Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Chapter 24 Summary

How It All Goes Down

The Wandmaker

  • Harry's in shock; he feels like he's back at Hogwarts, kneeling beside Dumbledore's fallen body.
  • Bill, Fleur, Dean, and Luna come out to him. Everyone has arrived safely, including Ron and Hermione.
  • Harry wants to bury Dobby himself – properly, without magically digging the grave. As he digs, he feels finally feels like he's mastered the pain in his scar, and shut Voldemort out, just as Dumbledore always wanted him to. He goes over the events of the night in his mind as he digs – Voldemort's murder of Gregorovitch, Wormtail's terrible, unwilling suicide.
  • Ron and Dean come out and help Harry dig.
  • When the grave is dug, everyone comes out to say good-bye to Dobby. Luna, oddly enough, steps up to take care of things, addressing Dobby and thanking him for saving her.
  • Everyone offers Dobby their thanks. They bury the house-elf, and Harry lingers outside for a moment, and finds a smooth white stone to lay at the grave's head. On it he magically engraves "Here Lies Dobby, A Free Elf."
  • Everyone's inside talking through things. Bill brings them up to speed – the Death Eaters know that Ron is traveling with Harry, so all the Weasleys have become targets. Bill is moving to their Auntie Muriel's house, which is protected by the Fidelius Charm. Once Mr. Ollivander and Griphook recover from their injuries, they'll be moved there too.
  • Before that happens, though, Harry needs to talk to both of them.
  • Harry goes to wash his hands, mulling over the events of the last day. Whose blue eye had looked out of the mirror fragment – who had sent help? He thinks about Dumbledore, who seems to have known so much (he knew to give Ron the Deluminator, and he knew that Wormtail would help Harry someday)… what did he know about Harry?
  • Harry, Ron, and Hermione go to talk to Griphook. Before they can get down to business, he muses about Harry's unusual qualities.
  • Harry has a shocking statement: he needs to break into the Lestranges' Gringotts vault, and he needs Griphook's help. He swears that it isn't for personal gain – and Griphook tentatively believes him.
  • Side note: Harry has proved that he protects even non-humans, or, as Griphook says, non-"wand-carriers." There's apparently a lot of rivalry between the goblins and humans, both of whom hide their magical secrets from each other.
  • Griphook doesn't give them an answer, and instead says he needs to sleep. Harry takes the sword of Gryffindor with him as he, Ron, and Hermione leave the goblin to rest.
  • Harry feels sure that there's a Horcrux hidden in the Gringotts vault; he thinks that Voldemort, an outsider, would want to keep his treasures there, in the heart of the wizarding world, and that he would trust the Lestranges more than anyone else.
  • Next, they go see Mr. Ollivander. The old wandmaker is a wreck – he was imprisoned and tortured at Malfoy Manor for more than a year.
  • First, Harry asks if his holly and phoenix feather wand can possibly be repaired. It can't.
  • Then, he asks Mr. Ollivander to identify the two wands they stole from Malfoy Manor – one is Bellatrix Lestrange's, and the other's is Draco's. More precisely, it was Draco's… but depending on how it was taken from him, it might have changed its allegiance.

(Click the map infographic to download.)

  • Since Harry took the wand by force, it's now obedient to him. Same goes for Ron, who took Wormtail's wand.
  • Harry asks if all wands work the same way – for example, what about the legends of wands that, say, have passed from wizard to wizard by murder?...
  • Ollivander knows that Harry is on to him. He admits that he told Voldemort about the twin cores of their two original wands, but he simply doesn't understand why the holly and phoenix wand managed to snap Voldemort's borrowed wand.
  • Harry confronts Ollivander about the Elder Wand – he knows that Voldemort is after it, and wants to know what he knows.
  • Voldemort doesn't only want the Elder Wand to defeat Harry, according to Mr. Ollivander. He actually wants it to take over the world… muahahahaha!
  • Ollivander is certain that the Elder Wand (a.k.a. the Deathstick, a much more awesome name) really exists. He's the one who told Voldemort that Gregorovitch might have had it, under great duress – he was being tortured by the Cruciatus Curse and had to give in.

(Click the infographic to download.)

  • Harry, Ron, and Hermione thank Mr. Ollivander, and leave the old man to his conscience, then go to reevaluate.
  • So this is the deal – Gregorovitch had the Elder Wand a long time ago, but it was stolen, as we know, by the young, dashing Grindelwald. As Harry's talking through this, he can see Voldemort in his mind's eye at the gates of Hogwarts… (Shoot.)
  • Harry continues: Grindelwald used the Elder Wand to gain power, but Dumbledore conquered him and took the Elder Wand.
  • Harry struggles to stay with Ron and Hermione and not give in to his vision. He tells them that it's at Hogwarts, but it's too late to get it – Voldemort is there already.
  • Harry desperately tells Ron that Dumbledore didn't want him to have the Wand – he wanted Harry to find the Horcruxes instead. He succumbs to his vision.
  • We're seeing through Voldemort's eyes now. He's walking through the Hogwarts grounds with Snape, but then goes off by himself, magically hidden, to do something private.
  • Voldemort approaches the white, marble tomb of Albus Dumbledore: he opens the tomb, regards Dumbledore's corpse derisively for a moment, and takes the Elder Wand.