A/N- So, like my story "A Twisted Harry," this is yet another angle that my story, "Breaking Forwards" could have taken, but didn't. It's just a fragment really. A blood five thousand word fragment. lol
Potter was assigned detention and now Snape is walking him down to where it will be held. This first bit is just a reiteration of what he found himself walking into.
My Blood
They turned down the hallway leading to one of the private laboratories he had on hand for his 6th and 7th year students to work on for experiments. The air turned foul as soon as they were only a few steps down, but Severus didn't hear any kind of sound from Potter; something he hadn't thought possible before then.
Just wait, his mind thought with an almost gleeful maliciousness.
The particular laboratory that they were headed to was one that had suffered an explosion of incredibly smelly proportions. Furthermore, the purplish-brown gunk that his students had inadvertently created smelled inexplicably horrible; causing more than one student serving detention down there to accidently lose the contents of their stomach—in turn, helping to further add to the smell.
As if that weren't bad enough in and of itself alone, the gunk was stuck hard to nearly every surface in there—ceilings, walls, you name it. Thus far they had only managed to remove the goo using physical means: scrapers and ice picks sharpened with magic that, in any other circumstances, would slice through nearly anything.
The goop seemed to have no end of nasty surprises associated with it. In addition to all of the other difficulties that it had created for Severus, it also was a serious danger, in that it was toxic to human skin; literally burning any flesh that it came in contact with. Unfortunately, the creators of the failed potion had learned that when the explosion had initially taken place. Luckily none of his Slytherins had been involved, but as it was, two Ravenclaws and a Hufflepuff had sustained injuries of excessively painful proportions—if the screams Severus had heard all the way from the other side of the dungeons had been any indication.
The extent and seriousness of those three students' injuries had forced Poppy to have them transferred to St. Mungos; where they had undergone several painful treatments in order to replace the skin—and some bone in one girl's case—that had literally melted away.
Severus, after several weeks of being awakened by nightmares in which those screams had played the grisly background soundtrack for, was now working for a way to remedy the situation; hopefully by discovering some kind of neutralizing agent with which to either vanquish the muck more safely, or at the very least, more easily.
It was that room to which Severus was taking the boy. Ever since the accident (which had occurred in the last month of the previous school year), he had been using the room for dealing with serious discipline problems. After all, having his students clean cauldrons simply didn't compare with the ghastliness of working on the goop.
HSHS
The room that his professor stopped in front of was unfortunately the one where the disgusting smell was emanating from. The smell was more than offensive; it was completely rank and horrible, reminding Harry a great deal of the way his bed had smelled at the end of the previous summer.
No, I will not think about that! He swallowed his bile and stilled his insides, turning his face to the stone that he had presented his uncle with all summer long.
Nothing can touch me; I'm not real—I don't exist!
He was simply an observer to the horrors that went on unchecked around him. His experiences were merely punishment for accidentally having been the one to live when the hero had died. Fate had fucked up, and now he had to pay the price.
"Notice that there is no door for this room. It was taken off when I realized just how high the toxicity of the fumes could get with no ventilation," Professor Snape told him in a dangerously low voice.
"This is a failed experiment that some of my upper years managed to create by accident. It goes beyond any explosion of mere Longbottom proportions. The product created is extremely toxic to human skin; meaning that you should not, under any circumstances, touch the stuff with your bare hands. Do you understand me, Potter?" The man asked him sharply; piercing through his thoughts with his voice, as well as the intensity of his eyes.
"Yes sir," he said seriously, looking intently back into his professor's face.
The man made him put on a pair of dragon hide gloves before handing him some kind of scraper and what looked like an ice pick.
"These have been sharpened using magic; so do not touch these unless you are wearing the gloves."
Last of all, the man flicked his wand and muttered something too low for Harry to pick out, but the effect was obvious, as Harry soon had a pair of tight fitting goggles and a face mask of some configuration now covering his nose and mouth.
"Do you see the space that is free of the potion here on the floor, Potter?"
He looked down where his professor was pointing and saw a space of approximately two feet by two and a half—roughly—scratched out on the floor directly next to the doorway.
