Can it be Impedimenta? Was: An AK Puzzle

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 134812

Merrylinks wrote:
> I've looked at some other instances of the use of Impedimenta, and
it does seem to fit. <snip>
> 
> Impedimenta appears to knock the recipient backwards. If any damage
 is done, it happens when the recipient collides with something during
that process. The curse is short-lived, and no countercurse is>
apparently needed afterward.
> 
> There is another element of Snape's AK curse which doesn't ring
true. We see the green light, but we don't hear the rushing sound.
When Voldemort killed Frank Bryce, it says, "There was a flash of
green light, a rushing sound, and Frank Bryce crumpled. He was dead
before he hit the floor." In the account of Snape killing DD we only
see a green light, and there is no mention of a rushing sound.

> On one hand, the question of whether Snape used an AK or a silent 
Impedimenta is irrelevant. The effect of the AK vs. the Impedimenta 
was the same--Dumbledore was murdered. On the other hand, we can hope
that the use of a silent Impedimenta rather than a successful 
unforgivable curse is technically important in the Potterverse.


Carol responds:
Thank you for you support of my theory and for the additional evidence
of the absent rushing sound, which I had overlooked. (I noted, too,
that in GoF Wormtail "screech[es] the spell into the night," the spell
is blinding, and Harry falls to his knees, retching, GoF Am. ed. 638.
Snape speaks the spell in a normal tone of voice; the flash is not
blinding; and Harry, though overcome with grief and horror, is not
made physically ill by the evil spell.) I am now thoroughly convinced
that the spell Snape cast was an Impedimenta disguised as an AK (or a
failed AK combined with a silent Impedimenta), and that JKR went to
the trouble of providing these clues so that we would understand:
Snape had the *power* to cast an AK but he did not have the *will*. He
had no choice but to kill Dumbledore or die himself, and I, for one,
am certain that he would rather have died than suffer the remorse and
infamy he now must bear. But that would have served no purpose: the
real Death Eaters would have killed Dumbledore, anyway, and they would
both be dead. So, in all likelihood, would Draco. Snape must survive
to save Draco and do whatever else Dumbledore wants him to do.

But I want to discuss your last paragraph. I agree that Dumbledore
would be dead either way, but if, as we have been speculating,
Dumbledore wanted Snape to kill him, then he was not *murdered.* The
distinction between "kill" and "murder" is not merely semantic. It
reflects a difference of intention. Killing is sometimes necessary, as
Harry himself will find when he faces Voldemort. And murder, we are
told, splits the soul. Dumbledore's peaceful expression and closed
eyes suggest that he was killed at his own request rather than
murdered; that the man he had trusted, perhaps even loved as a son,
had not betrayed him.  If he thought that Snape had split his soul,
that he was irredeemably evil, could he have worn that beatific
expression? I think not.

Nor, IMO, is the use of a disguised Impedimenta rather than an AK a
mere technicality. Snape had to kill Dumbledore and he had to make it
look like an Avada Kedavra. But Avada Kedavra is evil in itself, the
weapon of Voldemort and his Death Eaters. It corrupts the soul, as we
have seen so clearly with Barty Jr. It is *Unforgiveable*. It requires
either intense hatred or utter indifference to human life to cast.
*If* Snape cast a real AK, then he is a Death Eater. He has betrayed
Dumbledore, he has betrayed the Order and the WW, and he is beyond
redemption.

Snape, of all people, knows what an AK means. There is no question
that he has the power to cast one, but if he is loyal to Dumbledore,
he lacks the evil intention required for a successful AK. Snape cannot
openly cast a failed AK without revealing where his loyalties lie and
being murdered himself, failing Dumbledore by placing Draco in the
hands of the Death Eaters and unable to carry out the rest of
Dumbledore's plan. So, if my theory is right, he cast a silent
Impedimenta at the same time as the failed AK, accomplishing the
terrible thing that was required of him without irredeemably
corrupting his soul. The message that he sent, though there was not to
read it but the doomed Dumbledore, is "I am not a Death Eater." Later,
 Snape tells Harry that *he* must not use Unforgiveable Curses. The
reason, which Snape is in no position to state, is that he must
maintain the purity of his soul. He must not kill the Dark Lord with
his own evil weapons. There are other ways.

In the commotion, no one notices the odd behavior of the AK. The Death
Eaters see Snape kill his mentor, see the green light, and hear the
words "Avada Kedavra." They see Dumbledore fall backwards over the
battlements, as limp as if he were already dead. They know that Snape
is not a man to be fooled with and they obey him. (The momentary
expression of anger and revulsion, reflecting his inner anguish,
serves that purpose, too, undoubtedly increasingly their awe of him.)
The Death Eaters and the werewolf Fenrir Grayback are not deep
thinkers. They will not question either Snape's loyalty to Voldemort
or his power (he is clearly dangerous), nor will they examine his
methods, any more than they question the fact that he does not join
them in their duelling and their mayhem. His priority once Dumbledore
is killed is to get them and Draco off the Hogwarts grounds, and they
do not question the reason he gives them. It is unlikely that they
will stop to recall the strangeness of the abnormal AK. Instead they
will "honor him above all others," knowing that Voldemort will do the
same.

And Harry is no better witness. He sees only his beloved Dumbledore
murdered by the treacherous Snape, whom he has always hated and now
hates more than ever. He is not likely to notice that this AK did not
behave at all like the one that killed Cedric, which in any case he
didn't really see. He was blinded by the blast of green light and
retching with the horror of the evil spell (GoF Am. ed. 638). 

Why would JKR take care to differentiate Snape's spell from a normal
AK, to make it act like an Impedimenta, a neutral DADA spell used by
Aurors as well as Death Eaters? Why does it matter?

It matters for Snape and the possibility of redemption, and for
Dumbledore and the theme of trust. (Trust, Dumbledore believed, brings
out the best in people. It is, IMO, very important that he be proved
right.)

The question that remains is how anyone will find out what really
happened. The killing occurred at the top of a tower, not in
Dumbledore's office where it would at least have been witnessed by the
portraits. No one knows what *really* happened except Snape, who has
put himself beyond the pale in the eyes of his former colleagues at
Hogwarts and the Order and the whole Wizarding World, very much like
Sirius Black before him (but with no intention of being carted off to
Azkaban laughing like a madman). No one knows what *apparently*
happened except four Death Eaters and a pair of sixteen-year-old boys,
neither of whom will doubt that it was a real AK.

How, then, can anyone find out what really happened (if I'm right) and
deduce that Snape is still on Dumbledore's side, that he performed an
act of incredible courage and loyalty by doing what Dumbledore wanted
him to do? The abnormal AK is the only outward evidence and somehow
Harry must be made to see it. I can think of only three possibilities:
Dumbledore's portrait, Mad_Eye Moody (who will recognize the behavior
of an Impedimenta spell in place of an AK if Harry tells him the
story), or Snape himself at some point saving Harry and somehow having
the opportunity to tell him the truth.

All this is simply to say that the question of AK vs. Impedimenta is
not a technicality. The spell Snape cast is the key to where his
loyalties lie. If it was a real AK, he is a Death Eater, a murderer,
and a traitor, irredeemably evil and proof that Dumbledore is wrong to
trust a brilliant Slytherin drawn to the Dark Arts. If it was an
Impedimenta disguised as an AK, he is Dumbledore's most loyal servant,
 Dumbledore's man through and through.

I hope, I almost pray, that he's the second. The themes of redemption
and trust and choice depend upon it.

Carol