Treacle Tart, clinging to the hem of the smelly, dirty cloth that covered the Enemy, was righteously miffed. With the Enemy and Her Boy, she spun over and over and over until she was sure she would be sick, or perhaps die. But then, suddenly, the spinning was over as if it had never been. They were in a dark, gloomy place with strange smells -- and the scent of rat! -- and crates and boxes and a big bed nearby.

Her Boy was upset. She hated for him to be upset, and when Her Boy was upset, she was always quick to action, doing first and apologizing later. Thus, as soon as she had her balance, Treacle Tart lashed out at the Enemy again, clawing the delicate skin near his eyes so that he would let go of Her Boy to protect himself.

The Enemy did drop Her Boy, but only because he batted her away again, this time harder than before, hard enough to knock her into a wall. Hard enough to hurt.

--HPSSHPSS--

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw his white-furred Treacle Tart fly through the air and slap into a wall, where she lay still. "No!" he cried. He tried getting his legs under him, but his stomach was lousy with churning and his head hurt like Uncle Vernon had taken a belt to it. He stumbled and fell to his knees, then scrambled toward his kneazle kit. "Tree! Tree!"

"Harry," said a man's voice, the man who had taken him from his Father, and Harry scurried even faster to get away.

He reached Treacle Tart just as the man tried to grab him again. "Leave Tree alone!" Harry wrenched his arm out of the man's grip, and half turned to glare at him while using his body to protect Treacle from further attack. His throat felt thick, like it was full of syrup, and he could hardly breathe for fear of what this man would do to him. Was this the man everyone said killed Harry's parents? He swallowed hard, swallowing his fear, then backed up a few more inches, till his hand touched Treacle's fur. She nosed the palm of his hand, so he knew she was alive, if hurt. And the man had not killed him yet. "Where are we? Where's my Father? What'd you do to him?"

The man crouched right in front of him. He smelled awful, as if he hadn't washed in a long, long time, as if his own uncle had chained him in the backyard. The man's scraggly beard and the hair on his head were both matted with grime, tangled in knots and nasty looking. His clothes were stained and torn, and his eyes . . . his eyes were the bluest blue Harry had ever seen, but they were wild. Crazy eyes, like a madman.

"Your father died a long time ago, Harry. That man was not your father."

"Yes. He is."

"No, he's not. He kidnapped you--"

"He didn't!" Harry yelled in his face. "He rescued me, when the Dursleys were going to kill me." He swallowed thickly and lifted his chin. "Are you gonna kill me, too?"

"No!" The madman staggered backwards as if Harry had hit him. "No, Harry. I'm your godfather."

"Sirius Black." Harry spat the name. Father had told him what Black had done, how he had betrayed Harry's parents. Black had told the Dark Lord where James and Lily were, so he could kill them, and try to kill Harry, too. His eyes stung, and he blinked back any tears before they could fall. "You killed my Mum and Dad."

The man shook his head and moved forward like he might try and touch Harry again. "No. No, I didn't. It was Wormtail, Peter Pettigrew--"

"YOU KILLED MY MUM AND DAD!" Harry shrieked.

"No, no, please Harry, please, I didn't, you have to belie--"

"YOU KILLED THEM! YOU KILLED THEM! IT'S YOUR FAULT THEY'RE DEAD!"

The mad stumbled away from Harry like he was drunk. Like Harry had punched him in the gut. It felt good, so Harry screamed some more, "THEY TRUSTED YOU AND YOU KILLED THEM AND Then--" When his throat gave out, Harry went on, yelling in scratchy tones and almost sobbing at the same time. He had never given voice to this particular anguish before, and now he could, to the one person he hated more than anyone in the whole world. "And then the Dursleys starved me and chained me in the yard, and they beat me and broke my ankle, and they hurt me, and my Father came and he saved me. He - he adopted me, and he LOVES me, and WHERE. IS. MY. DADDY!?"

Harry then started bawling for real, for a long time, with a kneazle in his lap. The madman looked on, mouth hanging open.

