Professor Snape had been cruel to him in the past, but really-- this was crossing the line. Ambushing him in the Great Hall, telling preposterous lies, slandering Harry's mother... He knew his mother! Well, not really, but he'd heard enough about her from others, and he'd seen Snape's memory in that pensieve. He knew his mother well enough to assert with confidence that she would never touch that... that slimy git.

It was clear that Snape was up to something. Maybe something for Voldemort. Could he have switched sides again? That had to be it. Either that or he was just being a real bastard and going to extra lengths to torment Harry. Perhaps he was making up for all the Potions classes they no longer had together, all those detentions he had no chance to assign... Harry suspected sometimes that his role as Snape's verbal punching bag fulfilled some deep, twisted need in the Professor's black heart. In any case, Dumbledore wouldn't like it; he'd say something to Snape.

Harry was relieved to see Dumbledore standing right outside his office, chatting with Professor McGonagall. No reciting candy names to get by that Gargoyle today; he couldn't think of candy right now, anyway. He would have spent hours fumbling for that password and coming up blank. It was sheer luck that the Headmaster was already outside.

Thank Merlin for Dumbledore. For the first time since the business with the prophecy, Harry felt a warm sense of safety permeate his being. Dumbledore was not infallible-- he knew that now-- but this was something he could solve. Just like the days of old, he could throw himself into Dumbledore's protection and the Headmaster would make everything all right. He'd tell Snape to leave Harry alone, to stop making up nasty lies.

Dumbledore glanced up at his approach. At his side, McGonagall turned as well, her eyes looking hollow and grim against her pale complexion. The Headmaster smiled invitingly, and with a barely discernible rippling of his robes, shifted his weight, preparing to escort Harry into his office. A strange notion occurred to Harry...

Dumbledore had summoned his Head of House, and neither looked faintly surprised at Harry's approach.

They'd been expecting him.

Harry felt his insides go cold. He halted his step, staring incredulously at the Headmaster. Dumbledore said something-- words that drained into a blur before Harry's brain could fully process them. His eyes-- those watchful, blue eyes. There was no mistaking it; he'd been waiting for Harry's arrival. That meant--

"Mr. Potter?" McGonagall's sharper voice cut through his fog.

He looked wildly at her, then back to the Headmaster. It could be a mistake, this could be a misunderstanding. Maybe Dumbledore knew nothing. Maybe he wanted Harry for something else entirely. He might have news... Good news! Voldemort had died of a heart attack last night. The Dark Lord had renounced violence and wanted to meet for tea. Tom Riddle had abandoned his Death Eaters to elope with a Muggle stewardess. Something, anything...

Just please, please don't let that knowing look on Dumbledore's face have anything to do with Snape.

"Perhaps you should come in so we can talk, Harry," Dumbledore suggested gently.

Harry's heart pounded in his ears. He wasn't ready to hear this. Good God, couldn't they see that? Every time his mind grew still, he thought of all those things-- the Prophecy, Sirius, Voldemort's possession of him... They pressed in on him, as if to suffocate him. He could barely breathe as things were. He didn't need something new. He'd just wanted Dumbledore to laugh at what Snape had said, to assure Harry he'd reprimand the Potions Master. He hadn't actually thought the Headmaster would already know...

Harry turned and walked blindly in the opposite direction. Away from that horrible office, from the Headmaster who wore that gentle countenance he adopted for grave tidings. The surreal conversation with Snape threatened to replay in his thoughts, and with a ruthless determination, he thrust it back down again.

Harry heard... someone... call his name, and began to run. He'd always been fast, hadn't he? He tore past the startled faces in the corridor, breathlessly calling out the password and ducking through the Gryffindor portrait hole.

He slowed as he reached the stairs, stress now pounding violently at his temples. His ears were buzzing strangely, and his head really, really hurt. It felt like it weighed a thousand tons by the time he stumbled into his room and over to his bed, fumbling with clumsy fingers to yank the curtain closed around his private space. He needed the darkness, the aloneness. He buried himself in the covers, muttering a spell to block his cocooned little area from the mid-afternoon light filtering though the curtains.

