“What else do we have to do?” Ginny curiously questioned Harry encouraging him to tell her that he wanted to go to the Ministry in order to retrieve the papers to apply for the guardianship over Violet and that he had made an appointment with her father in order to lighten their visit to the ministry a little bit.

“Why guardianship?” Ginny asked confused, when they were having tea in Minister Weasley’s office, while Tonks had taken the kids on a tour around the ministry. “Aren’t you going to adopt her?”

“No,” Harry answered. “I have thought about it, and I prefer a permanent guardianship for the moment. I know that you already said you wouldn’t have a problem with the adoption, but I want us to think about this later, when you are of age and have hopefully agreed to marry me. For Violet it is important to know that I will always be there and care for her – the question of whether guardianship or adoption is not so important for her, at least not at the moment.” A bit hesitant to know what his girlfriend’s father would think about these revelations, Harry threw him a cautious glance and saw the minister smiling fondly at the two of them.

It was already nearly time for dinner when they returned to Hogwarts. Harry had just enough time to bathe his little sisters, grateful for Ginny’s help; then the castle’s other remaining residents came over to the Snape quarters for dinner. Harry groaned; he just couldn’t eat now, he was dead on his feet. He told Ginny he would go to bed for a while and after a short glance into his face she let him go threatening to send Poppy after him after dinner, if he didn’t show up until then. He did not notice Pomfrey checking on him or forcing several potions down his throat, but when he woke up in the morning, he felt very ill. Everything hurt, he was freezing, and he could hardly breathe. He groaned but relaxed a little when he saw his father entering his room. He would know how to help him.

Severus frowned when he took his son’s pale face into sight. Poppy had told him in the evening that Harry was probably coming down with a cold, but she had poured a few potions through his throat and he should be well on his way to convalescence by now. Noticing that Harry was hardly able to breathe, he told him he would be back in a moment and floo-called Pomfrey over, who was at Harry’s side within a minute. While she was doing several checks on his son, Severus noticed that her face was becoming more and more worried, until she finally said,

“He somehow managed to get a light pneumonia again. Maybe it was the asthma that triggered it. I have to take him with me to the Hospital wing; he is very ill.” Severus groaned. That could not be! He still had not come up with a new potion for his son’s immune system yet, although he was researching every day. It was so difficult because moon fern was one of the main ingredients in this special potion and could not be replaced easily. But Harry had to prepare for his lessons, and speaking of lessons – would he be able to teach at all after six weeks, when the new school year started? The last time he got pneumonia, he had spent several months in the infirmary. He was startled when he was brought out of his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry too much, Severus. His condition is not as bad as it was in the past, and we will do our best to help him,” Poppy told him as calmly as she could manage.

Harry spent the next two weeks in his old room in the Hospital wing. During the first week, his condition was worsening steadily, and except from his parents and grandparents only Violet was allowed to visit him once a day. Poppy and Ginny both took care of him and made sure that he was never alone. After the first week, he threatened Pomfrey that he would just leave the wing, if she didn’t allow his grandmother to bring him work to do. He had to prepare his lessons – could they not understand how much work that was, especially as it was the first time for him?

In spite of being worried about Harry, Ginny enjoyed her healer’s training very much, especially as Pomfrey allowed her to try out every spell she had learned so far on Harry. Fortunately, Harry did not mind being checked by Ginny, and she was very happy to be around her boyfriend most of the time.

During the second week of Harry’s stay in the Hospital wing, however, she remembered that it would be his 17th birthday in a few days and feverishly thought about what to do on this special day. As he could not get up, there was no other chance except from having a very small party in his room. Already at the end of the school year, her brothers had insisted on performing a huge firework display over the lake on the evening of his birthday, and she just had to find a way for Harry to be able to participate in the event. One night, when Harry’s parents, grandparents, Poppy and Ginny were all together having tea in Harry’s room, while the subject of attention was asleep, she told the others about the plans she had made and asked if anyone had an idea about the fireworks. Everyone seemed to be thinking about it, when Poppy suddenly spoke up.

