"So," Harry said, when the four of them were safely tucked away in the second year boys dormitory, "I reckon you've got some questions?"
"One or two," Ron said, grinning. Harry mustered a grin back; that, at least, was easier to do than think of a way to deal with Hermione's frown, or Draco's arched eyebrow.
"I don't," Hermione sighed, "understand why we always seem to end up in here." Harry blinked, wondering if her frown had more to do with the location than anything.
"Because we aren't allowed in your room," Ron said. He'd wanted to speak to Ginny one night, but Hermione had – very sternly – told him he wasn't allowed. Privately, Harry thought that was more a guideline than a rule, and that there was nothing – other than their formidable friend – stopping them from sneaking up. So far, though, they hadn't needed to.
"That's right," Hermione said, "you're not." Ron made a face at her, and she poked her tongue out at him. "I still feel funny coming up here, though. I'm sure Neville and Seamus and Dean wouldn't like-"
"They don't mind," Harry assured her. "They're hardly up here anyway." Hermione's frown didn't quite go away.
"If you're done," Draco interjected, looking annoyed, "I'd rather like to hear what mess Potter's got himself into this time."
"The usual," Harry shot back.
"Define usual," Ron said. Harry grimaced at him, and Ron paled. "You're joking."
"Nope," Harry said, looking at his hands. "Wish I was, but-"
"Do you mind verbalising this conversation?" Draco asked snidely. "We're not all privy to whatever weird connection it is that you-"
"It's Voldemort," Harry said. "You know: the usual."
"Harry," Hermione said, just as he'd known she would. "Are you- You're sure?"
"Positive." Harry risked a glance at Draco, whose expression was impossible to read, just as Harry had known it would be. He slid off the bed and opened his trunk, which had clearly been brought up while he was in Defence. He pulled out Reg's copy of Nature's Nobility and flipped open to the Gaunt page. Hermione took the book from him, frowning again. Ron peered at it over her shoulder.
"Tom Riddle?" he asked. "That's-"
"That was his name, yeah," Harry said.
"How?" Draco asked, finally. "Is he here, or is someone just helping-"
"Dunno," Harry said, shaking his head. "He's the Heir, though, so surely he'd have to be here-"
"Not necessarily," Draco said. "He's the Heir of Slytherin… there's probably an heirloom or something that could serve just as well as him being here."
"An heirloom?" Ron asked. "Like a ring or something?"
"Slytherin had a locket," Hermione said, putting Nature's Nobility down. Harry, who knew all too well about Slytherin's locket, shuddered, but then frowned. He hadn't realised the locket was common knowledge.
"How did you know that?" he asked her, at the same time as Draco.
"It's in Hogwarts: A History," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "Gryffindor had a sword, Ravenclaw a diadem, and Hufflepuff a cup."
"How did you know?" Draco asked Harry. Harry just shrugged.
"Who said I did?"
"If you hadn't known, you wouldn't have questioned her," Draco said. "If you want proof, look at Weasley." Ron, who had stayed quiet, scowled at him.
"I don't think it's the locket, Harry said. Draco frowned, apparently thinking.
"Why not?" Ron asked.
"Call it an educated guess," Harry said.
"Why's that?" Hermione asked curiously, but Harry refused to say anything more. She looked disappointed, and he was certain she'd be off to the library as soon as she could, to read up on the Founders' objects.
"It's not," Draco said. "At least I don't think-" His face was turning steadily whiter. Harry wondered, for a moment, if he was going to be sick. "I know how my father's involved, I think." He certainly sounded like he might be ill.
Harry's mind caught up after a moment; Mr Malfoy - if Padfoot and Moony were to be believed, and Harry thought they were – had been in Voldemort's inner circle during the war. When he'd been defeated by Harry all those years ago, his followers would have hoarded anything of his they could, to have ready for his return… But then, over the summer, following Croaker's possession and death, the Ministry had searched the homes of its employees and Ministry associates. Mr Malfoy would have had things to hide. Things Dobby would have known about. Things Dobby might have decided to warn Harry and Draco about.
"Not necessarily," Ron said; obviously he, too, had found and followed the same line of thought. "It might not be an object or an heirloom. It might just be- you know; him."
"Maybe," Draco said. He looked like he appreciated the effort Ron had made to give his father an out, but not as if he believed it. "So what's all this got to do with why you weren't back with the rest of us, last night?"
"Well, obviously Sirius was worried," Ron said. Both Hermione and Draco looked a little surprised at that, and Harry was surprised as well, that Ron had guessed it. "I don't know how you talked him into it, Harry; if it was Mum and I was the one with a murderous lunatic after me, she'd have probably just put me in a Body-Bind and tucked me away in my room."
"Surely he's used to it by now?" Draco asked.
