Author's Note: Can I just say how irritating it is to have fics removed? Seriously, I can understand not being allowed to create new stories for a while, but not being allowed to update stories that are not a part of the issue is quite irritating.

OK, Rant over.

Moving along, I will now address a few concerns raised by reviewers. Yes, there will be no Weasley or Dumbledore bashing in this story. There will also be no mention whatsoever of Dimensional Trunks, foreign villas or miscellaneous dramatis personae introductions. Those are waaaay too cliché for my liking.

People say that what I'm writing is cliché as well. I look at it as a new take on an old premise. I can only think of one or two stories that has Harry forced to take on extra wives rather than seeking them out.

A plot hole that one reviewer spotted will be explained in this chapter, although that isn't as a result of the review; it was planned the entire time.

And can guest reviewers like PaC please limit themselves to one review per chapter? And have said reviews be about the story, rather than other peoples reviews?

Enjoy and please review.

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter

"Harry" -Speech

'Ginny' -Thoughts

/Bill\ -Foreign/Non-human Language

Chapter 3: Ice and Fire

As soon as they got back to the Gryffindor Common Room, Harry went up to his dorm room and fetched the law book. He gave it to Hermione, who immediately sat down in 'their' seat next to the fireplace and began to read the book from cover to cover.

"You know she's going to be the next best thing to unresponsive while she's reading that, right?" Ron said with an eye roll at their bookworm of a friend.

"Probably." Harry agreed, "But it's the only book I can give her as I still have to finish reading the other two. And you know that Hermione wouldn't rest until she had at least one of them to read."

Ron snorted in agreement. Hermione, once she got over her shock at Harry cursing Malfoy and his thugs, had remembered that Harry had been given books by Dumbledore and had practically begged to read them.

"Fancy a game of chess then Harry?" Ron asked.

Harry winced. He was certain that Ron's chessmen were completely biased against anyone who wasn't a Weasley and he had lost the set he had won from a Wizard Cracker last year.

"Sorry mate, I was going to have a walk." Harry apologised hastily, not wanting to get his rear-end kicked at chess yet again, "Been reading too much, you know?"

Ron nodded. "Right. I'll se if Neville wants to play then."

Harry swiftly made a strategic withdrawal out of the common room while Ron searched for a new victim/opponent. Breathing a sigh of relief, Harry decided to go to the Library and do a bit more spell research, then see if he could track down Ginny and have a word with her.

On his way, he spotted the resident pranksters, Fred and George Weasley, legging it down a corridor, Argus Filch the Caretaker in hot pursuit screaming at them to, "Leave his poor Mrs Norris alone after her horrible petrifaction experience!"

Trailing after the three running figures was Filch's pet cat, Mrs Norris, staggering drunkenly along on all four feet looking quite shell-shocked…and colourful. Literally. She looked like she'd been attacked by a bevy of hyperactive kids armed with poster paint, greatly resembling a piñata Harry had seen while out shopping with his Aunt Petunia.

"Looks like those two are in fine form as always." Harry muttered as he continued on to the Library.

Ten minutes later found Harry delving through a large tome he had found entitled 'The Book of Cursed Fun: a Treatise' by Annie N I Mouse. Harry had muttered again about the lack of imagination that wizards had when coming up with pseudonyms before heaving the book to a table and beginning to thrash his way through it.

"A Gryffindor who isn't Granger studying when no exams are the next day? How odd." a cool female voice said from Harry's right. He looked up to see a girl about his age with long blond hair, piercing blue eyes and wearing robes trimmed with Slytherin green and silver.

"Can I help you?" Harry asked shortly. He really didn't want to have to deal with someone from Slytherin heckling him right now.

"No, I was merely remarking on the oddity of a Gryff' studying when there is no clear need to." she replied with a sardonic smile.

"Considering Lockhart only taught us one thing in DADA this year -Do Not Let Cornish Pixies Run Wild- I've been trying to study something that is of more practical use." Harry said dryly.

"You mean you haven't been doing that all year?" the girls said in mild surprise, "Goodness, it is a good thing we have no exams if that's the case."

