Chapter 5

In the Chamber

Harry agreed to bring Tom to the Chamber of Secrets immediately. The two did not even think about dinner as they walked down the corridor, following the others. However, as they went further down the marble staircase in the distance, Harry stopped Tom on the second floor and led him down the corridor towards the girl's bathroom. They stopped right outside, and Harry peaked in. "Good, Myrtle's not there," he said.

Myrtle? Tom wondered, the name sounding vaguely familiar. The two walked into the bathroom and Tom allowed his feet to carry him automatically to the sink he discovered what felt like only weeks ago. He barely looked at the snake inscribed into the tap as he said, "Open."

The sinks all vibrated and moved, sinking into the floor underneath to reveal a large entrance like an open pipe. Harry sighed and took a step towards it but Tom stopped him. "What are you doing, darling? It's not done yet," he chuckled. He looked at the open tube and said, "Stairway."

The large pipe shifted, pushing into itself as ridges appeared, forming steep steps with a banister on either side. Harry stared in shock and Tom smirked at his expression. "What?" Tom said, "You think I actually slid down when I found it?"

"Y-Yes," Harry muttered, his cheeks turning red from embarrassment or jealousy Tom could not tell. Tom gave a soft chuckle and shook his head.

"Darling, there is so much you'll need to learn," he said, and he began to descend down the staircase, Harry just behind him. The steps were steep but not dangerous. Lanterns lit their path with a green flame, each illuminating as they pass, basking the two boys in a soft green glow. There was no strange smell as they walked down. Harry expected to enter the sewer where the floor was covered with tiny, crunched bones. However, as the steps ended, Harry was shocked to see that instead of bones, they entered into the Chamber of Secrets proper.

The Chamber was long with tall pillars holding up the ceiling, each with ornate snakes carved into them with emeralds for eyes. At the end of the Chamber was a statue of Salazar Slytherin, at the foot of which was a small pool from which the body of the Basilisk laid.

Tom stopped at the sight of it and he squeezed Harry's hand. The Basilisk was tall, almost twenty feet, and it looked almost sad. The body was still perfectly conserved. "So it's true," Tom whispered. He stepped forward, his hand finally slipping from Harry's as he walked up to the Basilisk. He pressed his hand against the cold scales and sighed. There was a strange feeling in his chest that he could not describe. "I feel… sad?" he said questionably. "It is strange. It feels like only yesterday I have seen her for the first time. I had so much I wanted to do. I wanted to study her, ask her about everything she knew about the Chamber, about Slytherin, and his study." He gave a sigh and stared at the Basilisk almost longingly.

Harry to be cautious step forward and pressed his hand against the cold scales next to Tom, frowning. "I'm sorry," he said softly.

Tom shook his head. "Tell me," he said softly but it was still a command.

"It was in my second year," Harry began, and he told Tom everything. "Mr. Malfoy gave Ginny, Ron Weasley's sister, a diary. It was Tom Riddle's—Voldemort's diary. Somehow, it had uh him inside it, a sixteen-year-old version of him."

"Had an older version of myself in my diary?" Tom interrupted. He frowned, "Strange, I do not think such magic even existed. I'm sorry, continue."

Harry nodded and continued his tale. He told Tom about the diary, about the incompetent Professor Lockhart and the mystery of the reopening of the Chamber of Secrets and who the Heir of Slytherin was. "Students were being petrified," he said. "Voldemort was using Ginny to release the Basilisk, but every time it hunted, its prey only saw it in reflections. In the end, I had to go to the Chamber of Secrets with Ron and Professor Lockhart. Voldemort brought Ginny down here, he tried to absorb her soul or something to come back to life. Lockhart… he tried to obliviate Ron and me but failed, and I had to go and fight both the diary and basilisk. I killed the basilisk with the Sword of Gryffindor, which I pulled out of the Sorting Hat that Fawkes the Phoenix brought to me, and for the Diary and Voldemort, I destroyed it with a Basilisk fang."

"I see," Tom sighed. He looked once more at the Basilisk. "Thank you for telling me, my darling." He shook his head and said, "There is something that I wish to share with you now, as well as find someplace much more comfortable for us to sit and talk."

He took Harry's hand once more and pulled him to the left side of the chamber. There was a door there. A simple wooden door that Harry did not notice the first and only time he went down here. He wondered if it was locked behind magic, but it opened easily to Tom's touch and the Slytherin Heir pulled Harry in.

