Harry Potter and the Heir

Edited by: Writer Chica, who speaks French and has been helping a lot with that part of the story.

Summary: A young thief finds his way to Hogwarts in search of the dark wizards that kidnapped his half-brother, a half-trained wizard. A Harry Potter crossover with The Doctrine of Labyrinths series. Warnings for profanity, violence and sexual references.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything from the Harry Potter series, or the characters of Mildmay and Felix and many elements and people from their pasts. Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling, while Mildmay and Felix are characters from a very very well written, intriguing and INCREDIBLE series by Sarah Monette, "The Doctrine of Labyrinths" consisting of the books Melusine, The Virtu, The Mirador, and the forthcoming Corambis. If ANYONE else has read the series, you are now OBLIGATED to write. We NEED a "Doctrine of Labyrinths" section on or at least something to tide us over until Corambis comes out..

Chapter 2

Mildmay

So yeah, I wake up feeling lucky as shit that I ain't the kid lying next to me. He's petrified, with his hands held out like they were holding something. Like he's pantomiming taking a tourist's picture in front of the Tour d'Eiffel and wondering if he should finish and hand the camera back or if he should sell it.

I sit there awhile trying not to lose my shit now that I know there's a fucking basilic running loose. I've heard a lot of stories, most I thought couldn't be true even if there were hocuses. Now I know better. From what I remember about basilics, you see one's eyes dead on, and that's it. You are fucking dead. Kid next to me, my size and age I guess, he got lucky if he saw it through a camera.

Ginevra. Merde. It was heading towards the bathroom that she was in. I hope she's okay, but I guess I'll find out sooner or later. And when I find out which of these fucking hocuses hexed Ginny, I'll kill 'em.

I hear a door at the other end of the large hopital room open, and a nurse steps out. She's a little on in her years, but her face has the calm serenity of someone who enjoys helping people, so I relax the muscles I tensed at the sudden noise.

She gives a glance to the other patient, but there's not much she can do. She gives me a nice broad smile.

"Good afternoon. How are you feeling?"

I wonder if she wants an honest answer and can't decide so I ignore the question. "Afternoon?"

Patiently, "Yes, you slept through breakfast, but I can get you some leftovers from lunch if you feel up to eating." Guess some of her patients don't. I nod as I realize only once food is mentioned how fucking hungry I am.

She gets up and heads back to the small room at the end of the hall. I hear her voice but can't make out the words. A minute later and she's back with a tray of sandwiches and some juice. This whole magic thing is getting out of hand. I'm hungry enough to ignore this weirdness though.

When I finish, she's back with some clothes and a towel in her arms, and a frown on her face. I realize after a moment that she's glowering at my hair. "Did somebody use you as a broom, or does dust just collect there naturally?"

I almost smile but stop myself just in time. "That bad?" She nods sagely and starts prodding my hair with her wand. We both sneeze at the dust clouds that escape from the mats.

"Oh, we could never let you into the baths this dirty. The water would need to be replaced five times before you could even start to get clean!"

She grabs a lock of my hair loosely and points her wand at it. I fight to keep still as she mutters "scourgify". I keep my eyes closed, not sure what to expect, and she keeps grabbing more of my black hair. "This'll do the trick." She exclaims happily, and I hazard a peek. A few handfuls of my hair glisten cleanly amongst the rest of the mats. "I never had to use this spell on hair before."

"Glad it works." Great, I'm a guinea pig again. Felix used to test out some of the harmless spells he'd learned on me. Joline had given him an old wand of hers that didn't quite work right for her but worked well enough for Felix. At least with him it was an all-or-nothing deal. She once tried to turn her cat blue with it, but instead ended up looking like somebody hit her with a water balloon filled with bright blue paint.

The nurse-witch said something I didn't quite catch. "Huh?"

"That scar on your cheek. Didn't you see one of those muggle doctors?"

Oh, that. "I got stitches, but we couldn't afford or risk a good doctor, and it got infected."

She gave me a look like she had a few words for him. "If it wasn't already healed I could have done something about it."

"What, so you hocuses don't get any disfiguring injuries?"

"No, there are some magic-caused wounds that will never heal right, and some never heal. It's just," she sighs, "A boy as young as you shouldn't have to live with something like that." I shrug in response.

"Better'n loosing an eye, or being dead." Like what almost happened, like what happened to Joline. Something wet slides down my right cheek. I feel a ghost of another wet thing on the left side of my chin and I look down to see tears falling onto my shirt, running down my nose now that I'm pointed that way. Fuck, things can only get worse when the nurse-witch notices. I hide my face in the blanket covering my legs and try to cry silently like I was five again. Can't get Joline's face, her dead form, out of my mind. Can't stop worrying about Felix, if he's still alive, if there's a goddamn thing I can do about it anyways.

