Harry watched from his bed as Severus moved about his room, straightening up the desk and putting books and dirty clothes away. Harry rolled his eyes.
"You don't have to do that every night, you know?"
"If I don't, I'm afraid it will surely look as if a troll has come through here by the end of the week."
Harry shrugged. "The house-elves just take care of it in the tower."
Severus turned a steely gaze toward the teenager. "Harry James, you had better not be expecting the house elves to do all of your work for you. They have plenty of other things to do without having to constantly pick up after you as well."
"I was just saying," Harry pointed out as he pushed himself up into a sitting position at the head of his bed.
Severus continued to glare at him for a moment before nodding his head. "You're right though," he said as he dropped Harry's shoes back on the floor where he had left them. "I don't have to do this every night and I really shouldn't in the first place. It should be your responsibility to keep your room clean and from now on it will be."
Harry opened his mouth to assure Severus that it was actually perfectly fine with him if he wanted to clean up at night but before he could say a word, Severus continued, "Thank you, Harry, for bringing it to my attention. I hadn't realized that I was actually keeping you from doing one of your most important chores. Especially since you're the one getting the allowance every week."
"Great," Harry muttered under his breath as he studied the top of his blanket, completely missing Severus smirking at him.
Deciding that now would be a good time to change the subject, Harry looked up at his guardian and asked the question that had been weighing heavily on his mind for the past couple of days. "Dad, why are you still so mad at Uncle Remus?"
"What makes you think that I am?" Severus asked.
"You're not talking to him. He sat beside you at lunch yesterday and you didn't say a word the entire time. Then, today, he tried to talk to you in the hallway and you made up an excuse about being late for a meeting with a student but then you didn't even go to your office."
Severus raised an eyebrow. He hadn't realized how much Harry had been pay attention to him lately. He sighed, he didn't want to discuss this with Harry, but he couldn't lie to him either.
"He lied to me, Harry."
Harry shrugged. "So? I've lied to you before and you don't stop talking to me."
"You're my child."
Harry pushed aside the urge to smile at Severus's words and instead attempted a glare. "He's your brother. You should forgive him."
"No one said I haven't forgiven him. I'm merely still upset with him. He put you in danger by keeping information from me, Harry, and that's not something easily forgotten."
"That's not fair!" Harry argued. "I had that map first, remember? He took it from me! If he hadn't, you might still not have known."
"That's hardly the point—"
"Sure it is. You're just being ridiculous. You're mad at Remus for hiding something when I hid it from you in the first place. Even though he already apologized. Once you apologize you should make things right again. And besides, you both got into a fight and that should have taken care of it all. You should be even now. You would never let me and Draco go this long without talking."
Severus opened and closed his mouth as he tried to form a reply but nothing came to him. He could grudgingly admit that perhaps Harry had a point, but he wasn't ready to tell him that. Instead, he settled for holding the blankets up so that Harry could lie under them once more.
"It's late," he said as Harry continued to glare at him. "You need your sleep and we both have classes tomorrow. We can talk about this later."
"Fine." Harry lay down and turned away from Severus to face the wall.
"Good night. I love you." Severus tucked the blankets around him and lightly squeezed his shoulder before turning to walk from the room. Before he reached the door he heard Harry whisper, "Love you, too."
***
The next day Harry was in no better of a mood as he walked to lunch with Hermione and Ron beside him. He'd eaten breakfast with Severus and while it hadn't been unbearable, he would have much rather gone up to the Great Hall instead. Afterward, he had gone to Potion's class where he had botched up his Doxycide potion, earning him a ten-point loss for Gryffindor because he hadn't been paying attention to the correct order of ingredients. Then, to make matters worse, he had been late for Defense class only to find out that Remus wasn't even there! Instead, Severus was teaching the class because Remus was sick and had taken yet another ten points for being late! By the time class was over, Harry was well and truly furious with his guardian.
Hermione was no help at all and had actually sided with Severus, stating that Harry really hadn't been paying attention in class and that any teacher besides Remus would have taken points for being late. Harry was content to simply not speak to her.
