In which Severus Snape reveals his heart and soul. (Dignity? What is this thing called dignity?)


I must admit I was one of the lucky few. How? Because I had a fair trial.

Maybe.

As fair trials go, it lacked in such things as, oh, reason and justice and an unbiased judge. I was found guilty of consorting with Voldemort, killing Muggles and Magic-users alike, attacking Aurors with the intent to do harm, and use of the Forbidden Curses. All true, of course, but all under extenuating circumstances.

I was asked only two questions and my answers were the only words I spoke since being arrested. If I had answered the questions with the whole truth instead of the partial truth, protested against the evidence, or had explained I was a spy, I might have been found innocent or, at the very least, had a reduced sentence.

But when I saw Lily enter the court with Dumbledore, little you in her arms while Dumbledore carried a baby sack on his shoulder, I knew guilt because I was the one who brought this risk upon you, upon James, and upon Lily. Everyone would have been attending a funeral rather than a trial had the outcome been any worse.

Well, most everyone would have attended a funeral since the rest (myself) would have been rotting away in prison.

I saw hatred, anger, confusion, and betrayal appear in Lily's face. In that moment, I regressed to the beginning of my fifth year, feeling woefully misunderstood and distrusted. I may not have trusted, but I could be trusted. Where was James? Where was my brother during my trial? I thought surely he felt betrayed, and could not bear to face me. Though it hurt, I accepted my due.

The evidence was laid out, and then witnesses against me appeared. I remained silent, but when character witnesses were called forward to speak on my behalf, no one — not even Dumbledore — volunteered. I thought, So that is how it will be. Very well. This is an excellent opportunity to cut the ties from Dinsmore permanently. No one would miss me; I had shamed the man whose name I bore, and brought disgrace upon my family.

In the light of all the fighting Pandora and James had waged against Voldemort, in the light of the murders Voldemort had done within the family, I felt it better to be placed behind bars and forgotten.

Judge Barty Crouch stood before me at the end of the trial and said, "Why did you become a Death Eater?"

"For knowledge," I replied. Knowledge to help James, to tell my brother of Voldemort's plans.

He frowned down upon me. "Did you enjoy it?"

Enjoy it? Did I enjoy the time I spent with James, being closer to him and trusting him and he trusting me as we never did before, brought together to defeat the one man who was tearing our lives apart? Were it not for what I became, I would never have known this exquisite thing known as trust, or even have ever known such closeness to him as I once had when we were children. It made me feel something I never felt before: simple, actual trust for a single person; trust that extended even beyond what I granted Pandora Potter. And — dare I say it? — it also made me feel human and whole, instead of the misfit oddball from the slums. Words cannot describe how precious that trust, even if it was now shattered, had been to me.

This trust… it meant more to me than life itself.

I smiled. "Of course."

He banged his gavel and declared me guilty. I was sentenced to life in Azkaban.


Truth be told, Harry, that place is not as bad as people would have you believe. I'm sure that your godfather would lament at great lengths of his misery, but I cannot say I feel sorry for him. It may not have been Buckingham Palace, but it is through our miserable situations that we come to appreciate the more simple blessings in life.

Granted, your godfather and everyone else locked within those ice-cold stone walls, shut behind bars and trapped in their worst memories, did not have the experience that I had to appreciate the simple things in life.

Yes, it was cold, but it was dry! It did not drip or drizzle and the drafts were not fierce gales of wind that carried snow and sleet. It was a sheltered place – with a roof!

Oh, sure the dementors stole happy memories and good feelings, leaving people trapped in their hopelessness and knowledge of what they had done. But I was used to living in slums that knew only wickedness, as hope never existed long enough to die. All my memories were never completely happy but overlaid with a sense of bitterness and expectations from my life as a gutter rat.

Indeed, I derived a great deal of satisfaction from knowing I was better off in Azkaban than in the slums. Nor could the dementors take away my memories of the slums, as they were certainly not happy memories. As such, I did not lose the satisfaction. It puzzled them that I could not be broken. I could be dulled and numbed, but not bled dry, broken, or driven insane as other prisoners were.

The prisoners were also fed regularly, which is a very large bonus compared to the times on the streets where I would go days without food. And the food? Clearly of much better quality than what you would find rummaging through a garbage bin.

