Moments to Murder.
Bekajwp
Rating: K
The first moment came when I returned from that trip to find the Horcrux. When I saw the shrivelled hand, the weakness and strangeness in his eyes. When I wondered just what fail-safes the Dark Lord would have upon something so valuable as his soul, and who, if any, could break them. I wondered at the way he avoided our questions without seeming to. The way we let those questions die on our lips out of trust in his infallibility. No man is infallible.
The second moment was in my own home. A more decisive one, than the first, one could say. Maybe the first never existed and I conjure it up only now in order to ease the guilt in my mind. That I truly had a reason to swear such a thing to Narcissa. Days later, after informing Albus of my vow, I was informed of my placement as Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. I never took the rumours that the position was cursed seriously, until I too left after just one year.
Would I carry out the task that the Dark Lord has ordered Draco to perform? If necessary. I already have no choice- if my suspicions are true. If. This unbreakable bond will provide me with a path. I recall the last such bond I performed, so many years ago, in Dumbledore's office. A bond to do whatever necessary to continue the side of the light against Voldemort's darkness. In every war there must be someone who will carry out the worst tasks, who will do what is needed because it is needed, when all others shrink from the task. From the instant the tongue of flame bound our wrists I knew; only needed to prove it to myself. It mattered not if any other wanted proof, for they would never suspect as I had in the first place.
Why, Minerva asked once, would Albus not teach Potter Occlumency this year? With a sidelong glance at me that clearly added 'after the disaster of last year's lessons'. He smiled, explained about his busyness with the war effort. Added that what he was teaching Potter- when he had the time- was just as important. Sipped his tea.
And then more moments. When I would meet those blue eyes and find no trace of the old twinkle. When the great Albus Dumbledore began to treat every day as a new struggle. When gradually became as frail as his great ago would suggest he should be. But not for a wizard. And that hand, that hand that wouldn't heal. As if a poison had caused it and remained in the wound. But where was the wound? In the hand that we could see? I thought not. The eyes are the window to the soul. Looking into his eyes so often weary or pained, my suspicion grew as to what hurt his soul so. Not the war, for I had been there last time. Not Potter, for if anything this year proved less dangerous for him than others. Something else, inside; something draining his strength.
I think we both hoped he could fight forever. He was the only one Voldemort feared. I say both because at some point, he realised that I knew. I had told him months before of my promise to Narcissa, and we had agreed to face that when it arose. So unlike him, I thought at the time, not to tackle the problem. As if the idea that I may have to kill him by the end of the school year was an acceptable solution to the problem.
Finally, that ridiculous risk. Dragging Potter to god knows where on a quest for another Horcrux. Just Potter. Despite all of the talented back-up he could have asked for, and the danger he knew would face them. I don't know if he was in his right mind even then, so late on. The urge to protect the boy contesting the urge, finally surfacing, to harm him. Drinking the draught that protected the amulet in an act of selflessness that protected Potter. Drinking the draught that protected the amulet in an act of selfishness, desiring both to die and to leave Potter alone in danger. I do not know what he saw through that draught. Perhaps the blatant truth of how far the fight had progressed, and what should happen if it continued. The truth, enough to make any man scream. The truth that he was losing.
On the battlements he was coherent, and just that sapped his strength so much further. Only a student in need could have brought such strength up from whatever depths were left. He spoke my name so softly, and he was pleading. I was bound in place by two promises intertwined, leading to this one act.
Could I have explained to someone- anyone- what I suspected and knew from a collection of moments? Could they have understood the power of Voldemort and the possibilities of the Horcrux? That power linked with those possibilities, that fail-safe upon one Horcrux, that injury that refused to heal, and what connected them? Transferring itself into the destroyer, the hero becoming the thing he despised the most. Only thwarted for so long by someone so pure, so powerful? Could anyone else have killed Albus Dumbledore to ensure the continuation of the light side in our war?
Between us, we finished the destruction of the Horcrux.
I lifted my wand, and pointed directly at his chest.
'Avada Kadavra!'
The green light streams from my wand directly into his chest, freezing the pleading look in his eyes eternally, and he flies backwards. Over the battlements silently and limply, swallowed up into the growing evening. Perhaps this moment should have stretched out like an eternity, playing out in slow motion. Perhaps it would have been more palatable that way, as if it was something of great importance. But it is a moment much the same as any other in which he dies and falls from sight. Just a moment to murder.
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