Better Late Than Never

It was an incredibly long few minutes before Lily managed to stand up again, refusing help from an extremely harried-looking James, who seemed torn between putting Harry down (which he would probably never do ever, ever again) and helping Lily up to the best of his ability.

Instead, Remus and James hovered over her while she stood, taking Harry into her arms and stroking his head. He was wailing, nearly inconsolable, and Lily couldn’t help but think that she’d much rather him wailing than silent and dead.

“Lily? What did you see? Are you alright?” James’ hands were cupping her face and there was a desperate, searching look in his eye.

She pulled James’ face down so his forehead was resting against hers, Harry nestled between them. They were a family. They survived death, and they will survive this. She pressed a kiss, short and sweet, to his lips.

“I love you, you know that, right? I love you more than anything in the world. Don’t forget that.” Lily knew she was confusing him, but he took it completely in stride. His mouth turned up in a devilish smile.

“Well I would hope so, considering we’re married and have a child and all.” She couldn’t help the smile that spread across her face and kissed him once more, steeling herself for the next thing she had to do.

“Take the baby,” she whispered, and James took Harry into his arms once more, though it only served to raise the volume of his wailing. In the corner of her eye, she saw Remus back out of the room, sensing it was no longer his place to be present. She shot him a weak smile, which he returned with a sympathetic nod of his head.

Taking a deep breath, Lily straightened up to her full height.

“Severus,” she said lowly, this time not avoiding his eyes. She stared directly into them; saw every emotion he tried so desperately to hide but couldn’t. Not from her. “What did you do to Voldemort’s wand?”

If possible, Severus’ face seemed to pale ever further. It was quite likely that a piece of chalk could’ve been seen as having a rather nice tan compared to Severus. Lily’s stomach flip-flopped. It had to have been a good thing, what Severus did to the wand; she tried to reason with herself. She was still alive, wasn’t she? She still couldn’t shake the notion that this might all be one really long, terrifying dream.

“I created a curse,” he said slowly, as if every word pained him, a thousand pinpricks in his skin. Now, more than ever, Lily was aware of the Dark Mark tattoo menacingly creeping out of his shirtsleeve. Was it moving? “That reduced the effects of spells cast by the afflicted wand. I couldn’t make it permanent; it was nearly impossible to even get a hold of the Dark Lord’s—” he winced. “You-Know-Who’s wand in the first place. From what I had practiced on different wands, it worked enough to reduce the effects of maybe two or three spells. I was never certain.”

Lily was reeling. A glance at James showed him to be deeply conflicted, distractedly running fingers through Harry’s sparse hair, as if it could replace his own.

Severus seemed to take this as permission to continue. “So when he cast the Killing Curse, it must’ve been reduced to a very powerful Stun. Just enough to knock someone out, but not to—” Hesitation. “Kill them. And obviously,” he chose to draw out these next few words, like he was both pained and relieved to say them. “It must have worked twice.”

“Just twice?” James snapped.

“Yes, twice. Don’t you listen, Potter?” Severus sneered. “A Stunning spell powerful enough to knock someone out wouldn’t be enough to destroy You-Know-Who once it rebounded. It wouldn’t have caused that caliber of damage to You-Know-Who or your home. No, the spell that was aimed at your son was more than adequate to kill him. The shield was pure coincidence.”

Lily was enraged. She could have spit enough fire to frighten a Hungarian Horntail. “Pure coincidence? You’re calling my sacrifice for my son coincidence? He could have died, Severus!” Her words hit the walls and nearly pulverized them with the force of her hate.

“I know that!” He exploded. “And you could have, too! If I hadn’t cursed You-Know-Who’s wand—”

“Why won’t you say Voldemort’s name, Snape? Are you afraid?” James spit, a number of vitriolic insults sitting at the tip of his tongue and begging to be let loose. His patience was wearing thin.

Severus’ face darkened. “There are plenty of things to be afraid of in this world, Potter. It would benefit you to learn what they are.”

“Why did you do it? Why curse Voldemort’s wand?” Lily demanded. She needed to hear him say it. “What would saving me and my family do for you? You hate James, and you hate the fact that we have a child.”

“He doesn’t deserve you—”

“Oh, and you do? Please explain that logic to me, Severus, because I am incapable of understanding.”

Severus, for the briefest of moments, looked vulnerable. “You know why I did it, Lily.”

“Do I, Severus? Do I really know? Aren’t I just another filthy mudblood to you? I imagine that you’ve killed enough to know by now. Tell me why you did it, Severus.”

“You know—”

“Say it out loud!” She shrieked. Harry started wailing again, and she felt a fissure spread through her heart like a spider web.

“It’s because I love you!” Severus was seething, the only real emotion Lily had seen from him in years flaring up in his dark eyes. It was like setting fire to an oil spill. “You saw the memory, Lily. You know what my Patronus looks like. I’ve loved you since we were children and I’ll always love you—” He didn’t get to finish because James had let go of the last bit of his patience and hissed “Stupefy!” so vehemently that no one was sure if it was wandless magic or just the force of James’ anger that knocked Severus unconscious.

