AN: So I swore to myself that I would never write a cliche story, especially not a creature!fic. Well, guess what this is? You guessed it, a creature fic. It made sense and I just spent so long geeking out on how much sense it makes, which is not pathetic at all because it makes so much sense.

And everyone, a HUGE thank you to the fantastical alexsblackrose, my editor. She took the time out of her INCREDIBLY busy schedule to get this edited by Valentine's, so love her to death.

Anyway, so that is that. I do not own Harry Potter or its characters or settings, nor do I own any of the plot contained within the pages and discs. Those belong to JK Rowling and her publishers.

Enjoy!

~Kiro

P.S.- for all of you for Valentine's, look at this link:
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When Harry retreated to Gryffindor Tower after the Final Battle for some long deserved rest, the last thing he thought was that he would be awoken by screaming and an odd tingling sensation in his entire body, not to mention a headache to rival crucio. However, it seemed like life never really followed his expectations, did it? So, of course, that was exactly what happened.

Now before we begin the explanation of this newest development, you have to understand a few things about Harry.

One: Harry was at the tender age of one year old, a year crucial for emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual development, when his brain was forcefully fused with a foreign piece of malicious soul (ie. Voldemort).

Two: Everything, no matter if it is human, animal, some combination of the two, or something completely separate all together, has a self-preservation instinct. This includes keeping itself as hidden and separate as possible from pieces of anything malicious (like Voldemort's handy-dandy horcrux).

Three: There are certain things in this world (a healthy psyche, a good spiritual foundation, the power of a magical mythical beast of ancient bloodlines) that need a whole, untainted soul, mind, and body to come to their full maturity and full potential (thanks a lot, Moldy).

So you see it is understandable that, after the disgusting violation of one-year-old Harry's mind and soul, something in him took refuge and chose to remain hidden. It also is incredibly logical that it would then surface as soon as the unnatural "thing" that was the horcrux was destroyed and Harry had enough energy for the change to take place.

It is also logical that, after having missed about sixteen years and a large chunk of formative development for this major component of Harry's physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual being, the sudden reintroduction of said component would be... shocking at the very least.

Not a bad shocking. Well, not an unmanageable, bad shocking. But rather a "holy fuck" moment accompanied by actual physical shock and one monster of a migraine.

So it came to pass that, yes, Harry's well-deserved nap was interrupted by a scream and a tingling sensation and a headache worse than crucio. Because, no, Harry's life just wasn't complicated enough beforehand.

And if at that exact moment a man thought dead awoke, gasping, with no wounds to speak of, then that was of no consequence. No, none at all.

Harry groggily opened heavy lids, trying to force thought past the pain in his skull. Unfortunately, he was unsuccessful, and decided to simply close his eyes and try to wait out the pain.

Footsteps sounded in the hallway, followed by the door creaking open and Hermione entering quietly.

"Harry?"

He groaned and flipped over, burying his head in his pillow to hide it from the light which spilled through the doorway at her entry.

"Harry, are you okay?"

He groaned again and mumbled something that was muffled by the pillow. Exasperated, Hermione crossed her arms over her chest.

"Harry, I can't help you if you don't speak clearly."

With another groan, he threw off his pillow, flipped back over, and pulled the covers down to his waist.

"My head feels like- like- I can't even think right now, but it feels bad, okay. Painful."

Hermione simply stared at him, eyes scanning his now-exposed face and neck. Nodding to herself, she calmly took three steps back into the hall, closed the door, turned, and cast her Patronus, which zipped off to the hospital wing. That done, she turned, peeked through the door again, and promptly fainted into a neat heap on the stone floor.

When Harry re-awoke, sans headache, the entire red and gold room around his bed was filled with chatter. Moaning with unhappiness at the noise, he opened his eyes to find half the remaining Order surrounding his bed.

"Can you guys shut up?"

The room got immediately quieter, whispers decreasing to a rustle just within his hearing. A timid-looking Hermione got up from her seat next to Ron and cautiously approached him, avoiding his eyes.

"H-Harry, have you had time to look in a mirror since the battle?"

Harry screwed up his face at the odd question.

"Uh, no, I really didn't want to see how horrible I looked staring back at me. Why?"

Hermione pursed her lips, looked over her shoulder at Ron, and back to Harry on the bed, still not making eye contact.

"Well, you see, Harry, you've got some... changes. Some really big changes."

Immediately, Harry raised his hands to his face, mapping out the smooth skin there.

"What- was I hit by a disfiguring curse that I didn't notice? Do I have scars all over my face? I still have my nose, don't I? I would hate to go through all that defeating no-nose in order to lose mine myself."

Hermione looked to be debating something with herself, and eventually one action won out as she began to dig in her purse. She pulled out a hand mirror and, looking it over, held it out to him.

"Here. Just- take a look."

