Categories > Books > Harry Potter > Serpent Souls, Merged as One
Chapter Two: The Greengrass Family
(A/N: Hey all, Leonineus here again. I’m happy that the first chapter of this story got such good reception; the positive reviews put me in a very good mood. Then again, it was my birthday last Saturday so I might’ve already been in a good mood, but I digress. To clear up a couple of things, for those of you on FF.net, this pairing is not complete yet. Nor have the powers Harry and Daphne will receive from the bond yet manifested. They will soon, though… Enjoy!)
Harry sat on the couch later that evening, with Daphne at his side. Daphne’s seven-year-old sister Astoria was sitting cross-legged on the rug, gazing at her elder sister with confusion. Why her sister had a boy in the house, let alone sitting that close to her; she couldn’t understand.
Christopher had come back a little while earlier, saying that by Wizarding law Harry was now legally their adopted son. Melissa had used a couple of spells on Harry which had quickly healed his injuries. Now he sat before a roaring fire drinking hot chocolate. “I still don’t know why you’re doing all this for me,” said Harry, looking up at Christopher, Elizabeth and Melissa sitting opposite him, “My relatives told me I’m a worthless freak that nobody could ever like.”
Christopher bit back a curse which almost sprang to his lips. He would seriously have to deal with these ‘relatives’ of Harry’s. Anyone who would be willing to unleash the amount of torment Harry appeared to have suffered on an innocent child did not deserve to live.
After they had put the children to bed, Elizabeth sat on the sofa with her husband. Christopher slipped an arm around his wife’s shoulders and they both looked to Melissa opposite. She had been giving Harry a full check-up earlier that day. She consulted a strip of parchment, “He’s suffering from an extreme case of malnutrition, as we could already see from the fact he was as thin as a broomstick when he arrived. I ran a scan of his skeleton; most of the bones in his arms and legs have been broken at least once. A couple of the more serious were three hairline cracks in his skull and four ribs which look to be on their last legs. How the boy is even able to stand without howling in pain is beyond me. He must be a lot more resilient than most would give him credit for. He may look frail but he’s undoubtedly very tough.”
Elizabeth looked at her sister, “What do we have to do for Harry?”
Melissa took out another strip of parchment and handed it across to the other two adults. “He’ll have to be put on a strict regimen of potions to get him back to the proper size for a ten-year-old boy. Then of course there’s the other potions he’ll have to take to fix his bone structure. He has numerous other internal injuries as well, but those shouldn’t take too long to fix. About one or two potions should do the trick for those. Other than that there isn’t much you need to do. Oh, and you should find an expert on bonds of this kind and swear him to secrecy. Luckily you know my husband is an Unspeakable that researches bonds. If I can get him to come by some day and swear him to secrecy, I believe we could get Harry and Daphne taught about their bond without exposing Harry’s location.”
At that moment, several hundred miles north, Albus Dumbledore looked up as one of the little silver instruments began making clanging noises. That could mean only one thing; the wards around Harry Potter’s house were collapsing. That was odd, seeing as the boy should still be there. Picking up his wand, he walked around the desk and prodded the device carefully with the tip. A mistake, as it turned out; the device seemed to crumple in on itself like a paper cup, emitted sparks and smoke, and then melted. Dumbledore cursed under his breath; the wards had failed completely. Behind him his familiar, Fawkes the phoenix, trilled. Dumbledore stood for a moment, surveying the puddle of molten silver, before straightening up and striding from the room.
Harry woke up very early the next morning. He rolled away from Daphne, still sleepy, and climbed out of bed. Swiftly and silently, he tiptoed out of Daphne’s room and crept downstairs. Moving into the kitchen, he made a beeline for the nearest cupboard and began searching for pots and pans. Harry knew how to cook from the Dursleys; he had been forced to cook their meals since he was tall enough to reach the stove. He finally found the frying pan in a cupboard and went to pull it out, but felt a small finger poke him in the small of the back and jumped. Unfortunately his head was still inside the cupboard, so he cracked the top of his head hard against the top edge of the frame. Recoiling away from the cupboard with a hand over his aching head, he twisted around to see who or what had poked him.
A small creature with round eyes and bat-like ears stood staring at him, “You should not be up, Harry Potter; you should be resting!”
