Chapter Thirty-Six: The Chamber
October 4, 1997
The girls' bathroom on the second floor was abandoned this late at night, and completely silent as a result. Moaning Myrtle, who usually haunted the broken down toilet she'd died in front of, was nowhere to be seen. Hermione thought it likely that the mournful spirit was somewhere in the Black Lake, another of her favorite haunts. As the moon filtered through the high windows along the far wall, it suffused the room with a soft, ethereal glow. Despite the stark contrast in situations, Hermione found herself smiling as she remembered the time she had spent there, years ago as a thirteen year old girl, brewing potions that should have been well beyond her, and spending time with her two best friends. She wished for a moment that her current task were as innocent as brewing Polyjuice to infiltrate the Slytherin common room; turning herself into some horrific, anthropomorphic cat might be slightly less embarrassing if she were able to avoid entering The Chamber of Secrets in the process.
"Shall we continue lingering in the doorway, or were you planning to move very soon?" Severus' voice brought Hermione back to reality, and she glanced at him long enough to ensure he got the message that she didn't find him amusing. He only gave her a dashing grin in response and stepped past her into the empty bathroom. He seemed to inspect the place for several seconds, his gaze roving from the intricately designed washstands to the plush sofa shoved against a richly decorated wall. It seemed someone had made improvements to the place since she'd brewed there in secret years ago. "You know, you girls are really the most spoiled creatures. Is seating really necessary? Does shitting tire you all out so very much that you must rest immediately following?"
"Oh, shut it," Hermione dismissed fondly, following him into the bathroom and crossing to begin inspecting the sinks. "Help me look at these. Let me know if you find the one with a snake on it."
Severus raised a brow at her tone but complied nonetheless, approaching the sink opposite her and peering down at the spigot. Hermione watched him from beneath her lashes, noting, as she did so, the intensity of his gaze. She had wondered aloud on their walk to the second floor whether Severus might have access to the Chamber as Headmaster of the school, a notion he had immediately disabused her of, confiding in her as they had walked that Dumbledore himself had tried to open the place after Harry and Ginny had emerged, but that it had remained stubbornly closed. Salazar Slytherin, it seemed, had been quite thorough when he had enchanted the place. Only a witch, or wizard gifted with the ability to speak with snakes would be able to access the chamber, and while Hermione had not hitherto displayed such a talent, she was technically a descendent of the Hogwarts Founder; if anyone had a chance of opening the secret entrance, it would be her. Hermione moved on to the next sink, leaning down to inspect the tap before a thought occurred to her.
"This is a bit of an odd spot to build a secret clubhouse isn't it? Girls' lavatory. You don't think Slytherin was a pervert, do you?"
Severus looked up immediately, a perfect expression of shock on his face before his brows knitted themselves together, and he trained his most famous glare on her.
"Salazar Slytherin was not a pervert," he hissed.
It was Hermione's turn to give him a skeptical look as she spoke. "Really? Because from what you told me about him when you were studying his journals, it seemed as if he was quite keen to force himself on poor Hildred using the bond."
Severus grit his teeth, seeming to recognize that Hermione was goading him, but unable to resist responding. "If you recall, his wife was more than eager to satisfy her husband's desires, a state of affairs which would hardly lend itself to loitering about watching children relieve themselves." He sniffed, as if offended on behalf of his House's founder. "Besides, it's highly unlikely the Chamber's entrance was originally located in a girl's bathroom. It's far more likely the entrance, as we know it today, was built by some of your ancestors, after the advent of modern plumbing."
"Some of my—" She paused abruptly, his words sinking in after several seconds. "Wait, you think the Chamber was opened before The Dark Lord got to it?"
"It makes sense," he shrugged, leaning down once more to inspect another of the sinks. "Salazar Slytherin could hardly have built the entrance into pipes that didn't exist, and I find it far more likely that the rumors of the Chamber and it's monster, which have persisted throughout the centuries, were based on more recent experience than a millennia old possibility."
"So what?" asked Hermione, frowning, "Hogwarts, A History just forgot to mention Muggleborns being killed off by a great big snake every generation?"
