Accidents Don’t Just Happen Accidentally

Accidents Don’t Just Happen Accidentally

“Students- if I may have your attention!”

Severus Snape looked up from his seat at the Slytherin table to Headmaster Dumbledore. The old man’s eyes were twinkling and he looked exceptionally pleased with himself.

“We do have one additional student to sort tonight- I would like you all to meet our newest transfer student, fifth year, Hadrian Peverell.”

Severus clapped politely along with the rest of the students as the, holy god, singularly most gorgeous boy he’d ever seen stepped in to the Great Hall through the teachers entrance. He had lightly tanned skin, a perfect, if nervous, white smile, messy black hair and the brightest green eyes he’d ever seen. The boy, Hadrian, ran a hand nervously through his hair, reminding Severus sharply of a gesture James Potter frequently did when Lily Evans was nearby. Hadrian did it sheepishly though, as if he were nervous about the attention instead of relishing in it.

“Hadrian just transferred here from a private school in Liverpool,” Dumbledore said. “I’m sure you all will help to make him feel comfortable.” A few students clapped here and there. “Mister Peverell, please, have a seat and we’ll get you sorted.”

Severus thought Dumbledore’s blue eyes were twinkling more than usual, as if he were a part of a grand secret nobody else knew. Hadrian gave the Headmaster a grin and sat on the stool to be sorted.

He should have looked ridiculous, he was much too tall and grown to be on the small stool used for first years. But he didn’t, Hadrian looked elegant and confident.

It was mildly infuriating.

The Great Hall all watched with blatant curiosity as the first ever transfer student at Hogwarts was sorted. Finally the hat opened its mouth, chuckled(?!), and announced “SLYTHERIN!”

The Slytherin table clapped hesitantly for their new housemate. Severus exchanged wary glances with Evan and Regulus. This new addition to their house was an unknown, which made them all nervous.

Severus hoped he was a pureblood.

It was a bad time to be anything less in their house.

As he knew damn good and well.

“Hello,” Hadrian said softly, sitting down directly across from Severus. “I’m Hadrian, please call me Harry.”

“Regulus Black,” Reg said, offering the new student his hand. Harry nodded and shook it with a small smile toying around his lips.

“Rosier, Evan Rosier,” Evan offered his hand to be shook as well.

Severus offered Harry his hand, “I’m Severus Snape.”

Harry looked directly in Severus’ eyes and, oh, even with the glimmer of mischief in them they were gorgeous. A sparkling emerald green with the barest flecks of gold. Severus used to think Lily’s eyes were the most interesting and prettiest eyes he’d ever seen, but he’d been terribly wrong.

Harry took his hand and instead of shaking it like he did Reg and Evan he brought it to his mouth, “Pleased to meet you,” he murmured before kissing Severus’ knuckles.

Severus’ internal, just as snarky, monologue stuttered just as his external monologue did.

Evan and Regulus exchanged gleeful smiles though.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” Severus said slowly once his hand had been released by this very gorgeous, very forward, boy.

“I’m sure,” Harry said with an irksome smirk that Severus had a fleeting whim to smack off his face. He addressed his question to the three of them, but he kept his eyes on Severus. “So what’s Hogwarts like?”

Regulus, ever the snob that Severus would only begrudgingly claim to be an acquaintance of his, sniffed at Harry and stuck his nose in the air.

“That depends entirely on your blood status,” Regulus said haughtily. His (accurate) statement drew the attention of the other Slytherin students who silenced their conversations to hear this new students reply.

Harry wasn’t quelled, and Severus got the impression that he rarely was. His pink lips twisted into an amused smile as he looked Regulus head on. “Does it?” he asked.

“It does.”

“Mmm.” Harry looked around and seemed to ensure that he had the audience of every single Slytherin at the table before he waved his hand in a lazy manner and hissed something and transfigured Regulus’ goblet into a tiny grey mewling kitten.

“You should name him Ares,” Harry drawled. He pointed his finger at the kitten, “Family tradition, right, Regulus?”

Severus and Evan met each other’s eyes while the rest of Slytherin broke out into shocked and solemn whispers of this new student.

This new powerful student.

This student who used Parsletongue.

Severus read in Evan’s eyes what his own were surely broadcasting; Hogwarts had just gotten incredibly more interesting.

Severus also considered it that night as he laid in his bed, Regulus had offered Harry first choice of bed, and Severus realized that Harry had distracted them with his power and his talent that only the Dark Lord shared, and he never did disclose his blood status.

A brilliant half-blood, much like himself, Severus was certain.

Harry Peverell was a marvel and Severus was hardly the only one to notice it.

After a mere month at Hogwarts, Harry was every person’s favorite person. He was friends with all who approached him. He had a smile and a comment for every single student, house affiliation be damned. He always spent time with different groups in the library, he even ate meals at different tables.

Severus saw him eat a meal with Lily one morning and felt his heart clench painfully. How would Harry ever deem Severus to be as worthy of his attention as he found him for a brief moment on the first night if Severus had to compete with the likes of Lily Evans? Lily was smart and witty and Harry would find her as excellent of a friend as Severus did.

Though, peculiarly, Harry only ate with her the one time.

Severus asked him about it, casually and with a bored mask covering his intrigue. Harry merely shrugged and kicked his foot in a juvenile gesture of discomfort.

“I don’t think she likes me much,” he said softly.

Severus doubted that.

Everyone, from the groundskeeper to the headmaster, liked Harry Peverell.

Harry was brilliant as well friendly. He put the others to shame in their classes as he doodled on his parchments, rather intricate drawings of flowers and cauldrons, and carelessly breezed through questions and tests. Harry held little interest at potions, though he was a particularly clever brewer who knew as many tips and tricks as Severus did.

It went without saying that Slughorn adored him.

Harry had filled the dungeon common room with his bubbling laugh when he received a formal invite from their Head of House to join his ridiculous little club. Severus had nearly blushed when Harry winked at him and fed the invite straight into the fire.

He was brilliant at charms and transfiguration and everything. Defense was where he shone the brightest though. Defense was when the tide in Slytherin began shifting roughly six weeks after this magnetic young man arrived in their midst with a mysterious past and a magical personality.

Professor Totty, a boring and dull Professor drafted from the retired auror list, paired students up at random for duels. Severus had been excited for dueling, he’d been eager to show his skill and his talent, then he was paired with Pettigrew while Harry was paired with Potter.

Pettigrew was a blathering idiot who hid his cowardly face behind his more talented friends and Severus had bested him within a minute.

Hardly a showing of power.

Unlike Harry.

Harry offered Potter his hand and a wry smile before they started, “May the best man win, eh, James?”

Potter grinned at Harry, which caused Severus’ blood to boil, and grasped his hand as if he hadn’t spent the last five years spewing vitriol about Slytherins.

“Best man then, Peverell,” Potter said.

