Disclaimer: See prologue.
Guide: "Speech", Thoughts, ~letters and other written things, "Parseltongue"
Beta: cuter-than-a-guinea-pig. All remaining errors are my own.
Warnings for this chapter: paedophile character
AN: Here is the next chapter. The poll on my profile page concerning the Triwizard Tournament is still open. So go and vote now if you haven't already. The current vote is 57% for the inclusion of the tournament.
-~-~- Verbuar -~-~-
-~-~-by Still waters are deep-~-~-
-~-~- Chapter 9 -~-~-
What does it mean to be a teenager? For many it means a change in their body, a change from a child to a young man or woman. For me, it meant that I stopped being a boy and became a Foreas. And while two boys could share a room, a young man and an already betrothed and fertile Foreas couldn't, even if they've been best friends from the cradle and have only platonic feelings for each other.
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"I really hate that we aren't sharing a room anymore," Draco complained as we walked out of the Great Hall after the Welcoming Feast of our third year at Hogwarts.
"I know," I answered, having heard that particular complain for the fifth time today and even more times during the summer holidays. "But this doesn't mean that you can't visit me there, you know?" I said to cheer my best friend up.
"It still won't be the same as if we roomed together," the blond answered, dejected.
"Now you're being silly," I informed him. "What difference does it make if we're sleeping in the same room or not? I mean we're sleeping," I stressed.
"But you must be in your room by curfew," Draco whined. "So we'll have fifteen minutes less together every day, making it nearly two hours a week," Draco began to count up the time.
Before he started to tell me how much difference it would make in a year, I interrupted him, "And you're a Prefect and therefore can walk around the castle after curfew all you like. So just walk me to me room and we won't miss any time."
"Yeah, I forgot about that," Draco said with a smile. "But still..."
"Really, Draco. If you don't stop complaining, I'll have to believe that you're actually sad that you now have to share a dorm with three other people instead of about seeing me some minutes less every day," I accused in good humour.
Draco stopped mid-step and turned around to face me. "Of course I care more about you than about which room I'm staying in," he said, obviously hurt that I would even think something like this about him.
"So stop complaining about the new rooming arrangement," I said, ruffling Draco's blond locks before I ran away from his fury.
"Hey!" he yelled, trying to smooth down his hair again as he hurried after me.
I just laughed. Draco and his hair.
At the staircase I stopped and waited for Draco to catch up with me. As I usually would have run down all the way to the dungeon, Draco had reason to ask, "Aren't you coming down to the common room?"
"Not today," I answered. "I have to unpack my stuff and then it's straight to bed for me. I'm so knackered. I'm always surprised how doing nothing but sitting in a train all day long can tire you so much."
"Because you're bored?" Draco suggested.
"Draco Malfoy, are you saying that your company is boring?" I asked in mock outrage.
"Of course, not!" he vehemently denied.
"Good," I said with a smile. "Good night, Draco," I bided farewell to my friend, hugging him goodbye, while he hugged me back.
"Sleep well," he wished as I walked up the stairs to the second floor where Lord Slytherin's private rooms were located.
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"Dumbledore is insane," I hissed at the portrait of a silver-blue Ouroboros who guarded the entrance to my new rooms.
It was in the summer between my first and second year when Tom told me the password to his quarters in Hogwarts. While I hadn't been surprised that it was in Parseltongue, I'd been surprised that Tom would say such a thing about the headmaster. Dumbledore was strange, yes. But insane? I wouldn't have gone that far.
However, by the time I first had to use the password, I was ready to agree with Tom. The reason for the change of mind? The one and only Gilderoy Lockhart!
After the first lesson I already disliked the man. Seriously, what competent teacher quizzes their students about his favourite colour or when his birthday is? And as if this wasn't enough, the man also gave me a creepy feeling whenever he stood near me or leaned over my shoulder to see how I was faring with the 'quiz'. To top it off, after the fiasco with the Cornish Pixies, it was clear that the man was a fraud and hadn't the slightest idea about Defence.
And while some would say that hiring an incompetent teacher was enough to label the headmaster insane, my personal reason to agree with Tom's choice of password had more to do with the creepy feeling I got from the DADA teacher Dumbledore employed.
