Disclaimer: I own none of the characters, concepts, or settings of the Harry Potter world. Several quotes are used directly from the chapter 'The Prince's Tale' from The Deathly Hallows.
For a few moments, the inside of the train compartment was completely silent save for the rhythmic sound of the wheels shuffling along the train tracks. The Slytherin boy was completely at a loss as he struggled to process the question Lily had asked.
"Sev..? Say something…" Lily pleaded as she noticed what little color Severus had left in his face drain completely.
Without speaking a word, she watched as he got to his feet and walked to the door. She was about to protest his attempt to leave, only to watch as he pulled down the privacy curtain. Once he did so, however, he stood unmoving with his back to her. After what seemed like an eternity of his stonewalling, Lily noticed a weak chuckle finally break his silence.
"It's funny...years of deception have passed throughout my life, yet the one person I wanted to hide everything from comes startlingly close to figuring out the truth for herself…"
Lily's mouth opened, yet nothing came out as she waited for an explanation. If she was close, what else could it have been? Her thoughts were quickly interrupted when Severus turned back to face her, a look of absolute misery etched on his face. Her best friend's eyes were swimming with unshed tears that looked like they would break free any moment.
"Maybe I'm just tired of hiding, of lying to survive. You have no idea...how many times I've wished that everything that's happened could have just been a bad dream or a vision."
To Lily, those black eyes had lost a great deal of their armor and strength, and it disturbed her greatly. The look on her best friend's face betrayed a lifetime of misery, an absolute loss of the ability to care anymore. She watched as he slowly made his way back to the seat opposite hers, and although she could see that her gaze seemed to sting him with each passing moment, he made no attempt to break their eye contact.
"Honestly, I haven't the slightest idea of where to even start with all of this…" his voice trailed off.
"Why not start at the beginning?" she suggested, trying to remain helpful and strong when it was clear that his own strength was breaking.
"And what beginning are you referring to, Lily?" He asked, barely able to breathe out the words. "The beginning of this life, or where it all started with my previous one?"
"Wh-what?! Previous..? What in Merlin's name does that mean, Sev?"
"I mean that this isn't the first time I've been in Hogwarts as a teenager. From the moment you stepped forward at my defense that day at the lake...the day of my absolute worst memory...it's like I've been doing my life over."
"Your worst memory…" She echoed, remembering when she heard that phrase before. It had been when she found him in the Room of Requirement, an even worse wreck than he was now, and the moment his visions...no...memories started to force their way into her mind.
The words struck her with the force of a hammer as she recalled them. The vision of that day at the lake, so similar to how she herself remembered it. Only Severus wasn't so focused on her. Nor was he calm. He was furious. There was no concussion. He broke his fall, and when she came to his defense…
"I don't need help from filthy little Mudbloods like her!"
A sharp intake of breath escaped Lily's lips as the recognition of what she had seen had finally started to sink in. And with one small, powerful motion, she cast her gaze down to her lap, her lips parted and trembling.
All Severus could feel was relief at being freed from her gaze, yet heartbreak that she seemingly couldn't look at him anymore. Clearly, she was starting to put together the two conflicting sets of events that happened at the lake.
"That...was the way it happened in my first life, Lily. There is no excuse, no amount of apology could make up for what I did that day. And...rightfully so, I suppose; you never did forgive me after that. To this day I don't even know what caused me to say it. My anger at Potter, my embarrassment of being humiliated, the pain of having you smile as it happened...At the end of the day, I suppose what was truly to blame were my own self-destructive tendencies."
If Lily had heard any of what he said, Severus certainly couldn't tell. Her downcast stare hadn't wavered, and it seemed like she was trying to envision the details based on what his memories had betrayed to her over a week ago.
"So...if everything that you're saying is true...that what I've been seeing are your memories from this...first life...that means…" Her voice was trembling, interrupted by a gasp as her green eyes slowly moved towards his left arm. A few tears slid down her cheeks as she recalled another memory...the branding ceremony, Severus surrounded by Death Eaters as he swore his service to...
