ENEMIES OF THE HEIR
He was already moving before the Weasley girl screamed the curse.
The jet of light rushed toward him—he stumbled backwards just in time—it hit the bedpost instead, and the heavy wooden posts and curtains came crashing down, bringing Granger's shelves upon shelves of books with them. The redhead was quick enough to dive off the bed, but Hermione Granger was not so lucky. She disappeared under the cascade of wood, fabric, and paper as they pinned her down, effectively obscuring her and shielding her.
Destroying every chance he'd had of taking her with him.
He swore as the flurry of sound instantly awoke the other girls.
The blonde-haired girl with curly hair caught sight of him through a gap in her red curtains and let out a high-pitched scream. She set off the other three girls. He didn't even know where the redhead went.
He had to get out of there, and fast.
Shooting a curse at the screamer, he didn't stop to watch her collapse onto the floor before running to the window. Curses flew by him—the furious redhaired Gryffindor girl was shouting one after another, but her aim was slightly off.
He shot back a few more curses in her direction over his shoulder.
A gasp of pain.
Another body hit the floor.
The spells stopped.
The dormitory door opened behind him and a few more screams erupted, but he didn't have time to silence them—half the tower was awake from this raucous already.
There wasn't even time to open the window before he charged at it, grabbing his broom as he ran, and throwing his full weight against his reflection.
The sound of screaming and glass shattering rang in his ears—
—and then he was falling, falling out into the raging storm—
—in one swift move, he got his body out from under his broom to on top of it—
—and then he was falling no longer, but soaring—
—and he guided his broom to the sea of blackness he knew to be the Forbidden Forest. Where he would alert another of the Dark Lord's followers of his mission tonight that turned out successful after all.
After all the fear of being found out, and all the adrenaline from the fight, his face contorted into a smirk beneath his Death Eater's mask.
He still had Hermione Granger's shrunken trunk.
Yes...he had some very good news for the Dark Lord indeed.
Ginny sat on the floor, leaning against Hermione's bed, arm cradled to her chest and breathing hard. She stared at the broken window across the room where the Death Eater disappeared just moments before.
She never felt more furious at herself.
The chaos had started when her hand reached her wand while he was still searching through Hermione's wardrobe. It took her even longer to pick it up and bring it back into the safety of her bed without him noticing. Only then could she take her stance and aim her wand—but then he moved towards the trunk at the foot of the bed. He spent a good few minutes trying to open it with various non-verbal spells which would have been the perfect time to hit him from behind—except for the fact that he'd been facing her the entire time.
Ginny cursed herself silently. I should have got him right then! It was stupid waiting!
As it was, she had waited for a more opportune moment. Then the Death Eater just shrunk Hermione's school trunk and moved from the back to the bed, and stood beside Hermione, just staring, and Ginny'd had to resume her feign-sleeping.
She had been poised on Hermione's bed, hand clutched tight on her wand under the pillow, inches way from the curtain gap. Her mouth opened to perform her infamous Reductor Curse—
And then he actually touched her, the sick bastard! His hand went right to her chest and…
Ginny shuddered, trying to be rid of the heebie-jeebies invading her mind.
She'd been so caught up in his act that it wasn't until the lightning split up the room and she saw Hermione open her eyes that she realized her opportunity had passed.
The next few minutes were a blur.
She reacted in anger, practically warning the intruder to duck before her actual curse. Then it went awry, targeting her friend instead of her enemy. She'd been too busy ducking for cover and so aghast watching the huge, heavy bed posts books fall on Hermione that she failed to notice how quickly the Death Eater was moving.
He cursed Lavender and was off for his exit before she knew it. Throwing hex after hex, she followed his progress, but because of her rage, they were mostly misses. One of them did hit him, she saw, just as he smashed into the window. But it wasn't enough to slow him down or stop him.
And one hit her. Granted, it was a knick, but he hadn't seen or aimed with it at all. And Merlin did it sting. Blood oozed out of the cut on her arm as she clutched it to her chest, trying to stop the bleeding.
She should have had him. She could have had him. But she had blown it.
And now, because of me, he's gone. And it's my fault Hermione and Lavender are even hurt.
Some Gryffindor she was.
The screams jolted him awake.
Harry tore out of bed, wand at the ready, Ron right behind him. Sleep...confusion...was he dreaming…
But no. The screaming continued. Neville, Dean, and Seamus stumbled out of bed, eyes wide and alert, following Harry and Ron.
Something was very wrong.
They tore down the boys' staircase to the common room. Screams echoed down the girls' staircase to them. They couldn't get up the girls' staircase, of course, but they didn't have to. Girls streamed down the stairs from every single room, some scared and tearful while others were just sleepy and confused.
"What—"
"Death Eater!"
"There was a—a—in our room—!"
"Death Eater!"
"What—?"
The rest of the boys joined them, creating quite a crowd. Harry frantically searched among them for Hermione—for Ginny—
Then to their horror, Parvati brought a limping Lavender down the stairs, sobbing, and told them all what happened. Ron immediately ran over to Lavender, and gathered her up in his arms, peering over his head for his sister and best friend.
"Where's Hermione?" Harry asked frantically, pushing his way through. "Ginny!"
Fear pierced his organs, and he couldn't breathe—couldn't breathe—
But more girls streamed down the staircase, and neither Hermione nor Ginny were among them. Worried, Ron peeled Lavender from his arms and gave her to Seamus. Immediately, she clung to Seamus, sobbing. And then the last of the girls descended, and Harry and Ron saw their chance to rush the stairs, determined.
