*sequel to A Gutter Rat’s Tale* Severus and Harry set out to discover the secrets that entwine the only items that Harry's great-grandmother left Severus. Doing so may or may not revive the Snape-Potter family lineage, but it will, very literally, drag ghosts of the past, skeletons from the closet, and counterparts who walked separate paths in life.
Chapter 20
Chapter Summary:
*sequel to A Gutter Rat's Tale* Severus and Harry set out to discover the secrets that entwine the only items that Harry's great-grandmother left Severus. Doing so may or may not revive the Snape-Potter family lineage, but it will, very literally, drag ghosts out of the past, skeletons from the closet, and counterparts who walked separate paths in life.
Posted:
03/06/2005
Hits:
89
They sat together at a small dining table covered with exotic dishes of various meats, noodles, and vegetables. Francis and Tom Riddle eyed one another across the table from where Severus had made them sit as far apart from each other as possible. Harry, Harry2, and Draco were the only ones concerned with the meal. Francis just played around with his food and cast Riddle withering glances. Riddle leaned his chair back and propped his feet up on the chair across from him. Severus arbitrated between them, stiffly floating in such a way as to imply that if Riddle or Francis were to try and speak to one another, something Terrible Would Happen.
Everyone knew Riddle only tolerated Severus' behavior out of amusement and little else.
Harry2 reached out and tapped Francis on the elbow with the flat side of his fork. “Are you going to eat that?” he asked as he pointed at the sweet-and-sour pork cutlet on Francis' plate. Francis shrugged and shoved the plate over to Harry2.
Severus snorted. “Are you going to grow up?” he asked Francis darkly. “This is an entirely different realm, and this is a different Tom Riddle who married a different Pandora.”
Francis waved Severus' comment away. “Do you mind?” he asked as he glared through him at Riddle. “Allow me this single sulk for the night before I ignore what has happened to me because of him in the first place and must work together with him to save the Universe.” Francis scrunched his face up thoughtfully. “Save the Universe,” he muttered to himself. He made a face. “That sounds rather corny, doesn't it?”
Severus merely folded his legs beneath himself, crossed his arms before his chest, and scowled at no one in particular. The only sounds for a few minutes afterward were the click of silverware against fine porcelain, and Harry2 chewing with his mouth open.
Severus watched Harry2's somewhat tactless dinner manners. “Get your elbows off the table,” he said finally.
"Can't,” Harry2 mumbled a reply around a mouthful of buttered squash. "They're supporting my arms, which are holding my utensils, which I'm using to eat with.”
"Didn't that mother of yours teach you anything?”
Harry2 swallowed and raked another forkful of buttered squash into his mouth. "It was every demon for him or herself, especially when there were actual edible vitals on the table. When family came calling, fending for myself either worsened or eased, depending if the family that came calling could cook or not.” Harry2 shrugged. "Even then I get into trouble though,” he added.
Harry reached across Draco to grab the salt shaker. "How so?” he asked as he sprinkled salt over his potatoes. "Is all your family like Marcia?”
"Some are better, some are worse. Uncle Nandin is more dangerous to be around, but at least he can cook, and he tends to get rid of trouble rather than attract it. Grandmother and Grandfather are the best of the bunch. Grandmother's got a lot of money, and Grandfather is just young enough to be fun to be around with, but old enough for me to respect as an elder. My aunts Adora and Heather . . .” Harry2 shook his head. "You have to understand,” he said as he poured himself a glass of pumpkin juice, "I love my family. I think they're great, and they're the best sort of family an orphan like me could have been adopted into. I just wouldn't mind if some of them were a little more distant though, both literally and figuratively."
"I can tell where this is going," Francis said knowingly. He leaned forward. "What did some of your relatives do?"
"See, Mom isn't supposed to get involved with Voldemort in any shape, way or form, even when it comes to me. The Beast has declared it thus, and the Beast is the only creature in any dimension or realm Mom can admit to being frightened of for her own sake. That's saying a lot, too. Anyway, in the summer after she released the Wild Hunt, the Beast stepped forward to punish her for getting involved. He took the shadows of the Wild Hunt of old and dumped them and Mom together in a never-ending pathway. Can't quite figure out how that works, but that's how it was explained to me. Mom's duty was to outrun the Wild Hunt. It took her a whole summer to outrun and escape the Wild Hunt. In the time she was gone, Aunt Adora and Aunt Heather decided they needed to watch after me in the time that Mom was gone."
