Koama
Levi was over five hundred years old and he had had a few mentored students in his time. This one was shaping up to be the most difficult already, and Levi had only met the newly inherited mage less than an hour previous.
The first thing he took note of was not the age of the man, but his appearance. He seemed to be in some halfway form between a true halfling merrow form and a merrow's landwalking form. The bastardized form was obviously new with shiny new scales.
Then of course, there was the age. Sixty eight was well passed the threshold of being able to inherit naturally. And then came the issue of what was holding him back from inheriting in the first place.
Then there was the boy. Levi wasn't sure who the boy is or what he was to his student, but his student was visibly showing instincts that pointed towards the boy being important. The boy looked around twelve and was obviously injured by what appeared to have been some sort of knife perhaps.
And Levi couldn't forget the massive snake, bigger around than the boy's width and much longer than even Levi was tall. Which apparently his student could talk to. A beast speaker perhaps? Or perhaps it had to do with his merrow form showing obvious snake features. The boy hissing at the snake was perhaps the most surprising. Was he related to the merrow, perhaps? A son?
Before Levi could puzzle out any more answers, his student came back.
His eyes immediately sought out the boy and marginally relaxed seeing him in the same position.
Yes, there was definitely some instincts at play here.
“We will be leaving for Nevarah now?” Tom asked though his question sounded more like an order.
Levi felt a bemused smile curl his lips.
“Yes, we will.”
“Wait!” shouted the boy.
Everyone turned at once to the boy who was glaring up from the bed.
“We? Does that include me? I didn't agree to this!”
“Well we could leave you,” Levi said, uncaring. His only care was for the younger merrow right now.
“Absolutely not,” said merrow barked out. “Potter, you are coming with me.”
The boy reared up, ready to fight.
“No I am not!”
Levi could see his mentored student getting more and more visibly stressed, his instincts going haywire.
Levi had had enough of this. His student needed to see a merrow healer and the boy could use a healer as well. Inter-realm portals were difficult but certainly not impossible, if the boy wanted back on Earth so bad Levi would take him himself afterward. Right now he was coming with them whether he wanted to or not.
“Hyenda Portalis, Merrow Waters, Noble Healer's Office,” Levi intoned, focusing on all four of them, after throwing a spell at the child and snake so they could breathe underwater.
Within moments, the three and snake are in the office of Levi's own healer, Koama Malifors. Koama herself raised her head from her paperwork and gave Levi a dead eyed stare.
“Levi.”
“Koama,” he replied warmly.
The merrow woman shook her deep purple hair out as she gave a long sigh.
“And who are my patients?” she asked, completely ignoring the giant snake.
“I am Tom Riddle,” his student introduces himself, receiving a shocked look from the boy.
After a few silent moments, his student then nudges the child, who scowls up at him in indignation before muttering, “Harry Potter.”
Koama just accepts the introductions, as professional as ever.
Levi steps up now, “Tom is my student. He just went through his inheritance.”
Finally Koama seems stunned. “Just now?”
“Just now.”
The woman was suddenly in a flurry of movement as she began ushering the man into a seat as she began throwing diagnostic spells at him and frowning at whatever feedback she received. This went on for minutes as she kept throwing different spells around before finally stopping and just staring at Tom.
“What happened to you?”
Tom just looked somehow amused and irritated.
“You would have to be a bit more specific.”
“You somehow just broke over a dozen different seals at once, resulting in your inheritance, which shouldn't be possible at your age. And all of the seals! From the remnants of them I can tell they were a nasty piece of work! What in Kesmar's bloody reefs happened to you?”
Tom looked shocked and confused before turning to the boy.
“Check the boy.”
Koama looked enraged upon the order before visibly calming herself.
“Fine,” she gritted before swimming over to the child.
Said child was mesmerized by the woman's merrow form and just being underwater at all it seemed. He kept looking every which way.
“Come along, child,” she said, ignoring the angry frown she got from the boy for being called a child.
The boy, Harry, was sat where Tom was before and Koama began throwing spells once more, though different from the ones before. After the first few left the boy flinching and whimpering, Koama cursed under her breath before using different spells.
With each spell her face became more thunderous.
“I want to call Healer's rights,” she demanded.
Levi looked over in astonishment. He thought she'd be more upset by the admittedly very interesting and terrifying case of his student's. But for her to call Healer's rights after seeing the boy's results…
“He has just as many seals as your student did. Many of which are obviously illegally placed, including a death seal. And that's not even counting his physical health which is… Well, let's just say I have ample evidence to call Healer's rights.”
Levi looked on in shock, he had thought the boy looked rather pitiful looking but he thought that was mostly from the bloody gash in his arm making him appear more damaged than he really was. But no, as Koama quickly healed the cut, it was obvious the boy's pitiful appearance was just how he was.
“What's going on?” Tom growled, stepping closer to the pair on the bed. As he stayed underwater, he looked healthier and healthier as time went on.
“This child needs healing and soon, just like you. I will have to call in a few colleagues and alert the royals. There needs to be hunts for information done and fast.”
It was obvious his student hadn't comprehended half of the woman's words but he accepted them.
Koama twirled away to send off messages to the merrow courts and Levi was left the sole focus of the two Earthlings and the snake.
“That was Koama Malifors, the chief healer for Nobles of the Merrow Courts. She can be a bit abrupt but she is one of the best general healers in the realm itself. If she says she needs to find specialists, then you two are in dire need indeed.”
Tom scowled and stepped closer to Harry, his instincts obviously ruffled.
Harry scowled up at Tom and scooted away from him. It seemed the boy didn't agree with the attention of the new merrow.
This was definitely the most troublesome student he had had yet.