Chapter Text
Harry James Potter (of Number Four Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey) was a very lonely boy. He did not have any friends at school, due in part to his innate shyness, but mostly because his cousin Dudley would beat up any children that would try to make friends with him. Harry had not tried too hard to connect with the rest of the kids in his class after the first time his cousin had given Harry a black eye and then smashed the toy trucks of the boy who had dared to ask him to play.
Harry didn't want other people to hurt because of him, and he didn't want to get hurt because of other people's kindness. It was easier to avoid the conflict altogether. So Harry Potter would spend most of his free school time hiding in the library, or behind the kitchen building. It smelled pretty bad back there because of the dumpsters, but was also mostly free of other people, so Harry would make do.
Sometimes there would be mice that scuttled around, looking for scraps. And once, there had been a grass snake that slithered in from the empty lot next door to snatch up a fat little gray mouse that was too distracted by a glob of peanut butter on the ground to notice the predator slinking silently towards it. Harry watched with wide green eyes as the snake reared up a few inches before snapping down on the hapless mouse in a lightning quick strike.
“Wow.” He whispered, hugging his knees where he sat on an old milk crate, pushed up against the side of the building. “You're so fast.”
The snake was busy swallowing the mouse, but turned its dark eyes on Harry in an unnerving fashion, as if he was next to be snatched up and gobbled down in a single bite.
They stared at each other for a few moments, as the snake continued to swallow the mouse until it was able to fully close its mouth and then it bobbed its shiny green head at Harry and hissed.
“Thank you, human, though the rodent was no challenge. Tasty morsel, in any case.”
Harry just stared at it, mouth gaping, until the snake bobbed again and slithered away back to the empty lot, a noticeable lump along its sleek body. Harry stared after it, unblinking, until he could no longer see the snake. He wondered if he had imagined the whole thing, if his hungry stomach was playing tricks on his mind. Dudley had taken his lunch tray that day, pushing him down for good measure. He'd not had time to eat breakfast after cooking it for his relatives and cleaning the dishes while they ate, before it was time to leave for school. Yeah, it was probably just the hunger playing tricks.
A bell rang above his head, making Harry jump. Lunch was over, it was time to get back to class. It was the last week of school before the summer holidays, which Harry did not really care for. Not that he particularly liked school either, but it at least got him away from the Dursleys for a few hours of the day.
He still had to deal with Dudley, yes, but he'd gotten quite good at avoiding the larger boy. When summer came, he'd have nowhere to really hide. Not to mention the increase in chores he would be expected to take up, so that he would not be a lazy, good for nothing burden, as his Uncle Vernon was fond of calling him. Along with Boy and Freak.
Harry trudged his way back to class, putting the snake incident to the back of his mind. It was where he kept the rest of weird, freakish, things that tended to happen to him. The ones that made his Aunt Petunia purse her lips into a thin, angry line and his Uncle turn varying shades of puce.
The things that usually ended with him in his cupboard for extended periods of time with minimal food and water.
Yes, Harry would forget about the snake. Besides, how many talking snakes could there really be in the world anyway? He doubted he'd come across any more.
~~~~~~~>
With summer came the expected increased workload. Harry was turning eight in a few weeks, which Aunt Petunia took to mean he could handle all the gardening on his own now. So while Dudley laid about, eating ice lollies and playing games with his friends, Harry spent hours in the hot sun, weeding and pruning and planting and whatever else his aunt told him to do.
It was hard work and his hands soon got blisters and splinters from the tools. He'd not been able to find any gloves in the shed. The hurts usually healed up quickly enough, though, sometimes even overnight. Which was another freakish thing he never mentioned to his aunt. Even though it was freaky healing, it was still freaky. Harry still remembered the punishment he'd gotten for turning his teacher's hair blue, though how his aunt knew he'd been the one to accidentally do that, he'd never know. Harry had just been thinking that Mrs. Jones had been wearing way too much makeup that day and looked kind of like a clown, that all she needed was a funny wig, and suddenly her hair had burst into a vibrant sapphire perm.
The class had giggled loudly as Mrs. Jones scrambled for a mirror in confusion. Dudley had wasted no time telling his mother about the incident, laughing between words and not noticing the way Aunt Petunia’s mouth got thinner and her eyes trained sharply on Harry, anger in every line of her being.
