Albus stares at Severus, then at Potter, then at Severus again. He then puts his head in his hands. For several seconds, there is nothing but silence but then Potter whispers to Severus, “Is the old man all right? Should we take him to a doctor?”
“I’m fine, Mr. Potter,” says Albus, pained. “Everything is fine.” Drawing himself up, the man offers Potter a Sherbet Lemon—which he accepts—and then says, “Perhaps you should wait outside…”
“Why?” asks Potter, looking between Albus and Severus shiftily. “Mr. Snape isn’t in trouble, is he? I mean—I agreed to come. He asked me and everything.”
“I just need to…discuss the situation with Mr. Snape.”
“I’ll stay here,” Potter says stubbornly. Then, as if stunned by his own audacity, he back-tracks and explains, “For clarification! If I think you need it!”
“…Right.” Apparently having given up on that front, Albus turns back to Severus. “Did you kidnap Mr. Potter?”
Severus says, “No. His aunt and uncle did not attempt to stop me.”
“They shouldn’t have to attempt to stop you,” Albus says. “That implies that someone in a different situation would have. Please tell me the truth, Severus.”
Severus shrugs before turning away from his boss. “They weren’t letting the boy read his Hogwarts letter and they weren’t letting me give him a copy of it. Surely you understand why I felt the need to bring Potter here—how else could he accept the letter?”
Potter nods rapidly. “Yeah!” he says—and isn’t this a shock to his system, a Potter willingly backing him up against Albus Dumbledore…not that boy seems to know who Albus is. Potter continues, “I mean, our house was being flooded with hundreds of letters and Uncle Vernon got really mad if I even looked at them so we kept moving around to find a place where the letters wouldn’t find us, you see? Anyway, we ended up on the Hut on the Rock…”
“Awful Hut!” Severus declares, unwilling to keep that to himself. “Awful Rock! Completely unfit for human habitation! And the boy’s cousin was there, too—I ought to have taken him with me.”
“No!” shrieks Potter, looking alarmed. “He—he’ll be fine!”
“I don’t know if anyone can be fine with Petunia Dursley,” Severus mutters petulantly.
Albus sighs again. “Severus,” he says slowly, “did you kidnap Harry Potter from his family because of your childhood grudge against his aunt?”
“He didn’t kidnap me!” Potter declares. “He asked me if I wanted to go with him and I said yes!”
“Generally speaking, children are not awarded the power to control their own custody,” Albus says.
“Well, that’s stupid! Why can’t I control where I go?”
“Because children such as yourself generally do not think things through. For example, you just agreed to leave to somewhere you do not know with a man you have never met. This kind of behavior is very reckless—which is not necessarily a bad thing, mind you, because you are a child and children are naturally reckless, but it’s because of things like this that people your age are usually taken care of by an adult.”
“I can take care of myself,” Potter sulks. “And nothing went wrong, anyway. Mr. Snape is really nice.”
At this, Albus gives Severus a raised eyebrow and Severus pointedly does not sink into his seat in embarrassment. Instead, he sits up tall and says, “See? I’m nice. Nicer than Petunia, even.”
Potter nods solemnly. “You’re way better than Aunt Petunia.” Severus is slowly starting to like the boy.
“Put the boy back,” Albus says.
Potter screams, “No! You can’t make me! I’m staying with Mr. Snape!”
“Mr. Potter, I’m sure your relatives are very worried about you—”
“Nuh-uh! Uncle Vernon said that if I came here then he’d never let me back in the house!” Potter crosses his arms.
Albus frowns. “Surely it was said in a moment of passion…”
“They told him that his parents died in a car crash,” Severus offers.
Albus goes slightly green. “Well,” he wheezes, “maybe they just wanted to spare him the trauma of the truth…”
Severus needs to think of something to convince the man. He couldn’t bear the shame of taking Potter back to Petunia and having her laugh in his face, talking about how he couldn’t even keep his word. He gripped Potter’s elbow and drew him close, gesturing to him. “They had the poor boy sleeping on the floor while his cousin was on the couch! On his birthday!”
“On my birthday,” Potter agrees.
“That’s—that’s reprehensible. Surely you cannot send a child back to such conditions. I insist that you allow him to never return.”
“And stay with Mr. Snape,” Potter hastily tacks on.
Severus throws the boy a quick glare but breaks away before Albus could notice. Severus refuses to be saddled with a toddler. Potter looks just as determined as ever, though. Albus observes them both, looking positively bewildered, then says, “Mr. Potter…why did your aunt and uncle not allow you to read your letter?”
