A/N: This is a little drabble I wrote for a MNFF challenge. I don't have the exact wording of it with me (I'll put it here as soon as I do), but there was a quote about how love can change a person, and we were supposed to write on that theme. This is my take on it. Enjoy.
Emerald Green
It was clear to him now.
As clear as the mark burned painfully on his arm, the letter clutched tightly in his hand, and the memory searing itself inside his mind.
He had to do this, not because it was the right thing to do, but because she was in danger.
In all of his nineteen years, Severus Snape had never felt so alone. Alone, and caught between two irreconcilable choices. Should he go to his Lord and Master and repeat what he had heard, the prophecy that doomed a child to be the enemy of the Dark Lord, or should he go to Dumbledore, risking his life because she might be in danger?
In danger because of the child now resting in her womb. A child of parents who had thrice defied. A prophecy child. There was another, in the same danger, but that one did not matter to him. That child did not have Lily Potter as its mother.
He walked through the warm twilight, debating with himself.
It was dangerous enough for him to have asked to meet with Dumbledore. The Slytherin in him shouted to save himself, that Lily had made her decision when she chose James Potter over him. She should deal with the consequences.
But another part of him wanted to save her, if only for the memory that she had once been his.
He strode through the silent castle, wondering if it would be best to leave. Dumbledore would be disappointed, but he had already sworn his allegiance. A man could not serve two masters.
Besides, the Dark Lord was only after the child, not her. Surely he would care nothing of an insignificant little mudblood like her?
He winced mentally. He could never call her a mudblood, even in his thoughts. He stopped in the middle of a corridor, lost in thought, wondering what on earth he was to do.
Emerald green eyes. A memory, forever haunting him, of those eyes, brilliant green, full of tears, accusing him. The night she found out who he had sworn himself to, the night he lost her forever. The next week she had started going out with James Potter.
He could never betray those eyes. He continued walking, his decision made.
He knocked on a door. A voice called from inside, "Come in, Severus." A door opened to reveal an aged wizard, with a long white beard and piercing spectacled eyes.
He entered, and closed the door behind him.
Almost a year and a half later, the green light of death illuminated emerald green eyes.