Harry breathed a sigh of relief as he closed the door behind him. After a moment, he opened his eyes, and looked around the chamber. Where once it had held a giant, three-headed dog, now it was empty, aside from several stacks of chairs and desks.
He moved into the empty space and examined the floor. "Where is it?" he muttered, scuffing his shoes on the apparently solid floor. Taking a moment, he tucked his Firebolt, the racing broom his godfather had given him, under his arm while he checked the Marauder's map. Convinced that he was alone, he pulled out his wand and directed it at the floor where he remembered the trapdoor having been.
"Finite Incantatem," he intoned. To his delight, the floor wavered, and the trapdoor appeared. "Must not have bothered with anything strong since no-one should know it is even there."
Reaching down, he grabbed the metal ring and pulled the trapdoor up. Casting a simple lumos spell, he directed the wand's light into the hole and grinned. Though it did look like a considerable drop, there was no sign of the Devil's Snare that had met them the first time they had dared the trapdoor, beneath the slavering jaws of Fluffy.
Incanting a quick spell to slow his fall, he dropped into the hole. Flexing his knees, he absorbed the limited impact, and then closed the trapdoor behind him with a spell. Unfortunately, he was not skilled enough yet to restore the illusion that had concealed the trapdoor, but then, he wasn't really worried about anyone looking for him.
He simply wanted to ensure that no-one accidentally came across him, considering the illegality of what he was about to do, not to mention the reaction of Progressor McGonagall if she found out that he was trying to accomplish the Animagus transformation after she had explicitly forbidden it.
So what if his visualization of his form had only caught the bat-like wings, and not, at least in her opinion, enough detail to fully identify his species? He did not exactly think a bat was a great thing to be, but this was not just some whim. He did not want to face Voldemort again with no way to get away, and there was no way he was going to give up the chance to fly under his own power. Nothing in his life was as fulfilling as flying on his broom, and he could only imagine how wonderful it would be to fly with his own wings. And finally, he would be able to stay with Lupin, to be with him in his extremity as his father had once done. It was the least he could do, having caused Sirius, the last of Lupin's loyal animagus companions, to vanish into the Veil in the Department of Mysteries. Besides, if Peter Pettigrew, spineless worm that he was, could manage it, surely he could. He had more than reason enough, in his opinion.
Darkness fell as he extinguished his wand, a pitch blackness that enveloped him. He closed his eyes, and opened them again, and could not see any difference. Leaning over, he set his broom on the ground.
Welcoming the dark, he focused on the wings he had so briefly glimpsed. He concentrated on their long, black sweep, on the flexible, leathery skin that would bear him aloft, as he mentally chanted the spells that would guide his change.
He was not supposed to know them, but the Professor had allowed them to read an Animagus text while preparing to find their inner animal, and he had quietly skipped ahead, and memorized the actual transformative spells. He had not, of course, even contemplated at that point the possibility that he might fail to do what his father had done, or that Professor McGonagall might refuse to allow him to continue, but he had not been averse to the idea of doing a little extra practice on his own.
He felt a pain on his back, and quickly shed his cloak and shirt. The pain multipled four-fold, then four-fold again, approaching the pain of his scar when Voldemort was near, as he frantically skimmed out of his other clothes, holding his wand in his teeth. Curses directed at himself for forgetting to disrobe before starting marred his inward chant, and he gasped as the pain jumped to Cruciatus levels. He could feel his back warping, the skin stretching as if someone had driven barbed hooks into his back and was pulling his skin away from his flesh.
Able to hold it in no longer, he screamed in agony as the pain swept over him completely, exploding in an instant to cover his entire body as his surroundings seemed to be pressing in on him, crushing him from every side.
A fierce, piercing pain erupted at the base of his back, and he screeched in surprise. The pain of his back, and the crushing sensation he had been vaguely prepared for, as he knew that he would shrink dramatically in becoming a bat, and growing his wings, but did bats have tails? Why did his spine hurt so terribly?
The pain grew still stronger, and darkness took him as the pain finally overcame him. He dropped to the ground unconscious, still convulsing as his body warped and changed. A single fleeting thought wafted through his mind before it shut down completely. "McGonagall was right."
