A week later, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were walking across the entrance hall when they saw a small knot of people gathered around the notice board, reading a piece of parchment that had just been pinned up. Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas beckoned them over, looking excited.
"They're starting a Dueling Club!" said Seamus. "First meeting tonight! I wouldn't mind dueling lessons; they might come in handy one of these days. . . ."
"Ah, a duelling club." Dumbledore gave a small smile.
"What, you reckon Slytherin's monster can duel?" said Ron, but he, too, read the sign with interest.
"Could be useful," he said to Harry and Hermione as they went into dinner.
"Shall we go?"
Harry and Hermione were all for it, so at eight o'clock that evening they hurried back to the Great Hall. The long dining tables had vanished and a golden stage had appeared along one wall, lit by thousands of candles floating overhead.
The ceiling was velvety black once more and most of the school seemed to be packed beneath it, all carrying their wands and looking excited.
"I wonder who'll be teaching us?" said Hermione as they edged into the chattering crowd. "Someone told me Flitwick was a dueling champion when he was young — maybe it'll be him."
"As long as it's not —" Harry began, but he ended on a groan: Gilderoy
Lockhart was walking onto the stage, resplendent in robes of deep plum and accompanied by none other than Snape, wearing his usual black.
"These two idiots will teach them?" Sirius's eyes were as big as saucers.
Lockhart waved an arm for silence and called, "Gather round, gather round!
Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent!
"Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I myself have done on countless occasions — for full details, see my published works.
"Self-centred prick." James muttered.
"Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape," said Lockhart, flashing a wide smile. "He tells me he knows a tiny little bit about dueling himself and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Now, I don't want any of you youngsters to worry — you'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him, never fear!"
"I am getting a feeling that even Snivellus is better than him." Sirius said aloud. Remus turned to him with a teasing smirk.
"What? Just look at that Lockhart." Sirius defended himself.
"Wouldn't it be good if they finished each other off?" Ron muttered in Harry's ear.
"Best option ever." James said smiling before receiving a smack from his girlfriend.
"JAMES" Lilly shouted.
"Okay, sorry. I'm sorry." James said raising his hands in a surrender. Tonks giggled looking at them.
"You two are so cute together. I want a cute boyfriend too." Tonks said still giggling.
Lilly, Marlene and Molly smiled in amusement while Sirius shouted.
"You are just seven!"
"Okay, I will get one when I grow up a bit." She said thoughtfully.
Sirius shook his head so fast that the others feared it would fall off.
"No, I am not letting you date until you are at least fou.. no fifty." Sirius said making the others laugh. Tonks pouted and turned back to the memory.
Snape's upper lip was curling. Harry wondered why Lockhart was still smiling; if Snape had been looking at him like that he'd have been running as fast as he could in the opposite direction.
Lockhart and Snape turned to face each other and bowed; at least, Lockhart did, with much twirling of his hands, whereas Snape jerked his head irritably. Then they raised their wands like swords in front of them.
"As you see, we are holding our wands in the accepted combative position,"
Lockhart told the silent crowd. "On the count of three, we will cast our first spells. Neither of us will be aiming to kill, of course."
"I wouldn't bet on that," Harry murmured, watching Snape baring his teeth.
"One — two — three —"
Both of them swung their wands above their heads and pointed them at their opponent; Snape cried: "Expelliarmus!" There was a dazzling flash of scarlet light and Lockhart was blasted off his feet: He flew backward off the stage, smashed into the wall, and slid down it to sprawl on the floor.
"What a Hero." Moody grumbled.
Malfoy and some of the other Slytherins cheered. Hermione was dancing on tiptoes. "Do you think he's all right?" she squealed through her fingers.
"Who cares?" said Harry and Ron together.
Lockhart was getting unsteadily to his feet. His hat had fallen off and his wavy hair was standing on end.
