Disclaimer: I do not, nor will I ever own Harry Potter. It is the property of JK Rowling and her associates. No monetary or material profit was gained from this story.
Inheritance of the Elves
Chapter One
Mates
In a small room somewhere deep in the countryside there was a pale man sitting on a deep blue velvet cushion. His eyes were squeezed together tightly though the rest of his body was fairly relaxed. He was mumbling incoherently under his breath but the quill hovering above the parchment on a nearby table caught the words.
"Born today, July 31st of the year 1980, is Harry James Potter. Son of James Potter and Lily Potter nee Evans. Grandson of Charlus Potter and Dorea Potter nee Black and Harrison Evans and Rosemary Evans nee Brown. Future mate of Fred and George Weasley…
The man's eyes snapped open before he could go any further. Bolting up, he scrambled out of the room and down the hall to the others.
It was almost midnight when Molly Weasley crept into the small bedroom that her son, Ron, and Harry were sharing. It was the night before his birthday and she knew that coming from an old wizarding family, he could have any number of semi-human beings in his blood.
She silently watched the cloak on the bedside table with a small box in her hands. Every year she gave her children a birthday present after midnight. You only became an adult once, and it would be no different for the boy who was like her own.
As soon as the numbers on the clock changed to 12:00 a.m. sharp, a blinding light filled the room. It slowly died down to a soft glow before it died all together. As Ron sat up in bed and the rest of the Weasley family ran into the room, Molly gasped. By what she could see Harry's skin had become even paler in shade; his ears had become more leaf shaped and pointier. Around his wrists were swirled writing in various shades of blue, a quick lift of the blanket would have shown similar markings around his ankles.
The matriarch of the family waited before reaching out to shake the boy awake. Before she touched him though, his glowing green eyes slowly pulled themselves open.
Seeing the whole family in the room and staring at him, Harry pulled himself up till he was leaning against the headboard. He was just about to ask why everyone was in the room when a white owl that seemed to have a light blue tint to it's feathers, flew in through the window Harry had left open for Hedwig. The beautiful animal dropped a small letter from his razor sharp talons before wheeling back around and flying through the window as silently as he came.
He reached down, picked up the letter, and examined it before ripping it open.
"Well, Harry, dear? What does it say?" asked a confused Molly before he had even had an opportunity to begin. He shrugged lightly and examined the heavy ivory parchment. It read:
Dear Harry Potter,
You will have gotten this letter not but a few minutes after midnight on July 31st, the day you were born. You have just come into Elvin inheritance. You yourself are a Caelum Ventus Elf. We are sure that you have noticed your ease on a broom and in the air in general. This will only increase as your power over wind and air develop along with your power over birds.
We write not only to inform you of your inheritance that you might have been unaware of, but to also warn you that all elves are born having mates. Unlike other races who must search for their mates, Elves have used the services of the seers to ensure that no Elf need die from lack of their soul mate. You are a special case. Instead of having only one mate, you have two: Fred and George Weasley. You should also know that if both young men do not accept you, you will die of heartbreak.
Respectfully,
Soterios
Honored Scribe
Harry looked up at the Weasleys than looked back at the paper before dropping it to his lap, staring blankly ahead.
Molly reached forward and picked up the letter to determine to know what had caused the boy to pass out but the only thing seen on the parchment were markings like those she saw on Harry's wrists. She stood up and rushed down the stairs followed by the rest of her family. She tossed some powder into the fire before saying: "Hogwarts Headmaster Office!"
'Why has this happened to me?' the thought kept running through his mind.
They, whoever they may be, had said it as though it was a simple thing to get the both of them to fall in love with him. He knew he wasn't into girls. He had never thought about it much. Not during a war where he may die. That was something to avoid until after he had won.
Soon after she left, Molly bustled back into the room with McGonagall, Dumbledore, and Snape behind her.
"Lemon drop?" trust Dumbledore to ask that question after Harry had found out he was an Elf.
"No thank you, Professor. But I would like to know what is going on? How did this happen!" He seemed like the best person to ask about this. He almost always knew what was happening or why or how. It was the getting any information out of him that was the hard part.
"I'm sad to say that I do not know. But, do look on the bright side, I'm sure you have new powers and as a magical being may have a mate that will be perfect for you," He consoled.
"Mates," he choked out in a whisper. Only the twins had caught the choked whisper as they sat on the side of Ron's bed as he snored away. The rest of the children left when the adults had come into the room, trusting the Headmaster to fix whatever was wrong. The adults were off in the corner arguing in hushed tones about what he may be (having not seen fit to just ask) and how to best utilize this occurrence.
"Mates?" they asked him in a quiet whisper. He nodded gravely. The twins shared a look before George, being the more compassionate twin, moved to the other bed and wrapped an arm around the distressed boy as Fred slipped away to find something.
The two teens had sat on the bed for maybe ten minutes before Fred barged back into the bedroom carrying a rather large dusty book.
"I think this may help," Fred placed the book on Harry's lap, "There you are, Harry. If I'm right there should be the answer to you're questions."
Harry grabbed the tome and carefully lifted the worn cover. It was entitled "The Magical Beings in Your Blood - A comprehensive guide to the beings that wizards bond with by Josiah Scamander". He flipped to the table of contents and from there to the page he was seeking. Caelum Ventus Elves.
