Bad Medicine
A few days later, he got a thick letter from Greengrass, of all people, wanting to arrange a proper consult meeting, as the Muggle specialist had got to the end of the investigative process, and was ready to start treatment, and she wanted an opinion from a magical healer. The rest of the bundle was a copy of the report from the specialist, the quote, the lab results, and pamphlets intended for patients, Harry assumed. He started skimming, and found it hugely frustrating as he didn't know a lot of their technical medical terms. He left it on the kitchen table, and went to work. She'd been quite sensible, handing over all the document, so that he could know what he was talking about. Squeezing in some reading – and having to saunter into University College London's medical library to do some reading was, well it was like going to any other library, but the tired, intense faces were familiar. At the beginning of his next shift, realising how much reading he'd have to do he sent off a letter telling Greengrass that he was researching the topic, and would write again when he knew enough to be any real use.
Which really rankled, and he found himself spending every spare hour in UCL's medical library, with piles of textbooks that would make Hermione proud.
Eventually he came to understand that they had a genetic blood cancer, on the X chromosome, and that the treatment could be either anti-rejection drugs, and a bone-marrow transplant, or an experimental genetic therapy, where a retrovirus altered their DNA to cure it. And neither would apply to any children they had, as their eggs had already developed. What they really needed, thought Harry, was a way to alter their DNA that wasn't temporary like polyjuice. And privately, he thought, what they needed was not to be their father's genetic children. And that had him looking in dodgy spellbooks for spells to do with blood inheritance.
Harry was never going to tell anyone where he found it, but he found a ritual for blood adoption in a Black family grimoire bound in what he was pretty sure was human skin. It required two parents to provide blood, and didn't completely replace the 'bloodline' of the adoptee – and from the description, and cross-referencing the muggle genetics texts, it looked like it made the person a chimera. The muggle definition, unless you used animal blood, and that was… well, Harry was glad Hermione hadn't used that instead of polyjuice. But he had no idea how to do it, so it was time to use his superpower; which was having friends.
He flooed to Hermione's flat, and found her at home – asleep on the couch under a pile of paperwork, with Ron listening to a quidditch match on the Wizarding wireless, his feet up.
"Do I know you?" asked Ron, who was wearing a Cannon's t-shirt and jeans.
"Hi, I've got a complicated problem with a patient, that involves incredibly complicated rituals and potions, and I wanted to ask Hermione for help?" said Harry.
"She's sleeping," said Ron. "You look… tired but healthy. Is this medical homework?"
"No," said Harry, "confidentially, it's a family with a … well, inherited curse is as good a name as any. I had the idea to get a muggle specialist to look at it."
"They can do that? Curse-breaking?" asked Ron, frowning.
"It's not a magical curse. Its… a blood thing," said Harry.
"And you want her help with the muggle bit?"
"No I spent three weeks cramming genetics at the University College London medical library," said Harry. "They've got two workable treatments, but I think I've found a way to treat it magically. Even though they've tried for a couple of hundred years and failed."
"Fatal is it?" asked Ron quietly.
"They um… don't live long after having a kid, and the patients are both grown women. One sister's what we call symptomatic, so she needs girding potions to live, and the other's quite well, but knows if she ever tried to have a kid, she'd probably die," said Harry.
Ron stared at him. "Bloody hell," he said "I thought chasing dark wizards down Knockturn alley was rough. How have you not gone mental?"
"Well, maybe I'm just the right kind of mental for this," said Harry, not mentioning taking a lot of holidays to Hawaii in a bottle, "Anyway, I found a dodgy spellbook at Grimmauld place."
"How dodgy?" asked Ron, lifting his eyebrows a little.
"Don't search my house for dark artefacts dodgy," Harry conceded, "It's bound in quite probably human skin."
"And the curse is in it?" asked Ron, "good thinking."
"Um no," said Harry "The curse isn't in it. I'm not… entirely convinced it was ever an actual curse. An inherited illness, maybe. Anyway, there's a ritual in the book for blood inheriting people. It … mixes their bloodline up. The curse is in the bloodline. In the genetic – "
"Hermione told me about genetix," interrupted Ron, "Bushy hair, red hair, blue or brown eyes – the whole thing." Ron looked at Harry, "Is there like a special combo of gene things for really messy black hair, or is it a curse?"
"I don't think it's that important," said Harry.
