Harry lay awake for hours thinking on that fateful moment. Through a gap in the curtains around his four-poster he watched snow starting to drift past the tower window and wondered...
Could he be a descendant of Salazar Slytherin? From what Mrs Weasley had told him of the Potter line, his ancestor had duelled Gryffindor and received his nickname of Scarface from the injuries he suffered at the Founder's sword. It wasn't a reassuring thought.
Quietly, Harry tried to say something in Parseltongue. The words wouldn't come. It seemed he had to be face-to-face with a snake to do it.
'But I'm in Gryffindor,' Harry thought. 'The Sorting Hat wouldn't have put me in here if I had Slytherin blood...'
'Ah,' said a nasty little voice in his brain, 'but the Sorting Hat wanted to put you in Slytherin, don't you remember?'
Harry turned over. He'd see Justin the next day in Herbology and he'd explain that he'd been calling the snake off, not egging it on, which (he thought angrily, pummelling his pillow) any fool should have realised.
By next morning, however, the snow that had begun in the night had turned into a blizzard so thick that the last Herbology lesson of the term was cancelled: Professor Sprout wanted to fit socks and scarves on the Mandrakes, a tricky operation she would entrust to no one else, now that it was so important for the Mandrakes to grow quickly and revive Mrs. Norris and Colin Creevey.
Harry fretted about this next to the fire in the Gryffindor common room, while Ron and Hermione used their time off to play a game of wizard chess, and Ginny sat with Neville as he continued to practise with the wand holster.
"For heaven's sake, Harry," said Hermione, exasperated, as one of Ron's bishops wrestled her knight off his horse and dragged him off the board. "Go and find Justin if it's so important to you."
So Harry got up and left through the portrait hole, wondering where Justin might be.
The castle was darker than it usually was in daytime because of the thick, swirling grey snow at every window. Shivering, Harry walked past classrooms where lessons were taking place, catching snatches of what was happening within. Professor McGonagall was shouting at someone who, by the sound of it, had turned his friend into a badger.
Unable to resist this, Harry crept to the door and peeked in. A group of sixth years were crowded around a large, sleek looking badger, who was prancing about on a table like he or she had just won the lottery. The students started clapping in time while Professor McGonagall hopelessly tried to restore order, eventually un-transfiguring the Ravenclaw boy, who ended up sprawled over the desk with a bemused expression.
Holding back laughter in spite of himself, Harry hurried along, hoping his Head of House hadn't seen him. Thinking that Justin might be using his free time to catch up on some work, Harry decided to check the library first.
A group of the Hufflepuffs who should have been in Herbology were indeed sitting at the back of the library, but they didn't seem to be working. Between the long lines of high bookshelves, Harry could see that their heads were close together and they were having what looked like an absorbing conversation. He couldn't see whether Justin was among them. He was walking toward them when something of what they were saying met his ears, and he paused to listen, hidden in the Invisibility section.
"So anyway," a stout boy was saying, "I told Justin to hide up in our dormitory. I mean to say, if Potter's marked him down as his next victim, it's best if he keeps a low profile for a while. Of course, Justin's been waiting for something like this to happen ever since he let slip to Potter he was Muggle-born. Justin actually told him he'd been down for Eton. That's not the kind of thing you bandy about with Slytherin's heir on the loose, is it?"
"You definitely think it is Potter, then, Ernie?" said Hannah Abbott anxiously, tugging at one of her blonde pigtails.
"Hannah," said the stout boy solemnly, "he's a Parselmouth. Everyone knows that's the mark of a Dark wizard. Have you ever heard of a decent one who could talk to snakes? They called Slytherin himself Serpent-tongue."
There was some heavy murmuring at this, and Ernie went on, "Remember what was written on the wall? 'Enemies of the Heir, Beware.' Potter had some sort of run-in with Filch. Next thing we know, Filch's cat's attacked. That first year, Creevey, was annoying Potter at the Quidditch match, taking pictures of him while he was lying in the mud. Next thing we know – Creevey's been attacked."
"He always seems so nice, though," said Hannah uncertainly, "and, well, he's the one who made You-Know-Who disappear. He can't be all bad, can he?"
Ernie lowered his voice mysteriously, the Hufflepuffs bent closer, and Harry edged nearer so that he could catch Ernie's words.
"No one knows how he survived that attack by You-Know-Who. I mean to say, he was only a baby when it happened. He should have been blasted into smithereens. Only a really powerful Dark wizard could have survived a curse like that." He dropped his voice until it was barely more than a whisper, and said, "That's probably why You-Know-Who wanted to kill him in the first place. Didn't want another Dark Lord competing with him. I wonder what other powers Potter's been hiding?"
Harry snorted with laughter. It only got worse as he rounded the corner and saw their faces. Every one of the Hufflepuffs looked as though they had been Petrified by the sight of him, and the colour was draining out of Ernie's face.
"Gather round, children," Harry laughed. "Harry Potter's going to show you his terrifying powers of daaaarknesssss."
The Hufflepuffs looked uncertainly to Ernie. Hannah's lips twitched.
"I've never exactly hidden what I can do, though, have I, Ernie?" said Harry. Summoning his indignant rage over everyone's suspicion of him, he sparked lightning around his hand in a dramatic blue-white light show. "You know what, I came here to apologise to Justin. I figured it might have been a bit of a shock, and none of you would have figured out that the snake backed the fuck off after I talked to it. But you know what, keep making stuff up about me. I'm going back to my lair of evil to plot evil things."
