Slytherin's Horcrux (was:Hogwarts Houses Unite!)

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 163739

> Magpie:
> However, what popped into my head after HBP--and obviously I've no 
> proof of this whatsoever--but I was thinking about that whole scene 
> with Kreacher where Dumbledore has Harry test to see if he was able
> to inherit Kreacher, or whether the Blacks had charmed things so
> that they could only be inherited by Blacks. That scene had uses
> within OotP, but I started thinking that there was no real reason
> to introduce the idea of a charm like that--one where the family 
> only allows something to a relative. It wasn't absolutely necessary
> to get Kreacher into the Dursleys house and Dumbledore could have 
> just had demonstrate to Harry that he was Kreacher's true owner by
> having him give him an order. (In fact that might have spoken
> better of Harry if he resisted being an Elf-owner on principle.)

Jen: Still thinking about your idea Magpie, and I have a question re: 
this point.  I think you are saying 1) It wasn't necessary for 
Dumbledore to bring Kreacher to the Dursley's, Harry could have given 
him the order anywhere; and 2) Dumbledore's explanation seemed 
extraneous to you, Harry could have simply given Kreacher an order 
and that would prove that the house and Kreacher passed to him.

The first part, bringing Kreacher to the Dursleys, I think that was 
about Dumbledore feeling responsible for the Dursleys.  He's about to 
endanger them by asking if Harry can return one more summer, knowing 
full well Voldemort is aware the protection will end on Harry's next 
birthday.  DD made sure to say the address of 12 GP in front of them 
& had Harry prove that the house would be a safe house, Order 
Headquarters, should Voldemort attack Privet Dr. (Plus it fits JKR's 
sense of humor, Kreacher and the Durlseys spending quality time 
together <g>.) 

Moving on to the second point, Dumbledore's explanation made sense to 
me.  There needed to be an explanation for why Harry had to give 
Kreacher an order in the first place, why the will alone wasn't 
enough to prove the house and Kreacher had passed to Harry.  If the 
will *was* enough to prove the passing of ownership, the only thing 
DD and Harry needed to work out was what to do with Kreacher.  
Therefore, the explanation about the charm on the house was only 
important to explain why the will wasn't enough.

Oh! Maybe that's what you are saying?  Why wasn't the will enough, 
why did JKR go to the trouble of introducing the whole bit about the 
house being charmed to pass to a pure-blood?  

Now from Betsy's post: 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/163704
> Jen:
> You were talking about all this in terms of the Horcrux hunt--maybe
> what will happen is when it comes to the actual locating of a
> Horcrux for each house, one person will represent that part of the
> quest, like soliciting Zacharias Smith specifically during the
> seach for the Hufflepuff cup? I'm not sure if that would work
> since Harry and Co. know where the Slytherin locket is, not Draco.

> Magpie:
> <big snip>
> I thought it might be possible that the reason no one could open the
> locket wasn't only due to its being a Horcrux but instead had
> something to do with Regulus charming the locket to only recognize a
> Black--perhaps a Pureblood Black. Regulus had subscribed to the
> Pureblood ideology and the idea that Black made you royalty, so it
> wouldn't be impossible for him to use it somehow even after he'd
> rejected Voldemort.
> <big snip>

Betsy Hp:
> Combining these two ideas together (because I love both of them
> <g>), perhaps Zach and Draco and Luna(?) and Neville(?) will be
> needed to safely *destroy* the horcruxes. Perhaps being somehow 
> associated with the objects would help them recognize each object's 
> weak spot.  Just as Harry was able to easily figure out how to
> destroy the diary horcrux.

Jen: Harry figuring out how to destroy each and every horcrux sounds 
like a stretch to me at the moment, unless Harry the Horcrux has a 
natural understanding of how to destroy them all.  So your idea 
appeals to me much more and fits the theme of Harry acting as a 
uniter and Voldemort as the divider.  The only thing I'm wondering  
about is...the diary wasn't a Gryffindor horcrux, really.  Oh, but it 
was a *Muggle* horcrux container--wonder if Harry's blood status had 
anything to do with being able to destroy it?  But no, that doesn't 
work because Dumbledore seemed to have an extremely hard time with 
the Slytherin ring horcrux and he's supposedly pureblood.  Ack, my 
head is spinning now!  

Now just Magpie's idea again:
> I thought it might be possible that the reason no one could open the
> locket wasn't only due to its being a Horcrux but instead had
> something to do with Regulus charming the locket to only recognize a
> Black--perhaps a Pureblood Black. 

Jen: This seems like a very real possibility, more than a fanfic idea 
because of the way the Blacks have been depicted so far.  This would 
also open a scenario of who could reach the Horcrux first, Draco or 
Bella?  Both would be capable of opening the locket, as would 
Narcissa.  There might be a chance to learn more about the family 
dynamics with such a plot.  

Magpie:
>(We don't know what all Regulus might have been trying to do with
> the locket himself. Perhaps in his last hours he thought of Sirius
> and hoped he could destroy it while Voldemort himself would be
> unable to open it.)

Jen:  This idea really appeals to me given how many fighting siblings 
there are in the series!  The idea that Regulus & Sirius had a little 
more between them is a nice one, even if unfortunately they never got 
to tell each other in person.  I definitely got the sense from the 
way Sirius talked that he had some affection for Regulus, but he 
couldn't forgive Regulus joining the DE's or his pure-blood bias.  

Plot-wise, it makes sense that Regulus at some point realized he was 
going to die before figuring out how to destroy the locket.  He made 
it back to the Black house and may have even had a go at the 
destruction, yet time ran out for some reason.  So a charm *could* 
have been a last-ditch effort to ensure the locket wouldn't fall into 
the 'wrong' hands, i.e. a non-Black.  Well, Regulus would have to 
have some reason to believe Bella wouldn't find the locket before 
Sirius, that's the only glitch.

Magpie:
> The Blacks as a family are an important issue, and they I think
> need to be healed in a similar way that Hogwarts does. It would 
> make a nice symbolism with the locket's protection causing a 
> problem (and since the protection is kind of blood-prejudice
> related or family-related that relates back to a lot of the other
> themes). Both Draco and the House of Black have been associated
> with Slytherin. We get hints that the very objects in the House of
> Black are actively fighting the Order--while the Order is literally
> waging war on the House and trying to destroy it. 

Jen:  I agree, JKR not only introduced the house for several 
chapters, but she had Sirius describe much of the family history.  
And she did so with a pretty fair eye, I thought.  My first reaction 
to the house--Mrs. Black, the house elf heads, etc.--was 'ugh, she's 
showing us the bad Slytherin family to counter the good Gryffindor 
family', but as the story went along...there was a sense of how dark 
and sad their history was.  Not to mention a major theme in OOTP was 
Harry dealing with the ambiguous nature of good/evil.  Along the way 
Harry found out Sirius belonged to this family, and Tonks, and likely 
Regulus took a stand against evil as well.  Even the parents balked 
at how far Voldemort wanted to go, right?   And now I can't help but 
think there will be more to the family story, that JKR is *not* going 
for the Good Weasleys/Bad Blacks dichotomy.


> Betsy Hp (moved some of Jen's text around to make my responses flow
> a bit better -- because it's all about me <g>)

Jen, actually moving Betsy's post to another *thread* for my own 
purposes--what does that say about me?  Hehehe.