While I'd at first wondered why exactly Lockhart made me feel so uncomfortable around him, the reason behind my uneasiness became clear by the time Valentine's Day came around.
The peacock, as the Weasley twins had labelled Lockhart, had organized a special Valentine's event in a sickenly pink Great Hall. To make matters worse, dwarfs, dressed up as cupids, were delivering love letters and singing love songs.
With my status of being Lord Slytherin's fiancé being known, Draco and I didn't expect anyone to dare and write something to me, disrespecting their Lord. But not one, but two people had the audacity to send one of the cupids my way.
The first admirer was easily made out. When the cupid had sung the horrible song about my eyes being as green as a fresh pickled toad and my hair being as dark as a blackboard, Ginny Weasley's face had become so red that only she could be the one behind it.
The second admirer was harder to figure out as I received his letter during lunch. But in the end, his handwriting gave him away.
"The song was embarrassing, but this is just 'Eer'," Draco commented after having read the letter with me. I couldn't help but to agree with him.
~I want to stroke your hair, to kiss your lips~that was harmless enough. But~to caress your thighs and loins, to bury myself in your warmth~? That certainly wasn't something one should write to a twelve-year-old! Especially not to an engaged one.
"The handwriting looks familiar though," I told Draco, who agreed with me. But who was it? I wondered.
"Looks like Professor Lockhart's handwriting," Theo said from my right, having leaned over my shoulder to take a look at the letter.
"Now that you say it, it really looks suspiciously like the comments on my DADA assignments," Draco said. "A student could have faked his hand, though," the blond admonished.
"If I were you, I would inform Professor Snape about it," Theodore suggested as he finished his sandwich.
I agreed with my house mate. However, my godfather had the present of mind to avoid having to spend any more time in the Valentine's horror cabinet of a Great Hall by the impromptus placing of an important appointment with Lord Slytherin after breakfast, which fortunately kept him away from the castle until the following morning.
And because Nagijan had disliked all the pink too, I had asked Severus to take Nagijan with him. The snake had pestered me with wanting to meet with Nagini for some time anyway. So my animalistic defence was also out of my reach.
"Just try to not be alone with him until Sev returns," Draco advised to which I nodded in agreement. I had no wish to be alone with the man if all signs pointed in the direction of him having inappropriate intentions or feelings for me. But to my horror, just this happened in the evening.
I was on my way back from the library, as I unknowingly walked under one of Lockhart's Valentine's versions of a mistletoe, which was nothing but a glittering mass of pink ribbons with even more neon pink paper hearts as a berry substitute. But what was worse about the damned thing was that it would follow you around and play an annoying love song until a second person would step under it and the pair exchanged a kiss, after which, the object would finally vanish.
After cursing my misfortune, I decided to just walk down to the dungeon where Draco would free me from the damn thing. But as my luck would have it, I got caught by the damn pink joke of a mistletoe on the third floor. The third floor where the Defence classroom was located. And, as if he had been laying in wait for me to walk into his kissing trap, Lockhart came around the corner, sporting a hug smile, just like the cat who got the cream.
"Harry, my dear. Don't worry, I'll rescue you from the mistletoe," he called out to me in an overly joyous voice.
The horrible letter still clearly present in my mind, I didn't hesitate to run away from the man and sprinted down the staircase to the second floor. I wouldn't be able to run all the way down to the safety of the Slytherin common room. Hiding was also out of the question, thanks to the annoying song the pink mistletoe created.
Just in time I remembered that Tom's private rooms were located on the second floor, not too far away from the staircase I was currently descending.
"Wait up for me, Harry," I heard Lockhart yell behind me as I reached the second floor and turned left. Hearing his voice made me only run faster away from the man.
Why did I let Severustake Nagijan with him, I cursed. If I didn't know better, I would suspect that he flooded the school on purpose with all the pink and glitter just so that I would be on my own, I thought.
I only stopped running once I reached the portrait of the Ouroboros which guarded the entrance to Lord Slytherin's quarters.
