October had fallen and Thomas' birthday present was long since sent. Richard had done the same as last year. He had taken the liberty of getting a present on his own, failing to mention what it was to Elizabeth, making her sign the letter he had written to Thomas for the both of them, and sent it off without another word on the matter. Elizabeth really wished he would let her have some sort of say in the decision making, but he simply thought her incapable of giving Thomas a proper birthday present. He was always underestimating her like that.
Elizabeth had bigger things to worry about, though. A recent spring of colds had been going around the castle and Margaret was sending letters nearly daily to nag Richard and her to keep their health up. Elizabeth didn't understand why, since they could just take Madam Pomfrey's Pepperup potion and be good as new, although smoking at the ears for several hours, but Margaret insisted it best not to catch one at all. Poor Ginny seemed to have come down with one and Percy had to practically force her to take the potion. The steam pouring from under her vivid hair gave the impression that her whole head was on fire.
The Slytherin Quidditch team had also kept up the taunting, despite what had happened, and Oliver Wood was so determined not to lose to them again this year that he was forcing the Gryffindor Quidditch team to practise, rain or shine, despite the cold and the recent spring of flues. Elizabeth was wondering how Harry had managed to avoid catching something coming back every weekend drenched in mud and looking peaked.
Rain was lashing the windows of the common room, which were now inky black, but inside looked all bright and cheerful. The firelight glowed over the countless squashy armchairs where people sat reading, talking, doing coursework, or in the case of Fred and George Weasley, trying to find out what would happen if they fed a Filibuster firework to a salamander. Fred had "rescued" the brilliant orange, fire-dwelling lizard from a Care of Magical Creatures class and it was now smouldering gently on a table surrounded by a knot of curious people. Elizabeth couldn't help but keep glancing over at it.
"Elizabeth!" Hermione scolded her. "Pay attention to your coursework."
"I am," Elizabeth said, still staring at the salamander. "Potions. We're doing Potions."
"You will never finish your coursework if you don't work on it."
"Bunk." She turned to face Hermione. "I'm already heaps ahead of Ron and he's been at it longer than I have."
Ron grumbled something incoherently. He was always a bit defensive when Hermione made him do his coursework.
Elizabeth perked up when she saw Harry enter the common room. He quickly joined the three of them.
"How was practise?" Elizabeth asked.
"Cold and wet," Harry replied. "Filch tried to punish me for dripping mud over the castle, but Nearly Headless Nick helped me."
Elizabeth did like Sir Nicholas. He was always willing to help a Gryffindor and more than once had she had a pleasant conversation with him while wandering about the castle. Margaret did warn not to get friendly with the ghosts, but Elizabeth never really listened to Margaret all that much anyway.
"He invited us to his deathday party."
"A deathday party?" said Hermione keenly. "I bet there aren't many living people who can say they've been to one of those — it'll be fascinating!"
"Why would anyone want to celebrate the day they died?" said Ron, who was halfway through his Potions coursework and grumpy.
"Because, it's an important moment in the life of a ghost," Elizabeth said. "Well, afterlife technically. Just like a person's birthday."
Harry had told them all about Sir Nicholas getting Peeves to cause a distraction, and was at the point of telling them about Flich's Kwikspell course when Fred and George's salamander suddenly whizzed into the air, emitting loud sparks and bangs as it whirled wildly round the room. Percy bellowed at Fred and George as tangerine stars showered from the salamander's mouth before it escaped into the fire, causing more explosions.
Elizabeth quickly focused on her coursework, scribbling furiously with her quill. She suddenly stopped and looked at Hermione. She picked up her parchment. "I finished." She held it out toward Hermione. "You want to check it over?"
Halloween arrived and while the rest of the school was happily anticipating their Halloween feast, Elizabeth was sulking. The Great Hall had been decorated with the usual live bats, Hagrid's vast pumpkins had been carved into lanterns large enough for three men to sit in, and there were rumours that Dumbledore had booked a troupe of dancing skeletons for entertainment. Richard was surely going to exaggerate how great it was later just to spite Elizabeth.
