Hogwarts Reimagined

Content warning - risk of outing, interpersonal bigotry, panic, claustrophobia

As another week wore on and twice-weekly afternoon Quidditch practices were added to Rhiannon’s workload, she started to seriously wonder if she had made a mistake. The full moon was due to rise only two days after their Quidditchtryouts, and Rhiannon’s cyclical pain was worse than ever – in fact, now she thought about it, the first niggles of it had begun a full week too early. She told herself it was her workload and refused to think about it further – she wasn’t going to fail at something as mundane as extra classes. Hermione could do it – so could she.

The first few nights of the full moon were, for the most part, uneventful. Rhiannon turned earlier than Dudley by almost an hour, which worried Hagrid but Rhiannon, after turning back, explained it away as a side effect of the Time-Turning and besides, it had been two months now, an early turn was hardly much of a side effect to worry about. She and Dudley found more scent and signs of the peculiar dog, but Hagrid wouldn’t let them investigate it.

They also ran into what looked to be a scouting group of centaurs, all thoroughly riled about the Dementors posted on guard around the Hogwarts walls, and Rhiannon had to sympathise – it was bad enough being inside with them on the outer walls, but when those outer walls bordered your territory, which you lived in all the time? That had to be miserable.

On the final night of the cycle, Rhiannon was on her way out of Gryffindor tower with her potion in her pocket and cane in hand when she was stopped by an enormous crowd around the portrait door. Whispers pressed uncomfortably on her sensitive ears, and Rhiannon felt the familiar strains of anxiety unfurl in her stomach. “Sirius Black... here, in the castle... he tried to break in, we heard him... growling, like an animal, I thought he’d blast the door...”

There was no chance of getting out of here quickly, but already the first twinges of the turn were burning in Rhiannon’s muscles. She had half an hour, maybe an hour at most. She pushed her way through the crowd, fighting the urge to just run for the door, but was stopped when she bumped into a trembling first-year. The girl had warm burnt golden skin and puffy cinnamon-coloured hair, neatly braided on top of her head and the remainder left loose like a little cloudat the back. She caught hold of Rhiannon’s wrist, and Rhiannon firmly tamped down the urge to swat away the touch as she realised how frightened the girl was.

“No – you can’t go out,” the first-year girl warned, her voice trembling. It was a little lower-pitched than Rhiannon had expected, and she struggled to hear it amongst the whispers of the general student body. “The Prefects called for help, he ran off but – I heard him growling, tearing at something, we can’t go out.”

Rhiannon drew the anxious girl out of the thick of the crowd and sat her down in a chair, perching beside her. If that was true, there was no chance of her getting out at all – she just had to hold on for Minerva to rescue her. She might as well be nice in the meantime. “O-o-okay, thanks for the warning,” she replied clumsily. “I’m Rhi – Rhiannon, but ev’ryone calls me Rhi. What’s your name?”

“A-Alianne. Well, Aly, Blackwell. You’re Rhiannon? Rhiannon Potter? Oh – oh no! I’m so sorry I grabbed you, I didn’t mean to,” the first-year girl stammered, until Rhiannon shook her head and squeezed the younger girl’s quivering hand.

“Please don’t start the whole hero thing,” Rhiannon begged, rubbing her eyes underneath her decoy spectacles.

Alianne’s brown eyes widened, and she shook her head hurriedly. “No – no no no! No! That’s not it at all, I’m really sorry – I didn’t think. Just, you’re everybody’s hero and stuff and you do all these amazing things and you’re like me. Dad was worried I’d get bullied, he was going to homeschool Hazel and me ‘til we heard about you. It’s just – really cool, to meet another trans person. Sorry, I’ll – I’ll stop now.” she babbled, eliciting a good-natured giggle from Rhiannon.

“I still get excited when I me-e-e-e-meet other trans people too,” Rhiannon confessed with a shy smile. “I had the biggest cry when I stayed with a friend and she showed me this big Pride banner she had, I didn’t even know people like us did things like that.”

Alianne blinked, astonished. “Really? Your pa– sorry, foster-parents, they never talked about that stuff? Pride’s been around forever,” she said.

