Why is Voldemort not getting rid of Harry in some more final way?
Even if he’s worried killing Harry will rebound against him because of the prophecy somehow, he can, I don’t know, freeze Harry? Stick Harry in the mirror using whatever happened to Dumbledore? Destroy Harry’s brain and memories and leave him an idiot? Shoot Harry into space?
Why is “resurrect Harry’s best friend to give him good counsel” a winning move here?
It’s a form of prophecy-aversion that’s pretty orthogonal to the various forms of destroying Harry. The mechanisms of prophecy are still an unknown for Voldemort, and it seems potentially consistent with how magic works that all attempts to neutralize Harry are doomed to fail but redeeming him with friendship can work.
...or he’s setting up his next chess match, either as an explicit goal or as a subconscious desire influencing his prophecy-aversion plans.
Before Harry shot at him, Voldemort was cursed to be unable to threaten Harry’s immortality, and given the several times he’s found himself getting wrong answers to questions previously, I don’t think he was certain Harry would have betrayed him even with such a convenient que. So that covers anything that happens before Harry fires the gun.
After that point… I think he’s trying to cover his bases. That he set up such a ploy to enable him to kill Harry means that he’s likely at least going to try. But that’s not the only Winning move, and it’s a Winning move that prevents other Winning moves from being attempted.
“There are plots that must succeed, where you keep the core idea as simple as possible and take every precaution.”
“All thiss, all I have done, iss to ssmassh that desstiny at every point of intervention.”
This is one of those plots. “Keep Harry Potter from destroying universe” does not allow duct tape, WD-40, and lesser wishes to attempt a do-over. Killing Harry is probably the most effective way to keep that from happening, if you can do it. The last time Vold tried to subvert or redirect a Prophecy by destroying most of a person involved, things went so badly he spent most of a decade as a howling disembodied spirit. It’s not been explicitly stated that Prophecies act like Time Turners (aka DO NOT MESS WITH TIME/NO), but it’s pretty strongly implied to result in something like Mage’s Paradox or Continuum’s Frag. Resurrecting Hermoine and giving aid to Harry Potter was something that had to be done before any Death Eaters were summoned and arrived, and was about the only such thing, and was disjoint enough from people directly related to the Prophecy as to be unlikely to result in Paradox/Frag.
Vold knows Harry’s best friend as a pillar of restrictions. Even if we know her to be a threat to his plans, Vold knows that her death triggered Harry’s transformation into The One Who Tears Stars and that this is more dangerous than even an immortal Hermoine.
((I think he forgot some of the matters he said earlier, though. The Parsletongue curse will probably strike soon since he promised neither he nor his would seek to ever harm Hermoine. I’m genuinely surprised that cutting curse here didn’t already cause something horrible to happen to him.))
Don’t think the curse actually enforces oaths, just ensures that you’re telling the truth at the time you said it.
Besides, Voldemort, from his point of view, isn’t harming Hermione—since, after all, he just went ridiculously out of his way to make sure she wouldn’t care.
Because Voldermort expects the prophecy to become a reality if all the conditions it states are met, e.g. hermione dying. It doesn’t matter how he tries to thwart Harry, as long as Hermione dies the prophecy will be fulfilled and Harry wil end the world. He believes this strongly because he’s tried it before himself and there is plenty of lore of it happening before.
Why is Voldemort not getting rid of Harry in some more final way?
Even if he’s worried killing Harry will rebound against him because of the prophecy somehow, he can, I don’t know, freeze Harry? Stick Harry in the mirror using whatever happened to Dumbledore? Destroy Harry’s brain and memories and leave him an idiot? Shoot Harry into space?
Why is “resurrect Harry’s best friend to give him good counsel” a winning move here?
It’s a form of prophecy-aversion that’s pretty orthogonal to the various forms of destroying Harry. The mechanisms of prophecy are still an unknown for Voldemort, and it seems potentially consistent with how magic works that all attempts to neutralize Harry are doomed to fail but redeeming him with friendship can work.
...or he’s setting up his next chess match, either as an explicit goal or as a subconscious desire influencing his prophecy-aversion plans.
Before Harry shot at him, Voldemort was cursed to be unable to threaten Harry’s immortality, and given the several times he’s found himself getting wrong answers to questions previously, I don’t think he was certain Harry would have betrayed him even with such a convenient que. So that covers anything that happens before Harry fires the gun.
After that point… I think he’s trying to cover his bases. That he set up such a ploy to enable him to kill Harry means that he’s likely at least going to try. But that’s not the only Winning move, and it’s a Winning move that prevents other Winning moves from being attempted.
This is one of those plots. “Keep Harry Potter from destroying universe” does not allow duct tape, WD-40, and lesser wishes to attempt a do-over. Killing Harry is probably the most effective way to keep that from happening, if you can do it. The last time Vold tried to subvert or redirect a Prophecy by destroying most of a person involved, things went so badly he spent most of a decade as a howling disembodied spirit. It’s not been explicitly stated that Prophecies act like Time Turners (aka DO NOT MESS WITH TIME/NO), but it’s pretty strongly implied to result in something like Mage’s Paradox or Continuum’s Frag. Resurrecting Hermoine and giving aid to Harry Potter was something that had to be done before any Death Eaters were summoned and arrived, and was about the only such thing, and was disjoint enough from people directly related to the Prophecy as to be unlikely to result in Paradox/Frag.
Vold knows Harry’s best friend as a pillar of restrictions. Even if we know her to be a threat to his plans, Vold knows that her death triggered Harry’s transformation into The One Who Tears Stars and that this is more dangerous than even an immortal Hermoine.
((I think he forgot some of the matters he said earlier, though. The Parsletongue curse will probably strike soon since he promised neither he nor his would seek to ever harm Hermoine. I’m genuinely surprised that cutting curse here didn’t already cause something horrible to happen to him.))
Don’t think the curse actually enforces oaths, just ensures that you’re telling the truth at the time you said it.
Besides, Voldemort, from his point of view, isn’t harming Hermione—since, after all, he just went ridiculously out of his way to make sure she wouldn’t care.
Because Voldermort expects the prophecy to become a reality if all the conditions it states are met, e.g. hermione dying. It doesn’t matter how he tries to thwart Harry, as long as Hermione dies the prophecy will be fulfilled and Harry wil end the world. He believes this strongly because he’s tried it before himself and there is plenty of lore of it happening before.
Perhaps because this might all be happening within the mirror, thus realizing both Harry!Riddle’s and Voldy!Riddle’s CEVs simultaneously.