The study was about the size of the Slytherin common room. It had high walls with banisters of greens and silvers, as well as a very large portrait of Salazar Slytherin who was sleeping in the chair, a snake curled around his legs also asleep. Bookshelves covered the walls, and there were a few windows enchanted to show different landscapes and weather. On the right was a window showing snowy mountains while the left showed the evening sky over Hogwarts grounds. There were comfortable looking leather sofas with tables and a wide fireplace. Tom pulled Harry to the sofa and set him down. "Stay there, Darling," Tom purred as he went to the bookshelves. He did not need to hope that the book would be there, he had a sick feeling.

On the bottom row, closest to the portrait, looking as though it was crammed in, it sat. Slytherin's research. The book that Tom found and pulled out. It looked older, the already ancient pages looking more fragile than Tom's copy. He took great care pulling it out and pulled out his own as well as he returned to the sofa with Harry. He did not even presume to keep some space between them. He pressed his legs against Harry and placed both books in front of them and turned to the same page in both.

They had the same words, the same penmanship, and the same illustrations. Tom breathed deeply as he glanced at Harry. "I told you before, that when I visited the Chamber of Secrets, I pulled from it a book. Slytherin's book. These are his notes, his research into Parsel-magic, and as we can see later on…" he flipped towards the end of the pages where the handwriting changed, "his descendants continued their research. There is only one copy of this book in existence, Harry. And here, somehow, we have two."

"How is this possible?" Harry asked.

"Like I've been telling you, but now I can see this as a final confirmation, I am from a different time. Fifty years in the past," Tom said, frowning. "But a different past? A past that does not involve your Voldemort." He looked at Harry. "Do you believe me, Darling?"

Harry was silent for some time. He stared at the two books in front of him, as if studying the two intensely. Tom allowed him this moment of silence, knowing how far-fetched and ludicrous this situation sounds. The boy leaned back after some time and nodded.

"I believe you, Tom," he said with such a genuineness that Tom believed that at that moment he saw his boy, his beautiful Harry, without his masks. Tom kissed Harry's cheek. "Thank you, Harry," he said.

Harry blushed and smiled at the two books. "Now," Tom said, "we are alone, and have the little time misplacement out of the way. Tell me what troubled you with the wand weighing, my darling."

Harry jumped slightly, in all of his, he almost forgot what happened. Shame and anger filled him, and he found himself sifting through his masks in order to hide them, but under Tom's eyes, both knew that it was useless.

"You feel shame, Harry? Anger? What happened?" Tom asked. "Tell me, my sweet Darling," he hissed possessively.

Harry shivered at the parseltongue and leaned towards Tom who wrapped an arm around him. "I lost my temper, and my masks for a moment," Harry admitted. "This woman, Rita Skeeter, she insisted on an interview and even though I said no, Bagman and he thought I agreed. She pulled me into a broom closet and, well, she just never listened. I tried denying it, I was emotionless but everything she did irritate me. Like she already had an idea of who I am! And then, in the end, I just exploded."

"Did you hurt her?" Tom asked.

"No," Harry said darkly, "but I wish I had."

"You've shown restraint, which is good," Tom hummed. "However, we will rise above this Darling. No doubt, tomorrow will feature a very long and fictitious story about you. Use your masks Harry, but if it becomes too much, run to me. I will protect you."

"Thank you," Harry said. "There's one more thing," Harry said. "Do you know about my godfather?"

"Blaise and Theo told me only what Draco has told them," Tom said. "He is Sirius Black, correct? A man unrightfully charged for murder."

"Yeah," Harry nodded. "I've written him a letter about all of this—though I didn't mention you! I did not know if, if you would be alright with me telling him about you."

"Oh?" Tom said, amused, "And what about me?"

Harry's cheeks redden in response and Tom kissed them. "Tell him whatever you think is good, Darling," Tom whispered. "Now, I think we should head to dinner before people get suspicious about the evil Slytherin taking the noble lion."

Even though you are already mine, Harry, Tom thought with a smile. Harry agreed and the two left the Chamber of Secrets. Later that night, Harry received his reply from his letter to Sirius, telling him to be alone at the fire in Gryffindor Tower at one o'clock in the morning of the 22nd of November. He told Tom this right away as Tom continued to study Slytherin's notes.

As expected a few days after their time in the Chamber of Secrets, Rita Skeeter had published her piece about the Triwizard Tournament, and it had turned out to be not so much a report on the tournament as a highly colored life story of Harry. Much of the front page had been given over to a picture of Harry; the article had been all about Harry, the names of the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang champions (misspelled) had been squashed into the last line of the article, and Cedric hadn't been mentioned at all.

Harry ripped the article to pieces when he first saw it and retreated to the painting room with Draco, using the scraps of paper to create a mask. It was distorted, almost violently so, with Skeeter's words jumping out against the splattering of colors. "I get my strength from my parents. I know they'd be very proud of me if they could see me now." "I still cry about them." "Harry is rarely seen out of the company of one Hermione Granger."