"Dumbledore is insane," I hissed out in desperation, hearing the sounds of Lockhart's footfalls become louder and louder as the part of the canvas the Ouroboros enclosed vanished a bit too slowly for my liking. But at least I had been lucky that the guarding portrait was a snake because I still hadn't mastered to speak Parseltongue without seeing a snake in front of me at that time.
When the opening was just big enough for me to slip through, I dashed through the hole and called out, "Close!" To my relief, I was still speaking in Parseltongue, even though I hadn't a snake to look at.
With dread I watched how the opening closed again, hoping that I wouldn't see Lockhart's hand reaching through the still open hole. Only when the hole in the wall was fully closed without I having even seen a bit of his pink robes, did I allow myself to relax and slump down against the wall. Apparently the portrait hole did open and close faster than I thought; my fear of being caught by Lockhart having made everything seem like it happened in slow-motion.
When I looked up again, I noticed that I wasn't alone in the room. To my surprise and joy, Severus was sitting in one of the armchairs, Tom occupied the other while Nagijan and Nagini were cuddled together on the rug in front of the lit fireplace.
"What's the matter, Harry?" Severus asked, getting up from his armchair to walk over to me. But before he could take more than three steps, I'd already got up from the floor and had run into his arms, burying my head in his chest.
"Oh, I'm so happy to see you," I mumbled against Severus' chest as I hugged my godfather tightly, crying in relief.
"What happened, Harry?" he asked me, his voice full of worry.
"I..." I began but couldn't finish. Now where I was out of danger and safe, the adrenalin vanished, allowing my feelings to overwhelm me.
"I..." I tried once again. But I was still too distraught by what could have happened to get anything out.
"It's okay, Harry. You're safe now," Severus said in a soothing voice, rubbing comforting circles on my back with his left hand as he guided me to the armchair he had previously vacated.
Once we we're both settled comfortably in the armchair, Severus began to tease out what the problem was, Tom and the snakes watching us with keen eyes.
"Has it something to do with the annoying mistletoe over your head?" he asked me in a calm voice. I just nodded in agreement.
"Were you running away from someone who wanted to kiss you?" Severus asked after a short paused. It had taken him some moments to guess what could be the reason for my current hysteric and was somehow related to the mistletoe.
"Yes," I answered, finally finding my voice.
"Who was it?" Tom asked, before Severus could ask the question.
"Pro-fessor Lock-hart," I stammered out, talking to Severus' chest. While Tom didn't make me feel afraid, it still spooked me that he had suddenly spoken.
"Lockhart?" Severus asked in shock. Tom was doing his best to keep his outrage under control and to stay silent to not startle me again.
I nodded. "I got a Valentine during lunch," I began to explain. "It made me feel...uncomfortable," I found the word after a short pause. "And I wanted to show it to you, but you left after breakfast," I added.
"Do you have it with you?" Severus asked me. He believed that reading the letter would get him faster to the root of the problem than asking me more questions.
"Yes," I answered. "It's in my satchel."
Without a word, Tom got up from his armchair and walked over towards the portrait hole where my satchel lay forgotten on the ground. Handling it over to me, I rummaged around a bit until I found the letter.
With curious eyes, Severus took the letter from me and unfolded it. Lord Slytherin read the letter over the Potions master's shoulder.
It was both fascinating and scary to see how both their eyes darkened with every word they read.
"Isn't there a way to shut that damn thing up," Tom said in annoyance, referring to the song the pink mistletoe was playing in a continuous loop. Apparently, until now he had been so worried about me that he'd been able to ignore the horrible noise. But now, where he was beyond furious about what he'd read, it just fuelled his anger even more.
"One of us would have to kiss Harry on the lips," Severus answered, his voice monotone as he was doing his best to suppress his anger to not scare me.
"Would it be all right if I kissed you, Harry?" Tom asked in a soothing, calm voice.
"I'd planned to ask Draco to kiss me," I told him, not seeing how his left eye twitched at the comment. "But it's okay if you do it," I added in a shy voice after a short pause, giving Tom the permission to kiss me.
Severus loosened his hold on me, allowing me to turn around in his lap so that Tom could reach me better.
