I woke up with a bright light shining into my eyes and a myriad of voices blending into one as pain was all I could feel, save for the cold that felt all-encompassing. I was naked and submerged in something - or that was how it felt.
"Someone go ahead and give Poppy a heads-up."
"Who would do something like this to a first year?"
"We can discuss that later. First, let's get him down from there."
"Later? I want those involved expelled immediately!"
"Calm down, Filius. We'll get to the bottom of this..."
"Calm down? Someone capable of doing this deserves to get thrown into Azkaban, Albus! I do not need your platitudes!"
"I found his extended pouch... it's ruined."
"Azkaban! I'll tell you I won't rest until someone gets thrown into Azkaban for this!"
"This doesn't look good, Albus..."
"I know, Minerva. Young Macnair will want answers, too. Has Aurora been informed? He should have been at Astronomy right now, correct?"
"I sent an elf to her a minute ago."
"Where are the contents of his pouch, Minerva?"
"They... weren't there, Filius."
At that point, a slight breeze told me I was floating while soft fabric covered my pain-wrecked body. I tried opening my eyes, but they wouldn't listen. All I knew is that after I passed out from the spell that was likely 'Stupefy', somehow the headmaster, Professor Flitwick, and Professor McGonagall found me sometime around our first Astronomy lesson with the Hufflepuffs.
"Put him down," the stern voice of who I think was Madam Pomfrey, the resident mediwitch of Hogwarts, ordered in a commanding tone.
A few sensations other than pain started pouring through my body, and I felt my face once more. It hurt terribly, so I wouldn't yet call it an improvement.
"Burns I can treat, the hair I can have grown back, the bones I can mend, but... someone cast Crucio on the poor boy. The nerves in his left hand will need months to recover," Madam Pomfrey said after a prolonged period of silence, and I knew why the pain I felt was so overwhelming.
"Gather every Slytherin student for me! No, get all students! And have them bring their wands! I want to know who had the audacity to cast an unforgivable curse in this school! And long enough to leave behind nerve damage, too!"
Nobody stood up or moved to do anything, and I wondered what happened to stop Professor Flitwick's outrage.
"We can't. It would tear this school apart, Filius..."
"Are you joking?! Someone cast an unforgivable curse on a first year!"
"And they probably used a secondary wand to do it. We'll never find them."
"So we do nothing? Someone carved the words 'blood traitor' into his stomach with a dark curse and destroyed all his belongings! And I feel the need to say it again: They tortured him with Crucio and burned him!"
'So... my wand and my mother's notes are gone? Fuck, her telescope was in the bag, too... and the bag itself. Fuck!'
My thoughts gained an eery clarity as it tried its best to stop me from feeling any more pain.
"I will ask the portraits and the ghosts to see if they saw anything," the headmaster conceded with a heavy voice and it really made me wonder why he was so calm about all of this.
'Didn't he want me to be his backup plan for the prophecy? Is he not afraid of losing me to the dark side if this remains unresolved? Is he counting on it? Did he instigate it? For what purpose? Shit, the pain is still too much to think straight.'
"I'll put him to sleep for a full day while I try to get rid of the dark magic in that carving and the eye. I suggest you three find out what to do somewhere else."
And with that declaration, I was force-fed a nasty tasting potion and was out cold once more. "I'll contact St Mungo's to get someone from the permanent spell damage ward here."
The headmaster almost too eagerly countered, "Hold that thought and see what happens in the morning. His body is already-"
-----
In my dreamless sleep, a bunch of stuff happened. Flitwick, undeterred by Dumbledore's placating words, called in every Ravenclaw student and had them present their wands that very night.
And while he may have found a student that was training in particularly dark curses, nobody from his house had a wand that cast any of the curses that were used on me.
After that little exercise in futility, Flitwick tried all manner of spells to summon my belongings. But all he managed to conjure up were scraps and ashes as well as half of a broken wand that only increased his fury.
So when Dumbledore told him at breakfast the next day that nothing more could be done since the portraits were spelled to not see anything and no ghosts had been present, Flitwick contacted the auror department - and I could only assume - much to Dumbledore's displeasure.
Professor Snape on his end watched his smug godson all three meals that day, almost certain that Draco was behind it. Yet, despite his aversion to bullying - which was a cute way of calling my assault and what he lived through with the four marauders - he merely contacted his friend Lucius Malfoy to prepare for any potential fall out this might bring.
And then there were Professor Sprout and Professor McGonagall who both did... nothing. Both of them trusted the powers that be to do what was needed, though Professor McGonagall did see the unease in not only the Ravenclaws but also some of her lions during class for the first years that Wednesday afternoon.
As for Harry and the girls I was getting close to these days, they tried to get more information out of Flitwick and the other teachers but only learned that something happened to me that required me to rest in the infirmary and they couldn't see me until I was out or Madam Pomfrey learned more about my condition.