Harry shook his head, “I don’t know what you are, but I don’t want to rest. I want to cook.”
The small creature looked offended, “That is Dippy’s job, Harry Potter.”
Harry shook his head, “I want to do this. It’s thanks for helping me.”
Dippy shook his head, his batlike ears flapping, “No, Harry Potter. You must rest.”
At that moment, both jumped as a voice floated through the room, “You don’t have to, Harry. Though if you want to, I’m sure Dippy will consent to allow you use of her kitchen for the morning.”
Both Dippy and Harry whirled around to see Christopher Greengrass standing in the doorway clad in a jade dressing gown. He grinned at Harry’s startled expression, “I see my talent for moving quietly hasn’t failed me. Now, Harry, it’s not required for you to make us breakfast but if cooking is what you enjoy, why don’t you do it? Dippy, can you help Mr Potter with the meal if he tells you what to do?” The house elf nodded. Christopher turned back to Harry, smiling, “Dippy will show you where everything is.”
Harry nodded and gave Christopher a lopsided grin, “Ok then, I’d better get to work.” He scampered cheerfully over to the pan cupboard and started pulling out pans. The house elf hurried after him and began helping.
Daphne rolled over and went to throw an arm over Harry at her side. As Harry wasn’t in the bed; her arm simply landed on the mattress again. Opening her eyes, she searched out Harry with her mind and finally found him downstairs in the kitchen. Climbing off the bed, she pulled on her dressing gown and wandered out of her room and down the stairs. She was surprised when she arrived in the kitchen. The table was groaning under a massive quantity of food, and Harry and the family’s house-elf were standing in the kitchen doorway looking extremely satisfied. Harry caught sight of Daphne and quickly dragged her over to the rest of her family, whom were already seated. He pulled out the chair for her, before sitting down himself. She eyed him, “Did you make all of this?”
Harry gave her his standard lopsided grin, and she felt her knees inexplicably weaken, making her glad she was seated, “Yes. Well, Dippy helped.” Daphne eyed a plate of thickly-buttered crumpets sitting three feet away. Harry smiled as he reached over and carefully flipped two of them onto her plate, followed by some bacon and eggs. Astoria piled a few sausages onto her plate and took a bite out of one of them. For a second, she chewed, then swallowed, and finally smiled, “Wow… I’d say Dippy has a challenger for the title of greatest cook of the year…” Curious, everyone else took bites of their food, exclaiming in delight as they ate.
Elizabeth addressed Harry, “What did you cook and what did Dippy cook?”
Harry smiled, “Dippy handled things like toast and the crumpets; I cooked almost everything else. It took me a while to convince Dippy that I only needed her to do a couple of things for me and I could do the rest, but she relented when I made her understand how important it was to me to do this.”
Melissa chose this moment to say, “Harry, Daphne, I’m going to talk my husband whom works in the Department of Mysteries; his specialty is bonds. I’m going to talk to him today and see if he can come round to teach you about your bond.”
Harry cocked his head to one side. It was a testament to their forming bond that Daphne mirrored the movement a second later, “You haven’t spoken to him yet?”
Melissa shook her head, not noticing her sister and her sister’s husband staring past her at the door, “No, why?”
Harry smiled, “Your husband’s a man with greying hair and dark blue eyes, with a scar running down his right cheek.”
Melissa gaped at him, “I’ve never heard of a soul bond manifesting Seer abilities before…”
The tall figure standing behind Melissa bent over her shoulder and whispered, “It doesn’t, honey. I’ve been standing here for five minutes.”
Melissa almost vaulted the table and landed in Harry’s arms with fright. Instead, she whirled around and yelped, “Michael! Don’t ever do that again!”
Harry gave a snort of laughter, “I already love his sense of humour!”
Astoria chose this moment to butt in by jumping off her chair and hugging the man, crying, “Uncle Michael!”
Daphne tugged Harry up and dragged him around the table to greet her uncle as well. As Daphne embraced her uncle’s leg, Michael surveyed Harry, “So this is the young bonded, is it?”
Melissa nodded, “How did you know we needed to talk, Michael?”
Michael grinned at his wife, “Truth be told, I didn’t. I came via the Floo to say hello to my lovely little nieces, and heard the word ‘bond’. Then I walked quietly into the room and stood behind you nodding at everyone else in greeting. Then this young…” At that moment, he caught a glimpse of Harry’s forehead, and his eyes widened.
