Greater Love, an Essay

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man should lay down his life for his friends.”

So reads the epitaph on the grave Lily is visiting.

In a certain Mirror viewed by Severus, and perhaps also in his dreams. (EmmaD, “What I Wish”)

But the mirror lies, of course.



Oh, the verse is accurate enough; there can be no greater love.

But the unfortunate Severus was never accorded the honor of laying down his life for Lily.

However he might have craved it, and however often he might have put himself in mortal peril for her sake.

Severus was never granted the opportunity to make the supreme sacrifice.

For as there can be no greater love, so there can be no greater sacrifice, right? Laying down one’s life is the greatest sacrifice anyone can make.

It follows that in the Potterverse, that act must create the most potent protective magic.

“How did you survive? .... So. Your mother died to save you. Yes, that’s a powerful countercharm.” (CoS, 17)

See? Even Tom admits its power, though the whole concept of love and sacrifice is so utterly alien to him that he repeatedly forgets to take its power into account. To his cost.

No greater love, no greater sacrifice, no greater protective magic.

Got it.

**********************************************************************

When you really stop to think, some of Dumbledore’s actions make no sense at all.

For example, his question to the wild-with-grief Severus during the postmortem scene, “Is this remorse, Severus?”

Excuse me?

Twinkles had just offered the silver lining of Harry’s survival to the agonized young man, reminding him that Lily’s lovely eyes had been passed to the baby. The young man rejected the attempted comfort violently, bellowing, “DON’T…. Gone… dead….”

Does that look like remorse to you? Or does it look like the young man furiously resented that sentimental “Aaaw, but at least the baby survived, isn’t that sweet?” and insisted that Lily’s loss was the only thing that could matter?

Furthermore—blinks—remorse?

Um, remorse about what, exactly?

It was clear in the preceding Pensieve-scene on the hilltop that Snape most bitterly regretted having brought that Prophecy to Tom and thus imperiled Lily. Snape had since given up all his ambitions and other hopes, betrayed all his other friends, and risked hideous death and torture to atone for that original transgression.

He’d performed every penance his confessor had assigned.

So why should Dumbledore suddenly be worrying anew about Snape’s penitence?

*

Then there’s that “strongest shield” bit. I argued in “Dumbledore’s Misconceptions” that Dumbles seemed to have believed for years that Lily’s sacrifice had “shielded” her son, creating some barrier between him and Voldemort’s malice, rather than (as seems rather to have been the case) conferring unnatural good luck on him.

But if a sacrificial death could ever have the power to block a subsequent AK to the face, someone else should have discovered this first. In the Grindelwald wars, say. Or fighting that unnamed Dark Lord before him. Self-sacrifice has long been known to create “a powerful countercharm,” so it would be the obvious thing to try if you wanted to block an otherwise unblockable curse. (At least on the Continent, where the Dark Arts are still studied.)

Heck, if AK has been around that long, some stern Roman matron should have killed herself to try to protect her son from dying of that curse in battle. This one single exception to the no-magical-block-works rule for AK should have been worked out by some Dark Arts geek and tested by someone desperate to save a comrade, not stumbled over by sheer accident by Dark Arts-hating Lily.

But it wasn’t. Hence, it’s never worked before. To create the luck to dodge an Unforgivable or two, yes (we saw the luck potion create that effect with Ginny), but not to create a magic armour that stands against a direct hit from Avada Kedavra.

No one reading the November 1st issue of the Prophet speculated that Harry might have survived a direct AK because his parents had died to save him, and You-Know-Who had been stupid enough to let them. No one suggested that magical Britain should celebrate “James and Lily Potter Day.”

So how could Dumbles, who’s the one who put it about that Harry had survived a direct hit and who believed it himself (sorta), have believed Lily’s death to have been so uniquely powerful? How could he have believed that her sacrifice had shielded her child, when no comparable self-sacrifice had ever had a comparable effect?

And, apparently, gone on happily thinking so for years? It seems that Albus only stopped believing this when the barrier against Tom’s touching Harry (Albus’s magical augmentation of what he’d imagined her sacrifice to have bought) failed utterly, but Harry’s extreme luck (Lily’s actual gift) still held.

*

Then there’s Twinkle’s insistence that Severus must be the one to kill him. When Severus starts balking as the event approaches (making it clear he would quite literally rather die himself, since we know him to be bound by that Unbreakable Vow), Dumbledore reminds him of “services you owe me” rather than respecting Severus’s reluctance. What kind of person forces his most loyal supporter to murder him, instead of trying to find another way of reaching the goal?
And just what was Dumbledore’s true goal? The three reasons Dumbledore offered Snape at the time were entirely specious.

*

Then, most curious of all, there’s Dumbledore’s appointing Snape to be the one to tell Harry that he carried Tom’s soul fragment and must die to make Tom mortal. (Which Dumbles did the very night that Severus tried to back out of becoming his murderer; did Dumbles hope the revelation of this final betrayal might lessen Severus’s reluctance to perform his earlier-agreed-upon “service”?)

The fact that Severus managed to pull the job off (due to his brilliance and sheer strength of will, and Harry’s great good luck) tends to blind us to exactly how ludicrous it was to give that particular job to him.

Let’s examine these odd things Dumbledore did in reverse order, shall we?

*

Suppose Bellatrix had sauntered up to Sirius and said, “Hi, baby coz. I’m the Dark Lord’s most trusted and devoted servant, while you’re his bitterest enemy. Your loathing and rejection of me and all I stand for is surpassed only by my hatred and contempt for you. So I’m here to tell you, gratis, the only way my beloved lord may be destroyed. If you surrender to him and let him kill you like he’s asking, really he’ll be doomed. No need to thank me for the tip, coz. See you in the Forest!”

Yep. Uh-huh. Sirius would certainly have fallen for that one.

Mind, when Dumbles set Severus the task he didn’t know that Harry would find out that Snape had been the one to report the Prophecy to Tom, nor that Harry would personally witness Snape’s previously-scheduled murder of Harry’s grandfather-figure. But he knew that the first was possible, and he knew that Harry would hate Snape for the murder even without the inflammatory effect of having seen it. Moreover, Twinkles knew, he had worked to guarantee, that Harry not only mistrusted Snape’s loyalty, he believed that Snape hated him in return and would rejoice in his destruction.

