Severus collapsed into his favorite plush armchair, ruthlessly crushing down the urge to scream in frustration. He had finally managed to wrestle a drowsy, whiny Draco into pajamas, and had nearly strapped the disobedient child to his bed. He was worse than a stroppy toddler!

Finally, finally, patience at an end, he had it the boy with the lightest sleeping spell he knew, and had stalked from the room before he did something he would regret, not checking to see if the boy had taken the spell or not.

The past two hours had no been kind.

Harry had, by some miracle, managed to deposit both bodies onto the couch. Draco had, expectedly, been entirely uncooperative, both when Harry was trying to calm him down, and when Severus decided he needed that last calming draught. The potion’s master had gotten a bruised shin for his efforts, and had consequently been in no mood to listen to Draco’s caterwauling.

Of course, that had all changed once the boy clamed down enough to explain the entire situation. He kneaded his forehead tiredly. His poor Dragon. The things the boy had seen!

He shuddered involuntarily. If it wasn’t enough tat the boy had seen the depths of his parents’ devotion to the creature called the Dark Lord, (which Severus thought should have broken the boy alone), he had then had to witness several of the evil thing’s rituals and even some of his failed initiations. He closed his eyes tiredly. His poor Slytherins. Even with all the terrible things he had seen in his life, let alone the terrible tings he had done, he couldn’t wrap his mind around hurting the children he had practically raised. Severus sighed. He couldn’t begrudge the boy a touch of hysteria, not after what he had seen.

And been through. The state of Draco’s body before he managed to heal the boy wouldn’t let him forget that the boy had been through much.

But it didn’t mean he had to like it either.

And suddenly he jumped up from his chair, stalking over to stare angrily into the fire.  The idiot little boy had to go and get himself into trouble wit Dumbledore. Of all the slightly unhinged, borderline dark mages out there to make an enemy of, the stupid child had chosen Albus bloody Dumbledore. And why?  To peek at a few memories! Memories that hadn’t the slightest thing to do with the old man. The blonde boy’s idiot idea that he could find out for sure if the old man was going to help them by finding an appropriate memory was the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard (and he worked with teenagers everyday).

But he had to concede, the boy had had a lot on his mind.

And then the blasted boy had seen Harry’s memories. Of all the things to come across in Dumbledore’s extensive collection of memories, he had to find the one lifetime worth of abuse residing there. How insane was that?

Severus sighed again. He would have to speak to the boy tomorrow, and show him how to organize and lock away disturbing images. It was a good thing he was so gifted in Occlumency and had already caught the basics, or he would have a terrible time cataloguing the boy’s mind.

Mentally he ran through his potions stocks. He had no doubt that Draco would be suffering from nightmares tonight, and one look at Harry’s pale face told him the same would be true there, as well.

Harry.

All this time he had been indulging in his penchant to rant internally, and he had forgotten about Harry.

Well, not forgotten, really, he corrected himself and he watched the teen curled up on the couch. He couldn’t truly forget the boy if he tried, and there have been times he’d tried. It seemed, though, that Harry had forgotten Severus was in the room. The child’s eyes were glazed over and unfocused, and Severus wondered if the boy was indulging in his penchant to take the blame for things he could not control.

“Harry?”

After a beat, the boy blinked, and raised dull green eyes to meet his.

“Are you alright?”

Harry blinked again, pulling himself from his musings. Truthfully, he was so lost in thought he hadn’t even realized Snape had come back. Shakily, he nodded. He really was fine, kind of.

He wasn’t about to collapse into a pitiful heap of tears, or anything. But he did have a lot to think about. First though....

“I’m hungry.”

This statement was met with a thin smile from his guardian, and a disbelieving shake of his head. Severus ran a hand through his hair, and turned back to the fire. “I’ll fire call the kitchens, then.”

“Err,” Harry started. Now was a good a time as any to bring up his new….addition. “You don’t have to. I mean,” he faltered when the man turned his gaze back onto him, “I have another way.”

