The interrogation room itself was actually not designed for interrogation.

It was more of an office, with oak furniture, a bookcase leaned against the wall and dark green drapes that had been chosen with good tastes. The table was cleared, the bookcase had been emptied, but the Persian rug under his feet and the unmistakable scent of leather and richness told Harry exactly what he needed to know.

His arrival wasn’t expected, and this rushed self-made interrogation cell was a last-minute adjustment minutes before they brought him in.
There was a tin jar, filled with hard candy just out of Harry’s reach, next to a tidy line of quills and an inkwell. The tips were sharp, Harry could absolutely use that to deliver some damage to the fool who had forgotten to bind his hands or rather…did not think him intimidating enough to be restrained.

‘Fools,’ that’s what Dad would have said. ‘Bumbling fools, the lot of them,’

“I know Dad,” Harry muttered, slumping back in his chair, fiddling with a small folded parchment in his hands. He spun it with two fingers, traced the folded lines and refolded them, over and over in the eerie silence of the room.

His patience was wearing thin, but Dad had taught him better than that. He couldn’t afford even the smallest amount of frustration. The slightest distraction could easily obliterate this place into tiny chips, killing hundreds if not more with the sheer force.

‘Focus entirely on the paper Harry,’ his dad had told him, the first time they sat together and made origami out of disposable parchments. Harry was seven. ‘The complicated patterns, the order it needs to be folded into, it needs concentration. And concentration doesn’t leave any room for silly things like irritation and annoyance.’

Harry unfolded his parchment and started again.

The door opened and closed with a sharp metallic click, and then locked just as Harry’s file was thrown on the table. It was quite a leafy one, not much to it, from the looks of it. Harry himself suspected that the folder wouldn’t contain more than four or five parchments. Yet, as the doors locked behind the larger wizard, Harry felt as if his deepest and darkest secrets were in there.

Shacklebolt stood for a beat, staring at Harry with narrowed eyes as if he was expecting the boy to start attacking him.

Harry stared back at him.

“So?”

Shacklebolt jostled forward and took a seat across from Harry. His expression carefully blank, and devoid of all emotions. The man leaned back in his seat.

“We have a deal, Mr. Potter.” His voice was deep.

The sixteen-year-old nodded with closed eyes and a small frown, pressing his lips together as the small paper crumpled in his hands. They were silent for almost a full minute, before Harry opened his eyes, following the dark grains that ran along the fine waxed oak.

“Are you paying attention?”

The man nodded, and Harry’s shoulders sagged, his body hitting the back of his chair. “That’s good,” he said faintly, nodding to himself. “This means the whole world to me, Shacklebolt.” His throat tightened as he swallowed. “If you’re not paying attention, you will miss things.”

People always did that. They always missed the bigger picture by obsessing over the smaller, less important details. It infuriated Dad to no end.
“I’m recording us as we speak Mr. Potter,” Shacklebolt said it as an assurance, but it had the opposite effect.

“Then you’re not really paying attention.” Harry snapped. “Look at me in the eyes.” Shacklebolt did so, his eyes unblinking and his expression open. There was a hint of irritation hidden behind that carefully blank structure. Harry was like an itch under his skin. “If you let your thoughts wander to unnecessary details then you’re putting your trust into a recording charm and you will miss things. The most important things.”

“And what are those?”

“I will only say it once, from beginning to the end, where we are now. I will not pause, because I cannot afford to, and you will not interrupt me, because I’m not an idiot. You have to trust me on this.”

“Why should I trust a boy raised by the most notorious man known in the wizarding world? Mr. Potter, I’m afraid you’re under the impression that you hold some sort of power over me, let me reassure you that-”

“It is exactly as you think. Don’t think for a second that just because you’re sitting where you are and I’m sitting where I am, that you are in control. That’s not true, I am the one who’s in control here, and you won’t like it when I lose that control.”

“You need us more than we need you.”

He had a point. Harry needed the ministry people way more than they needed him. Dad’s life depended on whether these people would listen to him, and actually believe him. Harry didn’t care what they wanted from Harry himself as long as he got to save his dad first.

“He wasn’t a notorious monster you know.” He said after a short pause. “You’ve made him sound like a children’s ghost story, and he would have hated that.”

“Let me guess,” the Auror drawled sardonically. “Because you think he isn’t that monster at all?”

Harry smiled, perhaps for the first time in a long time. He huffed a laugh that was more an exhale of relief. “Oh no,” he waved a hand.

“He would have complained that he’s not scary enough. He has an ego to polish after all.” His smile faded to a faint line. “Being the villain in a story that sounds like something straight out of the Tales of Beedle the Bard…well…he’s gonna be pissed.”

Shacklebolt only hummed in response, tapping his quill against the parchment as the silence brought back the tension once again.

“Now Harry-”

“Oh, you cannot call me that. Only he can call me by my name,” Harry stared down at the table. “I was fine with ‘Mr. Potter’.” Harry didn’t concurrently act out his words with the obvious air quotes, but he was sure Shacklebolt was smart enough to get it.

And he must have because the Auror raised his eyebrows at the teen and gave him a long look. “Which is your name.” Shacklebolt didn’t phrase the words like a question and Harry didn’t treat it like one.

“Oh sure.”

With an agitated huff, the Auror flipped his file open with unhidden aggression and skimmed through the content. “Mr. Potter, the healers have passed you for your physicals,” he said, business-like. “And the mind healers seem to deem you sane enough for this interrogation, now I want to start with-.”
“No, you didn’t get it.” Harry took a deep breath, folding the corners of his parchment into tiny triangles.

‘Don’t you start losing your temper now Harry,’ his dad had said to him a few times, the first time being when he was six and accidentally broke his toy broom. ‘If you give in to that anger, then you’re letting it win. There’s a little monster inside all of us, and it loves angry little six-year-olds,’ his hand brushed Harry’s hair out of his eyes. ‘You won’t ever let the little monster win, will you?’

No, Dad. Harry exhaled. I won’t let these dimwitted scumbags kill you off for no reason.

Patience was the key.

“I’m the only one who speaks, Mr. Shacklebolt.” He said, as calmly as he could manage. After all, that was the deal they had in the first place. There would be no questions. Harry was there to confess. And a confession didn’t need the humiliation that came with questions.

“It’s like playing a game.” Harry continued. “A judging game. You sit and listen and at the end of the day you’ll decide whether Severus Snape deserves to die or not.”

“Well then, go on.” Shacklebolt squared his shoulders then gestured at him to begin. “Start with the first memory you have of Severus Snape.”

“I’m going further back.” The Auror looked confused. “The night the Potters died. You all think you have that night figured out, don’t you? A classic case of child abduction, probably peppered with some gory details like thoughts of revenge and torment as motivation in his head. Well, you’re wrong.”

***

Severus Snape was drenched in blood, standing in the middle of a ruin that was once someone’s home. If he, himself, hadn’t visited this house before it had been rendered to this state, he would have never believed that people lived in anything that wasn’t part of the rubble.

With his face paled, his eyes uncharacteristically wide, Severus Snape stared at the bloodied fingers encircling his forearm in a death grip, his chest tightening as large hazel eyes stared back at him in terror.

“Please.” The messy-haired man croaked as if each letter pained him to the point of passing out, his chapped lips were moist with blackish blood. His free hand was pressed against his gushing side, where blood flowed out in rushing rivulets. So much blood and Severus was already drenched in it.
He looked so young, Sev was agonizingly aware of that. They were both so young. They were just twenty-one. Basically children.

“Potter,” Severus couldn’t believe the man was still alive. The boy-the man who had bullied him his whole life, tormented him, ridiculed him and stole the girl he loved…the girl who was undoubtedly dead upstairs in the nursery.

There were muffled cries, coming from above, from the nursery, and James Potter seemed more devastated over the cries than his own grave condition. “Please,” he repeated, his eyes screwed shut in immense pain. And Severus pitied him so much in that instant.

There was no coming back from that. James Potter was going to die.

The infant’s cries increased. “Potter,”

Severus wanted to wrench his arm away from the dying man. Leave him to bleed out, and die alone as Severus properly mourned Lily, saw her for the last time, held her in his arms for one last time, before it all ended.

But he couldn’t. Potter was crying, and the image was so odd, so perplexing that Severus couldn’t do anything but stare. It wasn’t pathetic and it wasn’t cowardly or even from the pain. Potter cried in sync with his child. It was heartbreaking to watch.

“Save-.” Potter heaved, his face red and contorted. “My baby.”

Severus unwittingly knelt next to Potter, his own hands shaking. Potions, he must have a few in his robes, somewhere, he should give one to Potter. He numbly started reaching for his pockets but James’ hand tightened, painfully squeezing his wrist, gritting his bones against each other.

“Harry-.” Potter’s head seemed too heavy to be supported by his neck. It lolled against Severus’s bloodied torso for a moment before sliding to the ground, on the debris. “Save him.”

Sev licked his lips, nervously. If only he could give Potter a pain-relieving potion, or something to knock him out long enough that he would pass in his sleep. He couldn’t bear it. He thought that he would rejoice in seeing the great insolent James potter weeping and bleeding to death while he watched and smirked in glee. But he couldn’t. Severus wanted to cry with him because they both knew there was no relief from what had struck Potter. The curse had practically sliced the twenty-one-year-old man to shreds, and it was a wonder that he was still alive. Still breathing, and talking. Asking Severus to save his baby.

Dumbledore would be here soon, he would tend to the baby. Severus, he needed to get to Lily. One last time. He needed to grieve for the woman he loved. His best friend, and Potter, as always, was ruining this for him.

That was too cruel, he thought in shame, even for Severus.

“Potter let me give you something,” he hated how weak he sounded and how desperate, even to his own ears. He couldn’t believe the amount of blood that was still gushing out of Potter, tainting everything in its wake.

“No,” Potter whimpered, gritting his teeth. “My son. Harry.”

“He’s crying,” Severus said, quite dumbly. He didn’t know what Potter wanted from him. The man seemed almost delirious in his urgency. He was incoherent. Against Potter’s vehement pulling-with surprising strength- Severus managed to reach a hand in his robes and blindly fumble for a vial.

“Potter stop squirming.” He snapped but Potter wasn’t listening. His eyes were glued to the ceiling, glazed with pain and anguish, staring directly at the nursery through the roof it seemed. As if he could distinguish his son and dead wife through the plaster.

“Harry,”

“Here Potter,” Severus had to force the bitter liquid down Potter’s throat, and most of it dribbled down the man’s chin, Severus doubted he had even swallowed a drop, but James’s eyes suddenly darted to him with more awareness.

“Take him,” he said. “Take Harry. You owe me.” Every word seemed to take a toll on him, and Severus had the strongest urge to press his hands against his ears to block out the sound of blood gurgling in the man’s throat as he spoke, and the distressed wheezing that wrecked his chest with each pant.

“Potter quit rambling,” Severus snapped, irritated and disturbed. “Dumbledore-”

“No!” Potter recoiled as if struck. Baby Harry wailed louder and Potter’s hold tightened more. His other hand slipped from his side and Severus jumped, urgently pressing his own hand to Potter’s stomach to slow the bleeding.

“Alright! Alright!” he snapped. “Not Dumbledore then. Pettigrew will be here soon for the baby and the wolf too.”

He couldn’t understand what the big deal was, Potter might have lost Sirius Black to the Dark Lord, but he still had Lupin and Pettigrew at his beck and call, not to mention Dumbledore and his Order. Surely, they would come for the boy and sort things out.

James Potter, however, didn’t seem to think the same. The man shook his head, frantically, his eyes still shut. His glasses were nowhere to be seen. Did he even know that he was holding onto Severus Snape of all people? Or was he so gone from the pain and grief, that he couldn’t even recognize Severus’s voice?

“No, no, no.”

“Potter.” Severus really needed to stop Potter’s babbling.

“Take him, please. Run away, no one,” Potter panted. “-can find him. Love him. Hide him. No one can,”

“No one can have my baby.”

This was James Potter. The same man who once hung Severus upside down and pulled off his pants. The same man, who cursed his hair to drip oil for days, and charmed all of his clothes red, the one who put nasty things in his food, and made his life a living hell. All that name-calling, slurs-on both sides- because he gave as much as he got…and then him at sixteen, saving Severus from a werewolf.

This same man, who was now begging Severus with his eyes, desperate and suffering, worried to death for his infant son. His eyes wide with unsheathed love and absolute terror, even though he was weak, and dying in the rubble that he once called home.

“You’re delirious with pain,” Severus muttered, his eyes cast down. The look in potter’s eyes was driving him insane. How could an arrogant, immature man-child, change so much in a span of three years?

“You have to.” Potter’s voice was almost inaudible, and Severus could barely hear the man. He tried pulling his hand away from Potter once more. He could help that twit if only he could give him something, or reach his wand to put him out of his misery.

“Just let me give you something, I have a few vials with me there should be-”

“Listen to me!” Potter exclaimed. Severus stopped.

“Tell him I love him alright?” James’ eyes traveled back to the roof. “I love him so much, tell him that.”

Snape loudly exhaled, cursing under his breath. “Potter I’m not taking your son.”

“Lily’s baby.” James corrected with a weak grin. “You’ll love him,” he vowed, patting Severus’ hand. “Promise me.” Severus nodded, not in agreement, but out of obligation. James Potter still didn’t look convinced. “He’s in danger.” He repeated, with herculean effort. “Hide him, please. Save him.”

“I will,” he said and felt guilty for not meaning it. “Calm down. You’re going to be-”

“Dead.” The other man interrupted with a grin, looking impossibly smug, almost sheepish.

Severus winced and Potter’s smile faded into a severe grimace.

“I’m sorry,” James said as his eyelids started drooping. Severus stared down at him, feeling the weight of his apology. It wasn’t a simple one. It carried years and years of burden with it, years of bullying and misery and heartbreak, and here Potter was, apologizing for everything on his deathbed.

“Me too,” Severus said because he didn’t know what else to say in response.

Potter’s grasp finally loosened.

“What would you do?” Harry asked, but the question wasn’t necessarily pointed at Shacklebolt.

He did wonder about this question a lot. Sometimes, when his dad had to miss potion gatherings, or something of the sort because he couldn’t fake an identity. Or when the school called him for the umpteenth time in a week and he had to come and get Harry, or the times he stared down at his new potions journal with an unreadable look in his eyes that Harry swore was longing.

Dad, for all his poise and grace, and stoicism did look sad more often than not- when he thought Harry wasn’t paying attention. He hid it well, too well. Behind origami papers, or new exciting foods, or a new potion that he had invented, but Harry knew it, could see right through it.

It showed the most when they had to leave their home; pick up their whole lives and move to a new town and start from scratch, because someone might have seen something, or heard something, or thought something, and it was always Harry’s fault, but Dad never said that.

When he was ten, they had to leave their home on Boxing Day. How depressing was that?

‘It’s never your fault,’ Dad had said, in the car as they were pretending to move away. They always drove the charmed car for a reasonable distance, ditched it somewhere and then Dad apparated them to the new location.

‘You cannot stop things from happening, sometimes things happen for a reason.’ Harry was silent, his eyes red-rimmed and his arms crossed against his chest. He was ten. He didn’t understand logic and inevitability. They were running from their house on Boxing Day for Merlin’s sake.

‘I’m sorry,’ he truly was sorry for cheating in that stupid snowball fight that the neighborhood kids had started. He didn’t get to mingle with them much, and it was just so much fun that he forgot that he couldn’t use his magic to assist him against four other children.

No one saw, Harry personally thought that no one caught him doing it except for Dad, but if Dad had then it meant that someone else had too. Because people couldn’t be trusted. One couldn’t simply ‘assume’ things about people.

Dad didn’t tell him off for using his stupid magic, he didn’t shout, he didn’t look disappointed. He just turned his back to Harry and walked into the house to start packing. They left that afternoon.

‘It was my fault, Harry, not yours,’ his father looked straight ahead, his eyes glued to the snowy road ahead. ‘I should have known better.’

Harry wondered, a lot, about how much his dad had sacrificed in order to keep him safe, the things he had missed, in order to raise a child that wasn’t even his, to begin with. Practically his whole life was thrown away, the things he could have seen or had; the places he could have gone to and the awards and jobs his brilliance in potions could have granted him.

“Stranded after a war where you belong to neither side, with no jobs, and no way to access your money and no one to trust, with a baby, dumped on you, what would you do?”

Shacklebolt didn’t answer but looked uncomfortable nonetheless. The large man shifted in his seat, his chair creaking under his weight.
“He had no idea what he was doing. He didn’t have the first notion about babies. He didn’t how to feed me, how to hold me, or what to do when I cried. He couldn’t go to Gringotts for the money he had left in his vaults, and his best friend was dead.”

“You all think it’s so easy to give up your whole life in a span of one night.”


**

He didn’t get to say goodbye to Lily.

In fact, Severus didn’t even get to really examine his best friend's unmoving body more than four seconds before Baby Potter’s inconsolable cries demanded his attention and jostled him into action. He didn’t have time to mourn. He needed to take care of the baby first.

Severus took out his wand and surveyed the ruined nursery with pursed lips, his eyes darted away from the caved-in roof and the rubble, to the shelf and Harry’s wardrobe.

“Accio-.” Severus paused for a moment to think. “Harry’s bag.”

The wardrobe slammed open and a large bag zoomed into Severus’s grasp. It was quite heavy for its size and dotted with small brooms lazily flying all over the bag. Lily must have prepared it in advance. Severus realized that he knew less about babies than he probably should have, as he examined the diaper bag with great wariness and then glance back at the whimpering baby.

Harry saw him stare and opened his mouth to cry for his attention once again, his chubby hands gripping the bars of his crib and pulling with force. Severus quickly slung the heavy bag on his left shoulder and strode to the crib.

“Stop crying now Potter,” it couldn’t be good for him, crying that much. The baby’s face was already flushed and strained, his eyes glassy. They looked so similar to Lily’s that if Severus weren’t in such a hurry, he would have gaped at the uncanny resemblance.

He tried his best to ignore Lily’s body and went over the best ways to pick up the baby without hurting him. He knew nothing about them, other than the fact that they were unimaginably fragile and breakable.

“You’re all soft flesh and no bones,” Severus muttered, hesitantly reaching into the crib with blood-soaked hands that were already getting dried. “You have to cooperate with me here, infant.” His hands hovered in the air, and Severus groaned. He had no idea how to do this.

Harry sniffled, looking away from Severus to his mother for a moment before his eyes shifted back to the strange man. Severus watched as the baby’s chin dangerously wobbled, and he burst into a new bout of tears.

“To hell with it,” Severus said and plucked the baby off in one swift move, startling both himself and baby Potter into shocked silence. Harry stared at him with an open mouth, and Severus stared right back, holding him away from his body as if the child were about to explode.

Harry made a sound in his throat and gripped Severus’ sleeves to steady himself.

“Alright, you didn’t break.” That was good news, considering the circumstances. Now he just had to carry the baby with himself out of the wreckage and apparate with him at the very least.

Then he’d figure out what he needed to do with the baby.

There was no way he was keeping him. No way in hell that he would go into hiding, raise a BABY, by himself, for merlin knew how long, over something that his childhood bully had claimed on his deathbed, most likely when he was delirious with pain and just talking nonsense. Severus nodded to himself, and slowly brought the baby closer to his chest. That seemed the most natural pose.

Just at that moment, Harry had seemed to realize that this blood-soaked stranger was not his Mommy or Daddy, and he hated the way he was being held. The baby started squirming immediately, shedding crocodile tears and whining, his little hands pushing at Severus.

“No, no,” he told the baby and tightened his hold. “Potter, don’t be stubborn, trust me when I say that neither of us wants this.”

He stepped over Lily’s body with a longing glance, and then rushed out of the nursery. He was running out of time. Severus needed to apparate back to his house, get away from all of this, to actually think about his next move, and then most likely call in Dumbledore.

Obviously, he wasn’t going to keep the baby.

Potter craned his neck to reach for his mother back in the nursery, starting an anew string of “Mommy” in heartbreaking whimpers, making Severus feel even worse, as he shifted the boy away and pressed his face into his chest as they were passing over James Potter’s mutilated body. The child was already in hysterics, he didn’t need to see that.

Severus wasn’t certain how well-adjusted Potter’s son was to magical transportation, but he couldn’t tell the difference anyway, Potter was crying, either way, so Severus made it quick and painless, just as he had done earlier.

The baby wasn’t shocked speechless this time around, but his crying dramatically reduced as he noticed the surrounding change. Severus slowly sighed and adjusted baby Potter on his hip.

“That’s nicer, isn’t it?” he said, cringing at himself. “No smoke or rubble. Enjoy the view Potter.”

Baby Potter grunted, looking at the trees surrounding them with narrowed eyes. Severus guessed that the baby couldn’t quite distinguish the trees because of the dark. Still, Harry scrutinized the vague shapes, as he cried, only half-heartedly as Severus walked the path to his porch.

One might think it idiotic of him to return home after essentially kidnapping a baby, but Severus wasn’t daft. There was no way, that they would know it was him right away. He had at least a week alone in the manor by himself until anyone came sniffing around for him.

“How are you still crying?” he asked the baby, as they stood before the doors. By the time they were inside, and Severus’ shoulders relaxed he was getting increasingly worried and impressed by Harry’s lung capacities.

Tersely, he found his way to the kitchen with the lights dimmed, and carefully drew out his wand as he juggled Potter with his other arm. The baby needed to be sorted out first before Severus could let his shields down and start freaking out.

The Potters were dead. They were murdered, in their own home, betrayed by their best friend, and now Severus was drenched in their blood, with their baby in his arms.

Yes, he was most certainly repressing these bits of information until he deemed it safe enough to give in to delayed shock.

“We need to clean you up a bit,” he said, shifting a whimpering Harry in his arms. Severus’ eyes darted around the kitchen and finally settled on the kitchen table. The chairs were too dangerous for Harry.

The baby’s face was tracked with tears and blood, and for all he knew, the constant crying could be out of pain. Somewhere was bleeding, by the looks of it, but the infant’s face was too stained for Severus to notice the lightning bolt-shaped scar immediately.

He halted as his eyes finally fell on the inflamed, bleeding scar. A lightning bolt, the exact wand movement of the killing curse. Dear Merlin and Circe, Severus thickly swallowed the bile forming in his throat, did the dark lord try to kill this baby and failed?

He must have failed, or else baby Potter wouldn’t be alive.

“Momma, Dada,” Potter cried their names in a constant stream as he looked around the unfamiliar surroundings and then occasionally craned his neck to glance at a blood-soaked Severus. He was clearly asking him about the whereabouts of his parents with his tear-glazed eyes.

Severus hid his guilt, and carefully set Harry on the table, keeping a steadying hand on the baby’s back.

“They’re not here now Harry,”

Potter seemed too tired to sob louder, but he seemed to have understood Severus’s words and their meaning. The baby sagged against his hand, looking absolutely miserable.

Severus took the chance and ran his wand over the baby with a muttered diagnostic charm, his brows furrowing as he realized that the baby’s elbow was most likely injured in addition to the curse scar on his forehead.

Some rubble or a bit of plaster must have fallen on Harry, or the baby had hit it somewhere in his hysterics.

Severus leaned away, and cast another steadying charm on the baby, so he wouldn’t fall over. He went over to fill up a bowl of warm water and dig around for some rags that he could use to clean up the baby. He could have done it all with a few spells, but Severus needed the stimulation.

He also needed to get away from Potter for at least a few minutes, even though they were still in the same room, and Potter was still crying.

He couldn’t do this, Severus realized. He couldn’t keep and raise a baby. He was a death eater, a spy in disguise, he was loathed by both sides, and precisely because of that reason, the wizarding world wouldn’t appreciate a man like him taking care of their wonder boy.

Some part of him still couldn’t believe that the inconsolable whimpering child had defeated the dark lord, and survived a killing curse. It was surreal, and Severus had to stifle the strong urge to start giggling. He just feared that if he started, he would never stop.

‘He’s in danger.’ James had told him that, minutes before dying. Severus understood that. He understood what the wrath of vengeful death eaters could do to a grown man, much less a child. They would all be scramming into the shadows like rodents now that their master was gone, but a selected few would hang around for revenge.

Potter was right, but he was also wrong too.

If he had wanted protection for his son, then Severus was the wrong person to ask. Dumbledore was the most powerful man known to be alive, he was the leader surging the light side into action and resistance if there was one person in this world who could protect baby Potter it was that old man, not a Death eater spy who used to practice dark arts.

Severus placed the sloshing bowl of water down on the counter with too much force, startling Potter into silence again as the bowl clanked rather loudly as a result. Severus ignored the baby and knelt to look around in his cupboards.

Even if Potter was stung by Black’s betrayal, and he couldn’t find it in him to trust his other friends, such as Lupin and the rat, it wouldn’t explain why he would protest that strongly against the idea of Dumbledore tending to the child.

Besides, Severus thought as he closed the cupboards and stood with a sigh, it wasn’t as if he could keep the baby secret from Albus Dumbledore for long. The old man would find him in less than a week, question him, probe around in his head for answers, and then snatch the boy anyway before sending Severus on his way with a lemon sherbet and a pat on the head.

Severus wouldn’t mind walking away.

This war had taken too much out of him already, and he wasn’t willing to give any more. He wasn’t even sure if he was capable of giving any more than he already had. He wanted everything to be over, and it seemed that his wish was finally about to come true. Then trust James bloody Potter to provoke his life debt on Severus and dump a baby in his arms.

That cannot be right. Severus ground his teeth. His life debt was paid the moment he agreed to spy for Dumbledore, even if Potter had no idea, Severus’ decision was what saved James’s ass the exact night he gave his first report to a blank-faced Albus and urged him to send a backup to save those bloody mindless Gryffindors. His slate was clean. But what if Albus hadn’t told Potter about that night? Even more so, what if it didn’t count, because Severus wasn’t the one who actually saved the man from certain death?

If Potter knew about that night, then he wouldn’t have cited any life debts. That was unless, he knew all about it, but wanted to put Severus in an impossible situation.

How do you refuse a dying man?

Sit back, and watch Potter, Severus thought with a sneer.

He thought that he was already decided, as he grabbed a towel and headed back to an eerily silent Potter. He would clean the baby up, heal what he could, and then fire call Albus Dumbledore.

James Potter’s last words or not, Severus wasn’t about to abandon every shred of logic that urged him against the man’s words.

Harry was staring at Severus with wide green eyes. They were completely his mother’s, fitted in a face that was a carbon copy of his father’s. It was shocking, how Baby Potter looked like the perfect blend of the two. Even so, Sev had never seen Lily’s eyes stare at him with the expression that Potter was wearing now. Disturbingly blank.

Severus stared back at Potter, uneasily, and the baby didn’t blink or stir away. It was unsettling.

“I think I liked you more when you cried, Potter.”

Potter didn’t show the slightest hint of understanding him, yet carried on with the staring. After a moment or two, Severus shrugged this off and placed the rags near the bowl. Potter himself was an oddity to behold in his youth, trust his baby to have nailed the death stare this early in life as well.

Although, at this point, Severus wasn’t sure whether the creepy staring contest was a baby thing… or a Potter thing.

He reached a hand to the bowl and dipped the rag while his eyes were glued to Potter, wishing that he had the foresight to gather a scarring balm and a pain-relieving potion as well. Then he decided that it really didn’t matter, not only the dosage measuring would be a hassle, but the potion master himself was very reluctant to give Potter’s baby anything that he might later regret.

“This would be over soon Potter,” Severus said, almost as a vow. “And then you can snuggle Dumbledore’s pet wolf or the rat.”

Honestly, he couldn’t see what all the fuss was about. James Potter’s baby would be safe and sound.

Just as he leaned down to clean Harry’s face, a knife levitated from his countertop and zoomed right past him, missing his eye by a hairbreadth and embedding itself firmly into the wall over his shoulder. Quicker than a blink, and swifter than a spell, he was almost about to lose an eye.

Dear Merlin and Circe…Did that just happen?

Severus froze. His eyes went wide and his mouth slightly hung open, he looked at the baby with accusation and subtle rage but was surprised when Harry’s face crumpled and he was crying again.

“Oh my god,” Severus said, after a beat, and dropped the dripping rag to pick the baby up in his arms. He couldn’t trust the infant by himself, not after he nearly murdered Severus.

In his defense though, Severus thought somewhat wryly, the baby looked more terrified of his bout of…whatever it was than Severus himself. He just nearly lost an eye. Potter threw a knife at his face. A fifteen-month-old baby, whose vocabulary didn’t extend to anything beyond ‘Mommy and Dada’ almost succeeded in doing what the dark lord couldn’t.

Well, he is the boy who defeated Voldemort after all. Severus had no idea how, but he must have. He had a miracle baby in his arms. Who could also throw knives.

‘He’s in danger,’ James Potter had said, but what he really should have said, or meant, was that ‘He’s THE danger, don’t leave knives around him, Snape.’

This thought prompted Severus to stride out of the kitchen and rush upstairs, to the guest room with no dangerous cutlery or sharp-edged furniture around. He very much liked to remain intact, and also Potter could hurt himself with his outbursts.

That much power, inside that tiny body, he thought in wonder. How could that be?

How could the result of James Potter’s genes and Lily Evans’ be something much more powerful than anyone had ever seen? It didn’t seem right, it couldn’t be possible. This much magic cooped up, inside a baby, or even a full-grown adult, wasn’t natural. Magic wasn’t all about inheritance; it needed to be matured. To be tended to with utter delicacy and education, that’s why children were prone to accidental magic in the first place, but to have it at this age and to this severity?

It was unheard of.

**

“He didn’t know what to do. On one hand, he could have gone through with the plan, called this Dumbledore person and ridden himself of an unstable baby who could hurt anyone without even meaning to do it, on the other…calling them would mean exposing me and my magic, something that obviously no one knew about, especially not The Order. This wasn’t only unheard of, it was physically impossible. And he wasn’t sure how it happened, whether it was inherent,” he paused. “Or caused by the backlash of the Dark Lord’s curse.”

“It does sound impossible,” Shacklebolt sounded like he didn’t believe a word coming out of Harry’s mouth. That was fine. Harry wouldn’t get mad. Dad would be disappointed, and Harry honestly could do better.

“That’s what he always told me anyway,” Harry smiled at the blank-faced man. “I was his ‘incredible little brat,” maybe the information was too personal, for Harry to share with a stranger, a stone-faced Auror just waiting for an excuse to lock him up in a ward. But Harry didn’t care. He missed Dad, so much. He was afraid, confused, and just a bit angry, and all he could think about in that posh office imprisoning him was how he remembered the times Dad called him his ‘Incredible little brat’ as a child.

Those three little words of affection, was all Harry craved a child, and grew exasperated at as a teen. Dad loved teasing him about it, and Harry really didn’t mind, even though he pretended he did. He wished he hadn’t now. For all he knew, Dad could die, not knowing just how much Harry loved being called Dad’s ‘incredible little brat’.

Because it was just the two of them against the world, and even though Dad had to sacrifice everything, he still loved Harry. Even though this was all Harry’s fault, Dad would never be mad. He’d just always be his ‘incredible little brat’.

Dad had said. ‘Time for dinner now, and I mean it, you incredible brat,’ and Harry rolled his eyes at him.

He’d fallen off his broom and Dad was patching up his knees. ‘It’s not going to hurt anymore, do you know why?’

Eight-year-old him made a face at the weird foul-smelling balm. ‘You put the smelly paste on it?’

Severus wrinkled his nose at him with amusement, he pretended to think for a beat, and then shook his head. ‘No, I’m sure it must be because you’re my incredible little brat.’ Harry grinned slyly. ‘And little brats don’t cry over scraped knees.’

‘You’re not supposed to stir it that way!’ Dad’s raised voice sent chills all over his body and Harry cringed. He threw a sheepish grin over his shoulder and Dad mellowed. ‘Throw the Newt’s eyes first, you incredible little brat.’ He said in utter exasperation.

‘I’m still your incredible little brat Dad, I promise.’ Harry closed his eyes. He’d all but forgotten about Shacklebolt’s awkward presence in the room with him.

“Mr. Potter?”

“You don’t believe me,” Harry said as he opened his eyes. “But you have no idea what that disbelief could cost you Shacklebolt. I could kill every single one of us if you push me enough.”

“I find that quite hard to believe Mr. Potter, as I said, our healers hadn’t detected any abnormalities in your magical aura.” Shacklebolt almost looked as if he was pitying Harry. “I’m quite sure you’re making this story up…or you’ve been lied to, your whole life.”

Harry snorted. Oh, how he itched to show this brute of a man who he was dealing with. He could trash this room, rip the pretty curtains, and blast the wizard right through the charmed windows. Let the man fall on the hard marble floor.

Then he’ll learn not to accuse Harry’s father of lying to him.

‘Don’t even think about it Harry,’ that’s definitely something Dad would have said. ‘I’ll have you scrubbing cauldrons until you’re all old and grey.’
Harry smothered the smoky clouds threatening to cloud his vision and looked past Shacklebolt’s shoulder to stare at a framed Daily Prophet proudly hanging on the wall. The frame cracked and loudly shattered the next instance, sending Shacklebolt lunging to the side and drawing his wand.

“This room had protective wards all over it,” Kingsley said, slightly out of breath as he inspected the shattered mess on the floor. “What tricks are you playing?”

Harry raised an eyebrow. People just never listened, did they?

“Why don’t you get back in your seat so we can carry on, and while you’re at it, hand me a piece of parchment.” He nodded to the file on the desk as Shacklebolt slowly settled back into his seat. Harry’s own origami boat was now torn in half, thanks to this man’s stupidity, the least he could do, was supplying the paper.

“Why?” Harry ignored the question and waited until the man hastily drew a piece of parchment from the file and slid it over. It was a briefing. Harry didn’t let his eyes rest on the words and merely skimmed over them before he did the first fold.

“I happen to know how to prevent myself from blowing us up,” Harry finally shrugged as the silence dragged on. “And I love origami.”

“You want me to believe-.”

“I don’t want you to believe a single thing.” The boy cut in. “I just want you to see. Surely it cannot be that hard.”

He could see the Auror gritting his teeth. He didn’t care. Harry had the story they needed, and they had what Harry needed in return.

“If you cannot commit to this, then you shouldn’t be in this room. If you are, then that means you chose to be here with me, and you chose to listen, now whether you believe me or not is not my responsibility. It’s all yours.”

Shacklebolt didn’t respond. Harry cross-folded the parchment, distractedly. He took the silence as a cue to continue.

“Feathers,” Harry said. “That’s what it was all about in the earlier days.”

**

Potter liked causing chaos. That much was obvious.

The issue, with Potter’s newfound venting off method, was that it terrified the baby himself. Harry shook the bed on which they both sat upon, dropped the scarce shelves and then scared himself further with the loud noises as the windows shook and rattled and threatened to shatter.

Severus didn’t even attempt taking out his wand, there was already too much magic in the room. It was stifling, and quite frankly, it was making Severus more restless by the minute, and he had no idea how to stop it.

Even if he knew how to take care of regular babies in the first place, Potter’s case seemed to be different.

“It’s alright,” Severus shushed the child. He got up and started pacing the room again, and the chaos moved with them, but he paid it no mind. He couldn’t let Harry keep on crying any more than he already had, the baby was going to hurt himself.

Maybe he should give him a dreamless sleep potion, quickly figure out the dosage and force-feed the child if he has to, but on the other hand, …he couldn’t just drug a baby.

“You’re the one making noise Harry, I promise. We’re safe.”

He put a hand over Harry’s ear to muffle the sound of the door banging repeatedly against the hinges and moved over to the bed again, where it was safer. Harry’s breathing calmed as Severus’s hand muffled the havoc, and they sat on the bed again.

Severus noticed the boy’s calmed breathing immediately and sighed in relief. Then positioned the baby so his face was gently leaned against Severus’s-Still blood-soaked- robes. At least he couldn’t see or hear the damage anymore.

“It’s alright. You’re just tired aren’t you?” Severus felt silly for talking to the infant when the baby couldn’t even hear Sev, but he couldn’t deny the comfort it offered. More for his sake than Harry’s.

This changed things. A lot of things.

“You’re just like your father Potter, loud and dramatic.” He continued but then felt a stab of guilt, as he was reminded of James Potter’s pain-ridden eyes pleadingly staring into his soul, merely an hour ago.

James must have known that his son wasn’t a regular child. He and Lily both must have known, what The Prophesy meant, more than anyone else did at the time. If they felt the need to hide it from everyone, then there must be more to this.

Severus wasn’t an idiot; he needed to act rationally, like a proper Slytherin, and a mature adult. He was twenty-one now, if Potter had managed to keep a baby alive for fifteen months at twenty-one then so could Severus.

He nodded to himself once, his back straightening, as he adjusted Harry on his lap and reach for a pillow. He had no idea what he was doing, and apparently, Harry seemed just as baffled when Severus promptly dropped the pillow on his lap.

Harry cautiously grabbed the edge of the pillow in a death grip and then looked up at Severus with puffy eyes and a pout. Severus patted a hand on the pillow.

“How about we abandon the door and windows you destroyed and see what’s in this pillow?”

Feathers were harmless.

Harry made a noise and copied Severus by patting the pillow himself before looking up at Severus again.

“You’re doing well Harry,” Sev awkwardly praised the little boy and then patted the pillow once again, he was scared that the offending item would explode in their faces in a cloud of feathers and cotton, and scare Harry into another crying fit.

The baby imitated him again, this time with a hesitant smile as he looked up to Severus for praise.

“Very good Harry,” Severus muttered, running a hand over Harry’s messy hair. He dragged the pillow closer to Harry, grasped the edges and then inwardly rolled his eyes at himself.

“Do you want to see what makes it so soft?” Harry cooed at the pillow and the rattling windows eased back into their hinges. Sev gulped and then carefully tore the edge of the pillow. He was an idiot, but he was also exhausted, and he had a miracle baby to deal with. Tearing a pillow or two wouldn’t do anyone any harm.

Potter watched his hands tearing the white fabric with rapt silence, he seemed very curious as to where Severus was going with this, and Sev had to admit, he was very curious as to what the hell he was doing too.

