Severus slammed a large cauldron down onto his worktable and as the reverberations echoed through the room he pulled out a half-kilo of fresh comfrey and began chopping it into small pieces. The knife made satisfying thinks against the wooden board. He’d brew a headache relief potion, Severus decided, an extra large batch of it with half for Poppy and half for himself. Salazar only knew how badly he needed it after this morning.

The comfrey was chopped too finely, Severus discovered after he had vented some part of his frustration on it. The juice from its leaves, green and viscous, had stained his fingers and his knife. Severus stared down at his hands as though they belonged to a stranger.

He set the knife down and took deep breaths to calm himself. He could not afford to act like an emotional Gryffindor or Hufflepuff – he was Slytherin. He was Slytherin and as such, he would be calm, he would think, he would plan. There would be no ill-considered actions, no rash vengeance, no fits of rage – as much as he would love to indulge his temper, he could not retaliate against those vile Muggles directly. Potter’s family would pay for the harm that they had inflicted on one of his Slytherins, but it would be gradual and subtle and he would not be caught. Taking in deep breaths through his nose, Severus selected a new bunch of comfrey and took up the knife again. He was controlled now, cold and focused and he cut the comfrey into precise pieces the exact size needed.

Rage still simmered inside him, a cold bright fire that he banked and tended with care. He imagined the Muggle’s faces onto the helpless green comfrey, those wretched Muggles who had hurt Potter and taken away Severus’s last chance of a normal revenge against his school nemesis – normal retaliation, with him sneering and tormenting the boy with cutting remarks and knowledge of his parents’ idiocy, was not possible with the boy the Muggles had broken, the boy that had been sorted into his own House. This revenge was more complete and satisfying, to be sure, than a few cheap insults and undeserved detentions would have been, but it had required Harry’s pain and the Muggles would pay for it. Through the haze of his anger, the film that coated Severus’s thoughts, he was aware that he was being illogical, but that thought was shoved away with the pile of chopped comfrey.

Pickled slugs needed to be chopped next, and Severus imagined that his knife was sliding into Potter’s uncle, cleaving his intestines and making him plead for mercy. Harry’s uncle, who had forced Harry to sleep in a cupboard, who had caused the white frightened look on the boy’s face when he had confessed everything to Severus that morning – with the help of a calming potion and a mild truth serum in his tea after Severus had tired of hearing repeated denials. Potter had insisted that everything was “all right,” that he was “fine,” with “n-n-no problems wh-whatsoever, sir” and in the end it had come out that the boy believed his situation to be normal. One of his Slytherins had been locked in a cupboard, locked in a cupboard to starve by those wretched Muggles until he was afraid to sleep in a bed – didn’t think he was worthy of a bed, of all things.

Severus had been angry with Draco when the boy tried to manipulate him into dealing with Potter’s sleeping habits – angry because it was a waste of his time, because he’d thought that Draco could deal with the problem. Severus had rarely been so wrong. Draco wouldn’t have helped Harry any, Draco who had a bed larger than Harry’s cupboard – and how angry Severus had been when he’d prompted the boy to pace out the dimensions of the cupboard in his office and found that the boy had been living in a space smaller than Severus’s desk. Severus wasn’t sure that he had helped the boy – Harry had promised him that he would try to sleep in the bed, but his cursed stutter had returned and the boy had looked waif-like, so wretched and vulnerable, exactly the way he’d first looked in the Great Hall during the Sorting. Severus disliked seeing the boy so afraid and confused – the Savior of the wizarding world should not cringe, should be proud and confident like any Slytherin. Damn James and Lily Potter for abandoning their son to those horrible Muggles, and damn them for all the pain that they had caused Harry.

Severus looked down to see that he had reduced the pickled slugs to a mass of pulp. He banished the slimy pile with an Evanesco and stalked out of the potions lab, unwilling to trust himself to brew when his temper escaped like this.

Locked in a cupboard, told that a skinny little boy deserved the smallest room, told that he was a waste of space – of course Potter had believed that, the wretched trusting boy had believed every lie those Muggles had told him because he hadn’t any way to know better – starved down to a skeleton, and there was no telling what else those idiots had done to his student. It was intolerable. Even Severus, hating the boy’s parents and justified in doing so, wouldn’t have treated the boy that badly. If he’d been tempted to hurt the boy, at least he would never have lied to him, never abused him by withholding food or shelter or denying the normal needs of a young growing wizard – a wizard who should have been loved and protected, treated with kindness and encouraged to allow his burgeoning talent develop rather than being shut in a cupboard for “freaky accidents.”