"Yes sir," he said, his voice muffled by the mask.
"It took three students a total of two weeks, working in every spare moment of their schedules, to clear that much. Do you understand me Potter?" The man stated; a smirk appearing on his face as Harry realized the sheer enormity of the task before him.
"You have been excused from attending all of your classes, except mine, for the next two weeks. You will still be expected to keep up with your homework though," the man smirked snarkily at him.
"Let's see if you can't do any better, shall we?" Snape said, turning around and sauntering away.
"Oh, and if you decide not to work, I will know and you will regret it," the man called out to him before he left the hallway completely.
Harry looked back to the dark violet creation that coated nearly every surface in the room and narrowed his eyes in stubbornness.
I'll show him what I can do, and he'll see.
He wondered if he could possibly figure out a way to help rid the room of the mess with some kind of potion. He and Blaise had been writing notes back and forth all summer to help beef up their knowledge of potions in hopes of doing better that year in Snape's class, which was rumored to be impossibly difficult.
He took a step forwards into the space cleared out by the previous victims of the impossible detention, and knelt down, determined to show his professor just how tough he really was.
. . .
Here is where the story deviates from what happened in Breaking Forwards.
Severus looked up from his thoughts as his wards began to buzz softly in his ears.
"Blast!" He cursed under his breath as he sprinted towards the side of the dungeons where Potter was serving his detention. He slowed down as he rounded the corner; loathe to accidentally startle the boy into doing something more idiotic than whatever he had done to set the wards off in the first place.
Naturally adept at making very little sound while moving, he managed to come within ten feet of the boy without being seen. He arrived just in time to see the boy shoot himself backwards into the hall, an already gloveless hand going up to lift off his face mask from his mouth; all so the boy could vomit a long stream of bright red blood onto the stone floor.
The boy was still spitting the remaining strains of bloodied bile as Severus knelt down beside him. He kept his face blank, but his mind was whirring with anxiety for what could have caused such a reaction to have taken place in the first place. None of the other students who had served detention here—nor himself—had vomited blood after breathing in the fumes of the goop, and all of those had been subjected to many more hours than the few Potter had endured thus far that day.
He saw Potter flinch as he became aware of Severus's close and sudden proximity to him. It was a reaction that bothered him, and he promised himself time to analyze the situation later, when he was alone.
"Sorry for stopping my work, sir," the teen muttered ashamedly at him.
Severus quirked an eyebrow in disbelief, but didn't respond to the boy's inane apology.
"Is this the first time that this has happened?" He asked, indicating the mess.
"Today, sir?" The teen's voice asked weakly.
Now that was an answer he had not been expecting whatsoever.
"How long have you been vomiting blood, Potter?" He asked.
"Two or three months?"
Two or three months!
"Which is it? Two or three?" He asked, purposely sounding gruff in order to hide his growing fear.
The teenager brought his knees up under his chin and wrapped his arms around his legs before answering.
"Since the first of the summer hols," was the whispered response.
"And why is it that no one has heard about it until now?" He asked, angry now that the boy had been suffering needlessly the entire time.
"No one noticed, sir." The young man said, looking down at his shoes.
"You can't mean to tell me that your relatives didn't notice you running away mid-conversation all summer—just so you could vomit up blood?"
At his accusation, the teen leapt to his feet, an angry expression on his face.
Severus stood as well, but a great deal more gracefully.
"No they didn't, sir," the young man said, running his hands through his shoulder length hair.
"Let's say that you're telling the truth," Severus said, his anger still growing. "If so, why didn't the great Harry Potter feel the need to enlighten them! You certainly have no problem speaking up—or back—to me."
Two spots of pink appeared on Potter's thin cheeks, but he kept his mouth shut.
Severus needed to know what was going on, so he could do something to fix the problem and get on with his evening.
"Didn't the great Harry Potter feel that he deserved top quality medical treatment?" He accused, pointing his finger towards the increasingly upset young man before him.
His student flinched at the pointing finger, but held his ground; the determination not fading one iota from his hard green eyes.
