CW: Dysphoria


Though Thursday was days away, Hermione found herself incredibly anxious about her role in helping Amanda 'debut' as Manny to her classmates. This troubled first-year was counting on her, for some reason, and Hermione really didn't want to mess it up.

The Ravenclaws had to buy into it, she thought. If they didn't believe it was a real possibility that Amanda had been cursed, they might mock her even worse than they did now. And Dark curses didn't just come from nowhere.

Hermione brainstormed for a while, thinking. Eventually, she came up with a plan, and she began quietly calling in small favors around the castle.

Professor Lupin taught his first-year students a Dark magic detection spell on Wednesday in class. He faked casting it at an object on Amanda's desk, silently casting an illumination spell instead, and he reacted with confusion and surprise when Amanda 'lit up'. In front of the rest of the class, he asked her if she'd ever been exposed to a Dark spell, murmuring and looking puzzled when she responded 'no', before moving on with his class.

After classes on Wednesday, when Amanda was gone shopping with Professor Vector, Hermione had the Head Girl Jade hurry to the Ravenclaw common room to get Milan before dinner. Milan made sure their secret hushed conversation had her voice rise loudly enough to be overheard on certain phrases - "a Dark what?" and "Hospital Wing?" and "break the curse" - before hurrying after Jade on apparently-urgent prefect business.

Jade and Milan skipped dinner that night to enjoy a private dinner in the Hogwarts Kitchens, but the Ravenclaws didn't need to know that. And Hermione was pleased to hear a buzz of gossip from Tracey that night at the Slytherin table – rumor was, one of the Ravenclaw first years had been cursed with Dark magic.

"Some people are wondering if it was Sirius Black," Tracey told her, "but no one really knows what the curse is."

"If Black were going to curse anyone, it'd be Potter," Blaise pointed out. "Not some random first year."

Tracey shrugged. "I'm only repeating what I heard."

"Not everything Dark is Black's fault," Draco said, annoyed. "First years don't bother to think before they talk."

"I'd rather they blame it on Sirius Black than start suspecting a Slytherin for it," Theo said dryly. "If not him, we'd be the next ones they claim are the culprit."

Draco made a face. "Fair point."

On Thursday, Amanda was back in classes. Any questions she was asked, she was to deny and shake her head at, not answering. If pressed, all she would say was "they're still figuring it out" and refuse to say anything more on the subject, which would add to the tension and drama more.

On Thursday night, Hermione met Amanda, Milan, and Professor Vector at Professor Vector's office. Hermione had worn her fancy green velvet robes again to help her look intimidating, and Milan was looking down at Amanda, looking proud somehow.

"Aman—Manny," Hermione corrected, her eyes wide. "Look at you!"

The first year in front of her grinned widely.

"I look like a boy, don't I?" Eyes sparkled in excitement. "I really do!"

Hermione had to agree.

Male-cut robes were straighter and more tailored in certain places than girls' robes, and the difference was subtle but noticeable. More than that, though, was Amanda's hair. Hermione had noticed that witches tended to wear their hair fairly long back when Tracey had started cutting hers daringly short, but Amanda's was very short. It was clipped short on the back and sides all around and longer on top, looking sort of like how Seamus Finnegan wore his.

They were small differences, really - just a haircut and clothes - but more obvious was the pride in her stance. She stood up straighter, now, determined and less afraid. She looked confident and hopeful in her new more masculine appearance, and Hermione's heart swelled.

"You look so handsome!" Hermione praised, and the first year beamed.

"Professor Vector helped me get my hair cut and find boy robes," Amanda said happily. "She also showed me a place where they have something called 'packers', if I want one someday! I told her I want to try and grow my own first, but it was still neat to see!"

"Yes. Well," Hermione said, holding back laughter. "It's good that you had such a good time."

"I did." Amanda looked up at Professor Vector with something like veneration, and Professor Vector looked down at Amanda fondly.

"Come here," Milan said, smiling. "Let's fix your Ravenclaw tie before we go."

Milan drew Amanda aside, helping her tie her tie in a knot that most of the Ravenclaw boys apparently preferred, and Hermione looked at Professor Vector.

"Is this going to turn out okay?" she asked, keeping her voice low. "I mean - if Amanda's not even telling her parents—"

"You will find, Hermione, that the magical world can both simplify and complicate matters immensely," Professor Vector told her. "Amanda's magic is that of a boy; therefore, she is supposed to be a boy. There is no doubt; there is no psych evaluation; there is no worry of 'what if you're wrong?'. It simply is." She gave Hermione a wry look. "A curse is as good an explanation for it as any. I made a prediction tree for Amanda to help with her decisions and timing - her parents are highly likely to believe the broken curse theory and respond favorably when they see their child happy for the first time in a long time."

"Oh." Hermione let out her breath, somewhat relieved. "That's—that's good. I was worried for her. This is just such a big thing, really."

