Chapter Text
*Neville's POV*
Neville Longbottom woke up slowly, languidly, with absolutely no idea that life as he knew it was over, and that he was forever changed. He vaguely remembered that today was his birthday, and that he and one of his best friends, Harry Potter-Black would be having a joint birthday party later that day. They had swapped between their birthdays as the party day for as long as they'd known each other, which was about as far back as he remembered.
He rolled onto his back and groaned. What had he done last night? His whole body felt like it was aflame in pain at his slightest movement. He opened his eyes, then immediately shut them again at the blinding light that was coming in from the window above his bed. Stupid house-elf, he thought. For at least five years now, his grandmother has insisted that the house-elves were to stay out of his room unless she said otherwise, so he could learn how much effort went into cleaning and maintaining his room to the level he was used to. If he slept in, he wouldn't get any extra time in his greenhouse that day. Now, for some reason, his curtains were open after he distinctly remembered closing them the night before. The explanation his sleepy mind came up with was that a house-elf had, for some reason, decided to open his curtains.
Neville sighed and opened one eye to try and accumulate it to the amount of light in the room. Ever so slowly, he opened his other eye as well and looked up at the window. He blinked, and looked again. The curtains still covered the window. How odd. Confused at this discovery, he turned his attention to the rest of his room, and gasped. Everything had somehow become a thousand times more defined, and had far more detail than he'd thought possible. Like over on the bookshelf that contained all his old school books and his other Herbology texts, was a small amount of dust on every shelf, which was odd because he'd just dusted it the night before, and his desk seemed to have more ink stains than he remembered. This explained why he'd thought his curtains were open; his eyes were somehow far better than they'd been last night, and therefore were more sensitive to light.
Wondering whether his eyes had visibly changed in the mirror, he got out of bed and went to the mirror in his ensuite bathroom. When he locked eyes with his reflection, he screamed.
*Augusta Longbottom's POV*
Being woken up at 4 in the morning after staying up past midnight the night before was never fun. Waking up to a child screaming at this time of night is something every parent experiences at least once. Augusta had gone through this experience twice before; once when her son was a baby, and once when her semi-orphaned grandson was a baby, but between those two times, she'd gotten used to waking up at a far later, and more reasonable, hour. When her grandson started sleeping through the night, she rejoiced, and knew that the only times she'd be woken up at an unreasonable hour was either when her grandson had a nightmare, or on Christmas morning, both of which were perfectly acceptable reasons, as she'd experienced them before when Frank was younger.
However, Neville was fourteen today, and waking her up with his screams were certainly not acceptable. However, as she was a good grandmother, she groaned pitifully and made her way to see what had her grandson in such a kerfuffle. She found him, not in his bed, but in his bathroom, starting at his… somewhat altered reflection. “Neville?” she asked, and when he turned to her, she gasped, for it had not just been his reflection that had been altered, but also his own appearance. All of his baby fat had vanished overnight, and his button nose had morphed into a Grecian one, straight and aristocratic. His hair had changed slightly from the sandy blond hair he'd gained from his father to have darker blond highlights, making it resemble very light tree bark, and his eyes were an incredibly complex matrix of leaf green and dark brown, making an astonished Augusta think vaguely that it resembled a forest canopy.
“Oh dear,” she said faintly. She had of course heard the rumours of the Longbottoms being part creature before she'd married into the family, but she'd dismissed it when she'd fallen hard for Geraint Longbottom. After she'd married him, her mother-in-law had informed her that it was indeed true, that there had been a Dryad in the family five generations ago, and this meant that there might be a Dryad born into the family in the next five to ten generations, as the Dryadic magic stayed in a magical family for ten to fifteen generations before eliminating itself if it decided that no one worthy of the magic was born to the family.
With Neville’s affinity for all plants, magical and Muggle alike, and his difficulty making close friendships with anyone other than the most trustworthy people, she really should have seen this coming.
She was brought out of her reverie by Neville’s choked up and fearful voice. “What's happened to me, Gran?”
This was going to take a lot of explaining.
*Harry's POV*
Harry was shocked at the change in his friend. He'd Flooed over early with his godfathers to help set up for the party, but had been pulled into a shaking hug by a very different-looking Neville. Madam Longbottom bade them sit down, then started explaining.
“A male Dryad?” Harry asked, dumbfounded.
“Yeah,” sighed Neville. “A Drus. I'd never heard of a male Dryad before, even in Care of Magical Creatures, but Gran said that's because Hogwarts only teaches about the Celtic Dryads, who are an all-female species, and not about the Greco-Roman ones, who are mainly female, but there's a one to twenty ratio of Dryads to Drus.
Madam Longbottom took over again. “Since there used to be so many more of them, and the majority of the female ones are pansexual, the ratio made sense. Drus often have more than one chosen mate, usually two or three, and each of their mates exemplify a different element. Only a Drus-Dryad pairing can produce a pure Dryad or Drus, which is one from birth, unlike Neville, who unknowingly underwent a creature inheritance.” Madam Longbottom blushed slightly, but soldiered on. “Drus and Dryads reach sexual awareness and maturity at fifteen years of age. Prior to this, they may still search for potential mates, but it is only at fifteen that they feel a pull towards certain people or creatures. These pulls are towards potential mates, so do not worry about being destined to mate with a horrible person, or one already in a committed relationship, Neville.”
