Things Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart

Severus Snape ran his hands through his hair for the twentieth time. He always did that when he was nervous or worried and right now, he was both.

It had been just a week since the Dark Lord had come back to full power and Potter had duelled him, then walked away bringing Cedric Diggory’s body with him. Snape still couldn’t quite manage to believe that Potter had survived. There had only ever been one other person to walk away from a duel with the Dark Lord, and that person was Albus Dumbledore.

Snape leaned back in his chair and gazed around his classroom, lost in thought. A week ago he had felt the Dark Mark burn with an intensity he had long ago forgotten, but he had ignored it. He had continued to stand with Dumbledore, instead of returning to Voldemort.

‘Was that the right decision?’ He had asked himself, and since that day he had been constantly re-asking himself that. He had stood in the Hospital Wing listening to that fool Cornelius Fudge deny everything he had heard about the Dark Lord’s return. Then, to Snape’s horror, Dumbledore had revealed Sirius Black and forced them both to shake hands. Dumbledore then asked him to do something that they had discussed a few months before. Snape now had the ‘privileged’ role of trying to get information out of his former Death Eater companion’s. Which definitely was not going to be easy, as Potter had reported that Voldemort had remarked on missing Death Eaters and then declared:

“One is too cowardly to return…he will pay.

One, who I believe has left me forever…he will be killed of course.”

Dumbledore had told Snape this and then asked him which out of the two remarks was about him. He had been unable to answer, as he just didn’t know which remark was for him and which was for Karkaroff. However, it was a safe bet that it was the latter. After all Snape had been Voldemort’s second and he had betrayed him to Dumbledore and as every one of his followers knew…Voldemort does not forgive.

Snape had begun his new role two days ago. He hadn’t actually decided that he would, but since Lucius Malfoy had taken it upon himself to visit him, Snape had thought that it was a good time to start. He hadn’t gotten anything out of him though; instead he had ended up in an argument about why he was continuing to be a traitor. In the end Snape had agreed to attend the next Death Eater meeting and Lucius had promised that he would tell Voldemort that Snape was sorry, and deeply regretted his decision to defect. Snape didn’t see the point in this, as Voldemort would clearly be able to tell that Lucius was lying. Voldemort could always tell when somebody was lying, but Snape had thanked Lucius anyway. Snape could still remember being at school with Lucius. Even though he had been a year below Snape, Lucius had always seemed older and because of there ‘mutual interests’ they had become good friends. Snape was even made Draco Malfoy’s Godfather, a position he took very seriously.

After this encounter with Lucius, he had gone straight to Dumbledore to tell him what he had agreed to. Dumbledore had been very worried by this and Snape remembered feeling quite flattered as Dumbledore rarely showed his emotions.

Snape suddenly say bolt upright, his thoughts on the past few days forgotten, as he looked down at his burning arm. Voldemort was calling him to the meeting that would decide whether he would live or die. He slowly got up and reached inside his pocket for some Floo Powder. With shaking hands he through it into the fire and called out the name of his home. He would have to apparate from his home to the meeting.

As Snape stepped into the green fire a hundred thoughts swirled through his mind. ‘What was going to happen to him’ and ‘would he make it back to Hogwarts’ were just a couple of them. Then as he felt the spinning begin, a piece of a Muggle poem he had once read by W.B Yeats came into his mind:

‘Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack of all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.’

Snape allowed himself to be immersed in the spinning and as he waited for his grate to appear he found himself thinking ‘things do fall apart’.

The End