"Coming into the Library when everyone is whispering about you is hardly enjoyable or conductive to learning." Harry riposted, "Besides, DADA is my best subject. I even outscored Hermione on the practical last year."

"Oh? Not on the theory?" the girl asked with an eyebrow raised.

"Writing about something doesn't prove you can do the spellwork." Harry replied with a shrug, "If my theory work isn't up to scratch, my practical more than makes up for it."

"How very Gryffindor of you, Potter." the girl remarked, "You do realise that having a poor theory grade lowers your overall score for that subject?"

"My score isn't so much 'low' as it is 'average'." Harry replied, "And might I know who you are as you already seem to know me."

"Daphne Greengrass, Heiress of the Noble House of Greengrass." the girl said curtly, "You are an enigma, Potter. You are the last of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Potter, a family of high importance and influence in the Wizengamot, yet no one knows anything about you, as a person, just the usual Boy-Who-Lived nonsense."

Harry was shocked to meet the person who Professor Dumbledore had told him about so suddenly, but quickly brought himself back to the conversation at hand.

"Considering I've lived with Muggles for the first ten years of my life, completely out of contact with -and with no knowledge of- the Wizarding World, that isn't much of a surprise." Harry observed.

"So you do live with your Muggle relatives?" Daphne asked, blue eyes locked on Harry's own emerald eyes, "My father has remarked on how unusual that is. I severely doubt that any Wizarding Family would have refused to foster you, so why are you with Muggles?"

Harry smiled coldly. "And how many of those Wizarding Households were supporters of Voldemort?" he asked softly.

The girl almost levitated in fright at hearing 'the name' and her eyes widened in shock. "Don't say the name!" she hissed.

"Why?" Harry asked bluntly.

"Why? Just don't do it!" Daphne snapped.

"I'm serious. Why is it such a bad thing to say the Dark Tosser's name?" Harry asked, "I get he was an evil guy, but otherwise I'm not seeing any kind of reason for it."

If saying Voldemort's name frightened her, taking the mickey out of his formal title made her gape in astonishment, her face white as chalk.

"Are. You. Insane?!" she asked in a quiet, cold voice, "He isn't just an 'evil guy', he was the most powerful Dark Wizard in history! He killed so many people -Aurors, Hitwizards, families- that his very presence caused fear in his enemies! He regularly duelled against odds of ten to one and emerged victorious, which only Dumbledore and Grindelwald have been known to do in the last five centuries!"

"He's dead though." Harry pointed out, although he knew it was a lie. He had fought off the ephemeral wraith of Voldemort last year.

"That isn't the point." Daphne said with forced calm, "The point is that people still fear him, still live in terror of him returning. He was so powerful that the shock of you defeating him as a baby made some whisper that he had merely withdrawn to regain his power, biding his time to return and wreak havoc on Wizarding Britain. That's why no one says his name, as everyone who was brave enough to say it during his war, minus Dumbledore, invariably ended up dead."

"Finally, a reasonable answer." Harry said with satisfaction, "No one has been able to give me one that made sense until now. I'm still going to keep using his name though, no offence."

"Why?!" Daphne asked incredulously.

"He tried to kill me once and failed." Harry replied, gesturing at his scar slightly, "If he does come back, he cannot let that stand. I'll be a target regardless of what I say or do."

Daphne shook her head slowly, "You really are a Gryffindor through and through, aren't you?" she asked rhetorically.

"The Sorting Hat would disagree with you." Harry replied with a shrug as he returned his attention to the book in front of him and started scribbling down the incantation and effects of the Arm-Twisting Curse (Armis Detorquent), "It said I could do well in any House."

"Even Slytherin?" her scepticism was self evident in both her speech and body language.

"It was a tossup between Gryffindor and Slytherin in the end." Harry replied as he finished with the Arm Twisting Curse and moved on to the Defenestration Hex (Projectus Fenestra), "I wanted to be as far away from Malfoy as I could, so I asked for Gryffindor."

"You'd met him before Hogwarts." Daphne's voice had become dry with irony.