“I think he should be able to attend the fireworks in his phoenix form. He may transform into Icicle, however not flash and not change back to his human form as long as he is out of his bed. So one of us has to give him a ride outside, and if he feels well enough, he can even fly around a bit. Of course this has to remain an exception, and he will only be allowed to do so for the firework on his birthday.” Minerva eyed her sceptically, while Lily offered,

“I will give him a ride, as I am the only one except for Albus to be able to communicate with him.”

One day, Albus came into Harry’s room, followed by Poppy, and said,

“Harry, Poppy, I have something to tell you. Nobody except for Minerva knows this, but I have a nephew in Japan. Yesterday I decided to pay him a short visit to speak with him about a personal matter I don’t want to reveal at this stage. Anyway, we also talked about Harry’s problem, and he suggested something. They, my nephew and his family, live in a relatively small wizarding community, but they have a very competent healer. He thought it could be that they had different healing methods, so he called her, and when she heard about your story, she said that she probably knew what the problem was and maybe could help. Now I have given her a portkey, and she will arrive here at about lunchtime to check on you and see if she can do anything for us.”

A few hours later, Dumbledore came again with a friendly looking woman about the age of Poppy and introduced her as Healer Uehara. She turned to Harry and said in English with a Japanese accent,

“First of all, I have to check on him thoroughly in order to assess what the exact problem is. However, from what you told me, I assume that it is a certain illness affecting the immune system, which I can probably heal. Would you mind me checking on you now?” she asked Harry politely, and Harry shrugged, before he said,

“I hate being checked, but if you think you can help me…” he trailed off. Poppy threw him a glance that would have made Minerva proud and stated,

“Yes, please, Healer Uehara; we appreciate very much that you came from so far away to try to help Harry.” Albus and Poppy left the room, and the healer checked on Harry. An hour later, she entered Poppy’s office and told her,

“He is asleep now. My assumption was correct; he is suffering from an illness, which damages the immune system. There is a potion to heal this illness, but it contains moon fern, of which he told me he is allergic. Is that correct?” Poppy groaned and confirmed that it was correct, before she asked,

“Is there any other method to help him?” Uehara shook her head and answered,

“I am very sorry, but there is nothing I can do about it at the moment. However, I will do some research if there are other potions which could help. For a fact I know that moon fern is not easy to replace.” Poppy nodded affirmatively and told her everything about Severus’ potion for Harry. She accompanied her guest back to the headmaster’s office and they agreed that the healer would return after about six weeks to assess if the illness had worsened or just remained unchanged.

One morning Harry woke up and the feeling that something was different penetrated his fevered brain. Normally, when he woke up, Ginny was sitting next to him trying to do her spells on him. But it was not only the fact that she was not there; something else bothered him, he just couldn’t tell what it was, until he heard a voice coming from his other side,

“Good mownin, Hawwy, and Happy Bawfday!” He slowly turned around and noticed, that Violet was lying next to him on his bed. He frowned and asked worriedly,

“What is wrong with you, Violet? Why are you in my bed?” When Violet slightly flinched at his words, he noticed that he probably had spoken too harshly and immediately apologized to her and gave her a careful hug. Finally, she said,

“I was allowed to stay wif you, because it is your bawfday and ebyone else was busy wif somfink.” Harry glanced at her and asked,

“Is it my birthday today? Thanks for telling me, because I completely forgot,” he added a commendation, which he knew would make Violet very happy.

Suddenly the door opened widely, and everyone remaining at Hogwarts over the holidays entered the room. With a flick of McGonagall’s wand, the room was decorated with 15 chairs around Harry’s bed, each with a small table in front of it, on which with a plop breakfast appeared instantly. In front of Harry hovered a tablet with his breakfast, while at the same time his bedside table was filled with a pile of presents as well as a huge birthday cake. After more than a dozen hugs and birthday wishes, Harry sat up and managed to eat a little of the fruit yoghurt Dobby had prepared for him, while everyone was eating breakfast.