Yeah, that had been a bad few weeks. Harry did not want a repeat of it.
So he did his work and didn't complain about the heat or the blisters that healed quicker than normal. He snuck drinks from the hose when he could and on his birthday, just for once, he even crept into the empty kitchen and stole one of Dudley's ice lollies.
He slurped it quickly, in the bushes by the back fence. It was grape flavored, cold, and wonderful. Harry hummed happy birthday to himself while he carefully buried the wooden stick in the soil of the hydrangea bushes he was supposed to be pruning.
It was a sweltering day out, so Dudley would most likely stay inside the cool of the house and not bother Harry while he worked. Which was more than fine with him. Between the lifted lolly and presumed solitude, it was shaping up to be one of his better birthdays.
He didn't even care when a snake slithered in through a crack in the boards of the back fence. It was a grass snake again, a different one, though how he knew that Harry had no clue.
Feeling a bit adventurous after his successful theft, Harry bent forward a little and whispered a greeting at the serpent now basking in the grass by the bushes.
“Hullo there, Mr. Snake.”
The snake trained its beady eyes on Harry, lifting its head a couple inches off the grass and tasting the air with a bright red flick of tongue. Harry was starting to feel a little foolish, sitting there on his knees in the dirt, talking to a snake, when it spoke back.
“Hello, human, it has been a long time since I, or my kin, have spoken with one of your kind.
Harry grinned, bending down closer so that he was nearly lying on the grass with the snake.
“Why? Do you not like talking to people?” he asked, curious. The snake hissed a negative, bobbing its green head a little and tasting the air again.
“No, human. Not many know our language, or care to learn.”
“My name is Harry.” he told the snake, who he was pretty sure was male, “Do you mean I'm speaking a different language right now? It sounds like English to me.”
The snake bobbed its head again, hissing, in what Harry was sure was a laughing kind of way.
“You are a special hatchling, human-Harry. It would be wise to use this gift.”
“Just Harry, please,” he said, then impulsively, “Can I pet you?”
The Dursleys didn't have pets, unless you counted the goldfish Dudley killed because he forgot to feed them. Or his Aunt Marge’s bulldogs that she let chase Harry around the yard and up the tree to avoid the vicious snapping teeth while the rest of the family laughed.
Harry did not count those.
The snake flicked his tongue in and out a few times before bobbing his head in a gracious manner.
“Very well, human-just-Harry. I will allow the privilege, though not too hard.”
Harry nodded eagerly, not bothering to correct the snake on his name again, lest he end up with an even longer title, and lowered himself fully onto the ground.
He carefully reached out and ran tentative fingers along the smooth scales of the snake’s back. It was warm from the sun and dry. The snake lowered his head back to the grass and closed its eyes while Harry continued to run a gentle hand down its body, over and over. The snake hissed in a contented fashion and Harry grinned harder.
This was definitely the best birthday he’d ever had.
~~~~~~~>
The summer continued in much the same fashion for the next couple weeks. Harry cooked breakfast for his aunt and uncle while Dudley slept in, sneaking bites of scrambled eggs or beans as he did so. Next, whatever inside chores his aunt decided he needed to do before sending him out to garden. Harry didn’t mind the gardening so much anymore. His hands had toughened a bit so he no longer got blisters from the tools, and there really wasn’t that much upkeep that needed doing once he’d got the bulk of the pre-summer weeding done. Not that he told his aunt as much. No, he spent most of his outside time pretending to prune the bushes and manage the grass, when really he was talking to whichever snake had shown up that day.
Word seemed to have spread that he could, and enjoyed, talking to snakes. So every day one or two would show up for a chat, or a good petting in the sun. It was mostly grass snakes, though a couple sleek vipers had come by. Harry had been extra polite to them, though they promised not to bite, hissing laughs at his nervous pats down their spotted sides.
One time there had even been a large, albino python, who said his name was Monty with a long-suffering, hissing sigh. He had escaped from his humans for the afternoon to see what all the fuss was about: apparently, he was acquaintances with the snake that Harry had met on his birthday. Monty also seemed to like escaping his humans often.