He skipped all the way down to the part about mates.
Mates
"Mates are the most important thing to any elf no matter gender or race. Elves are very emotion based beings; their strength comes from their emotions. So it goes to say, that with all the love you would get from your mate, that the mate is the biggest power source for an Elf or, at the very least pertain to them/family/friends in some way…
Harry skipped further down the page.
The Double Mates Phenomena
"Occasionally an elf may have two mates instead of one. Cases like these are one in several thousand and only three sets have been recorded since the time of Merlin. No one knows why this happens. The first theory was that identical twins with the same magical signature was the cause, but this was disproved first when the first set from which this theory derived had different magical signatures and second, when it never occurred again.
"There is a story among the elves of how this phenomena came about, though it can not be proven in any fashion. This is the story:
"When one of the very first Elven Kings was on his death bed, he told his son that he was to be king and even though his son may not be there when he died that he wanted him to go out in the lands and find his one true mate. The son did as his father asked. He searched the lands of the earth and of others trying desperately to find his one true love before he died of heartbreak. Sadly, he never found them.
"While he was gone his sister ruled in his stead with her mate. The princess waited and waited for the rightful king to come home and take his place as king. After seven years her beloved sibling's body was brought back to her. He died of heartbreak; his heart hurt so much that it burst form the pain and loneliness. She was furious and took her leave along with her mate to visit the Fremtid clan, the seers.
"She pled with them for seven days and eight nights until they agreed to look into the future and record whom each and every elf's mate was. But there was a slight problem. A lot of elves were of impure blood and elves would not be ready for any mate 'till seventeen years of age. So the elves made an important decision; not more than an hour after any elf came into their inheritance a spectral owl will fly to the elf and give them a letter. This letter will hold all the important information that any elf would need to know.
"In extremely rare cases an elf will have not one but two mates. This is only in the case of very powerful elves that are the most deserving. It is said that the prince who died sits in the holy place of their fathers and judges the souls and the futures of all his children (the other elves) and those whose lives are filled with sorrow and hardship but still remain good and pure of soul and fight for the good of the world and the people will be blessed with two mates. But there is also a down side to this wondrous and rare occurrence. Unless both of the mates accept it then the elf will die of heartbreak. If one of them accepts the bond the elf will live their entire life in grief and sorrow, neglecting the mate and causing them both unimaginable agony. In most cases the elf will kill themselves to save both of them the grief in hopes that the mate(s) will find love elsewhere. The majority of the mates do.
Harry stared down at the page in shock then broke down into sobbing tears. He curled into himself before George pulled him closer and he felt Fred lean over to take the book from his lap.
He gathered that Fred had quickly skimmed the page before he let out, "Bloody hell," throwing the book aside before moving over to hug him as well.
It took a moment for the adults who were arguing in whispered tones to notice that the very boy they were worried about was crying while hanging onto the twin pranksters.
"What is the matter, my dear boy?" Albus finally turned around.
Harry just shook his head, burrowed his face deeper into George's chest.
Fred, knowing that George was the better one when it came to comforting anyone, leaned over and whispered in Harry's ear, " Harry, would you like me to tell them so you can sleep?" Harry nodded his consent before snuggling closer to the other man as Fred climbed off the bed and waved the group to follow him.
Once they had made it downstairs with out waking the portrait, Fred turned on the people who had followed him down there.
"What the bloody hell were you doing!" The looks on their faces were priceless.
"Fred! Language." Molly's face was scandalized.
"You all were too busy arguing about what to do with his new powers, that you completely forgot that about the person who just found out he had them. Did it ever occur to you to talk to him after you found out?"
McGonagall at least had the decency to look ashamed.
"What was the matter with the boy, then?" Snape sneered.
"He might die that's the matter! He has two mates and doesn't believe that they could both love him. And all you could do was argue about whether or not this will help the war!" And with that he left the room.
George watched as his brother and the group as they left the room so Harry could get some sleep. If there was one thing that George had ever been interested in it was magical beings in wizarding blood. When he had found out that one of his friends had some type of Siren blood he had helped him research everything he needed to know about what he would become.
After that he had been fascinated with the rights and passages of other beings that inhabited the world around them. Now he had a living, breathing elf wrapped in his arms, and thought back to all the information he had read.
He didn't know what kind of elf Harry was, but it was safe to assume that he would have air elemental powers. George couldn't figure out how he had become one though. A Potter being bonded to an elf would have been remembered at least by Dumbledore… Perhaps his mother was descended from a long lost squib ancestor. There was something else niggling at the back of his mind, but when Harry snuggled closer he brushed it off and focused on the boy in his arms.
Not long after he went down Fred came back to the room. Waiting on the threshold to his room, he watched Harry drift off to sleep in his brother's arms. When he was completely sure Harry was asleep, he gestured for George to bring Harry to his room, passing into the room after them and lowering himself down on the floor on his brother's side of the bed.
"We need to help him," George said in a low voice. Fred nodded his assent.
A minute later he started to work on the door from where he sat. The strongest locking charms and booby traps he knew before a silencing charm to keep out any yelling, screaming, bangs, booms, and/or other excessively loud noise that would disturb their Harry.
When that was done he vocally agreeing, "Even if it takes us to the end of world and back."
A/N: So… what do you think of the edit. I personally like this better. And this one is longer to boot.