"The Animagus Black!"

[erinellii]

No: HPFGUIDX 79912

 "trishel2003"  wrote:
> "Master, I am sorry, I knew not, I was fighting the Animagus 
Black!" sobbed Bellatrix.--P. 812
> 
> What a weird thing to call Sirius. When Bella could have called him 
> Sirius, or Sirius Black, or Black, or Mr. Black, or her cousin, or 
> her cousin Sirius, or her cousin Black, or basically anything, she 
> brings up the fact that he is an Animagus.
> 
> So, what's the deal? My personal theory is that the pureblood 
> fanatics think of Animagi as half-breeds, and therefore lesser 
> beings. That would also explain why Voldemort continually harps on 
> poor Peter, calling him "Wormtail." He, Voldemort, is angry because 
> his life depends on a lesser being.--RTJ



Do you think?  My take was that the WW saw the Animagi transformation 
as powerful magic; only 11 people (that we know of) have accomplished 
it this century.  So Bellatrix would be trying to remind Voldemort 
that her attention was taken by dealing with this really powerful 
wizard, and futhermore, that she'd managed to serve Voldemort well by 
defeating him.
  Why on earth would she want to call him her cousin?  "Cousin" 
doesn't sound menacing, or like a good excuse for messing up Voldy's 
plans.  "I was fighting my cousin Sirius"?  That sounds like 
something a seven-year-old would say. Why would she want to remind 
Voldemort that she was related to the enemy?  And of course the idea 
of being related to Sirius is probably as unappealing to her as it 
was to him.

 
As for the Wormtail thing, well, Peter is a lesser being without his 
being an Animagi coming into it at all.  If you ask me, Voldemort is 
trying to terrify him by reminding him that he is a rat, and 
Voldemort can posess and destroy rats any time he wants to.  Or 
possibly Voldy is angry because Peter's disguise as a rat is useless 
to them, since the good guys know what he looks like, so he calls him 
Wormtail all the time to remind him of that. 

Erin