Chapter One- Return To Sinner's End

Draco Malfoy ran without looking back. With every step the fact sank in that he would never see Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry again and if he did it would not be in the same way. The thought was enough to make him want to keep on running until he hit the sea. He went crashing into the wrought iron gates which lined the perimeter of the grounds. The Hogwarts four founders had erected them to protect the school and its students from attack. In Draco's time they had provided defence from escaped murderers and the Dementor guards of Azkaban prison, but tonight they had failed their function and it was entirely his fault. The Dark Lord Voldemort had set Draco a seemingly impossible task with no expectations of success, simply meaning to punish his incarcerated father with the loss of a son. His other Deatheaters had bullied him, doubting his abilities at every turn. He had plotted and he had planned and against all odds it had culminated in the murder of Hogwart's greatest Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore but despite direct orders, Draco had not had the heart to do it. Dumbledore was one of the greatest wizards in the world but none of Draco's intense training had come into play. At no point did Dumbledore put up a fight. He wasn't even angry at the prospect of being murdered by a schoolboy, just conversational, even impressed with all Draco had managed to achieve. His death seemed unworthy of his status, less like cold-blooded victory and more like a tragic accident. He had made a name for himself duelling and defeating dark wizards. He should have died trapped in fierce battle. Instead he had plummeted from one of the utmost towers of the castle had championed for decades. Draco had been one of many rushing to the verge to watch him fall but not out of any morbid curiosity. He had only wanted to see the freedom of falling on his face.


Snape appeared behind Draco, prying his frozen fingers from the castle gates. His was the only face in the darkness unbroken by a smile. Draco's aunt Bellatrix was dancing but Draco could not think of any music that would mark the occasion. "Back to the happy hell of HQ then?" Thorfinne Rowle suggested where he was standing smiling and taking one last look at the swirling Dark Mark he had cast into the sky in Voldemort's name. Draco's last and only visit to The Riddle House had involved threats, painful invasions into his mind, snakes and torment and ultimately landed him at the gates of the place he had called home for six years with no place to go. He did not want to step over its threshold again and into the Dark Lord's domain with a mind swimming in regret. Snape was staring at him as though he meant to read his mind too. Draco instantly went rooting through his own head, throwing the night's event and the tangled feelings he had about them to the very back where no one would go looking. Snape gripped his arm and apparated them both away from the death, danger and what was left of Draco's childhood.

Throughout that childhood Draco had always known Snape, first as Godfather and then as Head of House and Potions Master at Hogwarts but in those few moments of apparition his grip on Draco's arm was tighter than necessary. Before his father's imprisonment, Snape had been the one Draco had gone to for conversation and comfort. He had educated and protected him and given him special treatment even under accusations of favouritism. Draco may not have liked him all of the time but he had never stopped respecting him. The assignment of Draco's task from Voldemort had come with conditions of silence. He was forbidden to speak of his plans to anyone and when Snape had come asking with offers of help Draco had rudely told him where to get off. He had abused his favouritism; avoiding him after classes and at weekends, skipped detentions, gotten out of bed early and even taken to sleeping elsewhere and having lunches delivered to other parts of the castle. He had done his utmost to reject the man who had vowed at his birth to do right by him no matter the circumstance. Yet the moment Draco had faltered he had stepped in. He didn't know if the grip on his arm was protection or punishment but a part of him wanted it to be the latter.


Snape's bruising grip on his arm lifted. They came to an abrupt halt, at the bottom of a hill, a gated unkempt Edwardian mansion looming over them, the windows glowing like eyes. Feeling as though he had left his stomach back at Hogwarts, Draco stumbled and threw up into some bushes. The swirling confinement of apparition had not been what Draco needed. It was a sensation too similar to the crushing pressure he had been under every day since the Dark Lord had assigned him his task. The sleepless determination to succeed, the choking fear that he couldn't possibly and the weighty knowledge that he had no choice in the matter, had eaten away at any thought of his months. It was not air he had heard rushing past his ears, but his father's voice shouting disappointments. In his name Draco had knowingly cursed an innocent girl to inches from death, poisoned and almost killed Ron Weasley, led his fellow Deatheaters into the castle under both Harry Potter nose and Snape's questioning eagle eyes, watched a werewolf feed on his fellow students without remorse and held a dying man at his mercy and the poorly built walls of his malevolence were collapsing in on themselves. He barely felt like himself anymore and what he needed was the comfort of his mother's arms.


