The change in our protagonist's wand wood is deliberate. More about that in the commentary at the end.

Chapter 1: Questions and Answers

1.

"If the baby's a girl, what will you name her?" Sirius asks Lily, who has her hands folded over her moon-round stomach. (As if, just maybe, her delicate fingers can protect the child inside.) "I know it's Harry James Potter if he's a boy. James already spilled."

Lily shoots a look at her husband, a mix of a glare and a fond grin. "Some prankster you are, spoiling the surprise."

"Sirius played the best friend card," James says, trying for a repentant look. "How could I resist?"

Rolling her eyes, Lily tosses a copy of the Quibbler at her husband. It's better to read that, these days, than the endless list of deaths in the Daily Prophet. "Don't try to pretend you're sorry. It makes your face look strange."

(She tries not to think of her own former best friend. The one she would like to take a turn holding her baby, if only he weren't a Death Eater.)

"So you spill now," Sirius says to Lily. "Follow James's example and give way to my charm. What's the baby's name if she's a girl?"

Lily is pretty immune to Sirius's charm, but she has a tiny instinct—

(that maybe she won't always be here for the child she wants so badly to protect, and that maybe this information should survive beyond her)

—that it can't hurt to tell him. So she leans over and whispers three words in his ear.

Three words that will, somehow, survive the wreck Azkaban makes of Sirius Black. But he won't be able to put them to use. Not yet.

2.

I'm a snake too.

That's what Harry Potter thinks as she goes nose to nose with the brown-and-tan boa constrictor, which has stupid people drumming their fingers against its glass all day, which nobody can understand when it talks, which everyone calls freakish.

Like Harry calls herself, because Harry is supposed to be a boy, except for the inescapable fact that she is somehow a girl and always has been.

"I'm a snake too," she murmurs to the boa constrictor, tugging on a strand of her long red hair. The hair Aunt Petunia has been trying to cut for years, and has never succeeded in cutting.

The boa constrictor rolls its eyes. It doesn't seem to think much of this assertion. You're a human. A polite one, for once. A good one.

Harry decides snakes must not understand metaphor. Or symbolism. Whichever it is. But it's nice that somebody believes she's good, even if this boa constrictor is the only one.

Two minutes later, the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank is gone.

This is a snake that says thank you. And this is a girl who lies on the floor, knocked down on the floor, and thinks, freedom. I want freedom too.

3.

Harry has only experienced what love is not.

She's curled up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket, waiting for Dudley's watch to get to twelve, waiting to turn eleven.

She knows Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon love Dudley, but she can't imagine them, or anyone, loving her that way.

It's cold on the floor, but at least she has her sweater to help her keep warm. It's her favorite—navy blue with sky blue and white flowers. It used to be an ugly sweater of Dudley's that Aunt Petunia made her wear, and somehow it changed. The only reason the Dursleys let her wear such a "girly" thing is because they don't want to buy her a new one.

She's heard people called Dudley spoiled, and she wouldn't want to be spoiled. But how else do people love their children?

The countless letters sent to her—despite what Uncle Vernon said about the address being a mistake, Harry knows in her guts that somebody wants to talk to her. Is taking immense trouble to do so, trouble enough to somehow get letters inside of eggs (and how exactly are they doing that?), trouble enough to follow her and the Dursleys around the country and keep sending them. If only there were some way of telling that person, whoever they are, how much Harry wants to know what they have to say.

Mysteries poke at Harry, even when they don't involve her. She wants to unlock any one she comes into contact with. She's always been endlessly frustrated by hearing languages she can't understand. Once she heard a woman speaking French in a store and broke the Dursleys' rule against asking questions to inquire how a person learned to speak other languages. Aunt Petunia only said tersely that foreigners weren't to be trusted, which Harry didn't regard as an answer at all.

All Harry's clothes seemed to shrink in the wash, fitting her more tightly. It's a little odd because nothing else does, but the Dursleys barely notice, much less care. Harry notices.

Harry wants somebody to love her, even though she doesn't really know what that would be like. But just as much, she wants somebody whom she can love. She doesn't know what that would be like either.