Get real. This news should have been given to Harry by someone Harry trusted utterly—both to be on the same side and to care about Harry’s well-being, or at least not actively to desire Harry’s doom! Albus himself, say, Harry’s beloved mentor, or rather his portrait. If there was no way to arrange an interview between Harry and the portrait, Remus. Or Minerva. Moody. Arthur Weasley.

But really, if Severus was expected to smuggle the Sword of Gryffindor to the boy, why not Albus’s portrait at the correct time? Or Albus could have hidden a message along with the Suicide Stone in that Snitch, and given Severus the job of giving the boy the password to open it (not the same as was used in canon) as soon as Severus saw Tom start to protect Nagini.

Severus need not have known, even, what the portrait or the password-opened Snitch would make Harry do. He need not have learned (except in the unlikely event that both survived) of the full extent of Dumbledore’s betrayal of both Harry and him.

It was insane to give such a task to the person Harry “hated as much as Voldemort himself” and believed to be the vilest of traitors.

Seriously. Given Harry’s feelings, Dumble’s plan was clinically insane.

Now look at it from the other side, from the view of Snape’s feelings. Severus had devoted damned near his entire adult life to “helping Albus protect Lily’s son”—at Albus’s own instigation Severus had served Albus faithfully for years, no matter what the cost to himself: risking death, taking torture, lying, spying, doing things he hated. He had even accepted the role of becoming Albus’s murderer.

And his reward for this absolute faithfulness was to be chosen to send Lily’s child to his death?

Severus wasn’t even asked merely to accept that death’s necessity; no, he, personally, must be the one actually to send Harry off to die.

Could there be anything crueler than to force the boy’s lifelong guard, the man who’d painfully rebuilt the life shattered by Lily’s death on the foundation of protecting Lily’s son against Lord Voldemort, to send the boy into the Dark Lord’s arms? In effect, to become Harry’s co-executioner?

Well, yes.

There could.

And Twinkles did that too.

Albus told Harry in King’s Cross (DH 35), that Tom “took your blood and rebuilt his living body with it! Your blood in his veins, Harry, Lily’s protection inside both of you! He tethered you to life while he lives!”

Blood-magic expert Dumbles had long expected, or at least hoped for, that exact outcome. Way back in GoF, he’d betrayed that “gleam of triumph.” He’d been salving his own conscience all that time with that hope: that Harry could die enough to take Tom’s soul-fragment out of the world, but be tethered enough by that blood-tie to be afforded the chance to return.

Yet Albus denied Severus any shred of that comfort. In fact, he made absolutely certain that he wouldn’t reveal it inadvertently to his fellow Legilimens: the whole time he was telling Snape about the connection between Harry and Tom, he kept “his eyes still tight shut.”

What???

I dislike Albus, but that he would wantonly lead Severus to believe that Harry’s death must be permanent when he himself knew otherwise seems a bit worse even than what I expect of him. Why not tell Severus the truth?

We may be fairly certain that Albus did not, because it seems improbable that Severus, dying himself, should not have clung to that consolation as he sent the boy off to be killed at Tom’s wand.

Yet if Severus had, surely it would have spilled out with his other memories?

For years, indeed, that had been my naïve supposition as to why Albus would hide such a truth from Severus: lest he spill the secret to the boy.

Well, why not tell the boy? It was even crueler to keep the truth from Harry, after all.

Instead, Twinkles not only hid from Harry his expectation that Harry might not die of Tom’s AK; no, he instead reinforced the notion that of course Harry must. He made sure that Harry (and Tom) were convinced that Harry had previously been protected by the lingering traces of his mother’s sacrifice, and that that protection would expire entirely the moment Harry came of age.

That Lily’s love-shield would be completely gone by the time Harry faced Tom.

Well. That gives us two obvious reasons to hide the information from the boy. One was Tom. Tom must believe that it was now safe to kill the boy, and if he thought Harry still had some protection he might have second thoughts. And he must believe his effort would be effective this time. If Harry survived Tom’s AK yet AGAIN (as people think), Harry’s credit would be even higher and Tom’s lower.

Yet if Harry learned the truth, so too might Tom; Tom has access to Harry’s mind. Or rather, he had, as of when Dumbles came up with this scheme.

Fortunately, Tom so disliked his attempt to possess the boy he used his own Occlumency to hold their connection firmly closed ever since.

But then, during Harry’s sixth year Tom wouldn’t have had much reason to want the connection re-opened. Tom was busy preparing for the aftermath of Dumbledore’s demise (the fall of both the Ministry and Hogwarts), his best agent had the boy under observation, and his schemes didn’t require any immediate information or action from Harry.

But isn’t it fortunate that the following year, when Tom had no spy-eyes on the boy, urgently wanted to find him, and would have liked to have influenced Harry’s actions, it still didn’t occur to Tom that his repeated partial entries into Harry’s mind fifth year had never been intolerable (as the final possession-attempt had been)?

Nor that his own mind might still be open to Harry’s when Tom’s self-discipline slipped in extreme emotion?

Lucky, that double oversight. Real lucky.

*

The second reason not to let Harry know, of course, was Harry. Harry gave himself willingly to Voldemort in order to make possible Tom’s ultimate defeat. He made the greatest sacrifice one could, and that sacrifice had correspondingly great magical power.

Protection, great good luck, for the people still fighting Voldemort.

Who, to put it mildly, would need all the luck they could get.

Dumbledore knew that if his schedule went right, after Harry died to take the Harrycrux soul fragment from the world, there would still be quite the cleanup job to do.

In order for Tom’s final defeat to be effected, somebody (or somebodies) would still have to destroy Nagini (and any other stray Horcruxes still left lying about—there was no guarantee that Tom would wait until he was down to two to realize they were being destroyed), to defeat the Death Eaters, and to kill Tom’s current body.

If Dumbles were right in his supposition, Harry himself would return to finish that last job, supercharged by his own sacrifice.

Only it’s absolutely essential, then, that Harry MAKE a sacrifice.

Facing a spell that you know WOULD kill anyone else, but WOULDN’T (permanently) kill you (or even hurt much), is a very different matter from walking to your certain doom and laying down your life for your friends.

If Harry had given himself to Tom knowing what Twinkles knew, Tom’s AK would still have destroyed Tom’s soul-fragment, fine. But there would have been no magical luck afterwards for the people trying to finish the job of vanquishing Tom. (Whether Harry himself were among their number or not.)

