The bustle of Molly Weasley’s house began early. Her footsteps could be heard coming down the stairs long before daylight. Arthur and she spoke in the kitchen in soft tones for a while before the back door opened and shut. Back up the stairs went her footsteps. Her voice was still soft, as though she were trying to avoid waking up the house. A younger, higher voice answered: Ginny. The footsteps that came down the stairs with Molly’s were halting, uncertain.

A few minutes later, quick male steps came down the stairs. That had to be Bill—Percy always walked very deliberately and the younger boys still sounded like a herd of colts.

Only three voices in the kitchen—Arthur must have gone to work.

The measured tread of the Head Boy came down the stairs. The young man’s voice in the kitchen confirmed it.

Molly was cooking. The scent of sausage wafted through the air. Fifteen minutes after that, the expected galloping of a herd of lanky teenage boys thundered down the stairs.

Severus lay on his back listening to the house’s waking up sounds and wondered if he could get away with hiding in here all day. Perhaps if he pretended to sleep every time someone came in…

A little knock made up his mind.

“Yes? Come in.” he called, resigning himself to being fussed over and invited to breakfast.

It was the boy (“Your SON, Severus!” said Lily’s voice, loudly) with a tray full of food and a mug of tea.

“Professor?” the boy said quietly. “Mrs. Weasley thought you’d probably want to stay in bed for a bit.”

Severus sat up. The child put the tray down on the bedside table and hurried to help arrange the pillows.

The man sighed. “Pass me my cane,” he said, “I’ll be back.”

Fortunately the bathroom was right next to the room Severus was sleeping in. He was so stiff these last few mornings. He’d have to see if there was something he could take for it. He was tired of feeling as though he were older than Dumbledore.

It was some time before he emerged. The boy was waiting in the hallway for him.

“For god’s sake, Harry,” Severus said in exasperation, “there’s no need to hover.”

The child smiled a little. “Mrs. Weasley said I should make sure you’re okay.” He lowered his voice after a quick glance up the passageway. “I don’t want to get on her bad side.”

Severus found himself sharing the conspiratorial smile with the child. “Certainly not.”

So the boy would behave for Molly? He didn’t seem afraid of the woman.

Lily’s voice sounded amused. “You can catch more flies with honey, Sev”

The teacher in him decided to ponder that. His Slytherins were generally more well-behaved for him than other students. He’d always assumed it was merely house loyalty, but thinking on it, he realized that his interactions with his own students were marred far less by his temper. Perhaps he should ask Minerva about how she ran her classroom. His Slytherins seldom complained about her and some of them had real affection for her in spite of her stern manner.

Thinking on it now, he realized he’d always had a small measure of affection for the old cat. She was strict, but she never played favorites with students. Come to think of it, although she loved them, she never used to favor James Potter and his friends over himself in matters of discipline the way certain others did.

“Remember what she did to them after that stunt at the lake?” Lily’s voice asked in his head.

He didn’t for a moment, but then he vaguely remembered seeing Black and Potter mopping and polishing the floor of the Great Hall for months, even into October of the next school year. He remembered it particularly because some of the Sytherins took to maliciously spilling stuff onto the floor.

That was actually a good deal more punishment than they had received for nearly killing Severus. He’d gone to the headmaster after that escapade; perhaps he should have gone to Minerva first.

It seemed that he had more allies than he’d always thought. When he began teaching, Minerva had always been cautiously friendly. They had occasionally had words over students from their respective houses, but all in all their relationship had been pleasantly collegial. Things had been tense between Minerva and Severus since the truth of Harry’s parentage came out, but perhaps their relationship would thaw now.

When he emerged a few minutes later, Harry followed him back into the bedroom. Someone (Severus hoped it was Molly, but suspected it was actually Harry) had made the bed and turned down the blankets.

“You are not a house-elf,” Severus growled softly, “and I don’t need you acting like one.” The man nonetheless allowed the child to draw the blankets up over him and put the breakfast tray on his lap.

The boy shrugged and didn’t answer.

“Did you at least eat?” Severus sighed.