Snape rose to his full height, folding is arms over is chest. “Really,” he drawled. “Let’s see it, then.”

Harry pinked, and found the rug next to his seat very interesting. “Erm, well, you see…it’s kind of, um… err..what had happened was…” Harry stumbled over the words, knowing without looking that Severus’ ever mobile eyebrow was rising with every explanation he tried to give. “Oh bugger it. Winky!”

A sharp ‘pop’, and then the brightly clothed house elf was beaming up at him from her spot seated on the low coffee table.

“Master Harry called?”

Harry stared at her for a minute, unable to believe she was sitting on the furniture in Snape’s rooms. And the man hadn’t yet said anything. Not Gryffindor enough to look over and see the man’s reaction, Harry proceeded to order lunch. “And, er, Winky?” he asked when he was done, “could you bring some tea? Um, lots of it.” He had a feeling he and Severus were going to be here a while.

“Certainly, Master Harry. Winky is being right back.” And with another sharp ‘pop’, she was gone.

And there was silence. After a while, Harry peaked up at his pseudo-parent through his bangs, to see the man studying him intently. Nervously, he nibbled on his lip. Had he blown it? Was Snape going to yell at him now and send him away? He was so anxious he didn’t noticed he was wringing his hands agitatedly. Winky popped in again, laid down her trays, bid them both a cheery farewell and still there was silence. It wasn’t till a large, callused hand suddenly covered his that he finally began to come back to himself.

“Breathe, child.”

It wasn’t said nicely, but that simple command warmed Harry up like a whole bottle of butterbeer. It didn’t sound like Severus was angry with him, and he wasn’t getting any angry feelings from their link, either. What he was getting, he considered as he closed is eyes and enjoyed the sensation, was the equivalent of someone running a hand through his hair. It was very nice, really, and soothing. Abruptly, Harry’s eyes snapped open and he blushed when he realized he had been leaning into the mental touch.

Snape said nothing about it, though, and instead directed them both to the original matter. “So,” he said silkily. “You have a house elf.”

“We,” Harry corrected weakly, following a pattern on Snape’s dark robes. “We have a house elf.”

“Hmm. And this happened, when?”

“A few hours ago,” Harry replied, hoping desperately that Snape wouldn’t ask him anything else.

“I see.”

After a minute of fidgeting into the silence, Harry finally asked, “Can we eat?”

Black eyes met green in a searching gaze, but finally Severus agreed. “Certainly.”

~*~

Severus stared at the dark haired child over the rim of his teacup. He didn’t buy this calm façade for an instant. One wasn’t ambushed by your sobbing childhood enemy in your own home, made to listen to said enemy rant and rave about his eye-opening experience and how he was so very sorry for all he had put you through and beg for your help, and then sit quietly munching on biscuits and sipping hot cocoa. One did not. There was an explosion coming, and he would sit here till it came.

Harry, however, was oblivious to his guardian’s dire predictions. True, he was a tad confused about the whole Draco-having-a-life-changing-experience thing, but with all the other weird things that had happened to him in the past two days, he was pretty much going to take it in stride.

Draco had finally been encouraged (read: threatened upon pain of injury) to go to bed not thirty minutes ago, and Severus was deep in thought (Harry knew, because he had refilled his own cocoa twice and Snape hadn’t yet finished his first cup of his favorite tea). The blonde boy had sobbed and whined his way through an explanation that was so confusing, Harry still needed to think it out.

For one, Draco divulged information about his summer Harry didn’t want to think about. And here he had always thought Malfoy had been a spoiled brat. The irony had nearly made him snicker, but as Draco was in the process of telling of a particularly gruesome torture session, some of which the blonde had been subjected to, Harry had forced the urge down. Now, however, he felt the urge to giggle overcome him. He ignored Snape’s questioning glance, and pondered the afternoon’s events further.

