Five ~ First Transformation

"What do you do over the summer, Riddle? When there's no school?"

This question was blurted out in the middle of the next morning's Potions class, and, even though it was unforgivably rude and out-of-place, I stared at Riddle until he answered me. I had been thinking about my own situation, and I'd realized that I hadn't known what the orphaned wizards did. Surely Dippet didn't make the boy go back to a Muggle orphanage.

"What is to you, McGonagall?" he sneered.

"Just curious," I said. "I mean, do you go back to that – that place?"

"It's none of your concern."

"Well, fine. I'll go back to not making conversation with you."

He looked at me for a long time, holding a measuring flask in mid-air, as if he'd been hit with a Freezing Charm. "No, I don't go back," he said finally. "It's called the O'Shea Home for Wayward Children, by the way. Young criminals as well as orphans. It's in Surrey. But I don't go back there, or, rather, I have not been back since my second year. Headmaster Dippet has made – certain concessions for me."

It was the most he'd ever said to me in five years. "Certain concessions? What do you—"

"Miss McGonagall, Mister Riddle, please remember that your time in this class is for potion-brewing, not for socializing." Professor Caldecott was glaring at us from his desk.

I snapped my mouth shut, fighting back the urge to inform Professor Caldecott that I would never socialize with Riddle. Certain concessions. I thought of all the times I had gotten on the Hogwarts Express, and I had never once seen Riddle there. He was never coming and going from the school. I tapped my chin and went back to work, thinking that next time I might overcome my dislike of him enough to ask him what in the world he was doing talking to Rubeus Hagrid.

"Did you have a good holiday?" Riddle asked.

I jerked up, startled. He was back to working, as though he had never spoken at all. "Er – yes, I did. I stayed at my family's farm." I bit my lip at that, thinking that I shouldn't have said anything about family. "Did you?"

"It was fine."

"Were you here at Hogwarts?"

"Yes." He laid down the flask and looked at me with those disturbing eyes. I felt instantly like I was being interrogated. "Look, McGonagall – were you the one who sent me the gift?"

"Why would I do that?" I suddenly remembered Myrtle's Chocoballs and flushed. I didn't know whether to tell him, or to be silently offended that he could ever think I would be his secret admirer. I bit my lip. "Someone sent you a gift? That was nice," I added uncomfortably.

He didn't reply, so I worked quietly while thinking very uncharitable thoughts about him, most of which involved the words jerk and prat. Still, I wondered how he had reacted to Myrtle's present – surely she had been right in that he didn't often receive gifts. I just hoped he hadn't dumped them straight into the trash, but, then again, Myrtle would never know either way. The class ended.

At the Quidditch game, I waved Hagrid over to sit with us; Myrtle gave a great offended yelp at this. "Minerva," she half-growled into my ear, "he's probably crawling with critters. You're going to get infected or something."

"Oh, stuff it," I whispered fiercely, and Hagrid plunked himself between Cora and myself. Cliona was zooming around by the Slytherin stands; we watched and cheered as she managed to knock the Slytherin Keeper off his broom.

Hagrid glanced at Cora, who was involved in the game (or, rather, involved in watching one of the Gryffindor chasers who she'd recently gotten to fancy), and then leaned close to whisper to me. "Yeh haven't said anything to the Headmaster, have yeh?"

"No," I replied while following the Quaffle with my eyes. "What in the world were you doing talking to Tom Riddle in the Great Hall last night?"

He turned a brilliant shade of red. "Er – nothin' – he had ter take points from me."

I knew instantly that this wasn't true; I habitually checked the Gryffindor tally every morning and it had been unchanged. Still, I said nothing more about it. Truthfully, I really didn't want to know. Myrtle was shooting Hagrid suspicious glances every minute or so, and I kept my eye on her in case she began another outburst.

Afterwards, in the common room, I was reviewing my Astronomy charts for the OWLs. Myrtle sat herself beside me, and I looked up from the diagram I was sketching of the constellation Lyra. "Shouldn't you be studying?'

"D'you ever wonder why Tom Riddle never shows up to watch Quidditch?"

"Shouldn't you be studying?" I repeated with a half-laugh. "And no, I don't wonder about Tom Riddle and his Quidditch-watching habits, or anyone else's for that matter." I turned serious. "Look, Myrtle, you need to stop worrying about boys and think about your OWLs. I don't think Tom Riddle is all that great – I have him as my Potions partner, as you very well know, and he's been nothing but an ass to me for five years."

Her face twitched curiously, and she stood up and left me to my star charts. I watched her retreat, feeling slightly guilty, as if I had done something unspeakably cruel to her. I looked down at my chart and realized I had misarranged the stars.

The rest of January passed by in a blur and changed swiftly to February, and it was on the first of February, in 1942, when I found myself practicing in the Transfiguration room for what seemed like the hundredth time that year. Dumbledore was there, too; he monitored my sessions once a week and left me alone for whatever additional ones I chose to do. Both of us were silent. By this time, I was so skilled at the incantations that I was able to sustain the connection to the catalogue of beasts, as I called it in my head, for up to fifteen minutes. Yet no one creature had yet leapt out as my own, and, admittedly, I was becoming distressed. It felt as if no animal wanted me.

