Welcome back everyone!
As usual, you all have lifted my spirits with your reviews and feedback.
So we're breaking away from Snily to refocus a bit on the plot.
*waves to a crowd of boos and hisses*
We need get the diadem plot moving some seeing as it is nearly Christmas and they still have no real leads on it. I promise the Snily will return soon, so bear with me.
Sorry if this chapter has any confusion or inconsistencies, I rewrote it several times because it kept contradicting previously established details. I'd be writing and suddenly go "Wait, if it says this here...then what about when I said that over there?"
Anyway on with the show!
If Someone Cared Enough
Chapter Forty-Four: Ghostly Gab
To most students at Hogwarts, the Bloody Baron was an elusive spirit, almost a non-entity whom was seen very little and crossed their minds only rarely. Nick or the Friar were more well-known and acknowledged staples of the Hogwarts resident afterlife, popping in on students frequently and making their presence known.
Even the Grey Lady and Moaning Myrtle, though private and isolated in their own right, were seen or at least spoken of more than the Baron. This was mostly in part because the Grey Lady took her title of Ravenclaw's ghost with a measure of grim pride and begrudgingly graced students with her presence from time to time. Myrtle, while sticking to the comfort of her bathroom, sought attention and sympathy, descending upon any student who should wander into her abode.
Yet the Bloody Baron seemed entirely nonexistent, prompting many students who had not yet seen him to question if Slytherin's ghost was anything more than a myth to add to the foreboding mystery of the House.
Slytherins, however, could attest that the Baron was in fact real.
Every few months or so, the Baron picked a new place to roam translucently, rattling his chains and letting out the most mournful, low moans. Months prior, he could be seen staring wistfully at the dusty shackles in the dungeon, before that people thought they saw him floating aimlessly through the Spectral Anomaly section in the library. To the keen eye of the observant witch or wizard, it was easy to spot a pattern to his travels.
It was because of this precise factor that Simone and Severus were able to track the Baron down. Initially reluctant to engage in a likely pointless conversation with the silent spirit, Severus had delayed any actual pursuit of the Baron, hoping Simone would go alone.
However, she refused to do it without Severus, citing his own stand offish, regretful countenance as a common trait between him and the ghost, which might prove useful for winning the Baron's trust. That coupled with Severus's own burning curiosity about the diadem led him to eventually give in and assist Simone in her questioning.
That was what led to them hiding just out of sight of their target on a stairwell.
The Bloody Baron was currently haunting the astronomy tower, looking off over the edge as if he wanted to throw himself from it if were only possible.
"He looks less like a killer and more like a wet blanket," Severus muttered from his hiding place.
Simone shushed him, "He'll hear you! Remember; it's his temper that wound up getting the girl he loved killed. Let's not piss him off."
Severus snorted, "Why not? It's not like he can touch us."
"Do you want to get haunted for the rest of your school years?" Simone challenged.
Severus imagined chains rattling over his bed at night, wails keeping him from a good night's sleep. He pictured mournful howls and miserable sighs dogging his every step, preventing him from having a moment's piece. He grimaced.
Simone clicked her tongue, "Thought not. Now let's go talk to him."
Coming out of her hiding place, Simone cautiously approached the wayward ghost.
"Excuse me," She began gently, "Baron, sir? May we have a word with you?"
The Baron turned around slowly, his eyes landing heavily on Simone with a dull stare. He was a tall man in life, with dark wavy hair that hung over his shoulders and a dusting of fine hair around his chin. His eyes were heavy lidded and his mouth thin and down turned like an upside down cupid's bow.
In life he was probably fairly handsome, but in death he painted a grim, depressing visage of sadness and self-pity coated in blood.
"You're from Slytherin," he observed softly, "One of the outspoken ones; you like to fix things you deem broken."
Simone stood up proudly, "I'm pleased to see my reputation proceeds me; it is my intention to make school happier and healthier, especially for Slytherin who get such a bad reputation."
The Baron nodded, "Yes, I believe I have heard of the trouble going on outside the walls of this castle. A former student of my house wishes to bring about a war."
"Sounds like you don't agree with him," Severus said, stepping forward.
The Baron's eyes swiveled in his head to land on Severus.
"I care not for the politics of the living," the Baron said flatly, "A person's bloodline or magical ability has little bearing on me now, nor did it affect me much when I was alive. Pureblood or muggleborn; it had no impact on my greatest desire, nor the fatal outcome."
