Drinking Unicorn Blood

[three_sickles_short <three_sickles_short@hotmail.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 51994

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, SnapesSlytherin at a... wrote:
> Let me reach the *whole* way back to PS/SS for a little bit.  I've 
been 
> thinking about those "Is Quirrell really dead posts?" and I have a 
big 
> question.  "The blood of a unicorn will keep you slive, even if you 
are an 
> inch from death, but at a terrible price." 
> (US "Adult" Paperback 322)  Shouldn't the unicorn blood Quirrell 
drank keep 
> him alive?  Does drinking the blood only work for a short time?  I 
know it's 
> not like the Sorcerer's Stone, but shouldn't that have helped him a 
little 
> bit?  I'm pretty sure I'm just confused as to how the whole unicorn 
blood 
> drinking process works...

Since more than one unicorn was attacked in the Forest, my guess is 
that the effects were only temporary.  If drinking the blood worked 
permanently, Quirrell/Voldemort would only have had to kill one, not 
more.  We don't really get a sense of how long "temporary" is in this 
case, but we are told (sort of) that it's probably less than a week.  
Since Hagrid says that the one that he, Harry, Hermione, Neville, and 
Malfoy are looking for is the second one in a week, we can figure 
that the effects wear off within a week.  (Or, at least, Voldemort 
*thinks* they wear off within a week.  I guess it's not outside the 
realm of possibility that he could be wrong about this, but it seems 
to me like the kind of thing he'd know.  He was, after all, 
supposedly a brilliant student in his day.)

We also don't know whether it's Quirrell himself or just Voldemort 
who's getting the "stayin' alive" effect.  My first impression was 
that both of them would reap the positive effects - and the negative 
ones - from the blood, but maybe not.  Maybe, for some weird reason, 
only Voldemort gets the positive effects, or maybe he somehow takes 
them with him when he leaves Quirrell's body.  

TSS