Completely averted by the main characters. Cultural differences aside, part of what bonds the family so tightly is the shared commitment by the adults to the welfare of the children, including emotionally.
Invoked with Druella, Bellatrix and Narcissa's mother. She was a manipulative emotional abuser who continues to try to terrorise her daughters despite being a portrait. Word of God says she's a Borderline Personality.
Scabior's family was extremely dysfunctional, and his father Obed was a violent drunk. Which explains why Scabior kills him. It also gives some context to the incest between him and his sister Nora, but that doesn't make it less disturbing.
Deconstructed. By the end of SIH, the characters are essentially understood to be adults in teenage bodies, and have terrible mental and emotional scars from having fought in multiple conflicts, killed people and united Bulgaria. The adults about them are aware of it happening but can't do anything to stop it.
Viktor ends up being made lord of Castle Krum at fifteen, and by seventeen is Lord Protector of Bulgaria. He is also married to Hermione by this point.
Hermione is first lady Krum, and then Vicereineby the time she's fourteen. She ends up getting married to Viktor in the same time period.
Draco is Seneschal of Castle Krum, second in command to a feared war-leader, and by the time he's fifteen, has been forced to take the Mark and become a Death Eater.
Anu Tamm is twelve and the veteran of two different wars. He ends up being Seneschal of Castle Borev, as well as a high feudal lord in his own right.
Averted, but only just, by Nagini. She takes care to be gentle, but the humans are absolutely aware she could kill them in seconds, and tend to find her cuddles pretty scary.
And I Must Scream: Harry is possessed by Voldemort. It is exactly as disturbing as it sounds.
Animal Motifs: Most of the major characters have at least one animal associated with them.
Hermione is repeated compared to a doe, which becomes important as Snape comes to view her as the child he should have had with Lily
Viktor is compared to a mastiff
Snape is associated with beetles and bats
Anti-Hero: Most of the protagonists do seriously dodgy things.
Snape is the most obvious example. In order to save as many people as possible, he willingly sacrifices innocents to meet his goals, manipulates lives (including compelling a gay man to marry one of his spies, knowing very well that it will make them both miserable), and has teenagers trained to act as child soldiers. On the other hand, he is genuinely trying to do good, and acknowledges he's done all these things.
The younger generation has their share as well. Draco is pretty willing to use violence to meet his goals, and Viktor and Hermione make ruthless examples of their enemies. The three of them also have a show trial for a failed assassin which ends with their poisoning him with the drink he tried to give them, but which got served to children in their charge in front of the assembled nobles.
Desmond Feathering/Alastor Moodyis this. Played with, in that he is aromantic,but sometimes has sex with his wife Hetty to give her the child she wants so desperately. He finds it neither pleasant or unpleasant, but simply something he does to please someone he cares about.
Viktor, of all people, gets one when he threatening the Romanian ambassador because he thinks she helped to poison the child-hostages
'I am intimating nothing. I am telling you, with God as my witness, that should I find out Romania was behind this, should I ever discover that you or any other Romanian had a hand in this thing, I will bring my troops to your country and your world will burn.'
Draco gets one when he tells Sven and Ilya about his father, and suggests they leave him alone in the future.
My father is Lucius Malfoy, and they call him the Butcher of Britain for a reason. He's taught me everything I know. Everything. And what he didn't teach me, Bellatrix Lestrange and Severus Snape did. Now stand aside, you whoreson bastards, or I'll show you why people piss themselves when they hear we're coming.
Badass Family: The Lestrange-Malfoy-Feathering/ Moody family. Which makes sense given that it's Bellatrix Lestrange, Severus Snape and Mad-Eye Moody, not to mention most of the Inner Circle.
Bad Boss: Voldemort, as in Canon. Unlike Canon, his inner circle become fed up.
Battle Couple: Almost all of them. Special mention goes to:
Bellatrix and Rodolphus, who co-run the war in Wales together
Hermione and Viktor, who lead armies together.
