Written For:

Gift Giving Extravaganza 2017 (late!) - For Liza (NeonDomino)

Hogwarts 365 Prompts: Pirate!AU

Word Count: 3,818

Thanks to Bex (DobbyRocksSocks) & Sam (MissingMommy) for beta-ing :)

On the worst day of Remus's life, the sea was strangely quiet and almost glass-smooth. The sun was obscured by a blanket of mist and fog, and the few waves that lapped against his small wooden fishing boat were gentle and tame.

All things considered, it was a perfect day to be out fishing. Remus hadn't long since turned eighteen, and his parents had finally allowed him to venture out to sea alone, without the guidance of his father. Granted, he had journeyed a little further into the ocean than his father normally allowed, but Remus wanted to bring back a really big catch. He wanted to prove his worth as a fisherman to his parents, and prove that he could man the boat without instruction.

As the telltale gleam of sun behind the fog began to dim and darken, Remus hauled his net back onto the boat, marvelling at the amount of trout he'd managed to catch in such a short time. He beamed and hoisted the sail of his small boat up, and directed himself towards the harbour.

As the boat turned, however, Remus caught sight of something dark making its way through the gloom, heading straight towards him.

An enormous ship loomed, bigger than anything Remus had ever seen. The body was ebony, and the sails that hung from it's tall masts were black as coal. The skull-and-crossbones that adorned the sail signified that it was a pirate ship, but unlike most pirate ships that Remus had seen in picture books and articles, the sheets were in near-perfect condition and the wood was unmarred. As the ship drew closer, Remus saw dark green threads weaving through the black sails, and the crossbones were adorned with roses. It was a pirate ship that Remus knew very much about, but had hoped was only legend.

The ship was far too close for Remus to make a hasty escape, and even if he tried, he knew he wouldn't be able to out-row such a vessel. Two dark-haired figures appeared high on the deck, and beckoned for Remus to come closer.

He knew better than to deny a request of these pirates. His bedtime stories had been filled with tales of their dark deeds and violent crimes since he was old enough to listen and understand. Slowly, he lined his boat up alongside the ship, and looked up at the pirates. A rope ladder was thrown down. "Climb up!"

Remus took a breath and grasped the rope with both hands, and made his way up the ladder slowly. His little fishing boat looked smaller and smaller below, the higher he climbed into the ship. Finally, he reached the deck, and two pairs of rough hands yanked him on board, dragging him towards the helm.

He was forced to his knees in front of the wheel, where an ominous woman stood. "You're kneeling in front of Captain Walburga Black," muttered one of the men who clutched his shoulders. "Make sure you show some respect."

Captain Walburga was a terrifying sight to behold. Remus wondered idly if the perm-sporting, hook-handed pirates from his storybooks had anything on this woman. She was a small lady, with a slender frame and narrow shoulders, but her disposition seemed larger than life. Her onyx black eyes stared out at the sea ahead, instead of looking at Remus, and her lips were pursed in a thin line. She was dressed in expensive leather from boot to fingertip, and her white-streaked, pale blonde hair was scraped back into a tight bun.

"You have been caught stealing from me, boy," she spoke suddenly, still not looking at Remus. Her lips barely moved as she spoke.

"What?" Remus blurted, and he was kneed in the back. "I haven't—I swear I haven't. I haven't met any of you until right now, and I honestly wouldn't know where to steal from you, if I was to steal…" his ramblings were cut off by Walburga holding a gloved hand up sharply.

"You were fishing outside of your designated zone," she replied smoothly. "You were stealing produce from my territory. Don't you know that I own these seas, lad? I generously give each lowly fishing family a patch of space, yet you're still too greedy for your own good."

"I'm sorry," spluttered Remus. He was confused and shocked—he knew of Walburga's wrath, but no one had ever spoke of actually meeting her and dealing with the said wrath. If his family had been given an area to fish, why had his father never told him about it? Why wasn't he warned before he left to fish alone?

Remus's heart sank. He had been warned. His mother and father had both told him to stay where he could see the harbour clearly, and Remus had openly wandered just a little too far. It was probably because of the mist.

"I'm sorry," he repeated. "It's the first time I've been on the sea alone. I didn't realise how far out I'd gone. All the fish is still on my boat, you can take it."

Walburga shook her head, wearing a dangerous smirk. "You think I'd believe the likes of you?"

"Mother," a voice interjected from Walburga's left. Remus looked over at a tall man, around the same age as him, who looked a lot more sympathetic than the captain. He had long, wavy black hair that was tied loosely in a knot at the back of his head, and he wore leather trousers and an open flannel shirt. Remus saw the resemblance in his dark eyes and slim frame. "I think he's telling the truth. Surely we can show mercy for a first-time fisherman?"