---
"Idiot," Harry muttered to himself, as he groggily pulled himself up from the floor, looking around at darkness so complete that he momentarily feared blindness, before he remembered. He had neglected to do anything about providing the room with lighting or a mirror for after his transformation. Of course, he had not expected such a complete transformation the first time. Wasn't it supposed to take a long time to get it to work?
Wait a minute. Why did he understand what he just said? Was this like Parseltongue? Was he going to hear himself speak even when he was really emitting inaudibly high-pitched whistles? His voice had sounded normal to him, if maybe a bit high.
He flexed his hand, paw, or whatever it now was, and ran it down his face. His skin tingled where his fingers had passed, and he swayed as he fought to keep his balance. He felt top-heavy, though it was not as biased towards the back as he had expected, and he could feel something moving behind him.
He dropped his hand and squeaked in startlement as it brushed something on the way down that sent a jolt of heat through him. What was that?
"Too much," he whimpered, as his mind tried to deal with the shifting weight on his back, the movement behind him, the fire racing through him, and the almost frightening intensity of the movement of the air on his skin.
Scrambling for sanity, he focused desperately on the chant and focus exercises to reverse his transformation, picturing himself as he knew he was in his mind.
He could feel something changing, his wings seeming to almost slide into his body, as a wave of pleasure swept through him, bringing tears to his eyes. But something was not right. He did not feel like he was expanding, or changing size at all. A stuttering, bumpy sensation swept over his rear and he wondered if the unexpected tail was gone now.
Finally all the changes stopped, but Harry was worried. He still had not felt himself get any bigger. He flexed his hand. It felt like a hand, but then, it had when he was transformed, too. His wand had still not reappeared and Harry felt a sudden blaze of fear. "Accio wand!" he cried out, holding his hand out desperately, but nothing happened.
"Come on," he cajoled, trying to psyche himself up, to convince himself that he could do this. "Wandless magic can't be that hard. You did it before. You blew up Aunt Marge. You lit your wand when the Dementors attacked on Privet Drive and you weren't holding it then. Come on . . . Lumos!"
A light burst from his fingers and he gasped in relief. He looked at his clothes and grinned when he realized they did not look huge, nor were they at the same level as his eyes. He must just have not felt the pain of changing size the second time, that was all.
He grinned as he looked at his hand, where the light was shining from, then he frowned, turning it this way and that. Last time it was still his wand that had lit, not his hand, and besides his hand wasn't always this slender and well . . . delicate-looking, was it?
His eyes drifted further down, and he shrieked in surprise, then clapped his hand over his mouth in shock at the high pitch of the cry. There were two mounds of flesh on his chest . . . breasts. He had breasts! Honest-to-goodness female breasts! The Animagus transformation was not supposed to do anything like this, he was sure.
He leaned over a bit, peering past his new chest at his pelvis, and sucked in a pained breath. He saw nothing but a triangle of black curls. With a fearful whimper, he brought his hand down, and brushed it through the curls. It had to be there, right? The touch to his lower hair sent a shuddering burst of pleasure through him, and his legs suddenly felt weak. They folded beneath him, and he found himself sitting on his discarded cloak.
A mirror, he needed a mirror, he had to see for himself what had happened. Before he could jump up and start searching, a hazy reflection appeared in front of him, firming quickly until it seemed to snap into solidity, a full-length dressing mirror appearing out of nowhere, framed in gold and standing on four gold-plated lion's paws.
What it reflected completely pulled his mind away from where the mirror had come from. Looking back at him was a puzzled but beautiful naked girl with wavy black hair and green eyes that seemed unusually bright.
His hand was still tangled in his nether curls, and after the jolt that went through him when he shifted it, he was afraid to move it, much less just pull away, but he could not help wondering what he had looked like in his Animagus form. What could it have been to leave him looking like this?
Focusing on his wings again, he felt changes start before he even began the chant. His hair gleamed in the light as his skin took on a dusky red hue, as if he was blushing strongly over his entire body. Midnight-black wings peeked out over his shoulders, sliding out of his back, painlessly this time. The bumpy sensation on his rear came again, and a red tail, tipped by a black wedge-shaped point, passed briefly through his view.