“Are they friends?” Evan whispered to Severus as the students backed up to watch the duel.

Severus hoped not, though he suspected they somehow were as Black and Lupin leaned against the far stone wall and whispered and chuckled and watched the leader of their gang face off against Harry with casual ease. Either they believed Potter would somehow win, or they believe Harry would leave Potter uninjured.

A false belief, on either count.

The duel started and it was fast, furious, and Harry moved with such an elegant and arrogant grace that it was as if Severus could feel the commitment to their futures waver in every Slytherin in attendance.

Harry was beautiful in his every moment. Severus groaned silently as his stomach clenched with every smile Harry sent to Potter and every colorful curse they parried.

The only respectable thing about James Potter was his abilities in defense, but he was a flickering flashlight against Harry’s sunshine.

James sent a purple spell.

Harry conjured a mirror and somehow bounced the spell back at James.

James growled.

Severus smiled.

Harry laughed.

And the duel went on.

“He’s toying with him,” Evan murmured to Severus. “Watch.”

“I am,” Severus bit out. He narrowed his eyes and focused on the spells being fired from Harry’s fingertips as opposed to the gorgeous boy himself. Evan was… correct.

All of Harry’s spells were aimed just above Potter’s shoulder, just below his elbow, skimming his hair. Never dead on, and not for a lack of precision.

“No more pranks,” Harry told Potter as he easily blocked yet another spell.

“I’d never prank you, Harry!” Potter laughed, his face lit up with glee as he clearly believed he found an equal in his defensive talents. “My favorite snake? Never!”

“None of the others either,” Harry said, his lips twitching madly as he fought back a smile.

Potter transfigured a nearby parchment in to a swarm of wasps and sent them in a straight line to attack Harry. Harry swished his wand and turned them right back towards Potter who had to dodge them quickly to prevent being stung by his own (admittedly clever) transfiguration.

“Solemnly swear,” Harry chirped.

Potter startled while Black and Lupin barked out irritating laughs.

“You’ll have to kill me first!” Potter cried with his wand brandished dramatically. “And I’ll have you know—”

Whatever Potter wanted Harry to know, the others never discovered as Harry smirked and suddenly had James dangling in the air by his ankle.

“Cheater!” Potter laughed. He attempted to keep both his shirt from falling down around his face and rescuing his glasses from slipping off his face.

“Best man won?” Harry asked. He skipped over to James and grinned at him…

Severus wondered if the Peverell line and Potter line intermixed at some point. The grin Harry got back from Potter was startlingly similar to Harry’s.

He was unable to ruminate on it as Harry abruptly released Potter, dropping him to the floor. And, in front of the entire Slytherin and Gryffindor fifth years, James Potter got to his feet and gave Harry a flourished and dramatic bow.

“You’re the better man, for now,” Potter winked at Harry.

Harry laughed and shook the hand Potter offered him.

“Mate, you’ve got no idea how long I’ve wanted to hear you say that.”

And that was the night that Harry sat in the common room in the recliner by the fire and waited until the room filled to capacity before speaking.

He said it casually, softly. He said it clearly though as he scratched the kitten that lived in the fifth year dorm behind its fuzzy grey ears and caused it to pur on his lap.

“Hey, Regulus, Evan, Severus?”

The three of them perked up from the table they’d been sharing to work on their homework at. Every other Slytherin went silent, curious at what Harry would be calling across the common room—

Harry had become one of the most important members of their house, after all. Many believed that he was a descendant of Salazar himself as he shared his language. A few believed that Harry would join the Dark Lord soon, become his praised right hand man.

A belief Harry clearly wished to dismiss.

“Yeah?” Evan asked.

Harry’s eyes trailed slowly around the room before landing on their trio, though they lingered on Severus long enough to make him feel hot beneath the collar.

“If anyone joins the Dark Lord, I’m going to kill them when I kill him.”

Severus refrained from a shocked hiss that many of his other housemates let escape them, though that didn’t lessen his shock at all.

The Dark Lord was hardly a topic brought up in the common room. He was whispered about, discussed quietly, behind closed doors and only with the most trusted of friends.

“Is that right?” Rabastan Lestrange, an idiot of a seventh year, sneered from his spot near the fire between Bellatrix Black and his twin brother Rodolphus. Rabastan got to his feet and pulled his wand out, “You plan on killing the Dark Lord?”

Harry didn’t rise to his feet. He merely sat there, as regal as a king, and smiled down at the kitten on his lap. “Yes,” he said simply. He raised his face and graced Rabastan with the smile that the other boy hardly deserved. “And everyone who joins him, as I just said.”

Nobody moved to Harry’s defense when Rabastan shot a red spell at him. Their sense of self-preservation would simply not allow it.

Severus’ fingers itched, but Harry could hold his own.

Harry summoned a book to block the curse then blinked at Rabastan and suddenly had him on the floor, screaming with all his might. Harry placed a soft kiss on the kitten’s head and sat him on the floor, Ares ran to Severus and tangled himself in Severus’ ankles with pathetic little meows. Harry got up and moved to Rabastan without ending the curse on him.

Nobody flinched when Harry yanked Rabastan’s left sleeve up and displayed the mark of the Dark Lord on his arm for all to see. It was gruesome, red and raised and likely a recent branding over the summer, and his brother twitched.

“You as well?” Harry asked him politely. He wiggled a finger in Rodolphus’ direction and bound him with crimson ropes before Rodolphus could properly pull his wand.

If any expected Bellatrix to intervene on their behalf, they expected wrong. Bellatrix was a consummate survivor, in Severus’ opinion, and her survival instincts had her backing away from her closest friends with hooded and curious eyes.

Rabastan quit screaming when Harry bound him in ropes alongside his brother. He moved the two of them side by side and looked around the room with a polite and quizzical smile on his alluring face.

Severus felt a wave of envy consume him when it was Regulus who Harry’s eyes landed on.

“Want to come watch me prove a point?”

Everyone held their breath as Regulus weighed Harry’s offer and Severus fought to keep from volunteering.

Severus wanted to watch this beautiful and brilliant boy prove a point.

Severus wanted to be the one to hold the spotlight that they all knew Harry’s attention was.

“Certainly,” Regulus said in his haughty drawl. He shoved his books towards Evan, an unspoken request for him to put them away, and gave Severus a beseeching look of some sort. Panic, perhaps? Perhaps Harry knew of Regulus’ plan to join the Dark Lord at the end of the year and Harry wanted to make three points in a night?

Severus raised a brow and Regulus crinkled his nose. Then he obediently followed Harry and the bound and floating Lestrange brothers right out the common room door.

And that was how the beginnings of a true change in Slytherin started. Not by Albus Dumbledore and his grand speeches. Not by the Dark Lord and his show of force.

But by a boy. A boy with power that shone as brightly as his unearthly eyes. A boy who kissed kittens then cursed his enemies.

