Always

Chapter Seven

Twelve years ago...

"Dad says that he won't come down until you apologize."

Draco rolled his eyes. "And what am I supposed to apologize for now?" he asked in exasperation as he watched his daughter come all the way down the staircase.

"Perhaps you looked crossly at the robin on the window ledge," Snape offered and both men chuckled.

"Don't laugh!" Maia shouted in anger. She may have only been five-years old, but she knew when her father and Sev were being 'superior prats', as her dad called them when he was really angry.

Draco raised an eyebrow at his daughter. "Would you like to rephrase that, madam?"

Maia hunched her little shoulders at her father's warning tone, but didn't back down. "Dad's crying and sad. It's not nice to laugh at someone."

Sighing, Draco glanced at Snape before addressing his daughter again. "We are not laughing at your Dad. We are merely laughing at the situation. This happens every year and we become frustrated." His lips moved into a smirk. "Besides, if the person warrants it, it is perfectly acceptable to laugh at someone. Fools deserve it. Not that your dad is a fool. But others certainly are and should be laughed at and ridiculed as much as possible so that they either mend their ways or slink away into deserved solitude."

The slight whistle in the air gave Draco just the split second he needed to dodge the framed landscape painting that smashed into the wall behind him.

"You self-righteous bastard! You are no better than you were in school, you supieror prat! How dare you tell my daughter such nasty lies! Get away from her! Now!"

All three occupants looked at the flushed and angry Harry at the top of the stairs. His fists were balled at his sides and he was snarling and showing a fair bit of teeth.

"Maia, go get the biscuits from the side table next to my chair," Snape ordered quietly. Maia looked from her deranged dad to her cool Sev and quickly ran into the sitting room.

"Don't tell her what to do!" Harry bellowed. "You have no rights over her! She should be outside playing! In fact, that is what we are going to do right now! Maia! We are going to play outside!"

"Harry, it's bitterly cold outside. Why don't you wait a bit," Draco suggested nicely as his husband stormed down the stairs. The back of his neck throbbed from when a bit of the wood from the frame had hit him as it ricocheted off the wall. Draco thanked the fates that he had been able to duck or he feared he would be an unconscious pile on the floor at the moment.

"Don't tell me what to do!" Harry hissed.

"Why does he insist on skipping breakfast?" Snape groused as he backed away from the bottom of the stairs.

"Don't talk about me as if I can't hear you! You just want to steal my daughter, don't you? Don't you?" Harry snarled as he came to the bottom floor. He glared at Snape and then at Draco.

"Harry rarely eats breakfast," Draco explained. "And suggesting it to him this morning nearly cost me an eye along with the alabaster statue from Germany," Draco added. "Why he chooses art to throw, I'll never comprehend."

"Stop talking about me!"

"Here, Sev!" Maia ran back into the room toward Snape but was intercepted by Harry as she ran past. He scooped her into his arms, causing the plate of biscuits to hit the floor with a crash. Draco and Snape immediately straightened and tensed.

"Maia, darling, we are going to go outside and play, all right? I'll push you on the swings," Harry crooned while holding her tight and rubbing his cheek on her head.