"We know of which outcome you speak," Severus said plainly, "And who's death you really lament."
The Baron drew back sharply, alarmed.
"We are not here to judge," Simone interjected swiftly, shooting Severus a glare, "Love can drive one to great lengths. It's doubtful so romantic a soul as you meant to hurt her."
"We found your letters," Severus went on, "Quite by accident, we assure you. From how you wrote of her, it is clear she meant a great deal to you. She was your world."
"She was my everything," the Baron whispered, his face crumpling, "And I hurt her in a way I can never undo or make amends for."
"It was an accident," Simone said with forced kindness; never did she think she'd have to turn against her own principles to weasel information out of a stalker and murderer, "You were working on your temper, you put in so much effort to change yourself for her. No one could have foreseen it going so wrong."
"Oh if I were given but one chance to go back and fix my mistakes," The Baron moaned, "I would stop that accursed blade and wrestle it from my past self's hand. I would fall down upon my knees before her and beg forgiveness."
'If you truly loved her rather than obsessed over her you would go back and leave her alone in the first place,' Simone thought sourly.
Still she pressed on, "We know you would do anything for her. You loved her."
Severus was having just as hard a time sympathizing with a man who willing stabbed the woman he loved to death. There was so much malice in an action like that, a desire to inflict pain. Even if the thought was there for a tenth of a second, it still has existed, apparently with enough spiteful strength and conviction to act upon.
The Baron didn't understand love; he knew only desire and want.
"We do not judge you for your actions, Baron," Severus lied smoothly, "Rather we wish to help you move on and find peace with yourself, maybe even with her, with Helena."
At the mention of her name, the Baron threw his head back and wailed forcefully, tearing at his hair in anguish.
Simone struggled to be heard over his cries, "Wrongs can be made right if things are put to right! We just need the truth!"
"What happened to the diadem?" Severus asked.
The Baron cried to his heart's content until he wore himself out. Eventually his sobs petered out. Sniffling, he looked at Severus.
"The diadem?" he asked in confusion, "Why is that important?"
"You know exactly why it is," Severus insisted, "When you tried to take it from Helena's body, what happened to it next?"
"I haven't any clue what you are talking about," the Baron denied, "I never had Rowena's diadem. It's been lost for centuries."
"Because Helena stole it!" Severus snapped. Things were going nowhere fast, "After you killed her, what did you do to the diadem? How did it make it from Albania to here?"
The Baron didn't appear to be listening anymore.
"Helena stole it," he murmured, mystified, "So it was with her in the forest that day. She must have been protecting it…that's why she refused to come with me!" He clutched his chest, "If only I had known the reason for your rebuffing, I'd have acted less rashly."
Severus scoffed, "You honestly still think she once returned your feelings?"
"Snape," Simone scolded harshly.
The Baron heard not a word, "Oh, my love, is that why you wander the halls so sadly? Because I separated you from the diadem? In death you are denied the chance to return it to your mother, oh! If only I had known. I ruined everything for you!"
With a heartbroken cry, the Baron swooped over the edge of the astronomy tower, plummeting to the ground. Such an act might have seemed dramatic and startling, if it were not for his ghostly form preventing him from hitting the ground.
Sobbing softly, he floated away to another part of the castle.
Severus and Simone peered over the edge.
"Well, he's delusional," Severus said after a time, "He's convinced himself now that the only reason Helena rejected him was because she was hiding the diadem. Does he honestly think she would have otherwise loved him?"
"He's willfully ignoring all the previous years she rejected his advances," Simone said, "He doesn't take no for an answer."
"Sounds like someone we know," Severus quipped.
"Thinking of Potter?" Simone asked.
"Indeed," was Severus's response, "They're one in the same, loving the idea of a woman, but not the woman herself and more she says no, the more he wants her simply to get his way."
"Plus they both put the woman on a pedestal," Simone pointed out, "I seem to recall someone else doing that…"
Severus blanched, turning to stare accusingly at Simone.
"I am nothing like Potter or that beast of a Baron," he snarled.
Simone examined her nails, "Not now perhaps. But you did think the sun shone out of her ass. She had no flaws in your eyes and if she disagreed with you, you came up with dozens of accuses, other's to blame—like Potter—just to avoid acknowledging that your difference of opinion might have been because you or her were wrong."