"I might tell you that you can trace my family back through nine generations of witches and warlocks and my blood's as pure as anyone's, so –"
Harry had already turned to leave, but Ernie's persistence really stung. Not that the other Hufflepuffs really seemed to be behind him anymore.
"Malfoy's blood is probably purer than gold," Harry sneered. "If I could make one person in this castle shut up for a few months guess who'd be first on the list?"
With that, he left Ernie to stammer in his wake.
Harry blundered up the corridor, barely noticing where he was going, he was in such a fury. The result was that he walked into something very large and solid, which knocked him backward onto the floor.
"Oh, hello, Hagrid," Harry said, looking up.
Hagrid's face was entirely hidden by a woolly, snow-covered balaclava, but it couldn't possibly be anyone else, as he filled most of the corridor in his moleskin overcoat. A dead rooster was hanging from one of his massive, gloved hands.
"All righ', Harry?" he said, pulling up the balaclava so he could speak. "Why aren't yeh in class?"
"Cancelled," said Harry, getting up. "What're you doing in here?"
Hagrid held up the limp rooster.
"Second one killed this term," he explained. "It's either foxes or a Blood-Suckin' Bugbear, an' I need the headmaster's permission ter put a charm around the hen coop."
He peered more closely at Harry from under his thick, snow flecked eyebrows.
"Yeh sure yeh're all righ'? Yeh look all hot an' bothered –"
Harry couldn't bring himself to repeat what Ernie and the rest of the Hufflepuffs had been saying about him.
"It's nothing," he said. "I'd better get going, Hagrid, it's Transfiguration next and I've got to pick up my books."
He walked off, his mind still full of what Ernie had said about him.
Justin's been waiting for something like this to happen ever since he let slip to Potter he was Muggle-born...
Harry stamped up the stairs and turned along another corridor, which was particularly dark; the torches had been extinguished by a strong, icy draft that was blowing through a loose windowpane.
He was halfway down the passage when he tripped headlong over something lying on the floor.
He turned to squint at what he'd fallen over and felt as though his stomach had dissolved.
Justin Finch-Fletchley was lying on the floor, rigid and cold, a look of shock frozen on his face, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. And that wasn't all. Next to him was another figure, the strangest sight Harry had ever seen.
It was Nearly Headless Nick, no longer pearly-white and transparent, but black and smoky, floating immobile and horizontal, six inches off the floor. His head was half off and his face wore an expression of shock identical to Justin's.
Harry got to his feet, his breathing fast and shallow, his heart doing a kind of drumroll against his ribs. He looked wildly up and down the deserted corridor and saw a line of spiders scuttling as fast as they could away from the bodies. The only sounds were the muffled voices of teachers from the classes on either side.
He could run, and no one would ever know he had been there. But he couldn't just leave them lying here... He had to get help... Would anyone believe he hadn't had anything to do with this?
As he stood there, panicking, a door right next to him opened with a bang. Peeves the Poltergeist came shooting out.
"Why, it's potty wee Potter!" cackled Peeves, knocking Harry's glasses askew as he bounced past him. "What's Potter up to? Why's Potter lurking –"
Peeves stopped, halfway through a mid-air somersault. Upside down, he spotted Justin and Nearly Headless Nick. He flipped the right way up, filled his lungs and, before Harry could stop him, screamed, "ATTACK! ATTACK! ANOTHER ATTACK! NO MORTAL OR GHOST IS SAFE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! ATTAAAACK!"
Crash – crash – crash – door after door flew open along the corridor and people flooded out. For several long minutes, there was a scene of such confusion that Justin was in danger of being squashed and people kept standing in Nearly Headless Nick. Harry found himself pinned against the wall as the teachers shouted for quiet. Professor McGonagall came running, followed by her own class. She used her wand to set off a loud bang, which restored silence, and ordered everyone back into their classes. No sooner had the scene cleared somewhat than Ernie arrived, panting, on the scene.
"Caught in the act!" Ernie yelled, his face stark white, pointing his finger dramatically at Harry.
"That will do, Macmillan!" said Professor McGonagall sharply.
Peeves was bobbing overhead, now grinning wickedly, surveying the scene; Peeves always loved chaos. As the teachers bent over Justin and Nearly Headless Nick, examining them, Peeves broke into song:
"Oh, Potter, you rotter, oh, what have you done,
You're killing off students, you think it's good fun –"
"That's enough, Peeves!" barked Professor McGonagall, and Peeves zoomed away backward, with his tongue out at Harry.
Justin was carried up to the hospital wing by Professor Flitwick and Professor Sinistra of the Astronomy department, but nobody seemed to know what to do for Nearly Headless Nick. In the end, Professor McGonagall conjured a large fan out of thin air, which she gave to Ernie with instructions to waft Nearly Headless Nick up the stairs. This Ernie did, fanning Nick along like a silent black hovercraft. This left Harry and Professor McGonagall alone together.
"This way, Potter," she said.
"Professor," said Harry at once, "I swear I didn't –"
"This is out of my hands, Potter," said Professor McGonagall curtly.
They marched in silence around a corner and she stopped before a large and extremely ugly stone gargoyle.
"Lemon drop!" she said.
This was evidently a password, because the gargoyle sprang suddenly to life, sinking back into the wall and corkscrewing upwards, bringing a helical staircase up with it. Even full of dread for what was coming, Harry couldn't fail to be amazed once more by the incredible sight. As he and Professor McGonagall stepped onto it, Harry heard the wall thud closed behind them. They rose upward in circles, higher and higher, until at last, slightly dizzy, Harry saw a gleaming oak door ahead, with a brass knocker in the shape of a griffin.
