So...well honestly I meant for this to be a one shot since you know...drunk writing and all, but I recieved a bunch of positive PM's and I kinda like the idea of where I want to take this so if I get enough decent reviews who knows. This is mildly more serious then the last chapter because I'm building up Lilly's new persona, if enough people care I'll keep writing and keep a good balance of drama and humor. Oh also one of my favorite Discworld characters makes a cameo so enjoy!
It was an ashen faced Lilly Potter who finally made her way to the lavatories a short time later, the information overload she had just received had deeply unsettled her; really hadn't needed Hermione to go into such graphic detail on how her new plumbing worked. Although truth be told her inner Marauder was slightly curious if her long time friend hadn't been pranking her since the bushy haired bookworm already had diagrams and color coded graphs at ready.
Thats a lark, Hermione taking the Mickey out of her with paperwork...shit...it fit...good show really. Sighing as she entered the room while vaguely recalling it was Moaning Mertle's personal haunt Lilly came to dead stop in front of the sinks,
"Nothing for it, blokes won out women got the raw deal in this whole puberty thing..." realizing that she did not in fact know where to go from here she turned the faucets on and dunked her face into the basin of water.
After a few moments she pulled her head up and turned the water off, glaring down into the draining sink she wiped her face dry with a corner of her robe while pulling her annoyingly long hair behind her ears. Standing there contemplating her lot in life she allocated herself a few more moments of glowering time before glancing up into the mirror and felt her heart skip a beat.
She'd been operating on the assumption that she still looked like Harry, just you know, with lady bits, the end result was completely opposite of what she'd expected, "Wow...I'm hot..." Ok, not exactly the most humble thing to say but seriously, from the raven hair, pale heart shaped face and emerald eyes that now held a rather creepy inner glow she was quite striking, still had that damn scar though.
Realizing that her glasses didn't fit the new her she pulled out her wand and went over her options, concentrating she began to form an image in her mind. Frames had to go, and the round lenses were kind of tacky truth be told, so after a few deft transfigurations she was now sporting a rather tasteful pair of rimless lenses.
"Can't believe it I've been a girl for a few hours and I'm already accessorizing, ugh..." Looking at the striking young lady in the mirror a morbid thought hit her...she was now an attractive girl in a school filled with clueless pubescent boys, experience verifiying this. Shuddering at flashbacks of Harry's bungled attempts at wooing Cho Chang last year Lilly now had the uncomfortable realization that her real problems had only just begun.
Because simply put, Harry Potter had had many worries in his life and while they usually involved him being pushed around, abused, or more often then he liked nearly killed, one thing he had never had to deal with though was being pursued by romantically inept teenage boys.
With a groaned "Bugger me," she dropped her head and marched off to the dorms, best to just get this crap over with, maybe she'd get lucky and the common room would be empty, she actually had to stop and cackle at the idea of having good luck for a few moments before moving on. It soon was proven that her luck as Lilly Potter held true to Harry's standard, which is to say on the short end of abysmal, much to her annoyance it appeared that the entirety of Gryffindor was camping in the Common room to get a look at her.
The mixed bag of reactions was...disconcerting, from some of the girls she was getting looks of jealousy (which was stupid), from the boys looks that could only be considered lecherous (which was unsettling), and in between all that those exuding honest curiosity and sympathy (which was appreciated). Finally meeting Hermione's apologetic gaze next to the supportive Neville and Ron she gave a half hearted shrug and leaned against the door frame. 'What to say...well...being blindly courageous like a Gryffindor had gotten her into this mess so lets play this like a Slytherin and use some deflection.'
"I suppose you all heard so really I guess there's no point hiding it, I did in fact tell Snape to fuck off to his face, twice, sorry for the lost points." For once in her life she'd said the exact right thing at the right time, the collective took a breath then broke down into peels of laughter, looking back to her friends she received a nod of approval from Hermione and wide grins from the boys.
'Can work with that,' she thought with a smile, walking into the room proper she realized suddenly she was a bit taller then Harry had been, not an unwanted trade off but certainly unexpected, filing that away for later she began pacing back and forth while twirling a lock of her hair. Looking back at the now smiling crowd she continued whilst shrugging again, "I also stripped Malfoy down to his birthday suit and gave him some...fabulous hair care advice free of charge since I was such a giving person, lost points for that as well." Dean Thomas snarked out with,
"The poofter looks like one of the anorexic 'hunks' on the back of my mum's cheap romance novels, well played Harry!" As the laughter renewed she felt the urge to hug the hell out of the muggle-born for that opening, giving him a lopsided grin she drawled,
"Well I aim to please my target demographic Dean," more laughter, ah good stuff, finally letting her smile drop she fell into the chair that had obviously been left for her and just sat there for a few moments facing her entire house. Rubbing her face and growling in frustration she finally threw her head back and continued, "Ok, so long short, I seriously messed up a potion and this body is the end result of that mistake.
