"Magical power isn't like a lost quill. Someone can't simply pick it up and use it, nor can they stockpile it indefinitely. You're the DADA teacher. You should know that better than anyone. Where did you get such a ridiculous notion?" Severus snapped.
"Professor Dumbledore told me," Harry said, truculent as a child.
"Albus told you this nonsense? When? Why?" Severus questioned.
"In second year I . . . had questions after I opened the Chamber of Secrets. That's when Professor Dumbledore explained about the Parseltongue. The other stuff he told me in first year, after . . . what happened with Professor Quirrell. What do you mean 'nonsense'?"
Abruptly, Severus understood. This man had beaten the most malignant, powerful wizard of their age while still in diapers. From that horrible night in Godric's Hollow, Albus had been determined to protect Harry Potter from himself. Dumbledore had abandoned the child to those awful Muggles to keep the boy from learning what he was, and had done everything within his power to convince Harry that he was a normal wizard child, no different from any of the other Hogwarts students. But no other child in the history of all of Wizarding had ever defeated a Dark Lord while still a baby.
Severus had always questioned the wisdom of those deceptions, but now he wondered what he would have done in Albus' shoes when young Harry came to him for answers. What did one say to an eleven year old who had defeated the combined forces of a Dark Lord and a Dark Arts expert? Or to a twelve year old who spoke Parseltongue and had killed both a monster and a dangerous incarnation of the Dark Lord? Or a thirteen year old who'd raised a Patronus shield powerful enough to stave off dozens of Dementors? Or a fourteen year old who'd survived a duel with the fully restored Voldemort? The list went on and on with Potter.
Did one tell the truth, that the boy was a terrifyingly powerful force that they were hoping to mould into a weapon to be used against the ultimate evil? Or was it wiser to make up plausible explanations that kept the child in the dark, unaware of his own potential and the danger he presented to those around him? Apparently, Albus had chosen the latter course. For all Severus knew, Albus might actually have believed these fairy tales. There was, after all, no true explanation as to how two wizards of average power like Lily Evans and James Potter had produced a child this powerful.
"Severus, what did you mean?" Harry repeated, interrupting his thoughts.
What to say now? Severus wished he had Albus' wisdom when it came to handling human emotion. He didn't want to hurt Harry, but he couldn't foster these fantasies, not with a full grown man who needed to come to terms with his abilities.
Severus chose his words carefully, "You know that magical power isn't . . . transferable. If it were, why would we bother spending years teaching children magic, when we could simply share the ability? Several wizards can link minds and combine their powers to achieve a common goal, which is what we did in the final battle, but . . . you can't gift another wizard with your powers or abilities. Providing you had the power to achieve them, I could teach you how to levitate, or use Legilimency, or an Unforgivable, but I couldn't transfer that talent to you if your magic were too weak to accomplish it on your own."
"But . . . when I was a baby -" Harry began and stopped.
"You defeated a Dark Lord so powerful that no one dared stand against him. No one will ever know what happened that night," Severus softly answered.
"My mother -"
"Sacrificed her life to give you the strongest protective wards she could raise. But she wasn't a formidably powerful witch. The best she could have hoped for was to slow Voldemort down, not . . . turn his spell back upon himself or any of the other explanations that Albus offered up at the time. Blood magic has protected you your entire life, but . . . it didn't gift you with your abilities. They were your own, from birth."
"But I speak Parseltongue. I opened the Chamber of Secrets, just like Tom Riddle did fifty years before me. Only the heir of Slytherin could do that," Harry protested.
"What's your point?" Severus asked, starting to lose his patience.
Harry's voice was equally sharp. "I had to get that from Voldemort as a baby. How else could I have done it?"
Severus sighed. "There was a Muggle detective who used to say that when you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
Harry nodded, "The Sherlock Holmes maxim. He wasn't a real person."
"That's hardly important. We've already determined that a transfer of abilities was impossible. What other possibilities remain?"
Potter was silent for a time. "You're saying that I really was . . . am Salazar Slytherin's heir?"
