Thought the title would get some people's attention.

How did Montague apparate out of "limbo" after going into the vanishing cabinets and wind up in the Hogwarts bathroom?

Before I go into this any further, let me just ask...it was him right? I know he went into the cabinets and apparated out, but I don't recall where he wound up. Apparently he was put into the cabinets in book 5 and managed to apparate out into the bathroom. However, we know no one can apparate into Hogwarts...how did he do it? Unless it counted as him being in the school...then the question would be is whether wizards and witches can apparate within Hogwarts.

i forget but didnt in one of the books they take the spell down for testing? my guess is if he did apparate it was during this testing time when the spell was down.i am not sure quite which part ur talking about but if you give me the chapter i will gladly read it and try to add better insight.

I think Fred and George put Montague into the vanishing cabinet in Chapter 28 of OotP. I don't think there was a testing time though, but I might be wrong. Imagine this scenario if it was down for testing: Dumbledore is gone, or supposedly gone, and some crazy woman from the ministry who believes Voldemort hasn't come back to power has taken over. I think it would be the perfect time for the DE's to attack. But if the enchantments were down, then that would explain it.

yes that would have been a great time for the DE to take over, but i guess they wanted to wait cuz of the prophecy deal, i still am not sure on the apparating but i still think the best answer is that the spell was taken down for testing, or i had another thought though this is kinda a conspiracy theory, wat if dumbledor needs to be around for these spells to stay active and if hes not there to help maintain them ppl can have an easyier time breaking them down, so wat if someone was disarming his spells while he was gone, and who and if he is truely dead then that would mean the school is really in trouble.

It is possible, but I also thought there were magical defenses on the castle before Dumbledore arrived.

But if not, who would be taking them down?

wow..........400th post..........

thats what im wondering, i think there were some defenses like you said before DD came to the school most likely set up by the founders. but in book 6 DD is flying on the brooms to the school when the DE get in and he is taking down some of the defenses, which makes me belive he has some controll over most of the spells.

Right...maybe he does. But Harry heard him saying them in a different language which may be because they're ancient and he knows how to take down those ancient spells. I do have a vague memory of reading about the defenses being down in OotP...or I'm too easy to take your word for it! I'll look more into it...

ah yes true i forgot about that, he was speaking an acient language, then again its hard to tell with JKR writing becuase they speak of very old magic as saving harry yet it happend in more modern time, so it could be that the spells of that magnitude only exist in an older form?

Yep..maybe. Maybe ancient magic is extremely hard to do...so only few can do it...like Dumbledore, I'm guessing Voldemort to some extent, Grindelwald...maybe Lily was taught by Dumbledore.

Sorry, I got off topic...

Montague was in "limbo" for a long time. I think it was a week before he managed to apparate out. And it was in chapter 28...so the defenses had to be down while Dumbledore was gone. But was he gone? What if he was in his office with the door locked?

Yes, I'm sooo glad you made a topic on this. I made one on the vanishing cabinet a while back, while I was looking for strange quotes in book 2. Filch says that he'll finally get at Peeves, because it was very valuable....

So that line may help to. But this is more about the apparating isn't it? Well I'm not really sure, but I would like to know what bathroom he ended up in...

Hint, Hint- Moaning Myrtles Bathroom, that would be strange wouldn't it...

I wonder how the cabinet got there too. Or...If its a horcrux. Voldemort could have created a way to apparate within Hogwarts. I want to go back to that forum. Thanks crsdba

P.S. -
Yeah, I'm a procrastinator too, but still you can only procrastinate so long till you have to do work

Not sure which bathroom, but it was on the first floor. I think the thing with Filch involved Peeves dropping the cabinet on him or something and it broke...which is why Draco had to fix it to get the DE's in.

I remember that thread, its been a while though!

I'm not sure if its a Horcrux though, because it broke pretty easily; would it have any significance to Voldemort?

Would he have to apparate in if it were a passageway from his place of work, to his old school? What if Voldemort got into the school again...its possible....but then again, he would have done that a long time ago...but Dumbledore has been there, the only one he ever feared....

Yea, eventually you have to do some work...right before class...nah, jk.

Yes, I've been thinking that he has been. If his title of headmaster was taken away from him, then the office would be accessible. However, he remained in, keeping the password protected office safe...and he could get out if he needed to with his portkey...hey...why didn't Draco just use a portkey?

As far as taking down the defenses for the Apparitions test: We learn in HBP that it is only taken down in the Great Hall for the purpose of learning. So, it's not removed from the entire castle. I'm thinking this might just be an oversight by the author that Montague was able to apparate out of it. (Another thing to note, Dumbledore has never Apparated out of or into Hogwarts. . . he goes into Hogsmeade.)

