Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Study Guide

Tempers are flaring high the next day, and Harry can’t manage to produce a Patronus, which has him highly unnerved until Hermione figures out what’s wrong. The locket, which they’ve started taking in turns wearing to keep safe, is making them all feel horrible. When Hermione makes Harry take off the Horcrux he feels elated, as though he can produce a thousand Patronuses.

As time passes they get no closer to figuring out the Horcrux riddle. Food is often scarce, and Ron especially does not hold up well from being hungry all the time. He’s often argumentative with Harry and often presents problem after problem without even trying to think of a solution.

They search many of Voldemort’s old haunts looking for more Horcruxes, but they never find any clues. One night, in the middle of a fierce argument between Ron and Hermione stemming from the lack of food, Harry hears a disturbance outside the tent. They go out to investigate and discover some goblins, Ted Tonks, and Dean Thomas, their fellow Gryffindor. All, it seems, are on the run. They hear a good bit of news about what’s going on at Hogwarts and they find out from one of the goblins that the sword of Gryffindor that’s hanging in the Headmaster’s office is a fake, and because it was almost stolen, it's now hidden in the Lestrange's vault at Gringotts. Where the real one is, no one knows, and also the goblin says that the real sword is goblin-made. That night, they pull the portrait of Phineas Nigellus, which Harry had taken from his room in Grimmauld Place, from the handbag. Nigellus tells him that goblin-made products absorb only what strengthens them, and also the last time the sword was removed from its case was when Dumbledore had used it to smash a ring. The sword absorbed the Basilisk venom. Dumbledore knew this, so he used it to destroy the Horcrux. The Gryffindor sword is what they need to destroy the Horcruxes.

Later, however, Harry and Ron get into another huge row because Ron thought that they were getting no-where, and he thought that Harry actually knew what he was doing. Ron leaves the quest to go back home.