His mouth gaped in surprise, and he noticed his eye-teeth and canines were longer and sharply pointed, and his incisors now came to a sharp point as well. He did not notice that his glasses were missing, and had been in his other form as well.
Bracing himself for the pleasure, he pulled his still glowing hand away from his curls even as his hand felt a sudden dampness. He sobbed at the intense pleasure and pain as the claws he had not noticed before slid across his inner thigh, and the curly hairs caught against each other around his fingers and pulled against his sensitive flesh.
He brought his hand up to touch his smooth face, and a new, powerful scent caught his nose. Before he knew what he was doing, his fingers were in his mouth, his tongue laving them as he sucked off the faint traces of moisture. He moaned involuntarily, his eyes closing, and felt a new surge of wetness down there.
A shiver passed through him and he felt a sudden tightness on his chest. He forced his eyes open, staring at the mirror, not noticing his hand drifting downward as he stared at his breasts. Where they had looked smooth, now they looked shiny, and his nipples were crinkled and hard, standing out from breasts that themselves felt harder then they had been. He groaned as his involuntarily questing hand slid through his curls to the source of the dampness and swirled about, setting off sparks in his mind.
As his other hand rose up and slid gentle fingernails around his sensitive left breast, he wondered if Professor McGonagall could possibly have had anything like this in mind when she had warned about instinctive behavior following the transformations, and the need to learn to control it.
His nail slid across his left nipple, sending a shock through him as it seemed to harden still further. His fingers slipped around it and tugged, and Harry sobbed, falling back to lie on his cloak. His right hand came up for a moment as he avidly sucked off his juices, then it went right back down, sliding along the curious folds of flesh he had down there now. It glided between them, parting them smoothly, and Harry felt a surge of new heat as his fingers found his inner lips, stroking them and then sliding between them to swirl around the hole he found there.
He lifted his hips when a pain made itself felt on his spine, and felt his tail flip around to lie down between his legs. As his hips dropped back to the cloak, his tail came up to rub sensuously across his inner thigh. His eyes fixed on it in the mirror.
"So beautiful," he murmured, pinching his nipple tightly and tugging on it. He was not sure whether he was referring to his appearance in the mirror, or the feelings that were overcoming him.
His left hand swapped places with his right, as he rubbed his juices on his neglected right nipple before sucking them off of his fingers. His right hand took up the proper treatment of his right breast, even as his left ring finger slid inside him. A sobbing cry escaped again as his now moistened finger found his clitoris, and rubbed the soft hood, exciting his center still further, as it hardened and lengthened, peeking out of his folds.
His hand moved instinctively, finger sliding back in to fill his emptiness while the heel of his hand pressed rythmically against his mound, stimulating his clitoris. His moans and cries grew and filled the room, joined by the wet squelching of his hand in his cunt. He sobbed and gasped, twisting his nipple as he rode his hand hard and ever faster.
Finally he shuddered and screamed as he came, eructing a surprising volume of ejaculate several inches out, soaking his hand and thighs. With languid pleasure interspersed with gasps as occasional aftershocks hit, Harry consumed the fluid that covered his hands, then scraped his thighs and consumed that as well.
Sitting up with some effort, Harry laughed when he saw himself in the mirror, his breasts reddened from his fingernails, his nether hair moist and matted, his lips shiny, his eyes dilated as wide as he had ever seen them, tears running down his dusky cheeks.
"I guess there's no question as to what I am," he said, his voice quivering. "A succubus. A freak, just like the Dursleys said." His tears flowed faster, and he sniffled. "They nearly abandoned me just because I could speak Parseltongue," he stated quietly, thinking of his friends now. "They'll drop me like a hot rock if they find out I turned into a Dark creature. A demoness. Especially after I got them all hurt in the Ministry." He lifted his bangs and stared at the now red-on-red scar that still marred his forehead. "Not like I could pass myself off as someone else, either. Damn scar."
