A/N: This is a story written for the House Competition.
House: Slytherin
Year:1
Category: Short
Prompt:[Action] Betraying someone's trust
Word count:1524
What is it with love that people get crazy over? Tom Riddle, now commonly known as Voldemort, never understood the concept of love and why people choose to sacrifice their lives for someone else. Just a few nights back, Snape had come up to him with the prophecy about him and what it had said, a powerful wizard was going to 'vanquish' him and he figured out that this powerful wizard was James and Lily Potter's young son Harry, and Snape had begged him to spare Lily's life. He did not understand why Snape was such a fool to love someone who had not reciprocated the love. People are such easy prey for this disease called Love and Snape had clearly fallen victim, a pitiful victim.
As he sat there in his dimly lit room reading a book about ancient spells, he heard a storm approaching and looked out of the window. The sun was finally setting and the sky had darkened tremendously. His followers had slowly dispersed into the cold night, leaving him alone with his plan to kill the only one standing in his way of achieving full power. He slowly stood up from his armchair, put on his cloak, and apparated with the smallest of sounds into the streets of Godric Hollow.
Blending in perfectly with the night, and hiding away from the moonlight, he quickly walked up a silent street, the howling of the wind being the only sound around him. It was not hard to locate where the Potter's lived, and he looked up at the house seeing shadows from the windows. He wondered if he should spare Lily Potter, accept Snape's request since he was very resourceful. But it would be dangerous and foolish on his part to let her live. She might come back for revenge, and he just did not want to waste his magic trying to fend off a mudblood. Besides, if he didn't kill her now, he would just kill her some other time.
He whisked the thoughts away into the back of his mind, and blasted the door of the Potter's off its hinges. It did feel good knowing that he was here to kill Harry Potter. He walked into the room, kicking off the splinters of wood from the door away from him. He could hear footsteps approaching him and without even looking he threw the killing curse at whoever was in front of him. Green sparks shot out from his wand, hitting James Potter, and Voldemort did not wait to watch as James' body fell down, shock clearly evident on his face. He did not even have the time to respond to the attack.
Walking up the stairs, he could hear Lily trying desperately to hide her baby. "Fool," he thought as he reached the room where they were hiding, the boy crying while Lily held him in her hands.
'Not Harry! Not Harry! Please – I'll do anything –'
'Stand aside – stand aside, girl –'
'Harry!'
His patience was running low, he tried to spare the girl, but he would never win with her standing in his way, so he aimed his wand at her and another killing curse shot out from his wand, and Lily's body went limp, her voice stuck at the back of her throat, and she fell to the ground.
Turning towards the baby, he lifted his wand for the last time, feeling a rush go through him, knowing that the last person standing in his way of gaining power was about to be killed by him. Prophecies can be changed and he was just about to do that. But as he shot the killing curse towards the baby, he could see it bouncing back towards him. Ancient blood magic, and he was too slow to stop it. Is this what he gets for betraying Snape's trust? But before he could answer that, the spell hit him, crumbling him into decay.
His trust was betrayed. The one thing he had asked of someone, someone who he had done so much for, had betrayed him. Severus Snape sat on floor of the Potter's ruined house, cradling the dead body of Lily, his precious Lily, the love of his life. He cried freely for the loss of his love, and also because he had hoped that Voldemort might spare her life. He knew he was selfish too, because he had told Voldemort to kill James and Harry if he wanted but not Lily, knowing that he was betraying Lily's trust in him even more. The cycle just went on and on. But now Voldemort was gone, killed by a baby, a green eyed baby and he couldn't be more happy knowing that the person who killed his love was gone.
Wiping his tears away, he gently laid Lily down knowing that the aurors and the order would arrive soon and if they saw him there they would take him into custody and throw him into Azkaban. He knew that even Dumbledore would not help him. But as he stood up and was about to leave he heard Harry crying, and he turned back to see green teary eyes looking back at him. He had Lily's eyes and Snape could not look away from it. He picked up the baby and disapparated into his old home in Spinder's End, it was not much, but he could make a home here for the two of them and he wanted to make better memories in his house where he grew up with abuses and a loveless family life.
He entered the old tattered place, the house where he grew up and it looked exactly like he imagined it would look like. Dusty and worn out, just like his life. Looking around, it looked like after his family, nobody lived here and no one bothered to visit the place. They probably thought it was haunted. The windows were broken, some doors were off from their hinges, and the wallpapers were falling off.
He felt crazy and irresponsible of his act, but in that moment, Harry's green eyes reminded him of Lily so much that he could not leave him alone there in the ruins and he did not trust Dumbledore to give proper care to Harry. Everyone thought Dumbledore was a saint, but he was just as evil as Voldemort, maybe not a killer, but he used people to get what he wanted to achieve. There were reasons not to trust the old man, he was brilliant and one of the greatest wizard, no doubt, but he liked to use people as pawns, and he could not let him use Harry as a toy.
Taking in Lily's son and taking care of him felt like he was making up for the wrongs that he had done, for joining the ranks of the Death Eater when he knew that Lily despised them and they despised her, for calling her a mudblood when he knew that calling her by that word would tear her apart. Everything wrong things that he had done to Lily, he wanted to make amends, and he figured he could start by taking care of her own son, Harry, who had the same eyes as his beautiful mother and by that alone, he knew that he could come to love him as a son, and he was content knowing that he could protect the boy who had lost both his parents in one night.
Snape took out his wand and waved it around, and the house seemed to come to life in an instant. The dust was wiped clean from all the corners of the house, the broken windows were fixed, and it was no longer dark and gloomy inside the house. It instantly looked more lively, and Harry, who was sleeping quietly throughout the whole ordeal had woken up, and seemed confused by everything. He looked up at Snape, and started crying, asking for his mother. It hurt him that he could not give Harry his mother now, and he did not know how to explain it to a baby as well, but for now he held him tight, whispering softly to the baby, promising him that it would all be better, and that they would now have to be strong since the woman who they both wanted right now, at this very moment was gone forever. They would have to stick together now, braving the storm.
One day the boy would know much she tried to protect him, and how much Severus had tried to protect her from Voldemort, and how their lives and trust was broken by betrayal. It was perhaps that very thing that had destroyed everyone, taken everything they loved and brought their lives to ruins. No one could have predicted it, but maybe if they had lived differently, maybe they could have survived, and maybe they would not have been sitting here, in the middle of the night trying to stay strong for themselves and for each other. But maybe, just maybe, things could be better and they could save each others soul.