--HPSSHPSS--

Severus stared at the place where his son had been a moment ago. He still held his wand in his hand, and for a brief instant, he considered the possibility of tracking an Apparation. He knew it was impossible, but then, so was the idea of SIRIUS BLACK in his house!

In the next instant, Severus had wordlessly summoned a glass wall sconce into his hand for the express purpose of throwing it at the hearth to shatter in a million pieces while he shrieked incoherently for his son. His heart was shattering. How in the world had this happened? How had that monster come inside their home and taken Harry? And where could he have gone?

Albus. Albus must know something.

Severus spun in place and grabbed a handful of floo powder to dash in the hearth. Green flames sparkled around the slivers of glass from the sconce as Severus yelled, "ALBUS DUMBLEDORE! Wake up this moment! Albus, wake up!" He could not rage about his son being missing, not over the Floo system, which might be monitored by the Ministry, not to mention Lucius Malfoy or his minions. Thus, when Albus appeared in his view seconds later, he said only, "What we worried about has come to pass. That . . . that foul beast has taken . . ." Here he faltered, not wanting to say "the boy," as Harry's execrable relatives had called him, nor could he call his son anything like, "the package," or "the item," even if it would hide his identity; it was too drab, too inconsequential. His son meant more than that! Still, he had hesitated only a heartbeat before Dumbledore rescued him from that one decision.

"Move aside," Albus said, and in the next moment he was standing beside Severus in Harry's bedroom, looking at the rucked up bedclothes and the shattered sconce. "What happened?"

"That's what I'd like to know," Severus snarled. His much vaunted self-control was all but gone. He was taking sharp, short breaths, as if his heart was being squeezed inside his chest. He put his fists in his hair and pulled, unable to simply think. He made himself recite the events, however, knowing he had to pull himself together, for Harry's sake. "I woke to Harry's screams. I thought it to be a nightmare, but when I came in here, Black had grabbed him and had my son's arms pinned, and he Disapparated before I could get a spell off. What am I going to do? I'm going to kill that bastard! Where has he taken my son!?"

"Severus, dear boy," the Headmaster soothed, his hands folded together in front of him, "calm down, please. And breathe. You won't do Harry any good if you collapse for not breathing, you know--"

"Of course I know that," Severus snapped, unequipped to deal with a soothing Albus, when he had never required soothing before. Not even facing the Dark Lord had made him this frantic, this upset. He paced back and forth in front of the Headmaster, aware that he was babbling, yet unable to stop. "Where could Black have taken him? Where would he go with Harry? I have to get him back. He'll be so frightened; I told him he was safe here, that he'd nothing to fear, that I'd always protect him. Merlin, he'll think I lied to him, and I promised never to lie to him; Merlin, my son, now he'll never know--"

"Severus!" Dumbledore shouted this time, to get his attention. His blue eyes flashed like lightning as he grabbed Severus by both arms for good measure and gave him a sturdy shake. "Calm yourself! You won't do your son any good this way."

Severus nodded dumbly. His fists clenched again, and in a whisper, he asked, "What will I do?"

"Find him."

"Find him."

"Of course. I can imagine only one or two places that Black might have Apparated to without a wand, assuming, of course, he still does not have a wand. We shall go there and retrieve your son."

Severus stared. Of course. He had called on Albus, hoping for just this, but . . . he had not truly dared to hope. "You know where he is?"

"Perhaps." Dumbledore looked him up and down. "Get dressed, Severus," he said gently, "and I shall see what I can find."

--HPSSHPSS--

Mouth hanging open, Sirius Black watched Harry sob himself out. He had no idea what to do. It wasn't supposed to be like this. The boy was supposed to be happy to be rescued, not bawling his eyes out. Not crying for James, who was dead and had been dead for six long and impossibly hard years.

"Stop that now," Sirius said. He sat on the edge of his childhood bed in the home of his ancestors, the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. His room was still festooned with red and gold hangings and banners and rugs, as it had been when he was at Hogwarts and one of the Marauders. That was so very long ago now, though sometimes it seemed like yesterday. He wrung his hands together and leaned forward toward the boy, who was crouching in the corner. "Stop crying, Harry." Please.

