The Unbreakable Vow
It is a funny thing that when you are dreading something and would give anything to slow down time, it has a funny way of speeding up. Understanding that Dumbledore only had one year left to live and with which to impart all his knowledge meant learning to contend with a constant abundant flow of anxiety. While under the relentless demands of homework and becoming proficient in non-verbal magic, working with Dumbledore meant growing more confused with each passing day.
Harry felt like he was being consistently pulled in all directions. Time was flying at record speeds and suddenly it was March, with Harry having no idea how that had happened. Despite all his time spent with Dumbledore, he felt less prepared than ever for what was to come.
“A Horcrux is when a wizard splits his soul in half and conceals one half in some sort of object,” Sirius had explained to him, as Harry walked with him to the apparition point after their meeting with Dumbledore.
Harry was still trying to make sense of the term and its significance as he headed back to the castle alone after saying goodbye to him. According to Sirius, it was a banned subject at Hogwarts. Not one that would ever come up in a classroom, not even Defense Against the Dark Arts. Yet Voldemort had already been interested in them when he was Harry’s age. Sirius had explained that someone would create one in order to become immortal. For if your body was destroyed and you had a Horcrux, you would remain earthbound and could not die.
“Leave me alone!” someone was shouting. The voice caught Harry by surprise, who hadn’t expected to encounter anyone on his way down to the dungeons to visit Snape in his quarters.
It was well past curfew and nobody was supposed to be out and about. Already concealed underneath his invisibility cloak, Harry took care to keep his footsteps as silent as possible. As he turned to walk down the staircase and discovered Draco Malfoy about halfway up them, squaring off with Professor Snape.
“I believe we’ve had that discussion already, Draco, and that is not going to happen,” Snape said softly, who evidently had just caught Malfoy sneaking out of his dormitory. “You might think that you’re all grown up but you are still a student in my house, under my care, and I promised your mother that I’d keep you safe. None of that entails turning a blind eye to you wandering about the castle at night.”
“What do you think is going to get me in the dark?” Malfoy sneered, while Harry began to tiptoe quietly down the stairs to be nearer and able to listen in more effectively. “We know the real danger is outside this moldy old castle. Do you really think I’m afraid of that useless squib and his miserable cat? Do you think I’m afraid of you?”
“I know that you’re very afraid of what is going to happen when you inevitably fail your Master,” Snape replied, his eyes glittering dangerously. “As you should be.”
“I’m not going to fail him,” Draco sneered. “My plan is going to work. I just need you to stay out of my way.”
“Let’s be logical about this,” Snape said, acting as though Malfoy hadn’t spoken at all. “We both know that you don’t have the stomach to kill anyone. Your arrogance is going to land you in a lot of trouble very soon if you don’t learn how to accept help from me. You are in so far over your head, Draco. Now, let’s go back to my office and -
“I don’t want your help,” Draco snapped.
The venomous look on Malfoy’s face was a bit shocking to Harry, in all honesty. He never would have imagined that Malfoy would speak so disrespectfully to Snape, to whom he had always shown a great deal of liking towards in the past. Though Snape, who was stroking his finger over his lips and staring at Malfoy with a calculated look on his face, seemed quite unperturbed by this abrupt change of behaviour.
“Do you think you honestly have a chance against a wizard as great as Albus Dumbledore?” Snape asked, his mouth twitching as though he were amused by Malfoy’s sheer audacity. “Is it impossible for you to open your eyes and realize that your master is laughing at you? Waiting for you to admit defeat so that he can punish you for it? Your mother knows it. I know it. You know it too.”
“You’re just trying to steal my glory,” Draco snarled.
“Draco, if glory was what I was after then I’d simply let you fumble this assignment and suffer the consequences, before I stepped in to do the job myself,” Snape replied calmly. “Only that isn’t what I’m doing. Why do you think I made the Unbreakable Vow to your mother? That certainly was not for my benefit.”
“Then I guess you better go ahead and break it,” Draco retorted, “because I don’t need your help. My mother isn’t thinking straight. This is my moment, my honour! My father would be pleased with me if he were here. I’ve got a plan and it’s going to work. I won’t disappoint him. I’m going to make him proud of me.”