He knew now where he was. The last time he'd gone up this path had been under far better circumstances, however. This was the entrance to Professor Dumbledore's office.
They stepped off the stone staircase at the top, and Professor McGonagall rapped on the door. It opened silently and they entered. Professor McGonagall told Harry to wait and left him there, alone.
Harry looked around. The room was every bit as interesting as he remembered it being. If he hadn't been scared out of his wits that he was about to be thrown out of school, he would surely have had a greater appreciation for being back in here.
Harry took in the silver instruments on their spindly tables still hissing and puffing and making little plumes of smoke. He saw the portraits of old headmasters and headmistresses which adorned the walls, all of them snoozing gently in their frames. But Harry was most taken by something he hadn't noticed on his last visit. Behind an enormous, claw-footed desk was a shelf, and on that shelf a shabby, tattered wizard's hat – the Sorting Hat.
Harry hesitated. He cast a wary eye around the sleeping witches and wizards on the walls. Surely it couldn't hurt if he took the hat down and tried it on again? Just to see... just to make sure it had put him in the right House…
He walked quietly around the desk, lifted the hat from its shelf, and lowered it slowly onto his head. It was still too large and slipped down over his eyes, just as it had done the last time he'd put it on. Harry stared at the black inside of the hat, waiting. Then a small voice said in his ear, 'Bee in your bonnet, Harry Potter?'
"Er, yes," Harry muttered. "Err… sorry to bother you… I wanted to ask –"
'You've been wondering whether I put you in the right House,' said the hat smartly. 'Yes... you were particularly difficult to place. But I stand by what I said before.'
Harry's heart leapt.
'You would have done well in Slytherin.'
Harry's stomach plummeted.
"Why?" said Harry.
'Not what you wanted to hear, I presume,' said the Hat. 'Not with all this trouble in the castle.'
Harry almost snarled in frustration. How could the Hat be torturing him like this?
'Do not ask me why I thought you a Slytherin, Potter,' the Hat went on. 'Ask yourself why you feel the need to ask me.'
"Because I…" Harry frowned. Now that he thought about it, the question seemed silly. If he had any links to Slytherin that might make him responsible for the opening of the Chamber, he would remember opening the Chamber. "Oh."
'Oh indeed,' said the Hat.
"Hat?" Harry said. He thought it a bit silly to address the Hat thusly, but couldn't think of any other honorific to give. "Do you remember the last time the Chamber opened?"
'I do,' said the Hat darkly. 'I have a long memory, Mr. Potter. I remember kings who have been lost to history, magicks lost to time, and times lost to space. This story has no such grandeur. Of a bullied child murdered in a toilet, a man accused without proof, and an accuser who became a monster.'
Harry realised with equal parts excitement and horror that he was learning the truth that had been so completely covered up. There was a gagging noise across the room, but Harry ignored it. Lives were at stake.
"What happened?" Harry asked urgently.
'The accused was Rubeus Hagrid,' said the Hat.
Harry gaped, staring unseeingly across the room. 'No…'
'He was expelled from Hogwarts, his wand destroyed and his name marked down in the Ministry's little book to never be allowed to practise magic again. Yet he was never sentenced to prison. It was a sham, Potter. They never had more than Riddle's word that he was involved with the Chamber. They convicted him for illegal possession of an Acromantula, dangerous enough by itself but incapable of the crimes committed. But the attacks stopped, and it was swept under the rug, never to be spoken of again.'
"But the child…"
There was a whoosh. Harry looked up, alarmed, to see what appeared to be a bird on a perch, engulfed in bright fire.
"Fawkes…?" Harry muttered, thinking of the beautiful phoenix Ginny had mentioned. In moments it was a fireball. With one last, loud shriek it had disappeared in a pile of ash on the floor.
'The child was Muggleborn, Potter,' said the Hat. 'Her death was almost immaterial.'
Harry felt about ready to punch something. He thought of Hermione dying, and pulled the Hat off in disgust. But he had said that the girl was bullied. If he had died at primary school, and the Ministry had gone around modifying the Muggles' memories, would anyone have batted an eye?
The office door opened. Dumbledore came in, looking very sombre.
"Professor," Harry said forlornly, replacing the Hat on his shelf and thanking him quietly. "Your bird… I couldn't do anything. He just caught fire…"
To Harry's astonishment, Dumbledore smiled.
"About time, too," he said. "He's been looking dreadful for days; I've been telling him to get a move on."
He chuckled at the stunned look on Harry's face.
"Fawkes is a phoenix, Harry. Phoenixes burst into flame when it is time for them to die and are reborn from the ashes. Watch him…"
Harry looked down in time to see a tiny, wrinkled, newborn bird poke its head out of the ashes. It was quite as ugly as the old one.
"It's a shame you had to see him on a Burning Day," said Dumbledore, seating himself behind his desk. "He's really very handsome most of the time, wonderful red and gold plumage. Fascinating creatures, phoenixes. They can carry immensely heavy loads, their tears have healing powers, and they make highly faithful pets."
Dumbledore sat down in the high chair behind his desk and fixed Harry with his penetrating, light blue stare. Harry was about to question him about what the Sorting Hat had told him when the office door flew open with an almighty bang and Hagrid burst in, a wild look in his eyes, his balaclava perched on top of his shaggy black head and the dead rooster still swinging from his hand.
"It wasn' Harry, Professor Dumbledore!" said Hagrid urgently. "I was talkin' ter him seconds before that kid was found, he never had time, sir –"
Dumbledore tried to say something, but Hagrid went ranting on, waving the rooster around in his agitation, sending feathers everywhere.