Harry2 grimaced as he ate a few more spoonfuls of buttered squash. Harry reached across Draco for the pepper shaker.
"You know, you could have asked," Draco said with a frown.
Harry ignored him. As he shook pepper onto his mashed potatoes, he saw Riddle studying Harry2 intently. Harry glanced over in time to see Harry2's tattoo blink its ruby-red eyes.
Harry2 waited to continue until he had swallowed. "Aunt Adora and Aunt Heather wrecked my whole summer," he replied with a shadow of a pout. "While they can cook over a fire or a wood stove, they blew up Mom's kitchen stove because they didn't understand how to use electricity; they blew up the microwave because they put a metal can of pineapple into it; they tampered with the septic system so even now the toilet in the house tends to overflow at the most inopportune times. Once they decided to drive to the market for groceries. They drove the wrong way on a one-way street - in reverse! They drove on the sidewalk, they flattened crossing ducks, knocked over a fire hydrant, which tore out the bottom of the car. We literally lost the transmission while idling at a red traffic light."
Francis grinned. "I thought my relatives were bad. My cousins Herbert and Myron were pretty strange though, especially since they were just Muggles and didn't have the excuse of magic-based eccentricity."
Harry2 threw his arms up in the air. "When the police came to arrest them, Aunt Heather accidentally unleashed a triad of demons she was supposed to be guarding. They proceeded to wreak havoc on London. That was hell trying to gather them up again, because the Beast was the one who had given them to Aunt Heather in the first place. When the Ministry of Magic leaned of what happened, I got into trouble for it. My Grandmother had to leave her kingdom to bail me out of the penitentiary cell I was being held in until a ‘responsible' adult picked me up. The Ministry interrogated Grandmother for four and a half hours until they deemed her safer than the two whacked-out aunts who got me into the trouble in the first place. She promised to talk to Dumbledore about me since Mom wasn't home. When she did, Dumbledore sent Professor Hooch to watch me, and Grandmother removed Aunt Adora and Aunt Heather from the place. The professor and I tried to clean up the kitchen, which was a mess because Aunt Heather and Aunt Adora don't know how to run a dishwasher and they disagreed the night before over what to make for supper, and that had escalated into a food fight."
"Some family," Draco said with a hint of trepidation.
Harry2 held up his index finger. "Here's the clincher though," he said. "Mom came home just after Professor Hooch and I began our cleanup on the kitchen. She didn't see Professor Hooch, who was in the bathroom fetching some cleaning supplies. Mom looked around the kitchen, looked at me, and said, ‘Harry, if you can't take care of yourself while I'm gone, I'll have your aunts Adora and Heather stay and look after you.'" Harry2 rolled his eyes. The others sat in stunned silence.
Riddle ran his finger along the rim of his wine glass. "Tell me," he said, "why do you call your mother Mom? It's rather odd choice of words for one of your background."
Harry2 jabbed the air with his spoon. "She always corrected me when I called her mum. She said that being called mum was reserved for my birth-mother. She was my adopted mother, and she wanted to be called mom. I guess it was a way for me to make a distinction between the two. Mom was always adamant in my knowing about my birth-parents. She used to hunt people down and make them tell me about my parents. When I was a wee kid, I was confused about why she did it. James and Lily Potter were dead, and Mom was the main force in my life. As a hindsight now, I see the roles they played in the past influenced part of my life when I reached Hogwarts."
"I see. And who is this Beast?"
Harry2 fell silent. He kept his eyes trained upon his plate for several long moments. He sighed finally and put his spoon down so he could pick up his fork. "The Beast," he said carefully as he stabbed his pasta salad with his fork, "is a creature borne from the darkness at the beginning of the Time. I guess you could say He's the devil, if you believe in that sort of stuff, because He rules what people would consider to be Hell. He is the source of all Disorder, the Lord of Chaos. He's not necessarily the source of all evil, but only anything that contradicts Order."
