HBP post DH look Chapters 1-2.

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 184321

Carol earlier:
> > As Pippin said, he knew exactly how she felt. He had been in her
position, begging Dumbledore to save Lily's life. How could he refuse
to help Narcissa, even if it meant sacrificing his own life, under
those terms?
> 
> Sarah:
> I agree that he understood how she felt, but disagree with the
second part, because of the reason he *can* understand how Narcissa
feels. His real vow is to complete what he's set out to do on Lily's
behalf, not help all the mothers of the world who may bear some
universal similarity to Lily.

Carol:
I'm not talking about helping the mothers of the world. I'm talking
about desperate fear for the life of someone you love. He's not
identifying with Lily or mothers. He's identifying with Narcissa,
whose fear for Draco exactly parallels his own for Lily. He didn't
care whether James or Harry died; she doesn't care whether DD or even
Snape dies. Her only concern is for Draco. I'm quite sure that he
reads her desperate fear, not the details of the plan, which she
herself doesn't know, in her eyes. (Certainly, neither of them knows
about the Vanishing Cabinet.) I take Snape at his word that he knows
LV has ordered Draco to kill Dumbledore, and he knows that's "the
deed" that she expects him to perform. And Dumbledore in DH knows
about the plan to kill him. How else could he have found out about it
except from Snape? He's not reading Draco killing DD in her eyes. He's
reading LV killing Draco for failing. That's what she fears, as we
know from her words about LV expecting Draco to fail, and that's all
she's concerned about. If someone else, say Bellatrix, hed been
assigned to kill DD, she wouldn't care at all about the old Muggle
lover. She's probably think it serves him right. All IMO, of course.

Sarah:
  No matter how he might empathize with Narcissa, *his* mission still
is what it is.  If he fails to help Harry Potter carry out what he's
been set to do, he fails at life, basically.  If he's dead, he
probably can't finish his mission. 

Carol:
Well, true. It's rather hard to finish your mission when you're dead.
But, still, he's binding himself to do what DD wants, and the price
for failure is still his life. Now the only way to avoid going through
it is to procrastinate long enough for DD to die of the curse--or to
let Draco kill DD, which would be to fail Dumbledore and tear Draco's
soul. Anyway, the vow makes his mission *binding*, symbolized by ropes
and chains of fire. There's no turning back now. If he fails to
protect Draco *or* fails to "do the deed" if Draco wavers, he's dead.
If he lets Draco kill DD, he won't die, but he will have failed both
Draco and DD.

IOW, he didn't have to take the Unbreakable Vow. He could have
"slithered out of action" again. But by taking it, he calms and
reassures Narcissa, keeping her from doing something desperate. He
fools Bellatrix into thinking that he wants DD dead and is therefore a
loyal DE (she nevertheless wants to thwart him so that Draco, not
Snape, will get the "glory). He agrees to do what both LV and DD want
him to do, cementing DD's plans. But he vastly increases the danger to
himself. If Draco tries and fails to kill DD, he must either die or
become a murderer. The only thing he can do is to try to keep Draco
away from DD, make sure he doesn't do anything stupid that will get
him expelled or sent to Azkaban (and into LV's hands), On the Tower,
DD says, "Severus, please!" It's not *just* that he wants Snape and no
one else to kill him, even with the Elder Wand out the window. He
wants Snape to live to carry out the rest of his plans. And if Snape
fails to "do the deed," which he manifestly does not want to do, DD's
plans for Snape to protect the students and help Harry and undermine
Voldemort are also out the window.

Sarah:
 (I know Dumbledore still did, kind of, but Snape would have died in
much worse standing had he died of some Unbreakable Vow with the
Malfoys, or been taken out as a consequence of killing Dumbledore.)