Ron gently woke Hermione up, and she sat up blinking, and smiled at Harry "Harry!" she said.
"We've got a possible dark magical ritual to save some poor buggers at St Mungo's," said Ron. "Healer Potter there's cunningly found a muggle cure for a blood curse, but he thinks this dodgy blood adoption thing will be better."
"One of the treatments is hugely experimental, and the other will require taking medicine daily for the rest of their lives," said Harry. "I assume blood adoptions used to be a thing."
"Sounds like the sort of shit only the Blacks would do," said Ron.
Harry explained to Hermione all three options; in detail. Ron failed to feign interest and listened to the match instead.
"Well, the genetic therapy, obviously," said Hermione, "modern and no risk of rejection."
"What if," said Harry, wanting not to have to say it, "what if… being magical is in your genes, and the treatment stripped her magic away? She's held together with potion as it is – she could die. And, to be fair, any option that let her keep her magic would be better than that."
"Ritual magic, with actual human blood," said Ron, "you're talking Azkaban." Well, okay maybe he had been paying some attention.
"But it's for medical reasons," said Harry.
"You'd need," said Ron, with a small smile "A written exemption from say, I dunno… senior ministry staff."
Hermione got up and stroked Ron's head, then ruffled his hair "You're incorrigible, you know that," she said in what was nauseatingly like a purr.
"Can you two save that for later?" asked Harry, "I'm serious," and he took the spell-book out of his space-expanded jean pocket, and handed it to Hermione, who opened it to the bookmark.
"I assume this is not calfskin," Hermione said idly, staring to read, her lips moving. Five minutes later she'd clearly skimmed the whole thing, the quidditch match had ended with Tutshill spanking the Cannons three hundred and eighty-eight to ninety, and Ron gave Harry the fingers.
"Well," said Hermione, "this, for purely medical reasons, supervised."
"Patient confidentiality," said Harry.
"I'm not signing a carte-blanche to do blood magic, Harry. There have to be rules!" said Hermione, sitting down. She gestured to the parchment pile, "This weeks regulatory changes."
"All I want is a permit, assuming you think it can actually be done?" asked Harry. "Twice. Once for each sister."
"You'll need a donor," said Hermione.
"Well their mum doesn't have it, so she's one," said Harry. "I can't use their dad, that's where the problem comes from."
"Well, are they okay with crazy hair?" joked Ron.
"Not doing that," said Harry. It'd make shagging Greengrass technically incest, for starters. And while a remote prospect, Harry wasn't prepared to write off the option completely. And while he hated that Ron had said it, it was conceivable his blood would result in someone having uncontrollable hair.
"I'd assume you'd use someone that looked like their dad, where possible," said Hermione.
"It's not essential they be the spitting image," said Harry "They'll end up a mix of cells, some their original parents, some the donors. The younger it's done, the bigger the difference. Technically it's called chimerism, but if you don't use animal blood, you don't make what we'd call a chimera."
"That's some class-three prohibited shit, Harry," said Ron.
"So, Madam Granger, a waiver for medical use only?" asked Harry "Just one cauldron, two patients, and re-applying if I ever need to do it again?"
"Would the ritual cure their … future children?" asked Hermione.
"Yes," said Harry – the potion and ritual had an entire extra bit just for that, which made sense given its original purpose.
"So… this is the superior treatment. Apart from the extraordinary potential for abuse?" said Hermione, lifting her eyebrows in a way reminiscent of McGonagall.
"I was actually hoping you'd help with it, because it's really complicated," said Harry.
"And Snape's book doesn't have a cheat for it" said Hermione mildly.
"Well, obviously not. Would you help?"
"I think, given the circumstances – it's quite fatal isn't it?" asked Hermione.
"Life expectancy of the symptomatic sister was twelve," said Harry. Ron swore. Hermione stared at him fixedly, and her eyes watered. "I'll assist, and make sure you're not doing anything dark," she said. "So you'll get a waiver, but one-off, and supervised. No practice runs on your own."
"I'll have an interview with the patients to discuss their treatment options then," said Harry.
"Why?" asked Ron. "We've decided, haven't we?"
"The Ritual is old and feels evil," said Harry, "they might not want to. And I'm not sure muggle treatment will mess with their magic. It might not."
