What does it do to one’s psyche to spend a lot of time as an animal?

( In LeGuin’s Earthsea )

The teenaged boy has for years been subjected to merciless attacks for no valid reason. His enemies taunt him at every opportunity, try to discredit him before his peers, repeatedly attack him physically, verbally, and magically. His tormentors have even attempted to kill him. Moreover, his enemies have not restricted these attentions to him; they have repeatedly, openly, taunted and attacked innocent bystanders, and, he believes, (correctly) even endangered others’ lives—mostly without reprisal, save what he and his friends can inflict.

The Ministry of Magic is both corrupt and ineffectual. And the boy knows that some at least of the authorities side with the richest and most influential of his enemies.

But there is a third group, led by a powerful, brilliant, and charismatic outsider. Eccentric, yes; he has some strange ideas. Some say that he could have been the Minister of Magic, but he preferred to work outside the conventional power structures, untrammeled by bureaucratic constraints. (Though he too has strings to pull at the Ministry.) This third group offers the boy, if not protection precisely (he still isn’t safe), at least people on his side fighting his attackers. And they accept him; they show that they value his talents.

The boy is by nature a bit of a loner; his neglectful and abusive childhood has left him inclined to insist now on self-reliance. When he does allow himself to love a friend, he’s fiercely loyal, sometimes blindly so. But he’s not really much of a joiner.

But he has little choice here: the other side will attack him whatever he does. So does he fight alone, does he support the degenerate and incompetent Ministry, or does he throw in his lot with the charismatic outsider?

Harry and Dumbledore’s Order...

Severus and Voldemort’s Death Eaters.



A/N: I wrote this parallel a while ago; Smallpotato’s recent comment induced me to post it.

Amy wet herself when she sensed the presence near her bed. She would have screamed, but it was years since she could. It must be him back!


But instead of torment, she felt warmth.

*

The tiny muscles that allow the eye to focus had all atrophied; she’d never see more than blurs of color. But just to open her eyes upon light again was a gift past measure.

The doctors couldn’t account for it, no more than her being struck blind in the first place.


But Amy knew. It was an angel. She had heard his whispered words: “Fiat lux.”


*

A/N: I’d like to think this happened….

Q: What do a deceased Pureblood supremacist, a magic-hating Muggle, and the Half-blood Head of Slytherin have in common?
A: No, no, you had the correct answer: nothing at all. Don’t be silly!

Chapter Summary: Muggles help to investigate the Riddle mystery.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Muggle saying.


“Only two things make us human—
sorrow and love, sorrow and love…"

Peter S. Beagle, “The Last Song of Sirit Byar” in Giant Bones.



( Dear Mrs. Dursley )

So here's the question related to my last that I can't answer: why do we never see the piece of soul in Harry's scar ever try to "flit in and out of someone" who got "too close to" Harry? Why didn't Voldemort try to possess Ron, or Hermione, or Mrs. Weasley, or Hagrid, if becoming "fond" of a Horcrux leaves one vulnerable to possession?

I can think of a couple of possible answers, but they're not entirely satisfactory.

The first is, embedding a piece of soul in another human's body--well, a human body (unlike a piece of jewelry or a cup) is a natural place for a soul (or piece thereof) to live. So maybe Tom's soul-piece doesn't WANT to flit from Harry.

The second is related to what I suggested in my last. The effects of negative attachment are felt by HARRY'S enemies, not by Riddle's. So maybe possession would work the same. That if HARRY ever wanted to possess someone, he could--but it would be Voldemort's soul-piece doing the possessing. Fortunately, Harry never happened to want to do that.

The third is, maybe it did happen, and we never noticed it going on? If so, was the possessed person working Harry's will or Tom's?


What do you think?

Hermione (who’s perhaps not the world’s foremost expert on the Dark Arts, but is the only source we have for certain information about Horcruxes) tells us that “the bit of soul inside it [a Horcrux] can flit in and out of someone if they get too close to the object. I don’t mean holding it for too long, it’s nothing to do with touching it…. I mean close emotionally…. You’re in trouble if you get too fond of or dependent on the Horcrux.”

I’d point out that enmity/hatred is also a form of “being close emotionally,” and therefore possibly dangerous. Certainly we saw Harry, to take an example not at random, use the Map to stalk Draco in sixth year with as much interest as he used it the next year to track Ginny. In fact, in many spiritual traditions, a strong negative attachment would be considered potentially more dangerous a hook than affection. Perhaps trust might facilitate possession, but other effects might be facilitated by fear or hatred.

