Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Chapter 9

"We need to get out of here," Ron said. "We don't want to be caught here."

Harry, Ron, Hermione, and I started to walk away from the message on the wall and Mrs. Norris's body, but then the corridor suddenly became blocked with a large crowd of people. Everyone was going back to their dormitories after the Halloween feast and we were standing there in the middle of the whole scene. That isn't suspicious at all…

Everyone had been talking before they had seen us, but when they did, everyone went silent.

"Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next Mudbloods!" Draco Malfoy said in the front of the crowd.

Draco smiled when he saw the scene behind us, knowing that we were going to be blamed for the entire situation, which we probably would be.

"What's going on?" Filch's voice came through the crowd. "Move out of the way!"

Filch made his way to the front of the crowd, probably trying to see what was stopping everyone. When he saw his cat hanging from the wall, his face went pale.

"MY CAT!" he yelled. "You killed her! I'm going to-"

"Argus!" Dumbledore said as he walked forward.

Behind our headmaster came several other teachers, all of them looking horrified at what they saw in front of them.

"Come with me," Dumbledore said to Harry, Hermione, Ron, and me.

The entire staff, along with us, went into Lockhart's office. Along the way my greatest fear was that no one would believe us. I couldn't really blame them either. After all, we were the only ones in the corridor during the time and we were directly in front of it.

When everyone had gotten into the now crowded office, there was complete silence. I saw McGonagall looking at all four of us, trying to reason out what had happened. Snape was in a back corner, expressionless as he usually was. Lockhart started pacing the room, trying to figure out what had happened to Mrs. Norris despite the continuous sobs coming from Filch.

"It was definitely a curse that killed her - that's obvious!" he said. "I've seen this type of things many times, it's a sad thing really. Not even I can reverse the effects! If you want to know more about it all, you could read my autobiography, it's all there!"

I noticed that in the corner of the room that Snape was rolling his eyes, not even trying to hide his hatred for the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. Not that he usually tries to hide his hatred of anyone.

"She's not dead," Dumbledore said. "She's just been petrified."

"Of course she is!" Lockhart said. "It's very obvious."

"I'm not sure how this could happen though, second years are not capable of this magic," Dumbledore said.

We stood around for a few minutes, Dumbledore, along with the rest of the staff, was in deep thought.

"I know it was them!" Filch said. "The boy knows I'm a…SQUIB! He saw my letter! He told his sister and they decided that it would be funny to-"

"WE NEVER TOUCHED HER!" Harry and I shouted together.

"Yeah, right!" Filch spat. "You expect me to believe that rubbish!"

Then, from out of the shadow, Snape stepped forward. I noticed Harry's eyes narrow towards him as he started to speak.

"If I may suggest something, headmaster," Snape said.

Dumbledore nodded and Snape continued.

"Maybe they were all just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But, it is rather odd that the four of them were roaming the corridors during the Halloween feast."

"We were at Sir Nicolas's death day party," I explained.

Everyone looked at us, probably thinking that we were insane. It doesn't really make any sense for a person to join in on a celebration with the dead.

"And you didn't return to the Great Hall afterwards because…?"

"We were tired," Harry said. "So we were going back to the tower."

"That and we thought that it might have already ended," I added. "We weren't really sure..."

"I see," Snape said, his eyes narrowing in Harry's direction. "And we should believe you all because...?"

"You could ask Sir Nicholas," I told him.

Snape nodded in my direction and I noticed him do that familiar eye twitch that he did whenever our eyes met - something that I still wonder about...

"Well, there isn't any evidence suggesting that any them did this so-" Dumbledore said.

"What about my cat?" Filch said.

"Professor Sprout has some Mandrakes that we could use once they have fully grown, I will have a potion made to bring her back."

Then Lockhart, in his usual manner, stepped forward with his head held high.

"I'll make it!" he announced.

Snape glared in his direction and started walking slowly towards him.

"I do believe that I am the Potions Master at this school," he said evilly. "Not you."

Mrs. Norris being petrified was the talk of the school for a while after the incident. Some people were disturbed by it, but others were happy. I can't say that I really cared for Mrs. Norris, but I thought that whoever did this was a sick individual. What was with the message on the wall, what did it mean and what was the Chamber of Secrets?

"So you don't know what happened at all?" Dean asked me in the common room the day after.

"No, how would I know?" I asked him.

"Well, you were one of the people standing near the message and everything," Seamus said.

"Yeah, but I was just trying to see what it was."

The Gryffindors were all disgruntled, they wanted to know all about the Chamber of Secrets. In fact, that's what the whole school wanted to know. A lot of people came up to me asking what I knew about it, but I was just as clueless as them.

