I think we can be quite sure Harry did right by dear Ginny.

That's a great basis for a marriage, fear of your MIL.

I've finished the book!

It took me two weeks, a fast (I couldn't start the book before or during it), a sister's wedding (why, yes, the preparations in the book, and the crazy morning-of-wedding seem pretty much the same, magic or no magic), a weekend-full-of-guests (so I prevented myself from even opening the book, in order to not create a situation in which I disappear inside it completely), a missed bus due to reading at the station (Or, well, it could be that the bus was simply very late and not that I was so lost inside Ron and the sword and the locket to raise my eyes and see what's going on), roommates rolling their eyes at me, hiding from the internet in safe havens where I knew for sure I wouldn't be spoiled, and finally a peaceful weekend in which I could just sit and read and cry my heart out over several scenes.

And now, my head is spinning, and I'm supposed to work, but I kinda need to try and unentangle my thoughts, even if they are so stating-the-obvious and it-was-obvious-to-everybody-else-but-me. So I'm skipping (and threadsucking! And going to catch up!), and throwing large paragraphs at screens, OK?

I remember how, in the former book, I was all about reflections and triangles, but in this book, I shifted my geometry a bit, because it's so much more about spirals and circles. But still, of course, reflections.

It's silly, but even the riddle that they were asked when wanting to get into Ravenclaw tower, was about just that, a circle. Or rather, the answer to the riddle (what came first, the phoenix or the flames) was a circle, without a beginning or an end, returning to the same points, only a bit differently.

I mean, the first thing that comes to my mind is nothing profound or deep or character-searching or whatever, but practically a rather technical detail: using Voldemort's name. In the "Philosophers' Stone", Harry uses his name, without knowing that it's dangerous. He's being told, over and over again, to stop that, and in its end (IIRC) Dumbledore tells him not to stop using that name, with all the meaning that it has - knowing your enemy's name, daring to use it, not fearing the myth surrounding it. And all throughout the books, Harry does just that.

And then, in "Deathly Hallows", the pronunciation of the name itself becomes dangerous. This is how they're tracked when they run away for the first time, this is how they're captured by the Snatchers and brought to the Malfoy house. The name has a real immediate danger attached to it now. Things moved from the realm of myth and fear-inspiring to actual actions, to actual captures and results. And for the same reason for using the name as Harry's, too.

But then, at the end of the book, when there's nothing to lose, because things are already pretty much as bad as they could be and there's no revealing in the actual pronunciation of the name, they return to their habit of saying it out loud. When the fight is out and at the open, even when the opponent is at his strongest position yet (or maybe because of that?), the name returns to its former place, loses that special power again (even with the added power it now has).

And it goes further than that. When Harry duels with him, one last time, he's using not only the name that Voldemort had chosen for himself, but also the name that practically nobody but Dumbledore has ever used when referring to him, Tom Riddle. His human name, his not-Lord-ish name, the human part he tried to leave behind, to change and distort. That little crying child in the King's Cross that's in Harry's head. And that was a simple name that had no magical power or spell attached to it. But that was the thing that held the most power over Voldemort, in a way. Because of the power that he gave to it, himself.

But, no, wait, I'm running forwards too quickly. I'm still just at the very beginning of the book, not already at the end, when it comes to those circles, and there are already so many of them. I mean, the whole scene of leaving the Dursleys for the last time was such a lovely circle closed with Harry first arriving there, almost sixteen years earlier, as a baby.

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First of all, of course, the way he arrived and left - the motorcycle (Sirius's), driven by Hagrid. He was but a helpless baby, unable to do anything but being loved by his parents, pretty much, and surviving thanks to all that, when he first arrived, a little bundle in Hagrid's huge hands. When he left, he had so many friends with him, he has learned so much, had done already so much, but he didn't leave on a broom, like the celebrated Seeker that he was, or on a thestral, which he was one of the few who could see, suffering loss of loved ones in front of his eyes. He left just like he has arrived, in Hagrid's protection, inside Sirius's motorcycle. Still protected by that same love.

And even losing Hedwig (which was, and I'm probably the seventeenth-thousand person to point that out, the point in which I thought that all the bets are off, and JKR is really serious about taking this book to wherever she wanted to, whatever the price), even this fit into that circle. When he first left the Dursleys with Hagrid, it was just the both of them. Hagrid got him Hedwig at Diagon Alley, right? So when leaving for he last time, it's again just the two of them. All the circumstances around them are so completely different, of course, which is sort of what I meant by "spiral", the circle doesn't close at the same point it had begun, but still.

