Author's Note: Hello and welcome back to Kurania and the Slytherin Legacy! Thank you to dreamingrocketships, Luke21 and SiriusBlackLivesOn for favoriting/adding to alerts, and to Anj for reviewing! I was really excited about what the stats showed me, so I tried to work quickly on this chapter, but that ended up slowing me down majorly and it's been like twenty-two days... fail. By the way, this is the Halloween chapter I've been repeatedly advertising throughout the last six or seven chapters. I'm not entirely sure I'm doing it justice, but I hope things turn out nicely! Also, isn't it a little cool that the Halloween chapter is the thirteenth chapter? Bad luck and all.

The next morning, on Saturday, Kurania was woken up rather early by a chipper green snake. All four snakes had kept her up late the night before, talking and arguing in voices that were too quiet for Kurania to understand their words even when she strained her ears, but too loud for her to fall asleep. It annoyed her greatly that they were keeping secrets from her, as well, but when she mentioned that aloud Jade immediately assured her that they would never hide something from her again if she would just go to the throne room.

Her dormmates did not lose any sleep because of the hissing, and Kurania sat for several hours waiting for them to wake up in the morning. Eventually, she gave up, dressed, and headed down into the common room where a few students were sitting around quietly. Phillip Langley and the girl who had de-summoned Kurania's birds the weekend before were playing chess in a corner, but they were the only two that Kurania recognized.

"Can't you just take me to the forest on your own?" Jade asked her grumpily.

"No - what if we were attacked on the way? I don't really know any hexes, I can't defend us! Besides, most students here hate snakes and they might... well, hurt you." Kurania had risked going alone several times to visit Myrtle and on her way to detentions, but she wouldn't dare risk it when she had a snake with her. They were much more fragile, and Kurania doubted anyone would be penalized if they did kill one of her snakes.

Jade huffed in reply. "Kurania, I'm not an ordinary snake. My family was chosen to guide Parselmouths for a reason - we've got magical venom that can hurt, help, or do nothing all depending on what the snake who it came from wanted to do. If I bite myself, then I will heal from almost any ailment - I really doubt any silly student could hex me irreparably. Anyway, I'll see an enemy coming before they'll see us and then we can just hide - so there's no reason not to go alone."

"Still... one other person at least should come with us." Kurania said, unswayed by Jade's explanation. The snake sighed exasperatedly, but did not argue when the Slytherin sat down to wait. Kurania looked carefully at everyone who entered the room, hoping someone would look like they were heading outside. Finally, an older boy with dark hair and cyan-blue eyes came from the boy's dormitories holding a broom and strode purposefully towards the exit. "Are you going down to the Quidditch pitch?" She asked him, jumping up.

"There isn't anywhere else I'm allowed to fly." He spoke slowly as if to a handicapped person, one eyebrow raised at the stupidity of her question.

"Mind if I walk with you?" Kurania asked, struggling to reign in her anger at the way the older student spoke to her.

"Er, I guess." He shrugged, and then walked away. He had much longer legs than Kurania and she almost had to run to keep up with him. Her face burned with embarassment when they passed a couple of Ravenclaws because she was fairly certain she looked like a pathetic child. The brunet hardly paid attention to her, although he would throw back a smirk whenever she began to fall behind. He finally slowed down to a reasonable pace for the eleven-year old once the two were outside, causing Jade to sigh in relief. She had once again wrapped herself around Kurania's neck and though she had tightened her hold while Kurania was running, she could now relax.

"So, where are you headed-" The boy begin to ask in a friendlier manner than he'd used before, but he broke off as the blood drained from his face. Kurania frowned and followed his eyes to Jade, who lifted her head and growled at the boy. That snapped him out his funk rather quickly and he stumbled backwards, falling on his back and crawling until he reached the wall. "Wh-why is there a snake around your neck?!" His voice was at such a high pitch that both snake and girl winced, and Kurania would have sworn a crack appeared on a nearby window.

"Erm, this is Jade... and we're heading to the forest because that's where she lives and she asked me to drop her off." Kurania explained lamely. A part of her felt quite ashamed for frightening him, but another part felt vindicated. He'd looked down on her and made her run through the whole castle, so he deserved a scare. Maybe next time he'd be nicer when a young girl asked him for help.

"It's not - dangerous?"

"She. And no, she's just getting a kick out of scaring you..."

His eyes suddenly widened with realization. "You're... Kurania Riddle, aren't you?"