Slowly, to give me enough time to stop him if necessary, Tom leaned closer to me. Because Tom wasn't Lockhart, he only gave me a quick and innocent kiss on the lips. But still, it made my cheeks turn a bright, deep shade of red as the pink mistletoe vanished for good.
"Finally," Severus mumbled out in relief, happy that it was silent in the room again.
"Now," Tom said to the room, "let's see if we can find the man."
"Severus, you'll stay with Harry. Nagini, you'll come with me," Tom ordered as he walked towards the portrait hole.
Tom didn't have to look far to find Lockhart because he returned to his rooms just after Nagijan had crawled into my lap to comfort me. Apparently, the paedophile Professor had still been roaming the second floor, searching for my hiding place somewhere near the entrance to Lord Slytherin's quarters when Tom dragged him with him.
"Harry," Lockhart said in surprise. Why he was surprised to see me, I couldn't imagine. Either he was very dump or a very good actor. Really, why else should Lord Slytherin have dragged him into an isolated room right after his failed attempt at molesting his fiancé?
"I've been searching for you everywhere," Lockhart added, making me feel very uncomfortable, even with Nagijan and Severus right beside me.
Tom must have noticed my discomfort because he ordered in Parseltongue, "Harry, Nagijan, go to the other room."
Quickly, I picked up Nagijan and headed to the other room, which turned out to be the bedroom. Even with Tom and Severus being there with me, I still didn't want to spend a minute longer than absolutely necessary in the same room as Lockhart.
In retrospect, I wonder if he just wanted to have me out of harm's way, or if he just hadn't wanted me to witness what he and Severus did to Lockhart after I left.
But even then, I was still curious about what happened in the next room, so instead of inspecting the bedroom, I sat down just behind the door, trying to catch what was said.
At first I could just hear some bits and pieces. And that was only because Lockhart was speaking louder than normal.
"Soft skin", "seduce the rare Foreas", "a trophy to deflower the Lord's fiancé", and "would magnify my fame" were what I heard through the closed door. I did not like any of it. I was really relieved that Nagijan was with me. Petting him gave me a feeling of security.
"Being an expert in Memory Charms," was the last thing I heard. Severus or Tom must finally have cast a Silencing Charm on the door as no other sounds were heard for a whole minute.
Annoyed, I got up again with a huff and took a look around the room, not worried about Tom or Severus as Lockhart was no match for them. Expert on Memory Charms or not.
For this being the private quarters of Lord Slytherin, the room was rather sparsely decorated. But the few pieces of furniture in it were old, high-quality ones made of a dark red-brown wood with some black, silver and green accents.
Quickly, I'd inspected everything there was to see and opened the door to the bathroom. Surprisingly it was nearly as large as the bedroom and had both a big tub and shower.
Just as I wanted to inspect the different taps, Tom walked into the bedroom and called out for me, telling me that it was safe for me to come back to the sitting room.
"Don't worry, Harry," Tom said to me as he entered the bathroom and laid a soothing hand on my shoulder. "He can't do anything to you anymore."
"Don't worry, little one," Nagini suddenly spoke up as I re-entered the bedroom. "I tripped him so that his own spell hit him," she explained, very proud of her handiwork.
"And it makes questioning him under Veritaserum so much easier when he can't even remember his own name," Tom chided Nagini.
"But don't worry, Harry," he addressed me. "With the letter you showed us, the Aurors have all the evidence they need to arrest him. Especially since Severus is contacting your other godfather to make the arrest."
"Really?" I asked. I couldn't believe that Severus would contact Sirius of his own free will; the two loathed each other.
"I asked," Tom said and it was explanation enough. Considering how protective my family was, Tom had a good feeling that Sirius would do something to Lockhart before he even reached the questioning room.
"Besides, you'll need a substitute teacher for the next months. So why not have an Auror step in?" Tom asked as we went into the sitting room.
As it was already past curfew, we didn't stay in the sitting room. Instead, I got my satchel and Tom walked me and Nagijan down to the Slytherin common room, Nagini wanting to stay in front of the warm fireplace.
