Shannon McAllister sighed as she lit another cigarette, propped her feet up on the coffee table in front of her, and took a small sip of the vodka she had gotten from a neighbor. Life in Minsk wasn’t easy, but it was far more rewarding than working in either the States or the UK had been. Especially when working with the wizarding population in the area.

Communism and its follies had really done a number on the wizarding population in the Eastern Bloc.

Growing up in the US, Shannon had been brought up to fear what the USSR was capable of and those who followed the ideologies of Communism. Bombing drills were a part of her education in primary school, and even when she was a student at Ilvermorny that fear of attack was still pounded into her. Portions of the Ilvermorny basements were converted to bomb shelters and the warding was increased to dissuade even bombers flying high in the sky from flying near the school..

Naturally, she was fascinated.

Europe, however, was a forbidden fruit unable to be explored at the time. War within the wizarding world of Europe was raging with Voldemort at the helm of the Dark and Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, at the helm of the Light. The only way for an American witch to be allowed onto the continent was to be willing to fight, be smuggled in by Voldemort’s cronies, or to come as a medic.

Shannon was no fool, however. She knew what she was capable of and what she struggled with. She was not spectacular at fighting, but she was quite good at healing. Upon the completion of her NEWTS, she immediately applied for and was granted a healer apprenticeship at Tokoi Center for Magical Maladies in Pennsylvania. Keeping one eye on the unfolding crisis in Europe, she decided to focus on spell damage, particularly that caused by the Unforgivables.

Graduating no where near the top of her class, she immediately applied to be transferred to St. Mungo’s in England in hopes of working on the spell damage ward. While her application was accepted, she was initially placed in the pediatric burn ward due to a misunderstanding between her American qualifications and her transfer paperwork. Frustrating was an understatement. If she had thought the bureaucracy of the US was bad, the UK was so much worse. Drop off this form here, take this form there, pray they got filed correctly, find out they got lost when an owl got hit by a muggle truck, re-file everything again.

Nearly six months into her time in the UK, she finally was transferred to the Spell Damage department and quickly made a name for herself within the healers on the unit. Funny how that happens when you’re placed in the department you originally applied for and specialized in. For some reason they still felt that she enjoyed pediatrics so she was routinely assigned pediatric spell damage cases. While she didn’t really care much for the pediatric cases which came in, mostly because they generally revolved around children getting ahold of their parent’s wands or were emotionally charged messes, as the war continued to rage, more and more children were brought in with curse damage.

It was horrifying watching the children of nomajs be brought in screaming for their parents who had just been killed in front of them as they themselves were suffering the effects of the various torture spells. It was worse when she would be called to a scene to identify the curses used on the victims and verify which was the cause of death. This wasn’t what she wanted to do. This had never been what she wanted to do.

The last draw was the final patient she took at St. Mungo’s, and ironically had been deemed the final patient of the war: Harry Potter.

She still remembered the tears rolling down his face as he screamed for his newly deceased mother and father, blood freshly dried on the toddler’s face from the slice left from the killing curse.

He had been brought in by none other than Albus Dumbledore himself, a man she had never gotten to meet and hoped she never would again. He had brought the Potter boy in not to be admitted and treated, but rather to be sure no other curses had been placed upon the boy. A quick bath and a bandaid and the boy was right as rain in his eyes, never mind the fact that he had just been struck by the ONLY unblockable curse in the wizarding world. When Harry Potter had been checked out without a full evaluation, her rage threatened to boil over. There was a dark magic about the boy, she could just feel it. Not to mention there was something strange that showed up on one of her identity scans, though she couldn’t be sure what exactly it was.

The war was over and so was she.

She was done dealing with the insanity of the Wizarding World of Britain. She was done putting up with being shuffled from place to place. She had never truly wanted to be a healer in Britain; she had wanted to study the effects of Communism on wizarding communities in Eastern Europe. And with the war over, that was exactly what she was going to do. Be it as a healer or as a civilian, that was her goal.

It was much less difficult to get into the Eastern Bloc than she had thought, her credentials assisting her greatly in passing through the required government check points even as an American. And once she was in, she fell in love. Not with the government or the practices of the Communist regimes she encountered, no. The people of Eastern Europe were phenomenal, once they got over the fact she was American of course.

It didn’t take long for her to become established as an extremely good and thorough healer, though she did nothing to market herself as such. She found a home in a small, government designed wizarding town along the Dnieper River just north of Kiev and quickly learned the local language and dialect. Outside of occasionally travelling through the region, that was where she stayed. Just her, her cat, and her small garden of herbs and potions ingredients. It was peaceful in a way that she couldn’t describe and her family in America didn’t understand. She loved it.

