He was about a year old, maybe a few months older. He was lying on the floor in front of the fireplace Harry recognized as the one of his parents’ living room. Minerva was sitting on the floor next to him and read the story of Harry and Tom to him. When she finished reading about how Harry had managed to finish the evil man off, Harry tried to say,

“Gwanny, weed de book wif Hawwy and de dagon for Hawwy pwease.” Minerva smiled, transfigured a parchment into a cuddly stuffed green dragon and gave it a happily smiling Harry into his arms. He immediately cuddled the dragon, then held it in front of his face and had a good look at him, before suddenly the dragon’s eyes began to twinkle merrily. Harry turned to Minerva and said,

“Wook Gwanny, de dagon’s eyes winkle like Gwandads. Hawwy made dem.”

“Yes Harry, I saw it. You did that very well my sweetie,” his Great Grandmother commended him making him laugh happily, while he was busily cuddling his stuffed dragon.

Harry lay back onto his bed and held his head until the pain slowly receded a little. During the next weeks, Severus and Harry tried to improve the potion to limit the memory visions during the morning. He would have memories in the afternoon, and he could recover with just a few new memories during the night to be well enough in the morning to take the next potion and attend Transfiguration classes. Until about the second half of November, they managed to make the potion nearly perfect. From this time onwards, Harry tried to assist McGonagall as much as he could during morning classes, although he couldn’t be of much help with grading in the afternoon or evening. He didn’t even manage to attend Quidditch practise of the Merlin team more than about once a week. But he was determined to play in the match against Gryffindor on the last November weekend. Ginny and Lily had made an agreement, which allowed Ginny to visit Harry every evening after dinner, even when he was sick, and they spent a lot of time in Harry’s room talking or just being together. Harry had told Ginny about his grandmother’s plans for him and she looked at him in awe.

“Oh Harry, that’s just weird but also great – you’ll be my Head of House for my last two Hogwarts years! Cool!” Harry smirked, but suddenly this face became stern.

“Oh, I haven’t thought about this at all! You know, you are my girlfriend, but such relations between students and teachers are not allowed. We have to ask my grandfather what to do about this.” Ginny suddenly looked very frightened and said in a small voice,

“Harry, I don’t want to loose you.” He pulled her in a hug and said calmingly,

“Ginny, you won’t loose me; it’s just precaution. In the worst case we’ll just have to wait until you finish Hogwarts, but don’t worry, we’ll find a way to be together; if we can’t find any other method, we can ask my father to give you detentions.” Harry smiled fondly at his girlfriend.

“By the way, Ginny, do you know what you want to do, when you finish Hogwarts? Besides from being a Transfiguration teacher’s wife of course I mean,” he added grinning.

“I have thought about it a lot recently, because at the end of the school year I have to decide which subjects I want to take in my 6th year. If I can manage Potions, I would like to become a healer.” Harry glanced at her surprised.

“Wow, really? Have you talked about that with my mom or with Madam Pomfrey? I mean, maybe Poppy could give you a healing course during 6th year, so that you can drop another course. She has given me a healing course before; therefore, I know that she is a very good teacher. And concerning Potions I can help you anytime – you know, Potions is one of my best subjects!” He looked at his watch and saw it was nearly curfew.

“Oh Ginny, you have to hurry. Curfew will start in five minutes. Wait; let’s ask Mom if she could give you a permission slip or something.” He went out of the room looking for his mother; she seemed to be in her office grading papers.

“Mom, I’m sorry to disturb you. Em… you know, we talked and forgot the time. Now Ginny is still here and curfew starts in two minutes. What are we going to do?” He gave his mother a distressed glance, so that she sighed and said,

“All right. She may go through my office, but remember that this is an exception. Don’t think I will allow this every evening. Next time you better set an alarm clock.” Ginny hesitantly entered the room and said,

“I am very sorry, Professor Evans-Snape. We really forgot the time, and Harry suggested flashing me there, but as I don’t know if it would be so good for his condition, I refused to be flashed, so I’m really sorry.” Lily gave her a small smile and said,

“Thank you Ginny, and you are right, Harry should not even transform let alone flash at the moment. We just can’t do this every night, not because I don’t want it but because of the jealousy other students might show when they see you coming out of my office every evening. But when you really happen to run out of time, you may go through my office. Use the exit over there, and you will be in front of your common room. Good night Ginny.”

“Thank you Professor, good night. Night sweetie,” Ginny said smiling at both of them before she left the room.