Oh great, the boy was giggling. He nearly succumbed to the urge to pinch the bridge if his nose. He did not want to deal with another hysterical teen tonight. Or ever, really. He watched as another thoughtful expression shadowed the boy’s face, and felt himself relax, marginally.

It would only last for so long, however.

And like clockwork, Harry’s face gradually morphed into one of intense displeasure. The child was actually pouting.

‘It’s called a fearsome scowl, Severus.’

The man rolled his eyes at Two. ‘It is clearly a pout. Can’t you see his bottom lip protruding, just a bit?’ Severus asked the voice.

‘Yes, yes, that’s all good and well, for us at least. We know it’s a pout, but for the sake of our young charge, we must endeavor to at least attempt to think of it as a scowl. You know, manly pride and what not.’

‘Mmmm… I see your point. Fine then, I rephrase. Ehem: “The child was actually scowling.” Better?’

‘Much.’

Said scowl only proceeded to deepen, however, the longer Severus watched the boy before him.

And then, suddenly as if a light had gone off somewhere in his dark and crowded brain, Severus realized Harry had come back from meeting his friends much sooner than expected.

“I trust your rendezvous went well?” he asked, in what he hoped was a conspicuous voice.

Instantly Harry’s face darkened even further, if possible. “Yeah. Hermione and I aren’t seeing eye to eye right about now.”

Severus arched an eyebrow. He had expected the boy’s friends to have objections to his guardianship of the Boy-Who-Lived, but, he admitted to himself, he had been anticipating an explosion from their red-haired counterpart. “You’re friends took the news that badly?”

The teen’s eyebrows furrowed. “Well, no. Ron actually took it pretty well.” He still couldn’t puzzle that out.  “It was just Hermione….” He grabbed a pillow to pummel in frustration, “being Hermione!”

His other eyebrow matched the first. “Really now?” ‘Well this will be interesting,’ he mused to himself.  Making a note to investigate Mr. Weasley’s new attitude at a latter date, Severus asked, “What exactly was Ms. Granger’s problem with your new situation?”

And then Harry looked distinctly uncomfortable. Why did he have to ask that question? The boy squirmed in his seat. As angry as he was with the girl, he didn’t think she deserved whatever Severus might throw at her if he decided to enact revenge.

He looked up at his guardian (what a thought!) pleadingly, but only received an expectant look in return.

Fidgeting, Harry mumbled. “She said some stuff.”

Severus decided to ignore the boy’s mumbling, since he was obviously uncomfortable. Acting as if he hadn’t noticed he fixed the boy wit a dry look. “I assumed as much.”

Harry bit is lip nervously. “She just said…she thought…she asked if you touched…if you did…that thing….to me..”

Severus was no slouch, truly, but it took him a minute to fully understand and wrap his brain around the implications of Harry’s statement.

And then, he was angry.

Severus’ jaw clenched fiercely. “She accused me of impropriety?” he asked through gritted teeth.

Harry paled, and shook his head. “Well, you weren’t really there…so she couldn’t have, right?”

The boy was shaking, ever so slightly. Pushing his anger to the side, Severus reminded himself of his priorities.

Reassure Harry now, kill The Granger later.

Moving slowly, he caught the boy’s chin in his thin fingers, and turned the pointed face towards his own.

“Harry.” The boy blinked. “You do know that that will never happen. I will never, ever touch you that way. You know that, correct?”

But the blasted boy was shaking his head, eyes wide and fearful. “No, no, no! I know you won’t. You aren’t like that. Hermione was just being stupid. You wouldn’t do that. You wouldn’t. You’re not,” the child gasped, suddenly blinking back tears, “You’re not like Dudley.”

And everything else was forcibly driven from his mind. “Dudley?” he asked stupidly. “Dudl – What happened with Dudley?”

In a very small voice and with very wide eyes Harry asked, “You don’t know?”

Severus’ voice was very carefully controlled as he answered. “I have your earlier memories of your mother’s sister’s whale of a son, but nothing of this past summer.” He gave the boy a piercing look, willing his heart to stop hammering. “What happened?”