“Are we still talking about the Dark Lord or is it your father that you're really desperate to impress?” Snape asked, sounding impassive, almost bored at the sentiment. “I know his imprisonment has upset you but going all in on a suicide mission is no way to -”
Harry had to press himself deep against the wall in order to avoid Malfoy bumping into him as he turned abruptly to begin storming up the stairs away from Snape, who swiftly pulled out his wand as though he’d been expecting this. “Mr. Malfoy, it would be in your best interest to come back down here yourself, or I promise that you are not going to like what happens next.”
Harry’s curiosity and apprehension were triggered as Malfoy chose to deliberately yield Snape’s warning. He had never gotten to witness Snape discipline or reprimand a Slytherin student before, and besides being enthralled by the argument, Harry was also quite entertained. He watched Malfoy take a few more defiant steps and waited with bated breath to see what Snape would do. Hardly expecting it to impact himself, unnoticed and invisible against the wall, he was given a shock when the staircase he was standing on suddenly transfigured into a slippery slide at a lazy flick of Snape’s wand.
A gasp escaped Harry’s lips before he could stop it. His feet had slipped out from under him and he was plummeting towards the dungeon floor, holding on tightly to the fabric of his Invisibility Cloak and trying to keep his entire self concealed beneath its billowing curtains, though he wasn’t sure if he had been successful. However, he was relieved to see when he finally skidded to a halt that Snape’s eyes were focused upon Malfoy, who had landed directly in front of him and had taken out his own wand now.
“Draco, you have the choice to maintain some dignity as you walk with me back to your dormitory where you belong,” Snape said silkily, as with another lazy flick of his wand he disarmed Malfoy with practiced ease. “Or, I can immobilize you and levitate you into your bed in front of your peers where you will be forced to remain until I come to perform the countercurse in the morning. Which would you prefer?”
Scrambling up to his feet, Malfoy made a quick snatch for his wand, which Snape did not deny him. Harry watched him give Snape another contemptuous look before storming ahead of him in the direction of the Slytherin common room. Snape did not react or speak another word, but followed him slowly back along the corridor and Harry stood up to do the same. He watched as Malfoy muttered the password to the brick wall that concealed the secret entrance to Slytherin house.
“If you attempt to get out of your bed again tonight, I will be alerted and most displeased,” Snape cautioned him, just before Malfoy deliberately slammed the door aggressively in his face.
Harry watched as Snape continued to stare at the reformed solid brick wall for about a minute or so before proceeding ahead to his office. His face was curiously blank and Harry knew his own would probably give away every curiosity that was currently attempting to devour him from within. He had quite forgotten the events of tonight’s lesson with Dumbledore now. Harry was occupied with trying to decide whether to let Snape know he had heard everything or pretend otherwise, when Snape turned around to stare directly into the empty space where Harry was standing.
“Well, hurry up,” he said curtly. before giving the password to his office and then stepping back to allow Harry to enter ahead of himself.
“How did you know I was there?” Harry asked, slipping off the cloak once the door had securely shut behind them.
“You mean besides all the raucous?” Snape asked sardonically. "You have about as much discretion as a rhinoceros. You'd think playing so much Quidditch would give you a bit more grace."
"What do you expect when you knock the floor out from underneath someone?” Harry asked.
"I suppose that's just what happens when you choose to loiter in a stairwell to eavesdrop on other people instead of continuing on your way like a good boy," Snape smirked, pointing his wand at the desk that was covered in scrolls of parchment written in several different hands on the best way to fight Dementors. The essays arranged themselves in a neat pile and then slipped inside the top most drawer that opened automatically to receive them.
"But I knew Malfoy was up to something and tonight proves it!" Harry exclaimed triumphantly. "I've been saying that all year and you just kept telling me to shut up and worry about myself!"
"That order still stands," Snape replied, pressing his hand to the black stone stuck out of the wall so that he could open the passage to his private quarters.
"You said I could always come to you about anything," Harry protested, following Snape into the living room and kicking his shoes off onto the simple black mat against the wall.
"I didn't realize that meant listening to you ramble on in relentless and uninteresting circles," Snape replied. "You've already told me your suspicions about Mr Malfoy several times. I don't need to hear them again."
