Chapter 55: The Chamber of Secrets

"You certainly found him but why would you want to know where the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets is?" Crowley asked confused.

Harry, however, narrowed his eyes upon the question.

"How do you know what the Chamber is called?" he asked suspiciously when it dawned upon him, and his eyes widened in surprise. "You are Salazar Slytherin!"

It made sense, how he landed here of all places when he tried to teleport to the man, why Crowley knew about the Chamber and not to mention his early comment that he indeed found the man.

"Right in one but that didn't answer my question," Crowley replied, not even surprised that the boy had worked out who he once was, he knew that Harry was smart.

"Yes...that. Some idiot obviously thought it a good idea to open the Chamber and let whatever is inside it out and into the school. A cat was petrified, and the culprit left a bloody message on the wall next to it: The chamber of secrets has been opened. Enemy of the heir, beware," Harry recited. "We want to get in there to see what exactly happened and whether we can prevent another incident like this one."

Harry looked at Crowley expectantly. Crowley though hummed lowly while stroking his chin absentmindedly. Finally, he opened his mouth obviously to say something before he closed it again with a growl.

"For reasons I cannot explain to you, I cannot tell you what is hidden away in the chamber, but what I can tell you is where the Chamber is," Crowley told him in the end, again stroking his chin.

Actually, this was ingenious. Unfortunately, thanks to someone he couldn't name, he couldn't tell anyone about what resided in the Chamber, no matter what he did. However, thanks to the fact that Harry was asking about the location and entry point of the Chamber and not what was in there, he could very well circumvent the spell, which was obviously keeping him from speaking about it, and give Harry a somewhat adequate answer.

"The entrance is on the left-handed second floor in a storage room at the end of the corridor. On the floor in the middle you should find a small carving of a snake in the upper left corner of the largest tile. However, there is a problem. You'll need a Parselmouth to open the entrance and I currently don't have the time to come with you and open it for you."

"What is a Parselmouth?" Harry asked confusedly. "Besides, if what you just told me is correct, then the storage room has been replaced by a girl's bathroom, the exact same bathroom that is at the end of the corridor with the message."

Crowley began to swear so heavily that it would have put a seasoned sailor to shame, completely ignoring that Harry was a minor and certainly shouldn't hear most of it, much to said boy's amusement.

"Who the bloody hell thought it a good idea to place a bathroom there? However, the room should still be there, though with the remodelling of the room into a bathroom, I don't know how the entrance has manifested itself. When I build it, I not only warded it so that anyone not a Parselmouth couldn't get in, but also that in case that the room was changed, the entrance would change too to fit in," Crowley now mused. "The entrance nonetheless should be marked by a small snake carving. Now, to answer your question a Parselmouth is what a person is called, who is able to speak Parseltongue, the language of the snakes."

"Wait, there is a name for that?" Harry was surprised, not only about the fact that he wasn't the only one able to talk to snakes but also about the fact that his ability had an actual name.

"Why am I not surprised that you are one?" Crowley deadpanned, how else would the boy know about the ability but not the name for it? "Did you really think that you're the only one who can talk to snakes? Admittedly, people who can speak the language of the snakes are rare but not as rare as you might think. It was Lucifer who gave Eve as the first human the ability to speak with snakes, I think it was to mess with the little experiment that was going on at that time. When Adam and Eve later were thrown out of the Garden Eden and had children, the ability spread."

"So, does that mean I…I'm related to them?"

"Not necessarily. I know of a man who was envious and wanted the ability himself. He made a deal for it, but whether he had children afterwards and passed it on, I don't know. Then there were also the Greek gods Hermes and Asclepios who both possessed the ability not to mention Medusa. In Egypt, there are for example Ra and Wadjet, and I'm pretty sure that Loki also has the ability…you see many beings can converse with snakes."

"This is one hell of messed up and nothing I want to think about right now…or ever," he muttered, him being related to either a god or Adam and Eve? Not something he wanted to think about. "So, you say that since I'm a Parsel…whatever I'll be able to get in there?" Harry wanted to clarify before he yawned.

"Parselmouth and yes. Just say ~open~, and well it will open," Crowley explained.

"~Open~?" he asked in disbelieve. "You couldn't come up with an easier to guess password?"