Certainly none of the Trio seemed FOND of the locket—rather the reverse—but they were all obviously affected by it. None was ever fully possessed, no, but wearing it exacerbated their negative feelings: ill-temper, unreasonableness, despondency…. One might perhaps express the Horcrux’s effect on the kids who feared and hated it as bringing out the worst in them. And maybe, even, perhaps, it might have affected more than their immediate emotions? The children muddled through their raid on the Ministry, pre-locket, without resorting to anything too nasty. Whereas at Gringotts Harry threw the Imperius around like he was Mulciber, and the kids left destruction in their wake.

One more thing. Some have complained that some of the children’s morality and personalities seemed to worsen over time. Draco, for one instance, made friendly overtures to an apparent Muggle-born in Madam Malkin’s. Only after being comprehensively snubbed by Harry did he start in on: “I really don’t think they should let the other sort in…. [T]hey’ve never been brought up to know our ways.” A year later he was using much worse language (granted, only after Hermione accused him of buying his way onto the Quidditch team) and cheering on the basilisk; four years after that, he was attempting murder. Then there’s Hermione’s moral journey….

Being around Harry didn’t always exactly seem to bring out the best in his closest friends, did it? And it regularly brought out the worst in his enemies.


Harry was a Horcrux.


Just mentioning.

This is a totally off-the-wall reflection on Dark magic in the Potterverse sparked by one of Oryx_leucoryx’s recent ruminations on what’s NOT classed as Dark magic.

Much of what can be accomplished with the Imperius Curse can equally be accomplished by magic that’s not considered Dark in Potterverse canon.

( Forcing )

A funny thing happened on the way to Harry’s sorting. The reputations of the houses got terminally messed with, and even those of us who eventually prided ourselves on objecting to the distortion never fingered either the culprit or the timing of the crime.

( That a )

“Professor Snape’s version of events is far more convincing than yours…. without Pettigrew, alive or dead, we have no chance of overturning Sirius’s sentence.” Albus Dumbledore, PoA, “Hermione’s Secret”


Let’s revisit Albus's insistence at the end of PoA that he could not clear Sirius Black's name.

( Sirius’s status )

Back in my meta "Keeper of the Keys," I argued that that part of Trelawney's Prophecy which claimed that Voldemort had marked Harry as his "equal" applied because the curse-scar marked Harry as Voldemort's Horcrux, therefore as containing a portion of Riddle's soul "equal to" the other Horcruxes and to Voldemort himself.

Lynn_waterfall and Oryx_leucoryx has been continuing that argument: I'm posting (with permission) what Oryx recently emailed to me privately so that others may comment as they will.

*- emailed by Oryx

I'm writing here because this doesn't fit any essay or story directly. A while back we agreed that Dumbledore's 'protection' of the record of Trelawney's first prophecy was a sham [as of OotP] because there was no information there that was useful to Voldemort now that he already attacked Harry and marked him. But this is not exactly so. Voldemort might sit and think what was meant by Harry being marked as 'his equal' and realize Harry was his unintended Horcrux. And Tom would *avoid* killing Harry, especially if he found out the diary wasn't the only Horcrux that was destroyed or if he realized Dumbledore (and later Harry) was searching for Horcruxes with the purpose of destroying them.


What would Tom have done with the knowledge? I recall at least one fic where Tom keeps Harry in a 'golden cage' situation and Harry has to Polyjuice himself to get Tom to attack him. Mary_jo59 came up with Tom using Harry's body as a new body for himself. I suppose Tom would prefer to transfer the soul-bit to a more lasting container before doing away with Harry, in any case.


But even with this in mind there was more to Dumbledore's plan than keeping the prophecy out of Tom's hands because as the kids proved destroying the entire shelf of prophecies would have done the trick better.

**

“The truth… is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution.” Albus Dumbledore, the end of PS/SS.

Or, of course, avoided altogether— Albus’s more usual strategy.

I cannot believe marionros caught me out on this: treating Albus’s explanation of a Slytherin’s actions as truth. In my defense, I thought of Albus’s words as a partial exoneration—that Lucius really hadn’t understood what evil he was messing with.

But still. [Headdesk.]

Marionros said, among other things, “I think that that whole basilisk fiasco came totally out of the blue for Lucius, and that he became 'paler than usual' when he finally pieced together that it might be that bloody booklet that he let slip into the Weasley-chit's bag to discredit her father.”

Oryx_leucoryx and others responded that marionros’s scenario didn’t account for Dobby’s actions, in particular for the elf’s insistence that he knew that something terrible would happen to famous Harry Potter if Harry returned to/ stayed at Hogwarts.

Okay, here’s an expansion of marionros’s theory that explains Dobby as well.

( If we )

Who knew that Lord Voldemort had formerly been the poor-orphan-makes-good Tom Riddle, and why wasn’t it generally known?