As far as the castle defenses, I'm sure there are many that have been put up over a period of time. I'm sure the information must be passed from one headmaster to the other in order for the headmaster system to work. However, that is not to say that certain defenses that Dumbledore may have placed over Hogwarts weren't taken away in his absence, but as he didn't expect to be gone permanently, I doubt he would have removed them.

As the cabinet was malfunctioning (since it's supposed drop)-this also could be an instance where Montague wasn't even at the school. But the more I think about it, the more I think that it was just an oversight.

It might be passerby, I just thought it was interesting. Now that I think about it some more, I don't see a significance. But you have to admit that Rowling was making Draco say that he apparated out of the cabinets and found himself in the bathrooms...so she might have noticed. Or, it was something else. Montague did a different form of instant travel that we don't know about...but similiar to apparation. But how would he have done it in the school?

What if the bathroom and the cabinet exist on the same plain...then he didn't necessarily apparate inside or outside of Hogwarts but just moved rapidly from one area to another within the castle...like Harry did is SS/PS when he finds himself on the roof of his school. Perhaps its another instance of that, maybe he's kind of like Harry in that sense.

But it existing on the same plain would introduce a certain aspect of physics, that doesn't exist in Potterverse because of magic. Magic out wieghs physics...remember reading about a wizard who went to the moon? Could be a myth...but if it isn't its just another example of physics gone mad. But there are multiple plains in one given area...kind of like stacking cardboard or paper...each one is its own plain...so it would have to have a direct pull or something to it.

Heres a thought: what if it led into the entrance of the Chamber of Secrets? Was the entrance on the first floor? I'm not sure what this would lead to. Maybe thats how Voldemort opened the chamber? And why Draco, maybe under orders from Voldemort, had it fixed and used that as the way in when he could have easily done anything else. Montague was the one who told Draco about the cabinets...about that he could hear in Borgin and Burkes and at Hogwarts.

I'm not saying it's impossible for there to be some sort of "apparition" possibility for the cabinet. . . I just think it's unlikely.

I think the main thing to remember about this particular vanishing cabinet is that it was, until HBP, broken. For it to work properly, there needed to be the second (which of course was in B&B). So, somehow Montague had to get himself from point "A", the vanishing cabinet to point "B"- arguably should have been in B&B. However, since the contraption was broken . . . he couldn't get out. He was all vanishified. So, he tried apparating, which we've seen shouldn't have worked according to what JKR's given us in her dealings with other people not being able to apparate/disapparate to and from Hogwarts), so we're left with a conundrum. Perhaps he somehow forced the vanishing cabinet to release him somewhere, through the sheer power of his magical will, and only thought he was apparating because he'd been learning how to do it? I'm still thinking oversight. Hey, even brilliance has the ocassional second of befuddlement.

When did Draco say he'd apparated out of it? Can't remember him doing anything in the cabinet other than fixing it and talking to B&B about the other one.

He was telling it Dumbledore, how Montague got trapped in it and had to apparate out, in the chapter where Snape kills Dumbledore "The Lightning Struck Tower"

It really could have been just something Rowling messed up at. But Draco said specifically that Montague apparated out...that should have been a red flag right there. But she couldn't exactly go back to OotP and fix it, saying he apparated somewhere else like Hogsmeade.

But what if the bathroom was able to "call" him, like in computer science or something. He tried leaving and ended up in the bathroom, as in...maybe there was a worm hole somewhere in that "limbo" which I'm guessing is like a floating nothingness...but then how did the DE's get in? How did they not suddenly appear in the bathroom? Maybe with the two cabinets fixed it made it like a pathway that one could see.

Montague apparated in the 5th book, he hadn't learned how to yet...unless he qualified because he was older or something. It was also said that he almost died while trying. How can he almost die while trying to apparate? Unless he found himself upside down when he found himself in the bathroom.

I think it was a different type of traveling that ocurred...having to do with you said passerby about him willing it; or maybe it was his emotions that did it just like Harry with his aunt; among others.

Maybe the defenses don't allow someone to apparate into the castle...but apparition is possible within, but one has a huge chance of dying if they do.

But that wouldn't make sense. Its like setting a trap in your house that only affects you...

Now, if he could will it, why can't anyone else?

Montague could have Apparated out. Strictly speaking he wasn't at Hogwarts and he wasn't at Borgin and Burkes, but somewhere in between ... in limbo somewhere.

Apparation into Hogwarts would have been impossible, so he must have come out somewhere else.

Remember Wilkie Twycross saying that it's very important you fix your mind on where you want to go when you Apparate? Well, maybe Montague wanted to go home badly enough to fix his mind on his room at his parents' house, and Apparated there.

So how did he end up in the bathroom on the first floor? Maybe he got back to Hogwarts by some other means, and went back into the castle, and ended up in the bathroom because someone else thought it fun to flush his head down the toilet.