"Mercy?" scoffed Walburga, throwing a dirty look to her son. "I don't know where you get these revolting ideas, Sirius, but they will send you straight to Davy Jones' Locker." She slapped the back of a younger boy who stood close to her right. "Thank goodness you're not my only son. Now, make yourself useful and take him to the hold."

Sirius turned his eyes apologetically on Remus, and took over from the two men that were holding Remus to his knees. He pulled him to his feet and ushered him gently to the cabins, waiting until they are out of earshot to speak.

"I'm sorry about my mother," Sirius said once they were inside the hold. The musty room was filled with large wooden crates and a single desk in the centre. He led Remus to a wooden pillar by the wall, and sat him in front of it. "I have to tie you up. If I don't, she'll only get someone else to do it, and they'll make it hurt." Sirius used a damp rope that was already hanging from a hook on the pillar to tie Remus's arms behind his back, though the restraints were loose.

"Why are you being nice to me?" Remus asked suspiciously. "And why are you taking the captain's orders if you're sorry?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure you gathered that she is my mother," Sirius replied hesitantly. "I wish I could explain further, but I don't really know how to. All I can tell you is that she is just as dangerous and vindictive as the stories and myths make her out to be; if not worse. A true scourge of the seven seas."

Remus watched as Sirius's eyes darkened as he spoke about his mother, and he understood. Sirius was just as trapped here as he was.

oOo

It seemed like days had gone by before anyone came down to the hold again, but in reality it was only a few hours. When the door swung open, Walburga's slender frame was silhouetted against the speckled indigo sky. It was nighttime. Remus's heart pined for his mother, who would no doubt be fretting for his welfare.

One of the men who pulled Remus aboard followed the captain into the hold. Both of them ignored Remus and stood by the desk instead, using a match to light a lantern. The glow illuminated their harsh faces, and Remus listened to them converse idly and quietly. He soon learned that the man, Orion, was Walburga's husband—most likely the father of Sirius and Walburga's other son.

Remus understood quickly why Walburga was captain of the ship, and not Orion. She was intense, all severe glares and a sharp tongue. While she was slight and small and one of the few females aboard the ship, it was clear that the rest of the ship respected her—or feared her.

"Captain," Remus attempted to catch her attention, after several moments of being ignored. "Please. Allow me another chance to explain myself." He paused, waiting for them to look his way, but they continued talking between themselves. "My parents will be desperately worried about me. If you just release me back to them, I'll make sure that I never set a sail in your territory again." Remus knew that his mother would be ridden with anxiety, and his father would be blaming himself for Remus going missing.

Walburga's eyes suddenly lit up, as if the glow from the candle had reached deeply into the sockets. A small smile crept onto her face, and for a single, hopeful moment, Remus wondered whether he had touched a maternal nerve within the captain.

A stupid thought.

"Good, lad, very good," she crooned, walking around the desk and moving closer to Remus. "Yes, that's it. Your parents will save you."

"I don't understand," Remus said. "My parents don't need to save me. Please—if you just let me go…" The last thing Remus wanted was for his parents to be put at harms way while they attempted to rescue him.

"Silence!" Walburga snapped, her smile hardening cruelly. "They will save you, when they pay the fine."

"Fine?!" spluttered Remus. "What fine?!"

"The fine for breaching the territory that I set out with all the fishermen of these disgusting little towns," she continued. "It'll cost them two-thousand pounds for your release. Think of it as…" she paused, touching her chin with a gloved finger. "Bail conditions."

Remus's eyes widened. "Captain...my parents have never seen that much money in their lives. There's no way we could pay that fine."

"I know," Walburga released a cruel snigger. "Tricky one, isn't it?" Her shark-like smile grew bigger, until Remus began to wonder if she could swallow him whole. "Don't worry, lad. I think we can come to some kind of agreement. You don't need to worry about a thing." She straightened herself up, and threw one last smirk at Remus, before heading out of the door.

"What do you mean?" Remus called after her. "What agreement? Not with my parents?" Walburga continued to laugh as she closed and locked the door behind her, and Remus only shouted louder. "Leave them alone! Please leave them alone!" he howled, screaming until his throat was raw.

oOo

Several days passed. Remus only knew the change of daylight hours by the crack in the dark wood by his pillar. He tried to count the days that passed at first, but after several exhausted naps and hunger-induced weariness, he lost track. He was occasionally brought food—a jug of dirty water, a plate of dry seaweed, and even dryer crackers.

