When Jerry pushed open the door to the private room holding a stack of snacks, he nearly collided head-on with McGonagall.
McGonagall took a step back, still holding a half-finished cup of tea in her hand.
She swept her gaze up and down the colorful packaging piled in Jerry's arms; a few bags were currently sliding down from the crook of his elbow.
"What is this spectacle for?"
"Visiting the sick." Jerry shoved a bag of Cockroach Clusters that was about to fall back into the pile. "The Cultivation world doesn't have these. I thought she could try them when she wakes up."
McGonagall turned sideways to let him enter.
The private room had a few more items than yesterday: a bouquet of flowers from an unknown sender sat on the bedside table, and a small incense burner resting on the windowsill burned a calming incense.
Yin Luo lay on the hospital bed, her purple hair scattered across the pillow. The freezing layer on her right shoulder had been removed, replaced with a silver dressing exclusive to the Spell Damage ward.
A faint white light shone from beneath the dressing. The sword scar remained, but that lethal black aura was gone.
Her breathing was steady.
Color had returned to her cheeks.
Her fingers rested on the edge of the blanket; a small chip of black nail polish had flaked off her nail, exposing the original pink beneath.
"Stanley came by."
McGonagall set the teacup on the windowsill. "Two-thirds of the sword intent has been extracted. The remaining one-third has merged too deeply with her meridians; forcibly extracting it would damage her foundation. He said to use the silver dressing to slowly force it out, and with another week of rest, it should be completely cleared. She is out of danger; she just hasn't woken up yet."
Jerry piled the snacks on the bedside table, leaning over to inspect Yin Luo's face.
Her lips moved slightly, as if chewing something in a dream. He pulled the blanket up a bit, covering her exposed shoulder.
A laugh drifted from the corner of the room.
Very light, the kind that seeps out from deep in the throat. The tail end carried a trace of a hissing sound.
"My little son-in-law certainly knows how to dote on someone."
Jerry turned his head.
There was a companion chair near the window, and a woman sat in it.
She had been blocked by the doorframe earlier; he hadn't noticed her when he walked in.
Now she stood up. She was a bit taller than McGonagall. Her dark green long dress trailed to her ankles, with a slit running up the side of the skirt, revealing a section of her calf clad in dark-patterned pantyhose as she walked.
Cassiopeia.
She walked toward Jerry, her stride short, the sound of her heels striking the floor tiles falling one by one, as slow as if counting a beat.
She stopped right in front of Jerry, looking down at him from a high vantage point.
Her tongue darted out from between her lips and licked her upper lip.
Forked.
The tip of the tongue split into two halves dead center, licking across both corners of her mouth simultaneously before retracting.
"Haven't seen you for half a month, and you've lost weight."
She reached out and pinched Jerry's chin, her thumb and index finger gripping both sides of his jawbone, lifting his face to look at her. "If Isabella saw you looking like this, her heart would ache to death."
"She doesn't know I'm back?"
"Doesn't know yet. She's working overtime at the Ministry of Magic. The Department of International Magical Cooperation has been working around the clock recently because of the Cultivation world incident; she hasn't been home for three days." Cassiopeia released his chin, her fingers sliding down his neck, her fingertips brushing past his Adam's apple to pause in the hollow of his collarbone. "I came to St. Mungo's to pick up some medicine and bumped into McGonagall by chance. She said you brought a woman back from the Cultivation world to treat her injuries. So I came over to take a look while I was at it."
"Picking up medicine?"
"Suppressant potion to regulate my Basilisk bloodline. I have to pick it up every month." She withdrew her fingers from Jerry's collarbone, turned, and took two steps toward the bed, looking down at Yin Luo. "So this is the one whose life you saved? Quite a beauty. Purple hair suits her."
McGonagall walked over from the windowsill, placing the empty teacup on the bedside table, squeezing it in with the pile of snack bags.
"Cassiopeia. You said earlier you were leaving as soon as you got your medicine."