"– it can't've bin him, I'll swear it in front o' the Ministry o' Magic if I have to –"
"Hagrid, I –"
"– yeh've got the wrong boy, sir, I know Harry never –"
"Hagrid!" said Dumbledore loudly. "I do not think that Harry attacked those people."
"Oh," said Hagrid, the rooster falling limply at his side. "Right. I'll wait outside then, Headmaster."
And he stomped out looking embarrassed.
"You don't think it was me, Professor?" Harry repeated hopefully as Dumbledore brushed rooster feathers off his desk.
"No, Harry, I don't," said Dumbledore, though his face was sombre again. "But I still want to talk to you."
Harry waited while Dumbledore considered him, the tips of his long fingers together. His mind was restless. Although mere moments ago he had wanted to discuss the issue of the perpetrator with the headmaster, he was no longer quite so sure. Professor Dumbledore had surely been around when the Chamber last opened if Hagrid was involved. He certainly had remembered it back in the infirmary. Seeing as both he and Hagrid were still freely walking around, they would be in the best position to identify the Heir. The only missing piece of this puzzle was…
Harry's heart sank.
The Hat had called the accuser Riddle. And he knew that name. He wasn't quite sure why that disturbed him so greatly, but he barely heard the headmaster's words.
"I must ask you, Harry, whether there is anything you'd like to tell me," he said gently. "Anything at all."
Harry didn't know what to say. He felt like bringing up the diary would only incriminate him and Ginny. He needed to investigate further, or he'd just be telling the headmaster things he already knew, and making himself a suspect in the process.
"No," said Harry. "There isn't anything, Professor..."
Harry drifted towards the Gryffindor common room in a haze of disconnected thoughts. He'd thought of asking Hagrid, but didn't want Professor Dumbledore to overhear the conversation and so decided that his only recourse was to go and ask Riddle himself what he remembered of the incident.
A bullied girl murdered in a bathroom… Harry found himself struck with sympathy. If Harry had died with his head in a toilet in primary school, he would have felt…
Harry's clarity of mind returned as if struck home with a sledgehammer. He would be absolutely miserable. There was only one ghost at Hogwarts who haunted a toilet.
"Myrtle!" Harry breathed, charging through a door-pretending-to-be-a-wall.
Bursting into the first floor girls' bathroom two minutes later, Harry leaned against the sinks trying to regain his breath.
"Well, hello," said a sullen voice. "What's brought you here in such a hurry?"
"I came here to see you, Myrtle," said Harry. "What's up?"
"Nobody comes to see me," she said miserably. "Not unless..."
"I just did."
Myrtle looked at him. Harry looked back, raising his eyebrows slightly.
"What's up?"
"Well, um..." said Myrtle, looking rather lost.
Harry leaned against the wall, realising this might take a while. "It must be worrying, knowing that whatever the monster is can harm ghosts, too."
"Not really," said Myrtle. "Haunting a girls' toilet isn't much fun."
"No, I don't imagine there are many wild parties," Harry agreed. "But you'd be okay with that? Dying again?"
"What do I have to live for?" Myrtle challenged.
Harry watched her, unsure whether he was allowed to laugh. They both smirked at about the same time, and shared a brief snigger.
"It gets lonely, in here..." said Myrtle, turning coy.
"You don't keep company with the other ghosts?" Harry asked.
"I'm the only one who died so recently," said Myrtle. "All I've got in common with most of them is being dead."
'I'm sure it's nothing to do with your reputation for oversensitivity and throwing tantrums,' Harry didn't say. "That sucks. When did you die, if you don't mind me asking?"
Myrtle seemed to light up. "Oh no, it was nearly 51 years ago."
Once again, Harry was struck by the parallels. "Here in the toilets?"
"Ohhh yes!" Myrtle nodded. "It happened right in here. I died in this very stall. I remember it so well. I'd hidden because Olive Hornby was teasing me about my glasses. The door was locked, and I was crying, and then I heard somebody come in. They said something funny. A different language, I think it must have been. Anyway, what really got me was that it was a boy speaking. So I unlocked the door, to tell him to go and use his own toilet, and then..."
Myrtle swelled importantly, her face shining. "I died."
"How?" said Harry.
"No idea," said Myrtle in hushed tones. "I just remember seeing a pair of great, big, yellow eyes. My whole body sort of seized up, and then I was floating away..."
She looked dreamily at Harry. "And then I came back again. I was determined to haunt Olive Hornby, you see. Oh, she was sorry she'd ever laughed at my glasses."
Harry was happy that the bully had suffered, but he felt somehow that Myrtle derived entirely too much pleasure from it. More importantly, he had all but one piece of the puzzle.
"Did you recognise the boy?" said Harry. "His voice?"
"Not really," Myrtle shrugged. "It sounded all weird in that language. High pitched and... weird. I think it was like hissing..."
Realising that Myrtle wasn't sharp enough to draw the connection between the circumstances of her death and the then prominent activity of Slytherin's monster, Harry decided against informing her. The risk of her accidentally telling the perpetrator that Harry was on their trail was simply too great.
"So how come you're not haunting Miss Hornby?" said Harry.
Myrtle sniffed irritably. "Apparently the Ministry of Magic doesn't like revenge. They threatened me with necromancy if I didn't leave her alone. Told me to 'forgive and forget'. Ha! But she never forgot about me, I made sure of that. Not until her dying day."
Harry was rapidly losing sympathy for Myrtle. If this girl had been such a horrible person that she continued to deserve punishment until her death, all Myrtle would accomplish by torturing her was to cause even more suffering.
"She's dead?" said Harry.