There's a hand patting my back gently, and I wish I could just curl up and disappear. "Are you okay?" She listens quietly for a moment, and I know what my breathing must sound like, all hitched and forced through the silent sobs. "Oh you poor thing..." Her arms wrap around me and I keep still, not sure what to do anymore and not able to stop crying. She ain't Keeper, that much is obvious as she ain't hit me yet to get me to shut up and go back to sleep. "Sh.. sh.. everything will be better now. Don't worry." She keeps whispering shit like that, and it's worse because I know it ain't gonna get better, but it does feel nice to be held. She doesn't let me go until she's absolutely certain I'm no longer crying.

It's almost like she cares.

I let her lead me in a daze out of the hopital. I don't realize that we've gotten anywhere until she shoves me into a warm room leaving me with the towel and new clothes. Alone. She says, "Don't come out until you're clean!" The room has this huge ass bath in it, and it's already filled with water and bubbles of different colors. I hope she doesn't want to check behind my ears and shit.

I strip down real quick and jump into the warm water. It's been a long time since I've gotten to go to the baths, and these ones aren't even public, so it's like heaven. I can sit here as long as I want and just relax for once. I'm half asleep when I hear a voice, a girl's voice. I look around warily wondering when the door opened, but the girl comes straight up out of the water, untouched by it. 'Cause ghosts don't get wet of course. I freak out a little, on account of her being dead and all, but she's not trying nothin' so I calm down and decide to start washing my hair.

"What, you aren't mad that I'm peeking?" She giggles out, like its some sort of joke.

I shrug; I've been in baths where nobody cared what sex you were before. "Not much to peek at." She looks at my face a while, and I continue scrubbing at my hair.

"I haven't seen you before. First Years aren't supposed to be in here."

"Not a student." I say when I surface for breath. Funny how I can still hear her underwater.

"Really, then you're the one sneaking around everywhere?" She giggles, "You aren't the Heir of Slytherin, are you?"

"The what-in-the-who-now?" I get this incredulous look.

"You don't know about the Heir? He let loose this monster fifty years ago in the girl's bathroom." I get the odd feeling that that's the same bathroom Ginny went into last time I saw her. "He left a note for the entire school written in blood on the wall!" My blood gets even colder despite the warmth left in the baths. I realize my hand hasn't moved and has just been resting on top of my head awkwardly, so I try to focus on cleaning myself again.

"Was he... Did the monster kill you?" Didn't even realize I'd begun to speak before it got out there.

"Yes." She says sullenly and kinda floats down into the bubbles.

"Sorry." I can't tell her about Ginny, can't let Ginny get into trouble when I know it ain't her fault. I gotta save her.

"Your roots are showing." She replies after a moment with a sad smile. Then with a giggle she flies off leaving me to stare at my reflection in a mirror and curse.

When I finally get out of the baths and dress, it ain't the nice nurse-witch waiting for me, it's the black haired guy from last night, Severus. He gives my hair a look. Guess he thought my hair was like his with how dirty it was last night, too messed up to see the true color where the hair grew out. He starts leading me away without a word like I'm some sort of insect that he doesn't have to worry about. I can tell almost immediately that we're heading back to Albus's office.

He doesn't follow me up. The old man is waiting for me patiently with a smile on his face. It turns to a frown as he sees my hair still dripping wet, combed through by fingers only, and the big red stripe down the middle. I kept the towel on my shoulders to keep from getting soaked, since my hair is long enough to reach my shoulders.

"What did you do to your hair?" Albus says first off with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes.

"Cleaned it?"

"Is it supposed to be like that my boy?"

Don't like being called that, but I guess it's fair for thinking of him as Santa. "Keeper made me dye it, red ain't exactly inconspicuous." I have to repeat the last word a few times to get it recognizable.

"We could see about getting it turned black a bit more, permanently, or we can strip the dye out if you'd prefer that." The old man offers.

"Might as well change it, you've got enough redheads around here that it wouldn't be too weird." I let him do the point and shoot thing with his wand, only it's more of a flick of the wrist like throwing a knife. I look at my shoulder at the red hair I hadn't had since I was four. Ain't gonna be nice glancing in a mirror for a while.

"Did your mother have red hair?" Santa asks cautiously, knowing I might not remember her.

"It's about the only thing I remember about her. That and I don't think she was actually French. Her name was Methony." I can tell he doesn't recognize the name, not that he should, but he seems to be memorizing it. "Anything else you wanted to know, Santa?" I make sure the last word comes out jokingly so he doesn't think I'm some kinda idiot.

He laughs, but says, "I've never thought of myself as Father Christmas, and neither should you my boy. Just call me Albus, please." I give him a ghost of the grin I once had.

"Then just call me Mildmay, this 'my boy' shit is getting on my nerves."

He winces slightly, realizing what I meant. "Well then Mildmay, there is something else I was wondering about. You said you could hide in the walls. Would you mind showing me how you did it?"

