Potter, that blasted, irritating little brat, missed lunch and dinner in the Great Hall that day. Severus glared at the Slytherin table, glared at Potter’s empty seat, and deducted ten points from Gryffindor for their vacuous and insensitive behavior. No one but the empty-headed, swollen-hearted Gryffindors would have the audacity to chatter and laugh when the Wizarding world’s malnourished savior missed two meals in a row. Severus glared at the Gryffindors, deducted another ten points from them and glared at Potter’s empty seat again.

The boy was probably trembling in an abandoned corner of the library, clutching a potions textbook, afraid that he had lost his Head of House’s approval and with it the right to future meals. Severus stabbed at his roasted potatoes with the point of his knife, unable to banish the mental image. Potter would be sitting in the corner of a chair, his knees pulled up to his chin and his elbows sticking out at sharp angles as he hugged his legs close to his chest. The boy was nothing but skin drawn taut over sharp lines and sharp angles.

If Severus were to approach Harry, if he spoke in soft gentle tones and offered the hungry boy food, the child might forgive him his earlier harsh words. The child might forgive him, or flee from him, or burst into tears at the sight of him, and there was no predicting Harry’s reaction. Severus glared at the abandoned corner of the Slytherin table. He wanted to soothe Harry, wanted to feed him and reassure him and mollycoddle him and he didn’t dare approach him for fear of worsening the situation.

Severus scowled and demolished the pile of carrots that Poppy Pomfrey had pushed onto his plate. The school mediwitch was an interfering mother hen and he refused to encourage her maternal tendencies. It might be appropriate for her to coo and cluck over the students, but Severus would not submit to her regiments of vegetables and potions and exercise. He cast a sidelong glance at her and then at Potter’s empty seat. Among the Hogwarts faculty, Poppy Pomfrey was the one he would trust first with his plans, his revenge, with Harry’s secrets. Severus reached for his goblet of pumpkin juice, but the thick sweet liquid was tasteless tonight. Harry was hungry, felt betrayed by his professor, felt abandoned. He couldn’t betray that child’s secrets to Poppy. The boy didn’t trust him now as it was.

His remaining Slytherin students were stuffing their faces with braised lamb and roast potatoes and carrots and rolls and trifle. Some of them ate like wide-mouthed baboons, plowing their way through the food, while others ate with dainty aristocratic flair. Draco sipped his pumpkin juice and wiped his mouth clean with a napkin, using manners that would make his mother proud. Harry belonged at that table, eating with Draco.

Severus watched his godson eat. Draco cast a sly glance at Harry’s seat and then looked at his godfather, a question poised unspoken in his expression. With his gaze fixed on his godfather, Draco grabbed two dinner rolls, one in each hand, and closed his fingers into fists around them. He stood and paused behind Potter’s seat, showing Severus the bread hidden in his hands, before he left the Great Hall.

Draco’s own dinner remained half-eaten on his plate when he had left. Crabbe and Goyle, taking advantage of the blond student’s absence, scooped up the uneaten food and devoured it quickly.

----------

After a long night spent marking papers and not looking for Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy, Severus took a second cup of coffee with his breakfast. The strong bitter aroma was enough to overwhelm the greasy smell of bacon and eggs that permeated the Great Hall, and the taste of it on his tongue was enough to make Severus forget that he was surrounded by a horde of rowdy, hormonal adolescents. Coffee was the only vice that Severus allowed himself, the only beverage he drank that had a strong taste able to mask subtle poisons or potions. Albus, who presented him with exotic Costa Rican coffees every year for birthdays and Christmases, saw to it that Severus had his coffee every morning and saw to it that no one could tamper with the coffee. The Headmaster’s personal house elf, loyal and discreet, brewed it every morning. It was the only way to keep the volatile Potions Master in a half-decent temper in the mornings.

Severus curled his long fingers around the smooth warm comfort of his coffee mug. The sun escaped from the dark gray clouds that masked the ceiling of the Great Hall, and Severus winced at the sudden brightness.

Harry Potter slunk into the Great Hall then, just as the sun made its appearance. The thin boy took his usual place at the end of the table and reached a tentative hand out to take a piece of toast. The uncertain gesture was aborted when Draco Malfoy stood and walked down to the end of the table. Harry clutched his hand to his chest and trembled. “S-sorry,” he said.