"What's wrong with you?" Harry asked incredulously, his voice getting louder. "He just practically admitted that he's planning to kill -"
"A man that's already dying," Snape finished for him. "And if you were listening before then you know that I have absolutely zero confidence in Draco’s ability to kill anyone. Neither does Professor Dumbledore. The two of us have discussed this situation at length together and made an agreement on how to proceed. Just because our conversations didn't include you does not mean that they did not happen."
"You said before that there wouldn’t be any secrets between us," Harry said resentfully, glaring over at the fireplace.
"Considering our current circumstances, I don’t think that rule can apply anymore," Snape said softly. "You have quite enough to be getting on with to waste so much time concerning yourself with Draco's business.”
"When one of my friends gets attacked then it becomes my business," Harry glowered.
He was still seething with anger that Snape, McGonagall, and Dumbledore had all been so dismissive of his claim last fall that Malfoy was responsible for the curse on Katie Bell, who played chaser for Gryffindor. Katie could have been killed, she certainly would have been if Snape hadn't gotten there in time. Someone had handed her a cursed necklace to take to Dumbledore, and Harry was certain that Malfoy was behind it.
"What if you hadn’t been able to save her?" Harry pressed angrily. “Then what?”
"That is quite an unnecessary ‘what if?’ scenario to ponder when Miss Bell is due to be released from St. Mungo’s very soon," Snape replied. "Something like that will not happen again, I am quite sure."
"Malfoy didn’t even get expelled!" Harry shouted, his temper rising at Snape’s deliberate calmness, almost indifference on the matter.
"Use your head, boy," Snape said warningly. "There was absolutely no proof that Draco was involved in what happened to Katie Bell. What did you expect to happen? If you recall, he wasn’t even in Hogsmeade when the attack occurred. He was serving a detention with Professor McGonagall."
"But you know that he did it!" Harry yelled.
"And you'll be sent back to your dormitory and this discussion will be over if you dare to raise your voice at me one more time," Snape said in his sternest voice.
Harry, who had been about to say more before Snape’s warning, promptly shut his mouth and clenched his teeth together in order to resist the temptation to shout again. He really didn't want to be sent away and wouldn’t put it past Snape to do exactly that.
"That's better," Snape smirked. "I sincerely hope that you're putting as much energy into your lessons with Professor Dumbledore as you are into investigating your classmate."
Harry felt another stab of annoyance as he watched Snape turn and walk into his bedroom without another word, closing the door behind him. It was bothering Harry tremendously that Snape refused to be open with him about Malfoy and the Death Eaters these days. Sometimes Harry wondered if Snape was passive aggressively punishing him for all the secrets he was being made to keep from him by Dumbledore. He didn’t like the distance it was creating between them.
"I'm sorry," Harry said reluctantly, making quick strides to face Snape at the first creak of the opening bedroom door.
“Are you?” Snape asked, stepping around Harry to reach the bathroom sink directly across the narrow hallway and turn the faucet on.
"I know you're taking Malfoy seriously," Harry said begrudgingly, leaning heavily against the side of the door frame, watching as Snape splashed cold water onto his face. “That’s why you stopped him from sneaking out tonight. I just liked it better before when you told me everything."
"I liked it better too," Snape admitted, turning off the faucet and reaching for a towel to pat his face dry.
Harry swallowed a lump in his throat. He really did feel a bit guilty for badgering him. He knew that Snape was having a really rough year, not aided at all by the impossible schedule he was forced to keep. There were always dark circles under his eyes now and his sallow complexion had worsened, giving him the appearance of being chronically ill. It was difficult to see in his typical billowing black robes during the day, but dressed in pajamas, like he was now, it was quite noticeable that Snape had lost a lot of weight. That he was suffering was undeniable and Harry didn't want to make anything worse.
"What’s an Unbreakable Vow?" he asked quietly, the question seeming to catch Snape by surprise as the hand reaching for the toothpaste did an odd sort of twitch in the air.
“Exactly as it sounds,” Snape told him.
“What happens if you break it then?” asked Harry, a shiver running down his spine.
“You die,” Snape said matter-of-factly.