"I already went over this with the Headmaster and Madam Pomfrey, this is due to my own negligence and Snape being a condescending arse," Neville and Ron threw in a 'here here' but she received an annoyed glare from Hermione, Lilly inwardly snorted at that, 'baby steps dear, baby steps'.
Removing her glasses she began rubbing her temples slowly as she collected her thoughts, getting no inspiration she plowed on, "As it stands so far all we can tell is this...transformation is permanent, outside of some very odd magic levels I've nothing abnormal in my system...outside of missing my Y-chromosomes of course." That got a chuckle from the older muggle-born but looks of confusion from all else, 'Ah well can't please them all.'
"So, just work with me here, please? I know we've had a rocky start with the Tom Riddle...errr...Voldemort thing but we have Umbitch to deal with on top of all our normal harrowing school year drama so...lets all just try to play this by ear." The collective winced at the name of the self styled Dark Lord much to Lilly's annoyance, and while it was obvious they wanted more they also appeared to sense her desire to avoid further questioning for the time being and began dispersing. Thank Merlin for small miracles, eventually Fred, George, Ginny, Neville, Ron and Hermione crowded around her, the twins starting in first, of course,
"My my Harry, we had no idea you were so against courting our lovely Ginny," twin trade off,
"That you'd go through all this effort to make yourself available to the simple Ronnikins," Insert indigent yelp and a disgusted 'Hey!' here, the devious duo of course continued unabated.
"Of course you could have secretly been desiring the pair of us,"
"Indeed oddly suspicious George, I do believe dear Harry was supporting some rather off fantasies," Smirking at the twins antics she resumed rubbing her temples for a moment before making eye contact with Fred, winking she said,
"Sorry George, Fred's the pretty one and I can't go for a set of defective twins," getting a final laugh out of all her friends she stood and looked them over, eventually she muttered, "Thanks for sticking with me guys, but right now I need some sleep." They all nodded in understanding as she was escorted to the girls dorms by Ginny and Hermione, once she reached the offered bed Lilly fell face first into the covers and was out before anything could be said.
Nearly the second the young quartet had left Madam Pomfrey's care Albus rushed out of Hogwarts to check on something that had been tugging at his consciousness ever since Harry's unfortunate transformation, as he apparated in front of 4 Privet drive he silently thanked his foresight to cast a disillusionment charm. Muggle emergency service vehicles were surrounding the smoking crater that once contained the home of the Dursley's, looking about it was obvious what had happened and he really couldn't help muttering to himself.
"Excellent job Severus, truly excellent, try to belittle the boy by making him drink an unknown potion in a room where he already vented enough wild magic to charge a blood seal rebound..." That was the crux of the matter really, Harry becoming Lilly broke the protection charm his/her mother placed on them while simultaneously unanchoring more then a decades worth of pent up blood magic. What Dumbledore couldn't quite figure out just yet was where that energy had gone, with a rebound of this magnitude it would have to go back to person who had been leaching their magic, and since young Lilly's head hadn't exploded well...
Seeing as there was nothing else he could do here he apparated to the nearest connection to the floo network and re-entered his office, pacing back and forth he kept trying to figure out how to protect Lilly without the ancient magics he'd had her under for nearly a decade and a half. What truly worried him was that if his growing suspicions on the nature of her scar were true then the buffer of Lily Seniors sacrifice had offered was gone.
Now contemplating that the newly minted young ladies mind was being infected by a soul fragment of one of the most vile and misguided wizards of the day he was soon interupted by the unannounced arrival of Severus. Meeting the Headmaster's gaze the potion's master shook his head as he sat in one of the open chairs,
"I know you have words for me for my actions and for once...I may have to admit I overstepped my bounds, things have...happened to the Dark Lord that we need to discuss, please summon Professor McGonagall she'll need to hear about this as well since it involves one of her students." That...that was not expected from the normally condescending and demanding man, especially with anything involved with young Harry...or...now Lilly...maybe things hadn't changed that much after all.