"A promise is a promise," Hermione reminded Harry bossily. "You said you'd go to the deathday party."
"Yeah, he said," Elizabeth whinged. "Why does that mean we have to go?"
But Elizabeth went ignored, and at seven o'clock, the four of them walked straight passed the doorway to the packed Great Hall, which was glittering invitingly with gold plates and candles, and directed their steps instead toward the dungeon. She wanted to go to the feast with everyone else, but she knew Hermione was right. A promise was a promise, and even if Harry made it for them, Sir Nicholas had invited all four of them and they should honour that invitation.
The passageway leading to Nearly Headless Nick's party had been lines with candles, too, though the effect was far from cheerful: These were long, thin, jet-black tapers, all burning bright blue, casting a dim, ghostly light even over their own living faces. The temperature dropped with every step they took. Elizabeth wrapped her arms around herself tightly as she heard what sounded like a thousand fingernails scraping an enormous blackboard.
"Is that supposed to be music?" Ron whispered. They turned a corner and saw Nearly Headless Nick standing at a doorway hung with black velvet drapes.
"My dear friends," he said mournfully. "Welcome, welcome...so pleased you could come..." He swept off his plumed hat and bowed them inside.
It was an incredible sight. The dungeon was full of hundreds of pearly-white, translucent people, mostly drifting around a crowded dance floor, waltzing to the dreadful, quavering sound of thirty musical saws, played by an orchestra on a raised, black-draped platform. A chandelier overhead blazed midnight-blue with a thousand more black candles. Their breath rose in a mist before them; it was like stepping into a freezer.
Elizabeth had heard about deathday parties from her uncle, who used to sneak down into the dungeons in hopes of crashing one. He never actually managed. He said the overwhelming cold and irritating music stopped him. Thomas said that was normal of deathday parties. It was less of a party and more of a tragedy he said, and that William should have shown more respect for the ghosts of the castle than to try and crash their get-togethers. Thomas rarely ever said anything disapproving of William, so Elizabeth took this to heart. Even if she didn't want to be there, she was going to be on her best behaviour.
"Shall we have a look around?" Harry suggested.
"Careful not to walk through anyone," said Ron nervously, and they set off around the edge of the dance floor.
They passed a group of gloomy nuns, a ragged man wearing chains, and the Fat Friar, who was talking to a knight with an arrow sticking out of his forehead. Elizabeth stayed close to Harry as they shifted around the room. The Bloody Baron was being given a wide berth by the other ghosts and Elizabeth wasn't going anywhere near him either. Harry seemed not to want to get acquainted with him as well. He moved closer to Elizabeth, pressing against her side, as they passed the open area around the Baron. She felt her face flush as she took hold of Harry's hand, but was quickly pulled away from him. Hermione grabbed the back of her robes and yanked Elizabeth to her side.
"Turn back, turn back," Hermione said. "We don't want to talk to Moaning Myrtle."
Harry turned around when Elizabeth and Hermione backtracked quickly. "Who?" he asked.
"She haunts one of the toilets in the girls' room on the second floor," said Hermione.
"She haunts a toilet?"
Elizabeth nodded. "She's a right nightmare."
"Elizabeth," Hermione scolded. "It's been out-of-order all year because she keeps having tantrums and flooding the place. I never went in there anyway if I could avoid it."
"I met her by accident." Elizabeth remembered her first encounter with Moaning Myrtle last year near the end of term. "I won't even walk passed the second floor toilet anymore. You go down the corridor and all you can hear is her crying."
"It's awful trying to go to the loo with her wailing at you —"
"Look, food!" said Ron.