As they turned the corner and joined the group of students heading into the Great Hall, Harry noticed Draco standing off to the side, surrounded by three older Slytherin's. At first, he ignored them but as the crowd began to clear, he could see that Marcus Flint was among the group and he had his wand pointed at Draco, blocking him from leaving. Draco was glaring at Marcus and something the older boy said caused the others to laugh.
When Hermione and Ron noticed that Harry had stopped walking with them, they turned back to see Harry already heading towards Draco and the others. When they got closer, everyone could hear Marcus taunting Draco about something.
"Defender of halfbreeds now, eh, Malfoy?" Marcus sneered. "Bet your father will love hearing about that."
"Are you going to write him another letter, Flint?" Malfoy shot back. "Tell him what all I've been up to lately? I know you look for any excuse to think you're important but don't you think it's getting a little pathetic? What? Your own father too busy to write you back?"
Flint's eyes narrowed into slits before he laughed bitterly. "When was the last time he wrote you? Wasn't it to tell you how ashamed he was of you?" The other two laughed again.
Harry didn't miss the flicker of sadness that crossed Draco's face before he masked it into a look of indifference. He, Ron, and Hermione were still a few feet away. Draco could see them but the others had their backs to them.
"The thing is," Flint went on, "Mr. Malfoy personally asked me to do whatever necessary to keep you in line. He wanted me to remind you where your loyalties lie. Bet you didn't know that, did you?"
Draco swallowed hard but said nothing as Flint leaned closer towards him.
"I think we're more than capable of taking care of that, don't you?"
In the next few seconds, several things happened at once. First, Marcus stepped back and raised his wand directly in front of Draco's face. Second, Harry stepped forward, his own wand raised. Hermione and Ron were right behind him. And not just them. It seemed as if a few others had also noticed what was happening and before anyone realized, the Weasley twins, Dean, Seamus, Ginny, Daphne, and Astoria were all standing around them with their wands raised and ready to defend Draco.
"I don't think you're capable of much of anything," Harry said lowly. "I'd leave him alone if I were you."
Marcus and the other two boys that Harry didn't recognize turned around quickly. He snarled at the group that now surrounded him.
"Taking up for your new best friend, Potter?" he hissed. "I suppose he fits right in with the rest of you Mudbloods and blood-traitors."
"Shut up!" Harry tightened his fingers around his wand.
"What are you going to do about it?" Asked the boy on the right who was grinning wickedly.
"No doubt planning to run to his new daddy," laughed the black-haired boy on the left.
The first boy pointed his wand at Harry and just as quickly Fred's wand was pointed at his head. "Now, now, Daley," he said cheerfully, "even you must be clever enough to work out that the moment you try and hex our friend Harry here, the rest of us will already be hexing you."
Daley glared at Fred but before he could even think of a reply, Professor Flitwick rounded the corner and everyone began scrambling to put away their wands. Though it was of no use because he had already seen all he needed to.
"I think you'll find, Mr. Weasley, that there will, in fact, be no hexing of any sort."
"Of course not, Professor," Fred replied with an easy smile.
"Ten points from Gryffindor and Slytherin, each," Flitwick said before turning to Marcus. "And another twenty from Slytherin for you, Mr. Flint. There will also be no bullying of other students." Flint looked as if he wanted to argue, but thought better of it in the end and kept quiet. "Off you go now, all of you. I'm sure you all have places to be."
Flint shoved past Draco and headed for the Great Hall, his friends following behind him. Flitwick turned away as well, along with most of the others. Only Harry, Draco, Ron, and Hermione remained in the hallway.
For a long moment, no one said anything until finally, Draco murmured, "Thanks."
Hermione smiled. "Would you like to eat with us, Draco?"
It was the first time that Hermione had spoken to Draco first and it seemed like Draco was unsure of how to respond. After a long moment in which Hermione was sure he would turn down her offer, Draco nodded once. "Alright. I suppose since I'm already a traitor anyway."
Harry grinned and Ron rolled his eyes. "Welcome to the club."