"In Madame Malkins." Harry replied, "He reminded me too much of my cousin Dudley: a spoilt brat who had never had his parents say 'no' to him enough. On the Hogwarts Express, he and his boy toys showed themselves to be like Dudley yet again: cowardly bullies who run at the first sign of trouble."

Harry finished the notes of the Defenestration Hex and spotted one he'd like to use on Malfoy at some point: the Melofors Jinx, which encased the target's head in a pumpkin.

"Is that why you sent him, Crabbe and Goyle to the Hospital Wing earlier?" Daphne asked archly.

"No, that is because he tried to attack me. Ditto for the bookends." Harry said firmly, "I also hate it when he calls Hermione…that word."

"Ah. Understandable." Daphne admitted slowly, "So…you and Granger?"

"What?" Harry looked up at her for a moment before shaking his head, "No, we're…not like that. I'm just protective of her and vice versa. Neither of us had friends before Hogwarts, so we tend to be protective of what friends we do have."

"Hmm…Surprising." Daphne commented, "I would have thought you would have a couple of Wizarding friends at least."

"Nope. When I say I was cut off from the Wizarding World, I mean it." Harry replied as he finished copying down the Melofors Jinx and began on the Inversion Charm (Disputatio) which was a sort of very minor Shield Charm that reflected minor hexes and jinxes to the one who cast them in the first place, "As for Muggle friends, my cousin beat up anyone who might have befriended me, so that was a no-go."

"And Granger?" Daphne asked curiously.

"Not my story to tell. If you want to know, ask her in Arithmancy next year." Harry replied.

"How did you know I'm taking Arithmancy next year?" Daphne asked sharply.

"You just told me." Harry replied, making Daphne curse under her breath, "But when Hermione was talking about taking Arithmancy herself, she made a list of people likely to take it as well, your name being at the top of the list."

Daphne didn't like it that a Gryffindor, of all people, was able to predict her actions, even about something like course selection, so she fell back on snarking at the nearest available target: Harry.

"What about you? Care of Magical Creatures and Divination I'll bet." Daphne sneered.

"At first, yes, but having thought about it, I've changed from Divination to Study of Ancient Runes and Arithmancy." Harry replied evenly, not deigning to rise to the rattled Slytherin's taunts.

Daphne was once again thrown off in this conversation by something Harry had said, which she was not used to when speaking to those of other Houses. Even within her own House, very few could throw her off guard like this, all of them being Sixth or Seventh Years.

"Why not drop CoMC?" she asked eventually.

"I seem to run across Dark or otherwise dangerous creatures far too often." Harry replied, "Trolls, Cerberuses, Acromantula, Basilisks…who knows what else I'll come up against next. Might as well get used to dealing with them."

"A Basilisk? Potter, there hasn't been a Basilisk in Britain for hundreds of years." Daphne scoffed, "They are illegal to create and are classed as XXXXX category monsters by the Ministry of Magic. You cannot seriously expect me to believe that you've survived an encounter with one."

"The Monster of the Chamber of Secrets was a thousand-year-old Basilisk." Harry said coolly, "Only a Parseltongue like Salazar Slytherin could control it, or even get to it. I've been hearing it slither around the school all year. It was sixty or more feet long and a poisonous green colour. We were really luck no one died, unlike fifty years ago."

"Wait, what? A Basilisk kills just by looking someone in the eyes, so how did no one die?" Daphne asked incredulously.

Harry sighed. "None of the victims looked it directly in the eyes. Mrs Norris saw its reflection in the floodwater outside Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, Colin saw it through his camera, Justin saw it through Nearly-Headless Nick, Nick's a ghost and therefore cannot die and finally, Hermione and Penelope Clearwater saw its reflection in a compact hand mirror. Sheer dumb luck, but I'll take it if it means no-one died."

Daphne was stunned. He had extrapolated the likely situations that each victim had been in and come up with a theory that fit. A suspicion made itself known to her mind.

"How much help did Granger give you before she was petrified?" she asked, her eyes narrowed as she concentrated on Harry's face.

