The tunnel seemed to stretch on for miles—that, or the mounting second thoughts of the three students had stretched the walk into hours. When the three students reached the end of the tunnel and emerged into the Chamber of Secrets, they almost breathed in relief. Draco paused to take in the grotesque grandeur of the room. "Merlin," he said, his voice echoing. "It's real."

Hilda and Harry didn't pay him any mind. As soon as they laid eyes on the girl lying on her side in the center of the room, they were splashing towards her. "Frida!" Hilda dropped to her knees and shook the girl. "Wake up, we have to go!" Harry dropped down beside Hilda and studied Frida. The girl was cold to the touch, her lips blue. Her eyes stared to the ceiling unblinking. Beside her lay Tom Riddle's diary, flipped open to a blank page.

"Is she…" Hilda began. She couldn't bring herself to finish.

"She's alive." Hilda and Harry glanced up in surprise as the voice. A young man in school robes stepped out from behind a column and walked slowly towards them, his steps leaving no ripples in the water. "For now. The ritual is almost complete." Harry drew his wand. Tom Riddle rolled his eyes as the spell flew past his ear. "Gryffindors. Always acting, never thinking." A second stunning spell shot towards him. This time, Tom didn't bother to move as the spell passed harmlessly through his body. He looked past Hilda and Harry and frowned at the spell's caster. "A Slytherin? I expected better of my house. Guess there's a rotten one in every year."

"You're the rotten one," Malfoy snarled as he stopped beside Hilda.

"What have I done to deserve such a chilly reception?"

"You know exactly what you've done," Hilda growled, standing up. "It was you who opened the Chamber: both times. You possessed Ginny, and then you possessed Frida!"

"You killed Myrtle!" Harry added, his wand still trained on the Slytherin.

"Myrtle?" Tom scoffed. "Ah, yes, the poor, poor Mudblood. Hardly impressive, is it? Everyone else was so bloody lucky to only get petrified: what were the odds of that? I tried so hard," he hissed, his eyes suddenly flashing red, "and the only person I managed to kill was that sniveling girl."

"Why?" Hilda asked. "Why do this?"

Tom smirked. "Do you really expect me to confess everything?"

"You don't seem like the modest sort, Tom," Harry said.

"Ah, ten points to Gryffindor." Tom clapped his hands mockingly. "I suppose I can humor you both: last requests and whatnot. I did it because I could, Miss Dahl, and because it felt good."

Hilda shook her head. "There's more to it than that. Why come back fifty years later—as a ghost, no less—to finish what you started?"

Tom held up his hand and inspected it. "Not a ghost, Miss Dahl: a memory." Harry noticed he could faintly see the wall through Tom's body. "I was just a shade in that journal," he said. "A fragment of myself, waiting to break out. Fortunately, poor Ginny Weasley came along and made things so simple. I took control of her, and started draining her lifeforce. I'd have come back much sooner if the brat hadn't thrown me into a cauldron.

"But then Miss Aiken came and filled the void. Fortunately, she was just as insecure, just as weak as Weasley: I was able to make up for lost time with startling efficiency." Tom gazed down at the unconscious girl. "Yes, she did a good job. Smart girl, in spite of her naivety. Pity she has to die for it."

Harry dropped down beside Frida and resumed his attempts to wake her. "Really, Potter, it's no use. She's done for. In a matter of minutes, she'll be gone, and I'll be whole." Tom took a few more steps towards the students. He bent down and picked something up from the ground. "Yes, a matter of minutes," he said as he waved Frida's wand experimentally. "Not the best fit, but it will do for now."

"You won't get away with this," Harry said.

Tom gave a hard laugh that echoed throughout the chamber. "Oh, I will, Harry Potter. I'll come back to life and I'll celebrate by killing you." He leaned in towards Harry. "And this time, I'll do it right."

"This time?" Harry studied Riddle's face closely, then stepped back in horror. "That's impossible."

Tom chuckled. "Miss Aiken figured it out rather quickly: quite the clever witch."

"I don't understand," Hilda said, glancing between Harry and Tom.

"Of course you don't. I suppose I'll have to spell it out for you." Tom waved his hand in the air. Wisps of smoke flew from his fingers and arranged themselves into letters:

TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE

He waved his hand again, and the words rearranged themselves, creating an anagram that send a shiver rippling through the room.

"Lord Voldemort," Hilda breathed. Draco flinched at the name.

Tom smiled. "There we are, ten more points for Gryffindor. Slytherin's still not placed on the board. How disappointing." He stepped aside as a stunning spell flew past him, chipping the nose off of Slytherin's bust. Harry fired off another spell. This time Riddle deflected it. "Bombarda." Harry ducked, but Hilda was too slow. The spell struck her in the chest and knocked her back, sending her still form tumbling across the hall like a rag-doll. With another spell, Harry's wand was flung from his grip, landing a fifty yards off. "That should've killed you," Riddle noted. "My magical core must still be charging."

"Bastard!" Riddle hadn't expected a physical attack. Draco had charged the wraith, rugby tackling him into the shallow water. Riddle kneed him in the stomach and rolled the young Slytherin's winded form off him.

Riddle climbed to his feet, his robes soaked and his hair disheveled. "How disappointing," he snarled. He gave the boy a kick in the ribs, cracking several and further driving the air from Draco's lungs. "Miss Weasley told me about you and your father. From what she told me I had such high hopes. You're pathetic."

Riddle looked over to Harry, as though remembering he was there. "This is getting irritating," he said. "I think it's time we put an end to this, once and for all." He turned to the massive face of Slytherin. "Come to me." Harry watched as the mouth of Slytherin hinged open. From inside, the sound of something stirring reached his ears.