-----
"I'm afraid you have some new scars, Mister Macnair."
I slowly came to and was greatly relieved to feel a lot less pain than before.
"There's some juice and something light to eat to your right. I'll be back in a few minutes."
My eyes still wouldn't obey me and stayed closed as a raspy groan escaped my lips. With my right hand I slowly tried to feel my face and the rest of my body only to find unblemished skin among the shallow ridges of the scar over my nose that has always been there. Everything seemed fine except for an eyepatch over my left eye.
My hand slowly moved down toward my stomach where I remembered Flitwick mentioning something carved into it. That section was heavily bandaged so I didn't feel anything and much to my relief, my manly tools a little further down were fully intact.
Whoever attacked me at least left my manhood untouched, not that it lessened the boiling anger that started to bubble up inside me. And it only increased once I felt my left hand restrained by something and all I could feel was a stinging tingle as my entire left arm was wrapped up in something hard and unyielding.
'Did someone try to accuse Moody of having a bastard son? Is that why they took a limb and an eye from me?' I thought in jest, trying to lighten my own mood but the anger quickly took over again.
My Occlumency training was straining against this rage as best as it could, but it was coming to its limits. A cold glass of apple juice, courtesy of the elves who knew I disliked pumpkin juice, was doing the best it could to cool off my inner turmoil.
With a few deep breaths I tried to make sense of this attack that would have only happened during Voldemort's Hogwarts headmaster tenure in the last book of canon. But this particular attack left me questioning all I knew about canon Harry Potter, not that I wasn't already rethinking everything because Hogwarts started three years later.
Sure, it was a book for kids and Harry had lived through plenty bullying and abandonment... but outright violence against him had never happened when he was just minding his business while at Hogwarts. Well, if we discount the massive battle at the very end and a fight against a basilisk in his second year, of course. And maybe the likely downplayed torture of Umbridge... okay, maybe Harry did receive his fair share of actual violence and I'm just trying to lament my own fate here. His suffering still had a different flavor, though.
'So who was it then? Was Quirrel ordered to do it by the parasite in his head after he saw me? He did torture even my loyal grandfather if Patrick's words are to be believed. And Voldemort isn't entirely sane either with his soul ripped to pieces to begin with. But in canon, he didn't even touch Harry Potter, the one who was his actual downfall because he had his eyes on the prize: the philosopher's stone.'
I took another sip of juice and sighed tiredly.
'Malfoy and his gang? But I merely escaped them after Charms. Would they escalate this shit all on their own just because they are three years older than canon and therefore more willing to resort to cruelty? Or did Dumbledore have his hand in it once more?'
'But to what end? Did he need me angry? Vulnerable? What is it? My mom's notes? Did they contain some kind of hidden code or something? That makes no sense. So, was it just brats from Slytherin who disliked me so much that they actually cast a Crucio at me? For what? Hanging out with Hermione? Being my mother's son?'
"You haven't eaten yet? The elf told me you'd like it."
I finally managed to open my one free eye and looked to my right. Fluffy waffles were staring at me with a few peeled and cut fruit slices next to it. Light food indeed.
I gingerly reached out to grab a pear slice and merely listened on as Madam Pomfrey described my bodily state.
"Your left eye will be fine in no time. But in the short term, you'll likely have trouble focusing with it after I take off the eyepatch next week. There's also a nasty scar running down that side of your face that I'll be able to heal in a few more weeks. You'll have to cut your hair to your preferred style because I had to let it grow out with a potion after treating some burns. Someone saw fit to burn off your hair rather carelessly, as macabre as it sounds. Your stomach's skin will heal faster than your face, but I still left it bandaged to ensure it will heal as fast and cleanly as possible. There's a chance the skin will read 'blood traitor' for quite some time as the cuts were rather deep."
I let that sink in for a moment, aware that it wasn't all, and wondered how cruel you'd have to be to burn someone that you've already carved words into and nearly blinded while they were unconcious.
Nobody I wanted to stay in the same school with unprotected. That much was certain.
"Now, your limbs are what truly concerns me. I wanted to have you admitted to St Mungo's spell damage ward, but the headmaster wanted to wait until you woke up to speak with you about the options you have. Since he is your guardian, I had to listen to his orders," Madam Pomfrey explained, clearly annoyed at the headmaster's decision. "I'm capable, of course, but I do not have the needed specialisation to deal with nerve damage infliced by the torture curse."
"Crucio? How many of my attackers were sent to Azkaban?"
Madam Pomfrey's lips thinned even more than they usually would, and she stayed silent until someone else broke the quiet, oppressive air hanging in the room.
"I'm afraid there were no witnesses to the crime, Mister Macnair," an aged voice stated, and I immediately reigned in all my anger and rage to the best of my abilities.