The child nodded. “Mrs. Weasley said I’m still too thin,” he muttered, crossing his arms as he straightened.

Giving him a critical look, the teacher nodded. “I’d have to agree. Did you take your potions?”

Another nod. “Do you need anything else, sir?”

Severus wasn’t sure he trusted this respectful pose, but he merely shook his head. “No, thank you, Harry. Go spend the day with your friends.”

The child gave him a half smile and a muttered “Thanks.”

Severus applied himself to his egg and toast, wondering if he wanted to get up after breakfast. He was so tired.

That refrain was beginning to get old.

“Severus?” called Molly’s voice on the other side of the door. “Can I come in?”

“Yes,” the potions master called back, resigning himself to more Molly fussing.

She was dressed in a travelling cloak and held two letters in her hand, “These just came for you, dear,” she said, handing them to him. She spoke with an almost fond note in her voice, as though he were an old friend. “Now, I’m taking Ginny to the healers this morning. Bill is around and he’ll get you anything you need.” She handed Severus a small bell from her pocket. “Don’t get up unless you feel up to it. Bill will hear this. I’ll be back by teatime. I hope you’ll feel up to joining us? We can explain to the children what we’ve decided then?”

 “I should speak to Harry first,” Severus said firmly before she could close the door.

The words, or more likely, the tone made Molly pause and look back at him quizzically.

“Being Muggle raised, the boy would have no context for this betrothal nonsense. Most likely the boy would assume he’d be forced to marry your daughter, whether he wanted to or not. That’s not something he needs to be worrying about in his mental state.”

Molly came fully back into the room and shut the door, “Is he all right, Severus?” she asked seriously.

“No,” Severus admitted. “He’s nowhere near it.”

Molly opened her mouth to ask another question but the man cut her off. “I can’t tell you about it. That’s for him to do, if he wants to.”

She nodded solemnly. “All right, whatever you think best.” She glanced at the little clock on the table. “I’ll be back later. We’ll talk some more? Oh, and I forgot, Remus Floo-called this morning. Apparently Albus,” her voice dripped disdain all over the headmaster’s name, “needed him for something today, so we won’t see him till tomorrow or the day after, at the latest. Bloody old man.” She hissed, “He’s not happy unless everyone’s running around after him.” Molly’s brown eyes flashed with anger.

Severus sighed, “I’m sorry, Molly. We’ll be out of the way in the morning.”

“Oh my dear, I didn’t mean that I wanted you to leave.” She leaned over and patted him on the hand as though he were one of her sons. “You’re not going anywhere. You can hardly get out of bed.” She looked at the clock again. “I must go, we can’t be late.”

With that she crossed the room and closed the door behind her.

Severus finally looked at the letters in his hand. One had the familiar Hogwarts crest and was addressed in Albus’ handwriting. The other…

The other was a rich cream envelope addressed to him in a beautiful script; he’d only ever seen envelopes like it on Lucius’ desk. The seal had the crest of Gringotts Suisse.

With shaking hands, Severus slit the envelope.

Sir,

 I trust this letter finds you in good health. Attached is the full accounting you requested. I had the pleasure of serving the Prince family for many years, and I am delighted that the heir to the Prince fortune has resurfaced…

Impatiently, Severus skipped over the obsequious groveling in the letter and flipped to the accounting on the next page.

The writing was tiny, the paper enchanted to magnify the print as he put his finger to each line item.

As he went over the list, the reason the goblins were corresponding with him on the luxurious parchment and ink suddenly became clear. If this was accurate (and goblins were never inaccurate when it came to the contents of their vaults), Severus was more than well off—he was the Malfoy type of well off.

He had never really believed his mother when she used to tell him stories of her Prince relatives. He had always assumed she was embroidering the truth or outright fantasizing.

The proof that she had  been truthful seemed to bring on a wave of painful memories. It brought to mind that last Christmas holiday, when Tobias and Severus had fought almost continuously..

Toby had lost his job at the mill and the more Eileen tried to appease him, the worse he got. Severus was as tall as his father and refused to let the man take out his temper on his mother anymore.