We were in History of Magic when we learned about it. I was sleeping in class, as I usually did, when I was woken up by Neville.

"Huh-what?" I said sitting up quickly.

Neville looked back at Hermione behind us who had her hand raised in the air.

"Sir, do you know what the Chamber of Secrets is?"

Then, for the first time ever, everyone was awake and paying strict attention to what the teacher was going to say.

Professor Binns let our a large sigh, but decided that it was best if he just told us.

"You all know, of course, that Hogwarts was founded over a thousand years ago - the precise date is uncertain - by the four greatest witches and wizards of the age. The four school Houses are named after them: Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin. They built this castle together, far from prying Muggle eyes, for it was an age when magic was feared by common people, and witches and wizards suffered much persecution.

"But these honest facts have been obscured by the fanciful legend of the Chamber of Secrets. The story goes that Slytherin had built a hidden chamber in the castle, of which the other founders knew nothing. Slytherin, according to the legend, sealed the Chamber of Secrets so that none would be able to open it until his own true heir arrived at the school. The heir alone would be able to unseal the Chamber of Secrets, unleash the horror within, and use it to purge the school of all who were unworthy to study magic."

This time, my hand went up.

"What do you mean by the horror within?" I asked. "What is that?"

"It's supposed to be some kind of monster that only the Heir of Slytherin can control," he answered me. "Not that any of this is actually real. It's complete nonsense."

Then the teacher went back to his usual class and everyone else lost interest, including myself. It took me a few minutes, but I managed to fall back to sleep.

I dreamed about the monster of Slytherin, but I couldn't tell what it was. Every time I got near it, the thing managed to escape my sight.

My dream went on and on until I was woken up once again. Class had ended and everyone was walking out of the class.

"Do you think that it's real?" Harry asked us when we left the class.

"I think that it is," I said.

We walked through the corridors, talking about the possible existence of the chamber when we ended up facing the writing on the wall again. We looked all around the corridor in search of some kind of clue, but all we managed to find were some spiders that were all crawling out of a crack in the wall.

"I hate spiders…" Ron said cowering away from them.

We all laughed at him and looked at the spiders some more.

"It's kind of weird that they are all trying to get out at once," Hermione said. "It's like they're running away from something."

"So, who do you think is the heir of Slytherin?" Hermione asked us when we were in the common room.

I shrugged, honestly not knowing. There isn't anyone in the school that I could think of.

"Hmmm," Ron said. "Let's think, who is the one person in the school that seriously hates Muggle-borns? The one person that is constantly going on about how he is a pure-blood?"

"Malfoy?" Harry asked.

"Isn't it obvious?" Ron said.

"I don't think it's him…" I said.

Ron rolled his eyes and sat back in his chair dramatically.

"What?" I said.

"You always defend the people that are obviously against us! Can't you just be on our side for once?"

"Who have I defended that is against us?" I said.

"Let's see," Ron said. "Last year you defended Snape when we-"

"He was innocent!" I said. "I was right!"

Ron looked in the other direction, knowing that he didn't really have much of a fight to put up.

"I know that Draco is a prick, but I really don't think that it's him. He just seems like a bunch of talk."

"I think you're right," Hermione said. "But there is a way that we could get Malfoy to tell us…"

Harry raised an eyebrow and Ron looked at her like she was crazy.

"Yeah, that'll be pleasant!" Ron said. "Let's just stroll over to Malfoy and ask him if he's the heir of Slytherin!"

"That's not what I meant," Hermione said irritably. "We could use Polyjuice Potion to get into the common room. We could make ourselves into Slytherins and he would never know the difference."

"What's that?" Harry and Ron asked.

"That's going to take a while to make…" I said. "Snape was talking about it class the other day and he said that it takes about a month to complete it."

"Not to mention it is very difficult to make…" Hermione said. "Do you think that you could make it?"

I looked around, trying to see if she was talking to someone else.

"Why me?" I asked.

"Because you are the best potions maker in this group!" Hermione said.

"What about you?"

"I wish that I could be as good as you were! You've made every potion in class so far without a single flaw!"

"Well…I don't know…"

"Please!" Hermione begged me.

"Fine, but I don't know how to make it."

"What is Polyjuice Potion?" Harry and Ron asked again.

"It transforms a person into someone else," Hermione said then looked back at me. "I know where the book is in the library that has the instructions. Only problem is that it's in the restricted section…"

"We could get a pass, say that we are interested in the theory or something like that…" I suggested half-heartedly.

Ron scoffed loudly at me.

"Yeah, like any teacher would believe that!" he said. "They'd have to be a complete moron!"

"I think I know exactly the person…" I smiled.

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