-=0=-
The Greengrass sisters turned up precisely on time for their consult. Both of them were fairly tall. Not giants, but nearly as tall as Harry.
They had a family resemblance. Astoria had the subtle signs of ill health propped up by potions – the slightly parchment-looking skin, the ever-so slightly sunken cheeks, the slight shadows under her eyes, and incidentally, chestnut hair. Daphne was looking quite well, with that swelling round her eyes having gone down.
Harry wondered how Daphne was a blonde, given a blonde mother and dark-haired father; who had dark brown hair, probably. Her hair showed signs of fading in the sun, maybe it was just very sun-sensitive.
Daphne didn't make a dirty joke as she came in, probably thought Harry, because her sister was there.
Harry explained about the three options, and the downsides of each.
"If you had just done as I asked in the first place, we could have saved time, and a lot of work on my part," said Daphne, lifting her eyebrows somewhat suggestively.
Harry sighed, "Without the treatment plan from the endocrinologist, we would not have worked out how to use it as a treatment. The curse is, having checked, not in any book I own."
"So whose blood?" asked Astoria, "Yours?"
"Your mother for one, we want to preserve your genetic makeup as far as possible," said Harry "And I don't think I look that much like your father, do I?"
"Well, brown hair not black, tall," said Astoria, "I'd take gorgeous green eyes over my brown ones any day."
"You don't have any blood-bourne illnesses do you Potter?" asked Daphne.
"Not unless you're keen on billywig venom?" said Harry. "Then my intolerance counts, I suppose."
"Well I'm certainly not at all interested in being blood-adopted by you, Potter," said Daphne. Some tiny optimistic bit of his brain filed that under 'She has publicly declared her undying love for me', but he was trying to be professional.
"What you need in a donor is someone that looks like your father, but obviously without the family blood curse," said Harry. "After that, a little blood from your mum, potion, ritual, you're done, and it'll be largely effective within a week or so in your case, Astoria, and Daphne, obviously, won't experience any significant changes."
"Surely, given that you made this whole process take so long, you could find a donor," said Daphne.
Harry wondered. Maybe he knew just the man. He took a few allergy diagnostic strips with him when he left that night, and a quick copy of Greengrass's file using a gemino charm, that would probably last a day or so.
-=0=-
Harry went back to Hermiones' flat, and explained his plan. Hermione's dad, when Hermione explained about Harry wanting him as a blood donor for a blood adoption ritual, was confused. But also tall, with brown hair cut really short, starting to go grey at his temples.
"But I'm a muggle, aren't I?" asked Dr Adam Granger (BDS).
"Well, Hermione's a witch," said Harry, "so if magic really is genetic, you're a squib."
"Hold on. You're a Registrar, and you don't know if magic's genetic or not?" said Adam "I mean, I know there's a lot to learn but really, not knowing that?"
"It's heritable," said Harry, and Francis nodded and smiled, while Hermione frowned – which made Harry suspect Hermione's mum had talked to Hermione about making some little witches, with, for example, that nice Ron that you've been dating for years are but are still not married to.
"But sometimes magical parents have a child who's a squib, and can't do magic," said Harry "so it's not all the time." He didn't mention that St Mungo's found the odd abandoned squib child or baby, and did their best to keep them alive, and get them fostered out.
"Harry, if every magical child had magical children then in a millennia or so there would be a majority of magical people. And we know things have been largely as they are since at least the founding of Hogwarts a millennia ago, so there's some other limitation," said Hermione, without stopping for breath, "It's actually possible to make a proof by mathematical induction – " she started.
Harry shook his head, "I believe you, please don't make learn more maths," he asked. "I can do percentages, and my accountant talks about compunt interest."
"Compound," said Hermione. "Honestly it's not that complicated – "
"– Anyway," interrupted Harry, "I'm operating on two hypotheses at once. If magic is strictly blood inherited, then your dad's blood has at least a squib-like set of genes. If magic isn't strictly blood linked but something more um, magical, then Adam's blood won't do any harm."
"Let's assume, for the sake of our poor weak muggle brains," said Dr Francis Granger (BDS)(FBOAMS), "That it's genetic. Witches have a potion that can… rewrite an entire adult humans' DNA, in every cell, from two blood samples, and it was invented for inheritance reasons, in pureblood families?"
"Well, technically it's a ritual," said Harry "Which is like potion-making and charms smooshed together," said Harry, rummaging in his space-expanded coat pocket for the test strips.
