(a/n: I love this story, and I love you beautiful reviewers! Lemme know what you think of Harry's Animagus form. I just wanted to do something that no one's ever done before. I swear, I didn't have this planned, so it's all one huge coincidence, alright. I swear: no planning whatsoever. Btw: I don't own = you don't sue. Get it? Good.)
Chapter Four of Unexpected Losses
Harry began to change. The first thing to happen was that his skin turned white. The white was so bright it seemed to exude brilliance. Except at his scar, which turned a vivid red in color. The hair on his scalp shortened considerably, and a thick coat grew everywhere else. His emerald green eyes remained his own throughout the transformation, but his vision corrected. All of his senses sharpened.
Colors were brighter and he suddenly saw shades that hadn't existed before. A student in the back shifted in their stool, the resounding squeak would never have been heard by any human, but Harry heard it as clearly as if it had been made inside of his head. He fell forward as his feet stretched, his heel forming what resembled a backwards joint. White pads formed on his palms and fingers, and on his feet. He stretched, and to his unmarked embarrassment, grew a tail. His ears grew tufts on the ends, giving them a pointed look.
The smells, though. That was the biggest difference that Harry felt. That and that he was suddenly far shorter than he'd been before. Every smell was new, stronger. It was surprising just how hard the scent hit him. From where he stood, there was no mistaking the world around him. Every person, he could distinguish by their scent. Perfume overwhelmed him for a moment; the disgusting false odor was intense. Harry flinched away from it.
There was a sudden new sense at his movement. It was unlike anything that he'd ever smelled before. It was intoxicating, all-consuming. It was prey. The scent was so thick, he could nearly taste it, and it was delicious. It was fear. And scared prey made for an easy meal. "Mr. Potter." The voice jerked Harry's mind over the instincts of his Animagus form. "Mr. Potter, please go and sit in between Ms. Granger and Ms. Parkinson."
"Why?" He asked, but he did not speak, but a short roar was his speech.
"Mr. Potter, please do so now." The professor spoke again, and Harry did move. The false smell of perfume exuded powerfully from Pansy, so Harry kept walking sitting on the other side of Hermione. He was between Hermione and Neville, then. Hermione, unlike many females in the class, smelled so real. Like roses. Earthy. It was a wonderful smell, and in appreciation, he laid his head in her lap.
Humor rolled in waves from her. He didn't know how, but Harry sensed it. A strange, painful cramp in his stomach washed over him, and he headed back towards McGonagall again. A moment later, and he was Harry again. His joints hurt badly, his muscles felt oddly stretched, and was over-all quite uncomfortable. He swallowed the blue potion without question and internally rejoiced when the pain receded completely. Professor McGonagall returned his glasses without comment, and Harry retook his seat next to Ron.
"What was I?" Harry asked him quietly, from the corner of his mouth, as the rest of the class requested the next turn.
"Remember Professor Kehoe's class a few weeks ago?" Ron questioned back, with his light blue eyes wide. Harry thought for a moment, and then the answer hit him. From what he saw of himself, and what he felt, there was only one answer to what he had become. Swamplight Lynx.
Well. He thought, turning towards the front of the room, as Draco Malfoy and Blaise Zabini stepped up. That's a twist.
Draco stepped forward arrogantly, and downed the clear potion. A moment later, "Mutego." He swallowed the amber potion with a single swig. "Mutego Abeofera." He immediately began to shrink, and grow hair. It was striped, that was immediately obvious, but not much else could be told by the minute changes that began his transformation.
Surprisingly enough, of all the students in the class, Ron was the first to realize what Draco was turning into, and he fell out of his seat at the realization, laughing. Confused and slightly concerned, Harry leaned over his friend to offer him a hand up, but Ron didn't see his hand, tearing up in his laughter. Harry cocked an eyebrow at him, silently wondering if someone had hurled a tickling charm at his best friend.
Ron didn't seem to be breathing, and was turning an alarming shade of red as Harry looked on, still perturbed at the sight. "Are you alright, mate?" He questioned, still offering his hand to the redhead. Ron shook his head, rocking back and forth, clutching his sides. Eventually he managed to point towards the front of the room, and to Malfoy.
The blonde prince of Slytherin had finished his transformation. In his surprise at the sight that greeted him, he, too, fell from his stool, sliding backwards. He reeled his arms for a moment, but crashed next to Ron. For a moment he saw stars, but when his vision cleared well enough that he could stand without getting too dizzy to stand, he did. And what he'd seen hadn't changed.