When breakfast was finished, Pomfrey shooed everyone out except from Lily, Minerva and Violet, and asked Ginny to check on Harry. As often as she had checked on him during the last two weeks, it was a different matter when others were watching, and Ginny had to do every spell twice to be sure the results were correct. After Poppy had confirmed the results, she told Harry,

“Harry, before you have to take your potions and sleep for a while, your mother and grandmother would like to do something with you.” Harry glanced over to them enquiringly, and they came over with Violet to sit on the edge of his bed. Minerva was the first to speak.

“Harry, are you sure that you want to get the guardianship over Violet? I have talked to Violet yesterday evening, and you are her first choice for a guardian, but you should not feel any pressure about it but know that your mother would be alright as well, especially as Violet will grow up as Marina’s sister anyway.” Harry sighed and croaked,

“It’s alright. I would also like to adopt her, but I have decided to wait with that.” He told them his reasons for this decision as he had explained them in Mr. Weasley’s office the other day and everyone nodded approvingly. Lily handed him the guardianship papers, which Harry still had to sign. As soon as he had put his sign at the bottom of the parchment, it rolled itself up and made itself on its way to the ministry. Violet was watching everything fascinated. Harry pulled her into a hug, gave her a kiss on the forehead and told her,

“Now you are my ward and don’t have to fear your parents anymore. I’m sorry that I cannot spend as much time with you as I would like to, but I don’t feel very well at the moment. However when you want to talk to me, you are always allowed to come here and see me. Alright?” Violet nodded contently and gave him a sloppy kiss on the cheek. Afterwards Harry hastily drank down the potions Ginny handed him, lay down and was asleep within seconds. This breakfast with all his friends and family had been very tiring.

A few hours later Ginny woke him up again, gave him more potions and told him, his visitors would come back a few minutes later to eat his birthday cake together with him. Harry groaned but didn’t say anything. Couldn’t they see that he was ill and not able to have a birthday party? After devouring the whole cake, Dumbledore ushered him to open his birthday presents. Harry sighed and sent a pleading glance in the direction of Poppy, who understood immediately and told everyone, Harry would open his presents later and they were going to see him again in the evening when the firework was going to take place. Harry threw her an astonished glance and as soon as everybody had been thrown out asked,

“Fireworks? And…um… Thank you Aunt Poppy.” She explained about the fireworks the Weasley twins were planning for the evening and told him, that he could either watch from the window of the Hospital wing or transform into Icicle and come out to the lake together with everyone else. Ginny noticed that Harry’s eyes started to twinkle happily, before he mumbled,

“I will go as Icicle. Thank you, Aunt Poppy and Ginny, thanks for everything.” When Pomfrey left the room, Ginny sat next to Harry on the edge of his bed and asked,

“Now, do you want to open your presents, or would you prefer to sleep again?” Harry gave her a slight smile and answered,

“If you were so kind as to hand me one of the presents, I would like to open it.” Ginny handed him his presents one after another, and Harry was stunned to see what his family and friends had thought about. There were several books, for example ‘1000 easy tips for the magical prankster’ from Sirius, ‘Transfiguration during the ages’ as well as a few other books about transfiguration from Minerva. He received another book, ‘Tips for teaching’ together with an assortment of Honeydukes finest chocolates from Remus and Amelia, phoenix treats from Hagrid and a perch for Icicle to be set up in the Snapes’ living room from Albus. His parents had bought several new every day robes for him in different colours, which he could wear at school as well as a book voucher from Flourish and Blotts. From Hermione he received a book about the history of tournaments within the magical world, and James gave him two tickets for a national Quidditch game England – Ireland, which would take place on the next weekend. Harry sighed and handed the tickets over to Ginny, saying,

