My first thought was that Quirrell is behind this, and he is trying to strip away Harry’s friends and isolate him. It’s pretty clear that Mr. Hat and Cloak is Quirrell (I can argue this elsewhere if you disagree), and we know that Mr H&C is behind Hermione’s recent brainwashing.
The problem is that this plot ends with Quirrell blowing his cover. We can guess that Quirrell cast those spells protecting Draco in chapter 40, after learning that Lord Malfoy had threatened to give his entire game away as revenge against Harry should his son come to harm. So Quirrell was protecting Draco to prevent anyone (Dumbledore?) from killing Draco in order to turn Lord Malfoy against Harry. But Quirrell can’t tell anyone else this. He has no good reason to have those spells on Draco. Quirrell is a clever guy; I’m sure he could have come up with some excuse to make sure Draco was found OTHER than “Oh, I just happened to be watching over this one student with spells since last January”. He could have gotten past this point in the story still free of suspicion. So why didn’t he? How does this development benefit Quirrell?
My ideas so far:
1: Quirrell blew his cover on purpose, knowing he would be questioned by Scrimgeour. He is going to take over Scrimgeour’s mind in the next chapter, knowing that Scrimgeour is an important man in government. And we already know from the Canon that Scrimgeour would get elected if a crises like the reappearance of Voldemort took place. And we already know Quirrell has plans for creating a fake Voldemort crises. Harry is too young to run the country, but Scrimgeour could make for a good front for a while, while Harry builds up his own popularity. Result: Harry loses his friends and comes to depend more on Quirrell, Quirrell gains time alone with someone he can use to create a foothold in the government. Problems: Getting arrested seems to be an overly-elaborate and dangerous method for getting some alone time with a Auror.
2: Snape is behind this most recent plot twist. The second appearance of Mr. H&C (when Hermione is mindraped) is actually Snape. If, for some reason, Snape knew of Quirrell’s protective spells then he might have done the mind rape and arranged the duel, knowing that Quirrell would intervene. Which would result in Quirrell being caught. Result: Quirrell, the only person who know’s Snape’s secret, is discredited, Harry, who Snape hates, loses his best friends, and finally Draco, who Snape is responsible for, stops hanging out with a loser mudblood, and with Harry, who Lord Malfoy fears.
Problems: I was really sure Mr. H&C was Quirrell every time.
3: Too many intersecting plots = a giant mess that no one could anticipate.
My biggest question right now is what Snape is up too. We’ve had a lot of screen time with Quirrell so I think I understand what he wants pretty well, but Snape’s anti-bullying campaign doesn’t make much sense. All that work, just to make Hermione hate Draco? I don’t know. But I really doubt Snape gone to all that effort, and hurt the reputation of his own house, just because he hates bullies.
I will be very shocked if this ends with Quirrell killing a bunch of Aurors. Quirrell KNOWS that doing this would destroy his relationship (such as it is) with Harry. Quirrell has built up Harry for a purpose; he isn’t going to throw that away. Nor, I suspect, does he have any intention of going to prison. Most likely he will just disappear after the next chapter, and leave a bunch of people scratching their heads.
Chapter 79 is out!
My first thought was that Quirrell is behind this, and he is trying to strip away Harry’s friends and isolate him. It’s pretty clear that Mr. Hat and Cloak is Quirrell (I can argue this elsewhere if you disagree), and we know that Mr H&C is behind Hermione’s recent brainwashing.
The problem is that this plot ends with Quirrell blowing his cover. We can guess that Quirrell cast those spells protecting Draco in chapter 40, after learning that Lord Malfoy had threatened to give his entire game away as revenge against Harry should his son come to harm. So Quirrell was protecting Draco to prevent anyone (Dumbledore?) from killing Draco in order to turn Lord Malfoy against Harry. But Quirrell can’t tell anyone else this. He has no good reason to have those spells on Draco. Quirrell is a clever guy; I’m sure he could have come up with some excuse to make sure Draco was found OTHER than “Oh, I just happened to be watching over this one student with spells since last January”. He could have gotten past this point in the story still free of suspicion. So why didn’t he? How does this development benefit Quirrell?
My ideas so far: 1: Quirrell blew his cover on purpose, knowing he would be questioned by Scrimgeour. He is going to take over Scrimgeour’s mind in the next chapter, knowing that Scrimgeour is an important man in government. And we already know from the Canon that Scrimgeour would get elected if a crises like the reappearance of Voldemort took place. And we already know Quirrell has plans for creating a fake Voldemort crises. Harry is too young to run the country, but Scrimgeour could make for a good front for a while, while Harry builds up his own popularity.
Result: Harry loses his friends and comes to depend more on Quirrell, Quirrell gains time alone with someone he can use to create a foothold in the government.
Problems: Getting arrested seems to be an overly-elaborate and dangerous method for getting some alone time with a Auror.
2: Snape is behind this most recent plot twist. The second appearance of Mr. H&C (when Hermione is mindraped) is actually Snape. If, for some reason, Snape knew of Quirrell’s protective spells then he might have done the mind rape and arranged the duel, knowing that Quirrell would intervene. Which would result in Quirrell being caught.
Result: Quirrell, the only person who know’s Snape’s secret, is discredited, Harry, who Snape hates, loses his best friends, and finally Draco, who Snape is responsible for, stops hanging out with a loser mudblood, and with Harry, who Lord Malfoy fears. Problems: I was really sure Mr. H&C was Quirrell every time.
3: Too many intersecting plots = a giant mess that no one could anticipate.
My biggest question right now is what Snape is up too. We’ve had a lot of screen time with Quirrell so I think I understand what he wants pretty well, but Snape’s anti-bullying campaign doesn’t make much sense. All that work, just to make Hermione hate Draco? I don’t know. But I really doubt Snape gone to all that effort, and hurt the reputation of his own house, just because he hates bullies.
I will be very shocked if this ends with Quirrell killing a bunch of Aurors. Quirrell KNOWS that doing this would destroy his relationship (such as it is) with Harry. Quirrell has built up Harry for a purpose; he isn’t going to throw that away. Nor, I suspect, does he have any intention of going to prison. Most likely he will just disappear after the next chapter, and leave a bunch of people scratching their heads.