The worst was the day Eileen had received an owl. She hardly ever got owls, but this one had tapped on the kitchen window, causing Toby to throw an almighty fit, demanding to know why her relations couldn’t use a bloody phone like ordinary people. Of course, Severus had shouted back at the man that Wizards weren’t like bloody Muggles and that was a good thing.

She’d not been able to read the letter for hours after it came, as she was trying to calm both Severus and Toby down. It was only after Toby had drunk himself into a stupor that she had been able to open it.

Her face had gone very white as she read it. She had bundled herself up in her winter cloak and left the house without a word. She never told Severus or Tobias where she’d gone when she returned the next morning, but after that, she seemed different.

Since Severus had first started Hogwarts, she had become increasingly reclusive, until she hardly ever spoke, but she suddenly became almost loquacious. At the time, Severus had felt relief because it appeared that Eileen had become the mother he remembered from when he was very tiny. She sang and laughed for the first time in years, not even caring when Tobias missed Christmas dinner because he was passed out drunk in the living room. She’d merely served up dinner for herself and Severus. He remembered that they’d had some elf-made wine with dinner. The first Severus had ever had.

The last time he’d seen her was before he got on the train back to school.

“Don’t worry about me,” she’d said, with a serene smile, “I’ll be fine.”

That spring she had sent him a letter that told him he shouldn’t ever worry about her, she’d worked out how to make everything better. He’d taken that to mean she’d finally gotten the courage to leave her drunken sod of a husband. She meant something very different, as it turned out.

Two weeks after that letter, Dumbledore, Slughorn and Poppy had called him into Slughorn’s office to tell him that his mother had been found dead that morning.

These conferences were sadly commonplace because of the war. However, his mother was no war casualty.

 His hands shook harder and he felt wet tears slide down his cheeks. He squeezed his eyes shut against the tears and the memories, but the memories refused to stop, as did the tears.

The Ministry inquest had found her guilty of self-murder and confiscated every last Knut from her vault at Gringotts.

Eileen Prince had to be buried in a Muggle cemetery, because no Wizarding cemetery would take the body of a suicide.

Severus remembered that the first people he had seen when he returned to the castle after her funeral had been the Marauders.

Black had started in on him—Severus couldn’t remember what he’d said now—and Severus had only stopped short of casting an Unforgivable because Lily had gotten into the middle of it.

She’d been furious at him. He’d been furious at her because she so clearly took the side of Potter and his friends, even as he’d just finished burying his mother. He remembered how hard it had been not to break down in tears in front of his old friend.

“I swear I didn’t know until later,” Lily-in-his-head said sadly.

He knew he was making that part up. The Tribuo spell had unsettled his mind and his subconscious was making up comforting things for the Lily-voice to say. Everyone at school had to have known. Slughorn could barely look at him, as though the taint of his mother’s suicide would rub off.

When Lucius had written him the next week, saying that the Dark Lord wanted to meet him, Severus had been astonished. The Dark Lord had seemed so understanding of Severus’ pain. He’d given Severus a way to redeem his family’s name and a way to strike out at the Ministry. Not until later did the broken-hearted young man discover what the Dark Lord’s plans were really about.

All those years he’d spent being so angry at Eileen, at least some of the anger appeared to have been misplaced. She had obviously realized what was likely to happen to her pitiful life savings if she killed herself and had taken steps to prevent it, hiding her wealth in the Swiss bank.

But that didn’t explain how this wealth had come to her in the first place. He’d worn secondhand robes to Hogwarts, paid for out of his mother’s meager earnings from selling Dark charms and love potions to merchants in Knockturn Alley, or else out of whatever Eileen could stop Toby from drinking down the pub.

Severus glanced back to the letter.

… heir to the Prince fortune…

So the old bastard had not disinherited Eileen before he died, after all? Eileen was their only child, but Severus had assumed old Tiberius had left his money to St. Mungo’s or something.

A soft knock interrupted his thought.

Severus wiped his face with the handkerchief he had sitting on the side table. When he was sure his face was dry, he said, “Come in.”

It was Bill. “How are you, Professor?” he asked, picking up the tray with the half-finished breakfast.

