Ron Weasley had only been in Egypt for three days of the month-long Weasley family trip when the letter from Harry Potter arrived. That it was not delivered by Hedwig worried the young lad. And though the words "From Harry Potter" weren't particularly unusual, the fact that each letter was written in one of five different colors of ink was enough to make him even more curious.
After having Charlie check the letter for pranks spells — a sibling of the Weasley Twins could never be too paranoid about pranks — Ron opened it to see what was inside.
The first thing he found was the letter, but the first thing he actually paid attention to was the wizarding photograph. In it was a bloody five-headed dragon. Each head was a different color, while the body was a dark, almost-black grey. Huge spikes protruded from the shoulders, while a spiked tail swished in the background. Massive wings ruffled alongside the dragon's body.
But of all the things there, four things caught his eye. In order: Hagrid was standing under the dragon's heads, the dragon was giving the camera a thumb's up, the dragon's heads all had eyes the same green as Harry's, and there was a white patch of scales above each right eye that looked like a lightning bolt.
"Bloody hell."
Curious beyond belief, Ron picked up the letter and started reading.
Hey Ron,
It's Harry. Sort of. We know this doesn't look like our handwriting, but that's because we can't exactly hold a quill at the moment and are using a dicta-quill. If you haven't looked at the picture we sent yet, look at it. You'll see why.
Yeah. That's us. We got turned into a five-headed dragon.
Nobody knows how it happened. We ran away when we started transforming, and after we got wings, we flew to Hogwarts to get help. We're staying in the Chamber of Secrets (and the basilisk that almost ate us tastes delicious after being cooked in dragonfire) and Hagrid's helping to take care of us while Professor Flitwick (who took the photo) and Professor McGonagall help us find a way back.
The good news is that we can still use magic, so we're still technically wizards. The weird news is that we cast spells with our mouths now. Yeah. Magic tastes weird, by the way. The bad news is that it's looking like McGonagall and Flitwick aren't having much luck finding any sort of permanent solution, but on the upside, McGonagall thinks she might be able to invent a way to make us a reverse-animagus or something like that.
We're still waiting for Dumbledore to finish in Australia, so when he gets back, he might have a solution for us. We don't know yet, and we're slowly losing hope that he might. McGonagall and Flitwick were both his students, and yet even with Hogwarts's library, they're having trouble.
But it's not all bad. Our Red and Green heads really like being a dragon, while the rest of us (except Grey) don't really mind. Plus, we're really having fun flying with Hagrid; he's a surprisingly skilled rider and is helping us fly even further and faster than before. And even if we never go back to being just Harry, well, you and Hermione now have four new best friends.
Oh, and if we never get turned back to normal, we...
A) will never have to go back to the Dursleys and
B) can eat Voldemort if he ever comes back.
You have no idea how relaxing those two facts are. For the first time ever, summer vacation feels like an actual vacation. It's nice.
Have fun in Egypt. Show the photo to everyone and let them know we're okay. And Ron? You might want to warn your mum to get started now if she's really determined to make us a new Christmas Jumper. As far as we know, we're still growing.
Take care. We'll see you when you get back, and maybe we can go flying if your mum and dad let us. Trust me, it's brilliant.
Your friends,
Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, and Grey.
We, Harry Potter.
P.S. We will never, ever complain about your eating habits again. We're now more of a pig than you are.
P.P.S. Yes, we sent a letter to Hermione too.
P.P.P.S. If you could have Charlie take a look, that would be great. We're still trying to figure out what kind of dragon we are.
P.P.P.P.S. (We swear this is the last one) we hope Ginny is doing well and that she's not having nightmares or anything. We know we did the first few nights after fighting the snake. Give her a hug for us, okay?
"Whatcha got there, Ronniekins?" Fred asked.
"A letter from Harry, by the looks of it." George replied, picking up the envelope. "What's it say?"
"Umm..." Ron handed his brothers the photo, which Fred took while George looked over his twin's shoulder. "Apparently, Harry got himself turned into a five-headed dragon."
"No way!"
"Wicked!"
"That has got to be—"
"—the coolest thing we have ever seen."