“No, no, it’s my fault,” Draco said. “I apologize for startling you.”

Severus watched the two boys stare at each other, one with big green eyes and the other with calm gray eyes. What had happened between Draco and Harry last night? What were his godson’s intentions toward Harry, and what had he told Lucius? Severus gripped his coffee mug with fingers that had somehow turned cold, envisioning his revenge on James and Lily Potter gone, slipped away like a nightmare in the sunlight.

“May I eat breakfast with you?” Draco asked Harry. Green eyes wide and startled, the small boy trembled and nodded.

Crabbe and Goyle, abandoned by Draco further down the table, looked at each other and then at Draco and Harry. A swift glare and gesture from Severus convinced them to remain in their seats and they turned their fingers and their attention back to plates piled high with crispy bacon. Severus turned his attention back to Draco, who was buttering a slice of toast, and Harry, who was frozen in his seat. A subtle wand movement and a muttered charm ensured that the boys’ conversation was relayed to Severus’s ears. He would not trust the safety of the Potter boy with his godson.

Harry’s shoulders were hunched and he had scooted to the absolute end of the bench, as far from Draco as he could move. Draco ignored Harry’s obvious fear with the poise and manners that were the birthright of the Malfoy heir. “Shall I pour you a glass of pumpkin juice, or would you prefer a cup of tea, Harry?”

When Harry stared at him, still silent, Draco poured pumpkin juice for both of them as though Harry had voiced a preference. Watching the boy, Severus could see that Harry’s muscles had tensed when Draco moved close to him to pour the juice, but had relaxed when Draco moved away again. Severus sipped his coffee, enjoying its dark rich flavor, while Draco began drinking his pumpkin juice. “It’s very good today, Harry. You really should try some,” Draco said.

Severus frowned at Draco. Years of etiquette lessons and pureblood upbringing were enabling the young Slytherin to carry on an awkward one-sided conversation with elegant poise, but he had not yet succeeded in putting Harry at ease. Potter, the infuriating skinny brat that he was, had not eaten a crumb. Severus transferred the frown from Draco to Potter. Just like his father, inconsiderate and incapable of learning – the brat was disregarding Severus’s instructions about meals.

Draco rescued a platter of bacon from Crabbe and Goyle, offering it to Harry. The two boys sat frozen in this tableau, an extended plate of food almost connecting them. Draco held the plate steady with no hint of impatience until Harry reached out to take a slice of bacon. The movement was slow, all the muscles in Harry’s arm tense as he leaned away from the other boy. When he had claimed his prize, he shoved it into his mouth. The entire piece of bacon disappeared, went into Harry’s mouth at an angle and distended his cheeks.

No comment was made about table manners. Instead, Draco continued to hold the plate out to Harry. “Have another piece,” he offered.

Harry looked down at the plate of bacon and then toward the Head Table at Severus. Severus gave the boy a small nod of encouragement and Harry’s eyes dropped again to watch the food that was being offered to him.

Severus saw Harry’s muscles lock up, the boy tense with uncertainty. Hands clamped around the smooth sides of his coffee cup, Severus held his breath and began counting the number of poisons stored in his potions lab. One … belladonna, two … Runespoor venom, three …

With a quick sharp movement, Harry reached out and grabbed a handful of bacon. Several slices slipped from his trembling fingers and fell to the floor as the ill-mannered brat fled the room.

Lunch and dinner passed in the same fashion, with a polite Draco sitting next to an unresponsive Potter, making gentle remarks and trying to feed the boy. Severus renewed the eavesdropping charm at both meals and listened to Draco’s meaningless chitchat about the pleasant weather and delicious food. The boy’s manners were impeccable, but after his first success he did not succeed in convincing Harry to eat.

It was at dinner, when Draco had moved past the stage of holding plates out to Potter to offer him food and on to serving Potter himself, putting small aesthetically arranged servings of chicken and rice on Potter’s plate, that the silent boy finally spoke. “Why are you doing this?” he asked Draco, who was arranging green beans in an unruly cross-hatch pattern on Potter’s plate.

“If you aren’t going to eat it, it might as well look pretty, don’t you think?” Draco twitched one last green bean at a ninety degree angle to the others.

