Harry returned to his dorm, deciding to completely shrug off the fact that his Blank Out had yet again ended around Snape, and that he’d been wandering out after curfew, carrying his invisibility cloak, but not wearing it, and that he felt a hundred times better – aches he hadn’t even realized he’d had were gone. However, the fact that Snape had once again missed an opportunity to take points from Gryffindor was mind boggling.

And why did he suddenly have a fierce craving for pudding?

“Hey mate,” Ron whispered as he sat on his bed. “I’m really sorry for what I said earlier.”

He had said something earlier? Was it bad? Well, Ron was almost always saying things he shouldn’t, so perhaps it wasn’t so surprising that he’d overlooked something or other.

“Don’t mention it,” he answered, smiling for Ron’s benefit.

Today had been the oddest day.

-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-

Severus shuddered as he left the kitchens on Monday. House elves were horrid creatures and their high pitched fawning and eagerness gave him a headache. But how else was he supposed to get the idiot boy’s pudding?

He placed the chocolate dish on his desk and sat just as the door opened and Potter entered. Severus looked him over carefully, trying to see if he could determine what ‘persona’ was out now.

“Evening, Professor,” Potter greeted nervously. “Er…so what’s my detention today?”

Severus stared. This was Potter. How in the name of the Founders was he supposed to give him the pudding now? He could just see Potter’s expression if he told him that for detention he was to eat a bowl of chocolate. The boy would probably think he was poisoning him.

Well, he’d just have to draw Foster out. So what function did the child perform? How could he provoke Potter to get Foster to come save him?

“Sit down, Potter,” he ordered, while he thought. It was distracting to have him standing there. “You are here to talk, as you have been every other Monday.”

“S-sorry sir,” the Gryffindor stammered, “I don’t remember what I did during those times.”

Severus threw out his hardest glare, hoping to provoke something. “You don’t remember?” he growled, knowing full well the answer. “What have you been thinking about during those times, hmm? Thinking about your pathetic friends? Missing your fawning muggle family, perhaps? I don’t know how you stand such worship, really, but knowing you it probably just inflates your overly-large ego. You Potters are all the same, your father was an arrogant prat and you, though I fain thought it possible, are even worse.”

“Shut UP!” Potter shouted. “Just SHUT UP! You don’t know anything! Tom keeps saying we should trust you, but you’re no better than him! You keep treating Harry like some spoiled brat in desperate need of discipline, when all you really think is that we’re a carbon copy of James Potter and that you can take all your frustration at him out on us. Well let me tell you something, Snape, you know nothing about us or how we’ve spent the last fifteen years, so don’t you dare judge us!”

“You are correct there,” Severus sneered, “I certainly have no idea what it is like to spend fifteen years doted on as a savior.”

The boy glared furiously at him, breathing harshly through his nose, lips pursed so tight they had gone white with the pressure. Suddenly, he burst into motion, rushing forward and grabbing Severus’ arm, dragging him out of the classroom. The potions master felt fury rising at this audacious display, but decided that if he ever wanted to solve this mystery, it wouldn’t be done through yelling and punishment.

After all, he could always yell and punish afterwards.

Ahead, Potter was muttering to himself; Severus listened closer.

“It would be much quicker to just let him into our mind,” he said in Tom’s voice.

“I’m compromising as it is,” the voice that had ranted in the classroom retorted, still sounding angry. “Don’t push, Tom. Besides, no matter what, I am not letting that slime bag in one more time.”

“Fine, fine,” Tom agreed with a sigh, “but I want it noted that I think this is a bad idea.”

The first voice snorted amusedly. “Duly noted.”

By this time they were out on the grounds, headed toward the gate that signaled the edge of the anti-apparition wards. Severus found himself agreeing with Tom that this was likely a very bad idea, but he couldn’t deny his curiosity. He was now following voluntarily, as the boy had returned his arm soon after leaving the dungeons.

They stopped ten feet beyond the wards, the boy grabbing his arm even more securely and pulling out his wand. He couldn’t mean to…but no, he wasn’t even of age yet.

“John,” the boy commanded. A rather odd command in Severus’ opinion, but far too much had been odd in the past weeks for him to start questioning now.

“Yes?” Potter asked, blinking and squinting as if the prescription on his glasses wasn’t quite correct. “Ah, right. Off we go then.”

