Chapter 19 – The Wolves Cure

“Severus, look what I have found! This seems to be a cure for Lycanthropy!”

He showed Severus the pages he had translated a few hours ago.

Severus read the text and the ingredients excitedly, raised an eyebrow and said, “I think you’re right; it seems to be what it says. I will brew it, and we can ask Remus to try it out. He has to take it within a week before the full moon; do you know when that will be?”

“The last one was two nights before I came here. How long am I here now?

“Two and a half weeks I think. Therefore, it should be in a little more than a week. That is good. The Potion takes three days to brew, and he needs to drink it for three days, so when I start to brew it tomorrow, we should be right on time.”

“I hope it will work. When will you tell him?”

“I would like you to tell him, as it is you who has found the cure. Are you still not allowed to have visitors?” Harry shook his head.

“I’ll explain the situation and ask her; I’ll be back after dinner,” Severus said and went over to see Poppy. She was delighted about their discovery.

“In this case Mr. Lupin may come, but this has to be an exception, because Harry’s condition is still very bad.”

“Doesn’t the Potion I made help at all?”

“It helps a little, it reduced his fever and his congestion a bit, but not enough and I have no idea how to help him except to wait until his body gets better by itself with the help of the Potions. I am also considering taking him to St. Mungos; maybe they can do something else to help him. But as I said you may bring Mr. Lupin with you the next time you come to visit Harry.”

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In the evening, Severus came to see Harry with Remus in tow. Harry sat up excitedly.

“Hi, Remus. Has Severus already told you?”

“No, he only said you had an interesting story for me. What is it? And how are you?”

“As Severus has told you, maybe…, I’m using my time here to translate Slytherin’s books. At the moment, I’m translating a book full of Potions, and one of them seems to be a cure for Lycanthropy. I discovered it this morning and Severus said he could start to make the Potion tomorrow in case you want to try it out. I don’t know if it really works of course, but you could try. What do you think?”

Remus dropped into a chair next to Harry’s bed. He was stunned – so many years had he hoped for a cure, while he was a small child, but for a number of years he had given up all hopes of a cure. “Harry… Severus… I… I just don’t know what to say, I don’t want to get my hopes up too much, but nevertheless I would like to ask you to try whatever you can.” His eyes were swimming in tears.

“Remus, it’s okay. We cannot promise anything and I can’t do anything for you, but I can tell you that if anyone is able to make the Potion, it will be Severus. He is the best Potions Maker you can find.”

“The Potion will take three days to make, but I have already gotten permission from the Headmaster to skip classes tomorrow and on Friday, so that I should be able to finish the Potion on Saturday. Then you have to take the Potion on three successive days, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, and on the day of the full moon – Thursday I think – we will all go into the forest together, or maybe better the Shrieking Shack and see if it works. I cannot promise anything either, we will just have to try and see. Don’t get your hopes up too much.”

Remus took one of Harry’s warm hands in his own cold hand and said sincerely, “Thank you very much, you two. You can’t believe how much that means to me.”

“You’re very welcome Remus, and believe me if this doesn’t work, Severus and I won’t stop until we find a cure or at least something to help a lot – that I can promise.” At this moment, Pomfrey came over to shoo them out and check on Harry.

“How does this Potion work, Severus? When are you going to brew it?”

Severus explained the details to her and asked, “Maybe it would be better for him to come here to the Hospital Wing to take the Potions, don’t you think so? If he had any problems, you would be able to help him immediately.”

“Yes, Severus, Remus, that’s right. Please come here on Saturday, Sunday and Monday after dinner for your Potions, provided, that Severus has it ready by Saturday evening. Now, Harry, how are you? You are coughing a lot, are your Potions wearing off?”

Harry nodded solemnly “Yes, it hurts again.”

“Alright, Severus, you may come tomorrow morning, Remus, we’ll see you on Saturday evening, and Harry has to rest now.” She checked on Harry, fed him his Potions, mumbled something to herself and went back into her office only to come back and sit down next to Harry after two minutes.“Harry, you have told me some months ago that you had pneumonia last summer and were brought to me to cure you, is that right?”

“Yes, why?”

“Do you know by chance, what I did to cure you? What Potions I gave you, and how long did it take you to get better?”

“I don’t know what the Potions were, I think probably it was the Potion Severus invented last week, but as I’m a dunderhead at Potions I’m not sure. And I had to stay in the Hospital Wing for the rest of the holidays; it was quite long, nearly six weeks.”

Pomfrey seemed shocked but said, “all right, if my abilities 20 years in the future are not better, then I won’t be able to do anything differently now. So maybe it will still take a few more weeks. Anyway, try to sleep for a while until your Grandparents come.” During the next few days, Harry translated the first of the Potions books. He didn’t know much about Potions, but the Potions in the book were all unknown to him. Hopefully, Severus would find something helpful apart from the Lycanthropy cure. On Saturday afternoon, Severus came and brought three phials of the Werewolf cure.

“Can anything happen to Remus when he drinks the Potion? Does he have to take it here?” Harry asked excitedly.

“Oh Harry, that was only to find a way for you to participate in the big event of Remus drinking the Potion,” Severus laughed. “Pomfrey is not stupid either, of course she knew, but she didn’t want to take all the fun away from you.”

And as Severus had foreseen, nothing happened to Remus during the three days he had to take the Potion, and now everyone was waiting for the night of the full moon.

“I want to go too,” Harry told Severus on Thursday, when they were having lunch together.

