"No, I can't make you," Snape said in a mild voice. "But if you will eat one, you might come to understand how terrible your crime truly was. If you will not eat one I doubt you'll ever experience any true remorse over this incident, therapy or no. And without remorse, Draco, you remain a menace to my students. Which leaves me with but one option."
"Oh, great," sneered Draco, his upper lip curled. "So that's it. I have to eat one or I get unadopted, which is basically a death sentence in the circumstances. Well, gee. I guess I'll have to poison myself, then. Thanks a whole fucking lot, Severus--"
"You misunderstand." Snape shook his head. "I'm not threatening you. Quite the contrary. You are my son and you will remain my son and I will do what my son needs, no matter the personal cost to me. It's all quite simple. If you will not eat a fairy cake, you'll never truly understand that what you did was wrong, and I won't be able to set any store by your declared good intentions. I won't be able to leave you alone in my quarters while I am teaching, which means I can't teach any longer." He paused to let that sink in. "I'll resign my position and we'll live here in Devon where I can adequately supervise you."
Draco's mouth fell open. "But I don't want to live out here in the middle of nowhere!"
"You'll live wherever I do," replied Snape. "Harry will of course continue on in the Tower, but I'm certain he'll come frequently to visit. Won't you, Harry?"
Harry nodded, almost dumbfounded by the sudden sharp turn in the conversation. He couldn't quite figure out what Snape was doing. Was this all manipulation, or did he mean every word he said?
Draco was evidently having similar thoughts. "Oh, you're just bluffing," he said, contempt lacing his tones. "You aren't going to resign! That's laughable, it is."
"You believed I would go abroad to save you from Azkaban," Snape replied, still in the same mild tone. "And indeed I would have. What makes you think I won't give up my job to save you from a future there?"
"Get a grip, Severus. I'm not fated to go to Azkaban!"
"You're more than halfway there already."
"I'll change!"
"But I don't believe that," Snape patiently repeated. "Not unless you acquire some empathy, which is far from a simple matter. It's painful to learn how wrong we have been, Draco. I know this from personal experience. I have been a Death Eater and you were raised to be one, and I know better than any man alive what you need if you are to acquire a new mindset. Therapy alone will not do it."
Obviously shaken by Snape's dire pronouncements, Draco still had enough presence of mind to object, "Oh, yeah? Well what do you think Wizard Family Services would have to say about a father telling his son to eat poison?"
"I think that nobody in Wizard Family Services has been a Death Eater, so they are in no position whatsoever to judge what a budding young one needs! I think they would protect and coddle you to your detriment in this case, just as that casewitch would prefer to see Harry unbruised, even though it would mean he cannot adequately defend himself from Voldemort!" Snape rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Draco, I have no doubt they would think I am wrong, but don't you see? They do not know you or the life you have lived up to this point. They do not know that absent extreme measures, Harry and I will face the ugly reality of visiting you in prison. But I do, and I will act accordingly, no matter what any Ministry adjunct office has to say!"
"If you make me eat a fairy cake, I'll tell them about it!"
Snape rose to his feet, his travelling robes swirling about him. "Aren't you listening to me? You either want to become a decent human being or you don't. I can't make you, Draco."
"You'll make me by threatening to quit your job!"
"I can't do my job if you are likely to attack my students. And you are more important to me than my job." Snape narrowed his black eyes as he walked over to face Draco. "As for telling Wizard Family Services, you'll do no such thing. They'd certainly remove you from my care, which may be what you want at this point, but they'd remove Harry as well. Angry as you are, I don't think you want to take his father away from him."
"No," admitted Draco in a low voice. He glanced down once at the fairy cakes. "I wish I'd never started this."
"I know," said Snape, settling a large hand on the boy's shoulder. "But you wish that now because you're faced with an unpleasant prospect. When you can wish you hadn't done it because it was a terrible thing to do, that's when you'll start to turn away from the spectre of Azkaban. But how are you to begin to appreciate just how evil this scheme of yours was? Suffering the consequence that you once wished upon others... that will instruct you as nothing else can."
Draco's eyes were bright with tears as he looked up at his father. "I suppose you would know. I... I told Harry once you'd been to Hell and back and could keep him from having to make the same journey."
"I'm trying to keep you from making that same journey as well." Snape lowered his voice. "You want to stop this now, Draco. You don't want to end up like me, with much, much worse stains on your soul. I did unspeakable things in Voldemort's service. Crimes for which I can never atone no matter how I try. I learned remorse too late. You can save yourself a lifetime of regret by learning it now."
"But... Venetimorica?" His lips trembling, Draco confessed, "I... I can't. I'm not brave like Harry--"
"You left your birth father and his way of life. Draco... I know how much courage it takes to leave the Death Eaters."
"I didn't stand up to Lucius the way Harry stood up to him and the Dark Lord both!"
Snape chuckled then, which puzzled Harry until the man spoke. "Well, you don't have Gryffindor courage; I'll grant you that. Yours is the Slytherin variety, like mine. We don't see the point in standing up so that we can be knocked back down. We're more subtle than that. And there's a use for both kinds of courage, Draco. Where would your brother be now if I had stood up on Samhain and declared there'd be no needles used on Harry Potter?" Snape shook his head. "Letting Harry suffer that, Draco... it was a terribly hard thing, but it was the right thing to do. And so this as well."
Draco gulped, his eyes wide. "Harry..."
The other boy's tone spoke volumes. Harry, talk some sense into Severus. Harry, get me out of this. Harry, you can't let this happen to me. And against Draco's voice in his head, there was another one. A deeper one, telling him not to interfere.
Harry ignored both those voices and said what he really thought. "I want to be able to visit you at your house when we're grown up, not in Azkaban."
"You think I'm headed there too?" asked Draco in a pitiable voice.
Harry hated to just say yes, because he thought what Draco needed was some hope. "I think what you did here was really, really evil and you just don't get that right now," he said instead. "This reminds me of last year and the things you did to help Umbridge. Awful things. You have... a sort of darkness inside you, Draco. And Severus has lived in darkness and come out of it. He could help you learn to control it, if you'd let him. But if you don't let him..." Harry sighed, hating the truth. But Draco needed to hear it, probably more than he'd ever needed anything. "I think you might end up doing something like this again, yes. Whatever it takes for you to avoid that has got to be worthwhile."