[HPforGrownups] Re: Turning Items to Portkeys

[Trond Michelsen]

No: HPFGUIDX 52088

On Thu, Feb 13, 2003 at 12:34:56AM -0000, Grey Wolf <greywolf1 at jazzfree.com> wrote:

> However, Crouch!Moody learns that one of the little surprises for the 
> TriWizard tournament is that the final cup *will* portkey the winner to 
> the entrance (not a bad idea, after all, the winner should be the first 
> to get to the cup, not the one that is waiting for him besides the 
> entrance, not to mention the danger of the champion being waylaid in 
> the way *back* by some of the delightful monsters). Thus, Crouch 
> conceives the idea that, using the auror privileges of his disguise, he 
> can get close enough to the cup to introduce the extra step. Since the 

Actually, I doubt Voldemort knew the cup was still a portkey into
Hogwarts. Even if you're an arrogant Evil Overlord, you don't leave
objects of instant escape lying around unprotected until you've actually
killed your opponent.

> anti-aparition charm will be suspended in the case of this cup (by 
> using methods undisclosed but that probably require being Dumbledore), 
> Crouch can tamper enough with it to make it go to the Graveyard (but 
> not enough to delete the original destination, the outside of the 
> maze).

I have a small theory about that.

I think that the portkey spell can be visualised as a sort of very, very
thin clingfilm (plastic wrap). When you've used the portkey, you remove
this layer of film, and the object is back to its old self again. Now,
if you take an object that's already wrapped in a layer of portkey
clingfilm, no problem, you just add another layer, and the object now
has two destinations. 

This means that Crouch didn't need to tamper with the portkey, he just
made an ordinary object into a portkey, without knowing it already was
one.

-- 
Trond Michelsen