"That was my original intention." Cassiopeia sat down on the low stool on the other side of the bed. Her skirt draped around her ankles, her legs crossed, the tip of her dark green high heel swaying gently in the air. "But my little son-in-law has arrived. We haven't seen each other in so long; I'll chat for a bit before leaving."
McGonagall shot Jerry a look. The meaning of that look was... You deal with this yourself. She yanked her combat jacket off the back of the chair and draped it over her arm.
"I am going to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Stanley is keeping an eye on Yin Luo here; her safety is secured. You..." She pointed a finger at Jerry. "After you finish visiting, take a trip to the Great Hall. Rita has already sent me seven or eight Howlers demanding an interview with the 'hero returned from the dead'. Show your face and say a few words. Don't say too much."
"How much is 'a few words'?"
"The fewer the better. It is best to only state that you are alive and refuse to answer anything else. Don't worry, Rita will help you."
McGonagall patted Jerry's shoulder, gave Cassiopeia a nod of farewell, turned, and left the private room.
The door closed behind her.
The private room grew quiet.
The sound of Yin Luo's breathing drifted over from the bed, steady and rhythmic.
The column of smoke from the incense burner rose half a foot before being scattered by the draft from the window.
Cassiopeia uncrossed her legs and crossed them the other way.
Her dark-patterned pantyhose emitted an incredibly faint friction sound where her knees crossed.
"Come here."
Jerry walked around the foot of Yin Luo's bed and stood in front of her. Cassiopeia reached out, grabbed his wrist, and yanked him a step forward, pulling him right between her knees.
She was sitting; he was standing. The distance between the two was so close Jerry could feel the cool touch of her skirt.
Cassiopeia released his wrist, resting both her hands on the sides of his waist.
The temperature of her palms was lower than an ordinary person's. Through the fabric of his shirt, a thin layer of coolness seeped in, like pressing a hand against the surface of a freshly thawed pond.
"I, your mother-in-law, sent you twelve owls over the past half month. How many did you reply to?"
"Not a single one."
"Not a single one." Cassiopeia repeated. The two halves of her tongue flicked together from the sides, letting out a very light tsk. "Twelve letters sank like stones in the ocean. The Daily Prophet wrote that you were killed in action. My daughter didn't even know her fiancé was dead before he was awarded a posthumous Order of Merlin. What do you think I, as a mother-in-law, should do?"
"I'm back now, aren't I."
"Yes. Back. Back alive. And carrying a purple-haired woman in your arms." Cassiopeia's fingers tightened on his waist. Her nails were painted with dark green polish and trimmed to a sharp point. Through his shirt, they dug into the indentations of his skin. "My daughter hasn't even married into the family yet, and you've already found her a sister."
"I mean to say..." Her hands slid from his sides to the small of his back, intertwining her ten fingers behind him, pulling him another notch closer to herself. Jerry's knees bumped against the edge of the low stool; pitching forward, he had to reach out and brace his hands against her shoulders to steady himself. "...If you go missing for another half month, I will lock you in the secret chamber of my manor. And I'll have Isabella bring you food every day when she gets off work."
"McGonagall said something similar."
"McGonagall?" Cassiopeia's forked tongue darted out again, licking her lower lip. "Speaking of which, you smell like McGonagall."
"..."
"And dragon. And cat." Her nose moved close to Jerry's collar, sniffing upward from his collarbone to his Adam's apple. "My little son-in-law has been so very busy on his first day back. Neglecting only his mother-in-law's share."
Her hands moved from the small of his back to his waistband. Her fingertips hooked onto his belt buckle—not undoing it, just hooking it. The metal clasp trembled faintly under the touch of the cool backs of her fingers.
"Making up the mother-in-law's share right now?"
"What do you think."
Hooking his belt buckle with her fingers, Cassiopeia pulled him directly over herself; then she released her grip, leaning backward until her back rested against the backrest of the low stool.
Her serpentine pupils slowly constricted in the thin smoke of the incense, shifting from ovals to vertical slits. That was the instinctual reaction of the Basilisk bloodline when aroused... similar to Dragonification, but quieter. Lacking the fiery intensity of flaring scales, only the pupils narrowing soundlessly, like a door closing inward.
