CHAPTER 28
Hope For An Age-Old Cure
Severus was pacing the floor, unanswered questions rushing through his mind. A roll of parchment clenched tightly in his hand held many of questions covering almost everything... Harry's scar and leg, Voldemort's plans, Pettigrew and this other faithful servant, the last horcrux, the prophecy, the Triwizard Tournament and the most important question about whether he was going to use it to get to Harry...these were all connected in some way or the other. Some connections, Severus knew of, others were dangerously out of the reach of his knowledge.
Most unfortunately, the most important and most pressing of the unanswered questions was Severus's main concern.
If only he knew how. What exactly was Voldemort's plan? What was happening out there? What was going to happen? Knowing that something was up but not knowing exactly what was so infuriating! And the fact that Harry was in the midst of it all gave him shudders.
Every week, he would go to meetings and sit idly in Lucius Malfoy's living room along with many Death Eaters who had escaped the ministry scrutiny or had been proven not guilty, or like Lucius, bought their way out of jail. Severus would sit and listen to them talk amongst themselves and would then return to the castle and send in a report to Dumbledore.
Pettigrew, however, was not to be seen nor heard of after Harry's vision and and many of Severus's weekly companions were beginning to show signs of restlessness, but nobody dared to bring about anything to do with the rat's attempts of disloyalty or betrayal.
Severus was startled out of his thoughts when the floo roared to life and Poppy Pomfrey's head peered up at him, saying, "Severus, come to the infirmary, quick!"
With a fresh set of wild questions rolling about his mind, Severus stepped into the floo and followed her.
"Come to my office." she said as he stepped out of the fireplace. Severus dusted the soot off himself as he followed her, her newly installed magically operated dustpan efficiently scooping up the dirt and vanishing it to the dustbin before it touched her spotless floors.
When he entered her office, he saw Pat Baker sitting in a chair besides her desk, calmly going through a large file. He was a few years older than Severus, but the two of them and Lily had been very close friends. When he saw Severus, he put down the file and stood up.
"Good evening." he said warmly.
"Greetings, Healer." Severus said with a grin as he moved foward to embrace him and Poppy left the room to give them some time alone.
"How's life, Professor?" The jolly man asked."Just as I expect it to be, I suppose?"
Severus sighed and said, "And just how do you expect it to be?"
"Peaceful?" Pat grinned. "You don't have to run around from one room to another, it's just lectures and marking, eh?"
"You wish." Severus snorted.
"Seriously, Sev, how are you?" Pat asked with a frown.
"As well as I can be, given my circumstance, Pat."
Sensing his unwillingness to speak about his troubles, Pat cleared his throat and said, "Alright, Sev, back to business...I had promised Lily's three that I would try and find the actual cause and cure for young Harry's leg."
"And?" Severus said warily.
"I think I may have found it...this may take a while, why don't you and Poppy sit down while I speak. Poppy! Poppy! Get in here, please... Take a seat, my dear Lady ... alright, here we go...I stumbled upon it by accident actually. Stroke of luck, if you'd want to call it...I started with Armenia, but there were no records of damages caused by the Avada Kedavra, other than death, of course. There was a thin old book that explained the power of love and from what I gathered, Lily's protection is fool proof.
"I didn't find anything in India or Israel, so I decided to put down a wild card and opt for Japan. One ancient scroll in one of it's almost abandoned libraries mentioned something about a blackened limb that had been the receiving end of the curse. What the factors were that caused it were, it didn't show.
"Further research started to hint that there was more proof in China...And so, I travelled to China and spent a week trying to find about that blackened limb, or anything that had to do with the Avada Kedavra, but failed. And then, just on a haunch, I assumed that back then, every person with Asian eyes was probably taken to be a Chinese by our rather uninformed magical folk.
"So, I moved to Korea, and after searching for a week I decided to leave and continue elsewhere, but by chance, I asked the librarian if there was another library housing ancient scripts anywhere else in the country and apparently, the man didn't understand exactly what I meant or perhaps he did it to spite me, but he disappeared from his desk and returned with-"
"Pat," Severus said, "we're getting nowhere at this rate."
Pat shook his head sadly, "The world has no patience... anyway, it turned out that a Korean man of unknown name, according to a scroll, back around two thousand years ago, in an attempt of saving his son's life, had put his leg forward and intercepted the curse that turned his entire foot, as the scroll stated, into something that resembled charcoal. The curse began to spread painfully into his ankle and the man put up some shields that blocked the spread to some extent.