The whispers began and Severus and Evan dutifully kept track while pretending to study.

People were hesitant.

“…think he means it?”

“… bloody seem like he was joking…?”

They were nervous.

“He’s strong…”

“Stronger than the Dark Lord?”

“That’s the question…”

They were intrigued.

“What are his views…?”

“What’s his goal?”

“…looking for followers?”

Evan slid Severus a note-

Will you join him?

The boy who haunted Severus’ dreams?

Yes.

Perhaps.

None of the Slytherin students retired to bed until Harry, Regulus, and the Lestrange brothers returned. None could bear to miss discovering the end result of the point Harry wished to make.

Severus watched the room grow darker, the conversations become more hushed, and eyelids grew heavier.

It was nearly midnight when the door opened and Harry strut inside with a pale faced Regulus at his side.

Severus and Evan were on their feet immediately, but Harry held a hand up to them to stop them from approaching Regulus.

“Think about what I said?” Harry asked Regulus; he was warm, he was friendly, he was everyone’s friend and everyone’s brother.

Regulus nodded then scampered up the stairs to their dorm.

“Ares!” Harry plucked up the kitten that came running to his owner while the rest of the house waited to hear the judgement cast on the Lestrange brothers.

“Ahem.” Bellatrix cleared her throat and stepped toward Harry with her hips swinging and her eyes hooded. “Peverell, where are the boys?” She reached out for Harry’s chest, and Severus was surprised that Harry allowed it.

Then Harry snatched her wrist before she could make contact and flipped her arm over. Ares crawled up to Harry’s shoulders as Harry pulled Bellatrix’s sleeve up. His tense shoulders relaxed slightly at the lack of a mark and he threw her wrist away from himself.

“Dead,” he told her bluntly. His eyes narrowed slightly as they fixed upon her, “Take that mark and you will be too.” He looked around the room and his cool mask was replaced by a friendly grin, “Afraid that goes for all of you. I’m not living with any bloody death eaters, or whatever Tom Riddle calls his followers these days.”

“You aren’t worried that the Dark Lord will seek revenge for killing the Lestrange’s?” Evan asked Harry with respectful hesitancy.

Harry laughed and it was so horribly charming that Severus’ stomach twisted.

“Tom can come find me any day, any time, and I’ll end this war now,” Harry bragged.

Severus believed him. Harry had an aura that simply screamed ‘invincible’.

“I’m off to bed,” Harry announced. He looked around the Slytherin common room and smiled a little crooked and amused slash of his lips. “Think about what side you lot want to be on- my side, or the losing side. Night, guys!”

Severus felt eyes burning in the back of his head from his acquaintances and classmates, but…

He ignored them and followed that light straight to their dorm.

Regulus confided to Severus, Evan, and Barty what happened in a confidential tone the next morning as they skipped breakfast together to listen to the tale.

“He’s definitely related to Slytherin,” Regulus whispered in the Hidden Room they found last year. “He knows where his chamber is.”

“You’re joking,” Severus breathed.

Regulus shook his head. “There was a basilisk down there.”

Barty, ever the eager Ravenclaw leaned in eagerly. “Is there really?”

“‘Was’ he said,” Evan pointed out. He stared at Regulus hard. “What happened down there?”

Regulus swallowed and his face lost some of its usual haughty aristocracy. “Peverell woke the basilisk. He fed the Lestrange brothers to it, then- then he killed it.” Regulus snapped his fingers and his face lost another shade of color, “Just like that.”

None of them said anything. They all stared at their hands and their laps and the walls.

Severus eventually broke the silence, “Why you?”

“Hmm?”

“Why did Harry choose you to accompany him?” Severus clarified.

Regulus grimaced and tapped a polished black nail on the table top they shared. “He told me if I wanted to stay with him this summer that I could. He also… he said I should talk with my brother.”

Severus tampered down on the irrational jealously reading it’s head inside his chest.

“He wants you to… to move in?” Barty asked slowly. “What the hell, Reg? Have you been fucking him?!”

“Don’t be crass,” Regulus sneered. “He merely said that he… he was under the impression, from Sirius, no doubt, that perhaps I would appreciate having a different residence in the summers.”

Barty sank back in his seat and his angry blue eyes were soft once more. He reached out for Regulus’ hand and brushed it lightly with his fingertips before withdrawing both hands to his lap.

“Sorry,” Barty said quietly while the others pretended to be oblivious of their conversation. “What did you tell him?”

“I…” Regulus seemed surprised as he blinked at the table. “I told him yes.”

None of them were surprised by Regulus’ acceptance, though Severus doubted if he were the only one filled with envy.

Hogwarts was… odd… once the tide changed within Slytherin.

Harry began holding court with Slytherins. He preached about magical equality. He discussed magical theory, magical history, and magical future. He drew the Slytherin students to him like flies in a spiderweb.

The Slytherin students began sending letters home with increasing desperation to change their family allegiances and Harry watched with a self-satisfied gleam in his eye as he sipped his tea.

He also began meeting with the Headmaster, sharing smiles and nods at meals, and winks as they jaunted together through the entrance just in time to eat breakfast.

And Severus set about deciphering Harry’s story, for everyone had a story. He tried to catch him unaware, to decipher the thoughts that occasionally sent him into a quiet spell before the fire in the common room with Ares purring on his lap.

Catching Harry unaware was an incredibly difficult task. Harry was affable and charming and so damned charismatic, but he was wary. He walked like a man who fought, and won, a war. Harry never had his back to a room, a door was always in his peripheral vision, and even mid-conversation his bright green eyes would flick around the perimeter, scanning for threats while never breaking his speech.

And his speech was infuriatingly smooth. He was witty, charming, intelligent, and when you were speaking with him you couldn’t help but be drawn in.

Harry personally drew him like a moth to the brightest flame in the world and he feared that he would soon be burnt as a result.

He was so lovely. Severus despised him.

And as much as Severus despised him, he also admired him.

Harry clearly held none of Severus’ ill will because he seemed to make interfering in Severus’ life the next thing on his mysterious to-do list.

Anywhere Severus went after Christmas, Harry trotted alongside him. And if Severus wanted it to be in silence, Harry disagreed.

He chatted about all manners of things and found Severus funny in a way that even Lily didn’t.

“The Slytherin seeker is terrible,” Harry sighed after they watched their team be demolished by Ravenclaw the second weekend in January. “I could have caught that snitch ages ago.”

Severus scoffed. “Perhaps you should have attended tryouts then.”

“I don’t fly much anymore,” Harry said easily. “I like to fly, but I dunno… brooms just aren’t what they used to be,” he chuckled.

Severus paused when Potter yelled a greeting to Harry, his sycophants waving alongside him.

“Alright there, Harry?” Potter called.

“My team lost, so I’ve been better,” Harry said with a smile.

“Your team always loses,” Pettigrew said with an idiotic smile.

