The Dark Mark

[Rita Winston]

No: HPFGUIDX 5698

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, "Brandgwen G." wrote:

> The Dark Mark did fade, while Voldemort was lying defeated.  
> However, as he regained strength, the Dark Mark reappeared.  In
> fact, if what Snape says about it being a way for the Death Eaters
> to recognise each other, it mustn't fade. (snip)

> Based on this, my contention is that those Death Eaters who were 
> openly supporting Voldemort during his reign of terror were branded 
> with the Dark Mark.  These include all of the Death Eaters Snape 
> was aware of, but not those in sensitive positions.  When Voldemort
> was defeated, the Dark Mark faded, only to reappear as he regained 
> strength.(snip)

> A lot of people have asked "if the Death Eaters saw each other in
> the circle, why didn't they rat each other out?".  The answer is
> they did.  In spectacular fashion.  When trying to get Fudge to
> believe his story, Harry lists the names of a number of Death 
> Eaters he saw at the graveyard.  Fudge's reply is that these are 
> all people who were exonerated 13 years ago.  They are not the 
> clever ones, who avoided the Ministry altogether, they're the ones 
> who wormed their way out of punishment.  Their function is to
> supply Voldemort with influence, money, muscle, and that special 
> air of ruthlessness, which really makes Muggle torture an occasion.
> Not brains.  Not information.

I am sure that if teacher's, I mean Voldy's, pet Lucius had known 
that what he was contributing to the Dark Side was 'not brains', he 
would have felt so insulted that he would have switched over to the 
Light Side simply for vengeance.

> (snip)
> The Death Eaters at the graveyard are not the ones Harry really
> needs to worry about.  The really dangerous ones never had to make
> up excuses for their actions.  When Voldemort fell, they were still 
> squeaky-clean. They are probably still working in the same Ministry 
> department they were before, still living next door to the powerful 
> anti-Voldemort wizard, still married to the same public official.  
> They have nothing to fear, because they were never brought before
> the Ministry, never part of the circle of Death Eaters and never 
> branded with the Dark Mark.

This is depressingly reasonable and plausible. Before reading your 
post, I would have argued that V, besides his egomania and his love 
of theatrics, isn't smart enough to worry about secrecy (or take any 
other precaution like not using the Imperius Curse on Harry after 
Crouch had no doubt reported to him that it didn't work on Harry). 
Voldemort is not as smart as Brandgwen G.

However, when Harry told Sirius about Snape and Karkaroff conversing 
about their arms, Sirius looked completely puzzled and said he 
didn't know what that was about. That indicates that (contrary to 
my unposted fanfic in which James and Lily know that their enemies 
have the Dark Mark) the good side didn't know about the Dark Mark, 
didn't know to check people's arms, while V was still in power. Even 
after the fall of V, no one checked young Crouch's arm at his trial. 
HOW was the bad side ABLE to keep that Mark SECRET even tho' marked 
people were being caught by Aurors, tried, and imprisoned, and some 
of them blabbed? 

Maybe, sort of as Amanda suggested, V had spells to keep his Death 
Eaters from mentioning the Mark to lightsiders and to make it 
invisible when in the custody of lightsiders ... but then Snape's and 
Karkaroff's Marks wouldn't have darkened at Hogwarts (where they were 
in the custody of Dumbledore) and Snape wouldn't have been able to 
explain his Mark to Fudge (who appeared not to know about it despite 
having been an adult, a Ministry functionary, during the bad 
years). Oh, questions!