The sight was a delicious one, for Harry, at for some reason, it felt like a victory. And he really, really wished that Colin had this one class with him, and his camera on him. There would never be another opportunity like this. Harry could literally feel the moment escape him, when Draco finally returned to his regular form, clearly humiliated.
"Hey, Malfoy, look at it this way," Ron demanded of the blonde in between peals of laughter. "At least this time, you didn't bounce." He slipped halfway off his stool again before he righted himself again. The entire Gryffindor class was obviously doing their best to contain their laughter (most of them failing), while the Slytherin side seemed to be ignoring the boy. Harry had never seen the Slytherin boy quite to red before. Even at his angriest, his pale complexion never wavered…now, he slightly resembled a tomato. A pale, undernourished, and yellow-y tomato, but a tomato nonetheless.
Blaise nervously drank the clear potion, and, just as those before him, went through McGonagall's process of spells, potions, and thought. Blaise didn't take as much time to speak the spell in its entirety as those before him, and his transformation seemed somehow more graceful than those before him. His Animagus form was, almost surprisingly, a cat; like the Gryffindor Housemaster. He was all black, except for a white patch at his crest. He glanced smugly at the class before alighting McGonagall's desk at her command.
The movement from floor to desk, despite being at McGonagall's command, was obviously made slowly: as if to prove that it was his own idea. He curled up into a ball and stared, apparently bored, at the class with bright yellow eyes. He was still sitting on the desk when he resumed his normal form. He lightly jumped to his feet and self-importantly brushed himself off before retaking his seat, drinking the blue potion on his way.
Hermione and Neville were the next to go. Hermione's form was a large Peregrine falcon, she was magnificent. An ashy-blue on her back and four-foot wingspan, white underneath, barred with black. She had a blue-black cap and mustache. She turned her head to the wall, watching the whole of the class with a single, piercing blue eye. Her beak was short, hooked, and each of her talons ended in a wickedly curved claw. After performing McGonagall's task, she returned to her normal form, and silently accepted her potion. She drank it even as she headed back to her seat, still absorbed in the transformation that had just taken place.
Neville took a long time, just as Harry had, in speaking the spell. His changes were no less time-consuming than any others, but his form was surprising. A lion. A fully-grown African lion, full mane and all. He was nearly nine feet long (just like with Harry: discounting the tail), and a golden color. His long mane was dark brown, just as the tuft on the end of his tail was. He glared at the class with fierce golden eyes, and sat on his haunches, as if puzzling out the classroom. When he returned to his seat, he was in awe of his own experience, and absentmindedly drank the potion their Transfigurations Professor handed him.
Seamus and Dean were up next. Seamus had, to his personal delight, turned into a raccoon, and had set about frightening almost every girl in the room before returning to his own form, grinning.
Dean had become a snake, a python, to be exact, and twelve feet long, and almost a foot around its girth. He didn't seem to wish to listen to Professor McGonagall, but Harry, thanks to his Parseltongue, was able to convince Dean to come back to himself. When he returned to his normal form, he was shivering. He downed the blue potion without question, still rubbing his arms. "Bloody cold." He muttered to himself, taking his seat.
"That was the coolest transfiguration class ever." Ron declared as they left, nearly an hour later. Harry and Hermione agreed breathlessly as they scurried towards their lunch, all hungry. "You guys gonna do it? Become Animagi?"
"They'd have to kill me to stop me." Harry admitted with a grin. "So I was a Swamplight Lynx, then? That's an awesome coincidence, with Professor K's class. It was so weird, though, I thought I was either going to hunt someone down or run like hell...by the way, Hermione: you smell good."
"You noticed that, too?" Ron laughed, as Hermione blushed. "I thought Pansy and her bloody perfume were going to kill me, I've never smelled anything so horrible in my life. So, Herm, still scared to fly?"
"Not like that." Hermione answered with a faraway look in her eyes. "On a broom: not on your life, but as an Animagus...nothing could keep me grounded. So, do you guys want to start researching yet?" She grinned as she spoke, and just as she'd expected Harry and Ron rolled their eyes. "Become an Animagus is no easy task, you guys. There are months and months of preparation that we have to go through. It's not something that you can decide to do one day and do the next. Library. Starting tomorrow after classes."
Both boys sighed, knowing that arguing with Hermione in a mood like that one was completely pointless. Ron perked up quickly. "Can you belief Malfoy? I thought I was going to die," he snickered. "I just wished he bounced. Malfoy: the Amazing Ferret. It just doesn't have the same ring without the bouncing."
Willow, meanwhile, had begun to settle into life with the Dursleys. It was surprising how monotonous the days became, every one being so much like the one before that it was hard to recognize it as another day. She did well in school, acing every subject, and being ahead in most of them. She enjoyed school, and tentatively made new friends. Her days were marked by the e-mails she shared with her friends, usually with them updating her on the fast-paced world of a Hellmouth.