Severus scowled at Simone.
Simone tapped her lips in thought, humming, "One can't help but wonder how you would have turned out if the two of you hadn't worked things out. Would you have pined after her from a distance, loving a memory you built up to near godhood, unable to remember any of the flaws that made her human, that made her more than a fantasy?"
"I highly doubt I would get that bad," Severus sneered.
"Well we'll never know, now will we?" Simone shrugged, "For all we know, years from now you could have been a huge asshole, caring for no one but yourself and your precious Lily. I'm just saying."
"Shall we go on and speculate on whether I kicked puppies too in this hypothetical future?" Snape said sarcastically.
Simone raised her hands, "I just thought it interesting that you judge Potter so harshly for obsessing over Lily when you were nearly doing the same. But you're right," she added before Severus could object, "It's not exactly the same. You have actually known Lily for a long time and liked her for more than her looks. Potter hasn't even stopped to ask himself whether he cares about her feelings over his own."
"Thank you," Severus bit off, glad to have something they could agree on.
Simone sighed, "Well that significantly brought the mood down. Sorry…"
Severus huffed, crossing his arms, "Well…it's not like the mood was all that cheerful beforehand anyway, what with the crying, blood smeared ghost."
"Yeah, that turned out to be a bust," Simone lamented, "He didn't give us much other than confirmation that he is Helena's killer."
"And that she died in a forest in Albania like Myrtle said," Severus added.
Simone nodded, "Right, that too. Other than that, though, we've still got nothing. I guess we'll have to try and catch him again when we get the chance and question him some more. Till then we haven't anything else to go on."
"Not necessarily," Severus said cryptically, "Didn't you hear him?"
"Hear what?" Simone asked curiously.
"He spoke of Helena wandering around looking sad. He means her ghost."
"Yeah, so?" Simone shrugged.
"So, he haunts the school, so the ghost he would see would be in this school—Helena's in the school, Sim!" he ended irritably when Simone didn't seem to be catching on.
"You don't need to yell!" Simone winced, taking a step back, "I haven't had my second cup of coffee, give me a minute to mull things over, will you?" She rubbed her ears with a pout, before what Severus said hit her, "Merlin's saggy nut, she's here?! Why haunt the same school as her killer?"
"Helena died before him," Severus pointed out, "The Baron must have followed her here."
"I suppose it makes sense," Simone mused, "She probably wanted to be close to the place she grew up."
"Yes," Severus agreed, "Now, there aren't many ghosts to choose from and given this information I'm…grievously ashamed to say Helena has been under our nose this whole time..."
Simone blinked, "…The Grey Lady?"
Severus nodded, eyes pinched shut, massaging his brow.
"Does it make us blithering idiots that we didn't think of her from the start?" Simone asked, "I mean…she is the Ravenclaw ghost."
"Who could have been the ghost of any former student here," Severus pointed out, "Without records or pictures to compare her image to; there was no reason for anyone to automatically assume she was Helena."
"Yeah, but it seems so obvious now," Simone went on.
"I know!" Severus snapped.
"No wonder she's mopey all the time," Simone muttered, "I'd be too if I had to spend the afterlife followed around by my killer having a pity party for himself."
"She might also be upset because he stole the diadem from her," Severus theorized, "She seemed to care a great deal about it to have kept it in hiding all those years on the run."
"I guess we've got no choice but to ask her," Simone suggested.
"It won't be easy," Severus warned, "There's a reason no one here knows her as anything other than the Grey Lady. She's very tight lipped, so we need to be careful with how we ask her."
"Ask me what?" came a haughty voice.
Slipping up through the floor itself, the Grey Lady glided in front of them. A slim woman with dark hair, her face was pale, even for that of a ghost and her lips were pulled in a perpetual frown. Her eyes were sharp and inquisitive, the only life-like quality remaining to her otherwise lifeless demeanor.
Severus never noticed before, but her dark dress had an even dark streak on it, just under the left breast; the fatal blow that killed her.
"My Lady," Simone said with a curtsey, "What brings you here?"
"I heard that fool wallowing up here again," the Grey Lady sniffed disdainfully, "This was once my favorite place to be when I was living, but he is tainting it with his weeping. I came here to make him leave."
"It must be difficult to have him tainting your few happy memories," Simone said sympathetically.
