The Conception of Magic

Chapter Ten

Jane's announcement was met with a deafening silence.

Harry's mind, his thoughts and emotions and his understanding of reality, in a sudden and unprecedented shift, blanked. He stared at this woman, at Hermione's mother. Simply…stared. Her words echoed in his head, in all their heads, and he knew, he knew, she had to be wrong.

He couldn't be pregnant. He was a boy!

Exhaling, slowly, Harry reached up and put his hands over hers. Blank was cracking. "Do it again."

"What?" Jane seemed confused, blinking rapidly.

The look that crossed Harry's face was dark, almost menacing. "My bloodwork. Do it again."

His magic shifted, hissing in the air. Audible. He saw tendrils of electric green magic snaking through the air in the corner of his vision, saw it splinter and crackle. Flashing, bursts of silver and black whirling through the vibrant, green tendrils that was his magic. Stepping closer to Jane, Harry said, "I might not know a great deal about how the body works, but I do know that boys can't get fucking pregnant. Redo the tests. Keep redoing them until that…that…hormone-thing goes away!"

Someone hit the ground. Harry turned, blinking as he found both Ron and Vernon passed out on the living room floor. Petunia was swaying, reaching out absently and latching onto Cedric's shoulder as she stared, eyes wide and face pale, at nothing in particular. Luna was smiling.

Of course she was.

Harry's gaze swept over to the others, fingers itching. Hermione and Viktor, they both looked to be chasing a new formula Harry didn't even want to know about. It was disturbing to see the same expression on their face, let alone the fact the twins were quickly adopting the same look. Only they would be thinking on how to prank their fellow male classmates into thinking they're pregnant – bastards, the two of them.

"We could try graviendo," Charlie eased his way through the others, expression severe. Harry turned to face him, unnaturally still as Charlie said, "If it can detect an early pregnancy in a dragon, if it can pick up the second magical signature despite a dragon's hide, then it'd detect an unborn child in a human."

Harry met his gaze. "Do it."

Charlie's brow furrowed. "It isn't that simple. There're a few things I'd have to gather, first. Part of this spell is a ritual. Potions and runes are required."

"How long are we talking?" Harry exhaled, slowly.

Charlie's gaze stayed on him. "Three weeks."

His gaze shifted to Jane. She was sitting, now. Her husband was patting her hand as she said, "I could get an ultrasound set up in the same amount of time. A few people owe me a favor. I could commandeer their equipment for an evening."

Harry's scar was burning. He rubbed at the offending thing, not in the mood to deal with the Dark Lord's mood swings. The beginnings of a headache were biting at his senses as he let Luna lead him to a seat, his body almost weightless as he sat. His insides clenched, his stomach turning.

He could be…pregnant. The thought left a nasty taste in his mouth.

Dudley sat next to him. "What will you do?"

Harry slowly turned and stared his cousin down. Dudley turned away, blank-faced. Hermione cleared her throat, expressionless as Viktor roused Ron and Vernon out of their sleep. Harry tapped a pattern out along his leg, mind whirling as he tried to piece the information together. Then he thought about the stories on the Storm Magic in his body, stories of pregnancy and power they had discussed not long ago.

Exhaling, Harry stood and left the room. No one tried to come after him.

.

Three days passed. Hermione and Luna stuck around while the others camped out at Cedric's home or at the Burrow. Harry paced, brow furrowed as he held a journal in his hand. It had all the notes he needed to piece everything together. Small things, big things, horrible things…

On the night of October 31st, one of the few days when the rift between magic and the dead and the living was at its weakest, Storm Magic rose from somewhere on some unplottable island and infected his cousin.

Everything started there. With Dudley.

June 24th, at sundown, the Third Task commenced. The Storm had reached England at that point. Harry could still feel the wind, could feel the Storm when he closed his eyes. He could sense it in his body, feel the currents of a foreign power in his own veins pooling into his abdomen. Concentrating there, becoming something different and unnatural. Harry placed a hand on his stomach.

Eight months. The storm had swept over the land for eight months, and there were few reports detailing its presence or what occurred. Between Barty and the others, he knew wild, untapped magic didn't stay in a body. It passed through them, enhancing their spells for a period of time, but it would, in time, fade away. It wasn't a natural part of the body. It would either pass through on its own or the mage would burn it away in a few weeks.

Storm Magic, apparently, was different. It was in his body.

If the books Luna had gotten him were anything to go off of, the only reason the magic would be locked in his own body would be for one reason and one reason only – something was blocking it. Harry paced through the kitchen, waiting for the pudding in the refrigerator to set. Blocked. Something had blocked the Storm Magic from leaving his body, which would mean whatever happened during his fight with the Dark Lord was responsible…

The fight. Harry stilled in the middle of the room, his mind reeling as the battle came back to him.

.

Harry heard the Dark Lord roar his name, saw the still-present rush of green magic that would spell his death if he didn't find a way out. The Dark Lord stepped forward, the magic rippling and the Priori Incantatem doubled in size. Harry grit his jaw, and, after a split second to decide, he matched the Dark Lord's pace. The vortex expanded, the souls of the dead throwing their arms up to shield their faces.

Then the spell snapped.

