Severus's head snapped up when Bellatrix spoke. “Why would you care? Why don't you go make your plans for muggle-borns this year? What are you going to do now?”

Bellatrix's lips tightened. “I didn't tell you about them because I knew that you wouldn't approve.” She said.

Harry looked from one of his parents to the other. “What did you do mum? Did you put the mudbloods in there place?” He asked eagerly. Despite the talk he'd had with Severus he still thought more mudblood than muggle-born. It would take time for him to change the words he used.

“She had other students teach them.” Severus didn't look happy at all. “I know because I ended up excusing one of my best students from Wednesday classes only to find out that they were busy teaching yours!”

Bellatrix drew herself up to her full height. It was quite impressive, especially since Severus was still sitting on the floor at her feet. “I had more important things to do. I gave Slytherin points for it. And I was thinking about taking on a true apprentice.”

Severus just shook his head. “At least you didn't kick them out of your classes. Apparently when Dumbledore was the Transfiguration professor one of the staff members would actually force the muggle-borns to leave his classes.”

“That's horrible.” Harry crawled into his Da's lab and looked at the picture. It was a muggle one, but both of the people looked happy and the colours were bright. It wasn't a picture he'd seen before but the girl was defiantly one he recognized.

“That's my mum isn't it?” He asked quietly. But both of his parents were teachers and took hearing potions to make it easy to watch their classes and had heard what he was saying.

“I'm your mum.” Bellatrix smoothed his hair. “I will always be your mum.” She sneered at the picture but Severus cut in before she could say something hateful.

“You're very special Harry. You get to have two mums.” He awkwardly hugged the boy with one arm.

“And two Da's?” Harry asked expectantly. He knew almost nothing about his birth father since his parents tended not to talk about his original parents.

Severus's lips tightened but he nodded. “Yes, You've got two of those to.” He handed Harry the photograph that he'd been staring at so intensely. “Have a closer look.”

The picture was interesting, wizarding pictures were all in black and white and the only place Harry had ever seen clothes like that were in his muggle studies books. His Da's clothes looked close enough to robes, but his mum's clothes reminded him of the mudbloods that he'd met earlier.

“Your mother was muggle-born Harry. She was probably the most brilliant witch in our year. Maybe even the second smartest in the entire year.” Severus regarded her image with a sad look of loss upon his face.

“Second only to you, of course.” Bellatrix said. “Imagine, A mudblood and a half-blood. Brilliant!” She tried to crack a smile.

“Are you saying that Da is stupid?” Harry asked. He really didn't like it when his Da got insulted and during the school year it happened several times a day in his hearing.

Bellatrix glared at him. “It's simply surprising that people of their blood could be intelligent.”

“Bellatrix, I thought that we'd agreed. . .” Severus ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his head, the way that he usually did when he had a headache.

“Fine.” Bellatrix snapped. “But not the mudblood. She must be an exception on the rules.” She looked at the little picture that Harry was holding. “And she called you Sev?”

“Yes.” Severus took Harry's end in his and lead him out of the lab. Bellatrix hurried closely behind him.

“You can't run away Severus. I'll still be here every day. I don't care if you had a romance with a mudblood. Rodolphus did worse, of course he never actually had feelings for any of them.” Bellatrix's hand was on her wand. She didn't believe that Severus would curse her, but it was always better to be prepared.

Severus ignored his wife and after dispelling the wards he left their quarters with Harry's hand still in his tight grip. He walked all over the castle, always keeping Bellatrix a few corridors behind them. Finally after the two had passed through three password protected hallways and climbed down a few sets of stairs Severus stopped.

“Are we stopping here?” Harry turned in a slow circle in the room. “Where are we?” The room was rather small and looked as if it hadn't seen a house elf in more an a decade.

“This was our room.” Severus started using cleaning spells all over the room. “Lily and I used to meet up here. She was a Gryffindor and I was a Slytherin and we weren't able to be good friends in public.” He finished using the cleaning spells.

Harry wrinkled his nose and looked around the room. “You hung out in here? It's disgusting!” Even with the cleaning spells it was only a small, simple and empty stone room.

Severus sighed and waved his wand. Immediately the invisibility and protective wards disappeared. The room took on a new look and the doors that lead into the wizardspace rooms appeared. There wasn't much furniture left in the room, but the furnishing that remained became visible.

“Wow.” Harry breathed. “It's amazing.” He turned to his father. “You made this?” He asked incredulously.

“No.” Severus shook his head. “House elves did most of the work. But your mother and I also put a great deal of time into it.” He stepped over to the desk that they used to do their homework together on. There was still a paper left on it from the day that he'd stopped coming.

It had been after he'd said those unspeakable words to her in the courtyard. That night she hadn't shown for their study session. She had ignored him off the entire summer and when they returned he'd cast the wards over the rooms and left them.

“Can we go into the other rooms?” Harry asked. The entrance room was simple, just in case someone breached their protections and wards. There was a few desks, an empty bookshelf, and a half rotten carpet on the floor. It was not very exciting.

“Very well.” Severus opened the door on the far left. There was another two doors in front of them. This time he took the door on the right.

