Albus came slowly into the hospital wing for his daily visit. His face was even more lined than usual. There had been a new killing; the McAllistairs, a family of staunch light supporters. The whole family had been brutally murdered, even old 'grandpa' Peter. His wife Marie, their two grown up children visiting for the day; Katie and her husband Daniel with their baby daughter, and the newly wed Christopher and Janice. All tortured, killed and the dark mark shot over their house. They were all purebloods except for Daniel, whose father had been a muggle. Their crime had been talking too loud. Peter had stood up in the Wizgamot yesterday and recommended standing up against, 'this upstart that calls himself Lord Voldemort.' He had continued with an inspiring speech about how though one wizard might break like a splinter, if all who were for Justice and The Right stood together, they would form an unbreakable wand that would be an unbeatable weapon in the hands of the Good.

Brave, inspiring, but completely Gryffindor. Albus had been in Ravenclaw, but he had always admired the red and gold house. This make him likely to overlook their foibles, but sometimes their mistaken, foolish courage was force fed to him. This was one of those times. Voldemort wouldn't stand for such blatant defiance and this was the result. Their only chance against the dark was the bright light that was Harry Potter, the chosen one in the prophecy. So thinking, he looked at the beds. The same as yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that. He felt his heart sink yet again. He had hoped there would be something soon. It had been five days on the outside. That meant almost three weeks inside the speeded shield.

Wait, was that a movement? Surely Severus' hand had been on his chest? It was now sitting on his face. Severus sat up, the movement blurred as the figure inside the shield moved four times faster than the rest of the world. Albus dashed forwards, waving his wand as he did to take down the shield. The blue shimmered and collapsed, then fell with the sound of tinkling glass.

"Wait Severus." Dumbledore said as Severus made to get up. He took a vial filled with a green, sparkling substance out of his pocket. "You've been in a trance for almost three weeks by the shield's standards without any sustenance or liquid apart from a sustaining spell woven into the shield. Madame Pomfrey will have my head if I don't give you this super strength nutritional potion before you try moving." Severus nodded and downed the potion. Harry stirred and Albus went over to him to repeat the process.

"Well, I must go." Said Albus, his eyes twinkling. "Poppy will want to know you're awake."

"Wait one moment Albus. She'll probably come soon enough. Why don't you reveal whatever it was you couldn't tell me alone." Albus' eyes dimmed slightly and Harry looked at them in confusion.

"Severus my boy, do you really think now is the best time?"

"Yes." Albus sighed and sat on the end of Severus' bed.

"Very well. I suppose I should have told you a long time ago anyway."

"I suspect that neither of you want me to tiptoe around the subject, so I will be unusually blunt. Harry, you are not James Potter's son. You are, in fact, Severus' progeny." Harry was speechless. He looked at Severus, no, his father, but the man's face was unreadable. Harry worried that perhaps this could be because he didn't want his son to be the arrogant brat he had hated for years. Or maybe it was his unfortunate habit of killing those he had a bond with. No, he shouldn't think like that, Severus would be annoyed if he did after all their hard work in his mind.

Severus must have sensed something was wrong. He reached out and took Harry's hand.

"Don't worry Harry. I'm delighted to be a father, especially your father. This news is just a shock." They turned back to Albus who had replaced the twinkle in his eyes. "So tell us headmaster, how is this possible?"

"Lily went out with Severus in seventh year, but they broke up. I don't know why." He looked at Severus with a question in his eyes. The potions master sighed and cast his mind back to that painful time.

"It was in March, two months before the exams." Severus started hoarsely. "I had just had a visit from my father, he wasn't a death eater, but liked the Dark Lord's ideas. He told me I had to become a death eater and spouted all sorts of muggle-hating ideas. I repeated my conversation to Lily. She misunderstood me. She thought I shared those views and just objected to doing what my father wanted. We didn't get along you see. She broke up with me and ran back to the Gryffindor common room crying. After that, she wouldn't listen to me. She would ignore me and I couldn't get her in private to explain. Two weeks later, it was the half term. I went home and my father forced me to take the mark. He was like your uncle, except he used magic as he was a wizard. I didn't know the Dark Lord's service was for life at that point. I decided it would be the lesser of two evils between getting beaten to death or spending a few years in the Dark Lord's army.