"Heart attack," Myrtle said, grinning.
"Well, all's well that ends well," said Harry. 'Holy shit I need to get out of this bathroom.'
"You... really came here just to talk to me?" said Myrtle.
"Not everyone is your enemy, Myrtle," Harry smiled.
Miracle of miracles, she smiled back.
By the time Harry got back to the Gryffindor common room he had long since missed the start of Transfiguration. Deciding to put his feet up rather than run down for the last ten minutes of the class, Harry threw himself onto a sofa by the fire. He could share what he knew once the others got back.
The first thing he noticed was the muttering. It wasn't entirely unusual for him but it was far more prominent than usual, especially for the common room. And when he looked around the room (as casually as he could), the number of hurried head turns was really rather disturbing. Had Peeves been yelling his song to the whole school? Or had rumours spread so fast of how Harry had been found with Justin's frozen body?
"But why would he?"
"How should we know?"
"Always thought he was a bit odd."
Freak.
Harry stood up and left. The anger swelling within him was beginning to overpower his thoughts, and it was all he could do to walk away. His own housemates? The people he was supposed to consider family? Those he'd almost sacrificed his life to save? He wanted to tear them apart.
'But what would that make me?'
If he had thought it would be any better outside of Gryffindor tower, he was sorely mistaken. People openly pointed in the corridors and hurried in the opposite direction. A few students even drew their wands as they saw him. Even though he kept his head down and didn't do anything so threatening as to cough, people hurled threats and accusations if they had the courage to even be in the same corridor as him. Harry had never felt so vilified.
Wanting to avoid people, especially his friends who would soon be returning from class, Harry slipped through a mirror into a secret passage. And, finally alone, he gave into his rage. Lightning burst from his hand amidst a skittering of bright sparks as he punched the stone wall. His vision splashed purple and blue, while his knuckles exploded in agony. He almost missed the little red ripples of light in the masonry.
"Sorry," Harry muttered.
He sat heavily. Taking deep, slow breaths did nothing to soothe his heart, or the rage and despair that were building there. Why the betrayal hurt so much he could not say. All he knew was that the coming days would be incredibly trying. And it seemed like he was looking to face them alone. The feeling was of being disconnected, a terrible solitude Harry had not known since his cupboard. It was more than the student body turning their backs on him. He would never need the company of anyone, not their approval nor their acceptance, had he the presence of one he kept most dear to his heart. It was a presence that was always with him, a comfort and a reminder… until now.
As Harry stared at the wall, he wondered how long it had been since he had last felt Ginny's warm touch on his mind. And he knew then that it had all gone horribly wrong.
But as he wandered the castle halls, drifting past the onlookers, as passive a presence among his friends that evening as Ginny had been for weeks, he couldn't make the last piece of the puzzle fall into place.
Why?
Harry barely noticed the passing of the days. Suspicions were rising as Harry did nothing more to dissuade people of the notion that he might be responsible for the attacks befalling his peers. On the way back from a Potions class, something hit Harry in the head. It was a remarkably large onion. Harry stared at it on the ground while Neville and Ron vocally defended him, pulling their wands and daring the attacker to face them. When Harry looked up at the Entrance Hall around them, his eyes instantly found a pair of silvery blue ones.
Luna beckoned him forwards, and Harry followed without question. Another girl was with her, shorter and dark of hair, with Chinese features. Su Li, another friend of Ginny's from their year. The commotion faded away behind them as the girls led him away through a secret passage. They said nothing, but Harry doubted he would have heard them through his bitter thoughts regardless.
Finally, coming out onto the fourth floor, they stopped. Harry couldn't identify the corridor. He could only see that it was empty.
"Harry Potter," said Luna.
Harry looked up at her.
"Oh, Harry!" said Su, shocked and aggrieved. She met his eyes then for the first time Harry could remember.
"What is it?" said Harry, his voice slightly gruff from disuse.
"Do you want to-" Su began.
"No," said Harry firmly.
She looked taken aback, but nodded her acquiescence.
"We wanted to talk about Ginny," said Luna.
If anything was going to get Harry's attention, it was that.
"Has she... seemed strangely distant to you this year?" said Su.
"Why?"
"Because she's been distant with everyone," said Su. "She just tells us she's fine, feeling a bit under the weather, this or that, and people are getting used to it."
"But it's not natural," said Luna. "I know that, and you know that."
"She doesn't even go to the library anymore," said Su. "The only book I've seen her with is that diary of hers."
Something snapped in Harry's mind.
A memory stored in a book. Hagrid's accuser. Ginny behaving strangely. Harry not noticing her behaving strangely. The bond closing off…
"The diary!" Harry cried.
Su looked rather alarmed. "That's what I…"
Harry wanted to warn them of the diary's danger, but what if they did something foolish and it got control over them too? No, he needed to prevent collateral damage.
"I… I think she might have written about whatever's wrong in the diary," said Harry.
"You're not suggesting we read it?" Su said incredulously.
"No," Harry sighed. "Of course not, that's not fair. Look, I'll go talk to her, see if I can figure out what's going on. I'm sure she's just been down, what with all of the attacks."
"Yes, but…" said Su.
The Chinese girl was looking mildly infuriated as he turned away from them, but Luna still had her eyes calmly fixed on Harry's.
"What about you?"
Harry ran up the next secret passageway. He needed to find that diary.
His muscles were burning by the time he reached the seventh floor, but he kept pushing himself. If Tom Riddle was using Ginny to open the Chamber of Secrets, every second Harry wasted risked another attack.