Severus scoffed. "No. Contrary to popular belief, Slytherins are not all murderers. It is my understanding that the basilisk was meant largely to protect the school. If you recall your history, you'll note that in the 10th century, Muggles were not overly accepting of our kind. Was it so very wrong of Slytherin to prefer isolationism to the risk of extermination?"
"What risk?" asked Hermione crossly. "What Muggle weapon of the day could hope to compare to wands and magic? You don't honestly believe that—"
"Of course not," Severus answered, pacifying her, "but we cannot discount the very real motivations which influenced him. Had the man been a murderer, I think it far more likely he would have just decimated the Muggleborn population before leaving the school, rather than building a secure chamber with a guard dog only accessible to him and to his progeny."
"Humph," sounded Hermione. "I still don't see what this has to do with plumbing."
Severus sighed and moved onto another sink as Hermione did the same. "I was merely pointing out, that keeping the Chamber secure and the monster pacified until it was needed was likely the charge of Slytherin's descendants throughout the centuries, a practice perhaps only recently abandoned, when your father, knowing nothing of our rich history, discovered it."
"I see." Hermione's spine was stiff as she turned her attention back to the task at hand. "Well, considering the last time I saw the thing it petrified me, I'm not sure I'd have been much use at that."
"The creature didn't respond to your blood, Hermione, but to parseltongue. You would have to have spoken to it for it to obey you, and I'm fairly certain you didn't ask it politely to look the other way when you came upon it."
"No, I suppose you're—Severus, does this look like a snake to you, or is it more of an 'S' shape?"
At her question, Severus crossed to stand behind her, leaning down and letting his his chest brush across her back as he peered over her shoulder. Hermione felt her heart rate quicken as his warmth bled through the robes separating them, and she realized how chilly the room was this late at night.
"I'd say so," he nodded, his voice husky in her ear for a moment before he stood up and took a step back. Hermione straightened with him, and feeling bereft, took his hand in hers.
"Okay," she said, staring at the unassuming looking sink in front of them. "How do we get in?"
0-0-0-0-0-0
Two hours later, Hermione sat cross-legged in the middle of the floor, her eyes half open and unfocused as she stared in the direction of the Chamber's entrance. She knew she had the answer, somewhere. How many times had she heard Ron tell the story of how he and Harry had gained access to the basilisk's lair? A thousand at least. And each time he had imitated the sounds Harry had made, the language he had spoken to open up the entrance and allow them admittance. All she had to do was remember, to focus, and to empty her mind of all the unimportant and cumbersome thoughts clouding her memory and preventing her from performing the task she was here to carry out. She took note of each one as it flitted across the silver screen of her mind, catching it mid flight and tucking it safely away beneath a clear black lake, completely still and without boundaries. At last, with her mind carefully blank once more, she called forth the memory she was looking for, examining it and speaking as Ron spoke in her mind's eye.
"Shina hussy hef!"
A snort at her back broke her concentration, and Hermione turned to glare pointedly and the man responsible.
"If you keep giggling like a school girl we will never get into this chamber," she hissed. Severus, so often the picture of stalwart support, had apparently found her attempts to gain access to Slytherin's secret lair entirely too amusing. Each failed attempt to speak the language of her ancestors seemed to provide him with seemingly limitless joviality, and Hermione rather suspected it was the product of seeing her struggle to accomplish a task for once in their long acquaintance.
"I hardly think my reactions have a bearing on the outcome," he answered, shrugging, "I told you an hour ago how we'll accomplish it. All that is left now, is for you to realize I'm right. Forgive me if in the meantime I prefer to take pleasure in your frustrations rather than give in to my own."
"Oh, alright, you cad." Hermione huffed as she stood, yelping as she realized her legs had fallen asleep. She hopped from foot to foot as the sensation returned in thousands of tickling pinpricks. This time, Severus really did laugh, before reaching out and sweeping her up and into his arms, taking the pressure from her legs and staring down at her in amusement.
"It serves you right for your stubbornness," he told her, and she flicked his nose in response. He held her for a while longer, and as he looked down at her, his gaze searching, Hermione thought he might kiss her… but before he could, he was setting her down again and reaching into his robes only to withdraw his wand.
"Now," he asked, "are you ready to do this my way?"
Hermione wrinkled her nose but nodded. "I really wish your way involved less blood."
