Story starts in the summer before Harry's Fourth Year.
There is no Animagus Registration unless you are caught using it to cause trouble or break the law in this fic.
Also, just because I can't remember what was and wasn't around in the 90s, I am moving the timeline into 2015 so I don't have to worry about it as much.
Hope you enjoy :)
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Summary: Inspired by his father and Sirius, Harry decides to try and because an Animagus. Unfortunately, when has anything every been easy for the Boy who Lived?
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Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter
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Chapter 1- Beast Under Your Skin
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Harry couldn't help but blush even though no one was around to see him. He was also cold and his body shivered slightly as a cool wind blew over his bare chest and…other places. For reasons he was struggling to remember Harry was stood in a field at the local park, naked. It was almost midnight and the full moon was high in the sky almost directly above his head.
He even had to take his glasses off, which made thing harder than they were already going to be.
It hadn't been easy to find out how to become an Animagus. It was classed as advanced magic and therefore dangerous. So, while there were a lot of references to Animagus training the process to become one was not so easy to find.
Luckily Harry now had the threat of his Escaped 'Mass Murderer' Godfather to keep the Dursley's off his back. He was even able to get bus money from his Aunt, though it was more to get him out of the house and away from them more than anything. Harry never realised just how much bigger Diagon Alley was before he needed to wonder off the main street. It took over a week to find a little shop in a back alley of Diagon Alley that had a very old, very worn out book.
It was called 'Origins of the Inner Beast', though the authors name was faded out so Harry didn't know who wrote it. According to the book there were several ways to become an Animagus, each with their own positives and negatives.
The oldest and original method, before it even had a name, was to have someone transfigure you into an animal of your or their choice. Repeatedly. So many times, that your body and magic remembered how it changed and you could do it at will. The problem with this was that you rarely ended up with your true animal form and it had led to many witches and wizards going mad from conflicting instincts.
People who had forced their form to be a wolf or tiger jumping off cliffs because their natural form was a bird and they forgot they couldn't fly or drowned because it was an aquatic animal and they tried to breath underwater. People with natural Herbivore forms turning into predators and the conflicting instincts leading them to staving themselves because they didn't know what to eat anymore…
The practice had quickly fallen out of use.
The first True Animagus were called Changelings, and had a very dark history.
Back before Wizards and Witches had discovered a way to track the use of underage magic there had been a lot of Muggleborns that slipped through the net. Families had no idea what was happening when strange things would happen around their children and many thought they had been replaced by demons in the night. Leading to the Muggle myths of 'Changelings'.
This led to many being abandoned in the wilds, some as young as three.
When this happened one of two things would happen.
The first and most likely thing was that they would die. After all they were children and had no way of surviving without someone to take care of them. However, the second and much rarer thing that happened was that they would perform a very rare and dangerous bit of accidental magic. After all, at a young age Magic tended to react to 'desire' and 'situation'. The magic would react to the child's desire to survive and in the wild animals survived.
Because of it being their own, natural magic that cause the change, they would turn into their natural animal form. This meant there were no conflicting instincts to drive them insane. Then somehow by what could only be considered the will of magic these children had come together and formed 'Packs' that helped each other to survive.
It wasn't until after the formation of the Wizarding World that anyone had realised what had been happening and by then it was too late.
After generations of living in the wild like animals a new magical race had been born, The Changelings. Wild, uncontrollable, and complete driven by their instincts. They were stronger, faster, and deadlier then Wizards and Witches but had little control other than their change. Even their magic had become something different. Like the Changelings it was uncontrollable and would lash out, they couldn't even use Wands their magic was so different.
They were uncontrollable and listened to only themselves, and tended to run wild in the areas they considered there territory even if Muggles were nearby. More than one town had been levelled by the Changelings and more deaths then had ever been recorded.
When the Wizarding world retreated into the shadows and away from the Muggle World this become a very big problem. There had been multiple failed attempts to negotiate with the Changelings, who had at some point come under the banner of a single 'Alfa', a Bear Changeling known only as 'Grandfather'. All attempts at bringing the wild creatures under control failed.
The Wizards and Witches were forced to do something drastic. A 'cull' had been ordered. Every Changeling was hunted down and killed to the last.