"Then, he travelled North in the hope of a cure, I assume that the pain must have been unbearable, and a well known wizard-"
"Does Harry feel pain?" Poppy interrupted him to ask Severus.
Severus shook his head.
"Then how do you-"
"Poppy," Pat said patiently, "we're making assumptions. There is no proof, nor any firm basis to solidify the writings in these ancient rolls of paper...I am merely combining theories..."
"Are they written in English?" Severus asked curiously.
"Oh, no. I needed to use the translation charm...so, this wizard, um, where was I?...Oh, right, this wizard sought out a well known Healer wizard, and this well known wizard, with the knowledge he had, suggested that the man amputate his leg, from calf down-"
"Oh my!" Poppy exclaimed, interrupting again. "And this boy has something similar in his head! Amputation is out of the question! For heaven's sake! Harry will not live with a piece of his brain missing!"
"Poppy," Pat said soothingly, "Wait till you hear it all... alright, this man had his leg amputated..."
Here, Severus wasn't sure he wanted to know how or under what circumstances, and he was relieved when Pat skipped it, saying, "...but given the way it was described, the curse started spreading from his calf up, and a block was placed just below his knee, stemming it's movement. Well needless to say, the man died shortly, for the moment the curse was unleashed from the ankle, it couldn't be contained and controlled again.
"Back then, Egyptian magical folk were known to have the best equipment and skill when it came to research. So, seeing this as a new field, the people in Korea placed a statis charm on the rapidly blackening body before shipping the dead man off to Egypt with a letter. That was all I could gather from Korea. Now, I travelled to Egypt.
"The statis charm, it seemed, had preserved the body from decomposition but it did nothing to stop the spread of the blackening effect. Oh believe me, the Egyptians accepted this new challenge with grace."
"But the body had no life."
"It was just the beginning of a new study, Sev. Not that it continued."
"It didn't?" Severus asked in surprise.
Pat shook his head, "It was banned... Or else we would have been studying it now. These researchers had made it a habbit of using the killing curse on limbs of people and animals, in a bid to find out what drove it to work, and they realised it all depended on the purpose. For example, a mother was forced to protect her daughter and had to suffer from the blackening of her arms. A fleeing man was cursed on his leg and he died.
"They're many other examples stated, but none of which represent Harry's case, however a record showed that killing a female pelican, octopus and certain kinds of spiders which sacrificed a part of themselves to feed their young died when cursed but the young ones did not die, when cursed, though they too showed signs of blackening that were efficiently and automatically blocked.
"You must understand that any of the mentioned animals would sacrifice a part of themselves for their young. This isn't an unusual occurance amongst them which lets us characterise their deeds as a form of duty.
"Sacrifice is the weakness of the Avada Kedavra. It can be modified and such is Harry's case. The Egyptian scrolls mentioned about the tests on the subject, and some of the results were partially successful, some better than the others and some total failures. I have it all noted down in this file."
Severus frowned as Pat opened the file and turned a few pages, "But isn't the curse easily aggravated?"
"How do you mean?" Pat asked.
"This wizard whose foot and ankle was affected died due the unleashing of the curse when his leg was cut off at the calf. The calf is a good distance away from the ankle... This entire this is quite dangerous isn't it?"
Pat said, "Let me explain. The killing curse can be modified, and so far, only two causes for this modification is known, the first, when, let's say person A puts himself between the soaring curse and the person B, at whom the curse was aimed. This person A doesn't die a painless death, instead he's tortured with pain until the curse travels through his body slowly reaches his heart.
"Any shield is able to block this curse out, but the rest of the body is in some way directly in contact with this curse. You could compare it to two dogs laying in wait for the bone that's placed between them. Any movement from one, triggers a reaction from the other. At any moment, should the body show signs of enmity towards this cursed area, the curse retaliates with much more fervour than at first. And the body is surprisingly aware of it, and this keeps the immunity cells docile.
"The second case arises when person A is ready to die for person B. However, unlike the first case where reflex causes an intervention, this circumstance requires a full, voluntary sacrifice...a sacrifice of love. The pelican is ready to let her chicks feed on her blood, the octopus and spider let themselves be eaten by their young, an act of duty...all for the sake of their survival...yes, I almost forgot, there needs to be an intention, a purpose for this case...the survival of the one protected.