"We're about to erect heavy blood-wards using Dark Magic in the girls' toilet, and you're worried about bleeding a bit?"
"Hmmm," was Hermione's only—noncommittal—response.
Severus set to work after that, as it became clear that she would not argue further. He conjured a stone basin and produced the same silver dagger he had used to cut her arm the night she had found out the truth of her parentage, before summoning something with his wand that came zooming through one of the high windows of the bathroom. Hermione watched as he set the fragile looking, leather bound tome down on the sink. She cringed, hoping that there wasn't any standing water waiting to ruin the fragile volume.
"You really ought to take better care of that," she admonished.
"Worried for your family heirlooms?"
"Hardly," Hermione dismissed. "Only for a rather important piece of history…" A pause, and then, "Do you think this was what led him to the Chamber?"
Severus paused as he flipped through the journal's pages, looking up to consider her question before nodding. "Yes, it's very likely. He knew nothing of his family history upon attending Hogwarts. All the answers he would have needed are housed here. The headmasters before me were fools to leave them in the restricted section without first thoroughly perusing them."
"Well, I'm glad you confiscated them after your research into the Sanguinis Copulam bond. At the very least, it saved us a trip to the library to retrieve them."
"What happened to 'little miss nervous of blood'?" Severus teased.
"The prospect of getting rid of the diadem has cheered me considerably."
"Very well then, come over here so we may begin."
Hermione joined Severus in front of the sink, catching sight of herself in the mirror as she did so and noticing the dark circles beneath her eyes and the frizziness of her hair. It had been a long night, and it would be yet longer.
"Here it is." Severus turned his head up from the journal at last and gave Hermione a meaningful look.
"Be quick," she ordered, and then extended her arm and squeezed her eyes shut tight.
A warm, steady hand wrapped around her wrist, turning her arm to expose the soft flesh of her forearm. She heard him pick up the dagger and felt the barest sting on her arm before he hissed and withdrew, releasing her as the pained sound grew audibly and her eyes fluttered open. The first thing she saw was her arm, and a small nick just below her elbow welling with a single drop of blood. Puzzled, she turned her gaze towards Severus. She had been under the impression that there would be rather more blood than that. When her gaze landed on him, it was her turn to gasp.
"Christ, Sev, what are you doing?" she rushed towards him, pulling her wand, only to be stopped as Severus raised a hand in her direction.
"It's alright," he said through gritted teeth, and Hermione froze, her gaze now riveted on his right arm, which he held motionless over the small stone basin he had conjured. The gash on his arm was so deep she thought she could see bone, and the blood was coming extremely quickly. He let it flow for a while longer, until the bowl was half full, before drawing his own wand and tracing it along the wound with a grimace and an incantation she had never heard before. As the wound healed, Hermione let out the breath she had not realized she had been holding.
"You bloody fool," she said, taking his arm in hand and pulling it up to inspect before guiding him over to the sofa on the far wall. "Sit," she ordered, and he did. "What in Merlin's name were you thinking, you could have cut off your arm, or killed yourself!"
"I didn't plan it," he said mildly, looking pale as he took deep, steady breaths.
"So your knife just jumped to your arm and gave it a hack job of its own accord did it? And then your arm just held itself over the great bloody bowl and nearly bled you to death."
"You're exaggerating."
"What were you thinking?!" Asked Hermione, who had conjured a glass of juice and was pouring some potion she'd summoned into it. "Drink this," she demanded tersely.
He did, and when he had, he looked up at her. "The bond," he said by way of explanation. "It wouldn't let me— I couldn't spill your blood for the ritual. My hand moved of its own volition and made the cut, and I decided I wouldn't let the blood go to waste."
Hermione settled heavily onto the seat beside him. Blast and damnit. The bloody bond. She hadn't thought of it recently, not since the compulsion for renewal had seemed to disappear. But here it was again, rearing its damned head, reminding them that they were neither of them beholden to just themselves. Magic older than record flowed in them, making decisions for them, and holding them to the promises they had made by participating in it. For Severus' part, that apparently meant he could not spill her blood, even to participate in ritual magic.
"Shit," Hermione swore. "Alright, I'll do it myself." She stood, moving towards the knife with trepidation until she felt Severus' hand around her upper arm.