Sure enough, there was a slight dropping sensation and they were no longer on Hogwarts’ grounds – or anywhere thereabouts. It was a plain street, very muggle, with identical houses framing either side. The only lights were those of the streetlamps and an occasional window. Severus was led by the aggressive Potter up the walk of one particular house. They stopped on the front steps; he could just make out a number 4 by the mail drop.

“I want you to just watch, alright?” Potter said, pulling out his invisibility cloak. “Put this on and enjoy the show, as I’m sure you will.”

Severus sneered, but slipped on the cloak, almost gagging as he imagined that it still stank of James Potter. The arrogant idiot’s offspring knocked hesitantly on the door, almost as if he had to remind himself why he was there. Heavy footsteps could be heard inside, then the door was ripped open, revealing a bulbous, glaring, monster of a man.

“Boy,” he growled, menacingly. Severus watched Potter flinch with interest. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry, Uncle Vernon,” Potter apologized softly, trying to keep peace. Severus felt his memory spark – this must be Potter’s home, making the unpleasant man Vernon Dursley. “I forgot one of my schoolbooks. May I please get it? I won’t be but a minute, and they won’t let me back without it.”

Dursley grunted, but stepped aside, allowing Potter to enter. Severus slipped in behind as Vernon checked to make sure no one had seen before closing the door.

The moment the bolt clicked into place, Dursley spun on his heel and smacked Potter on the head.

“Idiot boy!” he snapped, striking out again. Snape felt his mouth drop open in shock and appall. “If I didn’t want to make sure you’ll be gone for the next nine months I wouldn’t let you set one filthy foot inside my house. How dare you leave one of your freaky books here!”

The fat man grabbed Potter’s collar and spun him around, slamming him against the wall, pinning him there.

“Seems to me you need a lesson in forgetfulness, boy,” he hissed eagerly, reaching for a cane that leaned against the wall nearby. “My old Smeltings Stick ought to do the trick.”

Holding Potter in place by the back of his neck, Dursley lifted the cane and brought it down on the boy’s half-healed back. Potter’s face scrunched up as he bit back a cry of pain. Again and again the stick came down on the boy’s back, and not once did he scream, plead, or even whimper.

Severus watched, paralyzed. Potter’s words repeated over and over in his head ‘enjoy the show, as I’m sure you will’ ‘enjoy the show, as I’m sure you will’ Had he really been so horrible to the Gryffindor that he thought Severus would find pleasure in watching him beaten by his own family?

“You’re a no good, lazy, worthless burden and you should be grateful we took you in,” Dursley shouted as he continued the ‘punishment’. “You’re father was waste of space drunk who couldn’t be bothered to work for a living and your mother was a freak and a whore. Say it!”

Don’t you dare say it, Severus willed mentally, trying to get his limbs to move so he could stop this. Don’t you dare give him that, Potter.

As if he could hear him, the boy suddenly kicked out, catching his uncle in the shin and forcing him to back up. Potter spun around, standing up tall and straight, and glared.

“No,” he said quietly, dangerously.

Dursley raised the stick again, but, as if Potter’s sudden action had unfrozen him as well, Severus threw off the cloak and grabbed the weapon before it could be used.

“That is quite enough,” he snarled. A quick glance at Potter (or Tom, if he’d recognized the tone during the denial correctly) let Severus catch a grateful half-smile before the boy’s eyes rolled up in his head and he lost consciousness.

-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-

Harry awoke and immediately gritted his teeth against the burning pain from his back. Merlin! It hadn’t been this bad since his first day back at school! Had he slept wrong? On one of his textbooks perhaps?

He opened his eyes and squinted against the glaring whiteness around him. The hospital wing. Harry sighed, it wasn’t from sleeping wrong, then. The worst part of waking up in the hospital wing was that eighty percent of the time it happened after a Blank Out, and this time was no different. The last thing he remembered was Snape glaring at him during detention.

Speaking of which.

A dark, blurry shadow to his right moved suddenly and Harry felt his glasses slide onto his nose, bringing the professor into focus.

Not again, he thought. Out loud he said, “Sir?”

“Potter,” Snape greeted with a nod. Then he stood and swept out with no explanation as to why Harry was in the hospital wing, or why he, Snape, had been watching him sleep.