“Pillows are filled with feathers,” he slowly eased his hand from Potter’s ears and tore the stitching. Then sighed before reaching in to retrieve a handful of feathers and tiny cotton balls.

“Birds have feathers, Potter, I’m not sure if you have encountered one yet, but it’s most likely that you’ve seen these on owls.”

Potter reached for the feathers and steadied himself by holding Severus’s left forearm in a death grip. Severus’s head snapped to his forearm where Harry’s small fingers were tightly clutching his sleeve, resting right on top of his dark mark.

He couldn’t help but stare at Harry’s hand, distractedly letting the baby entertain himself with the feathers. All Severus could hear above Potter’s gentle coos and baby babbling was the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears.

He wasn’t sure what hit him the hardest, the astonishing symbolism of Potter unknowingly, innocently touching the mark of death, or the lump in his throat as the day’s events crashed into him all at once, just as the baby seemed to have calmed down.

Lily was dead, and so was her husband. Their insanely magical baby was sitting on Severus’s lap, and no one could know that he was with Severus, because if people saw, if they just knew how much power this tiny body held…Severus couldn’t even finish the thought.

Albus Dumbledore, even he would be affected by the baby’s power. Severus wasn’t an idiot, and Dumbledore wasn’t all light and glory. The man was leading a war, and he was tired, they all were so tired. If he saw the opportunity Harry offered…he would sacrifice the child as if he were a lamb to be slaughtered.

‘Hide him,’

Hiding the boy who lived meant that they couldn’t stay at his house anymore. It was just him, against the whole wizarding community.

‘No one can know,’

Because if they did, Harry wouldn’t survive. Even James Potter knew that much.

Harry tore a few feathers from his slackened hand and shook his tiny fist at Severus with an inquisitive groan.

Severus knew what he was going to do before even looking down at Lily’s eyes. There was no way he was abandoning this baby, he wasn’t calling anyone to come to fetch him. This boy was not only his best friend’s legacy but also an innocent child who was absolutely defenseless. James Potter had made him promise to run and hide his son, but he didn’t even need to do that.

Severus was keeping Harry, and they were running away.

“Our house was a fortress. Not a bad thing, per se. It caged both of us, but he made it seem so different that it took me years to notice. So good, so precious, that at times, I think he barely saw the invisible restraints himself.” Harry held a finger above his steaming tea. Freshly brewed and brought by a nervous dodgy Auror in training, the same idiot who forgot to bind Harry’s hands. He watched as the white swirls bent around his finger, lapping up the warmth against his skin.

They never lived in one place for long, it was laughable to think so, but when Harry was younger he barely noticed the constant moving, the looks Dad threw over his shoulder, then tension on his back as he had to uproot and run in a matter of hours or get caught with Harry and possibly killed.

Harry’s lack of attention to those facts wasn’t because he was a child, it was because Dad never made it seem as if they were leaving their home behind and running away from people. He was Harry’s home, and they were playing a game, so they just needed to change their hiding places every once in a while, and then start there.

Harry used to love it.

He stared down at the cup. He knew he would never drink that tea. He didn’t trust these people enough to take anything from them. Especially food that they could’ve tampered or spiked. He wasn’t a moron. His father was a potions master.

Kingsley watched, unimpressed as ever as the teen finally leaned back and looked up.

“We were playing a game in that cage. Imagine a fortress, a ‘prison’, where you get to make blanket tents, and write silly books, and try crazy foods, and you get to have someone who loves you more than the whole world put together, who would die to protect you, never gets bored of you. Never stops loving you.”

‘Wouldn’t he though?’ A traitorous voice whispered in his head. ‘After all you did to him, he would have every right to abhor the sight of you.’
Shut up.

“You’re talking about a death eater.” Shacklebolt was saying.

Harry glared at the man, but then quickly squashed down the rising anger. “I’m talking about a father.” He said and looked down at the paper bird in his hands.

It was his fault. Everything was his fault. Dad didn’t deserve a son like Harry, he didn’t deserve the life Harry made him have, and now…with this mess. Dad could die because of him.

“I was a danger, not just to him,” he continued out loud, forcefully to push the intrusive thoughts away. He couldn’t afford to be angry with himself. Not now. “To everyone.”

“I was a keg about to explode,” he raised his voice. Shacklebolt had no right to judge his father. Nobody had that right. Dad had no other choice.
“He knew that, and you were all sniffing around for me like bloodhounds after a butcher, so his options were not that much to being with.” He couldn’t help sneering. “He had no other choice other than hiding me, other than teaching me how not to be myself because people could have gotten killed! He wasn’t my jail guard, Shacklebolt. He was a prisoner, just like me.”

He didn’t hear the cup breaking under his finger, rather, he felt the scorching liquid against his hand and clothes, and then watched, dazed as Shacklebolt jumped back from his seat once again and drew his wand. Harry looked down at his hand, vividly crisscrossed with burnt marks and dripping steaming droplets of tea dribbling on the table.

Shacklebolt glared at him and then vanished the mess.

“You need to stop doing that Potter, whatever it is that you’re doing. You’re disturbing the wards.”

‘Control yourself, Harry,’ Dad said, with crossed arms as he stood on the other side of Harry’s locked door. The fourteen-year-old was sulking.

‘I didn’t raise a hooligan, I expect better of you.’

It was one of the few times Harry remembered Dad being stern with him, or talking to him in that biting harsh tone of his that could chill the bones right off of any sane person. Harry couldn’t even remember what he had done wrong, but he was angry, and so was Dad.

Harry’s rage was shaking the walls, but Dad remained unimpressed.

‘Stop doing that,’ he had said.

“Stop doing that Potter!” Shacklebolt exclaimed in parallel to the voice in Harry’s head. “I bloody well mean it.”

Harry raised his chin and stared at the man, only to find him looking at Harry’s bleeding finger with an uncomfortable look on his face. Harry retracted the offending hand and settled it on his lap.

“He had no other choice,” he repeated, with more confidence this time. “I was a child, I didn’t know any better. No child was supposed to be born with that much unrestrained power. It was wrong . Every little thing set me off, I could hurt everyone around me with a single glance…Even Dad wasn’t exempt from that.”

“I hurt him, unintentionally, constantly, over every little thing that would have been deemed ‘normal’ for other toddlers. So much so, that I wasn’t allowed to touch people.” Harry spat the word as if it was an insult. “He never complained, he never punished me for it, he never stopped loving me.”

He should have, and he could have, but he never did. Harry didn’t know whether to love him all the more for it or hate himself for causing him this much pain and misery.

“I didn’t know I was doing it, he never showed the pain I caused him,” it was something that had plagued Harry’s mind for a while now.
How much did Dad really hide from him?


**

When Severus began, his voice was lower than a whisper, and it needn’t be any louder. Harry was a rapt listener. The child’s bed was a little cramped for Severus’s long adult limbs, but he made the effort to get in and-Merlin forbid he ever use that phrase out loud- ‘cuddle’ at storytime.

He laid on his side, face to face with the seven-year-old, his legs awkwardly stuck out of the bed, but he didn’t mind. Storytime was Harry’s favorite part of the day. Harry grinned weakly back at him, he was particularly worn out that day, and it was almost nine anyway, an hour past his bedtime.
Harry wanted a new story tonight, and he didn’t want Severus to ‘cheat’ by grabbing a new book.

Unfortunately, Sev wasn’t that imaginative or talented, so he just laid on the small, cramped bed and stared at the seven-year-old boy whom he loved as if he were his own child by blood. Harry stared back, in that eerie way that he did sometimes, but Severus didn’t mind it at all anymore. He knew that with him it was different. He was just observing Severus, carefully cataloging each line and crook of his face to memory. The child did that to a lot of things around them. At times, Severus found his son staring at the floor for a full hour, or scrutinizing a fork for minutes and minutes until Severus called his name.

Storytime was a favorite, precisely because Harry got to accomplish his daily ‘observing session’ with Severus and the changes that might have come upon him each day, and get to use his imagination to flourish the story he was hearing at the same time. Severus made a point of adding something subtle but silly to his face each time before bedtime.

Harry would point to the small mole, or the tiny potion vial or an inkblot hidden in Severus’s face with the expression of utter joy and pride on his face and then throw himself in Sev’s arms for a celebratory hug. That night, there was a small feather under Severus’ chin and Harry had yet to find it.
But Severus started the story regardless.

“There was once, a little fawn who lived under the valley, in a magical forest with his parents and all their friends.” He didn’t know why he was telling this particular story. He could hear the sound of his own heart hammering against his ribs, like a frightened bird’s. This could go very badly.

He reached a hand and smoothed it over Harry’s hair, just to comfort himself. “The little fawn was too little to remember, too young to know, but he adored his Mommy and Daddy and they loved and cared for him in return.” Harry nodded with a smile.

“One night, when the little fawn was asleep, a bad man found their home.” Severus swallowed and readjusted the sheets around Harry. Should he really be telling this to a seven-year-old?

“He wanted to hurt the little fawn, but Mommy and Daddy were awake, and they loved the fawn so much that they couldn’t bear to let the man take him away,”

Harry finally moved his gaze to Severus’ eyes with a thoughtful hum. “Did they stop him?”

“Yes they did,” Severus should have stopped, but Harry was enthralled, even though Sev’s way of unaided storytelling sucked. “But he-he had to take Mommy and Daddy with him, forever. However, the little fawn wasn’t alone. Um…a raven…a friendly raven, who was friends with the parents, arrived just before they took the fawn’s father, and he made the raven promise that he would love and take care of his little baby.”

“I like ravens, Daddy.” His son murmured with a yawn.

Severus didn’t let himself be affected by the metaphorical meaning behind the words. “Me too.” He muttered back at Harry without really meaning it and then sighed.

Lily’s eyes were like vast rain forests as she stared at him, lively and mysterious especially when she smiled. Harry’s were the very definition of spring, and the young father found himself startled nearly every time he gazed deeply into them. It felt as if his lungs were filled with fresh crisp air as he stood at the edge of a cliff. It was refreshing, especially when his son smiled. Severus felt as if he was on the verge of falling down the precipice.

Harry really did love him.

“The raven took the little baby with him but he was scared.” Severus was terrified. “He wanted to bring the little fawn to the great white owl in their forest, so he would know what to do with the baby, but what he didn’t know was that…The little fawn was a gift.”

“A gift?”

“Yeah, he was special, and he could do extraordinary things that no one ever could. And the raven found out that maybe…the little fawn was a miracle, his miracle, and he had to be cherished and loved, and the raven had to be honored and privileged above all the other animals, to get to care for him.”

Harry frowned and pushed off his blankets, and then attempted to prop himself on his elbows. “What does…pri-privi-.”
Severus gently pushed him back down. “Privileged means grateful,” he said with a smirk. “It’s when someone thanks somebody else for receiving a great gift.”

“Like the raven?”

His smirk broadened and Severus shrugged. “Yeah, like the raven. He was very thankful, and he wanted to show that by always keeping the little fawn happy, no matter what. Because when the fawn got upset, his incredible power got the better of him and…lashed out. But that was always all right with the raven because he loved the little fawn and the baby loved him in return. It was just them against the world.”

“Like us?”

Well, it is the story of our lives. Sev thought dryly but didn’t let the emotion slip onto his face.

“Kind of like us.” He admitted reluctantly. “But we’re not fighting the world, just playing a game, remember?” it was an important differentiation to make, and Severus was hoping to install the concept into Harry’s mind early on. They were playing a game, the two of them. They were playing hide and seek with the world, and no one else was allowed to play. “We’re a team, you and I. and everyone else is on the other team.” He reminded James’s son yet again.

Harry stared at him and shifted in his cot. “Were the raven and his baby playing hide and seek too?”

Severus raised his head and pushed himself off Harry’s bed with a grimace. “Maybe,” he said, ignoring the crick in his neck to lean and tuck Harry in. “But I’ll tell you all about that later.” He ruffled Harry’s hair and the boy squawked, laughing and wriggling under Severus’s hand. “It’s time to sleep, you little brat.”

Harry batted Severus’ hand away with a pout. “I’m not little!”

The pout resembled the ghost of James’s sneer for less than a moment before it dissipated. Severus shook his head at himself with a firm scold.
‘He’s not his father. He will never grow into that man. Even though he had loved his son with the last breath he took, I’m not about to let Harry make the same mistakes.’

‘Tell him I loved him,’ Severus didn’t see how he could. James might have been Harry’s biological father but Harry was only seven, the concept couldn’t be explained to him. He was too young and too volatile to hear the truth, too immature to understand it. Severus will tell him, he had to tell him someday, but that day wasn’t going to arrive any time soon.

Severus let the Occlumency shields firmly congeal themselves in place and then tilted his head at Harry with amusement. “Oh really?” he crossed his arms. “So you are a brat?”

Harry shrugged. A yawn stretched his face wide and his eyes watering by the sheer force and longevity of the pull on his facial muscles. Really tired out now, Severus thought with a smirk. With any luck, Harry would sleep in tomorrow, and give Severus some extra time to finish his latest batch of blood replenishing potions with no interruption.

As he turned to leave, however, a small hand closed around his sleeve.

“Can you stay?” the tiny voice asked.

“Is everything alright?”

Harry nodded with narrowed eyes but looked conflicted. His eyes distractedly drifted to his chin. “Yes Daddy, I just-.”

“Oh!” Suddenly he shot up from his cot and pulled himself up, using Severus’s sleeve as leverage. The boy bounced on the heel of his feet and tilted his head to peer at Severus’s chin with wide eyes and great interest.

Severus sighed. Of course, the feather. He almost forgot about its presence and was more than glad to let Harry sleep rather than mention anything. There was no need to do that, apparently. The feather was found.

Severus sighed again, and sat back on the bed, pushing Harry back into his cot as the bed dipped under his weight. He raised his eyebrows at his son, and Harry’s grin returned. The boy was jumping on the bed in his excitement.

“I found it!” he yelled again before he burst into a contagious bout of giggles. Of course, he did, Severus thought dryly. A seven-year-old would laugh at a crack in the wall, a feather on his father’s chin that was ‘in no way deliberately put there?’ That must have been hilarious.

“Found what, you little brat?”

“The feather!” Harry gasped. “It looks funny,”

“Are you telling me that there’s a feather on my chin?”

Harry bobbed his head with a groggy grin and pointed at the inked feather with his finger. “There it is Daddy! Look! Someone drawed-”

Sev cut in. “Drew.”

“Drew a feather on your chin!”

“You better hope it’s not you Harry.”

“Or what?” Harry leaned heavily on Sev’s arms to balance himself on the bed.

Severus had to take a deep breath to stifle the urge to move Harry’s hand away from his arm. The touch was burning the skin underneath his sleeve, a result of Harry’s excitement, undoubtedly.

“Or…I’ll sell all your toys.” He said, fleetingly distracted by the pain. He pasted another smirk on his face and gently eased Harry back in the bed. “Sleep now,” he brushed the boy’s forehead with the back of his hand and stood, trying his best to look composed. Push through the pain, he told himself. Pain is never permanent, Harry’s good night ritual is.

“I love you, Daddy,” Harry mumbled just as he was by the door.

Severus hesitated, just for a beat as he did every night. As though he was surprised by the declaration every time. Harry never noticed of course, and Sev always got himself together in time to say “I love you too,”

He felt like saying more, telling Harry that he wasn’t the only one, that his biological father and Lily had loved him even more than Sev, he felt like striding back over to the seven-year-old and hugging him again, in spite of his throbbing arm, but he didn’t.

He was a coward. That’s why Lily left him. He was incapable of showing emotion, and hearing that somebody actually found it in themselves to love him on a daily basis wasn’t easy. Not for him anyway.

He knew exactly how Harry saw him. As a strong unbeatable force that could do no wrong. Severus was Harry’s hero, and Sev felt guilty enough to take the blame for that huge misjudgment on the child’s part.

Severus was all Harry saw and interacted with daily. The other children-even though they were all muggles- could sense Harry’s power pouring in ripples out of him, shimmering and radiant. It bled in the background like a dull ringing. It felt suffocating, overwhelming, even, and it made other people very uneasy. The children avoiding his son, as a result, didn’t come as a surprise to Severus.

He also didn’t fathom that his child was taking it hard either, Harry already had a best friend in his guardian and it was all he had known all his life. He didn’t feel any void, or any loss at not interacting with these people, because he just didn’t know what it felt like.

You cannot miss the things you never had.

In spite of those conditions, Severus had made it blatantly clear that Harry wasn’t allowed to touch other people. In fact, anyone that wasn’t Severus himself was out of limit.

There were…instances before, where Harry had unknowingly hurt others when touched. Once when Severus made the gigantic mistake of leaving him in a local Daycare for a single day as he was too busy brewing an order…the other, was two weeks ago, at the park.

The daycare debacle was enough to convince Severus never to leave his child’s side again, not after the idiotic muggle woman had overwhelmed Harry by forcing him to interact with other children. Harry had been paralyzed, by the attention and the abundance of that many children around him. And had struck out. Unexplainably leaving the damn muggle with a jarring, gushing gash on her arm.

She called in a panic. Severus rushed over, erased her memories, and pretended as if nothing had happened. He didn’t ask Harry about it, and the boy had been more than glad to forget the disastrous experience before they had even moved houses again.

It wasn’t a big deal, Severus reassured himself. Harry would be fine as long as Severus was there to protect him. So what if he got a few burns or scrapes along the way? It didn’t matter as long as Harry was safe.
It didn’t matter as long as Harry didn’t mean to cause harm. A child, as innocent and as pure as his son never could, but Severus hoped that his nurturing would also prevent such an occurrence.
The throbbing burn on his arm calmed with that thought and Severus almost smiled.

**

“We used to have storytimes when I was a child.” He swallowed the lump in his throat. “It was our thing. It seems hard to believe for you people, that Severus Snape, the notorious death eater, the ‘murderer’ would lay down next to his child every night and tell him stories until he drifted off to sleep. But he did, he did it every single night without a fail.”

“One night, when I was six or seven, I asked him to tell me a new story, one that he couldn’t find in the books on my shelf. He told me the story of ‘the little fawn and his raven’. He left earlier that night, so I sneaked out of my bed, and followed him, I don’t know why.”

“I was so confused when he winced and reached for his potion bag, but maybe I shouldn’t have been.”

He remembered that night the same way he remembered his own name. He remembered shrugging off the blankets that Dad had tucked him in, the floorboards that were freezing cold against his skin. Sending jolts through his body and making him shiver as he quietly trailed the man downstairs to the kitchen.

He didn’t know why he’d done it, maybe to play a game, a late-night round of hide and seek, jump out of the corner with a loud ‘Boo!’ and then throw himself into Dad’s arms and win another story, or maybe somewhere deep down, he knew that something was wrong with the man.

Dad didn’t notice him sitting near the kitchen entrance, with his neck craned over his shoulder to peer at the older man while his knees dug into the cold floor.

He watched then, with morbid fascination as his father peeled back his sleeve with a pained hiss and revealed burnt skin, marred with painful looking blisters and angry red handprints. Harry’s handprints on his father’s sleeve when he had hugged just a few minutes ago.

Harry gasped, he did cry too, silently as his dad winced and groaned and administered a healing balm on his skin without a single complaint. He didn’t know what he had done wrong, or how he had exactly done it, but he knew one thing.

Even then, he knew it was his fault. He had hurt Daddy, really badly, just by touching him. He had learned a valuable lesson that night, on the floor, while eavesdropping; his love hurt his Daddy, and his joy and happiness burnt , scarred and marred the things that he did love.

For a week afterward, Harry had refused to touch his father, long enough for his childlike logic to kick in and repress the memory, long enough for him to miss his father’s arms. But years later, he still remembered.

How could his father tolerate this? Tolerate the pain and the blisters and not make a peep, as Harry had unknowingly been the cause of it?

**

“I still don’t know the answer. I tried asking him once, actually more than once, loving a monster like me couldn’t have been easy. Loving and raising one? It must have been a nightmare for him. Whenever I brought it up though, he told me this particular story, of when I was still an infant and he took me shopping.”

“Shopping?” Kingsley said it in a way that alienated the meaning of the word completely. It was an irritating interruption that was quickly losing its appeal to Harry. He swallowed his anger with a long sigh.

“Yes, in a second-hand store in a nameless town. He’d only had me for a week by then, and he was running very low on money, and well…I was a baby, and babies aren’t inexpensive you know.”

**

Holding a baby for an extended amount of time was an absolute nightmare, Severus had found, and he was more than glad when he found the opportunity to sit Potter in a red plastic cart in a charity shop.

He didn’t think it was safe enough to let go of the child for even more than a second while they were still in London, in plain view, so he had kept Harry close to his chest with one arm and basically id everything with his other.

He had been caring for Harry for seven days now, and the effects already showed. Two distinct sleeping bags were nestled under his drooping eyes, his outfit was disheveled at best and outright shabby at its worst. Severus had spent every second of those seven days taking care of a moody, supernatural baby who could blow things up at will.

It was a miracle that he was even standing on two feet, really, Severus couldn’t afford weakness. They were on the run, from practically everyone who once knew of their existence.

Severus’s whole life was charmed into a shrunk bag in his pocket, all the money he had-which wasn’t much- outside of his vaults had been traded into muggle money in a shady crook in Knockturn alley at midnight.

Severus had even convinced himself to sell his most cherished potion ingredients for a bit of extra money until he could find somewhere to settle. Now they were out of London, seven days later, in an unassuming town that he had picked at random. In a charity shop, because Severus couldn’t even fathom finding a regular store with the amount of money he currently had and had no idea how to use.

Muggle money was such a pain to handle, and he regretted not learning their system much sooner than this day.

Harry didn’t protest as he was put down in the cart and instead looked around with awed interest. He was a very silent child, Severus had found. The child hadn’t babbled or baby talked with Severus at all in these past seven days, and his most preferred form of communication with the man was either wailing, or silent staring.

Severus cherished the silence, but still couldn’t allow himself to lose composure.

“This is a charity store Potter,” he quietly told the child as he looked around. “I’m hoping that this will be our first and last visit.”

This place seemed discreet enough for a while. Severus might even consider renting a cottage in this place until he figured out how he was going to go about this.

He needed a job. Obviously. And a new name. Also obvious, since he couldn’t find said job with his own identity. By now, almost everyone must have known about Severus ‘kidnapping’ the boy who lived. Severus got to glimpse at one paper or two on his late-night visit to the Knockturn alley.

“Alright, Harry,” he took a hold of the cart and gave it a slow experimental push. What a queer invention, he thought in slight amusement as the wheels rolled the cart forward. Muggles were such strange creatures. “Let’s see what we will need.”

He could have stolen the things they needed, easily, with not an ounce of a nuisance. These were muggles. Not only he could have stolen what he wanted, but he could have easily erased their memory and gotten away with it.

Instead of using his Slytherin cunning, however, Severus found himself pushing the cart once again through the crowded aisles. Harry stared at him in silence, as if applauding Sev’s honorable choice and newfound morals, and Severus glared back, cursing under his breath.

“As if you would know any better if I stole a thing, Potter,” he grumbled, and Potter grunted in reply. “You cannot even tell your toes apart from your thumb.”

Harry made an indignant noise at Severus’s snide jab. Sev rolled his eyes at the baby.

The store was empty, with the exception of a plump middle-aged woman behind the counter, holding a muggle newspaper in her hands. Quaint muggle music was playing from the radio, enhancing the coziness of the cramped shop, and Severus could already see the sun setting from the storefront and let a tendril of anxiety slip past his Occlumency shields.

They had no place to stay the night. He had to find a motel, maybe charm the muggles or persuade them to let him stay and then go in search of a cottage the day after.

Potter squealed in delight as Severus rounded the cart and stood to examine the baby clothes. Potter only had three sets in his diaper bag, and that just wasn’t cutting it.

“You should see what riding a broom feels like Potter,” Severus said with an amused smirk. “This cart on wheels wouldn’t even compare.”

The baby waved his arms and held the cart’s bars with interest to peer at the shelves. Severus left him to entertain himself and then turned to the clothes with a slight sneer on his face. It was bound to get very cold soon, and the baby needed warmer clothes, anything warmer than the overalls he was wearing now. They were also out of diapers, but Severus had yet to see any packages here, he would have to go to a convenience store for that.

He had packed as many clothes as he could have himself, including his robes, and winter attire. The furniture too, Severus had picked out anything that wasn’t too magical and would function as a muggle device later on. He wasn’t an idiot. He had to make use of what he already had.

So, clothes and diapers for Potter, also a cot, for Potter, a winter jacket for himself as all he had were his thick wizarding robes, maybe a few books on muggle etiquette, if he managed to find any, and also one on parenting.

Because Severus had no idea, what the hell he was doing. It had taken him nearly fifteen minutes to figure out how the diaper worked on Harry’s first change, nearly double that time to figure out what babies could and couldn’t eat and an embarrassing amount of time to bathe Potter without the fear of nearly drowning the baby. At one point after each task, he found himself questioning his intelligence before Potter demanded his attention again.

He could heartily understand the difficulties new parents went through, and he envied them more because of that extra nine months they got to figure out the things Severus had to teach himself in seven days.

He picked out a fuzzy blue overall and held it out to Potter. “How do you like this one?” it looked warm enough, and the price tag was showed a decent amount. At least, Severus thought it did. Muggle money baffled him.

Harry tore his eyes from the shelf he was staring at and reached a hand to pat the overall. Then he looked at Severus for approval. Sev winced. That was a new thing, Potter had picked up ever since the pillow incident seven nights prior.

“Very good Harry,” Severus nodded, somewhat awkwardly. “Do you like it?” as Harry patted the attire again Severus found himself rolling his eyes at himself. He was asking a baby whether he liked a piece of second-hand clothing? What was wrong with him!?

He dropped the overall in the cart and picked out another one, this one a light red with cartoonish birds on it. Potter ‘oohed’ and ‘awed’ at it as it was thrown into the cart and Severus took that in stride.

“Yes Harry,” he said distractedly. “I’ve told you about birds, haven’t I? Their feathers help us make pillows.”

Potter squealed again, and Severus ignored him and went through the aisles with narrowed eyes and a conscious state of mind. He had a very limited budget after all.

It wasn’t until Potter’s squeals shifted to angry protests that Severus bothered gazing at him over his shoulder to check on the boy. There were two rows of purple tinsel levitating above the cart, one lazily wrapped around the baby’s neck as Harry tried to reach for the other.

Severus cursed and dove to catch the levitating spangle and potter’s protests morphed into silence cries. “For the love of merlin Potter,” Severus snapped, with the tinsel twisting in his hands. “Get yourself together.”

Potter’s cries increased in volume, and the muggle woman craned her neck to stare at them. Severus glared her down and turned back to Harry. “Harry, stop crying. Please.”

He handed the tinsel to Potter but the waterworks were already into play and Potter decided that he needed to throw a tantrum, right then in the shop with a muggle woman around.

Severus scooped him up in his arms and prayed to merlin that Harry’s magic wouldn’t act as irrationally as the one-year-old himself. He bounced Harry in his arms and distanced himself from the cart, Harry was stilling gripping the tinsel, and it flowed behind them as Severus walked the boy back to the aisle that held the ridiculous things.

This is why he never wanted children. He thought with a groan. It took them years to put their common sense into some use, and that on itself was a miss or hit opportunity with most.

“Here they are you brat,” he said to a sniffing Harry as the tinsels came back in sight, and the muggle woman was blocked from view.
Harry sniffed again, and pathetically whimpered as Severus handed him the tip of a green sparkly chain. “Oh quit it, you,” Severus grumbled and untangled the green one from the others. “You’re getting what you wanted.”

Severus had to take two other rolls of that deplorable garland and the snow angel ornaments before Potter quietened down and nothing was about to blow up anymore. Hesitantly, Severus put Harry back in the cart, this time surrendered with more than five strings of tinsels in vibrant colors. They made an annoying whooshing sound that Harry seemed very fond of, and Severus closed his eyes to stifle his annoyance.

If this kept Potter from causing havoc and destroying their cover, then Severus really didn’t have much of a choice in the matter.

He picked out the first suitable cot he could find in the pile and then rushed to the counter, the winter jacket had to wait then since he hadn’t anticipated Potter’s holiday ‘shopping’ to get in the way of his precise planning.

Harry cooed and held one of the snow angels to Severus with a huge grin on his small face, and Sev closed a hand around his. He couldn’t stay mad at the baby, he couldn’t lie to himself about that.

“Very pretty, isn’t it?” he muttered and Harry hummed. Severus pushed the cart to the muggle woman.

“You’re going to be absolutely intolerable at Christmas, aren’t you?” Severus smiled in spite of himself and then shook his head. It used to frighten him, to have a strong bond with the baby, or grow attached to him, but he couldn’t help himself.

He didn’t see Lily or James in the boy, all he saw was innocence and purity that he had sworn to protect no matter what.

“Single Dad huh?” the muggle woman asked with a raised eyebrow.

Severus paused and contemplated his response. They were strangers, she couldn’t possibly know them, and she didn’t look particularly threatening.
“Yes,” he kept his voice curt, and deftly piled the cart’s content on the cashier’s desk.

“Yeah, I gathered,” the redhead woman said, she had a thick Scottish accent that wasn’t unusual in the area. Severus ignored the woman and eased Harry out of the cart, with the tinsels still wrapped around him.

“It’s obvious you’re new to this you know,” the woman had the gall to say as Severus was coaxing the snow angels out of Harry’s hands.
Sev paused to glare at her. “Isn’t everyone at first?”

The woman’s smile annoyingly remained passed on her face as she checked the tags for the prices. “Oh well, that’s true.” She shrugged and drew out a plastic bag. “What I meant was, that you seemed so enamored with him, it’s cute to watch,” Severus’s scowl deepened at her words.

Cute? He wasn’t cute! Harry looked at Severus with the same indignant look on his face that the man was inwardly wearing. ‘Really?’ his face seemed to be saying. ‘Is cute the word for it?’

She bagged the clothes and the cot and then looked at the baby with a toothy grin and pruned eyes. “And looks like your lad’s started the holidays a bit early huh?” Severus drew back before she could reach and touch his face and then stared at her.

She stared back, undisturbed. “Shall I add the tinsels and the ornaments?”

“Yes,” Severus said through gritted teeth and stared down at Potter. “We should get you off those so she can-”

“Oh there’s no need!” the woman exclaimed, her voice chirpy with mirth. Although, Severus wasn’t quite sure what was so mirthful about their situation. “Let him have them, I can ring up the prices just fine.”

He nodded, his shoulders slumping as the woman hummed and clucked at Harry with that irritating baby voice that some adults did whilst talking to children. Severus ignored her and Harry, he was so tired.

He wanted to hand the baby to the woman, if only for a moment and then sprawl on the ground and just sleep. It was dark outside, they had no place to sleep for the night, Potter was going to get hungry soon, and Severus himself had been ignoring his own groaning stomach for two days now, in a measly attempt to save some more money.

He had to find a motel, find a store to buy other supplies for Harry, make sure the baby didn’t get upset enough to blast the roof down, forge a new identity, and also find a way to make an income without giving his skills or his name away.

When it was time to pay, Severus sluggishly drew out half of the parchment money he had in his pockets and handed them to the woman, whose nametag read Mary.

Mary looked at the money with raised eyebrows, and only took two of the bills. “That’d be enough sir,” she said with a soft smile that Severus abhorred but was too wrung out to complain about. “Here’s the change.” She handed him a few coins and a bill and slid the bags over with a small wave to Harry.

“Have a nice evening!” she said as they were leaving and Severus nodded. Harry actually managed to wave back twice with the snow angel tightly clenched in his fist before he stopped and gazed at it in wonder again.

Sev stepped out into the street with a deep breath and a glance over his shoulder.

Much much later, when he had remembered the incident, he noticed that she must have tricked him while receiving the money and had given the tinsels and the ornaments away for free. If she hadn’t done so, Severus couldn’t have bought Harry his other supplies.

If strangers, such as her, managed random acts of kindness such as this, then who was Severus to complain about getting to love and protecting this child who already means the world to him?

Plockton, Scotland, December the 3rd. -1989

“Carefully Harry,” Severus almost reached out to steady his son’s hand. “Loosen your grasp. That’s a very delicate plant, unlike its origami counterpart.”

The nine-year-old adjusted his grasp. “Like this?”

Severus leaned closer to inspect the plant with narrowed eyes. He wasn’t feeling all that great that morning, and he was uncharacteristically nervous too. This was the first time he and Harry went out unprotected. Usually, Severus had the necessary wards, or protective measures all figured out before he even thought about allowing Harry out of the house.

He was getting reckless, and he wasn’t sure that was a good thing.

“Yes,” he finally nodded and straightened his back. “Hold it by the stem, these barely flower. This is certainly a rare sight.”

They wouldn’t have to stay long, Severus reasoned with himself. The chances of them, running into anyone were beyond slim. It was cold, and about to snow. It made for an ideal ingredient-gathering trip, but no sane Muggle would get out here by the river unless absolutely necessary.

They were fine. Sev breathed deeply.

‘You’re fine. Stop acting like an idiot.’

He adjusted his Occlumency shields and glanced over at Harry, who had his tongue out in concentration as he plucked one flower after the other. It made for an amusing sight and Sev couldn’t help smirking. Before, he would have never guessed that parenting would be such a rewarding responsibility. His own parents certainly didn’t see, to think of him as a reward, and Severus had taken it upon himself to look down at anyone who was foolish enough to bring a child into this world.

Well, he couldn’t have been more wrong. His parents weren’t right either. Parenting was one decision that Severus never regretted making. It was beyond rewarding, Harry wasn’t just a part of his world, he was his world, and Severus couldn’t imagine his life without the brat.

That’s what parenting felt like.

Harry stood and stared at him. “Dad? Are you sure these are the ones?”

Severus shook his disgustingly sentimental thoughts away and rolled his eyes “Why would I lie to you about the plant’s name?”

Harry pouted and then paused to dispatch his flowers on a nearby rock. “Because you’re the one who turned my hair pink!” he huffed. “It’s obvious you want it to stay.”

Severus snorted. The brat had it coming with the pink hair, and Sev was more than glad to punish him for leaving his things around the house and underfoot. Severus’s foot had been almost victim to Harry’s Quidditch action figures laying around the floor.

The pink hair was a fit punishment. One that Harry severely hated and Severus immensely enjoyed.

“It brightens your face and you know it,” he calmly said in reply. “It’s merely parental suggestion Harry. The color suits you.”

“Dad!” Harry’s indignant flush was almost bright enough to match his hair. The boy’s hands laid on top of his head as if to protect them against Severus’s amused gaze.

“Yes, yes, fine.” Sev knelt beside his son and examined the delicate yellow flower head. “These are spring buttercups, used in the antidote we’re about to brew.” He gave Harry a look. “Although I still strongly approve of that hair color.”

“Really? Then why don’t you turn your own hair pink?”

Severus huffed with mock indignation. “No thanks, I love my hair the way it is.” Harry scoffed. “Glossy and enriched with color.” Severus reached and ruffled Harry’s hair with a face. “Yours is just a bird’s nest,” Harry squirmed and yelled, Sev continued with raised eyebrows. “The color might actually help keep the animals out of it.”

Harry pushed a kneeling Severus sideways into frozen grass and laughed at Sev’s put-out expression. This is what happens when your best friend is your son, Severus thought to himself with an inward sigh. As retaliation, he pushed himself back up and ruffled Harry’s hair again, much to the boy’s annoyance.

“Dad you’re unbearable!”

“And your hair might just stay pink forever if you keep handling that flower like a rag doll! Show some delicacy child.”

Harry sulked but obeyed nonetheless.

“Oh for Circe’s sake,”

“What is it, Dad?”

Severus cursed under his breath and then pinched the tip of his nose, he looked uncharacteristically upset. “I forgot the vials back home. I cannot believe I forgot to take them. I always have them with me. Some potions master I’m supposed to be.”

“Don’t say that Dad. Come on…cannot you just rush back to the house? We’re not that far, it’ll take less than five minutes.”

“We cannot carry them in our hands,” Severus reluctantly admitted.

Harry’s grin spread across his face. “Exactly, and I can stand watch,” he innocently glanced down at the flowers. “Maybe extract a few more of these while you get back?”

Dad looked at him for a beat. “Are you going to be alright?”

“Yes Dad, it’s going to be like five minutes, I can manage for that long.”

“You’re right, and I can find you fairly easily with that hair.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Now you’re just being cruel about it.”

Severus reached over and gave his hair a slight ruffle. “I won’t be long at all, don’t move, and stay out of trouble.”

“I don’t see how much trouble I can get into in five minutes.” Harry batted the hands away. “Don’t be weird about this Dad. You’re making a big deal out of it.”

“Alright, you brat.” Severus gave him a fleeting one-armed hug. “Be careful with the stems.” And then he was walking away, his pace quick and efficient and his coat billowing behind him with a dramatic whoosh. Harry stared at the man’s back until he faded from view. Then he stood motionless for several moments before his shoulders sagged in amazement.

He was alone.

Harry looked around with wide eyes, ready to take in his surroundings without his father around, and found it very disappointing when the image didn’t change much. The river was still half frozen, the pine trees were still standing tall, and the flower in his hands didn’t perish in his dad’s absence.

But he was alone, truly alone. Not only Dad was nowhere in sight, but he also had no way of watching over Harry, and Harry had no way of knowing what he was doing at the moment. An exhilarating thrill ran down his spine and Harry rolled on his heels with a grin.

He was alone.

He had no idea what to do with this new, fleeting sense of freedom that was quickly overcoming him. He felt a bit guilty for feeling relieved at once, it’s not that he didn’t enjoy his dad’s company, he did, Dad was his best friend, but this was…this feeling was wild. Besides, Dad was going to come back in a few minutes anyway. Harry could let himself indulge in this feeling for that long.

He leaned down, with the grin still taxing the muscles in his face and dunked his free hand into the freezing river. He had no idea whether Dad would have allowed him to do that, had he been there, but he didn’t particularly care. The cold water matched the exact replica of the excitement pooling in his stomach. So what if his fingers turned red and hurt a bit? He was doing it because he felt like it.