"Yes. After that day at the lake, you never spoke to me again. You never accepted my apologies, and now that I know what I do about your Boggart...I can hardly blame you. But after that, everything that was good in my life, everything that could have turned me away from that path was gone. And so I got darker, more drawn to power, and I foolishly turned to a man that I thought would free me from a life of mediocrity and misery." He slowly undid the left cuff of his robe's sleeve, sliding it back to reveal his clean, pale forearm. It was a symbolic gesture, confessing where his Dark Mark had been in his previous life.
"Have you...k...killed anyone…?" Lily's voice was quivering as she looked at it, the tears coming down harder as a hint of anger seemed to resonate underneath her despair at her friend's confession. She was trying desperately to cling to her own words that she had once assured him and herself were true. That her friend wasn't a murderer...
"Two people." He croaked, pain evident in his words.
"Anyone I know?" She spat, her voice growing bitter.
"Albus Dumbledore." Severus sighed.
"What?!" Lily raised her eyes in horror. She got to her feet, staring down at him, those piercing green emeralds filled with betrayal. Indeed, Severus had seen that look once before...
"Lily, stop. This is where it gets complicated. I'm telling you everything, the bad, and the...well, I guess there's little good to be found, but I promised you I'd be truthful. If you're going to storm out, please, just wait until I'm done speaking with you." He spoke with all the authority he had during his time teaching, and after a few moments of consideration, it was enough to get her to sit down, though she folded her arms defensively and cast her gaze down again.
"Think back to that memory of my meeting with Dumbledore. The one that spoke of a prophecy. Do you remember it?"
Lily stiffly nodded her head. What she recalled was obviously an incomplete recollection, but there was enough there to discern what had happened. Severus had told Lord Voldemort about some kind of a prophecy relating to her, and had come back to relay what he knew to Dumbledore.
"It was two years into my time with...them."
"Death Eaters." Lily corrected, meeting his gaze once more with a harsh glare.
"Yes...Death Eaters…" he sighed, feeling the sting that she had no-doubt intended to leave in her words. "Two years after I joined, Dumbledore hosted an interview with a woman who was applying for the recently-vacant position to teach Divination. He…" Severus drifted off, referring to Voldemort, but not wishing to say the name, nor call him the Dark Lord for fear of angering Lily further. "He was looking to get someone into the staff at Hogwarts in order to obtain information about Dumbledore's plans. The Headmaster was the leader of a group called the Order of the Phoenix, a sort of counter-weight to the Death Eaters in the wizarding world. A group, as it so happened, that you were a part of…"
"So we were enemies then...enemies on opposite sides of a war…" Lily muttered, the implications of Severus' words ringing quite clearly to her.
"For a short time, yes, we were. I was sent to spy on Dumbledore's interview with the soon-to-be Professor Trelawney. Admittedly, it looked like there was no chance of her getting the job, until she suddenly went into a trance, relaying the words of a prophecy. That the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord was coming. That he would be born as July, the seventh month, ended, to parents who thrice-defied him. But before I could hear any more, I was caught. Once I returned, I relayed what I had heard, and for a time, that appeared to be the end of it."
Lily's impatient stare continued to bore right through Severus' composure; clearly she knew otherwise.
"Then, once July came and went, two children were announced to have been born in the final days of the month, both to couples that had defied him three times. Neville Longbottom, born to Alice and Frank…And Harry Potter, born to James...and you…"
If it were possible for Lily's deep, expressive eyes to widen any further at his words, it would surprise Severus.
"I...came to find out that he interpreted that prophecy as referring to you, your husband, and your son. And even though I hadn't spoken to you for years by that point, even though we were on opposite sides of the war, I knew it was my fault that he was hunting you. And I couldn't let him do it...not to you…So I went to Dumbledore, told him everything, and agreed to become his double-agent. Pretended to remain loyal to the Death Eaters, but from that day forward, my loyalty was with the person it always should have been."
Lily's gaze had softened somewhat at his confession that he had chosen to redeem himself, but she still shook her head. "If that's true, then why did you kill him?! And...what if he had chosen Frank and Alice? Would that have been just fine with you if another family that wasn't mine was destroyed?!"
Severus closed his eyes, attempting to recompose himself before looking at her again. "To answer the second question...I don't know. It's one that I've asked myself multiple times. What if you hadn't been chosen. Would I have turned from that path? And more importantly, would you still be alive?"
