"So, you also think the girl who was killed fifty years ago was Moaning Myrtle?" Aeryn muttered to Harry at breakfast the next day.
"Definitely," Harry whispered back, passing her the bacon. "It has to be her…there's no other explanation."
"All those times we were in that bathroom, and she was just three toilets away," said Ron bitterly, "and we could've asked her, and now…."
They walked to Transfigurations class somberly, musing silently to themselves over what to do next. Escaping the ever-present net of teachers to sneak into a girls' bathroom would be difficult even for Aeryn, but for the boys it would be nearly impossible, especially since it was the girls' bathroom right next to the scene of the first attack.
But something happened in Transfigurations that drove the Chamber of Secrets out of their minds for the first time in weeks. Ten minutes into the class, Professor McGonagall told them that their exams would start on the first of June, one week from today.
"Exams?" howled Seamus Finnigan. "We're still getting exams?"
There was a loud bang behind Aeryn as Neville Longbottom's wand slipped, vanishing one of the legs on his desk. Professor McGonagall restored it with a wave of her own wand, and turned, frowning, to Seamus.
"The whole point of keeping the school open at this time is for you to receive your education," she said sternly. "The exams will therefore take place as usual, and I trust you are all studying hard."
There was a great deal of mutinous muttering around the room, which made Professor McGonagall scowl even more darkly.
"Professor Dumbledore's instructions were to keep the school running as normally as possible," she said. "And that, I need hardly point out, means finding out how much you have learned this year."
Aeryn stared down at the pair of white rabbits she was supposed to be turning into slippers. What had she learned so far this year? Nothing that would be remotely useful for exams, unless Snape decided to have the second years prepare the antidote for the Berserker's Mead for their final exam, or Professor Flitwick tested them on turning invisible. And, of course, for the rest of what she had learned this year…she pinched her lips tightly together. As far as she was concerned, the memories of the past year could very well bury themselves deep in the recesses of her subconscious, never again to see the light of day.
Harry and Ron looked as though they'd just been told they had to go and live in the Forbidden Forest.
"Can you imagine me taking exams with this?" he asked Harry, holding up his wand, which had just started whistling loudly.
* * *
Three days before their first exam, Professor McGonagall made another announcement at breakfast.
"I have good news," she said, and the Great Hall, instead of falling silent, erupted.
"Dumbledore's coming back!" several people shouted joyfully.
"You've caught the Heir of Slytherin!" squealed a girl at the Ravenclaw table.
"Quidditch matches are back on!" roared Wood excitedly.
When the hubbub had subsided, Professor McGonagall said, "Professor Sprout has informed me that the Mandrakes are ready for cutting at last. Tonight, we will be able to revive those people who have been Petrified. I need hardly remind you all that one of them may well be able to tell us who, or what, attacked them. I am hopeful that this dreadful year will end with our catching the culprit."
There was an explosion of cheering. Aeryn smiled with relief. Ron and Harry looked happier than they had in days.
"It won't matter that we never asked Myrtle, then!" Ron said joyfully. "Hermione'll probably have all the answers when they wake her up! Mind you, she'll go crazy when she finds out we've got exams in three days' time. She hasn't studied. It might be kinder to leave her where she is till they're over."
Aeryn laughed and grabbed a roll from the basket in front of her. Yes, she could very well imagine how frantic the girl would be once she was awakened, but Aeryn could hardly wait for that whirlwind to land. She looked across the Great Hall, feeling thoroughly content as she had not felt for a very, very long time.
It hardly mattered now that she had not been able to speak with Tom Riddle since the evening in the Forbidden Forest. She had tried speaking with him several times since then, but the blank paper sucked in her words as if it were quicksand, and she received no response other than the January 1 on the top of the page. She buttered her roll contentedly and took a bite.
Everything was fine—more than fine, fantastic—Hermione would soon be revived, the culprit would soon be caught, and Headmaster Dumbledore would return within days. And with his return, she could finally end the nightmare she had been living for the past eight months. Lockhart would finally be exposed for the slimy, devious creature he was.
And Snape—
Aeryn put her roll down, suddenly not hungry anymore.