Which shouldn’t have really blindsided Harry knowing what he already did about how far magic, particularly Dark Magic could go, but it did. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other while he waited for Snape to tell him that he hadn’t made one for real, that it had merely been a ploy of trickery to convince Narcissa Malfoy that he was truly on Voldemort’s side and eager to lend aid to a fellow Death Eater. However, no such reassurance came and with that revelation, Harry turned to go lay back down on the sofa. He felt like his frustration was peaking inside him like a volcano about to erupt.
“You have a bed,” Snape commented unnecessarily a few minutes later when he reemerged in the living room.
He looked to Harry like a fuzzy blur, as Harry had already removed his glasses and stuck them on the coffee table. He had pulled the throw blanket overtop of himself and thought that the prospect of walking a few feet over to his own bedroom seemed far too daunting a task to consider right now. He decided to stay where he was, even as he reluctantly sat up enough to swallow the vial of his potion that Snape had brought out for him. Harry was still required to drink it every single night and it kept his scar from hurting.
"You made an Unbreakable Vow to Draco’s mum," Harry said dully, handing Snape back the empty potion vial. "You weren't just saying that?"
"I was in a situation that called for it and I did what I had to do," Snape replied, pointing his wand at the empty vial to vanish it, apparently for want of something to do. "Don't worry so much. It's under control."
But Snape might as well have told Harry to stop breathing. Snape’s eyes scanned over him calculatingly but he did not elaborate. He seldom did these days and feeling particularly resentful at the moment, Harry rolled over to face the back of the sofa until he knew Snape was gone. Already being forced to reckon with the truth of Dumbledore’s imminent passing was hard enough without recognizing it as Voldemort’s heart’s desire. Imagining a world without Dumbledore was horrific and now to know that Voldemort was already preparing for the day when he would have nobody standing in his way. When he would be able to dominate in every realm that existed.
And Voldemort wanted Snape to kill Dumbledore for him. The ultimate test of loyalty once he finished playing with Malfoy first. Harry was trying to imagine what Snape would do once he was discovered, when it hit him so suddenly that he wondered how he could possibly have been so dense. It was staring him straight in the face...
"No way!" Harry yelled angrily, his resolve to speak calmly and respectfully quite forgotten as he burst into the bedroom where Snape was already sleeping soundly.
"Wake up! WAKE UP!" Harry hollered at him.
He saw Snape flinch deeply as he was rudely jolted awake. Immediately reaching for his wand to fill the whole room with light. "What the hell are you shouting about?" he snapped impatiently
"The plan!" Harry snapped right back. "Voldemort ordered Malfoy to kill Dumbledore, and you’re offering to help him to make yourself look good for the Death Eaters! And you think it’s okay to do that because Dumbledore is just going to die anyway!"
A twitch of his mouth was the only part of Snape’s face that had moved or reacted at all to Harry’s accusations. Slowly, he brought himself up to a sitting position with his back leaning against the headboard.
"Come here, I'll explain," Snape said softly.
His bottle green eyes still flashing angrily, Harry dragged his feet across the floor and over to stand at Snape’s side. His knees pressed against the mattress before Snape took a strong hold of both his shoulders and pulled Harry down to sit on the edge of the bed beside him.
"First of all, this is Dumbledore’s plan," Snape said, keeping his hands tightly on both Harry’s shoulders, "and I'm sick at the thought of it every single day. If I had my way, I would stop spying once Dumbledore dies of his own accord, and then I would work entirely with the Order."
"Then tell him no," Harry replied coldly, staring blankly into the hallway, already knowing what Snape’s answer was going to be.
"If I abandon the Death Eaters after Draco fails to kill Dumbledore - which he will - then there will be nobody able to save him," Snape explained. "The Dark Lord will kill him immediately and I’m not about to let that happen. Draco needs to be protected."
"You’re not his father," Harry said, feeling entirely indifferent to Draco’s plight at the moment.
"No, I'm yours," Snape replied, but Harry was not to be consoled.
"Malfoy has two parents to take care of him and you’re not going to wind up dead or in Azkaban because of his stupid face," he said angrily. "If the Malfoys weren't such scum then their son wouldn’t have joined Voldemort in the first place."