He breathlessly chuckled as he stood, a bit embarrassed by his own antics. Honestly, it wasn’t as if he was a freed prisoner, Dad wasn’t his jail keeper. He was just overly careful, that was all. Harry didn’t mind his dad being with him all the time, he really didn’t.

But maybe deep down, he did mind a little.

He would never let the thought ascend to the surface of his mind, would never let it linger for more than a beat, but it was there, sometimes, lurking in a dark corner of his mind. An annoyance that Harry was adept at stifling, just as he did with his anger.

‘Don’t let yourself linger on useless emotions Harry,’ his dad always said. ‘They’ll chain you down in one spot. Don’t let them stop you from moving, ever.’

His dad had a very strong opinion about Harry’s anger issues.

As he crouched to pluck a few more buttercups when he heard chattering from the distance. Harry stood immediately, his eyes narrowing as he determined to distinguish the vague shapes getting closer from afar. There were three of them, loudly jeering and talking as they strolled in Harry’s direction.

The nine-year-old tensed. He hadn’t been in someone else’s close vicinity in a while now. This was his first time ever encountering other people alone. Dad was always there, making sure that Harry didn’t screw up. well, he wasn’t there then, and Harry was all alone.

They looked to be close to his age, maybe only a few years older, maybe they were nice.

Harry nervously adjusted his hair, feeling his heart painfully beating against his ribcage as the teens closed in on him.

‘Just be nice to them,’ Harry told himself. ‘Wish them a merry Christmas. Don’t do anything freaky. They’re normal people. They’re not Dad, Harry.’
Harry wrung the flowers in his hands and tried his best to look casual as the teens finally noticed him.

The tallest, brunette one noticed Harry first and elbowed the other boy. The third teen looked to be the youngest and strongly resembled the blond elbow guy. They were still a few feet away from Harry, and he self-consciously threw them a sideways glance.

Don’t turn yet, he reminded himself and shakily exhaled. He really didn’t want to screw this up.

“Look at that fancy boy over there Jake.” The blond said.

Harry frowned. Was he talking slang? Harry didn’t know whether the words were offensive or normal speech. He quickly wiped the expression from his face and decided to wait until the brown-haired boy responded.

“I know that guy,” ‘Jake’ said. “He’s the creep living out of town with that scrooge guy or something.” They all were close enough to touch Harry now, and Jake roughly shouldered past him, almost sending Harry to his knees.

‘He has a crappy sense of balance,’ Harry thought with a smirk and straightened himself.

“Hello,” he gave a timid wave. The boys jeered rather rudely and looked amongst themselves before staring back at Harry with mock bewilderment. Harry had already screwed this up, by the looks of it.

“Well would you look at that Mikey…” the third, younger boy turned to the Blond. “The freak talks too!”

The smile died on Harry’s face. “Excuse me?”

Mikey snorted and the other boys sniggered, which Harry found ridiculously immature. Were these guys for real? He mentally shrugged at his own question and smoothed his expression to a slight frown.

The boys couldn’t be older than fifteen years old and Dad did always mention that teenagers were dumb. Not that Harry would personally know, his interactions with people, especially muggles, in general, was very limited. Were all muggles this rude? He didn’t know but decided to be nice about it anyway.

“I’m sorry, I’m afraid I didn’t understand.” He said calmly. As calmly as he could manage. His father would have been proud.

They started circling him. “Don’t overwhelm the weirdo with big boy words…” the boy, who looked about thirteen leaned into Harry’s personal space.

“A little baby like him wouldn’t get it.”

“I’m sorry-”

“You should be,” Mike cut in, bits of spittle flew out of his mouth and sprayed Harry on the face, and Harry grimaced, leaning away from the disgusting creature. “Look at his face.” Mike snarled. “He looks worse than the dirt under my shoe.”

Keep calm Harry. Keep calm. Don’t disappoint Dad. Don’t disappoint him.

Things were still in control. Harry knew that. He just needed to show these people the error of their ways, and maybe they wouldn’t be as rude anymore. It was all a misunderstanding. It had to be. “That’s really mean,” Harry snapped back at the boys. “Why are you treating me like this? Have I done something to offend you?”

Jake and the youngest boy, Alex, towered over Harry’s much shorter stature. “Yes you have,” Jake roughly shoved Harry back against Mike’s chest and Harry winced. He was acutely aware of how close they were to him, and he didn’t like it. “You’re alive. That’s offensive enough for me. How about you Mike?”

Instead of Mike, Alex pounded his fist into his other hand with a nasty grin. “I say we teach this little shit a lesson.”

“I don’t want to get into any trouble,” Harry held up both hands. “My Dad-.”

“What? You gonna go tattle to your fucking scrooge-like a little crybaby?”

Alright, that wasn’t fine.

They had no right to talk about his father that way. They had no right.

“Don’t talk about my Dad like that.”

“Oh!” Mike shoved him back to Jake, and the other boy did the same. “What you gonna do about it? Throw your flowers at us Nancy boy?”
They were really getting on his nerves. “Stop it.” Harry forcefully said. He didn’t want to lose control, not in front of these people who already thought he was a freak.

“He’s right Alex. Let’s get this little shit a proper beating, his father probably should’ve done it sooner.”

And then they were on Harry, savagely kicking and punching as the boy went down, the flowers forgotten, Harry cried out and blocked his head with both hands to hinder the hits. One of the boys had a stick that he was using to jab Harry in the back as the others took the front. Harry curled into himself, but the kicks made it to his stomach anyway, and it hurt so much that the air was knocked out of his lungs and Harry couldn’t breathe.

He had never felt pain like this, insistent and dense, like a dull knife repeatedly jamming into his stomach. It hurt more than the sharp kind. Throbbed more than the swift longing pain that didn’t last.

He yelled, he cursed, and he tried, oh how he tried to keep his temper under control.

Conceal it, Harry. He told himself through the pain. Control yourself. Don’t let the monster win.

Dad is on his way.

Dad had to be on his way.

“Listen you shit!” The Jake boy said after a vicious kick to Harry’s jaw. “This is what you get for being alive, you hear me?” Another kick, then a jab from the stick that ripped through his jacket.

“This is your fault. It’s all your bloody fault.”

**

Harry withstood Kingsley’s horrified expression with ease. “That’s the thing he became infamous for, isn’t it?” he asked of the man instead. “Severus Snape, child abductor who stole the boy who lived, also terrorized and killed three muggle children, 1989, third of December, in Plockton. It was obvious who did it. The area reeked of his magic. The children were mutilated, unrecognizable. It could only have been the works of a monster.”

Dad would applaud the amount of sarcasm dripping with his every word. “The monster that used to hang around the likes of Fenrir Greyback.”

Kingsley shifted in his seat, he did that a lot more often than Harry was anticipating. He looked uncomfortable. Well, he should be. He was the reason Dad was in prison.

“But it only got worse, didn’t it?” Harry viciously drawled every word. “Before you could get even a whiff of this atrocity, another one struck. A fifteen-year-old boy, one of the muggle’s older brother was also murdered the same day near the river, and not found until two days after. This time, you were sure that it was Snape, even though you couldn’t find any signs of him anywhere. But it must have been him right? Who else would have fit the profile as well as a soulless unhinged force of evil who could hold a grudge?”

“The way you speak implies that you don’t think we were right,”

Harry scoffed. “Oh no, the tone of my voice is simply implying that you are a bunch of brainless idiots,” He waved a hand and leaned back in his seat.

‘That’s the problem with most people Harry,’

‘What is, Dad?’ Thirteen years old him asked, still naïve, still an idiot.

‘They’re all a bunch of brainless idiots.’

“You heard how that story began,” he said aloud. “You think you know how it ends, well, I suppose you might as well sit and listen to the middle.”

“The boys assaulted you?”

Harry ignored the question. “Why do you think people demonstrate great acts of violence?” he swiftly reached in the file for another piece of parchment and idly started folding. He didn’t care what was written on it about his father or himself. All lies…every single one of them, he was more than glad to turn those ugly words into something beautiful.

“What is in that act, what sort of emotional gratification does it give some people who carry them out?” Harry kept his head down on the paper even as he spoke. He knew what he was going to make.

When Shacklebolt didn’t interrupt, Harry continued with a small shrug. “Well, I personally think it has got nothing to do with the violence itself.” Then he looked up to stare the man in the eye. “It’s always the intent.”

“It’s rarely because it feels good. Some say, that strong acts of violence require a strong sense of empathy, and others say that empathy has little to do with violence.”

“I believe both. Voldemort had no empathy for my father when he shredded him to bits. He had less than that for my poor mother when she stood between us. He didn’t need empathy to kill them and then attempt to kill an infant. All he needed was self-preservation and fear for his own life.”

“Then you have people, like my father, who had no empathy for the muggle children who were found dead after beating the shit out of me, instead his empathy was turned on his own child, and the fear of what would happen to me had they caught us. He didn’t mutilate those muggles because he liked to inflict violence. He did it so you thought he did.”

He slid the paper flower over to Kingsley. “He did it because I killed those children.”

**

“Can I put the angel on top? Please, Daddy! Please!”

“Alright, but you have to be careful. We spent hours on these decorations, it would be a shame if it got damaged.” It was true, Harry and Severus had spent the entire morning- including breakfast time- to make the origami ornaments, not one of the ones used in the decoration was real. Severus had issued the challenge two days ago after coming back from the markets with two thick stacks of origami papers in his arms and Harry had gladly accepted.

They had made almost a hundred of those things, too many for their tree, but Harry was unstoppable, and Severus didn’t have the heart to stop the boy once he was on the roll. Origami calmed him in a way that nothing else could, not even Severus himself had the power a piece of paper held before Harry.

“I can reach!” the child exclaimed loudly as he waved the paper angel in the air. Severus rolled his eyes at the child and adjusted a hanging blue paper ornament. This was the fifth time he had been forced to decorate the house for Christmas, and all of those times it had been for Harry’s sake.
Severus was never a holiday person himself, in fact, he rather he was caught dead rather than with anything festive near him. Obviously, children knocked personal preferences out of the park, and it wasn’t too bad. No one would see Severus happy and smiling at Christmas but Harry, and who was Harry going to tell?

They lived in isolation.

“Of course not, silly. You’re too short.” Harry made a sound in protest, and Severus had to remind himself that the child was only five years old. Better not let this turn into a tantrum, he thought and quickly leaned down to scoop the boy in his arms.

“Alright, I’ll hold you up. Be very careful not to touch the tree itself.”

Harry giggled, wildly waving his arms and legs in the air. “I’m doing it!”

“You are,” Severus nodded with a resigned frown. “Now, be careful there, don’t kick your feet!”

The tree shook lightly as Harry’s light kicks rustled the leaves, and Severus had to step back, in fear that the tree would topple or Harry’s accidental magic made sure that it fell Harry protested the move with a whine and a wriggle. “But I’m flying Daddy!”

This time, Sev couldn’t hide his rolling eyes. “We’ll fly later,” he promised. “Put the angel on top of the tree first.”

Harry clumsily fixed the angel in his hand and strained to reach the top. Severus rose him higher and finally, the tree topper was in place. The child clapped and giggled and Severus had to smirk at his antics.

He carefully lowered Harry back to the ground.

“Can we have cookies for Santa, Daddy?”

“Cookies?” Severus didn’t remember mentioning this to Harry.

The boy bounced his head and stared at the tree.

“He’ll be hungry!” he exclaimed with wide eyes. “When he brings our presents!”

Severus thoughtfully hummed. Maybe he had mentioned it to Harry in passing, while they were talking the other day. He didn’t recall Harry requesting cookies for Santa the year before. It was entirely new. What was worse though, Severus was quite sure that they didn’t have any cookies left in the house, and it was too late to leave Harry alone by himself to go get some more.

“Well, I’m sure he would get some refreshments from the other houses,” he picked Harry and brought him to the couch. “He’ll visit so many houses that he would be quite full by the time he reaches us. We don’t want to make him sick now do we?”

Harry looked genuinely disgruntled. “But,” he bit his lip. “He will be sad.”

“Oh Harry,” Severus couldn’t help but say. While this was a precious demonstration, and Severus found it endearing, he couldn’t help but fear that this might turn into a heated tantrum. His son was a toddler, and toddlers cried over nothing. Now when other children cried over nothing, no one got hurt…the same couldn’t be said about his son. His incredibly selfless, sensitive son.

“And then he’s gonna-.” Harry sniffed. “He’s gonna forget our presents!”

“No, he’s not.” Severus drawled. Children’s sense of logic was ridiculous sometimes. He hugged Harry to his chest. “I’m so sorry Harry, but I forgot to buy cookies,” Harry gasped and Severus sighed. “I’m sorry.” He said again.

“Cannot you go now?”

Severus followed Harry’s eyes to the window and then winced. “It’s too dark already, I’m sorry.” He put his chin on Harry’s head. “I’m sure Santa wouldn’t mind. We’ll leave him a note, how about that?”

Harry drew away to look at him. “With cookies?”

“Not the cookies, no.” Severus tried to remind himself that Harry was only five. Children weren’t often rational enough to be convinced the first time. Severus probably had to explain this all night, and even during story time before Harry slept. “But maybe you could draw him some? I’m sure he would like that more than the real deal.”

Harry hummed. “But he cannot eat that!”

Severus pursed his lips. He didn’t mind being patient with Harry. “How about you make him origami cookies?” he sounded gentler. “We haven’t learned how to make those yet, and I’m sure he’ll find it very funny.” He slid Harry off his lap and onto the couch. “We can leave them out with real milk, and maybe some carrots.”

Tentatively, his son slipped off the couch and trailed after him. “He won’t be mad?” he asked quietly.

Severus shook his head. “Not at all, I promise on his behalf.”

“Are you and Santa friends, Daddy?”

Sev saw the opportunity and gripped it with both hands. A friendship with Santa could prove vital for later use when he wanted Harry to listen to him without throwing a fuss.

“Oh yes,” he told the small child with a bit of guilt tinging his voice. “We have met a few times.”

Harry gasped in wonder, almost running into Severus in his excitement. “You know Santa!” he hugged Severus’s legs from behind. “Daddy knows Santa!”

“I sure do,” Severus was already regretting this.

“Santa’s your friend Daddy! You’re cool!”

“Wait,” Severus stopped walking and peered down at the grinning boy. “I wasn’t cool before?”

Harry contemplated the question. “You’re always cool,” he decided and patted Sev on the leg twice before letting go, a habit that had stuck with him since infancy.

“I really am?”

The child nodded. “You’re the coolest.”


**

Severus didn’t register the scene before him immediately. He had been as fast as he could without running, rushing back to the house for the forgotten vials and his wand, and then ran out of his house without locking the door, which forced him to turn again, and charm it closed while he swore under his breath.

Harry would have been fine, he thought he knew that, logically. The bridge was deserted, and Severus-despite the slight delay- wouldn’t have been gone for too long. Harry should have been fine. He should have been.

The scene before his eyes told a different story. The vials fell to the ground as Sev’s legs tumbled into a run. Harry sat on the frozen ground, on his knees, his face bruised and bloodied, almost beyond recognition, eerily similar to James Potter’s face minutes before dying. Around him laid three other children on their backs with their eyes open and void of life.

They were dead.

Severus numbly reached Harry’s side, crashing next to him with a force that almost reoriented his kneecaps. Harry was panting, his eyes glazed and staring ahead as if he couldn’t really see Severus staring at him in horror.

He closed his hands on Harry’s shoulders and moved until he was right in front of him. he examined his son’s face. He couldn’t have done it on purpose, he couldn’t have. He was injured, have taken a nasty beating by the looks of things. It was an accident. It looked like an accident.

“Harry,” he gently shook the child’s shoulders, but Harry was gone. He looked to be miles away. “Harry, look at me, come on now,” Severus was afraid of jostling him too much, one wrong move and he might end up next to the dead muggles, and who would take care of Harry then?

With great caution, Sev hesitantly brushed Harry’s blood matted hair away from his face and repeated himself, patiently, painstakingly waiting for some light to come back to Harry’s eyes.

“I didn’t mean to-” Harry heaved a choked sob, “I didn’t mean…they just-.”

“You didn’t mean it, I know. It’s okay. It’s all right, look at me, Harry,”

“They’re…they’re not moving-they were-hitting me-I cried- and I told them to stop-I told them to stop Daddy, and-and-and-.”

“Shh, just breathe, it’s alright. It was an accident, I know.” They couldn’t remain there. Three muggles were dead, they had hurt his son and now they were dead. In Severus’s eyes, it was not too much a price to pay, Sev himself probably would have killed them had he witnessed the beating…but in the Ministry’s eyes, things were different.

They would arrest his son, regardless of his status they would throw him in Azkaban. His nine-year-old son.

Not just his…James and Lily’s too.

“Don’t touch me.”

Severus blinked. “What?”

“Don’t touch me! You’ll die! Go away!”

Severus endured the weakened punches with a frown and held Harry tighter to his chest. Harry’s palms against his chest were uncomfortably heated, and Severus was resigned to the fact that they would most likely burn through his clothes. “No I won’t go away,” he hushed the thrashing boy. “Calm down Harry, shh.”

“They were hurting me,” Harry gasped.

“I know,” he knew, oh merlin, he knew. It was his fault. All, his fault. They wouldn’t have dared raise a hand on his son if Severus had been there.
“I didn’t mean to! I swear I didn’t mean it Daddy, I didn’t mean it!”

“I know, you need to calm down, we need to get out of here.”

The air stilled around them, and Harry’s magic poured out of him in agitated ripples, disturbing the plants and the bodies with a wild wind. His child looked terrified. “Are you mad?” he breathlessly asked. Sev shook his head, slowly and Harry whimpered. “Daddy I’m scared.”

“No I’m not mad,” he was terrified. “I’m never mad, alright? But we need to move, now Harry. They cannot find us like this.”

“Their moms and dads…” Harry’s eyes went disturbingly wide. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry! I just wanted to play, but they were hitting me, and it hurt! I tried not to get angry, but they were hitting too hard! And saying mean things about you! I’m sorry.” Severus realized that the child was just repeating himself in nonsensical babbling; he must be in shock.

Severus couldn’t handle a shocked, injured Harry and three bodies. He didn’t even have time to dispose of those three bodies without leaving a trace. He had to take Harry back to their house, pack what they could and run.

This was his fault, Severus realized. His recklessness had killed three children and traumatized his highly volatile son. Just one little slip, and now…Severus shook his head. He didn’t have the time to scold himself. He needed to think, he needed to move.

“Harry, you were very brave,” he drew back from his shaking son. “Look at me, look at me now…” subtly, he snuck a hand in his robes to retrieve his wand. “I need you to do one more thing for me alright?” Harry stared up at him, dazed and shaking. Severus repeated himself a few times and adjusted his grip on the wand. He needed Harry out of the way to take care of the corpses. “One thing and this will all be over.”

Harry stuttered and then trailed off before gazing at Severus with a wild desperate look in his eyes. “You can heal them?”

Severus gently tugged him back into his arms. The less Harry saw of the gore and violence left in the scene, the better. “No baby, they’re gone.”

Harry burst into tears, loud ugly sobs tore themselves out of his mouth, carrying with them the child’s loss of innocence. Severus wanted to seat there and hold him for hours, for days and mourn the loss of innocence with him, but there was no time.

There just wasn’t any time.

“Listen to me,” he kissed Harry’s head and brushed his hair away. “Just one last thing…” his pleading grasped Harry’s waning attention. The boy sniffed and looked up at him. “I need you to sleep,” Sev muttered.

“What?”

Severus tapped his wand to his son’s temple and murmured, “ Somnium .”


**

“I cannot remember anything beyond that, the rest, he told me afterward. When I woke up, I looked fine, I wasn’t injured any more, my hair was back to its original color, and it was still December. I think I was asleep for a few days, our house wasn’t the same, I don’t even think we were in England anymore.”

“He didn’t let you go out?”

“I didn’t want to go out, Shacklebolt.” Harry snapped. What an imbecile, he thought with an internal sneer.

It was beyond Harry, how they had maintained their jobs this long with this level of limited intelligence.

“I had killed four muggles at the age of nine.” He stated the obvious through his gritting teeth. “I was bloody traumatized. It took Dad months, almost a full year to make me somewhat functional again, took him weeks for me to let him come near me…then the snow fight happened, and we had to move, again.”

The table was almost littered with little origami pieces, mostly flowers, and Shacklebolt’s file was increasingly getting thinner. Harry realized, with slight amusement, that the Auror might have to call in for some extra parchment. “I know that you still don’t believe me,” he told the man. “But you should.”

“This doesn’t explain Murphy Lynton’s death.” Kingsley didn’t even bother masking the skepticism on his face. “Mike Lynton’s brother.”

“I can assure you that his death was still my fault, Shacklebolt.” Harry sighed. “I couldn’t believe it at first either, I hated myself for it, but Dad…the way he explained it all to me, didn’t make it seem as if I was some monster. It was just an accident.”

Harry swallowed, and desperately wished that he had a glass of water nearby. He stretched the silence as long as he could and then cleared his throat, deciding that the water wasn’t worth it, and he couldn’t beat around the bush any longer. “Murphy Lynton died the same time his brother did,” he admitted. “Dad found his body hiding under the bushes as he was carrying me back.” Harry couldn’t prevent a sneer from creeping onto his face.

Mikey liked to hit, and Murphy liked to watch.

“There just wasn’t any time for cleanup, and you were going to assume it was him anyway…” it made him sick in the stomach...thinking about those wretched people…thinking about his dad, all alone and desperate and not knowing what to do. “That’s why he mutilated the children. My trace was almost non-existent.”

“Don’t you believe that they deserved justice?”

What sort of logic was that? Harry thought with a frown. He was nine years old, a child in the law’s eyes. And it was an accident. He knew that now. He never meant to kill people for justice.

What did nine-year-olds know of justice anyway?

“I don’t believe any justice to be warranted for people who beat up a nine-year-old, Auror Shacklebolt.”

The Auror furrowed his brows. “They didn’t deserve death.”

Harry spread his hands. “I agree,” he hummed. “And my Dad didn’t deserve to take the blame for it. But here we are, with those teenagers dead and my father in a cell.”

“I just have too much power for my own good…Blame it on whomever you like. It cannot be helped,” it wasn’t as if the power thrilled Harry himself all that much. “And Dad was the only thing that kept me together, and whole and sane.”

His absence was glaringly obvious in his stature now. Harry knew that at some point origami and mental insults weren’t going to cut it anymore. He needed his father. He needed Dad, telling him to calm down, looking him in the eye and breathing in sync with Harry just like when he was a child. He wanted to be in Norway, with Dad, in their plain where it was just the two of them and nothing else. No one else.

“Sometimes, when the anger management methods didn’t work, he took me to this place…in Norway.” Harry wasn’t sure he should be enclosing that bit of information, but the rest of the story made no sense without it. Dad would forgive him for it, eventually.

‘If he survives this.’ The voice in Harry’s head hissed. ‘If he survives another one of your screw-ups.

Harry ignored the voice.

“A beautiful plain, and unhabituated, fortunately for us. It was our safe place. He jokingly called it our ‘hiding spot’. We were always playing hide and seek.”

They were still playing. Dad had always told him that they never stopped playing.

‘But what if they find us Daddy?’ he had asked as a clueless child. ‘Don’t we lose then?’

‘You and I never lose Harry,’ Dad had said. ‘You and I are the winning team, together.’

Olly Olly oxen free, Dad.

“Norway,” Kingsley repeated in disbelief.

“Yes,” Harry couldn’t resist rolling his eyes any longer. “It’s a breathtaking place. We’ve only been there a few times, the last time being…” he suddenly cut himself off with a snap and gazed up at the Auror.

“Before I tell you about that,” Harry pursed his lips, his eyes hooded. “You need to know about the 3rd of March.”

Shacklebolt quickly dipped his quill in the inkwell, ready to write. “Which year?”

Harry smirked. “Every year.”

“You weren’t the first people to discover us,” Harry was saying. “Dad was so careful about these things, all the time. Right under my nose too,” he shook his head. “For nearly half of my childhood, I had no idea that we were the ones running away,”

“It wasn’t that Dad was particularly good at hiding it,” the desk was clattered with numerous pieces of artwork, whereas once it looked blank and threateningly interrogative. “He was just too good at running away. He was an expert at it. I wasn’t allowed to talk to others or interact with them in any way, I was more than glad not to, after killing off a bunch of them. That certainly made things easier. If I didn’t talk then I couldn’t screw things up. He got us new identities every time, a new life, he even changed the cars we pretended to own as we ran away.”

“Methodical,” Harry ignored the man’s dry, sardonic tone. He was good at ignoring other people.

“The person who found us…was not human. I don’t think that he was. Dad almost never mentioned him, I’ve only seen him twice, heard him speak once. I know that he isn’t a big fan of you guys either,”

“Do you remember his name?”

“Yes, he introduced himself to me a while after our first meeting. He had a deal…going on with Dad. I saw Dad throwing out his deliveries every Christmas, all the time. He told me they were from ‘Santa’s only enemy’,” Harry rolled his eyes.

Kingsley cocked an eyebrow as well. “Did he introduce himself to you as Santa’s only enemy?”

“No, just a surname. Lupin. That was his name. Lupin.”

“Remus Lupin?” Kingsley looked far more flabbergasted than Harry was expecting. So much so, that Harry suspected that the man personally knew Lupin himself.

“Yes, him,” Harry said. “I’ve only met him twice.” And the last time ended up with him and Dad being found out, so Harry wasn’t exactly fond of Santa’s sole nemesis.

“Did you get to speak with him?”

“No,” Harry lied, quite easily. The word just rolled off his tongue. “Dad handled both interactions. He’s good at intimidating people.”
An innate talent that Harry had hoped that he had inherited but was greatly disappointed when he found out that Dad wasn’t his biological father and more like the man who had abducted him.

“Well, he was a Death Eater,”

“He was more than that,” Harry snapped back. He hated how Shacklebolt kept circling back to the fact that his father had a tattoo on his forearm. It was ages ago, Dad almost didn’t remember its presence half the time. They had a whole other life apart from this madness. The most he had to worry about were origami papers and his potions, and occasionally about running away. his death eaters days were all a blur. Or so, Harry was told.

“There was no room for mistake, not a single incident to get out of his grasp. The kindergarten was obviously a mistake so he Obliviated the whole place, leaving the muggles’ bodies behind was a mistake, but he mutilated them beyond recognition. He was a death eater for a reason.”

“Are you proud that he is a Death Eater?”

“He’s not proud of it,” Harry took a deep breath. ‘Don’t you snap now, not now’ he told himself and opened his eyes. “I’m not spouting about good and bad,” he said in a chiding tone. “I’m talking about survival. That man saved my life,”

“From what? That’s what we don’t understand.” Kingsley set his quill down. “There is absolutely no threats to your life Mr. Potter,”

Harry raised an eyebrow at the pitying look in the man’s eyes. He knew exactly what he must have been thinking. ‘Poor little orphan boy lied to and traumatized beyond help,’

“I’m being held in an interrogation cell as a minor while my father is in prison,” he snapped. “Don’t let my calm demeanor assuage you, sir, I feel very unsafe in this environment.”

“My father,” he swallowed. “My biological father begged the man he could barely tolerate to take me and run for our lives with his last dying breath. I never questioned their motives because they were right. You don’t understand this,” he nodded to himself with his chin, his eyes bearing a hint of desperation. “You haven’t seen what I can do, but I have. My dad, he wasn’t entirely worried about you hurting me, he was worried about you taking advantage of this thing that I have. He was worried, that once you saw what I could do, you would…”

“Do what?”

Harry scowled. “Let my Dad go if you want to find out.”

“He’s a convict Death eater.”

These bloody people, with their bloody names and titles. Harry gritted his teeth and wondered at the utter stupidity of a man twice the size of him. “He’s a spy caught in crossfire,” Harry growled. “Every single crime committed after Voldemort’s fall had been on my account. Every child you think he’s killed, I have, every harm inflicted on muggles you’ve thought he’s responsible for has been on my account. Every. Single. One of them.”

It took him a single beat to notice that the bookshelves were shaking, and the curtains rustling with a breeze that couldn’t possibly be occurring indoors. He sat back, gulped and wrung his hands. He promised himself. This wasn’t going to be easy, but Harry knew better. Dad had taught him better than getting mad at trivial stuff like this.

“March the Third.” He nodded to himself. That was what he wanted to talk about in the first place. Just state the facts and then hope for the best and if the best wasn’t enough…well, Harry would think of something then. “Dad…he took us, to Norway, every year, since I was six. He said…uh, he said that all of this pent up magic is doing more harm than good, and I wasn’t exactly a saint…he had to find a way to deal with my temper tantrums without destroying and killing anyone.”

Which didn’t end nicely for those muggle boys he’s killed, not at all. Harry had insisted the visits to be more frequent after that incident, in fact, at one point, he was begging his father to take him there and leave him behind. He couldn’t hurt anyone in utter isolation. Dad, of course, flat out refused even to consider Harry’s offer.

“Every March, we packed our bags and went ‘camping’” Dad loved his code names. “I don’t know where beyond the fact that we were in Norway. It was a lovely plain, surrounded by endless rows of mountains, and not a single soul would have known about us.”

“What was so significant about March the third?”

“There wasn’t a shred of significance about that day.it was just the day that I had been pushed too far. I don’t even remember why, but I had a temper tantrum of some sort…And Dad just scooped me up and went to the first unhabituated place he could think of.”

‘Let go?’ Harry had squeaked. His face red and tracked with dried tears. This would help, Dad had said. They were alone now. Harry could be mad. He already had a headache thinking about the damage he was going to cause, and he was absolutely terrified of hurting his dad. He was standing too close, almost in reach. Harry held on to the imaginary leash in his head and yanked it further back.

‘Yes, Harry just let go,’ Said Dad.

Little Harry hugged himself and looked around the wide plain. ‘But you said…’

‘I know what I said,’ Dad was trying his best not to look irritated. ‘But I’m also saying that you are allowed to let go now, let the monster out.’

Harry couldn’t understand the phrase, or what monster his father was talking about. Harry and his magic were the same, at least, Harry thought that they were the same. He gently prodded the volatile waves and screwed his eyes shut as it rippled in response, wild and thrashing.

‘Daddy I’m scared!’ there was a strong wind blowing, running through his hair and drowning out Dad’s voice in the distance. Harry shrank away from it, away from himself. This was wrong. He knew it was wrong. He could hurt people. Burn Dad again. He didn’t want Dad to get hurt.

‘Harry! Harry! It’s alright.’

“It was alright,” Harry shrugged almost in sync with his father’s voice in his head. “He said that doing it was the healthiest approach we could have taken. He said that…restricting my powers would make the monst-.” Harry caught himself just on time, cleared his throat and continued. “Me, more dangerous, something about an Obsucurus?”

Kingsley hummed. “And you released your magic every year on that date?”

“Yes,” Harry ignored the cruel twist in his stomach. “With a single exception.” He hated remembering that day. He abhorred himself the most when he thought of how he almost killed Dad because of that stupid, stupid mistake.

‘I hate you!’ he had cried. Naïvely, stupidly, shouted those words at his dad, hurled them at him with every bit of hatred in him.

Dad had barely flinched. He knew Harry enough to know that Harry mustn’t have meant those words. But he did. Harry meant every single word. He believed in them then, in the heat of the moment.

‘Harry wait,’ he was swiftly trailing Harry as the boy hopped from place to place in sudden bursts of uncontrolled apparation. This could gravely injure Harry, he could splinch himself, or worse. In Harry’s eyes, Dad was like a shadow, something swimming in his vision as Harry appeared from place to place. Something unreal, just like the monster Severus always insisted that resided in Harry’s soul.

‘YOU LIED!’ he was irrational with rage. ‘You ALWAYS lie!’ another sharp snap and Harry was panting on the other side of the plain, at the very edge of the valley that led to the rock bottom. He couldn’t bear the thought of his father getting close to him. He hated that man. He hated him.

Severus easily changed his course and started approaching him, his face a perfect mask of serenity mostly for Harry’s sake. ‘Calm down, let’s talk-.’
‘Talk!?’ Harry screamed, out of pure frustration. Dad wasn’t getting it. He didn’t understand how unbelievably ANGRY Harry was at that moment, how easily he could shove Dad off the cliff with a single nudge of his hand. He didn’t understand. “No! I don’t want to talk! You lied to me!” Harry was an idiot.

Dad stood, and just stared at him, and Harry didn’t see the look in his eyes. Not really.

He just took the silence as confirmation. ‘You’re not even denying it!” he yelled. “You’re not even my real DAD!’

‘Harry, NO!’

“The last time we went there…” Harry winced at himself. “I almost killed him.”

**

A hand shoved at his side. “Daddy?” the little voice whispered, and Severus groaned. He rolled away, yanking on his sheets. It was too early for this.
The little body followed the blankets and hastily crawled to the other side of the bed to face the sleeping man once again. He gently poked Severus in the eye. Sev expertly reached out and grabbed the hand before he could be poked again.

“Hm?” he grunted with closed eyes. If he was tired enough that he couldn’t bear opening his eyes, then surely it was too early for him to be dealing with Harry.

Ten more minutes, he groggily promised himself. If the boy hadn’t tired himself out in ten minutes, then Severus would get up.

Harry’s other hand wriggled in Severus’s hand and patted him on the cheek twice. “Wake up.” the boy murmured, his hand radiating heat where it was pressed against Sev’s cheek. He snuggled deeper in his covers. The bedroom was unusually cold, now that he really thought about it.

Another pat came and Sev knew that Harry’s face was inches from his. He could actually feel Harry’s eyes burning through his closed lids. Oh, for the love of God, he thought and sighed.

“Harry?” he croaked.

The child hummed. “Daddy wake up.” his small fingers poked Sev’s face all the way to his mouth until his fingers pulled the sides of Severus’s mouth upwards. Sev batted the hand away and finally willed his eyes to peel open.

He pushed the small boy off his chest. Harry willingly cuddled Sev’s shirt. “Don’t put your hand in my mouth Har-.” Severus paused at Harry’s loud snort. He pruned his nose and closed his eyes. “Merlin, did you just wipe your nose on my shirt?”

Harry meaningfully paused with a loud sniffle, then looked up at Severus with wide eyes. “…No.”

“You did,” Severus rolled his eyes and grimaced at his damp shirt. Children were gross. He let the apathetic voice whisper in his head and he rolled his eyes at it. Gross or not, he wanted to sleep.

He pulled Harry back down with him. “Come on, go to sleep again.” it wasn’t even light out, and Harry was already up and about. He usually didn’t exercise early rising habits with the child, in fact, Harry was worse than Severus himself when it came to getting out of bed in the morning. This morning was an oddity.

Harry wriggled in his arms with a pout. “No Daddy!” he sounded shrill with indignation. “We have so many things to do!” his body was much warmer than Severus’s himself, and that made him pause. Had he left a window open or something? He was unreasonably cold compared to his son. Harry reached his arm to wipe his nose as if to confirm his thoughts.

“No we don’t have anything other than sleep.” he pulled the covers over them. “Sleep. And stop wiping your nose with your arm-.” he frowned. “Wait, why do you have a runny nose?”

Maybe he wasn’t cold, and Harry was unusually warm. Suddenly, Severus was much more awake and sitting up. He pulled Harry up on his lap and stared at him.

His hand pushed the boy’s fringe out of his eyes and settled on his forehead. “Are you sick?” he muttered and then swore. Sick was a nice way of putting it. Harry was burning up. He pushed himself off the bed in an instant and scooped Harry by his elbows.
“No!” the child miserably complained.

“Yes you are,” Severus held him to his hip. He needed a fever-reducing potion immediately. He did have a few vials left from his last order lying around in his lab. And then maybe a Pepper-up too, or a dreamless sleeping potion so Harry could sleep this off. Harold didn’t get sick often, rarely at all. Severus could count the times he had been sick on one hand, and none where it came close to Harry having a fever.

“You’re a bit hot.” He explained to the sniffing child. Would his sickness have magical ramifications? Severus honestly didn’t know. It hadn’t happened before, but then again, Harry had never had a fever before. Maybe he should get his son out of the house, get him somewhere isolated enough that a magical outburst wouldn’t cause any harm.

“No I’m not!” even as he whined, Harry coddled his warm face against the crook of Severus’ neck and whimpered.

“Yes you are,” Severus muttered, and opened his bedroom door. “Let’s get you back in bed.”

He flicked his wand at the fireplace and it was gently set ablaze, creaking and crackling upon the cooled logs. Severus needed to restock those this afternoon.

“But no!”

“Harry stop it.” his chiding went almost unheard under Harry’s uncharacteristic fussing. He has a fever, Severus told himself. Of course, he was going to be difficult. “You’re just a little sick,” he soothed a hand over Harry’s hair. “You’ll be fine with a bit of rest. I just don’t understand how you caught this… We haven’t left the house in weeks.”

Harry pushed himself off Sev’s chest and stared at him. “If I go to sleep, we cannot play anymore!”

Rolling his eyes, Sev reached for Harry’s door. “We’ll play later.”

“It won’t snow later Daddy!”

Sev’s mind went completely blank. “Snow?”

Harry nodded and Severus, with a deep sinking in his stomach, threw Harry’s door open.

Oh.

Snow.

It was covering every inch of his son’s room, a thick firm layer that must have started piling since the night before while Harry was sleeping. That’s how he’s sick, Sev thought, stifling the urge to facepalm, he made it snow, and then slept in it, waited and counted off the minutes until he could crawl into Sev’s bed to wake him so they could ‘play’.

“Oh bollocks.” He rubbed a hand down his face. He was too old for this.

“Bollocks!” Harry cheerfully chirped, startling the frustrated man who stared down at him with a soft scowl.

“What, no,” he snapped, unintentionally harsh. “Don’t say that again.”

“Why not?”

Severus huffed and drew out his wand. He needed to deal with all this snow. “It’s a bad word. Daddy shouldn’t have used it either, I’m sorry.”

“Bollocks,” Harry muttered the word under his breath in awe, completely unheeding to Severus’s withering glare. Great, he thought, now he had to find a way to drop that word off Harry’s mouth.

“Oh delightful,” Severus rolled his eyes, then he just stood there and glanced around the child’s room in dismay. “How did you-“He cut himself off. “No, wait, wrong question, why did you make it snow Harry?”