Harry looked around the room that they were now in. It was very small, like a wash room almost. The entire thing was tiled and there was a small sink and toilet in one corner. Three lockers filled the only empty wall.

“What is this?” Harry opened one of the lockers. There was a green swimsuit in it. “Is this yours Da?” He asked. It was green, but there was red Gryffindor lions on it.

Severus took his old swimsuit out of the locker. It had been wet when he hung it up more than a decade ago. It had been a gift from Lily. She'd taken his plain green swimsuit and added the lions with a charm for his birthday. He'd tried to do the same thing to hers, but had only succeeded in making it see-through.

“It's a change room and that is my swimsuit.” Severus pointed his wand at the suit and used a shrinking charm until it was Harry's size. “Do you want to go swimming?” He asked, brandishing the suit at his son.

Harry looked questioningly at him. Is there even a place to swim in Hogwarts? I guess we could be swimming in the lake. But there are merpeople and grindlelows. Not to mention the giant squid. “I don't see a problem with that.”

Severus nodded. “All right. You may change in here.” He left his change room and took the other door into Lily's change room. It looked almost exactly the same as his except for the multiple swimsuits hanging in her lockers. She liked to collect them and wear a different one each time they went swimming.

He used a conjuring spell to instantly bring his swimsuit to himself. It was like apparating, but it could be used inside wards and it had a nasty tendency to kill living things when moving them. His current swimsuit wasn't anything like the one he'd had as a student. It was plain black and slightly too small for him since he hadn't worn it for ages.

Harry changed quickly into his father's old swimsuit. It was actually quite comfortable and well fitting once he'd gotten over the Gryffindor mascot printed all over it. He shrugged off his robes and cinched the drawstring around the waist.

Severus knocked on the door. “I'm coming in.” He called out.

Harry moved aside so that the door wouldn't hit him. His father's appearance was astonishing. He'd never seen the man in anything but his robes or dark, conservative, muggle clothing. Black swimsuits didn't fit in with his mental image.

“Ready?” Severus transfigured a pair of shoelaces in his locker into large, fluffy towels. “Let's have some fun!” He pushed opened the next door and let Harry followed him in.

Harry stared open mouthed at the pool in front of them. He knew that there were large bathtubs in Hogwarts. The teachers' bath and the prefects' bath were both the size of small swimming pools. But this wasn't a bathtub. It was a large pool and it looked recently cleaned. The water was clear and inviting and the tiles were scrubbed clean.

“Why is it still clean?” Harry asked. All of the rooms he'd seen so far were dirty and dusty from disuse. But here even the diving board seemed to have been recently oiled, so to give better power. The ceiling was highly domed and not a single cobweb ruined the perfect look.

“Dumbledore swims here. Almost every night.” Severus admitted. “He gave Lily and I permission to create this entire place as long as he was allowed to use the pool. The house elves on here on a regular basis.”

Harry smiled and after sitting his towel well away from the edge he approached the side. The white stones were cool on his bare legs, but the water was the perfect temperature. Just the right mix of refreshing coolness and relaxing warmth.

Severus smiled. He'd never been swimming with his son because of the mark on his arm. Bellatrix hadn't either. Harry had learned to swim in pureblood summer camp one year, but he'd never been swimming with his parents. Severus hadn't hidden the mark on his arm. They were in a secure location and Harry knew that he'd been a spy.

“Can you do flips?” Harry asked, pointing to the diving board.

Instead of giving a verbal answer Severus climbed the three steps to the diving board and ran off. He hadn't being swimming in ages and only did a simple front flip, not quite straightening out before he hit the water.

“Teach me!” Harry cried, jumping up. He headed to the diving board and carefully walked to the end. But looking down at the water from the raised platform had it seem much larger than it had been when he was sitting on the side. He pluged his nose and jumped in nervously.

The water was beautiful and cool. It whooshed through his hair and he came up only because he needed to breath. Swimming had always been one of Harry's favourite activities, but with his family's busy schedule and by the time summer came everyone just wanted to rest.

Severus spent the next hour teaching his son how to perform a simple flip and engaging in all manner of races and competitions It was more fun than the two of them had had in ages. The only thing missing were people that they loved. Harry wished that Bellatrix would join them and Severus mourned for Lily. It was the first time he'd swam in the pool since her death.

“That was awesome!” Harry said when they finally left the water. There wasn't a clock and both of them were getting hungry. They toweled off the worst of the wet and a drying charm took care of the rest.

Severus spelled the swimsuits and toweled clean and dry and put them back into their lockers to wait for the next time that there was an opportunity for a swim.

“Come on Harry. Let's go have dinner.” The two left the rooms, passing through the password checkpoints and casting spells when needed. After their long swim it took them quite awhile to arrive outside their quarters.

Harry rang the doorbell. They didn't need to have Bellatrix open the door for them, put it was always nice to be polite instead of barging in.

Bellatrix opened the door. The tears disappeared from her eyes and anger replaced the worry she'd been feeling. “Severus Snape! You idiot, where have you been?” She demanded.