Curious as I was, I asked Tom why he and Severus had been at Hogwarts instead of Slytherin Manor where Severus had said they would meet. I was pleasantly surprised when he told me that he'd decided to meet Severus at Hogwarts because he had wanted to check his quarters at Hogwarts, wanting to see if it would have everything I would need the next year.
"Be safe, Harry," Tom said to me in parting before he hisses "Open" at the wall hiding the entrance to the Slytherin common room.
Not knowing if I should answer Tom's demand/wish with "I will" or "Thank you", I decided for a simple "Good bye," as I stepped through the now opened entrance to the common room, just as I was now stepping through the circular opening in the Ouroboros' portrait to enter my new rooms―Lord Slytherin's private quarters at Hogwarts.
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Looking around, I saw that nearly nothing has been changed. The only difference was the lack of Tom's, Severus' and Nagini's presence in the room and the newly added writing desk and chair.
On the table between the two armchairs I noticed a piece of paper. Stepping closer, I picked it up and read it silently.
~Dear Harry,
I hope you like your new rooms. If you should need anything, don't hesitate to contact me via the Floo. The Floo here is always open for you to contact me any time you need me. Even if it is only to have a listening ear.
Love,
Tom~
By the end of the short letter, I had gotten a warm feeling in my chest which spread out to my arms, making me feel very cherished and happy. That Tom had already told me the same thing during the week I spent at his home, made me feel even more loved and cared for. With a little, silly smile on my face, I carefully folded the note and entered the bedroom.
Gingerly laying the note down on my bedside table, I put Nagijan on the bed and then walked towards my trunk, wanting to get the unpacking done so that I could go to bed and sleep. To my great surprise, my trunk was nearly empty. While my school supplies were still in it, all of my clothes have vanished.
"Where the hell are my clothes?!" I exclaimed to the empty room.
"Mipsy is very sorry, Harry Potter, sir," came the voice of a house-elf which suddenly appeared next to me and my trunk. "Mipsy thought that Mr Potter would like it if his clothes would already be in the wardrobe," the tiny elf revealed the whereabouts of my clothes, pulling at her ears.
"Mipsy, will correct her error right away and send the clothes back to the trunk," she added and was about to snap her fingers to do as she said.
"Wait, Mipsy," I called out, stopping her movement. "I'm not angry that you unpacked my clothes. I'm grateful actually," I told her. "I would just have liked a note or something which told me where my clothes are," I explained.
"Oh," was all the house-elf was able to say at first, her big eyes seemingly larger than usual. "Mipsy will remember to leave a note next time," she said, nodding her head earnestly all the while as if she had to physically show her agreement to everything she just said.
"Mipsy will stab herself with a quill as a punishment for forgetting to leave a note," she informed me, as if this would be the obvious thing to do.
Since I hated it when house-elves hurt themselves because of me, I tried to stop her from going through with her self-proclaimed punishment. "No, Mipsy," I said in the most commanding voice I could muster, "that isn't a suitable punishment."
Before she could suggest something like iron her hands or even cutting her hands off entirely, I told her, "Mipsy, for forgetting to inform me you'll unpack my school supplies and move them to the desk in the sitting room. And don't forget to leave a note!" I added, having a hard time restraining myself from laughing.
It was somehow funny that I instructed her to leave me a note when I, in the first place, was the one who told her to move my things. But, my experience has shown that house-elves only accept two kinds of punishments. The first one was to physically punish themselves, which was also the kind they preferred. The second option of punishment was to let them redo what they did wrong so that they could atone for their earlier mistake.
"Of course, Harry Potter, sir," Mipsy said and with a snip of her fingers my school supplies vanished from my trunk to hopefully reappear on the writing desk.
Somehow handling house-elves and stopping them from harming themselves was more exhausting than spending the whole day on a train. Getting up from the floor in front of my trunk, I walked over to the wardrobe in search for my sleepwear.
After looking around for a bit, I easily found what I was looking for and walked into the bathroom to brush my teeth and take a quick shower. By the time I came out of the bathroom, I spotted a note lying on my trunk which was from Mipsy and informed me that my school supplies had been moved to the sitting room desk.
