CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Chapter 14, Percy and Padfoot

[potioncat]

No: HPFGUIDX 93046

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Penapart Elf 
<penapart_elf at y...> wrote:
> I'm posting the following from Aesha on her behalf.
> 
> :) Penapart Elf
> 

snipping introduction<
 
> 1. If house elves are freed against their will, where do 
> they go? Can they stay at Hogwarts if they desire? If so, 
> what does it matter if a house elf is inadvertently 
> freed?

In mythology, if you ate so much as a pomegranate seed while in the 
Underworld, you had to stay.  So magic can bind you to a course of 
action, whether or not it was intended. But I would think if a 
Hogwarts house-elf was freed who did not want to be, DD would keep 
him/her on. I'm not sure what might happen at a different house. And 
we don't really know the "rules" for this sort of magic.
> 
 
> 6. We know now that Percy's letter wasn't written under a 
> curse, nor was it a matter of him trying to keep under 
> cover as a double-agent. Why would it have mattered if 
> the letter arrived during breakfast? Students don't read 
> one another's mail. Does he think one letter from the 
> estranged family member can turn Ron against all his 
> friends and family?

>From the interview with JKR, I understood he was acting of his own 
volition.  But does that mean he isn't undercover?  Or did I miss 
something? I haven't given up on Percy yet. His response in GoF when 
Harry rescues Ron from the lake, shows how much he cares.(Chapter 26 
page 504 Scholastic paperback) "...but Percy, who looked very white 
and somehow much younger than usual, came splashing out to meet 
them."

He certainly intended for Ron to read the letter in private, and I 
can see why he wouldn't send it to Ron at breakfast.  It wasn't the 
sort of letter you'd want your brother to read in a large group of 
people at a meal.

I also think there was a code in it.  Ron of course threw it away 
and I can't break it.

Potioncat