Seems like a fine time to share my speculations about yet unresolved easter eggs from the story. I’m not overly confident on either of those.
I present some hints first in case you want to try to think about it yourself.
The core (and power) of the Elder Wand
From chapter 122:
Harry took the Elder Wand out of his robes, gazed again at the dark-grey wood that Dumbledore had passed down to him. Harry had tried to think faster this time, he’d tried to complete the pattern implied by the Cloak of Invisibility and the Resurrection Stone. The Cloak of Invisibility had possessed the legendary power of hiding the wearer, and the hidden power of allowing the wearer to hide from Death itself in the form of Dementors. The Resurrection Stone had the legendary power of summoning an image of the dead, and then Voldemort had incorporated it into his horcrux system to allow his spirit to move freely. The second Deathly Hallow was a potential component of a system of true immortality that Cadmus Peverell had never completed, maybe due to his having ethics.
And then there was the third Deathly Hallow, the Elder Wand of Antioch Peverell, that legend said passed from wizard to stronger wizard, and made its holder invincible against ordinary attacks; that was the known and overt characteristic...
The Elder Wand that had belonged to Dumbledore, who’d been trying to prevent the Death of the world itself.
The purpose of the Elder Wand always going to the victor might be to find the strongest living wizard and empower them still further, in case there was any threat to their entire species; it could secretly be a tool to defeat Death in its form as the destroyer of worlds.
But if there was some higher power locked within the Elder Wand, it had not presented itself to Harry based on that guess. Harry had raised up the Elder Wand and spoken to it, named himself a descendant of Peverell who accepted his family’s quest; he’d promised the Elder Wand that he would do his best to save the world from Death, and take up Dumbledore’s duty. And the Elder Wand had answered no more strongly to his hand than before, refusing his attempt to jump ahead in the story. Maybe Harry needed to strike his first true blow against the Death of worlds before the Elder Wand would acknowledge him; as the heir of Ignotus Peverell had already defeated Death’s shadow, and the heir of Cadmus Peverell had already survived the Death of his body, when their respective Deathly Hallows had revealed their secrets.
At least Harry had managed to guess that, contrary to legend, the Elder Wand didn’t contain a core of ‘Thestral hair’. Harry had seen Thestrals, and they were skeletal horses with smooth skin and no visible mane on their skull-like heads, nor tufts on their bony tails. But what core was truly inside the Elder Wand, Harry hadn’t yet felt himself knowing; nor had he been able to find, anywhere on the Elder Wand, the circle-triangle-line of the Deathly Hallows that should have been present.
Previously in the Askaban arc, it was also mentioned that the sign of the Deathly Hallows on the invisibility cloak was drawn in thestral blood, binding in that part of the thestral’s power into the cloak, to make the the wearer as invisible to death’s shadow as thestrals are to the unknowing.
Suppose there’s some structure to it, try to fill out this table:
Invisibility Cloak
Thestral
Death’s shadow (=dementors)
Ressurection Stone
?
Personal Death
Elder Wand
?
maybe Death of Worlds (?)
My guess
Invisibility Cloak
Thestral
Death’s shadow (=dementors)
Ressurection Stone
Unicorn
Personal Death
Elder Wand
Centaur
Death of Worlds
So the second power of the Elder Wand may be some divination power. That would fit well to preventing the Death of Worlds, although it’s a bit unclean to have two explanations for Dumbledore’s divination power.
The true source of Dumbledore’s power
From chapter 86 (emphasis mine):
“The Hall of Prophecy,” Minerva whispered. She’d read about that place, said to be a great room of shelves filled with glowing orbs, one after another appearing over the years. Merlin himself had wrought it, it was said; the greatest wizard’s final slap to the face of Fate. Not all prophecies conduced to the good; and Merlin had wished for at least those spoken of in prophecy, to know what had been spoken of them. That was the respect Merlin had given to their free will, that Destiny might not control them from the outside, unwitting. Those mentioned within a prophecy would have an glowing orb float to their hand, and then hear the prophet’s true voice speaking. Others who tried to touch an orb, it was said, would be driven mad—or possibly just have their heads explode, the legends were unclear on this point. Whatever Merlin’s original intention, the Unspeakables hadn’t let anyone enter in centuries, so far as she’d heard. Works of the Ancient Wizards had stated that later Unspeakables had discovered that tipping off the subjects of prophecies could interfere with seers releasing whatever temporal pressures they released; and so the heirs of Merlin had sealed his Hall.
From chapter 119:
During the First Wizarding War, there came a time when I realised that Voldemort was winning, that he would soon hold all within his hand.
