Chapter Eighteen: Birthday Surprises
In chapter eighteen of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Harry saves Ron’s life and more importantly, saves him from publicly declaring eternal love to Romilda Vane on his birthday.
(Please be advised that this is a reread and I will be discussing book and movie spoilers.)
Hermione can’t find any information about Horcruxes, except that it is deemed the most evil of all magical elements which…really? REALLY? What is it about Horcruxes we don’t know? Yes committing murder to split your soul to be immortal is evil. But the MOST evil of magic? You’re telling me there’s no spell that commits mass murder? What is it about Horcruxes that we don’t know?
Speaking of Hermz, she’s being a bit smug and insufferable about Harry not being able to use the Prince’s tips in potions which is dumb and petty, since Harry doing well in potions is directly related to Slughorn, the man he needs to manipulate, liking him.
Snape makes me laugh, which has maybe never happened before or after, but “just shove a bezoar down their throats” is fucking funny, and perhaps our only glimpse as to why Lily puts up with this jerk as a friend since it comes from his teen angst emo era. Or as Snape likes to call it, his entire life’s era. Tell me Snape is not a thirty-six year old emo teenager!
Sassy!Harry delights Slughorn by smugly holding out a bezoar while Hermione plots everyone’s death in the room. Ron and Hermz are salty as a hamster salt lick about this trick of Harry’s, who uses Slughorn’s good humor to be like “soooo remember how you told TRidz something evil? Want to tell me that evil thing too, eh?” Shockingly, this subtle attempt at manipulation fails like Snape trying to wash the oil out of his hair and Slughorn flees, leaving a trail of crystallized pineapple footprints in his wake.
We get a look at Apparition and Malfoy being sketchy (don’t take a shot every time this happens with Malfoy, you’ll die five chapters in or so) and Harry starts stalking D-Malfs on the map. Really, the thing that should’ve convinced everyone that Harry was right about Malfoy is that Malfoy doesn’t seem to care about Harry’s activities at all this book. Malfoy. MALFOY! The dude who’s spent five years practically tattooing “I hate Harry Potter” on his own ass he’s so obsessed with him.
So Ron eats Harry’s spiked chocolates from Romilda Vane who apparently doesn’t get in trouble for DRUGGING A CLASSMATE WITH A LOVE POTION yet being out of bed gets you a death detention from McG. Oh Hogwarts discipline! Never change!
Ron loses his shit over Romilda Vane, punches Harry, and tells Lav Lav to get stuffed on the way to getting dragged to Sluggy’s office. Slughorn mixes up an antidote, but offers his 16 and 17 year old students alcohol early in the morning and wow is that wild to me. Most of the time the British-ness of the books doesn’t shock me, but this casual underage morning drinking with professors is NUTS.
Ron drinks the poisoned alcohol and Harry makes like emo teenage Snape and shoves a bezoar down his throat to save him while Slughorn does his best Ron impression.
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Why is the Horcrux the most wicked of magical things?
Why is Hermione so mad at Harry using the Half-Blood Prince’s book to manipulate Slughorn?
Why doesn’t anyone punish Romilda Vane?
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