( Tom's )

Purer Blood

Summary: Quirrell!Mort attempts to establish whether that Mudblood’s murder might have irrevocably alienated his former servant. A prequel to “His Servant’s Return.”

“But I was very weary—I’ll say that much for myself—and very angry, and full of despair; and just then, there on my knees, I did not love anyone, and I never had.” Peter S. Beagle, The Innkeeper’s Song.
( Snape slipped )

Second Chance

Summary: Dumbledore believes wholeheartedly in second chances.

«Tout comprendre, c’est tout pardonner» French proverb, translation: “To understand all is to forgive all.”

Well, perhaps not all.

*
( You’ll be the man of the house )

Mary Johnson wrote an interesting essay suggesting that JKR might have been deliberately subverting the fantasy genre.

It made me think: it seems that JKR at least subverted one of the major
staples of fantasy: the Otherworld into which real people may enter.

( One possible )

I’m working on a story for the Snapedom Big Bang 50th Birthday Bash, and I need some coolly logical people to critique me here. The name is "Protean Charm" and the premise is that Neville and Luna, immediately post-war, are working with a certain former headmaster (who’s now a Squib, and so injured he's not noticeably far from comatose) to clear Draco Malfoy’s fair name and spring him from Azkaban.

Here’s the thing—part of the fiction examines Draco, Vince, and Greg’s actions in the Room of Requirement (and why they showed up there in the first place) , and canon gets really confusing about then. Harry and co pop in and out and in of the RoR, which has made itself other doors besides the seventh floor entrance beside the dancing troll tapestry, and it’s rather hard to tell who’s exactly where when.

Not being JKR, I won’t accept continuity glitches in my fiction if I can possibly avoid them. So help me out here!

Here’s how I had it work for my fiction, followed by Oryx’s critiques, which s/he very kindly gave me permission to post.

We’re told that Neville could manipulate the room to create tunnels and stairs exiting anywhere in Hogwarts—or even going to Hogsmeade. First assumption of mine: that someone inside the RoR could hold such a door open—but that failing that, it’s back to the 7th floor tapestry and pacing. And the “real” door is always there on the 7th floor, even if it’s being held shut by the needs of the people currently inside. So anyone trying to ambush someone making for the Room would automatically go to the tapestry.

So—my fiction assumes that the minors being sent from Hogwarts went to the seventh floor (main door) for evacuation, that someone held the back door open (the one Harry and Luna had exited an eternity ago to look at Rowena Ravenclaw’s bust), and that Harry took the Trio back into the RoR that way. Then Harry propelled everyone remaining out the front door by the tapestry—everyone meaning the Trio plus the three remaining refugees (Ginevra, Tonks, and Augusta—maiden, mother, crone, as Oryx pointed out, how could I have been so dense as to miss that???).

The reason why I think it had to be the front door is that I can’t see any reason for the Unholy Trinity to be lurking anywhere else, and Vince attests that they were waiting, Dis’llusioned, for Potter to show up to be kidnapped, when Potter did show up and started mouthing off about some Die-dum Horcrux (Migod, talking about Horcruxes in Clear???) Plus I think once everyone is out one can only come in through the front door.

But, if Potter & Co. originally entered the Room through the front door, via a relaxing turn about the seventh floor corridor, if the Unholy Trinity were already there waiting why didn’t they follow immediately? (Or just blast them in the corridor—but my fiction addresses that concern.) Why let them go in, come out with reinforcements, and go in again? So that’s why I think Harry’s Trinity went in through a back door, out through the front, back in through the front, and then, finally, was followed by the Unholy Trinity.

But reconciling this with canon—or with common sense—is grueling.

Second problem: Harry tells us outright in canon that you have to go straight outside the RoR to change it from one FUNCTION to another. My fic has Draco (who has surely, in canon, established himself as a much more competent user of the RoR than Harry: Draco could keep Harry out in HBP, whereas Harry admitted Draco in DH) telling Harry (or rather, ordering Neville to tell Harry), that “You can change the room any way you want while people are still inside it; you just have to get everyone inside to agree on the change.”

So who’s right on that one? Could someone have changed the Headmaster's Army Headquarters (with all its embellishments) into the Room of Hidden Things without going out and coming back in, or was the change too substantial?


Here’s Oryx_leucoryx (the true, substantial, real unicorn) on the matter:

cation and mechanics of ROR: In books 4-6 the ROR was on the 7th floor, the same level as the headmaster's office, Gryffindor common room, Ravenclaw common room and Flitwick's office. However once the DA started hiding in it, some 2 weeks before the battle, we are told "it comes out somewhere different everyday". Now I can see how having people emerge from the room into some random place in the castle helps - they can't be ambushed from outside. But if so, how does one find the entrance to the room? How did anyone that wasn't hiding there already join Neville and his friends? Either you have to join someone you know is going to the ROR so s/he can bring you to the entry-point of the day (and why should the location remain the same for the entire day?) or the normal 7th floor entrance remained active all along.