Rhiannon shook her head, grimacing at the thought of the Dursleys. “My – they, weren’t good people. Hogwarts was like, a fresh start, I got to be a girl for the f-f-f-irst time.” she replied, with an uncomfortable shrug.

Alianne looked horrified and opened her mouth to speak, probably to apologise for bringing it up at all, when she was interrupted by the arrival of Professor Kjartanson, head of Gryffindor house. He swung the portrait door open with a slam, revealing tears across its face and its’ regular inhabitant gone. “Everyone to the Great Hall, we’re locking down the school. Prefects and seniors, space yourselves along the line. Percival, bring up the lead, I’ll be at the end. No screaming, no rushing, everyone stick together – nice and orderly.” the strict Professor ordered them, gesturing for the Gryffindors to form up in front of him. “Gillespie, Blackwell, go on upstairs and bring everyone down and then we’ll be off.”

Two Prefects, one of them clearly Aly’s older brother, separated themselves from the group and headed upstairs to fetch the last stragglers, including Ron and Lavender. When they returned, Lavender startled on seeing Rhiannon there and hurried over, a bewildered Ron following closely. “Why’re you still here?” she asked furtively, keeping her voice hushed as they were ushered from the Gryffindor common room. “It’s got to be near moonrise already, right?”

Rhiannon winced and rubbed her arms uncomfortably, feeling the prickle of hair spreading over the backs of her hands. “Y-yeah,” she agreed, grimacing as her voice cracked in a way that bothered her. Since Madam Pomfrey had upped her blocker dosage it hadn’t progressed any further, her voice wouldn’t ‘drop’ the way it would if she went through a regular puberty, but it was still irksome. She hoped her hormone potion, whenever she got it, erased that. But the full moon was a lot more imminent a problem than her dysphoria, and she shivered and leaned heavily on her cane and the railing as they headed down the stairs from the seventh floor to the sixth. “Don’t look, but I think Nyx wants to come out a bit early,” she muttered.

Ron swore under his breath, and walked on his tiptoes for a moment in search of a Prefect. “Shit. Nothing – only one that knows is Percy, and he’s a dick about it anyway. Lemme see if I can get back to talk to Professor K.” he suggested, and dropped back through the line to do just that.

Rhiannon leaned heavily on Lavender as they went down another flight of stairs, these with a pair of trick steps in the middle that Rhiannon struggled to manage at the best of times. She managed to avoid catching her feet in the stairs, but instead got her cane stuck and went sprawling on the stairs as it was jerked from her hands. “F-f-f-fuck’s sake!” she spat, picking herself up with Lavender’s help and continuing on down the staircase, her knees and elbows aching with new bruises.

When they reached the Great Hall, it was crowded with students. Someone had already gathered the other four houses, and most of the faculty were in attendance as well – though not Professor Lupin, and Rhiannon didn’t have to think hard to guess why, as her own arms prickled with hair, her wrists locked painfully and her hands curled into the first vestiges of lupine transformation. Her breath came too fast, as now she realised how stuck she was – this was a system designed to prevent students from sneaking away, designed to keep track of everyone, and she had maybe ten, fifteen minutes before she’d be standing here on four legs instead of two.

Someone caught her elbow from behind and Rhiannon whirled to face them, relaxing a little as she recognised Dudley. Only a little. Dudley gasped as he noticed her, and quickly covered his mouth to muffle the sound. “Shit – keep your head down, your eyes are all yellow and stare-y,” he hissed, casting about for someone to get them out of there. He pulled Rhiannon away from Ron and Lavender and hurried to the relative safety of a wall. “Rhi, have you taken your potion?” he asked. Blood drained from Rhiannon’s face and she shook her head, feeling the weight of it in her pocket – but that would do no good if she changed here, in this claustrophobic environment. She’d hurt someone.

Dudley swore, and dragged Rhiannon along with him as he headed for an exit. “Me neither, we’ve got to ditch and take it – at least that way if we get outed, nobody gets clawed,” he muttered.

