This was written as a challenge to write as much as I coherently can in 20 minutes. English is also not my first language, so watch for errors.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except a few rubles and some pocket lint.

Forgiveness From a Criminal

Ah, so this is it. The Dark Lord is no more, his Death Eaters are scattered and broken. I myself saw to it that the beast Fenrir Greyback would forever abandon his pastime of leading children into a bleak life of darkness and misery. Bellatrix turned her wand upon herself rather than face life without her master. It seems you were wrong about Draco, Albus. Multiple punishments and Death Eater raids had finally hardened him into a true killer, and he met his death by his father's side. As I lay here, my warm blood seeping down through cracks in the stone flooring, memories line up before my blurry vision.

I was only sixteen, sitting in your office with anger and fear written across my face. Back in those days I had a reverence for you that bordered on worship. I thought that if only you knew everything that was going on, you would immediately set it straight. In my mind, you were fair and just; you were the golden standard. I was in for a rude awakening. That night you gave Black detention, and threatened me with expulsion if I ever said a word about the night's events. I realized just how little worth a useless, nasty Slytherin's life had to you. Oh, you knew everything that happened at Hogwarts. And you didn't care, as long as it did not threaten your precious Gryffindor House. It was so easy to hate you then.

But I forgave you. Maybe the illusion never quite wore off, because just a few years later I was back in the same office, looking for a chance at redemption. I decided that you were right. I'd become a vile murderer, nothing more and nothing less. It had taken a comrade's death to see what I had jumped into without looking. That year, the Dark Lord revealed his true intentions. Whatever the pretty political message that the youth swallowed was, it had nothing to do with Lord Voldemort. He had no need for his Death Eaters. They were just tools to him, to be disposed of when their usefulness ran out. And when that realization finally hit me, I ran back to you, to the first person by whom I felt betrayed.

It was then that you offered for me to be a spy. Ever the manipulator, were you not, Albus? You could have just offered to hide me, like so many others, but you could see the need to compensate burning in my eyes. I had killed and I had tortured, and I felt that there was nothing I could do to ever make up for this. And so, you offered me the position. You immediately saw how you could use this to your benefit, standing me between life and death to obtain your precious information. But I forgave you. I knew to do what I believe was my duty.

Last year, I stood before your grave. My fingers gripped tightly at the cold marble as I kneeled before the monument. Once again I had been your weapon, this time a weapon against yourself. In that moment atop the tower, your eyes bored into me, asking of me something I did not think I could possibly do. And it was done. I killed you, at your own request. You would sacrifice the whole of Slytherin House to please you favorite Gryffindor, would you not? Did you not see what position you were putting me in? You left me alone in the camp of the enemy, with all the wizarding world out for my blood. You left me sealed off from everything but the celebrations of the Death Eaters, to be crushed and eaten by my own shame and guilt. You forced me to deal the last blow to an already bloodied and broken spirit, and I was on the very edge of hating you again, if just for a second. But I forgave you. I needed to finish what I had started, I needed to keep my promise. I could not live with you having died in vain.

I've done as I promised, Albus. I kept the boy out of harm's way, and I helped him finish off the Dark Lord. But now that it is over, I realize that you left me with no prospects for a future. Somehow, I knew it would come to this. You never said anything to the other Order members. There was no plan to soften my fall. To anyone I could ever turn to, I am an enemy, a traitor of the vilest sort. I've effectively been left by you to slam into a brick wall with no brakes. So now I lay dying at the very hand of your precious Harry Potter. And I forgive you.

Again.