Her forked tongue darted out again.
The two halves of the tip quivered slightly in the air. The forked tongue of the Basilisk bloodline could detect incredibly microscopic scent molecules in the air. She smelled the lingering scent of three women on Jerry, as well as his own scent... the heat radiating from his body as his blood flow accelerated, and that boyish scent mixed with the smell of spirit elixirs and herbs.
"Your mother-in-law's share..." She retracted her forked tongue, a hissing sound trailing at the end of her words. "...is not like theirs."
Her hands moved from the armrests of the low stool to her skirt. She pulled aside the slit of her dark green long dress, revealing her entire leg wrapped in dark-patterned pantyhose. The pantyhose wrapped from her ankle all the way to the root of her thigh, fastened at the thigh by suspender clips.
She hiked her skirt up to her waist, then moved both hands to Jerry's belt.
Click. The belt buckle was undone.
Click. The button unfastened.
His pants were pushed down, pooling at his ankles.
The two halves of her forked tongue enveloped the coronal ridge, wrapping around it in a circle; the pressure was light and exquisite, completely different from the tactile sensation of an ordinary human tongue... the forked tongue could apply force from two angles simultaneously: wrapping from the outside while teasing the inside. Jerry's hands, braced against her shoulders, curled into fists, his knuckles clutching the shoulder pads of her dress into creases.
Cassiopeia took the coronal ridge into her mouth. The temperature of her oral cavity was lower than an ordinary person's, offering a mint-like, cooling sensation.
During the process of taking it in, her forked tongue remained pressed against the shaft, the two halves of the tip sliding back and forth along the veins on either side.
Faint swallowing sounds echoed from deep within her throat; her throat contracted like a canal, sucking the long spear deeper.
Jerry thrust his hips forward. When the coronal ridge hit the back of her throat, Cassiopeia's serpentine pupils constricted to their narrowest... leaving only a vertical black line set against a pale golden fundus.
Her fingers dug into the backs of Jerry's thighs, her nails sinking into the muscle, but she didn't push him away.
Her throat contracted once more, while simultaneously her forked tongue wrapped dead tight around the base, the two halves of the tip scraping back and forth against the bulging veins.
Wet sounds. As she swallowed, the mucus within her throat was squeezed out to coat the shaft, producing sticky, squelching noises with every bob of her head.
Cassiopeia pulled her mouth away.
The long spear slid out from between her lips, slathered in her saliva, standing ramrod straight in mid-air.
The glistening wetness formed a thin, shiny membrane over the shaft.
She used her forked tongue to lick away the silver thread trailing from the corner of her mouth, bracing her hands against the armrests to stand up.
Her skirt fell, once again concealing her pantyhose-clad legs.
"The low stool is uncomfortable." Her voice still carried a trace of hoarseness from having just taken him into her mouth. "Let's go over there..."
Outside the door of the private room, the sound of high heels striking the floor tiles stopped.
Isabella stood outside the doorframe, carrying a bag of steaming hot pasties bought from Diagon Alley.
She had been working overtime until just a moment ago. Upon hearing the news that Jerry was alive, had returned, and was at St. Mungo's, she Apparated straight over from the Ministry of Magic, not even having time to change out of her work robes.
The hem of her grey Ministry uniform skirt swayed slightly above her knees; the brass buttons at her collar were fastened immaculately.
Her hand had just touched the doorknob when the sounds coming from inside made her stop.
Her mother's voice.
Not the usual languid speaking voice with the hissing tail-end unique to the Basilisk bloodline.
It was a sound overflowing from deep within the throat, a sound only produced when something was blocking it and then releasing it. Sticky. Wet. Intermittently interspersed with swallowing.
Isabella recognized that sound.
She had been engaged to Jerry; she knew exactly what that was.
Her fingers tightened on the doorknob. Then she released her grip, took a half-step back, and peered inside through the gap in the door.