They reached a side exit, more of a servants’ passage than anything else, but were stopped by none other than Percy Weasley. “Sneaking off again, Potter?” he asked them with a pompous sneer. “Just because you’re a werewolf now, doesn’t mean you get special treatment to go wherever you like, this is a lockdown,” he hissed. At least he had the decency to keep his voice low – but that was the only thing going for him.

Rhiannon fought the urge to growl, to just glare at him until he realised how wrong he was, but Dudley grabbed her by the elbow again and dragged her off in the direction of some other form of authority.

The first they found was Professor Kingshorn, the Arts instructor and head of Miremark house. Unthinking, Rhiannon grabbed the stocky woman’s arm to get her attention and then hurriedly retreated, wringing her hands anxiously and muttering apologies under her breath.

Dudley stepped in to improvise. “Professor, Rhi left her cat upstairs, and she needs help getting back up the stairs. Can we go and get her?” he asked, the perfect picture of a forlorn student. Rhiannon wondered how he stayed so calm – or at least, appeared so calm, she’d never mastered either.

Miss Finn turned a disbelieving expression on the two teenagers. “If your cat can sneak into my class when you think I’m not looking, Miss Potter, she can certainly make her way just fine through a locked-down castle.” she told Rhiannon firmly. “Get back where Leif – Professor Kjartanson - can see you, and you, Hufflepuff? Scat, back to Pomona – Sprout, that is.” she added, and shooed them both away in differing directions.

Well and truly in a panic now, Rhiannon sought out the nearest familiar face of authority. That turned out to be Nomi Eun, the pretty, bookish black-haired seventh-year Prefect of Gryffindor house. “I’ve got to – got- t-t-t-ttt- bathroom,” she stammered, hoping desperately for the chance to escape.

Nomi reached for Rhiannon’s hands to stop her from twisting them anxiously, Rhiannon pulled them away quickly so that the prefect wouldn’t notice the fur and the misshapenness of them. “Sorry, really – but Nick Flowers just went, you’ll have to wait until he comes back, and then someone else can go after you.” she replied. Rhiannon let out a growl of frustration and stomped away, beginning to feel very much like a caged animal. The lights were too bright, there were too many people, too many meaningless sounds, she was trapped... Rhiannon whined softly and clutched her head, she ached fiercely, it was like dry ice right in her bones...

Rhiannon startled as someone clapped loudly and called for silence, their voice magically amplified. Minerva, she recognised dimly, only half-hearing over the fire in her blood. She disregarded what little she did hear, she knew the important parts – Sirius Black was here, he’d broken in, but that didn’t matter – she had to get out of here or people were going to get hurt, hurt because of her. She threw caution to the winds and elbowed her way through the crowd to the front, her cane acting as additional encouragement for those too slow to get out of her way. “Mi-mi-McGonagall!” she yelled, her voice cracking again as desperately she tried to get the Headmaster’s attention.

It was a last-resort measure, but it worked. Minerva McGonagall’s eyes widened as she found Rhiannon in the crowd, and she passed her duty over to Professor Flitwick as the Deputy Head and stepped down from where she’d been speaking at the front of the Hall. “Rhiannon, you’re still here?” she whispered urgently, looking around them. “And it’s the last night too, isn’t it... mhac na galla, come with me, we’ve got to get you out of here.” she added.

Taking Rhiannon by the hand, Minerva led her back to the side exit that Percy guarded. “Come on lad, let us out, we’ve an urgent errand,” she asked, though Rhiannon was familiar enough with the Headmaster’s mannerisms to know that it wasn’t really a request.

“Headmistress?” Percy asked, looking perplexed. “It is a lockdown – I can let you out, of course, but not Potter...”

Minerva drew herself up to her full, imposing height. “Oh, thalla is cagainn bruis, boy!” she snapped, prodding Percy in the chest with an extended finger. “First of all, it’s Headmaster, second, which of us is in charge? Let me out right now, and for good measure, go and find me Dudley Dursley – Hufflepuff, second year, probably wall-flowering somewhere. I’ll even stand guard ‘til you’re back.” she added.

