NOTE: Thank you for all the kind words from the last few chapters im hoping this lives up to everything.

Chapter 14 – The Aftermath

"Professor Dumbledore! It was lucky no student was hurt!"

"What about my cat? Isnt she important?"

"Yes Argus of course she is, however it is evident that the students are in danger, we need to impose new rules for the students and warn them about the danger. Does anyone have any suggestions?"

"What is the problem headmaster?" asked Severus.

"The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. There was a message outside the girls bathroom on the

first floor saying 'The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir beware' it is written in a red substance. This and the fact that Mrs Norris was petrified mekes me believe that it is true

and we must be cautious"

"Right okay. For now headmaster the curfew for being back in their common rooms must be before eight o clock. The library can close and quidditch practice for all teams must finish by seven o'clock. This gives the students time to eat and to get back to their dormitorys. During the hours students are

not in class teachers need to be on patrol" replied Severus.

There were nods of agreement from all heads of houses. After that issue was dealt with professor sprout and fitlewick looked down at Gareth on the floor holding a young boy.

"Heads of houses will you please go and inform your houses about the new arrangements" requested Dumbledore trying to distract the professos from the boy.

"Mr Richards, its been years! How are you?"

"Doing well, professor Flitlewik"

"What on earth are you doing here, and who is that you are holding?"

"I am a qualified child healer specialising in mental health and magical capacity I am here at Professor Dumbledore's request to help a child in need." replied Gareth standing up and shaking his Charms professors hand. He didn't want to say he was holding Harry he didn't want to break Harrys trust after he had spent the best part of half an hour trying to get him uncurled from a ball.

"You've done well for yourself congratulations, though Professor Dumbledore is correct we need to

go and warn the students. I am assuming you have said everything you need to headmaster?"

"yes Fillius I think its time for all the heads of houses to return to the common rooms and impose the rules as soon as possible." Flicking his wand at a pile of parchment Dumbledore made four identical rule change notices and handed one to each of the heads of houses.

"Thank you all for your time we will discuss the circumstances in depth during our staff meeting Monday" in a tone to all the

professors that implied the conversation was over. The Gryffindor, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw heads of house left the office. Severus Snape stayed however looking at Harry, Gareth, and Dumbledore

each in turn. "Severus, go warn your students no one is going to leave here anytime soon I don't think" Severus nodded, swished his cloak and left the room.

Harry who had been very quiet the whole meeting glanced around before burying his head back into Gareth. Harry felt safe here in the moment with Gareth but was now worried about the whole conversation he had just heard, the professors did not realise that the boy was listening and knew

about the chamber of secrets. Harry wanted to go and tell Ron and Hermione but then the guilt of what he had recently done overcame him and he ended up just staying and not doing anything.

"I see you have managed to calm Harry down a bit"

"Yes, though I don't think that all the heads of house knowing about this is a very good way to earn Harrys trust at the moment"

"Understandable, how can we help him now?"

"I think for tonight at least I would like to stay with Harry to keep him safe and I don't think leaving him alone at this stage is going to help anything. So I can either take him home with me and he can stay the night or I can take him to St Mungo's which I don't think is a good idea due to the amount of media this will have and I'd rather Harry not go through that at this stage but overall it is what Harry is comfortable doing"

"Alternatively you could use the room you use usually, all you have to do is walk past that wall and imagine the type of room you would like and it will appear."

"That sounds the most appropriate, thank you headmaster"

"Would you like to head there now?"

"I think we are going to wait until Severus is back I would like to discuss the next steps for Harrys work with Severus and I." The headmaster nodded and started to pace the room before pulling out his wand and placing it to his head before extracting this white silvery strand of some sort and

bottling it. Harry who had turned around to look at the headmaster looked curiously at the old man having finally calmed down enough to remove his head from Gareth's ches but was obviously tired, his eyes were drooping.

"This is a memeory Harry, sometimes when this old man has too much to think about I bottle them until I have the time to come back and look into it further. Until then I can just leave it be" Harry nodded showing the headmaster that he was listening before settling down in gareths arms and

falling into a sleep. It wasn't long until

Snape returned to the office cloak swishing like usual as he passed into the office.

"The snakes have been told and accepted the new rules, they have been informed servere punishment will accompany them on their after curfew wanderings."