Anu and his future wife Yana Krumare this decades in the future. As he's killing the mad wizard Sepp, Yana holds off the remains of the man's mooks.
Penko is this, as he mentions having slept with women in the past. Rabastan, on the other hand, isn't at all interested in women, despite the fact he's married to Emmeline/Eugenia at the Dark Lord's command.
Viktor is this to Draco, to the point where Draco refers to him as his 'brother, best friend and cousin in law'. He also calls him brother in law more than once.
Draco in turns becomes this to Anu. Anu calls Draco his 'idol, big brother and cousin.'
Viktor is kind, well-mannered and gentle. Until you dare imply that his mother, Zhivka who dies mid-story or his fiancee later wife, Hermione are anything less than virtuous.
Never insult a lady's honour in front of Draco.
Threaten Hermione's fiance, later husband, Viktor in her presence and watch the fireworks commence.
Mention that Barty isn't 'really' family to the Lestranges and you'll regret it immediately.
Try to force Barty to leave the Lestranges, especially his surrogate child, Edric and he will come at you with everything he has. Threatening them is an even worse idea.
Suggest Anu Tamm's Nene is a bad woman and suffer for it.
Don't tell Draco that War Is Glorious. He will tear you a new one.
Becoming the Mask:Emmeline Vance eventually becomes Eugenia Lestrange.
The protagonists are Death Eaters. This is going to happen.
Snape does some serious messed up things in the name of bringing Voldemort down. Like selling Hermione for a thousand Aurors, marrying Emmeline Vance to Rabastan Lestrange and letting a paedophile teach children.
The Death Eaters, as in Canon. It's strongly implied that members of the Order suffered from this, which is part of what caused the First Wizarding War to become so vicious.
Early in the story, Hermione tries to escape Hogwarts, which is being held by the Death Eaters by running out the door. She gets caught and Rodolphus spanks her. For Purebloods, that's a very normal way to discipline a child, and he's hurt and surprised that it seriously damages her trust in him. Hermione perceives the incident as an adult first deliberately harming her and then wanting to act like it was all right.
The Lestranges aren't especially pleased when Hermione is too nice to the lower orders, but praise her for being cunning and her familiarity with the Dark Lord's writings.
The Dark Lord's philosophy is made of this. He leaves the children to die in Bulgaria because he asserts that if they aren't strong enough to save themselves, they deserve to die.
Most of Nagini's more disturbing actions fall under this category.
Scabior and his sister, Nora. He was potentially the father of her child, and the reason he went to Azkaban; he killed the other man who might have fathered the baby.
Anu and his future wife, Yana are implied to grow up to become these. Decades in the future, they're both famous in story for killing a mad wizard who slaughtered a bunch of muggles.
Deconstructed. The characters on every side see themselves as being having the moral high ground, and their beliefs as being the only possible rational choice.
Nearly all the characters under eighteen. Draco raises an army of schoolchildren to break the siege at Castle Krum and then help unite Bulgaria. Most of them end up maimed, emotionally scarred or seriously traumatised by their experiences.
Sirius, times a million. He gleefully teases Snape about his many conquests (and openly uses the money Snape gives him to help him spy to hire prostitutes), but takes care to treat the women well, and when he gets into a relationship with Emmeline/Eugenia, he's faithful to her. When he falls for Shrinking Violet Sose Tamm, he's even more of a gentleman.
Chubby Chaser: Wizarding society likes women somewhat larger than the muggle ideal, generally speaking.
Scabior is attracted to Hetty, and later Alise because of their soft, fleshy bodies.
One of the changes the reshaper makes to Emmeline Vance is to make her shorter and somewhat rounder in accordance to the societal ideal.
Snape chooses a wife for Desmond Feathering/ Mad-Eye because he assumes that a plump, curvy woman would please the bridegroom.
Draco gives Stefan one of these after blasting his chest apart with Reducto after negotiations fail. Possibly averted, in that his motive is to get his head, not any particular sense of mercy for his enemy.
Crapsack World: Voldemort takes over. Racism, classism and sexism ensue.