"Very well Severus, am I to assume this involves what happened to young Miss Potter?" Wincing at that the man nodded, shifting his twinkling gaze to Fawkes he bade him retrieve his Deputy Headmistress as the pair sat in uncomfortable silence, eventually Minerva entered the room and began staring daggers at her fellow house head. Taking her seat next to Severus they sat in uncomfortable silence before the black haired man spoke,
"As you are aware Headmaster shortly after Lil...Miss Potters unfortunate accident I was summoned to attend the Dark Lord, what I arrived to could only be described as utter chaos, well over half of Malfoy Manor has been leveled by some massive magical attack that seemed to be centered directly on the Dark lord." Both of the elder professors peaked up at this bit of news, popping a lemon drop into his mouth Dumbledore motioned for the man to continue, shifting uneasily while glancing at Minerva Severus sighed then dropped his head into his hands.
After a few moment he lifted his head and resumed his tale, "It would appear that a rather violent rebound from a broken blood seal had hit the Dark Lord and mangled his body, while he's recovering he's suffered some...mutations to his form that no one can explain. The other Death Eaters are scrambling to do damage control but not even Lucius' gold is going to make the Auror's ignore half his mansion being blown apart, I'm sure this has something to do with Miss Potter but I'm not sure how." Albus sat there dumbfounded, after a moment he began chuckling shaking his head in realization,
"The magics Lily placed on Harry upon her death were fueled by a blood seal placed in his Aunt and Uncle's home, and yes I'm aware that its a darker magic that causes instability in ones temperament, its why I always gave him such leeway." Minerva interupted him as her Scottish ire began to build,
"You put a blood seal on an infants magic core!?" Sighing he nodded, really he couldn't defend himself much here, she was right to be angry,
"Indeed I did Minerva, at the time the shield Lily placed on Harry was the only thing protecting him from Tom, we had no idea if he was truly gone and I was short on options, bringing him back to the wizarding world and leaving him with the Longbottom's or Bones' as his parents wished would have only made them targets. And considering what happened to Frank and Alice..." She didn't have a response to that, feeling his years once again he continued with his theory,
"'Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son. Flesh of the servant, willingly given, you will revive your master. Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken, you will resurrect your foe.'" These are the words spoken by Peter Pettigrew as he resurrected Tom's body..." He was met with silence as both his Order members came to the same conclusion, nodding he popped another lemon drop while smiling slightly. "I'm unsure how much you two know about muggle science's but in the study of genetics there are two sets of chromosomes for a male, XX from the mother and XY from the father..."
Pausing to really consider the implications he couldn't help but laugh at the situation, "The magics that Harry had running through his body must have sensed the rebound and did the quickest thing they could to his already transforming form...they overwrote the Y, no longer being the prime caniditate for the rebound..." Severus stared at him for a moment then nodded, leaning back in his chair he crossed his arms then gave a half hearted sneer,
"Well...that would explain why the Dark Lord has a rather smashing set of tits now," it took nearly a minute for Minerva to get the lemon drop out of the now chocking headmasters throat.
Lilly...did not know where she was, the wide open space glowing a faint white, there were...bubbles? Orbs? Floating about and as she touched them she soon experienced Harry's memories, interesting to say the least. Walking about she couldn't help but notice something as she reviewed her previous life, Harry either went from having complete control over his mind or being as idiotically impulsive as Ron; she had to pause at that, when did she start thinking so poorly of her best mate? Filing that away for later she looked past the bubbles and saw something dark on the horizon, and being the inquisitive witch that she was (that hadn't changed) she walked toward the shadows until she noticed the pulsing black tendrils bleeding from the shadows wrapping themselves around her memories, slowly pulling them in.
In the center of the shadowing mass was quite possibly the ugliest baby she'd ever seen, and considering she'd bore witness to Dudley's childhood photos more then once that was saying something. Not really knowing what to do about this black mass she touched one of the tendrils and immediately pulled her hand back hissing in pain,
"Ok note to self, don't touch the pulsing coalesced shadow eating your memories, its bad," Hearing a laugh behind her she spun around and was met with a strange sight, a young woman wearing a black Victoria era dress leaning against a scythe was grinning at her in amusement. She was pretty in a skinny way and her head was topped with long frizzy white hair sporting a single black locke, the woman addressed her after moment,
"Well, at least you've some common sense in that noggin of yours, 'ello I'm Susan and I'm your Death for the evening." Well...bollocks...cocking her head Lilly asked,
"So you're hear to kill me?" Blanching the young woman stood up strait letting her scythe vanish, waving her hands frantically she rushed towards Lilly apologizing profusely,
"No no no dear girl no! I'm your Death as in your assigned Reaper, Granddad asked me to take this project on special since he likes your spunk and Mr. Riddle over their tried to cheat us a soul, cheeky bugger thought mutilating himself wouldn't be noticed." She scoffed at that while rolling her eyes, "Yeah Death isn't going to notice that you didn't show up on your Death Day, real clever, anyhow I'm here to give you some advice since you've already nearly died once today."