Madam Pomfrey bustled in moments later, thoroughly distracting Harry with her poking and prodding. She turned him over onto his stomach and pulled up his shirt, gasping at his back. Harry wondered what was there.

“Goodness, child, you must have fallen down a whole flight!” she exclaimed.

“What?” Harry asked, confused.

“Professor Snape said you fell down the stairs on the way to detention,” Pomfrey explained, looking at him shrewdly. “Is that not what happened?”

“Oh, of course, I just didn’t hear at first, sorry,” Harry lied, wondering at the story. It wasn’t true at all, he knew that much at least, because he hadn’t had his Blank Out until he was already at detention. Why was Professor Snape lying?

A horrifying thought struck him suddenly. What if it was Snape who had hurt him? That would explain the lying – no way the head of Slytherin would admit to harming a student – and might even explain why he’d been waiting for Harry to wake up. But…something about that explanation didn’t add up, he couldn’t think what it was, but something kept the expected surge of suspicion and fear from welling up inside. Rather than feeling doubtful about his professor, he simply felt that the idea was absurd.

Rather odd, really.

“Honestly, Mr. Potter,” Pomfrey tutted, “I see you here more than anyone else, I believe, and you almost always arrive unconscious.”

Not able to think of a reply to that, Harry settled for keeping silent while she waved her wand. The relieving magic that washed over his back was delightful, and, though it didn’t take away the aches completely, it certainly soothed them and propelled them on the way to healing.

Soon enough she declared him healthy and sent him off to breakfast. It was, apparently, Tuesday morning. Well, at least he didn’t have potions, or any other classes with the Slytherins, today. Malfoy had been less of a prat than usual – possibly because whatever had made the boy look so scared at the end of that Blank Out the other day – but that still only put him at ‘barely tolerable’.

When he got to the Great Hall, the first thing Harry noticed was that neither Snape nor Dumbledore were present. He hoped nothing bad had happened.

-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-

Severus walked swiftly out of the hospital wing. He couldn’t get the image of death-green eyes out of his head. Now, knowing what was behind him, what had fragmented the boy’s mind; knowing that Harry himself didn’t know…those eyes seemed lacking, broken, dead.

And it certainly didn’t help matters that his favorite taunts were now out of reach. He doubted he would ever be able to mention Potter’s muggle family again without remembering how his face had pinched as he fought not to scream, nor the boy’s parents without hearing Dursley’s echoing insults.

The potion’s master found himself at the door of Dumbledore’s office with little memory of getting there, but knocked softly anyway.

“Severus, come in, come in,” Dumbledore said from inside, sounding relieved. “Perhaps you can shed a bit of light on a mystery of mine.”

Severus raised an eyebrow, but already knew what the ‘mystery’ was. The headmaster didn’t keep tabs on his staff, but the wards immediately notified him if a student left without permission. He smirked inwardly at the knowledge that all those times Potter thought he was ‘sneaking’ into Hogsmead, he was under the watchful eye of Albus Dumbledore.

“A student was out of bounds for approximately half an hour last night,” Albus elaborated. “He left under his own power, but was escorted back by a professor.”

“Albus I have no patience for this today,” Severus interrupted bluntly. Normally he enjoyed the verbal play Albus indulged in, seeing how well they could understand one another without ever getting to a conclusive point. However, normally he didn’t have shattered green eyes haunting him. “I cannot and will not tell you everything I know, suffice it to say that Mr. Potter will not be returning to his relatives for the summer holiday, nor any other holiday. If he does, you will have my resignation within a week and Potter will be in my family manor in two. Less, if I can manage it. Good day, Albus.”

Leaving a thoroughly shocked headmaster in his office while he returned to his normal activities of class preparation would normally have put Severus in a very good mood, but now all he felt was…rather hollow. Over the years he had had his part in keeping Potter at the Dursleys’ for as long as possible, arguing with the headmaster against Professor McGonagall, even the other members of the Order, that Potter was safest there and even if he didn’t particularly like his relatives (which Severus had always privately thought was because he was selfish and spoiled) he was safest from the Dark Lord there, and thus that was the best place for him whenever he could not be at Hogwarts.