Perhaps the best thing of all, in my opinion, was the isolation of the prisoners. This meant no human contact, which I'm sure many think is the cruellest punishment of all, but human contact is overrated. After all, rape is a thing unheard in Azkaban. I was very happy living with the knowledge no one would be assaulting me for a stolen moment of cheap gratification. This happiness could not be taken either and, even when I was left with the memories of those lives I had taken, I still clung to the notion their lives had been sacrifices, just as mine had been. A sacrifice to rid the world of the man who would demolish it so effortlessly.

In short, Azkaban is an overrated nightmare, and the Ministry of Magic would do well if they knew this. (Not that I advocate the raping, starving, and exposing inmates to the elements as a different punishment…)

And then James came to visit me four months into my sentence.

Oh, he was spitting fire and brimstone. I felt his rage the moment my cell door swung open and he stormed in to stand over where I was seated at my window, gazing at the ice fields outside. I did not know why he suddenly decided I deserved a visit, but clearly it had something to do with his rage.

James waited until the dementor who allowed him into my cell had moved beyond hearing to speak with me. "Why didn't you tell them?" he asked softly, though I knew he wanted to shout and vent his frustrations. I held my tongue and he began to pace the room, wringing his hands and his eyes darting wildly. "Why didn't you tell them Voldemort gave you the choice of death or joining him, and you joined him with the intent of becoming my spy? That you had to protect Lily?"

"Did you tell them?" I asked softly.

He glared at me. "No!" I knew he was struggling to keep his uneasy hold upon his temper. "I came here as soon as I was aware of anything!"

This was not what I expected to hear. "Aware?"

"I was in a coma for the first eight weeks, and the last eight were spent in therapy, gaining back my lost senses. No one told me you were sent here to this godforsaken prison until Sirius let it slip that you had gotten your just desserts; everyone thought you were guilty. Even Lily. I forced Sirius to explain what he meant. Everyone who knows what happened to you — and thankfully it's only a damn few — thinks you were the spy telling Voldemort the Aurors' plans. Dumbledore told me you willingly become a Death Eater for knowledge and you enjoyed it."

He glared at me as if he fully expected me to apologize for being found guilty. I wanted to tell him Peter was Voldemort's spy, but I could not summon the strength to say anything. At that moment, the only other time in my life where I ever felt so utterly drained and hopeless was when I had been bitten by Remus. So James did not come to see me at my trial because he felt I was a betrayer, but because he had been incapable of anything. At least he never abandoned me. For that I felt gratitude – which the dementors promptly sucked away. Oops.

James knelt down so we were eyelevel.

"We both know you became a Death Eater for knowledge about Voldemort's actions, and I have seen your eyes after you came from your missions. I have seen the pain and the grief you harbour within yourself and wouldn't share with me. I know you didn't enjoy what you did. Why'd you say you did? If you had told them otherwise, they'd have offered you a chance to exchange information and names for freedom. Why'd you allow them to imprison you here instead of explaining to them that you were my spy?"

I remained silent, and he rocked back on his heels. "You want to stay here," he spoke flatly, all anger gone from his voice when he realized the truth. As I nodded, he sobbed and threw his arms around me. "Oh Sev," he cried, hugging me tightly. "You were always the strong one, just like Grandmother. You may have been affected by what others did to you, but you never let it hold you back and even when I'd have sought revenge, you forgot, if not forgave, the matter. Where's your strength now?"

I patted his arm, secretly wondering too where was this strength that James mentioned. Where it had been all my life? Odd how it always before seemed to escape my notice. Did I actually forget what others did to me, when I only used such experiences as mortar for my brick walls of cold defence? Each perceived slight only hardened my resolve. How could this be forgetting? I hid behind those walls, too frightened to emerge from them and open myself up to trust.

This would be more aptly described as cowardice, not strength.

In a way, Azkaban was my escape from the world. It was my way of slipping away from all the horrors Voldemort created and the pain others felt, of letting everyone forget me. Yes, it was cowardice, I will admit to that now. Yet how fitting it was that my brother, the person I had inadvertently betrayed the most, should be the only one to visit me in my chosen confinement. "Leave me be," I said finally. "Forget about me. All that I need is here."