Pitch black. This was better. He closed his eyes and stilled his breathing, pretending he was somewhere else entirely... Back in that unexpected refuge he'd found this last summer.

Visions of Voldemort had plagued him every night, at least in the beginning. Within a few weeks, the isolation bred by a summer with the Dursleys, the horror and guilt over Sirius's death, and the constant assaults upon his sleeping mind found Harry half-delirious. He couldn't bear the stale air of Dudley's second bedroom one minute more, and he couldn't venture from the house without feeling the eyes of the wizards guarding him, measuring his every step. The only refuge he'd found that summer was in the place he'd once despised with all his heart.

It was odd how his perspective on the cupboard under the stairs had changed, now that it was smaller and he was larger. On a whim one day, he'd nestled himself into that dank, spider-filled little hole, hearing the Dursleys tromp up and down the stairs, and a strange feeling of peace descended upon him. Sure, he'd never been happy as a child. He always felt small, and worthless. But it was somehow better than the way he felt now. Back then he had nothing... He was nothing. Now he had people he loved, people he had to protect, and the future of a world resting in his faltering hands. Sirius's death had opened his eyes to the terrible consequences of his choices, the prophecy had barred him from escaping those awful choices, and Voldemort's terrifying possession of his mind in the Department of Mysteries had showed him how weak and hopeless his efforts truly were. The wizarding world looked to him to be their savior, and it was only now that Harry realized he was still just the frightened boy who had lived all those years ago in the cupboard under the stairs.

He never had visions when he was in the cupboard. It was as if burying himself in the darkest room hid him from Voldemort's notice. He began to retreat there every night, infuriating the Dursleys who, for some reason, were suddenly averse to their hated nephew voluntarily sleeping in there. They'd been more than eager to force it upon him when he was younger... He had no idea what had changed; he didn't care. It was the one place he could go to retreat to a simpler time, where he could escape the thoughts and fears raging through his head, and he would be damned if he'd let the Dursleys bully him away from it.

It was far more difficult to find a substitute once he was back at Hogwarts. He had roommates, people who noticed him, and his privacy was protected by curtains rather than walls. Most nights, he employed every weapon in the arsenal of his imagination, focusing upon that one goal-- pretending he was back in that cupboard, utterly without responsibility or worth in the eyes of others-- and usually he could set his mind to rest.

He went in overdrive today, burying himself in the blackness, forcing his thoughts into utter silence. He might have succeeded in forgetting the tumultuous events of the day, had rays of piercing afternoon sunlight not flooded his little alcove, and a black silhouette peered in.

"It's only 4 o'clock, mate, don't tell me you're already asleep!"

Harry groaned and rolled to his side. "Go away, Ron."

"McGonagall sent me up," Ron went on, ignoring him. "She says she's coming up if you don't come down, and I really don't want her coming up. Don't do this to Seamus and me. Please, Harry?"

Seamus and Ron had smuggled in an indecent amount of firewhiskey after several visits to Hogsmeade, and they were well-aware McGonagall might smell it.

"Fine," Harry said tersely, prickling with irritation. "I'm up."

Within a few minutes, Harry was trotting down the stairs, smoothing his sweaty hands across his head in the never-ending battle against his hair. McGonagall awaited him below, looking slightly less pale than before. Again, Harry prayed that her news was completely unrelated to Snape. Voldemort had... botulism. That had to be it.

"Mr. Potter, let's speak in private, shall we?" she murmured, gesturing for the boy to come with her.

He'd never seen McGonagall's chambers before, and he stood there silently as she made them tea, afraid to touch anything in the elegant interior.

"Now, Mr. Potter," she said, adopting a gentle voice as she handed the boy some tea and urged him onto the couch. "I know you must have quite a few questions."

"About what?" Harry said as casually as he could, sipping at the tea.

"About Professor Snape." She paused, eyes flickering uncertainly. "About his being your father."