“Because-,” the boy loudly sniffed. “You were sad last night when the bad man came.”

“You were supposed to be asleep Harry,” Severus, in no uncertain terms wanted his son to remember the brief interaction with Lupin. The visit had taken many hours after midnight, had taken less than half an hour, Harry couldn’t have possibly been awake.

“But I wasn’t,” Harry insisted and Severus carried him to his bed, banished the pile of glittering snow and cast a warming charm. “He knocked on our door and then I got up,”

He laid the boy down in his bed. “Well, you should have been sleeping,” Severus insisted, checking Harry’s temperature, this time with his wand.
“But he was making you sad!”

“And you decided to make it snow?”

Harry shrugged with a snuffle. “You like snow Daddy.”

Sev’s face softened and he leaned back against the bed’s small headboard. “I suppose you’re right,” he said. “Did you hear the bad man and Daddy talk?” he couldn’t have, Severus had a silencing charm up the entirety of last night, but with Harry, one simply couldn’t know. The boy could’ve easily thrown the charm off without Severus being the wiser.

“No Daddy, but his mouth moved a lot.”

Severus shook his head. “Well, he’s gone now.”

“But you cannot eavesdrop on Daddy again, alright?”

He reached for the box of tissues on the child’s nightstand and shook the snow off before offering it to the boy.

“I didn’t like him, Daddy,” Harry said. “Is he coming again?”

“No, never again,” Severus muttered. “Don’t think about him, or we’ll lose the game, alright?”

Those were the magic words for Harry. As soon as Severus mentioned ‘We might lose the game’, his son’s eyes would go wide, and then he would nod as he was doing now, then he would snuggle into Severus’s arms and say;

“Alright, Daddy.”

**

“This looks unbelievable.” A plump purple-clad wizard gasped at Kingsley, his eyes almost bulging in their sockets as he stared at the two way charmed mirror that Potter didn’t know existed in the interrogation office. Harry could only see the bookshelves from his side, whilst Ministry officials stood in the other office, peering through the charmed mirror.

“Tell me about it, Warren.” Said Kingsley as he rubbed a hand over his face. Potter was left by himself in the office, making odd shapes out of file parchments and making a few float around his head. “I had him analyzed by the mind healers, and he’s not wrong in the head,” he scratched his chin. “Or traumatized by his time with the guy, he’s not under any influential spells, no Unforgiveable curses-”

Warren cut him off with a snort. “He doesn’t look fine to me, Shacklebolt. The boy had transformed that entire office into a kids’ birthday party.”
Shacklebolt exhaled through his nose. “Yes, he seems to have…certain quirks.”

Warren raised an eyebrow as he waited for his colleague to elaborate. “He acts as if his name isn’t Harry Potter,” Kingsley started. “He claims his birthday is March the third, and not July 31th, he seems to have trouble looking at me while speaking-.”

“Did he seem timid?” Michael interjected. “Signs of abuse?”

“No, oddly enough.” They both turned to stare at Harry. “He looked as if he was doing me a favor by ‘containing’ himself. He seems very prone to anger, or I’m just frustrating him.”

“That’s messed up, but were you expecting anything less than a boy raised by that scum Snape?”

Shacklebolt hesitated, looking at Warren as awkwardness coiled in his stomach. Potter’s depiction of Snape wasn’t one that was widely known about the notorious man, in fact, Potter had genuinely seemed to believe that Snape was a model father, while Shacklebolt knew well that most victims of long-term abuse made such suggestions out of sympathy all the time.

And the murders? Merlin, the murders. The Auror winced. He was still waiting on the head of Magical child Care and Family support to stamp the approval for the usage of Veritaserum on Potter to confirm his confession. Deep down, Kingsley knew that he didn’t even need the Veritaserum, hadn’t it been for a formal procedure.

The haunted look in Potter’s eyes as he confessed was enough to make him believe that the child had done it.

It wasn’t as if it was the first time a magical child had severely harmed muggle children with accidental magic. Albus Dumbledore’s younger sister was a similiar case after her own harassment before she had died. In fact, the incident was so jarring that the Auror responsible for the case had outright quit and the poor girl had never been the same before her death. Kingsley had heard the stories, about unstable magical outbursts, regressed mental capacity, how her mother had died in an explosion caused by one of those outbursts. It was heartbreaking really, and to think, that Snape had supposedly lived with that for fifteen years and survived. Potter didn’t seem regressed, or unstable, but Kingsley would not really go as far as comparing him to a healthy magical child.

Something about this case, about how vividly Potter depicted the muggle boys harassing him bothered him.

And Snape’s actions afterward proved that the man wasn’t all that he had been cracked up to be. Kingsley seldom knew of any parent who would mutilate dead bodies to stave off suspicion from their ward. Not many people, Arthur and Molly Weasley, maybe one of the very few, but not many people that Shacklebolt knew would do such a thing, even for their own child. Much less a child they have abducted for revenge.

“You alright there mate?”

“Yeah,” Kingsley rubbed his neck. “Just a bit tired.”

“We can switch places,” the other man offered with a bit of curiosity bleeding into his voice. “I could take a go at cracking the boy who lived.”
“No, no, it’s fine.” He had promised Potter that he would stay and listen until the end. “Just ask a fellow to bring us some food when I go back in, the boy looks famished.” Although he doubted that Potter would trust anything enough to consume it while he was under arrest. He pointedly hadn’t touched his tea and then exploded the blasted thing into smithereens.

“Make sure it’s wrapped, unopened. He thinks the food is contaminated.”

“He does realize that we could easily charm any potions directly into his food without him knowing, doesn’t he?”

“I don’t think he knows, no.” Potter seemed not to know that much about the magical world at all. Kingsley couldn’t tell if it was a deliberate move on Snape’s side, or merely a coincidence.

“Do you think it’s true? His ranting about Snape’s treatment of him? Because I’ll be honest mate, it all sounds like obsessive dragon dung to me. You should have him checked by the healers again.”

“Maybe.”

Warren didn’t seem to detect Shacklebolt’s distracted tone. “Snape and storytimes I mean really, are we talking about the same man who tortured a woman into insanity with a manic potion? A Potion of his own creation? Please…he’s delusional, crazy even, if you’re asking me.”

“Well I’m not Warren,” Kingsley suddenly growled. “Mind your own damn division.”

“Hey! It’s not my fault Potter’s gone coo-coo in the head! You should watch out for your own neck while you’re alone in a room with him, remember Ariana Dumbledore? Poor Smith, he was never the same after her.”

“They’re not similar.”

“Yes, they are. Magical disturbance at a young age, both assaulted as children, unsteady magical levels, unstable emotional state.., you don’t have to tell me these Kingsley, I’m head of the Magical Disturbance Department for a reason you know.”

“Yes, you did your homework, well done Warren.”

“I think you should let me have a go at him.”

“Pardon me?”

“Aside from the mind healers,” the man shrugged. “I’ve studied this nearly half my life, and I’d admit, he seems fascinating, from a psychological standpoint. We don’t get cases like his often.”

“No thanks,” Kingsley was hating this conversation more by the minute. “I’ll stick to it myself.” It wasn’t even that he found Warren particularly irritating, but he felt as if there was a toothpick lodged into his head, tingling at an amiss piece. Either Potter wasn’t giving all of the information out front, or he was and Kingsley was absolutely missing it.

The nagging feeling only sank deeper when Potter’s tale got more gruesome, it probed at his head as the boy intently avoided his gaze, glared at his wand, or asked for more parchment. Shacklebolt was missing something, something that Potter clearly wasn’t capable of saying out loud. Especially with the recording charm in place, Kingsley thought.

“Whatever stirs your potion Shacklebolt.” Warren was saying. His voice was loud enough to snap Kingsley out of his stupor. “He’s gonna end up in our department after Snape’s prosecution anyway.”

“Wait, isn’t he going to the Magical child care and family support? He would be considered an orphan, eligible for adoption…as any other magical child.” As far as he knew anyway. He didn’t get to handle cases involving children often. Potter’s case was obviously different, more sensitive. It was sensitive enough that the Minister himself didn’t see it fit to let it pass from the Auror’s department.

Warren shrugged his shoulders, annoyingly chipper. “Problem is, he is not any other magical child.” He pointed out. “Who’s gonna adopt the boy who lived?” Kingsley frowned at the man as he continued. Warren caught his frown and narrowed his eyes, leaning closer to whisper as if afraid others would eavesdrop on the conversation. Even though they were standing in an empty hallway.

“I’ve heard from the big boys up in Fudge’s arse that they’re going to keep him in the ministry’s custody for a while.” He said. His voice was hushed.
“It is what Potter had agreed to after all.” Warren snorted. “‘His father’s freedom, in exchange for his ‘services’” he made air quotes with his chubby fingers. “Merlin,” he blew a breath with raised eyebrows.

“Now that’s some messed up shit.”

“Whatever,”

The door opened behind them and a young woman almost went headfirst to the ground. Tonks caught herself by the door’s handle and then grinned at him.
“Shacklebolt!” she carelessly waved with a gleaming vial in her hand as she peeled herself from the door.

Kingsley’s mouth twitched. “Auror Tonks,”

Tonks flushed, and the tips of her hair sprang into a deep red in shame, she cleared her throat. “Oh yeah, Auror Shacklebolt,” she corrected herself. “Your approval letter and the Veritaserum dosage.” She passed the clear vial along. “They also requested a pensive memory of the administration and the interrogation that follows.” Shacklebolt nodded, a normal procedure so far, he knew those things already.

“And a witness, I presume?” hence the two-way mirror charm installed by Warren.

“Yup!” she flopped down on a chair near the men. “That’s why they sent me.”

“Nymphadora,” Warren tipped a head in greeting and Tonks’ mouth curled in revulsion.

“Warren.”

His eyes narrowed, raking across her flaming hair color and the haphazard state of her robes. “Still trying to fit into adulthood, I see.”

The young woman rolled her eyes. “Still failing at normal social interactions I see.”

“Touché.”

Shacklebolt glared them down. “Let’s hurry this up Tonks, the boy is getting tired.”

She hummed with a frown. “Where are we keeping him for the night?” the men turned to look at her in confusion. “One of the holding cells?”

“No,” at least, Kingsley didn’t think so. “He’s an underage child, of course, we’re not holding him in a cell, he’s already wary as it is.”

“Most abuse survivors are, as you know Tonks,” Warren drawled. “Although I wouldn’t expect a rookie like you to understand delicate complex cases such as this one.”

Nymphadora looked as if she wanted to throttle the man with the depth of her glare. “Oh screw you Warren,” she finally snapped and flipped her file open.

“Ladies,” the third Auror growled, “keep it down.”

**

“You’ve done something to the room,” Harry said as soon as Kingsley stepped back in.

“I brought you more paper,” said Shacklebolt who had been fully prepared for the boy’s accusing tone of voice. Of course, he knew that the room had been saddled with an extra charm. Shacklebolt tenderly shifted the vial on the stack of paper and then sat down.

“Do you know how to make paper cranes Potter?”

Potter eyed him and then the vial in quick succession, and then leaned back against his seat with narrowed eyes.

“That’s Veritaserum,” he said, quite blankly. Just stating a fact.

“Don’t worry about that now,” the Auror promised and then pushed the stack across the desk.

He leaned across the desk, his head tilted to the side. “You know what they say about paper cranes, don’t you?”

“A thousand grants you a wish,” Harry automatically replied and then reached for the first paper, his eyes darkening as if he had just heard a morbid joke. “This is clearly less than a thousand,”

Kingsley shrugged.

“It’s enough to get you started.” He said. He grabbed the vial and then slid it across, next to the neat stack. “First, I need you to repeat your confession about the murders again under Vertiaserum. The questions will only be regarding the incident while you’re under the influence, this is a ministry approved and I’m entitled to assure you that we are being recorded and then the memory will later be used in a pensive.”

Harry, perhaps for the first time since sitting in that chair, hesitated. “Will it help my Dad?” he asked, biting his lip.

Kingsley was fully expecting the boy’s question. “I believe it will.” He said, honestly. Potter’s confession would certainly lighten Snape’s load. Not by much, but four murders were a start if any.

“I’ll do it.”

**

“Do you know what they say, about paper cranes Harry?” his father had asked, seemingly a lifetime ago. They were sitting cross-legged on Harry’s bed, both occupied with a small paper in their hands. Harry refused to leave his bed, had been doing so for the past few months, ever since…the accident.

Harry was under the impression that if he never left his bed then his magic could do no harm. Severus didn’t correct the misguided belief but didn’t encourage it either. His son just had to accept and forget the incident on his own time, and since this wasn’t hurting anyone, not even Harry, then Sev saw no harm in permitting it.

“They have sayings about Origami?” Harry asked quietly, meekly. It was heartbreaking, to watch a nine-year-old boy sound like an old weathered man who had been through hell.

“I heard someone saying it at the market today, a gossiping lady with a child on her tail,” Severus shrugged.

“You eavesdropped on them?”

Severus ignored the salty tone. “A Japanese legend claims,” he said. “That if you build a thousand paper cranes…then the old gods grant you a wish.”
Harry paused to stare at him, hesitantly. Severus ached to reach out and pat him on the shoulder, hug him and tell him that everything will be alright, that it didn’t matter that those blasted children were dead, to snap him out of this haze already. He was a child, he shouldn’t have been through something so horrific and then feel guilty about it. He shouldn’t be bedridden and miserable.

But he couldn’t, Harry hadn’t allowed Severus any physical contact since he had exiled himself to his room. He even refused to get out of that blasted bed for meals, couldn’t even stomach the idea of food for nearly two painful weeks.

Slow progress, Severus told himself. Small baby steps.

“A thousand paper cranes?” Harry repeated and then looked at the one in his hands.

Severus hummed, trying to act unimpressed. “Yes, apparently the price of eternal happiness is one thousand paper cranes and an old muggle lady away.”

Harry shrugged. “Well, I guess I have the time.” he dropped his eyes and turned back to his parchment.

They had all the time in the world for eternal happiness.

Right.

At first, Remus was sure that he was mistaken.

There were no possible explanations as to why his nose had picked up on a random scent in the street and immediately associated it with James’s distinctive scent that he hadn’t been able to find since his…death.

It was a mistake, Remus was half-insane, or the wolf was just messing with his head too close to the full moon, it didn’t matter. The scent wasn’t even completely James’s, just a shallow mingle of it that faintly reminded him of James. It was a mere coincidence, and Remus really had no place sniffing other people in the street to indulge in his fantasies.

James died. He told himself. He had seen the body, he had buried the torn body, alongside Lily’s prone one, he had seen them rest in a matching coffin under suffocating piles of dirt and hardened soil, he had visited their graves nearly every night for years, even fallen asleep by their sides by accident once or twice. There was no questioning that two of his best friends were dead, three of them, if one counted Peter.

And Harry too.

Sweet, innocent Harry, whose smile was the brightest Remus had ever seen, and the sound of his laugh absolutely melted his heart. He was gone from the first moment he had laid eyes on him and he wasn’t the only one.

Harry wasn’t just any baby, he was James and Lily’s, he was pack, and he was the best baby ever to be born anywhere in the history of the world, and no could change his mind. He and Sirius…He and Sirius adored Harry, James, and Lily, in their compassion for the infant had ascended to an intensity that never could have been reached. They were smitten, absolutely enamored with the little bundle of miracle.

James wouldn’t have shut up about him, Lily could barely stand being separated from him, Sirius and Remus played every trick in the book to try and gain babysitting time when they weren’t constantly crashing on Lily’s couch to spend more time with the baby.

“I don’t how I lived before this Moony,” James had told him one night, in their living room as the baby dozed against his chest. It was completely dark, with a solitary candle flickering on the table, Lily was asleep upstairs and Remus was staying the night.

Remus saw what he meant. “I cannot imagine my life without him either,”

“I cannot believe he’s ours,” James said with a nervous chuckle. Harry stirred but didn’t wake. “I feel like the universe is pulling a prank on me. Lily is the love my life, I’m married, we have a kid now! What if this isn’t real?”

“James, you’re clearly sleep-deprived.” Remus had said with a roll of eyes. “Go to sleep.”

“I’m serious though!” they both shared a wary glance and then gazed away, smirking. Sirius would have had a field day with this joke had he been there.

“Never gets old,”

“After eight years of it,” James confirmed.

“He’s not even here to make the joke himself,” Remus complained, half-heartedly as his smirk broadened into a grin.

“I think that’s the greatest prank Sirius’s ever pulled,” they hummed and settled back on the couch.

“Do you think that someday you’ll wake up and he’ll be gone?”

“No, I just…I cannot believe this tiny human being belongs to me, well us. Lily and I that is.”

“Easily the biggest accomplishment of your life then,” Remus said.

James nodded, thoughtfully. “No arguments here. He’s too good for us, too good to be real.”

“You deserve good things James.”

“It cannot last forever though.”

He was too tired to deal with this. “Shut up James.”

But his friend pressed on. “Lily thinks so too.” He said with utmost devotion. “She thinks that the timing is awful. We’re in a war Moony.”
They had been giving this thought, Remus thought. Lily and James were seriously considering death in the wake of their son’s birth. This night couldn’t get any grimmer.

“You’re going to be fine.” Said Remus and closed his eyes, wishing that he could fall asleep on a whim and leave James and his thoughts behind on the couch.

“You don’t know that. Lily and I…well he’s already here.”

Moony cracked one eye open. “Exactly. You should stop talking before your stupidity transmits to your son.”

“We might die.”

“That could have happened regardless of the war. You and Lily are being overly paranoid, my friend.”

“Well the war isn’t helping things,” Prongs retorted, jostling Harry on his chest once again. This time, the small infant woke, softly crying and fussing in his father’s arms. James glared at Remus with accusation.

“You’re not wrong,” Remus admitted as James comforted the baby. “But It’s happening, so is Harry. You cannot stop one in favor of the other. Harry was born and he’s here now, but the war might end soon, so suck it up and stop talking like this mate.”

“You and Sirius would make great godfathers.” His voice was traced with a faint line of mocking, in a way that suggested James was severely insulted by Moony’s condescending tone and words.

“Oh for Merlin’s sake, shut up you twat! You’re not going to die.”

James remained bitter as Harry settled back down in a light slumber. “Lily and I made the right choice.”

“I’m half tempted to wake her so she could stop this idiocy. Honestly Prongs.”

“I don’t think we’ll die, I just think that maybe-”

“Maybe?”

“Maybe Lily and I should take Harry and leave before something happens, just in case. Remus, you know that Harry isn’t just any child,” James looked angry with himself. “He’s different, he needs a certain kind of care, and during this war-”

“No.” Remus voiced his thought without it even being processed.

“Hear me out.”

“You’re out of your mind James, it’s not sleep deprivation.” Prongs glared at him but it went unheeded by Remus. “Do you think that You-know-who is only rooted here? Bolted to one place?” he scoffed. “Don’t be an idiot. You should know this already.” They both paused for a beat until Remus delivered the final lash. “Fatherhood is making you irrational.” He said, trying to keep the contempt out of his voice.

It was true, not necessarily, what Remus believed as he himself was besotted with Harry, but James and Lily were more affected and rightfully so. Harry was a miracle.

“We were going to talk to Dumbledore.” James sounded hesitant already, his eyes shifting down to Harry. Remus could barely remember his best friend looking this disheveled and unsure of himself. He hated it.

“You could stop fighting a war,” he said, his voice unintentionally rising. “But you cannot run away from it. Not this one James.” Prongs looked away from him. “When you stop fighting, you become a civilian" the word rolled off his tongue like an insult. “A victim, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing,” he paused.

“But Harry doesn’t need you two to be victims right now. He needs people who are capable of making a better future for him.”

“I know.” The man bit out in frustration. “That’s exactly what I said to Lily,” he groaned and shook his head. “And she agreed but…isn’t it our job as new parents to at least try? I cannot imagine anything happening to Lily or Harry, or any of you guys, ” he paused for a beat. “But I have a bad feeling about this.”

He was being ridiculous. Remus thought in his head. He didn’t know that fatherhood did this to people, he didn’t know if he had a name for it yet, but James didn’t sound like himself at all. If Remus hadn’t spent the whole day with the man, he would have barely believed it to be him.

“We both should go to sleep Prongs,” he said aloud. “We’ll talk about this tomorrow. When we’re both in a better headspace.” and you’re not being an idiot anymore. Remus finished saying in his head.

He wondered if things would have been different if he hadn’t rebuked his friend so harshly. If he had agreed, prompted him to take their child with his wife and run, maybe fifteen months from then they wouldn’t have been dead. Maybe then, Remus wouldn’t have been the one forced to bury them.

As he rounded a corner, the scent got stronger, Remus staggered in his place, his eyes rapidly falling from one passing stranger to the other and finally pinning on a man’s back clad in black as he was hurriedly making his way down the shops. Faster than a striking curse, it occurred to him…that this couldn’t be James’s scent, but it could be someone related to him. It could be Harry’s.

Merlin’s soggy socks, Remus wasn’t sure, this could still be a mistake, but what if it wasn’t? What if Harry was alive, and this man knew him, knew where he was?

Remus didn’t have a single thought swirling in his head as he followed the stranger, all he could really feel was some remnant of his dead best friend clinging to a muggle man. The wolf screamed ‘pack’ in his head, and Remus was utterly convinced. Harry was close. He had to be.

He couldn’t see the man’s face, and he couldn’t get any closer without revealing himself. He pushed the wolf’s impatience to the bottom of his mind, and kept his distance, he would follow the stranger home, to ensure that he was being mistaken and it was just the full moon messing with him, and he would never think of this day again.

And if he wasn’t wrong…then this man could lead him to Harry, and Remus could save him, take him away from the cruel bastards who had been imprisoning him for years. Harry was supposed to be six now, and Lupin felt an unspeakable rage bubbling in his stomach at the thought of strangers abusing his six-year-old godson.

He had failed James once. There would not be a repeat.

**

“I know you’re in there!”

“Let me in.”

Severus let cool hatred wash over him in giant waves, his wand sparkled at the tip and his fingers tightened around it, knuckle white. He couldn’t believe Lupin’s idiocy. Did he really, for even a second, believe that Severus would be naïve enough to open that door, and not kill him in the most brutal manner that pathetic wolf could fathom?

“I can break it down,” Lupin, that irritating creature was saying. It was absolute nonsense, of course, he couldn’t break down any doors that Severus has warded, even Albus himself would find the task tedious and time-consuming, just long enough for Severus to take Harry and run. He had made sure of that.

He just needed to wait this out. Lupin wouldn’t stand there in the cold for forever.

“I know you have him Snape!” another fist came upon their door, and Severus sneered. That buffoon was going to wake Harry! With a quick wave of his hand, Severus quickly casted a silencing charm over the living room.

“I caught his scent on you, you idiot,” Lupin said, almost growling. “I know he’s in there, let me in!”

Harry’s scent, so that’s how he had found them, Severus had been wondering about the wolf’s sudden appearance, despite Severus’s extreme measures to make sure they could stay undetected for at least a year here.

That horrendous beast and his snot, always ruining everything for Severus, almost killing Severus, and now blowing their cover, two nights before a full moon. Sev had never hated anyone with the same velocity that he abhorred Lupin. He might have hated Potter and the rest of his gang, but he absolutely loathed Lupin.

“Open this bloody door Snivellus!”

Oh, how delightful, now he was resorting to childish name-calling. Severus had done well in casting a silencing charm, all this yelling would most likely frighten Harry into displaying accidental magic again.

The knocking ceased for a beat and then Severus heard Lupin sigh, his weight slumping against the door. “If you don’t then I’m calling the ministry,” the man said. “I don’t care if you kill me before they arrive, they’ll know you have him,” there was a loud thud as Lupin punched the door. “They’ll know they can trace him using a werewolf! I’ll tell them everything!”

“Lupin,” Severus snarled, not being able to contain himself any longer. “Get the hell away from my house.” He strode closer to the door, the wand threateningly raised to the peephole. He could blast that infuriating beast right through the door for making such threats.

“I just want to see him you bloody sodding bastard! Open this door!”

“I will blast you through the door wolf! Get the bloody hell away.” he wasn’t letting that man into his house this close to a full moon.

“I don’t care if I die, kill me! But they’ll know about you even if you kill me before I contact the ministry, I’m not a complete idiot. Let me in, I don’t mean him or you any harm, I swear.”

“You could have fooled me,” Snape grunted then looked around his barely lit living room.

“You won’t be seeing him.” Severus said, “He’s not harmed, and that’s all I’m telling you.”

He just wasn’t going to leave without getting in. Severus was no fool he knew that already, so he wasn’t surprised in the least when Lupin’s reply came.

“Not like this Snape,” he said. “Let me in.”

Sev licked his lips, his thoughts rapidly swirling in his head. His options were awfully limited, not because he was afraid of hurting Lupin. That was a bold-faced lie, what he was wary of, was his son, Harry sleeping in his room.

“Then pass your wand through the door,” he said.

“What-Are you insane!?”

Severus was running out of patience. “Do it or I’ll kill you,” he growled and stood away from his door, ready to blast it and the beast behind ti to pieces of worthless flesh.

“With Harry in the house?” the dubious tone gave Severus pause. Could he kill someone with Harry in the house?

“Take it or leave it,” he barked aloud. He didn’t need to think about that just yet. He’d deal with a body if he happened to end up with a body.
There was a slight shuffling, then the man was shoving his wand from the slit under the door. Severus crouched to pick it up, his wand still pointed at the door. He rolled the unfamiliar wand in his hand twice and then put it inside his robe pocket.

“Step back, with your hands behind your neck.”

Remus swore lewdly from the other side. “Ugh for the love of-”

“Do it.” Sev barked with narrowed eyes.

“I did,” Lupin bit out, strong loathing coated his words.

Severus waited for a full minute, and then reached for the door bolt locks, and unlocked them one by one, there was a total of three, installed on this door. Harry’s room had one too, as did his labs.

“Where is he?” was the thing Remus asked upon shimming into the house through the open crack of the door, with Sev’s wand pointed to his face.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself wolf,” He nodded to the couch. “You can seat there.” It was facing away from the hallway that led to Harry’s room, which was the best subtle protection Severus could offer, he was already ready to bolt for his son’s bedroom at a moment’s notice.

“Where is he?” Lupin asked again, thickly swallowing as he looked around the darkened room as if trying to find a six-year-old huddled in a corner.
“It’s four in the morning,” Severus spat. “He’s in bed, as he should be.”

Lupin had the grace to flush. “Oh yeah,” he rubbed the back of his neck, still looking around with apprehension. Severus watched his with crossed arms and a sneer fixated on his face. He couldn’t believe that mutt was seating on his couch, in his home, less than a room away from his sleeping, defenseless child.

“What do you want from me?” he asked, he started circling the couch. “Money?” Lupin did look the shabbiest Severus had seen him, if he hadn’t known the man, he couldn’t tell him apart from a homeless man. “The wolfsbane potion?” he came to a stop in front of Lupin. “What do I need to give you to leave us alone?”

Remus’s face was quick to morph into indignation. His eyes almost bulging and his brows furrowed. “Excuse me!?”

“You heard me perfectly,” Sev snapped. “What’s your price? Say it and get lost.”

“My price,” Remus chuckled, purely out of disbelief and leaned back against the couch, his eyes radiating pure hate as they bore into Sev’s. Severus was acutely aware that a beast was in his living room, only two nights before the full moon. “My price is my six-year-old godson, whom you kidnapped after his parents…” Lupin deflated, his face contorting and his gaze falling down on his lap. “After-”

“Yes I don’t need a recap,” Severus didn’t have time for this.

Lupin’s eyes narrowed into their former glare, his legs bounced almost manically. “I want to see my godson,” he blurted out and looked around again. “Is he…alright? Safe, or are you-”

“I’m not torturing him,” Severus said. “This is the safest place he could be at the moment.” Even these few words pained him to say, he didn’t want the wolf knowing about Harry, he didn’t want him included in Harry's life. Couldn't even imagine Harry's small fragile frame next to such a beast.

The wolf snorted. “Right, living with his kidnapper.”

He could kill Lupin right then and there, cut off the chunks, boil them down in his labs, and then bury the vile emulsion in their backyard before Harry was even done with his breakfast.

Instead, he pushed the vivid imagery to the bottom of the endless sea in his mind and then stared the man dead in the eyes. “If I were you I would be choosing my words carefully wolf.”

“My bad Snivellus , I wasn’t aware you’re afraid of the truth.”

“You cannot see him.” Severus would die first. “He’s sleeping now, and I won’t have you disturbing his sleep,” the darkened room loomed his shadow over Lupin’s tensed figure on his couch. “Even if I were to let you, the full moon is close-”

“HOW dare you-”

“I dare on the account of not trusting you. Seat back down before I stun you.”

Remus shook his head once more in denial and then sat back down, terse and ready to lunch himself at Sev. “I would never do that to him, he’s my-“
“He’s your nothing now.” Severus knew the response was too immature, but couldn’t bring himself to care. “He doesn’t know you. He doesn’t know about you,” he pressed on. “I’m fairly certain he wouldn’t want to anyway. You know what you’ve walked into Lupin.” He nodded at the man.
“You’re wandless, sitting on my couch, and apparently not scared of dying at all.”

Remus didn’t look as if he was even listening. “He’s just a room away from me, I cannot believe it, I thought he was dead,” he glanced over the couch to the darkened corridor. “Six years…I really thought he was gone, and then I found you in a street and now he’s here, asleep in the other room.”

Sev sneered. “He’s staying with me,”

“I’m his godfather,”

“You’re a Werewolf.” Severus was more than happy to point that out. “I’m not letting him-.”

Lupin’s face was strikingly calm and composed as he interrupted him. “It’s not a matter of letting me, I’m his godfather.” He said as if it was an obvious actuality. “He’s my cub. I’m not letting a stranger raise James and Lily’s child.”

“Yet that stranger knows the child better than you do.” The irony was painfully clear to both of them.

“If you really cared about him, you wouldn’t demand he be separated from me.”

Remus was on his feet once again, his eyes dangerously narrowed. “You kidnapped him!” he exclaimed. Showing off every bit of his Gryffindor infused idiocy in those words and Severus had enough of it.

“No I did NOT.” his sneer broadened and an ugly expression came upon his face. “Your dear best friend begged me,” he drawled the words. “Barely breathing, choking on his own blood-.”

“Stop it.”

Severus had no intentions of stopping. He wanted to make it hurt . “Delirious with pain. He was out of his mind Lupin, shredded into chunks of meat, and in that moment, he didn’t ask for Dumbledore, or any of you,” he shook his head. “He begged me to take the child and flee,”

“You’re lying.” Lupin’s calmness was impressive, his face was lax, his posture forcedly relaxed, but the wildness, the utter hatred was evident in his eyes.

“He sobbed at my feet Lupin, balked when I mentioned your and Pettigrew’s name.”

“I know what you’re doing,” Remus said, “You’re trying to send me off rails, fill my head with these lies. Do you want to know the truth, Snape? Even in death, James was more than you’ll ever be.”

“Your starry-eyed delusions won’t change the truth, Wolf.” Remus instinctively shrank back as Severus advanced on him. “If you really insist on knowing the truth then maybe you should see it with your own eyes!” The moron’s face paled and his eyes widened and in the next instant, Severus was in his mind, pushing that one specific memory forward with all his might.

**

“He was being spiteful on purpose. Of course, he was.” Dad would get so mean, without even meaning it sometimes. Harry knew the peculiar mood better than anyone else. Because he knew Dad better than anyone else. “Dad does that a lot, as a defense mechanism.” Harry frowned at Shacklebolt.

He felt the need to explain…more. More of everything. Add depth to the words he was saying, or rather, to the version that Kingsley Shacklebolt was hearing. “He wasn’t scared that night, just…angry.”

He reached for a clean piece of parchment. The pile was already dwindling. “He showed Lupin everything,” that’s the version Severus had admitted to Harry. And he took Dad’s word for it. “Invaded his mind or something, he never told me the specifics.” He was always vehement to avoid Lupin as it came up. The truth about that night was one of the seldom things Harry doubted to be a lie.

“They had a deal together. Lupin and my Dad.”

**

It took the wolf over five minutes to lift his head from the couch, his eyes were wild, lost and raw with old grief. Severus was silent, standing there and waiting for Lupin to gather his wits about him.

“I want to be involved in his life.” it was the first thing Remus said upon clearing his throat several times.

That was just a big “No,”

“I need to see him.”

Severus shrugged. “I can provide pictures,”

Remus scoffed at him. “In flesh and bones Snape,” he threw his hands up in frustration. “You have to grant me that much,”

Severus didn’t have to do anything. He didn’t owe this man “I don’t have to grant you anything. Especially after you followed me home and endangered Harry’s life by exposing us! A picture is all you’re getting.” He crossed his arms. “Twice a year.”

“Twice a month.”

“Once a month and that’s it. I don’t want you sniffing around our residence, talking to him, or staring at him from a distance, I don’t want him stressed and pressured into loving you.”

“Of course not, I could send letters-”

“No letters.” That would be Lupin, basically holding up a huge neon sign to their hiding place. The full moon was truly making him daft. The grief and desperation could have had a hand in it, but Severus was pointedly ignoring that part. “I’ll send you pictures, once a month with a dose of the wolfsbane potion and that’s it.”

Something flashed in Lupin’s eyes. “I didn’t ask for that.”

“Yet you desperately need it.”

“I’m sending him the letters anyway,” said the stubborn man. “And gifts.”

“Do as you want,” Severus would make sure that none reached their destination. “I’d doubt a six-year-old would be able to write back.”

“His life is in danger, constantly, he’s not just a child Lupin. You’ve got to understand that. He’s special.”

Remus regarded him with a strange expression on his face. “James said that a lot too you know, he never explained why.”

Of course, he didn’t.

“Maybe that was done on purpose.”

“I wouldn’t hurt him. He should have known that, and so should you.”

“This isn’t about you, this isn’t about us.” How could he not understand this? “It’s about Harry, don’t you understand how larger the scale runs?” he shook his head at Lupin and paced to the fireplace and back.

“We’re nothing but pawns in this game Lupin,” he had known this for years now. Such a harsh truth. Biting, and unfair, but true. “My job is to protect that child with everything that I have, at first because of a vow, but now because I cannot imagine doing anything else…your job,” he pointed a finger at the wolf.

“Is to stay away and avoid endangering my son’s life.”

“Your son.” It infuriated Severus, how that man chose that part of his speech to focus on instead of reading between the lines and getting lost. He thought that Remus Lupin was supposed to be smarter than this. The full moon was already addling his brain.

“He’s mine in every way that counts.”

“He doesn’t even know about James and Lily.” It was more of a statement, but it sounded like a question, coming out of his mouth. “He doesn’t even know about his real parents.”

“He’s six years old,” it wasn’t a lousy excuse to Severus, it wasn’t rock solid, but who cared? Harry needed a parent. He needed a father, and he was only a child. The only logical choice was for Severus to fill that role. It never occurred to him to do this any other way. One day Harry started calling him Daddy, and that was that.

Lupin didn’t look as if he was following the same line of logic as him. “So that’s why you love doing this.” He said, somberly, he was miraculously smiling. In his mind, he had solved the grand mystery, the skeletons in Sev’s closet. “This is your way of screwing around with James’s legacy. You’re so petty that you couldn’t resist making Harry yours,” He laughed. “You just had to be included, to push James and Lily out of the picture.” He looked disgusted with Severus. “Has he asked about his mom? Have you told him that you slept around with her?”

It wasn’t true. None of it was, of course it wasn’t. Severus needed to keep track of that, or else he would lose his last nerve with this wild creature, invading his home. What sort of example would he set for Harry if he killed this pathetic, blubbering excuse of a man?

‘Don’t let the monsters win,’ that’s what he always told Harry, the least he could do was standing by his own words.

“Shut. Your. Gab.” Severus ground his teeth. “You said your piece and so did I.” he raised his wand to point at the wolf’s face. If he refused to cooperate, Severus was going to stun him, disrobe him and then leave him in the cold to freeze his dirty paws off until someone found him. “Get out of my house.”

Remus stood, complying almost too easily.

“I’m not leaving because you’re pointing a wand at me,” Lupin seethed, his face was disturbingly and utterly calm, his voice not wavering. “I’m leaving because I don’t have the power to stop you yet, but when I do,” he shook his head with a humorless laugh. “Merlin when I do, I would run you down, reduce you to ashes and free him of this. He deserves the truth that I’m about to give him.”

Severus just stared at him. “I won’t let you.”

“You could try.”


**

“I could tell the difference,” Harry said. “When we ran away from you lot,” he had more than a dozen paper cranes resting by his elbow. It was getting late, and he was getting tired. He had no concept of time, and he was afraid to ask. They still had to do the interrogation under Veritaserum, Shacklebolt had said, but Harry insisted to talk first.

Someone needed to know as much as possible before Harry was under Veritaserum, and not in control for a little while. Harry had to explain, try and dwindle enough for it to get late, to delay the interrogation to the following day. “Dad was more composed, almost stoic.”

He missed his dad. He missed him like someone missed a lost limb and fantasized that it was still there. If Harry closed his eyes, he could almost pretend that Dad was standing in the corner with his arms crossed, watching him with narrowed eyes.

“He didn’t worry as much. He always had backups in place. I didn’t even notice him the tension in his shoulders. When Lupin came knocking on our door…He was different. I couldn’t hear a thing, Dad had a silencing charm placed all around the living room, but I could see. He was frantic, twitchy…he avoided the man’s gaze, he was hunched as if ready to bolt to my room any moment, to protect me from that man…

“The thing was, Lupin was the gentlest stranger I’ve seen. His mouth moved a lot, his face was calm but his words were disturbing Dad, making him irritated, I remember getting sick the following morning. I’d made it snow in my room, and then slept in it, because I was trying to cheer Dad up in the morning…it was a whole thing.”

“We didn’t run after Lupin came for a visit. But I remember us running away from Death eaters. Dad wasn’t languid and sure of himself that night, he wasn’t angry or stoic, he was beside himself with fear. I’ve never seen him as afraid as he was the night he thought some Death Eater was on our lawn.”