"If I don't deserve food, then I can't see quite how I deserve medical care," Potter finally answered him in a low gravelly voice that Severus had to strain to hear properly.
"What are you talking about?" Severus demanded, crossing his arms over his chest to hide his sudden confusion.
Potter stepped forwards and stood directly chest to chest with him. The top of the teen's head only met his chin, so he was forced to look down into those angry green eyes.
"If I don't deserve food, then I can hardly deserve medical treatment." The teen said, speaking very deliberately between clenched teeth.
"You are being ridiculously dramatic. Of course you deserve food," Severus exclaimed back to him, his eyes glinting dangerously in the low light of the dungeon hallway.
Potter barked a laugh against him.
"I only serve one purpose for my uncle. Want to see?" Potter asked him in a far more bitter voice than he had ever heard come from the boy's lips.
No, he did not want to see.
However, the choice was taken from him as Potter slowly slid down to his knees, trailing his fingers down his professor's torso until he was touching them to the front of Severus's pants.
NO.
"What are you doing!" Severus demanded in a hoarse and choked voice; frozen to the spot at the sight of his student on his knees in front of him.
"My job," Potter replied, pulling the zipper of Severus's black pants down.
Severus's paralysis finally broke and he grabbed the front of the boy's robes and pulled him up to his eye level.
"I could have you expelled for this," he threatened, his mind still reeling with the implications of what the teenager had been about to do.
"And then I go back to doing the same thing I was doing before you stopped me," was the choked reply.
Severus finally remembered that the boy was still shorter than him, and he stiffly lowered the teen back down to the ground in return. He released his hold with a snarl, while reaching down with his other hand to zip his pants back up.
"You need to be seen by Madam Pomfrey," Severus said in a low voice, choosing not to focus any more on the situation until he had a calming drought—or two—well circulating in his overwrought system.
"No," Potter said emphatically while taking a step backwards from him.
"Yes you do," Severus hissed back, grabbing the teen's upper arm and attempting to pull him down the hallway with him.
Potter jerked backwards, throwing Severus off balance with the awkward motion of the teen's body. He was forced to let go of the black haired young man lest he want to wind up actually laying on top of him there in the hallway. And after what had so nearly occurred mere minutes ago, he was trying to be extra diligent at not allowing himself to be in that situation—or any others—ever again.
Instead, he twisted his body to the right and caught himself on a hand lightly. He looked up to see Potter trip backwards and land hard directly besides the pool of blood that he had forgotten to vanish.
"Potter, you're sick," he said evenly, getting to his feet calmly. "Madam Pomfrey can help you."
"I don't want her to know," Potter snarled at him, scrambling farther away from him before managing to find his feet.
"Trust me. You're not the first case of abuse that Madam Pomfrey has seen while employed here."
The teenager reacted as though Severus had reached out and actually slapped him.
"I'm not just a 'case of abuse'," he growled back at him.
"Of course not; you're the light of the world," Severus said sarcastically. He knew his words were more callous than necessary, but for fuck's sake, why did everything have to happen to him?
"How can you say that?" Potter's face had gone white; his eyes staring accusingly at him.
Okay, maybe he has a point. Potter wasn't the boy he had thought he was.
"Answer ME!" Potter yelled at him, as a sudden wind began rippling around them.
"Congratulations Mr. Potter. You are as screwed up as the rest of us. Are you happy now?" He spat at the angry green eyed visage before him.
Appallingly, the teen began to laugh, bending over nearly double as he did so.
"Potter, it is my unhappy duty to inform you that you have become completely demented," he sneered, barely cognizant of the increasing strength of the still present wind.
He wasn't expecting the teen to suddenly leap at him; seemingly propelled by an invisible force of fury that apparently was all directed at him.
It threw him against the wall, with Potter landing atop him only mere seconds later.
Oh no, not again, his mind gibbered to itself.
There was a blinding flash of pain in his side and he threw the boy away from him as his survivor instincts kicked in. Reaching down to his side, he touched the area just above his right hip and felt the warmth of hot blood against his fingertips. He brought his fingers up into the light and saw that they were indeed wet with bright red blood.
