Sirius' death and the power of love

[ernie_prang2003]

No: HPFGUIDX 82336

Jennifer (travelling the Knight Bus under the name of Susan Bones) 
wrote:

>  we see that 
> Harry was willing to embrace death for physical relief as well as 
the 
> relief of being united with Sirius again. Yet, later, when he has 
his 
> talk with Luna, he appears significantly taken aback when she 
> mentions seeing dead loved ones again.

and:
> At first reading, it seems as if Harry is not at all sure there is 
an 
> afterlife, a place where he'd be able to see Sirius again. Does 
this 
> contradict his feelings during the possession? The feelings that 
> apparently saved him from the Dark Lord? 

and:
> I really am at a loss to 
> understand this unless Harry, so near death during the possession 
was 
> somehow closer to Sirius and had no doubt or fear. There is this 
idea 
> of the veil being very thin at death, the veil separating this 
world 
> and the next. All I can think of is that the farther from death he 
> got, he lost that knowledge.

That makes sense to me.  When Harry was close to death he fixed on 
what really mattered, and that saved him.

Afterwards, when coming to terms with Sirius' death, it took a lot 
of time and pain to bring together everything he'd seen and heard.  
He had to follow all the blind alleys, and rage against his loss.  
Yes, he'd heard the whispering, at a time when he had no idea what 
the veil might be, and it took time to accept that.

While he was looking for a way for Sirius to come back, he wouldn't 
think about the possibility of himself going to join Sirius, and 
therefore about the voices beyond the veil.

It's a bit like the Knight Bus, really.  When Harry needed to get to 
the right place in a hurry, all his other thoughts and ideas just 
had to jump out of the way, higgledy piggledy.  Once he'd got there, 
he had to look back at the landscape and see how it all really 
fitted together.  That took time.

Ernie

It's not only the passengers who travel under assumed names