So there, of course, is the reason not to tell Severus the truth: lest he betray it inadvertently to either Tom or Harry. Albus couldn’t risk giving such a secret to “a basket that spends so much time dangling on the arm of Lord Voldemort,” nor such solace to the boy’s steadfast protector, who might pass that comfort on to the boy-hero and thereby lose the war.

Dusts hands in satisfaction. That works.

Until one looks at it.

*

Regarding Tom: make up your mind, Albus!

Either Severus is capable of keeping critical information from Tom, or he is not. If he is not, you have no business telling Severus anything that could truly endanger the war effort. Like, you know, what you just did, that Harry must die to remove a piece of Tom’s soul from the world.

If Tom had learned that Harry was a Horcrux, especially after realizing that Harry had destroyed some (most) of the others, he wouldn’t have killed Harry. He’d have trapped and imprisoned him, maybe paralyzed or Petrified him, but kept him firmly alive, right next to Nagini. At least until Tom felt completely safe on other fronts. And maybe forever, if he could swing a way to do that. (How long do Petrified bodies endure?)

It would be insane to tell Severus that Harry must die to kill Tom, if Albus had any doubts at all about Severus’s ability to conceal vital information from Tom. But conversely, if Severus could be trusted to conceal that, why should the further revelation that the boy might be expected to survive Tom’s Killing Curse be any harder for Severus to conceal?

Then there’s Harry. Could Dumbles really have expected Severus to have been at risk of letting slip to the boy that the required death might not be irreversible?

I mean, the first time I thought of this question I did think that; but that’s because I was reading canon backwards. I reasoned, Snape was in such extremity when he endowed Harry with his memories, even his iron control might have slipped and let Harry learn what he must not.

But Dumbles had no reason to expect Severus to manage to tell Harry while dying.

Dumbles might quite well have expected Severus to have to convince Harry by showing his memories in the Pensieve. So avoiding the issue at first would have been wise. Harry had already witnessed an altered memory; if Severus’s memory of the night Albus told him Harry must die had been edited, Harry would have recognized the deletion and bristled in suspicion. So it would be judicious to produce a memory suitable for framing before offering Severus any reassurance.

But after? Why not tell Severus after? Bring the scene to a well-rounded close (“Always.” ), bring down the curtain, and then twinkle, “You needn’t be so dramatic, Severus. I’ve good reason to suppose that if you manipulate the Dark Lord into using the Killing Curse on Harry, the boy can survive it again.” Even tell him, “Lily’s protection isn’t quite as gone as I’ve made the boy and Voldemort believe, but it will be better if neither of them suspect that.”

It wouldn’t even have been untrue, quite.

Surely Dumbles must have expected Snape to tell Harry, either while in his right mind, or not at all. (Since even our Severus might get himself killed with his mission unfulfilled.)

No, if Dumbles had worried about Snape letting slip to Harry his possible survival, it’s not because he had anticipated that Severus would make the grand reveal under circumstances more extreme even than Tom’s worst inquisition. He would have had to have feared that Severus would let something slip out of compassion for the child. That, taking comfort himself in Dumbledore’s analysis, he’d either injudiciously pass on the information to the boy, or let himself wallow, consoling himself, at the wrong moment to let Harry find out by accident.

Only, this is Snape. Who raced down a dark tunnel to face down the mass-murderer and the werewolf who’d conspired to kill him as a boy, in order to save three reckless, disobedient children who hated him.

And who then spewed insults at those ingrate children. While still wielding his wand in their defense.

Sorry, but if there is anyone whom we may rely upon never to succumb to the impulse to put a child’s emotional comfort above its long-term physical safety, it is Severus.

So it doesn’t make any more sense NOT to tell Severus that Harry might survive, than it did in the first place to tell Severus THAT Harry must die, and to plan to use him as Harry’s informant.

It all makes no sense. What was Albus thinking?

*

Moving backward, why did Dumbledore really insist that Snape kill him?

Dumbledore’s true reason must have been overwhelmingly important, because this is a horrific thing to demand of anyone, much less one’s most devoted follower. Whatever Dumbledore was trying to make happen, then, could have been purchased with no lesser coin.

(At least we hope not.)

But Albus’s true reason certainly had nothing to do with the reasons Albus gave Severus at the time.

The first reason Twinkles gave Severus was to save Draco from death—from Lord Voldemort’s retribution for Draco’s anticipated failure.

To which Snape responded, logically, “If you don’t mind dying, why not let Draco do it?”

“That boy’s soul is not yet so damaged,” said Dumbledore. “I would not have it ripped apart on my account.”

To which outrageous suggestion (trade one soul’s damnation for another, a willing murderer’s for an innocent’s?) Snape responded, again logically, “And my soul, Dumbledore? Mine?”

Which induced Dumbledore to give his third specious reason.

“You alone know whether it will harm your soul to help an old man avoid pain and humiliation,” said Dumbledore. “I ask this one great favor of you, Severus, because death is coming for me as surely as the Chudley Cannons will finish bottom of this year’s league. I confess I should prefer a quick, painless exit to the protracted and messy affair it will be if, for instance, Greyback is involved…. Or dear Bellatrix, who likes to play with her food….”


Well.

Severus had had years to worry about just how “protracted and messy” a death might be made to be.

But is Albus Dumbledore actually so craven as he seems here? Asking his most loyal servant to rend his very soul and become a justly-condemned criminal just to save Albus from some pain? Specifically, from the selfsame painful and protracted death that said servant has spent over a decade anticipating as his likely reward for his loyalty?

But if Dumbledore were indeed too craven to face the risk he blithely exposed his servant to, he had a simple recourse. Make an Unbreakable Vow never to say “Fiddlesticks” three times in succession, and Albus has his quick exit.

*

So this all doesn’t quite wash.

Notice, however, that all three reasons Dumbles gave were appeals to Severus’s mercy—asking him to sacrifice himself (his scruples, his reputation, his life, and his very soul) to save another from harm.

Not, say, appeals to Severus’s intellect and ruthlessness—asking him to consider the strategic value of positioning Dumbledore’s agent at Tom’s right hand. At any cost.

*

What did Severus, upon reflection, probably assume to be Dumbledore’s true reason? (Indeed, his reflections, not Albus’s plea for a mercy-killing, might be what made him finally concede.)