The Bloody Baron drifted down the corridor with Severus, a reassuring silent presence at first, until he said, “Are you this troubled by the boy, that scrawny whelp of two Gryffindors that I saw leaving your office this morning?”

To anyone living, Severus would have responded with a glare and an assertion that he was most certainly not troubled, but the Baron was a trusted though sporadic confidant, the only adult Slytherin that Severus could socialize with on a regular basis, and so he stilled his sharp tongue and merely nodded.

The Baron had once been Head of Slytherin House himself and was too sly and wise to press Severus for details. Instead, he drifted alongside the man in silence, waiting with a patience that Severus could never hope to match. “James and Lily Potter left him to the care of her Muggle relatives when they died,” Severus said at last, “and they abused the boy.”

“He is very small and thin,” the Baron said.

“Yes.” After a long pause, Severus felt that the Baron was waiting for more information and so he added, “They barely fed him and they kept him locked up in a cupboard whenever it pleased them to do so. He’s been sleeping in a closet in the dorms here. He doesn’t believe that he deserves any better – doesn’t believe he deserves either space or food.”

“You hated the boy’s parents when you were a student yourself.”

Severus smirked at the Baron, knowing the ghost was Slytherin enough to appreciate the twisted subtlety of his revenge on the Potters. A look passed between them and then the Baron looked away.

“You must take care not to alienate the boy with this revenge of yours. He’ll hate you more than he hates those Muggles if he learns you’re using him. I have watched him, Severus, arguing with young Draco and that redheaded boy at times – the Potter boy seems fragile and weak but he too is a Slytherin, dangerous when threatened and he may be dangerous to you as well. You know what he is.” The Baron turned back to look at Severus, one ghostly hand moving up to his face to wipe away a stream of silvery blood.

“I take it you’ve persuaded him to sleep in a bed tonight? I will watch over him and fetch you if there are any problems.” With that said, the Slytherin ghost faded until he disappeared.

----------

Severus held the porcelain cup to his lips, allowing it to appear to the casual observer that he was drinking his tea. The other three Heads of House – oblivious nitwits, despite their Mastery of their respective subjects – never noticed, but Albus’s eyes twinkled at Severus. A sigh ruffled the hot liquid, puffs of steam rising into the air, and Severus contemplated again the magical impossibility of casting the Killing Curse upon oneself. It was unfortunate that the strength of will and magic could not be mustered – he would have been willing to do it if only to escape these wretched faculty meetings. After a morning spent with the irritating stutter of Potter and an unsettling conversation with the Baron, Severus was not in any mood to listen to the other professors drone and simper about their first years.

After Minerva finished her rambling about the incompetent Neville Longbottom, Severus choked back a scathing comment when he caught the Headmaster’s stern look. All eyes turned to him, and Severus set his tea down. “The Slytherin first years are adjusting well,” he said. “I am taking care of all of the problems that have arisen.”

“You say that every year, Severus. Give us more details,” Minerva said.

Severus sneered at the interfering old cat. “I say that every year and you’ve never asked for more information before, never cared about a Slytherin or lifted your wand to help them when they needed it. You needn’t start expressing concern this year, Professor McGonagall – I won’t tell you anything about Potter to indulge your mawkish curiosity in a boy that has done nothing to deserve the adulation of the masses. He is a Slytherin, no matter how much you felt he should have been put with the reckless empty-headed fools in your care, and Slytherins take care of their own. I’ll not allow you to torment him with your false concern and unreasonable expectations.”

“Now, Severus,” Albus said in his cloying ‘let me offer you a lemon drop’ tone of voice. “You can hardly blame us for natural curiosity about the boy. It is true that the Slytherins have been forced to suffer under misconceptions and prejudice for many years now, but this is a wonderful chance to change public opinion. You would be amazed at the shifts in House reputations that I’ve seen over the decades. Before Grindelwald, the last Dark Lord was a Ravenclaw and that House was reviled just as yours is now.”

Flitwick took offense at that and said in his high twittering voice, “Honestly, Albus, how could you compare us to those dark wizards? Evil isn’t a Ravenclaw trait, it’s a Slytherin trait, as everyone knows. I won’t just sit here and let you insult us Ravenclaws.”

“Everyone knows a great many things that are wrong, you pin-sized…”

Albus clapped his hands together and cut off the remainder of Severus’s insult.

