"All because of a stupid duel," Hermione huffed in annoyance at dinner.

"Hey, dueling is not stupid. What are you going to do when you're cornered by a dark wizard or Death Eater and you don't know how to protect yourself?"

"Knowing how to duel, and sneaking out during dinner to do it against school rules are two different things," Hermione said before slamming her book closed and moving down the table to sit by some of the other first year Gryffindor girls. They giggled, and Hermione looked even crosser.

"Girls," Ron said, and Harry nodded.

A few days passed without incident and things seemed to be going well when Hermione sat down next to Harry and Ron in the common room.

"There's something you ought to know, but only if you promise not to go getting more detentions and losing us more points."

"No promises Hermione," Ron said.

Harry shrugged and said, "Tell us first, then we'll decide."

She gave them a cross look and then said, "There's a ceberus in the forbidden corridor."

"A what?" Ron asked.

Hermione crossed her arms. "A three headed dog Ron." He laughed and she gave him a glare that quieted him immediately.

"Seriously?"

"Would I lie about something like this? Would I lie at all?"

"Well you are a girl."

"Glad you noticed."

After watching the exchange for a few moments, Harry finally asked, "How do you know Hermione?" Surely after getting on their case so often about breaking rules she wouldn't have broken any herself?

"When Harry told me about Filch getting upset because his cat had been chased up to the forbidden corridor-"

"What? When did he say that?" Ron interrupted her.

With a huge sigh and roll of her eyes, Hermione said, "Honestly, don't you listen? He told us that the night of his last detention and near death! Now let me finish Ronald."

He quieted and let her continue. "When Harry told me that I wondered what would upset him about that and I thought that cats are scared of dogs. And then I wondered why a dog would be so dangerous, and I went and did some research in the Library, where I read about Ceberus dogs, which have three heads and are very territorial and protective. So then I went up to the forbidden corridor and-"

"You what!?"

Harry shoved Ron hard to get him to be quiet and stop interrupting because he wanted to hear the rest of the story. Ron closed his mouth yet again and Hermione kept going, ignoring the outburst.

"and I looked through the key hole of different doors, and finally I looked through the key hole of the door on the end of the corridor and there was a ceberus inside sleeping on top of a trap door. It's guarding something, and it's dangerous, and that's why they don't want us up there."

"Why did you go to all the trouble?" Ron asked, wondering if he was finally allowed to speak.

"It's always best to do research first to know what you're looking for."

"Yeah, but I mean, the cat could have been scared of water or piranha or Fred and George duplicates... you could have been wrong in your research. Wouldn't it have been easier to just go look through the key holes in the first place?"

"Well-"

Harry sniggered. Ron was right. She had done things the hard way. "I think we're rubbing off on her," Harry said. "She never would have broken rules before, and now she went up to the forbidden corridor."

"Shh, don't spread it around," Hermione said. "Obviously we're not to know what's up there."

"Hagrid loves animals," Harry said, "I bet he knows where the thing came from."

"And what it's guarding," Hermione said.

"Well I'm not going out on the grounds to find out what he knows," Ron suddenly said. "Hagrid's hut is right on the edge of the forest. You heard Harry when he said there was a man eating monster out there."

"It ate a unicorn Ronald, not a person."

"But it would have if it caught Harry!"

Harry nodded in agreement. He just knew it deep down that he would have been killed if he hadn't gotten away.

"Well what do you propose we do then?" Hermione asked in a huff, crossing her arms.

Ron thought on it for a minute, and said, "Turn it over to the master manipulators, that's what." And then he got up and crossed the room to his twin brothers. Harry looked on curiously, and Hermione looked on in horror as Ron told them about the ceberus and about needing their help to find out what Hagrid knew. He came back a minute later and said, "They're on it. They'll find out."

"You weren't supposed to tell anyone!" Hermione said, clearly upset.

"Loosen up Hermione," Ron said. "Can't do everything yourself! They'll figure it out and then tell us. Just sit back and relax."

She stood up suddenly and said, "Just see if I ever tell you anything again," and disappeared into the girl's dormitory.