“D-Daphne’s bonded to the Boy-Who-Lived???” he said incredulously.
Melissa nodded, looking her husband right in the eyes, “Tell anyone, my husband, and you will find out exactly how scary women can be.”
Christopher laughed, “That means watch your step. They can be thoroughly terrifying.”
Michael laughed, “Honey, I’m an Unspeakable. That means I cannot speak of anything I learn while working. If I were to learn that these two are bonded, the oaths I took when I got my job would stop me from saying a word. Now, I want to take Harry and Daphne into the other room to start my initial examination of them. This is exciting; I might be able to write a book on the soul bond. I can just imagine the title; Soul Bond Explained, by Michael Croaker…”
Harry smiled as he took Daphne’s hand. There was a soft flare of magic like light around their hands. Michael laughed, “Oh, I’d say that’s a soul bond. But…” he frowned and considered the two of them, “It’s not complete.”
Christopher stood up, “What do you mean, it’s not complete? I understand it would take a while for the bond to complete, but…”
Michael interrupted, “It’s not that. I mean it’s not complete as in there are only two members of the bond present. Harry and Daphne are not alone in their bond. I can’t tell you who the third member of the bond is yet.” He rubbed his hands together with something like glee, “Ooh, this is fun. Not only am I going to experience the formation of a soul bond, but it’s going to be a triplicate soul bond as well. This is going to be a fun few months.”
Elizabeth interrupted, “Speaking of which, we have only got a few more months before Harry’s and Daphne’s Hogwarts letters arrive. They should arrive in mid-July; and it’s March now. That means we’ve got a good four more months. Harry, when is your birthday?”
Harry looked up, “I’ll be eleven on the 31st of July.”
Elizabeth smiled, “Ok. In advance, what do you want for your birthday?”
Harry looked down at the floor, “I don’t know. I-I’ve never had a birthday present before.”
Christopher scowled; he really had to deal with those Muggles. Michael frowned, thinking hard. Glancing at Melissa, he asked, “Melissa, could you tell me what you know of Harry’s past? I’d like to know because past trauma has been theorized to have an effect on how successfully the bond finalizes.”
Melissa frowned, turning towards her husband, before catching his arm and dragging him from the room. Once they were in the next room, she turned on him. “When Harry arrived, he appeared directly on Daphne’s bed. When we found him in her room, his first reaction to seeing us was to cower into the corner. He seemed to have been terribly mistreated by his relatives; here are the notes I took when checking him over…” She rummaged in her pocket and pulled out the piece of parchment she had written her notes on. Michael looked at it for a second, before his expression clouded and he scowled. “Whoever Harry’s relatives are, I don’t think they should be allowed to live. Anyone whom would wreak this kind of damage on an innocent child doesn’t deserve to live.”
Melissa suddenly caught Michael’s arm, “What if it wasn’t relatives?”
Michael stared at his wife, before shaking his head, “No, Melissa. If it was Death Eaters that did this, Harry would be dead. Remember he did destroy Voldemort. Any Death Eater would want revenge for that.”
Melissa sighed, “I guess we’re lucky that Christopher and Elizabeth are going to look after him.”
Michael smiled, “Yes, we are lucky.”
Meanwhile, back in the dining room, Daphne suddenly yawned, "Wow, I'm really tired all of a sudden. I ought to... ought to...” She petered off as she fell asleep and slumped against Harry’s shoulder. Harry blinked as he slipped an arm around his soulmate’s shoulder. Smiling, Christopher and Elizabeth stood up. Christopher picked up his daughter, and carried her upstairs with Harry behind him.
A few minutes later, Harry and Daphne were laying side-by-side on Daphne’s enlarged bed. Daphne had her head resting on Harry’s shoulder. Harry had an arm around her shoulders, as he began to doze. A second later, he was out of it completely.
(A/N: Hey guys! Leonineus here, once again. I really hope you guys have enjoyed this chapter, because it’s taken me a good couple of weeks to write. That may have been because I received a TV for my room and some new 360 games for my birthday, but once again I digress. Anyway, Leonineus signing off, and I'll see you in the next chapter, when I will release a little information that you might find veeeeeeery interesting... GOODNIGHT!)