Harry, as usual, gave Pettigrew a look as distasteful as the one Severus reserved for Potter.

“See you later, James, Sirius,” Harry said, blatantly ignoring Lupin and Pettigrew entirely before falling back in step with Severus.

At a minimum, Severus was pleased that Harry had the good sense to not befriend Lupin or Pettigrew, even if his friendship with Potter was irksome. Irksome all the more when Potter and his gang had not so much as sneered at Severus since the day Harry bested Potter in defense.

Severus eyed Harry covertly. Harry was smiling, a perfectly white smile that suited his face very well.

“How old are you?”

“Fifteen,” Harry said immediately without hesitation. He turned that blinding smile on Severus, “And you?”

“I’m fifteen, but I don’t go talking about the ‘good old days’ of broomsticks,” Severus said. He tried to sneer, but it was difficult to sneer in the face of such unrestrained enthusiasm. It was as difficult to sneer in Harry’s face as it was Lily’s.

Pretty people simply received privileges they hardly earned.

“That’s because you’ve never rode my broomstick,” Harry winked.

Severus raised a brow and his lips curled up at the innuendo, intentional or not, until Harry finally caught it. He stumbled, for the first time in Severus’ memory, and shook his head, sending glossy black curls to wave with the wind.

“That’s not what I meant, but I wouldn’t say no either,” Harry said brazenly with flushed cheeks and bright eyes. “You’re—”

“Sev!”

Severus closed his eyes for a moment and turned his head. Lily smiled and waved and broke away from her group of girlfriends to jog over to catch up to Severus and Harry. They were nearly to the castle doors, though Severus naturally stalled to allow Lily a chance to catch up.

It was one of the only times Severus very desperately did not wish to see his friend.

He saw Harry’s form shift slightly out of the corner of his eyes. His shoulders curled in the slightest bit while he lost some of his lovely glee in favor of a more cautious and guarded expression.

What on earth happened during their single meal nearly three months ago to cause Harry to become so wary of Lily? Lily was one of the most genuinely friendly people Severus ever met. She was bubbly and warm and Severus’ complete opposite.

“Lily,” Severus said with a small smile for his first friend. He gestured toward Harry, including the boy who looked as if he expected to be turned away. “Would you care to walk with us?”

Lily smiled at Harry, clearly not sharing in his uneasiness and nodded.

“I’d love to,” she said. She linked an arm with Severus and offered one to Harry, though Harry merely moved to Severus’ other side in a move that looked casual and not at all as if he were skittish of a teenage girl with pink lipgloss and a Gryffindor scarf on.

“How are you, Harry?” Lily asked Harry politely.

Harry ducked his head and danced out of arms reach of Severus.

“Great,” he mumbled. “And you?”

Where was the affable boy making lewd sexual innuendos only moments ago?

“Very busy!” Lily said in a way that Severus knew prefaced a gushing rant. “OWLS are so important, now more than ever!”

Severus and Harry were gifted with Lily’s tirade on the importance of OWLS the rest of the, mercifully, short walk to the Great Hall before Lily turned toward the Gryffindor table with a last wave and cheery goodbye to Severus and Harry.

“You said she doesn’t like you, but I believe it is you who dislikes her,” Severus said lightly as they sat with their housemates at the Slytherin table. When Harry merely made a noncommittal sound, Severus asked “Why?”

“Hmm.” Harry hummed and poured himself a glass of pumpkin juice and began dishing steak and kidney pie on his plate. He stabbed a bite on his fork then fixated on it as if it held all the answers to life. “I don’t dislike her,” he said slowly, choosing his words with obvious care. “She’s smart, and funny, which I didn’t expect, but she’s also, sort of…” Inexplicably, Harry’s face turned a sweet shade of red.

“Kind of flirty, maybe?” he said in a rush.

Severus and Regulus met each other’s eyes, albeit briefly, just before Regulus and Evan burst in loud laughter that Severus struggled to not join.

“You don’t like her because she likes you?” Evan laughed. “Some people, with rather low standards, find Evans attractive.”

Severus flicked his wand in his hand, but Harry had already shown Evan the mistake he made.

With nothing more than a tap of his finger on the table and a furious look aimed at Evan, his mouth entirely disappeared.

“You can have that back when you apologize,” Harry said, his even tone a jarring juxtaposition to his glower. “Unless you know the nonverbal counterjinx to a spell I created.”

Evan’s eyes were wide as he frantically pat his face and felt nothing but skin where his mouth once was. Embarrassingly, his eyes filled with tears before he leapt to his feet and rushed from the hall. The nearby Slytherins made quiet sounds of disapproval- surely Evan hadn’t listened to the powerful boy in their year defend muggleborns so heatedly and expect no retaliation for insulting one, even in the slight way he did so.

“Dunderhead,” Harry muttered before rolling his eyes.

“You aren’t interested in Lily?” Severus asked Harry, more curious about the prior topic than he was Evan’s predicament.

“She is perfectly lovely and will make someone else very happy,” Harry said slowly. “I’d prefer she didn’t flirt with me, it’s… it’s really bloody weird.”

“I can talk with her, subtly, of course,” Severus offered. It would ease a weight from him if Harry and Lily were able to get along. And Lily was kind and understanding, if Severus said that Harry was uncomfortab—

“Tell her I’m gay, please,” Harry told Severus, entirely erasing his mental outline on what to say to Lily.

Severus blinked slowly.

“Certainly,” he said. “I will inform Lily that you’re gay.”

Lily may have no shot with Harry, but it seemed as if Severus may. If Harry were interested in ratty little half-bloods with a talent for potions, that was. Which… peculiarly enough, judging by the way Harry followed Severus about the castle, Severus thought perhaps he was.

“Thanks,” Harry smiled at Severus, a smile that tied a knot in Severus’ stomach, and appeared as relaxed as ever. “It’s er… just weird, to be flirted with. I thought she was just being friendly, then she invited me to Hogsmeade and James was upset and… and it’s all just bloody weird.”

“But everyone flirts with you!” Regulus cried. His face reflected the same amusement that Severus felt at Harry’s obvious discomfort. “Harry, how many marriage contracts have you received in the last two months?”

Eleven, by Severus’ very precise count. He had tracked each one and felt relief when Harry merely curled his nose, laughed, and burnt the letters to ash.

“That’s just… pureblood nonsense?” Harry said, looking to each of their faces uncertainly. “Jokes, maybe?”

When neither of them said anything, waiting for Harry to understand that marriage contracts were hardly sent out as ‘jokes’, Harry turned even more red.

“They don’t even know me,” Harry hissed, dropping his fork with a clatter. “That’s why I thought they were jokes or pranks. James or Sirius taking the piss, or something.”

Another excellent opening to resolve Severus’ other mystery surrounding the peculiar way Harry chooses friends.

