Severus followed him out, ready to grab him if the boy made a break for it, and they made their way to Pomfrey's domain.

Taking the lead, Harry stalked toward the Infirmary, knowing he was in a world of trouble and wishing he had the courage to just make a break for it. In truth, the only thing that kept him from doing so was the knowledge that he'd probably be expelled and then have to go back to the Dursleys.

What the hell was Snape's problem anyway? Harry hadn't done anything to him -- didn't even have him in class for another day or two -- and yet, the professor seemed to really hate him and want to make his life miserable. Harry had hoped that being in the magical world would be better than with the Dursleys, but so far, he'd been very disappointed by Hogwarts. It was too much like Little Whinging, where everyone seemed to dislike him for no reason or, like his relatives, just out and out despised him.

And now he was being shuffled of to see the school nurse, and he'd have to lie to her in order to keep his secrets. The last thing he was ever going to do was spill his guts in front of Snape!

Too soon they were there, and Snape brushed past him to push at the door, which he then held open for Harry to walk through. Not really sure what to expect -- a favorite game of Dudley's had been to do this very thing, and then cuff Harry about the head as he went by -- Harry ducked a little as he entered the long room. Snape frowned at him, though, and Harry moved a little faster, to get out of his way.

Madam Pomfrey was walking toward them, before they'd gotten a pace or two inside her realm. "Ah, good, Mr. Potter. I'm glad you decided to return so promptly."

Since Harry had decided no such thing, he said nothing, just shrugged a little.

"Well, let's have you behind the curtain, then," she said, and gestured to a movable curtain closing off a bed in the corner near her office. "Strip down to pants if you will."

Harry shook his head. This was going too far. "I'm fine, Madam Pomfrey. I don't need any work ups or whatever."

"I disagree, Mr. Potter, and your Head of House had given permission for the exam. Now, behind the curtain with you."

His Head of House . . . Harry glared at Snape again, angry and embarrassed and not in the mood for more humiliation. "You can't do this, sir. You've no business giving anyone permission about me."

Snape sneered at him and leaned in close, so Harry could feel his breath on his face. Oddly, it smelt of peppermint; he'd been expecting old socks. "I have a duty to all the students in my care, Potter, to make sure they are of sound mind and body. You are malnourished and underweight, and it is my job to make sure there's nothing else amiss with a physical exam."

Shaking his head again, Harry backed away from him. "I'm not stripping down for anyone!"

"I assure you, Mr. Potter, you haven't got anything I haven't seen before," said the medi-witch. She cut him off as he scrambled for safety, and maneuvered him toward the curtained area.

"And I assure you that we will all remain here in this infirmary, until you submit to the exam," Snape put in. "I would like to remind you that I have far better ways I could spend my time. Do not force me to show you the error of holding us here overlong."

Harry set his jaw. "It won't do any good you know. You'll just get in trouble."

"Whatever are you talking about?" Madam Pomfrey asked.

"If you tell. No one will care, so it's only going to get you in trouble. Just let me go back to my dorm, and we'll forget this ever happened, all right?"

A dark chuckle from Snape made Harry gape at him. "Don't think you can charm your way out of this one, Potter. Get behind the curtain. Now!"

Well, fine. He'd warned them. Now it was their lookout, and no concern of his anymore. At least, not until summer and he had to go back to the Dursleys. Anger tightened his steps as he went behind the curtain, and made it hard for him to undo the buttons on his robes, and his shirt. He was working on removing his trainers when Madam Pomfrey's voice came to him from rather nearby.

"There's a gown on the bed, Mr. Potter. Once you're down to pants, put it on, please."

"Yes, ma'am," he said automatically, and then did as he was told. It was big on him, even though the tag inside said "small," and he wrapped it twice around his torso and draped it over his knees before hiking himself up onto the bed. "Okay," he said finally, and cursed his voice for wavering. "I'm done."

"Excellent." Madam Pomfrey pulled aside the curtain only long enough to come through, and for Harry to catch a glimpse of Snape waiting on the other side, before she closed it up again. Was he really going to stay through the whole thing?

"Now, how's that scar doing today?" she asked and lifted the hair that was always flopping onto his forehead so she could peer at it. "You've been using the salve I gave you?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Good." Her fingers were light as they ran over the skin near his scar, and she nodded. "It looks a sight better. Now, chin up and glasses off, so I can get a look in your eyes. When was the last time you had your eyes examined, Mr. Potter?"

While she spoke, she was waving her wand around in odd circles and twists, and her question threw him off guard. "Erm . . . I don't remember."