And then, to their utter relief, Ginny and Hermione came down the stairs. The white-faced Ginny was holding her arm gingerly, blood soaking her pajama shirt, and a dazed Hermione was holding half the redhead's weight.
Merlin—
Harry barely had time to be relieved before the pale Ginny went straight to Ron, and he helped her sit down before she passed out.
"What happened?" Harry asked Hermione, concerned, hugging her.
But the loss in her features was evident.
"I don't...I don't know…"
The portrait hole opened, and McGonagall and Pomfrey came through, as well as several Aurors, just as Ginny told them all what she had seen, and what the Death Eater had done. Shocked faces surrounded them when she had finished.
The rest of that night was spent in torture.
It was quite akin to their third-year when Sirius broke into Gryffindor tower. Hermione, Ginny, and Lavender were fixed up by Madam Pomfrey as every student in the school was rounded up and transported to the Great Hall.
As a safety precaution, the teachers were searching the castle yet again. Harry had even lent Remus Lupin the Marauders' Map, but from the sounds of things the Death Eater was no longer in the castle. Nor did the Map show there any more running amok.
Dumbledore had been called back at once from whatever mission he had been on. Harry had never heard the Headmaster shout before, so this was definitely a first. The Aurors patrolling the grounds got an earful from him for letting such a man through and not being on their guard. He could have killed every girl in the entire dorm, let alone the whole tower.
Hermione and Ginny among them.
Hermione's entire portion of the room was in shambles. Several things were stolen, including an entire trunk, and they had no idea why.
The students lay in disquiet on their squishy sleeping bags on the floor of the Great Hall, staring up at the stormy black above them. The enchanted ceiling showing the pouring rain outside, though it hardly fell upon their heads.
"What could he have been after?" a confused Hermione asked. "He couldn't have just been after me, or else why search the room first?"
Ron called the Death Eater a name that made even Harry blush, but it was a mark of how disoriented Hermione still was that she didn't chide him.
"What was in your trunk, Hermione?" Ginny asked.
Hermione listed a bunch of random objects, mostly ginormous books that couldn't fit on her shelves. But none of them sounded remotely like anything Voldemort would be interested in. None of it made any sense...
"Oh, no...there was something else," Hermione suddenly moaned. "The Sorting Hat's riddles!"
"The...what?" Harry said. But he knew what she'd said.
"The Sorting Hat's riddle. At the start of term. And then the one he gave you when you went back, Harry! Those were both in my trunk!"
Ron let his breath out in a hiss. "He was looking for them so he could know how to find the heirs and the gifts. If he finds Hufflepuff's tomb…"
The thought of Voldemort getting his hands on the power of the Founders...
This changed everything.
Over the next few days, everyone was shaken and on edge. To be attacked outside of the castle was one thing...but inside the castle, inside even Gryffindor tower, and inside their bedrooms no less where they dressed, showered, slept, and were their most vulnerable…
It was a nightmare come to life.
The seven newfound friends were renewed in their searching for the rest of the Founders' tombs, in the hopes that they could find them before Voldemort and his spy did. Every minute during any of their free breaks and study periods, they traded the Marauders' Map back and forth. As Hermione and Ginny in particular were heavily guarded since the tower break-in, Hermione had to wait till her patrols with Ron to contribute any time towards the tomb hunt.
Ron thought he had found something one day in between classes when he saw a small animal traced into wood in a corridor. He even sent a notice on the old D.A. Galleons from last year that he, Harry, Hermione, Ginny, Neville, Luna, and even Meghan Freeman had come to use to communicate with each other before.
Not even ten minutes later, they all came running towards him from their prospective classes and free time, breathless, and looked at the tiny mark in the wood with him.
"What is that?"
"It's not a bird…"
"Doesn't look like a lion."
"Or a griffin."
"It looks more like three hills...with the middle one being the tallest…"
And then Ron realized what it was. Harry and Neville found out the same time, and they all turned red and hastily covered it up. The girls hadn't quite caught on, but the boys ushered them away, explaining it as stupid teenagers being stupid teenagers.
They took a small break from searching after that.
But on Thursday, after days of searching everywhere they could think of for Gryffindor's and Ravenclaw's tomb to no avail, Ron knew the time had come to take more drastic measures.
"Harry?"
"Mmm?"
"You know what we need to do, don't you?"
A sigh.
"We already know where it is. We already know how to get in there. And we already know we need to. You up for it, mate?"
A grumble.
And so, they began plotting when to sneak into the Chamber of Secrets.
They decided to do it at night (logically). They were all free for Thursday night and they all had a lower workload on account of the upcoming Halloween holiday ball and end of term.
It took quite a bit of sneaking around, using the Cloak, the Map, Disillusionment Charms, and Hermione's memorized schedule of prefect patrols. But at around midnight, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Neville, Luna, and Meghan all arrived, from various common rooms in the castle, to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom on the second floor.
"I hate this bathroom," said Ginny, shivering, stepping inside.
Harry's heart panged at the memory of what she went through when she was possessed by Voldemort's younger self. He moved closer to her, trying to comfort her, but not wanting to overstep his bounds.
"Yeah, seriously, Gin, what is it with you and bathrooms?" Ron said, trying to make light of the situation. "First you get possessed and chuck a book in a toilet, then you make a snake come out of one and set it on people...you almost died underneath one...you were cursed with an Unforgivable in one...now here you are again in a toilet…tagging along while we almost get killed again..."
"Oh, shove it, you prat!" snapped Ginny at her big brother, not amused.
