AUTHOR'S NOTE
Hey all! Long time no talk. I realize I haven't been on in years, so I sort of forgot to make the announcement here. But I got a PM recently and it made me think of it.
I will not be continuing to upload works onto this site. I don't use this site anymore, and I have no desire to. You can find more current works I've done on Archive of Our Own, under the name somefantasytosurvivereality. This fic exists there, and it currently has a sequel in the works called a A Summer of Magic. I would link you to it, but this site keeps deleting links I put in.

I realize that I'm not supposed to just put updates here with no actual fic, so here's the first chapter of that sequel!

This is the only chapter on Ao3 so far, but I will only be uploading there from now on, and I will not really be checking reviews consistently here, so PM me if you have any questions! Apparently I get emails for PMs so I'll notice those.

Also if you don't have an Ao3 account but want to, PM me and I'll be happy to send you an invitation. You will have to give me your email, but it would be faster than requesting one on your own, from my understanding.

"****************

Remus checked the address on the slip of paper in his hand. It had been a long day and all Remus really wanted to do was find a nice lunch. He had started early and taken a cross-Atlantic portkey to New York City in the States. When foreign Wizards entered the States they had to complete a formal process to register their wand and get permission to practice magic. Thanks to Dumbledore and his connections, all of Remus's paperwork was already in order, so it had been a time consuming, but relatively painless, process. From there, Remus had been able to floo easily to the North Gotham Mall. A large and complex building that was mainly a very large and labyrinth like area muggles could buy pretty much anything. But a few sections led to a small magical population that dwelled within Gotham, allowing the wizards and witches to gather and shop away from their muggle neighbors.

To keep this secret, there were a number of shops, like a fortune teller and an old used bookstore, that connected directly to their Muggle counterparts. Remus himself had gotten into an elevator in the magical part of the mall, but when he exited it had been in the Muggle, or No-Maj as they were referred to here, section.

Dumbledore had instructed him to go into the Muggle part of Gotham and hail a Muggle cab. Remus, while struggling a bit with unfamiliar currency, was thankful that he had experience in the Muggle world and would not stand out too much with his ratty coat and well used suitcase.

The cab driver had asked for Remus's destination, grunted a response, made a truly alarming entrance back into traffic, and turned the radio louder. It was playing an unfamiliar song, with a lot of screaming and loud beats, so Remus decided this was a hint not to talk, which he was grateful for as small talk had never been a skill of his.

However, this did have the unfortunate side effect of giving Remus time to ponder his circumstances. Dumbledore had approached him a few days ago with a special task. Remus had not thought too much about it at the time, since most of the members of the Order were being sent out on a number of tasks, but had quickly noted its strange nature.

For one, it was a teaching position. While Remus had taken the position at Hogwarts more out of desperation for a steady job than an actual desire to teach, he had enjoyed the position immensely. It was truly something to be able to shape young minds and help them on their way. There were of course rotten days too. Days where Remus really truly wondered if the pay check was worth all the shit he put up with, but thankfully those were rare days.

The position over the Summer was specifically focused on a single student who had little to no practical or theoretical knowledge of magic, and wished to attend Hogwarts the coming year. Dumbledore had expressed a desire to put the student into fifth year with his age mates, but Hogwarts did not have any formal rules about transfer students, considering there had been less than thirty in Hogwarts' long and illustrious past.

The more strange part about the task, was that Remus was to stay there until the school year started. This of course made sense as he would be tutoring, but made much less sense considering his 'furry problem.' However, Dumbledore assured Remus he would be supplied with a fresh batch of Wolfsbane potion every month and a safe place to go, and that had been that.

Remus noticed that they were drawing further away from the city. While the ride had started among tall buildings and crowded streets, the city was thinning out and houses were further apart until the trees grew thicker and thicker.

The Cabbie stopped abruptly in front of a large and ornate gate, and Remus could only see a meandering driveway beyond the large fence and tall trees surrounding the property. The driver gave another grunt and barked out a number, so Remus handed over a respectful amount of bills after fumbling a bit with the new money. Why it all had to be the same shape and color was beyond him. The cabbie did not offer change and started driving away almost before Remus had the trunk shut.

Alone now, Remus remembered the other instructions he had been given. Despite the fact that he was coming to tutor a magical child, the house was owned by Muggles, and Dumbledore had explained how to work the intercom on the gate to let them know he arrived.

It took a moment of looking around before Remus found the button on the unoccupied gatehouse.

"Wayne Residence," answered a stately voice with a much too familiar accent. It had an odd tinny quality from the speaker, but was easy enough to understand.

"Um, yes, hello. I'm Remus Lupin." Remus wasn't positive where he was supposed to look, so he just settled for focusing on the little speaker box. "I'm here as a tutor?"

