The cellar hardly rated as Five Star accommodation. Clarkson had steered Harry through the front door of the stone building that abutted the barn and into a poky, low-ceilinged hallway. It was echoing, empty, uninhabited. At the end of the hall there was a narrow door which Harry supposed might lead to the kitchen or out-houses. Instead, it opened onto a flight of stone steps, leading steeply downwards. They were worn lethally smooth, their front edges rounded or crumbling. There was no handrail.

“Make yerself at ‘ome!” Clarkson shoved Harry through another door and slammed it shut. His retreating footsteps could be heard mounting the steps.

“Lumos!” he shouted back as an afterthought.

Three rusting wall-sconces lit themselves, green and gold flames slicing the black space into flickering facets of light and dark.

The cellar was below ground level, an area about twelve feet square. The earthen floor sloped noticeably away from the door, dry and sandy at its highest level, becoming increasingly damp as the ground fell away, and ending in a brackish puddle on the far side of the room. Water dripped now and again into this puddle from a cracked glazed grating in the roof which must have been at ground level outside.

The mustiness of age, damp and mildew curdled with more acid smells: urine, blood and fear.

Harry claimed the moral high ground and settled himself down on the sand to wait.

An hour, at least, passed before they brought Snape. The thick, oak door was kicked open. The same two Death Eater thugs manhandled him into the cellar. As they released their grip on his arms he stumbled and slumped to the floor. The door closed with a solid ‘clunk’ as the heavies departed.

Snape lay face down, not moving except for the intermittent spasms - the aftershocks of the Cruciatus - that jolted through his body. The air sickened with the throat-catching, clagging smell of burning fabric and flesh.

Harry made no attempt to help. He observed the twitching form coldly for a moment, then feigned to ignore it.

Why had Voldemort thrown them into this prison together? Why had he not killed Snape when he had the chance? Did he intend to torture them both? Voldemort’s sadism was notorious. Yet Harry was unhurt. Was that a mark of gratitude or merely a delaying tactic? How did it fit in with Voldemort’s twisted schemes?

Harry decided he didn’t want to stay and find out. As far as he was concerned, it was ‘Mission Accomplished’. Voldemort would deal with Snape. Focussing his thoughts on Hogwarts, Harry went through his pre-Apparation checklist, centring his energy, counting down to go: three, two, one … …but there was no ‘pop’, no weightless, free-floating sensation, no sudden dimensional shift. Nothing. He was stuck in the cellar.

Snape groaned and pushed himself into a sitting position, panting with the effort. A gash across his right cheek was oozing thick, slowly coagulating gobs which trailed like fat, red slugs down his face and onto his shirt. He was no longer wearing his cloak or jacket. Deep scorch-marks had reduced his shirt-sleeve to a series of burnt holes and tatters. His left forearm was visible through the shreds, a blackened, blistered mess. The singed wet cotton clung to his raw skin.

Snape glowered at Harry.

“I hope you’re satisfied,” he said, finally.

Harry returned the scowl.

“I won’t be satisfied ‘til you’re dead,” he retorted.

Shutting his eyes, Snape leaned back against the wall, cradling his arm. Harry hoped it was really painful. He wasn’t sure what he had expected from Snape - anger, vituperation, viciousness, aggression even, (he’d been relieved that the man was in no physical condition to exact reprisals), but certainly not this silence. It irritated him. He had psyched himself up for a confrontation. He felt baulked, frustrated, and the irritation simmering within him began to bubble. This wasn’t how Harry had envisaged his revenge scenario: Snape should be cringing, abject with remorse, while Harry had the power to dispense an awful justice. But it wasn’t working out that way. Snape’s silence was infuriating. Didn’t the man want to argue, defend himself, retaliate?

Harry had thought that he had vented his hatred when he uttered that immensely satisfying ‘Crucio’. But he knew now that he couldn’t leave it at that. He had to have it out with the bastard. An all-encompassing rage possessed him.