The werewolf Greyback started laughing at him and was slapped by his aunt Bellatrix. Snape broke up their scrap and handed Draco a black handkerchief. His pale hands were shaking and Draco hoped that it wasn't just from the cold. He wanted Snape to be as shocked to the core as he was. He stood wringing his hands as Amycus Carrow drew his wife close and laughing like they had never been happier. Neither waited for him and Draco followed up the hill, out of breath in his attempts to keep up. They all passed through the gates as though made of smoke and carried on up the porch steps and into the huge estate. Draco followed through a maze of dark rooms and hallways, filled with torn, still portraits and hanging lamps, into a dimly lit room on the second floor. Wormtail's silver hand opened the door to let them in. They found the Dark Lord seated, silently at the head of a long table, before the fire, stroking a hand over the head of his great snake, Nagini like she was a warm and comforting pet. The long table seated a dozen more Deatheaters, whose crimes Draco had only read about in the Prophet. More than half of them were Azkaban escapees. Draco knew that he had to be the only person in the room who had not murdered anyone. His mother had been standing anxiously by the windows watching their approach. She came across the room to pull her son into a hug but Draco remained at the back of the pack with Snape, staring up at the ceiling. A woman was suspended over the table, her long blonde hair hanging down and her face and limbs contorted painfully. She reminded Draco too much of his mother. The patter of her blood dripping onto the table was the only sound in the crowded dining room.

Bellatrix did not bat an eyelid, simply pushing past Greyback to return to her seat between her husband Rodolphous and his brother Rabastan. "Your mark hangs high over the old fool's warm corpse my Lord!" she exclaimed, clapping her hands together in delight.

"Then I must confess myself, outdone!" The Dark Lord wasn't smiling but his hissing voice was uncharacteristically jovial. His flashing red eyes picked Draco's blonde hair out of the crowd. "Don't be so diffident Draco." He met his gaze and shook off the stabbing pains which meant that the Dark Lord was attempting to force his way into his thoughts. "I'll admit after your father's antics, expectations were non-existent but you have raised the bar. You have outshone your predecessor. Bravo! Ardour and ingenuity of such calibre shall forge a place for you amongst my ranks." Bellatrix watched his shining eyes and clasped hands intently. Draco's mother gripped the hand he was holding behind his back and kissed him lightly on the cheek. This was not the kind of paternal pride most children lived for.

"Don't be so eager to inflate his ego my Lord," Greyback sniped from where he was sitting at the table, licking the woman's blood from his fingertips. "The kid's exactly like his old man- couldn't follow through on his promises either." Narcissa's face fell. "All talk and no action clearly run in that family-" Bellatrix shot from her seat, wand extended and Voldemort raised a hand.

"A case of cold feet, Draco?" His tone was condescending and Draco prepared himself for pain as Amycus Carrow nudged him forwards. "To whom do I owe my undying gratitude?" There was silence as Voldemort surveyed the inhabitants of the dining room waiting for the victor to announce themselves. Bellatrix shrank back into her seat, glaring pointedly at Greyback but every other pair of eyes were cast to a silent and brooding Snape where he was standing in front of a wall of glass cabinets filled with expensive looking china. "Severus?" His tone had switched to one of surprise but the cock of his head and the grip of his white, skeletal hands on the chairs arms reflected a simmering irritation.