“Not Lupin or Pettigrew?” Severus asked him with a curious brow raised.

Harry stiffened and Severus felt an odd stab of remorse as he pushed away his untouched plate.

“I don’t talk to them much,” Harry said shortly. “I think I’ll go make sure Rosier isn’t getting Madam Pomfrey to help him. Excuse me.”

“Excellent job,” Regulus drawled after Harry abruptly left the Great Hall. “You’ve turned him off his meal.”

Severus scoffed. “You aren’t curious? Surely you’ve noticed there are only five students that he doesn’t speak to in the entire castle?”

Lily had been one, Lupin and Pettigrew two more, then Bellatrix, an understandable notion as Severus too avoided her at all costs, and—

“Barty certainly is,” Regulus said carelessly, listing off the fifth student that Harry seemed to purposefully avoid. “I could ask Sirius about Lupin and Pettigrew, though the less Harry has to do with Sirius’ friends, the better.”

Severus nodded distractedly, now puzzling through yet another act of powerful magic that Harry had done; Regulus had not called Black by his first name since midway through Regulus’ first year.

By breakfast the next morning, Harry’s odd moment of irritation with Severus had passed, and he was back to his new ‘force my company on my (un)willing housemate’ mission.

“Severus, Reg and I are going to go fly after breakfast, want to join us?” Harry asked Severus with a smile.

Severus cocked a brow, looking between Harry and Regulus both. They were both all but vibrating with excitement, an odd thing to see in Regulus.

“I thought you didn’t fly?” Severus asked Harry.

“I don’t, not on the shitty school brooms,” Harry said with a scoff. “But James said I can borrow his Nimbus and everyone says Reg is the best seeker in the school, so we’re having a seekers battle.”

Regulus’ chest puffed out at Harry’s compliment.

“I’m rather good,” he bragged. “Don’t feel too terrible if you can’t keep up.”

Severus would have refused to attend, but the confident smirk on Harry’s face changed his mind. If Harry were going to knock Regulus down a peg, Severus would like to see it.

And knock Regulus down a peg, he did.

Severus stood on the edge of the quidditch pitch, choosing to linger on the grounds rather than sit in the stands where Potter and Black were, and watched as Harry caught the snitch five times in a row.

“I haven’t flown in forever,” Harry said when he landed on the pitch. His cheeks were flushed and his hair was wild and windswept, his eyes though, by God his eyes sparkled as if they were cut from diamonds.

“You’re rather good,” Severus admitted.

“And Severus is really bad,” Regulus said, landing with a pout. He held out an amicable hand to Harry regardless, no doubt having no wish to upset such an important member of their house, of the entire castle. “You should try out for the Slytherin team, I’d consider alternating games with you, if you’d like.”

“Thanks, but it’s fine.” Harry accepted Regulus’ handshake, but shook his own head. “I don’t have a proper broom, and you like being seeker.”

It was a testament to the immense amount of cunning or ambition that Harry had to be so self-sacrificing to Regulus. Truthfully, even Severus could see that Harry and Regulus were rather close, had been since the night Harry invited him to stay with him in the summers, but it was still an odd trait to see in a student in green.

Severus’ admiration of the beautiful boy increased, ten-fold.

Severus waited with Harry as Potter and Black descended on them, jumping down the stadium stairs. Regulus sent his brother a small wave before darting off, citing the cold as reason to not dally.

“I’ve got to return James’ broom,” Harry murmured to Severus, as explanation for why they lingered. There was something nervous, unexpectedly anxious, in Harry’s expression though, so Severus wondered what other reason Harry had to wait for the idiot Gryffindor’s.

“That was wicked!” Potter cried when he leapt the last few steps to land on the ground in front of Harry. “You’re a brilliant flier!”

“Wish you were in our house,” Black groaned with a theatric hand held to his forehead. “You’d be way better than Helder, he’s rubbish!”

Harry was bouncing on the balls of his trainers as he handed over James’ broom.

“You really think I’m a good flier?” Harry asked James, as if it weren’t obvious.

“Mate,” Black threw an arm over Harry’s shoulders, causing Severus to grind his teeth at both the easy way they interacted and the smile Black gave Harry, “you’re amazing. I can’t say the best or Reggie’s feelings will get all hurt, but hell yeah you’re good.”

Although Severus, Regulus, and now Black has all complimented Harry on his skills, it was clearly Potter whose opinion Harry desired.

“I can’t talk just now,” Potter said with an easy smile for the one Slytherin he seemed to not dislike. “I’m busy thinking of how to best convince Minerva to let you fly for my team. How do you feel about Polyjuice?”

Severus watched Harry as he bantered with Potter and Black for another minute. He saw as Harry truly seemed to light up with Potter’s praise and he saw when Potter told Harry he thought Harry could ‘go pro’ and Harry quickly excused himself to go shower with misty eyes.

“Overkill,” Black told Potter when they ignored Severus and began striding off to the castle with their arms thrown about each other’s shoulders. “I think Harry really looks up to you.”

Potter laughed and said the first intelligent thing that Severus had ever heard from him.

“You got it all backwards, Padfoot, Harry’s a good bloke, I should be looking up to him.”

A sentiment that, once Severus waited for Harry to finish utilizing the quidditch locker rooms and the boy emerged with red-rimmed eyes, Severus repeated to Harry to peculiar results.

Harry sat in the chair he favored in the Slytherin common room, the one that any student sitting in it scrambled from when Harry entered the room, and held the kitten that should not still exist to his face for a long moment.

“This is mad.” Harry put the cat back in his lap and laughed a shaky laugh. “James didn’t say he looks up to me. That’s… this whole thing is mad.”

Severus glanced toward Regulus and (the recently forgiven after a public apology) Evan before clearing his throat.

“What, precisely, is mad, Harry?” Severus asked.

“Everything!” Harry said. He got to his feet, clutching the kitten to his chest with one hand. “I just need to… hell,” he ran a hand through his hair while he looked around the common room at the others who were pretending to not be listening in. “Severus, want to go for a walk? With me? I need- air, or something.”

“Certainly,” Severus agreed smoothly, masking the surprise that Harry’s words frequently gave him. He gently reached over and removed the cat from Harry’s incredibly tight grip and handed it over to Regulus before motioning to the entrance door. “Shall we?”

Harry waited until the door closed behind them to reach out and grab Severus’ hand in a shocking and absent manner.

“I was holding Ares to keep my sanity,” he said quietly in a strained voice as he began leading Severus on a complex path through the castle. “You took him, you deal with my death grip.”

“Charming,” Severus said drily.

He held Harry’s hand tightly, lending him strength in the moment that the strongest wizard Severus knew clearly needed it. Harry led them up through staircases that Severus never even knew existed, ducking through tapestries, hopping over trick steps, and finally making his intention known to be the Astronomy Tower.