“Don’t you even want to know WHY?” he shouted.

Snape opened his eyes.

“I know why,” he said quietly.

This floored Harry. How did he know? What did he know? And for how long had he known?

“You have repeatedly made the mistake of underestimating me, Potter,” continued Snape, in something approaching his normal acid tone. “Your inconsistent, provocative behaviour over the past weeks has been suspicious, to say the least. One did not have to be a genius to conclude - especially in the light of your recent birthday - that you had received information you deemed unacceptable…”

“Unacceptable!” Harry shrieked, “You killed my mother!”

“NO!” The denial shot from Snape like an Unforgivable Curse. Then, in a more measured voice, “I did not. I was not present.”

“You as good as killed her. You betrayed her. You ruined her life.”

Even at this pitch of emotion, in this bizarre reversal of roles - tormentor and accused - Harry found he could not quite bring himself to say the word ‘rape’ in front of the Potion master. The image it conjured was too vile, too intimate.

“Attention to detail has never been your strong point, Potter. I neither betrayed nor killed your mother.”

Somehow Snape seemed to be taking control of the conversation. Harry’s demons howled within him. What did it matter? The man was as good as dead anyway.

“But you raped her! Do you deny that?” This was, after all, no time to be coy.

Snape looked down at the damp floor.

“The facts speak for themselves,” he said in a low voice.

The facts…? What the hell was that supposed to mean? Harry was incensed by the man’s clinical attitude. He couldn’t stop himself…

“DO YOU DENY THAT YOU ARE MY FATHER?” he screamed.

“I concede the possibility.” Snape sounded exhausted. “I take it you have proof?”

Harry stared at him in disgust. He wanted to hit him, smash him, annihilate that inhuman self-control; he wanted to see him beg for mercy.

“You make me sick!” he spat.

They lapsed into a hostile silence. After a while Snape fell into a restless sleep. Harry brooded for a long time, before he too slept.

The temperature had dropped sharply during the night. Harry awoke damp, numb and shivering, and hugged himself inside his cloak. It was some consolation that Snape, without cloak or jacket, would be feeling even colder. The rain that had been forecast for days was now drumming steadily on the roof-light, and a stream of drips trickled through the cracked glass. Harry got up stiffly and went and stuck his head under to catch the drips. He hadn’t realised how thirsty he was. The water had an earthy, dead taste. Harry didn’t want to know.

The conversation with Snape was by no means over. Harry understood that. There were questions he would have to ask if he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life haunted by uncertainty. Snape had obviously always known that he might have had a closer relationship with Harry than that of teacher and pupil, even if he had not been certain. But he had not bothered to find out. What sort of a person could be so detached? So uncaring? So lacking in curiosity? Had he known about the Rite of Revenge, or had that come as a surprise? James had said it was old magic, an esoteric ritual, which was rarely invoked these days. Snape couldn’t have been expecting it. But he must have realised that Harry’s sixteenth birthday would resolve the question one way or the other, and he had been watching for signs… Harry remembered how he had noticed the Potions master contemplating him in class, more than once…

Harry kicked Snape hard on the shin.

“Wake up! I want to talk to you.”

The dark eyes snapped open. Snape moved as though to get up, but then sat back, wincing. Harry smiled to himself, savouring his pain. When Voldemort had hit him with the Cruciatus, he’d felt as if he’d been trampled by an Erumpent.

“Did you enjoy it?” Harry hated himself for asking, but he couldn’t help it. The idea was torturing him. It was his life - the beginning of his life, anyway. He had to know.

“Did you enjoy it?” he repeated fiercely, “Assaulting my mother? Did it make you feel big?”

“What?”

It was unlikely that anyone had ever spoken like this to Snape before. Harry was perversely encouraged by the look of shock on his face.

“Or was it just a job to you? All in a day’s work. Just one more Mudblood witch?”

“Would you rather I had killed her?” Cold, disdainful.

