Chapter 32: Petrified
When I finally got out of the hospital wing and was able to return to my own dorm, found that my welcome was less than warm.
"Oh, so you're back then?" Lavender frowned in my direction when I walked in.
"That's right," I nodded uncomfortably.
Lavender shrugged. "It was fun while it lasted," she muttered quietly, though still loud enough for me to hear.
Trying not to let her comments bother me, I headed over to my bed to get my things in order. I hadn't been back since Christmas and my Christmas presents were still scattered across my bed, though it seemed that the elves had taken care of the wrappings.
That evening, Harry revealed a diary that he'd found in Myrtle's bathroom. As it had belonged to someone who'd received an award for special services to the school fifty years ago, I immediately suspected that it could have some connection with the Chamber of Secrets. I tried a few different things to get the diary to reveal it's contents, but none of my efforts accomplished much.
As usual though, I wasn't ready to give up.
Just as promised, starting the very next day, I began my research in the library. I had a few things on my list of things to look into this time. As Ron had suggested quite wisely in the hospital wing, I wanted to look through records of past students to see if anyone who'd been at Hogwarts fifty years ago had any sort of connection to anyone who was at Hogwarts now. I also wanted to look into Tom Riddle and see if I could learn anything about why he'd received his award. And finally, I wanted to look into methods of uncovering hidden information. There was something in that diary, I was sure of it. And whatever it was, I was determined to figure out how to expose it.
It felt a lot like my research into Nicolas Flamel last year, though this year I actually had concrete things I wanted to look up, rather than just paging through any and every book that might contain something useful. But just like the year before, Harry and Ron showed no interest in helping, spending most of their time up in the common room being stupid while I slaved away in the library.
I didn't really mind. I enjoyed doing research. But time was running out. Harry and Ron, and the rest of the school, it seemed, were reassured by the fact that there hadn't been an attack yet since term had resumed. I wasn't so optimistic. Another attack was coming, I could feel it.
However, I still had other things I had to do. There was still my schoolwork. I wasn't as behind as I'd feared I might be upon returning to class, but I still wanted to put in a little extra effort to make up for my time in the hospital wing. And there were also my friends, who I knew it was important to spend time with, even with everything that was going on. I'd realized yet again during my time in the hospital how important Harry and Ron's friendship was to me, and I didn't want to take it for granted.
It also turned out that there was another person that needed my help. Ginny. I had sensed that something strange was going on with her after Colin had been attacked, but she hadn't seemed to want to talk about it, and I figured it was best left for her siblings to handle. But when Valentine's Day rolled around and Harry received a very embarrassing singing Valentine, I immediately knew she had sent it.
This time, I sought Ginny out. She was sitting in the corner of the common room looking miserable and my heart ached for her. She was clearly still dealing with some strong feelings, and I'd waved them off as a silly little crush.
"Hi Ginny," I greeted her, startling her a bit. "Can I sit with you for a moment?"
Ginny shrugged. "I guess so," she agreed, motioning to the chair across from her.
I sat and gave Ginny an earnest look. "You sent Harry the Valentine," I stated matter-of-factly. This wasn't the time for beating around the bush. This was the time for bluntness.
Ginny's face immediately turned red and she buried it in her hands.
"Was it that obvious?" she asked, seemingly mortified.
"Don't worry," I assured her. "I'm sure nobody else figured it out. I only did because you'd told me about your feelings for Harry already."
"You didn't tell him, did you?" Ginny asked, peeking through her fingers at me with a terrified look.
I shook my head vehemently. "I would never do that to you," I assured her. "But I do want to talk to you about it. Maybe you could look at me properly?"
Slowly, Ginny pulled her hands away from her face, and the redness slowly started to fade away.
"Listen Ginny, you can't be sending Harry singing Valentines," I informed her.
Ginny squirmed uncomfortably.
"I know that you like him, but what you're doing – having a dwarf sing about his eyes in the middle of the corridor isn't going to make him like you," I informed her. It may have been a little harsh, but she needed to hear the truth.
Ginny looked miserable.
"You don't have to say it Hermione, I understand," she muttered dejectedly. "He'll never like me, and I should just move on and get over myself."
I shook my head. "That's not what I'm saying," I disagreed. "I'm saying that this isn't the way to get any guy to like you. If he's ever going to be interested in you – and I'm saying if here – it's going to be because he likes who you are."
