Chapter 37: 31st August 1991, Saturday: Part 5

"You gave me quite a scare there, very funny George. If you can just show me a sign that you're still with me, I would be greatly reassured", Remus asked with a slight waiver in his voice.

Since George didn't want to get stunned today, he felt minimal movements were the way to go. He slowly raised his spiky tail off the ground and pointed toward Remus.

His large mouth parted as he produced a scratchy noise, "hhaaggg!"

Well, that didn't come out as he intended. Just like a ventriloquist puppeteer, Bs and Ms were not going to be the easiest to pronounce.

Remus's eyes squinted as he attempted to understand, "what?".

"Hhagg. He hag. Hi hant he hag", George repeated in a garbled mess whilst his tail kept pointing towards Remus's chest.

Remus looked down only to realise that George's tail had been gesturing to the leather sack. The cogs were slow to turn, but eventually, Remus put two and two together. George rolled his crimson eyes at the werewolf's incompetence, stress really can reduce anyone into imbeciles.

Remus's eyes went wide with realisation, "oh, the Bag. Do you want your bag back? Sure, take it."

Remus showed some apprehension as he placed the bag on the ground and slid it across the room. George's disturbing face formed into a creepy and toothy smile as he nodded toward Remus.

"Hank hue", he politely thanked him.

Remus awkwardly nodded, "you're... welcome?"

George then lowered his head toward the bag and stuck his snout inside. He clenched his jaw and dragged out a huge plastic water bottle commonly used on water coolers. Transformations always depleted a lot of George's energy and left him feeling very dehydrated. Normally, he'd be in a forest and could rely on a local stream as a perfectly convenient way to refresh himself. Because George knew he would be in a cellar instead, he had brought his own ample water supply. But now came the difficult part, unscrewing the damn thing.

No longer having opposable thumbs meant George only had his teeth and tongue to work with. The slime coating his new scales made gripping anything extra difficult, and applying too much pressure would just burst the bottle, spilling water everywhere. He ended up adopting a position where he could clamp the bottle with his useless spindly arms from under the poncho and twist the lid with his mouth. Sadly, all he was managing to achieve was shredding the plastic lid. Hoping that his struggle had been noticed, George looked up at Remus with pleading eyes.

"Oh... okay. I'll erh... help you with that", Remus said hesitatingly whilst walking up to George.

Remus bent down, put his wand back in his pocket, and gripped the lid tightly before wrenching it off. The lid parted from the bottle with a long line of saliva bridging the gap between them. Both of Remus's hands were consequently covered in a healthy coating of George's frothy drool.

"Horry", George promptly apologized.

Remus wiped his hands against his trousers, "it's alright. I'll just wash my hands later."

George picked up the bottle with his mouth and tipped the whole container upside down. He gulped rhythmically as pint after pint flowed down his parched throat. As embarrassing as opening this bottle was, George couldn't deny how much better this purified water tasted. No wonder Dominic insisted on using a water cooler over drinking from a tap. The streams in the forest tasted like runoff from a sewage dump in comparison.

"Thirsty?", Remus enquired.

George dropped the empty bottle and belched, "hardan he."

Now that his thirst was satiated, he could finally get around to solving the communication problem. This required him to stick his snout back inside the leather bag and retrieve another item. After a brief pause where George was mostly shaking his head inside of the bag, his snout retreated out with a brown fluffy quill poking out of his mouth. He unravelled his snake-like tongue and released the quill but it did not fall to the ground. Instead, it floated in the air. George and the quill looked at each other before returning their gazes to Remus.

It turned out that the quick-quotes quill George had purchased at Diagon Alley had far more applications than he'd initially anticipated. For one, it could be highly useful when an individual is unable to communicate through traditional means. After physical contact, there was a brief pairing before the quill could read the user's surface thoughts and act on them accordingly. George was happy to see that being a human wasn't a limiting factor, the quill was able to understand even his messed-up mind. The quill flew down to the leather sack and gestured in a beckoning fashion to something inside. A moment later and a floating notebook glided out of the sack to a company the quill.