On the other side of the dungeon was a long table, also covered in black velvet. They approached it eagerly, but next moment had stopped in their tracks, horrified. Elizabeth held her breath. The smell was quite disgusting. Large, rotten fish were laid on handsome silver platters; cakes, burned charcoal-black, were heaped on salvers; there was a great maggoty haggis, a slab of cheese covered in furry green mould, and, in pride of place, an enormous grey cake in the shape of a tombstone, with tar-like icing forming the words,
SIR NICHOLAS DE MIMSY-PORPINGTON
DIED 31ST October, 1492
"How fitting to die on Halloween," said Elizabeth, genuinely thinking Halloween would be the only suitable time in the living world for such a party. Hermione glared at her, but Ron nodded in agreement.
Elizabeth watched on in disgust as a portly ghost approached the table, crouched low, and walked through it, his mouth held wide so that it passed through one of the stinking salmon.
"Can you taste it if you walk through it?" Harry asked him.
"Almost," said the ghost sadly, and he drifted away.
Elizabeth was quite certain William would not have wanted to crash a deathday party if he knew that there would be no edible food, the ghosts were quite miserable, and the Bloody Baron was in attendance. She didn't even want to be there and she had been invited.
"I expect they've let it rot to give it a stronger flavour," said Hermione knowledgeably, pinching her nose and leaning closer to look at the putrid haggis.
"Can we move? I feel sick," said Ron.
"Wow, food making Ron ill," Elizabeth said. "Who would've ever thunk it possible?"
Ron was clearly not amused. "Ha ha."
They barely turned around, however, when a little man swooped suddenly from under the table and came to a halt in midair before them. Elizabeth recognised him immediately, and she was sure he was all too familiar with her after the events of last year. Peeves the Poltergeist was the very reverse of pale and transparent. He was wearing a bright orange party hat, and despite Elizabeth being very fond of the colour orange, so much so her bathrobe was orange, she thought it simply clashed with his revolving bow tie. He had a broad grin on his wide, wicked face. Elizabeth ducked behind Ron, hoping that Peeves wouldn't see her and decide to get her back for her antics toward him.
"Nibbles?" he said sweetly, offering them a bowl of peanuts covered in fungus.
"No thanks," said Hermione.
"Heard you talking about poor Myrtle," said Peeves, his eyes dancing. "Rude you and Izzy Wizzy was about poor Myrtle."
Elizabeth cursed under her breath. Peeves had spotted her.
He took a deep breath and bellowed, "OY! MYRTLE!"
Elizabeth jumped out from behind Ron. "Peeves!" she hissed. "Shut it!"
"Peeves, don't tell her what we said, she'll be really upset," Hermione whispered frantically. "We didn't mean it. Right, Elizabeth?"
"No." Elizabeth played along.
"We don't mind her — er, hello, Myrtle."
The squat ghost that was Moaning Myrtle glided over with the glummest face of anyone at the party. She had the saddest expression of any ghost, person, being, or animal that Elizabeth had ever seen, and those hunting dogs of Michael's looked like they'd cry if they could. Her face was half-hidden behind lank hair and thick, pearly spectacles.
"What?" she said sulkily.
"How are you, Myrtle?" Hermione asked in a falsely bright voice. "It's nice to see you out of the toilet." She tapped Elizabeth's arm.
"What? Oh yeah," Elizabeth agreed with Hermione. "Good to see you out and socialising for a change."
"Elizabeth!"
Myrtle sniffled.
"Miss Granger and Izzy Wizzy was just talking about you —" said Peeves slyly in Myrtle's ear.
"I hate you, Peeves," Elizabeth said.
"Elizabeth!" Hermione pinched her.
"Ow!"
"We were just saying — saying — how nice you look tonight," said Hermione, glaring at Peeves. "Liz is right. It's great you're out tonight. You look great."
"Fantastic, even," Elizabeth added.
Myrtle eyed them suspiciously. "You're making fun of me," she said, silver tears welling rapidly in her small, see-through eyes.
"No!"