"And what is the relationship between the Beast and your family?"
Harry2 shrugged. "I really can't say exactly. My adopted family is a guardian of sort to the outlets of the Beast's nature. Sometimes He's friendly to us, sometimes He's definitely not friendly. We generally like to leave Him alone because we rarely know what sort of mood He's in. We're just supposed to watch Him. At least, the druids of the family are."
Francis waved his fork in the air. "What exactly was that argument between you and your mother about the Wild Hunt?"
Riddle's eyes sharpened as his finger stilled at the edge of his glass. Harry2 did not seem to notice. "Well, in my fourth year, I was in the final task of the Triwizard Tournament. I admired Cedric for keeping up with me, even with my being a demon, so we took the cup together. It was a portkey that sent us to Voldemort who waited in a junk yard. Pah! I wouldn't have minded a graveyard. At least I'd have been in good company. Anyway, Mom had been watching the final task with Dumbledore, so when she saw me disappear, she went to Ron for help. See, my family acts as guardians against the Beast, but we all know it's a bit of a farce. If the Beast truly wanted to, He'd break us all into little tiny pieces." Harry2 looked directly at Riddle. "And don't you think of summoning Him to request for any power, you hear?" he asked. "The Beast does not take kindly to being used and would take it out on everyone, not just the person who summoned Him."
Riddle glared, clearly offended. "My power is my own," he said tightly. "Pure and untainted; I have the pride in knowing I am what I am for what I am, and not through siphoning it out of some other source."
"Whath happen'd th'n?" Draco asked Harry2 with his mouth full.
"The Beast forbade Mom to interfere with Voldemort and whatever he does. Even if I'm involved." Harry2 smiled suddenly. "Mom swore up and down that she would protect me, and even the Beast cannot make her break her vow. So she went to Ron, said, Look, Harry is going to get killed if we don't rescue him. She figured that if Ron ‘was responsible' then she wouldn't get into trouble. The Beast didn't believe her for one second. Anyway, she took Ron to the place where the Wild Hunt was chained, told him what to say and do to release it. When the Huntsman stepped forward, Ron told him the Hunt was to rescue me from Voldemort. Because Ron released the Wild Hunt - under Mom's guidance, of course - it regarded him as some sort of hero.
"So here I was, hiding from Voldemort and his ragged band of animated junk parts - he said that since his Death Eaters were too incompetent to do a simple little thing like capture me, he'd do it himself - and this horn sounded across the country side." He spread his hands wide. "Over the hill and down the side came these hounds flowing like silver. Behind them was the Huntsman. Ron was riding behind him, and Mom's in the antlers." Harry paused to take a quick sip of his pumpkin juice. "The hounds scared off the other Death Eaters, and the last I saw of Voldemort, he and his band of animated junk parts were trying to outrun the hounds. I suspect he got away, if only because he managed to stay ahead of the Hunt until dawn."
"If," began Riddle, "the Wild Hunt was released, then I assume no one was powerful or pure enough to chain them up again. They are still roaming the countryside, free?"
"That's why everyone's so upset with Mom. The best the Ministry could do was trap the Wild Hunt in some magical perimeters so it can only be seen by, and attack, anyone with any hint of magic. Of course, Muggles carrying even an object with the smallest bit of magic are prone to being attacked still."
"Your Mom sounds quite," Riddle paused to think of a kind word, "interesting."
Draco swallowed. "You have no idea," he muttered darkly. He glowered at the sharp look Riddle gave him while Harry, seated next to Draco, flinched.
Riddle leaned forward. "And what of you, Mister Malfoy?" he asked with a slight hint of mockery. "Does it behoove you to know that we are related, even through marriage?"
Francis twitched and slumped depressingly over his plate.
Draco studied Riddle for a moment. "Well, it behooves me more to know Mom Runes is my mother-in-law. Of course, if you had your lovely pet Nagini around, I might be even more behooved, except I know that Nagini ate house elves. Unless Nagini was specifically trained not to munch on Pinky, then it's safe to assume that she's not around."
