Snape, a Deatheater.

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 164018

Nikkalmati

Nikkalmati wrote:
<big snip>  

> The purpose was to get in with Draco; there were no terrible easily
forseeable consequences to what he thought he was going to promise; (I
agree  with Carol that once the process was started, he could not
refuse or stop, or if  he did, he, or even he and Narcissa, could die
at once.)  I don't know how  long it took him to figure it out, but I
don't think he had when he agreed to  take the UV and clasped
Narcissa's hand.
>  
> Nikkalmati (maybe I'm wrong, but I think it is a viable theory; if
he knew, for me, DDM goes out the window)

Carol responds:
First, a clarification. I'm only speculating that once the process
started, he couldn't get out of it. There may be other reasons, as
well, why he chose to accept the unanticapated third provision. He may
have been under orders from DD to keep his cover and/or protect Draco
at all costs, and if he knew Draco's mission (the killing part, not
the Vanishing Cabinet part) he must have thought, given Dumbledore's
power, that the risk to himself was greater than that to Dumbledore.
He may have believed, too, that together they could keep the vow from
being activated simply by preventing Draco from getting anywhere near
Dumbledore.

When Narcissa asks Snape to take the UV to help and protect Draco, he
certainly interprets "help" differently from Narcissa. "Help" actually
means thwarting him, as we see by his later putting Crabbe and Goyle
in detention. Fortunately, the UV as actually worded doesn't ask him
to help Draco at all, only to watch over him and protect him. He can
have only one motive for taking that vow, and that's to protect Draco
from the only person who is actually endangering him at that time,
Voldemort--at the risk of his own life. And he does that willingly,
perhaps because he's used to risking his life and intends to protect
Draco, anyway. (Having Bella as the binder implicates her in the
process--Narcissa and Snape can take the vow undermining one of LV's
objectives while still supporting the other one--or so he wants Bella
to think.) IMO, agreeing to take the vow in the first place reflects
the extent of his commitment to Dumbledore and his opposition to the
Dark Lord. No one but Snape is endangered by those first two
provisions. The third one, I realize, is tricky, but I think that the
hand twitch indicates that he knows what he's getting into, knows the
risk he's taking. But the motive to protect Draco and keep him from
killing or being killed is still there, as is the wish to keep
Bellatrix and Narcissa from discovering his true loyalties. And, as
you said, he may be unable to get out of it once he's bound by the
first two ropes of fire. The imagery is sinister and hellish. I was
terrified for Snape after reading that chapter. "Spinner's End"? I
thought it meant that Snape himself would die.

At any rate, it's still perfectly possible, in my view, for Snape to
agree to protect and "help" (watch over or even thwart) Draco. He's
not, after all, agreeing to help him fix the Vanishing Cabinet, which
he doesn't even know about, and he certainly intends to find out
exactly what Draco's plans are if he can. (Teenage boys being what
they are, that would not be an easy mission.) But once he'd either
been forced into accepting the third provision or chosen to accept it
as a calculated risk (more to himself than the powerful DD, he would
think), the only thing left to do was to report the entire incident to
Dumbledore and work out some sort of contingency plan, beginning with
watching over and interrogating Draco, the second of which he finally
managed at Christmas. As I said in another post, I think he and DD
knew virtually everything, maybe even that Rosmerta was Draco's
accomplice in Hogsmeade (as indicated by Katie's receiving the cursed
necklace in her ladies' restroom and by the poisoned mead also being
hers). 

The only thing they didn't know was that Draco would actually succeed
in getting DEs into Hogwarts via the Vanishing Cabinet. And, of
course, they couldn't have anticipated a helpless, wandless, and dying
Dumbledore on the tower. His condition made his death inevitable,
either from the poison or from the DEs. Only Snape, by keeping the UV,
could get his body off the tower, preventing Greyback from having him
for afters, snatch up Draco before they harmed him, and get the DEs to
follow him before Harry (whom Snape would have known from the brooms
was hiding under the Invisibility Cloak) came rushing out to fight the
DEs.

Anyway, I disagree that DDM!Snape is only possible if Snape didn't
know what he was agreeing to do. Trapped!Snape, caught in the fiery
ropes of the unanticipated third provision, is another possibility,
especially if the DADA curse fell into place at just that moment
(Slughorn's acceptance of the Potions position on what appears to be
the same night would make Snape the DADA teacher, whether he knew it
or not). But even if he could somehow have escaped from Bella
(standing over him with a wand as he knelt at her feet), Narcissa
(desperate enough by her own admission to do anything to protect her
son), and the vow itself (his wand hand was bound in ropes of fire),
and refusal to take the third provision could have been interpreted as
breaking the vow), he still could have chosen to agree to that last
provision as a calculated risk, accepting the huge danger to himself
and hoping to prevent the danger to either Draco or Dumbledore.

Carol, who would rather see Snape unemployed in Greenland than as the
DADA teacher bound by an Unbreakable Vow