"CHARLIE!" they chorused together. "You've got to see this!"
Their elder brother, who had been reading the paper, set it down. "What is it?" he asked as he stood and strolled over. The twins handed him the photo. He stared at it for a long few seconds, unspeaking. Then, "Well, that's no kind dragon I've ever seen. He's gorgeous, though Hagrid's insane for standing that close."
"Charlie, that's Harry," Ron said. He proceeded to explain the letter's contents, only to have to restart when Ginny came in, and then give up and pass the letter around when their parents, Percy, and Bill entered few seconds into his second telling. By the time the whole family knew, it had fully sunk in for Ron.
His best mate was a bloody dragon.
His best mate was apparently happy as a bloody dragon.
His best mate was now five best mates.
The pureblooded wizard in Ron, as tiny of a portion of his mind as it was, cried out that this was wrong, that Harry was a monster, that everyone was going to hate him. The young child in Ron, a portion of his personality several orders of magnitude larger than the stuffy pureblood, declared that Harry was now Grade-A Wicked, and that was that.
The rest of Ron's day was filled with daydreams of flying on Harry's back and figuring out what toppings and condiments would allow Harry to eat Snape and Malfoy without getting food poisoning. Had Ron been basically anyone else, his reaction wouldn't have been nearly so accepting. And if Harry hadn't just saved his sister a month earlier, Ron would have been a tad more wary. But neither were the case, and so Ron happily accepted the change — as much as one could reasonably accept that their friend was now a dragon.
Minerva McGonagall, dressed in emerald robes of a lighter weight than what she usually wore, relaxed in a reclining chair that had been conjured by the witch herself. In her hands, she held a book written by a good friend and fellow transfiguration master, while on a conjured table, she wandlessly controlled a quill that was noting down her thoughts.
And though Filius Flitwick was doing the same thing, reclining in a conjured chair of his own while reading a different book, we mostly forgot about him against the sight of a relaxed McGonagall.
"Though it might not seem like it, Mr. Potter," she'd remarked upon seeing our surprised faces, "I can relax. Indeed, I have always found it much easier to study this way."
Once our curiosity had been satisfied, McGonagall set us to work as well. She'd given us a brief overview of human transfiguration (it was a shame I'd have to wait until sixth year to get the rest of the lesson — it was interesting) plus some key terms, and then set a massive stack of books next to us. "This is basically every book Hogwarts has on human, reptilian, and cross-species transfiguration." She pointed to a second, smaller stack. "And these are books on transformative ailments. Sort through these to find which might have the slimmest chances of being helpful, and which are a waste of our time."
The first day or so had been spent rebuilding our ability to use magic; specifically, Flitwick had had us practicing making our magic come out the correct head's mouth. Once that was working, he taught us the position-lock spell, a levitation spell variant that kept something at a fixed position relative to another object. By sustaining and mentally adjusting that spell, we were able to each look at a book, pick it up, and hold it in front of our eyes without needing hands. We could even turn the pages without damaging them!
Hermione would be proud.
Professor Flitwick was proud.
Since that day, Blue had had his face almost literally glued to a book at all hours of the day, every day. Green, Yellow, and Grey, while not nearly as enthusiastic about reading, also spent their time engrossed in books. Red, the only head that disliked reading altogether (or at least claimed to — we could feel him occasionally reading through the rest of our eyes), instead spent his time playing solitaire with a muggle deck of cards. Our clawed hands lay crossed in front of us, unused, while our wings basked in the sunlight and provided McGonagall and Flitwick shade.
Nothing much was happening. Six of seven people were reading out in the courtyard, enjoying the cool Scottish summer, while the seventh entertained himself silently. And yet, we, despite Red's claims of boredom (he wasn't) and Grey's eternal misery (he exaggerated), were happy.
It was nice.
Hermione Granger was lying awake in bed. It wasn't her bed, but a nice bed in a French Hotel that should have been comfortable enough for her to fall asleep immediately. Instead, her mind was racing. Again.
The topic on her mind was a certain multi-headed dragon. She had no idea how that transformation had come about, but that wasn't what was keeping her up. Nor was it the anxiety that had come from realizing that her friend, if he couldn't find a solution, was basically doomed to being labeled a beast in the eyes of society.
