The thin eyebrows drew down over puzzled eyes. "You mean 'Sir'?"
Severus shut his eyes briefly, feeling the start of a headache. But the boy was so earnest. "No. There will be times when you may call me, or other adults 'sir.' What I was reminding you of was 'freak.' I will ask you again not to use that word in this house."
"But I--"
"No, Harry. I will not bend on this. I told you before, your relatives lied to you. You are not a freak because you can do magic. You are a wizard."
"Magic is a bad word, sir," the boy whispered. "You said . . ." His face screwed up in consternation. "Didn't you say it was?"
"No. You misunderstood me." Severus kept his voice very soft, gentle, knowing that any sign of anger would frighten the boy and set this fragile trust they were building back immeasurably. No matter the rage he felt rising in him again. Imagine telling a wizarding child that "magic" was bad and should never even be spoken about! A visit to those Dursleys was in order, for this and their many other transgressions. Immediately, if he could manage it. "Magic is not bad. Neither the word nor the deed."
"Really?"
"Really, child. I am very happy you are a wizard. Very pleased indeed."
Giving Severus one of his rare smiles, Harry leaned in close to him and whispered, "Me, too."
---
Some time later that evening, after Severus had settled Harry in the library, with instructions that he could look at, but not touch any books unless Severus was there, and making sure Dappin knew to feed the boy if he wasn't back by suppertime, Severus Apparated to Privet Drive.
The sun was low in the sky, as it had been two days previous, when he had first found the boy in the back yard. This time, a car was in the drive, identical to the car at the house next door. Good. He wouldn't have to wait for them.
Clothes transfigured into Muggle-appropriate ones, and wand glamoured to look like a cane, Severus marched to the front door and rapped upon it. A shout of "Boy!" sounded from inside, followed closely by a higher pitched call of, "Boy's gone, 'member, Dad?"
A third voice, this from a woman, hollered, "Duddikins, get the door, will you darling?"
"Mummy, I'm playing my new game!"
Moments later, the door opened to reveal a horse-faced woman with a long neck, skinny arms and a sour expression. She looked Severus up and down, and said sharply, "We're not buying."
"That is fine," Severus said, "for I have nothing to sell."
"What do you want then?"
"I have come," Severus told her, and placed his foot neatly across the threshold, "to discuss what you did to Harry."
The woman's pale face lost what little color it had, but she put up a front, even so. "I don't know what you're talking about. Harry who?"
"Harry Potter, though he is no longer called that. Your nephew. The child of your sister, Lily. You are Petunia Dursley, are you not?"
"I . . . I . . ." She turned and shouted. "Vernon! There's a man here asking about Lily's boy."
The roundest man Severus had ever seen thundered around the corner from their sitting room. His face was red and getting redder by the second. A bushy mustache hovered over protruding lips, and his eyes held a manic gleam. "We don't know anything about that. Now get out of my house!"
"I'm afraid I don't believe you, Mr. Dursley," Severus said smoothly. He pushed his way in, past Petunia, gripping his wand securely. "Because I found the boy chained in your backyard just two days ago."
"You! How did you—" The man seemed to realize what he was saying and cut himself off. "I have no idea what you're talking about. None at all!"
"I still don't believe you." Severus produced one of his most menacing glares, and was gratified to see the bluster seep out of the huge man. "And I have come on behalf of the boy to exact your punishment."
"You've come – punishment – what?" The bluster was back, and Vernon Dursley stomped forward, obviously intent on intimidation. It didn't work.
Out of the corner of his eye, Severus caught sight of the whale of a boy he'd met the other day, sneaking to the top of the stairs to watch the confrontation. He sneered. "Your son told me, himself, what you'd done to Harry. Told me where he was."
"I didn't either!" the boy, Dudders or Duddikins or whatever he was called, shouted. "Piers told him 'bout the dog." Vernon shot a look up the stairs, and Dudders clamped a hand over his mouth, too late.
"Now look here," Vernon started, putting up his hands and moving back a step. "That whelp is dangerous. You should have seen the things he's done. I did it for his own good!"
"His own good." Severus' voice dipped lower, to its most dangerous. The red-faced man blanched. "I have never met a person I more wanted to destroy than you, not even the Dark Lord, and he personally tortured and killed every person I ever loved. But you! Starving a child, beating him, chaining him up like an animal. You're lucky the boy seems to have a kind heart, for many's the wizard who would have destroyed Muggles like you the first time you dared to lay a hand on him. Yes, you got away with it for a good long time.
"But no more."
Dursley was trembling in front of him, hands still held up to pacify, but Severus was past the point of pacification. He pointed the cane at the enormous man and canceled the glamour so the tip of his wand was mere inches from the man's fat forehead. Sweat poured off the pink skin and ran down his flabby cheeks.
Severus snarled, "Legilimens!" and sank into the man's memories, searching out any that had to do with Harry. What he saw sickened him and fueled his rage to new heights. No wonder the boy was frightened of his own magic and sudden movements. No wonder he only responded with his set two words: "Yes, sir," or "No, sir," and had thought himself a house elf, for he had known nothing else in his whole existence here. His anxiety about having a room of his own was plain now, too.
He wrenched himself out of the man's mind without consideration for the pain such an exit would cause, and smiled grimly when Dursley collapsed onto the floor, holding his head. He lifted his wand to his next target, not sure what to expect, but bracing himself for the worst. "Legilimens!"
Lily's sister had amazingly erected a semblance of a block to the spell, but it was flimsy as spun candy and he tore it to shreds, searching her memories for signs of the boy. The woman huddled on the floor as he ripped through her mind, finding the reason the boy was so painfully, desperately thin and shied away from touch, and why showers were far preferable to baths. Bile rose in his throat as he poured through the years, looking for anything, any memory at all that would mitigate the horrors these people had put Harry – his son! – through.
He found nothing.
Even when his wand turned on the son, the blubbery Duddi-dipkins, all he saw was a series of hurtful pranks, petty persecutions and outright violence perpetrated against the little boy who had found a way into Severus' heart. This sadistic boy had broken Harry's arm and was responsible for the hurt ankle, many of the bruises, and for a thousand smaller traumas and taunts.
Enough!
The three Dursleys were on the floor, pale and shaking and repentant, with tears and pleas that would never reach him. Severus was unmoved. Instead, he told them, "Every sleight, every hurt, every unkind word or deed you inflicted upon my son, every one of these will come back to you threefold. You will not rest, as he did not. You will not eat, as he did not. You will hurt and find no comfort, as you gave none to him. You will find no respite, and no mercy here. Priori Malum Res, Redeo!"
The screams from within the house, as Severus shut the door behind him, were like a balm, the smallest piece of vengeance, and he felt lighter already as he returned to his home and his son.