“To keep them alert,” he hissed to Harry, as the boy ran a hand down his long pale body. “Plus, they always feed me the good mice when I show up again.” Harry snickered as Monty winked a pink eye at him.
Harry figured Monty didn't really mind his humans so much, but did like to stretch his scales every once in a while.
Monty was the only snake Harry had met so far with a name. Snakes didn’t really seem to need them, relying more on scent to tell others apart, or just not caring too much either way. The grass snake from Harry’s birthday, though, did consent to let Harry name him, since he kept coming back for chats (and pets). It had taken nearly a whole afternoon, but they finally settled on Alex. Alex the snake seemed to like how the ‘x’ sounded at the end of the name.
The snakes mostly talked about the best places to get mice or sunbathe or where the best spot for nesting was. Harry learned a lot more than he wanted to about serpent mating rituals and how to tell the strongest males and more fertile females than he ever really wanted to. Monty, however, mostly talked to him about Doctor Who; his humans apparently had the tapes and watched them on a loop.
Sometimes he had to shoo the snakes away, if his aunt came to check on his work, or Dudley and his smaller-than-Dudley-but-still-bigger-than-Harry friends came to taunt him. On one occasion, one of the viper ladies offered to bite him for Harry, “Though no promises on eating the lump, I doubt there is any snake big enough for that task.”
Harry had politely declined, though admittedly with a bit of hesitation. Dudley had lumbered back into the house after a few minutes anyway, yelling for ice cream and fizzy drinks.
It was towards the tail end of August that a different kind of snake showed up. It was just after noon, Harry having been banished to the garden about an hour ago to hang up the laundry, trim the hedges, and weed the roses. School would be starting up again soon, and Aunt Petunia wanted to get as much work out of Harry as she could. He’d snuck a piece of buttered toast with his bits of egg that morning, so he was feeling pretty good when the dark grey and red-spotted serpent slithered over the grass straight at Harry.
The snake stopped about a few paces from the laundry basket, where Harry was pulling out wet sheets to hang up to dry.
“Hello, pretty,” he greeted, stretching as far he could to clip the fabric to the line. The snake was pretty. Not just a dark grey as he’d thought at first glance, but also a dark green, with red and orange speckles like fire sparks across her scales. He’d never seen a snake like her before, not in his aunt’s yard, nor the book he’d checked out from the library and hidden under the cot in his cupboard.
It was definitely a her, her swollen belly looking like an overstuffed sausage. It was a wonder she could move at all, let alone as smooth and swiftly as she’d crossed the grass. Harry quickly finished pinning up the last sheet and knelt down on the warm grass in front of her.
“Little wizard, I require your assistance.” She had a regal sounding hiss, but Harry could hear the weariness in it.
Harry stared at the very pregnant serpent. She had red and orange eyes, slitted in either tiredness or pain, or just because the sun seemed to be extra bright that day, Harry didn’t know.
“Wizard? What--?” Harry stuttered. The snake glared at him.
“Yes, little wizard. You reek of magic, do not think you can hide it from one such as I.”
Harry sniffed himself in what he hoped was a surreptitious manner, but knew it fell far short.
“Magic? Is that what I can do? Magic is real?”
The snake hissed at him in exasperation, showing a very sharp set of fangs as she did so. Harry fought the urge to move the laundry basket between them.
“Of course, what did you think it was? Have you not started your training? This whole area stinks of magic.” Harry continued to stare at her for a moment; she had risen as far up as her swollen midsection would allow and was glaring again, if she’d even stopped in the first place.
“Erm, right. How-- How can I help you then?” he asked, hoping to lessen her glare, or at least his chances of getting bitten by those deadly looking fangs.
“As you can see, little wizard,” she bobbed her dark head at her belly, “I am very close to my time.”
Harry gulped, afraid he knew where this was going.
“Ah, well, the grass snakes say the creek has some nice soft dirt to dig a nest into,” he said, pointing in the direction of the little park the creek ran through, a block or so over. “Would you like me to carry you over there?” He could probably make it there and back without his aunt noticing; it was time for her stories right about now.
The snake hissed a sharp negative.