Harry held the mirror before his face. He didn't look that different- tired, yes, he had bags beneath his eyes. His skin was a bit too pale, and his eyes looked irritated and too wide. His hair-

His hair was staring back at him. Thirty some black eyes were looking at him from a mass of scales and cold-blooded flesh. Snakes were slithering over one another atop his scalp, growing from the skin there. They were almost pure black on top, and toward their bellies became an incredibly dark brown, patterned with diamonds. Their heads were triangular and the eyes were slitted, every now and then blinking at him. Each one was about the thickness of a pencil, and they were all the same length that his hair had been when it had still been- well, hair. One flicked its tongue at the mirror.

His brain finally realizing what it was seeing, Harry screamed like a little girl, tossing the mirror to the other side of the room where someone caught it before it could shatter. He scrambled backward in his bed as if backing up into his pillows could separate himself from his own appearance.

"What the hell! You couldn't tell me I was a- a- a- whatever I am?"

Hermione looked solemnly at the ground as she replied, voice solemn, as if delivering a eulogy or a prison sentence.

"A gorgon. They feature in Greek mythology, the most well-known was Medusa. Your gaze would ordinarily turn all of us into stone, but since you are so weak it would take direct eye contact, and even that would only petrify us. As it is, it would be safer if you would close your eyes. We don't need to burden Professor Sprout so soon after the battle by making her start maturing mandrakes again."

Harry closed his eyes and sighed, running a hand through his hissing hair.

"What happened? Was it Voldemort, or a Death Eater?"

"No. We- we believe that you inherited this from your... your father. When you were an infant and turned into a horcrux, it was suppressed by the shard of Voldemort's soul in your head. When that barrier was removed, it waited until you had enough strength to come back. After your nap- well, you saw. At least, that is the theory."

There was a heavy, meaning-weighted pause before she spoke again.

"I'm sorry, Harry. I've been thinking and I think- if your father's experiences are taken into account, that if your gorgon side had not been suppressed, you would have slowly grown into it and been able to control your gaze and your- hair. Right now, your body has to adjust and you won't be able to control any of your nature until it does."

Harry placed his head in his hands and sighed a half-sob into his palms. One of the black snakes on his head bit his finger and he swatted it. It recoiled itself with the others draped over his forehead.

"Just one question for now, Hermione."

She nodded, looking cautiously curious.

"Do these guys on my head ever shut up?"

A chorus of hisses, annoyed "no"s, met his ears from atop his scalp. He sighed.

Harry awoke from his doze with a snap at the thunk of heavy books on wood. Startled, he looked around to see Hermione taking books from the large pile she had set upon his bedside table.

"I've been doing research and I've uncovered a disappointingly small amount of knowledge. Most of it is straight from Greek mythology, and I have seen a few mentions of gorgons briefly in larger tomes, but there are a few good bits of information."

She thrust a thin, brown book with a supple leather cover into his hands. Looking down at it, he saw it was titled "Straight From The Centaur's Mouth". How charming.

"This is the best I've found so far. Look at page eighteen."

Harry obligingly flipped to the correct page and started to read, apparently not quickly enough for his friend's liking. After a few seconds, a groan came from his right.

"Oh, who am I kidding, you'll take forever. Here, let me read aloud."

The book was snatched from his fingers. Hermione smoothed out the pages and cleared her throat, ignoring Harry's pointed glare.

In a time long ago, before the gods went their separate ways and when magic still ruled over all mortals, there lived three sisters named Medusa, Euryale, and Stheno. These sisters labored under the goddess Athena as sister priestesses, pledged to her in life, body, and soul.

The three sisters were incredible in their beauty, but one, the youngest, named Medusa, was the most beautiful. The great god of the sea, Poseidon was attracted by her beauty and her work for the goddess. He began to visit her, in the form of a handsome fisherman, and slowly fell in love with her, and she with him.

One month, it was many days before Poseidon could see his Medusa, as his brother Zeus demanded storms be crafted on the sea to the east. When at last he was released from his duty, Poseidon could not bear to wait for his love in the nearby marketplace as usual, and instead went to meet her in the temple of her goddess.

Overcome with joy and lust at once again seeing one another, the pair fell upon each other and made love within the temple of Athena. It was on this night that Medusa learned of the true identity of her lover, before he left. He fled into the night before she could react, frightened of what Athena would do since her uncle had desecrated her temple.

Athena was furious. One of her priestesses, one who was pledged to her and belonged to her, had sullied her temple with another god. 'Twas an unforgivable action. Athena knew it had to have been one of the three beautiful sisters, she knew the essence of their magic. However, the temple was dark that night and she could not be sure of which sister it had been. Enraged at the actions of the unknown sister, she summoned all three of them together in her desecrated temple.

"Which of you was it," she cried, "which of you sullied my temple with your despicable actions?"

Possessing great love for their sister and not wanting to see her punished by the goddess, Stheno and Euryale sought to take the blame.

"'Twas I!" cried Stheno. "My fierce spirit, like the roughest waves at the edges of the world, attracted the sea god to me."

