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A mental connection to the Dark Lord.

A connection to the Dark Lord’s mind.

That confession was still echoing like a distant bell in Severus’s head as he answered Albus’s questions. Of course they had been missed after the Third Task was done, but Barty had arranged for the discovery of Moody’s body to provide part of the explanation, and Severus had been able to tell some of the truth.

Yes, an impostor had taken Moody’s place, using Polyjuice Potion. Yes, he had planned to kidnap Potter. Yes, Severus had stopped him.

Harry played his part convincingly, too. He huddled with his arms wrapped around his knees and his head bowed, and answered Dumbledore’s questions in a mumble.

He was such a good actor that Severus might have believed him.

“I am sorry, my boy, that you had to be subjected to this.”

Last year, Severus knew, that would have gained Albus an incredulous stare as Harry reflected on why he had to be subjected to this. But now, he only nodded, his shoulders shaking as he stared at his knees.

“I know, Headmaster. Thank you.”

He can do this now because he’s assured of his safety. Because he trusts the Dark Lord in ways that he never trusted Albus.

Harry smiled at Severus a little on the way out of the office. Severus entertained himself with the thought of what Albus would say if he knew where the smile came from. Albus didn’t, of course. Instead, he just smiled himself and teased Severus lightly about how he had become so close to James Potter’s son.

James Potter’s son in blood, Severus longed to say. My son in spirit.

For all the good it has done the both of us.

*

“Given the way that Harry was almost kidnapped, I would have thought you would welcome the guard on him, Severus.”

“When one of them is Black and one of them is Lupin? You know what kind of trouble they got up to in school, Headmaster.”

“Nothing too bad, Severus.”

For a long moment, words stuck in Severus’s throat, and he could not speak. Then he took a long mental step backwards. What Albus said and thought no longer mattered, not at any level that Severus had to care about. He could let the words wash off his robes like the potions that his first-year dunderheads brewed.

And he already knew how he was going to get Harry out of being escorted to Privet Drive, guards or not. Barty had left behind almost a full cauldron of Polyjuice.

Theodore Nott drank a dose of the potion with Harry’s hair in it, Harry drank a dose with Nott’s hair in it, and they maintained the doses during the hours that it took the Hogwarts Express to journey back to King’s Cross. No one else bothered them. This was one of the times Severus could acknowledge it a good thing that Harry had made no true friends in Slytherin House, only those who would do as he told them.

“Harry Potter” walked off the train and into the escort of the Order of the Phoenix members. Severus met “Theodore Nott,” scowling, with his arms folded.

“Sir?”

It was bizarre to hear that low, gruff voice speaking and know it was Harry. But the look in Nott’s grey eyes grounded Severus.

“Your father could not come to fetch you,” Severus said, at his iciest, and watched people glance away and lose interest. “I will take you home.” He extended his arm.

“Nott” nodded stiffly and stepped up to him. Severus whirled them away in a flash of Apparition.

The minute they were in Spinner’s End—Severus had adjusted the wards to create a pocket that only he or someone he accompanied could Apparate into—“Nott” tossed his head back and gave Severus a very Harry grin. “The Polyjuice will wear off in twenty minutes. You gave Theo the stone?”

“I did.”

“You wouldn’t have managed to enchant it without the book Barty gave you.”

“No, I would not.”

Harry was studying him with his head on one side. Severus turned away so as to be able to ignore the oddness of the right gesture on the wrong body. “Let us have some tea, and then I will test your Occlumency again.”

The stone he had given Nott would project an illusion of Harry looking out the barred upstairs window of Privet Drive and sometimes wandering in the garden, which would be enough for the Order guards. It was, admittedly, something of a gamble that they would not knock on the Dursleys’ door and demand to see Harry, just as it had been a gamble that the Order guards at the station would ignore Vernon’s protestations about how Harry hadn’t been living with them for the past two summers.

But none of those guards included a Legilimens, and Albus had never actually checked on Harry the past two summers, either. It was a gamble Severus felt good about taking, along with the one that would allow Nott’s father to appear inside the house on Privet Drive and retrieve him. The protections on the house, whatever they might be, included no wards against Apparition.

“Yes, Severus!”

And watching the way that Harry, even in his Nott guise, raced up the stairs to the room that had been his for those past two summers, Severus could not regret his choices.

Not most of them.

*

“What’s this?”

Barty had come over earlier to tutor Harry, and despite his desperate desire to be present, Severus had locked himself in the lab to brew Blood-Replenishers and other healing potions that the Dark Lord wanted to have on hand after raids. When he came out, it was of course to find Barty staring at a scroll of spellcrafting notes in Severus’s hand.

Fucking Ravenclaw.

“Work of my own,” Severus said repressively, waving his hand and snapping the scroll shut with wandless magic. Barty jumped, but turned hard eyes on him.

“The Dark Lord would like you to teach these spells to Harry.”

“How do you know?”

“How do I know our Lord’s mind? I wonder.”

Severus gritted his teeth. “Some of them are easy to cast but require more power than he currently has. He might magically exhaust himself trying them.”

“It will be a good lesson for him to see that. And you can explain it beforehand. I can see how the boy trusts you. Hangs on your every word.”

Severus said nothing, but simply inclined his head. “Very well. I will teach him these spells.”

“What spells?”

It is a measure of my own trust that I did not consider Harry enough of a threat to jump, Severus thought, and turned to face the boy, who was yawning, one hand over his mouth. “Spells that I invented when I was younger. I have been refining them.”

“You can invent spells?”

Severus blinked. “I was sure that some of our previous lessons covered this. I believe I also told you I invented some.”

“Sure, but it involved esoteric Arithmancy, and I didn’t have enough interest in that to pursue it. And I thought you were just talking about spells that did something like move the stirring rod on its own, to make brewing easier. I didn’t know you were talking about curses.” Harry came cat-footed forwards to stare at him.

Barty shot Severus a smug look and mouthed Told you. Severus sighed and nodded.

“I will teach you these spells,” he told Harry, “but they are hard to master, and require so much energy to cast that you are likely to faint the first time you try them.”

“So put down Cushioning Charms, then.”

“Did the Hat consider you for Ravenclaw for even one moment?”

“No.” Now Harry’s eyes had taken on a harder glitter than they usually had. “It said that I would do well in Slytherin, and make my real friends there.” He laughed a little, quietly. “I thought it was mistaken or lying for the longest time, until I realized that you’re as close to a friend as I come.”

Barty feigned a wounded gasp.

“You don’t count for this discussion, you weren’t a Slytherin.”

And the relationship between them is not as trusting as the one between Harry and me, Severus thought, listening as they insulted each other. Barty still had a cruel smile for Harry; Harry matched it. Barty’s loyalty was first and foremost to the Dark Lord, even though he would protect Harry for the sake of his own mental acuity and their Lord’s.

But Harry leaned trustingly against Severus’s side when Barty was gone and yawned again. “What’s for breakfast?”

“Dry oats.”

“You’ll make something more than that,” Harry said.

He sounded childish. Sleepy. Absolutely and utterly trusting. It was what had damned the rest of the world, Severus thought.