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A few days later, the Merlin team beat the Gryffindor team in the shortest Quidditch match Hogwarts had ever seen. Eight minutes into the game Harry managed to catch the snitch and heard Madam Hooch announce,

“Harry Snape-Dumbledore has caught the snitch. Merlin wins 150:00. Congratulations to the Merlin team!” As soon as he landed on the ground, the team surrounded Harry, and Anna and Julia shouted,

“Let’s go to the common room for our victory party!” Ginny pulled Harry into a hug and whispered,

“I’ve just asked your mom, and she says as the match was finished so early, you may come with me to the common room for a while if you want to; she says if you had any problems, I could just come to her office to call her.” Harry glanced at her pondering whether to join her or to return to his room and said,

“Alright; I’ll join you for a while; it should be safe for another hour or two I think.” When they arrived at the Common room, the party was already on its way. A big white poster covering a whole wall announced,

The shortest Quidditch match ever:

Merlin 150 – Gryffindor 00 after 8 minutes!

Julia handed the astonished Harry a bottle of butterbeer and whispered only for her brother to hear,

“You know, ever since you have introduced me to Dobby, I have very good connections to the house elves, and they brought us everything we have here today. We are going to have lunch here, and mom knows about it.” Harry enjoyed the party a lot, especially as Ginny stayed next to him on the sofa for the whole time, whispering to inform him who each single student was. After two hours, he could name most of the students in his house and even knew for most of them in which year they were. He smiled gratefully at his girlfriend. If he wanted to become Head of Merlin house in summer, he should try to learn as much as possible about the younger students of his house.

“Harry, Ginny,” Anna suddenly called them. “Come over here; they are going to have a butterbeer drinking contest!” But Harry shook his head and said,

“No thank you. I already feel a little dizzy from the bottle I drank”, and Ginny said,

“Harry stay here; you are not supposed to drink butterbeer at all as long as you are taking potions regularly.” Harry obeyed and leaned back, slowly dozing off in his seat. It did not take long until he was pulled in a memory vision.

“Vingardium leviosa” and managed to not only move the cushion around the room but the whole chair. The whole class erupted with laughter, while Harry’s eyes started to fill with tears. Lily threw him a stern glance but only said softly,

“Now Mr. Snape-Dumbledore; I think we have to do some extra practise to get a grip on your overflowing magic. Don’t worry; you’ll be able to manage it easily.” Harry looked at his mother gratefully and tried to levitate the cushion wandlessly – this time only the cushion moved to over to the other chair. While the class remained silent in awe, Lily threw him a questioning glance, content when he gave her a slight nod.

With this, the memory ended, and Harry was back sitting next to Ginny. He put his head onto her shoulder and closed his eyes, leaning into his girlfriend’s arms. Ginny eyes him worriedly and whispered,

“Harry, are you alright? Shall I get your mother or take you to her?” Harry shook his head and said,

“It’s okay, Ginny, let me sit here for a few more minutes, and then I’ll just go to her office; I have to go home soon.” Ginny smiled at him and said,

“Alright Harry, if you are sure. I’ll visit you again in the evening.

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Late in the evening, when Ginny had just returned to her house, Dumbledore came through the floo with an unnaturally stern face for the always smiling Headmaster.

“Hello Lily, Severus,” he said. “Is Harry here as well?” Lily glanced at him questioningly, and Severus said,

“He is here, but he has a fever and is in bed.” Dumbledore frowned and said very sternly,

“The Potters have just fire-called me. They have a big problem and hoped Harry might be able to help. You know James is an Auror, don’t you?” Both Severus and Lily nodded and Albus continued.

“He was on a mission for the ministry to get rid of dark artefacts that were gathered in the old Malfoy manor, which belongs to the ministry, as Lucius Malfoy died without an heir or any other relatives. Anyway James seemes to have been hit by a dark curse, which left a mark on his left arm, and according to his father, a dark arts specialist of St. Mungo’s who came to check on him today said there was no way to heal it, and James would probably slowly die of it. He said it would not help just to cut the arm off, because the dark magic had already spread from the arm to the whole body. But James remembered Harry being a natural healer; therefore his parents asked if I thought Harry might be so kind and see if he could do anything for James.” Severus sighed and asked,

“When did the whole thing happen?”

“This morning I suppose,” Albus replied concernedly. Lily stood up and said,

“I’ll go and check on Harry; wait a moment please.” She went into Harry’s room to see Harry was still awake and sat down on the edge of his bed. When she asked,

“How are you Harry?” he replied,

“I have been better, but it could be worse I suppose.”

