Snape and Dumbledore on the Tower: A Defense of Snape

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 165315

bercygirl wrote:
> I explained in a previous post (# 161643) why I'm convinced that
Snape did NOT make the Vow. If he is left-handed, and the Vow must be
made with the wand hand, then it was never made at all.
> 
> Harry did not notice what hand Snape used when he performed the
Avada keKedavra on the tower. What if Snape didn't use his wand to do
it? What if Dumbledore had already died at that point? Snape could
have said "Avada Kedavra" while pointing his wand at Dumbledore with
his right hand, and levitated him off the tower with a non verbal spell.

Carol responds:
Having snape not take the vow removes all the tragic irony of his
situation and makes nonsense of the twitch and the hellish imagery of
fire and bonds at the end of the "Spinner's End" chapter. It removes
his  terrible choice of kill Dumbledore or die. Nor is there any canon
in the books to indicate that he is left-handed or that the vow would
not take effect if he were.

It is quite possible, however, for him to have cast a nonverbal spell
along with or instead of the spoken Avada Kedavra, allowing Dumbledore
to die from the poison rather than from the spell. The vow wouldn't
know the difference, and he would appear to have killed Dumbledore
since Dumbledore was dead, anyway. But *if* that's the case, and
Snape's mental anguish when Harry calls him a coward seems to indicate
otherwise, there's still no need to disregard the vow or to produce
uncanonical speculation to strip it of its validity and the whole UV
motif of its significance.

And can you clarify what you mean by "What if Dumbledore had already
died at that point"?

Carol, who (needless to say) does see the possibility that Snape
levitated DD off the tower and is still asking others to explore the
implications of that possibility without taking the UV out of the equation