"I don't think you'll have to," he said. Hermione must have looked confused, because as he dropped his grip on her arm and made his way towards the knife and blood filled basin, he explained. "The blood wards were devised to allow access to the daughters of Slytherin's line. Those of his descendants who carried his blood but were not gifted with the traditionally male gift of parseltongue, would still need a way to access the Chamber if there was a need. By erecting these wards, you—"
"Grant myself access, yes, I know. You explained all of this before. Salazar's blood runs in my veins, and spilling my blood to protect the Chamber gets me in. I don't see why you're suddenly so reticent for me to do it when minutes ago you were—"
"Would you let me finish a bloody sentence, woman?" Severus looked truly annoyed, and for a moment Hermione felt badly before remembering that she was right.
"Don't you take that tone, Severus Snape. I am not just some child that you can boss around like—"
"The bond made our blood the same," cried Severus, clearly exasperated. Hermione, who was rarely taken aback, paused.
"What?"
"It gave us the same blood. Not in the traditional Muggle sense, but in all the ways that matter, the magical ways, it is the same. Our magical cores were melded when we were married. The magic that suffuses you is in me, and mine in you. If I am not mistaken, the blood ward ritual will draw upon the magical signature in my blood, and recognize it as yours, as a descendent of Salazar Slytherin, and admit me. I hadn't thought of our bond's effect on my blood before I began the ritual, or I would have started off with my own arm and not made it so bloody painful." He drew his arm up, rubbing the thin white line that was the only indication he had nearly bled himself dry minutes before. Hermione watched and thought for a moment. She did not know very much about Wizarding customs. Everything she had learned had been at Severus' hand, or at Keep Avery under her father's instruction. But if what he said was true, it made sense that his blood could substitute for hers in the ritual, and if it didn't, it wasn't as if she couldn't then use her own.
"Alright, give me the book," she snapped, striding forward and wedging herself between him and the sink which held his blood and the fragile old journal with the incantation necessary to erect the wards. "Back up," she ordered, aware of how cross she sounded but unwilling to change it.
The ritual itself was surprisingly simple; A few short phrases in Latin, a pledge to protect the school, and the offering up of Severus' blood. Then, Hermione stepped back rapidly because the sink in front of her was receding, leaving a large pipe in the floor which she supposed she was supposed to jump down. "Fantastic," she said under her breath.
"Shall we?" Severus spoke from behind her, putting a hand on her elbow and looking down at her from where he stood, his black hair sticking slightly to his forehead which was glistening with sweat, a side effect of the Blood Replenishing Potion she had given him.
"After you," she smiled. He leaned forward and kissed her then, his mouth warm over hers, his tongue sweeping the seam of her lips until she opened to him and felt the slick heat enter, running along her teeth before touching her own tongue and then receding.
And then he jumped down the pipe, disappearing into the blackness in an almost comical swirl of robes. Hermione laughed full-throatedly and followed.
The stench at the bottom of the pipe was unbearable. As she stumbled into Severus she gagged, burying her nose in the crook of her arm and looking around. They appeared to be in an underground passage. Debris littered the ground around them, old bones and rubble. They made their way through the passage as quickly as possible, both covering their noses as they walked, passing what looked like the remains of an old basilisk skin, and blasting their way through a cave-in Hermione thought might be where Lockhart's spell had backfired. When they reached the Chamber, they paused at the entrance, taking in the sight before them.
The room was massive, easily as large as the Great Hall, with huge pillars lining a walkway that lead to a gigantic statue of a man Hermione assumed was Salazar Slytherin.
"Rather vain, isn't it?" she said dryly from behind her arm, still blocking out the awful stench in the Chamber. "To put a great big statue of yourself in your panic room?"
"What a waste," hissed Severus in response, and for a moment Hermione was confused, until she saw the source of the ungodly stench permeating the room.
The basilisk lay motionless on the floor, rotted and putrefying, it was still in the process of decomposing. Its two bulbous eyes were gone completely, though from what Hermione remembered of the story, that might have been the work of Fawkes. Its scales seemed to have crumbled to bits around it, and portions of its flesh had turned liquid, sliding off to reveal its bones in patches.