"Yes - what's your name?" She bit her lip and glanced off towards the treeline. Kurania didn't like the way he said her last name, almost with reverence - Professor Hagrid had said that the name Riddle was associated with Myrtle's killer, and it shouldn't have been a good thing.

"Carson. Carson Evonne." He introduced himself, standing up slowly. His knees were still shaking a little, but his face had regained color. After a moment to recover, Carson continued to walk down Hogwart's lawn and Kurania walked alongside him though several feet away. When they passed the pitch he turned away and she continued to walk alone, still feeling a bit awkward and a little guilty, too.

Within the next couple of weeks, things began to settle down into a proper pattern. Classes became less of a problem, including duelling lessons; Pluto finally gave in and began to teach hexes although he tried to toss in defensive spells as well, and Kurania managed to convince Myrtle that visits once a day were too dangerous. Myrtle was rather cold to her on the visit after that agreement, but Kurania swore that she would continue to visit often and Myrtle trusted her enough to calm down about things. Denise and Opal became rather enthusiastic in teaching Pureblood customs to Kurania and Christine, as they hoped to make them presentable before Samhain.

"What's Samhain?" Christine had asked the first time they mentioned it.

Opal wrinkled her small nose. "I believe muggles and muggle lovers refer to it as Halloween. Samhain's especially special at Hogwarts, and the entire school will be camping out in a clearing in the forest for several days before and after."

"We're going camping for Halloween?" Kurania asked, her eyebrow near her hairline. "Why?"

"It's Samhain, and ever since the Battle of Hogwarts the castle has become unsafe on that night. The ghosts of everyone who died in the battle wander the school for one hour every Samhain now, and some of them are capable of hurting students. They never go as far as the forest, though, and for good reason. There are rumors of... of werewolves, and giants, and centaurs in there!" Denise shuddered delicately. "The teachers set up wards, of course, but they barely surround the tents."

Kurania had been into the forest with Hagrid several times and hadn't seen giants or centaurs. Also, the moon would be waning crescent on Halloween, but she didn't argue with the ladylike Slytherin. "So why do we need to learn to dance if we're going to be in tents that day?" She asked instead. As it turned out, there were magical tents that could appear to be a two-man tent from the outside but contain a ballroom, five bedrooms, two bathrooms and a full kitchen on the outside. The Greengrass family had such a tent that Slytherins had been using since the Battle of Hogwarts. Before that, some purebloods had given up on the old tradition as 'barbaric', and the few that had still practiced it would simply disappear for the night. Nobody really knew where they went.

"Why do you do it now, if your families decided it was barbaric?" Christine frowned.

Opal took her time answering. "Well... it seemed a little silly, to our parents and grandparents. Samhain is traditionally the night when the worlds of the living and dead touch, but there hadn't been any widely-acknowledged phenomena of the dead and moved on visiting until the Battle of Hogwarts. It'd just become a night to feast and remember those long gone..."

"Besides which, it was the night that the Lord disappeared and certainly not a night to celebrate - not until he rose again, anyway." Denise added primly.

Christine and Kurania shared a look at the 'Lord' part, but decided not to ask. The redheaded Slytherin supposed that it was a weird sort of Good Friday for the witches, and didn't really want to get into a religous debate.

Professor McGonagall formally announced the week-long field trip into the forest a couple of days before it, and Professor Dagsworth came around with a list to see who had not brought their own tent. Kurania had honestly expected that she would be one of few whose name ended up on the list, but it seemed that most students hadn't. Siblings were permitted to share tents, but everyone else had a tent to themself. Kurania debated with herself for quite a while on whether or not she should bring Kinnyoa, Charon and Deidei with her, only making her final decision to take them when Elena told her that the ghosts sometimes tore abandoned pets apart and spread their guts around the room they were found in. That conversation also led to some rather horrifying nightmares, but she was glad for it nonetheless. If she had left them and something had happened, she'd have felt much worse.

When the time came to head into the forest, each student was checked off a list once they'd passed the treeline. Phillip Langely and a couple of other first year students were silly enough to try staying behind, and the others had to wait until they were summoned - literally dragged through the air - by the Headmistress before they could continue to their assigned clearing. Their Head of House briefly explained where the classroom tents were, and then they set to work putting up tents. Kurania wasn't too surprised when she noticed that many students were using magic to set up their tents, but she didn't dare try it after Gabriel accidentally lit his on fire.