“You’re quite adequate at navigating the castle,” Severus said suspiciously when they reached the top of the tower and Harry inhaled a loud lungful of air.

“Yeah.” Harry pulled Severus’ hand, leading him to the railing. Harry leaned against it, propping his chin in his empty hand. He stared across the grounds, slowing his breathing until tiny even puffs of air left his mouth. “Hogwarts is home, you know?”

“I do know, actually.” Severus mimicked Harry’s position with his elbow on the rail and his chin in his hand. He felt Harry squeeze his hand and smiled slightly. “It’s been home to me since I first arrived.”

Harry turned toward Severus, letting the moonlight wash part of his face in shadows, and seemed to stare directly in Severus’ soul.

“My relatives I lived with didn’t like me either,” he said, his voice a sad and sweet wash over Severus’ shame at his knowing addition of ‘either’. “I’m never going back to them. You shouldn’t either.”

Severus cursed at Regulus in his mind for revealing his secrets to Harry, the one person Severus wanted to see him as someone special, someone aside from the pathetic boy from Spinner’s End.

“My mother,” Severus said, hardly noticing as Harry’s hand squeezed his while forcing himself to reward Harry’s honesty with his own, “I cannot leave her.”

“She doesn’t help you though,” Harry said bluntly. “You don’t owe her anything more than what she’s given you. And what has she given you?”

Severus thought of Eileen and her vacant eyes, her fluttering and useless hands, the way she turned away when Tobias was at his worst. He looked away from Harry, toward the distant trees, and felt something break at the answer he knew to be true.

“Nothing,” Severus said simply, tears burning the back of his eyes. “She has given me nothing.”

Harry said nothing for a few minutes, allowing Severus to ruminate over the ruined relationship with his mother in silence while he offered a comforting hand and his warmth when he shuffled closer.

“Stay with me,” Harry said, softly, coaxingly. “And Reg, I guess. And bloody Barty.”

Severus forced a laugh at the way Harry swore Barty’s name.

“Your dislike of Barty is odd,” he told him, thankful for a new topic to seize upon. “Most students hardly notice him; he’s quiet and reasonably well-mannered.”

“He… he reminds me of someone I hate,” Harry said slowly, his face twisting for a moment. “But I have to keep reminding myself that you lot aren’t the people I know, you’re… different… here and now, you’re different people. And I shouldn’t pick and choose who I help.”

Severus bristled defensively, only just resisting the urge to drop Harry’s hand and distance himself at the implication.

“I hardly need your assistance,” he sneered. “I am capable of handling myself.”

Harry didn’t retreat at Severus’ acidic tone, he merely smiled widely at him.

“Oh, I know you can,” he said, sounding much more cheerful than he had since he finished flying that morning. “I’m helping Regulus and Barty, but you… I just… I want you to stay with me.”

If it aren’t dark out, Severus would be quite certain that Harry was blushing. Severus was, and he was all the more grateful for the night.

“Most people don’t want me,” Severus said in a near whisper, perplexed at why Harry would choose to focus his attentions on himself.

Harry leaned forward and Severus had a rather mad thought that he was about to kiss him.

Instead he murmured, “Most people aren’t me.”

“No,” Severus agreed, “I suppose not.”

After that night, Severus felt a shift in his relationship to Harry. It was nothing as blatant as many others, but it was a shift nonetheless. Before, Harry would follow Severus around, chatting nonstop. Now, he drifted back to his prior arrangements of sitting at different tables (with Potter at the Gryffindor table, with Alice Fortescue and Amos Diggory at the Hufflepuff table, with Barty and Mary Macdonald at the Ravenclaw table), but his eyes and his smiles continued to find Severus in the Great Hall, making the room feel small the way he looked at him.

Harry also continued to sit with Severus in the library, sharing notes and laughing at Severus’ ‘side snark’, as he so eloquently phrased it, when Severus studied for OWLS with Lily, Barty, and Evan.

“I’m glad to see someone appreciates you for the genius you are,” Lily said with a grin when the two of them followed behind Harry and Potter after one such session in the library. Potter had interrupted them, asking Harry if he wanted to go flying with him and Black, and Harry had lit up in such a way that Severus could hardly begrudge him when he raced off to figure out the details.

“It’s quite odd,” Severus admitted to his friend, keeping his voice low so he would not be overheard. “Harry… Harry could be friends with anyone.”

“Harry is friends with everyone,” Lily corrected Severus. “But it’s youuuu he makes those goofy eyes at.”

Severus glanced down at her and raised a brow. “Goofy eyes?”

“Mhmm.” Lily caused her face to go slack and her eyes, so similarly colored to Harry’s, to go round and adoring. An appreciated look on Harry, a disturbing one on Lily. “Like how Potter looks at me.”

“Potter is a toerag,” Severus scoffed. “He’s hardly in the same realm as Harry.”

“That’s because you loveeee Harryyy,” Lily whispered in a sing-song voice. “Sev and Harry sitting in a tree—”

“I don’t know why I tolerate you,” Severus hissed. His face felt as if he’d been hit by a stinging hex it was so hot. “Merlin, Lily.”

“You tolerate me because you love me too,” Lily said confidently with a flick of her hair and a wink. “Just not like you do Harry.”

Severus curled his lip up at her and refused to expound further on the matter. Though, when he reflected on it later, Severus knew that his adoration and love for Lily was a thing much different than his adoration and love for Harry.

If Severus were a braver man, a better man, he would tell Harry such a thing.

He imagined how it would go… he would admit his feelings to Harry, Harry would eagerly throw himself in Severus’ arms, their classmates would clap politely for them, happy to witness their love…

Severus snorted at himself.

His life hardly resembled a romance novel.

Though, it was beginning to seem as if it were a mystery novel when Severus arrived to breakfast one morning in early March and Harry was no where to be seen. It wasn’t uncommon for Harry to miss breakfast, as he did on the occasions when he appeared midway through the meal with the Headmaster, but by lunch, Severus was concerned.

“Harry has not been in any classes,” he said to Regulus, Evan nodding from Severus’ side. “Do you know where he is?”

Regulus’ brows pinched in the center. “Why would I know where your boyfriend is?”

Severus scowled. “This is not the time for jokes! He is missing.”

“Maybe he’s skipping? He does that sometimes?” Evan offered.

Harry never skipped without sleeping in his bed though. If Harry were skipping, then Severus would have sent a light tickling hex at him, Harry would have mumbled that he wasn’t attending classes, and Severus would have seen him at lunch. And as none of those things had happened, thus, Harry was missing.

“Mm, I can sort this rather quickly,” Regulus suddenly said, quite brightly. “I’ll be back, boys.”

Severus waited in tense silence, worrying about the many different ways Harry could be taken from the school by someone looking to avenge the brothers he killed, or perhaps by the Dark Lord himself, as many saw Harry as a contestant for his power.