Well, what string did Dumbles later pull to ensure Snape’s compliance to distasteful orders? Dumbledore uses, always, what he expects to work.

And with Severus, it’s never considerations of his own safety:

“And Severus, if you are forced to take part in the [Seven Potters] chase, be sure to act your part convincingly…. I am counting upon you to remain in Lord Voldemort’s good books as long as possible, or Hogwarts will be left to the mercy of the Carrows.”

*

Severus told Dumbledore that he was going to die within the year. Albus refused to talk further with Severus about his impending doom, instead turning the conversation firmly to Draco’s “task.” And then Albus introduced the next topic: ”Now, I should have thought the natural successor to the job, once Draco fails, is yourself?”

There was a short pause.

“That, I think, is the Dark Lord’s plan.”

“Lord Voldemort foresees a moment in the near future when he will not need a spy at Hogwarts?”

“He believes the school will soon be in his grasp, yes.”

“And if it does fall into his grasp,” said Dumbledore, almost, it seemed, as an aside, “I have your word that you will do all in your power to protect the students of Hogwarts?”

Snape gave a stiff nod.

Severus, on reflection, must have thought this to be the real reason why the headmaster would ask such a terrible thing of him. Certainly the enormous cost is of no consequence if it ensures their students’ safety. For their sakes, he must get and remain in the Dark Lord’s “good books” by any means necessary. So that he can replace Albus as headmaster after the old man’s impending death.

He had previously risked his life to protect children in his care. Now he must sacrifice more.

Indeed, by consenting to the first request, “to do all in your power,” Severus might be said already to have committed himself to the second. No wonder Dumbledore had made him give his word first before revealing what that “all” was going to entail, the manipulative bastard! Snape has always stopped short of killing… but he’s already pledged his word.

And what, after all, is his tattered soul or honor good for, save to buy the safety of innocents?

At last Snape gave another curt nod.


*

That’s what Severus probably thought about Dumbledore’s demand.

Need that be what we think?

For one thing, we know what Severus did not, and apparently never learned: how Dumbledore got his mortal injury. We’ll return to this point much later.

For now, consider that Albus ordered Severus to do something emotionally devastating, possibly soul-destroying, and indisputably criminal. In the unlikely event Severus survived the war, he’d likely be executed, Kissed, or sentenced to death in Azkaban—by the very people he’d made this monstrous sacrifice for.

Snape would have dismissed the price he would pay as of no intrinsic importance.

But Dumbledore ought not to have. Not if there was any other way to achieve that goal.

Well, was murdering Albus the only, or the obviously best, way to guarantee that Severus be made the next headmaster?

Would Tom take the action as incontrovertible proof of where Snape’s loyalties lay?

Was Tom certain to reward that presumed loyalty with the headmastership?

Was there any way, of lesser cost to Severus, of achieving the same goal?


Of course, Harry took Dumbledore’s murder as irrefutable proof of Snape’s true loyalties.

Well, Harry would.

And Dumbledore’s other loyalists (save Luna?), blinded by Snape’s apparent betrayal of their beloved headmaster, did the same. But they were seeing the world as black or white: that Snape must be either Voldemort’s man, or Dumbledore’s.

But there were always other options, and Tom (and others) would have considered some at least of the theories we fans debated before DH.

Tom would probably not have entertained any hypotheses that involved Albus having ordered Severus to kill him. Tom feared death above all else; he wasn’t really equipped to register the concept of sacrificing one’s life for a loved one or a cause, however many times he witnessed fools do so.

But Tom’s blind spot still leaves all those explanations which had Severus kill Albus out of Machiavellian self-interest or from fear of the Vow. So, no, Tom wouldn’t consider Albus’s murder as establishing Snape’s perfect loyalty, if he’d previously doubted it.

But did he? Snape said not, to Bellatrix (HBP 2); he invited her to discuss her concerns with the Dark Lord, and told her their master was satisfied with his answers.

Then, when Albus asked Severus to offer “aid” to Draco to learn his plans, Snape objected that Draco liked Snape “—much less since his father has lost favor. Draco blames me, he thinks I have usurped Lucius’s position.”

Narcissa agreed with that assessment. That’s why she went to Spinner’s End: to ask the current favorite to persuade the Dark Lord to change his mind about Draco’s assignment.

So Severus didn’t need to go to extremes to attain the spot at Tom’s right hand—he was already there. He just needed to be careful not to lose it.

Indeed, publicly killing “the only one Voldemort ever feared” (except for Harry, the other person Tom had dueled and failed to kill), might logically be expected to decrease a DE’s life expectancy. What, Tom looks like someone who would countenance a rival?

When Snape reported his success to Tom, he must have been very careful to slather on the same grease he’d used with Bella: “The duel with the Dark Lord last month shook him. He has since sustained a serious injury because his reactions are slower…” (HBP2) Yep, all Severus had done, it was nothing, really, my Lord, was to kill an old man who’d been fatally weakened by fighting YOU last year, my Lord, and who’d further been disarmed by Draco.

Moreover, there was no assurance that Snape’s display of loyalty, even were it taken as such, would be rewarded by the headmastership. Or at all. Tom’s “most loyal servants” have a tendency to suffer a grisly fate. Quirrell was consumed and abandoned to die. Barty was sent to a cursed position and Kissed. Lucius was given a team composed half of crazies to capture the Prophecy, and his son set up to be killed when he failed. Bellatrix was humiliated in front of her peers precisely as she proclaimed her perfect devotion.

So, no, Albus’s murderer was not a shoo-in as his replacement.

And even if he were….

Any goal that could conceivably be accomplished by people (including Tom) believing Severus to have murdered Albus, could also be accomplished by their believing it falsely. Severus would surely rather be wrongly excoriated by his allies and lauded by his enemies for killing Dumbledore, than earn the same censure and accolades for actually doing so?

We’re talking about Severus here, the master of illusions. When Albus had previously wanted Professor Snape to demonstrate that he was so consumed by hatred for James Potter as to be unable to treat Potter’s son with professional decorum, that he was a sadist who would gleefully kill a little boy’s pet before the child’s eyes, Severus created convincing illusions without stooping to the reality. So why demand the reality here, if any illusion could possibly serve?

(Indeed, that the whole “murder” had been an act had been among the fan theories.)