"Well, there you have it!" he said, tottering back onto the platform. "That was a Disarming Charm — as you see, I've lost my wand — ah, thank you, Miss Brown — yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind my saying so, it was very obvious what you were about to do. If I had wanted to stop you it would have been only too easy — however, I felt it would be instructive to let them see . . ."
"LIAR" The twins shouted together.
"I think I'd better teach you how to block unfriendly spells," said Lockhart, standing flustered in the midst of the hall. He glanced at Snape, whose black eyes glinted, and looked quickly away. "Let's have a volunteer pair — Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you —"
"A bad idea, Professor Lockhart," said Snape, gliding over like a large and malevolent bat. "Longbottom causes devastation with the simplest spells. We'll be sending what's left of Finch-Fletchley up to the hospital wing in a matchbox." Neville's round, pink face went pinker. "How about Malfoy and Potter?" said Snape with a twisted smile.
"Excellent idea!" said Lockhart, gesturing Harry and Malfoy into the middle of the hall as the crowd backed away to give them room.
"Now, Harry," said Lockhart. "When Draco points his wand at you, you do this."
He raised his own wand, attempted a complicated sort of wiggling action, and dropped it. Snape smirked as Lockhart quickly picked it up, saying, "Whoops — my wand is a little overexcited —"
Snape moved closer to Malfoy, bent down, and whispered something in his ear. Malfoy smirked, too. Harry looked up nervously at Lockhart and said,
"Professor, could you show me that blocking thing again?"
"Scared?" muttered Malfoy, so that Lockhart couldn't hear him.
"You wish," said Harry out of the corner of his mouth.
Lockhart cuffed Harry merrily on the shoulder. "Just do what I did, Harry!"
"What, drop my wand?"
"I don't think he can teach you anything else." Fabian said to the memory Harry sympathetically.
But Lockhart wasn't listening.
"Three — two — one — go!" he shouted. Malfoy raised his wand quickly and bellowed, "Serpensortia!"
The end of his wand exploded. Harry watched, aghast, as a long black snake shot out of it, fell heavily onto the floor between them, and raised itself, ready to strike. There were screams as the crowd backed swiftly away, clearing the floor.
"Don't move, Potter," said Snape lazily, clearly enjoying the sight of Harry standing motionless, eye to eye with the angry snake. "I'll get rid of it. . . ."
"What the hell is he trying to do? The kids could get hurt." Molly shouted.
"Allow me!" shouted Lockhart. He brandished his wand at the snake and there was a loud bang; the snake, instead of vanishing, flew ten feet into the air and fell back to the floor with a loud smack. Enraged, hissing furiously, it slithered straight toward Justin Finch-Fletchley and raised itself again, fangs exposed, poised to strike.
Harry wasn't sure what made him do it. He wasn't even aware of deciding to do it. All he knew was that his legs were carrying him forward as though he was on casters and that he had shouted stupidly at the snake, "Leave him alone!" And miraculously — inexplicably — the snake slumped to the floor, docile as a thick, black garden hose, its eyes now on Harry. Harry felt the fear drain out of him.
He knew the snake wouldn't attack anyone now, though how he knew it, he couldn't have explained.
"The snake listened to him?" Arthur asked wide eyed.
"At least it won't attack anyone." Molly whispered.
"But that isn't possible. Snakes won't listen to you unless you are a Parselmouth." Remus said thoughtfully.
"Bu-but Remus that's impossible." Lilly muttered.
He looked up at Justin, grinning, expecting to see Justin looking relieved, or puzzled, or even grateful — but certainly not angry and scared.
"What do you think you're playing at?" he shouted, and before Harry could say anything, Justin had turned and stormed out of the hall. Snape stepped forward, waved his wand, and the snake vanished in a small puff of black smoke. Snape, too, was looking at Harry in an unexpected way: It was a shrewd and calculating look, and Harry didn't like it. He was also dimly aware of an ominous muttering all around the walls. Then he felt a tugging on the back of his robes.
