- CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE -
The Words of Slytherin

Hermione efficiently collected the rhyming clues given by each statue and wrote them all down, and drew herself a little diagram that said:

F / M / F / M
M / F / M / F
---door---

"You might be a genius, but you'll never make an artist, Hermione," said Ron.

"Ssh. I need to start assembling these clues..."

She would have sat on the floor and started trying to solve the whole thing then and there if they'd let her. Ron and Harry bodily picked her up and dragged her off to dinner, protesting all the way.

After eating they went down to the Room of Requirement, which helpfully provided eight pink and blue squares on the floor, and a number of brightly coloured cushions. "What are these for, Hermione?" Ron asked, sinking into a pile of red and yellow ones.

"Not to sit on. Accio yellow cushion!" One of them went flying into her hands. "I think we need to figure out everyone's houses first. I grouped the clues that way... Harry, read me the first four."

Harry unfolded Hermione's page of written clues, the handwriting exemplary despite the fact she'd been scribbling them down at speed while the statues sang them. He cleared his throat. "Er... Each house presents two members, their colours not on show, with no two in a column, or in the self-same row. The Hufflepuffs are women and the Gryffindors are men; in Slytherin, both genders, and in Ravenclaw again." Despite his best efforts not to, the rhythm of the verses had him delivering them in a sing-song voice. "A member of house Hufflepuff is leftmost of a four; you will not find a Ravenclaw adjacent to the door. One Slytherin is at the back, as she prefers to hide; a Gryffindor stands next to her, upon the right-hand side."

Ron gave him a round of sarcastic applause. Harry threw a cushion at him.

They both watched in rather awed fascination as Hermione wandered up and down the rows, muttering to herself and piling up coloured cushions by some kind of logic that Harry couldn't fathom. Occasionally she would have him repeat a line, mumble some more, and go on a quick colour re-arranging rampage. "Is she solving this or decorating?" Ron wondered, leaning over.

Eventually, she seemed to get the cushions into an order she approved of, with only one colour left in each box. She turned to look at them. "Does that seem right?"

They exchanged helpless glances. "Erm..."

"Yeah, that looks about right, Hermione," Harry lied shamelessly.

"All right. Now we need to figure out who's who, so we can find the statue of the writer that we need to get the item from. Harry?"

Harry pushed the list into Ron's hands. "You can read it this time."

He rolled his eyes. "The brewer is a Slytherin, the baker is his wife," he read. "The Quidditch player wore the robes of Hufflepuff in life. Okay, Hermione?"

"Hold on, Ron," she requested, running about with a piece of chalk and scribbling letters in various boxes. "Okay."

"The singer is a Gryffindor, and stands in the front row. The one behind the singer was a healer, long ago."

Hermione appeared to get those two straight away, and smiled smugly to herself. "All right, carry on."

"The Minister of Magic was a Ravenclaw of note, and stands behind a sporting type who never cast a vote."

More scribbling, and some erasing. "Yes."

"The artist was a gentleman enamoured of his looks. The eighth and last one left here was a writer of great books." Ron folded the note and sat back.

"Thanks, Ron." Hermione ran about erasing and rewriting for a little while, then stood still and frowned, apparently indecisive about the last two occupations. Then, inexplicably, she put her hand over her mouth and started to giggle.

"She's cracked," said Ron authoritatively.

She turned towards them, beaming. "No, it's just- Oh, it's so clever! 'Last one left here'- and it actually ends up being the statue in the back row, on the left. The whole riddle is almost a trick, you don't even really need to solve it because it tells you the answer in the poem itself. It's just so... Slytherin!"

"You say that like it's a good thing!" said Ron indignantly.

Hermione just grinned, and hugged them both. Harry checked the time, and was shocked at how late it was. "I think we need to get you into bed," he said. She giggled even more, and after a moment it occurred to him to blush crimson.

They dragged their triumphant friend back to Gryffindor Tower, and despatched her in the direction of the girl's dorms. Ron smiled slightly after her, and Harry gave him an enquiring look.

"What?" he said defensively, and folded his arms. Harry remembered everything that had happened, and decided not to push him.

"You okay, Ron?" he asked softly instead.

Ron looked like he was about to brush away the question, then sighed slightly, and let the forced cheer slide away. "Yeah, I'm..." He shook his head. "Sometimes I'm only pretending to be okay, and... sometimes I really am okay. And that's almost worse, you know?"

"I know." Harry touched his arm lightly in commiseration. Sometimes, no matter how busy life was, he missed Sirius constantly, an undeniable ache like a missing limb. And other times... well, life went on, and there were things to do and moments of happiness and reasons to laugh, and it wasn't until some random memory jolted him into guilt that he realised he'd been going on without thinking of his godfather at all.