"Since it was highly unlikely that any Parselmouth would come by anytime soon when I chose it…."

"Right…well…thanks for the information but I'm off now. I'm dead on my feet and need sleep. Ciao."

With a wave of his hand, Harry vanished, leaving behind a highly amused Crowley. That was until the demon remembered the threat the boy had issued because of the demon outside. Crowley called in said demon before he began laying into her. In the end he decided that it would be a good idea for her to clean the hellhound pens for the next thirty years. Hopeful that Harry would forget about the incident, he finally went back to his work.


Harry reappeared in the same corridor where he had found Mrs Norris earlier that evening.

Michael was quietly talking with McGonagall while Flitwick was busy trying to get the blood off the wall, not wanting such a gruesome sight where students passed by.

"Professors," Harry said to draw their attention to him. "The entrance to the Chamber is over there in the girl's lavatory so if you guard it no one will be able to get in unknowingly. Tomorrow I'll help you getting in but now I'm off to bed," Harry told them with a yawn.

He vanished again before any of the professors could react or say anything and reappeared in his bed where he instantly fell asleep.

"Don't worry, I'll guard the entrance myself," Michael said to the two remaining teachers, who looked at him to decide about the next steps. "I suggest that you also go to bed, it is quite late after all."

"But what if whatever is in there gets out and attacks you?" Minerva asked in concern. "You could be hurt or worse…killed."

"Minerva is right, you shouldn't be alone," Flitwick agreed.

Michael chuckled lowly. "I'm not that easy to kill and if what Harry just told us is correct then nothing can get out without someone going in and releasing it."

Minerva looked at him for a very long moment before she sighed in resignation. She knew very well how stubborn he could be and didn't want to argue with him, she was too tired for that.

"Very well but I'll cast some alarms so that I know if something is happening," she told him, she wasn't happy with it, but that was the best that she would get, and she knew that.

"I'll add my own, just in case," Filius said while he went to work together with Minerva.

A few minutes later under the amused gaze of Michael, they were done.

"Albus, you'll better be careful," Minerva admonished.

"I will Minerva, now go to bed and get some sleep, both of you. You look like you're about to topple over. So, off you go."

"After I checked in with my ravens," Filius said.

Minerva nodded along, they would make sure that the students were alright before going to bed themselves.

They both knew that Sinistra already checked on the Slytherins for Severus and Pomona was currently with her badgers, so it was only Ravenclaw and Gryffindor that needed a check-up. They would see it done before they went to bed.

With a last "good night" the two professors left to their respective houses.


It was the next day at noon that Neville and Sam finally decided that Harry slept long enough. He already missed breakfast and they didn't want to find out what Loki would do if he missed another meal. Ever since Loki learned of Harry's less than stellar upbringing, he made sure that Harry ate regularly and enough for a boy his age. It was thanks to Loki's nagging, that Harry was now a boy that looked his age and was healthy, but Loki never ceased to admonish him if he missed a meal.

That was why Sam now found himself in the unfortunate situation of having to wake the boy up. The problem was, that if you tried to wake Harry when he didn't want to be woken, you most certainly ended being pranked and Sam was wary of what the other boy would do. Harry could be very creative when coming up with retaliation pranks.

Nevertheless, Sam gently shook Harry's shoulder. It didn't take long for Harry to wake.

"Go 'way, wanna sleep," Harry muttered and turned around to go back to sleep, he was still exhausted from all the magic he had to perform the previous day.

Sam though would have nothing of it. "Harry, you have to get up. Lunch will end in an hour and you already missed breakfast. Loki will kill us if we don't get you up to get something to eat."

With a swift motion, Sam pulled Harry's comforter off him only to have to duck a few hexes sent his way. Luckily and with the constant training of dodging, Sam became pretty agile and now managed to doge about half the stuff Harry threw at him. Most of the rest he could block with a shield. The problem was that Harry also got better and faster in his spell casting, not to mention his aim, hence why he suddenly looked like a punk.

"Okay, okay, I'll get up…happy?" Harry growled when he saw Sam's smug grin after said boy managed to hit him with a stinging hex.


Half an hour later the seven friends sat at the Gryffindor table.