Until she couldn’t anymore.

She had been living there for only a few years when strange things began happening. It was as though the magic in the town was dying off. The people of the town were struggling with even the most simple of magical task. Pet kneazles died in the streets. Magical plants withered on their stalks. It was unlike anything she had ever seen before. It was terrifying.

Then the sickness began. Those who worked in the surrounding forest complained of severe headaches, nausea, vomiting, and burns from touching the ground. When tested, their magic was gone. Completely and totally gone. The sickness seemed to spread unchecked through the town for several days until finally word reached them that it wasn’t only affecting the wizarding communities.

The nomajes were falling ill as well.

Anti-nomaj sentiment raged unchecked as the town was evacuated in hopes of escaping the spreading disease. The hope was that they would be allowed to return to their homes soon, but Shannon doubted it very much. Whatever was removing their magic was unlikely to go away anytime soon, no matter what the government said.

And she was correct. It wasn’t until she made her way to Minsk that she found out the true extent of what had happened. If ever there was an event to study, this was it. What could possibly have happened that would effect both the nomaj and magical populations? How had it affected the wizarding world in the area? In Europe as a whole? Would it spread? She felt a sick sense of excitement about the potential research that could be done. Despite the danger to herself, she decided to stay in Minsk and monitor the wizarding populations there.

The fall of the Communist Bloc did little to affect her research or the effects of the Magical Death which was continuing to ravage the magical communities in what was now Belarus and Ukraine. There were even cases of lessening magical abilities in some of the more mountainous communities throughout Europe, though the effects were much less pronounced than what they had been in Belarus and Ukraine. Little could be done in the way of treatment, but as time went on fewer and fewer cases were being reported.

Nearly ten years on and she was finally finding time for a little R and R. Maybe a bit of travel was in order? She hadn’t been back to the States in a while, though she did keep in regular contact with her parents. Perhaps she could go see them? It would be nice to surprise them for once.

A tapping on her window startled her from her thoughts. Flicking her wand, the window sprung open and in fluttered a rather bedraggled looking owl with a British Magical Post band around its leg.

“Hmm,” Shannon muttered with a frown deepening the creases on her once smooth forehead as she offered the owl some refreshments. “Who the hell could this be?”

Turning the envelope over, she raised an eyebrow before unceremoniously ripping it open and casting it aside. What would a British potions master want with her?

Not even ten minutes later, her request for an international portkey was placed. She had a patient to see.

---

“So, let me make sure I’m understanding this properly,” Shannon said, resisting the urge to light a cigarette and take a long drag. “Harry Potter is your son and was hit with the Cruciatus while coming off of Falsum Paternis and you are now trying to both protect him from Vol- sorry- You-Know-Who and Dumbledore AND make sure that he is growing up and getting a proper education?”

“Yes,” Severus said stiffly, sipping his now lukewarm tea with a wince.

Admittedly, he hadn’t been expecting a response from the well known healer quite so quickly. Nor had he expected her to show up at his doorstep, lit fag in one hand and dilapidated suitcase in the other, looking the part of a rather angry Russian babushka. He had expected a letter demanding a better explanation, but apparently that wasn’t needed. He hadn’t realized how deeply her distrust for the Headmaster had become entrenched since she famously left St. Mungo’s to go to Russia of all places.

“How long did it take you to realize that man was more of a manipulator than he let on?” she asked as she finished her third cup of coffee since they sat down at the small cafe in downtown Cokeworth. The people here looked about as downtrodden as many of the people in Belarus, though she knew no one in the UK would admit it. Nowhere was all sunshine and roses after all.

Severus scoffed as he warmed the tea in his cup before sipping once more at it. “Far too long, I’m afraid. And the more I discover about Elias’s family, the more I learn to despise the man.”

“Bet that came as a shock to yah,” Shannon nodded, a smirk on her face.

“Less of a shock than you can imagine,” Severus said flippantly. “But yes, I was surprised to the extent of his manipulations, and not just towards the boy.”

“You’re caught in his web too, aren’tcha?”

“Unfortunately,” Severus sighed. “And I would greatly appreciate anything to keep my son from getting himself any more tangled in it than he already is.”

Shannon nodded and scratched her nose. It all made sense why she was contacted now. She still had her British healer’s license despite not working for St. Mungo’s anymore. She was known to thoroughly dislike Dumbledore, though her reasoning was not as well known. She wasn’t in contact with the British wizarding community and was known to be living in Eastern Europe. Who better to take care of a child with a past they were trying to create than someone who didn’t even live in the British Isles? It would also add credence to why he wasn’t sent a letter to attend Hogwarts nor did anyone know who he was in the British wizarding community.