With a heavy sigh, he once more focused on his normal appearance. His view of the mirror was occasionally obscured by a teardrop spreading over his eye before he blinked it away, but he could see enough to know that though his wings and tail were gone, and his skin once more had a human tone, he was also still undeniably female. "And smaller than I was," he groaned as he listened to his voice. At least his voice was husky, roughened, only a little higher than it had been, like a sexy whisper in the dark rather than high and clear like most of the other girls he knew. Granted, it had reached much higher when he had cried out upon seeing his new breasts.
With faltering hope, he mentally chanted the phrases that should lead him back to himself, but nothing changed. He tried again, saying them aloud this time, with no result. "What am I going to do?"
"Hermione would know what to do," he told himself, blushing as he pointed his hand at the damp spot on his cloak and murmured, "Scourgify." His mind's eye saw her, sitting over her books, her bushy hair shaking as she turned her head back and forth, paging through in search of answers to one of the many problems they had faced over the years. She would know, or be able to find out something about what had happened to him, but could he tell her?
Shaking his head, he looked up, and gave a high-pitched yelp. "'Mione! How?!?" After the initial startlement, he realized that he had not in fact seen his friend, but rather his own reflection in the mirror. "Oh my god, I look just like Hermione," he said, staring at his now bushy brown hair. "Eep, I sound just like her, too!" He touched his cheek, then turned his head, blushing furiously, but not before he noticed the scar visible on his forehead. It felt wrong to be looking at a naked copy of his best friend, and doubly so when her image bore the scar of Voldemort's curse. He never wanted to think of her hurt by anyone. He focused on his own image again. Finally he glanced back at the mirror, and sighed in relief when he saw himself . . . or rather, herself, again.
"What just happened?"
Shaking off the disturbing images that ran through his head, he quickly got dressed. If he changed again, involuntarily, at least he would not be looking at one of his friends naked.
Looking himself over in the mirror, he was somewhat surprised to realize that he did not look all that different. His robes hung a bit looser, as he was now both smaller and shorter than his already small frame had been. The swell of his hips were fairly well-hidden by the loose robes, but the front was visibly lifted by his new breasts, which tingled as they were rubbed by the rough fabric. They were especially visible when he shifted to look at his side profile.
Realizing that his new female-Harry form must be an ability of the succubus, and nothing to do with changing back from his animagus shape, given that he had also turned into Hermione, he focused on the mirror. He grinned as his breasts visibly shrank, then winced as a dull ache spread through his chest.
"What's wrong?" he muttered. "It didn't hurt when I turned into Hermione."
As soon as he stopped concentrating, his breasts swelled back out, the sensation of the fabric rubbing across his nipples causing his knees to buckle. He caught the floor with his hands as his legs gave out.
Glaring at the mirror, he focused on the youngest Weasley in one of her own tempers. Immediately his hair lightened to a gleaming red, his face shifting, and it was a scarred Ginny scowling at the mirror. He felt no pain. He deliberately turned his mind away from Ginny, and thought about the OWL's.
There was no change when he looked back into the mirror. He was still facing Ginny Weasley's likeness. Heaving a sigh, and ignoring the protest of his nipples at his chest's resulting movement, he returned to his Harry form.
"This sucks," he whined, once more trying to shrink his breasts down enough that his robes would hide them. It was easily done, but again it came with a painful ache that left him struggling against nausea. He gave up, his eyes crossing as his nipples were yet again abraded by the hard cloth. "I have got to get a bra," he complained, and then a moment later, "I can't believe I just said that."
Trying something that he hoped would be easier, he focused on getting his hair back to its usual short length. Thankfully, that went much more smoothly, his locks seeming to flow back into his head, leaving him with a short thatch of typically unruly hair.
He tried to square his face out a bit more, to get more of a male look. He succeeded, but his face ached, and he could tell that once more he would have to hold his concentration to maintain the illusion.