* * *
"I know the whole mystery of the Chamber of Secrets'll be solved tomorrow morning without our help," Harry said after Transfigurations, "but if we get a chance to talk to Moaning Myrtle today, I'm not about to pass up the chance."
Aeryn and Ron wholeheartedly agreed. For Aeryn, it was not only a chance to talk to the first victim of the monster, but also an opportunity to return Riddle's diary to Harry. She had been meaning to do so for days, but with the crowded atmosphere of the common room and dormitories and the inability to slip away to someplace secluded between classes, she hadn't wanted to risk the inevitable confrontation.
To her delight, the chance came, midmorning, when they were being led to History of Magic by Gilderoy Lockhart.
The Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, who had so often assured them that all danger had passed, only to be proved wrong right away, was now wholeheartedly convinced that it was hardly worth the trouble to see them safely down the corridors. His hair wasn't as sleek as usual; it seemed he had been up most of the night, patrolling the fourth floor.
"Mark my words," he said, ushering the students around a corner. Aeryn eyed the professor warily. Lockhart's normally cheerful grin seemed a bit strained, and his eyes were darting back and forth along the walls of the hallway in an oddly agitated manner. "The first words out of those poor Petrified people's mouths will be 'It was Hagrid.' Frankly, I'm astounded Professor McGonagall thinks all these security measures are necessary."
Of course, Aeryn thought sourly, slipping around Dean Thomas to place more room between her and Lockhart. Without any security measures, you'd have plenty of chances to feel me up in the hallways.
"I agree, sir," Harry exclaimed, and Aeryn nearly dropped her books in surprise.
"Thank you, Harry," said Lockhart graciously while they waited for a long line of Hufflepuffs to pass. "I mean, we teachers have quite enough to be getting on with, without walking students to classes and standing guard all night…."
And preparing beakers of the Berserker's Mead…but she instantly saw what Harry was trying to do, and she merely plastered a pleasant smile on her face.
"That's right," Ron chipped in, catching on. "Why don't you leave us here, sir, we've only got one more corridor to go—"
"You know, Weasley, I think I will," said Lockhart. "I really should go and prepare my next class." He broke away from the clump of Gryffindors, but before Ron, Harry, and Aeryn could dash away, the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor snapped his fingers and turned back to them, his handsome face slightly less strained.
"By the way," he said in a warm voice, "I'm very relieved, of course, that the Mandrakes are ready—I know you've been quite concerned about Miss Granger. Of course, words cannot express my sympathy—it must have been horrible for you, truly horrible, these past few weeks, wondering if she was ever going to get restored." He smiled benignly and spread his hands before him. "But, as words are my forte, please accept my humble, clumsy, and belated condolences in the spirit which they are given."
He gave a brief nod and hurried off down the hall.
"Prepare his class," Ron sneered after him. "Gone to curl his hair, more like."
"But that was nice of him, to say that about Hermione," Harry said as they let the rest of the Gryffindors draw ahead of them.
But Aeryn did not speak. She watched the multicolored form of the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor slip away down the turns of the corridors and was suddenly frozen with shock, for she finally realized with startling clarity why Riddle's diary had seemed so familiar when she had first seen Harry holding it—
—because she had seen it before, five months earlier, lying amidst the scattered papers and quills of Lockhart's desk, the diary she had asked about, which she had even flipped through, which he had passed off as a gift from Draco Malfoy…
He had it, she thought, too stunned to move. Lockhart had Riddle's diary.
And then, an even more serious thought:
Lockhart knew about the Chamber of Secrets.
She was only vaguely aware as the boys began to bolt down the empty hallway, then stopped and stared at her in disbelief.
"Aeryn, c'mon," Ron hissed, poking her in the shoulder. "This is our chance."
The blood began to course through her veins again, and Aeryn violently shook her head. She had to know. She had to find out. She took a step away from the boys, her hand instinctively flying to the pocket where she hid Riddle's diary. "You go," she croaked, her voice rusty with alarm. "Without me. Now."
"What?" Harry stared at her as if she had just told them to kiss Lockhart's feet. He flung a hand down the hallway. "Aeryn, what is up with you?" he cried. "Every time we've got a chance to figure this out, you—"
"Go," Aeryn yelled fiercely, backing away from them. Her breathing was coming quickly in her chest, and she had to clench her teeth together to keep herself from trembling. "I swear to you," she murmured, "what I'm doing is just as important to the mystery of the Chamber, but I can't tell you about it right now."