The final battle, in which Grandfather himself fought, resulted in the deaths of over 300 witches and Wizards…and the last 20 Changelings. Considering the low number of magical births at the time in history it had been a devastating blow to the population.
It had gone down in history as 'The Final Battle of the Beasts'.
Then there was the third, less dangerous method of becoming an Animagus.
Years after it was fought one of the only surviving wizards of the Final Battle of the Beasts, Abraham Magus, announced his research into the Changelings and their ability to become animals at will. It turns out the Changelings had fascinated the man long before the Cull even began. He spent years observing them, their behaviour and how their magic worked.
It was the main reason he had been involved with the Cull, Abraham Magus knew the most about the Changelings. His knowledge was vital to their defeat had had saved many lives.
So, after years of researched that had continued even after the Cull, Abraham was able to create a Potion that forced a Wizard to take the form of the Animal that their magic found most suitable. The Animagus Potion.
If Harry took this option he would be required to take the potion until his body and mind were able to remember his form and force the change at will. The average was estimated at two months, but there it could take less or longer depending on the individual.
A side note was that after all his years of effort and hard work to perfect his Potion and become an Animagus, Abraham found out his Animal form was a turkey…apparently, he killed himself shortly after discovering this.
The Potion was the second fastest method in the book, and defiantly the easiest. Unfortunately, there were too things that made this option unusable for Harry.
The first was that about a hundred years after its invention, it was discovered that the Animagus Potion was highly addictive and if taken too often or for too long Witches and Wizards could become stuck in their animal form permanently. For this reason, it had been outlawed. It had apparently been a big scandal.
The second was that the book really was old and worn, and the pages that had the Potion instructions had at some point been torn out so he didn't even know how to make it.
After the scandal of the Animagus Potion there was a period that no one would even speak of the subject. Until many years after the Potion was banned a Witch, who's name had 'unfortunately' been lost, discovered a new and safe way to become an Animagus. It had been a different time, though not so different to now, and the Wizards didn't want the Witch to be remembered because they didn't discover it.
But anyway, this method was the safest but also took the longest. As in years and years. It also involved something called Occlumency. The book didn't go into much detail but from what Harry could tell it basically had something to do with the mind and organising your thoughts.
Anyway, you basically meditate until you find your inner animal, then slowly work on bringing it out of the subconscious mind and into the conscious. After that came the even slower processes of bringing the Animal out of the mind and into the body.
The average time it took to become an Animagus with this method was 15 years. Harry wanted to be honest with himself and knew that this would take too long. He wasn't patient enough and wanted to be an Animagus as soon as possible.
Despite the risk if he had the recipe Harry would have used the Animagus Potion.
It wasn't until he came to the end of the book that Harry found his answer. Behind five pages of warning and advise not to follow the final method, were instructions for a Ritual. It would force him into his Animagus form for one hour before he changed back. After that he would be able to change back and forth at will…at least with a little practice.
He wasn't sure where the ritual fit into the history he had been reading about though. It didn't give any details like the rest of the methods had.
Harry didn't know much about Rituals. They weren't taught at Hogwarts and the Library had very little on them according to Hermione, who had looked them up for some 'light reading'. Ritual were how Wizards and Witches did magic before wands were created. They were very complicated and tended to have odd things happen that weren't supposed to happen when used. Even the slightest interruption or interference could have large effects.
There was a reason Rituals weren't used anymore outside of research and under strict observation. The other thing of note was that Rituals always involved the user sacrificing something. Give something to get something back, as it were.
Not in the way that meant Harry would be slitting the throats of goats like Muggles thought though, very few Rituals called for something like that and they were usually illegal. No, most Rituals called for Emotional Sacrifice. It could be something most considered worthless, but to that one person meant everything. Some Rituals, the more dangerous ones, didn't even specify what was needed to be sacrificed before you preformed them.
Part of the warning was an example of a Ritual that didn't go as planned. Apparently, a couple that couldn't have kinds had performed a Fertility Ritual, something that was common at the time and used without issue. Until then. The Ritual worked, and the couple gave birth to beautiful twin girls.
Everything was normal until they reached the age of 15, and then something odd happened to their magic and bodies. Men started falling over themselves around them, doing everything to get their attention. Even their own father had fallen under their 'spell'. They also developed a half bird form and gained an uncommon affinity for fire.