With a twisted grin, Ron said, "Want to go look at it?"

"Think we should?"

Ron nodded. "Just follow the twins out. They'll look out for us," he said.

And sure enough Harry followed Ron's gaze to the twins who were slipping out of the portrait hole unnoticed by any of the other students.

"C'mon," Ron said, pulling Harry along with him.

It wasn't quite an hour until curfew, and Harry knew that so long as they didn't get caught in the forbidden corridor or eaten by the three-headed dog, they'd be ok. They followed the twins at a distance until suddenly they lost sight of them.

"Where'd they go?" Ron asked.

And then a hand appeared from behind a yellow tapestry and pulled Ron inside a secret passageway. Harry pulled the tapestry back and found the twins and Ron inside another one of those small cramped tunnels, Ron being pinned down by his brothers.

"And what do you think you're doing following us around little brother?" George asked.

"Umgoo foomuju mooloo."

"What's that?" Fred asked with a grin.

"Maybe take your hand off his mouth," Harry suggested, and Fred pulled his hand away with an evil grin.

"Oh, that was it," he said. Ron glared at him.

"We wanted to look at the beast too."

"Well ask next time instead of trailing us."

"You would have said no!" Ron said indignantly.

"Maybe, but we all wouldn't have gotten caught because you don't know how to sneak around like we do!"

Ron looked chastised and angry at the same time.

"Well we're here now."

Fred and George gave each other an annoyed look and then to Harry. "Well, since it's Harry," Fred said with a smile.

"I guess we could make an exception just the once," finished George with a grin. He let Ron up and Ron gave his brothers a glare.

"Can't make an exception for your own blood?"

"Nope," they chorused together.

"Besides, mum has told Percy to keep an eye on you so that you stay safe and out of trouble. I bet he's out looking for you right now."

"Great," Ron said, blowing air out of his mouth and up towards his bangs.

"Well, come on then, haven't got all night," George said, and lead the way down the secret corridor. It twisted back on itself several times and at one point they took a small flight of stairs down a level, and then suddenly they popped out into a larger, better known corridor... the forbidden corridor.

"Oh," said Harry in realization. "I bet this is where those Slytherins ran off to when they heard Snape coming that night I got detention for being up here."

"Probably," Fred said. "Come on." Together they snuck to the end of the corridor and took turns peeking into the locked room through the keyhole.

"Wicked, she was right," Ron said with a grin. "Maybe we could set that thing on Snape." Of course Harry knew that Ron was only joking, but suddenly he was uncomfortable with the joke for some reason. Nobody noticed Harry fidgeting however because the next second a high mewling was sounding down the hall. The boys turned quickly to find Mrs. Norris standing there staring at them.

"Filch's cat!" Fred said in a hushed voice. "Scatter!"

Fred and George took off down yet another secret passageway, and Ron and Harry tried to do the same, but footsteps were coming their way now along with a dim light from around the corner, and Filch's voice. "What is it Mrs. Norris? Student's out of bed?"

Ron looked panicked and dove into the hidden corridor his brothers had escaped into, and Harry followed just in time to miss the caretaker coming around the corner looking eager. Unfortunately for Harry Ron was nowhere to be found, and neither were the twins. He followed the corridor down a flight of stairs, and then the corridor split into three even smaller ones. He was surprised the twins could fit at all because they were third years and were considerably bigger than he and Ron were. Thinking that the one to the right would probably lead back in the general direction of Gryffindor, he set off and decided that if he didn't see Ron on the way there, he'd find him in the common room.

Harry was right. This path dumped him out on the fourth floor near McGonagall's office, and he knew it was only a short jaunt to Gryffindor. Unfortunately for Harry, he had just stepped into the path of a cloaked maniac who was out for blood, and Harry soon went sprawling, glasses cracking as they hit the hard stone floor.

"Aah!" Harry couldn't help but scream as he was startled by the attack. He had grown complacent believing that he was in no danger because Snape was always lurking just around a corner. Suddenly there was something glinting in the pale light and Harry himself paled as he saw a sharp twisted dagger slicing through the air towards him. He rolled out of the way just in time, but only received a good kick for his trouble, and then the dagger was coming at him again, this time narrowly missing his chest, and slicing open the sleeve of his uniform shirt.

