A mate of mine who is bisexual (male) and has a well-developed gaydar says that whilst Harry is clearly bi (he is very aware of how other males look, and assesses them in terms of tjheir attractiveness), Snape is as obviously straight as it is poss9ble for a fictional character to be. That AU-ness aside, though, this is marvellous - one of the best fanfics I've ever read. It's full of wonderful little spot-on character-sketches - of Albus, Gellert, Ron etc - and I love the fact that Lily is just as nasty as she is in the books - vengeful, unforgiving, domineering, selfish and willing to dump a friend because he isn't cool enough - yet she's also quite symnpathetic and we see her gradually recognising and trying to fix her own faults, as one would hope the dead would do.
I also love the fact that Albus is just as ambiguous as he is in the books - he means to be a good person, and he kind of nearly almost succeeds, but would you buy a used Hippogriff from this person? And the writing style is stunning.
I don't believe for a moment that Severus really would have tortured Harry's attackers to death. He was a true Death Eater for about eighteen months and managed to garner so little reputation that Sirius, an Order memebr who hated him, had never heard even a rumour that he *was* a DE, and when he had the man who betrayed Lily to her death in his power, he bossed him around a bit and made him do the washing up. But I can believe that he would say, and maybe even think, that he would do so, because he talks up a very good monster.
Btw if you want to be bothered to fix them you have one Britpick, one canon pick and one typo in that order, all very minor.
Britpick - Lily would think that Albus (I think it was Albus) was handing something out like sweets or sweeties, not candy.
Canon pick - after the incident with the doe Patronus, the sword and the icy pond, Harry and Ron destroyed the locket Horcrux, not the ring one. It was Dumbledore who denatured the ring.
Typo - "smoke floating up from [the] stub he cups".