Chapter 10

Amy wheeled around to stare at Jen. "Not another attack? Not now?" she said desperately.

"What'll we do?" said Jen, aghast. "Go back to the dormitory?"

"No, we can't. We have an answer to this." said Amy. "Let's go and meet professor McGonagall." said Amy but before they could, they heart the professor approaching. Immediately they hid in a wardrobe full of the teachers' cloaks.

The teachers came in and McGonagall told them the heir had left a message and had taken a student. It was Draco Malfoy. Amy's eyes widened. Draco had been taken? But he had been the one controlling the snake! And if he was taken it means he had already written the message and when she had seen him, he was on his way… could she have done something to stop it? To stop him from being taken? She knew in her head that if she had done something then, she would have been dead.

She was horrified when she heard the teachers suggesting Lockhart go after the snake. That was sending Draco to a death sentence. No matter how much she hated the boy, she didn't want him to die.

"Come on. Let's go to Lockhart. He is stupid but we can tell him what we know. McGonagall is on her way to address the Gryffindors and it will take time which we don't have." Amy said and Jen nodded and they ran to his office.

They found him packing like the coward he was. It turned out he hadn't really done what he had written. He had obliviated the witches and wizards who had actually done it. The stupid oof had tried to obliviate them but Amy used her telekinesis, knocking his wand away. They practically dragged Lockhart to the bathroom and Jen held him at wand point as Amy looked around the sink. She found a tiny snake at the side of a tap. She hissed in psltongue and the sink opened.

xxx

Lockhart looked at the sink in shock a look of utter terror on his face. "Well, you hardly seem to need me," said Lockhart, with a shadow of his old smile. "I'll just —" He put his hand on the door knob, but he had 2 wands pointed at him.

"You can go first," Jen snarled. White-faced and wand less, Lockhart approached the opening. "But," he said, his voice feeble. "But, what good will it do?"

Amy jabbed him in the back with her wand. Lockhart slid his legs into the pipe. "I really don't think —" he started to say, but Jen gave him a push, and he slid out of sight.

The 2 girls shared a smile and then Amy followed quickly. She lowered herself slowly into the pipe, then let go. It was like rushing down an endless, slimy, dark slide. He could see more pipes branching off in all directions, but none as large as theirs, which twisted and turned, sloping steeply downward, and she knew that she was falling deeper below the school than even the dungeons. Behind her she could hear Jen, thudding slightly at the curves.

Just then pipe leveled out, and she shot out of the end before she fell with a wet thud, landing on the damp floor of a dark stone tunnel large enough to stand in.

Lockhart was getting to his feet a little ways away, covered in slime and white as a ghost. Amy stood aside as Jen came whizzing out of the pipe, too.

"We must be miles under the school," said Amy, her voice echoing in the black tunnel.

"Under the lake, probably," said Jen, squinting around at the dark, slimy walls. "Ugh Malfoy should pay me for this." said Jen as she looked at her dirtied clothes.

All 3 of them turned to stare into the darkness ahead. Amy lit her wand creating light. "C'mon," she said to Jen and Lockhart, and off they went, their footsteps slapping loudly on the wet floor. The tunnel was so dark that they could only see a little distance ahead. Their shadows on the wet walls looked monstrous in the light.

"Remember," Amy said quietly as they walked cautiously forward, "any sign of movement, close your eyes right away. . . ." But the tunnel was quiet as the grave. Amy led the way forward, around a dark bend in the tunnel.

"Amy — there's something up there —" said Jen taking Amy' shoulder. They froze, watching. Amy could just see the outline of something huge and curved, lying right across the tunnel. It wasn't moving.

"Maybe it's asleep," Amy breathed, glancing back at the others. Lockhart's hands were pressed over his eyes and Jen looked frightened.

Amy turned back to look at the thing, her heart beating so fast it hurt. Amy directed the light up and they saw it. There was a gigantic snake skin, of a vivid, poisonous green, lying curled and empty across the tunnel floor. The creature that had shed it must have been twenty feet long at least.

"That is long," said Jen weakly. There was a sudden movement behind them. Gilderoy Lockhart's knees had given way.

"Get up," said Jen sharply, pointing her wand at Lockhart. Lockhart got to his feet — then he dived at Jen, knocking her to the ground. "Jen!" cried Amy rushing to her friend.

Lockhart was straightening up, panting, Jen's wand in his hand and a gleaming smile back on his face. "The adventure ends here girls!" he said. "I shall take a bit of this skin back up to the school, tell them I was too late to save the boy, and that you two tragically lost your minds at the sight of his mangled body — say good-bye to your memories!"

