"She's hardly likely to respond to us favorably if you issue threats. No doubt she'll think it's my influence making you so ruthless." Snape's voice took on a sardonic cast. "On his own, the Boy Who Lived couldn't possibly be anything but sweetness and light."
"Or mentally unbalanced," Harry added, thinking of all the Prophet had printed the previous year. "I guess we don't want to add anything to that part of my reputation. So... how about we play on her being an overemotional Hufflepuff? If she tries to make you leave, I'll burst out into tears and say I'm scared and you're the only one who makes me feel safe."
"She might see that as over dependence."
"Hmm." Harry frowned, then. "Um, speaking of over dependence, though... Listen, it is really thoughtful of you to give up your library for me, and I can hardly say how much I appreciate it. But you know, I was thinking... Actually, I was sort of hoping that, er... when my magic is back under control, and I wasn't in any danger, or not any more than usual, I mean..." Harry remembered his dream, the Fat Lady not wanting to let him in, and shuddered. "Can't I go back to live in Gryffindor?"
Snape crossed one knee over another and rested his hands on the armrests of the brocade chair. Harry thought he looked entirely relaxed, which struck him as unfair since he felt like nothing but one huge knot of tension.
"What would make you think I have any other intention?"
Harry swallowed with relief. "Well, you saying it's my room, for starters."
"Don't your friends have rooms at their parents' homes? That doesn't constrain them from boarding in Gryffindor for the school year."
"Yeah..." Harry acknowledged, glancing back and then away. "It just seems strange to me. I mean, Ron can hardly go back and forth to the Burrow every day, but if I had a room here... I guess I thought you'd expect me to use it." He flushed, feeling like he'd stuck his foot in his mouth or something.
"You're welcome down here at any time," Snape assured him. "But I don't expect you to leave the Tower. Your friends are very important to you, as you took great pains to point out to me, not too long ago."
"Yeah, but when I did, you got all bent out of shape."
"I became appropriately concerned about your failure to appreciate the danger you were in," Snape corrected, his voice a tad acerbic. "Until your magic is back under your control, you'll have to continue living with me. Afterwards, I thought your room here would be something you'd use during holidays. I trust you don't wish to stay in the Tower once all the other Gryffindors have gone home for the summer?"
"I don't think so, no," Harry murmured. "You know, after Uncle Vernon died it dawned on me that I'd never have to go to Privet Drive again, but I didn't really think about where I would go. I guess I wondered if the headmaster would let me stay at the Burrow, maybe." He waited, aware that after the adoption, decisions like that would be up to Snape, but his teacher didn't volunteer anything. Harry was aware he should probably stop there--it was a long time until summer--but some shred of unease about the future had him blurting, "I mean, you probably don't want me hanging around all summer long."
"I don't see why not," Snape mildly returned. "I am, after all, going to considerable effort and expense to make you my son."
It was nice to be wanted, Harry thought, though he felt a little bad about the expense bit. It had never even dawned on him that Wizard Family Services would charge for their their services. That just showed how naive he was when it came to the whole wizarding world. He didn't know how anything worked. "I have money," he heard himself offer. "Is it really expensive, arranging an adoption? Can I help?"
"Would you like to fund your own Christmas present, too?" Snape scathed. "No, of course you can't help!"
"But I have scads of money, sir. I'd really like to--"
"What I'd like," Snape interrupted, "is for you to put your key away somewhere safe and not touch it again until you're grown and out on your own. I can provide for you perfectly well, Harry. Do you even realize that I'm supposed to?"
Harry thought better than to offer again, though he did wonder if Snape's refusal had something to do with his teacher somehow not wanting to take money from James Potter.
Snape waved a hand as though to start over. "Enough of that. Let's discuss your dream."
Harry crossed his legs on the bed and resisted an urge to hug himself. He wasn't a little child. So he'd had a bad dream, so what? He had them all the time. "I know what you're going to say. Same stuff McGonagall blathered off the one time I went to her in the middle of the night. Voldemort's been trying to kill me for years, big effing surprise. There's no need for me to get so upset about it. I should just relax because I'm safe while at Hogwarts, the staff would never allow anything to happen to me, etc. etc. etc."
"I'm disappointed in Minerva," Snape remarked. "A sense of false security is hardly what you need."
"Yeah. What I need is a potion. I guess it'll be all right, having a Potions Master for a... um, adult taking care of me."
Snape gave nothing away as he looked at Harry through half-closed eyes. "You do realize that there are problems potions won't solve?"
"What sort of Potions Master are you?" Harry weakly joked, then realized it wasn't funny. Snape was serious, and beyond that, he was right. "Yes, I realize that," he acknowledged. "I don't want to talk through my dream though. I mean, not any more than I have already."
"I need you to answer one question," Snape informed him, his tone serious.
"All right!" Harry snapped. "You were in it, all right? You were in the mirror with Sirius and I thought you'd died, and even if I'm not too swift with dream interpretation, it'd be hard to miss the implications of an image like that! Never mind that Sirius didn't have his mirror when he fell through the Veil, and so couldn't possibly show up in my own. Besides, mine's broken, so enough said!"
Snape's eyes bored into him. "I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about."
Oh yeah... Harry could have kicked himself. Instead, he ended up wrapping his arms around himself anyway, and rocking back and forth on the bed. Like a basket case, he thought with some amount of disgust, not that knowing he looked completely mental was going to stop him from looking that way. "It doesn't matter," he muttered, staring down at his socks.
Snape was silent for a long moment, then pressed, "Harry?"
The boy just shook his head.
"All right," Snape conceded, shrugging. "That wasn't what I needed to know."
That had Harry glancing up. "No? What, then?"
Snape laid a hand on his bent knee; that time, Harry didn't shift away. "Was it a seer dream?"
"No," Harry said, his tone short. When Snape seemed to want more, he detailed, "Those always have a past-then-future pattern, with this sort of whirling in between. And they don't have weird images like casewizards changing into Voldemort or snakes becoming bracelets or headmaster's doors opening into the forest. This dream was just a nightmare, honest."
His teacher nodded. "You must tell me if you have another seer dream, Harry. It's important."
"I will... Listen, I'll tell you if anything in my dreams starts to really bother me. Promise, I will. But for tonight, can't you just help me out? I don't want another nightmare, Professor."
Sighing slightly, Snape informed him, "More Dreamless Sleep isn't advisable. As I see it, your choices are to sleep without aid, or try the potion I make to help me deal with my own nightmares."
Reaching behind him, Snape drew out a small vial from a drawer. He handed it to Harry, who held it up and tilted it back and forth to study the thick, brackish fluid within. "Looks like used motor oil. What do you call it, Sleeping Sludge?"