"Come on," said Ron's voice in his ear. "Move — come on —"
Ron steered him out of the hall, Hermione hurrying alongside them. As they went through the doors, the people on either side drew away as though they were frightened of catching something.
"What's going on? My son can't be a parseltongue." James said.
Harry didn't have a clue what was going on, and neither Ron nor Hermione explained anything until they had dragged him all the way up to the empty Gryffindor common room. Then Ron pushed Harry into an armchair and said, "You're a Parselmouth. Why didn't you tell us?"
"I'm a what?" said Harry.
"A Parselmouth!" said Ron. "You can talk to snakes!"
"I know," said Harry. "I mean, that's only the second time I've ever done it. I accidentally set a boa constrictor on my cousin Dudley at the zoo once — long story — but it was telling me it had never seen Brazil and I sort of set it free without meaning to — that was before I knew I was a wizard —"
"A boa constrictor told you it had never seen Brazil?" Ron repeated faintly.
"So?" said Harry. "I bet loads of people here can do it."
"Oh, no they can't," said Ron. "It's not a very common gift. Harry, this is bad."
"What's bad?" said Harry.
"What's wrong with everyone? Listen, if I hadn't told that snake not to attack Justin —"
"Oh, that's what you said to it?"
"What d'you mean? You were there — you heard me —"
"I heard you speaking Parseltongue," said Ron. "Snake language. You could have been saying anything — no wonder Justin panicked, you sounded like you were egging the snake on or something — it was creepy, you know —"
Harry gaped at him.
"I spoke a different language? But — I didn't realize — how can I speak a language without knowing I can speak it?"
Ron shook his head. Both he and Hermione were looking as though someone had died. Harry couldn't see what was so terrible.
"Wait, Prongs' son can't be a parselmouth." Sirius said turning towards James.
"Prongs, you aren't secretly a Parselmouth, are you? I mean, you know you can tell me if you are... I won't judge you. With my own family and stuff..."
"Padfoot stop rambling." James interrupted Sirius, then turning to the other people in the memory who were staring at him with wide, disbelieving eyes he said,
"No, of course I am not a parseltongue. I don't know how Harry is one though..." He said his eyes trailing off to Lilly. Lilly gasped.
"I can't be a parseltongue, I am a muggleborn."
"Well that's a good point." Glidon said nodding his head alongside Fabian.
"I have a question." Tonks said interrupting the others, as the others turned at the little girl she spoke again. "We are not parseltongues so how can we understand what Harry is saying?"
"I think it's because of whose memory we are watching." Remus said thoughtfully.
"Come again." Arthur said intrigued.
"What Mr Lupin here is trying to say is that we are able to understand that because this particular version of the memory might belong to Harry himself, thus enabling us to understand what he is saying." Dumbledore elaborated. "The memories we are watching are the combined memories of many people so as this particular one belongs to Harry, we are able to watch it from our point of view."
"Oh" Everyone nodded their heads in understanding.
"D'you want to tell me what's wrong with stopping a massive snake biting off Justin's head?" he said. "What does it matter how I did it as long as Justin doesn't have to join the Headless Hunt?"
"It matters," said Hermione, speaking at last in a hushed voice, "because being able to talk to snakes was what Salazar Slytherin was famous for. That's why the symbol of Slytherin House is a serpent."
Harry's mouth fell open.
"Exactly," said Ron. "And now the whole school's going to think you're his great-great-great-great-grandson or something —"
"But I'm not," said Harry, with a panic he couldn't quite explain.
"You'll find that hard to prove," said Hermione. "He lived about a thousand years ago; for all we know, you could be."
"No he's not." James and Lilly said together.
The memory passed as they watched Harry being claimed as the Slytherin's heir by the other students and then finally the other attack happened. Joint attacks of Nick and Justin. As they saw Harry being dragged to Dumbledore's office Remus said,
"Poor boy he has an abnormal capability of attracting trouble."
"Must come with being James's son." Marlene smiled.