And so many plot points, both significant as well as less so, were carried away from former books! I mean, even the duel between Dumbledore and Grindelwald was already mentioned in "Philosopher's Stone", in the chocolate frog card describing Dumbledore, in the same card that contained the information on Flamel that Harry, Ron and Hermione were searching for most of that book. It had not just one important point, but two. And it wasn't just important plot-wise, but also meaning-wise, with death being the next stage in life, and adventure in and of itself, not just the thing to fear from and try to run away from, as Voldemort saw it. Flamel chose death, and was pretty much the first to show that, way before any Hallows were part of the game.

Oh, and Gringotts, of course. The first visit to Diagon Alley had Harry there, with a breaking-in (that failed), a goblin and a treasure that only those who knew about its existence knew that it was so. This time, with the addition of a dragon (though not named Norbert), the very same goblin (though from the complete opposite side), and a success in attempting to rob the place. How would the 11-years-old Harry have opened his eyes in amazement, had he known what he himself would have done at that same place.

And even stuff like the ghosts, which seemed to only be there for fun and for making Hogwarts seem cooler and messier, had their place, plot-wise as well as meaning-wise, in this closing of the circle. The Bloody Baron's bloodiness was finally explained, their connection to Hogwarts and why they haunted that specific place (and not gone over, just like Sirius, and Harry even used those same words regarding Dumbledore, too, in this book!), and even how they could fit it all to the story.

And it was lovely, in my eyes, because just like the ghosts, and Dumbledore's wand, and the diadem that everybody thought had been lost, all these things have been right there, *right there* all along, sometimes while some of the characters were desperately looking for them, waiting to be discovered, to have meaning thrust into them and the people behaving accordingly. Pretty much like Flamel's name in the very first book, like Scabbers in "Prisoner of Azkaban".

I practically jumped when they mentioned the diadem in the Room of Requirement, because I remembered Harry using those old bits-and-ends in order to point at the place he hid his book. He and Dumbledore were looking so desperately for Horcruxes at the time, right then, and he had one in his hand, and never even realized that. That same blind stop that Voldemort had, that Dumbledore admitted at having, was there for Harry, too. Nobody cal escape their own weaknesses and blind spots? I guess. But still, when it mattered, it wasn't overlooked for being old and musty. It wasn't considered to be this great beautiful sparkling thing. It was found, where it was waiting.

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Oh, and also the invisibility cloak, which was Harry's from pretty much the start, and its mystery was solved at last in "Deathly Hallows", and closed the circle, but in such a different place than where it began, as a fun mischief toy, like the Marauder's map, not like the secret part-of-three weapon that legends were told about. And it was not only right there all along, it was being used and appreciated and not-ignored, and still not fully grasped. So, again, the things that are under our noses, which we sometimes fail to see? The importance of the thing being what you see in it? I don't know. But I love how it is so for the readers, just as it is for the characters, and I love it that I have it circle in my head.

And the Chamber of Secrets. It waited ever since the book with that name, with that horrid Basilisk corpse inside, with its teeth and its poison, and when it was needed again, they got inside. And this time it wasn't Ginny, who suffered so much through that book, or Harry who tried to save her, but two characters who weren't there in the first place, Ron and Hermione. So the circle was closed, but a bit differently. Plus, this time, Ron's good ear to his friend made it possible for him to open the Chamber, without him. Again, the circle closed, but differently.

And speaking of "Chamber of Secrets", it's also there with the sword in the Sorting Hat. The sword played such an important part all throughout the book, with the fake and the attempted stealing and the doe patronus and Ron using it to destroy the locket and the deal with the goblin, that it was easy to nearly forget how it first showed up in the Chamber of Secrets. But then, when Neville (And who would have believed, in their second year, that it could be him?) needed this help, the sword emerged from the hat and was used to kill the snake, the other snake, not the Basilisk, but still. And, of course, yay Neville!