"A year ago?" she asked helpfully. "Two?"

Harry shrugged. It had been almost six years, but damned if he was going to say so.

"Come now, Mr. Potter, let's not have any of that, shall we? I know the prescription is out of date, so you can answer these questions now, like this, or you'll answer them later, when we have to bring in specialists."

"Specialists?"

"Indeed. You don't imagine you're the first child reluctant to speak of their health history, do you? We have a connection to Wizarding Child Services, who would only be too happy to come and spend some time with you." Madam Pomfrey smiled at him benignly, but he saw it for what it was. She was a great manipulator.

"I still don't see why--"

"I want you to feel comfortable, Mr. Potter," she said, and he could almost believe her. "But I am concerned about your health and well being. It would go much easier if you were honest with me from the start."

Harry swallowed, recalling how kind she had been with him the day before, with the ointment and everything. He couldn't repay that kindness with lies, not all the time anyway. He let out a huff of breath. "Fine. It's been six years. I'd just started at primary."

"Thank you," she said, and sounded like she meant it. "Now, I can get your glasses to the correct prescription in a trice, and you tell me how well you can read this chart . . ."

He tried on his improved glasses and gasped; everything was so clear. Excited, he rattled off the letters on the chart, down to the last line. "Thanks," he said sincerely.

She waved it away. "Now that's taken care of, I want you to tell me about how you've managed to break so many of your bones."

There was a rustle of cloth -- like robes -- from the other side of the curtain, but Harry paid it no mind as he yelped, "What?!"

"From my readings, I see that in the last twelve months, you have broken your left wrist once, your nose twice, and your collarbone three times. Please tell me how."

"I'm clumsy," he said immediately. "I'm always falling down."

"Mm-hm." She gave him a piercing look. "Now, how about the truth?"

Could she read minds? he wondered. Or did she use magic to tell her when someone lied? If so, he was in even more trouble than he'd expected. "I get into a lot of fights," he said warily. It was the truth, sort of.

"Oh? With whom?"

"You know," he said, shrugging one shoulder. "Other kids."

"Mm-hm." He was starting to hate that sound. "Who?"

"You want their names?"

"Not just now," she said. "But tell me, were they in your classes at school, or in your neighborhood . . . Please be specific."

Harry squinched his eyes shut. This was going from bad to worse. "Yes, they were in my neighborhood, and in my school." He paused, and peeked at her, and she gave him that look again, and he added quickly, "And one of them is my cousin. Mostly, they're Dudley and his friends."

"I see."

"But it's okay. I mean, it's no big deal."

"Mm-hm." She waved her wand about a bit more. "And you never had them properly set?"

"Sorry?"

"The bones. You were raised by Muggles, correct? And you never went to a Muggle Healer and had the bones set so they would heal properly."

"Ummm." Harry hugged the thin cloth of the gown tighter to himself. What did it matter if he had always had to tend to himself? It wasn't like anybody else was going to.

"That's answer enough, I imagine." For the first time, she picked up a clipboard and jotted something down on it. "I want you to tell me about your eating habits, when you were at home."

Harry frowned. "Like what I like to eat?"

"No. More like, how often you ate, and what kinds of things you had. Nutritionally."

"I don't know. Regular stuff, I guess." This was skating too close to that horrid list of rules Snape had given to him last night. Even thinking about the list made him want to scream.

Madam Pomfrey sighed. "The truth now, Harry, if you please."

He gritted his teeth. "And if I don't please?"

"Manners, Potter," growled a voice from the other side of the curtain, and Harry jumped, having nearly forgotten Snape was there. "Mind your cheek."

Something inside him snapped, and he hopped off the bed and grabbed up his clothes from the floor where he'd dropped them. "I won't, I'm not . . . I'm not doing this anymore. You can't make me."

Snape burst through the curtain like a demon. His scowl could have scared demons. "I can and I will. Get back on that bed."

Harry shook his head, and tried to make a break for it. This was stupid and surreal and he wasn't going to do it anymore!

But Snape snagged his arm as he was dodging past, and whirled him around so they were face to face again. "I am not playing here, Potter. You will remain here until you are given leave to go."

Tugging at his arm -- the same one Snape had grabbed to haul him out of the showers before -- proved fruitless, but damn it hurt! He couldn't suppress a wince as the man's bony fingers pressed into already existing bruises, and when Snape's other hand came up, he ducked reflexively, but the professor only took his other arm in hand, and lifted him to put him back on the hospital bed.