"I don't know what I'm going to do when we can finally go home," Ron admitted. "I mean, everybody's written to me, and I've written back, but it's just- it won't be real until I get home, and he's not there. It's too easy just to think that it's all a big mistake, and I'll just get home and everyone'll laugh at me for thinking something happened to Percy." He sighed. "If we ever get out of here at all."

"Oh, we will," said Harry. "With Hermione in mad clue-solving mode? She'll get us out of here whether we want to go or not."

They exchanged tired smiles, and stumbled up to bed.

The next day's lessons interfered with getting back to the hall of statues with Hermione's solution. She and Harry had the morning free, but Ron was in Herbology, and it seemed wrong to go without him. Then they all had Defence Against the Dark Arts, and Ron had the afternoon free but the two of them had double Transfiguration...

Hermione was unusually agitated as the day progressed, briefly creating a pair of bunny slippers instead of the desired rabbits in Transfiguration. Fortunately, with the erratic performance almost everyone's wand was giving these days, Professor McGonagall didn't pass comment on it.

As soon as the school day was over, Hermione practically charged back to the statue of the horse, forcing the two boys to chase her despite their longer legs. "Wait up, Hermione," Harry pleaded, as she ran on ahead to the alcove with five doors.

"Sorry, Harry." She waited for him to catch up, but almost bounced on the spot, unable to keep still. "I just want to see if I've got the answer right."

"Yeah, well, calm down a little, okay?" he suggested. "You don't want to trip and fall flat on y- yeargh!" He stepped through the rightmost door as they had the day before... and the floor fell away from underneath him.

"Harry!" Ron and Hermione rushed to peer down at him from the doorway. He rubbed the back of his head.

"I'm all right!" he called up. "I just fell into this..." He looked around. "Er... snake pit..." A writhing mass of serpents squirmed around and underneath him. He hastily jumped to his feet, trying not to tread on any of them. "Sorry, sorry, sorry..."

A blunt reptilian head the size of his torso appeared in front of him, swaying slightly. "You ssspeak our tongue, wizard?" it asked, intrigued.

He hadn't realised he'd slipped into Parseltongue. "Er, yes."

"No one has ssspoken to us since the Basilisk-friend came visssiting," remarked a small snake with a red and black pattern, which coiled lazily around his ankle.

Tom Riddle, Harry supposed - unless it was Salazar Slytherin himself. Exactly how rare were Parselmouths, anyway? "Um, I don't suppose you can help me out, can you?" He could see Ron's pale, freckled face looking down from above with an expression of great alarm.

"We are supposssed to crush any visssitors that fall into our pit," said the red and black snake crossly.

"Sssqueeze them, sssquash them," came a general murmuring from the serpent horde. Harry blanched.

"Er-"

"Idiotsss!" said the giant green snake that had spoken to him first. "If he ssspeaks to us, then he is surely sssupposed to be here. We must help him essscape."

"Yes!" he said fervently. "Please!"

The big green snake dipped its head towards him. "Climb upon my back, little wizard. I will lift you up to the sssurface."

Harry was not exactly thrilled at that prospect, but the idea of remaining down here in a pit full of argumentative snakes definitely didn't make for a better choice. He clung on to the snake as best he could, and closed his eyes briefly as it lifted him up to the doorway.

Ron and Hermione made a hasty retreat.

"Er, Harry-"

"It's all right," he said, hoping it was true. He scrambled down from the giant snake, and rubbed its scales in thanks. "Thank you for helping me."

The oversized head swayed slightly. "Of courssse. Drop in on us again sssometime."

"Maybe," he hedged, reluctant to actually commit to any such thing. He wasn't at all sure the rest of the snakes down below would be willing to refrain from crushing him a second time.

Harry gratefully stepped back from the edge, and shut the door. Ron continued to stare at it warily. "You know, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm the only one around here who thinks it's strange to keep giant killer monsters in a school," he mused.

Hermione looked horrified. "Oh, I'm sorry, Harry! This is all my fault."

He rubbed at his slightly sore elbow, and resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "How d'you figure that out, Hermione?"

"I was so impatient to get back and finish solving the puzzle... I should have realised the snakes on the ceiling would move around!"

Ron groaned. "You mean we're going to have to go through that whole tracing paths thing again?"

They did, and found that the correct door had now moved to the position of second from the left. Nonetheless, Harry opened it very cautiously, and didn't relax until he saw the rows of statues standing there.

"All right. We're here now, so no harm done," he said. "Which one did you say was the right statue, Hermione?"