"Technically none as she was petrified before she could tell me anything." Harry replied, "But she had ripped a page from a book that held the relevant information and when she was petrified, she had it in her clenched hand. Ron and I found it when we visited her in the Hospital Wing the same day Ginny Weasley was taken into the Chamber."

"From that you deduced your hypothesis on how all the victims were petrified rather than killed." Daphne finished, "Then the Weasley girl was taken into the Chamber. So you did…what, exactly?"

"That, I am afraid, is not something I'd like to talk about with an acquaintance, especially in such a public place." Harry replied as he snapped the large book closed, "On that note, I should go. I have someone to find."

Daphne eyed the black-haired boy as he rolled up the parchment he had copied the varied spells onto and tucked it into his robes before returning the book to the nearby desk and bid her goodbye politely.

'Harry James Potter…an interesting boy.' Daphne thought with a small smile. Then a familiar blinding headache rose up, staggering her with its intensity.

"Of all the times…Dammit!" Daphne hissed. The pain continued for a while before fading. As it did, Daphne Greengrass' face smoothed into a haughty, imperious façade that discouraged anyone approaching her and she had an air about her that suggested that anyone who did approach her would be hexed if they tried.

Striding forwards like royalty, the Ice Queen of Slytherin swept from the Library towards her own common room, no trace of her former self evident to the onlookers.

HPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHP

Half an hour later…

Entrance Hall

"Where in Merlin's name is she?" Harry muttered to himself. He had just spent the last half hour looking high and low for Ginny, with absolutely no success. Ordinarily he would as Ron for help, but he knew that his friend was very lax with his sister's whereabouts, despite the recent scare he had with her being taken into the Chamber.

'Besides, he seems to think that his mother can just wave her wand and make any residual effects from the last year vanish.' Harry though sourly. He liked Ron as a friend and knew he could be very smart when he wanted to be, but he was very short sighted when it came to emotional matters.

What Ginny had been through was not going to just go away with a kiss and a cuddle from Molly Weasley. He had seen a large amount of self-inflicted guilt in Ginny's eyes whenever he had seen her in the week or so since the Chamber Incident and knew that she was blaming herself for what she had done under the influence of the diary.

Granted, he would feel just as guilty as she evidently did if their positions were reversed, possibly even more so, but that was entirely beside the point. Actually, because he understood how guilty she was feeling, he was the best person to talk to.

Spotting the Weasley Twins plotting in a corner, made Harry feel slightly relieved and a little apprehensive at what scheme the two of them were cooking up now.

"Gred! Forge!" he called out to them, calling them by the muddled up versions of their names that they frequently called each other.

"Ah, Harrykins!" one replied, grinning cheekily at him.

"To what do we owe the honour, oh mighty slayer of serpents?" the other twin asked, grinning in a mirror image of his brother.

"You two are really creepy when you 'twin-speak' like that, you know that?" Harry said with a headshake, "Listen, I'm looking for Ginny. Got any idea where she's disappeared to?"

"And why, may we ask-" one twin started.

"-do you want to see our darling little sister?" the other finished.

Harry sighed impatiently. "Not out in the open like this." he said, jerking his head towards the Grand Staircase.

The twins followed him until they found an empty classroom a couple of floors up. After they closed the door and inundated it with Silencing Charms, Notice-Me-Not Charms and a couple of nasty Trap Jinxes, they turned to Harry, an expectant look on their faces.

"Right. So…you both know how Ginny was possessed by the diary, right?" Harry began. Their parents had told them when they pulled the twins and Percy out of the impromptu feast that had been thrown the night that Harry and Ron had descended into the Chamber.

"Yup." one twin said.

"We should have paid more attention to her." the other one said remorsefully, "First time I've ever felt bad about being outdone by Percy, that git."

"Uh-huh." Harry said, mentally rolling his eyes at the sibling rivalry between Mr 'rules-are-the-life of-me-Percy' and the Twins, who just didn't give a damn, "Well, haven't you noticed that she's feeling guilty? About what she did while under the influence of the diary?"

"She has." Twin B -who Harry tentatively labelled as George- said, "Been right gloomy she has."