"Yes," Professor Vector said. "But it is also the right thing."

Amanda came bouncing back over with Milan, the prefect following with a fond smile.

"Milan agreed to make the common room be quiet," Amanda declared. "Then you can talk, Hermione, and they can listen to you."

Hermione once again felt a swell of stress and pressure in her chest. It seemed like Amanda was trusting her far too much with this, when really, Hermione had originally just been nosy about why she hadn't been sleeping in a bed. How had she ended up as an authority on this when she'd only helped the poor first year go to the teachers for help?

"Are you ready?" Professor Vector asked.

Amanda nodded firmly, determined.

"After this, I'll be a boy," she said. "And they will all know it, too."

Professor Vector was giving Amanda a soft look. She gave the first year a hug and pressed a kiss to her forehead. She looked proud of Amanda, somehow, while also kind of melancholy.

"Then the next time I see you, you'll be Manny," she murmured. "The person you were always meant to be."

"Ready to go?" Milan asked.

Amanda brushed out her new robes, straightening up. "Ready."

Milan glanced at Hermione, who straightened her back.

"Ready," Hermione said. "Let's go."


Their entrance into the Ravenclaw tower was remarkedly unremarked upon until Milan blew off several loud bangs from her wand once they reached the center front of the common room area. The common room fell into a sudden silence, everyone turning to look at her, and Milan looked at them all, deadly serious.

"Something has happened to a fellow Ravenclaw that you should know about," she told them. "Please pay attention for just a moment before returning to your activities."

Milan turned to the side, visibly deferring to Hermione, who swallowed hard.

"It has been discovered that one of your classmates was the target of a Dark curse," she told them seriously. "An extremely Dark curse."

The Ravenclaws were all watching her, eyes wide. Hermione tried her best to emulate Snape's serious and forbidding stature as she spoke.

"There are Dark curses that can affect a person's family or bloodline," Hermione said. "This curse was one of these – a bloodline curse."

There was a murmur in the crowd.

"Your classmate, Amanda Barrows, was affected by such a curse," Hermione told them. "Mr. Barrows was cursed a long time ago by a Dark wizard, condemning him to have no heirs and no sons. Amanda was warped by this Dark magic, turning her from a son into a daughter, even though she would have otherwise been born a boy."

Some students from older pureblood families gasped. They must have heard rumors of such old magics, Hermione guessed.

"I am pleased to say that the curse has been mostly broken," Hermione announced. "There are some after-effects that are lingering, as the curse was laid for so long, and the teachers are helping with treatment for these after-effects. In the meantime… it is time for you to meet your classmate, properly, now, for the first time."

She swept the room a curtsy, before gesturing to the first year. "May I present to you now, Manfred Barrows, also known as Manny - heir to the Barrows family, and your new male classmate and friend."

There were gasps around the room as Manny stepped forward, giving the room a very formal bow. "Pleased to meet you all."

Hermione wasn't sure what she expected – skepticism and confused questions, maybe. She'd imagined an interrogative question and answer session to occur, where the Ravenclaws tested the veracity of her statements with pointed queries while she scrambled for reasons and excuses whilst trying not to sweat. General confusion and disbelief was another outcome she'd vaguely expected. She wasn't expecting the first year Ravenclaw girls to suddenly swarm Manny, tears in their eyes, while the rest of the common room broke into the buzz of conversation.

"Merlin, I'm so sorry, Manny!" one of the girls said, anguished. "We—we were so mean to you! We didn't know. And all this time—"

"We were so cruel," another one said. "We didn't know. But it all makes sense, now – of course you couldn't get up the stairs—"

Thank goodness for the gullibility of first years, Hermione thought with relief. They took everything at face value.

Manny looked slightly overwhelmed by all the sudden attention. Hermione watched the interaction with a cynical eye, wondering if the Ravenclaw girls were genuinely repentant, or hedging their bets because Manny was a moderately attractive boy, now. The first year Ravenclaw boys were drifting closer now, wide-eyed.

"That's why we have an extra bed," one of them said. "It's yours, Manny. Hogwarts must have known it was supposed to be yours."

"Is your trunk still around here?" another boy said. He offered Manny a sheepish grin. "We can help you carry up your stuff and get you set up."

Manny offered a small smile back to his new dormmates.

"That'd be nice," he said. "Thanks."

Hermione watched Manny go off with the first years, all of them asking him animatedly about what it had been like to be subject to a Dark curse. Hermione saw her own classmates approaching her as the area cleared; Milan had gone off to talk to her peers and the older students, keeping a serious expression on her face as she did so, but the third years looked curious and were looking to her.

"A Dark curse?" Terry Boot asked, his voice grave. "How did you get involved in it, Hermione?"

Hermione cleared her throat.

"I helped find it," she said. "Don't spread it around – but I had to use magic – raw magic – to root it out and determine just what it was."

"Are you serious?" Anthony breathed. "That's so messed up."