"He does know you're back, doesn't he, Harry?" Hermione asked sharply.
"Of course he does," Harry said, rolling his eyes. "If I'd sneaked out, he'd have tracked me into Defence and dragged me home." And probably hexed Lockhart for good measure, Harry couldn't help but think. He chuckled. "He wasn't happy about it all, but I've promised I won't go looking for trouble-"
"Well that's good," Hermione said briskly.
"I'll say; can you imagine if Potter went looking for trouble on top of everything that manages to find him?" Draco asked.
"Would you believe that after seven years in Azkaban, a couple on the run, a trial that almost went horribly wrong, thinking I was going to die in what turned out to be an elaborate Auror scheme, actually dying for a couple of hours, and a few chats with Peter on top of that, that I'm still sane, but that a twelve year old is coming dangerously close to ruining aforementioned sanity?"
"You've been speaking with Peter?" Marlene asked, looking up from a letter from Neville Longbottom. She'd sent him a letter after his Sorting the year before, to congratulate him, and they'd fallen into an irregular correspondence during the school terms; during holidays, they tended to bump into each other at St Mungo's.
Mostly he asked if she had any advice on how to do a particular spell, or how his parents were, and she mostly told him about Frank and Alice, and sent him the sweet wrappers that Alice usually gave him herself. This time was a bit different; Neville clearly had noticed that Harry hadn't been at dinner the night before, and had sent a very tentative letter to ask if that was supposed to be the case, and was Harry all right?
"That's what you got out of all of that?" Sirius asked. He spun on his heel to pace back the other way, almost bowling Kreacher over in the process. Kreacher, though, had years of experience dealing with his Master, and dodged with ease. He settled himself with his dinner and a single – rare – butterbeer, by the fire and the Black family tapestry, with a contented look on his face. Marlene didn't spend enough time in the drawing room to know if this was a habit of Kreacher's, but he seemed at ease, and Sirius hadn't commented on it. That said, she doubted he'd even noticed;
"Voldemort could be there with Harry right now and we wouldn't even know! What was I thinking, taking him back? I-"
"What's Peter had to say?" Marlene asked.
"Nothing important." Sirius stopped his pacing to scowl at her, and then bowed into Padfoot. He didn't seem to know what to do as a dog though; for a moment, Marlene thought he might have been entertaining the notion of destroying one of the pillows on the couch, or going to gnaw on the tapestry, but then thought better of it and turned back into a human again. The pacing resumed.
"You said a few," she said. "Obviously there's something to keep you going back."
"When I know what it is, I'll tell you," Sirius said darkly.
"Why don't you write to Remus?" she asked, trying to think of something to distract him.
"Remus agrees with Harry-"
"You told me he didn't, that he just wanted you to see both sides-" Sirius stopped to scowl at her again. Marlene dropped her eyes back to her letter, and waved at him to continue.
"The point is, is that Dumbledore knows, and Snape knows-"
"And Harry's friends, doubtless," Marlene said. "If he's anything like you and James – and he is – he won't be able to keep his mouth shut."
"-and them, then," Sirius snapped, "and the other teachers, but who can do anything about it? They've tried to solve this Chamber thing before, and still, the nearest anyone's come to it is Harry with Reg's book! How can they protect him if they don't know what's going on? How can I protect him if I'm here and he's there-"
"Ask Robards to assign Aurors to the school," Marlene said, folding Neville's letter up. She'd read it – the parts about what was for dinner at Hogwarts, and the conversation Neville had had with Nearly Headless Nick - to Alice and Frank tomorrow.
"Already have," Sirius said. "And we can't, because there's not a case there, and we can't assign a guard unless the Board approves it. And why would people like Lucius Malfoy want to waste money on paying Aurors to protect his pureblooded sons from a muggleborn-hunting monster?"
"If Draco keeps tagging along with Harry, protection might not be a terrible idea," Marlene said. "You could always point that out."
It had clearly been the wrong thing to say. Sirius' face shut down entirely, and he was silent for one… two… three… four… five seconds, and then he opened his mouth, and Marlene braced herself for what would doubtless be a scathing retort, when Sirius blinked and tore his pocket in his haste to retrieve his mirror from his pocket.
"Harry?" Sirius sounded impressively calm but she could see the tension in his shoulders.
"Padfoot, hi," Marlene heard Harry say. "I was just talking with everyone, and Draco thought maybe an heirloom? As in, if he's not here in person, that maybe this- this thing could be letting someone open the Chamber."
"Right," Sirius said, glancing at Marlene. His eyes softened a bit. She felt her mouth quirk up at the corner.