James pulled away and regarded me at arm-length. I weakly waved him off, truly wanting to share my thoughts and feelings, yet still unable to summon the strength needed. "Do you have nothing left?" he asked as more tears slid down his face. The tears… looked bloody in the dim light.

All I could do was stare, unable to answer. He covered his mouth in alarm. He must have thought I had given up all reason for living. Perhaps he blamed it on Azkaban itself. After a moment, he yanked off his heavy winter robe and wrapped it around me. "I'll be back," he promised fiercely as he hugged me once more. "I'm not leaving you here to rot! You're every bit a hero as I am and you don't deserve to be here. This isn't right."

"It's not that bad," I said quickly. I hastened to explain what I meant as confusion filled his face. "There's food, and it's not wet." He smiled through his bloody tears and shook his head at me, perhaps remembering that dirty and thin child Pandora had brought home so many years ago.

"Won't you ever move on from the past?" he asked me softly before retreating.

That made me think and question his words, my motives. Yet the more I puzzled through his meaning, the more I recalled how much of my life was dominated by my experiences and memories from the slums. Every sentiment I held for mankind, my desire to learn, my inability to trust and the difficulty I had in accepting love for and from other people. Even the ways I moved and thought came from being a simple little gutter rat who lived only five, six, perhaps seven years on the streets.

When my cell door swung open for another visitor one month later, I had been struggling with a dawning truth – a truth that frightened me more than Voldemort or James. I sat on my narrow cot, doubled over with my head in my lap and my arms folded over it to shield myself from the world. I did not move as a weight settled beside me on the cot and a gentle hand rubbed my back.

"Severus," came a voice I had not heard in five years. I slowly unfolded myself and beheld Pandora. Her arms encircled my shoulders and pulled me into a loving embrace before I could move to do the same. And though I did not want to admit this dawning truth to even myself, I knew she needed to know. And my damnable eyes began to leak.

"Grandmother." I wept as she began to rock. "Wherever I go, the slums follow me."

"Hush, darling. You're not well."

"Everything I do, everything I say, it's all as if I am still there, wary of those who will sell me out." I pulled free to look at her. She was far more fragile than I had ever seen. Pandora was thin and old, hair white as Dumbledore's, dark eyes sunken and bloodshot from too much reading and not enough sleep. The only thing that seemed to keep her from collapsing in an exhausted faint was the very same dignity of which I had been wary the first moment I had seen her, approaching a brick wall just outside Diagon Alley. "I will never escape the slums, will I? You can remove the gutter rat from the slums, but you can never remove the slums from the gutter rat." My head drooped depressingly onto her breast. "Let me stay here," I said, rubbing my damp eyes against her sleeve. "I can live with the slums here without trouble."

"No." Her arms tightened around me. "James told me of what you did."

Anger flared, directed at James. Why did he have to drag Pandora into this? Did he not realize how desperately Pandora sought a way to defeat Voldemort? I could have remained here without her having to be interrupted and distracted. Yet I should not have been surprised that this was what James did. Three times was I in mortal danger, and three times James turned to Pandora.

When Peter knocked me out of the boat, James demanded that Pandora be contacted and come to Hogwarts. When Remus had bitten me, James fetched Pandora, regardless of the punishment he might have received for his transgressions. When I wished to remain in Azkaban, letting my life slip away between my fingers, wasted despite what everyone invested, James fled to Pandora. All the times I desperately needed help, James turned to the only person he knew would help, and that was our grandmother. He never sought her help for anything or anyone but myself, as if he could not trust his own ability to assist me in my perilous need. In that, I know he loved me just as I loved him.

"Leave me alone," I said, trying to pull away from her.

"Why?"

"I belong here."

She slapped me. The sharp sting of flesh hitting cold flesh rocked my world for a moment. The numbness in my mind disappeared at the horror that Pandora had actually struck me. Pandora, who had never raised her voice in anger at either myself or James in all the years she had raised us.

She stood upright, frightfully angry and brimming with indignation. "Now you listen to me, Severus Dominic Snape: You may think you belong here and you may believe the world doesn't need you, but if you so much as even think for just one second that you are going repay my kindness and my love, make up for everything that I had to endure and pay me back the price of my soul and bed that is Riddle's due, by just disappearing off the face of this earth and finishing the end of your days in this horrible place, then you best take that thought and stuff it where the sun doesn't shine!"