When Harry and Luna exit the ROR on their way to the Ravenclaw common room they slip through a wall and show up on the 5th floor. They go up a spiral staircase to the entrance of the Ravenclaw common room. Later Minerva, Harry and Luna go at least 3 stories down when they encounter Severus, so their duel was no higher than the 4th floor. They go one floor up, part from Minerva to return to the ROR - presumably through the same place they came out of it (5th floor).

From the Great Hall (ground floor) Harry goes to the Entrance Hall, then upstairs to the first floor. During this time all the students who are not staying to fight are being marched to the ROR - how did the teachers know where to take them? Well McGonagall saw where Harry and Luna parted from her, but would she know where on the 5th floor to go? Obviously some of the room's defences had to be undone because Neville had blocked it to all supporters of the Carrows, some of whom were students. And possibly Filch as well.

It seems Harry's conversation with the Grey Lady takes place on the 1st floor, which is also where Grawp sends Hagrid into the building through the window. But then Harry sees the smashed gargoyles of the staffroom, which is on the ground floor. There is much running through corridors with no mention of going up or down any stairs but this doesn't mean there wasn't any. Harry, Hermione and Ron enter the ROR through the concealed entrance - presumably the same one he had used previously, probably from the 5th floor. They meet the crone, mother and virgin (assuming she still was one), the latter three exit. Ron remembers the house elves, Hermione kisses him - they are still inside the room. Harry et al leave for the corridor - it seems as though they are still using the same exit. They see Ginny and Tonks, then Aberforth. Harry gets Ginny out of the way, the trio runs back and Harry changes the room. The trio enter the ROHT, start searching, Slytherin trio arrives.

So here is the problem: Harry leaves through the concealed entrance which seems to be on the 5th floor that day, but he walks past it to change the room as he did in the past on the 7th floor - so even after changing the room remembers it should open where it did just before the change rather than where it normally opens when it isn't housing the DA. I don't know how logical it is, as once all the people who were using it as a shelter leave shouldn't it revert to its normal manner of operation? Alternately, maybe once everyone left the room the first time (to go to the Great Hall for briefing) the entrance could have reverted to its normal place on the 7th floor and the evacuation was being done from there. As I said, we are not given information about which level Harry is on after his meeting with the Grey Lady.

So we have a second problem: If the Slytherins were there all along then they saw the trio go in, the 3 women come out, trio come out again, Harry change the room, trio go in again. Did the Slytherins know the first time the trio entered the room that there were still others inside? How could they tell? Because if they didn't then I'd expect them to follow the trio in the first time around. Unless Augusta, Tonks and Ginny came out before the Slytherins decided it was time?

Then there is the question of how much change the room can tolerate while people are inside it. Sure, it can add bathrooms and change where the stairs connect but those changes do not affect the places where people are, they are just added in some exra dimension on the sides. Nobody finds themselves suddenly stuck in a newly arrived toilet. But what if one is standing just where a pile of medieval junk is supposed to be when the room becomes ROHT? So I don't know if Harry could really change the entire room from the inside, especially not if he wanted to preserve the location of ROHT items so he could find the diadem.

Arsinoe de Blassenville's story "The Best Revenge" has Snape threatening to report the Dursleys to the police for misspending the payments they get from the Muggle government on Harry's behalf.

Whitehound in a review suggest that such benefits are means-based and the Dursleys might be too wealthy to qualify (though that Harry would get still free glasses and medical prescriptions).

My own fictions "Unlikely Allies" and "The Girl and the Boy" assume that the Dursleys had receieved money on Harry's behalf.

But I'm American.

After the death of my father my mom got Social Security survivor benefits for us four kids, and welfare one year when her other income was non-existant. But Harry's birth was almost
certainly unregistered with the Muggle government, so he might be legally, an unregistered illegal alien that the Dursleys are raising. Even if his birth were formally registered, he would be legally the child of an illegal alien (you can't tell me any Purebloods have birth
certificates on file) and of a woman who never worked a day in her life (at least not in the Muggle world). So in the US, any Social Security benefits would be nonexistent to extremely scanty, and the Dursleys are certainly ineligible for welfare.

In the UK, how would the Dursleys go about getting Harry registered as Lily Evan's nativeborn son (father undocumented, since he's legally nonexistent in the Muggle world--in fact, is Harry legally a bastard in the Muggle world? I shouldn't think a Muggle marriage certificate is on file anywhere either, although maybe... And I shouldn't think that disgrace would have sweetened Tuney's temper), and what benefits would they be eligible for?