Reaching the common room, Harry schooled his features and tried to calm his breathing. Ginny didn't need to be clued in too much.
However, when he passed behind the Fat Lady, he realised that Ginny was not there.
"There you are!" said Hermione. "The others are out looking for you."
"We know what you're doing, Potter," said a faceless fourth year.
"We're not scared," said another.
"Oh leave him alone!" Hermione cried.
"It's fine, Hermione," said Harry. "I'm going to bed."
Hermione gaped at him. "It's five o'clock."
Harry took her hand in his. "Thanks, Hermione."
Then he turned to the boys' staircase and headed up before he could lose his nerve.
Grabbing his Nimbus 2000 from where he'd left it under the bed, he draped his Invisibility Cloak over boy and broom both and floated carefully out through the window.
Within moments he was at the girls' dorm, looking in. While there was no obvious activity, Harry couldn't risk leaving this to chance. Strafing slowly across each window in turn, he examined every inch of the room. He checked the common room, confirming that Hermione was still downstairs and people were starting to leave. With one more quick look, Harry eased open a window with Alohomora and slipped inside.
Still wary of being caught, Harry kept the cloak wrapped tightly under him as he descended, reaching out into Ginny's bed. His hand slid under her pillow, searching, searching...
His fingers clamped shut on the thin little book. Harry was seized by the urge to just tear out its pages, but somehow he felt that that wouldn't be particularly productive. A book with these kinds of enchantments was surely too valuable to risk to the ravages of time and careless handling. No, he needed to beat this thing at its own game.
Shutting the window behind him and levitating the lock shut, Harry took once more to the skies, thinking of all that this book had done. Trying to kill civilian children, endangering his friends, taking Ginny away from him... he returned to his room with murder in his heart.
Hello again, Tom.
Harry! What a pleasant surprise, I rather thought you'd tired of my company.
Now how could that be?
I am flattered. How have you been?
Not too well, I'm afraid.
I'm sorry to hear it. Why don't you tell me what's bothering you?
The Chamber of Secrets.
Ah. Yes, Ginny did mention this. One of those rare, unfortunate situations where the truth is as horrifying as the nightmare.
I thought you might know something. You were here around the time it was last opened, weren't you?
My, my, you are well informed. I do, indeed, know something of the Chamber, and what happened in Hogwarts Castle all those years ago.
Please, tell me.
It would be far easier to show you.
Harry gritted his teeth. This was the point of no return, and he knew it. He could go to Professor Dumbledore. The diary didn't yet hold him. But he hadn't needed the headmaster's aid last year, and he remembered well how the staff had responded to their offer of aid.
No. This would be his fight. For the victims who blamed him. For the school that rejected him. For the girlfriend who'd forgotten him.
Okay.
The pages of the diary began to blow as though caught in a high wind, stopping halfway through the month of June. Mouth hanging open, Harry saw that the little square for June thirteenth seemed to have turned into a minuscule television screen. Squinting to look through the little window, he began leaning in and before he knew what was happening, he was tilting forward. The window was widening, and he could no longer feel the floor or bed beneath him. It gave him the impression of take off and yet he felt like he was drifting, floating in oil.
For what felt like several long seconds, Harry was lost in a world out of focus. It was like being in a quiet room without his glasses on. Streaks and splashes of colour, and varying gradations of shadow, all swam smoothly around, slowly enough to be entrancing more than nauseating.
Harry's feet hit solid ground, and he stood, shaking, as the blurred shapes around him came suddenly into focus. He knew immediately where he was. This circular room with the sleeping portraits was Dumbledore's office – but it wasn't Dumbledore who was sitting behind the desk. A wizened, frail-looking wizard, bald except for a few wisps of white hair, was reading a letter by candlelight. Harry had never seen this man before.
Walking over to the old man, who Harry presumed was a prior headmaster of Hogwarts, he tried getting his attention by waving a hand. As Harry had suspected, the wizard was quite oblivious to his presence. Harry schooled his features, hoping that Riddle had not yet sensed his intentions, though he suspected that ship may well have sailed. If this was as he suspected, he was in a memory — Riddle's memory. And if he was inside Riddle's head, so to speak…
The wizard folded up the letter with a sigh, stood up, walked past Harry without glancing at him, and went to draw the curtains at his window. The sky outside the window was ruby-red; it seemed to be sunset. The wizard went back to the desk, sat down, and twiddled his thumbs, watching the door.
The question was, now that he was here, how could he subdue Riddle's spirit? What was there for him to fight?
There was a knock on the office door.
"Enter," said the old wizard in a feeble voice.
A boy of about sixteen entered, taking off his pointed hat. A silver prefect's badge was glinting on his chest. He was taller than Harry, but he, too, had jet-black hair.
"Ah, Riddle," said the headmaster.
Harry had a sudden vision of himself in the Mirror of Erised. Pale, waxy skin, with eyes that flashed red…
"You wanted to see me, Professor Dippet?" said Riddle. He looked nervous.
"Sit down," said Dippet. "I've just been reading the letter you sent me."
"Oh," said Riddle. He sat down, gripping his hands together very tightly.
"My dear boy," said Dippet kindly, "I cannot possibly let you stay at school over the summer. Surely you want to go home for the holidays?"
"No," said Riddle at once. "I'd much rather stay at Hogwarts than go back to that… to that…"
"You live in a Muggle orphanage during the holidays, I believe?" said Dippet curiously.
"Yes, sir," said Riddle, reddening slightly.
"You are Muggle-born?"
"Half-blood, sir," said Riddle. "Muggle father, witch mother."
"And are both your parents…?"