A purple-haired woman lay on the hospital bed, unconscious, completely oblivious to the outside world. In front of the low stool beside the bed stood her fiancé, his pants pushed down to his ankles, that massive object she was intimately familiar with standing erect in mid-air. Her mother, Cassiopeia, sat on the low stool, leaning forward, the forked tips of her tongue sliding along the veins on the side of that object toward the coronal head.
The corners of Isabella's mouth turned down half an inch.
She drew her wand from her sleeve.
Aiming the tip at herself, she precisely traced the details of the Transfiguration spell in her mind three times.
Shrinking Charm.
Not shrinking to miniature size, but shrinking to slightly shorter than a palm—just enough to hide in the shadow of the doorframe, just enough to escape her mother's notice, just enough to precisely manipulate those little things.
The spell was cast silently.
Isabella's figure rapidly shrank; her uniform shrank with her, her wand shrank with her.
In an instant, Isabella stood beneath the doorframe, only a head taller than the threshold.
Placing the bag of pasties gently in the corner outside the door, Isabella gripped her wand tightly and slipped in through the crack in the door.
Cassiopeia was taking the very tip of Jerry's member into her mouth, fine swallowing sounds echoing from deep within her throat.
Her serpentine pupils had constricted into incredibly fine vertical slits, completely immersed in arousal.
Her forked tongue enveloped the shaft, sliding up and down; every time she slid past a vein, her throat would clamp tight, and Jerry's hands braced against her shoulders would curl tighter.
The magical snacks Jerry had brought were piled on the bedside table.
Isabella's shrunken figure moved along the shadow of the wall to beneath the bedside table. She flicked her wand upward. A Chocolate Frog floated up from its box.
The Chocolate Frog turned in mid-air, aiming at Cassiopeia.
Cassiopeia was completely oblivious. Her mouth had just pulled back from Jerry's member, the two halves of her tongue tracing circles in the sulcus right beneath the coronal head, while her other hand pressed against the small of Jerry's back, pushing him toward her. The hem of her dark green long dress had been hiked up to her waist by her own hands; her pantyhose-clad legs were spread at an appropriate angle, the edge of the low stool pressing creases into the pantyhose on her inner thighs.
She was just about to take him back into her mouth.
The Chocolate Frog launched from mid-air.
The frog's legs kicked against empty space, propelled by magic power along an arc, drilling precisely underneath her hiked-up skirt. The instant the dark green skirt fell back down, the Chocolate Frog had already plastered itself against the back of her thigh.
Cassiopeia's body froze.
Her serpentine pupils snapped wide open, rebounding from vertical slits back to ovals.
Her mouth hung slightly open, the two halves of her tongue frozen stiff at her lips.
Jerry looked down at her; before he could even process what had happened, her fingers dug into the back of his thighs.
"What..."
She didn't finish.
The Chocolate Frog crawled an arc up her inner thigh, bypassed the suspender clip, and stuck itself to the side of her cheek.
The sensation of ice-cold chocolate, combined with the kicking force of the frog legs imbued by the spell, dug deeper and deeper—kick, kick, feeling completely alive.
Cassiopeia's entire face contorted.
The body temperature of the Basilisk bloodline was already on the low side; the temperature of the Chocolate Frog was almost identical to her skin, but that frog was moving. The rhythmic kicking motions imbued by magic followed no pattern whatsoever: a sudden violent double-kick, followed by complete stillness, and then a sudden convulsive bound. This unpredictable rhythm shattered her composure faster than any calculated teasing.
Her waist thrust upward, trying to stand up, but Jerry was still standing in front of her, his member erect beside her face, her shoulders pinned down by his hands. She couldn't get up.
"There's something..." The end of her sentence was bitten off by her own teeth.
The Chocolate Frog burrowed into that narrow crevice.
The cocoa butter coating the frog began to melt under her body heat, becoming slick and sticky. The frog legs kicked apart the folds, the frog head squeezing into the tightly shut entrance. The sensation of the edges being stretched open made Cassiopeia bounce two inches off the low stool and crash back down. Her pantyhose-clad calves straightened out, her toes curling into a ball inside her shoes. Her nails gouged dark green polish marks into the back of Jerry's thighs.
