Two more days until I go to great lengths to shut myself off from the outside world and devour the last Harry Potter book. I've been preparing for months now. Over the last three months I've re-read the entire series and watched several of the movies so that I was properly primed for the last installment.

Now, I am ready to make some predictions for the final book. If you don't like to speculate on such things then don't read any further. I wouldn't call these spoilers by any means as J.K. Rowling has a proven track record of out thinking me.

Let's start with Dumbledore is alive. At first I felt very strongly that he was dead, because if he is indeed dead then Jo has said explicitly that there is no coming back. I spoke with Pokiman about it and so I will add his input too, because I think he brought up some good points. So here is the corroborating set up. In the first Potions lessons' in book 1 & 5 numerous potions were named. One of them was named in both lessons. It is also the only one that hasn't made an appearance in the books one way or the other the entire time. That potion is the Draught of Living Death which produces a powerful sleeping potion. So the set up was complete to fake a death. If Voldemort thought he was dead then Draco would be safe and Dumbledore would want that.

The set up continued with the discussion of non-verbal spells. A decent amount of time was spent on explaining them and giving them due notice. This never came to fruition in this book either. Jo doesn't normally leave loose threads or waste time writing about something that has no consequence. I think however it did come into play. We just weren't made aware of it.

When Snape performed the killing curse, Dumbledore was blasted from the top of the tower, but that is not what the Avada Kedavra does. When the Avada Kedavra is performed then the people just fall dead where they are with no sign of anything having been done. So it would seem that Snape actually performed a different spell nonverbally and just said the words for the killing curse. This would make it appear that Dumbledore was killed and get him safely out of the way of the Death Eaters.

As far as falling to his death from the top of the tower I don't think that was the case either. We already know of about half a dozen flying things in and around Hogwarts that could have caught/saved Dumbledore. There are brooms, thestrals, the Ford Anglia, Sirius Black's motorcycle, flying carpets, Fawkes, and the Wingardium Leviosa charm.

Of course if all of this is true then I am also making the prediction that Snape is not on the side of Voldemort. For this I would point to the fact that Snape has not killed Harry or any of his friends this entire time. I think we will find out why Dumbledore trusted him when nobody else did and that he will be vindicated. Even after supposedly killing Dumbledore he didn't try to hurt Harry even thought htey were in a direct conflict.

I haven't heard any spculation on this next part, but this hit me a little while back. We know that Voldemort is a descendent of Salazar Slytherin. It has been inferred that Harry might be a descendent of Gryffindor as his parents lived in Godric's Hollow and he was able to pull the sword from the sorting hat. Is it possible then that his friends are also descendents of famous wizards? Could Hermione be from the line of Ravenclaw and Ron from Hufflepuff? They certainly display the qualities that those houses are known for. I don't have any proof to support those ideas, but I think it's an interesting thought.

R.A.B. could be Regulus, Sirius Black's brother, but could also be the missing partner from Borgin and Burkes. The owners of the dark wizard shop would be in prime position to know what Voldemort was up to. They also were the only other people we heard of that knew about the now missing locket. This could be the reason that we've only ever seen one of the owners of the shop as the other one was killed. The locket itself does seem to be in Grimmauld Place as there is mention of a heavy locket during the cleaning of the house.

As far as who lives and dies. I don't know. I expect that Voldemort must die. I don't know about anyone else. Neville and the Weasley family seem like prime targets for death. Luna and Cho have outside shots of getting killed as well. I don't know whether the final conflict will be a large scale battle or a more intimate affair, but I'm full of anticipation waiting for Friday night.