“Because they didn’t want me to know about magic,” Potter promptly replies. “I don’t think they like it very much.”
Albus nods slowly. “You said the house was being flooded with hundreds of them. Did you not manage to grab even one?”
“Well, I did, but Uncle Vernon took it from me before I could read it and then he locked me in my cupboard.”
There is a moment of silence. Then Severus asks, “Your cupboard?”
“Yes? The one my bed is in? You had to know about it. That’s where my first few letters were addressed!”
“That’s not how the letters work.” Silence. Then: “A cupboard!” Severus says, voice hoarse.
Albus, meanwhile, asks, “Was it a nice cupboard?”
“A nice—Albus, what the actual fuck?”
“I slept in a cupboard for a while,” Albus says defensively.
“What?”
“It was quite fun! My own personal cupboard…I felt quite special. My brother was very jealous and would get mad when I wouldn’t let him in…” Albus shrugs. “Every child should have their own cupboard, or its equivalent. I’ve heard pillow forts are all the rage these days…”
“I had a room!” says Severus. “An actual, normal room!” Then again, his house was far from an ideal one, what with having no bathroom other than an outhouse and not having a shower or bathtub at all, but at least he’d still had a room! Perhaps this is a wizard thing? Severus had been raised a muggle, after all. But no, the Dursleys were strictly muggles, too…
“I like my cupboard,” Potter says. “It has my bed and all my toys. I wish it didn’t have so many spiders, though…”
“They are hard to manage,” Albus says commiseratingly. “If you would like, I’m sure Mr. Snape could cast a spell to keep them out?”
“But there’s one spider that I want to stay. He’s my friend. His name is Craig.”
“I’m sure we can figure out how to make an exception for Craig.”
“What is going on?” Severus asks. “I’ve lost the plot.”
Albus waves him away. “Mr. Potter,” he says very seriously, “Mr. Snape will take you shopping for your school supplies but then he will return you to your home—and your cupboard.”
“It’s a cupboard!” yells Severus. “You know what—fuck this! Come with us, Albus, let’s see this cupboard of his!”
“No!” yells Potter. “I’m not going back! They don’t want me back! Mr. Snape, you said I could stay with you!”
“No, I said I wouldn’t take you back!”
“You lied to me!” Potter accuses.
“I could ask Hagrid to look after him for a few hours,” Albus offers. “I’m sure he’d be thrilled.”
“Who’s Hagrid?” Potter asks warily.
Albus smiles.
Turns out, Potter and Hagrid get along splendidly, and Potter seems to all but forget about him by the time Severus and Albus leave. Severus takes the opportunity to whirl on Albus. “A cupboard!” he screeches.
“Maybe it’s a nice cupboard,” Albus repeats.
“Albus, I’m going to tell this to you once and once only—there is no such thing as a nice cupboard. Or, at least, not nice enough to sleep in. I am concerned about Mr. Potter and, quite frankly, I’m concerned about your childhood, as well. How long did you sleep in this cupboard of yours?”
“Um,” says Albus, “until I was eleven, I think? Right before I started Hogwarts.”
“Eleven years in a cupboard!”
“Our house was small,” Albus says defensively. “It was bigger once we got to Godric’s Hollow! And once my father was sentenced to life in Azkaban…”
“Your father was what?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Albus!”
It seems that the Dursleys haven’t managed to make it back to No. 4 Privet Drive by the time Severus and Albus arrive. Severus just throws an Alohomora at the door and storms inside. Albus follows suit. Finding the cupboard takes a while but eventually Albus stops next to the stairway and stares at the door with the latch on the outside and says, “This is about the right height.”
“Nothing about this is right,” Severus mutters. He unlatches the door and swings it open and—
Yes, that is certainly a child-sized bed, and there are certainly toys, and there are definitely spiders. The boy had not been lying. However, the boy hadn’t quite explained the sheer magnitude of awfulness that the situation deserves. The cupboard is entirely unfinished, leaving the bare wood of the house out in the open, which is surely a splinter hazard. Every toy and book and crayon is broken or damaged in some way. When he pulls the string to turn the single lightbulb on, it sputters on and off. There is a spiderweb right by the pillow of the bed with a giant, but seemingly non venomous, spider lounging on it.
“I think that’s Craig,” Severus says blankly.
Albus observes this all with pursed lips, then says, “Cupboards were much more fun back in my day…”
“Get the damn spider,” Severus mutters. “I’ll get his things.”