My blood, as he realized with a start that the little bastard had cut him somehow.
He looked up and growled at the teenager before him, unable to put together a string of words that wouldn't get him sent immediately to Azkaban.
Even more infuriating that having his blood dripping down his side was the fact that the teenager wasn't frightened of him. Potter stood loose, but secure in his stance across from him—the emotions unreadable in his face.
Odd, his mind whispered below the haze of pain.
Potter didn't even react as Severus took a step forwards towards him.
"You little—," he trailed off, unwilling to speak the word.
"Bastard?" The teenager suggested, speaking with an adult timbre in his voice. "Shit? Fucker?"
That damnable brat.
"Infuriating brat," Severus said, supplying his own insult.
"Really Severus? Is 'brat' the best you can do?" The taunt was delivered coolly.
Severus began to wonder when he had lost control of the situation as he rushed the boy, intent on making him wish he had never messed with Severus Snape. He wanted to hurt the boy—not with magic, but with his hands, with his body physically causing the insufferable brat pain of an undeniable level.
The teen made no sound as Severus delivered one well deserved punch directly into his nose. He felt the cartilage twist and break under his knuckles, but he felt no remorse for his actions.
Not until the boy slipped on the still wet puddle of bloody vomit, that is. He tried to catch the teen by the robes, but Potter kicked out at him, understandably not wanting to be in his clutches—especially now with blood streaming across his face from a nose that Severus had broken.
He fell to the floor, briefly winded from the kick that Potter had landed on his stomach, and further aggravating his side injury as well—causing it to throb at a much faster rate than it had been doing before.
Before him, time seemed to slow as he watched the teenager try to regain his balance by grabbing the doorway of the room filled with the muck of his detention. But—oh shit—Severus thought, as he realized that Potter's hands were slick with the blood from his nose that had continued to gush. He watched as the Gryffindor grabbed at the doorway once, and then twice, before gravity finally won—pulling the teen down with it.
His student landed hard on the stone floor—hard enough to bounce again; his motion still continuing backwards.
Severus pushed his pain to the back of his mind as time skittered and swirled in chaotic scenes before him. The hallway had gone deathly quiet; only allowing him to hear the pounding of his heart beating frantically in his ears. He managed to make it to his feet, even while the world was twisting sideways, just in time to be too late to save the boy from landing on his arse in the crud of the room.
He couldn't seem to make his feet work. He stumbled as he moved forwards, but his eyes never left the face of the teenager before him. He watched the teenager as he looked around in horror at where he had ultimately ended up.
Thankfully, Potter had only taken off the dragon hide glove from his right hand, as the other was still covered. However, he realized at the same time as the teen that the other hand was completely submerged in the goo.
He saw Potter throw his head back in pain as he sought to free his arm from the all encompassing mass surrounding it. He saw the tendons standing out on the boy's throat as he worked to keep the scream confined internally.
And then finally he was there and he was pulling the boy out hastily, just as the teenager was freeing his hand as well. He got a look at the immediate damage that the goop had inflicted on the lad's skin and actually had to work to swallow against the sudden bile that had risen up in his throat. The boy's hand was free of the purplish gunk, but the effects were not dissipating in the least.
The skin looked as though it were literally boiling. Small bubbles were pushing their way up to the surface of the flesh, while others exploded the skin, sending blood flying in random directions around them. Severus pulled the boy away from the room and into the hallway, putting the wards back up around the doorway as he did so. He banished the boy's crud soaked robes and realized with a hasty glance that the lad's hand was not the only piece of exposed skin to suffer torturous pain that evening. The gunk had made it partially up Potter's arm as well, causing the boy to writhe with the suffering it was causing him.
Severus was more than a little unnerved that the fifteen year-old laid out before him was still not making any sound other than a pained harsh gasping noise. His eyes were closed and his body continued to twist and buck spasmodically, but the thin teenager was otherwise completely silent.
Damned muggles, he thought incoherently as he struggled to think past his growing panic.