"No — honestly — didn't we just say how nice Myrtle's looking?" said Hermione, nudging Ron painfully in the ribs.
"Oh, yeah —"
Elizabeth poked Harry in the back to get him to speak up. "They did —"
"Don't lie to me," Myrtle gasped, tears now flooding down her face, while Peeves chuckled happily over her shoulder. "D'you think I don't know what people call me behind my back? Fat Myrtle! Ugly Myrtle! Miserable, moaning, moping Myrtle!"
Elizabeth hated to agree, but Myrtle was miserable, she moaned, and she certainly did mope. Fat and ugly were debatable. Myrtle wasn't anything to look at, but then again she was a ghost. Elizabeth didn't really know what she looked like when she was solid and actually in colour, as opposed to the transparent, greyish, glowing figure floating in front of her. Margaret said Myrtle was picked on for her appearance, but she died so young, who knows what she could have grown up to look like. Not that looks mattered anyway. Margaret always told Elizabeth not to judge someone by their appearance, even if she was guilty of this herself. She described one of William's childhood friends as "that chubby boy" and she always told William that he would never be taken seriously if he didn't clean up his manner of dress and his unkept hair.
She was well aware that appearance made no difference when it came to personality. Hermione looked rather like a beaver having a bad hair day with her teeth and bushy hair, but she was the smartest student at Hogwarts. Harry was terribly awkward looking. His hair was permanently disheveled, his old, worn and often too big for him clothes made him look small and timid when Harry was one of the bravest people she had met, and she never would have guessed he could be athletic with those glasses of his. Ron, however, looked exactly how she thought he would for the qualities he had, except for being thin. With how much he stuffed his face, she would have expected Ron to be referred to by Margaret as Elizabeth's chubby friend and not that lanky kid. Myrtle's appearance didn't surprise her at all. She honestly looked as miserable as she acted.
"You've forgotten pimply," Peeves hissed in her ear.
Moaning Myrtle burst into anguished sobs and fled from the dungeon. Peeves shot after her, pelting her with mouldy peanuts, yelling "Pimply! Pimply!"
"Peeves!" Elizabeth called after him.
"Oh dear," said Hermione sadly.
"Someone should get the Baron after him."
They all just stood there silently until Sir Nicholas drifted toward them through the crowd.
"Enjoying yourselves?"
"Oh, yes," they lied.
"Not a bad turnout," said Sir Nicholas proudly. "The Wailing Widow came all the way up from Kent...It's nearly time for my speech. I better go and warn the orchestra..."
The orchestra, however, stopped playing at that very moment. They, and everyone else in the dungeon, fell silent, looking around in excitement, as a hunting horn sounded.
"Oh, here we go," said Sir Nicholas bitterly.
Through the dungeon wall burst a dozen ghost horses, each ridden by a headless horseman. The assembly clapped wildly. Elizabeth crossed her arms over her chest, knowing very well that Sir Nicholas was about to go into a very sour mood, and she felt right bad that he would be so cross at his own deathday party. He was so excited about it before. It was just like the time Claudius was excited for his birthday. He planned a party and everything. Thomas had talked Margaret into letting him have it at the house, as he had no residence of his own. He was staying in the guest room at the time. He failed to invite his mother, as she was even less accepting than Margaret, but she showed anyway and ruined the whole day. William then went and made it worse by saying it was the perfect example of why birthdays bring nothing but misery and bad memories. Poor Claudius, Elizabeth thought. He just wanted to be happy and the people in his life would have none of it.
Harry started to clap until Elizabeth grabbed his hands. "Don't," she said sternly.