"My Lord, if I may?" Snape stepped forwards, hands together like he meant to beg. Narcissa could not drag her eyes from him. "The boy would have seen the task through to execution had I not come across him. In my haste to return to you before Order or Ministry intervention, I did not give him the proper chance to prove his worth. The point of the matter is that he held a great wizard's life in his hands. It is more than can be said of others his age." The ensuing silence was unbearable. The intensity of Voldemort's stare meant that he was reading Snape's mind and any moment he would see the way in which Draco had lowered his wand with ease and teary eyes.

"I trust your word Severus...though perhaps Dumbledore shouldn't have." The Deatheaters burst into raucous laughter diffusing the tension but Draco could not relax.

"I acknowledge that my actions defied your plans-"Snape had been persistent in his attempts to discover Draco's plans. He had questioned him about both attacks on other students and yet never exposed or expelled him. Draco had foolishly thought that he meant to steal his glory but in seeing the ease with which he had killed Dumbledore at the tower Draco knew that he could have done so at any time.

"Indeed and for that you will pay but I suffer to think of superior circumstances. If Draco had done the deed, Dumbledore would have mourned only his innocence. With you, he died drowning in throes of a bitter betrayal. It's wonderful!" Bellatrix cackled and Greyback sniggered. There was the smallest trace of upturned lips on Snape's face. Draco failed to see a funny side. He felt on display like the china in the large airy room. There was nowhere for him to hide.

"What of your plans for me regarding Potter? My post died with Dumbledore." Harry Potter had chased them across the grounds without fear and with the intention of avenging his Headmaster. In the heat of that moment and the giant grounds keeper Hagrid's burning hut, Draco would have happily fallen to his knees and begged for his rival's forgiveness. When Potter had fatally attacked him in the bathroom months before, Draco had come to in a blood stained shirt with Snape at his bedside and a smothering sense of disappointment. If he had died in that bathroom he might have avoided all of this. His mother would have lost her only son to tragedy and people would have spoken only of how he was an eager student with a bright future. He now no longer had any future to speak of.

"Forget it. I no longer require a spy within Hogwarts. Without Dumbledore at the helm, Hogwarts may not reopen and if it does it will be an open house. I will force the boy to want an end to this. He will seek me out and beg for death." Voldemort had taken Potter's parents before he could walk. Last year he had lost his Godfather to Bellatrix's sadism and this year his mentor to Snape's betrayal. Draco had agreed to murder a man in exchange for his loved ones. He could not imagine the kind of revenge Potter meant to exact upon those who had robbed him of a family of his own. Like Dumbledore, Potter did not deserve the death sentence which the Dark Lord had prescribed him.

"Oh when, my Lord, when?" Bellatrix rose from her seat like an excitable child and the Dark Lord smiled.

"In due time Bella. You have to play with a mouse before you kill it."


Narcissa flinched as screams echoed into the room from another part of the house. "Wormtail! What have I told you about keeping our guests quiet?" Wormtail nodded fervently and left the room to quieten the faceless people in pain. His absence left the room in a silence punctuated only by the flickering of the fire as the Dark Lord stared up at the woman, suspended over the table. The ends of her hair were singed and there was a gaping bite wound on the back of her left calf which looked like the work of a vicious dog. Draco knew better and eyed Greyback with disdain. Were she to survive, the woman would become a werewolf, which was little of a life at all. "What has our guest revealed?"

"The boy's security is airtight until he comes of age. Do you plan to attack on his birthday?" Rabastan answered.

"I'll come bursting out of the cake and tear his family to-"Greyback's wit was cut short by Snape.

"The boy will no doubt be moved before his birthday my Lord. Ministry contacts are futile. Potter's protection will now be entirely within the responsibilities of the Order of the Phoenix."

"They've got quite the mortality rate these days!" Rabastan added and the others chuckled.

"Then our guest would do best to indulge us of the true date and drop off point before the full moon." The woman hanging over them screamed, her body tensing as though she was being stretched on a board. When her body returned to its contorted position, her eyes found Snape's.