Hermione has elements of this. Adults tend to find it sort of eerie that she's always cheerful and polite, no matter what. Deconstructed, in that it's symtomatic of her emotional issues, and characters know it. They're still disturbed.
Scabior is a unsettlingly jovial Psycho for Hire who helps Rodolphus interrogate 'guests', kills his own father and really, really loves his knife. He also deeply cares about those under his charge, tries his hardest to comfort Hermione after things go downhill and declares that he's Lestrange's man and always will be because Rodolphus is nice to him.
Nagini is revealed to be this. At one point, she finds Draco crying. Her response? She coils him and hisses. Since the scene is from her point of view, the audience sees that she's trying to calm him by cuddling him and hissing a snake lullaby.
Scabior is fond of these. At one point, a character reflects that it took quite a bit of work to persuade him not to bring 'wet prizes' back from sucessful 'jobs.' He also carried the tongue of the first man he killed about as a watch fob, and when he killed his father, Obed, he took his eyes and tongue and left them as an offering on his sister's grave.
Stefan's head is this for Draco, as he brings it to the Conclave to prove the man is dead. Rumour has it in-universe that he still has it.
After Barty tells her what happened to the LongbottomsHermione does this with Snape, even sitting in his lap and hugging his neck. He is appalled and horrified, but permits it, and gradually comes to tacitly offer comfort without being asked.
Cuddle Bug: Wizarding culture generally encourages people to be this way. Purebloods are very proper in public, but are very affectionate and tactile in private.
Barty, who loves to Glomp people. He actually glomps Snape repeatedly and lives to tell the story.
The Lestrange brothers are both this way. Rodolphus hugs and kisses his wife and daughter very regularly, and Rabastan often pats and hugs the wife Snape forced on him despite being gay, though it's strictly a brotherly kind of affection.
Nagini turns out to be this. The constant slithering into beds and coiling people? It's just snuggling.
Snape, as in Canon, especially toward Bellatrix and Sirius.
'Please, explain my motives to me, your insights are fascinating.'
Bellatrix herself does this to almost everybody she meets, and tends to lampshade Snape's plans by using this.
'Why yes, a convenient parselmouth will simply present themselves. Why don't we just advertise for one in the Prophet?'
Aunt Cunegarde, all the time, to everyone.
'Well, sitting here maundering about it will be ever so useful to them, won't it? If you all feel sorry enough for yourselves, perhaps this situation will undo itself entirely and we can all go on a nice picnic.'
The Death Eaters regard Rodolphus and Bellatrix's penchant for public sex on raids as an amusing eccentricity, and tend to politely ignore it, even having conversations with one or both of them directly after (as in, they're still joined together).
Pureblood men typically love their wives and want them to be happy. Except that nice women don't like being intimate, so women who do are clearly prostitutes. Not everyone actually believes this, but people give it lip-service, and this is basically what Narcissa tells Hermione when she gives her the Talk.
Lucius scolds Hermione for saying 'please'to an elf. 'One doesn't ask an elf, love, one commands them.'
Bellatrix agrees that Hermione can keep being friends with Alise but only as long as she's getting something from the friendship, as it's only acceptable for the higher orders to mingle with the lower orders as long as the superior person benefits personally.
It's totally acceptable for people of the same gender to platonically share beds. If anything, a person who wants to sleep alone if they don't need to is odd, and being unkind by depriving another person of companionship.
Lucius is proud of Draco when he finds out Draco is the one who does most of the babysitting, because far from being unmasculine, it shows he'll be a good father and provider when he's grown.
Hermione's muggle Dad disappears right after the Dark Lord returns, because the Lestranges kill him and his wife.
Viktor's father is alive, but too mentally ill to help in any way.
Anu's father was a gang rapist who assaulted his mother to avenge a debt. In an odd case, his offical father is a high noble who died years before he could have been conceived.
Scabior's father disappeared because Scabior tortured and killed him.
Discriminate And Switch: Walburga's portrait accidentally gets the wrong idea about Snape and Sirius and is utterly furious. She's not angry because she thinks her son is gay... she's angry because Snape is a halfblood.