"Pandora did not care for animals inside the house," Riddle said. "If I have a snake, do you suppose, given that animals were not to belong within Dinsmore, that I would keep something like this ‘Nagini' outside in the garden? The garden would be amazingly free of such pesky creatures such as garden gnomes."
Draco looked thoughtful. "Nah," he said. He took a bite of spiced vegetables.
"Just because I have always wanted to ask you this," said Severus to Riddle as the man reached for his wine glass, "what made you choose a skull and a snake for your dark mark?"
Riddle froze with the wine glass halfway to his lips. "I beg your pardon?"
"Dark mark." Severus pulled back his sleeve to show Riddle the dark mark he still bore. Riddle leaned over to peer closely at it. The others froze at the sight of the transparent mark on Severus' arm.
"Why do you still have that?" Francis inquired as he craned his neck to see. "It's supposed to fade with death."
"Voldemort's death," Severus replied coldly. "Wherever Voldemort lives, so does my mark appear."
Riddle leaned away from Severus. "Atrocious-looking thing," he said with a pointed shudder.
"That was the point," Severus said.
"Oh, I imagine so." Riddle took a sip. "But it's not very aesthetically appealing, and a skull is too passé to actually be original." He glanced sideways at Severus. "Really, am I a pirate or am I a dark lord?" It was not a question to be answered, so no one did.
The rest of the meal was finished in silence. Riddle stood up. "Now that you have all eaten," he said as he circulated around the table, his fingertips running over the high backs of the chairs everyone sat in, "and you are all comfortable," he passed over Francis' chair without touching it, "I ask you again: why should I help you? What's in it for me?" He stopped and looked pointedly at Harry. "Ah, child." He walked over to the back of Harry's chair and drooped over the top of it. His fingertips brushed over Harry's upper arm. "This is a question for you to answer. Pandora is not the key. You are. She merely wrapped you up in pretty paper, tied it with a curly ribbon, and sent it along to me to unwrap and use."
Harry gave Riddle a puzzled expression. "But you have to help," he said. "Our whole purpose of being here is to get you."
"Say that I did come," Riddle began, "how would I get back? Do any of you have any intention whatsoever of bringing me back home, to the life I made for myself? And how do I destroy this evil me who would destroy the world? Am I not powerful enough to stop his wreckage from affecting my own reality?" He dropped his hand onto Harry's hair. The tip of his middle finger caressed Harry's scar. "Why?" he asked. "Why does the only person to have somehow survived the Killing Curse seek out the very person who cast it?" He straightened upward. "Come now." His eyes traveled over the others. "Half of you are self-sacrificing Gryffindors, the other half of you are self-serving Slytherins. I'm sure that if you put your heads together, you could find a way to defeat your Voldemort without my help, even just to save Harry."
Francis stood up. "So, it's not going to be possibly to, well, bully you into joining us somehow?" Tom Riddle shook his head. Francis fiddled with his goggles. "Then I guess the only way to somehow convince you to come along and help us is to see what the Mirror of Rebounds has to tell us. All answers can be found there," he said knowingly, "both past and, be that as it may, the future."
"The future is only possible," grumbled Severus, "if Cousin Quigley uses it."
Francis started to the door. "So?" he asked over his shoulder. "Cousin Quigley seems to be inside the Mirror of Rebounds. I'm sure he won't mind if we ask him to give Tom Riddle a few reasons why he should come with us since Cousin Quigley is the person who insists we must save the Universe."
"Wait." The others turned to Draco, who jumped to his feet and hurried to Riddle's side. "I find I must ask for this before we do anything else," he said firmly. "Transfigure me into a girl."
Riddle's eyebrow arched as the others looked at Draco as if he had just declared himself the new Dark Lord of the Universe and Riddle was to be his love slave. "I beg your pardon?"
"Transfigure me into a girl. Since Harry and Harry have such a difficulty accepting me as a possible sweetheart since I'm a bloke, then maybe they would have a better time accepting me as if I'm a girl. I think you're the only person who can fully transfigure me into a girl without some sort of accident occurring."
"That's it!" Francis jumped up and down excitedly. "That's it!"