Eventually the sisters had families of their own, giving birth to daughters of their own who at the age of 15 also showed the same ability that would later become known as Allure. In the present day the ancestors of the two sisters were classed as a separate race to Witches, any child born of the Twins line was born a girl after all, called Veela.
The point of the story was that even Rituals used a hundred times with the same result could have unforeseen consequences.
But Harry had a good feeling about this…
So according to the book the Ritual needed to be performed under the light of the full moon at midnight.
Check.
Next was drawing a symbol on the ground, drawn with a special kind of chalk made from ground up Dragon Bone. A simple Triangle inside a circle with several other symbols inside and around it that Harry couldn't even begin to describe.
Check.
Three candles made from Unicorn ear wax placed in the middle of each line of the Triangle, forming an upside-down Triangle over the chalk one.
Check…and more proof that the magical world was weird.
Remove all possible outside magical influence, which in Harry's case mostly meant his wand. Rituals predated Wands. As unpredictable as Rituals could be Wands made things worst. The cores made from Magical Creatures held their own magic and could interfere with the Ritual. He had left it under one of his floorboards in his room back at the Dursleys.
Check.
Remove all possible mundane influences…he was stood in the middle of the park naked…enough said. He left both his cloths and glasses under a tree out of site but where he would be able to find them later.
Check.
Three items he held dear, as payment…
Check.
That had been the hardest part, choosing his 'payment'.
You couldn't cheat a Ritual, Magic enforces them and you can't lie to Magic. If the Sacrifice wasn't true then 'bad things would happen'. At least that was what the book claimed. Harry didn't have any desire to test that.
The first item he was offering was a small army man toy. It was old and slightly misshapen, but it had been Harry's first and only toy and had sat on the shelf inside his cupboard. He had even taken it to Hogwarts every year and kept it under his pillow.
The second was his Hogwarts letter. The one Hagrid had personally given him on his eleventh birthday. The letter that changed his life.
Finally, the third offering…was a picture. It was black and white, and in it were his parents holding a baby Harry. They were both smiling and waving at him like most wizard photo's, his mother holding baby Harry close to her chest. It was his favourite of the photo's Hagrid had given him in his first year.
Each item was placed at one of the points of the triangle.
Letting out a deep breath Harry stepped into the Ritual in the centre of the triangle, and wait as the clock slowly ticked closer to midnight. As the second ticked by Harry couldn't help but wonder what his Animagus form would be, and it could be anything.
During the Animagus boom that had followed the invention of the Animagus Potion almost every possible Animal form had been recorded. From insects to extinct animals, anything was possible. Although no one had every registered a Magical Creature as their form. Apparently, there had been one Wizards whose form had been rumoured to be a Dodo bird, though Harry really hoped his form wasn't anything like that. After everything he had gone through Harry really didn't want to end up as one of those funny little anecdotes about Wizards that ended up disappointed because their form was something stupid.
Harry was quickly brought out of his thoughts when the chalk symbols he drew started to glow with a pale white light. It looked a lot like moonlight. The little flames on the ends of the candles suddenly grew, more than doubling in size as the wind picked up without warning.
After that everything seemed to start happening very quickly.
The fire from the candles seemed to catch on the wind and started to circle around Harry, forming a small wall of flame on all sides. Even with his blurry vision Harry could see everything that was happening.
His three offerings caught on fire, even the plastic army man, and started giving off a dark red smoke that joined the fire circling around him. The flames got even brighter after that and Harry was forced to close his eyes from both the heat and the light. He could feel the flames licking at his skin and the air getting thinner.
His breath was coming in pants now and he fell to one knee as it got harder the breath.
Then the pain hit.
It started in his head, a heavy pounding inside his skull like something was trying to force its way out. Then it moved down his body like it was trying to burst out from under his skin. Harry's mouth opened wide to scream, but all that came out was a wheezing croak. There wasn't enough air left for him to scream and black dots were forming over his vision. His back arched in pain as muscles contracted and bunched, before suddenly releasing, and sending him the rest of the way to the ground face first into the grass.
Then it was over.
As quickly as it had all started it was over. The wind died down, the flames shrank and disappeared with the wind and everything fell quiet again. There was no sign of the Ritual left, both the chalk symbols and the candles were gone.