He put them on the kitchen table. "Test strips for allergies," said Harry, "before we get all excited, it's probably sensible to see what additional allergies I'd probably be giving the patient. Because we're quite sure allergies do just run in families – to the point where some people, like Madam Pomfrey, Hermione, suspect family ties if some muggleborn arrives at Hogwarts with an exotic potions ingredient allergy… like my allergy to billywig venom, for example. As she said, typical Potter."
"Oh," said Hermione, "How much blood?"
"One drop. I can get a haemo-spider if anyone would rather we do it that way, otherwise a prick on the thumb?"
"Haemospiders?" asked Hermione reading a test strip, and clearly trying to work out all hundred abbreviations from first principles.
"Remember that creepy silver spider brooch thing with the crystal at Grimmauld place? That kept trying to bite people?" asked Harry "Haemospider. They're normally not cursed, and a real time-saver if someone's thrashing about or, I suppose, if you're a massive blood bigot and want to get a blood sample of someone you're having tea in the parlour with," said Harry.
"So they could determine blood status?" asked Francis.
"That is a theory, but the gross old spells and potions for that all seem to, well… they can tell if someone's related to someone else, but short of having blood of every pureblood family in a cauldron, they seem more designed to single out allergies that might belong to families the inventor didn't like. Like, hypothetically, billywig venom."
"The lecturer used that in class, didn't they?" asked Adam.
"Yes," said Harry curtly, "most blood samples taken by stealth are used in curse rituals, which work from a distance, so mostly just for dark magic." He rubbed the crook of his elbow reflexively.
"So never let anyone get your blood?" asked Adam.
"Basically yes," said Harry. "Some absolute genius put an enchantment on all of Hogwarts that neutralizes blood as soon as it's spilt. I suppose kids at school get a lot of injuries, and before that protection, arseholes like Malfoy would have been using blood curses on anyone they didn't like."
"That's not in Hogwarts, A History!" said Hermione a bit loudly.
"Well no," said Harry "But Madam Pomfrey told me once I'd done first year at St Mungo's." Harry smiled at the memory of her huge grin and the extremely unexpected (non-bone-threatening) hug. "She also explained about just how much contraceptive she makes and hands out. I had no idea there was that much shagging going on."
Hermione had a superior look on her face, and that was oddly reassuring to Harry; he rather expected that Ron and Lavender had used a bottle-full in sixth year.
"I rather thought Magical Society was … old-fashioned" said Adam.
"We um, have had contraceptives for a couple of millennia, and witches can do anything a wizard can do" said Harry. "Muggle Britain seems a bit sexist, really."
"And the dark folktales about witches stealing pregnancies?" asked Francis.
"Technically we can do either way, but yes, it's been used maliciously in the past," said Harry. "It requires sign-off from the head of Obstetrics to move pregnancies these days."
"That's a thing?" asked Hermione.
"We got told it existed in a lecture, never seen it," said Harry. "There are some laws that make it rarer than it would otherwise be."
"I'll look into it," said Hermione.
"So, Hermione, Adam, Francis… one drop each?" asked Harry.
"I haven't got a lancet," said Francis. Hermione used her wand to prick her parents thumbs, and her own.
"You didn't help," said Hermione, as they waited for the test strips.
"When dealing with blood, it's protocol to let family do it unless it's an emergency," said Harry.
"In case you're doing one of those blood curses on the sly," said Adam. Harry nodded.
"Isn't that really annoying?" asked Hermione, "Stupid purebloods," she added.
"If they come in with a gunshot wound," said Harry, picking an example that happened to be top of his mind, "I just get on with it. It's the sort of thing that only matters in a consult, when people are trying to maintain dignity, and whatever manners they were taught at home," he said. Trying not to think about Greengrass's breasts. He closed his eyes and thought about Snape instead.
"Are you all right Harry?" asked Hermione, sounding quite concerned.
"Just um… "Harry wondered what to say. 'Fantasizing about some breasts I saw at work' would not help. "Remembering my first solo gunshot wound." he said instead.
"Oh, how interesting. Does that happen a lot?" asked Francis.
"It was um, basically a robbery gone wrong, witch that works in a rough area of London," said Harry. "Didn't have a decent shield up, gunshot wound to abdomen. Perforated intestines, nicked the hepatic portal, presented very faint, with thready pulse."