Severus collapsed in a heap to the floor. The thump of his body against the dark, warped wood was followed by resounding silence.

“Snape loves you,” James said lowly, and Lily turned to face him. His face was red and contorted with anger, chest heaving with labored breaths. “Snape loves you. He shouldn’t get to love you, he shouldn’t get to even begin to understand what it might be like to love someone, especially you, not when you he treated you so horribly and he’s killed people, Lily, he’s terrible and he doesn’t deserve to call his sick obsession with you love, not when I love you—” He stopped himself almost immediately as another, more pressing question came to mind. “What does his Patronus look like?”

“James—”

“Tell me, Lily!”

Angry tears pricked at her eyes but she went closer, wrapped her arms around him even as he was trembling with rage and attempting to keep Harry calm amidst all the confusion.

“His Patronus is a doe. He showed it to Dumbledore a few weeks ago to prove he had really switched sides.” A sour taste spread through Lily’s mouth. “You know what they say about identical Patronuses, James.” She made him look at her, kept his eyes focused slowly on hers. “Don’t think this changes anything, James. I love you. Severus’ part in my life was finished fifth year. I’ll never forget what he did for us, but it doesn’t change how I feel about you.” Lily smirked a little bit. “Besides, I’m rather fond of companion Patronuses. More true to us, I think. The world needs to know that I’m my own bloody person.”

She almost let out a whoop of victory when she saw the hint of a smile on his face. The redness receded from his face and the trembling stopped.

“Well, that does make me feel a tad bit less murderous.”

“You kept it together for a long time. I think you may have broken your record. I’m so proud.” The smile was wider this time.

They were wrapped up completely in their own little world when Dumbledore spoke once more. “Severus will be teaching this next coming school year.” Lily had forgotten he was there.

“Snape? A teacher?” James was incredulous. More than incredulous, even. Completely, wholly, one hundred percent baffled. He would have sooner expected McGonagall to join the Quidditch team as Seeker before he thought Severus Snape would be a teacher.

Dumbledore seemed amused by James’ reaction. “Yes. While he has proven himself to be loyal to our cause, I would feel more at ease if he were to be in the castle with me at all times.”

“What will he be teaching?” James asked, and though he wanted to argue that he didn’t want Snape becoming a teacher at Hogwarts, a school his own son would attend, he knew better than to fight Dumbledore’s logic.

Lily had a feeling that she already knew the answer to this question.

“Professor Slughorn has recently made it known that he wishes to retire at the end of term. Since Severus has demonstrated proficiency in Potions in the past, he will be taking up the position.” Dumbledore’s face darkened for a moment. “While he requested to be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, I thought it best that he stick with Potions. We all know about his… affinity for Dark Spell Theory.”

It was his affinity for Dark Spell Theory that saved our lives, Lily thought.

“Just as well, I thought you both should know that I’m disbanding the Order.” He silenced their protests with a simple wave of his hand. “Voldemort is no longer an imminent threat to us or anyone else. For the time being. The Ministry is capable of handling the remaining Death Eaters and their trials. The risks of running this organization now far outweigh the benefits.”

“For the time being?” Lily questioned. “You said Voldemort was dead?”

Dumbledore gave a sad little smile. “I do not believe that we have seen the last of Voldemort, my dear girl. His connections span the globe. For now we are safe, and we will be for a good while. It is imperative that we all make do with that.” They fell into a brief silence; even Harry fussed a bit less, occupying himself with blowing bubbles with his mouth.

“Now, I believe there is a situation involving Sirius Black and an unfortunate sentence to Azkaban.”

***

James, quite frankly, did not believe it. Sirius was hotheaded—you only had to be in a room with him for a few minutes to know that—but he wasn’t capable of cold-blooded murder. He sure as hell didn’t deserve to be sentenced to bloody Azkaban!

Dumbledore had sat the three of them down and explained the situation. The only people who had known about the Secret Keeper switch had been James, Lily, Sirius, and Peter. No one else, not even Dumbledore.

When the news got out that they’d been killed? It was clear that there had been a betrayal. Everyone assumed it was Sirius, because who else could have told Voldemort where they were staying and break the Fidelius charm?

Just as Remus had said, Peter and Sirius had faced off in Godric’s Hollow. It didn’t take James very long to put the pieces together, but Lily had done it almost instantaneously.

Peter framed Sirius and took down twelve innocent Muggles in the process. He cut off his own finger and turned into his Animagus form and disappeared into thin air. The public considered him dead, hailed him as a hero, even. All the while, Sirius was immediately sentenced and was en route to lifetime imprisonment in Azkaban.

James thought he would be sick. Lily shed silent tears, burying her face into his shoulder and dampening his shirt. Right then, James had made a decision.

He was going to save Sirius, he was going to make sure Lily and Harry were safe while he did it, and most importantly, he was going to find Peter Pettigrew and make the rat wish he had never been born.