"Oh, man, how am I gonna get through even one day of classes? What have we got tomorrow? Let's see. Potions first thing! Malfoy is going to have a field day with . . . wait . . . Potions . . . yeah, that's it! I just haveta keep up the pretense tonight and tomorrow at breakfast, then I'll partner with Neville . . . No, Snape might separate us. I'd better just sit next to him. His potion will blow up, and I'll let it hit me." He felt a frisson of fear shiver down his spine at the thought of letting Neville's potion touch him, but then, they really had never caused anything worse than boils before. Well, and melted cauldrons. "And then I'll stop concentrating on the way to the infirmary. They'll think I'm a girl because of something with the potion. They won't dare test it on anybody else. They'll turn me back into a guy, and I'll stop trying to become an animagus. Nobody will ever know."
"I'll have to make sure nobody notices my wand is missing until I get to the hospital wing. Then it won't matter anymore. They'll just think it got eaten by the potion, or something. I'll get a new one, one that works against Voldemort."
The thought of losing his wand hurt more than he thought it would, but it couldn't be helped. He attempted to summon his wand once more, with no success.
He lifted his glowing right hand and looked around the room. There was no sign of his wand, nor anything else that he had left behind, other than the mirror, and his broom. He pointed his hand at the mirror, intending to banish it, but it wavered and faded from view before he got the chance. "Okay, that was weird," he muttered, "guess it fits the theme. I wonder if this is really a Room of Requirement type thing?"
Moving to stand beneath the door, he accioed his broom, and was about to mount it to fly up to the trapdoor, when his new powers decided to kick in. His feet left the ground and he drifted upwards, even though his wings were not present, much less beating.
He lifted his hand as he approached the door, hoping that he would be able to avoid cracking his head on it. He knew it was a heavy door, and he did not exactly have a lot of leverage at the moment. His heart skipped a beat when instead of pressing against the trapdoor and slowing his ascent, his hand passed right through the wood. The rest of him followed, including his clothes and the broom he was holding, drifting upward through the wooden trapdoor into Fluffy's old chamber, now lit by his hand.
It was thankfully still empty, and Harry quickly put the light out with a whispered "Nox." To his surprise, the faint light of the stars, cloud-shrouded as they were, seemed to bring out all the details in the room. There was no part of it that was in heavy enough shadow to obscure it from his sight. He thumped down lightly on the wooden door, this time not passing through it.
"Hmmm . . . must have been black down there only because there was literally no light. I wonder if this is as good as Sirius' or Remus' canine sight? Oh well, at least I'm not permanently stuck as a ghost."
His heart shuddered at the thought of Sirius, and he felt the faintest of tugs, but he was too preoccupied to pay it any attention. He focused on his chest, then his face, and finally, he pushed for a few more inches of height. Then, with almost his whole body aching and his stomach churning, he slipped out into the hallway after a quick check of the map.
---
Concealing his nervousness with difficulty given the pain he was dealing with, Harry waited in the common room for his friends to get up. He had been forced to awaken early, in spite of his late night, so as to get dressed before any of the guys in his dorm woke up and saw that he was no longer one of them. He was wearing a pair of transfigured glasses. They had taken him three tries to get right, and the lenses were plain glass and did nothing for his sight, but they should look mostly right. He also had a transfigured replica of his wand, at least in the outward appearance. Hopefully it would serve to avert suspicion. He was still trying to figure out why performing wandless magic now seemed so easy.
Hermione came dragging down the stairs. Her hair seemed a bit limp, and Harry realized that she too was suffering from the disappointment of knowing that the shortcut to becoming an Animagus had not worked. It was not the course the Marauders had taken, but none of the three friends had wanted to leave Lupin alone for his transformations for that long.
Convincing Professor McGonagall that they had legitimate reasons for wanting to do this and strong enough intentions to go all the way had not been easy, and to have the shortened path she offered be so quickly closed to them had been a blow to both.
Ron could have gone on, according to their Head of House, but neither Harry nor Hermione were confident in his will to make it through without them, or his willingness to be near a werewolf in wolf form by himself.
"I wonder if Hermione's form is something off-the-wall like mine," Harry mused quietly as Hermione stepped off the last stair. She looked up and saw him, and smiled.
"Hey, Harry," she said softly. "I'm sorry about last night."