"Where is Loki?" Hermione asked curiously, wondering whether the pagan god was even back yet, though with a look at the head table, she saw that Snape also was still missing.

"Don't know, he wasn't back when we went waking Harry," Neville answered in between two bites.

"He was pretty pissed yesterday. If he hates something it is when someone hurts children, so I won't be surprised if he doesn't return before tomorrow," Harry grumbled before shovelling some mashed potatoes in his mouth, he was still annoyed that he had to get up. "Not that I fault him for it."

"By the way, you were great yesterday. How you healed all those other students…," Hermione told him with a bright smile.

"Hermione, I just did what was necessary. Everyone would have done the same in that situation," Harry replied with a shrug.

"Nonetheless you did save a lot of your schoolmates," Michael suddenly said from behind him, he together with McGonagall stood right behind Harry. "That deserves the proper appreciation."

"I didn't do it because of the appreciation but because it was the right thing to do," Harry huffed. "Anyway, can I help you?"

"Indeed, you can. If you're finished with lunch I'd ask you to let us into the Chamber," Michal explained him.

"Ah yes, there was something. Just give me a sec," Harry muttered, shoving his now empty plate away while diving for his schoolbag he had carelessly thrown under his seat.

Sure, he didn't have any class for today because Michael had cancelled all of them until the end of the week to give the students some time to recover and to get the whole Chamber thing under control, but Harry had taken the bag with him in hope of getting to the library later that day and some of the assignments done.

Once he had his bag, he stood up, threw it over his left shoulder, and walked towards the entrance doors of the great hall only to stop after a few feet. He turned around and looked curiously at his friends who also stood up and followed him.

"Do you really think we'll let you go there alone? We want to see the Chamber too!" Sam deadpanned upon Harry's questioning look.

"Yeah, we want…"

"…to see the chamber!" the twins added.

"You're not going to do…"

"…all the fun stuff alone."

Michael looked at them contemplatively before he sighed after a few moments.

"Very well but you'll have to follow a few rules, or you'll have to stay behind. First, you'll always stay close to us, no detours. Second, only enter a room after we made sure it is safe and told you so. I don't want you to get hurt," he told them sternly only to receive a disbelieving glare from McGonagall. "Minerva, don't you think that it is better if they accompany us where we can have an eye on them than them coming anyway and getting into trouble?"

"I would prefer them not to come at all," she said in a stern tone.

Michael chuckled upon that. "You really believe that they would sit back when there is an unknown part of the school to explore? They are children and when we tell them not to come they'll want it all the more. Not to mention that they're extremely crafty, I somehow have a feeling that they would find a way in even if we ward off any entrance we find."

McGonagall glared at him for another moment before she turned towards the children.

"You stray away from us, and you'll have detention until hell freezes over," she firmly told them.

"That could be arranged," Harry replied innocently. "Though I fear that Crowley would be less than happy."

McGonagall sighed exasperatedly. "And here I thought the Marauders were bad," she muttered but set into motion and walked towards the entrance.

With a low snicker, Harry followed her, who in turn was trailed by the others. In the entrance hall, they were suddenly joined by some Hufflepuff.

"Ah Mr Malfoy, you decided to join us?" Michael asked jovially.

Draco looked at Michael strangely because he obviously knew who he was but eventually nodded.

"You're going to see the infamous Chamber of Secrets," he replied as if it was out of the question that he would join them. "But Headmaster, could you please…."

"Don't worry, your secret is safe with me," Michael added upon which Draco looked relieved.

The group walked up to the second floor and past the point, where the previous night the message had been painted on the wall. But thanks to Flitwick's and later Michael's efforts it was even cleaner than it had been before the act of vandalism.

Together they entered the girl's lavatory where they were joined by the half-goblin and looked expectantly at Harry, who looked around.

"Salazar said that this previously had been a storage room in which the entrance was hidden in the floor under a tile with a snake carving. However, since the room has been remodelled, the entrance also changed to blend into the surrounding. Ladies and Gentlemen, we're looking for a snake carving!" he explained the situation.

Everyone spread around the room to search for said carving. A few minutes after they began searching, Myrtle suddenly flew out of one of the stalls.