"All right, what exactly are we doing again?" said Neville, nervous and jumpy to be in a girls' lavatory; sneaking around at night, no less. "We aren't going to die, are we?"
"Oh, we aren't doing anything, Nev. This is all up to Harry," said Ron assuredly.
Harry was not assured.
He squared his shoulders and walked over to the faucet opposite them with the snake carved on it.
It's all right. I can do this. I'll just...channel my inner Slytherin.
That wasn't comforting.
Imagining the snake slithering as if it was real helped, and the others waited, tension mounting, dread growing, as he hissed, "Open up."
It worked. Their eyes followed the top of the sinks as it rose up in the air, then their attention was drawn back to eye level as the sinks came outwards from the middle of the room. The one in front of Harry sunk down into the floor, leaving a gaping hole the size of several people abreast.
"Holy hell!" gasped Ginny as she crept closer. "I do not remember this…"
Hermione was white as sheet and uncharacteristically not talking; Luna's eyes were wide as saucers, Neville had backed away and looked way too nervous to form a coherent sentence. Even Meghan, their resident Slytherin, was perturbed.
"Well. After you, O Chosen One," said Ron with a smirk.
Harry gulped. Wand lit, showing the sudden drop before the tunnel curved away, Harry gritted his teeth. "Just follow me. It's not pleasant, but...you won't break any bones."
"At least not your bones…" Ron muttered ominously.
Then Harry dropped.
The tunnel was just as nasty and unforgiving as he remembered. Falling through the air with nothing underneath until suddenly the curve of the tunnel turned more into a slide. He tried not to shout on his way down, as he didn't want to scare the others, but couldn't help one or two slipping out when the tunnel floor suddenly dropped from under him.
Until he was at last at the bottom, sprawled out on the bone-strewn ground, and picked himself up.
"I'm all right!" he hollered up. "Come down one at a time!"
It took a while, but they all came down until at last Ron was the final one to slide down and join them. He looked far better than the rest of them, having known what to expect, and landed on his feet.
"I thought I heard the bathroom door opening as I came down, but I'm not sure," he said. "We'll need to make this quick, just in case."
They followed him and Harry through the Corridor of Secrets. The walls and numerous pipes were checked all over using spells to reveal the tomb entrance as they fanned out. Their eyes were wide, taking everything in, looking all around them, as if expecting to see the Basilisk jump out at them at any moment.
"Don't worry," Harry said quietly. "The monster is dead. Has been for over four years."
He led them to the cave-in, and Ron told them about Lockhart causing it, the daft git. One by one, they followed Harry through the hole in the top of the wall of loose rocks, until they came to the opposite side of the Corridor and the serpentine Chamber door, which Harry opened up for them.
The Chamber of Secrets was just as large and magnanimous as Harry remembered. The snake statues, the bridge walkway going straight towards the larger-than-life stillness of Salazar Slytherin, the sheer drop off the edge and the water surrounding them. Even the eerie green lighting and terrifyingly chilling atmosphere was the same. Tunnel holes in the ceiling scared them into thinking that something sinister might drop onto them at any moment. The rippling water surrounding the bridge made the ominous impression that another Basilisk was going to burst through from the depths below and kill them where they stood.
"Whatever you do," whispered Hermione, her voice still echoing around the quiet room, "Do not go in the water. The bottom isn't for hundreds of feet, and the water drained in from the Black Lake, which means any kinds of creatures may be in it. Salazar Slytherin's head is just the top of a very long body that stands on the ground. All these snake statues have unseen bodies that curve below us to the ground. They are all around fifty feet high. This chamber has flooded over the centuries, covering up the ground completely until now just this bridge remains. And in a few more years, this too shall be covered up."
"How did you know all that?" asked Harry. "None of the books in the library knew anything about the Chamber. Slytherin kept it hidden."
"Artificium Merlini."
Awed, they walked near the water, trying to peer into the dark, greenish murky depths. It gave Harry the heebie jeebies thinking about the creatures he encountered in the Black Lake being in here as well.
They walked quietly and nervously farther out on the bridge. And there, in the middle of the end, was the humongous skeleton of the Basilisk.
"Wicked," said Ron, who hadn't seen it last time.
"You battled that, Harry?" said Neville in his deep voice, awed.
Unnerved, they edged around it, and Harry shut his eyes to block out his twelve-year-old hellish memories of running away from that thing.
Get in, find the tomb, get out. Simple as that.
But his heart thumped loudly regardless, and he found himself squeezing Ginny's hand as they came closer to the large head of the statue, right to where Harry had found Ginny's body and thought she was dead…
"You found me right here," she whispered. "If you hadn't, Harry...if you hadn't been brave enough to come down here to find me…"
"Don't finish that sentence," Harry said firmly. He couldn't even think of the what-if's right now.
Get in, find the tomb, get out.
He said this aloud then, and they all spread out. Spells were cast along the snake statues and the bits of wall they could see and reach. Even along the head of the great Salazar himself, though they didn't dare enter his disgustingly opened mouth.
Scouring the wall around the statue, Harry kept looking for a tiny snake carved into stone. There had been a badger carved into the tomb off the kitchens, Ron and Hermione had said. There had been a snake on the faucet tap of the sink, showing the entrance to the tunnel. That had to be the key in finding this tomb.
But for almost an hour, they scoured the room to no avail.
"Harry…" Hermione started. But she didn't have to finish. Harry knew already.
"I know, I know, all right...we need to split up," he agreed. "We'll each take one of these tunnels and see if it's somewhere else."