Averted by Viktor. Everyone expects him to be this, and he's smart enough to use it fully to advantage. He also comments ironically on it when he tells Snape he's not as smart as Karkaroff was at his age meaning he has no intention of taking the Mark, as he knows Karkaroff's days are numbered because he didn't come back to the Dark Lord.
Embarrassing Nickname: Viktor is an international Quidditch star, liege lord of Castle Krum andLord Protector of Bulgaria. He's also Uncle Rumen's 'little bear'. Invoked, as Penko uses this to 'encourage' Viktor to nap whilst Zhivka is dying by threatening to tell Viktor's fiancee why he's got that nickname.
The first time we see Hermione, she stands up to the Dark Lord, refusing to follow his orders.
Bellatrix's first action out of Azkaban is to kneel and kiss the Dark Lord's hem. This is darkly referenced later when she begs on her knees for him to help Hermione, and he refuses.
Scabior stabbing John Dawlish, Emmeline Vance's fiance to death in front of Hermione. Despite the fact he's got a wand. And laughing about it, but then just as quickly scolding her not to touch Dawlish's wand, lest she hurt herself. He even tells her to be a good girl before leaving her with the body.
Scabior is initially very resistant to the idea of marrying Alise, and flat-out tells Snape that he doesn't want to marry a 'lil girl.'
Rabastan is totally appalled by the plan to use Anu Tamm as bait for Slughorn, and call out the rest of the group, basically invoking this trope.
' I have been party to a good many terrible deeds, but I will not be party to this. I'm sickened we're even seriously considering it. Anu is a child, not a pawn to be used.'
Many of the Death Eaters are appalled when Voldemort unleashes the Dementors on muggles.
Dark magic is highly addictive and causes hypersexuality in users (until it makes them sterile). This is apparently how the Lestranges conceived Hermione. The magic caused them to have spontaneous sex during a raid, and their magical energy allowed a conception to take place in spite of the fact they both should have been sterilised by too much usage.
Played with. The Lestranges and Malfoys expect the children to be good Death Eaters, but don't actually want them doing the dirty work associated with it. They stop entirely when it becomes obvious that the Dark Lord is willing to sacrifice the kids to further his own ends.
Most the younger characters. Viktor sometimes dreams of seeing blood and brains on the floor of the British Ministry and Draco has the 'chorus of screams' from the various battles he fought in.
A rare human example: Everyone, in-Universe considers Rodolphus this in regards to Bellatrix. He genuinely sees her as an adorable Moe whose violent fits of rage are just cute little wobblies, and whose sadism is actually childlike enthusiasm.
Pureblood culture expects this of everyone, and for people who don't to pay the ideal lipservice. Death Eaters actively working against the Lestranges and Malfoys are nonetheless genuinely excited about getting to play with Rabastan's son with Emmeline/Eugenia, Edric, and offended when they won't bring him down to see them.
Snape, to his absolute horror. Children tend to glom onto him, and despite his generally snarly nature, he makes himself treat them well, if not nicely.
Draco, who's the main babysitter of the younger Krum children (Viktor's cousins), and who ends up mentoring Anu, despite his efforts not to.
Scabior as one a these. When e's feelin nervous, it gets rite thick,it does, but when e's calmer, then he doan do it s'much, yeah?
Odd example: The Dark Lord has a phonetic POV. When He is narrating, everyone else speaks all in small letters unless they're addressing Him, and their names are uncapitalised. When He hears viktor speak, he hears him in a completely phonetic accent.
/nagini never says i or uses punctuation just speaks like this/
Averted with Viktor, who struggles a little but mainly uses standard spelling except for using 'v' for w words and so forth. Hexsept vhen the Darg Lort is narrat-ting—it geds notic-ably theekair becauze the Darg Lort duss nod lige to hear pee-pol speeking Een-glish vith an agsent.