Instantly, her accusatory tone ceased at this revelation. "I...I died? What about James? What about our son?"
Severus opened his eyes once more, and black met green. He could feel the weight lifting from his shoulders inch by inch as his explanation continued, but it wasn't enough. She needed a more complete picture than words could convey...And so, this time, once the memories flooded out of his mind on instinct, he no longer made any attempt to fight the flow…
The scene before Lily's eyes shifted to what she recognized as Dumbledore's office, populated only by two figures. The Headmaster was standing over the seated form of Severus, who was sobbing in a pain that haunted her.
"I thought...you were going...to keep her...safe…"
This was it. This was right after she died, and as she looked at the slightly older Severus, all she could see was a man destroyed. Who had lost everything.
"She and James put their faith in the wrong person. Rather like you, Severus. Weren't you hoping that Lord Voldemort would spare her?"
"But what about James? What about...my son?" she asked herself, feeling the maternal instincts of the boy she did not know start to flutter in her stomach.
"Her boy survives."
"At least...Harry is safe." she reminisced with a tragic smile.
"Her son lives. He has her eyes, precisely her eyes. You remember the shape and color of Lily Evans's eyes, I am sure?"
"DON'T!" Dumbledore was interrupted by the defeated shout of Severus, startling Lily. She looked at the face of Severus, a man who looked to have aged a hundred years from grief, one whose voice had dropped to a defeated whisper. "Gone...dead…"
"Is this remorse, Severus?"
"I wish...I wish I were dead…"
"Because of me..?" She asked herself. "Honestly, Severus, don't you have anyone else in your life that's important to you..?"
"And what use would that be to anyone? If you loved Lily Evans, if you truly loved her, then your way forward is clear."
Lily immediately stopped in her tracks as she shuddered at Dumbledore's words. "Love…?! Sev..?"
And almost in response to her words, the scene started to vanish in billowing smoke, returning her to her seat in the train compartment as Severus had broken their eye contact. This time, his gaze was the one that faced downward, his cheeks tinged with a hint of blush.
"Apologies...I should have ended that memory earlier…" He whispered, turning to look out the window at the green countryside passing by.
Lily was completely silent, taken aback by everything Severus had told her thus far, combined with this latest memory he had shared. There were a number of questions lingering in her mind, but her silence persisted, allowing him to continue.
"There were a number of events that followed, too numerous and not important enough to waste time talking about right now. If you want to know more about them at a later time, I'll tell you. But following the return of the Dark Lord, Dumbledore asked me to return to my duties as a spy. Just over a year after that, the Headmaster came to me, cursed by some manner of dark magic that I could only slow, not stop. At the same time, I had informed him that the Dark Lord was planning to have him killed, the murder to be carried out by a young, reluctant student who had just joined the Death Eaters.
"I knew, and I think Dumbledore did as well, that the student wouldn't be able to follow through with it. So that meant that the task would fall to me. And so, that was the day that Dumbledore asked the impossible of me, to kill him in front of a group of Death Eaters so all suspicion of my allegiance would be gone. He called it a mercy killing since his life was ending anyway...yet that did nothing to ease the stress my soul was racked with after I did it."
Lily could see those black eyes waver, and his voice was quite uneasy. Dumbledore's reasoning for trusting Severus to end his life was sound...in a cold, unfeeling way that Lily absolutely did not agree with. Surely there could have been another way…it was clear that the deed was still doing a number on Severus' mind, no doubt that was amplified further by seeing all of these ghosts from his past…
"Wait a minute…" she spoke, breaking the silence as that thought stuck with her.
"If you're here, and this is somehow a second life for you...did...did you die too?"
Severus nodded with a surprising lack of care, as if this news were the easiest of all for him to break, an action which deeply disturbed Lily.
"Did...did he really have such little regard for his own life by the end of it?" She thought to herself with a great deal of torment.
"Yes." He answered her question about his fate. "I was killed by the Dark Lord...not out of my deception being discovered, but rather because he thought I held ownership of a powerful weapon. I spent a brief period of time in what I assume is the afterlife, only to be thrown back here, at the exact point when all of this spiralled out of control."