"Not even pranking that git Malfoy and half of Slytherin has raised her spirits." Twin A added, "Think we should try again?"

"OI!" Harry bellowed before the two brothers could be caught up in prank planning again.

"Look, I need to speak to her, to try and reduce the guilt she's feeling." Harry said more calmly, once the twins returned their attention to him, "I'm probably the best person she can talk to about this."

"Oh? And why might that be?" Fred (?) asked.

"Who else has killed a Basilisk and walked away to tell the tale?" Harry asked dryly, making the twins duck in embarrassment at neglecting to factor that in.

"Well now brother mine, this puts us in a quandary." George (?) remarked.

"Indeed it does." Fred (?) replied, "Our dear little sister has threatened to hex our bits off if we tell anyone where she's hiding-"

"-yet this is, I believe, one case where we must take one for the greater good of the family." George (?) finished, "She's taken refuge behind a mirror on the fourth floor. Used to be a secret passage, but the tunnel caved in a little way from the entrance, so all it's good for is as a small hidey-hole now-"

"-which is a real shame as it used to go straight into Hogsmeade." added Fred (?), "Perfect for picking up Butterbeer from the Three Broomsticks or new pranking supplies from Zonkos Joke Shop."

"Right." Harry nodded, "How do you get to the passage? Is there a password or something?"

"Tap the bottom left hand corner with your wand and say 'Hypethrum Speculo'." George (?) told him, "The mirror will split down the middle and part for thirty seconds, so hurry and get through it before it closes."

"And to get out?" Harry asked. Two years in Hogwarts had honed Harry's paranoia to high levels when it came to secret passages, tunnels and stairways.

"Bottom right corner and the same words." Fred (?) replied, "Easy as pie. If Ginny asks…"

"I hexed you both into next week." Harry confirmed with a nod. It was odd that the Twins feared Ginny so much. Lockhart had been just as ineffective in the First Years' classes as he had been in the Second Years'. Harry supposed, as he parted company with the twins, that one of the other Weasley brothers had told her about a powerful spell of some sort that the two usually dauntless pranksters were wary of.

Making his way to the Fourth Floor via the Grand Staircase, Harry sought out the mirror that the twins had described to him. It was a large one that spanned the wall it was hung on, the frame carved with winding serpents and ravens.

After looking about furtively to confirm that the corridor was, in fact, deserted, Harry drew his wand and tapped the right hand corner, whispering, "Hypethrum Speculo," as he did. At once, the mirror's glass split in half and separated into an opening just large enough for a grown man to squeeze through, which was more than enough for the slightly built (and still small, damn it) Harry to slip through.

As he zipped through the opening, he found the end of a wand thrust into his face, one that was unfamiliar to him.

"Fred, George, I thought I said I don't want to see you prank Malfoy?" an annoyed female voice said. Ginny Weasley was sat on a chair, positively glaring into the rock and stone of the passage and had apparently drawn and pointed her wand on automatic.

"They already have." Harry said dryly, "As well as half of Slytherin House."

Ginny jumped in fright as he spoke, her head snapping around to see Harry grinning wryly at her and almost threw her wand to the ground in shock.

"Ha…Harry?" she squeaked, her face paling in shock, "H…How'd you…"

"I hexed Gred and Forge until they spilled where you were and how to get in here." Harry told her as he looked around the small space of what was once a tunnel. The cave in that had ended its use as a secret passage was about four meters away from the entrance. Evidently, the twins had been enterprising and had commandeered the space as their own, as there were chairs and desks that looked like they came from abandoned classrooms, as well as rugs and the odd parchment diagram here and there that outlines some of the Twins more elaborate pranks.

"Looks like Gred and Forge have been busy." Harry remarked as he looked around the space, "Mind if I have a seat, Ginny?"

"G-Go ahead." the redhead stuttered as she shakily stowed her wand back in her robe's pocket. Harry took the seat opposite her and continued examining the room that the twins had made of the old tunnel, deciding to pull a Dumbledore and wait for Ginny to speak first.