"Thank you Severus. Gareth will be staying in the Room of requirement to keep an eye on Harry for tonight at least, he also wanted to talk about the next steps" Severus nodded once at Dumbledore and the other at Gareth as he sat down on a vacant chair in the office.

"I am going to spend the day with Harry tomorrow doing different things because of tonight, and then I will see if he is safe to return to his common room under more supervision. He will not be able

to play quidditch tomorrow can the game be rearranged? Also, I would like Harry to meet with you four times a week and I will be coming an extra day too so that we can help him further with his habits. His parents seem to be a big trigger for all of this so maybe we can focus on that for a bit

before trying to talk to him about his home life, he has been avoiding it and tonight shows we cannot let Harry carry on the way he is."

"Agreed Healer Richards what I was going to do after the feast tonight was take him to see his parents grave, I doubt he has ever seen his village let alone their graves, I was hoping he would open up a bit more but did this before I could get hold of him"

Maybe you could take him next Saturday? Give him time to work through what has happened today. For the schedule I will still come every Wednesday and Sunday but I will come Friday too now" Severus nodded in agreement.

The headmaster hadn't said anything up until now and when he opened his mouth nothing seemed to come out for a while.

"You had best go and get sleeping Harry off to bed. The quidditch match can

be rearranged to the Saturday a fortnights time. Thank you Gareth for coming" In a way that made them all feel like they were being shunted from the office. Severus and Gareth applied bid the headmaster goodnight and left for the seventh floor. Gareth walked back, fourth thinking of what he wanted before the door appeared, and the three went in.

The room was now spacious with cream walls and a black carpet, two beds were situated in one of the corners, both with black duvets on with white stripes. In the other there was their usual two chairs and table for when they were there for therapy. There was a small kitchen and bathroom in two adjacent rooms. Gareth put Harry down and thanked Severus for all his help with harry.

The next morning found Harry being very quiet with Gareth, obviously very embarrassed about the night before.

"Harry I cant let you go back to class tomorrow until we know you can keep yourself safe, lets try this again, what happened yesterday to make you want to do that?"

Knowing Gareth was not going to let him go until he said something he confided

"Everything, everyone is better off without me, I'm wasting all of your times and you should have just let me go"

"No Harry, you would be missed by everyone who knows you. Do you think Professor Snapes gives his time up to everyone, especially Gryffindor's." Harry shook his head "and what about Ron and

Hermione?"

"They only keep me because they have to"

"If I brought them in here would you say that to them" Harry shook his head "I think they would be disappointed that you thought they wouldn't miss you. They would tell you that they would miss you dearly. Your head of house told me they were rather erratic and worried when you didn't return to the common room last night" Harry sighed and curled himself into a ball.

"Hiding is not going to help this situation Harry, isolation is not good when you feel like this, you need your friends now more

than ever. Harry on a scale of 1 to 10 how likely would you want to do it again and carry it out. Ten being yes I am going to try to kill myself again?"

"About a two now. I regret it. I'm sorry"

"But you still want to do it?"

"The thoughts are still there."

"I know Harry, perhaps we can work on it before you go back to Gryffindor tonight?" Harry nodded and so Gareth spent the afternoon using different techniques to help the young child in front of him, they worked on art and some music, working on thinking a different way to see the positives. They

ate together, Harry tried to eat as much as he could but because he had been starving himself he could not and ended up going to the bathroom where Gareth knew all the good food was now being put. Gareth knew he had to do something about that and so asked Harry to take a nutrient potion,

which had calming draught, anti-depressant and anti-nausea. Harry would have to take this at dinnertime every night and he would have to be at dinner and eat something alongside that.

Gareth also gave Harry a small bottle of quick acting calming draught which would automatically refill but a record would be kept by Gareth. Once half past seven came, Gareth told Harry that he would be coming for an extra day and he would have to meet with Severus the rest of the days. Gareth made sure Harry was safe that night and asked his friends not to ask any questions quite yet.

Harry played a game of chess with Ron while Hermione looked over his homework, which she said was rather good, and to a high standard than usual. She then took out a book and sat reading as the common room emptied. Harry and Ron were the last to enter the dormitory is that night and

surprisingly Harry felt relaxed and tired so he was able to fall straight to sleep without cutting and giving into his urges. However as he closed his eyes he thought it is nice to be alive.