This still won't explain why he was level-headed enough to find his way back to Hogwarts and totally disoriented when recovered from the bathroom ... so what we may have here is a genuine mistake by JKR.

Yep, I'm thinking its a mistake now. Draco said that Montague told him apparated and found himself in the bathroom...so Montague would have told him that he apparated home, then somehow got into the bathroom.

So how could he apparate without knowing how to? Maybe there was something else in there, like a portkey...but then that would only mean that there's a portkey in the bathroom........so that doesn't work.

I like the idea that this is not a mistale but a clue to something that will be important in book 7, in a similar way to the vanishing cabinet having played a role in several books.

So if we assume that it wasn't an error by Jo Rowling, how has it been possible for Montague to be transported from the cabinet to the bathroom?

• it wasn't by Apparition
• maybe he didn't do it by himself and someone else transported him (how?)
• the cabinet was temporarily working fine (but then how did Montague get from the cabinet to the bathroom?)
• if it was a Portkey, who activated it and why? It would have had to be a very powerful wizard or witch to do this, and someone very secretive.

Montague's sudden appearance in the bathroom is very mysterious. It's hard to believe that JKR didn't catch the inconsistency herself; after all she mentions Hogwart's Anti-Appraition spell several times in every book.

I read a theory that said you can apparate in and out, but it messes you up. It makes you weak and disoriented and forget what your task was, etc. That happened to Montague...he nearly died, and was confused. He also was thrown into an odd place, that further confused him.

Thats one possible explanation...BUT...if he nearly died, then surely maybe someone else tried it before and did die. Would Dumbledore want that? Would he want a possible student to try it and get killed in the process? I think Dumbledore wouldn't have wanted this, and I know he probably wasn't the original wizard to put the defenses up...but if they can be lifted, someone has to put them back on.

If the apparition training is advertised in Hogsmeade...it was in Hogdmeade right?...AND, past witches and wizards who are now DE's saw it, and saw the date on the advertisement, then wouldn't they be able to apparate into the Great Hall on that day?

I think the Apparition training was never advertised at Hogsmeade; the announcement only appeared on the noticeboards in the Common Rooms of the Houses at Hogwarts.

Even if it had been known that the Anti-Apparition spell had been lifted within the Great Hall for one hour, it would still have been impossible to Apparate from outside the Great Hall to somewhere within the Great Hall, or vice versa. The students were warned not to try to Apparate outside the Great Hall.

I have to take Jo Rowling's words for it that Apparition is not possible anywhere within Hogwarts (in or out), except in the Great Hall for one hour during the Apparition training.

D'oh, thats right. It was in the common room...and it must have also been in the Slytherin common room. The only reason I see why Draco didn't take advantage was what you said Bumblebee, and because Dumbledore was there and at least appeared healthy.

i think it could have been a day when it was apparition training for the sixth years of that year and so he could apparate into the great hall!
thats all i can think of..thing is, why would he apparate into the great hall?
its very confusing

I don't think Draco really cared about the vanishing cabinet at the time of Montague's unfortunate adventure . . . as he wasn't a DE at the time, and didn't have the mission from Voldemort because his dad hadn't messed up yet at the ministry.

bumblebee

I understand, it was advertised in the common rooms...but I find it convenient that she added that it was going to rain that day so they practiced inside when they could have easily just rescheduled. We know nothing happened...and apparently nothing would have happened anyway...

I know I brought up the portkey...but now I don't think there would be one in there floating around or something, unless someone else placed it in there...or it just fell in from which ever side. But still, someone had to activate it. And I think Montague would have said that he used a portkey, instead of saying he apparated.

it never actually says you cant apparate inside hogwarts, just in or out.
maybe it's very difficult to do but possible, and you would feel weak and disorientated after.

Oh and it never says he appartated into the bathroom, it just says he was found there, maybe he needed to throw up after feeling weak/disoriantated and made his way there? a possibilty....

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it never said that he apparated back into the school, maybe he apparated into Borgin and Burkes

Thats true Kirkstain, Draco didn't say he apparated into the bathroom. However, I think it was mentioned before that, that Montague was found in the bathroom (I think it was in OotP).

just to draw attention....

it never says he appartated into the bathroom, it just says he was found there, maybe he needed to throw up after feeling weak/disoriantated and made his way there? a possibilty....

yeh i guess i missed it, it didnt say he apparated there, so howd he get there?

hmm maybe he was so disoriented that he thought the baffroom was the slytherin common room, but soon realized it wasnt!

I looked over the chapters Montague was in, and it doesn't say he apparated into the bathrooms. I guess I assumed it was refering to him...can someone also tell me where it said he was disoriented? I forgot where it said that too