Chapter Text
Back when he first entered Hogwarts Castle by the Room of Requirement earlier that night, Harry hoped he, Ron and Hermione would find the Diadem and destroy it before Voldemort showed up and laid siege to the castle. But, before they even had time to evacuate the students, Voldemort and his Death Eaters appeared. The Battle of Hogwarts had begun.
After most of the younger students were evacuated and reinforcements arrived, Harry and his friends made to continue their mission to destroy all Horcruxes. Soon enough, he found himself in front of a near empty Room of Requirement watching as Hermione kissed Ron. For reasons he couldn’t quite understand, the kiss didn’t make him feel relieved and happy that his pining friends finally did something about their shared feelings. Instead, he felt quite strange, like the kiss was disappointing him, like he wished it never happened. He would think the kiss hurt him – if he could only understand why.
But Harry didn’t have time to think further about what that strange feeling meant. It wasn’t long before the trio found themselves flying over the Room of Hidden Things to escape the flaming tornado it had become.
It was then that Harry was separated from Ron and Hermione. With the Diadem gone, only Hufflepuff’s Cup and Nagini remained. They quickly decided that Harry would go after Nagini while Ron and Hermione would go to the Chamber of Secrets and destroy the Horcrux with one of the fangs from the Basilisk.
Now alone, Harry managed to fight his way through the Death Eaters and tracked Voldemort and Nagini to the Shrieking Shack. He was forced to listen as Voldemort killed Snape and apparated away. A few words were exchanged, Snape passed away and Harry left the shack with memories in hand.
Harry was running through the courtyard, scarcely noticing the sounds of distant detonations across the grounds of what was meant to be a mere school. With his mission failed, he ran to reunite with his friends, hoping they had better luck than him.
“There you are, Potter!” a Death Eater suddenly exclaimed. “The Dark Lord will reward me handsomely for bringing you to him.”
Harry rolled his eyes at the man’s words and quickly put up a shield to block the relatively weak curse that came his way. “I’m surprised Voldemort hire weak men like you!” he quipped. “He must be scrapping the bottom of the barrel to fill his army!”
The Death Eater let out an angry roar and shot another curse. To Harry’s amusement, the spell rebounded on the shield to come hit the Death Eater in the face. He immediately dropped his wand and collapsed, holding his stomach in pain.
“Yeah, just proving my point.” he said before stunning the man. Then, he continued to run toward the castle.
As he approached the doors, he heard a cry of pain come from a girl. His head immediately snapped in the direction of the sound and his blood chilled in shock – before boiling in anger.
Lavender Brown was laying on the ground with Fenrir Greyback towering over her. The werewolf looked like he was trying to eat the meat of her ribs. And, by the look in her eyes, Harry knew she was still alive and forced to experience the pain.
Harry felt rageful. He could not understand how anyone could do that to someone else. Even though he was far from Lavender’s biggest fan, he did not wish for her to go through such a horrible experience. Hell, he wouldn’t wish it on Voldemort! Greyback was a monster who needed to be put down like the feral beast he was!
“BOMBARDA!” he yelled, his wand pointed at the werewolf. A spell shot out of his wand to hit Greyback. Greyback was sent flying in an explosion of gore and blood. Harry saw the werewolf’s head fall ten feet further away than his torso. The man who turned Remus into a werewolf was dead.
Harry ignored the feeling of guilt he felt at murdering someone, instead running to Lavender’s side. He quickly inspected the damage on Lavender as the girl tried to breathe deeply.
“Shit.” he cursed when his eyes found it. Her entire left side was covered in blood and her clothes were in tatters. Harry could see three deep claw marks on her hip while her left ribs were left exposed for the world to see, the muscles having been eaten by the monster of a man Harry had just killed. It was a grotesque sight that made him want to barf the empty content of his stomach.
Swallowing the bile in his throat, Harry took some Essence of Dittany Hermione had given him at the beginning of the battle “Just in case.” and used it to stop the bleeding on the claw marks. He used the rest of the bottle on her exposed ribs. While it did not make the muscle reappear, it stopped the bleeding and gave him enough time to bring her to Madam Pomfrey or another healer.
“You’re all right.” he told her. “You’re all right. I’ll bring you to Madam Pomfrey and she’ll fix you up faster than you can blink.”
“T-... T-Thanks...” Lavender gasped, looking like she was fighting to keep awake. This worried him greatly. He did not want to see her die.
“Hey, don’t sleep yet! Not until you get to Madam Pomfrey! Otherwise you might never wake up and Greyback will win! We can’t have that!” he said. Too exhausted to talk, Lavender simply nodded.
As he was about to grab her to carry her back inside, Harry was suddenly tackled to the ground by a heavy body. His wand slipped from his grasp and landed right next to Lavender. Unarmed, Harry could only look at the face of the attacker. It was a strange-looking man with blood-shot eyes full of craziness. He also wore a horrible grin on his face that, combined with the eyes, made the man look utterly deranged. It brought shivers down Harry’s spine.