"My mother died just after I was born, sir. They told me at the orphanage she lived just long enough to name me – Tom after my father, Marvolo after my grandfather."
Dippet clucked his tongue sympathetically.
"The thing is, Tom," he sighed, "special arrangements might have been made for you, but in the current circumstances..."
"You mean all these attacks, sir?" said Riddle. Harry's heart started pounding furiously in his chest, and he moved closer, scared of missing anything.
"Precisely," said the headmaster. "My dear boy, you must see how foolish it would be of me to allow you to remain at the castle when term ends. Particularly in light of the recent tragedy... the death of that poor little girl... You will be safer by far at your orphanage. As a matter of fact, the Ministry of Magic is even now talking about closing the school. We are no nearer locating the – err… source of all this unpleasantness..."
Riddle's eyes had widened.
"Sir – if the person was caught – if it all stopped –"
"What do you mean?" said Dippet with a squeak in his voice, sitting up in his chair. "Riddle, do you mean you know something about these attacks?"
"No, sir," said Riddle quickly.
It was too fast. Harry started putting two and two together. Riddle was desperate not to go home for the holidays, but at the same time had at least something to do with the opening of the Chamber of Secrets. And after this, he'd started throwing wild accusations at Hagrid, which the headmaster and Board of Directors were more than happy to accept if it meant averting the closure of the school, but didn't have enough substance to them to result in a jail sentence.
Dippet sank back, looking faintly disappointed.
Harry tensed, knowing that he'd found his mark, and suddenly rather worried that he'd made a terrible mistake coming in here alone.
"You may go, Tom..."
Riddle slid off his chair and slouched out of the room. Harry followed him.
Down the moving spiral staircase they went, emerging next to the gargoyle in the darkening corridor. Riddle stopped, and so did Harry, watching him. Harry could tell that Riddle was doing some serious thinking. He was biting his lip, his forehead furrowed.
Then, as though he had suddenly reached a decision, he hurried off, Harry gliding noiselessly behind him. They didn't see another person until they reached the Entrance Hall, when a tall wizard with long, sweeping auburn hair and a beard called to Riddle from the marble staircase.
"What are you doing, wandering around this late, Tom?"
Harry gaped at the wizard. He was none other than a fifty-year-younger Dumbledore.
"I had to see the headmaster, sir," said Riddle.
"Well, hurry off to bed," said Dumbledore, giving Riddle exactly the kind of penetrating stare Harry knew so well. "Best not to roam the corridors these days. Not since..."
He sighed heavily, bade Riddle good night, and strode off. Riddle watched him walk out of sight and then, moving quickly, headed straight down the stone steps to the dungeons, with Harry in hot pursuit.
But to Harry's disappointment, Riddle led him not into a hidden passageway or a secret tunnel but to the very dungeon in which Harry had Potions with Snape. The torches hadn't been lit, and when Riddle pushed the door almost closed, Harry could only just see him, standing stock-still by the door, watching the passage outside.
It felt to Harry that they were there for at least an hour. All he could see was the figure of Riddle at the door, staring through the crack, waiting like a statue. And just when Harry had stopped feeling expectant and tense and started wishing he could return to the present, he heard something move beyond the door.
Someone was creeping along the passage. He heard whoever it was pass the dungeon where he and Riddle were hidden. Riddle, quiet as a shadow, edged through the door and followed, Harry tiptoeing behind him, forgetting that he couldn't be heard.
For perhaps five minutes they followed the footsteps, until Riddle stopped suddenly, his head inclined in the direction of new noises. Harry heard a door creak open, and then someone speaking in a hoarse whisper.
"C'mon... gotta get yeh outta here... C'mon now... in the box..."
"I get the feeling you know what happens next," said Riddle.
To Harry's alarm, he realised that the prefect was no longer watching the boy Harry assumed to be Hagrid. Riddle was staring right at him.
"Yeah, I do," said Harry. "Wouldn't expect any better from an Heir of Slytherin."
"I suppose an Heir of Gryffindor would have ridden the beast through the castle, slaying all who opposed him?" Tom smirked.
"An Heir of Gryffindor would never stoop so low as murder," said Harry. "But I suppose you're too fucked up to understand that."
Riddle laughed. "Your naivety is quite amusing."
"What have you done with Ginny?" Harry growled.
"Ah, little Ginny Weasley," said Tom. "You've been neglecting her, Harry. She's been hurting for a long, long time. And her only remaining comfort… is me."
"You sick bastard!" Harry shouted, charging at him.
Riddle burst into mist as Harry made contact, leaving him to look at the frozen image of a young Rubeus Hagrid, trying to encourage a spider the size of a large wolf into a box.
"Tsk, tsk. Temper, temper, Harry," said Riddle from behind him. Harry whirled to see the wraith arrogantly smiling at him. "That's going to get you into trouble one of these days."
"What are you doing to her?" Harry repeated through clenched teeth. A spark of electricity jumped from his middle finger to his index, but Riddle paid it no heed.
"Simply relieving her of her burdens," Riddle sighed. "All these little problems of hers… her consciousness… her life. You should be happy for her, Harry. Soon, she will be truly free."
"You're using her to open the Chamber," Harry said, resisting the urge to put his hands around the boy's throat. "How?"
"So many questions," Riddle mused. "Has the Gryffindor turned Ravenclaw? From the Neanderthal stance you're taking I should think not, but no matter. It is rather simple, Harry. Your little girlfriend is rather the pathetic little idiot. And while it was horrifically boring to listen to her drivel about her little problems, it made her so much easier."