**

Severus was barely breathing, he held the air restricted in his chest, racing from room to room, madly waving his wand. He raced back to Harry’s room, rousing the groggy child and fiddling for the child’s winter coat. “Harry, wake up for a second now,”

Harry whimpered, sleepily protesting, and sluggishly complying as Severus maneuvered his limbs into the jacket. It was so very cold outside, it had been snowing earlier, almost all day, and the biting cold after the snow was almost as worse as hell that had frozen over. Severus looked around for Harry’s scarf before carrying the sleeping child to the living room.

His lab and the kitchen were already packed, their traces cleansed from every visible surface, Severus didn’t know how much time he had, he didn’t know who was after them, but they couldn’t stay there, that much he knew.

He lowered Harry on the couch and then bolted up the stairs to take care of the bathroom, still not allowing himself to breathe properly, if he paused to breathe, the fear would get to him.

This wasn’t the first time he was doing this, he had been running away for years, more times than he could count, in fact, he was somewhat of an expert on the subject. But he had had time to think before, before, they were on the run from light wizards, ministry Aurors, bumbling witches and self-righteous fools that he could easily manipulate. This time, there was a Death Eater on their tail. Severus wasn’t sure , he was in no way certain that it had been him, but if he had seen Yaxley’s withering figure in their backyard, even if he had thought he’d seen it, then they were screwed.

Yaxley wouldn’t strike alone, he was too much of a coward to face Severus alone, but not all Death Eaters had been rounded up if it had been him in their yard, and if that man dares to go, back for reinforcement before breaking into their house…Severus couldn’t even finish the thought.

He had half a mind to scoop Harry in his arms, get out of this blasted house before setting it on fire, but it was too obvious, they would know for certain that it was him, muggles would notice the house burning down, and Severus couldn’t stay to fight off the ones coming to raid his house by himself. He had a child now. He had a seven-year-old that had no one but him in this world. An acutely isolated child, who hadn’t communicated with a single person but him nearly all his life.

Severus couldn’t stay, and he couldn’t destroy the evidence. He had to wipe everything clean and then apparate them to Norway, to Slogen and the mountain range where Albus had taken him all those years ago when he’d realized his mistake. When the thought of obeying a monster sickened him and the headmaster offered a way out.

No one knew about Norway, or Slogen, no one would find them there. They could stay there, at least until Severus had found a safer place for them to stay, maybe in another country for a while, maybe in Scotland, or further up, somewhere that Death Eater scums couldn’t touch his son.

The bathroom was cleared, that only left Harry’s room and the living room, both of which were downstairs. Severus avoided touching the stair rails as he quickly made his way back to Harry. He rushed past him to the boy’s room, not daring to turn the lights on, in case someone was stalking their house.

They would know that Severus knew and they would attack, sooner than they had planned. Severus needed to get the hell out of this place.
Harry’s room was the hardest to pack, not only because of the untidy state of a room inhabited by a toddler but because the room stank of Harry’s magic more than any other place in the house. The Death Eaters wouldn’t know that the source was Harry Potter upon inspection, but they would know that the wielder would interest them more than Severus’s head. Sev didn’t need new targets on Harry’s back.

Severus promptly started with the bed, shrank it and then waved his wand at the wardrobe, leaving the curtains closed and untouched and praying that the dark wouldn’t cast the flying furniture as silhouettes against the curtains. It was pitch dark, of course, such a thing was scientifically impossible, but he didn’t bloody care about science.

He had to consider other options as well, it had never occurred to him what would happen to Harry if he were captured or killed, or just died by an accident. The thought came upon him at a terrible time and place, adding more to the anxiety that shamefully shook Sev’s hand. Severus paused, forced himself to breathe and let the occlumency shields wash over him.

Harry would have no one, no place to stay, and no way to tell whether the Aurors would get to him first or the Death Eaters that still roamed free. He was a child. He couldn’t even talk properly.

With a final swish of his wand, Harry’s sizzling magic was dampened and Severus was back in their living room, taking an unwilling and languid Harry in his arms. He sat back down on the couch with urgency.

“Harry, you need to wake up for a moment.” He didn’t want to frighten Harry into showing accidental magic, not at the radius that Harry’s magic would show. Harry grumbled against his chest, lazily blinking.

“Sleep.”

“No, Harry I need you to listen to Daddy for a moment.”

“No,” Harry said even though he looked more aware, no gazing up at Severus with bleary eyes. Sev nodded at him.

“We’re leaving the cottage,”

“Why are we leaving Daddy?”

“It’s all part of the game,” Severus said in a rush and then stood. Harry blinked.

“We’re playing at night?” the words were slurred and muffled into Sev’s robes, hastily out on and barely buttoned, but at least the child was awake. Severus swallowed and forced himself to breathe again.

“We’re always playing Harry, we have to.”

“I wanna sleep!” this was accompanied by half-hearted sobs that faded into mild complaints as Severus did one last round around the house.
“I know, we’ll sleep soon I promise,” he peaked into the bathroom and deigned it the best place for apparating as it was facing away from their front door and the windows. Before Slogen, he had to apparate to a few other places too; obscure his tracks in case he was followed.

“Just stay awake enough for Dad to apparate.” He said, trying his best not to sound pleading. “I know you can do it,”

Harry pouted but leaned away from Severus’s chest and gazed around the empty bathroom with increasing alarm. Before he could voice his thoughts-rather loudly, Severus was sure- he apparated them both, and they disappeared with a loud crack.

**

Harry was having the time of his life, tangled with the tinsel strips that Severus had begrudgingly acquired for him in addition to the ones they already had.

“I cannot believe how much you like that monstrosity Potter.”

“DA!”

“Yes, it looks fascinating.”

Potter seemed in awe of the way the tinsels felt against his skin, and so buried his head in the tangled mess with high-pitched giggles and his hands flailing in excitement. The lamps dangerously flickered and Severus rolled his eyes. Potter was only a fan of extremes. He either burned something down by throwing a tantrum or burst lamps by being too happy.

“Alright enough for now,” he said, albeit with a bit of hesitation as he leaned down to pluck the boy off the floor. Harry whimpered and wriggled in protest, but Sev was adamant.

“This is the third lamp in danger of bursting since we got those tinsels Potter,” he explained to the child, carrying him to the kitchen. “And while I and the tinsels appreciate your enthusiasm, I cannot possibly buy a new set of lamps every few hours.”

Potter gave him a dirty look and then pouted. Grunting in displeasure as Severus gently lowered him in his high-chair. Potter absolutely adored the chair, it won’t make up for the tinsels, but it might prevent a power outage in the whole neighborhood.

The cupboards rattled with the boy’s displeasure as Severus went over to fetch his mug. “Really mature Potter,” Severus rolled his eyes and spared a glance over his shoulder. Harry glared back at him, furiously tapping his hand against his chair.

“Yes, I’m the worst father-.” Severus choked on himself, his eyebrows rising. Father? Did he really just say that out loud? He refused to shudder at the weird sensation crawling down his spine and slammed the cupboard shut without retrieving the mug.

“No,” Harry said as Severus sat across him. ‘No’ was Potter’s favorite word as of late. The boy refused to talk much, couldn’t say anything beyond five or six words, but the most that Severus had heard from him in this past two months was either ‘No’ or ‘Please’.

Clearly, Potter hasn’t been adjusting well in these two months.

“I am not your father Potter,” Severus said, staring into the baby’s eyes. Potter stared back, unimpressed.

“No!” the cupboards mildly rattled again and Sev sighed.

“Your parents,” he cleared his throat. “They’re gone. I am not your father, I’m just some man who takes care of you to fulfill a debt.”

“No,” Potter said again, staring at him dead in the eyes.

“Oh come off it,” Sev snapped. “You have no idea what I just said, you’re still mad about the bloody tinsels.”

Potter grunted in indignation and shifted in his chair. “NO.” the chair shook. A plate set by the edge of the sink clattered to the ground, breaking with a loud thud and Potter barely flinched. They were getting used to the sound of chaos, much to his discontentment.

“Fine,” Severus spat, he glared down Potter’s glare with a vengeance. “But I’ll only bring one string over, and you’re not allowed to smother yourself in it,” he grudgingly pushed himself to his feet. “I won’t have the Boy Who Lived suffocating by tinsel.”

“No,” Potter agreed.

**

“Come on Dad, are you really throwing those out?”

“You can clearly deduce as such using your eyes Harry, I thought we’ve talked about stating the obvious.”

The thirteen-year-old rolled his eyes. “Yes, it’s insulting to the both of us, but what’s more insulting is you throwing that package of chocolaty goodness-”

“They’re going into the trash,” Severus cut him off. “Don’t even think about sweet-talking your way out of it.”

“They’re not poisoned.” Harry pointed out, rather unhelpfully. Not only they didn’t look or smell poisoned, they looked to be home-cooked, and Harry mourned their loss as they were thrown into the bin instead of his mouth. Those looked like perfectly made fudges, what a waste.

Severus’s eyes darkened. “You could never know with that bastard.”

“Swear word.” Harry quipped back, flopping down in one of the chairs.

“Don’t push me on this brat,”

“Dad, you’re being too paranoid,” the boy groaned as though the scene taking place in front of him wasn’t a yearly occurrence. “And those smelled delicious. I don’t think Santa’s nemesis is going to mind us eating a few of them, I mean he did send them for us.”

“For you,” Severus corrected, dumping the rest of the package down the bin. “I don’t see why we’re still talking about him.” he dusted his hands off as if to rid them of the dirtiness. “He’s bad news.” They both shared a look before Severus finally glanced away. “Go get the pastry platter from the living room.”

Harry snorted but got to his feet. “Yeah let’s pretend you’re not going to set that bin on fire the moment I’m out of your sight.”

“No pastries for you then.”

“Hey!”

“Santa doesn’t bring gifts for bratty boys who talk back.”

“He wouldn’t,” Harry agreed, whole-heartedly. “If he was real.”

“Go get the platter.”

“I’m living in tyranny,” Harry shouted on his way to the living room.

“Yes, you’re right.” Severus rolled his eyes. “Your life’s a tragedy.”

He had no idea how right he was.

“Looking a bit lost over there.” Said a mousy voice, closer than Harry had imagined. He was leaning against a break wall, his breathing previously labored, his palms sweaty. He was terrified. He should have been.

He opened his eyes and slowly glanced over to the voice.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I was just leaving.”

Instead of leaving, or leering at him, the muggle smiled. “Oh, it’s fine.” She waved a hand and then looked over her shoulder, to the bustling crowd. “This place is a bit crowded for a first-timer, I know the feeling.”

“Alright.”

“I’m Emily, I’m the baker’s daughter.” She pointed to the wall Harry was leaning upon to get his wits together. It must have belonged to the bakery store she was talking about. Hastily, Harry pushed himself off the wall and straightened his clothes.

“Nice to meet you Emily.” He said a bit out of breath. He was interacting with a muggle. Actually talking to her. He crammed his hands deep into his pockets, he couldn’t afford to touch her, hurting her in the process.

Dad was already going to be mad at him.

They stood shrouded under an awkward silence before Harry’s mind snapped back to reality.

“Oh right…” she was waiting for Harry to introduce himself, as was the etiquette when you met someone new. Harry knew that his social skills left much to be desired, but he was supposed to know the basics of this. “I’m Harry.”

She nodded with a tight-lipped smile. “Well hello, Harry.” Her voice was really soft and caring. Harry liked to just listen to her speak.

“You work in a bakery?” he asked, licking his lips.

Emily shrugged. “Not really, my mom wouldn’t let me touch anything in the kitchens. So I just help around and carry stuff.”

Harry turned, half-heartedly looking out at the street, a bit more vacant now than it was when Harry jumped in the alleyway. Emily followed his gaze.

“Do you want to go for a stroll?” she asked but was already moving, Harry had no other choice but follow her. “I know it’s a bit crowded today, but it is Sunday. The markets are bound to get a bit busier.”

Harry nodded, taking meticulous care not to touch her as they joined the other muggles on the street, passing the bakery. She looked over her shoulder with a grin.

“So are you new here?”

Was he new here?

“Sort of,”

Emily raised her eyebrows at him, she was walking back through the crowd, keenly watching him. “I’m going to guess something,”

“Guess what?”

“I think I might know you,” she said with a shrug, sliding past a bustling woman fiddling with her bag. Harry felt the urge to reach out and pull Emily out of the way, or look over his shoulder and make sure that no one caught him touching someone else.

Then the words sank deeper.

“Know me?” Harry’s eyes widened. No way, she couldn’t know him, he was sure of that. No one got near their home, no one even knew the cottage was inhabited by anyone other than Severus Snape. She couldn’t know.

Emily, unheeding to his inner freak out, shrugged again. “I have a feeling, you’re the mysterious boy living uphill?”

Oh no. She did know. Harry felt his heart squeeze against his lungs. How did she know?

His expression must have given something away because Emily stopped with a wary frown. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Harry’s throat convulsed at the thought of moving again. He didn’t want to burden his dad with this. He knew he should not have done this. He knew that sneaking away was wrong, he knew that Dad wouldn’t approve, that he might hurt someone. He was hurting someone, if forced to run again, then Dad would be the one Harry hurt. Again and again and again.

Why didn’t he ever learn?

“Hey,” Emily reached out to grasp his shoulder and Harry sprang away, violently flinching away from her touch, eliciting a short gasp from the girl and a yelp from the person he bumped into. Harry rolled on the hills of his feet, stiffening his body to avoid touch.

“Sorry!” he blindly shouted to the crowd, to whomever he had bumped into. He was fine, he was fine . He wasn’t going to hurt anyone, not Emily, not all these muggles.

“Hey, hey Harry,” She didn’t try touching him again, her face swam in Harry’s blackening vision. Harry wasn’t freaking out. He was fine. He had to be fine.

“Let’s get out of the crowd, alright?”

He was walking as she led them away, not really sure where they were headed. Harry’s arms were firmly by his side, one single touch, one wrong move and this time Dad had more to repent for than getting rid of dead muggle children.

Children he murdered, drained, tore apart with the sheer force of his pain and anger. Children he enjoyed tearing apart.

Dad’s wrong, he thought as Emily led them to a narrow alley, the one he was originally standing in. Dad was wrong, there was no barrier between Harry and the monster, no distinct place where Harry began and the monster ended. Harry was the monster Dad tried his hardest to hide.

“It’s fine now,” she said, prompting him to lean against the bakery’s wall, and Harry did, flushing in shame.

“Sorry,” he said.

“It’s fine,” Emily pushed a strand of hair away from her face. “I shouldn’t have pushed you. Sorry about that, so you don’t like touching, that’s cool.”

“Not really,”

She chuckled. “I guess not, but who am I to talk? My baggage isn’t a walk in the park either.”

“I need to-.” Get back home to his dad, fall onto his knees, and beg for forgiveness that he loathed admitting Dad would grant him sooner than he should have. Beg and plead and pray that no one dies on the way back.

“Have a mint?” She dug into her pockets for a moment, biting her lip and sheepishly holding his gaze. Finally, she withdrew her closed fit from her pocket and brushed some imaginary lint off the small round treat. Harry accepted the mint with a frown.

“Sorry, that’s been in my pocket for a while now.” Harry popped it in his mouth, feeling his lungs expand more easily as he inhaled. “I don’t think it changes the taste?” Emily asked with a cringe, then she leaned against the wall next to him.

“No,” Harry shook his head.

She nodded, and they were silent again, listening to the chitter-chatter of the buzzing morning crowd and nearby birds.

“Do you want to come over?” Emily asked, quite suddenly, as if just remembering that she could talk.

Harry stared at her.

Dad was nothing like Emily, or Harry guessed, other people. He never needed to clarify anything for his son, when he spoke, he chose every word with care, every sentence painted clearly with no hidden intents.

He treated Harry, not as a separate person he lived with, but as an extension to his own mind. Harry always thought he knew what Dad meant to him, what his words, the look in his eyes, or the curl in his mouth said about him.

Not that Harry was the same in return. Not since…well since.

When Emily spoke, she had to explain herself, making Harry askance, making him wonder what she really meant, it all added to that glittery aura of ambiguity around her, one he wasn’t sure whether he liked yet or not.

“To the bakery,” she answered his unasked question. “And I could get you a pie. Mom could call your dad.”

“My dad,” Harry couldn’t help but snort at the absurdity of that image. Of him sitting in a booth with this muggle girl, eating pie while her mother called Dad to come get him. It was almost as ridiculous as Harry attending kindergarten was.

“Yeah, the gloomy one that only pops in once a week. I guessed you might be his son…was I wrong?”

She just guessed that out of the blue? “How did you guess?” Harry’s frown remained fixated on his face.

“This is a really small town,” Emily laughed, a bit humorlessly. The way Dad did sometimes when they talked about his inferior peers back in his school days. “Everyone is into everyone else’s business, except for the gloomy dude-err.”

“He is my dad.” Harry couldn’t help but grin as he confirmed her. He had never heard anyone call his father ‘gloomy’. Even Harry himself never referred to his dad as gloomy…just different, like Harry himself was.

“Right.” Emily smiled back and Harry felt something in his chest melt into his heart. “So, apple pie?”

“Sure.”

**

“I think I kind of like you Harry,” Emily giggled into his ear, intimately close but not really touching him. They were sitting next to each other, just watching the clouds, well, at least Harry was watching them. He liked staring at things in-depth, being mesmerized by them, losing himself in the tiny details he was sure no one else noticed at face value.

Their days spent together were short, fleeting, a shroud of oranges, and the smell of sweet-savory pastries, stolen mornings while his Dad slept in or worked in his lab. Quick, feather touched interactions that they mostly spent laying around and sneaking treats and watching the clouds.

She didn’t mind him staring at things for a long time, it would have been rude otherwise, Dad would have said so, but Emily didn’t mind. She’d flick her blond hair, lean back against her arms and watch him watch other things.

It was a nice thing they had together, for such a short fragile amount of time.

Emily might just be his first friend after his Dad.

Reluctantly, Harry tore his gaze away from the passing clouds. “I like you too Emily.” She was a nice muggle. She understood things others wouldn’t have. He hadn’t managed to screw things up with her yet, she hadn’t realized that he was a monster. Harry liked to keep it that way, for just a bit.

As selfish as it was.

“No stupid,” her eye-rolling was vividly more exaggerated than his father’s. Dad did it with grace, quick, sarcastic. Followed by a witty comeback that shamed Harry into wielding over the argument, Emily did it flippantly, with all her might, with a force that made Harry wonder whether it hurt.

“I like you,” she drawled again, almost singing. “Like you like a boy.”

“Like you like a boy?”

“Yeah,” she gave a nervous giggle, pushing a strand of ginger hair behind her ear. She did that a lot, it might have been annoying, except that it wasn’t. She reminded him of rays of sunshine rippling against his closed eyes or a cool glass of orange juice on a hot summer day.

“You’re really cute.” Her face flushed severely, and she dropped her gaze. Something weird and cozy spread through Harry’s chest. This was nice. She was nice. What they had was more than nice.

“Thanks,” Harry had no other response than that, and then he felt stupid for such a simplistic way to respond to a compliment. He didn’t know how to handle talking to her. She demanded things from Harry that he yet didn’t know.

“You’re cute too.” It was a good comeback, returning a compliment with a compliment. They were friends. Harry thought they were friends.

Dad shouldn’t know that he was gone yet, not for some time, he was still asleep, unaware of his son’s constant betrayal. Well, Harry couldn’t go as far as calling it a betrayal, but sneaking out wasn’t among his wisest decisions so far. Dad would flay him alive if he found out Harry was outside, every other morning, interacting with other muggles…talking with a muggle girl who he dared call ‘friend’.

A friend now eyeing him with a certain glint in her eyes.

Yeah, definitely flay him alive.

“How do you like a boy?” it occurred to him later than it should have, but Harry’s mind was whirring with the thought of his father waking and finding his son’s room empty, the window open, the breeze shuffling his curtains, his bed still unmade. Harry should have at least made the bed.

Emily hummed at his question. “I guess, like you like anyone.”

“Then why say it at all?”

“Would you just like to kiss anyone you like?”

Kiss?

“I don’t get it.”

“I’d guessed you wouldn’t.” she turned to face him with a teasing smirk. “Do you like me too? Enough to kiss me?”

She knew he didn’t like touching others. Kiss her? Was she insane? He could kill her with a flick of his head. It wouldn’t be right to do such a thing to her, a nice harmless girl with dreams and a family. It was morally wrong. But that was different than wanting to kiss her.

Wanting to do something and actually doing something were two separate things.

Harry could barely remember the last time Dad had shown physical affection towards him. Maybe when he was a child, eight, or nine, even younger. Dad wasn’t a touchy-feely person at all, and Harry himself wasn’t too keen on it as well. In fact, he was the one who weaned Dad off hugging or shoulder taps with careful dodging and flinching.

He didn’t want to hurt his dad more than he already was. Dad respected that. They understood each other.

Did he want to kiss Emily and risk killing her? No. But did he crave kissing someone , especially after years of depravation and trembling fear? Well, yes. Yes, he very much wanted to kiss Emily. She was very pretty, she knew a lot about respecting boundaries, and she smelled like apple pies.
A faint flush spread on his cheeks and Harry ducked his head.
“I like you a lot,” he admitted, his eyes back on the clouds. “Maybe I would want to kiss you.” Harry hoped that kissing was something other people did when they liked each other. Harry didn’t want to hurt her.

Emily nodded and laid back on the grass. “Maybe I would want to kiss you too.”

They stared at the clouds.

Later that morning, she would take him behind a tree and kiss him. Later that evening Harry will have the second biggest fight of his life with his Dad. A week from then, when he’s kissing Emily for the last time, he sees Santa’s Nemesis and another man, staring at him with wide rounded eyes.

That night, he and Dad would disappear.

**

“What do you think of adding pansies to the garden?” Dad mused, “They might need a little extra care, but I’m confident the results would make for extraordinary fever-reducing potions,”

“Dad?” they were sitting in their backyard, on the steps. Near Dad’s herbs garden.

Severus was busy examining his garden. His head slightly twitched towards Harry, realizing that the graveness of Harry’s tone didn’t possibly match his lighthearted question. “Hmm?”

“I want to hear ‘Raven and his little fawn.”

Dad hummed again, thoughtfully. “You haven’t asked for that in some time.” it was true. Harry hadn’t dared ask for a story voluntarily ever since he mustered up enough courage to stop exiling himself to his bed. If he was old enough to kill people, then he was old enough to stop demanding for storytime.

Today was an exception. Harry really wasn’t doing it for his own benefit, although he would be lying if he said that he hadn’t missed his father’s stories at all, didn’t crave them like a thirsty man lost in a desert because he did. This wasn’t about him though. This was about being a good son. This was about cheering up Dad.

Dad loved telling Harry stories, or Harry thought that he did anyway. He seemed truly torn up when Harry asked him to stop a few months back. This should be a nice respite. Make them unbroken somehow.

“I miss them.” He didn’t sound convincing, not in the slightest. But he meant it, he really did. He didn’t miss the stories, specifically. He missed himself, the Harry he was before, and he missed his dad too. His dad from before. He wished there was a way to make this stop, make everything stop just for a moment so he could breathe easily again.

He had been wishing so ever since he woke up dazed and restless, to his father gently stroking his head, softly telling him that it wasn’t his fault as he washed his face clean, wiped the blood away. Their blood. There was so much blood.

And Harry cried and kicked and swore. He screamed and wished, oh how he wished that he could cease to exist but not undergo this kind of suffering.

Dad stared at him, he knew him too well to buy in this little act. “Harry-”

“I miss us, Dad.” That caught the older man off guard. Harry hadn’t meant to say it, not at all, but now the dam was broken, and he couldn’t stop. “I think I broke us, and I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t know how to fix us Dad. It’s my fault. I killed…I killed people. I’m dangerous, I don’t want to be, I don’t want to hurt other people, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he paused to take a deep shaky breath. “I don’t know how I should stop being me. Did the little fawn ever go through this? Was he broken too?”

“Everyone is broken a little,” Dad said. his voice a steadying constant above Harry’s head. “The Raven was broken too before he found his little fawn.” He paused for another beat to stare into Harry’s eyes, willing him to understand. “I was broken before finding you.”

Harry burrowed his head back into his dad’s shoulder. “It’s my fault they’re dead.” He thought that maybe muffling the words into Dad’s robes would make the compact less devastating. It didn’t by much.

Dad’s response was immediate, almost as if his words were rehearsed time and time again in his head, and maybe they were. He and Dad never really talked about the incident before, by Harry’s insistence.

Harry could imagine the other man preparing a comforting speech in his head as he showed an indifferent front to a forlorn Harry. Waiting and bidding his time for an inevitable breakdown that never came.
It was such a dad thing to do.

“It’s not your fault that you’re alive and the way you are,” said Dad. “What those boys did to you…it was horrible. And I blame myself for it every minute of every day, but you cannot do the same. You have a great gift-”

“I ruin everything that I touch.”

Severus grasped his shoulder, firmly. “No you don’t.” he drew him back, made Harry look into his eyes, his expression solemn, but readable to Harry. Dad was upset. “You saved my life, and I vowed to save yours, no matter what.” Harry squirmed under his hold but his father was relentless. “You are a miracle, maybe you cannot be you just yet, like an untamed little cub, but once you grow up to be the best version of yourself then you’ll make the most magnificent lion there ever was.”

Harry flushed and tore his chin away, glancing at the herb garden. “You’re just saying that.”

“Have you known me to just say things?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Sure,” he snorted. “You’re my dad, so by complimenting me, you’re just complimenting yourself.”

An affectionate hand ruffled his hair, and his father glared softly at him with a roll of his own eyes. “You brat.” Harry accepted the touch without flinching. There was no harsh sentiment behind his father’s words. Brat was a term of endearment. There never was any harsh insults even when Dad was cross with him.

Even though he had many reasons to be mad about when it came to Harry for ruining his life already.

“So…” Harry wriggled his toes. “The raven and his fawn.”

Severus hummed with a nod. “The raven and his fawn.”

**

Once there was a Raven and his Fawn. And they were the only thing the other had.

They traveled through the dark forest, hid from the hunters and wild animals, and learned to avoid danger by stealthily sneaking away at just the right moment. The Raven loved his little fawn, and the little fawn loved his Raven.

The Raven was always soaring above the trees, looking ahead at what the future held for them. As he protected the little fawn, he grew too attached, he didn’t mean to care for the fawn as if he was his own, but he couldn’t help it, he guided him with an assuring smile and a warm hold on his shoulder.

“I will always be here for you my little fawn,” said the Raven as he perched on the fawn’s shoulder. “You will never be alone, you will never be hurt. You will be by my side, always, as long as I’m alive.”

“I love you, Raven,”

“And I love you, little Fawn.”

All was well for them, as long as they had each other, leading the other through the intimidating darkness looming over the woods. It was very dangerous out there, very grievous indeed. The woods were filled with all sorts of monsters, dark creatures, and sharp-teethed beasts with a foul smell. The raven knew them all, and he was smart, too smart to let the monsters get to his fawn.

They played a game, sometimes. A very simple one. All the little fawn had to do was snuggle and hide away, stay in the shadows when strangers approached the due, and then the Raven would protect him. He could make no sounds, he could make no moves, he and the raven were the ones hiding, not seeking. The little fawn knew that rule well.

“Hide until they go away.”

Sometimes the monsters were smarter, and so the little fawn and the Raven had to be smart too. Sometimes, in order to win the game, the raven had to distract the bad men so the fawn stayed safe.

Sometimes the Raven had to lose.

Once the bad hunters had the raven, the little fawn had to run and run and run so far away! To the safe meadow, sheltered and blessed, playing and hopping around until his Raven was ready to come back.
And he would always do, as was the way it always went. He came back and found his fawn and they were happy again, playing and laughing and spending their days without a fret.

It was supposed to be that way.

It was supposed to .

**

“When I say this food is untouched, I’m making an oath Mr. Potter. It wasn’t touched nor opened prior to this moment.”

With a skeptical frown, Harry reached for the chocolate frog. “What is this?” he asked, his voice almost childlike. The tone startled Kingsley so much that he stammered. “Err,”

It took him a moment to gather his composure, and he cleared his throat. “That’s a chocolate frog.”

Harry’s eyes slightly widened, he spun the treat in his hand. “Is it really a frog?”

Shacklebolt could only shrug with a frown. “Well no,” he couldn’t believe that this kid didn’t know what a chocolate frog was, but then again, should he really have been surprised?

“It’s just charmed to behave like one. You want to be careful opening that, the chocolate might hop around.”

The child curled his lip and then leaned down to inspect the frog.

“That sounds counterproductive,” he said. “If it’s meant to be eaten.”

Kingsley had no idea how to respond to that statement. “Ah well…err…” he scratched the back of his neck with his quill. “Most children keep it for the cards?”

Potter seemed content with that answer. He dropped the chocolate and grabbed the wrapped plate.

“The other one is Shepard’s pie,” Kingsley said, feeling as if it would be the polite thing to do.

Harry’s eyes narrowed into a deadly glare instead. “I know what Shepard’s pie is,” he snapped, but pointedly shoved the wrapped plate away from himself.

He was more than familiar with Shepard’s pie. It was his comfort food, Dad being picky eater he was, didn’t indulge in the meal the same way Harry did but he made it at least once a week for Harry anyway, good-naturedly grumbling and glaring at Harry throughout the process. He made the food. Harry studied at the kitchen table, nibbling on fruit, a comfortable silence would settle between them, a rhythm that was the product of years of companionship.

This plastic-wrapped plate seemed like fate taunting him with the irony.

‘This is what you get for ruining his life, that one person who loved you,’ it seemed to say, and much to Harry’s dismay, fate might not be that far off the bat.

“Alright. Do you think you’re up to taking the potion tonight?”

“I want to sleep.” Harry’s hands lethargically came to rest upon his lap. He really was tired, but he also really didn’t want to take that potion tonight. Not until he could figure out a way to ensure his secret was safe with him.

He didn’t regret his initial decision. This would help Dad, more than help Dad, but it came with its price.

Harry couldn’t back out now, but he also needed to do something. He had to tell Kingsley. Not the secret, but enough so the man would keep his mouth shut during the questioning.

But what if he doesn’t? He works for these people, Harry was more than certain that if he let on that he was withholding that sort of information, then there was a good chance Shacklebolt would sell him out to his boss, or the ministry, or whoever ran this place…but on the other hand, he was desperate.

He should at least try. Harry nodded at himself. Test the waters first and then dive in.

“That’s absolutely fine.” Said the Auror as he was getting to his feet.

“We’ll take a short break for your interrogation tomorrow morning and then you can continue your story.”

Harry stifled the urge to reach out and grasp the man’s robe, and instead settled for clearing his throat. Kingsley remained, half-standing, his eyes narrowed. Harry gulped. “You have to understand something about me Mr. Shacklebolt.”

“Auror.” Kingsley gently interjected.

Harry ignored him. “There are things worth knowing that you cannot understand under surveillance.”

Surveillance was the main issue. Harry needed Kingsley Shacklebolt to cut that off somehow, without raising any suspicions.

Shacklebolt slowly sat back, his eyes bearing into Harry’s. “We’re not under any surveillance,” it was quite pathetic to see the man still attempting a bald-faced lie to Harry’s face when he should have known better.

‘What a moron,’ that was something his dad would say, with a roll of his eyes.

“I’m a child, not an idiot.” He snapped. “They’re watching me.” From the wall, undoubtedly, Harry didn’t know how many of them were watching, but he could feel their eyes on his back, his neck prickled with the sensation. “I can always tell when someone is watching me.” Harry leaned over the table, his eyes wide and begging the Auror to understand. “You need to understand.” He said aloud.

“Understand what?”

He needed to test the waters, get the man hooked.

“I ruin everything that I touch.”

Shacklebolt’s eyebrows furrowed. “Pardon?” he asked.

Harry shook his head. “I ruin everything that I touch.” With a small sigh, he lowered his voice. They might still be able to hear him, but muttering would make Harry feel better. “There’s more. You need to know,” desperation started bleeding into his words. He missed his dad. “Someone needs to understand.”

Shacklebolt remained stubborn, but at least his eyes were narrowed.

Harry had his attention. “You can talk freely in this room,” the man said and Harry sagged back against his seat. This was a failure. An absolute loss. If Shacklebolt wanted to play daft, then Harry couldn’t force the man into not being a dimwit.

He was too tired to deal with this.

“You wouldn’t be saying that if you really understood.” He laced those words with as much venom as he could muster in that state of mind. He needed rest, needed to think again.

“Harry,”

Harry’s eyes opened, his face screwed in a snarl. “Do not call me by my name.” he had no right to do that. “You don’t get to do that, only my father gets to call me by my name.”

Even if Harry didn’t deserve to be called by his name even by his father. Well…by Severus who apparently wasn’t his real father, but it didn’t count. Harry knew that it didn’t count, he didn’t care for anyone else the same way. He didn’t love his own parents as he loved Severus. There was no Severus. There was only Dad. And Harry wished he knew that sooner, maybe then he could have prevented this.

“I don’t want to talk anymore.” He said, and he was telling the truth. He didn’t want to talk, he wanted to weep, and he wanted his father back. “I want to sleep.”

Kingsley wasn’t letting it go. “You need to eat something.” he gestured at the food and Harry wanted nothing more than to blast the whole bloody thing into smithereens.

“I don’t need to do anything.” He bit out. “I’m tired, I want to sleep.”
Shacklebolt gazed at him for a moment longer before standing again.

“Very well then. Good night, Mr. Potter.”

As he was closing the door behind him, he heard Harry whisper. “Not while I’m trapped here. It won’t be a good night at all.”


**


“He’s in the last one,” said an unassuming guard with a flick of his head towards the row of cells. The old wizard nodded his thanks and brushed a hand against his robes. He took his time, walking down the corridor; it had been a while since he’d been here. He didn’t have much to do in a holding wing filled with prisoners awaiting trial, not since Sirius’ unfortunate escape and arresting last year, Albus didn’t fathom coming back again for some time.

He stood before the warded door with slight apprehension. For once in a long while, Albus had little knowledge of what to expect. Severus always had that streak of surprise within him, always a new trick in his sleeve, something that caught the old man off guard, and Albus could surely think that this one trumped all other instances.

The guard nearby, nodded at him, his face scrawny and grim with years of experience in this job. Albus nodded back. The guard let him in.

“Severus,”

“Albus,”

Albus conjured a plain wooden chair with his wand and settled in. “I cannot quite say that it’s a pleasure to meet you again my friend, not under these circumstances.” He gestured at the overzealous chains locking the younger man down to his own seat.

“The sentiment goes both way Headmaster,” Snape drawled dryly. He was avidly keen to avoid the headmaster’s gaze. “I’m not heavily obliged to greet you either.”

“They’re treating you well, I’m assuming?”

Severus’s sneer prompted a smile on Albus’s face as he said. “Like a delicate little flower.”

Dumbledore nodded, his eyes pruned with an amused smirk. “It’s nice, knowing that time changes so little about you Severus,”

Something shifted in Severus’s eyes, a dark lurking shadow. “That does disgust you doesn’t it?” muttered the frowning man. “Once a monster, always a monster.”

Albus stared at him, his face passive but his mind whirring. “Not in the slightest.” He finally said. “I’ve missed you greatly in your absence. You have been busy too, haven’t you?”

“Don’t even pretend you don’t know everything you old bumbling fool. I know what you want from me, and you’re not going to get it.”
“What do you think I want?”

Severus finally dared to look at him, directly stare into his eyes with a loathing that made Albus inwardly shiver. It wasn’t necessarily directed at him, he knew that, but Severus was enraged, not just by Albus, but by everyone around him. “I think that your wants are correlating with my priorities.” His words were soft, but that did not soften their impact. “You’re not going to find him. I won’t let you.”

He’s worried about the boy. Well, of course, he was worried about him. The ministry’s method of acquiring Severus must have been terrifying to the boy, and Severus himself as well. If Harry hadn’t given himself up to the ministry, Albus shuddered to think what would have become of the boy.

“Harry is safe, Severus.” It didn’t exactly count as a reassurance. Severus wouldn’t believe him until he saw Harry himself.

“Of course he is. I made sure of it. You can dig the earth inch by inch, yard by yard with a rusty shovel and you would still be just as baffled. He cannot be found, nor rescued. I won’t let you get him.”

“There’s no need for this hostility Severus, we are old friends, and we have one thing in common.”

“We both care about the boy.”

“You’ll have to kill me first, I am not telling you a thing, Albus.”

“No need for that,” The headmaster smiled with a wave of his hand.
“Nor a rusty shovel. I already know where young Harry is Severus.”

Something died in Severus. He was sure of it. Some limb or inner organ was gone from his body as the headmaster spoke, leaving his veins to spurt blood in his guts and order his body to exude cold like a corpse. “No you don’t.” of course he didn’t.

They had no way of knowing where Harry was. You cannot find something you can never trace.

“He gave himself up to the ministry two days ago. Walked right in and demanded to be arrested.”

“What?” it sure as hell didn’t sound like a question to Severus himself. He barely heard the words he breathed.

“And the most curious thing happened,”

“You have my-”

“We don’t have him,” Albus spread his arms with a flourish. “He surrendered himself to us. He was fully consenting as Aurors led him to his holding place.”

No. this couldn’t be happening. He had been so sure, so bloody sure that Harry was safe, that he wasn’t stupid enough to try and come after him. He was supposed to follow the instructions, he was supposed to play the game, not walk right into the lion’s den.

“No,” he said in denial. This could be a lie, a trap. Albus Dumbledore wasn’t known for his lying, but Severus knew better. Everyone who wielded any kind of power lied well. Albus was a spectacular liar.

This could be a ruse. To try and get him to give up Harry’s location. His son is smart. He wouldn’t just surrender himself like that, not in a million years. He knew how the story went. He had to know. When they took the raven, the little fawn ran . He ran far away until the day the raven came back to find him. He didn’t fucking surrender himself to the bloody hunters!

“Severus,”

“You’re lying,” he growled.

Albus returned his jeering with a calmness that irritated Severus more than his words. “If I wanted to lie to you, I would have done so regarding much more pressing matters.”