“Why are you feeding me at all?” Potter asked.

Severus watched the boy, whose hands twitched near his silverware. Harry was smart, then, cunning enough to question Draco’s motives. Severus had known that the child was gifted from his performance in Potions, that he was strong based on his reaction to Legilimency, but this, this showed why he had been Sorted into Slytherin. An understanding of base human nature, an acceptance of the fact that true philanthropy is rare and that men are self-centered, self-serving animals, Potter had these Slytherin qualities. He refused to accept a stranger’s help until he had seen the attached price tag.

Draco’s silence hovered between the two boys for a moment like a fog. “Look,” Potter said, turning to look directly at Draco for the first time, “you can go back to your friends and brag to them again about how your father’s going to kill me, or you can go back to insulting me and mocking me, but stop sitting next to me and stop trying to feed me, got it?”

Harry rose to leave the table, but Draco reached out and yanked on his arm, touching him for the first time and pulling him back down into his seat. “Listen,” Draco said, his politeness and arrogance tossed aside, “it’s not like that, but I can’t explain it to you here, okay? I’ll tell you after we’re done eating, somewhere private. We can go see Professor Snape, he might give us tea and biscuits. You trust him enough to eat food if he gives it to you, don’t you?”

Potter’s flash of spirit had deserted him and his shoulders slumped. He reached one hand to the table and toyed with his fork, drawing it across the knife with a shrill scraping noise.

“Look, Professor Snape is watching us,” Draco said as he sliced his chicken into bite-sized pieces. “Do you think I would poison you right under his nose?” When Potter didn’t answer, Draco rolled his eyes. “Fine,” he said, taking swift bites of his chicken, rice and green beans. “I’ll swap plates with you – look, I’ve eaten some of everything on this plate, it’s perfectly safe. Just go ahead and eat something, Potter, you look like a walking twig.”

When the two boys rose from dinner, Severus strode out of the Great Hall and took a shortcut to his office. He waited there, marking papers so it wouldn’t appear as though he was waiting, until Draco and Harry arrived. The former was pulling the latter along with a hand loosely clasped around a thin wrist, and Severus saw at a glance that the unwanted physical contact was driving Harry further into his shell.

“Gentlemen, what a surprise,” Severus said. “Do unhand Mr. Potter and sit down, Mr. Malfoy.” A flick of his wand cleared a chair of its precarious tower of books and scrolls, and another flick closed the door with a silencing ward. “Have a seat, Mr. Potter.”

“Uncle Severus,” Draco said, “There’s something I have to tell you, and I want Harry to understand it as well.”

Severus nodded, summoning a house elf for tea and biscuits. “I believe that Mr. Potter and I are both curious as to the nature of your intentions toward him, Draco. Perhaps you had best start by explaining that.”

Draco fidgeted. “I want … I want to be friends with you,” he told Harry. “You … you’re interesting and … I know I’ve been a prat, but I do think we could be friends if you’d give me another chance.”

Draco took deep calming breaths. “I’m going to tell you something secret, Harry. I have to tell Uncle Sev because he’s my godfather, but I don’t have to tell you. I’m going tot ell you and trust you with my secret because I want you to someday trust me.”

“Lovely sentiment, Draco,” Severus said. “Are you sure the Sorting Hat didn’t mean to put you in Hufflepuff?”

Draco straightened his spine and glared at his godfather. “I’m sure that was unnecessary, Professor. There are more important things than snide comments, you know. You – you’ve hardly been here for me at all this week, even though you’re my godfather. I don’t mind that you want to help Harry, I know he needs it more than I do, but you don’t need to insult me.”

Severus ran a finger around the rim of his teacup, a stab of guilt hitting him. “I apologize, Draco,” he said.

“It’s all right,” Draco said. “I … I didn’t want you to know, not at first anyway, because I needed some time to think. Now … now can I just tell you what’s happened, without any interruptions, please?”

After a nod from Severus and silence from Potter, the blond Slytherin began his story. “The first evening here, I wrote home to tell my parents that I’d been put in Slytherin. I’d mentioned that the famous Boy Who Lived had been Sorted into Slytherin as well, and told them how skittish and badly dressed you were, Harry.”