His mother's frantic screams vanishing as the green-now-silver magic surged forward and slammed into him. He felt it seeping through his skin, felt it pushing past muscle and bleeding into his veins. He was cold and burning, senses deadened and overly heightened. He could feel the raw power that was the maelstrom rushing into him, could feel sparks of cold and hatred and fragmented fury cutting into his very being.

Black magic surged at the heart of the maelstrom's power. Black magic howled.

The magic was ice when it flowed into him.

His stomach cramped, heaving at the intrusion his body was undergoing, and his legs gave out…

.

The Storm Magic hadn't come upon him alone. Voldemort's magic had been caught in the middle of it, had ploughed into him with the force of a train and had kept flowing into him. The pain he had felt, after that battle…

Harry sat at the table, staring, wide-eyed, at the wall. Petunia, having entered the kitchen, stilled when she saw him. Then she was at his side, wrapping an arm around his shoulders as she whispered, "Harry, what's wrong? Are you okay? Should I have Hermione call for the others?"

"No," Harry swallowed, turning slowly to see his family and their two guests come into the room. Luna led the way to his side, sitting in a chair by him as Hermione asked, "What's wrong?"

"I know who the father is," it was impossible, really, but there wasn't any way to deny the truth that was screaming at him. His luck was shitty, anyway. Why not toss this wrench into his life, too? Swallowing, he looked up at Hermione as he whispered, "It happened during the Third Task. During the battle. There's only one person who could be the father. One person, Hermione! One!"

He saw her eyes widening even as he sprung to his feet, panic cutting through him. He could sense the magic in his middle, the pain he had been feeling lessening each day. The bloodwork Hermione's parents did every morning came back the same. Positive. Always positive. His hands were shaking as he started pacing, ignoring the journal resting on the counter as Hermione sat.

Luna's expression was pensive, Dudley and the other's confused.

Harry let out a bitter laugh before saying, "Trust fate to thrust Voldemort's heir at me. In me. Same thing."

He whirled on Hermione. "Voldemort, Hermione! The magic that blocked the Storm Magic from leaving my body was Voldemort's Killing Curse! It cut it off, somehow. Isolated the magic itself. When the two entered my body that night, they were locked in. I already know what the man feels and now I have to have his fucking baby? What the bloody hell did I do to earn this?"

Charlie said the spell he knew would confirm it. The ultrasound would, too.

Harry knew, though. Pressing a hand to his stomach, the skin softer than normal, but the muscles underneath hard as a rock, told him plenty. His pants were a tad tighter than what he liked. They pinched at his hips. He listened to Luna go over his notes. Hermione went through the few things they had from Dudley's time on the island as Dudley himself grabbed his wrist.

He leveled a hard look on his cousin even as Dudley said, "You'll be okay. We can hide it."

"Hide it?" Harry wanted to laugh. "How am I going to hide that I'm pregnant while I'm at school?"

That was the main issue, wasn't it? He and Hermione and Luna would be heading to Hogwarts in a few days. Dumbledore had said that's where they needed to be. Sirius wrote, almost daily, about things going on in his home. Nothing big, but Molly and Arthur were there. Remus, too.

Harry made his way to his room, drawing in a breath. Pregnant.

Harry stared at the wall, one hand idly resting on his stomach. He could feel the magic in there, the foreign, parasitic entity that had forced itself upon him. It was a baby. It was the Dark Lord's child, brought into existence by a storm. He wasn't a woman, though. How would it come out? Harry felt a tendril of panic curling up his spine as he turned to the window.

A dementor staring through the window at him didn't seem to care about the rising panic attack Harry felt coming. Harry blinked, noticing something else off. There was a figure standing in the rain on the other side of the road, staring up at his window. The dementor wasn't giving him any problems, but this was new. Pressing his hand against the wall by the window, Harry narrowed his gaze.

Harry ignored the dementor, not paying it any attention since it wasn't giving him fortifying visions of his parents' murder or naked old people. He was never watching 'The Shining' again. There were things a teenage boy never wanted to see. Wrinkly old women climbing out of a bathtub was one of them.

There was a person out there. Harry pushed the images out of his head, frowning as he eyed the figure that vanished after a car passed. Blinking, Harry leaned forward. Nothing. The dementors were drifting down the street, passersby's oblivious to their presence. A few dogs shrunk towards the ground as they passed, wagging tails curling between their hind legs. Cats avoided them.

There was nobody outside, though, staring at his window.

Had he imagined it? Was the stress getting to him?

When Harry turned, exhaling, mind whirling, he wasn't expecting to find a young man across from him with a sharp, manic grin on his face. The man stepped forward, dry as could be. Ripped jeans, a too-large shirt hanging off a shoulder. Chin-length hair, too-bright eyes.

Barty stood across from him, in his room, grinning. "Quite a mess you're in, Harry. Question is, what now?"

Author's Note

I'm back! I haven't been writing anywhere near as much as I'd like, but I do try. I've been working on a short story of my own, too. I've read a few stories that were mentioned in the comments, and I've fallen in love with a few of them. I actually started reading Black Bunny a long time ago, before the mPreg came into play. I haven't gotten too far, but I'm looking forward to seeing how that goes. This chapter isn't too much, not as exciting as some chapters, but the ending, when Barty shows up, has been something in my head for a while.

In the next chapter, Barty and Hogwarts come into play! Finally! And maybe Voldemort. Maybe.

So, Without Further Ado: Favorite, Follow, & Review!