"Crap!" Harry yelled as he scrambled for the entrance of the secret passageway again but was stopped by an invisible hand pulling him backwards and throwing his light frame back down to the floor.

Remembering his wand Harry felt frantically for it as he dodged another attempt on his life with the knife, and found it in his jean pocket. He pulled it out and used a levitation charm on the knife, which promptly flew into the air just in time for Snape to come running down the hall. He saw Harry on the floor bleeding and the knife in the air, and pulled out his own wand, casting some kind of charm called, "Expelliarmus!"

They heard a thud, but other than that, nothing happened. Severus was panting, and he tried hard to calm his breath so that he could listen for any sound of movement.

"Revelio!" he shouted, but again nothing happened, and it was the same with, "Accio cloak!"

"Damn," he muttered. Deciding that the best course of action was to get Harry away from the situation, he stooped down and pulled Harry up to a standing position. Unable to help himself Harry wrapped his arms around his guardian angel's midsection and refused to let go.

"You have to get out of here Potter," Severus told him, both surprised and annoyed at the grip with which the boy held on.

"No," Harry said adamantly. "Not without you."

And there was that surprise again, Severus thought. Was the boy that afraid to travel alone? Obviously not, or he wouldn't be out here wandering the halls alone. Then what was it? Was he actually concerned for his guardian's life?

"Fine Potter, we will go together," he said, gripping Harry's shoulder tightly to try and pry him off of him.

Snape moved Harry down the hall to an empty room and then closed and locked the door behind them.

"Are you hurt?"

Harry looked at his body and then noticed his shoulder was bleeding a little. "It's just a cut, I don't think it's deep," he said.

Severus pulled the torn shirt back and observed the wound for himself, and then did a simple healing spell that mended the cut and left only the little bit of blood behind as a reminder that it had been there.

"There goes another shirt," Harry said. Severus rolled his eyes and did a mending spell on the shirt as well, which looked better than new when it was finished.

"Thanks!" Harry said brightly. His bright look disappeared when he saw his guardian's stern gaze directed his way however.

"What were you doing out alone?"

"Well-"

"And don't even consider lying to me Potter. I can tell."

Harry bit his lip. "I don't lie." Well, that wasn't exactly true, it really depended on how much pain and deprivation he was in for at the hands of his relatives, but he wasn't expecting that here just at the moment.

"Speak then," Snape said shortly.

"I got separated from Ron. We took a short cut and we were running from Filch and he got ahead of me. I don't know where he's at."

"And you were running from the caretaker why?"

"We were looking through the key hole at the Cerberus."

Obviously Snape had been expecting something, but judging by the look on his face, that wasn't it.

"The what?"

"The big three headed dog guarding the trap door."

"How do you know about Fluffy?"

"Fluffy? That thing has a name like Fluffy? Who would name it that?"

"Hagrid. Now answer my question."

Harry began to recount the tale of how he'd told Hermione what the Hufflepuff's were in trouble for, and how she had deduced the cat was afraid of a dog, and then how she went and looked up magical dogs and read about the Ceberus. Although Harry conveniently left out the part about her going and looking through the keyhole herself.

"So then me and Ron thought we'd have a look and-"

"And you just thought you'd put your lives at risk and break a school rule in the process? Do you really enjoy detentions or are you just doing this to get on my nerves?"

Harry looked down at his shoes. Neither one of those choices fit the bill. Truth be told he hadn't thought about the danger involved in things because of his invisible attacker, and he hadn't thought about breaking the rules either... or at the very least, he hadn't thought about punishment for breaking the rules.

"Look at me."

Harry looked up into the man's eyes but didn't say anything, waiting for his punishment. This was the time when he was expecting that he should have lied to get out of a beating. The truth always served to hurt him in the end.

Snape took a step forward and suddenly Harry was falling backwards over a chair trying to get away from him. He couldn't help it, it was just a habit of trying to escape from all kinds of pain and abuse. Snape stopped immediately and seemed to rethink his single step forward.

