Julian woke with a start. What time was it? Where was he? What happened?

The sun was now beginning to set, its rays shining brightly through the cracks in the curtains and illuminating a strange desk and bookshelves across from the flat bed he was lying in.

Oh. Right. He wasn’t in the hospital wing. The events of the day came flooding back to him as he grabbed his glasses looked at the pile of books on the desk. He wondered if the headmaster had chosen those books in particular or if he had whoever was helping him choose some random books.

The bigger question was what had woken him up. He didn’t think he needed to go to the toilet, nor could he recall having heard a loud noise. The nausea was still there, but it was manageable. He was still quite tired and was already thinking about rolling over and going back to sleep.

Yawning widely, it suddenly hit him. There was something hard sitting in his cheek. It was a very small object and hard as a rock. Feeling for it with his tongue, he knew immediately what it was.

A canine tooth. His left canine tooth to be exact.

Julian pulled it out of his mouth and looked at it in curiosity before experimentally wiggling the other one. It was loose too. Very very loose. So loose, in fact, he could slide his tongue between the tooth and the gum.

Feeling the empty spot in his teeth with his tongue, Julian swore he could feel a sharp tip of a new fang growing in. It felt strange having a blank spot in his teeth. He hadn’t had one of those in a very long time, not since he lost the last of his baby teeth.

But what to do with his tooth? Setting it on the desk, Julian stared at the tooth as it sparkled in the sunlight.

When he had lost his baby teeth, he would put them under his pillow in hopes that the tooth fairy would come and give him money for them. It didn’t take long for him to realize there was no such thing as the tooth fairy. Other children would come to school bragging about having gotten a few pence for their tooth. Dudley would get a pound per tooth and would immediately demand more money from his parents for candy. Harry had tried keeping his teeth under his pillow for weeks, until finally giving up and throwing them away.

There wasn’t any point to keeping this tooth, but it felt almost wrong to throw it away. It was a reminder he was losing his humanity. He knew he couldn’t put the tooth back, but part of him was terrified of having fangs. What would they look like? Would he be able to hide them? Would he even be able to convince people he was human?

He shivered slightly at the idea of being outed. Thoughts of vampire hunters coming after him ran through his head. Was it even safe for him to be out of Hogwarts for this long?

Was it even safe for him to be out of Hogwarts at all?

Leaving the tooth on his desk, he pulled his hat down more firmly over his head and climbed out of bed. Padding almost silently to the door, he was happy he was no longer feeling extremely unsteady on his feet.

Poking his head out of the door, he looked around and was surprised to find no one in the hallway. Even with all of the students out on holiday, Hogwarts was a rather busy place. House elves didn’t shield themselves during the summer and could regularly be found throughout the castle performing maintenance or cleaning. The ghosts would occasionally fly through the hospital on their way to one function or another. Even when there were no living beings around, the portraits were always there to strike up a conversation with, though the ones in the hospital wing rarely wanted to talk for long.

Here, however, there were no moving portraits, ghosts, or house elves. It felt eerily quiet.

Turning and padding down the hallway, he opened the door across from what he assumed to be the toilet. Inside was a sparsely decorated bedroom with a simple chest of drawers. A dark black robe hung from a hook by the door, but other than that there were few signs of habitation. The one thing that was missing, however, was Severus.

Turning back to the toilet, Julian listened for any sounds of running water. Nothing.

Walking as close as he dared to the stairs, he closed his eyes and listened intently for any signs of the man on the first floor. He heard a few cars going by on the street outside first, then a door opening and closing across the street. A few jingling keys. A cat meowing for food down the street. A can opener being used next door.

There it was! Very faintly he heard the sounds of boiling water. No, not water, it was too thick. Potion. Or soup. Could be either as he had never actually been around potions before. But the sound he was hearing was not coming from the kitchen, it sounded much too far away for that. Either way, the sound was coming from within the house.

“Dad?” Julian called softly.