“No. I need a fire nest, not a water nest.”
“Fire?!” Harry nearly yelped, covering his mouth a second later, but fortunately no noises emerged from the house. He stared back at the snake, who bobbed her head.
“Fire. Wizard fire." She gave a pained hiss. “Quickly! Or my brood and I shall perish.”
Harry jumped up at her command, grabbing at his mess of black hair in panic. Fire? He didn’t know how to make fire! He didn’t even know that what he had was magic until five minutes ago, when the snake told him. Which, in hindsight, was a pretty big giveaway.
“Little wizard!"
“Right! Fire, just a second, I’ll be right back!” Harry rushed to the little shed, looking around frantically.
There! Under a nearly empty bag of fertilizer was a large, metal wash basin. Harry pulled it out, grabbed a bag of lawn clippings that he’d planned to drag to the curb the next morning, and emptied the bag’s contents into the basin for some cushioning and a fuel source.
“Is this okay?” he asked after he had lugged the big basin back out to the snake. She stretched her dark head up over the rim and glared down at the bed of dead plants.
“Yes, fine,” she hissed. “If you would be so kind, lift me inside--carefully--and then start the fire.” Harry hesitated a moment, grabbing his hair again, probably leaving behind grass clippings.
“Are you sure it won’t hurt you?”
Harry had not known it was possible for snakes to roll their eyes, “Right. Magic.”
He knelt down and carefully scooped up the heavy serpent, mindful of the soft bulges. She was really heavy for his underfed, eight year old arms, but he managed it with as much dignity as he could. She slithered her dark swollen body onto the soft bed of grass and stared up at him.
“Good. Now the fire, little wizard.”
Harry gulped again, and not knowing what else to do, held his hands over the basin and thought really hard about heat and flames and that one time Dudley had knocked the frying pan out of Harry’s hand and splashed grease all over the hob and Harry’s shoulder. He remembered the burning smell and the fear and the anger that had surged through him.
FWOOSH.
The grass in the basin lit up in a bright burst of orange and red flames. Harry fell back with a hiss, checking his hands, but they were fine. He looked back at the basin; the fire was bright, but he could see a dark shape wriggling in it.
He didn’t hear any cries of pain or screams for help, so he figured she was fine. He watched the fire and the smoke rising from it, hoping that the neighbors wouldn’t notice and his aunt wouldn’t feel the need to suddenly come check on him and find Harry starting fires like the little freak he was. He didn’t really want to imagine what the punishment for that would be. Harry hugged his middle, feeling the ribs under the too big shirt and the bruise where Dudley had kicked him as he was coming out of his cupboard that morning. He hadn’t been expecting his cousin to be up so early. Harry would need to pay closer attention.
He looked back at the basin. The fire seemed to be dying down, but also giving off purple, green, and blue sparks. Harry hoped that was normal for a magical fire serpent birth. He wondered if he should get anything for the snake and her babies. What did baby snakes eat? What did magic baby snakes eat? Before Harry could work himself into even more of a panic, the last of the flames died out, leaving only the occasional bright spark shooting out over the lip every now and then. Harry peered into it, being mindful of the hot metal.
The lady snake was coiled around a pile of pale ash colored eggs, looking relieved and much less like an overstuffed sausage. Harry grinned brightly.
“Congratulations!” he told her. “How many did you have?”
She hissed a contented sigh, eyes half lidded as she rested on her clutch. “Fifteen.”
Harry whistled, unsure if that was normal or not for her species, magical snakes not being covered in his library encyclopedia. She hissed her agreement, so he figured it was good.
“Do you need anything?” he asked.
“Privacy, and darkness if possible. It will be a few hours before they hatch.”
“That soon?” Magic sure sped things up, “I can put you guys in the shed, it’s nice and dark and no one but me ever goes in there. I can check on you again later.”
“Acceptable,” was her sleepy reply.
Harry carefully touched the basin, and finding it cool enough, began dragging it back to the little shed. It left a bit of a soot streak on the lawn, but a quick spray from the hose would fix that. Plus no one ever really came into the back anyway. Harry carefully maneuvered the basin into its previous corner, draping a spare bit of cloth over the top, just in case. He hissed a promise to be back in a few hours.