"What are you doing here?" she asked indignantly. "This is my toilet."

Michael, who already had the questionable pleasure of meeting the ghost, turned towards her.

"Mr Warren, we're searching for the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets," he told her, when he had an idea. "You might not happen to know something about it?"

The ghost shook her head. "The only thing I remember from when…when I…when I died are two large yellow eyes over there by that sink there," she said sniffing over the memory of how she died.

With a last sniff, she began to wail and took a head dive into the closest toilet, nearly dousing Neville with the water. Only the fact that he anticipated something like that happening prevented him from the unwanted shower.

Hermione in the meantime, who was closest to the sink Myrtle had pointed at, had a closer look at it and found a small snake carving on the side of the tap.

"Professors, here is the snake carving we're looking for!" she called out to get everyone's attention.

Soon everyone was crowded around the sink.

"Good work Mrs Granger. Now, you all wait in the corridor until we made sure that it is safe," Michael told them with a stern glare.

Everyone bar the teachers and Harry nodded and walked back into the corridor, not wanting to go against Michael. When everyone was in a safe distance, Michael nodded to Harry. Harry took a step back to leave enough room for the teachers and Michael to react to any threat.

"~Open~" he hissed at the sink.

As soon as the hissed syllable fell from his lips, a deep rumbling echoed through the room and the sink began to sink into the floor, revealing a large hole in the floor. When the rumbling stopped, and nothing lunged at them, Flitwick stepped forward and sent a small glowing orb into the black hole to illuminate it.

It turned out that it was a large sewer pipe that went through the school.

"Ingenious," Flitwick said astonished. "If whatever is down there moves through the pipes it is no wonder that no one ever saw it."

"But all the more dangerous for us, Filius," McGonagall replied. "How are we supposed to get down there?"

"~Maybe there are some stairs hidden away?~" Harry, who stepped between the adults, hissed, not realising that he was still speaking Parseltongue.

Upon the hissing from Harry, suddenly a lower rumbling echoed through the room and stairs shifted out of the pipe's wall, right for a comfortable descending down the tube and into the belly of Hogwarts.

"Ask, and it shall be given to you," Harry said amusedly.

"You read the bible?" Michael asked surprised.

"My former guardians' way of trying to get the evil – magic – out of me. Their world view was very twisted," Harry snarled. "Though I think the book is some loads of crap."

While Michael was highly amused by Harry's view of the Bible, McGonagall and Flitwick were shocked.

"What else did they do?" McGonagall brought out but feared the answer.

"Loki gave them a speed trip to hell and ensured that they landed with Alastair when he learned about it, so what do you think?" Harry deadpanned.

McGonagall first blanched to the point that she looked like a ghost before her face gained a green tint upon the implication of Harry's statement.

Flitwick, on the other hand, gasped in shock.

"Alastair you say?" he asked, holding a hand in front of his mouth.

Harry nodded while McGonagall looked a bit confused at her colleague.

"Who's Alastair?" She wanted to know.

"He's a demon and the Chief Torturer of Hell, he oversees the torturing of the damned souls and only the worst of the worst end up on his racks," the half-goblin explained, knowing most of it because of his heritage.

"She...but yes," Harry muttered.

McGonagall now looked positively ill before she jumped down Michael's throat.

"I told you," she nearly screamed. "I told you that they are the worst kind of muggles and what did you do? You did NOTHING! You said it was for his protection but look what happened...look how protected he was!"

Right now, she was a lion out for blood...Dumbledore's blood.

Michael sighed, this was getting complicated. For ones, Minerva had all rights to be enraged over what happened to Harry and where he had been placed, especially since she had vehemently complained about it. But on the other hand, he was not Dumbledore and certainly didn't want to take over the responsibilities for something the old fool had done. However, the only way to prevent her from blaming him was to tell her that he was in fact not Dumbledore.

He sighed again, it was becoming a tad too many people that knew about him for his liking. The risk of heaven finding out was getting higher and higher with every new person.

Michael closed his eyes and mentally shook his head over what he was about to do.

"Minerva, please calm down. Things recently became a bit more complicated, but I cannot talk about it...not here. I will tell you everything later but for now we have to tend to more important things, don't you think so too?" He finally told her.

