The Role of Kreacher

[Eric Oppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 162313

It occurs to me that Kreacher might still have a very important role to play 
in the story.

We know that House-Elves have powerful magic.

We also know that Kreacher's bought into the whole "purebloods rule, 
mudbloods drool, Muggles we scrape off the bottom of our shoe" even more 
firmly than most DEs seem to have.  Even Bella Lestrange can occasionally 
put together a sentence without disparging reference to "Mudbloods," 
blood-traitors, and suchlike subjects.

What if Kreacher were to find out, in a way he couldn't ignore, that 
Voldemort's a half-blood?

I could see a battle scene where Kreacher's present, and finds this 
out---and, all of a sudden, particularly if V'mort's been making it clear 
that he couldn't care less about Kreacher's precious purebloods, Harry's got 
an unexpected ally as Kreacher throws the whole arsenal of House-Elf magic 
at the Dark Lord.

We know that House-Elves are powerfully magical in their own right---as I 
mentioned in an earlier post, Dobby, once free to do as he chose, was able 
to face off with, and face down, Lucius Malfoy, who is not portrayed as a 
coward or a weak wizard.  An enraged House-Elf, or two or three (hello, 
Dobby and Winky!) doing an all-out banzai attack could be just the thing to 
even things up in the big final fight.

And as far as their position in the wizard world goes---sometimes there ARE 
no good choices to be had.  (I've been reading about Finland in WWII, which 
is what brought that to mind.)  As described, House-Elves strike me as too 
powerful to be safe to have around unless they're under control---a control 
which they themselves seem to welcome and want.  Kind of like the Giants---I 
feel bad for them, stuck in a valley too small for them and fighting like 
the Kilkenny cats, but they're big, dumb, nearly-invulnerable and much too 
dangerous to be let roam free.

House-Elves are rather like (the medieval concept of) demons---and you did 
NOT want to have a demon around unless you had it under very firm control. 
Medieval sorcery often included a lot of stuff about summoning, binding, 
controlling and dismissing demons safely, and a lot of stories centered 
around what would happen to a sorcerer who failed to keep control.