Why shouldn’t the dying man kill himself, with careful stage-management to frame Severus? And evidence hidden to exonerate the innocent man (probably posthumously) after the final victory?

Now, Severus wouldn’t think of this simple alternative, because the only real advantage of this scheme over the other would be that it would save him from an intolerable burden and justified calumny, moving the moral burden to Albus. And that wouldn’t register to Severus as worth doing.

But it should have with Albus.

But no.

For some reason known only to Albus, it was imperative that Snape actually do the deed.

*


Which brings us to the reason Albus didn’t (we infer) confide in Severus. The Elder Wand, and its mastery.

That, of course, was the real reason Albus had to die that way.

Right? Only so could Albus absolutely guarantee that the Deathstick’s mastery would go to—well, that it wouldn’t go to—well, that its Mastery would die with him. Maybe.

Or not.


Even leaving aside the absurdity of insisting someone MURDER you over a stick that might be (and was) taken from you before the murder could happen….

Well, those who thought the real reason was that stick, ever notice that Dumbles DIDN’T say via Legilimency to Severus, “Good news, Severus! I know you’d rather die than kill me, and now that Draco’s disarmed me, you might as well have your wish!”?

Snape (nvbl): “I’m outta here, thank God!” Keels over dead from the broken Vow.

Anyone besides me notice it didn’t happen that way in canon?



Dumbledore did not ever explain exactly what he thought he was doing about the Deathstick. Tom thought (DH 36), “Dumbledore was trying to keep the Elder Wand from me! He intended that Snape should be the true master of the wand!”

Harry had said the same when talking to Albus in King’s Cross (DH 35): “If you planned your death with Snape, you meant him to end up with the Elder Wand, didn’t you?”

“I admit that was my intention,” said Dumbledore, “but it did not work as I intended, did it?”

To Tom, later, however, Harry gave a different explanation, “Snape never beat Dumbledore! Dumbledore’s death was planned between them! Dumbledore intended to die undefeated, the wand’s last true master! If all had gone as planned, the wand’s power would have died with him, because it had never been won from him.”

Well. So we have two competing theories. The first is that Dumbledore wanted Snape to end up Master of the Deathstick, and so it was necessary that Snape kill the previous master.

Except it wasn’t. The last two transfers had been made non-lethally, and Albus knew it. (As were the next two.)

“Severus, my boy, which would you rather cast at me: Expelliarmus or Avada Kedavra? Take your pick, no rush.”

The second theory … Well, let’s watch how the Deathstick acted for Harry, the master of the wand that had disarmed its previous master.

In the Forest, Harry was willing to let Tom kill him. And the Deathstick obliged, casting an AK that took Harry’s soul and its passenger soul-fragment out of Harry’s body.

And that death did not make the Deathstick transfer its allegiance to Harry’s killer. Nor did the wand’s power die when Harry died; it still answered to Harry when he subsequently came back. When he didn’t want Tom’s Cruciati to hurt him, they didn’t. When he didn’t want Tom’s curses to hurt his friends, they didn’t. When he didn’t want Tom’s AK to kill him a second time, it did not.

Now, had Harry never come back, the effect on the Deathstick might have seemed the same to unhappy future wielders as its power “dying”. With no way to claim mastery from dead Harry, the wand would behave no differently than any other good wand, unwilling, as Tom whined, (DH32) to “reveal the wonders it has promised.”

So it seems Harry’s second theory works, and that might have been Albus’s intention.

Only note, please, Tom was hardly Harry’s faithful servant, reluctantly obeying Harry’s order to cast an AK. (“Tom… Please.”) Tom killed Harry very much at Tom’s own pleasure. But he didn’t defeat Harry in so doing, because Harry had consented to die.

Sp anyone could have killed Albus and transferred the wand’s allegiance to Limbo, as long as Albus consented to his death. (And if the killer got in before Draco.) If Albus had truly figured out enough to realize that a voluntary death wouldn’t transfer the wand’s allegiance to the killer, then he didn’t need Snape to assist at his suicide. The SMART thing to have done would have been to arrange for Bellatrix to kill him. That way if Tom finally figured out which wand Albus had held, he’d have killed his actual “good and faithful servant” in a futile attempt to gain the Deathstick’s mastery.

So those reasons fall apart too. So what did Dumbles gain by demanding Severus kill him? What goal otherwise unattainable did he achieve? What did his death at Severus’s hands actually accomplish?

Well, the one thing that we can be absolutely certain that forcing Snape to kill him did accomplish, and that Twinkles could know for sure it must accomplish, was that Severus was, however unwillingly, truly responsible for his master’s death.

This blinding insight doesn’t seem to get us any forwarder.

*

Okay, so let’s look back at Dumbledore’s apparent belief that Lily’s death had created a protective shield for her son.

Which was strong enough to hold against the Killing Curse, and to bounce it back in Tom’s face.

Only it couldn’t have been, and Albus couldn’t have believed so for long.

Magical sacrifices used to be the norm. They were regularly used to ensure the good of the community. It used to be the year-king’s sacred duty to die at the end of his term for the good of his land. When he accepted the role of king, a young man was volunteering for the role of sacrificial victim, and he was lauded accordingly for his willingness to sacrifice himself.

And every year a new young hero could be found to do so.

Later, the king was only expected to sacrifice himself in times of emergency: to break a pestilence or drought, to win an otherwise hopeless battle…. To turn his people’s luck from bad to good.

But, see, there’s a lot of information out there about magical sacrifices and the protection they confer. And the records don’t substantiate that a mother’s death to save her baby, however we may commend her, carries so much more magical weight than any other.

Nor that ANY single death has been powerful enough to shield against the AK.

So if other self-sacrifices have never created a shield against AK, why should Lily’s?

Severus, of course, wouldn’t question that the incomparable Lily’s death was unique.

Albus might for a time have bought that a maternal self-sacrifice was uniquely powerful, given his family history.

But on sober reflection, after serious study, no. Lots of people had been killed by Tom (or Gellert, for that matter), many of them had died trying to protect others, and none of their deaths had created a magical protection remotely comparable to an AK-deflecting shield.

And yet Albus apparently believed, for years, that an AK-deflecting shield had been produced.

So Albus had to have believed that there had been another factor that night.