Draco looked affronted. "You know, it shouldn't matter if I wanted to be a girl or not. Francis, I find such an excited attitude disturbingly unsupportive."
Francis waved Draco's hurt words away. "No, no." He turned to Severus. "Remember how we were talking about the disguise Harry needed so he wouldn't be attacked?" Severus and Harry looked lost. Francis frowned. "You remember! It was in that reality where Dumbledore made us wait for my voice to recover."
"Oh." Severus nodded. "Yes?"
"This is the disguise! Harry can be a girl!"
"WHAT?" Harry winced at the sound of his own voice. He had not been able to speak that high since before his voice changed. "I will not be a girl!"
Harry2's hand shot into the air. "You mean just him, right?"
"Harry," Francis stepped close to Harry. He reached out to place his hand on Harry's upper arm. "We've got to talk Tom Riddle into joining us, and when we start jumping realities again . . . Well, you have to keep in mind how many realities we passed through where no one took kindly to our being there. We're going to have to pass through them again, even if it'll be much quicker than last time. Some of them will be even more unfriendly because we passed through them. Harry is different enough not to be mistaken as you if he doesn't stand next to you or wear glasses. Severus can hide because he's a ghost, Draco's like Harry; different. No one under the age of sixty could recognize me, or even Tom." Francis turned to Riddle. "That is, of course, if you did not mind transfiguring Harry into a girl."
Riddle cocked his head to the side. "Why can't you do it, Francis?" he asked.
"Well, I imagine I could, if I had the power to."
"It's just a transfiguration though," Harry2 said. Harry glared at him.
"A complex one," Francis explained. "It takes a great deal more concentration and a great deal more power and control to transfigure a complex life form--and a human being is more complex than the little animals you had to work with in Transfiguration--into another complex life form. That's why being an animagus takes a great deal of skill. It takes more power and control to transfigure an animate creature into a different animate creature, rather than an animate creature into an inanimate object or vise versa. And your innate magic would also have to be overcome because it would work against me." He turned to Riddle. "You though. We all know you're powerful enough not to be even bothered by such a thing."
"But what if I don't want to become a girl?" Harry was torn between outrage that Francis would even consider such an idea, and fright that Francis would see his idea carried through.
"Harry." Francis turned to him. "How many realities did we Jump through that were hostile?"
"Um . . ." Harry had an odd idea as to where this was all going. The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach seemed to him to be a warning of what was to come. "More than thirty."
"And when we finally get back to our reality, we might have to hide you from Voldemort while Riddle does what he needs to do."
"If I go," Riddle blandly reminded them.
Harry bit the inside of his lip, trying to ignore the feeling that he was losing this fight to clear and sound reason, as well as the good intention his great-grandfather had for protecting him. "But-but I don't want to be a girl!"
"Be quiet," Severus said from where he floated next to the dining table. "If you're going to whine like a girl, you may as well become a girl."
Harry twisted around to glare at him. "Easy enough for you to say!" he snapped. "You're dead!"
Severus turned away with a grimace. "Why does everyone seem to delight in reminding me that?" he grumbled as he crossed his arms before himself. Harry squirmed in guilt; being a girl couldn't be as bad as being dead. Severus probably would make such a trade if he could.
Draco leaned against the wall. "Yada yada yada. Listen to you guys fight. Let's take a vote for Harry becoming a girl. Those in favor?" He raised his hand. "Vold--Riddle can't vote though. He has to remain neutral."
Harry fumed as Severus and Francis raised their hands. After a moment of quiet deliberation, Harry2 raised his hand as well. Harry rounded on him. "What are you thinking?" he demanded.
"Hey," said Harry2 with a shrug, "better you than me." He paused a moment. "Or even Draco for that matter," he added as an afterthought.
Harry fumed for a moment longer. "Fine!" he decided. "Just fine!" He glared at Francis. "As soon as this matter is finished though, I get transfigured back into myself."
Francis nodded. "Of course. It's only a temporary solution after all."
"This," the Bloody Baron popped into their existence with a wickedly gleeful look plastered on his face, "I've got to watch!"