Under George's guidance, the quill immediately started writing onto the first page of the notepad. It wrote a few sentences before piercing the page with the nib. Whilst impaled on the paper, the quill tore off the page and floated over to Remus. The werewolf pulled the page off the quill and read the following.

"Sorry about that, It's hard to talk without lips and I was spitting feathers after my transformation. I would have given you more warning, but I'd run out of time.

As you can already tell, I am completely sound of mind, hence why I'm capable of controlling the quill. Although my appearance may suggest otherwise, I am still the same old George. If you have any questions, just ask away."

After reading the message, Remus appeared to be at a loss for words. George, seeing Remus in such a befuddled state, chuckled once again. He couldn't help it, that look of bewilderment was so amusing. He'd only been seen by his patron before, and there was never a reaction like this. If it wasn't for the extreme danger it would put him in, George would have considered exposing his true self to others just to see the look on their faces.

Whilst Remus was trying to string a sentence together, George felt ready to get up off the floor. Being crammed inside that tiny child's body for a month at a time really crushed his spine. All that joint cracking in the mornings only relieved a minute of the permanent discomfort he was perpetually in. Now he could actually stretch to the full extent of his potential. George unsteadily pushed off the ground with his feet and almost instantly hit his head on the ceiling. He must have been going through a bit of a growth spurt since he was easily over six inches taller than last month.

It was quite nauseating going from being one foot shorter than Remus to over a foot taller. The change in perspective was always a little disorientating at first and the extra height only made it worse. Also, the webbing around George's arms felt thicker than before, his tail was easily a foot longer, and the spikes on his back were larger. Perhaps he was getting towards his adolescents. He would have to keep a record of the next transformation at Hogwarts and see if the growth was continuing to accelerate.

Remus stared up at the abomination before him and finally asked, "what are you, George?"

That was sort of rude, but reasonable nonetheless. It was a good question for George because he could be one hundred per cent honest with his answer. No lying or exaggerating is necessary. The quill looked back in George's direction, and the notepad flew over.

You are reading story Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon at novel35.com

Then the quill wrote on the next page on the notepad, "I don't have any idea what I am. As far as I am aware, I'm one of a kind."

That question had been haunting George for his entire life, his greatest pastime is contemplating his own scaly existence. All he knew about himself was, he was turning less human over time and his patron definitely had something to do with it. Since his patron was a little trigger-happy with deleting George's memories, it was hard to paint a solid picture of his childhood, but he did have faint memories of being almost completely human as a toddler. Then the 'treatments' began, and the remains of his humanity slowly faded away. Currently, he was some sort of lizard-man hybrid, but that probably wouldn't last for much longer.

George's best guess was that his patron was trying to play god for some sick nonsensical reason and he was merely a victim. God knew what his patron intended him to become, or what was the purpose of the experiments in the first place. George knew he wasn't the first, take poor Daniel for example, and he was not going to be the last.

On a limb, the quill wrote, "do you have any idea what I am?"

Remus started walking around George whilst rubbing his bristly chin in contemplation.

He did an entire loop around George before saying, "I've studied all manner of dark curses and blood ailments and nothing I've seen matches your condition. Can you explain the circumstances that result in this form?"

George nodded his scaly head and made the quill write, "over a month, my human body's core temperature heats up and dark purple bruises begin to form. Once the bruises start to bleed and my eyes turn red, I have to transform into... this.

After a few minutes of changing, I can turn back to my human self for another month. Then the cycle repeats itself."

Although everything George just said was technically true, he missed out one or two important details. The most significant detail was that this form was his natural state of being. George had only been a real human for the past year, before that he was living with his patron as this monster. If George didn't have his 'medicine', he would look this ugly all the time. Obviously, Remus must not be privy to this information. George could imagine that it was much easier to empathize with a boy turning into a monster, rather than a monster turning into a boy.