And if I'm already yay-ing Neville, can I please mention that ever since the very first book (in, why, yes, another circle), in which Dumbledore gave the house cup to Gryffindor due to Neville's acts (all the others, Harry, Ron and Hermione, only got them to a tie with Slytherin), it was lovely to see how not only readers cheered for him, but he started to let himself cheer himself, too. And what a wonderful way for him to shine! Join the group of people who destroyed the Horcruxes (Harry, Dumbledore, Ron, Hermione, and, well, Crabb setting the fire and Voldemort sort-of-killing Harry), in that desperate hour, trust his friend above questions, attempt to fight no matter how all-lost things seemed - oh, no wonder the sword leaped to his hand, from wherever the goblin was trying to hide it.

Ahem. Where was I? Oh, yes.

In the "Prisoner of Azkaban", a large part of the final showdown took place in the Shrieking Shack, where Snape almost died as a teenager, where James saved him, where the Marauders met and helped Lupin and went to run around. And that's where, in "Deathly Hallows", Snape found his death. Nothing heroic or through-a-duel or anything of the sort. It wasn't even a wizard who killed him directly, it was an animal. Like the werewolf that Lupin was, it wasn't a regular animal, it actually had part of Voldemort inside, but still.

And instead of James saving him this time, it was Harry's other parent, Lily, whose eyes were just like Harry's, that Snape saw (why, yes, I teared up quite a bit). And she - or rather, her son - couldn't save him then. The circle that opened all those years ago closed, but in a different way, because Snape got to complete one last task, got to close a circle of his own, the one that Dumbledore entrusted him with, and give enough memories to Harry for him to realize what he had to do in order to win, for them all.

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And, yes, that last piece of information was, indeed, Harry's unavoidable and upcoming need to die. Despite all that Snape worked for, keeping Lily's son alive, having her patronus as his own (I *knew* it was him when the patronus was a doe! It had to be him, because of the doe, because who else could have a patronus that so reminded Of Harry's and James's? Ginny, perhaps, if she wasn't underage and therefore unable to perform magic outside of school, so who else?). Poor unkind, not-nice, never-having-a-place-of-his-own Snape. I loved it so much, that he was so flawed, so troubled, so wrong - and yet so brave, so loving, so loyal.

Yes, I teared up again, OK? Those were such touching moments! Snape's worst memory, of calling Lily a mudblood (not being tortured and mocked with spells on his own invention! Hurting his true friend's feelings), and how he carried that pain inside, unable to correct things, unable to make Lily like him again, trying to go at wrong paths in attempting to get her love back, paths that Voldemort couldn't understand, and yet used to his own means.

And then, the circle closed - that old headmaster in the portrait, while trying to help Dumbledore and the Order, called Hermione a mudblood, and Snape forbade him to use that name. He had Lily's doe as a patronus, and her emotional response as his guide, trying to not repeat past mistakes. It didn't make him nice or kind or any sort of person who would fit anywhere, who would be able to find his place among the people whom he fought so hard to save. But it did make a difference. He did save Lily's son. And even though he died, in that lonely shack, knowing he had failed, knowing that even if he had succeeded, it would still mean failure at his personal mission, he didn't recoil, didn't stop, didn't run. Poor flawed hero, with his greasy hair.

To those who have read so far (goodness, it's getting long), I'll try to be a bit less of a sap, OK? I can't promise it'll work, though.

No, wait, I can't. I need to sap you up a bit more, with Wormtail. How he died through his own hand, the one that Voldemort gave him, because of the exact opposite, in a way, the second of mercy that he showed Harry, the act of mercy that Harry had shown him, sparing his life, several books ago. Nobody seemed to think much of Wormtail, no big talents other than fear and betrayal, and yet, it was that second of mercy that was so important in saving Harry and the others, in the whole process that led to their victory. He closed a circle, too. It was one of pain and evil deeds, but, in a way, of some redemption. He wasn't all evil, all selfish, when he died. In my book, it means a thing.

Oh, and the Deluminator. For me, personally, it was a wonderful return. The minute I knew I'm in love with the "Harry Potter" books, that JKR had me (not unlike Wash dubbing the dinosaurs in "Firefly"), was the moment Dumbledore used the Deluminator to collect the lights from the street lamps, the night they brought the baby Harry to the Dursleys. That was it. I'm not sure I can explain how come, maybe it was just the image, maybe I'm partial to street lamps ever since the Narnia books, I don't know. I only know that reading that description, for the first time, before the books were what they are today, I knew that I would stick with Harry to the end. And that was even before I knew who Harry was!