"Do not presume to know me, child," the Grey Lady cautioned, "I was long before your time."
"She's just saying it must be hard to be around the Baron," Severus broached, "Given the connection between you two."
The Grey Lady's eyes hardened, "What makes you say that?"
Severus shrugged, feigning casualty, "I just can't help but notice…there's blood on you," he gestured to her dress, "And blood on the Baron. Only…much of what's on him doesn't seem to all come from his wound. So if it isn't all his blood then perhaps it is…" he trailed off, looking at the Grey Lady expectantly.
The Grey Lady appeared to be quite thoroughly ruffled. She leaned down, inches from Severus's face.
"I don't appreciate your tone," she warned, "And whatever you may believe is of no concern of mine," she straightened, "Meddle not in the affairs of the dead, child," the last word was biting, "You know not of what you speak." She turned to leave them, fire in her eyes.
"No wait!" Simone cried, "Don't leave!"
"Guess we're putting all the cards on the table, then," Severus muttered, "Helena!"
At the sound of her name, the Grey Lady paused. Slowly she turned around.
"It's been years since I've heard that name," she said softly, almost in wonder.
Severus nodded, "You left behind your identity when you died. You didn't want anyone to recognize you."
Helena turned to face them fully, her eyes filled with regret and loneliness. Once cold and standoffish, the Ravenclaw ghost suddenly looked small, and childlike in her vulnerability.
"I didn't want them to remember me," she admitted.
"Because you stole your mother's diadem," Severus stated.
Helena looked up at him, shock warring with confliction in her face, "How do you know about that?"
"I've done my research," Severus replied simply.
"Is that why you've sought me out?" Helena accused, "to steal my mother's diadem and use it for yourselves? If you think I will let you soil it—"
"We don't know where it is," Simone interjected, practically pulling Severus into a headlock, "And we aren't after it."
"Last thing we need is her telling Dumbledore about this," she hissed so that only Severus could hear.
"We don't want the diadem," Simone continued for Helena, "And we've no idea where it is. We're really just curious, that's all."
"You'll never find it," Helena insisted hotly, "Even if you figure out where I died, you'll never locate it."
"We know," Severus said, shaking free of Simone's hold, "Because someone found its hiding place there."
Helena seized up in shock, "How do you know that?"
"We know it's in the school," Simone placated, "But not where and we don't want to find out. We just want to know why it was brought here."
"Enough games," Severus demanded, "We know the Baron killed you, and then tried to take the diadem."
"The Baron?" Helena questioned.
"What we want to know is why?" Simone explained.
"And what he did with it," Severus tact on.
Helena shook her head, "That's not…I don't know what…"
"Please, Helena," Simone begged, "Wouldn't getting the truth all out there feel better than keeping it in? We know you regret what you did. Let us help."
Helena looked away, biting her lip.
ow could you know that
"I didn't want to steal it," she protested futilely, "Not forever. I just wanted to be more like her…envied…and admired. I never lived up to her expectations."
"So you thought the diadem could help you," Simone said.
"I regretted it the moment I took it," Helena admitted, "But the damage was done. If anyone found out I had stolen it, things would never be the same. My reputation would be destroyed, my mother's name ruined….I knew I could never go back…so I ran."
"To Albania," Severus surmised.
Helena nodded, "I thought I would be well hidden there, but the Baron still found me. A hid the diadem in a hollow tree and next thing I know he was there. He begged me to come back, but I refused. Then…" she held her arms out, "Well, you know what happened next."
"And the diadem?" Severus pressed, "Where did the Baron do with it?"
Helena shook her head.
"How should I know?" she asked flippantly, "He must have taken it with him."
"He died covered in your blood," Simone pointed out, "How far could he have gotten?"
"Well I imagine seeing me dead drove him mad," Helena said tensely. She nodded to herself, picking up steam, "Oh yes, I remember watching him from beyond the veil. Mad he was, traveled night and day covered in my blood, howling to the sky in anguish."
"And then he killed himself?" Severus asked skeptically.
"Yes," Helena said, "He must have hidden the diadem at Hogwarts and then taken his own life."
"That doesn't necessarily add up," Severus said.
Helena tossed her hair over her shoulder, "Why don't you just ask him yourself what he did with it. I've told you all I know. Now, if that will be all," she drifted off through a wall before they could stop her.