"No, 'twas I!" cried Euryale. "My beautiful voice, like the sound of the waves on the open ocean, was what attracted the sea god to me!"

But Medusa, not wanting her sisters to suffer punishment for a thing which she had readily done, cried out as well.

"No, 'twas me!" she cried. "My beauty, with skin as pale as the palest sands, with lips the color of coral, and with eyes the shade of the Mediterranean were what attracted the sea god to me."
Athena, now even more unsure and set ill at ease by the selflessness each sister possessed, decided she had suffered enough.

"Enough!" She yelled, her bellow shaking the rafters of her temple. "Since none of you will allow another to undergo punishment alone, all three of you shall be punished."

She drew upon her godly magic of war and wisdom and cast curses upon the three.

"For all of your beauty, you shall be cursed with ugliness."

She waved her hand and the three sisters grew snakes upon their heads in place of hair, fangs in place of canines, and skeletal frames.

"And for daring to look at a man in such a way within my temple, each of you shall be cursed. From this day forward you will posess sight that will turn any man into stone when you look upon him."

Again, she waved her hand, then vanished into the air. Weeping, the three sisters fled to the harbor to pray to Poseidon, covering their eyes with their hands as they ran through the darkened city. When they reached the water, they collapsed in grief as one.

"Please," cried Medusa to the sea god, "my love, help us!"

Poseidon, wrought with pain that his love and her so loved sisters might suffer so, swept down before them.

"I am sorry," he lamented, "I cannot undo the curses the goddess has bestowed upon you. But I can grant you other gifts."

"For Stheno, the fiercest of the sisters, the weapon of magic of defense and of the mind."

He swept his godly hand in an arc, and Stheno glowed with godly light.

"For Euryale, the sister with the most beautiful voice, the ability to sway a man's actions and beliefs with nothing but words, and construct complex spells with nothing but a song."

He swept his other arm, and the second sister began to glow from within

"And for Medusa, my love, the most beautiful of the sisters, a child. And with this child, the knowledge that every one of our children and our children's children will possess another with as much love as we have for one another. Except that none of these future SoulMates will be able to be separated as we must be."

Watching as Medusa clutched her belly in bitter love, he shed a single tear, which splashed down onto the white sand of the shore.

"For you to protect our child, and for our child and our childrens' children to protect their loves, I give you greater power and greater destinies than any other mortal. Live well, my love."

With that, Poseidon vanished in a spray of sea mist.

Hermione looked up at the end of the page and folded the book closed, looking everywhere but at her friend's eyes.

"So... You think I am descended from one of these sisters?"

Hermione nodded.

"Well... Which one, then?"

Hermione reopened the book, scanning it eagerly.

"I do not know. We would have to learn by trial and error. Here- why don't you try commanding me to do something."

Harry thought for a moment.

"Uh... Hermione, make me a sandwich."

They waited a few seconds. Nothing happened. Hermione sat, prim and proper as always, staring curiously at her hands as if waiting for them to make a sandwich without her bidding. They remained still.

"Well, maybe you have to sing it? Sing something. It says that Euryale had a beautiful voice."

Casting around for a song he knew, Harry belted out a few bars.

"I ki-issed a boy and I liked i-it..."

Hermione winced and slapped her hands over her head to block out the sound, which resembled a cat screaming a battle yell at a rival, but with less drama and more gravel. When the horrendous sound stopped, she looked up from where she had covered her ears. Carefully, she removed her hands and sat up.

"No, no, definitely not Euryale then. That leaves Stheno and Medusa."

Minutes passed as each thought hard. Thinking, Hermione tapped the paper over and over with her index finger.

"Well," Harry thought aloud, "there isn't really a way to test if I'm Medusa's descendent. And I've always been good at defense. But we could see if I'm any good at Legilimancy now."

Hermione appeared a bit reluctant, but nodded, handing him her wand.

"Okay. Just don't- don't look at anything if you get in."

Harry nodded and lifted the borrowed wand, taking a shaky breath. Nodding decisively, he flicked the wooden rod.

"Legilimens!"

A few seconds passed. Nothing. No flashing lights, no diving sensation, no hitting of brick walls or painful revelations. Just the whistle of wind outside the window and painfully red and gold upholstery.

"Well, you are a descendent of Medusa, then."

A moment passed, then another. Harry's frame began to shake as he chuckled, then giggled, then belted out full laughter. Hermione soon joined in, and their laughs echoed through the tower, the first laughter they had uttered since long before the final battle.

And about the myth:

The myth in this is loosely based off of the gorgonsof Greek mythology, but I added things to make it more pretty.

I used Wikipedia, so shame on me, but apparently for the sisters (read the story first or this won't make sense):

Stheno = the oldest, most warrior like of the sisters, killed more men than the other two combined, has red snake hair and fangs, immortal
Euryale = second oldest, known for her bellowing cries (especially in grief for Medusa), immortal
Medusa = youngest, mortal, killed by Perseus (more further on)

Yeah. Hope you liked it! Please let me know what you think!