Something else had to have happened, to make Lily’s death create a magical protection an order of magnitude stronger than self-sacrifice normally does.

And Twinkles thought he had seen the answer.


“Is this remorse?”


*

Look again at the scene after Lily’s death. Dumbledore is poking at the agonized young man there, quite deliberately provoking him. “You remember the shape and color of Lily Evans’ eyes, I am sure?”

Oh, do you think, Albus?

There are three obvious reasons to prod at a grieving man like that. One is simple pleasure, the joy of kicking someone who’s down. Tom would do that, totally. One can envision him killing Draco and afterwards taking a connoisseur’s gratification in twitting Lucius and Narcissa about their grief

Whatever my opinion of Albus, I acquit him of that.

The second reason is to manipulate the griever, while s/he’s vulnerable and unable to think clearly, into an agreement that better judgment might resist.

And the third is to take advantage of shattered defenses to gather information.

I’ve long believed Twinkles guilty of the second. Now I think he was doing both.

*

Let’s look a little first at Dumble’s previous manipulation of Severus, in which Albus induced Severus to write his first blank check:

“Don’t kill me!”

…“I—I come with a warning—no, a request—please—“

…“Ah, yes… How much did you relay to Lord Voldemort?” [Poke!]

“Everything—everything I heard!” said Snape. “That is why—it is for that reason—he thinks it means Lily Evans!”

“The prophecy did not refer to a woman,” [Poke!] said Dumbledore. “It spoke of a boy born at the end of July—“ [Poke!]

“You know what I mean! He thinks it means her son, he is going to hunt her down—kill them all—“

“If she means so much to you,” said Dumbledore, “surely Lord Voldemort will spare her? Could you not ask for mercy for the mother, in exchange for the son. ” [Poke!] [emphasis mine]

“I have—I have asked him—“

“You disgust me. You do not care, then, about the deaths of her husband and child? They can die, as long as you have what you want?” [Poke, poke, poke!] …

“Hide them all, then… Keep her—them—safe. Please.”

“And what will you give me in return, Severus?”

“In—in return?” Snape gaped at Dumbledore, and Harry expected him to protest….

The point to note is the craft with which our Legilimens draws out the desperate young man and twists what he learns into a snare. By the time he asks his last question, he’s confident of Snape’s response. He turns Snape’s requesting Tom to limit the collateral damage while Tom’s disposing of a perceived mortal threat into a despicable attempt to “exchange” the baby’s life for its mother’s. He skillfully elicits the admission that Severus’s concern is for Lily, not for a former enemy nor a baby he’s never laid eyes on, and bludgeons Severus brutally with that admission. And he carefully reminds Severus that Lily’s peril is all Severus’s fault, for relaying that prophecy. Which Sev already knew, that’s why he risked his own life to approach the head of the Order with his warning. No, rather, with his plea: “Keep her—them—safe.”

(Voldemort might have spared Lily and killed the other two; Dumbledore, surely, would keep all safe, if he could protect any. If he knew of the threat to them.)

Albus pokes the young man with his comments (“How much did you relay…?” “The prophecy did not refer to a woman.”), learns the precise shape of his guilt and remorse, and uses that to bind him. Severus wants to expiate his fault, and Albus obliges him.

“Anything.”

*

So, too, then, in the next scene. Watch.

After a moment or two, Snape raised his face…. [Note that Albus didn’t try talking before Severus made eye contact.]

, “I thought… you were going… to keep her… safe….”

“She and James put their faith in the wrong person,” said Dumbledore. “Rather like you, Severus. [Poke!] Weren’t you hoping that the Dark Lord would spare her?” [Poke!]

Snape’s breathing was shallow.

“Her boy survives.” [Poke!]

With a tiny jerk of the head, Snape seemed to flick off an irksome fly.

“Her son lives. [Poke!] He has her eyes, precisely her eyes. [Poke!] You remember the shape and color of Lily Evans’s eyes, I am sure?”

[Albus keeps prodding at this one spot until he elicits a further response:]

“DON’T,” bellowed Snape. “Gone… dead…”

“Is this remorse, Severus?” [Poke!]

“I wish… I wish I were dead….”

“And what use would that be to anyone?” said Dumbledore coldly. [Poke!] “If you loved Lily Evans, [Poke!] if you truly loved her, [Poke!] then your way forward is clear.” [Poke!]

Snape seemed to peer through a haze of pain, and Dumbledore’s words appeared to take a long time to reach him.

“What—what do you mean?”

[Albus only stops poking when he’s led Severus to what he wants him to conclude:]

“You know how and why she died. [Poke!] Make sure it was not in vain. [Poke!] Help me protect Lily’s son.”

“He does not need protection. The Dark Lord has gone—”

“The Dark Lord will return, and Harry Potter will be in terrible danger when he does.”

There was a long pause, and slowly Snape regained control of himself, mastered his own breathing. At last he said, “Very well. Very well. But never—never tell, Dumbledore! This must be between us! Swear it! I cannot bear… especially Potter’s son… I want your word!”

“My word, Severus, that I shall never reveal the best of you?” Dumbledore sighed, looking down into Snape’s ferocious, anguished face. “If you insist….”


Back when I though Albus was only manipulating here, not snooping, I thought the sequence was: remind Severus that Lily’s death was all his own fault. (Sliding over the fact that the person Sev had mistakenly put his trust in had been Albus.) Remind Severus, repeatedly, that her son is alive. HER SON. You don’t care? Scum. Don’t you feel remorse for making her die? What good would your death do? LILY considered her baby valuable enough to die for. If you truly loved her, you’d protect what she died to save. Did you, do you? Prove it. By transferring that blank check you wrote me in Lily’s name, to her son’s.

But now I think Albus’s poking included as much investigating as manipulating. And that changes things a bit.

In particular, this realization was the genesis of my “In Dispraise of Albus Dumbledore” essay. For if Twinkles had been deliberately provoking and reading Severus’s reactions, then what he offered Severus in lieu of suicide was not HIS preference at all.

Love, and protecting life. Hate, and avenging death with further death. Self-indulgence, and escaping intolerable pain through suicide.

I no longer think Albus pushed Severus into choosing love over hate, protection over death.

It was never Albus’s choice at all.

It was his victim’s.

