"Uncle Sev," little Harry said, tilting his head to the side as he looked up at the wizard.

Sighing heavily, Severus plastered a smile on his face, and turned his attention to the dark-haired little boy. Harry looked so much like James Potter, that it was like he was staring at a mini-version of the wizard who'd become a thorn in Severus' side ever since he'd been released from Azkaban and into the Potters' home.

He tried to make his smile as 'nice' as possible, because Severus knew, that, if he frightened the little boy, Lily would be unhappy, and, even though she wouldn't 'punish' him for it, Severus didn't like making Lily unhappy. He still harbored feelings for her.

"Yes, young master Potter?" Severus was nothing, if not polite and courteous.

The little boy sighed and tugged at a loose thread on his sweater. A look of stern consternation, which reminded Severus of the boy's mother, crossed his face as he worked at the thread. Severus drew in a sharp breath as he was reminded that, no matter how much Harry might resemble James in looks, the little child was very much like his mother in so many other ways.

"How come my daddy doesn't love me?" he asked the question so matter-of-factly that it took Severus by surprise. He blinked down at the little boy whose face betrayed no hint of sadness, but rather determination and curiosity.

"What…why…of course your father loves you," Severus blustered.

Harry frowned, and gave him a look that communicated supreme disappointment. At only four and a half years old, it was quite an accomplishment, and it made Severus' blood run cold.

"No, he doesn't," Harry said, shaking his head.

"What makes you think that?" Severus could see no other way out of this awkward conversation than to go forward with it. He sat down on an armchair in the living room, and Harry scrambled up onto his lap without a second's hesitation. It still startled Severus whenever Harry took his hand, or sat on his lap, or randomly gave him a hug, but he'd learned to relax a little, even if it still made him uncomfortable.

Harry rested his head against Severus' chest, and drew in a deep, shuddering breath. Severus hoped that the boy wouldn't start crying. He wasn't quite certain how best to deal with tears.

"I heard him say it," Harry whispered after a minute.

"You heard him say what, exactly?" Severus asked, positive that the boy had misunderstood something that he'd heard. He'd clarify what the boy had overheard, and then send him on his way so that he could finish tidying the living room as James, Master Potter, had ordered.

From life as a spy, to life as a maid, Severus thought unhappily.

His name hadn't been cleared by Dumbledore when he'd been arrested as a follower of the Dark Lord. The elderly wizard had disappeared, and left Severus high and dry. Severus had spent the better part of a year in Azkaban, reliving all of his worst memories day-after-day when the Dementors made their routine pass by the cell he'd shared with Rodolfus Lestrange.

The fact that he hadn't gone mad, as had his cellmate, had led to Severus' current predicament. Some days, Severus wasn't sure which fate he preferred – that of madness brought on by the Dementors and Rodolfus' unwanted attentions, or living as a slave in the home of James, Lily and Harry Potter.

When he'd fully served his time – another six years (he'd already served three with the Potters and one in Azkaban) – Harry would be headed off to Hogwarts, and Severus would finally be free to live his life as he saw fit. Free toward what end, he didn't yet know, but he hoped that it wouldn't involve cleaning, wiping snot from children's noses, or coddling them, or cooking.

Severus hated that he'd been 'bonded' to the Potters, even though it was a 'temporary' condition that would be reversed once his time had been duly served. It was a complicated and ancient spell which made it impossible for him to do harm to the Potters (or anyone else for that matter) while he served out his sentence in the hospitality of their home.

It also placed him in a subservient position, even to young Harry. He had a wand, and could perform household spells, but nothing more. He felt worthless and small. He was not his own wizard, and wouldn't be for quite a few years to come, unless, by some twist of fate, he was to be pardoned before his term was up. That wouldn't happen unless Dumbledore returned. Unwinged pigs would fly before that would happen.

Harry swallowed back a sob, and Severus inwardly cringed. He conjured a box of tissues, keeping them on the arm of the chair, just in case they were needed. The little boy rarely cried, and Severus had not had to perform the duties of a nursemaid very often. Even when the boy skinned a knee, or broke something performing some of his death-defying antics that made Severus' heart catch in his throat, he didn't cry.