After Gabriel's was fixed and put up correctly, everyone walked to the largest tent, which was actually much larger from the inside. It held three floors, one of which was carefully hidden while the other two were filled with small circular tables and chairs with silverware set out. Each table had only four chairs; one red, one blue, one yellow and one green. In the spirit of inter-house relations (or so the Headmistress claimed), no two members of one house could sit at the same table. Hidan made an attempt to sit with Kurania but she hurried towards Aoife's table. The black-haired girl seemed surprised but also rather pleased, although she became less excited when Edmund and Calliope joined them. They were the only members of their respective houses that Kurania knew, but she wasn't overly fond of their presence either.

In the Great Hall, food had always appeared on the tables and if you wanted something you got up and served yourself. In the Mess Tent - as Aoife termed it - you placed an order with your plate. If you asked for something normal, like toast, it would appear the moment you quit talking. It took almost two minutes for a blue raspberry, sour apple, and mango triple flavour smoothie to appear after Aoife ordered it. That was easily the winning order of the two's silly game to try and outsmart the plate, although Kurania's blue-green algae spaghetti with mangos took quite a while too. Luckily, Calliope was willing to eat that although it was about the only time she talked.

After everyone was quite stuffed, food stopped appearing on plates and the Headmistress's voice echoed through the tent. She explained briefly what the daily schedule would like like aside from classes (which would proceed as normally as possible). Herbology and Quidditch lessons weren't taking place in tents, and there were special circumstances for those. Kurania didn't pay much attention though, because she had noticed that Teddy and Hidan were looking at her oddly, almost speculatively. She couldn't imagine what they were thinking, but she guessed it was something stupid.

She sat with Aoife again at breakfast, but the other girl was half-asleep in her plate throughout the meal and things were rather quiet. It took almost thirty seconds for Kurania's favorite cereal to appear, and it was originally along the bottom of a plate. She had to be much more specific to get it in a bowl with milk. The cause of the difficulty seemed to be that just about nobody else was eating cereal. Her teachers showed their usual level of prejudice, with Clay and Kolberts both having only enough chairs for Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw, respectively, although you could clearly see the outlines of the missing ten chairs through a blanket in the corners of their tents. Standing made potion-making quite a bit more difficult, and Kurania's feet were aching by the time the hour was over. Before that class, though, she'd had Defense Against the Dark Arts with Veronica Hansen. Generally Veronica was quite friendly, but she was in a terrible mood during that class, stalking around the room and snapping at anyone who so much as opened their mouths to breathe while they read a chapter from their textbook. The young teacher's brown hair was usually a little curly, but clearly styled, and she often wore mascara and lipstick, but on that day her hair frizzed like Aoife's and her makeup resembled that of a clown's - even without all her yelling, the class would have been terrified.

Charms with Flitwick after lunch was a small relief. The midget Professor seemed positively ecstatic as he walked along a shelf on the tent wall directing class, but Kurania honestly couldn't understand what he was asking them to do. Charms classes were gradually convincing her that something was wrong with her ears, and she ended up putting in her earplugs after a couple of minutes and having Christine write out the pronounciation for the spell they were meant to be practicing. Kurania screwed it up a couple of times, but she didn't destroy anything important, and Flitwick didn't check in on her at all.

Since Quidditch Lessons couldn't take place out on the lawn, it was changing its name to Tree-Climbing Lessons. Christine, Kurania, Phillip and Gabriel were the only Slytherins unrefined enough to enjoy this, but a small problem came in the form of some curious snakes.

"Kurania..?" Christine said in a trembling voice the first time she ran across one.

"Why are you stopping? Keep climbing!" McCoffrey barked.

"You smell a little of snake... do you hold one captive?" The large brown snake asked, flicking its tongue to test the air. Kurania had to climb onto a very shaky branch of her tree in order to tell the snake off, with McCoffrey yelling all the while. Kurania wasn't sure if she should be happy or annoyed that the loud-mouthed teacher hadn't seen the serpent.

Herbology the following day was surprisingly boring - generally, the lessons were fascinating but disgusting, but since they could not access the greenhouses they spent the hour taking notes as Professor Longbottom lectured about the useful properties of a magical plant whose name Kurania couldn't pronounce, much less spell. The only real highlight of that day was watching Gryffindor's Tree Climbing Lesson. Teddy and Hidan tried to have a race, but Hidan looked down when he was halfway up and wouldn't move another inch until Kurania summoned a hummingbird and set it on him.

"You shouldn't prey on his fears like that." Aoife told her, looking concerned.

Kurania snorted. "He's been doing it to me for ages - and anyway, if he would face his fears they wouldn't bother him so much."

"He probably should..." Aoife relunctantly agreed. "But if you're going to argue that, then you need to take swimming lessons." At that thought, Kurania grimaced.