Draco paused to sip his tea. “I … now I know that maybe I shouldn’t have done that. I got a letter back from my father, of course, encouraging me to spy on Harry and make his life miserable if at all possible. I … I wanted to do it at first, but then I opened the letter from my mother.” Draco dropped his gaze from his godfather’s face to the desk and traced the grain of the wood with his thumb.

“Mother sent me a package with a book about abu…” Draco cut the word off at a glare from Severus. “…about children like Harry, and she gave me a Souvienieve.”

With a quick glance at Harry, Draco explained. “It’s a magical device that can counteract an Obliviate, a spell that makes you forget something specific. It doesn’t give you the memories back directly, because that can traumatize a person, but it lets you watch them from the outside. I saw … I saw things that my father … that Lucius had done to me and to other people.”

Severus dropped his teacup at the implication that his godson had been abused. Lukewarm amber liquid flooded the desk, drenching the half-graded stack of papers. With a drying charm, Severus set the desk and parchments back to their original states. He reached across the desk to touch Draco’s hand, lightly tracing the pattern of veins on the back of his hand. Draco closed his eyes for a moment and continued.

“It … it really wasn’t all that bad, because fath- because Lucius didn’t want to damage his only heir. I was always fed and clothed properly, but … he hurt me, sometimes, with magic, and I wasn’t big enough to protect myself. Then he took the memories of it away so that I would still love him.”

“Mother … she couldn’t cross him, because he was quite vicious to her as well. She … she did what she could do, and she always helped me, afterwards.”

Severus felt Draco’s hand tremble beneath his own. He stroked it gently in the familiar pattern to comfort the pale boy.

“Mother wrote me to say that I’d have to choose whether I wanted to be like my father or like you, Uncle Sev. Father hurts weaker people, and that’s what I’d do if I hurt Harry, taking advantage of him for not knowing our world when it isn’t his fault that he was raised by Muggles. I … Mother doesn’t want that for me, and I don’t want it either.”

Draco leaned toward Harry. “Do you understand what I mean, Harry? Professor Snape is my godfather and he’s always helped me instead of hurting me. I’m going to be like him, and not like my father, and I’ll be here to help you get accustomed to the Wizarding world, just like he will, okay?”

Harry leaned backward in his chair and drew his legs up to his chest. He sent short frantic glances at Severus and Draco. “I-I … umm … I …”

“You don’t have to trust me all at once,” Draco said. “I understand that you can’t do that. But will you at least let me try?”

Harry nodded jerkily, his hair falling aside to reveal the pale scar on his forehead.

Severus summoned a house elf and asked for chicken broth and toast. “Harry, you didn’t eat very much at lunch and dinner today. Remember, I told you that I expect you to eat three meals a day. Why don’t you have a small meal now while Draco and I have a discussion?” They left Harry with his food and retreated to the sitting room in Severus’s personal chambers through an entrance hidden behind one of the bookcases in the office.

“Draco, how are you doing?”

Draco sat in an overstuffed green armchair with his habitual grace. “I … mostly okay. Some days are easier than others, and some days I just can’t stop thinking about what … what he did. I … after reading the book that Mother sent me, and watching Harry, I … I feel guilty about it. I mean, he’s suffered so much more than I have, the boy is afraid to even eat, and I’m sitting here whining and whinging because L-Lucius cast a few Dark spells on me?”

“Your suffering is not any less valid than his suffering because it differed in degree,” Severus said. He paced in front of the fireplace, his hands clasped behind his back. If his hands were free, they might take the opportunity to grab his wand and some Floo powder, and shortly thereafter he would cast some of those Dark curses on Lucius Malfoy himself. “You should not feel guilty, Draco, because of Harry’s situation. It is admirable that your compassion for him moves you to help him, but you should not lose sight of the fact that you may also be in need of assistance.”

Draco fidgeted and toed the throw rug near his armchair. It was green, with intertwined silver serpents forming a border, and Draco traced the lines of the serpents with the toe of his black boot. “Mother’s taking care of everything, now that I’m out of the house and he can’t hurt me. She’s set up counseling sessions and everything, so I’ll need a pass from you to leave the castle on weekends. I’ll be okay, Uncle Sev. It really wasn’t that bad.”

