First Bite

“Right, let us go through our findings for all four of you,” the goblin Healer said and sat down behind her desk while making a gesture at the chairs in front of said desk. The Healer was smaller than the male goblins Cassia had seen, dressed in white healer’s robes and with a braid of white hair down her back. She also seemed calmer and kinder than the goblins Cassia had talked to so far, almost personable. Not that Cassia should be one to talk, she wasn’t exactly personable herself, after all.

Cassia sat down with Harry on one side, Dudley on the other and Vernon on Dudley’s other side.

“First, let me alleviate any fears, and I do understand the reasons you have felt such fear for your health.” The Healer looked at each of them in turn. “While the results aren’t good and while it will take time and work to heal properly, every one of you will be able to heal properly within two years, at the latest. Even better, every one of you will be able to get helped along by magic. Heir Potter may get more magical help than the rest of you, as he is magic himself, but as he also desperately needs that help to remain alive, safe and healthy, I do not think you will begrudge him that help.”

The air left Cassia’s lungs in a whoosh, it felt like she had been punched in the gut. She was so relieved to hear those reassurances, so relieved! Her eyes stung.

She saw Dudley shake his head vehemently at the Healers last words, and saw Vernon do the same.

“Absolutely not. Help him as much as you can, please!” she croaked. “The fact that the rest of us can get any help from magic at all is more than I had hoped for, really.”

The goblin nodded. “Then, let us begin with the diagnostic results. Heir Potter. You have been starved for most of your life, which has led to chronic malnutrition, even if you have had the opportunity to eat everything you need most of the last two years. There are also obvious signs of abuse,” the Healer looked from Cassia to Vernon and back, “and let me assure you all; if we hadn’t also found obvious signs of broken curses and curse damage in your home and on yourself, the Goblin Horde would have taken action because of this. Child abuse is abhorrent! As it is, the cause of the curses will get our ire, instead of the two of you.” She gave a sharp nod. “The wrongly healed broken bones and other damage from the abuse will be easier to rectify than the malnutrition. What I would like to know is when did you get bitten by a basilisk, and how did you survive?”

“Bitten?! You got bitten by the basilisk?!” Cassia was on her feet shrieking, before she slammed both of her hands in front of her mouth and backed away from Harry where he covered in his chair. Her heart was beating so hard in her chest, she could taste blood. She sank to her knees on the floor.

“Harry, Harry please, please … did you really get bitten by that basilisk …?” Tears ran down her face and she suddenly realised that she was having her breakdown now. She had forgotten all about it, what with everything that had happened the day before. She had fallen asleep when her head hit her pillow, not only the first time, but also after Dudley’s first nightmare and every time after that, too. She hadn’t taken any time to herself to process, and now it came back to bite her.

“Please, Harry, please tell me … tell me that you didn’t get bitten, tell me that you didn’t almost die … Oh, please!” she could no more stop talking than she could stop crying. Her shoulders shook from her sobs. Far back in her head she hoped Vernon would stop her soon, before she pushed any kind of guilt for her breakdown onto Harry. He didn’t deserve it.

Her precious little boy, her beloved nephew. Bitten by a basilisk! He could have died! He could have died! He could have died!

Vernon’s hand on her shoulder, rumbling calming nothings to her while his thumb stroked down her neck. A smaller hand held a vial to her lips and got her to empty it.

Calm settled into her mind like a fog rolling in from the sea, and she took a deep breath for the first time in what felt like forever. The goblin Healer gave her a moist towel to wash her face with and then Vernon helped her up into her chair, but remained standing behind her, hands on her shoulders.

“I’m really sorry, Harry, Dudley,” Cassia whispered. “You should not have had to see that. I knew it was coming, so much happened yesterday, but I didn’t know when, and when it came, I wasn’t able to stop it. My apologies, Healer. I did not mean for that to happen now.”

The Healer waved it away. “I’m a Healer, I have seen worse. Now, Heir Potter, would you please answer my questions? While I did detect basilisk venom in your bloodstream and body,” Cassia shuddered and Harry gave her a sidelong look, “I detected nothing that would indicate why you are, in fact, not deceased.”

Harry looked at Cassia again.

“I will be alright, Harry, don’t worry about it. It should not have happened, and I will try my best to stop it from happening again.” In front of you children, she didn’t say. “I’m just scared for you, my dear, that is all. The thought of you dying …” She swallowed hard and shook her head. “Unthinkable!”

Then came the tale of a diary with a ghost, messages in blood and petrifications; a school in chaos and filled with fear. A tale of mediocre to horrible professors who were unable or unwilling to actually do anything. Of a child taken, a professor with a penchant for the Obliviate Curse and a hidden chamber housing a millennia old basilisk. A tale of an untrained twelve-year-old fighting with only a sword from a hat that he couldn’t use, and a phoenix to help him, while above him there was a school full of professors that was supposedly some of the best in their fields. A tale of a basilisk bite that should have killed their precious boy, but for a phoenix that cried for him and a diary with a basilisk fang through the pages and a ghost no more. Of a Headmaster that didn’t let their boy get healed before dragging the story out of him. Of a blonde man that treated his house elf like dirt and a cunning, little boy who managed to free the little creature and make him happy.

Before Harry got done telling the whole story, even obviously shortened down as it was, Cassia was crying again, silently now as the Calming Draught still held fast, and both Dudley, Vernon and the Healer were staring at Harry with open mouths.

Strangely enough, it actually became easier after that. Or maybe not so strange at all, as nothing could be worse than the thought of losing her nephew to a basilisk in a chamber no one else could access, far beneath that dratted school. Not that she didn’t cry when the Healer told her how bad her son’s health truly was or the fact that her beloved husband would not live to see his fifties if he didn’t get help. She cried a lot, but it was silent tears and sniffling, not the straight-out panic attack she had gotten at first. The Calming Draught stopped that from happening again, even if she knew that it would have happened if not for that Draught.

