KING AND VINEYARD
Disclaimer: This is a non-profit tribute to the works of JK Rowling who created and, together with her publishers and licensees, owns the characters and settings elaborated herein.
A/N: Spoilers, seventh year fic, begun after OotP and not compatible with HBP or DH. Thanks to all my reviewers and especially to my previewers, Bellegeste and Lady Memory.
Sorry for the long delay while I concentrated on finishing "Dreams". The story till now: After Professor Snape reveals his true feelings to a newly graduated Hermione, an unexpected friendship slowly develops, furthered by exchanges of letters and occasional meetings. Her last letter to date has both assured him of her loyalty and begged him, for both their sakes, to "drop the (hot) potato" of anti-Potter resentment, and to "Think how much more (his) hands could be doing, if they weren't clenched around it..."
Euphoria waned. Her letter required a speedy response, but to describe his idea of what "more" his "hands could be doing" would only embarrass her. There was another truth. Should he tell her?
Miss Granger, he began,
Since you ask it, I will try, but I don't know how to "drop the potato" when it's lodged in my gullet and my own flesh grows around it. Can I survive ripping out my throat?
I can't expect you to understand without explanation. So be it, then. You shall be my first – my only – confidante.
He paused several minutes.
I read a Muggle story once, about a king who desired a poor man's vineyard and killed him for it. I was the poor man (Naboth, I think he was called), your Potter's father the cruel king, and Lily Evans my vineyard. She was my friend before we came to Hogwarts, but we were Sorted apart. Idolised by three houses, Potter quickly made sure they shunned me, but it wasn't enough; he wanted Lily too.
I suppose she wearied of fighting the tide. When he contrived to appear the hero in the Shrieking Shack, she began to turn from me. She wouldn't believe he had engineered the situation nor that he was only saving his own skin. She thought I should be grateful.
How could I be?
She claimed still to loathe him, but when he subsequently attacked me in front of her, I realised she only had eyes for him. Foolishly, angrily, I swore at her, and she cut me off forever.
("Have you killed and also taken possession?" asked the prophet in the story. Where was a prophet to ask for me?)
They married and I joined the Death Eaters, as she'd predicted. Then I heard Sybil's accursed prophecy and passed it on, never dreaming it meant that. It meant Lily. I tried everything to save her, begged the Dark Lord, went to Dumbledore, became a spy… But Potter – convinced he knew best, as usual – ruined all.
She died, and I remained alive to protect her son through the war. That's done. I exist now only from habit and know no brightness but you.
The white heat passed and he stopped. He had never previously put it into words, and though the parchment was blotted and scratched where his Never-Fail Quill had pressed too heavily into it, he was amazed how fluently it had come pouring out. Almost as if it had waited to be written, in just these words.
But it would not do. As Potter's friend and his own, she would grieve doubly. He pulled out a fresh parchment, flexed his aching fingers and began anew.
I will try to "drop the potato", but it is lodged in my gullet, with my own flesh growing around it, and I must tear out my throat to reach it. I am no phoenix, to die and live again, yet I find great healing in your friendship.
S
No, still wrong.
A/N Naboth's vineyard is a Bible story (1 Kings). After King Ahab's wife Jezebel had organised Naboth's murder on Ahab's behalf, the prophet Elisha relayed Divine judgement: "Have you killed and also taken possession? In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick your blood..."
This account is, of course, Snape's view of James Potter and, naturally, not impartial, but almost pure book canon for all that. (The idea that James's bullying was partly inspired by wanting Lily is only interview canon.)