"She was...your only friend...You made Albus...a promise...He...trusted you...What would...she say?" Her voice was weak but Snape seemed unaffected. Draco had been aware Snape was a double spy but never that he was a member of Dumbledore's secret society. He knew now that there were many things about his Godfather that he didn't know.

"You speak when spoken to, filth!" Bellatrix stood, her wand raised and slashing through the air. The woman's mouth clamped shut and she whimpered loudly. The Dark Lord eyed the woman and she came crashing down onto the table noisily.

"Fenrir, return our guest to the cellar...and no nibbling." Greyback took the woman in his arms and disappeared from the room. "I believe celebrations are in order." Bellatrix clapped her hands together again and threw her arms around her husband as those seated pushed out their chairs and stood. Snape made to grab Draco but the Dark Lord shook his head. "Not you. I want the coward out of my sight-"Narcissa gripped her son's hand again.

"But my Lord, Draco let us into the castle under all their noses-"

"Your presence ought not to have been necessary. In the face of his failure, I must decline my generous offer-"

"You promised to release father!" It was all Draco had dreamed about for months. His father had looked like another man entirely when he had visited him in Azkaban. His mother had been crying herself to sleep and sending tear stained letters for months. With more bad memories to deal with than the average person, his father's health was steadily failing and Draco did not want him buried in an unmarked grave at the foot of a prison.

The Dark Lord rose from his chair, seeming to glide across the room and rained a hard slap down upon Draco, knocking him back into the glass fronted cabinets and onto the floor. His mother stood helpless staring at her empty hands. "Did that school not teach you the simple mechanisms of an exchange? Your father clearly neglected to teach you any manners or respect for your superiors! Severus had to go against my direct orders and dirty his hands for you!" Snape stood, silently, with an unreadable expression kicking at the broken glass at his feet. The other Deatheaters had lowered themselves back into their seats as though this was the kind of thing which entertained them. "Narcissa, this boy has disgraced you. I want him to feel your disappointment." His mother's eyes widened and Snape looked as though he would step in again.

"My Lord, please-"

"Would you rather he felt mine?" Narcissa stiffened, shaking her head, all eyes upon her as she approached her fallen son with her wand outstretched. Draco stared at her, bracing himself, knowing that she had no choice. She uttered the curse with such revulsion it stunned him. His entire body was doused in ice water and burning fire. Synapses firing, muscles contorting, bones stretching, skin ablaze, he grinded his teeth forcing himself not to scream. He convinced himself that his mother had shed enough tears for the pair of them. The curse was lifted after a few minutes which seemed like hours and he began to regain his breath. He padded at his clothing, sure that he had to be bleeding. He wasn't. No trace was left of the pain he had suffered but the redness in his face and the trembling wracking his body. Bellatrix took her sister by the shoulders. "Narcissa, you astound me. Perhaps you are the Malfoy I ought to have taken on side. Your worm of a boy will remain underground. With the rain, I will graciously grant him another chance to prove his worth and earn his place amongst this circle."

"I can take the boy my Lord," Snape did not seem to want to be any part of celebrations. He pulled Draco to his feet and held him there.

"Please let him stay-"Bellatrix begged but the Dark Lord cut her off with a wave of his hand like she was a bothersome fly.

"You know well the boy will be safe with me." A strange look passed between Snape, Bellatrix and Narcissa. Bellatrix nodded and stood up, pulling her sister with her.

"Taking out the rubbish and tending the children? If you aren't just the perfect little housewife-"Rodolphous goaded and Snape started forwards with his wand raised.

"I've killed one man tonight. I'll happily make it two!" Voldemort gave a high pitched laugh and they separated, staring up at him.

"Speaking of children, won't the pair of you settle? You've both endured enough petty exertion for one night. Celebration awaits you...Go and prepare. Bella, won't you send in the maid?" There was a loud scraping of chairs as those seated left the table and the room. Draco's mother did not look at him. "Severus, stay." He had not made to move. "You have disobeyed me. You must be punished. You wouldn't want to go setting a bad example for our novice recruits."