Something big.

"Are you hungry?" Riddle called out.

A voice replied in Parseltongue, its sibilance echoing off the walls and ceiling. "Always."

Riddle looked over at Harry, his eyes flashing red in the half-light. "Then feast."

Harry turned and ran as the basilisk emerged from its cave, taking cover behind a column. He kept his gaze to the ceiling, frightened to look down and spot the beast's reflection in the water. It was then he remembered Hilda and Draco, the further horror nearly overpowering him. "Draco!"

"Potter?" a voice called back.

"Where are you?"

"Behind a column. I can see you." Harry glanced over and breathed a sigh of relief; Draco had taken shelter in the chamber immediately opposite the chamber as him. "Where's Hilda?"

At this, Harry braved a glance to the center of the room. He gasped in surprise. "I don't know! She's gone!"

It was then he saw it. The basilisk was fifty feet long, its head the size of a small car. It opened its mouth, revealing hundreds of razor-sharp claws, facing backwards to tear and swallow its prey. Draco gave a gasp of terror and quickly shut his eyes as the giant snake turned its head and zeroed in his gaze.

Harry fired a stunning spell, which bounced off of the back of the snake's head. The creature whipped around to face him, but he was running off down one of the tunnels leading off the chamber. Disappointed, the snake turned back to Draco, but he, too was gone. With a hiss of fury, it surged off in pursuit.

Riddle watched his pet give chase and grinned. He walked over to Frida and ran a hand over her cold cheek. "Yes, soon," he whispered.

A bolt of blue light struck his side. He slid twenty feet back, clenching his jaw from the pain as he looked for the source. Hilda lowered her wand, her face set in rock-solid determination. "You're not taking anymore of my friends!" she shouted, another stunning spell flying from her wand.

Riddle cast a shield, but the force still send him reeling. "The strength of your core is impressive," he said. He whipped a cutting spell back at the girl. "I should've picked you as my conduit."

Hilda took the spell in the shoulder of her wand arm, a gash tore through the her layers of sleeves and cut skin. She cried out, gripping the wound with her other hand to staunch the fast-flowing blood that ran between her fingers and dripped down, turning the damp cobblestones a diffuse red. She shut her eyes and grimaced.

This is it, she thought.

The hell it is.

Hilda opened her eyes, a blue light zeroing in on Riddle like laser sights. Tom Riddle cocked an eyebrow and barely suppressed his surprise. "Well, that's interesting."

"We've searched half the school, ma'am," Percy said. The other prefects nodded in agreement. "There's no sign of them."

"Then check the other half!" McGonagall said, her face full of terror and rage. It was shocking to see the stoic professor on the verge of tears. "Save the whinging and moaning for the hiding you'll receive if those students are harmed."

"Professor!" McGonagall turned quick enough to cause whiplash. Ginny and Ron limped into the the headmaster's office, Filch carried on on their shoulders and followed by Twig. All save the deerfox were bloodied and caked in dust.

"Where have you been?" McGonagall shouted. "I gave express orders to stay in your dormitories, and you disobeyed me! And Argus, why haven't you tanned the lot of them?"

"We found the Chamber of Secrets!" Ron replied. "It's in Myrtle's toilet."

"Are you concussed, Weasley?"

"It's true, Minerva," Filch said, his voice hoarse from exhaustion. "Where are the aurors?"

"They're snagged in the Floo network: one of the system operators was sacked without warning. Half of the connections are down." She suddenly noticed several absences. "Argus, where is Potter, Dahl and Malfoy?"

"In the Chamber. They went after Miss Aiken. Lockhart's there, too, although I'm pretty sure he's dead." He took a deep breath. "It's Tom, Minerva. He's back."

McGonagall paled. "Riddle. How?"

"You can question me later; it's too complicated to explain."

There was another interruption as one of the devices on Dumbledore's desk began to spin furiously. Minerva glanced down at it, her rising to boiling. "Someone has penetrated the school wards!" the Ancient Runes instructor reported."

"Who on earth is it, and where are they now?" Percy asked.

The Weasley prefect's question was answered as a series of loud crashes and booms echoed through the corridors, followed swiftly by the furious blare of a car horn. "In the entry hall, by the sound of it," Filch reported.

They hurried down the grand staircase and found the front door half off its hinges and a Muggle sports car parked halfway up the first flight, its bonnet smoking and crumpled like a tin can. The driver's door was flung open, and Johanna Dahl stumbled out, half dazed, a pistol in one hand.

"Miss Dahl! What in Merlin's name—"

Johanna cut the assistant headmistress short as her gaze fell on Ron and Filch, and the elf perched on the Ron's head. "Alfur, where's my daughter?"

Alfur gave a nervous laugh. "Well, you see, about that, I can explain, please don't be mad."

"She's in the Chamber of Secrets, Johanna." Albus Dumbledore stepped through the castle threshold, his face placid. Fawkes the phoenix sat on his shoulder, the Sorting Hat clutched in his beak. "Have faith, all should be well." Dumbledore pointed past the students and up the stairs. "Fawkes, go to them." The bird sang in response and took off.

He looked back to Johanna, his eyes twinkling overtime. "Shall we wait for the aurors in my office. I think we could all use a glass of fire-whiskey to steady our nerves.

Dumbledore's back, enigmatic and infuriating as always. And it looks like there's a showdown imminent. How will them Duke boys get out of this one? Favorite, follow, and stay tuned.