"Sevi"
"… will you carry out the deed that the Dark Lord has ordered Draco to perform?"
He stood in the same room-oh, newer and cleaner. His mother was beside him, her arm around his shoulders. His father stood across the room from them, and he was
shouting.
"There's nothing you can do about it," said Eileen Prince Snape. "Sevi is going to Hogwart's. He leaves tomorrow."
"Not one penny of my money is going to send him or keep him."
"He won't need your money-not that you have any. There's gold enough in Gringott's to pay his way."
"Gold, is it? I knew you were holding out on me. You and your fine ways. You and your Family."
"And what would you have done with it? Spent it on drink, I dare say--like you've spent every penny of your own. Give it up. Sevi'll be safe from you, now. It's out of your hands."
"My knife is in my hand…"
One moment there was a flick knife in his father's hand. The next his mother lay on the floor, the knife in her chest and her wand rolling from her hand. Severus scrambled for the wand.
"Avada Kedavra!"
His father was down. His father was dead. His mother was so pale…
"Mum, are you all right?"
"No, but I will be. No Muggle doctor could cure this, but I'm a Witch… and a Potioneer. Get me to a chair."
It was easy. She was only a little taller than he was, and thin… so thin.
"Give me my wand. Now fetch a glass, and the little bottle from the back of the Potions shelf. The one marked 'Elderberry Brandy'."
"I can't get it open."
"Of course not. It's charmed so that only I can open it. Think I'd risk your father getting at it?"
She opened it. He poured it all into the glass, and handed it to her. She took a deep swallow, and raised her wand.
"Imperius", she said. "You will tell no one that you killed your father. Not until you come of age, and then you can decide for yourself."
"Mum…"
"That was an Unforgivable Curse. The world must believe that I cast it. Or you will rot in prison, growing steadily madder…"
"Mum, I can't let you…"
She drained the glass.
"Oh, yes, you can. For I will be, not imprisoned, but dead. 'Gone on', as the ghosts say."
"An antidote."
"Not in this house. Listen to me. You'll have to come back here in the summers. My Aunt Mildred will come and look after you then. Your things are packed. My old books… There's gold for your robes, and your own wand…"
"Mum…"
"No regrets. No one would believe that the spell cast by my wand wasn't my spell. No one will believe that a boy of eleven, a boy who hasn't started Hogwart's yet, could cast that spell. No one but I, who know you so well. My son, my heir, my Half-Blood Prince…"
And not another breath. He was still staring at her body when the Aurors Apparated into the room.
"I will." An Unbreakable Oath.