"Professor," Madam Pomfrey said. "I'm sure Mr. Potter will be fine if you let him go now."

"Of course," he said, and released Harry, stepping back just enough to block Harry's only point of exit and folding his arms across his chest. "Pray continue."

Madam Pomfrey took the clothes out of Harry's hands and set them gently on the bed beside him. His trainers were still on the floor; if he'd escaped, he would have had to back to the dungeons barefoot. "I know this must be rather frightening for you," she said, and Harry looked away and shook his head, "But it really is for your own good."

Harry didn't bother to correct her. Why should he care anymore? He was in for it, no matter what he did. In a low voice, he said, "Fine. I ate whatever was left. And only if my chores were done."

"Whatever was left from what?" she asked quietly.

"From when they ate, the Dursleys, I mean. If there was anything leftover, and I'd done my chores right, then I could eat."

"And was that often the case?"

Harry sighed. In for a penny, in for a pound. . . . "I got to eat almost every day. In the summer, when I work outside, it's easy to fill up on water from the hose so I don't get hungry."

"I see." She scribbled something more on her chart. "How did you get along with your friends at school?"

"I didn't have any."

"None?"

Harry snapped, "I couldn't very well, could I? With Dudley threatening anyone who talked to me."

"All right. And have you ever used drugs or alcohol?"

"No!" What kind of stupid questions were these anyway?

"Easy, Harry, I'm almost done."

Well, thank god for that. "And then I can go?"

"Of course. Just a couple more questions. How safe do you feel at home?"

Harry frowned. "Safe? I don't know. Compared to what?" He was almost sure he heard a snort or something from Snape, but when he shot a glance at the man, his face was as scowly as ever.

"Compared to, say, when you were at primary school, or here."

He studied her face for a minute then shrugged. "I'm most safe here," he admitted and smirked. "You know. No Dudley."

"Do you worry about being alone with him?"

"No. I worry about being alone with him and his friends." He shrugged one shoulder again. "They're bigger than me. I'm faster, though."

"All right then. I'll have you lie back on the bed now, let's move the gown down around your hips, that's right dear."

Harry complied, lying back, feeling naked despite the gown, and sick to his stomach. His ribs were dotted with bruises, and his arms looked like someone had made grabbing him a national sport. He also had part of a handprint around his throat, from when his Uncle had choked him a little, last time he'd failed to prune the roses properly.

"You tell me if any of this hurts, all right?" Madam Pomfrey asked, and started pushing on parts of his chest and stomach with her finger tips. He didn't say anything, but couldn't help wincing a few times when she pressed tender areas. "And if you could turn over onto your stomach . . ."

Once again he obeyed, burying his face in the pillow as heat washed over him. He tried to stay as still as possible, hoping this would be over soon. When she pressed one part of his lower back, he yelped and flinched away.

She patted his back gently. "My apologies, Mr. Potter. We're all done for now. You may get dressed while I prepare a few potions for you."

"Thanks," he breathed, not sure he could do much more than that. As he sat upright, he caught Snape's gaze, and was troubled by the look of frank speculation he saw there. Then both of them left the quartered off area, so he could get dressed, which he did in a hurry.

When he came out from behind the curtain, the two of them were huddled close together, near Madam Pomfrey's potion cabinet, obviously talking, but he couldn't hear what they were saying.

"Can I go now?" He looked at Snape. "Sir?"

Snape turned his dark gaze on Harry and waved his wand in a quick arc. "In a moment. Come here, please."

Harry couldn't help but drag his feet, but once he got to his Head of House, the man merely shoved a potion at him. "Drink that."

It was blue and sludgy looking. Harry sniffed it and almost gagged.

"Drink it, Potter," Snape warned. "It's a nutritional supplement. You'll take another dose in the morning, and every day thereafter at breakfast."

Harry scowled then plugged his nose and chugged the foul brew down. It tasted worse than it smelled. He choked a bit on it, but managed to keep it from coming back up.

"And this one," Snape said, handing him a metal cup with a clear liquid half filling it. "For your bones."

With a sigh, Harry drank that one, too, plus two more that Madam Pomfrey handed him -- one for his bruised kidneys and one for his "contusions," whatever the hell those were -- until he was swimming in potions. Finally, he was allowed to go, with strict instructions to return on Friday for another check up.

Even though he was ecstatic to be let free, he had to admit he felt better than he had in a long time, almost free of pain. It was a good feeling, even if he knew he was in for a world of hurt when school ended.