"Of course," the voice answered. "We have been expecting you, Mr. Lupin. Please wait there and someone will be down to collect you."

The voice didn't say anything else, and Remus wasn't sure what to do with himself while he waited. Remus put his suitcase down and admired the beautiful gate in front of him. Dumbledore had urged him not to go in without permission, as the house was surrounded by powerful magical wards. He had not answered when Remus had asked while a muggle house needed such powerful wards around it.

There had been a lot of unanswered questions recently.

Most of those unanswered questions revolved around Harry Potter. The twenty-four seven guard around his house had been discontinued only a week into the Summer, and the younger Weasleys had been getting letters from Granger about how Harry had left his relatives and was very happy where he was. Of course, Granger was smart enough not to risk putting the new location in a letter, but it still put all of the Order on edge. Remus had asked a great many times to be able to go get Harry, and Sirius was still insisting he could spend the Summer with him, so there had been a lot of hostility in the house when Dumbledore refused.

Not even a full month after Harry was discovered missing, there was an order meeting that Dumbledore missed, and no one had found any trace of him for several hours. The Order had been panicking when the man showed up in the fireplace to call an emergency Order meeting looking more exhausted than ever before. He had told them that Harry was safe, but refused to share any more information on the subject. It had been very tense at number twelve Grimmauld Place after that. Remus was almost glad to get away.

He was a bit concerned about the odd twinkle in Dumbledore's eyes when he saw him off, but he told himself it must have been nothing.

Remus was interrupted from his musing when he saw a man coming down the driveway towards him. The man was about Remus's age with tall, broad shoulders, and a suit that was expensive enough to make Remus shudder. The man nodded, then headed to the side of the gate, where he must have done something, as the gate opened before Remus.

Remus picked up his suitcase, but before he could go through the gates the man held up a hand to stop him. "I, Bruce Thomas Wayne, allow Remus John Lupin through these gates and into my home."

There was a slight ripple of magic in the air, and Remus recognized the wards acknowledging him. Remus made his way through the open gate and shook the man's extended hand.

"Bruce Wayne," he introduced. Wayne's grip was firm and his tone strong. While Wayne could not be considered friendly, there was none of the outright hostility that Remus usually found in the people that knew he was a werewolf.

"Remus Lupin."

Wayne nodded, letting go of his hand and gesturing to the driveway. They started to make their way up the road as Wayne continued talking. "Thank you for coming. First I'll show you to where you'll be staying. There's a nice cottage on the grounds that used to belong to the gardener, but hasn't been lived in for quite a few years. I thought you might appreciate some privacy, so I've had it fixed up for your use."

"Yes, I appreciate that," agreed Remus as they rounded a curve. A large house, more similar to a mansion or a castle, waited at the end of the road. It was dark and imposing, even in the bright light of day..

"That's the main house," explained Wayne. "My children and I live there with Alfred, our butler. You are more than welcome to join us for meals, but your cottage does have fully furnished kitchen. However, I do insist you come to lunch with us today to meet the rest of the family."

Remus was unsure what to focus on in that sentence. He had only known of one child, although it was not odd for a lone muggleborn to appear among non magical siblings. Remus decided to ignore the whole butler thing completely. "Lunch sounds wonderful."

Before they reached the main house, Wayne led them down a different path to the right of the driveway and through an elaborate set of gardens, leaving the house behind them. The grounds were well cared for and beautiful, boasting of a bright range of colors and scents. This was a garden one could spend an entire afternoon in and most likely still miss a few corners. "Every Wednesday a number of groundskeepers come in order to maintain the grounds. I would appreciate if you would refrain from using magic during that time. Any other time the grounds are secluded enough that it shouldn't be a problem."

It was the first mention of magic that Remus had heard. "I will keep that in mind thank you." There was silence as they continued walking through the well manicured garden, and Remus could just make out a shape of a small stone cottage in the distance.

"I'm curious to how exactly you know Dumbledore," Remus brought up after a moment. It had been bugging him since Dumbledore had explained the mission, but there had been no time to ask the older Wizard.

Wayne laughed. "We have a mutual friend." That didn't really answer any of his questions. Although, it rather did sound like something Dumbledore would say.

The cottage they were heading towards was modest compared to the grandeur of the rest of the estate. The stonework fit nicely into the garden and the woods behind it, without taking away from the scenery, altogether not a bad place to spend a few months.

Wayne pulled a key out of his pocket, unlocking the cottage before handing it to Remus. "Here is the cottage. It's a two bedroom, but I've converted the downstairs bedroom into an office space. The master bedroom upstairs has a fully furnished bath and has a lovely view of the grounds"

Taking a peak around showed the house was tastefully decorated, with a dining space and kitchen to his right and a living room to the left with a door leading to presumably the converted office.