"And when this happens, if the curse it thrown at B, after A dies for him, the sacrifice, prevents the curse from spreading around. And as hard as it is to believe, Magic is a very fair judge and has a mind of her own. Therefore, because of an intentional act, the curse is contained.
"These tests were performed on animals and hence there was no assurance of its authenticity. But Lily's own sacrifice, proves that the fact indeed is true. In her case, however, the curse thrown at Harry rebounded back on Voldemort. This was because Lily didn't only have the safety and survival of her children in mind, but she loved them.
"This voluntary sacrifice can be done for duty or for love. You must note that it isn't the power, nor the control that boosts one's magic to act on its own volition. It is the emotion and more importantly, the intention, or thought, or will or even the desperation that drives one's magic to work.
"It is the emotion and desperation that causes accidental magic in young children, not the power as most seem to believe. And coming back to it all, and taking everything into account, I will assume that the barrier automatically forming once this curse that has attached itself to person B in the second case, is more powerful for the sacrifice done through love than duty.
"And saying that, ancient studies show that blood flows normally through the barrier normally taking every body fluid through it. The researchers then began to search for a cure-"
"What was the need for all this history then?" Severus asked, a little put out.
Pat sighed, "Sev, you need to understand the links. What I've told you is the bare minimum that you should know. It all seems quite absurd and even fake, but when you've got bits of it all spaced out in so many different countries, you must try to believe it before you actually get down to trying it. Besides, after all this, none may work out for Harry."
"Why not?" Poppy asked.
"You'll see." Pat said. "Alright, now where was I?...Ah yes, the cure... the researchers tried for a cure in Egypt and they failed, for the careless deaths weren't taken lightly by the public. They moved to Libya but it vain. So the challenge was taken up by the researchers of Turkey, who found a combination to cleanse the body off the curse. It worked...but the pelican chick died seven days later from what I think was severe blood clotting, the scrolls referred to the clot as some slimy red paste like substance.
"Research continued now in Libya and Turkey and quite illegally in Egypt, and failures became very apparent. It became a trend then to fix the first mistake in the second try, and blood thinners were added to the mix, and the next chick died almost a decade later, however by then they had made the method a standard cure in Turkey just before the entire scheme was put to a stop, for then, the Avada Kedavra was considered as the first and only unforgivable.
"Mind, the cure was in the form of a potion that will have to be consumed by the body and enter the blood stream. Nothing was mentioned about how painful or painless the procedure will be, but research, before it had been forcefully closed down, had moved on to lionesses, tigresses, female cheetah's and their cubs, squirrels and their young ones and in certain cases even rodants.
"However, what we will need to do is prepare the latest potion first, and that will be Sev's job."
"Mine?" Severus asked in surprise.
"Of course. Don't worry, we won't be using it on Harry at the first go. I will get certain specimen on which we can practice."
"Wait!" Severus asked almost in a panic. "What kind of specimen?"
"Are they legal?" Poppy asked next.
"You leave all that to me." Pat said. "If ever you are accused of doing something illegal, when it comes to this assignment, you will tell the responsible parties to speak to me... Right, tell me, has Harry suffered from any previous trauma?"
Severus thoughts turned to the triplets' early life with the Dursleys and of his encounter with Quirrel and Voldemort, not to mention his midnight kidnapping just a week into entering the school and even his first meeting with Black ... and that vision like nightmare, if those weren't traumatic situations, Severus didn't know what were. "He's been through many."
"And, has he recovered?"
"I think so."
"Does he have a habit of bottling things down, until it's too much and then bursting open?"
"Not that I know of, Pat...he just doesn't trust easily."
"He hasn't met you, has he?" Poppy asked Pat.
"No. He'd been unconscious then. I met the others... lovely children, well mannered and decent...Did Harry need to visit a mind healer after any of these events?"
"He visited Poppy." Severus said nodding.
"Poppy?" Pat said confused.
Poppy smiled, "I am a healer specialised in dealing with such cases, Pat. That was my first occupation. Then I found that I got hurt everytime I let others talk to me...unlike other mind healers, I couldn't let the people's problems slide off my mind and it began affecting my health. So I gave up and enrolled myself for nursing. And though I don't practice counciling, Harry and his friends are an exception."