He needed help, but he knew that he couldn't safely ask Poppy without fear of severe repercussions. He had promised her and the headmaster both that precautions were in place against another situation like his other three students had originally suffered. And they had been in place, but Potter, always bloody Potter, had proven him incompetent once more.
Well at any rate, he knew that he needed to get him out of the hallway; and soon, before Albus happened to wander past. He wouldn't doubt that the old man already had an inkling that something was wrong, but if he were going to have to explains something of this magnitude, he did not want to be in a dimly lit, rarely traveled, rank smelling place like this to do so in.
With that idea firmly in place, he conjured a stretcher and strapped Potter firmly down upon it, lest he fall out and hurt himself even worse. Severus eyed the most affected areas with concern as the boiling motion gave way to something much more painful looking. The skin was still swelling, but now it was drying out and cracking; sending deep bone wracking shudders through the teen as it did so—yet still no noises escaped his lips.
Severus cast a disillusionment charm over them both before hastily moving them through the labyrinth like corridors of the dungeons, straight to his quarters. The pain in his side throbbed in time with his movements, but he had greater matters on his mind than a little spilt blood—even if it was his own.
HS
Minerva was in quite a state when she got to Albus's office that night.
"Albus!" She yelled, standing in the midst of his empty office.
"Oh, good evening Minerva! Care for a lemon drop?" He asked her calmly, walking into the office in a bright canary yellow nightshirt accompanied by a cherry red and pink bathrobe (with matching bunny slippers, no less).
"Where is he Albus?" She demanded, her eyes glaring harshly at him.
"He?" Albus answered the irate woman innocently.
"Mr. Potter—Harry. Where is he?"
"I assume he's still with Severus," Albus said, taking a seat and indicating that she should sit as well.
But she was having none of it.
Putting her hands on the edge of his desk, she leaned in directly in front of the older wizard and then through clenched teeth said, "You assume?"
"I would have been informed if Harry or Severus had left the castle," he said mildly; a rather impressive feat to do with Minerva only inches from his nose.
"Severus wouldn't need to leave the castle to kill Harry and you know it. What about that mess he got into with those three students at the end of last year? I know for a fact that Pomona and Filius—in particular—are still quite angry with him over that."
"Why in the world would he want to kill Harry?" Albus asked; the twinkle blossoming in his eyes as he did so.
"For pity's sake Albus; don't play stupid with me."
"Oh I know that Severus has his problems with the lad, but he's also sworn to protect him as well. I would think that you would remember that before jumping to hasty allegations of guilt," he said, carefully not looking at her as he unstuck two pieces of his favorite candy.
After all, he didn't need to see her contrite expression as she finally sat down with a very unladylike thump in the nearest armchair. He had worked with her for quite a number of years. He had a rather firm grasp on how her mind worked as a result.
Severus, on the other hand, was still growing and maturing, and as a result still managed to surprise him every so often.
Albus relaxed his mind and sought out the consciousness of his potions' master. Over such a long distance as this, he could only pick out the most vibrant of emotions or feelings, but that was usually enough to tell him whether his presence was warranted or not.
-Oh shit, Albus is going to kill me.—
That was a pretty good sign that he ought to go investigate. Severus rarely let his thoughts become so plebian, let alone frantic.
"Minerva dear," he said, standing up and looking at her benignly. "As much as I trust Severus, I know that he still quite a young man," he added, knowing how much the woman before him valued age and its so-called accompanying wisdom. "So if it will put your mind at ease, then I shall check on them this very moment."
"Oh would you Albus?"
"Yes my sweet," he said pleasantly, maneuvering around the desk to kiss her hand before taking his leave of her.
He headed for Severus's quarters first. It was after midnight and there really was no reason for his youngest faculty member to still be patrolling the halls that night anyways. Besides, he had a hunch as to how the evening had gone for Severus, and he wasn't one to doubt his hunches.
He could have flooed over, but chose to walk instead, feeling that the situation might get better with time; ultimately meaning that his visit was for naught and that he could simply go back to bed.
The unreasonableness of his thoughts actually caused him to stop mid-step and snort to himself over the unlikelihood of such a thing happening. Really, he knew Hogwarts far better than many had ever claimed to do; and he knew that within their walls the bizarre and unusual was not only possible, but rather it was to be expected, and then worked around accordingly.