"Yeah, me too," Harry agreed sourly. "You don't know how much," he wanted to say, but didn't.
"Is Ron up?"
"He was just waking up when I came down."
Hermione gave Harry a sharp look, as if sensing his mood. "We can still do it the normal way, you know."
"Yeah, I know, Hermione," he answered, sitting in a chair by the fire. She sat opposite him and waited for him to continue. "What would happen . . . if we were to do it the short way anyway? Is it as bad as splinching?" Harry congratulated himself for comparing it to the unfortunate consequence of a bad disapparition, where the wizard would leave pieces of himself behind, or become intermeshed with an object on the other end. That would ease her otherwise certain fear that he had already, or was about to try it.
"Oh, Harry, it's ever so much worse. Splinching is easily taken care of by the Ministry, but an unprepared Animagus transformation . . ." Hermione stopped for a moment as if contemplating the horror of it, and Harry gulped. "When a wizard changes but doesn't know what he's changing to through and through, he can get sucked into the new form and trapped. One of the books I read talked about it, and Harry, if they do, they have to live as whatever they turn into until they know it inside and out, and can do everything it can. In most of the known cases, they simply never turned back, because by the time they really knew their forms, they had forgotten what it was like to be human."
"But . . . can't they just do that spell that . . . that Remus and . . . that Remus used to turn Wormtail back?"
Hermione shook her head, her eyes darkening as she too was reminded of Sirius. She lowered her voice as footsteps sounded on the stairs. "It won't work on them. There is no known spell that can bring back a trapped Animagus . . . well, I mean, they aren't really an Animagus yet, even though they're in another form, are they? Because they don't control the transformation."
Dean waved as he passed through the common room. "Morning. Ron's right behind me."
"Thanks, Dean," answered Harry, turning to look at the stairs. Ron came into view a moment later, looking tired. He brightened upon seeing his friends, and came over to them.
"Morning Harry, Hermione."
"Come on, Ron. Let's get some breakfast."
---
Harry was not sure afterwards exactly how he made it through breakfast. His whole-body ache was bad enough, but it was the nausea that truly made eating a chore. He forced it down anyway, hoping that Hermione would not notice anything unusual. Everytime he had to answer a question, he could feel his concentration straining and had to resist the urge to snap at them in response.
His mind whirled, repeating Hermione's words again and again. He had hoped that his plan would result in his problem being fixed, but from the sound of it, there would be nothing they could do. It was still the best way forward that he could see, but he questioned whether he should risk showing them his succubus form in the hope that at the least, they might understand his plight without believing that he had this Dark form in him. If they thought it came from elsewhere, they might be more sympathetic, but he still had hope that he could keep it from them if he was careful.
He did not notice that a number of students seemed to give him a second, lingering glance before going back to their breakfasts, but Hermione did, and found herself looking him over as well, wondering what seemed different about him this morning. Ron, as usual, was oblivious, but she noticed that Ginny was paying Harry an unusual amount of attention, even though he was speaking as little as he could get away with.
Finally the meal was over, and they trooped down to Potions. Luckily, today Snape was there before him, in all his black glowering glory, so Malfoy held his tongue.
Harry stuck close to Neville, but not right next to him, looking to sit near him. He grinned as Hermione sighed and set up to partner Neville, and he quickly sat beside her.
He did not notice the black gaze of his professor boring into him, evaluating his grin. "Potter! Switch seats with Miss Granger. Now, Potter!"
Harry smothered his grin as he swapped with Hermione. To think, he had been worried that if he actually sat next to Neville, Snape would separate them. He managed a weak smile when Hermione gave him an apologetic smile and shrug.
They were halfway through the potion when Harry heard a faint plop and looked up to realize that someone, one of the Slytherins most likely, had managed to toss something into his potion. "Get down, Neville," Harry cried out, spinning to grab Neville and shield him, and casting a shielding spell as he spun, his hand hidden in his cloak to mask the way the light came from his fingers instead of the tip of his fake wand, to ensure that the potion, already lifting from the cauldron, did not splash anyone else. He transfigured the fake wand back to a simple quill just as the potion exploded outward.