As it was the day before Halloween, third years and above were allowed to walk to Hogsmeade with Professor Hagrid. They were only allowed two hours in the village, but that was plenty enough time for Elena to buy supplies for the Samhain celebration. Kurania was given the job of unloading them from her magically expanded bag into a cupboard in the Greengrass tent, and she couldn't help being a little confused.

"I thought you were supposed to use rocks... why'd you buy clay?" She asked.

Elena smiled brightly, and the vulture in her hair nest made a croaking sound. "Well, clay is a sort of rock, isn't it? And it's the cracking that's more important. Some rocks just don't work, but clay always does." The redheaded Slytherin just nodded, although she didn't really think that sounded right.

Despite the fact that it was a holiday, the Slytherins still had lessons on Friday. The first class held a bit of surprise - when Kurania walked into the Transfiguration tent, she had expected to see Professor Karlin. She managed to walk in, sit down, and take out her book before it occured to her that the woman waiting for everyone to enter was, in fact, Headmistress McGonagall. As it turned out, the usual Transfiguration teacher was apparently an expert on the sort of phenomena seen at Hogwarts on Samhain and stayed at the school in order to observe. Kurania found this a little hard to believe, and she wasn't the only one. Phillip was of the opinion that Professor Karlin had actually been eaten by a werewolf the night before, and thought that the Headmistress was covering it up so that students wouldn't panic.

In History class, Kurania chose to sit on the floor rather than stand for an hour. Professor Kolberts would probably have deducted points or given a detention if McGonagall hadn't come in at that moment to borrow a chair and noticed that he'd hidden them in a corner. Phillip grinned from ear to ear as he watched the Headmistress chew out the teacher, and even Denise was forced to admit a grudging respect for the witch.

After that, the day continued to improve. Kolberts was forced to behave as McGonagall left a kitten to watch over when she left for her own class. Kurania wasn't sure how a kitten was supposed to report back, but then she supposed it was possible that McGonagall had a connection to cats akin to Kurania's with snakes. That, or perhaps it was a summon like Elena's birds and had the command to attack or get help if Kolberts acted angry. Whichever way it was, the History professor seemed quite scared.

When classes ended for the day, Plue ushered all seventy Slytherins into the Greengrass tent in ones and twos while keeping an eye out for teachers. Samhain celebrations supposedly weren't against the rules, but as most of the school regarded Slytherins inexplicably as villains it could be viewed with a great deal of suspicion. Once everyone was settled at the tables around the tent's ballroom, Roderick and the girl who had sent away Kurania's birds a few weeks back (Kurania seriously needed to learn her name; it was rather cumbersome always addressing her as that,) wheeled tubs of clay and ensured everyone who wanted to participate had a brick. Christine was rather enthusiastic about the activity; she formed something like an alligator, then a bird, before finally settling on making a large pawn.

"Are you sure you want to be represented by that?" Kurania asked, frowning. She didn't really know what to do, so she'd been absently trying to make a perfectly round ball without cracks.

"Better a pawn than a crystal ball." Lyra teased her. She and her twin brother were making a pair of wings together, although they'd promised to slice it in two once they were done.

"It's not a crystal ball! I just... I don't know what to make." She sighed, looking around for ideas. Denise had just finished something that looked a little like a rose but also like a pine cone, and Opal seemed to be working on a heart. "Aren't you supposed to hollow things out?" Kurania asked.

"No, because hollowing things out is supposed to make it so it won't crack. The point here is to look at the cracks, though." Christine explained.

In the end, table by table students stood and placed their creations on shelves. Kurania was never able to figure out what she wanted to make, and ended up placing her ball on the shelf with her name as small as she could make it without it becoming illegible. Twenty minutes later, when everything and everyone was clean, Elena led the way skipping to the Mess Tent.

Halloween dinner was a major event for the rest of the school, and the feast was a great deal more interesting than usual. Still, Kurania knew that better food awaited her in the Greengrass tent and ate lightly. Students drifted out early with claims of a stomach flu, like they did every year, and like every other year most of the staff assumed someone had hexed the plates in front of the Slytherin chairs as a prank and did not find their escape suspicious.