She was glancing at him out of the corner of her eyes every so often and fidgeting uncomfortably. From what Harry could tell though, she hadn't been crying, as her eyes weren't red or swollen.

"Umm…Harry?" Ginny said finally. Harry politely turned his attention to her as she spoke, "Why…did you go to the trouble of looking for me, and even hexing Fred and George?"

"I was worried about you Ginny." Harry replied honestly, "I've seen guilt in your eyes ever since your parents left and I have decided to set you straight about a couple of things."

Ginny's eyes narrowed at the mention of setting her straight and she sat up ramrod straight as she said, "About what exactly?"

"The diary, Tom Riddle and the Chamber." Harry said bluntly, ignoring her flinch at the mention of her tormentor, "I must ask that you keep what I am about to tell you a secret though. OK?"

Curiosity made Ginny nod in acceptance. Harry nodded back and began.

"I don't know how much you remember about…well, the Chamber or he conversation that took place in McGonagall's office." he began, "Can I assume you remember some of it?"

"The…The Chamber is blurry and hazy." Ginny admitted, "And I was too upset to really listen to everyone afterwards."

"Understandable." Harry said gently, "First, let me show you something the memory of Tom Riddle showed me."

Harry drew his wand, raised it and muttered, "Flagrate!" then swished the wand around as if he was writing in midair, leaving orange writing behind each swipe of his wand.

TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE

"This is his full name." Harry told Ginny who was glaring in hatred at the name floating in front of her, "He made another name out of it. Watch."

He flicked his wand and the letters rearranged themselves to form four different words that made Ginny gasp in horror.

I AM LORD VOLDEMORT

"He…he was You-Know-Who?!" she squeaked, her face becoming pale once again.

"The sixteen year old version of the person who would become Voldemort, yes." Harry replied, "He said he was only called this by his 'most intimate of friends' while at Hogwarts…and please stop flinching at the made up name, it's ridiculous."

"B-but…" Ginny was trembling, "He was in my head! He…"

"Yes, that is something we need to talk about." Harry interrupted her before she could become hysterical, "Ginny, Madame Pomfrey gave you a clean bill of health, didn't she? Once I destroyed the diary, he was gone, along with any influence he had over you."

"It feels like he could still be there…waiting to take over." Ginny confessed in a small voice, "I stay awake at night because I'm afraid of what could happen…what did happen when I fell asleep this year…and worst of all it was all my fault!"

"You're talking about what your father said, aren't you?" Harry asked shrewdly, remembering Arthur Weasley's admonishment: 'Never trust anything that you can't see where it keeps its brains!'

"If I'd only listened to him, none of this this would have happened!" Ginny wailed.

"True." Harry acknowledged, shocking Ginny, "But you are an eleven year old girl who has grown up with magic as part of your daily life. A small thing such as a diary that can talk back wouldn't really register as something sinister or malicious to you, would it? It certainly didn't help that Tom Riddle was a very smooth talker and was probably able to sooth any suspicions you might have had, right?"

"Y-Yes…"Ginny looked at Harry in surprise, "You talk like you have experience of him doing that."

"Remember when I had the diary, before you stole it back?" Harry asked pointedly, making Ginny blush red as she nodded, "Well, Riddle told me exactly what I wanted to hear, then showed me his 'capture' of Hagrid, which was just him framing Hagrid for the death of Myrtle."

"Hagrid? The Heir of Slytherin? Who the hell would believe that nonsense?" Ginny asked in disbelief.

"The Headmaster before Dumbledore, Armando Dippet." Harry replied, "He was over three-hundred years old, so…?"

He shrugged conveying that he personally thought the man had been senile. Ginny snorted in disgust at the man and the two shared a grin.

"Now, some part of your guilt comes from the fact you were overpowered so easily by him." Harry continued after a moment, "But, as Riddle himself said, by the time you realised what was going on, he was far more powerful than you were. The fact that so few were attacked is a testament to your willpower, I'd say."

"Wh…what do you mean?" Ginny asked.