"You really are a wonder, Poppy." Pat said fondly and she smiled. "He's in safe hands then."
"Perfectly." Severus said.
"You should speak to him about this treatment. Let him decide. Tell him about the risks and the pros and ask him his opinion. If he says yes, then I'd like it if he could meet me in my personal clinic in Plymouth. You know how to get there."
Severus nodded.
"Right...the starting feast is tomorrow night, isn't it?"
Severus nodded again.
"Good." Will you be able to go through this file today and tomorrow and search through the ingredients and come up with your own theory...then start with the potion, I'll get you the ingredients. Their amounts and everything else is noted somewhere towards the end of the file, and get Harry to go through the file as well. That's all you have to worry about for now."
Pat handed the file over to Severus, then he stood up, clapped Severus on his back, bowed to Madam Pomfrey and said, "If ever you want to contact me, I'll be either at St. Mungo's or in Plymouth... However, for the moment, I will be visiting the Headmaster. Dumbledore's been searching for a cure too, you say?"
"Yes." Poppy said.
"Right... I'll see you soon, Severus, Poppy. Give my regards to the triplets and their friends, and even the Evans's for me."
With that, he walked to the door of the office on his short legs.
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Harry sat nervously in Prof's quarters with the rest of the Swarm, going through the big file, Prof had put in his lap after explaining what Healer Baker had said. He wasn't able to make a decision just yet and since no one was pushing him at the moment, Harry decided to wait.
He glanced at his brother and sister. Blaire, he noted, looked terrible and, when she saw him looking up, she moved to say something, comforting or encouraging, he had no idea, because Ethan intervened, by placing a hand on her arm and shaking his head. She sighed and nodded and, being the one sitting between her brothers, put an arm around Harry in silent support.
Harry leaned into the touch, slowly going through the neatly noted experiment failures, he wondered if it really was worth taking the risk. He looked at Prof in hopelessness and the Prof got off his seat and came to sit next to Harry with a sigh.
Placing a hand on his shoulder, he said, "Harry, you don't have to decide just now. We are still experimenting and you will be kept informed about every result. Don't worry about it at the moment."
Harry nodded and smiled.
"Prof," Harry began.
"You know," Prof said cutting him off. "I think it's high time that you call me Severus."
"But -"
"No, no. You're doing me injustice. Black and Lupin popped into your lives just a few months ago and they're being called by their first names already. I've known you for years and I'm still Prof!...I know it helps you cover for a slip up by adding an -Esser Snape- after that, but still..."
"Severus." Harry said uncomfortably, then shook his head along with the other four. "It sounds awkward, Prof."
Prof sighed but Blaire straightened up and said, "Prof, it just doesn't feel right. I'm sorry, but you are more than just a guardian and protector to us."
Prof looked up confused.
Blaire looked up at her mother's portrait and said, "Tell Dad not to take any offence, Mum, but," she turned to Prof, "You are more like a father to us than with Sirius or Remus or even Dad in his portrait will ever be. Calling you by your name, Prof, just doesn't feel right."
"I'm not your father." Prof said stiffly.
"We know, Prof." Neville said with a small nervous chuckle. "I'm not one for these kind of talks, but you hold a place in our hearts that no one will ever be able to take. And calling you by your name feels more disrespectful than anything."
"You lot are confusing the respect with gratitude, and I don't want it!" Prof said hotly. "No, do not interrupt...as touched as I am, I too was indebted to the Evans' so I know that feeling."
"It's not that, Prof!" Ethan said quickly. "Of course, we are grateful and we shall always be, but I consider you as the father I never had, and so do the others. It's still a bit awkward to call you Dad, but Prof, well, it just fits. It's a mixture of Severus and Dad and Professor and everything!"
Prof looked annoyed, but then remained thoughtful for a while, then he stood up and looked at them with an unreadable expression, and said, "Alright, Prof it is."
"Anyway," Harry said, "I think it's time we go for dinner. The carriages will arrive soon and I'm waiting to see what the other's reactions are to this tournament."
"There's time." Draco said and then turned to Prof and said, "Prof, Mad-Eye Moody won't come down here to keep an eye on you, will he?"
"If he does, I quit my job."