"Ah..."
As this cry tore from her, her serpentine pupils constricted to their narrowest ever. The Chocolate Frog's front legs had already squeezed inside; the hind legs kicked twice outside, and the entire frog slid in with a plop. The entrance clamped shut after the frog body was completely submerged, leaving only melted cocoa butter trailing down her gluteal cleft, dripping onto her pantyhose to stain a pale brown wet streak.
Jerry looked down at the nail marks gouged into the back of his thighs.
"You..."
"It wasn't me." Cassiopeia's lips were trembling; the frog inside her body began to move again. The frog hopped and hopped within the narrow chamber, its legs kicking against the inner walls; the chocolate grew softer and softer as it melted from her body heat, turning from solid to semi-fluid, sticking to the inner walls. With every hop of the frog, the melted chocolate slid a bit deeper inside. The twitching outlines of her abdominal muscles could be seen even through her skirt; the muscles of her inner thighs wrapped in pantyhose tensed, then relaxed, tensed, then relaxed. Her forked tongue extended from her lips, frozen in mid-air, trembling.
"You were perfectly fine a moment ago..."
"There's something in my..."
"Something what?"
Isabella stepped out from the shadow of the bedside table. It took her only two seconds to return to her normal size.
Using her wand, she levitated the remaining two Cockroach Clusters and the Fudge Flies, suspending them in front of her mother—then canceled the spell, letting them scatter across her skirt, and leisurely brushed off the cuffs of her uniform.
"Mom."
Isabella walked to Jerry's side and stopped. She reached out, pulled up Jerry's pants that her mother had pushed down to his thighs, and refastened his belt for him, her fingers snapping the metal buckle shut with a sharp click. "Didn't you say today you were coming to St. Mungo's to pick up medicine?"
Cassiopeia looked up from the low stool.
The daze and shock of the frog invasion still lingered in her serpentine pupils, the flush on her face burning from her neck all the way to her ears. The hem of her dark green long dress remained bunched at her waist, forgotten to be pulled down; the wet streak of cocoa butter on her pantyhose was as glaringly obvious as could be under the white lights of the private room.
"Isabella." Cassiopeia grabbed her skirt and forcefully yanked it down.
The frog was still jumping inside her; her voice trembled, the tail end of every single word pitching upward half a notch.
"I have always assumed you were here to pick up medicine."
Isabella slipped her wand into her sleeve, crossed her arms over her chest, and tilted her head to look at her own mother. "Turns out you're here bullying my fiancé."
"Bullying..." Cassiopeia wanted to say something, but the frog suddenly kicked its legs violently in the narrow chamber; her buttocks scraped against the low stool, cutting her words off in her throat.
"Correct." Isabella picked up the now-empty Chocolate Frog box from the bedside table, turning it around to show her mother. "Bullying. Taking advantage of the fact that he just returned from a life-or-death situation, taking advantage of his fiancée working overtime at the Ministry of Magic, taking advantage of the propriety expected of a future mother-in-law—using it all to bully him."
She set the empty box back on the bedside table, bent down, and leaned close to her mother's ear, lowering her voice until it was so soft only the two of them could hear it.
"That frog has twenty seconds left before it completely melts. After it melts, the cocoa butter will mix with your body heat and stick to your inner walls. When I help you clean it out later, I will use—spread your legs."
The tip of her wand pressed against the inside of her mother's knee, forcing the two pantyhose-clad legs apart.
The tip of Isabella's wand stopped between her mother's gluteal cleft.
"Mom. Where did that frog burrow into?"
"...Inside."
"Inside what. Use a complete sentence."
Isabella pressed the tip of her wand down a bit, pressing against the area below the tailbone through the fabric of the dress.
Cassiopeia's waist abruptly thrust forward, her serpentine pupils constricting violently.
"Just... that frog... burrowed into my..."
"Burrowed into your what."
"Back."
Isabella withdrew her wand, then patted her mother's lower back with her other free hand.
"Alright. Twenty seconds are up. You discharge it yourself first. I'll have Jerry turn around and not look."