And so was Harry.
In his place was a very large, very hairy…something.
It had the basic look of a wolf, but was easily the size of a full-grown horse and as stocky as a bear. Thick, pitch black fur covered its body and around its neck was a lion like mane. It had powerful legs and broad shoulders connected to a large head. It also had the teeth to match, two of which had a similar look to a saber tooth tiger.
Finally, were its eyes.
Large and yellow, with darker flecks of gold. They almost seemed to glow in the dark night. Over the right eye was a familiar scar, the only blemish on its otherwise perfect form.
However, Harry was unaware of the change…at least until he tried to get up. Not realise he wasn't still human Harry tried to get to his feet only to fall back down when he found himself physically unable.
Surprised at the unexpected fall Harry finally took the time to examine himself, at least what he could. It wasn't until a few moments later that he realised his eyes were perfectly fine and the world was in complete focus. In fact, they were even better then with his glasses, and the dark didn't even seem to hinder him anymore.
Excitement shot through Harry as he realised it had worked.
It took almost ten minutes for him to finally get to his feet and another five before he could walk. Luckily no one was around to see the giant…wolf, tripping over its own feet and stumbling into its...muzzle. this was going to take some getting used to.
Eventually he got the hang of walking.
Then there was the rather embarrassing moment when Harry felt something brush against his rear end and turned to see what it was…and kept turning…Harry wasn't proud that it took him several more minutes before he realised he had been chasing his own tail and it was only because he fell over and got a clear look at it as he was tangled in his own limbs for a moment.
Remembering that there was a small pound on the other side of the park Harry slowly started to make his way towards it. His steps were still unsure as he walked, almost tripping several times. But the longer he was walking the more confident his steps became.
Everything looked so much smaller, though it was more that he was just so much bigger.
Harry soon found that the less he thought about it the easier it was to move in the unfamiliar body. Except it wasn't unfamiliar…the longer he was in this body the more it felt…natural.
Shacking the thought from his head for later Harry soon found himself looking down into the pound, which had been turned into a mirror thanks to a mixture of the darkness and moonlight. He took his time examining himself, taking in his large form and even larger teeth.
Harry had no idea what he was. It wasn't anything he had seen or read about before in either the mundane or magical world. He would need to look it up later when he was human again.
When he finished examining himself in the reflection of the pond Harry finally allowed himself to feel excited again.
He was a Animagus!
Ok so he didn't really know what he was, but that wasn't the point. He was a giant Wolf...Bear…Lion…and possible Saber Tooth Tiger…How cool was that! Weird sure, but still cool.
Without thinking, which is probably why he could do it without tripping over his own feet, Harry turned on the spot and started running. He had no reason for it and just found himself running from one end of the park to another repeatedly but he didn't care.
Harry felt something building in his throat and stopped running. The next thing he knew Harry released a loud, bone chilling howl at the sky and moon overhead. Even to Harry's ears it was eerie and echoed around him.
It wasn't until a moment late that he realised his mistake.
Despite the park being so large and feeling isolated it was still in the middle of a neighbourhood full of muggles.
Muggles who were woken up by his howling.
Harry could see lights being turned on in houses in the distance.
Letting out a small whine like sound, Harry quickly turned away and moved back to where he left his clothes. Hopefully he would turn back before anyone came to investigate.
Harry changed back to normal not long after that.
It was painful, though not as painful as changing into his Animagus form had been. It involved a lot of groaning, twisting and what sounded a lot like bones snapping. It remained Harry a lot of what it had been like seeing Lupin changing into a werewolf. When Sirius changed it was fluid and quick. One moment he would be a man and the next a dog. Lupin's change was slow and ruff, like he was fighting it every second of the change.
Harry could only hope it would get easier with practice. Even when he returned to a human Harry could feel the difference. He didn't understand it but Harry knew that if he wanted to he could change back. Something had been opened in his mind and he could feel it.
Quickly putting his clothes back on Harry ran without looking back when he saw touch light shining in the darkness and getting closer. Harry was running before he even had his shirt all the way on, just avoiding the two police officers that were looking around.
It wasn't until he was back in his room, being careful not to wake his relatives, that Harry even realised he had forgotten his glasses yet could see perfectly.
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Things got a little difficult for a few days after Harry preformed the Ritual.