The boy was extremely resilient, much as Severus had been at that age. Of course, when he was Harry's age, Severus had been dodging his drunken father's fists and doing his best to protect his mother from the acerbic muggle.

He still sometimes suffered from nightmares in which he wasn't able to keep his father from beating his mother unconscious, or in which his father had succeeded in catching him and beating him almost to the point of losing consciousness. Severus blamed the resurgence of those unpleasant memories on the influence of the Dementors during his short internment at Azkaban.

Harry grasped at the fabric of Severus' sweater and buried his face into it, muffling his words as he spoke, much to Severus' irritation. "He told mommy that…that…that he never wanted me, that…"

It was unusual for Harry to break down into tears. Severus had only witnessed it once, at the disappearance of a worn stuffed dog that the boy had loved like a best friend, and the boy's mother had been there to comfort him, while James had watched mother and son with an unreadable look on his face.

Harry's breath caught on a sob. "That…that they should…should get…get rid of me." The boy hiccoughed and cried as he spoke, making it difficult for Severus to make out what it was that he was saying, and determine what Harry had really overheard.

"Hush, child," Severus said, and, he patted Harry's back, much as his own mother had done for him when he was a child. It was one of the more pleasant memories that Severus owned of his childhood, even if what had often led to the need for his mother to comfort him had been far from pleasant.

Severus rubbed the child's back. "Shh."

Transfiguring the armchair into a rocking chair, Severus quietly rocked the boy. He placed his unoccupied hand atop the boy's head, running his fingers through the boy's hair in a manner he recalled to have been soothing when his own mother had done it for him. Harry relaxed in his arms and loosened his grip on Severus' sweater, turning his face to the side, and breathing a little easier. His hiccoughs soon died down as well.

"What makes you so certain that they were speaking of you, and not of me?" Severus asked, suspecting that Harry had heard his parents arguing, yet again, about having an ex Death-Eater in their home.

To this day, Severus still didn't understand why Lily had petitioned to have him released into her and James' care, nor, even more to the point, why James had consented to it. The wizard did not like him, and the feeling was more than mutual. James might have 'saved' his life when Sirius Black had played a nasty trick on him those many years ago when they were students at Hogwarts, but he'd treated Severus like scum, and had stolen Lily from him.

Of course Severus knew it had been more complicated than that. Severus understood, much as it hurt him to admit it, that, while he'd loved Lily, she had not loved him in the same manner.

To her, he had been conscripted in the role of steadfast friend, when he'd aspired to be so much more. That she'd turned to James after their falling out had been like a hot brand to his heart, and Severus had never really gotten over it.

Neither forgiving Lily, nor the wizard who'd stolen her from him, Severus had turned wholly toward a dark path which had led him to where he was now – a slave to the very wizard who'd made his life a living hell when he was a teenager, and to the witch whom he still loved as much as he had when they were kids. He'd done many awful and terrible things. He'd hurt Muggles, witches and wizards in the name of a megalomaniac, and all because he'd allowed bitterness and anger to take root in his heart.

Harry wiped the lingering tears from his cheeks with the back of a fisted hand and gave Severus a puzzled look. He bit his bottom lip, and looked up at Severus with eyes the size of small saucers. They were uncompromised by glasses, which Harry sometimes wore (when his parents, or Severus, could convince him to do so), giving Severus a clear, unimpeded look at the boy's eyes.

They were almost the exact shade of green as his mother's – a murky jade. The only difference being that they held flecks of gold which, when hit by the light at just the right angle, made Harry's eyes shine with an almost ethereal vibrancy. Whereas Lily's eyes were speckled with tiny slivers of silver which seemed to give them even more depth of feeling when the light played over them in a certain way.

Severus smiled at the little boy, and let Harry snuggle even further against him. When the boy wrapped his arms around him, Severus didn't protest. He held his breath, willing his stiff muscles to relax.

There was an odd sensation in the pit of his stomach, and Severus felt something shift in the region of his chest where he knew his heart (ill-used as it was) resided. He knew that the concept of heart and the medical, scientific explanations were vastly different.

He understood that a heart couldn't ache the way it did in silly romance novels. He understood, and yet it did not stop his heart from being moved by the tears, and the trust that the littlest Potter had placed in him by sharing with him a secret hurt of such magnitude and laying it before Severus to make things right.