Harry was panting laying on the floor on the other side of the student chair looking panicked and ready to flee for his life again.

Calmly, Severus asked, "What did you think I was about to do?"

Harry shook his head but didn't say anything, not trusting himself to say the right thing.

"Speak."

Taking a deep breath, Harry said, "Hit me."

"What since I have been your guardian would make you think that aside from the swat you got for dueling Mr. Malfoy?"

Another shake of the head. "I... just... it's... you were ok?" He hung his head in shame now, realizing that this was not uncle Vernon he was dealing with.

Wondering if it was ok to move forward without alarming the boy too much, Snape took a few steps and moved the chair out of the way so that he could get to Harry. He kneeled down and said, "Look at me Harry." When Harry didn't look up he pulled his chin up so that their eyes met. "I will not hurt you. I am not those miserable Muggle's you lived with."

Harry looked away again. "I-," God but he wanted to believe it, to believe the torture was over, but he couldn't. His aunt and uncle had lied to him too many times... told him if he just stayed out of trouble then he wouldn't get hit... told him that if he finished his chores he could eat. But no, he reminded himself again, this isn't them. He wasn't there anymore and hopefully never would be again.

"Harry?"

Startled by the use of his first name, as it was so seldom used by this man, he looked up.

"I am not them," Snape reiterated. Harry nodded.

"Ok."

Severus pulled him to his feet and said, "You have been scared and punished enough for one night. I will take you back to your dormitory, where you are to stay unless escorted by at least one other friend, preferably an older one, am I understood?"

Harry nodded, but then a question popped into his head, and he said, "But what if I need you?"

"The spell alerts me to danger-"

"No, I mean... never mind."

In what other way could the boy mean that he ‘needed him?'

"We will discuss this in the morning. Come, I wish to make sure that Mr. Weasley is safely back in Gryffindor tower."

* * *

Harry woke up sweating in the darkness. Where was he? What was going on? He looked around and recognized his four-poster with the red hangings closed as he took in a deep breath of cool night air. Confused as to why, he suddenly wished he were down in the dungeons in the bed in Snape's guest room. He couldn't wait to get out of there when he had been forced to stay there for a week, and now all he wanted was to be back down there again? What was wrong with him? He didn't know, but he did know that he wanted to be hugged, or held, or something. The nightmares were the same each time... somebody attacking him from behind with a knife, and him moving too slow to do anything about it. This time the attacker had actually stabbed him straight through the heart, and he had writhed in agony on the floor of the Great Hall for what seemed like hours before he woke up.

Suddenly not wanting to be in his bed anymore Harry slipped on his slippers and went down to the common room. It was midnight and there was nobody around, which was surprising since this was Saturday night. But wait, everybody was pooped from the Quidditch game earlier in the day, and the Gryffindors were all depressed about losing to Hufflepuff. Harry's mind just hadn't been on the game, and his heart hadn't been in it either. They were only four minutes into the match when the fifth year Hufflepuff Seeker Daisy Abbot caught the Snitch and ended it. ‘Oh well,' Harry thought despondently, losing one game is nothing in the grand scheme of things. He was sure that it was easy to catch a flying Snitch when nobody was out for your life. Up in the air Harry kept looking at the crowd and wondering which one of them was planning his death. He kept expecting a dagger to fly through the air at him and take him off his broom. Of course it didn't happen, but that didn't keep Harry from dreaming about it that way either.

Harry watched the low flames in the fireplace for a short while before the entrance to the common room opened and Harry turned to see who was coming in so late, thinking that perhaps it was Fred and George. Instead of orange hair however, he found black, and the face of his guardian.

"Harry?" He spotted the tiny boy immediately sitting on the long red couch.

"Sir?"

"Did you have another nightmare?"

Harry nodded, feeling foolish for it now that his guardian had been woken and had come all the way up from the dungeons to check on him.

Snape rubbed an eye and walked over to Harry. "Do you want to talk about it?" This was the first time he'd asked since the last night Harry had stayed in his dungeon quarters near a month ago.

"No."