Then, in an instant, everything changed. A hot jolt of pain spun through my mind, and I fell back onto the stone floor. My stomach lurched, my head ached; I felt about ready to faint right there, with Professor Dumbledore watching me. I was vaguely aware that my entire body was tingling – changing. I felt smaller, stealthier, but my head was still reeling with pain, and I had to throw my hands up to my temples – but they wouldn't move that way, not the way they were supposed to. I closed my eyes, and, when they opened again, the world had changed.

Colours were different. There were fewer of them, and it was harder to tell where an object and the next began. I rose to my feet – but it wasn't right, I was crawling rather than walking, except it wasn't really crawling, either, because I was comfortable with it. It seemed natural. I was abruptly aware that the back of my ear was itching, and I reached up to scratch at it, but I grazed it roughly with my claws.

I had claws?

"Miss McGonagall? Do you understand me?"

I looked up at Dumbledore, who was suddenly much taller, and miaowed.

Then I blacked out.

When I woke up in the infirmary, I was in human form again. Professor Dumbledore was sitting at my side; the rest of the place was empty. As soon as I got my bearing, I sat up stock-still and exclaimed, "I'm a tabby-cat!" I looked down at my hands, marvelling at the fact that hours ago they had been furry little paws.

His face was lined with concern, but his eyes were shining. "So you are," he said warmly. "You managed to stay in form for almost a full minute – that's very impressive for a first transformation. Are you feeling ill at all?"

"Well – now that you mention it—" I could taste vomit in my throat, and, wordlessly, he handed me a large bucket, which I promptly threw up into. "Professor – is this normal? To feel so awful after changing forms?" My stomach was heaving violently, and my eyes were watering.

"It will subside eventually," he assured me. "The initial transformation is quite a shock to the system; it's often accompanied by dizzying pain. Eventually, your body will become accustomed to changing into your Animagus form – after a good deal of practice, you will experience no pain or discomfort whatsoever."

I paused. "It was very – disconcerting."

"I'd imagine so," he chuckled. "I'm quite impressed that you managed to accomplish a full transformation so early – it often takes a fully-qualified witch or wizard a year or more. You must take a few days to recuperate; I will allow you to have tomorrow's classes off."

I started to protest, but was overcome by another wave of nausea, and I had to rest my chin back against the bucket. "Perhaps I'm slightly masochistic, Professor," I said weakly, "but I can scarcely wait to try transforming again." When he laughed, I was struck by a thought. "How are we going to explain my being in here?"

"I told Headmaster Dippet that you were overcome by a bout of flu while we were doing our wand core research," he chuckled, "and I also told your friend Myrtle Markels while she was passing me in the corridor. I imagine the news will spread outward from there."

He was right. Not an hour later, Myrtle, Cora, and Cliona appeared in the infirmary, bearing food they'd nicked from that evening's meal in the Great Hall. "I was in here when I fell off my broomstick last year," Cliona said sympathetically, "and the food in here was just the worst."

"She can't eat, you nitwit," Cora said. "She's ill."

Cora was right, but I took their gift appreciatively, and even managed to eat a buttered roll. I arranged for all of them to take notes for me in the classes I would miss, and then sat back and listened to their chatter until they had to take leave. It might sound like they were foolish, but they were not, and I always enjoyed having them there, even I had nothing to contribute to the conversations but my ears. Truthfully, I even enjoyed hearing vitriolic comments about Olive Hornby once in a while – she really was a vile girl.

Later in the evening, I received an unexpected visitor in the form of Rubeus Hagrid, who grinned at me widely and proferred a large plant wrapped in a bow as a gift. The plant, apparently taking his cue, also broke into a large grin. "Hagrid, thank you, but – what is it?"

He sat down on the chair beside my bed, which creaked under his weight. "It's a Plainswell Pitcher plant," he said in a perfectly casual voice as he set the thing down on the side table. "Don' worry, though, Miss Minerva – I found yeh one that's a vegetarian. Yeh don' want 'im to be snappin' at yer fingers while yer sleepin'."

I glanced at the plant suspiciously. "How do you know it's a vegetarian?"

"The grass was all et up where I found 'im," Hagrid said proudly. "I'll show yeh." He snagged a piece of broccoli from the food the girls had brought me, and offered it up to the mouth of the plant. The plant opened up and secured the morsel with a long, green tongue. "See? He's a good boy," Hagrid cooed, stroking the upper stem of the plant, which emitted a sort of purring noise.

I had to laugh. "I suppose you think ordinary plants are far too boring?" I asked. I touched the plant where he had, and I could feel it vibrating softly. "It's very interesting, though – I like it."

"I thought yeh might. Yeh have to name 'im, yeh know. It's bad luck not to."

"Mmm. Any suggestions?"

"Snappers," Hagrid said promptly, as if he'd had the name picked out for years.

"Snappers it is, then," I confirmed, feeding it another piece of broccoli. "Wherever did you find it?"

