The Forgotten Son

Chapter 4: Nymphadora

Andromeda Tonks groaned as she opened her eyes. As she was coming to, she felt the coolness of a damp cloth that had been draped over her forehead. She sat up slowly, ignoring the bout of dizziness and nausea that struck and looked around the room to see her favorite cousin Sirius looking at her with a mixture of concern and amusement.

"Well that went better than I expected," he remarked. "Weren't you supposed to be the one doing the healing?" He finished cheekily, sporting a lopsided grin that she had not seen for many years. She smiled slightly, noticing that Sirius looked a lot younger with that smile on his face.

"Where are the children?" She asked.

"Upstairs getting to know each other. Hadrian seemed quite concerned for you. Are you sure you're alright?" This time his concern was outweighing his amusement. As Lord Black, one of his primary objectives in life was the well-being and success of those in his family. And as far as he was concerned, Andromeda, who was reinstated into the Black Family shortly after Sirius took up his Lordship, was more like an older sister to him.

Andi nodded at Sirius while still smiling and said, "Well let's go see the kids shall we?"

—-

While Andromeda was recovering and being watched over by Sirius, a semi-awkward silence had fallen over the two children who had not left Harry's future room. Though Harry was only eight, he could not help but think that the girl standing across from him was cute and would be a real beauty in a few years time. Unbeknownst to him, a similar thought was running through the nine year old's head. She looked at him intently. She too thought he would be a lady-killer in a few years. A little scrawny sure, but with eyes like those any girl would be lost in them. As if they both had the same thought at the same time, both youngsters flushed red and Harry was shocked that her hair had changed from the vibrant pink, to a deep red.

"What? How did you do that?" Asked an astounded Harry Potter. Sure he knew a lot about magic from his own little experiments, but he had never seen anything like that before. He was amazed.

Nymphadora noticed he was looking at her hair and scrunched her face in concentration to return it back to her favorite pink. "Sorry about that, the name's Tonks and I'm a Metamorphmagus," she said brightly. Seeing his look of confusion she decided to elaborate. "That means I could change my appearance at will to almost anything I want!"

The confusion quickly left Harry's face and was replaced with a look of awe. "That's bloody brilliant," he responded in almost a whisper.

Tonks waited a moment or so before saying, "Well aren't you gonna introduce yourself? I mean, I know Cousin Siri already did but it is polite y'know." Harry looked down and blushed at that. He took a moment to regain his composure before offering his hand with a sheepish smile.

"Sorry about that, my name is Harry Potter. I mean I guess it's actually Hadrian but you can call me Harry if you'd like," Harry said. She smiled and grabbed his hand shaking it excessively causing them both to laugh.

The ended up passing the time by sitting shoulder to shoulder on the ground with their backs against the wall. The talked about everything they could. Tonks had excitedly gushed about going to Hogwarts and being there together for almost the entire time together. Harry was unsure of what Hogwarts was but enjoyed his new friend talk happily about it so he just listened with a smile. Tonks mentioned parts of her childhood to him and he adopted a wistful expression. When talk turned to his childhood he immediately stiffened. Tonks felt Harrys shift in posture and looked to him curiously.

"I don't want to talk about my family. All I know is that my parents gave me to my Aunt and Uncle where they did not like me. I stayed there for four years before finding Sirius and here we are now. Please lets talk about something else," Harry said almost emotionlessly until the last sentence where he spoke in a pleading tone. Tonks took this to heart and decided to respect his wishes. She decided that Harry was now her best friend and she wouldn't let anything bad happen to him. They continued talking for another half-hour before a knock on the door interrupted them.