"Fine." Snape turned to leave, not wanting to push the issue, when Harry's hand shot out and grabbed the Professor's wrist. Severus stopped and turned, surprised by the firm grip Harry had on him.

"Can I come?" Harry wished he didn't always have to feel so foolish, but he did, and he could feel his cheeks turning red.

"You have no need to ask," Severus said, and Harry let go of his wrist as he stood up and came over to the man. They left Gryffindor together, and were quiet all the way down to the dungeons.

Severus deposited Harry into the guest room, and Harry gave him a quiet, "Thanks sir," before he shut the door.

Outside Severus marveled at how hard he had to work to not reply, "You're welcome son." He could barely manage to call him Harry... how had he managed to want to call him son? When had he begun to think of him like that?

Thinking that perhaps it was lack of sleep, extra stress, and perhaps a befuddling charm, Severus went back to his own bed and turned out the lights that he had waved up half an hour ago when he'd woken. ‘That boy will be the death of me,' he thought to himself as he drifted back to sleep.

Back in the guest room Harry drifted off peacefully, finally feeling safe enough to sleep. But feeling safe sleeping didn't stop his nightmares from waking him screaming again.

* * *

"Dad!"

Severus sat straight up in bed. What? Did somebody say something?

"Dad!" There it was again, and there was no mistaking that it was Harry's panicked voice from the next room, although it was strange to hear him say the ‘D' word, as he'd never said it before.

Severus found Harry crying in his bed and shivering violently. He swooped in and sat on the edge of the boy's bed and wrapped him up in a hug. It must have been a particularly awful dream for the boy to be shivering so bad, and Severus wished he would just talk about it and get it off his chest. But Severus had noticed when he'd actually stopped to look at the boy a while back, that Harry Potter was one of those children who held everything in until it tore them up so bad that they were bursting with agony, and there was no forcing those kinds of people to talk until they were good and ready. He knew this well because he himself was the very same kind of person. While it was frustrating dealing with somebody of this nature, he couldn't say he didn't understand.

"It's ok, it was just a dream," he said. He couldn't help but get a feeling of dejavu as he remembered saying this the last time Harry had stayed there.

"I hate sleeping," Harry said in a muffled voice.

"Understandable when one continually wakes up in the throws of terror."

"When will it stop?"

Severus sighed. Never, is what his mind told him. He himself still woke up from nasty nightmares of being beaten by his father or grandfather, and from being tortured by the dark lord. The dreams would never stop, but he couldn't bring himself to tell his unhappy charge that.

"Perhaps when the attacks stop," he told him. "We are a step closer to finding the attacker."

Harry sat up and pulled away from his guardian. "You are?"

"He, or she, left a knife at the scene of the last assault. The Headmaster and I have been running detection spells on it to figure out who it belongs to. We would not even have the knife if you had not levitated it from the attacker's grasp.

"That's not the only knife," Harry said, suddenly remembering his dreams.

Snape raised a brow, and Harry continued. "Every night I dream about him getting me with a different knife than the one he used last time. It's long and thin and straight, and has two blue jewels in the handle."

"Hm... you seem certain the attacker is male."

Harry bit his lip. "I don't know why, but I know it is."

Severus was unsure if Harry believed this because he had been given some indication that the attacker was male, or because it was always a man who tormented him, at home, or at school.

He cleared his throat, "I have a way to know for sure, and perhaps end the attacks."

"Then do it!"

"I will not do so until you know the ramifications of the magic involved."

"So... tell me." Harry wondered if it would involve another long, drawn out blood spell. Even if it did he had to admit that so far the ancient magiks the Headmaster had found had only done him good.

"It requires that I look through your mind so that I can ascertain that the assailant is indeed male, and perhaps glean more information about him."

"Look through my mind?"

"As the Headmaster mentioned before the adoption, I am a skilled occlumens. I can see into people's minds if I so choose."

Harry frowned. "That explains some things."

"Such as?"

"The feeling that you're reading my mind."

Severus rolled his eyes. "Had you asked, you would have known that I have never used occlumency on you against your will, at least never intentionally. It is considered rude to do so."