The Healer went through all their health problems and then all the solutions and lastly what magic could do to help them all.

Harry really was worst off, by far. He was so tied down in bindings, blocks, compulsions, and curses on top of his health problems, it was a travesty and Cassia’s tears turned to a simmering rage. The Healer didn’t dare begin to remove any of the blocks and bindings before Harry was a lot more healthy, as such blocks and bindings on his core, his Creature Inheritance and his Magical Abilities - if that was indeed what the bindings suppressed, the Healer didn’t know, so tight were the bindings – could cause a backlash big enough to hurt both Harry and the Healers working on him.

Harry would go through rituals to repair much of the damage on his body from both the starvation and the abuse, but he would have to eat himself up in weight in time as well as keep healthy habits. After the rituals he would be safe from his body collapsing on him, but he would still have to take several potions for at least six months to repair all the damage.

Another set of rituals would take care of all compulsions and curses and the damage on his mind and body from those. The rituals would also be able to remove a few lighter bindings, like a ward to stop him from getting his owl-post. Later in the summer, after a month to six weeks, when Harry had been able to get healthier and stronger, they would try to remove a binding or two and see how that went. If all went well, he would no longer have any bindings or blocks at all before he went back to Hogwarts. If he went back to Hogwarts. That was very much up to discussion in Cassia’s mind.

Both Dudley and Vernon would get rituals that would more or less repair any damage to their internal organs and their bones from the fucking Gluttony Curse that had been placed on them. Another ritual would kickstart their weight loss and make it easier for them to move.

Cassia would get similar, but different rituals, to repair her own organs and bones after her years of starvation and malnutrition. She was better off than Harry, but not by much. She hadn’t had a curse on her to directly affect how she ate, but she had been cursed to always think about how she and everyone around her appeared, and to care so, so much about it. That had included her weight and her eating habits. She would have to keep to a diet and exercise plan, just as her boys would.

The Healer told them that while Harry would get potions to further help him, those rituals were all the three of them could get of magical help. And the only reason for that was because there was a slight tendril of magic in all of them, tying them to Harry and his magic. Without that tendril of magic, it would have been impossible for them to get any magical help at all. The magic in the rituals needed magic in the recipients to work. Muggles without any magic could not go through a ritual at all.

“Is that because we lived with Harry for so long, or is it because of the blood drinking?” Dudley asked. “And could you tell Harry more about vampires and stuff? He needs to know.”

Harry shrank down in his chair, but no one reacted overly much to Dudley’s statement.

“My diagnostics only show that he most likely has a Creature Inheritance,” the Healer said, “but not anything more. If Heir Potter is indeed of vampire origin and has taken blood from all of you, that is most likely the cause of the tendril of magic, yes. Vampires in general bind their food sources close to them, and in case of some vampire lines, such sources get certain boons in return. This might be such an instance, but without removing the binding on the Creature Inheritance, we won’t know for certain.”

“What about the Potters?” Cassia asked. “May we know if the Potters in general are known for any kind of Creature Inheritance?”

The Healer hesitated. “They are indeed known for a kind of Creature Inheritance, yes, but they are not vampires. The Potters are a known Naga family. A kind of shape changing snake creature that can change between a snake, a snake-human hybrid, and a human,” she described when she was met with blank looks.

“Wicked!” Dudley murmured. “That’s probably why you are a Parselmouth, then, Harry, or what?”

Harry nodded, without looking up from his lap.

“Heir Potter, you are a Parselmouth?”

“Yes, I am,” he whispered.

“But you have also shown clear signs of being a vampire?”

All four of them nodded emphatically.

“Only the blood drinking and self-healing when he got blood, so far,” Cassia said, she decided against mentioning Harry hunting that blonde witch from the day before. “He also broke the worst of the curses on us, when he tasted our blood,” she added.

“That is not a vampire trait at all, but on the other hand, it might come from one of his Magical Abilities instead, and the blood drinking was simply a conduit for his magic. As should be obvious, the blocks and bindings does not stop all of his Inheritance and Abilities to arise, even though I would not like to hazard a guess on how things will unfold when the blocks and bindings are removed. But no, the Potters have never been vampires.”

Cassia frowned. “Then where does it come from? And who can we ask to get information to help him adjust to his new reality?”

“As for the first; I’m sorry to say that I cannot help. For the second, my suggestion is books and a study of his instincts and habits. Do not, under any circumstances, contact strange vampires. Not only are there several different kinds of vampires and you do not know which kind Heir Potter is, vampirism is also frowned very heavily upon by most magicians. If Heir Potter should be outed as a Creature, much less a vampire, before he becomes of age, I shudder to think of the consequences, both for him personally and for the society in general.”

Cassia nodded. “Then that is what we will do. Have you told us everything we need to know about our healing?”

“The last ritual you, your husband and son will go through, when you are as healthy as we ritualistically can make you in the coming days, will be a ritual that will remove the remains of the curses that made you treat Heir Potter badly. I understand that King Ragnok himself will commission the talismans that will hinder any recurrence of such.”

“Yes, indeed.” Cassia nodded.  

“Good,” the Healer stated. “Who will go first?”

“The boys first,” Vernon said.

“Harry, would you like to go first, or do you want me to go first?” Dudley asked.

“I … I … what do you want, Dudley?” Harry asked.

“I’m …” Dudley swallowed. “I’m a bit afraid, to be honest, but I will go first if you want me to.”

Harry shook his head. “That’s alright then, I can go first and show you that it will be fine. I’m more used to magic, after all.”

“Thanks, Harry.” Dudley gave him a wobbly smile and the Healer led Harry out the door.