Confusion twisted Ron's face. "But what—" he began to protest.
Aeryn cut him off with a sharp wave of her hand. "Go, before a teacher comes!" she snarled, the viciousness in her voice matching Professor Snape's most cutting tones.
"All right, fine," Ron muttered, throwing his hands up in disgust and stalking away down the hallway. Harry hesitated only a moment, staring at Aeryn with a betrayed light in his bottle-green eyes that cut her to the quick. Then he too turned and hurried towards Myrtle's bathroom.
Aeryn wasted no time. Hampered only slightly by the guilt wracking her stomach, she dashed along the now-deserted hallway, casting her mind hurriedly before her to warn of any oncoming teachers or ghosts. Someplace where she could hide, someplace quiet and far-removed from people, where she could write in the diary—the first floor was out of the question, as was the second, so she ran further up the marble staircase, panting only slightly as she landed upon the third floor.
Here there was quiet—only the soft murmur from the few occupied chambers of the sixth and seventh years and the scritchings of mice in the corners. Aeryn flew down the twists and turns of the deserted hallways, feeling the mind-presence of the students growing dimmer and dimmer. At last, she turned a corner into a dusty hallway, where it looked as if no one had trod for years. She skidded to a halt in front of the first classroom. The door, rusty with age, had to be helped open with telekinesis, and Aeryn threw herself into the room, slamming the oaken door shut behind her.
Aeryn tossed her bag onto the thick dust lining the teacher's desk, her eyes skidding wonderingly about her surroundings. The walls were curtained with cobwebs, eerily reminding Aeryn of Miss Havisham's house in Great Expectations. But instead of being laced with fly carcasses and desiccated arachnids, the pale-white silk gleamed with vibrant colors: scarlet, gold, sapphire, emerald, clinging to the webs like jewels in a setting. Aeryn brushed a hand before her to clear a path, and the webstuff did not tear, but stretched like elastic bands.
She would have gladly tarried in the room, had not she felt the urgent pressing of time. Giving one last swipe at the curtaining cobwebs, she brushed the thick dust from the teacher's chair and sat down at the desk. She pulled the diary from her pocket and grabbed a quill from her bag.
January 1 stared bleakly up at her as she flipped open the front of the little black book. Aeryn squared her shoulders and closed her eyes momentarily, drawing a deep breath to steel her nerves. Then she opened her eyes, and quickly wrote in a flowing, clear hand across the page:
Tom, talk to me.
Her words gleamed brightly, and then absorbed into the white page. She waited, but no response came oozing from the diary. Her lips pinched together in anger. Damnit, Tom, talk to me, I need to speak with you! she wrote, the nib of her pen digging deeply into the page.
Ink rose from the page, zipping across the pale surface like a tongue of flame. "What if I don't feel like talking?" His words dripped with bruised pride. "Unlike you, I can't very well slam my diary shut and run away when I don't wish to answer."
Don't be petty, Tom, she wrote sharply.
"Me, Tom, petty?" There was amusement now, cold and hard like tempered steel. "Would that or would that not make me a heartbreaker, my American girl?"
Ha ha, Tom, Aeryn wrote bitterly. Very funny.
Something akin to a sigh colored Tom's words as they spilled across the page. "Oh, Aeryn, your problem is you need to get more fun out of life."
I know about Gilderoy Lockhart, Tom. She scratched the words sharply, as if she was carving them into stone rather than merely writing them. I know that he had your diary, before the Chamber of Secrets was reopened, before this whole mess started.
A faint wave of shock rippled through the diary. "Did he, now? How intriguing," Tom said slyly, a sinuous thread of laughter lacing his words. "Gilroy Lothert, you say? The name sounds familiar…"
Anger caught the breath in her throat. Don't play games with me, Tom! she snapped.
"Don't push me, Aeryn," Tom snapped back, and his anger surged through her fingertips. "You're in no position to be making demands."
His words were sucked back into the diary, leaving nothing but a blank whiteness.
Tom?
He did not reply.
