True to Snape's word, Harry soon found himself standing in the doorway to Dumbledore's office, his professor directly behind him.

Blocking the exit, Harry thought nervously.

"Harry," Dumbledore greeted with none of his usual flamboyancy. His eyes were red-rimmed and he looked positively old. "Please come in, my boys."

Harry swallowed and took a step forwards, keeping his head bowed.

He cares for you very deeply. Snape's comment about Dumbledore kept bouncing around in his mind. His professor hadn't said the word, "love," but Harry had a feeling that he had meant the same.

Time seemed to be slowing down around him; his thoughts warring with his ability to keep moving. Dumbledore loved him, but Lupin had loved him too, hadn't he? He was one of his father's best mates. He thought of him as his "cub."

Harry came to a complete stop in the middle of the office, unaware of the worried glances he was now receiving from both Dumbledore and Snape.

He could see the images of Lupin bending over his prone form as clear as day in his mind's eye. Dumbledore cares deeply for you, but so did Lupin, and look what he did! Harry felt sick and he wrapped his arms around his midsection, hunching over as he tried to keep from vomiting.

Dumbledore's the reason that I had to grow up hated and ignored. He's the reason that no one ever hugged me or said that they loved me.

It was too much to reconcile. Lupin had loved him, but he had violated him. Harry gulped at the thought, his body breaking out into a cold sweat. Dumbledore loved him, but he had also left Harry with the bloody Dursleys!

His vision came back into focus and he looked up into Dumbledore's worried face fearfully. What else had the man done to him in the name of love?

Lupin had touched him. Lupin had touched him against his will or knowledge, and had been doing it for weeks. Dumbledore could do the same thing, couldn't he? After all, he was a stronger wizard than Lupin. Would anyone even stop him if tried something?

His breath quickening in his ears, Harry shook his head in the negative and took a step backwards, his back colliding with Snape.

He knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Snape hated him. Hated him, but had never touched him. The Dursleys might have starved him and sometimes smacked him around, but they had never touched him like Lupin.

He cares for you very deeply.

Suddenly Harry realized that he didn't want to be there anymore. He didn't want to be around someone who had hired the man who had done such things to him. He didn't want to be around someone who seemed to love him, but whose actions said otherwise. Snape at least had always been honest about his feelings.

Snape wouldn't hurt him.

Barely thinking, Harry resolutely turned around and pushed his face into the front of Snape's robes, hiding his eyes from the old man who was still staring sadly at him from across his desk. He didn't want to do this, didn't want to be here. He couldn't do this.

. . .

Severus looked down in shock at the boy who was now hiding his face against his chest. Tentatively, he reached out a hand and laid it on the child's thin shoulder. His eyes narrowed as he felt him trembling, and he glanced back up at Albus with a pointed look.

"Harry?" Albus asked gently, finally standing up and walking closer to them.

The boy immediately tensed further and pushed himself harder into Snape's front.

Severus raised a hand to halt his employer's progress across the room, and then touched the child's head gently, turning his face up towards his own.

Vibrant green eyes shone out at him, made brighter by the presence of tears and he swallowed hard as a wave of nostalgia washed through him. For a split second, he had seen Lily's face staring back at him, her face tight with misery, and the image made his chest hurt.

"Harry?" He asked softly, keeping a gentle hand on the lad's cheek.

"Wanna go," the boy whispered out in a hitching voice, his green eyes pleading desperately at him.

"Albus still needs to speak with you," he answered, trying to remain calm for those present.

The child shook his head back and forth violently, his tremors becoming more noticeable by the minute. Furthermore, Severus now noticed a definite greenish tint to the lad's face, and he realized that the child was only moments away from being sick.

It was time to go.

As though Albus had read his mind, the old man suddenly spoke, "Perhaps it would be better to postpone this meeting, Severus."

"I think that would be best, Albus," Severus said, not taking his eyes off the child in front of him.

He turned to leave, his hand on the boy's back in an attempt to guide him back to the stairwell. Harry took one unsteady step and then his knees buckled. He would have fallen to the floor if not for Severus's quick reflexes.

It was easy enough so swing the child up into his arms and lay him against his shoulder the way a parent might do with a younger child. The boy was clearly underweight, and Severus made a mental note to look further into the reasons behind that.

"Will he be all right, Severus?"

Severus glanced back up at Albus with a grimace. "Would you be?"

"Where will you take him?"

Harry's eyes were open, but it was clear that he was no longer aware of his surroundings.

"The boy is in shock, Albus. He needs to be watched after."

"Then perhaps you should take him to Poppy—," Albus began, only to be cut off by an increasingly irate Severus.

"This isn't some passing Quidditch injury, Albus. A trusted adult abused and raped him," Severus said with a snarl, thinking of Lily as he spoke. "Not only is Poppy responsible for a plethora of other snotty nosed ingrates, but her talent lies in healing the physical, not the mental!"

"Are you volunteering to help Harry Potter, my boy?" Albus asked with a momentary flash in his eyes.

"Since his other trusted adults have so grievously failed him, it seems that I must."

With that angrily spoken answer, Severus turned on his heel and stealthily made his way back to his quarters, a small underweight Gryffindor third year in his arms as he went.