Death Eater's Child - by Healer Pomfrey

1 - Two Small Freaks

While Harry grew up unloved and neglected by the Dursleys, he had one friend, a really good friend in fact. Her name was Brianna Mackenzie, and she was living next door to the Dursleys together with her mother Kathy. Just like Harry, Brianna was an outsider and had no friends, except for Harry. The two children knew each other since they could walk and play outside in the garden and on the street. They couldn't tell a reason, but both of them felt strangely attracted to each other. It was only at the age of five, when Harry observed her jump onto a very high branch of a tree when Dudley tried to catch and beat her, that he realised that she was a freak just like himself.

"Brianna, you're a freak like me. You do strange things too," he said, terrified for his friend, throwing the girl a sympathetic smile.

Brianna looked at him in surprise. "That's great, Harry. Can you do things like that too? Is that why Dudley and your aunt always call you 'Freak'?"

"Yes," Harry replied quietly.

"Harry, we can do things that the others can't. That's just great! I don't think it's bad."

"Um... right," Harry had to admit. "I'm so glad you're like me."

From that time onwards, the two children became inseparable. Even at school, they were always together, and if one or the other teacher made the grave mistake of trying to separate them for a while, the teachers always ended up spiking colourful hair, causing them to never again try separating these two children.

Brianna's mother, who worked at home translating technical texts for a company, was very happy for her daughter to have such a good friend, especially since the girl was growing up without her father, whom she didn't even know because she had been raped by an unknown man at that time. 'The man must have been a wizard,' she realised when Brianna told her excitedly that both Harry and she could do strange things like colour their teachers' hair.

The Dursleys on the other hand forbade Harry to be together with Brianna after Dudley had told them that she was a freak like Harry.

HP HEALER POMFREY HP

One day, Brianna invited Harry to come to their house on Sunday, because her mother wanted to take her to the zoo together with Harry. Harry was very excited, and he was looking forward to meeting Brianna on Sunday very much, because normally the weekends were very boring, since the Dursleys always locked him into his cupboard to have him out of the way.

On Friday evening, he excitedly told his aunt and uncle about the invitation, asking them to let him out on Sunday morning, so he could be out of their way for the whole day.

"Don't even think about spending a whole day with another freak!" his Uncle Vernon roared. "You will stay in your cupboard and won't infest anyone with your freakishness, and if I hear another word about that girl, I'll beat it out of you." With that Harry was thrown into his cupboard without dinner.

On Sunday morning, Harry heard the bell ring and got all his hopes up that the Mackenzies would perhaps manage to pull him out of the cupboard; however, his hope was destroyed quickly as Petunia told them in a false, gentle voice that Harry had unfortunately fallen ill and couldn't join them that day.

Soon afterwards, Vernon opened the door to the cupboard and shouted, "Tell your freakish friends not to bother us again. Do you understand me, boy?"

"Yes, Uncle Vernon," Harry replied in a small voice.

On Monday morning, Harry met up with Brianna on their way to school like every morning. It was raining cats and dogs, and while Vernon was driving Dudley to school, Harry had to walk. Brianna was holding an umbrella and quickly handed Harry a second one, which she had brought for him, frowning as she took in his already drenched form. "Here; I brought an umbrella for you, but you are already wet, aren't you? How can they let you leave like that after being sick over the weekend?"

Harry merely threw her a sad look and let out a sneeze, frowning as he noticed that she stared into his eyes. Suddenly, the events of Friday evening and the weekend played in front of his mind. "So you weren't sick, and the Dursleys only lied, because they didn't want you to spend time with Mum and me. So they locked you into a cupboard the whole weekend!" she exclaimed angrily. "I'll tell you something. Come home with me after school. You can stay with us."

"Thank you," Harry replied in a small voice, shivering violently in his wet clothes.

Unfortunately, the Dursleys always neglected Harry when he caught a cold or became sick otherwise, and this neglect of his illnesses had already caused his immune system to weaken, so that he fell ill easily. Even if Harry couldn't understand the reason why he became sick every second week, he knew exactly that he had to hide it from everyone, because otherwise the Dursleys would get very angry, and Aunt Petunia wouldn't take it lightly to be called to the school to collect him because he had a fever. The nurse had already called her too many times.

Neither Brianna nor Harry's teacher were surprised when Harry was slumped in his seat, playing with his meagre meal at lunch time. His eyes were glazed over, and beads of sweat were covering his forehead.

"Harry, you're really ill. Let me take you to the nurse," Brianna whispered, knowing how much Harry hated to get everyone's attention.

"No," Harry whispered back, "I told you how the Dursleys reacted when she called them the last time. It was no fun."

"Then we'll ask her to call my Mum. She can fetch you home and look after you," Brianna insisted.

"Exactly," the teacher spoke up gently, placing a cold hand on Harry's forehead. "Let's take you to the infirmary, Harry. Maybe it'll help to lie down for a while."