“How can you live with yourself?” Harry demanded angrily.

“I had done worse. I had killed others. But I did not hurt her, Potter. I was careful.”

“Yeah, but not careful enough!” Harry exclaimed, crudely. A nauseating thought struck him,

“You weren’t having an affair with her?”

An unfathomable expression passed across Snape’s face. When he answered, though, it was a plain statement.

“I was not.”

“And she didn’t love you?” Merlin forbid!

“I had no reason to suppose so.” His voice was dry and cracked. He must have been desperate for a drink. Let him get it himself, Harry thought unkindly.

“But she did recognise you?” How could she have known?

“So it would seem.” Snape was giving nothing away.

“But if you knew - or even suspected - that there was a chance that I might have been… …been yours, how is it that you couldn’t be bothered to find out? When they were killed, I mean. When I was sent to live with the Dursleys?”

“What difference would it have made? It was safer not to know. It was politic to leave you with the Muggles; you would have been a liability to me. I chose pragmatism over sentiment.”

Sentiment? Did he know the meaning of the word?

“Why didn’t my father kill you himself - if he hated you so much?”

At the mention of James, Snape’s face hardened and he spoke bitterly.

“Potter? Oh, he tried; believe me, he tried. But he was incompetent - all that bluster and bravado, but fundamentally weak.” The hint of a wry smile stole across Snape’s face. “The Dark Lord was at the height of his power, Potter was in hiding, I was inaccessible - he had little chance. And with my knowledge of the Dark Arts, I was no easy target for anyone, let alone that…”

“But what about all the wizard family lineage stuff?” Harry interrupted before Snape could launch a further attack on James. They were getting off the subject. “Didn’t you care about that? I thought it was supposed to be sacrosanct. It was to my father.” Harry emphasised the last word.

“Potter!” Snape made the name sound like a curse. “Always obsessed with his image. Ever the materialist. It was so important to him to have an heir to continue the Potter line. Too proud to accept that his marriage was a failure. Never occurred to him that I would have considered all paternal rights forfeit. No son of mine… I would have renounced any claim anyway, had I been aware of the situation.”

“Couldn’t you do the maths?” Harry sniped, sarcastically.

Snape didn’t demean himself to answer that one. He got unsteadily to his feet and collected a mouthful of water in his cupped hands. He looked rough - pale, bloodstained, unkempt, unshaven. A livid bruise discoloured the skin around the open wound on his cheek. He cast a shrewd glance at Harry.

“Would you have wanted to live with me?” he asked.

“I’d rather eat Dragon dung!”

“I think that proves my point,” Snape concluded.

Harry pondered. Snape was being unexpectedly civil, unnaturally so. He had answered most of Harry’s questions. Did he feel he owed him that? Would life have been better with Snape than with the Dursleys? It was unthinkable. Perhaps if he’d never known anything else… Logic dictated that that would have been tolerable - he would have had no basis for comparison. Yet as he stared at the man a wave of revulsion and hatred engulfed him. He was here to kill him, not discuss living arrangements.

“Why has Voldemort put me in here with you?” It was another question that had been bothering him.

“Isn’t it obvious? Think about it. He’s testing you, Potter.”

“Testing?”

“Testing your loyalty, your conviction, your determination. Checking that you and I are not conspiring in some plot.”

“But I’ve already proved my loyalty!” Harry was indignant.

“You have proved to the Dark Lord that you are hot-headed, angry, defiant and - yes - courageous. You have confirmed my suspicions that you are also confused, scheming, manipulative, wilful and reckless. All admirable attributes in the Dark Lord’s estimation. But he expects more from his associates. Be vigilant, Potter, he will be watching. You will have to prove that you have the capacity for cruelty, for inflicting pain…”

“I’ve already done that!” Harry interrupted.

“Indeed.” Snape muttered with feeling, then added, “That was just the beginning.”

As if on cue, footsteps sounded on the stairs.