Now he could only do his best to rectify that mistake. He hoped that the threat of losing his spy and potions professor, combined with the fact that Severus himself was the one making this demand, would be enough to get the headmaster to comply. If not, he fully intended to go through with it. He would turn his back on Dumbledore and Hogwarts and give James Potter’s son sanctuary in his own home if it meant he knew for a fact the boy wouldn’t have to face Vernon Dursley again.

He’d even let that idiot child have pudding.

The next time he was faced with Potter (any of them) was during potions the next Monday. He had seriously considered skipping, but he’d never skipped a day of classes in his life, not as a student and certainly not as a professor, and he wasn’t going to start now. Severus Snape could manage one class.

Severus decided halfway through that maybe skiving off wasn’t such a horrible thing anyway, and even Dumbledore took holidays, he was sure. The worst of it was that Potter wasn’t doing anything different. No, the potions professor couldn’t even blame his affliction on anything Potter had done, it was simply the fact that it was Potter. Just by being himself the boy had managed to completely disrupt Severus’ routine.

And he liked his routine.

And no he did not just sound like a petulant child who’d been denied a sweet, thank you very much. He sounded like nothing more or less than he was – a grown man who had lived a chaotic life and now wanted to settle down with firm boundaries who had just realized those boundaries were not just arbitrary but completely and utterly false.

He hadn’t been having so much trouble before he’d actually had to deal with Potter. The brief glances he’d been unable to prevent in the Great Hall at meal times (he refused to hide away) were nothing compared to having the boy in class. Every time he saw the look of concentration on Potter’s face, he was forced to remember how the Gryffindor learned such discipline; every time Potter smiled at something his friend Granger said, he couldn’t stop a flash of wonder that such a broken child could still smile.

It was bloody infuriating!

Severus was almost relieved when the time for detention came and he would, with any luck, only have to face one of the Potters who knew about the abuse already. Not that he needed to talk about it, Merlin no. It would simply be a relief not to know he was hiding it from the person who had experienced it.

At 6:59, the door to the potion’s classroom opened and Potter walked in. Severus forced himself not to gawk, and it was only his years of conditioning that let him succeed. Potter had somehow managed to tame his hair and also seemed to have found clothes that fit. Whoever this was, he cared about Potter’s appearance.

“Good evening, Professor Snape,” Potter said in a high pitched voice, doing what might, in any other circumstances, be called a curtsy.

“Good evening,” Severus drawled, barely keeping the confusion out of his voice. “Have we met?”

“No,” ‘Potter’ giggled nervously. “My name’s Amelia. I’m only nine years old, you know, but I’m the most civilized one.” She – for Severus had no more doubt that this was a girl in Potter’s body – giggled again. “None of the boys have table manners like mine, or can carry on polite conversation with all the proper ‘yes, sir’s and ‘no, ma’am’s. Anyway, I’m here to apologize. Even if you were a bit rude yourself, James shouldn’t have blown up like that, and he certainly shouldn’t have taken us to number 4.”

“James?” Severus asked quickly.

“Oh, yes, he didn’t even introduce himself, did he?” Amelia sighed. “So rude. James can’t come out at the moment for a proper introduction, since he’s the one responsible for what happened to Harry. Poor boy,” she said mournfully. “Even Tom had to get involved, and he usually stays well away from those interactions. But you were most wonderful, Professor Snape, and we’re all quite grateful to you for stopping him. I’m ashamed to admit most of us tended to equate you with him. I do hope you aren’t offended.”

Severus leaned back in his chair. In his desperation to not think about the events of the previous week, he had not put together the mentions of ‘he’ from previous sessions with Tom and Foster. So they actually thought he would abuse one of his students? He opened his mouth to deny it, but a sudden flash of memory made him stop.

Catching Potter peeking into his pensieve, gripping his arm tight enough to bruise, shaking him, throwing him to the floor and heaving the first jar he could get his hands on at him.

Amelia, apparently taking his darkened expression to mean he was offended, took the opportunity to flee and Severus leaned back in his chair to ponder the new developments in peace.

Potter obviously wasn’t faking. The abuse and Amelia were enough to ensure that. Not even his low opinion of the boy’s father could get Severus to believe Harry Potter would pretend to think he was a girl, thank him, and apologize to him for a prank. In fact, he thought with a bit of a smirk, Potter would likely be mortified when he found out.

Merlin. He was going to have to tell Potter!