Thank you--I liked Emerald Eyes very much, and it means a lot to me that you liked my story.

 Dumbledore's role will be revealed in the fullness of time (evil grin). I will say that Snape was not outright lying, and Dumbledore's mechinations are both subtle and far reaching. I can see Snape having short shrift for Dumbledore-- Snape is a manipulative, sly Slytherin, but I think he would find the twinkly, benevolent old man routine distasteful.

You're absolutely right about the repetition. I tend not to notice these things until too late. Thank you for pointing this out to me.

In my experience, emotionally abused people tend to supress reactions and bury their real feelings. Some people (coughcoughHarrycoughcough) use anger to cover them. Others become the class clown, or withdraw. The common denominator is a feeling  of having to continually prove one's worth. I see this in Harry--he seems torn between his conception of himself as the magical freak and the perception others have of him as the Boy Who Lived.

The key word being, in my experience. I am not a doctor of any kind--this is just my observation. I agree that Harry will be hard put to trust Snape-- he has no reason to think any adult really cares, and Snape did just whip the heck out of him. I think it will take a lot for the two of them to work through the mutual emnity and develope a rapport. Harry's dam is not just the way his relative's treated him-- it's the feeling of being straightjacketed by the expectations of others, as well as being thirteen and  in that awkward stage.

I certainly hope my amateur psychology hasn't given anyone offense; I'm drawing mainly on personal experience and my perceptions of things.