He raised Jen's wand high over his head and yelled, "Obliviate!" Amy instinctively held out her hand and hit him telekinetically and his spell missed hitting the stones at the back of Jen. He rose in the air hit the stones with a force and then dropped down unconscious.

There was a rubble and stones separated her and Jen.

"Wait there," she called out. "Wait with Lockhart. I'll go on. . . . If I'm not back in an hour . . ."

"Can't you move the stones with your powers?"

"I can but it's too narrow. I could hurt you and it will be too dangerous. I can hold my own. I will create a passage when I come back." Jen agreed and Amy left.

xxx

Amy's heart was beating so fast. She knew she could meet the snake at any time. She knew she could die. Then she came to a door with snakes on it. She hissed, 'open' and the door opened. She entered. She was standing at the end of a very long, dimly lit chamber. Towering stone pillars entwined with more carved serpents rose to support a ceiling lost in darkness, casting long, black shadows through the odd, greenish gloom that filled the place. Amy stood listening to the chill silence.

Amy could hear her footprints as she walked. She was gripped with fear. She walked down the corridor and then at the end of it, she saw him, Malfoy, lying on the ground looking so pale. She dashed to him unable to believe she was actually doing this for him…the boy who had tormented her and cursed her very existence.

"Draco? Draco wake up!" She then turned and saw a black diary beside him. Tom Riddle's diary. Then she felt someone behind her and she turned. She found herself face to face with a boy. He looked to be 16 in Slytherin robes and handsome. The same boy she had seen in the diary. It was Tom.

MEETING TOM

"Tom."

"Amaryllis Potter. Just the person I wanted to meet."

"Why did you want to meet me?"

"I am curios. How is it a baby with no magical powers managed to defeat me, a great sorcerer, Voldemort the most feared wizard in the world!" he demanded.

Amy's eyes widened at the reveal that he was Voldemort then she said, "Bitter you were bested by a baby Tom? I will tell you. You didn't do your research well." She was trying to be brave but knew she was out of her league. Was it written somewhere that every school end she had to meet Voldemort? She had forgotten to read that part!

She wondered how he could be standing there out of the diary the she looked at Draco and the diary. Suddenly it clicked. She realized what was happening. Tom was taking Malfoy's life force through the use of the diary.

Tom looked Malfoy. "Aah, the stupid boy. Always whining about how he was never good enough for his father, how the mudblood Granger was good at everything and how Potter was the best in quidditch. Yes. Little Draco Malfoy opened the Chamber of Secrets. He strangled the school roosters and daubed threatening messages on the walls. He set the Serpent of Slytherin on four mudbloods, and the Squib's cat. Of course, he didn't know what he was doing at first. It was very amusing. I wish you could have seen his new diary entries . . . far more interesting, they became. . . . Dear Tom," he recited, watching Amy' face, "I think I'm losing my memory. There are rooster feathers all over my robes and I don't know how they got there. Dear Tom, I can't remember what I did on the night of Halloween, but a cat was attacked and I've got paint all down my front. Dear Tom, I don't know what's happening to me…Tom!"

"He did nothing. You were forcing him to." said Amy not believing she was actually defending Draco Malfoy. "Why?"

"I am here to finish the work Salaazar started. Pure the school of stupid mudbloods."

"You will never succeed. I am going to stop you." Voldemort held Draco's wand and tried to cast a spell on Amy but she deflected it. Tom was wide eyed.

"Thought you were going to fight a baby? Not this time Tom."

They began to fight and Tom was getting angry when she deflected his curses. Then suddenly he stopped. He whirled around to stare down the empty Chamber. There was music that was growing louder. It was eerie, spine-tingling, unearthly; it lifted the hair on Amy scalp and made her heart feel as though it was swelling to twice its normal size.

Then, as the music reached such a pitch that Amy felt it vibrating inside his own ribs, flames erupted at the top of the nearest pillar. A crimson bird the size of a swan had appeared, piping its weird music to the vaulted ceiling. It had a glittering golden tail as long as a peacock's and gleaming golden talons, which were gripping a ragged bundle.

"Fawkes!" Amy sent a message to Athena for her not to worry. That she was fine.

A second later, Fawkes dropped the ragged thing it was carrying at her feet, then landed heavily on her shoulder. As it folded its great wings, Amy looked up and saw it had a long, sharp golden beak and a beady black eye. Fawkes gazed steadily at Riddle.