I looked at her for a moment then wearily slumped over my cot. Her anger turned to worry. "Oh, my darling - are you ill?" she asked me, pressing a warm hand against my bruised cheek.

"I'm tired," I said. "I don't want to go back — really, there's nothing to go back to. Frank's crazy, no one will believe James if he says I'm a spy and it will be worth my life if anyone finds out, and no one spoke up for me at the trial. They don't care if I come back and neither do I."

The anger returned. "I believed James!"

I held my head and laughed. "You know he has never lied to you and never will." I turned my back to her and curled into a ball. "Where will I go?" I asked softly. "Who will take a convicted Death Eater like myself?" The arm with the Dark Mark trembled and I clamped my other hand over it. What else could I say? My ambition seemed drained from me in the hopeless disparity of my situation.

"I'll get you out of here," Pandora promised me as she swept out of my cell. "If I have to conspire with Riddle himself to jail-bust you out of here and then go underground somewhere in Bermuda, then so be it!"

It was an amusing image to be left with, but it did nothing to hold back my dark thoughts.

What are regrets and what are hopes when, in the light of my past, I squashed regrets and never formed hopes? Yet never underestimate a woman who has her mind made up, Harry. Whoever said, "Hell knoweth no fury like a woman scorned," must have been on the receiving end of the said scorned woman's wrath. Whether Pandora believed it her duty to help me or perhaps she thought there was something I could live up to after leaving Azkaban, she did find a way to get me out without compromising my reputation with either the Aurors or the Death Eaters.

Pandora showed up at the Ministry of Magic's doorstep, a whirlwind of righteous fury. She threatened, ranted, raved, called on dozens of favours, levered her reputation and power, greased palms right and left with the family fortune, and finally received a recall on my sentence from the Very Higher Up. She had the element of surprise on her side because no one had seen her for more than five years, and it was forgotten how vicious the matron of the Potter family, Slytherin through and through, could be when she wanted her own way. In the end, there were stipulations: a lifetime of community service, under the care of a very powerful, very competent wizard that was not a Potter. Pandora then went directly to Dumbledore and told him the entire truth as she knew it from James. Dumbledore agreed to help her by taking me as an employee — for what, he truly had no idea but he was sure to think of something, he assured her.

Pandora wasted little time in snatching me out of Azkaban when the word came through from the Very Higher Up. She led me past the dementors, glaring at anyone who would stop her. She made public appearances long enough to ruthlessly squash rumours of my being a Death Eater. Easily done, as my arrest and trial had been kept under wraps. Of those who were part of her close-mouthed negotiations, only James and Dumbledore knew of my reality.

According to anyone who remembers Pandora (and even the history books; the Potter family made an entire chapter in Magical Mysteries Never Solved), James was the last to see her alive; accordingly, Pandora disappeared afterwards, never to be seen or heard of again. It was assumed she died as nothing ever became known of her after James' death. With the slaughter of her family, everyone supposed that James' funeral would have been enough to bring her into the public eye again, even if it was only to lay claim of you, her great-grandson, another Potter orphaned by Voldemort's hands.

Dumbledore and Pandora exchanged owls about information of the Fidelius Charm, but everyone believes that James was the person who physically saw her last. Pandora took him to the side and spoke to him softly. Having told him what she wished to say, she left. Only two alive could tell you of what passed between them: Dumbledore and myself.

James told me, before Dumbledore performed the spell that would hide you and your parents from the world, that Pandora was off to directly attack Voldemort for the first, and last, time in her life. She was worried she would not survive it and was not strong enough to completely destroy Voldemort, so she wished James to be gone, completely. That, she said, was the only way James would be protected, as he was the person who would be in the most danger; no longer would he have sanctuary, and Voldemort's revenge and retaliation would be completely directed at him.

Pandora was determined to carry out her plan, no matter the risk. She had the means in which to get close, though she never mentioned to James (despite how he teased her when her face turned red) what those means were.

I reiterate my own feelings: eww.

I, however, am the last to see Pandora alive.