(A/N: Hey all, Leonineus here again. I’m happy that the first chapter of this story got such good reception; the positive reviews put me in a very good mood. Then again, it was my birthday last Saturday so I might’ve already been in a good mood, but I digress. To clear up a couple of things, for those of you on FF.net, this pairing is not complete yet. Nor have the powers Harry and Daphne will receive from the bond yet manifested. They will soon, though… Enjoy!)
Harry sat on the couch later that evening, with Daphne at his side. Daphne’s seven-year-old sister Astoria was sitting cross-legged on the rug, gazing at her elder sister with confusion. Why her sister had a boy in the house, let alone sitting that close to her; she couldn’t understand.
Christopher had come back a little while earlier, saying that by Wizarding law Harry was now legally their adopted son. Melissa had used a couple of spells on Harry which had quickly healed his injuries. Now he sat before a roaring fire drinking hot chocolate. “I still don’t know why you’re doing all this for me,” said Harry, looking up at Christopher, Elizabeth and Melissa sitting opposite him, “My relatives told me I’m a worthless freak that nobody could ever like.”
Christopher bit back a curse which almost sprang to his lips. He would seriously have to deal with these ‘relatives’ of Harry’s. Anyone who would be willing to unleash the amount of torment Harry appeared to have suffered on an innocent child did not deserve to live.
After they had put the children to bed, Elizabeth sat on the sofa with her husband. Christopher slipped an arm around his wife’s shoulders and they both looked to Melissa opposite. She had been giving Harry a full check-up earlier that day. She consulted a strip of parchment, “He’s suffering from an extreme case of malnutrition, as we could already see from the fact he was as thin as a broomstick when he arrived. I ran a scan of his skeleton; most of the bones in his arms and legs have been broken at least once. A couple of the more serious were three hairline cracks in his skull and four ribs which look to be on their last legs. How the boy is even able to stand without howling in pain is beyond me. He must be a lot more resilient than most would give him credit for. He may look frail but he’s undoubtedly very tough.”
Elizabeth looked at her sister, “What do we have to do for Harry?”
Melissa took out another strip of parchment and handed it across to the other two adults. “He’ll have to be put on a strict regimen of potions to get him back to the proper size for a ten-year-old boy. Then of course there’s the other potions he’ll have to take to fix his bone structure. He has numerous other internal injuries as well, but those shouldn’t take too long to fix. About one or two potions should do the trick for those. Other than that there isn’t much you need to do. Oh, and you should find an expert on bonds of this kind and swear him to secrecy. Luckily you know my husband is an Unspeakable that researches bonds. If I can get him to come by some day and swear him to secrecy, I believe we could get Harry and Daphne taught about their bond without exposing Harry’s location.”
At that moment, several hundred miles north, Albus Dumbledore looked up as one of the little silver instruments began making clanging noises. That could mean only one thing; the wards around Harry Potter’s house were collapsing. That was odd, seeing as the boy should still be there. Picking up his wand, he walked around the desk and prodded the device carefully with the tip. A mistake, as it turned out; the device seemed to crumple in on itself like a paper cup, emitted sparks and smoke, and then melted. Dumbledore cursed under his breath; the wards had failed completely. Behind him his familiar, Fawkes the phoenix, trilled. Dumbledore stood for a moment, surveying the puddle of molten silver, before straightening up and striding from the room.
Harry woke up very early the next morning. He rolled away from Daphne, still sleepy, and climbed out of bed. Swiftly and silently, he tiptoed out of Daphne’s room and crept downstairs. Moving into the kitchen, he made a beeline for the nearest cupboard and began searching for pots and pans. Harry knew how to cook from the Dursleys; he had been forced to cook their meals since he was tall enough to reach the stove. He finally found the frying pan in a cupboard and went to pull it out, but felt a small finger poke him in the small of the back and jumped. Unfortunately his head was still inside the cupboard, so he cracked the top of his head hard against the top edge of the frame. Recoiling away from the cupboard with a hand over his aching head, he twisted around to see who or what had poked him.
A small creature with round eyes and bat-like ears stood staring at him, “You should not be up, Harry Potter; you should be resting!”
Harry shook his head, “I don’t know what you are, but I don’t want to rest. I want to cook.”
