"In the heat of anger, people say hurtful things," Snape returned, looking straight into his eyes. "I refuse to believe you are not old enough to realize this."
"Yeah, but--"
"Another thing you might keep in mind," the man interrupted, "is that quite often family members are the ones who say the very foulest things of all. Think about it. People will say things to their family that they would never dream of saying to a mere acquaintance. The closer the bond, the more willing people are to test it to its limit."
Harry couldn't help but scoff, "By that measure, Professor, my Muggle family and I were as close as two peas in a pod. They had no end of foul things to say to me."
Snape tapped his fingertips together. "True. I should keep in mind that you lived fifteen years without a decent model of family. So. Perhaps you should refresh my memory as to what was said."
Harry doubted Snape was that forgetful, but if the Slytherin wanted to play it that way, fine. "You said it was unforgivable, what I told Draco."
"I said it was indefensible," Snape corrected. "Which is not quite the same thing."
"Yeah, well you said I didn't deserve to be your son," Harry blurted. "What was that?"
"Equally indefensible, I should think." The man gave a heavy sigh. Then, proving that his memory hardly needed refreshing, he detailed, "I do believe my exact words were, At the moment you are being stupid and you don't deserve to be my son. And at that particular moment, Harry, you didn't. I expected more of you."
"Yeah, but the way you handled the points also showed that you didn't want me any longer," Harry confessed, looking down at his hands as they fiddled with the ring. "And that really hurt. Maybe more so than the comment, because that might have been off-the-cuff, but to accomplish the points thing, you had to give it some thought. And you still did it."
"I took points from Ronald Weasley, not you."
"No, you didn't. You used Ron so you could punish me without punishing Slytherin. But if I'm really your son, I'm in Slytherin too. Taking points only from Gryffindor is like saying I'm nothing to do with you." When Snape didn't reply, Harry pressed, "Can't you see that?"
He looked up to notice Snape regarding him thoughtfully. "You felt I had somehow denied the adoption by so doing?"
"Well, yeah," Harry admitted. "I even had a bad dream about it. Because... well, you said the adoption became real when it was real in your mind, remember? And if it wasn't any longer..."
"You daft boy," Snape softly murmured, picking up his wand. He waved it all around, incanting spells that sounded vaguely like the ones he'd used to ward his quarters, and as Harry watched, a brilliant green glow began to creep forth from deep in the walls. "There, Harry, there they are. Strong and thick as ever, protecting you. Now, watch."
He spoke again, a chant involving tempus, but the warding spells reacted not at all, remaining a steady, constant glow.
"That was a time spell," Snape explained. "Showing you the condition of the wards for the past few days. Did you see them so much as flicker?"
Harry shook his head.
"They never wavered because I have never wavered. Would you like to watch the spells spun all the way back to the beginning?"
"No." Harry thought a moment. "But if belief is all you need to make the magic take root, why did we need Wizard Family Services at all?"
Snape paused to think too. "I think perhaps we needed them because you needed to believe, too."
"Yeah, the adoption wouldn't have seemed real to me without the legal end of things, I guess," Harry realized. That explained the dream, too, didn't it? After all, it had been about nothing but legalities.
"Having availed ourselves of the legal process has certain advantages, however," Snape continued. "Suppose you were to grow angry enough that you no longer wished me for a father--"
"That won't happen, sir," Harry interrupted. "I promise."
"I speak in hypotheticals." Harry couldn't help but notice that the man looked pleased, even as he went on, "As I was saying, if you were that distraught, the spells might flicker, but I seriously doubt they would vanish, since now those selfsame spells rest on a contractual as well as an interpersonal basis. Do you follow? You are very secure here. Nothing short of mutual repudiation can erase a magically binding contract. And I assure you Harry... in fact, I promise, no matter how irate you or I might become, I will never repudiate you. Never. Do you begin to understand?"
The dream faded further away, dissolving into the mist where nightmares were born. Except that this particular nightmare had died. He'd just been hysterical, or something. Nothing in that dream could possibly be real, let alone prophetic.
"Yes, I understand," Harry murmured. Some part of him must still have needed reassurance, though, for he heard himself asking, "Um, so... I guess you think I do deserve to be your son, then?"
That time he thought he caught an idiot child crossing the man's lips as he stood up. "Come here, Harry," Snape said, opening his arms and then folding the boy into them in a warm, close hug. Harry pressed his cheek against the soft black fabric covering his father's chest, a feeling of reassurance swallowing him as the man's heartbeat thrummed, a steady thud, thud, thud, the rhythm as faithful as the man himself. Knowing he was home, Harry leaned completely against his father and melted into the embrace.
"You miss my point entirely," Snape whispered, one hand moving up to stroke the boy's hair. "This, what we are... Harry, deserving has got nothing to do with it. Think about it for a moment. How could a bloody irritating Gryffindor deserve to be my son? For that matter, how could a former Death Eater with a bad temper and abysmal family ties of his own deserve to be famous Harry Potter's father?"
For once the phrase didn't trouble Harry. Snape wasn't using it to belittle him, not this time. He was making a point. A weight lifting from somewhere in the region of his chest, he dropped Lily's ring and wrapped his arms around the man, squeezing him tight. They stood there for a long while, just holding each other.
Accepting.
Snape finally stepped back, his dark eyes somehow looking satisfied. He murmured an incantation to make the warding spells descend back into the granite walls, then gruffly admitted, "I suppose I should correct my error." His wand flicked through the air. "Two hundred fifty points to Gryffindor. Two hundred fifty points from Slytherin. There. I trust that is better?"
"Yeah," Harry admitted. "Though I still think that what I say to Draco down here isn't a school matter, sir. It's not like we were disrupting a class."
"I suppose you're going to claim that if two Gryffindors were screaming abuse at each other in the Tower when Minerva walked in, she'd say it was a private matter?"
"The Tower's a student area. This is my home."
Snape began to look a bit sour, probably from having taken so many points from his own House. "A valiant effort," he sneered, "but I made it clear from the start that I didn't care to have squabbling disrupt my home."
"Draco was squabbling just as much as I was," Harry mildly pointed out.
Every inch a Slytherin, Snape took that as an opportunity to change the subject. "Have you and Draco worked things out? You seemed quite amicable over dinner."
"Yeah, we're okay," Harry admitted. "I mean, I apologized."
"And?"
"Uh... he's forgiven me, I guess."
"Hmmph. I think perhaps Mr. Malfoy needs to be in on this discussion." Snape said a charm, and a moment later, there was a tentative knock on the door. When Snape threw it open, a thin, grim smile was on his lips. "Mr. Malfoy, how kind of you to join us. What time is it?"