Before heading to the party, Kurania stopped by Opal's tent to borrow dress robes. She didn't feel very comfortable in the dresslike outfit, though, and decided to wear her school robes after all. Opal was a little concerned about that, but Kurania wasn't planning on dancing and couldn't imagine any other situations that would require formal clothes. She almost regretted her choice when she entered the Greengrass tent to find that it looked entirely different from the way it was before dinner. Most of the tables were gone, and she was forced to stand against a wall to watch everyone file in. Three wrinkled little creatures known as Twink, Spark, and Ickle carried around trays food offering them to students sitting and standing, and a couple older students Kurania didn't recognize began to play music. The ballroom-like atmosphere was a little at odds with the giant bonfire in the far corner of the room, though, and Kurania was a little surprised when people began to dance. On the other hand, she managed to snag a real chair.

About half an hour in, Phillip Langely came over and asked her to dance but she promptly turned him down. An older girl at the next table seemed to find this hilarious, though, and dragged him over to give tips. He asked again a minute later with a huge bouquet of flowers, and was again turned down, after which some more girls joined in and made a game of it. Rather than being embarrassed, Phillip seemed quite pleased by their attention. When they got around to neon-glowing signs, Kurania stomped off across the room to sit with the short-haired girl who had gotten rid of the birds ages ago, and found that her name was Ashley Greengrass. Apparently, she was Roderick's older sister and had somehow gotten ahold of alcohol despite the fact she was only sixteen.

She introduced herself fairly calmly, but then grabbed Kurania's sleeve and yanked it up until she could look at her entire arm. "You've got lots of muscle, for a girl anyways. You should join the Quidditch team! It's loooots of fun!" She went on ranting about brooms in a less-than-child-appropriate manner that had Kurania bright red within a couple minutes. She would have ran away if Ashley wasn't still holding her arm, but instead she had to glance over longingly at the table at which Phillip was trying to convince Elena to dance with him.

After what felt like days, Kurania was finally able to pull herself away from the older Greengrass witch. Glancing around the ballroom nervously, she decided that it wouldn't hurt much if she decided to step outside for a breath of fresh air to pale her face before she tried talking to anyone else. The moon's light gave the trees a silvery sort of edge, and the sudden lack of babbling around her left her feeling a little dizzy. Of course, the calm didn't last for long, because a pale hand suddenly appeared and grabbed her arm.

Kurania very nearly shrieked, and only managed to hold it in because she didn't want to destroy the peace of the night. After swallowing it down, she tore the bodiless hand away from her. "Don't claw me!" A familiar voice yelped.

"Hidan?"

"I'm here too." Aoife added in hesitantly.

"How are you-? Why-?" Kurania broke off and shook her head for a moment.

"Does it matter?" Teddy Lupin whispered angrily. "Anyway, it's called an invisibilty cloak. Get under, will you? And hurry!"

"And why should I? Where exactly are you going?" She demanded to know, her eye twitching.

"Do you really need to know?" Hidan asked, his voice taking on a singsong quality. "It's going to be a fun adventure and we're not going to get in any trouble for it. Isn't that enough?"

It wasn't, but she went along anyway. Kurania hadn't forgotten the blackmail Hidan held, and she didn't want to start an argument about it with the other two present. Underneath the cloak, Kurania could see the other three students clearly but had a hard time looking at the old, faded piece of paper Teddy held. The most he would say about it was that it was a map, but the Slytherin was quite sure it was more than that. The rainbow-haired boy would not even let Hidan or Aoife examine the paper, and that seemed quite suspicious.

Still, he managed to lead the four out of the forest easily without anything sinister attacking them and put his 'map' away promptly when they began across the lawn, not taking it out again until they were nearly at the front doors of Hogwarts. "So what exactly's going on? Are you all trying to get torn to shreds by violent ghosts?" She asked, glaring at Hidan. He laughed but didn't otherwise answer her question, and she didn't speak again until she suddenly realized, with no small amount of dread, where they were heading. Gripping Hidan's arm tightly enough to cut off circulation, she snarled in his ear, "We're not going there."

"I don't know where you're talking about." He replied cheerfully. Kurania wanted to strangle him, and might have tried if Aoife hadn't frowned at her just then. About five minutes later, Hidan pulled the cloak off of everyone and pushed the door to the girl's bathroom open. "Myrtle~, we're here!" He called out.

"What took you so long?" The ghost asked sulkily. "I was beginning to think you weren't coming."

"Sorry, it took us a while to Kurania. Can't get in without her, after all."

"I wish we could." Teddy Lupin grumbled.

Kurania finally picked up her jaw to retort, "So do I!" Her voice was much too loud and Aoife flinched. "Just how long have you been planning this?!"