“I’ll do it,” she said abruptly. “No compensation necessary.”

Severus raised an eyebrow in disbelief. “Are you sure you do not need something for your troubles?”

Shannon laughed heartily and flagged the waiter down to pay for her coffees. She had neither want nor need of his money; she was happy enough with her modest lifestyle in a former Soviet country. She made enough on commission for her skills that she could easily afford to do whatever she wanted. And what she wanted to do more than anything was prove to herself that she hadn’t missed something all those years ago with the Potter boy.

“Not in the slightest,” she laughed as she pulled out a handful of British coinage and handed it to the waiter before he even handed her the bill. “I do what I want and what I want is to help.”

---

“How long has he been like this?” Shannon asked, eyes wide as she looked at the quivering boy on the bed.

“He’s been in this state for nearly two days now,” Severus said, rubbing a hand over his tired eyes. “He had been doing well, then he had some sort of … attack… related to what seemed to be a nightmare. He’s been like this since.”

Shannon nodded, lips pursed, and pulled a miniaturized medical bag out of her pocket and enlarged it before removing a variety of different devices and setting them on the bedside table. This case was already giving her flashbacks to some of her more horrific cases during the war. If it weren’t for the fact they were in the situation they were in, she would have recommended he go to St. Mungo’s immediately for a more thorough evaluation. She would have taken him herself if she didn’t know the situation she was walking into.

“Alright, run me through it once more,” Shannon said, pulling out a dictaquill and placing it on the parchment she now had floating in front of her before taking a seat on the wooden chair that was placed at bedside. “His mother was how far into her pregnancy when she started taking Falsum Paternis?”

“Judging by when the letters were sent, she was at least 2 months pregnant. She had to have just started taking the potion,” Severus said, double checking the silencing spell was active. It certainly wouldn’t do for Draco to hear any of what they were discussing.

“And the day he was cursed?”

“June 24th.”

“And she sent the letters to be delivered July 20th?” she verified, swearing loudly when Severus nodded in affirmation. “Dammit! Of course she did!”

“Is there a problem?” Severus crossed his arms over his chest and an eyebrow. He knew how the potion worked, but what did that have to do with when the letter was sent?

Shannon sighed and began slowly casting spells over the child in the bed and muttering under her breath. Slowly the twitching in Elias’s limbs began to subside as she worked her way from his head to his feet, with each limb being held momentarily in a soft, golden glow. As soon as the glow faded, however, the twitching began again.

“Seizures?” she asked suddenly, looking up from the long strings of writing which were forming on the parchment.

“Three that I know of,” Severus said brusquely. “None prior to this summer. The muggles did an ‘EEG’ to confirm that they were real.”

Shannon huffed loudly before casting another barrage of spells on the boy, this time focused on his head and back. It was as though she were going over every single portion of his brain and spine with a fine-tooth comb as she leaned in repeatedly and looked more deeply at certain parts of the scan. Occasionally she would stop and go back a ways before continuing on. Finally using her wand to shine several different color lights in his eyes and murmuring reassurances to the boy as he weakly fought to back away from the bright lights, she sighed and put her wand in her holster before beginning to pace back and forth in the room.

“I have an idea as to what this is, but it may make creating the backstory more complicated,” Shannon said, rubbing the back of her neck. “He fits all of the criteria, unfortunately. Every last one if you take into account that he was under the influence of a potion up until just before the summer started.”

“And what would that be?” Severus asked impatiently, feeling more overwhelmed at the idea of trying to create a massively complicated backstory.

“Shervil’s,” Shannon sighed, a look of sadness gracing her aging features. “Technically, Shervil’s Ataxia with Epileptiform Discharges and Associated Adolescent Dementia.”

Severus swallowed hard as his mouth went dry. That did not sound good. Rarely were conditions which were long in name a good thing, and not one word of that diagnosis sounded like a good thing. But if it had a name, it possibly had a treatment. Possibly. And if the treatment was a potion, there was no potions master in Britain he would trust to make the required potions for his son other than himself.

“And what does that mean?”

“In the easiest way I can put it, his mother was tortured while he was in utero. Probably around the time she was two months along, though anywhere from eight to ten weeks is when Shervil’s develops,” Shannon said sadly. “Or that’s how it normally develops. In his case, his body was beginning to check and ‘correct’ his nervous system to what it should have been prior to Falsum Paternis being introduced when he was tortured by You-Know-Who. The timing of that event could not have been worse, if I’m honest.