She has never, in her entire life, felt special. Even now, with letter after letter showing up with her name on it, she cannot comprehend that she might be anything but less than nobody. People will wonder, when they hear her story, how she could possibly not have realized she was a witch. But when you spend ten years, your entire conscious existence, with people who neglect you egregiously, why would you ever consider yourself special, even in the face of evidence that you are?

Maybe she'll wake Dudley up, just to annoy him—

BOOM.

The whole shack shivers, and Harry sits bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone is outside, knocking to come in.

4.

Harry has always been told never to ask questions.

She's been snapped at, yelled at, and given too many chores for the tiniest inquiries, the tiniest raising of objections. But that doesn't mean she doesn't have them. For self-preservation, she keeps her mouth shut, though, on the thousands of questions trying to burst forth.

Where did I get my scar? (The first one she remembers asking; the first time she was shut down; one of the few she asked at all.) What are the bees doing on the flowers? Why does Dudley get new clothes and I never do? Why do you always want to cut my hair, and why can't you? I know vinegar and baking soda foam up, but why do they do that? What happened when I ended up on the school's roof when Dudley's gang was chasing me? What's wrong with motorcycles, anyway? We learned in school about the tombs in ancient Egypt, but why did archaeologists think it was okay to just steal stuff out of them? Aunt Marge said my parents were drunks, but were they really? Why have I never had a birthday party?

And—why does everyone think I'm a boy when I'm a girl?

Harry does not ask these questions, to keep herself safe. And then an ambassador from a new world bursts in the hut on the rock and hands her a smudgy birthday cake, and she asks a small question: "Who are you?"

She gets a respectful answer, instead of being snapped at or yelled at. And, a few inches at a time, the floodgates start to break open.

"I'm sorry, but I still don't really know who you are."

"All what?"

"What world?"

"My—my mum and dad weren't famous, were they?"

"Keep what from me?"

"What does it mean, they await my owl?"

"You knew I'm a—a wizard?"

"Blown up? You told me they died in a car crash!"

"But why? What happened?"

"Could you write it down?"

"But what happened to Vol—sorry, I mean You-Know-Who?"

Each one of these questions has an answer, even if the only answer is that Hagrid himself doesn't know, and this is when Harry really starts to step into a new world. Not in Diagon Alley, not on the Hogwarts Express, but right now, when she realizes that at least one person from the wizarding world will respect her enough to listen to her and respond. That she can actually acquire new knowledge this way.

And that never goes away—not just her thirst for answers, but the glory of asking a question.

5.

Harry hates being called Mr. Potter.

Her first name isn't great, but she can pretend it's a nickname for Harriet and thus tolerate it, even though she doesn't love Harriet as a name. But Mr. Potter is absolutely masculine and she cringes every time she hears it. So when Tom the barman runs around the Leaky Cauldron's counter and shakes her hand, exclaiming "Welcome back, Mr. Potter, welcome back," Harry just wants to hide.

The desire to flee only increases when seemingly the entirety of the Leaky Cauldron gets up to shake her hand and address her as Mr. Potter over and over. Hagrid, who has more insight than most people give him credit for, sees this and steers Harry out earlier than he might have otherwise.

They enter Diagon Alley, and the strangeness and absolute wonder of it nearly overwhelms Harry. She's about to ask about a million more questions when Hagrid asks one of his own.

"Was somethin' wrong back in the Leaky Cauldron, Harry?" he asks. "Yeh looked upset."

Harry's about to deny or deflect—it's rare for anyone to express concern for her, and she isn't sure how to take it. Then she thinks about all the strange things she's heard in the last twenty-four hours, all the amazing sights she's seeing even now, and it occurs to her—is it possible she thinks she's a girl because she's a wizard? Do some wizards just feel this way?

"Hagrid," she says slowly as they walk along, "wizards are different than Muggles, right?"

"'Course. In lots o' ways."

"So do wizards ever—feel like they're girls when everyone else says they're boys?"

"Yeh mean are they ever trans? Sure."

Harry blinks. "What's trans?"

There's a moment of silence. Then Hagrid says, "Guess them Dursleys didn't tell yeh nothin', did they?"

"Not really."