~~~~~~~>
The rest of the afternoon passed in a sort of slow haze. He finished up the pruning and weeding just as Aunt Petunia called for him to bring the laundry in. He did his best to wash the dirt and soot off his hands and arms before carefully unpinning the sheets and folding them into the basket. His aunt then had him hoover the stairs and mop the kitchen before allowing him a cheese sandwich and some tap water. He thanked her and went to clean the bathrooms before starting the dinner prep, which was mostly cutting the vegetables for roasting before his aunt booted him back outside to water the roses. He did so quickly so he could dash around back to check on the snakes before his uncle was due home.
Harry snuck into the shed, closing the door behind him and creeping quietly to the basin.
“Hullo?” he hissed quietly, not wanting to wake the babies if they were hatched.
“Little wizard,” she answered, serenely, “You arrived just in time, come look.”
Harry carefully lifted away the cloth. It was dim in the shed, but there was enough light filtering through a dirty window to see by. The mother snake was coiled loosely around her clutch of wriggling eggs. Harry watched, wide eyed, as little noses started poking through the thin, ash colored shells. The first one to flop out was a shockingly bright shade of green. It yawned, showing sharp needle teeth. It was so tiny and cute, Harry wanted to reach out and stroke its little jewel bright body with his finger.
“Careful, little wizard, that one is highly venomous and won’t know yet not to bite,” she chided, looking down at her baby with motherly pride.
The next one out was mostly ash colored, with eyes red as hot coals. There was another green one, though a shade darker and with a few red stripes circling its tail. Next came a couple with the same dark coloring as their mother, then three more ashy ones. An albino with bright blue eyes slipped out of its egg, along with two rust red snakes that started immediately racing each other around the soot lined basin, much to the amusement of their mother.
An orange and red spotted one was next, followed by a pitch black baby with eyes like cut onyx. Then a dark green with ash gray stripes down its entire length.
The last one took a while to emerge, and Harry feared the worst. The mother snake must have felt the same because she let out a relieved hiss when the egg finally started to wriggle and a dark nose struggled to poke through.
“Come on, little guy, you can do it,” Harry hissed encouragingly, as the tiny snake managed to poke his head through the opening and let gravity help with pulling him the rest of the way free from his soft prison.
This one was a green so dark it was almost black, with random swirls of purple scales up and down its length, like fireworks or constellations. The eyes, when they opened, were also purple, like amethysts. This one was secretly Harry’s favorite.
“Hi,” he hissed quietly at it, not sure if the snake could even comprehend him at such a young age. It yawned at him, showing off needle teeth and a purple forked tongue. Harry giggled.
“They are all so beautiful," he told the mother snake, smiling happily at her. “You’re very lucky.” He didn’t say anything about the ache in his own heart when he thought about the mother he never got a chance to know. Or the deep longing he had for a family to love, not one that treated him like dirt on their boots at best.
As she stared at him with her red and orange eyes, it almost seemed like they glowed with an inner fire. For all he knew, they really did. The little snakes were wriggling all over the bottom of the basin now, getting soot all over their egg-goopy bodies and mother. She didn’t seem to mind so much. The littlest one was just starting to get the hang of the slithering thing, wriggling determinedly up the line of his mother’s closest coil and following it to its logical conclusion to squirm right up under her jaw and curl up for what looked to be a good nap. Harry grinned, wishing he had a camera.
“You can stay as long as you need to,” Harry said, wanting to stay in the shed for the next eternity but knowing he’d need to get back to the house soon to help with dinner. “Do you need anything? Food? Water? Er... fire?”
“Just rest for now, little wizard. Perhaps tomorrow you can find me a nice mouse or toad.” Harry nodded, looking at the babies in various states of exhaustion already.
“And them?” She shook her head slightly, careful not to disturb the hatchling under her chin.
“The magic from the birthing fire will sustain them long enough.” Harry nodded again.
“Okay, I need to get back to the house now, I’ll see you tomorrow.” He waited for her hiss of approval before pulling the cloth back over the basin and wishing them a warm and safe night.