Inwardly, Severus snarled at the fact that Flitwick was allowed to insult him but he was not allowed to retaliate. He allowed one of his more menacing glares to twist his face as he stared across the Headmaster’s desk at the Ravenclaw.

“I think you’ll find that evil is a human trait,” Albus said, “and also, I think that one of these days I’ll find that recipe I misplaced. It was for my Great Aunt Hettie’s lemon sorbet, very soothing and tasty in the summer. I’m sure there would be less evil in the world if there was just a spot more ice cream – sugar does marvels for the soul, you know, soothes the savage beast as they say. Now, if there’s nothing else in the way of House business, I’d like a word with Severus about the potions for the infirmary.”

“I am sorry that this burden has fallen to you,” Albus said when the others had left and the shine was gone from his eyes. “I do understand that it is harder for you than it would have been for any of the others.”

Severus sat back in his chair, allowing this rare candid moment with Albus to relax him. It was not often that the Headmaster lost his twinkle and affected eccentricity and turned serious, and these moments were to be relished. Severus accepted the fresh cup of coffee that was offered, knowing that it wasn’t laced with any calming potions. The rich aroma of the coffee went straight to his brain and an almost-smile twitched his lips for a second – Albus’s reward for providing him with his favorite beverage.

“You needn’t worry. I’ve already seen that he is not his father,” Severus said in an attempt to forestall a lecture.

“No, and neither are you your father, Severus. There’s no need for either of you to emulate your parents.”

Severus’s heart paused between beats in his chest and he took another sip of his coffee to cover his surprise. Albus achieved his reputation for omniscience by making enigmatic comments that seemed wise in hindsight and by keeping his calm when he was surprised. The Headmaster was not in fact all-knowing, and there was no way he could know of Severus’s plans for revenge.

“I suppose, Albus, that given the boy’s probable destiny, you’ve made some sort of plans for him to receive extra training. His summers to be spent studying at Hogwarts, making additional work for your entire faculty, I suppose?” Severus took another sip of his coffee, letting the rich aroma seep into his taste buds and enjoying it as though he wasn’t vitally interested in the Headmaster’s answer.

Albus took a lemon drop from the dish set on his desk – even when the mask of amiable eccentricity was gone, the man loved those candies – and looked troubled. “I hadn’t planned on it, no, Severus. I thought it was best to let the boy be a child while childhood was still an option for him, and telling him of the Prophecy – well, I think it’s too much for an eleven-year-old boy to bear, don’t you?”

Severus considered his words with care. There was only so much that he could tell Albus – the Slytherin in him didn’t believe in revealing information without gain to himself, and some voice from deeper inside him murmured that Harry would never trust him again if he betrayed his confidence. “You could keep him here in the castle without revealing too much to him, Albus, and still preserve his innocence. He’s a bright child, I’ll grant him that – smarter than both of his parents put together – and he has an aptitude for Potions, but he lacks much of the background necessary to understand what he reads. Three months spent in the Muggle world will do him no good – if he’s meant to save the world, our world, he has to want to save it, has to learn what it means to be a part of it, learn to appreciate it over the Muggle world, and he can only do that if he’s living in it.”

“You make a good point, I suppose. If we kept him here for extra lessons, they needn’t all be focused on Defense against the Dark Arts … but it would be a lot of work for the staff … I’ll think on it. There are a few months before we need to decide and I should perhaps check the status of the wards around Privet Drive. I’d rather not risk the additional safety of knowing that there is a place in the Muggle world where Harry can go and be protected if need be, and I expect that the wards are still strong after all these years. It would be a shame to waste them, wouldn’t it?”

Severus took a sip of his coffee and made a noncommittal noise that the Headmaster could interpret as agreement if he wished to do so. A casual brush of Severus’s fingers against his left arm served to remind the Headmaster of Tom Riddle, and the evil that had come out of sending him back to the Muggle world every summery, but he left the matter at that. At least the seed of the idea had been planted, and there were several months remaining to convince Albus that Harry would be safest here. The boy would not go back to those Muggles if Severus had to prevent it with the last breath in his body.

----------

Severus had forgotten the Bloody Baron’s offer to watch over Harry during the night and had, in fact, assumed that all was well in the first year boys’ dormitory since he did not hear otherwise from either Draco or Harry. After all, the Potter boy seemed to be doing well – his eating habits had improved and well, if he spent most of his time in the library with that annoying Gryffindor know-it-all Granger or with Draco, at least his social circle had expanded since that first disastrous week. The boy had top marks in all of his classes and a disappearing stutter thanks to the lessons after Occlumency, and Severus felt justified in smirking in triumph at the spirits of James and Lily Potter – he’d done a much better job with their child than they ever could have managed.