"Well, I'm thinkin' this might be somethin' to talk about over ice cream," Hagrid says with cheer, pointing to a sign reading Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor. "There'll be trans students and teachers at Hogwarts, so best yeh know what it means." Harry has no idea what's coming, but apparently there's actually an answer to the question she's had since she was three, which both excites and scares her.

Harry chooses mint-and-fudge ice cream and listens carefully, trying to keep her face neutral, as Hagrid explains over chocolate with nuts.

"Most people used to think yeh could look at a person's body and see if they were a boy or a girl, right?" Harry nods—she's certainly familiar with that line of thinking. "And for lots of us, that's true. But for some people, even though everyone thinks they're one thing, they're actually not."

"Why?" Harry ventures. "Why are some wizards that way?"

Hagrid chuckles. "Nobody knows. Just the way it is, I guess." He hoists his ice cream. "Me, I don't think it matters much why. We got to respect 'em no matter what. And so yeh know, it's not just wizards. Some Muggles are trans too."

"Wizards—respect people like that? Trans people?"

"'Course," Hagrid says. "Yeh'll meet some at Hogwarts. Some like to keep it private, so if anyone ever tells yeh they're trans, don't tell anyone 'less they say it's fine. And when people tell yeh what sort of pronouns they have, always use those."

"Pronouns?" Harry says, not putting it together.

"Like me, if yeh were talkin' 'bout me, yeh'd say he was goin' to visit Gringotts. But if yeh were talkin' 'bout Professor McGonagall—she's one of yer teachers—yeh'd say, she was goin' to visit Gringotts. Not he."

"You mean—wizards get to choose whether people talk about them like they're girls or boys?"

"They do."

Harry has too many feelings to sort out. She feels exposed but also exhilarated, bewildered but also hopeful, sick and unmoored but also thrilled and with a dozen more questions that she isn't sure she wants to ask right here, right now. Hagrid must see some of this, because he says, "I'll see yeh at Hogwarts too, and if yeh ever want to come and talk 'bout this some more, yeh can. And there'll be books in the library too, if yeh want to read 'bout it."

6.

Hagrid still looks sick when he staggers out of the Gringotts cart, but he turns to Griphook anyway and croaks, "May your diamonds be many and your enemies dead," before heading straight for the door.

Harry, curious again, hangs back. "Is that how you say goodbye to a Gringotts worker?" she asks Griphook.

Griphook eyes her with wary interest. "It is how goblins in England say goodbye to each other," he says. "Hagrid knows what it is like to be treated discourteously, and he says it to us to be polite."

"I know what it's like to have people be rude to me," Harry says. "I can say it too. If you don't mind."

"I don't believe any of us would mind," Griphook says, in a tone of voice Harry can't quite read.

"Well, may your diamonds be many and your enemies dead," Harry says. "And thank you for taking me down to my vault." She gives Griphook a cautious smile, then leaves to join Hagrid.

7.

"After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things—terrible, yes, but great."

Harry shivers, wishing herself elsewhere. Then she remembers another odd thing, and another question tumbles out of her mouth. "Mr. Ollivander, you said the wood in my wand—apple, right?" He nods. "You said apple and phoenix feather are an unusual combination. Why is that?"

Mr. Ollivander seems rather pleased to be asked. "You see, phoenixes are detached birds—notoriously detached. And apple is often drawn to wizards of great charm, who enjoy being with others, who often go out of their way to learn other languages so that they may talk to more beings. So the detached nature of the phoenix and the social nature of the apple are difficult to—"

He keeps talking, but Harry isn't listening anymore, because she's stuck on the learn other languages part. She doesn't feel particularly charming, and the Dursleys deliberately avoided any "foreigners," but Harry always strained to hear any language that wasn't English when they were out in public, longing to unlock it. If this wand somehow detected that desire…if having it means that desire is alright, not another symptom of her so-called freakishness…

She pays for her wand, and she and Hagrid head back towards the Leaky Cauldron. On their way, they pass Flourish and Blotts, and Harry stops. "Um, Hagrid? Can we go back in for a minute?"

Doing this makes her feel exposed for yet another time today, but regardless, Harry walks up to the counter and asks bravely, "Do you have any books for people who want to learn other languages?"

"What kind of languages?" the witch there asks with a smile. "From other countries, like French? Or maybe a local Goblin or Merfolk language?"