"But, why wouldn't they want you?" Harry asked as though it was the most baffling thing in the wizarding world – even more baffling than how the Potters could have survived the Dark Lord's attempt to kill little Harry when he'd been just a baby. He pierced Severus with a look very reminiscent of his mother's when she was trying to puzzle out a hard truth.

Severus took a deep breath and pondered what he could possibly say to convince the boy that both his mother, and his father, loved him, and explain why he himself might not be as equally wanted by Lily and James, without going into any details which might frighten Harry. He was unaware that he and Harry were under observation at the time. Though, in retrospect – long after Harry had been put to bed for the night, and confessions had been made – he shouldn't have been surprised that he was being watched. James' trust wasn't as easy to gain as Harry's and Lily's was.

"Well," Severus said, after several minutes had ticked by, and Harry's eyes had grown heavy with the sleep that often comes after a release of so many turbulent emotions. "You see, I wasn't always…"

"Good?" Harry supplied the word around a yawn.

Severus nodded, and gave him a wan smile. "No, I wasn't always good, and your father and I didn't always…"

"Like each other?" Harry asked. He rubbed his nose with his index finger, a sure sign to Severus that the boy would soon nod off. "Like Ron and I don't always like each other?"

Severus nodded, thinking of how the two, soon to be five year olds, sometimes fought like cats and dogs one minute and were thick as thieves the next. He wondered how easily Mrs. Weasley and Lily could weather the hot-and-cold nature of the boys' mercurial friendship without seeming to bat an eyelash, when it made him tense just thinking about it.

"And, you were bad, like I'm sometimes bad?" Harry asked, and Severus could feel the little boy's heartbeat increase, pressed as closely to his own chest as the little boy was.

Uh-oh, Severus thought, knowing that their conversation was about to head into rocky territory. He should have seen it coming, and he chastised himself for not heading it off at the pass, or better yet, sending the boy off to his parents to get the whole misunderstanding cleared up by the source itself, rather than engaging the boy in conversation. He really had no business meddling in the Potters' affairs.

The magic bonds which tethered Severus to the Potters as a slave, made it impossible for him to harm them in any physical or magical way. Yet, Severus knew that there were other ways which, were he to apply himself in the very way that James feared he would, he could carve out a place for himself in both Lily's and Harry's hearts and slowly edge James out of the picture.

Oh, Severus could poison little Harry Potter's mind against his father, paint the wizard as an unloving, uncaring bastard – not at all unlike the prejudiced bully that he'd been toward Severus when they'd been teens – but, looking into Harry's eyes, Severus realized that he wouldn't. Harry was an open, honest, loving, and curious little boy, who, by Severus' standards, trusted far too easily.

The fact that Harry was, even now, looking up at Severus with such open trust in his gold-flecked eyes, his heart pounding in his chest with the fear that, just as his father didn't want Severus in their home because of something that he'd done wrong in the past, his father wouldn't want him either if he did something wrong, was enough to give Severus pause.

He didn't love his position in the Potter's house, or the wizarding world, any better than he had a moment ago – before that monumental shift in his chest – and he didn't suddenly like James Potter, but, Severus found that he couldn't let Harry believe that, if his father got mad at him for some future offense, his father would stop loving him or want him put out of the house.

"Harry," Severus said, using the little boy's first name as a sure bid for his attention, and swallowing past a sudden lump in his throat.

Severus' gut churned with the bile of bitterness. Harry tightened the grip he had around Severus' middle, as though anxious as to what his, 'Uncle Sev,' (a nickname Lily had dubbed him with shortly after his arrival in the Potter home – much to his and James' mutual annoyance) had to say.

"Your father loves you, and would never, ever ask you to leave," Severus said, and there was another shift in his chest when he smiled down at the little boy whose eyes were searching his as though he could discern truth from lies.

Severus hugged the little boy, speaking his next words against the top of his head. "Harry, no matter what you do, your father will never stop loving you."

"Promise?" Harry asked in a tired whisper.

Severus nodded as he rocked Harry.

"Promise," Severus assured the little boy, knowing that it was true – for all his faults, James loved his son and his wife, there was no doubt in Severus' mind about that. He added, "And, your mother loves you."