“If he had really been born with this, he would have been in and out of the hospital multiple times due to complications. He may not have ever learned to walk or talk. His ability to function could be anything from normal with a slight lisp to bedridden and unable to care for himself. I only saw a few cases come through while I was working at St. Mungo’s and they were horrible. It was almost a constant reminder to the parents of what had happened and the children were constantly in pain.”

Together they stood in silence for a moment, both lost in their thoughts. A diagnosis brought relief, but with that relief it also brought intense sadness. The life Elias thought he would have was looking more and more like a pipe dream, and those damn Dursleys certainly hadn’t helped at all. A chronic, debilitating disorder was not what Severus had hoped for, but this was the hand he had been dealt, that Elias had been dealt, and it was what he had to work with now.

“Treatment?” Severus said quietly, sitting gently on the bed next to his son.

“Mostly symptom management, though a diluted Fulgur potion which seemed to help somewhat to improve functionality and memory.”

Severus frowned at the thought. Fulgur was a highly restricted potion, and for good reason. In proper doses, it could increase a witch or wizard's ability to channel magic thus optimizing core usage. Used incorrectly, however, even a single vial could cause a wizard’s magic to go haywire, essentially frying their brain. Their body would crackle with the magical discharges it caused until the wizard was dead. It was a horrible death to behold. Naturally, he had been tasked with making several batches of it for the Dark Lord over the years for the purpose of slowly torturing prisoners with their own magic.

“How dilute?” Severus asked tersely.

“Six to eight drops in an eight ounce glass of water,” Shannon said as she ran a small crystal across Elias’s chest. “I’d say give it to him once a day, preferably in the morning, though you could increase the dose to once in the morning and once in the evening if he starts to sundown.”

“Sundown?” Severus said, brows furrowing deeper.

“If he gets more disoriented or starts to hallucinate as the sun sets,” Shannon said, throwing the crystal back into her bag with a nod before placing several rune stones around the boy and watching as a multicolored mist covered his body. “It’s more common than you think, especially if he’s in an unfamiliar location. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if that played into whatever set off this episode.”

Severus nodded and pursed his lips. He could only hope that the ever growing list of potions and spells would do their job and Elias would begin to improve. He needed to improve. He had to improve. He had been through so much in his short life only to continue being kicked while he was down. He deserved a better life, one free of the fears and threats he had constantly had as Harry Potter.

“I do have some good news for you,” Shannon said suddenly as she snatched up the rune stones and threw them into her bag before closing it with a snap.

Severus raised an eyebrow questioningly. “Oh?”

“The Falsum Paternis has completely left his system now. Outside of Shervil’s, I’m not detecting any other defects to any of his systems,” Shannon said with a rye smile. “Congratulations. You are the father.”

Severus glared at her with the fury he only reserved for incompetent first years before huffing slightly and crossing his arms.

“I’ll have all of his paperwork forged before the end of the week,” Shannon said, groaning as she stood and grabbed her bag. “They’ll all be in Belorussian, of course, but a simple translator spell will show all of the information well enough. I’d still recommend him being seen at St. Mungo’s, though I understand if you don’t want him to go. It would be good to get him a Healer in Britain.”

“Thank you,” Severus said curtly but politely as he followed the healer out of the room.

“You’re welcome,” Shannon muttered around the unlit cigarette she put in her mouth as she pulled out a piece of parchment and quickly scribbled down several things. “Here, these are the standard potions prescribed for Shervil’s symptom management. Let me know if your boss is asking for anything else from you. Last thing I want is for him to get his grubby fingers on that boy again.”

“I shall keep you informed,” Severus said with a nod as he opened the front door for the woman.

Shannon nodded with a smile before stepping out of the house and walking around the corner into the alley. She was hopeful the young Snape would make a decent recovery from this episode, much more hopeful than she had been with many of the pediatric patients she had had while working at St Mungo’s all those years ago. His father obviously cared greatly for him, no matter what his political loyalties were, and was an extremely prolific potion’s master. While the chances of Elias making a full recovery were slim, he had an extremely good chance of living a normal life.

Closing the door behind the healer, Severus let out a sigh of relief before looking at the list of potions she had handed him. A small smirk graced his face for a moment as he saw the list. With the exception of the Fulgur, the other potions were the same cocktail he had been instinctively giving the boy. At the bottom of the list, however was a small note she had left for him: a few words of encouragement.

“You’re doing great, dad!”