"None of us should go it alone," Ron broke in. "Why don't we split into teams? Harry, you and Ginny take the tunnel on the right, Neville and Meghan can take the one on the left, and Hermione and I will...you know...go inside that slimy bastard's mouth."
"Oh, wow, thanks for volunteering me for the most unpleasant one," said Hermione with a grimace.
"You and I best know what we are searching for," said Ron, coloring. "So I figured we should handle the toughest one. Plus none of us have the benefit of the Map to help us as it doesn't work down here."
Harry was too elated to be going off alone with Ginny to really care.
"What about me?" said Luna, hands clasped behind her back.
Ron smiled. "I didn't forget about you, Luna, don't worry. We just ran out of partners."
"Oh, I have a partner," she said serenely.
There was a pause as they furrowed their brows. But Ron just took her odd statement in stride.
"Oooookay. Well, that gives us an even number then. I was thinking it would be great if you could stay here and search some more? Keep casting the revealing charm around any spots we may have missed. If any of us sends our Patronuses or red sparks or something down the tunnels to you, then you'll be able to alert the others and send them after us to help out. You all know how to cast your Patrous messengers, I trust?" said Ron.
They all nodded hesitantly. It was one of the spells covered by the D.A. class the previous Sunday. Harry was more grateful than ever for the chance to arm the entire school with knowledge like this.
"Don't worry. You can do this," said Harry to them all, looking each in the eye. "Keep casting the revealing charm. Be on the lookout for anyone...anything...amiss. Have your guard up. And send for help if you think you found something, all right?"
The six teenagers all nodded back to him, and they all split up.
This was going to be a long night, he thought as he followed Ginny into the long, dark tunnel.
Luna stared after the departing teams and fiddled with the bangles on her wrists. They were green today and paired very nicely with her favorite grindylow blouse. She wanted to dress up nicely for their Slytherin outing and, as she wasn't a Slytherin and was not in possession of their uniform, knew that dressing in green was the next best thing.
Sighing, she glanced around her at the cavern and started work on finding the tomb. She knew it wasn't in this room, but she told Ron she would help search for it, and she was a witch of her word. She wanted to help. She was really good at helping, she found. Though most people never asked her. Well, ghosts did. Ghosts were very fond of her. They said she was like them. She supposed she was like them a little bit. She could often see things others couldn't, like ghosts could.
Like Draco Malfoy, for instance.
He had been following them for quite some time, hiding in the shadows and watching. But he didn't know her very well. So he was probably watching someone else. Maybe Hermione, because Luna saw him watching her a lot. He watched Ronald a lot too. Luna used to watch Ronald a lot last year. He was very cute and had a great number of freckles, which of course meant he was very studious. And he had a very long nose, which meant he was very trustworthy...alhough Muggles thought it was the other way around. Muggles did get quite a lot wrong. After all, the fairy in that story wasn't a fairy at all, but a witch. Fairies of course were not that tall. They didn't carry wands either. And they weren't very blue. Well...some were. But only because of the billywig dung.
But she knew Draco was there. Nobody else said anything about him though, so she didn't either. After all, if somebody was hiding, that meant they did not want to be found. It was rude to interrupt somebody's hiding. Unless, of course, one was playing a game. And interrupting was required.
Though she had never played hide-and-seek before.
She drew closer to a serpentine statue and regarded the slithering forked tongue gravely before casting the charm on it. She quite liked snakes, actually. Most people didn't. That's because they didn't understand them, she guessed. It was easy to be fearful of what one didn't understand. But snakes...were misunderstood. Quite like a lot of the Slytherins, she found. Many of them didn't belong in that House any more than that House deserved to have a bad reputation. It was just how it was.
She came across a snake once. In the pond in between her house and the Weasley house. It was rather cute, not at all nasty and untruthful. It let her touch it, and it was so nice that she let its tongue touch her skin. That was how they smelled things. It probably smelled her moon frog, Sappho, on her.
Casting the spell Hermione taught them over and over, Luna wondered if Draco was going to come say hello. He was being awfully quiet. And watching her every move. Perhaps he didn't know the spell? Should she show it to him to teach him? Or did he want to stay hidden even though the others had gone?
Step by step, Luna drew closer to him, standing sideways so he could see her wrist movements. But he scooted farther back, so maybe he couldn't hear her?
"Do we want me to talk louder?" she finally asked. "I can enunciate the spell more clearly, if you'd like. Do you have troubles hearing like my Aunt Oddness? It is nothing to be ashamed of, you know."
Surprise emanated from his aura.
Luna looked directly at him. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone you have glumbumble treacle in your ears."
He stepped out of the shadows then, his wand pointed straight at her.
"How could you tell I was here?" he hissed. "My Disillusionment Charm was up."
Luna shrugged, and went back to casting the spells Ron told her to cast. "Did you not want to be found? I thought it was rather obvious. But I didn't tell anyone, just in case you were trying to surprise them. People like surprises."
His wand lowered. Confusion was still evident, though he was doing a good job keeping it off his face.
"What is your deal?" he asked. "Why are you so…"
"Loony?" Luna said.
Draco slowly nodded.
"Sometimes I can see things others can't. I have a hard time fitting in sometimes. Nobody in my House likes me. They call me names when they think I can't hear them. They play hexes on me...steal my clothes...my shoes...try to lock me out of Ravenclaw Tower sometimes…" Her wand movements slowed and then halted as she trailed off. But suddenly she was back casting charms and talking again. "It's not their fault, though, that I'm different. They just don't know how else to act around me. Nobody seems to know. That's okay, though. I don't mind."