The last one hurt, not because it wasn't true, Harry and Hermione did spend a lot of time together, but because he didn't want Skeeter's vicious words to reach anyone else. But even then, Harry knew that was a lie for while he did spend most of his time with Hermione now that Ron wasn't speaking to him, he spent an equal amount, if not more, with Tom, whom the article did not mention at all thankfully.

For some reason, the Slytherins did not use the article as a way to bully him. In fact, the day after the article came out, the Slytherins who weren't his friends all stared at him fearfully. He had a sneaking suspicion that Tom was responsible for that.

Of course, he was right.

On the day the article came out, Tom seethed. He was with Malfoy, Nott, and Zabini whom he was becoming good friends with in the Slytherin common room. There was a loud laugh from a group of seventh years and Tom paid it no mind until someone yelled out, "Can you believe this? Potter in love with a mudblood! And we let him in here! And listen to this, he still cries about his dead mummy and daddy!" The ugly laughter followed and Tom felt his muscles convulse with a need he did not have in some time.

"Excuse me," he said as he stood up, Draco standing up a second later. "Draco, allow me," Tom said simply, leaving no room for argument as he went over towards the seventh years. He did not know their names, nor did he really care. All he knew was that they were insulting his boy, and he will not stand for that.

"Excuse me," he said, getting their attention.

"What Riddle?"

"I was just wondering which one of you have been… speaking about Potter?" Tom said smoothly, "it was rather funny."

"That was Lucian," one said, grinning at a rather tall Slytherin with yellow hair. "Eh, Bole? Oh, do the crying impression!"

Lucian Bole smirked and cleared his throat. He spoke in a mocking cry as he said, "Sometimes at night I still cry about them, I'm not ashamed to admit it. I know nothing will hurt me during the tournament because they're watching over me." The group all fell into laughter, all oblivious to Tom pulling out his wand.

"I see. Incarcerous!" Rope burst from Tom's wand and in a second, Lucian Bole was on the floor, bound. The other seventh years all jumped away, gasping before fumbling for their wands, which Tom easily disarmed. "I am quite sorry, but I cannot allow anyone to speak ill of my boy," Tom said, his wand held loosely, as though it was about to fall at any moment. "However," his voice started to get a cold air to it, "I shall be merciful. Instead of punishing all, I shall only punish Lucian Bole. I've been researching a spell, one of Slytherin's design, and you shall test it out for me."

An arrogant glint shone through the seventh year. "Oh really?" Bole said, "I'll like to see you try."

"I was hoping you would say that," Tom chuckled. "It is a simple spell." He waved his wand and hissed out in Parseltongue, "Serpents of Flame, come burn my foe." A snake appeared. It was red and hazy looking, as though smoke slithered with its embers as fire engulfed it. Everything it touched smoked and even the air around it seemed to smolder and burn as the heat intensified. The students around them shrieked in terror but Tom paid them no mind. He just silently directed the snake towards Bole.

It started at his feet, wrapping around in between the ropes. The teen screamed immediately but the clothes did not catch fire. Instead, the spell was created so that the victim would feel intense pain as though thrown into a roaring fire without leaving any marks or burns. The snake continued to wrap around Bole, seemingly growing with every scream.

"Tom," Draco said, his skin deathly pale. "Tom that's enough. Stop."

"No, I don't think so," Tom said, watching in fascination. "He has yet learned his lesson." The snake now reached Bole's waist.

"Riddle I have—please!" he begged in between screams, his face was soaked and red with sweat and tears.

"Riddle!" Blaise said, "Stop!"

"Don't tell me what to do," Tom sneered. "Bigger!" The snake started to expand in size.

"I will tell Harry!" Draco yelled. Tom and the snake froze. He turned to face Draco. "I will tell Harry that you are too dangerous for him."

Tom's eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't dare."

"I will unless you stop this right now," Draco said, finding courage from somewhere Tom could not see. A nasty sneer spread across Tom's face. He looked at the snake which stayed wrapped around Bole's legs. Malfoy would dare tell his darling, his boy, that Tom was too dangerous? No, he couldn't risk it.

"Fine," he said simply, and with a wave, he dismissed both ropes and snake. He pointed his wand at Bole, who was still crying in pain. "Heal." He said in Parseltongue, and the pain disappeared. "I may have gotten overzealous; however I will not apologize. I've healed him, there should be no pain, and he can walk around as normal."

Draco did not look pleased or convinced. Instead, he sighed and shook his head. "I will be watching you closely," he muttered. "I am serious Riddle, if you even try to hurt Harry, I'll end you."