No, what was keeping her up was envy. It was the irrational sort of envy that one could immediately recognize the absurdity of, but couldn't squash. She knew it was ridiculous, but she was utterly envious of Professors McGonagall and Flitwick.
She prided herself on her intelligence. She loved reading and researching. And her best friend — friends — were in a situation that explicitly needed research to fix, yet she couldn't be there for him. Hell, when she'd found out that her professors stayed at Hogwarts over the summer to do research, she knew she would have been envious of that had everything else not happened.
She knew it was childish. She knew it was petty. And yet, Hermione Granger sulked in bed.
We wondered if they were speaking a different language. It sounded like English, but we couldn't understand a word that they were saying.
Dumbledore had arrived a half-hour ago, having been made aware of our full situation before then by international floo call, and after a quick exchange of pleasantries, had gone to work with McGonagall and Flitwick casting charm after charm at us, all in hopes of diagnosing what was wrong with us. That barrage of esoteric charms had morphed into a conversation laden with even more esoteric terms, such that we quickly got lost trying to follow along.
"Well, my boy, it seems that we still have no answer for you yet," Dumbledore eventually announced. "There are one or two more things we'd like to try, but at this point, I think you, McGonagall, and Flitwick have already exhausted what else I could do for you."
"So what now?" Blue asked for all of us.
"I, in my many years, have acquired a rather large collection of artifacts that may tell us more, some of which were created by Nicholas Flamel."
"Oh. Didn't he run out of elixir when the stone was destroyed?" Yellow asked.
"Unfortunately, he has. He and Perenelle finally passed away last December, though he did will to me some of his notes. Now that I think of it, there might be something useful among them, though I make no promises." The twinkle returned to his eyes. "On the other, better hand, while we might not know what caused your transformation, we do believe some of the solutions Minerva proposed might work for you."
"WILL THEY HURT ANY OF US?" Red demanded. "BECAUSE I WILL NOT LET YOU TRY THEM IF THEY HURT MY BROTHERS."
"They should not," Dumbledore assuaged, idly rubbing his ear from the volume of Red's voice. "But, I do have a suggestion. The sorting hat is a much more powerful tool than most realize; we can use it to better understand your minds and how they will react."
We immediately agreed to let it examine our minds. To be honest, we — mostly Blue and Green — were really curious about how we thought. And so, a few minutes later, we were lying in the Great Hall, heads roughly where the sorting normally took place, with the hat held aloft in Dumbledore's hand. There was a mirthful smile on his lips. "It's been awhile since I did this. Which of you will go first?"
"ME!" Red shouted, thrusting his head forward. Obliging our loudest head, Dumbledore sat the hat on his head.
"Gryffindor!" the hat shouted instantly, snapping awake.
"Hello, hat," Dumbledore greeted. "I'm afraid this isn't a sorting. Mr. Potter here has recently undergone some changes, and we need to learn how they have affected his mind. If you would?"
"Potter? This is not Potter I'm sitting on! This is by far the most Gryffindor-ish head I've ever sat upon! Even Godric himself wasn't this much of a Gryffindor! Never mind any Potter that I've sat upon."
Dumbledore simply waved his hand. "Even I could have told you that. Look deeper, please."
"Alright. Hmmm... Interesting... Strange, very strange. And what's this? Wait... five, six... Six minds? No, five and a conglomerate? Oh, you named it consensus; that's fitting. Hmm... my, you're a depressing one. Clever, very clever. No, not clever? Ah. Instinct navigating chance." The hat then fell silent for a minute as it thought.
When the silence seemed like it wasn't going to end, Red asked, "WELL?"
"You, Mr. Potter, have the most interesting mind I have ever met. Allow me to explain something about myself before I tell you what I observed. Whenever any wizard or witch puts me on their head, I take their memories, draw upon a small amount of their magic, and use it to improve myself. Headmasters throughout the ages have worn me, allowing me to become quite skilled in not only mind magics, but soul magics as well — at least as it pertains to understanding those who wear me.
