I’d doubt they can actually be poisonous.
But can Harry suborn a snake Patronus using Parseltongue and perchance gain leaked information from the other side of the link (or even fake a message from Draco to someone else)?
mjr
Karma: 233
Point. SIlly me. Well, that makes future communications between them even more of a no-brainer.
So it (not very surprisingly) came to pass that Draco was not sent back to Hogwarts, at least not yet.
Might be some pressure off of Harry to actively harass Dumbledore what with the enemy pledge. Especially as Draco might be unable to continue with his part of the deal. Though Harry is probably curious at this point himself what the real deal is.
I’d still call it possible that someone else did the deed and Heh just took credit for the good of all, but the probability of him being directly responsible got boosted as he was depicted to consider it important that he doom his brother in person also. Then again, though I’d rate it unlikely, perhaps mommy dearest can be found in a private dungeon or a memory charmed witness protection program.
Anyway, Draco. He’s probably restricted from communicating with Harry. As if that’d do any good, it having been established that they can communicate through Patroni. It would, of course, require Harry to reveal his Patronus 2.0 to Draco, though. Draco will certainly be the one to initiate contact, mentioning that he’s in a secure location. It seems from TSPE part 6 that the Patronus just appears into existence if the caster is far away from the target, so if Draco actually is in a secure location, others wouldn’t probably see it. Harry might just risk it.
So I’ll bet there will be a visit from a silver serpent soon, though perhaps only after things have settled down for a couple of chapters.
There is no reason to think he doesn’t need his wand for actual Dementor crushing. The Dementor scaring wasn’t him casting anything. It was due to Dementor’s own ability to commune with Harry turned against it (plus, hypothetically, some expectation manipulation—the “BOO” there was probably more than just for show, but also to prime Harry’s mind into expecting the thing to be spooked).
I notice that I am confused.
I’ve been doubting Quirrel being Mr. Hat on a story-obviousness-basis, being partial to twists. But rationally, it makes no sense to very much doubt the obvious solution with no comparably well-supported alternatives (despite having reached for ones). I wouldn’t wonder if that was even the moral there.
True as such. But storywise it would seem weird to leave this hanging. That’s one reason why I’m already irrationally overinvested, I notice, in my theory that it’ll get taken care of pretty much on the side by finding out the true culprit and thus cancelling the debt through the Wizengamot or, failing that, possibly through Draco.
There are other options, of course. There have been good points about Dumbledore now having an interest to Make Money Fast for Harry, and about possible other people who might be willing to bankroll a business venture for the newly brightened legend. And, again storywise, I can see handling the “leave it hanging” option in a decent manner as well, if there’s some closure about the relations of houses Potter and Malfoy (presumably with Lucius dead or imprisoned and stripped of his status).
At this point Harry is feeling pretty (over)confident in his ability to keep Lucius in check, so it’s not a big deal to him. Witness his riddle.
I rate it likely that she’ll read it. Unlikely she’ll babble. But she’s no Occlumens. (She should strive to be real quick, though.)
Incidentally, if one believes a certain piece of what seems like well-founded speculation about the Dread Totoro, the Merlin-Totoro legend mirrors Harry’s escapades quite nicely.
Good bit, though a bit of a hodgepodge. I presume the real culprit will be found, but that doesn’t necessarily counter the debt—the Wizengamot would have to agree, and the truth could be found out in a way that leaves little actual proof, even aside issues of Wizengamot’s fairness. I’ll be disappointed if paying the debt turns out to be too arduous though, but of course depending on the methods chosen there may be side effects. (One way would be for Draco to accept a counterdebt, having been convinced of the truth of the matter and seeing that being on good terms with Harry is still of value. Assuming Draco will return, which is sadly not a given.)
Merely spooking the Dementor was a good twist on the common (mine included) anticipation of it ending up destroyed. The telling of the incident was cleverly arranged not to give out too much new information on how they actually work. Harry’s theory of them operating on the expectations of others works as an explanation; as the animal Patronuses imperfectly shield the Wizengamot from the Dementor, thus they shield the Dementor from their expectations, leaving Harry’s dominant. (Also, one might argue that the Dementor shirking from Harry was wholly unexpected to almost everyone present, thus they didn’t really have sufficiently direct active expectations on that particular thing either way. But this is an unnecessary side hypothesis.) The Dementor may as well still have also some internal intelligence and self preservation instincts though, as has been hypothesised especially on the grounds of them all refusing co-operation with the Azkaban guards earlier.