"Dark magic is messed up," Hermione said, shrugging. "It's a real curse, though – when the professors were working to break it, I saw the book they found with the curse originally in it. It's really twisted and Dark."

"All this time…" Mandy Brocklehurst looked like she might cry. "All this time… I can't even imagine what horror it would have been to look like a boy and know I was supposed to be a girl inside."

"That wasn't the curse, though," Michael Corner said, somewhat nastily. "It was vice-versa. He was always supposed to be a boy, not a girl."

"It can be done both ways," Hermione said mildly. "Manny was cursed to be a girl when his magic was a boy's. Another person could have been cursed with the reverse – condemned to be a boy when their magic was a girl's."

Michael turned to look at her sharply, but Terry's eyes widened.

"Really?" he said. "That has interesting implications. Eliminating male heirs – that's fairly obvious and standard, isn't it? – but purposefully wiping out daughters from a line… that's potentially a very powerful way to get rid of a natural magic a family has talent in, isn't it?"

"Like Seeing."

Hermione whirled around to look at Luna Lovegood, who had appeared as if from nowhere at her side. Hermione glared at her, but Terry was nodding.

"Yes, exactly," he said. "Seers are much more common in the women of a line then the men. To make sure a family never bore any daughters – you'd essentially be cutting your rival off from access to their rightful family magic."

"These are very Dark curses," Hermione warned. "Discussing the theory is fine, but realize that you are talking about very Dark stuff."

Terry looked insulted. "I know! I was just—it's interesting to consider—"

"But you broke the curse?" Michael Corner wanted to know. "You broke the curse, so now Amanda's 'Manny' instead?"

"There are a few lingering effects that we're working on, but yes," Hermione said. "Long-term exposure to Dark magic, especially in one's blood, can cause a few rare difficulties with a person's body and magic. Manny is taking a course of potions to help treat the lingering effects of all this, but the core of the curse has effectively been broken."

"You knew," Anthony breathed. His eyes were wide as he realized. "You knew. I saw you with Ama—with Manny one night, making him try to go up the stairs. I saw you check the boys' dorm. You knew he was supposed to be a boy."

Hermione fidgeted.

"I suspected," she corrected. "We had to figure out what was wrong and get teacher support before a counter-curse could be found and used."

"Is this common?" Michael Corner wanted to know. "I thought Dark magic died out with You-Know-Who!"

"Not all of his followers were jailed, though," Hermione said darkly. "And who knows what terrible things he taught them in the time he was alive?"

There was an ominous silence at that as the Ravenclaws looked at each other, wide-eyed.

"I'd appreciate it if a few of you could help Manny out, though," Hermione said, turning to her male classmates. "Manny's kind of a mess psychologically from all this, as you can imagine. He's not sure quite how to behave as a boy. If one of you can help him…"

Anthony and Terry were nodding, but to her surprise, it was Michael Corner who spoke up.

"Of course," he said firmly. "We can help provide an example and teach him the small things, how to walk, how to chat with other guys. And we can help get him prepared to grow up, really – like his father will have never taught him how to shave, that sort of thing."

"We haven't told Manny's family about any of this yet," Hermione warned them. "It will be a shock. I think the decision was to wait until after Manny's settled in here for a while as a boy and is more comfortable, and then to have his parents come up and introduce them properly to their son."

"A wise decision." Terry was nodding. "Much easier to immediately replace the loss of a daughter with a new son to look at and behold, really. Manny has two younger sisters too, doesn't he? I imagine that'll make it easier."

The Ravenclaws discussed the Dark bloodline curse for a while more. Hermione had to deflect and defer several inquiries into how it had been broken, claiming she really wasn't supposed to talk it in detail.

"The professors did the specific counter-curse parts, while I just sort of held the curse separate from Manny's magic, if that makes sense," Hermione said. "My magic – I could feel that Manny's was tainted and not quite right, and I was able to separate it out while they did the counter-curse to destroy it…"

By the time Hermione was ready to leave, Manny had come back down from the boys' dorm, looking shaken but excited. The boys were talking to him rapidly, and they immediately dragged him over to their game of Exploding Snap. Hermione met his eyes and gave him a small wave, and Manny waved back with a wide grin.

When she left the tower, Luna walked with Hermione down one of the staircases, pensive.

"This might change things, you know," she said. "No one knew that Dark curses like that were possible. When word gets out, other people might suspect they're under a similar curse."

Hermione looked at Luna sideways, but she shook her head.

"Oh, no, not me," she said. "I figured out my—I'm fine. But other people, you know."

Hermione took a deep breath and blew it out.

"Well, I guess we help them 'break their curse' too, don't we?" she said, shrugging. "Better to help people become the people they were meant to be than keep them trapped in the wrong little box, right?"

Luna gave Hermione an exasperated but fond smile.

"For a Slytherin, you're remarkably idealistic, Hermione," she said. She laughed. "Let's hope it all turns out that way."