He felt the searing drops hit his cloak and burn his skin, and he cried out in pain. A heavy splash followed, soaking his cloak and burning his entire back and he screamed. The potion finally settled and Snape swooped in, grabbing Harry by the arm and hauling him up, ignoring his cry of pain and Hermione's protest.
"You will finish your potions," he snapped, turning about to eye every student, ignoring Harry's pained whimper as his arm was dragged around, "while I take Mr. Potter to Madam Pomfrey. If I so much as hear a single word being spoken in this room, and I will, you will all have detention! Longbottom, stop crying and help support Potter."
---
Snape growled as Longbottom's stride faltered. "Keep up, Longbottom," he ordered. He could see the worship in the boy's eyes for Potter, and it sickened him. It was only made worse by the attraction he himself felt for the boy. Obviously the potion had given Potter a temporary magical allure, like that of a Veela. No matter, a bit of isolation was just what the brat needed to temper his arrogance.
He snarled when he saw that Potter's blasted lustrous hair was getting longer. If Longbottom had managed to make a transformative potion, he would never hear the end of it from the Headmaster. They passed a few students and he noted that they seemed to have an almost hungry interest in Potter, but his glare sent them scurrying. He smirked when Longbottom practically wilted with relief as they finally swept through the doors of the Hospital Wing.
"Madam Pomfrey! I am afraid Potter has done it again, jumping in where angels fear to tread and playing at being a savior. You'll need to look at his back, and keep him isolated."
Pomfrey bustled forward, guiding Harry to a bed and chiding him all the while, with Longbottom looking on and sniffling pitifully. She pulled Harry's outer robe off, then stopped and stared. Snape's eyes popped open and he hissed, while Longbottom's jaw dropped, and he fainted, hitting the floor with a thud.
With his cloak off, there could be no question, between the long, silky hair, the smooth, high-cheeked face, stained with tears, the swelling of the hips and the front of the baggy shirt. Sitting on the bed and breathing through fitful sobs, was a teenage girl.
"Severus," breathed Pomfrey, "what was that potion?"
"N.Nothing," he stammered, his composure truly broken for the first time in Harry's memory. "Nothing that should have been able to cause this. Wait . . . the potion!" Snape blanched, then turned and raced out of the room. He cursed when he felt the triggering of the spell he had left to detect when someone broke the no-speech rule he had given.
Pomfrey said nothing, but gave the door through which Snape had exited an angry glare, when she saw the hand-shaped bruises on Harry's slender arm. She placed Neville on one of the beds with the help of a Mobilicorpus spell, and drew the curtains around Harry's bed.
She gently helped him remove his shirt. She let out an involuntary hiss at the dark red streaks on Harry's back, already beginning to form bubbles of pus.
Harry let her move him, acting like a limp doll, allowing her to position his limbs as if he was in shock. Inside he was counting the seconds until the Headmaster showed up. He knew it would not be long, and though part of him wanted to tell Dumbledore everything, the hurt of the lies, the silence that had cost him his godfather was too near, too strong. He just did not have the same trust he had once had in the older wizard.
Shivers of desire flowed over him as Pomfrey spent long minutes carefully spreading ointment on his back. He shifted uncomfortably when her hand finally stilled on his lower back and looked up to see her eyes dark with desire. Swearing inwardly, Harry scrambled to find the mental control he had been employing since the morning. No-one else had been looking at him like this, he was sure, so it must be a result of his releasing his control. He could hardly believe it when he realized that more than a quarter of an hour had passed and there was still no sign of Dumbledore.
He sighed in relief when he heard the doors open again. To his surprise, he heard two pairs of feet. He crossed his fingers, hoping that the second set did not belong to Snape. His wish was answered with a crash as the curtains around his bed were pulled down, wrapped around the clumsiest witch he knew. "Tonks!" he cried out, then his eyes grew wide, as he realized that Dumbledore was standing behind the crash site, eyes twinkling at him, and he was shirtless. He shrieked and grabbed the sheet to wrap around himself.
"Wotcher, Harry," Tonks moaned, trying to extricate herself from the curtains, while Pomfrey huffed at her and fired a glare at the Headmaster.
