The Order of the Phoenix Re-Read: Chapter 37

[slowfox]

So, Harry's Portkeyed back to Dumbledore's office, and the guilt follows him there all too swiftly. It's odd that the portraits speak directly to Harry even before Dumbledore arrives, but I s'pose they'll have noted the manner of his arrival, and have deduced that Great Deeds are afoot.

The rest of the gang's injuries are dismissed quite casually:

"Well, Harry," said Dumbledore, finally turning away from the baby bird, "you will be pleased to hear that none of your fellow students are going to suffer lasting damage from the night's events."

I have to side with Harry, a little: Dumbledore's being awfully condescending with the 'I know how you feel' stuff - Harry's just caused the death of the one adult he really considered close family. That's got to prey on the mind a little. OTOH, I don't think that throwing objects about the room is particularly constructive... (and isn't such vandalism a bit... pointless when a simple Reparo will probably render everything as good as new once he's left?).

Now, Dumbledore does redeem himself a little by 'fessing up:

"...you should never have believed for an instance that there was any necessity for you to go to the Department of Mysteries tonight. If I had been open with you, Harry, as I should have been, you would have known a long time ago that Voldemort might try and lure you to the Department of Mysteries, and you would never have been tricked into going there tonight."

This certainly has the ring of truth to it; having given Harry only half the truth with the misleading 'weapon' business at the start, you could argue that Harry was set up for this fall from the outset. Had they said that Voldemort was specifically after a prophecy from the Department of Mysteries, Harry might have been sufficiently forewarned to deduce that Sirius lying at Voldemort's mercy right by the very thing the Dark Lord was trying so hard to retrieve was possibly a trap.

Dumbledore states plainly, for the record, that he certainly views the relationship between himself and Harry as more than mere headmaster and pupil. There was, obviously, the conversation about the Mirror of Erised in PS/SS, but I do wonder if Dumbledore's connection with Harry extends beyond that date, further into the past (this is where I love lizardlaugh's hypothesis that Dumbledore is Ron, because it would make so much sense).

We then get explanations of why Dumbledore's been avoiding Harry all term, and also as to how Kreacher was able to lie to Harry (but Dobby never lied to Harry - he was pretty darned selective with the truth, but he seemed unable to lie),

This infuriating snippet is buried in the exposition:

"[Snape], like you, attempted to contact Sirius at once. I should explain that members of the Order of the Phoenix have more reliable methods of communicating than the fire in Dolores Umbridge's office."

Well, clearly you should explain, but you don't. You just gloat about instead, seeming to forget that it might've been handy to share these methods of communication with The Boy Who Lived...

OK, Dumbledore says that Voldemort set out to kill Harry as a baby because he believed he would be fulfilling the terms of the prophecy. The prophecy itself says either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives. So, um, why would Voldemort killing Harry as a baby not have been in the spirit of the prophecy?

Ooh, Dumbledore calls Harry a half-blood, too, despite the fact that he's the son of two magical parents. Huh. That classes him the same as Seamus, then?

"So," said Harry, dredging up the words from what felt like a deep well of despair inside him, "so does that mean that ... that one of us has got to kill the other one ... in the end?"

"Yes," said Dumbledore.

I like the bald simplicity of Dumbledore's confirmation. But the prophecy didn't feel like that much of a reveal to me - I'd always assumed that the books would be about Harry defeating Voldemort, but I s'pose Harry doesn't have the advantage of that external view of his life as a series in seven parts, so we have to ride with him as he has our suspicions confirmed.

Comments

[slowfox]

And now we know that Umbridge had *fake* Veritaserum from Snape to use on Harry - that's something I hadn't noticed before.

Not, as it transpires, that it would've made any difference, since Harry was smart enough to not drink any of the proferred tea anyway. Umbridge doesn't strike one as having been particularly blessed with grey matter in the whole affair - which does make you wonder about the calibre of applicants the Ministry attracts for its administrative function.