His run around the park defiantly didn't go unnoticed by the Muggles. The police had found his tracks all over the place and had gone door to door the next day informing everyone that lived locally that a bear had wondered into the area. Luckily his howl had been all but forgotten, partly because there were no wild wolves in England, but mostly because the track he left behind were too large to be any recognised species and were just assumed to belong to a bear.
A curfew had been put in place until they either found the animal or they were sure it had moved on.
Now while his relatives could care less if Harry left the house at night while a dangerous wild animal was running around the neighbours would report seeing him in a second. Not to mention the police cars that would be passing through regularly.
Harry had considered practicing in his room, but the fact was it was just too small. He also doubted the floor would be able to hold the increased weight. While the thought of his Aunt's horrified face as he came crashing through the roof of the living room was funny Harry would need the room to sleep in for the rest of the summer.
So, despite wanting nothing more than to sneak out and run around in his Animagus form Harry was waiting for things to calm down again. However, it was proving to be harder than Harry would have thought.
The longer he went without changing the more agitated he became. His temper was on a hair trigger and more than once he had caught sight of his reflection only to find his eyes turning yellow instead of their usual emerald green. But it wasn't just his eyes there were being affected.
His teeth would change a little and become sharper, not enough to be a problem but it was easy to see they were struggling to fit in his mouth. The nails on his fingers would become black claws and catch on his cloths and he had even cut himself a few times when it happened without him noticing. Harry knew he wouldn't last much longer without changing. The book had said nothing about anything like this happening.
He didn't know why, but he knew something wasn't right and the only way to fix it was to change.
Which was why Harry was so happy when after the third day the police announced that the 'bear' had moved on and that they found no more sign of it. The curfew was lifted, though they advised everyone to still be careful and report if they saw anything.
He barely waited for them to drive away before running out the front door and sprinting towards the park. The sky was already dark and most people were still staying inside to be sure for another day or two so he didn't run into anyone on the way.
The gate into the park was chained closed by the time he got there, but without pause Harry leapt over the ten-foot-high wall and rolled on the other side. Still not stopping Harry continued the roll onto his feet and kept running.
The change happened almost without him even thinking it.
Faster than the last time, but still painful. He stumbled onto all fours as his body changed yet still Harry didn't stop.
The pressure that had been building up for the last three days was gone. Harry felt better then he could ever remember. He finally came to a stop in the middle of the park, his whole body shacking and happy growls coming from his fanged mouth.
His adrenalin finally calming down Harry turned back the way he came.
Only to see a trail of torn fabric that had once been his clothes…
That wasn't right. When Sirius changed his clothes changed with him. Maybe it was a skill he would need to work on later. He would have to think of a way to get back to the Dursleys without cloths…that wasn't going to be fun.
But for now, Harry was going to enjoy himself.
Like the first time he changed after the Ritual Harry let himself fall into his instincts to help him move. This time he focused on his senses. Particularly his sense of smell, which was not only super charged but was also acting weird. Like, seeing smells as foggy clouds of colours weird.
Most seemed to be plane shades of brown that Harry somehow knew were the natural smells of the park. The earth, grass, and other smells of nature. Which was why Harry was so surprised when several other colours crossed his line of…smell…sight? There were four of them, close together and faded. But getting thicker and were starting to overpower the subtler scents of nature.
The first was light pink, the second dark purple, the third dark pink and the last a slightly lighter shape of purple then the other.
Turning his head to follow where the smells were coming from Harry felt his already large eyes widen. Over at the gate were four teenage girls about the same age as him. They were squeezing through the small gap that the chain couldn't keep closed and into the park.
Harry quickly ran to the other side of the park where several large bushes and trees had been planted but never tended, getting overgrown. He was forced to crawl on his belly to get behind them and stay down so that they provided some form of cover, but even then, it wasn't enough and he tried to stay as still as possible to avoid drawing attention.
And there he stayed.
He watched as the girls walked around the park at seemingly random, laugh and joking. It wasn't until they got closer that Harry recognised them as four girls he went to Primary School with, before he left for Hogwarts. He couldn't remember their names but he did remember that like Dudley and his gang they made his life hell.