"What!?" came five shocked responses from five wide-eyed fourteen year olds.
"What?" Prof said mildly amused. "I mean it. And Dumbledore knows it. He won't dare let it happen."
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Severus was glad to be back within the confines of his quarters again. Between Moody's dramatic entrance and the frequent disgusted looks he sent his way, Severus's endurance had reached it's breaking point.
Now in his chair he sat going through Pat's elaborate notes that would have been considered impressive had their theory not been founded two millennia ago. Nevertheless, based on the modern methods of practice, Severus could almost call the studies accurate. But, tests needed to be done to rule out the fact that all this could have simply been an attempt to acquire false attention from the public.
Mandrakes did indeed cure 'most' damages caused by curses, as did phoenix tears, but the Avada Kedavra blackness, needed a couple of catalysts accurately added along with the cut up Mandrake and tears and many other components that prevented further complications. The catalysts, aconite and a modified version of wartcap powder, one causing death, however aiding in the enhancement of the mandrake effect; the other, carefully preventing the aconite from touching any part of the drinker's body except the dark blackness that the modified version could detect, paralysing the curse's aggravation at the same time.
This weakened the curse and made it vulnerable, easy to be acted upon by the aconite, Mandrake and phoenix tears. However, the wartcap needed to be added in a large amount to cover up the whole body, but not large enough to nullify the aconite. The aconite on the other hand needed to be in just the right amount so as to not cross the barrier created by the wartcap, nor counteract the effects of the Mandrake. The phoenix tears needed to be enough to keep the excess of aconite, that the wartcap couldn't restrain, at bay as well as aid the poison and the Mandrake in defeating the curse.
But care had to be taken that the wartcap barrier didn't affect the metabolism of the body, and a whole lot of other ingredients were needed just for this. And while choosing these ingredients, Severus had to take care that they, in turn, didn't in anyway affect Harry's health, nor interfere with the main ingredients of the potion.
And all this depended on that barrier, that strong barrier created out of love by Lily. Severus had his work cut out for him, but he was undoubtedly guaranteed that if this potion worked on the young one of a self-sacrificing animal or bird, it would definitely act on Harry.
With a gleam of determination in his eye, Severus set up his cauldron and began experimenting.
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It wasn't one or two, but perhaps a few weeks later that Harry spared that curse cure a small thought. And that was all because of a small accident. Harry was down in the greenhouses with Blaire and their classmates that morning.
Far beyond, near the edge of the forest, they could see Hagrid, the Care of Magical Creatures Professor, lifting heavy crates that probably contained those dreaded blast-ended skrewts. Harry was fond of that gigantic man and even respected him. His classes were, however, something that Harry had begun to hate. Meeting up with the kind man, and enjoying a cup of tea with him was one of Harry's favourite pastimes, but Hagrid's classes were unpredictable.
The ride on a hippogriff back in his third year had been amazing, but the lessons with flobberworms that followed were dull. None of their lessons, though, could have ever been compared to those skrewts! If Harry had made a list of all the creatures he had had an opportunity to encounter, the blast-ended skrewts would have been put in the section of 'the most perilous'.
Harry was distracted from Professor Sprout's lecture on the uses of bubotuber pus by a loud bang, followed by the faint smell of rotting fish. He and many others looked up in alarm to find Hagrid staring down helplessly at a shattered box, three shell-less, headless lobster like creatures with six oddly angled legs propelling themselves in different directions with loud emissions of sparks.
And Harry was just on the verge of panicking when another loud bang brought a fourth skrewt, one that he hadn't counted earlier, straight in through the greenhouse doors, right besides Harry's table. Harry jumped up, grabbing Blaire's hand, fully intending on pulling her away from the beast and in the direction the other students, who were well aware of the dangers these little monsters could be, were running, when the darned thing let out another blast. This propelled it straight into a a tub full of the bubotuber puss, bathing poor Sprout, who was standing just besides it, in undiluted puss as well.
Professor Sprout was able to to shield off most of the shower, but the skrewt had no such luck, and watching it writhe around and blister was not a pretty sight. Blaire turned her head away from the sight and caught sight of Harry twitching about (the shock of the situation probably preventing him from crying out), his face scrunched up in pain.
And a moment later, she came to the realisation that a spark from the now dying skrewt had set his robes were on fire!
tbc...