Neville and the Prophecy

[Cathy Drolet]

No: HPFGUIDX 108365

charme: said:

"Remember, if LV were focused on killing Neville he'd be after him now
as well, and we'd see more about that in canon, wouldn't we?"

 
DuffyPoo:

I think LV *was* focused on killing both kids, but at the time, he only knew where the Potters were, thanks to Wormtail.  He'd worry about the Longbottom kid later.  Once he was turned into vapour at the Potters, via Lily's sacrifice, LV, knowing only the first part of the prophecy 'the one with the power to vanquish the DL approaches...blah blah blah' is wrongly convinced, that Harry Potter is the one the prophecy refers to.  LV, like some of us, equates vapourness with vanquishment. Oh, if that kid did that to me, then he must be the one.  Neville is now totally off his radar.  
But LV says himself, in GoF, that he had overlooked the power of Lily's sacrificing herself for Harry. "His mother died in the attempt to save him -- and *unwittingly provided him with a protection* I admit I had not forseen...I could not touch the boy.....His mother left upon him the traces of *her sacrifice*...this is old magic, I should have remembered it, I was foolish to overlook it.....I miscalculated, my friends, I admit it.  My *curse was deflected by the woman's foolish sacrifice,* and it rebounded upon me."  LV, at the time of GH, has fogotten all this stuff, but, at some point, it is recalled to him.  Some point, probably while he was coming up with this rebirthing potion.  He used Harry's blood so he would be able to 'touch the boy.'  And it worked - that part of HP's protection is gone.  LV hasn't yet figured out that if it was Lily's sacrifice that saved HP, not anything special or 'powerful' about him, that HP may not be the one in the prophecy at all.  It may be the Longbottom kid.  but right now, Neville, as I said above, is totally off LV's radar, because he still believes HP to be 'the one.'

charme said:
"Instead, LV consistently and reliably chooses to focus his killing efforts on Harry."

DuffyPoo:
PS - LV was trying to get the stone, that and that alone, until HP got in the way.  He only said 'Kill him!' after Quirrill said he couldn't touch HP to get the stone and HP wasn't giving it up freely.  'KILL HIM!' - and then we can take the stone from him you dork, Quirrell, I should never have trusted you!
CoS - Until Ginny told TR about HP, he was none the wiser.  The point of the diary was to re-open the CoS not kill HP (that may not have been the motive of LM in givng the diary to Ginny, however.)  That came after, only after Ginny had told TR everything she knew about HP.  Still, if HP had used his brain and actually told the teachers what he knew, as was his plan when he and Ron went into the staff room, he need never have been involved in meeting Diary!Tom.
GoF - Yup, LV wanted HP and HP alone....because he is wrongly convinced, through circumstantial evidence, that HP is the kid from the prophecy.
OotP - LV was after the prophecy more than he was after HP.  After LV found out he was working with dunderheads who kept saying they 'could' get the orb when they really couldn't, he had to lure HP to the DoM to get the orb for him.  If HP had handed the prophecy to LM (funny I always type LV when I mean LM, then have to change it...) he may never have met up with LV that night.  It truly wouldn't have mattered if he had given the prophecy to the DEs.  DD told HP what was in the prophecy anyway, via the pensieve, and now that the prophecy is in HP's mind, LV can access it there, or Snape can do it for him.

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