"I wouldn't get too worked up about the thing," said Hermione, "It did try to kill your wife when she was a second year."
"The potions I could have made had this beast been properly preserved," Severus continued, as if he hadn't heard her. "Merlin, this thing is a fortune set ablaze."
"Right. If you could stop waxing poetic about its earning potential, I think we ought to grab the stuff and get out." Hermione motioned towards the head of the basilisk and the countless, razor sharp fangs waiting there to be retrieved. "They'll still be good, won't they?"
Severus nodded, and they moved forward together, reaching down and taking hold of the fangs carefully before pulling, feeling as they slid easily from the jaw. They each took four, depositing them in a rucksack Hermione conjured and fortified to prevent rips, or damage. The last thing she wanted was to be stabbed by one of the bloody things by accident.
Leaving the chamber was made slightly more difficult by the pipe through which they had descended. Eventually, Severus was able to spell them both to resist gravity, and they simply fell up the pipe until they were deposited once more into the girls' bathroom. Looking up as Hermione righted herself, she realized a soft light had begun to filter through the windows on the eastern wall.
"We ought to hurry," she said, turning to face Severus and handing him the rucksack she had worn on their trek back. "Hold this for a minute while I wash the Eau Du Decomposing Basilisk off of my hands." He took the bag, slinging it over his shoulder and then eyeing her with an odd look on his face as she cleaned her hands meticulously and splashed her face with cool water. "What?" she asked when she was done. "Did I miss a spot? Have I got dead basilisk on me?"
Severus shook his head and cleared his throat. "No," he assured her. "I was only thinking…" he paused, hesitant. "Perhaps you should head back to the rooms. I can find the diadem on my own, and you can—"
"No!" Hermione spoke immediately, crossing her arms and shaking her head. "No! I'm fine. I'm coming with you."
"Do you really think that wise?" Severus still sounded uncharacteristically tentative, and for some reason that worried her. "Hermione, from what I've heard about Horcruxes, everything I've learned since I became aware of them, they are not the kind of thing you just waltz in and destroy. The diary Potter confronted his second year nearly killed him before he managed to dispose of it." His voice seemed to be growing more sure as he spoke, his expression less hesitant.
"You're only thinking of the worst possible outcome," Hermione argued. "Harry was thirteen years old, and he bested the thing. I think between the two of us, we can-"
He cut her off. "And what if you are in danger and the bond compels me to intercede? What happens when my attention is divided, and my actions hijacked by the magic between us? The danger is not worth the risk, Hermione!"
"I can take care of myself, I'm a grown woman, and I'm more than capable of seeing to my own safety. I wouldn't put you at any risk." He was being ridiculous, and while a part of her could understand his concern, given the injury the bond had done him just a short while before, the larger part thought he was being incredibly sexist and more than a bit insulting. She was not a child, or an incompetent, to be coddled and secreted away for her own protection.
"And if the bit of soul The Dark Lord had stashed in the diadem recognizes you as kin? What then? Have you even thought of the ramifications, of the risk that the fragment might flit to a magical signature resembling its own once the vessel is destroyed?"
"That is completely far-fetched," Hermione dismissed, turning her back to him and heading towards the door. "I'm coming, and your fear mongering isn't going to change my mind."
"I think you misunderstand me," he said, and something about the tone of his voice made her turn and look up at him. He looked less hesitant now, in fact, if she were pressed to name his expression, she would say that it was determined. "Go back to our rooms. I won't have you around the bloody Horcrux. Circe knows what the thing is capable of."
"Severus, don't be daft. I'm coming to help you! I can help—"
"Hermione, I Order you to return to our rooms, and to stay until I join you there. Go."
The compulsion to obey was immediate, and she gasped as she turned her back on him, striding stiffly out of the room as her eyes stung and her throat burned with betrayal at his Order. But there was nothing she could do, no recourse but to obey, and so, she fled at a run, racing up stairs and through corridors until she reached their bedroom and could breathe again before collapsing onto their bed and sobbing like a child.
A/N: Please don't hate me! Thank you all for the lovely reviews, favs, and follows. And thank you to Oblivion . Baby, who is a paragon of beauty and learning, for her spectacular beta work.