Viktor. He's built like a linebacker and has rough, thuggish features, but he's gentle, sensitive and extremely intelligent. Amongst other things, he teaches himself to read and speak fluent, if heavily accented, English with virtually no formal help aside from Draco. He can also memorise long passages of works and recite them from memory.
Dumbledore's whole motive in taking the Lestranges' baby. He was afraid that the Malfoys would turn her into a symbol for other Death Eaters to rally round, and that other magical families might not want to deal with a child who could well be an incipient Dark witch. He may be right about that last one...
Viktor, when he gets into a fistfight at camp with Blagun Hristov. Averted, in that the bottle doesn't break, which doesn't prevent Viktor from knocking out a number of teeth with it.
Groin Attack: Poor McNair gets this. From Bellatrix Lestrange. Twice.
Bellatrix, who starts hexing and shrieking at virtually any provocation. Her desire to control her temper so as not to scare Hermione is initially what helps them to bond.
Lucius is literally the master of this, as he's the regime primary spin doctor. He also uses this to soothe Hermione after Barty Crouch Jr lets slip about the Longbottoms, by explaining how her parents were 'helping them understand' about the Dark Lord.
Anu Tamm, who summons help when Hermione is attacked by Sven and Ilya, and then joins the war, despite being twelve, proving his valour by preventing the escape of Pavel the werewolf.
Hetty has shades of this. She calmly prevents aurors from raiding Twelve Grimmauld Place by flirting with them, and then helps Draco keep from reacting when he finds out he's supposed to Assassinate Arthur Weasley as punishment for raising an army.
Hermione has a major one when Rinky dies. It shows how far she's come that she feels all right letting her parents see her curled up in a ball, sobbing hysterically, and refuses to let go of her mother.
Draco has one when he breaks down crying in Skopje, telling Snape he knows he's leading his friends from Durmstrang and the other schools to a terrible death.
Viktor has a small one of these on the morning he and Hermione assume the Protectorate, saying he can't rule a country and wishes that they could run off together and leave it all behind. She firmly brings him back to reality.
Averted with Sose Tamm. She is constantly sick, but it's from a lifetime of malnutrition and hard work. At twenty-eight, she looks forty, is riddled with arthritis, coughs constantly from breathing so much soot and has spine issues that cause her to hunch. She also isn't dying—she's just chronically ill.
Bellatrix and Rodolphus are impressed and delighted when they get to know Hermione and find her to be polite, intelligent and genuinely kind to others. Snape finds this ironic, as the reason she's like this is because she was raised for the first ten years by muggles, in a culture that values those things. Had she been raised by her aunt and uncle Malfoy like the Lestranges would have wanted, she would not have turned out that way.
Killed Off for Real: Cunegarde, Erasmus, Martin, Zhivka, Rinky and Hermione's adoptive parents.
Knee Capping: Anu Tamm does this during the Battle of Castle Krum, to prevent Nicolae Pavel from running away. With a flaming torch. After getting an eye blasted out.
Many of the Death Eaters are this. They absolutely believe their actions, no matter how heinous, are justified, because they are creating a perfect New Britain. For them and people like them.
The Lestrange brothers both cry several times over the course of the story, especially when Rodolphus thinks he's going to lose Hermione, or Rabastan sends his son, Edricinto exile.
Rabastan also gets a bit teary when Barty asks to see the Longbottoms "because they're broken too."
Viktor cries from time to time, particularly when his mother Zhivka is dying.
Lucius Malfoy gets damp-eyed on a number of occaisions.
Viktor starts calling Draco 'Drago' when he stays at Castle Krum the first time. Draco eventually starts calling himself that to everyone who isn't part of his English family. Hermione deliberately invokes this, calling him 'Draco' when things are calm and 'Drago' when he's acting as Seneschal of Castle Krum.
Invoked in universe. The Snatchers wear clashing, mismatched clothing because it intimidates people. One guy dressed like a drunk rodeo clown is funny; five of them, showing up on your doorstep to invite you to have a 'chat' with Rodolphus Lestrange? Not funny at all.