"Since I found out nobody'd be in school on Halloween. This way, we can see the Chamber but Myrtle won't get in any trouble, because nobody'll ever know we were here." Hidan sounded quite proud of himself, and Kurania held her arms behind her back so that she wouldn't be tempted to smack him. The only part of the whole situation that she didn't hate was that she didn't have to climb in any toilet. Instead, she had to go down a sink.

After it was opened and all five could clearly see that the pipe down was long. Very, very long, and dark, and it smelled something awful. Teddy and Hidan wanted to jump right in, but Aoife worried about how they'd get back out. They decided to tie a rope to something so that they could climb slowly down, and back up, but they faced two problems. The first was a lack of rope, although Myrtle was able to quickly remedy that by teaching the younger students how to create rope from thin air. The second problem didn't occur to Myrtle until Teddy had begun rappelling down.

"The door to the Chamber closes after people enter it!" She spoke suddenly.

"What? How are we supposed to get back up then!"

"I don't know. I never paid much attention, but... I think opens whenever something approaches it from inside?"

Kurania sighed, "Well, let's hope so."

Of course, more problems presented themselves soon enough. Hidan had somehow forgotten that he was afraid of heights, and of the dark, in his excitement to have an adventure, but that didn't last very long. In fact, he remembered partway down, just as Kurania was starting. Consequently, she had to find a way to deal with his panic attack and get him moving back down the rope. By the time all of them had reached the bottom, their hands were rubbed raw from the rope and were quite annoyed to find that the pipe ended in a way that probably would have allowed them to slide down the whole thing rather than absail. A thick layer of bones and fur covered the floor and Aoife puked when she crushed her first skull. There didn't seem to be any human remains, but nonetheless Kurania found that she didn't want to walk across the floor.

"Myrtle, could you teach us a cleaning spell?" She asked, her voice trembling slightly.

"I don't know any." The bruenette admitted.

Kurania swallowed. "Right. Well, let's climb back up, we can come back when we know-"

"Now, hang on!" Teddy interrupted, looking incredulous. "We're not just leaving! We've hardly looked around at all, and it's not like we can come back any old time. Someone came and threatened Myrtle, remember? If we come in some other time we could get her in trouble."

Kurania had half a mind to ask when Teddy had begun visiting Myrtle, but she knew that wasn't an important point here. "Teddy, Hidan's still freaked, Aoife's puking, and I don't really want to be here either. Get over it."

Unfortunately, she was voted out three to two, with Aoife the only person taking her side. The black-haired witch flinched with every step she took, doing her best not to look at the ground while they walked. Kurania felt nearly quite sick as well when they began to walk alongside the giant snakeskin and Teddy and Hidan started a conversation about the amount of money they could make from selling Basilisk scales after they'd climbed over a random pile of rubble. Aoife looked nervously at the ceiling, and had to go and say something to scare Kurania. "What if more of the ceiling collapsed? Do you think we'd be flooded in?"

"Wha- you... don't ask me that kind of question!"

"... It really isn't hard to learn how to swim-"

"I don't care. I tried swimming lessons once, I couldn't do it then, I can't do it now, no more discussion!" Kurania's voice rose in pitch as she spoke. Normally, she could be a little rational when merely talking about her fears, but it was all too easy to imagine the damp tunnel filling with water and her slowly dying as water filled her lungs...

"Why are so scared of water?" Aoife wanted to know.

"Hidan didn't explain it when he told you about it?" The Slytherin sneered, glaring ahead at a white head.

"He only mentioned it by accident. The same with you talking to snakes."

Kurania raised an eyebrow. "How could someone accidentally mention-"

"When I asked him why... well, why you didn't jump in after him before I could, if you two were so close." Aoife fidgeted with the edge of her sleeve. "As far as the snake thing goes... anyway, that was my fault too." She finished awkwardly.

Eventually, the two witches, two wizards and ghost found themselves in front of a door with two snakes carved in. Emeralds glittered from where eyes should be in the pale wandlight, and Kurania hissed, "Open sesame," at them. Immediately after 'Open', the images began to slither apart and take the door away with them. Finally, they had reached the actual Chamber, but Kurania couldn't've been less impressed. Clearly, when Jade claimed that the Chamber of Secrets was really the Throne Room of Snakes she'd been messing around. In basic design, it was quite similar to the Great Hall, although the snake carvings along the pillars were a little extravagant. However, this room was clearly where the smell of decay originated from. The walls and floors were covered in grime and stained by blood, and a huge rotten corpse lay across the room. Dried blood, nearly black from age, lay all around the once-magnificent creature and even Teddy couldn't help but gag.