“I believe that, and you will be staying here, because I would prefer if you survived your sixth year, and I will speak to Pomfrey and McGonagall to make sure they are watching you tonight. Don’t even think about it! I’ll see you after dinner.”

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By the time Pomfrey had to leave to accompany Remus to the Shrieking Shack, Harry’s Grandparents had arrived and made themselves comfortable clearly intending to stay with Harry for a few hours.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to watch me; I promise that I won’t go anywhere,” he mumbled.

“No, Harry, we will stay with you anyway. Severus, James and Sirius are together with Remus watching him, but as soon as it is clear if the Potion has worked, Severus will come here to notify us. Remus has to stay at the Shrieking Shack for the whole night in any case,” his Grandmother told him.

“And? Have you found any other interesting Potions?” Dumbledore asked, his eyes twinkling.

“Oh, Granddad, I don’t know. I am not adept enough at Potions to know if there are Potions, which are not known in our time; for me all Potions in the book sound new. By the way, did I tell you that Slytherin had his own Potions lab in the Chamber? I don’t know if Severus has found it yet, but it might be that there are even old ingredients left. The Potions lab was described in the first Potions book I translated. I have now nearly finished the second one.”

“Do you have the two books here? May I have a look at them?”

“Severus has the first. The second one is here, because it’s still unfinished, but I think I have only one or two Potions left to translate. Here,” he handed Dumbledore a bundle of parchments.

Suddenly Severus stormed into the wing, his eyes full of excitement. “Harry! It worked! Remus didn’t transform, he’s still human! Harry, we did it!”

“Wow, that’s great! You did it, Severus, you made the Potion. Congratulations!”

“Credit to both of you my boys – 150 points each to Slytherin and Gryffindor! Please excuse me; I will go down to the Shack to see Remus with my own eyes. Harry, Severus, I will see you tomorrow. Good night.” Dumbledore changed into his phoenix form and was gone.

Severus said good night and went back to the dungeons.

“Harry,” his Grandmother said sternly, “Don’t even think about it.”

“Don’t worry, Granny, I don’t feel well enough to even think about it. You really don’t have to stay with me, I promise I won’t even move if I don’t have to.”

His Grandmother took his hand, noticing the heat radiating from her grandson seemed to be worse than it had been the other evenings. “Harry, I’ll get Poppy for you, all right?”

“Okay.”

“Poppy, he seems so hot tonight, is he all right?”

“Yes, his fever is spiking today, it has been higher than yesterday for the whole day, and so late in the evening it’s the worst of course; probably he had just too much excitement today.” Pomfrey gave Harry two more Potions, and within seconds, he fell in a long, dreamless sleep.

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Early the next morning Remus stormed into the Hospital Wing, his friends James and Sirius in tow. “Harry! Harry!”

“Harry, wake up you lazybones!”

“Mr. Potter, Mr. Black, what do you think you are doing? OUT! NOW!”

“But Poppy,” James tried to contradict, “we just have to thank Harry for what he did for Remus, can’t you understand that?”

“I can understand that, and therefore, Mr. Lupin, YOU and only you are allowed to come and see Harry after lunch to talk to him for ten minutes. And now out of here please.”

When Harry woke up sometime in the afternoon and slowly opened his eyes, Remus was sitting beside his bed holding his hand.

“Harry!” Harry was not completely awake yet. He knew something was different, something had occurred… but he just couldn’t recall… “Are you awake yet?” Remus sounded impatient, but Remus never was impatient. What happened? His Potions seemed to have worn off, and he couldn’t think properly.

“What’s wrong? What happened?” he croaked hoarsely and reached for his glasses.

“Harry, you seem confused, don’t you remember? Remus asked astonished, when he helped Harry with his glasses, and when Harry didn’t show any reaction he continued, “You found the cure for my Lycanthropy, and it really worked! I’m not a werewolf anymore, and I just wanted to thank you!”

By then his memories had come back and Harry beamed at his friend. “Oh Remus, yes Severus told us during the night. Congratulations! I’m so happy for you! But you don’t have to thank me, thank Severus. I would not have managed to brew such a difficult Potion.” His voice cracked, and he wanted nothing more than a glass of water. “Remus, sorry, could you get me some water, please?”

“Yes I will, and I will get the dragon as well.”

“No, wait, let’s talk for a few minutes first. Remus, now you have to learn to be an Animagus.”

“You mean, we’ll spend the nights of the full moon in the forest anyway?” Remus laughed at his friend.

Harry beamed. “Of course. Otherwise we would all miss it too much.”

“All right, but I will wait until after the next two nights of the full moon. Dumbledore told me he would arrange with my parents that I may stay at Hogwarts for a few days around the next two full moons during the summer holidays, and that James, Sirius and Severus may come as well, maybe Lily too, so that they can watch over me during the full moon. You will stay with your Grandparents anyway, won’t you?” Harry nodded thinking how nicely his meddling grandfather had managed to get all his friends to stay with him for some time during the holidays. “I will go and let you rest; I don’t know when I’ll be allowed to visit you again, but if there’s anything I can do for you, let me know through Severus.”

“All right, Remus, thanks, and tell the others I said hello.” When Remus had gone, suddenly a question occurred to Harry, and he couldn’t help thinking about it.

When Pomfrey came out of her office to check on Harry, she noticed that Harry was crying silently and was shocked; he had never cried before. Was he in so much pain, or what could have upset him so much? She rushed over to him and asked, “Harry, what’s wrong?” Harry only shook his head, his eyes full of tears.