The horses galloped into the middle of the dance floor and halted, rearing and plunging. At the front of the pack was a large ghost who held his bearded head under his arm, from which position he was blowing the horn. Elizabeth figured him as Sir Patrick Delaney-Podmore, leader of the Headless Hunt. William had told Elizabeth that Sir Nicholas did not like to be called Nearly Headless Nick, as it reminded him of his botched beheading, and, because his head was not completely severed, he could not be considered headless. Elizabeth thought this was a good thing until William told her it meant that Sir Nicholas was excluded from the Headless Hunt, and was still upset about it after all these years. The Headless Hunt was a group of beheaded ghosts, lead by Sir Patrick. Sir Nicholas had quite a beef with him, as he seemed to ridicule poor Nick for not being able to be awarded membership on the technicality of still having his head attached by a bit of skin and sinew.
Sir Patrick leapt off his horse and lifted his head high in the air so he could see over the crowd. Everyone laughed, except Elizabeth, who had decided she wouldn't like anyone who didn't like Sir Nick. He strode over to Nick and squashed his head back onto his neck.
"Nick!" he roared. "How are you? Head still hanging in there?" He gave a hearty guffaw and clapped Nick on the shoulder.
"Welcome, Patrick," said Nick stiffly.
"Live 'uns!" said Sir Patrick, spotting Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Elizabeth. He gave a huge, fake jump of astonishment, so that his head fell off again and the crowd howled with laughter.
"Very amusing," Nick said darkly.
"Don't mind Nick!" shouted Sir Patrick's head from the floor. "Still upset we won't let him join the Hunt! But I mean to say — look at the fellow —"
"I think," said Harry hurriedly, "Nick's very — frightening and — er —"
"Ha!" yelled Sir Patrick's head. "Bet he asked you to say that!"
Elizabeth pulled her foot back, ready to punt Sir Patrick's head like a rugby player going for a drop goal. It didn't occur to her at the moment that it would have gone right through him anyway. Hermione quickly grabbed by the her arm and swung Elizabeth around to stand on the other side of her.
"If I could have everyone's attention, it's time for my speech!" said Sir Nicholas loudly, striding toward the podium and climbing into an icy blue spotlight. "My late lamented lords, ladies, and gentlemen, it is my great sorrow..."
But nobody heard much more. Sir Patrick and the rest of the Headless Hunt had just started a game of Head Hockey and the crowd were turning to watch. Nick tried vainly to recapture his audience, but gave up as Sir Patrick's head went sailing past him to loud cheers.
"Should've let me kick him," Elizabeth whispered to Hermione.
"He's a ghost. It would have gone right through him."
"I can't stand much more of this," Ron muttered, his teeth chattering away, as the orchestra ground back into action and the ghosts swept back onto the dance floor.
"Let's go," Harry agreed.
They backed toward the door, nodding and beaming at anyone who looked at them, and a minute later they were hurrying back up the passageway full of black candles.
"Pudding might not be finished yet," said Ron hopefully, leading the way toward the steps to the entrance hall.
Harry stumbled to a halt, clutching at the stone wall. He looked around, squinting up and down the dimly lit passageway. Elizabeth stopped next to Harry and put her hand on his shoulder.
"Harry?" she asked worriedly. "Harry, are you all right? What're you — ?"
"It's that voice again — shut up a minute —" He paused for a second. "Listen!"
They all froze, watching him. Elizabeth gently rubbed his back as he stared at the dark ceiling.
"This way!" he shouted.
He began to run, up the stairs, into the entrance hall. Elizabeth took off after him immediately. The sounds of the students enjoying the Halloween feast echoed out of the Great Hall. Harry sprinted up the marble staircase to the first floor. Ron and Hermione were clattering behind them.
"Harry!" Elizabeth called after him. "Harry, what're we —"
"SHH!" He stopped for a moment to listen.
Elizabeth caught up with him. She gingerly touched his forearm. "Harry —"
"It's going to kill someone!" he shouted.
Elizabeth was glad to see Ron and Hermione looking just as bewildered as she was. She knew Harry to remain surprisingly composed in situations that would test her patience. He was a voice of reason, but he was acting downright mad. There was no audible voice besides her own trying to calm Harry down and figure out what he was doing. She had to admit she was quite fond of him, but he was scaring her at that moment.