"Why didn't Uncle Ron Vanish that thing when he came back?" He asked, covering his nose and mouth with his sleeves. "Please tell me you know how to get rid of that!" He begged Myrtle, who shook her head. The ghost seemed only vaguely aware of the smell, and was peering at the Basilisk's body curiously.

"So that's what killed me." She said, her voice echoing around. Myrtle seemed almost sorry for the creature, despite her words.

"Who killed him?" Kurania asked, fighting tears as she imagined how blood had reached all of the places it had, and looking at the Basilisk's gouged out eyes.

"Harry Potter." Three voices simultaneously answered.

Her left eye began to twitch as her stomach dropped further. She probably would have yelled some rather choice words about the true cruelty of the supposed hero if, at that moment, quite deep in the castle, a clock hadn't struck midnight. Their wandlight flickered suddenly, inconcievably, and a huge cloud of blackness began to form beside the Basilisk's head. After a moment, large glowing slitted eyes, a vivid red like a ruby, came into being and it began to hiss. Unfortunately, Kurania couldn't hear any of its original words because Teddy promptly shouted, "Is that the Basilisk's ghost? Bloody hell!"

At the noise, the cloud swirled timultuously and then flew directly at them. Everyone jumped out of the way, but Teddy wasn't quick enough and it touched his arm as it streamed by. Howling in agony, he grabbed his now-bleeding arm and Aoife jumped up to pull him behind a pillar. From the other side of the room, Hidan yelled, "Kurania! Distract it!"

"What?" She called back, staring at him. The cloud was coming back now, going directly towards Teddy for a second attack.

"It's a snake right, so talk to it!"

Kurania grimaced, but came out from behind the pillar anyway and hissed, "Stop!" in the most commanding voice she could manage. The cloud did indeed stop, and whirled around to face her.

"You dare to command Lord Voldemort?" It snarled in reply.

It took the Slytherin a moment to remember where she'd heard that name before. "You're the guy that died in the Great Hall." She said without thinking.

"Excuse me?" He replied, angry heat rolling away from him in waves. "Is that all I'm remembered for?"

"No, no! It's just that... that was the only time I've heard someone actually say it. Most people are still too scared." She explained hurriedly.

That seemed to be the right thing to say, as the cloud quickly calmed. "Of course... they can never forget the things I've done." He said, sounding pacified.

"Certainly not." She agreed, relieved that he'd calmed down. "Um, where'd you get the name Voldemort, anyway?" Kurania stalled, looking around for a way to escape the mist-like phantom. "It's awfully unique."

"Lord Voldemort." It corrected her, glowing red eyes appearing again for a moment. "I made a name for myself, by rearranging the letters of the common name my filthy squib of a mother gave me."

"It couldn't've been that bad of a name." She tried to calm the malformed ghost.

He laughed, a cold high-pitched laugh that hurt her ears. "Someone like me, someone who is without fault, deserves a far better name than something so plain as-"

He broke off, and then the dark cloudlike mass shuffled around and changed a little, before quite suddenly beginning an angry rant about Harry Potter. Taking a couple of slow steps backwards, Kurania looked to the other three students hiding partially behind pillars.

"Is it going to try and attack us again?" Hidan asked in a sort of stage whisper, and the momentary calm broke. The cloud barrelled towards Hidan's pillar, and he ran from it as quickly as he could.

"STOP!" Kurania yelled frantically. "Please stop!" But it seemed that the ghost couldn't hear her voice now. Luckily, Hidan moved faster than the black mist, but he wouldn't have been able to keep ahead for much longer if the cloud hadn't frozen suddenly within a couple of minutes.

Whatever it was made of swirled for a moment, and then it began slowly moving away from Hidan, towards Kurania again. "You're speaking Parseltongue." He suddenly realized. "Who are you, girl?"

"Wh-what do you mean?" She asked, startled by the change of topic.

"What is your name?" He repeated in a sort of snarl.

"Kurania." Kurania replied quickly.

Glowing red eyes appeared again, glaring at her. "Your surname?" It asked, voice deadly cold.

Taking a step back, she mumbled, "Riddle."

Instantly, the thing changed again, laughing that ear-shattering laugh. "Oh? Hmm, you don't look much like me at all, but you speak the tongue... and you're Slytherin, I see, good..." Voldemort's ghost mused in a silky voice, almost to himself.

"Why would I look like you?" She demanded, increasingly confused. Lead dropped into her stomach, though, and she could sense that she would not like the answer.

"Your mother never told you?" He seemed amused by this, although a tinge of anger was also audible.

She'd meant to say, "Told me what?" but instead she blurted out, "I've never met my mother."