"But I don't even know who I am," Ginny moaned. "How am I supposed to show him something if I don't even know what it is?"
"Maybe it means you need to figure yourself out before you start going after him – or any guy," I said. "Do you even have any friends?"
Ginny shrugged. "Well I was talking to Colin a bit before… you know… because you told me to. But now that he's… well…" She trailed off.
"Okay," I said, taking a deep breath. Telling her to befriend Colin might not have been as solid advice as I'd meant it to be. "Well I think maybe it's time to make some friends. Some real friends. Not just befriending the people I suggest but looking for some people you can really get along with. Stop thinking about Harry, and about boys in general, and just try to live. And then, once you're just being your true and honest self, that's when boys will start noticing you."
"So, you're saying to get boys to notice me, I have to stop trying to get boys to notice me?" Ginny frowned.
I shrugged. "In a nutshell," I agreed with her summary. "And don't hold out for one guy, Harry or otherwise," I advised. I didn't want her pinning all her hopes on Harry only to be disappointed. "The right guy will notice you when the time is right. And if that turns out to be Harry, then great. If not, I'm sure there's some other guy out there even more amazing than Harry."
"Nobody's more amazing than Harry," Ginny said emphatically.
I gave her a hard look.
"But I understand," Ginny nodded. "Thanks for your advice, Hermione."
"Don't worry about it," I assured her as I stood up.
Though a lot of my motivation for talking to Ginny had been for her benefit, part of me had also done it for Harry. He didn't need someone following him around and worshipping him. He hated the attention, hated being put up on a pedestal for no reason. So, a part of me also hoped that in having this conversation with Ginny, Harry would get some relief from whatever else she'd been planning to do.
The next morning, Harry revealed to Ron and I that the diary did indeed have information to share. The way it had shown Harry what it knew was awfully strange – apart from a pensive, I didn't know of any way to view memories. And in this case, it seemed like the diary had pulled Harry into the memory rather than Harry diving in himself. It was all rather strange.
And what Harry had learned – well I just couldn't believe that Hagrid was behind the attacks now. Maybe it had been an accident the last time. He did have an unhealthy attraction to dangerous creatures. He'd probably come across the monster and let it out without realizing the damage it would do. But he'd know better now. And the threatening message on the wall? No, it definitely wasn't Hagrid this time around, regardless of what had happened fifty years ago.
Easter came around and still, there hadn't been an attack. And suddenly, there was much more to think about than the diary and the Chamber of Secrets. In third year, students were allowed to take elective courses. There were five to choose from; Divination, Muggle Studies, Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Care of Magical Creatures. We were provided with information packages to look over to help us with our decision.
I tried talking to some of my dorm mates to decide, but that wasn't very helpful. Lily Moon was Muggle-born like me and didn't know much about what the new courses offered. Parvati and Lavender thought Divination and Care of Magical Creatures were easiest, so they chose those courses. Sally-Anne decided to copy them so that she wouldn't be alone in her classes and Lily ended up taking both those two courses and Arithmancy, claiming to want to try different things.
In the end, I signed up for all five courses because I didn't want to let any opportunity slip past. I hadn't yet decided on a career. What if I decided I wanted to work in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry, but I hadn't taken Care of Magical Creatures? Or what if I decided I wanted to be a Curse Breaker, but hadn't taken Ancient Runes?
In preparation for these new courses, I started reading up on them in my spare time. My research in the library hadn't produced any suspicious connections between the students from fifty years ago and the students attending Hogwarts today, apart from the fact that I had found Hagrid in the registry of students from fifty years ago.
I was reading a book entitled Ancient Runes Made Easy when Harry came down from his dormitory with some disturbing news. Tom Riddle's diary had been stolen from his trunk.
Suddenly, my interest in the Chamber of Secrets mystery was renewed.
It was the next day, on the way to the Quidditch pitch for the Gryffindor vs. Hufflepuff match, that I had a breakthrough. Harry, Ron, and I were just stepping out of the Great Hall when I heard a very faint hissing noise. Then suddenly, Harry jumped and shouted that he'd just heard the disembodied voice again.
Realization flooded through me. A voice that only Harry could hear; how could I have been so blind? It had been staring me right in the face the whole time and I hadn't put the pieces together. Harry could speak Parseltongue! And as far as we knew, he was the only person in the castle, besides perhaps the Heir of Slytherin, who could. The disembodied voice had to belong to a snake! Which meant…
I bolted off to the library, not worrying about Harry and Ron for the moment. I could fill them in after the match, once I had more information.