"All of those," Harry says firmly. "Please. And—" thinking of the feather in her wand "—is there a language phoenixes speak?"

She leaves Flourish and Blotts with elementary books on French, Hob, Mermish, and Avian. And for good measure, a book about how to do basic negotiations with several dangerous magical creatures in their own languages.

8.

Harry's schoolbooks are very interesting. In reading them, she quickly becomes even more enamored with getting questions answered. The books have not only fascinating text, but notes and indexes and glossaries. Some of these raise as many questions as they answer, but Harry hopes, cautiously, that a teacher might be able to answer them for her. Alone in her room at night, when the Dursleys are asleep, she tries mixing three of the simplest of the potions, all of which seem to work as they are supposed to.

The language books are equally intriguing, and Harry whispers the words aloud as she reads them. She's sure she's pronouncing much of it wrong, and wonders where to find speakers of French and Hob and Merrow and Avian with whom she might practice. Hogwarts doesn't seem to teach any languages, but maybe other students will speak them? Or maybe magical creatures who live nearby?

9.

"Blown up a toilet? We've never blown up a toilet."

"Great idea, though, thanks, Mum."

"It's not funny. And look after Ron."

"Don't worry, ickle Ronniekins is safe with us."

"Shut up," says Ron again. He's almost as tall as the twins already and his nose is still pink where his mother rubbed it.

"Hey, Mum, guess what? Guess who we just met on the train?"

Harry leans back quickly so they can't see her looking.

"You know that boy with long red hair who was near us in the station? Know who he is?"

"Who?"

"Harry Potter!"

Harry hears the little girl's voice.

"Oh, Mum, can I go on the train and see him, oh, Mum please…"

"You've already seen him, Ginny, and the poor boy isn't something you goggle at in a zoo."

Privately, and somewhat indignantly, Harry agrees. She spends enough time thinking she's a freak, and has only just begun to believe it might not be true—she has no interest in being seen as abnormal in any way, especially for something she doesn't even remember.

10.

Harry watches the girl and her mother disappear as the train rounds the corner. Houses flash past the window. Harry feels a great leap of excitement. She doesn't know what she's going to—but it has to be better than what she's leaving behind.

Commentary on Chapter 1

This is not necessary to follow the story, but will offer further insight if you want it.

I'm a trans man who loves the Harry Potter series. Now, I could avoid them like the plague because their author is transphobic, but I don't feel like giving bigotry the satisfaction of keeping me away from books I care about. So instead, I've chosen to write this story featuring our protagonist as a trans girl, because I steadfastly believe that even though said author may never accept trans folks, Hogwarts already celebrates them. And we deserve to have a trans person who saves the wizarding world.

Not only saves the world, but changes it.

What do I mean by that? I mean this: much as I love the Harry Potter books, there were some lost opportunities there. Right now, I'm thinking in particular of two things. Firstly, Harry's dreams of the Department of Mysteries:

And now he was in a dimly lit room as high and wide as a church, full of nothing but rows and rows of towering shelves, each laden with small, dusty, spun-glass spheres…

—Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Chapter 28: Snape's Worst Memory)

Those are memories; we know that now. But when I first read the book, I thought they were something quite different—something I still think would have been a better direction in which to take the plot. And I've never gotten over that disappointment. So in the story I'm creating here, they will be…well, that would spoil the surprise. Keep reading!

Other opportunity, when Ron asks if there's a way of putting your soul back together after you've made Horcruxes:

"Yes," said Hermione with a hollow smile, "but it would be excruciatingly painful."

"Why? How do you do it?" asked Harry.

"Remorse," said Hermione. "You've got to really feel what you've done. There's a footnote. Apparently the pain of it can destroy you. I can't see Voldemort attempting it somehow, can you?"

—Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Chapter 6: The Ghoul in Pajamas)

Why, exactly, is this in here at all? When I read it for the first time, I got super excited. I was like, "Is Voldemort going to end up feeling remorse? That's so interesting! I wonder why? I wonder how? Will it really put his soul back together? What are they going to do with him if he is really sorry? What an interesting moral dilemma!"

But nope. We had almost zero payoff for that section, and Voldemort never felt sorry, and died not feeling sorry, and Harry never had to face the moral question of what you do with your adversary when you can't justify killing him. Well, hell.

