Rebirth of a Deatheater

Master Snape sat alone in his room. The manor was empty and the person he planned to share this day with had not come. His glass was empty, so he got up to concoct another drink. Masterfully he blended the cognac, calvados and sweet vermouth then drank half of it quickly. The rest he nursed and let his mind wander to the titian-haired young woman whose presence intoxicated him more than the drink in his hand ... and who had not come to him. She wasn't coming. She would have arrived hours ago had she intended to come.

"She's with Potter," Snape spat at the tumbler grasped in his fist. He gulped the drink and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Lonliness and drink threatened to overcome him, but he was not alone. There was a knock at the door.

Snape considered ignoring it for only a moment, until an unseen thread binding him to the person on the other side tugged lightly but insistently. He heard the silent call and felt the cold draw of darkness, the spell probably made easier by his intoxication. He answered the door ...

***

Lily Evans stared out the window of the train. The peace that should have come with making a good decision was doused by the rain and gloom outside and the weight of the guilt she bore. She tried to think of James, to picture his face when it was joyful. She would go to him in the field, and find him at the safehouse at Godric's Hollow. His kind eyes would light up, hopefully, if she wasn't too late. Remus didn't think it was too late. Sirius wasn't speaking to her.

Leaving Snape was not easy. He had offered her every imaginable comfort - a large home; galleons to spend on whatever she pleased, "even charity should she be so inclined;" and he loved her passionately and completely. He never said so, but she read him well and easily. He was a man who felt actions were more important than words. He bought her expensive jewelry, went out of his way to make her life easy, he adored and doted upon her. But she had never given herself completely to him. This would have been the night had she made a different choice. She had not gone to him. She was going back to the man who loved her with his body, mind and soul - and yet could not offer her security in any way. He could not guarantee his love would be enough to save them, and he could never guarantee a typical life (if there ever was such a thing in wizard families). He couldn't promise her a home, or stability, or children. After all, the risk was so great.

She had laid in his arms a year ago, damp with sweat and heavy with spent desire.

"James, do you love me?" She was not afraid. She looked into his eyes when she asked.

He stared at her lips, her nose, her eyes. "Don't you know?" he asked. It wasn't until now, thinking back, that she realized he had never answered her question.

Two men. Two powerful men in their ways, and neither able to tell her what she needed to know to make a decision. So she had to make it with nothing to rely on but her own heart.

Severus won her sensibilty. He won her affection, her sympathy, her intellect.

But James had her heart.

So she would soon join him in this battle and give up the future she thought she wanted for the man she now knew she could not live without. She hoped he would still have her.

***

The mark burned his forearm and called him to the Master. Snape took down his cloak and apparated in midstride to the meeting place. The Dark Lord was already there.

"It will be done," he spoke to the half dozen or so Deatheaters who had arrived first. "I have the child's location."

"My Lord, are you certain you should go alone?" Snape asked.

The Dark Lord ignored his question. "Make ready my potion. I will come for it in an hour." He left in a cold breath of smoke, disappearing among the gravestones at Shepton Mallet.

The potion was ready. Snape felt the cold weight of it in his cloak. "Goodbye child of betrayal," he thought. "The Dark Lord cannot fail now." His conscience desperately reached for him and he suddenly had the urge to throw the potion and shatter it. But the feeling was brief, it passed, and Snape grasped the vial instead and placed it back in his cloak.

***

James drew his wand, but it was too late. The curse hit him in the chest and squeezed his heart until it stopped beating; it sucked all the air from his lungs and paralyzed all the muscles of his body. But his mind was still alive for a moment. And in that moment he thought of Lily.

Lily, whom he loved madly and gently. He did not deserve her, he had led her to her doom, he loved her, forever, he was a failure, he was dying, he could not stop it, Peter - Peter had lied, Peter betrayed, my Lily, please run, get away, save him, save yourself, save Harry, save Harry, my Harry, my son, my Harry, Harry ...

Unknown to his mind in this world, his body allowed his mouth to form one last word before the curse took him, and it was his son's name - calling, warning, begging for forgiveness.

***

Snape stood alone, always alone. He felt the burning and he had come, as he must. But when he arrived it was not the Dark Lord, but another figure in black cloak that met him with the news of Voldemort's failure to the hands of the child of James Potter. "Flee," Karkaroff had said. "It is our only choice. When Dumbledore learns James and Lily Potter are dead ..."

Snape froze. His mind failed and a weaker man may have showed some sign of grief, but he remained stoic as ever. Lily - dead, that was not part of the Dark Lord's plan. Voldemort was determined to kill the child. It was the child whose role was divined to him, it was the child who was a threat. Lily was not to be harmed. She was to be his. They had agreed. The Dark Lord had shared blood on the promise.

But now the Dark Lord was gone as well.

And so all who answered the call were briefed, and all fled while Snape remained in the crumbling temple. He sat at the altar and leaned his back against it and put his head in his hands. Snape wept.

It had been many years since he had thought about the sermons he heard with his Muggle mother in church. When he was old enough to be cynical, magic killed religion for Snape. Religion raised people to believe all the Red Seas of their lives would part. That great Goliath would fall at their feet. The fiery furnace would not burn them and a loaf would feed the masses. All prayers would be answered. All voices heard. All things possible.

But the truth is that Moses never entered the promised land. King David's family and kingdom were shattered. Wise Solomon died a fool. His anger overwhelmed him and Snape was suddenly outside his body, destroying himself and everything within reach. The first thing he touched and broke was actually fortunate, for with it he would have caused much more damage in the end ...

Dumbledore came softly into the sanctuary. Snape slept at the altar, his wand snapped in half at his feet; whether from anger or accident Dumbledore could not tell.

"Leviosa," Dumbledore spoke, and Snape's body rose weightlessly. The older wizard noted that he smelled of liquor.

"Come Severus," Dumbledore spoke. "It is time to remind you of the light in this world." He walked out of the church where a crew of wizards were assembled, waiting for his word. "It is empty. I shall revive this one to the best of my ability and see what he remembers. I assure you if I belive him to be guilty of any crime -" he spoke directly to Crouch "--I will take the proper action and a court shall be convened."

No one argued. "Where will you take him, Headmaster?" Crouch dared to ask.

"To Hogwarts." He turned his back on Crouch and prepared to apparate. To himself he added, "But first a trip to Ollivanders. A new start in life needs a new wand."

And with that, the Headmaster and Snape vanished in a gleaming light.