Upon arriving, he was not surprised to see that the guardian of Severus's portrait entrance was shooing him away with a sour expression on his face. The entrance to Severus's rooms was guarded by the Hogwart's Potions Master from two centuries prior; a rather formidable man with even less regard for humans—or children—than Severus himself had. It was rather amusing that Severus had chosen Professor Ogsworth as his guardian then, all considering.
Ogsworth's portrait had been painted about ten years into his tenure there, and ultimately it was a good thing that he had decided to do so, since only a handful of months afterwards, the man had completely disappeared during a random potions' explosion during his 7th year advanced potions making class.
According to the legend, the man had been gone by the time the smoke cleared, yet no one in any of the surrounding hallways had seen him go, and all of his belongings had remained as well.
Albus shook his head at the memory of the portrait's history and quickly renegotiated the wards protecting Severus's quarters from being pried into. Ogsworth shot him a nasty hand signal as he forced the door to open, but Albus ignored it and quickly made his way into the room, relocking the door's wards behind him as he went.
Severus's quarters were always very clean and orderly—a direct contrast to Albus's own, something he knew Minerva took great delight in pointing out whenever she had the chance. That evening—or really it was early morning—was no different, but the room still felt wrong to him regardless.
For starters, the odor in the room was—off. Albus knew that his olfactory acumen was not as detailed or sensitive as Severus's, but he had still been around long enough to recognize when he was smelling something as unpleasant as burnt or rotting human flesh mixed with the underlying stench of vomit and blood. Those scents were very, very faint when he walked in, but they were still there.
Unsurprisingly then, the smells only got stronger as he quietly made his way across the sitting room, towards the right hand far corner where Severus's bedroom was located.
The door was cracked a bit already, allowing him to hear a strange gasping sound that he couldn't quite place.
His curiosity piqued, he opened the door to find a most unusual sight.
Severus was down to his pants and shirt—of which the sleeves were rolled up—and his hair was pulled back tightly from his face. He was sitting up in his bed, his long legs and arms stretched out around the hushed figure of a clearly suffering Harry Potter.
Harry's right hand and arm were bandaged tightly, and his far too pale face was literally dripping with sweat. Albus could see that the boy's left hand was clenched tightly in a fist as he fought against the pain in a long tension filled battle.
Severus had his left arm under the armpits of the boy, holding him tightly to his own chest to keep him from doing any more damage to himself. The boy—who looked to be wearing one of Severus's older—black—pajama sets, was also being held down to the bed by Severus's legs; and yet, even for all of that, he looked perfectly at ease at being in the position he was in.
"Ah headmaster," a ragged voice greeted him. "So pleasant of you to drop in," Severus said sarcastically, but with very little real malice in his voice. Albus suspected that the man was simply too worn out to bother.
Albus walked to the edge of the bed and became aware of yet one more piece of the already complex puzzle in front of him. Severus's left side of his white shirt was ripped and bloodied, and upon further inspection, Albus saw even more blood on the bed sheets themselves. Around the two forms in front of him lay an array of empty potion bottles, with more on the night table beside the bed itself.
"If you insist on being here, then at least get me a fresh towel and some blood replenishing potion from there in my far cabinet," Severus told him brusquely.
Albus didn't rebuke the other man for his lack of manners, but chose to do his bidding for the time being instead. Chastisements could always come later, when everything had settled back down into their usual inane level of normality—or insanity as Minerva had always insisted on calling it.
Albus brought back several vials of the stuff and more than one fresh towel. Severus looked critically at him, but wisely kept his mouth shut—for once, Albus thought with a smirk of his own.
Severus insisted that he give Harry the first vial of blood replenishing potion, but he also insisted that the dark haired man take some as well.
"I'm fine," Severus growled at him.
"Nonsense," Albus said, patting him lightly on one far too tense shoulder.
"Take it or I call Poppy. I'm assuming you don't want her involved, or she would already be here, yes?"
Severus shot him a mixed look of exasperation, anger and also pain, if Albus was reading the man's face correctly.