As calm and controlled as he might have looked on the outside, Severus was the farthest thing from cool and collected on the inside. If what he thought happened to Harry had actually happened….His blood ran cold. He couldn’t have been sexually assaulted, not by his cousin. And if he had been, why didn’t he see it? How could Harry have hid something like that from him when all his memories were practically fusing and meshing with each other in their effort to drive the boy crazy. He couldn’t have been hurt tat way too. Surely not.

Severus would not admit that he was frightened senseless of the boy saying he was.

And just how deep were these Occlumency shields, anyway?

Finding out was a matter for another day, however, as right then he had to stop the little wonder from edging away from him.

And that was simply solved by pulling the child up against his side. While he wasn’t expecting the boy to actively pull away, for the child to curl into a ball and press his face to his chest was a shock. Carefully pulling off glasses that were in serious danger of being warped beyond recognition, Severus wrapped his arms around the small bundle of human, hoping to provide the comfort the boy so obviously needed.

“Just breathe, Harry. It’s alright.”

And then, just like that, Severus found himself with a lapful of sobbing, rocking teenager. At a loss, he continued to hold the boy close and rub his hair. This certainly wasn’t what he expected to deal with after Draco’s performance. It wasn’t something he thought he’d ever wanted to think about, let alone deal with. He was so completely out of his depth here. What on earth was he supposed to do? Should he take the boy to Poppy? No, what good would that do? Should he try and get the boy to talk? Considering the distraught child sobbing into his shoulder, he didn’t think it was likely to happen anytime soon.

And then suddenly there was a slight pressure on his mind, a wriggling, nervous little presence waiting to be acknowledged. Severus was confused. Harry had already bypassed his personal shields and spoken (more or less) directly to his mind earlier that same day. Why was the child hesitating?

Cautiously, he reached out and touched the presence. The very embodiment of a frightened child, it slowly, slowly drew closer and closer ….and a memory unfolded.

Some minutes later found Severus holding Harry close, the boy’s face hidden in the crook of his neck, long potion stained fingers lost among inky black strands while slow irregular tears journeyed down his thin cheeks. Severus could find no words...there were no words to express the things he was feeling, the remorse, sadness, regret, nothing he could ever feel could even begin to make up a tenth of what Harry had been through, and just now that fact hit him like a ton of bricks.

And there was nothing he could do about it. Nothing at all, but hold the child and try to make him feel better.

But it seemed, as Harry squirmed a little and settled again, turning his head to stare out at the fire, the boy didn’t want anything else. Indeed, the child seemed perfectly content, breathing deeply and evenly, curled up on his lap.

Severus arched an eyebrow. Did he truly come off as the cuddling type? Was the boy actually going to stay there? He scowled. ‘Should drop the blasted child right on his head. He’ll think twice about snuggling up to me again, then, won’t he?’  he thought darkly.

He was stopped from further dark musings, however, by a pair of brilliant green eyes peering up at him.

Really, for as snappy and grumpy as Snape was, Harry thought reflectively, he really was a nice bloke. He shifted in the man’s lap (the man’s lap!!) and gazed into the fire. He’d collapsed into a heaving, sobbing mess all over his professor, and all the man had done was hug him. And he was still hugging him. Harry fought not to smile. His professor might decide that he didn’t need to be hugged anymore. It was a bit puzzling too, that the man was still holding him, just like he did last night bringing him up from the train, like he was something important, even after Harry had showed him the latest trend in “Harry-hunting”.

And that got the green eyed teen thinking. Was this what it felt like to have a parent? And then he mentally slapped himself. Of course this was what it was like. He’d seen it enough times with his aunt and cousin, even though the most terrible thing to happen to Dudley was the Ton-Tongue incident. And mentally Harry cringed. Don’t think about it.

Pushing those thoughts from his mind, he let himself sink further into Sev’s (since when is he Sev?) embrace, and got is mind back on track. The older wizard had just signed guardian papers for him. And he knew that second stack of parchment was adoption forms, even if Sev and Neil didn’t tell him.