A girl named Faith had turned up, and she, too, was a Slayer. Buffy was getting used to having another girl helping her, and they were forming a friendship. Cordelia and Xander were amidst an on-again phase of their relationship, and according to Buffy: disgusting, with her on the side drowning in the gooey sappiness and occasional insult.
According to Xander, her most usual pen-buddy, everyone missed her terribly, and there was a horrible gaping hole in the Scooby-gang without her. Willow practiced her magic whenever she had a spare moment, which was an amount of time that, despite never changing, was impossibly long or nowhere near enough. Willow was advancing quickly, to her own surprise. She kept constant contact with Giles about her magical progress and he helped her whenever he could, but was adamant about not answering her questions involving his magic.
She was beginning to anticipate the arrival of Harry, just to bring a new atmosphere to the house. Anything to break the monotony. Willow had quickly grown to be uncomfortable with her surrogate family. For some reason, only "Aunt" Petunia seemed to care about her at all, and was willing to talk to her. One Saturday, after the morning news, a magic show had come one.
Willow had actually wanted to watch it, it was supposed to be a seamless show: at the very least entertaining for a witch who'd already finished her homework. But as soon as Mr. Dursley had heard the advertisement of the show, he turned it off, muttering darkly under his breath. He then proceeded to glare at Willow until she'd fled the room for the safety of her bedroom. Willow grew glad of her decision to hide her magical supplies: the Dursleys didn't seem to be a group who'd accept that kind of person.
It had been that day, in mid-November, after fleeing Mr. Dursley and his anger at the television's magic show, when her life on Privet Drive changed completely. She'd moved to--rather dramatically in her opinion--fling herself onto her bed, when the front of her shoe got caught on a floorboard.
"Ow." She announced plainly, aching all over at her topple onto the hardwood floor. She moved to disconnect her shoe from the wood when she realize that the floorboard was loose. "Feels like one of those cheap mystery movies." She muttered to herself before she pulled the board free. Underneath was, not the dust she'd expected, but an arrangement of things. "These must be Harry's." She muttered to herself, moving two fist-sized rocks. To her surprise, they seemed to have raisins imbedded onto them. She also moved a bunch of candy-wrappers with "chocolate frog" written on them, and one or two boxes with "Bertie Botts: Every Flavour Beans" as well.
On the bottom of the free-space were books. Intrigued despite herself, she earnestly cracked open one, hoping she wasn't too-badly invading Harry's privacy. The top book was, apparently, a book of spells. To her surprise the cover added: Grade One.
"Must be a series." Willow muttered to herself, and opened the cover. She hurriedly replaced the floorboard and sat on her bed, intent upon reading the book. And read it she did, not descending to the main floor to join the Dursleys for dinner, not taking any break at all: she just read. And absorbed.
In about two hours she'd finished, contented with her success. And then, earnestly, began the application of the reading. Less than halfway though the book she'd realized that the book was not part of some gibberish series: it was an actual magic book. Giles' magic. And with or without his help, Willow decided firmly, she would learn this magic. All of the spells, every last one, involved using a wand, but Willow already considered the matter.
With this other form of Magic, the wizards needed their wands. They used them to focus their magic, and were otherwise incapable of controlling it. But Willow didn't have that problem, and decided that she could at least try to use the theories behind this magic without the wand. What was usually more important than "wand-waving" was the words that were spoken. That, at least, was something Willow could do.
To her delight, she was able to complete each of the spells she tried. Lumos was an interesting trial. The spell was supposed to set a wand-tip alight, but because she didn't have a wand, a ball of light simply floated over her hand. Thus Willow returned to the loose floorboard. And for the next month, Willow led a triple-life.
She was an American-transfer student and a resident of the Dursley home some of the time. She was a part-time Scooby, despite her distance, her hacking skills were not become duller; she also worked much of the time with Giles practicing her Wiccan Arts. And finally, secretly, she was teaching herself an unfamiliar magic with the leftover schoolbooks of her soon-to-be-roommate.
And that was the icing on the cake. In only a few days: Harry Potter was coming home.
(a/n: sorry for the shortness. And I apologize in the over-sight of Willow's eye color. I don't know why I wrote green. Maybe I subconsciously want green eyes or something…except I do…and not subconsciously: I darmn well know it. I hope y'all liked it. And yay! Next chapter: the long awaited meeting of Willow and Harry. And ooh! Will's got a HUGE surprise for Christmas. Wonder what it is…now I'll have to come up w/ something! R&R!)