“The fact that you are justifying it is in itself evidence that you need help,” Severus said. “Although the counselor that Narcissa has hired is certain to be competent, you should know that you may speak with me as well.” Severus stopped his pacing and turned to make eye contact with Draco. “You know that any concern that I may feel for Harry does not in any way negate or diminish our relationship, don’t you? I am always your godfather.”

Draco nodded, and then looked down at the throw rug, tracing the lines of the serpents with his toe. “I was a kid, Uncle Sev. I had no idea what was happening, with Harry or with me. I – he really does need your help. He barely eats, and he sleeps in the closet, and he flinches if I get too close to him. I want to touch him so that I can reassure him but he won’t let me get that close to him.”

“I – if I had known the way your father treated you, I would have removed you from his care. Has Narcissa made arrangements for the holidays? I will not allow you to go back to that house.”

“I don’t know about Christmas, but by summer the divorce should be processed and I’ll be able to live with her. I’m sending her the Souvienieve as evidence for the custody hearings.”

“We’ll invite Narcissa here for Christmas, then. That gives us another excuse to keep Harry from his Muggle relations for the holiday. Slytherins often serve two purposes with one action, or cloak one purpose with another, Draco. It is a trick that you must learn.” Severus resumed his pacing in front of the fireplace. “You should go now, before curfew. Take Harry back to the dorms and if you can coax him into sleeping in his bed, do so, but do not insist. Take the same approach with meals. You should encourage him to eat, but do not force him. Come to me if you have any problems with him or with anything else, Draco.”

Severus crossed the room to stroke his godson’s pale hair. The strands were light and silky to the touch. “Let me know when you need a pass to leave to see the counselor, or if you want to talk to me about anything.”

----------

The next morning, Severus was striding to the Great Hall to catch the last few minutes of breakfast, when he heard Draco and Potter arguing. He’d hoped to catch them at breakfast, to see that Potter was eating, but had overslept. His dreams had been restless, full of recriminations about having left Draco with Lucius, and Severus was craving his morning coffee to wipe away the gritty taste of the dreams from his mouth.

“Come on, Harry, eat the apple. We’ve only a few minutes before Charms starts and you hardly ate any breakfast.”

Severus hardly heard Potter’s muttered response, but it was apparently a refusal because Draco continued to urge him to eat. Unhappy about the new obstacle between him and his coffee, Severus turned the corner to see the boys instead of turning to the Great Hall. The exasperating brat was still refusing to eat, after multiple orders and encouragement. With a sigh, Severus acknowledged the fact that his revenge against the senior Potters would be a long time coming at this pace.

“D-Draco, I c-c-can’t,” Harry stuttered. The Slytherins and Gryffindors were lined up outside of the Charms classroom, most of them checking their notes or textbooks. Harry and Draco were at the edge of the crowd.

“Why not, Harry? Why not eat the apple now or the toast this morning? You ate toast yesterday and didn’t have a problem with it. Are you sick or something?”

“I-I … yeah. I-I have diabetes.” Harry’s voice was soft, barely audible, and he stared at his shoes, obviously ashamed.

The Gryffindor girl, Hermione Granger, who’d been standing across the corridor from the two boys, still heard the comment. “Really? That’s really very surprising, you know. I read in Everyday Magical and Muggle Ailments that wizards aren’t affected by metabolic disorders in the same way that Muggles are. There aren’t any recorded cases of wizards being susceptible to diseases like diabetes. They also aren’t prone to autoimmune diseases, which occur in Muggles, and some authors have speculated that this is due to the innate magic …”

“Ten points from Gryffindor for nosiness and inability to mind your own business, Granger,” Severus interrupted her. “Mr. Malfoy, Mr. Potter, please see me in my office after classes.” With that, he stalked off to the Great Hall for his coffee. He couldn’t deal with the Potter boy’s eating disorders in a caffeine-deprived state.

The Potter brat couldn’t be doing this just to interfere with Severus’s revenge. The boy was truly, honestly reluctant to eat, sincerely afraid that he would be punished for taking food. It was not an act to play on Severus’s sympathies or earn his trust. Severus rubbed at the bridge of his nose, sitting in his office and waiting for Draco and Harry to arrive. They needed to get the Potter boy to eat, in reasonable quantity and variety, before the line was crossed. The boy was too thin, and might not develop properly in this state. There had to be a way to break past his timidity and reluctance and encourage him to eat.