Shaking my head in amusement, I set my alarm clock and then fell into the soft bed, closing my eyes and falling asleep in minutes, Nagijan sleeping on the spare pillow besides my head.
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The next morning Draco knocked on my door just as I was about to become exasperated with my tie.
"Morning, Harry," he greeted me as he walked into my new rooms.
"Morning," I greeted him back as Draco took hold of my tie and knotted it for me, just as he had done for the last two years whenever I didn't get the knot right.
"I can't wait to see how Remus will be as a teacher," I told Draco.
"For one, he will insist that you call him Professor Lupin during lessons," Draco said as he finished off the knot. "But I'm still glad that Sirius won't be teaching any longer or else Severus would have gone nuts soon."
While Sirius had been a funny teacher, who didn't care if I called him by his given name in class, I was still happy that this year Remus would be teaching. No pranks to watch out for, for one.
And so, even though Remus was very good in his previous job as an ambassador, Tom and Remus had agreed that the relationships with the werewolves were stable enough that someone else could step in. Also, they agreed that Remus working as a teacher even with his lycanthropy would be a good sign of trust and would help their case even more.
Besides, I had a very strong suspicion that Severus actually asked both Tom and the headmaster if they could replace Sirius with someone else. Though, I don't believe that he had Remus in mind for the job.
But at least this time there weren't a million rumours flying around about why our DADA teacher got replaced, unlike with Lockhart. The official reason why Sirius had replaced Lockhart was that Lockhart had become ill and needed to stay in St Mungo's to heal. And even though I asked, none of the adults told me what had happened to the man after he tried to molest me. The only information I had was what I overheard through the door and what Nagini gave away, so I knew that it had something to do with a Memory Charm gone wrong.
"It's a good thing that you weren't in the common room last night," Draco said as he inspected the sitting room.
"Why so?" I asked.
"Blaise had gone into a rant about how unfair it had been that he was the one who'd been kicked out of the Foreas dorm," he explained.
"But he was the one who didn't want to share a room with me because of Nagijan," I said.
"I know," Draco answered, "but you know how he is. Only because he's nearly a year older than us, he seems to believe that he's the better of the two of you. And now where he'd become fertile during the summer hols, he believes that he's all grown up now and owns the place," my best friend complained.
Entering the bedroom to get my satchel, I said, "Even without Nagijan, I wouldn't be surprised if he wouldn't have allowed me to share the Foreas room with him. Knowing him, he would have complained about me knocking him up or something," I joked.
"Or you could knock up each other once you're fertile too," Draco commented.
"I'm sure that would go over well with my fiancé," I said, dryly.
"And that's why you're staying in his private quarters with your own bathroom," Draco said, clearly referring to the fact that even a fertile Foreas shared a bathroom with the other horny males to save money and space because we Foreas were too few to get their own lavatories.
"If I or Blaise were afraid of being molested, we could always use the girls bathroom," I joked.
"I don't think that you would be safe there either," Draco said. "Even though you're a Foreas and engaged, there are still some girls who wouldn't mind dating you. Ginny Weasley especially seems to have her eyes set on you."
"Great," I mumbled, as we left my rooms to go down to the Great Hall. After Lockhart, I had enough unwanted admirers for the next twenty years.
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And so starting from the first day of our third year, Draco and I developed a new routine. In the morning, Draco would pick me up from my quarters and we would walk together to the Great Hall. And in the evening I would join Draco and the rest of my house mates in the common room until half an hour before curfew when Draco walked me to my rooms before he started his rounds as a Prefect.
Our routine changed slightly in November. In the night between the 11th and the 12th, I had my first wet dream. And while it was perfectly normal for a boy my age to have such a dream, I was still forced to see a Healer―Healer Scribner to be specific.
The reason? Unlike girls, Foreas don't have menstruations, so their fertility has to be confirmed from another source. I can still clearly remember how my father had explained everything to me.
