Two days later, after the curfew, Harry put his invisibility cloak on and went down to the dungeons. Snape invited him to sit on the same sofa where they had made love, served him a glass of Firewhisky and sat on the armchair facing the sofa.

"I don't know what to think anymore," Harry complained. "I don't even know what to call you. Who are you? What has really happened? You said you didn't play mind-fucking games, but if this is not mind-fucking, then I'm a Hufflepuff."

Snape dropped his eyes, in a very uncharacteristic gesture. "Nothing has changed. We still hate each other, as was your wish. And our life is still in the hands of Dumbledore and the Dark Lord. You and I are two sides of the same coin."

Suddenly enraged, Harry hit the glass on the coffee table, and perched on the sofa edge. "Stop beating around the bush! Tell me what you feel, what you want!"

Snape lifted his eyes to the younger wizard, surprised with his intensity. "What I feel? What I want? What can I say? I can see how powerful and complex your magic is. I can feel your power. As I told you before, there's more than light magic in you."

I'm attracted to your magic like a moth to a flame, thought Snape. And I'll be burned by your fire.

"But I'm not a necrophiliac. I looked in the dictionary. I never wanted to... you know... with a cadaver."

"Are you sure? Not even in your dreams? You have a morbid fascination with death and the dead."

"Er, in my dreams? Look, I don't even know when I'm dreaming and when I'm being possessed or seeing what Voldemort is seeing." Harry shivered. "Anyway, you lied to me all the time, not only about that. Why?"

"I've never lied to you, aggravating boy." Snape shook his head. "You and your perfidious schemes. How did it feel, when it backfired?"

"You are a bastard!"

"Well, that's not exactly fresh news." Snape's lips curved in a bitter sneer. "When you were alone in that white room, facing the eternal torment, oh, perhaps you have sensed it... And yet you don't need to be a vampire to know that loneliness you might have felt, that isolation I've told you about... You don't need to be a vampire to know rejection. If it wasn't so difficult for you to imagine me as a vampire, probably it is because I resemble, if not a real vampire, at least the vampire of your romantic dreams... Unfortunately, there isn't a potion like the one you have imagined, that I know of. Your idea is, notwithstanding, brilliant. Since I heard it, I could not stop thinking about it. Those books you see over my desk... they are the beginning of my research."

"Do you mean... you think it's possible to create that potion?"

"I haven't the foggiest idea."

"And if you could do it, would you agree?"

"To be bitten by a vampire?" Snape asked, with a disgusted grimace.

"If you prefer, I could be the first. And then I would transform you," said Harry, standing up.

A flicker of smile showed on the professor's lips in reaction to the boy's enthusiasm. He stood up and stretched his hand to Harry. "It's a deal."

Instead of shaking Snape's hand, Harry held it between his own, and took it to his lips.

Snape gazed at him, fascinated. "Harry... you can count on my hate. It creeps through my veins and burns deeply into my soul."

Snape bent his head and their lips met - softly, tentatively at first, then with more urgency and desire -, in a kiss that was battle and surrender.

Finally, Harry retreated a little and smiled. "Severus, we will conquer eternity. Together."

Then Severus Snape bowed, in a deep reverence. "Yes, my Lord."