"When I look at you, I see someone who was blasted in the soul while their magic and body were both very unstable. Basilisk venom and phoenix tears would cause that instability. Now, if I'm reading the scars on your soul right, you had a brush with death, a brush close enough that something left." There was an audible hitch in Dumbledore's breath, though the hat ignored it, continuing to talk and drawing back our attention. "Whatever was there wasn't part of you. I don't see traces of it affecting you up until that moment — I would have noticed it otherwise — but now that it's gone, I can see it by what it left behind.
"When the contaminant was forcefully ejected, your soul unfolded in response to the recoil, for lack of a better terms. Souls are not meant to unfold. Fortunately for you, young, innocent people have remarkably resilient souls that heal easily. Unfortunately, five parts of your mind independently tried to become your new center. The result is that, given that a regular mind is metaphorically shaped like a circle, your mind is shaped like a star. Five points of personality based on five archetypes — Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, Slytherins, and your own negative self-image — all around a central, silent personality that coordinates among you. Consensus, you called it. Fortunately, the human mind is already well adapted to working with multiple parts; your magic merely extended the pattern from two hemispheres to five spokes and a center.
"In summary, you five, together in consensus, form Harry Potter. Each of your heads represents an aspect of yourself, one you'd be incomplete without. Take care of each other."
The hat promptly fell silent, then went back to sleep.
Dumbledore plucked the hat from Red's head. "Well, I dare say that was far more informative than I anticipated. On the whole, however, I think it was very good news."
"Oh, yes. And it seems so obvious when said aloud," said Yellow.
"The firssst time we wore it, the hat sssaid we'd do well in any houssse," Green remarked. "Now that I'm like thisss, I can sssee why it wanted me in SSSlytherin."
"IT IS DECIDED. WE WILL STAY LIKE THIS!"
"Well, not completely like this. Just mentally." Blue cocked his head to the side. "Though, I do wonder why we turned into a dragon. The hat's thing explained our five personalities, but not that, nor why our head colors match up with the house colors."
"Likely, the transformation was reacting to your magic, which in turn was reacting to your soul and memories." Dumbledore twirled a bit of his beard. We could see a distant look creeping onto his face as he descended further and further into thought. "Allow me to check my notes. I think I can see the beginnings of a workable solution."
The only part of the massive basilisk that was left was the skull, having been carefully picked clean of meat, then scoured lightly with flame. Everything else had long since been devoured by the five of us. The skull, we'd decided, was to be a trophy of our first (and only) heroic victory as a damsel-saving-knight.
So, naturally, Red decided to play with it and somehow managed to convince Green to wear it like a hat. And sometime in the time it took us to climb up the ravine containing the exterior entrance to the Chamber of Secrets, the two of them had decided to put on a show.
Green obviously was to play the basilisk, while Red "selflessly" volunteered to play our original human self (painted in the best light, of course). Yellow did the voices for Tom and Fawks, Blue took up the role of Narrator, and Grey (who wanted nothing to do with this) played dead.
We mean Ginny.
Grey played Ginny.
(But he may as well have been playing dead.)
"HAGRID!" bellowed Red as we approached his hut. The ground was cool and damp from the previous night's rain (making it squish ever so wonderfully between our toes), and the air had not yet warmed despite it being nearly eleven o'clock. Woody smoke spiraled from the chimney of Hagrid's hut, hinting at the warm fire within.
Smoke curled from our lips as well; our fire never went out, and though it usually burned hot and smokeless, when we were relaxed, the gentle plumes escaped us with every breath. Given how humid it was, those plumes were even thicker than usual.
A short moment after Red's call, the door to Hagrid's hut creaked open, revealing the nearly twelve-foot-tall man, whom we now could look down at even while on all fours. Hell, even when we were lying down on our stomach, the length of our necks were great enough that the normal positions of our heads put our eye level above his. It was quite a novel experience for all of us, Hagrid included.
The man, dressed in a red shirt and leather pants, with an apron replacing his usual leather overcoat, waved to us with an oven-mitt-clad hand. "Harry! Good ta see ya! I just made some rock cakes. Want some?"