Dumbledore was here.
"How is that possible in a castle filled with ghosts, portraits, and invisible house elves?"
"How indeed?" Dumbledore whispered, and I immediately lost my grasp over my Occlumency. Did that asshole actually try to gaslight me into thinking that this was my fault somehow?
"So it was my fault for wandering the school without supervision??" I bit out and saw Pomfrey frown as well.
"Of course not," Dumbledore countered with a sad smile that I sorely wanted to punch. "You were in the wrong place at the wrong time and encountered true evil."
"The orphanage was rough, but even there, you'd punch each other face to face or put the others' clothes in a bucket of piss... if I get jumped and you're not even trying to find out who cast a spell that would earn you a lifetime subscription to Dementor Central... why am I still here?"
"It's not that easy, boy," Dumbledore said with a wry smile, and I felt him probing my mental defenses as we made eye contact.
All my anger and the fact that the number one target of all my revenge fantasies was talking to me face to face for the first time made it incredibly hard to focus my attention on what I wanted to do: Show him a memory of me seeing the red spell coming toward me as I dodged and putting half of Quirrel's face on a reflection seen in the corner of my eyes. A minor change to my actual memories, and I hoped enough to make Dumbledore think I thought Quirrel was the culprit.
I held no illusions that my attempts at revenge on the true culprits, whoever they may be, would be hidden from him forever, but I needed some diversion regardless.
"Actually, I think you make it too easy on yourself, headmaster," a cold voice interrupted my thoughts.
"Casting Crucio on a mere child. The fact that you aren't rounding up every single student and staff member for a round of Veritaserum interrogation is telling me that you don't want them to be found. Why is that, headmaster?"
Dumbledore looked back in surprise before his eyes gained a certain glint for a moment.
"I assure you, Amelia, I detest such a thing happening on my watch more than you may realise."
"I'm here in my role as a ministry official on business. Please address me as Director Bones," Amelia Bones interrupted before the headmaster could speak further.
"Of course, director. To what do we owe this unannounced visit?"
Amelia's already scrunched up face soured even more as she openly scowled at Dumbledore.
"One of your staff members saw reason and contacted me to inform me of this heinous crime, of course. Auror Jenkins and Scrimgeour are already scouring the crime scene for magical residue."
Dumbledore frowned, too, retorting, "This is a school for learning magic. You will find all manner of magical imprints everywhere. It won't mean that they are the culprits."
"An unforgivable has been cast and a wand snapped. Even if we find the magic of a hundred students, I would still interrogate them all," Amelia countered and the two stared at each other for a moment before Dumbledore sighed, wished me a speedy recovery and fucked off to meddle somewhere else.
"How are you?" Amelia asked with a rather soft voice that I wasn't expecting, and I think it showed. "You already know your mother and I were friends... you told Susan, after all. It stands to reason that I would care for your well-being."
"I'm sorry, Director Bones. Talking a big game to a 14 year old girl is much different from talking to a respected figure such as yourself..."
Amelia walked forward to sit next to me while wandlessly making the plate with the waffles float in front of me.
"Eat. You need it to regain your strength," she ordered. "Now tell me, how do you truly feel?"
I took a waffle, slowly ate a bite, and closed my uninjured eye.
"...angry."
Amelia hummed and nodded.
"Makes sense. What about pain? Is it manageable?"
"Yeah, Madam Pomfrey did a fine job."
"Thanks, brat," the mediwitch in question scoffed as she placed two potion bottles on the nightstand. "For after you've finished eating. Blue first, green second."
Amelia watched the witch walk away again, tending to a pregnant N.E.W.T. level witch on the other side of the infirmary.
"Can you tell me anything that might help us find who did this?"
I thought for a moment, judging in my head how likely it was for the aurors to find the culprit and get actual justice for me, the orphan of death eaters.
... it wouldn't hurt if they found them and couldn't punish them. All I needed to make sure would be that nobody was aware that I knew who they were for when I took my revenge.
"If an extended pouch is destroyed, do the contents get expelled, or are they lost to the void?"
"Lost to the void? Hmm, what a curious expression... no, they get expelled rather explosively," Madam Bones answered.
"In that case, my pouch was destroyed, and I had various unique things inside it. These items could be with my assailant or assailants."
"So you don't know who or how many attacked you?"
"Sadly not," I answered with a shake of my head.
"Hmm, according to Madam Pomfrey, a minimum of two wizards or witches caused your wounds. Have you made any enemies recently?"
"Nothing except for minor disagreements among students. Nothing that would warrant such a serious assault."
Amelia once more hummed thoughtfully.
We stayed like that for a moment as I finished the waffles. Eventually, Amelia asked, "Do you want to know more about your mother?"
Seeing as she wanted to get my minds of things and brought up a topic I would gladly listen to, I gained a warm smile and nodded in reply.