They made their way into the Great Hall and students immediately noticed when Draco sat down beside Harry. He swallowed hard and kept his head down. "Just wait till my father hears about this," he said with a hint of amusement in his voice.
Harry laughed, "I'm sure it won't take long."
Draco chanced a glance up towards the staff table and immediately caught Severus's eyes. Severus was eyeing him curiously but then gave a single nod of his head and turned back to his food.
***
The next morning Severus and Harry took the floo to the cottage so that he and Remus could get to work on the list of things Minerva had for them to do. When they got there, they found Remus seated on the couch, reading a book. Harry thought that he seemed really tired and wondered just how sick he had been the day before.
Severus nodded at Remus who offered no more than a wave of his hand in greeting before Severus walked into the kitchen. Harry moved over to the couch and sat down.
"Good morning, Harry," Remus said pleasantly as he closed his book and sat it down on the end table beside him.
"Morning. Are you feeling alright?" he couldn't help but ask.
Remus smiled. "Perfectly alright. I'm sorry I missed class yesterday. I do hope that having Sour Snape as your teacher wasn't too awful."
Harry groaned. "He took twenty points from me yesterday!"
"Just in my class?" Remus asked, taken aback by the news.
"Well, no. Ten in Potions because I wasn't paying attention and then ten in Defense for being late. But it was only by a few minutes!"
"Ah. I guess you weren't expecting him to be there."
"No," Harry admitted. "I thought it would be you."
"And you thought you'd get away with being a bit tardy."
Harry shrugged. "Suppose so."
Remus nodded before giving Harry a smile. "No worries, Harry. It happens to the best of us."
He reached over to his book and pulled a photograph from between the pages and offered it to Harry. "I dug this up this morning. Thought you might like it."
Harry looked down at the moving picture and a wide grin spread across his face. The picture was of a young Severus, standing in his bedroom and holding his hands out in front of his face as if trying to keep from having his picture taken. His hair that was normally black, was changing colors. First red, then blue, green, purple, and lastly, bubblegum pink.
"Wicked," Harry breathed as he watched in fascination as sixteen-year-old Severus kept trying to cover his head with things in the picture. "How'd you get this?"
"I took it myself," Remus replied with a laugh. "In sixth year, some of us played a prank on all of the Slytherins. We snuck into their dormitory and dyed everyone's hair with a color-changing hair dye. It only lasted for a couple of days, and in the end, it wasn't really worth it, but I couldn't resist taking the picture anyway."
Harry grinned. "Why wasn't it worth it?"
Remus frowned, a hint of red coloring his cheeks. "I was sort of the one behind it all, and I got caught. I was in trouble for weeks, which is why I don't recommend doing it," he added with another small laugh.
Before either of them could continue the conversation, Severus stepped into the living room and asked Remus, "Are you ready?"
Remus sighed, "As I'll ever be." He stood up slowly with a slight groan. He noticed Severus watching him intently and as he walked past him he quietly said, "I'm fine."
Severus then turned to Harry. "I'll be outside if you need me, but Mum and Dad are both around as well."
Harry nodded but didn't reply.
"Behave," Severus warned, only earning him another nod from the teenager.
***
Minerva had indeed found quite a bit for her sons to do. By late morning, Severus and Remus had washed all the outside windows, patched a few broken pieces of the fence, weeded the garden,— which Remus thought was especially dumb since it was winter— and they were now cleaning out the gutters. Since they only had one ladder, Remus stood atop the roof with a bucket and pulled out the bigger pieces of debris, such as pine cones, sticks, and small branches. While Severus went behind him on the ladder and cleaned out leaves and anything else still inside. Throughout all this, they only spoke when absolutely necessary.
Severus, for his part, was thinking quite a bit about what Harry had said in regards to him forgiving Remus. And as he watched him carefully maneuver across the roof, the soles of his shoes slipping more than a few times, Severus once more admitted that Harry was right.
With a long sigh, Severus sat his bucket on top of the roof and said, "I'm sorry."
Remus looked up in confusion. "Say again?"
"You heard me," Severus said with a scowl. "I was angry at you for not telling us what you knew about Black and for keeping the map secret. But I should have been the bigger person when you apologized and tried to make things right."
