Harry has shown again and again that he can’t lose, and instead doubles-down. He did so with Hermione, and now Lucius has killed her. If people realise it’s Lucius, all the better for him; nothing can be proved, but he shows himself to be extremely dangerous and willing to protect his family.
Harry has shown again and again that he can’t lose, and instead doubles-down. He did so with Hermione, and now Lucius has killed her. If people realise it’s Lucius, all the better for him; nothing can be proved, but he shows himself to be extremely dangerous and willing to protect his family.
All the better for him? You just told us why it is bad for him. Harry can’t lose and instead doubles down. His accomplishments so far despite being about 10 years old and newly exposed to the wizarding world indicate that given time he will be a threat or at least a significant potential nuisance to Lucius in the future. If Harry knows that Lucius killed Hermione but cannot prove it basically Lucius is going to need to have Harry killed at some point in the future or have his life (and vulnerable resources) at risk for as long as Harry lives. This is not a desirable outcome.
The reputation influence and aura of fear that you allude to would perhaps have made it useful to have Harry killed. Having Hermione outraged but unable to prove anything (may be) a minimal risk and would make Lucius seem more impressive. But Lucius is enough of a strategic thinker that he ought to know that creating a Harry with Nothing (or at least significantly less) To Lose and with a grudge against him isn’t worthwhile. If he is going to use violence against that which Harry cares about he essentially needs to use violence to kill Harry of outright. If not then three years later he might find himself obliterated in his sleep by a satellite that has been pulled out of orbit and directed at his house.
Harry may not be in the best PR position right now, but he’s a wizard of Noble House and great renown. Killing Harry would work much, much more poorly for Lucius than killing a Mudblood that everyone believes escaped Azkaban on technicalities and dirty tricks. And, y’know… their whole thing would appear to outsiders to be an elementary-school romance, so it’s not unreasonable for someone in Lucius’ position to assume that Harry will get over it before he’s in a position of causing any serious damage.
Harry already said “if you do this thing, Lucius, I will take you for my enemy”. And that didn’t stop Lucius, and so presumably he believes Harry has already taken him for an enemy anyway. The thing to do with an enemy is attack them.
Harry already said “if you do this thing, Lucius, I will take you for my enemy”. And that didn’t stop Lucius, and so presumably he believes Harry has already taken him for an enemy anyway. The thing to do with an enemy is attack them.
The thing to do with an enemy is kill them or (at least) reduce their power. It isn’t to take highly valued but marginally useful things away from them, leave them nothing to lose and free them from their moral constraint. That’s just impractical.
Lucius is probably afraid to try to actually kill Harry, or attack him directly. If he fails, or is discovered, the repercussions would be huge. And if he succeeded, Dumbledore and others would exert their full power to find the guilty party. In short, he probably doesn’t want to declare total war on Harry’s party.
By killing Hermione he doesn’t harm Harry much, but he hurts him a lot. He also happens to have a grudge against Hermione. If he was caught in the act, it would harm him much less politically. And his grudge against Harry is in the first place a struggle over punishing Hermione vs. protecting her. So killing her makes perfect sense.
For the reasons previously given I would grant Lucius idiot ball status for executing this reasoning. It is of course realistic as the behaviour of a high status dark arts amateur with known irrationality tendencies and a poorly calibrated vindication heuristic. This is the kind of thing that Harry should expect to happen when he goes about drawing the attention of and provoking people like Lucius. It just isn’t what a sane Lucius would do, nor is it what he would do if acting as an avatar of (metaphoric) Dark Arts strategy of the type Draco has been tutored in.
Just as you remark, Lucius is known to lose his sanity and strategicalness when his family is threatened. Witness how he tried at the Wizengamot not to accept Harry’s offer of blood-debt cancellation, even though this cost him politically.
I don’t, myself, believe that Lucius was behind this troll; but that is because I am outside the story and have very strong reasons to blame Quirrelmort. To someone inside the story, and particularly to anyone outside Dumbledore’s group who doesn’t know Voldemort is alive, Lucius would be the obvious suspect. They would probably fasten onto him as the only realistic suspect that they could think of, the only one with specific motivation to kill Hermione Granger; and they would explain this using the reasoning I gave.