Looking Lilly up and down she nodded in approval, "Well, you could have definitely done worse, nice subconscious magic by the way, that deconstruction potion should have turned you into something resembling bloody giblets but you managed to hold yourself together and do what was needed to protect yourself from that rebound. Honestly Granddads fairly impressed and willing to give you some leeway dealing with this...thing..."
Deciding to file the strange woman's ramblings away in the same mental folder as "Why do I suddenly think Ron's a git?" Lilly nodded and glanced over at the ugly baby,
"So...the hell is that?" Susan's pretty face scrunched up in disgust as she spat out the answer,
"A Horcrux, one of the most vile and evil of all magics, it is essentially the end result of a rather complex ritual that utilizes the most damaging thing to the human soul, namely cold blooded murder, and using its destabilizing effects to bind a fragment of said soul to an object. This prat made six so far but I'm sure he's shooting for seven, you dear girl are an unintentional soul anchor for one of the most disturbed wizards seen in centuries." Feeling sick Lilly stared at the...thing that was Voldemort and was suddenly very glad she didn't have a physical body necessary to throw up.
"Ok...how do I get rid of it?" Smiling Susan held her by the shoulders and massages them a moment before pulling her in a hug, for some reason being embraced by Death was one of the most calming things she'd ever experienced.
"Now now don't worry, I'm here to help, if Granddad just wanted us to Reap the dark tosser I'd have done it already, no what we're offering is something a bit more...morally ambiguous." Intrigued Lilly broke the hug and gave her a calculating gaze, not sensing any deception she nodded her head gently, smiling Susan continued, "Well as it stands without your lovely Mum's protection (By the way she says 'ello and she doesn't mind the new you just don't make the sex change thing a habit) this bastard is trying to devour your soul. What I'm offering is a role reversal, you consume Voldemort's soul fragment and gain all his knowledge acquired at the point of this Horcrux's creation as well as some of his magical core."
Now that...that was intriguing, Harry would have thrown that idea away in a moment but Lilly...hmm...ever since the accident she just felt more in control, more...in charge of her thoughts and she liked the idea of not only spiting the bastard that killed her family but learning all he had to offer without direct interaction. Meeting Susan's appeasing eyes she gave the Reaper an impish smirk,
"What do I have to do?" Laughing Susan hugged her again then smiled as her scythe reappeared in her hands,
"Simply put I'm going to cleave through his shields and you have to tackle him and overpower his will, you have a bit of an advantage since his magical core is already being strained from that blood seal rebound blowing his arse up. Gonna warn you love, you're going to be absorbing the very essence of one of the most corrupt mortals to walk this world, until you fully...heh...digest it you're going to have to resist some of the dark urges that come along with it." Nodding Lilly took a deep breath and then let it out, giving the Horcrux a wide toothy grin Susan pulled the scythe back and cleaved through the approaching tendrils.
The wave of destruction that followed in the attacks wake was honestly fairly memorable, as was Voldemort's screams of agony, not thinking twice about it both her Slytherin and Gryffindor outlooks grinned in anticipation of the coming battle, just as she was about to grab the terrified looking bastard monster baby she began to cackle,
"This outta be fun."
Hermione Granger was a very terrified young witch at the moment, her best friend who up until this morning had been a rather cute young man and was now currently a beautiful young woman was screaming in agony and attempting to thrash about even with magic binding her limbs in place. Little more then an hour after she'd passed out Lilly had begun screaming, it had taken all three Quiditch chasers to hold her down until Professor McGonagall could arrive.
The thrashing and screaming had of course caught the attention of everyone but it was the steady stream of smoke coming from her burning scar that garnered the most attention as they levitated the girl to the infirmary, pacing back and forth with Neville and the Weasely's all they could do was wait. After a time they noticed a change, for the first time in hours there was not strangled screaming from their friend, there was silence, then...laughter, nearly insane laughter.
Ignoring everything she personally believed about obeying authority figures she rushed into the room followed by her friends to see Lilly's back arching as she continued to cackle, Madam Pomfrey, and Professors Dumbledore, McGonagall , and Snape watching on in shock as black ichor pored from her scar. Soon after a smoky thread flew from the scar and took the face of a man screaming in agony, Lilly's eyes then snapped open, the brilliantly glowing emerald orbs watching the smoke dissipate in fascination,
"Fuck you and the Horcrux you rode in on Tom!" she giggled, and then she threw up and passed out for good.