There was a silence after this, until Luna cast her last spell on the statue and turned to him.
"You're a lot like me, you know. Different. Your House doesn't like you very much anymore. Sometimes you don't sit at the Slytherin table anymore. But you don't know where else to eat. Sometimes you don't sleep in your dormitory anymore. But you don't know where else to sleep. You don't have any friends anymore either. Like me. Except...now I do. Harry and Ron, Hermione and Ginny, Neville and Meghan. They're my friends now. You should be our friend too," she said, giving him a warm smile.
Dumbfounded, he stared at her. But the cool mask he always wore was soon put back on again.
"How the hell do you know all this stuff?"
A shadow crossed her thoughts. "When I was younger, my mother died right in front of me. She was experimenting with spells, you see. They always fascinated her. One in particular...the clairvoyancy spell...was one she wanted to make stronger. She was trying to pair it with the investigation spell so she could find a way to map out the future. But...things went wrong. I wasn't supposed to be there. She didn't see me until it was too late. My mother was hit with most of it. She died. But fragments of the spells hit me too and left scars behind. The healers say that's why I can see things others can't."
There was an even longer silence. Draco's wand was loose by his side.
"I'm...sorry," he said, almost as astonished as she was that those words left his mouth.
"Oh, it's not your fault," she said kindly. "You weren't there."
Luna turned back and surveyed the snake statues.
"Your father was though," she said.
Shock.
Horror.
They both slammed into her from Draco's aura, but she continued just as calmly as if she was talking about Flobberworms.
She rather liked Flobberworms.
"I saw him hiding in the shadows outside the window. That's what I went to tell my mother about. But I think he got to her before I could. That's why her spells exploded. He threw a curse at them that magnified their power. He must not have liked her very much," she said in afterthought.
Draco was gaping, clutching the stone snake for support. "My...my father killed...killed your mother?"
"It might not have been him, you know. It might have been his twin brother."
"He doesn't have a twin brother!"
"Oh...maybe somebody used Polyjuice? Does he normally do that sort of thing?"
He stared at her, face darkening. "No...he usually does do this sort of thing. That's the problem. Why aren't you more outraged about this? You're talking about it like...like we're just waiting in line or something! She was a pureblood, wasn't she? Why would he kill a...a…I mean, what, was she hiding Mudbloods in her spare time?"
"No," said Luna frankly, not happy with his use of the word. "She was a spellcaster. She invented spells in her spare time."
She turned away from him and started walking down the stone bridge. He followed her.
"What...what did everyone else think about why he was there?"
"Oh, don't worry," she reassured him. "I didn't tell anyone."
Draco stopped again. "But why? He would have gone to Azkaban for that!"
Luna shrugged. "Nobody asked."
"Why wouldn't you want him behind bars?" He insisted. "If anybody killed my mother, I'd want to kill them myself!"
Luna looked at him again, her protuberant eyes even darker in the cave. "That's a funny way of looking at it. Putting him in prison wouldn't bring her back to life, you know. It just robs him of his."
"Yes, but...but...but still—"
A burst of red sparks came shooting down one of the tunnels. Their eyes both stared at the sparks, hearts paused. But there was something else with the sparks. Something loud...and big...very big…
"What is that?" he gasped.
"It's coming this way. We should probably run."
It shot out of the tunnel with a force greater than any spell, and at once filled the cavern, shooting straight towards them.
"RUN!"
Neville knew he liked Meghan Freeman.
A Slytherin.
A Slytherin girl.
But still...he liked her.
He liked going to the hospital wing and watching her work with Madam Pomfrey, practicing healing spells. He liked watching her study a cut or a boil like how he studied plants. He liked bringing Professor Sprout's newest plants to her and Madam Pomfrey for them to use in healing salves. He liked getting hurt or...you know...pretending to be hurt far worse than he actually was...just so he could see her. He simply liked being with her.
Like right now.
Her spicy attitude was rather lax in the dark, as close as they were to danger. Their wands in front of them illuminated everything. The many twists and turns of this tunnel. The water they kept stepping in. The low ceiling over his tall form. The occasional rat trying to scurry to the shadows. Yet she wasn't very squeamish.
"You're staring at me you know."
"Oh?" he asked. "I do apologize. That wasn't very appropriate of me—"
"No...it's okay...I kind of like it."
"You...you do?"
"Yeah. I like staring at you too."
"You—" His voice was high. Neville cleared his throat and lowered it, then tried again. "You do?"
Meghan laughed.
The sound echoed around them.
And then they saw the sparks. And the rumble. The loud, angry sound of something rushing towards them. Neville gripped Meghan's hand.
She gripped his hand back.
"RUN!"
"Harry?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you...still have feelings for Cho Chang?"
"Er...no...I don't think so. At least I haven't thought about her for a while now."
"Oh. That's good!"
"...that's good?"
"Well, yes. It means you've gotten over her. You're free to move on."
"Do you...still have feelings for Dean Thomas?"
"No. We broke up, actually."
"Oh. Tha-tha-that's good!"
"That's good?"
"Er...I mean...you know...that's good that you know what you want. And that he wasn't it."
"Oh."
"Ginny?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you think…"
"...yeah?"
"I mean...since...you know...you aren't seeing anyone right now...and I'm not seeing anyone right now…"
"...oh, Harry, just spit it out."
"Iwasthinkingmaybewecouldseeeachother?"
"...sorry?"
"I was thinking….maybe...that is, if you're interested…if we could...maybe...you know..."
"Harry?"
