Disclaimer: See Chapter 1
The Misplaced Potter
Chapter 12
In which Henry leaves St. Mungo's
Barbara stopped walking down the corridor at St. Mungo's hospital a moment Maggie after did.
"What is it?" Barbara asked.
Maggie looked up at the blonde teen-ager with naked anxiety.
"He is alright now, isn't he?" She asked fearfully. "Some of what the others kids have said about his injuries were horrible."
Barbara looked Maggie in the eye. "I seriously doubt that what the others have said is anywhere a near match to how extensive Henry's injuries truly were. The sphenoid bones, vomer bone, nasal septum, nasal skeleton, and the zygoma were pulverized by the blunt force trauma. He also had several broken ribs and a punctured lung not to mention the lacerations and abrasions."
"Ribs and lung I know," Maggie said. "What was all that other stuff?"
"Henry essentially no longer had a face. Even his eyes were destroyed," Barbara said candidly causing Maggie to gasp. "Even with all of that he was very lucky. If his head had collided with that sink just a few millimeters higher, he would have been killed outright. Are you friend enough to him to still go into his ward?"
The short girl wavered then straightened. Barbara could see determination replace fear in the girl's eyes.
"I'm his friend no matter how he looks," she replied with resolve. "The person inside remains the same."
"Are you certain?" Barbara asked. "We still have twenty feet to go. You can leave and return to Hogwarts and Henry would never know."
"But I would," Maggie said. "Let's go."
Barbara pushed opened the door.
"This is the psych ward, right, where they house the lunatics mad enough to wrestle trolls?" She called out.
"No," Henry replied. "That's next door. This is where they put guys dumb enough to listen to girls who tell them to go wrestle trolls."
"I thought that it was safe advice," Barbara retorted. "It's a well know fact that guys don't listen anyway."
Maggie stared at Henry during the banter. He looked a bit different but he was not scarred or mutilated and he definitely had a face. Maggie looked from Henry to Barbara in mystification. Henry caught her expression.
"What were you expecting?" he asked.
"Something terrible," she blurted out as she ran to him.
Henry laughed as Maggie hugged him fiercely. "I've been in here for five weeks, Maggie. You saw Barbara here repair my hand in only minutes."
"I know but she told me how dreadfully hurt you were," she said. "She even said that you were blind."
Henry's expression clouded at the memory of waking up blind. He had never known such stark terror before not even with the troll. He could not bring himself to believe the healers when they assured him that they had artificial magic eyes that would give him back his vision. He had cried in relief when they placed the new eyes into his empty sockets and he saw the world for the first time in nearly a month.
"The healers said that someone from Hogwarts would be coming to take me back today." Henry said moving away from the subject. "You guys are it, I guess."
"Yes." Barbara said hefting a book bag onto his bed. "Ernie MacMillan packed you a change of clothes from your trunk unless you now think hospital gowns are the height of fashion."
"No, I think that I would like to have my backside covered when I leave here," Henry said grabbing the bag as he headed for the lavatory.
Maggie giggled when she saw that the gown indeed did not cover the entire body. Barbara gave out a teasing whistle, which caused Henry to scurry into the other room.
Barbara waited until Henry closed the lavatory door.
"How does he seem to you?" she asked quietly.
"He looks fine," Maggie said. "He doesn't quite look as he did. The nose is thinner I believe and the eyes are different, well you know what I mean, the shape of the eyes but he looks perfectly normal. You had me thinking that he would be like some monster or something."
"You showed a lot of character walking through the door expecting that, Maggie," Barbara said approvingly. "But what I'm asking is how does his behavior strike you?"
"I don't know what you mean," Maggie replied.
"As you can see with Henry, most physical injuries can be healed," Barbara explained. "But head trauma, especially trauma to the frontal lobes, can result in personality changes."
"He seems alright, I guess," Maggie said after some thought.
Barbara nodded. "If he starts exhibiting unusual behaviors such as angry or violent outbursts, inform me or Madame Pomfrey or Professor Sprout."
"He beat up two guys in a train station and fought a troll," Maggie replied. "I think that he was violent before the injury."