"Yesssssss!" Green cheered, deliberately extending the hiss beyond what his snakelike-lisp would have otherwise caused. Once upon a time, Harry-the-human would have reluctantly eaten the rock cake out of politeness. Now, we all legitimately enjoyed the crunchy treat — and none enjoyed it more than Green.
Hagrid smiled, disappeared back inside his cabin, and returned a second later with a tray of the still-hot rock cakes. He tossed one of them at Green, who snapped it out of the air. "Good catch."
"Thanksss."
"So, I imagine this here visit has something to do with that snake skull?"
"Hagrid, this is all that's left of the monster that killed Moaning Myrtle, the monster that Tom Riddle used and then framed you for." Blue grinned widely, showing off his shiny, dagger-sized and shaped teeth. "I think it would be nice trophy, don't you agree?"
"Harry...?" Hagrid asked, stunned. "You... how did you know about that?"
"Well, you know what was going on in the school last year. Things got interesting when I found Tom Riddle's diary..."
"EN GARDE, FOUL SERPENT!" Red bellowed. Hovering just inches in front of his mouth was a rock, transfigured to be longer and vaguely more sword-shaped. He swung it dramatically at the "basilisk" before him.
"Hessssss!"Green animalistically retorted. His long neck let him convey the motions of the original basilisk quite well.
The fight that followed was long, dramatic, fast-paced, and absolutely not at all what had actually happened in the chamber. And while we're almost certain that Hagrid had picked that fact up at the very beginning, the large man was certainly enjoying the show anyway.
Suddenly, the basilisk lunged at "Harry" and "bit" him (though not really; the remaining fangs were still in the snake's skull, after all, and we didn't want to get bit a second time). Rather than stabbing through the roof of the mouth as we had done originally, "Harry" gave one final taunt and stabbed the snake through the top of his head.
"Blah." Green flopped over and stuck out his (unfortunately un-forked) tongue.
"No! My snake!" Yellow cried out in the most annoying rendition of Tom Riddle's voice he could muster.
"I KNOW THE DIARY IS YOUR WEAKNESS! NOW, I DESTROY YOU TOO!" Red pantomimed stabbing the diary.
"NOOOO! Blah." Yellow flopped over, dead as a doornail, with his tongue flopped out as well. Hagrid laughed at that.
Grey, at least interested enough to stop himself from embarrassing us, popped his head up immediately. "harry, you saved me. thank you." His voice came out flat and unenthusiastic, without even an attempt to make it sound like Ginny's voice.
"ALAS, I AM DYING! GO FIND RON AND ESCAPE THIS DREADFUL PLACE! SO LONG AND FAREWELL, YOUNG GINNY WEASLEY!"
"And then came the brilliant phoenix, Fawkes, to save our life—" "SQUAAA!" "—with his healing tears!"
Yellow, now playing Fawkes, could not cry on demand. None of us could. So he improvised. Ach-too!
"DID YOU JUST SPIT ON ME, YOU PRAT?!" the enraged Red bellowed, rising up and baring his fangs at Yellow. Intervening, the rest of us commanded our claws to wipe the glob of draconic saliva off him.
"And thus Young Voldemort was defeated, Ginny was saved, and we were set on the path to becoming a literal five-headed dragon!" Blue forcefully narrated. The silent "shut up and move on" he forcefully sent through their consensus did not go unnoticed by the others. Acting as if nothing was wrong, Blue took his bow. The others followed suit.
"Bravo!" Hagrid cheered, applauding happily. Of course, as the sole member of our audience, his clapping stopped very quickly. Still, it was nice.
"Ssso, Hagrid. We were thinking... do you want to keep the ssskull?" Green inquired even as he adjusted the magic holding it in place, lifting the snake's skull off his head and setting it on the ground before us. "It would be a nice trophy."
"Ohoh! Thank you, Harry." Hagrid gave the skull an unsure glance. "But I don't exactly know what I'm going to do with it."
"You don't have to keep it if you don't want it." "We just thought it would give you a bit of closure." "Maybe you could ssshow it to Moaning Myrtle. It might make her happy."
Hagrid smiled. "You know, I think I will. She'd enjoy that."