"Do as you must." Draco knew what was coming the moment the Dark Lord reached inside of his robes but they were interrupted by a dirty, thin young woman. She entered the room quietly, tucking matted hair behind her ears, bowing her head to the Dark Lord.

"Clean the table, set out the china and then return to the kitchen. Be quick." The girl took a dirty rag from her apron and began scrubbing the dried blood from the table. Draco had not expected the Dark Lord to keep a muggle in his house but tried not to be distracted. He clamped his eyes shut as Snape suffered under Cruciatus over and over again. "Hide the boy and give him a hiding. Do not show him a sliver of the mercy I have shown you..."

The dining room door slammed shut. Snape's moaning ceased. Draco opened his eyes. Snape was curled on the rug and the maid was kneeling beneath the table with her hands clasped over her ears. Without Snape to hold him up, Draco had fallen to his knees beside him. Snape got to his feet without help as though he couldn't bear to be close to Draco. "Sir, are you-"

"I'm fine...Don't...The effects will soon...wear off-"Snape threw up all over the floor, came over faint, stumbled backwards into the cabinet and cut his hand open on the smashed glass. The muggle maid came gingerly across the room with the offer of water, pressing the rag she had been using to clean the table to Snape's bleeding hand. Snape glowered down at the vomit stained rug. He returned it to its previous dusty state with a quick spell, wiped clean and polished the table and set out the china in a fraction of the time it would have taken the girl. She took back the rag with a grateful and fearful smile. Draco had heard Rodolphous mention that Snape's mother had been a muggle but his kind treatment of the maid still seemed dangerous and out of place considering that he had murdered a man only an hour ago.


Snape did not allow himself to linger. He hoisted Draco to his feet and dragged him from the room. He hobbled, clutching his ribs as they made their way down the stairs and out of the house. Their passage across the grounds and through the gate was slow but eventually Snape apparated them away again. Free of the Riddle House, Draco felt a huge weight lifted from his shoulders. He could not stop the tears from rolling down his cheeks. He wanted to blame the apparition. Snape reached for his chin in a gesture of comfort but weakness overcame Draco and he recoiled. They were standing before a grey muggle residence on a damp cobbled street named 'Spinner's End'. Snape led them inside of the smallest house on the furthest corner of the street. After the airy expanses of the Riddle House, the cluttered, cosy furnishings of this strange place made Draco feel claustrophobic. Everything was neat and orderly but the whole place was coated in a thin layer of dust as though it had not been inhabited in some time. They passed the narrow staircase to the second floor, through an equally narrow hallway, turning right into a small, dark living room. Snape went about the room switching on muggle lights, igniting a room lined wall to wall with bookcases packed with bound volumes in all kinds of languages on potions and plants and the dark arts. Draco wondered if this was Snape's home but no family photos adorned the fireplace, only melted, dripping candles and empty potions flasks filled with dead flowers. Snape revived the flowers and opened a window to allow fresh air into the dusty room. He pushed Draco down into the comfortable, fraying sofa. "Sit...I'll get you something." Draco did as he was told, feeling too uneasy and out of place to do anything else as Snape limped into a dark adjoining room, shutting the door behind him. Draco did not hear him switch on the light for some time.

A kettle whistled loudly in the next room followed by the clinking of a spoon swirling in a cup. Snape appeared in the kitchen doorway, looking in at him, clutching two cups of hot cocoa. Draco was sitting in the corner of the old sofa with tears shining in his bloodshot, slate grey eyes. He pushed himself up off of the sofa and kneeled down upon the holy rug. "What are you doing? Get up."

"I'll only fall to my knees when you curse me." Draco had spent enough of the night being a coward. He would face his punishment with courage.

"I have no intention of cursing you." The way his own godfather refused to say his name convinced Draco that he deserved to be punished.