“Harry”, she said, “Granddad is here. Something happened to James Potter, and his parents are asking if you would be able and willing to help him.” Harry looked at her questioningly and shrugged.

“What do I have to do? Shall I get up and talk to Granddad?” Lily nodded and Harry climbed out of the bed and moved on to the living room, where Albus greeted him relieved and told him the whole story. Harry at first didn’t react at all, before he said,

“Alright; of course I have to try to help him. But I’m afraid I don’t have the energy to travel far tonight. Do you think it would be possible for them to bring James here?” Severus, who had noticed that this suggestion was very unnatural for Harry’s urge to help people, interrupted him.

“Wait Harry; let us check on you first; I think you need at least a fever reducing potion before you’ll be able to do anything.” He shoved the thermometer in Harry’s mouth ignoring his weak protests and sat down next to his son, so that he could lean onto him while they waited. The reading was red and said ’40.5’, and Pomfrey’s voice told him ‘Take a fever reducer and go to bed’. Severus pulled a phial of the strong fever reducer out of his pocket and held the phial to Harry’s lips, who immediately drank the potion and obviously relaxed a few seconds later. Lily frowned and addressed Albus,

“Granddad, could you please fire-call the Potters, explain the situation and ask if they could bring James here? In fact I don’t want Harry to do anything tonight, but I can understand if he wants to try to save James’ life, so I won’t prevent him from trying, but I do not want Harry do go anywhere tonight. You see the condition he is in.” Albus nodded and stood up, went to the fireplace and asked,

“Would you mind me directly calling from here?” Lily and Severus shook their heads and Lily sat down on Harry’s other side, putting an arm around his shoulders.

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A few minutes later, the three Potters came through the floo, and Lily stood up to let James sit next to Harry, while James’ mother went to Harry and pulled him in a big hug. He smiled at her whispering,

“Hello Granny,” so that nobody else could hear it. As soon as she relieved him, Harry turned to James and looked closely at his arm. Then he turned to Severus and said,

“Dad, could you please get Aunt Poppy here? Maybe she can help me; I remember in the past I was not able to control my healing magic when I was having a fever, so it might be that I’ll have problems today as well, and she would be the most competent person to stop me at the right time should it be necessary.” Albus, who was still standing in front of the fireplace, fire-called Poppy immediately, and within seconds she was standing in front of Harry.

A little relieved Harry turned to James and gripped his left arm, summoning his healing magic and sending it through his hands into James’ arm and body until he felt Poppy pulling him away, just before he fell unconscious. The next thing he knew was that he was lying in his bed and James’ mother was sitting on the edge of his bed, smiling fondly at him, when he blinked and slowly opened his eyes.

“How do you feel Harry?” his grandmother asked and Harry groaned.

“Tired, cold, achy. What happened?” Then he remembered and excitedly tried to sit up and asked,

“How is James?” Mrs. Potter pushed him down again and said,

“James is as good as new; thank you very much Harry!” and pulled him into a hug.

“How long have I been asleep?” Harry asked and was told,

“Only during the night; it is 6 o’clock on Sunday morning. You were right; Poppy could indeed save you. As soon as she noticed you had put enough magic into James, she pulled you away, although you were putting up a fight, as unconscious as you were. No one else could have saved you so fast.” Harry smiled and said,

“I know. That’s why I wanted her to be there. Thanks for staying here with me during the night Granny. I really appreciate it. I wouldn’t have liked to wake up alone, not knowing what happened and how James was.” Suddenly Severus entered the room and glanced at his son. Mrs. Potter stood up immediately, said good-bye and left the room to floo back home. Severus accompanied her to the fireplace and thanked her for staying with Harry, before he returned to his son.

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“I’m glad you are already awake. You were right to let us call Poppy. Otherwise I’m sure you would have put yourself in a coma for at least a week.” Harry nodded.

“Yes Dad, I know. I have to see her and say thank you. May I get up?” Severus frowned and said,

“Alright Harry, but just come and sit on the sofa please.” Harry put the warm, green Weasley sweater on, which he knew was in his wardrobe even in this time line, and had just sat down on the sofa, when the fireplace flared green and Mr. Potter’s face appeared and asked,

“May I come through?” Severus nodded and a few seconds later James’ father was standing in front of Harry and pulled him into a hug.

“Harry, I want to thank you very much for what you have done for James and for us,” he said beaming at Harry, who looked at the floor uncomfortably.