"Tom Riddle was one of the best students in Hogwarts history, Ginny." Harry replied, "Professor Dumbledore said so himself. He was also immensely strong willed presumably, as magic follows intent. Yet overall, there were only five attacks, if I include your abduction into the Chamber. Why? You must be very strong willed to hold off Riddle for almost the entire school year whilst being totally unaware of what he was doing."

"Once I guessed that Tom…that the diary was making me do things, I tried to destroy it." Ginny admitted, "But instead, you found it."

"Yeah…Myrtle really wasn't happy with you for doing that." Harry remarked dryly, "That's how I found it, she flooded the bathroom again. You should have tried burying it or something."

"I was too desperate to think clearly." Ginny said irritably.

"To return to my point, even after you got the diary back, the only attack made was against Hermione, which was part of Riddle's plan to get me to go down into the Chamber after he overpowered your will again. It worked." Harry continued.

"I should apologise to Hermione." Ginny said, drooping in her seat.

"No you don't." Harry said firmly, "The point of this entire talk is this: the person who did this to you was a memory doppelganger of a sixteen year old Lord Voldemort. No one could expect you to see through him or fully resist him successfully."

"But…"

Harry decided to take a leaf from Mrs Weasley's book this time. "Ginevra Molly Weasley, I can tell you how powerful Voldemort is." he said sharply, making her sit up straight, "He tried to steal the Philosophers Stone last year and it almost killed me to drive him off. The only reason I was able to do that was because of my mum's protection."

Ginny paled again. "He…he's still…alive…?" she whispered in shock.

"Define 'alive'." Harry snorted, "He's a pathetic little wraith-like spirit who can only possess people who allow him into themselves. Or animals, I suppose, and as Dumbledore said, he's floating about somewhere in darkest Albania right now, completely powerless and helpless."

"How…how did he almost kill you then?" Ginny challenged him.

"He didn't." Harry said, "Me driving him off almost killed me. My mother sacrificed herself to try to save me, which created a powerful counter-charm. According to Professor Dumbledore, it is imbued into my very skin. Neither he nor anyone possessed by him can touch me without suffering immense pain. The length of time my mother's protection was active for drained my reserves and the protection activating, causing me immense pain, both of these facts combined to almost kill me. I was unconscious in the Hospital Wing for three days."

"I've never heard of such a spell like that." Ginny frowned in thought.

"It's ancient magic, magic that he overlooked and ignored as insignificant." Harry explained, "At least, that's what I gathered from what both Professor Dumbledore and Riddle said about it."

"Wow…" Ginny breathed in awe, but her warm brown eyes still betrayed that she wasn't fully convinced of her innocence.

Harry sighed. "Look at it this way Ginny. If I had been the one to be possessed by the diary, would you blame me?"

"No, of course not!" Ginny looked horrified at the very thought of doing so.

"Why? By your logic, even if I didn't know about the diary being a container of a memory of a sixteen year old Voldemort I would still be responsible." Harry pointed out, this time using one of Hermione's favourite tactics, browbeating the opposition with superior logic.

Ginny's mouth flapped open and closed for a moment before she sighed and nodded in defeat. "Since when did you start channelling Hermione?" she grumbled good-naturedly.

"I haven't been friends with her for just under two years without picking up some of her better traits." Harry replied with a grin, "Now, care to tell me why Gred and Forge are terrified of crossing you?"

Ginny grinned shyly at him. "I may be small, but I'm a fairly powerful witch. They irritated me at the start of term and I hit Fred with a Tickling Charm. He had to go to the Hospital Wing to have it removed, George couldn't remove it for him."

Harry raised an eyebrow. Rictusempra, the Tickling Charm, was a Second Year spell. How did Ginny know about it?

"I pinched Ron's books at the Burrow and had a read of them." Ginny said, having correctly read Harry's questioning look.

"Well, Ron wasn't reading them, so all the more power to you." Harry grinned at her, "How useless was Lockhart in your DADA classes by the way?"

"He didn't unleash a swarm of pixies in our class, but he was chased around by a Doxy." Ginny grinned back.

"Want me to teach you a few spells?" Harry offered, "I've been researching some of them for the last week, since Lockhart was a twit."

"If…if it isn't a bother…" Ginny said shyly.