He hurried back into the house, with just enough time to wash up and finish helping with dinner. Harry had a feeling, this time next year, he might be in charge of the whole meal, like he was breakfast and the gardening. Even that thought wasn’t enough to keep the happy little grin off his face as he thought of the family of snakes. Though he had schooled his face into its normal impassive mask by the time the table was set, inside he felt truly warm for the first time he could ever remember.
~~~~~~~>
The next few days were hectic, what with snake care and dodging Aunt Petunia when she tried to give him even more chores. One afternoon he spent stuck with Mrs. Figg, from down the street, while his aunt took Dudley for some school shopping. Harry wished he could go back to Number Four and spend time with the snakes, but Mrs. Figg had roped him into looking at endless cat photo albums again. She did give him a stale cranberry scone to go with his weak tea, though, so that was nice.
The snakes were growing so fast; it had only been a few days and already they were big enough to wrap around his wrist twice. He knew this because the little dark green and purple one had slithered right into his hand when Harry had asked. Harry had tiny wrists, so that wasn’t really saying much, but with fifteen of them, plus the mother, they were quickly outgrowing the basin.
He’d managed to catch a couple toads at the creek that ran through the park down the street, for which the mother was very grateful. Though Harry knew she would have preferred a mouse, Aunt Petunia kept such a meticulous house that no mouse would dare step a paw within a mile of the place.
The snakes were also learning to talk very rapidly too. Harry liked to just sit there and listen to them hissing at each other, with their sibling bickering and boasting that one could definitely outrace the other, or bragging about who had the most venomous bite. Harry was almost roped into gathering up fifteen frogs, just to see who could kill the swiftest, before their mother settled them down with a few firm swipes of her tail.
Some of them let Harry pick them up, while others shied away; he didn’t press them any further. The little green and purple guy was always up for a cuddle. His mother even let Harry carry him around the shed (carefully cupped in his hands and wrapped once around his wrist) to show him all the weird human stuff in there. He was boundlessly curious about everything and asked endless questions about shovels (Why would you need a hole bigger than you can wriggle out for yourself?) and buckets (is this where you sleep?) and pruning shears (why not just bite the plants into submission?)
Harry was going to miss them when they left. He knew they couldn’t stay forever, as much as he’d love that. They had to move on to safer pastures, away from humans. The mother snake had told Harry a little about the wizard that she had escaped from; he was not a very nice man. He didn’t care for the animals in his charge. only about what profits he could eke out of them. Apparently, she didn’t even know what breed she was. She was already pregnant when she escaped, her instincts kicking in as she got closer to term to inform her that she needed some magic fire to complete the process with any hope of survival for her or her babies. It wouldn’t have been such a problem if she had stayed near other wizards; she could have snuck into a fireplace. But in her haste to escape, she’d become too separated from the magical world to find her way back in time.
“Then I came across a grass snake that mentioned a human child that talked to him regularly, and here we are. I was very fortunate to have found you. Snake language is very rare among wizard kind, not even my old keeper had it.”
Harry had sat rapt through the whole tale, little green/purple snoozing coiled warmly in his cupped palms.
“Wow," he hissed reverently, rubbing an absent thumb over his baby snake’s sleeping head. “I would never have been able to do that. Escape like that.”
“You underestimate your own strength, little wizard,” she hissed back, coiling tighter about her sleeping children.
She had been there nearly two weeks. School would be starting in two days, which meant they were no longer safe in the shed. Aunt Petunia might take it upon herself to do some gardening while Harry was away at school. The babies were big enough to travel, if the constant complaining about being stuck in the metal basin was anything to go by. They would be leaving in the morning and Harry did not know how he would be able to stand it. He clutched little green/purple close, savoring those last few moments they would have. He knew he would never see any of them again, knew it was safer for them away from people. But oh, how Harry wished he could turn into a snake himself and join them. Life would be so much simpler. He would never have to see the Dursleys again. Never be smacked over the head, or hit with a belt or denied food on a whim.
Harry knew a pipe dream when he saw one, though. He would just have to buck up and wish them all happy, long lives filled with fat mice and sunny rocks. Maybe Harry could learn to control this magic stuff and find his own escape. Yeah, he could do that. Nodding his head firmly, he carefully placed green/purple back amongst his brothers and sisters. He was filled with a new determination. He would get free of the Dursleys, find his escape, and maybe even find a new family at the end of it, too.