Aeryn gritted her teeth. If only time was not so pressing…but it was, and so she dipped her pen in the ink and wrote, trying to ease the tension from her hand so her words would not be quite so strained.
All right, yes, I'm sorry. Now please, tell me about Lockhart. Please.
"No." His reply was instantaneous.
PLEASE, she begged, desperation making her handwriting huge and sloppy.
Through her hand resting on the diary's blank pages, Aeryn felt a stirring of emotion. "All right, Aeryn," Tom wrote back finally, but his words were suddenly clinical, businesslike. "I will, on the condition that you finish telling me the story about the night your parents were killed."
Her hand faltered over the page. Why? she asked, her heart beginning to thump loudly.
"Why not, my dear? Who knows, I might be pacified and tell you what you need to know." A toying edge crept into his words. "You'll catch more flies with honey than you would with vinegar."
I don't have time for this, Aeryn wrote frantically, choking back the hysteria rising in her throat. I'm supposed to be in class right now, if I don't show up they'll come looking for me—
Ink flowed from the diary beneath her fingers and across the page, cutting off her words. "But we don't measure time the same way, do we, Aeryn? This is all the time you'll ever have."
Aeryn slumped back against the chair. Her eyes glazed to the jeweled cobwebs floating before her eyes. So lovely and fragile, yet with their own resilient strength…she couldn't tell him, she would not put herself through that agony again, to see…but then into her mind's eye floated the Petrified images of Nearly Headless Nick, and Colin, and Justin, and Hermione….
She drew a deep breath and bent her head over the diary.
"Consider this the last dance, Mary Jane," Riddle wrote, his words gleaming wetly on the page. "You were fifteen years old, and two very powerful mutants killed your mother before your eyes. Your father, a wizard, was able to get your hands free. And?"
—The woman, the illusionist, buried her hands in Aeryn's hair and yanked her head backwards, exposing her throat, and rage began to boil inside of Aeryn, burying her fear—
One mutant…tried to slit my throat. Her handwriting was spindly and awkward, her fingers suddenly clumsy. I pulled my hand from the ropes…and grabbed hold of her arm…
"And what did you do?"
I…
—she clenched her teeth and pulled as hard as she could, with her mind, and the woman shrieked and her knees buckled beneath her as her powers suddenly flowed into Aeryn—
…my touch…I was able to absorb her powers, even her life force…
"But that wasn't all, was it, Aeryn? There was still the other mutant."
—The man turned and saw them. His eyes widened, and, with a curse, he rushed over and pressed his hand to Aeryn's face. But she was ready for him as well—
The telepath. He came over, tried to…scramble my brains…but once he touched me, I…Her breath was ragged in her throat, and she had to swallow several times before she could shakily write the words…absorbed his powers, too.
"Did it kill them?"
Yes. She could see the two mutants, drained of their life, lying at her feet. My mother was dead, no saving her…but my father was still alive…Aeryn could feel the tears welling up behind her eyes, and she bit her lip, trying to hold them back. He was dying, even I could see that, but he said…he told me…
—He coughed, and blood stained his lips—
"If you couldn't be a wizard, I'm glad that you're a mutant." One lone tear trickled from the corner of her eye. And then…
Her pen faltered, and she put a hand to her mouth.
"Yes?" Riddle said. "And then what, Aeryn?"
She had to finish. Gathering her strength about her, she continued to write, the scratching of her pen almost deafening in the still room. He wanted me to…to take his power…so I could use it, so I could come to England, where he was born and…find others like him.
"And did you do as he asked?"
Yes.
—Aeryn's lips quivered, ready to refuse him, but she couldn't. "I love you, Daddy," she said softly, and bowed her head—
I started to…absorb his magic…but as I did, he…
—He groaned, and his eyes rolled back in his head, and she screamed his name but it was no use—
"He died," Riddle finished for her gently.
Yes.
For an instant, her knees were wet with her mother's blood as she knelt beside the body of her father…Aeryn brought a hand to her face and quickly wiped away the tears staining her cheeks. But she was not quick enough. One lone tear dripped from her cheek and splattered against the white page of the diary, where it was sucked up just as the ink had been.
There was a long pause.