Both sides to a degree, but the Death Eaters' dogma is deliberately this. People at the top are justified in any and everything they do to those beneath them, because the strong have an obligation to subjugate the weak and keep them in their place. Toward their equals, though, the rules of society apply.
Invoked: During the Siege of Castle Krum, the reinforcements sing so the people inside the Castle know they're coming and keep fighting. As it's a force of foreign aurors and schoolchildren everyone is singing something different.
Rita Skeeter realises that supporting the regime has led her to contribute to the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands, by writing misleading articles about the supposedly glorious war in Wales.
The Death Eaters collectively have a moment when Emmeline/Eugeniatells them that the children are likely to become Dark Lords in their own right unless their parents help them not to.
Played with and invoked in-Universe by Anu Tamm, the bastard son of a shepherdess. Viktor 'suggests' that someone as brave as Anu is, due to his help with the November War can't possibly be a bastard, so officially his father is a high noble. Unofficially, the noble died years before he was conceived, and his actual father is exactly whom his mother always said it was: one of her rapists.
The Dark Lord and his dogma. He explictly refers to a 'subhuman' class, and teaches his followers are essentially Ubermensche, which justifies whatever they do, and that the law of the jungle is the proper model for society.
When Rodolphus isn't a Fluffy Tamer, he's this for Bellatrix. He finds watching her perform Dark magic extremely arousing, to the point that Hermione was conceived on a raid and the Lestranges are famous in Death Eater circles for giving into their urges at strange times.
Viktor is becoming this for Hermione. Her huge magical abilities turn him on, whereas most other characters are frightened when she does things like immolate seventy aurors.
Sirius's attempts at ridding Spinner's End of garden gnomes.
What Lucius and Draco did to Lofstrom and Arbanas by the lake at Durmstrang. It never says, but Arbanas is too traumatised to discuss it even years later.
Averted. Hermione's first period is one of catalysts for her bonding with her mother.
Violently, squickily averted during the march through the Rhodopes. One of the things making Hermione miserable is that she's got her period, and the blood is freezing to her underwear in the cold.
Snape deconstructs Sirius's Black and White Morality by listing, in detail, every atrocity he personality took part in or had knowledge of. And then every one he knows Sirius, as an Order member, either took part in or condoned, and ends by invoking this trope.
Snape becomes this to Hermione(and the others, to a lesser extent), despite his best efforts. He manages to get the Dark Lord to send troops, if only a few thousand foreign volunteers, to Bulgaria to fight the wolves and teaches her how to defend herself in her new role.
Barty perceives himself as this, especially to Edric, and will attack anyone who tries to harm the others with incredible violence.
Lucius Malfoy, who scares the Swedes into giving them a fleet to break the siege of Castle Krum and save the kidssimply through force of reputation.
Rinky the house elf, to the extent that he sacrifices himself to save Hermione and Barty from Dementors, and uses his dying breath to demand Snape promise to guard his beloved Miss. Snape does it, to honour his courage and loyalty.
The werewolves (and Sirius in dog form) become extremely pissed off if "the pack is threatened". Slughorn attempting to harm Anu Tamm very nearly ended in a riot.
Hermione is intially led to believe her muggle parents either left or were kidnapped and killed by the Order. In actuality, the audience knows that Bellatrix and Rodolphus led a raid to torture and kill them. Hermione's abandoment issues are a serious plotpoint for a long time because of this.
Snape is an odd case, in that Hermione has two living parents, but sees him as a father-figure all the same. It's almost a tri-parenting situation, in that whilst Rodolphus is Father, Snape is Dad. He was the first 'safe' person Hermione meets, after Narcissa and she treats him like she did Cyril Granger, the muggle man who raised her with his wife.
Anu promotes Snape to being his father-figure after the events of December of 1995. Partly because he desperately wants a father of his own and partly so Snape will marry his Nene, his mother,to make sure she won't be alone if Anu dies helping fight the war.
Barty sees himself as this to Edric. It becomes official when Rabastan and Eugenia ask him to go into exile with their son and help raise him in their stead. There are also shades of this in his relationship with Draco.