"I know," Harry said, and he yawned, sagging in Severus' arms as fatigue overtook him. "She loves you too."

Severus held his breath, and then chuckled softly when Harry sleepily added, in a fair imitation of his mother's voice when she was angry, "She said, 'James Potter, you will put him out of this home over my dead body.'"

Severus continued rocking Harry long after the boy fell asleep, only ceasing the soothing, rhythmic movement when he started to nod off himself, and Lily took the little boy from his arms.

Lily graced him with a smile that Severus was certain could move mountains, or set off a war. "Why don't you rest a little while longer, Severus?"

He nodded, and closed his eyes, letting sleep claim him. For once, his sleep wasn't plagued by nightmares of what he'd done under the Dark Lord's command, or haunted by visions of what he'd do to James Potter when he was finally free to act as the full-grown wizard that he was. Instead, he slept peacefully; waking to Harry's gentle prodding when dinner was ready.

For the first time in the three years that Severus had been under the Potters' roof, he felt like he belonged. It was a strange, unwanted feeling; one that Severus was certain he'd get used to, over time, much as he had gotten used to Harry looking up to him as the uncle Lily had christened him three, short-long, years ago.

Later that night, as he was retiring for the evening, James stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. Severus fought against his desire to throw the wizard's hand off; after all, such an action could be taken as an attempt to physically harm his, Master. The ancient magic which bound him to the Potters would punish him with rather excruciating pain, not at all unlike the Cruciatus Curse with which Severus was intimately familiar.

"Yes, Master," Severus said in a biting, yet resigned tone.

"I wanted to thank you," James said, and Severus turned slightly so that he could see the other wizard out of the corner of his eye. James was looking at the floor; his lips were downturned into a thoughtful, rather than an angry, frown.

"It is my understanding," Severus said in as bitter a tone as he could muster, "that, as a slave under house arrest, my duties are neither to be thanked, nor are they wholly unanticipated. They are simply tasks which I must perform during my tenure here."

James shook his head and lifted it. His mouth was twisted in a sour grin.

"I'm not thanking you for cleaning the house, you insufferable git, I…" he took a deep breath, let it out, and ran a hand through his unkempt hair.

"I wanted to thank you for what you said to Harry. And," he paused, taking another deep breath.

He wouldn't meet Severus' eyes as he geared up to say the next part, and Severus knew that the words that James spoke next were guided by Lily, as though James were a puppet on a string.

"I wanted to apologize for my behavior over the past three years." James held out his hand to Severus, who eyed it dubiously.

"I'm not going to bite," he huffed, and Severus raised an eyebrow as he gripped his nemesis' hand, and shook it firmly.

"I'd like it if we could be friends." The words were spoken through gritted teeth, and James' smile was forced, yet Severus found himself nodding nonetheless, for Harry's, as much as for Lily's, sake.

EPILOGUE

Years later, when Severus stood in front of his first classroom filled with students – some who were eager to learn, others who were bored before they'd even set foot in his class– he thought back on that forced truce, on the day when James and he had ceased to be enemies, and had started down the rocky road toward friendship, and he thanked Merlin that Dumbledore hadn't happened along to clear his name for a very long while after that.

Severus had served the remaining years of his sentence under the Potters' roof. He'd witnessed the birth of Abigail Rose Potter two years after his and James' tentative truce, and the birth of Ignatius Sirius Potter, his godson, just a year prior to the end of his servitude. He and James had somehow skipped completely over friendship, and straight to becoming almost closer than brothers. And, now that Severus was no longer bound to the Potters as a slave, he was now welcome as part of the family.

Dumbledore had returned and cleared his name just in time for Severus to go into the workforce, enabling him to garner a teaching position at Hogwarts, where he'd promised Lily, and James, to keep an eye on their eldest son.

Harry loved him like an uncle, and sought out his counsel, often more so than he did his parents'. Severus knew that it was Harry's childlike faith and trust in him that had helped him to become a better wizard, and he loved the boy for that. He didn't know what the future had in store for him, or his new family, now that he was a free wizard, but it no longer looked as bleak as it had when he'd been sitting in a cell at Azkaban. His future held the promise of hope and love.