"I told you before, I will never do anything to harm Harry," Tom replied, "but we will keep this… incident between us." And any punishment shall have to be outside of Malfoy's view, he added mentally. Just until he learns.

"Very well," Draco said, though he still glared at Tom. His eyes shifted, "Get up Bole, nothing happened."

"Malfoy—"

"Nothing happened. Besides you all should know better than believe Skeeter's writing," Draco said. The Slytherins left it at that and, as promised, Harry never learned of this incident. Instead, Tom and Draco allowed him to focus on much more important matters: such as the Triwizard Tournament. November was swiftly coming to an end, and with it came the First Task which would be on November 24th.

It was currently November 22nd, and Harry ran around looking for Tom. Without a word, Tom understood completely after seeing Harry's worried look and they both made their way down to the Chamber of Secrets after classes.

"Dragons! They're putting us up against Dragons!" Harry said as soon as the door to the study closed. The portrait of Salazar Slytherin was now awake and watched the two silently. "Hagrid brought me to them last night, I saw them as did Karkaroff and Madame Maxime."

"No doubt telling their champions," Tom drawled. "I'm guessing the first task is supposed to be a secret?"

"Yes, but I told Cedric," Harry nodded.

"Good," Tom said. "I would hate for Hogwarts to be given a disadvantage. Now, what will we do for your dragon?"

"I don't know," Harry frowned. "Professor Moody caught me as I told Cedric. He asked me my strengths and all I thought about was flying."

"Summoning charm then, to summon your broom?" Tom suggested. "Or, something more… personal," he chuckled.

Harry frowned, "How did you know?" he said slowly before shaking his head. "I've thought about asking both you and Hermione to help me prepare."

Tom chuckled, "Wanting to add fuel to Skeeter's ridiculous claims?"

"No!" Harry said a little too quickly. He blushed and said "No," much more calmer. "It's just, you two are the first people I thought of with helping me. Hermione and I, we agreed to Summoning Charm. To summon my broom, but…"

"You want to hear what I think," Tom hummed. Harry nodded. Tom thought for a moment and brought out Slytherin's book. "It is a good idea, however, it is entirely reckless if flying is your own plan. So, I would suggest you use something that none of the other Champions have: Parsel-Magic."

"You want me to speak Parseltongue?" Harry asked.

"Yes, do you object?" Tom asked.

Harry hesitated. He looked around as though he felt thousands of eyes all staring at him. Using Parsel-Magic, that wasn't how he was supposed to act. He had no mask for it, no way of being. It would be easy, yes, and learning it would mean more time with Tom but… what would everyone think? How would everyone react? But still, he could not say no to Tom. It was almost impossible, not that he ever wanted. November has been hectic, as though a year in one month, and yet during the turmoil there always was Tom. Tom with his sweet words, Tom with his soft kisses. So he nodded. "As a last resort."

"As a last resort," Tom nodded. He smiled and kissed Harry's cheek. "The theory is very simple and interesting, my Darling." He pulled Harry down to sit on the leather couch. He opened Slytherin's journal and explained briefly, "There are two ways to use Parsel-Magic. The first, and simpler way, is to simply say the spell in Parseltongue. Using the snake's language, or any magical language intensifies the spell. For example…" he placed his notebook on the table in front of them and pointed his wand at it. "Wingardium Leviosa," he said in English and the notebook floated gently and slowly off the table, into the air, before landing softly. He aimed his wand again and hissed in Parseltongue, "Wingardium Leviosa." The book moved into the air again, this time faster, as though it was falling upside down and landed back onto the table with a soft thud. "You see?"

Harry nodded. "What else?" he asked.

"The second is spells created for Slytherin's family. Spells that needed to be cast in Parseltongue."

"Let me guess," Harry said with a smile, "they're all Dark Magic?"

"I mean there might be a healing spell here and there, as well as another more pleasurable spell created by Slytherin's nephew," Tom said, smirking at Harry's confused look. "Any way to deal with the Dragon. Their hide is resistant to spells, as I have read. So, in the end, I feel that using Parsel-Magic will be beneficial. Even if it is just the first kind."

"Yeah," Harry nodded. "Yeah if I do use Parsel-Magic it'll be the first kind. I don't—I don't think I'll be comfortable showing everyone that other side of me."

Tom nodded in understanding. He stood up and stretched, "In that case, I suggest we find Ms. Granger, we have a lot of practice to do."

"Okay," Harry nodded. He looked at Tom as he stood up and smiled, a sense of general relief filled him as he watched the boy walk towards the door. Relief that only lasted for a second before Harry found himself on his island once more, isolated by ocean waters.

A/N: Thanks for reading! We can never forget that Tom, though loving for his Darling, will not be afraid to use everything to attack those who would harm or insult his Harry.