Relationships

Bill and Fleur Weasley, a magical marriage

"*When you love someone, you know. It's a physical actuality, a certainty in your mind. And, from then on, the rest of your life revolves around it. The love, the certainty, is the pivot from which everything else flows.*"
— Persia's speech at her cousin's wedding
A **relationship** is the way in which two or more people or things are connected, or the state of being connected, whether it be through friendship, family or romantically. Typically romantic relationships will lead to marriage, which is a legally binding contract that says two people stay together until their death. Most relationships of any kind can also be attributed to the emotion of love, arguably the strongest and most mysterious branch of magic to ever exist.

## Nature of love

"*There is a room in the Department of Mysteries that is kept locked at all times. It contains a force that is at once more wonderful and more terrible than death, than human intelligence, than the forces of nature. It is also, perhaps, the most mysterious of the many subjects for study that reside there.*"
— The power of love
Love is a deep, powerful, and ineffable emotion of attachment to, and affection for, another being or beings.It gives those who experience it the ability to do very great things. Someone full of hate (for instance, powerful Dark wizards) who have never known it even once in their entire life, cannot understand love's full magical properties. Love is one of the hardest and strongest kinds of magic and as such, there is a room devoted to the study of it in the Department of Mysteries. Love is also quite possibly the most mysterious branch of magic and is extremely difficult to comprehend.

Love is also an incredibly dangerous emotion. It causes people to act in extreme ways, both bad and good. For example it gave James Potter and Lily Potter the strength needed to sacrifice themselves for their infant son, and gave Neville Longbottom the courage required to stand up to Lord Voldemort. It was also a motivator that drove Bellatrix Lestrange to commit all the heinous acts she had performed over the years, in the name of her obsessive love for the Dark Lord. These dangerous and potent aspects of love are the main reason why the Love Chamber within the Department of Mysteriesis always locked.

### Love and magic

Love has an incredibly profound effect on magic. Lily Potter's love for her son made her willing to die for him. Because of her loving sacrifice, Harry Potter was protected from very powerful Dark magic — the Killing Curse. Love is also the only protection against the lure and power of the Dark Arts, which come from hateful and spiteful emotions. Harry failed to learn Occlumency in order to block his connection to Lord Voldemort's mind, but he managed to block the link when he focused on his feelings for his loved ones, such as when he felt grief over his godfather's death. Those who are filled with hate can be inflicted great pain and even death by the power of love.

True love also has the power to change the form a Patronus takes, as proven with Maisie Thorn and her Patronus changing to a wolf alike James Peltier. Harry Potter's Patronus was the same as the Patronus and Animagus form of his father's, a stag. Severus Snape's mimicked Lily's doe Patronus because of his love for her. Nymphadora Tonks's Patronus changed to a wolf when she fell in love with Remus Lupin. Love can also enhance the power of a Patronus.

Love potions and Entrancing Enchantments are meant to artificially create love, but truly nothing can reproduce love. Instead, they can at most produce an intense infatuation. When a person smells Amortentia, they will smell things that remind them of what and who they love. Within the Love Room of the Department of Mysteries is where love is studied, and a large fountain of Amortentia is kept. This fountain is the centre of the room and the Amortentia within it is very powerful.

It appears that those who abuse the power of love usually suffer severe backlash, based on the First Law of the Fundamental Laws of Magic. A prime example is seen when Merope Gaunt used enchantments to subjugate the man she genuinely loved. This subjugation led to her being abandoned and left to die in despair (along with her magical powers being drained from the sorrow), when she lifted the control off her besotted. She later gave birth to a loveless being who would create a campaign of hatred for many decades, and would eventually be left to suffer a terrible after-death, due to his lack of understanding of love.

### Marriage

**Pandora Thorn**: "*Your mother was the one to show me what was truly in my heart. You. It's you. It's always been you.*"
**Kristian Walker**: "*Does this mean you'll marry me?*"
**Pandora Thorn**: "*Yes.*"
— Kristian Walker's proposal to Pandora Thorn

## Known marriages

### Magical marriages

The marriage between a wizard, witch or non-human, in rough chronological order.

### Mixed marriages

The marriage between a wizard or a witch and a Muggle, in rough chronological order.

## Known couples

### Magical couples

The relationship between a wizard, witch or non-human, that may have occurred briefly and/or does not extend to marriage, in rough chronological order.

### Mixed couples

The relationship between a wizard or a witch and a Muggle, that does not extend to marriage, in rough chronological order.