Carol:
I'm not sure what you mean here. Snape could have died fighting the
DEs, refusing to kill DD, and letting one of them kill him. He would
have died a hero, but he would also have failed Harry, Draco, and
Dumbledore. Or he could have done nothing, as he seemed in danger or
doing. It took him a long time to raise his wand. DD had to beg him
twice, and desperately. Dying right then from the Vow would not
necessarily have affected his "standing" (which does not seem to
matter nearly as much to him as it does to us readers), but it would
have accomplished nothing. DD would certainly have died anyway, and
Draco would have been killed for failing in his mission, with the
person who killed him (possibly LV himself) becoming master of the
Elder Wand. Harry, coming out from the freezing spell, would have
joined in the fight and been killed, and all would be lost. It was
crucial for Snape to kill DD himself and live, much more crucial than
it would have been without the Vow, in which case, he could have let
another DE kill DD and lived, pretending to be loyal. He could even
have gotten Draco and Harry off the tower and the DEs and Draco out of
Hogwarts, just as he did, without killing DD himself. From Snape's
perspective, everything would be fine. Draco's soul would be unsplit,
Harry would be safe, he could still carry out his own part of the
plan. The only problem would be the ownership of the Elder Wand, which
Snape doesn't know about. *With* the UV, he doesn't have that option.
He can't let another DE kill Dumbledore. He has to do it himself or die.

Sarah: 
> If Snape thought for a second that he might actually die from any of
this, he not only could refuse, he *must* refuse, to preserve his real
interest.  But that's not an issue for him.

Carol:
I disagree. He tells DD, *after* he has made the vow, that DD takes
too much for granted and that maybe he doesn't want to do it any more.
And his hesitation on the tower, along with his expression of seeming
hatred (probably extreme anger at DD and self-loathing or revulsion at
what he has to do) shows that he has absolutely no wish to do what DD
wants him, indeed begs him, to do. He would, I'm sure, rather have
died on the tower than do what he has to do. Only DD's reminder of his
promise, and perhaps a silent message regarding its importance,
convinces him to stay alive. (Maybe what he sees in DD's eyes is Lily
or his own doe Patronus, which would remind him of "his real interest.")

Sarah:
>  He reckons everyone involved expects Draco to fail, and Snape to be
the one to kill Dumbledore, so the Vow won't kill Snape.  And even if
Draco actually does manage to pull it off, Snape hasn't broken the
Vow, just his promise to Dumbledore.  I think Snape is pretty
confident that he won't get taken out by someone like Harry Potter as
a side effect of killing Dumbledore, with good reason (see: their duel
afterwards).

Carol:
I think you're missing the point, which is that Snape only reluctantly
agreed to kill Dumbledore and still, even after the vow, doesn't want
to do it. He has agreed, in essence, to do it or die, and it seems
that, at times, he'd rather die--or, alternatively, simply hope that
the confrontation won't happen. Obviously, he doesn't think that Draco
can get DEs into Hogwarts and is taken completely by surprise.

Sarah: 
> He makes the Vow because it's promising the exact same thing to two
different parties.  There's no additional danger involved on his part
by making it.  It's a win-win situation.  Unless he died, then
everyone involved would have some pretty bad repercussions.  But Snape
is confident that won't happen, so no worries. 

Carol responds:

No additional danger? Now he's committed to murder Dumbledore, which
he really doesn't want to do, or die from breaking the vow. It's quite
literally kill or be killed, whereas, before, it was only an agreement
with Dumbledore that he could choose to break and possibly come out
looking like a hero. In the end, he chooses to look like a villain so
that he can undermine Voldemort from within. He didn't have to take
that vow. He was planning to protect Draco and he knew that both DD
and LV wanted him to kill DD. But now he has no choice. If he fails,
he dies, and DD's plan to defeat Voldemort dies with him.

> Sarah:
> ,snip>  He wouldn't even have killed Dumbledore in the first place
if Dumbledore wasn't dying already.  But these plans were all made
after Snape (and only Snape and Dumbledore) knew that Dumbledore had a
year, tops, to live.  If he'd been approached to kill Dumbledore when
Dumbledore was healthy, he could have just said, "Please, he's so much
more useful alive, where I can spy on him."

Carol responds:
I don't think he was directly approached by LV. He only thought or
sensed that LV expected him to do it. (Maybe that's the idea he got
when LV told him about Draco. And I don't think that LV would have
accepted any reasons or excuses not to obey him. But, of course, he
would have refused *Dumbledore's* request to kill him if DD hadn't
been dying.

Carol, who is being distracted by someone trying to talk to her and
apologizes for any sbsurdities in this post