Regulus walked directly to the Gryffindor table, tapped his brother on the shoulder, said something Severus couldn’t hear, glanced at a parchment Black unrolled beneath the table, and walked back to the Slytherin table with a perplexed expression.

“Harry isn’t in the castle,” he said, apparently believing that to be the end of the matter.

“And you know this how?” Evan asked him.

Regulus rolled his grey eyes and stuck his nose in the air. “My brother has a map of the school, he can see every person within the grounds, and Harry isn’t here.”

Any other time, Severus would be filled with anger at Black having such an invasive item and envy that it was likely a brilliant creation of his own, but he had no time for that.

“I’m going to find Slughorn,” he said decisively, rising to his feet with his desire to do something. “Harry could be hurt.”

“The Dark Lord could have set up a kidnapping,” Regulus said, quite unhelpfully. “Harry has stolen all his followers.”

“In which case I guess we’ll finally know who’s stronger, eh?” Evan added, also unhelpfully.

Severus sneered at them both before practically fleeing the Great Hall to track down his Head of House.

“Gone,” Severus repeated blankly, staring incredulously at Slughorn. “Gone where, sir?”

Slughorn chuckled and took another bite of the sandwich he’d been lunching on when Severus barged in his office.

“Off with Albus, Mister Snape. Something about important affairs. I tell you,” Slughorn wagged a finger at Severus with a smile, “it’s a shame that boy wouldn’t join my club, he’s interesting. Did you know the Peverell line is one of the oldest in magical history?”

Not only did Severus not know that, he also did not care.

“Do you know when Harry will return?” he asked.

“Nope.” Slughorn continued his inane smiling as if a student under his watch was not on some absurd trip with the headmaster. “It’s touching, your concern, Mister Snape, but I think Mister Peverell can handle himself, hm?”

Certainly no one knew better than Severus that Harry could take care of himself, but Severus thought it was high time that someone else took over for the boy.

He didn’t get the opportunity to do so for two more days.

Once more, Severus joined his housemates at breakfast and, once more for the third morning in a row, Harry was not in attendance.

Severus had no more than unrolled the Daily Prophet than Professor Slughorn approached him.

“Mister Snape, there you are! I’ve been sent to fetch you, my boy. Your presence is requested in the Hospital Wing.”

“Is it?” Severus asked curiously. “For why, sir?”

“You’ll see,” with a wink was the only reply Severus received.

And if Horace Slughorn believed that Severus would somehow be delighted to find his friend in a bed in the Hospital Wing, looking as if he’d gone twelve rounds with a bludger in a locked room, he was wholly mistaken.

“Harry.” Severus’ hands faltered when he went to place them on Harry’s arm only to see a thick layer of burn cream covered the skin. “What happened?”

Harry, whose lovely face was bruised, swollen, and had dried blood from recently healed cuts, had the idiotic audacity to smile at Severus.

“Killed him,” he whispered. He groaned when he inclined his head toward Madam Pomfrey’s closed office door. “Albus and I, killed him.”

Severus sank in the chair beside Harry’s bed and tentatively held Harry’s pinky finger, one of the only unmarked parts of his body. He pushed aside the fact that Harry was apparently on a first name basis with the headmaster and partially chalked it up to Harry being delirious from the immense amount of empty potion bottles on his bedside table.

“Who?” Severus.

“Riddle.” Harry’s lashes fluttered and his smile flickered. “Dead.”

Severus sucked in a shocked breath.

The Dark Lord, the wizard who promised to bring a war of death to muggles and torture to muggleborns, dead.

“How?” Severus asked him. The Dark Lord was powerful, had dozens of followers. Harry was a boy, a powerful and beautiful boy, but a boy nonetheless.

“Magic.” Harry’s eyes opened to small slits that he watched Severus though. “You’re free, Sev. Everyone’s… everyone’s free. Safe.”

“You clearly aren’t.” Severus swallowed as he looked over the marks of what had to be a lengthy and terrible battle. “Are you in pain?”

“No.” Harry’s smile flickered once more, just for Severus. “‘M fine. I have you.”

When Harry succumbed to the potions, drifting off to a sleep hopefully taking him away from the pain, Severus swore that if nobody else would protect this foolish boy, he would merely do it himself.

And so he did.

Severus watched over Harry when he was released from the Hospital Wing and the others began hounding him, wanting to hear what the Daily Prophet merely hinted at.

“The Prophet said you killed him with a sword?” Dawlish said with bright eyes when Harry finally returned to dinner and was immediately praised and questioned in equal measures.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Severus sneered. “Here,” he made a plate of food for Harry, who would need to wear a sling on his right arm for another week while the bones in his once shattered shoulder regrew, “eat.”

Severus watched over Harry when the articles outlining his and Professor Dumbledore’s victory over the Dark Lord came along with cursed letters from furious followers.

“Where’ve you been all my life?” Harry laughed when Severus showed him a simple way to test if a letter had friendly information or not.

“Waiting for you to arrive,” Severus said truthfully.

It felt as inevitable as it felt incredible when Severus and Harry finished their final OWLS examination and Harry kissed Severus on the Hogwarts lawns.

“This is mad,” Harry whispered to Severus as he held him by the lapels of his robe and smiled up at him with the same sweet lips that had just been pressed against Severus’.

“I propose we embrace insanity,” Severus said before pulling Harry in and kissing him with as much passion as he could.

Even if Potter and his gang had not bothered Severus all year, they were still on Severus’ list of sworn enemies when they began whistling at the two of them when they walked past.

“Oi! Harry! Get a room, mate!” Potter yelled with a grin for Harry.

Harry grinned at Severus and moved his hands to a more socially acceptable placement of Severus’ own hands.

“Okay,” he agreed easily. “C’mon, Sev, let’s take this somewhere more private so we don’t upset anyones sensitive delicacies.”

An idea Severus was more than happy to entertain.

By the time they loaded on the train to leave Hogwarts, Severus felt, for the first time, at peace with leaving. And it had everything to do with his sense of home, his sense of safety, being in the 5’9” boy with bright eyes, messy hair, and an infectious laugh that stood by his side.

Harry held Severus’ hand and smiled at Barty and Regulus after they disembarked the train together.

“Where to?” he asked them.

Severus and Regulus exchanged quick looks of confusion.

“Your place, I suppose?” Regulus suggested slowly.

Harry laughed, causing Severus to smile despite his confusion over the situation.

“Truth time? I don’t actually have a house,” Harry said cheerfully. “So either we kill some of your parents, and I’d hear a case for Sev’s dad or Reg’s mum, or we just… just wing it.”

“Wing it,” Severus repeated slowly, staring in open mouth shock at his boyfriend. “Are you mad?”

“Yup.” Harry smiled at Severus and lifted their entwined hands to his mouth, where he placed a soft kiss to Severus’ hand. “Plenty of chance to back out now.”

“Far too late for that, I’m afraid,” Severus said with a small smile.

