump my bones and rut like dogs? But you can't resist my charms? What?"

Hermione laughed softly, though she suspected he'd like answers to all three suggestions.

"But I just haven't," Hermione said. "I can't explain it. The same way I can't explain why I live alone on the far outskirts of an almost-all-muggle village or why I don't keep in close touch with Harry and Ron anymore, or why I like to garden by moonlight and feel the earth under my fingernails when I do it. There are lots of things in my life I can't explain. You're simply one of them."

He nodded slowly before the laugh reel on the telly distracted them both and Hermione turned her eyes to it for a few minutes when Fenrir huffed a soft laugh along with them. For the rest of the night, they stayed there like that on the couch, her leaned against his side reading her book, while he watched whatever programs took his fancy on the telly until well after midnight.

"You got work tomorrow?" he wanted to know when she yawned loudly, stretching languidly against him.

"Mmmm, no," Hermione sighed, snuggling her cheek against his shoulder. "Tomorrow's Saturday."

"Good," he said. "Come on, girly. Let's get you to bed."

He nudged her a few times, but when she didn't budge he laughed softly and twisted, scooping her into his arms and carrying her out of the living room and to the stairs.

"I can do it," she said, resigned to going to bed after all.

"Shhh," he told her, carrying her up the stairs with ease.

At the top of them he buried his nose in her hair again.

"Hermione?" he asked quietly, surprising her with his use of her real name when he preferred calling her nicknames.

"Yes?" she asked, curling her head under his chin and enjoying how petite she felt when he carried her.

"Do you want answers to why you live out here alone, and why you don't bother with your old school friends much anymore, and why you like gardening by moonlight?" he asked, shouldering open her bedroom door and carrying her to the bed where he set her down sliding her between the sheets.

"Do you have answers?" she asked, frowning up at him.

He met her eyes before shrugging but he nodded.

"Go on then," she invited, blinking sleepily.

"You remember when I bit you?" he asked raising his eyebrows at her.

"In November?" she clarified, referring to the last time he'd showed up at her place highly out of sorts.

"The first time," he said. "During the war. That day in the forest."

"Oh," Hermione said. "That time."

She reached to touch the scar on the top of her right shoulder, where sometimes she would swear, she could still feel his fangs embedded in her flesh.

"That was a full moon day – right before the night of the full moon," he told her quietly. "I wasn't transformed, so you're not a werewolf. But… I was so close to it that you've got some… traits."

"Traits?" she asked. "Is this the part where you tell me I have a hairy back or something?"

He snorted, shaking his head and lowering himself down to sit on the edge of the bed.

"Not that I've seen," he told her. "Though I'd be happy to do a thorough inspection, just to be sure."

Hermione laughed and burrowed further under the covers.

"You see better in the dark," he told her. "You take comfort in the glow of the moon. Take your steak rare…. And prefer the company of werewolves."

"I…" Hermione frowned, prepared to deny him, but she knew for a fact that her favourite colleague at work was secretly a werewolf – something she'd only learned when Fenrir had smelled the scent of Hayley on her jumper one evening when he'd come to call after a work function where Hermione had loaned Hayley her coat after red wine was spilled on her dress in an unfortunate location over the bust.

"You do," he told her. "It's why the dates you used to go on with regular wizards all fizzled. It why you find no solace in your friendship with Potter and Weasley. It's why you live out here alone, and yet make room for me in your life, even when I'm awful. You're not a wolf, little moonlight, but you're as close as one can humanly get without the wolf-bite."

"But I…" Hermione began. "I don't feel any ill effects at the full moon, or suffer like you do," she pointed out.

"No, but you always know when it's full, don't you?" he asked. "You mark the days without even thinking, but you always know what phase the moon is. It's why moonlight gardening appeals to you and works for you when so many others fail at it. You don't feel any pain, but you feel the glow of it in your skin when it's full, don't you? You spend the full moon nights when I'm not here out there in the yard or even wandering the moors, don't you?"

Hermione bit her lip, looking out the window as she nodded.

"Is that why you said I smell like I'm in heat?" she asked, frowning. "I don't feel any different than I usually do."

"No?" he asked. "Not at all? You don't even feel like you need to shag someone?"

Hermione raised her eyebrows, her cheeks turning pink, though she ought to have grown accustomed to his habit of discussing the basic needs of her body in the same tone he would for the weather. They were one and the same to him, simply natural phenomenon to be dealt with accordingly.

"No more than I usually do when you're here," she answered without thinking.

"Makes a difference when I'm not here, does it?" he grinned and Hermione blushed.

"Um…" she said.

"Don't answer that one, little moonlight," he shook his head, grinning when she rallied her courage to admit that, yes, it did make a difference. "Not tonight, with the full moon so close. Not smelling like you do right now."

"Why?" Hermione asked.

"Because if you tell me you want to rut more when I'm around than you do when I'm not, all while you smell like you're in heat, ripe and ready to carry my pups… I might just plant one in you, girly," he told her, rising to his feet and pulling the covers up to her chin before making for the door, intent on patrolling the garden again, she expected.

He was in the doorway before the words blurted out of her mouth, unbidden.

"Would that be so bad?" she asked, unable to bite the question back before it was out of her mouth.

Fenrir stumbled in surprise, catching himself and bracing his hands in the doorframe as he stood there with his back to her, unmoving. Hermione instantly regretted her words. Gods, had she irreparably decimated this strange thing that had grown between them? Was there any going back from a question like that?

Slowly, he turned back to look at her and his eyes glowed the gold of the wolf. Had she angered him? Usually his eyes only went like that when he was angry with her…

"What was that?" he confirmed quietly.

"Um…" Hermine said, clearing her throat nervously. "I said…"

"Don't say it again unless you want me to join you in that bed right now, little moonlight," he warned her.

Hermione gulped audibly and picked at the duvet for a minute, weighing her options before latching onto her courage. She cleared her throat and look up to meet his eyes once more before she repeated, "Would that be so bad?"

Fenrir's low growl filled her eyes and Hermione squeaked when he pounced from the doorway, all the way across the room to land on the bed with her.

"You sure?" he confirmed, giving her one last chance to change her mind.

Hermione reached up, carding her fingers through the mess of dark hair hanging about his shoulders.

"Certain," she whispered, before pulling his lips down to hers and kissing him until she couldn't breathe.