"So I was thinking- Could you just check that the locket's where it's meant to be?" Sirius was over on the other side of the room so quickly she thought he might have apparated. Kreacher certainly had; he materialised by Sirius, peering onto a shelf in a big glass cabinet full of all sorts of junk that Marlene couldn't believe Sirius had kept when he cleaned the house; his mother's portrait had been condemned to Kreacher's cupboard-room, but Sirius had kept old brooches and jewellery and a truly ugly compact mirror.
"It's here- it's- it's still it," Sirius said, and Kreacher bobbed his head, glowering through the glass. "But that's not a bad thought about heirlooms. Maybe the ring?"
"The one in the paper clipping?"
"Maybe Reg did circle it," Sirius said. "I'll have a look in the library here, see if I can identify it. Can you send the clipping back with Hedwig?"
"I'll get Hermione to help me copy it," Harry said. "And then we can look here too." Sirius' fingers twitched on the mirror, and clearly his face – which Marlene couldn't see – did something too, because Harry sighed. "I'll be careful," he said. "Promise." Sirius grunted. "Anyway, I've got to go, I've got Quidditch. I'll talk to you tomorrow night."
"Okay," Sirius said. "Bye, kiddo." Harry's responding 'bye' echoed, and then Sirius tucked the mirror away. His eyes went to the cabinet again, and then landed on Marlene.
"Locket?" she asked.
"It's nothing." He came to sit down next to her, and ran his fingers through the ends of her hair. "I'm sorry for being-"
"Stressed?" she offered.
"Mmm." He was silent and then muttered, "Why didn't I think of that? Heirlooms." But before Marlene could answer, he'd kissed her on the forehead and swept out, presumably headed for the library to look for the ring Harry had been talking about.
"I don't recall- Hello, first years," Lockhart said, waving at Ginny, Luna, the Greengrass twins, and the two Andrews – Kirke and Higgs – who were standing over near Padma Patil. His smile seemed a bit off, and he was looking around, as if for help. "I'm sorry, but the posters were promoting this for people in second year and up-"
"The point of these little classes of yours, however is to teach the students to defend themselves. First years need those skills just as much as the rest, or do I have to remind you that Slytherin's monster has already attacked a first year?" Snape strode into the Great Hall, robes billowing. Harry was almost relieved to see him; if he was here, he wouldn't let Lockhart get away with teaching them rubbish. Even Ron looked pleased. Draco looked smug, and Harry wondered if he'd known about this before now. "Stay," he told the first years. "But I expect your best efforts in keeping up with the rest."
"Yes, sir," the Slytherin Greengrass twin – the tiny one – said quietly. Snape nodded at her.
"Yes, well- I'm glad you can stay, I always thought it was ridiculous that only second years and above could- yes, well." Lockhart cleared his throat. "You all know me, of course, and Professor Snape; he's agreed to be my assistant today-" Harry glanced at Snape, who looked as if he was only just resisting the temptation to roll his eyes. Harry didn't blame him. "-very kind of him, isn't it, yes. Now, the best way to learn, I've always found is by doing, so I'm going to split you into pairs-"
"After," Snape interjected, "you've been shown how to Disarm your opponent."
Lockhart blinked at him, then smiled, "I was just getting to that; your Professor Snape's a bit eager, I think." A group of Hufflepuff girls giggled, and Snape looked mildly revolted at the idea of belonging to anyone. "Now, the charm is Expelliarmus and the wand movement is as follows-" Lockhart gave his wand a quick twist. "-so now-"
"We will demonstrate," Snape said. He strode forward and students parted around him. Everyone stepped back to make room for a rough circle around him and Lockhart, and Snape conjured a platform while Lockhart talked them through the proper way to greet an opponent. Ron leaned closer to Harry.
"I hope Snape puts him on his-"
"-ask; does anyone have any questions about what I've just shown you?" Draco sniggered and Hermione shot the three of them unimpressed looks, then bounced up onto her toes to try to see over the people between them and the platform. A resounding silence met Lockhart's question, and he straightened himself and waved a hand at Snape, who nodded.
"On my count," Lockhart said. "One, two, three-"
Snape uttered his spell, with no more pomp than he would have said a student's name, or the name of a potion they were working on in class. Lockhart, predictably, said his spell loudly, and dramatically. Snape's spell hit first, and Lockhart's wand soared into Snape's waiting hand. Ron made a small, quiet cheering noise, and Hermione looked disappointed. Lockhart's spell fizzed past Hydrus and his cronies and collided harmlessly with the stone wall.
"Very good," Lockhart said, pressing his hand to his side, where the spell had landed. "Very good, an excellent demonstration, Professor Snape. Just be glad it wasn't a real duel; I'm sorry to tell you that if we were playing for keeps, that things might have gone rather differently."
Snape's only response was to throw Lockhart's wand back at him.
"Pair up," Snape said, "but you're not to start until we've made sure that the partners you choose are suitable."
"Hop to it!" Lockhart said, beaming.