Severin Snape woke to find himself under observation by his three male classmates, his new roommates. Since they had not attended Hogwarts the year before, Severin could not idententify them. He hadn't paid as much attention during the Sorting as he perhaps should have. "Morning," he greeted them.
There was a mumbled chourus of return greetings before one of them, a small brown haired one, stepped out of their ranks and extended a hand. "Darius Avery."
Feeling somewhat awkward, Severin sat up in bed and took it. "Severin Snape."
"Are you really Professor Snape's son?"
Severin reclaimed his hand and let it fall into his lap. "Yes, I am."
"And the Headmaster's godson?"
He smirked a bit, "Yes, I am."
"How come I never heard of you?"
Severin shrugged.
"You're not a, a bastard, are you?" He said it like he expected his parents to appear out of the floor and wash his mouth out with soap for saying such a dirty word.
He sighed, and decided to get it over with quickly. He knew perfectly well how some people would see the conditions surrounding his birth. It had been one of the reasons he had half-hoped he wouldn't get Slytherin. With Charlie around as his acknowledged brother, his parentage, impure blood, and illigitimacy was soon going to be very obvious. Best to spin damage control now than keep secrets that would shortly come back to bite him. "My father's not married, now is he?"
Avery took a short step back at the sharpness of the question. "I suppose you'd know that better than us."
Severin's lips twitched in amusement, despite the sullenness he was trying to project. He gave that up, and just shrugged, with a malicious light in his eyes. "Well, he's not. Married, I mean. Never has been, hopefully never will be."
It was safe to taunt a bastard. Even if he was the Head of House's bastard. Avery drew courage from that social fact. "Afraid of a legitimate heir, eh, Severin?"
Severin shook his head, taking no offense. "Nuh-uh." He left it at that, not wanting to go into explanations of why he wanted to keep his father to himself.
One of the other boys frowned, and asked uncertainly, "So you are a, a bastard?" He, too, lowered his voice when he spoke the impolite term.
Severin shrugged, indifferent. He was glad for the circumstance that led to his creation and had never felt cheated out of a 'real family.' He was a little bit jealous of Charlie's birthday parties but he wouldn't have given up the mindlink to his father for all the birthday parties in the world. And that just wouldn't exist if he'd had a normal mother. Nevermind that he wouldn't have existed himself. "I suppose you could call me that. But I'm still his acknowledged heir. I wouldn't call me that too loudly in front of him, were I you."
"He tell you who your mum was?" Avery asked, curiously.
Severin shook his head. Here goes. Dad, just so you know, I'm telling the Slytherins about Charlie and Hagrid. "I haven't a mum. Never have. Do you know about Charlie Hagrid?"
Try to be discreete, please. Nervous dread came back along the link with the words. He felt his father's presense come to observe the remainder of the conversation.
Avery snorted. "The freak giant kid? That oaf of a gameskeeper got himself pregnant with a potion. The clumsy beast-lover couldn't even manage to not spill it all over himself."
Bloody dog, Dad thought, but it was more out of habit than bitterness or malice. Well, towards the dog. He was quietly seething over the indirect insult to Severin. Freak giant kid indeed.
Severin himself was none too happy himself over the insinuation that his father could ever spill a potion. Under the circumstances, he could no more disassociate the insults flung at Hagrid than his dad could the ones aimed at Charlie. He spoke very stiffly, "Perhaps you noticed I'm several inches taller than Charlie?"
The three boys looked at each other in confusion, trying to figure out what that had to do with anything.
"Charlie and I have the same grandparents. One of them was a giantess." Making her the more compassionate and morally upstanding of your grandmothers, Dad added as an aside.
It took them a moment to work that out. Avery frowned. "Wait. Back up, Snape." His eyes narrowed in disbelief. "You and that, that creature can't share grandparents. That would make you brothers."
Amazing. I think he worked that out all by himself. There may be hope for wizardkind after all.
Severin tried not to smirk at the sarcastic remark. He held a new appreciation for his father's talent to hold a scowl on his face during class while talking with him at the same time. Recalling his roommate's words quickly brought back the anger, though. "Right. Charlie is my brother. I would thank you not to call him a freak or a creature in front of me." His hand subtlely sought to draw his wand from beneath his pillow.
"But Professor Snape is your father," he said in honest confusion.
"No. Professor Snape is Charlie's father." Ah, so you can admit it. Severin wished his father were present to cast a glare at. "He is my mother," he finished stiffly, giving the glare meant for Dad to Avery, who was at least equally deserving of it.
This will be fun to live with when it reaches the staff's ears. What happened to discreete?
I can still tell them about that bad dream you had again last night. Severin regretted the words as soon as they formed. The one bad thing about having Dad inside his skull was that his first response couldn't be repressed before the elder Snape heard it.
His father was silent for an uncomfortably long time, and Severin felt guilt churn through him. Father?
You saw my nightmare? The calm words were belied by the bubbling panic behind them.
You were scared. It woke me up.
There was another long silence. Then: Do you . . . have questions?
Once he realized Dad had no clue that he knew about sex, Severin startled his roommates and accidently started the rumour that he was borderline insane by bursting out laughing for no reason apparent to them. They backed slowly out of the room, never turning their backs on the laughing quarter-giant until the door closed between him and them.
Severin?