So that meant Sev was serious. He meant it when he said he was going to protect him and not ever, ever treat him like his nasty relatives did. Of course, Severus hadn’t said ‘nasty’, but since Harry wasn’t too sure how this mind connection worked, he wasn’t going to test it by repeating, even to himself, some of the more colourful members of Snape’s vocabulary.

So Severus was his parent now, kind of. That meant he was in charge, most of the time. And that he decided who Harry was allowed to see, occasionally. So…..there was something he needed to ask….

“Professor?”

As if he couldn’t see the boy looking up at him. Severus refused to roll his eyes. “Yes, Harry?”

The idiot child started biting his lip. Oh, how he wanted to hex away that habit….

“Did you have to tell them everything?”

He gazed down at the child. Was the boy truly fifteen? “I assume by ‘them’ you mean the forms I had to fill out.” At the boy’s nod, he replied, “Yes, everything I knew at the time. It will save us problems in future, particularly if Albus decides to contest my petition, and it helps to expedite the process. The Ministry gets very touchy about its children.”

Harry closed his eyes, suddenly very weary. “It’ll be in the paper by tomorrow morning.”

Severus said nothing. He could not deny the boy’s claim, as that would entail lying to the child. And, also, he was wondering why the blasted child was still sitting on his lap. Did he look like a chair?

“Can we tell Sirius and Remus?”

Well that certainly was a question to ask. He could feel his hackles rising, just at the mention of those two. Thankfully the boy did not see, those green eyes were still closed. And…quite tightly, actually. And why was the child so tense? And – Oh for goodness sake!

“Breathe child!” He leaned forward, rubbing circles in the boy’s back. “Harry you cannot do this! Forgetting to breathe every time you become upset is going to leave you with brain damage and me with heart failure very soon. I forbid you to scare me like this,” he said into the face that was quickly regaining some of its colour. “Do so again and you will be a very sorry young man, do you understand?”

Harry nodded, slightly breathless. It was still a novel feeling to have someone worried about him. He didn’t mean to stop breathing, honest. He was just terrified the professor would say no, and then forbid him from ever talking to his godfather and Remus ever again. It was nice though, that the man was worried he might someday hurt himself. He nearly smiled up at him, but then he reminded himself that the man might stop his hugs.

“Now, get off my lap.”

Looking at Harry’s slightly wounded, confused face, maybe that wasn’t the best way to put it. But still, he had been nice for the entire day. Surely he was allowed to be the Greasy Git some of the time!

“I need to be standing over there” he pointed towards the fireplace “to activate the Floo, or can’t your puny brain work that fact out for itself?”

At this sharp statement, Harry scampered off and settled onto the couch cushion he had previously occupied. He was tempted to feel offended by the professor’s sharp demeanor, but decided to see it for what it was. The man had been rather nice today, after all.

Severus strode over to the fire, and carefully cast a quick clean-up spell on his face. The boy could get away with a tear-streaked visage. He didn’t yet have a reputation to uphold, and the angst would surely earn the child sap points. He pinched the bridge of his nose. He was doomed to the company of Sirius Black and his damned werewolf for at least another four hours.

He shuddered. Oh, the price we pay for the ones we love.

‘LOVE?! What lo – Where the hell did that come from?’

‘Ah! He admits. Splendid, my dear boy! Absolutely splendid!”

‘I knew it! I knew you just had to love him, and now you finally know it as well. Oh, I’m so happy for you!’

‘S’about time, mate. That’s all I’ll say abou’ tha’.’

Appalled and newly enraged, Severus threw a handful of Floo powder into the grate and bit out the destination. When the fire finally stopped spinning, he didn’t even bother to put his head into the flames. He simply yelled, “Werewolf, get in here, and bring your stinking mutt with you!” and stalked off.

Damn the werewolf. Damn Black.

And damn the boy to hell.