"...yeah?"
"Do you want to go out with me?"
"I...I mean...since you're asking...I suppose if you really want to…"
"You're just as big a prat as Ron is."
"Are you serious?"
"No. I'm not Sirius. If you'd rather go out with him, though..."
"Oh, hell no. You are far prettier than he is."
"Yeah...I suppose...plus, he's not a redhead."
"Ron is a redhead."
"...you'd rather go out with Ron?"
"Ew. No. Just...no. I would really...really...love to not go out with Ron."
"Really? Because I'd really...really...love...to not go out with someone who isn't you."
"R-r-r-really?"
"Really."
"Bloody hell…"
"You know you're grinning like a dragon in a meatshop, don't you?"
"I am? Then I am one lucky dragon…"
"Then I suppose that makes me one lucky piece of—"
"What was that?"
"What was what?"
"That."
"Oh, shite. Harry—"
"RUN!"
Because Ron chose the most difficult tunnel, he and Hermione had the most difficult time getting into it.
As the monk-like statue's head was not conjoined with the bridge (instead being separated by a narrow channel of water), they quickly realized they'd have to use their wits to get in.
"A ferry, d'you reckon?" Ron asked, unsure. "I mean...levitating each other is too advanced for us, a bridge would require far too much effort and time, same goes for a boat, you wouldn't do great on a broom plus they are far too complex to conjure or transfigure, and obviously swimming is out…"
Hermione didn't say anything, but gave an almost imperceptible nod.
So Ron began conjuring a wooden raft to use to ferry them across. By the time he was done, it was several feet across and very roughly hewn together, but it was sturdy and very thick, and would hold their weight.
They both stepped onto it, holding the other for support, and Ron jettisoned them towards the nastily ominous mouth. Clambering through onto the statue's tongue (Ron shivered at this), which was very smooth, they then set off the dank, short, narrow tunnel into the darkness.
It took a minute or so of walking, Hermione casting the revealing spell the whole time. They didn't think they would find the tomb in the random side of the tunnel, however. Slytherin had been a pompous bastard and one for theatrics. Ron very much believed they were going to find a huge, serpentine elaborate door at the end of the pipe corridor.
After they'd been in the claustrophobic tunnel for far too long for Ron's taste, he thought he saw a wall up ahead. They quickly realized the ground below them was sloping up to rather an uphill climb and they would have to scale the wall.
Hermione didn't talk, but grimly started climbing, slipping in the wetness. As it was difficult for Hermione to find enough handholds, Ron went behind her to help boost her up, but still she slipped and started falling—
Ron caught her before she fell, then colored as he realized his hands were holding her bum. Quickly he helped her get back up again, but his face remained far too red in the darkness after that.
"S-s-sorry," Hermione said, teeth chattering in the cold tunnel.
Of course she had known where his hands had been, he realized.
And then concentration over where to put his own hands and feet took precedence. Pretty soon, they were both mastering the rock-climbing with something only a little less than grace. Ron was horribly glad he paired her up with him instead of Ginny, say, whose incessant prattling would have annoyed him to no end. He loved his sister, but...there was a reason why he didn't constantly hang out with her.
Of course, there was another reason Ron wanted to be alone with Hermione.
He wanted to say something. Strike up a conversation. See how she was doing, after…
But their current task proved to be too difficult for words. So he held his tongue.
After about twenty feet going straight up though, the tunnel flattened out and they were walking in a trickling stream, casting their spells on the surrounding circular pipe tunnel.
Until...it ended. Suddenly, abruptly, they were faced with a circular wall filled with crisscrossing pipes. The tunnel continued far above their heads as it went almost straight up. But there was no way anybody would put a tomb that high up…
Was there?
"It's got to be here," Hermione whispered furiously, scanning the wall before them with spells.
"Hermione…" he said after a bit. "Are you...doing okay...after the...you know...the break-in?"
It was a full minute before she responded.
"I'm worried, Ron. All the time. Worried about Tonks. Worried about Crookshanks. About my parents. About your parents. About you. About Harry. About the Spy. About the riddles, and the gifts, and the heirs. About the Slytherins. About the Death Eaters. About Voldemort. About Viktor. About the Wolflord Potion and the lack of an antidote. About the constant attacks. About the never-ending nightmares. About the continual fear. I just...I want it all to end, Ron. I want to be done with it. I want...to...to just go to sleep and never wake up." Her voice was hopelessly exhausted and drained.
Worry for her pierced through his mind, and Ron just couldn't fathom how much stress all that must be. She didn't even mention schoolwork and, in a perfect world, that would have been the only thing she'd be worried about. He wasn't even worried about half the things on that list, which just goes to show how many things he had not been thinking about lately.
He searched for something to say. Something to help her. Something that mattered.
Catching her elbow so she would look at him, he saw the tears on her face from his dim wandlight.
"You have me," he said resolutely. "I can't make it all go away...but at least I can help you with it. So you don't have to bear it alone."
The gratitude on her face was evident.
Then her eyes flickered and caught something to the left of his head. He turned and saw what had captured her attention.
"Is that a…"
Instead of a pipe crisscrossing above their heads like the many others, it had eyes. It was made to look like a copper snake and was sticking mere inches out of the wall like the other pipes. But it was slightly curved. In fact...very suspiciously so.
"It's a handle," Ron realized, eyes wide. He reached out to pull it—
And nothing happened.
"It's a snake, Ron. It needs Parseltongue," Hermione said, continuing bitterly. "Of course he would do this. It's just like everything else in this Chamber. Only his Heirs may enter, and nobody else is deemed marginally worthy."