"My mother did and you're stronger than her. Would you disobey more direct orders for me?" Draco asked, getting up as Snape stumbled with the cups, dripping their contents onto the hardwood floors.

"And more..." Snape said as Draco took the boiling cups from his hands. Draco stepped away feeling uncomfortable and wiping Snape's blood from the rim of his cup. Snape closed his eyes and steadied himself on the arm of the sofa.

"Sir...are you alright?"

"Don't touch me," Snape snapped as Draco tried to take his cup from him. Draco retreated, lowering himself into the armchair on the other side of the room. He took several large gulps of his hot chocolate, each one burning on the way down.

"Curses would be better than your disappointment-"Draco said as Snape sank down into the sofa where Draco had been sitting only moments ago.

"I am not disappointed-"An utterly exhausted Snape's eyes fluttered to a close.

"Then fulfil your orders! I deserve it-"Draco stared down at the dried blood on his muddy shoes wondering who it belonged to.

"You are deluded as to what you deserve." Incensed, Draco slammed his hands down on the arms of the chair but Snape did not stir.

"Stop talking in riddles and curse me! I know you have it in you-"Draco had resented being ignored ever since he was a child.

"I have inflicted enough pain on others tonight," Snape sighed, flinching as he picked up his cup with his injured hand.

"Father always said that pain was a part of life..." Snape shook his head.

"I vowed to your mother and your aunt that I would protect you. I am not the kind of man in the habit of making promises I cannot keep." Bellatrix had alluded to Snape making an Unbreakable Vow but Draco had not truly believed her. He had been sure it was another of Snape's ploys to steal his glory and refused to trust his godfather's motives.

"I didn't think I was either...It was foolproof...I just couldn't look him in the eyes and..."

"The ability to kill is not easily acquired. You are young and you will learn. Our Lord was satisfied. You surpassed expectations. You allowed his Deatheaters entrance to Hogwarts and led them to your target. You had one of the greatest wizards in the world at your feet-an enviable feat for a seventeen year old," Snape replied bluntly.

"But father stays in prison and you took the fall...I didn't need saving-"

"I could not allow you to become a killer. You were always meant for better things," Snape replied sternly. Draco struggled to believe him. He would achieve nothing but more terrible things now. He could only think of Wormtail. He had betrayed his best friends with murder, turning to the Dark Lord for glory and recognition and got a lifetime of servitude in return. Draco knew that he stayed only because he no longer had anybody else. Draco was his modern equivalent. Those he had betrayed at Hogwarts would never forget. If they saw him in the street in the future they would want to kill him. His mother might not even forgive him for his failings. The loathing with which she had cursed him had felt genuine.

"You must promise to go above and beyond to prove yourself to him and fulfil the next task he sets to the best of your ability." If Bellatrix had been telling the truth and Snape had made an Unbreakable Vow to protect Draco, it was only in his best interests that the Dark Lord didn't murder him in a rage. Draco wouldn't fool himself into thinking somebody like Snape cared about him.

"Haven't there been enough promises for one night?" Draco sipped at his hot chocolate and eyed Snape's closed eyes, willing him to just say his name. He knew that being a Deatheater meant servitude or death and he couldn't just get taken off the mailing list.

"Yes and all of them kept," Snape said, opening his eyes and draining his cup.

"Can't I do something-anything...sir?" Draco asked politely, in search of anything to take his mind off of thoughts of his last night at Hogwarts.