He ran up the next flight of steps three at a time. Elizabeth had trouble keeping up with his pace, especially on the stairs. Ron dashed right passed her. Harry hurtled around the whole of the second floor, his three best friends panting behind him, not stopping until they turned a corner into the last, deserted passage.
"Harry, what was that all about?" said Ron, wiping sweat off his face.
Elizabeth nearly collapsed into Harry when they stopped running. "Harry," she panted as she grabbed him to hold herself up. "Harry, there's no voice. The music at the deathday party must have warped your hearing. Right, Ron?"
Ron agreed. "I couldn't hear anything..."
But Hermione gave a sudden gasp, pointing down the corridor. "Look!"
Elizabeth peered down the corridor to where Hermione was pointing. Something was shining on the wall ahead. She let go of Harry and they approached slowly, squinting through the darkness. Foot-high words had been daubed on the wall between two windows, shimmering in the light cast by the flaming torches.
THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.
Elizabeth had a weird feeling in the pit of her stomach. She swore she had heard of the Chamber of Secrets before. It certainly sounded familiar, like she had read it in one of her books. She was feeling uneasy though, and that paired with her hunger from missing the feast was making her feel like she was about to vomit. The threat at the end of the message was what worried her. Enemies of the Heir, beware. She had heard that before. She could hear it in her head. A man's voice, low and gruff, whispering it maliciously. She could hear the whole sentence in a voice she recognised, but couldn't place.
"What's that thing — hanging underneath?" There was a slight quiver in Ron's voice.
As they edged nearer, Harry almost slipped — there was a large puddle of water on the floor. Elizabeth tried to grab him, but realised her mistake when she lost her balance and fell right into the puddle instead. Ron and Hermione had caught Harry and he extended his hand to help Elizabeth up. She didn't want to stand, as her robes were now soaked and sticking to her backside, but she took his hand and he pulled her up. She tried to examine the back of her robes, but the dim light didn't show anything. She could feel the cold water through her clothes.
"Liz," Ron said, reminding her of why they were walking through the water in the first place.
They inched toward the message, eyes fixed on a dark shadow beneath it. All four of them realised what it was at once, and leapt backwards with a splash. Elizabeth had forgotten all about her wet robes, as she was sure Mr. Filch was going to be beside himself when he saw Mrs. Norris hanging by her tail from the torch bracket. She was stiff as a board, her eyes wide and staring.
For a few seconds, they didn't move. Then Ron said, "Let's get out of here."
"Shouldn't we try and help —" Harry began slowly. Elizabeth just shook her head.
"Trust me," Ron said. "We don't want to be found here."
But it was too late. A rumble, as though of distant thunder, told them that the feast had just ended. From either side of the corridor where they stood came the sound of hundreds of feet climbing the stairs, and the loud, happy talk of well-fed people. Elizabeth had all but forgotten about her own hunger when students came crashing into the passage from both ends.
All of a sudden, the happy noise died as the people in front spotted the hanging cat. The four of them stood alone, in the middle of the corridor, as silence fell among the mass of students pressing forward to see the grisly sight. Elizabeth realised very quickly how suspicious it looked of them all and wished desperately for Harry's invisibility cloak to disappear under.
Then someone shouted through the quiet.
"Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next, Mudbloods!"
It was Draco Malfoy. He had pushed to the front of the crowd, his cold eyes alive, his usually bloodless face flushed, as he grinned at the sight of the hanging cat.
Richard came pushing through the crowd at the sound of Malfoy's outburst. He stopped before the puddle and his eyes fell on the writing on the wall. He spotted Elizabeth next and his lips parted slightly. No words came out, but she swore she saw him breathe out, "Gramps."
A/N: Plot and quotes from Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling, chapter Eight, The Deathday Party, pages 122 and 130 to 139.