"Er – well, uh, I was just poking round in the forest, Miss Minerva – but don' be angry, I didn't go too far in. There's nothin' too bad in the first few steps in." He looked very chagrined, and he looked at Snappers with a bit of horror on his face, finally realizing he'd just given a Forbidden Forest creature to a school prefect.

"Ah, well, Hagrid, just be careful what you bring out." There was really no way he could get too hurt in there – he was larger than most of the creatures. His face brightened considerably. "I'm already keeping a worse secret for you, remember? Just don't give me any more," I teased.

"Yeh, yeh." He hurried out before I could catch him at anything else. I spent the rest of the evening feeding bits of food to Snappers (true to Hagrid's claim, it refused to even acknowledge a sliver of a kipper I tried to tempt it with). I was allowed to go back to Gryffindor Tower in the morning, and, although I felt well enough to attend classes, I decided to enjoy my day off. It was the day for History of Magic, Potions, and Transfiguration – I wouldn't miss much in the latter, and I didn't particularly fancy putting up with the other two.

Myrtle and Cora burst into the dormitory before supper. "I don't care if you can't eat a thing!" Cora exclaimed (in fact, I was quite hungry). "You're coming down to dinner! Headmaster Dippet has announced that there's going to be a big surprise!"

I rolled over on my bed, partially with interest and partially to obstruct the title of Dealing with the Physical Demands of Advanced Transfiguration Techniques. "What sort of surpise?"

"We don't know," Myrtle said impatiently. "But it's got to be something big."

"Maybe exams have been cancelled," Cora said wistfully.

Cliona came up behind them. "Ha! As if exams would ever be cancelled at Hogwarts! Dippet's probably loaded on extra exams and expects us to be raving about it." She grinned at me, then her gaze fell on Snappers, which I had relocated to my desk in the dormitory. "Minerva! What's that?"

"It's a Plainswell Pitcher," I said matter-of-factly, as if were no more unusual than a pot of violets. "Hagrid gave it to me as a sort of get-well present." As if aware that I was I talking about it, Snappers gave a little ducking bow.

Myrtle leaned over it, her eyes wide and goggling. "It's probably vicious."

"It is not," I said immediately. "It only eats vegetables." Shoving my book under my pillow, I stood up out of bed and dusted myself off. "Come on, let's go down to supper. I want to hear what the surprise is."

The four of us traipsed down to the Great Hall, which seemed more alive than usual. I sat down and filled a plate with food, plus a serviette filled with steamed carrots and leeks for Snappers. "Feeling better?" Cliona laughed.

"Quite. It must have been one of those day-long illnesses," I lied.

"Hush!" Cora hissed. "Dippet's just come up to the High Table!" Her face was filled with tightly-controlled excitement; halfway to her mouth, a fork with a roasted potato on it was stopped in mid-bite. The day must have been rife with the rumour, for the rest of the student body looked equally rapt. Olive Hornby had a wide and rather dumb expression on her face. I glanced around – the only students besides myself who didn't seem to care were Cliona, and, over at the Slytherin table, Tom Riddle.

"Oh, I can hardly stand it!" Myrtle whispered. "Why doesn't he just say it?"

Dippet looked at each table, from Slytherin to Gryffindor, and smiled widely. "A number of students have come to me with interesting requests, and it is with them in mind that I make this announcement. It seems that many of you are distressed by the lack of social events here at Hogwarts; consequently, on the fourteenth of February, less than two weeks from now, the Great Hall will host a grand Valentine's Day Ball, with students and alumni alike attending. While anyone may attend, fifth-years and above are required to do so – we won't have our alumni come and see no students, will we?" He boomed with laughter, which no one echoed. "Well, at any rate, please be advised that dress will be formal – no Quidditch robes, Miss Brocklehurst – and that we, the staff, hope you enjoy this event."

The rest of the staff were beaming, even Professor Binns, who, as usual, looked about ready to kick the bucket. The reaction in the Great Hall was immediate; most of the girls looked triumphant, as if celebrating a victory, and most of the boys had slunk low into their seats and were darting their eyes about furtively at the girls. Myrtle and Cora had their heads together; both were whispering excitedly. "What if I prettied up the Gryffindor robes a little?" Cliona moaned.

"That won't do at all," Myrtle said firmly. "We've got to get to Gladrags, all four of us, and get ourselves new dress robes." Cliona, for her part, looked very green at this prospect; like me, she was probably remembering with great horror the three hours we'd spent watching Cora try on the sale items last autumn.

"Oh, I've just got to go, I've just got to," Cora whined. "D'you think that because I'm technically still in fourth year that I'll need a date to go? I'll just die of shame if I can't go because nobody asks me."

I thought about the idea of a ball, and shrugged. Really, it seemed like nothing more than a waste of time to me. "Now I'll have to miss a night of studying for my OWLs and practicing my—" I stopped suddenly. I had nearly said transformations.

Cliona's ears perked up. "Practicing your what?"

"Er – my Charms," I covered quickly. "You know how lousy I can be at Cheering Charms." I quickly forced my attention onto to my plate, and began eating at what must have been a highly unhealthy pace. I could feel Cliona's eyes burning into my forehead, but I steadfastly looked down, and soon, she looked away.