“Get off!” he exclaimed, trying to push the crazy man away. But the man did not move away. He used one of his hands to hold Harry down with an inhuman strength, snorting when the wizard tried to push him away. Harry noticed two strange glints of light appear in the man’s shadowed mouth. Then, he struck.
Feeling like history was repeating itself, just with different actors, the man bit his neck and Harry cried in pain. In his distant mind, he noted the irony of saving Lavender from being eaten alive only to suffer that exact fate seconds later. But, Harry doubted he would be saved. People didn’t just carry Essence of Dittany everywhere with them, after all.
And then, by miracle, the man was shot off Harry only seconds after he attacked, leaving him unrestrained. He looked in the opposite direction to find Lavender with his wand in her hand, pointing in their direction. She had just returned the favour and got rid of his attacker.
Harry did not waste time. He quickly stood up – ignoring the sharp pain in his neck – and grabbed his wand from Lavender before turning back to the werewolf who attacked him. The deranged-looking man was only now getting to his feet, still very much alive. But he was defenceless and thus could not block Harry’s powerful stunning spell. The man collapsed and did not stand back up.
“Thanks.” he told Lavender, moving to grab the vial of Essence of Dittany that was dropped on the ground with his wand. Only a few droplets were left inside. Not a lot but enough to help his wound heal. With a wave of the wand, he vanished the blood that flowed out of his wound before dropping the last drops of Essence on it. He felt a hissing pain before the feeling gradually vanished.
“Okay.” he said, dropping the empty vial on the ground. He moved to Lavender and bent down to take her in his arms. “It’s time to bring you to Madam Pomfrey.” he told the near unconscious girl. Lavender nodded faintly.
Harry carried Lavender in the Great Hall around the same time Voldemort announced his temporary cease-fire. He quickly found Madam Pomfrey, gave her Lavender and explained the situation before he moved back to the entrance. Except...
“No... no, no, no, no, no! It can’t be!” Harry gasped as his eyes found the dead bodies of two people he cared very much about. He felt tears form in his eyes. “Remus, Tonks, you can’t be dead as well!” Remus and Tonks were the parents of a newborn child. And now his godson would grow up without his parents. Just like Harry did.
Harry didn’t know how long he stood in front of the two dead bodies, still reeling from the shock. He only moved when he heard a familiar voice gasp behind him. He turned around to find Hermione standing right there, her puffy and wet brown eyes staring at Remus and Tonks in shock. Harry’s arm was already drawing her into a hug before he fully realized she was present, like it was programmed in his DNA to comfort Hermione when she was sad.
“I can’t believe it... Tonks and Professor Lupin. Them too?” she said quietly, leaning in Harry’s embrace. Harry would have enjoyed it if his brain didn’t focus on one thing.
“Them too?” he repeated, dread creeping up his stomach.
Hermione didn’t answer verbally. She instead looked up with teary eyes and pointed at the other side of the Great Hall where Harry found the Weasley Family. They were all gathered around something he couldn’t see, hidden as it was by other people and their legs. Yet, when he looked at them, he found they all looked on the verge of breakdown. Hell, Mrs. Weasley and George were already in tears and Arthur didn’t look much better. Speaking of George, he was surprised not to see his twin brother stand next to him, since the two were inseparable.
It was then the pieces of the puzzle put themselves into place.
Fred wasn’t standing with his family. His family looked distraught and were likely looking over a body. Mrs. Weasley and George were the worse affected.
“No... don’t tell me they got Fred too?” he whispered. Hermione nodded, confirming his fear.
“We s-saw him with Percy when Ron and I c-came back from the Chamber.” she said with subtle hiccups. “There was an explosion and F-Fred went down. He was d-dead by the time we reached them.”
Harry closed his eyes, trying to fight off the grief he felt at all the deaths they already suffered. He knew the peace was short and Voldemort would soon attack. And he still had Snape’s memories to watch beforehand.
Masking how he truly felt, he slowly disengaged from Hermione, feeling a strange sense of loss at his empty arms. “Go find Ron. He’ll need comfort.” he told her.
“What about you?” she asked him.
Harry hesitated for a brief moment before saying “Snape is also dead. Voldemort had Nagini kill him.” Hermione closed her eyes. Whether in grief or relief, he didn’t know. “But before he died, he gave me memories for me to watch. I intend to go to the Headmaster’s Office to use the pensieve.”
“Alright.” she nodded. “See you later, then.”
“Yeah.” he returned. And just before Hermione walked away, he added “Tell Ron I’m sorry, will you?” Hermione nodded.
Harry only looked at Hermione for as long as it took her to get to the Weasleys and hug Ron. Then, he turned around and walked out of the Great Hall with a purpose in mind.
Harry’s mind didn’t go back to the werewolf attack until nearly two days later. In his defence, he had been occupied by the shocking truth he learned from Snape’s memories, followed by his short journey in Death’s realm and, finally, Voldemort’s defeat and death.