A week after the Charm was performed — the day of your parents' deaths — Dumbledore allowed me to return to Dinsmore without an escort. He trusted me, he said, and it was not his place to spoil my last moments at what had been my home for more than fifteen years. The portraits were subdued and quiet as they watched me roam the cottage for the last time. It was dusk as I stood at the base of Dinsmore, my trunk at my feet and filled with the sparse things I found I could not be parted.

I felt someone Disapparate behind me. As I turned with a greeting, my words died on my lips. Pandora stood before me, hunched over with blood drenching her side. Her eyes darted nervously around and her chest heaved with painful gasps. I took a step forward to steady her and she shook her head, batting me away with one hand.

"Pandora – Grandmother, what happened?"

"That snake bit me!" Pandora sounded more angry than hurt. "That damned snake bit me after I stripped Tom of what power I could manage!" She gazed at me with wide, unseeing eyes. "It flew everywhere," she whispered with her voice filled with awe. "Such magnificent power… It was like a liquid that, it just poured! It took all my concentration to gather it together and use it as a lever to strip more from him." She growled and gritted her teeth. "I was not paying attention and I should have! I would have gotten away but for that damned snake." She swayed suddenly.

"Here." I offered her my hand. "We'll get you to St. Mungo's."

Pandora laughed bitterly, sounding eerily like James did when I had told him of my proposal to spy. "No. The poison moves too fast through my body – it will kill me in less than an hour. Another Apparation will kill me outright." She smiled. For a brief moment, she looked no different from that time long ago when she offered me a bowl of peaches and cream. "I brought this to you." She held a small box out to me, plain but for the silver fringe-like edging between the lid and the main body of the box. I solemnly took it from her and looked at her expectantly. "The poison—" she pressed a hand against her side "—there is hope, one way to cure it, but it will require a wild jump."

"Jump?" I repeated. She swayed unsteadily again and I reached out to help her, but she irritably pushed my hand away.

"Where I need to go no one may Apparate. Not even Tom Riddle may enter this place where I go." A look of worry creased her brow. "I just hope someone'll grab me. If no one does I shall die. I suppose it will make no difference in the end, then."

I was confused and already I could feel the sharp loss of her life. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, Severus." She reached out and gripped my hand. "Don't trouble your mind. I merely go to my mother's family." Her mother, who had gone to warmer waters, whatever that meant. "I just hope young Pettigrew remains strong enough," she whispered. "I fear there are dark trials in store for James."

"What does that cowardly Peter have to do with James?" I asked darkly, still trying to recall what I knew of her mother. "The damn turncoat is a spy for Voldemort."

If I had struck Pandora, her look of stunned dread would have been no different. She raised her arms, as if to shield herself from the truth. "Peter is a spy?" She curled her arms around her body and screamed – the hair on the back of my neck rose on end at the anguish. "What have I done?" she wailed. "I have killed James!"

"What? How?"

"No more!" Pandora pushed past me, dragging her left leg behind her. "We must get the Mirror of Rebounds." She seemed to regain her strength, or at least swept her emotional agony under the press of more demanding things. I ran after her as she stormed into Dinsmore, throwing the doors open without a heed to their weight. "Tom's coming," she whispered as she swept through the lightless corridors. I believed her. My Dark Mark began to burn with an intensity I had never before experienced. I clamped a hand tight over it to dull the pain. "No. Not Tom. He stopped being Tom Riddle long ago, didn't he?"

I failed to see the need to respond, and Pandora began to weep and babble at the same time. "Voldemort comes. I did not defeat him; I couldn't. He is weak though, and he will never regain the strength he possessed before tonight." She dropped a hand upon the box I carried and caressed its wood. "Open that only under dire circumstances and when your only other choice is to die." She finally reached and entered her room. Lily had kept it dusted and clean, in ready anticipation of Pandora's return. Sitting on the top of her chest of drawers was a royal blue-coloured cloth draped over a small round frame. She tore away the cloth to reveal a mirror hinged between two triangular poles. Its glass was inky grey and too dim to reflect.

Pandora shoved this into my arms. "A family heirloom of considerable power: The Mirror of Rebounds shows anything you desire so long as it happened." She looked into my eyes and then threw her arms around me in a tight hug. "Take care," she whispered before reluctantly pulling away. "Go to Albus Dumbledore," she said. "Go to him — don't stop for anyone or dawdle. You must get to him immediately and tell him that — that…" She wailed keenly. "Tell him that James and Lily are in danger, that Voldemort knows where they are — their secret keeper has or will betray them."