Harry saw Neville relax slightly, and realised this must have been one of many problems that his friend was worried about. Harry had a question of his own. “If their sexual maturity is at fifteen, why did Neville get his creature inheritance at fourteen?”
Neville perked up, interested in the answer his Gran would give. “They have some sort of power over plants and nature, it differs from one to the next. The only thing I can think of is that the extra year might give Neville a chance to learn to control his power before being overwhelmed with the need to get as many mates as his instincts tell him he needs.”
*
Luckily, the party only had their close friends and family invited, and all of them accepted the change relatively well. Once it was over, and all but the Marauders’ Recruits, who were staying overnight, had left, poor Neville was all but swamped with questions from his well-meaning but curious friends. Harry ended up stepping in and reminding them that Neville didn't know much more than they did. Draco suggested asking the Room of Requirements for books on Greco-Roman Dryads once they got back to Hogwarts, and the others reluctantly agreed, and they all focused on the reason why they had stayed overnight, other than planning pranks and talking about the Quidditch World Cup Final in two weeks. Fred and George had overheard their mum and dad talking about some sort of ancient competition that was happening at Hogwarts called the Triwizard Tournament. None of them knew anything about it, but they were going to look for books on it in Flourish and Blotts when they went to get their school supplies in a week or two.
A day after they'd all finished purchasing their Hogwarts things, they Portkeyed to the camping grounds around the World Cup Stadium. As it was late in the day, the first thing to do was to get water for tea and set up a campfire large enough for the Weasley, Lovegood, Black, and Prince families to fit around comfortably. Sirius took it upon himself to teach Arthur how to set up the campfire the Muggle way, and the Weasley kids wandered off to see what kinds of souvenirs they could get, so Harry, Draco, Neville, Luna, and Hermione allocated themselves the water-fetching job.
The Quidditch World Cup Final Match was the most incredible experience of Harry's young life. There were witches and wizards from every imaginable country and walk of life, and there were different and exotic smells in the air when he, Draco, Luna, Neville, and Hermione walked through the assigned districts of people from other countries in order to fill up the teapot with water from a Muggle tap that the map they'd been given said was nearby. Harry had heard at least seven different languages during that short time alone, as well as some hilarious discussions from English witches and wizards who had tried and failed to appear Muggle. There was one man dressed in a frilly pink nightgown who refused to wear anything else because he liked feeling the breeze around his privates, and someone who had decided that a neon lime green Muggle suit with coattails was perfectly acceptable. There was a mother scolding her toddler for stealing his father's wand and accidentally enlarging a slug to the size of a small flobberworm, which the witch had stood on.
Eventually, the four friends, red-cheeked and eyes twinkling from laughter, got back to Sirius and Remus’ magical tent, which was next to the Weasleys’ and Professor Snape and Narcissa’s tents.
With their return, tea was set up and a simple meal of sausages over the fire was prepared and eaten amidst excited chatter from the kids about the final, and more sedated talk from the adults about the most recent news from the Daily Prophet, and speculation on how long it would take for Voldemort to show himself.
Soon enough, a loud gong sounded, and the spectators made their way to the stadium. Mr Weasley had won a competition at work, getting tickets to sit in the Minister's box, so Sirius had pulled some strings and had managed to obtain tickets for his family, the Lovegoods, the Princes, Neville, and Hermione in the Minister's box too.
Harry had seen professional Quidditch games before, and had even been to the last World Cup Final, but the match they watched that night was the best one he'd ever witnessed. The Irish Chasers were so in sync it was like they were reading each other's minds, and the Bulgarian Seeker, Krum, barely seemed to need a broom as he soared around the pitch, easily flying circles around the Irish Seeker.
The Bulgarian Veela mascots made him feel a bit odd, but he shook of the effects a second later to Draco peeking at him surreptitiously. Somehow knowing what was on his boyfriend's mind, Harry turned to face him, winked, and kissed him deeply. Breaking away, Harry whispered, “I'm not going anywhere, luv.”
For a split-second, he was worried about what he'd said, for Draco's face showed clear shock. Despite being boyfriends for about a year and a half, they'd never really talked about using or allowing pet names, or if what they felt for each other was indeed love. Looking back on it now, Harry realised that though they'd had feelings for each other, they were a bit too young to really understand what they were getting into. He didn't know when it had happened, but sometime in the last month or two, after an embarrassing talk with Sirius and Remus, he'd realised that what he felt for Draco was love.
He forgot all about what he was talking about when Draco basically tackled him and kissed him breathless. “You-you love me?” Draco asked.
Harry nodded. “Yeah, I do. Sorry I didn't tell you when I first figured it out.”
Draco laughed softly and brought his forehead to rest on Harry's. “Well I forgive you. I love you too, you prat.”
Now it was Harry's turn to laugh softly. “Git. Did you see Ron's reaction to the Veela?”
Draco nodded, and then just like that their romantic moment was broken as they giggled like children as Fred and George pulled Ron back from pitching himself out of the Minister's box to get closer to the Veela.
In no time, the match finished when Krum caught the Snitch despite Bulgaria being more than a hundred and fifty points behind. Both teams flew to the Minister's box and the Irish team got the trophy. Just before both teams left, Harry noticed that Krum was staring at George, who was staring back, and then Krum winked and flew off. George whispered to his twin, “Was he… flirting with me?”