Penko is this to Edric, as he is his formal guardian after the baby is sent as a hostage to Bulgaria. He and Rumen are also this to Viktor after Martin disengages mentally.
The Snatchers are very deliberately psychos for hire, at least in the beginning. Rodolphus recruits infamous murderers, a Wizarding mafia assassin, and a serial killer in order to terrorise people. Those guys dressed as clowns? They're your universe's Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy or Ted Bundy, every one of them. And they're the police.
Averted with Scabior, and to a lesser extent Rice. Scabior does what he does because he's good at it, and because he wants enough money to buy a brothel and move up in the world.
Snape invokes this to Sirius, saying that every group needs an axe-man, and Dumbledore's use of Mad-Eye and the aurors was no better or worse than Rodolphus and his 'mad dogs'.
Snape's whole MO. He tends to hide things in plain sight and simply rely on others to not see them, or to discount what they do see. Surely a member of the Inner Circle wouldn't:
Recruit the eleven year old daughter of Bellatrix Lestrange as a spy, and then groom her as his apprenctice?
Manipulate his country's most dangerous enemy into springing the members of the Order currently in Azkaban and then turn them into assistants?
Decide he wants a spy in Sofia and accomplish it by marrying one of those same assistants to a gay Death Eater who also happens to be Rabastan Lestrange?
Convince the Dark Lord to have Karkaroff replaced with a disguised Mad-Eye Moody?
Sirius is this in spades. He convinces a werewolf to follow him by punching him out, bluffs his way into briefly teaching DADA at Beauxbatons and manages to convince the Inner Circle he was on their side the whole time by not saying anything.
Reptiles Are Abhorrent: Nagini subverts this.Voldemort gives her a baby to hold and she has a disquieting habit of slithering into people’s beds while they’re sleeping. But Hetty turns out to be a parselmouth and we find out that Nagini is actually rather fond of them all. When she offers to eat you after you die, it's a sign of respect. And when she's squeezes you with her coils it's because she thinks you're adorable and she's trying to hug you. Seriously.
In-Universe example: Lucius does this to explain the Lestrange's torture of the Longbottoms to Hermione. As he explains it, it was tough love to help them understand why the Order was bad, and the Lestranges meant to fix them after except the Order wouldn't permit it.
Most of the younger characters to one degree or another, but Draco Malfoy is the most obvious example. He has random crying jags, suffers terrible nightmares,is hyper-vigilant and can't sleep by himself anymore. He also has vivid flashbacks, and refuses to go anywhere unarmed.
Personally killing Dumbledore, because the alternative is letting Gyffindor Tower be burnt to the ground with the children inside.
Arranging a number of marriages between couples where one of the partners is, at best, a dangerous fanatic, and at worst a murderous lunatic because the alternative is even worse.
Deliberately using a child as bait for a paedophile.
Rodolphus is this trope incarnate. He's affectionate, loves to tease and joke, and is the best torturer in Europe. He's like Ward Clever if Ward Clever had a side-line involving red hot pinchers.
Snape finds out that Peter is still alive. Cool. Snape finds out that Peter betrayed the Potters and is responsible for Lily's death. Snape starts smiling and contemplating killing Peter when he stops being useful.
This is becoming Draco's trademark when dealing with diplomats. He manages to thoroughly unnerve Morreau just by smiling and talking casually to him.
Hermione, to a degree. She is genuinely shocked and appalled when she finds out Alise couldn't go to Durmstrang because she's muggleborn, offers to make clothes for her elf (he doesn't get offended because he knows she doesn't get it), and excitedly spins wool, showing off the calluses and chipped nails she gets from it.
Played With, in that she is spoiled by her biological parents but was given good principles by her muggle parents.
Hermione becomes a Type 1 due to her fears of being abandoned. Deconstructed, in that the people about her knows she's this and worry about her constantly because of it. Her slowly growing willingness to permit her Wizarding family to see her less than totally cheerful and smiling is a major point of character development, as she comes to believe that they love her and won't abandon her.