Harry continued to watch as they came to where he had been standing when they first arrived and stopped at the sight of his footprints in the earth. It made them pause for a moment before their smiles grew and they split up. They all had their mobile phones held out in front of them with the lights on as they looked around.
It didn't take Harry long to realise that they were looking for him. A slight growl crawling out of his throat without him meaning it to. Unfortunately, while quite it was enough to draw the attention of one of the girls.
As she got close Harry could separate her smell from the others as the dark purple. She had long dark brown hair tied back into a pony tail and blue eyes. Her face was covered in makeup. The white shirt she wore under the grey jacket ended above her bellybutton and her jeans were low down on her hips. It was the sort of look you would never see at Hogwarts, not with the old-fashioned ways it was run, but seemed to be common with muggles.
She didn't seem to notice him at first, slowly steeping closer with the camera of her phone pointed towards the bushes he was crouched in.
"Hey! You find anything yet?" one of the other girls called, the one with the light pink smell.
The girl in front of him turned to look over her shoulder but didn't turn the camera away. "I think so, I heard something over here in the bushes!" She called back.
Harry was running out of options, and his instincts weren't helping. They were screaming at him to stop hiding and hunt. It was taking all his will power not to lunge at the girl as she continued to get close. Another growl, this time deep in his chest, filled the air. It was enough to make her hesitate even as the other girls started to make their way over.
Then she noticed him.
The light from her phone shone on his face, making his eyes and bared teeth glow.
Her face went deadly pale and her hand started to shake at the sight of him as her friends moved to her side. They quickly followed her example and froze in place, colour draining from their skin.
Now that they saw him and there was no point in hiding, Harry slowly stood up. Even while still in the brushes he towered over both them and the four teens, his yellow eyes locked on the first girls deep blue.
Then the one that smelled like light pink did the worst thing she could have possible done at that moment. Something that her friends quickly followed.
She ran.
The other three not a second behind her.
And it took all of Harrys strength and will power to give them a five second head start before his new hunting instincts completely took over at the site of running pray and he burst out of the bushes and charged after the fleeing girls.
He was not fast. His large form was heavy and made for strength and endurance more than speed. However, his large steps and leaps were quickly closing the gap between the four teens. His growls had become a cross between barks and roars as he chased them across the park.
They reached the gate and the light pink girl was quickly through, being the first to have run and get to them. She was followed by the dark pink and lighter purple a moment later. However, when the last girl tried to squeeze through she panicked when she saw him closing in and got herself stuck half way through.
Harry couldn't stop himself. Her struggles only added fire to his instinct to hunt and he pounced, kicking up soil behind him into the air like a cloud.
His teeth bared, his eyes locked.
She slipped through at the last possible second just as one of his teeth grazed her arm.
She fell to the ground on the other side of the gates as Harry slammed into them with his whole body. The thick iron bent outwards, but was somehow able to stay on its hinges. He saw the girl's friends quickly pulling her further away from the now misshapen gate while she clutched her arm, blood dripping down it from where his tooth grazed it and cut through the skin.
Shaking himself after the collision, Harry forced himself back under control because of the shock. He rolled to his feet but didn't move away from the gate. Harry knew if he wanted to he could break it the rest of the way and sink his teeth into the four teens even as he licked the drop of blood that had caught on one of his saber like teeth.
Harry pushed his face up against the gates bars and locked eyes with the four girls, lips pulled back and teeth bared.
They didn't stick around long after that and quickly ran off down the street.
When they were gone and the scent started to become less prominent Harry shook his large head again to clear the last of the fog from his mind. He needed to get away before the police showed back up.
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So, I hope you like the chapter.
The thing where Harry is seeing Smell as colour is a form of 'Synesthesia', for those who want to look it up.
For those wondering about the girls taking video with their phones, it will not be very good video. After all Magic has odd effects on tec. They will have blurry video of a large thing, but not enough to cause too much trouble for Harry. It will be like a blurry picture of bigfoot.
As I am sure most people realised by the hints dropped in this chapter Harry is not a normal Animagus. I will say however he is not a Werewolf, at least not in the same way as Lupin. I don't want to go into too much detail now as it will all come out throughout the story.
I will say the Horcrux in Harry's scare is gone. Call it a side effect of using the Ritual for now. So Harry can no longer talk to snakes.
Anyway, let me know what you think :)