"Well...I may not be an Heir...but I do know a thing or two about Parseltongue," Ron assured her.
And then he opened his mouth and a long hiss came out of it.
"Hasseh gheseh nee ghe sashe heh."
Hermione jerked back from him, startled, and to both of their amazement, the snake handle's eyes gleamed, and it slithered, and an unlocking sound echoed, and the pipe-covered wall slowly and agonizingly creaked open.
Ron noticed her astonished gaze, and grinned. "Harry taught me a thing or two."
A small smile peered across her face as she stared into his eyes. He got the sudden urge then to kiss her. Like really...really...just take her beautifully unique face in his hands, and just—
But the moment broke, as something caught their eye.
An eerily green fog crept out of the opening, surrounding them both. It filled every crevice in Ron's body, making him tingle from the awe-inspiring power it contained. Before he could stop himself, he closed his eyes and breathed it in, reveling in the taste of it, the smell, the force of its great magic emanating and resounding within him. It was so incredibly brilliant, and he felt his magic enhancing with the might of it—
"Ron..."
Startled, Ron was jerked back to the present, and saw Hermione had fallen to her knees, gasping for breath, like the green mist was suffocating her, weakening her, killing her…
Ron snapped out of it, grabbing her around the body and pulling her away. But the green mist crept after them, seeking them out, trying to find them and finish what it had started, its long tendril-like ghostly fingers clawing towards them—
"Hermione—it isn't safe for you—!"
"What...what...why…"
"Because you're Muggleborn! It knows you are. It can't find magical blood in you, so it's poisoning you! It's trying to kill you!"
"But...we have...we have to…" Hermione's voice was growing weaker as the green mist caught up with them. They were at the edge of the cliff they had climbed up before.
"No, Hermione!" he shouted at her. "I have to. It knows I'm pureblood. It didn't affect me the way it did you. You need to wait here. Send out the sparks. I'm going to be as fast as I can, all right?"
And then he did one of the most difficult things he had ever done in his life.
He left her there.
Running towards the tomb, Ron knew he had to be fast. He had to get Slytherin's locket, and get out. Get in and get out. He reached the door, already standing open from before. The green smoke was choking him this time, as thick and congested as it was, and his eyes watered as he peered inside.
It was a much bigger room, than Helga Hufflepuff's had been. Far more grandiose and relevant.
And still Ron battled the overwhelming ambition and greed from the onslaught. He staggered to the tomb in the middle, the ornate black obsidian carved to within an inch of its life with runes and serpents.
And there…
There on the shelf…
"Accio Locket!" he tried.
Nothing.
"Accio Locket!" he tried again, putting more magic into it.
And not just nothing this time...but what looked like a locket on the shelf just...just shimmered and disappeared.
It was an illusion spell.
He swore.
And then...he swore again. Much louder this time because something was happening, and it wasn't good. It was bad. Bad, bad, bad—
The disappearance of the illusion set off a curse. Water rushed around the room with a terrifying force and speed. Like the Fiendfyre in its watery form, and it was everywhere, and it was rising up three times his height and growing with every passing second into the form of a snake—
And it lunged.
"Holy shite!" he roared, and then sprinted out of the room. Ran, full on, down the corridor, desperate to reach Hermione before—
The water crashed around him, behind him, under him, lifting him up, overtaking him—
Hermione's terrified face watched helplessly as the water rushed towards her. She shot out red sparks from her wand towards where the others must be, but didn't have time to save herself—
And then it swept her up too, and Ron tried in vain to grab her, to keep his face above water, but he couldn't see her, he couldn't see anything, just darkness, and he was tumbling head over heels, and couldn't breathe—
Rushing along the tunnels, splitting into forks, and was Hermione still with him—and then a small hand found his, and he pulled her closer—he wasn't going to lose her—
Then he saw Harry and Ginny, and his face merged from the water long enough to shout at them to run—
But it was too late.
The watery snake swept them up too, and their shouts and screams mingled with his and Hermione's water-filled ones, and Ron went under again, water filling his lungs, and they were on fire, and he was bursting, and was this what it was like to die…?
And then miraculously—miraculously—they shot out into the Chamber of Secrets, and the water dispersed, filling the Chamber and splashing several feet in the air, up around the walls, swirling around with the mighty rush of sound until slowly, slowly, it ebbed and flowed and died down…
Until they were all sprawled on the stone floor, soaking wet, in several inches of water. Painfully, Ron picked himself up, coughing and wheezing, spitting up the nasty-tasting stuff and puking it up as well.
Harry, already standing next to him, reached down to help him up. "You all right, Ron? Hermione?"
Ron's eyes shot towards Hermione, who was still with him, looking very pale as she gasped for breath on the ground.
"What...the...hell…?" gasped Ginny, wringing out her hair.
"Well…" Ron said apologetically. "Good news is, we found the tomb!"
"And the bad news?" Harry deadpanned.
"There was no locket. Just...the illusion of one. And when I tried to summon it, it triggered a curse."
"And let me guess," said Ginny snidely. "This curse was Slytherin's nasty way of wiping out anyone who isn't his Heir and visciously drowning them in the process?"
Ron shrugged. "Considering we are all here, undrowned, I consider this a win."
Just then, Neville and Meghan came sprinting into the Chamber, their footsteps splashing in the water.
"You lot all right?" said Neville, breathless. "We came as quickly as we could—"
"Wait, why aren't you two wet?" said Ginny suspiciously. "That water went in every tunnel."
