Some Early, Random, Crazy Predictions

Just prior to the release of Book 7, I plan to post at great length my predictions (read: wild guesses) for the book, many of which are not formed yet.  This is entirely for fun, of course, and my disclaimer about Narrative Misdirection should always be understood as a caveat to all my predictions.

That said, another forum in which I participate has a thread dedicated to our speculations about what will happen in Book 7.  On a whim, I plunked down a few of the thoughts that have been rattling around in my head, and I thought I’d share them here.  I plan to develop the “Harry as uniter” thesis a bit further over time. Let me know what you think!  

As the book opens up, I think the order of events for Harry’s planned visitations will be: (1) Privet Drive – fits the first 6 books, and Bill’s going to need time to recover, so Harry’s got to be somewhere before the wedding; (2) The Burrow, for the wedding, which I do not think will go off without a hitch and will probably involve some sort of Death Eater attack; (3) Godric’s Hollow. Since we don’t know what he will find there, where he goes from there is dependent, in my opinion, on things we can’t yet know.  He will of course end up back at Hogwarts and 12 Grimmauld Place at some point in the novel, perhaps many times.There will be, throughout the book, a sort of fusion and expansion of Dumbledore’s Army and the Order. The fusion will occur because Harry will become the default leader, even if he doesn’t spent much time in direct control over the Order. [Dumbledore, the previous Order's leader, seemed to be absent from the Order itself a good portion of the time as well.] The expansion will occur because Harry is going to be the great uniter of the divisions within the wizarding world.

Throughout the series, we continue to gather information about the various mistreated parties – prejudices abound concerning giants, house elves, “mudbloods,” centaurs, etc. In OP, Harry’s final conversation with Dumbledore involves the “lie” that the statue told, and there are really good reasons Dumbledore took that opportunity to tell Harry about the lie, even in a time of terrible grief for Harry. We end HBP with a third affirmation that Harry is “Dumbledore’s man, through and through.”

Voldemort has put together an army of Death Eaters, Dementors (which are multiplying!) and who knows how many Inferi. This army is far too big for even a combined DA and Order to tackle. Harry will unite the various parties – centaurs, house elves, giants (though certainly not all of every party) as an army against Voldemort’s evil force. He will unite the four houses (Slytherin will be reconciled through Draco’s redemption) as part of the expansion of the new Order.

Whatever the deal is with Ollivander’s disappearance, he will end up responsible for getting wands into the hands of the house elves, who will be a more powerful force than anyone could have imagined (or rather, a powerful force that the Ministry knew about long ago when they forbade them from having wands and subjected them to slavery so that they wouldn’t be so powerful).

There will be some version of a Harry/Fawkes vs. Voldemort/Nagini duel at the end. Ginny will once again be in mortal danger (Harry’s breaking up with her was noble and all, but ultimately silly – Draco knows of Harry’s love for her and can certainly pass that along to Voldemort, who won’t really care about the exact status of their courtship). Somewhere in all of this, there will be a battle over Hogwarts. Whether Voldemort ever does get control of it, he certainly intends to.

Random Thoughts:

Slughorn turns out to be manipulated by the threats of Voldemort – he’s been acting to save his own skin. (I’m working on a lengthier Slughorn post.)

There are more people than we realize who know about the horcruxes (think R.A.B.), and that the Longbottoms will play a big role in Book 7, perhaps as people who know about the horcruxes.

Some Epilogue Thoughts:

There will be no time in the book for a Ron/Hermione wedding, but if they both make it, they’ll end up married in the epilogue. They probably won’t both make it though.

Neville will return to the school to teach Herbology. Sprout’s gonna die.

If Harry lives, he will not become an auror. If Ron and Hermione make it, though, they might end up aurors.

McGonagall continues on as Headmistress.