Just as he was beginning to wonder if Sirius had been a dream, he heard the old lock in the door clicking, and the young pirate came in, clutching a small burlap sack. He locked the door behind him, and rushed over to Remus's side.

"I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner," he told Remus. "My mother is the only one who has a key to the hold, and I had to wait for her to leave her coat somewhere before I could steal it."

"It's okay," Remus replied weakly. "Thank you for trying."

Sirius carefully untied Remus's restraints, and he rubbed his wrists gratefully. "I brought you something better than the manky old seaweed they're feeding you, too," he muttered, and pulled a fresh breadroll out of the sack.

Remus took the roll and held it awkwardly in both hands, looking back up at Sirius. He felt the need to be suspicious towards Sirius for his kind intentions—but his dark eyes, while so similar to Walburga's in shape and colour, were warm and kind and sincere. Remus knew that Sirius must have risked a lot to steal the key and food for a prisoner. When he started to eat the bread, trying not to rush through it even though he was starving, Sirius's smile was genuine.

He had barely finished swallowing the first mouthful before speaking. "What has she done to my parents?"

Sirius's smile faded and his eyes flickered to the many boxes and crates that were in the cabin with them.

"Sirius," Remus said quietly. "Please tell me."

Sirius took a breath, and hesitantly began to explain. "My mother has enforced a work order on the Lupins. They are working off the debt that they now owe due to the fine."

"Work?" Remus furrowed his brow, and Sirius looked at the crates again. Realisation spread through Remus coldly. "There's drugs in those crates, isn't there?"

"Hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of heroin," Sirius confirmed, looking down at his hands. Remus leaned back against the wall of the cabin; the bread in his hands no longer tasted good. He felt sick. Captain Walburga had his parents—his innocent, good-natured parents—selling drugs on the streets, unpaid, in order to free Remus.

The half-eaten breadroll fell to the floor beside him, and he began to envision his parents in that scenario. Remus had never sold drugs himself, or been around anyone who did, but he'd seen the kind of people who were addicted to heroin in the streets of his town. They were hollow-faced and grey-skinned, just skin-and-bone people who skulked around in the dark and alleys, committing whatever crime they needed to in order to get their next fix. They were dangerous. "This isn't fair," he said, his voice sounding strangled. "They won't last a week selling drugs on those streets. They've never dealt with anything like that in their lives."

"I know," Sirius reached out and took Remus's hand. Remus thought about snatching it away initially—what could Sirius know, really? But when he looked up, he saw his expression reflected in Sirius. He was angry and upset, too. "I can't stand living aboard this fucking boat, with these fucking cockroaches," he spat. "I hate myself for being a member of this family. My mother knew what her intentions were with you all along—she always does. This isn't the first time she's kidnapped a young fisherman with hidden motives."

"What do you mean?"

"She never really frees them. Yes, they may go back to their parents and live in their homes, but it's only a taste of freedom. She knows all their weaknesses. The people she kidnaps are from small-town families with small-town trades, and their illegal activity weakens their trades. She could ruin their businesses in a matter of minutes just by anonymously reporting their activity. She's done it before. They're left homeless, with no money, no roof over their heads—nothing."

"Sirius," Remus started feebly. "What will happen to my parents if they refuse to work for Walburga or pay the fine?"

Sirius's expression darkened, and he stood up straight, walking along the side of the cabin. His hand stroked the dark beams until he reached a large knot in the ebony. At least, Remus had thought it was a knot. Upon closer inspection, he realised that it was a gnarly, shrunken human skull, varnished black like the rest of the ship. "They become part of the ship."

oOo

Sirius made as many visits to Remus as he could over the course of the next couple of weeks, always bringing food and snippets of news about his parents when he had any. When it drew to the third week of Remus's capture, Sirius returned to the hold looking different. His face and demeanor had changed.

"Are you okay?" Remus asked, concerned.

"We've stopped ashore," Sirius explained immediately. "In your hometown. The crew all have shore leave, and I've volunteered to watch the prisoner."

Remus remained quiet, allowing Sirius to continue.

"They've made a shit-tonne of money from shifting a recent load of cargo, so I know that my mother plans on going a shore to celebrate with the crew." Sirius knelt down on the floor so he was level with Sirius. "I'm going to get you out of here."

"But my parents, she'll know. She'll hurt them."

"Don't worry. I've been thinking about this a lot ever since I found out we had shore leave. I didn't want to share my plans with you in case I got your hopes up," Sirius smiled apologetically. "I have a contact I trust in town, and I've convinced him to get your mum and dad to safety this evening."

"For how long will the safety extend?"