"I would suggest you get settled in." Wayne checked his watch. "But it seems lunch is about to be served, and I'm sure that your journey has made you hungry."

"Yes, of course, lunch sounds good" Remus agreed, setting down his suitcase and coat. It was a warm summer day, there wouldn't be any need for it walking up to the main house.

"Excellent, if you'll follow me then." Wayne led them from the cottage up a different path, towards the back of the main house.

"The path we took here is the fastest to get to the gatehouse, there are a few other exits on the grounds, but that's the only one that leads to the main road. This will be the easiest to get to the house." Wayne pulled out another key and handed it to Remus. Remus wished for a moment he had the foresight to bring a keyring.

Wayne continued talking as they drew closer to the house "The back door of the house is generally unlocked during the day, but this key will get you in when it's not. Please do not use magic on the locks of the house, it will set off alarms. And if you see the lock broken and the alarms aren't going off, it's most likely the boys. The younger ones are learning to lockpick and tend not to listen when I tell them to use the practice locks instead of the doors."

Remus wasn't quite sure where to start with that. Not exactly sure what muggle children tended to learn, and a bit too nervous to wonder if all muggles knew how to lockpick, Remus decided to focus on something else.

"How many children do you have, Mr. Wayne? I was told very little, but that I would be teaching one student." There was a pool on their left, with some abandoned floats in it.

"Bruce, please. And four children." Wayne said. "Two of them no-majs, or Muggles to you I suppose, like myself. One has known he was a wizard since he was eleven and has been attending school. If you have some spare time, I'm sure he should brush up on a few things. But the one you specifically will be working with just recently learned he had magic at fifteen."

"Fifteen?" Remus wasn't sure what to do with that. Accidental magic generally started as young as about a year old, and most children started showing in their third year. Although some children were known not to produce anything resembling magic until 7. Some works would swear that it was possible for manifestations to never happen until thirteen, but there were no recently documented cases.

"Yes it was quite a surprise for us as well." Bruce said. They were at the backdoor, which was unlocked as Wayne had said. It lead to a living area that did rather look as though four children had been using it recently.

Wayne led them through a few hallways and into a formal dining room set for six. An older man was setting down a large bowl of mixed green salad, but other than that the room was unoccupied.

"Remus, this is Alfred Pennyworth," Wayne introduced.

Alfred inclined his head. "Pleasure to meet you Mr. Lupin." Remus recognized the voice from the gatehouse earlier. "I had the cottage set up, but let me know if there is anything else you require."

Alfred turned to Wayne. "The children jus stampeded in from the pool, and I instructed them to change before meeting our guest. And sitting in the good chairs. They should be down in a moment." With that Pennyworth headed back into the kitchen.

"Take a seat," Wayne said, gesturing to one, and Remus sat down, looking over the offering of sandwiches and side dishes. "Meals can get a bit chaotic, and it's pretty rare everyone is home in order to share one, so this most likely won't be a common occurrence."

There was the sound of what must have been hippogriffs running down stairs, as a third door opened from the other end of the room and in a mess of dark hair and tangled limbs, Wayne's children seemed to be fighting to get through the door first. They all landed in a rather large pile, and Remus looked over at Wayne to see the man holding his head in his hands.

The kid on top, one of the smaller ones whose shirt was pulled tight by another hand holding it in a vice like grip to hold the other back sat up. "Oh hi, you must be Mr. Lupin."

Remus nodded, not sure what to say.

The kids started to extricate themselves from the pile, with much grumbling, a few swear words met by a sharp, "Language!" from Wayne, and a few elbows thrown in. The kid on the very bottom of the pile dug around on the ground for a pair of glasses that fell about an arms length away, and one of the others helped grab them.

"Remus these are my kids." Wayne said gesturing to the kids as they got up. "This is Tim," He pointed to the youngest who was lucky enough to be on top of the pile and was making his way over to the seats.

"Jason, you're new student." Jason seemed to hold more interest in the food then in the conversation, but gave a nod at his introduction.

"Dick's the one that's way too old to be racing his brothers to lunch," the oldest laughed and helped the last one off the floor, his body slightly blocking the one getting up.

"Jason said ready, set, go, I couldn't just let him beat me!" Dick said. And Remus heard a different laugh that sounded a bit familiar but he couldn't place it. Until the oldest moved out of the way.

"And I hear you're already acquainted with my other son." Bruce said, gesturing to the last boy.

Remus felt his jaw drop. "Harry?!"

Harry smiled. "Hi Remus."

***********
AUTHOR'S NOTE

Once again, this fic will no longer be updated on this site.

If you want updates, please go to Archive of Our Own, under the name somefantasytosurvivereality. This fic exists there, and it currently has a sequel in the works called A Summer of Magic.

PM me if you have any questions!