In her interview with TIME and in webchats with fans, the Harry Potter author reveals a few more secrets
1. Why doesn't Fred appear in the woods at the end as well?
"Do you know what? I never even thought of Fred coming
back. That's how I always planned it, from when the first book was finished,
that the three marauders and his mother would come back. There were four
heroes as it were in the previous generation and one of them betrayed the
others, and then there were the three. So I wanted Harry to be surrounded by
his mother and James and Sirius and Lupin, all of whom had died in a way for
him. You know Lupin had laid down his life in Harry's battle, he didn't have
to come back, he didn't have to fight. James had died trying to protect the
family; Sirius very obviously had died fighting along with Harry, and then
his mum who most explicitly had died for him. I never thought of bringing
Fred back at all. It was all the previous generation, and they were all
strongly parental figures for Harry."
2. Did Harry die?
Rowling wrote this very carefully, so it could be read two ways. "Did he
just go into a state of unconsciousness in which his subconscious tells him
everything he needs to know? Dumbledore doesn't tell him anything he
couldn't have figured out with some educated guesses." But in her mind,
Harry entered a limbo between life and death, and faced a choice about which
way to go.
She explains on her website that this encounter involves some very deep laws of magic, which Voldemort himself did not understand: "Having taken Harry's blood into himself, Voldemort is keeping alive Lily's protective power over Harry — except that the power of Lily's sacrifice is a positive force that not only continues to tether Harry to life, but gives Voldemort himself one last chance ... Voldemort has unwittingly put a few drops of goodness back inside himself; if he had repented, he could have been healed more deeply than anyone would have supposed. But of course, he refused to feel remorse." Also, since Voldemort is using the Elder wand, which actually belongs to Harry, neither the Cruciatus or the killing curse work properly. "The Avada Kedavra curse, however, is so powerful that it does hurt Harry, and also succeeds in killing the part of him that is not truly him, in other words, the fragment of Voldemort's own soul that is still clinging to his. The curse also disables Harry severely enough that he could have succumbed to death if he had chosen that path."
3. The question that surprises her: What was that creature in the corner at
King's Cross?
"Harry's impulse, to the point of utter wrongheadedness,
is to save. His deepest nature is to try and save, even when he's wrong to
do so, when he's led into traps — 'I've got to save, I've got to try to
protect' — because he's been left with this very demanding legacy of his
mother's that she sacrificed herself for him and now he goes off and tries
to save as many people as he can."
But this encounter with Voldemort is different. "For the first time ever he approaches this vulnerable, naked, mutilated creature and he wants to help, but he feels repulsed for the first time ever by suffering. And he's right to feel that. This is something that has deliberately self mutilated as it were, that's the last maimed fragment of Voldemort's soul. I have to explain because so many have asked.")
4. The question she feared getting: What was Dumbledore's wand made of?
"That would have been quite a telling question. Because I had this elder
thing in my mind, cause elder has this association in folklore, it's the
death tree. I thought 'what am I going to say?'" It would have given away
too big a clue. But no one asked.
5. What did Dumbledore really see in the Mirror of Erised?
His family, alive and whole and reconciled.
6. Where do wizard children go to school before Hogwarts?
Most are homeschooled, because they aren't really able to control their
powers so it would be too dangerous to let them out and about.
7. Are Harry and Voldemort related?
Yes, distantly, through the Peverells; but nearly all wizarding families are
related if you go back far enough.
8. Who does Draco Malfoy marry?
Astoria Greengrass, younger sister of the Greengrass family. We meet Daphne
Greengrass, part of Pansy Parkinson's Slytherin posse, in Book V when
Hermione takes her O.W.L.s. Neville marries Hannah Abbott, who becomes the
owner of The Leaky Cauldron. "I do have it all worked out in my mind because
I couldn't stop myself doing that."
9. Where do the main characters work as adults?
Harry and Hermione are at the Ministry: he ends up leading the Auror
department. Ron helps George at the joke shop and does very well. Ginny
becomes a professional Quidditch player and then sportswriter for the Daily
Prophet.
10. Was Teddy Lupin a werewolf?
No he was a Metamorphmagus, like Tonks (who, incidentally, was a
Hufflepuff).