In any case, now the expectations of many will actually support Dementors fleeing from Harry, which might come in handy if they at least partially work off of those ;)
It’s a possibility. They might’ve beefed up security in unknown ways since the last breakout though. Risky business.
More importantly, I don’t think Harry’s Dark Side is big on patience. Or regular Harry, when it comes to allowing Hermione to be subjected to Dementors...
Indeed. The Dementor is storywise too conveniently present not to destroy as a way to grab the Wizengamot’s attention—Harry having been established as being in the possession of Chekhov’s Gun. Certainly not sufficient in itself, as you said. Give it 0.8 as a part of the solution.
(As for potion-making, I doubt the information would be very inflammatory to this audience, but good point from OP about him being able to wonk their economy a bit.)
Harry didn’t pay much attention to the testimony after the beginning, thus the timeline doesn’t have to change if he goes back to make sure it contains some new False Memoried tidbits, if he can get someone to do the charm. But I don’t think there’s been much indication that he can override his Time Turner limitations by himself and there may be little time left to try and get someone to do it for him before Hermione is hauled off.
Edit: Silly me, he could just decide what to make her say later and do a quick check from McGonagall if they were included (thus checking if he will manage to go back to do the deed) and go from there. But it’d be difficult to insert subtle enough bits to make a difference only when lampshaded by Harry afterward (since many others presumably listened to the whole testimony already without noticing). Not impossible though. [Re-edited for semi-clarity...]
I think he just didn’t want to believe that.
Indeed, I was thinking destroy the Dementor as a show of force and threaten with challenging Draco to a duel to the death (I’m presuming he can do that as a Noble House). For, I don’t know, willingly participating in a travesty of justice against a friend of Harry’s or whatever. Close enough to a trial by combat, which also is presumably possible in this “justice” system, so yeah, maybe that after the show of force.
I’m still slightly rooting for Draco to intervene, though. Slightly.
Edit: Oh yeah, that torture thing. Even if Draco has been wiped of it and it’s thus unprovable (aside from being not sufficient debt to cancel Hermione’s supposed debt), the claim would probably be sufficient grounds for such duel.
Okay, I don’t really think this is how it’ll go down—slightly too Dark Lordish. But the image was amusing, so here goes:
“It just happens that if Hermione doesn’t walk, everyone but me will lose the ability to cast Patronus. Don’t buy it? Oh, well, I’ll just explain it to Hermione and she’ll be able to testify under Veritaserum that I can do it.”
Or, you know, have Hermione figure it out herself from Harry’s note and do the blackmail herself.
Anyway, the blackmail potential for this is rather great, and I’d not be surprised to see it used in a more dire situation with more than Hermione on the line.
Indeed. Though I went a bit further (more likely than not too far ;) in the reviews:
“Speculation time: Lucius did it. But plot thickens: Draco will intervene on Hermione’s behalf, mostly on the basis of their remembered scenario being very implausible, as explained in the chapter. The Harry-Draco bond will strengthen. Just as Lucius intended, not being quite as inflexible as pictured in the discussion, and seeing that Draco will do quite well for himself as Harry’s second.
As a side benefit, he’ll get the record to show that (according to the false memory) Draco won a straight duel against Hermione. (Almost nobody will think to doubt that part of the memory—Draco might, but will keep it to himself.)”
Mr. Hat presumably can’t be Lucius, though (that “only teachers can cast this sort of stuff here without being noticed” thing), so ve’d have to be just under his control, but that should be simple enough.
Good show.
To nitpick just a bit, one can genuinely care about a cause, just care about being a lazy piece of shit even more. (I certainly value being lazy a lot, to some of me’s annoyance.) Not that that invalidates people generally caring about the appearances more.
Ha, dunno if my earlier speculation had a part in it, but nice that you ran with the resurrection thing.
Wonder if Irina will mate-bond again for the first time...
Canonically the situation was quite reversed, the Snitch (or rather it’s predecessor, the Snidget) having been introduced to the already existing Quidditch game by a noble’s quirk. I doubt this is different for MoR.