The night before Halloween, the Bloody Baron woke him by passing a cold ghostly arm through his head – it was the usual manner in which Severus was apprised of Slytherin troublemakers out of their dorms past curfew, and he sat up quickly. “Where?” was all he asked as he put on a robe. The sleep-stretched skin around his eyes was still tight and he rubbed at it with his fingers.

The Baron slowed his progress with a gesture. “No one’s breaking curfew, Severus,” he said. “It’s the Potter child asking for you. He’s been awakened by a bad nightmare.”

Severus was too tired to manage a full glare. “You’ve woken me for the boy’s nightmare? I am by no means his nursemaid, Baron, and he’s old enough to comfort himself. I don’t appreciate being woken up for such trivialities.”

The Baron turned his own glare on Severus. “I do not concern myself with the trivial even now when centuries full of nothingness would permit me to do so, Severus Snape. I have not woken you for any of the nightmares that the boy has had every night for these past few weeks, but he asked for you tonight and you had best remember your duties as Head of Slytherin.”

Severus stopped at the door and turned back to the Baron. Perhaps he had been wrong to assume that all was well in the Slytherin dorms. “He’s had nightmares every evening and you had the gall to keep silent about it? You know very well that I should have been informed.”

“He must tell you about his nightmares himself, Severus. We’ll discuss it later if need be. Go to help the boy now.”

The state of the Potter boy was as bad as Severus had expected it to be – he was pale and shaking, his bed sheets rumpled and sweaty. Severus cast a silencing charm around the two of them and sat down on the edge of the boy’s bed.

This was the part of his Head of House duties that Severus disliked the most intensely, and his Slytherins soon learned not to wake him for comfort after their nightmares when he’d treated them to the sharp side of his remarks the next day. He was never cruel to them directly afterwards, he comforted them to the best of his limited abilities, but they always came to regret the hours of sleep that he had lost as much as Severus did.

It was perhaps surprising that Potter had managed the unfamiliar experience of sleeping in a bed for so long without coming to Severus for help – the boy hadn’t even asked him for a sleeping draught and as talented as Potter was at potions, he wouldn’t be able to make one himself yet.

“Sir? I’m … I’m s-sorry to wake you,” Potter said. His voice was so quiet that Severus was barely able to understand him.

“You may speak louder,” Severus told him. “I’ve cast a silencing charm so that the other boys won’t awaken.”

Harry began to stutter his thanks, but Severus stopped him with a wave of the hand. “I’m not interested in apologies or polite niceties now, Harry. I’m tired and I’ll give you a sleeping potion so we can both get some rest tonight. First, tell me what bothered you so much that you disturbed me at this hour and don’t stutter … I’m not upset with you.”

Severus wasn’t certain if it would be best to put a hand on the boy’s trembling shoulder or if it would only frighten him further, given his usual reaction to physical contact. He’d seen the boy cowering away from Draco and wasn’t willing to subject himself to the same humiliating rejection. He waited to hear what the boy had to say before deciding how to comfort him.

“I … You’ll think I’m crazy, sir. I sometimes think I’m going crazy, too, but these dreams … they’re so real, almost like real life. I … they stopped for a bit, after we started Occlumency lessons and I was practicing before I went to bed, but I forgot tonight and they came back.”

The boy paused and took a shuddery breath. “Wh-What if he’s looking through my mind at night? I-I couldn’t stand it if he learned all my secrets.”

Severus leaned forward, controlling his motions so that they were very slow and obvious, and put a light hand on Harry’s shoulder. The boy’s pajamas were damp with perspiration. Severus was about to draw his hand back from Harry, whose shaking had stopped and whose muscles had gone tense, when the boy launched himself at Severus. The Potions Master found himself with a lap full of a skinny, sweaty eleven-year-old boy and he grimaced in the darkness, but brought his other hand up to rest on Harry’s shoulder.

‘James and Lily Potter, wherever your spirits are – watch this. Look at your precious son seeking comfort from your old enemy, and think about how much you owe me,’ Severus thought.

“Please don’t let him get me,” Harry said, his voice muffled by Severus’s shoulder.

“What are they teaching children these days?” Severus asked, trying to keep his tone of voice light and unthreatening. “Harry, ‘him’ is a pronoun and as such, it requires an antecedent. Please make an effort to calm down and explain yourself. I’ll need more details if I’m to protect you from anyone. Take slow, deep breaths and Occlude your mind.”