In that extremity, I went into the Department of Mysteries and I invoked a password which had never been spoken in the history of the Line of Merlin Unbroken, did a thing forbidden and yet not utterly forbidden.
I listened to every prophecy that had ever been recorded.
Confusion: Accessing the Hall of Prophecy doesn’t sound like sth that happened the first time in the history of the Line of Merlin Unbroken.
Notice: Dumbledore’s letter does not strictly say that the forbidden thing Dumbledore did was listening to all the prophecies. Those statements could refer to separate events.
Another useful excerpt from ch 80 (emphasis mine):
This is the Hall of the Wizengamot; there are older places, but they are hidden. Legend holds that the walls of dark stone were conjured, created, willed into existence by Merlin, when he gathered the most powerful wizards left in the world and awed them into accepting him as their chief. And when (the legend continues) the Seers continued to foretell that not enough had yet been done to prevent the end of the world and its magic, then (the story goes) Merlin sacrificed his life, and his wizardry, and his time, to lay in force the Interdict of Merlin.
From chapter 110:
“Distraction? ” roared Dumbledore, his sapphire eyes tight with fury. “You killed Master Flamel for a distraction? ”
Professor Quirrell looked dismayed. “I am wounded by the injustice of your accusation. I did not kill the one you know as Flamel. I simply commanded another to do so.”
“How could you? Even you, how could you? He was the library of all our lore! Secrets you have forever lost to wizardry! ”
Confusion: Dubledore seems a bit more magically powerful than Voldemort, so minus Elder Wand he should probably still be at least almost as powerful as Voldemort. Magical power comes mostly from lore, so if Dumbledore’s lore comes from Flamel, then it’s a bit surprising that Voldemort was able to just order someone to kill Flamel.
So how would you resolve those confusions given the hints I dropped here?
Last hint:
The method to trap objects or people in a timeless space in the mirror is called “Merlin’s method”.
My guess
Merlin trapped himself in the mirror. The forbidden password Dumbledore spoke allowed him to talk to Merlin through the mirror. Merlin gave Dumbledore additional lore to fight Voldemort. Voldemort has likely figured while he was trapped for 9 years.
(This also means that once Harry figures this out he can read the forbidden letter in the department of mysteries and use the technique to (at least temporarily) retrieve Dumbledore from the mirror. (Yeah I know Dumbledore said he couldn’t retrieve Voldemort, but I think that’s just because Dumbledore doesn’t want to, and wanting to is a requirement for the mirror.))
Seems like a fine time to share my speculations about yet unresolved easter eggs from the story. I’m not overly confident on either of those.
I present some hints first in case you want to try to think about it yourself.
The core (and power) of the Elder Wand
From chapter 122:
Previously in the Askaban arc, it was also mentioned that the sign of the Deathly Hallows on the invisibility cloak was drawn in thestral blood, binding in that part of the thestral’s power into the cloak, to make the the wearer as invisible to death’s shadow as thestrals are to the unknowing.
Suppose there’s some structure to it, try to fill out this table:
My guess
So the second power of the Elder Wand may be some divination power. That would fit well to preventing the Death of Worlds, although it’s a bit unclean to have two explanations for Dumbledore’s divination power.
The true source of Dumbledore’s power
From chapter 86 (emphasis mine):
From chapter 119:
Confusion: Accessing the Hall of Prophecy doesn’t sound like sth that happened the first time in the history of the Line of Merlin Unbroken.
Notice: Dumbledore’s letter does not strictly say that the forbidden thing Dumbledore did was listening to all the prophecies. Those statements could refer to separate events.
Another useful excerpt from ch 80 (emphasis mine):
From chapter 110:
Confusion: Dubledore seems a bit more magically powerful than Voldemort, so minus Elder Wand he should probably still be at least almost as powerful as Voldemort. Magical power comes mostly from lore, so if Dumbledore’s lore comes from Flamel, then it’s a bit surprising that Voldemort was able to just order someone to kill Flamel.
So how would you resolve those confusions given the hints I dropped here?
Last hint:
The method to trap objects or people in a timeless space in the mirror is called “Merlin’s method”.
My guess
Merlin trapped himself in the mirror. The forbidden password Dumbledore spoke allowed him to talk to Merlin through the mirror. Merlin gave Dumbledore additional lore to fight Voldemort. Voldemort has likely figured while he was trapped for 9 years.
(This also means that once Harry figures this out he can read the forbidden letter in the department of mysteries and use the technique to (at least temporarily) retrieve Dumbledore from the mirror. (Yeah I know Dumbledore said he couldn’t retrieve Voldemort, but I think that’s just because Dumbledore doesn’t want to, and wanting to is a requirement for the mirror.))