Remus read everything the quill wrote and he began to rub his eyes, "none of this adds up. It's like you suffer with half a dozen blood curses at the same time, but that would have killed you years ago. How long have you had this condition."

The quill wrote, "since I can remember. At least for six or seven years."

Remus shook his head, "then, I'm sorry but I can't help you, George. What you're suffering with is some sort of unique blood malediction I have never heard of before. Perhaps Professor Dumbledore..."

"NO!", George bellowed.

Remus took a few steps back and automatically reached for his wand. George admonished himself internally, he had gotten too emotional after hearing that scary name again. Now he'd put Remus back on guard over nothing.

George controlled the quill to fly over to Remus's retreated position and write, "I'm sorry, but you made me a promise. No one must know. You can't go back on your word, no matter what."

Remus relaxed a little and re-sheathed his wand, "okay, George. But all I wanted to offer was some support. I might not be able to help you, but I know others who could."

The quill wrote, "can you be there for me if I need you?"

Remus read the note and didn't hesitate to answer, "of course, I can."

Then the quill retorted, "then that will be enough."

Remus looked towards the ground, "you are putting me in a difficult spot, George. This condition of yours... it's a lot to ask of me."

This was always the risk with telling someone a secret, you never truly knew if they would keep it. George was a firm believer in the best secrets being the ones only one person knows. Nevertheless, he still felt good about showing Remus his scaly skin. That's because of one reason, the werewolf's soul. George had many memories of Remus, and one consistency in all of his actions was his sense of selflessness. He'd been through hell and back whilst maintaining a pure heart, a feet few in this world could equal. Therefore, George only had to write four magic words to ensure his secret remained concealed.

The quill wrote, "please, Mr Lupin. I need your help."

The Remus George knew could never say no to a friend in need, especially if it's a child. And as George expected, the werewolf looked back up at him with a clear conviction glistening in his eyes.

Remus took a deep breath before saying, "alright then. We'll do it your way. Who am I to say how you should live your life? But if you are committed to keeping this a secret, you're going to have to listen to me. First of all..."

From that point onwards, the negotiation went quite smoothly. Instead of Remus reporting all of George's suspicious behaviour to Dumbledore, now he'll keep his mouth shut and lend a helping hand when possible. On top of that, George now had an alibi for knowing the location of the Shrieking Shack because Remus had kindly drawn him a map. He also got all sorts of useful tips and tricks for avoiding detection from the students and staff at Hogwarts, the Marauder's Map even got mentioned. The only downside was the fact that George had to send him a letter from Hogwarts each month to update Remus on his condition.

The werewolf and lizard monster talked casually for about half an hour before George felt ready to turn back into a human. He had worked out all the aches and pains, and Dominic could be back at any minute. Jumping back into that tiny boy skin suit was never a fun process, it was like willingly wearing a suffocating straitjacket. George hid the retrieval of his medication under his poncho and swallowed it whilst Remus was looking the other way. A moment later and he was overwhelmed with a crushing sensation like he was ten miles under the ocean.

Under Remus's scrutiny, it took around five painfully slow minutes for George to be forced back into his human form. Once he put his clothes back on, it was just a matter of waiting for his foster father to arrive. Remus very kindly offered him some chocolate claiming it would make him feel better, and you know what, it actually did. None of George's future memories about Remus were false, he was genuinely a good person. That gave George all the more reason to ensure his patron never knew about this chat, Remus didn't deserve to be dragged under the bus with him.

George went home with Dominic feeling like the operation had been a complete success. With Remus turning from an obstacle to an ally, George had metaphorically turned some of the most disgusting lemons into the finest-tasting lemonade the world had to offer. The future was bright, and he was looking forward to tomorrow. Hogwarts better be ready because a new monster was on its way.

You can find story with these keywords: Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon, Read Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon, Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon novel, Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon book, Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon story, Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon full, Harry Potter and the Fractured Dragon Latest Chapter