When he received no answer, he inched closer to the stairs. They looked even more intimidating from the top of the stairs than they had from the bottom. Even if he hung onto the banister for dear life, there was no way he would make it down in one piece. Slowly, he lowered himself down onto the ground and slid to the stairs.

He could do this. He knew he could.

One step at a time, he lowered himself down the stairs. His arms and thighs burned from the exertion, his tailbone getting more and more sore from resting directly on the wooden stairs. He debated turning around and sliding down on his stomach, but he was afraid his jumper would ride up and his tube would get caught on a stair. And that would be hard to explain.

He made it to the bottom of the stairs after what felt like an absurdly long amount of time, arms on fire and legs shaking from the effort.

Sitting on the final stair, he called out once more trying to find Severus, however there was still no answer. He was much closer to the sounds of bubbling, however. He felt as though he were sitting directly over the sound, though there were no fumes he could see or heat of any kind he could feel.

Despite feeling completely exhausted, Julian pushed himself up and towards the living room couch he could see. He needed to find Severus. What if a vampire hunter came for him? He could hardly move, let alone defend himself. What if the cops came back to take him to an orphanage? Or if someone looking for Harry Potter had followed the cops here?

His mind whirled with the possibilities.

Severus had to be in the basement. The basement he wasn’t allowed into. Severus had only mentioned it, but Julian didn’t want to get into trouble by being down there. He didn’t even know where the entrance to the basement was let alone if he could make it down another flight of stairs.

Barely making it to the sofa, Julian couldn’t help but feel weak. It took all of his effort to make it down one flight of stairs. On his bottom, no less. Hogwarts wasn’t going to happen. He could feel it. He wasn’t going to be able to make it to class, even if he had a half schedule. And if he wasn’t able to attend class, he wasn’t going to learn to defend himself. Or learn to make potions. Or learn to create spells.

He was just going to be the sad, worthless, sickly, vampire child who couldn’t do anything for himself.

Pulling his knees to his chest, Julian looked at all of the books on the shelves. Maybe he could just stay here. He could learn to go up and down the stairs. He could read the books. He could teach himself. That’s what he was used to doing anyways. But who would take care of him then?

Pulling off his glasses and holding his now writhing stomach, Julian laid his forehead on his knees and rested over on the armrest.

“Severus?” he called once more, knowing it was in vain.

What was he going to do?

---

Severus had woken feeling surprisingly well rested after only a few hours of sleep. Assuming it was from years of practice waking up at odd times and sleeping when he could. A few hours of unbroken sleep was a rarity but cherished.

After relieving himself, Severus quickly checked on Julian. The boy was still sound asleep, curled into a small ball and holding his pillow as though it were a lifeline. His blanket had slid off his somewhat as he slept, but that was quickly remedied with a flick of the wand. Severus also noted the temperature of Julian’s room was somewhat lower than the boy was used to. If it hadn’t been for the permanent heating charms on his clothing, the child would definitely be shivering.

One heating charm and a vital sign check later, Severus was satisfied the child … his child… would be comfortable and asleep for a while longer. How long was a question, but considering the kind of night they had had the night before, Severus hoped Julian would sleep for a few more hours at least.

Severus sighed in frustration. In their haste to leave, they had forgotten to grab several nutrient potions for Julian. Whether they stayed here for the night or not, Julian was going to need at least two for the evening. If they stayed over night, that was another four. Thankfully, the variation of nutrient potion they found that worked required only a few ingredients and was quick to make. So quick, in fact, there was no point to apparating to Hogwarts and walking all the way to the castle when he had a decently stocked ingredients cabinet in stasis.

Quietly going down the stairs, Severus quickly spelled a slice of bread from the sparsely stocked kitchen into toast. He hoped the scent of toast was mild enough to not set off Julian’s stomach. That was another thing they had to add to the list of things to get under control before school started. If Julian was even going to stand a chance of acting as though he were a normal student, he would have to be present at meals periodically. Especially feasts such as the one at the beginning of the year.

Quickly polishing off the toast, Severus donned his brewers robes before removing the stasis spells from the basement.