“Thank you,” he hissed, roughly wiping the tears away from under his glasses. She didn’t say anything, just bobbed her head in a little nod as he pulled the cloth over the basin for the last time.
He was done crying. It was time to start planning.
~~~~~~~>
The next morning, Harry rushed through making breakfast and his inside chores. Aunt Petunia didn’t say anything about it, so neither did Harry.
He headed outside, making a pretense of watering the roses while his aunt watched from the window. As soon as she left for her stories, Harry made his way to the shed. The hissing was so excited that it sounded like a leaky water heater. Harry peeked under the cloth at the family of snakes, all wriggling excitedly and staring up at Harry with their jewel eyes and hissing happy greetings. Harry felt his heart clench but forced a bright grin.
“Hey guys. You ready for the big day?” A chorus of affirmative, happy hisses floated up at him from the basin. “Okay, just like we planned. I’m going to drag you over to the back fence where there’s a nice gap and you guys are all gonna escape unseen. Free and clear, got it?”
“Yesss!”
“Okay.” Harry dropped the cloth before the hotness behind his eye turned into tears and started dragging the heavy basin out into the back garden.
It was a lot harder this time around, due to the sheer mass of snakes filling it, but he determinedly trudged on until he reached the hydrangea bushes that hid the snake hole. He slipped off the cloth and grinned weakly as the babies got their first real look at the sky. He was happy for them, he really was, but why did it have to hurt so much?
Mother snake started corralling her offspring out of the basin. A few were somewhat reluctant to leave the only home they had ever known, but she got them all out eventually. Strangely, little green/purple was the last one out. Harry would have thought he’d be the first to wriggle over the edge into freedom and a new world full of things to discover. But he paused when he touched down on the grass, his mother following him out. He kept looking from his nestmates huddled together under the bushes to Harry, kneeling on the grass and trying not to cry, before finally looking up at his mother.
He hissed out a confused noise that wasn’t any real word, but seemed to convey its meaning to his mother all the same. She dipped her head down to his level, hissing softly in a sad tone.
“Are you sure, little one?” she asked, and he nodded, amethyst eyes glinting in the sunlight.
Harry just kneeled there, confused, until she slithered smoothly over to him, rearing up high enough to look him in the eye as well.
“I must ask one last favor of you, little wizard.” Her voice was stern, commanding, like the first time she had spoken to him. Harry nodded, still confused.
“I ask that you take this little one, my littlest one, as your familiar. To keep with you forever more, to protect and be protected by, to share your life and magic and love.”
“Wha--” Harry stammered, not comprehending what was happening, feeling dangerously close to the tears that he’d promised himself he wouldn’t shed.
“Do you swear to do this, for me?” She paused, and a warmth drove past the sternness in her reptilian gaze. Harry looked from her, down to the little snake on the ground, and back, hardly daring to hope but finding it difficult to stop himself from doing so.
He nodded, the heart in his throat making it hard to speak.
“I swear,” he managed after a few moments. She leaned forward and rested the flat of her dark head against his. Harry felt the little snake slither over one of his hands on the ground and wind his way up under the sleeve of his oversized hand-me-down shirt, until he lay draped across Harry’s bony shoulders, feeling like the world’s warmest necklace. Mother snake pulled away, hissing a final goodbye to her smallest and the little wizard that saved her and her clutch from certain death.
“Goodbye,” Harry hissed after her, unable to stop a few tears from falling despite his vow. He and little green/purple watched the family of snakes disappear one by one through the fence, knowing they would never see them again but wishing them good fortune and long lives.
Harry brought up a hand to stroke his new familiar’s tiny scaly head as the last flick of dark tail disappeared.
“Come on, I’ll show you where I sleep," he said, standing up and grabbing the depressingly light basin to drag back to the shed. “And we’ll need to give you a name.”
Harry had been afraid to name any of the mother snake’s brood, fearing the pain it would cause when they left, but now? Now Harry didn’t have to worry about that. They were together forever, wizard and familiar, his first friend, his only real family now. They would make it out of here.
Together.