Francis and Adam were looking at Harry intently. "Do go on," said Francis, "This is fascinating." she added.
"They were all right, though?" asked Hermione.
"Course," said Harry, "though I got a bollocking from the consultant in the review."
"Really?" said Francis "don't spoil it, tell us in order."
Harry explained about the welcome witch calling the patient.
"She does diagnosis?" asked Hermione "She just hands out clipboards and smiles."
"Unless the gems in her podium that detect life-threatening problems go off, then she whips off diagnostics," said Harry.
"So they were partially conscious, on a float charm, so I took the nearest consult room, turfed the patient out, and got her in. Got their coat off – dressed muggle of course – and got her up high enough to check for a through-penetration."
"And?" asked Adam quickly.
"We were lucky, no through-hole," said Harry. "Then I got the wound site clear of clothes and debris, and determined that it was almost certainly a bullet, not a curse."
Hermione inhaled loudly.
"I summoned the bullet straight out," said Harry.
"No forceps? No haemostats?" asked Francis.
"We try not to put anything into people if we can avoid it," explained Harry "And started using Vulneera Sultenaar to stop the bleeding."
"What's that ?" asked Hermione.
"A heavy-duty wound charm. It's halfway to a ritual, so you have to recast it a few times. When it worked after five incantations, I knew it was probably not a cursed hole too. So, I got the bullet and did a quick analysis charm on it. Luckily for me, and the victim, it was just lead and copper."
"Composition matters?" asked Adam.
"Trace contamination matters. Third year, one of the absolute boring bastards makes that point in lectures with some revolting photos." said Harry.
"Oh… no forceps… you're trying to keep contaminants out," said Francis.
"Yeah – potions can react really badly to say, bits of lead bullets left in the body." said Harry.
"What about blood loss?" asked Adam.
"Oh, I'd trickled a blood-replenishing potion into her mouth, and if you go slow it's absorbed directly. We save a lot more people because that works," said Harry.
"I didn't know that," said Hermione.
"Well, after two potions, heartbeat was basically normal, and the patient was more alert,"
said Harry.
"They weren't sedated?" asked Francis.
"With a gut wound, we can't pour potions in, and stunning someone with a bleeding wound's medically inadvisable," said Harry. "But there's a point in there."
Hermione huffed, "What happened next?" she asked.
"Well, that's when my consultant turned up and told me to keep going," said Harry, "So I used some imaging charms to look at the actual hole. The bowel needed repair, and once I got that done, I only had a nick on the portal to go." He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, slowing his heart a bit.
"And a few membrane repairs around the intestine, to prevent adhesions, closed the entry wound, bit more blood-replenisher, and pretty much done." said Harry.
"And then a critique?" said Francis.
"I was told in no uncertain terms I needed to demonstrate pain relief charms on her next rounds or I'd get marked down as having a failure in technique," said Harry.
"Oh dear," said Francis. "What does one do?"
"I admitted I knew the patient – they'd been coming in for a chronic condition," said Harry. "Got me a 'don't do it again,' and I did demonstrate the charm in rounds the next day.
"Harry," said Hermione, "You… you did an entire gunshot wound on your own?"
"Well, they do want me to go into Trauma now," admitted Harry.
"Well done lad," said Adam, "I've heard trauma surgeons bragging, and you did that all on your own."
"We generally do admissions alone, unless it's really bad," said Harry "And I did have a Consultant watching me for the last half."
"So, patient, recovered okay?"
"They were discharged after rounds the next day," said Harry, "and I made sure to get the consultant to change them into the hospital gown, so I think I got points for that. I didn't think a girl would particularly want a bloke to strip her naked when she was unconscious if it could be avoided."
"And how long before you're fully qualified then?" asked Francis.
"Three more years" said Harry "Pick a speciality, avoid the really slow courses."
"But you're not keen on a speciality" said Adam.
"No not really," admitted Harry.
"You want to be a G.P." Francis snorted "Your friend Harry really does have a self-sacrifice streak," she said, "You would still make a living, though?"
"Um. I've got an accountant trying to make what I inherited pay it's way," said Harry. "There are a few houses rented out. I signed a lot of forms, and it should all… work out I think. Even with the um, bank problems."
"It's really good that you got an accountant, Harry," said Hermione.