"That," said Harry, breaking the stunned silence, "is so like you, popping up to get satisfaction from someone else's misery."
"How do you know?" the Bloody Baron asked defensively. "You don't know me; you can't make a judgment like that."
Harry's anger deflated slightly. "Oh. Well, you don't have to be so cheerful about it," he said. He crossed his arms before himself and glowered at Tom Riddle. "How long will this take?" he asked in a resigned voice.
"Not too long." Tom Riddle gave him a come-hither wave with his right hand. Harry reluctantly walked over to Riddle's side. As he moved, his companions shuffled to the side. Harry and Riddle eyed one another. Riddle's expression was cool while Harry's was reluctant with a hint of panic.
"I don't think I'll like being a girl," Harry said.
"It," Riddle reached out and cupped Harry's face with his hands, "will only be temporary."
Riddle's power erupted forward, like a gigantic tsunami crashing down overhead. The wave of neon green magic slammed into other occupants of the room. Both Draco and Francis fell over backwards under the wave. Harry2 grunted and rolled his eyes as he fell back one step and braced himself against the assault. The Bloody Baron and Severus trembled against the power, but remained otherwise still. The dishes on the table rattled as the curtains on the window fluttered.
Harry stiffly fell backwards, and then floated horizontally before Riddle as the power suspended him in the air. He tried to take a breath under the heavy layer of power, but it pressed all around him like a tight blanket that hindered his movement. It was not painful. While the layer of power was uncomfortable, his scar tingled not unpleasantly.
"Watch my hand," Riddle whispered. His robes rippled as his power moved like the wind through the room. Francis, on the floor, grabbed his goggles before they were whipped off his head. Harry forced his eyes open against the pressure. There was something familiar about the broad palm and long fingers that hovered before his face. As Harry watched the hand, it became smaller and further away.
What's happening? Harry thought to himself. He tried to reach out and grab Riddle's hand, but he could not move. From each wave of power that rippled through the room, Riddle peeled off a layer and wrapped it around Harry.
The layers were meant to protect Harry from anything that would influence the outcome of the transfiguration, and to act as a buffer against his innate magic.
Matter can neither be destroyed nor created; only changed. Even magic had to obey this single law of reality. In Transfiguration, matter is rearranged or dispersed as needed to recreate what was to be, but there is only one direction of magic, and that was from the person casting the transfiguration. Being an animagus is a dangerous thing. If not controlled completely, the matter would be arranged in irrevocable forms. Once the animagus form is decided and successfully complete by use of one's own magic, it is locked to become the permanent and only form. To do so otherwise would allow for dangerous influences and arrangements.
For Harry, this Transfiguration was more than the arrangement of his sexual organs. It had to be complete and sound. It had to happen with exact precision so as to incur as little irrevocable damage as possible.
There is only one difference between the male and female genders, and that is hormones, and the influence of hormones begins long before birth and on a level that one's own magic cannot influence. The hormones during the nine months of a fetus' development decide which gender the child would be, no matter if there is an X chromosome or a Y chromosome. If there is more estrogen, the female reproductive organs are developed. If there is more testosterone, the male reproductive organs are developed. An equality of both, or misbalance of either one is a major culprit behind sexual birth defects. The one thing a mother should never hear the moment after labor is, "It's a girl/boy! . . . Wait. Um, I think?"
Once puberty is reached, it is hormones that allow for bone growth. In a girl, hormones come into play far faster than boys; hormones control fat deposition in the hips and breasts to give her a rounded figure. In a boy, whose hormones are slower and thus he is slower to reach maturity, hormones deepen the voice and allow facial hair growth.
Hormones allows for the different structures in the body, but also a difference in the brain. Girls generally links memories with their limbic system--the center for emotions. They are more adept with using the left side of their brain, where language is stored, and they produce two hormones exclusive to motherhood.
For Harry to become completely a girl, he would have to be reduced back to the simplest of human life forms--the sperm, and the egg--and then recreated from there with the X chromosome and estrogen being the influential hormone. Wrapped in the green layers of power, the others could not see Harry reduced from a fifteen year old adolescent boy to two single cells. From there, Tom Riddle's power would allow Harry to rapidly grow into his new form. Even then though, his scar remained. It, along with a single bright green spark, stubbornly latched onto the essence of Harry.