{page break}
For the next several days, Severus and Simone split their free time between interrogating the Bloody Baron and pleading for assistance from Helena, both strategies getting them nowhere.
The Baron denied any and all connection to the diadem, claiming to have never even seen it when he came for Helena. Most attempts to push him further just ended in him flying off, wailing with lorn, though on one occasion Severus failed to fake enough sympathy for the Baron's plight and resulted in the ghost chasing them from the astronomy tower.
Helena was just as impossible.
"Clearly he's lying," Helena said for the fifth time that week, "Of course he hid the diadem. He's the only one who can answer your questions."
"Well he's giving us nothing," griped Severus, "And I still don't think you're being completely honest with us."
"I've told you everything I know," Helena insisted.
"Perhaps if we could just hash over things again," Simone suggested, "Like, how did he know you had the diadem?"
"That is a good question," Severus agreed, "Rowena told no one that you were the thief and you had already hidden it when he found you. How'd he even know you would have it?"
For some reason, that question seemed to catch Helena off guard.
"I..." she stammered, "I-I...well...why wouldn't he know? He was obsessed with me!" she shot out quickly, "Would it be so hard to believe the man chasing after me all those years would have found a means to access knowledge not privy to others?"
"I suppose that is a possibility," Simone conceded, "He was rather fixated on you."
"He always has been," Helena said angrily, "He never left me alone. All through school he was there, pining, pleading. Nothing I said ever seemed to get through to him; he refused to believe we were anything but meant to be."
Helena floated by the window, looking out across the school grounds, "I had hoped to escape him when I fled this place, but somehow he always knew where to look. I oftentimes wondered if he had spies following me. When he cornered me in Albania, there was no reasoning with him. That rejection was the final straw for him, and I paid the ultimate price."
"Then the wretched fool killed himself," Helena huffed, thoroughly unimpressed, "As if falling on the very blade that killed me would somehow redeem his actions. It sickens me to think his body is still laying besides mine, like some poetic mockery."
"Wait," Severus interrupted, "You said the Baron killed himself at Hogwarts."
Helena paused.
"I did?..." she asked warily, slowly realizing her mistake.
Severus nodded, "How could he hide the diadem if he died that very night besides you?"
Helena didn't have an answer
"My god," Simone breathed, "He's not the one who hid it here, is he? He probably didn't even know you had it, just like everyone else."
"You've been trying to hide all traces of yourself or the diadem since the day you returned here after death," Severus surmised. He turned to Simone, "That fire Davis said happened in the common room so long ago; she must be the one who talked that student into it. She knew she couldn't cast the spell herself," He turned back to Helena, "That's why you were willing to help us; you were actually sending us in the wrong direction all along."
"I don't have to stand here and be accused like this," Helena snapped, gliding away.
"That's why you sent us back to the Baron," Severus called after her, "Because you knew he wouldn't be able to tell us a thing about the diadem. You've been leading us on a wild goose chase this whole time to avoid telling the truth."
"Think what you want, I've said my piece," Helen called back haughtily.
"We want to destroy it," Severus blurted out.
That stopped Helena dead in her tracks.
"We lied before; we do know where the diadem is," Severus continued, "We've known it was cursed since the moment we found it. It's not safe to keep in the school; to keep anywhere. That's why we wanted to find out what you and the Baron knew. We can't destroy is unless we know what was done to it."
Helena stared at Severus, her hard eyes glimmering with regret and unshed tears, if ghost could even cry.
"He told me the same thing once," she said distrustfully, "He said he would destroy it too."
"Who did?" Severus pressed.
"It was a boy," Helena answered, "He promised that if I told him where I hid the diadem, he'd destroy it and end my shame, but instead he brought it here. He corrupted it, tainted it. Then he hid it away in that room."
"Do you know his name?" Simone asked.
Helena hesitated to answer them.
"Please, Helena," Simone begged, "We can't destroy it without your help."
Helena finally relented, "In all honesty I have done my best to forget the one who misled me in order to bear the guilt. I was a fool to trust him, and now he has made my crime against my mother that much worse by corrupting the very item I wish I had never taken."
"So you don't know who he was," Severus said.
"He was charming when we met, though," Helena added wistfully, "He spoke with such kindness, such sympathy. It was almost as if he truly understood me. He told me that he was once Head Boy; I know that much."