She spun Jerry by the shoulders, making him face the window of the private room. Outside the window lay the hazy skyline of London. Her movements were crisp and clean—spin shoulders, turn around, pin in place—all in one smooth motion. Then she turned back to look at her mother on the low stool.
"You..."
"I what. Making you discharge it yourself was your own statement, not mine." Isabella leaned against the windowsill with her arms crossed, blocking Jerry's line of sight. "Discharge it. Mom. Your daughter is watching right here. Your son-in-law has his back to you. After you finish discharging it, we will have a proper talk about all these things you've done to my fiancé."
Cassiopeia's serpentine pupils trembled violently at their narrowest point for several beats. Then she closed her eyes, bit her lower lip, and her body sank slightly downward on the low stool.
From beneath the dark green skirt came the incredibly faint sound of sticky wetness.
Melted cocoa butter mixed with a small amount of clear fluid slowly oozed outward from deep within the narrow chamber.
The Chocolate Frog had completely melted. Mixed together, it flowed from the edges of the entrance, dripping onto the surface of the low stool. The murky, pale brown liquid added another fresh stain to her pantyhose.
She stood up from the low stool, her knees buckling, nearly losing her balance. She had to brace her hand against the edge of the bed to steady herself.
The dark green skirt fell down, covering the wet stain on her pantyhose, but it couldn't cover the flush on her face burning from the roots of her ears down to her collarbones.
Isabella stepped away from the windowsill and walked up to her mother. She was shorter than her mother, but her aura as she looked up at her yielded not an inch. She reached out and adjusted her mother's skewed collar, tucked a stray lock of hair hanging by her temples behind her ear, and then shoved the unopened bag of Cockroach Clusters from the bedside table into her mother's hands.
"Hold on to this. You said you came to pick up medicine; the medicine is picked up, take a portion of snacks back with you too. As for other matters, we will discuss them when we get home."
Clutching the bag of Cockroach Clusters, Cassiopeia's lips moved.
She wanted to say something—a threat, a rebuttal, a mockery, a justification—but every single type of sentence spun around the tip of her tongue only to be blocked back down by her current predicament.
Gripping the snacks, she stood up, her legs still shaking.
Cassiopeia took two steps toward the door, paused, cast one final glance at Jerry's back with an expression mixing shame, anger, and embarrassment, then pushed open the door of the private room and walked out.
The ta-ta-ta of her high heels striking the floor tiles was a full beat faster than when she had arrived.
Three people remained in the private room—Isabella standing, Jerry still facing the window with his back turned to the bed, and Yin Luo, who had been unconscious from start to finish.
Isabella walked up behind Jerry and poked him in the lower back.
"You can turn around now."
Jerry turned around. Isabella's expression shifted from the icy severity she held while facing her mother into something else—the corners of her mouth pursing upward.
"I worked overtime all day long. Organizing the draft treaties for the Cultivation world at the Ministry of Magic. Halfway through, I heard the news that my fiancé wasn't dead, that he had returned. When I left the office, my legs were trembling—not from excitement, but because I had been working continuously for fourteen hours."
Jerry opened his mouth.
Isabella pressed her index finger against his lips.
"Don't speak yet." With her other hand, she unbuttoned the collar of her uniform: the first button, the second button.
The grey work robe slipped down from her shoulders, exposing the white shirt and dark green tie underneath.
She folded the work robe twice and draped it over the railing at the foot of Yin Luo's bed.
"I bought pasties after I got off work and left them at the door. I originally wanted to eat them with you."
As she spoke, she loosened the knot of her tie, pulled it from under her shirt collar, wrapped it twice around her wrist, then yanked it off and tossed it onto the work robe.
"When I reached the door, I heard the kind of commotion my mother was making. I know exactly what kind of commotion that is. So I had no choice but to shrink myself to the size of a palm and deal with her first using a Chocolate Frog."
The door was suddenly pushed open again, and Cassiopeia walked back in from outside with a cold sneer.
With a flash of green light in Cassiopeia's eyes, Isabella froze dead in her tracks.