The green liquid in the basin

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 165658

Paul wrote:
> 
> > How did the basin get refilled? If the basin had been emptied
before, by whoever took the horcrux, it should have still been empty.
Is the basin enchanted, so that it refills itself when emptied? If
not, who refilled it? Food for thought.
> 
> Goddlefrood:
> 
> Welcome Paul. Ask yourself this - if the original locket Horcrux was
removed from the basin, do you not think it likely that as well as 
place a dummy locket therein that person would have refilled the basin?
> 
> What I find most interesting relative to the potion in the basin is
to wonder whether or not the potion that was there when Dumbledore and
Harry arrived on the scene was the same as what was there when the
original protection of the Horcrux was set up.
> 
> OTOH it could be possible that the basin refills itself as
suggested, but I like the idea that R. A. B. actually refilled the
basin with a different potion altogether. <snip>


Carol responds:
If RAB refilled the basin with a different potion altogether, then he
must be a powerful Dark wizard himself, intent on torturing and
killing anyone who retrieved the fake Horcrux--not to mention that
drinking the horrible potion not only made the drinker suffer, later
to weaken and possibly die, but also caused a terrible thirst that
forced the drinker to drink the water in the lake, releasing the
Inferi. The whole diabolical chain reaction has to be Voldemort's
plan, not RAB's--unless RAB is as murderous and powerful as Voldemort.

I'm pretty sure that RAB is Regulus, who would have been about
nineteen years old at the time, and he was clearly opposed to
Voldemort's evil reign. It's unlikely that he would have employed
similar tactics. All he wanted to do, according to the note, is to
steal the real Horcrux and destroy it, making Voldemort mortal (or so
he thought). So either he used a spell to refill the basin simply to
trick Voldemort into thinking no one had entered the cave, which seems
rather pointless since if he went to check on the Horcrux, he would
know how to get past the potion without drinking it and would quickly
discover that it was fake in any case, or the basin was enchanted to
fill itself with that potion the moment a Horcrux or any other object
was put into it. (The basin wouldn't know a fake Horcrux from a real
one.) It doesn't refill itself when it's emptied, or it would have
done so when DD scooped up the fake Horcrux. I think it only covers
over an object placed in it so that the object is irretrievable unless
the seeker, or a companion, drinks the potion.

I'm convinced that JKR has already provided all the hints we need as
to what happened. Bellatrix must have hidden the Horcrux and known
what it was (but not about the others). She says that the Dark Lord
has trusted her with his most precious (presumably secrets or
treasures), and she knew that LV wasn't dead or she wouldn't have
tortured the Longbottoms for information. Quite possibly, she took the
devoted Kreacher along to help her. (He would obey any Black other
than renegade Sirius and he adores "Miss Bellatrix.") 

Regulus would somehow have got wind of Bellatrix's mission, possibly
by questioning Kreacher, whom he could have ordered to show him the
cave and help him get to the island. Not being quite a perfect hero
with a sense for the rights of house-elves, he would have ordered
Kreacher to drink the potion (as Slughorn had a house-elf drink test
his mead for poison). Kreacher's brains could have been addled in the
process (not that he's completely crazy--he's still quite cunning--but
"he is what wizards have made him"--not a normal house-elf). We almost
certainly saw the real locket, unopenable and intact, in 12 GP when
the Weaselys, HRH, and Sirius Black were house-cleaning. Either
Kreacher retrieved it or Mundungus stole it when he stole the silver
goblets. Possibly, he sold it to Aberforth. At any rate, Regulus was
killed before he could figure out how to destroy the Horcrux, but it
will certainly be the easiest of the remaining four (unless we count
Nagini) to find and destroy.

Carol, who is more interested in whose memory Dumbledore was forced to
relive and hopes it was not his own