"I wouldn't have offered if it was a bother." Harry reassured her and stood up. He moved to a small strip where there was no furniture and beckoned her over.

"So then, the first spell I'm going to teach you is one I just hexed Malfoy with not long ago." he told her, "It's called the 'Curse of the Bogies'…"

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At the same time…

Gryffindor Common Room

With Hermione…

Hermione Granger was not happy. Her best friend Harry was being strong-armed into marrying three different witches simultaneously and every jot of evidence seemed to say, quite plainly, that no amount of protesting, procrastinating or predication would get him out of it.

She had been delighted when Harry had handed her the self-updating law book, because it allowed her to sift through the entire thing for ways to get Harry out of his predicament. She knew that the Blood Purity angle would be next to useless, thanks to the Merlin Amendment, but she was certain that there had to be some way of escape clause or something.

That had been at the start of her search. She had scoured the regular laws for any kind of solution and had come up totally blank. Now she was searching through the section on the ancient laws, thanking Merlin that she could speed-read, and hoping that she could find something to help Harry.

'It's been bugging me for a while, but why was the Bloodline Continuation Act invoked?' Hermione considered, 'Sure, Harry is technically Lord Slytherin right now, but the B.L.C.A. is all about bloodlines, not titles, so why did it activate?'

She flicked through the pages until she found the B.L.C.A. pages. Running her finger down the numerous amendments that Merlin had tacked on to the law, Hermione's finger stopped at one particular one entitled 'the Founder's Amendment'.

'In the case that a witch, wizard or other magical human (except a squib or part-human) should defeat the descendent and rightful Heir of one of the Four Founders of Hogwarts thrice and invoke the Line and Lineage Conquering Act as a result, in addition to being the Heir Primus for two other Wizarding Houses of at least the rank of Noble and Ancient, it is decreed that the magical human in question is required to be subjected to this Act of Magical Law. Once the person holding the title passes on and the Founder's title returns to the original line, the new line is to be renamed to include both of the Patriarch/Matriarch's Noble House names. So it is written, so mote it be.'

An additional note beneath the law noted that that particular Amendment was considered defunct as all but the line of Slytherin had been made extinct in the male name or died out completely before or after the first hundred years after the death of the last of the Founders, Godric Gryffindor. As of the 1930's, the House of Gaunt, Slytherin's last descendents, died out completely with the death of Morfin Gaunt in Azkaban.

Hermione bit her lip almost hard enough to draw blood. This was it. This was the reason why Harry was being forced into the B.L.C.A., why his will was being ignored. It made the bushy-haired girl want to spit out more expletives than Ron had said in the last two years.

'I can't give up. Not when Harry's future could be altered by anything that I discover!' Hermione thought determinedly. She bent over the book with a stubborn set to her jaw, unwilling to yield to the inevitable.

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Later that night…

High-Security Wing, Azkaban Prison, Azkaban Island, North Sea

The stone cell was filthy with the muck of untold decades, the walls and floor caked in dirt, grease and dust. The only furnishing within the cell was an equally filthy, threadbare mattress laid upon a rusty bed frame, with a thin blanket serving as a duvet.

Huddled beneath the bed was a large black dog that had seen better days. Its fur was matted in places and you could see its ribs sticking out from under its skin.

The dog shivered as the freezing cold aura of the Dementors was extruded from the monstrous beings. The dog, in actual fact the prisoner called Sirius Black in his Animagus form, was not affected as badly as when he was human by the Dementors due to the less complex emotions of a dog, but the effects were bad enough after almost twelve years of constant exposure to them.

Within his mind, he chanted several things like a protective mantra.

'I'm innocent, I'm innocent…Peter's the traitor, not me…Protect Harry…I'm innocent, I'm innocent…'

The dog whined as the two Dementors right outside its cell were joined by a further two, increasing the frozen sensation of their aura even more.

'I'm innocent…I'm innocent...I'M INNOCENT!' Sirius chanted frantically in his mind as his personal hell redoubled in its efforts to break his mind.

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Next Chapter: Return to Purgatory

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