So I was so pleased that it made another appearance, and I was so pleased that it wasn't just a fancy way to click light on and off, but indeed in possession of a guiding light, of showing the way. And as I am one of those who loved Ron from pretty much the moment he was introduced, the young not-noteworthy sibling, with his long nose, with the lack of a famous scar, an invisibility cloak, a superior brain or any other standing-out talent that any of his friends had, he had instead a real horde of inner demons to battle.

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( continues...) Ever since the mirror of Erised (I don't seem to be able to let that mirror go, now, do I? I keep returning to it), in which he saw himself alone and special, the dreams he could never live up to, he had to fight his own self doubts and fears. As a Keeper, it was his own fears and disbelief of himself that made him play badly. In past years, it was his own feelings of jealousy and inadequacy that made him pick fights with Harry and/or Hermione, that made him hurt. So, yeah, Harry may have beaten Voldemort (and parts of himself), but Ron really won one of the hardest battles there are, didn't he? An inner one.

And the fact that he is such an open-hearted person, and I wish there were an Hebrew expression for "wearing his heart on his sleeve", because that's exactly what he is, in my eyes, the sort of person who doesn't hide, doesn't sneak, doesn't lead people on. In a way, while Harry has the hot-headedness and some arrogance that are similar to Voldemort's, the person who is the full opposite is Ron. And, yeah, it brings me back to those triangles which fascinated me so in the former book, with Ron at one side, Voldemort at the other, and Harry in the middle, so the whole geometry is getting messy and complicated, but still.

I mean, they're opposites even in the way they grew up, Ron with his loving - sometimes too smothering - family, always playing tricks on him, always having his back. He never could even think about not having a safe haven, a place to go back to. In fact, the one time he couldn't simply go home was when he was under Voldemort's locket's influence, which brought out the worse in him, and still he didn't dare to face most of his family, and went to Bill, who probably understood, instead. He is the opposite of Voldemort's solitude, the opposite of his depending on his brain and talent (with insecurities, yes, but still). And yet, the most susceptible to the locket and to Voldemort's whispers in his fears.

And, frankly, I think it's because those whispers were about his own fears and worries, not any outside thing. He didn't fight Voldemort with the sword. The thrusting of the sword was the result of him winning the fight. He fought his own fears and doubts and thoughts of being not-good-enough and of needing from others emotions he thought they couldn't give him. But he chose to trust Harry, to trust what he wanted to be true, what he didn't even dare to hope to be true (Harry had to comfort him later and tell him), and ignore the images that Voldemort played with, from his mind.

And he did. All throughout the seven books (hey, circles closing again!), he fought those inner demons. He is probably going to fight them all his life, especially that he's continuing to be friends with Harry, let alone Hermione, and love them for the great things they are capable of doing. And in managing to thrust the sword, he did something that he tried to do for around seven years. Not only Harry got to have a final duel, having parts of himself and parts of his enemy intermingled, but Ron, too. And with him, it was all inside himself, no wands and lore and magic involved, and still.

And I loved it that Harry learned from the past, too, and told Ron that he is the one who should destroy the locket, that he is the one with the sword, the true Gryffindor, who should fulfill the task. And not just because of the lovely way that each Horcrux was destroyed by somebody else, but because it does show that Harry, too, grew up in the books, that he, too, learned about Ron's inner demons and how difficult that battle can be. And in letting Ron win this, in helping Ron win this, he won something, himself. Lovely.

And he changed even more. Not just because of the silly little compliments book, but also because he really looked at others before himself - that wife of the poor Ministry guy that he was disguised as, and, of course, the house-elves. He really thought about them, not because some "how to treat girls" book told him to, but because he was that kind of person. Or, rather, was able to fear less for himself, enough to have room for those emotions and thoughts. Oh, and yes, of course, I loved the kiss between him and Hermione, and how lovely it is that she, eventually, jumped on him, took the initiative, and didn't really care, for a single moment, about plans and thinking-ahead and all that.

