His not-quite-a friend hadn't disclosed all of the details, but Severus had a sneaking suspicion that the request for help had something to do with his attempts to woo Diane the baker.

He wasn't disappointed when Francis, on the walk to his house after work, said, "It's about Diane."

"Oh?" Severus said blandly, hoping he wasn't about to get asked for relationship advice.

“Yeah,” Francis sighed. A glazed look passed over his face, and Severus cleared his throat. “She’s been feeling run down lately, and I wanted to do something nice for her.”

Severus wondered what he’d ever done to give the impression that he had good relationship advice. He was almost tempted to ask Francis, just so he knew to never do it again. “I fail to see the relevance.”

Francis grinned at him and opened the door to his house. Severus followed him inside, glancing around curiously as he followed Francis’ lead and removed his boots.

The front door led into a small but cozy sitting room. An archway to the right revealed a kitchen with a small dining table in the center, and a partially open door from there led to a water closet. Directly across from the front door of the place was another door, between couch and bookshelf, that Severus assumed concealed Francis’ bedroom.

“I want to make her dinner,” Francis was saying as he walked into the kitchen, slinging his apron over a dining chair and picking up a pad of paper with pencil that had been waiting on the counter. “She's always cooking and baking for her shop, so a lot of the time she doesn't feel like making herself a meal when she gets home."

“You asked me over for culinary advice?” Severus asked. He was successful at keeping the derision out of his voice, but his tone was exceedingly dry. Francis took it lightly as always. Bad moods and general irritableness never seemed to bother the younger man, something that Severus snidely thought would serve him well in the marriage state.

"Well, yeah," Francis said. "Henry is a good cook, and I figured you would be the same. Boy had to learn somewhere. Was I wrong?"

No, he wasn't (about Severus knowing how to cook, anyways, if not about Harry learning from him), and that annoyed him. "Alright. When is this for?"

"Tomorrow."

"What do you have in your pantry?"

They spent the next twenty minutes scouring Francis' kitchen and discussing Diane's tastes. Despite his best efforts, Severus learned that the woman preferred marinara over alfredo, despised lamb, never ate bananas, enjoyed a small glass of merlot every now and then, knew a thousand different ways to make bread, and often baked homemade cat treats for her old pet, Gerald.

"Francis," Severus finally sighed, resisting the urge to rest this head in his hands, "if she is really as overworked as you say, I have no doubt that whatever moderately edible meal you scrape together will be appreciated."

Francis grimaced but smiled a moment later. "I'll make lemon chicken on rice, then."

Chicken, Severus internally groaned, thinking of the fish waiting for him at home. "Thrilling," he said blandly, standing to make his escape.

Francis showed him to the door. "Thanks for your help. Really."

"You're welcome," Severus said, a disturbing lack of sarcasm in his voice, and he left.

When he finally reached home, he found Harry already finished with his meal. He looked up and smiled at Severus' entrance, pointing to the covered pan on the stove, which was simmering on low. It was stir fry with cod again, something easily warmed up. Severus turned the burner up a few notches and started lazily stirring the contents.

"How'd it go?" Harry asked. His pen was poised above his Art of War notes, but he was looking up at Severus curiously.

"He wanted to talk about food," Severus muttered.

Harry looked at him a minute, then grinned. "Was it about Diane?"

"How did you know that?" Severus asked, surprised.

"You need to keep up more with the village gossip, Professor," he said cheekily, looking down at his notes again when Severus gave him a narrow-eyed stare.

The stir fry began to steam and sizzle, so Severus dumped what was left onto his plate and carried it to the table.

Harry didn't speak as he ate, but Severus could hear the light scratching of his pen against the paper.

As Harry was studying rather intently, the two of them sat in mostly silence that evening. Dark came much quicker these days, and winter was fast approaching. It had been a couple of weeks since they started keeping a fire in the hearth after dinner. Harry was lying on his stomach in front of said fire, reading his defense book, and Severus was in his armchair, when they first heard it.

Severus' heart seemed to skip a beat, and the book fell from Harry's grasp with a dull thud. He waited, hardly daring to breathe, for it to come again.

A log cracked in the fireplace, and Harry jumped badly. They stared at each other.

Harry began, clearly not talking about the log, "Was that—" before being cut off by another long howl.

Severus leapt to his feet, the journal in his lap crashing to the floor. He grabbed his wand, pulling a wide-eyed Harry to his feet.

"Listen to me," he said, laying his free hand on the boy's shoulder and turning him so they were face-to-face. He crouched slightly so they were at eye level. "I need you to go down to the beach. Take shelter amongst the boats on shore. Hide there and do not come after me."

Harry's green eyes shone with both fear and determination. "You can't go out there by yourself!" He grasped Severus' forearm, as if to keep him from leaving.

Severus tightened his grip on his shoulder. "I'm going to use magic to create wards around the village. If you are too close to me when I do so, it will alert the trace and the ministry will come."