Remus was quiet for a long moment as he sat down on the roof, bringing his knees up so that he could rest his arms on them. "You know I would never do anything to hurt Harry."
"I know that," Severus replied before climbing up onto the roof and taking a seat next to Remus. "Why didn't you ever tell anyone that they were animagi?"
Remus shrugged. "I suppose because they knew my secret and hadn't told anyone and I figured the least I could do was keep theirs." After a few seconds, he looked away, picking up a stick and breaking it into pieces. "And if I'm being honest, it was nice having someone with me through those long nights. All those times they snuck out to keep me company, as reckless and irresponsible as it was, for the first time it made me feel as if I could talk to someone about it. I felt like I wasn't alone. Like I had a family."
Severus tried hard to think about his next words carefully. "Are we not family, Remus?"
"Of course," Remus replied immediately.
"Yet you could never talk to me about it? In all these years we've never once really talked about what it's like for you when you turn. I've been there afterward more times than I can count, helping you stand when you were too weak to make it inside the house, and still, you've never talked to me about it."
Remus winced at the memories of Severus sitting on the floor in front of him as he cleaned and healed his wounds.
"I don't know, Sev. I guess I just thought you wouldn't understand. Maybe we both need to learn to talk about these things?" Severus furrowed his brows as he tried to piece together what Remus meant, but he needn't have bothered. Remus went on, "You've never talked to me about your time as a spy. And I was there just as many times after death eater meetings. Watching as your body shook with the after-effects of whatever curses they had used on you that night and knowing there was very little that I could do to help you."
Now it was Severus's turn to wince as unbidden memories came rushing to the forefront of his mind. He gave a small nod. "I suppose you're right."
They sat in silence for a while, each lost in thought until finally, Remus spoke once more. "I want to tell Harry the truth about me." Severus looked up but didn't say anything. "It's getting harder and harder to keep it from him. He knows that I'm ill a lot and I'm sure he'll figure it out himself eventually. And not only that, but Hermione already knows and it's not fair to ask her to keep my secret. Especially from her best friends. It's far too much to put on a thirteen-year-old's shoulders."
"Alright," Severus agreed, "but what about Ron and Draco? If Harry and Hermione know, you might as well tell them, too. At least that way hopefully it won't go any further accidentally."
Remus nodded. "Ron and Draco as well then. Do you think Draco can handle it?"
"I do. There has been an enormous change in him lately. I believe he is trying to do better."
"I've noticed as well," Remus said with a smile. "I heard he ate at Gryffindor table yesterday."
"I'd be surprised if his father doesn't already know." Severus's voice was full of sadness. "I don't want Lucius's life for him. He deserves so much more than that."
"I suppose only time will tell at this point."
Severus nodded, though he still seemed worried.
***
They spent the rest of the day at the cottage. When they had completed their list of chores, everyone gathered around the table and had dinner together. Harry had spent most of the day with Albus and Minerva and he had enjoyed his time with them. He was especially glad to see that his dad and Remus had evidently worked things out and were now on speaking terms again.
Eventually, though, it was time to go back to Hogwarts. He had homework to do the next day and Severus had said that if he got it done early enough, he would let him help out in the lab. He figured that as long as he was confined to their quarters anyway, he might as well get to do something he enjoyed.
"Go on," Severus said as they stepped out of the floo and into their parlor, "get cleaned up and into bed. I'll be in to check on you in a bit."
Harry rolled his eyes thinking that he didn't need to be checked on, but he went without argument anyway.
Severus watched him go and thought about how he was in need of a shower as well. His arms, shoulders, and back ached terribly and the idea of a nice, long, hot shower sounded especially good at the moment.
He was just about to head to his room when something on the end table beside his chair caught his eye. Walking over, he noticed it was a letter addressed to him. He picked it up and pulled the letter from the envelope and unfolded it.
Immediately his eyes landed on the Ministry heading at the top.
His heart stopped.
Severus read through the letter once, twice, a third time.
Never before had he felt such an urge to cry.