“As I won’t be able to take you there, you choose someone to take with you – maybe you could take Ron? I’m sure he would like to go.” Ginny looked at him flabbergasted and asked,

“I know that you have quite a fever, Harry, but are you crazy? You want the f… of my brother, who didn’t even bother to send you something for your birthday, to visit a national Quidditch match on your behalf?” Harry shrugged and replied,

“I do not mind, Ginny, as long as you have fun with the tickets. I think I am going to open the rest of the presents later, I want to lie down for a while.” Ginny nodded and watched him worriedly. His condition seemed to be worse than the day before. As soon as he closed his eyes, she went over to Poppy’s office to make her check on Harry and to get the permission to floo home to the Burrow for an hour over dinnertime in order to have a talk with her brother.

A few hours later, Severus woke Harry up, made him eat a bowl of chicken broth, handed him a few potions and asked,

“Do you think you can manage to transform? Poppy thinks you should be all right and would probably even feel better as a phoenix. Your mother will come here and give you a ride, as you are not allowed to flash or fly a lot.” Harry gave him a short nod, transformed into Icicle and noticed that he indeed felt much better in his phoenix form.

Half an hour later, everyone was sitting in the grass next to the lake. Harry was very happy to be able to attend the event the Weasley twins had arranged because of his birthday and left his mother’s shoulder to walk a few steps around the lake, where he sat down under a huge tree and proceeded to clean his feathers, while he watched the beautiful fireworks over the lake.

However, suddenly, one of the fireworks went in the wrong direction. Nobody could tell what happened or why it occurred – everything happened so fast, that everyone only noticed it, when the tree, under which Icicle was sitting, caught fire and a branch snapped and tumbled down just onto Icicle. Harry, who was busily cleaning his feathers while watching the fireworks with one eye, did not notice anything, until he heard a huge gasp from his friends. Then suddenly everything went black.

Everyone hurried over to him, and with combined powers, they managed to move the branch away from where Icicle was lying on the ground and did not move. How could he move? Most of his bones seemed to be broken. Immediately a huge discussion started about what to do. Could they do anything for him? Should Minerva transform him back to his human form? Or would Hagrid be able to heal him in this form? Dumbledore called Fawkes over, who flew over to Icicle and cowered next to him trilling soft tones to his friend.

Suddenly a huge, white flash illuminated the dark sky, and a wave of ice crushed onto everyone. After recovering from screaming, not because it hurt but because of the surprise effect, everyone turned to Icicle again. But where was he? Dumbledore went over to where Fawkes was still sitting with his beak in the ice, and after an exchange of two sentences with his own phoenix put his hands into the ice as well and pulled a very small, naked form out of it.

#Be careful, old man, you have to keep our baby warm, otherwise he will not make it!# Fawkes advised Albus, who put the small baby phoenix under his robes and translated Fawkes’ warning to the others. After that a discussion about where they should take Icicle, who should take care of him and whether he should be transfigured back to Harry started, until Dumbledore called everyone to silence and decided,

“I will bring him into the living room of the Snape quarters. On his perch, which is also made for baby phoenixes to sit on, he will have it comfortable, and if we place it in front of the fireplace, it will be warm enough for him. As we still have holidays, I assume that someone will be there for him all the time. I suggest that we take him there now and discuss everything else there. Hopefully Fawkes will be able to give us further advice about how to care for a baby phoenix and when to change him back to his human form.” He grabbed Fawkes tail feathers and his phoenix flashed him directly into the Snape quarters. While they were waiting for the others to arrive, Fawkes instructed Albus,

#You cannot transform him back now; you have to leave him as a baby for the moment.#

#How long would you call a moment?# Albus asked.

