Horcrux Cheat by JKR? (Was Tom Riddle and the RoR)

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 181911

Mike wrote:
> OK, I'll buy this. Nice plot hole filler, Mila. :) Of course, 
combine this with the people LV used to make the Horcruxes, and it not
only kills DD's "significant" murder theory, it makes designating
whose murders LV used to make them pointless. He just needs to have
murdered *someone* - and not feel any remorse so there is no soul
healing - to create a Horcrux. And per DD, he's killed enough to make
an army of Inferi.
> 
> So I reiterate, what was the purpose of DD's statement about LV's 
reserving Horcrux making for significant murders? But even worse, JKR
used DD's statement to show he had figured out how many Horcruxes
Voldemort had made, that he was one short when he went to kill Harry
at GH, and that therefore he decided to make Nagini his 6th Horcrux.
(Him not knowing about the Harry!Crux.) 
> 
> Now that it appears there was nothing to this "significant" murder
theory, why should I believe that Dumbledore knew which murders LV 
used to create Horcruxes? And without that knowledge, how am I 
suppose to believe that Dumbledore knew how many Horcruxes were made
pre-GH and that that left him one more to make with Nagini?
> 
> You (generic) can say that DD used more than Horcrux count to figure
out Nagini!crux, and you'd be right. But IF he hadn't known that LV 
had one more to make, he wouldn't have been looking for the clues that
led him to conclude Nagini was one. <snip>

Carol responds:
I'm sure I've posted on this topic before in relation to when DD
started suspecting that Tom Riddle was making Horcruxes, so I'll be as
concise as possible.

Dumbledore knew that Tom had taken Morfin's ring when he framed him
for the Riddle murders. He knew that Tom had stolen both the locket
and the cup (and killed Hepzibah to get them). He knew that Tom knew
the history of the locket and would have considered it his own, and
his taking the Hufflepuff Cup as well suggests that he would also seek
out a Ravenclaw and a Gryffindor Horcrux. (He also knew that the
Gryffindor Sword was safe as long as he was alive and it was in his
keeping.) He could tell by looking at Tom during the DADA interview
that his appearance had changed drastically since he stole the future
Horcruxes from Hepzibah. DD would know suspect that the three known
objects and possibly a fourth belonging to Ravenclaw had been made
into Horcruxes at that time. CoS showed him a fourth (or fifth)
Horcrux, the diary. And, of course, he suspected that Harry's scar was
an accidental Horcrux. But he needed Slughorn's memory to know exactly
how many Tom had intended to make. So, if he made six Horcruxes (the
seventh soul bit being his own tattered soul; he didn't know about
Harry), DD would know about the diary, the ring, the locket, and the
cup. He would suspect "something from Gryffindor or Ravenclaw,"
probably Ravenclaw given that the knew the sword was safe. That's five
of the six: one short of the magic number. I see no problem with that
deduction at all.

DD's "significant murders" theory is, as you say, mistaken, but it
does seem likely that Voldemort, once he learned about the Prophecy,
would have wanted to use Harry's murder to make a Horcrux. He wouldn't
need to have an object at hand; he could wait until he'd also killed
Dumbledore (another significant murder) and steal the Sword of
Gryffindor to complete his collection. However, after he was
vaporized, he seems to have given up on obtaining the Sword of
Gryffindor and decided to finish the job once he had a rudimentary
body, making Nagini his seventh Horcrux, the magic number seven being
even more important than the objects (or creatures!) used and much
more important, DD to the contrary, than the identity of the victims.

DD suspected from the close connection between Voldemort and Nagini
("but in essence divided") that she was more than just his pet snake,
possessed for the occasion. She was most likely a Horcrux. And, it
seems, he was right.

Carol, noting that DD was also mistaken about the manner of Frank
Bryce's death (I think he was fed to Nagini after he was AK'd, but he
wasn't killed by her)--or maybe JKR just forgot how Frank died