Chapter 26

A week has passed after the Quidditch tryouts. Harry had just finished his first training session and was happy as he was walking on the wet grass towards the castle. Quidditch was one of the few things that he loved a lot and enjoyed playing it. He knew that this season the Slytherin team would probably win as he saw the talents of the seven players; the chasers were brilliant and even though Draco liked to talk about himself that he was the greatest chaser ever, Harry knew that Draco was pretty good. The only two not so brilliant players were the beaters as they did not fly on brooms well, but they were quite strong.

Harry approached the castle and saw that many spiders were running away from the castle, as if something dangerous was occurring in it. The boy dismissed the little critters as the spiders always ran somewhere and thought instead about the upcoming Quidditch game.

"Kill, want to kill you" he heard a voice that came from the wall. The source was not seen although Harry was sure that whatever produced such a sound would be quite deadly as fear came over Harry. The boy followed the sound but could not find what made it.

"Harry?" Harry saw his friend Minerva walking in the castle, putting her ear to the wall.

"Yes? What are you doing here Minerva?" Harry asked his friend

"I heard some sounds that came from the wall and went to follow it. You mean you heard it too?" The girl asked him and Harry nodded. She felt some relief.

The two students then saw that the boomslang, that crawled quickly to the girl and coiled around her hand; the two students could sense that the snake was shaking. "What happened?" asked Minerva

"I heard voices from the wall and my scales contracted. I never heard such a powerful and deadly voice. I am confused on how I heard that though" Harry looked at the girl and their faces went white.

"Are you thinking what I am thinking?" he asked Minerva with some fear in his voice.

"I think so, we both heard the voice and then Poisy heard it too. It means only one thing; the voice belonged to a very large snake, which crawled somehow behind the wall. But what can be of that size?" the girl was confused as she never heard of the snake that large; she was quite an expert on snakes as she read many books on the serpent and judging from the voice behind the wall, the snake was larger than the biggest pythons and boas.

"I don't know but I think that whatever the species of the snake, it is very dangerous due to its size. However, I have seen spiders running away from the castle and I think that the incidents are related" The girl looked at Harry and nodded.

"Lets research in the library to see if it has anything on the snakes that size." The boomslang crawled away as the two students ran into the library. Fortunately for the two, it was almost empty as almost nobody was there since many people spent their entire Saturdays outside of the castle.

"Lets look in this book on different creatures" Minerva suggested and the two checked the animals that were present in there. Unfortunately, no modern animal present there fit the descriptions; they found a few species of snakes that lives near Hogwarts but all of them were too small for their rough estimate size of forty-five feet long serpent. As the two students turned to the last page, they sighed and went to get another book.

"How about this book, it lists different creatures by the level of how dangerous they are. The author states that the book has a recording of all creatures ever listed in categories XXX to XXXXX with a span of a thousand of years." The two looked in the ancient book that was extremely dusty and rust covered its metal binding. Harry and Minerva looked at the different animals or creatures, trying to figure what the snake was.

"Werewolf. Dragon. Acromantula. Basilisk. Manticore. Wait, Basilisk?" Harry re opened one of the pages he just skipped and saw a drawing of a large snake. The two read the description on the snake.

"A Basilisk is born from a chicken egg that is hatched by a toad. They live for hundreds of years and usually used as guards or pets of parselmouth wizards. Considered to be the most dangerous creature on the planet since not only the size of the snake can become legendary but also its venom that is used as the snake's weapon; it is a deadly poison with only one known antidote. The most powerful weapon of the beast is its stare, as it turns a living creature into stone; it is disputed if this ability affects a parselmouth. Spiders, even Acromantulas are mortally afraid of this snake. The last recorded basilisk was killed in 1785. " Before the two students could continue reading the information about the snake, they heard the Voice again.

"Kill, let me kill you" The voice started moving away from them and the two students ran away from the library to follow the voice; Minerva tore the page from the book and followed her friend. The voice was moving fast and after ten minutes of running, the two found a large pound of water spilled on the ground. A cat lay in it, its fur was wet and the animal was not moving. As the two students examined the scene, the voice completely disappeared.

"I heard the voice" the two Slytherins saw Poisy that also arrived at the scene.

"Poisy, do you know anything about Basilisks?" Harry asked the snake and saw that the snake shook violently before jumping at Minerva, trying to find some comfort in the girl's arms. Harry knew that boomslangs were quite dangerous snakes and were not afraid of many things but this one looked as if it seen Death.

"I heard about them, yes but I could not possibly imagine that there would be one. Do you actually have proof of one roaming the castle as that would be seriously bad news." The three looked at the cat and then realized that it was petrified.

"This ball of fur is not dead" the snake replied after tasting the fur of the animal with its tongue. "But this incident further gives some more evidence for your theory" It replied.

As the three continued talking, they did not realize that a group of students approached them. "Look, Potter is a parselmouth," cried Ron Weasley as he saw the three speaking. The boomslang quickly hid in Minerva's cloths and soon more students arrived.

"The Chamber of Secrets is now open. The enemies of Salazar Slytherin and his heir beware!" Read one Slytherin girl loudly. Soon, Professors arrived with Filch, who looked murderous and wanted to kill Harry.

"Relax Argus, your cat is not dead. It has been petrified." Professor Snape assured the caretaker.

"Follow me, you two" Snape led the two students to the Headmaster's office.