Harry's essence, his spirit and memories and all the matter of his fifteen-year-old body, absorbed safely into the layers of green where they would be kept while his brain and body was still yet to be formed. Harry floated listlessly about in them as he experienced life all over again. It felt familiar to him, warm and comfortable.
The layers protected Harry, but they did not stop him from Wandering from this reality, into a world where only the dead walked.
Harry stared at James for a long moment, uncomprehending of whom he saw. He shook his head to clear it, and then squinted. James was not very different from his pictures or even the time he had exited Voldemort's wand. He and Harry had the same rumpled black hair and lean bone structure. Here, James wore pinstriped trousers and a brown vest over a simple white dress shirt. They stood together on an endless background of baby-powder blue.
"I don't understand," Harry said finally.
James shrugged and looked off to the side. "Well, I guess you could now say you're my daughter." He grinned. "Doesn't matter though; I love you no matter which gender you are! Except I don't like the name Harriet. I was very adamant with your mother on that point. Harry was permissible, Harriet was out of the question."
"Oh." Harry's eyes flickered about his surroundings. There was just James and the background of baby-powder blue. Harry looked directly at James. "Are you real or just my imagination?"
James cocked his head to the side, an odd reminiscent of what both Riddle and Francis did when they found Harry's words curious and were going to respond thoughtfully. "If I'm your imagination," he said carefully, "your imagination is doing a pretty good impersonation." He shrugged and grinned again. "At any rate. We've got some time together until you're ready to go back to your new body. So, is there anything you'd like to know so long as you're here?"
Harry's eyes widened with surprise. He nodded as questions exploded in his mind and fought to hop onto his tongue. One question rose to the forefront and made it ahead of the others. "Who is Uncle Severus' godson?"
James' eyes twinkled behind his round glasses. "Oh dear." He covered his mouth and laughed softly. "Of all the many questions you had, that had to be the one that comes immediately to mind. But do I dare tell you?"
"Oh come on! Cousin Quigley knows and Uncle Severus knows, but both refuse to tell!"
James glanced from side to side. "Well, okay." He motioned Harry close. "Got to be careful," he said secretly, "you'll never know who's in hearing. It's--"
"Who is in hearing?" Severus, looking solid rather than transparent, materialized behind James.
James pointed at Severus and sighed. "Like spoilsport here."
Severus glowered at James. "You're dead!"
James' eyebrow arched almost exactly as Severus' habitually did. "As are you." Severus opened his mouth to snap back, and froze. With a thoughtful frown, he closed his mouth with an audible click. "Harry," James draped a friendly arm over Harry's shoulders, "that has to be the first time I ever effectively shut him up."
"Give me a moment," Severus said through gritted teeth, "and I'll think of something suitably scathing in which to respond with."
"I don't doubt it." James winked at Harry. "Now, what was that question you had?"
Severus turned whiter than usual. "You wouldn't dare tell!"
"You know I would." James laughed as he pushed away from Harry and ran across the blue surface with Severus in close chase. "It's Neville!" James laughingly yelled over his shoulder as he began to pull ahead Severus. "Neville Longbottom!" Harry stared after his father and uncle with amused shock. He closed his eyes and rubbed his eyes. When he opened them, he found himself gazing upward into Tom Riddle's wary eyes.
"Ah, you're awake." Riddle flicked his hand and righted Harry to his feet. Harry took one step forward, and nearly pitched forward on his face. Riddle grabbed Harry's shoulders and steadied him. "Careful. Your equilibrium is momentarily disrupted. Move slowly and easily."
Harry looked down at his feet. Two rounded lumps on his chest impeded his view. Harry stared at them in shock. A small thought trickled into his brain. I'm a girl. He--she--was he a boy or a girl? He still felt like a him, but from the current view, he was a she. "What am I?" he asked out loud. His voice was exactly like what it was before it broke during puberty.
Draco, from across the room, made a box with his fingers and looked through it at Harry. "Well," he said helpfully, "from my point of view, I'd say you are very feminine."