So the idea of putting Horcruxes back together into a whole soul, through remorse, will be addressed much more deeply in this story. Both of these opportunities don't come along until Order of the Phoenix. So up through Goblet of Fire, the main changes to the plot will be those that are wrought by our protagonist being a trans girl, with a few other medium-sized changes that I feel would improve the story or be fun. And in Order of the Phoenix, we'll start seriously veering.

So let's talk about deadnames and pronouns, because they matter. If a trans person has changed their name, and you are talking about a memory you have of the trans person before they changed their name, you should always default to their current name, not their deadname, no matter what name they were using in that memory. Same with pronouns. If that trans person wants something else, they can tell you so, but always default to the above.

Thus, during my commentary, I will always refer to my version of our protagonist as "Iris," and use she/her pronouns. If I am directly quoting the original books, or talking about something only the original version of our protagonist does, I will use "Harry" and he/him pronouns, because the stated actions will not apply to Iris at all.

The text of the story is in present-tense, and so the narrative uses whatever Iris herself uses at the time. I switch between an omniscient (all-knowing) narrator and narration by various characters. Iris has known she is a girl, and used she/her pronouns internally, since she was three years old. Thus, she and the omniscient narrator always use she/her pronouns.

While Iris uses the name Harry, she and the omniscient narrator will refer to her as Harry. When she changes her name to Iris, she and the omniscient narrator will refer to her as Iris. This reflects my personal experience—before I chose Elijah as my name, I thought of myself as [my deadname]. Not every trans person feels the same way, but my experience is what I know best. Furthermore, I felt a lot of relief when I switched from [my deadname] to Elijah, and I wanted to mimic that feeling in Iris, which means using Harry initially.

When other people are thinking about Iris, or speaking about her in dialogue, they use the name and pronouns they know. Thus, if they don't know Iris is a girl, they will use he/him pronouns. When they learn the correct name and pronouns, they will switch over. We don't experience the thoughts of anyone who refuses to believe Iris about her trans identity. A couple of our villains do deliberately misgender her. This can be traumatic for many people, and it's certainly not pleasant to write about, so I keep it very minimal.

That's a lot, but I wanted people to know my rationale.

Not everyone trans person can, or wants to, use a name from their parents as their new name. But Iris has so few things from her parents, and the name they gave her is one of them. I wanted her to have a moment when she gets a gift from "beyond the grave" in the form of a new name from her parents—a name that affirms her gender. And Sirius is the most likely to person to pass on such a name, so I arranged the scene where he learns it.

I made Iris inherit her mother's red hair for a couple of reasons, both of which will become apparent down the line.

I always wanted to see our protagonist use Parseltongue to connect with snakes more—another lost opportunity! So you'll get that, starting in my version of Chamber of Secrets.

I love the idea of a trans wizard using accidental magic to switch their clothes around. In my version of the wizarding world, that's one of the ways you know you might have a trans kid. Another way is if their pronouns keep changing on holiday cards and/or report cards. But I will say this: although our protagonist knows from a young age that she's a girl, not all trans people have such early knowledge. For example, I didn't know I was a guy until I was twenty-nine, and some people figure it out much later. So if you're a trans person who's new to the realization, it doesn't make you less legitimate.

We know from the originals that our protagonist in their early days is quite the curious person, intrigued by mysteries. Consider the following quotes from the originals.

"The library?" said Hagrid, following them out of the hall. "Just before the holidays? Bit keen, ain't yeh?"

"Oh, we're not working," Harry told him brightly. "Ever since you mentioned Nicolas Flamel we've been trying to find out who he is."

—Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Chapter 12: The Mirror of Erised)

And:

"Can't hurt to have a poke around," Harry said, dropping his bag and getting on his hands and knees so that he could crawl along, searching for clues.

—Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Chapter 9: The Writing on the Wall)

 And:

The silvery light was coming from the basin's contents, which were like nothing Harry had ever seen before…It looked like light made liquid—or like wind made solid—Harry couldn't make up his mind.

He wanted to touch it, to find out what it felt like, but nearly four years' experience of the magical world told him that sticking his hand into a bowl full of some unknown substance was a very stupid thing to do. He therefore pulled his wand out of his robes, cast a nervous look around the office, looked back at the contents of the basin, and prodded them.

—Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Chapter 30: The Pensieve)

For Iris, I have kept that same curiosity and expanded it to include a few other specific things, one of which is languages. Why that matters will become apparent later.

A person might respond in many ways to a childhood in which they faced nasty consequences for asking questions. One, obviously, is to evermore refrain from asking questions. But we see in the original books that this is not Harry's response. In my version, I pushed Iris a couple of steps further, and had her respond not just by retaining the ability to ask questions, but with an increased desire to do so. Iris can't quite articulate this yet, but she sees questions and answers as power, a power the Dursleys have kept from her, and in this version, she will jump on every possible opportunity to inquire and question everything around her—which will have unforeseen consequences for a lot of things, including her gender journey but not limited to it.

Everyone's experience is somewhat different, but when I'm called ma'am and miss as a trans guy, that induces much more dysphoria than the use of my deadname. So I used the greetings in the Leaky Cauldron as the jumping-off point for Iris actually learning there's such a thing as other trans people.

And so's you know, Hagrid definitely has a sense—between the feminine, pretty sweater and Iris's question—that she might be trans. However, I see him as tactful and aware enough not to assume, and to give Iris a reason for needing to know about trans people that doesn't force her to come out if she's not ready. Never try to force people to come out, whether about gender or sexuality (or any number of other secret things).

Obviously, the conversation Iris and Hagrid have is not full Trans 101, but that would take forever and I don't see Iris as being quite ready for it anyway. Pieces of how trans folks operate in the wizarding world will therefore emerge over time. You'll note that, although the wizarding world is better for trans folks than many Muggle societies, it's not completely with it (in the 1990s, anyway) because so far, nobody's asked for Iris's pronouns before assuming.

The Gringotts scene is the start of me trying to deal with an element of the originals that has always driven me wild—in a negative way—and that is the treatment of non-human people. What gets to me, just as much as the non-human people being treated horribly, is that this horrible treatment is often ignored or even justified by the narrative. And in the rare case of somebody trying to make systemic change, it's either glossed over or made into a joke. The battle to defeat Voldemort, who has prejudice against the human Muggle-borns and Muggles, is viewed as far more worthy of attention than any attempt to empower house-elves, werewolves, goblins, giants, centaurs, leprechauns, veela, basilisks, or other creatures who are obviously intelligent but whom it is convenient for human wizards to view as less than people.

Instead of giving all the examples I could think of right here, I'm going to give them as they arise in the text, usually with the demonstration of how I deal with them. The little scene between Iris and Griphook is only the start of how I want to alter Iris's relationships with various non-human peoples, with several plot and character implications along the way.

And about Hogwarts robes at Madam Malkin's: I see absolutely no reason why they would not be gender-neutral—I always saw them as such in my head—and therefore that fitting does not trigger dysphoria for Iris. It may even give her some relief.

The holly in Harry's wand doesn't have any effect on the plot—unlike the phoenix feather, which is essential—so I switched it out for apple. I heard somewhere online that wielders of apple wands have a knack for languages, and so I ran with it. I wanted to give Iris a chance to have her desire to learn languages affirmed by somebody outside herself, which gives her the guts to put it into action.

Now, let's look at this quote:

[Harry's] schoolbooks were very interesting. He lay on his bed reading late into the night, Hedwig swooping in and out of the open window as she pleased.

—Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Chapter 6: The Journey from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters)

As you will see once we get to Hogwarts, I'm not making Iris into another Hermione. Hermione is still the genius of the friend group academically, and Iris's most profound talents lie in her leadership abilities. But I'm letting Iris be a little stronger academically than Harry, because I find that more interesting to write and because Hermione shouldn't have to save the group all the time.

The twins entertain me vastly.

As you might deduce from this, Iris starts out with more of a negative attitude towards Ginny than Harry does. I as a reader/writer am fond of Ginny as a character, and I think it's realistic that she might have a celebrity crush on our protagonist, but I don't see Iris as returning those feelings, even later, and I think Ginny would be better off getting over them. So I have other plans for both Iris and Ginny, which I hope you'll enjoy.

See you next time!

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