By this point, the insults weren't even getting to Harry as much. Riddle had found his way into the corner of Harry's mind that was usually reserved for Malfoy and his ilk. But that last comment caught his attention. "You made me stop writing in the diary?"
"You gave me enough, Harry," Riddle smiled. "I've had a finger in your head for months. You see, while you aren't quite so full of trite, self-pitying nonsense as Ginny, you have a rather blatant vulnerability."
Harry frowned for a moment, wracking his brain. Then his mouth fell open. "No."
"And now you see why it's been so easy," Riddle laughed. "Why neither of you have so much as talked to each other for weeks. Why you all keep mysteriously forgetting things? And why you haven't felt anything through your curious bond in so long... It was mine the moment Ginny started complaining to me about all her second-hand books and clothes, the way her brothers always excluded her, and she would never be able to keep the great Harry Potter's attention…"
And suddenly everything clicked into place in Harry's mind. For a moment, the Chamber of Secrets almost seemed a secondary issue. Ginny's wanting to keep the bond secret, her attitude towards Katie, and her eagerness to... do more with him. And he was wracked with guilt that he had been neglecting her. That he hadn't understood and tried to help her, even though he could feel her emotions all the time. That he had been too scared to let their relationship… progress.
"I've always been good with people, Harry," said Tom. "Especially women."
Once again, the urge to flatten Tom's skull turned Harry's vision hazy with rage.
"She poured her soul out to me, and her soul happened to be exactly what I wanted," Riddle smirked. "I grew stronger and stronger on a diet of her deepest fears, darkest secrets… and desires."
Riddle was just pushing his buttons. Manipulating him the same way he'd manipulated Ginny. He had needed Ginny docile and compliant to possess her. He needed Harry angry for… what? Was he planning on turning Harry loose in the school? Make everyone think him the Heir? That would buy him maybe one or two more muggleborns before they closed the school… It made no sense. Unless…
Harry's eyes went wide. Riddle had been using the bond to manipulate him through Ginny. So what if, by saturating the bond with Harry's anger, he could use Harry to manipulate her? He couldn't fight Ginny! The fact that she'd trounce him aside, he simply couldn't do it. Harry needed to end this. Fast.
"… her entries became far more interesting. Dear Tom, I think I'm losing my memory. There are rooster feathers all over my robes and I don't know how they got there. Dear Tom, I can't remember what I did on the night of Halloween, but a cat was attacked and I've got paint all down my front. Dear Tom, Percy keeps telling me I'm pale and I'm not myself. I think he suspects me... There was another attack today and I don't know where I was. Tom, what am I going to do? I think I'm going mad. . . . I think I'm the one attacking everyone, Tom!"
The haze was back. Blood was pounding in Harry's eardrums. Ginny wasn't approaching yet — he could sense her on the other side of the castle, becoming confused and disoriented but too far away to interfere. And when he realised that, he stopped paying attention. All that mattered now was his rage. A rage that he didn't care to contain any longer.
Riddle could see that Harry was done talking. He simply watched, waiting.
A flurry of jinxes left Harry's wand, passing straight through Riddle and fading out of existence.
"Expelliarmus!" Harry yelled, attempting to replicate Professor Snape's wand movement. To his surprise, his own wand flew out of his hand, landing in Riddle's. It was cast aside, and melted into smoke.
"You are inside my mind you pathetic excuse for a wizard," Riddle sneered. "And this is the famed Boy Who Lived."
Harry yelled, lightning coursing over his entire body. He couldn't even see Riddle anymore. His whole world was light as he floated higher and higher off the ground. But he could feel the wraith — a pulsing nexus of bitterness and hatred, a hollow pain with no beginning and no end.
"Die."
There was a sound like a bomb going off as Harry released all his rage and all of his power in a torrent of electricity. It found its mark.
"AAIIIIEEEEE!" Riddle screamed. Harry felt the pain the wraith was suffering, but it brought him no satisfaction. It only steeled his resolve. He would finish this now. And when it was done, he would fix things with Ginny. He would not lose this chance he had been given.
Hovering now with the sheer force of charge on him, Harry drew upon himself, concentrating the energy in his right hand even as lightning continued to flood into Riddle from his left. And, drawing his hand back, he hurled a blinding ball of fear and pain and rage into the maelstrom that was Tom Riddle.
"HOW DARE YOU!" hissed a voice that came from everywhere and nowhere all at once.
Harry ignored it, now become a spinning vortex of raw energy that threatened to consume him with everything else in this forsaken diary. He would not fail.
"YOU ARE IN MY DOMAIN!"
"Aaaaarrrrghh!" Harry cried, set upon by something the likes of which he'd never felt. It was as though his temples were caught in a vice, and the pressure just kept increasing. But the pain made him ever stronger. "You will not have her!"
"She is already mine," said Riddle, strained but as arrogant as ever. "I wonder what I'll do with the body once I am done with it… Perhaps I shall keep it. She is a pretty young thing, and from good Pureblood stock."
Every muscle in Harry's body seemed to contract at once. Slowly, he folded backwards on himself, his head reaching back towards the soles of his feet. The pain was so all-consuming, he could no longer even form thoughts. But he held onto one thing. One thing kept him going as his body broke and his mind shattered. Through it all, he held on to Ginny. And with one last, breathless scream, he unloaded everything he had left to give in one cacophonous, brilliant explosion.
Smoking, finished, he fell to the ground with a thud. And as he lay there, broken, burned and beaten, Riddle looked down into his unmoving green eyes.
The wraith, almost transparent and twitching in and out of coherence, spat on Harry's body. Only then did he allow himself a contemptuous smirk.
"I win."