"That's a phoenix. . . ." said Riddle, staring shrewdly back at it. "And that —" said Riddle, now eyeing the ragged thing that Fawkes had dropped, "that's the old school Sorting Hat —"

"Good deduction Tom." So it was. Patched, frayed, and dirty, the hat lay motionless at Amy' feet. Riddle began to laugh again. He laughed so hard that the dark Chamber rang with it, as though ten Riddles were laughing at once —

"This is what Dumbledore sends his defender! A songbird and an old hat! Do you feel brave, Potter? Do you feel safe now?"

"As a matter of fact I do."

"Let's match the powers of Lord Voldemort, Heir of Salazar Slytherin, against famous Amy Potter, and the best weapons Dumbledore can give her. . . ." He cast an amused eye over Fawkes and the Sorting Hat, then walked away. Amy watched Riddle stop between the high pillars and look up into the stone face of Slytherin, high above him in the half-darkness. Riddle opened his mouth wide and hissed — but Amy understood what he was saying. . . . "Speak to me, Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts Four." Amy wheeled around to look up at the statue, Fawkes swaying on his shoulder.

xxx

Slytherin's gigantic stone face was moving. Amy saw his mouth opening, wider and wider, to make a huge black hole. And something was stirring inside the statue's mouth. Something was slithering up from its depths.

Amy closed her eyes. She knew no spell or enchantment to block a basilisk stare. Something huge hit the stone floor of the Chamber. Amy felt it shudder — she knew what was happening, she could sense it, could almost see the giant serpent uncoiling itself from Slytherin's mouth.

Then she heard Riddle's hissing voice: "Kill her."

The basilisk was moving toward her when Fawkes flew from her shoulder and began attacking the beast. She heard Riddle's scream of rage as well as the basilisk's hisses of rage.

Amy risked and opened her eyes and saw it. the snake was enormous. Nothing like she had ever seen or imagined before. It was bright, poisonous green, thick as an oak trunk. She was glad when she saw Fawkes had blinded it. Perfect.

She took out her wand and shot spells she knew but they barely had effect on it. It was resistant to magic. What now?

Amy looked around for something to attack it with. she the saw large stones. She smiled. She held out her hands and she concentrated. Using her telekinesis, she began to pelt the large snake with rocks aiming at its head. The snake hissed in rage and pain but Amy didn't relax the attack.

"NO!" Riddle screamed surprised and alarmed at the power Amy was showing. The snake began to writhe in pain while Riddle screamed profanities and ran to her to distract her. unable to endure the large rocks anymore, the snake gave out and fell.

Amy knew it wasn't dead and she need something to finish it off then she saw the hat. On the hat lay a sword handle that hadn't been there before. Amy took the handle and pulled out a beautiful sword. It was Godric Gryffindor's sword.

Amy turned and glowered at a stunned Riddle, her green eyes blazing. "You hurt my best friend and you will pay. No one hurts my friends!" she said and with all her strength, she stabbed the snake right in the mouth. The snake writhed taking its dying breaths.

Amy then ran to the black diary. She knew she had to sever the connection somehow. "What are you doing? No! Don't!"

Seeing the fear on Riddle's face, Amy plunged the sword straight into the heart of the book. There was a long, dreadful, piercing scream. Ink spurted out of the diary in torrents, streaming over Amy's hands, flooding the floor. Riddle was writhing and twisting, screaming and flailing and then — He had gone.

There was silence except for the steady drip drip of ink still oozing from the diary. The basilisk venom had burned a sizzling hole right through it.

There was a moan and Malfoy opened his steely gry eyes then he sat up quickly looking around in freight before his eyes lay at the large snake dead and Amaryllis covered in blood.

"Potter?"

"Malfoy. Are you alright?"

"What happened?" asked Malfoy then he saw the destroyed diary. "Tom…he made me do those things I did…he controlled me…"

Amy stared at him then said, "Well he is gone now. Get up. we are leaving." Said Amy. Malfoy got up and followed not saying much. He was in shock.

Fawkes flamed them all to Dumbledore's office where there was Dumbledore and Lucius. As soon as he saw his son, he took him and held him close before offering to take him to the hospital wing

Amy gave a statement to everything that had happened before she too went to the hospital wing. She was surprised when Lucius came over to her and said, "Thank you for saving my son." Without waiting for a response he left and Amy was left stunned.

Thank you for reading… next chapter Amy and Dumbledore have a hucrox talk.