The first to rise...

[secret seeker]

O.K. hello everyone, been a while.


Let us start off with this passage, im sure your all familiar with...

" I dare not, Headmaster! If I join the table, we shall be thirteen! Nothing could be more unlucky! Never forget that when thirteen dine together, the first to rise will be the first to die!"

" We'll risk it, Sybill," said Proffessor McGonagall impatiently.

Pg 169 H.p. & t.P.o.A.

Now let me start off also by noting that I found the words " Never forget " curious. J.k. Rowling could have just used " When " instead, right?. But she didn't.

At first we are led to believe this is self- fullfilling nonsense, from an unreliable source, namely, Sybill Trelawney. Neither Harry, nor Ron, who were both equally first to rise from the table have died yet.

However, what if it was a hint of a hint?, one clue to figure out an answer from another clue?. A clue so well hidden, you would have to have the first ( the passage above ) to find the second, to get your answer.


The answer being who will die out of the major characters left?....


So then, let's scrutinize the book's to see if we can find a scenario that may help.

Let's move on nearly 2 years in time to the beginning of O.o.T.P., when Harry arrives at Grimmauld place, the Heart of the Order of the Pheonix.

Here we have 13 people dining, before the trip to Hogwarts, they are;

1. Harry potter
2. Ron weasley
3. Hermione granger
4. Ginny weasley
5. Fred weasley
6. George weasley
7. Bill weasley
8. Arthur weasley
9. Molly weasley
10. Sirius black
11. Remus lupin
12. Mundungus fletcher
13. Nymphadora tonks

This is all in chapter 5, O.o.T.P. Now, let's go over the passage's of interest:

" Three helpings of rhubarb crumble and custard later and the waistband on Harry's jeans was feeling uncomfortably tight.
As he laid down his spoon there was a lull in the general conversation;Mr weasley was leaning back in his chair, looking replete and relaxed; Tonks was yawning widely, her nose now back to normal; and Ginny, who had lured Crookshanks out from under the dresser, was sitting cross-legged on the floor, rolling Butterbeer corks for him to chase".

So the first person to rise is Ginny, right?, but loads of people have died, yet she hasn't?.
Wrong. J.k. Rowling is telling us that even though Ginny was the first to rise, we don't see her rise because she is exempt.

An attempt has already been made on Ginny's life in C.o.S., and I believe that J.k.Rowling is telling us that although she is 1 of the 13, she won't be the first to die.
( That's not to say Ginny will not face life threatening situations, just she will not lose her life, there's a difference. )

So out of the 12 left, who is the first to be actually written standing from the table?. It would have to be Sirius if you follow who died next. And he is.

"' Sirius started to rise from his chair.
'Molly, you're not the only person at this table who cares about Harry', said Lupin sharply. ' Sirius, sit down ' .
' Mrs Weasleys lower lip was trembling. Sirius sank slowly back into his chair, his face white.' "

Pg 86 O.o.T.P.

So O.k. then who's next?, Cedric died in book 4, but wasn't present, nor was Dumbledore at the table, so their deaths are not part of the thirteen, and not relevant to this theory.

Next then must be book seven?.... who's next to rise?.....

Read it for yourself and find out, or carry on reading,

" Mum, I want to hear!" wailed Ginny.
" NO! shouted Mrs Weasley, standing up, her eye's overbright, ' I absolutely forbid - '".

Pg 86 O.o.T.P.

" ....Lupin hurried off to the portrait to restore calm...."

Pg 87 O.o.T.P.

My conclusion being that Mrs Weasley and Lupin will both die in book seven.

Mrs Weasley will die trying to protect Ginny, or sacrifice herself for Ginny.
Lupin will die trying to save Harry? ( life anyway ).

I strongly advise reading chapter five in O.o.t.P. because although ther's not enough space here, loads of inconspicous things don't seem right anymore now. Just this chapter though.

Is this wild speculation?..... Thanks for reading.

" The meeting's over, you can come down and have dinner now.
Everyone's dying to see you, Harry......"

Pg 72 O.o.T.P.

[secret seeker]

49 Viewings, and not a single reply. Oh well.

[horcruxfinder]

ok...I'll take the bait and respond. Nothing worse than an unanswered post! I am intruiged by your theory Secret Seeker. As we all know JKR uses certain characters to do or convey to us certain things. For example, if she needs to convey info to us, she let's Hermione or DD do it as we will believe them. They are credible. Perhaps JKR uses Trelawny to reveal things but obfuscate the message and confuse us as she is described as an unreliable source. She has two prophesies that we know of that came true and in HBP was very distressed by "the cards" revealing disaster repeatedly and DD not believing her. So, three times she needed to be believed but overall, she is shown to us as a fraud. So, JKR may have used Trelawny here to tell us who is going to die with her "never forget" line knowing that we don't fully believe the things Trelawny tells us thereby hiding a clue as to who dies and who doesn't.

[Sirius Potter Fan]

I have no idea how I missed this one! This theory came up quite a while back before HBP came out, but now with the new information from HBP we can continue to discuss here.

First, Ginny is not necessarily exempt because she has already been saved from death in CoS, that could also be a bad thing. Sirius was also saved from death by Harry in PoA. As a matter of fact we have had a discussion on “borrowed” time a while back on here. Probably archived by now, but basically we discussed how Sirius was saved from death, only to die a few years later. DD was saved by Snape when he injured his hand, and died just a few months later (maybe). So we still have Ginny, Ron, Arthur, Katie Bell, Colin Creavy, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Hermionie, Dudley, and possibly a few others on “Borrowed” time,

Now, back to the “13 at the table” idea. I went back through the chapter as you suggested, and actually, it was Molly who actually rose from the table first, a few lines earlier . . .


Mrs. Weasley threw a very nasty look at Sirius before getting to her feet and
going to fetch a large rhubarb crumble


So we have a problem here, in deciding just what the rules are with “the first to rise” It was simple enough with the 13 in PoA because the house elves delivered the food and cleaned up, So when Harry and Ron rose together it was a clear “first” Did Mrs. Weasley’s rise count since she was just going to get dessert? Did Ginny’s count since it wasn’t actually mentioned? Or does Sirius’ count since we know he ended up dead later in the book but . . . that could have been because of the fore mentioned “borrowed” time.

If we take Trelawney’s superstition to heart, can we be certain that either Ron or Harry will indeed die? (We must keep in mind that the superstition stated that the first to rise would be the first to die, but did not say anything to suggest that the rest of those at the table would die in order of their rising.)

Actually, I think this interesting, in that these all may well have been intended specifically to give us some clues as to who JKR had planned on killing. But then again we have a bigger problem . . . JKR said a while back that a character that was supposed to die had been given a reprieve, but that two other characters that were previously going to survive were now to die. So . . . sadly this nearly negates all the clues we may find in our quest to discern who will live and die.

[secret seeker]

Thanks, you made good sense Sirius potter fan!.

[Alz]

I thought that 'sight' was sorted already - wasn't Sirius the first to rise and later on he died?
I am pretty sure that is what Sybil saw and it was played out in OoTP?