Percy scurried away like he’d been slapped, and Minerva turned to Rhiannon and gripped her shoulder tightly. “Have you taken your potion?” she asked Rhiannon softly. Her mouth tightened when Rhiannon shook her head no, and she quickly shoved the girl behind her. “Take it now, then,” she ordered, when Rhiannon looked up at her anxiously. “No, don’t give me that look – I’m tall and you’re anything but, and I’m wearing a cloak besides. No-one can see if you just hurry.”

Hastily, Rhiannon did as she was bid, taking the potion from her pocket and downing it in a gulp. She grimaced and wrinkled her nose, hissing softly in disgust. Minerva sighed with relief and let go of Rhiannon’s shoulder, shaking her head wearily. “That’s one problem down... I can only imagine what could have happened had you turned here, without that... now where is that Weasley boy?” she muttered to herself, frowning and peering across the hall in search of Percy Weasley.

Rhiannon groaned and leaned against the wall, shivering as another wave of searing pain washed over her and she gritted her teeth to keep from screaming. “D-d-d-d-don’t worry, I’ve got – five minutes or so,” she slurred, the words clumsy around teeth and a jaw that weren’t quite the right shape.

“Lass, you’re lookin’ up at me with yellow lamps and sprouting fur right in front of me, don’t tell me whether to worry,” Minerva retorted sharply. Rhiannon recoiled and looked at the floor, and Minerva sighed and took one of the small girl’s curled hands in her own. “No, I’m sorry, that wasn’t fair... this isn’t your fault. Wrong place, wrong time – in the most literal sense. Just sit tight, I’ll get you out of here as soon as I can.”

Soon, Percy returned with Dudley limping in his wake. He nodded stiffly and took his post at the side door again, while Minerva hustled the two teenage werewolves out of the castle through the side passage, which led directly outside. A muttered incantation and some shuffling of bricks got them through the blockade, which had been brought down around the castle in light of Sirius Black’s intrusion, and then they were out in a side courtyard. Rhiannon staggered and fell to her knees, the urgency of the change increased tenfold by exposure to the moonlight. There was no time to cast off her clothes, and Rhiannon whined pitifully as she realised she was going to tear her favourite coat. It felt uncomfortably tight now as her shoulders flexed and reshaped themselves under her skin, her elbows locked and shifted as bones lengthened, her skull cracked and stretched as Rhiannon struggled to withhold a scream of agony.

Finally, Rhiannon sat four-legged on the cobbled ground, untangling herself from the last tangled mess of her clothes as the rest lay in ruins around her. She whined softly and nosed at the remnants of her favourite red tartan coat, a gift from Faye for her first Christmas at Hogwarts. Minerva stood to one side, one hand propped on her hip and her head tilted to the side as she studied the young werewolf. “You make a fine young werewolf, Miss Potter.” she told Rhiannon warmly. “I must say, I expected you’d be smaller... that’s good, I suppose. I’m glad you’re healthier now, than when we first met.”

Dudley shifted anxiously from foot to foot, his eyes faintly reflective under the moonlight. “Isn’t this – unsafe, though? If Sirius Black is out here somewhere?” he asked, unable to keep a stressed whine from his voice. He stroked Rhiannon’s ears affectionately, his hands shaking a little. It worried Rhiannon, and she pressed the top of her head into his palm in the only method of comfort available to her.

Minerva shook her head grimly. “Sirius Black is certainly reckless, and may well be dangerous, but I doubt he will tangle with two adolescent werewolves and the Headmaster of Hogwarts alone. Go on, take your potion, you’re already sprouting fluff out from under your jersey there.” she told him, and reached out to inspect Rhiannon’s torn clothes. She untangled the last of the girl’s school shirt from her furry shoulders and took the pieces in her hands, turning them over thoughtfully. “I think I can fix these,” she murmured, gathering up the scattered pieces in her arms and absently scratching Rhiannon’s ears as the young wolf pushed her nose in over her shoulder to see what she was up to. Minerva stowed the pieces under one arm and stood, looking over at the two of them.