"And a lawyer," Harry added, "It's a package deal." And they thought he'd made an atrocious hash of things in the war, and his family finances were amazingly bad, given how rich the Potters had historically been, but they were working on it. He was still pondering how to get Mafalda Prewitt on a date, for, um… reasons.
The test strips had reacted to the blood drops and … well Harry hadn't seen test strips this bad, ever. Hermione's was by far the worst he'd ever seen. Allergic to so many ingredients it was ludicrous. He slid the test strips around on the table and lined them up – she had every allergy both her parents had.
"Oh look, Hermione's got all of both of ours," said Francis, "she's so our daughter."
"Um," said Harry, "Hermione, um… you might want to take this to St Mungo's. Update your file, if nothing else. You're… god. You've literally got the worst allergy chart I've ever seen."
"I haven't got any food allergies," said Hermione.
"Sloth brains. I mean, honestly, who's allergic to sloth brains," said Harry.
"That's a medical ingredient?" asked Francis, grimacing in horror.
"WE use all sorts of revolting things," said Hermione, "Should I be careful making potions?"
"You might wear gloves, but that could be worse if it made your hands slip," said Harry. "Carry a bezoar."
"That's your solution to everything!" said Hermione.
"Well it works, and it's quick," said Harry.
"You can be so… bloody smug," said Hermione, "We were doing antidotes and Harry was cheating using a textbook with different recipes, and instead of making an antidote, he just said "shove a bezoar down their throat."
"It works in nintey-eight percent of cases," said Harry, "And the other two percent it does no harm, and you know in under thirty seconds it's a complicated case. Which is faster than an intern can cast a diagnostic charm set."
"God I love dentistry," said Adam, "Even orthodontics isn't this bloody fiddly."
"Yes it is, it's all teeth and stuff," said Harry.
"Agree to disagree," said Adam. Francis was looking … indulgently at Adam, in a way that reminded Harry a little creepily of the way Hermione looked at Ron.
"So anyway," said Harry, "Hermione, do take this to St Mungo's."
"Can't you update my file?"
"Not without you there. You're a protected case," said Harry, "Ministry senior staff."
"She's got quite a few allergies – is this serious?" asked Adam.
"Um," said Harry, "Maybe. There's probably something that uses all these, but it's not a common potion."
"What do you mean, is the test charmed?"
"I had to memorize common potions ingredients and toxicities for second year," said Harry.
Hermione glared at him, "you didn't say" she said.
"I was studying for exams," said Harry. "You gave me a timetable."
Harry had a good look at Adam's allergy test, then got out the copy of Greengrass's file and checked her potions list – not going to be a problem, and her existing allergies – which were less, but Hermione's had never been an actual problem.
"Harry, just going out on a limb here," said Francis "The test strips are very sensitive, aren't they?"
"Well, they have to be, allergic reactions combine," said Harry.
"Which is why Hermione's never had a problem, and you might be a tiny bit of a fusspot?" said Francis.
"I'm…" Harry sighed, "I'm proposing a treatment so far out of the ordinary the Minister here had to sign off on in. And not a carte-blanche." said Harry.
"Is it actually dangerous though?" asked Francis "it seems like, well quite advanced magic to do every cell."
"It um," said Harry awkwardly "Doesn't do every cell. A large number, and er…. Obviously the eggs and sperm and such… so the next generation look like dear old grandad."
Francis elbowed Adam who stuck out his tongue.
"I didn't mean him," said Harry "The sort of pureblood gits that invented this."
"Who's it for, actually?" asked Hermione.
"Um. Do you need to know?" asked Harry, turning the file over.
"I'm not signing off on it otherwise, and I'm supervising," said Hermione "There are the politics of it to consider."
"Okay, the politics, of course that's more important than saving someone's life," said Harry angrily. "It's the Greengrass sisters, okay. There's a blood curse on just the women of the family, one sister is symptomatic, and is kept alive by revolting, expensive potions. The other one," Harry looked over at Greengrass's file, "has had a tough life" he said, in the understatement of the year.
"Their father doesn't support reform bills," said Hermione.
"Which has precisely what to do with stopping the bloody woman from dying before she's thirty?" asked Harry, feeling a fiery anger in his chest.
"This isn't so they can pop out a vast number of purebloods and take over Hogwarts, is it?" asked Hermione.