#At least a week, but maybe better up to three weeks. You know that I feel very weak after a burning day for about a week, afterwards I’m better, but I only feel really good after about three weeks.#

In the meantime, Harry’s family had joined them, and Dumbledore translated for them what Fawkes had told him so far. Poppy turned to Fawkes and asked,

“Will he still be ill, when we transform him back, or will he be fully healed?” Fawkes thought for a moment and answered,

#Merlin had a freezing day once, and he managed to transform back after about three weeks. By that time, his general condition had not changed, but he was cured of all illnesses he had at that time. For example, he had an illness in his stomach, which was cured, but his allergies – I remember that he had an allergy against moon fern – remained.# Severus groaned when Albus translated the last sentence, and Poppy turned to Fawkes again.

“So, do I understand it correctly that he will be healed from pneumonia, but he will still have the problems with his immune system and his allergy to moon fern?” Fawkes looked at her and nodded his head, before he trilled,

#Maybe that his immune system will be better now, but I don’t think it will be completely healed. If he were a real phoenix as I am, he would be healed completely because he would be like a newborn, but this doesn’t apply for him, as he is only an animagus phoenix. Concerning the timing when to transform him back, you can ask him. In about a week he should be able to communicate to you – I will be the first to have a proper conversation with him of course.# After a short while, he added,

#And don’t make such a fuss over him, he will be alright.#

By now, everyone had settled into the chairs around Icicle’s perch and Albus had called Twinkle and asked for tea and biscuits for everyone. When she came back a minute later, he told her that Icicle was a baby now and that he wanted her to take care of him during the next weeks. Seeing the confused looks the others were throwing at him, he explained,

“Twinkle always takes care of Fawkes while he is a baby. Therefore, she knows exactly what he needs and is well prepared to care for him. Don’t worry; he will be in the best hands.” When Twinkle, looking at the perch to search for Icicle, suddenly started to giggle, everyone followed her eyes and saw, that Fawkes had taken a position just next to Icicle, spreading his pretty wings all over Icicle, so that not even the tiniest bit of the small phoenix could be seen. The room erupted with relieved laughter.

During the first week, Fawkes did not move at all. Every piece of food Twinkle brought went into his peak first and from there into the tiny baby’s mouth. He trilled and trilled to entertain the little phoenix whenever he seemed to be at least half-awake. Lily often stood next to the perch talking to Harry. Of course, she didn’t know if he would understand, but she was quite sure that he would – at least – recognize her voice.

On the eighth day, Fawkes finally moved and took a spot next to Baby Icicle who had grown a bit during the week and was even spotting small white feathers here and there. The little phoenix slowly moved his head out of his back feathers and turned around, slowly opening his beautiful green eyes. Albus immediately transformed into his phoenix form and sat next to his grandchild on the perch to exchange a few trills with him and Fawkes.

Finally, Icicle looked around to where his family was sitting and trilled,

#What happened?# Lily went over to his perch and held the back of her hand directly in front of his feet, and Icicle accepted the invitation and carefully put one foot after the other onto his mother’s hand. She carefully took him over to the sofa and sat down next to Severus quietly talking to Icicle. Severus carefully put his hand onto the back of Icicle’s head, knowing how much his son liked him stroking the back feathers of his head and told him what had happened in a quiet and calm voice.

“Harry”, his grandmother addressed the tiny bird, “I don’t know when you will be able to transform back to your human self, but I can change you back whenever you want me to.” Icicle nodded his head and trilled,

#Fank you vewy much Gwanny. I don’t know how and when to change back; I have to ask Fawkes.# Lily translated for everyone what Icicle had said, and Severus told him,

“No, Harry, you don’t have to ask Fawkes. He cannot tell you how to change back because he is not an animagus, and about the timing, YOU have to decide in which form you feel more comfortable. I don’t know if you are having your complete memory while being a phoenix baby, so let me tell you a little bit. You might feel a little more comfortable as a phoenix, but on the other hand you will start to be a teacher in about three weeks and you will probably want to have some time in your human form to prepare for lessons and adjust to your new position. Therefore, I would recommend that you let your grandmother change you back in a week the latest.”

Icicle seemed to be pensive for a moment before he addressed them again.