Harry swallowed more tea than he intended, and the scalding liquid burned down his throat. His eyes watered from the pain, and he set the cup down on the table quickly, as though expecting it to bite him.

"I know this must come as quite a shock--"

"You don't really believe it, do you?" Harry interrupted her. "He's just making it up. Professor Dumbledore--"

"Is the one who informed me," McGonagall cut in. "An hour ago. He thought you might need someone to talk to, someone who wasn't involved."

Harry stared down at his feet, unseeing. This couldn't be happening. Dumbledore was in on this farce, too?

"I'm not sure exactly what Professor Snape said to you, Harry," McGonagall said softly. "He's... Severus is not a demonstrative man. He's in as much shock as you are right now, so if he said anything that hurt your feelings--"

"Oh, please. Like Snape could ever really bother me." He felt a sudden vicious anger. "This is all some joke... some sick, twisted joke."

"Harry--"

"I don't want to hear it!" Harry bellowed, standing up to avoid the hand she reached out to calm him. "Don't touch me!"

"Control your temper, Mr. Potter!" McGonagall snapped. "You're very upset right now, I can see that. But when you've had time to think this over, the Headmaster can explain--"

"I don't want to see the Headmaster," Harry snarled, glaring at her, infuriated that she was still pressing this. Why was she doing this? "We have nothing to talk about. I don't know why he's going along with this!"

"Mr. Potter," she said firmly, her patience steadily fraying, "Professor Snape is your father. That is the reality of this situation, and no amount of denial on your part is going to alter it."

"What proof do you have?" Harry demanded, voice unsteady with a creeping sense of desperation.

"The Headmaster's word," McGonagall said. "That is all the proof I need."

"Well it's not enough for me!"

McGonagall sighed, apparently very tired of this argument. "Would you like Professor Snape to brew a heritage potion to prove it?"

"I don't want anything from him," Harry said vehemently. He looked back up at McGonagall, staring intently at her. "Why are you the one who came? Where's Dumbledore?"

"Professor Dumbledore, Harry," she admonished sternly. "And he thought that you ran because you were angry with him. I could understand in these circumstances why you may not wish to speak with him. Professor Snape is very upset, as well."

"Why?" he said dumbly.

She stared at him a moment, as though wondering if she'd revealed something she shouldn't have. "The Headmaster concealed this from you. From both of you."

"I..." Harry groped for something to say. Anything. He came up blank.

"Sit back down, Mr. Potter."

He lowered himself mechanically back into his seat.

"Now, you must understand-- the Headmaster has been overseeing the affairs of others for over a century," McGonagall said, addressing a concern Harry didn't even have yet. "He always tries to do what's best, at least in the long run. He did not care for the Dursleys, but he knew they were the only ones who could guarantee your safety. He did not wish to keep you ignorant about your heritage, but he knew Severus was in no state to raise a child. His legal status, as a former Death Eater, was still in dispute, and he had no means to provide the same protection you'd receive from your mother's blood relatives. Albus cares about you, Harry, and he cares about Severus. His heart was in the right place, even if, perhaps, his actions were questionable."

He had been glaring down at his feet, then at the carpet, but now he glared at McGonagall, suddenly feeling wretched and slightly ill.

"He should have concealed it for a while longer, then," Harry said in a low, cold voice. "I hate Snape. He's the reason I don't have Sirius. I'd rather be dead than be his son."

McGonagall's face hardened. "Mr. Potter--"

"And he feels the exact same way," Harry said with a bitter laugh that seemed forced out of him. "Just ask him. He'll tell you how much he hates me. He tells me about it every chance he gets."

His entire body was shaking when he rose from the couch.

"I don't want to talk about this. Not ever again."

McGonagall nodded gravely. "Very well then, Mr. Potter. You may leave, if you wish. But it changes nothing."

Oh, he begged to differ. This didn't have to be real. Not if he didn't let it. Snape certainly wasn't going to press him about it.

Harry didn't look at her again. He simply left.