Ruby eyes widened momentarily, and the cloud began to speak before the eyes suddenly faded away and it suddenly flew at her. She jumped out of the way but landed on her foot wrong and fell. As it spun around to face her, Kurania covered her face with her arms and closed her eyes tightly. She felt an intense warmth before suddenly something screamed agonizingly and the heat faded away. She waited until she heard Hidan's shaky laugh to move her arms and opened her eyes. Curls of dark mist were floating upwards away from her, and although her arms were a little red Kurania wasn't really hurt.

"What just happened?" She croaked in English.

"It just... blew up." Aoife explained weakly.

Hidan added, "Screamed first." almost incoherently.

Kurania cleared her throat a little, and then tried to take charge. "Let's get out of here quickly, in case it comes back."

"Ted's not really awake." The Gryffindor witch mumbled. "I tore part of my cloak off to wrap up his arm, so it's not blood loss, I think," She added quickly.

"Well, let's carry him to the-" Kurania tried to stand, but her ankle wobbled and she fell again.

"I can hold him. Aoife, help Kurania up." Hidan commanded.

"No..." Kurania argued, and managed to get everyone in a line that it went Hidan-Teddy-Aoife-herself, so that both of the unharmed Gryffindors could support the green-haired boy and she could lean on the other girl to walk. It was very slow going at first, but Teddy recovered enough that he was soon able to walk without much help. He was quite pale, though, and did not chat the way he usually did, besides asking if everyone else was alright.

When it came to climbing back over the rubble they'd passed easily before, though, things became more difficult. Kurania couldn't really place weight on her ankle and she and Teddy waited while Aoife and Hidan cleared up the path. "You almost let it attack Hidan." He accused suddenly. "Shouldn't you be able to control snakes better than that?"

She stared at him, surprised. Had the entire conversation been in Parseltongue, if he still thought that had been the Basilisk's ghost? "It... wasn't much like a snake. He kept going between being sort of aware and then mindlessly attacking. I did ask it to stop..." She mumbled rather pathetically. "But he just... couldn't hear me."

Teddy continued to give her a glare. He only stopped when they started onward, and none of them talked again until they reached the entrance and noticed an ashamed ghost waiting at the bottom. "You're all alright!" Myrtle exclaimed when she noticed, wringing her hands. Despite her happy tone of voice, she looked terribly nervous.

"No thanks to you." Teddy growled.

End Note: Well, this chapter didn't go exactly as I wanted it, but it's a well-known fact that good authors are controlled by their characters, rather than the other way around! I couldn't figure out exactly how to write Voldemort's ghost, though, and I'm sure that part's pretty disappointing. I'm sure someone will be all, "Voldemort's soul was in pieces, he couldn't have a ghost," but that would be why he doesn't have a solid form. Earlier in the books, Sir Nick claims that wizards who are too scared to move on become ghosts and that just fits Voldy perfectly. As far as appearing in the chamber - when I think of how his soul was broken I imagine that the smallest piece would actually have been the piece still in his body, while the largest piece would have been in his first Horcrux, the diary. Sorry about alternating between calling the ghost 'he' and 'it', but I wanted y'all to know how Kurania felt, because she couldn't decide if the ghost counted as a person or not.

So... all of my chapters are taking forever to write these days but at least they're getting nice and long. I'm always grateful to those who read this story all the way through, and I'll be even more grateful for reviews! I need some suggestions for future events, because I'm running a bit of a blank after this. In November there's Myrtle's birthday and I have plans for Kurania's Christmas, and I have a good of idea of events after that, but I don't want to just rush on by!

Also, I'm going to take a little break from things on the next chapter, and I already have half of a nonsense-y KatSL/BBC's Merlin crossover finished. It takes place in the episode The Sorcerer's Shadow, and Kurania and Hidan are fifth/sixth years in it. I do have some plans for what I want Kurania to do throughout her Hogwarts years and I may briefly reference one or two, but that doesn't necessarily mean my plans won't change. The longer crossovers will probably all be set in the same sort of timeline, by the way.

Reply to Anj: I had kind of noticed that her roommates are kind of personality-less - Honestly, I haven't yet decided what most of the Slytherin first years are like, besides Kurania, Denise, Phillip and Rode. That's a pretty bad mistake on my part, and I'm working on it - the next real chapter will hopefully help more.

Once again, thank you for reading! If you've got any comments, corrections, or suggestions, please write me a review! If you're not logged in I'll answer it at the end of the next chapter, so please don't let that deter you from reviewing.