The smells of the last potions he brewed prior to putting up the spells wafted up from the basement. Apparently he had been experimenting with the Wolfsbane at the time as the air reeked of monkshood and frog liver.

He quickly dispelled the scent before entering the makeshift dungeon. He knew Julian really wanted to study potions, but he was worried about how the boy would react to the smells. If food set him off, potions most certainly would. Every year there was at least one muggleborn first year who vomited during potions class.

The longest part of potions making was undoubtedly the prep work. Dicing ingredients to the correct size, attempting various knife skills on slippery elements, and bringing the base up to temperature all took time. Julian’s nutrient potions only required an oil base and ten ingredients, though heating the oil had to be done slowly to prevent it from burning.

Grabbing all of the ingredients necessary and setting the cauldron over a low flame, Severus started preparing the ingredients. It was easy for him to get lost in the process. Slicing, gutting, chopping, and mashing various ingredients had become so second nature it gave him a chance to think about other things.

Like Julian starting school.

There was no reason he shouldn’t be able to start school come autumn so long as he had a partial schedule as opposed to a normal full schedule. Obviously there would be some classes he would simply never be able to attend, such as Flying and Care of Magical Creatures, the latter of which wouldn’t be an issue until he was a third year anyways.

At the rate he was improving, it would be feasible for him to take morning and evening class at least for the first term of the year. That would allow him time to recuperate throughout the middle of the day. He would have the chance to nap, feed or run nutrient potions as tube feeding, or study if he felt able. It was certainly an idea. Of course he would have to discuss it with Albus before the school year started, as well as with Julian’s head of house.

He rather hoped Julian would be a Slytherin, but he also had to face the fact that, while he was becoming used to thinking of Julian as his son, Julian was actually the son of two of the most prominent Gryffindors in modern history. Could he stand the idea of Julian being a Gryffindor? Yes. Would he like it? Debatable.

Minerva would never let him live it down.

Thinking of Minerva’s glee at having his son in her house made him shudder.

He had managed to escape speaking to the other professors at length at the end of term about Julian or any of his health problems by sheer luck. The carriages had been pulling away from the castle with students leaning out of the doors and windows waving goodbye and craning their necks to see the small child carried by their horrible potions professor. Many of the professors were getting slightly emotional as their favorite seventh years were leaving for the last time, the other Heads of House included.

Julian had managed to watch the carriages pull away before Severus noted him starting to nod off. While the other professors had been engrossed with saying their goodbyes, Severus and Julian had slipped back into the castle.

Severus had then made it his goal to attempt to avoid the other professors who remained in the castle like the plague. Thankfully, only two professors had decided to stay on the castle grounds for the summer: Trelawney and Binns. Neither of which had lives outside of what they lived in the castle.

A brief conversation with Albus after Minerva had left assured him he had made the right decision to avoid them. From what Dumbledore had said, Minerva was “less than thrilled” that Severus had avoided telling them about his son for as long as he did. She had been demanding to know why he hadn’t said anything and forcibly offering her assistance.

As he added the first few ingredients to the potion, he swore he heard footsteps above his head. A quick check of the wards assured him no one else had entered the property. There was no way Julian was up though. Besides, there was no way he could have safely made it down those blasted stairs.

A few more ingredients made their way into the potion, and the temperature was decreased momentarily as Severus stirred the now viscous concoction. A few more steps and the potion would be finished. He would then have to strain, dilute, and bottle the solution. Those last few steps were not necessary for most potion drinkers, but for Julian they had been a life saver. Straining the particulate and diluting the potion had allowed for Julian to receive the potion through his feeding tube as opposed to attempting to drink it. The diluted version also allowed for him to receive more hydration.

Soon, however, they would have to start making some additional modifications to this potion. Once the boy’s fangs were in, he would start craving blood. There had been an initial thought to just modify the potion to have a higher iron content and leave it at that, but the more he worked with Julian and learned about how Julian’s body functioned, the more he realized that wouldn’t work.

He would need blood. Routinely.