"Stop saying the name," Snape said through gritted teeth, his nails piercing warningly into Harry’s shoulders.
"Dumbledore cannot expect this of you," Harry continued, not acknowledging Snape’s reprimand. "You already risk more than everyone else combined. He’s gone way too far this time."
"Most definitely, he has," Snape agreed softly, his grip on Harry’s shoulders slackening. “I don't want to do this anymore. I've thought of backing out several times, but in the end I can't bring myself to tell him 'no'. Dumbledore isn't being cruel to me, he's thinking about the bigger picture - it's the way things have to be and I'm going to listen to him. I believe Dumbledore when he says there is no other way."
"That's easy for him to say when he’s dying," Harry said in a broken whisper, his resolve weakening as he accepted defeat. "He doesn't have to deal with the consequences of such an act. You're the one who's about to have his whole life ruined.”
"And if we don’t make sacrifices now to stop the Dark Lord, every life will be ruined," Snape reminded him quietly.
Leaning back against Snape, Harry craned his neck to look up into the exhausted face that was already beginning to show aging lines from continuous stress and worry, despite being only thirty-seven. Harry understood that Snape was never going to stop torturing himself over the bad choices he'd made at eighteen, no matter that Harry had given him pardon and told him that he'd done enough. He realized now that Snape was not going to stop punishing himself until it killed him and all with Dumbledore’s encouragement.
"Everyone’s going to think that you murdered Dumbledore and were really on You Know Who’s side this whole time," Harry reminded him unnecessarily, kicking his heels against the edge of the bed.
"You know the truth," Snape replied. "You'll tell Sirius the truth and Ron and Hermione. It will be okay."
"No, it's not okay," Harry said sadly, leaning more deeply against Snape as he lifted his legs onto the bed and curled up on his side, resolving not to move again until morning. He was terrified to think that everything their family had built was already beginning to unravel like some too good to be true dream. Voldemort and Dumbledore together were seeing to that and it made Harry tempted to never let Snape out of his sight again so that they couldn't take him from him.
“We can continue this discussion in the morning,” Snape told him, using both of his hands to pull the covers up over Harry and tuck them in around him.
"This is wrong," Harry said helplessly, while removing his glasses and handing them to Snape to put on the nightstand for him.
Snape sighed as he lay back down in the bed next to him and Harry wondered how he still managed to sleep at all. How could Snape even find that morsel of peace necessary to hold on and not give up on absolutely everything?
"I feel so sorry for you," Harry said sadly, punching his pillow with frustration before pulling it closer to himself.
"Don't," said Snape. "This is my penance".
Harry resisted arguing back against that point, trusting that everything would weigh back upon him with renewed enthusiasm when he woke up. For that, Harry was not disappointed. He was hit with a fresh wave of reminder before he even opened his eyes in the morning. That Voldemort had ordered Malfoy to murder Dumbledore, that Snape had made an Unbreakable Vow to help Malfoy, and that Dumbledore was already dying so none of that was supposed to even matter. But could killing another person, even in good faith for the greater good, ever be morally acceptable? There was a reason that curse was unforgivable. Harry knew in more ways than one, Snape would never be the same again after he'd performed such an evil act, leaving Harry to wonder if the end could ever justify such means?
"How do you persuade someone to do something that they really don’t want to do?" Harry asked, when he'd come out into the living room to find Snape drinking his usual morning coffee and already dressed in his usual black robes for the day.
“Threats? Intimidation?” Snape suggested.
“No, that won’t work,” Harry replied, coming over to curl up on the other end of the sofa. “Neither will Veritaserum.”
“How to persuade someone to do something that they don’t want to do,” Snape repeated thoughtfully. “Don’t you think you’d be better posing that question to Professor Dumbledore?”
“Funny, but he won’t help,” Harry replied, looking into the fireplace which was still blazing with orange flames and warmth, rather comforting when Harry was still feeling so awful. Even while making the conscious choice right now to focus on what he could control, and despite Snape looking taken-aback by the random question, Harry knew that he was probably relieved to not be continuing their conversation from the previous night just now.
“Sirius and I met with Professor Dumbledore last night,” Harry reminded him. “He told me that I need to persuade someone to give us a very crucial memory about something that happened a long time ago. He said that only I can convince him.”