Albus merely didn’t want his best tool to either suicide or secede. So he needed to find out which of the two obvious reasons to live—vengeance, or preserving what his lost love had died to save—would appeal more to the grief-shattered man, and persuade him that blind allegiance was the best, the only way to accomplish it.

*

“What,” Albus must have wondered, “do I say to Severus now that Lily’s dead to make him re-commit to both life and me? Do I say, “If you loved Lily Evans, if you truly loved her, then your way forward is clear…. Help me avenge Lily’s death!’?

“Or do I say the other?”

*

In which case, what the HELL did Albus view in Snape’s reactions to make him choose the bait he did?

[Poke!]

Severus made it clear that he, personally, did not CARE that the baby survived, and indeed that reminders of the baby, alive only because of his mother’s sacrifice, were unendurably painful to him. The second part of Dumbledore’s accusation in the hilltop scene was entirely true: yes, Sev did not then and does not now care about the death of Lily’s husband or the survival of her son.

What was there in that to make Dumbledore imagine that Snape would be willing to give another “anything” to help Dumbledore protect Harry?

What did Albus see in Severus’s eyes? Because it’s certainly not evident in Severus’s words.

*

The second part of Dumbledore’s previous accusation had been true. What about the first and third?

“… ask for mercy for the mother, in exchange for the son…. They can die, as long as you have what you want?”

*

Albus had known in advance what answer he’d get when he asked on that hilltop, “And what will you give me in return, Severus?”

He knew because Severus had already demonstrated the answer. Severus had betrayed his own side and approached a man he expected might kill him on sight, merely to purchase a little extra protection for Lily. (A “little extra,” because Dumbledore must already have known that the Potters were “a” target; Severus risked his life just to warn that they were the primary one.)

Severus had already shown Albus that he’d give anything to protect Lily. Because he had already done so.

What had he already shown Albus when Albus asked him to honor Lily’s sacrifice by protecting her son?

*

In my fiction “Red Maned Lion,” Severus brewed Felix Felicis and smuggled it to Harry, not to Lily, because he had realized that a mother would place her baby’s survival ahead of her own. In my fiction “Betrayals,” Severus deliberately manipulated Voldemort into toying with Lily by offering her a chance to step aside, because Severus knew she wouldn’t, and he believed that letting Lily sacrifice herself was the only possible thing that might save her baby’s life.

But we needn’t posit any heroic actions on Severus’s part for him to have felt that, rather than being guilty of trying to exchange the baby’s life for the mother’s, he’d ended up exchanging Lily’s life for her son’s.

In fact, we needn’t even posit his having made a firm decision to do so, for him to have felt that he had.

All that would have had to have happened was that, even once, the reflection had crossed Severus’s mind that self-sacrifice can create a powerful protective counter-charm.

And then for Severus to have neglected to remind Lord Voldemort of that little fact.

We know this truth to be well-known to a sixteen-year-old Dark Arts smartass. Why not to a twenty-one-year-old one?

It’s fairly obvious that anyone proposing to attack a baby might encounter self-sacrificial behavior on the part of the child’s parents.

Snape could gain just that little extra protection for his Lily by saying, “My Lord, it would be safer for you to stun her. If you kill her, you risk her death creating a magical protection for her child. Maternal self-sacrifice, you know. Don’t give her the chance!”

But if Snape said that, then he would be doing the contemptible thing that Dumbledore had accused him of. Deliberately trading her baby’s life for her safety.

Betraying Lily’s probable wishes, to get what he wants most. Her survival.

Severus might have still been waffling about what to do, whether to put his selfish desire first or not. Once he did it, he could never undo it (unless you think Obliviating the Dark Lord a reasonable option), whereas he could always wait one more day to remind the Dark Lord of that little pertinent fact the Dark Lord might have overlooked….

Or he might have decided. If so, we know his decision.

For we know that Tom killed James and Lily without any shadow of a concern that this might be a profoundly stupid thing to do. He had NOT recently been reminded of the potential power of self-sacrifice.

*

Now, if Severus had done anything at all that put the baby’s life ahead of the mother’s, whether heroically unselfish action or passively hiding information while he tried to make up his mind, how would he have felt after Lily’s death?

Lily had died to save her baby, and it had worked. The baby was alive, specifically because of his mother’s death.

And Severus might have stopped it. He might have saved Lily instead.

Reminders of the baby would be agonizing to him. That baby was the reason for Lily’s death, a death which Severus might have prevented.

His pain would feel much the same whether he’d heroically intervened on Harry’s behalf, or just couldn’t let himself actually go to the extreme of trading the baby’s life for Lily’s by reminding Voldemort about the power of sacrificial death.

Either way, he’d be feeling( something like—dead—[her boy survives]--who cares about the boy?—she did--- died to save her baby—I could have stopped it, saved her— [he has Lily’s eyes, precisely her eyes] —her eyes—I could have saved her instead--only she wouldn’t have wanted me to—dead, gone!

Dumbledore, skimming surface emotions and images while he jabs verbally at Severus, wouldn’t necessarily learn exactly what, if anything, Severus actually did. (Which might have been, technically, nothing.)

Just that Severus felt that he’d sacrificed his Lily to let her save her child, and that he felt strongly that he’d gotten the worst of the deal.

(Which would imply, conversely, that she’d gotten the better.)

“DON’T,” bellowed Snape. “Gone… dead…”

“Is this remorse, Severus?”

Yes, as I first thought, Dumbledore is taking care here to remind Severus that he should properly feel remorse, that Lily’s death is All His Fault for telling Tom that Prophecy. But Dumbledore is also prodding to find out which way Severus will jump when reminded again of his responsibility.

His full responsibility. For a life, perhaps, as well as a death.

Lily’s death is doubly Severus’s fault, if he might have saved her instead of letting her die to save her child. Severus regrets her death bitterly.

Does he repent of it?

He had long repented of telling Tom the Prophecy. Because it endangered Lily, not necessarily because it was an immoral thing to do.

Does he now repent of letting Lily die to save her child?

Does he wish, now, that he had betrayed her and prevented her death, even at the cost of her child’s life?

Or does he place, still, her good ahead of his own feelings?

Well, what does Severus say in response to Twinkle’s prodding?

“I wish… I wish I were dead….”

“And what use would that be to anyone?”

Would Snape’s statement be echoed in his mind by, “I wish… he were dead….instead…”?

If so, Albus should now immediately present the young man with his best hope of sweet revenge.