Severus waited, all thoughts of sleep driven away by the fear of what Harry’s dream might represent, the possibility that Voldemort had been rifling through the boy’s unprotected mind. Harry’s breathing slowed and the thudding of his heartbeat became less frantic, but when the boy began to shift as though embarrassed to be sitting in his professor’s lap now that he was thinking more clearly, Severus grasped his shoulders more firmly and prevented him from pulling away. If the dream had been truly unsettling, it would be best if Harry didn’t panic when he retold it – it would take longer from him to fall asleep and Severus didn’t have the time to deal with an incoherent Potter twice in one evening.

Besides, the boy had to learn not to flinch away from touch and this was as much of an appropriate time as any other scenario that Severus could imagine. Harry stopped his weak struggles and leaned his head against Severus’s chest as though he was listening for a heartbeat. Severus held him awkwardly, unaccustomed to comforting distraught children.

“The dream was very real, like it was actually happening, only it was disjointed and abrupt. At first it was just a door, a normal sort of door that could have been anywhere, but somehow I got the feeling that it was in Hogwarts, even though I’ve never seen it here. The door is all that I ever used to see, when I had these dreams before.”

Potter stopped to take a breath and Severus felt the boy begin to tremble in his arms. By Salazar, the boy was disturbingly weightless in his lap. Severus moved one hand up and down the boy’s shoulder blade to calm him and felt him take another deep breath.

“The second part was the worst,” he said. His voice had gone soft again but he was speaking almost directly into Severus’s ear. “It was dark, with lots of trees like a forest, and there was this beautiful animal. It was like a horse, only silver, and it had a long spike on its head. It looked so peaceful and beautiful and good, sir, it was amazing.”

The boy sniffled, and Severus conjured a handkerchief for him. There was no need to make extra work for the house elves in the laundry – even the most demented house elf couldn’t enjoy the task of cleaning snot off of Severus’s robe. For that matter, it was probably best not to make a derisive comment now about the boy’s pathetically Muggle upbringing or sneer at the fact that he couldn’t even recognize a unicorn.

“This creature snuck up on the beautiful horse,” Potter continued. “It was all black and shadowy and it bit into the horse’s neck. There was silver blood flowing all over. The horse screamed and it tried to run away, but the creature held onto it and sucked at its blood. I – It felt painful, like he was really hurting it, and it was just horrible, sir.”

Harry made use of the handkerchief again. “The third part was even stranger, Professor, though it wasn’t so horrible. He – Professor Quirrell, I mean, wearing that silly turban, he was talking to this … this thing, in another language. The thing was big, really big and ugly, and it had this club that it swung at Quirrell, only the Professor cast a spell or something and it missed. They spoke to each other, only it was like grunting and I didn’t understand any of it. Only there was this peculiar feeling … like an aura over the whole scene … of anticipation, like something was about to happen.”

Harry stopped talking and for a moment there was silence between them before the boy flung an arm around Severus’s neck and pressed himself closer to his professor. “P-Please, sir,” Harry said with his cheek pressed against Severus’s collarbone, “please don’t send me back to the Muggles. I’ll be good, I’ll do anything you want if you only let me stay. I’m not crazy, sir, I – I know it sounds like I’m crazy but really I’m not, please let me stay.”

“Stop this nonsense immediately, Harry,” Severus said. He continued to trace reassuring circles around the boy’s protruding shoulder blade. “No one will send you away, you are most definitely not going back to those Muggles, you are not crazy, and you will not work yourself into a hysteric fit, is that understood?”

With a strange jolt and a peculiar feeling in his throat, Severus realized that this was a hug – that he, Severus Snape, Potions Master and heartless Slytherin, was giving the Boy Who Lived a hug and it was being reciprocated. Lily Potter, who had had popularity and gaggles of admirers and had insulted him with her false condescending pity, she had been killed before her son was old enough to embrace her. Severus hoped that her spirit burned with envy while she watched.

“You must practice your Occlumency every night before you fall asleep, Harry. It’s very important, do you understand me?”

Severus looked down at the boy in his lap when he felt a sleepy nod against his chest. The terror and panic past, Harry’s eyes were drooping shut. With one careful finger, Severus reached out and brushed a tear off of Harry’s cheek. He gave the boy a sleeping draught and a reminder to Occlude and then evicted Harry from his lap.

As he made his way through the dimly lit hallways back to his quarters, Severus wrapped his arms around himself. Without the fragile weight of Harry in his lap, he felt suddenly colder.