"I admit that you don't look like our son. But you are, Aldebaran."
"The awfulness of that name is a good reason for me not to be."
Mrs. Malfoy's eyes widened a little, and she leaned towards Harry where he sat on the bed in the hospital wing. "Do not be so disrespectful to me," she hissed. "I am your mother."
Harry folded his arms. Mrs. Malfoy was pretty intimidating, worse than Aunt Petunia had ever been. But that didn't matter. He wouldn't let it matter.
Draco Malfoy's eyes had gone very wide when Harry had hissed in Parseltongue at the dueling club. He had gone running from there as if his arse was on fire. Harry didn't mind admitting he had laughed about that.
But it had turned out that he'd gone to Floo his parents—where he had got access to a Floo, Harry didn't know, but he thought he could probably guess that it was Snape—and tell them that he thought Harry was his missing twin brother, who had apparently spoken in Parseltongue when he was little.
Then the Malfoy parents had shown up, and Harry had refused to listen. Sure, it was sad that apparently they'd had a kid who was kidnapped, but that didn't mean it was him.
"Ah, Mrs. Malfoy. I just heard. I think you are claiming that Mr. Potter is actually your son, Aldebaran Malfoy?"
Harry shivered at the sound of those names together. Really, it was just…ugh. But of course, it would probably be lower-class or something of the Malfoys to choose names for their children that people would actually want to be called.
"Yes, Headmaster." Mrs. Malfoy didn't turn a hair, just went on sitting there as if it was her right to stare at Harry. "We have every reason to believe so. He spoke in Parseltongue, and so did Draco's twin brother, who disappeared when he was just a few weeks old."
Professor Dumbledore walked over to join them. Harry looked at him gratefully. His eyes were twinkling, and he winked at Harry on the side of his face that was pointed away from Mrs. Malfoy. That must mean that he didn't believe a word of it, Harry thought. It was good to have the Headmaster on his side.
"Are you sure that your son spoke in Parseltongue, Mrs. Malfoy?" Dumbledore asked gently. "He would have been incredibly young to do so. The babbling of babies can sound like words, as I'm sure you know. And of course, Parseltongue is a genetic gift confined to the descendants of Salazar Slytherin, and no Malfoy has ever had it—"
"That is where you are wrong." Lucius Malfoy swept through the door of the hospital wing. Harry tensed instinctively. The last time he'd seen the man had been when he was insulting Mr. Weasley, after all.
This time, though, Mr. Malfoy had eyes only for Harry, the way Mrs. Malfoy did, although he was speaking to Professor Dumbledore. "One of the granddaughters of Salazar Slytherin changed her name and married into the Malfoy line when we arrived on English soil, to hide what she was. It was a time of particularly virulent prejudice against Parselmouths. Ever since then, the talent has shown up every few generations. But we have been intelligent enough to keep it quiet. It is a source of some prestige among those we trust, however."
"Great," Harry said. "It doesn't matter. I'm still a Potter, not a Malfoy. Or how do you explain this?" He gestured at his face, trying to cover everything, his glasses and his messy dark hair and his green eyes.
"Glamours," Mr. Malfoy said. "Illusions. They can be powerful and hard to break if set in childhood. Not to worry, Aldebaran."
"Stop calling me that!"
"For shame, Aldebaran." Mrs. Malfoy's voice was cold, and she caught Harry's eye and frowned sternly. Harry found that he really wanted to cower away from it. "Young men do not say such things. This rudeness must be a result of growing up with Muggles."
"Yeah, I did," Harry said, snatching at the words. "So even if I was your son, you wouldn't want me, right? Because I didn't grow up the way you wanted and I don't sound posh enough."
"That's not true." Mrs. Malfoy's face seemed to melt like a glacier. She smiled and reached out to put a hand on Harry's, and Harry caught his breath. It felt like he imagined a mother would, touching him. "We would want you no matter how you behaved. It is simply that polite young men do not do that, to any adults, so we will teach you the manners you missed out on learning."
Harry leaned back and shook off her touch. Sure, he would have liked a mother, but he had had a mum, and she had died for him. Harry owed her some loyalty. He ignored the stricken look that came over Mrs. Malfoy's face, and turned back to Mr. Malfoy.
"So if you claim that I'm your son, it should be pretty easy to break these spells, right?"
"It should indeed." Mr. Malfoy aimed his wand at Harry, and it took everything Harry had to sit still on the bed. But he reminded himself that Professor Dumbledore was right there and he would do something if Mr. Malfoy tried to hurt him. "Finite sanguis potentem!"