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Oh, and of course, the house-elves themselves. I mean, sap that I am, I cried when Dobby, poor Dobby, annoying and loyal and loving and free, sacrificed himself, buried with clothes and socks and a hat. Probably *because* he was so annoying at times, not in spite of it, because he was who he was, and that sort of character (yeah, fictional, I know) you couldn't like, but couldn't, at the bottom line, not care about (Hmm, and now I'm thinking about Snape, again. With completely different shortcomings, but still). Oh, and of course, Kreacher, who finally had somebody be nice to him, caring and thoughtful, and how he managed to show his gratitude, attacking along with the other elves. I'm so glad that the elves managed to be more than just important plot-points. I wonder if Winky has an house-Elvish equivalent of AA, poor thing.

And, of course, the circles closing for Harry, Voldemort and Dumbledore. The spirals, the reflections, the slight differences. Between themselves, who they used to be as children, who they wanted to grow up to be, what they wanted to do and how they chose to do it.

Even, again, in a technical detail, of Harry being appointed Ted Lupin's godfather, there's of course a circle being closed and a new one, a different-yet-similar one, being created alongside it. The minute that Remus asked Harry to be the godfather of his son, I was both glad that all is OK between them, and heartbroken, because I figured that it means the deaths of Remus and Tonks. I did shed a tear at that scene, because, newsflash, I'm a horrible sap, and there are a few things that sap me more than new babies and their joy, but I also was afraid, ever since that moment, for the life of little Ted's parents. And, yes, he had a grandmother (Hello, Neville!) and a godfather who was *there*, who could provide him with all the love and strength and feeling of home and support that he needed, closing the circle in a completely different place, but still. I wasn't even surprised when they did die, because I waited for it for a few hundred pages already.

Unlike Fred, whose death made me close the book for a few minutes and go do other things (which needed to be done anyway, I have to say, and suffered a too-long waiting because of the reading, but still. I didn't think the twins were safe from harm when George lost his ear, I was wondering who will be lost, I wasn't surprised. I was just heartbroken for Mr. And Mrs. Weasly, and especially for George. I wasn't in the middle of a fight, so I wanted to give him that minute that Harry and the others couldn't, before going on.

Yeah, a fictional character, me a sap, taking this very personally, but you know, just like Dumbledore said, in what may be one of my most favorite story-about-a-story phrases already, the fact that they only exist in my head doesn't make them not real, you know?

So, yeah, circles and reflections. For example, from the previous book, but explained in this one - Dumbledore's death. It was brought on by his own weakness (much like Voldemort's, as is emphasized several times in the book), his passion for the Hallows, his hope to get his sister and make his family whole again. He put on the ring, he gave in to that wild hope, he failed, and that, more than anything else, was what led to his death. Indirectly, yes, but inevitable, all the same.

But unlike Voldemort, he could take that failure, that giving-in to the weakness, and turn it into something else, something better, something that could lead to strength and love and victory. He had to put his trust in Snape for that (and, no, I won't throw all the large paragraphs I threw about trust and its important, to me, in the "Harry Potter" books, like I did last time. Well, no, there's one more thing I wanna say, in just a minute, but that's that. Honest). He had to plan and die, but still.

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And Voldemort's death, by his own curse (even though Harry used two of the unforgivable curses, he never used the worst one of them all), due to his own efforts to try to win, against Harry's most "obvious" and expected-from-him spell (like Lupin warned him in the beginning), the first dueling spell he has ever learned, IIRC.

Was it Voldemort's arrogance that finally beat him? His over-confidence? His too strong attempts for the one final thing, the killing curse, that backfired on him? Was it like with the prophecy, only in reverse - his own attempts to destroy the baby created Harry as his opponent, his own attempt to finish Harry once and for all went back on him and finished him?

So in a way, he finished in that last duel, which took place at the very end of the last book, the duel that began before the beginning of the very first one. So much happened along the way, so many changes and developments, in plots and characters. Horcruxes and Hallows and families and friends and love and loss. And the circle came back exactly to the same point. And a completely different one.

I mean, even in the motherly love thread there was a circle being closed, different yet whole. On the first round, Harry was saved due to his mother's love, her protection. And now, when Voldemort hit him with the killing curse, in the forest, he was saved, again, due to all the clever plot points and characters' good qualities and Voldemort's lack of notice of important things. But not just that.

There was another mother, who checked if his heart was beating. He could just as easily have been killed by sword or somebody else's wand, if Narcissa had declared him alive. Nagini was not dead yet, so not all the Horcruxes were destroyed. All could have been lost. But she was too worried about her beloved son, to really care about anything else. And it was her love, the deepest of her loyalties, that protected Harry, in the most technical magic-less sense, until they got to the school, and Neville killed Nagini, and he could finally duel Voldemort.