"I sure that you are smart enough to be able to distinguish amongst differing violent actions," the blonde teen said seriously. "Fighting two boys is hardly the same as if he began to lash out at you or the MacNarney girls."
The lavatory door opened before Maggie could reply. Henry strolled back into the ward wearing blue jeans and a long sleeved sky blue shirt. He was carrying a jacket and the book bag.
"Do you know what happened to my boots?" Henry asked eyeing the trainers on his feet.
"They were soaked with blood and water," Barbara said. "By the time that anyone thought of performing a cleaning charm on them the leather was too far gone."
"Oh, well," Henry said with a shrug. "They were beginning to get tight."
"You do take matters in stride, don't you, Henry?" Barbara asked.
"I'm walking out of a hospital when I could have just as easily been buried for a month," he replied. "A pair of boots is hardly a big deal."
Magical hospital or not, there was paperwork to be done before Henry could leave. After signing several forms and showing the authorization from the headmaster to allow her to escort Henry from St. Mungo's to three different administrators, Barbara was finally able to leave with her charges.
"Are you ready to return to Hogwarts?" she asked them.
"I'd like to go to my Aunt Caroline's first. My mom's been staying there all month," Henry said. "St. Mungo's has some strict rules about muggles in the hospital so she's only been allowed to see me a couple of times. It'll be a relief to her and dad if she sees that I'm okay."
"They didn't tell me that side trips weren't allowed," Barbara said who would have violated a direct order to the contrary in this case. "Where does she live?"
Henry gave her his aunt's London address.
"There's a tube station nearby," Barbara said. "But I don't have any muggle money, do you?"
Maggie and Henry shook their heads.
"Very well then, what's the use of going to Hogwarts if you don't learn a spell or two that can get you on the underground?" she asked mischievously.
The group found themselves in the Gallatin's sitting room an hour later. Danielle Porter alternated between hugging Henry close to her and holding him at arms length staring at his newly grown face as the others sipped tea.
"I can't believe the work that they've done on you," Mrs. Porter said joyously. "It truly is magic."
"I look a little different, mom" Henry pointed out.
"You're alive and healthy," she replied. "That's all that matters. What ever face you have, I love the son behind it."
"It's a shame that your people keep those synthetic eyes a secret," Mrs. Gallatin said to Barbara as they sat together on the sofa in the sitting room. "So many people could benefit from them."
"I know," Barbara replied sadly, "But the conventional wisdom is that we need to remain incognito and those eyes aren't anything mechanical or electronic. They operate solely on magic."
"But you pluck kids from of ordinary families and send them to your school," Mrs. Gallatin argued. "That gives you away."
"Yes," the teen-ager replied. "And some of us marry muggles but that gives ourselves away to a handful of people a year that then have a vested interest in keeping the secret. We cannot risk the repercussions that entire societies may bring upon us. We can defend ourselves but at what cost?"
"She's probably right, Caroline," Mrs. Porter said forlornly. "Over in Kentucky and other parts of America, every year there are people who object to The Wizard of Oz or A Wrinkle in Time being in school or public libraries. What would they do if they knew that there were societies of people that they would consider satanic spawn?"
"A handful of ignorant gits," Mrs. Gallatin grumbled.
"Undoubtedly ignorant even if sincere and perhaps even a very small minority," Barbara rejoined. "But we are a small nation and can't risk the unpredictability of mobs."
"But look at London." Mrs. Gallatin responded. "We are the most multiethnic, multicultural city in the world and we co-exist with one another very well."
"Mrs. Gallatin," Barbara began after a sip of tea. "Two women own two restaurants on the same block. One succeeds while one fails. People say that one had better food or better service or was a better manger. Same situation but one of the women is a known witch and her restaurant is the one that succeeds. How many muggles could be convinced that she used charms to lure customers to her or curses to hinder her rival?"
Mrs. Gallatin gave the young woman a long speculative look. Slowly she nodded. "Too many for your people's comfort, more then likely," she said finally. "You have a well trained mind, Barbara. I can see that Christopher will be well educated at Hogwarts."