Lily's Child

The pain was nearly unbearable. Nagini had done her job well; I could feel the snake's poison slowly slithering its way through my bloodstream, drawn inevitably towards my heart. I shut my eyes tightly as wave after wave of agony tore through my body and waited for the end to come.

A moment, or maybe it was an hour, later a scuffling noise alerted me to the fact that I was no longer alone. I hoped that it wasn't the Dark Lord come back to gloat about his now total control of the Elder Wand; true, I wasn't dead yet, but—as I learned over the years—there are worse things than death and I had neither the desire nor the strength to face torture. A calloused hand gently touched my neck, pressing on the puncture wounds, trying in vain to staunch the blood that flowed freely from my limp form. My eyelids fluttered and a familiar figure swam into view. It was Potter. He had such a strange expression on his face that it took me a while to find out what exactly it was and then it hit me: pity. Harry Potter, The-Boy-Who-Lived, the child who had made my life a living hell for the past seven years, felt sorry for me. It was too much, way too much for me to handle in my weakened state.

For the first time, I really looked at the young man in front of me. At a glance, he was the very picture of his father, a man I had both despised and was jealous of for taking away from me the only woman I had ever loved. I wanted to glance away, but I didn't have the strength to do that anymore so I just stared up at him as he knelt over me. Finally, I saw past the obvious and studied the face before me. His nose was different, shorted than James Potter's had been, the chin was rounder, the cheekbones less prominent. The eyes....

My breathing became erratic and I felt something wet trickling down my face. I remembered what Dumbledore had told me on one of our last meetings and I knew what I must do. Focusing on those memories, I forced them to mingle with my tears.

“Take them...take them, please.” I nearly choked on the words, but I saw that the boy understood me. He looked over his shoulder and motioned to someone else in the chamber. I caught a glimpse of bushy, brown hair and knew that it was one of Potter's...Harry's friends, the know-it-all, Miss Granger.

“Get me something, quickly! A flask, anything!” The young woman dug around in her bag, finally coming up with an empty phial that she instantly handed to the boy. He took off the lid and held the tiny bottle up to my cheek, catching the wetness there. Once he was finished, he leaned back and glanced down at the liquid.

“Take them to the pensieve.” He continued to stare at the thoughts I had just given to him. I felt the venom speed up in my veins and I knew that I wouldn't last much longer. Time had run out.

“Look at me.” I whispered and he obeyed. I peered once more into those emerald orbs and I saw who he really was. Memories flickered before my mind's eye and I relived all of the times I had ever come in contact with this man. He was nothing like his father after all; James had had no compassion and was not easily moved to help others. He had only been interested in himself, in what he had wanted and he wouldn't stop until he had it.

Harry was none of those things. He was kind; rash, yes and reckless, but he had a good heart and there was no malice in him. I saw something else in his eyes too, something that I had seen all too clearly when I looked in the mirror; he had been hurt—whether physically or emotionally, I didn't know—badly by those who should have loved him as their own. Deep down inside of me I felt the walls surrounding my heart crumble and turned to dust. This was Lily's child, the only piece of her that was left in this world.

An emotion that I hadn't felt in sixteen years welled up inside of me and I wished that things had been different. I wished that I had really had a chance to get to know this boy who had been thrust into adulthood too soon, to have been there when he needed comfort. To be the shoulder for him to lean on, to have heard him laugh and see him smile; to have watched him grow up the way all children should and see him married and with a family of his own. But it was not to be. My path had led in a different direction than that of the man before me and there was no going back for me or for him. I took one more ragged breath, and wished that I had the energy to pat him on the shoulder and tell him that everything would be alright.

“You have your mother's eyes.” I said, holding his gaze for what seemed like eternity. And then the world slowly faded away into darkness.

~*~

A bright light flowed all around me and for a moment it was hard to see anything. Someone moved nearby and strangely enough, I felt no need to be wary. A soft finger just touched my cheek and I looked up into a familiar pair of beautiful, green eyes. She looked just the same as I remembered: her red hair was falling over her shoulders in waves and her head was cocked to the side as if she were looking through me, deep into my soul. With an all too familiar grin, she slid her hand into mine and pulled me to my feet. By that time, my eyes had adjusted to the light and I could see all around me a wondrous land full of vibrant colors that I had never before imagined. I was drawn from my revery when I felt her questioning gaze fall on me.

"You kept your promise, Sev, you protected him?" She asked.

"Yes, Lily."

"To the last breath?" I smiled down at her and pulled her closer to my side.

"To the last breath." I replied.

~Finis