I’ve made only a little progress since my last Harry Potter speculations. Still believe I’m onto something with the theory that Harry’s mother, Lily, did something, used a potion to protect him. Believe she made him/his scar a horcrux, which made him invulnerable to Voldemort’s killing curse. To do that, my hunch is, she marked his forehead with a potion … a horcrux-priming formula I’m guessing she found out from Severus Snape. Who else was close enough to Voldemort to know? Slughorn didn’t seem to know the secret. Of course, it’s possible a great potions student like Lily could have figured it out.

So there are at least two potions to figure out: (1) What marks an object to become a horcrux? (2) How do you destroy a horcrux?

The second one is easier. Harry destroyed one, Dumbledore did too. To destroy Tom Riddle’s diary, Harry used the fang of a basilisk, which I mistakenly thought was a kind of snake. Actually it’s a kind of dragon. That fang also had Harry’s blood on it, and the diary, carried by the Phoenix Fawkes, maybe have had the enchanted bird’s tears, which healed Harry’s wound. Venom, blood and tears. But remember Voldemort’s withered, injured hand? He said something about a powerful curse — maybe he didn’t get it right. Or, maybe, it wasn’t the curse that got his hand, as this idea suggests:

Isn’t it on Dumbledore’s card that he discovered the twelve uses for Dragon’s Blood? Isn’t dragon’s blood some kind of symbol of Christ or purity or something? Well … what if one of these uses has to do with destroying horcruxes? Think about it. Dumbledore’s injured arm is blackened, as though it had been burned. … What does Sluggy use to disguise his own death? Dragon’s blood. (See original context.)

Dragon’s tooth or venom or blood. Seems to be a key ingredient. (Note that if Dumbledore was fatally wounded, Snape just hastened the inevitable — consistent with the idea that Snape’s a good out to deceive the Dark Lord.)

But what about tears? While they could be a key component for destroying a horcrux (that extra ingredient as called for in Gringalott’s Third Law), it doesn’t make sense, contrary to what I earlier speculated, that tears were part of the potion that created the horcrux scar. No, Voldemort coming up with tears? Well, maybe the victim’s tears. But do all victims cry? Sounds too iffy. More likely it involves the victim’s blood. The “love” that protected Harry for all these years was his mother’s sacrifice of her life, which created the scar horcrux (after she’d marked him with her blood), protecting Harry from the killing curse.

But wait. The house at Godric’s Hollow, where baby and his parents lived, was destroyed, and then Hagrid shows up to save Harry. That’s the sketchy mystery we were told. Some speculate the backfiring curse destroyed the place. But how about this theory: It was a dragon … and who better to bring it than Hagrid? Lily needed dragon’s blood to mark Harry to become a horcrux … and the dragon destroyed the house, before Voldemort arrived. Hagrid knew where to find Harry, because he sent/brought the dragon.

Can an ingredient be used to create and destroy the same thing?

Two more questions about Harry’s protection: Did it somehow change when Voldemort took a potion containing Harry’s blood? And why does staying with Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia protect Harry? Until taking that potion, Voldemort couldn’t bear to touch Harry. Afterward he could. When told this, Dumbledore had a much-discussed look of “triumph” come over his face … after which he felt weary once again. This suggests Voldemort didn’t just revive himself, he somehow made himself more vulnerable. Wait … 

What if dragon’s blood does both create and destroy a horcrux? Suppose, (a) dragon’s blood was given to Harry as part of the horcrux-creating potion, and (b) dragon’s blood is also used to destroy horcruxes, including the original piece of the horcrux-maker’s soul. Could it be then that in taking Harry’s blood, Voldemort was also taking dragon’s blood? Sounds far-fetched, since this is more than a dozen years later. How much dragon’s blood could Harry still have in his system? But wait again … didn’t Dumbledore say that Harry got some special protection by living with his aunt and uncle? Could it be that Aunt Petunia has been slipping Harry special potions under Dumbledore’s orders, and that these potions contained dragon’s blood?

We know unicorn blood kept Voldemort alive. Could dragon’s blood have played a role in protecting Harry his whole life?

If so, no wonder Dumbledore had that fleeting look of triumph. The toughest ingredient to get — dragon’s blood — was already in Voldemort’s veins. (Maybe it’s tough stuff to get rid off … has very long-lasting effects.) Then all Harry would need to do is find and destroy the rest of the horcruxes, then use tears or venom or whatever to finish the job.

Weird, but kinda cool. If true. 

Of course, maybe just Harry’s blood was enough, since it was on the basilisk tooth that destroyed the horcrux diary.

Still, no wonder Dumbledore then gets weary. So much work remained to do, including finding and destroying a bunch of horcruxes.

So that’s the idea: A dragon destroyed the house at Godric’s Hollow … just as a dragon hurt Dumbledore’s hand … maybe Aunt Petunia has been slipping Harry some kind of dragon’s blood brew … and maybe dragon’s blood was transferred from Harry to Voldemort, making him more vulnerable. Protected by some ancient magic, indeed. What’s more ancient than dragons?