"Which gave you all the more reason to trust him," Severus guessed, "So you told him the diadem was in Albania. Then what? I doubt he could really take off during his seventh year to go looking for it, nor would he be able to just walk back into school as he pleased after he graduated."
"He had already graduated when we first met," Helena explained, "He didn't seek me out until he came back to apply for a job. He wanted the Defense position and was rejected many times. The final time he returned to apply he had already cursed the diadem. He was quite sore when I saw him later that day, didn't even bother to hide what he had done to my mother's diadem. In fact, my horror seemed to raise his spirits; like it somehow made up for Dumbledore refusing him the post."
"Wait, Dumbledore?" Simone questioned, "He's only been headmaster since the late 1960's. So the diadem was hidden here not even twenty years ago."
Helena nodded, "Yes, it was not long ago."
"I knew it had to be recent," Severus muttered, "There's no way it would still be at the top of that pile if he was hidden centuries ago, not with so many people continuing to hid things in there. It probably would have been buried within two decades."
"So the culprit was a Hogwarts graduate not too many years ago," Simone mused, "A good student most likely given his Head Boy status, charismatic, probably manipulative and highly intelligent."
"And yet not qualified in Dumbledore's eyes to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts," Severus pointed out, "If he was planning to curse the diadem from the start, he would have been adept at some dark magic. Perhaps Dumbledore knew that and couldn't trust him."
"Must have been pissed off when he didn't get the job," Simone added, "He knew about the 'Come and Go' room and saw it as the ideal place to hide the diadem. What if he wanted to get back in to Hogwarts to learn more of its secrets. If that were the case, he'd be furious at Dumbledore for foiling his plan. I'm surprised he didn't hex him on the spot."
"What if it wasn't Dumbledore he would hex?" Severus asked, his eyes widening in realization, "Or rather cursed."
Simone cocked her head, "What do you mean?"
"The position of DADA wasn't always so hard to keep, Serapeum," Severus stated, "Professors used to last years in that job without anything happening to them. Now no one lasts to the next year and everyone says it is cursed. What if that was his doing?"
It was Simone's turn to be surprised, "Holy shit!"
"He was quite angry," Helena recalled, "The last I saw of him, he hid the diadem and left."
"Why didn't you tell Dumbledore?" Simone asked.
"Because this is all my doing," Helena admitted mournfully, "If I hadn't stolen the diadem from my mother, if I hadn't trusted that awful boy, none of this would have happened. Telling anyone would be admitting my shame, my greatest failures. I couldn't bear to let anyone know what trouble I had caused."
"In the meantime a dangerous artifact has been sitting in a school full of innocent people," Severus said in frustration, "Can you at least tell us what he did to it? What the curse or spell was?"
Helena shook her head sadly, "I know not. The damage was already done to it before he returned to hide it here. All I know is it felt like nothing I have ever encountered before. The magic covering it had a dark presence, a foul one. It was almost as if…" she trailed off.
"As if what?" Simone prompted.
"As if he and the diadem were one and the same," Helena said finally, "As if they were a part of each other somehow. I can't truly explain it, but when he returned, he had changed. Gone was the kind, handsome boy that once coaxed my secrets from me. In his place was a cold, unfeeling man, like he wasn't truly a man at all. His eyes lacked warmth or life to them, only a hard, cruelty remained, one that saw pleasure in my remorse. I saw his true self that day. The diadem felt like that too; it had become this unworldly, foul thing. I doubt the living can truly sense it as I would, but it was like death itself, a corpse. I just can put into words how…wrong it felt. It was like he put himself into it, a lingering aspect of himself to mock me."
"That unlike any dark magic I've ever heard of," Severus said, worry evident in his tone.
"Can you even attach a part of yourself to something?" Simone questioned, "I mean, what would it take? A piece of hair? A limb? Blood, maybe? Or would he have used a memory."
"Even the darkest blood magic doesn't take on anything of the caster from what they imbued it with," Severus said, "Nor would it give any sense of living to the item. It only strengthens its power to carry out whatever goal the caster had in mind. This might be beyond even that scope of dark magic."
"So how do we figure out what it is?" Simone asked.
"We be best off figuring out who cast it first," Severus admitted, "Some insight on them and their level of skill would help us figure out just how powerful a spell they could cast."
Simone huffed, "Well good luck with that. Helena doesn't remember his name, nor exactly what year he was in school apparently. We'd be trying to track down every Head Boy since 1965."
