Dumbledore's request (Was: HBP Chapters 27 - 30 post DH look LONG SORRY)

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 184477

Alla wrote:

<snip>
> And yes, I think he should have dropped from parapet, or AK himself,
 in fact why did he not AK himself before he lost his wand?
<snip>

Carol responds:

Thanks for your empathy with Snape on this point! I just want to
mention that Dumbledore was trying to end the power of the Elder Wand
by leaving it masterless. AKing himself would not serve that purpose
because he would still be the wand's master. Snape, however, would
not, because he would be following Dumbledore's orders to euthanize
him. (I personally don't think that Snape's soul was in danger, but I
agree that he absolutely did not want to kill Dumbledore. I think that
only his knowledge that everything--Dumbledore's plan, the relative
safety of the Hogwarts students, Draco's and Harry's lives--depended
on his killing DD persuaded him to heed Dumbledore's plea. And, of
course, none of that could happen if he dropped dead for breaking the
Unbreakable Vow.)

Anyway, murder by the hand of another DE, including Draco, would leave
that DE as master of the Elder Wand. Suicide using the Elder Wand or
any other form of death, including dying from the combined ring curse
and green potion, would leave Dumbledore as master of the wand (unless
dying from LV's curse or potion would make *him* master of the wand,
which would be even worse). Only death at the hand of another who is
killing him as an act of mercy at his own request could, as I
understand it, break the power of the wand altogether. If that had
happened and LV had somehow obtained the wand, I think he would have
found it a useless stick. It wouldn't be a matter of ostensibly
disappointing results from a wand that nevertheless served perfectly
well as an instrument to commit murder and mayhem (or create a
protective bubble for Nagini). It would have no more power, for LV or
anyone, than a wooden spoon from Petunia's kitchen.

That, IMO, is what Dumbledore was trying to accomplish by having Snape
kill him. Instead of using it and then asking Snape (without, in my
judgment, due cause) why it wasn't working properly for him, he would
have tried it out, found it useless, and thrown it away. Or he might
have summoned Snape, thinking him the master of the wand, and asked
him to try it only to discover that it didn't work for him, either.
And then he might have asked, with reason, "Why doesn't it work for
me, Severus? Or for you?" and Snape could have calmly replied, "I
don't know, my lord. Perhaps its power died with Dumbledore, just as
Fawkes the Phoenix did." And that would be that. Snape would have
lived to deliver the news of Harry's soul bit in some ingenious but
less dramatic manner.

Oh, well. Perhaps not the ending you would have liked, but I suspect
it's what Dumbledore hoped would happen. He certainly could not have
anticipated what actually occurred to "poor Severus." And he did, I
think, have reason for wanting Snape and only Snape to kill him.
(Harry would not have done it, nor would Hagrid, whom DD could trust
with his life but not his death. Snape alone knew that DD was already
dying. He alone would see the necessity of protecting Draco's soul and
of saving DD from Fenrir Greyback's teeth. He alone knew that DD
needed him as LV's right-hand man and headmaster of Hogwarts to
protect the students as best he could after DD was dead. For all those
reasons, and despite the risk to his own soul and the hatred with
which he would be regarded by the majority of the WW as DD's
"murderer," he alone could be persuaded to kill DD at DD's own
request. Why DD chose not to tell him about the Elder Wand, I don't
know, but possibly just knowing about the Elder Wand would have made
Snape master of it once he'd killed DD, and that, of course, was not
what DD was after.)

Carol, wishing that "KIng's Cross" provided a clearer picture of
exactly what DD was trying to accomplish