Harry's breathing picked up speed slightly, and Severus took an exaggerated breath of his own. Harry copied it, and looked slightly more calm (if not still determined) as he shook his head. "You can't go out there by yourself."

He shook Harry lightly. "Harry, please. Go to the shore. Do you understand me?"

Harry hesitated, and Severus felt the passage of time as the knolling of a church bell for the dead. "Do you understand?"

"Yes," Harry finally bit out.

"Go," Severus said, releasing his shoulder and standing at his full height. He waited for him to disappear out the front door, casting one last look at Severus before disappearing. Severus turned and ran out the back door.

Their cottage was on the very outskirts of the village. Starting in their own backyard, Severus waited only long enough for Harry to have gotten far enough away before casting wards to repel the werewolf somewhere out there on the highlands. He started running along the edge of the buildings, casting as he went. He spared a thought for the villagers he hoped weren't watching him, as a slight silver sheen began pulsing in the air after his wand.

It took far too long, in his opinion, to reach the edge of the village, where he secured the edge of the ward to a stone that he hastily etched a rune onto before turning and strengthening the ward again with extra protections as he ran back the way he had come.

Passing by their home, he continued on to the far end of the buildings. They were less tightly packed on this end, and he noted with some relief that the lights inside seemed to be off. 

He repeated the process of tying it to a stone, internally berating himself for not thinking to set up ward stones along the edge of the village before now in anticipation of any threat. Two stones, one at each end, was the barest of minimums for any type of perimeter ward, especially one designed to fend off a dark creature.

Cursing himself, he returned to their own backyard and cast a quick notice-me-not charm on himself in case anyone looked through their windows.

It was a full half hour before anything happened, in which Severus had begun to hope that the werewolf (or werewolves) would remain content to run around the empty expanse of highlands, without endangering the village at all. His straining eyes, however, eventually caught sight of a dark figure rising up above the crest of a not-so-far-away hill. He adjusted his grip on his wand, watching intently.

Two more figures rose up, one on either side of the first. The middle one, which seemed to be slightly bigger, raised its head and began to howl.

The hair on the back of Severus' neck stood on end—Merlin, he hated werewolves—and he forced memories of the shrieking shack and his sixth year away.

The group on the hill paused before turning their noses toward the village. With a sharp, bark-like sound, the middle one leapt down from the top of the hill and began loping towards the settlement. The other two followed, and then two more who had been concealed behind the hill's outline against the stars joined them.

Five werewolves. Could be worse, there are bigger packs in the UK than that. Still, he fought down some baser instinct to just apparate away and waited for what he desperately hoped would not be a fight.

The leader grew closer and clearly noticed him. Changing course slightly to head right for him, the werewolf ran at full speed towards him. Severus held his ground, wand raised to cast a powerful blasting curse if need be, but the ward held. The werewolf slammed into it and was thrown back, yelping in pain. This ward was one specifically designed against werewolves, a spell he had worked hard to learn in his youth after Black's little "trick". 

The werewolf threw himself against the ward again a few times, clearly growing more frustrated as each attempt failed. The rest of the pack reached him, and the five of them began pacing back and forth in front of the ward, snapping their jaws and snarling at Severus. For his part, he didn't flinch when all five abruptly threw themselves against it again, although the ward seemed to buckle a fraction. It immediately bounced back, however, hurling the creatures away again.

Severus waited to see what they would do next. If they continued running against the ward in a concentrated manner like that, it would eventually break.

He was surprised, therefore, when the five split up and started pacing up and down the ward, growling faintly and occasionally shoving against it.

He grew more anxious as two of them passed completely out of sight, heading towards the more dense end of the village. He kept an eye on the other three, who were also spread out along different points on the ward.

He could still sense the ward in his mind, and he could feel the other two testing it like the three who were closer by were also doing. He cast a stunner at the largest, who he thought might be the leader. It passed through the ward and clipped the werewolf's shoulder as he darted to the side. Snapping furiously, and not at all deterred, it flung itself at the wall again with renewed vigor. Severus frantically sent a sectumsempra at it, which the creature completely dodged, much more wary of any curses after the first one.

Severus paused before casting another spell, sensing the ward weakening at several locations. Clearly it was much too weak to take damage from several different points and still sustain itself. If there were more wardstones tied to it, it may have held up better.

He needed to draw the others away from the ward before they broke through and he was too far away to patch it up. Ignoring the spike of panic that the thought of his hasty plan sent through his chest, Severus leveled a wide-spread blasting curse at the nearest werewolf. When it was forced to retreat backwards several feet, he leapt forward and passed through the protective ward into the open.

Drawn by the appearance of prey within reach, several of the other werewolves abandoned their attempts to break through the ward and ran at him. He tried to get a count on them, but fighting several werewolves at once was a task that required all of his concentration and then some. Multi-casting and throwing some very dark, powerful curses that he hadn't needed to use in years, Severus was barely managing to keep them from ripping him apart.

He felt the gaping hole of a breach opening in the ward just as he was able to finally get a count of the ones attacking him.

Four.