When you took into account how Harry had been awake for two days straight, you couldn’t really blame him for only thinking about his bed and the sleep he was so desperately wishing for once everything was over. And, when he awoke twelve hours later, you also couldn’t really blame him for thinking about the lives lost during the battle rather than the injury he received in the middle of it. It wouldn’t be until nearly forty-eight hours after the battle that his mind would return to his injury, this time with a vengeance.
That morning, Harry woke up in his old dorm room in Gryffindor Tower and decided it was finally time to take a shower and wash off all the grime, dirt and blood his body accumulated in three days. After taking some change of clothes, he went to the bathroom, undressed and climbed in the shower.
He let out a sigh of relief when he felt the burning hot water shower down his body. While it was the beginning of summer, the temperature inside the castle still felt very cold. Harry believed it was more due to the oppressive and depressing mood around the castle than the temperature itself. No matter what, feeling hot water heat his body was very refreshing.
It took nearly forty minutes before Harry felt clean enough to end his shower. After wiping himself with his towel, he put on his boxers. Just as he was about to put on his shirt, Harry’s eyes found his reflection in the bathroom’s mirror. He stopped for a moment to look at himself.
The months he spent in a tent not eating as much as a growing teenager were never more apparent as before. His entire body had a slight gaunt look to it. He could almost see his ribs through his skin, and his stomach was entirely flat – almost sunk in.
Speaking of his skin, it felt way paler than it usually was. If he didn’t know better, Harry would think he was very sick. It was not helped by the fact he had dark bags under his eyes, which were slightly blood-shot. He looked like someone who barely slept these past few days, not someone who almost slept for two days straight like he actually did.
Then his eyes found his neck.
“What the hell?” he whispered, leaning toward the mirror.
On the right side of his neck, Harry found two small scars in the shape of circles an inch or two apart. They looked like puncture wounds. For a moment, Harry wondered where the two scars came from. His mind flashed back to the werewolf attack.
“Did that unstransformed werewolf bite me?” he asked very quietly. He frowned and shook his head. “No, that isn’t right.”
Harry knew what werewolf scars looked like. When they bit someone, you could see the mark all the teeth left behind. It was the case for Bill, who not only had been disfigured by an untransformed werewolf’s claw, but had been bitten on his bicep. This wasn’t it, though. In fact, the two puncture marks looked more like the kind of scars left behind by... left behind by...
Harry’s mind blanked. He suddenly had a hard time breathing. He was freaking out. He looked at his reflection, at his very pale skin, his blood shot eyes, the bags under his eyes, the puncture marks. His mind thought back to the attack, to the glints of light in his attacker’s mouth, and his inhuman strength.
“Oh god...” he gasped. Harry wasn’t attacked by an untransformed werewolf. He was attacked by a vampire! A vampire bit him! He was now a vampire himself.
“Oh my god...!” he repeated quietly as he took a terrified step away from the mirror. He was a vampire? That couldn’t be! He wanted to collapse and cry. Why him? Why did everything happen to him?
“What am I going to do?” he asked himself.
His instinctive thought was to go to Hermione and seek help from her. But he immediately shot that idea down. Not only was she out of the country, but he couldn't let Hermione know what he was. If she did, she wouldn’t want anything to do with him and would treat him like a bomb about to go off.
And why wouldn’t she? He was a ticking time bomb! Harry remembered all about the lessons Lupin gave in his third year on vampires. The hearts of vampires beat very slowly and their bones could not generate new blood cells. To live, the vampire needed to drink fresh blood (preferably human) to replenish their reserves of blood cells and exercise a lot to make the blood flow.
Unfortunately, that need to drink blood and exercise was important enough to completely alter the vampire’s mind if these needs were not met. A vampire’s instinct was to hunt humans to get their needed exercise and blood. In a way, vampires were like werewolves. They were human with the mind of a blood thirty monster inside. But where the werewolf’s monster took over only once a month the night of the full moon, the vampire’s monster would take over any time it thought it was lacking blood or exercise.
This was what made vampires so dangerous. They constantly needed human blood and you could never tell when the vampire would come out to seek it. There were stories where vampires were peacefully mingling through crowds minding their own businesses when they suddenly turned violent and attacked nearby witches and wizards, only to snap out of it after drinking their blood.
And these tales terrified Harry. What if he was visiting the Burrow and suddenly attacked all the Weasleys? What if he was walking through Diagon Alley and attacked innocent bystanders?
No, Harry could not let it happen. This was why Harry did not intend to involve Hermione or any of his friends. He would not gamble on their safety for his own sake. In fact, it was better if Harry didn’t involve them in his life at all. The war was over and he wanted them to live long, happy lives full of joy.
Unfortunately, that could not include a dangerous vampire.
Only then did Harry let himself collapse on the ground. He brought his arms around his legs and silently cried at the life and friends he was going to push away. It was needed for their safety and happiness.
He would do anything for them, even make himself miserable.