“If you loved Lily Evans, if you truly loved her, then your way forward is clear….”

Snape seemed to peer through a haze of pain….,

And Dumbledore, reading his eyes, knew just which bait to offer: “Help me protect Lily’s son.”

He believed that Snape would give “anything” to protect Lily’s son. Because he believed Snape already had.

***********************************************************************

Later (possibly much later) Dumbledore was musing about the power of sacrificial magic.

Back in the days when the kings were expected to sacrifice themselves in times of crisis…. well, it wasn’t always themselves they had to sacrifice. Sometimes, they must sacrifice a loved one. Agamemnon, for example, wasn’t told the winds to Troy would blow only if he sacrificed his life. He was told he must sacrifice his daughter’s. Iphigenia’s mother fought furiously, and Achilles offered to carry the girl off and marry her, but Iphigenia consented to die, and her father to kill her.

Or, think of the Bible. (Sorry, I know some people won’t like this.) In its pages we read of martyrs willing to lay down their lives for their faith.

But that’s not how Abraham, the Father of the Chosen People, was asked to demonstrate his devotion and perfect obedience. He was told to sacrifice his son.

There may be no greater love than required to lay down one’s very life. But there can be a greater sacrifice.

Well, there can, if the person of whom the sacrifice is demanded has the courage and devotion to have laid down his own life instead.

If I love you, but not quite enough to die in your place, then my sending you off to die would be a lesser sacrifice, not a greater. (Alcestis’s husband!)

But where we see a man demonstrate absolutely that he values another’s life far above his own, where we know that that person has risked death and torment to protect the other, then for him to sacrifice that (consenting) other would be a greater sacrifice than laying down his own life.

Indeed, it would transform the other’s death into a double sacrifice.

Dumbledore decided that’s what had made Lily’s death uniquely powerful.

She had died voluntarily to protect her child. And Snape had let her. To protect the child that she (though not he) loved better than her life.

She had sacrificed her own life; he, the life he valued far above his own.

It was the doubling of the sacrifice, Albus thought, that had given Lily’s death such unequalled power as to vanquish Voldemort the first time.

*

And Albus decided eventually: hey, if it worked once, it should work twice!

Or three times.

Consider when, precisely, Albus told Severus, “You must kill me.”

For years Albus had hoped that all he’d have to do to defeat Tom was wait for Harry to come of age and then tell the Harrycrux to suicide. Poof, no more Vapor!mort.

Then after GoF Albus’s task got a bit more complicated; Albus would probably need the powers of the Deathstick to get rid of Tom’s new body once Harry’s death made Tom mortal again.

Moreover, Albus had finally twigged to the fact that Lily’s super-special protection for her son was extraordinary luck, not a shield. (Undifferentiated luck being in fact the usual result of a death-sacrifice without other magical direction. Death blessings, death curses, right? Bit slow there, Albus.)

But eventually Albus realized he had more of a problem than just Tom’s new body.
Albus finally worked out that Tom probably had made more Horcruxes than just the Harrycrux and the Diary. Albus didn’t know how many, but there had to be at least one.

Well. That was a rather nasty little further complication. However, who could be better suited than Albus to find and destroy it, or them? He had privileged insight into the workings of Tom’s mind, information about Tom’s past known to no one else, vast experience, knowledge about the Dark Arts denied (by him) to most others in Britain, and native genius and power unmatched by any wizard alive. Oh, and the unbeatable wand. Who could be better prepared for the task?

So Albus set off to check the first of the obvious (to him) hiding places, the scene of Tom’s first mass-murders, Tom’s first great triumph over both the Muggles and the Purebloods: Little Hangleton, the Riddle manor and the Gaunt hovel.

Where Albus found what he was looking for.

And his comeuppance.

Twinkles almost died immediately and lost the war outright. Severus preserved him, but not even Severus’s great skill could lift that curse entirely nor arrest its effects for long.

Albus had received a mortal injury from the very first Horcrux he looked for, and he didn’t even know how many more there would be!

Say it again: who could be better prepared for the task than Albus?

Oops. That’s now a problem.

Albus knew he couldn’t find a Horcrux-hunter more powerful than he, nor wiser in Tom’s ways, nor better-armed….

However, there was Harry. Who’d three times defeated Tom (including destroying a Horcrux) due, not to any superior power or intelligence or experience, but to stubbornness and luck.

Great good luck, purchased by a sacrificial death.

There was only one thing to be done: Albus would (in the fullness of time) sacrifice himself to confer protective luck on the Horcrux hunt.

And that the protective magic be as powerful as possible, Albus would ensure it be created by another double sacrifice.

Severus would die to save Albus. So make Severus kill him instead.

*

And the boy… Harry would be sacrificing himself to assure Tom’s final defeat. Could his sacrifice, too, be doubled? Severus might not dote on the boy, but he’d proved he would die to save him. Moreover, Snape’s life for fifteen years had been dedicated to protecting that one life; what greater sacrifice could be asked of anyone than to sacrifice the life whose protection had been his whole purpose?

If Severus were good enough at Occlumency that Albus could be confident of his never letting escape to Tom that Harry’s death would hasten Tom’s own…. Well, the information that Albus was mortally injured and that his (temporarily) continued existence was due solely to Severus’s intervention was nearly as hot. If Severus could keep that from Tom indefinitely, it was probably safe to tell him the other.

Unfortunate that Albus could not let Severus know that the blood-tie to Tom might allow Harry’s ultimate return.

But Severus’s sacrifice, after all, like Harry’s, must be perfect.

Severus would die for the boy. So Severus must send the boy to his death.

*

And it all worked, just the way Albus planned.

Tra-la.


*


A/N: “Balancing an elephant on a pea,” madderbrad called my metas. At least this quadruped balances on four.

One of the things that intrigued me in the movie “Schindler’s List” (of course I’ve no idea if it were also true in real life) was the way Oskar Schindler was lured into his heroism. It was Schindler’s Jewish manager Stern who originally started (ab)using his position to hire the most endangered of his fellows, and the first Schindler knew about it was when he found himself being thanked profusely by those “he” had saved. And he eventually found himself being called to do in reality what he’d been given credit for.

I find it fascinating that there’s a chance Snape’s reformation might have been parallel, that Dumbledore might have given him credit for more than he’d really done, and thereby called him to do it.