With more strength than I thought possible, she heaved me out of her bedroom and slammed the door shut. I whirled around and kicked the door as she locked it. "Grandmother!" I cried as I threw my weight against it. The wood bent but did not give.

"Go to Albus!" she cried shrilly on the other side. "For the love of your brother, help James before it's too late!" I stared at the door for a moment, then Apparated as close to Hogwarts as I dared. I dropped the box and the mirror at the lake's shore and dashed headlong to Hogwarts, yelling for Dumbledore and McGonagall. Students still awake jumped from the path of my mad rush. Dumbledore met me at the base of the castle and I nearly ploughed through him before I realized he blocked my way.

"What is it?" His eyes were sharp and penetrating behind his glasses.

"Sirius — Pandora — !" I gasped for a quick breath, gathered my thoughts into a semblance of order, and then straightened. I found I could not tell Dumbledore that I had seen Pandora. "James is in trouble," I said finally. "Voldemort is going after him and he knows where James is."

Dumbledore frowned. "Are you sure?"

I nodded. "There is a traitor," I said, remembering Peter. Did Peter become a traitor because Sirius was one? I had wondered for years afterwards.

Dumbledore immediately launched into action. He commanded me to stay out of the matter as he called McGonagall to him. I watched as they left, feeling helpless. They and several other instructors flew off on their brooms and then Apparated once outside Hogwarts' barriers. Madam Pomfrey appeared behind me and the Bloody Baron shooed the students off to their Houses as he told them it was not safe to be outside. After a moment of staring at my back, Pomfrey gave me an unexpected hug.

I responded with stunned silence and a wide-eyed stare. "Severus," she said, "I haven't had a chance to say this, but I don't see you as a horrid man who became a Death Eater." She patted my arm. "I see you as a frightened and lonely child, scared and hurt from mischief gone too terribly wrong. Don't worry; James, Lily, and little Harry will be fine."

They would not be.

Pomfrey left and I went back to the edge of the lake to fetch the things I had dropped. Upon seeing them, I remembered my trunk and decided I would do no harm should I quickly Apparate to Dinsmore long enough to grab the trunk's handles and then returned to Hogwarts with the trunk on tow.

I paused a moment to straighten the mirror and the box Pandora had given me, and then Apparated to where my trunk sat. The moment I was aware of my surroundings I perceived something was wrong. The air was heavy with smoke and heat. I screwed my eyes shut, covered my mouth and coughed, blindly reaching for my trunk. When my hand found a handle and tightened around it, I opened my eyes and peered through the thick smoke.

I felt a strange emptiness when I saw Dinsmore engulfed in flames, fire reaching to the sky. A black figure stood silhouetted against the flames, cape fluttering wildly as orange embers floated about. The figure turned to face me. My Dark Mark blazed suddenly with pain and I wildly Apparated back to Hogwarts, almost crazy with fear, and nearly splinching myself in my crazed haste. The rage I had felt even from the distance was overwhelming and my retinas burned with the red hue of the black figure's rage. Overlaying that was agony and sorrow.

I collapsed to my knees beside the Mirror of Rebounds and Pandora's box. My eyes settled upon the dark glassAs I gazed at the mirror, I ached to see Pandora one last time.

This… this is all very difficult to write.

Of all the things I have had to explain, this is the hardest. I relive these memories for the sake of writing them for you, and it is painful to think of the what-may-have-been's, what-if's, and knowing there is nothing that can be done to change the damage wrought. My pride has been swallowed more times than I care to think; my face has burned with humiliation through most passages.

But here, my hand trembles and the ink blurs. Pain constricts my chest; my lungs refuse to draw in breath. Where did these watery splotches on the parchment come from? They're fresh…

The mirror darkened black and then lightened suddenly, as if someone had turned on a light from within. It was foggy before the image sharpened and I saw Pandora slam her bedroom door shut before my surprised face. She bent against it, screaming and shaking her head, then hid her face in her hands as she sank to the floor. After scrubbing at it, she raised her hand and I saw her face, saw the agony and grief adding years. She looked directly at the ceiling, wrapped her arms around herself, and moved her lips. I don't know what she said, but eventually she faded away. Not disappearing immediately as she would have if she Apparated but faded instead, as if she gradually lost substance.