"Rest and we will retrieve your things from the manor in the morning." Draco handed him his own empty cup and he disappeared into the kitchen once more, limping and clutching his side. He returned quickly as though he had forgotten something, clutching a small glowing orb. It was a celestial globe. Snape handed it to Draco. "I assume you thought I'd forgotten your birthday. I'm sorry that it isn't wrapped. I had one sent to your father in case it is a long time before he sees real stars." Snape disappeared again. Draco was glad his father was in Azkaban, unable to learn of his failure and safe from Voldemort's wrath. It was where he belonged too. Draco laid his head on the arm of the chair. He shut his eyes but he was assaulted by flashing images of Dumbledore. He had never seen anybody die before. He would never have thought of Snape as a murderer and now he would never be able to think of him as anything else. The look of utter emptiness and the emotionless precision with which he had cast the killing curse over Dumbledore's weakened old body would stay with him forever. It was all he had to look towards. He had left school without finishing with only OWLs to his name. As a child he had always dreamt of working in the Department of Mysteries but now that was never going to happen. A normal job was no longer in his future. Dumbledore's murder had eliminated all other options for him. He was the accessory to a serious crime. He could serve his time in Azkaban or remain a slave to the Dark Lord's whim his entire life, just like his father. Draco could not bear the idea that history would repeat itself and that one day a woman might fall in love with him, they would have a child and he would be stolen from them by evil and fear. He did not want his children thinking that their father was a coward.


Snape returned from the kitchen wiping wet, soapy hands on a bloody towel. The cut on his hand was red raw. He seemed shocked to find Draco crying into his sleeves. "What is it?" All night Snape's tone had been one of veiled exhaustion but in that moment it shifted to a kind of parental concern. He kneeled beside Draco's chair, wincing at pain in his knees. The close proximity to Draco in his vulnerable state clearly made Snape feel strange and awkward and this only made Draco want to cry more. He was supposed to be a cold, strong Malfoy. For the past few months he had cried in an unused girl's bathroom to the ghost who lived there. He wondered if Snape had known about that. He wondered if Snape could even remember the last time he had cried. Draco knew now that was e to continue on down the path the Dark Lord had set out for him, his tears would have to be left in a box in that unused girl's bathroom with his sense of morality and dignity.

"It's everything," Draco said, his eyes red and swollen, "If you knew what I know..."

"Which is?"

"The reason why I can't promise to you that I'll go above and beyond..." Draco stammered, sitting there in Snape's living room, utterly indebted to him and still questioning his loyalties. "Mother looked so ashamed but...there's just no going back once you kill somebody. He'll have my soul forever! I'd rather die than live like that-always at his beck and call. I'd rather die by His hand, than be ruled by it, beaten by it..." Draco had not meant to imply that he was better than Snape. His attentive expression did not change. "I'm not my father...He made you my Godfather for a reason. Dumbledore said he could hide me and mother. Surely you could do that too...Won't you get me out? Give me the chance you never had. Please..." Snape had gotten to his feet and was pacing before the fire, observing him thoughtfully. Draco had pleaded but he knew Snape had no choice. He had tangled them up in knots. If Snape did as any loyal Deatheater should have done and turned him over to the Dark Lord, he would have been killed for treason and the Unbreakable Vow would have taken Snape down with him.

"It's not possible. Banish such thoughts of spinelessness from your mind and step up the plate. That tattoo on your left arm is permanent. You must learn to accommodate your decisions, particularly the poor ones-"Dumbledore's phoenix flew in through the open window, startling Draco and causing Snape to stumble backwards and fall back down onto the sofa. Snape stared at it with large glossy eyes. It had perched itself beside him upon the arm of the sofa. Two fat glistening tears dripped from its black eyes, down onto Snape's bleeding hand. The blood cleared and the long angry looking cut disappeared. Snape ran his healed hand over the bird's head as Draco stared on in confusion. He knew about phoenixes and how they only left their owners to go to those who had shown loyalty to them. Snape had just murdered Dumbledore. His actions struck Draco as a bizarre show of devotion. Snape had lived a lie as a spy for the Dark Lord at Hogwarts for over a decade. He had also been a member of Dumbledore's secret society in charge of protecting Potter. He had made a vow which bound his life to Draco. His motives were no longer clear. Nothing was adding up. Still Draco hoped that this mystery of a man would dig deep and present him with an escape, saving both of their lives-saving him for those better things he so believed his godson was meant for.