Next to Francis, Severus spoke up quietly. "How do you feel?"
Harry looked at Severus with surprise. "What are you doing here?" he--she?-- asked.
Severus frowned. "I Jumped here with the rest of you. Why shouldn't I be here?"
"But--oh, never mind." Harry looked down the length of his decidingly female body. I guess this firmly makes me a she. "What do we do now?" she asked.
"Are you fully adjusted to being female?" Francis asked. Harry, not understanding what Francis meant, shrugged wordlessly. Francis glanced over at Riddle. "What about his--er, her, um, monthly moments?"
Harry frowned. "Monthly moments?" That did not sound good.
Riddle smiled slightly. "It is inevitable," he said. "It's set to occur in ten days."
"So soon?"
"Harry is going through exactly what he would go through if he was born a she."
Francis grimaced. "Oh dear."
Harry's frown deepened. "What's that supposed to mean? What are monthly moments?" she demanded. Francis cringed and looked at Severus for help. Once again reminded of her uncle, Harry turned to him. "Neville Longbottom is your godson?" she asked.
Severus choked. "Where did you--"
"Dad told me."
Severus cleared his throat and thought a moment. "Oh, he did, did he?" He crossed his arms before himself and tapped his fingers against his bicep. "When did this happen?"
"Just now," Harry said matter-of-factly. "You were there."
"I was not."
Harry sighed and wondered why Severus had to be so stubborn. "You were chasing Dad when he said that Neville Longbottom is your godson." Again Severus choked. He stared at Harry with wide, surprised eyes. "How come you never told anyone about this before?"
Draco shrugged. "I don't blame him," he said. "I'd be ashamed too." Harry2, without looking at Draco, punched him in the shoulder and sent him skidding across the floor into Francis. Upon impact, they both fell over in a tangle of flailing body limbs.
"What did I do?" Francis wondered as Draco got off him.
Severus cleared his throat and glared at Harry. "I never said I was ashamed of Neville Longbottom." He scowled at Harry.
"Then why did you write why Neville couldn't be more like Frank?"
"I never said I ashamed of Neville!" Francis and the Bloody Baron, who stood on the other side of Severus, both looked at him, and then edged (or crawled, in Francis' case), away. Severus sighed and looked tired. "I'm only disappointed," he said finally as he tiredly massaged the bridge of his nose with one hand. "If there is anything I wish about Neville, it's that he could have entered Hufflepuff. Being in Gryffindor automatically sets him up for the same treatment I give other Gryffindors. Well, perhaps I was a little harsher because of who his parents are, but he has the potential to be like them."
The Bloody Baron growled and gritted his teeth. His hand spasmed and moved to his sword handle. "Speaking of Hufflepuff . . ." He faded away.
"I am not ashamed of Neville," Severus said firmly. He glared at everyone, daring them to say anything more.
Harry looked down at her chest. She pulled at her robes. "They're too tight," she said finally. She pulled at the robes near her waist. "They're too tight all over!"
Riddle dropped a hand on her shoulder. "There are things in this house that belonged to women." His eyes flickered over to Francis. "Many of the things belonged to women who were born more than three generations ago and so are dreadfully out of style and lacking in certain condiments. But one of my granddaughters was about your size and I believe I know where some things are." He looked at Draco and Harry2. "Harry may feel more comfortable with you two. Either of you know how a bra works?"
Harry2 shook his head while Draco leered.
Riddle rolled his eyes. "Hmm. I see. Well, Harry, lucky for you, Pinky knows exactly how use them." He turned from Harry and clapped his hands. "Pinky!" Pinky, wearing her precarious wig of blonde corkscrew curls and atrocious pink lacy dress, appeared before Riddle with only a slight poof of smoke.
"Yes, Master?" she inquired politely as she gave him a clumsy courtesy.
"Would you take Harry up to the room where Sophie used to stay and help her dress?"
Pinky nodded her head and nearly knocked her wig off. "Yes, Master." She waved her hand at Harry. "Come with Pinky," she commanded haughtily. Harry, with a single nervous glance at the others, followed after.