“Excuse me” Severus interrupted, who saw how uncomfortable his son was with the situation, “are you telling us you just flooed here at 6 o’clock on Sunday morning only to thank my son, who isn’t even properly awake and is still ill? Wouldn’t that have had time until later?” Mr. Potter immediately remembered the reason for his early, urgent visit and countered,

“I am really sorry, Severus and Harry; in fact I came for a different reason. When we were back at home, James suddenly asked about Sirius, because he obviously has been together with him yesterday. Therefore, we checked with the ministry and heard during the night, that Sirius is in St. Mungos with the same problem James had yesterday. Now the Head of St. Mungos, Healer Burnham, asked me to inquire with Harry if he would be willing to heal Sirius as well. According to the healers, it must be done as soon as possible to guarantee a complete recovery like in James’ case. Sorry, Severus and Harry, to disturb you; that is why I came so early.” Harry sighed and said,

“It’s alright Granddad, you don’t have to apologize, and it is not your fault anyway. Of course, I will try to heal Sirius as well, but I would like Aunt Poppy to come with me. I feel better now, so it’s not a problem to floo over to Mungos, under the condition to get a portkey for the way back home.” Severus nodded and said,

“Alright Harry, but I will accompany you as well. I will ask Poppy to come and call Albus to make a portkey for us. But let’s have a small breakfast first; otherwise it will be too strenuous for you.” After a few minutes, Albus and Poppy joined them for a breakfast Dobby had brought instantly. When they were finished with breakfast, Severus went to fetch a robe for Harry as well as two potions he made his son drink. Afterwards Albus handed Severus a portkey and said,

“This works for both ways. Password to go is ‘healing sirius’ and to come back ‘merlin’s home’.

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Severus, Poppy and Harry held on to the portkey and soon they felt a familiar pull behind their navels only to find themselves standing in the lobby of St. Mungos. Poppy motioned Harry to stay with his father and went to the information desk to inquire where they could find Sirius. Several minutes later the Head of the hospital, Healer Burnham came, introduced himself and pulled Pomfrey aside for a few minutes’ talk, before he guided them to a room a few floors upstairs. Harry threw a glance at Sirius and sat down on the edge of his bed, but before he could do anything, Poppy gripped Harry’s hand and asked softly,

“Harry, are you sure you are well enough to do this again so fast after last night?” Harry looked at her and whispered,

“I want to try, but as I still have a bit of a fever, I’m not sure if I can control my magic, like yesterday when you had to save me.” She unobtrusively felt his forehead, frowned and gave him a slight nod.

“Yes Harry, but I’m just beside you; don’t worry, I’ll pull you away again.”

Harry put both hands on Sirius’ arm and sent his magic over to Sirius, not noticing that he was slowly drifting into unconsciousness. When Harry woke up, he found himself – again – in his own bed at home, Lily and Julia sitting on the edge of his bed, silently talking to each other. Harry sat up and said,

“Hi Mom, Julia, how is Sirius?” The two women nearly fell from the bed, startled by his sudden waking up.

“Sirius seems to be fine, Harry, but how are you? You have depleted your magic very much, so you have been asleep for a few days. Anyway they didn’t want to let you get away from St. Mungos; Poppy and Daddy had to put up quite a fight, and they had to promise to come back with you once you regained consciousness.” Harry’s face turned white in shock.

“Why?” Harry frowned and said in a very upset voice, “I don’t care what they said. I will not go back there, why should I?” Lily sighed.

“Harry, I really don’t know, and I think you are alright. But let me get Poppy to check on you, I had to promise her that.” Harry groaned and asked his sister,

“How are things? What did I miss?” Julia laughed and replied,

“You didn’t miss a lot; the last interesting thing to happen was the Quidditch match you just managed to attend between being ill and healing people only to fall unconscious. If you go on like this next year as a teacher, your students will be happy that classes will be cancelled all the time,” she teased him. Poppy came in and glanced at him piercingly before she waved her wand over him several times.

“I am sorry, Harry; I pulled you off, but I obviously did not manage to do it in time. You have depleted your magic much more than necessary. Please take it easy over the next two weeks and don’t use any magic for at least a week.” Harry nodded and asked,

“Mom said something; they wanted to keep me at Mungos?” Poppy sighed.