While the books Lucius had provided had been informative, they had spoken more to vampire mythology and less to the nitty gritty of being a vampire. Even the books which were written by vampires were geared more towards explaining the basics of vampirism in a way wizards could understand it.

Removing potion from the heat and allowing it to cool, Severus pondered the possibility of writing a book about vampiric anatomy and the difficulties of raising Julian under a pseudonym. It could potentially help other sire-less vampires from suffering the same fate as Julian. It would also be very difficult to keep details out of the book as some of the problems Julian faced were very unique to him and unlikely to be experienced by anyone within the wizarding world.

Best to keep that idea under wraps. At least for a while.

Diluting the potion and straining it took maybe ten minutes tops with bottling the small amount of potion even less. It seemed a waste to use a large cauldron for this procedure, but the smallest cauldron he had which would accommodate the requisite ingredients and could potentially brew this potion properly was silver.

They would need to properly test all of the myths about vampires on Julian. He had already demonstrated an aversion to garlic, but none of the OCD tendencies some vampires possessed. And Severus had never tried to take his picture or stand him in front of a mirror.

More concerning, however, was how his magic would behave once he had magical reserves built up. They were getting close to that point, but he didn’t have a large or consistent enough reserve to safely and consistently cast spells. Now that he was consistently receiving nutrients, his magical levels had dramatically increased but they weren’t within a normal range yet. Beyond that, however, Severus was worried about the vampiric affinity to blood magic.

There was a potential for proper spell casting, however many vampires seemed to prefer utilizing blood magic as a replacement for more traditional spells. The vampires that Severus had seen in the Dark Lord’s army during the war had exclusively used blood magic for all their attacks. It was horrifying to watch.

The concern was that Julian would prefer to use this form of magic over others.

Finally finishing bottling the nutrient potion, Severus sat back and admired his work. That should be enough to last a few days should Julian choose to remain here rather than going back to Hogwarts.

Severus had originally only wanted to come to assuage the muggle police, but now that they were here he didn’t want to return immediately. Hogwarts was his home, but so was Cokeworth. There was something humbling about coming back here; a reminder that not everywhere in the world was a beautiful castle overlooking a lake. He certainly had bad memories from being here, but interspersed through these were the lovely memories of growing up and playing with the few friends he had down by the park.

He was fairly certain Poppy would be fine with them staying for a few more days. If Julian had been hospitalized in St. Mungo’s, he likely would have been sent home by now with follow up appointments scheduled.

He also would have heavy tracking spells placed on him, he’d be registered with the ministry, and would under no circumstances be allowed to attend Hogwarts.

Severus sighed heavily before carrying the cauldron to the wash basin and scrubbing it clean. He really hoped they could keep Julian’s condition under wraps. Having a muggle team of doctors on his case may actually help with that. Why would a vampire ever seek out medical treatment from muggles when they were so intrinsically magical? It made no sense.

A few more minutes of cleaning up the basement and he was done with his brewing. He debated putting everything back into stasis, but, if there was even a remote chance of staying a few more days, that was more effort than it was worth.

He had only been downstairs for roughly an hour, but was already feeling as though he should check on Julian. This was their first day away from the school and he wanted to make sure Julian was still comfortable. None of his wards had gone off saying the boy had gotten up, but he wanted to be sure.

The wards. Shit. In all the exhausted franticness of getting to the house and entertaining the wishes of the police, he hadn’t set any of the monitoring wards. Julian could be getting sick or be in pain and he wouldn’t know. Or he could have fallen out of bed.

The thought chilled Severus to his core. How could he have been so complacent?

Packing the nutrient potions in a small wooden crate, he ran them up stairs and placed them on the kitchen counter and quickly walked to the stairs. He was halfway up them when a small movement on the living room sofa drew his attention. There, asleep in a ball, covered in only a small throw blanket, was a very distinctive child.

Severus’s stomach dropped. What had prompted Julian to come down stairs? Had he been looking for him? Was he ok? Had he gotten ill?

Was this what it was like to be a father?