I have been thinking a lot about that whole monologue of LVs. I think that LV is perfectly aware that Snape is a mole and that he is the one who "left forever," the one who would be killed. LV never says when, after all, and he has many good reasons for keeping Snape alive. Well, maybe not so many now, since Snape has left Hogwarts in apparent disgrace. Things look bleak for Snape, IMO. Everyone is going to want him dead.
JKR was asked in an interview why the Order members didn't communicate via the Frog cards. My hubby either saw or heard the interview--he said JKR seemed completely taken by surprise at the question, and she wished she'd thought of that. Maybe she never really had, maybe she's just playing dumb, I don't know. I think that DD left behind many of his thoughts for HP et al to view in the pensieve, including why it was he was so certain that Snape had, indeed, returned to the fold full of genuine remorse. I hope that is the case. If the whole question of why DD trusted Snape goes unanswered, I am going to be incredibly disappointed.
Well, there went one of my assumptions. I thought that perhaps DD could talk to Harry from the Chocolate Frogs, but from this interview, it appears that JKR hasn't had any of the cards "talking" up to now, so that they do not act like a photograph on the wall. Rats!
I think that DD will be available either in the pensieve, or from his portrait in the Headmaster's office, and perhaps even more importantly, from the pictures that reside in Grammauld house.
I think after Harry leaves the Dursley residence when he's turned 17, he might be at the Black residence, where there are photographs that have DD in them.
I also didn't respond to an earlier post about the Room of Requirement figuring into book 7 - and I agree that it will. Since it was used so much in HBP, and was the way that DE's got from Hogsmeade into Hogwarts, I suspect that that room holds more "answers" in book 7. I think that LV, a practitioner of the Dark Arts, certainly would have found that room; we know that his DE's know about it.
But I have NO idea how JKR is going to use that room to tie up all the loose ends, and end the series!
On Snape. Yes, I agree that he is the one who LV says "has left me forever. He will be killed." I referenced that in one of my previous posts. That he isn't seen as a double agent by LV. LV, in fact, sees him as a traitor, and one who will pay for the "crime" of leaving the DE's by dying.
So, Snape is an outcast for having killed DD, and an outcast because LV does believe Snape has left him, so where on earth does Snape go? His "champion", DD, is dead, and worse, dead at Snape's hands. We just don't know who sealed the vow between Snape and DD, but if it's Lupin as someone else thought, it's going to be pretty difficult for Lupin, since he's a werewolf, to be anyone's "champion".
So many questions, so few clues, and so long to wait for book 7, which I await with trepidation, wishing that there were going to be 12 books in the series, since it has been pointed out that JKR also loves the mystical number, 12.
I'll be rereading HBP while I'm on travel the next 2 weeks, and hope that I'll pick up some things that I missed the first time through.
Hasta la vista!