When he recovered enough to think, he answer the question implicit in his Dad's mind-voice. Dad, I lived more of my life in your head than in mine. I know what sex is. I don't understand why anybody would do that voluntarily, given your dreams, but I know what it is, and that it's needed to make babies.
Dad was quiet for a few moments, though not as long as before. You were never a child, were you, Severin? he asked, sounding sad.
Severin shrugged at the empty room. He had thought 'child' referred to an age less than - well, he wasn't entirely sure where the cut-off was. Headmaster Dumbledore still called Dad 'child' occassionally. But Dad's question implied age wasn't the only factor. Without a complete definition, he couldn't answer. "What makes someone a child?" he asked for clarification, not realizing he had switched to his spoken voice. Not noticing the door wasn't completely closed.
Nevermind. You're missing breakfast. Come eat, boy.
He nearly tripped over one of the other first years as he left the room, but the boy ran off before he could ask what he was doing.
Charlie Hagrid had made fast friends with the new Gryffindors. Being a resident at the school for his whole life, and having a stature significantly taller than them, he quickly assumed the role of big brother to most of them. He had already promised all of his roommates that he wouldn't let them get lost on their way to classes. He played tour guide around the Tower (the prefect had done a pretty bad job, showing them only the way to their own room) and told them about all the professors they were likely to meet.
"McGonagall: stern but fair. Spout: friendly, but don't ever hurt a plant in her presence. Flitwick: kind and cheerful. Hooch: sort of spooky, but nice. Sinistra: smart, not mean, but not especially nice either. Weasley: cool, just plain awesome, and easily the youngest teacher on staff. Fought in the War, you know, and Harry Potter's best friend. My godfather's younger brother. A bit of a temper. Nothing compared to Snape's though. Snape: well, I suppose we'll survive. He hasn't killed a student yet, and he's been teaching for about twenty years."
Then, as they walked down to breakfast, a little late because of the tour, he told them of the other people about the school.
"Filch: the caretaker, stay out of his way, he likes giving detentions. His cat's just as nasty. Aunt Poppy, I mean, Madam Pomfrey: She's the school nurse. She's my godmother. Very nice. My dad doubles as Keeper of Keys and Grounds and Care of Magical Creatures Professor, but that class isn't offered until third year. Pince: the librarian. Defacing a library book is grounds for a stay in Azkaban to hear her tell of it. And she'll know it if you do so much as close it too hard."
By the time they reached the Great Hall, he was explaining what McGonagall hadn't mentioned last night about the Houses.
"Intense rivalry between Slytherin and Gryffindor. Professor Weasley will go really hard on Slytherins because he used to be a Gryff like us. Snape - the Head of Slytherin - won't let a class go by without taking some points off Gryffindor. If any of you are Muggleborn, you'll get the most trouble from Slytherins."
"What, you're bad-mouthing us already? We haven't had a chance to deserve it yet."
Charlie turned around and grinned at his brother, who was pretending to look insulted and hurt. "Key word being 'yet', Snape."
Severin rolled his eyes. "Oh, like you won't ask for every hex we throw at you, Hagrid."
"I am a peaceful and gentle quarter-giant," Charlie told his brother, trying to look angelically innocent, but his eyes were laughing, and his mouth was grinning.
"Really? You, too?" Severin pulled it off. A sweet, innocent look of inquiry.
It was too much. Charlie started to laugh. "Severin, you really shouldn't do that," he gasped, "You look too much like Snape."
"Wearing an innocentlook?" his brother sounded shocked. "I thought it was the only time we didn't look alike. Mine still works. Sometimes."
"No," Charlie shook his head, using the movement to regroup enough to say the next sentence, "It just so wrong to see that look on someone whose face is as much like his as yours." Severin smirked, the expression much easier to accept on those features. "Much better, thank you."
"I suppose it's lucky you got Hagrid's nose then."
Charlie's hand shot to his nose, not having made the connection until now that half his genes must have come from Snape. Severin's black eyes twinkled in amusement at the alarm on his face. "I promise, Charlie, your nose didn't change since yesterday."
"Can you imagine what would have happened if we wereswitched?" Charlie blurted.
Judging by the very brief flash of fear that had lurked momentarily in his brother's eyes, the answer was probably 'yes'. Though what Severin imagined could be that awful, Charlie didn't see it. But then, he hadn't lived with the Head of Slytherin for the last eleven years. That had to do something to one's parania levels.
"Charlie?"
He looked at his brother, confused by the note of wariness in his voice. "Yeah?"
Severin jerked his chin, and Charlie followed the direction of the movement to notice that a rather large and stunned looked crowd had gathered around them. "I think the cat's out of the bag."
"Yeah."
Severin smirked again. "Well, brother, it wasn't like my height didn't give it away."
"Snape's tall, brother. You're too skinny to look like a giant."
Severin shrugged. Further conversation was lost to McGonagall and Sprout breaking up the crowd so they could distribute timetables. As they took seats at the Gryffindor table, Charlie felt the gazes of most of his house and much of Hufflepuff on him.
"Are you and Snape's kid really brothers?" one of his second year friends asked the question in all of their eyes.
"Yes. I found out on the train yesterday. Snape and my dad had the same potion get on them. Snape hid Severin away in the dungeons and never told anyone he even existed."
Those close enough to hear that, looked toward the Slytherin table, then began passing the story down the table. "Poor kid," a third year spoke the Gryffindor consensus for all of them.
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