In the summer between my first and second year, he called me into his study. Besides other things, he told me that it was a tradition for a Foreas to have long hair. I couldn't help but ask if Lucius Malfoy was actually a Foreas because of his very long hair. But my father assured me that this wasn't the case and that the only reason why a Foreas' hair had to be at least shoulder-length was that it would later be braided as a symbol of their fertility.
And when I asked him how I would know when I was fertile and had to start braiding my hair, he told me that only a Healer could assert my fertility. However, there were some hints which usually were a good indication to start having monthly check-ups. One of the hints was the breaking of the voice and the second was the first wet dream which usually was a better indication than the vocal change.
So, as instructed by my father, I sat down at my writing desk and composed a quick note to him, letting him know that he should get me an appointment with the Healer. And as if it wasn't embarrassing enough to tell my father that I had my first wet dream, I also had promised to Floo call Tom when it was time for my first fertility check.
Apparently, being the fiancé of the current Lord did speed up the usual waiting time for an appointment with Healer Scribner immensely. Instead of having to wait for a week, my father picked me up right after classes to Floo with me to St Mungo's.
While my memory of my last check up with Healer Scribner was a bit foggy, I could still clearly remember that I hadn't liked his methods. To my great relief, I didn't have to produce a semen sample for him to test. At this age producing a sample on demand would have been problematic at best, if not impossible. Instead, Healer Scribner cast a very complex spell on me which would produce a parchment which would vanish after an hour. Therefore, the Healer made three copies of it, one for my files, one for my father and one for Tom.
"Congratulations, Mr Potter. While your son's semen isn't fertile yet, he's already able to conceive children," Healer Scriber said to my father as he handed over one of the handwritten copies of the test result to him.
Curious to know what it said, I read the paper together with my dad.
~FERTILITY-TEST-RESULTS
Patient: Harry James Potter
Date of Birth: 31.07.1980
Test date: 12.11.1993
Semen:
Sperm-percentage: 5%
Sperm-mobility: Dreadful
Overall: INFERTILE
Ova:
Ova-count: 17
fertile ova: 1
Overall: FERTILE
Done by: Marc Scribner~
"Isn't the normal ova count much lower?" my father asked, surprised by the high number.
"Usually it is between three and ten," Healer Scribner answered. "But," he added, "if a Foreas is magically very powerful the number of ova increases. As far as I know, the highest number of ova was twenty-one, but that was some hundred years ago."
"And before you ask, Harry," Healer Scribner addressed me. "A Foreas only has one to two fertile ova at a time but usually it's only one. But unlike with the female ova they're pregnable for more than one day. They stay pregnable for ten years after which the next ovum will become fertile," he explained.
"Ah, okay. Thank you, Healer Scribner," I said as we took our leave.
On our way to the Floo, I asked my father, "Ehm, dad?"
"Yes, Harry?" he answered, slowing down his steps so that we could talk more easily.
"Does being only partly fertile mean that I don't have to braid my hair yet?" I asked, unsure about the exact rules of the tradition.
"No, you start braiding tomorrow," he answered. "The braid signals that a Foreas is able to conceive children and not to sire them. So, with you having one fertile ovum, you're considered fertile," he explained.
Therefore, when Draco walked into my room the next morning, I asked him to put my hair into a braid and while he was surprised about the news, he didn't hesitate to grab my brush to get the braiding done. And while the rest of my friends, like Draco, congratulated me on my new status, Ronald Weasley couldn't help himself but to make fun of me, calling me girly and other more immature things.
And Blaise? He was suddenly more distant to me than ever. Apparently he didn't like that he wasn't the only fertile Foreas in Slytherin house anymore. The twins had their own theory about his behaviour. According to them, Blaise had hoped that I would turn out to be infertile, which would have allowed him to take my place as our Lord's fiancé. And while I didn't agree with them, time would show that the Weasley twins hadn't been too far off track with their assumption.
-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-Verbuar―Blinded-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
And that's how I started to wear my shoulder lenght hair in a braid in symbol of my fertility in the same year that I was forced to stop sharing a room with my best friend Draco. However, it didn't stop Draco—hair obsessed Malfoy he is—from entering my room every morning so that he could braid my hair for me because my own handiwork was apparently too sloppy for his high standard.