I shrug, "Could, but it don't work here. All I gotta do is think about it a little, or sometimes not think." I try it now just to remind myself how it feels, and then I fall on my ass with a thud. The chair I was sitting on is now lying on top of me on it's back, and I think it hit me on the forehead when I fell. "Ow." Fuck, yeah, it hit me. "Milly-Fox, vous ne vous embarrassez pas." Keeper's voice again, don't embarrass yourself. I toss the chair off and Albus is giving me a worried but thoughtful look. He's smart, just waits patiently and doesn't try to fawn over me to help me up or anything that'd make me feel even worse about the stupid thing I just did.

"Well, seems like it works even on wood. Do you need to see Madame Pomfrey again?" I can't tell if his concern is genuine or not, can barely tell with Felix and he's not a stranger.

"Who?"

"The school nurse, Madame Pomfrey. You met her this afternoon." I nod, we never did exchange names.

"'Kay, I don't need to see her. This'll stop hurting in a minute. I can still see straight." I'd have said yes if I thought I had a concussion, I ain't a total idiot.

"You do realize that this makes you at least something of a wizard, don't you?" Albus says after I finish resetting the chair and I sit back down.

"No I ain't, it's just this place." I'm not a hocus, none of that magic shit ever made sense to me, not like Felix who could read and pick up a spell faster than Joline could teach them.

"You found this castle. It's spelled to look deserted to muggles. You can also see the ghosts I take it?"

"Yeah." Come to think of it, I never did figure out how I ended up in England, what with La Manche, the English Channel, in the way and me never being on a boat in my life. "Musta just picked up something from Felix."

"Mildmay," I think he just stopped himself from saying 'my boy' again, "Magic is not contagious. Our spells are successful at picking up all young witches and wizards from known families with magic, but they are far less reliable in finding muggleborns. If for some reason you never exhibited your powers openly, then it's quite possible we missed you."

He grabs a tattered old hat of his desk, the kind of hat you'd see the Wicked Witch of the West wearing. He tosses it at me and I catch it. "Put it on and see for yourself. This hat should be able to explain your magic for us."

I put it on. The wide brim is kinda large, and I have to tilt it back to keep it from covering my eyes. "Well, what do we have here?" There's a fucking voice in my head, and it sure as fuck ain't mine. "No need to be frightened, I'm just the Sorting Hat after all." I hope I can trust Albus not to curse me with this stupid fucking hat. "I am neither stupid nor... fucking... thank you very much. Am I supposed to be sorting you?"

"No... I think you're just supposed to see if I have magic..." I hope I'm not making myself look like the idiot I know I am.

"Well of course you have magic, otherwise how could you hear me?" Good point. "Also, most first years are a little scared of having me in their heads at first. You aren't the first to have this reaction." Bet they looked like idiots too. "So let's see then. You have used magic before coming here I think. From your memory I'd say you used a variation on apparition, very dangerous that. I wouldn't try it again if I were you. Your powers seem to manifest more as abilities than as actual spells. With training that will change, but it explains why the finding spells the schools use didn't work. What can you do that nobody else seems to be able to do, I wonder?" Pick locks blindfolded? "You don't get lost easily. You've already created a mental map of at least half the castle, including hidden passageways, the moving walls and the moving staircases. That's quite an accomplishment in itself. You also seem to have a sixth sense. Yes, you can tell when things will go wrong." So that's what that particular feeling was, magic. "You're very aware of your emotions, and you listen well to your magical intuition. Subtle talents to be sure, but magical nonetheless."

"So I'm a fucking hocus..."And a subtle one at that. The hat finally shuts up and I take it off, handing it back to Albus.

"That's what I thought. Did it offer any insight as to why our spells didn't find you?" Albus asks, and I get a feeling of what it must have been like to be his student.

"My magic's subtle. I got abilities, not flashy spells like Felix did." Felix knew how to do a few tricks even before getting a wand. He always knew he had magic, never said how he knew though. But I once saw him go up to an obviously rich tourist and ask politely for American money, and she just got a glazed look in her eyes and pulled out her wallet. He said "Thank you very much." and walked off, and then she stared at her empty wallet wondering where it had all gone. Scared the shit out of me at first knowing he could use magic to get his way whenever he wanted.

"Would you like to learn?" He's obviously expecting a positive answer, but I think about it a minute. It would give me the chance to stay here and find my brother, maybe even give me a few spells to help him. And then there's the feeling I have right fucking now, like I gotta stay here, or else. If that feeling's part of my abilities, I'd better listen to it. I know something bad'll happen to Felix if I don't.

"Sure, why not..."

He's already handing me a large book. It's got an English title. Fuck, problem number one in my new plan.

"I can't read English."

He frowns wondering how hard it will be to teach me. Pretty fucking hard, I've already tried. "I have a French first year book somewhere around here, and we can order some more if that will work for you."

"I ain't so good at reading French either, but I can get by." If I read aloud and get help with the big words. This is going to take a long time. He gets up and starts looking for the book. I take the one he had tried to give me and look at the first page. Sounding it out doesn't even help, never did get the hang of how oddly things were spelled in English, and it just doesn't make any sense. Yup this is gonna take a very long time.

French Vocabulary:

Tour d'Eiffel - Eiffel Tower

merde - shit