He handed Severus the potion—who took it with his right hand since his left was quite busy—and watched as the man quickly downed it.
"Very good," he stated jovially as Severus shot him a glare of utter hostility.
And then he tried to hand Severus a healing potion and nearly got spat at for his trouble.
"Take it or I force it down your throat," he said, still grinning.
"Why the ultimatums, Albus? Afraid of losing your touch?" Severus snarled at him; an expression that had lost its effect when Albus saw how protectively Severus was holding the boy in his arms.
"You're taking a pain relieving potion after this one also," Albus told him calmly, sitting lightly on the bed next to his two most wayward boys.
"No Albus, I am most certainly not. I will agree to the healing potion if you promise to stand up and leave me to this on my own, but I will not under any circumstances take a pain relief potion," Severus balked.
"Humor me. Why are you refusing to take the pain relief potion?" He asked curiously.
Severus looked away from him and towards the teen that had started to moan deep in his throat.
"Because he needs it more," Severus said quietly.
"We can make more," Albus said insistently.
"You do not understand," Severus stated stubbornly.
"Then explain it to me," Albus answered, his tone indicating that it was a command and not a suggestion.
"He has suffered enough at the hands of those around him, including myself. Compared to him, my pain is very little. I need to suffer; he does not." Severus answered, fixing him with a piercing dark eyed glare.
"I believe you've suffered enough."
"It's not your place to make that decision," he was told coldly.
"Who makes that decision then?" Albus asked.
"He does," Severus said, directing his eyes downwards to the teen now twisting back and forth in his arms.
"It looks as though he needs pain relief now," Albus pointed out.
"He's at his limit," Severus growled.
"You shouldn't have to hurt for him," Albus said calmly.
"Someone should," Severus said pointedly towards him.
"My boy, we've been over this. I did everything I could when you were young—," the man across from him shut him up with a furious glance.
"I'm not talking about myself. I'm talking about Potter!" He snapped at Albus. "I'm talking about you!" He bit out angrily.
Albus jerked back at the unexpected anger directed at himself.
"You fool," Severus accused him in an extremely choked and hoarse voice. "If Lily were here, she'd kill you herself for leaving him with those ignorant, immoral bastards that you call his relatives!"
Albus jerked again.
"What have you learned?" He whispered, suddenly afraid. It wasn't like Severus to advocate for Harry, furiously or otherwise.
"I don't blame him for turning against you! You have hardly left him any other recourse!" Severus was yelling now, his normally pale features reddening with fury.
"You've done your best to create another dark lord here in our decade Albus! How could you have left him with those—those monsters?"
Albus stood up, backing away hastily.
"I did what I felt was right, m'boy," he said in defense.
"Visit them yourself. Look at the memories of that great pig he has to call his uncle," Severus's face was shuttered, while his voice had returned to normal.
"Perhaps I will." Albus muttered before taking leave of them.
HSHS
In the few hours between getting Har—Potter back to his quarters and the arrival of Albus, Severus had learned more about the teenager in his care than he had previously been aware of altogether.
For one, Potter had an incredible pain tolerance—telling Severus that the teenager was used to bearing great amounts of suffering. Second, Potter was used to dealing with said pain on his own and quietly too; further raising Severus's own opinion of him as he did so. Third, the teenager had been beaten within an inch of his life not once or twice, but multiple times, if the scars on his body had anything to say about it.
What good did it do for him to protect Lily's son during the year if only to almost lose him every summer?
As for the other things—the unspoken things—and the fact that the lad nearly had given him a blow job right there in the fucking hallway allowed him to make assumptions about the other traumas the boy had likely undergone in his years growing up there.
He was—in a word—livid at Albus for allowing him to suffer such abuse when it could have been easily avoidable. His anger had only grown as he had fought to keep the boy alive and more or less stable. That evening's happenings had sunk in once he had been given a chance to think, and then they had proceeded to tear at him.
Potter's child or not, the boy was still an innocent suffering for no fucking reason. It reminded him of the dark lord and of himself as well, if he were to be personally honest.