A short while later, Harry found himself in the infirmary, begging the nurse not to call his aunt. "Harry, lie down here on the bed and let me check on you first. Then we'll see what we're going to do," the nurse replied softly.

"Come here, Harry," Brianna called out and carefully helped him onto a bed, unaware of the fact that the adults were watching them with amusement. "Open up and keep it under your tongue," she ordered him when the nurse tried to coax a thermometer under his tongue.

"He has an upper respiratory tract infection," the nurse informed the teacher. "I'll let him use the inhaler and give him something for the fever; however, considering how high his fever is, he should get antibiotics, for which a doctor's prescription is needed. Therefore, I have to contact his legal guardians."

Harry silently began to cry as he heard the nurse talk to Aunt Petunia. 'She'll be so mad at me,' he thought, unable to keep the tears back.

"You cannot come and fetch him?" the nurse asked angrily. "Well, then please give me your permission, so I can take him to the hospital myself. If this infection remains untreated, it's likely to turn into pneumonia. No? Oh well, you'll hear from me again." With that she angrily finished the conversation.

"Mrs. Dursley can't fetch him, because she's just going to leave for an appointment. He has to come home when school is over, and she's going to take him to the doctor tomorrow if necessary," the nurse told the teacher.

"Let's call Mrs. Mackenzie," the teacher decided, and called Brianna's mother, who came immediately to take Harry home.

"Frankly speaking I'm ready to call Child services," the nurse said angrily as she once more took Harry's temperature. "He gets sick much too often, and I have the impression as if his aunt wouldn't even try to improve his condition."

The three women agreed to observe Petunia's handling of Harry's current illness, and Kathy Mackenzie took Harry home. She made him lie down on the bed in the guest room, tucking him in gently. "Try to sleep for a while, sweetie; I'll be here and check on you from time to time," she said softly, gently bathing his flushed face with a cool cloth.

"Feels good," Harry mumbled, unconsciously leaning into the cool touch as he slowly drifted off to sleep.

He woke up a few hours later to Brianna and Kathy speaking right next to him. "Harry, how are you feeling?" his friend's voice penetrated his ears.

"Fine," he mumbled, realising that he felt horrible, if not even worse than before.

"I don't believe that," Kathy said, placing a cold hand on his forehead. "Harry, let me quickly check your temperature, and then I'll take you back home to your relatives."

Feeling too bad to protest, Harry merely opened his mouth and closed it around the icy stick, shutting his eyes in exhaustion.

"His fever is still going up," he heard Kathy tell Brianna in obvious concern. "Harry, can you listen to me for a moment please?"

Harry cracked his eyes open, blearily looking at Brianna's mother. "I'm sorry for being such a burden," he croaked, causing the woman to shake her head.

"You're not a burden," Brianna protested vehemently, "neither to Mum, nor to anyone else."

"Harry, I'm going to give you something," Kathie explained, showing him two cordless phones. "These two are like a walky-talky. They only work up to a distance of three hundred metres, but that's enough for us. I'll call you tomorrow afternoon. Your phone will make a small sound, and then you switch it on here and speak to me. You'll tell me if your aunt took you to the doctor, what he said and how you feel. Do you understand me? If your relatives don't take you to the doctor, I'll speak with your teacher and the nurse at school, and we're going to call Child services to help you. Be careful that you don't let the Dursleys see the phone."

"Of course," Harry croaked. "Thank you so much for your help."

HP

Exactly twenty-four hours later, Harry admitted to Brianna's mother that his relatives had neither checked on him, nor brought him to the doctor. He hadn't even seen any of them since Kathy had taken him home the previous day.

"How are you feeling, sweetie? And I want an honest answer please. Don't give me 'fine'," Kathy said sternly. "Worse or better?"

"Worse," Harry admitted quietly, "can't breathe well."

"Hold on, Harry, you'll hear from us later today," Kathy promised and hurried to the school to fetch Brianna and speak with her teacher and the nurse.

The nurse immediately called the police as well as Child services, and twenty minutes later, Kathy, Brianna, the nurse, Harry's teacher, two police officers and a man and a woman from Child services were standing in front of the Dursleys' door.

The officers of Child services interrogated Petunia, before they asked the nurse to check on Harry. When she reported that his infection had proceeded into pneumonia due to the neglect by his guardians and Harry confirmed that they hadn't even given him anything to eat or drink during the last twenty-four hours, the officers of Child services decided to withdraw the Dursleys' guardianship rights instantly.

"We're going to have a trial against the Dursleys as soon as possible," the man from Child services explained to the others. "So far, we have to take the boy with us."

I'm not a native speaker of English. Please excuse my mistakes or help me to correct them.

All recognizable characters belong to J. K. Rowling, and I am not earning anything by writing this story.