Harry looked at Dumbledore, focusing past his embarrassment. "It wasn't Neville's fault," he said forcefully. "Someone threw something in the potion from the left of the room. I didn't see who it was, though," he admitted.
"Don't worry about Neville, Harry," Dumbledore assured him, "though it does you credit that you do. He won't be punished for this, in fact, he won't even remember it. He will be obliviated."
"What?! Why would you do that?"
"Harry," interjected Tonks softly, her eyes suspiciously shiny even as she stared at Harry with wide eyes, "no-one can know about this . . . You-Know-Who . . ." She stalled, unsure how to continue.
"There are spells, Harry, terribly dark spells that can bind a witch's magic to the service of her husband. If Voldemort learned of what has happened, I am very much afraid he would no longer be seeking to kill you."
"Marry him?! I would never!"
"As I said, Harry, the spells are Dark, near as Dark as they come. They don't require consent, under the appropriate conditions, and I am very much afraid that the mark you bear may already be sufficient of a connection between you to allow this binding to be performed. I myself will assist Professor Snape in forgetting about this after, well . . . after a certain task is completed."
"What?! But he has to fix me!"
"I'm sorry, Harry. The potion that did this to you was lost. Without that, the chances of his successfully creating a counter-potion are practically non-existent."
"But what about . . ."
Tonks reached out, grabbing Harry's hand, a tear dripping from her eye. "Oh, Harry, I'm so sorry. But gender-changing spells and potions are heavily restricted by the Ministry to prevent abuse by families desperate for male heirs. And the Ministry is full of leaks, we can't let them know what happened, or You-Know-Who will find out right away."
"You mean, I'm stuck like this? Forever?"
"We will set up rooms for you, attached to Tonks' rooms. She will watch over you. She, myself, and Madam Pomfrey will be the only staff to know of your problem."
"What about Ron and Hermione?"
"I'm sorry, Harry. They will be told that you've been taken elsewhere to receive focused personal instruction."
Harry just gaped at the Headmaster, feeling a gnawing pain in his chest. He was going to be alone, just as much as if he had shown his friends the truth and they had rejected him. Already he could feel it weighing him down. He could not help the tears that started to trickle down his cheeks.
Tonks shook her head, sitting on the bed and pulling him to her, wrapping her arms around him. Her hand slid up his back to tangle in his hair, then she began to stroke his head. She looked up at Dumbledore. "I can feel it," she said. "Snape was right. She does have an allure."
"And it is affecting you?" He sounded surprised, and Harry guessed that it was surprise that the allure seemed to affect men and women equally. It surprised him that she could feel it at all. He knew that it was definitely weakened by his concentration, as evidenced by Madam Pomfrey's retreat after he focused on suppressing it, but he had thought that he was able to suppress it completely. Maybe it still leaked through if they touched him? Er, her? "Your training is holding?" Dumbledore questioned her, watching her closely.
"Yes. I'll be fine, but it is strong. We'll need to shield her rooms."
"I'll take care of it."
Madam Pomfrey stepped in, glancing jealously at Tonks who was still holding Harry close. "I'll just set up an inner room until you've got the rooms set up, then, shall I?"
"That won't be necessary," responded Dumbledore. "The house-elves are taking care of it as we speak. Her rooms will be ready by the time we get her there."
"And how are you going to do that?" she asked peevishly, irritated that she would be losing the little beauty to that . . . that slut so soon. Dumbledore noticed her behavior, and shielded her from Harry's allurement with a wave of his hand. Pomfrey looked startled, and blushed deeply. Tonks just smiled indulgently at her.
Reaching into his robes, Dumbledore pulled out a sock. "We'll be taking an intra-building portkey," he answered her finally, tapping the sock with his wand and muttering a charm under his breath, then stepping over the curtains where they lay still on the floor, and holding the sock out to Harry and Tonks. Tonks lifted Harry's hand, rubbing her thumb across the back of his hand as she placed their joined hands on the sock. Dumbledore tapped the sock again, and Harry felt the hook in his navel, as he was dragged to his new rooms.