"Just a few hours. That's all we need," Sirius took a breath. "I pilfered enough gold from my mother's treasury to buy a boat large enough to take you out of the British sea, to Europe, or the Americas—wherever you want to go."

"We have to leave town?"

"That's the best I can do," Sirius murmured sadly. "I wish it could be different, but if you escape and stay in this area, you'll be a target for my mother. If you go abroad, she'll forget about you eventually. She never leaves Britain."

Remus was silent for a few moments, then realization dawned on him. "You stole gold from your mother?" Sirius nodded. "How could you do that? Sirius, you've risked way too much for me and my family already—your mother will hurt you, she'll kill yo—" he was cut off suddenly, as Sirius leaned forward and pressed his lips to Remus's.

When they pulled apart, Sirius's eyes were twinkling, and he produced a key from his pocket. "I've been stealing the key to this hold nearly every day to get in here, but I finally managed to find a different key old and rusty enough to put in my mother's pocket. She's on shore leave now, with the fake key, thinking that you're locked up safely in here."

"You know," Remus grinned. "For all your sparkling personality traits, you make a surprisingly good pirate."

Sirius laughed. "Okay. This is the plan."

oOo

It was almost midnight when Remus used the key that Sirius had given him to let himself out of the dock. He had been told to watch through the crack in the door and wait for the moon to be directly over the ship.

It felt brilliant to be free, even though he was still only aboard the ship. While he stood on the deck, he could feel the salty air in his lungs, the wind whipping through his hair, and hear the waves lapping beneath him. They no longer sounded cruel and violent below his prisoner's cabin—they were cheering for his impending freedom as they crashed against the ship.

There was no one else on the ship, as Sirius had promised. They were anchored in the harbour, and from his position on deck, he could hear jeering and chanting from a pub somewhere close to the port. Hopefully they were drunk enough to forget all about their prisoner.

While he waited, Remus cast his eyes around the rest of the seafront, glancing at the small, colourful painted houses that sat in uneven rows, some with awnings over their windows and some with little tables and patios on the front. He had always loved this little town, and he wanted nothing but to take his chances and rush onto dry land—but then he remembered the sparkle in Sirius's eye, and the way he kissed him earlier that night. He knew he could trust the pirate.

A low whistle sounded from somewhere behind him, and Remus rushed to the other side of the deck, leaning over the railing. Sirius was in a small rowboat, positioned close to the ship, beaming up at Remus. "Use the rope ladder to climb down," he called, and Remus dropped a nearby ladder over the edge, then hastily descended into the boat. "We have to hurry. It's five minutes to midnight, and my mother won't be able to stay away from the ship for long." Sirius started to row swiftly, and Remus stared ahead.

As Walburga's ship grew gradually smaller, and they turned around the bay nearing the next town over, Remus caught a glimpse of a small, wide-berth ship. There were no lanterns lit, so it was shrouded in darkness. But as they drew nearer, Remus spotted the silhouettes of two people standing on the deck—his parents.

Remus stood up so suddenly that he almost toppled out of the rowboat, and his mother and father reached over the railing to pull him on board, their arms folding around him instantly. He felt the warm damp of his mother's tears on his shoulder, and scratchy stubble from his father's chin tickling his neck. "I'm sorry," Remus babbled. "I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

"Hush," his father said, pulling back to get a better look at his son. "You're back now. You're safe."

When they had their fill of fussing over Remus, he suddenly remembered Sirius, and leaned over the railing. Sirius is grinning up at Remus from the rowboat. "I can't thank you enough for this," Remus said, his voice almost a whisper.

"You can thank me by getting as far away from here and my mother as possible."

The image of Walburga suddenly flashed through Remus's memory, and he pales. Sirius was charged with watching the prisoner, and if she returns to an empty cargo hold, she'll know that he was the one to free Remus.

The worry must have been evident on Remus's face. "Don't worry, Remus," he said softly. "I can deal with my mother."

"Come with us," Remus said suddenly, speaking over Sirius. "You hate living with them, you said so yourself. You went to all this trouble to free me, to free us—so free yourself, too."

"You don't want a pirate on board your vessel," Sirius tried to joke, but Remus's father stepped forward.

"A funny sort of pirate would go against his captain and reunite a family, my boy."

From the other side of Remus, Mrs Lupin held out her hand. "Climb aboard, son."

Slightly hesitant, Sirius took her hand and let the family pull him onto the boat. "It's the least we can offer you," Remus said. He kept hold of Sirius's hands, even after he was safely aboard the boat. "After you strived to provide the same thing for me."

"Thank you," Sirius replied softly. "You've saved me, too."