"We do have clues to help us," Severus pointed out, "Dumbledore clearly didn't want this person to have the DADA position. There are only too possible reasons someone as esteemed as head boy wouldn't make the cut; either he wasn't qualified—which isn't true given his obvious knowledge and skill in dark magic—or Dumbledore didn't trust him."
"So Dumbledore didn't trust him," Simone shrugged, "So what?"
"So it is unlikely Dumbledore would have appointed someone he didn't trust to the position of Head Boy when they were in school," Severus elaborated, "Meaning he wasn't the Headmaster who made the decision in the boy's final year. Given the timeline, it was Dippet who appointed him."
Simone's eyes lit up in realization, "And then he came back not long after to ask the new headmaster Dumbledore to give him a job. That narrows down the list some."
Severus nodded, "Exactly. And he cursed the DADA position. If we can figure out when that happened it might help us even more." He turned to Helena, "You're sure you don't know exactly how long it's been since he came here?"
Helena shook her head, "No. The first time we met he had already graduated. It was the first time he asked for the Defense job from Dippet, but was turned down. It was because he was young, though; from what I understand Dippet told him he was welcome to apply in a few years. That's when he asked me about the diadem."
"So he got rejected twice but there was still a silver lining for him," Simone said, "He used the first time to learn of the diadem, the second time to hide it. He probably wanted to be in the school so he could be close to it."
Severus tapped his chin, "He was too young for the job when Dippet was still Headmaster, but returned a few years later when Dumbledore was appointed…and Dumbledore was appointed in 1966 or so…I'd say the student probably couldn't have been out of school more than eight, maybe ten years or so when he came back the second time."
"That means we can cut the more recent graduates out of our search," Simone said, "That makes this easier."
Severus turned to Helena, "I know you didn't want to help us, but we do appreciate your assistance. It goes without saying, we'd appreciate you didn't tell anyone what we discussed today."
Helena stared at Severus with uncertainty, "You promise you are going to destroy it?"
"I swear on my magic," Severus vowed, "Rest assured there are those here whom I would like to protect and we cannot risk that thing falling into the wrong hands. Once we figure out what was done to it, we can find a way to destroy it."
"If you like, if we figured out what the spell is we could remove it and save the diadem instead," Simone offered.
Severus disagreed but bit his tongue. The simplest solution would be to just destroy the whole thing, but he wasn't about to argue about it in front of an audience who's cooperation was already precarious.
Helena smiled sadly, but shook her head.
"Destroy it," she said, "Too long has that diadem haunted me. I wish to put an end to things for good. If I cannot move onto the next realm to make amends with my mother, I can at least ensure her prized possession is no longer used for evil." She turned to leave.
With a sorrowful look, Helena glided through the wall and off across the courtyard.
"One more thing," she added, turning back to them briefly, "I cannot be sure what house he was in, but I know for certain it was not Ravenclaw." Then she floated away.
"So," Simone said after a time, staring after the Grey Lady, "Are we any closer to solving this?"
"I certainly hope so," Severus said quietly.
Once again, sorry if the chapter had any mistakes or contradictions. I kept editing this chapter over and over to direct the plot in the correct direction and I lack a beta to oversee my final results.
So I thought I would use the interaction with the Bloody Baron to touch upon a subject that bothers me in some fanfics depicting him:
Lust is not love.
The Baron hounded after Helena for years while they were alive, and judging by his refusal to give up, he didn't seem to respect her wishes and leave her alone. Using a request by her mother to find her in order to pursue her to Albania demonstrates the lengths he is willing to go to ignore her wishes and continue to harass her.
Killing her in anger is the ultimate example of how his feelings were not love. No one would go to such a depraved length to hurt someone they love. We make rash mistakes when we are hurt, but I truly believe in order to kill you must have true anger in your heart, a level of anger I do not believe you could truly direct towards someone you truly care for above all else. What the Baron did was little more than the selfish cliche of "If I can't have you, no one can" and I truly do not believe a person could do that to someone they genuinely love.
Even becoming a ghost at Hogwarts shows how little he actually respected Helena's wishes and feelings. Who the hell would think it appropriate to follow around someone you have hurt beyond repair? If he truly wanted to show repentance, he would have left her alone in the afterlife, finally honoring her wishes. Instead he intends to hang around all eternity, preventing his victim from ever truly being away from him.