The boy had his hands over his face. He was scrunched up into about the smallest boy-shaped ball Sirius had ever seen. The fuzzy white she-devil of a kneazle rubbed against Harry's leg, consoling him, giving him the comfort that Sirius wanted to give him. "Want . . . sob my . . . sob Daddy!"

"Harry," Sirius tried to tell him, ever so gently. "Your Daddy died when you were a baby."

"No, he didn't! He's at . . . sob my home . . . now! I . . . sob . . . I wanna go home!"

"This is your home now." Even as he said it, he knew it could not be so. Not yet. The Aurors would know to look for him here, not to mention the Dementors, and he should be well away before the Minister or Dumbledore came looking. But it had been the only place he could think of in that moment of panic, the only place he knew he could Apparate to without splinching either himself or the pup.

But Harry didn't want his comfort. "No! Want my Sev'rus! Want my Daddy!"

Sirius growled. He couldn't help it. He had to nip this one in the bud, right now. It galled him that the boy believed that liar. "That greasy, grimy, nasty, Death Eating git is NOT your FATHER! Get that out of your thick head right now, boy! He kidnapped you--"

"YOU kidnapped me!"

"--and he was treating you like a House Elf. He hated your father, worse than anything."

"You killed them!" the boy shouted. "He told me you killed them!"

That stopped Sirius cold. He could only shake his head, even though there was a nugget of truth to Harry's words. He knew it, and James would have known it, too. The words came out hoarse when he admitted, "I suggested Peter be their Secret Keeper. Peter told You Know Who where they were. Where you all were. But I didn't. I wasn't Secret Keeper."

"You're lying," Harry said, but this time he didn't scream, at least.

"I'm not."

Harry scrubbed dirty, snotty hands over his face. "I'm not either, you know. Severus Snape is my Dad. We're blood adopted."

And if that wasn't a kick in the teeth, nothing else was. Technically, according to Wizard Law, a blood adoption would make Harry Snivellus' son. Except for one little thing: Snape didn't have the right to adopt Harry, so long as Sirius was alive. Sirius had not given his permission. So he told the kid, "Doesn't matter. I didn't give him permission to adopt you, so it wasn't legal. You are my godson, and James was, and always will be, your father. Now that I'm here, you'll stay with me."

Harry stared at him with wide eyes, shaking his head. "No, no, Sev'rus is my Dad. Sev'rus is my Dad!"

"Not once I get his arse thrown in Azkaban for kidnapping, he won't be." Sirius rose from the bed and grabbed one of Harry's arms. He twisted the boy around to meet his eyes. Harry had to know something before he opened the door to the hallway and the stairway to the first floor. Walburga had only been dead a year or so, but he could imagine what sorts of hellish games she'd play on invaders to her home. "You've got to be quiet once we're out this door, or you'll wake my mother. I guarantee none of us will like that. All right?"

Harry nodded, looking frightened, but Sirius didn't let up his grip at all. Just as well, as the moment he opened the door, the boy opened his mouth and drew in a breath like he would scream. Sirius clapped a hand over his mouth, hitched Harry up onto his hip, and whispered harshly into his wee ear, "Don't you make a sound, boy. We need to get out of here, fast. I'll tie you up if I have to." He hated saying that to James' son, but he'd have time to apologize later. James would understand.

"Do you understand me?" Sirius whispered in a near-snarl, and waited till the boy nodded beneath his hand, his green eyes impossibly wide. A faint tremor ran through Harry's small limbs, and even before he smelled it, Sirius knew the boy had lost control of his bladder. The warm liquid soaked both of them from the knees down. "Merlin, James," he hissed.

The boy's face reddened beneath Sirius' hand; he was obviously embarrassed. His tiny nostrils were flaring, as if he couldn't breathe quite right. But Sirius just wanted to get them out of there, maybe with a few provisions first so they wouldn't have to steal anything to eat right away. So he hitched Harry a bit higher on his hip, tightened his grip so the boy couldn't wriggle away, and eased the two of them down the stairwell to the first floor. From there, he knew it was just a hop, skip and jump to the kitchen and then out the backdoor. They could get away before the Aurors came, before anyone knew they'd been there; it just had to be fast.