"Oh... does it hurt?"

"Only if you resist."

"But you'll see... everything in my mind, won't you?"

"Not necessarily. I can only view what you are thinking about and currently feeling. Therefore, I should only see what you allow me to see. If you think about each attack, or each nightmare involving attacks, then I will see only those memories. A skilled occlumens can search through other memories, but I will not do so in this case."

There were too many memories Harry didn't want anybody to see ever. He just couldn't handle somebody watching him get beaten or starved, or held under the water in the bathtub, or any of the other horrible things he'd been through. Telling somebody it had happened was one thing, but letting them watch a video of it was another.

"Promise?"

"Yes."

Harry nodded. "Ok. What do I have to do?"

"Think about the attacks one by one. Try to remember every detail, and look into my eyes. Do not fight when you feel me in your mind."

Taking a deep breath Harry nodded and began to think about what the knife looked like from his dreams before he looked into Snape's black eyes. He remembered clearly the way it glinted in the light as it came slicing down through the air and stabbed him in the heart repeatedly, and then he was suddenly gasping and laying on the floor holding his heart.

"Harry, open your eyes." Snape was there beside him.

"How'd I get down here?"

"You fell. Apparently the memory was too much for you."

"It, it wasn't," he tried to lie feebly. "Keep going."

"Fine." Snape helped him up and instructed him to sit in the center of the bed rather than on the edge where he might fall and crack his skull open on the floor.

"Think about a different dream or attack."

Harry did so and began thinking about the most recent nightmare, the one he had woken from a short while ago. He was flying around the pitch in the game against Hufflepuff and he saw the glint of something shiny in the staff stands. He flew closer to see what it was and suddenly Snape was throwing a dagger at him and hitting him square in the chest, and then he was falling from the sky like a sack of bricks and landing with a crunch on the cold ground. He opened his eyes, unaware that he had closed them again, but was thankfully still sitting on the bed.

He looked into Snape's eyes and noticed how sad they looked, although the rest of his face did not portray the feeling. "It is not me," he told Harry.

Nodding, Harry said, "I know it, but I still dreamed it. That was the same dagger I keep seeing over and over again."

"How many more dreams are like this, where I am the one killing you?"

Harry bit his lip. "I don't know, a few maybe."

"Tell me about them."

"I said I didn't want to talk about them."

Severus crossed his arms. "You would rather show them to me one by one?"

"No," Harry said in a low voice, realizing that it was better to just describe them.

"Then continue."

"In one I'm eating in the Great Hall and I look up at the staff table and there's this knife flying at me from your direction, and in another I'm with Hagrid and I'm getting something out of a secret vault, and then there's the same dagger coming out of the darkness at me, and the last one is from the forest. That thing is chasing me through the darkness and when I look back I can see the dagger glinting from underneath its cloak."

"Hm..."

"Hm what?"

"I believe your mind is revealing facts about your attacker to you through your dreams. So far you have told me that you saw him at the Quidditch match in the stands, that he sits in the Great Hall at meal times, apparently somewhere by me, that he has something to do with the Sorcerer's stone, and that it is the same being that attacked you in the Forbidden Forest."

"And he likes the color blue," Harry added.

"And you know this how?"

"The knife has two blue rubies in the handle, like blue snake eyes."

Severus sighed. "That is a good observation." He paused, and then said, "Perhaps that is enough for the night. It is late and you should try to get some sleep."

Harry nodded as Snape got up off the bed. "Ok." He was open to suggestions at this point, because his guardian had just let something important slip, and he wanted the man not to think he had noticed or was at all curious about it. As Snape flipped the light off and closed Harry's bedroom door, Harry wondered what the sorcerer's stone was, and why it was so important. He remembered Hagrid taking a small package from a top secret vault in Gringotts and knew it must be here now. Wouldn't Hermione just be thrilled that he had learned what Fluffy was guarding? Where else would they put something top secret in Hogwarts that they wanted to protect? Under an enormous three headed dog with lots of teeth and claws seemed reasonable.

He put his hands behind his head and thought about it some more, before drifting into another fitful doze.