He had a point, Severus wasn’t blind. “No, this wasn’t supposed to happen. Arrest him for what? Being kidnapped by a deranged Death Eater? Is the ministry sinking that low now? Arresting minors?” every word out of the man’s mouth was stressed, but his face betrayed nothing but hatred.

“He has certain claims,” Albus answered calmly.

The man chuckled, out of disbelief it seemed. “He has no right to claim anything.” Albus felt his eyebrows rise above his hairline. “He’s an innocent child I stole and manipulated through the years. He’s nothing but a gullible daft boy.”

“He confessed to the murders,”

Severus didn’t let the other man see or hear the sudden intake of breath, the inhaled surprise, the utter shock and devastation in the form of one measly gasp. Severus was too good of an Occlumence to fall into such humane traps. “The ones that I committed.” He shot that response, almost impulsively.

Albus frowned for a beat. “The ones that he did.”

“It’s curious,” he continued, “The things that we do for the people we love. James Potter for his son, you for yours.”

“Shut up.”

“You held up magnificently,” Albus nodded as if approving of Severus’s paternal technics. “Raising and loving a child is hard work. Not everyone is sculptured to care for another human being, be responsible for them, and carve them into a person with the right beliefs and perceptions. You have done splendidly.”

“You know nothing,” Severus might have as well spat those words as he forced them past his lips with force. He was angry, beyond infuriated and lulled into a dangerous calm that promised a blow up in the near future. And Severus was so desperately itching for an explosion.

“I know.” Albus’s tone was annoyingly pleasant.

Sev’s eyes narrowed with hatred. A trained response, he might not have been ready for this encounter, but he had rehearsed this speech many times in his head. As long as it took to sound convincing, unhinged, a rambling mad man destined to be imprisoned for the rest of his life. “I kidnapped him because I hated his father,” he said.
“Because I craved the torment that came upon his son after his death, I did it for the same reason I killed those children and hurt that muggle woman, and cursed the others, because I COULD.”

He rattled his chains with a smirk. It was a hateful one. One he hadn’t felt upon his face for years and years since having Harry. “And because it felt good. I would do it again the moment I am out of here, while you’re all too busy searching for dead ends inside a teenager’s head. I’d kill, and torture and torment every soul I can get my hands on. The way my lord intended for me. To have his revenge for him.”

Albus sat through the rant, his leg draped over the other and his hands idly circling his knee. His expression betrayed none. His eyes remained on Severus, unflinching at the cruel words. “You always had a way with words,” he finally said as Severus’s words ran out and there was only haggard breathing.

“Not many knew that about you,” Severus’s snarl went unheeded and the old man continued. “How you can adapt and put yourself in somebody else’s shoes, in this instant…an unstable Death Eater ranting out of desperation.” Albus shook his head, only slightly. “It’s what made you into a wonderful spy Severus. Your words are always on point…” his hands came loose and he sat back, a newfound glint in his eyes that Severus recognized all too well. The gleam of a victory.
“Your intent on the other hand…”

“You’re delusional.” Severus was trying, grasping at the edges of his arguments and pulling at the seams. This was all he had, his admission to guilt, without it Harry wasn’t safe, without it, they could get to him. Severus would die first.

“It’s wonderful what a parent’s love can do.” Albus knew that Severus knew that he knew, as was evident from the faint smile on his face.
“James and Lily aren’t the only people willing to sacrifice themselves in order to save their child.”

Severus closed his eyes, bearing himself for the words that were about to barrel through his shields. The headmaster did not spare him any longer.

“You love him,” he said and Severus sneered.

“You know nothing about me,” He spat.

“Prove me wrong.” Albus extended the wand he had hidden in his robes to the growling man. “Cast a levitating charm.”

**

“Hey there kid, can I come in?” a feminine voice asked, probably the same one who was knocking.
“I’m in a cell,” it was such a stupid thing to say in response, but the act baffled him. Was she aware of the fact that Harry was a prisoner here?

“I’m taking that as a yes,”

“Wotcher, Auror Tonks at your service,” she shook her head at herself. “Actually no, you’re in our custody,”

Harry didn’t want her to be too friendly. “Potter.”

“Right. I won’t disturb you much,” she said, trying to look as unintimidating as possible as she approached an equally wary Harry. This woman looked nothing like Shacklebolt, which might have seemed like an obvious remark at first glance, but it was true. Tonks would be the last person Harry guessed to be an Auror like Shacklebolt.

She certainly looked younger.

“Wow, did you make those” she poked at a paper boat, her round face stretched with awe, and her eyes wide with wonder. “That’s so cool,” she picked up a duck origami in her other hand, snorting at the structure. Harry permitted the intrusion. He was too tired to trust himself into having a conversation.

He just needed to wait until this woman left, to make it through one day without killing or maiming anyone.

‘I didn’t raise a hooligan,’ his father had told him once, when he found out about Emily and Harry had the audacity to be the mad one out of the two of them.

‘I expect better of you,’

You expected too much of me, Dad.

As Harry prepared himself to turn away, the most impossible thing happened. The woman’s nose morphed into a duck’s beak almost as if it was supposed to be there fused to the rest of her face, eliciting a loud yell of surprise from Harry. He stepped back, his magic lashing and rippling in agitated waves that rustled the curtains.

Tonks’s head snapped up, still harboring a duck’s beak instead of her own nose.

“Oh shit! Sorry!” her face was instantly altered back into its original shape. She dropped the origami back on the table, then smacked her own forehead. “Oh crap, I just swore in front of a child.” She cringed.
“Well fuck. I’m so sorry if that freaked you out, I just got excited.”

It took Harry a moment to reply. “You turned into a duck.”

“Well…kind of.” She cringed once more. “Sorry again. Any chance you might not mention this to Kingsley later…and the swearing? I’m still trying to rein it in. It’s my last year as a trainee you see.”

“I won’t talk.”

“Awesome. Oh, chocolate frogs! Can I trade my sugar wands for it? I had a few in my robes somewhere, hang on-.” the young woman scrambled to reach for her pockets, her hair all over the place as she shook her robes as if expecting the ‘sugar wands’ to simply fall out of her clothes.

Finally, she drew a fisted hand around a few long treats, that Harry assumed was the aforementioned sugar wands. The scene eerily reminded him of his and Emily’s first meeting. He took the treats with narrowed eyes.

Tonks flushed under his gaze, swiping the chocolate frog off the table with a chuckle. “Sorry, it’s just that, I’m collecting these, and I’m only a few cards short, I’ll take my chances whenever I see one of them lying around.” She stopped her rambling and then looked frustrated at herself for doing so as she crammed the chocolate in her robes.

“Right,” he brought the sugary blue wand to his mouth and nibbled on it. It tasted well enough, nothing magical about it. Dad would scowl at him for having those instead of dinner, that’s for sure.

“Too sugary right?” her hair whooshed into a vibrant blue and she grinned. “I used to love them as a kid. I actually got sick a few times when I had had too much. Once they had to take me to the St. Mango’s, purged my stomach and stuff. Mom made me quit after that.”

Harry stared at her and Tonks cringed. “Right, too much information.” She huffed, her hands swaying by her sides. “So I need to transfigure a bed for you. You cannot sleep in a chair.”

Harry didn’t feel like talking to her and so turned his back, still somewhat reeling with surprise as he let her do her. He wasn’t being watched anymore, he thought he knew that much, maybe these people just weren’t creepy enough to watch a teenager sleep.

If the price of eternal happiness was a thousand paper cranes, then Harry was sure that the world’s definition of the term must be distorted. His Dad was still in a prison, about to be shipped off and executed for crimes that Harry had committed, Harry himself was currently an orphan as a result also about to be arrested for the crimes he has committed…and no one knew about his…thing.

This was supposed to be his bargain with them, they would let Dad go and Harry would let the ministry people unleash him on whomever they liked. He would drain them on the spot with a single touch of his hand as he let his body do the…thing, and then the other person would either die or wish they were dead.

The thing, never had a name, to begin with, Harry himself didn’t know that he was in possession of such a gift until very recently when he found out that what his constant presence had done to his father.

‘I ruin everything that I touch.’

Those words couldn’t have been more literal.

“Hey…Kid?” Harry turned, the sugar wands crushed in his grip. The short woman nodded her chin to a transfigured bed, pushed up against one of the empty bookshelves.

“That’s your bed, I made it as comfy as possible.” She pocketed her wand and glanced around the room with a slight frown, but didn’t say anything until she made sure Harry was getting settled.

“You don’t need the loo, do you?” Harry detected the timid twitch in her voice and shook his head. Tonks sighed with a nod.

“Alright then…if you did, just holler at one of the guards stationed outside, the same thing goes if there was an emergency or you were hungry too.”

“Okay.”

“Great,” she clasped her hands and mulled her lips, looking as if she was mentally checking an item off her checklist. Harry patiently waited her out, rigidly standing by his cot until the room was empty once again and he was alone.

Alone at last.

He laid on the covers, facing the empty bookshelf. He would stare at it for a while, inspect the little dents and imperfections lining the carved wood, staring into the empty space to guess how many books once filled the void before Harry was put here. He needed to do something familiar, something that grounded him enough so that he could carefully plan his next steps.

Shacklebolt was a loss. At least, so far, Harry hadn’t managed to get his point across to the man as he had originally thought. He thought that there was at least one person in this god damned place who could be trusted with certain information. Harry needed someone to know everything in case something went wrong.

But the Auror was an idiot, he didn’t cut the surveillance and now Harry had no other choice but go through the interrogation he had agreed to go through with, to save his father.

If he took the Veritaserum tomorrow morning, two things could happen; either he would lose his bargaining chip if asked a wrong question at the wrong time or situation, Dad would still be exonerated, even let free by the ministry people with the secret out, they would use Harry to their whims like a precarious weapon.

Or, he would lose his bargaining chip tomorrow during the interrogation anyway, they would declare both him and his father guilty of their crimes, and most likely execute Dad, maybe him too, deciding that he was too dangerous to be kept alive.

He could NOT let the secret out.

Which led to another singular conclusion; he couldn’t take the serum, and as a result, his father could not be vindicated by the ministry.

It wasn’t about what they did to Harry personally, he didn’t care if he was executed or kept in this place as a pretty doll to be used against anyone who looked at the ministry the wrong way, what he did care about was his father.

If they freed his father with Harry still in custody, then Dad would freak out, probably do something stupid like storming the ministry or assassinate someone to get to him, and then get himself killed or arrested in the process. If they didn’t free his father and moved on with a trial… Then Dad still pretty much could ruin himself, in order to save Harry and would not stop at any costs.

That only left one other alternative…his father being executed and Harry still a prisoner. It was the least desirable option for obvious reasons. If his father died, then Harry would die too. The grief would plain kill him, his magic would no doubt assist in the act, and his guilt could amount in to help the process as well.

Dad’s death was not an option. Nor was Harry remaining as he was.

“I’m so sorry,” Harry whispered to the bookshelf, his knees coming up to his chest. “I’m so sorry dad.”

“Harry? Where are you? Come on out!”

The tablecloth rustled, and Sev heard a muffled giggly. “I’m coming to get you!”

“I’m gonna steal your nose, and gobble it all up with ketchup! Now if only I could find you, you little brat!”

“No!” the loud exclamation was followed by a breathless giggle, muffled into Harry’s hands, undoubtedly. Severus played along, a playful smirk on his face as he encircled their kitchen, half crouching and pointedly ignoring their table.

“Oh who’s that squeaky noise?” he drawled as the giggling went on. “Maybe a little mouse is hiding under the sink.”

“No!”

‘My son is terrible at hide and seek,’ Severus thought with a roll of his eyes. Typical Gryffindor-ish behavior, he supposed. No sense of tact or self-preservation in that boy at all, Severus might as well ‘win’ the game now by asking where the four-year-old was hiding.

“No?” he asked instead. “Maybe it’s a tiny bird then?” Harry squealed in delight, and Severus couldn’t help but smile. “Well, I’ll just have to keep looking for my little brat.” He huffed and straightened his back with narrowed eyes. “Maybe the little birdie will help me find him.”

Harry paused in his hiding place for a beat, and then did something that melted Severus’s heart right on the spot-Not that he’d ever admit that aloud. He poorly imitated a bird’s chirp, his voice shrill, but small at the same time. “You cannot find him Daddy,” Harry continued in his high childish voice, posing as the bird…Severus supposed.

His son…was something else. Of course, it was very cruel of Severus to expect a four year old toddler to be good at playing a game, and not forget the rules on the spot, but still…Harry was truly something else. Sev could vividly imagine James Potter being this laughable at his son’s age, riding a toy broom into a wall.

Severus mocked a deep sigh. “Oh well,” he edged closer to the table. “I guess we will just have to give up then,” he grasped the tablecloth with a smirk, “After I’ll LOOK under the table!”

Harry jumped back with a shriek. “Not my nose!” he cried and tried scrambling away, but Severus was faster. He dove in and scooped the little child in his arms, dropping him on his lap and attacking his nose.

“Hmm Delicious!” he hummed, slightly horrified at himself by the childish display before he diminished such thoughts. It wasn’t as if the dark lord was about to see his most loyal servant playing with a child. No one judged him but Harry, and the boy was thoroughly enjoying himself at the moment, laughing himself silly. Severus rubbed his nose against Harry’s with a growl. “If only I had some salt or ketchup now!”

Harry screeched, brought his hands up to cover his face. “Don’t eat my nose!”

Severus smirked. “I’m a hungry snake.” He said. “What will you have me do besides eating little boy’s noses? Huh?”

Harry drew away with a grin. “You can eat my Daddy’s nose,” he said and then cackled, imitating an evil laugh. Severus had no idea that children laughed this much, prior to raising Harry. He couldn’t even begin to understand how could the boy store this much amusement in that tiny body.

“Oh really?” he played along. “Is his more delicious than yours?”

Fervently nodding, Harry leaned in to Severus’s ear. “And bigger too!” he whispered loudly, covering his mouth.

Severus felt his eyebrows ascend above his hairline. He reached and softly pinched Harry’s nose. The boy yelped and then draped himself over Severus in another fit of laughter.

“You nosy little rascal!” Severus found himself exclaim. “Did you just sell out your father to a hungry snake?”

Harry was red in the face, breathless and heaving against Severus. “But you’re the hungry snake Daddy!” he yelled, squeaking when Sev tickled him.
“Well you leave me no choice Harry,” Severus said with a shake of his head. “Your nose simply has to go.”

Harry leapt off his lap with a shriek of laughter. Severus was surprised to find that he wasn’t annoyed by it at all. “No!” he cried and started running.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Severus got to his feet and started chasing him. “Yes!”

**

Harry was in his room. Their windows were rattling against the hinges. Dad was standing before the locked door, his arms crossed against his chest. “I didn’t raise a hooligan,” he said. “I expect better of you.”

The lamp above Sev’s head dangerously flickered, another one down stairs burst. Harry raged back, facing his closed door, as if he was glaring back at Severus through the wood. “You’re the one who started this!” the boy yelled, and windows shook harder.

Severus kept his calm. He has had fourteen years of experience, dealing with Harry. He knew how to handle a tantrum. “Let’s not forget who’s in trouble here shall we?” the man drawled, calmly. “You were the one who sneaked out, mingled with some muggle girl,” his lips curled on their own accord. “Seduced her-”

Another lamp burst. From the kitchen by the sounds of it. “I didn’t seduce her!”

Severus couldn’t help but sneer. He was enraged, and it was getting progressively harder to remain stoic in the face of Harry’s foolishness. “Well then I suppose that makes Obliviating her a lot easier for me,” he jeered, not flinching as a shattering sound came from his right. Just a vase, easily repairable.

“You don’t understand!” his son sounded on the verge of tears. Tears of frustration. Severus had seldom seen his child this angry. Not after the incident, this was a first.

“If I were you I would choose my next words very carefully Harry,”

The door slammed open, and there Harry stood, with his fists clenched by his sides and his chin held high. “Well you’re not me are you?” the boy spat.

“You just want me to be like you! And I don’t want to be you!” he roughly rubbed at his eyes with his sleeves, and Severus had to stifle the urge to hold out his arms for a hug. Harry didn’t need coddling right now, on the contrary he needed a firm scolding, topped with a smack upside his head to get him back to his senses.

“I like Emily!” the boy snapped, “She likes me too, I’m sure if we tell her, warn her about me then we can work something out-”

“That is the most absurd thing I’ve heard coming out of your mouth.” This behavior was highly unusual, coming from Harry. Severus couldn’t quite understand the motive behind his son’s words. “Why cannot you see sense?”

“Because you’re not listening to me!”

It wasn’t Severus’s job to listen to him, the man seethed. “I am your father.” He said. “You listen to me.”

“I love her.”

Severus threw his head back with a menacing snort. “Oh spare me the theatrics,” he scoffed, “You’re fourteen! How could you possibly know ANYTHING about love?”

Something seemed to have snapped in Harry. His eyes took on an expression that Severus had never seen on the child’s face before. Something dark, and brooding. Something murderous. “Do you?!” he shouted.

“Because I don’t see you mourning over mom,” he scoffed at himself and then continued. “In fact you’ve never even mentioned her!” his words were striking Severus, carelessly rooting him to the ground, and he stood, doing nothing, but stare at Harry as the boy ranted. “I don’t even know her name or where she is now! Clearly you’re not too torn up over the loss of the woman who loved you!”

“Oh for the love of Merlin. This isn’t about me.”

“It’s about me!” Harry cried. The door cringed in its place in sympathy. “If you really loved my mom then you wouldn’t stop me from seeing Emily.”

“Who are we really arguing about, your mother or that muggle tart?”

“Don’t you dare call her that!” Harry’s door finally gave in and broke, sending wooden plasters flying inward to Harry’s room. The rest of the door hung off by one single hinge. Severus knew that he should calm Harry down, deescalate the situation, and be the adult he was pretending to be, but something was stuck in his throat, some nameless emotion that drove him further down the argument.

He was frightened. Frightened of the power this muggle girl held over Harry’s head. Scared that he might have to mutilate another body, take the blow and wait another year, possibly more for his son to gather all of the broken pieces.

“I dare call her anything I want, you indolent whelp!” he asserted an authoritative tone in his voice. He was Harry’s father and he had every right to prevent Harry from making a mistake. “You were bedridden for half a year after butchering two muggle boys! Boys you didn’t even know! The mere idea of touching me sickened you! Now you’re out there shoving your tongue down some girl’s throat and you dare ask me about love and sacrifice?”

“This isn’t fair,”

“Life isn’t fair, the sooner you learn that, the better.”

“You just don’t understand.”

Severus had had enough of this behavior. “Then I think your cognition abilities will have to be more than enough for the two of us.” He snapped and turned away, taking his wand out with a sneer, before he remembered that it was useless to him. They needed to pack by hand. “Pack your bags,” he called over his shoulders as he slid his wand back into his pocket. “We’re leaving tonight.”

Harry gasped behind him. “No!” he roared, and Severus swore that he could feel Harry’s magic…derived from Severus himself wrap around his throat, squeezing and constricting his breathing. Severus bared his teeth and stilled, swallowing with severe difficulty but otherwise indicating nothing wrong with the way he was breathing.

He didn’t want to frighten Harry.

“You will calm yourself this instant,” he bit out, trying to use the lack of air to his advantage. The invisible hands somehow slackened around his throat as Harry’s eyes blazed. Severus glowered back. “Or I will shove a calming draught down your throat.” He snapped. “I will not have you damaging the property or hurting-”

“You?” Harry cut off with a sneer of his own.

Severus stubbornly refused his heart to skip a beat.

“Yourself,” he said. “In the process. Go and pack.”

His son shook his head, eerily similar to his biological father, as he crossed his arms and glared. Severus couldn’t help but see the ghost of James Potter hovering behind his son’s shoulder, glaring at Severus with the same ferocity that Harry was trying to imitate. “I cannot leave without Emily.” Harry gritted out, and Severus’s eyes narrowed, still staring at the phantom over the boy’s shoulder.

“Oh really?” he sneered at the invisible figure. “Well then, I suppose you can live with the guilt of killing her better than the thought of leaving her behind.” He didn’t even have time to be horrified at himself as he waved his hand at Harry in dismissal. “By all means, leave now.”

Harry’s eyes widened, losing James Potter’s hateful glared behind them, being replaced by a look of utter betrayal and fret. “You said I’m not a killer.” Harry whispered, staggering where he stood.

“I’m not saying that you are one now. I’m asking you to see common sense without giving in to this bout of teenage rebellion. This girl is just one amongst the many. You will forget her in a week.”

“Just like you forgot all about mom?”

Harry just wasn’t letting this go, was he? Severus was not ready for this.

“This isn’t about your parentage.” He said. He could not have this conversation. “This is about you acting like the responsible boy I raised you to be.” This mess was big on itself already, he didn’t need Harry to inquire after Lily and James at the same time.

It would break him.

Severus didn’t even know when Harry had started thinking of his mother, it was only logical of him, especially after Sev gave him ‘the talk’ a few weeks ago, to their shared mortification, but he wasn’t expecting the boy to inquire after his mother so quickly.

He was an idiot in assuming that, of course the boy would have wanted to know about his mother at some point. Severus had naively assumed that day was too far in the future to ponder about.

Harry didn’t take the bait at all, instead he glared down at Severus with narrowed eyes. “I bet you hated her,” he muttered, “And I bet she hated you too.”

She did hate Severus, as it happened. Both of them did, one of them was his former enemy, and the other his best friend, there was no surprise that they bonded over their shared hatred of him as they married. Lily was not one to hate carelessly or strongly, but Sev’s shortcomings were beyond unforgivable.

“You know nothing,” he told Harry and couldn’t help but wonder whether he was the reason for Harry’s blindness regarding his parents.
‘Tell him that I love him,’ James had said. Well Severus did tell Harry that his father loved him, daily, actually. But he never got around to telling Harry that his father and Severus weren’t the same person, not by blood anyway.

“And neither do you.” Harry said. “I like Emily, I love her.”

It was astonishing, how Harry had seemed to inherit Lily’s resolution and James’s stubbornness without even being raised by the due. Nature versus Nurture, as it seemed, had played its hand well.

Severus inhaled deeply, glad that the suffocating hands were gone, and stared Harry in the eyes.

“If I let you go down that path you will see nothing but utter despair,” he said. “And misery and pain. I’m trying to spare you the heartbreak!” he needed Harry to understand this. There was no such a thing as a happy ending when it came to love. Even for true lovers like Potter and Lily. Death is the worst inevitability when it comes to love.

He didn’t want Harry to go down that path with his eyes closed and his heart bleeding and torn apart in his hands. “Why cannot you see that she’s using you?”

Severus was vaguely aware that he was deflecting his words, making sure they sting, making sure that Harry understood. “You’re just a summer fling to her!”

“That’s not true!”

“It is, because she’s just like you!” the idea that Harry had anything beyond infatuation for that girl, was simply laughable to Severus. Just as his own crush on Lily had been back then. “A hormone-ridden teenager, who has no idea what it’s like to be in love. Fourteen years cannot possibly be enough to understand the devastation that love brings along with itself!” he straightened his sleeves with a nod. “A simple fling isn’t worth another weight burdening your conscious.” There was a stifling moment of silence and then Severus blinked. “Go, and pack.”

“Dad-”

“We will be leaving tonight.” he started to walk away. “I’m asking you to stay put and not sneak out.” Deep down, he knew that he shouldn’t have. “I’m trusting you not to do that.”

Harry should have stayed.

**

“Auror Shacklebolt?” a rather young, confused trainee toned the Auror’s name. his face scrunched and his eyes squinting as if he couldn’t believe the senior Auror standing before him that late into the night.

The older man nodded slowly, his wand loosely gripped in his left hand.

“I’m to take the boy to another holding cell for the night,” he said quite smoothly. The trainee shared an uneasy glance with his partner and she shrugged. Kingsley frowned at them. “It’s procedure.” He said.

Michaels fidgeted in his post, and shared another glance with his friend. “But sir,” he said, his voice oddly on edge. They had explicit orders from Auror Tonks and Wilson, not to let anyone visit the boy until tomorrow morning during the interrogation. “Auror Tonks already-”

“I know what she did,” Shacklebolt interjected with a quirk of his brow. “Under my orders.” He reminded them. “Now I’m issuing different ones.” The blonde head reluctantly bobbed, acknowledging the Auror’s authority. “Stand aside Michaels,” said Kingsley gently.

“Yes sir,” Lance Michaels hung his head and dropped his wand, standing aside to let the larger man open the locks and enter the barricaded room.
Kingsley entered the dimmed office-makeshift interrogation room- and cast a muted ‘Lumos’ and noted a transfigured bed pushed up against one of the empty bookcases. The boy was lying prone on the bed, his breathing slowed, and his hands tucked under his head, Kingsley could see the back of his head, unmoving upon the pillow. Silently he strode to the bed.

“Potter?” he said, subtly waving his lit wand over the boy’s head. Potter didn’t stir.

“Potter wake up,” Kingsley muttered again, this time edging his wand into Potter’s face. The man almost jumped out of his skin as he noticed that Potter’s eyes were open wide, intently staring ahead. The boy didn’t even react to the harsh light of Kingsley’s wand.

Shacklebolt waved the wand into the boy’s eyes, “Are-Are you sleeping?” he asked, concerned that there was something severely wrong with the boy. He seemed to be breathing right, and his face was relaxed. Kingsley, hesitantly, poked him in the shoulder, and Potter, as if stung, blanched away from his touch, nearly smacking his head into the bookcase.

Kingsley fell back in surprise.

“Are you alright?” he asked and Potter sat up, rubbing his forehead with a bewildered look on his face.

“You startled me!” he snapped. “Is it already morning?” he looked around in the dark, his brows furrowed before he stared at Kingsley again, his lip curling.

“Were you sleeping?” Shacklebolt asked, somewhat breathlessly.

Potter shook his head slowly. “No, I was…focusing.” He paused. “Is it morning?”

“No, actually.” Shacklebolt straightened his back. He looked slightly uncomfortable as he scratched the back of his neck. “You made me think a lot,” Harry narrowed his eyes. “I thought that maybe we needed to talk, somewhere…safer.”

“You’re doing this against their orders.”

Shacklebolt nodded. “No one has to know Potter, as you are adamant to repeat.”

Potter just stared at him, looking as if he didn’t believe a word coming out of the man’s mouth. “Alright,” he said slowly, and Kingsley nodded again, to himself this time. Potter stood, tapping his wrist twice before running a hand through his hair. Shacklebolt extended a hand to the boy’s shoulder.

Harry hastily slipped past Kingsley’s hand. “No, you shouldn’t…you shouldn’t touch me.”

“I wouldn’t hurt you,” the Auror said, as softly as before. Somehow, he seemed to forget that he was dealing with a child as he interacted with Potter. There was just something about him, the look on his face, bore an expression suited for a weathered solider and not a teen.

Potter looked faintly amused on his behalf. “I might hurt you,” he said. “Just…don’t touch me. Lead the way.”

**

“Do the guards know you smuggled in a wand Albus, or are you being naughty? They didn’t even check for contraption, did they?”

Albus flashed him a quick smile. “Being who I am has certain advantages, I’m afraid.”

It appalled Severus, how easy it was for the man to evade him. He has softened more than he had realized in the years, a transgression that solely fell on Harry’s shoulders, but one that he couldn’t really blame him for, even in his mind. “It’s considered a minor felony,” he sneered. “As I’m sure you’re aware, it would be a shame to see you chained up here Headmaster.”

The wand trembled slightly in the man’s hand as he shifted in his seat, crossing one leg over the other. “I’m sure what they won’t know wouldn’t hurt them Severus.” He said and Severus grabbed onto the reckless bit of trust with hungry claws. The headmaster thought him incapable of disobeying him, well if he really thought that then Severus had startling news for him.

“Except that I’m about to start screaming right now,” he said, fully expecting to see Albus’s frown. He had only seen it once before, when he was sixteen and shaking, trying to control himself in the man’s office, his breathing was haggard and his eyes begged the old man to believe the words stumbling out of his mouth. ‘I almost died tonight, sir, I was right! Lupin is a werewolf and he almost did it! He was going to kill me. Black, he-he was the one-he told me- he baited me!’

James Potter was there too then, standing behind Severus’s chair, strangely quiet, not defending his friends, not saying anything, Sev couldn’t even see the expression on his face. Albus was staring at James though, and he was frowning, as if he couldn’t hear Severus at all.

Instead of that peculiar frown, what Severus got is a small nod. “And prove me right.”

“I don’t have anything to prove,”

Albus extended the wand again, this time his eyes challenging, daring Severus to decline him. “Then it wouldn’t be much to ask you to cast a simple charm, as I mentioned the levitating charm would do.”

If he wanted to play dirty, then Severus was only compelled to join in. “Or I could stun you,” Severus drawled, deliberately letting his voice drop in a soft whisper. Intimidation wasn’t always about loud exclamations and thrashing. “Kill the guards, free as many prisoners as I can to cause havoc and then flee.” He smirked as he leaned back in his chair. “My oh my, Albus, you are getting old and barmy.”

Albus surprised him again, the man leaned back and flicked his sleeve away to reveal the end of the wand, encircled by a red band. Severus actually snarled, and Albus’s grin expanded across his face. “It would be entertaining to watch you accomplish that much with a trainer’s wand Severus.”
A trainer’s wand. Trust Albus bloody Dumbledore to humiliate Severus with a trainer’s wand.

“You bastard,”

“Let’s get this over with, shall we?” Albus smiled jovially and sat back. The wand barely warmed in Severus’s hand. “I cannot wait to be disappointed.”
Severus dismissed the pang of hurt that came upon seeing how he couldn’t even command a trainer’s wand and glowered at the headmaster. “Whatever you think that you can accomplish by doing this, you’re mistaken.”

Albus’s jovial smile gave in to a thoughtful frown. “Do you want to know what I think Severus?” he didn’t wait for him to respond. “I think, that you are physically unable to cast any sort of charms in the state you are, without straining your core, or burning it off completely. I think the dramatic decline in your magical powers has only one source, one that you have sworn to protect with your life, and have done splendidly.”

**

When Harry got back, it was already dark, too silent. Emily had insisted on walking him home, to try and talk to Harry’s father, unaware that the problem wasn’t her in the first place. Harry firmly stood his ground, quickly kissed her on the cheek and said that he would talk to his father. He didn’t tell her that he might never see her again.

As he approached their house, he saw no light flickering from the windows. Pitch darkness engulfed the entirety of their home, and the silence amplified the stillness hanging around their yard. Their house almost looked darker than the sky. Harry had an irrational voice, uncontrollably shouting in his head, telling him that his father had already left.

Instead, the man was sitting in their living room on the couch, his arms crossed and his face stoic, his eyes intent on burning through the mug he had placed on their coffee table. Harry lingered by the couch, his head hung and his eyes stinging. “Dad,” he muttered, standing in front of his father.
Severus looked up. “Have you eaten?” he asked, his voice perfectly blank. Harry didn’t like it when Dad was like this. He gazed at the lukewarm mug of tea that his father was trying to will out of existence and then tore his gaze back to his Dad’s face.

“Dad I can explain,” he said. “I know that you said-.”

“Have you eaten?” Dad cut him off, uncrossing his arms as he stood. Harry stepped back, unconsciously. He wasn’t scared of his father. Dad never got angry with him. Harry regarded the question and tried to find the hidden meaning behind his father’s question.

“Um, no.” he and Emily shared a cupcake she had stolen from the bakery. She said she did the frosting herself.

Dad nodded. “There’s a plate in the oven waiting for you,” he said then paused. “Shepard’s pie.”

He started his journey to the kitchen, but Harry’s feet were still stitched to their floor. “Dad,”

Dad looked over his shoulder. “Why don’t we take this to the kitchen?” he didn’t wait for Harry’s response as he made his way to the kitchen. Harry meekly followed, from the corner of his eyes he could see two suitcases leaned against the staircase.

“I’m sorry,”

Dad crouched down to take his plate out of the oven, still pleasantly warm. The aroma soon wafted around their kitchen, tantalizing Harry and torturing him at once. He knew the significance behind this meal. Dad had made him Shepard’s pie, thinking that Harry was upset after their fight, brooding and packing his things. Probably spent two hours making the food from scratch, then went to Harry’s room and saw it deserted.

Harry was a terrible person.

Dad set the plate on the table, then nodded at him. “Never apologize when you don’t mean it. Seat,”

Harry sat.

“Eat.” He turned to open their fridge, without attempting to turn the lights on. ‘Oh right, I destroyed the kitchen lamps too’ he realized with a jolt and squirmed in his seat.

“Orange juice or milk?” father asked.

“Water.” The fridge closed with a sharp snap and Severus took out his wand, carelessly accio’ing a glass out of the cabinet to hold it under the tap.

“Did you have fun?” something in Harry’s chest tightened, and he pursed his lips. He wasn’t going to cry. He was fourteen. He couldn’t tell if Dad was pissed at him, not from his tone, or his face. That was a first.

“Are you angry?” he asked.

“How many times have I told you not to answer a question with another one?” it was an exhausted chiding. No force behind those words at all. “It’s impolite.”

“Sorry father,” It was the first time Harry had called Severus ‘father’, “Yes. I…we had fun.”

Severus hummed noncommittally. “And you were safe?” the words were carried out with utter nonchalance, and Harry actually choked on his food, flushing vermilion.

“No…” he muttered, still flushing. “Not that kind of fun.”

Sev firmly set the rimming glass next to Harry’s plate, letting some of the water haggardly slosh out of the glass. He sat across Harry, his chin settled on the back of his entwined hands.

“Did you know,” he idly began, “That Emily is derived from its Latin root Aemilia which was also derived from a Romanian root, meaning ‘eager’?” Harry’s head dropped in response, the boy swallowed, but Severus continued. “She’s the baker’s daughter, isn’t she?”

His son nodded. “Yes.” There was a pause. “I’m sorry for sneaking out.”

Severus leaned back against his seat. “No you’re not.”

Harry took a small sip from his water. “I can still pack, if we’re in a hurry,”

Dad raised his eyebrows in response. “You don’t want to leave.” He said and Harry stiffened. Dad usually didn’t do that; stating the obvious. He actually hated doing so, with a passion.

“No, I don’t.” Harry finally said, his leg bouncing under the table. He and Severus gazed at each other for a beat, “But please, I cannot bear it when you’re cross with me.”

“I’m not cross with you.”

Harry’s head snapped up. “You’re not?”

He was expecting another round of argument and broken furniture around the house, maybe with his father finally yelling at him for the first time. He was expecting blood and tears and raised voices, not his father looking down at the table with hooded eyes.

“No.” the man said, and something in Harry’s chest tightened. “Merely confused. Do you really like this girl that much?”

Harry wanted to say no. No he didn’t, they could pack and leave now, and Harry was sorry for being ungrateful, he was sorry that he was causing his father this much pain. He knew how much dad was sacrificing for him and he was sorry. He really was sorry.

But he knew how his dad despised half-truths, even ones out of pity.

“She’s really nice,” he said instead, his voice wobbling. “And she understands me…she’s trying Dad. She can…well someone can put up with me,” he chuckled very briefly. “And she’s the first one who’s ever…”

He trailed off, his fork scratched against his plate and Dad looked up to stare at him.

“Who has ever what?” he asked softly, slowly. Harry hated himself.

“Who has ever treated me like I matter.” He replied meekly, his fingers tightened around the fork. Then he realized what he had said, and dropped the fork altogether. “Aside from you that is.” He scrambled to say. “I swear I still love you more.”

“Harry, there is no competition regarding the people you’re allowed to love.” Dad said and reached for his pocket as Harry sat in a mild confusion.

“But you said-.”

“I know what I said.” Dad cut him off, and brought something out of his pocket, hidden inside the crook of his palm. “I still believe in what I said, I think you’re making a mistake, I think she’s not worth the trouble, she’s going to hurt you, drain you of what little happiness you have inside of you and then leave you stranded…” he trailed off, and pushed the hidden object towards Harry with a shrug. “But you like her.”

It was a paper flower.

“You’re not guilt tripping me into this,” Harry realized, numbly reaching for the small pink paper flower.

“I’m not.” Severus confirmed. “I know what’s going on inside your head, and there too,” he nodded to Harry’s chest. “I raised you, I made an oath, and I’m keeping it to this day, and I think…you should be happy. Do what makes you happy. If snogging the baker’s daughter can do that, then I cannot really stop you.”

The bulge in Harry’s throat expanded and he cleared his throat. He really didn’t want to cry. “I’m still sorry.” He said, and gulped down some more water to give his hands something to do.

Dad smiled, in that special way he did, that was more of a smirk than a smile, but it conveyed so many emotions. “I know, and Harry?”

“Yes Dad?”

Dad paused. “I love you,” he said. “You need to remember that,”

“How could I forget?”

**

“I think your sacrifice runs deeper than most realize.” Said Albus, utterly oblivious to how wrong he was, in his regard towards Sev. “How many other wizards would risk losing their magic by raising a ‘Devoratrix’ for more than fourteen years?” he waited for Sev to sneer. “I happen to know none.”

Severus recalled that particular memory, of his loathsome neglect with something akin to disgust. He wasn’t some saint, a willing sacrifice. He had wronged Harry beyond measure. He was atoning. He would rather die than treat Harry like that again.

This punishment was only fair. “I have no idea what you’re rambling on about Albus,” he said to the man. “I think you need to leave now.” Harry’s cries were ringing in his ears, eerily tangling themselves with his son’s desperate calls just a few days ago as Severus abandoned him to distract the Aurors.

“I suspect that no one else knows,” Albus said. “James and Lily must have, Harry needed a steady magical source until his own core formed to sustain the child…except it never did, did it?”

It never did, no. Severus suspected that Harry had been feeding on Potter’s magic before they were murdered. Maybe Lily and Potter were both feeders, they had to sustain the child somehow in those months. “I’m calling the guards,”

Albus had no way of knowing all this. Sev was certain of it. James Potter wouldn’t have told Dumbledore that his son was the way he was, or else he wouldn’t have begged Severus to run away from Dumbledore as well. Moreover, Lily and Potter were smart enough to realize that this information wasn’t common knowledge. They would have hidden it well.