“Well enough, thank you,” Severus replied gruffly.

“The boys are out on their broomsticks this morning,” Bill said. “Can I get you more tea, or something? Or maybe something to read? Mum says you’re staying with us another day or two.”

The dour man grunted in the affirmative. After a second he said grudgingly, “Another cup of tea would be welcome. And perhaps you can get me a quill and parchment? I have some letters to write.”

“Yes, sir,” Bill replied cheerfully.

It was only a minute or two before Bill was back. He came in and shut the door behind him, before handing Severus a fresh cup of tea and the quill and parchment.

“Thank you.”

Bill stood there as though gathering his courage. “Ah… I owe you an apology, Professor,” he said hesitantly. “I thought… well, since you haven’t taken any Healing Oaths… ” He hesitated some more.

Severus cut him off. “You assumed that I could not have learned that spell through legitimate channels. That I had in fact been taught that spell by someone with nefarious intent?” he snarled caustically. It felt good to vent some of his feeling on a safe target.

Bill’s face went almost as red as his hair. “Well… I spoke to some of the other Cursebreakers when I heard. One of them said that You-Know-Who was experimenting with it during the war… and I heard… well, one of the goblins actually told me you had Death Eater ties and I… I’m sorry, it was wrong of me to assume… ”

“You would not be wrong in your assumptions,” Severus said quietly. “I have had… connections to the Dark Lord. I spied for Dumbledore in the war. And it was indeed the Dark Lord who taught myself and several others that spell. I’m afraid my knowledge of it is quite incomplete. I am aware that it will save a life when other means will not and I know it is best done with three, but I’m afraid I wasn’t aware of the… side effects.” He paused to consider. “It certainly explains why the Dark Lord wanted to experiment with this particular healing spell.”

Bill stared at the professor as if he’d never seen him before. Shaking his head in wonder, he pulled his wand from a pocket and conjured a chair to sit on. “You mean you didn’t know what it did?” His eyes were huge.

“I knew it saved lives. At the time, it was all I needed to know,” Severus snapped, “or would you have preferred I let your sister die?”

“No, I told you, I’m sorry. But didn’t you know it worked as a Necromantic spell? And a Bondage spell?” Bill said, very quietly.

“Necromancy?” scoffed Severus. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I’m not,” Bill asserted. “There are books in Gringotts that they never show to wizards who aren’t under oaths of secrecy. I looked it up in a few of them. Tribua allows you to speak to the dead.” His voice dropped to a whisper.

Severus was irresistibly reminded of films he’d seen with his father that invariably starred Christopher Lee or Vincent Price. Any minute now, someone was going to play a theremin in the background.

“If I want to talk to the dead,” he said contemptuously, “I need only wander the halls of the castle until one of the ghosts wants a chat.”

Bill shook his head again. “No, I mean it lets you talk to the dead who’ve gone on. Not ghosts. Have you had anything like that happen?”

“Not so you’d notice,” Lily whispered and she laughed.

Severus felt all the blood drain from his face.

“Professor?” Bill reached out, as if to stop him from falling off the bed. He quickly grabbed the mug of tea that was in danger of slopping all over the coverlet.

“I’m all right, Mr. Weasley.” Severus tried to stop his hands trembling with no success. His voice sounded distant to his own ears.

“I think you better lie down, sir,” Bill said. He put the mug down on the bedside table and helped rearrange the pillows to get Severus lying down.

It was much better to be horizontal. The room didn’t seem as likely to spin. He tried to process what he’d just heard. The idea that the voices in his head, the people that he was meeting in his dreams—that they could be real was almost too much to bear.

“Severus! Calm down. It’s all right,” Lily told him.

“Get out.” Severus’ voice was choked and thick. He wasn’t sure whether he was talking to Bill or Lily.

“All right, sir,” Bill said, sounding worried. “I’ll check on you in a bit, shall I?”

“Get out!” He turned onto his side in order to turn his face away from the young man, appalled that the tears threatening should fall while he spoke to his former student.

The door opened and shut. Severus curled up and sobbed as he had not done since Lily died.