The mirror's picture changed and showed Dinsmore burning with Voldemort stood before it. He slouched over with one hand clasping an end of his cloak close. Heat waves danced before his image. He had been staring at the flames, but after a moment, he glanced up and saw me. Across time and across distance, he saw me. Such was his power even after Pandora's attack. His eyes held a shattered look; a mingling of pain, betrayal, rage, hatred, and sorrow. A moment passed before his rage boiled forward and something popped.

I fell backwards as the images disappeared and inky darkness was all I could see within the mirror before I realized there a fine crack had appeared to run along the glass' surface. A dark liquid seeped from the crack. As I wordlessly reached out to touch the mirror, the very aspect of it changed.

It warped, and then I saw James fall backwards limply, a green light clinging to his body. I watched in frozen horror as Lily appeared before the twisted form of Voldemort, poised and ready to fight. I saw, but did not hear, words exchange. Then Voldemort pointed his wand at Lily as she flung herself forward to cover a swaddled babe: you. Green light burst forward and tears blurred my vision.

"Stop it!" I could tolerate no more. I had just witnessed the deaths of two family members and the fate of a third. I did not want to see what Voldemort had in store for your fragile body. I could not stand the idea of seeing you, who had never done anything to anyone, the most innocent of us all, tortured and killed. It was too much. I struck the mirror to wipe away its pictures, and it toppled against Pandora's box. The box fell to its side and the hinged lid swung open. A light, an odd mixture of deep green and baby blue, both of which seemed to be warring against one another for command, blasted forth. The green absorbed the blue, took on a lighter hue, and pulsated with a new life. Frightened even more, I snatched up the box and slammed it shut. The light shot directly into the air as if it were launched free, split in half, and then disappeared into two distances.


And now we come to the end of my tale. There is nothing left to explain. After you somehow managed to destroy Voldemort — how, I truly have no idea, perhaps I should have kept watching the Mirror of Rebounds because then we would all know exactly how you managed to do such a thing — the Aurors launched an all-out brutal assault against stunned Death Eaters everywhere. The Potions instructor at Hogwarts was among those was found guilty and Dumbledore allowed me to assume the position.

You were sent to the Dursleys who would raise you and prevent an inflated ego from being the Boy-Who-Lived, although there is no ego to be encouraged from such a bloody heritage. Peter framed Sirius who was sent to Azkaban without a trial, and though Dumbledore knew Peter was the true secret keeper, there was no way he could prove Sirius' innocence. If I had told him Peter was Voldemort's spy, perhaps Dumbledore could have negotiated for a recall on Sirius' sentence, but for more than a decade I honestly and truly believed Sirius had been James' and Lily's secret keeper. Because I thought him to be a Death Eater so had to have been Peter, ever willing to follow like a brainless sheep over a cliff after the herd.

I have fulfilled my duty. I, the one remaining person alive who truly knows the depths of the Snape/Potter heritage and history, have passed it to the only living blood member of the Snape/Potter family. There is more, I imagine; so much more that would broaden the general knowledge of your family, but that is the main gist. You now know why Voldemort hates you and why you are kinless.

I must now answer Voldemort's insistent call. I may no longer hold off.

I know that going to Voldemort will be my death. Rather than have this valuable information die with me, I took it upon myself to write you this (abysmally long) letter. I could not explain anything of the Potter family without my own ties, and that could not be done in spurts and fragments. Like it or not, the little gutter rat Pandora rescued from Voldemort possessed as many ties to the Potter family as do you.

Fate has deemed to throw you against the Dark Wizard who had been born Tom Marvelo Riddle. One cannot butt heads against Fate, but one may be prepared for what Fate has decided. By knowing what you are, you find clues to who you are. Whether you find that a comfort or not — at least, coming from me — it is the truth. There are few things I leave you after all I have done to you, but these: a testimony of your father, your family's greatness, and perhaps a little of the enigma known as Voldemort. It is the most precious thing I can give anyone.

At least I shall not be alive for you to gloat over when you receive this. That, I suppose, is the one blessing.

Severus D Snape