Severus hunted through his bookshelves until he found the Hogwarts yearbook from his graduating class. Flipping through the bright animated pages, he stopped at a page with a picture of James Potter and Lily Evans together. Yes, the elder Potter had passed his features down to his son. The shortsightedness, the untamable hair, the cheekbones and facial structure, they were all the same. However, Severus could not superimpose a mental image of Harry Potter over the photo of James Potter. The boy’s features were sharper and his face was thinner. Severus sneered at the picture as James Potter wrapped an arm around Evans and grinned out of the photo. There was another difference.

Severus had never seen Harry smile like this, unrestrained and cheeky and free. Any expression that Severus had seen on Harry’s face was shadowed and hesitant and overlaid with fear. The set of his mouth sometimes resembled the determined, steadfast curve of Lily Evans’s lips. No, this boy, this Slytherin boy was nothing like his parents.

Severus was jolted from his reverie by a knock on the door. Putting the yearbook in a desk drawer, he bade his visitors to enter and prepared himself for another confrontation with Harry Potter.

“Harry,” he said, “Have you eaten enough today?” Severus had been absent at lunch, brewing a potion that Poppy Pomfrey had required, and had not monitored the boy as he should have.

“Yes, sir,” Harry replied. Although he did not have the calm composure of Draco, the boy did not fidget.

Severus raised an eyebrow and Draco answered the implied question. “He ate a little, sir. Not enough by any standard.”

“Very well, then. Chicken broth and toast again, Harry?” Severus asked. An almost imperceptible nod was his answer, and he summoned a house elf and asked for the meal as well as tea for himself and Draco.

When they were all settled with food and drink, Severus continued. “Although she has an unfortunate tendency to sound like an encyclopedia, Miss Granger was quite correct. It is not possible for you to have diabetes, Harry. Who told you that you had it?”

“Uncle Vernon told me, sir.”

“We have discussed numerous topics in relation to your uncle and he has been wrong every time, has he not?” Severus poured a cup of tea for Harry and added cream and sugar. The more calories he could get into the boy’s stomach, the better off he would be.

“Y-yes, sir. B-but Uncle Vernon said that they took me to the doctor and everything.”

“Tell me about this doctor, then. Do you remember going to see the doctor, or what the doctor said specifically?”

Harry curled one hand around the warm teacup and toyed with his spoon with the other. “N-no, I was too young to remember anything about it, sir. But whenever t-the Dursleys gave me sweets, it made me sick. S-so it all makes sense, because diabetics aren’t supposed to have sweets or anything with sugar, sir.”

“Diabetics also need to have insulin injected and to monitor their diets carefully, Harry. When I say that they monitor their diets carefully, that does not mean that they exist on the wrong side of anorexia and starvation. If you were indeed diabetic, which as a wizard you cannot be, you would have made yourself very sick by going for so long with the way that you eat and with the lack of insulin shots. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

Harry took a sip of his tea. “You mean that I’m not diabetic, sir?”

“No, you are not diabetic. You need have no fear of consuming foods that contain sugar. Nonetheless, you need to work to maintain a healthy, balanced diet. Draco is capable of assisting you there. As you take your meals with him, Harry, I want you to watch his eating habits. Observe the variety and quantity of foods that he eats, and try to emulate him.” Severus then turned to his godson. “Draco, I want you to continue to feed Harry, but do not force him to eat too much. As his stomach is unused to large meals, he could easily make himself sick. Do both of you understand?”

After a chorus of “Yes, sir,” Severus dismissed them to dinner. When they were gone, he withdrew the yearbook from its hiding place and turned back to the picture of Harry’s parents. “Potter, Evans,” he asked their picture, “Do you see your son? Forced to suffer at the hands of foolish Muggles, at the hands of your own relatives, and now rescued by a Malfoy and a Snape? Do you realize that your son, your precious child, would not be eating if Draco and I had not intervened?” James Potter in the photo grinned at Severus with his trademark flippant expression. Neither he nor Evans had had a care in the world on the sunny day that the picture was taken, the two of them enjoying a picnic near the lake. As Severus watched, Potter lifted a bunch of grapes to Evans’s mouth and fed them to her one by one.