“I see,” Snape said slowly. “May I ask who you need to persuade?”
Harry hesitated, having it so drilled into him that nothing that took place during the meetings in Professor Dumbledore’s office were for anyone’s ears outside of himself, Sirius, Ron, and Hermione. But on the other hand, Snape had finally conceded to share what was occurring from his side. “Professor Slughorn."
“Well….” there was a pause while Snape considered this new information. He had a few more sips of his coffee and then set it on the coffee table. “Slughorn….the best way to persuade Professor Slughorn to do anything would be flattery. Your Mum was always rather cheeky with him when he was our teacher, and he loved her for it. I think that’s probably the best way to get what you want.”
“Yeah, he tells me about Mum all the time,” Harry agreed, “and I know that if I want to get invitations to parties or extensions on the homework from him that it would be cinche, but this is different. Dumbledore couldn’t even persuade him this time. It seems impossible.”
“You have a history of luck in unlikely and near impossible circumstances,” Snape reminded him. “The thing you have to understand about Professor Slughorn is that there always has to be something in it for him.”
But to Harry, it was as if a stroke of lightning had just hit him at the word ‘luck’. “What about a lucky potion?” he asked, sitting up a little taller as he remembered the tiny bottle of Liquid Luck that Hermione had won from Slughorn on the first day of class.
“Felix Felicis?” Snape clarified. “Yes, that is certainly one way to increase your chances. It won’t work against impossible odds but if Dumbledore already thinks you have it in you to convince Slughorn, then I don’t see why it wouldn’t work. Hold on”.
He got up and went into his office. Meanwhile, Harry leaned his head back on the arm of the sofa and thought back upon last night’s lesson with Dumbledore, which his confrontation with Snape had temporarily caused him to forget.
He didn’t know what he had expected Dumbledore to be teaching him this year, but so far it had amounted essentially into what was a life study of Voldemort. Insight into his family of origin; with their poverty and few prized possessions; Slytherin’s locket, which had been pawned by Voldemort’s mother when she’d run away from home, and the odd ring that Dumbledore had taken to wearing on the ring finger of his cursed hand. Harry had learned about Voldemort’s early years in an orphanage, how he had been brilliant at school despite being linked now to several murders during that time. And about how he had gone to work at Borgin & Burkes shop upon graduation, despite all the prestigious opportunities he had been offered.
Last night’s memory was a bit different. It showed a young Tom Riddle attending one of the traditional parties that Professor Slughorn liked to throw for his favourite students. He had hung back when all the other boys had left, intending to catch Slughorn alone. And after asking him a question about Horcruxes, the memory had gone black. It had clearly been tampered with. Slughorn did not want anyone to know what he had actually said to Voldemort on that night. But that was exactly what Dumbledore now expected Harry to find out.
“Nobody can drink Felix Felicis in excess,” Snape explained, coming back into the living room with a tiny flask containing molten gold potion clutched in his hand. It was exactly the same as what Slughorn had presented in their first class as a prize for whoever made the best attempt at Living Death. “It is highly toxic in large quantities but this is enough to drink for one exceptionally lucky day. Take it before you go to see Slughorn.”
“Thank you,” Harry said, eagerly reaching for the bottle and giving it a tight squeeze. “Dumbledore says what he’s teaching me will help me survive.”
“I won’t contend with any other possibility,” Snape replied. “That’s the reason why I continue to do what I do. Aiding Draco, my vow to Narcissa, my agreement with Dumbledore, it’s all to help you in the end. It’s all to get rid of him for good.”
“But is it really the only reason?” Harry asked bluntly, slipping the vial of Felix Felicis into the pocket of his sweatshirt.
“What is that supposed to mean?” Snape frowned. “Do you think I risk death and torture every single day for the fun of it or the challenge?”
“No, of course not,” Harry replied. “But I know that you actually care about the Malfoy family even though you shouldn’t.”
Snape sat back down on the sofa before he spoke again, appearing to take time to choose his words with care. “It’s not for you to decide whether I should or should not care about anybody. Though I hope you’ve realized by now that people are not all good or all evil, even those on the wrong side of this war. My relationship with Draco’s parents goes back to our own school days and, whatever they came to be, they have always treated me with the utmost consideration and respect.”