"Doesn't that seem more logical than the unnatural transfer of . . . magical power and genetic markers? Being Salazar Slytherin's heir doesn't make you evil, Harry; any more than being James Potter's son made you a bully."
Severus waited for Harry to spring to his father's defence, but he didn't. Potter seemed to digest the idea for a time, then he softly asked, "But I used Godric Gryffindor's sword to kill the basilisk. Only a true Gryffindor could do that."
Realizing that he was challenging Harry's view of who he was in the world, Severus softly answered, "And you are a true Gryffindor. For all we know, you could be Godric's heir as well. These men lived a thousand years ago. There's no telling who their heirs are these days. Purebloods can trace direct descent, but . . . ."
"Not all heirs are born to the marriage bed," Harry completed with a small smile.
"Precisely. Your mother was Muggleborn. There's no telling who her ancestors may have been," Severus said.
"So what you're saying is that all these powers and abilities are my own? That I didn't get them from what happened when I was a baby or from Albus sacrificing himself in the final battle so that we would win?"
"If the latter were true, then my powers would also have been augmented, and I assure you that is not the case," Severus said.
"And the mage fire? How come I can suddenly do that?"
"A wizard might finish growing physically by age twenty, but it can often take twice that time for his powers to fully mature. You're not even thirty. You have another decade of magical growth."
Severus heard Harry give a noisy swallow. "You mean I'm going to keep getting stronger."
Severus nodded.
"Doesn't that . . .frighten you? Aren't you worried about . . . what I'll become, what I might do? You know that if the Ministry of Magic knew about any of this, they'd be hunting me down along with Burke."
"Which is why I would suggest refraining from advertising your abilities. So far, you've been very discreet at hiding them," Severus assured him
"But aren't you afraid of what I might do?" Harry pressed.
Severus held that nervous gaze and answered, "No, not in the least."
"Why not? I -"
"We've already had this conversation once this morning, Potter. I'm not afraid because there's nothing you could do in the future that you're not capable of doing to a lesser degree at this very moment. If you were interested in taking over the world, you'd be ruling right now, probably as Minister for Magic. They love you so much that you wouldn't even have to force your rule. The idiots would elect you if you wanted them to. As for anything else . . . what more is there to fear, once a wizard has turned down being master of the universe?" Severus asked.
"You're not taking this seriously," Harry complained.
"Aren't I? Are you telling me that I'd be able to do a damn thing to stop you if you wanted to put me under Imperius and force me to do anything you wanted? Remember, I've felt your power every night. I know what you're capable of," Severus reminded him.
"Then why aren't you afraid?"
Apparently, hearing it once wasn't enough for Harry. "For the same reason I'm not afraid that Hagrid will go berserk at the dinner table and kill me, even though he could easily crush the life out of me with one hand. I know it because I know you and it's not in your nature. I know it because I . . . trust you. Answer me this, Potter, if you could do anything you wanted, without fear of consequence, what would you chose to do?"
Harry dropped his gaze. "You mean personally, as opposed to world peace or something on that level?"
It was at that moment that Severus realized just how oblivious Harry was to his own capabilities. "They're the same with you. If you wanted to, you could enforce your will on Wizard and Muggle world alike and force them to stop fighting."
Harry paled at that. "We know how that turns out. It's not an option."
"So what would you do?" Severus prodded, genuinely curious. "What do you want more than anything?"
Harry stared down at the hair on his kneecaps for a moment before softly stating, "You wouldn't believe me."
"Try me," Severus said, now intensely curious.
Harry met and held his stare. "You already gave me the thing I wanted most last night and this morning when you . . . when you didn't run away from me. If I have to name the one thing I want most, it's you. I want you."
Severus wasn't prepared for that. It hit him hard. The survivor in him insisted that he refute the ridiculous idea, but Harry's gaze would brook no argument. Finally, he rallied enough to say, "What you mean is that you want acceptance. These things you feel for me, you feel them because I've stayed when others have run, but . . . that isn't enough to justify . . . you could find what we have with someone younger and more attractive, someone like yourself. You're mistaking gratitude for -"