The woman looked at Michael for a long moment before she nodded. "But don't think that you'll get out of it," she admonished him.

The archangel nodded at her in understanding, turning back towards the hole.

"I suggest we go first and the children follow once we made sure nothing harmful is waiting at the other end of the pipe," he said, taking the first step down the stairs.

McGonagall and Flitwick followed him closely, warding every pipe that went off from the one they were descending in order to prevent anything from attacking them from behind or ascending to the school. Meanwhile the twins stepped up to the hole. They looked into it and then at each other.

"What do you think will be down there, dear brother o' mine?" Fred asked.

"Treasures of untold value?" George answered.

"Or just some dusty vault?" Fred finished.

"I think we're about to find out," Harry interrupted their conversation when McGonagall gave them the all clear.

Slowly they walked down the stairs one after another, and soon they stood at the foot of the pipe.

"This is disgusting," Draco, who cancelled the illusion charm on himself halfway down the pipe since no one who didn't know was there to see it, complained over the sewer water that piled on the floor mixed with other things he didn't want to name.

"Mr Malfoy?" McGonagall asked surprised.

Okay, no one who didn't know except the two teachers, one of whom was now looking at him surprised.

"The glamour was my idea to help him getting away from Slytherin from time to time," Harry remarked.

McGonagall rose an eyebrow but opted not to comment any further upon it. Together they walked down the path that looked as if it was cut right out of the rock. They walked a few minutes, when they reached the other two who currently stood in front of something really large.

"It is the shed skin of a snake," Flitwick explained. "From what I could gather it is at least sixty feet long though we have no idea what kind of snake it is since normally no snake gets this large."

"You want to say that a sixty feet long snake is down here?" McGonagall asked incredulous while frantically looking around. "What if it lurks around here in the shadows?"

Michael though shook his head. "Doubtable, we found a locked door a few feet down the corridor. It has snakes covering it, so I think it has a Parseltongue password like the entrance and since we sealed off any other way down here nothing can follow us."

Since the rest of the corridor was straight forward, there was no way, that the snake could lurk around somewhere, waiting to ambush them. So, Harry walked around the others and approached the large round door that had snakes coming from what Harry assumed was the hinge and that went across the door right until the stone surrounding it.

"You go and stay around the corner until we tell you otherwise," Michael told the children sternly.

Luckily, they did so without any complaint, not wanting to be sent away completely. Once they were out of sight, Flitwick, McGonagall, and Michael all trained their wands at the door while Harry commanded it to open.

As soon as he did, a new snake emerged from the hinge and crawled around the door once and vanished in the hinge again while the other snakes receded enough to let the snake pass. Once the snake circled the door, a loud metallic noise echoes through the hallway, indicating that the door was unlocked and shortly afterwards swung open.

Michael carefully stepped through the door when it became obvious that no snake would suddenly attack them. He, together with the two other teachers perused the quite large hall that laid behind it only to find it empty. Once they were back at the door, they gave the children the all clear.

"But stay close to us we still don't know where the snake is," Michael warned them, and they all nodded simultaneously.

"Tacky," the first twin said when he saw all the snake statues.

"Really tacky," the second added.

"We're really in the infamous Chamber of Secrets," Draco said in awe, not knowing where to look first.

"This is a piece of history probably no one saw for a very long time," Hermione mused. "To be able to see this…."

Sam in the meantime was a bit more composed, and Luna looked around with her usual dreamy expression.

"Loki will be so glad," she said out of the blue, confusing everyone though no one asked, knowing that it would be futile.

Harry in the meantime looked around contemplatively, wondering whether there was another room or something like that hidden away.

"~Open~," he tried but nothing happened. "~Hello, something here? Salazar Slytherin…beast of untold power…open sesame!~"

Suddenly something began to rumble and after a moment it became clear that the mouth of the statue that was at the other end of the large hall could open and in fact was doing so right now. However, when Michael became aware of what was emerging from the newly opened hole, he did the only thing that came to his mind and he knew would be able to protect everyone. Within a split second he turned around to the others, who conveniently stood close together, unfurled his wings and wrapped them around everyone before the beast could fully emerge from its resting place.


A/N: 'til next chapter!