“How so?” asked Harry, who would never be able to overlook the mistreatment Lucius Malfoy had bestowed upon Dobby. Or at the way Draco strutted around this castle as though he owned the place and felt as high and mighty as royalty.
“When I was sixteen, my mother died suddenly just before the summer holiday and I could not bear to go home with only my father there,” Snape shared quietly. “I was contemplating sleeping in a park or under a bridge just to escape from that house - a sentiment that I’m sure can resonate with your own upbringing. But Lucius, who had graduated from Hogwarts a few years prior, reached out to me upon hearing about the news of my mother’s passing and invited me to spend the summer at their manor. Otherwise, I’m not sure what I’d have done.”
Harry stared at him skeptically. “But didn’t he just use that summer as an opportunity to introduce you to You Know Who?”
“That was part of it, yes,” Snape acknowledged. “But you never forget who was there for you when you needed someone and nobody else was. Just like Draco desperately needs help right now, even if he refuses to admit it. So, I'm going to make sure their son is okay and I'm going to prevent anyone else from getting hurt by his actions.”
There was no way that Harry could dispute any of that. Of course he knew that people were grey. He had Sirius and Snape as constant examples of how people you loved could be capable of doing terrible things sometimes. And he begrudgingly accepted that even people he despised, like the Malfoy family, were not entirely incapable of demonstrating some humanity and kindness, that would make Snape struggle to write them entirely off. It was complicated, like all people were.
“How did your mother die?” Harry asked curiously, as he got up to get the coffee pot from the counter and then brought it over to refill Snape’s cup without any prompting.
“She committed suicide,” Snape replied, compressing he lips as he picked up the mug of fresh coffee and took a sip. “Thank you, Harry.”
“That’s not what I thought you were going to say,” Harry said honestly, as an image of a sixteen year old Severus Snape being called into Dumbledore’s study to be told that his mother had killed herself flooded his mind.
“No? Well it didn’t surprise me,” Snape replied, as Harry returned the coffee pot to its place and then reached for an apple in the glass bowl. He waited until Harry had come back over to sit beside him, with his legs crossed comfortably on the cushions, before continuing. “She was a very unwell woman the whole time I knew her - very unhappy. Cut off from the magical world, disowned by her family for marrying a muggle, and then she regretted that choice when she was faced with a life of poverty and an extremely miserable marriage. I wouldn’t have expected anything less of her in the end. And then my father drank himself to death a year later.”
“And you never went home?” Harry asked, though he did not consider this as strange as others might. People who grew up feeling loved couldn’t possibly understand how some children could be so indifferent, or even relieved, by the deaths of their parental figures. Yet Harry was quite certain that if he received news of one of the Dursleys passing, that it wouldn’t emotionally impact him at all. They weren’t anything to him. They never had been.
“I went back when they were both gone,” Snape explained, “but that was more for practical reasons than because I wanted to. I wasn’t going to pay money to live somewhere else when I had that house just sitting there.”
“It probably does something to a person to return to where they’re from though,” Harry said thoughtfully, shifting his apple from one hand to the other. “The two weeks I had to spend at the Dursleys last summer, I kept going back to look at the cupboard under the stairs for some dumb reason. Like I needed to process that part of my life being real, but over.”
“Quite like how we all have to face our fears eventually, no matter what,” Snape said reasonably, drinking some more.
“And sort of like how I’ve felt so displaced my whole life, not knowing where I really was meant to be,” Harry added. “Like I never knew what my Mum and Dad looked like until I got to Hogwarts, and I didn’t know where I could have grown up until Sirius gave me that memory of them in the apple orchard the house was built in. I’d like to see that someday in person.”
“I might be mistaken, but I believe that house was destroyed on the night that the Dark Lord attacked,” Snape replied.
“I'd still like to see it,” Harry said, the words slipping out before he really had thought them through. Logically, he knew that that probably was the last place Snape would ever willingly want to be. A memorial to the worst mistake of his life and all the pain he had caused. He carried enough of that with him all the time, he didn’t have to venture to the place where it all began. But Snape surprised him.
"Then we will."