The small creature looked offended, “That is Dippy’s job, Harry Potter.”
Harry shook his head, “I want to do this. It’s thanks for helping me.”
Dippy shook his head, his batlike ears flapping, “No, Harry Potter. You must rest.”
At that moment, both jumped as a voice floated through the room, “You don’t have to, Harry. Though if you want to, I’m sure Dippy will consent to allow you use of her kitchen for the morning.”
Both Dippy and Harry whirled around to see Christopher Greengrass standing in the doorway clad in a jade dressing gown. He grinned at Harry’s startled expression, “I see my talent for moving quietly hasn’t failed me. Now, Harry, it’s not required for you to make us breakfast but if cooking is what you enjoy, why don’t you do it? Dippy, can you help Mr Potter with the meal if he tells you what to do?” The house elf nodded. Christopher turned back to Harry, smiling, “Dippy will show you where everything is.”
Harry nodded and gave Christopher a lopsided grin, “Ok then, I’d better get to work.” He scampered cheerfully over to the pan cupboard and started pulling out pans. The house elf hurried after him and began helping.
Daphne rolled over and went to throw an arm over Harry at her side. As Harry wasn’t in the bed; her arm simply landed on the mattress again. Opening her eyes, she searched out Harry with her mind and finally found him downstairs in the kitchen. Climbing off the bed, she pulled on her dressing gown and wandered out of her room and down the stairs. She was surprised when she arrived in the kitchen. The table was groaning under a massive quantity of food, and Harry and the family’s house-elf were standing in the kitchen doorway looking extremely satisfied. Harry caught sight of Daphne and quickly dragged her over to the rest of her family, whom were already seated. He pulled out the chair for her, before sitting down himself. She eyed him, “Did you make all of this?”
Harry gave her his standard lopsided grin, and she felt her knees inexplicably weaken, making her glad she was seated, “Yes. Well, Dippy helped.” Daphne eyed a plate of thickly-buttered crumpets sitting three feet away. Harry smiled as he reached over and carefully flipped two of them onto her plate, followed by some bacon and eggs. Astoria piled a few sausages onto her plate and took a bite out of one of them. For a second, she chewed, then swallowed, and finally smiled, “Wow… I’d say Dippy has a challenger for the title of greatest cook of the year…” Curious, everyone else took bites of their food, exclaiming in delight as they ate.
Elizabeth addressed Harry, “What did you cook and what did Dippy cook?”
Harry smiled, “Dippy handled things like toast and the crumpets; I cooked almost everything else. It took me a while to convince Dippy that I only needed her to do a couple of things for me and I could do the rest, but she relented when I made her understand how important it was to me to do this.”
Melissa chose this moment to say, “Harry, Daphne, I’m going to talk my husband whom works in the Department of Mysteries; his specialty is bonds. I’m going to talk to him today and see if he can come round to teach you about your bond.”
Harry cocked his head to one side. It was a testament to their forming bond that Daphne mirrored the movement a second later, “You haven’t spoken to him yet?”
Melissa shook her head, not noticing her sister and her sister’s husband staring past her at the door, “No, why?”
Harry smiled, “Your husband’s a man with greying hair and dark blue eyes, with a scar running down his right cheek.”
Melissa gaped at him, “I’ve never heard of a soul bond manifesting Seer abilities before…”
The tall figure standing behind Melissa bent over her shoulder and whispered, “It doesn’t, honey. I’ve been standing here for five minutes.”
Melissa almost vaulted the table and landed in Harry’s arms with fright. Instead, she whirled around and yelped, “Michael! Don’t ever do that again!”
Harry gave a snort of laughter, “I already love his sense of humour!”
Astoria chose this moment to butt in by jumping off her chair and hugging the man, crying, “Uncle Michael!”
Daphne tugged Harry up and dragged him around the table to greet her uncle as well. As Daphne embraced her uncle’s leg, Michael surveyed Harry, “So this is the young bonded, is it?”
Melissa nodded, “How did you know we needed to talk, Michael?”
Michael grinned at his wife, “Truth be told, I didn’t. I came via the Floo to say hello to my lovely little nieces, and heard the word ‘bond’. Then I walked quietly into the room and stood behind you nodding at everyone else in greeting. Then this young…” At that moment, he caught a glimpse of Harry’s forehead, and his eyes widened.