“Voldemort’s attack was quite a shock, the curse never rebounded as originally thought…Harry ate it up, damaging his own unformed core in the process…corrupting it in a way, and Tom’s core must have been devoured too, to a certain extent. All of that magic, inside a tiny body…it doesn’t seem possible at all.”

“You had no way of knowing this,”

“It held him up for a few years. You mustn’t have noticed it right away. When was it Severus? When did you find out that he was feeding on your magic?”

**

Severus remembered well, he remembered the anguish, the dull tug of war as his magic diluted and waned into thin strips, steadily detaching itself from Severus, he remembered the whine of his magic against the chain, resisting Harry’s pull, holding out for as long as it could before finally resonating back into Severus and then back to Harry again.

It didn’t physically hurt, not in a way that Severus could explain, but he could feel it somewhere deeper, as if his magic was wedged in a hole between what held his soul and body together. He felt it lessen.

At first, when he found out, he hated the child for it, because of course James Potter’s child would be that way, a ‘Devoratix’ of all things, and of course Severus would have to be the one victim in order for the child to survive, it was the way of the world and the world was cruel.

In his hatred, and pettiness, and the unwillingness to share what was most dearest to him, Severus, for the first time in two years since he’d had Harry, thought about abandoning the boy. He could handle a lot of things, he could handle any sort of torture thrown his way, any smidgen of misery written in his fate, but his magic? It was just too much of a price to pay.

He remembered, shamefully now, how he had plopped the child down in his crib, and locked the door on his way out, casting the strongest wards he knew around the room.

‘Just for a few hours,’ he had thought. ‘Just to have some time to myself. Only a few hours’

He recalled how he did his best to ignore Harry’s inconsolable cries and ventured down in his labs, relishing in the abundance of his magic, and the potion fumes surrounding his core, crowding his instincts.

He remembered how he had forgotten to feed the child in his excitement to finish a potion he couldn’t even properly pronounce, as he reveled in the fact that yes, ‘my magic is mine, no one has the right to take it, I was born with it, I earned it, and it will have to stay that way’.

Only that those few hours turned to something more. He had left a two-year-old child in his crib all day, forgotten, with no food, and attention, locked him in his nursery and let the child cry himself to sleep, wake and repeat the cycle again for hours and hours as he selfishly, grudgingly used what was supposed to be inherently his.

He had vialled the gleaming blue potion with great care, his breathe held tightly in his chest as he filled vial after vial and set them to cool on his desk. The potion was highly exotic. He could make a good fortune out of them. He had been so occupied with raising a child that he hadn’t had brewed anything in months. This was exhilarating to him, it made his heart race and his mind whirl with instructions, stirring and chopping up ingredients.

He reveled in it, he ignored a two year old sobbing in his crib upstairs, the crying was so muffled in his labs that Severus honestly couldn’t hear it at all over the sound of his own thoughts, instructing him how to advance, how to stir just right, how many crushed salamander eyes should he add.

It was almost midnight, by the time he was finished putting away the last batch, his arms hurt from exertion, his legs wobbled a bit and his magic was thoroughly satisfied, Harry was the furthest thing from his thoughts, as though the child didn’t even exist in the first place. He didn’t know how, he didn’t know what had come over him that day, all he knew was that, he needed this break, he needed his magic to be his, and he was tired of sacrifices.

Then he got out of his labs, then he heard Harry still crying his crib, heartbroken and alone after hours of wailing, and then he heard the child calling for his ‘Daddy’.

He dropped the batches nestled in his arms, didn’t hear them shattering against the steps at all, and raced up to the living room, his mind annoyingly blank as he ran to Harry’s nursery and crashed the door down. His magic was whirling around him like a whip as he approached the child who was holding onto the bars of the crib, extremely red in the face, crying and calling for ‘Daddy’ over and over again.

Severus gasped. He couldn’t help himself. He stifled the self-loathing that threatened to tear itself out of his throat and ran to the child, gently scooping him in his arms, wincing from the way Harry’s small hands clung to his shirt as he buried his face into Sev’s neck, ignoring the soiled clothes clinging from the child and the tear-jerking odor of urine and misery. He held the child close and stepped out of the cursed room, bouncing him and gently hushing him as he took him to the bathroom.

He didn’t let himself think at all, as he went through the process of cleaning the toddler, taking care of the painful red rashes on his thighs, muttering apologies in an endless cycle. He stroke Harry’s hair, on the verge of tears himself as he sat the child on his lap to feed him an apple, whilst he was preparing him a hasty meal. Harry clung back to him, his face still half buried in Severus’s chest as Sev shakily fed him the apple slices.

“I’m so sorry,” he kept telling the child, gently bouncing his knees and reaching for the next slice. “It won’t happen again, I promise, shh. Daddy’s so sorry, shh. I’m so sorry.”

This was the price of holding onto his magic, neglecting a child for a whole day, letting him wail in hunger and fear, letting him seat in his own filth. This was the reason why Severus didn’t deserve what he already had, the reason why he had thought locking an innocent child away would fix his problems.

This is what happened when he had abandoned the child for a day, out of foolishness, out of literal thoughtlessness. Severus hated himself with a vengeance. He cursed himself in his head with the same ferocity that Harry called out to him, still softly crying as he munched on the mushed apples.
Even as he felt the strong, desperate tug of magic, he refused to let the child go, he held Harry close, shushing him, feeling his magic wane into thin strings and latch onto Harry’s core, in a steady endless stream. He didn’t care. He hated himself too much in that moment to care. He let it happen, and he held his son close, and vowed never to let something like this happen again.


**

“I want to try that Daddy!” Harry quickly heaved himself up the wooden stool and leaned over the cauldron. “Can I? Can I? Please! Can I?”

Severus dropped his knife and gently pulled Harry away from the fumes. “You need to be careful!” he said and sat Harry down on the stool with a pat on the head. He wasn’t making anything toxic, just finishing up the last batch of his fever reducing order, but he never took any chances with his child.

Harry scrambled to his knees again. “But it looks pretty!” he exclaimed, his hand holding onto Sev’s robes to steady himself. Well, Severus supposed that the colors might be fascinating to Harry. His son liked staring at things, transfixed by them, drowned in the details, so of course the potion’s rich colors would draw him in.

“And it’s steaming,” said Severus gently. “Stand back Harry,”

The four year old pouted and tried to cross his arms in a poor imitation of Severus. Sev smirked at the display. “I want to help you,” Harry said.
Severus barely felt it anymore, that subtle tug that gently pulled his magic away from him and tangled itself in Harry’s core, of course, it would have made sense to feel as such after two years, and he suspected that it would continue to do so as the years went on.

The loss of his magic was painstakingly gradual, and Sev barely even thought of it on a daily basis, he could still do most charms, and ones that he couldn’t he would either stow away for their annual Slogen day, or just when Harry’s presence wasn’t dangerous.

He wasn’t sure how it worked between them, when Harry was near, but he could occasionally draw some of his magic back through the open channel, accomplish a seemingly difficult task and then feel the magic snap back to Harry again like an elastic band.

That feeling only intensified every March, when he took Harry to Slogen and taught him how to unleash the overwhelming waves of magic he had consumed from Severus or his surrounding throughout the year. He felt his magic lapping up to him in the vacant field, apologetic but taunting too and grieved it only for a moment, resigned to the fact that it belonged to Harry now, and even if it was released, it was bound to get back to the boy following their departure from their hiding place.

“Alright,” Severus picked Harry up and lowered him near his workshop. He dropped a few beans in Harry’s palm. “You can drop the crushed beans.” He said, and picked up his own knife again.

Harry’s eyes darted over to the stirring rod. “And stir it?” his legs bounced and he was grinning. Severus regretting giving Harry applesauce for breakfast already. Too much sugar.

He resumed chopping the leek roots. “We’ll see about stirring if you’re really good at dropping the beans.” He offered and Harry, eager and still grinning from ear to ear nodded. He held onto the beans as he watched Severus work, his legs tangling from the edge of the table and his eyes serenely staring at Sev’s hands.

Sev added the last beat of salamander’s tail and then waved his hand at Harry.

“Alright,” he said, holding Harry above the cauldron. “Don’t lean in too far,” Harry’s eyes were narrowed, an expression took upon his face that was years beyond his age, as he gently opened his palm.

“That’s right,” Sev muttered, ready to yank his son back in case anything went wrong. “Just over the edge. Drop them one at a time,”

“I know that!”

“I know you know little fawn, there’s nothing wrong with reminding. Wait a little before dropping a new one.”

“I’m a big boy now! I’m helping you make juice!”

Severus scoffed. “Juice?” he asked. “This is a potion I’ll have you know. A very delicate one too.”

Harry stared at him as if he was insane. “Potions are juice.” He said slowly, pronouncing each word carefully and patiently. He tapped Sev’s hand twice in sympathy and the man narrowed his eyes.

“No they’re not,” he said.

“Na-huh! They’re juice!”

“They’re both liquid, that’s what they have in common. Potions taste differently and actually accomplish things. Juice just tastes good.”

“They’re ‘likid’?” Harry flung that word into the wind, wincing as he realized that it didn’t sound right in his mouth.

Severus smiled. “No, liquid.” He corrected. “It means they’re runny, like water, and milk, and they take the shape of whatever they’re in,” he pointed at the boiling cauldron. “This potion is inside a cauldron now, so it…somewhat looks like a cauldron too.”

Harry steadied himself against Severus’s shoulders with a hum. “So milk is like a glass?” he peered into the cauldron before Sev drew them both away. He still didn’t like the fumes anywhere near Harry.

“No, not all the time” he replied, half regretting this conversation as he toed the toddler back to the door.

“Maybe I’ll explain this again when you’re older.” He said, and gently pushed Harry out of the door, trying to persuade him to a game of hide and seek.

The ruby red potion was left simmering on his worktop, unattended.

**

“They look identical.”

“I know,” was Remus’s dry reply.

Sirius was too enamored with the boy to detect the dryness in his friend’s tone. “That hair, and his frame…he has glasses Remus!”

“I know,” said Remus once again.

Sirius grabbed his arm in a death grip as he turned to him. Something wild shone in his eyes. “He should be fourteen by now,” he said, with a grin that nearly threatened to split his face in two. “Fourteen years old and about five months.” Then he bit his lip and stole another glance at the oblivious boy, splitting a cupcake with an unknown girl. “Isn’t he too small?”

Remus raised his eyebrows. “You kept count?” he had a feeling that if he asked Harry’s age more specifically, Sirius would provide the answer down to the exact day and hour, even minutes. It was somewhat disconcerting, but Remus wasn’t too worried about it.
Sirius had always been this…way. He was himself in the most ridiculous manner, and twelve years in Azkaban rarely did anything to beat that eccentric part out of him.

“You didn’t?” Sirius asked, in a way that implied that Remus was the weird one.

The other man shrugged with a small smile. “Not really,”

“Things like this are the reason why James chose me as Prongslet’s Godfather you know.” Sirius said airily, “You couldn’t handle the responsibilities.”

“You’re right,” Remus replied, in spite of the fact that he was the one who had found Harry again, on Dumbledore’s insistence and tagged Sirius along. “I’m a terrible godfather,”

Padfoot winced. “Well I wouldn’t go as far as call you terrible,” he patted Remus’s arm as if comforting him. “Just not dogmatic,”

“Sirius stop, he cannot see us.” They weren’t supposed to be seen, just keeping an eye on Harry from afar, checking in on him, was what Dumbledore had said. It was to be kept undercover. Sirius didn’t even know that Severus Snape was the one in charge of Harry. Not that he was supposed to be aware of that, even Dumbledore didn’t know.

He had tried asking of course, and Remus had a feeling that the old man already had guessed, but the werewolf never outright admitted as such when he visited Albus. He cherished Harry’s safety above all else, even his animosity with Snivellus didn’t matter as much as Harry did.

Sirius tugged him a bit closer, his neck craning and his eyes narrowed. “Just a little closer,” he muttered and tried to move, but Lupin held him back. Sirius glared at him over his shoulder, “Moony I need to see him,” he calmly explained, but didn’t try to move again. “Do you think he sounds the same too?” he asked with newfound excitement.

“The same as he did when he was a year old?” Remus grinned. He shook his head exasperatedly at his best friend. “I think you might scare him if you approach him like this, Padfoot.”

“Like what?” Sirius hummed absently.

“Like a creep.” Remus deadpanned. “You’re a stranger to him, he doesn’t know you, or me for that matter,”

Sirius frowned at him. “I thought you sent him letters,”

“Christmas gifts only,” Remus corrected him with a frown of his own. “The others are sent back unopened.” Which infuriated him to no end. He understood the logic behind it, how his owls could compromise Harry’s safety, but monthly Wolfsbane and a dry note essentially saying that ‘He’s alive and well’ wasn’t simply enough to sustain him over the years. He constantly felt as if a part of him had been torn and kept inches away from his reach.

“That’s not even the point…” he said, trying to convince himself, mostly, “Just, don’t startle him.”

However, to his disappointment, Sirius wasn’t even paying attention anymore. His eyes were stitched back to Harry chuckling with the girl. Not a shocker, that. Remus thought.

“And look at that girl hanging off his arm!” The shaggy haired man exclaimed. “He’s a player, you can tell,”

“Sirius!”

“What?” the man sputtered indignantly. “It’s true. That’s Jamie thorough and thorough.” A Cheshire cat smile expanded across his face. “Remember Mia?” he drawled.

Remus stifled a grimace. “I don’t think I could forget Mia if I tried.” Through an unfortunate chain of unluckiness, Remus had somehow walked in on Mia, the fifth year Ravenclaw, every time she and James were trying to get some action…once he even walked in on her with Sirius whilst they were getting…acquainted with each other. He wished he could purge all incidents from memory.

“I set them up you know,” Sirius snorted. “Lovely bird, Mia…she and I were well acquainted before she ran off to James…if you know what I mean,”
Yeah, Remus still remembered. Quite vividly. “I do, unfortunately.” He said and they both turned to look at Harry and the muggle girl, lingering by the bakery’s door before they started walking towards the markets.

Remus saw Sirius’s eyes dim and his cheek dimple with a mischievous smirk. He tugged on Moony’s arm. “Let’s get closer.” He said, already on the move, and dragging Remus with him. “I can go as Padfoot. We could pass by them…I need to hear his voice Moony,”

“I don’t think that’s a good-“And the other man was already gone, trotting in the street as a dog.

“Sirius!” Remus hissed and ran after him. This could not end well.

Chapter Nine; the Slow Gun Was Stolen

There was a very peculiar memory, one etched into the back of Harry’s mind since early childhood. A snippet, truly, that he was reminded of at the most random moments.

“Harry,” Daddy was calling him, and Five-year-old Harry was perched on the edge of their table, mildly swinging his legs and staring at the ceiling with mild wonder.

“Yes Daddy,” Harry replied.

Dad was cutting up some leeks for their dinner. “What happened to the man in Norway?”

Harry giggled, and he clapped his hands. “His slow gun got stolen!” he was filled to the brim with mirth. He loved that rhyme, it made no sense, there was hardly any context to it but Harry loved it, so much.

Dad had ruffled his hair. He smelled like leeks and tomatoes. “That’s good.”

Sometimes Dad didn’t sing the rhyme anymore, at the breakfast table every few months, between his bites of scrambled eggs all he had to say was, “That man in Norway,”

And Harry always automatically replied with “Slow gun got stolen,”

When he was being tutored about something completely unrelated, his dad mildly hummed while they were on a break and said, “Remember that man in Norway,”

Harry didn’t even think about the answer. “His slow gun was stolen,”

“That’s right,” Then they were back to the tedious lessons as if nothing had happened.

As Harry steadily aged, their rhyme shortened considerably. In the living room of whatever house they had at the time, Dad would be sitting in his armchair, sifting through his journals. “Norway?” he would muse.

Harry would look up from his own book with a slight nod. “Norway.”

“I knew a man once whose gun got stolen,”

“Is that a real thing?” he had asked once.

Dad was writing a letter, to Santa’s enemy, Harry had assumed. “Hmm?”

“That rhyme?” Harry was much older than the last time they’ve played. About thirteen. “What happened to the man in Norway? You really seem to like it Dad,”

Dad had waved him off, tying the letter and a purple vial to an unsuspecting Owl. “It’s not a real event no,” he had turned to Harry, “Just something I made up when you were a child, I don’t know why it calmed you down, but it did.”

Thus, the man in Norway was born to be the only riddle Harry couldn’t solve.

**

This was one of his earliest memories, of Harry sitting on the kitchen table, kicking his feet back and forth, with Dad in the chair in front of him, holding his hands steadily. “If the strange man says do you want a chocolate, what would you say Harry?”

The toddler breamed. “Good!”

Severus visibly slumped. They had been doing this for a while. “No,”

Harry, despite hearing this for probably the tenth time, gasped in astonishment. “No?”

Dad had rolled his eyes with a smirk. “No. you have to say no. If the strange man asks your name?”

Harry had smiled. He knew the answer to this one. “I’m Harry James!”

Dad surprisingly sighs again. “No, Harry pay attention please,”

Harry thought this was a new game back then, and he reveled in the look of resignation on his father’s face, even though he got the wrong answers every time. He had memorized each and every little line and crook of his Dad’s face, every small twitch and expression, Harry knew by heart. He loved cataloguing them.

“But Daddy that’s my name!” he exclaimed.

“But the strange man wouldn’t know that alright?” Dad tapped his hand. Harry liked tapping things.

“Only I’ll call you by your full name,” he said and Harry’s smile expanded.

“Always?”

“Always and forever.” He promised, “If someone asks, you shouldn’t answer at all, alright?”

“But what if he really wanted to know?” that was a genuine question. Harry was curious about a lot of things, there might be other people like him out there, Harry wouldn’t have known, he hadn’t met a lot of them.

“Never tell him if he seems scary.” Dad replied. “And if you ever got lost, you run and find a safe person, if they asked your name to find me, you’d say ‘I’m Harry, and I lost my daddy, and his name is Sam Stevens’.”

He looked a bit relieved that they had gotten this far, during this round of the game. This was new information to Harry, who had no concept of fake names and false identities as a four year old. “But your name is Sev-er-rus!”

Dad’s cheek twitched, and Harry’s kicking legs came to a halt, that wasn’t a happy twitch, Harry knew. Dad stared at him, there was a small pause before he nodded his head. “I know that Harry, we both do alright?” he said, squeezing Harry’s hands. “But it’s all make-believe. We’re playing a game, and we should always win.”

The game was the only thing that mattered. Harry knew that already. He was going to be a good boy.

“Okay,” he tapped Dad’s hand in confirmation.

Dad’s face did a happy twitch that expanded into a smile. “Good. Now if a strange man or woman ever asked to touch your forehead what will you do?”

Harry knew this one. “I scream for you and then start running to find a safe person.”

Daddy ruffles his hair. “That’s right.”

Dad was very serious when it came to Harry and other people who weren’t Dad, Harry knew this. He did know that Dad was a safe person, but they’ve never talked about other people who might be safe persons too.

“Daddy…how do I find a safe person?”

Severus seemed startled. “Well, I’m hoping that you’d never have to rely on them,” he said. “But they’re called ‘The Police’, they usually wear blue or black uniforms, and badges, it’s their job to help people.”

People in blue dresses. That was easy. Harry liked the color game. “Alright,” he could do that.

“Harry it’s very important that they don’t find out about your magic,”

In a manner, only specific to fatigued adults and toddlers, Harry whined. “But why?” it was too complicated, so many rules and not to do’s, it made Harry despise everything that wasn’t his father and their home. It took so much effort.

“We’ll lose the game that way alright? If there wasn’t any Police Officers around-that’s what they’re called- you should go into a shop or a store and ask the person behind the counter to contact the police because you got lost, alright?”

“Okay,” Harry conceded, but he was still pouting. Dad who must have seen it coming, plucked Harry off the table, and started heading to Harry’s room.

“Can you repeat that back to me before we take a nap?”

Harry did.


**

Shacklebolt walked a disoriented Harry past the guards and into an elevator, one that he vaguely remembered getting into a while back. He didn’t talk, didn’t ask unnecessary questions, he didn’t even move in his place. Harry was grateful.

The narrow halls were all empty, with only an odd office here and there occupied. Shacklebolt led him past all these rooms to a cramped office at the very end of the corridor, and through that, inside another, rather cramped room.

“You wanted privacy,” the man said with his arms crossed as he turned to Harry.

“You changed your mind quickly,” Harry said.

Shacklebolt looked rather uncomfortable for a moment. “I needed to hear the rest,”

“The rest of what?” Harry thought that he knew already.

“The rest of all the things you wanted to say and never did.”


**


He’d just dropped Emily off by the bakery, stolen a quick kiss and a scone and was on his way back. He still didn’t go out in public much, but since that big argument he’s had with Dad nearly two months ago he’s been surprisingly lax with Harry’s security.

Dad claimed that Harry was old enough to realize right from wrong, and thus as long as he didn’t make any trouble, or escalate things too far with Emily, he was allowed to go out during the days only with a curfew. Harry had tried to push his boundaries on the curfew thing, but after a talk with Emily he found out that curfew was an ‘everyone’ thing and not just his dad’s paranoia.

He liked this, this kind of freedom. He still wasn’t comfortable enough to interact with total strangers in the busy streets, and he barely managed a fifty-second introduction with Emily’s mom, but he got to walk around the woods, watch people from atop of tall trees from afar and spend as much time with Emily as he wanted to.

Still, in spite of all of this, he couldn’t help but notice a small ridge that separated him from his father. Dad was acting odd lately, more distant than usual, and Harry for once in his life, had no idea how to counter the sudden withdrawal.

As he was busy kicking a pebble down the streets, his thoughts were interrupted by loud bark, moments before something barreled right into him, sending Harry-and the dog both the ground.

Harry groaned, wincing at the way his elbow throbbed. He must have grazed it on the ground. The dog- a black one by the looks of it was goofily staring back at him, his tongue lazily rolled out and his tail wagging. Harry had never pet a dog before.

“Hi there,” he said to the funny dog and scratched its head. The dog treated him with a lick across the face.

“Ew!” Harry laughed. The dog barked once more and Harry rolled his eyes. He had never had a pet before, Dad really didn’t like cleaning up after their mess and with the constant moving Harry really didn’t want to inconvenience the man further. This dog though, was the kindest one Harry had seen.

He stuck by Harry’s side as the boy stood and inspected the slight damage to his elbows. Small, barely noticeable grazes and a bit of detritus, he brushed them off.

Just then, he noticed a man approaching them. A rather familiar looking man. Presumably, the dog’s owner, or at least Harry hoped that he was. Tall, with honey colored hair and hazel eyes, in very shabby clothing. He was out of breath by the time he reached Harry and the dog.

“Hello!” the man panted out, before glaring down at the dog. Harry’s hold on the mutt’s neck tightened on instinct.

“Hi,” he said, he could be polite for now.

The man flashed him a quick smile, before reaching for the dog. “I’m very sorry if he frightened you, he’s a bit…enthusiastic,” Harry’s plastered smile was fixed in place as he reluctantly loosened his hold and the dog trotted to the man, whining in apology. They seemed to be familiar with each other so Harry wasn’t going to get too worried.

Instead of turning to leave though, the man and the dog kept staring at him, intently, as if Harry was a fascinating specimen they have never encountered before.

Harry cleared his throat. “May I help you?”

Their home was too far to make it by running, especially with the friendly dog, Emily’s was closer but…No. Harry didn’t want to hurt this familiar looking man or Emily on accident. This was probably nothing, and Harry was too paranoid.

The man scratched the back of his neck, opened his mouth and then closed it again. The dog’s sharp bark prompted him into speaking.

“Actually, yes.” The man said, throwing a flustered glance down at the dog. “You’re Harry, right?”

Harry’s heart froze in place, and his eyes widened. He knew Harry’s name. This wasn’t good.

“Do I know you?” he asked. His throat was dry and his hands clammy. There was something about this man’s voice, something awfully recognizable. His accent, perhaps.

“You might not,” the man said. “You were a small child the last time-.” it clicked then.

“You’re Santa’s enemy,” Harry said, astonished by the fact that it took him this long to recall. He’d only seen the man once but the pink scar on his face was too noticeable to miss. Harry remembered seeing this man, ranting and raving at his father. He couldn’t hear the words then, with a silencing charm in place, but everything else matched.

Santa’s enemy looked taken aback. “I’m what?”

Harry’s shoulders slightly relaxed. “Santa’s enemy,” he said, concealing a sigh of relief. “You came over to our house, the one who sends the brownies every Christmas,”

The dog yelped. Santa’s enemy gave Harry a strained smile. “I’m Remus Lupin.” He said as he extended a hand to Harry. “It’s very nice to finally meet you,”

“Oh, well you already know me.” Harry shook the man’s hand, the grip was stronger than he was expecting. “Does Dad know you’re here?”
Remus Lupin shrugged.

“Well, he might.” He said amicably, a flash passed through his eyes. Harry let go of the man’s hand. He had a bad feeling about this. Dad had always made his feelings very clear regarding Santa’s enemy. The brownies went to trash ever year, the potions were sent monthly without a response, Dad barely ever mentioned him. They shouldn’t have been on good terms then, and he would probably have a kitten if he saw Harry talking to the man.
“I feel like I’m not supposed to talk to you,” he said, praying that saying so wasn’t considered rude. “And your treats smell delicious by the way…I’ve never tasted one, since Dad throws them out every year,” he cringed at the way the dog growled. He had revealed too much. “But at least they look nice.” He said, in hopes that it will balance out his previous words somewhat.

Remus’s eyebrows were furrowed. “He throws them out?”

Harry hid another wince. “I don’t think it’s personal.” He said. “It’s on Santa’s behalf, apparently.” He realized that the man was still frowning. “Sorry, I have a terrible sense of humor, um…”

Remus was jolted out of his trance. “Oh it’s fine,” he smiled at Harry again.

“Yeah. I like your dog. I don’t get see many, what’s his name?”

“Padfoot,” Remus said. The dog barked in agreement.

“Padfoot?” Harry echoed. That was a peculiar name. “That’s nice. So…”

“Harry, do you want to grab a cuppa?”

Harry went very still. He didn’t exactly feel too uncomfortable around the man, but he wasn’t sure about this. “Oh, well I’m not really supposed to go anywhere with strangers,”

“I’m not a stranger though.” Remus insisted, a bit desperately. “I’m…a friend of your Dad. I think it’s time we finally talked over some things,”

Harry glanced down at the dog’s eyes and then nodded his head. He only had an hour left until his curfew, if anything happened to him, then Dad would know, and this man looked like a very lonely man with little company. Harry kind of felt sorry for him. One cuppa wasn’t going to hurt.

He had never set foot in the town’s coffee shop, and it turned out to be quite nice. With cozy looking chairs, and patterned cushions, orange lights. He felt at ease in that place, and somewhat to his shame, bewitched by the calming aroma. He and Remus settled on a table next to the window, which Harry chose on purpose.

“I don’t get to meet people much.” He said to the man, the dog obediently laid his head on the ground, near Lupin’s chair. “Actually this is a nice surprise, I barely know any one of Dad’s friends.”

Dad didn’t have any friends at all. Asides from Harry.

“He doesn’t have many,” Remus confirmed his thoughts. They ordered tea and chocolate truffles.

“I think it’s because we move too much.” Harry said as the tea mugs arrived. “He doesn’t have the time to get to know other people,”

“Right.”

Harry decided that enough was enough. He was going to cut the crap. “How did you find us?” he asked.

Remus fiddled with the truffle in his plate. “I had some business in town, it was accidental.”

“Right,” Harry couldn’t tell if the man was telling the truth. Although he really doubted he was. “So Remus, what do you do?”

“I…teach?”

“Yeah?” Harry sounded exactly like Dad in that moment. Snarky and amused by the man’s shifting.

“Well I used to,” Remus said. “I actually teach in the same school your parents went to,”

“Hogwarts?”

Remus’s hand paused in midair with the mug. “You know of it,” he sounded very surprised.

“Well, just the name.” Harry shrugged. “Dad doesn’t like talking about there much. You knew Mom?”

Mom was another thing dad didn’t like talking about. Harry wasn’t too bothered by her apparent lack of presence, so he didn’t bring it up after the argument, and Dad looked secretly relieved, so he didn’t push it.

Mom was a mystery.

Remus’s smile was fond and reminiscent. “I knew both your parents.” He said, deftly settling his mug down. He reached down to scratch Padfoot’s head. “Your father and mother both were very dear friends of mine,”

That sounded curious. “Dad doesn’t seem too fond of you now,” Harry pointed out. Maybe they had been estranged, maybe that was the reason why this Remus Lupin was so angry with Dad back then, and if Harry played his cards right, maybe he could make something out of this.

Remus looked bemused. “I meant your biological parents,” he said.

Harry leaned back in his seat. “You meant my Dad and my mom,” he must have heard him wrong, or maybe Harry had misspoke.
Remus interlocked his fingers on the tabletop. “Yes but…I didn’t mean Severus, Harry.” He said, his voice gentle, almost inaudible. “I meant James and Lily,”

Harry had no idea who these people were.

“I don’t know those people,” he said, narrowing his eyes as he pushed his chair back. “But my dad’s name is Severus.” He stood. “Maybe I should get going,”

This was a bad idea. He knew that it was. This man wouldn’t have been dubbed as ‘Santa’s Enemy’ if he were on good terms with his father. Harry still had half an hour left of his curfew. He could make it home on time and just claim that his date with Emily took longer than expected.

“He didn’t tell you,” Remus whispered. The dog, as if sensing his distress growled in protest.

“Tell me what?” Harry shouldn’t have asked that. He needed to leave. He had to leave.

“I knew he wouldn’t,” Remus’s previously kind face twists into a hateful glare as the man stares down at his tea. “I knew he would lie.”

Harry stepped back. He knew that he was more dangerous than this man, even though Lupin was acting pretty wild at the moment. He didn’t want to cause a scene.

“Harry, your parents sacrificed so much for you to be here with me today,” Remus said, standing as well.

This could be a prank, Harry thought. It wasn’t. It didn’t sound or look like a prank.

“My Dad is alive and my mother passed away when I was a child,” he said.

Remus huffed. “What was her name then?”

What was mom’s name? Why didn’t Harry know the answer to that question? It was such a simplistic one too. It had never occurred to him to inquire after the woman’s name. In his mind, the mysterious woman was only known as ‘mom’. Dad scarcely mentioned her, and when he did, he always called her ‘Your Mother’. Never by name. Harry didn’t know his mother’s name.

“I don’t know.” Harry snapped, defensively this time. “Dad doesn’t like talking about her, it makes him sad, so I never asked,” that was true.

“Severus Snape, lied about that Harry, your parents were magnificent people, Lily and James were so in love, they got married and they had you-.”
This was bullshit.

“I think I should leave,” Harry said again, this time fully intending on carrying out the threat. Lupin’s hand darted over the table and clasped around his forearm.

“Don’t you want to know the truth?” he asked.

Harry glanced down at the hand that gripped his arm. “My dad isn’t a liar,” he said.

“How would you know? Did he ever show you any pictures of your mother as a child? Did he ever mention her? Never said why you’re on the run? He stole you, Harry, the night your parents were murdered-.”

He tried pulling his arm away but Lupin persisted, seemingly unaware of his bruising grip in his rant.

“Stop, please,” Harry said.

“He came in and stole you from us. Padfoot and I are your godfathers, we’ve been looking for you for years, James, your biological father, that is, asked Severus to take you and run,” he sighed. “But there’s no reason to run now,”

“You’re crazy. You and the dog are my godfathers? If you hurt me Dad is going to kill you,”

“He’s not a dog.” Lupin exclaimed. “He’s Sirius Black, your father’s best friend.” At Harry’s disbelieving expression, he sighed once more. “I can prove it,” he said before glancing down at Padfoot. “Sirius, go and change back, please.”

Harry yanked his arm free. “Sir, you need help,” he said. He didn’t like touching people, he didn’t like the vibes he was getting from this creepy batshit crazy man. He needed to get away.

Remus paused for a moment, trying to recompose himself before he opened his eyes again. “Don’t you know about magic?” he asked, his eyes were practically beseeching Harry to say that he did. And Harry did know about magic.

“I know all about it,” he said, maybe a tad more darkly than he was intending to sound.

Lupin slumped down in relief. “He’s an Animagi.” He said, nodding down to Padfoot. “He can change to a dog at will.”

“Then why is he a dog now?”

“It’s a bit complicated,”

Harry scowled. “Tell me or I’ll scream,”

“He’s a fugitive,” Remus sighed, “But he’s innocent!”

Harry looked down at the innocuous creature. “That dog,” he said again. The dog in question barked in recognition, bumping his nose into Harry’s knee.

“Yes.” Remus hissed. “The dog.” He looked down at Padfoot. “Sirius, go and change now, please.” The dog exchanged a glance with him and then trotted out of the shop, leaving Harry gaping behind him. “You might want to seat back down, Harry,” Remus’s voice was gentle once more. “This is a long story.”

Harry sat, dazed.


**

“Now you know,” Severus said as Albus leaned back in his seat, voice dripping with a thick imaginary poison. “Congratulations, I suppose. You cracked another code, is your self-entitled brain resting easy now?”

The Headmaster smiled. “I wish I was happy about this discovery, Severus, but alas, I would be lying if I claimed as such.”

Severus didn’t resist rolling his eyes at the man. He was done with Dumbledore. Don with everyone, really. He was worried sick, concerned about Harry and where he was and what were they doing to him, whether he was being fed or if the ministry rats were bothering him. He didn’t have time to chat with Albus Dumbledore.

He gazed deep into the man’s eyes, “So you came all the way here, brought a trainer’s wand to prove a point, prove yourself right, and now that you know you’re right…” he shrugged. “What can you do? Nothing. This changes nothing. I kidnapped him. I kept him because I grew fond of him. I killed for him, I maimed for him…Doesn’t change the fact that I did.”

It was this truth in particular that really made his heart race. The possibility that his actions, the things that he had done in order to protect Harry were the same reason why he would be endangering his son now.

Albus, by the looks of things, disagreed with his assessment. “It all brews down to moral skepticism. What is considered right or wrong? Is it subjective?”

Severus curled a mouth, “I don’t know, Albus,” he said, nonchalantly. “Would you take it personally if I murdered you?”

The old man considered this. “I would understand if you did it in order to save the person you love,”

Severus rolled his eyes once more. It was miraculous, how his tolerance for stupidity and other people had sunken considerably in these years. Dealing with people who weren’t Harry was exhaustive now. “That logic is highly flawed,” he pointed out, but he had a feeling it was exactly the kind of thing Dumbledore wanted him to say.

“As is philosophy. As is our perception of ethics, of right and wrong.”

Yes, Severus decided. Pure stupidity, or rather, in Albus’s case, an irritating mysticism that was heavily unwarranted at the time. “I’m sitting in a prison cell,” he snapped. “I don’t get to be subjective about my actions, I’m being judged already,”

Albus’s smile expanded across his entire face. “And we’re back to moral skepticism. Don’t you just love the way of the world?” he looked very satisfied with the aforementioned conclusion.

“No.” Severus gritted his teeth. “But I’m glad you found a new hobby.”

Whoever introduced philosophy to Albus Dumbledore deserved a long, unrelenting bout of torture that could only result in death.
Albus got up from his chair, “Well, Severus, unlike you, I am currently free to make my own judgment.” The man said as he took out his wand once more to get rid of the chair.

Severus sneered. “Good for you,”

To his mild surprise, Albus then turned to him, the wand pointing steadily to his wrists. Or rather the shackles. “And my judgment is heavily advising me to wrap this up, lest we’ll be late.”

“Late for what?”

His shackles snapped free and fell down to his feet with a dull sound. Albus smiled. “For our grand prison breakout, of course,”


**

“Dad,”

It was way past midnight, and everywhere was dark except Dad’s room. The man liked reading at nights, and true to his habits, he was busy reading a journal when Harry came knocking on his door, “Why are you awake?” was the first thing the man asked, upon seeing his son petulantly shuffling by the door.

“Do you ever feel awful for no reason? Because I feel really bad right now and I don’t know why,”

Dad stared at him for a minute. “I do too, sometimes.” He said, slowly.

“I don’t like it. It’s like a burning, in my chest and I cannot make it stop,”

Dad threw his blanket away, and tapped the bed beside him. “Come here,” Harry dragged his feet on the cold wooden floorboards as he went and flopped down next to his dad. He was in an awful mood.

His head fell on Dad’s shoulder and the man hummed. “You cannot help some things,” he said, his hand carding through Harry’s hair. “You cannot help ambivalence, cannot help what others think of you or what you think of yourself,”

Harry swallowed the thick bile in his throat. “Can I tell you a secret?” he didn’t have many. Everything dad either already knew or found out. But Harry did have a few. The majority were small ones, others like this one, more significant.

Dad to his credit didn’t waste a beat. “You can always tell me anything you want,” he said and Harry believed him, but he was still worried about the man’s reaction.

“You have to promise me you won’t bring it up again, ever.” He said. “I’m going to be really embarrassed tomorrow,” in fact, he could already feel a bit of shame pooling in his stomach. He had made his decision though.

“I promise,”

“Sometimes I think about not existing. What would it be like for me, and if I would know the difference,”

Beside him, Dad sat up a bit straighter, his shoulder jostling the boy’s head. “Harry,”

Harry raised a hand. “You promised.” He reminded the man. “I don’t…think about death much. I don’t want to kill myself or anything, don’t freak out, Dad.” He really didn’t know how to explain it. That gaping feeling in his chest that he only felt in certain times. “I just, think about the stillness, you know? Just being in one place, with no worries, and no guilt,”

Dad hummed thoughtfully. “You would be bored of it in an hour,”

Harry scowled up at his father, with a curled mouth, the trademark sign of disapproval in their little family. “But I wouldn’t know what an hour is because there’s no concept of time in the afterlife.”

“There is no afterlife.” The man deadpanned. “I thought we ripped that band-aid off a while ago,”

Harry recalled the talk quite vividly. He chortled in the memory of it. “Along with the Santa talk? Yeah.” Then he sobered once more. “I like to think that there’s something , Dad. Total blackness is fine too.”