“Right, let’s get you both down to Hagrid’s cabin – stick close, Master Dursley, and lean on me if you need.” Minerva instructed them both. She didn’t notice the grimace Dudley made at the reminder of his surname but Rhiannon did, and she pushed her nose into his hand and whined softly.

Dudley shook his head and sighed, ruffling Rhiannon’s ears in silent thanks. “Yeah, you know it,” he murmured, leaning on her and his cane as they limped down the hill. “Think I could ditch it? I could borrow yours, or something, I dunno,”

Rhiannon thought about that for a bit. Dudley Potter... she wasn’t quite sure if that worked, and to be honest she had no particular connection to the name either, it didn’t feel like it was hers to give away. But she’d like it if he was just her brother, without the added complications of separation. She yipped softly and snuffled at his hand, licking it and nudging against his hip until he finally paid attention. “You are the bossiest sister ever,” he teased her. Rhiannon wiggled happily and let out a little howl of joy, while Minerva watched them both with a fond smile.

Dudley coughed and wiped his slobbery hand on his robe, embarrassed. “I can feel it coming on, I’ll see you there,” he said, and limped off into the shadows while Minerva and Rhiannon carried on down the hill.

“He used to bully you, didn’t he? But you’ve both healed together, or started to. I am... glad, for that. You deserve to have had something good come of that start to your life.” Minerva said gently, as she and Rhiannon reached Hagrid’s cabin. Rhiannon flicked her ears and shrugged uncomfortably, she never liked to think of the Dursleys but even less when she was like this. She had found that her wolf’s instincts emphasised family, and the perversion of that was distressing in the extreme. Minerva sighed and absently stroked Rhiannon’s thick ruff of neck fur as she laid out the pieces of torn clothing on her knees, matching up the parts of each garment and setting them aside to focus on another. When she had everything set out correctly, she took her wand from her belt and prodded the garment shreds with it, frowning as she did so.

“I think the Mending Charm can handle the worst of this, and I can sew up any leftover patches afterwards, don’t worry,” the Headmaster reassured Rhiannon, and took up the pieces of Rhiannon’s torn coat. “Reparo,” she murmured, joining each strip together with the charm. She was mostly finished with the coat by the time Dudley returned, shaking leaves from his thick creamy coat, a little tufty and disheveled-looking as his winter coat grew in.

“Well goodness me,” Minerva said, setting her mending aside to look at Dudley more fully. “And I thought Rhiannon was tall! It suits you, young Master Dursley – it’s good to see you confident in something, even if it is on four legs.”

Dudley whined and flattened his ears, and Rhiannon bounded over to comfort her brother, casting a disapproving look back over her shoulder at Minerva. The Headmaster sighed and rubbed her eyes. “Don’t give me those puppy eyes, young lady,” she warned mock-sternly, but she stood and dusted herself off. “I apologise, Dudley, I’m still unlearning the whole formality thing when it comes to you and your friends. Now, let’s be off, shall we?” she suggested.

Rhiannon wondered how Minerva, human as she was, would manage alone with the two of them. She’d guessed some time ago that Hagrid was non-human or partly so, he probably wasn’t susceptible to the virus, and her friends had orders to get clear if anything bad happened with her or Dudley – they could come along, but they never had to personally wrangle either of the werewolves. It seemed Minerva read her thoughts, the Headmaster smiled wryly and took her wand out again. “Let’s head over the highlands to the loch, shall we? There’s no cover there so the Dementors won’t search it, I don’t want to risk running across them in the forest.” she suggested.

Then, closing her eyes, the Headmaster drew her wand in close to her body and transformed before their eyes into a long-tailed, strikingly marked classic black-and-silver tabby cat. She seemed to take pleasure in their astonishment, and trotted past them with her tail in the air, then turned back and jerked her head in the direction she had suggested, beckoning them on with a wave of her tail. She couldn’t have been clearer had she spoken – well, come on then, and eagerly, the two young werewolves set off after her at a comfortable pace through the long, thin grass and across the uneven pitted ground of the highlands leading out to the Black Lake.