Rabastan Lestrange is this. He's a feared warrior with zero interest in anything even slightly sterotypical, dresses terribly and happens to like men. Justified, in that the sexual politics of the Wizarding world are very different.
Well, more like 'Tell me about my father figure's mother. Since Hermione has promoted Snape to Dad she wants to hear about his mother. He obliges her, showing that he returns her affection and has come to see her as a surrogate child.
Type 3. There are adults, but the Lord Protector and Vicereine prefer to be surrounded by people they know personally and trust, most of whom are friends from school. Aside from the Minister of Magic and Lord Paramount of the Conclave, pretty much literally every other named position is filled by someone under twenty. Visitors find it incredibly creepy.
Averted by the main characters, all of whom are capable of empathy, but express it in ways indicative of the Blue and Orange Morality of their culture.
Played straight by Stefan Borev. He decides to sell a castle full of women and children to werewolves who want to kill them. Why? They insulted him by throwing him out because he used his sister's funeral rites as cover to steal from another guest, assaulted a brain-damaged war veteran, and then insulted his nephew's inlaws. He's a Truth in Television type sociopath, meaning that whilst he can be outwardly charming, his own lack of foresight undoes him, and people tend to sense something 'off' about him unless he's actively trying to charm them.
Snape will sacrifice anyone and do whatever it takes to save Britain from the Death Eaters. Later, he becomes this about his surrogate daughter, Hermione, to the point where he willingly betrays comrades and has people killed to meet his goal.
Bellatrix will do anything to protect the people she loves, especially Hermione. Anything.
Bellatrix and Rodolphus are implied to feed one another's devotion to, and willingness to commit evil for, the Dark Lord. At least until He betrays them and they decide to bring Him down
Played with by Hermione and Viktor. Others see their relationship as this, but the audience sees them in their private moments, and perceives them more as they perceive one another.
This is how Snape snaps Draco out of his Heroic BSOD moment in Skopje. He asks whether Draco was truthful about what the fighting would be like, and when he says he was, this trope is Snape's response.
Rodolphus. He's a very competent warrior but his real genius is extracting information this way.
Took a Level in Badass: Draco gets lessons from Mad Eye Moody. Hermione gets duelling lessons from Bellatrix Lestrange and Magnificent Bitch lessons from Snape. Draco goes from the moany little whinge bag of Canon to undisputed Badass and Hermione goes from frightened eleven year old to cunning Lady of War. Both of them are somewhat miserable though.
Cunegarde's training of Hermione is this emotionally. She's insanely brutal, even deliberately cruel, but it's to make sure Hermione can handle whatever happens without batting an eyelash.
Averted in the case of Feathering/ Mad-Eye's training of Viktor and Draco. It's tough but not unreasonable.
Also averted by Bellatrix and Rodolphus, who make no bones about expecting the best from Hermione academically and magically, but prefer to use praise and approval to encourage her to excel.
Villain Protagonist: The Lestranges and the Malfoys are the main characters. Go figure.
Deconstructed by Rita Skeeter. She writes a series of editorials praising the war in Wales, and then ends up spending the night in a field hospital, tending dying trainee-aurors.
Desmond Feathering/Mad Eye Moody invokes this, ordering Viktor and Draco to make sure the students under their charge understand this isn't true.
Played straight. The battles are bloody and terrible, with body parts everywhere and dying people screaming for their mothers. The fighters often suffer serious mental scars afterwards.
The Order of the Phoenix. Snape outright states that they were the ones deliberately escalating the conflict, and gives examples, such as Barty Crouch Sr's edict that aurors leave their wounded comrades to give chase to enemy combatants, even if the enemy was in flight and the aurors were dying.
by Madea's Rage is a deconstruction of the “Hermione is really a pureblood” fics. At the end of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Voldemort possesses Harry, the Death Eaters take over and Hermione turns out to be the long lost daughter of Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange. War, politics and arranged marriages ensue.Basically it’s Harry Potter meets A Song of Ice and Fire.Has a sequel in progress, Influence of Souls
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