Dad’s hand brushed over his unkempt hair. “You also liked gluing glitter to your cheeks.” He said. “Those things got everywhere,”
Harry did love smacking anything and everything with glitter for a while. He didn’t believe it at first before Dad brandished the pictures. ‘You had a glitter phase,’ the man had said with fond exasperation.

Harry gaped at the picture of himself sat on a blue couch he couldn’t remember, both cheeks smeared with purple glitter. ‘The biggest mistake of my life was buying it for you, of course,’

“Yeah,” Harry stretched the word, his voice tinged with nostalgia. “Where is our glitter, by the way?”

Dad snorted. “Burning in the depths of hell,”

“With Santa,” Harry teased.

There was a moment of silence before Harry spoke up again.

“Do you think I’m just being an irrational teenager?”

“No. I think you’re just being human.” Dad swiftly threw his journal to the nightstand and drew away, causing Harry to lift his head and look into the man’s eyes. “Death doesn’t matter, you know. Not at all.” He said. Harry was inwardly amazed at the topic of their conversation. This was the first time they were discussing death on itself, and not relevant to the people Harry murdered. Not murdered, Harry thought to himself, furiously pinching his hand. Dad said it wasn’t murder.

“What matters is what we make of life.” Dad said. “The people we affect.”

Harry slumped down with a roll of his eyes, suddenly gripped with a strong sense of self-loathing. “I’ve barely affected anyone in my life,”

“You have more than you think,”

“I’ve only known you, Dad.” Which wasn’t a very impressive list of people, mathematically speaking.

“Not that I’m complaining.” He hastily added afterwards, knowing that the admission must have sounded wrong.

“It doesn’t matter.” The man waved him off. “You have the rest of your life ahead of you.”

“What about you?” Harry asked. Because just like Dad was the only person on the list of people he was associated with, Harry himself, was the only person dad saw or spoke to, so if anything, both of their lists consisted of only one measly person. Each other.

“This is the rest of my life,” Dad said, with a sigh. “Currently.”

“Don’t worry,” Harry said. “I won’t let Santa’s enemy steal you.”

“I’m counting on it,”

“Once, there was a raven and his little fawn. The raven loved the fawn more than anything in this world, was willing to do anything in order to keep him safe and warm. The raven couldn’t imagine life without his child.

Everyone in the jungle was after their blood, from hunters to monsters to wise old monks. They wanted the fawn, to defeat the shadow for them. A child facing Evil. The raven couldn’t allow that, so when the stag begged and pleaded on his deathbed, the raven struck, took the baby, and flew on, to places where nobody knew their names or his crimes.

The fawn grew up alone, but he was safe, that’s all that mattered to the raven, they were safe and the fawn loved him as much as he loved the child. He was something he had never imagined to be, a father.

But luck wasn’t always on their side, from the massacre to the wild warriors and paper frogs. Then came the wolf and the mutt.

The raven should have known, secrets were never eternal, because they only ever had more than one participant, and the other one, even from beyond the grave was opening up, whether the raven liked it or not.

The wolf found his fawn. The wolf tricked his fawn, lured him away from the safety of the raven’s wings, and unearthed the secret that never should have been. The fawn was horrified.

The raven knew that once the fawn found out the secret then he wouldn’t be his raven anymore. The fawn would love him no longer, he would turn away and join the wolf, and the mutt, the ‘friends’ who claimed to be family in disguise.

The fawn found out, and the raven could not behold the storm that came hurtling toward them as a result.

***


Severus’s forefinger tapped the worn cloth of the armchair with rapid speed. It was the only outlet he was allowing his body in the face of a tremendous, yet irrational fear that was gripping his mind.

Harry was late. His curfew was twenty minutes ago. He was late. By twenty minutes. And thirty seconds.

Severus was being embarrassingly illogical, he knew that thus he didn’t allow himself to fret about a twenty-minute delay as he most certainly should have, had he not had had a massive argument about boundaries with his son only a few weeks ago.

Harry was a teenager. Harry needed freedom, and the company that Severus could in no way substitute for, Severus as a parent and an experienced teenager who survived adulthood, sympathized with that notion. Harry, as delicate as his situation was, needed to have others around him, he was allowed to have peers and friends. He had a girlfriend now. One whom Severus hadn’t met yet, but had heard all about.

Harry couldn’t shut up about her even if he tried. It was like an impulse. From the moment he woke up, the little brat started his rampage on ‘Emily likes this, she likes that, she eats that food, she hates that color, she likes my hair don’t brush it, I want new jeans, Emily likes jeans and she hates cotton…,’ and so on and so forth.

Severus had never in his life been more glad that he wasn’t a teenager anymore. It was, quite frankly, exhaustive, and embarrassing too, if he were being honest. Harry was obsessed with this Emily girl, the same way Severus himself had been once obsessed with Harry’s mother.

Thus here he sits, trying to think like a civilized, rational adult, and a somewhat carefree parent, who cared about his child’s social life. Twenty minutes was nothing. The girl must have been extra clingy that day, maybe even bribed his innocent, gullible son with cherry pie and cinnamon tea to make him stay around for longer. It didn’t matter and Severus was not panicking.

Yes, Severus nodded his head, as the tapping continued. It’s all Emily’s fault.

Except, twenty minutes turned into thirty, Severus’s leg started bouncing, forty minutes gone and he was making holes in the rug in their living room as he paced, using every ounce of self-preservation and Occlumency that he had to remain calm.

Forty minutes. That was nothing.

Except that it was.

Because only an hour later, Harry returned.

He didn’t use his key, just knocked on the door, and waited until Severus almost wrenched it open, just about to spew out the lecture he had been brewing in his head about responsibility and time management.

Then he saw Harry’s ashen face, and his mouth closed. Harry didn’t glance up at his face and quietly waited for Severus to stand aside before he came in, making his way to the kitchen.

Severus closed the door with a frown. Something had happened.

He followed Harry to the kitchen, and watched, transfixed, as the boy opened the fridge to retrieve the bottle of orange juice, and started gulping it down straight from the bottle, something he knew Severus was very sensitive about.

Severus though, let it slide without making a comment. Nothing other than a pointed frown. Harry didn’t even look his way.

Harry chugged and chugged until the bottle was half empty, before he let his fingers go lax around the glass, and it fell, shattering on their floor.
“What are you doing?” he asked his son, his arms crossed and his brows furrowing. He was so glad that he wasn’t a teenager anymore.

Harry didn’t answer, walked to his chair, and flopped down.

“Did the girl dump you?” Severus tried not to sound too gleeful. Harry was quite taken with this girl. His son glared at him head-on, with a ferocity and volume that was very unlike him. Severus uncrossed his arms and leaned forward. He had to be the supportive parent now.

“Did you dump her?” he had never been in a relationship before, but Severus thought that he knew how to teach Harry to handle heartbreak and dating on the side.

Harry resumed his glaring for a full minute before he spoke. “Who is my mother?”

It took Severus a moment to register those words. “What?”

“Who’s mom, Dad?” this time, it was Harry crossing his arms. “What’s her name?” he shrugged, heavily leaning back into his seat. “Where’s your ring? Where is hers?”

This was the last thing he was expecting his son to say. Severus was not prepared for this. “Harry,”

Harry scowled. “Just tell me. I want to know,”

Severus leaned forward, alleviating his weight by his elbows. He could do this, he thought. He just needed to gather his bearings, get to the root of this inquiry and then calm Harry in the process. “What happened?” he asked, softly as he could manage. “Did something happen with Emily?” his lungs weren’t working the right way. Severus could hear the sound of his blood rushing in his ears, dimming out Harry’s indignant scoff.

“No,” his son growled. “I just asked you a question. You always hate it when people avert questions, don’t you?” he gazed at Severus the same way Lily had, the last time they’ve spoken to each other. Angry, and indignant and slightly repulsed. Severus remained mute. “You taught me that people who did that undermined the other’s intellect,” Harry said. “Don’t question my intellect.”

Severus, as a matter of fact, did hate it when people did that. All that dawdling and senseless jabber was nothing but a waste of time, and time was golden to him. He had never realized how much he was counting on that same senseless jabber in order to buy himself time now. He remained silent. Took another breath.

“Who’s mom?” Harry asked again, agitated by Sev’s silence.

“She is your mother,” Severus said. “The woman who gave birth to you,”

Harry’s frown deepened. “What’s her name?”

“Harry—”

He cut him off. “Do you really want to do this the hard way?”

Severus wasn’t sure whether there was an easy way to do this. He already knew that none of the possible outcomes of this situation was going to be pleasant.

“What happened?” he asked again. This seemed awfully unprovoked. Harry had been fine that morning, chipper even, to be spending his time with the muggle girl, and Severus was as equally pleased to be on his son’s good side again. And now this. Something must have happened to shift Harry’s mood this dramatically.

“Alright,” Harry sighed, and then mimicked Severus by leaning on his elbows. “If you don’t want to talk, maybe I should. Then you can just sit there and listen.”

Severus quickly realized that this was getting out of his hands. “Harry,”

“My mom’s name was Lily Evans,” Harry said, staring right into his eyes, not blinking once in the tense silence. “I have her eyes.” He shrugged. “She died, Dad.” Then an unpleasant, wretched smile formed on his face. “Interestingly enough, so did you.”

Severus was shocked into silence, and Harry, calmly carried on, his expression disturbingly clean of any outward emotions. He had taught the boy too well, Sev realized with dismay.

“It’s really funny, isn’t it?” his son asked. “Apparently, you were both murdered by an evil wizard. And I’ve been missing for fourteen years.”

There is no way that Harry came upon that information by himself.

“Who told you these things?” Severus asked once he found his voice.

Harry raised his eyebrows in mock concern. “My godfathers,” he said. “I mean you should know them, you’re pals!” the living room lamp shattered but Harry didn’t even seem to notice. “You and mom and them. Aren’t you? Well, except that you’re supposed to be dead.” He leaned back in his chair.

“James Potter is supposed to be dead.” The name sent a shiver down Severus’s spine. Harry scoffed.

“Lily’s husband, you see.” He explained. “You guys married when you were nineteen, you had me when you were twenty.” His eyes narrowed. “You died when you were twenty one.”

Lupin. That damned, bloody monster. That had to be his job. He had found his son, cornered him, and fed him these…well they weren’t lies. But they were truths that Harry would have fared much better without. He had no right to do this, he had no right to upset Harry like this.

“Do you remember the day you died,” Harry asked. “Or the day you married? Do you remember the day I was born?” he huffed a laugh. “Because I have to say, you look really fresh for a man who’s died fourteen years ago.”

Severus took a deep breath. “I can explain,” he said.

“I don’t want you to explain.” Harry countered, composed but in no way calm. “You’re not James Potter. He, my dad, that is, died. With my mom.” Another shatter arose above them, on the second floor and Harry’s eyes were still burning into his. “I survived, but you took me. You’re not my dad, you’re my kidnapper.”

“Your father…”

“My dad,” Harry cut in, thickly swallowing. “Yes. You’re not him. You stole me. Everyone’s been looking for me, all these years. That’s why we kept running away.” Another thud, this time from the living room once more. “In the middle of the nights, you woke me up and told me that we had to play hide and seek? The days you crammed me into a car and drove away and we never looked back.”

Harry’s face finally morphed into a hateful glare. “New names, new identities. New prisons.”

“I know you’re angry,” Severus was past denying Harry’s words. It wouldn’t help anyone now, if anything it would cause more harm than good. Whatever method the wolf had used to convince his son must have been compelling enough, that any negative reaction towards said method might just send Harry off the rails. “Maybe you should eat something,” he said. They had a small stack of papers on the coffee table. If only Severus had his wand on him to summon said papers. Harry would be marginally calmer if he was busying his hands. “And then sleep on this, and then we can—”

“What?” Harry cut in. “Negotiate the terms of my freedom?”

Severus sighed and resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous, Harry.” Then, almost as an afterthought, it occurred to him that Lupin might still be in the area. “Where’s the wolf?” he asked.

Lupin wouldn’t just drop a truth bomb and then disappear.

“Oh, so you do know him,” Harry said, his face flushed with anger. “Santa’s enemy. All that shit about him not being important. All those brownies you threw away, all those letters you destroyed, right in front of my eyes. Every single one of them was addressed to me.”
Severus regarded Harry for a moment. He needed to get to Lupin. Kill him, and then make him explain things to Harry the right way. “Where is he?” he asked once more.

Harry shrugged. “They’re coming back for me.”

“They?”

“Yes. Remus and Sirius.”

Severus surged to his feet, his eyes wide with shock. This wasn’t good. Black was a fugitive!? Oh no. Lupin was sheltering his friend’s murderer? Why on earth would he do such a thing? The need to find that bumbling fool was even greater now. He couldn’t let that happen. He wouldn’t let them take his son away.

He needed to make Harry understand.

“No, Harry, Sirius Black is—”

“An escaped convict,” Harry filled in with ease. “Like us. Unlike you, he’s actually innocent of the crime he’s committed.”

Severus felt frustration and anger brewing in his veins. What on earth had they fed to his son?

“He sold your parents out,” he growled, but Harry remained unimpressed.

“No he didn’t,” he said, looking perfectly certain. “But you did kidnap me.”

Severus sat back down. “On your father’s behest,” he gritted out. “If you would just let me talk, for a moment.”

“You lied to me,” It was the first sentence that was said with no bite or anger behind it. Severus felt something coil in his stomach. Shame, guilt, and heartbreak in an ambivalent mess.

“No,” he said. He never lied. He just never told Harry the truth. He just gave Harry what he needed at the time. He needed a strong father figure. He needed a dad and Severus was a father in all but blood. Maybe he wasn’t entitled to bear such a title, but he at least deserved some recognition. James Potter had had his son for fifteen months. Severus had been raising him for fifteen years.

Harry’s eyes burned like Greek fire, green and avenging. Just like his mother’s. “Yes you did.” his son said. “They told me who you are,”

Severus was having enough of this. “A very annoyed parent at the moment?”

“You’re one of them.” Harry spat in disgust. “You work for the guy who killed my real parents,”

“No, I don’t.” Severus groaned. Damn Black and Lupin, damn them to the lowest pit of hell. Severus pinched the bridge of his nose. “I used to work for him,” he said. “I don’t anymore. He’s dead,”

“He’s not,” Harry growled. “He’s back! And he’s probably mad you didn’t scram off to him on your knees.” He sneered at Severus with a look of pure loathing. An expression that was wildly out of place for his son. Severus refused to be taken aback by it. “Remus told me all about you do.” Harry continued with disdain. “Dark magic. You…you cursed me!”

What?

No. no, he absolutely refused to take responsibility for that. That wasn’t his fault. Murders and torture and disfiguring muggles might have been, working as a double agent with wavering loyalties, surely, kidnapping a baby and raising him as his own, certainly but this? No. Severus refused to accept such a notion. As messed up as it was.

“Oh for god’s sake…” he groaned out loud.

Lupin had just run his mouth at his son, hadn’t he? He and Black had corrupted Harry’s mind, undid what took Severus years to build. Now Harry thought that he was responsible for his volatile magic because that’s how lying works, doesn’t it? it’s just tiny nips here and there, woven into an undeniable truth.

‘Your dad isn’t that bastard Harry, he works for the dark lord, oh and he also cursed you into killing four children, and lashing out with your magic,’
Who could prove them otherwise? James Potter and Lily were long dead. The only way to prove Harry’s magical disability was for Harry to find out about it himself. For him to know that he has been draining Severus’ magic dry for years, for so long that even the simplest charms took him a strenuous amount of effort. That would destroy Harry. Severus wouldn’t let it happen.

“What did those idiots tell you?” he asked.

Harry stubbornly turned his head away. “What I needed to know,”

Severus needed to take hold of this conversation. Fast.

“He’s not back,” he snapped, irritatingly pushing up his sleeve to reveal the faded mark. It hadn’t changed a bit since the day he had taken Harry. Voldemort was gone. He was absolutely certain of it. “I would know. Trust me, Harry.” Harry’s eyes were still narrowed. Severus knew that he had to push harder.

“They’re probably using this to scare you into doing stupid things,” he said. “Which you are by the way,”

Harry frowned. “You’re lying,”

“No, I’m not,”

Harry slammed his hands on the tabletop. “Yes, you are!”

Severus’s temper snapped. “I raised you!” he yelled back. “They talk your ear off for half an hour and suddenly I’m the bad guy? You’re treating me as if I shackled you to the bed and starved you all your life! I abandoned my life for you!”

“You cursed me! You’re the reason why I killed people!” Harry hollered and Severus fisted his hands.

“No,” he seethed. “You’re the reason why you killed them!” he strode to Harry and shook him by the shoulders. “Open up your eyes, boy!” Harry flinched, but Severus didn’t draw away. He would not be blamed for this. “Why in the world would I curse you,” he sneered. “What could I possibly accomplish by giving away my magic to you?”

“Giving away?” Harry’s meek voice snapped Severus back to reality. He’s given away too much. With an internal groan, he pulled up his mental shields and released Harry’s shoulders.

“Forget it,” he ordered. “Delete everything I just said from your mind.”

Harry’s mouth fell open. “But—”

“I need to talk to Black and Lupin, and you-you need to stay in your room. Do not leave until I tell you it’s okay. We might have to leave again,”
Harry sat, astonished and insulted as Severus turned away from him. “Didn’t you hear a word I just said?” he whispered.

“I need to attend to more pressing matters now, Harry.” Beating Black and Lupin to a pulp and then acquiring after this whole dark lord nonsense were his top priorities at the moment. They couldn’t be far from here, and Severus might not be able to defeat them both with his wand, but he had the element of surprise on his side, and his potions too, of course. “I’ll deal with them,” he said, “And then we can talk. I’ll tell you all about James and Lily,”

Harry, contrary to Severus’s expectation, stomped his feet. “No!” he yelled. “You’re not brushing me aside again! This is important!”
Things shattered upstairs, the sound was too mutinous for Severus to discern, but it might have been their windows.

“Harry, calm down, now,”

Harry didn’t. “No! You keep doing this!” He wasn’t breathing right, Severus could see Harry’s chest heaving. “Always just brushing me aside! You’re not even my dad! You’ve been playing pretend as a dead guy! Doesn’t that make you feel anything?”

Severus, against his better judgment, snapped back instead of backing off. “Annoyed,”

“Annoyed?” Harry seethed incredulously. “That my whole life is a lie?” behind him, a plate rose above the sink and started spinning, drawing Sev’s gaze over Harry’s shoulder. “Who even are you?” Harry asked, oblivious, and disgusted. Severus’s eyes remained on the spinning plate. “You’re just a stranger, who plucked me off my dead father’s arms and ran off,”

That got his attention. This wasn’t fair. It hit Severus all at once, the sheer unfairness of being accused of something like that. He had put his blood and tears in raising Harry the way he was, he had abandoned his entire life, to raise this child, who wasn’t even his, he had to give up his magic to keep him alive, he had to live like a recluse, and this is how he was getting repaid? It wasn’t fair.

“For your information,” he started, having little to no control over the words that were firing out of his mouth. “Your father died with his guts splayed out of his stomach while you were crying in the nursery,” Severus said without an ounce of mercy. Harry went mute. “He asked me to take you and flee, for reasons that I WILL explain.” He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. “Now, PLEASE, calm down.”

The plate ceased spinning at once, and shattered against the counter the same moment Harry crossed his arms, defensively glaring at him.
“I’m not believing a word you say,” he said, venom dripping off his voice.

Severus scoffed. “Then maybe you should have asked the wolf why he didn’t ‘rescue’ you when he first found us.” He glared back at his son. “He was quite selective with his tale, wasn’t he?”

“Remus didn’t have enough power_”

Severus growled.

“And he does now?” he sneered in disgust. That damned beast had already poisoned his son’s mind. “Please.” He snorted. “The people you’ve come to know in an hour, I’ve known for a lifetime,” He sneered. “They’re bullies, they ruined my childhood, and now they’re trying to take you away. You cannot just believe them over your father,”

“You lied to me. I’ll take anyone’s word but yours. This is just proof.” Harry sniffed. He was staring over Severus’s shoulder with a deep frown etched on his face. “You stole me because you hated my dad.” He accused. “You wanted to have the last word.” His shoulders went lax, and his expression softened into a blank stare.

“No,” Severus said. “I did it because I’m a decent person.” Harry didn’t look at him. “Unlike Lupin and Black. I wasn’t the ones tormenting them for nearly a decade.” He knew, he knew that they had manipulated his son, planted these thoughts in his mind. Harry needed to hear everything, if they were going to put Severus’ filthy past on the table, then Severus was going to do the same. James Potter wasn’t a saint. Neither were his so-called friends. They were horrible people. And so was Severus.

Everyone was horrible. That was the whole point of being human.

Harry looked as if he hadn’t been listening to a word Sev had just said. He had the look his face that he got when he was staring off deeply into something, like the drawn feather on Sev’s chin when he was a child. Severus knew he was still listening though, he could tell. This was his child.
He wouldn’t allow them to take his son.

“You cannot possibly believe them over me,” he voiced his fear. Because Harry couldn’t. Severus wouldn’t let them do this to him, Harry didn’t need this, not now. His son needed constant care and attention, he needed what only Severus could provide for him. It’s been them against the world for what felt like forever now.

Severus could fix this. Severus knew Harry and his quirks. He would calm him down, sit him down with some papers and tell him everything as they made origami. This is what they did. It was the only thing that worked.

When Harry looked at him, his face was still blank. “I don’t want to see you anymore,”

“Harry,” Severus stepped forward, opening his arms. Harry come to him, he knew it.

The child’s eyes went wide with rage, and he shook his head, the lamps exploded overhead as Severus dived for his son moments before he would disapparate.

“NO!”

**

“First, you need to make sure it’s square,”

“With a ruler?” Harry asked. He had just started teaching him the basic shapes, and simple math. At first, he thought it was too early for the six-year-old, but then he realized that Harry needed the mental stimulation, and he was eager enough to learn anything Severus told him on the spot.
“You can tell with your eyes.” Severus gently flattened his paper on the kitchen table. “See?” He said and ran a finger along the edges. “All the sides are the same size.”

Harry compared it with his own paper and then nodded. “Okay, now what, Daddy?”

He scooted closer to Severus, and the potion master tugged him to his side. “Now you fold it like this,” he folded the left edge of the paper into a triangle.

Harry clumsily followed suit. This was the third time he was making an origami himself. “Uh-huh,” the little child uttered, his tongue sticking out of his mouth in concentration.

Severus inspected the work. “You have to make sure the folding line is very prominent.” He said and Harry pressed down on his fold with a huff, his eyes immediately seeking Sev’s face for approval.

Severus nodded with a smirk. “Now open the fold,” he did so and did another fold on the other side of the paper. “And do it like this,”

“But we just did that!”

“No, do the other side. Do you see the one in my hands?”

“Uh-huh.”

Severus smiled. “Now the hard part, you have to bring the edges under, and then fold it into a triangle. Do you think you can do that?”

“Yes, Daddy.”

Severus bit his lip. “Are you sure?”

Harry’s head bounced up and down, Sev could see him kicking his legs under the table. He might have given him too much sugar this morning, now that he thought about it. He inwardly grimaced. “I want to make my own frog!” Harry exclaimed. “I’m a big boy.”

He feared that the frog origami would be too advanced for his son, but Harry was doing splendidly thus far, only seeming to have a problem with the right proportions and the double folds.

“Alright,” Severus admitted with a small smirk. “Just gently push the edges under the diamond and fold down,”

“It’s not staying!”

“Don’t be too harsh with the paper, Harry.” He nudges the paper out of Harry’s hands and puts it in front of him. “It’s delicate. If you’re not careful you might tear it.”

“Okay,” Harry tenderly straightened the paper. “I won’t hurt the froggy,” he tapped the vaguely frog-shaped origami with a small coo.
“Fold it down…” Severus demonstrated on his own frog. “There you go. See?”

The child frowned. “It doesn’t look like a frog,”

“Not yet.” Sev mused. “Go fetch your crayons.”

Harry’s eyes widened in mirth. Severus rarely ever joined coloring time. “You color too?!”

Severus kissed the top of his head. “We’ll color together,”

***

They were in the clearing, the one in Norway, except that it wasn’t March the third, It wasn’t a belated outing/birthday party for Harry, it wasn’t a picnic. Their presence posed an entirely different reason.

For the first time in a very long time, Harry was angry. Not that anger was the right word to describe the myriad of emotions in any way. It felt like rage enveloping all the hurt and grief in the world and stuffing it into Harry’s soul in a single instance like a stuffed toy.

The man he loved most in the entire world had been lying to him as long as he can remember. The man is a stranger, not his father. His father had been murdered, with his mother, and Harry…

He looked around the barren field, the view was breathtaking, it always has been, the tall grass, the grey-ish sky, the sea. It never ceased to amaze Harry. How could something so beautiful remain untouched and unbroken?

It took him a while to find him , kneeling about a hundred yards away from Harry, gathering his composure. Harry felt the wind picking up around him, and he looked at the man with utter hatred and loathing.

He couldn’t see the man’s face, but as the figure looked up, Harry felt the bubbling emotions take over. He watched, his fists clenched, as Dad swayed on his feet and started striding to him, the panic in his face clearing the closer he got.

“Harry!” he screamed, and Harry could hardly hear him over the howling wind, and the rustling of the tall grass. He closes his eyes, and shoves the wind towards the man full force, knocking him down on his back with the force as the wind whips away at the clearing.

“YOU LIED!” he screamed. He wants to kill Severus, he feels the itch under his skin. He wants that lying monster to be GONE. All his life had been a lie, everything had been ruined, his childhood, his everything. He was a murderer because of this man, he could never afford to feel real emotions because of this man. He didn’t deserve mercy.

Snape got up, this time jogging the distance, “Harry,” he called out.

“I hate you!” Harry yelled at him. “I hate you!”

The itching under his skin was getting worse, morphing into a burning sizzle that didn’t belong in Harry’s body. He wanted it out. He wanted Severus Snape to be gone.

“You’re going to hurt yourself,” Severus said, his eyes calm despite the fear evident on his expression. Harry shouldn’t have let him get this close. He knew Harry’s weakness, he thought that if he behaved as if Harry was still his son then things would be better, and Harry would listen and abide like a good little boy.

“They were right,” he said. “You’re a liar.”

Dad’s eyes narrowed when Harry turned his head away. “You made me into a monster,”

“I didn’t curse you,” he said as he held his hands out as if trying to assuage a wounded animal.

“You…you hated my dad,” he did, Remus showed him evidence, he showed him how cruel this man had been to his father, the man who’d sacrificed his life for Harry, and Harry didn’t even know him. It made him sick, whether, with grief or guilt, he wasn’t quite sure at the time.

Dad-the man, kept approaching him, “Harry, look at me,” he said, and his voice made something twisted coil in Harry’s chest. “I love you, okay?” he said, “You’re my son, and I love you. You’re going to hurt yourself,”

Lies. Everything that came out of his mouth was a lie.

“No! You lie! You lie all the time!”

Dad shook his head, “Not about this.” He was looking right into Harry’s eyes, “Never about this,”

He looked so sincere, Harry had rarely seen him so open, and his face full of expression. He remembered this man, playing hide and seek with him as a child, helping him walk, teaching him how to build a paper boat, cooking for him, disfiguring bodies for him. They couldn’t be the same person, Dad couldn’t be this man, but he was, right in front of Harry’s eyes.

“I hate you,” he said, his cheeks felt damp, but Harry didn’t bother to check whether they were tears or something else. He needed to leave. His body obliged his wishes and vanished him on the spot, only to appear in the same field, only now another hundred yards away from Severus.

“Harry, wait.”

He wasn’t getting it. It infuriated Harry, how was he so calm in the face of something so heartbreaking for Harry? It was because he didn’t care in the first place, all he cared about was keeping the ‘monster’ away from Harry, well, the teenage boy sneered, he was out of luck because there never was any monster, only the one that Dad had made him into.

Harry let him come near, gave him the false sense of security he wanted. He was angry. So so angry. And he wanted to make it hurt , maybe then the man would finally feel the pain he was causing Harry.

Severus approached, his eyes seeking Harry’s face for any shred of mercy, “Just let me come a little closer,” he said softly. “I swear it’s going to be fine, Harry_”

Harry hated it, the fake look of compassion on his face, in comparison to the man who had hated and bullied his real father. He hated it.

“I love you,” he said and Harry couldn’t remain silent anymore.

“Lies. You ALWAYS lie!” the air seemed to suddenly go still around them, and Harry ignored the strong, throbbing pang in his chest. He needed Snape to understand.

“Calm down, let’s—”

“Talk?!” Harry screeched, a vague silver shape began to form in front of his chest, but he paid it no heed. Severus did though, and his eyes went wide, Harry glowered at him.

“Harry,”

“No, I don’t want to talk!” the silver being evolved into something sharp and gleaming, “You lied to me!”

Dad remained silent.

“You’re not even denying it!” the silver dagger pointed outwards, spinning in place, and Severus looked at him, into his eyes, as if he couldn’t believe the sight before him. He hates the monster. He hated Harry, he always has. He was not Harry’s father. He was a twisted, evil death eater.

“I love you,” Severus said, not denying a single word.

“You’re not even my real dad!” the dagger zoomed away and Harry’s eyes instantly widened. It was heading to Dad, and the man just stood, and he wasn’t moving away. Harry cried out but it was too late, the silver blade had already embedded itself into his chest.

Harry watched as he fell.

“Dad.”

***

“Daddy?”

Severus sounded exhausted, it was long past midnight, but no matter how many times he’d read the damn children’s book for Harry, the boy didn’t seem to doze off. “Yes?”

Harry’s small head shifted on his shoulder, “Do you think the stars are mad at me?”

Severus closed the book he was holding and peered down at his child.

“No,” he said, “Why would you say that?”

Harry shrugged, but then pointed at the book, “Well, Bobby found lots of friends when his star was happy with him,” he pointed at the smiling boy on the cover of the book. “I don’t have any friends,” then he looked up at Severus. “Is my star mad?”

Severus kissed his head. He felt the guilt churning in his stomach. He was responsible for this. For his son’s loneliness. “Your star thinks you’re the best-behaved boy she’s ever met,” he assured the boy.

“Then why don’t I have friends?”

“You have me,” Severus said, acutely aware of the irony as he did, “And I have you. That’s how our stars planned it.”

That was the problem with children, he thought as his son grinned up at him, missing two recently fallen teeth. They made heroes out of anyone. He was Harry’s hero, and he couldn’t hate himself anymore for it.

“You’re right.” Harry hummed, hugging Severus. “You’re my bestest friend in the world.”

“It’s ‘Best’, Harry,” Severus said, feeling awful. “And you are my only best friend in the world too,”

Even if it didn’t have to be that way.

***

“Dad?” the boy nudged his father’s shoulder, a whine accompanying his voice. “Dad, please.”

Dad remained unconscious, his temple bleeding and his face lax and unresponsive, he must have hit it on a rock nearby, Harry was too dazed to look for it, the blade was bloodied and Harry didn’t know what to do.

He’s hurt him. Dad was dead. Harry had killed him. It couldn’t be.

“Dad I’m sorry,” Harry whispered, putting his ear down on his father’s chest near the dagger, waiting for a heartbeat. It had to be there. It had to be. “Wake up,” he couldn’t hear anything. “DAD?” his voice broke, and Harry’s hand grappled for his father’s wrist. He wouldn’t hurt dad. He couldn’t have. He didn’t mean it.

He was a monster. Oh god, what had he done?

He didn’t mean it. He wanted to take it back. He had to take it back.

“No,” his hand was bloodied, it was Dad’s blood, “No, no, please! I didn’t- Dad I didn’t mean it. Dad, wake up, I’m sorry! God, oh god,”
He cried and he cried and he cried, like a small child, like he used to cry, and Dad would hold him and tell him it’ll be alright. But it couldn’t be. Because Harry had hurt him.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered into Dad’s robes, “Daddy wake up. Please, please!”

***

Kingsley was leading Harry out of the room a while later, a hand clasped on his shoulder despite Harry’s numerous protests.

“I cannot just leave you walking around with no cuffs or supervision.” He’d said. “So either handcuffs or my hand,”

Harry had chosen the less evil as he resisted the pull on his eyelids. He was so exhausted.

As they made their way to the main hallway, the duo noticed a bulk of people gathered around Harry’s ‘jail cell’, about four young people in red robes, and an older, plump looking man who did not look pleased in the slightest. He saw Harry and Shacklebolt approach and a deep frown etched itself on his face.

“Where had you taken him?” he snapped as soon as the two were in hearing distance. Harry did not like this stranger. He was the sort of person who just gave him the wrong vibes.

“Warren?” Shacklebolt asked instead.

The man crossed his arms, “Obviously.” He drawled. “Why is he out of his cell?”

Shacklebolt didn’t even pause for a bit. “He needed to use the loo,”

Now that he did mention it, Harry really felt like using the loo. He should have asked the pink-haired woman when he had the chance. His mouth curled in disappointment.

Warren grumbled. “Well, you better put him back in that cell.” He said. “I’m calling in more guards.” At Kingsley’s askance hum the man’s overly expressive face broke into a glare. “Bastard broke out of Azkaban,”

Shacklebolt’s eyebrows shot upwards. “What?!”

Harry felt the tingling in his stomach increase ten-fold. Did he break out by himself? Of course, he did, Harry wasn’t sure how, he didn’t care. Dad had broken out, he was safe. Or was he? He was going to come and find Harry, and this place was littered with Aurors and all sorts of people who weren’t a fan of his father.

Harry sincerely hoped the man stayed away for now.

“He did.” Warren sighed, “Knocked Dumbledore out cold and then vanished.” Then he looked at Harry over his nose, an unusual tendril of malice lurked in his gaze. “He might be heading this way to take the boy. We’re double folding the security,”

Kinglsey pressed his lips in a thin line. “How did he break out of Azkaban?”

“The same way Black did, apparently,” Warren replied. “I’ll be damned if I know. The wards around that place need to be redone, someone needs to have a word with the dementors. Those bloody things are slacking off.”

“Is Dumbledore alright?”

That name was important. He was the one Kingsley needed to contact in order to help Harry if he was injured or dead that would complicate things. Harry really hoped that Dad hadn’t killed or maimed the man.

Warren rubbed a hand over his face. “He was transferred back to Hogwarts. It’ll take Snape a few days to get back on land, we need to be careful,”
Shacklebolt scoffed at the paranoid manner of his colleague. “He won’t be stupid enough to break into the ministry, Warren,”
He was so wrong.

“He’s going to wreck you,” Harry muttered under his breath, not being able to contain the surge of excitement any longer. His dad was alright, he was out of the prison, he might have seriously injured a man, but Harry didn’t care because he’s missed his dad so much that he felt like they’ve been apart for years.

Warren turned on him with narrowed eyes. “What was that, you little twerp?”

Harry met the man’s gaze with a cool expression of his own. Chin held high and his voice unwavering. Dad would have been proud of him. “I said ‘he’s going to wreck you’. If you think anything is stopping him from coming to get me…well,”

Harry really hoped that wouldn’t be the case.

Warren looked disgusted. “He’s your kidnapper, why are you rooting for him?”

“I’m not.” Harry totally was. In fact, he was inappropriately giddy about it. “I don’t want him to endanger his life for me.”

“But?”

Harry didn’t seem to be able to hide his smile any longer. “He will find you,” he said with absolute certainty. “And he will know every single face that touched me, and he’s going to fuck you up,”

Warren glared deep into Harry’s eyes. “Not without giving up his fucking head first.” He seethed and then looked over his shoulder. “Rogers!” he barked.

A lanky blonde Auror ran up to meet the trio. “Sir,” he said.

“Call in two combat Auror teams now,” he threw Harry a twisted sneer, “Protecting the boy’s cell, I want five in the room with him,”
Roger looked awfully uncomfortable. “Sir it’s two in the morning,”

Warren’s glare hardened. “Did I stutter?”

Roger rapidly shook his head back and forth with a gulp. “Sir, yes sir. Fire-calling them now,” then he hurried down the corridor with the manner of a man scrambling away from a wild animal. Warren turned to Shacklebolt.

“Warren,” the Auror said, “You’re being dramatic,”

“Shacklebolt.” Warren mirrored him, “This is my division now,”

Kingsley almost couldn’t believe his ears. “He’s a single death eater.” He exclaimed, his hand tightening just a notch on Harry’s shoulder. The boy subtly recoiled but kept his gaze steadily on Warren, who was now looking rather uncomfortable in the boy’s presence.

There was just something about Potter, Kingsley had realized that before, but now, in the presence of other colleagues it just stood out more prominently than he had been imagining.

“Well, he’s got death eater friends. That’s how those filthy rats work, Kingsley. You’re a field agent, you should know better,”
“Potter is baiting you, and you’re falling for it,”

Harry nodded in agreement. “I am baiting you.”

Warren’s contempt grew thicker in the air as he turned to another Auror, a blonde-haired woman with green eyes, Kingsley’s memory strongly suggested that her name was ‘Tina’ but he couldn’t be certain. “Get him in his cell.” He ordered and Tina nodded. “I’m contacting Fudge. Potter needs to be transferred to the ministry’s custody, immediately.” Shacklebolt released Potter’s shoulder with a subtle squeeze. He needed to contact Dumbledore and hope for the best.

“Put under magical shields, maybe even Merlin’s golden chain,”

None of those sounded particularly helpful.

Tina replaced Kingsley and led the boy into his cell. “Come along, Potter,”

“This is ridiculous,” Kinglsey seethed to a frustrated Warren once Potter was safely put and locked in his cell with two other Aurors inside.

“No, Kingsley,” Warren spat back “Ridiculous is hearing that boy talk about his abductor as if he’s merlin himself. I’m having him looked over before the interrogation again,”

Kingsley didn’t think Potter would be fond of that idea. “We already checked him over.”

“Well, you mustn’t have done a sufficient job.” The other man started walking away. “I don’t think the Minister will want you working on this case after this. Your shift is over too,”

Shacklebolt stood and stared at the man’s back as he and his Aurors disappeared from view.

He had started a dangerous game.