With that foolish mistake, I lost anything I might have had with Lily. She accidentally caught sight of the mark during transfiguration; Black had set my sleeve on fire and it burnt away the cloth. Just a glimpse, but even that was enough. She cornered me after the lesson and spat out that she never wanted to see me again. The next day, she was on Potter's arm. I don't know how you could be my son." They both looked to Dumbledore who took up the thread.

"Lily and Severus had had a couple of intimate…um… situations while they were still going out. She found that she was pregnant a month after she broke up with your father. She didn't want the baby to be born nameless so cast an old charm which freezes activity in the womb. It would be dangerous for more than a few years, but that was enough. She got married to James Potter soon after graduation and had you a year later." Harry drank to wet his suddenly dry mouth.

"Did-did my father, I mean James Potter, know?"

"Yes, she told him a month before you were born."

"If Severus is my father, why do I look so much like James?" Albus chuckled and conjured a mirror.

"I think you'll agree with me that you don't." Harry took the mirror and gasped. His hair was almost straight with only the barest hint of waves, and jet black instead of the dark brown of James Potter. His mouth was slightly thinner too. He scowled and pushed the mirror away in shock. He had looked the image of Snape! The changes were subtle, but noticeable. One thing that remained unchanged was his eyes, cheek bones and nose. They were from Lily and Lily alone. He looked back up at the headmaster.

"Ok, I believe you. I have several questions though." The headmaster gestured for him to continue. "Why did I look so much like James Potter for most of my life?"

"James adopted you by magic in a ritual Lily did. It made you his legitimate son so you will be able to access the family vaults when you are seventeen and gave you the ability to take on his appearance. When you were a baby, you apparently liked to switch features between your original father's and your adopted. Lily was a charms mistress and cast a charm that froze your features when you looked like James. When Severus came into your mind, his magic added to yours burst the charm, of course, being a part of the ritual even if it was an invisible part had something to do with it. It released both features and any latent talents. You might find potions a little easier now, after all, potion making is a talent that runs in the Snape family." His eyes twinkled at the both of them.

"How do you know all this?"

"When Lily heard the prophecy, she had a premonition that she wouldn't survive Voldemort's attack, so came and told me the whole story in the hopes that someone would know the truth. She also wondered whether it affected the prophecy."

"Does it?"

"No. Sorry." Harry sighed

"Thought not."

"Harry, the prophecy says, 'born to those who have thrice defied him,' not 'born of those who have thrice defied him.'" Silence descended.

"What does this mean for us?" Harry looked at Dumbledore but his question was directed to his father.

"What do you mean?" Severus entered the conversation once more.

"Are we going to acknowledge I am Severus' son, or am I going to continue pretending to being a Potter?" Dumbledore replied before Severus could.

"Harry, you are a Potter by magic. I don't think it would be wise to inform people of your parentage until Voldemort is dead. Apart from the fact that it would increase Severus' already high danger level, the wizarding world has, as a whole, a very medieval view of birth within marriage to the father" both Severus and Harry saw the sense in this and nodded.

Madame Pomfrey came bustling in. she froze for a moment when she saw that the two patients who had been dead asleep when she left, were now sitting up and chatting with Albus.

"Albus!" she reproved the headmaster. "You should have told me straight away once they woke up. Have you even given them the potions?" the headmaster chuckled.

"I told you she would tell me off if I didn't tell her immediately you woke. Yes Poppy, that was the first thing I did."

"How long have they been awake?" demanded the irate mediwitch.

"Uh, about half an hour Madame Pomfrey." Answered Harry, looking at the clock in the infirmary. He was quite surprised they had been talking that long.

"Right, that's quite long enough. You need to take a normal nutrition potion and go back to sleep. You won't even think about getting up for at least a day." She said fiercely, turning a stern eye on both, especially Severus. The man always tried to get out early, and often, to her annoyance, succeeded. They were the two most frequent patients in her infirmary. "No excuses or complaints. Headmaster, I would appreciate it if you left now. You can come back tomorrow, but now, my patients need to sleep. The headmaster twinkled at the helpless pair as they succumbed to the mediwitch's medical ministrations.