“What?” asks Albus, looking dazed.
“Well we’re not going to leave him here, are we?” Severus demands.
Albus comes a bit more to life at that. “No,” he says, “I don’t think we will. You gather his things, though—I must check on something…” He then wanders off, muttering under his breath about “blood” and “one month” and other such rot.
And so Severus is left to collect Potter’s things. And the spider.
Craig stares up at him with its (his?) beady eyes and Severus takes a deep breath. “The boy is fond of you,” says Severus, “so I will take you to him. Don’t try any funny business.”
Craig, being a spider, does not respond. Fair enough.
Ten minutes later, Severus is carrying a meager bag of Potter’s belongings in one hand and cradling Craig in another. He finds Albus in the backyard, sitting on the ground, sketching on a stone with a ballpoint pen.
“What are you doing?” Severus asks, confused.
“A thing,” says Albus, which explains exactly nothing.
“What thing?”
“Messing with the wards.”
“There are wards here?” Severus asks.
“Of course there are wards here. Did you think I would leave Harry Potter in muggle hands without ensuring he had magical protection?”
“They didn’t seem to do much protecting,” Severus mutters.
“Yes, well—I meant protection from Death Eaters, and he has remained thoroughly safe from Death Eaters, hasn’t he? No matter how many resurgences we’ve had, not a single one of them laid a finger on Mr. Potter.” Albus frowns down at the stone. “I admit that I’m…hesitant to sacrifice it.”
“What are you on about?”
“I mean that these wards are probably the safest thing possible for him. If there were a Death Eater resurgence, as long as he remained on the property of No. 4 Privet Drive, no Death Eater could touch him.”
Severus thinks about Potter sleeping in a cupboard. He then thinks of facing Petunia after allowing Potter back into this house, knowing that he’s been sleeping in a cupboard. She would think it was hilarious. (Also—a cupboard! The boy probably needs therapy. Severus needs therapy after seeing it. Maybe Albus needs therapy, too. This entire situation is insane.)
“Can’t you move the wards elsewhere?” Severus demands.
“No, these are powered by Mr. Potter’s maternal blood—that is, they were created by Lily Potter’s love for her son. He needs to cohabit with someone who has his mother’s blood—so that means his aunt or possibly his cousin. I couldn’t recreate these protections if I tried to.”
“You didn’t cast them?” asks Severus.
“Of course not. This is Sprucian Ward Theory—Mrs. Potter had always subscribed to his principles but I never quite studied them.”
“Why not?”
“Because Leonard Spruce is a bastard and he can kiss my arse.”
Severus stares, unused to the headmaster displaying such hatred. “Um.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Albus says with a sigh. He comes to a stand, tucking the stone into his pocket and clicking the ballpoint pen closed. “I’ll work on it more at Hogwarts—see what I can do with it. Worst comes to worst, Harry will be forced to return here for a week or two next summer. Well, no, actually—worst would be if Voldemort magically resurrected and began gathering his followers again. I would actually combust trying to figure out what to do…”
“That’s an issue for later,” Severus says firmly. “For now, we have the boy’s things. Let’s get back to Hogwarts. Craig is getting restless.”
And off they go.
Potter is chatting cheerfully with Hagrid when Albus and Severus go to pick him up. He smiles up at them when they inform him he won’t be going back to the Dursleys and his smile turns blinding when Severus presents Craig to him.
“What a cute little fella,” Hagrid coos.
“Right?” Potter says, looking hyper without consuming an ounce of sugar. “His name is Craig!”
“Lovely name,” Hagrid says. “Why, I know a spider, too. Aragog. Very friendly. Should I take you to meet him some time?”
Potter nods frantically. “Then Craig can have a friend!”
“Yep,” says Hagrid.
Severus decides to leave Potter and Hagrid to their bizarre little bonding ritual. Instead, he says to Albus, “Who will he stay with until the school year begins?”
Albus looks decidedly amused. “You’re not off the hook that easily, Severus.”
“What?”
“You’re the one who kidnapped the boy. He’s your responsibility now.”
“That’s not how that works—”
“Finders, keepers and all that.”
“You can’t just—”
“Good luck.”
“ALBUS!”
Author's Chapter Notes:
In which Severus Snape explains himself to Albus Dumbledore and realizes that he is in way over his head. Also Harry is adorable.
Chapter 2
Chapter End Notes:
I'm posting this while at the airport lol. Luckily I had access to a very good hotspot. Next chapter is going to feature the Dursleys in what will hopefully be an entertaining manner. Until then!