"Hermione dear, don't be a fucking politician for a minute," said Francis politely. "This is a medical matter. Harry, how bad is it, medically?"
"The asymptomatic sister can probably just barely have a child and die in childbirth," said Harry bluntly. "The symptomatic sister? I don't think so – the Endocrinologist is calling it a genetically linked leukaemia. His preferred option is an experimental genetic therapy, but… I'm worried that would take her magic away."
"And of course that would be a tragedy, nobody can live without magic," said Hermione snidely.
"I did say she's literally kept alive on potions, Hermione. If the treatment worked she'd probably die as the potion lost effectiveness."
"But potions work on muggles," said Hermione, and she blushed.
"I didn't hear that," said Harry, "obviously, what you meant was that you tested a few on your parents, who are within the 'close family living with you' exception to the statute."
"Yes," said Hermione, who was still a terrible liar.
"But they do work on muggles," said Francis. "Pepper-up potion cleared up my cold when Hermione was twelve." Who was a much better liar, thought Harry.
"Does the steam actually have to come out your ears?" asked Adam.
"It's an emergent property of the potion," said Harry "There have been attempts to make medical potions with less odd side effects, but the potions get very complicated and finicky."
"Finicky?" said Hermione dismissively.
"On muggles, the potion only has the magic put into it work with," said Harry, "major medical potions like Geurfeffel's girding solution use the patient's magic. Which makes treating children with magical exhaustion an absolute bastard if it's something major. I think that's why we don't start Hogwarts till eleven. Children's illnesses are over and done with, and at least at Hogwarts, they're unlikely to get something during the year. When I was… very tired in first year, Madam Pomfrey had to basically just wait till I woke up."
"Which was four days," said Hermione. "That can't be healthy."
"Well imagine someone brings their sick kid in to St Mungo's and instead of a potion and a lollipop, they need to stay for three days?" said Harry "We don't have the ward space, for starters."
"So… hypothetically in a post-statute of secrecy world," said Hermione "We, that is magical Britain, wouldn't be able to cure everyone in England, let alone the potions ingredients shortages we'd face?"
"And the shortage of brewers," said Harry, "who'd be flirting with simple physical exhaustion. Our professional brewers are only allowed to brew eight hours a day. Which is compromise, so they could do some study out of hours."
"Hmm," said Hermione "And the potions ingredients shortages."
"Which are bad enough now," said Harry crossly "I have to wait three days for some things – and stabilizing someone with swine flu is a pain in the arse. And the pigs aren't big enough to use in the kitchens, before you ask."
"Swine Flu?" asked Adam. "Isn't that a virus?"
"The magical kind makes them cough up little pigs," said Harry, "and that causes damage to the lungs that you have to treat."
"That's completely mad," said Francis.
"Respiratory diseases… I hate them," said Harry, "There are still untreatable variants today. Hanahaki disease, for example. Thank god it's so fucking rare."
"Hanahaki disease?" asked Hermione, "Is it a medical threat to Britain?"
"No, as you need to be infected and fall in unrequited love at the same time," said Harry, "almost worth teaching young witches to be a bit avoidant to prevent it."
"That's… terrible," said Francis. "What are the… symptoms?"
"It starts with coughing up flower petals, progresses to small flowers. In the terminal phases they cough up entire stems. Once the roots start ripping alveoli, it's all over," said Harry. "The only treatment, well excision of the growths, they won't fall in love again. We haven't had a case in Britain yet, it's from Japan, hence the name."
"Oh good lord," said Francis, looking, pale, wide-eyed and Harry thought, aghast, "There has to be a cure?"
"Well, there's a paper that you says can treat it with Amortentia, but that's kinda nasty; you give the subject of the unrequited love the Amortentia, and erm… let matters take their course. Depends on the subject being willing and able to take the Amortentia." said Harry. "And you can imagine how ghastly that could get if … well. The Kyoto institute says they're working on a cure, but they won't say how. Considering the paper about using Amortentia is from them, I honestly think it's going to be worse than the Amortentia. That's an extremely dangerous love potion. Well, it causes obsessive fixation anyway."
"Specially as you're a handsome celebrity young doctor," said Francis.
"Mum!" said Hermione sharply. "Sorry Harry, mum finds us being celebrities amusing."
"I haven't had a weird stalker come for a consult in ages," said Harry, fudging the truth a little.
-=0=-