Voldemort's Intentions & Snape's Expectations
justcarol67
justcarol67 at yahoo.com
Thu Dec 2 16:26:02 UTC 2010
No: HPFGUIDX 189843
Carol earlier:
> > snip, snip>
>
> > I can only account for his promise to spare Lily (which, according to JKR, he intended to keep, no doubt because it cost him nothing to keep *her* alive, Harry being the only threat to his "immortality") because he asked the young Snape to name his own reward. Snape must have begun having doubts (and gone to DD out of desperation) somewhat later when he learned that LV intended to go after the Potters. Harry was not yet born (and, if my theory is correct, just barely conceived) when Snape reported the partial prophecy to LV, so, not having any idea that it involved the Potters, LV would not have hesitated to grant such a minor request. (Why not make an unwilling mistress out of a "Muggle" Order member? IMO, that's how he would see it.)
> >
> > At any rate, he must, I think, have promised Severus that he would spare Lily at a point when he was "merely" killing off Order members one by one, not when he was specifically targeting Harry and his family. I doubt that Snape would go to LV at that point to request his reward. He must have seen the danger that LV might go back on his word and gone to Dumbledore for help.
> >
> > Admittedly, JRR's time frame is far from clear, but that's the only way the promise to Snape--which LV *had* to have intended to honor for Lily to have that crucial choice that makes possible the Love Magic--makes sense to me.
> >
> > Carol, wondering how many OWLs Severus earned and thinking it odd that JKR never informed us
> >
> Nikkalmati
>
> I am not sure. Of course we are speculating here. I have doubts LV would have felt bound by a promise almost a year old - unless Snape had reminded him.
>
> I am impressed with the way JKR portrayed Snape's coming to DD even in fear of his life. Snape acted like he had just found out what LV was going to do - hunt down and kill the child(ren) that threatened him and their families. I pictured him in that shocked and distressed state rushing first to LV and requesting that Lily should be spared. LV agrees (for his own reasons), but Snape has no confidence in that agreement. Maybe he feels that LV is not to be trusted or maybe he realizes that Lily will fight to the death in any case. His only chance is to go to DD at the risk of his own life to ask that he protect Lily, so he immediately contacts DD in some way and meets him on the hilltop. DD also promises to protect Lily and her family in return for Snape's service. Sometimes you just can't win.
>
> Nikkalmati
>
Carol responds:
I completely agree that when Snape goes to DD, he has just found out that LV is targeting children, in particular Harry Potter, and their families. His desperation is evident, as you say, and had he known earlier what LV was doing, he would have gone to DD earlier. (Why LV took so long to decide on a course of action is unclear, but that's JKR for you.)
But my point was simply that we keep hearing about Voldemort rewarding some especially loyal follower "above all others." Surely, he would have asked Severus to name his reward at the time he performed the service (reporting the partial prophecy)--at a time when Harry was not yet born and probably neither Snape nor Voldemort even knew that she was pregnant). I can't see young Snape going to LV and belatedly asking for a reward a year or even two after the Prophecy, hiding his anxiety for Lily's life through Occlumency. (Had he even mastered Occlumency--and his acting abilities--at that point?) It seems to me more likely (though, as you say, we're speculating) that he asked that she be spared when she was in the same (grave)danger as the Order members but was not being specifically targeted. Possibly, when he learned that LV was targeting the Potters, he reminded him of his promise (which, as we know but Snape didn't, Voldemort intended to keep--until Lily became an annoyance). Clearly, Snape himself felt some doubts on the reliability of LV's word.
Carol, who feels that the time frame for the Prophecy and subsequent events is extremely unclear
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