Just as you remark, Lucius is known to lose his sanity and strategicalness when his family is threatened. Witness how he tried at the Wizengamot not to accept Harry’s offer of blood-debt cancellation, even though this cost him politically.
On this much (what to expect from Lucius) we seem to agree.
Harry has shown again and again that he can’t lose, and instead doubles-down. He did so with Hermione, and now Lucius has killed her. If people realise it’s Lucius, all the better for him; nothing can be proved, but he shows himself to be extremely dangerous and willing to protect his family.
All the better for him? You just told us why it is bad for him. Harry can’t lose and instead doubles down. His accomplishments so far despite being about 10 years old and newly exposed to the wizarding world indicate that given time he will be a threat or at least a significant potential nuisance to Lucius in the future. If Harry knows that Lucius killed Hermione but cannot prove it basically Lucius is going to need to have Harry killed at some point in the future or have his life (and vulnerable resources) at risk for as long as Harry lives. This is not a desirable outcome.
The reputation influence and aura of fear that you allude to would perhaps have made it useful to have Harry killed. Having Hermione outraged but unable to prove anything (may be) a minimal risk and would make Lucius seem more impressive. But Lucius is enough of a strategic thinker that he ought to know that creating a Harry with Nothing (or at least significantly less) To Lose and with a grudge against him isn’t worthwhile. If he is going to use violence against that which Harry cares about he essentially needs to use violence to kill Harry of outright. If not then three years later he might find himself obliterated in his sleep by a satellite that has been pulled out of orbit and directed at his house.
Harry may not be in the best PR position right now, but he’s a wizard of Noble House and great renown. Killing Harry would work much, much more poorly for Lucius than killing a Mudblood that everyone believes escaped Azkaban on technicalities and dirty tricks. And, y’know… their whole thing would appear to outsiders to be an elementary-school romance, so it’s not unreasonable for someone in Lucius’ position to assume that Harry will get over it before he’s in a position of causing any serious damage.
Harry already said “if you do this thing, Lucius, I will take you for my enemy”. And that didn’t stop Lucius, and so presumably he believes Harry has already taken him for an enemy anyway. The thing to do with an enemy is attack them.
The thing to do with an enemy is kill them or (at least) reduce their power. It isn’t to take highly valued but marginally useful things away from them, leave them nothing to lose and free them from their moral constraint. That’s just impractical.
Lucius is probably afraid to try to actually kill Harry, or attack him directly. If he fails, or is discovered, the repercussions would be huge. And if he succeeded, Dumbledore and others would exert their full power to find the guilty party. In short, he probably doesn’t want to declare total war on Harry’s party.
By killing Hermione he doesn’t harm Harry much, but he hurts him a lot. He also happens to have a grudge against Hermione. If he was caught in the act, it would harm him much less politically. And his grudge against Harry is in the first place a struggle over punishing Hermione vs. protecting her. So killing her makes perfect sense.
For the reasons previously given I would grant Lucius idiot ball status for executing this reasoning. It is of course realistic as the behaviour of a high status dark arts amateur with known irrationality tendencies and a poorly calibrated vindication heuristic. This is the kind of thing that Harry should expect to happen when he goes about drawing the attention of and provoking people like Lucius. It just isn’t what a sane Lucius would do, nor is it what he would do if acting as an avatar of (metaphoric) Dark Arts strategy of the type Draco has been tutored in.
Just as you remark, Lucius is known to lose his sanity and strategicalness when his family is threatened. Witness how he tried at the Wizengamot not to accept Harry’s offer of blood-debt cancellation, even though this cost him politically.
I don’t, myself, believe that Lucius was behind this troll; but that is because I am outside the story and have very strong reasons to blame Quirrelmort. To someone inside the story, and particularly to anyone outside Dumbledore’s group who doesn’t know Voldemort is alive, Lucius would be the obvious suspect. They would probably fasten onto him as the only realistic suspect that they could think of, the only one with specific motivation to kill Hermione Granger; and they would explain this using the reasoning I gave.
On this much (what to expect from Lucius) we seem to agree.
What makes you think this was Lucius other than his basic motivation?