"How old were you..?" She questioned tragically.
"I was 38."
"And me? How old was I when I died?"
"You were 21."
She let out a quivering breath.
"I honestly have no idea what happened after that. I was in a white limbo, only to be visited by Dumbledore. He gave me a choice, with the option to come back to this era...to 'shape the world with my own choices' as he so eloquently put it in his usual, infuriating way. I woke up right at the moment of my worst memory, and from there, you've been here for the rest."
"Don't lie to me, Severus…" Lily muttered once she saw he had finished with his explanation.
"Lily, I assure you, everything I told you about my old life is the truth…" He said, taken aback by her accusation.
"You know what I meant!" She snapped with annoyance. "All that bollocks about shaping your future and the world around you, when you and I both know that you didn't give a damn by the end of it. You didn't care whether you lived or died; in fact, death was probably a relief for you by that point…" Her voice was breaking, and the tears were beginning to pour again. "You just came back to see me again, didn't you?!" She bellowed, getting to her feet and making for the door.
"Lily, wait!" Severus called, trying to reach for her arm, but he was too late as she slid open the compartment door, and slammed it shut behind her, leaving him alone in an all-too familiar position. His forehead came to rest against the door in defeat, just as it had against the Fat Lady's portrait when they had their falling-out in his previous life. A few, brief sobs left Severus' lips as he realized he was alone again…
In the train's central hall, Lily had collapsed against the other side of the door, sitting with her back against it, unaware that the only thing separating her from Severus was the door between them...
"So...you spent nearly 17 years living for no other reason but to correct your mistakes...in my memory? No...that's not living...that's just existing...from day to day waiting to die...Sev...nobody is worth that kind of pressure to put on yourself…" She desperately wanted to vocalize those melancholy thoughts out loud as she made her exit, but couldn't bring herself to do so as she continued to cry for the tragedy that her best friend had suffered through.
Author's Note: There's just way too much that Severus needs to confess to get out of the way all at once, so I really wanted to focus on a few things he needed to tell Lily in order for there to be a greater understanding of what happened to him. Other things from his past life will come up at later points in the story, but the major bullet points needed covered.
The ending of this chapter is what I really wanted to drive home, and was one of the first images in my head when I first started writing the whole story. A lot of times when I read other "Severus goes back in time" fanfiction, there's not a lot done to capture the conflict that these two characters have. They very clearly care for each other, in Snape's case, almost too much for Lily. Yet there's a very strict difference between their moral guidelines.
If you look at the nine classic D&D character alignments, Lily very clearly falls under Lawful Good (some might even say Lawful Stupid). She's very grounded in her morals of right and wrong if you read the way Rowling writes her in the books. That's a rough skeleton for me to go on. Basic character alignments are boring and flavorless if there is no reasoning or detail to any of it, which is why I added Lily's boggart in the story to give her some reasoning for why she abandons Severus following his worst memory. The same goes the fact that she had been in the dark about what truly horrible things his father had done to him.
The things that Severus had done in his past, whether he regrets them or not, are going to shock Lily, especially since he's made such large strides towards improving his behavior since his resurrection. It's a huge pill to swallow and it's going to take some time. The Mudblood Incident, the fact that he chose to become a Death Eater, the fact that he has killed (I plan to go into much greater detail on the first person he killed at a later time; it's something I've referenced once or twice so far, and it will be important later), and even the reason in which he DID defect, these are all things that speak volumes about Severus' shortcomings as a character. But at the same time, he DID turn back from that dark path Voldemort put him on. Too late for Lily's sake, but he stood the course nonetheless, and that too speaks volumes.
All in all, people are going to take their stance on which characters they side with, and that's an inevitability. As I said at the start of this story, I'm trying to faithfully keep these characters in the same shades of grey that I saw them in when I read from Rowling's books. Not everyone will agree, and that's perfectly fine, perception is an important part of literature and fan discussion.
Thanks so much for reading, and hopefully I'll have another chapter ready soon. As always, please feel free to leave your thoughts and reviews for me to see! They're always so helpful to keep a pulse on where my readers are at throughout the process of writing new chapters, so I'm happy to see Tempus Vita so well-received!