"The one at the back there on the left," she said, still sounding rather wobbly and less confident. Nothing upset Hermione quite so much as having overlooked something in her planning.

Harry found himself faced with a statue of a tall, thin woman with a slightly disturbing smile. She didn't look like somebody who'd written great books, unless they were the kind that contained gruesome descriptions of how to poison people. Still, Hermione had solved the puzzle, and she was certainly more likely to have got it right than he could possibly hope to... He took a deep breath, and gripped the statue by its stony wrists.

A book appeared out of nowhere, balanced on the upraised palms. Harry yelled in triumph, and snatched it away from its silent guardian.

The feeling of achievement was short-lived. The pages of the book turned out to be completely blank, and no amount of spell-casting or other means of persuasion could make them any other way. "This is Riddle's diary all over again," he grumbled.

"Try writing in it," Hermione suggested.

Harry found his quill and ink, and quickly scribbled the word 'hello'. The ink bled away into the page and vanished, but no other words appeared to replace it.

"It must be password-protected," she said.

Harry groaned in disbelief. "Well, how are we supposed to read it, then?"

"It must be the final part of the clue - the words that Salazar held dear."

"Fine." Ron spoke directly to the pages. "Pure-blood! Cunning. Ambitious. Er, snakes." Nothing happened.

"Maybe it's a different kind of words... Say something in Parseltongue, Harry," Hermione suggested.

"Hello?" he tried cautiously.

"That was English," Ron told him. Harry concentrated hard.

"Hello?" he said more gruffly.

Hermione giggled at his tone of voice, then held up a hand in apology. "Still English," she sighed. Harry shook his head.

"I can't do it," he said. "I can't speak Parseltongue to it unless I can see a snake."

She frowned. "Well, that can't be the solution then. It must be some kind of saying that Salazar Slytherin was famous for."

"Well, wouldn't something like that be in Hogwarts: A History?" Ron asked. Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Honestly, it would help if you would only sit down and read it for yourself," she said. Probably all but automatically by now. "There's actually very little about Slytherin written down anywhere. He was very private and rather secretive - most of what we know about him comes from the other Founders, not directly from the source."

Harry sat down and sighed. "So how can we possibly solve the clue?"

Hermione wore a slightly hesitant expression. "Well, there is one way..."

"What?" Ron demanded.

"You're not going to like it," she said.

"What?"

She pulled a face. "Well, we could always try... asking the Slytherins..."

She was right. They didn't like it.

Harry was convinced that the only way a Slytherin was going to tell them anything was if they used the Polyjuice Potion again, but as Hermione pointed out, if it was really something every true Slytherin should know, asking about it would be deeply suspicious.

"What if we sent them a note pretending to be somebody else?" Ron suggested desperately.

Harry rolled his eyes. "Ron, they're Slytherins. They're naturally suspicious, and I think even Crabbe and Goyle might find mysterious letters a bit weird."

"I'm not too sure they can actually read, anyway. What about if we ask Luna to get her dad to make it a question on the puzzle page in The Quibbler, and then intercept all the replies...?"

"Or we could steal some of Snape's Veritaserum."

"Put on your Invisibility Cloak and pretend to be the Bloody Baron quizzing members of house Slytherin to make sure they know their stuff."

"It's no good," Hermione told them firmly. "Whether you like it or not, you are going to have to try and talk to them."

Easier said than done. The closest thing to a non-hostile Slytherin they could get was a Slytherin that none of them had ever actually spoken to, and there was no point talking to first-years since they were least likely to know anything. Harry ended up sidling up to the smallest, least aggressive looking third-year he could find sitting alone in the library.

"Hey, excuse me. Can I speak to you?"

The boy looked more startled to be addressed than immediately confrontational, which Harry hoped counted as a good sign.

"I just wanted to ask a question," he explained quickly.

"What?" the boy said, a little warily.

Harry smiled encouragingly. "What was Salazar Slytherin's favourite saying?"

The Slytherin scowled, and abruptly pushed his chair back. "Oh, ha ha," he said sharply. "Find someone else to set up your punchline, Potter." He stormed off.

Harry blinked after him, befuddled. Ron appeared around the edge of the bookshelves. "Well?" he asked, eyebrows raised.

"He thought it was the beginning of a joke."

"It does sound like one, actually," Ron said thoughtfully. Harry sighed, and sat down at the newly vacated table.

"It's no good," he said, shaking his head. "How are we supposed to get anything out of the Slytherins? They hate us! And we hate them!"

"'To know the secrets of the school, your enemies befriend'," Ron recited quietly. Harry smiled bitterly.

"If we're supposed to be making friends with the Slytherins, I think we've left it just a little too late."

"We're in big trouble," Ron sighed, sitting down beside him.