Finally, words came rising up from the depths of the page. "Thank you for sharing that with me, Aeryn." Tom's voice was soothing, like gentle waves against the shore. "You don't know how much I appreciate it."
Please, Tom. Aeryn forced herself to pull her mind away from the past, to think instead about the task at hand. She sniffed and dipped her pen again in the ink, not caring at the pleading, desperate tone of her words. Tell me about Lockhart. What does he have to do with the Chamber of Secrets?
A flow of raw emotion swelled from the diary, and Aeryn jerked her hand away with a cry. "Lockhart?" Tom wrote, and she could almost taste his sneer. "That bumbling, pretentious, egotistical excuse for a wizard?" A laugh, or what would have been a laugh, tinged his next words. "The only chamber he's interested in is one with you lying atop a vibrating bed."
Aeryn stared down at the pages in disbelief.
"On the other hand," he wrote slyly, "Severus Snape would be a completely believable candidate for the Heir of Slytherin. I am aware that you and he have an…understanding."
Horror lanced through Aeryn's body. How do you—
"Honestly, Aeryn, do you think a wizard as pathetically inept as Lockhart capable of formulating the delicate subtleties required for the use of the Berserker's Mead?" There was triumph in his words now, a condescending triumph that froze her to her seat. "Did you never wonder where he might have received the information to make such a poison?"
I—
"Of course, our relationship was strictly quid pro quo—I never would have put up with that loathsome bore otherwise. Vain, although exceedingly intelligent in some respects, and always, always talking about himself! Me this, me that…it was extremely tiresome."
Aeryn sank back against her chair. This couldn't be happening, it couldn't—
"Unless, of course, he was writing about you," Riddle said. "He certainly has a flair for the artistic—the Marquis de Sade himself would have blushed at some of the things our Gilderoy described—"
With trembling fingers, Aeryn slammed the cover of the diary shut, blocking out his awful words. The chair clattered back as she leapt to her feet, blood thundering in her ears as she leapt towards the door—she had to get out of here, find McGonagall, find someone, let them know about—
Her movements halted as if she had suddenly become tangled in a huge, invisible net. Without warning, a crushing presence flooded her mind, and Aeryn was abruptly unable to move. Her eyes widened and she struggled to move, to free herself—but her muscles had turned to stone and no matter how hard she pushed, they wouldn't give—
*However, although he was accommodating, Lockhart was never what I would call essential. Which is where you come in, my dear.*
If Aeryn could have screamed, she would have. A high-pitched voice boomed sonorously inside her head, smothering her ability to think, to struggle, to—
*What a veritable Gryffindor you make, sweet Aeryn,* the voice whispered, and in its clear tones Aeryn could feel joy, an evil, victorious joy. *So unwilling to disclose your past, but yet so desirous to aid your friends….*
Terror brought her strength. With a tremendous effort, Aeryn wrenched her head around and looked towards the desk. What she saw made the breath stop in her throat. The little black diary was glowing, and as she watched, the cover slowly flipped open to the first page.
*It would have been in your best interest not to pour so much of yourself into me,* the voice said in a chiding manner, and a chilling laugh echoed inside Aeryn's head. *But then again, I have always found Gryffindors to be the easiest of the four Houses to manipulate—especially when presented with the correct incentives.*
The glow brightened to an almost unbearable intensity, but Aeryn was unable to tear her eyes away. Just when she thought she might go blind, the light coalesced into a tall column, shooting out from the heart of the diary. The column began to darken, to mold into a semblance of a shape, and Aeryn could see a mop of jet-black hair, a thin, smiling face, and the cold, piercing eyes of a serpent….
"And mutants, of course, even more so," whispered Tom Riddle.
He stretched out a hand towards her face. Aeryn writhed against her invisible bonds, trying to free herself, trying to free her mind to strike back at the glowing shape, but his hand fell against her skin, and suddenly all went black.
~*~*~*~*~*~
A/N: This time, the Riddle/Aeryn exchange was directly ripped from the movie 'The Silence of the Lambs.' I did a semester paper on the interpersonal communication in SOTL and the dynamics of the relationship between Clarice and Lecter. This scene is heavily based off my transcription of the third meeting between the two, 2/3 of the way through the film.