“Wing it it is!” Harry cried. “To… er…”

“Knockturn Alley,” Regulus said just as Barty declared, “My father’s house!”

“I’ll hear arguments while we walk,” Harry told them.

Severus shook his head at himself as he walked with the group of boys. All lost, all meant to be alone, all joined together by a mad boy with a beautiful face and an even more beautiful personality.

It was far, far too late for Severus to turn back.

“That is quite the story, Mister Potter.”

Harry grinned and patted down his hair nervously, covering the scar that was a mere silver mark on his skin.

“I know it sounds insane, but I promise it’s the truth, sir,” Harry said earnestly. He leaned forward in his chair, catching and holding Professor Dumbledore’s eyes. “You can check, if you’d like.”

“Or, perhaps less invasive…” Dumbledore stood and moved to his cabinet, pulling out the familiar pensive. “Are you familiar?”

Harry laughed and took out the wand that travelled back with him while he moved over to join Dumbledore.

“Sir, you have no idea how much.”

It took the rest of the night, early morning rays filling the Headmasters office with orange light by the time Harry replayed walking to his death and making a choice.

“Amazing,” Dumbledore breathed. They exited the pensive and Dumbledore sank in his office chair and somehow looked older than Harry had ever seen, despite being years younger than he’d been the first time Harry met him.

“I appear to owe you quite the apology,” Dumbledore said quietly, his eyes truly sorrowful.

Harry waved his hand and gratefully accepted a scone from the tray that popped up on Dumbledore’s desk.

“You did what you had to do, sir,” he said truthfully. “I don’t know what decisions I would have made if I were in your shoes. I’m glad I wasn’t.”

Dumbledore nodded and stroked his beard as he looked out the window that oversaw the grounds.

“We appear to be in a unique position here,” he said thoughtfully. “With our knowledge of where Tom’s horcruxes are, and the lack of one in your own mind,” he inclined his head toward Harry, “my dear boy, we could end the war before it has truly began.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “Together, sir?”

Dumbledore’s smile was genuine when he reached over his desk and offered Harry his hand.

“I can think of no better person to work with,” he said, his eyes twinkling merrily. “I can give you access to my home while we work, if you’d like. It’s rather unused, I’m afraid, but—”

“I’d like to be a student,” Harry blurted quickly. “I- I do have a plan,” he admitted. “I want to save them, sir, keep Snape from joining the death eaters, keep Sirius’ brother alive…”

“And the others?” Dumbledore leaned forward and scanned Harry intently over the top of his glasses. “There are a few that I would wager have already joined Tom.”

“Such as?”

“The Lestrange brothers,” Dumbledore said, finally not seeing any purpose in withholding information from Harry. “Perhaps Bellatrix Black as well.”

“Respectfully, sir, someone has to be the example.” Harry’s lips twisted as he thought of Neville’s parents, of Sirius, of the way Bellatrix tortured Hermione. “Seems like they volunteered.”

“I don’t condone killing,” Dumbledore said, a soft contrast to Harry’s harsh statement.

Harry shrugged. “Do you condone torturing Frank and Alice Longbottom in to insanity? Because that’s what they did, sir. Or, what they’re going to do, I suppose.”

Dumbledore made a face while he seemed to debate the dilemma. He poured two cups of tea from the breakfast tray, handing Harry his before sipping his own.

“I cannot condone the death of any student, despite how disturbing their future actions may be.” Dumbledore held his hand up when Harry opened his mouth to argue. “However, if they have taken Tom’s mark, I do not feel if it is in the other students’ best interests to have them within our castle either.”

Dumbledore’s sparkle seemed to be on full blast when he added:

“I suppose the old saying is ‘what happens in the Slytherin common room, stays in the Slytherin common room’.”

Harry nodded shortly, understand that to be as much permission to handle the Slytherins on his own as he was likely to receive. He had toyed with the idea of sorting Gryffindor, getting to become dorm mates with his dad and Sirius was like his most desperate desire; so close, yet still out of reach.

“I believe you may find that James, while disliking Severus quite viciously, has been spotted giving directions to younger Slytherin students.” Dumbledore gave Harry a knowing smile. “Correct directions, even.”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said genuinely. “Would it be possible to, er… I mean, I don’t quite have any place to stay until term?”

“You should stay at my home, of course,” Dumbledore said. “I would offer you housing within the castle, but I’m afraid your presence over the summer may make our cover story much more difficult to sell to the professors. And you know the ghosts are quite the gossips.”

“Thank you, again, sir,” Harry laughed. “I also… er…”

“Should be given a key to the Dumbledore vault,” Dumbledore said, both somehow guessing at Harry’s next predicament of being entirely poor and shocking Harry at the offer. “We are distantly related, after all,” Dumbledore said with a small wink. “I seem to owe you much more than mere gold, you dear, brave, boy.”

“That’s… that’s really nice of you, thank you, sir,” Harry said.

“Think nothing of it, Harry.” Dumbledore grabbed a chocolate drizzled scone and relaxed back in his chair with a smile. “Now, I believe you said Frank and Alice Longbottom? Tell me, did my plan on making them Head Boy and Girl next year succeed then?”

Harry laughed loudly and felt all his previous antagonism towards Dumbledore- the frustration he felt while hunting for horcruxes with Ron and Hermione, his fear the Dumbledore had never seen him as anything more than a lamb to be slaughtered -melt away as he was finally an equal to the wizard he has admired for so much of his life.

After spending the last two weeks of summer at Dumbledore’s home, flooing to Hogwarts nearly every day for tea with Albus, Harry sat on the stool and waited for the inevitable conclusion.

“SLYTHERIN!”

As much of an accident as Harry’s jump back in time was, as much as Harry knew that he would miss Ron and Hermione for the rest of his life, it was difficult to be terribly putout by the new life Harry planned.

Not when he saw James Potter clapping politely at the Gryffindor table while Sirius Black lazily levitated a fork by his side.

-Alive and young.

Not when Harry saw Lily Evans smiling at Harry from where she sat with a group of other Gryffindor girls.

-Happy and beautiful.

And certainly not when Harry sat at the Slytherin table and received the biggest shock he’d had yet.

“Severus Snape.”

Harry’s professor, a man Harry despised and later admired in nearly equal amounts, sat before him— young and alive and hot.

It wasn’t Severus Snape, bitter and vile potions Professor, it was Severus, the half-blood prince who entertained Harry so much through his sixth year.

Harry accepted Severus’ hand and impulsively brought it to his lips with a smile that made his eyes undoubtedly twinkle harder than Albus’ ever had.

“Pleased to meet you,” Harry murmured, a delighted feeling rushing through him as he placed a feather light kiss to Severus’ knuckles.

Accident or not, maybe Death had ulterior motives in sending Harry to 1975 instead of 1991, as Harry had wanted.

And who was Harry to argue with Death?