“Yes, you were unconscious with a high fever, your magic very much depleted, and they just didn’t want to let you go. You have to know that it is not normal for wizards to be in a kind of coma with their magic so depleted, so Healer Burnham was very worried about you, but I told him that I am used to your problems and wouldn’t let them keep you. However I had to promise him to bring you back there, but I don’t know if that is only to check on you – perhaps they have better methods to deal with the depletion of magic – or if he has other intentions because of you being a natural healer; maybe they want to offer you a training position or something.” Harry frowned at Poppy.

“Do you really think so? But I don’t have the intention to become a healer. I mean when someone needs my help like James and Sirius I will always try to help, but nothing more than that. And if I would like to get another training in healing, I would like you to teach me. In fact Ginny wants to become a healer; maybe I can make a deal with them.”

“Alright Harry. I suggest you stay here today and rest, and we’ll go and visit Mungos tomorrow morning, presumed you are well enough for the trip.” Harry nodded his consent and closed his eyes to sleep a little more.

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After a good night’s sleep which was interrupted by several memories, Harry, Severus and Poppy flooed to St. Mungos to meet the Head Healer. Healer Burnham first thanked Harry for healing one of his patients whom St. Mungos hadn’t been able to heal. Harry just shook his head uncomfortably; he didn’t want to be thanked. Then the healer took them to a room and asked for permission to examine Harry. Severus as Harry’s guardian agreed, and the healer did several checks on him, frowned and said reproachfully,

“His magic levels are very low; at about a level of 40, he seems to have a bad headache and is running quite a fever. What is being done for him at Hogwarts?” Poppy sighed and explained Harry’s history and the problem with the memories, which actually caused the headache and the fever. Finally, she clarified that he had problems with controlling his magic when he was performing healing magic in a bad condition.

“Normally I wouldn’t let him do healing magic when he was ill, because I know that although he normally can control his magic – I taught him by myself – he is not able to when he is running a fever, which was the case last week. However, we were told that it was urgent to heal Mr. Black, so we reluctantly let him perform the magic, only about twelve hours after he had already healed Mr. Potter. It will take him a week to get his levels up again.”

“Alright,” the healer said contently. “Now I have another item to discuss with Mr. Snape-Dumbledore.”

“Please just call me Harry,” Harry interrupted the healer.

“Alright Harry, thank you. I would like to ask you, if you ever thought about becoming a healer.” Harry sighed and countered,

“Yes, I have thought about it when Madam Pomfrey found out that I was a natural healer and began to teach me several things about healing, but I don’t think that it is the right profession for me. I will start as Transfiguration teacher at Hogwarts next summer and am looking forward to it. However, of course I will always try to help in situations like last week. When you have problems no one else can solve but you think I might be able to help, you can contact me through Madam Pomfrey anytime.” The healer frowned.

“You know how rare natural healers are, don’t you?” Harry gave a short nod.

“Yes, Madam Pomfrey informed me accordingly. However, you see, everything I would learn here, anyone could learn, who would perhaps be a much better healer than I would – and the natural healing I don’t have to learn; I just can do it. So please reserve your apprentice capacities for people who really want to become a healer. As I said, I will always be willing to assist with my special abilities. Maybe we could make a deal – my girlfriend wants to become a healer. She will finish Hogwarts in two and a half years time, and would like to start to learn directly afterwards. As she is looking after me every evening, while I am having troubles with my memories, I know that she will make a very good healer, much better than I would ever be able to.” Healer Burnham laughed after Harry’s speech.

“That’s alright Harry, don’t get yourself so upset. I have understood, and I promise, that I will make a note that if your girlfriend – you have to tell me the name later – applies for the healers’ training in two years, it will be granted to her. In return, we may contact you through Healer Pomfrey, if your special abilities are needed for people who cannot be helped otherwise. Do you agree?” Harry nodded his consent and said,

“Thank you very much Healer Burnham; I agree fully, and my girlfriend’s name is Ginny Weasley.” The healer waved his wand, and a written parchment appeared in front of him, which he signed; and with another wave of his wand the first sheet rolled up itself and flew away through the closed door, the second sheet shifted into the healer’s hand and the third remained on the desk. Healer Burnham handed the sheet to Harry and said,

“Please give this sheet to your girlfriend; it is a confirmation that she will be able to attend the healer’s training after she has finished Hogwarts.” Harry raised an eyebrow and said,

“Thank you very much; she will be delighted.” Before they flooed back, Poppy and Severus dove into an expert talk with the healer about potions and other healing methods to help Harry to recover faster – but as Severus’ potions abilities exceeded those of the potions master at St. Mungos by far, their talk was not very efficient.