And that scene in the forest (why, yes, how on earth did you guess I was reading it through tears? It's as if you know my sappiness, or something), it was such a lovely heart-breaking reflection to the first time Harry, as a baby, faced Voldemort. He was trying to do for his friends and loved ones the exact same thing that his mother did for him, all those years ago. Of his own free will, just like her, not for any means of "and this will be a clever trick to help us all". He walked to his death, in order to protect the ones he loved, and he knew that this was the only thing he could give them, and even his failure may help. Just like Lily.

And, yes, Lily died doing this, and Harry, at the bottom line, survived. But he had no way on knowing that! He was sure he was going to die, die for the people who tried to fight with him and protect him and love him, die for the people who - like Voldemort said in contempt and attempts to scare him, but they did it with pride, of their own choice, exactly the thing he couldn't understand - chose to sacrifice themselves for him.

And so his use of the Resurrection stone was both lovely and heart-breaking at the same time. It was just like he said - he didn't bring the dead back to life, in order to try to make them live again. He used the stone in reverse, in order to have them accompany him to their midst. Not what Dumbledore was trying to do with it - he didn't have his remorse, his pain. Harry's pain a nd longings were different. Yes, he probably felt that it was his fault that they were dead, but in a different way. And he managed to use the stone of resurrection in a way that took him to his death, rather than its original purpose. He took the circle and undid it, made it a different line altogether.

He was sure he was going to die, to join them, not have them join him. And in a way, that's what gave him comfort, enough strength to actually do what he was trying to do, that thing that Voldemort could never understand. That thing that took so much courage, so much selflessness, so much love. Oh, man, I think my computer screen is making a electronic face of "that sappy stuff again?" at me.

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And then, he got to choose whether to live or die, in the King's Cross chapter. King's Cross being the place between life and death in Harry's head, just like the real train station was the place for him between the Muggles and the wizards' world. And the places where the books started and ended, for so long. He chose to live. He chose life as the *harder* option of the two, the one with pain and fighting and the possibility of failure and lack of peace. So in another reflection and circle closing, he was neither dead nor alive, like Voldemort was for most of the books, but in a completely opposite way. And he chose what Voldemort tried to create for himself all along. But he could only do this through his willingness to die, and only through the hardships of life, not the fear of death. The acceptance of them both.

And in a heartbreaking image (and, oh, JKR is such a master of those images. She does what resonates most with me, in books - creates these powerful vivid can't-get-out-of-my-head images, that speak with something that isn't words or music or anything that I can explain, just live in my head and - oh, I'm not even going to try. I don't know to use words cleverly enough to express myself. It's not the English, of course. It's me). That baby, without skin, completely open to the world (the exact opposite of what Voldemort was trying to do all that time), feeling all the pain and the suffering. And can't be consoled. Voldemort refused to get any sort of comfort, of human connection, of love. And now he's bound to shiver, unable to receive any of those, anything that can help him, for all time. He got exactly what he fought so hard to get, what he sealed himself so tightly to enable, and that exactly in his punishment.

Oh, and in another circle closing, that child, or baby, crying all alone in a deserted train station, was a reflection of another baby, left alone at his parent's ruined house, crying and seemingly unprotected. Of course, they're as opposite as they can be, because Harry was protected exactly by being left alone, with his mother's sacrifice, and Voldemort was the one who cut, himself, all his cords to the world, but still. And, oh, that image. Sigh.

Oh, and it reminds me of something else I really liked about the whole series, which was especially noreworthy in this book: how it was not like the classics, in the old-and-wise-guys sense. We never knew Gandalf's past, he was able to resist all temptations (even by asking Frodo not to test him, but still). Aslan was never a cub, never made any mistakes, and when he sacrificed himself, unlike Harry, he had a notion of what may happen. And yet, we got the teenaged Dumbledore, he made mistakes, he was arrogant, he carried his weakness to his old age, to the time in which we already knew him and saw him, just like Harry, as that pillar of wisdom and strength. And he, too, was human.

So, yeah, he managed to take his flaw and failed hope and use it for the greater good, he managed to choose, much like Harry did, Horcruxes upon Hallows, to try and have the Elder Wand rest, to beat his old friend and spare his life and enable him to try and make amends. But he was still flawed, and they were still mistakes.