Upon arriving in the library, I ran straight up to Madam Pince and asked where I could find a book on different types of snakes. Thankfully, she wasn't busy, because most of the school was heading out to the Quidditch pitch to watch the game. She located a book for me entitled Snakes of the World: The Magical and the Non-Magical, and I skipped straight to the magical section.
It didn't take long to find what I was looking for. When I got to my third type of snake, my eyes widened as they read about the basilisk.
It was called the King of Serpents, and it immediately sounded like exactly the kind of creature Slytherin's Heir would want to control. The book also indicated that basilisks could live hundreds of years, which would account for how it was still alive all these years since the founding of Hogwarts.
I skipped forward, looking for something about petrification, but found nothing. The book said that anyone that looked directly in a basilisk's eye would die immediately, but so far none of the victims had died. I frowned, but then something else clicked.
The water on the floor the night Mrs. Norris had been petrified. What if Mrs. Norris only saw the reflection of the basilisk's eye? And Colin had been holding his camera to his eye when he'd been petrified. He'd have seen the basilisk though a lens. And as for Justin, what if he'd been looking at the basilisk through Nearly Headless Nick? Whatever kind of death beam the basilisk was sending out from its eyes was being affected by the various mediums its victims had been viewing it through. What if the result of that was that people were being petrified instead of killed?
I was suddenly unable to breathe. If that was the case… then all the attacks so far had only survived by chance, by accident. The basilisk was looking to kill, not to petrify. And it was on the loose right now. Harry had heard its voice. It was already looking for its next victim. And without a convenient flood, or a camera or a ghost to look through, the next victim would soon be dead.
I had to tell someone. I had to tell Professor McGonagall what I'd learned. There wasn't much time. But already I could hear Professor McGonagall in my head challenging my claims.
According to the book, basilisks were huge, and got bigger the longer they lived. This basilisk had been living in the bowels of the castle for centuries. How was it travelling around the castle undetected?
Harry kept hearing it in the walls. However it was travelling, it definitely wasn't moving around out in the open. And then it came to me. There were pipes in the walls.
Quickly, I scribbled this down on the page of the library book and ripped it out, crumpling it up and grasping it firmly in my fist. I knew Madam Pince would be livid when she found out what I'd done, but this was an emergency and I didn't have time to wait for her to check the book out the proper way.
As I moved towards the entrance of the library, I became very aware of the fact that the basilisk was out there, and I was completely unprotected. Rummaging around furiously in my bag, I searched for something that could help me. A blindfold of sorts would be ideal for avoiding the basilisk, but it wouldn't be practical. I needed to get to Professor McGonagall's office quickly and didn't have time to be bumping into walls and falling down the stairs.
Instead, I grabbed a small pocket mirror that I regularly carried with me. It wasn't perfect. If the basilisk found me, I would surely be petrified. But that was better than death.
I held the mirror in front of me, making sure that it was the only thing I was looking at, and began walking backwards, using it to see where I was going. It was slow going, but I couldn't risk a mad dash to the transfiguration wing. I was a muggle-born, a prime target for the heir of Slytherin.
I rounded a corner and bumped into an older student, a Ravenclaw.
"What are you doing?" the girl demanded, apparently upset at almost being knocked over.
"The monster in the Chamber of Secrets," I said quickly, "it's a basilisk, and it kills you when you look it in the eye. If I only see it with the mirror, I won't die, just end up petrified."
The girl looked at me skeptically. "What are you talking about?" she demanded. "Nobody knows what the monster is, and besides, the attacks have stopped."
"They haven't," I insisted. "It's on the loose now. I have to tell Professor McGonagall."
There was a noise behind us. I felt my blood run cold with fear. The Ravenclaw girl started to turn to see what it was, but I had a really bad feeling.
"No!" I cried, grabbing her by the arm. "Use the mirror!"
I could tell she was rolling her eyes at me, but I didn't care. If this saved her life, it wouldn't matter.
I raised the mirror just a bit to get a better visual on the hallway behind us. I'd had it pointed at my shoulder and regardless of the situation, I needed to know what was going on behind us.
It happened in a nanosecond. One moment I was looking at my shoulder through the mirror and the next, my eyes had locked onto another pair of eyes. They were bright yellow, and they pierced me all the way down to my soul.