“D-Daphne’s bonded to the Boy-Who-Lived???” he said incredulously.
Melissa nodded, looking her husband right in the eyes, “Tell anyone, my husband, and you will find out exactly how scary women can be.”
Christopher laughed, “That means watch your step. They can be thoroughly terrifying.”
Michael laughed, “Honey, I’m an Unspeakable. That means I cannot speak of anything I learn while working. If I were to learn that these two are bonded, the oaths I took when I got my job would stop me from saying a word. Now, I want to take Harry and Daphne into the other room to start my initial examination of them. This is exciting; I might be able to write a book on the soul bond. I can just imagine the title; Soul Bond Explained, by Michael Croaker…”
Harry smiled as he took Daphne’s hand. There was a soft flare of magic like light around their hands. Michael laughed, “Oh, I’d say that’s a soul bond. But…” he frowned and considered the two of them, “It’s not complete.”
Christopher stood up, “What do you mean, it’s not complete? I understand it would take a while for the bond to complete, but…”
Michael interrupted, “It’s not that. I mean it’s not complete as in there are only two members of the bond present. Harry and Daphne are not alone in their bond. I can’t tell you who the third member of the bond is yet.” He rubbed his hands together with something like glee, “Ooh, this is fun. Not only am I going to experience the formation of a soul bond, but it’s going to be a triplicate soul bond as well. This is going to be a fun few months.”
Elizabeth interrupted, “Speaking of which, we have only got a few more months before Harry’s and Daphne’s Hogwarts letters arrive. They should arrive in mid-July; and it’s March now. That means we’ve got a good four more months. Harry, when is your birthday?”
Harry looked up, “I’ll be eleven on the 31st of July.”
Elizabeth smiled, “Ok. In advance, what do you want for your birthday?”
Harry looked down at the floor, “I don’t know. I-I’ve never had a birthday present before.”
Christopher scowled; he really had to deal with those Muggles. Michael frowned, thinking hard. Glancing at Melissa, he asked, “Melissa, could you tell me what you know of Harry’s past? I’d like to know because past trauma has been theorized to have an effect on how successfully the bond finalizes.”
Melissa frowned, turning towards her husband, before catching his arm and dragging him from the room. Once they were in the next room, she turned on him. “When Harry arrived, he appeared directly on Daphne’s bed. When we found him in her room, his first reaction to seeing us was to cower into the corner. He seemed to have been terribly mistreated by his relatives; here are the notes I took when checking him over…” She rummaged in her pocket and pulled out the piece of parchment she had written her notes on. Michael looked at it for a second, before his expression clouded and he scowled. “Whoever Harry’s relatives are, I don’t think they should be allowed to live. Anyone whom would wreak this kind of damage on an innocent child doesn’t deserve to live.”
Melissa suddenly caught Michael’s arm, “What if it wasn’t relatives?”
Michael stared at his wife, before shaking his head, “No, Melissa. If it was Death Eaters that did this, Harry would be dead. Remember he did destroy Voldemort. Any Death Eater would want revenge for that.”
Melissa sighed, “I guess we’re lucky that Christopher and Elizabeth are going to look after him.”
Michael smiled, “Yes, we are lucky.”
Meanwhile, back in the dining room, Daphne suddenly yawned, "Wow, I'm really tired all of a sudden. I ought to... ought to...” She petered off as she fell asleep and slumped against Harry’s shoulder. Harry blinked as he slipped an arm around his soulmate’s shoulder. Smiling, Christopher and Elizabeth stood up. Christopher picked up his daughter, and carried her upstairs with Harry behind him.
A few minutes later, Harry and Daphne were laying side-by-side on Daphne’s enlarged bed. Daphne had her head resting on Harry’s shoulder. Harry had an arm around her shoulders, as he began to doze. A second later, he was out of it completely.
(A/N: Hey guys! Leonineus here, once again. I really hope you guys have enjoyed this chapter, because it’s taken me a good couple of weeks to write. That may have been because I received a TV for my room and some new 360 games for my birthday, but once again I digress. Anyway, Leonineus signing off, and I'll see you in the next chapter, when I will release a little information that you might find veeeeeeery interesting... GOODNIGHT!)
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