He had that younger brother who seemed the lesser man and turned out to not only save the day and be a great source of help, a soldier in that same fight, but also the one who understood from the start what the brilliant Albus had to practically die in order to learn. Not only wasn't Dumbledore perfect, he also failed to see what was right in front of his eyes, what his brother told him all along.

And it wasn't just in the character of Dumbledore, who in the earlier books appeared as this great white figure, to save Harry when he needed, to save the day. It's not just this growing-up of finding out that the other grown-ups around us are people justlike us, with practically very similar flaws and aches, who can't, sometimes, make it all better with a flick of a wand (it reminds me of the end of the Prydain series, its first book and its last one, and how it was all so very different for Taran, just like it was for Harry).

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It happened with the stories themselves, in this book. Already in "Chamber of Secrets", with the chamber itself, and in "Prisoner of Azkaban", with the story of what Sirius did or didn't do, but mostly in "Deathly Hallows". The way secrets and legends from the past, from books and songs and myth, become not just real, with objects that people can touch and use, but also create new legends, in their turn, Harry's and Ron's and Hermione's. And I don't just mean the legends that we read and that I babble about for what I'm afraid to look back and see how long.

I mean the legends inside the story. The way things that are supposed to be merely ideas and far-off and inspiring become actual objects to hold and actual wands to break their strengths and actual stones that may be used to bring back the dead, bring them wrong, and break your heart, or change their purpose. The stories develop, unfold and change themselves, and this time without the veil of mystery and distance of the past. A different awe? I'm not sure, yet again, that I manage to explain myself. Oh, well.

Um, and if I may be so bold and refer to something that *I* personally wanted to find in the book, the trust that Harry would have to put in a person, the way of Dumbledore, that appeal to the best of a person, to believing that they can, indeed, act upon that best, regardless of the worst that is consuming them. I hoped that Harry would have to trust Snape. But in the book, it was so much better than this. JKR took this point and raised it, in my eyes, to a whole different level.

She didn't make Harry choose whether to trust Snape. She made Harry choose whether to trust Dumbledore. Which was brilliant! Taking the one character who had his faith without any reservations - Harry led "Dumbledore's Army" in "Order of the Phoenix", he kept saying how he's Dumbledore's man, through and through, and then, to crack this faith, to take the idol down, to make him human - not just as a teenager, Harry's age (as Harry kept repeating), but as the old, wise, father-figure he has been to Harry all these years.

And Harry really had to struggle with this inner conflict. He didn't have definite answers - and he didn't have them when he decided, too. He chose to *trust*, not to take a clear path of proof. He kept wishing for a final way of reassuring himself, kept not finding one. And still, he chose. Just like Dumbledore himself, in a way. Just like people not-in-stories have to do, all the time.

Oh, and my heart froze, for a minute, when Dumbledore was talking so matter-of-fact-ly with Snape regarding Harry's inevitable death. Was he so cold-hearted? Was he just keeping this boy alive as a weapon, as a tool, as something that needed to be killed at a specific moment and not beforehand? Frankly, I don't believe it. And if that makes me a naive fool who chooses to put her faith in somebody who doesn't deserve it (yeah, fictional, I know), then so be it. Just like he taught, I rather trust somebody's best qualities, rather than turn to their worst.

Just like Harry choosing (there's that word again) his own death, which was what made all the difference, sometimes it's not the act itself that matters, but what's behind it. And I don't believe that what was behind all of Dumbledore's acts towards Harry was a cold-blooded calculation. I think he loved the boy, and the man he became. I think he really wanted to prevent all harm from him. I think he made mistakes (he himself was sorry for them, talked about them), but I also think that he meant all the possible well he could.

Even if he sounded so matter-of-factly cold when talking to Snape, it might have been out of the personality that Snape showed him (Dumbledore wasn't sure, himself, how strong Snape's love to Lily was, after all these years), to the language he had thought that Snape would listen to, would understand. I don't care if it sounds like excuses. I'm sure that Dumbledore was broken by the inevitability to sacrifice Harry, was trying to do his best to make sure that things wouldn't turn out with Harry's death. And, hey, it worked. He found the loop-hole, and he and Harry managed to have it happen, too. The best in both of them.

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