Meghan shrugged. "Not ours, I guess. Maybe we were higher elevation? Wait, what's he doing here?"
They all whipped around to where she was pointing at Luna Lovegood, who was standing right next to Draco fucking Malfoy.
Ron swore.
Wands went up on all sides. Well, except Luna's, of course, but she appeared to be even more determined to stand beside him, as if protecting him.
"Easy now, all right?" said Malfoy. He and Luna were both suspiciously dry, and that alone peeved Ron even more. "I was on Patrol and I saw a huge gaping hole in the bathroom and somebody fall down it, so I thought I'd go and save them."
"Then why the hell haven't we seen you sooner?" Harry snapped.
"Why do you think?" Malfoy hissed. "When I saw it was you lot, I knew you were going to hex me again. So I Disillusioned myself. It's not like I could just fly up that tunnel and be on my merry way. You lot looked like you knew where you were going. So I followed you."
"And how do you explain how the water missed you?" said Harry, eyes narrowed.
"The Weasel shouted to run, didn't he? Just because I'm quicker on my feet than any of you doesn't mean I should be persecuted for it, Saint Potter!" Malfoy said venomously. "Now why don't you quit aggravating me and figure out how we're going to get out of this mess!"
Ron dropped his wand. The rest of them followed suit, though Harry did not.
"He has a point," said Neville. "How are we getting out of here, Harry?"
For once, Harry looked stumped. They didn't have Fawkes this time around to fly them back up, Ron realized. If they could maybe Summon their racing brooms though…
The rest of them threw out several ideas, but each one seemed weaker than the last. Harry's idea that they use the house-elves turned into a bust when they couldn't call for Dobby, Winky, or even Kreacher.
"Are you kidding me?" said Harry savagely, kicking at a puddle of water. "Slytherin must have put some sort of...I don't know...ward or ban around this place to make not even house-elves be able to pop in. The slimy, arrogant arse."
"Out of all of our planning," said Ginny morosely, "How did we fail at an exit strategy?"
There was a silence after this as they ruminated this. Ron looked up at them, and realized they all cut quite the miserable figures. He, Hermione, Harry, and Ginny were all soaking wet while Neville and Meghan, and Luna and Malfoy (who was standing as far from Harry and Ron as he could manage), were all relatively unscathed. And they were all—barring stupid Malfoy, of course—wearing their comfortable Muggle clothing.
"There is one thing," said Hermione quietly.
Ron's head jerked towards her, astonished that she was speaking up after being rather mute for so long. This by itself unnerved Ron more than anything else, as he'd never known Hermione to just...not talk. She still looked pale from the water onslaught and that weird greenish fog-thing, but other than that, she was talking fine and not coughing or anything—
"Go on, Hermione," he encouraged, when she'd halted.
"Well...the bones for example," Hermione explained.
That confounded them all.
"The...bones?" said Harry. "Why are we talking about bones?"
"Well, think about it. There were probably hundreds of rat bones on the ground in that one chamber before this one. But there is no possible way for the basilisk to have eaten rats while it was alive—"
"And why not?" said Malfoy, scathingly.
"Oh come, Draco, surely you must know this one, given your House and all," Hermione shot back, just as scathingly. "Snakes eat prey that is either the size of their own girth at its widest point, or just a bit bigger—of course, the bigger the prey, the more it can cause gut impaction. Besides look at those fangs. The only way it could have eaten a rat is if it hopped into its mouth. Which means there is no way that a basilisk as large as that thing—" she pointed to the looming carcass mere feet from them— "could have survived on tiny rats alone. Besides the fact that those bones were whole, and for a basilisk to have eaten any of them, the bones would have dissolved within its body."
"Meaning…?" said Harry, still clueless.
"Merlin, you're daft," said Malfoy, rolling his eyes. "She's saying the basilisk didn't eat the rats, dimwit. And it didn't eat any humans while it was alive and patrolling the castle. Which means it went somewhere else for its food. Now where can you think of that is huge, can hide a fifty-foot snake, and has room enough to house creatures large enough for a basilisk to eat?"
"The Forbidden Forest," said Ron and Harry at the same time.
"Exactly," said Hermione after her initial glare at Malfoy (for stealing her thunder, as it were). "Which means that one of these backdoor tunnels will lead us straight to the grounds. All we have to do is find it."
Author's Note:
So sorry this chapter took so long in getting to you! I wrote most of it in the past two weeks. Everything about the Spy in the Tower was already written, then the rest of this chapter was going to be what you'll find in the next chapter, "The Fall of Ginevra Weasley".
But then I decided to have them go into the Chamber of Secrets and find Slytherin's tomb, even though I already had plans for the Locket, which meant most of this chapter is brand new. I didn't think it would take this long to write the darn thing, but a lot of research had to go into the scenery for the Chamber and the tunnels, and the basilisk as well. And then of course I got distracted watching some Anaconda movies and other monster movies, lol. And this is how I discovered a few of Rowling's plot holes while I was at it and so I wrote in more extra bits to try and plug them up for her. But I didn't think you'd mind have several thousand more words to read.
Always remember the best books have the best research!
Anyway I hope you liked it! We will be seeing more fallout from this chapter in the next, although fallout from the Spy in the Tower won't happen for a few more chapters. Hopefully the next chapter (which only needs a few more scenes, not the whole thing) will be here within the week!
As always, don't forget to tell me what you'd like to see, or what you want to have happen. Just a few more chapters till we come to the climax! What do you want me to put in the climax? What are you hoping you will get out of it?
Let me know, in the review box below!